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Built in Britain  the car that could conquer America: Brexit boost as Honda makes UK its 'global hub'

By Ray Massey for the Daily Mail 16 September 2016One of Britain's biggest car makers is planning an export boom outside Europe after Brexit as it seeks to boost profits from the US and Canada.Honda announced the plan to reduce its dependence on the Continent as it unveiled its new five-door Civic family hatchback  the 10th generation of this popular model  with its Swindon factory as the global production hub.The new strategy means the proportion of Honda cars exported from the UK to the world beyond Europe will soar four-fold, from just 10 per cent to 40 per cent of production.In a ringing endorsement of the UK economy post-Brexit, the Japanese boss of Honda in Europe says the car maker is firmly committed to building its vehicles in Britain and exporting them to the wider world.Katsushi Inoue, Honda Europe's president and chief operating officer, said: 'The launch of this new model is very significant for the European region, not just because of the improvements made in the product, but also what it means for this factory here in the UK.'The strategy of transforming Swindon into a global production hub was our plan regardless of Brexit.'It was the plan before the vote in June and it remains our plan after the Brexit vote. There's no change.'Honda is investing 200million to build the new Civic in Swindon, taking its total investment to 2.2billion as 'part of a long-term vision for the plant in Honda's global operations'.Mr Inoue promised a 'clear and sustainable future role' for the factory as it broadens its export markets and horizons beyond Europe towards other growing areas, such as North America, Australia and South Africa.A new Civic will come off the line at Swindon every 69 seconds, with about 800 vehicles produced per day  nearly half of which will go to America as part of the new post-Brexit export blitz.Swindon, which manufactured its first engine in 1989 and first car three years later, also builds the Civic Type-R and Tourer.Its CR-V off-roader will be phased out by 2018 as Civic production cranks up.Honda has taken on 600 more employees to build the new hatchback, taking the total workforce to about 3,600.Currently 40 per cent of cars built there are sold in the UK, 50 per cent exported to Europe and 10 per cent to the rest of the world. Now it forecasts that 20 per cent will be sold in the UK, 40 per cent exported to the Continent and 40 per cent to the rest of the world, mainly North America.Mr Inoue said: 'We have a clear role in our global production network for this facility and we remain committed to our sales and manufacturing operations in the UK.'In recent years, Swindon has produced cars for the UK market and for export to mainland Europe.'It will now become the global production hub for the Civic hatchback, producing cars for the UK and Europe, but also for export to North America.'The first units set sail for the US just four weeks ago and will be on sale there just before the end of the month.'Full production for the UK and European markets will start in February with cars hitting showroom floors in spring. Pre-production cars are now being built for testing.The upbeat comments of the Honda boss are in sharp contrast to the Japanese government, which had warned that some of the nation's manufacturers may switch their operations from the UK to Europe as a result of Brexit.Honda also stressed that being outside the EU did not create any technical issues on car specifications  it exports to 70 markets and already manages 548 variants.Swindon plant director Jason Smith, who has worked at the factory for 25 years, said: 'We've been chosen as the global hub to build the new Civic for the world.'There's a real buzz at the factory. It's the first time in a decade we've exported a car to North America. It's exciting times for us. We take real pride in what we do.'The US is a fantastic, untapped opportunity. Currently almost all of our production is for the UK and Europe.Soon nearly half of our production will be outside of Europe. It's the first time we've sold a five-door Civic in the US. It helps on currency and any potential issues from Brexit.'
Several local companies successful in Best of the Best awards

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The World Banks Board of Executive Directors approved US$5 million (T$12m) for Samoas Second Fiscal and Economic Reform Operation, which will strengthen public finances, support economic growth and help foster increased climate resilience.

The operation is structured around three objectives closely aligned with current government priorities: improve fiscal management in the areas of debt, public procurement and revenue collection; strengthen the payments system, tourism sector policy and private sector development as foundations for more robust economic growth, and improve the monitoring, reporting and coordination of climate resilience activities across Samoa.

The Government of Samoa is continuing its program of ambitious reforms to help consolidate our fiscal position, boost economic growth, and build our resilience to natural disasters and climate change, said Minister of Finance, Sili Epa Tuioti.

We are pleased to have the support of the World Bank as we pursue our development goals, as articulated in the Strategy for the Development of Samoa, to improve the quality of life for all.

The second in a series of two development policy operations is expected to contribute to improved compliance with Samoas debt strategy; increased public procurement efficiency; improved tax compliance; a more efficient payments system making better use of technology; improved tourism industry performance; greater private participation in state-owned enterprises, and stronger monitoring and coordination of initiatives to increase climate resilience.

This second operation supports the Government of Samoas commitment to achieving more resilient and sustainable economic growth, said Robert Utz, World Bank Acting Country Director for Timor-Leste, Papua New Guinea and the Pacific Islands. Stronger public finances, more robust economic growth and increased resilience to climate and weather-related shocks are particularly important for boosting shared prosperity in Samoa.

The Second Economic Fiscal and Economic Reform Operation is funded through a US$5 million credit from the International Development Association (IDA), the World Banks fund for the poorest countries.
WASHINGTON (AP)  Japan will increase engagement in the South China Sea through training cruises with the U.S. Navy and multilateral exercises with regional navies, the nation's defense minister said Thursday.

Newly appointed minister Tomomi Inada said Japan will also help build the capacity of coastal nations. She was speaking ahead of her first meeting with Pentagon chief Ash Carter in Washington.

Japan, a close U.S. ally, is not among the countries claiming territory in the disputed South China Sea but shares U.S. concern about China's assertive behavior there.

Japan has a separate territorial dispute with China over unoccupied islands they both claim farther north in the East China Sea. Inada said China has escalated its incursions by its vessels into Japan's territorial waters around the islands.

However, Inada said she is open to constructive dialogue with China and will expedite negotiations on preventing collisions between their forces at sea and in the air.

Inada took up the defense post last month. The 57-year-old lawyer previously attracted attention for questioning mainstream accounts of Japanese atrocities during World War II, but has been mum on her views of history since becoming defense minister.
MANILA, Philippines (AP)  A former Filipino militiaman testified before the country's Senate on Thursday that President Rodrigo Duterte, when he was still a city mayor, ordered him and other members of a liquidation squad to kill criminals and opponents in gangland-style assaults that left about 1,000 dead.

Edgar Matobato, 57, told the nationally televised Senate committee hearing that he heard Duterte order some of the killings, and acknowledged that he himself carried out about 50 deadly assaults as an assassin, including a suspected kidnapper fed to a crocodile in 2007 in southern Davao del Sur province.

Rights groups have long accused Duterte of involvement in death squads, claims he has denied, even while engaging in tough talk in which he stated his approach to criminals was to "kill them all." Matobato is the first person to admit any role in such killings, and to directly implicate Duterte under oath in a public hearing.

Human Rights Watch late Friday urged the Philippine government to order an independent investigation into the "very serious allegations" of direct involvement by Duterte "in extrajudicial killings."

Brad Adams, the rights group's Asia director, said: "President Duterte can't be expected to investigate himself, so it is crucial that the United Nations is called in to lead such an effort. Otherwise, Filipinos may never know if the president was directly responsible for extrajudicial killings."

The Senate committee inquiry was led by Sen. Leila de Lima, a staunch critic of Duterte's anti-drug campaign that has left more than 3,000 suspected drug users and dealers dead since he assumed the presidency in June. Duterte has accused de Lima of involvement in illegal drugs, alleging that she used to have a driver who took money from detained drug lords. She has denied the allegations.

Matobato said Duterte had once even issued an order to kill de Lima, when she chaired the Commission on Human Rights and was investigating the mayor's possible role in extrajudicial killings in 2009 in Davao. He said he and others were waiting to ambush de Lima but she did not go to a part of a hilly area  a suspected mass grave  where they were waiting to open fire.

"If you went inside the upper portion, we were already in ambush position," Matobato told de Lima. "It's good that you left."

The recent killings of suspected drug dealers have sparked concerns in the Philippines and among U.N. and U.S. officials, including President Barack Obama, who have urged Duterte's government to take steps to rapidly stop the killings and ensure his anti-drug war complies with human rights laws and the rule of law.

Duterte has rejected the criticisms, questioning the right of the U.N., the U.S. and Obama to raise human rights issues, when U.S. forces, for example, had massacred Muslims in the country's south in the early 1900s as part of a pacification campaign.

Matobato said under oath that the killings went on from 1988, when Duterte first became Davao city mayor, to 2013, when Matobato said he expressed his desire to leave the death squad. He said that prompted his colleagues to implicate him criminally in one killing to silence him.

"Our job was to kill criminals like drug pushers, rapists, snatchers. These are the kind we killed every day," Matobato said. But he said their targets were not only criminals but also opponents of Duterte and one of his sons, Paolo Duterte, who is now the vice mayor of Davao.

Presidential spokesman Martin Andanar rejected the allegations, saying government investigations into Duterte's time as mayor of Davao had already gone nowhere because of a lack of evidence and witnesses.

Philippine human rights officials and advocates have previously said potential witnesses refused to testify against Duterte when he was still mayor out of fear of being killed.

There was no immediate reaction from Duterte. Another Duterte spokesman, Ernesto Abella, said at a news conference that while Matobato "may sound credible, it is imperative that each and every one of us properly weigh whatever he said and respond right."

Matobato said the victims in Davao allegedly ranged from petty criminals to a wealthy businessman from central Cebu province who was killed in 2014 in his office in Davao city, allegedly because of a feud with Paolo Duterte over a woman. The president's son said the allegations were without proof and "are mere hearsay," telling reporters he would "not dignify the accusations of a mad man."

Other victims were a suspected foreign militant whom Matobato said he strangled, then chopped into pieces and buried in a quarry in 2002. Another was a radio commentator, Jun Pala, who was critical of Duterte and was killed by motorcycle-riding gunmen while walking home in 2003.

After a 1993 bombing of a Roman Catholic cathedral in Davao city, Matobato said Duterte ordered him and his colleagues to launch attacks on mosques in an apparent retaliation. He testified he hurled a grenade at one mosque but there were no casualties because the attacks were carried out when no one was praying.

Matobato said some of the squad's victims were shot and dumped on Davao streets or buried in three secret pits, while others were disposed of at sea with their stomachs cut open and their bodies tied to concrete blocks.

"They were killed like chickens," said Matobato, who added he that backed away from the killings after feeling guilty and entered a government witness-protection program.

He left the protection program when Duterte became president, fearing he would be killed, and said he decided to surface now "so the killings will stop."

Matobato's testimony set off a tense exchange between pro-Duterte and opposition senators.

Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano accused Matobato of being part of a plot to unseat Duterte. "I'm testing to see if you were brought here to bring down this government," he said.

De Lima eventually declared Cayetano "out of order" and ordered Senate security personnel to restrain him.

Another senator, former national police chief Panfilo Lacson, warned Matobato that his admissions that he was involved in killings could land him in jail.

"You can be jailed with your revelations," Lacson said. "You have no immunity."

Duterte has immunity from lawsuits as a president, but de Lima said that principle may have to be revisited now. "What if a leader is elected and turns out to be a mass murderer?" de Lima asked in a news conference after the tense Senate hearing.
Every good thing comes to an end. And today, it is my turn to say goodbye not only to my Samoa Observer family but also to Samoa as I begin to make my way back to Germany.

Samoa  and the Samoa Observer  has been my home for the past four weeks. Time has passed by so quickly.

I still have the feeling that I had just arrived yesterday.

But as it says in life, everything must come to an end. And thus I look back on four very intensive weeks, of which I will certainly take home many, many nice and positive impressions and experiences.

First of all I was finally able to realize my lifetime dream, namely to visit Samoa and having an insight into the journalism business.

I have not been disappointed, even more, I highly appreciate the change I have had in Samoa. I will never forget.

I had a great time here in a country where everything is so much different from Germany. Interestingly enough, although Germany is so far away, I felt consistently at home.

Lots of Europeans do have in mind that Samoa is paradise. But that is only one side of the coin, and as we all know from our life experiences, there is always a second side of the coin.

As a visitor from far away, one should not close their eyes to this second less beautiful side of the coin. Like everywhere else in this big world, topics like poverty, crime, disease just to name a few, shape the daily life in Samoa.

There is also a lot of work to do in Samoa to decrease or even to avoid them.

So what will I take to Germany from Samoa?

Firstly, I will remember the super friendly people. They are smiling all day, they are relaxed all the time, even if for some of them life is not always easy.

What Ive definitively learned in Samoa is that you do not need lots of stuff to be happy.

Happiness is certainly a choice and one can be happy with less material wealth. This is something Samoans can be very proud of. You dont need much to live a happy life. It is certainly a lesson for many European people.

The Samoan people made me feel at home here, even if I am a foreigner.

They were considerate, curious and absolutely open-minded towards everybody and everything.

Here in Samoa, people start the not only by a good morning, even more with have a great and wonderful day, although they do not know you. I liked that a lot since it is not common to do this in Germany.

I will also remember the beautiful amazing landscape. Samoa is indeed the Pearl of the Pacific.

Its lustrous beauty, its unique and natural landscapes and of course the pristine beaches.

For people who havent been to Samoa, pictures and a few words dont do justice. You have to come to see it for yourself. The colours are simply amazing. And yes the heat will be a factor but it is manageable.

Of course, I have to mention my visit of Savaii. Before I left, everybody told me that Savaii is the real Samoa and that one has to see it before leaving Samoa. Im glad I did. It is true, in Savaii everything is still a bit greener than Upolu and much more quiet than Apia.

And how can I forget my time at the Samoa Observer?

It was not easy but I gained such valuable insights into journalism and the real work of a newspaper that I will never forget this moment in my life.

It was sometimes a challenge, especially because I didnt know people and places around Apia, so my Samoa networking was definitely expandable.

But since in my opinion challenges are there to cope with them, it was a good practice day by day. If one wants to achieve something, one has to invest.

At the end of the day, four weeks is not enough to get a real practice in journalism business. So perhaps there is another reason to return to Samoa.

If not, I will return to Germany and perhaps plan writing my own novel.

So thanks to everybody who supported me during my stay in Samoa and who made me feel at home even though Im far away from my real home.

I want to thank the Malaki family for everything, the Samoa Observer Newspaper and anyone on the streets who has helped  even if its just a smile.

Im returning to Germany with many wonderful pictures I have taken in Samoa but the most beautiful memories are the ones in my heart forever. Faafetai lava and tofa soifua.
Tonight is the finale of the first Samoa Fashion Week. Dubbed the red carpet event of the year in terms of fashion, fifteen talented designers will showcase their work on the runway.

During the past few days, a lot has been said about the great initiative to have a Fashion Week in Samoa.

Added to the list of happy people are the local business owners in the fashion industry who had the chance to showcase their work and make sales for the past two days.

Held at the Tanoa Hotel compound, the two-day market day wrapped up yesterday.

One of the vendors was Theresa Grace Finau. The 42-year-old from Malololelei is the owner of Tepa-i-tua Creation.

She specializes in making lopa necklaces and jewelry. As a tenderfoot to the fashion industry, Theresa said she is grateful for the opportunity this fashion show is offering for the fashion designers of Samoa.

To me, I think the most important thing about this is creating network with other fashion designers in Samoa. Its important to share our ideas and ways to improve and develop the fashion industry in Samoa.

This show is such a great move by the Samoa Art Council. Samoa has some of the very talented and successful designers and most people dont know their work. With shows like these, it enables people to see the hard work of the designers and sewers and also people who are talented in making Samoan hand-made jewel.

She believes the fashion industry contributes a lot to the economy of Samoa.

This should be an annual event for Samoa. Also I think we should have this show every six months.

Sabrina Percival agrees.

I think its great, she said. Im an ex-fashion designer but I did most of my work in Australia.

Sabrina believes local designers should be encouraged to be original and creative.

I think itll be more exciting to see new creations and new patterns. Because what we see nowadays is that the designs and the patterns are similar. Most people nowadays sort of like copy other peoples work. But I think we need to develop the idea of being original and diversity in terms of patterns and designs.

As for the market day, Sabrina believes that in order for this show to move forward, it needs to be advertised more.

The first day of the market day wasnt so good. Yesterday was better than the first day of the market day. I think in the future, they should advertise it well and inform a lot of people about it. There wasnt enough advertising on the event and maybe its because its the first time.
On the busy streets of Vaitele, a new Chinese business is emerging.

Owned by William Zhang and Jolie Cui, the Happiness Link Company opened two months ago is located opposite the Vaigaga Primary School.

From the city of Qingdao in China, the couple fell in love with Samoa and had set their eyes on establishing a business in the country.

But business hasnt been blissful and busy as the couple expected.

Like every other new business, the first few months are always hard to get revenue.

We dont make much, Mr. Zhang told the Weekend Observer.

You see the road there is busy but we dont have a parking space like the other businesses. People cant stop by if they dont have space to park in so its very hard to make money here.

According to the Chinese man their shop makes about $200 some days.

On a really bad day they get zero dollar.

Its not enough to pay for rent of $1,000 a month, he said.

The businesses are very competitive in Vaitele. We cant afford to bring in other new products if we cannot make profit. We spent about $200,000 on setting up the shop and bringing in the products.

The Happiness Link sells car accessories, and other general merchandise imported from China.

Mr. Zhang who is an engineer by profession said the move was his wifes idea.

My wife was working with Qing Dao Construction Company, he said.

She came here to work for the company and she loved the island. She came back to China and said she wanted to return to Samoa and setup a business here. That is how we ended up on this side of the world.

Two months ago the couple managed to secure the space they are renting in opposite the Vaigaga Primary School.

They are now looking for another space to rent in where they can have parking space area.
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The Central Bank of Samoa (C.B.S.) has cautioned businesses against dealing with foreign currency illegally.

The Bank delivered the warning in a media statement it issued yesterday.

The Central Bank of Samoa (C.B.S.) has noted that there are various retail shops and businesses operating foreign currency exchanges without licenses, the statement reads.

Some of these businesses have openly displayed their foreign exchange rates at their business premises on a daily basis.

We wish to remind these businesses that these unfortunate practices are in breach of our Exchange Control Regulations 1999.

The bank called on such business to stop immediately.

It is to this effect that we wish to provide a kind reminder for all businesses operating foreign exchange dealings without a license to refrain from these illegal practices or face the legal and appropriate consequences.

The C.B.S. will be also conducting onsite inspections starting on 5 October 2016 to assess if any businesses are still operating illegally on foreign exchange or currency dealings.

This offence is stipulated in the Financial Institutions Act 1996 and the Exchange Control Regulations 1999 in which each will attract an imprisonment term, a fine, or both an imprisonment term and a fine.
Average rent was $1,743 a month in San Diego County at the start of September, increasing 8.4 percent in a year, said MarketPointe Realty Advisors in a report released Thursday.

The number of apartments available to rent could have proved difficult to find, with the vacancy rate dropping to 2.17 percent  its lowest in at least five years.

MarketPointes data covers mostly complexes that have 25 or more units so, for example, a building or large house in North Park with just five apartments isnt included (and likely cheaper than a large complex). But, MarketPointes data is still the most comprehensive rental study in San Diego County, covering 131,287 apartments.

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Rent increased 7.7 percent from March, when the average was $1,618 a month, the report said.

The rise is largely attributed to lack of new housing and apartments. Just two new projects entered the market in the past six months, adding 370 apartments.

Russ Valone, president of MarketPointe Realty Advisors, presented the latest findings Thursday at Apartment Perspective 2017, an event put on by the San Diego Apartment Association and the local chapter of the Certified Commercial Investment Member network.

Unless we do something to satisfy demand, those of us that have grandkids can look forward to visiting them in North Carolina, he told the crowd of roughly 200 real estate workers at the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel in Mission Valley.

Valone blamed rising prices on California environmental laws, lack of political leadership and the hesitancy of city and county government to approve new housing.

These numbers are not going to change for us, significantly, as we move forward into the next decade, he said.

In early September, the average rent for a studio was $1,383; $1,533 for a one-bedroom; $1,821 for a two-bedroom; $2,257 for a three-bedroom; and $3,043 for a four-bedroom.

The highest rent in the county is on the coast in North County, where the average rent runs $2,152 a month. The cheapest is in East County, at $1,422 a month, but units can be hard to find.

Vacancy rates for apartments in East County are at only 1 percent. Out of 18,622 apartments, just 275 were empty at the start of September.

Russ Valone, president of MarketPointe Realty Advisors, presents latest rental data Thursday at the Apartment Perspective 2017 event at the DoubleTree Hotel in Mission Valley (Phillip Molnar/San Diego Union-Tribune )

Predictably, the cheapest apartments were the quickest to fill up. Out of 8,653 apartments under $1,200 a month, just 51 were vacant in September.

The hardest to fill? Apartments in the $2,200 to $2,299 range. Out of 18,164 apartments, 683 were empty in early September

Two-bedroom apartments were the most prevalent rentals in the county, with about 52.6 percent falling into that category. One-bedroom apartments took up 35.3 percent; three-bedrooms 7.8 percent; studios 3.68 percent.

Ben Metcalf, director of the state Department of Housing and Community Development, also addressed the crowd at the Mission Valley event about the need for more housing.

He said while the state was unable to pass Gov. Jerry Browns by right housing proposal during the past session, it did succeed in elevating the conversation.

The governors plan would have speeded up approval for housing projects, bypassing stringent California environmental laws, as long as some of the units were set aside for low-income residents. It faced widespread condemnation from environmental and labor groups.

Metcalf said the next step for his office was to release a 10-year draft statewide housing plan in the fall but had no immediate plan to revisit the by right proposal.

I think the notion that we need to do something about housing, to make it easier to build, is going to come back in the next session , he said. At this point, from the governors perspective, we are sort of taking a pause.

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A state appeals court has agreed to review a controversial California Public Utilities Commission decision to greenlight a proposed $2.2 billion power plant in Carlsbad.

Opponents of the natural gas-fired Carlsbad Energy Center celebrated the news, hoping that it would boost the chances of keeping the plant from ever getting built.

Its the wrong technology in the wrong place at the wrong time, said April Rose Sommer, executive director at Protect Our Communities Foundation (POC), one of a number of environmental activists opposed to the construction of the project.

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The First District Court of Appeals in San Francisco late Wednesday afternoon agreed to a petition filed by POC and the Center for Biological Diversity to take a closer look at a 4-1 vote by the CPUC in May 2015 that granted approval of a contract for the Carlsbad Energy Center.

The CPUC vote raised objections from opponents of the power plant that the vote was held without holding a public bidding process and after an aide from CPUC President Michael Picker met privately with the developer of the project about downsizing an earlier plan for the plant that had been rejected by the commission.

The Carlsbad Energy Center is slated to be built by NRG Energy, based in Princeton, New Jersey and Houston, Texas, and would replace the aging Encina Power Station.

We are confident that after reviewing the legal arguments on their merits, the Court of Appeal will affirm the CPUCs decision approving the contract for the Carlsbad Energy Center, NRG Energy spokesman David B. Knox said in an email.

San Diego Gas & Electric would buy power from the proposed Carlsbad plant.

The unfortunate thing is any further delay in the construction of the Carlsbad Energy Center, which is a clean-burning natural gas facility, continues to delay the retirement of the regions last costly, inefficient and high-emissions power plant (Encina), said Stephanie Donovan. SDG&Es senior communications manager.

When asked for reaction from the commission and Picker, CPUC spokeswoman Terrie Prosper said in an email, The court has decided to review our Carlsbad decision, and has not reached any substantive decision.

The 62-year-old Encina Power Station is being forced into retirement in large part due to its cooling systems that suck in seawater, a process called once-through cooling that regulators have come to oppose in recent years because it harms marine life.

Supporters say the Carlsbad plant would provide the area with quick-starting power to help back up renewable sources in order for California to meet its target of 33 percent of clean-energy generation by 2020 and 50 percent by 2030.

California has become more reliant on natural gas in recent years, especially after the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station went off line.

In the most recent numbers compiled by the California Energy Commission, 59.9 percent of in-state generation in 2015 came from natural gas, compared to 45.4 percent in 2011, the last full year of operation at San Onofre.

Opponents of the Carlsbad plant say it will harm the environment along the coastline, especially the nearby Agua Hedionda Lagoon. They also say the growth in renewable energy makes the plant unnecessary.

The numbers show we do not need this additional generation, Sommer said. If we did need additional generation, there is a statutory mandate and an executive order that requires that we fill this need for energy with things like energy efficiency, renewables and demand-response.

Donovan described the Carlsbad Energy Center as the new workhorse for the region.

The reality is we cant just go forward with all-renewables and only renewables, Donovan said. This plant is still needed because it is actually not in competition with renewables or any other resource. We really need a balanced mix of all of the above.

The appeals court decision does not block the potential construction of the Carlsbad Energy Center. Rather, it means a panel of judges will review the approval of the contract passed by the CPUC.

Nonetheless, the decision to accept the review caught some by surprise because courts typically show deference to decisions made by state agencies.

Last week the Second District denied review of a similar case against the CPUC for approving contracts for three new power plants in the Los Angeles area.

In its announcement to hear a review of the Carlsbad case, the First District said it was not going to accept new briefs and does not intend to hear oral arguments. That, court observers say, indicates the court may render a decision relatively quickly.

They really havent made any decision on the merits of the case at this point, Donovan said.

Sommer said POC is optimistic the appeals court will rule in favor of the power plants opponents.

Its unusual for the court to have even accepted the petition for review and it seems unlikely that they would do that simply to reaffirm the decision of the CPUC, Sommer said.

rob.nikolewski@sduniontribune.com

(619) 293-1251 Twitter: @robnikolewski
For a technology startup to be successful, it needs not only engineering talent but also business know how.

UC San Diego has created a new Institute for the Global Entrepreneur to give students both skillsets  potentially paving the way for more university-based innovation to come to market.

Targeting graduate students, the Institute combines classes and work teams from UC San Diegos Jacobs School of Engineering and the Rady School of Management. It will focus on leadership training, entrepreneurism training and path to market concepts.

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University officials believe that by working together, students will be better prepared to launch real-world startups.

I am hoping our new Institute in the next 10 years will make a significant difference in creating an ecosystem where we have engineers with these (business) skills, said Sujit Dey, director of the Institute and an electrical/computer engineering professor. If we can do this right, the translation of innovations coming out of the university will create a lot more companies, and that might change the innovation economy of San Diego.

This spring, the first group of engineering graduate students began taking business related classes. Early next year, they will start working with MBA students from the Rady Schools Lab-to-Market program  which asks students to build a business around a real technological innovation.

This first, four-quarter pilot effort is a precursor to the universitys plans to develop a joint Technology Management and Entrepreneurism masters degree program.

We are responding to industry demands, said Albert Pisano, dean of the engineering school. The companies we interact with are asking for engineers who are empowered beyond the technical expertise and also have the innovation and management of innovation skills that the Rady School is famous for.

The Institute also aims to help students, faculty and alumni who start companies by providing mentoring and links to capital through the Triton Technology Fund and the Rady Venture Fund.

A few other universities have similar programs, including UC Berkeley. UCSD aims to stand out by emphasizing the practical side of taking a technology from the lab bench to customers.

I have seen myself, either when I have worked at a big company or had my own startup, that one of the big challenges is engineers, even brilliant engineers, are sometimes not able to appreciate real market needs, said Dey. And the people who are running the business side -- the sales, the marketing -- they are not able to communicate with the engineering teams properly.

UCSD already has a rich history of entrepreneurship, with hundreds of San Diego companies, including Qualcomm, having roots back to the university.

Last year, UCSD established The Basement incubator program for campus founded startups.The $8 million Triton Technology Fund was launched in 2014 to support early stage companies created by university students, faculty and graduates.

Dey said UCSD ranks second among UC universities for patents filed and startups created. It leads in University Technology Transfer, where campus generated research is licensed to third parties.

But Dey believes innovation could happen faster  with fewer missteps -- if engineering researchers took market needs into consideration early on. That is one of his goals for The Institute for the Global Entrepreneur.

With students working in these projects who have engineering skillsets as well as business skillsets, I believe the results of these research projects will be much more translatable, he said.

mike.freeman@sduniontribune.com Twitter @TechDiego
Universities in San Diego are reporting strong interest in the advanced courses theyve begun offering in cybersecurity and anti-terrorism issues.

San Diego State University recently added 66 students to its Graduate Program in Homeland Security  twice the number it reported a year ago.

The University of San Diego has a similar number of graduate-level students barely one year after it created the Center for Cyber Security Engineering and Technology. An additional 45 students are set to be added in the spring.

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UC San Diego doesnt have a standalone cybersecurity program. But the campus is making the issue a key component of its engineering and technology certificates, and the campus plans to soon introduce a course titled Best Practices for Security Managers.

At the same time, UC San Diego is searching for a security chief for its massive, campus-wide information system. Such experts are in heavy demand nationally, and its common for them to earn $200,000-plus a year in high-profile positions.

SDSU has seen tremendous growth in 2016 enrollment in-part due to the need for qualified homeland and cybersecurity-trained professionals in the United States and around the world, said Lance Larson, assistant director of the Graduate Program in Homeland Security.

Some of our students transition from recent military service, arm themselves with a masters in homeland security degree and find they are highly sought-after by military contractors and intelligence agencies, Larson said.

Our students can speak Mandarin, French, Russian, Italian, Urdu, Spanish and Arabic, to name just a few languages, he added. Most SDSU homeland security students are from the United States, but others attend from South Korea, the United Kingdom and South Africa.

Programs like the one at San Diego State are evolving to meet local and regional needs.

Only a small percentage of (our) students are from law enforcement, said John Callahan, who heads the cybersecurity program at USD.

We have a good number from the defense/military community, but probably less than 10 with a law-enforcement background. However, we are starting a law-enforcement cybersecurity and cyber-investigations training program this fall.

gary.robbins@sduniontribune.com
The House of Mexico, which plans to build a cottage with the others at Balboa Parks House of Pacific Relations, is hosting its first Mexican Independence Day celebration from 6:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. Friday at Spreckels Organ Pavilion.

The celebration  on Mexican Independence Day  will culminate with the Mexican consul performing the traditional grito, according to Gloria Cazares of the House of Mexico.

Art Castro, president of the House of Mexico, called the grito a declaration of independence or a shout for independence.

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The grito, which means shout or cry, recalls the impassioned speech, known as El Grito de Dolores, made by the Rev. Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, a priest who called his congregation to arms against Spain in 1810. Mexican officials, including the president, perform the grito every year in honor of the beginning of the war that led to Mexicos independence after 300 years of colonial rule.

The House of Mexico festivities will also feature two mariachi groups, Mariachi Miztli from San Ysidro High School and Mariachi Estrellas de Chula Vista. A ballet folklorico group, La Fiesta Danzantes de San Diego, will demonstrate various regional dances. Radio Guacamaya will perform Son Jarocho, a cultural art form from Veracruz that includes music and dance.

The organization hosted an event in September 2015 that drew about 700 people, Cazares said. It was the Houses first annual Arte Color y Fiesta event, timed to coincide with National Hispanic Heritage Month, which runs from September 15 to October 15. Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Chile also celebrate their independence days in that time frame.

This time were trying to inform and educate people and reference the typical dancing or typical protocol of what independence day is, Cazares said. A lot of people think Cinco de Mayo is independence day in Mexico. Theres no relationship.

The House of Mexico was approved by the House of Pacific Relations to join the other Balboa Park houses in 2004. There are thirty-three countries listed in the House of Pacific Relations website as belonging to the group.

Castro, who was one of the charter members of the House of Mexico, said the organization has been fundraising since then to build a cottage of its own. He said so far it has raised about $120,000, but it needs another $150,000 to complete the cottage. Eight other houses are also planning to build cottages, including the Philippines and India.

The House of Mexico also will host its annual lawn program at the international cottages from 12 p.m. to 4 p.m.on Sunday afternoon.

This posting has been amended from its original, which said Castro was a founding member of the organization. Although Castro was a charter member of the group upon its incorporation, the effort was founded years earlier by Enrique Morones.

kate.morrissey@sduniontribune.com, @bgirledukate
Andres Gallegos Arguello stood on the American side of a metallic mesh fence in Friendship Circle between San Diego and Tijuana. His mother and father stood on the other side.

It was a family reunion under the close watch of the Border Patrol agents that serve as chaperones for every one of these meetings.

How are you, my son? Eva Arguello, 71, asked her son as tears welled in her eyes. I really want to hug you.

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Around them the Pacific Ocean treated them to pretty vistas as Gallegos reached through the grid-like mesh and grazed his mothers pinky finger.

Im just happy to see you, he told her.

As the gate gains prominence in immigration circles, there is a new effort by some to make this stretch of border more accessible. The Let Them Hug petition asks that the Border Patrol let people get together in a spot where they can hug and kiss if they want to.

The fence has been an unlikely meeting place during weekends for countless families divided by immigration policy. Parents and children, husbands and wives, lovers, friends and hikers curious about the border and a fence that has the contours of Chex cereal. Every week hundreds make the pilgrimage there, some traveling from as far east as New Jersey or south as Chiapas.

For those for whom crossing into Mexico or the U.S. is a fraught affair with no guaranteed return, the fence is the best they can do when they want to see people they love face to face.

Every four months, Noemi Medrano leaves her home in Sacramento to meet her mother, Carmen Urrea, 60, who travels from Sinaloa. Daughter and mother said they have not shared a hug in six years.

Earlier this year, when Medrano  who is temporarily protected from deportation as long as she doesnt leave the U.S.  told her mother that she was pregnant, they touched fingers through the metal mesh. Medrano said she would return next year and present her infant son through the fence.

The idea of making this span of border less restrictive is one that the Border Patrol opposes. Richard E. Smith, assistant chief for the Border Patrol in San Diego, said the agency opposes the idea, calling it a vulnerability and level of risk to national security that are not acceptable at this time.

A Border Patrol agent watching over the visitors said that the strangely configured mesh on the fence was designed, in part, to make it harder for contraband to cross the border.

A generation ago the border was a different threshold, easier to cross both legally and illegally. Located atop Monument Mesa, Friendship Circle is inside Border Field State Park. People have gathered there since the U.S.-Mexico Boundary Commission first met at the location in 1849, at the end of the U.S.-Mexico War. In 1971, then-First Lady Pat Nixon helped to dedicate the park, crossing through a hole freshly cut in what was then a barbed wire fence to meet and hug Mexican children.

I hope there wont be a fence here too long, she said.

When its about national security, they dont care about the feelings of the ordinary people.  Andres Gallegos Arguello

The metallic mesh  which prevents people on each side from touching  was installed on the fence at Friendship Circle in 2011 as a security measure.

Until the 1990s, it was relatively easy for folks in Mexico to come to the U.S. and folks in the U.S. to go into Mexico, said Louis DeSipio, a professor of political science at UC Irvine. Creating this new arbitrary situation of You can touch right here but not there is a new development in the long history for the U.S. southern border.

DeSipio said the Border Patrol is in a very difficult situation. They are getting pressure from the right to seal the border in some absolute sense and pressure from the left to recognize the humanitarian implications.

The ability to embrace loved ones is the top desire shared by people who visit the park for these reunions, said Friends of Friendship Park organizer John Fanestil, a Methodist reverend who gives a weekly service of communion at the U.S.-Mexico border.

He said he and his coalition have spent tens of thousands of hours at the park without ever experiencing any danger or violence.

Every April a handful of families are allowed to hug in a highly staged media event, Fanestil said. Coordinating with an immigrant advocacy group, the San Diego Border Patrol opens a gate on the massive border fence, allowing children and parents to reunite for just a few minutes with their relatives on the Mexican side.

The Border Patrol opens a gate to the mesh covered fence area during weekends and allows no more than 25 people at a time to gather there.

They get together between the metal mesh. Border Patrol officials said they are working hard to accommodate the families who gather at the park but said there are simply too many security issues to allow fewer restrictions.

The fact that the park is so popular with families and visitors is a testament to the hard work of the men and women of the Border Patrol over the past two decades, Smith said.

Not everyone gathered at the Mexican side of the fence is Mexican.

Standing on U.S. side of the border, Arcen Avagyan, 42, sneaks into prohibited area to meet his wife, Anna Sargisyan, 28, in Mexico. (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times )

On a recent Saturday, an Armenian man, Arcen Avagyan, 42, and his wife reunited through the fence. They had not seen each other in three years. Standing in Tijuana, Anna Sargisyan, 28, hoped to ask for asylum at the Port of Entry. Divided by the metallic fence, the couple puckered their lips as they attempted a kiss through a too-small hole.

Moments later, Avagyan jumped over a rope and made his way to an area where he could steal a hug and a proper kiss from his wife. A Border Patrol agent quickly ran toward them and reprimanded him, ordering Avagyan to stay in the cordoned area.

Nearby, Gallegos and his 10-year-old son, Saiid, visited the boys grandparents.

Gallegos is in the process of becoming a legal resident but cant leave the U.S. without risking his return. A month ago, he visited with his mother and father, Andres Gallegos Saenz, 76, at the park after not having set eyes on them in more than two years.

Spotting four musicians  one carrying an accordion, two guitars and one a cello  nearby, Gallegos father hired them to play Mexican songs for his son, including one about the love of a parent for a son.

Getting up from his wheelchair and leaning on his cane, Gallegos father got close to the fence.

At least I can see him, he said of his son.

Despite the heartache of feeling so close yet so far, Gallegos said he understood the Border Patrols point of view.

When its about national security, they dont care about the feelings of the ordinary people, he said.

Though he expressed being content, for the moment, with being able to see his parents, when Gallegos saw the Armenian couples bold attempt at closer physical contact he felt he had to do something.

Slowly, he crept up to a rope away from the grate-like fence. When Gallegos felt the agents were sufficiently distracted, he took a leap into the prohibited area, where only giant, rusted iron bars block the way.

In a few seconds, he hugged his mother and father and planted kisses on their cheeks. Then, with a grin on his face, he hopped back.

cindy.carcamo@latimes.com

Follow Cindy Carcamo on Twitter @thecindycarcamo

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THE WALL OF SHAME

"The only thing [Trump's] mouth is good for is being Vladimir Putin's c--k holster."

--STEPHEN COLBERT

"[Ivanka Trump] Your father is a racist birther. Steve Bannon an anti-Semitic opportunist. You and your husband are enabling hatred. F--- your shoes."

--BRADLEY WHITFORD

"Melania [Trump] is a hooker."

--JACOB BERNSTEIN

"And my job is to shut other white people down when they want to interrupt."

"We have to, at the DNC, provide training. We have to teach them how to communicate, how to be sensitive, and how to shut their mouths if they're white."

--SALLY BOYNTON BROWN

"And to our detractors that insist that this march will never add up to anything: F--- you! F---you!

"Yes, I have thought an awful lot about blowing up the White House."

--MADONNA

"Barron Trump looks like a very handsome date-rapist-to-be."

--STEPHEN SPINOLA

"Barron [Trump] will be this country's first homeschool shooter."

--KATIE RICH

"Hollywood is crawling with outsiders and foreigners, and if we kick 'em all out, you'll have nothing to watch but football and mixed martial arts, which are not the arts."

--MERYL STREEP

"There's a billion to one chance we're living in base reality."

[That means we're almost positively living in a simulation, like a video game.]

--ELON MUSK

"When I would deny that there was a significant racist component in some of the politics on our side, it was because the people I hung out with were certainly not. When suddenly, this rock is turned over, there is this'Oh shit, did I not see that?'"

----------------------------

"In any other scenario, Hillary Clinton's lying about her emails, and her pay-for-play relationship with the Clinton Foundation would be disqualifying issues. The only reason they're not disqualifying is because Donald Trump is a fundamentally more repellent, dishonest figure."

--CHARLIE SYKES

"I made a mistake in recalling the events of twelve years ago... I said I was traveling in an aircraft that was hit by RPG fire. I was instead in a following aircraft."

--BRIAN WILLIAMS

"I'm here to tell you if you elect me governor of this state, I will end the civil war."

--TOM BARRETT

"I would not look to the U.S. Constitution, if I were drafting a constitution in the year 2012. I might look at the constitution of South Africa. That was a deliberate attempt to have a fundamental instrument of government that embraced basic human rights, had an independent judiciary. It really is, I think, a great piece of work that was done."

--RUTH BADER GINSBURG

"Callista Gingrich. Karen Santorum. Ann Romney. Now, do you really think our country is ready for a white first lady?"

--ROBERT DE NIRO

"The death of Andrew Breitbart disproves the adage that only the good die young."

--JULIAN BOND

"The National Institute of Health has said that it is a danger to women's health and safety of their families that for 30 years to be exposed to the prospects of pregnancy."

--GWEN MOORE

"[Tea Party Republicans] have acted like terrorists."

--JOE BIDEN

"Why did- Couldn't the President have said at that moment, way back in December of last year, 'no game playing. No hostage-taking. No terrorizing this country with the debt ceiling. I'm not going to negotiate with you guys. You can't play it that way.' Could he have done that?"

--CHRIS MATTHEWS

"[T]he tea-party Hobbits could return to Middle Earth having defeated Mordor."

--WALL STREET JOURNAL EDITORIAL

"I remember distinctly an image of--we were sitting on his couches, and I was looking at [Obama's] pant leg and his perfectly creased pant, and I'm thinking, a) he's going to be president and b) he'll be a very good president."

--DAVID BROOKS

"I feel like calling her back and smackin' her around."

--FRED CLARK, DEMOCRAT

"The picture was of me, and I sent it."

--ANTHONY WEINER

"[I]f you go back to the year 2000, when we had an obvious disaster and - and saw that our voting process needed refinement, and we did that in the America Votes Act and made sure that we could iron out those kinks, now you have the Republicans, who want to literally drag us all the way back to Jim Crow laws and literally - and very transparently - block access to the polls to voters who are more likely to vote Democratic candidates than Republican candidates. And it's nothing short of that blatant."

--DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ

"This is probably one of the worst times we've seen because the numbers of people elected to Congress. I went through this as co-chair of the arts caucus. In '94 people were elected simply to come here to kill the National Endowment for the Arts. Now theyre here to kill women."

--LOUISE SLAUGHTER

"The protesters have proven today that theyre not going away. It was a pretty rough night last night. You can imagine if people said, well, we just cant fight the power. Instead, this morning, they came by tens, by hundreds, by thousands. By midday today, it was easily more than 10,000, perhaps as many as 15,000 people on the square here in Madison. Not organized by anyone, just grassroots citizens who came out just like the Minutemen in 1776."

--JOHN NICHOLS

"They're sitting on the money, they're using it for their own -- they're putting it someplace else with no interest in helping you with your life, with that money. We've allowed them to take that. That's not theirs, that's a national resource, that's ours. We all have this -- we all benefit from this or we all suffer as a result of not having it. I think we need to go back to taxing these people at the proper rates."

--MICHAEL MOORE

"Why don't we just raise the taxes and let these folks have their collective bargaining, have their union representation and go back to their jobs? Raise the taxes on the wealthy."

--DAVID LETTERMAN

"In 1933, [Hitler] abolished unions and that's what our Governor [Scott Walker] is doing today."

--LENA TAYLOR, Democrat State Senator

"So I would urge my Republican colleagues, no matter how strongly they feel -- you know, we have three branches of government. We have a House. We have a Senate. We have a president. And all three of us are going to have to come together and give some, but it is playing with fire to risk the shutting down of the government."

--CHUCK SCHUMER

"Well, when you start off with the Preamble of the Constitution, you talk about the pursuit of happiness."

--JOHN LEWIS

"I'm Rebecca Kleefisch. I performed fellatio on all the talk show hosts in Milwaukee. And they endorsed me and that's how I became lieutenant governor."

--SLY SYLVESTER

"Do you think this Constitution-loving is getting out of hand? I mean, is it a nod to the Tea Party?"

--JOY BEHAR

"We cant just leave it up to the parents."

"[Military leaders] tell us that childhood obesity isnt just a public health issue; they tell us that it is not just an economic threat -- it is a national security threat as well."

--MICHELLE OBAMA

"Actually, I did not take part in [the assassination of Sarah Palin]. I led it."

--KATHLEEN PARKER

"[The repeal of ObamaCare is] a kind of creeping genocide."

--JESSE JACKSON

"[Obama] has to realize that Mitch McConnell has virtually said so that politically he wants to cut out his heart and throw his liver to the dogs."

--DAN RATHER

"And the instructions are not to improvise a comedy sketch, but to elect a group of unqualified, unstable individuals who will do what they are told, in exchange for money and power, and march this nation as far backward as they can get, backward to Jim Crow, or backward to the breadlines of the '30s, or backward to hanging union organizers, or backward to the trusts and the robber barons.

"Result: the Tea Party. Vote backward, vote Tea Party. And if you are somehow indifferent to what is planned for next Tuesday, it is nothing short of an attempted use of democracy to end this democracy."

--KEITH "Reagan's dead and he was a lousy President" OLBERMANN

"I gotta wonder when people are gonna start wearing uniforms. I mean they've got an army out there in Alaska of militia people. You've got these guys going around acting like street thugs. I mean it isn't far from what we saw in the thirties, where all of a sudden, political parties started showing up in uniform."

--CHRIS MATTHEWS

"[Sharron Angle] is a moron on top of being evil... I'd like to see her do this ad in the South Bronx. Come here, bitch. Come to New York and do it. I'm not praying for her. She's going to hell. She's going to hell, this bitch."

--JOY BEHAR

"So people have been hurting and I understand that. And it doesn't give them comfort or solace for me to tell them, you know, but for me, we'd be in a worldwide depression."

--HARRY REID

"And to play Dick Cheney, all I had to do was find my Dick Cheney. And you can find all the villainy in the world in your own heart, and that's what an actor's job is. I always say to kids, inside you is Hitler and Jesus. And you got to find the appropriate person and bring them out."

--RICHARD DREYFUSS

"Because I live in the District of Columbia which is so predominantly Democratic, I am a registered Democrat. But I am an avowed neutral. And to put that into practice, I take my young daughter into the voting booth and she votes for me. She's now 14. We've been doing this since she was about age 4. She's now quite informed."

--BOB WOODWARD

"Sarah Palin's an idiot. Come on. This is a remarkably, stunningly, jaw-droppingly incompetent and mean woman."

"The Democrats may have moved into the center, but the Republicans have moved into a mental institution."

--AARON SORKIN

"Perhaps the greatest threat of all is the undermining of our Constitution and the systematic attack against the inalienable rights of the citizens of this nation, rights that are guaranteed by our Constitution. At the vanguard of this insidious attack is the Tea Party. This band of misguided citizens is moving perilously close to achieving villainous ends."

--HARRY BELAFONTE

"[Christine O'Donnell is] a witch who doesn't masturbate."

--JOY BEHAR

"Ah, the Tea Party, the nativist bed-wetters who somehow control our national dialogue. Yes, I call them the Pee Party, Jay, because they're always peeing in their pants about something. They're just, they're afraid of a mosque being built in New York. They're afraid of guns. You know, they think Obama, who like every other pussy Democrat has never said a single word about gun control, but they are very sure that he and his Negro army are coming after their guns. You know what? If you think that he's coming after your guns, you need to get out of your chat room and have your house tested for lead. He's not coming after your guns or your Bible or your fishing pole or your chewing tobacco."

--BILL MAHER

"That's a trade-off society is making because of very, very high medical costs, and a lack of willingness to say, you know, is spending a million dollars on that last three months of life for that patient, would it be better not to lay off those ten teachers and to make that trade-off in medical costs. But that;s called the 'Death Panel' and you're not supposed to have that discussion."

--BILL GATES

"NOT the 'whiteman's bitch'"

--IESHUH GRIFFIN

"[If Rush Limbaugh suffered a heart attack in my presence, I would] laugh loudly like a maniac and watch his eyes bug out. I never knew I had this much hate in me. But he deserves it."

--SARAH SPITZ

"You want freedom, you going to have to kill some crackers. You going to have to kill some of their babies."

--KING SAMIR SHABAZZ

"If this was Texas, which is the state that, that is directly on the border with Mexico, and they were calling for a measure like this, saying that they had a major issue with, you know, with undocumented people flooding their borders, I would say I would have to look twice at this. "But this is a state that is a ways removed from the border. And, um, it just, it doesn't make sense to me that when you google this subject, if you put in 'Arizona S.B. 1070,' that you see a picture of the governor of Arizona meeting with President Obama in May of 2010. If you have direct linkage to the president, there are already National Guard troops on the border in Arizona."

--PEGGY WEST

"Tell [the Jews] to get the hell out of Palestine. Remember, these people are occupied and it's their land. It's not German. It's not Poland. [The Jews] can go home. Poland. Germany."

--HELEN THOMAS

"After the last eight years, it's good to have a president that knows what a library is."

--PAUL McCARTNEY

"By the way, I just want to point out I'm wearing my splash shield because I was told I was going to be in the splash zone (during Harry Smith's colonoscopy on live TV)."

--KATIE COURIC

"And that Word is, we have to give voice to what that means in terms of public policy that would be in keeping with the values of the Word."

----------------------------

"Think of an economy where people could be an artist or a photographer or a writer without worrying about keeping their day job in order to have health insurance or that people could start a business and be entrepreneurial and take risk, but not job loss because of a child with asthma or someone in the family is bipolaryou name it, any condition  is job-locking."

--NANCY PELOSI

"Back in World War II, we viewed the Japanese as 'yellow, slant-eyed dogs' that believed in different gods. They were out to kill us because our way of living was different. We, in turn, wanted to annihilate them because they were different. Does that sound familiar, by any chance, to what's going on today?"

--TOM HANKS

"The 'White Right' is trying to set Barack up to be assassinated.... Here are Christians praying for God to kill Barack Obama."

--LOUIS FARRAKHAN

"I refuse to accept the notion that the United States of America is not going to lead the world economically throughout the 20th Century."

--JOE BIDEN

"Obama's critics keep blasting him for Chicago-style politics. So, fine. Channel your inner Al Capone and go gangsta against your foes. Let 'em know that if they aren't with you, they are against you, and will pay the price."

--ROLAND MARTIN

"Martha Coakley is running to fill the rest of Ted Kennedy's term, and her opponent is a far-right tea-bagger Republican."

--CHUCK SCHUMER

"I tell you what, if I lived in Massachusetts, I'd try to vote ten times. I don't know if they'd let me or not, but I'd try to. Yeah, that's right, I'd cheat to keep these bastards out. I would. 'Cause that's exactly what they are."

--ED SCHULTZ

"We also see how revved up the tea baggers are at the thought of hijacking health care reform and every chance we have at making progress in Washington."

--JOHN KERRY

"A few years ago, this guy (Obama) would have been getting us coffee."

--BILL CLINTON

"I didn't realize I had written a column defending Roman Polanski and minimized his crime - are you sure it was me? I mean, I? There is, apparently, more to this crime than it would seem, and it may sound like a hollow defense, but in Hollywood I am not sure a 13-year-old is really a 13-year-old."

--TOM SHALES

"Joe Wilson yelled 'You lie!' at a president who didn't. But, fair or not, what I heard was an unspoken word in the air: You lie, boy!"

--MAUREEN DOWD

"One awkward moment for Sarah Palin at the Yankee game... During the 7th inning, her daughter was knocked up by Alex Rodriguez."

--DAVID LETTERMAN

"I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasnt lived that life."

--SONIA SOTOMAYOR

"We all considered sexual abuse of minors as a moral evil, but had no understanding of its criminal nature."

--REMBERT WEAKLAND, Archbishop of Milwaukee 1977- 2002

"You know, you might want to look into this, [President Obama], because I think maybe Rush Limbaugh was the 20th hijacker, but he was so strung out on Oxycontin he missed his flight."

"Rush Limbaugh -- 'I hope the country fails.' I hope his kidneys fail."

----------------------------

"[Obama] told me I did a great job. The first lady said the same thing. I got a 'well done' from the president, I'm on cloud nine."

--WANDA SYKES

"Americans are looking for more government in their life, not less."

--COLIN POWELL

"[Tea Party goers are] just a bunch of wimpy, whiny, weasels who don't love their country."

--PAUL BEGALA

"I wouldn't want [gay marriage] to go to the United States Supreme Court now because that homophobe Antonin Scalia has too many votes on this current court."

--BARNEY FRANK

"Going forward, my mind will be open to every solution -- except one. We should not -- we must not -- and I will not -- raise taxes."

--JIM DOYLE, Liar

"He's a terrorist. Rush Limbaugh is a terrorist."

--JOY BEHAR

"You know, I just want to say to her (Sarah Palin), just very quickly...F--- you."

--JON STEWART

"Should I be worried about being a slave and being returned to slavery?"

--WHOOPI GOLDBERG

"I also believe that America is the greatest sin against God."

--FR. MICHAEL PFLEGER

"Those who think they can revive the stinking corpse of the usurping and fake Israeli regime by throwing a birthday party are seriously mistaken. Today the reason for the Zionist regime's existence is questioned, and this regime is on its way to annihilation."

--MAHMOUD AHMADINEJAD

"We'll be eight degrees hotter in ten, not ten but 30 or 40 years and basically none of the crops will grow. Most of the people will have died and the rest of us will be cannibals."

--TED TURNER

"Look, [Mitt] Romney comes from a religion founded by a criminal who was anti-American, pro-slavery, and a rapist. And he comes from that lineage and says, 'I respect this religion fully.'"

--LAWRENCE O'DONNELL

"Mexico does not end at its borders... Where there is a Mexican, there is Mexico."

--FELIPE CALDERON

"The planet has a fever. If your baby has a fever, you go to the doctor. If the doctor says you need to intervene here, you don't say, 'Well, I read a science fiction novel that told me it's not a problem.' If the crib's on fire, you don't speculate that the baby is flame retardant."

--AL GORE

"Don't fear the terrorists. They're mothers and fathers."

--ROSIE O'DONNELL

"Is America ready for a black president? Well, I say we just had a retarded one. When did being black become a bigger deterrent than being retarded?"

--CHRIS ROCK

"Shut the f--- up! Shut up if you can't take a joke [about President Bush]!"

--BARBRA STREISAND

"Right, oh, yeah, Happy 9/11! Celebrate the day, right?"

--JAMES BROLIN, Mr. Barbra Streisand

"I think President Bush very well may have signed an authorization for the 9/11 attacks."

--KEVIN BARRETT, UW-MADISON Lecturer

"I said what I said. I am not guilty."

--SADDAM HUSSEIN

"Terri will not be starved to death. Her nutrition and hydration will be taken away."

--MICHAEL SCHIAVO

"On the eve of the election last month my wife Judith and I were driving home late in the afternoon and turned on the radio for the traffic and weather. What we instantly got was a freak show of political pornography: lies, distortions, and half-truths -- half-truths being perhaps the blackest of all lies. "

--BILL MOYERS

"I hate the Republicans and everything they stand for."

--HOWARD DEAN

"The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not 'insurgents' or 'terrorists' or 'The Enemy.' They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow -- and they will win."

--MICHAEL MOORE

"And there is no reason, Bob, that young American soldiers need to be going into the homes of Iraqis in the dead of night, terrorizing kids and children, you know, women, breaking sort of the customs of the--of--the historical customs, religious customs."

--JOHN KERRY

"F---ing retarded."

"[Republicans] can go f--- themselves!"

--RAHM EMANUEL

"I'm not going to have some reporters pawing through our papers. We are the president."

--HILLARY CLINTON

"It depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is."

--BILL CLINTON

"And let me tell you something -- for the first time in my adult lifetime, I am really proud of my country. And not just because Barack has done well, but because I think people are hungry for change. And I have been desperate to see our country moving in that direction and just not feeling so alone in my frustration and disappointment."

--MICHELLE OBAMA

"If asking a billionaire to pay the same tax rate as a Jew, uh, as a janitor, makes me a warrior for the working class, I wear that with a badge of honor."

----------------------------

"If you love me, you got to help me pass this bill."

----------------------------

"[F]or most of my lifetime, the United States was such a dominant economic power, we were such a large market, our industry, our technology, our manufacturing was so significant that we always met the rest of the world economically on our terms. And now, because of the incredible rise of India and China and Brazil and other countries, the United States remains the largest economic and the largest market but theres real competition out there. And that's potentially healthy. It makes -- Michelle was saying earlier I like tough questions because it keeps me on my toes. Well, this will keep America on its toes."

----------------------------

"If Latinos sit out the election instead of saying, 'We're gonna PUNISH OUR ENEMIES and we're gonna reward our friends who stand with us on issues that are important to us,' if they don't see that kind of upsurge in voting in this election, then I think it's gonna be harder and that's why I think it's so important that people focus on voting on November 2."

----------------------------

"We don't mind the Republicans joining us. They can come for the ride, but THEY GOTTA SIT IN BACK."

----------------------------

"We can absorb a terrorist attack. We'll do everything we can to prevent it, but even a 9/11, even the biggest attack ever... we absorbed it and we are stronger."

----------------------------

"We're buying shrimp, guys."

----------------------------

"We are the ones we've been waiting for."

----------------------------

"We talk to these folks because they potentially have the best answers so I know whose ass to kick."

----------------------------

"We're not trying to push financial reform because we begrudge success that's fairly earned. I mean, I do think at a certain point you've made enough money. But, you know, part of the American way is, you know, you can just keep on making it if youre providing a good product or you're providing good service. We don't want people to stop fulfilling the core responsibilities of the financial system to help grow the economy."

----------------------------

"If you've got a business, you didn't build that. Somebody else made that happen."

----------------------------

"It is a vital national security interest of the United States to reduce these conflicts because whether we like it or not, we remain a dominant military superpower, and when conflicts break out, one way or another we get pulled into them. And that ends up costing us significantly in terms of both blood and treasure."

----------------------------

"But I -- I think that the most important thing for the public to understand is, we're not handling any of these cases any different than the Bush administration handled them all through 9/11."

----------------------------

"One such translator was an American of Haitian descent, representative of the extraordinary work that our men and women in uniform do all around the world -- Navy CORPSE-MAN Christian [sic] Brossard. And lying on a gurney aboard the USNS Comfort, a woman asked Christopher: 'Where do you come from? What country? After my operation,' she said, 'I will pray for that country.' And in Creole, CORPSE-MAN Brossard responded, 'Etazini.' The United States of America."

----------------------------

"I hear that Dr. Joe Medicine Crow was around, and so I want to give a shout-out to that Congressional Medal of Honor winner. It's good to see you."

----------------------------

"We are God's partners in matters of life and death."

----------------------------

"[T]he Cambridge police acted stupidly."

----------------------------

"I am going to teach [my daughters] first about values and morals, but if they make a mistake, I don't want them punished with a baby."

----------------------------

"The reforms we seek would bring greater competition, choice, savings, and INEFFICIENCIES to our health care system."

----------------------------

"Over the last 15 months, weve traveled to every corner of the United States. Ive now been in 57 states? I think one left to go. Alaska and Hawaii, I was not allowed to go to even though I really wanted to visit, but my staff would not justify it."

--BARACK OBAMA
Los Angeles City Council President Herb Wesson said Thursday that he has chosen himself to temporarily manage the San Fernando Valley district that had been represented by Felipe Fuentes.

Wesson, whose own council district stretches from Koreatown to South Los Angeles, will oversee services in the northeast Valley for the next six to eight months, depending on when the contest to replace Fuentes is decided.

The decision leaves Wesson responsible for an array of issues  trash pickup, sidewalk repairs and graffiti removal, to name a few  for twice as many constituents, or around 500,000 people. It also could require his involvement in the contentious issue of where to place a high-speed rail route.

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Wesson planned to meet with Fuentes former staffers on Friday. He said in an interview that Fuentes former constituents deserve to have a council member working on their behalf until voters pick a permanent replacement.

It is important to make the folks within the district feel there is an elected person that they can reach out to, he said.

Fuentes resigned from the council Sunday to become a lobbyist, departing nearly 10 months early.

Although Wesson will oversee operations in two districts, he will continue to have only one vote on the council, said his spokeswoman, Vanessa Rodriguez. He also will not receive additional compensation, she said.

Serving constituents in the Valley, even for a short period, could enhance Wessons political profile, helping him should he run for citywide office. But it could also produce headaches if Valley residents conclude that their needs arent being met, said Dermot Givens, a political consultant based in Hollywood.

Those neighborhood councils out there are very contentious and very active, Givens said. He better be on top of it. Because if hes not, hes going to get all the blame.

Wessons district has the multi-story office towers of Koreatown on one end and the African American cultural hub of Leimert Park on the other. Fuentes former district, by contrast, sits next to the Angeles National Forest and is known for its foothills and horse trails.

On the west are the heavily Latino neighborhoods of Sylmar and Pacoima. On the east is Sunland-Tujunga, where residents are so skeptical of development that they succeeded in stopping a Home Depot from opening a decade ago.

Givens described the two districts as worlds apart, both politically and geographically. Wesson, however, said residents in both districts have the same demands of City Hall: trees that are trimmed, roads that are fixed and parks that are properly maintained.

They may want it at a different level or a different pace, but usually the wants, needs and desires are pretty similar, he said.

Wessons decision was unusual for City Hall. In previous years, a little-known city department  the chief legislative analysts office  has been assigned to serve as caretaker when a council seat is vacant.

When a council member steps down early, city lawmakers have the power under the City Charter to fill the vacant seat temporarily or call a special election. Wesson ruled out a special election last month, in part to spare taxpayers the extra cost.

Fielding complaints from double the number of constituents will be a challenge, said former Councilman Richard Alarcon, whom Fuentes replaced in 2013.

Its a heavy lift, no question about it, Alarcon added. But if there is one person on the council who has the expertise to lift heavy tasks, its Herb.

The campaign to replace Fuentes already has 24 candidates, according to a preliminary candidate list on the Ethics Commission website. If no one gets a majority of votes in the March primary election, a runoff will be held two months later.

Wesson said he wants the winner to be installed ahead of July 1, to give the district elected representation as quickly as possible. The proposal will be introduced on Friday, Rodriguez said.

Lydia Grant, a neighborhood activist who lives in Lake View Terrace, said she hopes Wesson will reverse some of the actions taken by Fuentes over the last three years. One was his decision to push the Sunland-Tujunga Neighborhood Council out of a city building, she said.

Wesson may be able to undo some of those things that were done wrong, Grant said. So it actually could be beneficial.

david.zahniser@latimes.com

Twitter: @DavidZahniser

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As Venice booms, some residents wonder whether L.A. is holding them back

UPDATES:

5:50 p.m.: This article was updated with additional reporting.

This article was originally posted at 11 a.m.
An Oceanside woman was sentenced Friday to 21 years to life in prison for intentionally drowning her toddler son after learning shed have to split custody of the boy with his father.

Veronica Rivas, 30, pleaded guilty in Vista Superior Court last month  three weeks before trial  to second-degree murder and willful cruelty to a child.

In September 2014, Rivas placed 21-month-old Elijah in the bathtub of her familys Oceanside condo and held his head underwater until he stopped fighting, authorities said. When the boy regained consciousness, she called her estranged boyfriend  the childs father  to ask him to give up his custody rights. When he said no, Rivas held the child underwater again until he died, prosecutors said.

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In court Friday, the boys father, Marine Sgt. Juan Concha, addressed Rivas as he clutched his sons blue stuffed elephant  the toy the boy had slept with.

How do you kill a 2-year-old? How do you hold Elijahs head underwater?  Juan Concha, Elijahs father

Remember this? the 30-year-old asked, holding a long stare at Rivas.How do you kill a 2-year-old? How do you hold Elijahs head underwater?

He told Rivas that young, innocent Elijah didnt do anything to you. He wished her a long life, adding I hope you think about it every night and every morning.

Rivas remained mostly expressionless while Concha spoke. The grieving father said he should be getting ready to celebrate his sons birthday  Elijah would have been 4 this November  not speaking at the sentencing for his murder.

How do you kill a kid? Concha again asked. How do you hold Elijahs head underwater not once, but twice? Do you even care?

After a tense and quiet moment, Cocha wiped his eyes, picked up the toy and walked away.

Deputy District Attorney Claudia Grasso told Judge Richard Monroy that Rivas actions were all committed out of revenge and spite.

From the beginning, this baby was a pawn to her that she used to get back at Mr. Concha, Grasso said. The minute he moved on  she would not allow him to see the baby.

The prosecutor said that five days after Concha formally asked for custody, Rivas told police she suspected he was abusing the boy. The ensuing investigation by three agencies, including Oceanside police and child social workers, found no merit to the allegation, she said.

Later, the day after learning she would have to share custody of Elijah, Rivas killed the child.

According to Grasso, Rivas was about to pick up her son from his baby sitters home around noon on Sept. 10 when she decided to kill him. Grasso said Rivas told police I had to put him down for his own protection.

Grasso said Rivas poured herself a drink, and filled the tub in an upstairs bathroom as the toddler ran around in his diaper. She then put him in the tub and held his face down. But he was a sturdy little guy, who fought, who struggled, Grasso said.

Rivas thought Elijah was dead, but he regained consciousness.

And instead of feeling that remorse  she called Mr. Concha to continue the fight, Grasso said.

After they hung up, out of anger, out of spite, out of revenge, she got the baby a second time and immersed him in the tub until she killed him, Grasso said. Revenge, spite, thats all it was.

Rivas did not make a statement during the hearing. Last month, public defense attorney, Daniel Segura said his client was tremendously remorseful. When she was arrested two years ago, her arraignment was delayed as she was on suicide watch.

Her family attended Fridays hearing, but did not comment.

Rivas must serve 21 years  she has already served two as she waiting for trial  before she is eligible for parole.

Concha said the stuffed toy is the only item of his sons that he has. The sergeant, who is from New York, said he hopes to permanently remain in California for one reason: My son is buried here.

teri.figueroa@sduniontribune.com

Twitter: @TeriFigueroaUT
Several bottles of alcohol were found in the car of a teenage DUI suspect who ran a red light and crashed into a California Highway Patrol vehicle in Lakeside early Friday, the CHP said.

The officers were treated for minor injuries and bruises at a hospital, then released, the CHP said.

The other driver and her three under-age passengers complained of pain and also were treated a hospitals, CHP Officer Kevin Pearlstein said.

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A sergeant and an officer were in their black and white SUV, heading south on Los Coches Road at 1 a.m. As they entered the intersection with Julian Road on a green light, a Hyundai Accent heading west ran the red light, the CHP said.

The cars collided, causing major damage to the smaller cars passenger side.

Witnesses told officers the Accent was speeding erratically down the road before the collision, CHP Officer Brian Pennings said.

The Accents driver, a 19-year-old San Diego woman, was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence causing injuries. She was booked into jail after her release from the hospital, Pearlstein said.

Officers found several liquor bottles in the Accent, along with drug paraphernalia, the CHP said.

Pearlstein said the three female passengers, ages 18 to 20, were not tested for blood-alcohol levels. He said it is illegal for anyone under 21 to have alcohol in their car.
A controversial arrest at San Diego State University was captured on camera and posted on social media Thursday, prompting a response from the universitys police chief and president.

In the video, which was shared on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook, SDSU police officers force a black individual to the ground near the student union in an effort to detain him.

The suspect was later booked into jail on suspicion of being under the influence of a controlled substance and resisting arrest, university officials said.

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In response to the arrest, students held a silent protest outside the universitys Manchester Hall, which houses the presidents office.

In an email to students and faculty, President Elliot Hirshman said: The use of force in an arrest is a significant matter and we understand the concerns members of our community have expressed about the arrest.

He said SDSU police officials would investigate the incident, including a use-of-force expert.

SDSU police Interim Chief Josh Mays told student that the suspect, who was unhurt, was booked into San Diego County Jail on suspicion of being under the influence of a controlled substance and resisting arrest. University officials said he is not a student.

Police had received two calls about the man about 12:45 p.m., Mays said. One person said the suspect appeared to be under the influence of narcotics. Another said the man jumped a construction fence near the universitys open-air theater.

Campus officers contacted the suspect in front of a Starbucks at the Conrad Prebys Aztec Student Union. Mays said officers noticed symptoms indicating the individual was under the influence of a controlled substances and decided to arrest him.

Officers tried to handcuff him, and a struggle ensued.

Mays, who said he had not seen video of the arrest, told students the video is a very important piece, but its also one piece of the overall information.

Twitter: @D4VIDHernandez
An 18-year-old woman from San Diego was fatally shot in the face and upper body in Tijuana last week, authorities in Baja California said.

Someone found the body of Desteny Hernandez in the early hours of Sept. 8 along Tijuanas Via Rapida, a busy highway, said a spokeswoman for the Baja California Attorney Generals Office.

She didnt offer other details surrounding the killing.

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Family and friends reported Hernandez missing online sometime that day, the Baja California Attorney Generals Office said Thursday.

Earlier this week, the family was notified of the corpse that was recovered, and relatives later identified the body as Hernandez.

The young woman was remembered on a GoFundMe page as a loving, caring and outgoing person.

She was full of laughs and was always smiling, someone wrote on the page.

The spokeswoman for the Baja California Attorney Generals Office said Hernandez was known to frequent Tijuanas nightclubs.

According to Mexican media reports, Hernandez went out to Tijuanas popular bar Le Container, in the Zona Rio neighborhood on Sept. 7. She met a group of men that night and went to one of their homes in an area known as El Florido. In her last text to a friend, at 1:07 a.m. the following morning, Hernandez said she was about to leave them because she was tired and they were acting irritated, according to reports.

Mexican homicide investigators are investigating the death.

Twitter: @D4VIDHernandez
Two former executives of a foreign defense contractor have been charged in San Diego federal court with participating in a yearslong scheme to defraud the Navy, prosecutors said Thursday.

Neil Peterson, 38, and Linda Raja, 43, both of Singapore, worked as chief deputies for Malaysian businessman Leonard Glenn Fat Leonard Francis, owner of Glenn Defense Marine Asia.

The company performed ship servicing work for Navy vessels in ports across Southeast Asia.

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Francis is at the center of the expanding corruption scheme in which he bribed officers and civilians with cash, gifts and prostitutes. Those who accepted the bribes then helped Francis get Navy ships assigned to call at ports he controlled.

Francis overbilled the Navy for services including sewage disposal and ground transport, prosecutors said.

He pleaded guilty to charges in U.S. District Court and will have to pay $35 million in restitution.

The U.S. Attorneys Office has said Peterson was the contractors vice president for global operations and Raja served as general manager for Singapore, Australia and the Pacific Islands. They are accused of submitting fraudulent claims of more than $5 million to the Navy, then working to cover up the fraud by misrepresenting the cost of providing services to ships in Asia.

According to the indictment, unsealed Wednesday, the pair submitted false price quotes from non-existent companies on letterhead that was created from graphics lifted from the internet.

Peterson and Raja each face one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States with respect to claims, one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and several counts of making false claims.

They are under arrest and are being held in Singapore, awaiting extradition to the United States, prosecutors said.

In total, 16 people have been charged in connection with the Glenn Defense Marine Asia corruption and fraud investigation. Of those, 11 are current or former Navy officials.

Several defendants have pleaded guilty to federal charges and have been sentenced to prison. Others, including Francis, await sentencing.

Cases filed against five defendants, including Peterson and Raja, are still pending.

Twitter: @danalittlefield
On Wednesday at Camp Pendleton, Marine veterans of the Korean War marked the 66th anniversary of the Inchon Landing, the risky amphibious invasion on Sept. 15, 1950, that turned the tide of the then-fledgling war.

More than 200 Korean War veterans and their families, Korean consulate officials and a dozen or so active-duty Marines, gathered for the 23rd annual Inchon celebration hosted by the Marine House Association USA, a Los Angeles-based veterans support organization.

The afternoon event featured speeches, war-related films and a Korean dance performance, as well as the award of special appreciation medals to nearly 70 Korean War vets, all in their 80s and 90s. A medal was also awarded posthumously to Lt. Gen. Raymond Murray, who died in 2004. The Encinitas resident  whose widow, Zona, accepted the medal  was one of the Korean Wars most-decorated heroes.

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The association commissioned the gold star-shaped awards from the Korean government. The medals were created from barbed wire and brass cartridge cases from the nations Demilitarized Zone with North Korea, strung on a red ribbon printed with the flags of the 21 nations who fought in the war.

Among the medal recipients was San Diego native Robert Bob Weishan, 86, who joined the Marines just out of high school in 1948. He was 20-year-old corporal when he boarded an amphibious landing craft for the Inchon invasion. Hed seen newsreels of D-Day and Guadalcanal during World War II, but nothing prepared him for experiencing it in person.

It was fascinating and a little bit terrifying, said Weishan, an El Cajon resident. Some people were calling it the Korean conflict, but when someones shooting at you, its a war.

Ken Dower, 89, of Ramona, didnt land on the beach until a day after Weishan. He was a 23-year-old intelligence specialist aboard the ship that Gen. Douglas MacArthur used to plan and oversee the Inchon Landing. The mission was so risky, Dower said he was surprised it was not only a success but that so few lives were lost.

Dower said many military experts thought the Inchon Landing might fail. The military was working with limited information on North Korean troop positions, tricky tidal conditions could have left Marines stranded on mud flats far from Blue Beach, and somehow, a high tide wall had to be crossed to reach the mainland.

But the successful five-day Battle of Inchon broke the supply lines of the invading North Korean army and allowed the South Korean military to reclaim its capital city of Seoul. It also proved the mettle of the Camp Pendleton-based 1st Marine Division, said Col. Christopher Gideons, commander of the bases 1st Marine Regiment.

Deactivated after World War II, the division was hurriedly re-established on Aug. 4, 1950, after North Korean forces crossed the 38th parallel into what is now the Republic of South Korea. Just 45 days later, division Marines were scaling handmade ladders over the Inchon seawall. That victory was so quick and decisive, the word Inchon has been part of the divisions call sign ever since, Gideons said.

They showed how the Marine Corps (tries) to be the most ready when the nation is the least ready, Gideons said. Those Marines showed how, in spite of a lack of training, they believed in themselves, they believed in the mission and they believed in each other. Thats how deep the band of brotherhood runs in the Marine Corps.

The Marine House Association was founded 1984 by Yong Chu Park. As a young man, he served in the Republic of Koreas Marine Corps, was wounded fighting for the U.S. in Vietnam and settled in California in 1975. Park said he started the association to express his gratitude to the U.S. Marines and to forge an enduring friendship between the two countries.

Besides hosting annual luncheons, Park paid for the medals given out Wednesday and has commissioned monuments in Korea for U.S. service members killed in the war. And each year he underwrites the cost to send up 10 Marine war veterans back to Korea for a week-long sightseeing trip.

Dower took one of those trips three years ago and said he was astonished at how the Republic of South Korea has grown economically since the war. He was also honored by how grateful its citizens remain today to their U.S. liberators.

The afternoons most emotional speaker was former Camp Pendleton commander Maj. Gen. Robert Haebel, 89, who earned a Bronze Star in Korea and retired in 1987 after 42 years in the Marine Corps. Speaking through tears, he said that the Marines who died in Korea and the veterans who have since passed away would agree it was worth the fight.

Korea is a great country, a country worth fighting for and worth dying for, he said. They are an unbelievable people.

pam.kragen@sduniontribune.com Twitter: @pamkragen

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pam.kragen@sduniontribune.com. Twitter: @pamkragen
South County voters in November will choose from a field of five candidates who are vying for the Southwestern College governing board seat Humberto Peraza has held since 2011. Peraza announced last year he would not seek re-election.

The race features a few familiar faces. The candidates are:

Roberto Alcantar, 29, works as the district director for state Sen. Marty Block, who serves the central San Diego 39th Senate District. Alcantar graduated from Southwest High School and attended Southwestern College. He holds a political science degree from UC Berkeley.

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Lander Iriarte, 34, whose background is in finance, holds a sociology degree from Princeton University and a masters in business administration from Rollins College. A longtime resident, he went to Chula Vista Hills Elementary, Bonita Vista Middle School and Bonita Vista High School. He is studying farming practices at Wild Willow Farm.

William Bud McLeroy, 56, is an Army and Marine Corps veteran who served more than 30 years in the military, and was a federal firefighter. He retired as an Army command sergeant major in 2014. McLeroy lost his right leg below the knee in 1993 as the result of an off-road racing accident, and went on to become the first amputee to serve in the Iraq War.

Casey Tanaka, 40, whose last term as the mayor of Coronado is up this year, has served in that post since 2008. He has taught U.S. history and government at Coronado High School for nearly two decades, and holds a degree in history from UC San Diego.

Lei-Chala Wilson, 57, is the legal adviser to the San Diego Black Police Officers Association. Wilson is the past president of the San Diego branch of the NAACP, and was appointed legal adviser to the board of the SDBPOA last year. She holds an economics degree from San Diego State University and doctorate of law from UC Davis.

The governing board sets the districts policies, oversees its finances and makes decisions about upcoming bond projects. The district has made major renovations and upgrades in recent years paid for with funds from Proposition R, the $398 million bond measure approved by voters in 2008. It has a new bond initiative on this years ballot for voters to consider  the $400 million Measure Z.

District officials say the bond money will be used to repair and upgrade the colleges infrastructure and technology, and create job training and transfer opportunities for students and veterans. It would also be used to complete a Performing Arts and Cultural Center.

Southwestern serves about 19,000 students at its Chula Vista campus and higher-education centers in San Ysidro, Otay Mesa and National City. Its budget for the 2016-17 school year is about $115 million.

The seat is one of two open on the governing board. Trustee Griselda Delgado, first elected in 2014, is not facing any opposition on the ballot. Delgado works in the Sweetwater Union High School District, serving as principal of Hilltop Middle School.

The election is Nov. 8.

Follow me @HuardSDUT
PLATTSMOUTH  Plattsmouth High School students will be able to use new tools for their college searches thanks to a grant from a Nebraska-based foundation.

EducationQuest Foundation announced this week that Plattsmouth will be one of 28 Nebraska high schools that will receive an EducationQuest Foundation College Access Grant. PHS will receive $7,500 in each of the next four years.

The grant program will help PHS fund a variety of activities for the college preparation process. This includes financial aid sessions with students and parents, visits to college campuses and additional resources for scholarship searches. The money will also help students explore different types of careers, complete a larger number of college application forms and take American College Testing (ACT) prep courses.

EducationQuest Foundation awards College Access Grants to Nebraska high schools every two years. The organization will award $840,000 in grant funds to the 28 selected schools this year. EducationQuest Foundation determines the amounts for each grant based on each high schools enrollment. Plattsmouths current enrollment is 549 students.

EducationQuest Foundation officials said they are providing grants to help increase the number of Nebraska students who go to college. All 28 grant-winning high schools have set goals to increase their number of college attendees by approximately 10 percent over the next four years.
Donald Trump, who for years has stoked unfounded conspiracies about President Barack Obamas birthplace, said Friday that he is now convinced the president is an American-born citizen.

President Barack Obama was born in the United States. Period. Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again, he said, then walked off stage at the Trump International Hotel after a 30-minute event consisting mostly of praise for him from veterans and Medal of Honor recipients.

He also incorrectly blamed Hillary Clinton for fueling the birther controversy. No evidence exists that Clinton or her 2008 campaign team, when she ran against Obama in a prolonged fight for the Democratic nomination, did so.

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Trump was under increasing pressure to distance himself from the controversy, which helped fuel his rise but also aligned him with white nationalists and alienated many mainstream voters. Trump refused to concede that Obama was a natural-born American as recently as Thursday, and was actively promoting the theory as recently as 2014.

But in his terse statement Friday, Trump did not apologize for the years he spent inflaming the issue or explain how or when he came to change his mind. Instead, he made his statement and abruptly left to take photographers on a tour of his new hotel, ignoring reporters questions after claiming credit for resolving the problem.

What a liar, Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, the top Democrat in the Senate, said in a CNN interview shortly after Trumps announcement. He is just such a phony.

The staging of his announcement, like so much of the campaign, was unusually promotional for such a serious issue. Trump gave the statement in the Presidential Ballroom, a gold and neon-accented venue with several hanging chandeliers in new hotel blocks from the White House, and said on Fox Business News earlier in the day that he did not yet want to answer a question about Obamas birthplace because he wanted to keep the suspense going.

Nice hotel! Trump exclaimed, taking the stage.

Trump was the most prominent person to promote the fringe view that Obama was not born in the U.S., which has been repeatedly debunked. In 2012, Trump offered to donate $5 million if Obama would produce records related to his citizenship. Long after others had stopped pressing the case, Trump continued.

The president should come clean, Trump said on Irish television in 2014, a clip unearthed by BuzzFeed late Thursday, refusing to accept that Obamas Hawaii birth certificate was genuine proof. A lot of people feel it wasnt a proper certificate.

Clinton, speaking just before Trump to an African-American womens group in Washington, accused Trump of feeding the worst impulses of bigotry with his campaign.

We know who Donald is. For five years he has led the birther movement to delegitimize the first black president, she said. His campaign was founded on this lie. There is no erasing it in history.

Obama, speaking from the Oval Office on Friday morning, appeared disdainful.

I was pretty confident about where I was born, he said. I think most people were as well, and I would hope that a presidential election reflects more serious issues.

Protesters rallied outside Trumps hotel, joined by Rep. Donna Edwards, D-Md., who said Trump needs to end his birtherism campaign.

Its time for him to stop delegitimizing this president, she said.

Mascaro and Bierman write for the California News Group, publisher of the Union-Tribune and L.A. Times.
An attempt by lawyers for Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump to delay until Jan. 2 a trial over whether his Trump University defrauded customers was denied Thursday.

In court papers, lawyer Daniel Petrocelli said he had a conflict with another trial set to take place in Los Angeles. It should finish just before the scheduled Nov. 28 start date for the Trump University trial in San Diego.

That wouldnt allow him enough time to prepare for the Trump University case, Petrocelli said. A request to delay the Los Angeles trial was turned down by the judge in that case.

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In the San Diego case, lawyers for the plaintiffs, who say they were defrauded by claims that Trump University would teach them real estate secrets, opposed the move to continue their trial. They said the trial date was set earlier this year by U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel, with agreement by both sides. They also said if Trump is elected, the trial would be delayed indefinitely given the unprecedented issues of a sitting president being a defendant in a civil class-action fraud case.

The judge, who Trump has attacked as unfair because of his Mexican heritage, initially selected the Nov. 28 date because he wanted to do the trial after the Nov. 8 election and before the January presidential inauguration.

Curiel stuck with that decision on Thursday. In issuing his order, he also scheduled a Nov. 10 hearing to discuss jury instructions. The case was filed in 2010.

Plaintiffs contend they were duped into paying thousands of dollars for Trump University courses believing that Trump would pass along his real estate secrets. Instead, they contend, they got little value from the seminars.

Trumps lawyers have said he was involved in drawing up the concept for the university and the materials, but the businessman left it to subordinate executives to implement the plans.

Editors note: This story has been updated to reflect that the judge on Thursday denied the request by Donald Trumps lawyers for a delay in the trial.

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Twitter: @gregmoran

greg.moran@sduniontribune.com
Between 200 and 300 Poway High School students gathered Thursday night to remember classmate Blake Casale, 17, who died Sept. 9.

The somber candlelight vigil began in front of the Poway Center for the Performing Arts. From there, students silently walked in a procession to the rear of the school, and for more than an hour then took turns telling stories about Blake and saying what he meant to them.

Sheriffs investigators are trying to determine how the senior and past member of the wrestling team died suddenly.

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Authorities were called around 8 p.m. Sept. 9 to a home on Orchard Gate Road where Blake was found unconscious. Investigators said he was reported to have been acting strangely, and was having trouble breathing when firefighters and deputies got to the home. He was pronounced dead soon after.

jharry.jones@sduniontribune.com; 760/529-4931; Twitter: @jharryjones
A proposal to build more homes on Oceansides El Corazon property than was previously planned is getting stiff opposition from community advocates and some city leaders.

The 465-acre El Corazon property, a former sand mine in central Oceanside, is expected to be developed into a park along with some retail space and housing to help pay for the cost of its maintenance.

The property, between El Camino Real and Rancho Del Oro Drive, is bordered by Oceanside Boulevard to the south and Mesa Drive to the north.

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After years of study, the city adopted a plan in 2009 that calls for a total of 300 housing units to be built at the site.

Earlier this week, developer Shopoff Land Fund presented a plan to the citys Planning Commission for a mixed-use project, called the Park Villas at El Corazon, that would include 70 townhomes and 3,000 square feet of retail space on a 4.8-acre lot that was supposed to have no more than 32 housing units.

The Planning Commission deadlocked 3-3 on the proposal. The tie means the project wasnt recommended for approval and will have to be decided by the City Council.

Brian Rupp, senior vice president of development for Shopoff, said the project would provide much needed housing in Oceanside and would help support nearby businesses. But community activists, some of whom helped develop the El Corazon master plan, said the city should not permit more units on the property than allowed.

Diane Nygaard, president of Friends of El Corazon, said the community originally wanted no housing on the land but compromised by agreeing to 300 units.

Its a vision that took many people many years to come up with, Nygaard said. Its important for all of us to make sure that we get this right. This project requires a major amendment more than doubling the number of units allowed on this parcel.

Planning Commissioner Thomas Morrissey, who voted in favor of the project, said it would benefit the city to have more new housing close to the Sprinter rail station on Rancho Del Oro Drive, just south of Oceanside Boulevard.

I think its a win-win, Morrissey said. Its what California is trying to do putting high density (housing) in areas where theres public transportation and thats what this does.

Commissioner Curtis Busk said he liked the project, but not at El Corazon.

Its a great looking project. Unfortunately, its not in the right spot, Busk said. Its not even close to the specific plan.

The tie vote at the Planning Commission was due in part to Commissioner Colleen Balchs absence. The panel could have tabled the project for another meeting but Commissioner Claudia Triosi said she would be on vacation the following meeting.

Rupp said he preferred that the panel forward the matter to the City Council as soon as possible.

The council will likely split on the project also because Council members Esther Sanchez and Jerry Kern, who attended the meeting, disagreed on whether it should be approved.

Kern said he favored the project because the region needs more housing, especially if the city wants to attract more businesses. Sanchez said she believed the housing project would actually cost the city more money in service than it would generate in tax revenue and that other housing projects are already under way.

edward.sifuentes@sduniontribune.com

@EdwardSifuentes
An iconic telescope store in downtown Oceanside has changed hands for the second time in its nearly 70-year history, and its new owners say they see a bright future for the business.

Dustin and Ginny Gibson bought Oceanside Photo & Telescope this month from longtime owner Craig Weatherwax. The shop has a worldwide following and in North County its something of a landmark, in part because of the large telescope perched on its roof.

The store opened in 1947 on Coast Highway, then called Hill Street, and later moved to its current home at the corner of Horne Street and Mission Avenue, just west of Interstate 5.

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Weatherwax had owned it since 1974.

The Gibsons, both avid astrophotographers, were customers and then employees who fell in love with the business. When they learned Weatherwax was looking to retire and sell the store, they jumped at the chance to pursue their passion.

When youre looking at the telescope industry, sure its retail, but youre giving people perspective, Ginny Gibson, 27, said. I cannot tell you how many star (viewing) parties weve been to and kids are just blown away at seeing the moon or Saturn (through a telescope) for the first time. So for us, its very cool that we get to share that.

The company caters to everyone from amateur astronomers and photographers to some of the most recognizable names in the space and technology industries. Besides selling cameras and telescopes, the company also custom designs advanced imaging systems for universities and governmental agency clients, including NASA.

The Gibsons, who are natives of Nashville, Tenn., gave up careers in the health fitness industry to pursue astronomy. They started working for Weatherwax about nine months ago and became owners on Sept. 1.

One of the main reasons the couple decided to buy the store was its 25 expert employees, said Dustin Gibson, 30.

These are the people that (NASA, JPL and MIT) are calling for help, to purchase optical equipment, he said. Being around a staff like that, were working with some of the smartest people weve ever known.

Weatherwax said hes confident in the new owners and will be around to help out when necessary.

In the Gibsons, we have found a couple with the passion, desire and work ethic to carry on the legacy of OPT, he said.

When Weatherwax purchased the business, it was a simple camera store near failing and would have probably disappeared by now if it wasnt for a near accidental encounter.

A salesman for the Celestron telescope company walked into the store in 1980 and asked about selling his product line, said Mike West, who greeted the salesman then and still works at the store all these years later.

One day a salesman walks in and I was familiar with the telescopes he was selling and sort of always wanted one, West said. So, I got excited about it and we got the boss excited and he saw the potential in it.

Telescopes now make up the bulk of the stores sales.

Oh, yeah, we wouldnt be here without them, West said.

The store also started reaching a wider customer base after launching a website in 1999. The website, which started as a simple listing of products, is now its main source of sales.

The stores showroom is packed with telescopes of all shapes and sizes and the walls are lined with digital cameras and photo equipment but the heart of the operation is in the back, where most of its products are stocked on nondescript shelves.

Most people buy online, Dustin Gibson said. But there are people coming to the beach, they have no idea this is here and they see it and say, Wow, weve got to check it out. And then there are the people who come on trips across the country to come in.

The Gibsons said they have plans to improve the business using social media and special events to get more people excited about their passion, including partnering with local breweries for viewing parties and schools for science educational programs.

Imagine that you took a picture and in that picture you have a galaxy with 200 billion suns and the majority of those have planets ...Its an amazing experience that you cant get anywhere else outside of astrophotography, Dustin Gibson said. I cant imagine anything that we ever do being on such a grand scale.

edward.sifuentes@sduniontribune.com

@EdwardSifuentes
Four Chula Vista City Council candidates went head to head answering a barrage of questions during a recent forum at Southwestern College.

For the first time in the citys history, the candidates who win their races Nov. 8 will represent a geographic area rather than an at-large seat  a change voters made in 2012.

Beginning this year, those running to represent Districts 3 and 4 must live in their respective districts and will be elected by voters also residing in that area.

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At Mayan Hall on the colleges campus Sept. 8, candidates were asked about 20 questions, with one minute to respond to each. Each candidate was also given one minute for an introduction and one minute for closing remarks.

District 3 candidates Steve Padilla and Jason Paguio took the first questions.

Nothing makes me more proud than to call Chula Vista my home, Paguio said. We have a bright future ahead of us but only if we have the right leadership and thats why Im running for the District 3 seat in Chula Vista.

Question: A number of homeless are burdened by unaddressed mental issues. What actions would you take to help those with mental health challenges in the city?

Padilla: You cant just enforce your way out of a homeless problem, you have to understand what causes mental illness. And getting people directly connected to the right resources is the first step. That takes coordination and collaboration and working together to not just implement what youre doing, but secure funding to do it.

Paguio: We need to be effective at seeking out those who are in need of help or down on their luck and work with regional support services to ensure they get what they need ... The second thing is, we need to be more proactive with law enforcement to find proactive ways to address homeless issues.

Question: Do you support the reinstatement of the Tourism and Marketing District?

Paguio: Ive see the success of tourism and marketing districtsI think its a great opportunity to showcase our assets  the Olympic Training Center, SeaWorld Aquatica and  youth sports. I think its in the best interest of businesses and our community.

Padilla: I think the TMD can be a tool ... we ought to work with the chamber and every organization that might play a role in administering the district. But the bottom line is, it has to be structured and yield results.

Question: What is your position on the proposed Chula Vista sales tax increase, and how would you prioritize city spending if its approved?

Padilla: I support it in that we have a short-term unfunded liability for infrastructure in this community. We have a shortfall that we have to meet, and the longer we wait to address some gaps in the infrastructure, the more its going to cost our taxpayers.

Paguio: I personally opposed the sales tax because its a general sales tax and a lot of the revenue can be spent on pensions instead of improving our neighborhoods... We need to be careful with the money that we already take in and be responsible.

Mike Diaz and Rudy Ramirez are competing for the District 4 seat.

Diaz, 58, is a retired Escondido firefighter and fire technology teacher at Sweetwater High.

Im running for this position because its where I have lived most of my life, Ramirez said. Southwest Chula Vista is an area that needs a lot work. I have served it for 45 years in many capacities.

Question: What actions would you take to better address and support the homeless population of Chula Vista?

Ramirez: Its a two-part plan  one addresses the humanitarian needs of people, and the second part is addressing the impacts to the community with a homeless population. I see homelessness as a public health issue and not necessarily as always a law enforcement issue.

Diaz: Homelessness is a big issue and I think what we need to do is work on the mental health side, that is a huge problem with that population. We also need to start working on housingwhat I would do is look to collaborate...

Question: Do you favor building dense and tall multifamily homes near mass transit?

Diaz: Yes, generally speaking, but we need to be careful with where we are doing that. In some communities you want to maintain the character of the community...

Ramirez: Yes, some density in the right place in transit corridors, around trolley stations is an appropriate place to build additional density Its another way to address to affordability issue.

Question: Do you support the proposed Chula Vista sales tax increase?

Diaz: Im on record for opposing that. I think Chula Vista right now, we do need money but I dont know that its a funding issue that we have, I think its more of a spending issue.

Ramirez: I dont support the sales tax increase, not because we dont need funding for infrastructure  but its a regressive tax, its going to make our retail less competitive. We need competitive retail.

Ive lived in Chula Vista for 50 years, Diaz said. Ive raised my family here and got married in Chula Vista. My goal is to bring representation back to City Hall and work for the people of the southwest community.

Ramirez, 55, is a former Chula Vista councilman and small-business owner.

Padilla, 49, is a principal at Aquarius Group Inc. He is a former Chula Vista mayor, a former California Coastal Commissioner and was also a port commissioner representing Chula Vista.

Im seeking a seat on the council and return to public service because of the love and commitment I have to this community, Padilla said. This is where I grew up, this is where Ive skinned my knees and learned the lessons of life.

Paguio, 30, is a small-business owner and policy adviser to Councilman Steve Miesen.

allison.sampite-montecalvo@

sduniontribune.com

(619) 293-1394

@allisonsdut
IMPERIAL BEACH

A transportation assembly bill that recently passed in the state legislature could give Imperial Beach local control of its portion of State Route 75, a main thoroughfare into the small beach town.



For the record: An earlier version of this story stated that Congress passed AB 1500, in fact it was the state legislature.

Also known as Palm Avenue, it connects the Silver Strand and Coronado.

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Assembly Bill 1500, passed by the house and senate last month, was introduced by Assemblywoman Toni Atkins and co-authored by Assemblyman Brian Maienschein in February 2015.

It would change the streets and highways code to require Caltrans to give respective local jurisdiction of Palm Avenue to city government under certain conditions, in this case Imperial Beach and San Diego.

The bill passing was the first major hurdle, said Imperial Beach City Manger Andy Hall. Its big for the city because we could move forward and implement improvements in the Palm Avenue Master Plan and we dont have to get encroachment permits we can do it ourselves.

Existing law gives the Department of Transportation full possession and control of all state highways and establishes the process for highway adoption on a route OKd by the California Transportation Commission.

It also authorizes the commission to relinquish to local agencies state highway segments that have been deleted from the state highway system via legislation.

Right now if we want to build a new project like a restaurant or gas station along SR 75 we have to get an encroachment permit from Caltrans, they can be costly and time consuming, he said. As a city process we could turn that around in a matter of weeks and the city would cover our costs and encourage the developer to do a nicer project because we wouldnt be spending so much money on an encroachment permit.

Although the state legislature giving the bill a thumbs up is a big deal it must get the seal of approval from the California Transportation Commission, expected to happen sometime this fall.

Once approved by the Commission, Hall said city staff members would create a cost benefit analysisessentially a list of pros and cons to taking on jurisdiction of the road to present to the City Council.

Hall said benefits include the city saving money on encroachment permits.

Other advantages he said include landscaping, crosswalks, signal synchronization and lighting, things not consistent with Caltrans standards.

However, there are potential cons.

Its the citys responsibility to maintain the road...now we patrol the roadaccidents are within our jurisdiction, wed have to investigate them, Hall said. This, he said could take more manpower and require more hires in public safety.
San Diego police and transportation officials are not doing enough to protect pedestrians from being injured and killed, a lack of attention to detail and data that is contributing to a rising number of fatalities, a city audit has found.

Auditors said 270 people died on San Diego streets over the past 15 years, and the frequency is climbing.

The three-year period between 2013 and 2015, when 66 pedestrians lost their lives, was the deadliest since 2001, according to the report released Thursday.

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During that time, more pedestrians were killed than any other type of roadway user, the audit said.

The 116-page report said police do not enforce traffic laws in ways that would help reduce injuries and fatalities.

At the same time, transportation officials working to upgrade intersections and increase pedestrian safety too often make such improvements at traffic signals that do not generate the most accidents and injuries, the audit said.

Other cities with substantial pedestrian-safety infrastructure needs have used data to identify and proactively improve the most hazardous locations for pedestrians, the report found.

The audit included 18 specific recommendations. Among other things, the proposed changes call for incorporating historical data into enforcement operations, upgrading traffic signals, improving training and raising public awareness of pedestrian dangers.

The public information campaign should include a core message that can be customized to fit different neighborhood needs, the audit said.

Nationally, San Diegos pedestrian fatality rate was tied for 10th place with Los Angeles, among large cities, according to a 2014 report by the National Complete Streets Coalition.

The group found San Diego and Los Angeles had a rate of 1.79 pedestrian deaths per 100,000 population, compared to 2.97 in Tampa, Fla., on the high end and 0.72 in Minneapolis, on the low end.

San Diego city officials agreed to all 18 recommendations from the auditor. In a formal response to the audit, Assistant Chief Operating Officer Stacey LoMedico said the police and transportation departments would make the recommended changes over the next six months.

The Transportation and Storm Water Department will use available crash data over five years to develop a methodology for identifying locations that pose the greatest risk to pedestrians, LoMedico wrote.

Pedestrian safety has been an increasing concern as the number of accidents continues to rise.

On Sunday night, a 48-year-old woman was killed by a hit-and-run driver while walking along Linda Vista Road near Mesa College. Hours before the auditors report was issued Thursday, police said a teenager was struck near Mira Mesa High School.

Kathleen Ferrier of Circulate San Diego, a nonprofit group that works to make neighborhoods more bike- and pedestrian-friendly, said the recommendations put forward in the audit mirror a list of suggestions her organization promoted in June 2015.

Our streets should be safe no matter where we go or how we get there, Ferrier said. The report shows that pedestrians are especially vulnerable. The data is alarming.

City officials have been aware of the problem for some time.

Last year, city officials adopted a program called Vision Zero, a plan to eliminate traffic deaths and serious injuries by 2025. To meet those objectives, the plan calls for action involving engineering, enforcement and education.

The Mayor included $23 million in this years budget for Vision Zero projects, including new and improved bicycle facilities, sidewalks, lighting, medians and traffic signals, city spokeswoman Katie Keach said in a statement for this story. Moving forward with the recommendations in the audit report will ensure additional progress on this critical issue.

Ferrier said she hopes the audit prompts city officials to act more quickly to meet the objectives that were outlined more than a year ago.

Its more important to implement Vision Zero now than ever before, she said. Its a proven strategy that works. San Diego is one of 15 cities across the country that are purported to have committed to implementing Vision Zero, but quite frankly other cities are doing more.

San Diego police issue more than 100,000 tickets a year to drivers who commit Vehicle Code violations that can endanger pedestrians, the audit noted. Last year, they also conducted 70 drunk-driving saturation patrols, 50 DUI checkpoints and two dozen targeted enforcement efforts for bicycle and pedestrian safety.

Auditors said police should rely on their own statistics to help improve traffic enforcement in neighborhoods that are historically more dangerous for pedestrians.

SDPD does not generally use data to determine where to conduct targeted pedestrian safety enforcement operations and what traffic violations to focus on during those enforcements, the audit said. As a result, SDPDs targeted pedestrian safety enforcement operations may not be directed towards the locations at which additional enforcement is most needed and for the violations that have caused pedestrian collisions in those locations.

LoMedico said police can apply some of the same practices they use to combat more serious crime to traffic enforcement, and will do so by early next year.

The SDPD regularly uses data to determine criminal activity trends and assist with policing efforts, she wrote. These same strategies can be used to address traffic-related issues.

The audit said transportation officials could also improve public safety by better prioritizing improvements to San Diegos 1,600 intersections governed by traffic lights.

City crews improved or plan to improve more than 200 of those traffic signals in recent years, but too often the upgrades were made at street corners that were not the scene of repeat accidents, the audit said.

For example, 10 pedestrian collisions were reported at the intersection of University and Marlborough avenues in City Heights between 2001 and 2010, and 12 people were injured, the audit said. It was the second-highest pedestrian accident rate in the city.

We found the intersection of University Avenue and Marlborough Avenue had not received any of the improvements we surveyed for, and between 2011 and 2015, it continued to have one of the highest pedestrian collision rates in the city, the report said.

Six more people were injured in six separate accidents at the City Heights intersection between 2011 and 2015, the auditors said.

Of the 207 signalized intersections where improvements were made since 2010 or are planned, 49 percent experienced two or less pedestrian accidents in the previous 10 years, and 18 percent had no accidents at all, the report showed.

The transportation department has the expertise and resources to develop a basic methodology, utilizing existing collision data, to identify locations that have experienced the highest pedestrian collision rates, the audit said.

Some of the recommendations listed in the audit will be implemented as soon as next month. Others are expected to be put in place by March 2017.

jeff.mcdonald@sduniontribune.com (619) 293-1708 @sdutMcDonald
Gov. Jerry Browns response to factual criticism of his favorite November ballot measure  Proposition 57  isnt helping its cause.

In its original incarnation, what became Proposition 57 was a simple measure to reverse language included in a 2000 ballot measure that gave prosecutors, not judges, the authority to decide whether to try teenagers as adults.

But with the blessing of Attorney General Kamala Harris, which a Sacramento County Superior Court judge later equated to Harris abusing her discretion, Brown rewrote the measure as a much broader reform: an amendment to the California Constitution making it easier for convicts the governor described as nonviolent felons to win parole and try to rebuild their lives. Critics called the revised initiative illegal because it wouldnt get scrutiny accorded prospective measures, and the Superior Court judge agreed. But in February, the state Supreme Court voted 6-1 to allow Brown to proceed with signature gathering for the measure.

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We think theres ample reason to question the courts decision. Thorough vetting of ballot initiatives is essential. But we share the governors concerns about an excessively punitive criminal justice system that warehouses thousands of prisoners without good reason. That needs to change.

Unfortunately, whether by haste, error or misjudgment, the measure on the Nov. 8 ballot doesnt only affect nonviolent felons. The measure doesnt define nonviolent crime so it would apply to felonies not classified violent in state law.

As members of the California District Attorneys Association documented in a June meeting with The San Diego Union-Tribune editorial board, Proposition 57 classifies a number of sex crimes as nonviolent  including rape of an unconscious person, the crime committed by former Stanford swimmer Brock Turner that led to a national uproar after he was given a light sentence. The uproar led to the passage of a state bill that would mandate a strong sentence for those guilty of such crimes.

Yet Brown and the Yes on 57 campaign continue to push the idea that the measure applies to those guilty of nonviolent crimes. The governor has also been sharply critical of those who point out hes not telling the full story, leaving a harsh voicemail last month for Fresno County Sheriff Margaret Mims and on Monday complaining to the Sacramento Bees editorial board that district attorneys were spreading propaganda about his measure.

The governor and Yes on 57 advocates say a key point that critics are missing is that corrections and parole officials can block the release of such convicts. But we think that Stanford law professor Michele Dauber made a powerful point in an Associated Press interview when she said diminishing the seriousness of such a crime underscores what triggered the uproar over Turners light sentence: how the legal system treats sexual assault and violence against women.

Jerry Brown needs to own up to his mistake.

Whats propaganda is asserting that sexually assaulting an unconscious person isnt violent. That bizarre and hateful claim must not be enshrined in the California Constitution.
LA PAZ, Bolivia (AP)  Bolivias government is proposing a law to punish illegal growers of coca with prison time.

Illegal cultivators of coca currently do not face prison time in Bolivia, a country where the plant used to make cocaine also has many traditional uses.

Vice Minister for Social Defense Felipe Caceres announced the legislation Friday while touring illegal coca crops in a remote area.

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Carceres said the proposal would be sent to the Legislative Assembly and it would carry a penalty of up to three years imprisonment for illegal coca cultivation.

Bolivian President Evo Morales is a former coca farmer who rose to power supporting legalization of the plant for traditional purposes. There are about 20,000 hectares (50,000 acres) of land in Bolivia where the plant can be grown legally.
TEHRAN, Iran (AP)  Iran began building its second nuclear power plant with Russian help on Saturday, the first such project since last years landmark nuclear deal with world powers.

The project in the southern port city of Bushehr will eventually include two power plants expected to go online in 10 years. Construction on the second plant is set to begin in 2018. The entire project will cost more than $8.5 billion, with each plant producing 1,057 megawatts of electricity.

Construction of the power plant is a symbol of Iran enjoying the results of the nuclear deal, Senior Vice-President Ishaq Jahangiri said at a ceremony marking the start of the project.

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We will continue working with Russia as a strategic partner and friend, he added.

Irans sole operational nuclear reactor, also built in Bushehr with Russian assistance, produces 1,000 megawatts. It went online in 2011, and the two countries have agreed to cooperate on future projects.

Iran has a current capacity of 75,000 megawatts, nearly 90 percent coming from fossil fuels. It hopes to generate 20,000 megawatts of electricity through nuclear power in the next 15 years.

Sergey Kiriyenko, the head of Russias atomic agency, told reporters the plants would be built according to high safety standards, particularly those defined after Fukushima, referring to the Japanese nuclear power plant that was badly damaged in the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.

Irans top nuclear official, Ali Akbar Salehi, said the project would be monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency and was in line with the Non-Proliferation Treaty. He called the project a new page in the trend of our peaceful industrial nuclear activities.

Western nations do not view the Bushehr plant as a proliferation risk because Russia supplies the fuel for the reactor and takes away spent fuel that could otherwise be used to make weapons-grade plutonium.

Russia, along the United States, Britain, France, Germany and China, reached a deal with Iran last year in which Tehran agreed to curb its nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions. Iran rejects Western allegations that it is covertly seeking nuclear weapons, insisting its atomic program is for entirely peaceful purposes.

___

Associated Press producer Mahdi Fattahi in Bushehr, Iran, contributed to this report.
VATICAN CITY (AP)  Pope Francis has prayed for victims of violent protests in the west African nation of Gabon, calling attention to what he described as a grave political crisis in the former French colony.

In remarks to the faithful in St. Peters Square, Francis on Sunday also encouraged the Gabonese people, particularly Catholics, to be builders of peace while respecting legality, dialogue and brotherhood.

Gabon was marked by violent protests after the results of an Aug. 27 presidential election were announced. The opposition candidate mounted a legal challenge, accusing the incumbent leader of fraud.

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The opposition says as many as 100 people have died in the protests, while the government has put the toll at three.

Francis says he supports an appeal by Gabons bishops for all sides to renounce violence.
Less than 50 miles away (as the crow flies) from Ambergris Caye is an area so different, that I almost felt like I was in a different country. And I almost was

Just on the border of Mexico and Belize, lies that village of Blue Creek. A town founded by Mennonite settlers over 50 years ago (who had left Chihuahua, Mexico to find land even more remote). The Mennonites have a long history of moving, looking for open land and governments that will leave them to their own way of life.

Its estimated that there are about 15,000 Mennonite citizens of Belize  and they vary, generally, from village to village with their practices. From the most strict, the Old Colony who speak Low Country German and use only horse and buggies for transportation (going as far as to put steel tires on their tractors) to a town like Blue Creek. Where many people are indistinguishable from the average visitor from the US or Canada.

Evening. Moonrise.

NIghtfall.

And sunrise.

But this is not a post about Mennonitesits about gorgeous farmland, a town with some very quirky features, about animals and meat, about how this one town provides an amazing amount of what we eat in Belize and about great beef.

YES. GREAT BEEF IN BELIZE.

Quirk #1: When we drove into town, I noticed that the river seemed to be dammed. So I asked

Apparently, in the 60s, a large cargo plane made an emergency landing at Belize City International Airport and sustained some damages. Because of the damages and the length of the runway at the time, the owner decided to sell the plane.

To a gentleman in Blue Creek. Who used engine parts to fashion a power generator  and he built a dam and ran lines to parts of the town. Power! That is still generated today.

The remains of the plane are set up on a hill and used as a storage shed.

On the one road into town, you pass a guard station.

No animals are allowed inthey must go into strict examination and quarantine. Blue Creek is the only area of Belize that is certified disease free for farm animals. We were about 40 minutes drive north of Orange Walk townthrough a few small villages and along the road by the old colony Mennonite town of Shipyard. Once through the gate, the road is beautiful, there is no litter at allgreen pastures. Much of that has to do with Quirk #2: Blue Creek Village is all private land. The roads are all built by the community and maintained by the community. Speed limits and traffic regulations of Belize dont apply here  they set their own.

I asked if they had ever considered running the country of Belize. Joking. Sorta. Wellnot really joking at all.

I headed over to Reinland Meats which is under new ownership for the past four years. Albert Reimer, the owner, is a man passionate about the beef and this land.

I really enjoyed spending time with himseeing his huge operation and asking about 1000 questions.

I first went through the processing plant. I am from suburban NJ and NYCmy knowledge of animal husbandry and meat production was pretty close to zero.

Wednesday is pig day. Friday is beef day  and while I was VERY interested in the operation, Im not sure I was ready for slaughter day. Here are the pigs chilling

And lovely smoked bacon.

And the meat, all packaged and vacuumed sealed in the freezer. Everything from sausage to rib eye steaks. Just about every single part of the animal is used in some way.

Everything is pretty much spotless.

But how do we get here? And why is Reinland, now served in higher end restaurants, sold in specialty shops and even made into the gorgeous burgers at Riverside Tavern in Belize City, considered the best in Belize?

Belize has always been a chicken country. In fact, Blue Creek is also the home to Caribbean Chicken which produces 30% or more of the chicken for Belize.

For years, the beef that was eaten (and still is) came from a can (potted meats) or was considered stew meat. Tough and requiring long periods of cooking. Grilling or roasting still is quite rare.

Mr Reimer wanted to change that. And with beef  that means focusing on two things.

Genetics. A black angus from Wyoming or a waygu from Argentina may produce gorgeous meat in those areas but in the tropics? Those steer are going to be miserable, sick and will find it hard to gain weight. Instead of eating, they will be suffering heat stroke under a tree

Reinland found that the Nelore breed, primarily from Brazil, works best.

Rations. Its not about the least cost food. Its about raising hearty, healthy animals and helping them gain weight.

Age is also important. In the US, the top 2%, is graded PRIME. Only young beef are graded prime. The next level is CHOICE. Reinland beef is young and would fall into the prime category.

All of this is taken into careful CAREFUL account at Reinland.

Reinland grows all their own feed to feed the cows and bulls from beginning to end.

We eat the bullsbut all of the animals are in the pastures on specially planted grass from the beginning. They live here with their moms for their first 8 months. At this point they already weigh 600 pounds.

They are then moved to the feed pen. Where they eat corn, hay, soy and molassesall non-GMO. GMO seeds are illegal in Belize.

All (but the molasses) are produced on the Reinland land. And its absolutely gorgeous. Soy for acres

Picture perfect corn.

Serious machinery is involved

Many silos

Even crop dustersBlue Creek flies all of the crop dusters for the whole country. The runway is HUGE and there are lots of small planes.

Which brings me to Quirk #3: Flying is a course that you can take in High School in Blue Creek. I watched one of the Flying Club planes practice overhead on Wednesday afternoon. Interesting. I took drivers Ed in New Jerseyhere you can learn to fly.

Back to the cows. They then have 4-5 months in the feed lots eating this fermented mixture

These guys get no hormones, no antibiotics, only vaccinations when they are young.

Once they are over 1000lbsand about 12-14 months oldwellit is their time.

I had my first grilled steak in Belize at the Reimers home  a New York strip, Quickly grilled over the firea few minutes on each sidesalt and pepper and it was delicious. Really really good meat.

I had to take some home. And I did. A few T-bones, 2 rib-eye steaks (the most popular) and a few packages of bacon/hamburger mixone with habanero in it.

I will be sure to tell you how they all are.

BUT, if you love beef of any sort, you must try Reinland. Other beef in Belize is raised on native pastureand can take up to 3 or 4 years to reach the full weight. It makes for a tougher meat.

You are starting to see Reinland more and more at stores. And restaurants. Its really good stuff.

And the product list, both pigs (that are raised and slaughtered in Shipyard but processed by Reinland) and beef, is over 150 items. Everything and anything you can think of. From skirt steak to star steak (thats a cross section of the neck.)

For direct sale information (or information where you can buy it), call the sales manager David Varro at 323-0038.

In San Pedro, you can buy Reinland at Island City Supermarket, Island Depot in Boca Del Rio and Beach Basket at Grand Caribe.

Quick #4 I will save for tomorrow. From Blue Creek, you can walk across the border to a small town in Mexico. It too is pretty interesting
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In the latest News of the week, Bob Sassone tackles the important questions: Was Grease just a deathbed hallucination? Does moobs belong in the dictionary? Do peas belong in guacamole? This and more.

Weekly Newsletter The best of The Saturday Evening Post in your inbox! Join

Heres a Theory About Grease I Bet You Never Thought Of

Of course, you probably dont sit around your house thinking about Grease theories at all  Hey, Edna! Get in here! I have a new theory about Grease I want to share with you!  but if you did, heres a new one that might interest you.

Sandy was dead the whole time! [insert scary music here]

This theory was spread by actress Sarah Michelle Gellar on Facebook. She didnt come up with it, but she heard about it and passed it along to her fans.

Subscribe and get unlimited access to our online magazine archive. Subscribe Today

Thats right, Sandy actually drowned at the beach that day (I saved her life, she nearly drowned ) and shes in a coma imagining this entire musical before she dies. Grease co-creator Jim Jacobs disputes this theory, though to be accurate, he co-created the stage musical. This theory has to do with the 1978 movie version with John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John.

If anything, this new theory might give you an idea for a Halloween costume this year. Sure, many people will be dressing up as Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton or Captain America or someone from Game of Thrones, but you can surprise everyone by going as Dead Sandy from Grease. Just be prepared for a lot of questions.

RIP Greta Zimmer Friedman

Friedman is one of the most famous women in the world, but you never knew her name.

She was the dental assistant grabbed and kissed by a sailor in Times Square on V-J Day, the day World War II ended in 1945. Friedman was just standing there with friends celebrating when George Mendonsa, a sailor also celebrating the end of the war, surprised her by taking her in his arms and kissing her. The classic photo was taken by Alfred Eisenstaedt.

Friedman passed away last week at the age of 92. Shes going to be buried at Arlington National Cemetery next to her husband.

There has actually been confusion about who the couple was, with several other people coming forward over the years, claiming to be the man and woman in the photo. But researchers say that Mendonsa and Friedman are the ones locking lips in the iconic picture, and four years ago CBS reunited the couple in Times Square.

Squee, Moobs, and YOLO

No, that isnt the title of a new kids cartoon about animals who open a law firm. Theyre three words that have been added to the Oxford English Dictionary.

Squee is the high-pitched sound someone makes when theyre excited. YOLO is an acronym for You Only Live Once, and moobs is a pudgy mans  well, you can Google that if you want.

Other new words added include Murica (a different way of saying America, and it has more than one spelling), clickbait (those web headlines that try to get you to click on them and they turn out to be misleading or worse), and fuhgeddaboutit (forget about it mashed into one word and often said by people in New Jersey). To celebrate Roald Dahls 100th birthday, the OED editors have also added Oompa Loompa and scrumdiddlyumptious, and theyre also adding yogalates, which is a combo of yoga and pilates. Like you, this is the first time Ive ever heard that word.

By the way, if you can use all of those words in a single sentence, let us know in the comments.

New F. Scott Fitzgerald Stories Coming in 2017

Who said there are no second acts in American lives? Oh wait, that was F. Scott Fitzgerald. But he might change his tune if he were alive today.

Next April, Scribner will release Id Die For You, a collection of stories Fitzgerald wrote in the 1930s and was unable to sell because the subject matter was different from what magazine editors at the time expected of the writer. The title comes from the time Fitzgerald was suffering from alcoholism in North Carolina and his wife was in a sanatorium.

Fitzgerald, of course, wrote several classic stories for The Saturday Evening Post, and heres a feature on how we helped create The Great Gatsby.

This Week in History: Jesse Owens Born (September 12, 1913)

Owens wrote several pieces about the Olympics for The Saturday Evening Post in 1976, including this piece on how he trained for the 1936 Olympics in Berlin and what happened there.

This Week in History: Princess Grace of Monaco Dies (September 14, 1982)

Heres how Princess Stephanie, youngest daughter of Princess Grace, described the car accident that took the life of the former actress known as Grace Kelly.

National Guacamole Day

How many ways are there to make guacamole? Youre probably thinking that guacamole cant possibly be controversial. But it is, and well get to that in a minute. Meanwhile, for National Guacamole Day (which is today), heres a classic recipe from The Saturday Evening Post Antioxidant Cookbook.

Youll notice that this recipe  like most guacamole recipes  doesnt have peas in it. And therein lies the controversy. Last year, people were up in arms because The New York Times printed a guacamole recipe that included those little green veggies. It was The Great Green Pea Scandal of 2015! The Guacamole Recipe That Shook the World! The Guacamole Conundrum (which also happens to be the best Robert Ludlum novel)!

Heres the recipe that caused all the trouble. Even if you dont think it sounds too appetizing, try it anyway. Maybe youll be surprised. YOLO!

Next Weeks Holidays and Events

The Emmy Awards (September 18)

The 68th ceremony airs this Sunday at 7 p.m. Eastern on ABC. Heres a list of nominees so you can make your guesses at home.

Wife Appreciation Day (September 18)

Not to be confused with Mothers Day, which celebrates women with children. Wife Appreciation Day is for married women who dont have kids.

Fall begins (September 22)

BREAKING NEWS: I bought tea this week; Im ready for fall. That doesnt mean the temperatures are going to cooperate right away, but fall begins on the 22nd, and Im ready for it.
Lakeland, FL -- (SBWIRE) -- 09/16/2016 -- For two days, rain tortured the heart of bayou country, dumping 24 inches in less than 48 hours on southern Louisiana.



The 1000-year event flooded more than 100,000 residences, sending families into shelters and the homes of friends, relatives and even strangers.



Now, as the region enters peak hurricane season, with Hurricane Hermine bearing down on the Gulf coast, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) officials are scrambling to bring temporary housing to flood victims, and bracing for what Hermine may bring to the states in its path.



The last time events in the southeast tested federal resources was in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, when shoddy, hastily assembled "Katrina trailers" became enduring symbols of FEMA's failure to provide safe haven for thousands left homeless.



FEMA has "upped their game" tremendously since then, says Steve Duke, executive director of the Louisiana Manufactured Housing Association.



Thousands of newly minted Manufactured Housing Units -- known as FEMA MHUs -- were at the ready in Selma, AL, the southeastern staging area, when the floods inundated Louisiana.



Thousands more have been contracted to be built by manufacturers who met an August 24 application deadline.



All of these new-style FEMA manufactured housing units (MHUs) are constructed to exacting HUD-code specifications, designed to withstand local wind force criteria; these will be anchored on piers, not rolled into yards and left there, on wheels, as were the Katrina trailers.



These are, in fact, bonafide manufactured homes, not trailers or mobile homes -- a term that applies only to pre-HUD-code homes built prior to 1976 -- a fine point that is widely missed in media reporting.



"The terminology matters, because the terminology defines the construction standard," says Duke.



The number of homes damaged or destroyed is well over 100,000 and in that part of Louisiana, some 20 percent of the housing stock is manufactured homes.



That means MH factories may need to churn out 20,000 homes -- or more -- to replace homes lost in the disaster -- in addition to the thousands of desperately needed MHUs that FEMA requires to provide flood victims with secure temporary housing.



Retailers and manufacturers that supply Louisiana are gearing up for a monumental effort to meet the almost unprecedented needs of the people of coastal Louisiana.



Alabama-based Sunshine Homes has opted to focus on keeping its Louisiana dealers stocked with inventory and has not applied to manufacture the transitional MHUs.



"We anticipate our normal business in that market to be -- unfortunately -- spectacular," says Sunshine president and CEO John Bostick. "I believe our Lafayette retailer is going to call and say everything is sold."



Bostick says he can supply them with high quality move-in ready homes within a month.



"We have almost unlimited capacity," he says. "Our factory is running at about two-thirds capacity. We could stretch and build a lot of homes."



For more on the race to provide shade, shelter -- and much more -- to the residents left homeless by natural disasters, see the latest account by award-winning consumer affairs reporter Jan Hollingsworth here at MHLivingNews.com.



Manufacturers Gear Up to Replace Thousands of Homes Lost in Louisiana Floods



About MHLivingNews.com and MHProNews.com

MHLivingNews.com and MHProNews.com are the leading trade publications for manufactured homeowners, consumers or MH industry leaders, investors and public policy professionals who want up-to-date lifestyle and business news.



Media Contact:

L. A. "Tony" Kovach, Publisher

MHLivingNews.com

Phone: 863-213-4090

Email: tony@mhmsm.com

Website: http://manufacturedhomelivingnews.com/
Greenville, SC -- (SBWIRE) -- 09/16/2016 -- Deals On The GOGO, a Greenville SC, based Real Time Mobile Marketing Company, recently rebranded to Locally Epic and unveiled a redesigned website and mobile app. Deals On The GOGO just finished its first full Market Launch. Prior to the Upstate South Carolina launch they decided the time was right to make the change.



"We have been working on the rebrand for several months and have just finalized the migration to our new brand," said Michele Minor the CIO of LOCALLY EPIC. "The brand change and creative redesign gives us a fresh look which showcases our ability to connect consumers and businesses at the right time and place."



LOCALLY EPIC will be launching an Upstate South Carolina "Let's Keep It Local" initiative through various Chamber and other partnerships this fall. "Consumers are preparing to spend in record numbers this coming holiday season. We believe with the right offer at the right time we can drive consumers to our local business partners rather than losing customers to online stores," added Dave Ropes, CMO of Locally Epic. "The world's most successful Brands and Small Business need to put the consumer experience on the mobile platform at the center of their enterprise. LOCALLY EPIC provides a singular, unified platform for managing marketing and advertising in real time connecting with consumers across all mobile touchpoints and experiences.



Branding  As LOCALLY EPIC moves into a significant growth period, the bold look is part of a transformation to increase awareness, appeal to new markets and broaden its reach.



Logo  As shown above, the first component of the new brand identity is the revision of the logo, which conveys the company's strong, unique value proposition.



Website/APP  The new design of the LOCALLY EPIC website, website app and mobile app, incorporates the look and feel of the new brand allowing businesses to Engage, Acquire and Retain customers, Now.



"In today's mobile society Brands face a new paradigm for engaging mobile consumers. They lack tools to truly know, understand and communicate with the consumer one-on-one in a hyper-local setting, let alone on a global mobile scale. LOCALLY EPIC is changing that," said Chase Michaels Founder and CEO of Locally Epic.



About LOCALLY EPIC

Based in Greenville SC, LOCALLY EPIC, is a Mobile business to business and business to consumer software company specializing in time, space and message deployment with real-time aspects of engagement, implementation, customer loyalty and consumer acquisition metrics.



Contact:

Michele Minor, CIO

LOCALLY EPIC

Address: 7 Toy Street, Greenville SC 29601

Phone: 864-354-7069

Email: communications@locallyepic.com

Website: https://www.locallyepic.com/
[MANILA] Despite the recent decline worldwide in the number of leprosy cases and the large number of patients that have completed treatment, new infections persist and socio-economic challenges hound the afflicted, particularly discrimination.



New cases of leprosy will definitely continue to be diagnosed in the years ahead, acknowledges the International Leprosy Association (ILA), a professional society of physicians, scientists and organisations in related fields.



When the ILA convenes its 19th International Leprosy Congress in Beijing starting this weekend (18-21 September), experts will discuss the emerging role of technology and new tools in the campaign to eradicate a disease whose origin dates back to biblical times. Increasingly, leprosy is now referred to as Hansens disease in a move to erase its stigma.



Declining incidence



Reports from 121 countries compiled by the World Health Organization (WHO) show that in 2014 (the latest available data), new cases of leprosy totalled 213,899, down from 215,656 in 2013 and 295,919 in 2005.



Three countries account for 81 per cent of the 2014 newly diagnosed and reported cases globally  India (125,785 cases), Brazil (31,064) and Indonesia (17,025).



The ten countries in South-East Asia reported a total of 22,579 cases in 2014, a drop of 21 per cent from 2005. The largest number of cases are in Indonesia, Myanmar (2,877) and the Philippines (1,655).

Currently, I am doing what I can to make governments, the media and ordinary citizens aware of leprosy as a way to encourage early detection and treatment. Yohei Sasakawa, Nippon Foundation



In East Asia, China reported 830 cases, South Korea, 6, and Japan, 5. In South Asia, a 24 per cent decline was seen in the total number of cases, from 177,980 in 2005 to 135,174 in 2014, although Bhutan and Sri Lanka recorded increases.



Except in a couple of countries, leprosy had been eliminated as a public health problem globally in 2000 when the overall prevalence rate fell to less than the benchmark of 1 case per 10,000 persons. Over the past two decades, more than 16 million leprosy patients have been treated with the multidrug therapy (MDT) recommended by the WHO.



A different view



There are misgivings about the reported decline in new leprosy cases, however. An international symposium in Vatican City organised on 9-10 June by the Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers, Good Samaritan Foundation and the Nippon Foundation of Japan noted that the decrease could have resulted from a decline in case-finding activities and reduced community awareness [about the disease].



The increase in the rate of disabilities in new cases detected seems to support this explanation, the symposium document said, adding that it is essential to aim at early detectionparticularly to child cases.



The Vatican symposium also expressed concern about the substantial risk of partly losing the expertise that has been accumulated over recent decades by leprosy experts, medical doctors and health workers in relation to Hansens disease.



Grants for study and training may be needed for service providers and caretakers, including persons affected by the disease, argued the symposium, which was also supported by the Fondation Raoul Follereau of France, the Catholic group Sovereign Order of Malta, and the Sasakawa Memorial Health Foundation of Japan.



Nippon Foundation, a leading grant-giving organisation in Japan headed by Yohei Sasakawa, the WHOs goodwill ambassador for leprosy elimination, underwrote the free supply of MDT around the world from 1995 to 1999. Since 2000, supplies have been provided by Novartis, the Switzerland-based pharmaceutical firm.



Thanks to free MDT, Sasakawa says, the integration of leprosy services into general healthcare services and the efforts of all involved, 16 million people have been cured since the 1980s.



[But] while the number of patients has declined, there are still difficult-to-access areas such as city slums and mountainous regions, and high-endemic districts within countries. Currently, I am doing what I can to make governments, the media and ordinary citizens aware of leprosy as a way to encourage early detection and treatment, Sasakawa tells SciDev.Net.



Beijing agenda



At next weeks leprosy congress in Beijing, scientific initiatives aimed at boosting leprosy control will be on top of the agenda. We hope to discuss the latest advancements in leprosy science in order to translate them [to actual work] in the field, ILA president Marcos Virmond tells SciDev.Net.



We need translational research for us to improve the control of the disease and offer better care to those affected by it, says Virmond, who is also director-general of the research organisation Instituto Lauro de Souza Lima in Brazil.



He adds that new technology in the treatment of the disease, including a potential vaccine and a shortened treatment regimen, the Uniform-MDT (U-MDT), will take centre stage at the conference.



Research on the potential vaccine is in advanced stages and experts will give updates on their work at the leprosy congress. We are not sure when its applicability will be a reality, Virmond says.



On the U-MDT regimen, which uses a unique set of drugs to treat all types of leprosy (as opposed to the different sets now used for two distinct types), Virmond says an important impact will be not only in the treatment acceptability but also in the logistics [or the achievement of deliverables] of leprosy control programmes.



Currently, patients showing negative skin smears, classified as paucibacillary leprosy, are given rifampicin and dapsone drugs, while those showing positive smears, classified as multibacillary leprosy, are administered a combination of rifampicin, clofazimine and dapsone. The multidrug approach is to avoid the development of resistance to a drug when used solely.



The standard WHO-recommended MDT is quite effective and the U-MDT is a new way to offer treatment to patients. We hope that new clinical trials bring us new hope for shorter and even more effective regimens to treat the disease, Virmond tells SciDev.Net.



Still another technological breakthrough expected to be highlighted at the ILA congress is the proposed introduction of chemoprophylaxis  the use of chemical agents  in leprosy control. Current research on this method points to an important possibility to halt the transmission of the disease in certain conditions, says Virmond.

We need translational research for us to improve the control of the disease and offer better care to those affected by it. Marcos Virmond, ILA



Research on the use of chemoprophylaxis is now in full swing in certain countries although some experts argue for deeper studies into safety and ethical issues raised by some sectors, according to recent media reports.



Stigma and discrimination



Social exclusion remains a major challenge for leprosy patients and those who have recovered from the disease. Across the globe, violations of the rights of persons affected by leprosy are noted in the fields of education, work and marriage.



According to the WHO, stigma that surrounds the disease, along with a lack of awareness, leads people to delay seeking help. As a result, they are diagnosed too late to prevent life-changing disabilities.



Leprosy is caused by the bacillus Mycobacterium leprae which multiplies very slowly. It is not highly infectious, experts say, and transmission is through fluid droplets from the nose and mouth during close and frequent contact with untreated cases.



When left untreated, the disease can cause progressive and permanent damage to the skin, nerves, limbs and eyes  a sorry picture which could be the reason for the stigma and the discrimination against sufferers.



The WHO says diagnosis and treatment of leprosy is easy and most endemic countries are moving to integrate leprosy services into existing general health services. This is especially important for those under-served and marginalised communities most at risk, often the poorest of the poor, says the WHO.



Sasakawa laments that discrimination limits or denies leprosy patients, and even members of their family, opportunities for education and employment. The WHO goodwill ambassador has pursued a campaign of advocacy that in 2010 led to the UN General Assembly adopting a resolution on Elimination of Discrimination against Persons Affected by Leprosy and Their Family Members.



I think countries are becoming more cognizant of the issue of discrimination, Sasakawa tells SciDev.Net. The focus is now on efforts to make the resolution viable.



Sasakawas office has held five regional symposiums in different parts of the world to promote the UN resolution. He tells SciDev.Net he would like to engage with individual countries where discriminatory laws and practices remain, so that these laws and practices will be abolished on the basis of the UN resolution. I intend to continue focusing on tackling both the disease and the discrimination.



New WHO strategy



The ILA congress comes on the heels of a newly launched WHO five-year global strategy aimed at attaining a leprosy-free world by 2020. The programme puts emphasis on the need to sustain expertise and increase the number of skilled staff, improving the participation of affected persons in leprosy services, and reducing visible deformities as well as the stigma associated with the disease.

Sasakawa says he rates the WHO programme very highly, particularly its target of zero disability in new child cases and reducing the rate of newly diagnosed leprosy patients with visible disabilities.Three core objectives are identified in the WHOs 2016-2020 strategy: strengthen government ownership, coordination and partnership; stop leprosy and its complications; and stop discrimination and promote inclusion.Defining the next steps towards achieving these goals should already ensure that delegates to the Beijing leprosy congress will have a busy schedule.This piece was produced by SciDev.Nets South-East Asia & Pacific desk
[JAKARTA] Indonesia and the European Union (EU) are stepping up their partnership to combat illegal logging practices by applying the system of wood legalisation for timber exports.

Under the partnership, timber exports from Indonesia to the EU will be accompanied from now on by a licence indicating its legal guarantee that these were produced under environment friendly management.

Indonesia is known to have the worlds highest rate of deforestation. In 2015, a report from the Anti Forest-Mafia Coalition, which comprises environment conservation groups, said more than 30 per cent of timber products processed in Indonesia are illegal. This stems from the gap between the supply of legal wood reported by Indonesias Ministry of Environment and Forestry (KLHK) and the volume of processed wood produced by the timber industry.

90 per cent of Indonesian timber products are legal and 100 per cent of the Indonesian timber industry is under control and regulated under the national timber legality system. Vincent Guerend, EU

Putera Parthama, director general of sustainable forest management at KLHK, says nobody actually tracks the statistics on illegal logging but Indonesia can use its Timber Legality Assurance System (TLAS), an online process that records timber products starting from its origin.

A piece of wood is legal if it comes from a legal harvest  transported, processed and marketed according to government regulations. We have 14 different sets of TLAS standards for different types of wood-producing or processing industries. Besides covering the legal aspect, the criteria include other factors such as sustainability, Parthama notes.

The EU is the first government body to use a licence-based on this system. The licence, under the Forest Law Enforcement Governance and Trade (FLEGT) partnership agreement, will prevent illegal wood products from Indonesia entering EU member countries.

Vincent Guerend, EU ambassador to Indonesia and Brunei, says European consumers are greatly concerned with combating illegal logging. Ten years ago, some EU importers and consumers avoided Indonesian products because of illegal logging issues.

Today, we are delighted to observe that the situation has reversed and over 90 per cent of Indonesian timber products are legal and 100 per cent of the Indonesian timber industry is under control and regulated under the national timber legality system, he says.

Guerend adds that the start of FLEGT licensing sends a reassuring signal to European consumers that all Indonesian timber products exported to the EU are verified to conform to relevant Indonesian laws, in line with EU legislation on international timber trade.

Andy Roby, senior forestry adviser at the UKs Department for International Development, says the licensing agreement is a positive sign because it brings the whole weight of the EU timber market in support of Indonesias efforts to combat illegal logging.Although only about 10 per cent of Indonesias US$10 billion timber exports go to Europe, it is a high-value market that delivers jobs and growth in Indonesia and sustains skilled rural communities in value-added industries such as furniture and handicraft, Roby says.This piece was produced by SciDev.Nets South-East Asia & Pacific desk.
[ISLAMABAD] With all four strains of the dengue virus now circulating in Pakistan and outbreaks of the viral disease being reported in new areas, this South Asian country now faces a serious health problem from the mosquito-borne pestilence, researhers say.

A study published August in The Virology Journal documents dengue serotypes prevalent in Pakistan during the 2011 outbreak in Punjab province, which claimed more than 365 lives, as well as the 2013 Swat Valley outbreak that killed more than 57 people.

It was the first time dengue had been reported in Swat, a tourist destination in the mountainous Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, some 600 kilometres north of Punjab which is more amenable to the spread the disease because of higher population density and a hotter climate.

Pakistan is witnessing dengue outbreaks continuously and it causes severe damage in the form of morbidities, mortalities, and socio-economic disturbances, says lead author of the study Amjad Ali, a molecular biologist at the University of the Panjab, Lahore.

In 2011 and 2013, dengue caused havoc throughout Pakistan by affecting thousands of people, Ali said. I decided to examine these dengue outbreaks molecularly to better our understanding and for possible preventive and remedial measures.

Ali and his colleagues used real-time polymerase chain reaction tests to look at 600 blood samples collected at health centres in Punjab during the 2011 outbreak, and 740 samples collected in the Swat Valley during the 2013 outbreak. Specifically, they sought to identify which types of dengue were circulating in both areas, as well as their prevalence among the affected populations.

They found that all four dengue virus serotypes  labelled DENV-1, DENV-2, DENV-3, and DENV-4  were circulating in Punjab at the time of the 2011 outbreak, with DENV-2 and DENV-3 accounting for 42 and 41 per cent of those infected, respectively.

The incidence of DENV-1 was four per cent while DENV-4 was recorded in nine per cent of patients. Additionally, four per cent of those infected in Punjab had both DENV-2 and DENV-3 viruses, which may have had an impact on mortality rates.

Infection with one strain does not provide immunity against other strains so that person living in an endemic area could have up to four dengue infections during his or her life span.



The finding that all four serotypes are circulating in Pakistan increases the likelihood of secondary infection and hence, severe disease. David Harley, Australian National University

In the Swat Valley, the investigators determined that only the DENV-2 and DENV-3 viruses had been circulating, accounting for 40 and 60 per cent of infections, respectively. They also found that eight per cent of patients in the Swat Valley had been infected by both versions of the virus.

Males aged 1545 were hit hardest by the virus outbreaks in both locations.

The study showed for the first time that all four serotypes of dengue are present in Pakistan. Concurrent infection determination in this study is a very important observation which leads to dengue haemorrhagic fever and dengue shock syndrome, Ali said. The phenomenon of antibody-dependent enhancement is also linked to concurrent infection.



Ali said that the paper is a wake-up call for Pakistani officials to do more to understand, prevent, and treat dengue. Concrete steps should be taken to cope with dengue, otherwise we will face severe consequences in the future.



David Harley, an epidemiologist at the Australian National University, Canberra, said the paper provides more evidence of the ongoing increase in dengue incidence globally.



Dengue is more likely to produce severe disease in secondary infections with a different serotype, said Harley. The finding that all four serotypes are circulating in Pakistan increases the likelihood of secondary infection and hence, severe disease.



This piece was produced by SciDev.Nets South Asia desk.
[NAIROBI] Smallholder farmers in Africa face challenges in getting reliable access to sufficient quantities of quality seed of superior varieties at the right time at an affordable price, an expert says.



Miltone Ayieko, regional coordinator for the Kenya-based Integrated Seed Sector Development in Africa (ISSD Africa) project, says that the lack of quality affects agricultural productivity, income resilience and livelihoods of smallholders.



Smallholder farmers face challenges in getting reliable access to sufficient quantities of quality seed of superior varieties and that impacts negatively on their productivity, earnings and livelihoods, Ayieko said in an interview with SciDev.Net yesterday.

Smallholder farmers face challenges in getting reliable access to sufficient quantities of quality seed of superior varieties. Miltone Ayieko, ISSD Africa

He says that the ISSD Africa projects goal is to support the development of a market-oriented, pluralistic, vibrant and dynamic seed sector in Africa that provides both female and male smallholder farmers access to quality seed of superior varieties.



ISSD Africa, in collaboration with partners such as the Centre for Development innovation (CDI) of the Netherlands-based Wageningen University and Research and Tegemeo Institute of Agricultural Policy and Development of Egerton University, Kenya, will be holding a conference in Kenya next week (19-20 September).



The conference brings together seed experts from around the continent, government agencies, as well as donors and development partners



According to Ayieko, the conference creates a platform to share the outcomes of a two-year piloting phase, alongside the discussions on how to translate these findings into change agendas.



The conference presents an opportunity to build a basis for follow-up with a view to the creation of an African-owned enabling structure and network that will enhance farmers access to quality seed of superior varieties, hence contributing to food security and economic development agenda in Africa, he explains.



Marja Thijssen, the ISSD Africa Project Coordinator based at the Centre for Development Innovation (CDI) -Wageningen UR, says that Africa requires seed entrepreneurship that responds to demands by farmers, agro-dealers, service providers and others in the seed value chain.



Entrepreneurship and market-orientation are important incentives for sustainable development, she tells SciDev.Net.

She adds that an improved demand orientation of public breeding programmes and increase in the number of public varieties used for commercial seed production will benefit farmers by increasing their choices in terms of seed varieties.According to Marja, a senior advisor on plant genetic resources and seed systems at Wageningen UR, Netherlands, whereas global commitments are important they fail to recognise national realities and acknowledge the importance of different seed systems in providing farmers access to quality seed.Making these commitments more coherent with the practices and realities of farmers, and creating an enabling environment for strengthening multiple seed systems will increase farmers access to quality seed, she notes.This piece was produced by SciDev.Nets Sub-Saharan Africa English desk.
On the basis of a new study, scientists claim that there might be a possibility of microbes hiding underneath the surface of the red planet. The new research, being carried on in the Outer Hebrides, states that the hydrogen formed from minor quakes on the red planet could provide a life-sustaining source of energy for some simple microbes.

The search for alien life in our Universe does not always have to involve study of extra terrestrial objects. Much of the study is conducted on Earth as well. Recently, researchers have been studying rocks in some of the most remote parts of UK including the Outer Hebrides to get a thought of what the other possibilities of life on the red planet are.

A deep analysis of the rocks present on the islands of 'Barra and Uist', now suggests that minor quakes can possibly generate hydrogen in the Earth's crust. This hydrogen found in the rocks has raised new hopes about the same processes that could be happening on Mars. The researchers believe if that does happen, it could be a potential source for life on the red planet. The findings were published in the September issue of the journal of Astrobiology.

'Marsquakes' have been known to occur on Mars and may have the same effect, scientists believe. "Earthquakes cause friction, and our analysis of ancient rock in the Outer Hebrides has demonstrated how this creates hydrogen." said Professor John Parnell from the University of Aberdeen. He also added that Hydrogen is like an energy fuel for some simple microbes and they could live off the hydrogen that's created in the Mar's subsurface as a result of its seismic activity.

The model could be applied to any other rocky planet and we already know that on Mars there are "Marsquakes", and its produced hydrogen could feed life in the Martian sub-surface. The scientists state that their analysis has found that conservative estimates of the current seismic activity on the red planet predicting hydrogen generation would be very useful to microbes. This adds to the possibility of far more suitable habitats that could support life in the sub-surface of Mars, reports dailymail.

Nasa already plans to measure the seismic activity on Mars during its InSight mission that is to be launched in 2018. If tremors are observed, the data would offer much more insight into the inner structure of Mars. Scientists hope that it would reveal the formation of planets in the solar system and whether or not alien life exists underneath the Mars' surface. 'Our data will definitely make those measurements more interesting,' concluded Professor Parnell.
Are polar bears hunting humans these days? For quite some time already, polar bears have been making news due to the fact that they belong to the list of the world's threatened species. There have been debates as to whether or not they should be deemed endangered. But one thing is for sure; or almost: that climate change affects them a lot. And recently, there are claims that climate change is forcing the polar bears to hunt humans.

CBS News reported that a bunch of polar bears trapped a team of Russian scientists in their Arctic weather station. While it was usual for these animals to approach their station, the situation intensified due to lack of food to eat after running out of supply. This apparently led to polar bears hunting humans.

It was September 10 when a mother bear and some of her cubs started to stand and remain outside one window in the research station. For this reason, the team was forced to stay inside and was directed to keep themselves safe without harming the polar bears. Moreover, there was one instance when one of the bears broke a window in the weather station's warehouse and another one killed one of the two dogs living with the staff.

TASS, a Russian news agency, reported that the team already received a new supply of flares. A dog was likewise sent to replace the one killed by the bears. This was made possible by the use of a helicopter owned by Russia's Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute. According to Russian officials, the bears may disperse in the coming month when more ice are formed in the Arctic. The predators are likewise expected to travel further to look for food.

Meanwhile, in his article published in The Daily Caller, blogger Jim Treacher called for people to realize that their mere practices have been contributing to the gradual changes in the environment. For instance, the electricity that we use are increasing our carbon footprint which affects innocent creatures like polar bears to the point that they would have no choice but to hunt humans.

The thought of polar bears hunting humans may be scary. But the fact remains that these animals have needs such as food and protection. Indeed, something must be done to help them.
HEMINGWAY, S.C. -- Four men were arrested by the Williamsburg County Sheriffs Office following an attempted armed robbery incident Thursday in Hemingway.

Jowuan Todd Givens, 23, of Kingstree was arrested and charged with one count of robbery/attempted armed or allegedly armed robbery, weapons/discharging firearms into a dwelling and weapons/pointing and presenting firearms at a person.

Brandon Myers, 27, of Kingstree was arrested and charged with one count of robbery/attempted armed or allegedly armed robbery to include weapons/pointing and presenting firearms at a person.

Travon Dashawn Mouzon, 18, of St. Stephens was arrested and charged with one count of robbery/attempted armed or allegedly armed robbery to include weapons/pointing and presenting firearms at a person.

Michael Jerome Mcclary, 22, of Hemingway was arrested and charged with one count of robbery/attempted armed or allegedly armed robbery.

According to a release from the sheriffs office, deputies responded to an attempted armed robbery incident that occurred at 33 Daisy Lane in Hemingway at approximately 12:15 a.m. Thursday.

Deputies made contact with a male victim, Brain Lequan Hilton, 19, of 33 Daisy Lane, concerning the incident. According to investigators, three suspects allegedly knocked on the door to gain entry into the residence. The victim opened the door and quickly realized one of the suspects was in possession of a handgun.

Based on information at the scene, one of the suspects discharged the firearm when the victim attempted to close the door, according to the release. The suspects were not able to gain entry inside the residence and ran from the scene. No one was hurt during the incident. The suspects were apprehended at Scotts Bar-B-Que in Hemingway when deputies searched the area.

Givens, Myers, Mouzon and Mcclary will appear before a Williamsburg County magistrate for explanation of the charges against them, according to the release. The defendants will remain in the Williamsburg County Detention Center until bond is posted. The investigation into this incident is ongoing.
FLORENCE, S.C.  Mike Nunn says the movie Sully is a very faithful representation of what happened when U.S. Airways Flight 1549 went down on the Hudson River seven years ago. Nunn was one of the 155 people on the flight.

He and other passengers who survived in the Miracle on the Hudson had the opportunity to see a private showing of the movie in Charlotte before it was released to the public.

It was pretty interesting to see it all play out on the big screen, said Nunn, a major in the Florence County Sheriffs Office. It was very well done.

Nunn made his very own silver screen debut as he and a group of other passengers were featured in a short scene as the credits were rolling at the end of the film. Nunn said the scene was shot at the North Carolina Air Museum where the plane now rests.

The scene, directed by Clint Eastwood, was meant to recreate one of the first meetings that passengers had with Captain Sullenberger and the rest of the flight crew when they first brought the plane back to Charlotte. Nunn described being directed by Eastwood as pretty cool.

It was a pretty poignant moment for all of us, Nunn said. I was very pleased to be a part of the movie.

The film Sully was released to the public on Sept. 9. It portrays what the flight crews, passengers, air traffic controllers and rescue teams experienced before, during and after the aircraft made an emergency landing in the Hudson River in January 2009. Nunn recalls vivid details about the events of that afternoon.

Nunn was a lawyer for a private law firm at the time and had gone to New York to give a deposition in a medical malpractice case.

He was originally scheduled to depart from LaGuardia at 5 p.m. but he finished his deposition early and contacted his secretary to switch to an earlier flight. There was one seat left on the 3 p.m. plane, Nunn said. So I took it.

He described the weather as perfect for flying with not a cloud in the sky. He took his seat in row six by the window and could see the planes engine directly beside him.

Approximately three minutes into the flight, Nunn saw something get swallowed by the right engine as he was looking out of his window. Nunn said he could feel the plane rock and lose the sensation of forward thrust. The plane and its passengers went unnervingly quiet.

And then Captain Sullenberger comes on the speakers and says, This is the captain. Brace for impact, Nunn recalled. At that point we knew, certainly I knew, this is a real problem.

The plane began to descend rapidly and Nunn said he didnt see any other place for the plane to go but into the river.

I just figured, OK, this is where it ends, Nunn said. I never expected to survive. If we somehow survive the crash, we wouldnt survive the water until we could be rescued.

In the minute or two that it took for the plane to descend, Nunn said, he thought about his family and all that would follow the crash. He wondered how his family would get closure and regretted having to put his family through this. Then the plane hit the river at approximately 150 mph.

The deceleration was just massive, Nunn said. It was like nothing Ive experienced at all. Ever. I really expected the seats were going to be ripped out of the floor, it was so massive.

Nunn saw water shooting up and over the windows of the plane and expected the plane to fly apart.

I figured this is probably going to be one of the last things I see, Nunn said. And then, surprisingly the plane just kind of sat up on the water and we were floating.

Passengers were quickly evacuated onto the wings and onto inflatable emergency slides that automatically deployed following the water landing. The air temperature that day was 20 degrees with a wind-chill factor below 5 degrees. The water temperature was at 36 degrees. Nunn said he became very hopeful after seeing the plane was still intact and ferry boats en route for rescue, regardless of the frigid conditions.

When the plane didnt break up and we didnt wind up in the water, I thought, Wow, theres a chance some of us might make it out of here, Nunn said. The miracle was all 155 of us made it out of there.

Following the crash, Captain Sullenberger was praised as a hero, both nationally and among the passengers and flight crew. In the movie, however, Sullenberger is reprimanded for his decision to land the plane in the river instead of attempting to return to LaGuardia. Nunn said that without Sullenbergers knowledge and extensive flight experience, that landing might have yielded a much different result.

What are the chances that guys unique abilities would come to play out on a flight that actually needed that? Nunn said. There were thousands of flights that day. But he was assigned to fly this aircraft on this day that actually needed his unique expertise. You can call that luck all you want. I call it something else. I call it Gods hand.

Nunn said he sees the events of January 15, 2009, as nothing short of a miracle and knows that he and the other passengers who survived that day are still here for a reason.

Its our job to seek every day to find out what that reason is and to make sure in the quality time left that we are getting the most out of that, Nunn said. I try not to leave the houses any day without telling those that I love that I love them. You never know when you leave whether youll be coming back or not.

The morning after the crash landing, Nunn, along with several other Flight 1549 passengers, boarded the first flight from New York to Charlotte. Nunn laughed, admitting he was a bit nervous as the flight climbed to its cruising altitude.

Once we got out of goose altitude, I felt pretty good about our chances, Nunn said.
FLORENCE, S.C. -- NUCOR Steel in Darlington donated 24,146 pounds of steel to Florence-Darlington Technical Colleges (FDTC) Welding Department Sept. 9.

The donation will allow FDTCs students to get hands-on training on a wider variety of steels. FDTC usually receives two donations of steel a year from NUCOR. This particular donation will supply the Welding Department through the fall semester and into the early weeks of the 2017 spring semester.

It would be difficult to operate without NUCORs support, said FDTC Welding Director, Jamie King. The donations that we receive from NUCOR is high quality product, and it allows our students to get training on a wide variety of steels. In a traditional classroom, students primarily need books, paper and pens. The steel that we receive from Nucor is our students school supplies. They wouldnt have class without it. We cant show our appreciation enough!

NUCOR Steel supports FDTC in a variety of others ways as well. Most notably, the Charlotte, North Carolina based company, which has facilities in Darlington County, supplies the steel for the colleges popular annual Welding Rodeo. The seventh annual competition was held back in April at Francis Marion Universitys Arts International Festival.

NUCOR Steel was also a sponsor at this years Entrepreneurs Forum Gala, and the company is a significant donor to the foundations major gifts campaign. As for the colleges Jazz Galas held at the Southeastern Institute of Manufacturing and Technology (SiMT), NUCOR has been a singular Platinum sponsor of the events over the years.

We are so thankful for NUCORs continued support, said Florence-Darlington Technical College Educational Foundation Vice President, Jill Lewis. NUCOR not only supports the colleges mission but also the hopes and dreams of our students. The company wants to see the students learn and succeed.
FLORENCE, S.C. -- Gemma Bernard knows what its like to need a refuge.

Dont be intimidated being in a shelter, she said Thursday. Dont be so afraid.

Bernard, a native of Trinidad-Tobago, fled domestic violence several years ago to relocate to Florence.

Im a former Naomi occupant, she said.

Bernard was referring to The Naomi Project, an organization with the goal of transitioning women from a life of domestic violence toward an independent and self-sustaining future.

A yearly luncheon was held Thursday at St. Johns Episcopal Church on South Dargan Street to raise money for the nonprofit organization.

Its the only fundraiser I do, said Joyce G. Ford, the organizations executive director. We usually do about 900 lunches.

Grants, private donations and corporate backing keep The Naomi Project going, she said, and all monetary help is welcome. As a line of volunteers boxed baked or barbecued chicken and side dishes, Ford said domestic violence is an epidemic.

Everybody has seen it. Its an epidemic no one wants to talk about. In order to stop it, we have to talk about it, she said. We want to stop this.

By offering long-term housing along with assistance about education, finances, spirituality and mental health, the organization helps women break away from abusers and create a new life, she said.

We offer an opportunity to take back their lives, she said.

As The Naomi Project celebrates a decade in existence, Ford said not all women have the moment when the lightbulb goes off, but she estimates 70 percent of those helped by the organization find lives of their own free from violence.

They dont go back to the abuser, she said. Thats the key. We give them the resources and support and the opportunity for them to do it for themselves. We just plant the seed and add water and fertilizer.

Success stories such as Bernards are the joy, she said. Thats what keeps me going.

Coming back to support Miss Joyce along with Bernard was Galaunda Pee, a case manager with Florence County Department of Social Services who interned with The Naomi Project.

I learned a lot from Miss Joyce, she said. I loved it. Her vision is faith-based and thats me. I couldve gone anywhere to intern but I chose her. She had so many resources I didnt know were available in Florence County. She is a blessing.

Bernard said the lessons she learned were life-changing.

I followed the rules, got a job and moved out on my own, she said. Its my dream to be an RN (registered nurse). I was able to get my GED from Poynor (Adult Education). I didnt just sit down in the shelter.

Bernard plans to go back to school soon to achieve her goal.

I got a job at a nursing home. I was hired yesterday, she said. It is hard for domestic violence survivors to claim independence, but it is possible.
God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging. Psalm 46:1-3.

In September 1923, a terrible earthquake rocked Japan.

It was followed by a 40-foot-high tsunami that swept away thousands of people. Fires then roared through the wooden homes of Yokohama and Tokyo, killing everyone in their path.

A Smithsonian magazine article lists the death toll at about 140,000. The nation was traumatized by the tragedy, known as the Great Kanto Earthquake, which occurred just 18 years before Japan entered World War II.

Many of us have never been in an earthquake, but we know what its like to be on shaky ground.

The earth may not be quaking physically, but it can seem like our job situations, finances, health or relationships are starting to crumble. Maybe we havent been in a tsunami, but we know the overwhelming flood of grief that can come with the death of a precious loved one.

In such times of life, I find uncommon comfort in the Bible story of a woman whose life really did fall in all around her  yet who was mentioned in what is called the Hall of Faith.

At first blush, she seems an unlikely candidate for Biblical stardom. She had a rather inglorious start.

In fact, she was a woman of ill repute.

Her name was Rahab.

We find her story in the Old Testament book of Joshua in chapter 2. At this point in Biblical history, the Israelites have been in the desert for 40 years after God freed them from slavery in Egypt.

They plan to enter the land that God promised their forefathers, but must conquer the formidable city of Jericho.

Their leader Joshua sends two spies into the city.

In Jericho, the two spy guys end up at the house of Rahab, a prostitute. When the king of Jericho learns that spies have infiltrated his realm, he sends word to Rahab to send those fellas out to him.

But brave Rahab doesnt do that.

Instead, she hides the spies and lies.

She says the spies left before the city gate closed at dark. So the kings men head out in search of the spies, whom Rahab has hidden on her roof.

Just before the spies plan to lie down for the night, Rahab shares an interesting bedtime story.

And this is no fairy tale.

I know the Lord has given you the land and the fear of you has fallen upon us, she says.

Everyone in Jericho is terrified, because theyve heard how God parted the Red Sea for the Israelites four decades earlier  and how they later conquered fierce enemies.

Now, the hearts of the people of Jericho are melting with fear.

Please let me say here that Bible scholars can tell you the people in Jericho werent friendly folks. They were barbaric and cruel. They did unspeakably terrible things to youngest and most vulnerable among them.

But Rahab seems to be different.

She knows the Lord is the one true God  and says that to the Israelite spies.

Then she asks for a favor.

 Give me a sure sign that you will save alive my father and mother, my brothers and sisters, and all who belong to them, and deliver our lives from death, she says.

Ive long been touched by how Rahab seems more intent on saving the lives of her family than herself.

The spies agree to save Rahab and her relatives.

Rahab  whose house is built into the city wall  lets the men down a rope through a window.

In turn, the spies tell Rahab to hang a scarlet cord in the window so they know where to find her when they return. The spies report back to Joshua.

Then with what may seem like a little watery deja vu for Joshua, God parts  not the Red Sea this time  but the Jordan River for the Israelites, who cross it and enter the Promised Land.

Days later, the Israelites are told to follow an unusual battle plan.

For six days, priests will carry the Ark of the Covenant (a sacred gold-covered chest) while blowing rams horns like trumpets. Armed men will walk ahead and behind the priests. Together, theyll march around the city one time  each day  for six days.

Can you imagine how fearful and bewildered the people of Jericho must have been?

On the seventh day, Joshua has the priests and armed men march seven times around the city. When they hear the trumpets, they are to shout.

And when they shout, the walls of Jericho fall down flat.

Try to imagine what that must have been like for Rahab.

Her home  and her life  literally was falling all around her.

Was she shaking? Did she scream? Did she wonder if the spies would find her?

The Bible doesnt say anything about that.

But it does say the spies brought Rahab and all of her family out of that place. The other people of Jericho were killed and the city was burned.

What happened to Rahab?

Turn to the first chapter of the book of Matthew in the New Testament and youll find the genealogy of Jesus Christ.

Climb up Christs family tree and youll see Rahab near the top.

Yep, she was an ancestor of Jesus.

Rahab married an Israelite named Salmon and they had a son, Boaz, whod marry Ruth, a foreigner with her own fabulous faith story.

And so the family line continued.

Rahab also became an ancestor of David, the shepherd who killed the giant Goliath and later became king of Israel.

Look in the New Testament book of Hebrews  and youll see Rahab mentioned in what many call the Hall of Faith.

In this text, the writer talks about great people of faith, like Abraham, Jacob and Moses. Then in chapter 11, verse 31, he writes: By faith the prostitute Rahab, because she welcomed the spies, was not killed with those who were disobedient.

The writer doesnt overlook Rahabs former life, but makes sure to include her redeeming features.

Rahabs story is one of second chances and faith under fire.

Faith when everything is falling.

Faith that remains even when life hangs by a thread or  in this case  a scarlet cord.

As Christians, we have our own scarlet cord  our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ  who shed his own blood on a cross to save us from our sins and give us eternal death.

Jesus is the rope we cling to when everything else is falling out from under us. He really is the tie that binds. After sin separated people from God, Jesus became the bridge that reconnects us. If we believe Jesus died on the cross to save us, repent of our sins and ask him to come into our hearts, we can go to heaven.

I was 16 years old when I prayed that prayer and Ive never regretted it.

Ive come to know God as the one who is with us through good times and bad times  and all the times in between.

The same God who brought Noah through the great flood, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego through the fiery furnace and Paul through a scary storm and shipwreck can help us through our troubles, too.

Hes the one who can steady us when we feel lifes tremors and bring us to that place of peace.
KINGSTREE, S.C.  Barbara Parrott graduated from college on a Sunday nearly 40 years ago. She started her first job the following day and has worked ever since. Thirty-two of those years were spent with the South Carolina Department of Social Services.

But last Friday, Parrott closed that chapter of her life as she retired.

Parrott worked with DSS in many capacities including serving as an administrative specialist, team leader, economic service specialist and foster care worker. She has worked in Orangeburg, Charleston and Berkeley counties.

Parrotts most recent title was Williamsburg County DSS director. That role came with several responsibilities.

Im responsible for a budget over a million dollars. Im responsible for ensuring that services are rendered to the constituents of the county, both economic and human services, child protective services, adult protective services, Parrott said.

She was also responsible for supervising a job workforce consultant, working with the community to help provide services for clients and overseeing the day-to-day operations of the agency in Williamsburg County.

Since being in Williamsburg County, Parrott said, she has seen the agency change locations and more services become available for clients. Staff morale is high, and turnover rates are low at the Williamsburg agency, she said.

Working in social services for so many years has had its benefits, Parrott said. She recalled a time when she worked with a young woman in Orangeburg County whose children were in foster care. Parrott worked with her to get off drugs, get a job and find a better way of living.

And she was able to do that," Parrott said. "She became drug-free. She got a job. She bought a house. And she was able to get her children back. And, I had forgotten, actually, about the young lady until one day my phone rang.

The person on the other line was the young woman Parrott helped to get back on track.

She said, Mrs. Parrott, I have been trying to find your telephone number to thank you for all that you did for me because when other people were giving up on me, you never did. You kept encouraging me. You kept working with me. You were patient with me, Parrott said.

The client told Parrott that she went to college, got a degree, had a good job and was providing for her children.

And she just wanted to thank me for all that I did for her, Parrott said.

That success story was just one of many Parrott has heard over the years through working with DSS.

Elizabeth Copeland, administrative assistant for DSS in Williamsburg County, said Parrott has been a blessing to each person at the agency.

She works well with the community as a whole, and she has been a big asset to our community, Copeland said.

If people are doing right, Parrott will fight for them and stand up for them the entire way, Copeland said. Over the years, Parrott has fought to make sure Williamsburg County was on top, she said.

Shes going to be very much missed, Copeland said.

The thought of retiring causes Parrott to have mixed emotions, because she loved her job.

I love the work. I love working with families," Parrott said. "I love working with children and families. I love the community, the Williamsburg County community, the Kingstree area. I feel like Ive worked to the point that its time for me to just do something else.

Parrott said that during retirement, she is considering volunteering at schools and reading to children, volunteering at a womens shelter in Charleston and sitting at home not doing anything.

But I know thats going to be hard because Im so used to going and doing, she said.

Parrott has four grandchildren that she said were waiting for her to retire so she could pick them up from school. In addition to volunteering, Parrott said, she will continue to be active with the Womens Missionary Society and Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority.

Im just excited for this chapter of my life, Parrott said.
MULLINS, S.C.  Members of the Mullins and Marion Chamber of Commerce recently celebrated the opening of the George Agency at its new location on South Main Street in Mullins.

Mullins has been good to us and Marion County, said owner Wayne George, a state representative. Sept. 1 would be 33 years in business. We rented a small spot and bounced around a bit in town at different locations, but I think weve found a home. We love this location.

He, along with agent son Bradley and co-owner Richard Marsh, set up in the same building his father operated as a department store more than 30 years ago.

George said the agency started as a general insurance and real estate company. The business partners with groups across the state in regard to health insurance and providing coverage for local customers.

George is closing in on the final weeks of his term with the South Carolina House of Representatives after deciding not to run for re-election.

Id like to say a personal thanks to Sen. Kent Williams, George said. Ive enjoyed my two terms at the Statehouse, and Ill miss him and serving in Columbia, but I wanted to come home a little more, spend time in Marion County.

George said he was happy for the support.

Weve been mighty blessed and appreciate the tremendous turnout, he said. We feel like we offer a good service to our clients and excited about that being the main thing.

Marsh brings more than 20 years of financial service experience. He said the company will offer home and auto insurance thanks to business expansion.
HARTSVILLE, S.C.  The TEACH Foundation (Teaching, Educating and Advancing Children in Hartsville) has announced that its PULSE (Partners for Unparalleled Local Scholastic Excellence) initiative has been selected as a finalist for The Riley Institute at Furman Universitys 2016 Dick and Tunky Riley WhatWorksSC Award for Excellence.

The WhatWorksSC award, first given in 2011, highlights outstanding evidence-based educational initiatives throughout South Carolina.

Finalists were chosen by a panel of judges from more than 100 entries in the Riley Institutes WhatWorksSC clearinghouse. As a finalist, PULSE will receive a small grant from the Riley Institute for enhancement of the program or consulting with other schools, districts and organizations interested in its replication.

PULSE is a one-of-a-kind public-private partnership formed to implement a comprehensive scholastic excellence program in Hartsville public schools that expanded curriculum opportunities and further improved student achievement through collaborative academic and social development initiatives.

Partners include the Darlington County School District, South Carolina Governor's School for Science and Mathematics, Coker College and Sonoco. Sonoco funded the initiative through a $5 million grant over five years.

We believe it is our responsibility to build the community as we build our business, said Harris DeLoach, executive chairman of the board, Sonoco, and chairman of the board, TEACH Foundation. It is absolutely critical that every child, regardless of economic status, leaves the public school system with the skills needed to succeed in the workplace.

After PULSEs five-year implementation, here is a snapshot of results:

>> A key component of PULSE, the Comer School Development Program, focusing on academic achievement and personal development of elementary students, served more than 6,500 students at four area elementary schools. On average, students increased reading scores by 12 points and math scores by 14 points on Measures of Academic Progress testing.

>> Accelerated Learning Opportunities served more than 840 high school students in Hartsville with courses such as Mandarin Chinese, molecular biology, engineering design and development, circuitry and electronic inventions, applied piano, class voice and more. The program grew to 14 course offerings during the 2015-16 school year and celebrated three successive years of all students passing AP tests and earning college credits. Students participating in Accelerated Learning Opportunities have published scientific papers, earned prestigious scholarships and been selected for competitive internships at organizations like NASA.

>> The local Scoutreach component helped more than 350 male students in grades 5k-5 gain leadership skills.

>> The summer reading program (six weeks long) exceeded its goal of increasing reading proficiency  from four months to six months of reading growth.

Every accomplishment begins with action, and PULSE is no different, said Jack Sanders, president and CEO of Sonoco. The five-year program is a great example of coordinated action resulting in positive change. We must build on it.

The TEACH Foundation is much more than just an exciting and unique partnership, said Eddie Ingram, superintendent of the Darlington County School District. The Foundations leadership is forward-thinking in approach and execution. In addition to substantial fiscal support of the PULSE program, the TEACH Foundations also brings innovation and networking opportunities to the people of our district.

Finalists will be recognized, and the winner of the 2016 award will be announced at a luncheon on Oct. 14 in conjunction with South Carolina Future Minds annual Public Education Partners (PEP) conference at the Columbia Metropolitan Convention Center.

The public is invited to attend the full conference or the luncheon only. For more information or to register for the luncheon or conference, visit the Riley Institutes website or contact Jill Fuson at jill.fuson@furman.edu.
HARTSVILLE, S.C.  The Greater Hartsville Chamber of Commerce is hosting the 51st-annual Women in Business Celebration on Monday at the Harris E. and Louise H. DeLoach Center. The networking social begins at 5:15 p.m., and the program begins at 6 p.m.

Two academic scholarships will be awarded, and the Woman of Achievement will be recognized.

This years committee has chosen the theme Under the Big Top: Lifes a Juggling Act, and it has taken the evening to exciting extremes. The event will feature vintage circus decor with the ever-popular photo booth.

During the networking social, women will be enchanted by magic and acrobat-like performances. The evenings dinner, catered by Bizzells of Hartsville, includes colorful and delicious circus-type fare with enough variety to tantalize and excite.

The fun will continue as Toyinda Smith, a recent Leadership Hartsville graduate and founder of Leadership Strategy and Consulting, LLC, will deliver a message about juggling life. A scholarship to a Coker College student and a Florence-Darlington Technical College student will be presented.

The Woman of Achievement will be recognized during the event for her contributions to her profession and the community.

The Carolinas Kids Hunger Busters program will be the recipient of this years community outreach. Guests who bring a donation to the event will be eligible for a special door prize. Carolinas Kids is in need of ramen noodles, peanut butter crackers, peanut butter, applesauce cups, pop tarts, Vienna sausages, macaroni and cheese and cereal.

To purchase tickets or reserve tables of eight, call the chamber at 843-332-6401 or visit hartsvillechamber.org. To sponsor the event or donate a door prize, call the chamber or send an email to admin@hartsvillechamber.org.
A separatist faction in Pakistans southwestern Balochistan Province has called on India to intervene militarily in their simmering insurgency that has seen thousands of rebels, soldiers, and civilians killed since 2004.

We want India to help us militarily, like its intervention in the support of Bengali [nationalists] in 1971, said Sher Muhammad Bugti, a leader of the Baloch Republican Party (BRP).

They should rescue us the same way they rescued the Bengalis, he added. Like the Bengalis, we will accompany their [Indian] army to win independence.

An Indian Army intervention in 1971 resulted in the emergence of Bangladesh after the defeat of the Pakistani military, which was engaged in a counterinsurgency campaign against a Bengali nationalist uprising.

The rebellion was provoked by longstanding claims of discrimination and a political crisis following elections in 1970, when a Bengali political party was prevented from taking office after sweeping the polls. Pakistans East Pakistan Province became Bangladesh after the nine-month war.

Bugtis comments follow reports that the BRPs exiled leader, Brahamdagh Bugti, and his key lieutenants are all set to receive Indian passports in the near future.

The development is likely to further escalate tensions between South Asian nuclear archrivals India and Pakistan. Islamabad has already accused New Delhi of crossing a line after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi accused Pakistan of committing large-scale atrocities in Balochistan last month.

Modis criticism followed Pakistans support for a new wave of anti-India protests in the restive Himalayan region of Kashmir. The two neighbors have fought three wars over the region since 1947. They now control parts of Kashmir but each claims it in full.

The BRP, however, doesnt seem worried about the consequences of an overt alliance with India.

They are not exactly showering us with rose petals. Instead, they are bombing us from their jets, Bugti said, referring to alleged Pakistani air strikes against Baluch rebels.

Bugti said his party will debate the issue of formally petitioning New Delhi to grant citizenship to thousands of BRP supporters who now live in exile in Afghanistan and European countries.

He [Brahamdagh Bugti] currently does not have a travel document. We would like him to approach a country that would give him such a document so he can mobilize people for the Baluch cause, he said. India is our neighbor and the worlds largest democracy. They can give us travel documents quickly.

Pakistans private Geo Television reported on September 16 that Brahamdagh Bugti and key associates are all set to receive Indian passports after months of negotiations with authorities in New Delhi.

Brahamdagh Bugti, now in his 30s, has been living in exile in Switzerland since 2011 after leaving Afghanistan because of incessant attacks on his hideouts.

He moved to neighboring Afghanistan after the 2006 killing of his grandfather, Nawab Akbar Bugti, in a Pakistani military operation in a remote region of Balochistan. He was a key leader of the fifth Baluch rebellion that began in 2004.

Brahamdagh Bugtis reportedly received a setback after Swiss authorities rejected his asylum application in January 2016, citing Islamabads decision to declare him a terrorist because of his role in Balochistans violence.

The BRP, however, maintains his asylum application was not rejected and is still pending with the Swiss authorities.

We want to mobilize the international community about the suffering in Balochistan and cannot wait longer [for the Swiss asylum process to conclude] as the bloodshed continues, Bugti said.

Brahamdagh Bugtis Indian citizenship is expected to escalate tensions with Pakistan, which reacted to Modis statements on Balochistan with fury last month.

On August 12, Modi accused Islamabad of committing large-scale atrocities in Balochistan.

Pakistan forgets that it bombs its own citizens with fighter planes in its own land, Modi told Indian politicians. Now the time has come that Pakistan shall have to answer to the world for the atrocities committed by it against the people in Balochistan.

He again mentioned Balochistan during his Independence Day speech on August 15.

The world is watching. People of Balochistan, Gilgit, and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir have thanked me a lot in the past few days, he said, referring to his earlier comments. "It is a moment of pride that these people have looked out to India for support."

Later the same month Tariq Fatemi, a special assistant to Pakistans premier on foreign affairs, accused New Delhi of crossing a red line, with these comments.

Balochistans provincial government spokesman Anwar-ul-Haq Kakar said Modis comments were proof that his country is meddling in Balochistan. Indian and Afghan spy agencies are backing Baluch insurgents and working to destabilize Pakistan."

Comprising nearly half of Pakistans landmass, Balochistan is the countrys biggest province. Rich in mineral, hydrocarbon, and coastal resources, its Gwadar seaport is slated to be the lynchpin in a multibillion-dollar Chinese transport and trade network that aims to connect the countrys northwestern Xinjiang region to the Middle East.

An acute sense of deprivation and discrimination among the Baluch majority has provoked five rebellions during the past seven decades. Nearly a dozen Baluch separatist factions see the estimated 8 million to 10 million Baluch as a marginalized minority among Pakistans 200 million population.

The separatists and even moderate Baluch nationalists fear turning into a minority in their homeland, which is strategically located at the crossroads of Afghanistan, Iran, and the Gulf.

After years of counterinsurgency operations, Islamabad appears to have gained an upper hand on Baluch separatist factions, who still frequently claim attacks on Pakistani forces.

They also accuse Islamabad of grave rights abuses such as enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings. Islamabad has rejected such claims and accuses them of being pawns in the hands of its enemies in New Delhi and Kabul.

With thousands killed, civilians have been the worst victims of violence in Balochistan. With nearly half a million people forced to leave their homes, the region has also seen large-scale displacement.

Sectarian attacks against Shiite Muslims by hard-line Sunni militants and high levels of criminality have also contributed to instability in Balochistan.

fg/
Geekologie has shut down.

Thank you to everybody.

Now go be happy.
URBANDALE  Iowa is crucial to both presidential candidates Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, according to two veteran campaign operatives who discussed the state of the race Friday during taping for this weekends episode of Iowa Press on Iowa Public Television.

Iowa has been one of the most competitive states in polling on the presidential election, most showing Trump or Clinton leading within the polls margins for error. Although Trump has been gaining in recent polls, a Monmouth University Poll published this week showed Trump ahead by 8 percentage points in Iowa.

Still, most election prognosticators say the Electoral College map shapes up better for Clinton.

The tightening race means Iowas six Electoral College votes will be important to either candidates hopes for becoming the next president.

At this point  it is incredibly important to both, and I think both candidates would, both of their campaigns would tell you that, said Brad Anderson, who ran Barack Obamas successful 2012 re-election campaign in Iowa. And we saw this in 2012. We saw, at the end of the day, it will come down to five or six states, and Iowa will be one because the math just doesnt work in a lot of ways without the electoral votes from Iowa.

John Stineman, who ran Steve Forbes 2000 presidential campaign in Iowa, said Iowa is crucial to Trump because of the difficulty presented to him by the Electoral College map.

I would say that its undeniable that the Electoral College at this point in time favors the Democratic candidate, Stineman said. And the math is there that there is a path for Trump. And whether Trump or any other Republican, it is a much more challenging path to 270 (the number of electoral votes needed to win), and I think that theres no way to shake it out other than to say that Iowa matters a great deal for Trumps victory scenario.

Trump already has campaigned in Iowa four times during the general election. Clinton has been in Iowa once and held a Labor Day event in the Quad Cities, just across the river from Iowa in western Illinois.

On Monday, both of the candidates running mates will be in Iowa: Democrat Tim Kaine will campaign on the Iowa State University campus and Republican Mike Pence will host a town hall event in Mason City and a rally in Dubuque.
NORTHWOOD  A North Iowa nonprofit is working with the Food Bank of Iowa to host a monthly mobile food pantry at the Northwood Community Center.

Formerly offered every other month, the mobile pantry hosted by Manna of Worth County and the Food Bank of Iowa began happening monthly this summer.

Manna of Worth County Coordinator Terri Sculley said she jumped at the chance to expand the service when the Food Bank of Iowa offered to expand the program to every month.

People are just so grateful for the things that they get, she said.

The mobile pantry is now offered from 5 to 6 p.m. the first Tuesday of every month at the community center, 829 Central Ave.

Recipients self-report their income. There is no residency requirement.

Started in 2013, the Mobile Food Pantry Program was created by the Food Bank of Iowa to provide better access to fresh produce, non-perishable food and protein to Iowas rural counties.

The Des Moines-based organization partners with local agencies, such as Manna of Worth County, to distribute food at the locations.

The program has been a great way to reach senior citizens, especially those who might not feel comfortable visiting a regular food bank in their community, said Trish OBrien-Edwards, regional partnership coordinator for the Food Bank of Iowa.

Thats a great thing about the mobile pantries  the stigmas not there as much as maybe coming to the (regular) pantry, she said. We see people that come to the mobile that wont come to the pantry.

OBrien-Edwards and Sculley told Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey about their experiences with the program when he visited Manna of Worth County on Wednesday.

Northey, who toured several North Iowa sites that day, said it was good to hear what local agencies were doing in their communities and to thank volunteers for what they do.

It can be a very quiet part of our community, but very meaningful to a lot of families, he said.
Editors note: The Globe Gazette asked the eight candidates in the Sept. 20 Mason City Council special election why they decided to run for the open at-large seat. Today we feature the response of Max Weaver.

I was born and raised here in Mason City, and it is dear to my heart. I want my two boys, now 23 and 25, to want to live here. I believe my role on the City Council is to figure out how to make that happen. How to make Mason City a place our children, and their children, want to live.

How are we going to get there? A community moves forward in the most positive ways when everyone is involved. I believe in transparent government. I believe in a government that serves the people.

In my three terms on the council, I provided public service to over 1,200 citizens. I take my service very seriously, and this includes effective constituent service. Ive rolled up my pants and waded barefoot through flooded basements. Im always there for you and Ive got your back.

I bring 30 years of political interest and service, on and off the council, with experience on dozens of boards, committees, and citizen groups. Even when off the council, Ive assisted citizens with their issues.

My vast knowledge base of this community and the interconnectedness of the 30+ neighborhoods and tribes will help me to begin work on day one. No on-the-job training necessary.

Mason City is at a crossroads. I want to work effectively for our city government, but working effectively does not mean rubber-stamping everything the administration wants. Legitimate disagreement should not be misconstrued as racism.

If you like the way things are going in Mason City, then vote for any of my opponents. If you want an effective, experienced advocate who will have your back and speak truth to power, then Im your man. Your influence counts. Use it!

Thank you for your time and interest.
The Hanjin Scarlet which had been unloading Port of Prince Rupert, British Colombia, was arrested on Wednesday afternoon, as preparing leave port bound for Seattle according to local reports.

The vessel was arrested by terminal operator DP World that is claiming $1.6m in unpaid bills from Hanjin ships. The Hanjin Scarlet had been calling at DP Worlds Fairview Terminal after a deal had been struck with the terminal operator and CN Rail to offload boxes.

A second vessel the Hanjin Vienna was detained off British Colombia on 1 September.

Meanwhile although three vessels Hanjin Boston, Hanjin Greece and Hanjin Gdynia have managed to come into port in the US unload, a fourth Hanjin Jungil remains stranded at sea of southern California.

Were negotiating with every service provider and they are saying 'I'm not going to let this ship berth,'" Hanjins lawyer Ilana Volkov was reported at a Newark, New Jersey court he hearing, by Reuters. "My client is being held hostage."

Last week Hanjin gained provisional bankruptcy protection in the US, and injection of $36m in funding from its parent, allowing its vessels to come into port.

Hanjin filed for receivership in Korea on 31 August leaving 141 vessels, including 98 containerships stranded around the world with $14bn in cargo onboard.

Read all the background to the Hanjin Shipping bankruptcy on our timeline
Roger Megann, group sales director containers of Peel Ports, said its cluster of ports have remained relevant destinations for direct deepwater services for vessels plying the transatlantic and Canadian trades. But having Asia-Europe direct calls would further entrench their foothold on the global market.

What weve seen over the last 12 months is an increase in feeder connections to the port, interestingly from the Mediterranean into Liverpool, and upgrades in current feeder services to take Far East cargoes to the North Continent, Megann told Seatrade Maritime News.

That puts a milestone in the ground that we are seeing a shift for lines to view Northern England as a possible destination, and maybe in two to three years we will be looking at Asia-Europe direct calls, if not sooner, he said.

Peel Ports owns and operates seven of the UK and Irelands ports, including Liverpool port and the new Liverpool2. Liverpool2 is a GBP400m ($520m) project comprising of a new quay wall, a newly dredged 16.5m deepwater berthing pocket, installation of eight ship-to-shore quay cranes and 22 cantilever rail mounted gantry cranes, as well as associated supporting infrastructure.

For us Peel Ports and in Liverpool, it is about future-proofing, Megann said. Our big cranes can handle mid-sized to big container vessels of 13,500-14,000 teu. And although our target market is not those 18,000-20,000 teu mega ships, our new terminal would be capable of handling them if required in our deepwater ports.

Meanwhile, Peel Ports has garnered support from 125 shippers representing 1.5-1.6m teu of UK trade for its Cargo200 initiative with an aim of cutting freight mileage by 200m miles over the next five years.

The Cargo200 initiative, launched in 2015, saw Peel Ports calling for importers and exporters whose goods begin or end their journey in the north of the UK, to switch current delivery of ocean freight from southeast ports to the centrally located Liverpool port.

Shippers signing up to the move could potentially allow them to save up to GBP400 per container in transportation costs by delivering to the heartland of UK. Ideally we are looking to get 200 shippers for this inititiative, Megann said.
The Straits Times reported that Judicial Commissioner Aedit Abdullah approved the interim order pending full hearing to see if it should be extended until 25 January next year.

"The imperative for orderly rehabilitation and restructuring of a company running a global business across jurisdictions, and the need to ensure that the company's assets could be marshalled and collected for such effort, both provided sufficiently strong grounds for the exercise of the inherent powers of the court to grant the restraint and stay orders," said the judge in brief decision grounds published on Thursday.

The order will prevent the arrest of Hanjin ships in Singapore waters and should allow the company to its vessels into the port to unload, assuming it is able to port and handling fees to do so. One vessel owned by the Korean company Hanjin Rome has been under arrest in Singapore waters since the 30 August, the day before it filed for receivership.

Singapore joins the US and UK in recognising the Korean bankruptcy protection order, with Hanjin reportedly filing for similar orders in a total of 43 countries.

Read all the background to the Hanjin Shipping bankruptcy on our timeline
The 2005-built Tong Yuan Hai vessel was transporting coal from Russias Nakhodka port to South Koreas Pohang port.

The vessel then reported water ingress and developed a list about 280 km northwest of Japans Ishikawa prefecture.

Japans coast guard rescued the crew of 14 during the rescue operations comprising of patrol boats and a helicopter amid heavy seas.
The companys direction is jointly decided by the board of directors and management team, he told local media. Mokhzani and Yeow, together hold a 18.55% stake in the company.

Yinson chairman and founder Lim Han Weng has a 22% stake.

The two, who have been active in various sectors of the oil and gas industry, recently resigned from the board of SapuraKencana Petroleum, citing personal reasons.
MASON CITY  Two stolen bikes and more than 20 other bikes, bike frames and dozens of other bike parts were seized after a search warrant was executed Thursday in Mason City, according to police Lt. Rich Jensen.

A news release said Mason City officers served a search warrant at 330 S. Pennsylvania Ave., Apartment No. 4, and recovered two stolen bicycles, one reported stolen to Mason City police, the other to Ames police. They also discovered the other bikes and parts, and drug paraphernalia also was found, Jensens statement said.

Three men and a woman were in the apartment when police arrived, Jensen said. No charges have been filed, but the investigation is still going on and arrests are probable, he said in the news release.

Mason City police were assisted in the investigation by the Cerro Gordo County Sheriffs Department.
Researchers have found Amelia Earhart's last picture, taken the day before her fateful flight over the Pacific.

Happy and smiling, Earhart is shown in Lae, New Guinea, as she waits for her aircraft to be fueled following a test flight on the morning of July 1, 1937.

In the picture, she is standing with Frank Howard, the local representative for Vacuum Oil who was supervising the fueling.

The following morning, Earhart and her navigator Fred Noonan took off for the longest and most difficult leg of Amelia's record attempt to fly around the world at the equator.

RELATED: Amelia Earhart's Fate Reconstructed: Photos

"It was meant to be a 2,500-mile jump to Howland Island, a tiny coral outcropping in mid-Pacific where a runway had been carved out," said Ric Gillespie, executive director of The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR), which has been investigating Earhart's fate for nearly three decades.

The Coast Guard cutter Itasca was waiting there to refuel Earhart's twin-engine Lockheed Electra for the flight to Hawaii.

"From there she would fly to Oakland to complete the world flight," Gillespie said.

But Earhart and Noonan never arrived at Howland Island.

Earhart's last messages were heard by the Itasca on the morning of July 2nd, as she flew toward her target destination. One message, send at 07:42 local time, explained that she was low on fuel.

"We must be on you, but cannot see you -- but gas is running low. Have been unable to reach you by radio. We are flying at 1,000 feet," Earhart said.

RELATED: Amelia Earhart's Plane Discovered in Odd Movie Cameo

Her final inflight radio message occurred a hour later, at 08:43.

"We are on the line 157 337. We will repeat this message. We will repeat this on 6210 kilocycles. Wait," she said.

According to TIGHAR, the numbers 157 and 337 refer to compass headings -- 157 degrees and 337 degrees -- and describe a navigation line that passed not only Howland Island, the target destination, but also Gardner Island, now called Nikumaroro.

This uninhabited atoll in the southwestern Pacific republic of Kiribati is where TIGHAR believes Earhart and Noonan landed safely and ultimately died as castaways.

"An abundance of archival, photographic and artifact evidence suggests that Earhart and Noonan made a successful landing on the island's fringing reef," Gillespie said.

RELATED: Earhart's Anti-Freckle Cream Jar Possibly Found

In a video presentation on YouTube last month, Gillespie explained that Earhart sent radio distress calls for nearly a week before the aircraft was washed into the ocean by rising tides and surf.

Using digitized information management systems, antenna modeling software, and radio wave propagation analysis programs, TIGHAR re-examined all the 120 known reports of radio signals suspected or alleged to have been sent from the Earhart aircraft after local noon on July 2, 1937 through July 18, 1937, when the official search ended.

They concluded that 57 out of the 120 reported signals are credible.

"The post-loss radio signals are actually the one body of evidence that cannot be explained away by even our most dedicated critics," Gillespie told Discovery News.

"There is a growing realization that there is no reasonable alternative interpretation for the 57 credible post-loss radio signals that were heard in the days following Earhart's disappearance," he added.

RELATED: Amelia Earhart Letter Encourages Aspiring Aviator

To make multiple transmissions, the Electra plane needed to be on land and on its wheels. It would have also needed to run the right-hand, generator-equipped engine to recharge the batteries.

"The safest procedure is to transmit only when the engine is running, and battery power is required to start the engine," said Gillespie. "To run the engine, the propeller must be clear of obstructions and water level must never reach the transmitter," he added.

TIGHAR analyzed tidal conditions on the island from July 2-9, 1937, the week following Earhart disappearance.

It emerged that transmission of credible signals occurred in periods during which the water level on the reef was low enough to permit engine operation. At least four radio signals are of particular interest, as they were simultaneously heard by more than one station.

The first signal, made when the pilot had been officially missing for just five hours, was received by the Itasca, and two other ships, the HMS Achilles, and the SS New Zealand Star.

The Itasca logged "We hear her on 3105 now -- very weak and unreadable/ fone" and asked Earhart to send Morse code dashes.

The Achilles did not hear "very weak and unreadable" voice, but heard Itasca's request and heard dashes in response. The SS New Zealand only heard the response dashes.

In other cases, credible sources in widely separated locations in the United States, Canada and the central Pacific, reported hearing a woman requesting help. She spoke English, and in some cases said she was Amelia Earhart.

RELATED: Hidden Moon Crater Named After Amelia Earhart

In one case, on July 5, the U.S. Navy Radio at Wailupe, Honolulu heard a garbled Moorse code: "281 north Howland -- call KHAQQ - beyond north -- won't hold with us much longer -- above water -- shut off."

At the same time, an amateur radio operator in Melbourne, Australia, reported having heard a "strange" code which included KHAQQ, Amelia's call sign. According to TIGHAR, such distress calls were ignored.

"Earhart and Noonan eventually died as castaways on the waterless, uninhabited atoll, their aircraft washed into the ocean," Gillespie said.

After 11 expeditions to Nikumaroro, Gillespie is now trying to raise money for a 12th in the summer of 2017, on the 80th anniversary of the disappearance of the legendary pilot.

The search for whatever remains of Earhart's Electra will rely on two, three-person manned submersibles operated by the University of Hawaiii's Undersea Research Laboratory (HURL). They will inspect the underwater area down to a depth of up to 6,500 feet.

Gillespie estimates the expedition will cost $1,750,000.

See Photos: Amelia Earhart's Fate Reconstructed:
It's a common misconception in the U.S. that doctors are legally required to treat patients regardless of ability to pay -- or any other reason. That's not quite the case. Jules Suzdaltsev explains in today's Seeker Daily report.

In fact, as with everything else in the U.S. health care system, multiple variables are involved. Whether a doctor is legally obliged to treat you depends on location, type of facility, type of doctor, and the nature of the treatment.

First of all, doctors in private practice -- who do not receive public funding via programs like Medicare -- can deny pretty much anyone for pretty much any reason. They can choose to refuse customers like any other merchant or service provider, although they are still subject to federal anti-discrimination laws.

RELATED: Should Doctors Get Your DNA?

Doctors who receive public funding are subject to different rules in different states. Many states, for instance, allow doctors to refuse treatment to a patient exhibiting threatening or dangerous behavior. Some grant doctors the right to refuse treatment on moral grounds. In April 2016, Mississippi passed a law that would have allowed doctors to refuse any medical case that would contradict their religious beliefs -- notably gender reassignment surgery. The case was later blocked by a federal judge.

Speaking of the feds, that's where things get even more confusing. Both patients and medical providers are governed by broad federal protections, which sometimes contradict state and local laws. For instance, federal policy prohibits hospitals from denying treatment to anyone who is facing a life threatening emergency, or on the basis of a person's race, faith, age or sexual orientation.

But some church-affiliated hospitals use their code of ethics to justify refusing a treatment that challenges their religious beliefs -- even in the case of emergency treatment. In fact, a recent case in Chicago made headlines when a Catholic hospital refused to remove a woman's IUD contraceptive device.

The bottom line: The U.S. health care system is terminally confusing. But we already knew that.

-- Glenn McDonald

Learn More:

The New York Times: When Doctor's Slam the Door

The Atlantic: Why Mississippi's Law on Religious Rights and LGBT Discrimination Got Blocked

The Huffington Post: Lawsuits Target Catholic Hospitals for Refusing to Provide Emergency Miscarriage Management
Police have a new ally in the hunt for drug dealers: scientists who probe the sewer system for traces of illicit substances that can give clues to where and how much is being consumed. These drugs pass from dealer to user to toilet. By checking for metabolites of these drugs, heroin changes to morphine in urine, for example, researchers get a big picture of who is using what. In the medium-sized town of Lausanne, Switzerland, Frederic Been, a toxicologist, collaborated with police to analyze wastewater before it entered the town's treatment plant. The cops had been following two heroin dealers, and thought they had the city's problem solved by arresting the pair, but it turns out that other dealers were picking up the slack. RELATED: New Technique Can Date a Fingerprint "Wastewater is an objective way of measuring drug use," said Been, now a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Antwerp in the Netherlands. Been published a study this month in the journal Forensic Science International with the results of his research. By sampling water for heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine, Been and colleagues were able to help police assess the drug market share, decipher the structure of the drug markets, as well as the local organization of traffickers. Based on seizures and arrests of dealers, the Lausanne police believed that dealers were selling 6 grams of pure heroin a day. In Switzerland, heroin is 10 percent pure. The amount sold was closer to 60 grams of "street" drug. . WATCH VIDEO: Why Heroin Abuse Is On The Rise In America

But the wastewater analysis showed that approximately 12 or 13 grams of pure heroin was being consumed per day, explained Been. "It tells you that the market was flexible enough that the drug consumers had other ways to find it," he said. The wastewater analysis helped reveal that dealers were coming in from other neighboring towns to fill the void. RELATED: 'Edible Barcodes' Help Fight Counterfeit Drugs "For these three cites, there was an exchange going on," he said. "It was also interesting for the police that even if they got this guy, there is still a lot of drugs on the market." This isn't the first time that wastewater analysis has focused on drugs. In 2013, researchers in Washington state documented the use of Ritalin and other drugs for attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) around exams. Many students say the prescription medication helps them focus on their studies and the researchers found the use of both Ritalin and amphetamines jumped seven-fold around finals week. Been says the wastewater analysis can also be used in bigger cities to get an idea of trends over time, and which areas are seeing spikes or drops in drug use. Now he wants to track other biological markers that help understand the health of a population, rather than their drug use, such as the use of tobacco or alcohol, for example or prescription medications for medical conditions. "It's a very cost-effective tool," he said. SEE PHOTOS: 9 Incredibly Creative Drug Smuggling Tricks

An Innovative Industry With multi-trillion dollar global market for illicit narcotics, drug traffickers have a clear incentive to get their products down the supply chain to their customers, despite the legal and moral objections to their activities. As traffickers are increasingly put under pressure by authorities looking to shut down such enterprises, entrepreneurial drug smugglers are constantly inventing new, unusual and often outrageous means of crossing borders unchecked.

Submarine Smuggling In what might be the most sophisticated means of transportation ever employed by drug traffickers, this submarine was used by smugglers based out of Timbiqui, Colombia, until the Colombian army seized the vessel earlier this year. Capable of transporting roughly 8 tons of cocaine in each trip, the submarine would leave from Colombia and drop off its contents in Mexico, which would then be broken up and transported in smaller quantities across the U.S.-Mexico border.

Incoming! Modern technology may not be the only means of getting illegal drugs across the U.S.-Mexico border. More primitive tools may be enough to do the trick. Last month, the Mexican Army seized two catapults that were use to launch marijuana into Arizona from the Mexican city, Agua Prieta, according to a report from the Associated Press. Oddly enough, this seizure was actually the second time that authorities uncovered this method of smuggling. In January, two other catapults were discovered in Naco, a city that shares both sides of the border.

Going Underground If drug smugglers can't get over the fence that stands between them and the southwestern United States, there no reason that they couldn't just tunnel under. Since the 1990s, more than 100 such tunnels have been discovered, many of which originate in Tijuana, Mexico, and lead into San Diego, Calif. Some tunnels are so sophisticated that they have lights and climate control, according to a report by CNN in 2009. The tunnels help smugglers not only bring drugs across the border, but also people, money and weapons.

Contraband Clams Smuggling drugs in clams might make sense if taken on a fishing boat. A plane, however, is another story. On Sept. 8, 2011, 26-year-old David Pocasangre Vaquiz from El Salvador arrived in Washington-Dulles International Airport. In his luggage, Customs and Border Protection officials found more than 150 grams of cocaine concealed inside 15 clams, all of which had been glued shut to conceal their cargo.

Once You Pop... A Pringles can may not seem like the most thoughtful means of hiding small quantities of narcotics. However, in 2006, police in Texas found a Pringles can containing what were essentially molded wafers of solid cocaine that were thinly sliced and shaped to resemble potato chips.

A Small Stash Even the smallest object can be used to contain a hidden drug cache. In August 2011, authorities with the Federal Public Revenue Administration of Argentina found cocaine concealed in tiny screws carried by a Peruvian man flying from Buenos Aires to South Africa. In total, the smuggler had some 20 kilograms (44 pounds) of cocaine hidden among screws and other items on his person.

A Casket Case Hiding narcotics in a coffin may seem like an especially grim means of smuggling illegal cargo. But this tactic has been used successfully by smugglers, most famously by trafficker Frank Lucas during the Vietnam War to ship heroine in the caskets of dead American soldiers. In fact, even tombstones have concealed hidden caches of marijuana and cocaine.
In Ghana, women are more susceptible to HIV infection, largely due to their socioeconomic disadvantage.

Because Ghanaian society favors the education of men, many women are financially dependent on male partners. Men are in control of sexual relationships as well, and often choose not to use protection during sex, especially because the fertility of women is very important in Ghanaian culture.

When women do contract HIV, they are often shunned by society and considered worthless by men. Doris Yarnie was one of these women.

The Seeker Stories team recently traveled to Ghana to speak with Doris and to film a VR documentary about how HIV and AIDS is disproportionately affecting women in Sub-saharan Africa. Watch the documentary now.

Learn More:

TIME: Why Poverty is Sexist

UN.org: The United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women

ONE.org: Poverty is Sexist
OSAGE  Six Mitchell County organizations have pledged support for enhanced natural gas pipeline infrastructure in the county.

Phase one of the proposed natural gas line project would extend an additional pipeline to Mitchell County across Worth County. A joint partnership with Worth County, the pipeline would adequately serve both areas and reduce project costs.

Mitchell County could use tax increment finance revenues to support the project, which is supported by the Osage Development Corp., Riceville Area Development Corp., Stacyville Economic Development, St. Ansgar Economic Development, Heartland Power Cooperative and Mitchell County Economic Development Commission (MCEDC).

During a recent board of supervisors meeting, Ivan Wold said the lack of infrastructure has hampered economic development.

Mitchell County has natural gas pipeline restraints which are impacting our efforts to attract business and industry, said Wold, president of St. Ansgar Development. We have lost economic development projects due to the lack of pipeline capacity.

Although the first phase would bring additional natural gas to the St. Ansgar area, all agreed the supervisors should not wait three to five years to bring natural gas to the east side of the county  McIntire, Riceville, Stacyville and Osage.

Iowa is home to 10 percent of the countrys ag-bioscience jobs, according to a report from the Biotechnology Innovation Organization. Employment in that sector grew by 5 percent from 2012-2014, according to Brenda Dryer, the fastest growth rate of any state.

Mitchell County is home to a number of outstanding ag-bioscience companies, said Dryer, MCEDC executive director. We have an opportunity to continue to grow this industry sector, but to do so, we need a key infrastructure component, natural gas.

She said the commission would like to see an ag industrial park outside Riceville, in the county.

The eastern population of Mitchell County lacks access to any natural gas pipelines, said Christopher Smith, Riceville Area Development board of directors. We want to grow and expand and need this opportunity.

Harlan Bisbee, director for Stacyville Economic Development and MCEDC, encouraged the supervisors to pursue a whole-county phased solution to enhancing access to natural gas as they move through the design and engineering phase.

The Mitchell and Worth County supervisors and economic development staff will meet in the next few weeks. They plan to set a plan to move into the design and engineering phase for the proposed project.
Its as if they didnt get the memo.

As in years past, some die-hard iPhone buyers lined up early this week outside Apples flagship store in San Franciscos Union Square, mirroring lines outside the Fifth Avenue store in New York. In Berlin, they set up tents in hopes of being the first to get hard-to-find models.

Yet these adopters may go from early to surly Friday as they learn that their strategy wont pay off.

Lines around the block have long been a symbol of the frenzy around Apples iPhone. In 2010, a line of more than a thousand people waited to pick up an iPhone 4 at Apples downtown San Francisco store.

Since last year, though, Apple has had a quiet policy of encouraging people to shop online through its website or mobile app. Angela Ahrendts, the executive in charge of Apples stores, sent a note in April 2015 to retail employees declaring that the days of waiting in line are over.

Customers who listened and ordered online early were in luck. Apple announced Thursday that larger iPhone 7 Plus models and units with a new jet-black finish are sold out and wont be available in stores. According to Slice Intelligence, an e-commerce analysis firm, more than half of the customers who ordered a phone online in the first 48 hours after they became available last Friday chose the Plus, and black was the most popular color.

Ordering online may be efficient and productive. But for some, it lacks grit and romance. By Thursday morning, 16 roped-off chairs lined the side of the Apple Store, but almost all of them were missing their owners. One woman sat asleep, her head in her hands, empty chairs to her left and right.

Shortly after Josh Bell plopped down a cushion around 10 a.m. to become 17th in line, he heard the bad news about the iPhone 7 Plus he had hoped to buy. Though he said he was bummed, the experience of camping out mattered more, and an iPhone 7 would do just fine.

Ill be one of the first, hopefully, 30 or so people in San Francisco to have one, Bell said. And Im more than OK with that.

Despite Bells hopes, the first people to get iPhones will almost certainly be those who cleverly ask UPS or FedEx to hold on to their deliveries at a warehouse, where they will be available hours before the Apple Store opens.

The first person in line, Justin Harris, had tried to order an iPhone 7 Plus online last week, but he learned it wouldnt arrive at his home until months later. So he packed a weeks worth of Soylent meal-replacement shakes, a sleeping bag, toothbrush, a Chewbacca pillow, iPhone, battery pack and other items  then settled into a spot on the sidewalk for several days.

Lea Suzuki/The Chronicle

Its been a tradition, said 19-year-old Harris, who camped at the store last year so he could chat with fellow Apple geeks. Buying the iPhone at the end is the icing on the cake, he said.

Apple is also downplaying the opening-week frenzy. Since 2008, the company has touted first-weekend sales figures for new iPhone models like boffo box-office numbers for a blockbuster movie. This year, Apple said it would discontinue the practice, saying that it expects to sell all the phones it could make.

With expanded distribution through carriers and resellers, the company said, it knows even before the orders come in that we will sell out of iPhone 7.

Sales for the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus are expected to roughly match the blockbuster sales of the iPhone 6 two years ago, and outpace the popularity of last years model. Reports from wireless carriers, which also sell the phone, suggest that more people are ordering online. Advance orders were up more than 375 percent at Sprint in the first three days that the phone was on sale, compared with last years iPhone 6S sales. Advance orders also soared at T-Mobile.

Customers may be able to find hard-to-get iPhone models through the carriers or retailers like Best Buy, which said it will have limited quantities for walk-in customers at Bay Area locations.

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Part of Apples problem is its prior success. Sales of iPhones have faltered as the smartphone market has become saturated. Analysts say there are enough new features in the iPhone 7 to persuade people with older phones to upgrade, but that sales will not surpass the 6. The iPhone 7, which starts at $649, has a speaker system that can play music two times louder than its predecessor, is water resistant, and has two hours more battery life than the 6S. The iPhone 7 Plus, starting at $769, has a dual-lens camera.

While Apple is selling the new iPhone in more than 25 countries Friday, many around the world will have to wait. In the San Francisco line, at least two shoppers said in Vietnamese that they plan to keep the new iPhones for themselves and bring their 6S devices to relatives in Vietnam, where Apple does not have retail stores and is not selling the iPhone 7 in its initial release. Those shoppers, who declined to give their names, said they also waited in line for the new iPhone last year.

As he counted down the hours until the store opening, Harris, an Oakland resident, noticed that he still had half of his Soylent provision left. He was waiting for his boyfriend  an Android fan  to deliver a recharged battery pack.

San Francisco Chronicle staff writer Michael Bodley contributed to this report.

Truong Nguyen provided Vietnamese translation.

Wendy Lee is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: wlee@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @thewendylee
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On the day that would forever change Haiti, Valerie Noisette was thousands of miles away.

She had just finished a six-week stint on the island, living in a house that no longer existed by the time night fell on Jan. 12, 2010. As she watched the news of chaos, heartbreak and disaster, she knew she had to go back.

The Haiti she returned to hardly resembled the one Noisette left: An earthquake had turned buildings to rubble and left hundreds of thousands of people without homes or food.

She spent the next six years working with agencies to set up temporary school sites for displaced children, to bring education back to those who had so little else.

There was a call for me to go back to Haiti and contribute to the rehabilitation efforts, she said recently, sitting in a colorful, window-lit office in San Franciscos South of Market neighborhood. I knew I had to do it through education, because more than 50 percent of the country is under the age of 24. Thats how youre going to change a country, by educating its people.

This weekend, Noisette will return to Haiti with a similar mission.

Leah Millis/The Chronicle

Working as the program manager for San Francisco nonprofit Worldreader, which uses e-books to deliver thousands of titles and learning materials to countries around the world, Noisette will oversee Worldreaders first-ever program in the Americas.

The goal, Noisette said, is to try to bring about a better future for a country that has struggled for years to recover from natural disasters, epidemics and political instability by empowering Haitis youth with the ability to read and write.

Noisette grew up as a child of two worlds. She was born and raised in Chicago, but made frequent and extended visits to her parents native Haiti. Seeing the disparities in that country inspired her to move there as an adult.

Three-quarters of children in Haiti are unable to read by the end of second grade, according to a report this year from the U.S. Agency for International Development.

Leah Millis/The Chronicle

The agency has been working with Haitis Ministry of Education to overhaul the curriculum for students in grades one through four, and push reading and writing as part of its $4.2 billion investment in the country.

This year, Worldreader will add its technological approach to spreading literacy in Haiti public schools  a vast minority among the nearly 20,000 schools on the island.

Most are run by nongovernmental organizations or religious groups. Worldreader officials hope that their efforts in public schools will push others to incorporate better technology.

I hate to say this, but so much aid work in the past has been taking technology that nobody wants and putting it in the hands of Third World countries, said co-founder and president David Risher. The problem with that is it doesnt make anybody feel good.  What weve seen is when you invest in people and say, We trust you, and put in their hands technology that a lot of people even in very wealthy countries, people in the United States, dont have, it opens their minds and makes them proud.

Leah Millis/The Chronicle

Thousands of books, digitized and downloaded to Kindles and similar e-readers, were sent to Haiti this week.

Each device comes equipped with a teaching guide, guidebooks and fun books for instructors, as well as stories for the children. E-reader hubs, centers where teachers can go to download updates, new materials and lesson plans, will be set up in hard-to-reach areas.

Its the first time Worldreader has created a program specifically for teachers, rather than students, parents or community members.

In its pilot program, which distributed the e-readers to 20 schools, Worldreader found that teachers were four times more likely to use the e-readers than their paper manuals.

Leah Millis / The Chronicle 2016

Worldreader plans to track data and teacher feedback to adjust the program and improve the curriculum. And since teachers will be using e-readers instead of books, they can update their materials with the push of a button.

Noisette said she hopes it is only the first step of many.

I see bigger visions of getting the children involved and communities involved and parents involved, and really making a it a community practice to promote literacy, she said. With an e-reader, you can have, what? Fifteen hundred books on a single e-reader? That means you have 1,500 books that you can take with you anywhere, to school, to your home.

Worldreader has concentrated most of its global efforts in Africa, where it has sent thousands of e-readers to teachers, students and community centers like libraries for general use.

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In Kenya, one of the first countries in which Worldreader offered its program, nearly 54,000 people use e-readers. More than 29,000 more access Worldreaders digital library from their mobile phones.

When the program began in 2010, e-readers were more expensive and more cutting-edge than they are today. But decreasing costs and increasing capacity make them the perfect devices to send to developing countries, Risher said.

In India, where more families have access to data-enabled phones, the organization has released an Android app and a Web version that can work with any phone with a built-in browser. Worldreader spearheaded a campaign there to encourage mothers to read to their children using their phones.

Risher, who got his start at Microsoft, working on its first database product, went on to become a top Amazon.com executive. He left Amazon in 2002, but retains close ties, and negotiated with the e-commerce giant on the donation of thousands of Kindle devices. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and his wife, Mackenzie, have donated to Worldreader.

At the start of each program, teachers, librarians and community leaders are encouraged to throw a party and introduce the technology to the community. The idea is that once people are familiar with who they are and what the e-readers are for, they will not only be more open to using the technology, but it creates a sense of public accountability.

Sarah Jaffe, Worldreaders director of education, said the e-readers that it has sent to foreign countries break about half as often as they reportedly do in the U.S. because the people who receive them treat them with such care.

Less than 1 percent of devices have been stolen, she said.

This is the future, Risher said. And people understand that. They understand you cant steal someones education because youre stealing their future. Its really quite amazing to see how something like this not only transforms individuals, but it can transform an entire community.

Marissa Lang is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: mlang@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @Marissa_Jae
A 66-year-old man shot dead in a car Wednesday in Oaklands Fruitvale neighborhood worked as a security guard in City Hall, Oakland officials said Thursday.

Tony Smith, of Oakland, worked for Cypress Security, which has a contract to provide guards for the building. He was killed about 4:30 a.m. while sitting in a vehicle on 35th Avenue near International Boulevard, a few blocks from the Fruitvale BART station.

No motive has been released in the shooting, nor have police said an arrest was made.

Stephanie Wright Hession/Special to The Chronicle

Tony was a great asset to our security team and City Family, he was instrumental in ensuring the safety of our staff and visitors to the Civic Center Complex and the Frank H. Ogawa Plaza, city staff said in a written announcement to employees. Tony will be missed by all who knew him, he was always helpful, courteous and respectful.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Updated to include drought zones while tracking water shortage status of your area, plus reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

Kimberly Veklerov is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kveklerov@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kveklerov
The San Francisco public defender will argue that an African American man charged with battery and resisting arrest in connection with a scuffle with BART officers had every right to fight police  a legal strategy that comes amid heightened scrutiny over police use of force and issues of race.

Videos of the July confrontation that were posted on social media showed one of the officers apparently punching a handcuffed Michael Smith, 22, whom police had detained in response to reports of an armed man trying to rob someone on a BART train. Prosecutors say the videos tell an incomplete story and that body cameras worn by police show that Smith was kicking and spitting at BART officers.

Jury selection is scheduled to begin Friday in Smiths trial on six counts of battery on a police officer and one count of resisting arrest. Public Defender Jeff Adachi, who will represent Smith personally, said he will make what amounts to an argument of self-defense.

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His actions were necessary in order for him to save his life, Adachi said. This was a situation where the officers really made assumptions about him and acted too swiftly.

The incident happened just before 1 p.m. on July 29 as BART officers responded to the Embarcadero Station to reports that an armed man was trying to rob a passenger on a train.

Adachi said Smith hadnt tried to rob anyone. The 911 call was made in response to a dispute that Smith and his pregnant girlfriend had with a passenger as they were on their way to a doctors appointment, the public defender said.

Police found no weapon on Smith, and prosecutors charged him only with crimes that stemmed from the confrontation on the station platform with the BART officers.

Lawyers for both sides agree that as the train pulled into the station, officers with guns drawn ordered Smith and his girlfriend onto the platform. What happened next will be up to the jury to decide.

Prosecutors contend that Smith defied officers orders, forcing police to use a controlled takedown to detain a man they suspected was armed with a gun.

Footage from the officers body cameras, which has yet to be shown publicly, shows Smith bite, kick, finger-gouge and spit on the officers, said Alex Bastian, a spokesman for District Attorney George Gascon.

The cell phone footage that circulated on social media was fuzzy and shot at a distance. The officers cameras gave a more complete picture of the incident, Bastian said.

We were even able to see the defendant kicking the body camera off the chest of one of the officers, he said.

Adachi, however, said any violence was instigated by police.

What you see is the officers have him at gunpoint and then they immediately sweep his feet and slam him on the ground, he said. Mr. Smith is detained, yet they continue to use force. Even after they search him, they continue to use too much force.

Smith has been arrested by BART police on two other occasions, in 2013 on suspicion of petty theft and in 2014 for alleged fare evasion. Both times he resisted officers, and in one case he tried to take an officers gun, BART officials said.

Adachi will argue to the jury that the officers actions in this incident were unreasonable or excessive. He cited a provision in the law that allows a defendant to lawfully use reasonable force to defend himself if officers use excessive force.

Some legal experts said it might be difficult to persuade a jury that an accused batterer of police was acting in self-defense.

Jurors tend to assume that the cops are telling the truth, said Hadar Aviram, a law professor at UC Hastings in San Francisco. She said publicized video footage of police beatings may be reducing juror skepticism, but when its the cops word against the citizens word, its pretty difficult.

Another potential barrier is that the judge would instruct jurors to consider the situation from the perspective of a reasonable, objective observer in Smiths position, said Robert Weisberg, a Stanford University criminal law professor and co-director of the schools Criminal Justice Center.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Updated to include drought zones while tracking water shortage status of your area, plus reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

You could make the argument (for a reasonable fear of excessive force), but it would be very, very hard, Weisberg said. Defense attorneys seldom attempt it in court, he said.

Adachi said the trial will really focus on how police are trained. After the Oscar Grant case, there was a huge effort to reform BART, yet what we see here is officers working to escalate a situation.

Grant, who was also 22, was shot dead by a BART police officer while lying facedown on the Fruitvale Station platform after a fight erupted on a train in the early morning hours of New Years Day 2009. Johannes Mehserle, who shot Grant, was sentenced to two years in prison after being convicted of involuntary manslaughter.

The case has been followed by a wave of national scrutiny over police killings of unarmed black men, many of which have been filmed and posted to social media.

Smith, Adachi will argue, was victimized by police and now faces very serious criminal charges. Theyre throwing the book at him, he said.

Chronicle staff writer Bob Egelko contributed to this report.

Evan Sernoffsky is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: esernoffsky@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @EvanSernoffsky
A woman, with hiking backpacks strapped to her back and chest, talks loudly on her phone when she boards a San Francisco-bound BART train at MacArthur Station during the morning commute.

The train hiccups into gear, and she pinballs off the passengers standing around her, annoying them. Oblivious to commuter etiquette, she keeps talking.

As the crowded train leans into bends, heads bob like movie popcorn shaken to spread salt and butter. It gets uncomfortably cramped and warm as people squish in at 19th Street, 12th Street and West Oakland.

On the other side of the Transbay Tube, relief awaits at Embarcadero and Montgomery stations, where masses of riders will exit into the Financial District.

But some people dont always make it through the tube standing up. On this day, its a woman trying to steady herself on a headrest. She begins slowly tipping, like a hardcover on a shelf after its bookend has been removed.

Her collapse jolts riders from the trance of flipping through electronic updates, posts and dating profiles. There are gasps followed by a plea for a doctor. The backpacker stops talking. Someone sidesteps their way to the intercom at the end of the car to call for help.

Weve all been delayed by a nebulous BART medical emergency. According to BART, more than 60,000 people pass through the Transbay Tube in each direction during the morning commute.

An official tally of people who have fainted on trains, particularly inside the tube, isnt available because BART doesnt track medical emergencies individually. Theyre stuck in there together with other medical emergency data, not unlike the commuters using the public transportation system. And data are collected only on incidents that result in train delays of five minutes or more.

Thus, in the quarter that ended in June, we know that 163 trains were late because of medical emergencies. For the three-month period that ended in March, 285 trains were delayed because a passenger needed assistance.

Alexandra Sowa, a clinical professor of medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York, says prolonged standing and heat are two of the most common culprits of vasovagal syncope, the most common type of fainting.

Overcrowded trains frequently trigger a vasovagal episode.

In many of my patients, there is a often a direct correlation between a vasovagal event and a previous night of drinking or a morning of skipping breakfast  two events that can lead to dehydration, Sowa says.

When the body is dehydrated, Sowa, who practices internal medicine, tells me, It can be harder to compensate for decreased blood pressure, leading to a decrease in blood flow to the brain.

Lights out.

And BART is ready for it  with quick-response paramedics at both ends of the tube.

When someone has a medical emergency at West Oakland or Embarcadero, it impacts the entire system because all of our tracks merge into the tube and we cant easily move other trains around a train holding for medical, Alicia Trost, a BART spokeswoman, tells me.

On this day, what I witness causes a stir, not a delay. And it warms my soul.

If you remove politics and social status and drop people into a stressful situation where survival depends on a selfless act, I believe a great majority of us will do the right thing: help. The current presidential cycle, police shootings and battles for equality have exposed how divided people are. Instead of taking a bus or taking my chances carpooling, I choose BART because a more regular diverse representation of the Bay Area standing shoulder to shoulder cant be found.

If I have a medical emergency, Id rather be on BART than on the street, where I could be stepped around and ignored  or worse, arrested. The recent stabbings and crack smoking, and the shooting earlier this year, wont change my mind. Not after watching scenes like this unfold.

The impact of the womans fall sounds like a bag carelessly dropped just inside the front door after a punishing day of work.

People clutching coffee cups and thermoses, workout bags and novels sway in search of a better view. The train is coasting toward Embarcadero, slowed by  ding, ding, ding  a medical emergency on an earlier train entering the station.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Updated to include drought zones while tracking water shortage status of your area, plus reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

A man in sandals and with a fedora over his dark, curly hair still damp from a morning shower, squats in front of the woman. She sits up and runs her fingers through her short hair.

A passenger hands the man, who might be the requested doctor, a water bottle to give to the woman. She blows wisps of hair out of her eyes before taking a few sips. Her description is relayed to the train operator: gray pants, pink shirt, black hair.

The train operator inquires about her ethnicity.

Does it matter? a man scoffs.

Im OK, Im OK, the woman says as she dusts herself off. Im just dehydrated.

The train pulls into Embarcadero, and the passengers who were on the far end of Car 1752 rubberneck to catch a glimpse of what happened as they trudge to greet new triumphs and failures.

The backpacker resumes her conversation. There was an emergency. Shes going to be late.

Otis R. Taylor Jr. is a San Francisco Chronicle columnist whose column appears Tuesday and Friday. Email: otaylor@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @otisrtaylorjr
ST. ANSGAR  Three generations of the Patterson family have worked in the soybean seed business.

Patterson Seed produces thousands of bushels of Stine seed beans, which are distributed throughout northern Iowa, southern Minnesota, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Missouri and Michigan.

Soybean growers in northern Iowa and southern Minnesota, along with the Patterson farm operation, produce 20 different types of Stine beans. With their expanding operation, Patterson Seed is currently constructing new office and warehouse space.

Today, Jeremy Patterson is the third generation to work in the business. Jeremys dad, Mike Patterson, was the first Patterson involved in the business, working for Harold Nickerson.

Nickerson started the seed business 8 miles northwest of Osage. Max Patterson, Mikes dad, later purchased the business in 1977.

In addition, Mikes wife, Lisa, has also played a big role in developing the business.

She has helped bag and did all kinds of other things throughout the years, Mike said.

Mike and Jeremy both acknowledged two of their long-term employees have had a great impact on building their business.

Tom Gerk, of rural Stacyville, was an employee with Nickerson Farms and joined the Pattersons when they bought the business. Teresa Dorsey, of Osage, who is the office manager, has been with the firm since 1999.

I began helping out as soon as I could lift 50-pound bags, Jeremy said. After high school, Jeremy attended the University of Northern Iowa where he obtained a business administration degree in 2003. He returned to join the family business in September 2005.

Jeremy explained how their soybean business operates.

When the soybeans are harvested in the fall, they are stored in steel bins. Thats when the process of producing seed beans begins, Jeremy said.

The beans are taken from the Pattersons on-site storage bins and unloaded into a gravity pit. From there they flow out of the pit into an elevator leg that transports them to overhead holding bins. The beans are then sent through a fanning mill where swift air currents blow out any foreign matter such as weed seed, dirt or other debris. Next, the seeds travel through a spiral-separator, where odd-shaped beans are disposed of.

The soybeans then travel through a machine which treats them with various chemicals, specified by farmers and dealers who purchase the seed. These treatments can cost from $4 to $40 per bag, depending on specified treatment requested by the customer, Jeremy said. Other beans by-pass the chemical treatment area and are kept separate throughout the remaining process.

Untreated beans cant go through equipment which has handled treated beans. This avoids contamination, Jeremy said. Some of the seed will leave the plant untreated.

Some of the elevator legs that carry the beans are very gentle, because they are designed to handle potato chips, Mike said. We have these types of elevator legs so we dont damage the seed.

Both the untreated and treated seed beans are then sent to a bagger or stored in large bulk bins.

The seed beans are stored on-site until they are picked up.

Id say that 25 percent of our beans go in paper bags and 25 percent go into large totes or pro boxes, Mike said. This is where the business is changing, as 50 percent of the seed goes out in true bulk to large farmers or dealerships.

The Pattersons large warehouse will be filled and emptied about three times from October until May.

Mike said some of the new soybean technology headed for farmers fields are new genetic traits of beans, which can be used with chemicals that have previously been only used on corn.

New genetic beans have been developed that can be used with the herbicides using Dicamba, 2-4D, and Balance. Stine research plots with these beans are currently being tested on the Patterson Farm.

A limited amount of extend beans, which will work with Dicamba herbicides, will be offered to farmers next spring, Mike said.

He cautioned, New technology sounds great, but we dont know how it will work yet, and we dont know the cost of it. Farmers have various concerns. They dont know the cost of the seed, cost of the herbicide or the price of the beans when they sell.

The Pattersons pointed out Harry Stine, who heads the Stine Seed Company in Adel, is an innovative corn and soybean breeder.

Stine recently helped to design a 20-inch row-crop planter with John Deere that plants current soybean seed populations but does a better job with equal distance spacing of the seed for better utilization of sunlight, and a quicker canopy production, which helps with weed control and preserves moisture to produce higher yields, said Mike.

This past spring, the Pattersons used the planter on some of their soybean acres.

Stine genetics is also working on soybean varieties that will produce angled leaves for better utilization of sunlight, Mike said.
Addie Mae Collins, age 14.

Carol Denise McNair, 11.

Carole Robertson, 14.

Cynthia Wesley, 14.

Rest in peace.

The Chronicles front page from Sept. 16, 1963, covers the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing in Birmingham, Ala., that killed four girls who were changing into their choir robes.

A bomb shattered a crowded Negro church yesterday, killing four girls in their Sunday school classes and triggering a reign of violence that left two more persons dead in the streets, the story read, using the accepted language of the time.

As if the girls deaths werent sickening enough, more blacks were killed in the violence that flared up in Birmingham as word spread about the bombing.

It was clear who was responsible for the original crime, but justice lagged.

Ku Klux Klan members planted at least 15 sticks of dynamite and a timing device at the church during a period of extreme racial tension in Alabama. Original reports stated that the dynamite had been thrown from a car, but that wasnt the case.

The men responsible werent held accountable for their actions for years. The suspected ringleader was found guilty of one of the girls murders in 1977. Two of the perpetrators were convicted of four counts of murder in 2001 and 2002 after the FBI reopened the case. The fourth bomber died before getting his due.

The bombing shocked much of the nation and helped push the civil rights movement into the mainstream  but at a dreadful cost.

See more front pages: Go to SFChronicle.com/covers to search a database of hundreds of Chronicle Covers articles that showcase the newspapers history.

More from the Archive The Vault Home of the San Francisco Chronicle's archive and more than 150 years of journalism covering the Bay Area and beyond.

Chronicle Covers highlights one classic Chronicle newspaper page from our archive for 366 days. Library director Bill Van Niekerken and producers Kimberly Chua, Michelle Devera and Jillian Sullivan contributed to the project. Tim ORourke is the executive producer of SFChronicle.com. Email: torourke@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @TimothyORourke

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Weve all coveted an item to project our self-worth. It could be a degree, a car, a watch or a handbag.

The hardest and the softest among us  and the richest and poorest  want the same thing: to look like theyre somebody.

Kicks, the debut film by Richmond native Justin Tipping, examines the financial, physical and mental pressures that are unpacked by a young mans determination to retrieve his stolen sneakers  coveted Air Jordan 1 black-and-red retro high-tops. The films a coming-of-age tale that explores how self-esteem and self-worth are tied to the sneaker culture.

Sneakers are a source of self-expression. Theyre no different than nappy hair, hairstyles with streaks of purple, or other fashionable Bay Area sartorial favorites such as ripped jeans, leather motorcycle jackets and beautifully busted Chuck Taylor All-Stars.

The people standing in line for a late showing of Kicks at Oaklands Grand Lake Theatre last week wore Timberland boots, Vans skate shoes, Adidas Samba Classics and, of course, there were Air Jordans in fresh-out-the-box condition. You wont find these kicks hanging from telephone wires and power lines.

Sneakers are high fashion and high art, as seen in Out of the Box: The Rise of Sneaker Culture, a traveling exhibition that will come to the Oakland Museum of California in December. Sneaker boutiques have become destinations for those who treat their sneakers as art collections to congregate.

Santiago Mejia/Special to The Chronicle

SoleSpaces flagship store on Telegraph Avenue, for example, is more of an arts space than a store. Earlier Devlin Braswell, a sneaker customizer, was filmed for a reality TV series this week.

On one wall, Braswells work, including a pair of Jordans reconstructed with Golden State Warriors colors and Stephen Currys No. 30, were expertly arranged. Do not touch was written on Post-it notes stuck to the wall.

Its like when you go to a museum, you cant touch the art, SoleSpace worker Jetia Deity, who is also a DJ and performance artist, told me after ringing up a customer.

Shoes have a necessary function. Your feet are essential to a healthy life, especially if youre on them all day. Foot discomfort is hard to tiptoe around. And, as depicted in Kicks, cool sneakers can jump-start a love life.

My first car, a 1985 Buick Century with whitewall tires, didnt turn heads like the week I wore three new pairs of sneakers in three consecutive days. I was driving on fumes for weeks, but I was immediately more popular  and confident.

Along with status comes pressure.

A boyfriend of a girl I had flirted with put the word out he was going to beat me up and take my shoes, the off-white with teal accents Air Trainer Huaraches. I didnt take the threat lightly, because Id heard stories of beat-downs and stolen sneakers, some similar to what I saw in Kicks.

I rode with friends to the guys apartment complex for the confrontation. If my shoes were going to be taken from me, it was going to be on my own terms. And they were going to get scuffed, made unwearable.

We didnt fight, and I didnt get the girl. But I earned respect. Im fortunate I wasnt tripped up by circumstance.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Updated to include drought zones while tracking water shortage status of your area, plus reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

Almost three decades after killings over sneakers made national headlines, lives are still being lost over sneakers. Kicks, which remains in local theaters, gives us a backyard view of how the love for sneakers can lead to the loss of loved ones.

I talk to my friends of all ages about shoes frequently, and they mock my fear of aging into New Balance sneakers worn by dads, cargo shorts owners and people who tuck in T-shirts.

Im still young enough to value style over comfort, but old enough not to spend frivolously on sneakers. I wore Vans to see Kicks, and it wasnt just sneaker-heads in attendance.

Kicks transcends race and class, because you dont need to have a closet full of shiny shoes to understand a movie about fighting for acceptance, fighting to belong.

Otis R. Taylor Jr. is a San Francisco Chronicle columnist whose column appears Tuesday and Friday. Email: otaylor@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @otisrtaylorjr
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There are visual artists who see their role as akin to that of poets, looking for that heady distillate of experience. Tom Sachs is more of a complicator. He has hand-crafted of plywood, epoxy resin, steel and paint a credible reproduction of an ordinary cinder block. Then he extended the thought with a windowed version drilled with a pattern of holes.

His elaborate blowout of an exhibition at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, Space Program: Europa, is a loose narrative, woven of tight ruminations on aspects of the American space exploration program. Its a social-historical deconstruction by virtue of painstakingly detailed construction. It is a triumph  and one that is all the more satisfying for proudly revealing all the stumbles along the way, all the seams in the final product.

The exhibition occupies every ground-floor gallery at YBCA, a first for a solo show there, and overflows outdoors. It needs the space, with a checklist of 72 objects ranging from an inches-high handmade tape dispenser to a modified 1972 Winnebago (the Mobile Quarantine Facility at the Mission Street entrance) and a full-scale Landing Excursion Module topping out at 23 feet.

Grab a copy of the free brochure and follow the prescribed route. Allow at least an hour, not counting a stop at the Logjam Cafe, a working establishment with Brooklyn-sourced coffee (the artists favorite), alcoholic drinks and snacks. There, you can even be a part of the projects next phase by sorting screws into their corresponding bins.

An anteroom houses a tongue-in-cheek biographical timeline and a mini-retrospective of Sachs career, including some of the luxury-brand knockoffs  like a white-painted plywood Kelly bag, complete with Hermes-branded plywood box  that first brought him wide attention.

The main event is in the larger galleries and outdoor spaces. Between the exhibition brochure and a 32-page newsprint Pre-Flight Risk Assessment Checklist  an insert, designed by the artist, in the free art newspaper SFAQ, available at visual art venues around the Bay Area and online at www.sfaq.us  we begin to piece together the complex story told through the exhibition.

In the first big room, we encounter a mission control console straight out of old TV images of manned space shots. In the second, we walk through what is meant to be a settlement on Europa, a moon of Jupiter. Somewhat ominously, it appears to be abandoned or otherwise depopulated.

All through the show, we find what seem incongruous allusions to Japanese culture and its custom of the tea ceremony. Sachs makes a rambling but ultimately convincing case in his Checklist for his full-scale Tea House (2011-16) and the Tsukubai (2014), Daisu (2013) and other ceremonial objects he has built by hand. Its about community and faith in traditional values of purity, harmony, tranquillity and respect  but all of these on his own terms, and tweaked to suit our time and culture.

Thus, a large sculptural Bonsai (2016) reads from a distance like the windswept image of tree-on-hilltop we might expect from the title. Closer inspection, though, reveals the trees needles to be cast bronze Q-tip cotton swabs, roughly soldered to a trunk and branches cast from Reach toothbrushes and cardboard tubes. A bronze Kama kettle and brazier (2013) is topped with a tiny head of Yoda; a 10-foot-high Stupa (2011-16) is cast from a corrugated cardboard original.

All of the objects in the exhibition are made from the same sort of humble materials, patched together in surprisingly convincing configurations. The huge LEM space vehicle is pieced out of plywood with plastic resin joins. The spacesuits are just Tyvek and tape.

Multifaceted Mars rocks in a collection are all built of plywood. So is a large simulated-stone setting for an outdoor landscape of ice  the supposed natural surface of Europa  frozen on-site, temperature maintained by a whining compressor in the corner.

As entertaining as it all is, Sachs wry, makeshift Modern take on science and interplanetary travel is more than a game. At a point in the late 1960s, right around the time of Sachs early childhood and the U.S. landing on the moon, the early idea of space as a place where human beings interact with a larger universe was co-opted.

No longer a dream for kids and late-night basement tinkerers, space exploration was bureaucratized. Astronauts might be called heroes, but their image shrank to incidental passengers on giant, government-run cargo shuttles.

Sachs work returns all that back to human scale, reclaiming ownership of our dreams of exploration, of the very idea of space. He and assistants hand-logo their machines and tools NASA, but he makes a careful distinction between those objects and the slick products of the other NASA.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Updated to include drought zones while tracking water shortage status of your area, plus reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

Despite that underlying skepticism, the work demonstrates a deep understanding of science and engineering. Its apparent in the detailed, four-hour launch  like the one documented in the 2015 film A Space Program, to be shown several times during the course of the exhibition  that will open the exhibition on Saturday, Sept. 17. Its clear in the solid construction of the Landing Excursion Module, hovering on four legs with no central support, able to carry the weight of several crew members and visitors.

And yet in the end, Sachs guided trip to Europa represents a victory of the imagination over brute science, of wonder over cowering awe.

Charles Desmarais is The San Francisco Chronicles art critic. Email: cdesmarais@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @Artguy1

Tom Sachs: Space Program: Europa: 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tuesdays-Sunday, until 8 p.m. Thursday. Through Jan. 15. $9-$10. Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 701 Mission St., S.F. (415) 978-2700. www.ybca.org

Space Program: Europa Live Demonstration: A five-hour performance. 1-6 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 17. $20-$25.

To see a video of Tom Sachs discussing the exhibition: http://bit.ly/2chzD65
MASON CITY  Both major party vice presidential candidates will be campaigning in Iowa Monday.

Indiana Republican Gov. Mike Pence will be visiting Mason City at 3 p.m. and Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia will be speaking at Iowa State University in Ames about 2 p.m.

Pence will have a town hall meeting at The Music Man Square in Mason City. Hell also have a 7 p.m. rally at Giese manufacturing in Dubuque.

Iowa is considered a swing state in the presidential election and polls, for the most part, have shown the race to be tight. However, a Monmouth University poll Sept. 15 showed GOP nominee Donald Trump leading Clinton by 8 percentage points. The RealClearPolitics.com poll average shows Trump leading in Iowa by 4.3 percentage points.

According to Hillary for Iowa, Kaine and his wife, Anne Holton, will talk about whats at stake in the 2016 election and urge Iowans to vote early starting Sept. 29.

 Globe Gazette State Bureau
In 1996, California voters approved Prop. 227, which severely curtailed the availability of bilingual programs in the state. Today, just 312 of 10,393 schools offer multilingual programs.

That initiative, promoted by businessman Ron Unz, was crafted on the premise that immigrant children would benefit from instant immersion in an English-based curriculum instead of being transitioned slowly, sometimes for years, in classes with their native language.

Unz was motivated by horror stories of Latino students being forced, sometimes against their parents will, into programs where Spanish was the dominant language. Passage of 227 resulted in the shift of 1 million students into English immersion. Unz is convinced that the dismantling of the bilingual system accounted for a rise in their reading test scores within two years.

Prop. 227 did not outright ban bilingual education, but it provided significant disincentives for schools to offer it. Students who were limited English proficient were to be be taught predominantly in English; and the length of special classes was shortened. Schools were required to sign an annual waiver for each student put in a bilingual program. Parents who objected to their child being forced into a bilingual track were given a right to sue administrators  or even teachers.

Its time to reassess the wisdom of this 18-year-old voter mandate.

Prop. 58, put on the November ballot by the California Legislature, would restore some essential flexibility into educators judgment on the most effective teaching methods. It does not back off from the requirement that all California students become proficient in English. And it requires that school districts maintain an option for students with limited English proficiency to be taught mostly in English.

But, significantly, it removes the bureaucratic barriers to allowing school districts to offer dual-language immersion programs for native and non-native English speakers. These programs have become in high demand in the school districts that offer them, as more and more parents recognize the value of language skills in an increasingly global economy. If anything, the state should be encouraging such programs.

State Sen. Ricardo Lara, a Los Angeles County Democrat who is leading the Yes on 58 campaign, draws on his own familys experience to note that there is no single approach to English proficiency. He prospered with English immersion; his siblings benefited from a transition in bilingual education.

Meanwhile, Unz said he was quite irritated that legislators put the 227 repeal on the ballot when the issue had been dead and forgotten for over a dozen years. But neither the lack of a public outcry nor the test-score improvements he cites necessarily means that California schools are employing the best possible techniques to bring their students up to speed in English.

California education must always be driven by what is in the best interest of our children, not ideological dogma, and kept adaptable to adopt better practices as they emerge. Vote yes on 58.
Nick Podell Co.

When I was 15, on St. Patricks Day, my house at the corner of 26th and Valencia streets burned down. My immigrant family had already been through a lot. We couldnt help but notice that the building next to us, which had also burned, got rebuilt within the same year of the fire. Our building took five years to get rebuilt and when it did, our rent went up by $2,500. This happened in 2008, the beginning of the gentrification of the Mission District in San Francisco.

There was a rumor going around the city then that the landlords were setting fire to their buildings, most of which were under rent control. Since then, many fires have happened and the Fire Department doesnt seem to know how and why these fires started. With all the fires and the rise of rent, many families  some of whom I grew up with  have had to move out.
Wave goodbye to Hillary Clintons post-convention bounce in the polls. A new CBS/New York Times national poll of likely voters out Thursday shows the race is a dead heat  41 percent apiece for Clinton and Donald Trump  in a four-way race with Libertarian Gary Johnson (8 percent) and Green Party nominee Jill Stein (4 percent).

More bad news for Clinton  an enthusiasm gap. While Trumps supporters remain just as pumped about his candidacy as in August, the poll reports that those who remain at least somewhat enthusiastic about the Democratic nominee dropped from 77 percent in August to 64 percent today. Even wunderkind pollster Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight.com scaled down Clintons chance of winning to about 60 percent Thursday.

Thats why Clintons primary rival, Sen. Bernie Sanders, is hitting the trail Saturday in swing state Ohio  aimed squarely at young voters in the Canton, Kent and Akron areas. And Sen. Elizabeth Warren is stumping in Columbus on Saturday and Cleveland on Sunday. If those two cant start to close the enthusiasm gap, then Clinton has bigger problems.

 Joe Garofoli

But theres good news: Swing state Millennial voters dont dislike Hillary Clinton as much as they did earlier this summer. Plus, more young supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders who were previously Hillary holdouts are heading her way.

The reason, according to a new survey of 809 likely Millennial voters out Thursday from NextGen Climate, is that the more young voters hear about Clinton, the more they are likely to support her. And Millennials loathe Trump  75 percent of them view him unfavorably.

The survey found that 54 percent of the young voters surveyed Aug. 24-30 viewed Clinton unfavorably, 44 percent, favorably. Thats an improvement over July, when NextGen found 63 percent of young likely voters had an unfavorable impression of her.

Her lead over Donald Trump, which was 43 to 24 percent in July, grew six points in August, which, the survey notes, almost precisely matches the increase in Millennials who see a difference between Clinton and Trump on the issues.

The bad news for Clinton is the survey found that on many issues  including the minimum wage, the environment and gun rights  where she and Trump have stark differences, upward of 1 in 5 Millennials still dont see much difference between them.

Still, overall, we are excited about these numbers, San Francisco billionaire environmentalist Tom Steyer, the groups major funder, said Thursday.

But dont look for Steyer to dump millions into TV ads. Everybody knows young people dont watch TV, much less TV ads. Instead, Steyer said, NextGen will talk to young voters one on one.

The organization is campaigning for Clinton in eight swing states and has organizers on more than 200 college campuses.

 Joe Garofoli

Whats in a name? Francisco Herrera, candidate for District 11 supervisor, is angry that the Department of Elections rejected his proposed Chinese name because, he says, it sounded like the 19th century painter Vincent van Gogh.

Every candidate for political office in San Francisco has to have a Chinese name on the ballot under the federal Voting Rights Act, which requires election information to be translated when a significant percentage of voting-age citizens speak limited English.

Also, having a good Chinese name is useful  or not  for candidates trying to appeal to monolingual Chinese voters. Herrera learned that the hard way.

When he ran for mayor last year  polling second behind Ed Lee, with 15 percent of the vote  he left it to the Department of Elections to pick a Chinese name for him. The result was gibberish, he said. A Chinese translator we consulted  Gloria Li  agreed. Put together, it was a collection of random characters mimicking the sounds in his English name.

So when he became a candidate for supervisor, he decided to pick a new name, this time with the help of a friend. He chose Ha van Goh. Ha means a superior and stand-up person. Van Goh, he said, means fine music  a reference to the fact that hes a musician. (Li said she saw no allusion to music in the name.)

But the elections officials rejected the name six weeks after he submitted it for approval and after he had spent $1,000 on campaign materials featuring the new name.

While Herrera said the Department of Elections believed people would confuse van Goh with van Gogh, the departments rejection letter makes no reference to the artist.

I got so pissed off, Herrera said. Im thinking, people are really going to think Im an artist who lived 200 years ago?

Herrera filed a motion with San Francisco Superior Court to challenge the departments decision. A judge ruled against him.

So now hes stuck with gibberish for a Chinese name.

 Emily Green

Good for the environment: Attorney General Kamala Harris Senate campaign got a boost this week with an endorsement from the California League of Conservation Voters, one of the states best-known environmental groups.

Californians deserve a committed environmental champion in the Senate seat that has been held by Barbara Boxer for more than two decades, said James Johnson Jr., the groups political director. Harris is the clear environmental choice for Senate.

The league isnt the first environmental group to back Harris bid to replace the retiring Boxer. Both the Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council Action Committee have endorsed her, citing the attorney generals work in defending the states tough environmental laws and her lawsuits against polluters.

Despite backing Harris, the conservation group cant say too many bad things about her opponent, Orange County Rep. Loretta Sanchez, who, like Harris, is a Democrat. In Sanchezs 10 terms in Congress, she has an 89 percent lifetime rating on environmental issues from the league, more than double the 41 percent average for the current House.

 John Wildermuth

Email: jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com, egreen@sfchronicle.com, jwildermuth@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @joegarofoli, @emilytgreen, @jfwildermuth
Binsar Bakkara/Associated Press

JAKARTA, Indonesia  The European Union has admitted Indonesia to a special licensing system it hopes will prevent the illegally felled tropical timber that makes up a substantial part of the countrys wood production from being shipped to the 28-nation bloc.

The EU said Thursday that Indonesia is the first country to qualify for the licenses. It will mean that traders of goods such as wooden furniture, plywood and paper that earn the certification will find it easier to do business with Europe.
Buoyed by the success of its pioneering program to help African American boys succeed in school, the Oakland Unified School District is creating one for girls, officials announced.

The African American Girls and Young Women Achievement Program aims to give female students a place where they can find support and encouragement. It follows the highly regarded African American Male Achievement Program started in 2010.

That program was created to counteract the reality that in the previous decade, the number of African American men killed on the streets of Oakland nearly matched the number of black students who graduated from public high schools in the city and were ready to attend a state university.

Oakland Unified was the first school district in the nation to create a department with the sole focus of helping African American males while sponsoring a charter school specifically for black boys, though the school closed after 18 months.

Since then, districts nationwide have followed suit. The effort has been noticed by the Obama administration and its initiative to boost the academic performance of African Americans. Indications show the districts program is increasing attendance and reducing suspensions.

Chris Chatmon, deputy chief of equity for the district, wants to offer similar support for girls.

Ultimately, we want to create an extraordinary learning environment that helps girls of color meet the goals of graduating and being college-ready or community-ready, he said. We have work to do.

The district has hired Nzingha Dugas, formerly director of UC Berkeleys African American Student Development Office, to head the program. She started work Wednesday and will spend the first 100 days interviewing girls and their families, along with teachers, principals and community members, to decide what the school district needs to change, Chatmon said.

We want to follow the same scope of actions as in the male program, he said, but knowing they may not lead to the same strategies.

Michael Cabanatuan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: mcabanatuan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @ctuan

Even Odds

The Chronicle spent a year documenting the issues facing black students in Oakland, and the citys efforts to address the staggering odds against them, in a 2013 three-part series called Even Odds. To read the series, go to www.sfchronicle.com/evenodds.
/ STOCK XCHANGE

A former lawyer from Marin County has pleaded guilty to defrauding investors out of more than $2.5 million.

James Seltzer, 67, of Belvedere, who specialized in securities law, admitted victimizing more than 10 investors between October 2007 and May 2011.
NEW YORK  William Bratton, the police commissioner who led departments in Boston, Los Angeles and New York and saw his crime fighting strategies copied across the nation, ended his unparalleled law enforcement career with a ceremonial send-off Friday in the city that was the setting of his biggest triumph.

Commanders lined up in formation outside of New York Police Department headquarters to bid farewell to the 68-year-old Bratton as he left the building for the last time as commissioner. Applause mixed with anti-Bratton shouts from protesters behind barricades.

Violent crime in New York remains near a modern-day low. Yet, debate is likely to continue indefinitely over how much credit Bratton should get for the citys transformation from the bloody mess it was in the 1980s and early 1990s.

Fridays ceremony came just a week after Bratton fiercely defended the legitimacy of his signature broken windows policing strategy  an idea, first proposed by social scientists James Wilson and George Kelling, that you can deter violent crimes by cracking down on lesser types of lawlessness, like graffiti or turnstile jumping.

Bratton earned wide acclaim for his assaults on quality-of-life crimes and for mining crime data to deploy his forces more effectively.

New Yorks homicide rate had already begun to drop in the two years before he became commissioner in 1994, but during his 27-month tenure it plummeted. Between 1993 and 1995 killings fell by 40 percent, erasing two decades of climbing murder rates.

Homicides fell another 35 percent in the two years after Bratton left the department, forced out by Republican Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.

In more recent years, though, some criminologists have concluded that the impact of broken windows on violent crime is minimal.

In March, the independent inspector general for the New York Police Department issued a report concluding that focusing on offenses like urinating in public and riding bikes on sidewalks had no influence on felony crime rates. It also accused the 36,000-officer department, the nations largest, of unfairly singling out communities of color for quality-of-life enforcement at a time when Democratic Mayor Bill de Blasio has emphasized protecting civil rights.

Bratton pushed back last week, saying the report was the work of amateurs and had no value at all.

After leaving New York the first time, Bratton worked in the private sector, then took over a scandal-scarred Los Angeles Police Department in 2002.

There, he presided over a decline in violent crime and an easing of tensions between the department and black and Latino communities. He left Los Angeles in 2009 with high approval ratings.

After returning to lead the NYPD again in 2014, Bratton saw perhaps the biggest crisis of his tenure: the death of an unarmed black man, Eric Garner, at the hands of a white police officer trying to arrest him for the minor crime of selling loose cigarettes. The death sparked angry protests.
The San Francisco public defender will argue that an African American man charged with battery and resisting arrest in connection with a scuffle with BART officers had every right to fight police  a legal strategy that comes amid heightened scrutiny over police use of force and issues of race.

Videos of the July confrontation that were posted on social media showed one of the officers apparently punching a handcuffed Michael Smith, 22, whom police had detained in response to reports of an armed man trying to rob someone on a BART train. Prosecutors say the videos tell an incomplete story and that body cameras worn by police show that Smith was kicking and spitting at BART officers.

Jury selection is scheduled to begin Friday in Smiths trial on six counts of battery on a police officer and one count of resisting arrest. Public Defender Jeff Adachi, who will represent Smith personally, said he will make what amounts to an argument of self-defense.

This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate 3 1 of 3 Paul Chinn/The Chronicle Show More Show Less 2 of 3 Tarina Larsen Show More Show Less 3 of 3





His actions were necessary in order for him to save his life, Adachi said. This was a situation where the officers really made assumptions about him and acted too swiftly.

The incident happened just before 1 p.m. on July 29 as BART officers responded to the Embarcadero Station to reports that an armed man was trying to rob a passenger on a train.

Adachi said Smith hadnt tried to rob anyone. The 911 call was made in response to a dispute that Smith and his pregnant girlfriend had with a passenger as they were on their way to a doctors appointment, the public defender said.

Police found no weapon on Smith, and prosecutors charged him only with crimes that stemmed from the confrontation on the station platform with the BART officers.

Lawyers for both sides agree that as the train pulled into the station, officers with guns drawn ordered Smith and his girlfriend onto the platform. What happened next will be up to the jury to decide.

Prosecutors contend that Smith defied officers orders, forcing police to use a controlled takedown to detain a man they suspected was armed with a gun.

Footage from the officers body cameras, which has yet to be shown publicly, shows Smith bite, kick, finger-gouge and spit on the officers, said Alex Bastian, a spokesman for District Attorney George Gascon.

The cell phone footage that circulated on social media was fuzzy and shot at a distance. The officers cameras gave a more complete picture of the incident, Bastian said.

We were even able to see the defendant kicking the body camera off the chest of one of the officers, he said.

Adachi, however, said any violence was instigated by police.

What you see is the officers have him at gunpoint and then they immediately sweep his feet and slam him on the ground, he said. Mr. Smith is detained, yet they continue to use force. Even after they search him, they continue to use too much force.

Smith has been arrested by BART police on two other occasions, in 2013 on suspicion of petty theft and in 2014 for alleged fare evasion. Both times he resisted officers, and in one case he tried to take an officers gun, BART officials said.

Adachi will argue to the jury that the officers actions in this incident were unreasonable or excessive. He cited a provision in the law that allows a defendant to lawfully use reasonable force to defend himself if officers use excessive force.

Some legal experts said it might be difficult to persuade a jury that an accused batterer of police was acting in self-defense.

Jurors tend to assume that the cops are telling the truth, said Hadar Aviram, a law professor at UC Hastings in San Francisco. She said publicized video footage of police beatings may be reducing juror skepticism, but when its the cops word against the citizens word, its pretty difficult.

Another potential barrier is that the judge would instruct jurors to consider the situation from the perspective of a reasonable, objective observer in Smiths position, said Robert Weisberg, a Stanford University criminal law professor and co-director of the schools Criminal Justice Center.

You could make the argument (for a reasonable fear of excessive force), but it would be very, very hard, Weisberg said. Defense attorneys seldom attempt it in court, he said.

Adachi said the trial will really focus on how police are trained. After the Oscar Grant case, there was a huge effort to reform BART, yet what we see here is officers working to escalate a situation.

Grant, who was also 22, was shot dead by a BART police officer while lying facedown on the Fruitvale Station platform after a fight erupted on a train in the early morning hours of New Years Day 2009. Johannes Mehserle, who shot Grant, was sentenced to two years in prison after being convicted of involuntary manslaughter.

The case has been followed by a wave of national scrutiny over police killings of unarmed black men, many of which have been filmed and posted to social media.

Smith, Adachi will argue, was victimized by police and now faces very serious criminal charges. Theyre throwing the book at him, he said.

Chronicle staff writer Bob Egelko contributed to this report.

Evan Sernoffsky is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: esernoffsky@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @EvanSernoffsky
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A Facebook post you may already have seen populating your timeline, depicting what many believe to be a massive crowd protesting the Dakota Access oil pipeline, is a hoax.

The photo, posted by an Arkansas prankster named Tyler Eldridge and shared nearly 350,000 times as of this writing, was not taken anywhere near North Dakota. It wasn't even taken this century. It's actually a picture of Woodstock, New York in 1969.

Along with the image, taken by Barry Levine at the storied music festival, Eldridge included the caption "This is why the media won't show the protest on the pipeline #StayAware".

The Dakota Access Pipeline has been a source of hot debate in recent weeks. The Standing Rock Sioux and other Native Americans in the area have been protesting to halt the construction of a four-state, $3.8 billion Dakota Access pipeline, which they say violates a few federal laws  mainly the National Historic Preservation Act  and will disturb sacred Native American sites, per the Associated Press. Tribe leaders add that the Army Corps of Engineers did not work with them on their plans for the project.

Related: Pipeline protest site a city unto itself with school, meals

Last week, a federal judge denied the tribe's request for Energy Transfer Partners to stop building the pipeline, but in a shocking move very shortly thereafter, the Obama Administration intervened to pull the brakes on construction.

"The Army will not authorize constructing the Dakota Access pipeline on Corps land bordering or under Lake Oahe until it can determine whether it will need to reconsider any of its previous decisions regarding the Lake Oahe site under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) or other federal laws," reads the joint statement from the Department of Justice, Department of the Army, and the Department of the Interior. "Therefore, construction of the pipeline on Army Corps land bordering or under Lake Oahe will not go forward at this time."

Most recently, the pro-pipeline Dakota Access LLC filed suit against protestors and are seeking restraining orders and monetary damages.

Alyssa Pereira is a staff writer for SFGATE. Follow her here on Twitter.
AIM: MARL

TSXV: MRA







16 September 2016



Suite 102, 3 Eden Street

North Sydney, NSW 2060

Australia

THIS NEWS RELEASE IS NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION TO THE UNITED STATES NEWSWIRE SERVICES OR FOR DISSEMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES.

Turkey-Hot Maden Gold Copper Project NI43-101 Lodged on SEDAR

Indicated (100% basis): 2.79 Million Oz Gold + 166,000 Tonnes Cu (3.43 Million Oz Au equivalent**)

Inferred (100% basis): 375,000 Oz Gold + 17,000 Tonnes Cu (439,000 Oz Gold Equivalent**), and

Zinc Zone- Indicated (100% basis): 11,600 Tonnes Zinc

Inferred (100% basis): 114,000 Tonnes Zinc

NORTH SYDNEY, Australia, Sept. 16, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Mariana Resources Ltd ('Mariana' or 'the Company'), the AIM and TSXV listed exploration and development company with projects in Turkey and South America, announces it has filed on SEDAR the National Instrument 43-101 - Hot Maden Gold Copper Project Resource Update Technical Report, dated September 7, 2016, along with all required consents and can be accessed via the link below:

Link : http://media.wix.com/ugd/dcdadf_e0b314bd462d49e985a750bf2ff3e612.pdf

The Resource Estimate in the report, as previously announced on the 25th July 2016, paves the way for the completion of the Preliminary Economic Assessment currently in progress with an anticipated completion date of around October 2016.

The July 2016 Mineral Resource Estimate in the applicable zones comprises:

Hot Maden Gold-Copper Project Update

Hot Maden - Main Gold-Copper Zone (2 g/t AuEq Cut-off) Indicated Mineral Resource Domain Tonnes Au Cu Zn AuEq Au Cu AuEq T g/t % % g/t* Ounces Tonnes Ounces** Main Zone LG 463,000 1.1 1.1 0.3 2.4 17,000 5,000 36,000 Main Zone HG 4,501,000 3.9 1.9 0.2 6.3 570,000 87,000 908,000 Main Zone UHG 2,086,000 32.7 3.5 0.1 36.9 2,195,000 73,000 2,476,000 Mixed Gold-Zinc 17,000 7.5 3.1 3.6 11.2 4,000 1,000 6,000 Peripheral Lodes 60,000 2.1 0.4 0.4 2.5 4,000 5,000 Total 7,127,000 12.2 2.3 0.2 15.0 2,790,000 166,000 3,431,000 Inferred Mineral Resource Domain Tonnes Au Cu Zn AuEq Au Cu AuEq T g/t % % g/t* Ounces Tonnes Ounces** Main Zone LG 395,000 1.7 0.9 0.03 2.8 21,000 4,000 35,000 Main Zone HG 31,000 3.9 1.6 0.1 5.8 4,000 6,000 Main Zone UHG 6,000 39.1 2.1 0.01 41.6 7,000 8,000 Mixed Gold-Zinc 4,000 1.7 0.4 2.4 2.2 Peripheral Lodes 282,000 3.2 0.9 0.1 4.3 29,000 2,000 38,000 Total 718,000 2.7 0.9 0.1 3.8 62,000 7,000 88,000







Hot Maden - Southern Gold-Copper Zone (2 g/t AuEq Cut-off) Inferred Mineral Resource Domain Tonnes Au Cu Zn AuEq Au Cu AuEq t g/t % % g/t* Ounces Tonnes Ounces** South Zone LG 396,000 2.8 0.7 - 3.6 35,000 3,000 46,000 South Zone HG 583,000 5.3 0.7 - 6.1 98,000 4,000 114,000 Main Zone UHG 224,000 22.2 1.0 - 23.4 160,000 2,000 169,000 Mixed Gold-Zinc 44,000 9.0 1.0 3.2 10.2 13,000 15,000 Peripheral Lodes 104,000 1.9 0.3 - 2.2 6,000 7,000 Total 1,352,000 7.2 0.7 0.1 8.1 313,000 10,000 351,000

Hot Maden - Hangingwall Zinc Zone (2% Zn Cut-off)

Indicated Mineral Resource Tonnes t Zn% Pb% Zinc t Total 398,000 2.9 0.6 11,600

Inferred Mineral Resource

Tonnes t

Zn%

Pb%

Zinc t

Total

2,871,000

4.0

0.5

114,000

This Updated Mineral Resource Estimate above has been compiled by Stewart Coates from RPM who also falls under the definition of Qualified Person ("QP") as defined in the Canadian National Instrument "NI 43-101". This resource estimate has been estimated in compliance with the CIM Definition Standards on Mineral Resources and Mineral Reserves and is included in the updated NI 43-101 Technical Report on Hot Maden, within appropriate reporting requirements, filed on AIM as well as on SEDAR.

A detailed breakdown of the Total Mineral Resource estimate is given below:

Note:

1. The Statement of Estimates of Mineral Resources has been compiled under the supervision of Mr. Stewart Coates who is a part-time employee of RPM and a Member of the the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of the Province of British Columbia. Mr. Coates has sufficient experience that is relevant to the style of mineralisation and type of deposit under consideration and to the activity that he has undertaken to qualify as a Competent Person as defined under the JORC Code which is accepted as a Foreign Code by CIM and NI 43-101.There are no material differences between the definitions of Measured, Indicated and Inferred Mineral Resources under the CIM Definition Standards and the equivalent definitions in the JORC Code. The Resource would report the same quantities to the same classifications under both the CIM Definition Standards and the JORC Code.

2. All Mineral Resources figures reported in the table above represent estimates based on drilling completed up to 22 nd June, 2016. Mineral Resource estimates are not precise calculations, being dependent on the interpretation of limited information on the location, shape and continuity of the occurrence and on the available sampling results. The totals contained in the above table have been rounded to reflect the relative uncertainty of the estimate. Rounding may cause some computational discrepancies.

3. *Au Equivalence (AuEq) calculated using a 100 day moving average of $US1,215/ounce for Au and $US2.13/pound for Cu as of May 29, 2016. No adjustment has been made for metallurgical recovery or net smelter return as these remain uncertain at this time. Based on grades and contained metal for Au and Cu, it is assumed that both commodities have reasonable potential to be economically extractable.

a. *-The formula used for Au equivalent grade is: AuEq g/t = Au + [(Cu % x 22.0462 x 2.13)/(1215/31.1035)] and assumes 100 % metallurgical recovery.

b. **-Au equivalent ounces are calculated by mulitplying Mineral Resource tonnage by Au equivalent grade and converting for ounces. The formula used for Au equivalent ounces is: AuEq Oz = [Tonnage x AuEq grade (g/t)]/31.1035.

4. Mineral Resource grades are estimated in accordance with the JORC Code.

5. Mineral Resources are reported on a dry in-situ basis.

6. LG = low grade, HG = high grade and UHG = ultra-high grade.

7. Reported at a 2 g/t AuEq cut-off.

8. Mineral Resources referred to above, have not been subject to detailed economic analysis and therefore, have not been demonstrated to have actual economic viability.

Resource Estimate Authorship and Methodology

The Mineral Resource Estimate for the Hot Maden Project was compiled under the supervision of Mr Stewart Coates, a full time employee of RPM and a Member of the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of the Province of British Columbia. The Mineral Resource Estimate was completed using the following parameters:

A site visit was conducted by Stewart Coates (RPM) to review the project and deposit geology, drilling, sampling and QAQC procedures. The data, drilling and geological records were found to be well maintained by Lidya and comprehensive field procedures had been developed. The site visit review concluded no significant issues were identified with regards to current geological understanding and data information.

The Hot Maden Mineral Resource area extends over a north-south strike length of 670m (from 4,541,710mN - 4,542,380mN), has a maximum width of 105m (740,590mE - 740,695mE) and includes the 495m vertical interval from 885mRL to 390mRL.

Drill holes used in the Mineral Resource estimate included 52 diamond holes for a total of 3,748m within the wireframes. The database contained records for 65 drill holes for 16,455m of drilling.

Drill hole spacing is approximately 50m by 50m at the Project. Approximately 55% of current drilling is angled -60 degrees to the east, with the remaining holes angled -60 degrees to the west. Mineralisation is generally sub-vertical.

Since the commencement of drilling Lidya has implemented a consistent QAQC system utilising standards, blanks and duplicate samples. The program included the submission of one standard every 20th sample, the submission of two blanks in every assay batch and field duplicates taken every 40th sample. All standards and blanks were obtained and certified by Geostats. Duplicates were split to quarter core with a core saw.

Monitoring of standards, blanks and duplicates was undertaken by Lidya and Mariana geologists. Raw QAQC data was reviewed by RPM and results considered acceptable and suitable for use in Mineral Resource estimation.

The mineralisation was constrained by resource outlines based on mineralisation envelopes prepared using a nominal 0.5g/t Au Equivalent cut-off grade for lower grade material, 3g/t Au Equivalent for higher grade material and approximately 15g/t Au Equivalent for ultra-high grade material. All mineralisation intersections were defined with a minimum down hole width of 2m.

Samples within the wireframes were composited to even 1m intervals based on analysis of the sample lengths in the database. Top cuts were applied to the data based on statistical analysis of individual lodes. A top cut of 35g/t Au was applied within the higher grade domain (Object 101), a top cut of 175g/t Au was applied to the ultra-high grade domain (Object 102), a top cut of 20g/t Au was applied to Object 103 and a top cut of 10g/t Au was applied to Objects 2 and 3, resulting in a total of 10 samples being cut. Top cuts for the remaining elements were not required; no Au top cut was applied to the remaining lodes.

A Surpac block model was used for the estimate with a block size of 25m NS by 25m EW by 10m vertical with sub-cells of 3.125m by 3.125m by 1.25m. This was selected as the optimal block size as a result of kriging neighbourhood analysis (KNA).

Using parameters derived from modelled variograms, Ordinary Kriging (OK) was used to estimate average block grades in three passes using Surpac software. Linear grade estimation was deemed suitable for the Hot Maden Mineral Resource due to the geological control on mineralisation. Maximum extrapolation of wireframes from drilling was 50m down-dip and 50m along strike. This was equal to one drill hole spacing. Maximum extrapolation between drill sections was half drill hole spacing. Down-dip and along strike extrapolations were classified as Inferred Mineral Resource.

Bulk densities within the wireframes were calculated based on a linear regression equation between Fe grade and density measurements obtained from drill core. A bulk density of 2.85t/m 3 was assigned to waste material as a result of average core densities outside the wireframes. A bulk density of 2.20t/m 3 was assigned to overburden.

was assigned to waste material as a result of average core densities outside the wireframes. A bulk density of 2.20t/m was assigned to overburden. The Mineral Resource was classified as Indicated and Inferred Mineral Resource based on data quality, sample spacing, and lode continuity. The Indicated Mineral Resource was defined within areas of close spaced diamond drilling of less than 50m by 50m, and where the continuity and predictability of the lode positions was good. The Inferred Mineral Resource was assigned to areas of the deposit where drill hole spacing was greater than 50m by 50m, where small isolated pods of mineralisation occur outside the main mineralised zones, and to geologically complex zones.

The high grade nature of the mineralisation and the substantial thickness and size of the deposit suggest that the project has potential for eventual economic extraction using open pit and underground mining techniques.

Qualified Persons

The Statement of Estimates of Mineral Resources has been compiled under the supervision of Mr Stewart Coates, who is a full time employee of RPM and a Member of the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of the Province of British Columbia. Mr. Coates has sufficient experience that is relevant to the style of mineralization and type of deposit under consideration and to the activity that he has undertaken to qualify as a Qualified Person as defined in the CIM Standards of Disclosure and as a Competent Person as defined in the JORC code (2012). Stewart Coates has consented to the inclusion in this release of the matters based on his information in the form and context in which it appears. All information relating to exploration activities has been reviewed by Eric Roth, Chief Operating Officer and Executive Director of Mariana Resources. Mr Roth holds a Ph.D. in Economic Geology from the University of Western Australia, is a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (AusIMM), and is a Fellow of the Society of Economic Geologists (SEG). Mr Roth has 25 years of experience in international minerals exploration and mining project evaluation.

**ENDS**

For further information please visit website at www.marianaresources.com or contact the following.

Glen Parsons (CEO) Mariana Resources Ltd +61 2 9437 4588 Eric Roth (COO) Mariana Resources Ltd +56 9 8818 1243 Karen Davies Mariana Resources Ltd +1 604 314 6270 Rob Adamson RFC Ambrian Limited (Nomad) +61 2 9250 0041 Will Souter RFC Ambrian Limited (Nomad) +61 2 9250 0050



In U.K. Oliver Stansfield Brandon Hill Capital (UK Broker) +44 20 3463 5061 Jonathan Evans Brandon Hill Capital (UK Broker) +44 20 3463 5016 Camilla Horsfall Blytheweigh (Financial PR) +44 20 7138 3224 Megan Ray Blytheweigh (Financial PR) +44 20 7138 3203

About Mariana Resources

Mariana Resources Ltd is an AIM (MARL) and TSXV (MRA) quoted exploration and development company with an extensive portfolio of gold, silver and copper projects in South America and Turkey.

Mariana's most advanced asset is the Hot Maden gold-copper project in north east Turkey, which is a joint venture with its Turkish JV partner Lidya (30% Mariana and 70% Lidya) and rapidly advancing to development. An updated mineral resource estimate of 3.43 Moz gold Equivalent (Indicated Category) and 0.09 Moz gold Equivalent (Inferred Category) (100% basis) in the main resource zone as well as a maiden 351,000 Moz gold Equivalent (Inferred Category) (100% basis) in the new southern discovery zone was reported for Hot Maden on July 25, 2015. Elsewhere in Turkey, Mariana holds a 100% interest in the Ergama gold-copper project.

In southern Argentina, the Company's core gold-silver projects are Las Calandrias (100%), Sierra Blanca (100%), Los Cisnes (100%), Bozal (100%). These projects are part of a 160,000+ Ha land package in the Deseado Massif epithermal gold-silver district in mining-friendly Santa Cruz Province.

In Suriname, Mariana has a direct holding of 10.2% of the Nassau Gold project. The Nassau Gold Project is a 28,000 Ha exploration concession located approximately 125 km south east of the capital Paramaribo and immediately adjacent to Newmont Mining's 4.2Moz gold Merian project.

In Peru and Chile, Mariana is focusing on acquiring new opportunities which complement its current portfolio.

Safe Harbour

This press release contains certain statements which may be deemed to be forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are made as at the date of this press release and include, without limitation, statements regarding discussions of future plans, the realization, cost, timing and extent of mineral resource estimates, estimated future exploration expenditures, costs and timing of the development of new deposits, success of exploration activities, permitting time lines, and requirements for additional capital. The words "plans", "expects", "budget", "scheduled", "estimate", "forecasts", "intend", "anticipate", "believe", "may", "will", or similar expressions or variations of such words are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties, assumptions and other factors that may cause actual results to vary materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements, including, but not limited to: the effects of general economic conditions; the price of gold, silver and copper; misjudgements in the course of preparing forward-looking statements; risks associated with international operations; the need for additional financing; risks inherent in exploration results; conclusions of economic evaluations; changes in project parameters; currency and commodity price fluctuations; title matters; environmental liability claims; unanticipated operational risks; accidents, labour disputes and other risks of the mining industry; delays in obtaining governmental approvals or in the completion of development or construction activities; political risk; and other risks and uncertainties described in the Company's annual financial statements for the most recently completed financial year which is available on the Company's website at www.marianaresources.com . Although we believe that the expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements are based upon reasonable assumptions and have attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in forward-looking statements, there may be other factors that cause results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such forward-looking statements. Accordingly, readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. We do not undertake to update any forward-looking statements, except in accordance with applicable securities laws.
This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate 3 1 of 3 Brant Ward/The Chronicle Show More Show Less 2 of 3 MICHAEL MALONEY/SFC Show More Show Less 3 of 3





A 25-year-old man has been arrested on suspicion of raping a woman at a University of California at Berkeley residence hall earlier this month, campus police said Thursday.



Sardar Sikandar Wali Zia Khan was arrested Wednesday on suspicion of the sexual assault, according to police.



UC police responded on Sept. 5 to a report of a rape that had occurred the previous night in the residence hall. Police were told the victim, a 19-year-old student, was allegedly assaulted by a male acquaintance who was a student and a resident of campus housing.



Detectives began investigating and eventually arrested Khan on suspicion of two felonies.



No other information about the case was immediately being released by police.

Over the weekend three women reported sexual assaults in separate incidents following a concert at the Greek Theater on campus.
STUART, Fla., Sept. 16, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- CPSM, Inc. (OTCQB:SWMM) the Florida based pool & spa industry aggregator today closed on the sale of its former headquarters property reducing its debt load by over 26%.



CPSM, Inc. sold its former headquarters in Palm City, Florida. The proceeds reduced the Companys debt by more than 26% resulting in a Debt to Total Assets ratio of 0.44 to 1.



Lawrence Calarco, Chairman of CPSM, Inc. commented, Growth is vital and to date we have continued at fervent pace. Growth alone however, does not make for a healthy company. We have managed to keep expanding while reducing our debt by a substantial amount. Fiscal restraint and prudent leverage are the hallmarks of a successful, sound and lasting company.

CPSM, Inc. is a publicly held company serving the surging pool/spa maintenance, design, and construction industry.

Safe Harbor Statement: This news release contains forward-looking statements as defined by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements include statements concerning plans, objectives, goals, strategies, future events or performance, and underlying assumptions and other statements that are other than statements of historical facts. These statements are subject to uncertainties and risks including, but not limited to, product and service demand and acceptance, changes in technology, economic conditions, the impact of competition and pricing, government regulation, and other risks described in statements filed from time to time with the Securities and Exchange Commission. All such forward-looking statements whether written or oral, and whether made by or on behalf of the Company, are expressly qualified by the cautionary statements that may accompany the forward-looking statements. In addition, the Company disclaims any obligation to update any forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date hereof.
NASSAU, Bahamas, Sept. 16, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Tourism Minister Obie Wilchcombe was elected as the new chairman of the Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO) at the State of the Industry Conference (SOTIC) in Barbados on Thursday, September 15.

Minister Wilchcombe, who will serve his second non-consecutive two-year term, replaces Barbados Tourism Minister Richard Sealy.

"I intend to build up on what [Sealy] began and I also intend to build on the relationship with the private sector," Wilchcombe said in a statement following the election. "I've always thought that the CTO is the body that provides equity and we can; and the way is to speak with the same voice. We also have to deal with the issue of inter-regional travel," Minister Wilchombe said.

Wilchcombe, who previously served as CTO chairman in 2002, said he is honored to be at helm of the Caribbean organization once again. He added that in order to achieve greater success, the Caribbean community must have a spirit of togetherness.

Tourism Director General Joy Jibrilu was named chairman of CTO Board of Directors. According to the CTO Constitution, the Board Chairman and the Chairman of the Council of Ministers and Commissioners of Tourism must come from the same Member Country.

Director General Jibrilu said she is "extremely honored" to serve. "It is a phenomenal opportunity for The Bahamas," she said. "I am anxious to begin my work and to continue to build on the wonderful job that Minister Sealy and his team has done over the last two years. Minister Wilchcombe and I have our work cut out for us but we are up to the task."

In addition to the election of the chairman, vice chairs were elected to serve on the Executive Committee of the Board of Directors to represent various sub-groups  Curacao, representing the Dutch Caribbean; Martinique representing the French Caribbean; Barbados and Belize, representing the Independent CARICOM countries and the Turks & Caicos Islands representing the British Overseas Territories.

Each of these Member Countries will form the Executive Committee of the Board of Directors, which will be completed with representatives from the private sector.

The conference, which ends tomorrow, is being held at the Hilton Barbados Resort.



The Islands Of The Bahamas have a place in the sun for everyone from Nassau and Paradise Island to Grand Bahama to The Abaco Islands, The Exuma Islands, Harbour Island, Long Island and others. Each island has its own personality and attractions for a variety of vacation styles with some of the world's best scuba diving, fishing, sailing, boating, as well as, shopping and dining. The destination offers an easily accessible tropical getaway and provides convenience for travelers with preclearance through U.S. customs and immigration, and the Bahamian dollar is on par with the U.S. dollar. Do everything or do nothing, just remember It's Better in The Bahamas. For more information on travel packages, activities and accommodations, call 1-800-Bahamas or visit www.Bahamas.com. Look for The Bahamas on the web on Facebook Twitter and YouTube

Photos accompanying this release are available at:

http://www.globenewswire.com/newsroom/prs/?pkgid=41435

http://www.globenewswire.com/newsroom/prs/?pkgid=41436
Leadership Icons of a Globalized World

PRINCETON  In todays global culture, where simple models help make sense of so much complexity, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Russian President Vladimir Putin embody opposing archetypes of national leadership. Like others before them, such icons often have a foil  a yang for a yin  that establishes a stark choice between two alternate worldviews.

That was certainly true in previous periods of political and economic strain. For example, in the aftermath of World War I, with democratic political systems disintegrating, much of the world looked to either Benito Mussolini in Italy or Vladimir Lenin in Russia to determine the future.

In the 1920s, Mussolini convinced many foreign observers that he had devised the optimal way to organize society, one that overcame the anarchy and self-destructiveness inherent in traditional liberalism. Under Mussolini, Italy was still integrated into the world economy, and official corporatism, with its emphasis on the supposed harmony of interests between capital and labor, seemed to many to herald a future without class conflict and pitched political struggle.

In Germany, members of the orthodox nationalist right, as well as many others, admired Mussolini, not least the young Adolf Hitler, who asked for an autographed picture after Il Duce (as Mussolini became known) seized power in 1922. In fact, Hitler used Mussolinis so-called March on Rome as his model for the Beer Hall Putsch in Bavaria in 1923, which he hoped would be a stepping-stone to power throughout Germany.

Mussolinis fascist internationalism inspired imitators around the world, from Oswald Mosleys British Union of Fascists to Corneliu Zelea Codreanus Iron Guard in Romania. Even in China, cadets at the Whampoa Military Academy tried to launch a Chinese Blue Shirts movement akin to Mussolinis Blackshirts or Hitlers paramilitary Brownshirts, the Sturmabteilung.

During this period, Mussolinis foil was Lenin, the fulcrum for the international left. Throughout the world, leftists defined themselves by the degree to which they admired or disapproved of the Soviet leaders ruthlessness. Like Mussolini, Lenin claimed to be building  by any means necessary  a classless society, where political conflict was a thing of the past.

Todays leaders are grappling with the politics of globalization, and in that debate Merkel and Putin  who are less similar in their tactics than Mussolini and Lenin were  represent two paths forward: openness and defensiveness, respectively. In Europe, political leaders define themselves by their relationship to one or the other. Hungary and Turkey are both vulnerable to Russian geopolitical machinations; but their leaders, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan seem to have joined the international Putin admiration society.

Meanwhile, Marine Le Pen, the leader of Frances far-right National Front, who will likely be a candidate in the second-round runoff of next years presidential election, has established herself as a foil to Merkel. For Le Pen, Merkel is an empress using the European Union to impose her will on the rest of Europe, and especially on hapless French President Francois Hollande. Likewise, Germanys generous refugee policy under Merkel is a pretext to import slaves.

In the United Kingdom, Nigel Farage, the former leader of the UK Independence Party, takes a similar position. Merkel, he believes, is a greater threat to European peace than Putin.

On the other hand, UK Prime Minister Theresa May seems to be channeling Merkel, at least in her negotiating style. Her first major policy speech largely ignored Junes Brexit referendum, which brought her to power, and promised to push for so-called codetermination  workers representation on company boards  which is a crucial part of Germanys social contract.

Putin and Merkel are fixed compass points not only in Europe. In the United States, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump  who has praised Putin for getting an A [in leadership]  recently lambasted his opponent, Hillary Clinton, as Americas Merkel, and then started a Twitter hashtag equating Merkel and Clinton. Like Le Pen and UKIP, Trump has tried to put Merkels immigration policy at the center of political debate.

One obvious interpretation of the Merkel-Putin dichotomy is that it embodies gender archetypes: Merkel favors feminine diplomacy and inclusion, whereas Putin favors masculine competition and confrontation. Another interpretation is that Putin represents nostalgia  a longing for an idealized past  whereas Merkel stands for hope: a belief that the world can be improved through effective political management.

Putins position is apparent in his effort to unify Eurasia around social conservatism, political authoritarianism, and orthodox religion as a nominal arm of the state. His is a barely updated version of nineteenth-century theoretician and czarist adviser Konstantin Pobedonostsevs three-pronged political prescription: orthodoxy, autocracy, and nationality.

Merkel emerged as Putins foil and a global icon, incidentally, during the eurozone debt crisis, when she was seen as a rather nationalistic defender of German economic interests, and again in the summer of 2015 when she countered objections to her migration policies by arguing that Germany is a strong country that will manage.

Of course, this new Merkel had always been there. In 2009, she openly rebuked former Pope Benedict for not providing sufficient clarification about his decision to rescind a Holocaust-denying bishops excommunication; and, in 2007, she insisted on receiving the Dalai Lama, despite official Chinese objections.

Merkel and Putin have emerged as political icons just as globalization has reached a crossroads.

While Trump, channeling Putin, wants an alternative to globalization, Merkel wants to salvage it with strong leadership, competent management, and a commitment to universal values and human rights.

The 1920s global icons inspired calls for violent political change. Today, that kind of language is kept at arms length. But the choice between inclusive integration and exclusive disintegration remains with us.

http://prosyn.org/PkbJkNJ
The Great Income Stagnation

.



BERKELEY  Nowadays, the inequality debate often focuses on the disproportionate accumulation of income and wealth by a very small share of households in the United States and other advanced economies. Less noticed  but just as corrosive  is the trend of falling or stagnating incomes for the majority of households.

For much of the post-World War II period, until the 2000s, strong GDP and employment growth in the advanced economies meant that almost all households experienced rising incomes, both before and after taxes and transfers. As a result, generation after generation grew up expecting to be better off than their parents. But, according to new research from the McKinsey Global Institute, that expectation may no longer be warranted.

During the last decade, income growth came to an abrupt halt for most households in the developed countries, with those headed by single women or comprising young, less educated workers among the hardest hit. Real income from wages and capital for households in the same part of the income distribution was lower in 2014 than in 2005 for about two-thirds of households in 25 advanced economies  more than 500 million people. From 1993 to 2005, by contrast, less than 2% of households in these economies had flat or falling incomes.

Increases in government transfers and lower tax rates reduced the effect of stagnating or falling market incomes on disposable incomes. Nonetheless, 20-25% of households faced flat or falling disposable incomes from 2005 to 2014, compared to less than 2% in the preceding 12 years.

A major culprit behind this reversal is the deep recession and slow recovery following the 2008 economic crisis in the advanced economies. From 1993 to 2005, GDP growth contributed about 18 percentage points to annual median household income growth, on average, in the US and Europe; that figure plunged to just four percentage points from 2005 to 2014.

But the post-crisis drop in growth is far from the only problem. (If it were, the last decade could be just an anomaly.) Longer-term factors like weak investment, decelerating labor-force growth, and a sharp slowdown in productivity growth have reduced income growth for the median household in most advanced countries relative to the 1993-2005 period.

Demographic shifts  including changing family structure, low fertility rates, and population aging  have led to reductions both in the overall size of households and in the number of working-age earners per household. And labor-market shifts  driven by technological change, the globalization of low- and medium-skill jobs, and the growing prevalence of part-time, temporary employment  have caused the wage share of national income to decline and the distribution of that income among households to become increasingly uneven. None of these trends is going to be reversed anytime soon. On the contrary, some are likely to strengthen.

McKinseys research confirms the role of such long-term factors in undermining incomes for the majority of households. It shows that most households real market incomes remained flat or fell, even though aggregate growth remained positive in the 2005-2014 period.

In the US, in particular, the ability of labor to protect its share of national income, and of lower- and middle-income households to protect their share of the wage pool, eroded substantially. As a result, real growth in median disposable income slowed by nine percentage points from 1993 to 2005, and by another seven percentage points from 2005 to 2014.

Sweden, where median households received a larger share of the gains from output growth in the 2005-2014 period, has bucked this negative trend. In response to the growth slowdown of the last decade, Swedens government worked with employers and unions to reduce working hours and preserve jobs. Thanks to these interventions, market incomes fell or were flat for only 20% of households. And generous net transfers meant that disposable incomes increased for almost all households.

To be sure, the US also intervened after the crisis, implementing a fiscal stimulus package in 2009 that, along with other transfers, raised median disposable income growth by the equivalent of five percentage points. A four-point decline in median market income thus became a one-percentage-point gain in median disposable income. But that did not change the fact that, from 2005 to the end of 2013, market incomes declined for 81% of US households.

Similarly, recent research by Berkeleys Emmanuel Saez shows that real market income for the bottom 99% in the US grew in both 2014 and 2015 at rates not seen since 1999. Nonetheless, by the end of 2015, real market incomes for that group had recovered only about two-thirds of the losses borne during the 2007-2009 recession. In other words, the US intervention was far less effective than its Swedish counterpart at enabling workers to recapture their past income levels.

The consequences of such failures are far-reaching. Stagnating or falling real incomes do not just act as a brake on consumption demand and GDP growth; they also fuel social and political discontent, as citizens lose confidence in existing economic structures.

MGI surveys in France, the United Kingdom, and the US have found that people whose incomes are not growing, and who do not anticipate an improvement, tend to view trade and immigration much more negatively than those who are experiencing or foresee gains. The Brexit vote in the UK and bipartisan opposition to trade agreements in the US are clear signs of this.

Recent debate about income inequality in the US and other developed countries has focused on the rapid surge in incomes for the few. But stagnating or falling incomes for the many add a different dimension to the debate  and demand different types of solutions that emphasize wage growth for the majority of the income distribution. With most households continuing to face stagnating or falling incomes  and with younger generations thus on track to be poorer than their parents  such solutions are urgently needed.
Things are looking kind of rough recently in America, what with our wealth gap and headlong embrace of an megalomaniacal white nationalist. But are things so bad that we're basically nothing more than a gaudy toilet country? Probably not, but just in case you feel that way, you can go to the Guggenheim and piss on a golden toilet called "America," according to the NY Times. Just whatever you do, don't laugh while you're doing it, because this toilet made of gold is very serious and not a joke.

"America" is a new exhibition at the Guggenheim and no, it's not a room where a guy stands there and explains that Neil Young didn't sing "Horse With No Name." "America" is a fully-functional and otherwise normal toilet that happens to be made entirely out of gold. And yes, you can do your business in it while summoning your inner-Spank and yelling stuff from the bathroom like "HEY LOOK AT ME! I'M SHITTING ALL OVER AMERICA!"

Artist/toilet designer Mauirizio Cattelan told the Times he doesn't want you to see his gold toilet named "America" as some kind of joke. The paper suggested it's a "an absurd sendup of inequality (and a commentary on the runaway wealth inside the art world)." Despite Cattelan suggesting that the golden toilet has a "democratic appeal" because everybody poops, The New Yorker reports that the Guggenheim won't let it become the kind of festering mess that your average public toilet turns into:

Someone from our regular cleaning staff will come by every fifteen minutes, and theyll use special wipes, like medical wipes, that dont have any fragrance or color or oxidizers. And we have a steam cleaner that well use periodically.

As it happens, the average toilet weighs somewhere between 70 and 120 pounds and gold is currently going for $1,316.60 per ounce, which would put the cost of this serious commentary on income inequality somewhere between $1,474,592 and $2,527,872.
Back in the day it took more than an Instagram feed to be able to call yourself a "street photographer." There was some real dedication, time spent both on the streets and in the darkroom, and after all that, no simple way to show everyone what you had captured.

Robert Herman began documenting the city and its people in the 1970s, and his vivid images look unlike others we've seen from previous decadesdilapidated sun-soaked subway cars, disaffected youth attached to pinball machines, and a young woman who looks less like a New Yorker and more like an extra from Dazed & Confused. Many of his subjects look like they're straight out of Central Casting, in fact, and his photographs often look like movie stillsthis may have to do with Herman's own past.

Born in Brooklyn, his father owned a movie theater on Kings Highway"when I was 13 I started working there as an usher and a candy stand guy," he told us. "This was my way of being close to my father. I loved movies, and going there gave me the chance to see them over and over. When I look back I can see that my street photography has a cinematic quality." In 1976, he enrolled at NYU Film School and got his own apartment on Waverly Place for $250 a month.

It was around this time that Herman began shooting the photos that would eventually land in his book, titled The New Yorkers, which spans the years 1978 through 2005.

Herman recently shared a few photos with us from that book, and discussed his life in the city he has documented so well. Click through for a look at his images from the 1980s, which he confirms was one of the most "wonderful" times to shoot here.



First Love, New York, NY, 1980. (Robert Herman)

Where else have you lived in the city, what neighborhoods? After living near Washington Square, I moved to 13th and 3rd Avenue near the Variety Photoplays and the Paladium. A couple of years later, I got a loft in Little Italy on Kenmare Street, in the building that now has the Storefront for Art and Architecture on the ground floor. I had a place to shoot and I set up my first darkroom. This where I lived when I began to make the photos that eventually became my first book, which I self published, The New Yorkers.

In 1984, the building was sold and because rents had risen so much I ended up in Astoria. As always I continued shooting in the neighborhood near where I lived. Then 8 years later I moved to Boerum Hill, Brooklyn. It hadnt gentrified yet and in fact it was a pretty rough neighborhood. It was a 2 bedroom and again, I set up a darkroom and a shooting space. Today, I live in Battery Park City.

What was your favorite year, or decade, to shoot the city during? SoHo, Tribeca and the East and West Village in the early '80s were wonderful places to shoot. The buildings were short so there was direct sunlight on the street. My inspiration for making a street photograph always starts with the light and the color. I shot Kodachrome because I loved the way the colors popped. SoHo was still the place where the artists lived, graffiti was everywhere I looked and it made a great background for some of my photos. Kenmare Street was on the edge of Little Italy and still an Italian neighborhood, so I was constantly making pictures.

What are the biggest things you've seen change over the years? The loss the mom and pop stores is an ongoing tragedy. So many things that I loved about Manhattan are rapidly disappearing are being replaced by corporate chains. When a Starbucks is in the background, I could be shooting in any major city in the world. And of course, now that everyone is looking at their smart phones, it makes it much harder to make compelling pictures on the streets.

Can you describe a typical day you had back in the '70s or '80s? In the early '80s when I lived on Kenmare on the edge of Little Italy, I would go out with my Nikon loaded with Kodachrome. The raw material for good photos was everywhere I looked. I was teaching myself street photography, learning to expose with a manual film camera, and referencing all the greats who came before me. The books by Kertesz, Callahan, Frank and Winogrand that I bought from Photographers Place on Mercer Street were the beginning of my education.
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WASHINGTON  San Francisco faces potentially drastic cutbacks in its water supply, as state regulators proposed leaving more water in three Northern California rivers Thursday to protect wildlife in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta estuary, the linchpin of Californias water supply.

The draft rules by the State Water Resources Control Board would raise the amount of water into the Merced, Stanislaus and Tuolumne rivers to 30 to 50 percent of what would naturally flow in them. That means less water would be available for urban users and farmers in the northern San Joaquin Valley, compounding their need to conserve.

Current flows into those rivers dip as low as 10 percent during parts of the year, and, if the plan is made final, state officials said they would start the increase with a midpoint of 40 percent during spring flows from February through June.

The bottom line is weve simply diverted too much water for fish to be able to survive, said board Chairwoman Felicia Marcus in a telephone interview. This should have been done earlier, but its a hard thing to do in the worst drought in modern history.

The rules on river flows have not been updated since 1995, and even then they never considered the needs of wildlife in any of the three tributaries, Marcus said. In the meantime, fish populations have plummeted in all three rivers and Californias second-largest river, the San Joaquin, runs dry for long stretches. Marcus said the science clearly shows the fish need more water.

The board would have acted three years ago but delayed the plan because of Californias record drought that has forced thousands of acres of farm fields to be fallowed, required individuals to cut their water use by a quarter and driven half a dozen species of native fish, including the states storied salmon runs, to the brink of extinction.

Birds using the Pacific Flyway migration path through the Central Valley have also suffered a dire lack of water.

The Tuolumne has become one of the most over-drafted rivers in the state, with about 80 percent of its normal flow diverted to human uses. San Francisco draws its water from the river, which it dammed in the early 20th century in Yosemite National Park, and is one of its largest water rights holders. Even as the Tuolumne has been over-drafted, the city has aggressively defended its water rights.

In all, the river provides water to 2.6 million residents and businesses in the Bay Area and also supplies water to farmers through the Modesto and Turlock irrigation districts.

On paper, California has allocated five times more water to human uses than exists in the states rivers. The over-drafting becomes apparent during droughts, when it is impossible to meet every user demand and wildlife often takes the biggest hits.

As high as the proposed increases are, they fall short of the 60 percent flow that state and federal wildlife officials had recommended, both to save wildlife and to prevent saltwater from damaging the Sacramento-San Joaquin River estuary.

Still, San Francisco Public Utilities Commission spokesman Charles Sheehan said the agency has not yet seen the full draft rule, but said for Bay Area customers this could have significant impacts in drought years and in post-drought years when youre trying to refill your system.

Farm groups, which often say water left in rivers is wasted to the sea, swiftly denounced the proposal.

California Farm Bureau President Paul Wenger said in a statement that the plan could idle as many as 240,000 acres of farmland. Farmers have made great strides in improving water efficiency, he said, and its time to apply the same standards to water dedicated to environmental flows. Efforts to protect fish by simply increasing the water available to them have not worked, he said.

But fish biologists said the state continues to shortchange fish, even with the new rule.

There is no evidence that 40 percent is going to cut it, said Jon Rosenfield, a salmon biologist at the Bay Institute, an environmental group. All the fish and wildlife agencies have said that way more than 40 percent of tributary flows is necessary to protect the hardiest fish, the salmon, and thats not counting other fish and wildlife that might require more flows.

Less than 5 percent of San Joaquin River water now reaches the delta, he said, and what is left in the river is often a poisonous soup of farm runoff.

The river has been mined almost out of existence, Rosenfield said. One recent consequence is the emergence of highly toxic algae blooms in the southern delta, he added.

Peter Drekmeier of Save the Tuolomne, an environmental group, said San Francisco has cut its water use by 30 percent since 2008 and can do more. He faulted farm irrigation districts that use the river for encouraging unwise use by vastly underpricing water, selling it as cheaply as $15 an acre-foot when urban residents pay $1,500.

Marcus said the board will hear public comments until November and then issue revisions incorporating those comments with final approval expected early next year.

San Francisco is expected to challenge the rule, although how aggressively remains to be seen. We intend to participate in that process, said Sheehan, the utility agency spokesman.

The rules are part of a series of updates of something called the Bay Delta Water Quality Control Plan. They cover only the San Joaquin River and southern delta; the board will later take up the Sacramento River, delta outflows, Suisun Marsh and other areas.

Carolyn Lochhead is The San Francisco Chronicles Washington correspondent. Email: clochhead@sfchronicle.com
A monthly subscription company for gin lovers, aptly called ILoveGin, is searching for a part-time worker with an open six months to travel around the United Kingdom and other parts of Europe tasting all sorts of different kinds of  you guessed it  gin.

The "gintern," as they're calling the role, will be required to work two days a week, tasting from 1-2 gin companies each few days, and "be happy to spend their days trying new gins, new mixers, finding new brands to work with, visiting distilleries, pairing gins and 'ginspiring' us with their new-found knowledge."
Are you relatively new to this bustling metropolis? Don't be shy about it, everyone was new to New York once upon a time, except, of course, those battle-hardened residents who've lived here their whole lives and Know It All. One of these lifers works among us at Gothamistpublisher Jake Dobkin grew up in Park Slope and still resides there. He is now fielding questionsask him anything by sending an email here, but be advised that Dobkin is "not sure you guys will be able to handle my realness." We can keep you anonymous if you prefer; just let us know what neighborhood you live in.

This week's question comes from a New Yorker who wants to know if it's okay to exclude a friend with a bed bug problem from her party.

Hello Mr. Dobkin,

A friend of mine lives in an apartment in which one of the other roommates has bedbugs. A couple weeks has gone by and they have not had an exterminator in. Insane, right?

It becomes my problem because I'm having a party to which I plan to invite a circle of friends that includes the bug lady, and I don't plan to include her. Although she has no bites, I don't want the risk of her dropping any eggs or whatever at my place.

Is that OK?

DK in the BK



A native New Yorker responds:

Dear DK,

You are within your rights to exclude your infested friend from the party, just as you would be if you excluded a friend who had a case of some other highly contagious diseasethe mumps or measles. This is even more understandable if the suspected carrier refused to be vaccinated, which is analogous to living in a bedbug apartment without taking any protective measures.

Of course, and this is the hard part, you must tell your friend why she is being dissed. Being ostracized from anything is terrible, but being excluded from a party by your friends with no explanationthat's the worst. (I assume you are friends, because no sane person would even contemplate inviting a mere acquaintance to a party at their home if they were suspected of hosting bedbugs on their person.)

So you must level with her. First, get yourself in the right mindset. Put aside the pejorative "bedbug lady"that's a sign of lack of empathy. Let us agree to call her a "bedbug victim." After meditating for awhile on the cruel hazards and sudden disasters that the universe inflicts on the just and the unjust alike, pick up the phone, and say, "Hey Yo, you know I really like you but this apartment is a no bedbug zone." Then outline your reasons for concern: bedbugs can indeed travel on human clothing, her apartment has not yet been treated, and it would be unfair to expose your other friends to this avoidable hazard.

She may object! It's possible she has read the scientific literature and knows that bedbugs really don't like to travel on human skin (it's too warm), or even clothing that's close to skin, so unless she brings luggage to the party, the risk is low. Keep calm, and simply respond that a low risk is not no risk, and you're not prepared to roll the dice. If she persists, up the ante with this offer:

"You may attend the party, but I must insist that you strip naked in the hallway outside my apartment and put on this fashionable painter's coverall, and then bag your street clothes in two layers of garbage bag, and place them outside the building, to be carried away when you leave."

If you're really paranoid, you can ask her to strip in the street outside, but that seems unduly cruel to me.

She will probably refuse, which is the point. But if she hasn't already hung up on you, this is a good time to get real with her and ask why, for the love of all things holy, she hasn't yet called an exterminator. If you found out your roommate had ebola, would you just carry on for two weeks as if nothing was wrong? Bedbugs are the ebola of New York infestations. Her lackadaisicalness suggests a depressive tendency towards self-harma profound recklessness that should concern you as her friend.

With compassion, help her work through to address the deeper causes, and move forward to addressing this pestilence. Remind her that her landlord is required to provide an insect-free environment, and if they refuse, there are many well-reviewed bedbug exterminators in NYC, and she can deduct the costs from her rent (that part will probably require speaking to a tenants' lawyer, however.)

Remind her that though bedbugs are very annoying, there is no reason to become frozen with fear. So much of bedbug paranoia is a creation of the media, which reports each new infestation (of a subway car, of city hall, of a swank hotel) as if it's part of an unstoppable epidemic of giant mutant flying bedbugs attacking the city with laser beams. It is notbedbug reports have actually been on the decrease the last five years. Here are the most recent numbers from HPD:



(via the NYC Department of Housing Preservation & Development)

So do not give in to fear and hysteriawe are winning the bedbug war. It's not easy, but your friend's apartment can be de-bugged and she can return to socializing with the rest of your gang. When she does, show her love; according to my sources, the worst part about bedbugs isn't the bites, it's the PTSD you experience afterwards, when every mosquito attack makes you think they're coming back.

Namaste,

Jake

N.B.: One office millennial here at Gothamist HQ suggests that you just move the party to a bar, which is a typically irresponsible millennial life-strategy that avoids conflict at the cost of potentially exposing innocent barflies to bedbugs. Take responsibility for this problem and confront your friend!

Ask a Native New Yorker anything via email. Anonymity is assured.
KHAR, Pakistan  A suicide bomber attacked a Sunni mosque in northwest Pakistan on Friday, killing at least 24 worshipers and wounding 28 others, officials said. Several children were also among those killed or wounded in the deadly attack.

A breakaway Taliban group later claimed responsibility for the bombing.
BRATISLAVA, Slovakia  Bruised and split but refusing to be beaten by Britains planned exit, European Union leaders on Friday gave themselves one long winter to prepare a fundamental reset of the bloc to try to stave off increasing discontent and offer solutions for the multiple crises it faces.

The leaders, 28 minus British Prime Minister Theresa May, committed to have a clear road map of the way ahead and some practical results when they meet in late March to mark the 60th anniversary of the EU-founding Treaty of Rome in the Italian capital.

Europe can, must move forward as long as it has clear priorities: protection, security, prosperity and the future of the youth, said French president Francois Hollande in a joint news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Still, not all were in agreement. Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi left the summit dissatisfied, insisting not enough had been achieved on migration. His Hungarian counterpart Viktor Orban also voiced displeasure on the issue, highlighting how the leaders still have a way to go in finding a united front.

I do not have to play in a script to show that we are united, Renzi said.

Merkel called the current situation in the EU critical, and not only because Britain voted in June to leave the bloc. The next months would be decisive, she said.

She noted the migration crisis and economic problems that have fed growing disenchantment with the EU among many member states. Still, she said there was a common willingness to bounce back beyond the many issues that divide and even anger individual EU nations.

EU Council President Donald Tusk agreed, calling the current mood in the EU sober but not defeatist.

In a centuries-old castle in the middle of their fractious continent, the EU leaders anxiously sought to forge a sense of common purpose.

At the top of the agenda was how to heighten security and improve defense cooperation, secure external borders to deal with chaotic immigration and come through on measures to get the vast ranks of unemployed youth in Europe back to work.

In the joint Bratislava Roadmap, the leaders said they were determined to never allow a return to the uncontrolled flows of last year and further bring down the number of migrants entering illegally.

They added they would ensure full control of our external borders.
1 Female leader: Renho Murata became the first woman to lead the opposition Democratic Party in Japan after winning a leadership contest on Thursday. Murata, who has served in the countrys upper house of Parliament for more than a decade, won in a landslide against two male competitors despite controversy over her part-Taiwanese heritage. By winning the leadership contest, Murata became the third woman to take up a prominent political job in Japan in less than two months, heralding a budding shift in a country with an abysmal track record of putting women in power.

2 Missing plane: A wing flap that washed ashore on an island off Tanzania has been identified as belonging to missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, Australian officials said Thursday. The flap was found in June by residents on Pemba Island, and officials had previously said it was highly likely to have come from the missing Boeing 777. An analysis by experts at the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, which is heading up the search for the plane, subsequently confirmed the part was indeed from the aircraft, the agency said.
WASHINGTON  Small numbers of U.S. special operations forces for the first time are accompanying Turkish government forces and their Syrian opposition partners fighting Islamic State militants inside Syria, military and administration officials said Friday.

The move follows a period of U.S. tensions with Turkey, including U.S. criticism of clashes last month between Turkish and Syrian Kurdish forces in northern Syria. Turkey is a NATO ally of Washingtons, but it has been angered by U.S. support for the Kurdish Peoples Protection Units, or YPG. The militia has been the most effective U.S. partner in fighting the Islamic State in Syria.

Separately, the Pentagon announced that a U.S. air strike near Raqqa, Syria, on Sept. 7 killed an Islamic State leader it identified as Wail Adil Hasan Salman al-Fayad. Pentagon press secretary Peter Cook called him one of the Islamic States most senior leaders. Cook said he operated as the groups minister of information and was a prominent member of its senior leadership council.

In a statement explaining the new U.S. role with Turkish troops in Syria, a Pentagon spokesman, Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, said the Americans are advising and providing other assistance to Turks who are clearing territory on the Syrian side of Turkeys border between the Syrian towns of Jarablus and Ar Rai.

Access to the Turkey-Syria border region is strategically important to ISILs operations in Syria and Iraq as well, Davis said, using a common acronym for the Islamic State.

Denying ISIL access to this critical border cuts off critical supply routes in and out of Iraq and Syria and further isolates ISILs so-called capital in Raqqa, said another Pentagon spokesman, Marine Maj. Adrian J.T. Rankine-Galloway.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest noted the U.S. has long pushed Turkey to enhance security along its border.

We have been pleased to see the Turkish pursue this kind of decisive, strategically significant action that will aid our efforts, he said.

Davis said the Americans are providing the same training, advice and other assistance that U.S. forces have been providing to other Syrian opposition groups  such as the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces  fighting the Islamic State in northern Syria. This is the first time, however, that U.S. troops have performed this role alongside Turkish troops.

Davis did not say how many U.S. troops are working with the Turks, but others said it was approximately a few dozen. They are among 300 U.S. troops authorized by President Obama to provide training, advice and assistance inside Syria as part of the broader military campaign against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.

Officials said not say how long the U.S. special operations troops will work with the Turks and their Syrian partners, but it appeared likely they will help with Turkish-led operations aimed at clearing the towns of al-Bab and Dabiq, which are south and southwest of Ar Rai and are under Islamic State control.
Fulton Hogan boosted annual profit 11 percent, outpacing revenue gains, as a number of acquisitions helped widen the tightly held civil construction company's margins.

Net profit rose to $168.7 million in the 12 months ended June 30 from $158.6 million, the Christchurch-based company said in a statement. Revenue advanced 5.9 percent to about $3.1 billion in what managing director Nick Miller described as a "challenging environment" where multi-national rivals have been attracted to the certainty of New Zealand and Australia's investment pipeline.

The bottom line was bolstered by the introduction of new technology, such as on-site mobile devices, research and development for specialist products and several acquisitions in the year, including quarries in Auckland, Waikato and Wairarapa, and a joint venture in Melbourne operating an asphalt plant.

"It's not huge topline but we're focused very heavily on driving efficiencies in our operation," Miller told BusinessDesk. "That's very much of the Fulton Hogan strategy is the vertically integrated business. In New Zealand, that's in a reasonably mature state. In Australia, there's still a lot of opportunity for infill in that strategy."

The construction firm has been focusing on strengthening its balance sheet as part of a share buyback with former cornerstone investor Shell, which has included selling non-core assets and reducing debt.

Miller said Fulton Hogan's gearing ratio - a measure of debt to equity - was down to 26 percent from 35 percent in 2015, and that there was plenty of headroom to fund any new acquisitions. He sees Australia's regional towns as offering the biggest opportunity, with Fulton Hogan generating $1.6 billion of revenue across the Tasman in a market with a notional value of $84 billion.

"There's significant opportunity for us to grow in that market, but we've been very deliberate," Miller said.

Spain's Ferrovial delisted Australia's Broadspectrum after taking over the former Transfield Services earlier this year, while ASX-listed Cimic, once known as Leighton Holdings, is controlled by Spain's Grupo ACS. On this side of the Tasman, HEB Construction was acquired by France's Vinci Group last year.

Miller said the merger and acquisition activity was a result of a deliberate strategy where New Zealand and Australian governments provide "certainty of pipeline for infrastructure spend" at a time when infrastructure investment in Europe had subsided.

"Unquestionably, the pipeline of work is an attraction for them given where their current operations exist in Europe and North America," he said.

Fulton Hogan touts its local knowledge, flexible 6,294-strong workforce, and ability to operate and maintain projects after they're completed when pitching to join consortia for major projects, he said.

Miller said the level of activity was varied across the company's regions, with New South Wales and Victoria growing strongly in Australia whereas South Australia and West Australia were soft. Fulton Hogan's National Broadband Network contracts across the Tasman were helping make up for the downturn in mining

In New Zealand, where Fulton Hogan generated $1.4 billion of revenue, Auckland was still strong, though Christchurch work was expected to taper off as the Stronger Christchurch Infrastructure Rebuild Team (Scirt) work winds down, and last year's slump in dairy prices was still weighing on regional work.

The company's forward order book was $1.9 billion for 2017, up 10 percent from a year earlier.

Fulton Hogan declared dividends of 62 cents per share in the 2016 year, up from 53 cents a year earlier.

The company reduced its total recordable injury frequency rate to a record 4.8 from 6.7 in 2016. Miller said the alignment of Australia's and New Zealand's health and safety legislation meant the Kiwi operations had benefited from the company's experience across the Tasman.

Miller leaves the company at the end of March. Fulton Hogan's search for his replacement is "on target", he said.

BusinessDesk.co.nz

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Rakon shareholders not aligned to founder Warren Robinson have voted his son Darren off the board as part of efforts to loosen his family's grip on the electronic components maker.

Proxy votes went against re-electing Darren Robinson although chairman Bryan Mogridge survived the vote. Shareholders are upset at the companys lacklustre performance, flagging share price, and lack of dividends since it listed 10 years ago. Mogridge was re-elected

It is the first time the NZ Shareholders Association has ousted a director through a vote. Association chairman John Hawkins told the meeting the Robinson family had listed the company and then continued to run it like a family-owned business. Mogridge was re-elected on 84 percent of votes cast while Robinson was ousted with 54 percent of votes.

In August the association wrote to about 6,000 Rakon shareholders seeking proxy support to reduce the Robinson familys level of control on the board. They represent half the directors on the board but hold only 24 percent of the companys shares.

Darren Robinson told shareholders that it was important to customers that he continue to be able to directly represent their interests at board level but several shareholders at the meeting said there needed to be a clear distinction between management and governance, as was the normal practice in New Zealand and Australian listed companies.

Ahead of the vote, Mogridge said founder Warren Robinson, who wasnt up for re-election today, was prepared to stand down before the next AGM but wanted to do so with dignity. Mogridge also said he will only serve one more term.

Rakon, which makes frequency control and timing components for the telecommunications, defence and space industries, reported a $1.7 million full-year net loss in May.

Its share price has dropped from $1.60 when it listed on the NZX in 2006 to just 20 cents today on the back of failed investments and missed financial targets. In its heyday in 2007 the share price hit $6 per share.

Chief executive Brent Robinson said the company was on track to deliver a 20 percent cut in operating costs by the end of the fiscal year ending March 2017, but the full benefit of that wouldnt be realised until the final year. He said redundancies were involved, without saying how many.

He recounted the history of the company in a seeming effort to get shareholders onside, saying its latest sales drop in the last financial year and this year related to a downturn among its key telecommunications customers. Revenue from the telco business dropped 41 percent in the 2016 financial year.

Brent Robinson said they were getting some traction in the defence and space industries and were developing new products as part of its investment in a new Internet of Things network being rolled out in Australia and New Zealand.

Hawkins said the CEO had a lot of excuses but it was his job to sort out problems that arose in the business. The credibility of the board and management was now in question, he said.

Year after year there have been upbeat forecasts and reassurances, he said, but year after year the outcome was less than what had been promised," he said. "Everyone knows Rakons performance has been dismal and the management and board have a litany of excuses over what went wrong  its always external factors.

Hawkins pointed to an old saying that the people that get you into trouble are rarely the ones that get you out of it.

Shareholders also questioned Mogridge why the company hadnt delivered on promises made at the last AGM to diversify the board, with Hawkins saying the nominations and remuneration committee had not held even one meeting all year. Mogridge said the issue had been discussed at board level and there was an acknowledgment of the need for change.

In the letter to shareholders sent in August, the association said the final straw for many shareholders was the decision last year to increase Brent and Darren Robinsons pay by about 23 percent  to $907,892 for the chief executive and to $734,605 for the marketing director, respectively.

In 2012 the company promised to freeze director and executive director pay until underlying earnings hit $25 million, which has not happened.

Mogridge said today the increase related to bonus entitlements from the 2015 fiscal year which the board approved for payment in 2016, while the base salaries remained frozen.

Following shareholder disquiet, the executive directors have agreed to a 12.5 percent cut in their base salary and no bonus entitlements this year.

Mogridge was paid $120,000 last year while Warren Robinson got the standard director fee of $60,000 per annum.

In April Rakon said its cornerstone investment in Australian start-up Thinxtra, which is rolling out a new internet of things network in partnership with French company Sigfox, is expected to start having a positive impact on the companys earnings by 2018.

Thinxtra last week completed its first significant round of venture capital financing, raising A$11 million. Rakons 64 percent stake has been diluted to 36 percent as it made no further investment in the latest round. It has paid out A$5.8 million to date.

Thinxtra said it was on track to provide coverage through its LPWAN ( low-power wide area network) for 85 percent of Kiwis and Australians by June next year and is looking to expand into Asia. It has currently achieved 33 percent coverage in New Zealand.

BusinessDesk.co.nz

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Douglas Pharmaceuticals, New Zealands largest drugs developer and manufacturer, expects the US market to become its biggest, overtaking the European Union, in the near future as new drugs it has under development come to market.

The Auckland-based company was founded in 1967 by the late Graeme Douglas, who died last week at the age of 87. He started the business empire in the back of his Te Atatu chemist shop when he made a cough syrup called Kofsin that he sold himself and through other pharmacists.

The company set up its first manufacturing site in 1980 making generic medication but moved into exporting in a big way in the early 1990s when the advent of government drug-buying agency, Pharmac, dramatically lowered prices on the domestic market and threatened its survival.

Chief executive Jeff Douglas told the NZBio conference in Auckland today that it currently has a $35 million turnover in the US where prices are particularly attractive and it was expecting that to grow dramatically to become its largest market.

It has nine to 10 active development products in various stages of lab testing and three or four more on regulatory review with the Food and Drug Administration in the US, he said.

The commercial model is quite different in the US where it attracts better margins by partnering with an existing big pharmaceutical company, going 50:50 on drug development and marketing costs and with profits. Under European rules it has to sell the intellectual property for each drug and enter into a five-year exclusive supply deal which means it is vulnerable to being replaced at contract renewal time, though Douglas said that hadnt happened yet.

Douglas Pharmaceuticals has been focused on diversification and getting into higher risk/reward novel drug development in a bid to meet its target of growing annual revenue to $244 million by 2020. Douglas said total sales are expected to be $185 million this financial year, of which $120 million will come from export. It employs 470 staff and exports to 35 countries.

It has struggled to get a foothold in China where Douglas said protectionist policies meant two breast cancer products it had submitted for approval seven years ago are yet to come even close to being signed off while in India it cant compete against tariffs and low-cost domestic manufacturers.

The company has four divisions: contract manufacturing for other drug developers which is expected to keep growing; compliance packaging make Medico blister packs for prescriptions; over the counter consumer products ranging from cough medicine to hair care where it acts as an agent for other brands and sells it owns; and developing and manufacturing novel and generic drugs, including taking an existing molecule or drug and changing its form for new uses.

It is working with the University of Otago on a new drug for severe depression which Douglas said is well advanced and with the University of Manchester for a drug to treat cervical cancer.

Its also doing its first foray into biologics (derived from living organisms, though biotechnology is used in their manufacture) which have revolutionised the treatment of a number of chronic diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis and Crohns disease and are used in treating a variety of cancers.

Thats with a customer from Wellington, Douglas said, and it would like to do more.

We have in-house experience but if there is a market or project being talked about, wed be delighted to listen, he said. We dont want to be left behind in this industry.

Douglas said one of the hardest parts of the business was quality control with several manufacturers in China and India having failed recent audit inspections by the FDA.

Some companies were taking short-cuts and the quality was not so good, he said. Douglas recently got through an FDA audit unscathed though he said one of the advantages of being so far away in New Zealand was is it gets a couple of weeks advance notice of an audit.

A move two years ago to import robots from Japan, which it onsells to pharmacies and rest-homes to fill Medico blister packs rather than doing them laboriously by hand, has paid off and Douglas said the company was now exercising its exclusive licence rights to sell them into Australia.

BusinessDesk.co.nz

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5,000 New York City francophiles, decked head-to-toe in all white, descended upon the Wagner Park waterfront in Battery Park City last night for the city's sixth installment of Diner en Blanc. Last night's warm and breezy weather was a pleasant change from the heat and humidity of last year's fete.

The high profile event, which spans six continents, 25 countries, 70 cities, and 125,000 participants globally, boasted a wait-list of 45,000 people this year for the NYC location alone.

In keeping with tradition, the dinner's location was kept secret until minutes before the start of the event. Elizabeth Angebrandt, a third year veteran of Diner en Blanc, explained that guests are instructed to follow specific protocol, such as mandatory white apparel, no paper or plastic tablecloths, and only wine and champagne permitted, which must be purchased from onsite caterers.

Attendees flooded the waterfront all at once and quickly set up their white picnic equipment, including tables and chairs, as well as fine china, silverware, and elaborate centerpieces. Elizabeth and Chaz Thomas, who brought a pergola arbor decorated with hanging paper lanterns, told us that they "wanted to bring a romantic ambiance to their table" and "preserve the magic of the night."

Many participants dressed in extravagant ensembles, including gowns embellished with string lights, fairy wings, silk tuxedos, powdered wigs, enormous picture hats, and other elegant accoutrements. Basia Malinowska, who wore a dress adorned with wires and a top hat, told us that she spent a month on outfit preparation. A fancy feathered headpiece she wore last year has now become her table's centerpiece.

A live quintet performed covers of jazz songs made famous by The Ink Spots, Billie Holiday, Django Reinhardt, Eartha Kitt and others. Hired professionals swing danced around the venue in pairs, and an FDNY harbor unit ship even sailed by, spouting streams of water to mark the occasion.

Dinner commenced at sundown, marked by a mass wave of white napkins in the air accompanied by the delighted whoops of the participants. Guests dined on their own specially curated meals: charcuterie, cheese plates, and desserts, many as opulent as their attire.

After dinner, the dancing continued. The jazz band was swapped out for a DJ and guests converged on the dance floor to let loose to Stromae, a Belgian electronic artist, as well as '90s R&B hits.

The evening concluded with a mass exodus of slightly-disheveled attendees, cleaning up after their night of indulgence and returning to their humdrum lives of multi-colored clothing.
In the next step towards making life bearable for the city's fleet of fast food workers, Mayor de Blasio will push legislation that should help curb the wildly unpredictable schedules of the 65,000 hourly workers in NYC. Yesterday in front of a Brooklyn McDonald's, the mayor announced the Fair Workweek legislation, which would require employers to release employee schedules a minimum of two weeks in advance.

"Too many New Yorkers are being put in untenable situationstaking care of kids and aging parents, and then being forced to deal with an arbitrary schedule at a job where they still dont always make ends meet," the mayor said.

Unstable work schedules are one of the many ways that employers and management make life difficult for workers in already low-paying fast food jobs. Workers are routinely asked to work last-minute shifts or have shifts removed from their schedules without notice. This practice, along with tampering with time sheets, are just a few examples of rampant wage theft and instability in the industry.

The legislation, which de Blasio intends to draft with the City Council, is expected to include the following changes, according a statement from the administration:

Require fast food employers to schedule a majority of expected shifts and publicly post a workplace schedule two weeks in advance.

Protect workers by requiring employers to provide additional compensation when workers are required to accommodate last-minute changes to their schedules for reasons within employers ability to plan or control.

Address problems created by the practice of clopenings, or shifts that require employees to consecutively work closing and opening shifts with fewer than ten hours between them.

"Think about the fact that these companieswe're talking about some of the biggest corporations in AmericaMcDonald's, KFC, so many otherssome of the most profitable corporations in America, are led by some of the best compensated CEOs in America," the mayor asked of the crowd. "Now, I remind you, those corporations couldn't survive without their workers. Those wealthy CEOs would be nowhere but for the people who do the work every day."

A reminder: McDonald's CEO Donald Thompson gets paid $13.7 million per year to hawk "edible" dish sponges while his employees sign up for food stamps.
Donald Trump is not a celebrity. Donald Trump is a tremendously unqualified presidential candidate who, if elected, will drive this country off the edge of a cliff into a fiery inferno, taking the rest of civilization with him. Donald Trump has empowered a bigoted mob of embittered rednecks and given them tacit permission to attack immigrants, people of color, women, and journalists, and encouraged them to assassinate his opponent Hillary Clinton. Donald Trump is a walking catastrophe who must be stopped. And yet, Jimmy Fallon invited this sociopath onto the Tonight Show, threw him a couple softball questions, and ruffled his hair.

Indeed, last night Fallon handled Trump as if the latter was merely plugging a new film and not, in fact, poised to assume highest office in the country, if not the world at large. Fallon asked Trump if he knew what a coin is, if he'd ever played the board game, "Sorry," how he eats so much fast food, if he'd ever gotten a cold on the campaign trail. Fallon asked Trump if he "still want[s] to do this," as if it's super cute that this lying, racist, misogynistic, narcissistic piece of shit might be a few months away from getting access to our nuclear codes. Fallon never asked Trump a substantive question, but he did play with that mess that lives on his head:



Jimmy, what the fuck is wrong with you? The "bromance" between Putin and Trump isn't cute, it's frightening.







Trump and Clinton are nearly neck and neck in the polls right now, and there is a chance he will become President of the United States. He has threatened to put Peter Thiel, a billionaire who is using his money to silence journalists, on the Supreme Court. He has threatened to unconstitutionally block an entire religion from coming into the United States. He has picked an anti-gay, anti-science, and anti-woman running mate. He claims he has the expertise to run a country because of his "very good brain," and refuses to listen to advisors.

He has crafted few viable policies. His economic plan is a joke. He will destroy us. Fallon is complicit in our destruction, as is NBC at large, a network that profits off of Trump's television shows and Miss Universe competition and has repaid him by giving him a hosting spot on Saturday Night Live, and allowing both Matt Lauer and, now, Fallon, to give him metaphorical handjobs on national television. NBC executives are gambling the lives of 7 billion people on ratings and fat paychecks. Hope it's worth it!

Go to hell Jimmy Fallon, and we mean that with utmost sincerity. This is not funny anymore.
Periodically, Gothamist sits down with teachers at different stages in their careers to talk shop. For the first week of school, we spoke with three teachers about why they chose to teach, what they're doing in their classrooms, and their goals for the year.



Angela teaches Spanish to high schoolers in Park Slope. She's been teaching for almost 20 years.

I came from a family of teachers. It was always in the back of my head, the idea of pursuing teaching as a profession. It was not until I got to college, where I met a professor who, out of the blue, came out and said, "You would make a great teacher." I said, "I don't think so. I am shy and I don't think I can stand in front of a classroom." And he responded, "Oh no, you would do well."

He had this program where he would take students to Guatemala to teach school children. He would choose students from his classes whom he thought would be successful. That was my first dip into teaching and I really enjoyed it. Before that, I thought I was going to teach elementary school. But it became obvious to me that my passion was to teach teenagers. I found they were open minded and they were eager to learn. You could have a conversation with them and get a sense of how they felt about things.

I love reading. My parents, my brotherwe would all read literature together. My father, after dinner, would read classics, like something by Cervantes. He would read us a chapter and then leave us hanging. The next day, he would pick up where he left off. So when I was training to teach, I told myself, "I want to bring what I love into the classroom, to get the kids involved in reading and writing." That is really important.

My first year of teaching in New York City, I was in a private school and I walked in and I thought, "Oh my god. These kids look my age." I was surprised at how they looked so much like me. I was thinking, "How am I going to be able to get them to be interested in learning a language?" But it became natural for me. I taught in a private school for five years, but I have been in Department of Education schools for 13 years now.

I grew up in different places. New York is the place where I did most of my growing up. This is where I went to college. I went to NYU, got my master's degree. For my parents, it was very important to be in a cosmopolitan place. They thought that you needed to be exposed to different things. I grew up in an environment where New York represented culture, arts, music and all that.

But some kids do not get to experience the city at large. When I started to teach in a public school, I took a group of kids to Rockefeller Center. They were in Bushwick and they had never been to Rockefeller Center to see the tree. And that was a moment where I was like, "Wait a minute. You are in New York, you have access to all these things!" But they don't go there. Their whole lives revolve around the neighborhood. It opened my eyes to the fact that not everyone has the same opportunities. I try to incorporate that into the classroom. Even though my school now is in Park Slope, we have kids who have not really been to Manhattan, have not seen a play, haven't been able to take advantage of everything New York has to offer. So I make it a point for the kids to go to Manhattan and see something completely different.

I think one of the things that a few students taught me last year was the importance of making them believe in themselves, that they can do the work. Last year, I had a kid say, "My mom thinks I can't learn another language, that I'm not wired for it." And the parent would come and say, "He can't learn it." I kept saying, "You can learn. You will be able to do it." He's a whiz in math. But I would see this 15-year-old boy cry and say that he was not going to pass the Spanish Regents, so he wasn't going to take the test. I would say every week, "You're going to do it." "No, no, I can't," he would say. But he would come and spend his lunch or come after school on Friday and we would go over material again and again. I would record my voice with vocabulary words and he would listen to them to practice. And he ended up passing the Regents. The mother had been so adamant that he was not going to do it.

There have been people in my life who have mentored me, helped me to grow. I think there comes a time when you have to give back. In order for society to function, you have to give back.

Jennifer Preissel is a New York City high school teacher.
We've seen breakfast pasta before but the new brunch menu at LaRina Pastificio & Vino is doing breakfast ravioli, which is an upgrade to the category to be sure. Starting this weekend, swing by for an entire section devoted to breakfast pastas, including the Black Pepper Raviolone ($15) with bacon and a poached egg or Smoked Spaghetti Carbonara, an eggy and bacon-y dish in its own right. They'll have plenty of other egg-type dishes, plus sandwiches, pancakes and healthful fruit bowls and chia puddings.



Egg in the Hole at Nix (Rayna Greenberg)

Elsewhere in the eggesphere, Chef John Fraser's outstanding new vegetarian restaurant Nix is also launching their meat-free brunch menu. Break into the Egg in a Hole (seen above), soft scrambled eggs with shaved truffles, or Walnut Buns with cream cheese frosting.



Lobster Bisque Fries from Extra Fancy (Nell Casey/Gothamist)

Eat your way around the 'burg and the 'point on Sunday at Taste Williamsburg Greenpoint, the seventh annual culinary festival celebrating the area's eats. The block party's got over 50 different local eateries participating, and you can pick the number of tastes you want ranging from four tastes and two drinks ($35) up to 12 tastes and six drinks ($100). Newcomers like Barano, Cheeseboat, Lilia and Freehold are joined by area favs like Extra Fancy, Maison Premiere, Pies 'n' Thighs and Nitehawk Cinema. The event benefits the Firehouse North Brooklyn Community Center.



(Sessanta)

Also on Sunday, Thompson Street's Sessanta launches a Red Sauce Sunday tradition celebrating New York and New Jersey Italian heritage. On this special menu: red sauce classics like chicken parm, mozzarella in carrozzo, scungilli fra diavolo and baked macheroni with salumi ragu. Bottles of wine are also half off for the event and there'll be plenty of garlic bread flying around, too.
KOLKATA: A day after West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee invited the Tatas to set up a car factory in the state, Swedish automobile giant Volvo has expressed intention to establish a unit.



"I spoke with Volvo (representatives) today. We will give them 25 acres in Panagarh industrial park," Banerjee told reporters here today.



"They will have a setup there. We have given them land," she said, adding details will be shared later.



Bengal has a land bank and policy ready for investors, she reiterated.



The Swedish multinational approached the government for land to set up a base in the state.



The chief minister, who recently visited Germany and Italy seeking investment from global giants like BMW, however, did not specify what Volvo would do with the land at Panagarh.



During the day, the state government signed an MoU with Tata Metaliks to impart skill training in ITI, Midnapore.



"It would have been an expensive proposition to set up buildings and infrastructure but the government was very forthcoming. So we are focusing on the software part rather than the hardware part," Tata Metaliks managing director Sanjiv Paul said.



While infrastructure with respect to classrooms and workshops would be provided by the department of technical education, training and skill development, Tata Metaliks will take care of procurement and installation of machinery and equipment, training along with management of the centre.



Paul said 1,200 youths will be trained annually and the number would increase gradually.



Training would be given in plumbing, electrician, carpentry and scaffolding, beauty and wellness, hospitality and housekeeping and security.



Banerjee said the government's target is to prepare a workforce of six lakh skilled workers every year.



"If you want to take charge of other districts also you can do it. Our infrastructure is ready. The government will give full help. If there is any problem we will help," she said.

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NEW DELHI: Government will soon launch three expressway projects -- Delhi-Amritsar-Katra, Delhi-Jaipur and Vadodara-Mumbai -- soon at a cost of about 1,32,000 crore, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari today said.



"We will soon start three important expressway projects that would reduce travel time significantly between Delhi-Katra, Delhi-Jaipur and Vadodara-Mumbai. These would entail a total project cost of 1,32,000 crore," road transport and highways minister Gadkari said here.



He hoped that the travel distance to these destinations will reduce significantly once the projects are operationalised.



As per the plan, Amritsar could be reached via Delhi in up to 3 hours after completion of the 60,000-crore Amritsar-Delhi expressway, which will reduce travel duration by over two hours.



Also on the anvil is a project connecting Jalandhar to Ajmer that will bring down the travel time to 5 hours.



Meetings in this regard are scheduled with chief ministers of Jammu & Kashmir, Punjab, Haryana, Delhi and Rajasthan.



Yesterday, the minister in the poll-bound Punjab laid the foundation stones of 12 major NH projects worth 10,596.19 crore at Ropar, Samrala and Jalandhar in the state.



The road projects also include four-laning of Jalandhar-Barnala, Jalandhar-Hoshiarpur, Ropar-Phagwara, Kharar-Kurali, Chandigarh-Kharar and Kharar-Ludhiana roads, besides an elevated road in Ludhiana city.



The projects will provide world-class road connectivity to commuters between Doaba and Malwa, along with adjoining Haryana and Himachal Pradesh, in the next 2 years, Gadkari said.



Chandigarh will also be connected with 4-lane roads with all major cities such as Amritsar,Jalandhar and Ludhiana.

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EXPRESS BUS X12

Commuters getting on X12 express bus will have fewer options due to cuts in service. (Advance File Photo)

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- The decision by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) to cut service on the express bus X12 line during rush hour has commuters and local elected officials alike shaking their head.

The X12, which services the North Shore and Mid-Island, is one of the most heavily utilized routes, along with the X10. However, the X10 runs all day long, while the X12 was created for weekday rush hours.

Councilman Steven Matteo has already reached out to the MTA and New York City Transit, stating in a letter: "The cuts to the X12 have made my constituents' already arduous commutes longer, more difficult and more dangerous, particularly for those have to stand for the entire hour-long trip to and from Manhattan. This is unacceptable."

Starting this month, the MTA has cut the 6:25 a.m. X42 (which is the X12 with limited stops), and the 6:46 a.m., 6:58 a.m., 7:04 a.m. and 8:18 a.m. X12. In the evening, the 4:55 p.m. and 5:05 p.m. X42 have been eliminated.

Matteo said the decision to cut service on "one of the most popular and heavily utilized commuter bus lines on Staten Island is baffling."

"As you should know, buses are a vital mode of transportation for our constituents, who face the longest commutes in the country and have the fewest public transportation options in New York City," Matteo stated in his letter.

The New York City Transit and the MTA Bus Company regularly review, evaluate and revise bus schedules to ensure they meet approved guidelines for operations, accurately meet customer demand, and reflect current operating conditions, an MTA spokesperson stated.

These service changes are a part of this ongoing effort, according to the MTA.

Matteo is working with other local elected officials on the Staten Island Comprehensive Bus Study - to improve bus service in the borough. Its goal is to make changes in obsolete routes and increase service where there are great ridership demands.

Matteo explained that cutting express buses during the busiest times is extremely detrimental to any types of borough-wide improvement.

The MTA defended the choice to cut service, noting that "after a review of the X12/42 route, we aligned service with the route's ridership, which combined was 2,248 average weekday customers in 2015 and reflects a decrease of 3.7 percent from the year prior."

Matteo is requesting that service is returned to its previous schedule to ensure a smooth commute for Staten Islanders, as riders have already complained that the buses are more overcrowded and their commute times are longer.

According to an MTA spokesperson, the MTA will continue to monitor the route and make adjustments to service as ridership or customer demand changes.

Staten Island Advance City Hall reporter Anna Sanders contributed to this story.
Screen Shot 2016-09-16 at 4.18.10 PM.png

District Attorney Michael McMahon holds a press conference shortly after taking office in January. (Staten Island Advance/ Jan Somma-Hammel)

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Staten Island District Attorney Michael E. McMahon revealed he is working on a new pre-arraignment drug diversion program to battle the borough's heroin epidemic.

Speaking at a recent summit called Intersections of Health and Justice, McMahon said he plans to connect people arrested for low-level drug possession with health care providers and peer counselors instead of sending them to jail.

"We cannot jail our way out of this or lock people out of this problem," McMahon said Tuesday at the summit, hosted by the New York State Health Foundation.

"I'm in crisis mode, and that's why I'm trying to do something expedited."

As part of the plan, McMahon said when someone is arrested at the precinct, his office will send a counselor to convince them to go for treatment within seven days. The case will then be adjourned for 30 days, and if the person continues treatment, the case will be dismissed.

The person, he said, will also be trained to use Narcan, the anti-overdose spray.

Currently, cases involving drug treatment, which is usually a condition of a plea agreement, can take too long, the D.A. said.

"Drug treatment court process takes months and during those months we're losing lives," McMahon said. "The problem is severe and it's everywhere."

McMahon said he's close to getting the program off the ground, and admits he needs help and resources from other agencies.

He would like an independent evaluator to assess the program and a 24-hour recovery center so that people who are arrested and decide to participate can access treatment right away, McMahon said.

Since Jan. 1, there have been 70 suspected overdoses on Staten Island.

In the last two weeks, there were 12 overdoses, 10 fatal, and three within a 24-hour period, McMahon said. Seven of the recent overdoses were a mixture of heroin and cocaine, he added.

Since he took office, there have been four major drug takedowns, but McMahon acknowledges the need for police and health officials to work together.

"The only way we're going to solve this problem is when law enforcement understands it's a public health problem and when people in public health understand it's a law enforcement problem," McMahon said.
NEW YORK -- William Bratton, the police commissioner who led departments in Boston, Los Angeles and New York and saw his crime fighting strategies copied across the nation, will end his unparalleled law enforcement career with a ceremonial send-off Friday in the city that was the setting of his biggest triumph.

Bratton, 68, is due to participate in a traditional "walkout" at New York Police Department headquarters at 3 p.m., where commanders line up in formation to bid him farewell as he leaves three years into his second stint as the city's police commissioner.

His goodbye is well timed. Violent crime in New York City remains near a modern-day low. Yet, debate is likely to continue indefinitely over how much credit Bratton should get for New York's transformation from the bloody mess it was in the 1980s and early 1990s.

Friday's ceremony comes just a week after Bratton fiercely defended the legitimacy of his signature "broken windows" strategy -- an idea, first proposed by social scientists James Wilson and George Kelling, that you can deter violent crime by cracking down on lesser types of lawlessness, like graffiti or turnstile jumping.

Bratton earned wide acclaim for his assaults on so-called "quality of life" crimes, and for mining crime data to deploy his forces more effectively.

New York City's homicide rate had already begun to drop in the two years before he became commissioner in 1994, but during his 27-month tenure it plummeted. Between 1993 and 1995 killings fell by 40 percent, erasing two decades of climbing murder rates.

Homicides fell another 35 percent in the two years after Bratton left the department, forced out by Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.

In more recent years, though, some criminologists have concluded that the impact of broken windows on violent crime is minimal.

In March, the independent inspector general for the New York Police Department issued a report concluding that focusing on offenses like urinating in public and riding bikes on sidewalks had no influence on felony crime rates.

It also accused the 36,000-officer department, the nation's largest, of unfairly singling out communities of color for quality-of-life enforcement at a time when Mayor Bill de Blasio has emphasized protecting civil rights.

Bratton pushed back last week with characteristic aplomb, saying the report was the work of "amateurs" and had "no value at all."

There is no consensus today about what caused New York City's turnaround in the 1990s, or what caused similar, dramatic improvements in violent crime rates in many other U.S. cities at the same time.

"The idea that the NYPD has a huge impact on crime was always a very dubious claim," said Eugene O'Donnell, professor of police studies at John Jay College of Criminal Justice.

After leaving New York the first time, Bratton worked in the private sector, then took over a scandal-scarred Los Angeles Police Department in 2002.

There, he presided over both a decline in violent crime and an easing of some tensions between the department and black and Hispanic communities. Bratton left Los Angeles in 2009 with high approval ratings.

After returning to lead the NYPD again in 2014, Bratton saw perhaps the biggest crisis of his tenure: The death of an unarmed black man, Eric Garner, who died while a police officer was attempting to arrest him for allegedly selling loose cigarettes on Victory Boulevard near Bay Street in Tompkinsville.

The death sparked angry protests.

It also fueled a backlash in some quarters against "broken windows" enforcement.

That outcry, though, hasn't caused city leaders to back away from the tactics, or the man, often credited with leading New York out of the darkness.

"The same strategy that helped make us the safest big city in America," Mayor de Blasio said recently, "is still making us the safest big city in America."
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Officers on modified duty will be reviewed to determine if they should remain eligible for overtime pay, an NYPD statement said Thursday.

"The police commissioner believes that officers on modified assignment should not be making overtime, except in those cases that are essential for the department to carry out its mission," the written statement said.

"Moving forward, overtime earned by officers on modified assignment will be approved on a case-by-case basis by the chief of department."

The statement added that the chief of department is currently developing a new policy for those officers on modified duty, and that it would be "announced shortly."

All officers currently on modified duty will have their cases reviewed as part of the new policy.

A spokesman for Mayor Bill de Blasio said Hizzoner praised the change in policy.

"The mayor commends the commissioner and the chief of department for swiftly taking steps that will dramatically alter a practice that was wrong and understandably raised real concerns across the city," spokesman Austin Finan said.

James P. O'Neill, the current chief of department, is set to become the next commissioner Friday, replacing William J. Bratton. O'Neill will be replaced by the current chief of patrol, Carlos M. Gomez.

O'Neill ordered a review of officers on modified duty on Tuesday after revelations that Officer Daniel Pantaleo earned nearly $40,000 in overtime over the past two years.

A Staten Island Grand Jury chose not to indict Pantaleo in the death of Eric Garner, 43, of Port Richmond, who died after officers attempted to arrest him for allegedly selling loose, untaxed cigarettes on Bay Street near Victory Boulevard.

A spokesman for de Blasio's office said the mayor spoke with the incoming commissioner about the review.

"Mayor de Blasio supports incoming Commissioner O'Neill's ordered review. These overtime payments raise real concerns," Finan said on Tuesday. "And the mayor agrees this practice deserves a close examination."
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y.-- Next time you want to post that adorable first day of school picture on Facebook, think again.

An Austrian teen is suing her parents for allegedly posting more than 500 of her childhood photos on Facebook, according to a report from The Telegraph.

The 18-year-old feels the photos published on Facebook violated her privacy in addition to causing embarrassment.

"They didn't care if I was sitting on the toilet or lying naked in the cot, every moment was photographed and made public," the Telegraph quoted the teen as saying.

The intimate photos, she says, have allegedly been shared with around 700 Facebook friends despite the fact that she has asked her parents to take the pictures down.

The teenager's lawyer Michael Rami said he would seek financial compensation for her and a court order for her parents to take down the photos, which they have allegedly refused to do. The case is set to come to court in November and Rami said he believed she had a good chance of winning, according to the Telegraph.

Several Staten Island students disagreed with the teen's decision to sue her parents, despite the fact that they could relate to her.

"I think it's crazy," said Moe Diawara, a junior sociology student at Wagner College. "I'd never sue. It's family!"

Diawara wasn't the only college student who admitted that embarrassing or not, he wouldn't take his parents to court for sharing photos on social media.

However, it's more than just a few pictures most parents share on social media.

A recent survey finds that the average parents will have posted 1,498 pictures of their children on social media by the time the child turns five years old, according to the Telegraph.

Mia Marcucilli, a freshman at St. John's University who will be 18 in just a few short weeks, said parents often use social media "for reminiscing," about their favorite moments with their kids as they grow up.

The Grymes Hill teen says her mom isn't really into social media but has shared plenty of her childhood pictures with friends and family at functions.

"With your parents, they're not doing it to defame your character...There's no bad intentions," she said.

Amanda DeMeo, another freshman taking a break from classes at St. John's to discuss the case, agreed. "It's your parents," she said. "I don't think it deserves to be in court."

What's DeMeo's solution when her family posts a picture that's embarrassing?

"You can untag yourself," she said, adding that then at least your friends won't see embarrassing shots.

Her friend, Francesca DelMaestro of Richmond, agreed. "Everyone has had a bad picture of themselves (posted). Untag yourself--Immediately!"
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- The West Brighton ex-convict accused of sticking a gun into the ribs of a Roman Catholic priest during a holdup and beating four months ago will soon return to the place he's called home for much of the past two decades - a prison cell - and he could stay there for the rest of his life.

Kerry Pack, 40, will be sentenced to 12 years to life behind bars on Oct. 28 after pleading guilty Friday in state Supreme Court, St. George, to attempted second-degree robbery stemming from the June 2 incident in West Brighton.

According to a criminal complaint, Pack and a co-defendant, Antwyne Lucas, 44, of Brooklyn, approached the Rev. Marc Roselli at about 5:30 a.m. outside St. Mary of the Assumption-Our Lady of Mount Carmel-St. Benedicta R.C. Church, at 1265 Castleton Ave.

Police said the pair accosted the priest as he exited his car.

Pack jammed a gun in Father Roselli's ribs, the complaint said, and the victim handed over his car keys, phone and other property, as demanded.

The suspects then punched Father Roselli in the face, blackening his eye, said police.

They fled in the victim's champagne-colored Ford Fusion, which was recovered several blocks away from the scene, police said.

Later that day, around 4 p.m., the two suspects and a third person entered and unlawfully remained in a building on the 700 block of Henderson Avenue, alleges the complaint.

They were charged with misdemeanor criminal trespass for those alleged actions.

Pack is also accused of burning the other person with a hot piece of glass in a prior incident on May 19 on the 100 block of North Burgher Avenue.

He was charged with assault in that episode.

Pack's plea covers all the charges against him.

Based on his criminal history, Pack was adjudicated as a persistent violent felon, which calls for a potential lifetime component in his sentence.

Pack has served two prior prison stints in New York and one in New Jersey, according to public records and statements made in court.

In 1994, he was convicted in Queens of attempted second-degree robbery and sentenced to 18 to 54 months behind bars, online state court records show.

Two years later, he was again convicted in Queens, this time for rape and sodomy, said those records. He was sentenced to seven and a half to 15 years in prison.

Pack has also served an 18-month sentence in Bergen County, N.J., for receiving stolen property, it was said in court.

"This defendant mercilessly victimized a priest in front of his own church, a parish which has faithfully served the Staten Island community for decades. Mr. Pack, who has a long record as a violent felon, will now face a sentence of 12 years to life in prison for his wanton and craven actions," said District Attorney Michael E. McMahon.

The D.A. credited Assistant District Attorney Adam Silberlight for prosecuting the case, and the NYPD Robbery Squad.

"Staten Island is a safer place with this criminal behind bars," McMahon said.

Mark Geisser, Pack's lawyer, declined comment on the plea and sentence.

Lucas' case is pending in state Supreme Court, St. George.
Staten Island Flood Zone Map

This map, found at FloodHelpNY.org, can help Staten Islanders determine their flood zone.

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Staten Islanders know the horrors of a weather emergency firsthand after Hurricane Sandy devastated various areas of the borough in 2012. And as hurricane season officially runs from June 1 to Nov. 30, with the busiest time for the East Coast between mid-August and mid-September, it's important to be prepared.

For Islanders, a first step in preparation is knowing your flood zone.

Flood zones can help you determine the challenges you -- and your home -- face when weather emergencies arise.

WHERE TO START

The Federal Emergency Management Agency's Region II office creates and updates Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs) that highlight flood risk and determine flood insurance and building code requirements. The flood maps detail flood risk zones and their boundaries.

The most recent maps FEMA produced in December 2013 were appealed by the city and are currently being reviewed and updated.

"We had an appeal period for the maps and the city challenged several aspects of our storm surge analysis...we are still working with the city on resolving that. We hope to have a path forward within the next month or so," noted Andrew Martin, FEMA region II risk analysis branch chief.

However, those who are interested in knowing their flood zone for safety and evacuation purposes can go to the New York City Emergency Management website, where they can find maps and hurricane information.

Another option is to go to FloodHelp.org, a website created by the Center for NYC Neighborhoods, a nonprofit organization dedicated to preventing foreclosure, rebuilding from Hurricane Sandy, and promoting affordable homeownership in New York City. Martin recommends the "user-friendly" website, which features easy-to-read maps such as the one shown above.

KNOW YOUR ZONES



Those who go to Floodhelp.org, can zoom in on Staten Island to see what zone their neighbhorhood is in. The site also allows you to put in your exact address and email to get more information sent to you about your zone and flood risk.

According to the Floodhelp.org map (see above), areas along the water line, from Arrochar, South Beach, Ocean Breeze, Dongan Hills, Midland Beach and New Dorp Beach fall in the "VE" category -- indicating high risk of flooding and waves. Parts of Bay Terrace, Eltingville, Annadale, Prince's Bay, Pleasant Plains and Tottenville also fall in that category.

Bloomfield and Arlington are among the neighborhoods that fall in the "A/ AE/ AO," which indicates high risk and flooding.

Parts of Dongan Hills, Grant City, New Dorp, Oakwood and Bay Terrace are in the "X" or moderate risk zone.

HOW TO PREPARE

Whether you are at high risk or moderate risk, the key to being prepared in case of a weather emergency is to prepare a disaster plan. According to Flood Zone NYC, there are a few key steps to preparing your family and your home for any emergency.

Prepare a disaster plan: Together with those you live with, develop a plan with your household members that details what to do, how to find each other, and how to communicate if a hurricane or other disaster strikes.

Have insurance: If you rent your home, renter's insurance will insure the items inside your apartment. However, please remember that if you are a homeowner, make sure your home is properly insured. Also, be mindful that flood and wind damage are not covered in a basic homeowner's policy.

Know where you will go: If you are told to evacuate, the city strongly recommends evacuees stay with friends or family who live outside evacuation zone boundaries. For those who have no other shelter, hurricane shelters will be open throughout Staten Island and the rest of the city.

Have an emergency supply kit. According to ready.gov

NATIONAL PREPAREDNESS MONTH

In light of the 15-year anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks and the recent catastrophic Louisiana Flood of 2016, September has officially been proclaimed National Preparedness Month by President Obama.

"Let us recognize that each of us can do our part to prepare for emergencies, help those affected by disasters, and ensure all our people have the necessary resources and knowledge to protect themselves," Obama said in a statement.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- A Correction officer from Staten Island was supposed to enforce the law in city jails.

Now, Alfred Rivera will be on the wrong side of the bars after a judge sentenced him to four and a half years in prison in connection with the beating of a Rikers Island inmate and the subsequent attempt to cover up the attack.

Rivera, 47, was one of eight Correction employees -- including a former assistant chief of security and a captain -- to be sentenced Friday before Justice Steven Barrett in Bronx County Supreme Court for their roles in the incident.

The charges stem from a gang assault of inmate Jamal Lightfoot at the George R. Vierno Center at Rikers in July of 2012, the city Department of Investigation said in a press release.

Lightfoot testified that the officers repeatedly stepped on his head while others held his arms, according to

. Prosecutors alleged the officers then doctored evidence to make it appear that the inmate had a razor on him during the attack, according to the News.

Rivera, who earned an annual base salary of $76,488, was terminated in June after he was convicted of first-degree attempted gang assault and first-degree attempted assault.

He began working with the department in January of 2008.

In addition to the prison time, Barrett sentenced him to two and a half years of post-release supervision.

Among the others sentenced Friday were former Assistant Chief of Security Eliseo Perez Jr., 49, of Port Jefferson Station, N.Y., and retired Captain Gerald Vaughn, 49, of the Bronx. Perez got six and a half years behind bars, while Vaughn got five and a half. Each also were sentenced to three years post-release supervision.

Perez was accused of ordering officer to kick Lightfoot's "teeth in" during a weapons search, according to the Daily News account.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- The arrest of an accused DVD bootlegger this week outside the Stop & Shop in Eltingville was met with criticism by shoppers and store employees who watched it unfold.

Kung Zhow, 60, is described by those who know him and have bought DVDs from him at the grocery store on Amboy Road as a gentle man who wouldn't hurt anyone.

But he apparently wore out his welcome Tuesday afternoon when, according to witnesses, a female shopper who identified herself as an off-duty police officer confronted Zhow outside the store claiming he did not having a license.

A crowd of onlookers started to gather.

Uniformed NYPD officers arrived soon after, and according to shopper John Le Vine, wrestled Zhow, who stands about six-feet-tall with a slim build, into custody.

"There were two [officers] on his back cuffing him, and another [officer] grabs the back of his head, and grabs where the cuffs were and scraped his face across the ground," Le Vine said.

Zhow was charged with trademark infringement and resisting arrest, an NYPD spokesman said Wednesday.

Police said Zhow was flailing his arms at the time of the arrest.

He was issued a desk appearance ticket, and was back outside the store Wednesday selling DVDs.

When asked if a ticket to appear in court is common for those charges, an NYPD spokesman referred the question to the Richmond County District Attorney's office.

Since prosecutors would not receive the case until the desk appearance return date, a spokesman for the D.A.'s office declined comment at this time.

Zhow had bandages on his elbow and hands, injuries he said he suffered during the ordeal. He did not have any visible marks on face.

When asked about the incident, he pointed to what appeared to be surveillance cameras outside the store and in broken English said, "I call a lawyer."

Stop & Shop employees and shoppers who regularly greet Zhow outside the store said that while they're aware it's illegal to sell bootleg DVDs, he's never bothered anyone and didn't deserve that kind of treatment.

"It wasn't like he was selling drugs or guns or something," said store employee Jason Gough. "They could've just told him to 'get out of here.'"

Stop & Shop spokesman Jim Keenoy said the store did not call the police or have anything to do with the arrest. But he added that any form of solicitation outside the store, including the sale of Girl Scout cookies, must be approved by upper management.

There are several DVD bootleggers who have worked openly for years at shopping centers and outside grocery stores on Staten Island.

Le Vine, 64, said a blue ribbon is tied to a tree outside of his house in support of police officers and he has family members who serve.

But he said the incident Tuesday was unnecessary.

"People were yelling at the police officers to stop," he said. "I looked at [the off-duty officer] and said, 'There's got to be a better way of doing this,'" Le Vine said. "She said, 'He's breaking the law.'"
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. - For months, the lawyer for Richard Gambale maintained his client had stabbed and fatally wounded Anthony Perretti in self-defense after Perretti attacked Gambale with a pipe during a dispute in a Rossville industrial yard in January.

On Friday, prosecutors conceded in court there was some "viability" to attorney Gerald J. McMahon's contention that Gambale, of Great Kills, was defending himself on Jan. 14 when he allegedly stabbed Perretti 22 times.

Assistant District Attorney Lisa Davis moved to dismiss a murder charge against Gambale, 42, and the defendant agreed to plead guilty to a felony weapon-possession charge in exchange for a prison sentence of two to six years.

Davis said prosecutors were offering the plea deal after thoroughly reviewing the evidence and considering "the potential viability of a self-defense claim."

Davis, who called the resolution of the case "just," said Perretti, 43, had blocked Gambale's car with his vehicle in the yard on Industrial Loop East and struck Gambale with a metal pipe before Gambale pulled out a knife and stabbed the victim.

"This was self-defense," Gerald McMahon said outside court. "It's not a murder. Never should have been (charged as) a murder. The only reason we took a plea is because Staten Island is a tough place to try a case. It was a bit of a struggle to get to this point, but, thankfully, it ended up well."

However, the agreement almost fell through.

Gambale balked when Justice Stephen J. Rooney said he would issue orders of protection, at prosecutors' request, in favor of Perretti's wife and son at sentencing on Oct. 4.

"I had no ill-will toward them at all, and I was the one attacked," said Gambale, a short, stocky man garbed in tan prison scrubs.

McMahon told the court neither he nor his client believed the orders were necessary but they would consent and adhere to them to resolve the case.

Perretti's wife was in court, as were about a half-dozen relatives and friends of the defendant. There were no outbursts during the proceeding.

Prosecutors have said Gambale stabbed Perretti, of Bay Terrace, throughout his upper body after the men argued over finances.

McMahon, the defense lawyer, said outside court Perretti had been hounding and threatening Gambale and his family for months over $60,000, which the decedent claimed he was owed.

McMahon said the money was seized by police in California, and his client didn't owe Perretti anything.

That information could not immediately be confirmed.

According to prosecutors, the victim had picked up a metal fence post and struck Gambale with it in the shoulder moments before the fatal stabbing.

McMahon, the defense lawyer, said his client testified before a grand jury he was attacked first and stopped stabbing Perretti when Perretti stopped hitting him with the pipe.

The lawyer said an eyewitness confirmed Perretti had blocked Gambale's car, picked up a pipe and hit the defendant.

Afterward, Gambale allegedly fled in a black Mercedes, leaving behind Perretti as the dying man's toddler sat in his father's car. The boy was uninjured. The victim was later pronounced dead at Staten Island University Hospital, Prince's Bay.

Officers with the New York/New Jersey Regional Fugitive Task Force nabbed Gambale four days later in Manhattan with a suitcase full of clothes, nearly $3,000 cash, his passport, five cell phones and three driver's licenses with minor variations, prosecutors said.

Besides murder, Gambale had been indicted on felony and misdemeanor counts of criminal possession of a weapon and two counts of tampering with physical evidence.

Prosecutors allege he tossed into a Manhattan garbage receptacle, the knife and a bloody jacket he had worn when he stabbed the victim.

The plea to third-degree criminal weapon possession covers all charges against Gambale.

Gambale will be sentenced in state Supreme Court, St. George.

The defendant has a criminal history.

According to the indictment and statements made in court, Gambale was previously sentenced in Brooklyn federal court in February 2002 to 30 months in prison for conspiracy to import MDMA, an illicit drug.
A first-class ride for Cowboy Kel Bridle Path residents show love for mail carrier

For the past six years, Kelvin Hoang has been delivering mail and smiles to people living in Simi Valleys Bridle Path neighborhood. We love Kelvin. Hes the best. Hes like...

SV Womans Club to meet Detectives Kelly King and Jessica Getchius of the Simi Valley Police Department will discuss the problems faced by victims and perpetrators of domestic violence at the monthly luncheon meeting of...

Womans flight aboard B-25 bomber honors grandfathers WWII bravery As Kerri Braemer-Castro looked down at the mountains and valleys of Camarillo from the cockpit of a World War II B-25 bomber earlier this month, she finally felt connected to...

Shred your documents The Simi Valley Chamber of Commerce will hold a drive-thru document shredding event from 1 to 4 p.m. Fri., Nov. 11 in the parking lot behind the Chamber office, 40...
Student entrepreneurs will present their business plans to potential investors and others on Oct. 6 as part of Startup Tech Valley, a partnership among Skidmores management and business department, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and the Saratoga Chamber of Commerce. The pitch event will be held at the Saratoga Convention Center at 5:30pm.

Among the pitchers will be Skidmore student businesses Adirondack Flannel and AuxNation.

Adirondack Flannel founders Jamie Benjamin and Leif Catania, both seniors, are hoping to follow in the footsteps of Vineyard Vines co-founder Shep Murray 93 -- but with their own twist.



Adirondack Flannel founders Jamie Benjamin and Leif Catania.

AuxNation, founded by Skidmore sophomores Zack Jones, Noam Kahn, and Dhruv Singh, is a mobile app that unites DJs and their audiences through the crowdsourcing of song requests. Unlike apps for making requests in real-time, AuxNation will be the first that allows for crowdsourcing before a show.



AuxNation founders with alumnus Kenneth A. Freirich.

Cathy Hill, Skidmores Harder Professor of Business Administration and an organizer of the event, hopes to widen opportunities for students. When they go to this event, there will be tons of different types of students there, she says. That commingling of expertise is whats going to turn this region into a real powerhouse of entrepreneurship.

Learn more about entrepreneurship opportunities at Skidmore College.
There are currently 402 housing units in Mountain View Meadows. The developer expects to add another 400 within the next five to six years and eventually top off with about 1,200.
UPCOMING EVENTS

Rummage, cookie sale Saturday

Covenant United Methodist Church of Helena will hold their annual rummage and home-baked cookie sale on Saturday, Sept 17, from 9 a.m. until 2 p.m., in the Fellowship Hall. Everyone is welcome. Proceeds are for missions.

The church is located at 2330 E. Broadway, across from St. Peter's Hospital.

***

Strutt Your Mutt registration open

The Strutt Your Mutt Community Walk and Pet Fair, sponsored by Guardian Kennels and Alpine Animal Clinic, will be held on Saturday, Sept. 24, at Pioneer Park in Helena.

Strutt Your Mutt is a noncompetitive walk and pet fair that allows families and their dogs to come together and socialize while showing their support for homeless animals, said LCHS Executive Director Gina Wiest. This event is always very popular, and anyone can participate, with or without a dog.

The walk will begin and end at Pioneer Park, located downtown by the library, at 10 a.m. on Saturday, Sept. 24. Registration begins at 8:30 a.m., and the pet fair begins at 9 a.m. Registration forms can be completed prior to the event at the Humane Society or by printing the form at mtlchs.org. The pet fair is open from 9 a.m. to noon.

The entrance fee for the walk is $30 or at least $30 in pledges. You may walk with or without a dog, and all participants will receive a Strutt Your Mutt 2016 T-shirt. Prizes will be awarded to the participants who raise the most money through their pledges.

All proceeds benefit homeless and abandoned animals at Lewis & Clark Humane Society.

***

PPLTs Harvest Moon Banquet on tap

A hike up the Sleeping Giants nose, a fly fishing package featuring a guided day of fishing and lodging at the Double Arrow Resort, a hand-crafted table by Al Swanson, an original painting by Dale Livezey created specifically for Harvest Moon. These are just a few of the live auction items you can bid on at this years Prickly Pear Land Trust Harvest Moon Banquet, which is Saturday, Sept. 24.

Don't miss your chance to take part in one of Helena's most enjoyable events of the year. Triple Divide Distillery will create a special cocktail in honor of PPLTs 20 years of conservation work and special beer mugs will also be available for purchase.

The event will be at the Helena Civic Center, 340 Neill Ave., beginning at 5 p.m. for drinks and appetizers. Then enjoy dinner catered by Chili OBriens followed by a lively live auction. Agave Blues will provide music during cocktail hour.

Tickets are $75 per person and are available at www.pricklypearlt.org. Or call 442-0490 to reserve your seat.

ANNOUNCEMENTS

Book launch, signing

Meikele Lee, a Helena mom, has recently published a children's book titled "My Belly Has Two Buttons."

This book it unique as it is feeding tube specific, inspired by her own son's journey thus far with a feeding tube.

The official book launch will take place at Montana Book and Toy company on Friday, Sept. 16, at 6:30 p.m. Lee will be there to meet people and sign books.

Publisher Jesse Butler from Publishing Our Children's stories will be there to give a brief presentation.

***

Carroll, NAMI Helena host speaker

In preparation for the upcoming NAMI Walk, NAMI Helena and Carroll College will present speaker Amanda Lipp whose topic will be Finding Wellness: Strength in Adversity. The event will take place on the Carroll College campus in All Saints Hall on Monday, Sept. 19, at 7 p.m.

Lipp, 25, graduated from the University of California, Davis in 2014. She runs her own business working as a consultant and filmmaker with national to local level agencies across the United States dedicated to improving education, access and partnerships across education and mental health systems. She is a board member to national mental health organizations, including the California National Alliance on Mental Illness, and speaks publicly around the nation to inspire individual wellness innovative systems change.

The NAMI Walk will take place in Helena on Sunday, Sept. 25.

***

Part of Winne Avenue closed Saturday

The City of Helena Streets and Traffic Division will be doing road work on Saturday, Sept. 17, from 8:30 a.m.-5 p.m. on Winne Avenue east of California to Medical Park Drive.

During the course of this project, Winne Avenue will be closed to through traffic. Expect possible delays at intersections and driveways.

Please do not park vehicles along Winne Avenue. The City Street Division will tow any vehicles at the citys expense to the nearest adjacent street.

For more information, call 447-1566.

***

LWVHA to hold monthly meeting

The League of Women Voters of the Helena are will hold its monthly meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 20, at noon at the Lewis & Clark Library, 120 S. Last Chance Gulch. Guest speaker will be Rep. Moffie Funk, talking about automatic voter registration. Everyone is welcome.

***

Easter Star meeting upcoming

Marlene Pfaff of Billings, Worthy Grand Matron of the Grand Chapter of Montana, Order of the Eastern Star, will make her official visitation to Josephine Hepner Chapter No. 89 in Helena, on Saturday, Sept. 24, at 7 p.m. She will be accompanied by Worthy Grand Patron David Nielsen of Helena.

The meeting will take place at the Neighborhood Center, 200 S. Cruse Ave., preceded by a soup dinner at 5:30 p.m. All members of the Eastern Star are invited to attend.

Josephine Hepner Chapter No. 89 was chartered March 20, 1920. The current leaders are Worthy Matron Debbie Jones and Worthy Patron Les Saisbury.

***

Nonprofit seeks local representatives

World Heritage, a nonprofit student exchange program, is seeking volunteers to serve as area representatives in your local community. World Heritage offers qualified students from around the world, between the age of 15 and 18, the opportunity to spend a high school year or semester in the United States with a host family. The opportunity to study abroad and live with a host family is also offered to our American high school students between 15-18 years old. World Heritages Area Representatives are the cornerstone of the organization, making all of this possible!

Area representatives recruit and screen potential host families, supervise the exchange students in their community, organize activities with the students throughout the year and provide support to host families, students and schools. Area representatives receive compensation covering their expenses incurred for each student placed and supervised.

For more information call us at 866-939-4111 or email courtney@world-heritage.org.

***

City of Helena has board openings

City-County Parks Board

One citizen to serve on the City-County Parks Board as a city representative. The term would begin Oct. 1, 2016 and expire Sept. 30, 2019.

The City-County Parks Board shall perform various functions for the city and county related to parks, recreation and open space.

City-County Planning Board

One citizen to serve as the joint appointment on the City-County Planning Board. Term will begin upon appointment and expire Sept. 1, 2018.

The Planning Board shall perform planning functions for the city and county and shall be the sole Planning Board to serve either or both governmental entities. Duties of this board will be to ensure the promotion of public health, safety, convenience, order, and the general welfare, and for the sake of efficiency and economy in the process of community development, the board shall prepare a growth policy and serve in an advisory capacity to the local governing bodies establishing said board.

Helena Housing Authority

Three citizens to serve on the Helena Housing Authority Board; two as citizens at large and one as a tenant representative. The citizen at large terms will begin upon appointment and expire Aug. 1, 2020 and Aug. 1, 2021; the tenant representative term will begin upon appointment and expire Aug. 1, 2018.

This nonprofit organization managers and sets policy for all public housing in Helena. The Housing Authority Board consists of five housing commissioners and two tenant representatives.

Helena Open Lands Management Advisory Committee

One citizen to serve on HOLMAC. The term will begin on appointment and expire June 30, 2019.

Members of HOLMAC shall perform various functions for the city related to the management of the open space properties.

Applications are available at www.helenamt.gov /commission/boards and committees or by calling 447-8410 and can be submitted to the City Clerks Office, 316 N. Park Avenue, Room 323, Helena, MT 59623. The deadline for all board applications is 4 p.m., Monday, Sept. 19, 2016.

***

WITH THE COLORS

Cadet Keller John Balsam, son of Wreford and Juliet Balsam of Helena, completed Cadet Basic Training at the U.S. Military Academy.

The initial military training program provides cadets with basic skills to instill discipline, pride, cohesion, confidence and a high sense of duty to prepare them for entry into the Corps of Cadets. Areas of summer instruction included first aid, mountaineering, hand grenades, rifle marksmanship and nuclear, biological, and chemical training.

Balsam graduated from Helena High School. He plans to graduate from West Point in 2020 and be commissioned as a second lieutenant in the U.S. Army.
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A 27-year-old Helena man is jailed an an accusation that he slapped a child with the back of his hand for using a profanity.

Michael Cooper faces a felony charge of assault on a minor.

Court documents allege Cooper slapped the child in the face and chest Wednesday on the 500 block of North Last Chance Gulch. The boy suffered a slight cut to his lip.

Police arrested Cooper at 6:14 p.m. He denied the allegations, according to documents filed in Lewis and Clark County Justice Court on Thursday.

-- Angela Brandt, Independent Record
As a Head Start graduate herself, Denise Juneau knows first-hand how a high quality education for preschoolers can change a life.

As Office of Public Instruction superintendent, she and her staff have taken a lead role in bringing in $40 million in federal grant money to expand free preschool options to more Montana children.

Montana is one of 18 states that received a federal grant to develop high quality public preschool programs, and is now in its second year of the four-year federal grant.

In the first year (2015-16), funding was focused on 16 Montana communities and benefited 650 children from low-to-moderate income families, according to an OPI press release.

On Thursday, Juneau visited a Ray Bjork Learning Center preschool classroom, which is a partnership between the Head Start Program and the Helena Public Schools. She used the visit as a perfect setting to announce that this coming year, the federal grant will reach children in 34 communities, including: Anaconda, Browning, Heart Butte, Butte, Lewistown, Roundup, Harlowton, Crow Agency, Lodge Grass, Pryor, St. Ignatius, Ronan, Pablo, Arlee, Hays-Lodge Pole, Harlem, Wolf Point, Frazer, Poplar, Great Falls, Hardin, Bozeman, Livingston, Belgrade, Kalispell, Libby, Troy, Eureka, Boulder, Helena, East Helena, Whitehall, Townsend and Rocky Boy.

Its good for our state, said Juneau, because we are one of nine states without state-funded preschool. I know there was a proposal last session (to publicly fund preschool) that wasnt successful. Maybe well see something again this session.

Juneau also released The Montana Early Learning Roadmap: A Community Framework on Thursday.

The roadmap gives examples of what some communities have done to boost their preschool programs and make them more vibrant. It also builds on whats been successful in Graduation Matters communities.

Graduation Matters communities have seen a boost in graduation rates, said Juneau, and now they want to see preschool be part of their education program."

We know when children are attending preschool, theyre more likely to graduate from high school, said Juneau.

Children who dont attend preschool are 25 percent more likely to drop out of high school, according to an OPI factsheet.

Preschool-age children are ready to learn. Ninety percent of brain development happens before a child is 5 years old, according to research shared by OPI.

We know when students are attending a high quality preschool and they are learning the skills necessary to step into kindergarten, theyre going to be much more successful in elementary school, said Juneau. Not only are they more likely to graduate from high school, but theyre more likely to be successful adults because theyre getting those skills early on.

Families at or below 200 percent of the federal poverty level or who are eligible for special education, could qualify to attend these public preschool programs. For a family of four, 200 percent of poverty is an annual income of $60,625.

The average cost of childcare for a Montana 4-year-old is more than $7,500, according to OPI.

For more information, visit http://opi.mt.gov/.
James moves into his one-bedroom apartment on Monday, but imagines he will be "sitting in the dark until the power comes on".

James and the other people have moved into the Ivy Apartments in Franklin but have no power because the builder didn't install meters. Credit:Elesa Kurtz

And they could be waiting some considerable time, with Actew AGL saying on Friday that for big developments such as the Ivy the connection could take up to 45 days.

Apartment owners in a new block in Franklin, Gungahlin, are moving in this week without power, after they were told they must install their own meters.

James said he had checked some time ago with Actew and was told there were no complications. But when he called on Thursday he was told there was no meter, and a number of other residents were in the same position. He paid $560 for the meter, and now must wait.

"This is my first place I've ever bought and it's kind of taken the shine off the whole experience to say it politely," he said.

Richard, who like James doesn't want his last name published, is getting married in a week, with relatives arriving from overseas to stay. He and his fiancee moved in on Thursday, and have plugged an extension cord into an outside power point, running it under their door to a multibox, to power a lamp and the television. They use a torch in the bathroom.

Richard said he called ActewAGL in August to organise the connection, and had called many times since. At one point, Actew told him it couldn't find the apartment on a network map, and more recently that there was no request for service from the developer.

While the real-estate agent had assured him the paperwork had been done many weeks ago, Actew said the paperwork had only come through last week. He was finally able to book an installation last week, and pay $563, but was told it would take up to 20 working days to happen.
The couple started trying naturally for children but after eight months without success, consulted Dr Bronwyn Devine who was then working for the Canberra Fertility Centre.

They turned to the Canberra Fertility Centre and the option of IVF (in-vitro fertilisation) because although Alicia was still young she had suffered a series of health issues over the years, including psoriasis, which required the use of some powerful drugs for its treatment.

Alicia and Jeremy Spindler and children Kylah, three, and Layken, four months. Both children were conceived through IVF at the Canberra Fertility Centre. Credit:Elesa Kurtz

Two of those babies are now three-year-old Kylah and four-month-old Layken, the treasured children of Gordon couple Alicia and Jeremy Spindler.

The Canberra Fertility Centre on Sunday celebrates 30 years of making families in the national capital, responsible for more than 7000 babies being born in the local community over the last three decades.

They were advised Alicia, at 28, had low fertility, so started their first round of IVF. It was a success and little Kylah was the result.

When they went back to try for another child, things did not run so smoothly. A frozen egg from that first round of IVF didn't thaw. They then had to try another three rounds of IVF to finally have Layken.

It was an emotionally trying and financially difficult but that was soon all forgotten.

"At the time, you have doubts but once you have the children, it just makes everything worthwhile," Alicia, now 32, said.

Alicia said when she got to the last round of IVF she decided to tell her family and her boss right from the start about what was happening. She had previously kept it private because she wanted to surprise them with news of a pregnancy. But as time went on, she knew she needed the support of those closest to her. She said that made all the difference. As did the support of staff at the centre.
There's a cornucopia of jobs to be had in Canberra but only if you've got the right skills, recruitment experts say.

More employers are seeking to put people on, the latest figures from umbrella recruitment group Manpower showed.

Canberra's mushrooming information technology sector buoyed job prospects in the capital this quarter. Credit:Michele Mossop

The ACT had the second highest net employment outlook out of all states and territories, their quarterly report revealed.

About 14 per cent of ACT employers anticipated an increase in employment in the past quarter, an improvement of 4 per cent on the same time last year.
They might not be the most graceful when they're expecting, but eastern female quolls have had no trouble beginning to breed in the ACT. Pregnant quolls with awkwardly bulging pouches have been captured in a video taken at Mulligans Flat Sanctuary, months after it was revealed the species would be breeding in Canberra for the first time in more than 80 years. Pregnant eastern quolls with bulging pouches have been captured in video taken at Mulligans Flat Sanctuary. Credit:Screenshot It's good news for the species that has been considered extinct on mainland Australia for more than half a century.

General manager of the Woodlands and Wetlands Trust, Jason Cummings, said the reintroduced cat-sized species had been settling in well. "Our reintroduced eastern quolls are fostering their young in dens, and collecting more nesting materials with awkwardly bulging pouches," he said. "Our resident bettongs show no sign of letting the new quolls take over, with more than 300 now in the sanctuary and routinely seen on twilight tours." Fourteen of the spotted marsupials were released in the fenced sanctuary in March. They were once widespread across south-eastern Australia but were wiped out on the mainland in the early 1960s due to habitat-loss, introduced predators such as foxes and cats, and diseases.
Highly sought after defender Caleb Marchbank wants to play for Carlton in 2017.

The 19-year-old was Greater Western Sydney's second selection, the sixth pick overall in the 2014 draft, but has been hampered by injuries and played just seven games for the expansion club.

Marchbank is understood to have been homesick in Sydney and keen to return to his home state of Victoria - St Kilda and Essendon were reportedly also interested in recruiting the youngster.

GWS staff recently asked Marchbank to make a decision about his future and he told them he wanted to leave the club.
Maile Carnegie, former managing director of Google Australia & New Zealand, was one of the witnesses pulled before the Senate inquiry in Sydney on April 8, 2015. Credit:Christopher Pearce Is enough income being declared? Mr Konza said the recent high-profile European Commission decision against Apple  that the company had received "illegal state aid" and will have to pay back up to 13 billion ($19 billion) in back taxes, plus interest, to Ireland  did not have direct implications on Australian taxpayers. That was about whether the correct tax rate had been applied to income, he said. Ann-Maree Wolff and Phil Edmands testified for Rio Tinto at the corporate tax avoidance inquiry. Credit:Jesse Marlow

In the Australian context it was about whether the right amount of income has been declared in Australia. At the Senate inquiry, Tax Commissioner Chris Jordan accused multinationals including Apple, Microsoft and Google of giving inaccurate evidence and signalled they had been under audit for "aggressive tax planning". Uber's director of public policy (Oceania), Brad Kitschke , appears before the Corporate Tax Avoidance inquiry on November 18, 2015 in Sydney. Credit:Dominic Lorrimer I was quite shocked by what I saw... I thought it was a blatant attempt [to work] against the will of Parliament. ATO deputy commissioner Mark Konza The inquiry heard, for example, that in Google and Microsoft's case, the companies sent income to low-tax Singapore as well as no-tax nations such as Bermuda.

The inquiry had also heard from companies such as Uber, which routes through Nethrlands, and Airbnb which sends income through Ireland. Uber has, for example, paid just over $403,000 tax in Australia over a three-year period. Appeals against tax bills on the rise If a company feels that they have been unfairly taxed by two different countries, it can appeal to tax administrators. In recent years the number of multinational companies appealing Australia's right to tax  under an international process known as a mutual agreement procedure (MAP)  has spiked. These cases do not just impact e-commerce companies, but all multinationals, particularly those involved in transfer pricing disputes. ATO figures show that as of June 30 2016 there were 37 MAP cases in progress (up from 23 at the end of 2015), most of which relate to transfer pricing issues. The ATO said so far 13 MAP cases have been finalised (10 of which were related to transfer pricing).

Of the 10 transfer pricing-related MAP cases finalised, nine resulted in revenue "adjustments", five of which saw more revenue flowing to Australia, and four of which resulted in less revenue. Asked how much revenue this amounted to, an ATO spokesman said: "We do not give out details about revenue adjustments." Mr Konza said the ATO was working with the OECD to avoid tax revenue wars with overseas tax administrators. "There's been a lot of progress over the past three years in getting clearer and agreed rules on how things should be done," Mr Konza said. Multinationals try to circumvent the "Google tax"

The bigger concern, Mr Konza said, was that a number of companies and their tax advisers were turning to dubious tax structures to avoid getting hit by the federal government's multinational anti-avoidance laws (MAAL). The MAAL applies to multinational groups that operate in Australia but book their profits offshore. As previously revealed to Fairfax Media, the ATO has identified 175 companies that may fall within the scope of the laws. Mr Konza said to escape being hit by the laws, tricky schemes were being developed whereby an Australian partnership is interposed between the foreign company and the Australian customer.

The multinationals then claim that because the partnership is technically an "Australian entity" for tax purposes  even though its profits are predominantly allocated to offshore entities for tax purposes  the MAAL does not apply. But Mr Konza said he was appalled by the conduct of two taxpayers  one was a service company and the other was a financial services company  that had used this "contrived" and "artificial" arrangement to prevent being hit by the laws. He said in one purported partnership case just 1 per cent of the income was coming to the Australian entity, and 99 per cent was still going through the foreign entity. "I was quite shocked by what I saw," Mr Konza said. "I thought it was a blatant attempt [to work] against the will of Parliament." The amount of money involved in these two matters was worth tens of millions of dollars, but Mr Konza said it was not about the amount of individual tax involved, but the fact that their intent was to undermine the laws.
Apple fans from Sydney to Shanghai, the first customers worldwide to snap the new iPhone 7 off the shelves, cheered as they left stores on Friday brandishing their purchases, flanked by applauding sales staff.

But underneath the usual fanfare, the crowds of enthusiasts and overnight campers were smaller than in past years. Some customers complained after the larger version and models with the new jet-black colour sold out.

In part, online pre-ordering has made queues unnecessary for all but diehard fans, and in Chinese stores only those who had ordered in advance were queuing to collect.

Yet in markets like China, online interest in the new phone has also been muted compared to past launches, as cheaper local brands amp up their features, design and marketing.
He said the meeting consisted of himself, former Queensland Nickel chief financial officer Daren Wolfe taking notes and a third unnamed person. He'd previously admitted to having meetings with himself to decide QNI business on behalf of a committee of the two wholly Palmer-owned companies sitting above it known collectively as the Joint Venture Owners Committee. Mr Palmer and nephew Clive Mensink were the only members and Mr Palmer, as chairman, secretary and beneficial owner of both companies (QNI Metals and Resources), purported to have the majority vote. Mr Sullivan again asked why the meeting needed to be held. "We thought it was a good way to make you angry, to ratify things just to annoy you," Mr Palmer said, leaning back in his chair with a broad smile.

"So that's why we did it, because we didn't like you." The contents of the meeting were outlined in a letter sent Monday to PPB Advisory's legal counsel, which is trying to claw back almost $70 million in taxpayer funds paid out in entitlements to almost 800 sacked refinery workers. It wasn't me. It was the JVOC The note went on to make it "abundantly clear" that all communications between Mr Palmer and QNI from 2009 onwards were technically the JVOC speaking to the general manager of the joint venture. Mr Palmer sought to make this definition ad nauseum throughout his four days on the stand, clashing regularly with Mr Sullivan over the issue.

"You had difficulty understanding that while you were examining me on Friday," Mr Palmer said, when asked why the letter was necessary. "We wanted to be as helpful as we could so you could understand because your repeated questioning on Friday was very monotonous, very boring and you didn't seek to understand. "So I said, 'let's put it in writing for the poor chap and see if he can understand it." Mr Palmer stepped down as a QNI director after his election to federal parliament but Mr Sullivan was seeking to prove he'd been acting as a shadow director, which he denied. The court examined dozens of texts and emails showing Mr Palmer giving directions or asking for information about refinery details large and small.

The resources tycoon put up the diary, written entirely in pencil, in conjunction with the joint venture agreement as proof he was merely performing his duties as chairman and secretary of the committee. Liquidators couldn't examine the phone Mr Palmer used to conduct QNI business on because he said he lost it at a steak restaurant two months ago. Nor could they question Mr Mensink, the company's managing director, because he remained somewhere in Europe with no plans to return to Australia. Insolvent trading When he wasn't focused on the "little green book" and reams of emails, Mr Sullivan sought to pin his examinee down on claims from administrators FTI Consulting the company was trading while insolvent for a month and a half before going into voluntary administration in January.

Mr Palmer wrote off a potentially damning email from November 27 last year serving a default notice for a $12.5 million debt on refinery operators as corporate "posturing". Always in a pin-striped suit, mostly with his left hand jammed in his pants pocket, sometimes leaning back in his chair and at others tilting forward in apparent frustration or condescending explanation, Mr Palmer often sought to blame others for the company's problems. Finger-pointing on the stand Mr Palmer singled out Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk, Treasurer Curtis Pitt, Administrator John Park of FTI Consulting and the big four banks for criticism. The mining magnate was forced to deny insolvent trading and heavy involvement in separate decisions to send the company into administration and lay off more than 200 workers, despite documents appearing to show he was.

He defended a half-million-dollar loan to a long-time acquaintance who he told not to "worry about" paying back on time, alleged Mr Turnbull had influenced the banks against him and accused the media of assaulting his wife. The Palmer United Party was unable to fully explain an expletive-laden email sent to his nephew warning him not to "cover his arse" or he would "f-- everything". Lawyers fight to block examination The former Sunshine Coast MP was told he was "free to go" on Friday afternoon, with his lawyers set to return on Monday, seeking another injunction against the liquidators to "restrain" them from gathering details of his personal assets. "I won't voluntarily provide you with anything," Mr Palmer said.
Myer has ramped up plans to reduce its total floor space by 20 per cent as it races to reinvent itself in challenging retail conditions.

Myer chief executive Richard Umbers, who took the helm in March last year, said the department store has cut, or committed to cut, 5.9 per cent of its total retail floor space in the first year of its turnaround.

The shrinking strategy more than doubled Myer's profits with total sales growing 2.9 per cent in the full year to July 30.

"The actual objective here was to address the 20 per cent [of unproductive floor space] and there was a common misconception that meant we were instantly going to close 20 per cent of the portfolio, and that was never the case," Mr Umbers said.
Outsourcing of building management services has moved beyond being a cost-saving exercise for the tenants to encompassing a wide range of factors to make the property more efficient and attractive, according to a CBRE report. The review shows that tenants now expect more from the property such as end-of-trip facilities, security and now concierge servers, which are best undertaken by a third party manager. Westpac's new offices at Barangaroo, Sydney, which have an outsourced concierge service. . Credit:Nic Walker In some cases the outsourced managers are basing their offerings on five-star hotel services, where the guest rules and demands are well catered. CBRE's head of research, Australia, Stephen McNabb said traditionally, the decision to outsource property/facilities management has largely focused on cost, given that outsourcing typically delivers procurement savings of 10-20 per cent.

"However, the focus is now broadening, as owners recognise the level of asset services required to attract and retain tenants and deliver competitive advantage," Mr McNabb said. The report says there was a growing recognition that property management adds value through its tangible impact on tenant attraction and renewal, particularly when it is informed by an understanding of occupier needs and priorities. It focuses on a recent CBRE study in EMEA, To Stay or Not to Stay, which identified that a building's facilities and attributes as well as the quality of the technical services provided by the building management team could be the "tipping point" for tenants when considering whether to move. CBRE national director, asset services, Suzette Lamont said that scale in systems, access to a wide and experienced talent, and the drive for best practice was leading a growing number of owners to outsource their property management functions and seek higher value from the relationship with the management team. Examples of best practice include The Edge in Amsterdam, which has been described as one of the most connected buildings in the world, enabled by technology and data.
The first  a report by Lord John Chilcot  found that then British prime minister Tony Blair had "led" his country into an illegal war in Iraq based on flawed intelligence that politicians and officials could and should have challenged. It was devastatingly critical of British political processes and by extension our own since, if anything, Australian officials were even more gung-ho about putting Australian and Iraqi lives at risk, to little ultimate avail. One day, one hopes, there will be a third review of what, if anything, was achieved by intervening in Afghanistan. In matters like this, the British are mostly like us. Politicians often make bad decisions and bad policy, sometimes for reasons that seem to them very good at the time. Sometimes their policies fail because they were ill-conceived. Sometimes their advisers let them down. Sometimes things go wrong in the execution. Sometimes our people die as a result; often many others die, too. Mistakes may be mere human frailty. But at least the British take a regular good hard look at themselves and let it all hang out. We don't. Their systems are big enough and robust enough that they can allow hindsight of errors of judgment, appreciation and execution. Even colleagues criticise each other or are reflective, even rueful. Even when mistakes are obvious most of our mainstream politicians, and not a few of their advisers, live in denial. In Australia, our national security establishment would demand that similar reviews be kept secret lest the public lose confidence in the efficiency, effectiveness or nobility of our guardians. Even when mistakes are obvious, most of our mainstream politicians, and not a few of their advisers, live in denial.

Australia was not a direct party to what happened to Libya. Not untypically, however, then Australian foreign minister Kevin Rudd was an early and loud spruiker for Western military intervention there. In this, he was like Alexander Downer, the most bloodthirsty international shill for war against Saddam Hussein in 2003. Neither really served Australia's interests, nor helped save the lives of others. The Libyan review was scathing, particularly of decision-making back in England. Everyone copped it, but especially prime minister Cameron. It's not a particularly remarkable report, by British standards, but I can't recall anything like it here in Australia over the past 50 years. The committee noted that, as with the invasion of Iraq, well-meaning support for rebellious Libyans was not conceived initially as being for the purposes of regime change. It was simply so as to encourage Gaddafi to be less repressive. But matters "drifted", as they so often do in war. Gaddafi and most of his family are now dead, which is no great loss. But Libyans are hardly better-off. The average standard of living has halved. Political instability is why it is now home to more than 1 million refugees from the Middle East, North Africa, the Horn of Africa and west Africa, all transiting through Libya seeking to set off in boats across the Mediterranean Sea to Europe. Few Libyans are safer or more free. International efforts to create a government and political institutions are not doing well, and had not, of course, been pre-planned. As Human Rights Watch recently put it, the various regional, religious and tribal militias and private armies continue, with impunity, "to arbitrarily detain, torture, unlawfully kill, indiscriminately attack, abduct and disappear, and forcefully displace people from their homes. The domestic criminal justice system has collapsed."

It turns out that Western intelligence on Libya was highly shonky. As Britain's former ambassador to Libya dryly put it, "the database of knowledge in terms of people, actors and the tribal structures might have been less than ideal". Reading the report is like reading a Yes Minister script. Or a report by Australia's Auditor-General into whatever incompetence, mismanagement and abuse of process the Immigration Department is up to this week. (Especially if it involves management of our concentration camps in Nauru and Manu. Already, Immigration Minister Peter Dutton has implied that anything that went wrong occurred while or because Labor was in power  the result of a great rush by officials to get the camps up and running, with hot and cold showers, in an incredibly short time. In fact, the most serious departmental mismanagement occurred last year, much of it on Dutton's watch.) There are more parallels between British parliamentary select committee reports and auditors-general's reports than one might think. They put independent eyes over government activity, even if the auditor's scope is circumscribed. Such eyes are now more necessary than ever. That's not only because of an increase in spin, government secrecy and politicised officials, or a greater complexity of affairs, or "wickedness" and "connectedness" of problems. It's also because of a decline in the power and resources of watchdogs, including the media. And at just the same time, a new generation of spineless politicians in opposition everywhere are opting to be small targets, performing only limited scrutiny of governments. Here, Labor folk think they will be wedged if it makes a fuss about national security, human rights or refugees. The ultimate public benefit of independents may be that most have no particular reason to subscribe to the Great Yellow Silence.

British select committees are usually more inquisitive, and independent of the government of the day, than ever we see of Australia. They decide their own tasks. Many committee chairs take little notice of guidance from the government. Their reports are often unanimous, but not around the lowest common denominator. They have been known to inflict lethal wounds, right up to the top. Ask Tony Blair. Or, in this week's example, David Cameron and an array of ministers, spies, service folk and officials. The more funny  if one can use this word to describe something so pathetic  for devastating understatement. One of the Libyan adventure's big problems was that Britain's intervention was reactive, rather than in pursuit of a strategic objective. Many of those in the committee rooms, especially those under the age of 40, were haunted by the memories of Srebrenica and Rwanda, places where thousands of people had died while the world looked on indifferently. "The international community's inability to prevent that act of genocide influenced a generation of Western politicians and policymakers," the committee said. "[Defence Minister Liam] Fox told us that 'a fear of another Srebrenica was very much a driving force in our decision making'." Younger politicians, including Cameron, were particularly affected by this, while older officials tended to focus on the need to cut a deal with Gaddafi. Gaddafi used a good deal of bloodthirsty rhetoric against dissidents but it now appears that he didn't in fact do much in the way of reprisals against civilians. With many interested players spruiking for Western support, and with very poor intelligence, the world believed a bloodbath was happening. International media flocked to Benghazi and, while it was newsworthy, recorded lots of images of war. But the reportage provided no calm overview of the situation.

Of course, even one reprisal murder or terrible brutality is too many. But people considering putting others in harm's way need facts, not hysteria. Britain did not get them from its intelligence or diplomatic establishment. The military was as ill-briefed and prepared, overeager to please government, slow to ask the right questions, to warn, or to reflect on some sage experience. The Chief of the Defence Force, Lord David Richards, told the committee that whether the military knew that some of those NATO was supporting were associated with al-Qaeda was a "grey area". It seems no one was worrying much about this at the time. He added that "a quorum of respectable Libyans was assuring the Foreign Office that militant Islamist militias would not benefit from the rebellion" but "with the benefit of hindsight that was wishful thinking at best". Most of the players were unaware of reservations he now says he had. I expect that, had they become known, they might have been called disloyal by those who were gung-ho. The foreign secretary, Lord William Hague, admitted the lack of reliable intelligence. But, he said, with Downer-like logic, it later became clear that even Gaddafi had not understood the militias, tribes and movements, and what was going on. "So there is not much hope that a foreign intelligence service would have such an understanding."

The committee concluded that British strategy had been founded on erroneous assumptions and an incomplete understanding of the evidence available. By contrast, the French seemed to know what they were doing, and why. Get Libyan oil, for starters. But they were acting on their own national interests (which were, explicitly, not British ones) and the president's political interests. Yet again, the perfidious Frogs seem to have outwitted the trusting Albions. The British political, intelligence, military and bureaucratic establishment failed to explore non-military options. Doubters, questioners and those not on-board were unwelcome. Asked if he thought intervention had been in the British national interest, the chief of the defence force said "the prime minister felt it was". The head of the Secret Intelligence Service also doubted it would serve British interests. But cabinet's national security council seemed unaware of any officials' reservations. Thank God that could never happen here. Shortly after Gaddafi fell, Cameron asked his national security adviser, Sir Peter Ricketts, to review how the national security council had functioned during the "crisis". The adviser is the council's secretary, and his report was described by the select committee as "rapidly marking his own homework". Here, only the politicians do that.
This is not some hypothetical construct. It is a statistical certainty. The 2016 Senate result in Tasmania proves the point. The last (sixth) seat was a tussle between the Greens and One Nation. It was won by the Greens over One Nation by 141 votes. At that stage of the count, 9531 valid but exhausted votes lay idle on the counting-room floor, expressing no preference between the two. This effect could be more pronounced in the ACT because, unlike in the Senate, the ACT does not have above-the-line party voting. In the Senate in the states, the Electoral Commission says you must mark one to six above the line or one to 12 below the line. Given most parties field 12 candidates in a double-dissolution election, a one-to-six vote would typically embrace 36 candidates and increase the likelihood of that vote being live at the last stage of the count. The ACT has a far more democratic system than any other in Australia. You get a say as to which of 'the other lot' gets a seat.

Fortunately, ACT voters are more engaged and more likely to preference more candidates than their state and NT counterparts. Nonetheless, in past elections the exhausted vote has often been higher than the margin between the last two candidates. So it's important to go the distance and preference every candidate to the bitter end if you want to make sure your vote is in there at the time of deciding who is to be the last candidate elected. Even then, there is a further nuance. A lot of major-party voters work on the basis of "I don't like the other lot so I will put them last".

That may work in the states in the Senate, but it is a disenfranchising approach in the ACT. Voters for the major parties should recognise that, at the next ACT election, most likely at least two of "the other lot" will be elected in each electorate. Two quotas is just 33 per cent of the vote after preferences. That should not be difficult for even on-the-nose major parties. So, it means that Labor voters (and Green voters, for that matter) should look closely at the individual Liberal candidates and work out which they would prefer. In the ACT, the political party does not do that for you. In the ACT ballot paper, the order in the party columns is randomised. There is a different order on different ballot papers. It is called Robson rotation. So Labor and Green voters should ask: "Do I want a lock-'em-up, no-abortion-even-in-rape-cases, bring-back-corporal-punishment Liberal member, or should I pick and choose which of the Liberal candidates sits closer to my beliefs?"

Conversely, Liberal voters should look at the Labor candidates and ask: "Do I want a card-carrying commie or can I find a more pro-business, pro-family Labor candidate?" On this front, Labor and Green voters should look closely at gender equity in the Liberal Party. Last election, six male Liberals and two female Liberals were elected. Labor had an even four-four. (The balance has changed since the election through resignation and countback, but the Liberals don't have an even-handed policy on candidate selection.) So an intelligent Labor or Green voter, after giving their first preferences to Labor and Greens, should then move over to the Liberal column and assess gender equity. If it isn't there, they should give the female Liberals a higher preference than male Liberals. That would be more constructive than just whingeing after the election about gender imbalance. The ACT has a far more democratic system than any other in Australia. You get a say as to which of "the other lot" gets a seat.

Now to the Northern Territory. In the lead-up to ACT self-government in 1989 and in subsequent debate about electoral systems for the ACT, this newspaper argued persistently and consistently for proportional representation. Most of its columnists (including me) argued the same way. Our fear was that the ACT, being fairly pro-Labor, would, under a single-member system, elect an overwhelmingly Labor majority and there would be no effective opposition. That's not good for democracy. In a broader jurisdiction  such as the whole of Australia  that is less likely. But in our small, more-homogeneous jurisdiction, a single-member system was likely to deliver the result we have seen in the Northern Territory. The less-than 45 per cent of the Labor vote delivered more than two-thirds the seats. The opposition was reduced to an ineffectual rump. In the ACT, on the other hand, the opposition has always had at least just enough MLAs to populate the committees and share the frontbench load.
I won't be holding my breath, but it would be nice if John Howard paid tribute to his hero and mentor Sir Robert Menzies' initiatives to promote women in public life in his television series Howard on Menzies: Building Modern Australia, which debuts tomorrow night on the ABC.

I'm not expecting it because this is a key area in which the former prime minister not only parts company with his predecessor, but he actually got rid of Menzian initiatives designed to promote women.

John Howard with Sir Robert Menzies looking over his shoulder. Credit:Glen McCurtayne

For all his conservatism, Menzies was far more pragmatic, not to mention fairer, when it came to including women in public life than his protege a generation later.

It was Menzies, when the modern Liberal Party was being formed, who insisted on quotas so women were guaranteed equal representation on the party's governing bodies.
So winning and losing aren't absolute concepts in Shorten's world. Everything is a negotiation based on the balance of numbers, but also trends in support. This sounds like a backroom factional negotiation, and it's based on the same concept  whatever you can get away with. Or as the Opposition leader put it to me on the subject this week: "The government says it has a mandate  fine. Let them put it to a vote." Meaning that the government will likely prevail in the House if it can hold all its members and isn't outwitted tactically by Labor. As we saw a couple of weeks ago when Labor exploited government inattention to seize the majority, this can be a minute-by-minute proposition. But, without Labor's support, the government will likely fail in the Senate. This is mandate defined not by any right but by raw power. And this is only the beginning of Turnbull's problems in claiming a mandate. Because it's not just Labor that claims its own, competing mandate. There's the Senate, Paul Keating's "unrepresentative swill", which claims its own prerogatives. As Nick Xenophon told me: "Australians get two votes"  one for the House and one for the Senate  "so there are two mandates".

The government has 30 seats in the Senate and needs 39 to prevail on a bill. So Turnbull can only win a vote in the Senate if he has the support of the following. First, he needs the Coalition senators in his own government, and that is not a given. The conservatives, in particular, and party rebels in general, commonly reserve their right to cross the floor and vote against their own party. This week it was the Liberals' Senator Dean Smith, who has a philosophical objection to plebiscites on any matter. If Turnbull does have all his senators behind him, he could prevail with either the Greens with their nine seats  but they are the most unlikely Coalition supporters on just about anything  or Labor. Without Greens or Labor, Turnbull needs nine of the 11 crossbenchers. And that crossbench includes Xenophon and his three votes, but also Pauline Hanson and her four. And all of these consider themselves to have their own, separate, special mandates.

As Hanson said to reporters this week in defending her call to restrict Muslim immigrants: "As we have seen many other countries around the world have lost control of their countries their suburbs and there is civil unrest on their streets. I do not want that for Australia. I have a responsibility now as being a Senator in this place to be a voice for more than nearly 600,000 people that voted for One Nation." So Turnbull claims a mandate based on the votes of 6.8 million people on a two-party preferred basis, or 50.4 per cent of the total, and Hanson claims a mandate based on fewer than one-tenth of that. Everyone has their own special claim to a mandate, it seems, and no-one recognises that the government has one. Not even some members of the government itself  the conservative clique of the Liberal-National Coalition claims a higher loyalty. Sometimes it's to an ideology, other times it's to the party "base". This was the justification for the conservative revolt against Turnbull, Scott Morrison and the government's budget proposal on superannuation  the plan was unpopular with "the base," they said, so they defied their leadership and a Cabinet decision. Strikingly, only the conservatives consider themselves to have these higher loyalties. They are special. The Liberal moderates seem prepared to accept the simple concept of loyalty to the government. With this clamour of clashing claims to mandates, can the Turnbull government hope to achieve anything?

This week it did, but only because Shorten's Labor party allowed it to. It was a fascinating week because it gave Australia a view of Shorten's view of mandate in action. On some matters he was prepared to compromise and work with the government to solve problems, where it suited Labor. On others he is flatly obstructionist. Where was the compromise? There were two, on major matters. One was trimming spending on a grab-bag  an "omnibus", as the government preferred it  of policies to find $6.3 billion in budget savings over four years. Another was increasing tobacco excise to wring another $4.6 billion out of smokers. How big is this? In scale, it's not enough to halt Australia's long slide into ever-increasing indebtedness. Even if the government gets every budget proposal it wants over four years, even if all the forecast revenues arrive exactly as anticipated, this total improvement of $11 billion to the budget balance over four years still sees Australia running up $85 billion in new deficits by 2019-20, according to the budget.

Symbolically, though, it's huge. It shows that bipartisanship is possible; that the major parties can work together to solve problems; that Australian democracy is not necessarily doomed. But Labor is shaping to deny Turnbull the same-sex marriage plebiscite. Because, in this case, it doesn't suit Labor to cooperate. Shorten considers that he has a mandate to support the wishes of the same-sex marriage lobby. The lobby prefers the matter is resolved by a simple vote in parliament without any plebiscite. Shorten's Labor will serve its own constituency, as defined by Shorten. Is this state of affairs a new outbreak of narcissism, where any party, any faction, any individual claims their own special mandate at will?

No. When John Howard claimed "a huge mandate" with 93 of the 148 seats in the House, he was defied by Labor, by independents and even sometimes by members of his own government in the Senate. He had to negotiate bill by bill, item by item. Gough Whitlam argued that he had "a specific mandate to implement each part of the program set forth in the 1972 policy speech". Yet the constitutional crisis of 1975 was brought on when Malcolm Fraser's opposition refused to recognise that Whitlam had a right to do anything, even to continue to fund the routine operations of national government. That was such an extreme that the main parties have since pledged not to repeat this. They now observe the convention that an elected government has an automatic right  a "mandate" - to win the supply bills to kepe the country running. But, short of Fraser's extremes, it's business as usual that a government must fight, negotiate and manoeuvre for everything it wants to accomplish. The original claim of a government to a "mandate" has been traced to Britain's parliament in 1832, and it's a concept that's been argued without settlement ever since.

"Whether a mandate has been given, and of what a mandate consists," said the eminent British legal and constitutional expert Sir Ivor Jennings three quarters of a century ago "are matters for argument." Academics define two separate types of mandate. One is the "general mandate", the idea that an election only decides who is to govern, not what policies they are entitled to pursue. This is an uncontroversial version of a mandate. In this case, Turnbull has been able to form a majority in the House so he's acknowledged as the legitimate prime minister. But the "specific mandate" theory that says a government has a right to enact its promises is hugely contested, as Macquarie University's Professor Emeritus Murray Goot has set out in his paper Whose Mandate? In particular, in a parliament with a powerful upper house such as Australia's, "a government's claim to ANY sort of mandate [is] much more difficult to sustain", says Goot.
Character actor and unique model Zoltan Lloyd died this week, aged 68. He was known in the film and TV industry as "The Actor Who Played The Parts Nobody Else Would Touch", but was known more fondly by his fans as "that sweaty old fat guy with his head and legs cropped out, on every current affairs TV story about Australia's obesity epidemic, 1988 to 2012".

Zoltan Lloyd may not ever have won a Logie or an AACTA award, but he was one of the hardest-working "uglies" in showbusiness, giving fearless performances in countless unpopular roles, including "Toe-Rot Tony" in Fungal Toenail Treatment: A How-To YouTube Tutorial, and "Tumorous Mouth-Cancer Man" in 2008's Quit Smoking ad-campaign. Many will recall his highly-acclaimed performance as "Bloated Decomposing Corpse Washed Onto Beach, Being Pecked by Seagulls" in the movie Murder Most Murderous  a low-budget thriller that could not afford any special effects, but Zoltan gave a thoroughly convincing performance without the need for prosthetics experts, make-up artists or seagull-trainers.

Zoltan's role model: Derek Zoolander.

From an early age, Zoltan discovered his natural gift for portraying medical afflictions and physical malformations, and by the age of 10 he had won the coveted role of "Infected Abscess Boy" in the dental-health poster, viewed by millions in dentist waiting-rooms across the country. From here on, his career skyrocketed, appearing on television as "Gastric-Reflux Stomach-Guy" in the legendary Gastrox commercials (providing his own reflux-gurgles). Then Hollywood came knocking, casting him as "Butchered Slab Of Naked Torso, Glimpsed In Background On Kitchen Benchtop" in Zombie Cannibal Love-Orgy. More recently he shifted into the world of online modeling, starring in the viral internet phenomenon "Ten Things A Man Over 60 Should Never Do" (he was Number 8: Never Wear A Latex Penis-Pouch In Public).

His long-term agent, Ermintrude Drucker, founder of Talent Limited, paid tribute to Zoltan, saying: "He was such a dedicated artist! If an ad agency needed someone sitting on a toilet, gripped by severe constipation, Zoltan pushed hardest for the job! If a medical journal needed a distended goiter for a hyperthyroidism cover-shot, Zoltan gave them distended goiter, and then some! When a TV news crew needed a close-up of creepy man-hands for a news re-enactment about a psycho-strangler on the loose, Zoltan put up his creepy man-hand and said, 'I'll do it!' He was always my go-to guy, after everyone else I asked said no."
The ceasefire excludes two other anti-Assad rebel groups, the IS and fellow Sunni extremists the Nusra Front, which has renamed itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham.

Syrian government operations continued to target IS and NF strongholds on Wednesday, leaving six civilians dead.

The truce is monitored daily. If it holds, Moscow and Washington then decide whether to extend it another 48 hours, which they did on Wednesday.

Eventually, the aim is for seven straight days of ceasefire so that UN-backed aid convoys from Turkey can access areas under fire from the radical groups or indeed locked down by the Assad government. The aid goal could not be achieved in the first three days because the Assad regime seemed unwilling to allow free access to cities such as Aleppo, where moderate anti-Assad rebels themselves might reject supplies because to accept them would work to validate the government's control. Still, the UN was hopeful on Thursday that aid would pass into Aleppo and relieve some of the suffering there.

But even if aid arrived and the truce held for seven days, the eighth day would be highly problematic. That is when the Pentagon and Russia have to share information about the location of IS and/or NF targets with the aim of each better targeting the terrorist groups. US Defence Secretary Ashton Carter has been sceptical at best of the intelligence-sharing plan.
Australia could soon have its first female Defence Department boss, meaning women would dominate the senior reaches of the defence and foreign affairs portfolios as never before.

Fairfax Media understands that Kathryn Campbell, the head of the Department of Human Services and a brigadier in the Army Reserve, is a hot prospect to replace current Defence boss Dennis Richardson.

Outgoing Deputy Commander Joint Task Force 633 Brigadier Kathryn Campbell, CSC, left, with incoming Deputy Commander Joint Task Force 633 Brigadier Neil Sweeney at the Taji Military Complex in Iraq. Credit:LSIS Jake Badior

There is a strong view in Canberra that it is time for a female Defence Department head, sources have said. If appointed, she would join Defence Minister Marise Payne, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop and Department of Foreign Affairs Secretary Frances Adamson.

Ms Campbell sits alongside outgoing senior Defence official Peter Baxter, who led the development of this year's White Paper, and Australian Strategic Policy Institute chief Peter Jennings, as one of the top names on the list.
"For fear of being accused of being sexist  let me just say, it would be a great rarity to find a 16-year-old girl who would be willing to sleep with a 50-year-old man," he said.

"Basically, anyone can have sexual relations with a16-year-old  and I am just speaking in general here and stereotyping I suppose, or generalising  I would think that most 16-year-old girls would find it pretty gross to be thinking about having sexual relations with a 40 or 50-year-old man.

"But we do know there are older men, paedophiles, who are attracted to younger men in particular and I just think that if they were going to lower the age of consent - if we are talking about an 18-year-old and a 16-year-old, two guys in a relationship, I don't have any problem.

" The difference with what's happened has, is that last week, if a parent found out that their 16-year-old son had been having sex with a 50-year-old man, they could have phoned the police and that 50-year-old could have been done for statutory rape, and I think most people would agree  particularly if there is grooming involved and all the rest of it, that is fair enough.

"This week, now it is different, that person gets a free kick from the government."
A central Queensland Islamic community wants Pauline Hanson to share fish and chips and discuss her views on Islam at their open day.

The One Nation leader was holding a free forum on jobs and prosperity in Rockhampton on Friday evening.

Senator Pauline Hanson delivers her first speech to the Senate. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

During her first Senate speech this week, Ms Hanson said Australia was in danger of being "swamped by Muslims" and called for an end to Muslim immigration.

Muslims, she argued, bore "a culture and ideology that is incompatible with our own".
The nine of us outliers were shepherded away to our allotted classroom to be instructed in the Catechism by an old Catholic priest. We were such a tiny tribe the other kids didn't even bother to taunt us, at least not aloud. We were, I suppose, fortunate. In a larger town not a half hour away there was a Catholic school, and the pupils copped the street chant of "Catholic dogs, jump like frogs, eat no meat on Friday". The bolder pupils, it was said, responded with a battle cry of their own: "Catholics, Catholics ring the bell, while the Proddies go to hell". Here was Australia's Donald Trump in a skirt; one who does not know or care to admit that Muslims, far from swamping the nation, make up about 2.2% of its population. You need numbers for challenges like that. We didn't have the numbers.

Our little group simply put its collective head down. It is likely most of our fellow pupils didn't give the matter a thought that lasted beyond lunch time, but when you're a child, you are hyper-sensitive to your place in the world, or what you perceive it to be. We knew, or felt, there was some secret form of judgment that marked us as outsiders, though we weren't as isolated as the even smaller number of pupils from families who belonged to a mysterious sect known as Cooneyites, and none of us experienced the desolation of Indigenous kids who came from a creek-side settlement 10 kilometres out of town. They were treated as if they didn't exist at all unless they were winning a footy game for the town. We imagine, these days, that Australia has moved beyond all that. We look back at those years of my childhood as a sort of Dark Ages. Religious  and associated political  divides have faded since. Why, the Liberal Party has produced two Catholic prime ministers  Tony Abbott and Malcolm Turnbull  and from the National Party, a deputy prime minister, Tim Fischer. Use a racial slur at the footy today and you'll likely find yourself banned from attending future matches.

And yet. The leader of a political party that gathered the support of almost 600,000 Australian voters at the last election stood in our national Parliament this week and declared, in effect, there was no place in Australia for the followers of one of the world's two most prominent religions. Pauline Hanson went so far as to deny that Islam was a real religion, which might come as a surprise to a lot of the world's 2.3 billion adherents. She asserted no more Muslims should be allowed to immigrate, no more of their places of worship ought to be built and those that already stood should be "monitored". Here was Australia's Donald Trump in a skirt; one who does not know or care to admit that Muslims, far from swamping the nation, make up about 2.2 per cent of its population. Hanson, you'd imagine, ought to have developed a bit of empathy for outsiders. She was brought up working hard, ran away from home several times, left school at 15 and was married for the first time at 16.

Instead, she appears to wish a new Australian Dark Age on public discourse, and gives no pause to consider the effect on the children condemned as would-be terrorists before they have the chance to figure where they might wish to fit within the Australian community. Would she have declared half a century ago that all Catholics be condemned because the Irish Republican Army was involved in terrorist activities? Elsewhere this week raged an argument about publicly funding, to the tune of millions of dollars, campaigns for and against allowing people who love each other to marry. Could there be a person left in Australia who doesn't have an opinion on same-sex marriage and who still needs persuading one way or another via a public slanging match? It is hard to imagine a more effective way to ensure that the children of same-sex partnerships feel judged as worthless than to have one side of the argument spend millions of dollars advertising that their parents' relationship is illegitimate or worse. There are lots of ways little kids can be made to feel outsiders.
They come from completely different worlds but Magnolia Maymuru and Fernanda Ly share a lot in common, not in the least being part of a revolution taking place on catwalks across Australia.

As Womens Wear Daily's Australian fashion correspondent, Patty Huntington, put it to PS: "The blue-eyed, blondeocracy ruling over Australian fashion has come to an end."

From tending to her pet crocodile, named Nike in honour of Cathy Freeman, to catching mud crabs in her home in East Arnhem Land, where she says "family comes first" and pays homage to her cultural ancestry with an extended clan numbering more than 800 people, softly spoken 19-year-old Magnolia Maymuru is actually not that different to most other women her age.

"She likes to go shopping, she loves Facebook and all that," says her manager and Northern Territory Fashion Week founder, Mehali Tsangaris, who first discovered the elegant beauty at an ATM in Darwin. "I believe she can go all the way if she wants to."
Fashion Week and cultural appropriation - you couldn't possibly have one without the other, could you?

Celeb-designer Marc Jacobs was blasted online after his show at New York Fashion Week featured models - including Kendall Jenner, Gigi and Bella Hadid, Adriana Lima and Karlie Kloss - walking the runway in pastel-y dreadlocks.

Models Bella Hadid and Kendall Jenner wear fake dreadlocks at Marc Jacobs' NYFW show. Credit:Marc Jacobs Instagram

"Why didn't you hire models with real dreads?! Is it that hard Marc Jacobs?!", one Instagram commenter wrote, calling the show "hideous and disappointing".

"There are much better points of inspiration for dreads and locs... Like ones that naturally and beautifully grow out of a black woman's head," another commenter added.
Sean Davison and his mother Patricia in Kathmandu in 2001, to celebrate her 80th birthday. Davison's memoir Before We Say Goodbye, published in 2009, omitted his role in his mother's death at the request of his publisher. But an earlier draft that he gave his siblings to read detailed her overdose. He recalls the moment a police detective placed the damning manuscript before him. On the cover was the photograph of his mother that he had specially glued to Mary's copy. In November 2011, the New Zealand High Court sentenced Davison  who the judge described as an "exceptionally devoted and loving son"  to five months' home detention for "counselling and procuring" his mother's death. Sean Davison and his mother Patricia at her home near Dunedin, in August 2006, two months before her death. The first time I spoke to him was by phone in January 2012, while he was serving his sentence at a friend's home in Dunedin, more than 10,000 kilometres from his wife and young children in Cape Town. His soft voice shuddered then as he spoke of his agonised decision to help his mother die.

Four years on, Davison, 54 and professor of biotechnology at the University of the Western Cape, sounds stronger and looks well, with his lean frame and bright blue eyes. He speaks on Skype from his home near Table Mountain, which he climbs on weekends. One of his mother's landscapes hangs on the wall of his study, where he escapes the ruckus of his children Flynn, 7, Finnian, 6, and Fia, 2. Sean Davison in the High Court, which sentenced him to five months' home detention for helping his mother die. Credit:Martin van Beynen "It was very hard to be separated from my family when the children were so young. It was one of the happiest days of my life to get back to them," he says of his time in detention. He accuses Mary of the "horrendous crime" of sending his manuscript to the police. Mary, who now works in Wellington, did not respond to requests for comment. But she denied the allegation when I spoke to her briefly by phone in 2012. "He is entitled to believe that. It didn't come through me," she said. "I love my brother." I also spoke then to Fergus and Jo, who both praised their brother's "bravery" in assisting their mother's suicide.

Davison, who has not spoken to Mary for several years, says he was initially angry at his sister. But he misses her. Do you forgive her, I ask. "Normally, forgiveness requires some kind of regret or apology from the person wanting forgiveness. But in spite of that I do forgive her." His life has taken a sharp turn since his incarceration. Davison is now president of the World Federation of Right to Die Societies and founder of Dignity South Africa, which wants to help overturn the country's prohibition of assisted suicide. The campaign was buoyed in May 2015, when the High Court in Pretoria granted a 65-year-old terminally ill man the right to end his life with the help of a doctor. The South African government has appealed the decision. A similar push in Victoria to legalise euthanasia won public support this week from several government ministers. Premier Daniel Andrews stopped short of supporting euthanasia but said the recent death from cancer of his father had challenged his views against assisted suicide.

Assisted suicide is illegal in NSW. In 2013, the NSW Parliament rejected a bill to allow terminally ill people with decision-making capacity to request medical assistance to die. However a 2015 survey found 72 per cent of people in NSW agreed that terminally ill patients should be able to legally end their own lives with medical assistance. Davison says seeing the suffering of a family member often changes people's position. "It is the core of our humanity not to let people suffer. Any humane person in the same situation I was in with my mother would have done exactly the same thing," he says. "I am certain that in 10 years' time the Western world is going to look back at cases like mine and say 'How horrific, somebody could be criminalised for an act of compassion'."
The government's tab for all levels of education (including tertiary) was 27pc fatter in 2013 than it was just five years earlier, so public spending on education has been growing fast even before the "Gonski" funding for schools was rolled out. Supporters of Gonski funding argue this is because the money was spent on the wrong things and was not allocated according to need. Education Minister Simon Birmingham says the new university reform package deserves to pass the Parliament. Credit:Louise Kennerley School funding - mixed Primary school funding per student in Australia in 2013 was below the OECD average ($US8289 compared with $US8477). But Australia's secondary education spending was above average ($US10,932 compared with $US9811). Early childhood - below average

In 2014, 69pc of three-year-olds were enrolled in some form of early childhood education, just below the OECD average. But only 20pc of the money spent on early childhood came from government sources, the rest out of parents' pockets. The OECD average sees 80pc of early childhood education funded publicly. Due to national regulations, Australia has the highest educator-to-child ratios in the world. It's five children per carer in Australia, while 14 was the OECD average. School class sizes - above average In 2013 average class sizes in Australian primary schools were 24 students, (OECD average was 21), while secondary schools averaged 24 students (OECD average 23). Ms Haythorpe from the AEU argues this means "Australian teachers are doing more face-to-face teaching than the OECD average, and teaching bigger classes, because our school system is under-resourced."

But class sizes have shrunk: the trend data indicates that high school classrooms have dropped by an average of four children in the past decade in Australia. Classroom hours - long Australia has the world's longest period of compulsory education with 11 years of primary and secondary education. The OECD average is nine years. Teacher salaries - above average Teacher salaries in preschool are 35pc higher than the OECD average, but they slip down to 13pc higher in high school. Australia stands out for having a relatively flat distribution of salaries - it only takes teachers 8.3 years to get from starting salary to the top of the scale, compared with the OECD average of 25 years.

The federal government wants to change the structure of teacher salaries by linking pay increases to performance measures rather than time served, and NSW has already embarked on the change. Tertiary education levels - high Our share of tertiary educated adults is high - 43pc, behind only Canada, Japan, Israel, Korea, the US and the UK. But most of those are bachelor's degrees as just 6pc of Australians have masters degrees, well below the OECD average of 11pc. In 2015, 89pc of men and 79pc of women with tertiary education were employed; which is in line with the OECD average. That's good news not just because graduates earn higher salaries, but because people with higher levels of education report higher life satisfaction, too. Tertiary education fees - high

Australia's tertiary fees are the fifth highest in OECD countries, after Canada, Japan, Korea and the US; and they have been growing fast. Bachelor's degrees cost on average 20pc more than they did a decade ago, and master's degrees - which are the world's second most expensive after the US - cost 85pc more than a decade ago. Fees for international students are even higher. Tertiary education spending - high Loading Australia spends significantly more than the OECD average per tertiary student - this is largely due to our investment in research which helps drive our universities showings in the global rankings and hence attract international students. But despite this, 58 pc of the money spent on tertiary education comes out of private pockets, not public money. International enrolments - high
A former Penthouse Pet who smuggled ice into Australia to bankroll her extravagant Hollywood lifestyle has been jailed for six-and-a-half years.

Simone Farrow, 41, used her image as a swimsuit model as a cover for the "principal role" she played in a syndicate that exported drugs concealed in bath salts and similar products, the Sydney Downing Centre District Court heard on Friday.

Farrow, formerly known as Simone Cheung and by career alias Simone Starr, was a key player in the exportation of nearly 750 grams of pure methamphetamine from the US over a seven-and-a-half-month period.

In his sentencing remarks, Judge David Arnott said Farrow played an "essential and important part in a sophisticated international enterprise using her image as a model as a cover".
BILLINGS -- Montanas commissioner of political practices has cleared the conservative group Americans for Prosperity of electioneering charges stemming from literature mailed to Billings households in August.

At issue were glossy postcards targeting South Billings legislator Robyn Driscoll and Gov. Steve Bullock in mid-August. Both Driscoll and Bullock are Democrats. AFP is part of a free-market organization founded by billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch.

AFP has targeted Montana politicians with issue-advocacy campaigns for about a decade. Commissioner Jonathan Motl cleared AFP on Thursday.

The cards gave Driscoll an F grade on AFPs Montana Freedom Scorecard and urged recipients to call her. Bullock was impugned for what AFP considers reckless spending and encouraged voters to call Bullock to tell him they want fiscal responsibility.

Driscoll was appointed to a seat on the Yellowstone County Commission last month and is no longer a legislative candidate.

The literature struck a nerve with Scott Skokos, whose family received the mailers. Skokos filed a complaint with Political Practices because AFP hadnt registered as a political committee and because the cards arrived in the mail within 60 days of the start of Montana absentee voting.

But the legality of the mailings was in the nuance of AFPs message and the date they were mailed. AFP doesnt support or oppose candidates. Rather, it focuses on issues, or whats known as issue advocacy, and the reporting requirements are different for issue advocacy groups.

AFP didnt have to report its activity or its expenditures to send out postcards focused on an issue and not supporting or opposing a candidate, Motl ruled.

The timing of the mailing of the postcards was also OK. AFP contracted with WizBang Solutions, a Denver mailing house, to ship the cards. WizBang mailed the cards before Aug. 16, which was the deadline by which all literature that identifies a candidate had to be reported. The mailing house issued 3,525 Driscoll cards and 51,540 Bullock cards. Skokos family members received the postcards between Aug. 18 and 20.
Further rain is on its way this weekend after record rainfall caused major flooding, leaving large parts of NSW and Victoria underwater.

This year's winter was the second-wettest on record, and the conditions have continued into spring with significant rain falling inland over the Murray-Darling basin and bringing a major dam near to capacity.

Neale Fraser, a meteorologist at the Bureau of Meteorology, said the rain had been caused by warmer than average sea surface temperatures in the eastern Indian Ocean, which brought moisture over Australia.

"With the warmer water you're getting more moisture into the atmosphere, then it's coming across the tropics, down into our part of the world," Mr Fraser said.
Converting Sydney's existing airport train line between Central and Revesby to take single-deck metro trains is an option under consideration as the state government grapples with the rail needs of western Sydney.

The possibility of separating the Airport Line from the suburban network, and running a metro-style shuttle, emerged in an options paper prepared by the state and federal governments and released on Friday.

The paper canvasses a range of proposals for how to service Sydney's proposed new airport at Badgerys Creek, but as part of that analysis also suggests overhauling how trains travel to the existing airport at Mascot.

Running metro services on the rail lines between Revesby and Central via the existing airport could allow an extra 12 trains an hour from the outer south-west to operate on the congested City Circle Line, the paper found.
A 50-year-old woman is in a serious but stable condition in Liverpool Hospital after she was struck by a car in Sydney's south-west in what is believed to be a targeted attack.

Police believe the crash is a result of an ongoing neighbourhood dispute.

Emergency services were called to Kinkuna Street in Busby about 11pm where they found the woman suffering compound fractures to her legs, a fractured pelvis and lacerations to her head.

Initial investigations said the women was struck after a Toyota Landcruiser drove onto the footpath, trapping her between it and a Subaru Forrester.

She was treated at the scene before being taken to hospital where she will require surgery.
A cyclist is in a critical condition after he was dragged underneath a vehicle in Brisbane's north.

A man in his 50s was riding along the footpath on Stafford Road near Gordon Street at Gordon Park on Thursday night when he collided with a vehicle that was leaving a driveway about 7pm.

The man was cycling along the footpath when he collided with a vehicle and was dragged along.

The cyclist was then dragged under the vehicle for a "short distance", police said.

He was trapped under the vehicle for a "period of time" before he was rushed to hospital in a critical condition, a Queensland Ambulance spokesperson said.
A man has been airlifted to hospital after a crash at the Sunshine Coast on Friday morning.

The man was driving along the Bruce Highway at Forest Glen when his vehicle rolled into a ditch, just before 6am.

He was transported via helicopter to Royal Brisbane and Women's Hospital with suspected spinal injuries.

The Bruce Highway was closed as paramedics transferred the man into the helicopter, but it had reopened by peak hour.
Their findings published in PLOS ONE on Friday come in the week where it was revealed that the sugar lobby paid to downplay research in the 1960s on the role of sugar in heart disease.

Further, they claimed the bias "was not prevented by the peer-review process".

A Sydney University study has found financial conflicts introduce a bias at all levels of research into artificial sweeteners.

Industry funding into the efficacy of artificial sweeteners in weight loss is nearly 17 times more likely to deliver a favourable result than independent research, a University of Sydney study says.

Of the 31 reviews analysed by Professor Bero and her colleagues, four were paid for by the sweetener industry, 10 were funded from non-industry sources, 13 revealed no funding source and four were funded by the sugar and water industries, which were classified as competitors to the sweetener industry.

The study said that "100 per cent of the industry-sponsored studies concluded that aspartame was safe and 92 per cent of the independently funded studies identified adverse effects of aspartame consumption".

Almost half (42 per cent) of the sweetener reviews had authors that did not disclose conflicts of interest and one-third of the reviews failed to reveal any source of funding.

Professor Bero said that a sample size of 31 was enough for her to come to such conclusions given the large disparity in results from the differently funded studies. The initial database her team reviewed was more than 900. She says a rigorous process of screening meant that 31 were relevant for assessment.

Given that the peer-review process did not pick up on the biases her study claims, she said "more standardisation across the peer-review process is needed".
A policeman has been suspended amid an investigation into an alleged sexual assault.

The sergeant, based at a station in Victoria's north-east, was suspended with pay this week.

An officer based in Victoria's north-east is under investigation over an alleged sex assault. Credit:Getty Images

He has not been charged.

Professional standards command detectives are investigating an allegation that he committed a sexual offence at least a decade ago, Fairfax Media understands.
The Surrey Hills rail crossing where two women were killed this week is closed to cars for up to 25 minutes in every hour, and the intersection is only going to get more congested with major new development planned in the area.

Each week almost 2000 train services travel through the Union Road level crossing, which has been rated Victoria's 14th most dangerous.

The Union Road level crossing has been rated Victoria's 14th most dangerous. Credit:Eddie Jim

A recent planning tribunal was told the boom gates at the crossing could stay down for almost 50 per cent of the time during peak hour, causing long lines of traffic to bank up.

But even more cars could be attracted to the neighbourhood in the near future when a Coles supermarket is built just a few metres from the intersection that was the scene of Wednesday's horrific collision.
A man who allegedly slashed a security guard's face with a knife in broad daylight in Melbourne's north-west earlier this month is still on the run.

Police have been hunting a 35-year-old suspect for more than a week after he allegedly attacked a security guard on Horne Street, Sunbury, around 10.20am on Tuesday 6 September.

Police wish to speak to Anton Lewryk in relation to an alleged stabbing that occured in Sunbury earlier this month.

The security guard was attempting to stop the man, who police have named as Anton Lewryk, after he allegedly attempted to flee with stolen goods.

After confronting the alleged shoplifter, the 61-year-old security guard was slashed across the face with a knife. The alleged offender then fled the scene.
A man who broke a door at the office of state opposition leader Matthew Guy has told court that he had wanted to discuss police corruption with him. Rohan Brown appeared in the Supreme Court on Friday, representing himself to make an application for bail. The judge adjourned the hearing until next week to allow Mr Brown to be assessed for drug treatment and mental health care. Credit:Penny Stephens Mr Brown has been charged over the incident and is also facing separate charges, including alleged breaches of intervention orders, property damage and threats to kill. He rejected a Fairfax Media report that the incident may have been sparked by his views against multiculturalism, insistingthey had nothing to do with his visit.

"Multiculturalism was never the issue discussed in Matthew Guy's office," he said. "In fact, it was actually police corruption that was the matter of discussion." Mr Brown said that he suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, which he claimed had been triggered by previous police bullying. He also said that the incident occurred "in a breakdown moment, a brain-snap moment that I regret ... I was leaving when I broke the door." Mr Brown also noted that when police arrested him on June 3 he was with his best friend, a Mauritian man, his Zambian wife and in "a house full of Africans." Police opposed bail, with prosecutor Leading Senior Constable Mark Sontag stating that Mr Brown posed an unacceptable risk of breaching conditions, noting he had previously failed to attend court a number of times. Justice Christopher Beale said that Mr Brown's "strongest point" was that if he were not bailed, he could end up spending more time in custody on remand than if he was later found guilty and sentenced for all of his charges.
Attending one primary and secondary school has become a thing of the past.

Dissatisfied families are redefining education in Victoria, with almost one in two students changing primary or secondary schools at least once.

Marine Chu, who moved to Mac.Robertson Girls High School, says she is now with friends who have the same ambitions. Credit:Eddie Jim

A staggering 40,000 Victorian students moved in and out of government, Catholic and independent schools in 2015.

Bullying, aspirations and toxic friendships are behind the churn, according to academics.
About 100 people gathered outside Perth's CBD Apple store on Friday morning awaiting the release of the iPhone 7, with a sizeable proportion having camped out overnight.

This reporter watched in bemusement as staff inside gathered for a ritual involving forming a human corridor to greet their lucky first customer and warming up by shouting SEVEN at each other.

Their door-greeter geared up those first in line outside on Hay Street by yelling 'are you ready' and jumping about with his fists in the air.

He briefed the first in line on what direction to take once inside, in case dazzled by the white surfaces, so as not to mess with the system they must have had in place to deal with the rush.
Two contenders have emerged as serious front-runners in Radio 6PR's quest to find the pub of the year.

Karl Langdon made his way to The Raffles and The Boulevard Hotel over the past two weeks and, while he had great experiences at both, was higher in his praise of the former.

Almost a perfect score for iconic Applecross venue The Raffles.

'The Raff' is an iconic staple on the corner of Canning Highway and Canning Beach Road... the epitome of Perth's social scene in the 1940s and 1950s.

Langdon said that he was underwhelmed by the attempt to make The Raffles a more casual venue.
Beirut: Rebels and government forces have engaged in heavy shelling across frontlines on the outskirts of Damascus, testing Syria's fragile truce.

Aid, meanwhile, was still stuck at the Turkish border on Friday, further complicating an already difficult situation.

Nearly two dozen rockets and grenades were fired near Jobar neighbourhood, in the eastern outskirts of the Damascus, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, adding that two shells fell in the Old City, controlled by the government.

A building belonging to the Syrian Civil Defence, a rescue organisation also known as the 'White Helmets' was also hit in overnight air strikes. In Aleppo, the Observatory also quoted activists as saying a church in the government-held area of western Aleppo was hit by shells fired by rebels.
Kampala: More than one million refugees have fled South Sudan's ongoing civil war, overwhelming aid agencies and creating one of the world's worst humanitarian disasters.

The United Nations says South Sudan joins Syria, Afghanistan, and Somalia as countries that have produced over one million refugees, as people continue to flee to neighbouring countries.

"This is a very sad milestone,'' said Leo Dobbs, a spokesman for the UN refugee agency.

South Sudan gained independence from Sudan in 2011, but civil war erupted two years later and tens of thousands have been killed.
London: More than three quarters of Europeans sympathise with Syrian refugees coming to their countries, a poll found on Friday, challenging reports of growing anti-immigration sentiment across the continent.

Ireland topped the poll of European countries that are most supportive of Syrian refugees with 87 per cent of people interviewed there showing sympathy for them, while Slovakia ranked bottom.

A man walks among hundreds of lifejackets scattered by UK charities ActionAid and Islamic Relief on the bank of the Thames, London, to highlight the plight of refugees. Credit:AP

The Ipsos MORI survey also showed that less than a third of the roughly 12,000 people polled across 12 EU countries believe refugees are a risk to national security despite a number of recent attacks involving migrants.

"These findings show that Europeans have not lost their hearts," said David Miliband, CEO of International Rescue Committee (IRC), an aid organisation which commissioned the poll.
New York: A man armed with a meat cleaver has attacked a police officer in New York City before being shot during a struggle with officers who were trying to subdue him.

The gunshots rang out about a block from Macy's midtown Manhattan flagship department store just as rush hour was getting underway on Thursday evening.

The Empire State building in the background, the Macy's logo is illuminated on the front of the department store in New York. Credit:AP

Police say the wounded man has been hospitalised in critical condition while an off-duty police detective has been hospitalised for a slash wound to the face.

A law enforcement official has told The Associated Press the officers had chased the man, who was armed with a meat cleaver, and had unsuccessfully tried to subdue him with a Taser before the struggle that led to the shooting.
Prosecutors in the case of Oscar Pistorius have been accused of pursuing a "personal vendetta" against the athlete after they lodged a last-ditch attempt to have him jailed for longer.

Gerrie Nel, the state attorney, last month appealed to the trial judge over the "shockingly too lenient" six-year sentence she handed down for the murder of Reeva Steenkamp.

Jailed for six years: Oscar Pistorius. Credit:AP

Judge Thokozile Masipa rejected the application, saying she did not believe another court "would find differently". But the National Prosecuting Authority said on Friday it would now apply to the Supreme Court of Appeal for a stronger sentence.

Sources in the Pistorius legal team and among his friends said Mr Nel, who was nicknamed The Pitbull during the long-running trial for his ferocious interrogation technique, had "lost his sense of perspective" over the case.
GREAT BAY(DCOMM):--- Ministry of Public Housing, Environment, Spatial Development and Infrastructure (Ministry VROMI), announces that there will be a road closure on September 17.

The road closure will be from 7.00AM to 10.00AM in the vicinity of the former Doctor Bryson Clinic on the A.T. Illidge road, Dutch Quarter to the Jean Tata Brooks round-a-bout in Dutch Quarter.

The works are being carried out in connection with the maintenance of the sewage pit.

Motorists are advised to drive with caution and to pay attention to traffic signs indicating a road closure.

Ministry VROMI apologizes for any inconveniences this may cause.
PHILIPSBURG:--- Leader of the United St. Maarten (US) Party MP Frans Richardson on Thursday complimented the Public Prosecutors office for realizing that it had to change its role in the community.

The prosecutor's office last week announced that it would have to re-invent themselves to make progress beyond their classic vertical role of the magistrate who steers criminal investigations and decides about prosecution in a case-oriented manner. A new horizontal role has to be developed aiming at the realization of broad, sustainable effects.

In this new role, the Prosecutors want to be accessible safety partners who, as equal parties, strive after consultation and cooperation with relevant parties to arrive at joint strategies for intervention and prevention.

Richardson, who has always said that the prosecutor's office should be closer to the public, welcomed the news. "I have always said that if the prosecutor wants to solicit the cooperation of the public, it had to get closer and be more accessible to the public. For too long they have acted like supreme overseers, an entity that the public does not trust. So this step is a positive one," Richardson said.

Essential to that are aspects like legitimacy, acceptance, visibility openness, contact, accessibility and exchange of information, partnership, solidarity and an external orientation. There is a direct relationship between these issues and overall effectiveness of the implementation of the Offices task. Whether these elements are there or not is crucially determined by the culture of the Offices and the behavior and attitude of their staffs.

USP Press Release
Marigot:---On Wednesday, September 14, 2016, the Our Land Matters movement launched its billboard with as theme Movement to Safeguard Our Property Rights. This movement signifies that the people of Saint Martin / St. Maarten will not stand back while others try and trample on their rights. The movement has gained momentum amongst the grassroots, politicians and most importantly amongst the people of Sint Maarten. With the unveiling of the billboard Our Land Matters,inclusivity a new approach in addressing the manner in which the French colonial powers dictate for Saint Martin has developed. This approach is one of inclusive and unity. Ringing out during the gathering for the unveiling of the billboard was that We Are St. Martin. The movement has received overwhelming support and the petition now totals to more than 1300 signatures. Our Land Matters movement will also meet with various district head representatives and heads of associations on St. Martin. The movement is also planning to host an awareness event at the former Boo Boo Jam area in October 2016. Our Land Matters.

Our Land Matters Press Release
National commission on presidential debates requires 15% to Debate Trump, Clinton

This puts him just shy of the 15% that he needs in order to participate in the Clinton versus Trump televised debate scheduled for FOXNews for September 26, 2016.

Update, 9/16: The Commission on Presidential Debates has announced that only Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, will participate in the presidential debate on September 26th.

Libertarian Party Presidential Candidate Gary Johnson polled 13% in a national Quinnipiac University poll released today, Wednesday, September 14.

This puts him just shy of the 15% that he needs in order to participate in the Clinton versus Trump televised debate scheduled for FOXNews for September 26, 2016.

The 15% is an artificial level set by the commission. Only candidates polling above 15% ten days before the debate, may participate in it. The rule makes it very difficult for third-party candidates. Green Party candidate Jill Stein polls around 3% -- not bad for a third-party candidate, but not even close to debate participation.

A CBS news poll of Ohio put the former New Mexico Governor at 10%, but Ohio is an important swing state and it means he could be a factor in the election.

The Johnson-Weld campaign took out a full-page ad in today's New York Times, asking the commission to at least allow Johnson to participate in the first debate and then take a national poll. Sounds good to me.

A minority of Libertarian party regulars think it is a mistake for Johnson to participate in the debate, given that he can make mistakes as bad as he did last week, when he did not know that Aleppo is a city in Syria at the epicenter of the Civil War.

Ironically, the gaffe appears to have given Johnson and his running mate Bill Weld, the former Republican governor of Massachusetts, a boost in the polls. Johnson was on every cable news network last week on able to remember what Aleppo was on MSNBC.

Facebook users generated 8.1 million likes, comments, shares and posts about Johnson in the week ending Sept. 11, more than double the 4 million interactions a week he had been averaging for the past month. This according to USA TODAY, http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/onpolitics/2016/09/14/gary-johnson-facebook-traffic-aleppo/90349664/

The only week this year in which Johnson has generated more Facebook traffic was the end of July, when he was a fixture on TV talking about his candidacy as an alternative to the two major parties that were staging their conventions.

By comparison, both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump generated more than 75 million Facebook interactions last week. Green Party candidate Jill Stein generated 1.8 million interactions.

This seems to disprove the axiom that all press is good press. While it is true everybody was talking about Johnson, it is a good bet that not all of that chatter was praise.

If elected, Gary Johnson would be the third president Johnson after one each in the 19th and 20th century. What does Johnson actually believe in?

Johnson's views have been described as fiscally conservative and socially liberal[112] with a philosophy of limited government[113] and military non-interventionism.[114][115] He has identified as a classical liberal.[116] Johnson has said he favors simplifying and reducing taxes.[117] During his governorship, Johnson cut taxes fourteen times and never increased them.[118] Due to his stance on taxes, political pundit David Weigel described him as "the original Tea Party candidate."[119] Johnson has advocated the FairTax, a proposal which would abolish all federal income, corporate and capital gains taxes, and replace them with a 23% tax on consumption of all non-essential goods, while providing a regressive rebate to households according to household size, regardless of income level. He has argued that this would ensure transparency in the tax system and incentivize the private sector to create "tens of millions of jobs."[120] In June 2016, Johnson said that he supported the Trans-Pacific Partnership, stating that he previously thought it limited fair trade, but is now informed it, in fact, fosters free trade.[121]

Johnson has said that he supports balancing the federal budget immediately.[122] He has stated he supports "slashing government spending", including Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security,[117] which would involve cutting Medicare and Medicaid by 43 percent and turning them into block grant programs, with control of spending in the hands of the states to create, in his words, "fifty laboratories of innovation."[122] He has referred to Social Security as a pyramid scheme. He has advocated passing a law allowing for state bankruptcy and expressly ruling out a federal bailout of any states.

Johnson has expressed opposition to the Federal Reserve System, which he has cited as massively devaluing the strength of the U.S. dollar, and would sign legislation to eliminate it. He has also supported an audit of the central bank, and urged Members of Congress in July 2012 to vote in favor of Ron Paul's Federal Reserve Transparency Act.

In his campaign for the Libertarian Party nomination, he stated he opposed foreign wars and pledged to cut the military budget by 43 percent in his first term as president. He would cut the military's overseas bases, uniformed and civilian personnel, research and development, intelligence, and nuclear weapons programs.

He has stated his opposition to US involvement in the War in Afghanistan and opposed the US involvement in the Libyan Civil War. He has stated that he does not believe Iran is a military threat, would use his presidential power to prevent Israel from attacking Iran, and would not follow Israel, or any other ally, into a war that it had initiated.

Johnson presents himself as a strong supporter of civil liberties and received the highest score of any candidate from the American Civil Liberties Union for supporting drug decriminalization while opposing censorship and regulation of the Internet, the Patriot Act, enhanced airport screenings, and the indefinite detention of prisoners. He has spoken in favor of the separation of church and state, and has said that he does not "seek the counsel of God" when determining his political agenda.

This puts him just shy of the 15% that he needs in order to participate in the Clinton versus Trump televised debate scheduled for FOXNews for September 26, 2016.

Johnson endorsed same-sex marriage in 2011; he has since called for a constitutional amendment protecting equal marriage rights, and criticized Obama's position on the issue as having "thrown this question back to the states." Johnson supports the enforcement of Protected Classes that was established by the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and believes that providers should be prohibited from not providing service to customers based on demographics, such as race or sexuality.

This differentiated him from his Libertarian Party opponents in the party primary, especially Austin Petersen. He has been a longtime advocate of legalizing marijuana and has said that if he were president, he would remove it from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act as well as issue an executive order pardoning non-violent marijuana offenders.

Johnson opposes Roe v. Wade, believing states should decide the matter (accessibility to abortions); however, he has stated he personally believes that "it's the woman's choice."

Johnson has stated his opposition to gun control and has said, "I'm a firm believer in the Second Amendment and so I would not have signed legislation banning assault weapons or automatic weapons." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Johnson#Political_positions
Multiple Aspen Prize Finalist Community Colleges a First for California

The art center at Chafee college. California's Chaffey College and Pasadena City College Named Among Ten Finalists for 2017 Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence Multiple Aspen Prize Finalist Community Colleges a First for California

$1 Million Prize for Excellence in Four Areas:

Learning, Degree Completion, Employment and Earnings, and Access and Success for Minority and Low-Income Students; Winner to be Announced in March 2017

Washington, D.C., September 13, 2016  California's Chaffey College and Pasadena City College were named today as two of ten finalists for the 2017 Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence, the nation's preeminent recognition of high achievement and performance in America's community colleges.

The $1 million prize fund will be awarded in March 2017 in Washington, D.C. to the winner and up to four finalists with distinction. (See complete list of finalists below.)

The Prize, awarded every two years since 2011, recognizes outstanding institutions selected from an original pool of more than 1,000 public community colleges nationwide. With a singular focus on student success, the Prize assesses community colleges' achievements in four areas: student learning, certificate and degree completion, employment and earnings for graduates, and access and success for minority and low-income students.

Chaffey College (28,000 students) (Rancho Cucamonga, CA)

"Chaffey College has pioneered some really exciting programs, including its FastTrack program aimed at providing accelerated eight-week courses for its students," said Joshua Wyner, Executive Director of the Aspen Institute's College Excellence Program in Washington, D.C. "With FastTrack students outperforming others by nearly 10 percentage points, this is the kind of scaled intervention that community colleges across the country ought to pay attention to."

Chaffey College stands out as one of the nation's top community colleges for many reasons, including:

Serves a diverse, historically underrepresented population, of which 81 percent are students of color, more than 60 percent of whom are Hispanic

A high first-year retention rate of 73 percent that's well above the national average of 52 percent

Awarding substantially more degrees per 100 students each year with an increase of 75 percent over five years

Pasadena City College (34,000 students) (Pasadena, CA)

"Pasadena City College has made incredible strides in closing the achievement gap for minority students, especially in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields. Not only are PCC's STEM programs dominated by Latino students, but women and first-generation students are also highly represented," said Joshua Wyner, Executive Director of the Aspen Institute's College Excellence Program in Washington, D.C. "This reflects the college's strong demonstrated commitment to making sure all students succeed both while in college and in promising careers after they graduate."

Pasadena City College stands out as one of the nation's top community colleges for many reasons, including:

Serving a large, diverse population of students, more than 76 percent of which are students of color and 43 percent are the first in their families to attend college

A graduation/transfer rate of 49 percent, well above the national average of 39 percent

A program that fast-tracks graduation by providing priority registration to students who are only a few courses short of completing their degree

A leader among California community colleges for the number of associate degrees for transfer awarded, for the number of associate degrees awarded, and for the number of associate degrees awarded to minorities

Community colleges today enroll nearly half of all US undergraduates-7 million students-working toward degrees and certificates. This includes rapidly growing numbers of low-income and minority students. While fewer than 40 percent of all community college students graduate, Aspen Prize finalist institutions demonstrate that every community college can help more students achieve success while in college and after they graduate.

This fall, the Aspen Institute will conduct a rigorous review process that includes examination of extensive data on performance and improvements in learning, graduation, workforce, and equitable outcomes for all students as well as multi-day site visits to each of the ten finalist institutions. Then, a distinguished Prize Jury of higher education experts will select a grand prize winner and up to four finalists with distinction.

The 2015 Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence was awarded to Santa Fe College in Gainesville, Florida. In 2013, Santa Barbara City College (California) and Walla Walla Community College (Washington) were co-winners. In 2011, Valencia College (Florida) was the inaugural Prize winner. According to the Prize rules, former winners were not eligible to reapply this cycle.

The Aspen Prize Finalists selected today reflect the diversity and richness of American community colleges.

The 2017 Aspen Prize Finalists (listed in alphabetical order):

Two colleges have been named finalists in four consecutive Prize cycles (indicated with *) and two others were finalists for a second time (indicated with #)

Anoka-Ramsey Community College  Coon Rapids, MN

Broward College  Fort Lauderdale, FL#

Chaffey College  Rancho Cucamonga, CA

Contact: Ms. Alisha Rosas, 909-652-6115, [email protected]

Indian River State College  Fort Pierce, FL#

Lake Area Technical Institute  Watertown, SD*

Northeast Community College  Norfolk, NE

Odessa College  Odessa, TX

Pasadena City College  Pasadena, CA

Contact: Alexander Boekelheide, 626-585-7422, [email protected]

San Jacinto College  Pasadena, TX

West Kentucky Community and Technical College  Paducah, KY*

####

The Aspen Prize is funded by the Joyce Foundation, the Siemens Foundation, and the Kresge Foundation.

Nursing students of Pasadena city College. California's Chaffey College and Pasadena City College Named Among Ten Finalists for 2017 Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence Multiple Aspen Prize Finalist Community Colleges a First for California

The Aspen Institute's College Excellence Program aims to advance higher education practices, policies, and leadership that significantly improve student outcomes. Through the Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence, the New College Leadership Project, and other initiatives, the College Excellence Program works to improve colleges' understanding and capacity to teach and graduate students, especially the growing population of low-income and minority students on American campuses. For more information, visit http://highered.aspeninstitute.org/aspen-prize/.

The Aspen Institute is an educational and policy studies organization based in Washington, DC. Its mission is to foster leadership based on enduring values and to provide a nonpartisan venue for dealing with critical issues. The Institute is based in Washington, DC; Aspen, Colorado; and on the Wye River on Maryland's Eastern Shore. It also has offices in New York City and an international network of partners.
One of the Largest Ever Found on Earth

Gancedo is likely the second or third largest meteorite ever found on planet Earth.

Over the weekend, a work crew used a crane to hoist a 30-ton meteorite out of the Campo del Cielo (Field of Heaven) about 670 miles northwest of Buenos Aires, Argentina, on the border between the provinces of Chaco and Santiago del Estero.

The meteorite, named Gancedo, has been tentatively declared the second largest yet discovered on Earth. Careful weighing will have to be done before that title can be formally declared, as well as tests to confirm that it is an actual meteorite.

This confirmation seems likely.

The accurately named Campo del Cielo is blistered with craters caused by a powerful meteor shower 4000 to 4700 years ago. At least 26 craters spread across an area of less than 2 x 12 miles.

Excavation at the site has already revealed an estimated 100 tons of space debris.

The undisputed champion of meteorites is called Hoba and was found in Namibia almost a century ago. Hoba weighs a whopping 66 tons. Though it has been fully uncovered, it has never been moved from its discovery location due to its enormous size. Hoba is thought to have slammed into our planet about 80,000 years ago, and is estimated to be between 190 million and 410 million years.

Gancedo's competition for the second largest is El Chaco. Weighing in at 37 tons, Chaco is also from the Campo del Cielo, and is therefore a brother of Gancedo, so to speak, likely arrived in the same space shower.

"While we hoped for weights above what had been registered, we did not expect it to exceed 30 tons," the president of the Astronomy Association of Chaco, Mario Vesconi, told the Xinhua news agency. "The size and weight surprised us."

"We could compare the weight with the other large meteorite found in the province. Although we expected it to be heavier, we did not expect it to exceed 30 tons," Vesconi reported to the Argentinian government news service, Telam.

"We will weigh it again. Apart from wanting the added confidence of a double-check of the initial readings we took, the fact that its weight is such a surprise to us makes us want to recalibrate."

--------------------

About Meteorites

Eugen Zibiso Hoba, the largest known meteorite on Earth, was declared a national monument in Namibia in 1955. It has never been moved, but is a popular tourist destination, visited by thousands each year.

A meteorite is a solid piece of debris from an object, such as a comet, asteroid, or meteoroid, that originates in outer space and survives its passage through the Earth's atmosphere and impact with the Earth's surface. When the object enters the atmosphere, various factors like friction, pressure, and chemical interactions with the atmospheric gases cause it to heat up and radiate that energy. It then becomes a meteor and forms a fireball, also known as a shooting/falling star; astronomers call the brightest examples "bolides." Meteorites that survive atmospheric entry and impact vary greatly in size. For geologists, a bolide is a meteorite large enough to create a crater.

Meteorites that are recovered after being observed as they transit the atmosphere or impact the Earth are called meteorite falls. All others are known as meteorite finds.

Meteorites have traditionally been divided into three broad categories: stony meteorites are rocks, mainly composed of silicate minerals; iron meteorites that are largely composed of metallic iron-nickel; and, stony-iron meteorites that contain large amounts of both metallic and rocky material. Modern classification schemes divide meteorites into groups according to their structure, chemical and isotopic composition and mineralogy. Meteorites smaller than 2 mm are classified as micrometeorites. Extraterrestrial meteorites are such objects that have impacted other celestial bodies, whether or not they have passed through an atmosphere. They have been found on the moon and Mars.
Claim: A Certified Registration of Birth issued in Kenya documents that Barack Obama was born in that country. Rating: About this rating False

On 2 August 2009, realtor/dentist/lawyer Dr. Orly Taitz Esq. unveiled her latest piece of dubious evidence in her long-running quest to demonstrate that President Barack Obama was not born in the United States of America: A photograph of a document purporting to be a Certified Copy of Registration of Birth issued by the Republic of Kenya in February 1964 which recorded a "Barack Hussein II " as having been born to Barack Hussein Obama and Stanley Ann (Dunham) Obama in Mombasa, Kenya, in August 1961. Said document was reportedly obtained by Dr. Taitz from "an anonymous source" who didn't want his name disclosed because he was "afraid for his life":



The document is dated 17 February 1964 and a bears a legend identifying it as having been issued by the "Republic of Kenya," but Kenya (a former British colony) didn't officially adopt that name until 12 December 1964. In February 1964, it was known as the Dominion of Kenya.

1964. In February 1964, it was known as the Dominion of Kenya.

The listed age of Barack Obama's father is incorrect. (Barack Obama Sr. was born in 1936 and therefore would have been 24 or 25 years old at the time of Barack Jr.'s birth, not 26 as shown on the document.)

old at the time of birth, not 26 as shown on the document.)

Mombasa is very far (several hundred miles) away from the part of Kenya in which Barack Obama Sr.'s family lived. Even if Barack Obama's parents and family had wanted to travel away from their home so his birth could take place at hospital facilities within a large city, they would likely have set out for the much closer city of Nairobi.



Within a few days the certificate was clearly revealed to be a fake  it was actually a forgery based on a copy of an Australian Registration of Birth issued to one David Jeffrey Bomford (who was born in South Australia in 1959) which was grabbed off the Internet and used as a template for creating the fake Kenyan certificate:

names  the

G.F. Lavender,

E.F. Lavender

J.H. Miller,

M.H. Miller.

When reporters tracked down David Bomford, who currently lives in Adelaide, South Australia, for comment, he was somewhat bemused at having become the focus of an international news story:

Bomford said it was hard to believe "a grey-haired old guy sitting in a corner in quiet old Adelaide" had been swept up in a push to unseat the most powerful man in the world. "It is interesting someone from here being involved in a conspiracy  that is so funny," he told public broadcaster ABC. Bomford said he knew nothing about the "birthers'" claims. He said the fake Kenyan birth certificate contained his personal details and was clearly based on his own South Australian document. "It's definitely a copy of my certificate. It's so laughable it's ridiculous," he said. Bomford said he only expected relatives researching their family tree would be interested in the document when it was posted on the Internet.



Dr. Taitz declined to throw in the towel and admit she was duped by a forgery, however, instead claiming that the "Bomford [birth certificate] was created to try to discredit my efforts" and suggesting that hoaxsters had created an identical (phony) Kenyan Registration of Birth in order to discredit her genuine (phony) Kenyan Registration of Birth.

Another Barack Obama "Kenyan birth certificate" of dubious origin was offered for sale by one Lucas Smith via eBay in August 2009:

Obama Jr.'s

Obama Sr.'s

The image is part of the extremely ill-informed conspiracy theory that Obama was born in Mombasa  conveniently, one of the more Muslim parts of the country. This has always been a red flag for conspiracy theorists, so it deserves some explanation. Barack Obama Sr. was born and educated in Nyanza Province, in southwestern Kenya, on Lake Victoria. This is the area where Obama's family lived and continues to live; Sarah Obama, the step-grandmother of the president, lives in Nyang'oma Kogelo, a small town in the province. But Mombasa is a city on the Indian Ocean, a thousand miles to the east. It didn't even have an international airport until 1979.





In September 2009, Orly Taitz attempted to introduce the second "Kenyan birth certificate" in the case of Rhodes v. MacDonald as evidence that Barack Obama was born outside the United States U.S. District Court Judge Clay Land dismissed the complaint and threatened to sanction Ms. Taitz if she filed any similarly frivolous motions in the future:

Plaintiff has demonstrated no likelihood of success on the merits. Her claims are based on sheer conjecture and speculation. She alleges no factual basis for her "hunch" or "feeling" or subjective belief that the President was not born in the United States ... Unlike in Alice in Wonderland, simply saying something is so does not make it so. Plaintiff's counsel, who champions herself as a defender of liberty and freedom, seeks to use the power of the judiciary to compel a citizen, albeit the President of the United States, to "prove his innocence" to "charges" that are based [solely] upon conjecture and speculation. Any middle school civics student would readily recognize the irony of abandoning [the] fundamental principles upon which our country was founded in order to purportedly "protect and preserve" those very principles. Plaintiff's counsel is hereby notified that the filing of any future actions in this Court, which are similarly frivolous, shall subject counsel to sanctions.



A spoof web site, the Republic of Kenya Birth Certificate Generator, allows Internet users to create their very own fake Certified Registration of Birth documents from Kenya.
Puppet Adds Two New Executives to Accelerate Its Rapid Growth

PORTLAND, OR  (Marketwired)  09/15/16  , the standard for automating the delivery and operation of the software that powers everything around us, today announced the appointment of two new executives with extensive experience in scaling billion-dollar businesses. Gary Green joins Puppet as senior vice president of worldwide sales. Gary most recently served at VMware as vice president of worldwide sales for the network and security business unit, where he grew the NSX line from $2.5 million in revenue to $600 million in four years. Celebrated HR leader Mike Guerchon joins Puppet as chief people officer (CPO). Mike previously led human resources at Riverbed during the period when the company scaled from 100 to 2,800 employees around the world.

Puppet is growing fast, expanding across the globe, and pushing hard to enable every organization to adopt the transformative innovations that can make technology a competitive advantage, said Luke Kanies, founder and CEO of Puppet. As we accelerate our growth with Gary leading our sales organization and Mike leading our people organization, we have the leadership in place to ensure that we not only grow fast, but do so while maintaining our great culture. Im proud of where we are today, but even more excited for whats coming.

Gary Green is a veteran sales leader who has extensive experience building billion dollar businesses through high functioning sales organizations. Gary joined VMware when the company had just over 100 employees, and was instrumental in building it into a world-class sales organization. In his most recent role at VMware, Gary was vice president of worldwide sales for the network and security business unit, where he grew the NSX line from $2.5 million to more than $600 million in sales in four years. Prior to this role, Gary was vice president of Global Strategic Alliances at VMware, a group he grew from zero to $1 billion in revenue. Before embarking on his celebrated career at VMware, Gary was part of the leadership team at Synopsys when the company grew from less than $100 million in sales to more than $1 billion in revenue.

Theres no better technology available today than Puppet for businesses to modernize IT so they can deliver new value to their customers faster than ever, said Gary. I look forward to capitalizing on this massive opportunity through global expansion and aggressively scaling our channel so we can help all of our customers adapt to the realities of modern business.

Mike joins Puppet from Riverbed, where he led Human Resources from 2005 to 2015 while the company scaled from $2 million to $1.2 billion in revenue, grew from 100 to 2,800 employees in 43 countries, and went public. During this high-growth phase, Mike helped build an organization that enabled people to do their best work by fostering diversity, communication, and a great work environment. Mike has a proven ability to build organizations that have been the drivers of hyper growth and have been celebrated for their culture. Under his leadership, Riverbed was ranked number four globally on Glassdoors Top 25 Companies for Culture and Values in 2014, and ranked in the top 20 worldwide in Glassdoors Best Places to Work in 2013 and 2014.

Puppet is in a position most people dream of, said Mike. It has a great product in a huge market, and is driven by a fantastic team. Were going to build on this foundation by creating a work environment that maximizes everyones individual potential. Ill know weve succeeded when our employees are able to take their careers and personal development further than they thought possible.

Puppet is now used by more than 33,000 companies around the world including 75 percent of the Fortune 100.

Puppet Enterprise customers include the three largest banks in the world, including some of the largest banks in the U.S., China, and Australia.

Strong growth in EMEA accounted for 25 percent of bookings in Q2.

More than 470 people work for Puppet today.

Learn more about .

Subscribe to the .

Follow Puppet on Twitter .

Try Puppet Enterprise for .

Puppet is driving the movement to a world of unconstrained software change. Its revolutionary platform is the industry standard for automating the delivery and operation of the software that powers everything around us. More than 33,000 companies  including more 75 percent of the Fortune 100  use Puppets open source and commercial solutions to adopt DevOps practices, achieve situational awareness and drive software change with confidence. Based in Portland, Oregon, Puppet is a privately held company with more than 470 employees around the world. Learn more at puppet.com.
BBG Management Corporation Ranks No. 39 on the 2016 PROFIT 500

OTTAWA, ONTARIO  (Marketwired)  09/15/16  Today, Canadian Business and PROFIT ranked BBG Management Corporation No. 39 on the 28th annual PROFIT 500, the definitive ranking of Canadas Fastest-Growing Companies. Published in the October issue of Canadian Business and at PROFITguide.com, the PROFIT 500 ranks Canadian businesses by their five-year revenue growth. BBG Management Corporation (BBG) made the 2016 list with a five-year revenue growth of 2,033%.

Companies become a part of the PROFIT 500 through innovative thinking, smart strategy and sheer grit, says James Cowan, Editor-in-chief of PROFIT and Canadian Business. These firms demonstrate what Canadian entrepreneurs can achieve, both at home and across the globe.

BBG is very pleased to be recognized as one of Canadas Fastest Growing Companies, says BBGs CEO John Gabriel. BBGs growth is attributed to the value that our team delivers, the strength of our culture, and the commitment to our strategy. Our growth objectives over the next five years are very aggressive, and we are looking forward to lots of hard work and continued success.

Visit website:

Twitter:

LinkedIn:

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About BBG Management Corporation

BBG Management Corporation is a Global Technology and Business Process Services Firm.

Our Technology Services provide our clients with proven and innovative cloud and workload management, application modernization, data virtualization, data security, data management, and desktop/device management solutions.

Our Business Process Services offer our clients full-time permanent staffing, temporary staff augmentation and recruiting business process outsourcing solutions. Each service leverages over twenty years of recruiting best practices, ensuring that the candidates we submit meet your technical, financial and cultural requirements, guaranteed.

About PROFIT and PROFITguide.com

PROFIT: Your Guide to Business Success is Canadas preeminent media brand dedicated to the management issues and opportunities facing small and mid-sized businesses. For 34 years, Canadian entrepreneurs across a vast array of economic sectors have remained loyal to PROFIT because its a timely and reliable source of actionable information that helps them achieve business success and get the recognition they deserve for generating positive economic and social change. Visit PROFIT online at PROFITguide.com.

About Canadian Business

Founded in 1928, Canadian Business is the longest-serving, best-selling and most-trusted business publication in the country. With a total brand readership of more than 1.1 million, it is the countrys premier media brand for executives and senior business leaders. It fuels the success of Canadas business elite with a focus on the things that matter most: leadership, innovation, business strategy and management tactics. We provide concrete examples of business achievement, thought-provoking analysis and compelling storytelling, all in an elegant package with bold graphics and great photography. Canadian Business-what leadership looks like.

Contacts:

Media contact:

BBG Management Corporation

John Gabriel

President, Chairman and CEO

(613) 789-8080 ext.777
Independent Research Firm Cites Neo4j as a Strong Performer in Big Data NoSQL Report

SAN MATEO, CA  (Marketwired)  09/15/16  Neo Technology, creator of , the worlds leading graph database, announced today it has been named a strong performer in report by Forrester Research. Forrester evaluated Big Data NoSQL technology from 15 vendors using criteria categorized by current offering, strategy and market presence. Information gleaned from the report indicates that more than 60 percent of surveyed enterprises already have implemented or plan on implementing NoSQL solutions within the next 12 months.

The Forrester NoSQL Wave contains expert analysis of the key differentiators, future outlook and use case suitability for more than 15 of the top commercial NoSQL vendors within this quickly-changing market. The report also explains why technology decision makers select NoSQL DBMS for their ability to enable elastic scale, support flexible data models, lower data management costs and deliver extreme read and write speeds.

The Forrester report also states that Neo4j is the most popular graph databaseIt supports transactional operations in the context of mission-critical systems running real-time queries. Customer feedback indicates that Neo4js key strengths are its ability to support native storage and processing of graph data models and its fully ACID-compliant, flexible data models, plus high performance for connected data. (1)

According to the report, customers often use it for real-time recommendations, graph-based search, social networking, fraud detection, network and identity management and master data management.

This recognition by Forrester builds on the global recognition that Neo4j has received this year. In April, the company announced its involvement in working with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) to uncover the , the worlds largest offshore finance expose involving thousands of celebrities and millions of data points.

Neo4j transformed our investigative journalism process due to its ability to pinpoint where the criminality lies, who works with whom, and ultimately helped us uncover the biggest news story of the decade, said the ICIJs research unit director, Mar Cabra. Understanding relationships at massive scale is where graph technology truly excels.

Mar Cabra will discuss the Panama Papers use case at Neo4js annual conference, taking place on Thursday, October 13-14 in San Francisco.

Interest in Neo4j is skyrocketing and we credit this to the fact that companies are discovering immense value of relationships and they are looking to Neo Technology as the leading innovator in the space, said Emil Eifrem, CEO and co-founder of the Neo4j project. The level of recognition weve experienced further validates our company strategy, product integrity and vision for helping companies become better at analyzing the relationships and interconnections in their data. Graph databases are going mainstream and Neo4j is leading this movement.

Neo Technology is the creator of Neo4j, the worlds leading graph database. Neo4j is a highly scalable native graph database that leverages data relationships as first-class entities to help companies build intelligent applications that meet todays evolving connected data challenges including fraud detection, real-time recommendations, master data management, network security and IT operations.

Global enterprises like Walmart, UBS, Cisco, HP, adidas Group and Lufthansa and hot startups like Medium, Musimap and Glowbl rely on Neo4j to harness the connections in their data.

(1) Forrester, The Forrester Wave: Big Data NoSQL, Q3 2016, Noel Yuhanna, Gene Leganza and Christian Austin, August 17, 2016

Tanya Carlsson

Kulesa Faul for Neo Technology, Inc.

707-529-6139
ERF Wireless Continues Restructuring Efforts

LEAGUE CITY, TX  (Marketwired)  09/15/16  ERF Wireless Inc. (OTC PINK: ERFB) today announced that it intends to engage the firm of Asset Econometrics Inc. (AEI), a Dallas-based turnaround and workout company, to evaluate the company and its options regarding the possibility of debt restructuring and/or bankruptcy. The company has significantly declined due to the major drop in oil prices and has over the past two years sold off some of its assets to shed itself of a major debt burden but continues to be in financial distress. In addition to the evaluation of the companys current options, AEI will also provide its suggestions to the company as to how it may move forward in the future. AEI will also be talking to the creditors of the company to assess the possibility of completing a non-judicial restructuring without the necessity of a Chapter proceeding. Please visit our website at and or call 281-538-2101. (ERFWG). For further information call Wade Westheimer 214-280-1975.

Forward-Looking Information:

The information in this release may contain forward-looking statements relating to anticipated or expected events, activities, trends or results. Forward-looking statements, can be identified by the use of forward looking terminology such as believes, suggests, expects, may, goal, estimates, should, likelihood, plans, targets, intends, could, or anticipates, or the negative thereof, or other variations thereon, or comparable terminology, or by discussions of strategy or objectives. Because forward-looking statements relate to matters that have not yet occurred, these statements are inherently subject to risks and uncertainties. These statements are made to provide the public with managements current assessment of our business, and it should not be assumed that that the forward-looking statements will prove to be correct. Security holders are cautioned that such forward- looking statements involve risks and uncertainties. The forward-looking statements contained in this release only as of the date hereof, and we expressly disclaim any obligation or undertaking to report any updates or revisions to any such statement to reflect any change in managements expectations or any change in events, conditions or circumstances on which any such statement is based. Certain factors may cause results to differ materially from those anticipated by some of the statements made in this release. Please carefully review our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission as we have identified many risk factors that impact our business plan.

Wade Westheimer

Asset Econometrics Inc. (AEI)

Tel: 214-280-1975
Ingram Micro Launches Automated Cloud Marketplace Platform in Portugal

LISBON, PORTUGAL  (Marketwired)  09/15/16  To support the increasing demand for cloud computing, Ingram Micro Inc. (NYSE: IM) today announced the Ingram Micro Cloud Marketplace, a leading automated cloud services platform, is now available in Portugal.

This further extends the European roll-out of the Ingram Micro Cloud Marketplace which is currently available in Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.

The Ingram Micro Cloud Marketplace is an ecosystem that brings together buyers and sellers, enabling them to conduct business on a single platform. Rather than building out a comprehensive and multi-layered infrastructure, resellers can leverage the pre-built, flexible platform from Ingram Micro to purchase, provision, manage and invoice technology solutions including Microsoft Office 365, Dropbox Business, Nomadesk, and Acronis Cloud Backup for their end-user clients.

We are pleased to provide a flexible and customizable infrastructure to our channel partners in Portugal and empower them to focus on their core competencies rather than divert valuable resources to building a cloud platform infrastructure, said Juame Soler, executive director, Portugal and Spain, Ingram Micro. The Ingram Micro Cloud Marketplace presents a true competitive advantage for our partners by helping them reduce time-to-market and deliver streamlined cloud management solutions through a single online portal.

With Ingram Micro Cloud, we will be able to access the tools, technology and platform needed to completely redefine our business infrastructure, said Pedro Duque, Technical Director at Informantem S.A. In addition, through this partnership we will have the ability to better respond to our end-clients needs and compete more efficiently in todays disruptive marketplace.

To learn more about the Ingram Micro Cloud Marketplace, please visit: .

Ingram Micro Cloud empowers service providers and partners to monetize and manage the entire lifecycle of cloud services, infrastructure, and IoT subscriptions, so they can simplify digital transformation with confidence, speed and agility. For more information, please visit: .

Ingram Micro helps businesses Realize the Promise of Technology. It delivers a full spectrum of global technology and supply chain services to businesses around the world. Deep expertise in technology solutions, mobility, cloud, and supply chain solutions enables its business partners to operate efficiently and successfully in the markets they serve. Unrivaled agility, deep market insights and the trust and dependability that come from decades of proven relationships, set Ingram Micro apart and ahead. More at .

Jaume Benitez

Ingram Micro Cloud

Danielle Gaut

Ingram Micro Cloud
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A Glastonbury man who went undercover and became a Mormon as "a joke" and to "expose the religion" has criticised the faith, calling it "false" and a "cult".

On his Youtube channel, comedian Danny Hyde has released video blogs explaining his time in the religion, including one 15-minute video that includes footage of followers of the Mormon religion attempting to convert him and his baptism.

"I want to make it perfectly clear that I never set out to do this," he said.

"They came to my house and tried to convert me. When I asked them clear and simple questions about what they were telling me they answered me in riddles that had no relevance to the question that I just asked.

"In the end I got so frustrated that I sarcastically announced that I all of a sudden agreed with everything they had just said.

"Unable to read my quite obvious sarcasm they asked me if they could book a date for my baptism and I said 'yes'.

"I never expected to go through with it but with a little push from my friends and a personal thirst for an understanding of what their religion was about, I decided to see if I could get baptised without them realising I was a fraud.

"It wasn't as easy as I thought it was going to be, I felt like James Bond going undercover on a top secret mission. It took a lot of guts, a lot of acting and a constant battle with my conscience."

Danny said he understands people could think what he did was wrong, but he has defended his actions. He is now trying to warn people against joining the religion.

"I know on the surface it seems what I did was wrong, but as I realised the extent of the lies that the church feeds its victims in order to keep them obedient, I began to realise exposing them for what they are was a good thing and the guilt began to fade," he said.

"In the three months I spent as a Mormon, I learnt a lot about the church and I feel people should know what they are really about.

"It is not a harmless little religion like they want people to think it is. It is a cult, started by a convicted conman, conning people into believing complete lies, in order to amass huge financial wealth.

"I made a video on YouTube that has been very well received by ex-Mormons from all over the world, who like me, are passionate about exposing the church for what it really is.

"If I can stop one person from joining them, or make one person leave them, I feel like becoming an undercover Mormon was three months well spent."

Somerset Live approached Malcolm Adcock, spokesman for the Mormon faith in the UK - officially known as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints - for his response.

Mr Adcock said: "Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints strive to live their lives in accordance with the teachings of Jesus Christ. These missionaries have accepted the Saviour's invitation to share His teachings by sacrificing their time and means to invite others to learn about Jesus Christ. Mr Hyde's choice to act as he did does not diminish the importance of the gospel truths shared by missionaries who tried to help him."
5 seats up for election on St. Joseph County Council, majority at stake

Five of the nine seats on the St. Joseph County Council are up for election
DECATUR  Judge Thomas Harris, Jr. sees the U.S. Constitution as a document that has withstood the test of time.

While the wording of the Constitution has remained the same since it was ratified in 1792, Harris said Thursday during a presentation at Richland Community College that that hasn't stopped discussion about its meaning.

It's the interpretation that has changed, said Harris, who was speaking during Richland's annual Constitution Day recognition, which was held early this year because the actual day falls on Saturday.

Prior to serving as a Fourth District Appellate Court judge, Harris previously has worked as a lawyer and a judge in Logan County.

The Fourth Amendment, as it relates to search and seizure, has been of particular concern, Harris said.

He said 5,000 cases in Illinois have dealt with the Fourth Amendment over the years.

That amendment has been questioned as to its ability to ensure the safety of citizens while protecting their privacy rights, Harris said.

Those two are constantly competing against one another, Harris said.

The presentation was a chance for students to consider a topic of widespread importance, said Jason Brooks, vice president of Richland's Student Government Association.

We hope they take advantage of these opportunities, Brooks said. It gives us an understanding of an interpretation of the Constitution.

The Constitution can seem like a distant topic, said Alex Berry, Richland's coordinator of student engagement.

The Fourth Amendment is something that is on a lot of college students' minds, Berry said. It's something everybody should consider.

The Constitution can be difficult to interpret, which Harris said leads to so much discussion.

We don't really think about it enough, Harris said. It's such a broad document.

Harris said as a judge, he must find probable causes exists before approving a search warrant. He said exceptions are allowed, such as if somebody provides consent for the search, the search of a motor vehicle happens after a violation of a traffic law or in extenuating circumstances.

Harris gave the example of a motorist pulled over in what amounted to a legal search by Decatur police following a traffic violation when a trunk full of cocaine was found upon searching the vehicle.

Search warrants aren't always obtained, Harris said. That's not always illegal.

Harris said courts have struggled for years in deciding when Fourth Amendment protections apply or not. He said it's becoming increasingly difficult as technology has advanced and more digital information is available.
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DECATUR -- An image that invokes fire and knowledge is one way for the Decatur Public Library to build its brand.

And by the end of the year, the public will be able to see it in a new logo.

The simple design draws parallels to an open book and a torch and was enthusiastically supported Thursday evening by the Decatur Public Library Board.

Decaturs DCC Marketing created the logo as part of a $2,000 agreement to design several logos. The firm created 10 logos, and three were presented to the board.

Pam Morrow of DCC said the logo was inspired by the Greek mythology of Prometheus, who stole fire from Mount Olympus and brought it to man. But instead of the gift of fire, the Decatur Public Library would bring the gift of knowledge.

It invokes that classic sort of image of the flame with academics, Morrow said.

The only change to the logo that the board requested was to the text under the logo, which read knowledge, creativity, inspiration. Board member Mark Sorensen suggested it be changed to past, present, future, which drew praise from the board.

City Librarian Rick Meyer said the library has lacked a distinctive brand" that could appeal to teenagers and young, single-adults who do not use the library as often as other demographics.

We wanted something that was recognizable  and one that we could use to market to people who dont generally use our facility, he said.

The new logo could begin to be rolled out within the coming weeks. It will first be added to the website and to official business cards and documents.

In other business, the board approved the library investigating equipment that would add a significant technological upgrade to how books are checked out, checked in and sorted.

Among the updates would be a radio frequency tag in every rented material that would instantly update the system whenever they were checked in. It would also allow staff to better organize shelves, sending a signal that it is out of order.

Similar systems are in place at libraries like Champaign and Mahomet.

Its a neat project that brings us into the 21st century, Meyers said. It helps us keep control of our inventory and really serve our patrons better.

The next several months will see further negotiation before they send out a request for proposal. The quoted price for the upgrade is $365,000; with $200,000 covered by the Decatur Public Library Foundation. The rest would be covered by the librarys contingency fund, with the idea the foundation will pay them back after a capital campaign.
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An artists impression of meteors crashing into water on the young Earth. Did they bring phosphorous with them?

Meteorites that crashed onto Earth billions of years ago may have provided the phosphorous essential to the biological systems of terrestrial life.

The meteorites are believed to have contained a phosphorus-bearing mineral called schreibersite, and scientists have recently developed a synthetic version that reacts chemically with organic molecules, showing its potential as a nutrient for life.

Phosphorus is one of lifes most vital components, but it often goes unheralded. It helps form the backbone of the long chains of nucleotides that create RNA and DNA; it is part of the phospholipids in cell membranes; and is a building block of the coenzyme used as an energy carrier in cells, adenosine triphosphate (ATP). [7 Theories on the Origin of Life]

Yet the majority of phosphorus on Earth is found in the form of inert phosphates that are insoluble in water and are generally unable to react with organic molecules. This appears at odds with phosphorus ubiquity in biochemistry, so how did phosphorus end up being critical to life?

In 2004, Matthew Pasek, an astrobiologist and geochemist from the University of South Florida, developed the idea that schreibersite [(Fe, Ni) 3 P], which is found in a range of meteorites from chondrites to stony-iron pallasites, could be the original source of lifes phosphorus. Because the phosphorus within schreibersite is a phosphide, which is a compound containing a phosphorus ion bonded to a metal, it behaves in a more reactive fashion than the phosphate typically found on Earth.

Finding naturally formed schreibersite to use in laboratory experiments can be time-consuming when harvesting from newly fallen meteorites and expensive when buying from private collectors. Instead, it has become easier to produce schreibersite synthetically for use in the laboratory.

Natural schreibersite is an alloy of iron, phosphorous and nickel, but the common form of synthetic schreibersite that has typically been used in experiments is made of just iron and phosphorus, and is easily obtainable as a natural byproduct of iron manufacturing. Previous experiments have indicated it reacts with organics to form chemical bonds with oxygen, the first step toward integrating phosphorous into biological systems.

However, since natural schreibersite also incorporates nickel, some scientific criticism has pointed out that the nickel could potentially alter the chemistry of the mineral, rendering it non-reactive despite the presence of phosphides. If this were the case, it would mean that the experiments with the iron-phosphorous synthetic schreibersite would not represent the behavior of the mineral in nature.

"There was always this criticism that if we did include nickel it might not react as much," said Pasek.

Pasek and his colleagues have addressed this criticism by developing a synthetic form of schreibersite that includes nickel.

This 6-inch-wide (15 centimeters) fragment of the Seymchan meteorite found in Russia in 1967 is an iron-nickel pallasite. The long filament of dark grey material in the center is schreibersite. (Image credit: University of South Florida.)

Nickel-flavored schreibersite

In a recent paper published in the journal Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics, Pasek and lead author and geochemist Nikita La Cruz of the University of Michigan show how a form of synthetic schreibersite that includes nickel reacts when exposed to water. As the water evaporates, it creates phosphorus-oxygen (P-O) bonds on the surface of the schreibersite, making the phosphorus available to life. The findings seem to remove any doubts as to whether meteoritic schreibersite could stimulate organic reactions.

"Biological systems have a phosphorus atom surrounded by four oxygen atoms, so the first step is to put one oxygen atom and one phosphorous atom together in a single P-O bond," Pasek explained.

Terry Kee, a geochemist at the University of Leeds and president of the Astrobiology Society of Britain, has conducted his own extensive work with schreibersite and, along with Pasek, is one of the original champions of the idea that it could be the source of lifes phosphorus.

"The bottom line of what [La Cruz and Pasek] have done is that it appears that this form of nickel-flavored synthetic schreibersite reacts pretty much the same as the previous synthetic form of schreibersite," Kee said.

This puts to rest any criticism that previous experiments lacked nickel. [Read stories about the search for alien life]

A bubbling hydrothermal pool in the Myvatn area of Iceland. Could such pools have promoted phosphorus-oxygen bonds on the surfaces of schreibersite meteorites that had fallen into the pools? (Image credit: Keith Cooper)

Shallow pools and volcanic vents

Pasek described how meteors would have fallen into shallow pools of water on ancient Earth. The pools would then have undergone cycles of evaporation and rehydration, a crucial process for chemical reactions to take place. As the surface of the schreibersite dries, it allows molecules to join into longer chains. Then, when the water returns, these chains become mobile, bumping into other chains. When the pool dries out again, the chains bond and build ever larger structures.

"The reactions need to lose water in some way in order to build the molecules that make up life," said Pasek. "If you have a long enough system with enough complex organics, then, hypothetically, you could build longer and longer polymers to make bigger pieces of RNA. The idea is that at some point you might have enough RNA to begin to catalyze other reactions, starting a chain reaction that builds up to some sort of primitive biochemistry, but theres still a lot of steps we dont understand."

Demonstrating that nickel-flavored schreibersite, of the sort contained in meteorites, can produce phosphorus-based chemistry is exciting. However, Kee said further evidence is needed to show that the raw materials of life on Earth came from space.

"I wouldnt necessarily say that the meteoric origin of phosphorus is the strongest idea," he said. "Although its certainly one of the more pre-biotically plausible routes." [Fallen Stars: A Gallery of Famous Meteorites]

Despite having co-developed much of the theory behind schreibersite with Pasek, Kee pointed out that hydrothermal vents could rival the meteoritic model. Deep-sea volcanic vents are already known to produce iron-nickel alloys such as awaruite, and Kee says that the search is now on for the existence of awaruites phosphide equivalent in the vents: schreibersite.

"If it could be shown that schreibersite can be produced in the conditions found in vents  and I think those conditions are highly conducive to forming schreibersite  then youve got the potential for a lot of interesting phosphorylation chemistry to take place," said Kee.

Pasek agreed that hydrothermal vents could prove a good environment to promote phosphorus chemistry, with the heat driving off the water to allow the P-O bonds to form. "Essentially its this driving off of water that youve got to look for," he added.

Pasek and Kee both agreed that it is possible that both mechanisms  the meteorites in the shallow pools and the deep-sea hydrothermal vents  could have been at work during the same time period and provided phosphorus for life on the young Earth. Meanwhile David Deamer, a biologist from the University of California, Santa Cruz, has gone one step further by merging the two models, describing schreibersite reacting in hydrothermal fields of bubbling shallow pools in volcanic locations similar to those found today in locations such as Iceland or Yellowstone National Park.

Certainly, La Cruz and Paseks results indicate that schreibersite becomes more reactive as the environment in which it exists gets warmer.

"Although we see the reaction occurring at room temperature, if you increase the temperature to 60 or 80 degrees Celsius [140 or 176 degrees Fahrenheit], you get increased reactivity," said Pasek. "So, hypothetically, if you have a warmer Earth, you should get more reactivity."

One twist to the tale is the possibility that phosphorus could have bonded with oxygen in space, beginning the construction of lifes molecules before ever reaching Earth. Schreibersite-rich grains coated in ice and then heated by shocks in planet-forming disks of gas and dust could potentially have provided conditions suitable for simple biochemistry. While Pasek agreed with that idea in principle, he said he has "a hard time seeing bigger things like RNA or DNA forming in space without fluid to promote them."

This story was provided by Astrobiology Magazine, a web-based publication sponsored by the NASA astrobiology program. Follow us@Spacedotcom, Facebook or Google+.
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CLINTON -- When Paul Skowron came to Dr. John Warner Hospital to interview for its CEO job in January 2015, he couldn't figure out where he was supposed to go in.

He ended up, like many, Skowron said, who aren't from Clinton, standing in the parking lot scratching his head.

"The wall where the sign is now used to be this big, empty wall," Skowron said. "I didn't know where to go in, so I went in where everyone who isn't from here goes in -- the emergency room."

Beginning Sept. 1, Skowron ended the confusion with a new sign that at the same time revealed a new name -- Warner Hospital and Health Services. On Thursday, Warner showed off its new sign and renovated admitting and registration area with a tour and health fair.

Skowron is from Chicago and has worked in the medical field for 35 years. He said he thought while changing the sign it would be a good idea to update the hospital's name.

"It was the only hospital in the state starting with the word, 'doctor,' and that sounded very rural," Skowron said. "But we're not rural -- we're dead center in between Bloomington, Decatur, Lincoln, Springfield and Champaign. We wanted a name that would help let people know that we're more than just an emergency room and some beds."

To change the name, Skowron went to city hall -- Clinton owns the hospital -- and later through the required state and federal agencies. But first, he went to John Warner IV -- the last of the Warners. He owns Warner Farm Management in Clinton but lives in Rhode Island.

"I explained that I wanted to change the name, but to keep the Warner name, and he said it was a, 'capital idea,'" Skowron said. "I gave him some names to choose from, and he happened to choose the same one I liked."

The former admitting and registration area was, like the lack of a sign on the exterior, not inviting for patients and visitors.

"You walked in and there was no desk -- just a counter and some chairs were registration was being done," Warner risk manager Heather Schofield said. "There were also these ... interesting purple curtains."

Now there's a reception desk and a more separated registration area with tall dividers between each station.

"We wanted to improve patient confidentiality, and this gives us more space, too," Warner Chief Financial Officer Donna Weisner said.

Skowron said the old setup was uncomfortable, confusing and slow.

"We expanded it and made patient flow better, and the signage is better so people know where they're going," Skowron said.

Weisner said 19 Warner employees made up a focus group to help design the renovation. In addition to the admitting and registration upgrades, the chapel -- previously downstairs -- has been turned into a reflection room. The chapel has been moved to the second floor, closer to patient rooms.

Warner holds a health fair annually, and Skowron said he wanted to combine this year's fair with the open house for the new sign and renovation. There were booths featuring Warner's services, and also booths from nearby hospitals and healthcare companies.

The hospital was named after Dr. John Warner, who arrived in DeWitt County in 1842 and practiced medicine until 1856. He went into banking and donated money to build a hospital before his death in 1905. The city took ownership of the hospital in 1909.
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SPIEGEL: Your party can bluster and threaten all it wants, but you will ultimately have to find common ground with the CDU so as not to do too much damage to the CSU.

Seehofer: No one has to tell me that constant conflict, and I emphasize constant conflict, is damaging. But it is also true that policies will have to change if we want to win back trust.

SPIEGEL: There is something else that your party has to worry about: If the CDU was to establish a chapter in Bavaria at some point, it would be the end of the CSU's absolute majority in the state. Former CDU general secretary Ruprecht Polenz recently mentioned the possibility.

Seehofer: There are many brainy people from the past, but we're not particularly impressed with such talk. Our contact people are in Berlin, the chancellor first and foremost.

SPIEGEL: We have examined dozens of interviews that you have given in recent months. You talk a lot about refugee policy, but one thing is constantly left ambiguous, perhaps intentionally. What concrete steps does Angela Merkel have to take before you will say: "Okay, now we'll back off?"

Seehofer: We want a solution to the immigration problem. To do that, we first need a ceiling. We don't want unlimited immigration like we saw last year and that's why we need binding measures as a guarantee. When announcements are made that we are combatting the root causes of flight, then they must be combined with concrete measures. When it is said that those who don't have a right to asylum will be sent back, then we together with the federal government must enact a detailed, binding repatriation program. We want a clear system of rules that clearly and credibly reduces immigration to a reasonable level.

SPIEGEL: So you are sticking to your demand for a hard ceiling of 200,000 immigrants per year despite its potential inconsistencies with the guaranteed fundamental right to asylum?

Seehofer: Yes. We want a policy that safeguards this ceiling. We also, by the way, already changed the constitution to make this possible 23 years ago. With the support of all parties. Our constitution does not require us to take everybody who appears at our borders and demands asylum. And when someone comes from a safe country of origin, we can immediately repatriate them. The ceiling will work and it is consistent with the constitution.

SPIEGEL: The chancellor and several other CDU politicians have repeatedly insisted that they will not accept a ceiling. If the approval of such a ceiling is the prerequisite for an agreement, then there won't be any agreement.

Seehofer: We'll see. We will not back away from the 200,000 ceiling. It's about our credibility, plain and simple.

SPIEGEL: Given that anything seems possible at this point, is a situation conceivable whereby the CDU enters the campaign with Merkel as its candidate for chancellor and the CSU says: We won't support her?

Seehofer: We as a party will make personnel decisions in the first quarter of 2017. German history is full of serious mistakes pertaining to premature personnel decisions.

SPIEGEL: Last weekend, CSU leaders presented a paper containing the party's refugee policy demands and it is full of odd sentences. Such as this one: "We are opposed to our cosmopolitan country being changed by immigration or refugee flows." How cosmopolitan can a country be if it doesn't want to be changed by immigration?

Seehofer: The paper's title is: "Germany Must Remain Germany." The chancellor has used almost the exact same formulation. When she says it, it's considered liberal and future oriented. When we say it, it's seen as reactionary and backwards.

SPIEGEL: Merkel never said that immigration cannot be allowed to change the country.

Seehofer: Look, Bavaria is a dynamic, cosmopolitan state. Those who don't adapt fall behind. But we need ground rules. In every governmental speech I give before state parliament, I say: Bavaria will remain Bavaria. That's not a contradiction.

SPIEGEL: There are other controversial sentences in your paper. "In the future, immigrants from our Christian-Western culture must be given priority." Do you intend to select immigrants based on their religion?

Seehofer: Nonsense. For people who must fear for their lives because of their religion or political convictions, the protection provided by Article 16a of the German constitution, the right to asylum, applies. Nobody is questioning that. Irrespective of that, there is immigration that must be regulated, to bring skilled personnel to Germany, for example. We have to establish criteria for that. Their affiliation with the Christian-Western culture should be one of them. Such people are the easiest to integrate.

SPIEGEL: You don't want any computer specialists from India in Bavaria?

Seehofer: We say "priority." That doesn't exclude a Chinese vice president of a Bavarian university, as we've had before. But even if we remain flexible, we need ground rules. That is what we are trying to express with this sentence.

SPIEGEL: The paper is full of sentences that lack clarity.

Seehofer: Oh my God, every Saturday I read sentences in SPIEGEL that lack clarity.

SPIEGEL: We just wonder whether the ambiguity is intentional. Whether you perhaps consciously intend to send messages to the far-right spectrum for which you have a different explanation in an interview with us.

Seehofer: Our thinking isn't nearly that serpentine. Our paper is being interpreted in all kinds of ways that aren't explicitly stated.

SPIEGEL: We just want to find out how certain things were meant.

Seehofer: I know full well what is being said about us in this one square kilometer of the Berlin government quarter and which false trails are being laid. We are always presented as the evil Bavarians who only want to throw a wrench in the system. When we say how we see things, we are instructed to adopt a more moderate tone. It's always the same game. And it's always the same people.

SPIEGEL: In the Bundestag recently, the chancellor called for the use of more moderate language. Do you think she was talking about you?

Seehofer: I wondered who she was talking about. One day later, I spoke with (SPD head) Sigmar Gabriel and he was wondering the same thing. There are nice political formulations that can apply to everyone and to nobody. I wouldn't know how I could be more reserved in my formulations than I already am.

SPIEGEL: Another question about your paper: In rejecting dual citizenship, the paper says that it is impossible to "serve two masters." We always thought that it wasn't citizens who served their state, but the other way around.

Seehofer: You aren't asking why we are opposed to dual citizenship. Instead, you are quibbling over locution. The sentence is true and completely okay. I am allergic to this paternalism and censorship.

SPIEGEL: In the paper, it says that the constitution applies in Germany and not Sharia law. Why do you insist on emphasizing something that goes without saying?

Seehofer: Unfortunately, that doesn't go without saying. You should conduct an interview with security policymakers about parallel justice systems in immigrant communities.

SPIEGEL: The sentence suggests that there is currently a struggle underway as to whether the constitution or Sharia applies. You are presenting it as a larger problem than it really is.

Seehofer: The only thing left is for you to ask: "When was the last time you encountered somebody wearing a burqa and does that justify the debate you are conducting?"

SPIEGEL: We mostly encounter women wearing burqas in the expensive shopping streets of Munich.

Seehofer: It's great if you don't think there are any problems. The people see things differently and they have a clear stance on burqas. As a party of the people, we make it clear that we take people's concerns seriously. That is our job. It's the best way to combat extremism from both the right and the left.

SPIEGEL: Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki of Cologne has accused you of doing the work of the right-wing populists.

Seehofer: I don't understand Mr. Woelki on that point. But I would be happy to speak with him about this misunderstanding.

SPIEGEL: The right-wing populist AfD has three main enemies: Angela Merkel, immigrants and the public broadcasting system. Ever since you went after public broadcasters ARD and ZDF and demanded their consolidation, one has the impression that the AfD's enemies are the same as the CSU's enemies.

Seehofer: First of all, Angela Merkel and the CDU are not our political adversaries. The CDU and the CSU are sister parties. When it comes to ARD and ZDF, I am interested in the question as to how they can be more efficient in the future. They are, after all, financed by contributions from German citizens. That is completely different than the "lying press " accusations made by the AfD.

SPIEGEL: You have often complained about the news coverage of the public broadcasters. And now you want to consolidate them.

Seehofer: The focus here is on media policy. You at SPIEGEL also talk about how you should adjust to the changing media world. I am on the ZDF administrative board. There are myriad structures at this broadcaster that remind one of a government agency. I want to talk about how we can improve programming while at the same time lowering contributions.

SPIEGEL: You are constantly emphasizing how dissatisfied you are with politicians in Berlin. Would you be happy if Angela Merkel was to break Helmut Kohl's record of 16 years as German chancellor?

Seehofer: I hold Angela Merkel in high regard. But you won't get an answer from me to that question.

SPIEGEL: Mr. Seehofer, thank you for this interview.
Wholesale dairy commodity markets have risen sharply over the past four months, and yet some processors remain extremely slow to raise the price they pay farmers, says Mike Butler, chairman of the board at Old Mill. The frustration being felt by milk producers is matched by their concern that milk buyers and processors are focusing on their own bottom lines rather than considering the health of the dairy industry as a whole.

The prolonged period of low prices, caused by global oversupply of milk, has sent many farmers into a loss-making position, but a tightening of supply and the weaker sterling have boosted wholesale returns by almost 68% since April, to the equivalent of 26p/litre in August. In contrast, the average farmgate price in July was 20.57p/litre, compared to a cost of production of around 28p/litre.

Global and domestic milk output has dropped and UK dairy farmers have no appetite to keep production levels up while milk is so undervalued, says Mr Butler. The weaker pound against the euro has also made imported dairy products more expensive, fuelling the increase in the spot price of domestic milk.

UK spot milk prices typically track cream values, which in turn tend to follow currency movements, reflecting the importance of the import/export trade across the channel and the Irish Sea (see graph). Generally farmgate prices follow the trend of the spot market albeit with some small time delays.

However, since April, wholesale cream prices have jumped by 84%, to 1,470/t, and yet farmgate prices have failed to respond to this upward trend, showing only a 3% rise between June and July to 20.57p/litre  1p/litre below the April average. So why is that? Part of the answer may lie in onerous milk contracts which many producers are bound by, explains Mr Butler. Notice periods and penalty clauses are all contributing factors that allow processors to control their farm producers without taking reference to market forces.
Supporting the AHDB Export team, NSA played a major role at a reception in Berne for companies and organisations involved in buying and supplying lamb. Phil Stocker, NSA Chief Executive, spoke at the event hosted by David Moran, the British Ambassador to Switzerland and Lithuania. Mr Stocker presented an overview of UK sheep farming with a focus on its many sustainability credentials.

Despite not being part of the EU, Switzerland enjoys a trade relationship with member states by way of bilateral agreements. The UK has not needed to hold a Swiss export certificate for red meat under its EU membership, although this will clearly change post-Brexit.

Mr Stocker says:

Switzerland is one of the most developed countries in the world, ranked first in terms of nominal wealth per adult. This affluence means product quality is key and consumers have a good grasp on social and environmental issues. Switzerland is a net importer of lamb and its values and interests align well with the UKs high welfare standards and sustainable approach to sheep farming.

The trip this week provided an excellent opportunity to engage with Swiss buyers and suppliers of lamb in the presence of the British Ambassador and representatives of the British Department of International Trade. The guests accounted for the vast majority of the Swiss lamb trade and it was a unique opportunity to talk about the many benefits of UK sheep farming and how it is closely linked to landscape, environment, wildlife and rural communities.
SPRINGFIELD  An organization with close ties to Republican Gov. Bruce Rauners administration that bills itself as nonpartisan is releasing a new documentary that takes a critical look at Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan of Chicago, who also leads the state Democratic Party.

Illinois Policy Actions Madigan: Power, privilege, politics comes as the Republican Party is trying to use the long-serving speakers unpopularity to bring down fellow Democrats in legislative races this fall.

The film, which the group says will offer an unprecedented look at the life and influence of ... one of the states most powerful political figures of all time, is scheduled for an October release online and in select movie theaters across the state.

Illinois Policy Action, the advocacy branch of the conservative Illinois Policy Institute, is registered as a tax-exempt social welfare organization, which means its barred from engaging in partisan politics. But the organization has close ties to Rauner.

Before he was elected in 2014, Rauners family foundation gave the policy institute a series of donations totaling $625,000. More recently, John Tillman, the groups CEO, joined the governor and others last week in interviewing potential replacements for former state Sen. Matt Murphy, a Palatine Republican who resigned his seat to become a lobbyist.

Diana Rickert, a spokeswoman for the policy institute, said Tillman participated on his own time and not in his capacity as head of the organization. As for Rauners contributions, they were made before he was running for office and represented a small fraction of the organizations annual budgets, she said.

Rickert said the documentary is being released weeks before the election because it makes sense to put it out when voters are paying close attention to politics and government.

The trailer for the documentary, which can be viewed at michaelmadigan.com, highlights Madigans 45 years in office and three decades as House speaker, and the accompanying news release emphasizes Illinois lack of term limits for elected officials.

Those are also major talking points for Rauner and his fellow Republicans this campaign season.

However, Aaron DeGroot, a spokesman for the Illinois GOP, said the party had no involvement with this documentary.

Politically motivated documentaries arent a new phenomenon.

In fact, a groups attempt to make a 2008 documentary about Hillary Clinton, titled Hillary: The Movie, available through video-on-demand services ahead of that years Democratic presidential primary led to the U.S. Supreme Courts landmark Citizens United decision.

That decision, in turn, created fertile soil for the growth of social welfare groups such as Illinois Policy Action, which arent required to disclose their donors or most of their expenditures.

Edwin Bender, executive director of the Montana-based National Institute on Money in State Politics, said this is the first hes heard of a social welfare group producing this type of documentary at the state level.

But Bender said its a natural extension of other activities these groups have engaged in across the country, including campaign-style tactics like opening field offices, knocking on doors, sending out mailers and making phone calls.

Any (social welfare group) that says its nonpartisan  thats the letter of the law, but their activities belie that, whether its conservative or liberal, Bender said. (These groups) are designed to be involved in elections.

The organizations typically argue that theyre advocating on issues, not doing election work, he said.

Thats a thinly veiled excuse for being involved in electioneering, Bender said. Theyre conforming to the letter of the law, but the spirit of the law has long ago vanished.

Kent Redfield, an emeritus professor of political science at the University of Illinois at Springfield, said he hasnt seen the film, but given the Illinois Policy Institutes various ties to Rauner and the Republican Party, he doesnt expect it to be evenhanded.

All of those things would indicate that this is probably not produced with an eye of airing it on PBS, said Redfield, who was invited to be interviewed for the film but didnt respond.

Madigan was also invited to take part, but spokesman Steve Brown said that invitation was added to a long list of other media requests.

As for the groups claims of nonpartisanship, Brown said: Its just a dark money lobbying group. They make a mockery of anything thing that is remotely viewed as nonpartisan.

Rickert countered that a lot of people misunderstand what nonpartisan means.

Sometimes, were more aligned with politicians of a particular party on one issue over another, but we wont ever get involved in party politics, she said.
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NASA's Curiosity Mars rover has sent Earthlings a few more photos to look over as it continues to explore the landscape of the Red Planet.

And this batch of photos looks oddly familiar.

The photos are from an area of the planet called the "Murray Buttes," which is a region of lower Mount Sharp. The Martian buttes and mesas rising above the surface are eroded remnants of ancient sandstone that originated when winds deposited sand after lower Mount Sharp had formed.

MORE MARS: 'Skeletal remains' spotted in NASA Mars rover Curiosity photo

"Studying these buttes up close has given us a better understanding of ancient sand dunes that formed and were buried, chemically changed by groundwater, exhumed and eroded to form the landscape that we see today," Curiosity Project Scientist Ashwin Vasavada says in a news release.

These findings could lead to more proof to the theory that Mars once hosted life. Furthermore it comes after the rover successfully found evidence in 2014 on the surrounding plains of Mount Sharp that ancient Martian lakes could have offered conditions that would have been favorable for microbes if Mars ever hosted life.

OTHER WORLD BEAUTY: NASA rover takes interactive 360-degree panorama of Mars

We haven't found any conspiracy theorists claiming they see a Glock, or an alien's skull or anything else, but we'll keep you updated if the theorists' imaginations can form something we can't.

But for the meantime, take a look at the rock formations shared by NASA and the conspiracy theories already created with other photos from Mars in the gallery above.

MORE SIGHTINGS? Pretty sure this skull found on Mars is that of an alien or Bigfoot
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While NASA is hard at work determining if life ever existed on Mars, the internet has already found all the evidence it needs: shoes.

This week, UFO enthusiasts have spotted what they believe is real evidence of a long lost puma-wearing civilization.

"While looking though some Mars rover photos I found a lone shoe on the edge of the crater," said Scott Waring of ufosightingsdaily. "This is probably a shoe of a species that were at war in long ago, the shoe being the lone evidence that the person had ever existed."

READ MORE: Scientists' year-long Mars simulation on Hawaii volcano is about to end

In April, Waring supposedly discovered another shoe. But he's not the only one: a quick Google search will return dozens of different videos and theories from amateur astrologists trying to solve their own version of the mysterious Martian shoe. Never in pairs, some are made of leather, others have laces and some are sandals. The speculation is endless.

The phenomenon is known as pareidolia, or the mind's tendency to spot familiar patterns (like shoes) in randomness.

"The pareidolia phenomenon is actually a deeply rooted one, something that helps infants focus on faces early and also allowed humans in the wild to spot danger easilypicking a potentially menacing human or animal peering out from a backdrop of leaves or scrub," a Time article explained when the public noticed what it thought was a crab monster on Mars. "Yes, more often than not it's a false alarm, but better to overreact fifty times than under-react even once."

It is the same phenomenon behind seeing President Obama on Mars or Jesus on a piece of toast.

READ MORE: NASA rover takes interactive 360-degree panorama of Mars

Holger Isenberg is the creator of areo.info, a website that uploads colorized Mars photos from NASA. He says he receives messages from UFO enthusiasts every couple of weeks, but it doesn't bother him. In fact, he welcomes it.

"The curiosity about Mars' surface keeps the spirit of space flight alive and offers a good opportunity for later manned expeditions," Isenberg explained. "It's like centuries ago, when seafarers were looking if dragons existed on the far coast of the Atlantic Ocean."

While the internet is worried about finding life on Mars, NASA is worried about creating life on the planet by accidentally contaminating it with Earth's microbes. Needless to say, they won't be wearing shoes anytime soon.

Check out the images above of the strange things people have spotted on Mars.
E uropean banks were stunned today as it emerged the US Justice Department was planning to charge Deutsche Bank a huge $14 billion (10.6 billion) to settle claims it mis-sold toxic debts at the heart of the global financial crisis.

The figure is more than three times the amount analysts had forecast and would put huge pressure on the balance sheet of Germanys biggest lender. Shares in the bank dropped 7% today giving it a market value of just under 18 billion (15 billion).

Shares in Royal Bank of Scotland were hit hard by the news. It, too, is in the final stages of negotiating a settlement with the Justice Department over its role in mis-selling residential mortgage-backed securities in the run up to the global financial crisis.

Some analysts have speculated it might have to pay up to $13 billion. Its shares dropped 7.5p, or 4%, to 186.7p.

Barclays and Standard Chartered shares both dropped 2%. On the continent, bank stocks also tumbled, with Italys troubled Monte dei Paschi shares being suspended after crashing more than 7%.

Deutsche Bank has no intention to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited, Deutsche said.

The bank confirms market speculation of an opening position by the Department of Justice of $14 billion and that it has invited the bank as the next step to submit a counter-proposal.

The department declined to comment.

It is highly unusual for a bank to go so public when it is negotiating with US regulators. Deutsche said the case centred on its issuing and underwriting of residential mortgage-backed securities and related securitisations between 2005 and 2007.

The bank, headed by British banker John Cryan, said: The negotiations are only just beginning. The bank expects that they will lead to an outcome similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts.

In the past, the Justice Department has made a high opening bid with banks and then accepted a much lower figure.

In 2014 it asked Citigroup to pay $12 billion over mortgage-backed securities and then settled at $7 billion.

Other US banks which have reached settlements over the matter are JPMorgan Chase ($13 billion), Bank of America ($16.6 billion) and Goldman Sachs ($5 billion).

Cryan has insisted that Deutsche would not try to raise extra capital through a rights issue until it knows how much historic legal issues will cost it. But investors fear that a fund-raising is becoming more urgent.

European banks this week complained to regulators about the speed of new Basel reforms forcing them to boost their capital buffers.
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S hares in Avanti Communications spent a rare day in orbit as investors remained hopeful that the satellite data firm can secure a sale.

Avanti, whose value has shrunk by 80% this year on AIM, rocketed 5.5p, or 17%, to 37p as it confirmed it was still in talks with suitors, having hoisted the For Sale sign earlier in the summer amid crippling debts.

Upon the completion of due diligence by interested parties, the board intends to request best and final indicative offers for a potential acquisition or any strategic investment in the company, Avanti said.

Its shares more than halved in a single day in July when it warned it needed to raise at least $50 million (38 million) of equity as it slashed revenue targets. It today issued more loan notes to shore up its short-term finances.

Larger rival Inmarsat ruled out a bid for Avanti last month. Inmarsat, down 4.11p at 711.39p, announced that it had raised $400 million through a bond offering to repay a loan from the European Investment Bank.

Banking shares dragged the blue-chip FTSE 100 index lower on fears over Deutsche Banks potential $14 billion fine, leaving it down 17.95 points at 6712.35.

Morrisons provided analysts with enough evidence yesterday that its turnaround is on track as the Citys scribblers hailed the supermarkets groups first-half results.

Exane BNP Paribas and Bernstein removed their Sell ratings on the back of its surprise sales growth. The shares remained in favour, up 3.1p at 211.2p.

Gym Group slipped 12.62p to 210p as its private-equity backers Phoenix Equity Partners and Bridges Ventures decided to offload more shares. Between them, the pair sold 31.5 million worth of shares, leaving Phoenix with a 20% stake and Bridges with 10%.

The sale follows news this week that rival Pure Gym, the UKs largest gyms operator, is limbering up for a float.

Acacia Mining, the miner formerly known as African Barrick Gold, retreated 33.71p to 466.29p as it revealed setbacks at one of its Tanzanian mines.

On the junior market, troubled e-invoicing firm Tungsten Corp sank 0.5p to 63.25p as it set out its targets for the year.

The company, whose biggest shareholder is Crispin Odeys hedge fund, projected annual revenues of at least 30 million and an underlying earnings loss of between 12 million and 14 million, smaller than the 19 million loss it racked up last year.
L ike the Prime Minister, Theresa May, I only got where I am today because I went to grammar school. Perhaps you had guessed. There are, after all, a few grammar school tells, including a slightly superior manner, a basic understanding of English verbs and certain Shakespeare plays, and a deep-seated chippiness towards people who went to public school and thus managed to get a proper education without the warping need to pass a stressful exam at the age of 11.

Also like May, I believe grammar school did me some good. But that is neither here nor there. My prejudice leads me only to romanticise my schooldays. May wields more power. It is not quite a flick of her 11-plus passing wrist that rearranges the entire British secondary education system but it is not a great deal more.

Peering into ones own history for the solutions to current problems is a natural human instinct but that does not always mean it is right. I went to grammar school in Oxfordshire in the Seventies and I did OK, therefore every county in England should be opened up to selective education by the 2020s is a piece of bogus deduction that would alarm most scientists. It is bias and anecdote deployed as common sense in order to reach a pre-determined conclusion. Yet this was Mays boast at the Despatch Box in the House of Commons this week. Quip or no quip, the reasoning will stick.

Or perhaps this could be the new basis for government policy-making at large as we move towards the brave, post-rational, expert-scorning era of Brexit.

My dad was a churchman and I did all right  therefore all new fathers should be offered a parsonage in lieu of paternity leave. That might get the evangelical vote out.

For a few years I went to a convent school, and the nuns did me nothing but good: therefore let all female teachers wear a ring signifying their marriage to God, and refuse to wax their chin-hair. Its hard to know if the blue-rinse Tory shire wives would love that or hate it.

I read geography at Oxford, and look now! All first-year undergraduates must take a supplementary course to show that they have mastered the formation of an ox-bow lake. You might have trouble with the radical students who would demand trigger warnings before discussing potentially unsettling water-features, but otherwise it sounds fine.

Plainly this is an absurd method of reasoning. Yet you hear it all the time, from the back of the bus to the front benches of the Commons. When I was a child everyone smoked in pubs, and there werent so many bloody Romanians about. You see where that sort of thing gets us, and it is called Nigel Farage.

Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, educators are used to this. It is a tiresome fact of life that every decade or so a new government arrives with ideas about how to improve British schools. Virtually never do those ideas amount to leave them alone for a bit and let teachers teach. It is curious, because that policy would seem to be the very definition of conservatism. But as the great Sir Alex Ferguson used to growl at moments of looming controversy, Im no gettin intae all that.

Where Google can add to our cultural awareness

The Natural History Museum announced its partnership this week with the Google Cultural Institute, meaning if you cant be bothered to get on the Piccadilly line and schlep down to the magnificent Victorian building in South Kensington and queue for an hour among the school parties you can just sit at home and check out the dinosaurs and whale bones in 3D rendering on your iPhone.

Im a huge fan of the Google Cultural Institute. Undoubtedly we lose something by viewing art and artefacts online, rather than up close, but the instant, free access it allows to the best of museums and galleries across the world is opening up history and heritage to millions who might otherwise have no access at all. On balance, thats a wonderful thing.

Who will share my piece of Holy Grail?

A private collector in London this week announced the sell-off of a collection of memorabilia from the all-time medieval classic Monty Python and the Holy Grail. A plastic helmet worn by Graham Chapmans King Arthur is going for 600. But I have my eye on the model of the famous Trojan Rabbit. The only small problem is the asking price of 10 grand. Is anyone interested in kicking in if I set up a justgiving.com page?

In memory of a great little entertainer

Eric Tovey, the circus entertainer-turned-professional wrestler who went by the stage-name Lord Littlebrook, has died of Alzheimers, aged 87. His obituaries were absolute belters: born in London in 1929, Tovey made his fortune grappling in the US, as a cod-aristocratic character with a monocle and pencil moustache. He claimed he married six times, once made love to an underwater stripper and shot a man he found in bed with his wife but got off on a technicality.

Tovey was a midget wrestler: an un-PC term that, as the Rio Paralympics draws to a close, probably makes us cringe. He exploited his disability for laughs and money. But he was also a noble sportsman, of a sort, and as one of his fellow wrestlers said, he accomplished what he did regardless of all the odds against him. A Londoners life well lived, I think.
Theresa May hailed the future of British fashion and said the UK would continue being a "global leader" as London Fashion Week officially launched today.

The Prime Minister met with leading British designers and their apprentices at a special reception at No 10 last night attended by Christopher Bailey of Burberry, Charlotte Dellal of Charlotte Olympia and Dame Natalie Massenet, chairman of the British Fashion Council (BFC).

Mrs May invited the trainee designers to encourage more youngsters into the industry, with companies such as Mulberry, Jasper Conran, John Smedley, Roksanda Ilincic, Richard James and Lou Dalton now taking part in apprenticeship schemes.

The Prime Minister said: "British fashion is of huge importance to our country, contributing 28bn to the UK economy and supporting nearly 900,000 jobs. I was delighted to welcome representatives from across the industry to Downing Street ahead of London Fashion Week - which is one of the biggest and most influential fashion events in the world."

PM Theresa May / AP

"I was also pleased to welcome fashion apprentices, scholarship winners and graduate trainees who are the future of British fashion. The Government I lead will do everything we can, including providing the right investment in training and skills, to help everyone, whatever people's backgrounds, to go as far as their talents can take them. I am proud to say that our British fashion industry is a global leader in trade, creativity and innovation."

Workplace apprenticeships in London, in general, have increased by 47 per cent in four years with 257,290 youngsters signing up to one at the start of the academic year 2014/15.

Sam Lavelle, an apprentice at John Smedley, said: "Every day when I go to work I learn from people who are vastly experienced and knowledgeable in their field. Working for such a well known brand is a great opportunity and is, clearly, advantageous as it allows me to take part in large scale projects such as London Fashion Week which have a direct impact on the business."

Dame Natalie Massenet said: "London is unique. It is a great place to live and work. It is a dynamic fashion, business, creative and cultural capital and we have no doubt we will show it at its best over the next few days."

Fashion week sketches - in pictures 1 /17 Fashion week sketches - in pictures Front row etiquette Feeling feral Illustrations by Julie Houts for Stylebop.com Front row etiquette Sneaking in Illustrations by Julie Houts for Stylebop.com Front row etiquette A Victorian rodeo clown in Stan Smiths Illustrations by Julie Houts for Stylebop.com Front row etiquette The exhausted attendee Illustrations by Julie Houts for Stylebop.com Front row etiquette The party-girl guest Illustrations by Julie Houts for Stylebop.com Front row etiquette The peacock Illustrations by Julie Houts for Stylebop.com Front row etiquette The designer Illustrations by Julie Houts for Stylebop.com Front row etiquette The luxurious spartan Illustrations by Julie Houts for Stylebop.com Front row etiquette Models off-duty Illustrations by Julie Houts for Stylebop.com Front row etiquette The publicist Illustrations by Julie Houts for Stylebop.com Front row etiquette The "I'm just here to do my job" character Illustrations by Julie Houts for Stylebop.com Front row etiquette The snoozing guest Illustrations by Julie Houts for Stylebop.com Front row etiquette An eclectic mix Illustrations by Julie Houts for Stylebop.com

The BFC has teamed-up with City Hall to produce the latest #LondonIsOpen video showing behind the scenes footage at fashion shows and how the capital is at the cutting edge of creativity and innovation.

Mayor Sadiq Khan said: "London Fashion Week begins today, showing that London is open to the world and is an international leader of creativity and entrepreneurship. Theres a fantastic range of designers and talent on the schedule this season, highlighting the very best the industry has to offer  from big brands to independent retailers, the London fashion scene has never been more diverse. The fashion industry epitomises all that is great about the capital and Im delighted to see the British Fashion Council bring the industry together to support our #LondonIsOpen."
L ondon's nightlife is a mercurial proposition. There is no such thing as a prescribed evening; there is no certainty that the small, subterranean cell on Kingsland Road you were in on Saturday  hair slick with sweat, your arms imprinted with stamps  is still there this weekend.

Often these venues are Rooms of Requirement: the result of very specific moods and moments on one specific evening. One night you want something riotous and ridiculous, like Lady Gagas surprise gig at MOTH Club last Friday; next week youll want something different, and youll be south of the river. London will deliver.

Of course there is a loud chorus rightfully dismayed by the closure of major clubs  notably Plastic People, Fabric and Passing Clouds  and who argue that our clubs are being persecuted by legislation and villainous developers intent on sterilising the city. The closures are definitely worrying, and they mark a death of sorts.

In happier news, though, Mayor Sadiq Khan has pledged to protect London clubbing culture  including employing a Night Mayor  and optimists suggest tentatively that the Night Tube might recharge the industry. The partys not over yet.

Furthermore, while insiders are worried, their scene is resilient. New options wont replace Fabric but theyre honouring its legacy, and new areas are reanimating certain parts of London. This is how were going out now.

All night party: Sink the Pink in Bethnal Green Working Mens Club

Cult club nights

The best modern club nights inspire devotion: an impassioned collection of regulars who will book tickets as soon as the dates are announced, wholl follow a dedicated Facebook group to ensure they are notified of any updates, and who share events on their own walls to recruit new blood. Its a little like the slavish constancy people once paid to their favourite band or member of One Direction.

Hot tickets include Sink the Pink, an exuberant collective of drag queens who run one of Londons premier LGBT nights. It started as a relatively regular spot at Bethnal Green Working Mens Club  with a glitter stand where guests could smear sparkles across their sweaty brows  and now it also runs bigger nights (sort of like postmodern balls) at locations like the Troxy.

Last years New Years Eve party in one of the nondescript warehouses in Hackney Wick was a rowdy, kaleidoscopic, all-night affair  many attendees were still picking confetti out of their hair on January 8. Its next throwdown is on Saturday at Troxy and the theme is Under the Sea.

Hard Cock Life is a cheeky homo hip hop night that colonises the basement of the Ace Hotel once a month. The playlist (a mash-up of 1990s, 2000s and recent R&B and hip hop) and it draws a crowd of white-hot young things  tickets always sell out ahead of time. Buy now for next Saturday. Its a cast-iron guarantee of an excellent night out.

I think Londons club scene is still pretty healthy, though definitely at risk, reflects Josh Cole, the nights founder and one of its DJs. With Hard Cock Life Ive always been surprised by how much appetite there is for something new and exciting. Something different. And how much people just want to have fun.

Late night London: where to stay up all night to get lucky in London 1 /4 Late night London: where to stay up all night to get lucky in London AN20260076600_2123_72dpi_72.jpg Bra bar: Slim Jims offers free punch in return for underwear secretsundaze DJ.jpg Scantily clad: a DJ at SecretSundaze SecretSundaze.jpg Everybody dance now: SecretSundaze

Deadly Rhythm has been seducing south-east Londons caners for almost a decade: it draws guests including Four Tet, Floating Points and Joy Orbison to play alongside its estimable resident DJs. It normally pops up in Rye Wax studios and the Bussey Building, and delivers explosive one-off blow-outs: this years post-Carnival party at Bussey Building was reportedly wild.

South London Soul Train also pops up at the Bussey Building on the first and third Saturday of each month. Unless youre a student at Camberwell College of Arts youll likely be the oldest person there but the music is hypnotic.

And Your Mums House, a weekly spot at the Nest, successfully executes a house party vibe off the back of its chaotic playlist of old-school R&B and hip hop and 2.50 drinks.

Out on the razzle: Oval Space

Watch this space

Londons nightlife scene is extremely healthy in output and quality, says Tom Ranger, music programmer at Oval Space in Bethnal Green, one of a new generation of agile venues that is up for a bit of everything (29-32 The Oval, E2). The diversity and choice on offer for each aspect of nightlife culture, be it art, comedy, dance, drink, food, music or poetry and spoken word is pretty insane. Any given night of the week you can sample any of the aforementioned aspects to a very high standard.

Its certainly true of Oval Space  one evening therell be an art show, the next a club night, the day we speak Ranger is setting up for an orchestral performance.

Its also true of The Pickle Factory, which is opposite Oval Space and operated by the same team. Its a former medical supplies storage unit that is now a small party space.

Legendary DJ Gilles Peterson name-checked it as his favourite London venue: its dimensions mean its good for acoustic sets or club nights, and it is already acquiring a reputation as a space for all-nighters (13-14 The Oval, E2). American label Proibitio will play its first UK showcase there at the end of the month, joined by New Yorker Huerco S.

Corsica Studios, in the railway arches at Elephant and Castle, comprises two parts: a small studio and a live music and bar area. It hosts club nights as well as gigs (4/5 Elephant Road, SE17).

Vogue Fabrics is primarily a club but is also  fittingly  hosting a London Fashion Week presentation next week, and the launch of Sister magazine later in the month (66 Stoke Newington Road, N16).

Ranger also name-checks other new, flexi-venues including Echoes, Omeara and The Bridge  Most of which are under 300 capacity which is exactly what London has needed for a good few years.

Star turn: Lady Gagas surprise gig at MOTH Club last Friday

Redrawing the map

London continues to grasp outwards. Deptford has been ascendant for years: locals mouth about Bunker (46 Deptford Broadway, SE8) and Little Nans Bar (The Basement at The Golden Anchor, 16 Evelina Rd, SE15)

Meanwhile, its nice to see that Camden is trying to re-establish itself as a music hub after quite a few years in the doldrums, Ranger observes. Indeed, the whole area had threatened to become one big market dispensing tat to Spanish teenagers in crop tops but venues including the Camden Assembly are giving it credibility again (49 Chalk Farm Road, NW1).

Another insider references Walthamstow, where DJs play at Wildcard Brewery on an industrial estate - Pete Fowler is there on October 1 (Unit 7, Ravenswood estate, E17), and theres a scene bubbling in Leyton.

Overall, the offerings present an effervescent mix of established clubs and nomadic nights.

We have promoters offering us the choice, says Ranger. One weekend youre in your standard music venue, next weekend youre in a park or road-closure, next youre off to your local church. Its fantastic and keeps things fresh. On the flip-side, having residencies and in-house dedicated nights to promote is a great thing where youre able to build and grow something. On the whole, its not all doom and gloom.

Seize the night, then no one else can seize it from you.

@phoebeluckhurst

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Review at a glance









R enee Zellweger, star of Bridget Joness Diary (2001) and Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason (2004), used to be a delicious comedian. Those who say she still is are being very kind.

The third instalment of the franchise sees our heroine trying to hold down her job as a TV producer in London (shes just acquired a bolshy, Northern, twentysomething boss). No longer plump, Bridge is still a drinker, mildly moronic and lusty. Shes trying to ascertain which of two men  old flame Mark Darcy (Colin Firth) and suave American Jack Qwant (Patrick Dempsey)  might be the father of her unborn child. She slept with them in rapid succession and balks at the idea of a DNA test because it involves a scary-looking needle.

Talking of which, something has happened to Zellwegers face. She denies shes had surgery. Whatever, it seems to me that her eyes and cheeks have become a dead zone. Once so natural and almost blush-inducingly expressive, Zellweger now labours to seem animated.

In other words, she overacts. When I mentioned this to a friend he said it was sexist to reduce an actresss performance to her appearance. Give me strength. Im not criticising her funny face. Im just sad that it currently lacks the power to crack me up.

Anyway, Zellweger isnt the only problem with a reboot that thinks riffing on Cinderella is sophisticated  Bridget loses a wellington boot when she first meets the Prince Charming-like Jack. The uneven script was put together by Helen Fielding, who wrote the original books, along with the once-great Dan Mazer, best known as Sacha Baron Cohens writing partner. The latter recently directed Dirty Grandpa, a boysy American comedy that might seem the antithesis of a girls-night-out treat. Actually, both films are lazily plotted and wear their non-PC badge with pride. The minor characters are cartoonish. Italian chef Gianni, for example, is infinitely loyal, louder-than-life and romantic. Its not the 1950s, Bridget tells her Tory mum. Yet Gianni definitely belongs in that decade.

Dempseys character feels just as tossed-off. Jack is mostly implausible. A handsome tech billionaire, he attends rock festivals on his own. You know, like they do. Generally hes just the predictable, eager-to-please New-Man type, who just cant appreciate the joys of a good cuppa.

Patrick Dempsey on being the new boy in Bridget Joness Baby

Sharon Maguires direction, in case youre wondering, is merely adequate. The soundtrack is devoid of surprises. Ed Sheeran, in a cameo role, overstays his welcome. So does a set-piece involving male bottoms and a frozen computer screen.

Yet, incredibly, the film is still worth seeing. Mostly this is down to Firth, who somehow gives the priggish Darcy a heartbeat that makes our own quicken.

Huddled with Bridget and her newly-christened baby girl, the civil rights lawyer is told by a photographer: Give her a little kiss, you know, on the forehead. At which point, Darcy plants his lips on Bridget. As the photographer mutters, Er, I was talking about the baby, Firth conveys simultaneously Darcys mortification and his post-kiss euphoria. Along with Cary Grant (in Bringing Up Baby) and Ronald Colman (in The Talk of The Town), Firth has become one of the cinemas finest geek impersonators. Thank god he was cast as Mr Darcy (in the BBCs 1995 Pride and Prejudice). Its the gift that keeps on giving.

Emma Thompson, as Bridgets salty obstetrician Dr Rawlings, is just as much fun, delivering her extremely pithy lines (which she apparently wrote herself) in a way that avoids hearty-matriarch cliches. Whether discussing parenthood, or the way a vagina can resemble a burning pub (I dont want to spoil the gag, suffice to say its one of the films best), the doc knows theres more to life than white weddings and cute sprogs. She deserves her own film/TV series/meme.

Bridget Jones 'gets into all kinds of trouble' in latest film

The same goes for Sarah Solemanis Miranda (Bridgets thirtysomething colleague at the TV station and her new BF). Smart and down-to-earth, Solemani makes you believe in a world where fact and fiction have a habit of blurring. At one point a cab driver gets mistaken for a corrupt dictator and grilled over his record on human rights abuses. Solemani, like the actors in The Mary Tyler Moore Show (or Drop the Dead Donkey) has obviously studied media types. Shes got us hacks nailed.

Bridget Joness Baby, ultimately, snatches victory from the jaws of defeat. Its a shame Zellwegers not quite herself but at least shes there at the centre of the frame (her lovely voice, by the way, is as huskily forceful as ever  her diary-like musings, which book-end many of the scenes, work beautifully).

The film industry continues to marginalise older women and we should probably count our blessings that were not being asked to watch Bridget Joness Daughter. Or Bridget Jones: The Prequel. Fieldings brainchild has spawned much loveliness. Even when bodged, Bridge is a boon.

Cert 15, 123 mins

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M ax Irons says he cant wait to get started on an A-list adaptation of a lesser-known Agatha Christie story.

The actor will join Terence Stamp, Glenn Close, Christina Hendricks and Gillian Anderson in and around London this month to film the first screen version of Crooked House.

The story, published in 1949, is about a young man, Charles Hayward, who must solve a murder case in which nobody is above suspicion.

Irons, 30, right, who starred in historical TV drama The White Queen and 2014s The Riot Club, plays Hayward. He told the Standard: Crooked House was apparently one of Christies favourites and you can see why. Weve got a great international crew, who want to come at it from a fresh perspective, and an incredible cast. I think its going to be something special and I cant wait to get started.

The film is co-written by Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes. Producer Joseph Abrams said filmmakers have often focused on Christies great detectives, Poirot and Miss Marple, but Crooked House has all the great Christie plotting.

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T o hear Ala.ni sing in her hushed, bluesy voice, an instrument made more lovely and otherworldly through a 1930s ribbon microphone, is to feel mesmerised, spirited away. You can almost see the swirling petals as she croons of everlasting love on Cherry Blossom, a track she memorably performed to guitar-and-harp accompaniment on Later With Jools Holland last year.

On her black-and-white video for Old Fashioned Kiss, the next single from her acclaimed debut You & I, Ala.ni emotes with grace and poise while wrapped in the arms of a tattooed hunk, her lips a breath away from his.

Its all too lush for words. Little wonder, really, why Ala.nis sudden, fully-formed arrival on the scene last year had music fans and critics swooning.

Its been a very busy summer, she says with a smile, sipping tea on the sunlit terrace of an east London cafe, willowy and elegant in a white shirt and burnt orange bell skirt. Ive been doing a lot of gigs and the reaction has been great. I even stage-dived at a festival in Belgium  the crowd caught me, passed me slowly over their heads then sent me slowly back to the stage.

Born to parents from Grenada and raised by her mother, a couture seamstress, Ala.ni grew up in Shepherds Bush. While shed rather not reveal her age she has the knowingness of an old-school west Londoner. For the past few years shes been based in Paris, in an apartment with a visiting blue Persian cat and a view of the Eiffel Tower, regularly playing such hallowed venues as La Cigale and David Lynchs club-cum-art laboratory, Silencio.

Swoonsome soul: Ala.ni makes lush records

Word of her cafe-society aesthetic, her dark Disney-style magic, has spread like, well, a spell: in the UK shes supported the likes of Rufus Wainwright, French-Cuban twins Ibeyi and the Mercury Prize-winning Benjamin Clementine.

She had just finished an intimate gig in Paris when Vanessa Paradis turned up backstage with her friend, iconic fashion photographer Jean-Baptiste Mondino, both in raptures over her voice and, in Mondinos case, her cheekbones.

I knew Mondinos work but I didnt know his face, says Ala.ni of the man who has snapped everyone from Madonna to Michael Fassbender and now, in portraits that see her dressed in couture and clutching that ribbon mic, herself. He said he wanted to photograph me and I was like, This old dude? Yeah right. Vanessa grabbed my arm and whispered, If Mondino asks to take your picture you must let him!

My understanding of music comes from being a perfectionist. Now its all fallen into place

Ala.ni has that sort of effect on people. She was dubbed Estee Lauders Girl of the Moment, and headlined its VIP launch in London earlier this year, after a Lauder PR executive caught a show and sent her a gift of make-up. I needed a lipstick in a gold case for a video I was making  for Come to Me, a song that conjures the rosy glow of new love  and their lipstick was also the right tone for the colour theme. I wrote to tell them and our relationship grew organically.

Ala.ni scripts and directs all her own music videos, which she records in a day on her iPad and occasionally, on spooky Super 8 film. Her releases include such unconventional formats as music boxes and wax cylinders (used for the first commercial sound recordings in the 1880s).

Multi-tasking out of necessity as well as creativity There are no budgets for anything any more so Im working with limitations  she is also an exhibited photographer. Six years ago she enjoyed a successful stint in fashion after a multifunctional dress she designed caused a stir at a London gala opening.

I got two orders from random women in the loos then a load of other orders. Then the British Fashion Council invited me to do a show at London Fashion Week. I had no idea what I was doing, she continues, laughing, and I messed it up completely. But I did learn about branding and marketing.

The British Fashion Council invited me to do a show at London Fashion Week. I had no idea what I was doing and I messed it up completely. But I did learn about branding and marketing.

Her label was called ALA.NI. When she returned to music the punctuated name went with her. It means I can be someone else, shrugs Ala.ni, who was christened Alani Charal. And then step back and let it all go.

Her childhood memories are musical ones. Singing Over the Rainbow aged three. Being in a girl band with her cousins. Watching her reggae-loving father play bass guitar.

There were piano lessons, ballet classes and a penchant for piling friends into photo booths and making montages. Along the way she fell for surrealism and the avant-garde cinema of 1940s experimentalist Maya Deren, who as a woman made me feel if that I listened to my instincts I could do anything.

Performing is in Ala.nis blood: her great-uncle was Leslie Hutch Hutchison, one of the most notorious cabaret stars of the 1920s and 1930s, a lover of everybody from Edwina Mountbatten to Cole Porter and the inspiration behind the character of musician Jack Ross on Downton Abbey (Hutch lived in tough times  Ive inherited his resilience).

A graduate of the Sylvia Young Theatre School, Ala.ni started out singing backing vocals for the starry likes of Andrea Bocelli, Mary J Blige and Blur. But after struggling to land gigs because she allegedly sounded too English she made that segue into fashion. I am not a fashion person but my mum worked in couture, managing cutting rooms, and I grew up with her bringing home dresses meant for people like Princess Diana. She was always saying, Put this on so I can fix it. But the longer I was in fashion, the more I missed singing and music.

It took a break-up with a boyfriend for Ala.ni to turn things around: After being a heartbroken recluse for three months I found this jam session in a pub at the top of my road and started going there every week. I got my confidence back and started doing my own stuff.

One morning at around 3am she created a song called Ill Remember  lyrics, melody, everything, which shed never done before. Months later, holidaying at her grandparents place in Grenada, she wrote and recorded Cherry Blossom under her duvet in the wee hours. Other sepia-tinted songs about love and loss followed.

A four-strong EP cycle, individually titled Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter and tracing the arc of a love affair with a man who also loves another (yes, its autobiographical), received more than 2.5 million streams online.

I always knew I had that voice, says Ala.ni, who went on to record You & I in Damon Albarns Studio 13. It was just about accepting it. My understanding of music comes from being a perfectionist and failing loads. Now, because I dont care so much, everything has fallen into place.

The French capital, which has clutched Ala.ni to its decolletage and helped her, well, blossom, is a constant source of inspiration. Paris has been amazing. Ive sung in ministries and castles and churches and all over. But want to know the best thing? She flashes a grin. Wherever I play, people really seem to listen.

Ala.ni plays St Pancras Old Church, NW1 (songkick.com), on Monday September 19

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T he Luxurious One

Le Bristol

The 8th arrondissements Le Bristol, a stones throw from the Champs Elysees, opened in the roaring Twenties but inside its all 18th-century glitz. During Fashion Week, its a hotspot for the couture-clad editors who flock to the city in style.

Eat It would be remiss not to devote at least one meal to Michelin-starred chef Eric Frechons exceptional cooking at Epicure, Le Bristols triple-starred restaurant.

Drink The Bar du Bristol has an all-star cocktail programme, so make a beeline for its plush sofas and oak-panelled walls, then settle back with one of the bars signature drinks: a Prohibition-era Old Fashioned.

Shoe Art galleries fan out from all sides of the hotel, including Galeries Bartoux, specialising in modern painters and photographers. Doubles from 800 (lebristolparis.com)

The Modish One

Bachaumont

After many incarnations, this stately building on Rue Bachaumont, in the heart of the 2nd arrondissement, was restored to its former glory and opened as a design-forward boutique hotel in 2015. Award-winning designer Dorothee Meilichzon dreamed up the art deco-inspired interior, with mosaic marble flooring and smart touches of brass.

Eat With a bistro menu thought up by chef Gregory Marchand, the hotel restaurant is a draw of its own. For an off-site experience, book a table at Fish Club a few blocks away, for a sharp seafood and cocktail menu.

Bistro bliss: Bachaumonts restaurant

Drink Start your stay with a craft cocktail at NightFlight, the hotels ground-floor bar managed by the Experimental Cocktail Group, then continue a few blocks over to Mabel on rue dAboukir, the citys first rum den.

Shop LAppartement Sezane, the stunning showroom from Sezane, is modelled on a Parisian flat and the closest youll come to a bricks-and-mortar space from Frances first online fashion label. Doubles from 150 (hotelbachaumont.com)

The Fashionable Newcomer

Amastan Paris

Two-month-old Amastan Paris, a five-minute walk from the Grand Palais where Chanel presented its SS17 collection, strikes a delicate balance between minimalist design and maximum impact. With 24 rooms, and a courtyard dining area that transforms into a lively bar called Anouk after dark, it has shades of those aspirational Parisian abodes we swoon over on Pinterest.

Eat The food is simple at Amastan and it is happy to send guests to its favourite establishments for lunch and dinner. Nearby, theres Kinugawa (left), an upscale gastronomic Japanese restaurant.

Simple pleasure: the Amastan dining room

Drink To hang out with the locals, take a stroll over to Faust, a terrasse-club underneath Pont Alexandre. Its open Thursdays and Fridays with Seine-side house music and a young crowd.

Shop For niche French brands and designers, including Maurice (below), head to LException, a multi-brand concept boutique whose flagship recently opened at the new Forum des Halles.

Doubles from 170 (amastanparis.com)

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A man has been rushed to hospital following a hit and run in east London.

A 22-year-old man was hit by a car in Fanshawe Avenue, Barking, just after 2pm this afternoon.

He was rushed to hospital by crews from London Ambulance Service.

His injuries are not believed to be life-threatening.

Metropolitan Police said the driver of the car did not stop at the scene of the smash.

A spokeswoman added: We were called to the junction of Ilford Road just after 2pm today to reports of a pedestrian in collision with a car.

The fled the scene and a search is currently underway to locate the driver.

Anyone with any information is asked to contact police on 101 or Crimestoppers, anonymously on 0800 555 111.
T he mother of a student shot dead with his aunt by an armed gang who stormed their north London home today paid tribute to her "perfect son."

Victims Anny Ekofo, 53, and Bervil Ekofo, 21, were gunned down in East Finchley at around 6.25am yesterday after five gunmen smashed down the front door and burst into their flat.

The mother-of-nine died in a hail of bullets before her son was shot in the head as he slept on a couch in what is thought to be a tragic case of mistaken identity.

Her husband Jean-Pierre is understood to have been take to a psychiatric unit where he is being treated for trauma after witnessing the horrifying dawn assassination.

Bervils mother Maymie, 38, told the Standard her son was an art and media student at the Univerity of West London who dreamed of being a photographer, and had never been in any trouble. The family believes he was murdered in a tragic case of mistaken identity.

Police officers at the scene of the shooting yesterday

She said: "I call for an end to this violence. My perfect son has been torn away from me.

is mother said the killing illustrated the escalating level of violence in London since she moved to the capital from the Congo in the 1990s.

Mother of nine and her nephew shot dead at flat in East Finchley

She lives in Tottenham and said she feared for her peace loving family.

She said: This violence has to stop. Back in the day it was not like this. I came from Congo as an asylum seeker in 1990 for a better life and to have a family in a safer place.

These kids are running wild with knives and guns. Its got to stop, I call on them to stop.

I have lost my son for nothing. These gangs roam and shoot and knife innocents.

Bervils sister Francine said: He was sleeping. Anny answered the door to the gang, they shot her and then shot Bervil while he was asleep on the couch.

A distraught woman tries to burst through the police cordon / Daniel Leal-Olivas/PA

There had been someone staying at the house who was on the run from someone but had moved on.

They were targeting him but got my brother instead. It was a case of mistaken identity.

My brother was never in any trouble he was just stating at his aunties house it was wrong place wrong time. He was the best brother anyone could have.

Fifi Selo, a cousin of Anny, said: She was an amazing mother and a wonderful person. She was a friend to all, she would help anyone.

A dozen close friends of Mr Efoko last night held a candlelit vigil at the police cordon next to the flat in Elmhurst Crescent where they were killed.

They held each other and sobbed in near silence amid a collection of floral tributes left for the victims.

As the bodies were brought out earlier in the day around 50 relatives and friends, many Congolese, also held a vigil, wailing Mrs Efokos nickname Mamale.

Distraught onlookers at the scene in East Finchley / Lucy Young

Neighbours told how they were woken by sirens just after dawn as paramedics and police cars raced to the scene.

A family friend said: One of Annys sons was lying over her body, crying, Wake up, mum.

It is understood that the gunmen were hunting a relative of the family who had been staying at the flat but has since moved on.

Last night detectives hunting the killers were also trying to track down the missing man to place him protective custody.

Scotland Yards Homicide and Major Crime Command are investigating and no arrests have been made.

Detective Chief Inspector Andrew Partridge, who is leading the investigation, said: This is a shocking incident that took place in daylight, albeit in the early hours, and at this early stage I am keeping an open mind with regards to a motive for the attack.

A UWL spokesman said: We are shocked and saddened to learn of the death of Bervil Ekofo in these tragic circumstances. Our thoughts and deepest sympathies are with his family. We will be working with staff and students affected to support them at this difficult time. 

Anyone with any information is urged to call the incident room on 020 8358 0300 or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.
A south London woman who was motivated by greed helped scam a victim in Morocco into paying nearly 38,000 for two printers.

Olamide Aina, 34, from East Dulwich, was sentenced for her role in a 40,000 money laundering scam after the fraudulent money was found siphoned into her account.

One victim paid 37,945.18 for two printers from a fake website while in a separate scam a 29-year-old man lost 3,675 when he bought a lawnmower online.

Neither of the victims ever received the goods they had paid for.

Aina, of Friern Road, was found guilty at Southwark Crown Court on Friday.

She was sentenced to a total of two years imprisonment, suspended for two years and must carry out 200 hours of unpaid work.

The court heard how Aina allowed her account to be used as part of a scam in February 2013.

She was arrested on July 15, 2013 after detectives traced the bank records which were used to funnel off the fraudulent money.

But police still do not know who orchestrated the scam.

DC Michael Esangbedo, of Southwark Borough CID, said: The investigation was complicated as Aina tried to hide the money trail.

It was a well-planned and complicated scam. Aina was no doubt motivated by greed and has never shown any remorse for her actions."


P olice officers from Poland have been on patrol in Essex after a Polish man was killed in a suspected hate crime attack.

Arkadiusz Jozwik, 40, was killed following an attack outside a takeaway in The Stow on Saturday, August 27 at around 11.35pm.

He died in hospital two days later after he suffered head injuries.

Two other men, believed to be friends of the victim, were also assaulted.

Six teenage boys were arrested following the attack, which is being treated as a suspected hate crime.

Essex Police accepted an offer by the Polish State Police earlier this month to send two officers to support their engagement work with Polish residents in the town.

Second Lieutenant Bartosz Czernicki and Chief Sergeant Dariusz Tybura  who work for the International Co-operation division of the Polish State Police, based in Warsaw  have joined British officers on patrol.

District commander Chief Inspector Alan Ray said the officers were working to help police engage with members of the Polish community who do not speak English as their first language.

They have no investigative role and no police powers.

Second Lieutenant Czernicki said: The aim of our visit is to establish co-operation with the local Polish community, and to make it easier for them to report various incidents to the police.

We are collecting various information and we will pass these suggestions on to the Essex Police.
A n Ex-Penthouse Pet was today sentenced to a minimum six and a half years in jail for helping to smuggle drugs concealed in bath products into Australia.

Simone Farrow was once voted on to the list of the Worlds Sexiest Women by readers of lads mag FHM.

The one-time Penthouse Pet of the Month built her modelling career in the name of Simone Starr  but adopted 19 aliases as she entered the world of drug smuggling, said police.

She played a principal role in helping to smuggle methamphetamine into the country over a seven-month period before her arrest in October 2009, a Sydney district court judge found.

Farrow, 41, who admitted importing border-controlled drugs, was given an overall sentence of 11 years but with time served she will be eligible for parole in February 2019.

Prosecutors claimed she was a drug kingpin who posted high-grade methamphetamine  known as ice  to buyers in Australia and used staff from her music and modelling business in California to run the operation. But Farrow claimed she was duped by her employees, saying they took control of her bank accounts, email addresses and mobile phones without her knowledge to run the drug network.

They included Xander Rian, who killed himself in a Hollywood flat after US investigators arranged to interview him before Farrows arrest.

At her trial Farrow broke down as she told the court she had fallen into a spiral of daily drug use, saying: I couldnt basically function unless I smoked it.

The former model, who suffers from mental health issues including bipolar and depression, claimed her mother used to lock her in a room and had taken her to a brothel when she was 17, telling her it was OK to do that work.
G eorge Osborne today warned Theresa May not to lose focus on improving education for hundreds of thousands of pupils in non-selective schools across Britain.

In his first major intervention since being axed as Chancellor, he vowed to carry on championing causes in which he believes rather than quitting the Commons as David Cameron has.

Mr Osborne stressed he was not against new grammar schools opening in areas which wanted them.

But he also told BBC radio: Eighty per cent of the political discussion is about where 20 per cent of the children go, when in fact we should be focusing on where 80 per cent of the children go in a selective system.

For me, the great transformation of the last six years driven by Michael Gove and Nicky Morgan under David Camerons leadership has been the academy and free school programme.Im all for elements of selection. Im not against new grammar schools opening where areas want them.

But I think the real focus of education reform remains the academy programme transforming the comprehensive schools that most people in this country send their children to.

In comments likely to raise eyebrows in No 10, he said he had backed Mrs May in the leadership race as she was the best person for the job of the candidates.

Challenged by interviewer Nick Robinson over whether this amounted to an unenthusiastic endorsement, he highlighted her as well placed to bring a divided Conservative party together, adding: She was absolutely the best person for the job.

Mr Osborne backed the Governments decision to press ahead with the 18 billion deal for the new Hinkley Point nuclear power station.

Safeguards have been added after Mrs May delayed the decision by two months amid security concerns over Chinese involvement. But Mr Osborne, accused of putting economics ahead of security concerns, said: It looks to me pretty much like the same deal.

He said the UK needed to get the best economic result from Brexit as possible and he would champion the country being internationalist, outward-looking, free-trading.

He also appeared to hint he has not ruled out a comeback to government and said: I dont want to write my memoirs because I dont know how the story ends.

His comments came as Whitehall announced a new wave of free schools, including 24 more in London, with Premiership rugby club Saracens behind one.

A senior No10 source said: The plans that we put forward are precisely about ensuring that all children get the opportunity of an excellent education.

She stressed that the Hinkley deal was different from that agreed when Mr Osborne was at the Treasury, with extra safeguards over national security and ownership.

She also rejected claims that the Government had wobbled over the Northern Powerhouse.
A three-hour armed siege took place outside a block of flats in Waterloo after a man threatened police officers and firefighters with a gun.

Scotland Yard said a man made the threat while emergency services attended homes in Windmill Walk to help residents after a balcony collapsed.

Police said a gun had not been recovered and no-one had been injured after they were called at 9.30am on Friday.

It was confirmed the stand-off was over shortly before 1pm after a man was detained. Scotland Yard said he was arrested on suspicion of making threats to kill.

Witnesses told the Standard armed police were deployed after a man refused to leave his flat when a concrete balcony collapsed at the former Church Commissioners estate.

Armed police outside the flats in Waterloo / Nick Stewart

Artist Nick Stewart, 63, who lives in a neighbouring flat, told the Standard: "There are about 50 police here and it is multiplying all the time, it is extraordinary.

"I was told a third floor concrete balcony collapsed and as police and fire evacuated the building one man refused to leave and claimed he had a gun.

"It is normally a quiet street but today we have had the bizarre combination of events."

Scene: Police and fire were called after a third-floor balcony collapsed at a block of flats / Kathy Burke/PA

Resident Susan Young told the South London Press: The area is all cordoned off. There are armed police all over the place. It is a bit scary.

The police have been going around the building, I think trying to get his attention.

It started when a fire engine tried to get near the building but had trouble reaching it. Then two more arrived. We were told at the time it was someone trying to jump off their balcony. Then we were told he had a hand grenade. It is obviously someone quite desperate.

There are a lot of people live in the building, so I am concerned for their homes.

A Met spokeswoman said: Local police officers were in attendance at a block of flats in Windmill Walk, where they were assisting the London Fire Brigade with a collapsed balcony.

Whilst at the location officers were threatened by a man who imitated he was in possession of a firearm. At this stage a firearm has not been seen.

Officers retreated and armed officers have been deployed to the location.

There are no reported injuries and no shots have been fired.

A London Fire Brigade spokeswoman said: "Firefighters were called to a block of flats on Windmill Walk in Waterloo after a concrete balcony on the third floor of the building collapsed onto floors below.

"Approximately 20 to 30 people were evacuated from flats within the block and set up a safety cordon as a precaution. There are no reports of any injuries."
P rince William helped an elderly dignitary today after he fell over while welcoming the royal couple to Essex.

William and Kate were greeted at Stewards Academy in Harlow by Vice Lord Lieutenant of Essex Jonathan Douglas-Hughes, the Queen's representative in the county.

But the 72-year-old, who was wearing full ceremonial uniform including a sword and boots with spurs, fell over as the royal couple got out of the car.

The Prince rushed to help the official, who got up looking embarrassed.

Duke and Duchess of Cambridge visit Stewards Academy in Harlow 1 /18 Duke and Duchess of Cambridge visit Stewards Academy in Harlow The Duke of Cambridge comes to the aid of Jonathan Douglas-Hughes, after he tumbled over after hitting a bollard John Stillwell/PA Prince William helps Jonathan Douglas-Hughes, Vice Lord Lieutenant of Essex to his feet after he fell over Tim Rooke/Rex It is thought he slipped over after hitting a bollard on the wet pavement Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror The Prince makes sure Mr Douglas-Hughes is alright after helping him to his feet Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror The Prince makes sure Mr Douglas-Hughes is alright after helping him to his feet Chris Jackson/Getty Images The Vice Lord Lieutenant of Essex took a nasty tumble but the Prince was on hand to help him up Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror The Duchess of Cambridge and the Duke visited Stewards Academy, Harlow Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror Kate was nearby as Mr Douglas-Hughes fell over on the Royals' visit to Harlow Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror A windswept Kate arrives at Stewards Academy in Harlow, Essex, where the Royals were meeting to discuss how young people cope with issues such as starting a new school Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror Kate wore a high-end 1,700 dress by Altuzarra for the Royal visit to the school Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror HRH Catherine, The Duchess of Cambridge and others react after Jonathan Douglas-Hughes (centre), OBE, Vice Lord-Lieutenant of Essex, tripped over a concrete bollard Facundo Arrizabalaga Back to school: The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge sit at desks in one of the college's classrooms Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror/PA The Duchess speaks to a pupil at the school Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror/PA Excited pupils were on hand to greet the Duke and Duchess Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror/PA

Mr Douglas-Hughes turned to William and said 'Sorry about that', and the Duke replied 'No, it's all right'.

Helping hand: William helps the stricken pensioner outside the Stewards Academy in Essex / Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror

The royals visited the academy to promote their Heads Together campaign, launched in May with Prince Harry, which encourages positive conversations surrounding mental health.

Writing in a blog published on Friday, the Duke said he hoped to learn about how students cope with pressures including starting a new school.

Back to school: The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge sit at desks in a classroom (Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror/PA ) / Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror/PA

He said: "The truth is, for many young people, changing schools or starting a new academic year is really difficult to deal with.

"Catherine and I have young children who will be going through this themselves in a short period of time, and like all parents we will want to make sure that our children are not just able to achieve their academic potential at school but are also happy and emotionally supported."

Stewards Academy is one of the schools supported by children's mental health charity Place2Be, a part of the Heads Together initiative.

The royals are due to join a student-run lesson on mentoring, hear speeches in a school assembly and view performances from students coping with big changes.

William is also due to make a speech before the couple meet with parents in the afternoon.
A rodent-infested cafe in Londons East End has been fined nearly 27,000 after mice chewed through food in the stockroom.

Inspectors for Tower Hamlets Council found a packet of Kit Kats and spaghetti had been gnawed by mice at Cafe Fresh in Whitechapel.

Photos show nibbled food as well as a hole in the wall surrounded by smear marks which inspectors believe was the work of mice.

The cafe, in Commercial Road, was closed by public health inspectors last October after contaminated foods were discovered.

Last week it was fined a total of 26,579.

The cafe was closed by environmental health on October 30 after they discovered a severe mouse infestation and contaminated foods.

Nearly two months later, returning inspectors found the owners, Fresh Frill Cafe, had not complied with food hygiene improvement notices  so charged them with 12 hygiene offences.

Hole in the wall: Photos from the hygiene inspectors show evidence of the mouse infestation. / Tower Hamlets Council.

Director Mahbub Alam pleaded guilty to the charges and was fined 5,220. He was also ordered to pay some of the councils legal costs and a 54 victim surcharge.

The cafe was also fined 12,000 and ordered to pay the rest of the legal costs to the sum of 2,685.15 with a 120 victim surcharge.

The full amount owed by the company is 18,805.15, the council said.

On a return to the cafe, inspectors found standards have improved to a satisfactory condition.

Councillor Shiria Khatun, deputy mayor and cabinet member for Community Safety, said: We take breaches in hygiene regulations very seriously in Tower Hamlets, and will not hesitate to prosecute in such cases.

I am glad to note that the cafe in question has now improved standards to a satisfactory condition.
T he Tory leader of Theresa Mays own local council today vowed to use all necessary financial resources for a High Court battle to block a third runway at Heathrow.

Councillor Simon Dudley, head of Windsor and Maidenhead council, pledged the legal action to protect residents irrespective of who the Prime Minister is.

He has joined forces with Wandsworth, Richmond upon Thames and Hillingdon councils for the looming court battle if the Government, as expected, backs Heathrow expansion.

We have very significant financial resources, he said. We will put all the necessary financial resources behind a vigorous legal action.

The town halls lawyers, Harrison Grant, wrote to David Cameron this year warning him that his no ifs, no buts promise before the 2010 general election to oppose a third runway had created a legitimate expectation among residents that the project would not go ahead.

Court challenge: Theresa May could face a legal challenge from her local council over plans to expand Heathrow (Nick Ansell/PA ) / Nick Ansell/PA

So if it were given the green light, they argued, it would be an abuse of power correctable by the courts.

Mr Dudley said Windsor and Maidenhead had allocated 30,000 for the legal battle and signalled that this could rise to hundreds of thousands.

We are going to protect our residents irrespective of who the Prime Minister is, he added. The councils concerns include more pollution, noise and traffic as well as extra housing needs.

Following the Brexit vote and Maidenhead MP Mrs May becoming Prime Minister, the council commissioned a poll to gauge whether local opinion over Heathrow expansion had changed.

The survey found it was broadly stable, with 38 per cent opposed to Heathrows proposed third runway, compared with 34 per cent for, while 50 per cent backed another runway at Gatwick, with 13 per cent against.

The Government is set to decide within weeks which airport should grow. Heathrow is expected to get the go-ahead and Boris Johnson today repeated his strong opposition to it, branding it a fantasy which should be consigned to the dustbin.

However, Sussex MPs still fear that ministers could opt for a bigger Gatwick. They have written to rail minister Paul Maynard warning him that services along the Brighton main line would go into complete meltdown if Gatwick got a second runway.

The Gatwick Coordination Group of MPs said there would be a devastating impact from Gatwick expansion on the already beleaguered Southern rail service, as many of the extra travellers would come by rail. But a Gatwick spokesman said: The Airports Commission itself concluded road and rail improvements already under way or planned will more than meet the demand.
S adiq Khans war of words with Donald Trump escalated today after he accused the US Presidential hopeful of playing into the hands of terrorists.

The Mayor said he hoped that Hillary Clinton would beat her Republican rival with a stomping victory in the race to the White House.

He will take his message of building bridges not walls right into the billionaire businessmans own back yard in Queens, New York, this weekend.

As his six-day tour of North America crossed into the US from Canada, Mr Khan turned his guns on his adversary.

Donald Trump said that Muslims from around the world would not be welcome into the United States of America, he said.

Not only does that show a lack of understanding and awareness of the great country that is the USA and its history and legacy, its also inadvertently playing into the hands of Daesh and so-called Isis because it implies its not possible to be a Western liberal and mainstream Muslim.

I think its important that the USA maintains her role as a beacon for tolerance, respect and diversity.

Mr Khan broke diplomatic protocol by backing Hillary Clinton to become the next US President.

Its important for those of us who are foreigners to stay out of the US elections. I hope the best candidate wins and I hope she does win with a stomping majority, he added.

However, the Mayor said he would be willing to meet Mr Trump during his tour to show the capital is open for business in the wake of Britains decision to leave the European Union.

He is also stressing the importance of senior politicians building bridges not walls  a reference to Mr Trumps controversial plan to build a wall along the US-Mexico border.

City Hall aides revealed that Mr Khan would take his message of hope and unity to Queens, where Mr Trump was brought up, and where the Mayor will address Muslim American community leaders alongside New York mayor Bill de Blasio.

Mr Khan has gradually stepped up his rhetoric against Mr Trump throughout his tour, which began in Montreal before continuing to Chicago.

He reopened his row with the billionaire businessman, who had proposed that Muslims be banned from entering the US, while standing alongside Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau yesterday.

Can I scotch the rumour that the reason why Im coming to America before January is in case Trump wins and Im stopped from coming, he said.

While Mr Khan backed Democrat Hillary Clinton, Mr Trudeau stuck to diplomatic protocol by refusing to reveal who he would rather see in the White House.

I look forward to working with whomever the American people choose as their president, he said.

Mr Khan quipped: Who believes him when he says that?!

However, the Canadian PM said some negative, divisive politicians often resorted to scape-goating or pointing fingers to address the concerns of millions who felt marginalised.
E uropean Union leaders have given themselves the winter to prepare for Brexit.

The 28 leaders, not including Prime Minister Theresa May, committed to have a clear roadmap of the way forward after Britains exit by late March.

They plan to discuss practical results during the meeting in spring to mark the 60th anniversary of the EU founding Treaty of Rome in the Italian capital.

"Europe can, must move forward as long as it has clear priorities: protection, security, prosperity and the future of the youth," said French president Francois Hollande at a joint press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Mrs Merkel called the current situation in the EU "critical" and said the next months would be "decisive".

She mentioned the migration and economic problems that have left an increasing disenchantment with the EU across many of the member states.

EU Council President Donald Tusk said the current mood in the EU is "sober but not defeatist".

Summit co-host and Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico added that exchanges were frank at the summit.

"There are different views, different ideas," he said.
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N igel Farage quit as Ukip leader today declaring Ive done my bit.

However, he is to stay on as an MEP and stressed he is not going away as he seeks to ensure the Government does not backslide on delivering Brexit.

Yes, we will leave the EU, the question is what deal we get, he told ITVs Good Morning Britain.

Will we get back proper control of our borders? Will we get back our territorial fishing waters?

The only way it is going to happen is if Ukip keep up the pressure.

The new Ukip leader was being announced this afternoon at the partys annual rally in Bournemouth but all of the five candidates are virtually politically unknown.

It has also been riven by splits, with one of Mr Farages close aides quitting today to join the Conservatives.

Alexandra Phillips, Ukips former head of media, told BBC radio: There are far too many schisms and divisions which I think at this point are irreparable.

There are so many factions in Ukip it becomes a Venn diagram, almost, where my enemys enemy is my friend.

The five leadership contenders are Diane James MEP, who stood in the Eastleigh by-election, Cllr Lisa Duffy, Bill Etheridge MEP, Elizabeth Jones, Ukips deputy chairwoman in Lambeth, and Phillip Broughton.

With some Ukip members urging Mr Farage to stay on, he added: Things move on in life.

Ive been doing this for over two decades.

Ive done my bit.

But he also made clear he would not shy away from the media spotlight, saying: Im not moving to a flint cottage in Snowdonia never to be seen again.

His legacy would be helping to take a fringe party considered a little bit crazy to be a mainstream one that won the European elections in 2014 and forced the EU referendum to be held.

Its been an amazing journey, he added.

He admitted he had been a bit dominant in the party, having frequently clashed with members of its national executive committee, and believes it needs to be professionalised.

Outgoing deputy leader and Ukip MEP Paul Nuttall acknowledged that other members may find a new home with the Conservatives under Theresa May.

This is the issue that the new leader will have to face and probably one that Nigel Farage never had to face, he said.

People may well drift across.

Thats why its so important that Ukip unifies.
T he Princess Royal is still recovering from a bad chest infection and has been forced to cancel a visit to Africa, Buckingham Palace confirmed today.

Prince Andrew will now undertake the trip to Botswana and Mozambique on her place.

Princess Anne's work schedule for next week has also been scaled back as a result of her ill health.

She was taken to hospital last Wednesday and treated for a chest infection.

Princess Anne had been watching the Braemar Highland Games in Scotland with the Queen, the Duke of Edinburgh and Prince Charles.

After having tests at the Aberdeen Royal Infirmary, she was discharged and went back to Balmoral, the Queens summer residence. She is now resting privately.

The palace said a number engagements had been forced to be cancelled.

"As a precaution, on the advice of doctors, The Princess will not undertake the planned visit to Botswana and Mozambique at the end of the month.

"HRH The Duke of York will now undertake this visit," a spokesman said.
A Brazilian soap actor drowned after cries for help were ignored by witnesses who thought he was filming for the show.

Domingos Montagner was dragged away by strong currents when he went for a swim near the set for popular soap opera Velho Chico in which he played a lead role.

He and another actress reportedly went swimming in the river in Sergipe following a day of shooting.

According to the actress, Camila Pitanga, he was dragged away by strong currents.

She shouted for help but local people did not immediately assist because they believed it to be a scene in the soap.

Brazilian authorities told O Globo that the spot they had chosen to go swimming is one of the most dangerous areas in the town and usually avoided by locals.

Mr Montagners body was found a few hours after the incident, 300 metres from where he drowned.

The actor has been married for 14 years to actress Luciana Lima and the couple had three children.
D onald Trump let his guard down on live TV as he allowed chat show host Jimmy Fallon to ruffle his distinctive blond hair.

The Tonight Show host closed his interview with the controversial Republican presidential candidate by proposing the unusual act.

Stating that now were both civilians and the next time they meet Mr Trump could be president, he asked if he could ruffle his blonde hair.

Mr Trump, who claims to spend at least an hour styling his hair every day, smiled throughout and took it in good humour.

But Mr Fallon has since faced a barrage of criticism from viewers who feel he should not have been humanising a monster.

Donald Trump gets his hair ruffled by Jimmy Fallon 1 /8 Donald Trump gets his hair ruffled by Jimmy Fallon Republican Presidential Candidate Donald Trump during an interview with host Jimmy Fallon Andrew Lipovsky/NBC/NBCU Photo Bank via Getty Images Republican Presidential Candidate Donald Trump during an interview with host Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show NBC Republican Presidential Candidate Donald Trump during an interview with host Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show NBC Republican Presidential Candidate Donald Trump during an interview with host Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show NBC Republican Presidential Candidate Donald Trump during an interview with host Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show NBC Republican Presidential Candidate Donald Trump during an interview with host Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show NBC

Fans of the show on Twitter slammed the host for showering a racist with love and for his funny, adorable response to racism.

It comes as the mayor of London, currently in north America on an ambassadorial trip, accused Mr Trump of playing into the hands of ISIS.

As his six-day tour of North America crossed into the US from Canada, Mr Khan turned his guns on his adversary.

Donald Trump said that Muslims from around the world would not be welcome into the United States of America, he said.

Not only does that show a lack of understanding and awareness of the great country that is the USA and its history and legacy, its also inadvertently playing into the hands of Daesh and so-called Isis because it implies its not possible to be a Western liberal and mainstream Muslim.

Loading....

I think its important that the USA maintains her role as a beacon for tolerance, respect and diversity.

Mr Khan broke diplomatic protocol by appearing to back Hillary Clinton to become the next US President.
A wild boar injured a police officer and a passer-by as it ran amok in a three-hour rampage through the streets of Hong Kong.

The pig first evaded police on a private housing estate on Hong Kong Island at around 9am on Friday before it ran riot on the streets, the South China Morning Post reported.

A policeman was later rammed while trying to capture the animal and a 73-year-old man was hit as the pig ran in a park.

Both victims were taken to hospital for treatment with minor injuries.

A police spokesman told the newspaper: As police approached, it escaped, ramming an officer.

While running into a park on Oi Tak Street, it hit a male passer-by.

Police and conservation officers reportedly surrounded the pig with shields and nets inside the park but it managed to escape again and fled to a nearby car park.

The animal was finally captured at around 12pm after it was shot by a tranquilliser dart by a vet from the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department, the paper reported.

The incident took place two days after a wild boar reportedly wandered into a police station in Tsuen Wan, also in Hong Kong.
James Carville is interviewed in the documentary "Starving the Beast," about the defunding of public higher education.
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When Whitney Gilbert and Shadese (DeeDee) Griffith began dating more than a year ago, neither could have expected that they and their family w
A report was made Wednesday to Statesville police about a clown being spotted at Summer Pointe apartments on Mueller Circle.

Officers responded and checked the area, but did not locate anything suspicious, according to Statesville Police Department Public Information Officer Chan Austin.

Iredell County Sheriffs Office Maj. Todd Carver, who supervises the road patrol division, said hes not aware of any clown sighting being reported to the sheriffs office.

Statesville now joins a growing list of areas in North and South Carolina and Georgia where residents have made unverified reports of seeing people dressed in clown costumes. In some reports, the clowns are said to be in wooded areas.

Arrests have been made, not of costumed perpetrators but of people filing false reports.

Earlier this month, a 24-year-old Winston-Salem man was charged with filing a false police report after he told authorities that someone dressed as a clown knocked on the window at his home. The man told police he chased the clown into the woods.

He later admitted he made up the story, according to reports.

Two Georgia residents were charged this week after making separate 911 calls about people dressed as clowns and trying to lure children into a white van. The two acknowledged the report was a hoax, authorities said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Friday, 16 September 2016 00:06:47 (GMT+3) |

The American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI) today applauded the US Senates passage, by a vote of 95-3, of the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA), which will authorize more than $10 billion worth of projects to improve navigation, replace and restore aging locks and dams, and provide aid to Flint, Mich. and other communities in need of replacing pipes, sewers and other drinking water infrastructure.

The steel industry relies heavily on seaports and inland waterways to move raw materials necessary for steelmaking and bring finished steel products to market. A bill to improve water infrastructure is long overdue, and todays passage is a critical step toward ensuring more efficient and cost-effective navigation that will help our nation remain globally competitive, said Thomas J. Gibson, president and CEO of AISI.

Our nations seaports are heavily congested and not dredged to full capacity, while our inland waterways include obsolete and aging infrastructure that often results in costly delays. WRDA reauthorization will help restore some of our nations precious ecosystems while enhancing critical infrastructure and creating jobs. We applaud the Senates commitment to bipartisanship in passing this bill.

Gibson noted that the House could consider their version of the measure as early as next week.




Thursday, 15 September 2016 23:57:25 (GMT+3) | Sao Paulo

Argentinian crude steel output in August declined 27.5 percent, year-on-year, and 3.6 percent, month-on-month, to 343,200 mt, the nations steel chamber, CAA, said this week.

According to CAA, accumulated crude steel production in the January-August period totaled 2.7 million mt, 17.4 percent down, year-on-year.

Argentina s hot rolled finished steel output in August was 218,100 mt, 44.9 percent down, year-on-year, and 30.7 percent down, month-on-month. As for the January-August period, accumulated hot rolled finished steel production reached 2.5 million mt, 17.3 percent down, year-on-year.

CAA said the nations cold rolled flat steel output in August fell 52.7 percent, year-on-year, and 46.5 percent, month-on-month, to 67,600 mt.

Accumulated cold rolled flat steel output in the eight-month period was 909,800 mt, 6.7 percent down, year-on-year.


Friday, 16 September 2016 23:54:02 (GMT+3) | Sao Paulo

Brazilian steelmaker Companhia Siderurgica Nacional (CSN) said it is expecting approval from authorities to resume construction of its unfinished Transnordestina railway. The project, initially estimated at BRL 7.5 billion and launched in 2006, was expected to be completed in 2010.

The companys CEO, Benjamin Steinbruch, said the BRL 1.24 billion in public funding approved in July could be used to restart construction, however, the steelmaker is waiting for approval from authorities.

Steinbruch met with Piaui state governor, Wellington Dias, and said that since the BRL 1.24 billion is released, workers should be hired and works in the state of Piaui resumed.

We want to finish works in the state of Piaui soon  so we can guarantee the railway can be used to transport agricultural products and iron ore. We estimate to finish part [of the project] in H1 2018. Then we should focuse in the Ceara-Pernambuco state extension of the railway, he said.

The Transnordestina railway was allowed in July to receive public funding, after a previous decision by the nations audit court, TCU, which suspended public funding for the Transnordestina railway, was revoked, allowing investment aimed to building the project to continue. Late in May, TCU suspended public funding for the project until indications of irregularities were investigated.

At the time it said it was investigating alleged irregularities committed by Brazil s ground transportation agency, ANTT, which is said to have approved contracts without issuing a bid for CSNs owned Transnordestina railway. The railway will extend about 1,728 km (1,073 miles) in length.
Friday, 16 September 2016 12:06:27 (GMT+3) | Istanbul

Germany-based plantmaker SMS Group has announced that Egypt -based long steel producer El Marakby Steel has officially opened its new compact steel plant in Giza supplied by SMS Group. The electric steelworks has an annual capacity of 350,000 mt and comprises a raw material handling system, a 45-mt electric arc furnace, a ladle furnace and a three-strand billet caster.





By producing billets in-house, we create value locally and strengthen our competitiveness by reducing our dependence on hard currencies. In addition, the new plant allows us to expand our range of steel grades and produce rebars extremely flexibly, stated Hassan El Marakby, CEO of El Marakby Steel.




Japanese steelmaker Nippon Steel and Sumitomo Metal Corporation ( NSSMC ) has announced that NS BlueScope Coated Products, a joint venture (JV) between NSSMC and Australia-based BlueScope Steel Limited, has decided to install the No.3 metal coating line in NS BlueScope Thailand , a subsidiary of NS BlueScope Coated Products, and enhance production capacity of zinc/aluminum hot-dip alloy coated steel and painted steel to meet the growing demand of the building and construction market in Thailand

The plant with an investment of approximately $125 million will have an annual production capacity of 140,000 mt and is planned to commence operations in the middle of 2018. With the new plant, NS BlueScope Thailand aims to further strengthen the responsiveness to the needs of customers in the building and construction market and provide more value-added products and services.
Friday, 16 September 2016 23:49:46 (GMT+3) | Sao Paulo

The cost of rebar in the greater Buenos Aires area slightly declined in August, according to data released this week by the nations institute of statistics and census, Indec.

Rebar was among the main products whose prices changed the least in the general expenses category, according to Indec.

Rebar costs slightly fell 0.3 percent in August, month-on-month, Indecs data indicated.

According to Indec, cost of civil construction in the greater Buenos Aires area in August rose 0.5 percent, month-on-month.

Cost of materials and general expenses in the same month increased 0.9 and 1.8 percent, respectively, in the month-on-month analysis.


Thursday, 15 September 2016 23:55:06 (GMT+3) | Sao Paulo

Brazilian pellet producer Samarco, a 50/50 joint venture (JV) between Vale and BHP Billiton, agreed with federal prosecutors to hire experts to independently analyze the damages caused by the Mariana disaster in November last year, which killed 19 people and forced Samarco to halt production.

Federal prosecutors are demanding BRL 155 billion ($46.3 billion) for the damages Samarco caused to the environment; at the same time Samarco is struggling to get the operational licenses it needs to restart operations.

In a court hearing this week, Samarco and federal prosecutors met but didnt agree on the lawsuits value, which is seen by Samarco, BHP Billiton and Vale as too high.

In addition to the experts analyses, Samarco also agreed to hire an audit to evaluate the companys relationship with the affected communities. In the court hearing, a judge determined Samarco should have 11 public hearings with the affected communities.


Thursday, 15 September 2016 00:00:49 (GMT+3) | San Diego

Tenaris announced this week that production will resume at its AlgomaTubes seamless mill in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, recalling between 120-150 union employees who were laid off earlier this year. Tenaris projects the mill to restart in November.

Production was temporarily interrupted at the facility in March due to the impact of unfairly traded imports and a prolonged industry downturn, the company said in a statement.

While market volatility persists, the statement continued, a modest improvement in Tenariss forecast, as well as progress in ongoing policy discussions with members of the federal and provincial government that support Canadian manufacturing drove the decision to commence operations.




Friday, 16 September 2016 23:55:42 (GMT+3) | San Diego

SteelOrbis has learned that import rebar offers to the US from Turkey are still in the range of $395-$405/mt CFR FO in US Gulf ports (on a theoretical weight basis).
Friday, 16 September 2016 23:44:13 (GMT+3) | Sao Paulo

Brazil imported a mere 1,700 mt of rebar in August, of which 1,300 mt was from Turkey at $440/mt and 400 mt was from Peru at $416/mt, both FOB conditions, according to the Brazilian ministry of development, industry and foreign trade, MDIC.

The volume of August compares with 2,600 mt imported in July, far from the 14,600 mt imported per month in average by the country last year, or from a peak of 24,000 mt per month imported in 2014.

The reduced volume of imports reflects the downturn in activity in the local civil construction sector, which has seen a severe reduction in the construction of new houses and in rebar -intensive consumer works linked to governmental activities.

The downturn has also affected domestic sales of rebar , in a reduction estimated at 20 percent, when comparing the first seven months of 2016 and 2015.
The western city of Timisoara is Romania's choice for European Capital of Culture 2021, Steve Green, chair of a jury that made the choice, told a new conference on Friday at the National Library in Bucharest.

Making the choice was an international jury delegated by the European Commission.

Thursday and Friday the final selection of the Romanian bid for European Capital of Culture 2021 was made from among the bids filed, with the cities of Baia Mare, Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca and Timisoara making their case before the jury, according to Agerpres.
At a plenary session on September 19, the Supreme Council of Magistrates (CSM) will discuss a justice memorandum drawn up by professional associations.

It will look into an opinion filed by the Legislation, Documentation and Dispute related to challenges from magistrates related to the justice memorandum, as mentioned in the agenda for the session posted on the CSM website.

The National Union of Romania's Judges (UNJR) on September 14 announced that 66 courthouses and 25 prosecutor's offices in the country had adopted the justice memorandum that far, a document that presents problems facing the judiciary and asks for the implementation of a set of measures leading to an efficient, modern and high quality justice system.

UNJR said as of Wednesday morning five courts of appeal, 17 tribunals and 44 courthouses as well as three prosecutor's offices with appellate courts, eight prosecutor's offices with tribunals and 14 prosecutor's offices with courthouses had already adhered to the memorandum, but the real number of courts and prosecutor's offices having adopted the document is higher, but not all of them have completed their minutes.

"The adoption of the memorandum by general assemblies is the first measure of protest that has led to a programmatic document of principles, with solutions to the problems facing the judiciary and directly affecting the citizens dealing with the courts of law," said judge Dana Girbovan, chair of UNJR, co-initiator of the memorandum.

UNJR says the memorandum emphasises the need for justice independence being respected along with the principle of separation of powers; problems with justice dispense on television ; respect for the statutes of magistrates; justice underfunding; the assessment of Romania's progress with judicial reform under the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism (CVM) ; the CSM and Judiciary Inspection course of action, as well as the need for human rights and freedoms being respected.

"The memorandum is premised on justice essentially concentrating on the protections, advancement and guarantee of all the citizens' rights and freedoms, as well as on the citizens and the state being equal before judges. The document expressly states that by adopting it, the magistrates reserve their right to makes use of all the democratic action forms for their demands to be met," according to the statement.

UNJR added that at their general assemblies some courts resorted to additional forms of protest, such as delaying non-urgent cases or wearing armbands.

"Other courts have called on the Ombudsman, the President and CSM to notify the Constitutional Court about an alleged conflicts among state powers following the passage of an emergency ordinance by the Ciolos Cabinet that is said to preserve pay discrimination and inequities. Other courts have taken a vote on Justice Minister Raluca Pruna resigning office. This is the widest protest movement in Romania's justice system after 2009, with judges and prosecutors highlighting at their general assemblies the problems facing the judiciary and coming up with solutions for efficient, modern and high-quality justice."

The justice memorandum was also discussed by the chief magistrates with Cooperation and Verification Mechanism (CVM) experts.

European Commission experts in charge with the assessment of Romania's judicial reform under a Cooperation and Verification Mechanism (CSM) on September 13 met officials of Romania's professional associations of magistrates in Bucharest to discuss the latest developments in Romania's justice system..

In a press statement released after the meeting, the National Union of Romania's Judges (UNJR) says talks focused mainly on magistrates' demands included in the justice memorandum, which presents problems facing the judiciary, with CVM experts agreeing that the problems mentioned by the magistrates in the memorandum are legitimate and deserving of grounded debates and analyses.

The officials of Romania's magistrates are said to have underscored the need for the publication of the methodology underpinning the CVM report, as well as the names of the persons and organisations providing opinions about Romania's judiciary, according to Agerpres.
A committee this week finalized its recommendations for spending nearly $1 million that Sauk County government is slated to receive due to the installation of a high-power transmission line.

Following more than a month of deliberations, the Sauk County Boards Finance Committee agreed Tuesday to fund nine of the 18 project requests it received from various organizations and government agencies.

The funds are part of millions of dollars local governments will receive from American Transmission Co. in compensation for the environmental impact of its 345,000-volt Badger-Coulee transmission line from La Crosse to Madison.

State law says the money may be used only for park, conservancy, wetland or other similar environmental programs, unless the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin grants special approval for an alternative use.

The initial requests totaled nearly $3.2 million, meaning more than $2.2 million in projects didnt make the cut. The list of rejected projects included a proposal from one of the boards own committees.

The boards Property and Insurance Committee asked for $300,000 to install solar panels on several county buildings. If approved, the project could be completed by late spring of 2019, according to the committees proposal.

In its request, the committee said the solar systems would lower energy bills, making the project economically sustainable. The committee did not offer a timeline regarding how long it would take for the solar panels to pay for themselves.

During an August meeting of the finance committee, Sauk County Board Chair Marty Krueger suggested that the solar panel project request be altered.

Rather than spend $300,000 on solar panels for existing buildings, Krueger said, the county should spend $225,000 to test whether energy efficiency projects are beneficial by installing them on a building that is slated to be built at a county park.

Weve been working on a third party (solar) agreement in this county for two years, or something like that, and we still dont have anything near ready to go or the partners to do it, Krueger said.

Kruegers proposed change  which was approved by the finance committee  included that the county use $225,000 to experiment with solar panels and possibly a geothermal energy system on a soon-to-be-built facility at White Mound Park in Hillpoint.

During a meeting Tuesday, Supervisor Tom Kriegl said that plan didnt make much sense.

Sauk County is not going to do groundbreaking research to prove whether or not renewable energy systems works, Kriegl said, noting that a number of federal agencies already have done that.

He said the county could get more bang for its buck by using renewable energy to lower the cost at existing government buildings that use the most energy. He said two facilities account for roughly three quarters of county governments electric use.

Supervisor Richard Flint, an accountant from Reedsburg who recently was appointed by Krueger, said he has prepared taxes for clients who have installed small-scale solar systems. The energy savings dont pay for the installation costs in the long run, even with tax credits, he said.

Kriegl attempted to respond to that remark, but was silenced by Krueger, who said Kriegls participation in a back-and-forth discussion violated the spirit of county board rules, because he is not a member of the committee.

County board rules allow board members to speak during meetings of committees on which they do not serve at least once for a period of time that is at least equal to the time allowed for members of the public. The decision to allow a supervisor to speak more than once is within the discretion of the chair of the committee, the rule states.

Krueger is not the chair of the finance committee.

Several town government representatives who attended Tuesdays meeting suggested a portion of the money be spent on roads. But Sauk County Administrative Coordinator Renae Fry said the committee already had decided to use the funds for park and conservation projects.

Projects that made the finance committee's list include the following:

$250,000 to the Villages of North Freedom, West Baraboo and the Cityof Baraboo for the first phase of the Baraboo River Corridor Plan

$225,412 to add renewable energy systems such as solar and geothermal to a planned facility at White Mound Park

$55,000 to the Riverland Conservancy for a prairie restoration project

$98,250 to the Aldo Leopold Foundation for expanding crane roosting habitat and crane tourism

$70,000 to the Nature Conservancy to support a bio diversity project in the Baraboo Hills

$50,000 to the Wisconsin Society for Ornithology to expand the Honey Creek Nature Preserve in the Baraboo Hills

$60,000 to the Sauk Prairie Conservation Alliance for land management on Badger lands with a focus on the Great Sauk Trail

$50,000 to the International Crane Foundation for a Sandhill Crane exhibit

$50,000 to the Riverland Conservancy to support the Manley Creek Restoration Project
RACINE COUNTY  Elected officials in Racine County sharply criticized Gov. Scott Walkers proposed transportation funding plan for creating more delays on the Interstate 94 north-south project.

Under Walkers plan, the 2017-19 state budget would allocate no money for the project, which extends from General Mitchell International Airport in Milwaukee County, through Racine County to the Illinois state line. If approved, several interchange projects, an intersection reconstruction, I-94 repaving and other improvements planned in Racine County would be pushed back.

As a years-long struggle over transportation funding continues, Walker on Thursday touted the plan for including no fee or tax increases and giving local governments a $65 million increase in aid.

But local officials zeroed in on the Interstate 94 north-south project, putting multiple Republicans at odds with the governor.

State Sen. Van Wanggaard, R-Racine, said he was promised when delays occurred five years ago that funds for the expansion would be included in the 2017-19 budget.

Road safety and economic development in Racine and Kenosha County is just as important as in Milwaukee, Rock and Outagamie counties, Wanggaard said, referring to areas where construction would remain. I intend to hold people to their word. Taxpayers deserve nothing less.

Racine County Executive Jonathan Delagrave said he was pleased with the increase to local governments, but disappointed about the proposed I-94 delay, saying it would hurt economic development efforts.

He pointed specifically to the DeBack Farms Business Park under development on Highway K near I-94 in Caledonia. He said prospective businesses often ask about the status of the I-94 project, which includes a planned reconstruction of the Highway K interchange.

One of my priorities is to promote economic development along the strategic I-94 corridor, Delagrave said in a statement. The proposed delays make it difficult to attract new investments and retain businesses that depend on properly developed and maintained roads along this critical stretch.

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester, who has also resisted more construction delays on I-94, said in a joint statement with other Republican Assembly leaders the budget request falls short of addressing the long-term funding crisis in our transportation budget.

It is a political solution, not a real solution, officials said in the statement.

Legislators said more money to support local roads should not come at the expense of delaying other projects, which will result in higher costs and lead to more dramatic fee or tax increases in the future.

The Legislature will take up the budget proposal when it reconvenes in January.

Walker defends plan

In addition to the proposed local funding and lack of tax and fee increases, Walker has emphasized the plans reduced borrowing and commitment to other mega-projects besides I-94.

Under the proposal, $122 million would be allocated to other freeway work in southeastern Wisconsin, including the Zoo Interchange and beginning work on the I-94 east-west corridor. An expansion of Interstate 39/90 between Madison and Illinois and work on Highway 10/441 in the Fox Valley would remain on schedule.

But several other projects around the state would also see delays.

On Twitter, Walker challenged opponents of the plan, writing Those who want to spend more should tell voters where its coming from.

This budget provides more funding to local governments for their roads and bridges, keeps borrowing at historically low levels, and maintains our no tax or fee increase pledge, Walker said in a statement. Good roads and bridges are important to Wisconsin and our economy, and this budget proves you dont have to raise taxes or fees to maintain a safe and strong transportation network.

Delagrave praised the increases in transportation funding to local governments, which he said will help us address many of the necessary maintenance projects and repairs on our roads.

He pointed to Highway U as an example. The county is considering reconstructing the road from Highway K to 6 Mile Road in Raymond next year, but would like to do the entire stretch to the county line. Extra money could make it easier to do that, Delagrave said.

Several projects planned

In Racine County, the $1.6 billion I-94 north-south project has included a reconstruction of the Highway G interchange in 2009, the Highway 20 interchange last year and the rebuilding of the Highway C bridge over I-94 in 2014.

Future work planned includes a reconstruction of interchanges at Highway 11, Highway K and 7 Mile Road, according to the project website.

Walkers plan could also delay work on the frontage roads from Highway 20 to Highway KR and a proposed roundabout at the intersection of Highways 20 and C, both of which are considered part of the north-south project.

The DOT had also planned resurfacing I-94 in Racine County, which has seen pavement begin to deteriorate after temporary repairs about three years ago.
A day after Monsanto announced its $66 billion sale to Bayer AG, top executives from the German firm traveled to St. Louis to meet with employees and community leaders to address concerns about future plans here.

The mayors of Creve Coeur and Chesterfield wanted more information on the commitment the combined company would have to the region, particularly in their municipalities, which together have more than 4,000 Monsanto employees.

Monsanto and Bayer executives did not make any assurances about specific plans for the two municipalities, said Creve Coeur Mayor Barry Glantz. But both Glantz and Chesterfield Mayor Bob Nation described the lunch meeting as positive.

They stated a few times over about their significant presence in Chesterfield and Creve Coeur and how theyre doing this to grow the business instead of cutting back, Nation said.

The synergies will be very, very good for St. Louis if they follow through with what they say, Glantz said.

Earlier in the day, executives from both companies, including the CEOs, addressed employees at a town hall meeting at the Creve Coeur campus.

Liam Condon, head of Bayers crop science division, said later he could relate to employees Thursday morning as he spoke.

I could feel a little bit with everybody in the room for the simple reason: Almost exactly 10 years ago, I was working for a company called Schering and I was the country head for China, and Bayer acquired Schering. So, I was like the Monsanto folks today. I was on the other side wondering: What is happening, how is this all going to play out?

Condon said the process with Schering proved to be transparent and fair. He expects the same as Bayer takes the next 12 to 15 months to complete the acquisition of Monsanto. It also faces shareholder and regulatory approval.

In a separate meeting with reporters, Condon, joined by Monsantos Chief Technology Officer Robb Fraley, did not provide details about future numbers of employees or job changes.

Bayer previously said it expects to achieve $1.5 billion in synergies after the two companies merge; its a term that usually means job cuts in areas where theres duplication.

And thats what will happen, Condon explained, using IT as an example.

Two fully fledged companies both have an IT system. If you want to have one integrated company youve only got one IT system and one cost, Condon said.

The two will look for similar areas of overlap in the coming months.

Theres absolutely no point, whatsoever, in any of us spending money on things twice, he said.

He did make it clear that what makes Monsanto special to Bayer is its ability to create innovative products.

What built this company was the innovation in biotech and seeds, Fraley said. The acquisition by Bayer will fuel another round of innovation.

So when asked to address the perception that research jobs were safe but administrative-type functions were more susceptible to cuts, Condon said:

I would say on the research side its probably a good assumption, on the admin side it is too early to call, Condon said of the St. Louis area.
AWARDS

One equine and two poultry products from Manna Pro won new-product awards at SuperZoo, the nations biggest pet retailer show.

GRADUATED

Entrepreneur Quarterly, a St. Louis-based media company that had been incubated within ALIVE Magazine, launched independently.

HELPING OUT

Forty First Bank employees took part in Operation Food Searchs Annual Saturday Jubilee, which collected donations of more than $41,000 and 177,000 pounds of food.

MERGERS AND ACQUISITIONS

Millstone Capital Advisors acquired Hardin Industries, a Lacon, Ill.-based manufacturer of custom generator set enclosures, fuel tanks and trailers.

Century Tokyo Leasing Corp. announced it would purchase the remaining shares of CSI Leasing Inc., making it a wholly owned subsidiary.

MILESTONES

Ricks Ace Hardware is celebrating 60 years in business.

MORE BUSINESS

4M Building Solutions was awarded contracts to clean five facilities at State Farm Corporate, Vystar Credit Union headquarters and branches, and 9100 Keystone Crossing.

NAME CHANGE

Auto Spa Speedy Wash is now Martian Car Wash.

OPENINGS

Pinots Palette opened a new location:

 10 Meadows Circle Drive, Lake Saint Louis, Mo. 63367

 (636) 265-0799

Harmony Christian Counseling opened an office:

 7128 South Outer 364, OFallon, Mo. 63368

 (636) 578-9201

Inspired Hope Christian Counseling opened an office:

 7128 South Outer 364, OFallon, Mo. 63368

 (314) 223-6976

Firebirds Wood Fired Grill opened its first location in the St. Louis area:

 1501 Beale Street, St. Charles, Mo.

Horner & Shifrin Inc. opened a new office:

 101 Laura K Drive, Suite 101, OFallon, Mo. 63366

PARTNERSHIPS

Bell Insurance Solutions of Collinsville joined the Valley Insurance Agency Alliance family of independent insurance agencies in Missouri and Illinois.

RECOGNITION

Jill Huckelberry, a project manager for Mosby Building Arts, was named to the 2016 Women In Construction list by Constructech Magazine.

Karpel Solutions was named to the annual Inc. 5000 list of the nations fastest-growing private companies.
Ameren says its customers could see significant economic benefits as a result of the newly passed federal Inflation Reduction Act, according to new filings from the St. Louis-based electric utility.
CREVE COEUR  Just a day before German conglomerate Bayers announcement of a $66 billion deal for Monsanto, hundreds of agriculture technology entrepreneurs and investors gathered within sight of the seed companys sprawling campus.

The people from around the world who make their way to the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center for the annual Ag Innovation Showcase are a testament to the ecosystem the St. Louis region has managed to build around ag-tech, helped in no small part by the presence of one of the giants in the industry.

More than 4,100 people in the region work at Creve Coeur-based Monsanto, and many of the young companies trying to commercialize new plant science technologies view the company as a potential partner or acquirer. The startups recruit from Monsanto, and vice versa, and the companys charitable arm, the Monsanto Fund, donated land and provided the money for the construction of the Danforth Center, one of the premier institutes for plant research.

Now, the largest private company in the regions biotech industry may soon be less local. German drug and plant chemical giant Bayer announced Wednesday it would buy Monsanto for $66 billion.

Attendees at the ag-tech conference this week were well aware that a deal between Bayer and Monsanto might soon be announced. Two other megadeals had already been announced in the agriculture industry in the last year.

It was basically mentioned in every conversation, said Nathan Kurtz, who heads entrepreneurship programs for the Kansas City-based Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation and was in town for the conference.

How the deal might ultimately affect the regions plant science industry is unclear. Much depends on how much Bayers top decision-makers in Germany decide to invest in St. Louis area operations, which will include the seeds and traits headquarters for Bayers crop science division.

Bayer officials emphasized that its in their interest to keep scientific talent in the region and to help startups grow through grants, venture funds and other outreach.

We will want to further strengthen this going forward because the core for everything biotech, seeds and traits is going to be St. Louis, Liam Condon, the head of Bayers crop science division, told the Post-Dispatch. The ecosystem you require to thrive can never just be internal. It has to be a supporting community.

A deal is far from certain. Antitrust regulators are expected to scrutinize the transaction closely. Monsantos stock, already trading well below Bayers offer price of $128 per share on fears that regulators will block the deal, fell 2 percent Thursday to $104.22.

Even if the deal is approved and Bayer de-emphasizes the St. Louis office, people in ag-tech note that the region has more than Monsanto going for it. The Danforth Center is thriving and just opened an expansion. Research institutions such as Washington University serve as regional anchors. Food ingredient giant Bunges North American headquarters is expanding in Chesterfield, and one of the worlds largest seed companies, Germany-based KWS SAAT AG, set up a research shop for 75 scientists at the Danforth Center two years ago.

When you think about the bioscience ecosystem, Monsanto has certainly been an important anchor to that but they are by no means an oasis in a desert, said Donn Rubin, chief executive of BioSTL, which advocates for the areas biotech industry and runs nonprofit lab space operator BioGenerator. There is a lot of activity going on.

Many expect Bayer to retain much of Monsantos scientific workforce while cutting some overlapping corporate functions. Such cuts could shake loose talent that might migrate to startups, or launch new companies.

Its putting talent on the market thats high-caliber, said Matthew Crisp, president and chief executive of Benson Hill Biosystems, which has offices in Creve Coeur and North Carolinas Research Triangle Park. If theres more talent available and its easier to recruit, thats only a good thing for innovation.

As big ag companies consolidate further, Crisp sees an inevitable reduction in their research and development spending. That will add to the urgency among growers and others in the food supply chain who want more innovation and choices. St. Louis, he said, has an infrastructure for ag entrepreneurs that is second to none.

Technologies at companies like Benson Hill, which uses big data techniques to help analyze and sequence genes, make it far faster and easier to develop new seed and plant traits. That opens up commercialization opportunities that were previously restricted to deep-pocketed giants like Monsanto.

Growers are eager to see more innovation and less control by a handful of players, Crisp said.

The loss of Monsantos headquarters doesnt worry the investors behind Clayton-based venture capital firm Lewis & Clark Ventures. They announced Monday they had raised $20 million to focus on ag-tech firms.

Youd certainly rather have an independent Monsanto, but the value of Monsanto and the value of the people and the influence here in St. Louis is unlikely to change dramatically, Lewis & Clark managing director Brian Hopcraft said Monday. St. Louis is such a well-positioned geography and we have some great things happening here and it makes St. Louis stand out on ag-tech.

The Kauffman Centers Kurtz, however, said it was a legitimate question whether the loss of Monsantos headquarters might slow the attraction of experienced talent here.

On the other hand, experienced Monsanto employees now may take a risk and start or join a young company. I think St. Louis is one of the best resourced towns for helping entrepreneurs and those who are interested in pursuing entrepreneurship, Kurtz said.
NEW YORK/LONDON  The worlds major central banks, stung by this years $81 million heist in Bangladesh, have launched a task force to consider setting broad rules to protect the vast network of cross-border banking from cyberattacks, according to two sources with knowledge of the matter.

The committee of central banks, part of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) in Basel, Switzerland, set up the task force this summer. It has begun gathering information from members on their protections against fraud, said the sources, who requested anonymity because work had just begun.

The task force could ultimately set cybersecurity standards around inter-bank transfers that may be adopted globally. The new principles or guidance could cover responsibilities of banks that send and receive money transfers, and networks like SWIFT that transmit payment instructions in correspondent banking.

The task force also aims to consider recommending the steps each player should follow if a central bank falls short of protecting its systems from hackers, what role domestic regulators should play, and how to respond if another breach happens, the sources said.

Its in its formative stages, said one of the sources. Its what needs to happen ... but its not a fast process. The other source said a focus of the task force will be identifying where the breakdowns are hidden in correspondent banking.

The Bank for International Settlements, which oversees the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures that launched the effort, declined to comment.

The sources said the attempted theft of nearly $1 billion from Bangladesh Banks account at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, as well as other cyberattacks that since came to light, helped spur the committee of central banks.

In early February, hackers breached the Bangladesh central banks systems and peppered the Fed with payment requests via the SWIFT global money-transfer network. Some requests were filled, amounting to $81 million that disappeared mostly into Philippines casinos. A Reuters investigation found the theft happened amid missed warning signs and miscommunication between the New York Fed and Bangladesh Bank.

After months of international finger-pointing, central banks and police investigators now appear to be cooperating to try to recover the funds, find the culprits and strengthen a banking system found to be vulnerable.

It just shows the vulnerabilities and, with the Bangladesh example, how a lot of money can be redirected in a very short amount of time, U.S. Sen. Gary Peters, a Democrat from Michigan who has urged the Group of 20 to prioritize cybercrime, said in a recent interview.

The National Bank of Belgium, which directly oversees SWIFT, has a leading role in the task force, one of the sources said.

The New York Fed, which handles some $80 billion in global money transfers each day and which is also taking part in the task force, said in June it was talking with other central banks about cybersecurity and the structure of global payments.

Belgiums central bank, the New York Fed and SWIFT, which stands for the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, each declined to comment.

The task force would have representatives from some of the most influential 25 central banks that make up the Bank for International Settlements payments committee, including the Bank of Japan, the European Central Bank, the Peoples Bank of China and the Fed. However it was unclear who was tapped to serve.

The committee, which does not include Bangladesh Bank, promotes the safety and efficiency of bank-to-bank payments and settlements. It could open consultations with outside entities as early as this year, said one of the sources, adding it could take another couple of years before anything is formalized.
Les Sterman wants to flip the script on transportation funding in Missouri.

Traditionally when there are big proposals to increase funding for roads or bridges in the state, the highway, or concrete, lobby writes them. Cities often get left out of the discussion. Transit gets a nod at best.

Such was the case with 2014s Amendment 7, which sought to raise sales taxes to rebuild Interstate 70 and prop up the lagging funding sources of the Missouri Department of Transportation. As usual, the proposal did almost nothing for transit. It didnt cause the biggest users of the highway system  truckers and cross-state drivers  to pay their fair share, instead shifting the burden to the poor.

At lunch one day, Sterman and his friend Tom Shrout vowed to do something about it.

It was such a greedy and misdirected proposal, Sterman told me over coffee recently. We both said weve got to do something about this.

Sterman, who is semi-retired, had been the longtime executive director of the East-West Gateway Council of Governments, which helps determine transportation priorities in the St. Louis region. Shrout was the former executive director of Citizens for Modern Transit.

They put together a group of grass-roots urban and transit supporters and started meeting about what to do. St. Louis Aldermen Cara Spencer and Scott Ogilvie were there. Former state Sen. Joan Bray joined the group. So did Gwen Moore, a University of Missouri-St. Louis business professor.

They formed an organization called Missourians for Better Transportation Solutions and raised a little money to fight Amendment 7. It was a David vs. Goliath effort, but they won a resounding victory.

Then they were left with a challenge. What to do next?

We felt an obligation to come up with an alternative, Sterman says. Our goal became trying to find a way to fund the Northside-Southside MetroLink proposal.

This was before Mayor Francis Slay decided to make MetroLink expansion the priority of his last year as mayor. It was before St. Louis County Executive Steve Stenger took a roundabout route to suggesting MetroLink expansion would be good for the county, too.

The problem, though, Sterman and his group found, was agreeing on solutions to expanding MetroLink that might actually work. Frustration set in. Regional leaders werent listening. Eventually, the group just stopped meeting.

Meanwhile, the regions politicians started latching on to MetroLink expansion as a significant priority, pushed in part by the Ferguson Commission report that said improving mass transit is a key to overcoming racial inequities in the St. Louis region.

Moore started her own group, Missouri Coalition for Better Transportation. I wrote this month about her attempts to get the Justice Department to investigate disparities in transportation funding in Missouri.

The column had a mistake. Moore told me Sterman was part of the group.

Hes not. Its not that he and Moore dont support the same general goals. They do.

But like many civic projects in St. Louis, the process of breaking up coalitions is easier than building them. Moore and Sterman both want to see the state start participating in funding mass transit in Missouri, as states with big cities all over the nation do. They just disagree on how to get there.

This is where Stermans script-flipping comes in.

Hes written a draft of a white paper that he hopes urban leaders in St. Louis and Kansas City consider as a road map to transit-funding success. He thinks the Northside-Southside route can be built for $1.5 billion with better planning. But key to paying for it is getting about 40 percent of the funding from state sources.

Its fallacy to think we can expand MetroLink without some sort of support from the state, Sterman says.

He suggests a new sales tax on gasoline in conjunction with a reduced rate on the existing gas tax, and an increase in vehicle registration fees. Further, he suggests MoDOT consider tolls for the eventual rebuilding of Interstate 70, otherwise, it would suck up all the existing funding sources for a decade or more, and urban areas such as St. Louis would continue to suffer.

Of the $500 million or so a year that Sterman believes his proposal could raise, 35 percent of it would be dedicated to public transit in Missouris cities.

The paper is Stermans attempt to bring better focus to the regions renewed interest in talking about transit expansion.

It gives me hope that our leaders are talking about transit again, Sterman says. But what Im seeing now is a lack of serious, intellectual focus. We need to be finding answers to one very important question: How do you provide a first-class transit system in this region?
MARYLAND HEIGHTS  The attorney for Maryland Heights deputy police chief accused the city Thursday of unfairly suspending his client in order to bring in a company with possible ties to a city official to restructure the police department.

Its been about two weeks since Maryland Heights Police Chief Bill Carson and Deputy Police Chief Joseph Delia were put on paid leave after the city said it received complaints of an unfair work environment within the department. Officials said the pairs suspensions were necessary to ensure an unbiased and thorough review of the department.

Carson, but not Delia, was allowed to return to work Monday.

City officials said in a press release that, after a preliminary review of the department was completed, they found that Carson was not the reason for the personnel complaints.

City officials have not yet said why they did not release Delia from his suspension.

It seems somehow, some way, youve accused Mr. Delia of something. We dont know what this something is, said Chet Pleban, Delias attorney, during the public comment period at a City Council meeting Thursday night.

Pleban says the city is unfairly barring Delia from appealing his suspension. Police can appeal disciplinary decisions to a city board of police commissioners.

But Pleban said Delia was told he cant do so because the city does not see it as a disciplinary move.

Pleban also voiced concerns about Strategos International, the Missouri-based law enforcement consulting company that Maryland Heights hired behind closed doors to carry out the review of its police department.

On Sept. 1, the City Council approved a $45,000 agreement with Strategos, an agreement that was arranged by City Administrator Jim Krischke.

Pleban claimed that Maryland Heights brought in Strategos because of Steve Ijames, who he said is affiliated with Strategos and who used to be the interim police chief in Republic, Mo., where Jim Krischke was previously city administrator. Krischke is in his first year on the job in Maryland Heights.

Pleban claimed that Ijames came to the city in August and told them to cut 10 of its police officers. Pleban said he thinks Delias suspension is part of a bigger plot to restructure and reduce the police department.

Officials did not respond to Plebans claims during the meeting. Mayor Mike Moeller said afterward that Ijames has spoken to the council during executive session before, but never about police staffing.

In a previous statement, Krischke said that no staff reductions are planned for Maryland Heights police and none have ever been discussed. The police department has 77 full-time officers.
MADISON COUNTY  Officials found nearly $2.4 million in alleged drug money hidden in the car of two Arizona women driving through Illinois.

Francisca B. Encinas, 43, and Yesenia A. Guillen, 38, both of Tucson, were each charged with two counts of money laundering Sept. 6 in Madison County.

The two women were found with $2.399 million in several hidden compartments throughout their 2015 red Chevrolet Suburban.

Madison County officials said that more than $500,000 was found in the car when the charges were initially announced. Officials only identified $500,000 then because it was the minimum amount required to justify the charges, said States Attorney Tom Gibbons. Officials began the drug asset forfeiture process Thursday to seize the $2.4 million.

Encinas and Guillen were southbound on Interstate 55 when they were pulled over by an Illinois State Police trooper for allegedly speeding and having an obstructed license plate, according to the Madison County State Attorney's office.

The officer became suspicious when Guillen acted nervous and the two women told inconsistent stories about their travels, according to court documents. Guillen agreed to the officer's request to search the vehicle and a K-9 drug dog found evidence of narcotics inside.

A girl from Arizona was also sitting in the backseat of Guillen's car. Neither Guillen or Encinas are the girl's legal guardian. She has been placed in protective custody.

Guillen later told officers that she had driven from Tucson to California, where other people picked her car up in the morning and returned it at night. She didn't know what they put in the car.

Guillen, Encinas and the juvenile passenger then drove the car to Reading, Pa. Other people picked up the car and then returned it to her four days later.

Guillen told police she was instructed to take the car, which she assumed they put cash in, back to California. She said she was getting paid $15,000 to make the trip and giving Encinas $5,000 for accompanying her. She told officers she was communicating with the unknown suspects using "Whatsapp," a texting application, on her phone.

Guillen and Encinas are being held at the Madison County Jail in Edwardsville without bail.

Gibbons said drug traffickers frequently Illinois highways as a pipeline to move drugs and money.

"While $2.4 million seems like a lot of money to most of us, it's a drop in the bucket for drug cartels," he said. "It disgusts me to think this is happening on a regular basis."
Virent  the Madison company with a process to turn sugars from corn stalks into the makings for jet fuel, polyester t-shirts and recyclable plastic bottles  will become part of a consortium of high-level, international companies that will work together to bring Virents biofuels and chemicals to market.

Tesoro, the Texas oil refiner that plans to buy Virent, will be part of the consortium along with Toray, a Japanese chemical company; Johnson Matthey, a U.K. specialty chemicals and sustainable materials company; and The Coca-Cola Co.

Together, they will decide how to finalize development of Virents BioForming technology to produce biofuels and chemicals on a commercial basis.

This is a critical and innovative approach to address scale-up challenges, Virent CEO Lee Edwards said.

We are delighted to share a common vision with a global group of respected industry leaders, recognized for their innovation and commitment to meet the changing needs of their customers who seek more sustainable products and services, Edwards said, in a written statement.

Virents technology converts plant materials into auto and jet fuels as well as chemicals for use in plastics and fibers, identical to comparable products made from petroleum.

The consortium plans to use traditional corn sugars for the first commercial plant, said Virent chief operating officer Jeff Moore.

These are widely available in the U.S. and provide the best balance of commercially available product, economics, and carbon reduction benefits, Moore said, in an email interview.

For the long term, corn stalks and cobs might be the fuel source, he said.

Moore said the consortium is working on supply options but no agreements are in place yet.

Tesoro announced last week it will buy Virent for an undisclosed amount.

The acquisition is expected to be finalized by the end of September.

The consortium is the key to getting Virents technology commercialized, said Tesoros executive vice president of operations, CJ Warner, hinting at how it will be accomplished.

We are focused on fostering the development of high-quality, lower-carbon, renewable feedstocks and blendstocks that can either be co-processed in existing refineries or blended seamlessly with traditional fuels, she said, in a news release.

Virent has been working with Coca-Cola since 2011 when the two companies signed a multiyear, multimillion-dollar agreement for an undisclosed sum so that Virents chemical, BioFormPX, commonly known as paraxylene, can be turned into a resin and shaped into recyclable, plastic bottles for the soda pop and water company.

Earlier this year, Virent showed off what it called the worlds first 100 percent plant-based polyester shirts, made from paraxylene derived from Minnesota sugar beets.

The company, at 3571 Anderson St., was founded in 2002 based on UW-Madison research and has 36 employees.

UW, Cellectar team up in cancer study

Cellectar Biosciences, Madison, and UW-Madison will work together in a study to see if one of Cellectars drug compounds, CLR 131, is an effective treatment for certain head and neck cancers when it is used along with radiation therapy.

The study will be conducted as part of a $12 million SPORE (Specialized Program of Research Excellence) grant the UW received from the National Cancer Institute.

We are excited to apply this promising new approach, which will allow us to simultaneously treat tumors from within using CLR 131 and from outside using external beam radiation, said Dr. Paul Harari, chairman of the UW School of Medicine and Public Healths department of human oncology.

The research is aimed at squamous cell carcinoma, a common type of skin cancer, on the head and neck.

CLR 131 also is in its first round of patient testing for use against multiple myeloma, a blood plasma cancer.
MONTGOMERY CITY, Mo.  The murder case against Pablo Antonio Serrano-Vitorino, who is accused of killing a man near Interstate 70 while fleeing a multiple-murder scene in Kansas, has been moved to St. Louis.

Serrano-Vitorino, 40, is accused of fatally shooting Randy J. Nordman, 49, of New Florence, Mo., during a struggle in the victims garage on March 8. At the time, Serrano-Vitorino was wanted for questioning in the murders of four of his neighbors in Kansas City, Kan., the night before.

New Florence is at I-70 and Missouri Highway 19, about 70 miles west of St. Louis. Officers found Serrano-Vitorinos abandoned pickup on the interstate shoulder and arrested him after a 17-hour manhunt.

He is a Mexican who had been deported from California in 2004 after a felony conviction there and re-entered the United States illegally some time afterward.

As his case unfolded in the Montgomery County Courthouse, Serrano-Vitorino asked for a new judge and a change of venue, or location. The Missouri Supreme Court assigned the case to St. Louis Circuit Judge Steven Ohmer, who on Wednesday moved it to his courtroom downtown.

Serrano-Vitorino also faces four charges of murder in Kansas City, Kan., but prosecutors there are letting Missouri handle its case first. Ohmer did not set a date for the next hearing. Serrano-Vitorino remains in the Montgomery County Jail.
ST. LOUIS  Police arrested a man, 19, in the murder of a woman earlier this week in the Central West End neighborhood, but prosecutors declined to issue charges Friday pending further investigation.

Three others may have been involved in the killing, police said. The man was arrested Thursday.

Victim Monica Shaw, 54, was a stranger to them, officials said, and appeared to be the target of a robbery.

Shaw was shot to death shortly before 11 p.m. Monday in the 400 block of North Sarah Street. She lived in the 4100 block of Enright Avenue. Police found her on the ground, unconscious and not breathing; she was pronounced dead at a hospital.

A niece, who asked to remain anonymous, said Shaw had never married or had children.

She was a very high-spirited person, she said. She was very loving and very much about family.

The relative said Shaw grew up in East St. Louis, and had family living throughout the St. Louis area, and in Atlanta and Tennessee.

Brenda Austell, 67, who lived near Shaw, said she had often seen Shaw walking to and from the bus stop, but that Shaw had mostly kept to herself.

Anyone with information is asked to call CrimeStoppers at 866-371-8477. Tipsters can remain anonymous and may be eligible for a reward.

Denise Hollinshed of the Post-Dispatch contributed to this report.
WASHINGTON  Rep. William Lacy Clay, D-Mo., said Friday that the voices of voter suppression were behind a constitutional amendment referendum to require a photo ID in Missouri, and that as many as 225,000 people could be disenfranchised if it is approved.

Clay was scheduled to monitor a panel on voting rights at an annual Congressional Black Caucus legislative conference here. In prepared remarks for that forum, Clay accused House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., of bottling up a Clay-sponsored full reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act. Its stalled in the House Judiciary Committee.

Not because it is objectionable, Clay said, in remarks obtained by the Post-Dispatch, but because they know that if they let it come out to the floor for a vote, it would pass with a clear, bipartisan majority.

He said that a 2013 Supreme Court decision, Shelby County vs. Holder, stripped away part of the 1965 act and, that because of that, in just a few weeks, we are going to conduct the first presidential election in 50 years without the full protection of the Voting Rights Act.

Missouri voters will be asked to approve a measure requiring voters to present an ID at polling places, which Republicans have argued is a common-sense way to prevent voter fraud. Democrats say its particularly onerous for the elderly, the poor and minority voters.

Federal courts in North Carolina, Wisconsin and other states have recently agreed with the Democrats position. Clay lauded those decisions, but said it cost millions to win in court. Clay is advocating uniform national voting standards. The obvious and best solution would be to establish a uniform VRA pre-clearance mechanism across the country, so that we could ensure the same standard of voter protection for every citizen, he said.

The Congressional Black Caucuss four-day annual legislative conference began Wednesday and culminates Saturday night with a dinner that will feature a keynote speech by President Barack Obama, the last of his presidency.

Besides the Clay-led discussion on voting rights, the conference has explored such topics as faith in politics, the state of African-American small businesses, and exploring ways to build trust between black communities and police.

Former President Bill Clinton will also be honored at the dinner Saturday night.
JEFFERSON CITY  Missouris next governor will have the power to remake a commission that protects the states water quality.

And that has environmental groups and others fearful for the future of Missouri's rivers.

On Wednesday, the Republican-led Legislature overrode Democratic Gov. Jay Nixons veto of a bill giving farming and mining interests a bigger say in the states water policies.

The change, which was championed by groups like the Missouri Farm Bureau, would limit the number of members of the public on the commission to no more than four, while at least two members would have to come from the agriculture and mining industries.

In short, opponents argued, it would allow for a corporate takeover of a commission that has the ability to approve or deny construction permits for facilities that have the potential to damage Missouri waterways.

Ed Smith, policy director of the Missouri Coalition for the Environment, called the change an incredible knee jerk reaction to an earlier decision by the commission to deny a permit to a large-scale hog farming operation in Grundy County.

In denying that permit, board members said the company seeking to build the facility failed to prove it had the assets to pay for the clean-up of any potential manure spills.

Smith said the panel could become dominated by members representing industries that pollute, resulting in a downgrade of the states waterways.

At least there should be a reasonable balance, Smith said.

Todd Parnell, the most senior member of the commission, also is upset with the override.

Im disappointed and Im angry, the Springfield resident said. Its a travesty to take away citizen representation as the foundation for the Clean Water Commission.

Parnell, the former president of Drury University who has served on the board for a decade, said there are a number of large-scale farm projects in the commissions pipeline that could draw scrutiny from the board, including a hog operation in Calloway County near Fulton.

The water of our state is unique and precious and it belongs to the citizens and not corporations or agricultural or mining interests. Its a legacy and a heritage, Parnell said.

The change was among a number of victories for agricultural interests during the spring legislative session and the veto session.

In addition to the Clean Water Commission, the GOP supermajorities in the House and Senate approved legislation that will close some types of farm data from the states open record laws. State agencies will be required to keep information collected for voluntary agricultural programs confidential.

They also created a state income tax deduction for disaster payments to farmers and ranchers and exempted livestock owners from having to pay for damage caused by wandering cattle and horses unless the owner is negligent.

Missouri Farm Bureau President Blake Hurst said the organization was thankful for legislators efforts.

Every one of these bills will benefit the farmers and ranchers of this state. They will make a positive difference on their farms. We appreciate the Missouri General Assembly for overriding the vetoes of bills important to Missouri agriculture, Hurst said in a statement.

Or as Smith put it, It certainly was a big year for Big Ag.

In defending the Clean Water Commission legislation, Rep. Tim Remole said the public members dont have the expertise to make good decisions regarding the effects of industry on the states waterways.

This has resulted in poor public policy, said Remole, who sponsored House Bill 1713. It has hurt the economy of Missouri.

But Rep. Tracy McCreery, D-Olivette, said the legislation was designed to punish the commission for its decision in the Grundy County case. She said there was never any public hearing of the proposed change, shutting out the public from commenting on whether the public should be shut out of having a say on the states water resources.

This was not properly vetted. Its never been publically heard. This process is very disrespectful to democracy, McCreery said.

The override moved through the Senate with no discussion.

Unless Nixon moves to put his stamp on the board before he leaves office in January, the next governor will have the ability to replace all members of the commission.

Democratic candidate for governor Chris Koster, the current Missouri attorney general, has the endorsement of the Missouri Farm Bureau. The Republican candidate for governor is former Navy SEAL Eric Greitens.
Kevin McDermott Kevin McDermott is a member of the Post-Dispatch Editorial Board. Follow Kevin McDermott Close Get email notifications on {{subject}} daily! Your notification has been saved. There was a problem saving your notification. {{description}} Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items. Save Manage followed notifications Close Followed notifications Please log in to use this feature Log In Don't have an account? Sign Up Today

In case you're looking for something new to worry about while you're online, try this: An international crime ring that lures people to engage in "inappropriate" internet conversation with the intent of later blackmailing them.

That's what former Illinois state Rep. Ron Sandack says happened to him.

Sandack, a Republican from the Chicago suburbs, surprised Springfield with his largely unexplained resignation from the Legislature in late July.

He finally explained it Friday.

In a statement to the media, released along with details of a police investigation, Sandack described how he was the target of an international crime ring focusing on high profile individuals luring them to engage in inappropriate online conversations with the intent of extortion.

I took their bait and fell for it hook, line and sinker, Sandack wrote.

According to his statement and a heavily redacted report released by police, Sandack in early July accepted a "friend" request from a woman on Facebook, then engaged in conversations with her on Facebook and Skype. The woman was described in the report as "in her early 20's with long black hair."

She later demanded that he wire money to the Philippines  a demand that was accompanied by a list "of his contacts from Facebook," according to the police report.

Sandack, who is 52 and married with two children, wired money twice in July, in amounts that were redacted from the police report.

He finally went to police after the blackmailers increased their demands.

Downers Grove, Ill., police told the Chicago Tribune they closed the case earlier this week, after determining the suspect was in the Philippines. The case has been referred to authorities there.

"Poor decisions on my part enabled me to be a victim, Sandack wrote in his statement. . . . I want it to be clear that no aspect of my involvement in this incident was related to my position as a State Representative nor was the computer state property.

Im human. I made a mistake for which I am remorseful and ashamed; especially because I have hurt my family, and there is no greater self-inflicted wound than that.
Gun rights in Missouri were expanded this week by a victorious Republican supermajority in the Legislature. Will we have more senseless mayhem or a greater sense of personal safety?

The debate will roil on, probably without resolution. Whats certain is that the paragraphs of Senate Bill 656 are part of the Missouri Revised Statutes, mainly sprinkled through Chapter 571 covering Weapons Offenses.

The expanded right to concealed carry takes effect Jan. 1. Changes in rules for stand your ground are effective Oct. 14.

The only section that became law immediately with Wednesdays override vote says that service personnel whose concealed-carry permits expire while they are on active duty can get renewals without penalty for two months after discharge.

The marquee section generally allows gun owners to pack them concealed without the need of passing the special training and paying permit fees the state has required since 2004. The issue has divided Missouri politics, largely along urban-rural lines, much longer than that.

After years of legislative debate, Missouri voters went to the polls in 1999 and narrowly defeated Proposition B to allow concealed carry, with urban and suburban voters opposed and rural voters heavily in favor.

The divide persisted as the Legislature voted in 2003 to allow concealed carry despite the referendum and then overrode Gov. Bob Holdens veto.

So it went Wednesday, when the House and Senate voted to override Democratic Gov. Jay Nixons veto of Senate Bill 656, which the Legislature had passed earlier in the year. Republicans all voted for override. All Democrats but Rep. Ben Harris, D-Hillsboro, backed their governor. In the Legislature, almost all of the Democrats hail from urban areas.

Both sides spoke at length of the culture divide  rural legislators about the right to bear arms, urban representatives about the potential for replays of the Gunfight at the OK Corral. The mayors of St. Louis and Kansas City strongly urged legislators to uphold the governors veto.

The National Rifle Association was jubilant, calling the override a great day for freedom in Missouri. State Rep. Kimberly Gardner, D-St. Louis, who is the Democratic nominee for city circuit attorney on Nov. 8, warned that the new law has put our state on a disastrous course.

Heres what the law does and doesnt do, according to the NRA, summaries by the legislative library and interviews with legislators and law-enforcement officers:

 Come Jan. 1, lawful owners of firearms will be able to conceal and carry them anywhere in Missouri, subject to the limitations that already exist  not in the likes of courthouses, jails, polling places or businesses, such as grocery stores, that post no guns at their doors.

 Background checks for buying weapons still apply as required.

 Only holders of Missouri concealed-carry permits can carry concealed weapons outside of the state, and Illinois still requires visitors to have Illinois permits. The other seven states surrounding Missouri honor its permits. There also are some places in Missouri, such as some school districts, that give more rights to permit holders.

 Local governments, such as St. Louis, still can prohibit people from carrying weapons openly unless they have concealed-carry permits.

The oddity, said NRA lobbyist Whitney ODaniel, of Carbondale, Ill., is that people will be able to carry concealed weapons in St. Louis and other places that limit open carry. A pistol in your pocket, yes, but not in an Old West holster on your hip.

Angie Brooks, manager of STL Sharpshooters range and gun shop in Affton, warned that many people who applaud the new law may not understand that local exception, which she called common in the St. Louis area. Without a permit, you still could be in violation without knowing it, Brooks said.

St. Louis City Counselor Michael Garvin said the city has an ordinance prohibiting open carry but doesnt enforce it because state law has pre-empted most, if not all, local restrictions. Garvin said his staff is studying the provisions of the new law to, among other things, determine whether open carry can be restricted.

 County sheriffs still will issue state permits after applicants pass training courses, but theyll have less power to refuse them for reasons of an applicants history with law enforcement  even if they dont have disqualifying convictions. Franklin County Sheriff Gary Toelke said he probably refuses a dozen requests a year from people in his county, where more than 6,000 residents have permits.

I have no problem with the original law, said Toelke, who is retiring Dec. 31 after 28 years as sheriff. I could refuse a permit for somebody who has had frequent contact with the law, or who is a suicide threat. Now that person will be able to carry a concealed weapon, and that concerns me.

 Applicants can seek lifetime permits for $500 if they dont want to face the five-year renewal requirement. But lifetime permits arent valid outside the state.

Another key change is in the definition of stand your ground, which generally protects a person using deadly force to defend his or her home or vehicle. The new law no longer requires people to attempt to back away from trouble in public, as in a tavern parking lot, before using deadly force if there is fear of bodily harm.

Toelke said that part of the law is going to have to be pinned down more for deputies who are called to public disruptions.

Kevin Ahlbrand, legislative director for the Missouri Fraternal Order of Police, raised similar concerns. His organization opposed the override. He noted that sponsors of the bill admitted to some of the flaws in debate, but promised to fix it next year.

This is not some type of banking regulation, this is public safety and law enforcement safety, Ahlbrand said. To pass a bill that they know there are problems with is unconscionable.

He is concerned about the status of the few local restrictions left, and fears that some rural legislators dont understand urban challenges.

Our biggest fear is criminals who have not been convicted of a felony but are engaged in criminal activity will be legally carrying guns, and were now going to have to assume everyone is armed, Ahlbrand said. When we show up to a scene and there are five guys with their guns out, what do we do?

St. Louis Police Chief Sam Dotson said the new law will leave (citizens) less safe, and make the job of law enforcement more difficult and put our officers in danger. Dotson also said that eliminating the required training courses necessary for permits means there will be people carrying concealed weapons who dont know how to use them.

You just assume everybody knows how to use a gun, but how many people accidentally shoot themselves? he said. You have to show us you know how to drive a car, but dont have to show us you know how to shoot a gun.

State Rep. Eric Burlison, R-Springfield, a sponsor of the new law, said the worries by Dotson and others are much ado about nothing.

Missourians have more freedom than they did yesterday, Burlison said Thursday.

What Missourians will get, countered Rep. Stacey Newman, D-Richmond Heights, a vocal opponent of the law, is more deaths by gunfire. And we already have too many.

Christine Byers and Kurt Erickson of the Post-Dispatch contributed to this report.
Thirty schools in St. Louis and St. Louis County will benefit from nearly $1.5 million in federal funding for programs to combat the adverse effects of trauma on students.

The funding is offered specifically in response to the protests and violence that erupted in the aftermath of the fatal police shooting of Michael Brown and other incidents in the region.

The St. Louis funding, announced Thursday through the U.S. Department of Educations Promoting Student Resilience initiative, is part of more than $5 million awarded overall. The rest of the share went to schools in both Baltimore and Chicago where similar civil unrest occurred, much of it in protest to fatal law enforcement action against blacks.

The grants support programs linking schools with mental health service providers and community-based organizations to address educational, behavioral and mental health needs of youth who were affected by the civil unrest.

St. Louis funding will be used to launch trauma-informed programs and training for staff in 18 elementary schools in St. Louis Public Schools, six north St. Louis County public schools that serve areas in and around Ferguson, and six nonpublic schools in St. Louis.

Ultimately the grants aim to strengthen schools capacity to understand the effects of trauma and toxic stress on student behavior, said Jerry Dunn, executive director of Childrens Advocacy Services of Greater St. Louis. The agency will provide training to school staff to create more understanding and environments to help kids dealing with trauma.

Dunn said the unrest in Ferguson and elsewhere was traumatic for children and their families.

But those events were only part of the many types of chronic stresses and trauma children face in the region.

There are underlying circumstances within many childrens lives throughout St. Louis city and county that are inherently traumatic, Dunn said. It could be trauma from living in poverty. It could be from crime. It could be child abuse and neglect. And that has far-reaching implications in their social and emotional behaviors as well as their learning behaviors.

In February, the Post-Dispatch published a special report on toxic stress and trauma experienced by children living in Ferguson from the civil unrest and ensuing police response as well as chronic neighborhood violence and poverty.

The funding is intended to work in partnership with another $4.7 million federal grant announced this week through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.

That grant went to help fund counseling, after-school programs, violence-prevention efforts and other initiatives in the federally designated St. Louis Promise Zone, which includes parts of St. Louis, portions of 26 St. Louis County municipalities and parts of unincorporated north St. Louis County.
Sunday marks the arrival of one of the years most anticipated telecasts. Hype for this evenings event, marked on calendars long before the night arrives, has been building for months, and its organizers arent holding anything back.

But the Packers-Vikings game isnt the only thing of note on television Sunday. The 68th Primetime Emmy Awards are scheduled, too, over on another channel.

The Emmys, Hollywoods annual night to honor the fine work being done on small screens everywhere, come around just as TV junkies are faced with a smorgasbord of new network programs, and the shuffle for DVR space begins. Only with so many outlets offering original content  beyond cable and premium cable to streaming services such as Hulu, Netflix, and Amazon  fall isnt the beginning of the TV season anymore.

HBOs Game of Thrones, Veep, and Silicon Valley air in the spring, while USAs Mr. Robot rebooted in July, and while season two episodes of Amazons Transparent premiered last December, the third season will be available Sept. 23.

Television has become a year-round premiere machine, with new seasons popping up wherever they seem to fit, but the bulk of new shows still kick off in mid- to late September. And before that happens, the Emmys ask us to pause and remember the greatness of the previous year (or the period from June 1, 2015, to May 31, 2016, inclusive).

It is not a coincidence that, given the fracturing of the traditional television landscape, the majority of nominations honor non-broadcast network programming. Amazon, Netflix, HBO, and other cable networks make up the bulk of those shows vying for awards. In the major categories, ABCs Modern Family and black-ish, in the race for Outstanding Comedy; and American Crime, vying for Outstanding Limited Series, are the only non-cable shows recognized. PBS Downton Abbey is up for Outstanding Drama, but even that airs in the United Kingdom first.

(The reality-competition category is lousy with non-cable offerings; CBSs The Amazing Race, ABCs Dancing With the Stars, and NBCs The Voice and American Ninja Warrior prove tough competition for Bravos Top Chef and Lifetimes Project Runway, both mainstays of the genre.)

The news is better for broadcast networks in the acting categories. Performances in ABCs American Crime, How To Get Away With Murder, Modern Family, and black-ish, along with those in Foxs Empire, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and The Last Man On Earth, CBSs Mom, and NBCs Saturday Night Live.

SNL, btw, is the most-nominated show ever, with 209; its in the running for Outstanding Variety Sketch Series, and  SPOILER ALERT!  it already won Amy Poehler her first Emmy, after 17 nominations, who with Tina Fey took home the prize for guest actress in a comedy series for their December hosting gig. Well, its not really a spoiler; the Emmys have more categories than can fit into a one-night show, so the Creative Arts Emmys are awarded the previous weekend, this year over two nights (Sept. 10 and 11). These awards include costuming, makeup, casting, opening title sequence, and hair styling, which, for a limited series or a movie, went to FXs American Crime Story: The People vs. O.J. Simpson. It must have been all those Marcia Clark wigs, worn by Sarah Paulson.

Who will win? For comedy series, its a tough field. In addition to the two ABC shows, HBOs Veep and Silicon Valley are up against Master of None, with Aziz Ansari, and Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, starring Ellie Kemper; and Amazons Transparent, with Jeffrey Tambor. Veeps hapless presidential politics offers the chance to laugh at Washington again, until the show ends and reality returns. It could definitely repeat in this category.

As for drama series, strong competition comes from Game of Thrones (HBO), Better Call Saul (AMC), Homeland (Showtime), House of Cards (Netflix), Mr. Robot (USA), and The Americans (FX), along with Downton Abbey. Mr. Robots bleak view of society makes it one of the sharpest shows on the air, while Game of Thrones managed yet another epic battle and some serious emotional turbulence. Thrones could take the statue again this year.

The 68th Primetime Emmy Awards, hosted by Jimmy Kimmel, air at 7 p.m. Sunday on ABC (Ch. 27.) If you want a preview of the glamour, tune in at 6 p.m. for Countdown to the Emmy Awards: Red Carpet Live.
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When President Barack Obama took office, two-thirds of his top aides were men. Women complained of having to elbow their way into important meetings. And when they got in, their voices were sometimes ignored.

So female staffers adopted a meeting strategy they called amplification: When a woman made a key point, other women would repeat it, giving credit to its author. This forced the men in the room to recognize the contribution  and denied them the chance to claim the idea as their own.

We just started doing it, and made a purpose of doing it. It was an everyday thing, said one former Obama aide who requested anonymity to speak frankly. Obama noticed, she and others said, and began calling more often on women and junior aides.

For decades, women have struggled to crack the code of power in the White House, where grueling hours, hyper-aggressive colleagues and lack of access to the boss have proved challenging to women from both parties. The West Wing is also home to the ultimate glass ceiling: Men have had a lock on the Oval Office for more than 200 years.

That could change if Democrat Hillary Clinton prevails in November. Not only would she break a gender barrier by winning the presidency, she also could bring in a female chief of staff  another first in the White House  as she did as first lady, as a senator and as Obamas secretary of state.

During Obamas second term, women gained parity with men in the presidents inner circle; Clinton has actually had women outnumber men within her senior staff at times during her government career. GOP nominee Donald Trump has installed some female managers while working in the male-dominated construction industry, and has at least three women playing senior roles in his campaign.

Proximity is power

The White House is unlike any workplace in America. Power is defined by proximity to a single individual: the president. Being in the room  whether its the Oval Office or the 7:30 a.m. senior staff meeting where the chief of staff hashes out the administrations top priorities  is crucial to exerting influence.

And the job is a constant race against the clock: Presidents have as few as four years to pursue an agenda and cement a legacy. Burnout is endemic, and top White House aides typically leave after less than three years.

Given the short period you are in the White House, you leverage every minute to ensure that you can be there, fully committed and totally present, said Juleanna Glover, who served as press secretary to Vice President Dick Cheney during President George W. Bushs first term.

Women often struggle just to get a foot in the door. Presidents typically select their most senior advisers from the male-dominated ranks of their campaigns. As late as the administration of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the only women working in the West Wing were secretaries  and they were barred from dining with men in the White House mess.

Regardless of the weather, we had to slog out to any hole-in-the-wall we could find, recalled Patty Herman, who worked there until she met and married George Herman, the White House correspondent for CBS. Now, I understand, thats changed.

Once your foot is in the door, you have to get a seat at the table.

Anne Wexler, who served as President Jimmy Carters assistant for public outreach, complained that Chief of Staff Hamilton Jordan never invited her to a key daily meeting where aides offered ideas to the president, even though Jordan publicly described Wexler as the most competent woman in Democratic politics.

Personally, I never spent a great deal of time with the president, Wexler said in a 1980 interview for Carters presidential library. I think that was a mistake on [Carters] part.

Bonnie Newman got a job in the administration of President Ronald Reagan in 1981 after playing squash with Helene von Damm, who had acted as Reagans personal secretary since the 1960s. Although von Damm had access and proximity to the president, Newman recalled, There werent a whole lot of other women in the West Wing: So when you looked around, you looked a little out of place.

In Bill Clintons presidency, several women gained greater influence, including the first lady, who spearheaded Clintons signature health care reform initiative. But Hillary Clinton retreated to a more traditional role after the initiative foundered. And the presidents affair with intern Monica Lewinsky served to undermine his claims of gender progress.

In the early days of Obamas administration, the West Wing was a well-documented bastion of testosterone, due largely to the dominating roles of men such as Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, now mayor of Chicago, and then-economic adviser Lawrence Summers. At a dinner in November 2009, several senior female aides complained to the president that men enjoyed greater access and often muscled them out of key policy discussions.

If you didnt come in from the campaign, it was a tough circle to break into, said Anita Dunn, who left her post as White House communications director shortly after that meeting. Dunn says it was a matter of simple math: Given the makeup of the campaign, there were just more men than women.

The atmosphere has changed considerably in Obamas second term. Many of the original players have moved on. Today, Obamas closest aides  the ones who sit in the 7:30 a.m. meeting and earn the top White House salary of $176,461 a year  are equally divided between men and women. Overall, the average man still earns about 16 percent more than the average woman. But half of all White House departments  from the National Security Council to the Office of Legislative Affairs  are headed by women.

Critical mass

I think having a critical mass makes a difference, said White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett, who came in with the president and remains one of his top aides. Its fair to say that there was a lot of testosterone flowing in those early days. Now we have a little more estrogen that provides a counterbalance.

National security adviser Susan Rice also has served throughout Obamas administration. In previous positions, Rice said, she had to push to get into key gatherings. Its not pleasant to have to appeal to a man to say, Include me in that meeting, she said.

Now, said Domestic Policy Council Director Cecilia Munoz, the folks who were jockeying to get into meetings or struggling over manifests are just kind of not around anymore.

Today, if were not in the room, Rice said of herself and other senior female advisers, its not happening.

Second terms have traditionally served as a critical period for women, an opportunity to move up after the men move out. After Obamas re-election, Jennifer Palmieri replaced Dan Pfeiffer as communications director. She remembers the moment the president expressed his confidence in her and shared his high expectations.

This is it, youre in the room. There is no other room: This is the Oval Office, Palmieri recalls him saying. Youre here for a reason, and I want to know what you think.

Sylvia Mathews Burwell, secretary of health and human services, describes a woman pull during Clintons second term, when she was promoted from deputy chief of staff to deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget. Another woman, Maria Echaveste, got Burwells former position, and a third woman, Minyon Moore, moved into Echavestes spot.

In President George W. Bushs second term, Condoleezza Rice and Margaret Spellings were promoted to the Cabinet, becoming secretary of state and secretary of education, respectively. Other women moved into more senior White House jobs, including legislative affairs director Candi Wolff and press secretary Dana Perino.

Family needs

Regardless of when they served, women described a constant struggle to balance work and family, especially if they had young children. After Bush was elected in 2000, longtime aide Karen Hughes said she recoiled when incoming chief of staff Andrew Card tried to establish a 24/7 work schedule.

Hughes said she called Bush and told him that she didnt have to be there at 10:30 at night to do her job.

Bush responded quickly, Hughes said, telling Card: Dont run off all my working mothers!

Although Card made accommodations, Hughes left the White House after a year and a half, saying the job was too hard on her homesick Texan family. That fact hit her one Saturday morning, she said, when her teenage son asked her to bake him some brownies and she was simply too exhausted to do it.

Sarah Bianchi had two children under 3 when she joined the White House in June 2011 as a deputy assistant to the president and the vice presidents head of economic policy. She left in May 2014 to return to the private sector. Half the battle from there is parenting, Bianchi said. Were just not doing well enough on this.

White House aides say a slew of recent changes has improved conditions for working mothers. Last year, when legislative affairs director Katie Beirne Fallon and public engagement director Paulette Aniskoff were pregnant, the General Services Administration set up a tasteful Japanese screen in a West Wing restroom to provide a private spot for pumping breast milk. (Years earlier, then-deputy chief of staff Alyssa Mastromonaco had successfully procured a tampon machine.)

Meanwhile, the administration encourages staff to take advantage of up to 12 weeks of paid medical and family leave  much more generous than what most federal workers receive.

Aniskoff said she assumed she would have to quit when her son was born, but decided to stay after Jarrett helped her work out the logistics.

Even though I know theoretically that we had paid leave and all these things, Aniskoff said, I just didnt know that it applied to me.
Working families are struggling across Missouri with stagnant pay and falling real wages. Low pay is so pervasive that nearly half of Missourians today earn less than $15 an hour, or $31,000 a year.

Wanda Rogers is one of these struggling Missourians. She has worked for years in the fast-food sector. Even when she gets full-time hours, she is not scraping by on her $7.65 an hour paycheck. She cant cover rent, transportation and food on her own, and has to rely on food stamps, food pantries and help from her daughter, with whom she pools her earnings to raise her young grandchild. But the Republican-controlled Congress has refused to act, keeping the federal minimum wage frozen at just $7.25 since 2009. While the wage is 40 cents higher in Missouri, its still less than $16,000 per year for a full-time worker.

Missouri voters are faced with clear and stark choices on the question of raising wages this November. Missouri Sen. Roy Blunt has a long track record of fighting any increase in the minimum wage, and Republican gubernatorial candidate Eric Greitens joined in, saying he opposed any increase in the minimum wage as well. Both are locked in tight races against their opponents, Jason Kander and Chris Koster, who have both called for raising the minimum wage to help Missouris working families.

But new polling released this Labor Day shows that Greitens and Blunt are on the wrong side of Missouri voters on this issue. According to the poll, Missouri voters by an overwhelming 67 percent to 26 percent margin want Congress to drop its opposition and raise the minimum wage. And by only a slightly lower 57 percent to 38 percent margin, they support raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour over several years.

The new poll also shows that this is a voting issue. By a 48 percent to 38 percent margin, Missouri voters say that they are less likely to support a candidate who is against raising the minimum wage. And for Missouris U.S. Senate race, the poll shows that highlighting Blunts opposition to raising the minimum wage, and Kanders support for raising it could make a significant difference in the outcome. Informing likely voters of the two candidates positions on the minimum wage shifts voter support by a total of 8 points  from a 47 percent to 43 percent Blunt lead, to Kander ahead by a 45 percent to 41 percent margin. With polls showing a close Senate race, bread-and-butter economic issues like the minimum wage could make the difference in who Missouris working families send to Washington and Jefferson City in January to look out for their interests.

Blunt and the Republican majority in Congress have kept the minimum wage so low that working Missourians must rely on taxpayer-funded safety net programs to get by  letting McDonalds and Walmart off the hook for providing a decent paycheck. As a result, more than 506,000 working people and their children in Missouri are enrolled in Medicaid and related health programs, and 237,000 must turn to food stamps to put meals on the table  with taxpayers footing the bill.

Ten years ago in Missouri, the minimum wage helped make the difference in a close U.S. Senate race when Claire McCaskill, a minimum wage increase supporter, successfully used it to highlight the difference for working families between her economic agenda and that of Republican Sen. Jim Talent, who opposed raising the minimum wage. McCaskill rode the issue to an Election Day victory, helping break the logjam in Washington and deliver the first federal minimum wage increase in 10 years in 2007.

With the need to raise wages long overdue again, the minimum wage is poised to make the difference again this fall. Working Missourians are making clear their demand to break the gridlock and raise pay  and this fall will reward candidates who listen.

Richard von Glahn is the organizing director of Missouri Jobs with Justice.
The city of Madisons credit is good. Very good indeed.

Madison got the highest municipal bond rating once again, a week before close to $100 million on notes and bonds are issued by the city.

The Aaa bond rating with a stable outlook came from Moodys Investor Service, and is the highest possible rating an issuer can receive, according to Mayor Paul Soglins office.

It is very reaffirming to receive the Aaa bond rating again, Soglin said in a statement. My office, city staff and Common Council members all work very hard to maintain this high rating, and we are committed to maintaining it, despite the continued restraints we are facing.

Moodys listed a stable and diverse economy, sound financial operations and a history of healthy reserves as strengths.

Analysts noted, however, that challenges include strict levy limits that reduce the citys revenue-raising flexibility for operations, the statement said.

The Aaa bond rating is for $99.1 million in tax-exempt and taxable general obligation bonds and notes that will be issued by the city next week.

As budget discussions continue, the city is determined to maintain this level by enacting another responsible budget for 2017, Soglin said.
As we have since July 2006, each Friday well post a mixed bag of quick cigar news and other items of interest. Below is our latest Friday Sampler.

1) A bill is moving through the New Jersey legislature that would decriminalize the establishment of new cigar lounges in the state. The General Assembly Commerce and Economic Development Committee recently passed the bill, which now moves to additional readings before potentially heading to the House floor for a vote. Interestingly, Reed Gusciora, a Democrat, is a primary sponsor of the bill, even though he considers himself anti-smoking. Cigar smokers are a devoted and nuanced group of aficionados who gather and socialize in an environment that would be their own, he told New Jersey 101.5. This bill would give towns that want to expand their offerings and appeal to this niche market the option to do so. It would also create a new economic engine for entrepreneurs who want to cater to cigar enthusiasts, and give cigar smokers more places to go to and enjoy their hobby without affecting non-smokers.

2) Pennsylvania-based online retailer Famous Smoke Shop has announced a new house blend thats made by Plasencia Cigars S.A. in Esteli, Nicaragua. Called Seven Deadly Sins, it is the brainchild between Michael Vandenstockt, Famous vice president of operations and marketing, and Nestor Plasencia. Offered in all seven sinsLust, Gluttony, Avarice, Sloth, Wrath, Envy, and Prideeach vitola has been given its own unique blend. As a whole, [the cigars] comprise filler and binder from Nicaragua, Honduras, Costa Rica, Brazil, Mexico, and Pennsylvania, while the wrappers are from Nicaragua, Honduras, and Cameroon.

3) This week the FDA announced 55 tobacco sellers nationwide who were receiving warning letters for reportedly selling newly regulated tobacco products to underage buyers. Of the products purchased, only two could be categorized as premium cigars, both flavored. The rest were mostly vaping products with some machine-made mass-market cigars. The FDA announcement did not say how many undercover stings it conducted where tobacco sellers appropriately asked for ID from the buyers.

4) Inside the Industry: In what would seem to qualify as a stealth cigar (i.e., a cigar released under-the-radar with little fanfare in order to get it on the market before the August 8 FDA deadline), one retailer is now selling Drew Dominicana by Drew Estate. Atlantic Cigar announced the addition in an email to customers Monday afternoon, but little is known, except that the cigar is made in the Dominican Republic by an undisclosed factory and comes in three blends with different wrappers: Maduro, Shade, and Rosado. (Although it is pure speculation, one potential source could be Royal Agios Dominican Factory where the Balmoral Anejo XO is made, as the company has a strong partnership with Drew Estate.) Also announced in the same email was the availability of Drew Estate Factory 2nds, with wrappers described as Connecticut Broadleaf, Connecticut Habano, and Sumatra Sungrown. To date, no details have come from Drew Estate about these blends.

5) From the Archives: Looking for a way to improve your palate? About three years ago, StogieGuys.com explored the unusual strategy of smoking two cigars at once. If you try alternating between two cigars that are relatively similar, the article notes, youll be amazed at what flavors you can discover in a cigar when searching for differences between two cigars that, smoked alone, would be described in very similar terms.

6) Deal of the Week: Looking to try some (mostly) new cigars without committing to an entire box or even a five-pack? This 2016 Premium Sampler may be for you. Included in the 10-pack for $89 are such cigars as the Padron Family Reserve No. 50 Natural, Caldwell Blind Mans Bluff Toro, Avo Syncro Nicaragua Fogata Robusto, Gurkha Ghost Asura, New World Toro, PDR AFR-75 Maduro Sublime, and the Illusione Epernay Le Matin.

The Stogie Guys

photo credit: Flickr




Drivers on southbound I-39/90 south of Madison had to detour for seven hours early Friday after a semi-trailer involved in a crash split open and spilled its load of iced tea onto the highway.

The crash happened shortly after midnight, about two miles south of the Beltline Interchange. It involved two semi-trailers and an SUV, and was caused by a truck driver not slowing down for traffic in a work zone, the State Patrol said.

Andrew Cox, 29, of Onalaska, was cited for operating under the influence of a controlled substance and inattentive driving.

According to the State Patrol:

Cox was in the left lane and came upon the active construction zone near Highway N, with vehicles slowing or stopped in front of his semi.

He swerved to the right to avoid a crash, but the trailer jackknifed and the tractor hit the left rear corner of a semi-trailer in the right lane, as well as an SUV that was in the left lane.

The trailer being hauled by Cox split open, with Arizona Iced Tea dumping out all over the road.

Cox suffered non-life-threatening injuries. The driver of the second semi, Awale Sahal, 43, of Eden Prairie, Minnesota, and the driver of the SUV, Kyle Venden, 30, of Edgerton, were not injured.
American International Group, Inc. (NYSE: AIG) announced that it has entered into an agreement to sell its interest in Ascot Underwriting Holdings Ltd. (AUHL) and related syndicate-funding subsidiary Ascot Corporate Name Ltd. (ACNL) (together Ascot) to Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), a professional investment management organization that invests the assets of the Canada Pension Plan. The transaction is subject to regulatory approvals.

Total consideration for the deal is $1.1 billion inclusive of CPPIBs recapitalization of Syndicate 1414s Funds at Lloyds (FAL) capital requirements. AIG will receive approximately $240 million in net cash proceeds from the transaction after the FAL recapitalization and release of the AIG-guaranteed Letter of Credit currently supporting the syndicates FAL. Proceeds reflect AIGs 20 percent stake in AUHL and ownership of ACNL.

Ascot and AIG founded the managing agency and the syndicate in 2001. As a global specialty insurance underwriter, Ascot focuses on property insurance, marine insurance, and reinsurance.

AIG will maintain its strategic partnership with Ascot Underwriting Bermuda Ltd. (AUB). While AUB is a wholly-owned subsidiary of AUHL and part of the sale to CPPIB, AUB will continue to serve as the managing general agent for AIG-Ascot Re, which writes assumed treaty reinsurance business on behalf of AIGs wholly owned subsidiary American International Reinsurance Company Ltd. (AIRCO) in Bermuda.

As part of the agreement, AIG, CPPIB, and Ascot intend to expand a collective commercial relationship in Bermuda, and for AIG to be a preferred reinsurer to Syndicate 1414.

This deal successfully repositions our strategic focus and underwriting capacity to our relationship with Ascot in Bermuda, while monetizing our position in the syndicate at an attractive value and retaining exposure to the syndicate as a reinsurer, said Robert Schimek, Chief Executive Officer, Commercial Insurance. We are also pleased to start a collaborative relationship with CPPIB who we see as an ideal partner for Ascots outstanding management team.

Andrew Brooks, Chief Executive Officer of Ascot Underwriting Ltd. said, Ascot and AIG have enjoyed a strong and profitable relationship for over 15 years and we value the support that we have received from AIG throughout that time. We are pleased to be continuing our relationship through Ascot Underwriting Bermuda and look forward to building on the success of that platform.

Evercore served as financial advisor to AIG, and Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer served as legal advisor to AIG on the transaction. Macquarie Capital served as financial advisor to Ascot Underwriting Holdings Limited.

Canada Pension Plan Investment Board is a professional investment management organization that invests the assets of the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) not currently needed to pay benefits on behalf of 19 million contributors and beneficiaries. As of June 30, 2016, the CPP Fund totaled C$287.3 billion.
Consolidated-Tomoka Land Co. (NYSE: CTO) announced the acquisition of four single-tenant triple net lease properties in a sale-leaseback transaction with Bloomin Brands, Inc. (the Portfolio) for approximately $14.9 million. The Portfolio includes three restaurant properties that operate as Outback Steakhouses, located in Austin, Texas, Charlotte, North Carolina, and Charlottesville, Virginia, and another property that operates as a Carrabbas Italian Grill, also located in Austin, Texas. The newly originated absolute triple-net leases, which include a corporate guaranty, each have an initial term of 15 years and include annual rent increases. This acquisition completed the 1031 like-kind exchange utilizing the remaining proceeds from the Companys recent disposition of the property in Lexington, North Carolina, that was leased to Lowes and is also expected to be a part of the like-kind exchange utilizing proceeds from the anticipated closing of the disposition of fourteen properties previously announced by the Company.

John P. Albright, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Company stated, Although the initial yield is below our cap rate guidance, this portfolio represents strong performing units in both attractive demographic areas and major retail corridors.
Harvest Natural Resources, Inc. (Harvest or the Company) (NYSE: HNR) announced that, at the Company's annual meeting held yesterday, the Company's stockholders authorized the sale of all of the Company's interests in Venezuela to CT Energy Holding SRL, a private investment firm (CT Energy), with more than 97% of the total number of shares voting on the proposal approving the transaction. At the closing of the sale, CT Energy or one of its affiliates will pay Harvest $80 million, subject to certain adjustments, and a $12 million six-month 11% note payable, among other consideration.

On June 30, 2016, the Company announced that it and its wholly owned subsidiary, HNR Energia B.V. (HNR Energia), had entered into a Share Purchase Agreement, under which CT Energy would acquire HNR Energia's 51% interest in Harvest-Vinccler Dutch Holding B.V., a Netherlands company through which all of Harvest's Venezuelan interests are owned. Under the Share Purchase Agreement, in addition to the consideration mentioned above, Harvest will receive the cancellation of (i) $30 million of outstanding debt held by CT Energy, (ii) CT Energy's 8,667,597 shares of Harvest common stock and (iii) warrants held by CT Energy to purchase 34,070,820 shares of Harvest common stock, exercisable under certain circumstances, at an exercise price of $1.25 per share.

The closing of the sale of the Company's Venezuelan interests remains subject to certain conditions, as further described in the Share Purchase Agreement and the Company's public filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Closing is expected to take place on October 7, 2016.

Six other proposals were approved by Harvest's stockholders at the annual meeting. These included proposals to (i) approve, on an advisory basis, compensation that will or may become payable to the Company's named executive officers in connection with the sale of the Company's Venezuelan interests, (ii) re-elect the Company's seven existing directors and (iii) adopt an amendment to the Company's certificate of incorporation to effect a reverse stock split of the Company's common stock at a ratio between one-for-four and one-for-ten, inclusive, with the exact ratio to be determined by the Board, as well as certain administrative proposals.
NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- American International Group, Inc. (NYSE: AIG) today announced that it has entered into an agreement to sell its interest in Ascot Underwriting Holdings Ltd. (AUHL) and related syndicate-funding subsidiary Ascot Corporate Name Ltd. (ACNL) (together Ascot) to Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), a professional investment management organization that invests the assets of the Canada Pension Plan. The transaction is subject to regulatory approvals.

Total consideration for the deal is $1.1 billion inclusive of CPPIBs recapitalization of Syndicate 1414s Funds at Lloyds (FAL) capital requirements. AIG will receive approximately $240 million in net cash proceeds from the transaction after the FAL recapitalization and release of the AIG-guaranteed Letter of Credit currently supporting the syndicates FAL. Proceeds reflect AIGs 20 percent stake in AUHL and ownership of ACNL.

Ascot and AIG founded the managing agency and the syndicate in 2001. As a global specialty insurance underwriter, Ascot focuses on property insurance, marine insurance, and reinsurance.

AIG will maintain its strategic partnership with Ascot Underwriting Bermuda Ltd. (AUB). While AUB is a wholly-owned subsidiary of AUHL and part of the sale to CPPIB, AUB will continue to serve as the managing general agent for AIG-Ascot Re, which writes assumed treaty reinsurance business on behalf of AIGs wholly owned subsidiary American International Reinsurance Company Ltd. (AIRCO) in Bermuda.

As part of the agreement, AIG, CPPIB, and Ascot intend to expand a collective commercial relationship in Bermuda, and for AIG to be a preferred reinsurer to Syndicate 1414.

This deal successfully repositions our strategic focus and underwriting capacity to our relationship with Ascot in Bermuda, while monetizing our position in the syndicate at an attractive value and retaining exposure to the syndicate as a reinsurer, said Robert Schimek, Chief Executive Officer, Commercial Insurance. We are also pleased to start a collaborative relationship with CPPIB who we see as an ideal partner for Ascots outstanding management team.

Andrew Brooks, Chief Executive Officer of Ascot Underwriting Ltd. said, Ascot and AIG have enjoyed a strong and profitable relationship for over 15 years and we value the support that we have received from AIG throughout that time. We are pleased to be continuing our relationship through Ascot Underwriting Bermuda and look forward to building on the success of that platform.

Evercore served as financial advisor to AIG, and Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer served as legal advisor to AIG on the transaction. Macquarie Capital served as financial advisor to Ascot Underwriting Holdings Limited.

Canada Pension Plan Investment Board is a professional investment management organization that invests the assets of the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) not currently needed to pay benefits on behalf of 19 million contributors and beneficiaries. As of June 30, 2016, the CPP Fund totaled C$287.3 billion.

This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements, including the closing of the transaction described herein, are not historical facts but instead represent only AIGs belief regarding future events, many of which, by their nature, are inherently uncertain and outside AIGs control. Except for AIGs ongoing obligation to disclose material information as required by federal securities laws, AIG is not under any obligation (and expressly disclaims any obligation) to update or alter any forward-looking statements, whether written or oral, that may be made from time to time, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. Factors that could cause AIGs actual results to differ, possibly materially, from any forward-looking statements include the factors set forth in AIGs filings with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission.

# # #

American International Group, Inc. (AIG) is a leading global insurance organization. Founded in 1919, today we provide a wide range of property casualty insurance, life insurance, retirement products, mortgage insurance and other financial services to customers in more than 100 countries and jurisdictions. Our diverse offerings include products and services that help businesses and individuals protect their assets, manage risks and provide for retirement security. AIG common stock is listed on the New York Stock Exchange and the Tokyo Stock Exchange.

Additional information about AIG can be found at www.aig.com and www.aig.com/strategyupdate | YouTube: www.youtube.com/aig | Twitter: @AIGinsurance | LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/company/aig. These references with additional information about AIG have been provided as a convenience, and the information contained on such websites is not incorporated by reference into this press release.

AIG is the marketing name for the worldwide property-casualty, life and retirement, and general insurance operations of American International Group, Inc. For additional information, please visit our website at www.aig.com. All products and services are written or provided by subsidiaries or affiliates of American International Group, Inc. Products or services may not be available in all countries, and coverage is subject to actual policy language. Non-insurance products and services may be provided by independent third parties. Certain property-casualty coverages may be provided by a surplus lines insurer. Surplus lines insurers do not generally participate in state guaranty funds, and insureds are therefore not protected by such funds.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005392/en/

AIG

Media:

Matt Gallagher, 212-458-3247

[email protected]

or

Investors:

Liz Werner, 212-770-7074

[email protected]

Source: American International Group, Inc.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- Brookfield Investment Management Inc. Announces Information Concerning Proposed Reorganizations of Brookfield Mortgage Opportunity Income Fund Inc. (NYSE: BOI), Brookfield Total Return Fund Inc. (NYSE: HTR) and Brookfield High Income Fund Inc. (NYSE: HHY)

Brookfield Investment Management Inc. ("Brookfield") announced that the Special Meeting of Stockholders of Brookfield Mortgage Opportunity Income Fund Inc. (the "Special Meeting") held on September 15, 2016, has been adjourned to allow for further solicitation of BOI stockholders to meet the requirement that holders of a majority of the outstanding shares of BOI vote in favor of the reorganization of BOI into Brookfield Real Assets Income Fund Inc. Notice of the date, time and place of the adjourned Special Meeting will be provided in the future, in accordance with applicable law.

As previously announced, stockholders of Brookfield Total Return Fund Inc. and Brookfield High Income Fund Inc. have approved their respective reorganization proposals and no further action or solicitation is necessary with respect to those Funds. The reorganization of each of HTR and HHY into the Brookfield Real Assets Income Fund Inc. is contingent upon BOI's approval of the reorganization.

Forward-Looking Statements

Certain statements made in this news release that are not historical facts are referred to as "forward-looking statements" under the U.S. federal securities laws. Actual future results or occurrences may differ significantly from those anticipated in any forward-looking statements due to numerous factors. Generally, the words "believe," "expect," "intend," "estimate," "anticipate," "project," "will" and similar expressions identify forward-looking statements, which generally are not historical in nature. Forward-looking statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ from the historical experience of Brookfield Investment Management Inc. and the Funds managed by Brookfield Investment Management Inc. and its present expectations or projections. You should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date they are made. Brookfield Investment Management Inc. and the Funds managed by Brookfield Investment Management Inc. undertake no responsibility to update publicly or revise any forward-looking statements.

Brookfield Investment Management (the "Firm") is an SEC-registered investment adviser and represents the Public Securities platform of Brookfield Asset Management. The Firm provides global listed real assets strategies including real estate equities, infrastructure equities, real asset debt and diversified real assets. With over $16 billion of assets under management as of June 30, 2016, the Firm manages separate accounts, registered funds and opportunistic strategies for institutional and individual clients, including financial institutions, public and private pension plans, insurance companies, endowments and foundations, sovereign wealth funds and high net worth investors. The Firm is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Brookfield Asset Management, a leading global alternative asset manager with approximately $250 billion of assets under management as of June 30, 2016. For more information, go to www.brookfield.com.

Brookfield Mortgage Opportunity Income Fund Inc., Brookfield Total Return Fund Inc. and Brookfield High Income Fund Inc. are managed by Brookfield Investment Management Inc. The Funds use their website as a channel of distribution of material company information. Financial and other material information regarding the Funds are routinely posted on and accessible at www.brookfieldim.com.

Contacts: Brookfield Mortgage Opportunity Income Fund Inc. Brookfield Total Return Fund Inc. Brookfield High Income Fund Inc. Brookfield Place 250 Vesey Street, 15th Floor New York, NY 10281-1023 (855) 777-8001 [email protected]

Source: Brookfield Mortgage Opportunity Income Fund Inc. and Brookfield Total Return Fund Inc. and Brookfield High Income Fund Inc.
KANSAS CITY, Mo., Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- City Year, an education-focused national service organization that helps students and schools succeed, today announced the official launch of a high-impact program to build the academic and social-emotional success of students in five high-need Kansas City schools. In the City Year program, diverse teams of near-peer City Year AmeriCorps members serve full-time alongside teachers, tutoring students one-on-one, providing in-class support and organizing school-wide programs to increase academic achievement and student engagement. (For more information, see the City Year Kansas City video.)

The program was launched in partnership with Kansas City Public Schools, the Office of Kansas City Mayor Sly James, the Missouri Community Service Commission/AmeriCorps, the Kauffman Foundation and many other business and community leaders. Last year, the City Year program was piloted with 16 AmeriCorps members in two Kansas City public schools.

After a successful pilot year, Kansas City Mayor Sly James said: "City Year has become a strong partner. The interventions in attendance, behavior and course performance City Year AmeriCorps members provide supplement our current strategies to transform low-performing schools by supporting students, teachers, and administrators in boosting student achievement."

With the pilot success, this school year fifty City Year Kansas City AmeriCorps members are supporting students at four Kansas City Public Schools (Central Middle School, Central Academy of Excellence, Northeast Middle School, and Northeast High School) and one public charter school (the Ewing Marion Kauffman School). Nationally, City Year is dedicated to keeping students in school and on track to graduate high school, and currently operates in more than 300 schools in 28 cities, serving more than 200 thousand students.

"Our city needs more passionate, diverse young people entering the education sector and the young people who serve with City Year fit the bill," said Corey Scholes, Director of Education, Kauffman Foundation. "What's exciting is that City Year AmeriCorps members will not only help the thousands of students they work with stay on track in school, but beyond their year of service the AmeriCorps members themselves will be a pipeline of talent for Kansas City schools and education non-profits."

City Year's "Whole School Whole Child" Model Yields Results

A recent third-party study by Policy Studies Associates found that schools that partner with City Year were up to two-to-three times more likely to improve school-wide proficiency rates in English and math, when compared to students and schools that did not have the benefit of a City Year partnership. In addition, a recent national study by MDRC found that schools that partnered with Diplomas Now, a collaboration of City Year, Communities In Schools and Talent Development Secondary, significantly reduced the number of students at risk of dropping out, according to research-based early warning indicators.

Locally, pilot year results showed significant gains in attendance at Central Middle School. For example, students City Year supported in attendance during the 2015-2016 school year attended school three weeks more than the previous year.

Kansas City Public Schools' Superintendent Dr. Mark Bedell said, "It is the right time to bring City Year to Kansas City Public Schools. City Year is an established, scalable national service model that has a proven track record of results across the country. Early results show that City Year Kansas City has the ability to help our schools succeed and improve attendance and student achievement. I am excited City Year is growing its program to serve in more of our schools this year."

Cross-Sector Community and Business Leaders Champion City Year

The launch of City Year in Kansas City has been led by many community and business leaders, including lead investments from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, Hall Family Foundation, Baum Family Foundation, Marion and Henry Bloch Family Foundation, Hunt Family Foundation/Kansas City Chiefs, JE Dunn Construction, Sosland Foundation, William T. Kemper Foundation, Brandmeyer Family Foundation, Oppenstein Brothers Foundation, John and Terry Petersen, Polsinelli, and Hallmark.

"City Year is grateful to both our private and public sector partners, including the Kansas City Public Schools, the Office of Kansas City Mayor Sly James, the Kauffman Foundation, and the Missouri Community Service Commission/AmeriCorps, who worked so hard to make City Year Kansas City possible," said Michael Brown, CEO and Co-Founder, City Year. "It is a privilege for City Year to serve the students and schools of Kansas City."

Mark Donovan, President, Kansas City Chiefs and Board Chair of City Year Kansas City, said: "The business and philanthropic communities in Kansas City recognize that City Year's data-driven, innovative model can play a significant role in improving students' ability to succeed. The Hunt Family Foundation/Chiefs are excited to continue to invest in City Year Kansas City as they transition from a pilot to a full-scale program in 5 schools this year and serve even more students."

Kansas City Natives Fuel City Year Kansas City Team

"It is a great honor to help bring City Year to Kansas City, my hometown, and to work with our diverse AmeriCorps members here to provide excellent service to our public school students day in and day out," said City Year Kansas City AmeriCorps member Andrew Gillen, who is starting his second year of service with City Year.

Audra Clark, City Year Kansas City Executive Director, and also a Kansas City native, said: "City Year Kansas City looks forward to continuing to work collaboratively with all of our public and private partners to help the students of Kansas City stay in school and on track to graduate high school ready for college and career."

Gillen and Clark are among many City Year Kansas City AmeriCorps members and staff who are natives of Kansas City and greatly appreciate the chance to serve their hometown communities.

Today's launch event at the Kansas City Public Library's Plaza Branch included the site's Opening Day ceremony, when City Year Kansas City AmeriCorps members recited the City Year and AmeriCorps pledges to publicly kick off their year of service in Kansas City schools. Opening Days are held at all City Year sites at this time of year and are sponsored by Comcast NBCUniversal, City Year's national Opening Day sponsor. A strategic partner since 2001, Comcast NBCUniversal has provided more than $87 million in cash and in-kind support to City Year. During that time, City Year has grown from nearly 700 City Year AmeriCorps members to a corps of 3,100 diverse young leaders.

About City Year:

City Year is dedicated to helping students and schools succeed. Diverse teams of City Year AmeriCorps members provide high-impact student, classroom and school-wide supports to help students stay in school and on track to graduate from high school, ready for college and career success. A recent third party study showed that schools that partner with City Year were up to two to three times more likely to improve on Math and English assessments. A proud member of the AmeriCorps national service network, City Year is funded by the Corporation for National and Community Service, local school districts, and private philanthropy from corporations, foundations and individuals. Learn more at www.cityyear.org, City Year's Facebook page, and on Twitter.

Logo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20110714/NE35509LOGO

To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/city-year-kicks-off-partnership-to-support-students-in-five-high-need-kansas-city-schools-300328849.html

SOURCE City Year
Grant to Fund Programs and Operations for Remainder of 2016

AUSTIN, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Austin-area minority entrepreneurs will benefit from a $16,000 Partnership Grant Program (PGP) award to the Economic Growth Business Incubator (EGBI). The nonprofit, dedicated to helping minority and low-income small business owners, will use the funds to provide skills training and cover operational expenses for the remainder of 2016.

This Smart News Release features multimedia. View the full release here: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005856/en/

Representatives of Comerica Bank and the Federal Home Loan Bank of Dallas presented a $16,000 grant to Austin's Economic Business Growth Incubator on September 16, 2016. The funds will be used to cover operational expenses for the remainder of the year. (Photo: Business Wire)

The grant is the second since 2014 from Comerica Bank and the Federal Home Loan Bank of Dallas (FHLB Dallas), bringing the institutions combined contribution to $36,000.

I could not be more thrilled that Comerica Bank and the Federal Home Loan Bank of Dallas are helping the Economic Growth Business Incubator, said Austin Mayor Steve Adler. This grant will make Austin a more affordable and equitable city by helping us focus entrepreneurial and technological skill-building to the people who need it the most.

EGBIs offices are located in East Austin, a designated HUBZone, which means the area has been designated as a Historically Underutilized Business Zone by the U.S. Small Business Administration. Statistics from EGBI show that 81 percent of its clients are minorities, and of those, 68 percent are Hispanic, and 60 percent are women.

Austins spirit of innovation has led to more than a dozen incubator-like programs in the region, but they are primarily related to technology, said EGBI Executive Director Al Lopez. EGBI works to bring skills, training, and resources to an often-overlooked group of hard-working citizens. We appreciate the continued support from Comerica Bank and FHLB Dallas to serve these aspiring and established business owners.

PGP grants are offered annually through FHLB Dallas member institutions via a lottery system. Funds may be used for research, organizational capacity-building, grant- and funding-application assistance, or contractual services.

We understand the importance of supporting our communitys micro-entrepreneurs, said Lueretha Slack, vice president of Corporate Public Affairs, Community Reinvestment and North Texas CRA market manager at Comerica Bank. EGBIs programs have proven to be a model for success in East Austin. Its a worthwhile partnership for everyone involved.

Through the PGP, member institutions contribute $500 up to $4,000 to a community-based organization (CBO). FHLB Dallas matches the contributions at a 3:1 ratio, which provide up to $12,000 in grant money to a CBO. In 2016, FHLB Dallas awarded $225,000 in PGP funds to assist 23 CBOs. Combined with the $96,200 from member institutions, a total of $321,200 was awarded this year.

Comerica Banks commitment to EGBI works to create economic viability for entrepreneurs in underserved areas of Austin, where it has made a tremendous difference, said Greg Hettrick, first vice president and director of Community Investment at FHLB Dallas. Thank you, Comerica Bank and EGBI for the opportunity to work with you through our Partnership Grant Program.

About Comerica Bank

Comerica Bank is a commercial banking subsidiary of Comerica Incorporated (NYSE: CMA), a financial services company headquartered in Dallas, Texas, and strategically aligned by three business segments: The Business Bank, The Retail Bank, and Wealth Management. Comerica focuses on relationships, and helping people and businesses be successful. In addition to Texas, Comerica Bank locations can be found in Arizona, California, Florida and Michigan, with select businesses operating in several other states, as well as in Canada and Mexico. Comerica reported total assets of $71.3 billion at June 30, 2016. To find us on Facebook, please visit www.facebook.com/ComericaCares. Follow Comerica on Twitter at @ComericaCares and follow Comerica Chief Economist Robert Dye on Twitter at @Comerica_Econ.

About the Federal Home Loan Bank of Dallas

The Federal Home Loan Bank of Dallas is one of 11 district banks in the FHLBank system created by Congress in 1932. FHLB Dallas, with total assets of $54.4 billion as of June 30, 2016, is a member-owned cooperative that supports housing and community development by providing competitively priced advances and other credit products to approximately 850 members and associated institutions in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Mexico, and Texas. Visit fhlb.com for more information.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005856/en/

Federal Home Loan Bank of Dallas

Corporate Communications, 214-441-8445

www.fhlb.com

Source: Federal Home Loan Bank of Dallas
A series of bank robberies and attempted bank robberies could possibly be attributed to the same suspect, Madison police say, after crime analysts discovered similarities in all of the cases, including the description of the suspect.

The most recent case happened a week ago when a burglar broke into US Bank on Cottage Grove Road and stole rolls of coins.

A grainy surveillance image from that break-in shows a man wearing a dark hooded sweatshirt with the hood up, similar to the suspect in the previous five cases.

"The crimes are generally occurring on Fridays or Saturdays, typically during morning hours," said police spokesman Joel DeSpain.

The cases include:

Robbery on July 14 at Chase Bank, 602 N. High Point Road

Attempted robbery on Aug. 20 at the same bank

Attempted robbery on Aug. 26 at Union Bank and Trust in Oregon

Robbery on Aug. 27 at Anchor Bank, 216 Cottage Grove Road

Robbery on Sept. 2 at Heritage Credit Union, 2555 Shopko Drive

Burglary at US Bank, 6401 Cottage Grove Road

The suspect is a black male 30 to 40 years old, 5 feet, 8 inches to 6 feet tall, 250 pounds, wearing a dark hooded sweatshirt, sunglasses and a bandana over his face during the robberies.

Anyone with information about the crimes is asked to call Crime Stoppers, 266-6014.
HARRISBURG, Pa., Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- During the month of October, the Department of Banking and Securities will be emphasizing the need to help our senior citizens protect themselves from improper and illegal financial transactions. The department's outreach staff will be meeting with senior citizens and members of the general public across Pennsylvania during the month of October to discuss financial topics of interest to senior citizens as part of Governor Tom Wolf's Consumer Financial Protection Initiative.

Department staff will be participating in several senior citizen's expos sponsored by members of the General Assembly, including:

Rep. Sue Helms' Senior Expo at the Halifax Area Ambulance Social Hall in Halifax (Dauphin County) on October 6 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM

(Dauphin County) on October 6 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM Senator John P. Sabatina, Jr. Senior Expo at the PA National Guard Armory at 2700 Southampton in Philadelphia on October 7 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM

on October 7 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM Senators John T. Yudichak and Lisa Baker and Rep. Aaron Kaufer's Senior Expo at the Kingston Armory in Kingston (Luzerne County) on October 13 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM

(Luzerne County) on October 13 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM Rep. Jim Marshall's Senior Expo at the United Methodist Church's Community Life Center of Chippewa in Beaver Falls (Beaver County) on October 14 from 9:00 AM to 12:00 PM

(Beaver County) on October 14 from 9:00 AM to 12:00 PM Senator Don White and Rep. Dave Reed and Rep. Chris Dush's Senior Expo at S&T Bank Area, White Township Recreation Complex in Indiana (Indiana County) on October 20 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM

(Indiana County) on October 20 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM Senator Tom Killion's Senior Expo at the Penn State-Brandywine Campus in Media (Delaware County) on October 21 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM

Department staff will be presenting "Understanding Reverse Mortgages," which helps senior citizens and their families have a better understanding of this complicated mortgage product. The presentation will be at the Schuylkill Township Hall in Phoenixville (Chester County) on October 27 at 7:00 PM.

Department staff will also be visiting private senior communities and presenting "Avoiding Scams and ID Theft," which takes a look at ways people's identities are stolen or compromised, what people can do if they find their identities have been stolen, and how to stop theft from occurring. (Note: attendance at these events is limited to residents of the communities and their guests) Location for these presentations:

Lodge Run Apartments in Portage (Cambria County) on October 12 at 11:00 AM

(Cambria County) on October 12 at 11:00 AM Spring Manor Apartments in Hollidaysburg (Blair County) on October 13 at 11:00 AM

(Blair County) on October 13 at 11:00 AM Apartments at Cliveden in Philadelphia on October 27 at 4:00 PM

The Department of Banking and Securities offers a number of education presentations designed to help senior citizens and consumers of all ages learn protect and grow their own money. The department's outreach Calendar of Events can be found online: http://bit.ly/1KIscBZ. Consumers and community groups can call 1-800-PA-BANKS or email [email protected] for more information, or learn more online: http://bit.ly/2bjKrTa.

Media contact: Ed Novak, 717-783-4721

To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/consumer-financial-protection-initiative-outreach-focuses-in-october-on-protecting-senior-citizens-300329502.html

SOURCE Pennsylvania Department of Banking and Securities
TARRYTOWN, N.Y., Sept. 16, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- As the largest private practice of board certified Otolaryngologists and related sub-specialists in the nation, ENT and Allergy Associates (ENTA) is always pleased to share its knowledge, expertise and experience with colleagues. This year, once again, the American Academy of Otolaryngology  Head and Neck Surgery (AAO-HNS) has called upon several ENTA physicians to speak at its annual convention, to be held in San Diego from September 18-21, 2016. This gathering, which attracts a huge number of otolaryngologists from across the country, represents the ideal forum for ENTA to demonstrate its knowledge in the practice of Otolaryngology, Allergy & Immunology, and Audiology. In addition to over a dozen of its clinicians in attendance, ENTA physicians Drs. Lee Eisenberg, Marc Levine and Ofer Jacobowitz will travel to San Diego to present seminars on various topics of relevance. Beyond that, Jonathan Aviv, MD, of ENTA's East Side Manhattan office and Phillip Massengill, MD, of ENTA's Middletown, New York office will receive the AAO-HNS Foundation Honor Award, in recognition of their long and valued service to the medical field. This prestigious award is presented to members to honor their contributions and volunteer service with the Academy and its Foundation. In addition, Lauren Zaretsky, MD, of ENTA's Port Jefferson and East Patchogue offices in Long Island will be honored by the AAO-HNS, and awarded its Presidential Citation, in recognition of her superb service to the organization and its goals. ENTA presenters and topics include: Ofer Jacobowitz, MD: Integrating Oral Appliances into Your Sleep Apnea Practice Minimally Invasive Implantable Approaches for OSA Surgery for OSA: More or Less? Lee Eisenberg, MD: Business of Medicine for Residents and Fellows Planning for the Future Marc Levine, MD: Thyroid Ultrasound Robert Glazer, CEO of ENTA, proudly noted, "The AAO-HNS annual gathering is an opportunity to learn from the very best in the field of Otolaryngology. Our practice is delighted to send many of our physicians to be a significant part of it. I am certain we will all gain valuable knowledge." The AAO-HNS is the world's largest organization representing specialists who treat the ear, nose, throat, and related structures of the head and neck. It supports its members' ability to achieve clinical excellence through professional and public education, research and health policy advocacy. Its vision focuses on empowering otolaryngologists and head and neck surgeons to deliver the best patient care. About ENT and Allergy Associates, LLP: ENT and Allergy has over 180 physicians practicing in 40+ office locations in Westchester, Putnam, Orange, Dutchess, Rockland, Nassau and Suffolk counties, New York City and northern/central New Jersey. The practice sees over 80,000 patients per month. Each ENT and Allergy Associates clinical location provides access to a full complement of services, including General Adult and Pediatric ENT and Allergy, Voice and Swallowing, Facial Plastics and Reconstructive Surgery, Disorders of the Inner Ear and Dizziness, Asthma, Clinical Immunology, Diagnostic Audiology, Hearing Aid dispensing, Sleep and CT Services. ENTA has a clinical alliance with The Mount Sinai Hospital for the treatment of diseases of the head and neck and esophageal cancer, a clinical alliance with the Montefiore Medical Center for the tertiary treatment of pediatric patients in New York City and the Hudson Valley, a clinical alliance with the Northwell Health for the tertiary treatment of pediatric patients in Queens, Nassau and Suffolk Counties and a partnership with the American Cancer Society to educate and treat patients with smoking disorders and cancer. The Practice has also expanded its clinical capabilities to include advanced Immunodeficiency trials. ENT and Allergy Associates Management and Marketing teams have been recognized numerous times with awards and accolades including Health Leaders Media 2011 Top Leadership Team in Healthcare, Top Doctor Awards, ACS recognition award, AHAA Audiologist awards, The Westchester County Association Big W Awards and the Healthcare Marketing Report Healthcare Advertising Awards. Visit www.entandallergy.com for more information.

CONTACT: Keith Arluna 560 White Plains Rd Suite 615 Tarrytown, NY 10591 914-575-1934 [email protected]

Source: Ent and Allergy
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Two people were detained in Belgium on Friday, both suspected of links to Islamist militants, federal prosecutors said.

Police searched three houses across the country, including one in Brussels, part of an ongoing investigation into what prosecutors said was "the activities of a terrorist group."

It gave no further details.

Belgium has been at the heart of investigations into the militant attacks in Europe since the Paris attacks in November last year that were partly planned in Brussels. Militants later attacked Brussels airport and metro in March this year, killing 32 people.

(Reporting by Robin Emmott; editing by Philip Blenkinsop)
Bulgarian border police stand guard near barbed wire fence constructed on the Bulgarian-Turkish border, near Malko Tarnovo, Bulgaria, May 22, 2016. REUTERS/Stoyan Nenov

SOFIA (Reuters) - Bulgaria has asked for 160 million euros ($180 million) aid from the European Commission to help it protect its borders and stem the flow of migrants and refugees into the country, deputy prime minister Rumiana Bachvarova said on Friday.

Over a million people fleeing conflict and poverty in the Middle East and Africa arrived in Europe last year, many coming via Turkey, and Bulgaria says migrant flows through its territory have been on the rise again since June.

The European Union's poorest country has built a fence and sent army officers to its border with Turkey but needs EU support to maintain proper frontier protection. Prime Minister Boiko Borisov is expected to raise the issue at the EU summit in Bratislava today.

"We have filed three applications for a total amount of 160 million euros to the European Commission. We have asked for technical support, for support to build video surveillance and support for operational activities," Bachvarova told parliament.

Bachvarova said Sofia had been assured that it will receive the main part of the support package very soon.

Bulgaria has detained 12,500 migrants, mainly from Afghanistan, in the first eight months of the year, some 30 percent less than a year ago, but says the inflows have registered a steady increase since June.

(Reporting by Tsvetelia Tsolova; Editing by Toby Chopra)
By Arno Schuetze

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - The U.S. Department of Justice is asking Deutsche Bank to pay $14 billion to settle an investigation into its selling of mortgage-backed securities, Germany's flagship lender said on Friday.

The claim against Deutsche, which is likely to be negotiated in several months of talks, far outstrips the bank's and investors' expectations for such costs.

While it is yet to become clear what the final payment will be, if it were to be as high as $14 billion, this would be a severe strain for Deutsche's fragile finances and would likely further rock investor confidence in the bank.

The bank's US-listed shares fell 8 percent in after-hours trading.

"Deutsche Bank has no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited. The negotiations are only just beginning. The bank expects that they will lead to an outcome similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts", Deutsche Bank said in a statement on Friday.

The Department of Justice declined to comment.

The Wall Street Journal earlier reported the department's demands.

The Department of Justice has taken a tough stance in settlement negotiations with other banks, requesting sums higher than the eventual fine.

In 2014, it asked Citigroup (NYSE: C) to pay $12 billion to resolve an investigation into the sale of shoddy mortgage-backed securities, sources said. The fine eventually came in at $7 billion.

In a similar case, rival Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) agreed in April to pay $5.06 billion to settle claims that it misled mortgage bond investors during the financial crisis.

That settlement included a $2.39 billion civil penalty, $1.8 billion in other relief, including funds for homeowners whose mortgages exceed the value of their property, and an $875 million payment to resolve claims by cooperative and home loan banks among others.

Deutsche Bank's settlement will comprise a different list of recipients, a source close to the matter said, adding that the lender had already settled some claims three years ago.

In late 2013, Deutsche Bank agreed to pay $1.9 billion to settle claims that it defrauded U.S. government-controlled Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, America's biggest providers of housing finance, into buying $14.2 billion in mortgage-backed securities before the 2008 financial crisis.

A $14 billion fine, or even half that sum, would still rank among one of the largest paid by banks to U.S. authorities in recent years. In 2013, JPMorgan Chase & Co (NYSE: JPM) agreed to pay $13 billion to settle allegations by the U.S. authorities that it overstated the quality of mortgages it was selling to investors in the run-up to the 2008-2009 financial crisis. In 2014, Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) agreed to pay $16.7 billion in penalties to settle similar charges.

Deutsche Bank has not said what it has set aside in anticipation of a settlement over the sale and packaging of resident mortgage-backed securities before 2008. Its overall legal provisions stood at 5.5 billion euros at the end of the second quarter.

Deutsche was once one of Europe's most successful players on Wall Street. Like many of its peers, it has since faced a slew of lawsuits that often trace back to the boom years before the crash. Its litigation bill since 2012 has already hit more than 12 billion euros.

Claims filed by individuals, companies and regulators against Deutsche, outlined in the bank's 2015 annual report, relate to mis-selling of subprime loans and manipulation of foreign exchange rates or gold and silver prices. Other lawsuits are for the rigging of borrowing benchmarks Libor and Euribor, used to set the price of mortgages and derivatives.

In July, Chief Executive John Cryan said he hoped to close the four largest remaining litigation cases this year.

These are the mortgages and FX cases, an investigation into suspicious equities trades in Russia and allegations of money laundering.

(Reporting by Arno Schuetze; additional reporting by Suzanne Barlyn in New York, editing by G Crosse, Bernard Orr and Diane Craft; Additional reporting by Suzanne Barlyn in New York.)
BUDAPEST (Reuters) - The four Central European member states of the European Union will submit a text of joint proposals to tackle the problems of the bloc at a summit later in the day in Bratislava, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban told public radio.

"The V4 countries are preparing a (text), and we will submit this ... as a joint Visegrad Four proposal to the European Council, this will be an important moment in the life of these four countries," Orban said in the interview recorded on Thursday and published on Friday morning.

Orban also said that he expected migration pressure to increase in the Balkans again, once the weather worsens and sea routes to Italy become difficult.

(Reporting by Krisztina Than)
By Katy Migiro

NAIROBI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Kenya reaffirmed on Thursday its plan to close the world's largest refugee camp by November, rejecting allegations by Human Rights Watch (HRW) that it is harassing and intimidating Somali refugees to return home when it is not safe to do so.

The rights group said Kenya is not giving the refugees a real choice between being repatriated or staying, and that the United Nation's refugee agency, UNHCR, is not giving refugees accurate information about the risks they face in Somalia.

"Our timeline is November 30th for closure of the camp," Karanja Kibicho, principal secretary for Kenya's interior ministry, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

"We are trying to restore sanity in matters of refugee affairs. We are a sovereign country that is trying to address a security concern and we are as humane as possible."

A spokesman for UNHCR in Kenya said the agency would have to study HRW's report before responding.

Kenya announced in May that it would close Dadaab, home to more than 300,000 mostly Somali refugees, by November, following deadly attacks on Kenyan soil by Somali Islamist group al Shabaab.

The government says al Shabaab has used the camp as a recruiting ground for its attacks.

Kenya softened its stance in June, following an outcry from rights groups who said much of Somalia was not yet safe for return, and agreed a goal of halving Dadaab's population by the end of 2016.

Somalia continues to face an Islamist insurgency and is struggling to rebuild after decades of conflict.

Kibicho's comments suggest the government is sticking to its original November deadline.

There has been a surge in departures from Dadaab in recent months with more than 24,000 refugees returning to Somalia since December 2014, the United Nations said.

Some are third generation residents of the camp, which was set up in 1991 to host Somalis fleeing civil war in the Horn of Africa country.

FEAR

HRW interviewed 100 refugees and asylum seekers in Dadaab, some of whom said in a report released on Thursday that they agreed to return home because they fear the Kenyan government will deport them if they stay.

Community leaders told HRW that a government official intimidated them at a meeting in July.

"When I tried to tell the (official) that people can't go back, that it is not as safe as he suggests, he pointed his finger at me and told me to sit down," HRW quoted one elder as saying.

"He told me to pick up a gun and defend my country ... After that meeting, people began to really worry that we would be put into lorries come November."

In 2014, Kenyan authorities deported more than 300 people to Somalia in a crackdown the United Nations said violated the 1951 Refugee Convention which prohibits refoulement -- the forcible return of refugees to areas where their lives would be threatened.

"These people are voluntarily taking themselves (home)..." Kibicho said. "We are a country that respects our obligations to the international conventions."

Refugees who choose not to return to Somalia will be taken to Kakuma, he said, referring to Kenya's second refugee camp, which mostly hosts people fleeing war in South Sudan.

The United Nations has struggled to raise funds to provide health and education services to refugees returning to Somalia.

Some refugees who left Dadaab were stranded near the Somali border in August after local authorities in Jubaland refused to receive them, saying they could not provide enough assistance, HRW and local media reported.

(Reporting by Katy Migiro; Editing by Katie Nguyen.; Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, womens rights, trafficking, property rights and climate change. Visit http://news.trust.org to see more stories.)
Mexico's President Enrique Pena Nieto delivers a speech to the media to announce new cabinet members at Los Pinos presidential residence in Mexico City, Mexico, September 7, 2016. REUTERS/Edgard Garrido

(This Sept 15 story corrects "asked" in first paragraph to "raised with" California lawmakers)

By Gabriel Stargardter

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto, who has proposed liberalizing his country's drug laws, privately raised with California lawmakers visiting Mexico a state measure to legalize recreational marijuana, a state legislator said on Thursday.

A delegation of California Democratic lawmakers visiting Mexico talked for an hour on Wednesday with Pena Nieto about trade and the state's border with Mexico.

During the meeting, Pena Nieto brought up the November ballot measure without getting into details, California state Senator Ben Allen said in an interview.

"But they're clearly paying close attention," he added.

If California votes to create a legal cannabis market, it would place great pressure on Mexico, which is mired in combating its vast drug-trafficking networks, to follow suit.

There was no mention of the California marijuana initiative in the presidency's report on the meeting, and Pena Nieto's office did not immediately respond to request for comment.

Pena Nieto has said the United States and Mexico should not pursue diverging policies on marijuana legislation and in April proposed a bill to allow Mexicans to carry up to an ounce of marijuana has stalled in Congress.

California's proposal would allow people over 21 years to possess up to an ounce of marijuana for private use and establish a system to license, regulate and tax sales of cannabis.

Recent polls show a majority of Californians favor legalizing marijuana.

Four U.S. states plus the District of Columbia already allow recreational use for adults. Voters in several more states, including the southern border state of Arizona, will consider similar legislation in November.

Long regarded as a conservative on drug policy, Pena Nieto has modified his stance since he took office in 2012, reflecting growing Latin American disenchantment with the war on drugs. A bill to legalize medical marijuana remains in Congress.

Ethan Nadelmann, the executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance, said he eventually expects Mexico to be swayed by the fiscal opportunities of regulated cannabis, which he believes could earn California around $1 billion a year in tax revenue.

(Reporting by Gabriel Stargardter; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)
By Alexis Akwagyiram and Tife Owolabi

WARRI, Nigeria (Reuters) - A truce in the conflict in Nigeria's oil-producing Niger Delta is in danger of being derailed by anger at the military over the death of an elderly local leader.

The Niger Delta Avengers group, whose attacks on oil pipelines in the southern region crippled crude output earlier this year and pushed Africa's biggest economy into recession, said in August it agreed to a ceasefire.

The government has held out the prospect of holding talks on the grievances of people in the Delta with militant groups which maintain a truce.

But the death last week of Chief Thomas Ekpemupolo, the father of a fugitive former militant leader, could rekindle hostilities.

The octogenarian fell while fleeing an army raid on his home town in May and injured his leg, which had to be amputated two months later, said a spokesman for his son, former militant leader Government Ekpemupolo, known as Tompolo.

Militants launched a wave of attacks at the start of the year to demand a greater share of oil revenues for the swampy region, which produces most of Nigeria's crude but whose residents are mired in poverty.

Security sources say Tompolo has links to those responsible for the attacks, which began shortly after corruption charges were brought against him. He has denied any involvement.

"In a nutshell, (the) government caused the death of my father," said Frank Ekpemupolo, another son, raising his voice above the traditional music played through giant speakers at a gathering of 400 mourners at his father's compound in Warri, the largest city in Delta state.

Mourners including community chiefs, politicians and villagers accused troops of harassing people in the fishing communities dotted along the region's waterways.

An Avengers spokesman told Reuters the military was "harassing poor people of the Niger Delta". The military denies it, saying troops are merely searching for militants and criminals.

Several new militant groups have sprung up in the last few weeks, each with its own demands, and some have vowed to launch a new wave of attacks.

Community leaders say they are concerned that the government has not contacted militants or unveiled a negotiation team, three weeks after the Avengers said they were ready for the promised talks.

"We haven't been contacted, but we are not worried," said the Avengers spokesman.

'GOVERNMENT MUTENESS'

Captain Mark Anthony, a spokesman for defunct militant group the Niger Delta Liberation Force (NDLF), said the "government's muteness" since the Avengers announced a ceasefire was creating "a security concern for everybody".

"They have only stopped bombing temporarily. It doesn't mean they are tired of bombing," he said.

An army offensive was launched in late August against militant camps and led to the deaths of five people and the arrests of 23 others.

Eric Omare, spokesman for the Ijaw Youth Council, which represents one of the region's largest ethnic groups, said statements by President Muhammadu Buhari that militants would be treated like Boko Haram jihadists prompted fears that the offer of talks was a ruse to prepare for a military onslaught.

Tensions in Warri are concentrated along its murky brown waterways - used by fishermen, commuters and thieves stealing crude oil - where fleeting encounters with strangers can end in bloodshed.

Boats slow down and their occupants raise their arms when they encounter naval patrol boats fitted with machineguns.

Fishermen say they fear being mistaken for militants and shot. Gunmen disguised as priests killed three soldiers last month.

An official who did not want to be named said "arrangements" were being made to resume dialogue with the militants.

He said the government wanted each militant group to send representatives, rather than acting through intermediaries as in the past.

(Additional reporting by Felix Onuah; Editing by Ulf Laessing and Andrew Roche)
U.S. President Barack Obama walks back to the Oval Office upon his return to the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., September 15, 2016. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama will meet with a group of business and government leaders on Friday morning to discuss the economic and security benefits of the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact, the White House said.

"Tomorrows discussion is an opportunity for the president to hear directly from a diverse coalition of experts and leaders in their fields on how the Trans-Pacific Partnership can benefit American workers and businesses and further our national security," a White House spokeswoman said in a statement on Thursday.

Obama has made the 12-nation free trade deal the centerpiece of a diplomatic "pivot" to Asia, but the prospects for congressional approval have looked increasingly dim. Both major presidential candidates for the Nov. 8 election - Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump - oppose the agreement.

U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has said the Senate will not vote on the pact this year, punting it to the next president, who will take office in January.

The White House said businessman and former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Louisiana Governor Jon Bel Edwards, Ohio Governor and former Republican presidential candidate John Kasich and IBM (NYSE: IBM) Chief Executive Ginni Rometty were among those who would attend the meeting with Obama.

Obama said in a speech on the sidelines of a summit in Vientiane, Laos, on Sept. 6 that a failure to move ahead with the TPP would "call into question America's leadership."

Administration officials have argued a failure to approve the trade pact would cede ground to China in the region and allow it to increasingly set the terms of world trade.

(Reporting by Eric Walsh and Roberta Rampton; Editing by Peter Cooney)
Community leaders on Thursday called for renewed attention to the challenges and opportunities facing Dane Countys growing Latino population, with increased investment in what they called a holistic, multi-generation strategy to reduce long-term poverty rates.

The report is a strong statement to our community with calls to action for Dane County, Karen Menendez Coller, Centro Hispanos executive director, said in a statement with the report. It is our hope that the greater community learns more about the issues the (Latino) community experiences in Dane County from this report and is inspired to take action alongside our members.

The report, an update of a study done 10 years ago and completed in partnership with United Way of Dane County, shows the Latino community is the largest non-white demographic in Dane County and its fastest growing.

But Latino families also earned less than 46 percent of what white households did, the report found, while posting only a 30 percent high school graduation rate and a poverty rate that rose from 17 percent to 28 percent between 2009 and 2014.

There has been some progress in the lives of (Latino) families since (2006), but many challenges, needs and inequities still exist, in particular in ... education, health, economic development, and jobs, coalition member Salvador Carranza said in an introduction to the report.

The reports recommendations to address many of the problems and correct disparities included:

Increasing access for K-12 Latino and English Language Learner students to high-quality, best practice programs.

Promoting career and college access/prep programs.

Expanding GED and adult skill and trades development.

Intensifying investment in culturally relevant and bilingual training programs for Latinos in Dane County.

Hiring and retaining culturally and linguistically competent health care providers.

Citing figures from the U.S. Census Bureau, the report found Dane Countys Latino population numbered 30,662 people in 2014, with a growth rate of 16 percent between 2010 and 2014. Thats a growth rate second only to non-Hispanic Asians, whose numbers rose 21.4 percent to 21,491.

The report also warned that immigration policies are forcing some of Dane Countys Latino community to live in the shadows. Citing opinions from the ACLU and a Syracuse University immigration project using data gleaned from Freedom of Information requests, the report said legally questionable detentions of Latinos by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Wisconsin dropped more than 25 percent between November 2014 and October 2015, while more than doubling  from 9 to 22 detentions  in Dane County during the same period.

The report was issued by the Latino Consortium for Action  a group of agencies and community councils, including Centro Hispano, advocating for the needs of Latinos  together with United Way of Dane County.

Its based on data from a number of sources, including the U.S. Census Bureau and the state Department of Public Instruction, with seven sections: schools and education, poverty, income and employment, housing, migration and deportation, public assistance, and a demographic profile.

The report also includes executive summaries that detail the groups findings on education, income and health care, with recommended steps for improvements in each area.

On income, the report recommended, among other things, encouraging female entrepreneurs as a means to develop sustainable pathways out of poverty. For improved health care, more preventive health education programming was one of the recommendations, while steps to improve educational outcomes included expansion of youth and family multi-generational education services.
U.S. President Barack Obama addresses the 39th Annual Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute Public Policy Conference and Annual Awards Gala, in Washington, U.S., September 15, 2016. REUTERS/Mary F. Calvert

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama will meet with the leaders of Iraq, Nigeria and Colombia on the sidelines of the annual United Nations General Assembly gathering next week, the White House said on Friday.

Obama will hold separate sessions with Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari and Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, White House deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes told reporters on a call.

Obama is not expected to meet with Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte, Rhodes said. The White House canceled a meeting with Duterte during Obama's recent trip to Laos for a regional summit after Duterte insulted him.

Duterte, who has lambasted the United Nations and threatened to quit the world body after it criticized killings in his war on drugs, has not been scheduled to attend the General Assembly meeting.

Duterte turned down a meeting with U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon at the Laos summit.

(Reporting by Ayesha Rascoe, Michelle Nichols and David Brunnstrom; editing by G Crosse, Bernard Orr)
(This story corrects origin of report as source, not negotiator)

DUBAI/SANAA (Reuters) - A senior U.S. diplomat has presented a proposal for a comprehensive ceasefire in Yemen to the country's dominant Houthis at a meeting in Oman, a source close to the Houthi negotiating team said on Thursday.

Negotiators will return to Houthi-controled Sanaa on Friday carrying the plan offered by U.S. Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas Shannon in talks in Muscat, the source said.

Shannon met the Houthi team, officials of the allied General People's Congress (GPC) party and an Omani mediator in Muscat on Sept. 8 and 9 to discuss how to end a war that has killed over 10,000 people and displaced more than 3 million.

In Washington, U.S. officials said the plan was an "extension of the efforts Secretary (of State John) Kerry initiated in Jeddah."

The source did not disclose details of the proposal. Kerry said in Saudi Arabia on Aug. 25 he had agreed in talks with Gulf Arab states and the United Nations on a plan to restart peace talks on Yemen with a goal of forming a unity government.

Yemen's crisis began in September 2014 when the Iran-allied Houthis seized the capital, Sanaa. A Saudi-led Arab alliance intervened in support of the country's internationally recognized government led by President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi. U.N.-sponsored negotiations to end the fighting collapsed last month.

Peace talks foundered after the Houthis and the GPC announced the formation of a 10-member governing council on Aug 6., ignoring a U.N. warning that such a move would violate Security Council resolutions on how to solve the conflict.

The Houthi negotiating team has been in Oman since the collapse of the peace talks, after Saudi authorities in control of Yemen's airspace refused to grant the Houthi team access to Sanaa, the source added.

Saudi authorities have now agreed to allow the negotiating team to return to Yemen in a U.N. airplane, the source said.

In a statement on the Kerry proposal on Thursday, the governing council reiterated that its willingness to restart peace talks depended on implementation of a full ceasefire, including the lifting of the no-fly zone and siege imposed by the Saudi-led coalition.

Forces allied to the Houthis attacked across the border into Saudi Arabia's southern Jizan province on Thursday, with both sides claiming victory and giving conflicting casualty tolls.

Sources in the Saudi-led coalition said Saudi forces at the Jabal Dukhan mountain repelled the attack by Yemeni Republican Guard troops loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, killing about 25 and wounding 30.

In the Yemeni capital, Sanaa, a Houthi official said the clash resulted in the Houthi capture of the mountain as well as a place called Al Romaih. The commander of a Saudi rapid intervention force was killed in the fighting, he added.

(Reporting by William Maclean in Dubai, Mohammed Ghobari in Sanaa and Lesley Wroughton in Washington; Writing by Katie Paul; Editing by Andrew Roche and Peter Cooney)
FORM 3 UNITED STATES SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

Washington, D.C. 20549



INITIAL STATEMENT OF BENEFICIAL OWNERSHIP OF SECURITIES



Filed pursuant to Section 16(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934

or Section 30(h) of the Investment Company Act of 1940 OMB APPROVAL OMB Number: 3235-0104 Expires: December 31, 2014 Estimated average burden hours per response: 0.5

1. Name and Address of Reporting Person * Smith Jimmi Sue (Last) (First) (Middle) 625 LIBERTY AVENUE, SUITE 1700 (Street) PITTSBURGH PA 15222 (City) (State) (Zip) 2. Date of Event Requiring Statement (Month/Day/Year)

09/13/2016 3. Issuer Name and Ticker or Trading Symbol

EQT GP Holdings, LP [ EQGP ] 4. Relationship of Reporting Person(s) to Issuer

(Check all applicable) Director 10% Owner X Officer (give title below) Other (specify below) Chief Accounting Officer 5. If Amendment, Date of Original Filed (Month/Day/Year)

6. Individual or Joint/Group Filing (Check Applicable Line) X Form filed by One Reporting Person Form filed by More than One Reporting Person

Table I - Non-Derivative Securities Beneficially Owned 1. Title of Security (Instr. 4) 2. Amount of Securities Beneficially Owned (Instr. 4) 3. Ownership Form: Direct (D) or Indirect (I) (Instr. 5) 4. Nature of Indirect Beneficial Ownership (Instr. 5) Common Units 7,538 D

Table II - Derivative Securities Beneficially Owned

(e.g., puts, calls, warrants, options, convertible securities) 1. Title of Derivative Security (Instr. 4) 2. Date Exercisable and Expiration Date (Month/Day/Year) 3. Title and Amount of Securities Underlying Derivative Security (Instr. 4) 4. Conversion or Exercise Price of Derivative Security 5. Ownership Form: Direct (D) or Indirect (I) (Instr. 5) 6. Nature of Indirect Beneficial Ownership (Instr. 5) Date Exercisable Expiration Date Title Amount or Number of Shares

Explanation of Responses: Remarks: Exhibit 24 - Power of Attorney

/s/ Jonathan M. Lushko, Attorney-in-Fact 09/16/2016 ** Signature of Reporting Person Date Reminder: Report on a separate line for each class of securities beneficially owned directly or indirectly. * If the form is filed by more than one reporting person, see Instruction 4 (b)(v). ** Intentional misstatements or omissions of facts constitute Federal Criminal Violations See 18 U.S.C. 1001 and 15 U.S.C. 78ff(a). Note: File three copies of this Form, one of which must be manually signed. If space is insufficient, see Instruction 6 for procedure. Persons who respond to the collection of information contained in this form are not required to respond unless the form displays a currently valid OMB Number.

Exhibit 24 - Power of Attorney LIMITED POWER OF ATTORNEY ? SECURITIES LAW COMPLIANCE The undersigned, as an officer, director, or employee of EQT GP Services, LLC, the general partner of EQT GP Holdings, LP, or its subsidiaries or affiliates (the "Company"), hereby constitutes Jonathan M. Lushko, Tobin M. Nelson, Mary C. Krejsa and Melissa E. Lauteri or any one of them the undersigned?s true and lawful attorney-in-fact and agent to complete and execute such Form ID Uniform Applications for Access Codes to File On Edgar, Forms 144, Forms 3, 4 and 5, Schedules 13D and 13G and other forms and schedules as any attorney shall in his or her discretion determine to be required or advisable pursuant to Rule 144 promulgated under the Securities Act of 1933 (as amended), Sections 13 and 16 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (as amended) and the rules and regulations promulgated thereunder, or any successor laws and regulations, as a consequence of the undersigned?s ownership, acquisition, or disposition of securities of the Company, and to do all acts necessary in order to file such forms with the Securities and Exchange Commission, any securities exchange or national association, the Company and such other person or agency as the attorney shall deem appropriate. The undersigned hereby ratifies and confirms all that said attorneys-in-fact and agents shall do or cause to be done by virtue hereof. This Limited Power of Attorney shall remain in effect until the undersigned is no longer required to make filings pursuant to Rule 144 promulgated under the Securities Act of 1933 (as amended), Sections 13 and 16 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (as amended) and the rules and regulations promulgated thereunder, or any successor laws and regulations, unless earlier revoked by the undersigned in a signed writing delivered to the foregoing attorneys-in-fact. This Limited Power of Attorney is executed in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania as of the date set forth below. /s/ Jimmi Sue Smith Signature Jimmi Sue Smith Type or Print Name Date: September 14, 2016
1. Name and Address of Reporting Person * Brueck Felix M. (Last) (First) (Middle) 5605 CARNEIGE BLVD. SUITE 500 (Street) CHARLOTTE NC 28209 (City) (State) (Zip)

2. Issuer Name and Ticker or Trading Symbol

ENPRO INDUSTRIES, INC [ NPO ]
UNITED STATES

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

Washington, D.C. 20549

FORM 8-K

CURRENT REPORT

PURSUANT TO SECTION 13 OR 15(d) OF

THE SECURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934

Date of Report (Date of earliest event reported): September 14, 2016

APOLLO MEDICAL HOLDINGS, INC.

(Exact name of registrant as specified in its charter)

Delaware 001-37392 46-3837784 (State or Other Jurisdiction (Commission File (I.R.S. Employer of Incorporation) Number) Identification Number)

700 N. Brand Boulevard, Suite 1400, Glendale, CA 91203

(Address of principal executive offices) (zip code)

(818) 396-8050

(Registrants telephone number, including area code)

N/A

(Former name or former address, if changed since last report)

Check the appropriate box below if the Form 8-K filing is intended to simultaneously satisfy the filing obligation of the registrant under any of the following provisions (see General Instruction A.2. below):

 Written communications pursuant to Rule 425 under the Securities Act (17 CFR 230.425)

 Soliciting material pursuant to Rule 14a-12 under the Exchange Act (17 CFR 240.14a-12)

 Pre-commencement communications pursuant to Rule 14d-2(b) under the Exchange Act (17 CFR 240.14d-2(b))

 Pre-commencement communications pursuant to Rule 13e-4(c) under the Exchange Act (17 CFR 240.13e-4(c))

Item 5.07 Submission of Matters to a Vote of Security Holders.

On September 14, 2016, Apollo Medical Holdings, Inc. (the Company) held its 2016 annual meeting of stockholders (the Annual Meeting). As of the record date of July 21, 2016, there were a total of 5,745,036 shares of common stock, 1,111,111 shares of Class A preferred stock and 555,555 shares of Class B preferred stock, or an aggregate 7,411,702 shares, issued and outstanding and entitled to vote at the Annual Meeting. At the Annual Meeting, 3,409,306 shares of common stock, 1,111,111 shares of Class A preferred stock and 555,555 shares of Class B preferred stock, or an aggregate 5,075,972 shares, were present in person or by proxy, representing a quorum.

At the Annual Meeting, the Companys stockholders: (i) elected each of the seven persons listed below under Election of Directors to serve as a director of the Company until the next annual meeting of stockholders; (ii) adopted the Companys 2015 Equity Incentive Plan; (iii) approved a non-binding advisory resolution relating to executive compensation; and (iv) voted on a non-binding advisory proposal on the frequency of future advisory votes relating to executive compensation. The results of the voting at the Annual Meeting on each such matter are set forth below.

1. Election of Directors:

Name For Withheld Broker Non-Votes Warren Hosseinion 5,075,972 0 0 Gary Augusta 5,075,972 0 0 Mark Fawcett 5,075,972 0 0 Thomas Lam 5,075,972 0 0 Suresh Nihalani 5,075,972 0 0 David Schmidt 5,075,972 0 0 Ted Schreck 5,075,972 0 0

2. Adoption of the Companys 2015 Equity Incentive Plan:

Votes For 5,075,072 Votes Against 900 Abstentions 0 Broker Non-Votes 0

3. Approval of Executive Compensation (Non-Binding Advisory Resolution):

Votes For 5,075,072 Votes Against 900 Abstentions 0 Broker Non-Votes 0

4. Frequency of Future Votes to Approve Executive Compensation (Non-Binding Advisory Vote):

1 Year 120,920 2 Years 1,500 3 Years 4,953,552 Abstentions 0

Item 9.01 Financial Statements and Exhibits.

(d) Exhibits

10.1 Apollo Medical Holdings, Inc. 2015 Equity Incentive Plan (filed as Exhibit 10.59 to the Companys Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2016)

SIGNATURES

Pursuant to the requirements of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, the registrant has duly caused this report to be signed on its behalf by the undersigned hereunto duly authorized.
The special prosecutor tasked with explaining to the courts why a John Doe investigation should have continued was unaware that Republican lawmakers had passed legislation favorable to a lead industry billionaire who gave $750,000 to help them win recalls in 2011 and 2012.

Francis Schmitz also said Friday in an interview that he supports an investigation into who leaked hundreds of pages of investigative documents to the Guardian US, as well as any other violations of the John Doe secrecy order.

Schmitz was the special prosecutor appointed to lead the multi-county John Doe investigation into Gov. Scott Walkers recall campaign. The Wisconsin Supreme Court quashed the investigation last year and removed Schmitz from the case.

Leaked documents this week showed Walker raised millions of dollars for Wisconsin Club for Growth, which aired ads during the recalls backing Republican senators and Walker. The donations included $750,000 from lead industry magnate Harold Simmons, who died in 2013, and his company.

Walker and the Republican-controlled Legislature made two changes to state law in 2011 and 2013 that protected the lead paint industry from civil lawsuit penalties. The latter provision, which applied the lawsuit protection retroactively, was tucked into a catch-all budget provision that disguises the author of the proposal.

At the time of the donations, three Republican senators who served on the Joint Finance Committee  Alberta Darling, Luther Olsen and Sheila Harsdorf  were facing recall elections. They did not respond to a request for comment on Friday.

Republican lawmakers, in the 2015-17 budget, also increased the threshold for the amount of lead that can be used in paint before it is considered hazardous and last year reduced lead paint testing regulations.

The lead paint connection was news to me, Schmitz said, adding that its quite possible he would have brought it up in court arguments if he had known.

Schmitz argued in previously released court documents that a $700,000 donation from a mining company to the Wisconsin Club for Growth raised questions about the appearance of corruption. The group is organized as a tax-exempt nonprofit that doesnt have to disclose its donors.

The leaked documents showed that Gogebic donated a total of $1.2 million to the Club. Schmitz said if he had known about the larger amount he would have included that in his court filings.

Schmitz said he cant say whether he knew about the Simmons donations given the secrecy orders. He said Friday he didnt have staff combing through Club donations to find other connections to laws being passed.

Republican lawmakers have called for an investigation into who leaked the documents and Attorney General Brad Schimel expressed interest in pursuing legal action. Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm, who initiated the John Doe investigation in 2012, also said the leak was illegal and should be prosecuted.

John Doe secrecy is one thing, Schmitz said. When a court makes matters sealed it should be of equal importance.

Assembly Democrats, meanwhile, Friday called on the Assembly Judiciary Committee to hold a hearing within two weeks on the documents unveiled by the Guardian.

The strong appearance of corruption and serious ethical violations the John Doe documents point to is alarming and needs immediate and comprehensive investigation, said Assembly minority leader Peter Barca, D-Kenosha.

Republicans control the Assembly and its committees.

The strong appearance of corruption and serious ethical violations the John Doe documents point to is alarming and needs immediate and comprehensive investigation. Rep. Peter Barca

D-Kenosha
The Latino Consortium for Action (LCA) produced a report issued Thursday that surveyed the demographics and state of Dane County's Latino community. An update of a similar study done 10 years ago, it was designed to raise awareness of the community's successes, challenges and opportunities, while supporting a "call to action" initiative intended to address the problems and inequities cited.

Some of the report's key findings include:

Educational outcomes

Centered mainly in Madison and Fitchburg, the rising Latino population has sharply impacted the Madison School District, where Latino youth now represent 20.5 percent of total enrollment, or 5,554, and are the second largest racial group in the district after whites, at 11,724.

Latino K-12 enrollment in the Madison School District also has grown 96.3 percent in the past 10 years, up from 2,830 students in the 2005-06 school year.

That's in contrast to the decline of all other major racial groups during the same period, when black, Asian and white enrollment in the Madison School District dropped 7.1 percent, 5.6 percent and 14.5 percent, respectively.

But many Latino students still are not graduating on time -- 31 percent didn't finish in four years or less in the 2014-15 school year in Madison, the second-highest rate after African-American students, at 40 percent.

And for adults aged 25 and above, Latinos showed the lowest level of educational attainment of all the major racial groups in Dane County. Almost a third of Latinos -- 31 percent -- didn't have a high school diploma county- wide, rising to 41 percent in Middleton, 38 percent in Sun Prairie and 36 percent in Fitchburg, the Census said.

Overall, the Latino population in Dane County aged 25 and older rose by just over 30 percent between 2009 and 2014, with Latino women making up the bulk of that growth -- increasing by 42 percent, compared to the increase of only 21.5 percent seen in Latino men.

Poverty, income, jobs

The 10-year update report also found nearly two out of every five Latinos worked in the service industry in Dane County, at 38.8 percent, or 5,422 people. That percentage was much higher, however, in certain municipalities -- almost 64 percent in Fitchburg, and about 45 and 44 percent in Sun Prairie and Middleton, respectively.

After service work, the most Latinos worked in management, business and arts occupations -- at 23.1 percent -- and in production, transportation and material- moving jobs, at more than one in 10, or 16.6 percent.

Reflecting job-creation trends in the workforce overall, the report noted that the service industry is not only the most common occupation among Dane County Latinos, but also is the only sector showing any real job growth for Latinos.

Between 2010 and 2014, the number of Latinos working service jobs grew by 13.3 percent, compared with declines or almost no change in all the other sectors, from a 14 percent decline of Latino-held jobs in sales and office occupations to less than 1 percent Latino job growth in the production, transportation and material-moving sectors.

Of Dane County municipalities, Sun Prairie and Middleton posted the largest increases in Latino-held jobs between 2010 and 2014. However, the percentage of Latinos working in Sun Prairie in the better-paying job sector of natural resources, construction and maintenance jobs saw a significant decline, at 91.6 percent, or 133 losses.

However, even as the rate of work-eligible Latinos in Dane County has been rising, the unemployment rate among these workers has risen -- from 3.7 percent in 2009 to 6.9 percent in 2014. Within Dane County, Monona and Madison has the highest average unemployment rates for Latinos, at 7.1 percent and 6.8 percent, respectively.

Meanwhile, the combination of high representation in low-wage service jobs and relatively high rates of unemployment results in lower incomes and higher rates of poverty for Latino residents. Countywide in 2014, median Latino household income was 46 percent less than white households, or $36,208 compared with $66,860.

Across Dane County, Latino median household incomes also have declined by more than a quarter, at 26.7 percent, between 2009 and 2014. Household incomes also varied by municipality in Dane County -- in some cases dramatically. In Monona, where 397 Latinos make up the largest racial/ethnic group, median Latino household income in 2014 was $26,833, or only 12 percent above the federal poverty line for a family of four ($23,850).

Poverty, in turn, has risen for Latinos between 2009 and 2014. Overall in Dane County, the percent of Latino living under the poverty line rose from 17.6 percent in 2009 to just under 28 percent in 2014. That growth represents a rise of 59 percent, or 4,375 more Latinos in poverty.

However, changes in the poverty rate vary widely by municipality. Monona and Sun Prairie have seen rate declines, for example, of 68 percent and 63 percent, respectively, between 2009 and 2014, while Madison saw the percent of Latinos living in poverty rise by a third. The worst was Fitchburg, where rates increased 102 percent, reflecting 1,202 more Latinos slipping into poverty.

Housing

Since 2009, the proportion of Latinos who rent rather than own their home has risen significantly, from 63.5 percent to 70.2 percent in 2014. That 10.5 percentage increase also is the largest such rise experienced by any major racial group in Dane County. By comparison, rental rates rose by 3.7 percent for black households, 5 percent for white ones and 1.7 percent for Asian households.

Latino households also stood out as being the most over-crowded in Dane County, the report said. Using a Census definition that considers more than 1 person per room to be over-crowded, the report found Latino over-crowding consistently ranging around twice the rate of African-Americans, who posted the next highest rate.

The rate of over-crowding also has grown for Latino households, increasing 24.3 percent, from nearly 13 percent in 2009 to nearly 16 percent in 2014. Other than Latinos, only Asians in Dane County saw a rise in household over-crowding during the same period.

Migration and deportation

The number of Latinos who moved to Dane County from other counties in the state rose from 2.6 percent in 2009 to 3.4 percent in 2014, while the number that moved from other states increased from 3.4 percent to 4.4 percent.

The report authors said the number of undocumented Latinos living in Dane County was unknown, while noting that "immigration enforcement is becoming a more significant issue within the community."

This conclusion is based on a sharp reported increase in detainers, or immigration holds, issued by federal officials at the Dane County Jail between July and October of 2015, when there were 22, compared with just nine holds between November 2014 and February 2015.

Public assistance

In 2014, Latino households ranked third among Dane County racial groups getting nutritional assistance, making up 10.7 percent of the total households receiving food stamps. Whites made up the majority of households receiving Dane County stamps -- at 61.5 percent of recipients-- with black households at 20.7 percent.

The report was prepared by Revel Sims for Centro Hispano and sponsored by United Way of Dane County.
Members of the Royal NZ Air Force Association will gather at Mount Maunganuis Classic Flyers Museum for a commemoration service to mark the 76th anniversary of the Battle of Britain this Sunday.

Starting at 10am, the service will feature an address by a guest speaker from the RNZAF base in Auckland and two cadets from 16 Squadron Air Training Corps, followed by a wreath laying ceremony lead by the Mayor Stuart Crosby, and wreaths laid by the Western Bay of Plenty District Council, RNZAF and the local RSAs.

RNZAFA executive Lee White explains that The Battle of Britain refers to the Second World War air campaign waged by the German Air Force against the United Kingdom during the summer and autumn of 1940.

The Battle of Britain was the first major campaign to be fought entirely by the air forces as well as being the largest and most sustained aerial bombing campaign to that date.

The objective of the Nazi German forces was to achieve air superiority over the RAF especially its Fighter Command.

The RAF lost 1250 aircraft, including 1017 fighters. In all, 520 men were killed serving with Fighter Command. But with more than 700 fatalities during the period of the battle, Bomber Command suffered even more heavily. Another 200 men were killed flying with Coastal Command.

The RAF Fighter Command was the third largest national group of pilots, says Lee, and of the 135 New Zealanders who served in this command during the Battle of Britain, 20 lost their lives.

Another 29 New Zealanders died serving in Bomber command and eight in Coastal Command. In all, 57 New Zealand airman died during the course of this battle.

Air Vice Marshal Keith Park was a Kiwi was in command of 11 Group who fought for the defense of London during the Battle of Britain. His grandniece Lesley Park will also be in attendance and laying a wreath.

For more information call Lee White on 027 291 6151.
Funding to fight the Zika virus isnt about abortion, Obamacare or the Confederate battle flag.

At least it shouldnt be.

And it isnt about which political party in Washington will look good or bad before the fall election.

Emergency funding to fight the spread of Zika is about preventing terrible brain damage and birth defects in newborns  including shrunken heads.

Congress should stop playing games and pass a clean Zika bill aimed squarely at diagnosing and preventing the disease so it doesnt devastate more children and families.

Zika, which is transmitted by mosquitoes and sex, is expanding in the United States, especially in Florida. And about 40 cases are confirmed in Wisconsin, involving people who have traveled outside the state to areas where Zika-carrying mosquitoes flourish.

Congress should approve $1.1 billion  without political strings attached  to help scientists and health officials defeat the disease.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Janesville, must rise above the petty politics that dominate Washington and rally his members to support a solid funding package that doesnt go after Planned Parenthood or cut Obamacare or monkey with regulation of the Confederate flag. Those divisive and distracting political issues should be set aside for now.

Ryan and his GOP colleagues are right to search for existing dollars to pay for a Zika response, rather than borrowing $1.1 billion and adding it to the national debt. Thats the fiscally responsible thing to do.

But the president asked for Zika funding back in February. And a spending bill is still stalled.

If Democrats wont offset Zika funding by reducing spending elsewhere, we understand Ryans frustration. But given how many months have passed without an agreement, borrowing the money is better than allowing Zika to go unchecked. Thats because infected babies will cost far more to treat and care for than aggressively moving to prevent further infection.

U.S. Rep. Curt Clawson, R-Florida, whose constituents are on the front lines of the scary affliction, understands well the need for swift action.

If we dont move to spend a little bit now, were going to spend a lot more later, he said this week, according to the Washington Times.

We cant spend a billion or two for babies, and for pregnant women? he asked. I mean, wheres our priorities?

Good question.

Speaker Ryan and the rest of Congress should set aside their political squabbles and quickly pass a Zika bill.
Positioned at 33rd in the Superyachts.com Top 100 Largest Yachts in the World listings, the superyacht aliased widely as Project Solar left the yard this week to showcase her Nuvolari & Lenard exterior design; the studio who were also responsible for her interiors.

With naval architecture by Dykstra, the Dyna Rig sail plan  most commonly known for the iconic profile of The Maltese Falcon - of Project Solar is just one element of striking design. The eco-credentials and latest technology utilises solar energy, heat recovery, batteries and revolutionary tech to minimise the impact on the water.

The Top 100 superyacht Project Solar is still an extremely secret project, but thanks to the photos provided by Dutch Yachting, we have a first glimpse at the incredible project before her giant masts with solar technology are attached.
IUand C's want to pressurise the Junta de Andalucia to keep its promise to build two treatment plants and end the pollution

Waste from 100,000 people accumulates in the inland Malaga river every day. :: PAULA HERVELE

The Guadalhorce river is an important natural feature running through Malaga province. But surprisingly, 17,000 cubic metres of sewage from 100,000 people is still being pumped into the river every day.

Local politicians from the Izquierda Unida (IU) and Ciudadanos (Cs) parties have this week pledged to do more to force the Junta de Andalucia to build two long-promised water treatment plants.

Delays in starting work

Bureaucratic hold ups and lack of funds have held up two effluent treatment works along the valley for over ten years.

One, the lower Guadalhorce plant, would treat waste from Coin, Alora and Pizarra, and another, north of Malaga, would take a lot of the citys waste and provide relief for Alhaurin el Grande and Cartama.

Both IU and Cs have said they will step up the pressure in the Andalusian parliament, Malaga Diputacion provincial council and the national parliament.

IUpolitician in Malaga, Teresa Sanchez said: The Junta has to get a move on and get an effective grip on this problem.

For the Cs, the problem is widespread. We think its sensible to prioritise [the Guadalhorce], as it affects some big towns, the nature reserve on the estuary and the beaches, which hits our main income generator, tourism, explained Cs regional MP, Carlos Hernandez White.

Spain is facing fines from the European Union for failing to put in place adequate water treatment systems in 38 towns across the country.
The man thought to have shot Gary Hutch to death last year has been arrested by the Guardia Civil in collaboration with the Irish Garda

The suspect under arrest. :: SUR

The Guardia Civil have arrested a man suspected of shooting Irishman Gary Hutch to death in Mijas in September last year. The police operation code-named Geraneo, in collaboration with Europol and the Irish Garda, also involved four raids on properties connected to the suspect and a Puerto Banus gym. Several vehicles, weapons and mobile phones have been seized.

The victim was 30 when he was gunned down on the grounds of Urbanizacion Angel de Miraflores on 24 September 2015. Witnesses told SUR at the time that the gunman, wearing a balaclava, chased Hutch around the pool, firing shots. He died at the scene after receiving gunshot wounds to the back, head and chest.

Hutchs killing sparked a gangland war between two rival Irish criminal organisations which resulted in seven more deaths in Ireland and Calvia (Mallorca).
The new rental law that came into effect in May of this year is proving unpopular with some foreign owners on the coast

Private tourist accommodation will come under the scrutiny of government web crawlers :: T. Bryant

The regional governments new legislation concerning holiday rentals states that owners who are renting their properties to tourists are now obliged to register the property with the Andalusian tourist registry.

The Junta de Andalucia estimates that around 80,000 private homes with some 400,000 beds are offered as tourist rentals in the region, and this new law is intended to bring to light illegal practices and unfair competition.

The legislation has received the thumbs-up from the local hotel sector, but some property owners claim they have been forced to stop offering their properties for short-term rentals, because they simply cannot afford to comply with the conditions.

Owners who fail to comply with the new regulations could face fines of up to 150,000 and they could also have their properties removed from the registry, but are the proprietors of potential holiday apartments complying with these new rules?

Patricia Brown is one person who has registered her studio in Benalmadena, and even though she first had difficulties with the paperwork, she believes that the new law will make things better for everyone.

The initial cost is something we must all face, but there are far too many owners who rent out unsuitable accommodation and it is these people who are moaning the most, she said.

Shortly after registering her flat, Patricia received a visit from the inspectors, who gave her the all clear; she claimed the procedure was pretty straightforward.

The owner stated that the standard of some apartments offered as tourist accommodation in her area falls far short of requirements, and she believes it is about time that these illegal landlords were dealt with.

These people are running an illegal business by not declaring their apartments and I dont see why only a minority are complying with these new rules, while these villains are having a free ride, she said angrily.

The law states that all living rooms and bedrooms must have direct exterior ventilation, air-conditioning and heating, a cost that many property owners cannot afford.

The owner must provide paper or electronic brochures providing information about the closest amenities, medical treatment facilities, parking, restaurants and shopping centres, as well as details and timetables of public transport, a map of the surrounding area and general tourist guides.

Marbella lawyer Antonio Cobo told SUR in English he believes that the law is something that had to be enforced, because it has the consumers best interest in mind.

The tourist will benefit from the new laws, because all accommodation must now meet strict standards, and so landlords can no longer get away with renting unsuitable properties, he said.

Cobo explained that the law has caused confusion for some and this is why a few have not registered, but he claimed the procedure is relatively easy if you are patient and follow the guidelines. However, he had good advice for those who were not complying with the new regulations.

If people ignore this law and continue to advertise their properties for rent, the police will catch them. They are already starting the prosecution procedures in certain areas like Sotogrande, so if you break the law, you will face the consequences, he said.

Information in English

The Foreign Residents Department at Mijas town hall claimed one of the biggest problems was that the Junta de Andalucia did not publish anything in English.

The Junta promised public awareness campaigns to help people understand this new law, but those with little command of Spanish were forced to hire a lawyer, which created even more expense.

The foreigners department, however, made an information sheet for those who could not speak Spanish, and they received quite a few enquiries prior to the May deadline.

Katja Thirion, a spokesperson for the department, said, When the new regulations had been published, we received many requests with regards to registering properties. However, it seems that all paperwork has been completed, as we are not getting any further requests.

Recent surveys suggest that these new laws are driving many expat property owners away, and some town halls are reporting that the foreign population has taken a sharp dip recently.

Marbella town hall for example, has reported that 5,000 foreign residents have vanished from the padron (population census) in the last few years and the majority were British. However, since May, Marbella has had the highest number of applications to register properties as tourist accommodation.

There are a number of alternative explanations for the fall-off in numbers of foreign residents, but it is possible that some owners have simply had enough, sold up, and gone back to their home country, while there are others who have chosen to live under the radar for various reasons.

Raymundo Larrain Nesbitt, a Spanish real estate lawyer, claims the new rules have not been drafted with the consumers best interests in mind, but rather with those of the hotel industry that fought tooth and nail to regulate this sector.

Although he does not agree with the new legislation, he understands the seriousness of the situation for those who do not comply.

Anyone who thinks that the Junta de Andalucia will not hound violators and fine them harshly is deluding himself, Raymundo said.

Raymundo claims that the Junta de Andalucia is using a new technology, which methodically and relentlessly trawls the internet to come up with non-regulated rentals that are advertised over the web.

From the outset, the whole purpose of this legislation was geared towards sanctioning offenders, as those behind it had an axe to grind, but to the best of my knowledge, the Junta has not prosecuted anyone yet, Raymundo continued.

One owner, who has two properties in Benalmadena Costa, claims his lawyer advised him to register just one, which is what he has done.

The flat was registered in July, and yet he has received nothing other than a registration number. There has been no booking forms or paperwork of any kind to log the residents details, information that must be given to the local police, so he is not sure what will happen about this.

My lawyer told me that the paperwork was not available yet, and this seems to be the problem, because this law was rushed through before any serious thought was given to it, he continued.

He was under the impression that the authorities would only try to regulate the properties that are advertised on Facebook pages or websites, so he does not feel he is actually breaking the law.

I only advertise the flat that I have registered, but the other one is available, it is just not advertised anywhere, other than word of mouth, the owner explained.

We bought these apartments as investments and we do not rent them to make a profit, it is not a business. We only rent to family and friends: all we want to do is cover the mortgages, he continued.

Some properties however, are exempt from the new laws and these include those that are located on what is legally classified as rural land, as they are subject to a different legislation, and accommodation that is offered to friends and family without an exchange of money.

Properties that are let to the same individual for a continuous period of more than two months are also exempt, as these are regarded as a standard rental agreement subject to Spains Tenancy Act. Owners of several properties in the same place are also subject to different legislation.

Another Englishman, who owns several holiday apartments in Torremolinos, told SUR in English of his dilemma. I have seven flats that I rent out to tourists during the summer season, but I have put them all up for sale, as I simply do not have enough money to renovate them to meet the new legislations standards, he said.

He at first intended to ignore the law and continue trading illegally, but his lawyer advised against this, warning him of the risk he would be taking in doing so.

I am still honouring the bookings I had taken prior to the new legislation, and I know that I am breaking the law, so I am just keeping my fingers crossed, he said.

SUR sources also suggest that this law will eventually bring into the open all undeclared tourist rentals, and heavy fines will be levied on those which are not in compliance with the regulations. Property owners are also advised to be aware of the fiscal requirements affecting rental income in Spain.
Instability in other countries alongside the quality on offer means that many wealthy people are focusing their sights on the coast

Private jets parked at the terminal at Malaga airport at the end of August. :: FRANCIS SILVA

With barely a few hours between them, two Airbus 340s, two Boeing 737s and various other aeroplanes land. This would not be truly noteworthy were it not for the fact that they were all headed for the private jet terminal. Specialised handling operators recognise that this has been a fruitful summer, with 1,500 operations between July and August, representing a significant increase on last year. According to experts, the instability of Turkey, combined with the quality on offer on the Costa del Sol justifies this increase.

As the manager of the temporary consortium involved with the terminal, Alejandro Sardon, states: Many people from Saudi Arabia used to go to Turkey, but with the instability in this country theyve chosen the Costa del Sol instead.

In his opinion, the improvement in the image of the destination makes it more appealing to tourists with higher purchasing power, as they arrive at a completely renovated terminal, which gives Malaga an image of quality. It is of little wonder that Malaga is one of the primary models of executive flying in Spain.

In terms of the profile of its users, the anonymous European tourists with money to spend are joined by members of royal families from Arab and African countries, well-known sportsmen and women and musicians who have performed at parties and concerts along the coast.

Ricardo Leon, head of the company Sky Valet in Spain, says that we have observed a notable increase this summer, up to 30 per cent higher than in previous years. Alongside seasonal tourism, this expert refers to the growing amount of international investment, from property to business, highlighting the increase in Russian clients.

It has also been a good season for the latest operator to enter the local market. Aviapartner has burst on to the scene but John Kay, head of private aviation for the company in Spain, recognises that the demand has been higher than they were expecting. However, he has no doubts as to the principal causes of this boom: What has happened in the rest of the world has been beneficial to us.
Thousands of pro-independence demonstrators took to the streets on 11 September

The 'Diada' in Barcelona. EFE

The September 11th Diada, the traditional Catalonian annual holiday, held more significance than usual this year.

If regional politicians plans succeed, it may be the last one before this Spanish region declares independence.

Thousands of pro-independence demonstrators marched in Barcelona, although the current breakaway process has been declared illegal and lacks majority support in opinion polls.
EEOC Loses Racial Discrimination Suit Over Dreadlocks Ban: Allissa Wickham of Law360.com had this report (subscription required for full access) back in March 2014. Today, a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit issued a decision affirming the judgment in that case.







Stevens light still shines brightly: David Thomas and Emily Donovan of the Chicago Daily Law Bulletin have an article that begins, Decades before he would be nominated by President Gerald Ford to the U.S. Supreme Court, John Paul Stevens was a 12-year-old kid watching the Chicago Cubs play in the 1932 World Series.







Judge rules for unsealing 1942 grand jury testimony after Reporters Committee, historians bid for openness: The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press issued this news release in June 2015. Today, the majority on a divided three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit issued a decision affirming the district courts order unsealing the testimony.







Donald Trump Wants Peter Thiel On The Supreme Court, Sources Say; The eccentric billionaire endorsed Trump in a speech at the Republican National Convention this summer: Ben Walsh and Ryan Grim of The Huffington Post have this report.







Clinton Says She May Not Choose Garland for Supreme Court: Mike Dorning and Greg Stohr of Bloomberg News have this report.







Changing Work Patterns in the Supreme Court: Adam Feldman has this post today at his Empirical SCOTUS blog.







A Take on Domnarskis Posner Bio: Paul Horwitz recently had this post at PrawfsBlawg.







Joan Biskupic on reporting about the U.S. Supreme Court: You can access at this link the latest installment of the UCI Law Talks podcast.







This Loophole Ends the Privacy of Social Security Numbers: Law professor Noah Feldman has this essay online at Bloomberg View.







Reflections on the Natural Born Citizen Clause as Illuminated by the Cruz Candidacy: Law professor Laurence H. Tribe has this article online at the Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review.







The Murder Of Dan Markel: Tensions Between Police And Prosecutors. David Lat has this post at Above the Law.







The New Mexico Bar Associations 27th Annual Appellate Practice Institute takes place tomorrow in Albuquerque: The reduced volume of blogging here this week, which will continue through Saturday evening, can be attributed to the wonderful time I have been having traveling through northern New Mexico this week. The scenery and Native American history that I have observed (the preceding two links just being an example of each category) have been outstanding. My visit to New Mexico will conclude with a presentation I will be delivering tomorrow at the event mentioned in the title of this post. You can access the agendas event at this link. As always when I am traveling, additional appellate related retweets are likely to appear at this blogs Twitter feed.






I have learned the hard way not to put my personal life on the Internet. But suffice it to say that, God willing, things should be pretty much back to norm...

2 weeks ago
I am Kerry Burgess. This is what I think.
Ballast Water Convention - the US view

The US Coast Guard has welcomed the ratification of the Ballast Water Convention.

Rear Adm Paul Thomas, assistant Commandant for prevention policy, said that the USCG saw this as an important step forward in controlling invasive species spread by ballast water and meeting the challenge of reducing the environmental footprint of international shipping. We also understand that the announcement heightens concerns in the industry about the differences between the BMW Convention and the US ballast water regulations. In previous posts, I have explained in detail how and why the US regulations differ from the BWM Convention. Weve also explained how compliance dates and the extension process are managed while we are working hard on US type approval of ballast water treatment systems. The entry into force of the BWM Convention will not change the USCG approach to or enforcement of the US ballast water regulations, he stressed in a statement. Ships operating in US waters must comply with US requirements, including using one of the ballast water management practices described in 33 CFR Part 151.2025 and 2050. Therefore, ships in US waters will not be subject to Port State Control verification of compliance with the BWM Convention. Those ships equipped with a USCG approved Alternative Management System (AMS) will remain in compliance with US regulations until five years after the compliance date (for an individual ship) is set. Compliance dates will be determined on a vessel-by-vessel basis after USCG type approved ballast water treatment systems are commercially available. After five years, the AMS must either achieve USCG type-approval, or be replaced with a type-approved system. He explained that currently, there are 19 BWMS manufacturers with systems approved by other administrations (AMS) that are seeking type-approval from the USCG. Three of these manufacturers report they have recently completed testing with the USCG independent lab. On the basis of information provided from manufacturers and independent labs, we expect to receive applications for USCG type-approval in the next few weeks, Rear Adm Thomas said. In the meantime, the USCG continues to work with the IMO to harmonise the international testing procedures within the BWM Convention, known as the G8 Guidelines, with US type-approval processes. The IMO type-approval guidelines are currently under review, and recommendations for revisions are being developed for the Marine Environmental Protection Committee (MEPC 70) meeting in October, 2016, he said. At MEPC 70, papers will be presented by various bodies outlining BWTS technical standards that should be attained and also calling for a level playing field worldwide, including a study on a double ballast water exchange. Scott Bergeron, Liberian International Ship & Corporate Registry (LISCR) CEO, said that early adopters of equipment should not be punished by having to replace their systems. He calculated that a maximum of 6,000 vessels could be handled per year by the worlds shipyards for equipment retrofits. A vessel of 17 years of age when the convention enters into force could be 22 years old before it needs to be retrofitted, given the five year survey deadline. Is most cases, the work would not be economically viable. Bergeron stressed that the IMO was still the proper place to discuss and adopt legislation.




Damen to takeover Curacao Drydock

The Curacao Government and Damen Shipyards Group signed a concession agreement for the future operation of the Curacao Drydock Co on 9th September.

Damen will establish a new company in Curacao under the name Damen Shiprepair Curacao. It is expected that Damen will start operations in the two graving docks and on the available quays at the end of October, 2016. Part of the agreement includes Damen bringing in extra capacity in the shape of a floating dock. Furthermore, a total of $40 mill will be invested in the infrastructure and training facilities for personnel. The facilities of Damen Shiprepair Curacao currently consist of two graving docks (280 x 48 m and 193 x 26.5 m), as well as around 2,000 m of repair quays together with 13 cranes. Rene Berkvens, CEO, Damen Shipyards Group, signed the agreement with the Minister of Economic Development, Eugene Rhuggenaath. Whilst having a long history in building and delivering new ships to customers in the Americas, this is the first step in our ambition to play a major role in shiprepair and conversion in the Caribbean area. This strategic partnership between Damen and Curacao fits into our strategy to further expand our repair and service activities worldwide. Damen Shiprepair Curacao will become part of the Damen Shiprepair & Conversion group, which currently operates 40 drydocks in 15 shipyards worldwide.




Markets - VLCC rates softer to the West- firmer to the East

The VLCC market ex MEG saw steady demand during the latter part of last week, but the lukewarm sentiment did not carry over into this week.

Rates remained stable, but corrected half a point down in the early part of this week for MEG/West, while MEG/East saw an increase of one to two points, Fearnleys reported. The overhang of tonnage decreased and bad weather in the Far East may further delay a few vessels. However, there was still enough tonnage to cover charterers expected demand. The Atlantic Basin also saw more of the same with steady activity and charterers managed to maintain recent levels except for WAfrica, where demand on fairly prompt dates brought levels up to WS42.5-45 level for the WAfrica/East run. Suezmaxes in West Africa remained more or less unchanged last week with the exception of some prompt replacement deals that paid up. At time of writing (Wednesday), the tonnage list has seemingly become tighter, due to steady activity in all areas, combined with the paper trading up for October dates. On the back of the above, owners bullish sentiment grew and expectations are for higher rates for the first decade of October fixing schedule. The Med Suezmax players have already seen the effect of less available tonnage on the back of ships being sent east and recent deals from Black Sea and Ceyhan have paid some WS5  7.5 points above previous deals. In the North Sea and Baltic areas, rates have settled since last weeks sudden hike. However, there seems to be a lot of different opinions whether or not this market still has the potential to firm even further. For the time being, we believe it will continue sideways, Fearnleys said. Last weeks momentum in the Med and Black Sea continued throughout this week. More cargo activity was seen than expected. A busy CPC programme and cross-med activity pushed rates above WS90. Owners were bullish for the week to come and were still holding out for higher rates, the broker concluded. Elsewhere, Gener8 Maritime took delivery of two ECO VLCCs, the Gener8 Perseus on 9th September, 2016 and the Gener8 Oceanus three days later from Hyundai Heavy Industries and Hyundai Samho Heavy Industries, respectively. The two VLCCs represent the 14th and 15th of 21 VLCCs due to be delivered into Gener8 Maritime's fleet. Upon delivery, both vessels entered Navig8 Group's VL8 Pool. Meanwhile, Ardmore Shipping Corpo has taken delivery of the first three of six MRs that it agreed to acquire in June, 2016. The Ardmore Endurance, Ardmore Explorer and Ardmore Engineer are 49,500 dwt Eco-design IMO II/III MRs built by STX Offshore and Shipbuilding in 2013, 2014 and 2014, respectively. The vessels were delivered on 31st August, 7th September and 12th September, 2016, respectively, and are currently employed in the spot market. Ardmore also announced that it has completed debt financing for the acquisition of the six vessels. Four of the vessels are being financed through a new $71.3 mill senior debt facility with ABN AMRO. The facility is an amortising senior term loan with a final maturity date in 2023. The covenants and other conditions are consistent with those of the company's existing credit facilities, it said. The remaining two vessels have been added to the existing credit facility with ABN AMRO and DVB Bank, which was completed in January, 2016. The facility has been increased by $36.6 mill, and NIBC Bank has agreed to join ABN AMRO and DVB Bank as lenders under the facility. The increase comes in two tranches to coincide with the delivery of the two vessels, and they will mature in 2023. In another move, Ardmore announced that it has agreed to sell the 2005-built, 29,000 dwt Eco-mod product/chemical tanker Ardmore Centurion for $15.7 mill. The vessel is expected to be delivered to her new owner in late September, 2016. Anthony Gurnee, Ardmores CEO, commented: "We are pleased to welcome these high-quality, modern MR product/chemical tankers to Ardmore's operating fleet. Alongside the three additional vessels that are scheduled to deliver to Ardmore in the coming weeks, these recent acquisitions will expand our long-term earnings power, enhance our cost efficiency and lower our breakeven costs. We also appreciate the support of ABN AMRO, DVB Bank, and NIBC Bank in providing bank financing for all of our newly acquired vessels." Stena Bulk and Golden Ari Resources have taken delivery on a joint basis of the eighth IMOIIMAX type MR - Stena Immortal - from Guangzhou Shipbuilding International (GSI). The Gothenburg-based owner placed an order for 13 IMOIIMAX product tankers in 2012. Stena Immortal will be operated by Stena Weco and will become a unit of the companys global logistics system, which employs around 60 vessels. The remaining five vessels will be delivered every third month with the last vessel one in 2018. Three of the 13 IMOIIMAX tankers are wholly owned by Stena Bulk, six together with GAR, two by Stena Bulks sister company Concordia Maritime and two by Stena Weco.



In the charter market, broking sources reported that Scorpio had fixed the 2013-built Aframax Densa Alligator for six option six months at $18,000 and $21,500 per day for the optional period, while Litasco was believed to have taken the 2016-built Aframax STI Grace for six months at $18,500 per day. KNOT Offshore Partners has confirmed that Statoil has declared the last two optional years of the Bodil Knutsens timecharter on the same terms as the existing contract. The firm contract period is thus extended from May, 2017 to May, 2019 In addition, KNOP has granted Statoil new five one-year options. A few newbuildings were reported, including Sun Enterprises opting for a VLCC at JMU and two, option two Aframaxes from Hyundai for $47 mill each. The Aframaxes were thought to be at the LOI stage. Eastern Pacific was also said to have invested $86 mill on two Aframaxes at HHI Subic, plus two options. Navig8 was believed to be at the LOI stage for two, plus options for two, plus two, plus two MRs at Hyundai Mipo for $36 mill each. They were said to be IMO II types and are to be fitted with 18 tanks each. Kumiai Senpaku was reported to have ordered at 37,000 dwt asphalt carrier at Chengxi for 2018 delivery. The 2007-built Aframax Isis was reported sold to Atlas Marine for $24 mill. Included in the deal was a two year charter to Phillips 66 at $19,000 per day.




Russia to cease Baltic state oil exports

Russia plans to halt exports of oil products from foreign ports in the Baltic by 2018, the head of oil pipeline monopoly Nikolai Tokarev told President Vladimir Putin on Monday.

According to a report from Reuters, Tokarev said exports of crude products through non-Russian ports will fall to 5 mill tonnes this year from 9 mill tonnes in 2015 and by 2018 will stop completely. "We will be shipping through our own ports as there is surplus capacity," Tokarev told Putin, according to a transcript of the meeting published on the Kremlin website, translated by Reuters. More than a decade ago, the giant Primorsk terminal and nearby Ust-Luga allowed Russia to suspend exports of crude via non-Russian Baltic ports. Since then, Russia has been gradually cutting exports of oil products via foreign ports, such as Latvia's Ventspils. If product flows are suspended, it would deal a blow to the transit revenues of Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania and hit the worlds largest oil trader Vitol, which controls Ventspils, Reuters said. But the move would boost several Russian ports. Ust-Luga, which has a capacity of more than 30 mill tonnes a year, is 74% controlled by billionaire Andrei Bokarev. Primorsk is operated by Novorossiysk Commercial Sea Port Group. Vysotsk in the Leningrad Oblast (region), which belongs to Russia's second-largest oil producer, is also likely to benefit.




Tankers held in Yemen

Authorities in a port controlled by Yemen's Houthi movement have seized two tankers from international traders in a payment dispute,

Ocean Tankers, the Singapore-based owner of the LR1s, Chao Hu and Hong Ze Hu, confirmed to Reuters that the vessels were being denied permission to leave Hodeida, which is controlled by the Houthis. Importing goods into Yemen has become a major challenge since civil war broke out in the country and a Saudi-led coalition imposed a maritime blockade in its fight against the Houthi group that drove President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi from Sanaa in 2014. Hadi's government now controls the southern port of Aden, but Sanaa and the north are in the hands of the Houthis and military forces loyal to their ally, former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, the news agency explained. "The vessels themselves are not under arrest but have unfortunately been caught up in a commercial dispute between cargo interests. The dispute is nothing to do with Ocean Tankers or our ships and we hope the dispute can be settled quickly," an Ocean Tankers spokesman reportedly said. Several trading sources told Reuters that the Yemeni authorities had barred the ships from leaving after failing to pay tens of millions of dollars for their cargoes of gasoline and gasoil. The cargoes are owned by Swiss-based trading houses Gunvor and Litasco, the trading arm of Russian oil company Lukoil, and were imported via CruGas, a London-based trader and regular supplier for Yemen's main oil company. A document seen by Reuters showed that the Yemeni ministry of justice issued an injunction on 4th September instructing the shipping agent not to give the two ships departure permits. In response to the seizing of the Hong Ze Hu, Gunvor filed a lawsuit on 6th September at the UK High Court against CruGas, claiming nearly $39 mill for losses suffered, according to the court filing seen by Reuters. Gunvor said CruGas owed the money for demurrage  a charge for failing to discharge the ship on time  and pre-payment for the cargo of 30,000 to 35,000 tonnes. Gunvor and Litasco declined to comment. CruGas could not be reached for comment. Sources at the port of Hodeidah confirmed that CruGas and the Yemen Oil and Gas Company (YOGC) were in a payment dispute over the delivery of fuel. According to Reuters ship tracking data, the two vessels have been anchored off the coast of Yemen for several months.




UKHO warns of ECDIS-related detentions

The United Kingdom Hydrographic Office (UKHO) has called for shipowners, operators and managers to exercise greater vigilance to tackle the rise in ECDIS-related detentions.

With a growing majority of the global fleet having completed the switch to digital navigation, evidence is emerging that the number of ECDIS-related issues during inspections and audits is on the rise. For example, earlier this year, the Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) reported a significant increase in the number of ships detained because of ECDIS deficiencies.



The consequences of ECDIS deficiencies during inspections were highlighted in the recent case of a ship detained in Brisbane by AMSA, due to a lack of on board familiarisation training in the use of ECDIS. This required an ECDIS trainer to be flown in from Singapore to train the crew. The vessel, which had passed through the Great Barrier Reef, was released from detention upon completion of her crew training.



Speaking at SMM 2016 in Hamburg, Thomas Mellor, head of OEM technical support and digital standards at UKHO, said: ECDIS can deliver tremendous benefits for safe, compliant and efficient navigation. However, once installed shipowners, operators and managers must fulfil their responsibilities for its ongoing use, including compliance with all relevant regulations. This includes updating their bridge procedures, upgrading their ECDIS software to the latest IHO ENC standards and, above all, ensuring that bridge teams are trained and certified in the operation of ECDIS and in line with the requirements of Port State Control inspections and audits.



There can be any number of reasons for non-compliance, ranging from inadequate detail in the ships Safety Management System (SMS), a failure to use the latest Electronic Navigational Charts (ENCs) for the voyage plan, or a bridge team unfamiliar with the use of ECDIS. Whatever the reason, the penalties can be severe, whether through the costs of a delayed onward voyage or the impact on an owners reputation of a failed SIRE inspection. Most importantly, every incident of non-compliance is a potential threat to the safety of that ship and its crew, as well as other traffic and the marine environment.



PSC inspectors are carrying out more inspections on ships using ECDIS as the primary means of navigation and as a result, are becoming more aware of the latest requirements and which questions to ask.



The good news is that there is plenty of guidance and support available for owners from ECDIS manufacturers and ECDIS training providers. The UKHO has been freely distributing the ADMIRALTY Guide to Audits and Inspections at ECDIS Seminars for several years.



Furthermore we have developed the ADMIRALTY ENC Maintenance Record (NP133C) to make official digital chart information easier to manage, inspect and audit, he said.



The compliance challenges associated with ECDIS are taking on greater prominence as the proportion of the global shipping fleet carrying ECDIS continues to grow. An important landmark was reached earlier this year when the UKHO announced that 51% of all vessels subject to the SOLAS regulations on ECDIS carriage were ECDIS-ready, marking the first time that ECDIS-ready ships made up the majority of the global SOLAS fleet.



Furthermore, out of almost 42,000 internationally trading vessels, an estimated 59% are now ECDIS-ready, according to the UKHO.








Thank you for reading!

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Mad Catz announced on Thursday evening that it has sold its Saitek brand and line of flight, space and farm simulation controllers to Logitech for $13 million in cash. I didn't even know farm simulation controllers were a thing but I digress.

As per the agreement, Mad Catz will hand over trademarks, equipment and tooling, inventory, technical data, records and any other documents necessary for the design, manufacture, marketing and distribution of the aforementioned controllers.

What's more, Logitech will be welcoming eight of the company's research and development employees.

Karen McGinnis, President and Chief Executive Officer of Mad Catz, said in a statement that after a thorough and deliberate process, they believe this sale to Logitech brings Mad Catz attractive and certain value for the flight, space and farm simulation line of Saitek products. She added that they are pleased to find a company like Logitech that will lead Saitek into its next phase of growth and best support its strong acceptance within the flight simulation community.

Saitek got its start in the late '70s as a maker of electronic chess games. The company eventually expanded to include PC peripherals and made quite the name for itself - so much so that Mad Catz came knocking in 2007 with a check for $30 million.

Selling Saitek to Logitech for just $13 million may seem like a steep loss (and who knows, maybe it is) but there's more to the story. Logitech is getting everything mentioned above but will retain the mouse and keyboard product lines that have developed out of the Saitek brand.

Image courtesy Kevin Bentley, YouTube
What would you do if you were the proud owner of a DeLorean? It may be illegal on public roads, but many "Back to the Future" fans would probably try to get it to 88 mph. In the UK, that's exactly what one person managed. But instead of traveling through time, he got arrested for his troubles.

55-year-old Nigel Mills was caught by police driving the iconic vehicle at 89 mph on an Essex highway. He denied that he was attempting to time travel, and no flux capacitor was found in the gull-winged car.

"I wasn't trying to time travel," Mills told The Guardian. "It was at 11am on Sunday and the road was completely clear."

In the movie trilogy, 88 mph is, of course, the speed the Delorean needs to reach in order to activate the flux capacitor - the device that makes leaping back or forward through time possible.

Mills said he paid 22,000 (around $29,000) for the DeLorean as he was a car fan and his family enjoyed the movies. "When I'm out in it a few people recognize it, they slow down and take pictures - drivers take pictures out of their windows or try to film you and I get approached at petrol stations," he said.

Mills added that he only takes the DeLorean out a few times a year, and was only having a bit of a "run around" when the police clocked his speeding.

Thankfully for Mills, his case at Chelmsford Magistrates' Court was dismissed by the Judge after the prosecution offered no evidence. Biff Tannen's involvement has not been confirmed.

Image credit: BRENTWOOD GAZETTE / SWNS.COM
Apple has announced it won't reveal first weekend sales of its iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus, but that doesn't mean sales are down. T-Mobile and Sprint have confirmed the new iPhones are the most successful smartphones both have ever launched.

After months of rumors revealed what Apple had in store for its next-gen iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus, there was one huge feature Tim Cook left out of his presentation that is proving to be something everyone wanted and something wireless carriers were quick to jump on, a free iPhone 7.

A few years ago, the idea of a free iPhone usually meant a smartphone that was at least two generations behind the latest and greatest iPhone, and it also came tied with a two-year contract with a wireless carrier.

As it became clear that iPhone sales were on a decline year over year, it was time for Apple to enlist wireless carriers to come up with a novel way to increase sales of the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus.

Shortly after Cook's keynote, Verizon, AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile went to work and all announced free iPhone 7 deals, which require customers to trade in a qualifying iPhone and agree to a two-year commitment that credits the wireless account each month for 24 months to equal the price of a 32 GB iPhone 7. Consumers were left wondering if these new free iPhone 7 offers were too good to be true.

While consumers will have to judge for themselves if it's worth trading in last year's iPhone 6s and essentially signing a two-year contract with a wireless carrier to get a shiny new iPhone 7, carriers are already boasting that Apple's latest iPhones are breaking records in terms of sales.

"iPhone 7 is the biggest pre-order in T-Mobile's history, and that says a lot about our momentum and the excitement customers have for iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus!" said John Legere, T-Mobile's president and CEO. "Q3 was already off to an incredible start, and when you add a kick-ass phone to T-Mobile ONE and top it off with the nation's fastest LTE network, Americans can clearly see that it's the best time ever to switch to the Un-carrier!"

Sprint has also announced that it has seen incredible demand for the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus and claims that preorders for the new iPhones are up more than 375 percent in the first three days over last year's iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus.

Meanwhile, AT&T and Verizon issued less over-the-top statements, with AT&T stating iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus sales are "better-than-expected" and Verizon reporting "business as usual."

Unfortunately, it's impossible to tell how many of the record sales numbers were based upon consumers availing themselves of the "free iPhone 7" offers as opposed to genuine direct sales of the devices. Those numbers would provide a better sense of the appeal of Apple's latest iPhones outside of the promotions intended to boost reported sales.

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Financial technology companies from South Korea are determined to take Apple to court, as the company is blocking rivals from using near field communication (NFC) in its mobile devices.

The case will be filed at the Korean Fair Trade Commission (KFTC), where fintech ventures aim to prove that Apple's lockdown of its programming interface (API) denies other companies the use of NFC. The local fintech companies argue that this creates an unfair advantage to the iOS developer when it comes to financial services.

The plaintiffs are alleging that Apple's policy denies them access to NFC business opportunities such as user identification, simple mobile payments and transportation cards. The issue might generate a lot of media attention, as the fintech companies say they are ready to take Apple to court for barring their access to NFC by keeping its own API under lock and key.

Korean Enterprises

Insiders familiar with the matter say that names such as Interpay, Korea NFC, Cashbee and Kona I met on Sept. 9 to discuss the opportunity of opening up a legal case against Apple, in the hope of getting access to NFC support.

The Korean fintech firms will receive legal advice from the Korea Fintech Association.

Apple offers NFC support on its smartphone models (starting with the iPhone 6), but requires that the feature be used exclusively with Apple Pay. This means that Apple's lockdown on its API is denying Korean customers' access to NFC services such as mobile payment to various vendors, paying for buses and subways or identification of credit card users.

According to the fintech firms from South Korea, Apple restricts consumers' rights and effectively sabotages services and business opportunities for businesses and clients.

Hwang Seung-ik, the helm of Korea NFC, explains that customers have the elementary right to enjoy a variety of services that use NFC.

"Services such as paying fares for buses and subway, a safe tax service and an NFC-based police report service [are unavailable to users of iPhone in Korea]," he notes.

It should be noted that a similar current of opinion is starting to form in Australia, where Apple is also chastised for keeping its API for NFC outside of developers' reach.

The Australian Precedent

Back in July, Apple summoned in court in Australia by an alliance made up of four banks. The financial institutions took Apple before the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) in a similar case. The banks asked the tech company to raise the gates on its API for NFC to ensure that a more flexible market for mobile wallets can come into being.

Should the Korean fintech firms proceed to lock horns with Apple to open its API for NFC, a legal conflict is probable to flare up, with multiple institutions joining the fintech enterprises.

People familiar with the matter note that the ventures are determined to present their case in front of the KFTC. The second meeting of the fintech companies is expected to take place at September's end.

Hwang is confident that the cooperation between the fintech firms, the Korea Communications Commission and the KFTC will lead to Apple "opening the API to NFC."

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Samsung finally rolls out Galaxy Note 7 replacements.

Three weeks after the first incidents of the exploding Galaxy Note 7 were reported and half a month after it issued a global recall for the handheld, Samsung finally confirms the availability of Note 7 replacement units in the United States.

In a press release dated Sept. 15, Thursday, Samsung specified that the Note 7 replacements will be in majority of retail locations by Sept. 21, Wednesday. The company specifies that the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission has already approved of its exchange program and will be replacing units that were sold in the United States from August 2016 until Sept. 15, 2016.

Samsung issued a recall last Sept. 2, citing battery cell issues as the main culprit for the reported explosions. Prior to the recall, 35 cases of the explosion were reported by Galaxy Note 7 owners. Samsung also released a quick fix recently, a software update that limits battery recharging to 60 percent.

"Consumer safety is always our highest priority. Our collaboration with the CPSC to fast-track a voluntary recall in the U.S. addresses safety concerns by ensuring we reach Note7 owners quickly to exchange their devices," says President of Samsung Electronics America Tim Baxter. "We are asking owners to act now by powering down their Note7 devices and receive a replacement devices or a refund through our exchange program."

Samsung says that although there were only a handful of cases of the explosion, the company has taken great care to provide affected consumers with the needed support. Moreover, the company reveals that it has identified the affected batch of units and has already stopped the shipment and sales of them.

It should be noted that the exploding Galaxy Note 7 was recently reported to have injured a 6-year-old boy and set afire a family vehicle. A man also suffered third-degree burns because of a Galaxy S7 edge unit's explosion and is currently pursuing Samsung in court.

Samsung is using its customer service, social media, direct communications and in-store communications to inform consumers of this exchange program. The company also encourages consumers to inform themselves through this web address: www.samsung.com/us/note7recall.

The CPSC-approved exchange program specifies a number of options for Galaxy Note 7 owners. One is to exchange the Note 7 they have with the Note 7 replacement unit when it becomes available at the retailer where the current one was bought (point of purchase).

The second one is to exchange a Note 7 unit, along with the accessories that came with it, with a Galaxy S7 or Galaxy S7 edge. Again, this should go through the point of purchase. A refund will be issued for the difference in price and consumers who choose this option will be given a gift card worth $25, an in-store credit or accessory credit or bill credit from select carrier retail stores.

The third is a refund from the retailer for the amount that was spent in purchasing the Note 7 unit.

Below is a video message from Tim Baxter in which he apologizes to consumers for the defective Galaxy Note 7 units and assures the public that the battery cell issue has been resolved.

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Donald Trump has been a contentious presidential candidate ever since he entered the scene last year, making a plethora of statements that would have left essentially any other candidate dead in the water. In the end, these continued instances have led to one overarching question: is Trump fit for the presidency?

Well, as it turns out, he is  as far as his health is concerned.

To be clear, Trump's capacity to lead as president based on his health has never been seriously called into question  unlike Hillary Clinton, whose recent bout with pneumonia has left many Americans unsure about her state of health. However, with his rival's camp revealing the status of their candidate, Trump aimed to be more "transparent" by revealing his own status on live television.

Appearing on Thursday's airing of The Dr. Oz Show, Trump pulled out a note from his physician, Dr. Harold Bornstein, which detailed everything from the weight to the medications of the 70-year-old presidential candidate. The verdict? He's overweight, but healthy overall.

The note revealed that Trump has a cholesterol level of 169 and blood pressure of 116/70. His blood sugar level is 99 mg/dL, and his triglycerides, a type of fat found in the blood, are 61 mg/dL.

Furthermore, it revealed that Trump takes a statin drug, called rosuvastatin, which treats high cholesterol and triglyceride levels, as well as a low-dose aspirin. His liver function and thyroid function are within the "normal range" and his latest electrocardiogram test and chest X-ray also appeared normal.

The note also revealed that Trump had a prostate-specific antigen level test that resulted in a low score of 0.15. In addition, he had a colonoscopy in 2013 and a transthoracic echocardiogram to examine his heart in 2014, both of which were normal. His calcium score was 98 in 2013.

Lastly, the note stated that Trump's testosterone level is 441.6, "which is actually  is good," according to host Mehmet Oz.

All in all, everything conveyed in the note pointed to Trump being in good health, except for one thing: his weight. The note revealed that Trump is 6-foot-3 and 236 pounds, meaning he has a BMI of 29.5, and thus overweight  something that Trump revealed he has been aiming to address.

"You're 6'3," 236 lbs. as I mentioned," Oz said. "Now, in my mind, I'm thinking your body surface area and your BMI is high. It's probably close to 30, which is sort of the barrier for most people. Do your doctors or your family ever give you a hard time about your weight?"

"Yeah, I think I could lose a little weight," Trump admitted. "I've always been a little bit this way. I think that if I had one thing, I'd like to lose weight. It's tough because of the way I live. But the one thing I would like to do is be able to drop 15 to 20 pounds. It would be good."

It should be noted, however, that Trump having a high BMI doesn't automatically mean he is in poor health. A study conducted by a team of researchers from UCLA earlier this year revealed that the correlation between BMI and actual healthiness isn't as clear as initially believed. With that in mind, especially with all his other stats considered, Bornstein determined that Trump is in "excellent physical health" and has the "stamina" to serve as president.

So, there you have it, Trump is indeed fit to be president  as far as his health is concerned.

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Emails leaked by Apple employees are said to reveal the alleged sexist and toxic work environment in the company, a picture which is not good for a company that claims it is making good progress in its workforce diversity.

The extensive report, published by Mic, started with an incident involving a female Apple employee. Danielle, not hear real name, works on a team made up of mostly males in the company, similar to how most of the teams in Apple are set up.

In a certain morning of July, the men started joking about an office intruder who would come to rape everybody. Hearing the jokes, Danielle spoke out, and while the coworker who started the jokes apologized and promised not to say such things again, she was not confident that things will change.

This is because this is not the first time that Danielle saw something like that happen, and despite numerous complaints to her manager, no improvements were made.

Danielle raised her complaint the following day to the CEO of Apple himself, Tim Cook, writing "I do not feel safe at a company that tolerates individuals who make rape jokes."

Cook, however, did not respond to the formal complaint lodged by Danielle, a copy of which was acquired by Gizmodo. The female employee was given a month off, but upon her return, she found that no serious consequences were triggered by her complaint.

The incident with Danielle is just one of many stories of employees who are all claiming to have been the victim of the sexist and toxic atmosphere at the company. The writer of the report, Melanie Ehrenkranz, claims that she has acquired 50 pages of emails from former and current employees at Apple, all of which reveal that there is a problem on how women are being treated within Apple.

One of the incidents saw a female employee sit through a meeting wherein the male attendees stereotyped women as nags. The employee was the only woman in the meeting.

In another incident, Claire, not her real name, reported that her male colleagues were harassing her. However, instead of addressing what was said to be a hostile working environment, Claire was given the option of either staying put or take a demotion to be moved to another team. Claire took the second option.

Amanda, also not her real name, said that she was not given the chance to apply for two higher positions, despite being qualified for them, as her male boss selected two men for the jobs, which were not publicly posted.

Amanda, who filed a complaint with Department of Fair Employment and Housing, also sent an email to Cook, similar to what Danielle did. Also similarly, Cook did not reply to her email.

Apple did not comment on any of the incidents in the report, but a spokeswoman said that the company takes work environment complaints very seriously and that it investigates each incident thoroughly.

In its latest workforce diversity report, Apple said that it has solved the pay gap between genders, with a slight increase to 32 percent for the women population of its employees. However, with the incidents reported by Ehrenkranz, it seems that there is a deeper and more toxic issue beneath Apple's workforce.

 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Scientists have unearthed new coping mechanisms used by certain mammals to overcome human-created noise levels when hunting down their prey.

A recent study on the preying habits of fringe-lipped bats in the context of rising disturbances from human-induced noise revealed that the bats use echolocation as a second sense to pinpoint the prey when the mating calls of tungara frogs are overlapped by other noises.

The study, which was published in the Sept. 16 issue of Science, reveals what a bat will be doing when road noises block their perception of frogs, identified by the mating calls they make.

Wouter Halfwerk, a professor at VU University in Amsterdam, hailed the experiment and said it showed how animals are adapting to increased noise levels by energizing other senses.

According to experts, the action of bats is comparable to the way people speak to one another in hushed tones in a noisy party: by tuning out the unwanted noise.

By tracking the reflecting signals from high-frequency sounds, the bats' echolocation ability lands them to a new sensory mode for assessing the environment perfectly.

Found mostly in South and Central America, fringe-lipped bats prey upon male tungara frogs by acting on their mating calls and hunting them down with perfect precision. The mating calls initiate the flight of the bats from their perch.

Lead author Dylan Gomes, who conducted the research at Panama's Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI), said the impact of noise on bats is a new area of study.

Previous studies have been focused more on the effects of human-generated noise on birds and whales. The new study showed how anthropogenic noise has been changing the way animals process environmental information.

It affirms that animals that are able to shift their sensory mechanisms in noisy environments are more successful as predators.

Use Of Robotic Frogs

In the study, the researchers used two robotic frogs that accurately mimicked tungara frogs in terms of mating calls and vocal sac expansion for attracting the bats. One frog emitted the mating call while the other played the mating call and expanded its vocal sac.

It was found that, despite a masking noise, the bats were faster in attacking the robotic frog that emitted both signals. The experiment proved that bats adapt to noise by using their other senses to increase their echolocation power.

The findings are a pointer for further research on how animals adapt to anthropogenic noise with implications for sensory ecology and species interactions.

Photo: Gerwin Sturm | Flickr

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Leica's Sofort Instant Camera Offers More Nostalgia Than Features | TechTree.com

German brand Leica with a history of over century, has unveiled a latest camera. Dubbed as Sofort, the snapper offers more nostalgia than features. It takes you back to the good-old days when people loaded films instead of memory cards.



Depending on how far you want to turn back the time, Leica offers monochrome and colour films to choose from. In terms of aesthetics, Leica has aptly chosen retro colours including mint and orange. The design is minimal, save for the distinct lens. The instant camera comes with modes such as Auto, Macro, Party and People, Sport and Action, Double Exposure, and Selfie. To ensure best results every time, the camera automatically adapts parameters such as the exposure time and aperture to the mode the user selects. Much like yesteryear's cameras, the Sofort comes with an optical viewfinder.







The Leica Sofort is expected to hit the stores in November. In the US, it is expected to be priced at $300, which roughly translates to Rs 20,000. A pack of 10 exposure colour or monochrome films is expected to cost somewhere between $10 to $20.



Technical Specifications:

Aperture / Focal length: 60mm f/12.7 (34mm in 35mm equiv)

Focusing Area: Standard: 0,6m - 3m 3 Focus Steps: 0,3-0,6m (Macro) / 0,6 m - 3m (Standard)

Shutter Speed: 1/8 - 1/400 sec (Mechanical shutter)

Viewfinder: Optical real image viewfinder 0,37x with target spot and parallax compensation

Mode Dial: Automatic, Selfie, People and Party, Action and Sport, Bulb, Macro, Self-Timer

Exposure: Time automatic / -0,7 EV / 0,0 EV / +0,7 EV

Light Metering: Automatic exposure control LV 5.0 - LV 15.5 (ISO 800)

ISO Sensitivity: ISO 800 Instax film

Self-Timer: 2 sec / 10 sec

Power: Li-ion battery pack (3.7V, 740mAh, 2.6 Wh) (included) Battery Life (Approx.): 100 pictures

TAGS: Cameras, Leica
Oregon and software giant Oracle have ended their bitter legal fight.Gov. Kate Brown announced today the settlement of the six lawsuits the state and the company filed against one another after the failure of the Cover Oregon health exchange website.The settlement, valued at $100 million, includes cash payments to Oregon as well as a six-year license agreement for products and services that Brown said can be used to "significantly modernize state government's IT systems.""Today's settlement agreement ends years of turmoil and taxpayer expense related to a troubled health exchange program I dissolved in March 2015," Brown said.At a press conference Thursday morning, Brown said the risks of going to trial were too great. Legal fees alone would have topped $1.5 million a month, she said.Oracle's $100 million consists largely of technology. Only $25 million will come in the form of cash. And all of that will go to pay the state's legal fees and other costs. Oracle also agreed to contribute $10 million to a state technology education program.All in all, it's a far cry from the $240 million the state paid to Oracle for the failed Cover Oregon project. The company's army of IT experts worked for years on the exchange, repeatedly missed deadlines and never produced a functional exchange. In late 2013 and early 2014, Oracle sent in its "A-team" to complete the work. But the first-stringers were no more successful than the junior varsity, state officials claimed. (Oracle disputes this.)The state fired Oracle in the spring of 2014 and killed the Cover Oregon project. Instead, Oregon adopted the federal healthcare exchange.Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum, at the request of then-Gov. John Kitzhaber, filed a lawsuit against Oracle. It was an aggressive complaint, accusing Oracle and several executives of fraud, filing false claims and racketeering. It sought more than $6 billion in damages.The complaint led to discord within the top ranks of Oregon government. Brown, who replaced Kitzhaber in the wake of the Cylvia Hayes influence-peddling scandal, viewed the Oracle beef as a political liability and pressed for a settlement. Brian Shipley, Brown's former chief of staff, spent hours with Oracle executives in 2015 seeking common ground.Oracle claimed they'd reached a deal with Shipley and Brown to settle for $25 million worth of software. The governor's office steadfastly denied it.The company filed one of its many countersuits against the state claiming it had improperly reneged on the deal.But Brown clearly wanted the Oracle mess to go away. Rosenblum resisted the pressure to settle. Oracle executives said Rosenblum refused Brown's direct order to settle, which they claimed was unconstitutional.The legal effort proved extraordinarily expensive. By August, the Department of Justice confirmed it had paid $16 million to Markowitz Herbold and the three other firms hired to handle different aspects of the case. By Thursday's settlement, state officials pegged the total legal costs at $25 million.Oregon's hands weren't clean in the Cover Oregon mess. The state's oversight of the project was marred by mixed signals, feuding state bureaucracies and questionable technical competence.The state never hired a so-called systems integrator to act as a general contractor with ultimate authority. Instead, it hired Oracle to a time-and-materials contract, which allowed the software giant to run up massive bills.Given the state's own culpability, Rosenblum's aggressive attack made no sense, critics said. On Thursday, Republicans were scathing calling the settlement "the end of one of the most embarrassing chapters in Oregon's history.""Despite the state's obvious culpability, Attorney General Rosenblum put tens of millions of taxpayer dollars on the line for a legal strategy that was motivated by politics and never stood a realistic chance of recovering everything that was lost," said Mike McLane, House Republican Leader.The Republicans were muted compared to Oracle, which repeatedly blasted state officials for their decision to sue the company. Executives accused Brown of lying and Rosenblum of defrauding her own state.On Thursday, Oracle took a more diplomatic tone. "We are pleased to have this contentious litigation behind us and to provide Oregon with the flexibility to obtain the software and technical support it desires to address the State's needs over the next several years, said Dorian Daley, Oracle general counsel.Rosenblum also praised Thursday's deal. "This settlement outcome is a 'win-win' for the people of Oregonwithout the expense and continued impact on our collective psyche," she said.The state's main case against Oracle was scheduled to go to trial in January. Oregon had won a series of favorable rulings in court, defeating Oracle's attempt to move the case to federal court and winning on its motion to seek punitive damages on top of the treble damages it could have collected if it had won on the racketeering charges.But Brown wasn't willing to roll the dice on a trial.One of the lasting ironies of the settlement is that it could increase Oregon's reliance on the software company that was the chief author of the Cover Oregon disaster. State officials said the settlement and the software licensing deal could allow a thorough overhaul of many of the state's information technology systems with Oracle products and expertise.When asked about the wisdom of exposing other state agencies and projects to Oracle, state officials said it would be difficult to launch an upgrade without Oracle given its dominance in the information technology business.
With a shout out from the White House, the efforts to teach computer coding to more Kanawha County, West Virginia, girls expanded Wednesday, with plans for an initiative that started with just female students to further grow and, eventually, expand beyond women and Kanawhas borders.Ysabel Bombardiere, the volunteer instructor for a girls coding group that started early this year at the West Virginia University Extension Service office in Kanawha City, said shes started a new initiative, called Project Code Nodes, that will add  atop the Kanawha City group, where a new session of meetings started last month  three new free coding groups based in downtown Charleston, Institute and Rand.On Wednesday, the Institute class became the first new one to open. Bombardiere said the downtown Charleston group is expected to start this fall and the Rand group is planned to begin in January.Bombardieres classes will continue to receive support from the New York City-based nonprofit Girls Who Code, and all the new locations are affiliated with the Partnership of African American Churches, whose executive director, James Patterson, said is a group of about 21 churches, all in the Mountain State.He said the Institute class will be held at Institute Church of the Nazarene, which he pastors, while the downtown Charleston group will be at the Martin Luther King Jr. Community Center and the Rand group will be at Levi First Missionary Baptist Church.NASAs West Virginia Space Grant Consortium  a group of a dozen West Virginia academic institutions and eight corporate and scientific partners that includes science, technology, education and mathematics education in its mission  provided three college students who are NASA fellows to aid with the coding classes.Bombardiere said it is hoped that 4-H workers and the fellows will be able to learn enough to teach more classes on their own, to eventually expand the program and achieve her goals of teaching boys and girls coding and robotics. Right now, shes the only instructor for the four locations.She said the four locations should be able to provide the free computer coding classes to 70 girls overall.All middle- or high-school female students of all races who are interested in coding, whether affiliated with the Partnership of African American Churches other existing programs or not, are welcome to sign up for the classes. Those interested can call the Partnership of African American Churches, at 304-768-7688. Those involved with Project Code Nodes said they didnt receive new funding for the initiative, and donors interested in giving can call the same number.Bombardiere said girls are encouraged to bring their own laptops  she said Kanawha school system-issued tablet computers wont work for the classes  and said if a participant doesnt have a laptop, the program will work to provide one for her.She said the expansion and collaboration with the Partnership of African American Churches came in response to obstacles in getting girls to Kanawha City.Transportation is a barrier for a lot of families, she said, so having community-based clubs increases the access.She noted the Partnership of African American Churches locations where the new classes will be held already are community centers that students already attend for after-school, free food, summer programs or church programs.Its another thing for them to do in their community that is free and they dont have to travel or get a ride from somebody to go, she said.Project Code Nodes was highlighted by the White House Wednesday as part of a summit on President Barack Obamas Computer Science for All initiative . Among other things related to the initiative, Obama is calling on Congress for $4 billion in funding for states and $100 million directly for school systems to expand K-12 [computer science] by training teachers, expanding access to high-quality instructional materials, and building effective regional partnerships, according to the initiatives website.A White House statement on the initiative released Wednesday credited West Virginia as one of a dozen states that have taken concrete policy actions to support computer science education since Obama highlighted the need for it in his final State of the Union speech. In April, the state Board of Education approved a policy revision that, starting this school year, mandates that all public high schools offer optional computer science classes.In 2015, only 22 percent of students taking the AP Computer Science exam were girls, and only 13 percent were African-American or Latino students, the Computer Science for All website states. These statistics mirror the current makeup of some of Americas largest and more innovative tech firms in which women compose less than one-third of their technical employees, and African-Americans less than 3 percent.Edna Green, the director of the Partnership of African American Churches after-school programs, said the initial session of the Institute group will run from now through March, with hour-long meetings twice a week, and the downtown Charleston groups initial session will run from October through April, with hour-long meetings twice a week. She said the Rand groups initial session will launch in January and run through the end of the school year in May, with two-hour-long meetings once a week.
Tesla announced Thursday that it has been selected by Southern California Edison to build a battery project at the utilitys Mira Loma substation that will have the largest output of any existing lithium-ion storage facility.When Teslas big battery system is expected to come online by Dec. 31, it will store 80 megawatt hours of energy, enough to power more than 2,500 households for a day, Tesla said.The battery system is designed to increase reliability of the electric grid by taking a charge from it during off-peak hours and delivering power to customers during peak hours.Edison and other California utilities are under a 2013 order by the state Public Utilities Commission to install 1.3 gigawatts of storage capacity by 2020. One gigawatt is the equivalent of 1,000 megawatts.Paul Griffo, an Edison spokesman, said the company was ahead of schedule in meeting its 2016 targets. And while cost for energy storage has been a factor in wider use of the technology, Teslas project met state regulators requirements for competitive prices, he said.Much like renewable resources, we expect to see a declining cost curve in energy storage over time, Griffo said.Projects already are under development that will have five times the output of Teslas.AES Corp. is building a 100-megawatt system at the Alamitos Power Center in Long Beach.In 2014, Edison announced the opening of its Tehachapi energy storage facility, which, at the time, was the largest storage building in North America. The Tesla project will be more than twice the size of the Tehachapi plant.Accounting for power and duration combined, [Tesla] will be the largest for a bit, said Matt Roberts, a spokesman for the Energy Storage Association. But Roberts said the AES project is the largest lithium system ever announced, and is due to be completed in the next couple years.Tesla responded to a request for proposals by Edison to create more electricity storage to supplement the Aliso Canyon natural gas storage facility, which has been out of service following a leak in one of its wells last fall.The Aliso Canyon plant is the states largest storage facility. Southern California Gas says the storage facility is needed to ensure ample supply of natural gas for power plants, homes and businesses in Southern California.Bill Powers, of San Diego-based Powers Engineering, has argued at public hearings and in reports that Aliso Canyon isnt needed. Powers said Teslas battery project highlights that there are other solutions to meeting the energy needs of Southern Californians.It is good news that it is being fast-tracked, said Powers, adding that installing the batteries at a substation such as Edisons Mira Loma facility makes it easier to deliver large-scale battery storage. Its not cutting edge, Powers said, but it is kind of the simplest way to do batteries.
Elecciones presidenciales

El pais mas grande de la region elige este domingo a su proximo mandatario. Tras no lograr hacerse con la mayoria de los votos en los comicios del 2 de octubre, Luis Inacio "Lula" Da Silva y Jair Bolsonaro se disputan la Presidencia en una balotaje que enfrenta tendencias y valores contrapuestas. Con equipos en el terreno, Telam presenta una cobertura exclusiva con noticias, analisis, opinion, fotos y mas.
On the debate, two pollsters who conducted studies, agreed on Saturday that former president Lula defeated Bolsonaro. | Read More
Bratislava, September 16 (TASR)  There's a need to return to the EU's original goals, which even after 60 years are still up to date and important for dealing with the prospects of the EU, said Slovak Chamber of Commerce and Industry president Peter Mihok.



The security of and guarantees for Europe's citizens are being viewed in a ever more sensitive manner than a few years ago. The migration crisis has played a significant role in this. However, it has to be said that many EU-member states have handled the crisis better than the EU itself so far.



Frontex, the European Agency for the Management of Operational Cooperation at the External Borders, which was set up in 2004, hasn't even been able to protect the EU's territorial waters in the Mediterranean Sea so far, said Mihok. The EU must tackle problems with smugglers and resolve illegal breaches of the Schengen area.



A Europe without conflict and wars is the main factor when it comes to the security of all EU citizens. The main precondition for this is EU-wide cooperation and mutual respect for all players. The EU can't be economically and financially successful if its members don't cooperate with each other, stressed Mihok.



"If we were able to find solutions in a bipolar world, we need to be able to find them all the more now. The current substantial security threat in Europe is international terrorism. We have to search for common global solutions in order to stop people falling victim to this and to deal with the extra costs involved," stressed Mihok.



In the first four decades of the EU project people thought that European integration was a model solution for sustainable development and growth in the quality of life. However, the coming of a new century showed that this needn't be the case in the long term. EU-member states weren't able to keep up with the USA. At the same time it was as though they were unsettled by the changes in China, India, South East Asia and on the Arabian peninsula. The first signs of Europeans living above their means came to light as did a poor structure of education unsuitable for the needs of the labour market.



"Today we can see that this impression is becoming a reality. High social costs and a meagre motivational environment are significantly reducing the competitiveness of the European economy and increasing firms' costs. This has become even more complicated due to an unsuitable regulatory framework that significantly restricts business activities in various sectors. Improvements in the regulatory framework and an easing of the impacts of indirect regulations in order to facilitate productivity growth among companies is an immediate priority of the whole EU," added Mihok.
Bratislava, September 16 (TASR)  Comments are emerging concerning a 'Bratislava process', which is very important, because in this way the EU summit that is taking place in the Slovak capital on Friday could be written into the political history of the EU, said Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico prior to the summit.



The Slovak capital will host the leaders of all EU-member states, excluding Great Britain, for the first time ever.



"I would call this summit self-reflection and a search for solutions. This Bratislava process should continue in Malta and then next spring in Rome, where the anniversary of the Treaty of Rome will be celebrated," stated Fico. [The Treaty of Rome was signed on March 25, 1957 and led to the establishment of the European Economic Community  a predecessor of the EU.  ed.note]



Slovak Foreign and European Affairs Minister Miroslav Lajcak noted that 343 delegates, 1,350 journalists, including 1,100 from abroad, have registered for the summit. "Around 500 suppliers are taking part in ensuring that this event functions well. There will be 75 interpreters and dozens of personal bodyguards. This event doesn't have a precedent here in Slovakia. It can be compared only to the Bush-Putin summit [that took place in Bratislava in February 2005]," said Lajcak.



Bratislava on Friday will become not only the 'capital of Europe', but also the centre of attention of the whole world. Journalists from the USA, Mexico, South Africa and Japan are among those accredited.



The most important role of the summit is to halt the surge of pessimism and eliminate the risk of further attempts or referendums on leaving the EU, noted Fico. "If we start the process in Bratislava by saying that the EU is a unique project that we care about, while admitting certain errors and naming concrete topics on which we'd like to focus in the next few months, it will be an extraordinarily successful summit," he stressed.



Fico said that the summit will deal, for instance, with the form that the EU will take after Britain's departure and with security in terms of fighting terrorism as well as in social and economic terms. The EU leaders should also discuss new investments, forms of communication and the global role of the Union.



Fico added that it can be presumed that the discussion will be critical as well. "Otherwise, what would be the point of all of this? We haven't invited the premiers and presidents for a trip, we've invited them for a very serious debate. We can also expect some harsh comments and talk," he warned.



The premier would welcome it if this summit sent out a so-called Bratislava letter, process or memorandum to the world indicating that everyone stands behind the EU because nothing better is available.



"This summit is historical also due to the fact that EU leaders have met in Brussels so far to deal with questions concerning financial crises, security and migration. This is the first time in the past ten years that such a summit is being held outside of Brussels," explained Lajcak.



EU leaders will meet at Bratislava Castle. The first session will be dedicated to diagnosing the current situation in the EU, while the second will focus on specific steps that need to be taken in the next few months. The two sessions at the castle will be separated by an informal lunch during a boat trip on the Danube River, where the delegates will discuss the fallout from Brexit.
Bratislava, September 16 (TASR) - High-quality projects with delays are better than hasty ones with imperfections, said European Commissioner for Regional Policy Corina Cretu in connection with the delay in completing the reconstruction of Bratislava's Old Bridge from European funds.



Accompanied by Bratislava mayor Ivo Nesrovnal, Cretu travelled by tram across the newly reconstructed bridge and then also walked along it. "I think that you managed to complete a very sound project," she said during her inspection. She praised the new trams, stating that they can compete with the ones in Strasbourg in terms of design.



"Infrastructure is a very demanding matter. It takes time, and can't be built overnight. The most important thing is to have a high-quality project and to use the finances in a wise manner," said Cretu, adding that the delay that occurred in the case of the Old Bridge reconstruction is usual in new EU-member states.



The reconstruction of the Old Bridge and construction of a tram line over the Danube River to the borough of Petrzalka cost 69 million. Cretu views the Old Bridge as important not only for the 120,000 residents of Petrzalka; she also sees a kind of symbolism regarding the unification of East and West. "While we see many differences and divisions within the European Union, it's very important to point to important symbolic moments these days, as it shows us that we can be united and should be united," stressed Cretu.



Nesrovnal thanked Cretu to her personal contribution towards the implementation of the transport project. "We launched tram transport for Petrzalka residents for the first time in 55 years. We view this as a big joint success. It's evidence of the fact that very good things can be done in Bratislava if you do them with heart, energy and with the support of good partners," he said.



The European Union provided 85 percent of the finances for the project, while the state covered 10 percent and the city 5 percent. The city had to complete the project by the end of 2015 in order to obtain European funds for it. The reconstruction work on the Old Bridge was completed in mid-December 2015. The bridge was opened to pedestrians and cyclists in May, while the tram service across the bridge to Petrzalka was launched in July.
Bratislava, September 16 (TASR) - The Visegrad Four (V4) countries (the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia) have prepared a joint statement in support of bolstering EU security, providing tighter control of external borders and preserving the Union's Cohesion Policy, the free market and the Schengen zone, said Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka after arriving for the informal EU summit at Bratislava Castle on Friday.



"The Czech Republic is convinced that we shouldn't waste time on a discussion on European institutions. We should focus instead on the practical issues required for people's everyday lives; namely, safety, security and prosperity," said Sobotka.



The Czech prime minister isn't worried that the conclusions of the summit might be inadequate due to differences of opinion. "There's a very strong will within the EU to continue cooperation. There's a plethora of issues that we agree on. We speak about security, the fight against terrorism and putting a stop to illegal migration. We have a shared interest in employment and in modernising the European economy. Europe must stay competitive," he stressed.



"Extremely important in Bratislava today will be the mood and prevailing climate. We need to seek issues that bring us together and not waste time on things that we know we won't overcome. Because what's the alternative? - only protectionism, the building of fences and conflicts between individual states, and nobody wants that," he added.
The reputed henchman for former Knight Oil Tool CEO Mark Knight pleaded guilty Thursday to four felony charges in what prosecutors have called the staged 2014 drug arrest of Knight's brother as the siblings were in mediation over the family business.

Russell Manuel, a former Knight Oil Tool employee, will not spend any time in jail, according to the deal he made with the 15th District Attorney's Office in Lafayette Parish.

Manuel, 49, is expected to testify if there is a trial for Mark Knight, former Louisiana State Trooper Corey Jackson and former Lafayette Parish Sheriff's Deputy Jason Kinch. The next scheduled hearing for the three defendants is Feb. 16. No trial date has been scheduled yet.

Knight, Jackson and Kinch each face two felony racketeering charges in the June 2014 drug arrest of Bryan Knight.

The defendants are accused of taking part in a scheme with Manuel to plant cocaine, methadone and Hydrocodone in a magnetic box attached to the undercarriage of Bryan Knight's Cadillac Escalade, and using a GPS devise to track the younger brother of Mark Knight.

In court Thursday, Manuel didn't elaborate on his actions, answering with a simple "yes sir" when Judge David Smith asked him if he was guilty of the crimes.

+3 Man arrested for role in Knight Oil brother-versus-brother frame job A former Knight Oil Tools employee jailed Friday was Mark Knights henchman, a loyal soldi

Manuel pleaded guilty to conspiring to commit corrupting influence; conspiracy to distribute cocaine, methadone and hydrocodone; and intimidating a witness.

Following the plea agreement, Judge Smith suspended the decades of prison time that Manuel was potentially facing. As a result of his plea, Manuel will spend five years on supervised probation.

"I think Russell is extremely happy that the DA's office was able to extend this plea (deal) to him," Manuel's attorney, Patrick Magee, said following the hearing.

Manuel, Mark Knight and the two former lawmen were arrested in April 2015 following a Sheriff's Office investigation that unraveled the alleged plot to frame Bryan Knight.

Mark Knight "ordered" Manuel to try to catch Bryan Knight in possession of illegal drugs, according to a court document filed Thursday.

According to the factual basis for the guilty plea, Manuel got a member of Knight Oil's information technology staff to purchase GPS tracking devises and magnetized water-proof containers. He later told the employee to set up an account to track the device that was later planted on Bryan Knight's vehicle.

Manuel admitted Thursday to planting the device and drugs on the Escalade, and to enlisting lawmen Jackson and Kinch in the scheme.

Manuel received a year's salary from Mark Knight andKnch and Jackson also received cash. The exact cash amounts were not disclosed Thursday.

After he was arrested and fired from the company, Manuel confronted the IT employee at a traffic light at Pinhook and Verot School Road, dropping a note through the employee's window that threatened the man's wife and child, according to a police report.

The incident resulted in the most serious charge against Manuel, intimidating a witness, which could have resulted in a prison sentence of 40 years in prison at hard labor. On Thursday, Manuel was sentenced 10 years at hard labor for the crime. But that sentence, like the others, was suspended.

Mark Knight's father, Eddy Knight, started the company 44 years ago. It remains privately held, and its financial statements are not made public.

After his arrest, Mark Knight relinquished his positions as CEO and chairman of the board.
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The north Baton Rouge emergency room that residents and politicians made their rallying cry in the spring has finally been packaged into a deal between state government and Our Lady of the Lake.

Commissioner of Administration Jay Dardenne and Our Lady of the Lake announced Friday that the hospital system signed a formal agreement with the state to add an emergency room to their extensive LSU Health North Urgent Care facility on Airline Highway, a few blocks from the old LSU Earl K. Long Medical Center. The state expects to give the hospital system $5.5 million to build and staff the expansion, which will have to meet certain physical and staffing standards to qualify as an accredited emergency room, Dardenne said.

Political leaders and residents in north Baton Rouge have pushed for an ER for months. Gov. John Bel Edwards eventually joined the chorus of voices who said they wanted to see an emergency room in north Baton Rouge, and Our Lady of the Lake quietly submitted a proposal over the summer showing how they could add emergency physicians and expand lab services at the location.

"For the past year we have been studying the needs and available access to services and now with the support of the State, the addition of an ER to the North Baton Rouge location will provide even greater access and complement the already successful urgent care center on Airline Highway," Our Lady of the Lake CEO Scott Wester said in a statement. "Housing an emergency department in the same location as an urgent care clinic could also reduce follow-up visits to the ER. Our top priority is preserving the good health of families in our community.

He also said the emergency room would be an extension of Our Lady of the Lake's main campus. The urgent care facility will remain on Airline as well, making it home to both urgent and emergent care.

The urgent care facility on Airline Highway already sees more than 100 patients a day, Our Lady of the Lake reported. They said the combination of urgent care and the emergency room in one place will allow for education about when to seek one type of care versus the other.

State Sen. Regina Barrow, D-Baton Rouge, and State Rep. Ted James, D-Baton Rouge, both celebrated the announcement of the project. Barrow said the emergency room "can't get done fast enough," and James called it "a step in the right direction."

"People are going to be more encouraged that their voice is being heard, and this is one of the things that people had been really asking for and had been inquiring about," Barrow said.

North Baton Rouge has lacked an emergency room since Baton Rouge General closed its ER in Mid City a year-and-a-half ago, which provided the bulk of emergency health care in the area after the state shut down the LSU Earl K. Long Medical Center in 2013. After Earl K. Long closed, Our Lady of the Lady essentially became the public hospital in Baton Rouge, providing care for uninsured patients through a contract with the state.

Baton Rouge General and other hospitals said operating in north Baton Rouge without a government subsidy was nearly impossible because so many patients lacked insurance and hospitals were forced to swallow tens of millions of dollars in medical bills.

The deal for Our Lady of the Lake to be the provider of an emergency room in north Baton Rouge seemed unlikely this past spring despite the hospital holding the state hospital contract. As residents decried their lack of emergency health care services in the area, Our Lady of the Lake administrators said a stand-alone emergency room in the area was not the right answer.

Wester told The Advocate's editorial board in the spring that it was a myth north Baton Rouge needed an emergency room. Our Lady of the Lake's Vice President of Mission Coletta Barrett said in late June to the Rotary Club of Baton Rouge that the northern part of the city might be better served by more primary care services.

Louisiana Emergency Response Network officials also repeatedly emphasized the difference between a trauma center and an emergency room.

LERN pointed out that people who had been shot, those who were in grisly car wrecks, and people who were having heart attacks and strokes would be diverted to the closest trauma center, which is located at Our Lady of the Lake's main campus on Essen Lane. And they said that even if a victim of those traumas was closer to a stand-alone emergency room, only a specialized center would likely have the capabilities to take care of them.

Barrow said the past statements from Our Lady of the Lake officials have led some to question the organization's commitment to north Baton Rouge.

"It is something they are going to have to win over with people that they are committed to the project," she said. "It may seem like they were more pressured into doing it as opposed to them just being willing to do it."

Metro Councilwoman Chauna Banks-Daniel, who created the #NBRNOW Blue Ribbon Commission to study how to bring health care and economic development to north Baton Rouge, expressed more pointed disappointment, slamming the governor and Our Lady of the Lake for the plan.

The #NBRNOW Blue Ribbon Commission advocated to both the local and state governments to open an emergency room at Champion Medical Center in Howell Place off Harding Boulevard. Champion is run by a for-profit company based in Texas, and the hospital currently focuses on specialty surgeries.

+4 Inside look at company's pitch for ER in north Baton Rouge medical center Leaders of a health care company told a group of local politicians and activists on Thursday

Banks-Daniel continued to back the Champion proposal on Friday, saying Our Lady of the Lake was the wrong choice.

"The governor has no understanding or interest as it relates to north Baton Rouge, he felt this was a way to shut up the request of the people and the negative press," Banks-Daniel said, adding that Edwards "obviously has zero respect or interest for" the people in north Baton Rouge.

The governor's spokesman Richard Carbo fired back.

"Gov. Edwards' sole commitment to the people of north Baton Rouge was to work with the legislative delegation to get an emergency room opened to serve the needs of the people," Carbo said. "The councilwoman is both misinformed and out of line in her accusations. The governor stood by his promise and has delivered for the residents of north Baton Rouge.

Executives from Champion's owner company, Next Health LLC, said they could build out the existing facilities at Howell Place and have an emergency room there up and running by 2017. But the price tag was $7 million over the next two years to build the facility and subsidize the health care business there, and an additional expected $3.8 million a year in operating subsidies.

Champion also would have needed to gain approval from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to accept their reimbursements. And the emergency room there would have required a transfer agreement with one of the full-service hospitals in Baton Rouge.

Hospital leaders respond to push for transfer agreements with potential emergency room in north Baton Rouge Our Lady of the Lake, Baton Rouge General Medical Center and Ochsner Health System responded

Carbo said Champion's inability to accept Medicaid and the need for a transfer agreement made their plan problematic.

James took the governor's side as well.

"Chauna is more concerned with Champion than she is with providing access to care," James said. "The governor has stayed focused on the issues and not the personalities driving the conversation. This is a win for all of our constituents, she should focus on that."

The governor said in June that he was not ready to commit to a specific plan for a north Baton Rouge emergency room, with both the Champion plan and Our Lady of the Lake draft on the table.

The next month, Department of Health Secretary Rebekah Gee said her marching orders were to ensure there was an emergency room in north Baton Rouge. Gee said then that the Department of Health was "in active discussions" with Our Lady of the Lake about an emergency room, but had not received a commitment yet.

Dardenne said more information about the plan should become available next week.

Advocate staff writer Mark Ballard contributed to this report.
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Attorneys for two Baton Rouge men jailed in the April slaying of two Southern University students argued Friday their clients' constitutional rights are being trampled by being held for more than four months without a judicial determination of probable cause on murder allegations.

A so-called preliminary examination hearing was scheduled to take place Friday to have prosecutors show whether there is probable cause to hold the men in jail, but at the request of the East Baton Rouge Parish District Attorney's Office and over the strenuous objections of Ernest Felton's and Brandon Henderson's lawyers, state District Judge Beau Higginbotham delayed the hearing until next Friday to give a grand jury time to complete its work in the case.

An East Baton Rouge Parish grand jury met Wednesday and worked until about 7 p.m. before retiring without hearing from all of the witnesses who had been subpoenaed. The panel will resume, and is expected to conclude its work, next week.

"I anticipate the presentation of evidence will be concluded next Wednesday and a decision made as to all defendants," District Attorney Hillar Moore III said Friday.

Felton, who turns 23 on Saturday, and Henderson, 25, each have been booked on two counts of second-degree murder in the April 10 shooting deaths of Annette January and Lashuntae Benton, both 19, outside The Cottages apartment complex on Ben Hur Road.

They are being held on half-million-dollar bonds.

Police have said Henderson admitted firing the first shots, into the air, in a drive-by shooting, but they claim the bullets fired in return by Felton killed January and Benton -- two innocent bystanders -- and wounded Henderson.

Former prosecutor Brent Stockstill, one of Felton's attorneys, argued Friday to Higginbotham that his client is being held in jail "on a mere allegation," and he said there was no legal reason to delay the preliminary exam.

Henderson's attorney, Neal Wilkinson, told the judge his client would be "exonerated" on the murder charges if such an evidentiary hearing is held.

Prosecutor Chris Hester argued that a preliminary exam could impact the future grand jury proceeding and asked for a one-week hearing delay, which Higginbotham granted.

"I understand your frustration," the judge told the defense lawyers. "I thought long and hard about this decision."

Henderson told police his brother, Anthony Dewayne Henderson, had been involved in a fistfight with a group of people sometime before 2:17 a.m. that day outside the apartment complex. Brandon Henderson drove to the complex to meet up with his brother, later driving up to a crowd with his brother inside the car, according to a police report.

After the initial round of gunfire, Brandon Henderson drove around a curve and into a dead end in the parking lot. Felton walked toward the dead end and waited for Henderson to return, the report states. Brandon Henderson turned around and drove out of the parking lot in an effort to flee, but Felton, in a second blast of gunfire, shot at Henderson's car and struck January and Benton, the report says.

Stockstill proclaimed Felton's innocence after Friday's heated court proceeding.

"I'm angry that an innocent man is sitting in jail," he said outside Higginbotham's courtroom. "We look forward to proving his innocence. He's not responsible for a second-degree murder."

Wilkinson said he is aware that police allege his client precipitated the events that April morning.

"My client wasn't involved in this" double-murder, he insisted. At worst, Wilkinson said, the grand jury could charge Brandon Henderson with illegal use of a weapon or perhaps aggravated assault.

Felton is being held in East Baton Rouge Parish Prison. Brandon Henderson is in jail in Catahoula Parish.

Anthony Henderson, 22, who is wanted for questioning in the double-slaying, was arrested in Houston on Sept. 7 and is being extradited to Baton Rouge on unrelated drug charges.
A Baton Rouge lawyer and former state liquor lobbyist on Thursday characterized as a "crude joke" his decision to forward unsolicited videos of boys engaging in sex acts with donkeys to friends, family and clients in 2013 and 2015.

Christopher Young, the brother of former Jefferson Parish President John Young, testified in Baton Rouge federal court that he didn't consider the videos to be child pornography because he didn't think the persons in the videos were minors.

And, at one point during the hearing, U.S. District Judge John deGravelles said a key issue is whether Young's case was "singled out" for prosecution, given the defense claim of pressure by the FBI to have him aid in the investigation of public officials.

The 53-year-old Young's testimony came during a daylong hearing on his motion to dismiss the federal charges on the basis of what he calls "selective and vindictive" prosecution. The hearing will resume Oct. 5.

FBI agent Stephen Soli, who took part in the August 2015 seizure of Christopher Young's cellphone outside Galatoire's in Baton Rouge, testified he doesn't consider Young to be a child pornographer in the traditional sense of the term, but he said what Young did was nevertheless a violation of federal law.

Young, who was indicted by a federal grand jury in May on one count each of possession of child pornography and distribution of child pornography, testified he consented to the FBI search of his phone once agents confiscated it.

Brother of former Jefferson Parish president indicted on child porn charges The brother of a former Jefferson Parish president has been indicted on two counts of posses

"I thought I was very cooperative because I had nothing to hide," he said while being questioned by Assistant U.S. Attorney Cam Le.

Young testified that FBI agent Maurice Hattier Jr. told him in August 2015 that the child porn material on Young's phone would not be made public if Young, a Beer Industry League of Louisiana lobbyist at the time, cooperated with federal authorities in public corruption investigations.

"I said, 'I don't know anything about public corruption,'" Young said under questioning by one of his attorneys, Billy Gibbens.

Hattier later delivered a target letter to Young in the parking lot of Mr. Gatti's Pizza in Baton Rouge in October. The letter said Young was being investigated for child pornography and obscenity.

"We can make this go away if you cooperate with us," Young recalled Hattier telling him.

Hattier, while being questioned Thursday by Gibbens, denied making such a statement.

"I'm absolutely sure about that," the agent said.

Young said Hattier raised the possibility of Young wearing a recording device and mentioned the name of Troy Hebert, who was commissioner of the state Alcohol and Tobacco Control office at the time. Hattier noted that Young and Hebert were friends and had traveled together.

"Certainly you know something about him," Young remembered Hattier telling him in regard to Hebert, who is now a U.S. Senate candidate.

Hattier acknowledged Thursday he did bring up Hebert's name "as an example." The agent testified Young's name had come up in a now-closed public corruption investigation involving the ATC. There were allegations that Hebert's office gave favorable treatment to Young's clients.

Hebert said recently he is proud of his service as ATC commissioner in that he aggressively cleaned up the agency and industry by rooting out fraud, tax evasion, drug sales and prostitution at some of the establishments he regulated.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Rene Salomon pointed to the case of former Baton Rouge lawyer William Steven Mannear, who was sentenced to 10 years in prison in March 2015 after pleading guilty to receiving child porn via the internet over a three-year period. He permanently resigned from the practice of law in mid-2014.

Young faces up to five years in prison if convicted.
Columbus Day is no longer a holiday, Christmas vacation will begin a day later than planned and four half days are now full days, under a new post-flooding schedule approved Thursday by the East Baton Rouge Parish School Board.

Also, starting on Sept. 26, the school day will be 11 minutes longer for the the rest of the 2016-17 school year  five minutes earlier in the morning, and six minutes later in the afternoon.

The parish school system, the second largest in Louisiana, is one of several flood-affected school districts adding more instructional minutes to the school day. State law requires that schools be in session for at least 63,720 minutes a year, a law that only the Legislature or the governor can waive. East Baton Rouge Parish schools closed Aug. 12 when the flooding first hit and stayed closed for 16 school days.

The school system, however, is applying to the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education to waive the number of hours high school students have to spend in class to earn course credit known as Carnegie Units. Those seat time requirements are per semester, meaning high schools would have to had to add even more time to their days in the first semester.

Here are the new start and end times that will take effect Sept. 26:

 Elementary schools start at 8:20 a.m. and end at 3:31 p.m.

 Middle and high schools start at 7:05 a.m. and end at 2:31 a.m.

Despite the added 11 minutes, bus schedules are expected to remain unchanged, said Adonica Duggan, spokeswoman for the school system. Parents who drive their kids to school, though, will have to adjust their pickup and dropoff times. Duggan said schools are set to announce the new times and calendar on Friday.

Superintendent Warren Drake said school leaders and principals had long, impassioned discussions before settling on the new calendar and school schedule approved unanimously Thursday.

We beat up each other for a long time, Drake said.

Although the new start and end times take effect Sept. 26, the first impact will hit next Wednesday. Originally to be a half day, that day is now a full work day. Same with Dec. 16, 18 and 20. In addition to converting Oct. 10, Columbus Day, into a work day, Dec. 21, which was supposed to be the start of Christmas break, is now the last day of the first semester.

No days off or half days in the second semester have been changed from what is in the old calendar.

Also on Thursday, a couple of School Board members questioned the recent awarding of a $1.2 million FEMA consultant contract to CSRS/Tillage Construction. The partnership will spearhead the school systems effort to get maximum reimbursement from the federal agency for flood damage to schools, which at last count topped $50 million but is likely to be much greater.

We already have a contract with CSRS, said board member Dawn Collins. Im concerned with the appearance of not having a competitive process.

Since the late 1990s, CSRS, partnering with a variety of other construction firms, has overseen most school construction in the district. Through the years, a minority of board members have pressed unsuccessfully to hire someone else to handle school construction work.

Domoine Rutledge, general counsel for the school system, said CSRS/Tillage was judged the best applicant among seven other competitors. A review committee gave CSRS/Tillages proposal a score of 95 out of 100, using a six-part criteria. The two other firms scored lower: Landmark Construction of Milton, Fla., 86 points, with a $1.5 million price; and Hunt Guillot Associates LLC (HGA) of Ruston, 82 points, with a $1.25 million price.
Numbers in the polls may differ, but the one thing on which all the surveys agree is that, barring some miracle during the final six weeks of 
Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards will take part in a meeting with President Barack Obama on Friday as the White House attempts to build support for a contentious trade pact that Obama's trying to pass before leaving office.

Edwards, a Democrat, has already come out strongly in favor of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which is the largest regional trade deal in history. Ohio Gov. John Kasich, a Republican and former presidential contender, also is slated to take part in the meeting.

The TPP, as it's commonly known, is opposed by Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and her Republican rival Donald Trump, and it's chances of passing this year have remained slim as a majority of Democrats in Congress oppose it, as do many Republicans.

U.S. official promotes Pacific trade pact in Louisiana In front of a receptive crowd of local officials and business leaders, an Obama administrati

Critics of the proposal say it could send American jobs overseas and that it may be harmful to the environment, among other issues.

But Edwards has argued that the free trade deal would be good for Louisiana business.

"We have built a thriving international commerce and trade economy and have one of the largest port complexes in the world," Edwards said in a statement earlier this year announcing his support for the president's plan. "The TPP will directly impact Louisiana businesses and open the pathway for improved commerce and trade between the United States and our Pacific Rim partners."

The trade pact would slash tariffs and eliminate other trade barriers among the 12 Pacific Rim countries involved.

Louisiana is one of the country's top 10 exporting states.

According to the U.S. International Trade Administration, $17.5 billion in Louisiana products were exported to TPP countries in 2014 -- more than a quarter of the state's exported goods.

Edwards has argued that the TPP also would be good for the Port of New Orleans, which would be expected to capture more trade traffic from countries covered in the agreement.
State Treasurer John Kennedy said he wont back off asking about allegations that his opponent in the U.S. Senate race was allegedly involved with prostitutes.

And if its all lies, as Congressman Charles Boustany contends, then he should sue the publisher of the book, Scribner / Simon & Schuster Inc., Kennedy said moments after chairing a State Bond Commission meeting Thursday morning.

It was the first time Kennedy personally addressed Boustanys contention that he had deliberately spread the alleged reports of the allegations made in the book. Boustany said Wednesday the claims in the book that he frequented Jennings prostitutes are scurrilous lies.

Congressman Charles Boustany blames John Kennedy for spreading prostitute-involved claims U.S. Rep. Charles Boustany on Wednesday blamed State Treasurer John N. Kennedy  one of his 

Regardless, Kennedy said, the accusations go to Boustanys character and in a campaign for the U.S. Senate such questions are reasonable. Hes saying I cant talk about the issue that goes directly to his character? Of course I can talk about the issue, everybody is talking about this issue, he said.

The most prestigious publisher in the world has alleged that he was serviced by not one, not two, not three but four prostitutes and has cheated on his wife. He says its a lie. I didnt write that. Simon and Schuster did. He needs to sue them if its not true, Kennedy said.

Boustany said Wednesday and reiterated Thursday that hes keeping his legal options open. "The allegations made about me by tabloid writer Ethan Brown and spread by the Kennedy campaign are wholly and completely false, he said.

+2 Wife's defense of US Senate candidate spark objections from opponents Charges by the angry wife of Republican U.S. Rep. Charles Boustany defending him against pro

Published earlier this week by Scribner / Simon & Schuster Inc., Murder in the Bayou is about the unsolved murders of eight prostitutes from 2005 to 2009 in the Jefferson Davis Parish town of Jennings.

Brown stands behind his reporting. He wrote that he spoke to a sex worker in Jennings who claims that Boustany was a well-regarded client of at least three of the Jeff Davis 8 victims and another prostitute.

Brown didnt name his source  out of her concern for her safety  and The Advocate, as well as other media outlets have been unable to corroborate any of the published details concerning the congressman.

The publisher is completely irresponsible, Boustany said. This is just complete tabloid nonsense. Theres no basis in truth or reality  Youd think there would be more integrity and responsibility and accountability here.

The publisher of the book, in a statement Thursday, stood behind the author.

While we do not comment on our editorial process, Scribner is confident that Ethan Browns Murder in the Bayou is a responsibly reported account by an experienced journalist. Brian Belfiglio, vice president and director of publicity at Scribner / Simon & Schuster Inc., wrote in an email Thursday.
State auditors couldnt tell if the state Department of Justice properly spent $24.7 million last year because of inadequate documentation.
Last fall, John Bel Edwards was pretty busy, facing a campaign that resulted in a big win for him as governor.

On the same two ballots, though, Louisiana voters elected a state school board that is markedly independent. The board majority has refused to fire Education Superintendent John White, with whom Edwards frequently clashed during the latter's time in the Legislature.

Over his first months in office, Edwards and White have worked cordially enough, if not perhaps warmly; with tough budget issues, both wanted to sustain support for public education. The governor has not always backed his supporters on some issues, apparently looking at each piece of legislation on its merits.

But Edwards is nothing if not determined, and the teacher unions and school board members that backed him are apparently seeking a confrontation with White and the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education.

We hope that common sense de-escalates this fight.

As required in a new federal law, the Department of Education headed by White is seeking input and ideas about how to implement the U.S. Every Student Succeeds Act, or ESSA. It replaces the NCLB, or No Child Left Behind Act.

But the public commentary is going to be supplemented by a new panel, appointed by the governor, that includes many representatives of his backers from unions and traditional school systems. The latter are often hostile to public charter schools and other innovations pushed by White's supporters on BESE.

The governor's panel may recommend changes in how public schools' letter grades are formulated and call for changes to other accountability measures.

The voice of the Old Guard, Scott Richard of the School Boards Assocation, puts it this way: The new advisory council could "really look at the various initiatives that we have bounced around with in Louisiana and determine if they are truly working."

We think they are, although the harsh reality is that it is an uphill battle to achieve gains in public education, given Louisiana's legacy of poverty and underachievement. Many of today's students are children of parents who struggled in school, too.

Nevertheless, it's a battle that is fundamental to economic and social growth in this state. The views of the governor's ESSA council ought to get a hearing from the state department and BESE. Everybody has an interest in success, including Edwards and White, and we are open to new ideas.

What the new panel ought not be is a kangaroo court on education reform.

As Edwards is more aware of than most, having given a vain campaign pledge to fire White  only BESE can do so, not the governor  it is not gubernatorial fiat but persuasion and compromise that are likely to be productive in education policy.

The mainstream view, we think, is reflected in the general conclusions of nine hearings statewide, and other meetings with civil rights advocates and other groups: better align public schools with the workforce needs as well as college expectations; improve assistance for struggling students; upgrade teacher training.

All are major issues that could involve heavy lifting. Success will depend on cooperation rather than renewing the education reform battles of the past decade.
The U.S. Senate gave new life Thursday to the 30-year-old Comite River Diversion Project, which would have kept some of the flood waters from entering homes and businesses last month.

On a vote of 95-3  with both Louisiana senators voting yes  the Senate passed the Water Resources Development Act of 2016, which deals with water quality and habitats, but also includes authorization for more than $10 billion in infrastructure developments in 18 states. It includes projects for drinking water in Flint, Michigan, and restoration to parts of the Florida Everglades.

U.S. Sen. David Vitter, R-La., was able to slip in the legislation the 12-mile project that would divert water from the Comite River across north Baton Rouge into the Mississippi River.

No money was included in the bill, but Gov. John Bel Edwards, who is in Washington lobbying for federal flood relief dollars, and the Louisiana congressional delegation are attempting to include the necessary money in a resolution Congress currently is working on to continue funding the federal government through December.

The water bill now goes to the U.S. House.

After last months deadly, historical flooding in south Louisiana, its more important than ever for us to be proactive in updating our water infrastructure so that Louisiana families and communities are better protected, Vitter said in a prepared statement.

If passed by the House and signed into law by President Barack Obama, the legislation would give the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which oversees the water projects, and local officials the ability to bypass red tape, Vitter said.

An estimated 160,000 structures were damaged in 20 parishes, more than 200,000 households have applied for disaster assistance, and 13 people were killed when heavy storms dropped about 2 feet of rain on the Baton Rouge area over a three-day period.

If we dont strike now, it may never happen, said state Sen. Bodi White, in whose district most of the diversion project lies. The Central Republican has been working on finding dollars to complete the project since he worked the 1983 flood  one of the worst floods in Louisiana, until August  as a sheriffs deputy.

The diversion project was approved in the early 1990s, but has been delayed for years. Complete funding has never been found, leaving the work to be done in dribs and drabs. White says $150 million to $200 million, maybe a little more, would be needed to complete the project.

The state already has its match from a local property tax. If the money had been made available on the federal level, White said, the work could have been completed in about 2 years.

It wouldnt have solved all the flooding from last month, but it would have prevented a lot of it, said White, who is running for mayor-president of East Baton Rouge Parish.

The money would be needed to build five bridges across the east-west canal and deal with several intersecting north-south bayous as well as dredging the canal and handling environmental issues of crossing wetlands.

One of the most expensive portions of the project  a let down station that lowers the water to the level of the Mississippi  is the only one of five phases that are being worked. Another expensive part of the project is deepening a canal at U.S. 61, then building a bridge for travelers on the highway and railroad over the gap.

Basically, the idea is that when the narrow Comite River reaches flood stage, water would be diverted to a deep channel at a structure about a mile southeast from where La. 64 intersects Plank Road. The water then would flow west, away from the Amite River.

The Comite intersects the Amite near Denham Springs and empties into Lake Maurepas farther south.

In arguing for the project, U.S. Rep. Garret Graves, R-Baton Rouge, noted much of the flooding in the neighborhoods along the Amite in East Baton Rouge, Livingston and Ascension parishes came about because of the massive wall of water dumped into the Amite.

As we rebuild from the Louisiana floods, funding to prepare for future storms and to lower the risk for future flooding is important to every Louisiana family, U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., said in a prepared statement.

The legislation also authorizes $718.1 million for hurricane and storm-damage risk reduction along the east bank of the Mississippi River in St. Charles, St. John the Baptist and St. James parishes; more than $3 billion for hurricane storm surge damage reduction and ecosystem restoration; and to conduct studies to determine the feasibility of allowing access channels along the Mississippi River Ship Channel and carrying out flood control projects in St. Tammany parish.
A New Orleans activist group is threatening to pull down the city's most recognizable statue in response to what members claim are unreasonable delays in removing four other monuments honoring Confederate leaders and a 19th century white supremacist militia.

Take 'Em Down NOLA says it will attempt to topple the statue of Andrew Jackson during a protest later this month in Jackson Square. Legal delays have kept the other statues -- honoring Confederate President Jefferson Davis, Confederate generals Robert E. Lee and P.G.T. Beauregard, and a militia known as the White League -- standing nine months after the City Council authorized their removal.

"We're going to go to Jackson Square. We're going to put ropes around Andrew Jackson and we're going to take him down off his pedestal," Take 'Em Down organizer and longtime civil rights activist Malcolm Suber said during a forum the group held Thursday.

The demonstration, scheduled for Sept. 24, will come a few days before judges on the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals are scheduled to hear arguments over whether to lift an order that halted the removal of the monuments.

"The key is we're not going to wait," Take 'Em Down organizer Angela Kinlaw said. "The city has taken plenty of time to make a decision. But the people are ready to move."

It's not clear how serious or successful any attempt to remove the Andrew Jackson statue would be.

Asked whether protesters would actually try to wrestle the statue to the ground, Kinlaw said it was largely a symbolic effort, but that "anything can happen during a demonstration."

Suber said after the meeting that the effort would succeed "if we've got enough people and we've got enough rope."

Hayne Rainey, spokesman for Mayor Mitch Landrieu, said in an email, "We understand that there are strong emotions surrounding this subject and we ask that any public demonstrations remain peaceful and respectful as they have since we began this process. As a reminder, vandalism of any public property is strictly prohibited."

The equestrian Jackson statue is one of numerous monuments, streets and buildings that Take 'Em Down organizers believe promotes the idea of white supremacy by honoring slave owners and others who contributed to the oppression of minorities.

Although Jackson was the hero of the Battle of New Orleans in 1815, he not only owned slaves but, as president, was responsible for the removal of Native American groups living in the Southeast.

The City Council has not seriously considered pushing for the removal of the Jackson statue.

"Why would we want to continue to honor this person?" asked Suber, who said removing a statue so associated with New Orleans would send a wider message and serve as a "shot heard 'round the world."

Landrieu called for the removal of the Confederate monuments last summer after a young man who espoused white supremacist views killed nine parishioners at an African-American church in Charleston, S.C. The City Council agreed in December, voting 6-1 to authorize the statues' removal from city property.

However, several groups quickly filed suit to block the plan, and the case has been tied up in the courts ever since.

A panel of 5th Circuit judges is expected to hear arguments Sept. 28 on whether to extend a court order that would keep the monuments in place while the suit challenging their removal goes to a full trial.

Plans to take down the monuments weren't helped after the original contractor hired to remove them dropped out after its owner said he received death threats. Interest from other companies was lukewarm when the city later asked for public bids.

Take 'Em Down organizers blamed the delay on both the courts  the 5th Circuit is considered one of the most conservative federal appeals courts in the nation  and a lack of aggressive action by the city. They said the city should have denounced or ignored the court order.

"I'm saying we should defy that order. That order should have no standing with us at all," Suber said. "We have no respect for the 5th Circuit because they're all (expletive) racists anyway."

Take 'Em Down is also planning a protest at next week's City Council meeting and is encouraging supporters to attend the court hearing on Sept. 28.

While the City Council and Landrieu have made few public comments in recent months about the case, it's not clear there's much more it could be doing while the suit is being reviewed by the courts.

"We remain committed to taking down these monuments," Rainey said. "At this time, we respect the courts order to not remove them while the matter is pending. We understand the publics frustration with this process and ask for continued patience as we move forward."

Citing the city's success in previous phases of the case, and in a similar one filed in state court, Rainey said "we are confident the court will continue to rule in our favor."

Rainey did not comment on whether the city would be making any plans for increased security around the Jackson statue during the protest.

Its attorneys have repeatedly argued that the city should have the right to do what it wishes with public statues on city land, and they have made specific arguments about why each of the Confederate monuments should come down.

+5 Federal agencies won't seek to block removal of New Orleans' Liberty Place monument Two federal agencies have said they have no reason to try to keep a monument to an 1874 whit

In addition, the city has used the case as a way to seek federal permission to remove the White League monument, which commemorates the Battle of Liberty Place  fought in New Orleans in 1874  and which is protected by a federal court order dating back to a previous attempt by city officials to remove it.

The stone obelisk, which now sits behind the Canal Place parking garage on Iberville Street near the river, commemorates an attempt to overthrow the state's biracial Reconstruction-era government by a group of mostly former Confederate soldiers seeking to restore all-white "home rule." Dozens of people, including black and white police officers fighting against the militia, were killed.

But Suber and others said those actions by the city were not enough.

"If the city doesn't fulfill this promise, if the administration won't fulfill this promise, if the councilmen won't fulfill their promise, it's imperative that we act on behalf of the good citizens of this city," Suber said.
Labor would give every public high school and college student in the ACT a tablet device if re-elected, a pledge that would cost government $17.2 million over four years.

The election sweetener is to be formally announced by Labor at its official campaign launch at the National Portrait Gallery on Saturday, which is expected to be boosted by the presence of federal Deputy Opposition Leader Tanya Plibersek.

Belconnen High year 7 student, Reece Bowman, with ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr and MLA Yvette Berry. Credit:Rohan Thomson

The conference may face some small disruption, with greyhound trainers and club members planning to protest against the ACT government's intention to end the industry.
The Liberals would spend $6 million upgrading neglected local shops around Canberra, and want private landowners to contribute money to prevent centres deteriorating.

Deputy Opposition Leader Alistair Coe made the announcement on Friday at Kaleen shops in Canberra's north.

Canberra Liberals deputy leader Alistair Coe said $6 million would be spent on local shops. Credit:Jay Cronan

He said the Liberals would spend the money on shops in "older suburbs", focussing on improving pavement, lighting, parking, and landscaping.

Mr Coe said the neglect of local shops was hurting local business owners as well as "suburban amenity and pride".
The Liberals have vowed to reverse the government's "City to the Lake" strategy, strip the Land Development Agency of much of its power, and prevent shipping containers from sitting idly in the front yards of Canberra properties.

The opposition released its planning policy on Saturday, a collection of 29 commitments across a broad range of areas.

Opposition transport spokesman Alistair Coe wants to reverse the City to the Lake strategy and focus on the city centre. Credit:Jay Cronan

The commitments, a number of which have already been made, include comprehensively reviewing the territory plan, scrapping the lease variation charge in town centres and the city centre, boosting the role of the government architect, and ensuring "meaningful consultation" before planning legislation is introduced.

There are also measures to prevent dodgy building practices, including the creation of a searchable register of builders' past projects, the delivery of training programs for members of bodies corporate, and a requirement that planning officials visit completed buildings before issuing certificates of occupancy.
The ACT's emergency services agency has denied union allegations that it is planning to close fire stations overnight.

The concept of making some Canberra fire stations part-time was first raised last year, during a string of reviews underpinning a major structural overhaul of the Emergency Services Agency.

Greg McConville said having stations only open for 12-hours per day would put lives at risk. Credit:Melissa Adams

One confidential review from a UK-based consultancy suggested ACT Fire and Rescue could potentially close the stations during low demand periods.

The government ruled out that plan in July.
Guards at the ACT's jail have voted overwhelmingly against a needle exchange at the Alexander Maconochie Centre, a move described as "bitterly disappointing" by Justice Minister Shane Rattenbury and public health advocates.

The vote leaves the government's plans for a prison needle and syringe program in serious jeopardy, and means a key element of the Labor-Greens 2012 parliamentary agreement has not been achieved.

Justice Minister Shane Rattenbury described the result as "bitterly disappointing" but said he would continue to fight for a needle exchange if re-elected. Credit:Rohan Thomson

The guards voted down the needle exchange 151 to four, following more than a year of consultation and negotiations.

The needle exchange was designed to prevent inmates from sharing and using dirty needles behind bars in an effort to curb the spread of hepatitis and other blood-borne diseases.
When the big four banks are called to Parliament to face their first public hearings on October 4, 5 and 6 it is worth remembering that financial misconduct isn't unique to Australia.

It's a global problem, the cost of which has recently been pegged at more than $400 billion for the top 20 banks globally.

It is one reason why the argument that a royal commission would hurt Australia's banks internationally is lame.

The most recent international scandal erupted a few days ago in the US, where it was revealed that staff at Wells Fargo  driven by pressure to cross-sell products  created 2 million customer accounts without authorisation. More than 5000 staff have since been fired.
The majority report recommends keeping Tony Abbott's Direct Action policy (which would helpfully provide political cover for the PM) but 'enhances' it. Instead of Labor's big bang emissions trading policy that scared the electorate, it puts forward a suite of sensible measures. They include a benign-looking emissions trading scheme in the electricity sector and a hybrid-ETS in other energy sectors, although in disguised form. And the words ''emissions trading scheme" have been banished. The pundits could detect the genius of the majority report's approach. It keeps enough of existing policy to prevent the backbench sceptics flaring up but it also overlaps sufficiently with the Labor Party's platform that the Opposition will go along with it and so vote for it in the Senate. After the non-threatening toolkit has been pushed through parliament the PM would be able to ramp up the level of ambition of Australia's emission cuts, and the momentum would (somehow) drown out his critics. Hey Presto! We have the holy grail of a bipartisan climate policy that will make a difference.

But how credible is this story, the one that gives the pundits confidence that the majority report offers a real chance of a breakthrough? It asks us to believe a lot. Firstly, it assumes that Malcolm Turnbull's sceptical backbench is too dopey to realise that the strategy is a bait and switch. (The same goes for his Coalition partners) Mike Seccombe thinks they are, describing the majority report as "clever" because it hides what needs to be done. Second, does Malcolm Turnbull really want to do something about climate change? Since he became leader (possible only after signing a commitment to the National Party never to introduce an emissions trading scheme), the evidence is hardly encouraging. After all, he wants to abolish the Australian Renewable Energy Authority, and he did nothing when the CSIRO gutted its climate science capability. Third, if he is serious, is the PM willing to spend his political capital pushing his climate change agenda through the Coalition party rooms? Perhaps more to the point after his election set-back, does he have any political capital to spend? Many commentators say "no" and the ill-disguised challenges to his authority in recent weeks seem to confirm it. Fourth, will the Labor Party decide that it's in its interests to go along with the secret plan and give it bipartisan support? The signs are not positive. Labor's climate change spokesperson Mark Butler praised our minority report (Its suite of recommendations, including the targets we propose, are similar to Labor's platform).

Worse for the strategy, Environment Minister Josh Frydenberg's reception of the majority report was somewhere between cold and dismissive. He's new to the job, so perhaps the cunning plan has not yet been explained to him. After all, if he were in on it, wouldn't he have welcomed the report and said the government would give it serious consideration? The pragmatic pundits have invested their hopes in this delicate series of hypotheticals, viz., sceptical backbenchers are too dopey to realise what's going on, Turnbull is still the old Malcolm, he has a lot of political capital, he will spend it on climate change, and Labor will go along with it all. It seems to me that in their desire to see Australia have a serious climate policy the pundits are victims of wishful thinking. Their desire is noble, but maybe they need a bucket of cold political reality tipped over them. I might note here that when at times I have expressed doubts about whether this elaborate chain of hypotheticals would hold together, I have been assured, with nudges and winks, that others had inside information that made them confident it would all unfold according to plan. It was on the basis of this particular reading of the political tea-leaves that David Karoly and I were expected to put our names to recommendations that soft-pedalled on the science. I had reached the view that the realists' story was in fact a fantasy, and it seemed to me that by signing I would be downplaying the science (and the authority's own earlier work) in exchange for a big slice of pie in the sky.

Now the pundits are saying that by putting forward an alternative set of recommendations based on the science we are being "purists" or, in Richard Denniss' phrase, more interested in protest than progress. All because we no longer believed in their hypothetical house of cards. In a strong sense, however, the question of which political story you believe is a side issue. The pundits are entitled to advocate policies based on their judgments about what may or may not get the numbers in the current parliament. But as members of a Commonwealth statutory authority, with a legislated obligation to provide independent advice based on the best scientific and economic evidence, we are not. David Karoly and I take this obligation seriously, and have done so since we were appointed over four years ago. In its first three years, the authority built a fine reputation for its independence, with a series of excellent reports signed off by all members, often after sharp differences of opinion had been resolved through a consensus process overseen by Bernie Fraser. In the legislation establishing the authority, its independence is underlined. In the second reading speech at the time of the authority's formation in 2012 the Minister told Parliament: The authority will be independent from government  This means that climate change policy will be directed by evidence and facts, rather than fear and political opportunism. It will take the politics out of the debate.
In Samuel Beckett's one-act play, Krapp's Last Tape, a "wearish" old man spends "a late evening in the future" replaying and commenting on his life, spooling through recordings he made in youth and middle-age.

Irish artist Gerard Byrne isn't that old yet, but at 49, he's reached the retrospective stage of his career, and he's found the inspiration to confront this milestone in Beckett. His exhibition at the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (ACCA), A Late Evening in the Future, is a conversation between his video works, seemingly moderated by a tape player with a mind of its own.

A still from Gerard Byrne's 'Jielemeguvvie guvvie sjisjneli (Film inside an Image)'.

Byrne's breakthrough work, Why It's Time for Imperial, Again, established a method that has proved fruitful ever since. Using actors, he re-imagined a conversation between Frank Sinatra and Chrysler executive Lee Iacocca. The text, puffing the company's new car, was culled from an old advertorial in the pages of National Geographic. Relocating it from the glossy pages to run-down post-industrial New Jersey brought out the pathos and absurdity of the conversation.

Imperial was one of the last pieces that Byrne made in New York in the late 1990s, before his visa ran out and he was obliged to return home to Dublin. He spent six years in the city, studying at Parson's School of Design, completing fellowships at PS1 and the Whitney Museum and riding around at night on his bicycle, photographing empty, lit interiors, and getting into rows with security guards.
The state government has agreed to provide personnel to a planning team for the Brisbane Metro rapid transit system, but has insisted the council-led project remained unfeasible.

Earlier this month, Lord Mayor Graham Quirk said he was keen to have the state government involved in the planning of the $1.54 billion project.

Cr Quirk has welcomed state government involvement in helping to build the business case for the Brisbane Metro project.

On Friday that wish was granted  but there was a sting in the tail.

In a letter obtained by Fairfax Media, Department of Premier and Cabinet director-general David Stewart said the government would provide two public servants to the council's government reference group.
Facebook has been accused of "enabling vicious Jewish hatred" after telling users an image depicting human remains on a shovel below the tag line "How to pick up Jewish chicks" did not breach its standards.

Just days after back flipping on its decision to censor an iconic Vietnam War photo of a naked girl escaping a napalm bombing, the social media giant is again under fire over its handling of posts reported as offensive.

In reply to complaints about the shovel image - which was widely shared, "liked" 21,000 times, and received more than 37,000 comments - Facebook said: "We reviewed the post you reported for displaying hate speech and found it doesn't violate our community standards."

Under its community standards policy, Facebook says it "removes hate speech" that attacks people based on their race, ethnicity, national origin and religious affiliation.

"We allow humour, satire or social commentary related to these topics, and we believe that when people use their authentic identity, they are more responsible when they share this kind of commentary," the policy says.
Daniel Porter wrote his first business plan as a 14-year-old to set up a small stud cattle operation with his parents' financial backing.

A year or so later he responded to his first medical emergency, as part of a crew-of-three St John Ambulance first aid volunteers dispatched to a suspected cardiac arrest at an AFL footy match at the MCG.

Daniel Porter, 19, getting Bert ''prettied up'' for the Royal Melbourne Show. Credit:Simon Schluter

Agriculture and health might seem like divergent fields, but Mr Porter, now 19, seems to be blending them seamlessly - and has done so for years.

Next month he will travel to America to study hair science and cattle fitting, in Omaha. But before heading overseas he has some cattle commitments much closer to home.
The husband of missing Parmelia woman Iveta Mitchell faced Mandurah Magistrates Court on Friday.

Chad Jeffery Mitchell appeared in relation to a string of charges including possession of methylamphetamine, possession of stolen property and possession of weapons.

Chad Mitchell faced a Mandurah court on Friday.

He has been engaging in a pre-sentence opportunity program in relation to some of the charges, but pleaded guilty on Friday to possession of a controlled weapon.

This charge related to Mitchell being found with an imitation firearm in Mandurah on March 11.
London: On an August weekday evening in Newham, east London, the 67-year-old man in beige chinos and open-necked blue shirt looks out over the glasses balanced on the end of his nose to his adoring audience.

Appearing more like an awkward university lecturer than a celebrity, he steps down from the stage into a mob of fans seeking selfies and handshakes. "And they say he's unelectable," one woman exclaims, gesturing at the eager crowd.

It's another moment in the world of Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of Britain's opposition Labour Party. His support is so fervent, it's preventing attempts by his colleagues in parliament to get rid of him.

Polls show Labour under Corbyn has little or no chance of returning to power in Britain, and yet the 116-year-old party's grassroots members overwhelmingly look set to stick with him in a leadership election for the second time in a year.
Hong Kong: China's legislature has expelled 45 of its members in a vote-buying scandal that has snared a prominent businessman active in donating to US universities, foundations and political campaigns.

Some of the legislators whose dismissals were announced on Tuesday, all from the economically struggling north-eastern province of Liaoning, had bribed their way into the National People's Congress by buying votes, according to the state-run news agency Xinhua.

Delegates at National People's Congress (NPC) at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. Forty-five members have been expelled after allegations of vote-buying. Credit:QILAI SHEN

The nearly 3000 members of the congress, which meets as a full body for less than two weeks each March, ratify laws and government programs, usually with little drama. Members are mostly voted in by lower-ranking organisations, including provincial congresses.

The businessman, Wang Wenliang, is a billionaire who made his fortune in the construction business and from operating a strategic port on the North Korean border. Wang has also been linked with entities holding hidden stakes in three condominiums in the Time Warner Center in New York.
Washington DC: Donald Trump has refused again to acknowledge that President Barack Obama was born in the United States, reviving the so-called birther issue that the Republican presidential nominee has played down since announcing his campaign last year.

Mr Trump said he planned to address Mr Obama's citizenship today (US time), after on Thursday refusing in a newspaper interview to say whether he believed Mr Obama was born in the United States.

"I'm going to have a big announcement," Mr Trump said in an interview with Fox Business Network. He said he would likely make the announcement during a speech at a new hotel his company is opening in Washington.

The resurfacing of Mr Trump's doubts about Mr Obama's birthplace  in an interview with The Washington Post  comes less than two months before the US general election and as he has been working more aggressively to court minority voters.
Does Historical Coincidence Unravel Obama's Legitimacy?

By Marc J. Rauch

Exec. VP/Co-Publisher

THE AUTO CHANNEL

I have this nasty habit of researching things that I take an interest in; Ive been that way forever. I think I learned more from researching topics on my own than I did from formal schooling. I read a book, see a movie, hear an abbreviated news report, and bang Im at the family encyclopedia, at the library, nowadays online.

Well, there I was, in my kitchen slurping up some hot delicious soup and reading the tail end of a "new" Sam Spade novel written under license by a Dashiell Hammett biographer, Joe Gores. The story includes a fictional Chinese woman who claims to be the daughter of Sun Yat-sen, the real-life "father" of nationalist China. The overall Spade story takes place in San Francisco in the period between the end of WWI and the start of the Depression  its meant as a prequel to the Sam Spade Maltese Falcon novel.

Im a bit rusty on my Sun Yat-sen legacy, so to brush up on his background and chronology of events I googled Sun Yat-sen. At the top of the Wikipedia page, and again in a section titled Early Years, Suns birth date and then birth place is listed as November 12, 1866 in Guangdong province (16 miles north of Macau), in the Empire of the Great Qing of China.

Sun Yat-sens history goes on to relate how after receiving a few years of local school, at age thirteen, Sun went to live with his elder brother, Sun Mei, in Honolulu. Sun Mei, who was fifteen years Sun Yat-sen's senior, had emigrated to the Hawaiian Islands as a laborer and had become a prosperous merchant. According to the listed birth date the year that Sun went to Hawaii was 1879.

Everything jives with the new Spade novel; Joe Gores did his homework.

A bit more reading about Sun reveals that he eventually graduated from a small Hawaiian college and then returned to his native land, China. Its at this point that Sun Yat-sens history took on a dramatic story twist, a twist that has absolutely nothing to do with Sam Spade, but it may be the key to solving a mystery story of its own - a story that has been simmering at the top of our national news ever since Barak Hussein Obamas name began being bandied about as a presidential candidate.

It seems that around the turn of the century  the old one  1900 or 1901, Sun Yat-sen returned to Hawaii. It was at this time in his life that Sun was involved in politics and trying to free China from its dictatorial monarchy. In 1904, Sun obtained a Certificate of Hawaiian Birth, issued by the Territory of Hawaii, stating he was born on November 24, 1870 in Kula, Maui. (See the Wikipedia entry at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_Yat_Sen#cite_note-17)

The discrepancy of birthdates didnt startle me, but the significance of the documents meaning did.

It has been said that Barak Obama, current president of the United States of America was not born in Hawaii or anywhere in America, as claimed by him and his supporters; thereby invalidating him to run for and hold the office of the President of the United States. For some peculiar reason, while a candidate for president must produce income tax records, he or she is not required to produce a genuine birth certificate.

Obama himself doesnt respond to the issue, which could be answered by simply providing a legally acceptable copy of a genuine birth certificate. Instead, what has been circulated is something that is called a "Certificate of Live Birth" from the State of Hawaii. It sort of sounds the same, but even the State of Hawaii doesnt say that a Certificate of Live Birth is just the name for the document that is otherwise known as a Birth Certificate. There is a distinctive difference. (Sun Yat-sens Certificate of Hawaiian birth can be found online at

http://www.scribd.com/doc/9830547/Sun-Yatsen-Certification-of-Live-Birth-in-Hawaii )

Some argue that proof of Obamas Hawaiian birth can be found in the birth announcements of local Hawaiian newspapers. But, birth, death, and marriage announcements can be phoned in or submitted by mail. In todays identity-theft, security-conscious world it may require some institutional or quasi-governmental documentation to get one of these announcements published, but at the (alleged) time of Obamas birth America and Hawaii was a very different place. Newborns were not immediately assigned social-security numbers and I have the feeling that finger and sole prints were not regularly being taken.

So there are three, no four, conclusions that I draw from this research:

1) It's a complete and utter coincidence that Hawaii issued Certificates of Live Birth to these two politicians.

2) Every one hundred years or so Hawaii issues a fake birth document to someone that they would like to call a native son.

3) Sun Yat-sen is really a native-born Hawaiian of Chinese ancestry, who returned to his ancestors' homeland to fight for its freedom  something that all American-born Chinese can proudly salute.

4) Obama was not born in the U.S. and because of the circumstances regarding his mother's status he is not qualified to be president.

Other resources corroborate Sun's birth date and place as 1866 in China.

See http://www.notablebiographies.com/St-Tr/Sun-Yat-Sen.html for example.

There's one other strange but apparently true coincidence to this entire affair. Joe Gores, writer of the Sam Spade prequel, Spade & Archer, who had worked in his life as a private investigator, a repo-man, a truck driver, a logger, motel assistant manager, and of course journalist, also worked as an English teacher in Kenya, Africa, perhaps around the time of Barak Obama's birth. You know, Kenya, the country where Barak Obamas father was born and is a citizen of. (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Gores)
SANTA MONICA, Calif., Sept. 14, 2016; The new revelation of a second fatal Tesla crash while the vehicle was likely on autopilot shows the company cannot be trusted to deal with deadly failures in its vehicles and underscores the need for enforceable federal safety standards covering autonomous vehicle technology, Consumer Watchdog said today.

China's CCTV reported Wednesday that Gao Yaning, 23, died in January after crashing into the back of a road sweeping truck near Handan, 300 miles south of Beijing. CCTV said the Tesla Model S was on autopilot.

"Tesla's Failure to report the death of another of its human guinea pigs in a timely manner is unconscionable," said John M. Simpson, Consumer Watchdog's Privacy Project director. "It also makes it clear that autonomous vehicle technologies must be subject to safety regulations that are enforceable by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration."

View CCTV's coverage of the crash, including video taken from the Tesla, here: http://video.sina.com.cn/view/250748967.html

What was widely believed to be the first fatal Tesla crash in Florida killed Joshua Brown, 40, in May. It was not revealed until late June.

"Tesla's vehicles are connected and data is transmitted to the company. There is no way that Tesla was unaware of the China crash. Keeping it secret since January smacks of a cover-up," said Simpson.

Consumer Watchdog noted that NHTSA is expected to release autonomous vehicle policy "guidance" any day.

"Guidance is meaningless and will be ignored by companies when it suits them," said Simpson. "This second fatal crash and the following cover-up demonstrates the need for real enforceable standards. NHTSA needs to start a rulemaking covering autonomous vehicle technologies."

Visit our website at www.consumerwatchdog.org

To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/second-fatal-tesla-crash-shows-firm-cant-be-trusted-need-for-mandatory-safety-standards-says-consumer-watchdog-300328414.html

SOURCE Consumer Watchdog

CONTACT: John M. Simpson: 310-392-7041; 310-292-1902

RELATED LINKShttp://www.consumerwatchdog.org
KNOW MORE: Audi Q7 2017-2007, Specs, Prices, Safety, Recalls, Reviews

HERNDON, Va.The 2017 Audi Q7 earns a spot among Wards 10 Best User Experiences with editors noting that the Q7 makes for a first-rate, intuitive user experience in the luxury SUV segment.

As manufacturers increasingly strive to create vehicle systems designed to minimize distraction and frustration, the Q7 received high marks for its virtual cockpit, excellent sound system and the intelligence of the adaptive cruise control.

We are honored to be recognized by WardsAuto on their inaugural list of vehicles with exceptional user experiences, said Scott Keogh, President Audi of America. The Q7 embodies Audis position as an industry leader in the development of connected car applications and driver assistance systems that are redefining how customers interact with our vehicles.

WardsAuto editors evaluated vehicles based on the overall effectiveness of the user experience, how easily the car connects with a compatible smartphone, user-friendliness of the controls, the availability of the advanced driver assistance technology, and how appealing the materials are as a component of the user experience.

The innovative Audi virtual cockpit transforms the way the driver interacts with the Q7 through an entirely digital dashboard that renders 3D graphics with brilliant clarity. A quad-core NVIDIA Tegra 3 processor that can deliver vibrant color at 60 frames per second helps to enhance the infotainment viewing and navigating experience via the large Google Map images supported with 4G LTE (where available). Newly available Audi smartphone interface offers Apple CarPlay and Google Android Auto integration for compatible smartphones.

In addition to infotainment and connectivity features, the advanced Q7 driver assistance systems are designed to help drivers navigate the road and traffic with confidence. Standard Audi pre sense basic and city can prepare the vehicle for impact in the case of an impending collision. Available Audi pre sense rear helps monitor the traffic following the vehicle and takes similar actions to Audi pre sense basic while Audi side assist provides blind spot monitoring via LED indicators on the exterior mirror housing.

One of our judging criteria recognizes a user experience that delivers ?surprise and delight to the driver, and the Audi Q7 does that many times over, said WardsAuto Senior Editor, Tom Murphy. From the high-resolution, brightly colored graphics in the Audi virtual cockpit to the simple phone pairing and the available driver assistance systems, the Q7 makes for a first-rate, intuitive user experience.

The Q7 competed among a field of 29 nominees for the accolade, which complements the annual Wards 10 Best Interiors award. Audi will formally receive the award during a ceremony held at the WardsAuto User Experience Conference, taking place October 4, 2016 in Novi, Michigan.

ABOUT AUDI

Audi of America, Inc. and its U.S. dealers offer a full line of German-engineered luxury vehicles. AUDI AG is among the most successful luxury automotive brands globally. The Audi Group delivered over 1,800,000 vehicles to customers globally in 2015, and broke all-time company sales records for the 6th straight year in the U.S. Through 2019, AUDI AG plans to invest about 24 billion euros - 70 percent of the investment will flow into the development of new models and technologies. Visit www.audiusa.com or www.audiusa.com/newsroom for more information regarding Audi vehicles and business topics.
Auto Lab LIVE From NYC - Saturday 7-9 AM (EDT) Auto Focused Radio Call-in Show







The Auto Lab Radio Show is Broadcast Saturday's 7 to 9 AM On New York City's WNYM Radio AM 970 and Streamed Worldwide On The Auto Channel

Broadcast Date: September 17, 2016

Car Question or Concern? Call Toll Free 888-692-7234

Auto Lab is a 28 year old interactive automotive-focused New York area radio call-in show hosted by Professor Harold Wolchok. Each week a cadre of experienced hands-on automotive experts are in-studio with advice for the New York area's 12 million people, providing listeners with honest, practical and street-smart car repair and buying advice.

Auto Lab is also about the automotive industry, its history, and its culture, presenting the ideas and advice of leading college faculty, authors, and automotive practitioners in a relaxed, conversational interactive format.

Listeners can hear the past 18 years of archived Auto Lab shows as simulcast on www.theautochannel.com.

Listen - Auto Lab Page (Includes Audio-on-Demand Archives, Auto Programs at Community College Database, Guests Pictures

Auto Answers - Maintenance, How To's, Safety, Used and New Car Buying, Ombudsmen Suggestions. From These Auto Lab In-Studio Experts

Broadcast Date: September 17, 2016

Harold Bendell- Major Auto

Ivan Anderson-Brookdale Community College

Fred Bordoff-Bronx Community College, CUNY

Tim Cacace-Master Mechanix

David Goldsmith - Urban Classics Auto Repairs

Michael Porcelli - Central Avenue Auto Repairs & I-CAR

Joanne Porcelli, Esq

Nicholas Prague- MTA and Rockland Community College, SUNY

Jordan Weine-Bay Diagnostics

Auto Lab Correspondents Report Auto Safety News, New Car Reviews, Technology and Latest Auto World Information That May effect You!

Broadcast Date: September 17, 2016











Sharon Sudol & John Russell Senior Correspondents

FIAT 500 1957

Russ Rader, Vice President Insurance Institute for Highway Safety

LINCOLN MKZ EARNS GOOD SMALL OVERLAP RATING, TOP SAFETY PICK+

Holly Reich, Automotive Journalist

2017 VOLVO S90
2016 Toyota Highlander Review by Steve Purdy +VIDEO

2016 TOYOTA HIGHLANDER

Review by Steve Purdy

The Auto Channel

Michigan Bureau

For those who continue to complain that all vehicles look alike these days I say, thats not always the case. Just look at cars like the Nissan Murano, Lexus NX and many Mercedes Benz cars. On the other hand they are quite right when talking about the mainstream, three-row crossovers like the Dodge Durango, Nissan Pathfinder, the Korean entries and this Toyota Highlander.

Dont get me wrong, the Highlander is a fine crossover - competent, comfortable and nicely designed, but it does not stand out much aesthetically from the equally competent crowd. Theyre all pretty good looking but they mostly look alike.

The front-wheel drive, all-wheel drive optional, uni-body Highlander weighs in at around 5,800 pounds and will accommodate either 7 or 8 passengers depending on the second row seating configuration you choose. It comes in four trim levels  LE, LE Plus, XLE and Limited. The LE with four-cylinder engine starts at just $30,490. Our well-equipped XLE All-Wheel Drive starts at $39,275. (See Links To Complete Specs For All Highlander Trim Models Below Review)

A Highlander Hybrid (27/28 mpg) is also available and only comes with high-end content starting at $47,870.

Distinguishing one of these crossovers from another is primarily the grille and front fascia. The Highlander shares the newer Toyota styling language that uses a massive, gaping grille with big emblem in the center. The Highlanders modest sculpting and sharply protruding, high-mounted taillights give it just a whisp more personality than some of the others.

Highlanders interior, as we would expect from such a utilitarian vehicle, has lots of handy, thoughtful features led by a horizontal shelf lining the lower dash from the drivers instrument cluster all the way to the passengers door. Intermittent ridges keep things from sliding across. Eight cup holders, four bottle holders, extra large, roll-top console, well-placed controls, a good sized multi-function screen and attractive design make this a convenient place to spend time. Ergonomics, including placement of USB and auxiliary ports are good.

On the downside, Im not fond of the navigation system including the map. The voice activation function couldnt understand me after repeated attempts with increasingly crisp elocution  and I host a radio show, so I think Im pretty good. It immediately responded to my pretty wifes voice though. Whats up with that? I also found the map harder to read than most and struggled to manage the half-screen/full-screen modes. Like all these systems, if we live with them for a while we get proficient but I found this one a challenge.

Seating at all positions are good, even in the way back. We dont expect full size people to be comfortable back there but if theyre not too big they will be. And, access is good with second row seats that fold well out of the way. With the captains seats for the second row like our tester, we have plenty of room between the seats to slide into the rear as well.

Cargo capacity is not much different than the others with 83.7 cubic-feet and a flat surface with second and third row seatbacks folded, 42.3 cubic-feet with just the third row folded and 13.8 cubic feet with all seatbacks in position. Some continue to call this kind of vehicle a sport-utility. I would hesitate to call it sporty, but we can certainly consider it utilitarian.

Our test cars 3.5-liter V-6 makes a good 270 horsepower and 248 pound-feet of torque and is mated to a well-calibrated six-speed automatic transmission. We have plenty of power. The EPA estimates well get around 18 mpg in the city and 24 on the highway on regular fuel (one click better on each end without AWD) and our experience was well within that range. The 4-cylinder is good for only 1,500 pounds of towing and while we have not driven one we could expect tepid performance.

With the V-6 engine you also automatically get the towing package that will allow for 5,000 pounds of capacity. If you need to tow more than that youll need to go with a truck-based vehicle like Sequoia or Tahoe. The 4-cylinder Highlander is good for only 1,500 pounds of towing.

The Toyota new vehicle warranty covers the whole car for 3 years or 36,000 miles and the powertrain for 5 years or 60,000 miles.

The traditional Toyota quality partly accounts for the CUVs good residual value and cost of ownership is claimed to be best-in-class.

As alluded to earlier in this narrative, we put many highway miles on our Highlander this week. We found its driving dynamics and road manners excellent and its cabin a most pleasant place to spend time. Road noise could not find its way inside and we found nothing in its ergonomics about which we could complain. The Toyota designers have always been skilled at providing handy and convenient features and this CUV is no exception.

So, if you need something this big you have plenty of choices in our rich marketplace. Just be sure the Highlander is on your shopping list.

Steve Purdy, Shunpiker Productions, All Rights Reserved
Hospital offers safe option to dispose of meds, narcotics Los Robles Health System is working to crush the opioid drug crisis by raising awareness about the dangers of opioid misuse and the importance of safe and proper disposal of unused or expired medications. Crush the Crisis will take place...

Alzheimers Foundation to host free conference The Alzheimers Foundation of America will host a free virtual educational conference from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Tues., Nov. 15. The event is part of the foundations 2022 national Educating America Tour. The conference, which is free and open...

Authorities warn about rainbow fentanyl Victims often arent aware theyre taking it

The Ventura County Office of Education and state health officials have issued a warning to schools and families about rainbow fentanyl, a form of the potentially fatal synthetic opioid that comes in bright colors. Rainbow fentanyl can be found in...

Cancer support community to host remembrance event Cancer Support Community Valley/Ventura/Santa Barbara invites family members and friends of those who have died from cancer to attend the second annual Evening of Remembrance from 5:30 to 7 p.m. Thurs., Nov. 3 at Cancer Support Communitys Garden of Hope,...
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 16/09/2016 (2235 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Winnipeg man headed out of Steinbach court on Thursday with a conditional discharge for assaulting a Ste Anne police officer, escaping a jail sentence not uncommon with such charges.

Eh Me Moon was a passenger in a vehicle stopped by an officer in Ste Anne on the night of March 12. The court heard that Moon, who was intoxicated, exited the vehicle and proceeded to shove the officer. The situation escalated as he resisted the officers efforts to restrain him. Once in handcuffs, Moon continued his aggressive behavior, reaching for the sergeants duty belt and attempting to trip the police officer, who was ultimately uninjured in the incident.

The Crown and defence submitted jointly to Judge Ken Champagne that a conditional discharge was appropriate. The incident was said to be out of character for the 28-year-old who has since written an apology to the officer and completed an addictions assessment. The fact the officer escaped injury was also a mitigating factor.

Moon, whose first language is the Burmese language of Karen, was assisted by a translator in court. The court heard that Moon was born in Burma and was later a refugee, eventually coming to Canada in 2006. The language barrier was also cited as an complicating factor in the March incident.

Police have a very difficult job to do. Police officers have a duty to protect and serve all people in the community. Often simple matters become serious matters because people dont obey police. Thats what happened in this incident, said Champagne.

Often people go to jail if they assault a police officer. It is unusual for a court or judge to agree to such a low sentence but because of your personal background and steps you have taken already, I will agree to it.

Moon was handed a one year conditional discharge which includes a requirement for him to complete 200 hours of community service.
OPKO Health, Inc., a healthcare company, engages in the diagnostics and pharmaceuticals businesses in the United States, Ireland, Chile, Spain, Israel, Mexico, and internationally. The company's Diagnostics segment operates BioReference Laboratories that offers laboratory testing services for the detection, diagnosis, evaluation, monitoring, and treatment of diseases, including esoteric testing, molecular diagnostics, anatomical pathology, genetics, women's health, and correctional healthcare to physician offices, clinics, hospitals, employers and governmental units; and a novel diagnostic instrument system to provide blood test results in the point-of-care setting, as well as 4Kscore prostate cancer testing services. Its Pharmaceutical segment offers Rayaldee to treat secondary hyperparathyroidism in adults with stage 3 or 4 chronic kidney disease, and vitamin D insufficiency; OPK88004, an orally administered selective androgen receptor modulator; OPK88003, a once-weekly administered peptide for the treatment of type 2 diabetes and associated obesity that is in Phase IIb trials; and hGH-CTP, a once-weekly human growth hormone injection that completed Phase III clinical trial in partnership with Pfizer, Inc. This segment develops and commercializes longer-acting proprietary versions of already approved therapeutic proteins. The company also offers specialty APIs; develops, manufactures, markets, and sells pharmaceutical, nutraceutical, veterinary, and ophthalmic products; commercializes food supplements and over the counter products; manufactures and sells products primarily in the generics market; and imports, markets, distributes, and sells pharmaceutical products in a range of indications, including cardiovascular products, vaccines, antibiotics, gastro-intestinal products, hormones, and others. In addition, it operates pharmaceutical platforms in Ireland, Chile, Spain, and Mexico. The company was founded in 1991 and is headquartered in Miami, Florida.
Theres extremely stiff competition for the title of Worst Trump Surrogate. Youve got Trump official campaign spokeswoman Katrina Pierson, who blamed Obama for the Afghanistan war.

And theres Pastor Mark Burns, who tweeted a picture of Hillary Clinton in blackface and said Bernie Sanders doesnt believe in God and needs Jesus.

Theres also Trumps attorney, Michael Cohen, who once said spousal rape isnt a thing.

And who can forget Trump veterans coalition co-chair Al Baldasaro, who said Hillary Clinton should be executed for treason?

But as luck would have it, Trumps worst surrogate is in his very own family.

Trumps eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., has distinguished himself with his rare gift for consistently embarrassing the campaign.

On Sept. 14, he told the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review that his dad wouldnt release his tax returns because they would raise too many questionsinstead of sticking to the (latest) explanation that the mogul is under audit and will release them once that process concludes.

When he spoke at the RNC, his speech generated allegations of plagiarism since some phrases sounded like they were lifted from an article that ran in the American Conservative magazine.

This week, a Trump aide yanked him out of an interview with a Pennsylvania TV station when the interviewer started asking him about the Trump Foundation.

And last month, he inadvertently criticized some of his dads top advocates, saying the Trump defenders who appear on CNNpeople like former Reagan White House official Jeffrey Lord and conservative author Scottie Nell Hugheshave no real political knowledge.

And then theres the penchant for interacting with the alt-right.

Whether its retweeting white supremacists, doing radio hits with white supremacists, or joking about gas chambers, DJT Jr. has proven remarkably adept at generating campaign crises.

The latest: comparing reporters to Nazis. Really.

The media has been her number one surrogate in this. Without the media, this wouldnt even be a contest, but the media has built her up, he told the Philadelphia radio station WPHT on Wednesday. Theyve let her slide on every indiscrepancy, on every lie, on every DNC game trying to get Bernie Sanders out of this thing. If Republicans were doing that, theyd be warming up the gas chamber right now.

Trump later told NBC that he was referring to gas chambers used in the U.S., not the ones used by Nazis.

To his credit, at least Trump Jr. seems to think gas chambers are bad. Hes made a habit of retweeting and associating with members of the racist alt-right, an internet movement that is fond of using Nazi imagery and making Holocaust jokes. One alt-right site, for instance, has a feature called The Daily Shoah. And at a recent press conference in D.C., alt-right figure Richard Spencer defended gas the kikes jokes.

More than any other figure in Trumps orbit, Don Jr. has repeatedly associated himself with the alt-right. Last week, he tweeted out a meme that first appeared on a white supremacist site and depicted the alt-rights green frog mascot. The meme also showed him standing next to famed 9/11 truther Alex Jones. Hillary Clinton used the tweet to hit Trump, and her website put up a page saying the frog is more sinister than you might realize.

He also has a habit of retweeting white supremacists, maybe because he follows a bunch of them on Twitter.

For instance, two weeks ago he retweeted Kevin MacDonald, a professor beloved by Holocaust deniers who has written papers theorizing about Jewish media manipulation. MacDonalds white nationalist political party, the American Freedom Party, posted a story about the retweet on its website along with a fundraising ask. In other words, white supremacists are literally fundraising off of Donald Trump Jr.s twitter feed.

MacDonald isnt the only white supremacist who Trumps son has boosted. He also sent out a tweet from science fiction author Theodore Beale, who, as the New Republic noted, once said being gay is a birth defect and who has said that being a Jew makes you not an American, by definition.

Don Jr.s alt-right flirtations arent limited to Twitter. In March, he did a radio interview with white supremacist radio host James Edwards, as the Huffington Post reported. On the show, Edwards told Trump Jr. he hoped his father would become Americas Charlemagne. And, as The Washington Post noted, Don Jr. didnt take issue with that. Edwards said he also had no trouble getting press credentials for a Trump rally. In the past, Edwards has said slavery was good and interracial sex is bad. Don Jr. says he wasnt aware of this at the time.

It shouldnt come as a huge surprise that Don Jr. isnt the universes best communicator. Hes spent his life saying weird things. For instance, when he toasted his mom at her wedding in 2008 (she remarried after divorcing from Donald Trump), he said she had great boobs.

In a 2012 radio interview, he said he supported gay rights because having fewer straight men around would make it easier for him to get laid.

I think there was a time in my life, probably in college, that I wished every guy was gay, because it just meant more women for me! he said, according to the Huffington Post. I dont know why you guys have a problem with this thing! I think itd be great! I wish everyone was gay!

When he decided to stop chasing the women the gay men left for him, he chose the mall as the venue to ask his then-girlfriend, Vanessa, to marry him for a specific reason.

According to Gawker, he proposed to her in the New Jersey mall in front of a jewelry store so he could get the ring for free.

His Twitter feed is a trove of bizarre missives.

He once speculated as to whether the protagonist of the film War Horse had sexual relations with the aforementioned horse.

He also had some good takes on Snookis pregnancynamely, that it shouldnt have happened:

Now, the inability to stay on message could be to the fact hes a businessman with a lack of experience in politics (sound familiar?).

But, instead of letting his gaffes and associations deter him from the profession, he appears to believe that hes doing a really good job.

In a July interview on CNN, Trump Jr. declined to rule out a run for mayor in 2017.

As my father has always said, I want to we always like to keep our options open, he said on State of the Union.

So if I can do that as a service to our country Id love to do it, he said.
The Night Of star Riz Ahmed has penned a powerful Guardian piece on his experiences with racial profiling.

The actor, who was born into a British Pakistani Muslim family living in London, explains how his ethnicity has been typecast and recoded, as he moved from the London youth scene to Oxfords prestigious Christ Church to mainstream Hollywood success. But like most Muslims living in a post-9/11 world, Ahmed faced intensified scrutiny not just in these disparate worlds, but at the borders between them. His essay focuses on airport security and the numerous times, pre- and post-stardom, that hes been typecast as a terrorist. He begins by recalling the first time he was helplessly cornered in a windowless room at Luton airport: My arm was in a painful wrist-lock and my collar pinned to the wall by British intelligence officers.

After acting in his first film, The Road to Guantanamo, about a group of friends who were illegally detained and tortured, Ahmed was manhandled on his own British soil. Upon his return from the Berlin film festival, British intelligence officers frogmarched me to an unmarked room where they insulted, threatened, and then attacked me. What kinda film you making? Did you become an actor to further the Muslim struggle? an officer screamed, twisting my arm to the point of snapping. Instead of suing, Ahmed chose to speak to the press, in the hopes of shedding light on this new post-9/11 reality. Unfortunately, Ahmeds increased visibility hardly exempted him from overenthusiastic policing: It didnt help that The Road to Guantanamo had left my passport stamped with an Axis of Evil world tourshooting in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Iran within six months, he writes.

Ahmed draws a connection between the audition room, a place where Muslim actors are few and far between, and the airport interrogation room, a space theyre all too familiar with. In both rooms, three-dimensional human beings become two-dimensional typesor more accurately, stereotypes. They are places where the threat of rejection is real. They are also places where you are reduced to your marketability or threat-level.

He gives a lengthy description of a flight to the U.S. and how he spent the entire journey in fear of his likely interrogation. The inevitable holding pen was filled with 20 slight variations of my own faceit was a reminder: you are a type, whose face says things before your mouth opens; you are a signifier before you are a person. The audition allegory extends to the holding pen, where nervous travelers compete to graduate out of a reductive purgatory and into some recognition of your unique personhood. Potential solidarity gives way to an attempt to distance yourself from the rest of the pack.

Ahmed quips that when the interrogation came, it was more of a car crash than my Slumdog Millionaire audition. He immediately regrets showing the officer a DVD copy of The Road to Guantanamo, which features a picture of the actor handcuffed in an orange jumpsuit on its cover. Hes questioned on his reading materialMohsin Hamids novel The Reluctant Fundamentalistand asked if he knows anyone who wants to do harm to the United States.

Ahmed writes, A similar version of the same thing happened again soon after. And again. And again. And again. While his numerous airport auditions were all technically a success, they started to wear away at Ahmeds sense of self, as he internalized the role that he had unwittingly been cast to play in a panic-ridden, Islamophobic America. I tried not to ingest all the signs telling me I was a suspect. I tried not to buy into the story world of this protocol or its stage-one stereotype of who I was. Ahmed explains. But try as he might, I couldnt see myself as just a bloke. I failed at every single audition I went up for.

As a non-white actor, Ahmed articulates the struggle of seeking out rich roles in a world and an industry that reduces minority artists to pops of color. This is the story of his attempt to break free of the fetters of diversity casting to the Promised Land, a career milestone where an actor may finally play a character whose story is not intrinsically linked to his race. Ahmed has arguably entered into this artistic utopia with The Night Of, where his portrayal of accused killer Nasir Khan carried the show to a good deal of critical acclaim and drew an impressive number of viewers for an HBO miniseries.

These days, Ahmeds U.S. airport experience is smoother, though he stresses that I still get stopped before boarding a plane at Heathrow every time I fly to the U.S. His random selection flying into L.A. was so reliable that he recalls a six-month stretch of being searched by the same middle-aged Sikh guy every trip: I instinctively started calling him Uncle, as is the custom for Asian elders. He started calling me beta, or son, as he went through my luggage apologetically. It was heart-warming, but veered dangerously close to incest every time he had to frisk my crotch. As his celebrity grows, Ahmed is increasingly lauded by the same staff who surveil him. I have had my films quoted back at me by someone rifling through my underpants, and been asked for selfies by someone swabbing me for explosives. Ahmed closes on a portrait of one of these millennial staff members: The last kid who searched me, a young Muslim boy with an immaculate line-beard and goatee, was particularly apologetic. Sorry bro. If it makes you feel any better, they search me before I fly too.

Ahmeds essay is excerpted from The Good Immigrant, a book of essays about race and immigration in the U.K. It comes on the heels of a string of complaints from Muslim Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan. I fully understand and respect security with the way the world is, but to be detained at U.S. immigration every damn time really really sucks, Khan tweeted in August after being pulled aside at the Los Angeles airport. His tweet echoed sentiments he voiced in 2012, when he spoke about being targeted: Yes, it always happens. Whenever I start feeling arrogant about myself, I always take a trip to America, he joked. The immigration guys kick the star out of stardom.
FRACKVILLE, Pennsylvania  Arthur Johnson has spent the past 37 of his 64 years alive in solitary confinement.

Over a span of four decades, hes been shuttled from one correctional institution to anotheroften without notice, like a protagonist in a Kafka novel. Until very recently, his home of three years was the Restricted Housing Unit at the State Correctional Institution at Frackville, Pennsylvania.

Hes now in restricted housing at neighboring SCI Coal Township, where he is forced to spend 23 hours a day in a 7-by-10-foot cell with a light that never turns off. He suffers from crippling insomnia and is permitted to take just three, 10-minute showers each week.
Its nice to be able to go to the grocery store and buy some strawberries without being surrounded by eight armed guys.

Yes, Bernie Sanders began his Thursday night appearance on Late Night with Seth Meyers in the most Bernie way possible: kvetching. But after some light pleasantries, the Vermont senator got down to brass tacksnamely, that its time for his supporters to rally behind Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton in order to defeat former reality show host Donald Trump. I think what people will understand is that, as we look at the real issues facing the American peopleand that is the decline of the American middle class, income inequality, and climate changeyouve got a guy like Trump who denies the reality of climate change, which the scientists tell us is the major global crisis that we face, said Sanders. So, I think more and more people will catch on to what Mitt Romneyand I dont often quote Mitt Romneybut Romney was right at least once and he called Trump a phony and a fraud, and I agree with that assertion.

Sen. Sanders emerged as a hero for the working class, and Trump, a real estate heir who inherited tens of millions from his rich father, has been sued time and again for stiffing his workers, had magical disappearing bone spurs that allowed him to dodge the Vietnam draft, and lives in a literal Bond villain-esque gold penthouse overlooking Manhattan, rather inexplicably has as well on the strength of accent and bravado.Its pathetic and its laughable, said Sanders. Here is a guy who has exploited people for much of his business career. Here is a guy who claims how concerned he is about American companies going abroad to manufacture productsa very legitimate concernand yet his own clothing manufacturing is done in other countries around the world where the poor workers are being exploited. And then he talks about how hes going to stand up with working people, and he puts his business advisers council together and theyre all these billionaire conservative folks. So I dont think theres any reason for anyone to believe that Trump is going to stand with working people. Hes a billionaire; his proposals call for massive tax breaks for the wealthiest people in this country. This is not a guy who, in my view, is going to stand up for working people.While Sanders confessed to Meyers that hed very much like to be debating Trump right now as the Democratic nominee, he also touched on how the mediaand the publichas placed far too much emphasis on personality over substance.

What media does is focus on Trumps personality, and Clintons personality, and my personality. Whats personality, right? Weve gotta get beyond personality, Sanders said. You dont like Clinton? Fine. Take a hard look at the issues that impact your life! When Hillary Clinton is saying shes going to make public colleges and universities tuition-free for all families earning $125,000 or lessand deals significantly with student debtyou know what? That is a very big deal in this country. Shes going to double the number of community health centers in America so working-class people and low-income people can have access to health care. Thats a big deal. She is going to address climate change, she is going to raise taxes on the rich. So what I would ask those people who voted for me, even if you have concerns about Clintonyou dont like this aspect, I understand thatbut look at the hard issues that impact your life and your neighbors life, and then think whether or not you want Donald Trump to become president. I think if you frame it in that way, I think that people will end up voting for Clinton.

Toward the end of their spirited chat, Sen. Sanders also seemed to echo Hillary Clintons recent alt-right speech castigating Trump for dog-whistling to his many racist supporters.Ive got seven grandchildren and I do not want them growing up under a Trump presidency, Sanders shouted. Its not just the tax breaks for the rich and the denial of the reality of climate change, it is that he has made bigotry the cornerstone of his campaign. This country has struggled since its inception in terms of what we did to the Native Americans, in terms of slavery, in terms of all kinds of discrimination. We have fought so hard to try to become a less discriminatory society. In many respects, we have succeeded, we have come a long way: gay rights, womens rights, we have made real progress. I do not want to see this country recede and go back to where one group is scapegoating another group. That is not where we can go. And Im going to do everything I can to prevent that from happening.
Bill Clinton made 10 separate appearances over the course of a decade on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Thursday night marked his first sit-down with Stewarts successor, Trevor Noah.

Its been a rough week for Hillary Clinton, who took three days off from her presidential campaign to recover from pneumonia . Her absence from the trail meant extra time in the spotlight for her husband, who filled in for the candidate in Las Vegas on Wednesday. And he continued to advocate for her forcefully on The Daily Show.

Clinton began by reporting on his wifes health. He said she looked great when she left home in the morning, looked great during her stump speech in North Carolina, and she just called and said she got home and she still feels good. He added, Big deal, she had pneumonia. People get it all the time. Asked if he was afraid when he saw her nearly faint this past Sunday, Clinton said, Youre always concerned, but I was pretty sure I knew what it was because she had been working hard, she was dehydrated, she had been standing up a long time there.

The former president also addressed some of the criticism of the Clinton Foundation and his Global Initiative, which is meeting this week in New York. Because you cant undertake the type of large-scale health access initiatives that CGI does without government assistance, Clinton said he would keep that side at arms length should his wife become president. I cant be involved at all, it needs to be an independent entity, and it will be, he promised.

After a break, the conversation pivoted to the politics of the presidential campaign. Speaking about the sharp divide between left and right in the U.S. today, Clinton said, We have one remaining bigotry: We dont want to be around anyone who disagrees with us. As the crowd laughed tepidly, he added, They didnt laugh too loudly because they know Im telling the truth.

Noah framed the 2016 election as a battle between more of the same from an insider like Hillary Clinton or an outsider like Donald Trump, someone who doesnt believe in logic or ideas.

Thats factually accurate, Clinton remarked, laughing.

As a former president who came into office as an outsider, Clinton held up experience as paramount. First he explained that he had an advantage in the 1992 race by being simultaneously an outsider to Washington but also Americas longest-serving governor.

Both of these candidates have had a lot of experience, Clinton said. Theyve made a lot of decisions, and those decisions have had consequences. The big difference between the two candidates, he said, is not that one is an insider and the other an outsider.

Most of her strongest supporters are those whove worked for her or have done business with him, Clinton said of his wife. Theyre for her, too. Most of his supporters just want something new and want to close the door on anyone whos not like them, Clinton said. Its those people, he added, that are being played by Trump.

What I think is important is the proven record of making good decisions that make good things happen for other people, Clinton said.

Because he knew they make his guest smile, Noah ended the interview with a balloon drop.
The first time Donald Trump appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon as a presidential candidate was one year ago this week. Still considered a long shot for the GOP nomination, Trump sat across from his impersonator and pretended to talk to himself in the mirror, parodying his comical lack of campaign specifics.

The second time, four months to the day later, the votes were yet to be cast in the first caucuses and primaries, but Trump was already at the top of the polls. There were no more comedy sketches, no more bits, just a lightweight mock job interview segment in which Fallon asked his guest questions like Do you have a weakness? (He never forgets and is too nice, for the record.)

On Thursday night, Trump was a guest on the show for a third time, and with less than eight weeks until Election Day, the stakes were way higher. So what did Fallon do? He mussed Trumps hair.

Even Fallons monologue lines about Trump were soft, joking about the audience having the check their baskets of deplorables and suggesting the candidate could drop the 15 pounds he wants to drop by visiting his barber.

When the interview got under way, Fallon began by noting that this whole presidential campaign thing is getting real and asking Trump, Do you still want to do this?

Were doing well, Trump replied. Its been really a lot of fun and its an amazing movement all over the country. Its been incredible, so, no, its been an honor for me, I have to say. The unusually subdued candidate went on to say that being president is the best way to help people, and thats what hes in it for. Fallons asked about the challenges of running for president and how Trumps business background helps him campaign. Later, he inquired about Trumps favorite Monopoly property.

The host also gave Trump a chance to go after one of his favorite targets: the media. I think the press has become more and more vicious, the candidate said when asked how things have changed over the course of the campaign. But at the same time, Trump said theres even more love out there from his supporters. He claimed to be leading in Colorado, though most averages have him trailing in that state by several points.

Trump said he loves the polls but also admitted, I dont pay attention if Im losing or lagging, I never mention it. Believe me, only when Im winning.

Fallon demonstrated his impression of the candidate to Trump and even thanked him for saying so many shocking things and providing him and other late-night hosts with material. Im trying not to anymore, Trump said, but Fallon did call him out for at least one of his more recent outrageous statements about Vladimir Putin.

If he says great things about me, Im going to say great things about him, Trump told Matt Lauer of Putin last week at NBC News Commander-in-Chief Forum.

But he was striking a different tone with Fallon. Well, look, I dont know him, and I know nothing about him, really. I just think if we got along with Russia, thats not a bad thing, Trump said. The Democrats try to say I like him somehow. I dont like him. I dont dislike him. I dont have any feelings one way or the other. And its not going to matter what he says about me. If he says good things or bad things about me, Im going to make great deals for our country. He added, They make it like hes my best friend, I dont know him.

Looking ahead to the first general election debate, Trump said he thinks moderator Lester Holt is going to have a tough time because there will be pressure for him to be harder than Matt Lauerwho did a fantastic job, in Trumps wordswas on him. He predicted the whole thing would be unfair to both him and Holt.

After a break, Fallon decided to finish the mock job interview he started with Trump nine months earlier. But though we are now less than 60 days away from the election, the questions didnt get any more pressing. When Fallon asked if Trump has any hobbies, the candidate said he doesnt have time for anything besides campaigning. Trump joked that if he doesnt win the election, he next best option could be taking over The Tonight Show.

Thats not going to happen. But theres always NBCs Chicago President.
ROME  There is often a fine line between pity and fear when it comes to the hundreds of thousands of refugees who have landed on European shores in the last year.

On one hand, its difficult not to feel an outpouring of sympathy over pictures of babies born on perilous rescue missions, or the bodies of children washed up on the waves. Just as it is almost as difficult not to feel distrust and anger over news that, yet again, alleged jihadists have been found hiding among the legitimate refugees.

This week three would-be terrorists were arrested in the Schleswig-Holstein region of Germany on suspicion they were operatives of the so-called Islamic State. The three men, referred to in German court documents which do not include last names as Mahir al-H., 17, Ibrahim M., 18, and Mohamed A., 18, reportedly came to Europe last year through Turkey to Greece, where they essentially rode the migrant wave all the way to Germany. As Syrians, their asylum applications get preferential treatment, allowing them, essentially, to cut the line at the borders.

But before grouping all refugees into the terrorist camp, it is important to note that the three men would not have been caught at all if it had not been for other refugees who raised the alarm several months ago. According to a spokesman for the BKA, Germanys counter-intelligence force, the trio were trying to recruit others among the pool of mostly idle men waiting for their papers to be processed and theyd been fingered by some of those they approached. As a result, they had been under surveillance for many months, which allowed authorities to gather valuable information about the wider ring.

Its also the case that while refugees and migrants are living in camps awaiting word on their status requests, they are often subject to practices that invade their privacy in ways regularized citizens would never accept. Counter-terrorism police in Italy, who are part of the countrys anti-Mafia forces, dont even try to hide the fact that refugee phones often are tapped and that there are undercover faux refugees at most major camps for the sole purpose of spying on them.

In the Sicilian port of Augusta, a number of former refugees are now working for local authorities to help weed out any extremists. One man who goes by the name Leo told The Daily Beast last year that he can spot a fake refugee within 10 minutes of a conversation. Either they dont know the dialect of the area they pretend to be coming from, or they fall immediately into a trap when I start complaining about the West, he said. His job is to meld into the groups of men that have been separated from the refugee families and just start talking to them.

Italian authorities also have native Nigerians, Afghans, and Iraqis on the payroll, depending on the demographics of the migrant boats.

One key piece of information netted by such covert intelligence work: German intelligence is certain that the three men arrested this week had traveled to Leros, Greece, together on the same boat with two of the suicide bombers who blew themselves up in the deadly Nov. 13, 2015, attacks in Paris. One suicide bomber, whose fingerprints collected from the Paris attacks match those of a man identified in refugee records as M. Al-Mahmod, was in the same Greek camp where the men arrested this week first entered.

At least one of the three just arrested also apparently had connections to the group responsible for the August 2015 attack on a Paris-bound train.

German authorities say all of these dots were connected long before arrests were made, thanks to testimony from legitimate refugees who traveled with these five men. For their cooperation, the German authorities say the key witnesses have been moved on to other countries and their asylum applications have been granted.

What complicates the hunt for terrorists among the real refugees is the cottage industry of document forging spurred by the migratory crisis. Fake documents can make anyone seem legitimateat least until theyre not. Last month, Europol found a whole cache of fake documents in Greek refugee camps apparently designated for foreign fighters coming in to the continent.

Last spring an Iraqi man was arrested in Italy on suspicion of running guns and falsifying documents for similar purposes.

Authorities also believe that there are a number of human trafficking outfits that cater specifically to would-be terrorists, ensuring safe passage hidden among the legitimate refugees.

Everything points to the fact that the same smuggler organization behind the Paris attacks also brought the three men to Germany, Germanys interior minister Thomas de Maiziere said at press conference when the arrests were made this week. He says there are at least 520 potential fighters in Germany alone, and described how some fighters were part of hit teams that sneak in under orders from ISIS commanders.

Others, he says, are lone wolves who are either recruited along the way or once they get to the camps. Still others go to the Middle East for training and then come back to carry out attacks. Some operatives are working on their own; others are spontaneously inspired by other attacks, then there are returnees from crisis zones.

Just over 28 percent of the 298,099 migrants and refugees who have arrived in Europe by sea since the start of this year are from Syria, according to the United Nations Refugee Agency UNHCR. The rest are from troubled spots like Afghanistan, Iraq, Nigeria and Eritrea. There are Palestinians, Sudanese and other nationalities among the mix as well. Of the total, 54 percent are men; the rest are women and children.

Europes border patrol organization Frontex, which cruises the Mediterranean Sea along with the Italian navy and private rescue organizations, has long warned that terrorists find an easy ride with legitimate refugees, which is why it has argued against the rescue operations like Italys Mare Nostrum and those in effect now, which it says create a pull factor. Frontex argues the only deterrent is to turn back the boats.

The Paris attacks in November 2015 clearly demonstrated that irregular migratory flows could be used by terrorists to enter the EU, Frontex reported in its risk analysis report for 2016. Two of the terrorists involved in the attacks had previously irregularly entered through Leros and had been registered by the Greek authorities. They presented fraudulent Syrian documents to speed up their registration process.

It is little wonder that Europe remains divided about how to protect itself and still save lives at sea and provide humanitarian aid to those in need.

It is wrong to put refugees under general suspicion, says de Maiziere. But the fact is we do have refugees who come here as potential terrorists or sympathizers. The rest, of course, do deserve legitimate sympathy.

The hard part is telling the difference while protecting people in one group and protecting Europe from those in the other.
Constitution Day is this weekSeptember 17 officially, September 16 as its being celebrated at schools across America.

Which is ironic, because rarely has the Constitution been so flagrantly flouted as in the annus horribilis of 2016. Theres no shortage of unconstitutional acts to choose from, depending on your point of view. Conservatives and libertarians are still litigating the constitutionality of Obamacare, for example, although Article III of the Constitution grants that power to the Supreme Court. Liberals, meanwhile, have begun to wonder whether there are any limits on when the government can spy on all of us.

And none of us knows whether the Obama administrations immigration actions are constitutional, because the short-staffed Supreme Court was too broken to decide.

But for my money, there are three constitutional howlers so outrageous as to merit special attention on this Constitution Day: the Obama wars, the Supreme Court stalemate, and almost everything Donald Trump says.

1. War Without War

Did you know that Article One, Section Eight of the Constitution states that Congress has the power to declare war? Did you know that the last time it did so was during World War II? What about all those other wars since then: Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf Wars (plural!), Afghanistandid they never happen?

Well, not constitutionally they didntthere never was a formal Declaration of War, and since there wasnt, there was never really any war. (Tell that to the veterans, the fallen, the enemy combatants, and the civilian casualties from Pusan to Peshawar.)

But in most cases, Congress at least authorized the use of forceincluding the second Gulf War, which Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump supported, before they were against it, and the war in Afghanistan.

Both of those wars are over, in case you were confusedIraq on December 15, 2011, and Afghanistan on December 28, 2014. Those U.S. soldiers still on the ground, the warplanes, the battles against ISISnone of that is really war, you see. Nor were the U.S.s adventures in Libya. None of those activities have been authorized by Congress, notwithstanding what the constitution says.

Of course, war is different these days. One no longer issues Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and one no longer formally declares war either. Indeed, Congress recognized the effective nullity of Article I, Section 8, back in 1973, when it passed the War Powers Resolution, meant to require presidents to obtain congressional approval within 90 days of engagement.

Then again, the War Powers Act (as its known) may itself be unconstitutional, and is basically never enforced by the Supreme Court, which has noticed that the party complaining of violations always seems to be the one not holding the White House at the moment. Liberals and conservatives alike recognize that invoking it is basically a political ploy.

As a result, weve grown used to war without war. After all, what is a war on terror, really? The Obama administrations use of drone warfare, for example, is now well-documented. Is it part of a declared war? No. Part of an undeclared but congressionally authorized war? No. Is it constitutional? Well, that depends what the meaning of the word is is.

2. Oaths without Actions

Whats worse than undeclared war? Unfulfilled oaths of office.

The Appointments Clause of the U.S. Constitution, Article II, Section 2, says that The president shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Judges of the Supreme Court.

In 2016, this clause has been violated like never before in U.S. history. For longer than any other time in the history of our country, a seat on the Supreme Court has remained vacant while a fully qualified candidate has been denied even a hearing by the U.S. Senate. Whatever consequences this unprecedented inaction has had on the dispensation of justice, it is blatantly unconstitutional.

Shall, in constitutional language, means must. It means that the president must nominate judges, and the president and Senate must work together to get them appointed. While, of course, the Senate can set its own rules as to how to do so, it must do so.

Which it hasnt.

September 16 isnt just Constitution Day, after allits also the six-month anniversary of Merrick Garlands nomination to the Supreme Court. That isnt just a recordit blows away the record, previously held by Louis Brandeis, who waited 125 days after he was nominated by Woodrow Wilson. And he, of course, got hearings, a vote, and a confirmation.

Republican spin doctors have sold America the line that this is business as usual that Democrats have stalled nominees in the past, that its an election year, that the people should decide. Thats a pack of lies. No nominee has been stalled like this, no informal custom has ever stopped a nomination of someone this early in an election year, and the people decided already, when they elected President Obama to a full eight years in officenot seven and a quarter.

And its not just Judge Garland. Over the last year and a half, the Senate has confirmed 17 lifetime-appointment judges. In the same period in 2007-08, the Democrat-led Senate confirmed 45. This is completely unprecedented, and has caused a judicial emergency throughout the system.

Every Republican Senator who has refused to move forward with a bona fide confirmation process has violated his or her oath of office, and the U.S. Constitution. Their actions may or may not determine the outcome of the election, but they will go down in history as among the most outrageous constitutional violations in history.

3. That is, unless Trump becomes president.

Although he hasnt done anything unconstitutional yetafter all, hes not yet in officeI couldnt observe Constitution Day without noting how many blatantly unconstitutional, criminal actions Donald Trump has promised to undertake.

If he puts into practice his belief that Mexican Americans cannot fairly discharge their duties (as judges, as federal employees, as whatever), if he acts on his promise to bring back open racial profiling, he would violate the Equal Protection Clause.

If his administration singles out Muslims based on their religion, if it implements Trumps statement that all students must salute the flag, it would violate the First Amendment.

If he builds the transit camps and other infrastructure necessary to deport eleven million undocumented immigrants, if he indeed deports people merely accused but not convicted of crimes, he would violate the Due Process Clause.

And of course, if he follows through on promises to bomb the families of terrorists and torture people in ways worse than waterboarding, he would probably not violate the Constitution, but he would be a war criminal, which probably counts for something.

Good thing the Supreme Court will be there to check Donald Trumps unconstitutional abuses of power.

Oh, right.
However you feel about the recent mobilization of students demanding a more inclusive and supportive climate on college campuses, one thing is abundantly clear: Nothing good will come from throwing an ethnicity-themed party.

Unfortunately, some Princeton students missed the memo, hosting a Mexican-themed party on campus Monday night.

The party was called MMMMMMF,or the 27th annual Mandatory Makeout Mexican Mustache Monday Madness Fiesta. In the Facebook page invite to the eventwhich began with the phrase Holy Guacamole, Im proudo to invito youthe hosts recommended that guests wear a sombrero, bikini, fake mustache and later added, mustaches must be donned. The party was hosted in Spelman, one of the upperclassmen dorms on Princetons campus.

The incident was reported to University officials on Tuesday by three students, according to a statement from the school.

Following students reports of the party, LaTanya Buck, Dean of Diversity and Inclusion, and the directors of the Carl A. Fields Center, LGBT Center, and Womens Center sent a letter to university students apologizing for the cultural appropriation and disrespect that occurred.

In the letter, Dean Buck communicated that she and her colleagues were aware of the incident and expressed her regret for the hurt, pain, and frustration that this has caused individuals within the Latinx community as well as others.

Buck also promised that her office and the Princeton administration would not turn a blind eye to any events of this nature hosted by students at the university.

We are deeply sorry for your experience and how this affects you, she wrote in her email, we do not condone cultural appropriation and disrespect to any individuals and groups racial, cultural, and ethnic identities.

They did not include any information about who the partys organizers were, or if there would be any disciplinary action taken against them.

While the early days of campus life can be difficult for any incoming college student to navigate, this years freshmen face the additional challenge of deciding whether to draw alliances with student activist groups, negotiating their place in the various safe spaces on campus, and scanning their syllabi for trigger warnings.

The increased hypersensitivity on campus might be fraught with controversy, but it should also have given these students a heads-up that their Mexican-themed party was not going to go over well.

Cuauhtemoc Ocampo, a Princeton grad from the class of 2014 and former member of Princeton Latinos y Amigos (PLA)a pan-Latino student group on campus aimed at promoting inclusion and awarenesstold The Daily Beast that while he hadnt heard about the specific incident, annoyances like cultural ignorance are prevalent on campus.

Heres the thing about those parties, Ocampo wrote in a message to the Beast, they happen every year. And I have [zero] knowledge about the event but I can say it probably involved mustaches and sombreros.

Nicole Gonzalez, a member of the class of 2016 and former co-president of PLA, told The Daily Beast that a Mexican-themed party took place during the 2015-2016 school year as well.

While Gonzalez didnt attend last years event herself, she said that the name of the party was offensive and included the word Mexican in it. It was reported thoroughly to the university administrators but no direct action [was taken].

When asked if he had any first-hand experience of similar events during his time at the university, Ocampo told the Beast, I dont think its worth bringing up the incidents that occurred because that will only give them the attention they sought.

He would say that events of this nature keep happening because people, even at Princeton, simply like to have fun with appropriation.

Those that express it are usually never well informed, Ocampo added, Im a firm believer that the ignorance I speak of will only go away with time and as generations of different cultures grow up together and learn about each other first-hand.

Isabella Gomes, Princeton class of 2016 and former member of Mas Flow Dance Company at Princeton, told The Daily Beast that while she appreciates the deans message it baffles me that this event was allowed to have happened at all.

Or maybe it doesnt, she added, that says something about Princetons campus culture and where it needs to be when you have students who are sociology majors, international and public-affairs majors, cultural studies certificate students and beyond participating in events like the party on Monday, its hard to see aspects of our campus culture as anything but a mechanism that perpetuates the trivialization and caricaturization of entire cultures.

Benjamin Gallo, a current Princeton senior from Managua, Nicaragua, added that these kinds of parties dont just caricaturize groups of people, they also often serve as a vehicle for binge drinking.

Such events ultimately tend to serve as an excuse for heavy partying, Gallo told The Daily Beast, and it is unfortunate that they spread incorrect notions about the kind of fun and traditions that define other cultures.

While it doesnt bode well for Princeton students that these tasteless theme parties have begun occurring during their first week on campus, Min Pullan, the Media Relations Specialist from the Office of Communication at the university, told The Daily Beast that these kinds of events unfortunately dont really cluster around a certain time of the year.

Students are in a celebratory mood [and more parties] are prevalent during the beginning of the year, said Pullan, but these incidents are dealt with as they come up.

The Universitys Director of Media Relations, John Cramer, told The Daily Beast that the university has expanded their statement regarding the incident, adding that Princeton University fosters a welcoming and inclusive environment for all We continually strive to make the University a place where everyones perspectives are welcomed and valued, resulting in a positive and more successful future for the institution and all members of our community.

In the last year, Princeton experienced a number of incidents involving racial relations, inclusivity, and diversity on campus.

In fact, the position of Dean of Diversity and Inclusion was only recently createdas a response to student activism and protests at colleges across the country, as well as a number of Princeton-specific incidents regarding Woodrow Wilsons legacy at Princeton as well as confrontations between University President Christopher L. Eisgruber and the Black Justice League, including a 33-hour sit-in at the presidents office.

Formerly the founding director of the Center for Diversity and Inclusion at Washington University in St. Louis, Dean Buck became the inaugural Dean for Diversity and Inclusion at Princeton and a new member of the campus life leadership team. In her appointment, Dean Buck supervises directors of other safe spaces and advocacy centers on campus and is responsible for responding to reports of bias.

At the end of her email, Dean Buck reiterated her commitment to educating individuals in the Princeton community as well as countering instances of blatant racism on campus.

Please know that we will continue to work collectively to engage, educate and empower our Princeton community to confront and understand the impact of racial and cultural discrimination, bias, and hate, Dean Buck wrote. We will continue to do better on your behalf.
Donald Trump might as well have been invented in a laboratory by liberals to be the most repulsive, ogreish, unpopular presidential candidate in the history of our republic.

So how the hell is Hillary Clinton barely beating him?

Certainly, a great deal of the blame for our terrifying circumstances lies with Clinton herself. She is an abominable candidate, a wooden speaker, a cynical triangulator, andto put it kindlyethically challenged.

But she also has something very important in her favor.

Shes running against Donald Trump.

Im not going to rehearse the case against the Republican nominee in this space because Ive done it so many times before. Needless to say, Trump is the most manifestly unfit presidential candidate ever to win the nomination of a major American political party. He is a racist. A proto-authoritarian. A menace to the free world.

Yet despite running against a candidate who combines the racial divisiveness of George Wallace with the pro-Russian sympathies of Henry Wallace, Hillary Clinton has barely been able to break 48 percent in any national poll. She does significantly better in head-to-head match-ups than in the actual four-way race, thanks to the not insignificant number of voters expressing support for Libertarian Gary Johnson and Green Party standard-bearer Jill Stein. Support for these minor candidates is most pronounced among a crucial demographic, my demographic: millennials. Twenty-six percent of voters aged 18-29 say they will vote for Johnson; 10 percent back Stein.

What explains the millennial willingness to risk a Trump presidency? A lot of it stems from cynicism toward, if not downright hatred of, Clinton and everything she represents. Seventy-seven percent of voters 18-34 find Clinton untrustworthy, compared to 65 percent of all likely voters. Theres also not a small degree of lingering bitterness from those who supported Bernie Sanders in the Democratic primary, only 52 percent of whom, according to an Economist/YouGov poll, plan to back the partys nominee (Sanders won millennials overwhelmingly, and Saturday will be in Ohio to try to convince voters there to hold their noses with one hand and pull the lever for Clinton with the other).

As Ive written here before, I suspect that Clintons inability to pick up Sanders backers stems in part from a left-wing anti-imperialism that considers her to be a warmonger.

But theres something deeper, and darker, about millennial opposition to Clinton and the attendant blitheness toward the prospect of a Trump presidency. Its best described as a mix of moral relativism, historical ignorance, and narcissism.

Millennials are the first post-war generation to have come of age after the Cold War. Baby boomers, by contrast, grew up listening to their parents tales of American heroism in World War II and read about the depredations of international communism every day. Throughout their formative years, the United States was locked in a Cold War struggle against an expansionist Soviet empire, and the world lived under threat of nuclear holocaust. The anti-Vietnam War movement may have bred skepticism about Americas global role, but the notion that American power was necessary to protect freedom in the world remained a majority one.

Millennials, by contrast, spent their early years blissfully unaware about the world and its dangers. That changed, of course, on 9/11. But unlike other age groups, over half of us believe U.S. actions might have provoked those attacks. Older people think, Were a great people, we got attacked by these crazy people, and now we are dealing with it and we have to be careful, Trevor Thrall, co-author of a study on millennials and foreign policy, told Voice of America last year. Millennials are the only generation the majority of which think the U.S. must have done something to provoke 9/11. Thralls study concluded that millennials perceive the world as significantly less threatening than their elders, are more supportive of international cooperation than previous generations, and are also far less supportive of the use of military force. Millennials are also deeply skepticallike Trumpof American exceptionalism. A 2011 Pew poll found that only 32 percent of millennials believe America is superior to other countries, compared to 64 percent of baby boomers.

But the main reason for millennial apathy toward the possibility of a Trump victory, I suspect, is a lack of historical understanding. Millennials, particularly American ones, are too young to have any memories of the Cold War, never mind World War II, when fascists ruled Europe and millions of people died as a result. Trumps echoes of fascist movements past has no resonance with us.

One of the most disturbing poll results I have ever read is the recent World Values Survey finding that only 31 percent of Americans born in the 1980s say it is essential to live in a country that is governed democratically. That figure compares to about 44 percent in Europe, where the memory of totalitarianism is both physically and temporally closer. We American millennials take our freedom and prosperity for granted. My generation has so little experience of authoritarianism and illiberalism that over two-thirds of us basically say we wouldnt mind living in a non-democratic society. Because we have no historical reference points, when we see Trump, we think only of a silly reality television show star, not a nascent dictator.

If Trump wins, well get what we deserve.
In some cities the border between one neighborhood and another is strictly a matter of realtor speak. The Leaf District shades into Upper Joad, Upper Joad into Barrel town, Barreltown into Winthrop, Winthrop into Caudillo, all without so much as a bend in the road or a diminution in the density of Starbucks cafes, Sprint stores and CVS pharmacies.

Pittsburgh aint like that. For one thing, it takes 446 bridges, nobodys sure how many tunnels and an ungodly amount of highway spaghetti to link its 90 neighborhoods together. Oh, and a couple of inclines, which are basically the station-wagon version of the chair thingie they used to advertise on late-night TV that lifted infirm elderly up the stairs. Here they use these contraptions to get up bluffs, of which Pittsburgh has a lot. There are also rivers, flats, strips and ever so many hills, heights and mounts. Here, neighborhoods mean something.

What they mean for the thirsty visitor in particular is that most bars in Pittsburgh are neighborhood bars, that youre going to have a hard time getting to all the good ones and that if youve got an urge to wander youre not going to be able to hit all the cool areas in one night, not without a serious commitment to one-and-done-style imbibing. But it also means youve got a whole lot of different drinking environments.

Pittsburghs Downtown is right where the Allegheny (to the north) meets the Monongahela (to the south) to form the mighty Ohio River. In other words, its a point, so its easy to get around on foot. Until a few years ago, that wasnt much use, since the neighborhood was pretty marginal. You can get a sense of that Bukowski-ish, cheap-shot-and-a-beer past at the Original Oyster House (20 Market Square), the oldest bar in town. (Make sure to go to the proper bar, on the corner, rather than the takeout place next door). It aint fancy. Still, you can get a shot of Seagrams VO Canadian Whisky, a full pint of Duquesne beer (the local cheapo domestic) and a surprisingly good fish sandwich for under $20. (The fish sandwich is a local specialty, and a reminder of just how many Catholics settled in Pittsburgh.) The sign over the bar says, Life doesnt get much better than this. Some, taking in the humility of the surroundings, might consider that a caution. I do not.

These days, however, Downtown has a lot more to offer, including a liberal sprinkling of the kind of modern restaurant that starts with a great bar and then fills in with excellent food to back it up. Meat & Potatoes (649 Penn Ave.) and Poros (2 Market Square) both do the job. The Butcher and the Rye (212 6th St.) also adds a dangerously comprehensive American whiskey collection and serves the traditional Italian Sunday gravy not as a pasta sauce but as an ultra-rich sort of dip for bread. Addictive.

On the North Shore, across the Allegheny from Down Town, lie the citys large new stadia and the Andy Warhol Museum. Behind those youll find Deutschtown and the Park House (403 E. Ohio St.), which might not be the oldest bar in town but claims the oldest liquor license, dating back to Repeal. A fine old tavern with local craft beer on tap and good, live string band music, it also has one of the damnedest sandwiches Ive ever seen in the form of a pita stuffed with a potato latke, fried eggplant, a fried egg and a bunch of other stuff. Its Israeli street food (the owner is from there), and is truly delicious.

The Strip District, just east of Downtown on the south bank of the Allegheny, has a lot of bars and restaurants, most of them pretty touristy. (It does also haveword to the hung-overPamelas P&G Diner (60 21st St.) rightly famous for its epic breakfasts; be prepared to wait, though.) Arts Tavern (2852 Penn Ave.), does not fit the prevailing fratty mode for Strip District bars, and not only because it admits nobody under 30. Arts is a reminder that Pittsburgh has always had a large and vibrant black community, centered on the nearby Hill District, which was hit hard by urban renewal. I guess that makes Arts a survivor, but if so its a lively one, with stiff drinks and a jukebox with a lot of old-school jams.

Behind the Strip lies Polish Hill. The name is no joke: Its a hell of a climb to get up there, but when youre there youll find a quiet wood-frame hill town, with at least one truly great dive bar: Gooskis (3117 Brereton St.). Dark and loud, with a great jukebox packed with home-burned CDs and heavy on the punk, Gooskis is a true rock and roll bar. Big beers, cheap whiskey, pierogis, burgers, and wings. Enough said. (Around the block at 3138 Dobson St. youll find Mind Cure Records, with a great selection of vinyl, and upstairs from that the nicely Bohemian Copacetic Comic Co., which also has a lot of books.)

Across the Monongahela, the other river, lies the South Side and East Carson St., which is nothing but bars. Most are pretty collegiate and nothing you cant find anywhere else in the country, but Dees Cafe (1314 E. Carson St.) is all local and another truly great bar. You can find Pittsburghers of all shapes and sizes and sorts slugging beer, whiskey, and simple Highballs, shooting pool and talking up a blue streak. Good times. For ballast, Kassabs (1207 E. Carson St.) is nearby and offers big plates of exceptionally well-prepared Lebanese food. Theres nothing in the world like a good lamb gyro to tamp down a miscalibrated dose of Old Overholt.

Pittsburghs East End is almost a whole other city, one separated from Downtown and the Strip by hills and freeways rather than rivers. Its where the colleges are, and of course the kinds of bars and restaurants that tend to flourish in Collegelandia. But its worth an Uber over there to go to Hidden Harbor, in Squirrel Hill (1708 Shady Ave.). The Harbor is a tiki bar, and a fine one, and its full of non-students drinking excellent rum drinks (try the arrack-based Josies Faraway Vacation) and snacking from Pu Pu platters. As befits a bar near a major engineering schoolCarnegie Mellon is nearbysome of the drinks have a food-science edge to them; indeed, Hidden Harbor turns every Wednesday into Weird Science Wednesday, where the bartenders let their inner lab rats loose.

After a Rum Barrel and a Tropic Thunder, you might need more than toothpick food. Fortunately, less than a mile away, a rather unpromising side street holds Chengdu Gourmet (5840 Forward Ave.). Sure, theres a menu of the usual Chi-Am fare for the students (labeled, helpfully, American Chinese Menu). But theres also a Traditional Chinese Menu for lovers of dead-serious Chinese regional cooking, full of things like beef tendon, pork belly, wood ear mushrooms, and organ meats of all sorts. If number M2, Double Cooked Sliced Pork Belly, doesnt get you, then B6, Lamb with Cumin, in Xinjiang Style, will.

By my count, that leaves just 84 neighborhoods to go.

This marks the debut of Out and About In, an occasional series dedicated to the pleasures of the bar crawl. Each installment will look at a different city, presenting a manageable list of bars of all sortscocktail bars, tiki bars, old institutions and diveseach one of them carefully inspected by us in person and found worth a visit. It is not a comprehensive guide, just a roadmap for a good time. And because youll need some ballast to keep you on your barstool, well throw in a couple of places to eat, also tested and approved for drinkers.
The pro-life movement has officially joined the Trump train.

This morning, Trump rolled out his Pro-Life Coalition, helmed by Marjorie Dannenfelser, the president of the Susan B. Anthony List, which funds pro-life candidates. In a press release announcing the group, Dannenfelser praised Trump for his commitment to making the Hyde Amendment, which keeps tax dollars from funding abortions, a federal law. Hillary Clinton, in contrast, has promised to repeal Hyde so tax dollars can pay for abortion procedures.

While this might not seem terribly important coming nearly four months after Trump locked down the Republican nomination, it is further proof that the partys social conservatives are finally coalescing around Trumpand using their resources to support a man who they once hoped would just go away.

Unlike typical presidential candidates, Trump made more overtures to pro-lifers after winning the primary than he did while it was going on.

Its great, Dannenfelser told The Daily Beast in June. Its why it makes it easier for me to be open-minded, because we are dealing with somebody who is not a typical candidatehe just does things very differently.

Dannenfelser was a vocal Trump critic during the primary.

Before the Iowa and South Carolina contests, she joined other female pro-life leaders in urging Republicans to back anyone but Trump. They found his kind words for Planned Parenthood to be very disturbing. And Trumps decision to bail on a meeting with a group of pro-life Catholic priests didnt do him any favors with the pro-life community. And when the Supreme Court leveled a devastating blow to the pro-life community by overturning Texass abortion regulations, Trump stayed mum . And they didnt like it.

Her decision to work with him suggests the tensions that had divided Trump from the pro-life community have largely dissipated.

Now, that doesnt mean all pro-life leaders are head-over-heels the nominee. But they say hes still leagues better than his opponent. And the new management running Trumps campaign includes a number of Republican operatives with deep ties to the pro-life community. Kellyanne Conway and David Bossiehis campaign manager and deputy campaign manager, respectivelyare both consistent foes of abortion and close to pro-life leaders. And Trumps hiring of social conservative stalwart John Mashburn, formerly an aide to Sen. Jesse Helms, also heartened pro-life leaders.

Couple that with the fact that social conservatives dont want Hillary Clinton anywhere near the Supreme Court, and their turnaround on Trump makes sense.

And Trump needs it.

His campaigns state-level get-out-the-vote organizing is woefully behind Clintons, which is where SBA List comes in. Mallory Quigley, a spokesperson for the organization, said they have knocked on 600,000 doors so far this cyclefocusing on registered Republican pro-life voters who arent likely to voteand aim to hit 1 million by Election Day. She said the group also has 500 paid canvassers working in North Carolina, Florida, and Ohio. And theyve already had some success this cycle: SBA List backers helped stop North Carolina Rep. Renee Ellmers, a Republican who opposed one of their legislative priorities, from winning her primary.

And Trumps full embrace of the pro-life movement puts him at odds with some of his own family members. His son, Donald Trump Jr., said in a 2012 interview that he supports abortion rights and couldnt understand why anyone would want legal limits on the procedure.

I dont even understand how its a political issue, he said in a 2012 radio interview. I dont understand how there is one issue for voters for that. I dont understand how you can tell someone what they can or cant do.

I cant buy into the abortion argument, he added. I wish the Republicans would drop it as part of their platform.

Despite that, pro-life activists are set to give Trumps campaign a major assist. And given swing-state polls that show him and Clinton in virtual ties, he needs all the help he can get.
Woody Harrelson isnt the only actor playing President Lyndon B. Johnson during cinemas current LBJ renaissance, between his foul-mouthed turn in Rob Reiners LBJ, Bryan Cranston in HBOs All the Way, and John Carroll Lynch in Pablo Larrains fellow Toronto Film Fest entry Jackie. He is, however, most certainly the only actor playing President Lyndon B. Johnson right now who politically self-identifies as an anti-government anarchist and has few kind words for the man he plays onscreen in the biopicin a pointed Texas accent and under heavy prosthetics.

Im more of an anarchist than anything, confirmed Harrelson as he spoke with The Daily Beast about LBJ, Reiners first politically-themed film since An American President. I dont really believe in government. I dont see the positive effects of it. Our federal government was just supposed to take care of trade between the states and protect us in times of warand instead, its become belligerent around the world and its constantly in every aspect of our lives.

Were overtaxed to pay for an out of control weapons industry, added Harrelson, 55, who has two Oscar nominations and an Emmy under his belt. Off-screen, hes known for vocally advocating for environmental rights, fighting to legalize weed, and being one of Hollywoods most visible 9/11 truthers. We subsidize countries around the world to buy weapons from us. The government, Im not terribly proud of.

Ironically, he doesnt think much of presidents either. I like Obama, he said. He was better than what the other choices were, but in the end I look at presidents as puppets. Industries control our countries and make decisions for us. The politicians are all really puppets of the industries, and I think thats really obvious to anybody who looks at it with any clarity. The point is, I dont really see how were helped by the government. There are some good social programs that I think are worthwhile, but we could do that just as people running our own business, you know?

Harrelson found himself playing Americas 37th VP turned 36th POTUS, whose explosive ego the film highlights in its most raucous moments, not so much because he admired Lyndon B. Johnson but because Reiner was doing it and he wanted to work with the Princess Bride and A Few Good Men helmer. He did his research, poring over records and taped phone conversations to get under LBJs skinskin that, the film argues, was way thinner than the history books might have thought.

LBJ made its premiere at the Toronto Film Festival, competing for buzz with the Natalie Portman contender Jackie, about Jacqueline Kennedy dealing with the aftermath of JFKs assassination, while vying for buyers as an acquisition title. It chronicles LBJs private fears, questions, and ideological splits with Kennedy before the rivals became running matesand how JFKs assassination changed LBJs politics. He did adopt a big swath of JFKs policies so it would be hard to not see it that way, said Harrelson. Im not sure how much of it was motivated by his depth of emotion or by what he considered to be politically expedient. Its really hard to read him. Hes a fascinating character.

Reiners film opens on the pre-White House days in which Johnson scrapped bitterly with his political rivals, using an acid tongue to bark at his staffers and wielding great power as the Southern Democrat enjoying his position as the Senate Majority Leader. Hes always wanted to be president, he says, but not through such secondhand ways as surviving the Dallas assassination of Kennedy, which catapults Johnson into action.

Behind closed doors, however, the powerful politician from Texas confides in his wife, Lady Bird Johnson (Jennifer Jason Leigh, also marvelous under prosthetics) his most private self-doubts.

Hes a sensitive man with an enormous ego, describes John F. Kennedy (Jeffrey Donovan), who wins the Democratic endorsement and goes on to the White House. Only Lady Bird sees the real Lyndon: Hes afraid people wont love him.

I felt a bit ambivalent, said Harrelson of his onscreen alter ego. Well, even more than that: I didnt like LBJ. I always think of LBJ and Vietnam, like a lot of people do. Thats really the legacy that hes most remembered by. Of course he did a lot of things, good things, civil rights and the Voting Rights Act and so forth, but he did escalate in Vietnam and he lost a lot of peoples lives on both sides of the equation. So I dont know, man. Im still a little torn about him. Im very fascinated by him, still.

Harrelson brings an irritable, irascible stoicism to this LBJ, subtle in his notice of perceived slights and fiery in his exchanges with an openly hostile Bobby Kennedy. Human moments bring both him and the otherwise conventional film to lifelike when he terrorizes the Senate whip by threating to slam his two-inch pecker on a tabletop, or holds a meeting with his aides while unceremoniously taking a crap with the door open.

Its fantastic, said Harrelson, recalling how he got to re-create Johnsons infamous conversation with his tailor shortly after being sworn in as president. Hes like, Down where my balls hang, imma need another two inches its so funny. And by the way, that conversation happened less than a week after he became president.

Looking to November, he has strong words for both GOP candidate Donald Trump and Democratic hopeful Hillary Clinton.

Unfortunately theyre both hawks, and I think thats one of the big issues going on in the world today, he said. Weve got three wars going on simultaneously that seem to be going on in perpetuity. Im not seeing either one of them address that. But I dont think Trump is presidential material. Hes like a boxer who just says the most outlandish shit to get on the front page. And hes obviously stoking a lot of racism. I dont see anything positive coming from Trump building a wall, he laughed.

I mean, I cant imagine anyone who wouldnt be a better candidate than Trump. I mean, literally anyone, he said. But definitely Hillaryat least shes qualified.

Harrelson still has doubts over the U.S. governments questionable behavior the morning of Sept. 11, 2001particularly President George W. Bushs decision to read a childrens book during the attack. I think theres no world leader whos going to sit after being attacked and read a story about a goat for seven minutes, said Harrelson. Before I had read anything I thought that was a little questionable.

As it happens, Harrelson is about to reunite with Reiner and screenwriter Joey Hartstone in Shock & Awe, about a group of journalists pressing Bushs claims that Saddam Hussein is allegedly stockpiling WMDs.

Its kind of along the lines of All The Presidents Men, said Harrelson. These guys were finding out incredible information and they had good inside sources. Its these journalists who were writing stories for Knight Ridder saying, hold on, what the hell are we blaming Iraq for 9/11? They were trying to associate Bin Laden, this deeply fanatical religious guy, with the secular dictator. Theres no connection!

Theyre writing these articles but nobodys picking them up, he exclaimed. But theyre picking up stuff from Judith Miller thats all fabricated shit that she got from Cheney and other sources. It was really a wild situation.

And after that, Harrelson will prepare to shoot and star in his own directorial debut. All hell say about the plot is that its based on a wild adventure he once had in London, and that the experience in question left him changed: Well, he said, it taught me how lucky I am.
Julia Roberts Says MLK Jr. Paid Hospital Bill For Her Birth

YES, YOU READ THAT RIGHT

The actress said her parents were friends with King and his wife, and the couple helped out when they couldn't afford the bill.
Westons creates hop cider for new collection

Following the successful launch of Caple Rd cider, the UK's first cider in a can, premium English cider producer Westons has launched a collection of canned craft ciders.

The collection of lightly sparkling ciders is now available and comprises Caple Rd No. 5, the latest Caple Rd variant, which is double-filtered from fresh English apple juice to give a crisp, dry and complex taste with a powerful tart finish. Complementing the challenging dryness of Caple Rd No. 5, Westons is also launching two cloudy flavoured ciders under the Rosies Pig brand.

Rosies Pig Handbrake Cloudy Cider with Damson is a slowly matured, medium-sweet cider which has hints of cherry and hedgerow fruits and a sharp finish. Rosies Pig Flat Tyre Cloudy Cider with Rhubarb is made from freshly pressed apples paired with a refreshing infusion of rhubarb juice to provide a fruity taste and tart finish.

The final launch in the collection is the result of a collaboration between Westons Cider and Purity Brewing Company to create a hopped cider  Pure Hopped  which is a blend of English cider made from apple juice from Herefordshire and a dash of the finest hops from Worcestershire. Pure Hopped is a beautifully balanced and smooth cider, with subtle citrus flavours. All of the ciders are packaged in 330ml cans.

Caple Rd No. 5 and the Rosies Pig Cloudy Ciders were introduced to the on-trade market in the spring and are now available to the off-trade for the first time. Pure Hopped is launching in the on and off-trade markets now for the first time. The new collection comes amidst a growth opportunity for both craft beer and cider, with followers looking increasingly towards premium drinks which have a point of difference, traceability of ingredients, and artisanship.

Tessa Holden, brand manager for the craft collection, says: We are extremely excited to be launching our new collection of craft ciders. The new ciders will help attract more drinkers to the cider category as a whole, where Westons is leading the way in driving a genuine craft offer.

The launch follows the highly successful introduction of the UKs first craft cider in a can, Caple Rd Cider, to the market, two years ago. Our category insight showed that craft cider is the second biggest trend in the on-trade at the moment and following the successful launch of our Rhubarb and Damson flavoured cloudy ciders under our Rosies Pig brand in the on-trade market we have now launched them in the timely format of the 330ml can. When looking at innovation, growing the cider category is a priority for Westons and its also high on our customers agendas.

Pure Hopped is the result of a chance meeting on a visit to Worcestershire-based fruit and hop farm, Stocks Farm, which brought together Westons head cider maker Guy Lawrence and Puritys founder Paul Halsey. As they meandered though hop bines and orchards at Ali Cappers Stocks Farm an idea struck them both. They shared a cursory look and both thought what if

Enjoying a drink at the end of the walk, looking out over the rows of hops and apple orchards, Guy told Paul to bring his finest hops to the cider mill where they would combine them with a unique blend of 100% cider apples. Two weeks later they poured two glasses straight from the tap."

19 September 2016 - Sam Coyne The Drinks Report, editorial assistant
The Earth's last intact wilderness areas are shrinking dramatically.

In a recently published paper we showed that the world has lost 3.3 million square kilometres of wilderness (around 10% of the total wilderness area) since 1993.

Hardest hit were South America, which has experienced a 30% wilderness loss, and Africa, which has lost 14%.

These areas are the final strongholds for endangered biodiversity. They are also essential for sustaining complex ecosystem processes at a regional and planetary scale.

Finally, wilderness areas are home to, and provide livelihoods for, indigenous peoples, including many of the world's most politically and economically marginalised communities.

But there's another important service that many wilderness areas provide: they store vast amounts of carbon. If we're to meet our international climate commitments, it is essential that we preserve these vital areas.

Climate consequences

Large, intact ecosystems store more terrestrial carbon than disturbed and degraded ones. They are also far more resilient to disturbances such as rapid climate change and fire.

For instance, the boreal forest remains the largest ecosystem undisturbed by humans. It stores roughly a third of the world's terrestrial carbon.

Yet this globally significant wilderness area is increasingly threatened by forestry, oil and gas exploration, human-lit fires and climate change. These collectively threaten a biome-wide depletion of its carbon stocks, considerably worsening global warming.

Our research shows that more than 320,000 sq.km of boreal forest has been lost in the past two decades.

Video: James Watson and James Allan explain their recent research.

Similarly, in Borneo and Sumatra in 1997, human-lit fires razed recently logged forests that housed large carbon stores. This released billions of tonnes of carbon, which some estimate was equivalent to 40% of annual global emissions from fossil fuels.

We found that more than 30% of tropical forest wilderness was lost since the early 1990s, with only 270,000 sq.km left on the planet.

How do we stop the destruction?

All nations need to step up and mobilise conservation investments that can help protect vanishing wilderness areas. These efforts will vary based on the specific circumstances of different nations.
Franklin County first-graders were the first to experience this years Franklin County Agricultural Fair as representatives from local organizations were on hand to demonstrate the importance of agriculture.

If not for the pollinators, we wouldnt have food or clothing, said Kathy Smith, program manager and education coordinator with the Blue Ridge Soil and Water Conservation District.

Smith was on hand this week, performing puppet shows and teaching students about the importance of pollination in nature.

First-graders from all 12 county elementary schools were bused to the Franklin County Recreation Park Wednesday to spend a day exploring the different aspects of agriculture and its significance in Franklin County.

Students from Franklin County High Schools agriculture department and FFA (Future Farmers of America) chapter gave students a peek at what agriculture classes they would be able to take in high school. They learned about horticulture, veterinary science, horses and their management, as well as the different species of wildlife.

Our students are very proud of what they do and what theyve made, said Jean Capps, agriculture department head and advisor for FFA. This event allows them to showcase this to the younger kids and to the community. It teaches them leadership skills, public speaking and responsibility.

The Southwest Virginia Antique Farm Days Club demonstrated the role of a 1915 Peerless steam engine in the agriculture of yesteryear. The engine was cranked and running so students were able to see it live and in action.

We hope to give them a little lesson in physics and chemistry, said club member Bob Most. At their age, in order to complete the picture, they need to see it actually running and doing things.

First-graders were not the only ones visiting the fair this week, as county third-graders got the experience on Thursday and fifth-graders today (Friday, Sept. 16).

With the third-graders, we were able to talk a little about simple machines and how they work, Most said. They are a little older and are learning about that in their classes.

Many of the exhibits reinforced SOL (Standards of Learning) skills and concepts students have already mastered, giving students the opportunity to ask many questions from the presenters, said Brenda Muse, director of curriculum and instruction. Students learn early on about the settlers and how they grew food and used locomotives for transporting food. This program helps to reinforce that knowledge.

Representatives from the West Piedmont Health District were also on hand to lead first-graders in a healthy activity, teaching mosquito safety and facts about the Zika virus.

The Skills USA students from FCHS worked with the third and fifth-graders, educating them on what classes are available for them in the CTE (Career and Technical Education) department at the high school. The teenagers set up booths and demonstrated their skills in subjects like welding, HVAC, automotives, TV production, robotics, forensics and more.

The exhibits were a great way for students to start considering possible careers in those areas, Muse said.

The Farm Bureau Womens Committee talked with students about ATV and lawnmower safety and the dangers of not wearing proper head gear.

The students really responded well to our presentation, said Mark Dawson, Farm Bureaus district field services director. We had a simple message for them. Wear their helmets, ride the correct size ATV and that one seat means one rider. Of all injuries, most of them are related to not wearing a helmet. If we can instill that one message, maybe it will save a life.

This learning program is unique in that we (Franklin County) are the only ones in this region that offers it, said Tourism Development Manager David Rotenizer.

Our partnership with the county and the Franklin County Recreation Park has been phenomenal, said Most. Were really good for each other.

In addition to agriculture lessons from local representatives, county students got a first-hand look at the fairs Dialed Action BMX stunt show, K-9s in Flight Frisbee Dogs show and petting zoo, which are all available at this years fair, in addition to the midway and the nightly return of the FCHS agriculture and Skills USA students, who will be available to explain their programs to the general public.
LEXINGTON  The Rocky Mount man convicted last year of displaying a noose in his yard has taken his case to the Virginia Court of Appeals.

At a trial last year in Franklin County Circuit Court, Jack Eugene Turner admitted he hung a dark, life-sized dummy in his yard on Lindsey Lane during an ongoing feud with his neighbors, a black family.

A sheriffs investigator later said Turner admitted he was a racist who did like black people but did not like n-----s.

But Turner is now challenging his felony conviction and on Tuesday in Rockbridge County Circuit Court both his lawyer, Holland Perdue, and Assistant Attorney General Christopher Schandevel, presented oral arguments before a three-judge panel.

As he had at Turners trial, Perdue argued that the display fell under protection by the First Amendment.

"True threats are not protected speech," Perdue allowed, but added, "There was no direct threat to any individual, directly."

"Your client ... is a self-described racist," Judge Richard AtLee observed. "It was clearly an effigy of color.

"How on earth are they supposed to take that?"

Perdue further argued that the wording of the 2009 law prohibits hanging a noose on a highway or other public place or on the private property of another without permission.

As the noose was displayed on Turners private property, Perdue claimed it did not require anyones permission and thus did not violate the statute.

In a brief to the court, Schandevel said Turner's conviction should be affirmed, arguing that his actions constituted unprotected threats, a classification Schandevel said remained unchanged by Turner's standing as the owner of the property where the noose was hung.

"Interpreting Virginia's noose statute to permit Turner's conduct would subvert the legislative intent as surely as interpreting Virginia's indecent exposure statute to permit a person to stand at the edge of his property and expose himself to passing motorists would subvert the legislative intent behind that statute," he wrote.

Whether the judges will consider Turner's display a threat, and how they will read the statute's wording in relation to the incident remains to be seen. They will now consider both Perdue's and Schandevel's briefs and arguments and issue an opinion at a later date, but there is no set time limit for that decision.

At Turner's trial in circuit court last September, Judge Joseph Canada rejected Turner's arguments.

"It was public and it was put there to intimidate," Canada said, and later sentenced him to six months in jail. The offense carries up to five years in prison and a $2,500 fine.

Turner already has served his jail time, but between his trial and his sentencing, he was rearrested after he violated the terms of his bond by posting a spray-painted sign in his yard that read: "Black n----- lives don't matter. Got rope?"

Last week, however, Turner sent a signed, handwritten letter to The Roanoke Times, dated Sept. 6, in which he expressed regret but did not specifically mention the incident with his neighbors or the noose.

"I would like to apologize to all Roanoke to Christiansburg and surrounding area African-Americans for my senseless and cruel actions," he wrote, simply. "I ask for your forgiveness."
God has given me so many of the desires of my heart.

After a 58-year career in the music industry, Charlie Daniels attributes his success to the blessings of God.

The latest blessing in his nearly 80 years of life is Daniels induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame, which is scheduled next month.

A deep desire of my heart was to become a member of the Grand Ole Opry, Daniels said during an interview with the News-Post. That dream came true in 2008. "Now, to be inducted into the Hall of Fame  there are no words. Its something you dont even dream about.

Although humble, Daniels is excited about receiving the medallion, as well as the plaque that will hang in the Hall of Fame.

Once I get it, Im not giving it back, he joked. Im keeping it.

Famous for his blend of Southern rock, blues and gospel music, a style he simply calls Americana, the fiddle player from Wilmington, N.C., is perhaps even more well known for his patriotism and values that resonate with his legion of fans.

These values are reflected in his songs, like Simple Man.

Well, you know whats wrong with the world today, people done gone and put their Bibles away. Theyre living by the law of the jungle, not the law of the land.

And In America, Daniels celebrates the rebirth of patriotism in the early 1980s following the Iran Hostage Crisis.

In recent years, Daniels has shared his thoughts and opinions online in a blog he amply named Soap Box. On July 1, he explained why America is still the greatest nation in the world and how our nation can overcome its current challenges.

America  despite her warts and wrinkles  is still by far the greatest nation the world has ever known, the only remaining Superpower and still the hope of free people everywhere, Daniels writes. With the help of God, and only with the help of God, we will get over this rough patch. I pray for America every day.

For many years, Daniels has supported Americas veterans, putting his money and star power where his mouth is, traveling all over the world to play for soldiers. He is also deeply involved in The Journey Home Project, which provides support for soldiers returning home from war with physical and psychological scars. The groups mission is to connect donors to veterans' organizations that do the most good.

Those soldiers who have placed their lives between us and our enemies are very dear to my heart, he said. And there is a huge disconnect between governmental bureaucracy and the needs of our veterans. Its a disgrace!

Daniels also supports The Journey Home Project with his annual Volunteer Jam concert and the Yellow Ribbon Program for veterans. However, his philanthropy doesnt stop with veterans causes. He also supports Angelus, which provides care for severely disabled adults in Florida, as well as programs that support abused and neglected children and teen suicide prevention.

When the Charlie Daniels Band plays at the Harvester Performance Center in Rocky Mount on Sept. 23, fans will be treated to the same hardcore show the band performs in larger venues all over the country. And, as always, the show will include gospel music.

We play the same show every night, he said. And Ive never played perfect yet.

Doors open at 7 p.m. and the concert starts at 8 p.m. For ticket information, visit harvester-music.com.
Iowa organizations earn grants from A Community Thrives initiative

Seven Iowa organizations receive grants from the USA TODAY Network to support families in need, local initiatives.
It's time to break down beer-lovers' favorite time of the year: Oktoberfest. The annual celebration of all things beer and German cuisine is back so before you grab a stein of ale, check out the history and numbers behind the fest.
When we think of raising our daughters to be entrepreneurs, we often think first of developing their money-smarts. And that's important. No entrepreneur will be successful if they can't develop, market, budget and invest in a savvy manner. But being an entrepreneur takes a certain mindset. A willingness to take calculated risk, the ability to know when to stick to your guns and when to change course, a love of brainstorming and the ability to understand what people want. That entrepreneurial mindset comes more easily to some kids (and adults) than others, but it's a skill that can be encouraged, and it pays dividends in all areas of life.

Here are four ways we can help our daughters be entrepreneurs -- not just in business, but in life:

1. Set the example.

Long before Melinda Gates became half of the Bill-and-Melinda-Gates powerhouse couple, she was Melinda French, one of four children growing up in a solidly middle-class family in Dallas. Education was key in the French household, and her parents, Ray and Elaine, were determined that all four children -- sons and daughters -- would attend college.

So Ray set up an entrepreneurship project on the side: operating rental properties. But it wasn't just Ray and Elaine doing the work every weekend. The kids pitched in, too, on all aspects of the venture. They cleaned. They mowed grass. And they learned all about the financial end of the business, too.

"We would help him run the business and keep the books," she told Fortune in 2008. "We saw money coming in and money going out."

That fundamental equality, that requirement that all the children participate in all aspects of the business, laid the foundation for Gates as she went on to college at Duke University and then, eventually, when she herself became a parent.

As her first daughter got older, Gates told Fortune, she realized it was her turn to set the example. So Gates ramped up her involvement in the couple's philanthropic foundation. "I really want her to have a voice, whatever she chooses to do," she said of her daughter. "I need to role-model that for her."

Related: Lack of Confidence, Fear of Failure Hold Women Back From Being Entrepreneurs

2. Break the mold.

Not every entrepreneur -- surprisingly -- is a natural at forging her own path. But that willingness to try, to adapt and to be persistent can be nurtured in our daughters.

When Indra Nooyi was a child in Madras, India, "there was a well-defined conservative stereotype," she told Adi Ignatius of Harvard Business Review last year. But even within the boundaries of not embarrassing her parents, Nooyi stretched her wings -- and her parents permitted it.

"Everything I did was breaking the framework" of 1950s and '60s Indian society, she told HBR. "I played in a rock band. I climbed trees. I did stuff that made my parents wonder,'What the hell is she doing?'" But they didn't hinder her exploration.

And in the process, she learned that she could not only hold her own, she could thrive.

Today, as president and CFO of PepsiCo, Nooyi continues that idiosyncratic exploration. She watches replays of Chicago Bulls games to study teamwork. She studied design with the late Steve Jobs of Apple, she told FastCompany.com, and adapted those lessons to PepsiCo products. She gives permission to -- no, expects -- those under her to find ways to adapt PepsiCo products to localized markets. And that leads us to ...

Related: Why Millennial Women Crave Authenticity

3. Don't hide your light.

Encourage your daughter to develop her unique point of view.

We often tell our daughters to "be yourself." For years, that often wasn't possible in the business world. But companies and, certainly, marketers, are finally discovering the benefit of listening to what half of the world's population has to say. So tell your daughter: If you have an idea, share it. If you have a suggestion, speak up. If someone disagrees and you still feel your idea has merit, don't abandon it.

PepsiCo's Nooyi has many stories of the ways being a woman, and a business executive whose roots were outside America has given PepsiCo an edge. She has a sense of how some products and changes will be perceived outside the American framework. If she were trying to fit into the traditional "American businessman" mold, she'd lose what makes her unique -- and she'd lose much of her influence.

Figure out what makes you unique, we must tell our daughters. Celebrate it, don't apologize for it or diminish its importance. Once they have that confidence and that self-knowledge, they'll have a set of qualities that sets them apart.

Related: 5 Powerful Rules for Women Entrepreneurs to Live By

4. It's OK to fail.

A dozen rejections for her first book. Unemployment. Divorce. A family member's death. Welfare.

The early 1990s were not kind to J.K. Rowling.

Now, of course, she's known as the mother of the Harry Potter universe. Her wealth has been compared to the Queen of England's. But in interviews, Rowling well remembers what it was like to be labeled a failure when measured against what society calls "success."

Our kids often feel pressure to "be perfect." They don't want to disappoint us, or fall out with friends, or be unpopular at school, so they stick with what they know: They may find it difficult to take chances.

It can be hard as parents to watch our daughters fail at something. We want to step in and smooth the path for them. But failure, Rowling says, can be freeing: If you're self-motivated, it can clear life's clutter and force you to focus on what you really want to do. She even titled her commencement address to Harvard's Class of 2008, "The Fringe Benefits of Failure, and the Importance of Imagination." "Rock bottom," she said, "became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life."

Show your daughter how to recover from failure. Demonstrate how to set a big goal, and then how to set milestones along the way to measure her progress. Help her figure out what lessons her failures are teaching her.

And remind her that, once she's on the right path again, she should share that encouragement and experience with others.

Related:

4 Ways Parents Can Foster an Entrepreneurial Spirit in Their Daughters

VC Funding's Gender Gap Is Hurting the Marketplace

Women-Owned Businesses Are Looming Large In North Dakota



Copyright 2016 Entrepreneur.com Inc., All rights reserved
BizCast

Doug Grimsted's software development company Aginity has an analytics hub that powers the entire enterprise. Aginity makes software that revolutionizes the way companies create, manage and deploy analytics, allowing companies to establish analytics as a new and valuable class of asset.

Grimsted is a seasoned technology startup and growth executive. He's an expert at determining where the puck is going and creating companies to serve the need and capture the value of being first. He's been recognized in Deloitte & Touche's "Fast 50" Program for Chicago, he won the prestigious KPMG Illinois High Tech Award in 1999, he's a member of the Chicago/NW Indiana Entrepreneurship Hall of Fame and he was a finalist for the E&Y Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 1999 and 2000. He's also the chairman of a database ANSI Committee.
The idea came to Charles Guiteau suddenly, like a ash, he would later say. On May 18, two days after New York Senator Roscoe Conklings dramatic resignation, Guiteau, depressed and perplexed wearied in mind and body, had climbed into bed at 8:00 p.m., much earlier than usual. He had been lying on his cot in his small, rented room for an hour, unable to sleep, his mind churning, when he was struck by a single, pulsing thought: If the President was out of the way every thing would go better.

Guiteau was certain the idea had not come from his own, feverish mind. It was a divine inspiration, a message from God. He was, he believed, in a unique position to recognize divine inspiration when it occurred because it had happened to him before. Even before the wreck of the steamship Stonington, he had been inspired, he said, to join the Oneida Community, to leave so that he might start a religious newspaper, and to become a traveling evangelist. Each time God had called him, he had answered.

This time, for the rst time, he hesitated. Despite his certainty that the message had come directly from God, he did not want to listen. The next morning, when the thought returned with renewed force, he recoiled from it. I was kept horried, he said, kept throwing it off. Wherever he went and whatever he did, however, the idea stayed with him. It kept growing upon me, pressing me, goading me.

Guiteau had no ill-will to the President, he insisted. In fact, he believed that he had given Gareld every opportunity to save his own life. He was certain that God wanted Gareld out of the way because he was a danger to the Republican Party and, ultimately, the American people.

On May 23, he again wrote to the president, advising him to demand Secretary of State James G. Blaines immediate resignation. I have been trying to be your friend, he wrote darkly. I do not know whether you appreciate it or not. Gareld would be wise to listen to him, he warned, otherwise you and the Republican party will come to grief. I will see you in the morning if I can and talk with you.

By the end of May, Guiteau had given himself up entirely to his new obsession. Alone in his room, with nowhere to go and no one to talk to, he pored over newspaper accounts of the battle between Conkling and the White House, xating on any criticism of Gareld, real or implied. I kept reading the papers and kept being impressed, he remembered, and the idea kept bearing and bearing and bearing down upon me. Finally, on June 1, thoroughly convinced of the divinity of the inspiration, he made up his mind. He would kill the president. from Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President

The Imaginative Conservative applies the principle of appreciation to the discussion of culture and politicswe approach dialogue with magnanimity rather than with mere civility. Will you help us remain a refreshing oasis in the increasingly contentious arena of modern discourse? Please consider donating now.

The featured image is an engraving of James A. Garfields assassination, published in Frank Leslies Illustrated Newspaper. This image is in the public domain and appears here courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
John Kerrys new cease-fire in Syria, launched this week after negotiations with Russia, is an admirable effort to bring a measure of peace to a shattered land. But its almost certainly doomed to fail  despite the diligence and even passion the secretary of State has devoted to it.

Too many forces, from Bashar Assads government to al-Qaidas Syrian offshoot, dont really want the cease-fire to last. And its not clear that anyone can stop them from blowing it up  least of all the Obama administration, which has sworn off military intervention on the ground.

Heres how the deal, negotiated by Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, is meant to work:

The Syrian government and Syrias moderate rebels  the ones supported by the United States  are supposed to stop shooting at each other. (So far, theyve mostly complied.)

The extremists of Islamic State and al-Qaida arent included; nobody expected them to cooperate. (The al-Qaida branch in Syria, formerly called Al Nusra Front, has rebranded itself as the Front for the Conquest of Syria, but its the same outfit.)

If the truce holds for seven days, the United States and Russia will set up a joint center to coordinate their air forces in attacks against Islamic State and the Front for the Conquest of Syria.

At that point, the Syrian air force, which has dropped thousands of primitive barrel bombs on its own citizens, will be required to stop attacking rebel-held zones. Routes will be opened to allow humanitarian aid convoys to bring food and medicine to areas the government has besieged.

And then, if all goes well, the government and the rebels will start negotiations to end the war for good.

That would be a remarkable diplomatic achievement  especially in view of the limited leverage the United States has applied so far.

Heres why its unlikely to work:

The two great powers involved in this conflict, the United States and Russia, both want a truce  nevertheless their basic goals are still far apart.

Kerry wants to push all sides into negotiations to set up a new Syrian government that would ease Assad out of power.

The Russians, who sent troops and planes to Syria last year to bolster Assad, mainly want to stabilize the government.

Assad not only wants to keep power, but he also wants to use the cease-fire to improve his military and diplomatic positions. Thats what he did, with help from the Russians, during a brief cease-fire earlier this year.

Opposition leaders hope the truce will end the governments siege of the rebel stronghold in Aleppo, Syrias largest city, but they fear that the broader effect will be to weaken their forces and strengthen the government.

Finally, Islamic State and the Front for the Conquest of Syria have already rejected the truce and can be counted on to try to foil it  in part to avoid becoming the only remaining targets for airstrikes.

There are practical problems, too, beginning with this: How is the truce going to be enforced?

For a cease-fire to work, you need a monitoring group on the ground  and there isnt one, Robert S. Ford, a former U.S. ambassador to Syria, told me.

If the Assad government violates the agreement, what then?

Without a Plan B, there is no useful or else, warned Frederic C. Hof of the Atlantic Councils Hariri Center on the Middle East. (As Plan B, he recommended U.S. strikes against the Syrian air force, an option President Obama has turned down.) And theres a longer-term risk, Hof added: If the U.S. and Russia succeed in defeating the Front for the Conquest of Syria, whats to stop the Assad government from restarting its war against the smaller, weaker opposition?

Finally, theres still no clear path to success in the peace negotiations Kerry wants to start  even if the government and the rebels show up.

Saying that were going to get everyone to the negotiating table isnt really a strategy, Ford said. Its going to take a lot longer, and the opposition is going to need a lot more support.

Kerry deserves credit for the work hes done to get this cease-fire started. Even a brief truce is better than none. I lived in Beirut during the early years of Lebanons civil war; days with cease-fires, even shaky ones, were generally safer than those without.

If the truce holds and humanitarian aid flows, Obama might even avoid the fate of leaving office with his Syria policy a symbol of unbroken failure.

But it doesnt look likely. This peace plan depends too heavily on scarce commodities: the wisdom of Syrias armed factions and the goodwill of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Theres an old rule in the Middle East: Its hard to go broke if you bet on pessimism.
Astros strike back to win Game 2 vs. Phillies, evening up World Series

The Houston Astros won Game 2 on Saturday night to send the World Series back to Philadelphia at 1-1.
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The Glen Carbon Board of Trustees approved the promotion of one police officer and the hiring of two new police officers at its last regular board meeting.

Glen Carbon Police Chief Todd Link said the success of the department would not be possible without the support of the board and the community.

In the 23 months Ive been here we have promoted one sergeant to lieutenant, three officers to sergeant and now we have hired six new police officers, he said. We could not do that without the support of the mayor and the board. All the police officers and the staff want you to know how much we appreciate the support of the board and the police commission.

The board promoted Officer Ryan Smith to the rank of sergeant

Link said Smith has been with the GCPD for 17 years.

Ryan has served the village and the police department for a long time and is a very conscientious and hard working officer, Link said. I know he will do a great job as our new patrol sergeant and I have all the faith in the world in Ryans ability.

Village Clerk Peggy Goudy swore Smith into his new position.

The new officers hired by the village were Jeffrey Hartsoe and Jeremy Coppotelli.

Link said both officers have great backgrounds in law enforcement.

Hartsoe, 34, has a bachelors degree in criminal justice from Lindenwood University. He has been a full-time certified police officer since 2008.

From 2008 to 2012 he worked for the Dallas Metropolitan Police Department in Texas. Since 2012 he served as a road deputy, investigator for the St. Clair County Sheriffs Department and served on the Greater St. Louis Major Case Squad.

Coppotelli, 34, holds an associates degree in administrative justice from Southwestern Illinois College.

He has been a full-time certified police officer since 2004.

He has worked for the Fairmount City and Caseyville police departments and was most recently a road deputy and Metro Link detail officer for the St. Clair County Sheriff's Department.

Mayor Rob Jackstadt congratulated Smith on his advancement and welcomed Hartsoe and Coppotelli to the department.

For the new officers, you have a great group of colleagues and we expect nothing but the best because they expect nothing but the best from you, he said. The work that the police do every day in this community is outstanding. Its a difficult job in the climate around the nation at this time and on behalf of the board and the 13,000 residents in the village we cant say thanks enough.
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Linkedin Dimas Muhamad (The Jakarta Post) Yogyakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

Borobudur is known for a lot of things, but holding a secret to Indonesias maritime adventures in the past is probably not one of them.



Philip Beale, from the UK, visited the Buddhist temple in 1982 and saw a carved stone relief of a ship with two outriggings, which he believed to be the proof of voyages across the Indian Ocean.



He was so convinced that 20 years later he initiated the construction of the ships replica, named Samudra Raksa (guardian of the ocean), and sailed with it in a seven-month expedition from Indonesia to Ghana to show that the ancient voyage using the ship was indeed possible.



The finding further reaffirms Indonesias maritime identity and its presence in the Indian Ocean, but more than that it also reinforces the notion that since immemorial times the Indian Ocean has always been a bridge that connects people across kingdoms and even continents.



Other oceans do that too, but the Indian Oceans history is somewhat exceptional. It has enabled relatively benign cross-border relations, and that is partly attributed to the fact that the relations were people driven.



Indonesia is a perfect example. Its immensely rich identity is shaped by external influences but it did not occur with the use of force. Our religious traditions from Hinduism to Islam were not imposed by malevolent invasion from kingdoms or sultanates outside the archipelago.



They were brought by traders, monks, scholars and ulema. While the ancient kings did have ties, it is clear that the people were the driving force behind the dynamic relations in the region.



Reflecting from that history, one of the most pivotal tasks for IORA (Indian Ocean Rim Association) is to nurture that people-to-people connectivity and to eventually make its cooperation more people driven.



That is essential for IORA to truly thrive. IORA members already enjoy solid political and official relations, they manage to stave off conflicts and they do an excellent job in maintaining regional peace and stability.



In order to elevate it to the next height, IORA needs to engage the people more, so that they can take part, own and advocate for a more vibrant IORA. If the people believe that a stronger IORA is in their interests, then they will encourage or even put pressure on their own government to pave the way for a stronger IORA.



Regrettably too many people in the region, including Indonesia, are in complete darkness as to what IORA does for them or even what IORA is. The fact of the matter is, IORA has made important headways in this area.



Some of IORAs priorities are aimed to strengthening people-to-people connectivity such as in academic, scientific and technological cooperation. Most importantly IORA has also established platforms for non-governmental parties including the IORA Academic Group and IORA Business Forum, which are commendable steps in the right direction.



Notwithstanding IORAs hard work, the severely lacking awareness toward IORA among the people means much more needs to be done.



As the current chair of IORA, Indonesia also seeks to promote the people-to-people connectivity. Indonesia is known for its efforts to consolidate the IORA institution such as through the formulation of the IORA Concord and the plan to convene the IORA summit next year. Aside from that, engaging the people is also an integral element of Indonesias IORA chairmanship.



This among others manifests through the convening of an international symposium under the theme of 20th Anniversary of IORA: Learning from the Past and Charting the Future now being held in Yogyakarta.



The symposium is an important initiative; it engages various stakeholders that include the private sector, scholars and officials both from IORA member states as well as dialogue partners.



The symposium provides a rare opportunity to various stakeholders to get their voices heard in helping IORA chart its future direction.



Some often criticizes IORA for being ineffective and lackluster. The symposium is their time to share their ideas on how to turn it around.



The outcome documents will also be disseminated to IORA officials, so that it will contribute to their deliberation in strengthening the association. The Indian Ocean is an incredibly strategic waterway as it carries half of worlds container ships and two thirds of the worlds oil shipments.



Furthermore, the Indian Ocean region also host a third of the global population. With its paramount importance, it is perplexing to witness how regionalism across the Indian Ocean still lags behind its peers in other oceans such as the Pacific.



Engaging the people and making IORA more people driven is one of the keys to help the association live up to its tremendous potential.



Indonesia is determined to work together with other IORA members and dialogue partners to enable the people taking part in the journey of IORA, owning its process and cultivating their sense of belonging to IORA. If the spirit of IORA goes beyond conference halls and become the household name among the people, then the people will finally be the engine that propels regional partnership forward, just like they once were.

***

The writer works for the Foreign Affairs Ministrys policy analysis and development division, which hosted the IORA symposium from Sept. 13 to 14 in Yogyakarta.

---------------

We are looking for information, opinions, and in-depth analysis from experts or scholars in a variety of fields. We choose articles based on facts or opinions about general news, as well as quality analysis and commentary about Indonesia or international events. Send your piece to community@jakpost.com. For more information click here.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the official stance of The Jakarta Post.
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Linkedin Adhitya S. Ramadianto Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

The trial of Jessica Kumala Wongso, who allegedly murdered her friend by pouring cyanide into her coffee, has arguably turned into an exhausting media circus. Each court session is broadcasted nationwide, every word and every gesture scrutinized to the point of irritation  even as some basic facts have not been established yet.

One early source of intense media speculation and subsequently ensuing public obsession is Jessicas mental health. After all, mentally-healthy people do not poison their friends  or do they?

The involvement of forensic psychiatrists and psychologists in the legal process is nothing out of the

ordinary.

However, media coverage exploits the simple fact that Jessica underwent psychiatric evaluation to fuel a long-standing narrative that people with mental disorders are extremely violent compared to those without.

Consequently, this world is painted as a dangerous one because unhinged criminals live freely among us. This narrative is not only misleading, but also damaging to people with mental health issues and to society in general.

First of all, the narrative downplays the vast range of mental disorders that impacts human behavior in very different ways. Formulating a diagnosis of mental disorders, like any other medical diagnosis, requires careful clinical interview and observation with sufficient time.

Yet, different news outlets gave Jessica wildly different diagnoses willy-nilly, mostly based on nothing more than a few minutes of video recordings. Irresponsible media attached any fancy-sounding psychiatric diagnosis they could find to Jessica just to keep the flames of sensationalism burning.

The scary idea of people with mental disorders are much more likely to commit violent acts is not based on sound evidence. The overwhelming majority of violence is done by people without mental disorders, and the absolute risk of violence by those with mental disorders is very low. Surveys found that members of the general public exaggerate the link between mental disorders and violence; they also overestimate their own risk of being a victim of violence committed by people with mental disorders.

To claim that mental disorder turns a person violent is a gross simplification of the complex web of factors surrounding violence. Numerous studies show multiple factors contributing to the risk of violence in mental disorders: age, sex, substance abuse, socioeconomic status, social stress and adverse personal history such as being abused as a child or witnessing parents fighting. Unsurprisingly, these are the same factors that increase violence risk in the general population. Living with mental disorder is not the sole predictor of committing violence.

This irresponsible and inaccurate media portrayal of mental health issues is harmful in many ways.

Stigma is a major barrier to accessing psychiatric treatment. People who feel that they need psychiatric help may defer seeking treatment because they feel that the risk of isolation and discrimination is too great to bear.

The resulting treatment gap is saddening because we know that the currently available range of treatments for mental disorders, both pharmacological and non-pharmacological, generally work well to control symptoms and improve quality of life, and that the sooner treatment is initiated the greater the chance that we will see positive outcome. Sadly, the best therapy in the world will not work if those who need it cannot access it.

Stigma inevitably leads to discrimination. Members of society avoid living, working, and socializing with people living with mental disorders, essentially depriving them of basic human rights. Many fear that getting psychiatric help will cost them their relationships, jobs, and all other parts that make up their lives. Such intense discrimination then engenders feelings of isolation and hopelessness, putting even more burden on those fighting against their mental disorder.

In fact, people with mental disorder are far more likely to be victims of violence and other forms of abuse.

Further down the line, the treatment gap and discrimination negatively impacts the welfare of society through higher healthcare costs, lost productivity and reduced quality of life.

The prevailing negative media portrayal of mental health and mental disorder actively contributes to the stigma attached to such illnesses and those who live with it, especially when we consider the immense influence mass media wields in shaping public perception. More people obtain information on mental health through print and electronic media than from mental health professionals.

Stakeholders have been working hard to fight the stigma against mental disorder because of the wide-ranging damage it poses to individuals and society. The media should be a partner in that fight, rather than exploiting baseless, harmful stigma for the sake of ratings and short-term profits.

_____________________________

The writer is a doctor living in Jakarta.
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Linkedin Ni Nyoman Wira (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

A standing ovation erupted at The Dock, Skylight Moynihan Station, the New York Fashion Week venue, following the finale of the hijab and modest wear collection from Indonesian designer Anniesa Hasibuan.

Called DJAKARTA, the collection consists of 48 looks, 38 ready-to-wear pieces and 10 evening gowns, all rich gold, brown, peach and green shades with intricate details combined with jewelry as well as shoes designed by Anniesa.

A photo posted by Anniesa Hasibuan (@anniesahasibuan) on Sep 13, 2016 at 6:32am PDT

After the show, Anniesa was featured in numerous magazines, such as Teen Vogue and Elle, and received glowing responses from fashion critics and bloggers. Voice of America Indonesia (VOA Indonesia) reported, I didnt recognize this designer, but I was amazed when I saw the collection; her work is extraordinary, especially the color combinations and intricacy of the outfits, said fashion critic and curator Megan Gallhehar from Global Glam magazine.

Anniesa made history last night as the first designer to showcase an entire collection of hijab designs and the first Indonesian designer at NYWF, wrote Haute Hijab chief executive officer Melanie Elturk.

(Read also: Bringing Indonesias Muslim fashion to the New York stage)

A photo posted by Anniesa Hasibuan (@anniesahasibuan) on Sep 13, 2016 at 6:53am PDT

Twenty-eight years of age, Anniesa began her fashion career last year when she debuted her collection in London in March. She later exhibited her collection at the Jakarta Fashion Week, Istanbul Modest Fashion Week and New York Fashion Week. In Indonesia, her boutique can be found in Kemang, South Jakarta.

I want to bring Indonesia's name to the fashion world and introduce people to the different and diverse parts of our country, she told The Jakarta Post. (kes)
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Linkedin (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Thu, September 15 2016

The Indonesian Migrant Workers Network (JBMI) has called into question President Joko Jokowi Widodos statement that Indonesia would proceed with a plan to execute Philippine death row inmate Mary Jane Veloso after his meeting with visiting Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte at the State Palace in Jakarta on Friday.

JBMI Hong KongMacau coordinator Sringatin said Jokowis decision revealed his administrations uncompassionate stance toward the fate of migrant workers falling victim to human trafficking and drug syndicates.

Mary Jane is a victim, just like dozens of female Indonesian migrant workers who are currently facing death sentences abroad. Moreover, a legal process to charge a recruiter, who had entrapped her, is ongoing in the Philippines. Will the Indonesian government execute a victim who is still fighting for justice? she said as quoted by kompas.com in a written statement on Wednesday.

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Linkedin Wimar Witoelar (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Thu, September 15 2016

Last week an investigative team from the Environment and Forestry Ministry was ambushed as it investigated fire-ravaged concession lands in Rokan Hulu, Riau.

Later, a team from the Peatland Restoration Agency (BRG) was prevented by security staff from the Riau Andalan Pulp and Paper (RAPP) company from conducting an inspection to collect data on the opening of new peatlands and the construction of canals as reported by the local community.

This confrontational dynamic can be traced back to 2015. At the Paris Climate Summit in December 2015 (COP21), President Joko Jokowi Widodo in an important part of his opening address outlined his plan to reduce emissions by revamping the management of forests and land use.

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Linkedin Zaki Habibi (The Jakarta Post) Lund, Sweden  Fri, September 16 2016

Public art: Artwork can be enjoyed inside and outside of galleries and museums in Scanian cities. Dunkers Kulturhus (Culture House) in Helsingborg realized the potential of public engagement in art when it put this installation outside the building.

What makes a city memorable? Could it be its history, culinary experience, or even its expression of creativity?

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Linkedin Liza Yosephine (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

Activists in Jakarta are intensifying efforts to raise awareness ahead of World AIDS Day on Dec. 1, with a series of activities, including a social media campaign under the hashtag #KamuBisa (You Can).

The Indonesian AIDS Foundation (YAI) will run a series of events, presenting music performances and talk shows attended by all members of society, at various malls around the capital to raise public awareness about HIV and AIDS.

"These events have a mission to convey the message that it is not only we [YAI] who care about HIV and AIDS in Indonesia, but also all members of society," according to a statement released on Friday.

The team of YAIs campaign this year is "You can be infected! You can prevent it" as well as to extend empathy toward those who are infected.

YAI noted that on average 89 people throughout the first quarter of the year were infected with HIV every day, while four people were infected by AIDS each day. The foundation believes the real figure is higher, referring to the official numbers as "just the tip of the iceberg".

"If there isn't awareness and serious prevention, it will be no surprise if HIV and AIDS numbers rise every day, month and year in Indonesia," YAI said in its statement. (bbn)
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Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

The Villages, Disadvantaged Regions and Transmigration Ministry is planning to develop aqua culture in an effort to improve conditions in the countrys impoverished far-flung outer islands.

Local residents will be involved in tapping its marine potential for their welfare in the new business projects that will include pearl culture, fishpond development, capture fishery, salt production, seaweed cultivation and downstream processing.

Three regenciesthe Morotai Islands in North Maluku, Western Southeast Maluku in Maluku and Sabu Raijua in East Nusa Tenggarahave been earmarked for pilot projects in the next three years.

We will oversee the business lines from production, downstream processing, packaging and marketing, the ministrys director general for the development of specific areas, Suprayoga Hadi, told The Jakarta Post on the sidelines of a meeting in Jakarta on Thursday.

The projects are expected to help promote conservation in the regions, where blast fishing has been blamed for widespread destruction of marine resources.

Once the projects were in place, Suprayoga said, the ministry wanted to see stricter law enforcement on the environment. (rez/bbn)
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Linkedin Ayomi Amindoni (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

Business integration between Sun Life Indonesia and a subsidiary of Malaysian financial group CIMB, CIMB Sun Life, will double the sales of bancassurance in the Canadian life insurance company to about 40 percent from 20 percent.

Bancassurance is a partnership between a bank and an insurance company to use the lenders offices to sell insurance products to its clients.

Sun Life Financial Indonesia president director Elin Waty explained before the start of the business integration, the contribution of insurance agents to the premium sales was between 75 and 80 percent, while the remainder came from bancassurance.

"Following the integration, the contribution of insurance agents and bancassurance will be 60 percent and 40 percent, respectively. In the future, we expect the contribution will be an equal 50 percent," Elin told reporters in Jakarta on Thursday.

She further explained that the integration would also create total assets of Rp 9.14 trillion, comprising Rp 6.7 trillion worth of assets from Sun Life and Rp 2.4 trillion from CIMB Sun Life. "With this integration, we are integrating management in the two companies. This will automatically strengthen us both," Elin said.

The merger will strengthen Sun Life Financial's commitment to invest US$40 million to increase its online penetration and strengthen its brand presence in Indonesia. (ags)
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Linkedin Farida Susanty (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

While many keen travelers are familiar with the names on the governments list of promoted tourist destinations, like Mandalika in West Nusa Tenggara and Morotai Island in North Maluku, those who have never set foot in those places might have a few basic questions.

How do I get there? How do I get around?

The government seems to be taking these questions more seriously, as institutions like the Public Works and Public Housing Ministry and the Transportation Ministry have pledged to prioritize the development of infrastructure in 10 areas listed recently as the countrys priority tourist destination.

The Public Works and Public Housing Ministry, for example, has included the construction of roads in five priority destinations, namely Lake Toba in North Sumatra,

Mount Bromo in East Java, Mandalika, Labuan Bajo in East Nusa Tenggara as well as Raja Ampat in West Papua, in its strategic program to build 796 kilometers of new roads next year.

We are actually just continuing what have already been doing. But now, as we are more focused on development there, we might even take over road construction projects that were under regional administrative responsibility, Public Works and Public Housing Ministry secretary general Taufik Widjoyono told The Jakarta Post recently.

The infrastructure support would not be limited to roads, but also extend to sanitation, clean water, waste management as well as homestay, Taufik said, adding that a master plan for infrastructure in tourist destinations was currently being drafted in cooperation with the Tourism Ministry.

The ministry has recently assigned state construction firm Hutama Karya, in charge of the 2,600-km Trans-Sumatra project, to build a 90-km toll road connecting Tebingtinggi and Prapat in North Sumatra, specifically to support tourism near Lake Toba, a scenic volcanic lake.

Tourism is one of five designated priority sectors for the administration of President Joko Jokowi Widodo.

The government has proclaimed a target of attracting 20 million foreign tourists a year by 2019, twice the 2015 figure, with the 10 emerging destinations promoted by the government expected to contribute strongly to growth in the industry.

However, the 2015 World Economic Forum (WEF) Global Travel and Tourism Report found that while holding the third spot on a list of 141 countries in terms of price competitiveness, Indonesias infrastructure for air transportation ranked 39th, lower than that of neighboring Malaysia in 21st position. Indonesias ground and port infrastructure was ranked even lower in 77th place, compared to Malaysias 35th.

Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi acknowledged the gap and pledged to develop transportation infrastructure, such as airports.

[The development] can be handled by the government or state-owned enterprises, he said.

Next year, the ministry plans to extend runways at 18 airports and build new terminals at 11 airports.

The head of the West Nusa Tenggara chapter of the Association of Indonesian Tours and Travel Agencies (Asita), Dewantoro Umbu Joka, said the infrastructure development was crucial to attract investors to build amenities.

It will prompt the private sector to also develop the area, he said.
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Linkedin Anwarullah Khan (Associated Press) Khar, Pakistan  Fri, September 16, 2016

A suicide bomber attacked a mosque in northwest Pakistan on Friday, killing at least 16 worshippers and wounding 25 others, officials said.

The attacker shouted "God is Great" as he entered the mosque in the village of Ambar in Pakistan's Mohmand tribal region, government administrator Naveed Akbar told The Associated Press. He said rescuers were transporting the dead and wounded to nearby hospitals.

Pashin Gul, the head of local tribal police, confirmed that it was a suicide attack. He said the bombing took place during Friday prayers, adding that several of the wounded were in a critical condition.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack. The country has witnessed several large-scale militant attacks this year, claimed by an offshoot of the Pakistani Taliban and the Islamic State group.

Pakistan's tribal regions, which border Afghanistan, were considered to be strongholds of Pakistani Taliban militants until 2014 when the military launched a major operation there, evicting and killing large numbers of insurgents. However, violence has continued in some of the tribal regions.

Friday's attack came hours after army chief Gen. Raheel Sharif met with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to discuss security issues. According to a government statement, Sharif pledged to continue the war against terrorism.

The military says some 18,000 civilians and 5,000 soldiers have been killed in militant attacks in Pakistan since the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, when Islamabad threw its support behind Washington in the war on terror.

____

Associated Press writer Riaz Khan in Peshawar contributed to this report
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Linkedin Indra Budiari (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

With eviction just around the corner, and knowing that they can do little to stop it, most residents of Bukit Duri in South Jakarta have packed their belongings and accepted the citys offer to be relocated to a low-cost apartment complex (rusunawa).

The Tebet district office recorded that as of Thursday, as many as 305 out of 440 households, whose houses are marked for demolition, had voluntarily dismantled their houses and registered for an apartment at the Rawa Bebek Rusunawa in East Jakarta.

As more people have left their houses, we plan to start the demolition of empty houses on Tuesday, district head Mahludin said on Thursday.

To make way for the Ciliwung River flood mitigation program, the city administration is set to relocate households who live on the riverbank and move them to the Rawa Bebek Rusunawa.

The plan, however, has faced resistance from some local residents and human rights group who

believe that moving the locals to a vertical housing complex 14 kilometers from their old neighborhood will only reduce their standard of living.

The residents and the rights group have also criticized the government for not giving the residents a say in the eviction and relocation process even though they are ones who are most affected.

Despite various criticisms, Jakarta Governor Basuki Ahok Tjahaja Purnama has defended his policy, saying the houses disrupt the river restoration project aimed at reducing floods in the capital.

Ahok said he would ignore the objections of NGO activists until they presented a viable alternative to his plan.

They can protest if they want, but give me another solution, the governor said on Saturday.

Out of desperation, the residents have filed a class-action lawsuit against the plan with the Jakarta District Court. However, the ongoing legal process does not seem to bother the city administration. The administration recently issued a second warning letter, urging the residents to leave their houses.

As the eviction appears unavoidable, the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) has demanded that it be carried out with as few violations as possible, referring to earlier evictions that were tarnished by clashes between residents and officials and the military.

Despite the questionable legality of military involvement, the Jakarta Legal Aid Institute (LBH Jakarta) recorded that the military took part in 65 out of the 113 evictions carried out by the administration in 2015.

In August, an eviction in Kampung Pulo, East Jakarta, made headlines when a clash broke out. Some residents were injured in the clash.

On Sept. 1, dozens of residents of Rawajati, Pancoran, South Jakarta, clashed with military personnel while trying to defend their homes from demolition. The residents and the military personnel pushed and jostled one other.

Komnas HAM commissioner Hafid Abbas said the involvement of the military was unnecessary as the evictees were not enemies of the state and should not be treated as such.

I hope with the Bukit Duri eviction the city administration will only deploy Satpol PP [Public Order Agency] officers instead of asking for assistance from the military or the police, he said.

The Jakarta Military District Command (Kodam Jaya) has denied allegations that it had broken the law by getting involved in the evictions, saying that all it had done was to protect the residents from violent encounters with the officials.

Our presence was asked for by the city administration and we were there only as backup, nothing else, Kodam Jaya claimed.
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Linkedin Indra Budiari (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16 2016

With eviction just around the corner, and knowing that they can do little to stop it, most residents of Bukit Duri in South Jakarta have packed their belongings and accepted the citys offer to be relocated to a low-cost apartment complex (rusunawa).

The Tebet district office recorded that as of Thursday, as many as 305 out of 440 households, whose houses are marked for demolition, had voluntarily dismantled their houses and registered for an apartment at the Rawa Bebek Rusunawa in East Jakarta.

As more people have left their houses, we plan to start the demolition of empty houses on Tuesday, district head Mahludin said on Thursday.

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Linkedin Liza Yosephine (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

It is estimated some 50 convicted terrorists continue to resist the government's prison deradicalization efforts, a top counterterrorism official has said.

"There are still 50 people who burden us. We are thinking about how psychologists and ulema [Muslim religious leaders] can reach out to them. We are also trying to find other ways of connecting with them, including by taking care of their families and children, National Counterterrorism Agency (BNPT) chief Comr. Gen. Suhardi Alius said on Thursday.

Suhardi was speaking during a hearing with House Commission III overseeing law, human rights and legal affairs, about the progress of the agency's prison deradicalization program. The program was implemented in March this year after the government identified 242 convicted terrorists who continued to hold radical ideas.

The program, which extends throughout 70 prisons and two detention centers, is divided into four levels, depending on the progress of the deradicalization process, Suhardi said.

Level one means that the terrorists refuse to follow the program. The 50 convicted terrorists highlighted by Suhardi fall into this category.

Meanwhile, around 63 convicted terrorists are categorized as belonging to level two. Level two means that the terrorists meet with authorities, but refuse to engage in deradicalization.

However, Suhardi remains optimistic, noting that over 100 people have complied with the program so far.

Level three means that the terrorists cooperate with authorities, but refrain from inviting other radicals to join in the program. Level four is reserved for those who have progressed in the deradicalization process and are also open to inviting others to participate in the program, Suhardi said. (evi)
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Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

Indonesian Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati held an unplanned press conference on Thursday night in the House of Representatives building in Senayan, Central Jakarta, in response to news reports that Singaporean banks reported Indonesians participating in the tax amnesty program to Singaporean police.

I directly checked with Singaporean authorities, specifically Deputy Prime Minister Tarman, to get official explanation from the Singaporean government, she said as quoted by kompas.com.

Sri Mulyani said the Singaporean government told her they had encouraged all banks in Singapore to support their clients wanting to join the Indonesian tax amnesty program.

Singapore also has rules stipulated by its Financial Action Task Force that banks must follow. The rules say banks have to report any suspicious transactions to prevent illegal activities or money laundering.

However, Sri Mulyani said Singaporean authorities said Indonesians joining the amnesty could not be considered an action that could trigger a criminal investigation.

Therefore, Indonesian taxpayers should not worry about being reported for participating in the tax amnesty, she said.

She said Indonesian and Singaporean governments continued their cooperation to close all loopholes that could be made into excuses for Indonesian taxpayers not to join the amnesty.

Previously, news reports quoting various sources said Singaporean private banks brought the list of clients joining the Indonesian tax amnesty program to Singaporean police.

"The moment the client tells you [their] participating in the amnesty, you have a suspicion that the assets with you are not compliant, and so you have to report it to the authorities," said a senior executive at a Singapore-based wealth manager as quoted by The Strait Times. (evi)
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Linkedin Andre de Boer (The Jakarta Post) Berlin  Fri, September 16 2016

A new era in Indonesia-EU trade will begin in just a few weeks, as Indonesia becomes the first country in the world to have its timber products  from floorboards to furniture  exempted from the EUs strict controls against illegal logging.

In forested nations like Indonesia, illegal logging has long deprived the government of tax revenue, caused deforestation, undercut law-abiding businesses and thwarted sustainable timber production.

Global efforts to limit climate change suffer, as do indigenous peoples and other communities that depend on forests for their incomes and way of life.

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Linkedin Prima Wirayani (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

The government is turning to internet giant Google, which it claims owes unpaid taxes from its advertising revenue, as the latest data show that tax collection remains pitifully low.

In a press briefing on Thursday, the head of the Taxation Directorate Generals Jakarta branch Muhammad Hanif said Google had rejected a request, sent in April, for permission to examine its tax reports.

It refused to be investigated by us. We will move forward by investigating it soon because its refusal indicates [that] a criminal act [occurred], Hanif said, adding that the tax office would launch an investigation into Google as soon as possible.

He said that Google only allocated 4 percent of its revenues to be taxed, a figure that the tax office claims is unfair, considering that the giant receives much more from advertising income in Indonesia.

We dont know where it gets its advice from, but it now refuses to be named as a BUT [permanent establishment], Hanif stated, pointing to the governments requirement that global tech giants offering services in the country  such as Google, Facebook and Twitter  set up permanent entities and pay taxes or risk having their services shut down.

However, the BUT requirement itself has yet to have a legal basis because the Communications and Information Ministry is still drafting the regulation.

Communications and Information Minister Rudiantara previously also promised to provide enough time for the tech giants to comply.

Meanwhile, the tax offices statement came amid the revelation that participation in the tax amnesty program remains low and nationwide tax revenue collection moves at a snails pace.

-(Directorate General of Taxation/-)

According to data from the tax office, year-to-date collection stood at below 50 percent of its target at only Rp 656.11 trillion (US$49.74 billion) as of Sept. 13, with less than four months until year-end.

However, the tax office claims that the nominal figure is still higher compared to what it booked in the same period in 2015.

The highest growth was booked by non-oil and gas income tax, with 8.32 percent year-on-year growth, said the Taxation Directorate Generals tax compliance director Yon Arsal.

Value added tax (VAT) was lower compared to last year on the back of low imports, he added.

Going forward, Yon said his office would make its best effort to meet the target, even though Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati has already forecast a Rp 218 trillion tax revenue shortfall for 2016.

The tax amnesty program, which the government had been promoting as a solution to plug the shortfall, has been a damp squib. The programs penalty payments only amounted to Rp 14.9 trillion as of Sept. 13 from the targeted Rp 165 trillion.

Commenting on the latest situation, Mohammad Faisal, Center for Reform in Economics (CORE) research director, said the low revenue realization increased concern that the shortfall could possibly be higher than expected.

This is caused by a too-high revenue target set by the government amid low tax potential, he said by phone.

PermataBank economist Josua Pardede shared a similar concern, saying the shortfall could be worse than the governments projection. It will be difficult to boost the collection even with the tax amnesty, he said.

Separately, Google claims to have complied with existing government regulations.

We continue to cooperate fully with local authorities and pay all applicable taxes, a Google Indonesia spokesman said in an emailed response to questions, as reported by Reuters.
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Linkedin (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16 2016

Fishermen have said that the low-cost apartment blocks, which the city plans to develop to accommodate those affected by the ongoing reclamation projects, were not suited to their occupations.

We cant live far from the coast because we need to monitor our boats continuously, said Iwan, who is member of the Traditional Fishermen Community (KNT) in Jakarta, adding that an apartment was not a home for a fisherman.

Previously, Coordinating Maritime Affairs Minister Luhut Pandjaitan and Jakarta Governor Basuki Ahok Tjahaja Purnama vowed to construct around 20,000 low-cost apartment units in Muara Baru, North Jakarta, and Cakung Cilincing, East Jakarta, for the fishermen.

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Linkedin (The Jakarta Post) Tangerang  Fri, September 16 2016

The Tangerang Council promised fishermen in Dadap, Tangerang, that they would be fully involved in a low-income area improvement program to develop their fishing village into Kampung Baru Dadap (New Dadap Kampung) during a meeting Wednesday.

The councillors have been deliberating a bylaw on slum prevention and improvement programs, and Dadap fishermen have urged the administration to follow the principles of the bylaw in upgrading their kampung.

We come to follow up on the slum improvement plan, residents want to be involved in the bylaw deliberation, a resident representative, Waisul Kurnia, said in a statement made available on Wednesday.

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Linkedin Bambang Muryanto (The Jakarta Post) Yogyakarta  Fri, September 16 2016

The Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA) urged closer cooperation among member countries in an 11-point document called the Yogyakarta Message.

The said document will be presented to the 16th Council of Ministers Meeting in October 2016 in Bali. We hope it can contribute toward strengthening IORA as an institution as well as contributing to the formulation of the IORA Concord and action plan, head of the Foreign Ministrys Policy Planning and Development Agency, Siswo Pramono, said at the close of a two-day symposium on Thursday.

The symposium was held to commemorate IORAs 20th anniversary. Some 200 government officials and experts from 12 of 21 member countries attended the event as well as those from six dialogue partners and diplomats stationed in Indonesia.

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Linkedin Callistasia Anggun Wijaya (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

Jakartas General Elections Commission (KPU Jakarta) has threatened to exclude Jakarta Governor Basuki Ahok Tjahaja Purnama from the candidate list for next years gubernatorial election if he refuses to take leave during the campaign period.

According to a new regulation, if incumbents who have been declared candidates refuse to take leave during the campaign period, they will be eliminated from their [race], KPU Jakarta chairman Sumarno said in Jakarta Friday.

In August, Ahok had filed a judicial review with the Constitutional Court to demand the court annul the leave requirement stipulated in the Regional Elections Law.

Ahok said he refused to take leave because he did not plan on holding a campaign. He said he preferred to focus on preparing the 2017 Jakarta city budget bill. Hearings on the issue are still taking place.

Sumarno said any candidate, when registering with the KPU Jakarta, had to submit a letter declaring their readiness to take leave during the campaign period.

But he said should the Constitutional Court decide in favor of Ahok's request, the commission would abide by the courts decision and would revise its regulations accordingly.

Separately, Ahok said he would take leave if the court rejected his judicial review or failed to make a decision on the matter until the campaign period begins. (bbn)
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Linkedin Greg Duly (The Jakarta Post) Bangkok  Fri, September 16 2016

As Taiwan and China count the cost of category five Super Typhoon Meranti, the lingering effects of a slow changing weather pattern are simultaneously causing havoc across our region.

Despite being pronounced dead in April, the impact of whats been touted the Godzilla El Nino is still being felt by more than 30 million people in Asia, and 60 million around the world.

The UN says the global figure could reach 100 million by years end with food shortages yet to peak.

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Linkedin Marguerite Afra Sapiie (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

The Religious Affairs Ministry expressed concern on Thursday over the spread of radical ideologies through dakwah (religious outreach) programs aired by local television and radio stations that featured radical clerics.

Television and radio stations should conduct thorough and proper screening of religious preachers before giving them airtime because citizens often considered electronic media as a source of trustworthy information, the Ministry's secretary-general, Nur Syam, said.

"We are sometimes disappointed that figures who we know as radicals are invited [onto shows] as speakers. Television and radio stations should be aware of [the need for] conducting proper screening," Nur Syam said during a hearing at the House of Representatives.

He further urged lawmakers in the House special committee tasked with deliberating the Terrorism Law to insert articles in the terrorism bill that would give officials the authority to ban media outlets that spread radical ideologies that went against the nation's ideology.

This would include hate speech, anti-nationalism, as well as provocations to commit violence toward certain persons or community groups, he went on.

Meanwhile, special committee member Martin Hutabarat from the Gerindra party said that aside from radical dakwah circulating on television and radio stations, the government should also monitor religious outreach programs conducted in houses of worship in order to prevent the spread of radicalism. (dmr)
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Linkedin Ruslan Sangadji (The Jakarta Post) Palu, Central Sulawesi  Fri, September 16, 2016

The captured leader of the East Indonesia Mujahidin (MIT) terrorist group Mohammad Basri, alias Bagong, has undergone a psychiatric evaluation following his arrest on Wednesday.

Basri underwent the evaluation on Friday as part of a thorough health check-up at Bhayangkara Police Hospital in Palu, Central Sulawesi, Operation Tinombala spokesman Sr.Comr. Hari Suprapto said on Friday.

"The mental examination is important before the investigation process starts at the police's criminal investigation directorate," he told The Jakarta Post.

Hari declined to give any details about the health check but said Basri looked stressed and under pressure.

Basri was second-in-command after the notorious MIT leader Santoso, alias Abu Wardah, who was shot dead in an ambush in July. Basri and his wife Nurmi Usman surrendered to Tinombala personnel in Tangkura village in South Poso Pesisir on Wednesday morning and were transferred to Central Sulawesi Police headquarters in Palu for investigation.

Basri did not divulge what he and his group had done during their periods in the mountainous forests of Poso in a brief interview with The Jakarta Post. He also declined to explain his decision to surrender to the security personnel after the death of Santoso.

In the interview, he only said he was well treated by the police.

"I eat well here. I have to refuse food because theres too much," Basri told the Post in an interview at the Police headquarters.

His long hair had been cut short and he wore clean clothes. He also showed off his neatly manicured nails in contrast to how they looked after spending years hiding in woods as an MIT militant. (rin)
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Linkedin Ruslan Sangadji (The Jakarta Post) Palu  Fri, September 16, 2016

Members of the East Indonesia Mujahidin (MIT) detained during Operation Tinombala have revealed the names and the graves of people they killed in recent years

Operation Tinombala Task Force spokesperson, Adj. Sr. Comr. Hari Suprapto said the suspects admitted they killed I Nyoman Astika, 70, a resident of Balinggi village, Parigi Moutong regency in Central Sulawesi.

They beheaded the victim, Hari said.

The suspects also admitted to killing two Sedoa villagers in Lore Utara district in 2014 and three villagers from Tamadue, Lore Timur. The latter three were identified as: Garataudu, Harun Tobio, and Ditla Tetelembu. The three were kidnapped as they were looking for rattan and the MIT members later killed them.

They gave us the direction to the graves of the three men, Hari went on Thursday.

Operation Tinombala personnel have been deployed to search for the graves and retrieve the remains.

The team arrested a MIT prominent figure in Central Sulawesi on Wednesday, identified as Basri. The police are sending him to the National Police headquarters in Jakarta for further questioning. (evi)
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Linkedin Marguerite Afra Sapiie (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

At least 80 percent of domestic worker mistreatment cases reported to law enforcement in Jakarta this year do not enter legal processing as they are discontinued by police, the National Network for Domestic Workers Advocacy (Jala PRT) has said.

In a report submitted to the National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas Perempuan), Jala PRT revealed that from 217 cases of mistreatment against housemaids up to mid-September, only seven cases had successfully begun legal processing until reaching court, while the 210 other cases remained unsolved.

The 217 cases included 41 cases of multiple rights violations, namely a combination of physical, mental, economic and sexual abuse; 102 cases of physical abuse such as beating, isolation and trafficking; and also 74 cases of wages being unpaid including bonuses, Jala PRT national coordinator Lita Anggraini said.

"We have tried to resolve the issue together and report the cases to the police, however, because they [the police] believe we don't have enough evidence [most of the time], they don't initiate investigations into the cases, where about 80 percent have been dropped," Lita said on Thursday.

Meanwhile, Komnas Perempuan commissioner Magdalena Sitorus said the nations laws had yet given sufficient protection for domestic workers' rights.

Therefore, Magdalena said, the country should accommodate domestic workers' pleas for protection by taking proactive measures to legislate the domestic worker protection draft bill and ratify ILO Convention No. 189 on decent work for domestic workers. (dmr)
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Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

National Police chief Gen. Tito Karnavian said on Friday that police internal affairs were investigating Lampung Police deputy chief. Sr. Comr. Krishna Murti in connection with a report of a woman being attacked by a police officer, causing wounds to her face.

Krishna, who is former Jakarta Polices crime and detective division head, has denied that he had attacked this woman.

Yes, [Krishna] will be surely summoned by police internal affairs. He had clarified to the media that he did not commit the attack, Tito said at National Police headquarters in Jakarta.

Although Krishna had denied the allegations, the National Police would carry out an investigation. I have told internal affairs to look closely into the case. We will start to know the facts, he added.

Meanwhile, National Polices internal affairs division head Insp. Gen. Muhammad Iriawan stressed that his division would soon carry out the investigation.

We will investigate what really happened. We will collect the photos that have been circulating in the media [as evidence], he added. (bbn)
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Linkedin Liza Yosephine (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

The Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) must play a strategic role in becoming a responsible global partner that is beneficial for its people, Foreign Minister Retno LP Marsudi has said ahead of the bloc's upcoming summit.

"This world needs a NAM of the 21st century, which is a [movement] that is broad-minded, pragmatic, innovative and efficient," Retno said in a statement released by the Foreign Ministry on Friday.

The minister is currently in Venezuela with an Indonesian delegation led by Vice President Jusuf Kalla for the 17th NAM summit to be held on the Caribbean island of Margarita on Sept. 17 to 18.

Venezuela, under its President Nicolas Maduro, is set to take over the chairmanship from Iran, which had held the position since 2012.

The theme of the summit this year, "Peace, Sovereignty and Solidarity for Development" was a reflection of the basic principles of the bloc, Retno said. However, she continued, since its establishment 55 years ago, the NAM was still being overshadowed by a lack of peace, sovereignty and solidarity, especially amid rising global challenges.

Retno emphasized three steps that needed to be taken by the organization's 120 members, which began from strengthening the spirit of multilateralism where every country had an equal voice.

The NAM, secondly, had to contribute to handling of global economic challenges through inclusive global partnership. Finally, the NAM also had to reform internally to improve the workings of the bloc to avoid being trapped as a "talk shop organization", she outlined.

The two-day high-level meeting is set to produce the Margarita Declaration, which would include assertions from member heads of state on the various principles and shared values of the NAM. (rin)
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Linkedin (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

The American Indonesian Exchange Foundation (AMINEF) and PT Freeport Indonesia agreed on Thursday to provide scholarships for students from Papua and West Papua to study at community colleges in the US for two semesters through the Community College Initiative (CCI) program.

Freeport is providing US$1 million to fund the scholarship program from 2016 to 2020. Freeport previously funded the same program from 2010-2015, sending roughly 36 students to study in the US through CCI.

This agreement requires a continued collaboration between Freeport and AMINEF, which began in 1998. As many as 26 Indonesian students have received opportunities to earn masters degrees in the US through the Fulbright program, which is a US government funded exchange program.

Freeport had recently given over $2.4 million to AMINEF in response to their recent commitment, Michael Manufandu, a senior advisor from Freeport said.

We need to inform the public that Freeport has good intentions to improve the quality of education in Indonesia, especially in Papua.

AMINEF is a binational organization managing the Fulbright program and other educational exchange programs funded by the US and Indonesian governments.

It provides 200 grants every year for Indonesian students to study in the US. Meanwhile, there are 100 annual grants for American students to study in Indonesia.

Separately, Brian McFeeters, the US Embassy deputy chief of mission in Indonesia, said approximately 500 American students were currently studying in Indonesia.

We have a Fulbright exchange program that brings students to Indonesia and we have other programs, like the English Teaching Assistant program, where Americans teach English for a year in Indonesian high schools, McFeeters said, adding that the embassy would like to encourage more American students to come to Indonesia.

McFeeters was speaking at the annual US Graduate School Fair 2016 event in Jakarta, which aims to provide information about masters degree programs in the US.

He told Indonesian students attending the fair to look at opportunities to study in the US during the event as the students could interact directly with representatives from universities in the US, such as Oregon State University, the University of Arizona and Yale University.

He also explained the US Embassys involvement at the event stemmed from the commitment to promote people to people ties with Indonesia, meaning encouraging Indonesian students to study in the US and to send Americans to Indonesia, as well.

There are about 18,300 Indonesian students studying in the US currently and the US aims to expand this number through various measures, such as hosting a graduate school fair. (vny)
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Linkedin (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

People living and working near an abandoned, partly constructed, high-rise building in Bintaro, South Tangerang, have expressed fears about the safety of the building.

The building, whose lower stories collapsed in June, has begun to lean to one side and its structure has deteriorated badly.

Feri Ivany, 24, a security guard at the Heritage factory outlet, located just over 100 meters from the building, said he was worried that the building could collapse again at any moment.

I am always anxious that if the building collapses again we could be hit by the debris, he said.

Four stories of the lower part of the building collapsed on June 2, shrouding the vicinity in dust although no one was injured in the incident.

A 25-year-old man who preferred not to give his name said he always made an effort to be vigilant while working at a nearby row of shop-houses.

Developer Jaya Property began construction of the building in 1995 but work came to a halt following the 1998 monetary crisis. The building is now owned by the Panin Bank Group.

My boss received a notification letter saying that the building will be demolished at the end of this month, Feri said.

Acting head of the South Tangerang City Planning, Building and Housing Agency Edi Malonda was quoted by kompas.com as saying that the South Tangerang administration had approved the Panin Bank Groups plan to demolish the building.

The [demolition] plan has been approved and were now just waiting for the building to be demolished by Panin Bank, Edi said.

He added that his agency, however, was still having discussions with the group on the technicalities of the demolition to ensure the safety of the surrounding environment.

Urbanist Marco Kusumawijaya said that as the building was constructed using concrete its demolition should be carried out by a certified demolition company using explosives.

The certified company, he said, would be able to bring down the building with a controlled explosion, which would safely limit the fall of debris to a specific area. (sha)
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Linkedin Callistasia Anggun Wijaya (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) might close its door to supporting non-cadres in the upcoming Jakarta gubernatorial election as the candidate registration was near, Jakarta Deputy Governor Djarot Saiful Hidayat said on Friday.



We will endorse our own cadres with the partys mechanism, Djarot said at City Hall on Friday.

The PDI-P has not yet declared its governor and deputy governor candidates despite the clock ticking for the registration set by Jakartas General Election Commission (KPU) that will start on Sept. 21 to 23. As the ruling party with 28 seats in the City Council, the PDI-P can nominate its own candidates without having to form a coalition.

Meanwhile, Jakarta Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama still expressed his hope to be PDI-Ps candidate, paired with Djarot in the election.

Previously, Teman Ahok [his volunteer supporter group] had provided me the ticket to run in the election, as well as three political parties. If Djarot fits well with me, I hope the PDI-P can also give me a ticket to run, Ahok said.

If this does not eventuate and the PDI-P nominates its own cadre, Ahok said he would run with his current Jakarta Financial Asset Management (BPKAD) head Heru Budi Hartono.

On Wednesday, Ahoks campaign chief Nusron Wahid said Ahok might register himself to the KPU on Sept. 21 where he would also officially declare his running mate. Ahoks political party ticket to running was secured with the support of the NasDem, Golkar and Hanura parties. Jakarta is one of seven provinces contesting simultaneous elections slated to take place February next year. (rin)
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Linkedin Margareth S. Aritonang (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16 2016

While failing to prove any collusion between police officers and executed drug kingpin Freddy Budiman, an independent team said on Thursday that it had instead found officers involvement with another drug syndicate.

Ending one month of investigations, the fact-finding team comprising police members and experts, announced that it had not found evidence of police personnel facilitating Freddys business, as alleged earlier by human rights activist Haris Azhar.

However, the investigation revealed transfers of more than Rp 2.5 billion (US$ 190,000) to certain police personnel.

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Linkedin Margareth S. Aritonang (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

While failing to prove any collusion between police officers and executed drug kingpin Freddy Budiman, an independent team said on Thursday that it had instead found officers involvement with another drug syndicate.

Ending one month of investigations, the fact-finding team comprising police members and experts, announced that it had not found evidence of police personnel facilitating Freddys business, as alleged earlier by human rights activist Haris Azhar.

However, the investigation revealed transfers of more than Rp 2.5 billion (US$ 190,000) to certain police personnel.

Team member Effendi Ghazali said Rp 668 million had been transferred by drug convict Akiong to a middle-ranking officer identified by his initial KPS. Five separate transfers of Rp 25 million, Rp 50 million, Rp 77 million, Rp 700 million and more than Rp 1 billion to unidentified officers were also discovered. The polices Internal Affairs Division is further examining the findings.

Indeed we did not find any transfer of money from the late Freddy Budiman to certain officials in the National Police, as he had told Haris Azhar, Effendi told a press conference on Thursday. But dont focus on that specific case only. Our investigation has found the transfer of money [related with Akiong].

Effendi explained that the failure to substantiate Freddys claims was due to technical challenges, such as the limited time given to the team to carry out the investigation. He cited the long delay between the moment Freddy testified to Haris in 2014 and the time when Haris eventually posted the testimony on social media last July as one of the challenges faced by his team.

The communications expert said corruption was hampering the governments efforts to eradicate drugs in the country.

As a further indication of difficulties faced by the government in its war on drugs, Effendi presented findings on the practice of frequently changing command structures in the narcotics business. The team, he said, had found that a drug convict named Tedja had been falsely identified as someone named Rudi, who was allegedly Freddys partner in marketing 1.4 million ecstasy pills.

Effendi said Tedja was currently on death row as he failed to pay a judge, whose identity is yet to be revealed, during his trial.

Besides Effendi, the investigation team engaged two other members from outside the police corps, including National Police Commission (Kompolnas) member Poengky Indarti, who was formerly the director of Jakarta-based human rights monitor Imparsial. The rest of the 16 team members are police officers.

The team was set up by National Police chief Gen. Tito Karnavian last month, not long after Haris was berated by the National Police, the Indonesian Military (TNI) and the National Narcotics Agency (BNN) for making public testimony in which Freddy allegedly revealed support from law enforcement officials for his drugs business.

The three institutions then quickly reported the coordinator of the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) to the National Polices Criminal Investigation Department (Bareskrim) over defamation.

Haris legal status still hangs in the balance, because police have yet to decide whether or not to proceed with the process following the conclusion of the investigation team.

National Police spokesperson Insp. Gen. Boy Rafli Amar said the police would comply with the teams recommendation to set up a working team to follow up the investigation teams findings.

Contacted separately, Haris said he appreciated the work of the polices team and expected further action to cleanse the institution from corrupt practices that backed drug businesses.

The findings can be a starting point for the police to raise public awareness on the war against drugs. If the government seriously considers drugs an extraordinary crime, then it must show serious action to prove its commitment, he said.
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Linkedin Fadli (The Jakarta Post) Batam  Fri, September 16, 2016

A resort companys plan to build a private international airport has been hampered by regulations that do not currently allow privately run airports to offer international flights.

Construction began on Bintan Special International Airport in 2012 but the operator, PT Bintan Resort Cakrawala, has yet to receive the green light from the government.

General manager of Hang Nadim International Airport in Batam, Riau Islands, Suwarso, told The Jakarta Post on Thursday that the Directorate General of Air Transportation at the Transportation Ministry had declined to issue a permit to the special airport in Bintan.

The operator applied for a permit for a private airport but with international flights. Whether it will be allowed is something the government is still considering, Suwarso said. However, the government had never issued such a permit before.

Is it possible? Of course, because it is an opportunity for the future of Indonesian aviation industry, he said.

Suwarso said Bintan airport met the technical requirements with a 2,500-meter runway overlooking the sea. Technically, it is ideal, he said.

The airport sits on a 1,000-hectare site and would accommodate mostly chartered planes carrying tourists. The construction is roughly 15 percent complete.

Bintan Resort general manager Abdul Wahab declined to comment on the regulations when contacted by the Post. (evi)
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Linkedin Ina Parlina (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

The International Peoples Tribunal on the 1965 Crimes against Humanity (IPT 1965) plans to recommend to the UN that the Indonesian government be considered responsible for acts of genocide during the 1965 communist purge in an attempt to press the current government into resolving the issue.

President Joko Jokowi Widodo made the resolution of past human rights abuse cases one of his campaign promises but so far he has made no effort to act on his promises.

Following the non-binding verdict reached by the IPT 1965, then coordinating political, legal and security affairs minister Luhut Pandjaitan said Indonesia had its own legal system and no external party could dictate the way the nation solved its problems.

IPT 1965 coordinator Nursyahbani Katjasungkana said her team was preparing to take its verdict to the UN Human Rights Councils (UNHRC) upcoming Universal Periodic Review (UPR) and to the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).

We have met many officials to present our findings. But no one takes any action. This shows that the government is unable and unwilling to resolve the prolonged injustice surrounding this crime against humanity, Nursyahbani said. We will present our consolidated data before the international human rights meeting. It is time to solve this case once and for all.

The Indonesian government is scheduled to give a presentation on the actions it is taking to protect and promote human rights at home during a UPR session in April and May next year. As a member of the UN, Indonesia will have to sit through a review during the quadrennial meeting.

Nursyahbani said the IPT 1965 would present its findings during that session in order to counter reports prepared by the government, which will likely exclude details on the violence that erupted in 1965.

International law expert Jaka Triyana believes the UPR is the right mechanism through which rights groups can put political pressure on governments that lack the commitment to solve past human rights abuse cases.

We need to keep doing this kind of advocacy work so that it will continue to resonate with people, he said.

The IPT 1965 also plans to make its case to the OHCHR in an effort to build an international movement that will force the Indonesian government to resolve the case.

Nursyahbani said the IPT 1965 had been emboldened in their efforts after meeting with members of the Presidential Advisory Board (Wantimpres), who told them bluntly that the President would focus his attention on the economy and infrastructure.

The group was dealt another setback following Jokowis decision to name former Indonesian Military commander Wiranto as coordinating political, legal and security affairs minister.

Wiranto has declined to meet with a group known as YPKP 65, a group of survivors from the 1965 communist purge.

As a last resort, Nursyahbani said the IPT 1965 would take the case to the UN Security Council (UNSC).

It is part of the plan. But it may take a long while to do this because in order to eventually see them, the UNSC must deem that the purge was an extraordinary crime. We need to gather political support from other countries, Nursyahbani said.

She said a country need not be a member of the UNSC to call for an extraordinary court. However, membership of the UNSC, something which Indonesia is currently seeking, would help her cause.
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Linkedin Safrin La Batu (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16 2016

The fantasy is officially over. Incumbent Jakarta Governor Basuki Ahok Tjahaja Purnama, often dubbed the inevitable victor in the upcoming Jakarta gubernatorial election, may fail to secure his re-election if Surabaya Mayor Tri Risma Rismaharini enters into the fray.

Jakarta-based pollster Poltracking Indonesia revealed on Thursday that Risma could seriously threaten Ahok as her electability rating was edging closer to that of Ahoks. In a head-to-head scenario of Ahok versus Risma, the survey showed that the governor was favored by 44.10 percent of respondents, while the mayor was favored by 33.85 percent.

Although Rismas electability trails Ahoks, there is a chance she could catch up and overtake the popular governor as the number of undecided voters is also high when the two are placed up against each other. When provided with an Ahok-versus-Risma scenario, 22 percent of respondents said they could not make a decision about who to support.

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Linkedin Ni Komang Erviani (The Jakarta Post) Denpasar, Bali  Fri, September 16, 2016

Karangasem Police confirmed that two people had died from injuries caused by an explosion on a speed boat departing from Padangbai Port in Karangasem, Bali, on Thursday.

The second boat passenger confirmed dead is Kathrin Zefferer, 28, from Austria, Karangasem Police chief Adj. Sr. Comr. Sugeng Sudarso told The Jakarta Post.

He said the Austrian national died after she received medical treatment at Kasih Ibu Saba Hospital in Gianyar.

It was earlier reported that one person was killed from the explosion, which occurred at 9:35 a.m. local time when the Gini Cat 2 speed boat was on its way to several destinations, including Gili Trawangan in Lombok, West Nusa Tenggara.

Police have not yet identified the other victim, which was previously reported as a German national. It is suspected that the first victim who died is from Spain, but we cannot yet confirm it. What we can confirm is, the second is an Austrian national, said Sugeng.

The Gini Cat 2 brought 35 passengers, all were foreigners. They comprised nine UK, six Italians, four French, four Portuguese, four Austrian, two Spain, two Germany, two Ireland and two Dutch nationals.

From the results of the polices preliminary investigation, Sugeng said, it was suspected that the explosion was an accident. From the forensic laboratorys initial examination results, it is suspected there was a leakage from the boats fuel tank or its pipeline, causing high-pressure gas to accumulate under the deck, which then caused the explosion, he said.

He also said the other 19 injured passengers treated at several hospitals in Denpasar and Badung had been allowed to go home. (ebf)

Fatal incident: The list of passengers that boarded the Gili Cat 2 speed boat on Sept. 15.(JP/Ni Komang Erviani)
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Linkedin (The Jakarta Post) Singapore/Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

Private banks in Singapore are sharing with local police the names of clients embracing Indonesias tax amnesty, banking sources revealed, a move that could undermine the amnesty and damage the banks business with their biggest client pool.



Singapores Commercial Affairs Department (CAD), a police unit that deals with financial crime, told banks last year they must file a suspicious transaction report (STR) whenever a client takes part in a tax amnesty scheme, three banking sources told Reuters.



After initial resistance from the banks, worried they might lose clients, that message was reinforced this year by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), the countrys central bank, when Indonesia launched a tax amnesty aimed at wooing back some of the cash its wealthy citizens have stashed in Singapore, the sources said.



We are filing the STR and hope others are doing it, too, said one senior private banker when asked about clients responding to the Indonesian amnesty.



Banks have filed STRs, said another banking source, adding that clients should not be informed about the filing.



Singapore, where Indonesians hold an estimated US$200 billion in private banking assets - 40 percent of the islands total private banking assets - made tax evasion a money-laundering offence in 2013.



It is toughening up the implementation of the law after an investigation into state-backed fund 1MDB in neighboring Malaysia exposed how some of its banks failed to impose robust controls on suspicious money flows.



The STR requirement on suspected tax crimes is part of that process.



The moment the client tells you hes participating in the amnesty, you have a suspicion that the assets with you are not compliant and so you have to report to the authorities, said a senior executive at a Singapore-based wealth manager.



In light of the toughening regulatory environment, banks need to conduct more proactive checks on the effectiveness of their internal controls and procedures, said Wilson Ang, a partner in the Singapore office of law firm Norton Rose Fulbright.



Reuters spoke to several other senior private bank officials who confirmed the STR filing requirement, but declined to comment further.



Responding to the report, MAS said it advised banks in Singapore to encourage their clients to use the opportunities afforded by tax amnesty programs to regularize their tax affairs.



In a statement quoted by Bloomberg, MAS said participation in the tax amnesty program would not attract criminal investigations in Singapore.



Contacted separately, tax office chief Ken Dwijugiasteadi said: I havent heard of such information, but if true, it is a matter for the Singaporean government. It becomes my matter when someone joins the tax amnesty.



Responding to the report, Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati said she had spoken with the Singaporean authority, including Singapore Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam to get an official explanation.



From the Singaporean governments side, the Monetary Authority of Singapore said it advised all banks in Singapore to support or encourage their clients to use the opportunities offered by Indonesias tax amnesty program in to improve tax management in Indonesia, she said.



She added that Singaporean banks are required to comply with the Financial Action Task Force regulation that demands them to file a report whenever they suspect that a suspicious activity takes place.



However, she said the MAS had insisted that Indonesians participation in tax amnesty could not be considered an action that would trigger a criminal investigation.



I reaffirm once again that we will continue to cooperate with the Singaporean government to lessen the possibilities that will prevent Indonesians from joining the tax amnesty.



Businessman Sofjan Wanandi, an adviser to Vice President Jusuf Kalla, said the Indonesian government needed to take action to respond to any efforts that threatened the countrys tax amnesty program.



This is one of ways to prevent the tax amnesty from achieving success. Dont trust [Singaporean] banks that are reluctant to have their revenues reduced, Sofjan told The Jakarta Post on Thursday.



Sofjan also suspected that both the Singaporean government and its banking sector harbored the intention to see Indonesias tax amnesty program fail.



Having said that, I encourage fellow Indonesians not to use Singapores banking industry. They should move to Indonesian banks, Sofjan said.

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Linkedin Anton Hermansyah (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

South Korea has asked Indonesia to help persuade North Korea to stop its nuclear program through a UN resolution mechanism.

On Sept. 10, the communist country conducted its fifth nuclear test, it produced a 5.3 Richter scale tremor around the test area. The country has reached an advanced state in the technology as it can now control the radius and strength of the explosion.

"We believe Indonesia as a friend of South Korea will play a big role in resolving North Korean nuclear issues," Korean Ambassador to Indonesia Taiyoung Cho said at Korean Cultural Center in Jakarta on Wednesday.

However, according to former foreign minister Dino Patti Djalal, Indonesia cannot do much in the way of direct intervention with North Korea because of its distance from the peninsula, however Indonesia can play a part in conveying aspirations from Southeast Asia to the UN.

"What the international community can do is to revive again the six party talks," Dino said.

The six party talks involving North Korea, South Korea, Japan, Russia, China and the US went on for five rounds from 2003 to 2007. However in 2009 they broke up as North Korea resumed nuclear tests. (evi)
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Linkedin Sagara Kusuma (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16 2016

Indonesia could help curb tensions on the Korean Peninsula given its friendship with Pyongyang, the South Korean ambassador to Indonesia said.

Ambassador Cho Tae-young told Indonesian students on Wednesday that South Korea highly appreciated Indonesias consistent and strong disapproval of North Koreas nuclear and ballistic missile tests.

However, given the fifth and reportedly biggest nuclear test on Sept. 9, following a series of ballistic missiles launches, Cho said he hoped Indonesia could play a great role in solving this issue.

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Linkedin Ni Komang Erviani (The Jakarta Post) Karangasem, Bali  Fri, September 16 2016

Two foreign tourists were killed and 19 others were injured in an explosion on board of a ferry in Padangbai Port in Karangasem, Bali, on Thursday.

The police say they believe the blast was an accident and ruled out the possibility of a terrorist attack.

The incident occurred at around 9.35 a.m., shortly after the boat left the port. Five minutes after the boat departed, only around 200 meters from the harbor, smoke was seen coming from the boat, then an explosion was heard, Karangasem Police chief Adj. Sr. Comr. Sugeng Sudarso said.

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Linkedin Ni Komang Erviani (The Jakarta Post) Karangasem, Bali  Fri, September 16, 2016

Two foreign tourists were killed and 19 others were injured in an explosion on board of a ferry in Padangbai Port in Karangasem, Bali, on Thursday.

The police say they believe the blast was an accident and ruled out the possibility of a terrorist attack.

The incident occurred at around 9.35 a.m., shortly after the boat left the port. Five minutes after the boat departed, only around 200 meters from the harbor, smoke was seen coming from the boat, then an explosion was heard, Karangasem Police chief Adj. Sr. Comr. Sugeng Sudarso said.

The boat, the Gili Cat 2, was on its way to three islands  Gili Air, Gili Meno and Gili Trawangan  in West Nusa Tenggara (NTB) when the incident happened.

The boat carried 29 foreign tourists: two Spanish, nine British, six Italian, four Portuguese, two Germans, two Dutch and four Austrians.

Fifteen victims were evacuated to Penta Medica Clinic, five to Manggis community health center and another to Klungkung public hospital. After receiving emergency treatment, they were evacuated to several hospitals in Denpasar and Gianyar.

Padangbai Health Agency coordinator Putu Swardiana said dozens of ambulances were involved in the evacuation. One victim was directly taken to Klungkung hospital after sustaining a fractured spine, Swardiana said.

The first fatality, who has yet to be identified, died on the way to hospital. The second fatality, identified as Austrian Kathrin Zefferer, 28, died after receiving treatment at Kasih Ibu Saba hospital in Gianyar.

About five minutes after we left we saw an explosion and we saw people with injuries, Portuguese tourist Eduarda Carvalho said, adding that she only saw smoke and no fire.

Members of the polices bomb squad and forensics laboratory team were involved in the investigation into the incident.

From preliminary investigations, we believe that this is purely an accident. We suspect there was a leak from a fuel tank under the deck. Perhaps the explosion was triggered by an electrical short circuit, Sugeng said.

He added that further investigation was needed to determine the exact cause of the explosion.

The boats skipper, named Totok Wasito, and three crew members  identified as Sugiarto, Nyoman Supartika and Kadek Kris  have been interrogated.

The incident did not dissuade other tourists from making their trips to the three islands off the northwest coast of Lombok, the capital of the province of NTB.

Many foreign tourists were seen at the port waiting to board the boats that would take them to the province, which has begun to rival Bali in terms of popularity.

Visits by foreign tourists to NTB have increased, according to the latest data from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS).

More than 7,300 foreigners traveled to the region in March, up 22.52 percent on the same month last year, marking the fastest growth in tourist arrivals among all destinations in the country.

During the first three months of 2016, the agency recorded 18,702 foreign tourist arrivals through Lombok International Airport.
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Linkedin Farida Susanty (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

The US is pinning high hopes on economic ties between it and Indonesia growing exponentially, as the worlds largest economy sees a future in creative industries, the financial sector and infrastructure.

The total value of economic relationship between Indonesia and the US could reach US$131.7 billion in 2019, a 46 percent increase from $90.1 billion in 2014, according to the US-Indonesia Investment Report 2016 released by the US Chamber of Commerce and American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham) Indonesia.

Economic relationship does not only cover trade and investment, but also financial flows, company sales and government revenues.

The prediction was made with a best-case scenario assumption that President Joko Jokowi Widodo achieves his goal of a staggering 7 percent economic growth by the end of his term, from 4.79 percent last year, the lowest in six years.

The target is possible, said US Chamber of Commerce executive vice president and head of international affairs Myron Brilliant, provided the government has the right policy mix, including transparency and a more relaxed negative investment list (DNI).

There have been some important steps in the right direction in this relationship. This is the kind of thing that sends a positive message to the investment community, Brilliant said in his speech at the annual US-Indonesia Investment Summit on Thursday.

The US has acknowledged that the government, for example, opened up total foreign investment for 35 sectors in February this year, including the e-commerce sector, which is expected to be a future growth sector for US investment in Indonesia.

It has also rolled out over a dozen economic policy packages, addressing various problems, including cutting bureaucratic red tape and decreased the number of permits required to do business in Indonesia.

The moves might have borne fruit. A survey conducted by AmCham Indonesia this year with US companies operating in Indonesia this year showed that more than 80 percent of the companies felt that there had been some improvement in the investment climate over the past two years.

As a result, the participating companies said they would invest more than $334 million over the next five years. Nine potential areas identified are: creative industries, finance, infrastructure, oil and gas, consumer goods, agriculture, extractives, pharmaceuticals and information and communications technology.

Coordinating Economic Minister Darmin Nasution said that although the countrys foreign direct investment (FDI) stood at $893.2 million in 2015, lower than $1.3 billion in 2014, their was a lot of untapped investment potential. The US is Indonesias seventh-largest foreign investor.

The US will continue to remain one of Indonesias most important economic partners in the years to come, said Darmin, citing the $20.25 billion in deals committed by US businesses during Jokowis visit to Washington late last year.

(-/-)

At the moment, Indonesias economic relations with the US trail behind that of other Southeast Asian nations. Last year, Thailand and Malaysia respectively posted $137 billion and $121.1 billion economic relationships with the Western superpower.

AmCham Indonesia and the US Chamber of Commerce also said that one big challenge that could hamper Indonesia achieving its full potential was the fact that the thinking of many bureaucrats had been inward looking, posing a threat to the countrys openness.

While some senior technocrats make the case for greater participation in the global economy  an idea backed by President Widodo with orders to streamline regulations  the reality is that many career bureaucrats have been resisting the directives as they continue to pursue regulatory complexity, reads the report.

Indonesia so far ranks 109th out of 189 countries in the World Banks 2016 Ease of Doing Business report, beaten by Malaysia at 18th, Thailand at 49th and Vietnam at 90th.

Some of the ideas proposed by the US to make Indonesia reach its full potential are: abolish the DNI, bureaucratic reform, regulator- or government-and-business collaboration instead of distant monitoring and freedom to establish foreign legal entities (PMAs) via an online application with the Law and Human Rights Ministry instead of a lengthy bureaucratic process.

As if giving a green light to US businesses, Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin) chairman Rosan P. Roeslani said that Indonesia was pragmatic.

We know that we need FDI to grow our economy. We cant be too protectionist. We have to help our businesses succeed, he said.
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Linkedin (The Jakarta Post)  Fri, September 16 2016

Jakarta is notorious for its horrendous traffic, which many of its residents have now accepted as a fact of life. But despite everything, the city has a lot to offer residents and visitors. In order to accommodate a hunger for art and culture, government and private entities have established various cultural centers where people could forget for a while the pain of living in the Big Durian. Here are five of them.

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Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Fri, September 16, 2016

Cihampelas shopping area will soon have a skywalk to allow cozier access for visitors.

Bandung Mayor Ridwan Kamil told kompas.com that the city administration would prepare a budget of Rp 43 billion (US$3.26 million) to complete the project by December.

(Read also: Bandung's Labyrinth Park offers new city attraction)

"The project will start next week; there will probably be road closures between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m., with an adjustment during weekends," he said in Bandung on Thursday.

The skywalk is part of the administration's efforts to manage street vendors in the area. "Our concept is to move all the street vendors from between Jl. Eykman and Jl. Cihampelas [to the skywalk]," he added. (kes)
The fashion runway is known for its glitz and glamour, but is the pre-show routine a different affair?

We headed backstage at London Fashion Week's Vin + Omi show earlier this year to find out what really happens.

(Hannah Ellison/PA)

Rather than models sauntering down the catwalk, dressed to the nines in luxury fashion while being blinded by flashing lights from the paparazzi, designers, make-up artists and stylists frantically dash round a tiny room thats permanently engulfed in a cloud of hairspray. Its actually very hard to breathe.

(Hannah Ellison/PA)

As the catwalk evolves, the outfits get more and more eccentric  meaning that the getting-ready process is constantly having to step up several notches. Wigs tend to feature heavily, whether theyre brightly coloured, or piled high on the head (a la Marge Simpson).

(Hannah Ellison/PA)

There are nearly as many photographers backstage as there are on the catwalk. And theres a lot less space. So fighting to get a good shot will invariably involve elbows.

(Hannah Ellison/PA)

Models are always ready to pose. Its as if they have a sixth sense for cameras. They could have four different people pulling at their hair, and another two invading their face with make-up brushes, and still theyll be able to look incredibly photogenic.

(Hannah Ellison/PA)

The model strut genuinely looks really hard to master. The timing and space between each model is an exact art. Plus, given the increasingly avant-garde nature of catwalk fashion, the clothes dont exactly lend themselves to basic manoeuvres, like walking.

(Hannah Ellison/PA)

Everybody involved in getting the show together deserves a medal. Working for hours  sometimes days  on end in hot, cramped conditions, surrounded by fumes from various beauty products, cant be that much fun. But somehow they make it happen. The fashion runway is a pretty spectacular thing to witness, and its all thanks to the crew backstage.

(Hannah Ellison/PA)

And heres all that hard work paying off on the catwalk.
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Household debt at new high

BANGKOK: Average household debt in the year to date has risen by 20.2 per cent, the highest growth in nine years, according to a survey by the University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce (UTCC).

economicspolitics

By Bangkok Post

Friday 16 September 2016, 09:01AM

Thanavath Phonvichai, director of the UTCCs Centre for Economic and Business Forecasting, said the latest poll of 1,221 respondents found the biggest increase in household debt since the survey began in 2008.

Average debt has risen to B298,000 per household from 248,000 baht at the end of 2015.

The key difference is the growth rate this year, Mr Thanavath said.

Since we started conducting surveys, the initial growth was 2.2% and has since risen in single digits, with the most significant increase in 2013 with 12% growth, compared with 5.7% in 2012, he said. Even though the growth rate has been in double digits ever since, it had peaked at 16% growth in 2014.

Mr Thanavath said the figure is no cause for alarm at the moment, as there has been a significant shift in the source of borrowing, between financial institutions and loan sharks.

Most respondents (62%) said they have borrowed from financial institutions, while the percentage of those who borrowed from non-formal sources of funds, such as loan sharks, has fallen to 38%, the lowest in nine years.

Most debt came from three types of lenders, including auto leasing, housing loans or extending credit lines for working capital to use in business operations, Mr Thanavath said.

The respondents have faced rising household debt since 2013, mainly due to the first-time car buyer and homebuyer schemes introduced by Yingluck Shinawatras government.

The resulting rise in household debt has remained until now.

The rice-pledging scheme has been more detrimental, creating expectations of future income streams that could not be achieved.

Consequently, they were confident in borrowing from hire purchase schemes for goods such as cars, electrical appliances and expensive smartphones.

The consequences of these policies on household debt remain, and this years sluggish economy reduced availability of cash for small-business operators, which further induced borrowing, Mr Thanavath said. Thats why debts shot up.

The figure is not yet a concern, as the majority of the debts are owed to financial institutions, with assets such as cars, houses or heavy machinery used as collateral.

Despite the high growth rate of the debt, the risks of default that might affect the banks non-performing loan would be limited, Mr Thanavath said.

Thailand's swelling household debt has dampened consumption and economic growth.

Household debt in 2015s final quarter climbed to B11 trillion or 81.5% of GDP, an increase from 10.8 trillion or 80.8% of GDP in the third quarter.

We are among the top 10 nations with the highest household debt in the world, which creates a real obstacle for economic development, and in the long term commercial banks will find it increasingly difficult to provide loans because of the high risks, Mr Thanavath said.

He said that even if household borrowing continues over the next three years, household debt is not likely to become a serious problem.

So far, we can see that the government is moving in the right direction as they continue to encourage borrowers to access the formal lending system rather than become hapless victims of loan sharks as seen in previous years, Mr Thanavath said.

He said that if the government can boost GDP growth to 4% a year, then the ability to repay debt of households will consequently rise in line, especially given that their main purpose of borrowing is to facilitate business operations, a need which will subside along with the growth of economy.

Central bank governor Veerathai Santiprabhob said the Thai economic recovery is expected to continue at a gradual pace for the second half of the year, but the country is facing greater external risks.

He referred to the rate-setting committee's statement in saying that Thailand, in the coming period, will be facing higher risks from the fragile global economic rebound and uncertainties from monetary policies of major advanced economies.

Looking at the MPC's statements, we [the central bank] clearly stated that we are ready to use monetary policy if the economic conditions turn out to vary from our estimations, especially from external risks that may be higher than we expected, Mr Veerathai said.

He said the Thai economy will also be facing a spate of internal risks, namely the continuation of private consumption and non-performing loans in the banking sector.

Read original story here.
Phuket-bound bus staff, including driver, busted for theft and kratom

PHUKET: Three employees, including the driver, of a bus from Surat Thani to Phuket were arrested at a police checkpoint on Wednesday (Sept 14) for possession of kratom after a Belgian man told police his money was stolen while he was on the bus.



By Yutthawat Lekmak

Friday 16 September 2016, 09:28AM

The three were charged with theft and possession of a Category 5 drig (kratom). Phang Nga Police

The three were charged with theft and possession of a Category 5 drig (kratom). Phang Nga Police

The bus driver, Sucha Khaosaard, and the two staff, Somchai Tohmard and Samart Chimplee, were arrested at 4:30pm by Phang Nga Provincial Police led by Col Chotipong Ketsarin during a routine check at a checkpoint in Takuapa.

Col Chotipong explained, While we conducted a routine check on the bus, a pickup truck pulled up. The driver, Bumrung chanbumrung and his passenger Peter De Balabander from Belgium, who was one of the passengers on the bus, asked us for help.

Mr De Balabander asked us to question the bus driver and bus staff because he suspected someone had stolen the money out of his bag while he was on board. He said that he realised the money was missing from his bag after he got off the bus at Khao Sok and about to pay his taxi fare.

Col Chotipong continued, Both driver and two staff denied said they seen nothing. We searched the bus and discovered three bundles of kratom leaves, together weighing about about 100 grammes, on the shelf above the drivers seat.

Then Samark started acted suspiciously so officer asked him to get off the bus. Upon searching his person, officers found euro banknotes worth B3,040 and a futher B4,000 in Thai banknotes in his back pocket.

Sucha, Somchai and Samart were taken to Talad Yai Police Station in Phang Nga to face possession of a Category 5 drug (kratom) and theft.
Phuket readies for Vegetarian Festival 2016

PHUKET: The Tourism Authority Of Thailand (TAT) Phuket office has released its programme of events for the upcoming Vegetarian Festival, to be held for the traditional nine days on October 1-9.

cultureChinesetourism

By The Phuket News

Friday 16 September 2016, 12:21PM

The Sui Boon Tong Shrine street procession will be held on Oct 9, starting at 7am. Map: TAT

The Kathu Shrine street procession will be held on Oct 8, starting at at 6:45am. Map: TAT

The Bang Neow Shrine street procession will be held on Oct 6, starting at 6am. Map: TAT

The Jui Tui Shrine street procession will be held on Oct 7, starting at 6:45am. Map: TAT

Many of the activities will be focused on the main Chinese shrines in Phuket Town. Map: TAT

Chinese shrines across Phuket will be taking part in the Phuket Vegetarian Festival 2016. Map TAT

The festival will begin with the lantern-pole raising ritual on Sept 30 at all 24 participating Chinese shrines across Phuket. Photo: TAT

The festival will begin with the lantern-pole raising ritual on Sept 30 at all 24 participating Chinese shrines from 3 pm-5:45pm, except for Sheng Leng Shrine in Baan Muang Mai, Thalang, which will start early by holding their pole-raising ceremony at 7am.

Every year the event attracts large crowds of residents and tourists and this year Phuket can again expect large turnouts for the festival, TAT Phuket office Director Anoma Vongyai told The Phuket News.

Just like every year, we always expect to see huge crowds at the Phuket Vegetarian Festival. I think the number this year will exceed last year, she said, though she declined to reveal how many people the TAT estimates took part in the festival last year.

The most popular activities, and spectacles for tourists, include firewalking, bladed-ladder climbing,

hot oil bathing and nail bridge crossing, performed by devotees at participating shrines across the island.

These activities start at Jui Tui Shrine in Phuket Town at 8:09pm on Oct 2, and continue at different times and at different shrines across the island throughout the festival. (See programme for full details.)

The last ceremony of the Phuket Vegetarian Festival is certainly the most impressive. Between 9pm and midnight, all shrines join a street procession in Phuket Town: the Nine Emperor Gods Farewell. Each shrine involved in the festival has an Emperor God. The latest procession aims to accompany them to Saphan Hin, from where they will leave Phuket.

The annual festival features popular processions organised by each participating shrine, with Ma Song devotees parading the streets with a variety of implements impaled through their faces as testament to pain-enduring powers of the gods that occupy the ma Song for the duration of the festival.

The street processions, however, also bring traffic to a standstill to unsuspecting motorists as devotees parade along the streets of Phuket.

The TATs official guide provides maps of the routes to be taken for just four street processions, all in Phuket Town, as follows:

Thursday, Oct 6  Bang Neow Shrine, starting at 6am

Friday, Oct 7  Jui Tui Shrine, starting at 6:45am

Saturday, Oct 8  Kathu Shrine, starting at at 6:45am

Sunday, Oct 9  Sui Boon Tong Shrine, starting at 7am

Most shrines start their street processions relatively early in the morning. While tourists are welcome to line the streets to view the spectacle, motorists are urged to try to avoid the following areas, as this is the current list of scheduled street processions across the island:

Oct 2

Choor Su Gong Naka Shrine, Wichit

Oct 3

Leng Ho Bel Shrine, Mai Khao

Bang Khu Shrine, Sapam

Sapam Shrine

Cherng Talay Shrine

Oct 4

Sheng Leng Tong Shrine, Muang Mai, Thalang

Choor Su Gong Naka Shrine, Wichit

Lim Hu Tai Su Shrine, Samkong

Gim Tsu Ong Shrine, Baan Don

Bang Neow, Phuket Town

Leng Ho Bel Shrine, Mai Khao

Tai Seng Pud Jor, Chalong

Oct 5

Tai Seng Pud Jor, Chalong

Jeng Ong Shrine, Phuket Town (near Vachira Hospital)

Tha Reua Shrine, Srisoonthorn

Tae Gun Tai Tae Shrine, Baan Pasak, Thalang

Choor Su Gong Naka Shrine, Wichit

Sapam Shrine

Oct 6

Bang Neow Shrine, Phuket Town

Gim Tsu Ong Shrine, Baan Don

Ong Hu Shrine, Cherng Talay

Jong Nghi Tong, Thalang (near Ton Sai Waterfall)

Tai Houd Tong, Surin Beach

Sheng Leng Tong Shrine, Muang Mai, Thalang

Oct 7

Gim Tsu Ong Shrine, Baan Don

Jui Tui Shrine, Phuket Town

Oct 8

Lai Tu Tao Shrine, Kathu

Tae Gun Shrine, Baan Nabon, Wichit

Hai Yiang Geng Shrine, Mai Khao

Lim Seu Chor Shrine (Tha Reua Shrine), Srisoonthorn

Yok Ke Keng Shrine, Samkong, Phuket Town

Oct 9

Ngor Hian Tai Tae Shrine, Baan Kian, Thalang

Sui Boon Tong Shrine (also called the Lor Ong Shrine), Phuket Town (off Pattana Rd)

Bang Khu Shrine, Sapam

The schedule for the event from October 1  9 including maps and guides available to download at Phuketemagazine.com (or click here).
PM Prayut arrives in Phuket

PHUKET: Prime Minister Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha arrived in Phuket this morning (Sept 16), where his first action is to officially open the new terminal at Phuket International Airport.

tourismtransportconstructioneconomicsmilitarypolitics

By Tanyaluk Sakoot

Friday 16 September 2016, 10:49AM

Prime Minister Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha landed at Phuket Airport this morning where he officiated the formal opening of the new International Terminal. Photo: Tanyaluk Sakoot

PM Gen Prayut landed at 8:45am to be welcomed by Phuket Airport Director Monrudee Gettuphan among many other high-ranking Phuket government officials, including Phuket Governor Chamroen Tipayapongtada. As PM Prayut made his way through hordes of well-wishers and members of the press, restrained by a scores of security personnel, he stressed the importance of improving land transport systems, including the development of road networks across Phuket, to better serve the ever-growing needs of tourism. After meeting and greeting tourists at the immigration check-in counters in the Arrivals Hall, PM Prayut at 10am left the airport for Patong, where he is to officiate the Phuket launch of the Startup Thailand 2016 project at the Duangjit Resort & Spa in Patong. As the Startup Thailand project aims to inspire entrepreneurs to launch their own successful businesses, PM Prayut is to deliver his keynote address titled, Phuket: From World Class Destination to World Class Smart City & Startup Hub. PM Prayut in the afternoon will attend an event to meet with local residents and members of the press at Phuket Rajabhat University (PRU) in Rassada, north of Phuket Town.
PM Prayut talks mafia, tells officials to better care of the people, at Phuket Airport terminal opening

PHUKET: Prime Minister Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha urged officials to tackle local mafia and to uphold their responsibilities in order provide better care for the public. The Prime Ministers directive came his official opening of the new International Terminal at Phuket International Airport this morning (Sept 16).



By Tanyaluk Sakoot

Friday 16 September 2016, 05:36PM

PM Prayut stopped to welcome tourist arrivals at the new airport terminal. Photo: Tanyaluk Sakoot

PM Prayut stopped to chat with Tai Mongkol, better known as the Thai celebrity 'Mr Bean Phuket'. Photo: Tanyaluk Sakoot

PM Prayut this morning told officials that the taxi mafia is to never rise up again. Photo: Tanyaluk Sakoot

The mafia problem must not happen again, and especially with taxis, he said.

PM Prayut blamed the style of thinking in failure to solve recurring problems.

Thais do not come up with systems as a way to solve problems, he said.

The Prime Minister also highlighted the depth and extent of problems of failing to deal with such issues, and targeted his comments at officials.

How do others benefit from your work? he posed. And how do poor people, small people, get any benefit from you? All the results from our work must be transferred to ordinary people.

Everything must be done from the heart. I am sorry to speak out loud, but if I dont speak about this, then nobody will talk about it. This must be done, with nothing expected in return, he said.

Any questions? he asked.

In closing, PM Prayut said, I wish everyone to rise up, be rich and happy  but dont forget the small people. Dont make small people complain about you to me much. Take care of them.

After his message to officials, PM Prayut walked the concourse, talking with tourist arrivals and and officials en route. He also stopped to chat with Tai Monkong, better known as Thai celebrity Mr Bean Phuket, accompanied by his brown teddy bear.
Russians arrested in Phuket with fake ATM cards

PHUKET: Two Russian men were arrested in Kamala on fraud charges yesterday (Sept 15) after police discovered the men using fake ATM cards in Patong and Kamala. Police seized more than 400 unused cloned electronic cards in a subsequent search of the mens hotel room in Patong.

Russiancrimetourismpolice

By Eakkapop Thongtub

Friday 16 September 2016, 10:08AM

Police seized more than 400 unused cloned electronic cards in a subsequent search of the mens hotel room in Patong

Police seized more than 400 unused cloned electronic cards in a subsequent search of the mens hotel room in Patong. Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub

Kamala Police Deputy Chief Lt Col Chokdee Mabangyang and Region 8 Police led by Lt Col Prawit Engchuan presented the men  named by police as Russian nationals Evgenii Zavialov, 27, and Pavel Ryzhankov, 33  at a press conference at Kamala Police Station yesterday.

Presented as evidence seized in the making the arrests was B5,000 cash, six ATM cash withdraw transaction receipts from Krungsri Bank, 48 fake electronic cards, a notepad containing ATM card numbers with corresponding PIN codes and 427 unused electronic cards with no serial numbers.

Police also seized one Acer tablet, Sumsung notebook, skimming equipment and other items.

The men were arrested at a police checkpoint in Kamala at 2pm after local police were alerted that the suspects were heading their way.

An investigation team from the Provincial Police received a tip-off that two foreigners, both white males, on a black-and-red Yamaha motorbike with license plate number 1 KorChor 3288 were travelling around using fake ATM cards at several ATMs in Patong and Kamala, Col Chokdee explained.

Police were told the two men had just left the Patong area and were heading to Kamala, he added.

 So we set up a checkpoint waiting for them. Officers signalled for the men to stop when they approached the checkpoint. We found them in possession of 43 fake ATM cards and B5,000 cash, Col Chokdee said.

Police later searched a room at the Royal Prince Residence in Patong, where officers discovered 427 cloned electronic cards, skimmer machines, a computer tablet and other evidence, he said.
Security for PM Prayut deployed as Phuket sea gypsies mass to deliver plea against forced relocation

PHUKET: More than 100 police and military security personnel have been deployed at Phuket Rajabhat University ahead of Prime Minister Gen Prayut Chan-o-chas visit to the campus this afternoon, where more than 500 Phuket sea gypsies have turned out in the hope of delivering to the nations leader a plea to stave off forced relocation from their village in Rawai.

landpropertymilitaryculture

By Eakkapop Thongtub

Friday 16 September 2016, 01:53PM

Hundreds of sea gypsies have gathered at Phuket Rajabhat University ahead of Prime Minister Gen Prayut Chan-o-chas visit to the campus this afternoon. Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub

Under instruction from Col Akanit Danpitaksan, Chief Inspector of the Phuket Provincial Police, the security personnel have moved the sea gypsies to a site on Ratsadanusorn Rd, about one kilometre to the north from the campus, and ensured they do not block traffic at the busy Wor Kor intersection.

However, motorists have reported to The Phuket News that traffic flow is already being inhibited by officers aiming to keep vehicles only passing through, and declining to allow even u-turns near the junction.

The group, led by spokesmen Sinchai Rueprohchin of the Community Network for Social and Political Reform, are hoping to hand to PM Prayut a letter requesting the Prime Minister to take action to resolve issues of land ownership for poor people, including sea gypsies.

The letter is a joint-request issued by three groups: Community Network for Social and Political Reform; the Chumchonthai Foundation; and the Sea Gypsy Foundation.

However, Col Akanit explained to Mr Sinchai that only five representatives would be allowed into the area to hand the letter to the Prime Minister, while the rest have to stay outside.

The letter sets out three main requests, but buried in the very polite Thai language used is a request for the Prime Minister to sack Gen Surin Pikulthong from his position as chairperson of the special committee established under the Prime Ministers Office specifically to resolve sea gypsy issues. The letter also called for the deputy chairperson of the committee also to be replaced.

The letter was gracious enough to ask PM Prayut to allow Gen Surin to continue his work while his replacement is found, which they asked to be selected from the 26 Ministers of the Prime Ministers Office.

In order as presented in the letter, the first request in the formal letter calls for the Interior Ministry to revoke the land deeds issued for the 19 rai claimed by individuals laying claim to the entire Rawai sea gypsy village  but to also compensate those with land documents issued for plots within the village so that the resolution is fair.

However, the letter also asks for the Prime Minister to follow up on the progress made by the Department of Special Investigation (DSI) and the special committee currently headed by Gen Surin.

The DSI has already supported the Rawai sea gypsy claims to live on their ancestral land on the southern Phuket beachfront by providing aerial historical photographs, DNA confirmation that bones buried in graves at the village are directly related to sea gypsies still living in the sea community, and even footage of HM The King Bhumibol Adulyadej at the Rawai village during his visit in 1959.

The second request in the letter calls on the Prime Minister to investigate the land documents presented by developer Baron World Trade Co, which claims more than 30 rai next to the Rawai sea gypsy village. Baron World Trade Co has been at the centre of a dispute with the villagers as sea gypsies revered Balai shrine has for generations been located on land that the company now claims.

The third request calls for the Prime Ministers Office to work towards having Community Chanote land titles issued for poor people represented by the three groups, including sea gypsies, and calls for Gen Surin and his committee deputy to be replaced.

The letter notes that 450 communities have signed a petition to support this move so the committee can perform its duty.

The fourth request is for the special committee to quickly resolve the issues that communities represented by the three groups are facing to bring social justice and to provide monthly updates on its progress.

The fifth request was that the Prime Minister must boost the special committees effectiveness by involving all ministries involved in the issues, in accordance to the Cabinet resolution in June 2010.
11AAA semis will be awesome and more from HS football quarterfinals

high-school-sports
Cassidy Hillburn

hillburn@grinnell.edu

Grinnell Colleges Center for Humanities sponsored one of the first events of this years speaker series entitled Rethinking Global Cultures earlier this week on Sept. 13. Dr. Chen Yi spoke with the goal of exploring cultures on a global scale. Yi is a professor at the Conservatory of Music and Dance at the University of Missouri-Kansas City and a composer who produces music blending East and West tradition,

Born in Guangzhou, China in the early 1950s, Chen Yi describes music as a main focus of her life since she was a child.

[My parents] raised me to love music and be trained as a musician. I started piano lessons when I was three, and violin when I was four, she said.

Raised by medical doctors who were huge fans of Western music, Chen grew up aware of the cultural divide that existed in having music rooted in a background different from her own.

I didnt realize at first that they were all dead white men, she said, I remember [when I realized], my dad and I were listening to recordings of Heifetz and Kreisler playing their own compositions, and my dad turned and said to me that it would be great if I could one day play my own works like what they did.

In coming to Grinnell, Chens focus was to highlight music as an agent for sharing culture, specifically between Eastern and Western cultures.

The main thing is to introduce the cultures and blend the cultures through my own creation, she said.

Though she has worked with students for over 30 years, her aim has remained consistent: to further understanding of other cultures. She returned to China as a visiting professor several years ago and brought students with her to learn from and gain understanding of a culture different from their own.

The result, she said, is the creation of a same, shared generation of connection. [It becomes] not only about teaching but sharing the same understandings. That is why exchange is so important  and exchange programs.

Chen, seeing parallels between the knowledge Grinnell focuses on and her own interests of working towards a multicultural global future, was excited by the culture Grinnell teaches.

Grinnell College  is very visionable; you can see the long term goal, and this is very beneficial for the next generation, she said. When you graduate and think back, you will know the global culture, you [will understand] why this education was so important.

Looking forward, Chen seeks to continue composing more exciting and meaningful works bridging the cultures of East and West and sharing ideas through her own musical creations.

I believe this [can] improve the understanding between people from different cultural backgrounds, and work towards peace, of our world in the present time, and for the future.

She also encouraged others to engage with music and bring their personal cultural identity into music in new ways. She sees studying internationally as a key tool in this aim and enthusiastically encourages interested students around the world both to treasure their traditions and to explore new adventures.

We need to love people, love nature, love our society and work hard in our community. Everything coexisting in the world would be an inspiration for our innovative creation in our own voice.

To all of our young students, she said, you are the hope of the future of our world.
By Keli Vitaioli

vitaioli@grinnell.edu

While Grinnell has not had a permanent Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) center for years, the satellite location in the Community Center, opened once a week for issuing drivers licenses, has served an essential service to the community. With Grinnell LLCs purchase of the Community Center, the building will be renovated into a 45 room hotel, displacing the DMV indefinitely. The firm asked the DMV to be cleared out by Nov. 1, after which the closest DMV to Grinnell in Poweshiek County will be in Montezuma, 22 miles away.

The Community Center currently houses the 10 city officials of the town, including Mayor Gordon Canfield. Extra offices in the three-story building were rented out to other institutions such as rehabilitation facilities, school district offices and the DMV.

Built in 1923, the building was becoming more expensive to repair than it would be for the city officials to move to a new location  the site of the former Transportation Museum in town, which the city still owns after the museum closed in 2015. Though the closing of the DMV is an inconvenience for the members of the community, Canfield believes the new hotel can stimulate some much-needed economic growth.

The purpose for the hotel is to strengthen the downtown, Canfield said. The hotel will have a small bar and a breakfast room, but it will not have a restaurant. The idea is that the people who stay here will go to the other restaurants in town.  [The hotels event center] will be used for events, but if they want food for an event then theyll cater in from these other restaurants and spark up business for these restaurants in town.

The benefits of the DMV reached thousands of miles beyond that of the Grinnell community  domestic and international students of the College would use the location to renew or receive a United States drivers license. Nirabh Koirala 17 never received his license at home in Nepal, and the one he got in Grinnell not only allows him to drive but also allows him to occasionally travel without his passport.

Koirala chose to get his license in the States because he believes it is much easier to pass the driving test here than in Nepal. He passed his driving test after the second time he took it, and has since returned with other international students to provide support during their tests. Koirala may be one of few guests for which the DMV evokes pleasant memories.

Theres a little bit of sentiment attached to me getting my license, and failing it and then getting it with Louise [Carhart 17], Koirala said. And then I went back with a Nepali first-year, and he got it, and I was his mentor  so theres a little bit of sentiment attached to that.

Mayor Canfield himself, however, has fond memories from before the building served as the community center.

We are sitting in my old junior high school, Canfield said. The school sold this building to the City of Grinnell for one dollar.

The DMV was paying no rent to use the space in the Community Center. At the time of the interview, Canfield was unsure whether there would be enough space in the new city building to continue that arrangement with the DMV. The responsibility for funding the DMV location falls on Poweshiek County. According to Mayor Canfield, though 60 percent of the population of Poweshiek resides in Grinnell, they are reluctant to fund a location in town due to there already being one in Newton. This puts the responsibility to find a location and pay for it on the DMV, and by extension, on the City of Grinnell.

We have not found a space for them at this point, not to say we wont, but so far, we have not been fortunate, Canfield said. Its an inconvenience.

Canfield is hopeful the City will find a space for a new satellite DMV location, but the search is hindered by special security and communications requirements for the satellite DMV to be able to communicate with the Iowa Department of Transportation.

I think it will be a disservice to the international [students] to get either their state IDs or drivers licenses, Koirala remarked. It was hard enough as it is, given that it wouldve only opened on Wednesday mornings, but now you need to go to Newton or Montezuma.

Louise Carhart 17 is the Community Editor
By Zane Silk

silkzane@grinnell.edu

In October 2013, when Duane Neff inspected 1217 Fifth Ave., he was met by a welcoming committee of cockroaches and leaky pipes had forced the water to be shut off for more than three days. The house ranks among the top five worst Neff has seen  even after 35 years of experience inspecting homes, and the house has not changed since. Because Grinnell tenants deal with problems like this and more, the City of Grinnell is attempting to propose a rental inspection program for the second time in five years.

In 2011, the Citys Planning Committee first considered an inspection program, which would have required all rental properties to be inspected annually at a cost of 50 dollars to the landlord.

We proposed an ordinance, took it to committee.  it never went to council, because through the committee, landlords basically were the ones who were at the meetings, spoke against it, and so at the time, the council determined not to do anything, said Neff, who serves as the Director of Building and Planning and authored the 2011 proposal.

In Iowa, only municipalities with over 15,000 people must have a rental inspection program, exempting Grinnell despite the citys housing stock being 36.8 percent rental properties, nearly 25 percent higher than the state as a whole. Currently, the City can only order inspections on the basis of a complaint from the tenants or owners, or in rare cases, by getting a search warrant, and either Neff or his assistant conducts them.

We usually get, Id say an average of, its not very many, four or five [complaints from tenants annually], and usually its when college students parents come to either move them in or move them out and they see the condition of what their son or daughter has rented, Neff said.

Neff cites his October 2013 inspection of 1217 Fifth Ave. as the main motivation for re-launching the rental inspection initiative.

The day that we went in there, there were two tenants for the eight units in there. The water had been turned off for the three days prior to that because of so many leaks. There were electrical issues, they were having heating issues, cooling issues, rodent issues, Neff said. Lots and lots of cockroaches.  Light fixtures were broken. The plaster was all cracked and falling off.

Following the inspection and relocation of the tenants and a year and half of negotiations between lawyers, property owner Dave Seaba agreed that by the end of 2016 he would do one of three things: sell the house, fix all of the issues and get the house up to code or demolish it. Currently, no action has been taken and the property remains as it has for the past three years, boarded up and empty.

The long, drawn out case of 1217 Fifth Ave. eventually led to concrete steps towards a new proposal during the City Councils annual retreat earlier this year.

At their meeting they decided they felt like rental inspection was on of the top priorities they wanted to look at, Neff said.

The idea caught on to convene an independent taskforce to review the 2011 proposal and to create a new proposal for the council to vote on. Most likely, the council will vote on Oct. 3 on whether to convene the taskforce, which would be composed of City staff, tenants, landlords and ordinary citizens. If approved, Neff thinks the taskforce will have a final proposal by March 2017, and he hopes the taskforce will help reduce opposition relative to 2011.

Unfortunately for Neff, some of the old opposition is not budging, including Seth Rozendaal who, together with his parents Bill and Norma Rozendaal, owns and manages a number of rental properties in Grinnell.

This is kind of how the government works. When they dont have the support to get something through, theyll just try over and over and over until finally it passes, Rozendaal said, who distrusts the City because of issues like the Iowa Museum of Transportations foreclosure last year. You get a worse service at a higher cost whenever you do a government thing versus [private companies].

A major point of concern for Rozendaal is the cost of the program, especially given his view that the rental inspection program would require a new fulltime inspector. However, Neff is adamant that there would be no new hires.

Its going to be tough, I understand that, its not like I dont have anything else to do, but well get through it, Neff said.

Grinnell has approximately 1,300 rental housing units, according to The American Community Survey, meaning that inspecting the whole rental stock in a year would require roughly five inspections each business day. Neff conceded that, without any new staff, the first round of inspections might take more than a year.

According to Rozendaal, landlords are not alone in their opposition as many of their tenants do not want to shoulder the burden of the costs either.

I think a lot of the tenants themselves are against it, just because of these costs that are associated with it, first of all theyll never go away, they never go down and they always go up, and they always get pushed out on to the end user, which, in this case, is the tenant, he said.

One tenant who supports the program is Louis Engleman 17, who lives with a few housemates in a house on High St. that has been occupied by Grinnell students going back several years. After moving in June 1, Engleman received a water bill for June 10 through Aug. 9 of 740 dollars, much of which he believes is due to a leaky toilet.

This problem supposedly started just about a week after our landlord did a walkthrough the house, Engleman said. And if it started that soon after,  we think she didnt do a good enough job examining the place.

I knew the tenants that lived here last year, and that toilet was an issue.  It had to be fixed multiple times, said Rebekah Rennick 18, a friend of Englemans who said that his landlord had a responsibility to inform him and his housemates of those issues so they could watch for it.

At the time The S&B went to print, Englemans landlord agreed to pay 200 dollars of the bill. Engleman believes that City-recognized inspectors would likely have had the leaky toilet fixed, saving him and his housemates a hefty water bill.
By Lily Bohlke

bohlkeli@grinnell.edu

Although many students are excited about the new free menstrual products in womens bathrooms this semester, the same products have not made an appearance in male-gendered and single-occupancy bathrooms. Last September, Rebekah Rennick 18 picked the locks of many tampon and pad machines across campus to demonstrate her belief that every student who menstruates, not just those who identify as women, should have access to free menstrual products.

We have conversations about menstruation that are very woman-centric and are alienating to people who menstruate who dont identify as women, Rennick said. For a college as socially progressive as we are, to not be aware or concerned with making this conversation inclusive is a problem.

Last years Student Government Association (SGA) President, Dan Davis 16, worked with both administration and Facilities Management (FM) to make free menstrual products available. Davis initiative called for the machines to be installed in female-gendered, male-gendered and single-occupancy bathrooms. FM verbally agreed to pay for the upkeep of the free machines if SGA and the College would pay for the installation.

When students returned to Grinnell in August, however, they found mens bathrooms still absent of menstrual product machines. Pads and tampons also remain absent from single-occupancy bathrooms.

Although we are open to providing such products in non-gendered, single-occupancy restrooms, it is atypical to do so, given the lesser volume of patrons and expense of the vending units, Rick Whitney, assistant vice president for FM wrote in an email to The S&B.

For students with disabilities who may be more likely to use single-occupancy bathrooms, the absence of menstrual products in these bathrooms can prove to be a real issue of accessibility.

We are so about accessibility, said SGA President Anita DeWitt 17. Even making sure  that if you had a wheelchair you would still be able to reach up to grab that. Making sure that the thing you have to turn isnt complex. Even if it just means baskets of tampons and pads.

Although SGA will likely not put funding toward additional menstrual product machines, they plan to support any efforts to do so as best they can.

Our job is to advocate for students, and thats what were going to do going forward, [but] the money towards those things should come from the school, DeWitt said.

Although Rennick is disappointed that free pad and tampons machines were not installed in all academic building bathrooms, she views the conversation around this issue as a sign of progress.

If [there is] anything Im happy that has come out of this besides for the implementation of free products, its that there is a dialogue, Rennick said. There is a conversation and we are actively in a space where were able to break the stigma and give people more connection to their bodies.

According to Rennick, student support has also been very positive. However, after Rennick wrote an article for the Grinnell Underground Magazine, she did receive some backlash. She was told that fighting for such a small issue was selfish or frivolous or silly.

Its pretty weird to be called selfish and a profit of suburban strife, because this isnt just something that affects people coming from places of privilege who have the time to be concerned about this, she said. This is something that affects people who dont necessarily have the money to afford menstrual products. These are a real expense.

DeWitt noted that although she thinks that menstrual products should have a comfortable space in all bathrooms, there are many logistics to think about. She explained that there are potential instances in which openly displayed pads and tampons may not be accepted. For example, she brought up a hypothetical cisgender heterosexual male who is not familiar with Grinnells culture. A person could become upset about seeing menstrual products in his bathroom and write a slur on the machine.

Thats something we have to look for, she said. You have to think through every aspect of these things and how people are going to respond, and thats where we are right now.

Some universities have begun the movement towards menstrual products in all bathrooms, including male-gendered bathrooms. Brown University is a recent example DeWitt cited.

I hope it can be moved forward and we can do more than what our peers institutions are doing, Rennick said. Its more than just a womens issue; it is a human issue.
By Graham Dodd

doddhenr@grinnell.edu

Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are potentially the most disliked presidential candidates in American history. While many voters feel forced to pick one of the two, others are searching for alternatives.

Professor Barbara Trish, Political Science, says this has created a rare opportunity for third parties and independents, which are typically overshadowed in Americas two-party system.

With unfavorable scores for both candidates this year, this would be the year to pull it off, Trish said regarding the potential for third party candidates Gary Johnson, Jill Stein and independent Evan McMullin to broaden their support bases and garner significantly more votes than in the past.

Gary Johnson, former Governor of New Mexico, is the presidential candidate for the Libertarian Party. He is running on a platform based on reducing the size and reach of the government. Consistent with libertarian ideals, on most issues Johnson supports deregulation and emphasizes civil rights. Running mate Bill Weld, former governor of Massachusetts, adds political credibility to Johnsons campaign. Johnson is currently polling at around nine percent nationally and is on the presidential ballot in all 50 states.

I think Gary Johnson is a credible candidate, he has experience, notwithstanding the Aleppo thing, Trish said in reference to a recent gaffe of Johnsons wherein he did not know the name of a major hotspot in the Syrian war. The message people took away from it was that he probably didnt have the knowledge to engage in foreign affairs. But he is a credible third party candidate. Hes got a credible running mate, and by credible, I mean someone with experience in the political realm.

Dr. Jill Stein is the Green Partys presidential candidate. Her platform is centered around a variety of left-wing policies. These include extensive climate control reform, free college education and criminal justice reform. The Green Party hopes to greatly expand the role of the federal government in order to create universal standards of employment, health care and justice. Stein is currently polling at three percent nationally and is on the ballot in 45 states, with write-in status in another 3 states.

Independent candidate Evan McMullin is the former Chief Policy Director for the House Republican Conference in the U.S. House of Representatives and a former CIA operations officer. His campaign strategy appeals to Republicans who cannot bring themselves to vote for Trump. McMullin, who has very little name recognition, is only taking one percent in the polls and is on the ballot in only 10 states.

In Americas two-party system, it can seem wasteful to vote for a third party candidate who has little chance of winning. Anna Schierenbeck 18 is the co-chair of Campus Democrats, a student organization which encourages student political participation. She does not think voting for third parties is wasteful despite the likelihood that such votes will not result in their candidate winning.

I dont think it is wasting your vote to vote for third party, Schierenbeck said, Just because you should vote for the person that most aligns with your values. What I will say is that I think that, when you recognize the dominance of the two-party system in this country, it is important, especially in presidential elections where it is harder for candidates to gain more votes, that you have to recognize that your vote probably wont result in a win.

Schierenbeck pointed out that Iowa voters may not be in the best position to send a message by voting third party because Iowa is a swing state.

In the case of a high stakes presidential election where the two opposing Republican and Democrat candidates are so ideologically different, Schierenbeck said I think that it makes the most sense to vote for one of the two major parties.

Trish noted additional concerns for voters considering candidates from outside the two major parties.

It is really hard for third parties to compete in the US system, she said. The decks are stacked against them. The rules work to their disadvantage. Not just in the obvious ways. Theyve got to demonstrate a pretty monumental threshold to be included in the debate, for example. It is harder to get onto the ballot for them in many states. Everything seems to work against them. We dont have a great history in the United States of third party or independent candidate success.

Trish added she that she does not believe third party votes are not wasted votes, although their impact is limited.

Also there is a message that comes with significant support for a third party candidate. Either a message that says you dont like either of the major party options, or that there may be a policy message youd like to send with your support of the Libertarian or Green party.

Johnson, Stein and McMullin will be on the Iowa ballot come election day.
But the tribe has a long way to go
Elder brother India (External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj insists that India is the benevolent elder, not the bossy big brother) is most certainly happy. Nepal's newly appointed prime minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal 'Prachanda' who didn't tarry too long before coming to New Delhi for his first bilateral talks, had a packed day on Friday, meeting President Pranab Mukherrjee, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Sushma Swaraj, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Power Minister Piyush Goyal.

Productive, warm conversations" was how Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar described these interactions, emphasising that both sides recognised that their futures are tied together.

Although officially India signed three agreements with Nepal, which included kick-starting the Terai road project, finalising a line of credit of 750 million dollars that India had already committed earlier, the significant part of Prachanda's conversation was regarding the vexing issue of Nepal's constitution, which soured Indo-Nepal ties during K.P. Oli's tenure and also perhaps led to his ouster from the post.

Prachanda briefed Indian leaders on the developments regarding the constitution and the political processes in Nepal. India appreciated the gesture," said Jaishankar, reiterating the country's stance that India expected the constitution to be framed through inclusive dialogue, accommodating the aspirations of all sections of Nepal's diverse society.

It may be recalled that last year, Jaishankar was sent to Kathmandu to discuss with the Oli government which had drafted the constitution that several minorities felt accorded a shoddy deal to them. Although the Janajatis and other communities had grouses, India's main concern was regarding the Madhesis of Terai who have close familial ties with Indians of eastern UP and Bihar.

Prachanda would head to Himachal Pradesh to review a hydro electric project there. Nepal's main request to India has been to speed up power supply, specially with the Pancheshwar project.

The Oli regime saw one of the most strained relations between the two countries in the recent times. Even after Oli placated India over the constitution issue, he remained hostile, and when Prachanda and a group of other parties attempted a coup, Oli's suspected that India was behind it. He even recalled his ambassador Deep Kumar Upadhayay, who had tried giving Oli some advice which the latter thought to be pro-Indian.

Consequently, Indian aid to Nepal remained on paper. For instance, not much progress has been made on post quake reconstruction. Also, India has only completed 71km of the 605km Terai road.

With Prachanda's visit, India has increased the commitment for constructing 50 thousand houses from Rs 2 lakh per unit to 3 lakh.

With Prachanda, a good start seems to have been made, but India will remain wary of the neighbour it often took for granted. Prachanda is a Maoist and is close to Beijing, even though Chinese premiere has called off a scheduled trip to Kathmandu, reportedly over Nepal not toeing the Chinese line.
The bickering in the Yadav clan came out in open late on Thursday after Shivpal Singh Yadav resigned from the Akhilesh Yadav cabinet and also resigned as state party chief.

Soon after he sent his resignation to his nephew Chief Minister, his son and Chairman of the Uttar Pradesh Pradeshik Cooperative Federation, Aditya Yadav, also quit the post.

Unconfirmed reports suggest that the Chief Minister has returned the resignation of his uncle.

Close aides of the former PWD minister informed that Shivpal has returned all government perks and facilities, like official staff and vehicles, and will be vacating his official residence, 7, Kalidas Marg on Friday.

Shivpal's official residence is adjacent to the official 5, Kalidas Marg, residence of Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav. The development further shook the ruling party in the state with its stalwart leader Shivpal throwing in the towel and getting ready for a showdown.

Shivpal Yadav took the decision to quit the cabinet and party post after a meeting with his elder brother and party Chief Mulayam Singh Yadav.

Akhilesh Yadav had on Tuesday stripped his uncle Shivpal from the plum posts of PWD, Cooperative and Irrigation minister.

Earlier, Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav, who reached the state capital in the evening, made it clear that under no circumstances would Shivpal be removed as the state unit president.

Speaking informally to reporters in Delhi, Mulayam had called Shivpal, who is his younger brother, a grassroots leader who had a happy-go-lucky disposition. "I am sure things will be sorted out when Akhilesh and I speak across the table," he added.

Mulayam, who was received by Parliamentary Board member Kironmoy Nanda at the airport, left the airport without speaking to the waiting media.

However, sources say the SP supremo was unmoved at the plea of party national general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav that he go soft on his Chief Minister son. A close aide said "Netaji" was convinced that Akhilesh Yadav had challenged his authority when as a tit-for-tat, the Chief Minister divested Shivpal of all important portfolios.

On Friday a meeting is likely to happen between Mulayam and Akhilesh and some major decision is likely to emerge to douse the flames threatening to decimate the party in the run up to the state assembly polls just a few months away.

Earlier, Ram Gopal Yadav, who came to Lucknow as an emissary of SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav, was closeted for over an hour with Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav at his residence.

Emerging out of the meeting, Ram Gopal Yadav expressed hope the crisis would be resolved at the earliest. In a moment of candour he also admitted that probably a mistake had been committed in removing Akhilesh as the party's state unit president.

Ram Gopal Yadav said it would have been better had Mulayam Singh asked Akhilesh to step down rather than summarily removing him from the post he has held for the past five years. Later at a press interaction at the VVIP guest house where he is staying, the Rajya Sabha member indirectly hit out at his colleague Amar Singh as the "outsider" who was behind the crisis.

Ram Gopal Yadav said everyone in the party and the cadre felt that Amar Singh had triggered the whole crisis for his own narrow and petty political gains. Singh, he added, had nothing to do with the party and its ideology and that he was only concerned about himself.

He said that party workers wanted Singh to be thrown out of the party yet again. With regards to Shivpal Singh Yadav, he said, there was no question of now removing him as the state party president since the decision was taken by "Netaji" and that it was irrevocable.

Asked if the power struggle in the family could be contained by reinstating all portfolios held by Shivpal to him again, Ram Gopal answered in the negative and said that a minister was a minister and that departments were of no consequence.

Shivpal Yadav, who reached the state capital in the afternoon along with his son Aditya Yadav, was received by hundreds of supporters at the airport.

Addressing a hurriedly convened press conference, Shivpal said he was ready for "any and all sacrifices for the party" but added that for him Mulayam's word was final and that he was the party boss and the family patriarch.

He also called for unity in the family as elections were round the corner and everyone should work hard to ensure return of SP to power. He, however, cautioned that "Mulayam's decision dare not be challenged in the party".

In a related development, former chief secretary Deepak Singhal, whose sudden removal is said to have triggered the whole controversy, was on Thursday posted as Chairman of State Vigilance Commission.

Sources say, Singhal who had been put on waiting list after his removal, was hurriedly posted to this new post so that the issue is closed for the time being. Mulayam Singh Yadav, hours after his removal, had asked Akhilesh to reinstate him, which he refused.
[PHOTOS IN EXTENDED ARTICLE]

While three suspects were arrested after breaking into the home of Kiryat Gat Chief Rabbi Moshe Havlin Shlita last week, protestors returned on Monday night to protest against the rav again.

The protest stems from the ravs participation in efforts that led to the recently-signed agreement between the IDF and Chabad rabbonim vis-a-vis military service for Chabadniks.

Protestors accuse Rabbi Havlin of selling Jewish neshomos, insisting he is personally profiting from each talmid compelled to enter the IDF under the agreement.

The three were arraigned a second time on Monday 9 Elul and released with restrictions. They were part of the group of over 20 people who entered the ravs home and began a ruckus. The rebitzen was hospitalized for observation following the traumatic incident.

The rav told the media his rebitzen has yet to recover from last weeks traumatic incident.

The agreement reached between the Chabad rabbonim and the IDF permits talmidim to travel to 770 for Kvutza with the understanding they will enter the IDF at age 24, or at the very latest, 26, permitting those who wish to continue limud following Kvutza.

(YWN  Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
A jury was selected on Wednesday for next weeks trial of two former allies of Republican Gov. Chris Christie who are charged with deliberately causing traffic gridlock at the George Washington Bridge as part of a political vendetta.

The panel will hear opening statements on Monday in federal court in Newark. The trial is expected to last at least six weeks.

Bill Baroni and Bridget Kelly are accused of reducing access lanes to the bridge in Fort Lee in September 2013 to punish the towns Democratic mayor for not endorsing Christie. The bridge, one of the busiest in the world, links Fort Lee and New York City.

Prosecutors are expected to introduce texts and emails showing the defendants joking about the traffic chaos they had wrought even as the mayors pleas for help went unanswered.

Kelly was Christies deputy chief of staff and was the author of an email saying, Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee.

She and Baroni face identical counts of wire fraud, conspiracy, deprivation of civil rights and misusing an organization receiving federal funds. The organization is the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which runs area bridges, tunnels and transit hubs and is where Baroni served as a Christie-appointed deputy executive director.

Kelly and Baroni, who have pleaded not guilty, have said in court filings that the government has twisted federal law to turn their actions into crimes. They also have said other people with more power and influence were involved but arent being prosecuted.

Christie, who failed in a 2016 presidential bid, has repeatedly denied any prior knowledge of the bridge scheme, and a taxpayer-funded report he commissioned absolved him of wrongdoing. He wasnt charged but is sure to be mentioned during the trial and could be subpoenaed to testify.

A former political blogger and high school friend of Christies who also worked for the Port Authority, David Wildstein, has pleaded guilty and will testify for the government.

The 12-member jury, part of an original pool of more than 200 people, survived individual questioning by U.S. District Judge Susan Wigenton and several rounds of challenges in which attorneys dismissed potential jurors without having to give reasons.

The judge also dismissed several jurors who indicated they couldnt set aside their personal feelings about the scandal.

Several, including some who made the final cut, expressed strong opinions about Christie. Among two selected were a woman who wrote on her questionnaire that she doesnt like Chris Christie and a man told the judge he didnt like videos hed seen of the often combative governor jumping down peoples throats.

(AP)
The Orthodox Jewish community of Berlin celebrated a Hachnasas Sefer Torah into the local shul at the beginning of the week. During the ceremony, led by Rabbi Yehuda Teichtal, Rabbi of the Jewish Community of Berlin, torches were held by children of the local Jewish community and by Syrian refugee children. We seek to live our lives in peace stated Rabbi Techital in his speech, referring to the endless arguments discussed as reaching the upcoming Berlin election day.

The Torah teaches us to love humanity as a whole and to always reach out to those in need, were the opening words in Rabbi Teichtals speech.

Unfortunately, we have been witnessing those who try and spread out hate while taking advantage of the fear and disorder feelings of this time. This kind of manner is one far from the Jewish customs and Jewish values. We mustnt forget that regardless of the time, and no matter what the political arguments are, we must unite as a whole and together look forward to a time of peace.

Further in his speech Rabbi Teichtal directed his words to the Syrian refugee children It is an honor for me you joined us today and celebrated with us. G-d has brought us all to this part of the world. I wish that we all do our best to allow us all to live in love and peace together.

In spite the tension in the air of Berlin as reaching the upcoming elections on September 18th, this parade was walking to the beat of a different drummer. The festive night will remain in memory of the Jewish community of Berlin as they marched through the city streets carrying the Sefer Torah, calling out in the name of tolerance and love, freedom and hope.

The welcoming of this 10th Sefer Torah to the community was another one of the many events held by Rabbi Teichtals community as he celebrates 20 years of communal work at the Jewish community of Berlin. At the parade 150 members of the Jewish community joined the march along with the honored guests, the 10 refugee children and their families. This parade today is an alliance between God and us all to live our lives together in harmony concluded Rabbi Teichtal.

(YWN  Israel Desk, Jerusalem/Photo Credit: David Osipov)
Earlier this week YWN-ISRAEL reported that Bayit Yehudi party leader, Minister Naftali Bennett, is going to be challenged for the partys top spot.

The dati leumi Srugim website now reports that challenger is IDF reserve duty colonel, Yonatan Branski. Branski has served as deputy commander of the Gaza Division along with other command posts, as well as serving today as the executive director of Netzach Yehuda, the non-profit arm of Nachal Chareidi. http://nahalharedi.com/?lang=en

The following biography on Branski appears on the NGOs website: Col. (res.) Jonathan Branski is the CEOat Friends Of the Nahal Haredi since 2014, after retiring 25 years positions in the IDF. Among his military duties he served as the Nahal Haredi (97) Battalion commander, as the operations officer of the Southern Command, commander of the Negev Battalion, the head of Staff at the military rabbinate and the deputy commander of the Gaza Division.

He graduated three years in the Bnei David Yeshiva at Eli and has BA in political science and Middle Eastern studies, and a masters degree in diplomacy and national security.

Srugim adds that Branski has yet to officially announce he is challenging Bennett for the partys leadership slot, most likely because he was abroad for a period of time. It is added Branski is likely to make his intensions official after the Tishrei Yomim Tovim.

(YWN  Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
Speaking to Reshet Bet Radio on Thursday, 12 Elul, Shas party leader Minister Aryeh Deri explained that if Yair Lapid forms the next coalition, as some polls indicate may be the case, his party would not rule out joining such a coalition. Deri stated this would be the case if Lapid can amass a majority of 61 without the chareidim. Such a scenario however is most unlikely.

He explained that if Lapid has a majority without the chareidim then he will approach Shas and present his guidelines explaining he is forming a coalition with or without the chareidim, offering him to bring Shas in. Then Deri is willing to consider such a situation.

Deri added that other than a passing hello, he and Lapid are not in touch. He also added that lchatchila Shas and the chareidim would prefer another scenario but he is not ruling out the above. Deri explained that while he does not see eye-to-eye on many issues with Avigdor Lieberman and Yisrael Beitenu, he believes that would be easier than a coalition headed by Lapid.

This said, readers are reminded that Health Minister Yaakov Litzman has recently reiterated he would never sit in a government headed by Lapid unless he first served and proved he is doing teshuvah towards the chareidim and then, and only then, there might be something to consider.

(YWN  Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
Israel has been telling the international community that much of the donor funds given to Gaza by the international community never reaches the people of Gaza. The report is also critical of the PA (Palestinian Authority) and its spending habits.

Israel has been saying this for quite some time, reporting much of the donor funds infused into Gaza since Operation Protective Edge are not used to rebuild the civilian population but to strengthen the Hamas military regime.

The World Bank now announces that less than half of the donor funds to rebuild Gaza after Operation Protective Edge actually reach the Gazan economy and people.

The recent report cites unemployment in Gaza is 42% and 18% in PA (Palestinian Authority) autonomous areas. The report also blames Israeli restrictions for the ailing Palestinians economy citing restrictions discourage investment and competition.

The bank is recommending a lightening of restrictions by Israel both in The West Bank and Gaza. The report also addresses the PA and the need to cut spending.

(YWN  Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
Rabbi Yitzchak Chai Zaga has announced he plans to compete against Naftali Bennett in the partys next primaries for the partys leadership position. In the ravs own words, he plans To make Bayit Yehudi a part for all Israelis, with a clear ideological principle and addressing social issues together with offering practical and creative solutions in the fight against poverty and solving the housing crisis as well as all other aspects of Israeli life.

The rav is building his camp, calling himself Orot Bayit Yehudi, reaching out to party members. Rabbi Zaga has a Masters degree in law as well as business and has worked as an attorney for a fund redeeming land in Yehuda and Shomron, a strategic advisor, a member of the directorates of Africa Israel, Dor Energy, Alon Delek, Dor Gas, and Negev Ceramics.

In 5763 he took a break to learn and teach Torah, seeking to bring a new Torah spirit to Israeli society and of late has been working under the title Beit Medrash Ruach Yerushalmit  Life According to Rav Kook. The rav also delivers a weekly shiur in Jerusalems Beit HaRav Kook.

(YWN  Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
A meeting was held on Thursday 12 Elul in the office of Attorney General Dr. Avichai Mandelblit to discuss the future of the community of Amona. Amona, situated near Ofra in the Binyamin Regional Council of Shomron, must be razed by the end of the Gregorian year as per a High Court order. The High Court ruled the community was by and large built illegally on privately owned Arab land.

A plan was discussed to address the 11 areas of absentee landlords, areas that the Arabs have not made any claim to. This proposal comes from the Justice Ministry, which hopes to conduct an an in-depth probe as to the status of the land in question with the assistance of the IDF Civil Administration. It is reported that the Civil Administration is not on the same page as the Justice Ministry, with the latter claiming it does not see a legal way to make this plan work.

The petitions filed with the High Court by organizations representing PA (Palestinian Authority) resident address 24 of the existing 35 land divisions in Amona, while the remaining 11 are not included in the legal action. If and when the Justice Ministry completes the probe and learns the land has no claims, then a solution will surround those areas, which amount to a combined 73 dunams of land, which is about 18.25 acres.

At present, Amona is home to about 40 families and to date, these families have rejected any and all government offers to move the community to a new venue and rebuild it larger than it is today.

At a recent gathering of prominent dati leumi rabbonim, Rabbi Zalman Melamed Shlita poke of the removal of the Ulpana neighborhood of Beit El three years ago. At that time, he supported the voluntary evacuation to prevent confrontation based on a promise from Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to rebuild the neighborhood at a new venue, a larger version, 300 housing units. However, as Rabbi Melamed points out, this never happened and the government headed by Mr. Netanyahu is no longer to be trusted as promises are not fulfilled.

(YWN  Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
While the matter of discrimination in chareidi girls high schools (seminar) is not new, this administration, perhaps more than any preceding it, has announced it will not tolerate such policies and will act immediately and swiftly to prevent it. Previous governments have declared war and promised to end it, but this administration is actually taking the necessary steps, making good on threats to cut school funding.

In the latest incident, Director of the Education Ministry Chareidi District Itzik Zahavi has taken stern action against five high schools accused of continuing to discriminate against girls. In a letter sent to the schools, it is explained that if they continue to refuse girls assigned to the schools by the ministry, they will face a harsh response including cutting their budget from the ministry. The schools that received the letter include Darchei Rachel (Mendelson), Netivot Chachma (Modiin Illit), Bnos HaRama (Beit Shemesh), Ateret Rachel (Tiveria) and Einhorn.

Ministry Director-General Michal Cohen explains she has decided to accept the appeal filed by parents claiming discrimination.

Zahavi explains the schools have remained defiant despite earlier warnings and the ministry will not tolerate the discrimination, hence the budgets to the school will be cut.

(YWN  Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
While many Chabad-affiliated rabbonim signed the agreement between the chassidus and the IDF, it appears protestors have decided to concentrate their efforts against Kiryat Gat Chief Rabbi, Rabbi Moshe Havlin Shlita. A number of protests have been held at his home in the past two weeks, including one in which some two dozen sikrikim entered the ravs home and created a ruckus. Three people have been arrested, arraigned and released on bail, but the protests are continuing.

The latest protest took place on Thursday afternoon 12 Elul, once again outside the rabbis home. Police detained 17 protestors who gathered illegally outside the rabbis home. At the time of this report police are working to identify the detainees, who in the past have refused to cooperate with authorities. Police explain they respect ones right to protest but this must be done legally and there will be no tolerance for illegal activities.

Following the first protest the rabbi spoke to the media. The rav, who is in his 60s, explained he has been in the predominately non-frum community for decades and Baruch Hashem, there is a harmonious relationship between the religious and non-religious residents. He lamented the fact that two dozen chareidi-appearing protestors violently entered his home and their actions not only led to concern among his neighbors but caused a profound Chilul Hashem. Rabbi Havlin explained that he neighbors cannot understand how people dressed like rabbis can act in such a fashion, in total disregard for him and his rebitzen.

Rebitzen Havlin was hospitalized for observation following the trauma suffered when the sikrikim broke into their home.

(YWN  Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
[PHOTOS IN EXTENDED ARTICLE]

There is a Muslim cemetery adjacent to the Herod Gate entrance to Jerusalems Old City that has been used in recent months to bury terrorists responsible for the wave of deadly terror since last Rosh Hashanah. This locale is rapidly becoming a site for pilgrimage by radical Muslims wishing to identify with these Shahids, Yisrael Hayom reports. Flowers and Palestinian flags are placed on graves of these despicable murderers in an effort to hail them as heroes.

Visitors are taking photos of themselves aside these graves while holding up two fingers in a V for victory.

The report quotes Lach Yerushalayim (For You Jerusalem) head Maor Zemach saying Letting this practice take place at the heart of the Israeli capital, having terrorist being honored in broad daylight without anyone lifting a finger, is just mind-boggling.

Zemach calls on Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan to act to prevent this from becoming a larger trend, which he fears will lead to additional bloodshed.

(YWN  Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
[PHOTOS IN EXTENDED ARTICLE]

MDA paramedics and advanced EMTs traveled to Russia and the Ukraine to train Chabad shluchim in first aid. MDA officials explain this is part of the organizations overall mission, to bring lifesaving skills and services wherever needed, even if it means boarding a plane.

It was decided to train the shluchim amid the awareness the response time for an ambulance in some of the areas they serve is far too long, hence the decision to arm the shluchim with the tools to treat different life-threatening scenarios.

After the course, the tens of newly-certified first aid providers and EMTS arrived in Israel to put their newly-acquired skills to use, joining ambulance teams delivering basic and advanced life support. This gave them an opportunity to put their skills to use and return home with some practical experience under their belts.

After the hands-on practical training in Yerushalayim, a MDA team returned with the newly-certified recruits for a graduation ceremony in the office of Russias Chief Rabbi, Rabbi, Berel Lazar Shlita. Among the MDA officials present were MDA Chief of Operations Eli Bin, Deputy Director of Operations Gil Moskowitz, and the chief paramedic instructors, Sagi Abramov and Itzik Asraf. The graduates are shluchim in Moscow, the Ukraine and Siberia, and they will be joining veteran MDA volunteer in Hatzalah Moscow, Rav Schneur Halprin.

Twelve of the graduates are certified as EMTs (Emergency Medical Technicians), while ten others are certified in first aid. Each received a first response bag containing appropriate equipment.

(YWN  Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
Federal law is supposed to protect the privacy of your Social Security number from government inquiries  but apparently that doesnt extend to a check on whether youve paid back taxes and child support. In a decision with worrying implications for those who oppose a single national identification number, a divided federal appeals court has rejected a lawyers refusal to submit his Social Security number along with his renewal of Maryland bar membership.

The state says it needs Social Security numbers to make sure lawyers child support and taxes are up to date. The courts majority said that was enough to fit the Social Security number under the federal law that allows states to use your number for tax purposes. That definition is so loose that it enables states to ask for your Social Security number pretty much whenever they want  even when their records have been hacked.

The test case was initiated by a Washington-based lawyer named Michael Tankersley, who is a member in good standing of the Maryland bar. He got legal help from the watchdog group Public Citizen, which among other things is interested in promoting privacy-rights litigation.

In Maryland, anyone who wants to practice law has to pay a fee that goes to the client protection fund run by the state bar. Along with the annual fee, the lawyers Social Security number must be disclosed. Thats by order of the Maryland Court of Appeals, which has responsibility for attorney registration in the state. The Court of Appeals says that its necessary so that the state can ensure that its lawyers have paid back taxes and child support that they might owe.

Tankersley paid the fee but never disclosed his Social Security number. He says hes worried about identity theft generally, and points out that Maryland agencies have had data stolen in cyberattacks. The state authorities suspended his license.

Tankersleys legal argument was based on the federal Privacy Act, which says that its unlawful for any federal, state or local government agency to deny to any individual any right, benefit, or privilege provided by law because of such individuals refusal to disclose his Social Security account number.

On the surface, the privacy law sounds as though it covers Tankersleys situation. He wants the privilege of practicing law in Maryland, and the state is withholding his right to practice because of his refusal to disclose his Social Security number.

But things are a bit more complicated, because two other federal laws, the Welfare Reform Act and the Tax Reform Act, both allow states to demand your Social Security number in particular situations.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit first held that the welfare law didnt cover Tankersleys case. That law allows the government to require the Social Security number of any applicant for a professional license. The court said Tankersley wasnt an applicant because he already had a license to practice law and was seeking only to renew the license.

But a majority of the panel went on to say that the Tax Reform Act trumped the Privacy Act. The tax law says that a state can ask for a Social Security number in the administration of any tax law from any individual who is or appears to be affected by the tax law.

Tankersley doesnt live in Maryland and doesnt pay taxes there, nor is the Maryland bar a tax-collecting authority. But the panel thought that didnt matter. In essence, it held that the state of Maryland is itself an entity empowered to collect taxes, and that it intended to use the Social Security number in part to make sure taxes were paid to it. And it noted that although Tankersley doesnt live in Maryland, he might become liable to its taxes if were licensed to practice there.

In dissent, Judge Andre Davis wrote that he accepted Tankersleys arguments. The state of Maryland, he argued, was improperly taking advantage of the client protection fund, which has nothing to do with taxation or the administration of the tax laws.

Daviss decision is drily written and doesnt invoke the public policy interest in favor of privacy. But thats the best rationale for his viewpoint.

The whole point of the federal privacy law is to prevent states from making the Social Security number into a nationally mandated identification number of the kind thats common in Europe. The practice goes back to the immediate post-World War II era, when Sweden became the first country to assign every citizen a personal identity number that follows you throughout your life and must be used in essentially every interaction with state. Every Swede memorizes the number in childhood. And notably, the tax authority makes everyones number publicly available to anyone who asks for it.

Concern for privacy and suspicion of the federal government have combined to make the U.S. resist this common bureaucratic requirement. The Privacy Act is supposed to block states from making the use of a Social Security number a requirement for all citizen-state interactions.

Taxes are an exception, as they should be. But if states can require you to give your Social Security number in other situations by asserting that theyre going to check if youve paid your taxes, that could spell the end of the federal privacy law. A state could simply decide that it needs to check your taxes every time you ask for a benefit to which youre entitled.

The 4th Circuit got this one wrong, and has needlessly created a loophole around federal privacy law.

(c) 2016, Bloomberg View  Noah Feldman


1:50PM IL: In a second Palestinian terror attack in less than an hour, a vehicle tried to run over Jews at the entrance to Kiryat Arba, near the gas station. Bchasdei Hashem security forces were able to detect the threat in time, firing at and killing two terrorists.

Bchasdei Hashem there were no injuries to the intended victims of the attack.

2:11PM IL: A male terrorist was killed in the attack and the second terrorist, a female, remains in critical condition. A very large knife was found in the vehicle, leading authorities to believe after running people over, they planned to get out and begin attacking others.

(YWN  Israel Desk, Jerusalem/Photos: Media Resource Group)
Sadiq Khan is using his first trip to the U.S. since becoming Londons first Muslim mayor to criticize Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.

The Chicago Tribune reports Khan said Thursday evening that Trump was representing the views of extremists when he said mainstream Muslims cant have Western values. Khan says hes a big fan of Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton who should be infusing, energizing people to vote for her.

Khan talked to reporters after speaking at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, where he focused on social integration.

The London mayor plans to tour the city Friday with Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel. The two are expected to stroll along the Chicago Riverwalk, visit a digital startup community and dine at the Art Institute of Chicago.

(AP)
The following is via OnlySimchas.com:

Dr David Applebaum and his daughter, Nava HYD. Today, 13 Elul is their yahrzeit. Murdered by a terrorist, the night before Nava was to marry. ..... A wise man once said It is amazing how quickly life can change and amazing how quickly we can forget,..if we dont take time to remember Let us take some time to remember (or learn about) these beautiful souls who were lost on this day, 13 years ago.

Nava Applebaum was a 20-year-old Israeli-American woman who was murdered together with her father on the evening before her wedding by an Arab suicide bomber.

Journalist Yossi Klein Halevi described the incident as an epic tragedy, and wrote: If a new book of Tanach were ever written about the modern return to Zion, it would have to include the story of the Applebaums.

Nava Applebaum was the eldest daughter of David and Debra Applebaum, the third of six children.

Her father, David Applebaum, was a prominent ER doctor well known for work on methods for assisting suicide bombing victims.He was born in Detroit, Michigan, and moved to Chicago, Illinois, as a teenager. After getting semicha he attended Northwestern University and graduated with a Masters in Biology. David then attended the University of Toledo Medical Center. He moved to Israel in the early 80s, and traveled back at times to practice in the USA.

READ MORE: ONLYSIMCHAS.COM
Dear Mayor de Blasio,

I submit this letter in anticipation of my retirement, which becomes effective at midnight on Sunday, September 18, 2016.

Serving as police commissioner during your administration has been one of the great honors of my life, and as I tender this resignation I also tender my thanks. In leading six different police departments across the country in the past 35 years, I have never been better resourced or more fully supported by any mayor. From equipment, to training, to technology, to policy, to the first substantive headcount expansion in more than a decade, you have stood by the NYPD and made much of what we have accomplished possible.

Thanks are also due to the people of New York and the cops of the NYPD. Working together in partnership in our neighborhood-based policing initiatives, they are forging the way forward in crime fighting and collaboration. Public safety is a shared responsibility, but police will always carry the larger burden. It is impossible to quantify the many acts of bravery, kindness, and concern that our officers perform each day, but I am deeply grateful for their acts and for the privilege of working beside them for the past 33 months.

Those months have not been free from tragedy. We lost five officers in the line of duty and one overseas during my tenure, a steep and painful cost. We faced crisis and challenge, most notably the great unrest during the winter of 2014/2015. Our officers restrained management of those protests showed the nation what a professional police department can do.

Our core reform is the Neighborhood Policing Plan, a fundamental redesign of the way our precincts and police service areas conduct patrol. Under this plan, the precincts have been re-sectored to reflect neighborhood boundaries, and each sector is patrolled by a team of officers, who work that sector exclusively. We have established a new position, neighborhood coordination officer (NCO), to work closely with the residents and businesses, with two NCOs permanently assigned to each sector.

By October 2016, the Neighborhood Policing Plan will be in place in more than half of the patrol precincts and all of the Housing PSAs. By dedicating more resources to communities and responding to their needs, we are bringing the cops and the citizens of New York City closer together, with substantial benefits for both crime fighting and quality of life. None of this would have been possible without your decision to add nearly 1,300 officers to our department.

In the first two years of your term, index crime decreased 5.7 percent and has gone down 2.5 percent so far this year. Your years in office have seen the lowest murder total since 1957 and the fewest robberies, burglaries, and auto thefts since the mid-1960s.

Even as crime continues to drop, arrests, criminal summonses, and Terry stops are all down as well, and by very considerable margins. Precision policing has achieved results that exceed anything obtained by over-reliance on street stops and indiscriminate enforcement. It fulfilled the vision you and I shared: that we could maintain safety in our city with far fewer interventions on the street.

Officer safety is paramount, and we are giving our cops the most up-to-date tools: lighter and more protective vests, stronger pepper spray in better canisters, upgraded escape hoods, smaller and brighter flashlights, trauma kits to carry on their belts, and enhanced ballistic protection in our vehicles.

Todays NYPD is undergoing a transformative technological change. As of March 2016, every officer has been given a smartphone and more than 2,000 vehicles have been equipped with tablets. We are also developing new software and building a high-speed data network to connect all of our facilities. No police department in America is doing so much in terms of qualitative and quantitative technology upgrades.

Training has also been transformed. Previously, our newest, least experienced cops often were not as well-guided as they ought to have been. Under our new training model, recruits in the Academy receive a field-training component, and then, after graduation, they spend six months as rookie cops with dedicated field-training officers, or FTOs. These FTOs help new cops develop the fundamental skills that are essential to modern policing. Three days of in-service training for veteran officers covers ethics, de-escalation, tactics, and the nobility of policing. Given annually, these three days update our officers skills and keeps them abreast of the changing world of law enforcement.

For the first time in the history of the NYPD, we are modernizing our facilities throughout the Departmentour headquarters, training facilities, precincts, and other buildings. The Precinct Enhancement Program is reducing clutter, fixing broken equipment, and thoroughly cleaning each patrol precinct, housing police-service area, and transit district facility.

We have reorganized our investigative units, which were previously divided between the Detective Bureau and the Organized Crime Control Bureau, into the new Unified Investigations model. All of these units now report to the Chief of Detectives, which allows for more thorough, more focused, and better-coordinated investigations by our detectives.

We have launched a variety of new units within the NYPD, rearranged existing functions, and developed entirely new capabilities, as noted below:

 Strategic Response Group: A consolidation of eight patrol borough task forces into a unified command, this unit is better staffed, equipped, and trained than its predecessors, allowing for more efficient mobilizations, disorder control, and targeted crime suppression.

 Critical Response Command: A dedicated unit for site protection and counterterror response, the CRC has over 500 dedicated officers, all with specialized counterterrorism and active-shooter training.

 Force Investigation Division: The new division handles all aspects of officer-involved shootings and other critical use-of-force cases.

 Grand Larceny Division: The new division conducts pattern investigations of grand larcenies, as has long been done with burglary and robbery patterns. Grand larcenies now account for 40 percent of major crimes in the city, and 70 percent in Manhattan South.

 Gun Violence Suppression Division: This division assigns dedicated staff to investigate and enhance all gun arrests through successful prosecutions, to counter gun trafficking, and to conduct long-term investigations of violent gangs and crews.

 Risk Management Bureau: The new bureau works closely with our oversight entities to evaluate compliance and misconduct, and to improve training.

 Strategic Communications: This new office puts our editorial, graphics, video, social media, and internal and external marketing capabilities under one roof to coordinate and amplify our message of positive change in the Department.

 Animal Cruelty Investigation Squad: This new sub-unit of the Detective Bureaus Special Victims Squad coordinates, investigates, and assists with complaints of animal cruelty.

 Police Action Litigation Section: This section of the Legal Bureau, strengthens our defense against frivolous lawsuits and provides our cops with better information on cases that involve them.

You have left all of these initiatives in the best possible hands by appointing Jim ONeill as my successor. I am confident that you will have as productive a collaboration with Jim as you have had with me.

Thank you again for the extraordinary privilege and opportunity to serve you and the citizens of New York and, for the second time, to serve proudly alongside the greatest cops on Earth. The men and women of the NYPD are truly New Yorks Finest.

All the best,

William J. Bratton

(YWN Desk  NYC)
Andrew Bailey: 'I would not favour over-weighing to any one asset class'

Top City watchdog Andrew Bailey has thrown cold water on the idea that investing more in property will help savers to fund their retirement.

A rush to use property for pensions could be self-defeating as higher demand will push up the cost of ownership and thus household indebtedness, according to the boss of the Financial Conduct Authority.

In a riposte to the Bank of Englands chief economist Andy Haldane, who controversially claimed property was a better investment for retirement than a pension, Bailey also warned against 'over-weighing' to any one asset class such as housing.

However, Bailey acknowledged there was nothing wrong with exposure to property if it was part of a balanced investment portfolio in a speech to a Pensions and Savings Symposium at Gleneagles in Scotland today.

Haldane, a former colleague of Bailey who was Deputy Governor of the Bank of England until last July, was slammed by former Pensions Minister Ros Altmann for being 'irresponsible' and divorced from reality over his comments about investing in property.

Asked by the Sunday Times whether property or a pension was best for retirement planning, he said: It ought to be pension but its almost certainly property.

'As long as we continue not to build anything like as many houses in this country as we need to we will see what weve had for the better part of a generation, which is house prices relentlessly heading north.

Haldane's remarks followed an admission in May that he could not make the remotest sense of pensions, despite his senior role at the Bank of England.

Today, Bailey said: 'There is an argument that pension saving would be assisted by people holding more housing in their stock of pension assets, based on the real appreciation in the value of housing.

'I dont subscribe to this argument. Why? First, because given the scale of uncertainty over long-run real returns on assets, I would not favour over-weighing to any one asset class, while recognising that a balanced investment portfolio can be exposed to property.

'But, increasing the weight on housing investments could be self-defeating. In the FPC we have been concerned about increasing levels of household indebtedness.

'If the effect of increasing the demand for housing as an asset to own is to push up the cost of ownership, an increase in holdings of housing as pension assets will tend to increase the real cost, and thus household indebtedness.'

Property vs pension: Top City watchdog has thrown cold water on the idea that investing more in housing will help savers to fund their retirement

He also cautioned against the risks of using equity release to unlock money from your home, noting the costs are relatively high and the product was complicated by the need to embed a no negative equity guarantee.

Old Mutual Wealth pensions technical expert, Jon Greer, said: 'Andrew Bailey is right to point out the risks of treating property as collateral against which to generate income in retirement, whether that be through downsizing or equity release.

Housing wealth can be an important part of the mix when it comes to retirement income. But treating your house as your pension is a major risk.

'Putting all your eggs in one basket is never a good idea, particularly when you consider that unlocking value in property is not straightforward. Relying on equity release alone, for example, could leave you exposed if you retire at a time when lenders are restricting credit.

'The remarks from the FCA chief executive provide a timely reminder of the importance of diversifying your pension investments, particularly considering some recent inflammatory remarks from his Bank of England colleague, Andy Haldane.'

Money Mail recently investigated the myths about property and pensions, and analysed the numbers to see what really has been the better way of saving for a retirement in the past 25 years.
Tyler Technologies, Inc. provides integrated information management solutions and services for the public sector. The company operates in three segments: Enterprise Software; Appraisal and Tax; and NIC. It offers financial management solutions, including modular fund accounting systems for government agencies or not-for-profit entities; utility billing systems for the billing and collection of metered and non-metered services; products to automate city and county functions, such as municipal courts, parking tickets, equipment and project costing, animal and business licenses, permits and inspections, code enforcement, citizen complaint tracking, ambulance billing, fleet maintenance, and cemetery records management; and student information and transportation solutions for K-12 schools. The company also provides a suite of judicial solutions comprising court case management, court and law enforcement, prosecutor, and supervision systems to handle multi-jurisdictional county or statewide implementations, and single county systems; public safety software solutions; systems and software to automate the appraisal and assessment of real and personal property, as well as tax applications for agencies that bill and collect taxes; planning, regulatory, and maintenance software solutions for public sector agencies; software applications to enhance and automate operations involving records and document management; and data and insights solutions. In addition, it offers software as a service arrangements and electronic document filing solutions for courts and law offices; software and hardware installation, data conversion, training, product modification, and maintenance and support services; and property appraisal outsourcing services for taxing jurisdictions. The company has a strategic collaboration agreement with Amazon Web Services for cloud hosting services. Tyler Technologies, Inc. was founded in 1966 and is headquartered in Plano, Texas.
Barnes Group Inc. provides engineered products, industrial technologies, and solutions in the United States and internationally. It operates in two segments: Industrial and Aerospace. The Industrial segment offers precision components, products, and systems used by various customers in end-markets, such as mobility, industrial equipment, automation, personal care, packaging, electronics, and medical devices. This segment also designs and manufactures hot runner systems, mold cavity sensors and process control systems, and precision high cavitation mold assemblies for injection molding applications; provides force and motion control solutions for various metal forming and other industrial markets; and designs and develops robotic grippers, end-of-arm tooling systems, sensors, and other automation components for intelligent robotic handling solutions and industrial automation applications. In addition, it manufactures and supplies precision mechanical products, including mechanical springs, and high-precision punched and fine-blanked components used in transportation and industrial applications. This segment sells its products primarily through its direct sales force and distribution channels. The Aerospace segment produces fabricated and precision machined components and assemblies for turbine engines; and nacelles and structures for commercial and defense-related aircraft. It also provides aircraft engine component maintenance, repair, and overhaul services for turbine engine manufacturers, commercial airlines, and defense market; and manufactures and delivers aerospace aftermarket spare parts. This segment serves original equipment manufacturing industry. Barnes Group Inc. was founded in 1857 and is headquartered in Bristol, Connecticut.
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The Progressive Corporation, an insurance holding company, provides personal and commercial auto, personal residential and commercial property, general liability, and other specialty property-casualty insurance products and related services in the United States. It operates in three segments: Personal Lines, Commercial Lines, and Property. The Personal Lines segment writes insurance for personal autos and recreational vehicles (RV). This segment's products include personal auto insurance; and special lines products, including insurance for motorcycles, ATVs, RVs, watercrafts, snowmobiles, and related products. The Commercial Lines segment provides auto-related primary liability and physical damage insurance, and business-related general liability and property insurance for autos, vans, pick-up trucks, and dump trucks used by small businesses; tractors, trailers, and straight trucks primarily used by regional general freight and expeditor-type businesses, and long-haul operators; dump trucks, log trucks, and garbage trucks used by dirt, sand and gravel, logging, and coal-type businesses; and tow trucks and wreckers used in towing services and gas/service station businesses; as well as non-fleet and airport taxis, and black-car services. The Property segment writes residential property insurance for homeowners, other property owners, and renters, as well as offers personal umbrella insurance, and primary and excess flood insurance. The company also offers policy issuance and claims adjusting services; and acts as an agent to homeowner general liability, workers' compensation insurance, and other products. In addition, it provides reinsurance services. The company sells its products through independent insurance agencies, as well as directly on Internet through mobile devices, and over the phone. The Progressive Corporation was founded in 1937 and is headquartered in Mayfield, Ohio.
PNM Resources, Inc., through its subsidiaries, provides electricity and electric services in the United States. It operates through Public Service Company of New Mexico (PNM) and Texas-New Mexico Power Company (TNMP) segments. The PNM segment engages in the generation, transmission, and distribution of electricity. The segment generates electricity using coal, natural gas and oil, nuclear fuel, solar, wind, and geothermal energy sources. As of December 31, 2021, this segment had owned or leased facilities with a total net generation capacity of 2,168 megawatts; and owned 3,426 miles of electric transmission lines, 5,751 miles of distribution overhead lines, 5,765 miles of underground distribution lines, and 250 substations. The segment also owns and leases communication, office and other equipment, office space, vehicles, and real estate. The TNMP segment provides regulated transmission and distribution services. As of December 31, 2021, the segment owned 983 miles of overhead electric transmission lines, 7,297 miles of overhead distribution lines, 1,408 miles of underground distribution lines, and 113 substations. The segment also owns and leases vehicles, service facilities, and office locations throughout its service territory. The company serves approximately 806,000 residential, commercial, and industrial customers and end-users of electricity in New Mexico and Texas. PNM Resources, Inc. was incorporated in 1882 and is headquartered in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
The following companies are subsidiares of Johnson & Johnson: 3Dintegrated ApS, ALZA Corporation, AMO (Hangzhou) Co. Ltd., AMO (Shanghai) Medical Devices Trading Co. Ltd Beijing Branch, AMO (Shanghai) Medical Devices Trading Co. Ltd Guangzhou Branch, AMO (Shanghai) Medical Devices Trading Co. Ltd., AMO ASIA LIMITED, AMO Asia Limited (Korea Branch), AMO Asia Limited Taiwan Branch (Hong Kong), AMO Australia Pty Limited, AMO Australia Pty Limited (New Zealand Branch), AMO Canada Company, AMO Denmark ApS, AMO Development LLC, AMO France, AMO Germany GmbH, AMO Groningen B.V., AMO International Holdings Unlimited Company, AMO Ireland, AMO Ireland Ireland Branch, AMO Italy SRL, AMO Japan K.K., AMO Manufacturing USA LLC, AMO Netherlands BV, AMO Nominee Holdings LLC, AMO Norway AS, AMO Puerto Rico Manufacturing Inc., AMO Sales and Service Inc., AMO Singapore Pte. Ltd., AMO Spain Holdings LLC, AMO Switzerland GmbH, AMO U.K. Holdings LLC, AMO United Kingdom Ltd., AMO Uppsala AB, AUB Holdings LLC, Abott Medical Optics, Acclarent Inc., Actelion Ltd, Actelion Pharmaceuticals, Actelion Pharmaceuticals Ltd, Actelion Pharmaceuticals Trading (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Actelion Pharmaceuticals US Inc., Actelion Treasury Unlimited Company, Akros Medical Inc., Albany Street LLC, Alios BioPharma, Alza Land Management Inc., Anakuria Therapeutics Inc., Animas Diabetes Care LLC, Animas LLC, Animas Technologies LLC, AorTx Inc., Apsis, Aragon Pharmaceuticals, Aragon Pharmaceuticals Inc., Asia Pacific Holdings LLC, Atrionix Inc., Auris Health, Auris Health Inc., Backsvalan 2 Aktiebolag, Backsvalan 6 Handelsbolag, Beijing Dabao Cosmetics Co. Ltd., BeneVir BioPharm Inc., Berna Rhein B.V., BioMedical Enterprises Inc., Biosense Webster (Israel) Ltd., Biosense Webster Inc., Branch of Johnson & Johnson LLC (RU) in Kazakhstan, C Consumer Products Denmark ApS, CSATS Inc., Calibra Medical LLC, Campus-Foyer Apotheke GmbH, Carlo Erba OTC S.r.l., Centocor Biologics LLC, Centocor Research & Development Inc., Cerenovus Inc., ChromaGenics B.V., Ci:Labo Customer Marketing Co. Ltd., Ci:Labo USA Inc., Ci:z Holdings, Ci:z. Labo Co. Ltd., Cilag AG, Cilag GmbH International, Cilag Holding AG, Cilag Holding Treasury Unlimited Company, Cilag-Biotech S.L., CoTherix Inc., Coherex Medical Inc., ColBar LifeScience Ltd., Company Store.com Inc., Conor MedSystems, Cordis International Corporation, Cordis de Mexico S.A. de C.V., Corimmun GmbH, DePuy Hellas SA, DePuy International Limited, DePuy Ireland Unlimited Company, DePuy Mexico S.A. de C.V., DePuy Mitek LLC, DePuy Orthopaedics Inc., DePuy Products Inc., DePuy Spine LLC, DePuy Synthes Gorgan Limited, DePuy Synthes Inc., DePuy Synthes Institute LLC, DePuy Synthes Leto SARL, DePuy Synthes Products Inc., DePuy Synthes Sales Inc., Debs-Vogue Corporation (Proprietary) Limited, Dutch Holding LLC, ECL7 LLC, EES Holdings de Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., EES S.A. de C.V., EIT Emerging Implant Technologies GmbH, Ethicon Endo-Surgery (Europe) GmbH, Ethicon Endo-Surgery Inc., Ethicon Endo-Surgery LLC, Ethicon Inc., Ethicon LLC, Ethicon PR Holdings Unlimited Company, Ethicon Sarl, Ethicon US LLC, Ethicon Women's Health & Urology Sarl, Ethnor (Proprietary) Limited, Ethnor Farmaceutica S.A., Ethnor del Istmo S.A., FMS Future Medical System SA, Finsbury (Development) Limited, Finsbury (Instruments) Limited, Finsbury Medical Limited, Finsbury Orthopaedics International Limited, Finsbury Orthopaedics Limited, GH Biotech Holdings Limited, GMED Healthcare BV, GMED Healthcare BV (Branch), Global Investment Participation B.V., Guangzhou Bioseal Biotech Co. Ltd., Hansen Medical Deutschland GmbH, Hansen Medical Inc., Hansen Medical International Inc., Hansen Medical UK Limited, Healthcare Services (Shanghai) Ltd., Hickory Merger Sub Inc., I.D. Acquisition Corp., Innomedic Gesellschaft fur innovative Medizintechnik und Informatik mbH, Innovative Surgical Solutions LLC, J & J Company West Africa Limited, J&J Pension Trustees Limited, J-C Health Care Ltd., J.C. General Services BV, JJ Surgical Vision Spain S.L., JJC Acquisition Company B.V., JJHC LLC, JJSV Belgium BV, JJSV Manufacturing Malaysia SDN. BHD., JJSV Norden AB, JJSV Produtos Oticos Ltda., JNJ Global Business Services s.r.o., JNJ Holding EMEA B.V., JNJ International Investment LLC, JOM Pharmaceutical Services Inc., Janssen Alzheimer Immunotherapy (Holding) Limited, Janssen BioPharma LLC, Janssen Biologics (Ireland) Limited, Janssen Biologics B.V., Janssen Biotech Inc., Janssen Cilag C.A., Janssen Cilag Farmaceutica S.A., Janssen Cilag S.p.A., Janssen Cilag SPA, Janssen Development Finance Unlimited Company, Janssen Diagnostics LLC, Janssen Egypt LLC, Janssen Farmaceutica Portugal Lda, Janssen Global Services LLC, Janssen Holding GmbH, Janssen Inc., Janssen Irish Finance Unlimited Company, Janssen Korea Ltd., Janssen Oncology Inc., Janssen Ortho LLC, Janssen Pharmaceutica (Proprietary) Limited, Janssen Pharmaceutica NV, Janssen Pharmaceutica S.A., Janssen Pharmaceutical K.K., Janssen Pharmaceutical Sciences Unlimited Company, Janssen Pharmaceutical Unlimited Company, Janssen Pharmaceuticals Inc., Janssen Pharmaceuticals Inc. Japan Branch, Janssen Products LP, Janssen R&D Ireland Unlimited Company, Janssen Research & Development LLC, Janssen Sciences Ireland Unlimited Company, Janssen Scientific Affairs LLC, Janssen Supply Group LLC, Janssen Vaccines & Prevention B.V., Janssen Vaccines Branch of Cilag GmbH International, Janssen Vaccines Corp., Janssen-Cilag, Janssen-Cilag (New Zealand) Limited, Janssen-Cilag A/S, Janssen-Cilag AG, Janssen-Cilag AS, Janssen-Cilag Aktiebolag, Janssen-Cilag B.V., Janssen-Cilag Farmaceutica Lda., Janssen-Cilag Farmaceutica Ltda., Janssen-Cilag GmbH, Janssen-Cilag International NV, Janssen-Cilag Kft., Janssen-Cilag Kft. Branch Office, Janssen-Cilag Limited, Janssen-Cilag Manufacturing LLC, Janssen-Cilag NV, Janssen-Cilag OY, Janssen-Cilag Pharma GmbH, Janssen-Cilag Pharmaceutical S.A.C.I., Janssen-Cilag Polska Sp. z o.o., Janssen-Cilag Pty Ltd, Janssen-Cilag Pty Ltd (Branch), Janssen-Cilag S.A., Janssen-Cilag S.A., Janssen-Cilag S.A. de C.V., Janssen-Cilag de Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., Janssen-Cilag s.r.o., Janssen-Pharma S.L., Jevco Holding Inc., Johnson & Johnson, Johnson & Johnson (Angola) Limitada, Johnson & Johnson (China) Investment Ltd., Johnson & Johnson (China) Investment Ltd. Beijing Branch, Johnson & Johnson (Egypt) S.A.E., Johnson & Johnson (Hong Kong) Limited, Johnson & Johnson (Ireland) Limited, Johnson & Johnson (Jamaica) Limited, Johnson & Johnson (Kenya) Limited, Johnson & Johnson (Middle East) Inc., Johnson & Johnson (Middle East) Inc. (DHCC Branch), Johnson & Johnson (Middle East) Inc. (JAFZA Branch), Johnson & Johnson (Middle East) Inc. Service Center (DAFZA Branch), Johnson & Johnson (Mozambique) Limitada, Johnson & Johnson (Namibia) (Proprietary) Limited, Johnson & Johnson (New Zealand) Limited, Johnson & Johnson (Philippines) Inc., Johnson & Johnson (Private) Limited, Johnson & Johnson (Thailand) Ltd., Johnson & Johnson (Trinidad) Limited, Johnson & Johnson (Vietnam) Co. Ltd, Johnson & Johnson - Societa' Per Azioni, Johnson & Johnson AB, Johnson & Johnson AB Eesti filiaal (Branch), Johnson & Johnson AG, Johnson & Johnson AG (Zuchwil Branch), Johnson & Johnson Belgium Finance Company BV, Johnson & Johnson Bulgaria EOOD, Johnson & Johnson China Ltd., Johnson & Johnson Consumer (Hong Kong) Limited, Johnson & Johnson Consumer (Thailand) Limited, Johnson & Johnson Consumer B.V., Johnson & Johnson Consumer Health Care Switzerland Branch of Janssen-Cilag AG, Johnson & Johnson Consumer Holdings France, Johnson & Johnson Consumer Inc., Johnson & Johnson Consumer Inc. (Dominican Republic Branch), Johnson & Johnson Consumer NV, Johnson & Johnson Consumer Saudi Arabia Limited, Johnson & Johnson Consumer Services EAME Ltd., Johnson & Johnson Del Paraguay S.A., Johnson & Johnson Dominicana S.A.S., Johnson & Johnson Enterprise Innovation Inc., Johnson & Johnson European Treasury Unlimited Company, Johnson & Johnson Finance Corporation, Johnson & Johnson Finance Limited, Johnson & Johnson Financial Services GmbH, Johnson & Johnson Financial Services GmbH (Branch Office), Johnson & Johnson Gateway LLC, Johnson & Johnson Gesellschaft m.b.H., Johnson & Johnson GmbH, Johnson & Johnson Guatemala S.A., Johnson & Johnson Health Care Systems Inc., Johnson & Johnson Health and Wellness Solutions Inc., Johnson & Johnson Hellas Commercial and Industrial S.A., Johnson & Johnson Hellas Consumer Products Commercial Societe Anonyme, Johnson & Johnson Hemisferica S.A., Johnson & Johnson Holding GmbH, Johnson & Johnson Inc., Johnson & Johnson Industrial Ltda., Johnson & Johnson Innovation - JJDC Inc., Johnson & Johnson Innovation LLC, Johnson & Johnson Innovation Limited, Johnson & Johnson International, Johnson & Johnson International (Belgian Branch) (European Logistics Center), Johnson & Johnson International (Singapore) Pte. Ltd., Johnson & Johnson International (Singapore) Pte. Ltd. (Branch), Johnson & Johnson International Financial Services Unlimited Company, Johnson & Johnson K.K., Johnson & Johnson Kft., Johnson & Johnson Korea Ltd., Johnson & Johnson Korea Selling & Distribution LLC, Johnson & Johnson LLC, Johnson & Johnson Lda, Johnson & Johnson Limited, Johnson & Johnson Limited (Sri Lanka Branch), Johnson & Johnson Luxembourg Finance Company Sarl, Johnson & Johnson Management Limited, Johnson & Johnson Medical (China) Ltd., Johnson & Johnson Medical (Proprietary) Ltd, Johnson & Johnson Medical (Shanghai) Ltd., Johnson & Johnson Medical (Shanghai) Ltd. Beijing Branch, Johnson & Johnson Medical (Suzhou) Ltd., Johnson & Johnson Medical B.V., Johnson & Johnson Medical Devices & Diagnostics Group - Latin America L.L.C., Johnson & Johnson Medical GmbH, Johnson & Johnson Medical Korea Ltd., Johnson & Johnson Medical Limited, Johnson & Johnson Medical Mexico S.A. de C.V., Johnson & Johnson Medical NV, Johnson & Johnson Medical Products GmbH, Johnson & Johnson Medical Pty Ltd, Johnson & Johnson Medical S.A., Johnson & Johnson Medical S.C.S., Johnson & Johnson Medical S.p.A., Johnson & Johnson Medical SAS, Johnson & Johnson Medical Saudi Arabia Limited, Johnson & Johnson Medical Taiwan Ltd., Johnson & Johnson Medikal Sanayi ve Ticaret Limited Sirketi, Johnson & Johnson Medikal Sanayi ve Ticaret Limited Sirketi (Ankara Branch), Johnson & Johnson Medikal Sanayi ve Ticaret Limited Sirketi (Izmir Branch), Johnson & Johnson Middle East - Scientific Office, Johnson & Johnson Middle East FZ - LLC (Lebanese Branch), Johnson & Johnson Middle East FZ-LLC, Johnson & Johnson Middle East FZ-LLC (Ghana Branch), Johnson & Johnson Middle East FZ-LLC (Kenya Branch), Johnson & Johnson Middle East FZ-LLC Branch (TSO) (Saudi Arabia Branch), Johnson & Johnson Morocco Societe Anonyme, Johnson & Johnson NCB (Belgian Branch), Johnson & Johnson Nordic AB, Johnson & Johnson Pacific Pty Limited, Johnson & Johnson Pakistan (Private) Limited, Johnson & Johnson Panama S.A., Johnson & Johnson Personal Care (Chile) S.A., Johnson & Johnson Poland Sp. z o.o., Johnson & Johnson Poland sp. z o.o. oddzial w Warszawie "Consumer", Johnson & Johnson Private Limited, Johnson & Johnson Pte. Ltd., Johnson & Johnson Pte. Ltd. Korea Branch, Johnson & Johnson Pty. Limited, Johnson & Johnson Romania S.R.L., Johnson & Johnson S.A., Johnson & Johnson S.A. de C.V., Johnson & Johnson S.E. Inc., Johnson & Johnson S.E. d.o.o., Johnson & Johnson SDN. BHD., Johnson & Johnson Sante Beaute France, Johnson & Johnson Services Inc., Johnson & Johnson Surgical Vision Inc., Johnson & Johnson Surgical Vision India Private Limited, Johnson & Johnson Taiwan Ltd., Johnson & Johnson UK Treasury Company Limited, Johnson & Johnson Ukraine LLC, Johnson & Johnson Urban Renewal Associates, Johnson & Johnson Vision Care (Shanghai) Ltd., Johnson & Johnson Vision Care Inc., Johnson & Johnson Vision Care Ireland Unlimited Company, Johnson & Johnson d.o.o., Johnson & Johnson de Argentina S.A.C. e. I., Johnson & Johnson de Chile Limitada, Johnson & Johnson de Chile S.A., Johnson & Johnson de Colombia S.A., Johnson & Johnson de Mexico S.A. de C.V., Johnson & Johnson de Uruguay S.A., Johnson & Johnson de Venezuela S.A., Johnson & Johnson del Ecuador S.A., Johnson & Johnson del Peru S.A., Johnson & Johnson do Brasil Industria E Comercio de Produtos Para Saude Ltda., Johnson & Johnson for Export and Import LLC, Johnson & Johnson s.r.o., Johnson Y Johnson de Costa Rica S.A., Johnson and Johnson (Proprietary) Limited, Johnson and Johnson Sihhi Malzeme Sanayi Ve Ticaret Limited Sirketi, LTL Management LLC, La Concha Land Investment Corporation, Latam International Investment Company Unlimited Company, Legal Entity Name, MDS Co. Ltd., McNEIL MMP LLC, McNeil AB, McNeil Consumer Pharmaceuticals Co., McNeil Denmark ApS, McNeil Healthcare (Ireland) Limited, McNeil Healthcare (UK) Limited, McNeil Healthcare LLC, McNeil Iberica S.L.U., McNeil LA LLC, McNeil Nutritionals LLC, McNeil Panama LLC, McNeil Products Limited, McNeil Sweden AB, Medical Device Business Services Inc., Medical Devices & Diagnostics Global Services LLC, Medical Devices International LLC, Medos International Sarl, Medos International Sarl succursale de Neuchatel (Branch), Medos Sarl, MegaDyne Medical Products Inc., Menlo Care De Mexico S.A. de C.V., Mentor B.V., Mentor Deutschland GmbH, Mentor Medical Systems B.V., Mentor Partnership Holding Company I LLC, Mentor Texas GP LLC, Mentor Texas L.P., Mentor Worldwide LLC, Micrus Endovascular LLC, Middlesex Assurance Company Limited, Momenta Ireland Limited, Momenta Pharmaceuticals, Momenta Pharmaceuticals Inc., NeoStrata Company Inc., NeoStrata UG (haftungsbeschrankt), Netherlands Holding Company, NeuWave Medical Inc., Neuravi Limited, Novira Therapeutics, Novira Therapeutics LLC, NuVera Medical Inc., OBTECH Medical Sarl, OGX Beauty Limited, OMJ Holding GmbH, OMJ Ireland Unlimited Company, OMJ Pharmaceuticals Inc., Obtech Medical Mexico S.A. de C.V., Omrix Biopharmaceuticals Inc., Omrix Biopharmaceuticals Ltd., Omrix Biopharmaceuticals NV, Ortho Biologics LLC, Ortho Biotech Holding LLC, Ortho-McNeil Pharmaceutical LLC, Orthospin Ltd., Orthotaxy, PT Integrated Healthcare Indonesia, PT. Johnson & Johnson Indonesia, Patriot Pharmaceuticals LLC, Peninsula Pharmaceuticals LLC, Pharmadirect Ltd., Pharmedica Laboratories (Proprietary) Limited, Princeton Laboratories Inc., Productos de Cuidado Personal y de La Salud de Bolivia S.R.L., Proleader S.A., Pulsar Vascular Inc., Regency Urban Renewal Associates, RespiVert Ltd., RoC International, Royalty A&M LLC, Rutan Realty LLC, SYNTHES Medical Immobilien GmbH, Scios LLC, Sedona Singapore International Pte. Ltd., Sedona Thai International Co. Ltd., Serhum S.A. de C.V., Shanghai Elsker For Mother & Baby Co. Ltd, Shanghai Elsker Mother & Baby Co. Ltd Minghang Branch, Shanghai Johnson & Johnson Ltd., Shanghai Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceuticals Ltd., Sightbox LLC, Sodiac ESV, Spectrum Vision Limited Liability Company, Spectrum Vision Limited Liability Partnership, SterilMed, SterilMed Inc., Surgical Process Institute Deutschland GmbH, Synthes Costa Rica S.C.R. Limitada, Synthes GmbH, Synthes Holding AG, Synthes Holding Limited, Synthes Inc., Synthes Medical Surgical Equipment & Instruments Trading LLC, Synthes Produktions GmbH, Synthes Proprietary Limited, Synthes S.M.P. S. de R.L. de C.V., Synthes Tuttlingen GmbH, Synthes USA LLC, Synthes USA Products LLC, TARIS Biomedical, TARIS Biomedical LLC, TearScience Inc., The Anspach Effort LLC, The Vision Care Institute LLC, Tibotec LLC, Torax Medical Inc., UAB "Johnson & Johnson", UAB Johnson & Johnson Eesti Filiaal (Estonian Branch), Vania Expansion, Verb Surgical, Verb Surgical Inc., Vision Care Finance Unlimited Company, Vogue International, Vogue International LLC, Vogue International Trading Inc., WH4110 Development Company L.L.C., XO1, XO1 Limited, Xian Janssen Pharmaceutical Ltd., Xian-Janssen Pharmaceutical Ltd. Beijing Branch Office, Xian-Janssen Pharmaceutical Ltd. Shanghai Branch Office, Zarbee's Inc., and Zarbee's Naturals.

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Meggitt PLC designs and manufactures components and sub-systems in the United Kingdom, rest of Europe, the United States, and internationally. The company operates in four segments: Airframe Systems, Engine Systems, Energy & Equipment, and Services & Support. It offers ice protection products, radomes, and structures; air data and flight display products; brake control and tyre pressure monitoring systems, and wheels and brakes; engine health and vibration monitors, H2/O2 analyzers, and turbine monitoring and protection products; and aircraft cameras and security systems, and wireless aircraft systems. The company also provides ammunition handling, thermal, weapon scoring, and weapon training systems; energy storage, power conversion and distribution, and power generation systems; ducting systems, engine composites, and flow control valves; and fire protection and controls comprising bleed air leak detection products, cables, electronic control units, fire and overheat detection products, and fire suppression products. In addition, it offers ground fueling, and fuel systems and tanks; motion control actuators, electric motor drives, and electric motors; oxygen and specialty restraint systems; and accelerometers, ceramics, fluid sensors, magnetic and current sensors, position and inertial sensors, pressure sensors, speed sensors, and temperature sensors. Further, the company provides polymer seals; heat exchangers, printed circuit heat exchangers, thermal components, and thermal management systems; and live fire and virtual trainers, as well as aftermarket services. It serves aerospace, defense, and energy and equipment markets. The company was formerly known as Meggitt Holdings Public Limited Company and changed its name to Meggitt PLC in April 1989. Meggitt PLC was incorporated in 1947 and is headquartered in Coventry, the United Kingdom.
The following companies are subsidiares of InterContinental Hotels Group: 2250 Blake Street Hotel LLC, 24th Street Operator Sub LLC, 36th Street IHG Sub LLC, 426 Main Ave LLC, 46 Nevins Street Associates LLC, Allegro Management LLC, Alpha Kimball Hotel LLC, American Commonwealth Assurance Co. Ltd., Asia Pacific Holdings Limited, BHMC Canada Inc., BHR Holdings B.V., BHR Luxembourg SARL, BHR Pacific Holdings Inc., BHTC Canada Inc., BOC Barclay Sub LLC, Barclay Operating Corp., Bristol Oakbrook Tenant Company, Cafe Biarritz, Cambridge Lodging LLC, Capital Lodging LLC, Compania Inter-Continental De Hoteles El Salvador SA, Crowne Plaza Amsterdam (Management) B.V., Crowne Plaza LLC, Cumberland Akers Hotel LLC, Dunwoody Operations Inc., EVEN Real Estate Holding LLC, Edinburgh IC Limited, General Innkeeping Acceptance Corporation, Guangzhou SC Hotels Services Ltd., H.I. (Ireland) Limited, H.I. Soaltee Management Company Ltd, HC International Holdings Inc., HH France Holdings SAS, HH Hotels (EMEA) B.V., HH Hotels (Romania) SRL, HI Sugarloaf LLC, HIM (Aruba) NV, Hale International Ltd., Hoft Properties LLC, Holiday Hospitality Franchising LLC, Holiday Inn Mexicana S.A. de C.V., Holiday Inns (China) Ltd, Holiday Inns (Chongqing) Inc., Holiday Inns (Courtalin) Holdings SAS, Holiday Inns (Courtalin) SAS, Holiday Inns (England) Ltd., Holiday Inns (Germany) LLC, Holiday Inns (Guangzhou) Inc., Holiday Inns (Jamaica) Inc., Holiday Inns (Malaysia) Ltd., Holiday Inns (Middle East) Ltd., Holiday Inns (Philippines) Inc., Holiday Inns (Saudi Arabia) Inc., Holiday Inns (South East Asia) Inc., Holiday Inns (Thailand) Ltd., Holiday Inns (UK) Inc., Holiday Inns Crowne Plaza (Hong Kong) Inc., Holiday Inns Holdings (Australia) Pty Ltd, Holiday Inns Inc., Holiday Inns Investment (Nepal) Ltd., Holiday Inns of America (UK) Ltd., Holiday Inns of Belgium N.V., Holiday Pacific Equity Corporation, Holiday Pacific LLC, Holiday Pacific Partners LP, Hotel Inter-Continental London Limited, Hotel InterContinental London (Holdings) Limited, Hoteles Y Turismo HIH SRL, IC Hotelbetriebsfuhrungs GmbH, IC Hotels Management (Portugal) Unipessoal Lda, IC International Hotels Limited Liability Company, IHC (Thailand) Limited, IHC Buckhead LLC, IHC Edinburgh (Holdings), IHC Hopkins (Holdings) Corp., IHC Hotel Limited, IHC Inter-Continental (Holdings) Corp., IHC London (Holdings), IHC M-H (Holdings) Corp., IHC May Fair (Holdings) Limited, IHC May Fair Hotel Limited, IHC Overseas (U.K.) Limited, IHC UK (Holdings) Limited, IHC United States (Holdings) Corp., IHC Willard (Holdings) Corp., IHG (Australasia) Limited, IHG (Marseille) SAS, IHG (Thailand) Limited, IHG ANA Hotels Group Japan LLC, IHG ANA Hotels Holdings Co. Ltd., IHG Bangkok Ltd, IHG Brasil Administracao de Hoteis e Servicos Ltda, IHG Commission Services SRL, IHG Community Development LLC, IHG Cyprus Limited, IHG ECS (Barbados) SRL, IHG Franchising Brasil Ltda, IHG Franchising DR Corporation, IHG Franchising LLC, IHG Hotels (New Zealand) Limited, IHG Hotels Limited, IHG Hotels Management (Australia) Pty Limited, IHG Hotels Nigeria Limited, IHG Hotels South Africa (Pty) Ltd, IHG International Partnership, IHG Istanbul Otel Yonetim Limited Sirketi, IHG Japan (Management) LLC, IHG Japan (Osaka) LLC, IHG Management (Maryland) LLC, IHG Management (Netherlands) B.V., IHG Management MD Barclay Sub LLC, IHG Management SL d.o.o, IHG Management d.o.o. Beograd, IHG Orchard Street Member LLC, IHG PS Nominees Limited, IHG Systems Pty Ltd, IHG Szalloda Budapest Szolgaltato Kft., IHG de Argentina SA, IND East Village SD Holdings LLC, Inter-Continental D.C. Operating Corp., Inter-Continental Florida Investment Corp., Inter-Continental Florida Partner Corp., Inter-Continental Hospitality Corporation, Inter-Continental Hoteleira Limitada, Inter-Continental Hotels (Montreal) Operating Corp., Inter-Continental Hotels (Montreal) Owning Corp., Inter-Continental Hotels (Singapore) Pte. Ltd., Inter-Continental Hotels Corporation, Inter-Continental Hotels Corporation de Venezuela C.A., Inter-Continental Hotels of San Francisco Inc., Inter-Continental IOHC (Mauritius) Limited, Inter-Continental Management (Australia) Pty Limited, InterContinental (Branston) 1 Limited, InterContinental (PB) 1, InterContinental (PB) 2, InterContinental (PB) 3 Limited, InterContinental Berlin Service Company GmbH, InterContinental Brasil Administracao de Hoteis Ltda, InterContinental Gestion Hotelera S.L., InterContinental Hotel Berlin GmbH, InterContinental Hotel Dusseldorf GmbH (Germany), InterContinental Hotels (Puerto Rico) Inc., InterContinental Hotels Group (Asia Pacific) Pte Ltd, InterContinental Hotels Group (Australia) Pty Limited, InterContinental Hotels Group (Canada) Inc., InterContinental Hotels Group (Espana) SA, InterContinental Hotels Group (Greater China) Limited, InterContinental Hotels Group (India) Pvt. Ltd, InterContinental Hotels Group (Japan) Inc., InterContinental Hotels Group (New Zealand) Limited, InterContinental Hotels Group (Shanghai) Ltd., InterContinental Hotels Group Customer Services Ltd., InterContinental Hotels Group Healthcare Trustee Limited, InterContinental Hotels Group Operating Corp., InterContinental Hotels Group Resources Inc., InterContinental Hotels Group Services Company, InterContinental Hotels Group do Brasil Limitada, InterContinental Hotels Italia S.r.L., InterContinental Hotels Limited, InterContinental Hotels Management GmbH, InterContinental Hotels Nevada Corporation, InterContinental Management AM LLC, InterContinental Management Bulgaria EOOD, InterContinental Management France SAS, InterContinental Management Poland sp. z.o.o, InterContinental Overseas Holding Corporation, Intercontinental Hotels Corporation Limited, KG Benefits LLC, KG Gift Card Inc., KG Liability LLC, KG Technology LLC, KHP Washington Operator LLC, KHRG 11th Avenue Hotel LLC, KHRG 851 LLC, KHRG Aertson LLC, KHRG Alexandria LLC, KHRG Alexis LLC, KHRG Allegro LLC, KHRG Argyle LLC, KHRG Austin Beverage Company LLC, KHRG Baltimore LLC, KHRG Born LLC, KHRG Boston Hotel LLC, KHRG Canary LLC, KHRG Cayman Employer Ltd., KHRG Cayman LLC, KHRG DC 1731 LLC, KHRG DC 2505 LLC, KHRG Donovan LLC, KHRG Employer LLC, KHRG Goleta LLC, KHRG Gray LLC, KHRG Gray U2 LLC, KHRG Hillcrest LLC, KHRG Huntington Beach LLC, KHRG King Street LLC, KHRG La Peer LLC, KHRG Miami Beach LLC, KHRG Muse LLC, KHRG NPC LLC, KHRG Onyx LLC, KHRG Palladian LLC, KHRG Palomar Phoenix LLC, KHRG Philly Monaco LLC, KHRG Pittsburgh LLC, KHRG Reynolds LLC, KHRG Riverplace LLC, KHRG SFD LLC, KHRG Sacramento LLC, KHRG Savannah LLC, KHRG Schofield LLC, KHRG Sedona LLC, KHRG State Street LLC, KHRG Sutter LLC, KHRG Sutter Union LLC, KHRG Taconic LLC, KHRG Tariff LLC, KHRG Texas Hospitality LLC, KHRG Texas Operations LLC, KHRG Tryon LLC, KHRG VZ Austin LLC, KHRG Vero Beach LLC, KHRG Vintage Park LLC, KHRG WPB LLC, KHRG Wabash LLC, KHRG Westwood LLC, KHRG Wilshire LLC, KHRG Zamora LLC, Kimpton Hollywood Licenses LLC, Kimpton Hotel & Restaurant Group, Kimpton Hotel & Restaurant Group LLC, Kimpton Phoenix Licenses Holdings LLC, Kimpton Sedona Licenses LLC, Louisiana Acquisitions Corp., MH Lodging LLC, Mercer Fairview Holdings LLC, PML Services LLC, PT SC Hotels & Resorts Indonesia, Pollstrong Limited, Powell Pine Inc., Priscilla Holiday of Texas Inc., RM Lodging LLC, Regent Hotels and Resorts, Resort Services International (Cayo Largo) L.P., SBS Maryland Beverage Company LLC, SC Cellars Limited, SC Hotels International Services Inc., SC Leisure Group Limited, SC NAS 2 Limited, SC Quest Limited, SC Reservations (Philippines) Inc., SCH Insurance Company, SCIH Branston 3, SF MH Acquisition LLC, SPHC Group Pty Ltd., SPHC Management Ltd., Semiramis for training of Hotel Personnel and Hotel Management SAE, Six Continents Corporate Services, Six Continents Holdings Limited, Six Continents Hotels Inc., Six Continents Hotels International Limited, Six Continents Hotels de Colombia SA, Six Continents International Holdings B.V., Six Continents Investments Limited, Six Continents Limited, Six Continents Overseas Holdings Limited, Six Continents Restaurants Limited, SixCo North America Inc., Solamar Lodging LLC, Southern Pacific Hotel Corporation (BVI) Ltd., Southern Pacific Hotels Properties Limited, Universal de Hoteles SA, White Shield Insurance Company Limited, and World Trade Centre Montreal Hotel Corporation.

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United Parcel Service, Inc. provides letter and package delivery, transportation, logistics, and related services. It operates through two segments, U.S. Domestic Package and International Package. The U.S. Domestic Package segment offers time-definite delivery of letters, documents, small packages, and palletized freight through air and ground services in the United States. The International Package segment provides guaranteed day and time-definite international shipping services in Europe, the Asia Pacific, Canada and Latin America, the Indian sub-continent, the Middle East, and Africa. This segment offers guaranteed time-definite express options. The company also provides international air and ocean freight forwarding, customs brokerage, distribution and post-sales, and mail and consulting services in approximately 200 countries and territories. In addition, it offers truckload brokerage services; supply chain solutions to the healthcare and life sciences industry; shipping, visibility, and billing technologies; and financial and insurance services. The company operates a fleet of approximately 121,000 package cars, vans, tractors, and motorcycles; and owns 59,000 containers that are used to transport cargo in its aircraft. United Parcel Service, Inc. was founded in 1907 and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia.
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By Tom Allon

I remember being angry for at least seven years that our then feckless and incompetent President George Bush could not bring Osama Bin Laden to justice for his declaration of war on 9/11.

On that tragic day, I remember being dumbfounded that the worlds largest superpower did not have the proper intelligence to stop an attack from a ragtag bunch of stateless terrorists. Isnt that why we pay so much of our taxes to support our countrys massive defense infrastructurefor the CIA, the FBI, military intelligence?

Three weeks before 9/11 Osama Bin Laden warned of an unprecedented attack on America. How could George Bush and Dick Cheney, the worst president and veep in modern American history, miss that audacious warning? Later we learned that CIA Director George Tenet tried to alert the administration to the unusual chatter from terrorists, but his alarm went unheeded in those dog days of summer.

When George Bush was elected (in a corrupt counting of votes in Florida that stole the election from Al Gore), the die was cast. After eight years of peace and prosperity under Clinton-Gore, our country was sent down a rabbit hole under leadership that was unqualified and which took us into two misguided wars that ravaged the Middle East and then our countrys economy.

Bush-Cheney sent our young troops to Afghanistan and Iraq to fight against the wrong people, while the Most-Wanted Man since Adolf Hitler was able to operate unfettered to plot more evil.

It was only a decade later, when Hillary Clinton was secretary of state and Barack Obama was president, that we were able to hunt down Bin Laden in Pakistan and skillfully execute the man responsible for nearly 3,000 deaths on 9/11.

I was thinking about this as I watched the 9/11 services this past Sunday. It made me realize how vitally important it is that we elect the right president in November.

We cannot elect an incompetent president like George Bush again. Our country barely survived his eight years of reckless leadership, first in allowing 9/11 to occur, then in rushing to war in the wrong places and then finally in a near total economic collapse.

This is the scenario that once again could unfold if we elect a man who is clearly unfit for office. Who, like Bush, is an anti-intellectual who will not read intelligence briefings, who will lead from his gut.

We need a leader like Hillary, who pushed Obama to finally execute Bin Laden, who spent four years intensively crisscrossing the globe trying to maintain peace and important alliances.

Of course she is a flawed candidate. She made a mistake in voting in favor of the Iraq war. She did not handle Benghazi well.

But none of that should in any way distract us from the stark choice ahead  Hillary Clinton is a smart, tough, thorough woman who will sweat the details of governing. She will not make the mistakes that Bush made, the potentially tragic mistakes that I fear her opponent, Donald Trump, will make.

On this solemn day, as I watch the news of Hillary Clintons feeling unwell, I pray for her health. She is the only thing standing between us and another four years of unqualified leadership.

We now know from the experience of 9/11, Iraq and the Great Recession of 2007, what bad leadership can do to our great country.
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By Patrick Donachie

Assembled near the bus stop where DAja Robinson died from a gunshot more than three years earlier, family members, elected officials and members of the community gathered to remember the 14-year-old girl and pledge that more would be done to ensure that other young lives were not cut short by gun violence.

We are here to memorialize an innocent person, a bystander, Councilman Ruben Wills (D-Jamaica) said at the beginning of the ceremony, which was held in Baisley Pond Park near the intersection of Sutphin and Rockaway boulevards.

On May 18, 2013, Robinson boarded a Q6 bus at the intersection at around 8:30 p.m., preparing to head home from a friends Sweet 16 birthday party. Someone fired into the bus. Wills said the shooters intended to hit a rival gang member who was also on the bus. Robinson was struck in the head and died at Jamaica Hospital, and two men were arrested for the crime. Kevin McClinton, 22, was convicted of the murder earlier this year. On Wednesday, he was sentenced for 40 years to life in prison.

Shamel Capers, the other suspect, is awaiting trial.

Shadia Sands, Robinsons mother, expressed her thanks to everyone who offered her family support during the previous three years as she stood at the podium, flanked by her own mother and a picture of her daughter.

As parents, were strong, we try our best, she said. We take things one day at a time. Were survivors. This is another milestone on the course to change.

After Robinsons death, elected officials launched New York Citys Gun Violence Crisis Management System, which allocates resources to specific police precincts with high levels of gun violence. In South Jamaica, LIFE Camp, a Cure Violence partner headed by Erica Ford, has seen 600 days without a single shooting death in its target area, which spans from 111th and 118th Avenues from 146th Street to Guy R. Brewer Boulevard.

Councilman Jumaane Williams (D-Brooklyn), a co-chairman of the Councils Gun Violence Task Force, said the push to reduce gun violence in communities like south Jamaica belied easy solutions and such areas needed robust support from the city.

Dont say youre sorry if you wont give us the resources we need, he said. Stop putting forward simplistic solutions to complex problems, because if the simplistic solutions worked, they would have worked already.

Wills also briefly mentioned two initiatives he was working on with other elected officials, but hesitated to go too far into specifics. The DAja Robinson Redemption Act, he said, would allocate funds so people convicted of gun violence could perform community service in their neighborhoods post-release.

He also was looking for spaces on Sutphin Boulevard for the DAja Robinson and Dalilah Muhammad Young Girls Center, where teenage women from the community could gather in a safe space for activities, programs, and to hang out in peace. Muhammad is a track-and-field athlete who was born in Jamaica and won a gold medal in the 400-meter hurdles at the 2016 Rio Olympics.
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By Gina Martinez

U.S. Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew visited Queens College Tuesday to participate in a student town hall meeting about the nations recovering economy and federal aid for CUNY.

In the conversation with students moderated by NPR business anchor David Brancaccio, Lew discussed the renewed economic health of the United States and the role financial reform and growth in the global economy played in the turnaround.

Lew, a Queens native, graduated from Forest Hills High School before attending Harvard. He served as director of the Office of Management and Budget during the Clinton administration from 1998 to 2001 and then for President Obama from 2010 to 2012. In 2013 he became secretary of the treasury.

Around 100 students packed the Rosenthal Library auditorium. Lew spoke with Brancaccio before students took to the microphone and asked the secretary pressing questions about the economy, which fell into a deep recession in 2008 because of the mortgage crisis.

Around the world people look at the United States as a model of resilience because we bounced back, Lew said. We created 15 million new jobs, we have an economy thats been growing. The challenge we have is how to make sure the rest of the world grows and how do we grow faster.

One student asked what could be done on a federal level to address the needs at CUNY.

Queens College and CUNY in general is an extraordinary asset for New York City, he said. My sister went to Queens College and my aunt. So we have a long history in our family of taking advantage of the fact that theres an affordable college education available here at Queens College. At a federal level we do things like Pell grants that go a long way for those in financial need.

Lew acknowledged that the current $6,600 tuition was low by national standards, but it still increased from $4,200 in 2009 for a 50 percent increase. Lew explained that the pressure on public budgets could be a factor for a raise in tuition.

I dont know that theres direct federal assistance that would be unique to a public system like CUNY, he said. But I do think that making sure we pay for Pell grants and have other forms of assistance for students who are in need is important. We need to make sure we run student loan programs in a way that it provides understandable and affordable financing and repayment terms that are consistent with opening opportunities, not closing opportunities. Those are the kinds of things we should do on a federal level.

Lew also discussed the redesigning of currency to add a woman for the first time in U.S. history, a story that caused controversy earlier this year when announced.

I was very proud to announce that were going to redesign our currency, he said. Putting Harriet Tubman on the $20 bill, introducing our $10 and $5 bill themes that reflect the broader history of our great country, including some of the great iconic events that happened at the Lincoln memorial and the history of womens suffrage.
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By Patrick Donachie

Southeast Queens was the site of a shooting death and a potential homicide in recent days and police were seeking suspects or witnesses to the incidents.

At 11:42 p.m. on Sept. 10, police from the 105th Precinct responded to a call about a car that was on fire in the public parking area of Idlewild Park, located near the corner of 224th Street and 149th Avenue. FDNY firefighters were already on the scene, attempting to extinguish the fire.

When the fire was put out, the first responders made a gruesome discovery. They found the body of an unidentified adult male, who was significantly burned, in the trunk of the car. EMS workers responded but pronounced the man dead at the scene.

A spokeswoman for the office of the chief medical examiner said the determination of a cause of death was still pending, although the commanding officer of the 105th Precinct called the incident a homicide, saying it was the first one of the year for the precinct. The commanding officer said it was unlikely the man was killed within the confines of the precinct, but the fact that the body was found there makes the 105th the precinct of record.

About an hour before the burning car was found, police from the 113th Precinct responded to a call of a suspicious vehicle at 124-08 153rd St., near the edge of Baisley Pond Park.

There they found an unidentified man with a gunshot wound to the back of his head in a white Lexus sedan. The engine was still running. EMS workers responded and pronounced the man dead at the scene.

Police were continuing to investigate both incidents and no arrests had been made as of press time.
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By Mark Hallum

Elected officials are speaking out against S.J. Jung, the failed Democratic candidate for state Senate, who they believe was falsely claiming their support as well as using photos of them to promote his campaign.

The statements, which draw a clear line of allegiance, are due to the recent backlash over his pro-life stance and his promise to prevent marriage equality from being depicted in textbooks. Among those speaking out were City Councilman Daniel Dromm (Jackson Heights), U.S. Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-Manhattan) and U.S. Rep. Nydia Velazquez (D-Brooklyn) as well as the Working Families Party and the Service Employees International Union.

Jung lost the race to oust state Sen. Toby Stavisky (D-Flushing) in the 16th District, which stretches from Glen Oaks through Flushing to Rego Park and Forest Hills.

The Working families Party is one of the largest labor unions in the state and said Jung supporters were touting WFP backing for their candidate.

We were disturbed to hear of reports that her opponent, S.J. Jung, is calling for the removal of same-sex couples from school textbooks. We were even more disturbed to learn that Jungs supporters have been falsely claiming that he has the support of WFP and trying to deceive voters about our endorsement in this race, said New York State Director of the Working Families Party Ari Kamen. To be clear: there is no place for this type of bigotry in New York state, and there should be zero confusion about whom we are supporting in this race, he said, referring to Stavisky.

Dromm held a Sept. 6 news conference outside Jungs headquarters in Flushing to defend LGBT rights. Speakers expressed the need to keep textbooks inclusive to prevent LGBT youths from suffering the dangerous effects of alienation, which they said often culminates in suicide. Dromm, one of the first openly gay men elected to City Council, said Jungs stance was a betrayal in consideration of the work they had done together in the past to promote equal rights for all, and requested that Jung remove the lawmakers photo from his campaign site.

He has pictures of me speaking at rallies that I organized at City Hall and I would really like to have them taken down, because I dont feel that he should capitalize on the work that we did together now that hes made these statements, Dromm said.

Members of congress used the occasion to endorse Stavisky.

Her opponents use of my photo to promote his candidacy is completely unauthorized and he should stop immediately, Nadler said.

I have not endorsed S.J. Jung, and he should stop using my photo immediately, Velazquez said.

Our members endorsed Senator Stavisky in this race because of her track record of support for working New Yorkers. Her respect for all people in our city makes her the best choice to represent Queens. S.J. Jung should stop using campaign literature with my photo immediately since it misrepresents the unions position in this race, said Hector Figueroa, president of SEIU Local 32BJ, which represents 155,000 building services workers.

Jung did not respond to a request for comment.
Hopewell Community Park remains a 'labor of love' for local community

The lush green park is a product of the combined efforts of the Hopewell Township community and a symbol of decades of conservation efforts in Beaver County.
Richard Carter/Special to the Times Record News The Midwestern State University one-act play "Speech and Debate" is about three misfit students coming together. It stars (from left), Solomon (Dean Hart), Teacher (Hope Harvick) and Diwata (Sarah Dempsey).

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By Richard Carter, Special to the Times Record News

For those who would say high school is the best five years of your life, consider the movies "Heathers," "Mean Girls" and "Election."

These black comedies are similar in tone to "Speech and Debate," a one-act play, directed by Midwestern State University senior Houston Pokorny, at 7:30 p.m. Thursday-Sept. 24 and 2:30 p.m. Sept. 25 in the Fain Fine Arts Centers' Bea Wood Studio Theatre.

Pokorny also serves as producer and designer for the 2008 story written by Stephen Karam. The 100-minute one-act is frequently produced nationwide, and a film version, directed by Dan Harris, is set to be released in 2017.

"It's about three high school outcasts who come together," Pokorny said. "The play has a universal message for acceptance and hypocrisy and misfits coming together. Everyone can relate to an underdog misfit story. We are all one deep down."

"Speech and Debate" is set in Salem, Oregon, in 2008 and features four characters.

"Howie (Joey McGinn) is hiding a secret online relationship with another person. Diwata (Sarah Dempsey) is the local crazy girl in charge of the speech and debate club and uses the other two high school characters' secrets to blackmail them into joining the club."

Solomon (Dean Hart) is a reporter for the school newspaper.

Hope Harvick plays a teacher and reporter.

"She's basically the outside voice of social construction telling that you can't do this, you can't do that," Pokorny said.

All the actors in the play are MSU theater majors.

The three high school characters eventually "open up about themselves at club meetings and talk about themselves and what's going on."

The play revolves around an inappropriate online relationship Howie finds himself in and how the three students inventively address it.

Pokorny read the play after one of his professors gave him several to read, and he liked its dialogue and message. He is directing a one-act for the first time, and while Pokorny is nervous, he is very confident in the material and his actors.

"The show asks you to broaden your horizon and consider hypocrisy and how we are all people. We all have certain things we want, and we all have secrets deep down," he said.

Pokorny, who is from Sherman, called it a light R-rated show because of some language.

The director has appeared in numerous MSU one-acts and main-stage shows, most recently "Lysistrata."

"I asked my professors to do the play as an advanced project to substitute for my final play directing class, and they agreed," he said.

Pending the success of this production, he will graduate in May 2017.

"The way the characters in this 'Speech and Debate' talk inspires my own writing," he said. "There's quick, witty dialogue  it's quickly paced."
By PTI: About political transformation in Nepal, Dahal said, "I About political transformation in Nepal, Dahal said, "I shared with Modiji that promulgation of the Constitution last year by the popularly elected Constituent assembly was a historic achievement for people of Nepal. You are aware that my government has made serious efforts to bring everyone on board as we enter the phase of implementation of the Constitution."

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Modi said he conveyed to Dahal that India stands ready and prepared to strengthen its development partnership with Nepal. "And, we will do so as per the priorities of the people and government of Nepal."

He said India has also agreed to extend additional Line of Credit for new projects such as Phase-2 of Terai Roads, power transmission lines, substations and a polytechnic in Kaski.

Modi said both sides agreed that security interests of the two countries are closely aligned and inter-linked and that close cooperation between defence and security agencies of the two countries will continue.

"Open borders between the two countries provide great opportunities for cooperation and interaction among our people. But, we must also continue to guard against elements that seek to misuse the border," Modi said.

He said Indias initiatives for open sky, cross-border power trade, transit routes, cross-border connectivity would directly benefit Nepal and help strengthen our economic partnership.

"Prime Minister Prachanda and I agreed to push for speedy and successful implementation of the ongoing hydro-power projects, and development and operationalisation of transmission lines," Modi said, adding it was agreed to have close monitoring and time-bound completion of all development projects.

India has a close relationship with Nepal but off late, China has been trying to have some influence over Kathmandu. Oli had tried to forge a deeper cooperation with China. Nepal had signed a transport and transit treaty with China during Olis tenure as PM.

Nepal has been facing political crisis since the adoption of a new Constitution in September last year. Nearly five-month-long Madhesi protests led to the closure of key trading points with India ,triggering shortage of essential supplies in the land-locked country.

The blockade of trade points with India ended in February after more than 50 people were killed in clashes with police. Nepal had blamed India for the Madhesi crisis, a charge rejected by New Delhi.

Prachanda also invited Modi and President Pranab Mukherjee to visit Nepal soon.

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One of the MoUs signed today will facilitate kickstarting Terai road projects.

Asked about Indias engagement with Madhesi community, Jaishankar said "In an open border, our doors are never closed to anybody."

On security issues, he said Nepal conveyed to India that it would never allow itself to be used to affect Indias security interests.

Asked about Chinas growing influence over Nepal, he said Indias ties with Nepal is very unique and that "Not all neighbours have same history and cultural bonding. Look at the unique nature of the relationship." PTI MPB GSN

--- ENDS ---
Lunch Bunch/Times Record News The Lunch Buddy chose the burger steak dinner at the recently opened Heff's Burgers in Parker Square.

SHARE Lunch Bunch/Times Record News The Heff's burger combo with the twister fries will satisfy any burger craving you might have, say the Lunch Buddy and Lunch Dude.

Sometimes you just need a burger.

And sometimes, you get that burger, and then your buddy tells you it's time to have another burger. That was the scenario last weekend. I finally had my burger craving satisfied, and then my buddy noticed a Facebook post declaring the opening of a joint we've been monitoring since we spotted the turquoise paint on the facade: Heff's Burgers in Parker Square.

Heff's is a burger joint with locations scattered across North and West Texas. The home base location in Abilene was featured on The Texas Bucket List, and the burgers have won awards galore.

Even in the face of these accolades, however, my buddy and I get leery anytime a burger joint opens in Wichita Falls. The city touts some of the best burgers in the state. But by this point, my burger-consuming muscles were primed and ready to go. So my buddy and I prepared ourselves and ventured out to give Heff's Burgers a try.

We arrived at 1:30 p.m. on Sunday afternoon. The eccentric interior decor of Heff's brings the turquoise inside to complement the vintage dineresque feel, with purple table tops to boot. While it was cute, the dining area was obviously recoiling from the Sunday lunch rush. My buddy and I both noted the understandable carnage left over from what had to be this location's first Wichita Falls post-church onslaught  an experience that requires a lot of preparation on the part of the restaurant and grace on the part of the customer.

My buddy and I approached the order counter and wasted no time deciding what to get. My buddy chose the burger steak dinner ($8.59)  a plate that includes a half-pound patty covered with brown gravy and grilled mushrooms and onions served with Texas toast, a side salad and choice of fries. He went with homestyle. I, of course, got the Heff's burger combo with my choice of Heff's twister fries ($8.59).

With our drinks and order number in hand, we crossed the dining area and claimed a table in the back corner by the window. Granted, we didn't take a long time to order, but the space was still in disarray by the time we selected our table. And while they were all friendly and inviting, some of the staff was lacking, as my dad would say, that "giddy up" necessary to clean the space for the next wave of customers. Some of the staff were hard at work, but an engine runs most efficiently with every part in working order.

We waited a smidgen longer than I thought necessary before our food was brought to us. But, nevertheless, our plates were placed before us  and they looked delicious. I unwrapped my hefty Heff's burger and placed it in the basket next to my Heff's twister fries; my buddy asked for ranch, then drizzled it over his side salad that adjoined the golden Texas toast and savory-looking patty. There was only one problem: The homestyle fries were nowhere to be found.

I'll suffice it to say that I detest having to ask for something that was supposed to come with my plate.

But once we acquired the fries, we went to town. My buddy's plate was, in his words, enjoyable. The patty was as savory as it looked, and the Texas toast tasted like it should. Notably, the side salad was tossed with a spring mix instead of the standard, dull, iceberg lettuce. And the ranch, as my buddy put it, was "the good ranch." I contemplated getting him a spoon.

I can see why the Heff's burger is legendary out west. It was weighty, juicy, and all kinds of tasty. It landed right in the sweet spot between gourmet and backyard barbecue. But while this burger was delicious, the Heff's twister fries stole the spotlight. These little potato-chip-looking treats were thicker and softer than potato chips, but still thin and crispy. I'd buy them in bulk if I could.

Also, the Heff's sauce, similar to Cain's sauce, was delicious. My buddy and I dunked everything we could in it.

Not only was this food great, but my buddy and I both got combos (meal, fries, drink) and came out at $17.84 after tax. This is notably below the average cost of our Lunch Bunch experiences, by about $5. That's a deal, right there.

My only advice: An entire staff with the same goal in mind gives the best experience to all those who dine. We give Heff's Burgers four out of five forks, and a warm welcome to Wichita Falls!
photos by John Ingle/Times Record News Maintenance crews for the Air Force Demonstration Team Thunderbirds inspect their F-16C Fighting Falcons on Thursday afternoon after the high-performance jets landed in advance of a two-day air show at Sheppard Air Force Base. The best of the best of the Air Force's aircraft maintainers, which receive their specialty training at Sheppard early in their careers, perform six hours of maintenance on each jet after each flight.

SHARE John Ingle/Times Record News Crew Chief Staff Sgt. Todd Hughes ensure a two bar is attached to the front landing gear of an F-16C Fighting Falcon, the high-performance aircraft used by the Air Force Demonstration Team Thunderbirds. In the cockpit of jet No. 8 is Tech. Sgt. Conrad Nelson, also a crew chief. Nelson and Hughes received their initial crew chief training at Sheppard Air Force Base in the 362nd Training Squadron. John Ingle/Times Record News Capt. Sara Harper, left, public affairs officer for the Thunderbirds, catches up with Sheppard Air Force Base Public Affairs Director George Woodward on Thursday at Hangar 1040. Harper began her Air Force career at Sheppard's PA shop, where she was stationed 2010-2012. She has one more season with the premier demonstration team. John Ingle/Times Record News Capt. Angelina Urbina (right), executive officer for the Thunderbirds, talks with F-16 crew chief students, left to right, Airman 1st Class Elijah Clark, Airman Brandon Graham and Tech. Sgt. Greg Penrod about the aircraft that has been used since 1982 as the high-performance machine used by the Air Force Demonstration Team Thunderbirds. All aircraft maintainers on the premier demonstration team receive their specialty training at Sheppard Air Force Base. Tech. Sgt. Conrad Nelson, crew chief for Thunderbird No. 8, steps into his jet Thursday at Sheppard Air Force Base.

By John Ingle of the Times Record News

What better act is there to help Sheppard Air Force Base and its surrounding communities celebrate three significant anniversaries than the Air Force Demonstration Team Thunderbirds?

The high-performance aerial demo team arrived Thursday afternoon  delayed by weather for a bit  to get ready for their high-octane show Saturday and Sunday at Sheppard's 2016 Open House & Air Show.

The base is also celebrating its 75th anniversary as well as the 50th anniversary of German air force pilots training at the base and the 35th anniversary of the Euro-NATO Joint Jet Pilot Training program.

The premier demonstration team is certainly the highlight act for the two-day spectacle, but there is a much deeper tie between the Thunderbirds and this North Texas base. Looking at their roster, quite a few of these airmen  enlisted and officers  began their Air Force careers at Sheppard.

Capt. Sara Harper, public affairs officer for the team, is one of those, cutting her PA teeth fresh out of Auburn University in November 2010. She departed for Spangdahlem, Germany, in 2012 and then was at MacDill AFB, Florida, before her selection to the Thunderbirds.

"It (Sheppard) was the perfect place to start because all of the (technical) training that happens here as well as the 80th Flying Training Wing  the ENJJPT program  I learned all about pilot training and what goes into that," she said.

Harper, from Tyrone, Georgia, said her roughly two years at Sheppard provided an "incredible foundation" for things to come in her career, learning about the various training missions and how the base fits into the bigger Air Force picture.

She said she has seen quality airmen go through Sheppard the Thunderbirds are looking for to fill their ranks and continue their mission as "America's Ambassadors in Blue."

Of the 120 members of the team, 90 are in aircraft maintenance career fields and received their technical training at Sheppard. Crew chiefs Tech. Sgt. Conrad Nelson and Staff Sgt. Todd Hughes are two who started their Air Force journey at Sheppard, Nelson in 2008 and Hughes in 2009 at the 82nd Training Wing's 362nd Training Squadron.

"It brings back a lot of old memories where you thought, 'Man, I'm here forever. I'm never going to leave and I just can't wait to graduate,'" said Goodyear, Arizona-native Nelson. "Everything you learned here you still use on a day-to-day basis, so it just brings back those memories of tech school."

Neither said being a member of the Thunderbirds ever entered their minds when they were first beginning their careers. They were focused on their first and second assignments following their time in North Texas.

Providing operational maintenance at Luke AFB, Arizona, Kunsan AB, Korea, or Spangdahlem is a little different from what they do with the Thunderbirds.

Instead of loading munitions, making sure the jet engine works and avionics are functioning, maintainers with the demonstration team, aside from maintenance, are making sure the aircraft is clean, smoke oil is loaded, paying visits to hospitals and schools and being the voice of the Air Force.

"As far as doing maintenance now on the Thunderbirds, for me it weighs in a lot more in the sense of pride," said Hughes, a native of Williamsport, Pennsylvania. "It's awesome to be able to do what we do to keep these jets in the air for the public."

The Sheppard connection doesn't end with Harper, Nelson or Hughes. Two of the jet jockies learned their craft at ENJJPT. Lt. Col. Christopher Hammond, team boss and pilot of Thunderbird No. 1, and Thunderbird No. 2 pilot Capt. Ryan Bodenheimer both graduated from the flying training side of the base.

Bodenheimber, an Air Force "brat" from Colorado Springs, Colorado, graduated from the program in October 2008 and was assigned to fly the F-15E Strike Eagle.

He said having the bedrock of learning from some of the best fighter pilots in the world at ENJJPT laid the foundation for his career, and his opportunity with the Thunderbirds.

"Being able to start with a foundation like that is incredible," he said. "You can't ask for anything better."

Being on the team, Bodenheimer is also able to see the contributions of Sheppard's aircraft maintenance training mission and the quality of airman produced.

"The maintenance crews that we have are absolutely the best in the Air Force," he said. "Them having the bedrock from here from the training they got is clear that whatever is going on here is working and it's doing an incredible job to produce outcomes like we have here with the Thunderbirds and all over the Air Force."
SHARE Joe Pence

By Linda Stewart, Special to the Times Record News

Vernon City Commissioners unanimously approved hiring Joe Pence to serve as Vernon's interim city manager Thursday.

Pence was hired through the Texas First Group, a company that cities hire to help find interim employees until positions are permanently filled.

Pence is from Wichita Falls and formerly served as the city manager of Henrietta.

He will fill the position left vacant when Vernon's former city manager Joe Jarosek resigned during a commission meeting Sept. 2 following numerous conflicts with Mayor Joe Rogers. City officials said it may take two to six months to fill the position permanently.

Commissioners also discussed steps toward the demolition of a large downtown building whose roof collapsed during a heavy rain storm Sept. 10. The collapse also heavily damaged a neighboring restaurant that shares a common wall.

The building is owned by On-T-J Inc. of Wichita Falls. Michael Payne is the registered agent for the building. Payne indicated to city officials the corporation had no assets and no means to pay for the demolition. Commissioners said a lien would be placed on the property for costs involved in the demolition and agreed that demolition should begin immediately.

Environmental Engineer Flint Skaggs of Burkburnett is expected to inspect the facility Monday for the possible presence of asbestos. The survey process to determine the presence of asbestos is expected to take several days.

Concerns about the future of the Three Hearts Steak House were voiced by owners Greg and Misty Tyra who replaced their roof, plumbing, and wiring in July. Attempts by Tyra and other family members to cover the damaged part of their building's roof with a tarp were halted when the roof began crumbling.

Tyra said the collapse occurred exactly six years to the day of when the restaurant opened.

"Now we have lost our livelihood and have fifteen employees out of work," he said.

Because the collapse is considered a public calamity, the city will not have to take bids for the demolition. Commissioners were in agreement that it is an emergency situation and the city must hire someone as soon as possible for the safety of the public.

"We need to go there and just do it," Commissioner Travis Taylor said.

Monica Wilkinson, Vernon's Community Development Director, said the roof of the building had been in disrepair for a few years.

"When the roof collapsed, the damage and debris fell to the west causing damage to the Three Hearts Steak House located next door at 1722 Pease," Wilkinson said. All utilities have been turned off to the buildings and all the buildings evacuated.

About three quarters of the 1700 block of Pease St. from the Quality Sales building west to Main St. are blocked in case of a "domino effect" if the damaged structure totally collapsed . The buildings are located across the street to the north from the Wilbarger County Courthouse.
CHRISTOPHER WALKER/TIMES RECORD NEWS Times Record News employees James Byerly, finance (left), Charlotte Dameron, marketing coordinator, John Ingle, business editor, and Rachel Koetter, circulation sales, inspect "Through the Lens: 75 Years of Sheppard Air Force Base as seen by the Times Record News." The book shows how the newspaper has covered the base from the 1940s to the present day. A team of TRN employees, including those pictured, worked to develop the concept and design that commemorates the relationship between the newspaper and Sheppard for the past 75 years. Also on the team but not pictured were Denise Nelson and Spencer Williams from the digital department, chief photographer Torin Halsey, military reporter Claire Kowalick, and circulation district manager Adam Cole.

By Deanna Watson of the Times Record News

Perhaps the largest collection of images chronicling the history of Sheppard Air Force Base lives inside the walls of the Times Record News.

From the first moments of its existence, as early as when a military base in North Texas was just an idea, Sheppard Air Force Base appears in the preserved newspaper clippings and photographs from the Wichita Falls Daily Times, the Record News and now the Times Record News.

To celebrate the 75th anniversary of Sheppard Air Force Base and, incidentally, the 50th anniversary of the German air force training pilots and the 35th anniversary of the Euro-NATO Joint Jet Pilot Training program, staff members at the Times Record News brainstormed a significant effort to showcase the base's impact on our community. What better way, the committee decided, than implementing the age-old adage, a picture speaks a thousand words.

That effort culminated in a book celebrating the base through the images captured by the newspaper through eight decades.

"Through the Lens," a 76-page, hardcover book created by the Times Record News, displays nearly 100 photographs focusing on the creation, operation and history of the community's largest economic force, injecting $750 million annually into the Wichita Falls economy.

On sale for $25 plus tax, the book can be ordered online at TRNoffers.com by using the code: SAFB75. Books will also be available for purchase at the Sheppard air show Saturday and Sunday. You can also stop by the TRN to pick up a book at 1301 Lamar.

The committee represents a cross-section of TRN, from fields of sales, journalism, distribution, marketing, online and finance. The committee includes: Rachel Koetter, circulation sales; business/metro editor John Ingle; marketing coordinator Charlotte Dameron; James Byerly, finance; Denise Nelson and Spencer Williams from the digital department; chief photographer Torin Halsey; military reporter Claire Kowalick; and circulation district manager Adam Cole.

A few members of the committee can claim military ties, including Ingle, who relished the opportunity to celebrate the history of Sheppard through our images.

"Telling the story of something that is so prominent in our community  a person, place or thing  is always a challenge because you always want to get it right," Ingle said. "Our team thought sharing Sheppard's story would best be served by showing how the newspaper covered the base from the very beginning.

You're never going to be able to get everything in a single book, especially given the vast history of Sheppard and its training missions throughout the year. But showing it through the lens of the newspaper was a unique angle."

The Times Record News houses far more images than what one book could include, which made this a daunting task, Ingle said.

"I think the most favorite part of going through archives at the Times Record News and the Museum of North Texas History was learning of the early connection between the newspaper and the base before the installation was given a name," Ingle added. "A letter from Gen. George Marshall, chief of staff of the War Department, sent to the newspaper and dated April 15, 1941, informed the newspaper that the decision had been made to accept the newspaper's suggestion of naming the installation after U.S. Sen. Morris Sheppard. So, in essence, the newspaper played a hand in naming the base."

Another member of the committee, self-proclaimed military brat Denise Nelson, took great pride in preparing every image for publication. A child of a soldier and TRN employee for 33 years, Nelson, also worked on the 100th anniversary celebration of the newspaper in 2007. When pressed to pick a favorite, Nelson said working on "Through the Lens" was a labor of love because "I think my father would be proud" that the significance of Sheppard in this community was highlighted.
MSU

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Roberta Faulkner Sund, Wichita Falls

I was delighted to see the recent story in the TRN about the group from First Christian Church being so helpful to the foreign students arriving to study at MSU. Those students will always remember this kindness and take those memories back to their home countries. What a plus for international relations!

I was in a similar situation back in 1955 only I was the foreign student when I arrived in Heidelberg, Germany to study at the university there as a Fulbright Scholar.

It was not that many years after World War II when Germany had been our enemy so I was a little apprehensive about how I would be received.

Allied forces occupied all the nicer homes in Heidelberg at that time and there were many refugees arriving every day fleeing the communist zone of East Germany, so the housing shortage was critical. Thanks to the helpfulness of the university and various townspeople I found an attic room to rent.

Throughout the year I was made to feel welcome by different organizations and by people in general. I had a marvelous year.

Kudos to the First Christian Church for making the foreign students feel welcomed.
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MALTA  GlobalFoundries announced Thursday it plans a multibillion-dollar investment at its Fab 8 computer chip factory in Malta to start making next generation 7-nanometer chips for customers.

The announcement by Fab 8 general manager Tom Caulfield follows the company's successful launch of 14-nanometer chips at Fab 8 that have been the talk of the industry.

Although GlobalFoundries has been expected to eventually move to 7-nanometer chip production, it was significant because it shows that the company and its backers  the government of Abu Dhabi  are looking at making significant investments at the Fab 8 site in the coming years after spending $12 billion since breaking ground on the site in 2009.

The money likely will be spent on additional manufacturing equipment, or "tools" at Fab 8 but won't require a substantial increase in the number of employees at the site  now at about 3,000 people  or a second fab.

Caulfield said about 80 percent of the tools used for 14-nanometer chips can be used in 7-nanometer production.

"Our plan is to augment our 14-nanometer capacity with 7-nanometer," Caulfield said. "These technologies do complement one another."

Tools used in Fab 8 cost about $10 million each, and there are more than 1,000 of them inside the factory clean room. Caulfield declined to provide the exact amount of money the company will spend adding 7-nanometer tools. He also declined to say how much market share the company would have to gain from competitors to justify a second fab. He did say the state would need to keep investing in the semiconductor industry, especially in cutting edge research programs at SUNY Polytechnic Institute in Albany. Fab 8 engineers use SUNY Poly to speed up the development process of chip manufacturing technologies, working with companies like IBM.

"They (the Cuomo administration) need to do more of the same that got us here," Caulfield said.

The plan to add 7-nanometer manufacturing will also help GlobalFoundries leapfrog other chip companies, which have sought to spend money developing 10-nanometer chips. By moving to 7 nanometers, GlobalFoundries could potentially get a lead on its competitors such as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.

"GlobalFoundries made a bold decision to jump directly from 14 nanometers to 7 nanometers, a decision that is now supported by several leading semiconductor companies as they see only marginal performance and power benefits for the high cost of the 10-nanometer process node," Jim McGregor, principal analyst at Tirias Research, said in a statement.

Chips made using 7-nanometer architecture have transistors half the size of 14-nanometer chips, which power today's high-end smartphones.

That translates into 30 percent better performance and 30 percent lower costs for 7-nanometer chips compared to 14-nanometer chips.

"That's a big deal," Caulfield said.

After several years of building the Fab 8 campus and working on 28-nanometer chips, Fab 8 has spent the past two years ramping up and perfecting making 14-nanometer chips, which have been a hit with Advanced Micro Devices, the chip design company that spun off its manufacturing unit to create GlobalFoundries in 2009.

AMD recently revealed that its new Zen chip, which is made at Fab 8 by GlobalFoundries, beat Intel Corp.'s fastest chip. The test was significant because Intel is the world's largest chip company.

And AMD's new Radeon graphics card, which used a graphics chip made at Fab 8, has been getting rave reviews from the video game industry. Caulfield and other GlobalFoundries employees showed off the capabilities of Radeon at Fab 8 on Thursday after making the 7-nanometer announcement using the graphics card in a virtual reality demonstration. Caulfield believes the 14-nanometer and 7-nanometer will help power the digital world for the next decade.

"That's why I call it the next golden age of the semiconductor industry," he said.

lrulison@timesunion.com  518-454-5504
Albany

19th Congressional District candidates Republican John Faso and Democrat Zephyr Teachout found few areas of agreement in a WAMC Northeast Public Radio/WNYT Ch. 13 debate on Thursday, the first of three before Election Day.

The barbs they traded followed familiar campaign rhetoric thus far: Faso says Teachout is a carpetbagger from New York City and Teachout says Faso is a bought-and-paid-for lobbyist.

The hottest moment of the debate came when Teachout attacked Faso's voting record as an assemblyman, claiming that he missed some 1,700 votes during his time in the chamber. Faso said about 104 missed votes were at the end of a legislative session because he was by his wife's side while she underwent cancer surgery.

"I think I was at the right place, Ms. Teachout," Faso said, turning to speak directly to the Democrat. "I was at the right place at her side at the hospital, worrying about her and my two children instead of sitting in the Assembly. I think it's a really below-the-belt kind of thing."

Speaking to reporters after the debate, Teachout acknowledged Faso was right to miss those votes, but "if you take those out, it's 1,500 times  but 1,500 times John Faso is taking a paycheck not showing up for work."

Fireworks aside, the hour-long debate, broadcast live on radio and set to air at 7 p.m. Friday on NewsChannel 13, mostly stuck to policy and positions. Faso repeatedly brought questions back to his economic plans, saying "the overall issue that we face in our country today ... is how do you get more growth in the economy?"

"If we do not get more growth, we will not be able to fulfill our obligations to seniors and veterans, much less provide opportunities for our children and grandchildren to find prosperity and happiness and hope in our country," he said. "In our district, the support for Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump in the primary was a manifestation of the economic frustration that exists."

Teachout said she will be an independent voice in Congress fighting against big-money interests on issues including campaign finance.

"I showed two years ago when I ran (for governor) against Andrew Cuomo that I'm going to be independent, and I think it's really important because the people (of the district) are independent," she said. "They've been disappointed by both parties ... and that disappointment is real and is for real reasons."

Two rare instances of agreement were on term limits and the water contamination crisis in Hoosick Falls and surrounding areas in eastern Rensselaer County.

Both pledged to serve no more than five terms, saying that 10 years would give them enough time to accomplish their goals. Republican Rep. Chris Gibson, who will retire at the end of the year, had pledged to serve four terms, but will leave Congress after three.

On Hoosick Falls, both decried what they said was a blame game played by state and federal regulators over what has been roundly criticized as an insufficient governmental response.

"Everybody is to blame in Hoosick Falls," Teachout said, adding that while she has called for federal hearings, the conversation needs to move beyond that to "real, concrete solutions" such as funding for medical monitoring of people in contaminated areas.

Faso pointed to congressional action last session to update the Toxic Substances Control Act, and the need to advance that work.

"I think this is an opportunity for us to continue to make sure that we have the right bureaucratic responses, but also that we're investigating the chemicals that, like PFOA, were not being truly tracked and evaluated," he said.

The district includes all of Columbia, Delaware, Greene, Otsego, Schoharie, Sullivan and Ulster counties and parts of Broome, Dutchess, Montgomery and Rensselaer counties.

Teachout and Faso are scheduled to take part in two more televised debates before the Nov. 8 election. They are set to appear on WMHT Oct. 13 and Time Warner Cable News Oct. 24.

mhamilton@timesunion.com  518-454-5449  @matt_hamilton10
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Albany

The fifth annual Mississippi Day in Lincoln Park on Saturday promises to be bigger than ever, with more barbecue ribs, sweet potato pie, Delta blues and attendees.

The family-friendly event is a celebration of Mississippi food and culture and the transplanted Mississippians who live in Albany's South End.

Organizers are confident long waits for the free Southern-style feast have been corrected, with four serving stations this year instead of just one.

More Information If you go What: 5th annual Mississippi Day, with Delta blues music, Southern food and family fun. When: Noon to 9 p.m. Lincoln Park, Albany. (March begins at 11 a.m. at St. John's Church, 94 Herkimer St.) Info.: Free. Donations accepted. http://www.avillageworks.org See More Collapse

More volunteers will be serving barbecue ribs, fried chicken, collard greens, black-eyed peas with okra, corn bread, sweet tea and sweet potato pie and banana pudding for dessert. The event has grown from about 850 people in 2011 to more than 2,000 people anticipated on Saturday.

"We competed with Lark Fest in past years, but we changed the date so we didn't conflict with any other events," said organizer Willie White, a native of Tupelo, Miss., and executive director of A Village, a South End grass-roots activist group. He visited Mississippi in the spring and brought back a special rub for the event.

The program also features gospel music, performances by soul band Prime Time, R&B group Test of Time and the George Boone Blues Band as the headliner.

Stories will be shared by South End residents who grew up in Mississippi. Black families relocated to Albany from Mississippi beginning in the 1920s during the Great Migration, when tens of thousands of blacks fled poverty and racial discrimination in the rural South and relocated to industrial cities in the Northeast in search of economic opportunity between 1915 and 1970.

Several families came from Shubuta, Miss., led by the Rev. John "Jack" Johnson, a Shubuta native who became known as "the black Moses." He migrated to Albany in 1931 and founded St. John's Church of God in Christ in 1952. He died at 94 on July 4, 2004 during a Sunday service in his church.

His son, the Rev. McKinley Johnson, now pastor of the church, will lead a community march as he has each year from St. John's at 94 Herkimer St. to Lincoln Park to kick off Mississippi Day. Mayor Kathy Sheehan will speak. Rena Cunningham, a teenage member of Reigning Life Church which donates use of its kitchen for food preparation  will sing the national anthem for the fifth time. Dozens local college studnets volunteered to prepare food.

"Mississippi Day started as a dream and it gets bigger and better each year," said White.

pgrondahl@timesunion.com  518-454-5623  @PaulGrondahl
ALBANY -- A city woman wanted in New Jersey was stopped on I-87 while driving a car reported stolen in Albany, State Police said Friday.

About 10:50 p.m. Sept. 10, troopers stopped Romona Cordero-Ousmane, 46, in a southbound Hyundai Sonata for multiple traffic violations.
Manish Sisodia pulled up outside the gate to his official residence on Mathura Road, in central Delhi, on a recent weekday evening. Delhi's deputy chief minister strode towards his home office, a set of sparse rooms, overlit so that everything, sofas and people, looked a little shabbier, seams a little more exposed. Assistants followed, bowed under the weight of files. Two others wheeled a pair of squat, burgundy leather despatch boxes into the office. The scene is like a parody of industry, as if Sisodia were about to enter the Circumlocution Office and wade through an ocean of government paperwork to reach his marooned desk. When Sisodia emerged from his office, it was with an apology: "Sorry, I just cleared 50 to 60 files." He had a flight to Finland to catch late that night, a trip that caused controversy on the nightly news talk shows.

For all the appearance of business, of bustle, and there are few that will deny that Sisodia is a hard worker, the truth is that over several weeks the Delhi government has ground to a halt. The next day, as Sisodia would have been lounging in his executive class seat (if the media is to be believed) 30,000 feet above the capital, news broke of a fourth death in a Delhi hospital of a patient with chikungunya, the typically non-fatal mosquito-borne virus.

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No one from the Aam Aadmi Party was available to answer questions about the death or the rising panic over the numbers of people flocking to hospitals and mohalla clinics around the city with symptoms of dengue or chikungunya. Arvind Kejriwal, the chief minister, was in Bangalore for throat surgery, having spent the previous four days campaigning in Punjab, where AAP has, if not run aground, found itself in treacherous waters. Once odds-on favourites to win the state's assembly elections, to be held early next year, AAP is suddenly on the back foot, defending self-inflicted scandals, dissent, and a botched (at least, temporarily) flirtation with Navjot Singh Sidhu. "I have pitched my tent in Punjab now," Kejriwal announced during his visit, "and I will leave the state only after sending the Badals to jail."

Literally or metaphorically, Kejriwal appeared to be putting distance between himself and Delhi, the city where he won so overwhelming a mandate less than two years ago. While Kejriwal was campaigning in Punjab and Sisodia was on his way to Helsinki, Satyendra Jain, Delhi's health minister and, alongside Sisodia, the government's most able administrator, was in Goa. AAP is campaigning there too, seeking to garnish its anticipated win in Punjab with electoral victory in a third state and near-certain national party status. Meanwhile, Najeeb Jung, the Lieutenant Governor (LG) of Delhi, and the AAP government's bete noire, was missing in action too, on a personal trip to the United States.

"Who's in charge," reporters and news anchors thundered. And the unadorned truth was-nobody. Early last month, the Delhi High Court ruled that the LG is, for all intents and purposes, the city's principal administrator. Since then AAP has been in what appears to be a prolonged sulk, waiting for the Supreme Court to pronounce judgement on the party's appeal and essentially, as one commentator put it, "abdicating its responsibility to the people of the city."

Since then, the party has been mired in scandal, with a cabinet minister accused of spiking a woman's drink and raping her on camera, another leader accused of molestation, and a third still of thuggery. And this is in Delhi alone. Fully 21 of the party's MLAs are waiting for the Election Commission to decide whether they should be disqualified for accepting positions as parliamentary secretaries, a so-called 'office of profit', though they were sitting MLAs.

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Sputtering with rage down a phone line, Ashutosh, AAP national spokesperson insisted that it "defied logic for an elected government to be reduced to an advisory capacity". Several days ago, he had received a summons from the National Commission for Women (NCW) to justify a blog he wrote defending Kumar's right (albeit before the rape allegation) to conducting consensual adult relationships as he wished. The blog was written in what we have come to know as 'AAP standard style' -prose that is humourless, bumptious, and self-aggrandising. That said, Ashutosh has a point when he argues that the NCW "acted with unprecedented haste. Every day members of the BJP and RSS make sexist statements. What about Modi's description of the late Sunanda Pushkar as a Rs 50 crore girlfriend, did the NCW issue a notice to him?" This is the ur-AAP narrative, that the party, whatever its own excesses, is being bullied by Modi and the BJP. "They can't," Ashutosh says, "take dissent. It's their authoritarian nature."

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Sisodia, too, is unequivocal in absolving AAP of any blame in precipitating the current, crippling stand-off with the LG. "We are working around the clock," he says of the Delhi government, "but we're being blocked by the LG." Sisodia denies that AAP has a bad relationship with bureaucrats, instead claiming that pressure is being exerted on them by Jung, who in turn answers directly to Modi and Amit Shah, the corpulent BJP president. Santosh Desai, the columnist, accepts that there is some justice in AAP's claims of victimhood. "It can't be denied," he says, "that they don't have the room for manoeuvre that governments generally do, that they are sandwiched between a hostile municipal corporation and LG but AAP is at war with everyone, including themselves."

There is a danger too that a government which has promised to do things, to achieve unrealistic targets, is becoming comfortable with the idea of non-performance. But do voters care that the LG has embarked on the futile, time-wasting task of retroactively investigating AAP government decisions for examples of neglected protocol? Or do they just see the government they elected as defunct?

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In a curious way, says an AAP insider, unwilling to be quoted except anonymously, it makes sense that Kejriwal should ignore Delhi in favour of Punjab: "His hands are tied in Delhi. If AAP wins Punjab it will help us win more credibility in Delhi, will make it harder for the LG and the BJP to block us." Sisodia emphasises that Kejriwal "cannot be expected, as leader of the party, not to play a key role in campaigning in other states. He is in a supervisory role, as all chief ministers should be, and he lets his ministers get on with the details of administration." But Kejriwal, with his frequent absences from Delhi, ironic given his criticism of Modi's foreign jaunts, gives the impression that the state he promised to govern for five years is becoming an afterthought. Ashutosh rejects this interpretation, saying that Kejriwal "has left Delhi barely a handful of times, with only one trip to Rome, a few to Punjab and Goa and one to Gujarat". It is not, the party insists, that it is uninterested in Delhi. It is that AAP has lost the initiative, that the high court decision has given the LG authority at the expense of the elected government.

What people see on TV, though, is a party forever eager to pick a fight. Sisodia says Modi and the BJP "are irritated with the people of Delhi and are taking their revenge on the people for rejecting them so completely". Kejriwal tweets that the "CM n min [are] left wid no power now, even to buy a pen. LG n PM enjoy all powers wrt to Del". Between the lines of all that eye-watering text speak, what is there to glean but a man throwing his hands up in despair? And that is not an image people in Delhi associate with the once dynamic, once proactive party it elected. AAP and Kejriwal must rediscover their mojo. And it won't be enough to whine that Modi stole it.

'They want revenge'

In conversation with Delhi Deputy CM Manish Sisodia.

How does the government function when the relationship with bureaucrats is so bad?

Our relationship with bureaucrats is not bad. But the problem is that they feel more accountable to the LG. And the LG's priorities are different. In Delhi, chikungunya is rife. Has the LG's office called a single meeting? The PM interferes in the governing of Delhi but has he thought about asking his municipal corporation about sanitation, about the dirt that clogs this city?

Can AAP be fully engaged in governing when the chief minister is in Punjab, and the health minister is in Goa while there is a health crisis in Delhi?

Any party will try to expand its wings. But that has nothing to do with our fight with the PMO or the LG. What do we want from them? To leave us to get on with our work. If we put an estate manager in government schools to ensure that schools are clean, they're concerned only about whether we've asked them for permission.

Why would the PM obstruct you?

Their ultimate problem is that they are not able to digest their defeat in Delhi. It's not about Aam Aadmi Party only. They want revenge on the people of Delhi.

If AAP can win the Punjab election, what will be the Delhi CM's role in Punjab?

Look, the Delhi CM will always be dedicated to Delhi. But Arvind Kejriwal has two roles and, as leader of the Aam Aadmi Party, wherever there is an Aam Aadmi government, he is duty-bound to look at it. Because people have reposed their trust in him. The whole country looks to him. How do you expect him to keep quiet when Dalits are being murdered in Hyderabad, or Gujarat, or some part of Uttar Pradesh? Any sensitive leader in this country should speak out.

How as a party will you recover from recent accusations of rape, molestation, corruption...

Aam Aadmi Party has proved its credibility. If someone does something wrong, even if he is a minister, we will sack him. We don't hide things behind curtains. Individuals are important but the Aam Aadmi Party stands for something much larger. We care about education and health. Unless you do something about that, you can't have a progressive citizenry. And if you don't have progressive citizens, forward-looking citizens, critical citizens, then you can't develop as a nation.



--- ENDS ---
Hispanic Heritage Month is the recognition of Hispanic and Latino American contributions to the United States. Celebrated annually between Sept. 15 and Oct. 15, the month honors the rich heritage, traditional culture and countless contributions made to the United States since 1968. The term Hispanic, or Latino, refers to Puerto Rican, South of Central America or other Spanish culture or origin regardless of race.

Sept. 15 was the anniversary celebrating the independence of five Latin American countries: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. Mexico, Chile and Belize also celebrate independence during the month.

Hispanics or Latinos constitute 16.9 percent of the overall United States population or 53 million people, making it home to the largest community of Spanish speakers outside of Mexico.

Tinker Air Force Base will observe the outstanding contributions made by the Hispanic community during the celebration of history, education and literature.

The following events are scheduled at Metro-Technology Center in Oklahoma City and TAFB to stimulate cultural awareness.

 Traveling Display Board Embracing all contributions, Hispanic Heritage Month through the years.

Sept. 19-23: Bldg. 3001

Sept. 26-30: Bldg. 201

Oct. 3-7: Bldg. 1

Oct. 10-14: Bldg. 3001

 Traveling Spanish Tourist Talk with Alex Garcia. Learn Spanish in a fun and informative manner, learning phrases that are needed when traveling to a Spanish speaking country.

Sept. 22: 11a.m. to noon, Bldg. 3001, Bob Queen Conference Room

 Enriching our Communities and Workforce Metro Technology Center, Educational Outreach Presentation

Oct. 4: Business Conference Center, 1900 Springlake Drive, 9:15 to 10:15 a.m. and 11:40 a.m. to 12:40 p.m.
[September 16, 2016] Axalta Coating Systems actively supports student racing teams across Europe

Axalta Coating Systems (NYSE: AXTA), a leading global manufacturer of liquid and powder coatings, has a rich heritage in motorsports, and its support of student racing teams is perhaps the most rewarding. This Smart News Release features multimedia. View the full release here: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005100/en/ The OS.CAR Fachhochschule team from the University of Applied Sciences in Vienna, Austria, painted its internal combustion engine race cars at the Axalta Refinish Training Centre in Oeynhausen, Austria. (Photo: Axalta) Formula Student Axalta is supporting five different teams competing this year in Formula Student, an internationally recognized motorsports competition for students from universities around the world. The competition brings teams together to develop, to design, and to construct racing car prototypes, gaining valuable practical engineering and scientific experience. Matthias Schonberg, Vice President of Axalta and President for Europe, Middle East, and Africa, said, "The students participating in Formula Student learn the importance of team work and have te opportunity to put their theoretical knowledge into practice. We support them in this important step in their educational journey and believe in investing in our future engineers."



Axalta technicians helped the students paint various components of the vehicles, including the chassis of both classes of race cars - Formula Student Combustion and Formula Student Electric - which are judged separately. For the third consecutive year the OS.CAR Fachhochschule team from the University of Applied Sciences in Vienna, Austria, painted its internal combustion engine race cars at the Axalta Refinish Training Centre in Oeynhausen, near Vienna.

Axalta technicians also painted race cars for the Green Lion Racing Team, from Wuppertal, Germany, and the ImpulsEracing Team from the University of Oviedo, Spain. The Green Team from the University of Stuttgart, Germany, and the KA-RaceIng Team from the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany, each had support from Axalta with coatings for the electric motors. For further information on Axalta Coating Systems, please visit Axalta at www.axaltacoatingsystems.com. About Axalta Coating Systems - Celebrating 150 Years in the Coatings Industry Axalta is a leading global company focused solely on coatings and providing customers with innovative, colorful, beautiful and sustainable solutions. From light OEM vehicles, commercial vehicles and refinish applications to electric motors, buildings and pipelines, our coatings are designed to prevent corrosion, increase productivity and enable the materials we coat to last longer. With 150 years of experience in the coatings industry, the 12,800 people of Axalta continue to find ways to better serve our more than 100,000 customers in 130 countries every day with the finest coatings, application systems and technology. For more information visit axaltacoatingsystems.com and follow us on Twitter (News - Alert) @axalta and on LinkedIn. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005100/en/

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[September 16, 2016] Fitch Affirms Telefonica Moviles Chile at 'BBB+'; Outlook Stable

Fitch Ratings has affirmed Telefonica Moviles (News - Alert) Chile S.A.'s (TMCH) Long-Term Foreign and Local Currency Issuer Default Ratings (IDR) at 'BBB+'. Fitch has also affirmed the company's National long-term rating at 'AA(cl)'. The Rating Outlook is Stable. A full list of rating actions follows at the end of this release. KEY RATING DRIVERS TMCH's ratings reflect its leading market position in the Chilean mobile telecommunications market, strong brand recognition and network infrastructure, and sound financial profile backed by solid cash flow generation. The ratings also incorporate its linkage to the parent, Telefonica S.A. (TEF) rated 'BBB', and TEF's other Chilean subsidiary, Telefonica Chile S.A. (TCH), also rated 'BBB+'. TCH offers complementary fixed-line telecommunication services and allows TMCH to achieve synergies mainly in terms of integrated business strategy under the common management, brand unity, as well as sales coverage under the common management strategy. The ratings are tempered by the intense competitive landscape amid the industry maturity, and the company's shareholder distribution policy. Strong Market Position: TMCH is one of the two dominant mobile operators in Chile, along with Empresa Nacional de Telecomunicationes S.A. (ENTEL), with a 34.3% subscriber market share as of March 2016, estimated by Subsecretaria de Telecomunicaciones (Subtel). Its high capex to bolster network competitiveness bodes well for its growth strategy centered on mobile data, which still has ample room for growth given only 33% of mobile internet penetration of its subscriber base. The company is also estimated to have the largest mobile internet market share of 34%. The competitive landscape in Chile will remain intense, as other major mobile operators, including the new entrant, WOM, continue to offer aggressive tariff plans to improve market shares. While this would suppress the company's subscriber base growth, especially in the prepaid segment, and profitability, Fitch expects TMCH's market position to remain intact as its solid network competitiveness and service quality, and strong brand recognition will help fend off competition. Mobile Internet Drives Growth: Growth in mobile internet and data services should help offset negative impact from ongoing contraction in voice service revenues over the medium term, caused by a high level of competition and the falling subscriber base - mainly the prepaid segment. While the continued loss in prepaid mobile internet user base is negative, with a 32% fall at end-June 2016 compared to a year ago, a solid 15% growth in high-ARPU post-paid data users helped achieve 2.5% mobile internet revenue growth during the same period. TMCH's mobile internet revenues proportion of total sales improved to 37% at end-June 2016 from just 11% in 2012. Fitch believes that ever-increasing demand for data will continue in Chile over the medium to long term, in line with the global trend. As such, Fitch expects this trend to continue with the data users representing around 45% by end-2018 and the segmental revenue proportion increasing above 45% during the same period, mitigating ongoing voice revenue contraction. Voice ARPU Erosion: Revenue contraction in the voice segment is unlikely to be curbed over the medium term as the average revenue per user (ARPU) continues to trend down against the backdrop of high competition and industry maturity, with the high mobile service penetration rates at 127% as of March 2016. Fitch forecasts the erosion in voice revenues will remain steeper than the mobile internet revenues growth at least for the short term, suppressing the company's top line growth in negative territory until 2017. During the first half of 2016, TMCH's revenues fell by almost 5% compared to a year ago. Positively, its EBITDA generation remained relatively stable, only falling by 1% as a result of its cost control efforts, including lower subsidies. Rbust Cash Flow Generation:



TMCH boasts strong and stable cash flow generation which helps the company maintain its solid financial profile in line with the rating level. The company's pre-dividend FCF margin is high, with an average of 9% during 2011-2015, and Fitch expects a similar level of margin to continue over the medium term. Fitch forecasts the company's CFFO generation to consistently be over CLP200 billion annually over the medium term, which should comfortably cover the company's capex needs of around CLP120 billion per year on average during 2016-2018. This provides the company with comfortable headroom to support its shareholder returns, which Fitch expects to be largely covered by its pre-dividend FCF generation. Stable Financial Profile:

TMCH's financial profile is forecast to remain commensurate with the rating level over the medium term backed by solid cash flow generation. Fitch forecasts the company's net leverage, measured in terms of total adjusted net debt-to-EBITDAR, to remain stable at around 1.2x-1.3x in the short- to medium-term in the absence of any sizable dividends, which is considered moderately low for the rating category. During the latest 12 months (LTM) as of June 30, 2016, TMCH's net leverage was 1.1x, reflecting its net value of hedge derivative instruments, which was in line with the end-2015 level. KEY ASSUMPTIONS

Fitch's key assumptions within the rating case for TMCH include --Negative revenue growth in 2016 and 2017;

--EBITDAR margin to remain stable at around 26%-27% over the medium term;

--Capital intensity, measured by capex to sales, to gradually fall toward 12% by 2018;

--Pre-dividend FCF margin to remain stable at around to 10% over the medium term;

--Net leverage to remain modestly above 1.0x over the medium term. RATING SENSITIVITIES Negative rating action could be considered in case of material deterioration in the company's key operating and financial metrics due to intense competition, unfavorable regulatory impact, and higher than expected capex and shareholder distributions - all of which combined resulting in negative FCF generation and net leverage increasing to over 2.0x on a sustained basis. Telefonica Moviles Chile S.A.'s ratings are not directly linked to the ratings of its parent, Telefonica SA (News - Alert) (TEF). However, any significant deterioration in the parent's credit profile, to the effect that it results in further rating downgrades or in a material liquidity crunch for the parent, could place pressure on Telefonica Moviles Chile S.A.'s ratings. TEF is currently rated 'BBB'/Outlook Stable. Conversely, an upgrade of Telefonica Moviles Chile S.A.'s ratings, resulting in more than one notch differential from the parent's 'BBB' rating, would be limited given their strong linkages. LIQUIDITY TMCH boasts a sound liquidity profile backed by its large readily available cash position amid robust CFFO generation. As of June 30, 2016, the company's short-term debt amounted to CLP169 billion, which was fully covered by its cash balance of CLP223 billion. The company has good access to capital markets, which further bolsters its financial flexibility and liquidity profile. Full List of Rating Actions Fitch affirms TMCH's ratings as follows: --Long-Term Foreign and Local Currency Issuer Default Rating (IDR) at 'BBB+';

--National long-term rating at 'AA(cl)';

--Local debt issuance programme series No. 589, No. 590, No. 813, and No.814 and series C, D, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, and M bond issuances at 'AA(cl)'. Additional information is available on www.fitchratings.com. Applicable Criteria

Corporate Rating Methodology - Including Short-Term Ratings and Parent and Subsidiary Linkage (pub. 17 Aug 2015)

https://www.fitchratings.com/site/re/869362 Additional Disclosures

Dodd-Frank Rating Information Disclosure Form

https://www.fitchratings.com/creditdesk/press_releases/content/ridf_frame.cfm?pr_id=1011836

Solicitation Status

https://www.fitchratings.com/gws/en/disclosure/solicitation?pr_id=1011836

Endorsement Policy

https://www.fitchratings.com/jsp/creditdesk/PolicyRegulation.faces?context=2&detail=31 ALL FITCH CREDIT RATINGS ARE SUBJECT TO CERTAIN LIMITATIONS AND DISCLAIMERS. PLEASE READ THESE LIMITATIONS AND DISCLAIMERS BY FOLLOWING THIS LINK: HTTP://FITCHRATINGS.COM/UNDERSTANDINGCREDITRATINGS. IN ADDITION, RATING DEFINITIONS AND THE TERMS OF USE OF SUCH RATINGS ARE AVAILABLE ON (News - Alert) THE AGENCY'S PUBLIC WEBSITE 'WWW.FITCHRATINGS.COM'. PUBLISHED RATINGS, CRITERIA AND METHODOLOGIES ARE AVAILABLE FROM THIS SITE AT ALL TIMES. FITCH'S CODE OF CONDUCT, CONFIDENTIALITY, CONFLICTS OF INTEREST, AFFILIATE FIREWALL, COMPLIANCE AND OTHER RELEVANT POLICIES AND PROCEDURES ARE ALSO AVAILABLE FROM THE 'CODE OF CONDUCT' SECTION OF THIS SITE. FITCH MAY HAVE PROVIDED ANOTHER PERMISSIBLE SERVICE TO THE RATED ENTITY OR ITS RELATED THIRD PARTIES. DETAILS OF THIS SERVICE FOR RATINGS FOR WHICH THE LEAD ANALYST IS BASED IN AN EU-REGISTERED ENTITY CAN BE FOUND ON THE ENTITY SUMMARY PAGE FOR THIS ISSUER ON THE FITCH WEBSITE. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005783/en/

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[September 16, 2016] Navidea's Lymphoseek Receives Positive Opinion in Europe for a New Reduced Mass Vial

Navidea Biopharmaceuticals, Inc. (NYSE MKT:NAVB) has announced that the European Medicines Agency's (EMA (News - Alert)) Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) has granted a positive opinion for a new Lymphoseek 50 microgram kit for radiopharmaceutical preparation. Lymphoseek is a medicinal product for diagnostic use only and is indicated in the EU for imaging and intraoperative detection of sentinel lymph nodes draining a primary tumor in adult patients with breast cancer, melanoma, or localized squamous cell carcinoma of the oral cavity.1 This new Lymphoseek "dose packaging" enables a single injection per patient and is appropriate for the radiopharmaceutical distribution model in Europe. "This is an important milestone achieved by both Navidea and our partner SpePharm AG and was achieved through great collaboration by both companies," said William J. Regan, Navidea Senior Vice President and Director Navidea UK, Ltd. "We are excited that Lymphoseek, with proven clinical benefits and performance characteristics which may improve the clinical outcomes of oncology patients, will shortly be available throughout Europe. The impact of this new dose packaging will also be important to Lymphoseek distribution as we register in markets throughout the rest of the world." Peter Stein, Chief Executive Officer, Norgine commented, "As a European specialist pharma company, Norgine is looking forward to making this specialist product available to patients in Europe. The EMA positive opinion on the Lymphoseek reduced mass dose vial will ensure that patients can have their cancer accurately staged with the minimum of potentially disfiguring and disabling surgical intervention." Lymphoseek is approved in the U.S. by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for use in lymphatic mapping to locate lymph nodes draining a primary tumor site in patients with solid tumors for which this procedure is a component of intraoperative management and for guiding Sentinel Lymph Node Biopsy (SLNB) using a handheld gamma counter in patients with node negative squamous cell carcinoma of the oral cavity, breast cancer or melanoma. About Lymphoseek Lymphoseek (technetium Tc 99m tilmanocept) injection is the first and only FDA- and EMA-approved receptor-targeted lymphatic mapping agent. It is a novel, receptor-targeted, small-molecule radiopharmaceutical used in the evaluation of lymphatic basins that may have cancer involvement in patients. Lymphoseek is designed for the precise identification of lymph nodes that drain from a primary tumor, which have the highest probability of harboring cancer. Lymphoseek is approved by FDA for use in solid tumor cancers where lymphatic mapping is a component of surgical management and for guiding sentinel lymph node biopsy in patients with clinically node negative breast cancer, melanoma or squamous cell carcinoma of the oral cavity. Lymphoseek also received EMA European approval in imaging and intraoperative detection of sentinel lymph nodes draining a primary tumor in patients with melanoma, breast cancer or localized squamous cell carcinoma of the oral cavity. Accurate diagnostic evaluation of cancer is critical, as results guide therapy decisions and determine patient prognosis and risk of recurrence. Overall in the U.S., solid tumor cancers may represent up to 1.2 million cases per year. The sentinel node label in the U.S. and Europe may address approximately 600,000 new cases of breast cancer, 160,000 new cases of melanoma and 100,000 new cases of head and neck/oral cancer diagnosed annually. EU Lymphoseek Indication Radiolabelled Lymphoseek is indicated for imaging and intraoperative detection of sentinel lymph nodes draining a primary tumour in adult patients with breast cancer, melanoma, or localised squamous cell carcinoma of the oral cavity. External imaging and intraoperative evaluation may be performed using a gamma detection device. Important Safety Information about Lymphoseek&rg; for EU patients



In clinical trials with Lymphoseek, no serious hypersensitivity reactions were reported, however Lymphoseek may pose a risk of such reactions due to its chemical similarity to dextran. Serious hypersensitivity reactions have been associated with dextran and modified forms of dextran (such as iron dextran drugs). Prior to the administration of Lymphoseek, patients should be asked about previous hypersensitivity reactions to drugs, in particular dextran and modified forms of dextran. Resuscitation equipment and trained personnel should be available at the time of Lymphoseek administration, and patients observed for signs or symptoms of hypersensitivity following injection.

Any radiation-emitting product may increase the risk for cancer. Adhere to dose recommendations and ensure safe handling to minimize the risk for excessive radiation exposure to patients or health care workers. In clinical trials, no patients experienced serious adverse reactions and the most common adverse reactions were injection site irritation and/or pain (<1%). Prescribing information and more information about Lymphoseek for EU patients is available on the EMA website. For full prescribing information and more information about Lymphoseek for U.S. patients, please visit: www.lymphoseek.com. About Norgine Norgine is a European specialist pharmaceutical company that has been established for over 100 years. In 2015, Norgine's total revenue was EUR 320 million and the company employs over 1,000 people. Norgine provides expertise and 'know how' in Europe to develop, manufacture and market products that offer real value to healthcare professionals, payers and patients. Norgine's approach and infrastructure is integrated and focused upon ensuring that Norgine wins partnership opportunities for growth. Norgine is headquartered in the Netherlands and its global operations are based in Amsterdam and in Harefield, UK. Norgine owns a R&D site in Hengoed, Wales and two manufacturing sites, one in Hengoed, Wales and one in Dreux, France. For more information, please visit www.norgine.com. In 2012, Norgine established a complementary business Norgine Ventures, supporting innovative healthcare companies through the provision of debt-like financing in Europe and the U.S. For more information, please visit www.norgineventures.com. NORGINE and the sail logo are trademarks of the Norgine group of companies. About Navidea Navidea Biopharmaceuticals, Inc. (NYSE MKT:NAVB) is a biopharmaceutical company focused on the development and commercialization of precision immunodiagnostic agents and immunotherapeutics. Navidea is developing multiple precision-targeted products and platforms including Manocept and NAV4694 to help identify the sites and pathways of undetected disease and enable better diagnostic accuracy, clinical decision-making, targeted treatment and, ultimately, patient care. Lymphoseek (technetium Tc 99m tilmanocept) injection, Navidea's first commercial product from the Manocept platform, was approved by the FDA in March 2013 and in Europe in November 2014. The development activities of the Manocept immunotherapeutic platform will be conducted by Navidea in conjunction with its subsidiary, Macrophage Therapeutics. Navidea's strategy is to deliver superior growth and shareholder return by bringing to market novel products and advancing the Company's pipeline through global partnering and commercialization efforts. For more information, please visit www.navidea.com. The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 (the Act) provides a safe harbor for forward-looking statements made by or on behalf of the Company. Statements in this news release, which relate to other than strictly historical facts, such as statements about the Company's plans and strategies, expectations for future financial performance, new and existing products and technologies, anticipated clinical and regulatory pathways, and markets for the Company's products are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Act. The words "believe," "expect," "anticipate," "estimate," "project," and similar expressions identify forward-looking statements that speak only as of the date hereof. Investors are cautioned that such statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from historical or anticipated results due to many factors including, but not limited to, the Company's continuing operating losses, uncertainty of market acceptance of its products, our ability to repay our debt, the outcome of the CRG (News - Alert) litigation, reliance on third party manufacturers, accumulated deficit, future capital needs, uncertainty of capital funding, dependence on limited product line and distribution channels, competition, limited marketing and manufacturing experience, risks of development of new products, regulatory risks and other risks detailed in the Company's most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K and other Securities and Exchange Commission filings. The Company undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements. Source (News - Alert): Navidea Biopharmaceuticals, Inc. _____________________________________ References 1 European Medicines Agency LYMPHOSEEK approval 2014. http://www.ema.europa.eu/ema/index.jsp?curl=pages/medicines/human/medicines/002085/human_med_001827.jsp&mid=WC0b01ac058001d124. Accessed 13 September 2016. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005378/en/

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In his letter to Union Minister JP Nadda, Health Minister Satyendra Jain said the Delhi government is making efforts to tackle the outbreak of dengue and chikungunya.

The AAP government requests a meeting of health ministers of all states neighbouring Delhi to tackle the crisis with large number of patients coming to the Capital for treatment.

By Mail Today Bureau: The AAP government requested the Centre on Thursday that a meeting of health ministers of all states neighbouring Delhi - UP, Rajasthan, Punjab and Haryana - is required to tackle the dengue and chikungunya menace.

The letter to the Centre pointed out that many patients are coming to Delhi for treatment due to lack of proper healthcare facilities in their respective states.

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Twelve people have so far died due to chikungunya complications out of which seven were from UP, including Ghaziabad and Mathura. Dengue has also claimed 18 lives in the national Capital with at least three of the victims from UP and Bihar.

READ| Delhi: Dengue-chikungunya outbreak worries shoo away tourists



MOSQUITO MENACE

In his letter to Union Minister JP Nadda, Health Minister Satyendra Jain said the Delhi government is making efforts to tackle the outbreak of dengue and chikungunya.

However, many of the patients coming to Delhi hospitals are from neighbouring states in the NCR, apparently due to lack of proper healthcare facilities in the said states, thus, creating pressure on the medical infrastructure in Delhi in general and government hospitals, in particular, Jain said in the letter.

"It is, therefore, requested that a meeting may be convened inviting the health ministers of the NCR region to review the state-wise action required to augment the healthcare facilities for effective tackling of the issue," he said.

According to an AIIMS report on Thursday, 96 patients were admitted to the hospital, of which 56 have been discharged. Out of the total patients, 70 per cent belonged to UP, 10 per cent to Bihar and rest are from Delhi, the letter said.

Chikungunya and dengue continue to wreak havoc in Delhi with the death toll climbing to 30 on Thursday and the number of those affected crossing 2,800.

Jain, meanwhile, said unlike dengue, chikungunya in itself cannot cause death. "Nadda ji told me no one died of chikungunya in the entire country.

People die directly of dengue. But medical literature says normally people do not die of chikungunya," he said.

ALSO READ:

South Delhi hit hardest by dengue-chikungunya outbreak

Defective fogging machines add to woes amid rising chikungunya, dengue cases in Delhi Chikungunya spreads wings to Delhi, Uttar Pradesh



--- ENDS ---
[September 16, 2016] Sunovion to Present Data on Latuda (lurasidone) at the 29th European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ECNP) Congress

Sunovion Pharmaceuticals Inc. (Sunovion) will present seven research posters on Latuda (lurasidone HCl) at the 29th European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ECNP) Congress which will be held September 17-20, 2016 in Vienna, Austria. LATUDA is an atypical antipsychotic approved in the U.S. for the treatment of adult patients with schizophrenia and for the treatment of adult patients with bipolar I disorder (bipolar depression) both as monotherapy and as adjunctive therapy with lithium or valproate. LATUDA is approved in the EU for the treatment of adult patients with schizophrenia. "Our presentations at ECNP cover a broad range of Latuda global clinical study data and analyses of randomized controlled trials," said Antony Loebel, M.D., Executive Vice President and Chief Medical Officer, Sunovion, Head of Global Clinical Development for Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma Group. "These presentations reflect our commitment to increased understanding of Latuda by the global community of psychiatric health care practitioners and researchers." Following is a list of the presentations sponsored by Sunovion: Poster P.3.f.006: Efficacy of Lurasidone in Schizophrenia: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of RCTS with Active Comparators (Sunday, September 18, 10:40-11:15 a.m. and 12:15-1:45 p.m. CEST) Authors: Tadashi Nosaka, Katsuhiko Hagi, Andrei Pikalov, Antony Loebel, John M. Kane

Poster P.3.f.007: Safety of Lurasidone in Schizophrenia: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of RCTS with Active Comparators (Sunday, September 18, 10:40-11:15 a.m. and 12:15-1:45 p.m. CEST) Authors: Katsuhiko Hagi, Tadashi Nosaka, Andrei Pikalov, Antony Loebel, John M. Kane

Poster P.2.b.037: Lurasidone for MDD with Mixed Features: Effect of Baseline Depression Severity on Clinical Outcome (Monday, September 19, 10:40-11:15 a.m. and 12:15-1:45 p.m. CEST) Authors: J. Craig Nelson, Joyce Tsai, Andrei Pikalov, Yongcai Mao, Josephine Cucchiaro, Antony Loebel

Poster P.3.d.067: Efficacy and Safety of Lurasidone in Male and Female Patients With Schizophrenia: A Pooled Analysis of Short-Term, Placebo-Controlled Studies (Tuesday, September 20, 10:40-11:15 a.m. and 12:15-1:45 p.m. CEST) Authors: Michael Tocco, Andrei Pikalov, Jay Hsu, Josephine Cucchiaro, Antony Loebel

Poster P.3.3.059: Metabolic Syndrome in Patients With Schizophrenia Receiving Long-Term Treatment With Lurasidone, Quetiapine XR, or Risperidone (Tuesday, September 20, 10:40-11:15 a.m. and 12:15-1:45 p.m. CEST) Authors: John Newcomer, Michael Tocco, Andrei Pikalov, Hanzhe Zheng, Josephine Cucchiaro, Antony Loebel

Poster P.3.3.057: Efficacy of Lurasidone in Patients with Schizophrenia with Prominent Positive Symptoms: a Pooled Analysis of Short-Term Placebo-Controlled Studies (Tuesday, September 20, 10:40-11:15 a.m. and 12:15-1:45 p.m. CEST) Authors: Steven Potkin, Michael Tocco, Andrei Pikalov, Yongcai Mao, Josephine Cucchiaro, Antony Loebel

Poster P.2.b.062: Efficacy of Lurasidone in the Treatment of MDD with Mixed Features: Early Improvement as a Predictor of Short-Term Response (Tuesday, September 20, 10:40-11:15 a.m. and 12:15-1:45 p.m. CEST) Authors: Dan V. Iosifescu, Joyce Tsai, Yongcai Mao, Andrei Pikalov, Antony Loebel

About Latuda Latuda is approved in the U.S. and Canada for the treatment of adult patients with schizophrenia, and for the treatment of depressive episodes associated with bipolar l disorder (bipolar depression) as monotherapy or as adjunctive therapy with lithium or valproate. Latuda is approved for the treatment of adult patients with schizophrenia in the EU, Switzerland, Australia, Taiwan, Russia and Singapore. (U.S.) IMPORTANT SAFETY INFORMATION FOR LATUDA INCREASED MORTALITY IN ELDERLY PATIENTS WITH DEMENTIA-RELATED PSYCHOSIS; AND SUICIDAL THOUGHTS AND BEHAVIORS Elderly patients with dementia-related psychosis (having lost touch with reality due to confusion and memory loss) treated with this type of medicine are at an increased risk of death compared to patients receiving placebo (sugar pill). LATUDA is not approved for treating elderly patients with dementia-related psychosis.

Antidepressants have increased the risk of suicidal thoughts and actions in some children, teenagers, and young adults. Patients of all ages starting treatment should be watched closely for worsening of depression, suicidal thoughts or actions, unusual changes in behavior, agitation, and irritability. Patients, families, and caregivers should pay close attention to any changes, especially sudden changes in mood, behaviors, thoughts, or feelings. This is very important when an antidepressant medicine is started or when the dose is changed. Report any change in these symptoms immediately to the doctor. LATUDA is not approved for patients under the age of 18 years. LATUDA can cause serious side effects, including stroke that can lead to death, which can happen in elderly people with dementia who take medicines like LATUDA. Neuroleptic malignant syndrome (NMS) is a rare but very serious condition that can happen in people who take antipsychotic medicines, including LATUDA. NMS can cause death and must be treated in a hospital. Call your healthcare provider right away if you become severely ill and have some or all of these symptoms: high fever, excessive sweating, rigid muscles, confusion, or changes in your breathing, heartbeat, or blood pressure. Tardive dyskinesia (TD) is a serious and sometimes permanent side effect reported with LATUDA and similar medicines. Tell your doctor about any movements you cannot control in your face, tongue, or other body parts, as they may be signs of TD. TD may not go away, even if you stop taking LATUDA. TD may also start after you stop taking LATUDA. Increases in blood sugar can happen in some people who take LATUDA. Extremely high blood sugar can lead to coma or death. If you have diabetes or risk factors for diabetes (such as being overweight or a family history of diabetes), your healthcare provider should check your blood sugar before you start LATUDA and during therapy. Call your healthcare provider if you have any of these symptoms of high blood sugar (hyperglycemia) while taking LATUDA: feel very thirsty, need to urinate more than usual, feel very hungry, feel weak or tired, feel sick to your stomach, feel confused, or your breath smells fruity. Increases in triglycerides and LDL (bad) cholesterol and decreases in HDL (good) cholesterol have been reported with LATUDA. You may not have any symptoms, so your healthcare provider may decide to check your cholesterol and triglycerides during your treatment with LATUDA. Some patients may gain weight while taking LATUDA. Your doctor should check your weight regularly. Tell your doctor if you experience any of these: feeling dizzy or light-headed upon standing,

decreases in white blood cells (which can be fatal),

trouble swallowing. LATUDA and medicines like it may raise the level of prolactin. Tell your healthcare provider if you experience a lack of menstrual periods, leaking or enlarged breasts, or impotence. Tell your healthcare provider if you have a seizure disorder, have had seizures in the past, or have conditions thatincrease your risk for seizures.



Tell your healthcare provider if you experience prolonged, abnormal muscle spasms or contractions, which may be a sign of a condition called dystonia. LATUDA can affect your judgment, thinking, and motor skills. You should not drive or operate hazardous machinery until you know how LATUDA affects you.

LATUDA may make you more sensitive to heat. You may have trouble cooling off. Be careful when exercising or when doing things likely to cause dehydration or make you warm. Avoid eating grapefruit or drinking grapefruit juice while you take LATUDA since these can affect the amount of LATUDA in the blood. Tell your healthcare provider about all prescription and over-the-counter medicines you are taking or plan to take, since there are some risks for drug interactions with LATUDA. Tell your healthcare provider if you are allergic to any of the ingredients of LATUDA or take certain medications called CYP3A4 inhibitors or inducers. Ask your healthcare provider if you are not sure if you are taking any of these medications. Avoid drinking alcohol while taking LATUDA. Tell your healthcare provider if you are pregnant or if you are planning to get pregnant. Avoid breastfeeding while taking LATUDA. The most common side effects of LATUDA include sleepiness or drowsiness; restlessness or feeling like you need to move around (akathisia); difficulty moving, slow movements, muscle stiffness, or tremor; and nausea. These are not all the possible side effects of LATUDA. For more information, ask your healthcare provider or pharmacist. You are encouraged to report negative side effects of prescription drugs to the FDA. Visit www.fda.gov/medwatch or call 1-800-FDA-1088. Please see Important Safety Information, including Boxed Warnings, and full Prescribing Information at www.LATUDA.com. (EU) IMPORTANT SAFETY INFORMATION FOR LATUDA The marketing authorisation for LATUDA in the EU was based on short- and long-term data, which found LATUDA to be effective in treating adult patients with schizophrenia.1,2,3,4,5,6,7 This medicinal product is subject to additional monitoring. This will allow quick identification of new safety information. Healthcare professionals are asked to report any suspected adverse reactions. Adverse reactions should be reported to the Competent Authority in your country. Adverse reactions should also be reported to Sunovion Pharmaceuticals Europe Ltd. on +44207 821 2899. About Schizophrenia Schizophrenia is a chronic, serious and often severely disabling brain disorder that affects approximately 1 in 100 American adults (about 2.4 million people) in the United States.8 It is characterized by symptoms such as hallucinations, delusions, disorganized thinking, lack of emotion and lack of energy, as well as problems with memory, attention and the ability to plan, organize and make decisions.9 About Bipolar Depression Bipolar disorder, a mental health condition that requires long-term treatment and is characterized by debilitating mood swings,10 affects approximately 12.6 million adults in the United States.11,12 It is among the top 10 leading causes of disability in the United States.13,14 Bipolar I disorder is characterized by at least one lifetime manic or mixed episode; often individuals have one or more depressive episodes.15 Bipolar depression refers to the depressive phase of bipolar disorder;10 its symptoms include: depressed mood, loss of interest or pleasure in activities, significant weight loss, insomnia, fatigue, feelings of worthlessness, diminished ability to concentrate and recurrent thoughts of death or suicide attempt.10 When symptomatic, most individuals with bipolar disorder spend more time in the depressive phase.16 Depressive episodes associated with bipolar disorder have been shown to result in significant impairment in work, family and social function,17,18 and are associated with increased risk of suicide and direct and indirect healthcare costs.19,20 About Sunovion Pharmaceuticals Inc. (Sunovion) Sunovion is a global biopharmaceutical company focused on the innovative application of science and medicine to help people with serious medical conditions. Sunovion's spirit of innovation is driven by the conviction that scientific excellence paired with meaningful advocacy and relevant education can improve lives. The Company has charted new paths to life-transforming treatments that reflect ongoing investments in research and development and an unwavering commitment to support people with psychiatric, neurological, and respiratory conditions. Sunovion's track record of discovery, development and commercialization of important therapies has included Brovana (arformoterol tartrate), Latuda (lurasidone HCl), and most recently Aptiom (eslicarbazepine acetate). Headquartered in Marlborough, Mass. Sunovion is an indirect, wholly owned subsidiary of Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma Co., Ltd. Sunovion Pharmaceuticals Europe Ltd., based in London, England, and Sunovion Pharmaceuticals Canada Inc., based in Mississauga, Ontario, are wholly-owned direct subsidiaries of Sunovion Pharmaceuticals Inc. Additional information can be found on the Company's web sites: www.sunovion.com, www.sunovion.eu and www.sunovion.ca. Connect with Sunovion on Twitter (News - Alert) @Sunovion and LinkedIn. About Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma Co., Ltd. Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma is among the top-ten listed pharmaceutical companies in Japan operating globally in major pharmaceutical markets, including Japan, the United States, China and the European Union. Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma aims to create innovative pharmaceutical products in the Psychiatry & Neurology area and the Oncology area, which have been designated as the focus therapeutic areas. Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma is based on the merger in 2005 between Dainippon Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd., and Sumitomo Pharmaceuticals Co., Ltd. Today, Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma has about 7,000 employees worldwide. Additional information about Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma is available through its corporate website at www.ds-pharma.com. BROVANA is a registered trademark of Sunovion Pharmaceuticals Inc.

LATUDA is a registered trademark of Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma Co., Ltd.

APTIOM is used under license from BIAL. Sunovion Pharmaceuticals Inc. is a U.S. subsidiary of Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma Co., Ltd.

 2016 Sunovion Pharmaceuticals Inc. For a copy of this release, visit Sunovion's web site at www.sunovion.com References 1 Meltzer H et al. Lurasidone in the treatment of schizophrenia: a randomized, double-blind, placebo- and olanzapine-controlled study. Am J Psychiatry 2011; 168:957-67

2 Loebel A et al. Efficacy and safety of lurasidone 80 mg/day and 160 mg/day in the treatment of schizophrenia: A randomized, double-blind, placebo- and active-controlled trial. Schizophr Res 2013; 145:101-109

3 Nakamura M et al. Lurasidone in the Treatment of Acute Schizophrenia: A Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Trial. J Clin Psychiatry 2009;70:829-36

4 Ogasa M et al. Lurasidone in the treatment of schizophrenia: a 6-week, placebo-controlled study. Psychopharmacol [Berl] 2013;225(3):519-30

5 Loebel A et al. Effectiveness of lurasidone vs. quetiapine XR for relapse prevention in schizophrenia: A 12-month, double-blind, non-inferiority study. Schizophr Res. 2013; (147) 95-102

6 Nasrallah H.A., et al. Lurasidone for the treatment of acutely psychotic patients with schizophrenia: a 6-week, randomised, placebo-controlled study. J Psych Res 2013; 47:670-677

7 Stahl, S.M., et al. Effectiveness of lurasidone for patients with schizophrenia following 6 weeks of acute treatment with lurasidone, olanzapine, or placebo: A 6-month, open- label, extension study. J Clin Psychiatry 2013

8 Regier DA, Narrow WE, Rae DS, Mandercheid RW, Locke B2, Goodwin, FK. The de Facto US Mental and Addictive Disorders Service System. Arch Gen Psychiatry. 1993;50:85-94. Calculated by extrapolating from the 2008 United States Census Bureau population estimates.

9 NAMI, Schizophrenia. Available at: http://www.nami.org/Template.cfm?Section=By_Illness&Template=/TaggedPage/TaggedPageDisplay.cfm&TPLID=54&ContentID=23036. Accessed May 15, 2013.

10 Swann, AC. Long-term treatment in bipolar disorder. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry. 2005; 66(1):7-12.

11 National Institute of Mental Health. Bipolar Disorder. [Internet]. Available from: http://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/topics/bipolar-disorder/index.shtml. Accessed March 17, 2016.

12 "Bipolar Disorder." Decision Resources. Table 2-2. Burlington, MA. December 2013.

13 National Alliance on Mental Illness. The Impact and Cost of Mental Illness: The Case of Bipolar Disorder. [Internet]. Available from: http://www2.nami.org/Template.cfm?Section=members&template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=42734. Accessed March 17, 2016.

14 National Alliance on Mental Illness. A Primer on Depressive, Bipolar and Anxiety Illnesses: Facts for Policymakers. [Internet]. Available from: http://www2.nami.org/walkTemplate.cfm?Section=NAMIWALKS&template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=42736. Accessed March 17, 2016.

15 American Psychiatric Association: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, Text Revision. Washington, DC, American Psychiatric Association, 2000.

16 The Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance. Mood Disorders and Different Kinds of Depression. [Internet]. Available from: http://www.dbsalliance.org/site/PageServer?pagename=education_bipolar_types. Accessed March 17, 2016.

17 Huxley N, Baldessarini RJ. Disability and Its Treatment in Bipolar Disorder Patients. Bipolar Disorder. 2007; 9(1-2):183-96.

18 Calabrese JR, Hirschfeld RM, Frye MA, Reed ML. Impact Of Depressive Symptoms Compared With Manic Symptoms In Bipolar Disorder: Results Of A U.S. Community-Based Sample. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry. 2004; 65(11):1499-504.

19 Parker G, McCraw S, Hadzi-Pavlovic D, Fletcher K. Costs Of The Principal Mood Disorders: A Study Of Comparative Direct And Indirect Costs Incurred By Those With Bipolar I, Bipolar II And Unipolar Disorders. Journal of Affective Disorders. 2012; 149(1-3):46-55. (ePub).

20 Leverich GS, Altshuler LL, Frye MA, et al. Factors Associated With Suicide Attempts In 648 Patients With Bipolar Disorder In The Stanley Foundation Bipolar Network. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry. 2003; 64(5):506-15. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005535/en/

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[September 15, 2016] Top 4 Trends Impacting the Global Satellite Manufacturing and Launch Market Through 2020: Technavio

Technavio's latest report on the global satellite manufacturing and launch market provides an analysis on the most important trends expected to impact the market outlook from 2016-2020. Technavio defines an emerging trend as a factor that has the potential to significantly impact the market and contribute to its growth or decline. Moutushi Saha, a lead analyst from Technavio, specializing in research on space sector, says, "The growing economic and territorial disputes between Russia and the US, China and Vietnam, India and Pakistan, and North Korea and South Korea are expected to result in an increased adoption of advanced systems and technologies to strengthen the respective countries' warfare capabilities." Request a sample report: http://www.technavio.com/request-a-sample?report=53120 Technavio's sample reports are free of charge and contain multiple sections of the report including the market size and forecast, drivers, challenges, trends, and more. The top four emerging trends driving the global satellite manufacturing and launch market according to Technavio aerospace and defense research analysts are: Advent of 3D printing

Development of reusable space launch vehicles

Emergence of all-electric propulsion systems

Implementation of micro-systems Ask an analyst: http://www.technavio.com/content/ask-analyst?report=53120 Ask Technavio's lead analysts a question about this market and they will have your answer within 24 hours. Advent of 3D printing Additive manufacturing (3D printing) is a fascinating development that could change the manufacturing processes of different products. 3D printing allows a final product to be created directly through computer-aided drafting (CAD) designing. It does not require expensive molds for different product designs, and a single additive manufacturing system can create multiple parts and components just by varying the CAD design as desired. Since the manufacturing process is in layers, it utilizes only the raw materials needed to build the part, thus providing a substantial reduction in raw material consumption and also the weight of the component. Companies such as Aerojet Rocketdyne have been working in cooperation with research institutes to realize the possibility of manufacturing microsatellites from metal and composites using 3D printing technology. In 2014, te company successfully demonstrated its 3D printed rocket propulsion system for satellites. The propulsion system was designed for CubeSat, which enables missions for such miniaturized satellites that were not available previously. One of the future objectives is to build such satellites in space using 3D printing technology. It would further reduce the cost of launching satellites from earth.



Development of reusable space launch vehicles Satellite launches are mostly done using expendable launch vehicles that carry a payload to the orbit, and can be used only once. The majority of the satellite launch cost comes from building the rocket, which is used for a single mission. However, instead of an expendable Launch Vehicle (ELV), reusable space launch vehicles are being developed nowadays. Such reusable space launch vehicles can substantially reduce the cost of access to space if the rockets could be effectively used for multiple missions, similar to that of airplanes.

Companies such as SpaceX (News - Alert) have been working on developing such reusable space launch vehicles that can re-enter the earth without burning and return to the launch pad for a vertical landing. Emergence of all-electric propulsion systems Chemical propulsion systems such as solid rocket engines carry a substantial amount of fuel for missions, which is not possible in the case of nano and microsatellite designs. Also, the propellant used in such solid propellant propulsion systems, once started, cannot be stopped or restarted, and multiple stages have to be used if more than one burn is desired. It further increases the weight. The advent of miniaturized electronics and micro-electro-mechanical-systems (MEMS) is enabling the designing of micro-electric propulsion technologies such as micro-thrusters. Micro-thrusters can be used for micro-propulsion of nano and microsatellites. The all-electric propulsion systems for satellites minimize the launch mass and thus maximize the available payload. "The MEMS-based thruster is minuscule but can fit highly sophisticated propulsion systems. These MEMS and electric-based miniaturized propulsion systems provide a whole new dimension for nano and microsatellite missions," says Moutushi. Implementation of micro-systems As the defense budgets are being cut down, multi-billion-dollar military satellite programs are being called off by a number of governments. This has prompted many countries to adopt cheaper alternative methods to implement microsatellites that can perform many of the functions (i.e., GPS navigation, communication, surveillance, and earth imagery) traditionally done by expensive large satellite systems. These microsatellites weigh between 22 and 220 pounds. Some of the other variants are minisatellites (220-1100 pounds), nanosatellites (2.2-22 pounds), picosatellites (0.22-2.2 pounds), and femtosatellites (0.22 pounds). They are comparatively cheaper (10 times cheaper than legacy satellites) and faster to build and launch. These systems are being made with the help of commercial-of-the-shelf (COTS) technology for a plug-and-play approach to construct microsatellite. Other than being cheaper and faster, these microsatellites can also be used for missions such as configuring constellation of communication nodes or conducting an in-orbit survey of larger satellites, which could not be accomplished by traditional satellites. These could also be used as anti-satellite weapons to terminate satellites of nemesis. For instance, China's BX-1 microsatellite system, an experimental anti-satellite weapon, was deployed in 2008. A total of nine nano or microsatellites will be launched by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) for the US during 2015-2016. On September 2015, China launched 20 microsatellites into space using its latest carrier rocket powered by pollution-free fuels in the global satellite launch sector. Browse Related Reports: Global Satellite Ground Station Equipment Market 2016-2020

Global Satellite-Based Augmentation Systems 2016-2020

Global Satellite Transponder Market 2016-2020 Do you need a report on a market in a specific geographical cluster or country but can't find what you're looking for? Don't worry, Technavio also takes client requests. Please contact [email protected] with your requirements and our analysts will be happy to create a customized report just for you. About Technavio Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. The company develops over 2000 pieces of research every year, covering more than 500 technologies across 80 countries. Technavio has about 300 analysts globally who specialize in customized consulting and business research assignments across the latest leading edge technologies. Technavio analysts employ primary as well as secondary research techniques to ascertain the size and vendor landscape in a range of markets. Analysts obtain information using a combination of bottom-up and top-down approaches, besides using in-house market modeling tools and proprietary databases. They corroborate this data with the data obtained from various market participants and stakeholders across the value chain, including vendors, service providers, distributors, re-sellers, and end-users. If you are interested in more information, please contact our media team at [email protected]. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160915005045/en/

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[September 16, 2016] Test Innovators Launches PSAT Prep on its Adaptive Platform

SEATTLE, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Test Innovators, the leading test prep platform for the ISEE and SSAT, today announced it is launching personalized prep tools and support for the Preliminary Scholastic Aptitude Test through its online platform. As part of the launch, Test Innovators will be providing free study materials for the PSAT at www.testinnovators.com through November 2, 2016. The PSAT, also known as the National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, is taken every year by millions of high school students. Based on the test results, students qualify for academic recognition and approximately $30 million in scholarship money from the National Merit Scholarship Program. Test Innovators' technology was created in 2013 to deliver a personalized, data-driven approach to test prep. The adaptive platform offers full-length practice tests, immediate scoring, actionable insights, a timing feature that builds critical time management skills, and access to world-class tutors. Today, the platform is used by students, schools, and top tutoring companies worldwide, and company research shows that students who use the Test Innovators platform score 70% higher than average. "We use the Test Innovators technology with all our ISEE and SSAT students because we think it is the most effetive personalized test prep platform available," said Kendra Srivastava, Director of Academic Trainers, a California-based tutoring company. "We have wanted to use it with more students for additional tests, and are thrilled that we will now be able to offer PSAT prep on their personalized platform."



As part of its service, Test Innovators gathers information on testing scores and results, including being recognized as a National Merit semifinalist or offered admission at a selective secondary school. Test Innovators uses this data to help parents and students pinpoint the test scores needed to reach their testing objective. After taking an initial practice test, each student receives a personalized prep plan outlining subject areas to work on, test strategies, and specific recommendations on how to best achieve their testing goals. "At Test Innovators, we believe in the power of personalized test prep," said Edan Shahar, chief executive officer of Test Innovators. "Our adaptive technology tells students exactly what they need to study, and what they need to score to reach their specific testing goals, whether it is to be a competitive candidate at a selective secondary school, or a National Merit Scholar."

About Test Innovators

Test Innovators is the leading test prep platform for the SSAT and ISEE. Founded in 2013, TI's adaptive technology is used by students, schools, and top tutoring companies worldwide, and has helped tens of thousands of students get into the most selective schools. A complete test prep solution, Test Innovators offers full-length practice tests, immediate scoring, actionable insights, a timing feature that builds critical time management skills, and access to world-class tutors. To learn more, visit www.testinnovators.com. Kimberly Kennedy

Public Relations

Test Innovators

781-603-6066

[email protected] This release was issued through WebWire(R). For more information visit http://www.webwire.com. To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/test-innovators-launches-psat-prep-on-its-adaptive-platform-300329300.html SOURCE Test Innovators

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Briggs: Elkharts RV workers are only essential until a recession

RV sales are great for job security in Elkhart, yet horrible for human bodies.
By PTI: New Delhi, Sep 16 (PTI) An AIIMS doctor allegedly committed suicide by injecting herself with some poisonous substance at her flat in IP Extension in east Delhi following which her husband has been arrested, police today said.

The doctors husband Brijesh,who is a pilot with Air India, has been arrested,said DCP (East) Rishi Pal.

30-year-old Dr Ritu Bangoti, who worked at Anesthesia department of AIIMS, took the extreme step at her flat in Kurmanchal Apartment yesterday evening, they said.

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Bangoti used to stay with her in-laws at a apartment.

When she she did not come out of her room for a long time, family members grew suspicious and broke open the door, he said.

The victims family members, meanwhile, have accused her in-laws of harassing her for dowry.

However, the police was informed about the death of the doctor by her brother who had made a PCR call.

The deceased was reportedly having strained relations with her husband.

Neighbours told police that the couple had frequent fights over domestic issues.

The family of the girl also alleged that the couple fought often and the in-laws of the girl used to demand dowry which constantly worried Ritu, said the officer.

"Based on the womans family statement, recorded in front of the SDM, and basis the facts that came out,we have arrested her husband. A case under sections 498(A) (Husband or relative of husband of a woman subjecting her to cruelty), 304(B)(dowry death), 306 (Abetment of suicide) has been registered against him, " said Singh.

Ritu did not leave behind any suicide note but police is currently investigating the matter by questioning her family members and neighbours.

The reason behind the death of the doctor and the nature of substance she allegedly injected to herself was under investigation, he said.

Ritu got married three years back and had a two-year-old daughter.

Husband of the deceased was questioned for several hours and was arrested late evening.

The post mortem report of the deceased is awaited, police said. PTI SLB SMJ

--- ENDS ---
By PTI: New Delhi, Sept 16 (PTI) An AIIMS doctor allegedly committed suicide by injecting herself with some poisonous substance at her flat in IP Extension in east Delhi even as the police today said they were probing dowry angle.

30-year-old Dr Ritu Bangoti, who worked at Anesthesia department of AIIMS, took the extreme step at her flat in Kurmanchal Apartment yesterday evening, they said.

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The victims family members, meanwhile, have accused her in-laws of harassing her for dowry.

"The statement of the girls family has been recorded in front of the SDM and inquest proceedings are on. We have added the charges of 304(B)(dowry death)," said DCP (East) Rishi Pal Singh.

Ritu did not leave behind any suicide note but police is investigating the matter by questioning her family members and neighbours.

The deceaseds husband, Brajesh, who is a pilot, was questioned for several hours, police said, adding the postmortem report is awaited, police said.

The deceased used to stay with her in-laws. When she did not come out of her room for a long time, family members broke open the door and found her body, he said.

The police was informed about the death of the doctor by her brother who had made a PCR call.

Ritu was allegedly having strained relations with her husband. Neighbours told the police that the couple had frequent fights over domestic issues.

The girls family members alleged that her in-laws used to demand dowry which constantly worried Ritu, said the officer.

The reason behind the death of the doctor and the nature of substance she allegedly injected herself with were under investigation, police said.

Ritu got married three years back and had a two-year-old daughter. PTI SLB VIT SRY SC RC

--- ENDS ---
How to download iOS 16

Learn how to update your iPhone to iOS 16, to make use of all the latest and best features while ensuring your iPhone is as secure and optimized as it can be
By Indrajit Kundu: In a major blow to the Congress party in Arunachal Pradesh, 43 party legislators have unanimously signed a petition to join the People's Party of Arunachal Pradesh which is backed by the BJP.



Today, 43 out of the total 46 Congress MLA's unanimously decided to merge with the PPA en-bloc along with current Chief Minister Pema Khandu. Founded in 1979, the PPA is a part of the North-East Democratic Alliance, a paltform of 10 regional North Eastern parties under the aegis of the BJP and was formed in May 2016 by BJP president Amit Shah. Currently, BJP heavyweight from Assam Himanta Biswa Sarma is incharge of the alliance.



In an 60 member Arunachal Pradesh assembly, Congress has 46 lawmakers while the BJP has 11 MLA's. However, former Congress chief minister Nabam Tuki and a few others continue to be in the party.



Former state chief minister Kalikho Pul, who recently passed away had also joined the PPA in February 2016 along with 24 other Congress members. A recent Supreme Court verdict had replaced Kalikho Pul's government with the previous Congress run government under chief minister Nabam Tuki terming the act "unconstitutional". The SC had come down heavily on the BJP run Central government for its political interference in the matter.



If MLAs don't want to stay with Congress then what can we do? SC also reinstated Cong govt but ultimately the MLAs decision is the final. Kiren Rijiju (@KirenRijiju) September 16, 2016

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Also read:

Jyoti Prasad Rajkhowa removed as Arunachal Pradesh governor



Khandu takes exception to security lapse, breach of protocol



--- ENDS ---
You can get an autonomous vacuum to clean your floor or a mechanical nanny to tell stories to your kids, so why not a robot that helps you socialize with friends?



Due out in November for $100, the Ozobot Evo can help you teach you to program, play games and send messages to friends anywhere in the world.



About the the size of a stack of two stacks of quarters, the 1.2 x 1.3-inch dome-shaped Evo is an upgrade over the Ozobot Bit, an identical-looking $50 robot that teaches kids about programming and logic by following a series of colored lines and dots you draw (or place) beneath it.



The 0.8-ounce Evo works with the same paper-and-ink-based system, but adds in Bluetooth connectivity and a smartphone app that lets you not only control your robot but also send alerts to your friends' bots.

Ozobot Evo



I spent a few hours playing with the Ozobot Evo this week, with intriguing but mixed early results. I received an early beta version of the smartphone app, which allowed me to drive the robot around using an on-screen joystick, make the lights blink in one of five preloaded patterns and cause it to emit one of five preloaded sounds.



I was also able to record any my movements and then play them back. Though I couldn't test the social features in my beta app, I saw some of them working during a briefing with Evollve, the company which makes Ozobot.



As I watched, CEO Nader Hamda demonstrated sending and receiving a message on his phone. When he received the message, his Evo began to do a little dance, complete with lights and sounds. Hamda said these messages could help cheer someone up or otherwise communicate your feelings. Right now, the Evo only has a small set of beeping sounds and light-up patterns, but he told us that users would be able to add their own.



Hamda also told us that the final version of the app, which will be available on iOS and Android around launch time in November, will add games and some cute features like the ability to ask your robot for advice. He gave the example of a teenager asking the Evo whether a girl would say yes to a promposal.



However, in my tests, the aspect of the Ozobot Evo that is most interesting is the paper code feature it shares with the Bit. The device comes with a set of markers in black, red, green and blue colors. When I drew a straight black line on a blank piece of white paper and put the Evo on top of it, it beeped and followed the path I set.

MORE: Meet Zenbo, a Family Robot Straight Out of the Jetsons



When you draw a series of three colored circles -- the company calls them OzoCodes -- in the robot's path, it reacts accordingly. For example, red/blue/red means to pause for three seconds before proceeding and green/black/red means to turn left. I found that the Evo recognized these patterns pretty well though, a couple of times it appeared to skip over them (perhaps it was how I drew them).



Ozobot.com has a ton of information, including a series of tutorial videos that show you how to program the robot. However, I wish it was easier to find a list of the Ozocodes. There was no documentation in the box and, in order to find a page with a list of the different color patterns and what they do, I had to use Google, because it wasn't easy to locate via the site's navigation. This list should come with the product.

Ozobot Evo



Evollve markets the Bit toward kids and has a section of its site that's filled with PDF lesson plans. Hamda said the company has already sold its education kits with the Bit to around 2,000 schools, who use to teach the students about programming. The Evo is also good for this purpose as it offers all the same capabilities and throws in an infrared sensor that keeps it from bumping into objects.



When I stuck my finger in front of the Evo while it was following a line on paper, the robot stopped and waited for me to withdraw the obstruction. However, when I was using the smartphone app to control the robot, it ran right into my finger.



In addition to controlling the robot with OzoCodes, users can program the bot using a web tool and scripting language called OzoBlockly. At OzoBlockly.com, users can write their programs by dragging some simple logic blocks around the screen and then can save these instructions to the cloud. To run the programs, you press the bottom of the robot against a white circle on the computer screen and the web tool passes the data to its sensors by flashing different colors. Hamda said, you'll also be able to code in JavaScript eventually.



The Ozobot Evo isn't meant for serious work, but it does provide a fun way to learn about programming concepts, if not about real-world coding. We look forward to seeing how its functionality evolves as the product moves closer to launching in November.
Not every smartphone exploit is a life-or-death matter of security. Some are just fun. Take, for example, what 17-year-old Jacob Ajit accomplished with just a little spare time and ingenuity.

By using a simple command and a proxy server, Ajit bypassed T-Mobiles internet-activation process and found a way to surf the net for free  until he graciously notified the company of the flaw, that is.

Ajit is a student at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Fairfax, Virginia. Like any high school student with a smartphone and some time to kill, he decided to fool around with the handset -- an unspecified model of iPhone, judging by Ajit's screenshots, with a prepaid SIM card -- and see if there was anything fun he could accomplish. Ajit found that although he did not have an internet data plan on his phone, it did offer a limited LTE connection for the exclusive purpose of accessing the phone's billing information.

MORE: Best Antivirus Software and Apps

If the phone could access billing information online, could it access other things, Ajit wondered? By clicking links in the billing menus, he eventually found his way out onto the T-Mobile website and realized that the phone could indeed access the internet, plan or no plan. He ran a Speedtest app and discovered that the phone had an active 20 Mbps connection.

After connecting to mitmproxy (which allows users to monitor traffic on a network) on his Mac, Ajit found that if Speedtest could connect to the Internet, T-Mobile must be whitelisting its own servers on phones without paid data plans. From there, he simply designed his own fake Speedtest folder and found that his phone treated it just like a legitimate Speedtest server. Instead of testing Internet speeds, though, Ajits Speedtest server took him to a Taylor Swift music video.

The experiment worked, but unless Ajit wanted to program fake Speedtest servers for every site on the Internet, it didnt have much practical use. Thats where Heroku, a proxy server program, came in handy. Ajit created his own Glype-based proxy system, which tricked T-Mobiles browser into thinking that every site he visited had its own Speedtest folder to go along with it. The whole Internet was at his fingertips.

Rather than use his finding for evil, however, Ajit turned the information over to T-Mobile, which quickly corrected the error. However, it's not necessarily a happy ending; T-Mobile has refused to speak to either Ajit or the press about its faux pas, making the company seem rather ungrateful for a very easy and rather important fix. In the world of mobile carriers, no good deed goes unpunished.
Acclaimed UK emcee Skepta was slated to launch his Australian tour tomorrow in Perth, but has now pulled out of all dates, citing unexpected circumstances. Skepta, whod sold out several dates of his Aussie tour, was recently awarded the Mercury Prize.

With deep disappointment, Skepta is not able to travel to Australia and New Zealand at this time for an unexpected and personal reason, a statement reads. His tour, planned to commence on Saturday 17 September 2016 is regrettably cancelled.

Full ticket refunds will be available on all shows from point of purchase. We are working in close conjunction with the Artists booking agency and management in order to organise a new run of shows in 2017.

You will receive an email from your local ticketing agency on how to obtain your refund. The award-winning grime star had completely sold out shows in Sydney, Brisbane, two nights in Melbourne, Auckland, and Perth shows within minutes.
AP: "A police unit set up to investigate crimes against children including rape, abuse and serious negligence failed to properly investigate thousands of cases, with some detectives doing no work at all, according to internal police memos that described "gross negligence," ''incompetence" and efforts to cover up the problem."





"In response to the recent news stories about the KCPDs Crimes Against Childrens Unit, our focus at the Jackson County Prosecutors Office will remain on protecting children and prosecuting those who have preyed on them.





"Our goal today is to protect the cases currently pending against the accused abusers of children. Investigations may be flawed or less than perfect, but that does not mean the defendant is not guilty of the crimes theyve been accused of doing. We will do everything possible to bring justice for the victim. "

More devastating news as of late involving accusations against local police and horrific implications for public safety.Take a look:The latest from the prosecutor's office just now . . .We'll have more on this one and its implications but right now we want to turn to our blog community for guidance and mounting questions about where blame should be assigned.Developing . . .
"Mike Shanin interviews Wes Westmoreland about the Command and General Staff College and the Todd Weiner Gallery's Art of War exhibition. Then Patrick Tuohey, Mary O'Halloran, Steve Rose & Jon Stephens discuss the InterContinental Hotel seeking blight status so it can raise its sales tax, Steve Rose's endorsement of three Kansas conservatives & the tightening poll numbers in the presidential race."

Theof Kansas City political discourse is back again with a stellar episode for our late night local newz junkies.Description . . .More than a few great political exchanges here . . . Tell us who you think won!!!Hint:You decide . . .
Here are KCK Mayor Mark Holland's controversial remarks: "Captain Melton's death tells us that tragedy and evil are always possible in this line of work. It reopens a raw hurt still festering within our community. Further, in the two months between our officers deaths, our nation has erupted with violence. We have seen the loss of innocent lives at the hands of police; and we have seen the ambush and murder of police who were actively protecting the public. Our nation is in uncertain times."

Update: Family Laments Controversy...

Apologies in politics are rare amid election season so the Mayor of Kansas City, Kansas forced to eat his words after weeks of criticism is noteworthy.Again, we talked about this topic a bit last night but it's worth revisiting . . .Remember thatHere's the take back:You decide:
SCATHING

The Hill: A new agenda for cities must come from cities

"One of the biggest problems in Kansas City, as with other metropolitan areas, is that the citys affairs have been so poorly managed for a very long time through regular rounds of bad public investments. Its not that Kansas City needs more moneyit receives plenty through taxesbut the city spends and invests that money poorly, chasing glitz while letting basic services languish. Throwing more federal dollars at failed initiatives wont retroactively salvage these projects."

Conservative think tank dude Patrick Tuohey writes aresponse to. . .Money line . . .You decide . . .
A small jungle with hyenes, rhinos, giraffes, gazelles, antilopes, apes and also sabre toothed tigers that lived 7 million years ago in the mountainous region of Kerasia on north Evia is expected to be discovered by a team of scientists headed by professor of Paleontology Georgios Theodorou.

The excavations, Theodorou said to ANA, are expected to resume in April 2017. "We have already found parts of Acerhorinus neleus, namely the scull and the lower jawbone of a rhino which are displayed at the Mammals Fossil Museum in Kerasia. It is a new species for science and the most important exhibit of the museum. It is a "holotype" the first and only specimen in the world which is used as the basis for the original description of a species. Our team will seek sculls, jawbones and bones from giraffes, gazelles, apes, birds and turtles not discovered yet and have a special importance for paleontology.

Theodorou's vision and dream is the establishment of a modern local museum in which will be in display the finds of the mammals' fossils as well as an exhibition on the petrified forest of Kerasia. An exhibition that will give the opportunity to the visitors to observe the spectacular changes of the geomorphology and enviroment that took place in the last 7 million years, when the Aegean Sea was not a sea but a land.

Read more here.

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The Bank of Greece has blocked funding towards Attica Bank and rejected the appointment of a new bank president. This dramatic development came after the home of the BoG Governor Yannis Stournaras was raided by corruption prosecutors, over his wifes alleged involvement in an advertising scandal.

Aside from blocking funding towards Attica Bank, the Bank of Greece rejected the appointment of Gerasimos Sapoutzoglou as president and only accepted the appointment of Panagiotis Roumeliotis as a non-executive officer in the banks board, rather that the position of managing director. The appointments of Anna Pouskouri and Konstantinos Makedos were also rejected.

According to a report in the Avgi newspaper, these developments constitute direct threats from the central banker against the entire financial system. This development, the newspaper claims, occurred in spite of Mr. Stournaras having agreed with the Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras that the investigation will not affect the relationship between the Bank of Greece and the government. The two have also reportedly arranged to meet after the PMs return from Bratislava.

Trading of bank shares temporarily suspended

The Athens Stock Exchange announced on Friday, shortly after opening, that trading on Attica Bank's stock has temporarily been suspended, until the administrative changes within the bank have concluded. At the time that the suspension was announced, the bank's shares were retreating by 3.45% for 0.056 euros, while 76,084 shares traded hands.

Read more here.

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Greece will be able to start issuing bonds and borrowing from the markets soon, possibly by next year, European Stability Mechanism Managing Director Klaus Regling said in an interview with the Slovakia's "Hospodarske noviny" newspaper published on Friday. According to Regling, economists currently questioning the sustainability of Greece's debt "have not really looked at the facts" and the very low debt repayments required of Greece under the arrangement with its creditors. He said he was confident that the country should have no problem, provided it continued to implement reforms.

"At the moment, there really is no burden. And there wont be one for a long time, because our loans to Greece already have an average maturity of around 30 years. There is also no risk that we will withdraw money like private investors might do if there were a new problem. So it is a safe investment. Other investors know that. They know that Greece has no debt service problem for at least the next 10 or 15 years and that is why I am very confident that Greece will be able to start issuing bonds  maybe next year. What is necessary, of course, is to continue with reforms. If they stay on course, they will get out of these current problems. The savings every year are so big, that they have a real possibility to grow out of their debt issues," he said.

Sticking with the reforms was paramount, he warned, in order for the country to get back on its feet, but ruled a fourth programme will not be needed if Greece implements adjustment policies.

"This third package was agreed about a year ago in a volume up to 86 billion euros and from todays perspective, not all of that will be needed. It runs until the middle of 2018 and if Greece implements all the reforms that are part of this programme, by mid-2018 Greece can again stand on its own feet and will be able to have market access and refinance itself. So I am quite confident this is sufficient," he said.

According to Regling, the need for an additional two programmes arose because implementation capacity had been weaker than in other countries, leading to delays. He also suggested that attempts by Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and his government to reverse some policies and reforms in the first half of 2015 had sent the country back into recession. "That has been now corrected and since August of last year, cooperation is again good and Greece is making progress," he added.

"I remember that at the end of 2014, as we were coming to the end of the second programme, there was a discussion about a possible third programme, but the amounts that people were talking about  if at all a programme was needed  was 10, maybe 20 billion euros. In the end we needed 86 billion. That shows how big the problem became after policies went in the wrong direction for six months," Regling pointed out.

"In the second quarter of 2016, there was small positive growth again. So I think now Greece is getting back to where it was in 2014," he added.

Read more here.

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As per Reserve Bank of India (RBI) data, 11,997 cases related to ATM, credit and debit cards as well as net banking frauds were reported by banks in 2015-16.

By Shashank Shekhar: Uttar Pradesh authorities have blown the lid off an ATM card syndicate that swiped lakhs of rupees from dozens of people with the help of bank officials and technology.

The Special Task Force says the gang misused a loophole in the phone banking system, bypassing all security norms.

CARD CLONING

According to officials, with their technique the cheats did not need to steal an ATM card and PIN, or block the mobile number of a person to siphon money from his bank account. In fact, banks would deliver original debit or credit cards into their hands while the clients remained oblivious.

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The incident comes against the backdrop of mounting cyber crimes in India as technology penetrates deeper into even the most intractable corners. As per Reserve Bank of India (RBI) data, 11,997 cases related to ATM, credit and debit cards as well as net banking frauds were reported by banks in 2015-16.

The modus operandi of the gang kicked off with the leak of client information from the bank. "We have discovered the role of bank officials, who used to take screenshots of bank account holders information," said UP STF's additional superintendent Triveni Singh. "It has name of account holder, address, mother's name, date of birth, account balance and mobile number. These details are sufficient for the gang to target anyone. Screenshots of potential targets were leaked by bank officials to gang members through WhatsApp."

One of the cheats then called up a bank call centre as a customer and choose the option of updating a debit card.

"Here is the flaw in the system. If the caller does not enter the ATM PIN despite being asked twice then, to forward the call to a customer care executive, the system will ask the person to enter a nine-digit reference number. The system accepts any random nine-digit number. As soon nine numbers are typed, the call gets connected to a customer care executive who asks for basic details, which have already been supplied by bank executives to the gang," Singh explained.

After providing the account holder's details, the imposter would request an upgrade for the debit card, which as per norms is done based on the balance in the account. The customer care executive then clears the application.

OBLIVIOUS CLIENTS

To get the new card and PIN, the gang followed the same process and a member would call up the bank's customer care department after a few days, complaining that he had not received his card.

"After asking for some personal information, the customer care executive provided details of the courier company assigned to deliver the card and PIN," the officer said. "The cheat then called up the delivery firm and expressed urgency to collect the card. As the imposter had all the details handy, the courier man delivered the card to the person at the desired location."

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The syndicate, which now had a new card and PIN, would go to any cash machine and change the linked mobile number so the customer would not get any alert messages on transactions "When a request to change mobile number is placed, the ATM machines ask for the old number, which the gang already has. So, a member inserts a number which does not exist.Now they make transactions without getting tracked," said the officer.

The gang's mastermind was arrested in UP's Kanpur city on Wednesday and was identified as Dhiraj Nigam. He earlier worked with a debit card selling company in Delhi and knew minute details of the banking system, police said. About half a dozen victims have come forward so far with losses amounting to Rs 20-24 lakh. More cases are expected to emerge. "We have also zeroed in on a call center executive who was passing the information to the gang and will be arrested soon," Singh said.

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ALSO READ:

Assam robbers who stole ATM mistaking it for passbook machine are not alone, here are some other geniuses

Delhi: This ATM skimmer gang robs only army personnel



--- ENDS ---
Megas Yeeros SA sales grew 20 pct in 2015 and were currently rising by 10 pct, Nikos Loustas, chief executive of the company told ANA

Megas Yeeros SA sales grew 20 pct in 2015 and were currently rising by 10 pct, Nikos Loustas, chief executive of the company told ANA on Wednesday.

He said that sales of its subsidiary in the United States -a US factory completed one year of operation recently- totaled 3.0 million euros last year and were expected to surpass 7.0 million in 2016. In total, sales of the two production units are expected to surpass 33 million euros this year.

In 2015, sales amounted to around 25 million euros from 21.2 million in 2014 and this year are expected to surpass 27 million euros, Loustas said, adding that EBITDA totaled 3.3 million euros in 2015. Exports in Europe totaled 2.5 million euros and are expected to surpass 4.5 million euros this year.

Megas Yeeros is the largest company in the sector and won the European National Champion award in 2015.

US activities -led by George Nikas one of the main shareholders- expands to a sales network in all States, along with Canada, Mexico, Panama and the emirates (Dubai and Qatar). Exports to Arab Gulf states are made from the US since the US factory is certified with Arab legislation on food.

Based on existing plans, the US company will double its sales each year -rising to 12-15 million euros in 2017.

Loustas said Megas Yeeros will seek to list in the Athens Stock Exchange and in the London Stock Exchange (parallel market) after 2020 when sales were expected to surpass 80 million euros. The company unsuccessfully tried to list its shares in the ASE in 2014 and in the London market in 2015, the first because of adverse market conditions ahead of general elections in Greece and the second because of the introduction of capital controls in the country.

The Greek factory employs 180 workers. Main shareholders are George Nikas and Nikos Loustas and the Arista and Demerkon funds.

Read more here.

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Cyprus and Israel share common values and their bilateral relations are today in their best chapter in their history, Israeli Minister of Defence Avigdor Lieberman has stressed

Cyprus and Israel share common values, are reliable friends and partners and their bilateral relations are today in their best chapter in their history, Israeli Minister of Defence Avigdor Lieberman has stressed.

Lieberman, who is paying Cyprus a visit, held a meeting on Friday with his Cypriot counterpart Christoforos Fokaides. In statements after the meeting, he said that the two states enjoy a very close cooperation in many areas, including politics, security, economy, tourism.

He also referred to the Cyprus issue, expressing the wish that the talks succeed and Cyprus is reunified.

On his part, Fokaides said that during the meeting they discussed the geopolitical developments in the wider region and how they influence both international and domestic security.

In addition, he said they reviewed the `remarkable steps that we have made in our relations during the last couple of years` but also set the framework for the next steps ahead.

This strategic relation that we have built does not only serve our national interests. It is also in line with the common interest of our wider region. It serves the common goal of Europe and the international community for security and stability in this fragile neighbourhood, Fokaides pointed out.

In his statements, the Israeli official said that Cyprus and Israel are `two very small democratic non Muslim states` in the region, that share the same values and `are very reliable partners`.

Reliable friends

`Despite all political problems, security problems in our region, we are two small democracies and very very reliable friends. I was happy to start this new chapter seven years ago in our bilateral relations and today maybe the best chapter in our history. We enjoy very close cooperation in many levels, including security, political cooperation, economic cooperation`, he underlined.

Referring to tourism, Lieberman said that more than 100,000 tourists from Israel visited Cyprus in the previous year and at least 40% more will visit the island until the end of this year.

As regards security issues, he expressed the view that the cooperation of the two countries on security level, constitutes a huge contribution to security of all moderate states in the region.

`I hope that we continue our successful dialogue, our fruitful cooperation and I wish you to accomplish your talks and I would be happy to see again unification in this beautiful island` he concluded.

In his statements, the Cypriot Minister pointed out that Lieberman`s visit to Cyprus `constitutes a clear manifestation that the reliable partnership that we have established is growing further`.

In particular, he said, in the priority pillar of security and defence, `it proves our common will and joint commitment to strengthen our coordination in addressing new asymmetric threats, in fighting terrorism, in promoting conditions of stability and regional cooperation in Eastern Mediterranean`.

Fokaides noted that this is not only important for those who live in this neighbourhood, it is important for Europe which has suffered from terrorist violence, it is important for the security of the whole world.

Energy prospects

Referring to the energy prospects in the region, he said that they should only work as a catalyst to solve long-standing problems and to promote mutually beneficial incentives for all neighbouring countries.

`To achieve these two things are of crucial importance: goodwill and predictability` he stressed.

During the talks, Fokaides said, `we had the opportunity to discuss all these, the geopolitical developments in the wider region and how they influence both international and our domestic security`.

In this respect, I underlined the initiatives undertaken by the Republic of Cyprus in the direction of promoting cooperation with other neighbouring countries like Egypt and Jordan` he said.

The Cypriot Defence Minister also said they reviewed the progress, as well as the future plans, in relation to all items included in the Bilateral Programme of Military Cooperation, including common exercises, training, exchange of information, cyber and search and rescue.

Fokaides briefed Lieberman on the latest developments on the Cyprus issue, and `our intensive efforts for a viable solution that will end the anachronism of division and occupation of a member state of EU`.

I reiterated our position that such a solution should of course not curtail the capacity of Cyprus as a sovereign independent state to continue playing a constructive role as a pillar of security  as a security provider  in this turbulent region, he underlined.

Concluding, Fokaides expressed his appreciation for Lieberman`s dedicated efforts and principled support to Cyprus and for the value that he personally attributes to the Cyprus  Israel relations.

Source: CNA

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Raid on home of central banker is a brutal attack against the independence of the Bank of Greece

Greek main opposition party has lashed out against the coalition government over the raid on the home of Yannis Stournaras, claiming that it is attempting to manipulate the course of justice.

According to New Democracy the investigation of the corruption prosecutors into the involvement of Lina Nikolopoulou, wife of Mr. Stournaras, in an advertising scandal related to KEELPNO is a brutal attack against the independence of the Bank of Greece. The statement also called the government to carry out the investigations related to Attica Bank promptly.

New Democracy also called the prosecutors to demonstrate the same zeal in the accusations regarding the recent television license tender and specifically the objections raised against Yannis Kalogritsas from the leader of the Independent Greeks Panos Kammenos.

Government chastises ND over its haste to politicized the investigation

The government responded to New Democracys statement by underlining that the Governor of the Bank of Greece is not a political figure, while his role is to maintain political neutrality. This neutrality, notes that government, has been agreed upon with the European supervisory institutions

As such, the government response continues, it is unacceptable for New Democracy to intervene in the course of Justice and the Bank of Greece. The main opposition partys haste to act as an advocate and instructor for the Governor harm both him and his role.

Finally, the government noted that the KEELPNO scandal will be fully investigated, whether New Democracy likes it or not.

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Negotiations between the Greek government and its creditors ended on Friday, after the three representatives of the Quartet departed from Athens. The first week of talks between the two sides failed to produce any concrete results, with sources close the Greek government underlining that the lenders objected the recent announcement by Greek PM Alexis Tsipras regarding the setting up of a special irreversible bank account for the voluntary disclosure of hidden income by taxpayers. The same source said the representative of the IMF remained in Athens to compile the Funds report on Greece.

Government sources expressed optimism that a deal could be reached by the start of next week on the staffing of the new Privatisation Fund, estimating that the approval of the 2.8 billion Euro tranche could come as soon as the September 29 Euro-Working Group (EWG), which would result in the disbursement of the money at the October 10 Eurogroup. Progress was made on the types of incentives provided for people willing to legalise hidden income, but there was disagreement on the way the special account would operate. The PMs announcement could not be realised, but we will offer additional incentives, besides the irresistible bank account, said a government source. According to information, most of the pending prior actions Greece has agreed to implement will be included in an omnibus bill to be introduced in Greek parliament in September.

Meanwhile. according to reports, also rejected the Greek governments proposals for the staffing of the board of the new large Public Assets management Fund. The creditors turned down the proposals by the Greek side for former SYRIZA MP Olga Chariotu and Thessaly University professor George Stamboulis to be included on the board questing their credentials for the positions. Agreement was reached on the inclusion of Bank of Greece executive George Tavlas, who got the green light by the creditors to participate on the board.

Read more here.

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The food and beverage sector grew 5.0 pct in value in the first seven months of 2016

The food and beverage sector in Greece grew 5.0 pct in value in the first seven months of 2016, during a difficult period, Valissarios Dotsis, chief executive of Enterprise Greece said addressing an event on Greek exporters.

Dotsis said that Greek products could excel in international markets and added that Enterprise Greece was trying to support enterprises to maintain existing and traditional markets where they have established activities and to open the doors to new markets through participation in trade fairs, B2B meetings and other action. He said that a total of 150 Greek enterprises had successful meetings with South Korean and Japanese companies in Greece, adding that some Greek enterprises have proceed with order execution. Enterprise Greece will organize a business mission to South Korea and Japan in November "because there is plenty of room to access these markets".

Enterprise Greece held a seminar on Thursday on participation on trade fairs, targets and preparation, as the responsible national agency to organize nationa participation in the large international food and beverage trade fair in the world, SIAL Paris 2016.

In the framework of the seminar, chef Dina Nikolaou, presented detailed action for the promotion of Greek food products in the French market.

Read more here.

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"We are from market economies but there need to be some ground rules" argued the Nobel Laureate

American economist and Nobel Laureate Paul Krugman is currently in Greece for the 4th Athens Democracy Forum organized under the auspices of the President of the Hellenic Republic Prokopis Pavlopoulos.

Neoliberalism can mean many things, but if it means letting markets reign without restrains is always the answer then Im also against neoliberalism Krugman told the Athens-Macedonia News Agency in an interview.

Krugman explained that he found the Greek Presidents speech to be interesting. A very interesting speech, there were a few themes in there that are dear to my own heart. It is good to see someone talking about the necessity of reining in. We are from market economies but there need to be some ground rules. I was happy to hear it.

Asked on the austerity imposed, the US economist explained that as I took it, it was more about the obsession with structural reform which can be a good thing but it is often taken to mean simply remove all restrictions, which is not what you want.

Finally, commenting on the upcoming US elections, Krugman argued that the New York Times model says 80 percent Hilary Clinton. I hope that is true. Well, no, Im not allowed to do endorsements, sorry, but God knows. The Nobel Laureate further elaborated that it is frightening that we have a risk of a very, very bad accident right now and I will not be relaxed until the day after.

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Photo Source: Wikimedia Commons Copyright: Arturo Di Modica License: CC-BY-SA
NASA had warned that an astronomical phenomenon, such as the one that took place last Friday in Cyprus, could happen

NASA had warned that an astronomical phenomenon, such as the one that took place last Friday in Cyprus, could happen, astrophysicist Chrysanthos Fakas has told SigmaLive on Friday.

Any Cypriots who had the chance to see this show will remember it forever. Information had varied, but all sources had been talking about large blue light accompanied by a humming, which after of 2-2.5 minutes ended in a large bang. These are all indications that a meteor entered and "traveled" in Earth's atmosphere. Once again our atmosphere proved reliable and a timeless guard, which using the laws of physics, always manages to defend against intruders, Fakas said.

Had the intruder been predicted?

Fakas mentioned that NASA had warned about the phenomenon, as the Perseids meteor shower was expected to be more intense this year, with approximately 200 meteorites falling an hour.

The reason for the intensified Perseids meteor shower, Fakas said, is due to the gravity of Jupiter, which brings the Swift-Tuttle comet and the Earth closer together, in turn making the Earths atmosphere absorbed more shooting stars.

Fakas added that this is connected to the meteorite, if we take into consideration that our planet was in the path of meteorites until a few days ago. The Earth had exited the Perseids shower on August 24, he mentioned.

The possible locations where the meteorite could have fallen, Fakas said, are two.

Fakas mentioned that the meteorite could have fallen in the sea just north of Morphou, or it dissolved in the Earths atmosphere.

The astrophysicist has said that the possibility that the meteorite reached the sea in very small, as that would have surely been visible by many.

He added that the Earths atmosphere is very dense, causing anything to enter to be eaten, therefore acting as the planets protection.

The meteorite had fallen last Friday and Cyprus is still awaiting photographs of the phenomenon to be released.

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Exiled Baloch leader Brahumdagh Bugti likely to get Indian citizenship. Bugti plans to travel around the world on Indian papers to campaign against Pakistan.

By India Today Web Desk: Recent reports suggest that exiled Baloch leader Brahumdagh Bugti is likely to get asylum in India. Long negotiations between the Baloch leader and Indian authorities are underway to obtain an Indian passport.

Sources said that Bugti will soon seek asylum in the Indian embassy of Geneva. The outlawed Baloch Republican Party (BPR) has convened a meeting in Geneva discuss the process.

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BRP sources has confirmed that the India in principle has agreed to grant citizenship to Bugti and his key aides. BRP representatives have said that just like India facilitated Dalai Lama, who uses an Indian passport to campaign around the world against China, the Balioch leader too can move freely across the globe and highlight the plight of Balochis.

BUGTI AND TWO AIDES TO GET INDIAN PASSPORTS

India reportedly will grant citizenship to Brahumdagh and his key lieutenants in Switzerland including his trusted aides Sher Muhammad Bugti and Azizullah Bugti.

Nearly 15,000 Balochis are seeking asylum in Afghanistan, while 2,000 others are spread across various European nations. A 16-member delegation from the BPR has called for a meeting in Geneva between September 18 and September 19 to decide on Brahumdagh Bugti's asylum in India.

Bugti fled his native Dera Bugtin Balochistan after his grandfather Akbar Bugti was assassinated in 2006. He has been living in Afghanistan and Switzerland ever since.

Also read:

India raises Balochistan at UNHRC Session in Geneva, hits out at Pakistan

Balochistan freedom movement gets new poster faces

US says does not support independence for Balochistan





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Alstom, the French maker of TGV trains, said on Tuesday it was in discussions with the government over its controversial plan to close a plant in eastern France and would take no action until the talks had ended.



Chief executive Henri Poupart-Lafarge had told staff earlier on Tuesday that he intended to press ahead with the planned closure of the Belfort site, which unleashed a political furore when announced last week.



"No decision will be taken before [the talks] are concluded," the company said in a statement.-Reuters
Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (Dewa) has awarded the contract for Independent Power Producer (IPP) Advisory Services for the 200MW Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) Plant to a consortium led by KPMG Lower Gulf (Financial), alongside Mott MacDonald (Technical) and Ashurt (Legal).



This is part of Dewas efforts to make significant and steady progress in increasing the percentage of renewable and clean energy in the energy mix, and support the Dubai Green Energy Strategy 2050, launched by HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, to make Dubai a global centre of clean energy and green economy, said a statement from Dewa.



The project lies within the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum solar park - the largest single-site solar project in the world with a planned capacity of 5,000MW by 2030, and a total investment of Dh50 billion ($13.6 billion).

When completed, the park will reduce over 6.5 million tonnes of carbon emissions annually.



We are determined to continue building and developing a greener economy, to achieve the UAE Vision 2021 to instil a sustainable environment in terms of air quality, conserving water resources, more reliance on clean energy, and implementing green development in Dubai," said Saeed Mohammed Al Tayer, managing director and CEO of Dewa..

We support the long-term Green Economy for Sustainable Development initiative and the Dubai Plan 2021 to establish Dubai as a smart and sustainable city, whose environmental elements are clean, healthy, and sustainable. We are inspired to achieve these ambitious goals of our wise leadership to diversify our energy mix to ensure energy security, and build a sustainable future, for generations to come," stated Al Tayer.

The 200MW CSP project is another milestone achievement that will put Dubai and the UAE at the forefront of the countries in the region in producing renewable and clean energy, he added.- TradeArabia News Service
Razak Khan, the leader of local Baloch community has assured that the Agra Baloch community will support the movement within the framework of Indian law.

By Siraj Qureshi: When PM Narendra Modi raised the issue of Balochistan in his 15th August speech, he was praised all over Agra for taking a firm stand against Pakistan's oppression of the Dalits, but until last week, there was a very small percentage of Agra residents, who were aware of the fact that there are hundreds of ethnic Balochs living right in the heart of Agra, in a locality aptly named "Billochpura".

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"AGRA BALOCH COMMUNITY WILL SUPPORT THE MOVEMENT"

However, this fact became known to all, when Mazdak Dilshad Khan, the leader of Free Balochistan movement contacted this minority community for support and Razak Khan, the leader of local Baloch community came forward and assured that the Agra Baloch community will support the movement within the framework of Indian law.

Also read:

India raises Balochistan at UNHRC Session in Geneva, hits out at Pakistan

Modi's Balochistan attack on Pakistan now up in the AIR



Talking to India Today, Razak Khan said that he will soon lead a delegation of local Balochs to areas of western UP that have ethnic Balochs living there, including Bagpat in Haryana among other cities. He said that they were waiting for the festival of Eid-ul-Adha to get over before making their move.

"MODI FOLLOWING POLICY OF QUID-PRO-QUO"

Social activist Vishal Sharma said that although some may term Modi's mention of Balochistan as interference in Pakistan's internal affairs, in fact, Modi was following a policy of "quid-pro-quo" with Pakistan by mentioning Balochistan in reply of Pakistan's mention of Kashmir. He said that there were two Billochpuras in Agra, one near the Taj Mahal and one closer to Agra Mental Asylum. In fact, he said, the Mental Asylum itself was often known by the name Billochpura, which is an etymological derivative of "Balochpura".

He said that although it was quite heartwarming to see scenes from Balochistan where Baloch leaders were praising India and shouting "Bharat mata ki jai", but if the local Baloch leaders are willing to support the separatist movement in Balochistan, they should be aware of the fact that India officially frowns upon groups causing unrest in other countries, which includes Pakistan and its occupied territories.

He said that opposition parties who are criticising Modi for mentioning Balochistan and blaming him for sparking in that Pakistan-occupied territory should also have the guts to criticise the separatist leaders living in India who openly voice pro-Pakistan statements.

Sharma said that this new turn in Modi's diplomacy towards Pakistan will have far-reaching results and could deal India a better hand in the global power game.

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Thousands of litres of beer will be pumped below the streets of Bruges from today, and solve the city's beer mobility issues.

By Shreya Goswami: What's a trip to Belgium without tasting some of the country's finest wheat beers?--This is just the thought that runs through the minds of all the tourists to the European nation. We love to visit Belgium, and make sure we try out all the different kinds of beers available.

In recent years, the country has even made its beers more easily available worldwide (you can try a Hoegaarden beer at any good restaurant or bar in India).

The beer pipeline is 3kms long, and stretches from Bruges to a bottling plant in the outskirts of the city. Picture courtesy: Twitter/MarkLabossiere1

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But while the rest of the world rests assured that Belgium will keep up with the demand for its famous brew, the Belgians themselves have some issues to consider.

Let us explain how the beer brewing industry works. The brewery is where the beer is made, but unless the brewery is a part of a cafe or bar, the beer is transported to a bottling factory. The product is transferred into barrels, cans, and bottles, and then shipped off to the rest of the world. The trip between the brewery and the bottling factory is made using trucks.

Why is that a problem you ask? One of the major Belgian cities, Bruges, is also a UNESCO heritage site. Its cobbled streets and old-world buildings are what make the city a must-visit place. And the brewery in Bruges, De Halve Maan, falls right in the middle of the city.

Also read: Make each mug of beer an experience with these chillin' accessories



Can you imagine the kind of damage huge trucks driving through those small streets can do? To make sure that their city remains intact, the people of Belgium decided to lay a pipeline beneath the medieval city to transport the brew from the brewery to the bottling factory!

Partly crowdfunded, the project cost around four million Euros. The finished pipeline, which will start functioning today, has the pumping capacity of 4000 litres an hour. This project has given the most elegant solution to the beer mobility and heritage preservation dilemna faced by the Belgians.

De Halve Maan is one of the oldest breweries in Belgium. Picture courtesy: Instagram/afearfulsymmetry

According to a Euronews report, Renaat Landuyt, the Mayor of Bruges, said: "It was so important to find that solution for our mobility problem, because if we want to work in a modern way, from time to time we need to let trucks enter the historical city, and that is what we don't like, because it is always a risk for the historical buildings and streets."

This might not be the first time an underground beer pipeline has been created to resolve transportation issues--the Griffin pipeline in London was the frist to achieve this feat in 2014. But, the reasons behind the construction of the Bruges pipeline do make it more special.

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It's the perfect balance of interests for the two parts of Belgium's national heritage, one of its oldest towns (Bruges), and its greatest export to the world (beer).

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Includes Three New Horizon Models Among Expanded Fleet for 2017



(TRAVPR.COM) USA - September 15th, 2016 - Le Boat,Europes largest self-drive boating company, is now accepting orders for its new 2017 brochure, which will be available at the end of September. Featuring 76 colorful pages, the brochure provides detailed descriptions of the companys 15 cruising areas in Europe, complete with maps, points of interest and suggested routes, as well as pictures, layouts and specs of the companys 40 boats.

A major highlight of the 2017 season is the introduction of three larger Horizon models, following the sell-out success of the original Horizon. Designed and built exclusively for Le Boat by Delphia Yachts, the new models are ideal for larger families and small groups and will be available for the first time in Ireland, Belgium, Brittany and Charente in France. Offering the largest top-deck of any boats their size, Horizon models boast bright, spacious saloons with excellent panoramic views. Another development is the opening of a new Le Boat base in the old-world city of Hindeloopen in the Netherlands, replacing the companys former base in Woudsend. Hindeloopen is a former fishing village, known for its many small, wooden bridges and wide range of water activities.

New Flotilla Dates

Le Boat also announced new dates for its popular Flotilla vacation in Italy. The perfect combination of independent and group boating, flotilla participants navigate the rivers, canals, lakes and lagoons of the Veneto region in their own boats, all while guided by an experienced skipper on the lead boat. Guests have the option to participate in group activities and tours, or go off on their own whenever the mood strikes them.

Our 2017 season is already shaping up to be one of our best, with bookings for the new Horizon models filling up fast, said Shannan Brennan, Le Boats head of Distribution and Marketing, U.S., Canada and Latin America. We are thrilled with the growing recognition of the self-drive boating options by U.S. and Canadian travellers going to Europe.

Early Booking Specials

Le Boat is also offering early booking discounts for 2017 when booked before November 30th. Customers will receive 12% off regular booking prices on all 1-4 star boats and 5% off the Vision, Mystique and Royal Mystique. Special, select dates are also available at 20% off.

As with all Le Boat vacations, no boating experience is necessary and a full orientation is given before setting off. For more information and to book a vacation with Le Boat, call toll-free 1-800-734-5491 or visit http://www.leboat.com.

###
By India Today Web Desk: Sunny Leone has made quite the journey from her debut in Mukesh Bhatt's Jism 2, to shutting up a journalist on national TV for slut-shaming her. She's had the curiosity of Bollywood and continues to churn out movies, with her latest release called Beimaan Love opposite Rajneesh Duggal.

Her director has quite openly pegged her as an actor as good as a Deepika Padukone or a Katrina Kaif. Katrina could serve as an example for her who went on to make a big Bollywood career for herself inspite of the language barrier. Sunny has seen some great success in glamorous songs post-Babydoll.

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Here are five of her most recent pictures which make us believe that she has all the makings of a big Bollywood star in the coming years:

--- ENDS ---
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, September 16

Aimed at strengthening the UAE-Punjab economic ties, industry body CII today signed a tripartite MoU with Invest Punjab and Indian Business and Professional Council (IBPC), Dubai, at the Dubai road show.

A high-level delegation led by Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal comprising ministers, political representatives, senior officers from the Punjab Government, CII members of Punjab and top business leaders took part in the road show. The delegation conducted an investors road show to showcase strengths and plethora of investment opportunities in Punjab.

"The objective of conducting this outreach seminar in Dubai is our endeavour to reach out to investors. We wish to offer a great platform to the investors who are exploring investment opportunities in India and to convince them as to why Punjab is the best investment destination in the country, said Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal.

Mohali will emerge as the economic hub of Punjab through the proposed 'Edu City', which shall have an international-level educational facilities right from the school to research level, he said.

To cater to the needs of potential investors from the UAE, CII has been asked by the Punjab Government to open an office in Dubai. The CII centre in Dubai will help in liaisoning between business communities of both the countries and facilitate investment in Punjab for which modalities will be finalised soon, said vice-chairman, CII Punjab State Council, Gurmeet Singh Bhatia.
Chandigarh, September 16

Gionee Mobiles has signed an MoU with the Haryana Government to set up its manufacturing unit in Faridabad. The firm will initially invest Rs 500 crore which, later on, would be increased to Rs 1,500 crore.

In the presence of Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar and Industries Minister Vipul Goel, the MoU was signed between Gionee Mobiles chairman Liu Lirong and HSIIDC. Goel said the mobile manufacturing hub would be set up over an area of 40-50 acres and provide employment to 28,000 persons in three years. TNS
For us, the Cauvery river is like a goddess?she is the lifeline of south Karnataka. We will not stand attacks on Kannadigas in Tamil Nadu in the name of our goddess," thunders Ravi Gowda, an activist of the rabble-rousing Karnataka Rakshana Vedike as he justifies the torching of TN-registered vehicles in the state. That's the kind of emotion the sharing of Cauvery waters evokes in Karnataka, a sentiment that the state's political parties have been milking for ages. Unfortunately, this time the ruling Congress government failed to gauge how aggrieved the public was, resulting in large-scale arson and violence even in cosmopolitan Bengaluru.

Police arrests protestors in Bengaluru

Rather than settling the dispute amicably or through a Cauvery Management Board, it has become a game of oneupmanship for Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. This year has been no different. For both states, 2016 has been a 'distress' year, as the Cauvery catchment area (Kodagu district in Karnataka) received 33 per cent below average rainfall. The combined water storage levels (for the KRS, Kabini, Harangi and Hemavathi dams) in the Cauvery basin by the end of August 2016 was 115 thousand million cubic feet (Tmc ft), as against a normal average of 216 Tmc ft. As per the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal award, Karnataka should release 192 Tmc ft of water in a normal rainfall year-10 Tmc ft in June, 34 Tmc ft in July, 50 Tmc ft in August, 40 Tmc ft in September and 22 Tmc ft in October. As Karnataka failed to release the required quantum of water in July and August, TN approached the Supreme Court seeking relief against the 'injustice'.

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With the court ruling in favour of TNadu (for the second time) and directing Karnataka to release 12,000 cusecs of water by September 20, there were widespread protests and violence in the state on September 12. Two people were killed in clashes with the police in Bengaluru, and over 150 TN registration vehicles have reportedly been vandalised all over Karnataka. Losses in the arson are said to run into crores of rupees. With the police largely absent in the initial stages, businesses owned by Tamilians were mercilessly targeted by rioters. Chief Minister Siddaramaiah was caught completely offguard even as his home minister, G. Parameshwara, maintained that the "situation was under control". By evening, and with large parts of Bengaluru burning, the CM finally reviewed the security situation and a curfew was imposed in 16 police station limits. It was too little, too late.

A day after the violence, Siddaramaiah played it safe by agreeing to release water to TN in accordance with the SC's orders. "We have always honoured the apex court's verdict. I request the people of the state, especially farmers, to cooperate and support us in this moment of crisis," he said in a glum televised address.

In TN, the ruling AIADMK has termed it as another victory for their leader 'Amma'. Tamil Nadu is unlikely to remain satisfied with the revised verdict of the SC and has already approached the Cauvery Supervisory Committee, which will meet next week to decide the quantum of water to be released.

On the ground, Karanataka's farmers point fingers at political leaders for failing them again. "I don't understand the logic behind approaching the courts in distress years. It will go by whatever the law says. This water dispute cannot be settled in a court of law. It has to happen across the table through meaningful negotiations. It is time leaders of the two states shed their egos and evolved a formula to share Cauvery water during distress years," says K.S. Puttannaiah, an independent legislator representing the Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha (a farmers' body) from Melukote, Mandya district, the epicentre of the Cauvery-related violence.

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Farmers like him squarely blame the politicians of Karnataka and TN for the present state of affairs, as a distress formula has evaded them for the last nine years. The Cauvery Tribunal announced its final decision on February 5, 2007, but so far, there has been no consensus on how water will be shared when the monsoon fails.

Distress years like these also provide an opportunity for Kannada leaders like Vatal Nagaraj and Karnataka Rakshana Vedike founder Narayana Gowda, to take the stage espousing their favourite causes, the Kannada language and farmers. Nagaraj is categorical: "Why should we share Cauvery water with Tamil Nadu when we don't even have adequate stock to meet the drinking needs of Karnataka? We will fight for Cauvery?she belongs to Karnataka."

The problem arises during distress years because of the lack of clarity in the order issued by the Tribunal: "In case the yield of Cauvery basin is less in a distress year, the allocated shares shall be proportionately reduced among the states of Kerala, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and the UT of Pondicherry." It is left to the discretion of the Cauvery Supervisory Committee to arrive at the quantum of water to be released to TN after assessing the ground realities in both the states.

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There has been no attempt by either Karnataka or TN to press for the constitution of the Cauvery Management Board, which could decide on the water flows in lean years based on a sharing formula like that adopted by other river management boards in the country. Instead, they have been contesting the finer points of the Tribunal award in the SC. At the same time, while Karnataka is unhappy with some of the decisions taken by the Supervisory Committee during distress years, TN is in their favour.

Karnataka does feel there is scope for a Cauvery Management Board, but only after all the states have accepted the final award of the tribunal. As CM Siddaramaiah says, "all of us want to put an end to this issue?but where is the National Water Policy? If there was such a policy in this country, I don't think we would have faced a problem of this magnitude."

Experts believe the only way forward is to assess ground realities in distress years. "Firstly, the two states have to accept the tribunal award. The issue of sharing water during distress years has to be addressed scientifically after assessing crop growth patterns, land usage, soil fertility, water usage during surplus and deficient rainfall years, and the Cauvery basin groundwater level. The supervisory committee should expedite the process and both states should pursue it vigorously instead of raising it during distress years," says Prof T. Hanumanthaiah, a hydro-geologist and irrigation expert who has worked on large watershed projects in south India.

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Neither state has accepted the final award of the tribunal and both have approached the SC. Karnataka's appeal is up for hearing on October 18. Siddaramaiah is clear about his state's approach, as the definition for 'distress formula' is not clear. "There are plenty of issues involved. We are looking at a long-term solution. On October 18, we will lay before the court the ground realities. When there is no definition for a distress formula, how can this issue ever be tackled?" he wonders.

It is a fact that none of the states are satisfied with the tribunal's award. The tribunal allocated 419 Tmc ft of the total 740 Tmc ft water available in the Cauvery basin to TN, 270 Tmc ft to Karnataka, 30 Tmc ft to Kerala and 7 Tmc ft to Puducherry. The balance 14 Tmc ft has been earmarked for environmental protection and outflow to the sea. However, Karnataka has staked claim to 312 Tmc ft of water and it will be interesting to see how the Supreme Court addresses the problem.

Follow the writer on Twitter @AravindShiv

--- ENDS ---
Akash Ghai

Tribune News Service

Mohali, September 14

The airport is all set to go international tomorrow evening with the maiden flight of Air India Express to Sharjah.

The long wait will end at 5.15 pm when Air India Express Boeing aircraft 737-800 arrives here from Sharjah at 5.15 pm. It will take off after an hour at 6.15 pm tomorrow. Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal, along with his delegation, comprising eight ministers and nine senior officers, will be present at the airport to head at least three ceremonies ahead of the take-off.

Follow Chandigarh Tribune on Facebook

Sukhbir will address a press conference at the arrival lounge of the airport. It will be followed by a cake-cutting ceremony before giving boarding passes to the passengers, who will be part of the historic journey. The Punjab Government delegation, led by Sukbir, will also be on the flight.

3.15-hour flight

The flight will take 3.15 hours to reach its destination, Sharjah, at 8 pm (Gulf time). The time difference between India and Sharjah is 1.30 hours. The flight departure from Sharjah to Chandigarh will be at 12.45 pm (local time) and it will arrive in Chandigarh at 5.15 pm.

Security being beefed up

To meet the international standards of security at the airport, the Punjab Police have approved an additional force of 200 personnel. A dedicated police station, having nearly 20 policemen, on the airport premises is already functional. Besides, the CISF, which has about 300 personnel to guard the premises, has also increased its strength. Mohali SSP Gurpreet Singh Bhullar, who was present at the airport to take stock of the arrangements for tomorrows programme, said the additional force of 200 personnel and five new vehicles would be deputed at the airport soon. The process is under way. The airport is being guarded by the CISF, well-equipped commandos of the Punjab Police and other staff with top-class coordination, said the SSP.

Immigration counters set up

To facilitate international passengers, the authorities have set up 12 immigration counters, six each at the arrival and departure arenas, at the airport.

MIA to hold car rally

The Mohali Industries Association (MIA) has planned to hold a car rally from its office to the airport to make the moment memorable.

A five-member delegation of the association will also travel on the first flight to be part of the historic moment.

186-seater aircraft packed to capacity

The Air India Express 186-seater aircraft (all economy class seats) will fly to capacity.

All seats have been booked for the flight on Thursday. The response to international flights is encouraging, said sources at the airport. Passengers will be served food boxes and tea/coffee free of cost on the flight.

Fly to Sharjah thrice a week

The Air India Express flights to Sharjah will be thrice a week -- Monday, Thursday and Saturday. Initially, the cost of the return ticket is Rs 9,500.

City-Dubai flights from September 26

IndiGo will start its operations from September 26 with its daily non-stop flights from Chandigarh to Dubai. The return fare is Rs 9,999.

Airport yet to get a name

Over a year has passed since the airport was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on September 11 last year, but it is yet to gets a name even though international flights are starting from Thursday. There were differences between Punjab, Chandigarh and Haryana over the final name of the airport. Though the Punjab Government has made up its mind to name the airport after Shaheed-e-Azam Bhagat Singh, the authorities concerned are yet to reach a consensus in this connection.
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, September 16

The dengue crisis in the tricity deepened further with 93 fresh cases bring confirmed today from Chandigarh, Mohali and Panchkula. With this, the total number of confirmed dengue cases in the tricity has gone up to 622.

As many as 81 cases have been reported from Mohali district alone, taking the total number to 446. This includes 14 fresh cases of dengue reported from Mohali city today. The total number of dengue cases from Mohali city is 200. Chandigarh, too, has reported a rise in the number of dengue cases with nine confirmed cases being reported today, taking the tally to 121. The total number of confirmed dengue cases diagnosed in the health centers located in Chandigarh has touched 562. Meanwhile, Panchkula today reported two fresh cases of dengue, taking the total number to 55.

So far, Chandigarh has reported four cases of chikungunya while Panchkula has reported five confirmed cases. The onus of controlling the spread of the disease lies not alone with the health and municipal authorities but residents also. This is no time to play the blame game. Rather, each one of us should try to check and eliminate the potential breeding ground of aedes aegypti mosquitoes, which is clean stagnant water, said a senior official of the UT Health Department.

He said residents should regularly check for sources of breeding grounds around them like coolers, containers, tyres and overhead water tanks.

Dr Ranjit Kaur Guru, Civil Surgeon, Mohali, said, Awareness is being created to check the spread of the disease, but public cooperation is a must to achieve good results. Our teams are visiting areas from where cases are being reported and conducting checks in houses of each affected locality. Besides, we are creating awareness about the disease in the morning assembly of various schools. Field activities are being conducted, including fogging and larvicidal activities.

Dr VK Bansal, Chief Medical Officer, Panchkula, said, It is important for residents to realise that 90 per cent of the preventive measures begin at home. They must ensure there is no stagnant water in or around their houses. They must wear fully covered clothes and apply mosquito repellent. These simple measures can prove life saving.
Our Correspondent

Mohali, September 16

Following an incident of weird haircuts given to students at a government school here, the DEO concerned visited the school to get first-hand information today.

Surinder Singh Sidhu, DEO ( Secondary), said he went to Government Middle School in Phase VII and found that haircuts had been given to students. He said he would submit a report in this regard to senior officials. He, however, declined to give details about his findings and the action, if any, he would recommend.

Boys of Classes VI to VIII were given shabby haircuts on September 14, causing humiliation to the victims. Some of the boys were compelled to get their heads tonsured on leaving school to avoid attracting attention with their patchy and shabby haircuts, given by two Class VIII students. The fathers of three of the affected students had expressed unhappiness over the incident and demanded the transfer of the teacher in charge of the school.
Saurabh Malik

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, September 16

Passing through Nayagaon may soon be a one-way affair. More than seven years after directions were issued for the expeditious removal of encroachments in Nayagaon abutting Chandigarh, the Punjab and Haryana High Court was today told that a one-way traffic proposal was being contemplated.

As the case came up for resumed hearing before the Bench of Justice Rajan Gupta, Punjab Local Bodies Director Parveen Kumar, UT Deputy Commissioner Ajit Balaji Joshi and Mohali Deputy Commissioner DS Mangat were present in the court in pursuance of the orders passed on the previous date of hearing.

Appearing before the Bench, the state counsel submitted that a joint meeting was held in the office of the UT Deputy Commissioner, wherein certain measures were discussed to ensure the removal of congestion and encroachments in Nayagaon. He added that several encroachments had already been removed. The counsel, on instructions from officers present in the court, further submitted that a proposal was being considered for introducing one-way traffic through the Nayagaon area, and added that proceedings of the meeting would be brought on record through an affidavit within 10 days.

Taking a note of the assertions, Justice Gupta granted exemption from personal appearance to officers present in the court. This court may, however, require them to be present again in case any clarification is required, Justice Gupta said.

Justice Gupta, on a previous date of hearing, had asserted that prima facie the order on the expeditious removal of encroachments had not been complied with.

The developments took place on a petition filed by advocate Mohinder Kumar alleging contempt of court following non-removal of encroachments. The state counsel, on the previous date of hearing, submitted that the entire encroachments had been removed from various places in Nayagaon as directed by the High Court  a claim contested by the counsel for the petitioner.
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, September 16

Think twice before flouting traffic norms as the UT traffic police are soon going to enforce stringent traffic rules by suspending the driving licences of violators for three months if they are caught for drunken driving, using the mobile while driving, speeding and overloading people in commercial vehicles.

The police have decided to follow the Supreme Court directions regarding seizing and suspending the driving licences of violators for these offences. Police sources said the driving licence would be suspended at the first instance of being challaned.

The Delhi and Haryana police have already implemented the directions of the apex court.

A senior police official said the modalities for implementing the directions were being worked out.

On being challaned for these offences, the traffic police will seize the driving licence of the motorist and send it to the authority that has issued the licence, which will then hand it over to the motorist after a particular time period, said the police official. The police official said the driving licences issued by other states would be sent through couriers to the issuing authorities.

While the traffic police will seize driving licences of morotists for speeding, drunken driving and using the mobile phone while driving, the authority to seize the driving licences for overloading commercial vehicles will wrest with the State Transport Authority (STA).

Police officials said the date from when the SC directions would be implemented was yet to be decided. The modalities are being worked out and before implementing the directions, an awareness campaign will be initiated in the city, said another police official.
Rajendra Pratap Gupta

On Independence Day, we heard the Prime Minister saying that his governments motto is to reform, perform and transform. On September 1, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace wrote, Indias economy has grown rapidly in recent years, but the countrys bureaucratic quality is widely perceived to be either stagnant or in decline.

It is time to relook at overhauling the bureaucracy, if we wish to realise Modis idea of India. We need speed, we need efficiency and we need effectiveness in our entire chain of command. This is the pre-requisite in realising the vision.

We have had a mixed bag of experience with the bureaucracy in implementing some of the key announcements from the Prime Minister, and the commitment on budget announcements. I present here an appraisal and certain suggestions to address some of the issues with our bureaucracy.

First, a look at the reasons why the bureaucracy fails:

nUnlike the politician, who has to go to the electorate every five years seeking votes as his appraisal for the performance, bureaucrats come with a seniority-based promotion and a defined retirement age, and hence they are least bothered about their performance reviews. Even these Annual Confidential Reports (ACRs) are often managed.

nMost of the bureaucrats approach is to control and govern, and not work as a team for development.

nThe majority of bureaucrats work for themselves. And then, there are egos, differences, grudges and dislikes for fellow bureaucrats. So there is never a team approach in whatever they do and this drags the performance of the government.

nOur bureaucracy is more procedure driven than outcome driven. Famously, one of the best performing ministers, Nitin Gadkari, said on May 9 that it took him a nine-month wait for an approval for an automated parking. This is when Gadkari is known for being really fast in getting things done with the bureaucracy. We can well imagine what other ministers must be facing.

An overhaul of the system is thus obviously due. Our biggest failures will be because of the inefficient and unaccountable bureaucracy.

As of now, we have an appraisal system that looks at ACRs, which only accounts for an individuals performance. If the performance and payment of the bureaucrat were based not just on his individual performance, but also the performance of his department/ministry and the overall performance of the government, then the bureaucrats would work as a team and give up the silo approach. So the first change required is a move from ACR to CPR (Comprehensive Performance Review), which includes:

nIndividual Performance Review (IPR): (50% weightage) Based on the yearly goals/deliverables assigned.

nDepartments Performance Review (DPR): (25% weightage) Overall departmental review be based on the goals set for the year for the department/ministry.

nGovernment Performance Review (GPR): (25% weightage) This is the overall performance rating of the government based on (a) fact/data-based self-assessment by the ministry/department (10% weightage) and (b) annual online survey taken by the citizens, for all departments/ministries at the Central level (15 % weightage).

Next, increments, variable pay/incentives and promotions of officials should be based on the CPR thus arrived at. The implementation can be in a phased manner, starting with the secretaries, then joint secretaries and then the director level.

A major change in bureaucracy would be moving to a performance-based contractual service. The biggest bane of bureaucracy is their job security. When politicians have to go every five years for their performance review and for renewing their term before the electorate, why should the top officials not undergo a review and renewal based on their performance?

All officers of the rank of joint secretary and above must be put on a five-year contract, based on their performance review, with a performance-based financial incentive. The salary structure should have a fixed pay and a variable component. If they fail to live up to the performance standards (IPR) of at least 80% for three years (out of a five-year term), they must be relieved of their service. Let us not forget that the best are first to be hired and last to be fired.

Even, Nirmal Kumar Mukarji, the last serving Indian Civil Service (ICS) officer who retired as Cabinet Secretary in 1980, while speaking as chief guest at the Indian Administrative Services 50th anniversary celebrations in 1997, had called for an end to the all-India tenured services.

A private secretary (PS) to a minister is considered an important bureaucrat, but he is a junior IAS officer (below the rank of joint secretary), and hence he plays safe while dealing with his seniors, as one day he might have to work under them. The loser in this case always is the minister. We thus need to consider that the PS to a minister should be a special-secretary-rank officer.

Modi rightly said recently, We cannot march through the 21st century with the administrative systems of the 19th century. It is noteworthy that we still have collectors in post-British India; this itself shows that the bureaucracy is still in the 19th century! A senior IAS wrote to me, Modi is ahead of time, and I said, Yes, Modi is definitely ahead of time, but unfortunately, the bureaucracy is still in the 19th century. When Modi was thinking of the Planning Commission, he made a profound statement, Sometimes it is better to build a new house than to repair the old one. May be the same approach is needed for the institution called bureaucracy. The transition is critical and we have no time to lose, and there should be a time-bound plan to implement it.





The writer is a public policy expert.
S Nihal Singh

MEN are ruled by toys, according to an old adage. In the modern age, men and women are ruled by slogans and PM Modi has been particularly inventive in coining slogans. Apart from acche din in the offing, a whole series of slogans have been propagated from clean India to home manufacture.

The problem is that catchy slogans can go wrong. And as warts in the Modi government come to the surface, his candid minister, Nitin Gadkari, has confessed that the good times slogan has become a bone stuck in the throat, perhaps provoked by a jibe of a comedian facing tax problems. And he further attempted to lighten the burden of the new rulers by suggesting that it was Mr Modis predecessor Manmohan Singh who had coined it.

Mr Modi simply purloined it, as he did so many things of the Independence movement and post-1947 Congress rule because the record of the BJP and its mentor, RSS, is rather patchy. It is presumably this realisation that made Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi to change his mind in contesting his declaration in court that RSS people were responsible for Mahatma Gandhis assassination. The Congress has belatedly realised that the more the past leading up to Independence is the focus of attention, the greater will be the public realisation of how thin the Sangh Parivar was on the ground in fighting for Indian Independence, if not opposed to it as a priority.

As it is, the appropriation of avatars for Mr Modis government is complete, with the Gandhi firmly established and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, the deputy prime minister in Congress governments, made the hero of the BJP. It is hardly surprising that Jawaharlal Nehru, the maker of modern democratic India, has been banished.

As the recent meal invitation to RSS foot soldiers at the official residence reveals, Mr Modi is still trying to find how to surmount the hurdles of winning over men steeped in medieval thinking and a concept of nationhood far removed from modern practices. If he refuses to comment on the depredations of so-called cow protection vigilantes, there is a public outcry. If he finally does, there is an outcry from the Parivar.

The basic problem is simple. A BJP government under its own steam is leading the country for the first time. The RSS is in a hurry to bring about the Ram rajya of its concept, but the problem of squaring up a Hindutva India with the amazing diversity of the country is a major hurdle.

Mr Modis job is to administer the country and that requires a less blinkered view than what he was taught in his long apprenticeship in the RSS. His unceasing travels around the world have opened his mind to an extent, as has his administering Gujarat for a decade and more.

The PM is still searching for a formula to pacify the RSS, a vital link to his partys ideology and fortunes in the foot soldiers it provides at election time, without scaring off the minorities, in particular Muslims. As some of the Kashmiri participants have suggested, the Valleys problems have become more difficult to resolve in the face of reports of lynching of men carrying cattle and even the humble biryani served on Haryana roadside is subject to police inspections and tests.

As this brief summing up would suggest, Mr Modi is still seeking answers as tensions bubble over. And judging by the plans of the BJP, he will be the lead campaigner in important state Assembly elections, with the inevitable result that instead of being a uniting figure, he will become a partisan combatant spewing vitriol at the Opposition parties. It was a wise convention that national leaders refrained from playing a key role in Assembly elections, except symbolically.

It is well recognised that Mr Modi is no respecter of norms and he is in a hurry to increase his partys strength in the Upper House. But the question that must be asked now is whether it is possible to govern India as a Hindu state, with all the minorities and dissenters consigned to the scrap heap.

Logic suggests that it is an impossible task and as evidence of the last two and a half years suggests, attempts to build a Hindutva India is leading to a million mutinies. The question is at what point Mr Modi and his party will see reason and step back from a headlong march towards Hindutva. The main party to be placated is the RSS, the mentor of Mr Modi and most of his ministers, although Mr Gadkari has often shown, one can be a pragmatist, despite RSS apprencticeship and even Mr Modi was able to keep the Parivar at a distance in administering Gujarat, a task he finds impossible to replicate at the Centre.

We are thus living in a time of experiments, with a ruling party sure of its ideology but seeking ways to a path that will lead it to Hindutva without destroying the countrys unity and integrity in the process. If such a magic wand has been discovered, it is a secret best known to the RSS.

Perhaps the unique nature of the task of changing the mores of the country and its thinking people honed in the Independence struggle and the many decades of Congress rule are proving more difficult than the RSS anticipated. The RSS, it must be noted, has not shied away from rebuking the Prime Minister on occasion and got him to correct his estimate of fake cow protection vigilantes from 70 to 80 per cent to a few in 24 hours.

Generally, however, the RSS does not publicly rock the Modi boat using go-betweens and direct contact to sort out problems. What is less clear is the stage at which its patience will be exhausted.
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, September 16

As Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia are away from the national Capital, the Delhi Congress today held dharnas in the all 70 assembly constituencies, observing a "Bhagora Diwas" in protest against the government's failure to tackle dengue and chikungunya cases.

The viral fevers have attained epidemic proportions in Delhi, said Ajay Maken, president of the DPCC.

Maken also made a charge-sheet against the AAP government, the BJP-ruled three MCDs and the Central government on their failure to tackle the diseases.

He visited various assembly constituencies to take part in the "Bhagoda Diwas" dharnas.

Addressing the Congress workers, he said in the history of Delhi, it was for the first time that viral fevers like chikungunya and dengue have attained epidemic proportions.

Holding both the AAP and BJP guilty for the current crises, DPCC president said it is extremely unfortunate that while Delhiites are facing an epidemic-like situation, the Chief Minister was campaigning in Punjab and later went away to Bangalore.

Similarly, Deputy CM Manish Sisodia is holidaying in Finland, the Lt. Governor was retreating in the United States and one of the mayors was out on a foreign jaunt.

He said another Minister had gone to Chattisgarh while the Health Minister, who was away in Goa, has returned.

Stressing the requirement for pre-monsoon preparedness, Maken flayed the AAP government and the BJP-ruled MCDs on their failure to form a working relationship which could have averted the present crises.

He said during the Congress rule, the Chief Minister used to convene meetings with other stake holders well in advance so that a roadmap could be prepared to tackle any unforeseen eventuality on account of monsoon rains. But no such meetings have taken place now.
The Supreme Court has rebuked both Karnataka and Tamil Nadu for their failure to control mob violence over the Cauvery dispute. Regardless of the cause, violent protests have no place in a civilised society. However, the court has gone a step further, crossing the line of reasonableness, saying none can agitate on the streets or call bandhs to protest against a court order. In a democracy there is a right to peaceful protest even against a court directive. It is when the agitators take the law into their own hands, block road/rail traffic, burn property or inconvenience citizens that they lose the right. The court has reminded the two states of its 2009 order which required governments to fix responsibility for large-scale destruction of public and private properties during agitations. This is a court order the least complied with.

Violence over the Cauvery dispute is not new. It happens every time there is below-average rain. Each time the court has intervened, it has ensured a temporary truce without providing a mutually acceptable lasting solution. Inter-state water disputes require a fair, statesmanlike approach. Courts only rule on the basis of available evidence and precedents. Water is a lifeline. Any genuine or perceived loss can easily raise emotions and trigger protests. To their credit, politicians in both Tamil Nadu and Karnataka have avoided inflaming passions. They have by and large played a constructive role. The Chief Ministers of both states have appealed for calm.

Tamil Nadu and Karnataka are not the only water-stressed states. Punjab and Haryana too are locked in a lingering court battle. Water scarcity is a national phenomenon and requires a holistic approach to conserve and replenish the fast-depleting water resources. The groundwater levels are falling rapidly. The impact of climate change on agriculture is all too evident and yet the traditional cropping pattern, supported by governmental policies, has remained unchanged. The rising urban and industrial demand for water has taken its toll. This warrants a relook at the existing growth model, which has to be reworked to make it environment friendly and sustainable. Otherwise water-related rioting may only become more frequent and more violent.
Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar has every right to feel annoyed over the way Punjab hijacked the celebrations for the first international flight from Chandigarh airport, and its nomenclature. But Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Badal couldnt care less. Thats because he is in the election mode and has little time for proprieties or patience for protocol. Punjab did push more desperately for the building of the new terminal; residents of the state would also be using it in greater numbers; and it is physically located in Mohali. All this would suggest Punjab may be justified in referring to it as Mohali International Airport. The fact, however, is that Haryana has an equal stake, while the Centre has the greater stake of 51 per cent. Khattar wants the facility to be called Chandigarh International Airport, which makes all sense for the simple reason that it is a commercial venture and the city lends it the greatest brand value. Also, were it not for Chandigarh, there would have been no airport, or even Mohali the city.

For the ruling alliance in Punjab, the airport is of particular importance because it is one of the few glitzy accomplishments it can boast of. It is, of course, of no less significance that the government would have financially gained way more from the airport than it had to spend on it. It was prompt to launch real estate projects in the vicinity of the terminal, and the efforts continue well into the election year.

Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal never tires of asserting how the SAD-BJP alliance is the anchor for Sikh-Hindu unity. But when it comes to territorial issues between Punjab and the BJP-ruled Haryana, neither state holds back any punches in being parochial. Leaders of all political hues have no qualms about stoking regional passions, if not religious. Agitation over the Jat reservation or the SYL canal would suggest both states should avoid raking up such matters. That, however, may be asking for too much in a democracy, where keeping the constituents duly enthralled is of foremost importance.
Supreme Court may have asked Karnataka to release Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu, but the ground reality is quite grim.

By Jugal R Purohit: While there is heartburn in Karnataka over releasing Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu after the latters arguments were endorsed by the Supreme Court, the situation on ground isnt as simple.

Farmers located close to the Mettur dam in Tamil Nadus Bhavani region, who rely on the waters of Cauvery river stated the actions, either from the government or driven by the apex court were too little and too late.

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GROUND REALITY

Standing next to his farm, Sarwana, a farmer said he usually cultivated paddy. I am now sowing groundnut, corn or dal as there is no surety over the availability of water. The loss of almost Rs 1 lakh per acre because we have changed the crop??, he claimed. He felt if this action had been taken a month back, damage could have been limited. Why does the SC need to step in for something which is obviously a genuine need everyone knows about??? he asked.

His neighbour, N Muthukumar, said till last season they would consume the rice they grew and sold the surplus. We will have to buy it this time,?? he said.

Has the SCs intervention not meant anything to them? It may be beneficial to Thanjavur or Trichy or Kancheepuram but not to us. Last season the rains were adequate so we did not need Cauvery waters. This time there has been little rain and Cauvery too isnt around??.

P Kumar Swamy was harvesting sugarcane crop. As he directed his labourers, he seemed worried.



Look how thin the stem is. Lack of adequate water has spoilt the crop. We will see how much water actually comes after the SC intervened. We also hope the rainfall (large parts of Tamil Nadu and some parts in Karnataka receive rainfall from the North East monsoon typically between October and December) is not deficit??.

Like others, A Shanmugham too has shifted to alternatives. His 4-acre farm today bears watermelon and turmeric because they consume less water.

There is loss of Rs 50,000 per acre in earnings. Both governments have to talk, not fight. Our people are living in each others states and it is time we fix the issue,?? he said.

WRITER IS A SENIOR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT WITH INDIA TODAY TV & TWEETS @JRPUR



--- ENDS ---
Sunit Dhawan

Tribune News Service

Rohtak, September 16

Yash Bhushan Jain, a local industrialist, was booked under Section 307, IPC (attempt to murder) in connection with a group clash here on August 31. Jain was subsequently arrested and remanded in police custody. When his wife and friends approached the police, a hefty bribe was allegedly sought.

Under pressure, we gave Rs 3 lakh to the SHO concerned and Rs 5 lakh to the gunman of a DSP. After that, Section 307 was changed to Section 324 (voluntarily causing hurt by dangerous weapons or means), following which the accused was released on bail, Jains friends, Jatin Batra and advocate Shekhar Sharma, said here today.

Batra and Sharma have filed a complaint at the CM Window in this regard. They have named the SHO as well as the DSP and his gunman in their complaint and maintained that they had CCTV footage of the clash and audio-recording of the telephonic conversations regarding seeking of the bribe.

Rohtak SSP Rakesh Arya said appropriate action would be taken in the matter as soon as the complainants approached him with evidence or when he received the complaint filed through the CM Window.

The complainants maintained that the CCTV footage of the clash which they had provided to the police investigators was sufficient to prove that Jain was not guilty of attempt to murder.

Still, they mounted pressure on us to extort money. In our complaint, we have sought strict action against the corrupt police officials , they stated.

The complainants said while the SHO sought a bribe of Rs 3 lakh himself, a gunman of the DSP sought the bribe of Rs 5 lakh in his (DSPs) name for getting Section 307, IPC, removed from the FIR.
Majid Jahangir

Tribune News Service

Srinagar, September 16

After an additional brigade, the Army has deployed two additional battalions  one in south and the other in north Kashmir  to restore peace in the unrest-hit Valley, where over 80 people have lost their lives and over 12,000 have been injured.

With these two battalions, a total of five additional battalions have been deployed in Kashmir to bring back normalcy in the Valley.

Code-named Operation Calm Down, the Army recently stepped in to bring back normalcy in Kashmir. Under the operation, the Army plans to reach out to people, provide a sense of security and chase out militants who are blamed for fanning the unrest. Out of the five additional battalions, four are operating in various districts of south Kashmir, which has been the epicentre of the unrest, and one is operating in north Kashmir.

The additional soldiers are engaged in area domination and round-the-clock patrolling in areas along with the Rashtriya Rifles battalions already deployed in south Kashmir for the counter-insurgency operation.

Sources said more Army personnel might be deployed in the hinterland as per the requirements on the ground to help in the restoration of peace.

Prior to the deployment of an additional brigade in south Kashmir last week, there already were three brigades (called sectors) based at Khanabal in Anantnag, Balpora in Shopian and Wazoor Qazigund in Kulgam.

The Army has begun making its presence felt in south Kashmir. It is conspicuous in most parts of south Kashmir, especially on the national highway. On Thursday residents in Tral, the native town of militant commander Burhan Wani whose killing triggered the unrest, were stunned to see the movement of Rashtriya Rifles soldiers in the area, sources said. A large contingent of troops emerged from a local Army camp and walked through several lanes and bylanes of the town not visited by them in a long time. This was apparently done to demonstrate their presence. There are similar reports from most parts of south Kashmir.
Tribune News Service

Srinagar, September 16

Governor NN Vohra today attended the inaugural function of the seven-day Naropa 2016 festival being held at the Hemis Monastery in Leh district.

An official statement said His Holiness Gyalwang Drukpa; Chering Dorjay, Minister for Cooperatives and Ladakh Affairs; Sonam Dawa, CEC, LAHDC, Leh; Thupstan Chhewang, Member of Parliament; Nawang Rigzin Jora, MLA, Leh; Prasanna Ramaswamy, Deputy Commissioner, Leh; Lt Gen PJS Pannu, GOC, 14 Corps, and Tsewang Thinles, president, Ladakh Buddhist Association, were among the dignitaries present on the occasion.

Addressing the gathering, the Governor welcomed the devotees at the Hemis Monastery to celebrate Kumbh Mela of the Himalayas. Nearly one lakh people attended the festival.

The Governor said the special event, which was held after 12 years as the Kumbh Mela of the Himalayas, commemorated the beginning of a rich tradition in Buddhist philosophy and hoped that the festival of teachings, dance and music would bring people together spiritually not only from different sects of Buddhism but also from other communities.

He said it also acquired special significance as it marked 1,000 years of the birth of saint Naropa. Highlighting the contributions of scholar-saint Naropa, the Governor said he was best known for having collated the Six Dharmas and from him several Buddhist traditions flourished throughout the country, Central Asia and beyond and his life and teaching marked the beginning of a new era of Buddhism that continued to thrive in all corners of the Himalayas and the world.

The Governor said such events played a crucial role in promoting cultural heritage and strengthening the bonds of compassion, love and understanding which was needed the most in todays strife-torn world. Paying his respect to His Holiness the Gyalwang Drukpa, head of the Buddhist Drukpa Lineage, and a world-renowned humanitarian, author, environmentalist and a champion of gender equality, the Governor lauded his 2,500-km expedition on cycle from Kathmandu to Leh along with over 200 Kung Fu nuns belonging to various nunneries of the Drukpa sect, spreading the message of womens empowerment, gender equality and climate change en route.

He hoped that such eco-friendly expeditions would inspire people to respect and enjoy nature in sync with it.

His Holiness Gyalwang Drukpa in his address urged everyone to work for the welfare of humanity and play a constructive role in conservation of environment. He emphasised the need to introduce curriculum which educated people about climate concerns and maintenance of ecological balance. Earlier, the Governor and His Holiness Gyalwang Drukpa inaugurated Naropas Six Ornaments and released books on Buddhist philosophy and devotional songs.
Ishfaq Tantry

Tribune News Service

Srinagar, September 16

Jammu and Kashmir Police detained Srinagar-based human rights activist Khurram Parvez from his house here on Thursday night.

Khurram, 39, was picked up from Sonawar area at midnight, his wife Sameena said. Khurram had returned from Delhi on Thursday evening. Late in the night, a police party from Kothibagh police station arrived and asked for Khurram. They told us that the SP concerned wanted to meet him and took him along, she said.

Khurram, who is chairperson of Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances, a group of 13 NGOs from 10 Asian countries that campaign on enforced disappearances, and also the programme coordinator of Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS), was detained on unspecified charges, his wife said.

On reaching the police station, he was told to stay there as there was no senior police official present there, Sameena said.

I met him on Friday morning. So far the family has not been told on what charges he has been detained, she said.

In a statement, JKCCS president Parvez Imroz said Khurram had been detained, without formal arrest or notification, in violation of his right to information and legal counsel. He has not been provided any written document, court order or the reason for his detention.

He said Khurram was detained at the New Delhi international airport for two hours on September 14 and was barred from travelling to Geneva.

Imroz said Khurram was scheduled to attend the UN Human Rights Council Session in Geneva to brief the UN bodies on the current situation in Kashmir.

It is a clear indication of reprisal; an attempt to intimidate and restrain Khurram and his human rights work. In doing so, it seeks to isolate him and silence the critical concerns of Kashmir from being heard by the international community, he said.
Arteev Sharma

Tribune News Service

Jammu, September 16

In a major setback to the National Conference, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) leader Kacho Ahmad Ali Khan was today elected the new Chairman and Chief Executive Councillor (CEC) of the Ladakh Autonomous Hill Development Council (LAHDC), Kargil, amidst the boycott of election by the National Conference and some Independent councillors.

The PDP leader, backed by the Congress and some Independent councillors, managed to get 16 votes in the 30-member council. The NC-supported 14 councillors boycotted the election terming it illegal and against the decision

of High Court.

The Congress-backed PDP councillor Kacho Ahmad Ali Khan has been elected the new CEC of the Kargil Council. He managed to secure the support of 16 councillors, while the NC and its supporting councillors boycotted the election, Deputy Commissioner, Kargil, Hassan Khan, who was the Election Authority, told The Tribune over phone from Kargil.

To a query, he rubbished the charges levelled by the NC-backed councillors, saying the election was conducted in compliance with the orders issued by the state government and the court.

On the directions of the court, we conducted the floor test on August 27. The results were declared on September 2. The NC-backed CEC Haji Hanifa Mohammad Jan got defeated in the floor test. He got 14 votes, while his opponent secured 15 votes with one vote declared invalid in the House of 30, Khan said, adding that nothing wrong has been done. We followed the government and the court directions.

On the other hand, former CEC Hanifa Mohammad Jan described the election as an illegal procedure and against the decision of High Court.

The Deputy Commissioner had conducted the secret floor test on the orders of the High Court but he was restrained from declaring the results. He was asked to send the ballot papers to the court. Later, the Deputy Commissioner, however, declared the results.

In a letter sent yesterday to the DC, who happens to be the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Council, Jan said the Executive Council of Kargil LAHDC had challenged all illegal SROs (sadr-e-riyasat ordinances) and circulars issued by the state government as well as district administration for illegal removal of an elected body of the council.

The LAHDC Kargil has 26 elected councillors and four nominated councillors with a total strength of 30 members. The outgoing CEC had the support of 16 councillors but it lost the majority after Independent councillor Kacho Ahmed Ali Khan, who is the former CEC of the council and now a PDP councillor, had withdrawn his support to the LAHDC, Kargil, on June 20.
Nonika Singh

Better be safe than sorrythis is exactly we tell, nay drill into, our girls in India all the time. Never ever do we goad them to fight back. Their safety is their problem and they cant let the guard down.

So, what happens when they don't follow the safety manual, diktats that the society has imposed on them? Clearly, they prove our worst fears right. The first half of Pink brings us face to face exactly with those deep-seated dreadful thoughts we harbour when our girls are out there in metros, all by themselves.

Put simply, it recounts the nightmarish experiences of three normal young girls who having thrown caution to winds have also taken on their molesters, one of whom has political links. How they are intimidated, how they have to pay the price for standing up for themselves...the first half races to unveil their sorry state and their dare.

Second half doesn't paint a rosy picture either. But as retired lawyer Deepak Sehgal (Amitabh Bachchan) decides to fight their case, things are put in a perspective. Women, single independent young girls in particular, are judged all the time.

We judge them on the basis of what they wear, what time they go out, whom they meet, where they party, how much they drink and what kind of jokes they crack...the list of their misdemeanours hence ammunition for their character assassination goes on ad nauseam.

All of this we brave and brace in a courtroom drama where holding the narrative is Amitabh Bachchan in a stellar act. An ageing heirless lawyer, who has otherwise called it quits, comes out of his retirement to fight for the brave, albeit hapless, girls. Restrained, emotive, piercing, even enigmatic, its a performance of many shades. With Piyush Mishra as his adversary lawyer, no doubt the courtroom drama is the highpoint but within the realm of credulity.

That Taapsee Pannu (as Minal) brings out the gumption and vulnerability of her character so remarkably well only adds to relatability. You empathise with her and can see in her all those young girls around you who just want a normal life of their own. Kirti Kulhari (Falak Ali) is equally good. And Andrea Tariang says it all when she utters---girls from the North-east are harassed more than an average girl. In fact, all through the film simple one-liners are packed with meaning. When Falaks beau, an older professor, says, I can either be truthful or liberal, the implication is clear. Being liberal is a grey zone, only orthodoxy can be pure and true.

Of course, in the courtroom the tone becomes sharper, even dramatic but not out of focus. Its a serious film and doesnt try to get funny, not even in the courtroom scenes. Finding a wondrous balance between striking home a relevant theme and telling a story equally well, its cinema that makes a difference.

Its riveting, its heart-rending and its incredibly touching. And its not just Big B the lawyer with mood swings who has his eyes moist as he picks up cudgels on the behalf of the fair sex, the film is as thoughtful as moving.

In fact, rare is a film that is so focused and so clear in what it cares to convey. Pink is an emphatic and unambiguous statement that not just bares the reality but also shows the way. If it unveils societal prejudices that most of us harbour, it also debunks them step by step. So what if she is a virgin, so what if she even demands money for sex, she and she alone has the right over her body. We have heard that before in court judgements but here as it leaps out with audiovisual force, it become a fait accompli, society will have to accept, sooner or later.

Way to go, must watch for all, especially for the boys and men so that they can for once hear it loud and clear that when a woman says no, she means no.

And just a reminderdont walk out when credits begin to roll. In the beginning the casting credits might unspool with stillness, in the final role call it encapsulates what in an average film would have been the opening sequence. Whats more in Big Bs baritone voice we also get to hear Tanveer Ghazi's poem that underlines what the film expects us to echo---more power and freedom to pink.
Washington, September 16

Asserting that Pakistans struggle with terrorism would not come to an end until it made a decisive shift in its policy of tolerance towards externally-focused groups, the US said there could be no peace in the region until these cross-border attacks were stopped.

The statements were made by US Special Representative for Pakistan and Afghanistan, Richard Olson, before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, adding that US President Barack Obamas administration had also conveyed this message to the Pakistani government, reports Dawn.

(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)

Olson also emphasised the need for a constructive relationship between Afghanistan and Pakistan which, he said, was essential for bringing peace and stability to the region.

Prior to his current position, he was the US ambassador in Islamabad.

Noting that relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan experienced a significant improvement when Afghan President Ashraf Ghani came to power, he said they peaked and troughed over the past year in part due to critical issues, including refugees, border management, and counter-terrorism.

He also underlined encouraging signs of progress in recent months between the two countries, stating that after a meeting in June between Afghan and Pakistani foreign policy chiefs, both sides agreed to coordinate at senior and tactical levels on border management issues.

Kabul also provided Islamabad with evidence that prompted the Pakistan military to conduct combing operations in a few key areas along the border in the wake of the deadly August 24 attack at the American University of Afghanistan in Kabul.

Olson said the Pakistani military had made progress in shutting down terrorist safe havens through Operation Zarb-i-Azb, adding that Islamabad had also worked with the United States to decimate core Al-Qaeda.

Meanwhile, the US diplomat told the Senate committee that Pakistans leaders had assured Washington of their intention to do so.

He also emphasised that the US would also continue to support the India-Afghanistan relationship, including through the revival of a US-India-Afghanistan trilateral talks. ANI
New Delhi, September 16

Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia on Friday denied he was holidaying in Finland, saying India needed to learn a "lot from their education system, the best in the world".

Referring by name to a television anchor, Sisodia demanded to know why the journalist and "his political bosses (are) spreading conspiracy against my efforts to improve education (system) in Delhi?" The Aam Aadmi Party leader said India's education was in a mess and he was making efforts to improve it in Delhi.

"Learning from across the world is not a sin. It's a sin to defame an educational tour as a 'holiday'," Sisodia tweeted.

"Studying Finland's schools is not a sin while working day and night to fix the problems of our schools in Delhi." Attaching pictures of his various meetings in Helsinki, he said: "If you have the guts, show these pictures and tell the country what I am doing in Finland for the last three days.

"I'm in Finland. We need to learn a lot from their education system, the best in the world." Sisodia said he had visited some dozen schools, colleges, skill centres and universities in the last three days.

He said he had met senior officials of the Education Ministry, educators, principals, teachers, students and others in Finland.

"We have worked hard in Delhi on improving education and now we're here to see what more needs to be done.

"To fix the problems of Delhi's education system, I'll do whatever is needed. Whatever trolls may say!" And Sisodia added: "I am not on holiday as (some) are trying to propagate." A long-time associate of AAP leader and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Sisodia presides over Delhi's education department and is widely credited with bringing about major changes in government schools.

'Bhagoda Divas'

The Congress protested the absence of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and his ministers from Delhi in the middle of a chikungunya and dengue outbreak in the city.

Calling it 'Bhagoda Divas', the Congress held protests in all 70 Assembly segments that the AAP had won in the national capital.

Delhi Congress President Ajay Maken criticised Kejriwal and Lt Governor Najeeb Jung for being out of the city instead of helping people at a time of crisis.

"It is extremely unfortunate that while Delhiites are facing an epidemic-like situation, the Chief Minister was campaigning in Punjab and later went to Bangalore. Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia is holidaying in Finland and even the Lt Governor was in the United States. One of the BJP mayors is also on a foreign jaunt," Maken said.

The party also issued what it called a "charge-sheet of failures criticising AAPs state government and BJPs municipal corporations to contain the outbreak.

Maken also demanded an all-party meeting over the outbreak.

Kejriwal recently underwent a throat surgery in Bengaluru for his persistent cough.  Agencies
By PTI: Bhubaneswar, Sep 16 (PTI) Holding Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik responsible for Mahanadi river water row with Chhattisgarh, Congress today said if the tripartite meet called by the Centre fails to resolve the issue, the state government must demand formation of a water dispute tribunal.

"If the exercise fails to reach an understanding to protect Odishas interest, the state government should ask the Centre to constitute Mahanadi Water Dispute Tribunal as per provisions of Inter-state Water Dispute Act, 1956," a white paper on Mahanadi water issue released by state Congress said.

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The white paper was released here by Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) President Prasad Harichandan a day before the tripartite meeting called by Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti in Delhi tomorrow.

Demanding immediate halt to construction of all dams, barrages and other projects on the upper reaches of the Mahanadi river by Chhattisgarh government, the white paper said river water was meant for the life and livelihood of the people of both states and not for business.

While hoping that the meeting would succeed in resolving the issue and safeguard Odishas interest, the PCC chief said Mahanadi river water issue should never be allowed to assume the shape of Cauvery water dispute.

Stating that a water sharing agreement should be signed with Chhattisgarh with emphasis on protecting the interest of Odisha, Harichandan said a river corporation or board should be formed for the development of Mahanadi and the river valley as per provisions of the constitution.

Hitting out at the BJD Government, the white paper alleged that after having failed to protect Odishas rights over Mahanadi river water, Naveen Patnaik regime was doing politics over the issue by launching agitation despite being in power.

Targeting the chief minister, the Congress white paper claimed that Patnaik, who is also in charge of water resources department, was fully responsible for Mahanadi river water controversy which is taking the shape of a major dispute.

"He (Patnaik) is accountable for negligence in protecting states interests," Harichandan said quoting the white paper.

Odisha Government should prepare a comprehensive document on all projects being constructed and the existing ones on the upstream of Mahanadi river before Hirakud dam, their impact on environment, he said, adding it should also include assessment of water requirements of both states at present and for next 100 years. PTI SKN PR ARK

--- ENDS ---
New Delhi, September 16

Chief Minister Nitish Kumar-led Bihar Government on Friday filed an appeal in the Supreme Court, challenging the Patna High Courts order granting bail to gangster-turned-politician Mohammad Shahabuddin.

Earlier, senior advocate Prashant Bhushan also filed a petition in the top court for the cancellation of the bail granted to Shahabuddin, who walked out of the Bhagalpur jail last week. Siwan native Chandrakeshwar Prasad has also filed a petition in the apex court seeking cancellation of Shahabuddins bail.

The court will hear Prasads plea on September 19.

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Shahabuddin, who had been in jail for more than 10 years in connection with multiple cases, was granted bail by the Patna High Court on September 7 in connection with the murder of a man who witnessed the killing of two brothers in Siwan.

Shahabuddins release from jail evoked widespread criticism of the grand alliance in the state with the opposition accusing the government of paving way for his release by not opposing the bail strongly in the court.

The BJP had on Thursday had demanded the immediate arrest of Shahabuddin and accused the former Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) parliamentarian of being the main conspirator in the murder of journalist Rajdeo Ranjan.

Senior BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi said sharpshooter Mohammad Kaif is one of the accused in the murder of Ranjan and is the close aide of Shahabuddin. He demanded that the former parliamentarian should be removed from the party.

However, Nitish Kumar has said that law will take its own course in Shahabuddin case. I only want to say that law will take its own course, Kumar said when asked about Shahabuddin.

When asked about comments of some RJD leaders, including that of Shahabuddin, questioning his leadership, he said he did not pay attention to those.

Meanwhile, RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav has said that the controversy over Shahabuddin getting bail has been created by the BJP and the media and the matter should be decided only by the courts.

Shahabuddin had also downplayed the NDAs demand of slapping the Crime Control Act against him and put the ball in Nitish Kumars court while asserting that if the process was initiated then it would be an administrative decision.

I will do what I have to do. I have always been the way I want. Whatever the government wants to do...can do...what can I comment on that? The grounds for initiating the CCA will be prepared and then imposed. According to me, there should not be any grounds for anything but the decision will be taken on what the government says, Shahabuddin told ANI.

Its not about ego or pride. I dont have any regrets because I think a lot before speaking. I might seem to be angry when I speak. If I cant smile then how can I pretend? I have always spoken the truth, he added. ANI
New Delhi, September 16

The Congress on Friday accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP of foul play and committing a fraud on democracy after Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu along with 42 Congress MLAs quit the party and joined the Peoples Party of Arunachal (PPA).

Modis and BJPs (Bharatiya Janata Party) foul play and fraud on democracy has come to a full circle in Arunachal Pradesh today, Congress spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala told reporters here.

The PPA is the illegitimate child of the BJPs diabolical design to decimate democracy, he alleged.

Mandate of the people of the border state of Arunachal has been robbed in broad daylight, Surjewala said.

The Congress leaders remarks came after Pema Khandu and 42 Congress MLAs defected to the PPA, an ally of the BJP in the state.

The gross and rampant misuse of money power finally delivered an immoral government of opportunists and turncoats, Surjewala alleged.

Sadly the architects of extinguishing and murdering the very spirit of democracy and constitutionalism, are Prime Minister (Narendra) Modi and (BJP national president) Amit Shah who rode to power on the promise of cooperative federalism, he said.

Having been thwarted twice, the BJP began by engineering defections, inducements, threats, etc., to subvert peoples mandate, the Congress leader said, adding they sacrificed a former Chief Minister and Governor, who enjoyed their patronage. The BJP government has annihilated the soul of constitutional supremacy, he added.

Surjewala also said the prodigal sons of Congress who have jumped ship have made massive ideological and political blunder and compromise.

They have also destroyed trust of people of the state, who voted for them as candidates of the Congress. Such politics, as we are seeing in Arunachal Pradesh, is neither tenable nor credible, the Congress leader added.

Addressing the media, Congress northeast in-charge C.P. Joshi said there was no space for the BJPs ideology in the northeast region, and it was trying to impose it there.

There is no space for the BJP ideology in northeast India, Joshi told reporters, adding that BJPs attempt to try and impose its ideology will have dangerous impact.

We have seen what has happened in Jammu and Kashmir. And we are concerned that similar situation will be seen in northeast India, Joshi said.

The Congress leader also said that despite the Supreme Courts judgment, the fraud that was committed today (Friday) is very ominous for democracy in India.  IANS
Simran Sodhi

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, September 16

India and Nepal today took the first step forward in bringing an old, historical relationship back to the level of trust it enjoyed some years ago. The visit of the newly appointed Nepalese PM Prachanda here has given both countries an opportunity to discuss many of the outstanding issues in the relationship.

It is reliably learnt that during the discussions between Prachanda and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the issue of Nepal making amendments in its constitution came up and India remains hopeful that Nepal will make these amendments in order to make the constitution an inclusive document. The newly promulgated Nepalese constitution, which India publicly said ignored the rights of the minorities like the Madhesis, has become the bone of contention between the two countries. People familiar with the developments said India remains optimistic that the new government of Nepal under Prachanda would do the needful.

Modi, in his statement to the media, after both leaders had held delegation level talks said, I am confident that under your wise leadership, Nepal will successfully implement the constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating the aspirations of all sections of your diverse society. The PM wished his Nepali counterpart success in this endeavour.

Another major point of discussion between the two countries was the speedy implementation of the ongoing hydro-power projects. Prachanda will visit the Nathpa Jhakri hydropower project in Himachal Pradesh tomorrow to underline the importance the two countries attach to co-operation in this field.

China is always the unspoken elephant in the room when it comes to Nepal. Later in the day, during a press briefing when Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar was asked about Chinas relationship with Nepal vis-a-vis India, he chose to play it diplomatic and merely pointed out to the unique relationship that India and Nepal share.

He added that while countries can share same geography, but not the same history and culture. However, there is no denying the fact that India today has to compete with a very aggressive China in what it considers its own backyard.
New Delhi, September 16

As Nepal undergoes a political transition, India on Friday pitched for implementing the countrys Constitution by accommodating aspirations of all sections and assured it of all possible support amid Chinas efforts to gain ground in the Himalayan nation.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi held an extensive and productive dialogue with his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal, popularly known as Prachanda, after which the two sides inked three pacts, including one on India extending $ 150 million for Nepals post-earthquake reconstruction.

It is Prachandas first visit to India after becoming Prime Minister for the second time. KP Sharma Oli quit the top post in July following fresh political turmoil due to protest by the Madheshi community against the new Constitution.

The two countries also decided to continue cooperation in areas of defence and security.

In a statement to media following the talks, Modi said India hoped Nepal would be successful in implementing the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating aspirations of all sections of its diverse society.

As immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability and economic prosperity (Shanti, Sthirta aur Samrudhi) of Nepal is our shared objective, the Prime Minister said in the presence of Prachanda.

On his part, the Nepalese Prime Minister said his country had nothing but goodwill for India and that destinies of both the countries are interlinked.

The Prime Minister said India had been privileged to be Nepals partner at every step of the countrys development journey and economic progress. Our friendship is time-tested and unique. We share our burden during difficult times, just as we celebrate each others achievements.

Modi said both sides had agreed to focus on close monitoring and time-bound completion of all development projects being implemented by India in Nepal. He said speedy and successful implementation of ongoing hydropower projects would be ensured.

Showering praise on Prachanda for his efforts to bring stability to Nepal, Modi said, I am confident that under your leadership Nepal will be successful in implementing the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating aspirations of all sections of the diverse society.

I conveyed to Prachanda that India stands ready and prepared to strengthen the development partnership with Nepal and we will do so as per priorities of people and Nepal government, Modi said.

About the political transformation in Nepal, Prachanda said his government was making sincere efforts in taking every section of society on board while implementing the provisions of the Constitution.

I shared with Modiji that promulgation of the Constitution last year by the popularly elected Constituent Assembly was a historic achievement for the people of Nepal. You are aware that my government has made serious efforts to bring everyone on board as we enter the phase of implementation of the Constitution, he said. PTI
Lucknow, September 16

Patch up in the Yadav family appeared to be on the cards with Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav announcing tonight that his disgruntled uncle Shivpal Yadav will be given back his portfolios and Gayatri Prajapati will be reinducted as Cabinet Minister, issues which had triggered an all-out war.

The announcements were made as per the compromise formula worked out by Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav who asserted that there can be no division in the party, till I am there.

The signs of patch up came after Mulayam held discussions with brother Shivpal and son Akhilesh.

Also read: Till I am around, no divide in party, says Mulayam

Portfolios will be given back to Mr. Shivpal Singh Yadav, Akhilesh tweeted about his uncle who was stripped of his key ministries only two days back by the Chief Minister, triggering all-out war during which Akhilesh was removed as partys state unit chief.

In another tweet, the Chief Minister said, Gayatri Prajapati will be inducted in the cabinet.

According to party insiders, Prajapati, who was sacked as Mines Minister, could be accommodated in the Cabinet but with a different portfolio.

Setting in motion the reconciliation process, Mulayam as well as Akhilesh earlier rejected Shivpals resignation from the Cabinet as well as the head of state party unit, to which he was appointed two days ago replacing Akhilesh.

Shivpal had resigned last night as a Minister and as state party unit head.

Netaji (Mulayam) has heard all of us. He will talk to some others if he wants and will take decision by tomorrow, Shivpal said today, indicating a truce was on the anvil.

Akhilesh said at a function that he has rejected the resignation of Shivpal and he will comply with whatever his father directs.

Netaji (Mulayam) will find a solution (to the current crisis) and everyone will accept it, he said.

Shivpal said he continues as UP party chief and is preparing for electoral challenge ahead but was evasive whether he will go back to the government.

That (resignation from party post) has not been accepted. When I have said that for me, Netajis hint is an order... Akhilesh has also said so. So, where is the feud anymore, he said.

At the same time, he indicated that he may not return to the government. Look, I have resigned only recently. I have got a bigger responsibility. Elections are near and I have to work for the polls. Who is bothered about portfolios? I had only one portfolio, so I said why only one. I will work for the party.

Earlier today morning, Mulayam also broke his silence over the five-day no-holds-barred family war, saying, There can be no division in the party, till I am there. The party supremo, who rushed here last evening from Delhi to douse the raging flames of feud, said, We have a big family, differences may occur...There is no fight between Shivpal Yadav and Akhilesh.

He has met Shivpal and Akhilesh separately and then together to ensure that the crisis was resolved.

Mulayam said Akhilesh will not defy his words and announced that Prajapati will be taken back in the UP Cabinet, considered a bone of contention between Shivpal and Akhilesh.

Akhilesh, on his part, said, I have two duties, as Chief Minister and as son. I will honour the word of the party president and I will do everything to make my father happy. At India TVs Chunav Manch conclave here, he said, I felt bad and you saw its effect. Im coming here after a discussion with Netaji (Mulayam). Samajwadi Party is a family and there are no differences in the party.

He rubbished reports that he is behind the feud in the family saying, Its a fight for the chair. If a good person asks for the Chief Ministers post, I am ready to give it up.

Its election time. We should all come together and work. There is no fight between Ramgopal Yadav, Akhilesh and Shivpal.

Making it clear that he wanted a say in the distribution of tickets in the upcoming state elections, Akhilesh said, I say I will give back everything but then I will say I should have the authority to distribute tickets. It will be my pariskha (test) in elections.

Apparently attacking SP Rajya Sabha member Amar Singh for fuelling feud in the family, he said, Everyone understands who is this outsider, even you know that. I have told Netaji that if an outsider comes between us, he will be thrown out. Netaji and I have decided that we will not let outsiders drive a wedge between us, he said.

Shivpal defended outsider Amar Singh while advising Akhilesh Yadav not to develop an ego and to gain more experience.

Anyone sitting on the chair of the Chief Minster should not develop an ego. I have seen many Chief Ministers. Akhilesh needs to gain experience. He should learn from Netaji (SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav) and me as well, Shivpal said.

Defending Amar Singh, he said, His name should not have been taken. He can never cause any harm to our family. No decision in the party is taken without Netajis consent. Need to tactfully deal with outsiders, if any, and one should apply his mind.

On Akhileshs demand for more say in ticket distribution, he said, Netaji will decide on ticket distribution. How elections are fought are perogative of the party chief. Netaji will allocate responsibilities.  PTI
New Delhi, September 16

Clad in black sweatpants, red jackets and white helmets, the hundreds of cyclists pedalling the treacherously steep, narrow mountain passes to India from Nepal could be mistaken for a Himalayan version of the Tour de France.

The similarity, however, ends there. This journey is longer and tougher, the prize has no financial value or global recognition and the participants are not professional cyclists but Buddhist nuns from India, Nepal, Bhutan and Tibet.

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Five hundred nuns from the Buddhist sect known as the Drukpa Order on Saturday complete a 4,000-km bicycle trek from Kathmandu to Leh to raise awareness about human trafficking in the remote region.

When we were doing relief work in Nepal after the earthquakes last year, we heard how girls from poor families were being sold because their parents could not afford to keep them anymore, 22-year-old nun Jigme Konchok Lhamo said.

We wanted to do something to change this attitude that girls are less than boys and that its okay to sell them, she said, adding that the bicycle trek shows women have power and strength like men.

The bicycle trek is nothing new for the Drukpa nuns. This is the fourth such journey they have made, meeting local people, government officials and religious leaders to spread messages of gender equality, peaceful co-existence and respect for the environment.

They also deliver food to the poor, help villagers get medical care and are dubbed the Kung Fu nuns due to their training in martial arts.

Led by the Gyalwang Drukpa, head of the Drukpa Order, the nuns raise eyebrows, especially among Buddhists for their unorthodox activities.

Traditionally Buddhist nuns are treated very differently from monks. They cook and clean and are not allowed to exercise. But his Holiness thought this was nonsense and decided to buck the trend, said Carrie Lee, president of Live to Love International, a charity which works with the Drukpa nuns to support marginalised Himalayan communities.

Over the last 12 years, the number of Drukpa nuns has grown to 500 from 30, said Lee, largely due to the progressive attitudes of the 53-year-old Gyalwang Drukpa, who was inspired by his mother to become an advocate for gender equality.

Experts say post-disaster trafficking has become common in South Asia as an increase in extreme events caused by global warming and earthquakes leave the poor more vulnerable.  Reuters
Islamabad, September 16

Pakistan, estimated to have the worlds fastest-growing nuclear stockpile, could be building a new uranium enrichment complex, according to commercial satellite imagery analysed by Western defence experts.

The construction of a new site, based in Kahuta, 30 km east of Islamabad, provides fresh evidence of how Pakistan is seeking to boost its atomic arsenal  a goal which is inconsistent with the principles of the Nuclear Suppliers Group the country is seeking to join, said the analysis.

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The analysis was conducted by IHS Janes Intelligence review using satellite images taken by Airbus Defence and Space on September 28, 2015 and then again on April 18, 2016.

Pakistan, which conducted its first nuclear tests in 1998, is believed to have around 120 nuclear weapons, more than India, Israel and North Korea. A 2015 report written by scholars at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Stimson Center said Pakistan could increase its stockpile by 20 warheads a year and have the worlds third largest in a decade.

The area of interest is 1.2 hectares and is located within the secure area of the Khan Research Laboratories (KRL), said the statement. Karl Dewey, a proliferation analyst at IHS Janes, added: It is sited within an established centrifuge facility, has strong security and shows some of the structural features of a possible new uranium enrichment facility. This makes it a strong candidate for a new centrifuge facility.

The structure of the site also bears strong resemblance to facilities built by nuclear fuel company URENCO, which also operates several nuclear plants in Europe, it said.

This may be more than coincidence as AQ Khan, considered to be the founder of Pakistans nuclear programme, worked at URENCO before stealing centrifuge designs and returning to Pakistan, said Charlie Cartwright, an imagery analyst for IHS Janes. Pakistan is currently seeking to join the 48-member Nuclear Suppliers Group that seeks to prevent nuclear proliferation by controlling the export of materials, equipment and technology that can be used to manufacture atomic weapons.

Pakistani physicist AH Nayyar said if the site was indeed a centrifuge, then primarily because they are being built inside KRL I would conclude they are for weapons, adding that the countrys nuclear power plants were supplied by imported uranium from China. He, however, cautioned it was not possible to be definitive about the sites purpose based on imagery alone.  AFP
After 59 years of marriage, a New Carolina couple died holding hands within nine hours of each other.

By India Today Web Desk: After 59 years of marriage, a New Carolina couple died the same way they made a commitment-for-life to each other - holding hands.

Don and Margaret Livengood died within nine hours of each other, in the hospital where they spent the few days of their lives.

Don, 84, had difficulty breathing and was receiving 70 liters of oxygen due to his his pulmonary fibrosis and bilateral pneumonia. Margaret, 80, meanwhile, was diagnosed with cancer with in May, along with several other serious health issues.

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Days before their death, their daughter drove them to the hospital and they were admitted together.

According to a report in the Salisbury Post, two were allowed to share a room together in Intensive Care, despite prohibitory hospital rules. Even hospital staff positioned their beds in way they could lie facing each other, and the tubes and tapes could not stop them from slipping their finger into each others hands.

They held hands almost continuously over the next few days, said the report.

Margaret passed on first, and 9 hours later, Don died too after saying air would be better in heaven.

Its the first time Ive seen doctors and nurses with tears in their eyes,?? said their son David Livengood.

A day before their death, the immensely spiritual couple met their priest and Don said, We could walk in together, just like were getting married again.??

Their daughter Pattie Livengood Beaver had been maintaining 'Personal Record Book' with the help of her parents. A day after death she found a message in it written by her father:

"To my family, I love you all!! Please dont mourn for me at my death. Have a service of praise and thanks. My faith and trust is in Jesus Christ, not only in my earthly life but throughout eternity. Love, Daddy. My greatest desire is that all of you believe in Jesus Christ as Gods Son and receive Jesus gift of forgiveness from sin (John 3:16)."

Pattie, David and their third son Wayne said their mother was the peacemaker in the family, who never got angry and never said a cross word and was a sweet.

They were never, ever separated in life,?? said Pattie said.

--- ENDS ---
New Delhi, September 16

The Supreme Court on Friday extended the parole of Sahara chief Subrata Roy till September 23, granted to him in May on humanitarian grounds after his mother passed away.

The parole continued later to enable him arrange money to refund his investors.

The decision to extend the relief was taken by a Bench headed by Chief Justice TS Thakur in-chamber as his parole was to end today.

The regular special Bench of CJI and Justices AR Dave and AK Sikri was not available.

Saharas lawyer Keshav Mohan said that a draft of Rs 353 crore has been deposited in the SEBI-Sahara account.

The Bench extended the relief to 68-year-old Roy till September 23, the next date of hearing.

The apex court on September 2 had asked the Sahara Group to come clean by disclosing its sources from where it had raised Rs 25,000 crore and paid its investors in cash, observing that it is difficult to digest as such a huge amount cannot fall from the heavens.

It had earlier extended Roys parole on August 3 till today with a condition that he has to deposit to Rs 300 crore with SEBI.

The apex court had granted parole to Roy on May 6 for four weeks on humanitarian ground following the death of his mother Chhabi Roy in Lucknow after prolonged illness.

Besides Roy, the court had also granted parole to a jailed Sahara director, Ashok Roy Choudhary.

It had said they were free to meet prospective buyers of properties and move within the country under police escort.

Roy has been lodged in Tihar jail since March 4, 2014, on the orders of the apex court in relation with a long running dispute with market regulator SEBI.  PTI
Geneva, September 16

India today lost its appeal at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in a dispute over solar power, failing to overturn a US complaint that New Delhi had discriminated against importers in the Indian solar power sector. The ruling came just days after India lodged a complaint against subsidies to the solar industry in eight US states.

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The judges upheld an earlier ruling that found India had broken WTO rules by asking solar power developers to use Indian-made cells and modules. This report is a clear victory for American solar manufacturers and workers and another step forward in the fight against climate change, US trade representative Michael Froman said.

The judges said India could not claim exemption on the plea that solar goods were in short supply or on the grounds of ensuring ecologically sustainable growth or combating climate change.

Under WTO rules, countries are not allowed to discriminate against imports and favour local producers.

We strongly support the rapid deployment of solar energy worldwide, including in India. But local content requirements are not only contrary to WTO rules, but actually undermine our efforts to promote clean energy by requiring the use of more expensive and less efficient equipment, Froman said.  PTI
Washington, September 16

Pakistans support base in the US is fast dwindling as American lawmakers are unhappy over Islamabads reluctance to take action against some terror groups and its continuance of providing safe havens to them, a group of Indian parliamentarians has said.

One thing came across very clearly from across the spectrum that they (Americans) are very unhappy with Pakistan.

They are very concerned about...Americans lives at stake (in Afghanistan), the kind of promises that have been broken, Baijayant Jay Panda of the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) told reporters.

Panda, who is leading a seven-member delegation of Parliamentarians as part of Indo-US Forum of Parliamentarians (IUFP) organised by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industries (FICCI), said the sense he and his colleagues got from these meetings that the support for Pakistan in the US has come down considerably in the last few years.

As a result, Panda said there was greater sensitivity and recognition of Indias constructive and developmental role in Afghanistan.

This was not the case earlier. We can see that some of the (American) attitude (towards Indias role in Afghanistan) is changing. They are much happier today about continuing and increasing Indias investment in Afghanistan. The Americans used to be sensitive to Pakistan pressure until a year or two ago, he said.

The world knows the cross border terrorism that we face....this is connected to the Kashmir issue. In some of the discussions the issue came up about the violence of Kashmir and the concern, but it was the overall general concern about the rise of violence which we ourselves are concerned. We are tackling it, he said.

Other members of the delegation are Anurag Thakur and Harish Chandra Meena from the BJP, Neeraj Shekhar from Samajwadi Party, Jayadev Galla from Telugu Desam Party and Rajeev Satav and Sushmita Dev from Indian National Congress.

During their stay here, the Indian MPs have had a series of meetings with top American lawmakers, officials of Obama Administration and top think-tanks.

Bilateral relationship between India and the US has transformed completely in the last decade and a half, he said, adding that it has bipartisan support in both the countries.  PTI
Chennai, September 16

The dawn-to-dusk Tamil Nadu bandh on Friday on the Cauvery issue called by associations of farmers and traders passed off peacefully even as opposition leaders, including DMK's M K Stalin and Kanimozhi, courted arrest while leading protest demonstrations in various parts of the state.

The day was marked by a slew of agitations, attempts to block trains and roads, by the bandh supporters, including opposition parties, across the state. Attempts to stop the Vaigai Express at Dindigul station was foiled by the police.

Meanwhile, a youth who had set himself on fire over the Cauvery issue on Thursday, succumbed to injuries, police said.

The activist belonging to Naam Tamizhar Katchi had suffered over 90 per cent burns and died on Friday morning.

We were giving him all possible treatment. However, he suffered a cardiac arrest and despite our best efforts, he could not be revived, a senior hospital official told PTI.

Several establishments remained shut in Coimbatore, Tirupur and Nilgiri districts, affecting normal life, in response to the bandh call.

About 20,000 small and medium scale units in and around the city and over 30,000 garment factories in the textile hub of Tirupur also extended support to the bandh and downed shutters, according to reports.

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In Chennai, DMK treasurer Stalin led a rally from Rajarathinam stadium to Egmore railway station. He then squatted in front of the railway terminal along with hundreds of party workers after his attempt to stage a rail roko was foiled by police, who detained him along with his protesters.

DMK Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi, who staged a road roko on arterial Anna Salai along with DMK supporters, was later detained by police in a marriage hall. She has sought convening of an all-party meeting over the Cauvery issue.

In Coimbatore, senior leaders of various political parties, including DMK and MDMK and farmers associations were arrested while trying to stage rail roko near railway stations and road blockade.

The bandh did not affect functioning of state and central government offices in Tamil Nadu, which remained open.

While state transport corporation-run buses besides trains are operating as usual, some auto-rickshaws, taxis and commercial freight operators stayed off the roads.

Farmers leader PR Pandian also took part in protests with farmers of various organisations.

VCK Chief Thol Thirumavalavan, who staged a rail roko with his supporters by blocking a North India-bound express train, was detained by police near Basin Bridge here.

Meanwhile, DMDK leaders and party workers led by party leader Premalatha Vijaykanth went on a fast at the party headquarters in the state capital. They held aloft placards and raised slogans against the Centre and Tamil Nadu and Karnataka governments.

They condemned the violence against Tamils in Karnataka and sought protection for them.

In Tiruchirapalli, MDMK supremo Vaiko courted arrest while trying to block trains.

Large-scale demonstrations were on in Thanjavur and the Cauvery delta region by VCK, MDMK and Left parties.

The bandh has been called to protest the violence targeting Tamils in Karnataka and also to seek the Cauvery water for the state.

Barring the ruling AIADMK, its allies and trade unions affiliated to it, all other opposition parties, including DMK, Tamil Nadu Congress, DMDK, MDMK, Left parties and PMK, are supporting the bandh.

Thousands of police personnel, including armed reserve, have been deployed in Tamil Nadu, and in Chennai alone over 15,000 police personnel are on duty.

Protection is being provided for Karnataka-related business establishments, schools, institutions and areas where Kannada speaking people live, including Krishnagiri district. PTI
Sanjay Bumbroo

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, September 15

Concerned over the lackadaisical approach of the state government towards the victims of the 1984 riots, five woman members of the 1984 Sikh Katleaam Peerat Welfare Society have threatened to immolate themselves in front of the Chief Ministers residence in Chandigarh on September 17.

President of the women wing of the society Gurdeep Kaur said for the past 32 years, they had been hoping that the SAD government, which claims to be a Panthic government and well-wisher of the Sikh community, would fulfil their demands on preferential basis. However, it had failed to do, she rued.

Lashing out the SAD government led by Parkash Singh Badal, Gurdeep said SAD had been ruling for 20 years since the 1984 riots, but it failed to resolve their problems. I consider him (Prakash Singh Badal) as our father, but he has used us for his personal benefits during elections. Badal Sahib was not sensitive towards the problems of the five widows who had lost their family members in the 1984 riots.

Gurpreet added that SAD had been using the 1984 victims for their political ambitions during the past 32 years, but this time it would not be so as they had decided to urge the members of the society to vote as per their conscience. She also criticised the police action yesterday, when the police lathicharged the peaceful protesters.

She said they had been on indefinite fast for the last four days, but no minister or senior officer of the government had cared to seek information about the problems being faced by them. Gurdeep added that she along with five widows would march towards Chandigarh and thousands of victims of the 1984 Sikh riots would also join them from across the state. If the Punjab Police tried to stop them on their way, they will take the extreme step on the site and the government will be responsible for any untoward incident thereafter, she warned.
Mahesh Sharma

Chhapar (Ludhiana), Sept 16

Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal said here today that the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the new outfits would fall apart in the run-up to the Assembly elections.

Addressing a gathering at the Chhapar Mela, the Chief Minister said the rival parties were falsely blaming the state government for the suicides by indebted farmers. He blamed successive Congress governments for the plight of the farmers.

The CM added that the Akali-BJP government had supplied free power to the farmers at a cost of Rs 50,000 crore in the past almost 10 years.

He also accused the Congress of nurturing terrorism. Punjab could have become the number one state in the country, had the Congress not promoted terror, Badal said.

Amargarh (Sangrur): Addressing a sangat darshan programme at Amargarh (Sangrur) Badal termed leaders of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) as chhurlibaj (tricksters), saying they had been misleading farmers and farm labourers by making promises that they could not fulfil.

He said AAP had promised in its manifesto that it would waive loans of farmers and farm labourers, but that could only be done by the Centre, not by the state government.

He lashed out at the Congress saying its leaders had also been misleading farmers on the issue of waiving loans. He said Punjab farmers were under heavy debt only because of the wrong policies of the successive Congress governments at the Centre and in the state. He said he allowed free power for tubewells, but after coming to power in 2002 Amarinder Singh imposed power bills on farmers.

He said former BJP MP Navjot Singh Sidhu had formed the fourth front, but how could a man who betrayed his parent party (BJP) be faithful to the people. (With inputs from Sushil Goyal in Sangrur)
Archit Watts

Tribune News Service

Lambi, September 16

A day after two factions of the SAD clashed over the distribution of cheques among poor families for the repair of houses at Sehna Khera village in Lambi, some SAD leaders of this VVIP constituency had to face embarrassment in villages here today due to factionalism.

Irate SAD activists even threatened their senior leaders and officers, who had gone to Bhitiwala village today, of boycotting the CMs Sangat Darshan programme, likely to be held this month.

They publicly said that when the works announced during the previous sangat darshan programme had not been started, there was no fun in holding another sangat darshan in the village, said an eyewitness.

He added, The CM had announced the construction of concrete streets in the village, but the work is yet to begin.

Senior SAD leaders of Lambi, including SADs Muktsar district coordinator Avtar Singh Vanwala, CMs OSD Balkaran Singh and Chairman, Punjab State Cooperative Agricultural Development Bank, Tejinder Singh Middukhera and some senior officers of the district administration had visited the village to prepare the list of public demands that would be put up before the CM during his sangat darshan programme.

Kulwant Singh, Additional Deputy Commissioner (Development), Muktsar, assured the protesters that the pending works would be started soon. I have asked the Executive Engineer of Punjab Mandi Board to start the construction of concrete streets. It will begin in 2-3 days, said Kulwant Singh over the phone.

Sources said that the village had three groups of SAD leaders. One is headed by Sarpanch Chhota Singh, who has nominal say in day-to-day works. The second group is led by Jagtar Singh, Bohad Singh and Nachattar Singh and the third group is led by Harshpinder Singh. Sources termed todays unpleasant scene a result of groupism.

In Mehna village too, some SAD activists exhibited groupism by shouting at each other. Punnu Ram, Sarpanch, Mehna village, said, Some people had an argument in the presence of senior leaders, but nothing major happened.
Jitendra K Shrivastava

Tribune News Service

Patna, September 16

Bihar will observe a three-day state holiday on the occasion of the 350th birth anniversary of the tenth Sikh guru  Guru Gobind Singh  early next year in Patna.

The state would observe three days government holiday on January, 3, 4 and 5 next year during weeklong celebrations.

Chief Minister Nitish Kumar announced three days state holiday during Prakashotsava on Thursday, while he also launched a website www.350thprakashparv.bih.nic.in to facilitate tourists visiting Patna on the occasion.

The weeklong birth anniversary celebration would begin on December 30 this year. At least ten lakh devotees from different corners of the world are expected to arrive in Patna.

Three tents would be erected covering an area of 60.91 acres in Gandhi Maidan. Two other tents would also be erected at Gurdawara Kangan Ghat and near Bypass to accommodate the devotees.

The state tourism department would be the nodal agency of the grand celebration.
A Madrasa teacher and a tempo driver were stripped and beaten with rods by a mob in outer Delhi on the suspicion of cow slaughter.

By Mail Today Bureau: In an assault that is reminiscent of the lynching of Mohammad Akhlaq in Dadri last year, a Madrasa teacher and a tempo driver were stripped and beaten with rods by a mob in outer Delhi on Wednesday night on the suspicion of cow slaughter.

The victims - Mardasa teacher Hafiz Abdul Khalid (25) and tempo driver Ali Hassan - said they were going to dispose of the waste of animals sacrificed on Bakrid along with a student when they were attacked by some vigilantes in Kanjhawala area. They said they had taken prior permission for the sacrifice from the local police station. The two men have sustained multiple injuries and are currently recuperating in a private hospital.

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According the police, Khalid and the student were going to dispose the carcass in a tempo along with the driver, when they were waylaid near Mundka Road at Rani Khera village by two vehicles. Madrasa's general secretary Qari Mohamma Lukman said in his complaint, "The unidentified men were armed with rod and sticks and opened attack on them. They were pulled out of the car and were brutally beaten up."



'GAU RAKSHAKS' STRIKE AGAIN

The student somehow managed to flee from the spot as he was not wearing scullcap and did not had beard. "He came to me and told me about the incident following which I informed the police," Lukman said.

Some passersby found the two men lying nude with a pool of blood around their bodies. The victims were taken to Sanjay Gandhi Hospital from where they have been shifted to a private hospital in outer Delhi.

The families of the victims said they were being targeted. "The attackers blamed them for slaughtering a cow. But the fact is that we were granted permissions by the DCP, ACP and SHO for sacrificing animals," said a local.

A police officer said that they have registered a case under section 308 (attempt to commit culpable homicide) of the Indian Penal Code. Sources also claimed that police have rounded up four persons for the assault, but no arrests were confirmed till the evening.

Lukman alleged that in the past too, some locals have tried to disrupt madrasa's activities. "We suspect involvement of few locals and have informed police about them. We guess that one of them called up 'gau rakshaks', who followed the madrasa people and attacked them at an isolated place," Lukman added.

The Madrasa is located in Block-Z of Aman Vihar, which is about four kilometres away from the scene of attack. Around 25 children from UP, Bihar and West Bengal study in the Madrasa. Lukman said some people in their locality always try to trouble them during the sacrifice of the animal.

ALSO READ:

We were gangraped for 'eating beef', says Mewat woman



--- ENDS ---

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Gurvinder Singh

Tribune News Service

Chhapar, September 16

The Aam Aadmi Partys Chief Ministerial candidate will be a Punjabi, AAP state affairs incharge Sanjay Singh said here today during the party conference at the Chhapar Mela.

Sanjay Singh said rumours were being spread by rival parties that Punjab would be ruled by Delhi. I reiterate that the CM as well as the other ministers will be from Punjab, he said.

He said the Badals and Agriculture Minister Tota Singh were responsible for the plight of farmers. Sanjay blamed Tota Singh for the sale of spurious fertilisers to farmers which led to a heavy damage to the cotton crop.

Meanwhile, AAP Member of Parliament Bhagwant Mann was not present at the conference. When asked about Manns absence, Sanjay said he might be busy with some personal work.

Jarnail Singh, state party co-incharge, said Sutlej-Yamuna Link canal was an inter-state issue which the Centre should resolve.

AAP leader HS Phoolka, who didnt attend the partys Baghapurana rally on Sunday, made an appearance today and addressed the conference.
Vikramdeep Johal

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, September 16

A 110-kg bronze bust of Maharaja Ranjit Singh will be unveiled tomorrow in the French coastal town of St Tropez  the birthplace of his trusted warrior, General Jean-Francois Allard.

The high-profile ceremony in Allard Square will feature Indias Ambassador to France Mohan Kumar, St Tropez Mayor Jean-Pierre Tuveri, Deputy Mayor Henri-Prevost Allard (the Generals great grandson) and other dignitaries. However, conspicuous by his absence will be Prabhat Rai, the Madhya Pradesh-based sculptor who made the bust. Reason: Neither the Punjab Government nor the French authorities extended an invite to him.

Talking to The Tribune on the phone, Rai said, I was expecting a call to be part of this historic event. But it never came.

Rai (53) is feeling left out particularly because he is the state governments go-to guy for sculptures. The statues displayed at the Baba Banda Singh Bahadur memorial in Chappar Chiri (Mohali) have been crafted by Prabhat Murti Kala Kendra, the nationally renowned centre he has been running in Gwalior for the past two decades. He is also working on the statues of Valmiki and BR Ambedkar, to be installed at the Ram Tirath temple in Amritsar and the Punjab Vidhan Sabha, respectively.

The Ranjit Singh bust  nearly 3 ft tall  was handed over by Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal to Henri-Prevost Allard during the latters Chandigarh visit in July. Rais works are spread across the country, but this is the first time that one of his creations will be displayed abroad.

Since this was a special assignment, I charged just Rs 75,000. Usually, its in the range of Rs 3-5 lakh for such busts, Rai said.

When contacted, NPS Randhawa, Director, Tourism and Cultural Affairs, Punjab, said, Why should the government send an invite to Rai? He didnt gift the sculpture to us. We bought it from him and gifted it to France.
Ruchika M Khanna

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, September 15

Congress MLA from Banga Tarlochan Singh Soondh would never have imagined how his worn-out pair of shoes would become a prized possession.

A Canada-based news channel has reportedly offered Soondh Rs 50,000 if he could bring on their show the shoe allegedly hurled by him towards the Akali Dal legislators in the Vidhan Sabha yesterday, or even the one he did not throw.

The MLA went back to the Vidhan Sabha this afternoon to get his shoes. Secretary Shashi Lakhanpal Mishra reportedly told him that the shoe that landed near Revenue Minister Bikram Majithia was a case property, while the other one was not in their possession.

Parliamentary Affairs Minister Madan Mohan Mittal said while the shoe that fell near Majithia had been handed over to the Speakers office, he had no clue where the other one was.

Soondh had claimed that he had hurled the shoe at Akali MLA Virsa Singh Valtoha over an alleged caste slur.

The Treasury benches came to know about the shoe-hurler only when they noticed that Soondh had only one shoe on. Sensing trouble, Soondh hid it near his seat. It was taken into possession by the watch and ward staff and its whereabouts are not known.

Soondh admitted receiving calls from Canada-based news organisations. They want to highlight the incident as a strong protest not just against Majithia, but against the government, he said.

Soondh walked barefoot yesterday and asked the CLP office secretary to arrange a pair of shoes. They did buy me a new pair, but it was uncomfortable. Now I am looking for a new pair in the Sector 19 market, he said.
Mohali: Even as the first international flight took off for Sharjah from the airport here on Thursday, Union Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju said no decision had been taken on the name of the airport. It will take more time, he added.

We are getting a number of requests regarding naming it after Shaheed-e-Azam Bhagat Singh but are yet to reach a consensus, said Raju, who was at the airport to mark the taking off of the maiden international flight.

On the dispute between Punjab and Haryana over naming the airport, the Minister tried to downplay the issue and indicated that it might be named after Chandigarh, the joint capital.

People should not have any problem in calling it the Chandigarh international airport, as it was being called presently as well, Raju said.

Interestingly, while the display board put up by the Punjab Government mentions the name as Mohali International Airport, that of the Airports Authority of India has Chandigarh International Airport Limited written on it.

A year has passed since the international airport was inaugurated by Prine Minister Narendra Modi on September 11, 2015, but the issue of giving it a name that both Punjab and Haryana agree to remains unresolved.  TNS

Why Mohali, asks Haryana

Khattar objects to Punjabs use of name in advts

Chandigarh: The tug-of-war between Punjab and Haryana over the name of the international airport got revived on Thursday with Haryana taking strong exception to the Punjab Governments use of the prefix Mohali.

In a strongly-worded letter to Punjab counterpart Parkash Singh Badal, Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar said he was deeply anguished by the Punjab Governments advertisements terming Chandigarh International Airport as Mohali International Airport.

Calling it factually incorrect, Khattar reminded Badal that the final nomenclature of the airport was yet to be decided by the Central government.

The airport is managed by the Chandigarh International Airport Limited. The Airports Authority of India has 51 per cent equity partnership and the two state governments 24.5 per cent each, Khattar asserted.

While Punjab wants the airport to be named as Shaheed Bhagat Singh International Airport, Mohali, Haryana has no objection to it being named after the martyr, though it is vehemently opposed to use of the word Mohali. It wants Chandigarh retained in the nomenclature.  TNS
Peshawar, September 16

At least 25 people, including five children, were killed and 30 others injured when a suicide bomber shouting 'Allahu Akbar' blew himself up inside a mosque packed with worshippers for Friday prayers in Mohmand Agency in Pakistan's restive northwest tribal region.

The attacker blew himself when the prayers were in progress at the mosque in the Anbar tehsil of the agency bordering Afghanistan.

"A suicide bomber was in the mosque. He shouted 'Allahu Akbar' and blew himself up," Assistant Political Agent Naveed Akbar told reporters. He said that Friday prayers were being offered around 2 PM when the powerful blast took place.

At least 25 people, including five children, were killed in the attack and 30 others injured, Pakistani media reported, citing officials.

"Many people were gathered inside the mosque when a suicide bomber blew himself up," an eyewitness said.

Rescue teams and police rushed to the spot. The bodies and the injured are being shifted to local hospitals for medical treatment.

Injured were also taken to hospitals in Bajaur Agency, Charsadda and Peshawar for treatment. There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban routinely targets courts, schools and mosques.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has expressed his grief over the loss of lives in the blast. The cowardly attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the government's resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country, he said in a statement.

The attack came on a day when Sharif vowed to continue the war against militancy and terrorism till elimination of the last terrorist.

During a meeting with Army chief General Raheel Sharif today, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy.

The army had launched operation Zarb-e-Azb in June 2014 to flush out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas. Most of the myriad militant groups that stage attacks inside Pakistan seek to overthrow the government to establish an Islamic theocracy and impose a stricter interpretation of the religion.  PTI
BEIJING/UNITED NATIONS, September 16

China is in a bind over what to do about North Korea's stepped-up nuclear and missile tests, even though it is annoyed with its ally and has started talks with other UN Security Council members on a new sanctions resolution against Pyongyang.

China shares a long land border with North Korea and is seen as the only country with real power to bring about change in the isolated and belligerent nation. However, Beijing fears strengthening sanctions could lead to collapse in North Korea, and it also believes the United States and its ally South Korea share responsibility for growing tensions in the region.

China is in a difficult spot, a source close to the Chinese leadership said when asked if Beijing's attitude to North Korea had changed after its fifth nuclear test last week.

"On the one hand, China is resolutely opposed to North Korea developing nuclear weapons for fear of triggering a nuclear arms race in the region," the source said, referring to Japan and South Korea following in Pyongyang's footsteps.

"On the other hand, North Korea is a big headache but regime change is not an option," the source added. "Collapse of the regime would lead to chaos in (China's) northeast" bordering North Korea, the source said, requesting anonymity.

The prospect of a unified Korea under Seoul's leadership and the possibility of US troops on China's borders has long been a nightmare for Beijing.

A collapse in North Korea, sending a flood of refugees across the relatively porous border into China's rustbelt northeastern provinces, would also be deeply destabilising to Beijing's rule as well as a huge economic cost.

Those concerns have been around for years, but now Beijing is also deeply angered by a US decision to deploy an advanced anti-missile system in South Korea, the Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (THAAD) system. It has said its own security has been compromised and that North Korea's recent belligerence is due to this deployment.

Publicly, China has not linked the THAAD deployment with whether it will support sanctions on North Korea. It condemned the latest missile and nuclear tests but said sanctions alone could not resolve the issue and has called for a resumption of talks with Pyongyang.

Beijing has also said it will work within the United Nations to formulate a necessary response to its fifth nuclear test.

"We're in negotiations on a UN Security Council resolution," Samantha Power, the US ambassador to the United Nations, said on Thursday.

Diplomats said the talks were at an early stage and negotiations were likely to be long and tough.

Irritation and consensus

One senior UN diplomat said Beijing made displeasure with Pyongyang clear at an earlier Security Council meeting called after North Korea tested three medium-range missiles at an embarrassing time  when US President Barack Obama and other world leaders were gathered for the G20 summit in the eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou this month.

"The tone of the whole discussion was much more consensual, it didn't feel like there was two camps fighting arguing with each other," said the diplomat. "Of course, there continue to be different views about sanctions."

The United States has called on Beijing to use its influence to get North Korea to give up its nuclear ambitions, and to close sanctions "loopholes", since the existing ones had done little to prevent Pyongyang from pursuing its nuclear and missile programmes.

Shen Wenhui, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told influential state-run newspaper the Global Times last week that crippling sanctions would cause a "humanitarian disaster" in North Korea.

"In putting sanctions on North Korea, the international community must reduce the effect on ordinary people to the greatest possible extent," Shen wrote.

China's concerns also include the larger issue of what Beijing sees as Washington's attempts to surround it under Obama's strategic "rebalance" towards Asia. Besides THAAD, the dispute in the South China Sea, cybersecurity and human rights have marred ties between the world's two biggest economies.

Chinese officials also say that the West over-estimates its influence with North Korea.

"I think any idea to ask North Korea to abandon nuclear weapons would fail, and any idea to ask South Korea to abandon THAAD would fail," said Shen Dingli, a professor at Shanghai's elite Fudan University and director of the school's Programme on Arms Control and Regional Security.

North Korea is useful for China, Shen added. "China needs North Korea to counter the United States." In Seoul, some are already accepting that China will not do much more to punish North Korea.

"The sanctions that North Korea will not be able to endure will be all blocked by China even without being asked by the North," Chun Yung-woo, a former South Korean national security adviser, said. "So the North is hiding behind that and comfortably pursuing the nuclear programme."  Reuters
Washington, September 16

Republican Donald Trump finally acknowledged on Friday that President Barack Obama was born in the United States but accused Hillary Clinton of starting the so-called birther controversy, a charge that independent fact-checking sites have said is false.

President Barack Obama was born in the United States, said Trump, reversing himself on a controversy about Obama's birth that the Republican helped launch but that had become a distraction to his White House bid.

Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again, he said at an event at a new hotel he owns in downtown Washington.

Without offering evidence, Trump accused Democratic rival Clinton of starting the birther allegations during her 2008 presidential primary campaign.

Trump had for years promoted the birther movement against Obama, who was born in Hawaii to an American mother and a Kenyan father. In 2012, The New York businessman wrote on Twitter that the president's birth certificate was a fraud. The birther conspiracies, which cast doubt over whether Obama is legally able to be president, incense black Americans whose votes Trump has been trying to court.

Clinton demanded Trump apologise to the president for having helped spread the birther idea and said Trump had tried to delegitimise our first black president. His campaign was founded on this outrageous lie. There is no erasing it in history, Clinton said in an address to the Black Womens Association in Washington. The issue has not been a factor in the campaign for the November 8 presidential election, but it resurfaced in recent days, taking the focus of Trumps campaign away from topics such as immigration, trade and the economy, which he has been using to hit Clinton.

Trump has gained ground on Clinton in national opinion polls after revamping his campaign staff in August and taking steps to give a more polished performance on the campaign trail.

But he revived the birther controversy on Thursday in an interview with the Washington Post when he declined to say whether he believed Obama was born in Hawaii. A US President must be a natural-born citizen.

The nonpartisan PolitiFact fact-checking website has rated the accusation that Clinton started the birther movement false, saying it appeared to begin with some Democrats who backed Clinton in 2008 but there were no ties to her or her campaign. Trump had promised a big announcement about the birther issue, giving the impression it was the purpose of the event at his hotel. Obama declined to comment on the birther issue, telling reporters he had better things to do.  Reuters

Trumps enigmatic hair put to test

Donald Trump's hair-a crusty, complex, yellowish affair that has become one of the enigmas of a very weird US presidential race-got messed with big time. The usually brash presidential candidate talked in subdued tones and played the good sport as he appeared on one of America's most popular late-night broadcasts, "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.

Fallon did his very popular impression of Trump's speaking style, ribbed him right and left and concluded his interview with a request. "Can I mess up your hair? Fallon said.

The comic explained that this might be the last time he could ask to do something unpresidential with Trump, lest he win election in November against Hillary Clinton.

The crowd went nuts over the idea. Trump grinned and agreed. Fallon reached out with his right hand and mussed Trump's hair with a vigorous, repeated rub.

The Republican nominee endured it with a broad smile. AFP
Washington, September 16

Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton has vowed that she will never give up as she hit the campaign trail again following a three-day rest after being diagnosed with pneumonia.

Speaking at a rally in greensboro, North Carolina, Clinton said her time off was a gift, allowing her to reflect on the campaign, BBC reported.

(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)

"People accuse me of all kinds of things," she said, "but nobody ever accuses me of quitting and I will never give up, I'll never walk away, no matter how tough the going gets," she told her supporters at Thursday's rally.

Polls indicate a tightening White House race, with 54 days to the election day -- November 8.

The former State Secretary's return comes a day after her doctor said she was "healthy and fit".

"With just two months to go until the election day, sitting at home was pretty much the last place I want to be," Clinton said.

The 68-year-old said she felt "lucky" that she could afford to take a few days off, compared with the millions of Americans who could not.

At a brief press conference afterwards, when Clinton was asked whether she had shared details of her pneumonia diagnosis with her running mate, Tim Kaine, the Democrat replied that "many senior staff knew and information was provided to a number of people".

"This was an ailment that many people just power through," she continued, "and that's what I thought I would do as well." She then jetted off to a give a speech at an event in Washington DC.

The race has focused on both candidates' state of health and medical records in recent days.

As countless thousands of armchair physicians looked on, Clinton took to the campaign trail for the first time since her near-collapse on Sunday, in a ceremony marking the 15th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.

She said one of her strengths was never quitting. Early on, she pivoted from talking about her illness to the struggles of Americans who cannot afford quality healthcare.

Although Clinton took swipes at Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, she only referred to him as "my opponent".

She said she wants to give Americans "something to vote for, not just against".

According to EFE news, Clinton said of Trump that she knows she will "never be the showman my opponent is, and that's OK with me." "Let's talk about what really matters," she said. "And here's my promise to you. I'm going to close my campaign the way I began my career and the way I will serve as your president -- focused on opportunities for kids and fairness for families. From now until November 8, everywhere I go I'm going to talk about my ideas for our country." On Thursday, Trump released a letter from his doctor saying he is in "excellent physical health", albeit overweight.

He earlier this year released a brief memo from the same physician asserting he would be "the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency".

At a rally in Ohio on Wednesday, Trump used Clinton's recent health scare to cast doubt on her stamina, saying: "I don't know folks, do you think Clinton would be able to stand up here for an hour?" The first debate between Clinton and Trump will take place on September 26 at Hofstra University on Long Island, followed by one in St. Louis on October 9 and a final one on October 19 in Las Vegas.

IANS
Washington, September 16

A House intelligence committee report issued condemned Edward Snowden, saying the National Security Agency leaker is not a whistleblower and that the vast majority of the documents he stole were defense secrets that had nothing to do with privacy.

The Republican-led committee released a three-page unclassified summary of its two-year bipartisan examination of how Snowden was able to remove more than 1.5 million classified documents from secure NSA networks, what the documents contained and the damage their removal caused to US national security.

Snowden was an NSA contract employee when he took the documents and leaked them to journalists who revealed massive domestic surveillance programs begun in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. The programs collected the telephone metadata records of millions of Americans and examined emails from overseas.

Snowden fled to Hong Kong, then Russia, to avoid prosecution and now wants a presidential pardon as a whistleblower.

Devin Nunes, chairman of the committee, said Snowden betrayed his colleagues and his country. He put our service members and the American people at risk after perceived slights by his superiors, Nunes said in a statement.

In light of his long list of exaggerations and outright fabrications detailed in this report, no one should take him at his word. I look forward to his eventual return to the United States, where he will face justice for his damaging crimes.

Snowden insists he has not shared the full cache of 1.5 million classified documents with anyone.  AP
Police arrested four persons in a case of cow vigilantism in Delhi for assaulting a madrasa teacher and a tempo driver. The victims were admitted to a hospital, where their condition was critical but stable.

Madrasa teacher Hafiz Abdul Khalid was among two assaulted by suspected cow vigilantes in Delhi on Wednesday.

By India Today Web Desk: Delhi Police arrested four people on Thursday in the case of cow vigilantism in Delhi. A madrasa teacher and a tempo driver were assaulted brutally by suspected cow vigilantes in outer Delhi's Kanjhawala area on Wednesday.

The victims, identified as Hafiz Abdul Khalid, 25 and Ali Hassan, 35, were on their way to dump and dispose of the carcasses of animals sacrificed on Bakra-Eid, celebrated on Tuesday. They were intercepted and thrashed by suspected gau rakshaks on Mundka road. A 14-year-old boy was also with the victims but he fortunately escaped the wrath of cow vigilantes.

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The victims were admitted to a government hospital but later had to be shifted to a private hospital in outer Delhi. Their condition was critical but stable.

'IT WAS BUFFALO'

The cow vigilantes assaulted Abdul Khali and Ali Hassan suspecting that they slaughtered cows during Bakra-Eid celebrations. However, as it turned out that the victims had sacrificed buffalo in the wake of the festival.

The victims had taken requisite permission from the local police station for the sacrifice of buffalo. Cow slaughter is prohibited in Delhi and police is entitled to take action if such a matter is reported to them. For sacrifice of other cattle, a fit-for-slaughter certificate is given by the administration. The victims had followed the requisite procedure.

POLICE CHECKING BACKGROUND

The four accused arrested by police were identified as Naveen, Raju, Devesh and Abhishek. Naveen, Raju and Devesh live in Rani Khera area while Abhishek is a resident of Rasoolpur. Both these villages are near the spot where victims were assaulted.

Police officials involved with the probe were checking antecedents of the four accused. They were ascertaining as to whether they belonged to any gau raksha group.



ALSO READ:

Cow vigilantes strip, thrash two Muslim men for dumping buffalo carcass after Bakr-Eid sacrifice

We were gangraped for 'eating beef', says Mewat woman







--- ENDS ---
Athens, September 16

Edward Snowden, in exile in Moscow after leaking US National Security Agency documents, said on Friday he intends to vote in the US presidential election, but did not say which candidate he favours.

I will be voting, Snowden said, speaking at a conference in Athens by video link from Moscow.

But as a privacy advocate I think its important for me ... that there should never be an obligation for an individual to discuss their vote. And I wont be doing so with mine.

He added: What I will say about the candidates is that Im disappointed were not hearing much about the constitution in this election cycle. Were not hearing very much about our rights.

The 33-year-old spoke ahead of the opening of the movie Snowden, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt.

Snowden thanked human rights groups for their campaign to seek a pardon for him from President Barack Obama.

Im not actually asking for a pardon myself because I think the whole point of our system and the foundation of our democracy is a system of checks and balances, he said. But ... Im incredibly grateful and fortunate to be able to experience the support of the worlds three leading human rights organisations.

A Republican-led bipartisan US House intelligence committee yesterday released a report calling Snowden a serial exaggerator and fabricator who doesnt fit the profile of a whistleblower.

All of the committee members separately sent Obama a letter urging him not to pardon Snowden, who revealed the NSAs collection of millions of Americans phone records.

The American Civil Liberties Union, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International are behind the campaign to pardon him.

Kenneth Roth, HRWs executive director, was on the panel of the Athens conference, and described the effort as an uphill battle.

What were hoping is that after the election when Obama is in his final months in office at that stage he can begin to do something that are appropriate as a matter of conscience but politically difficult, Roth told the AP.

One of them we would be is to pardon Snowden, he said.

Theres been broad recognition that Edward Snowden has done an enormous public service by disclosing the degree to which all of our privacy has been invaded needlessly.  AP
Peshawar, September 16

At least 23 persons were killed and 29 others were injured when a suicide bomber shouting Allahu Akbar blew himself up inside a mosque packed with worshippers for Friday prayers in Mohmand Agency in Pakistans restive northwest tribal region.

The attacker blew himself up when the prayers were in progress at the mosque in the Anbar tehsil of the agency bordering Afghanistan.

A suicide bomber was in the mosque. He shouted Allahu Akbar and blew himself up, Assistant Political Agent Naveed Akbar told reporters.

(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)

He said that Friday prayers were being offered around 2 pm when the powerful blast took place.

At least 23 persons were killed in the attack and 29 others were injured, Pakistani media reported, citing officials.

Many people were gathered inside the mosque when a suicide bomber blew himself up, an eyewitness said.

Rescue teams and the police rushed to the spot. The bodies and the injured are being shifted to local hospitals for medical treatment.

Injured were also taken to hospitals in Bajaur Agency, Charsadda and Peshawar for treatment.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban routinely targets courts, schools and mosques.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has expressed his grief over the loss of lives in the blast.

The attack came on a day when Sharif vowed to continue the war against militancy and terrorism till elimination of the last terrorist.

During a meeting with Army chief General Raheel Sharif today, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy.

The army had launched operation Zarb-e-Azb in June 2014 to flush out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas.  PTI
Stockholm, September 16

A Swedish appeals court on Friday upheld an arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange over a 2010 rape accusation, rejecting his request to have it lifted.

The court announced in a statement that Assange is still detained in absentia, adding that it shares the assessment of the (lower) district court that Julian Assange is still suspected on probable cause of rape... and that there is a risk that he will evade legal proceedings or a penalty.

(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)

The 45-year-old Australian has been holed up in the Ecuadoran embassy in London since June 2012, seeking refuge there after exhausting all his legal options in Britain against extradition to Sweden.

Assange has refused to travel to Stockholm for questioning over the rape allegation, which he denies, due to concerns Sweden will extradite him to the US over WikiLeaks release of 5,00,000 secret military files on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

This is the eighth time the European arrest warrant has been tested in a Swedish court. All of the rulings have gone against him.

The appeals court said Assanges four-year embassy sequestration is not a deprivation of liberty and shall not be given any importance in its own right in the assessment of proportionality.

The length of his stay in the embassy and the earlier passivity of police investigators were arguments for setting aside the detention, it noted.  AFP
Stockholm, September 16

A Swedish appeals court decided to uphold the arrest warrant for Wikileaks founder Julian Assange on Friday, prolonging the six year long legal stand off with prosecutors and clearing the way for the Wikileaks founder to be questioned in London next month.

Assange, 45, is wanted by Swedish authorities for questioning over allegations, which he denies, that he committed rape in 2010. "The Court of Appeal shares the assessment of the District Court that Julian Assange is still suspected on probable cause of rape," the court said.

Assange avoided possible extradition to Sweden by taking refuge in Ecuador's London embassy in 2012. He says he fears further extradition to the United States, where a criminal investigation into the activities of Wikileaks is ongoing. Per Samuelson, a Swedish lawyer representing Assange, said he had not yet talked to his client.

"I assume we will appeal, it would be strange if we did not," he said.

The court said the lengthy deadlock and the previous passivity of Swedish prosecutors in pursuing the investigation were arguments for setting aside the warrant, but there remained a strong public interest argument for it remaining in place. "At present, continued detention therefore appears to be both effective and necessary so as to be able to move the investigation forward," the court said.

Ecuador has set an October 17 date for questioning Assange at its London embassy. Swedish prosecutors have said the questioning will be conducted by an Ecuadorian prosecutor.  Reuters
WASHINGTON, September 16

US Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, who has long questioned President Barack Obama's US citizenship, said on Friday that he believed the president was born in the United States.

"President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period," Trump said at a campaign event.  Reuters
The farmer with a marginal income of not more than Rs 2,000 a month was facilitated with financial assistance in the form of donations and government schemes.

Majhi was forced to walk for about 13km with his wifeas body on August 24 after nobody came forward to help him.

By Soudhriti Bhabani: Dana Majhi, who drew nationwide sympathy for carrying his wife's body on shoulder for 13km, was once again in the media limelight on Thursday as he received a cheque of Rs 8.87 lakh donated by the King of Bahrain.

"I am relieved as a father now. My daughters will get free education," Majhi said in Oriya, at an event held in Delhi for presentation of the cheque. "I want one of my daughters to be a doctor so that she can serve our village. I would be happy if my other daughters could join the police force or any other prestigious government service."

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MONEY WALKS UP TO MAJHI

Visibly shaken at the media attention, Majhi recalled how he was emotionally shaken when his wife passed away. "I pleaded several times but no one was ready to give me a hearing. I was not provided a hearing by the Kalahandi hospital authorities because I could not afford it," Majhi said.

Clad in a wrinkled shirt and dhoti, Majhi said he had no other option but to carry the body on his shoulder. The farmer with a marginal income of not more than Rs 2,000 a month was facilitated with financial assistance in the form of donations and government schemes.

Bhubaneswar-based school for tribal children, Kalinga Institute of Social Science (KISS) promised to admit three of Majhi's daughters - Chandini (13), Sobei (7) and Pramila (4) along with funding his travel expenses. "I am going back to Odisha today. I need to take my flight back home," he said.

His travel to the capital was supported by KISS founder and social worker Achutya Samanta who had forward his case to the King of Bahrain.

Earlier, another social welfare body, Sulabh International also made a fixed deposit of Rs 5 lakh in his name for five years along with a promise of Rs 10,000 for his daughters' education.

ALSO READ:

Tribal man in Odisha had to walk 10 km carrying wife's body after being denied govt help





--- ENDS ---
On the pretext of visiting Finland on an educational tour, Delhi Deputy CM Manish Sisodia has been seen indulging in extravagance.

By India Today Web Desk: In the wake of chikungunya and dengue outbreak in Delhi, Lt Governor Najeeb Jung has sent an urgent fax to Deputy CM Manish Sisodia asking him to return from Finland immediately.



On the pretext of going on an educational tour to Finland, Delhi Deputy CM Manish Sisodia was caught on camera indulging in extravagance. This at a time when the national capital is plagued by cases of dengue and chikungunya and patients are struggling to get medical attention.

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SISODIA SPLURGING



Sisodia was seen chilling in Helsinki, wining and dining, relaxing on a luxury boat cruise, enjoying ice-cream and smiling, quite brazenly one would say, as toll of patients dying of dengue and chikungunya in Delhi keeps rising.

Also read: As Delhi battles diseases, Congress' Bhagoda Diwas jibe at missing AAP leaders



This foreign jaunt has been paid for by the common man or aam aadmi, who elected these netas to power.



AAP NO BETTER THAN OTHERS



CM Kejriwal and company will have a lot of explaining to do as a party that prided on its 'holier than thou' plank of superiority vis-a-vis the others today finds itself flagrantly violating its own code of values.

Also read: Arvind Kejriwal in Punjab: Delhi's AAP government on sick leave

Meanwhile, Sisodia in his defence has said that he is not on a holiday and that all allegations against him are a conspiracy. To defame tour is a sin, he added.

--- ENDS ---
Dear friends,

I personally do not enjoy travelling but what I have always longed for is to live in the mountains with trees, streams, greens and nature ever since I was young. I would like to stay in the mountains in a small little hut with trees surrounding me.

I would live there on vegan foods with my dogs. I would have a large outdoor Vajrayogini statue made of stone and make offerings of juniper leaves burned daily as sang. I would love to live in the mountains away from the senseless repeating actions in urban life. Urban life with its various pollutions do not connect us to who we are inside. We become more lost in urban artificial lives.

The article below highlights some of the most mesmerising and unique places on earth. Some of them are set in nature, which I like very much. It is amazing to see these places and actually believe they exist. The imagination and creativity behind these places are wonderful.

I hope you enjoy the article.

Tsem Rinpoche

Seven Weird and Wonderful Towns Around The World

If you think that your own neighbourhood is strange, then this list will likely make you reconsider. From a town that has more cats than humans, to a village that has no roads  these pockets of the world may just tempt you to relocate to somewhere a little more weird and wonderful.

1. Coober Pedy, Australia

Lets start on home turf with this South Australian town that exists entirely underground. Coober Pedy came about in 1915 as an opal-mining hub and to this day is still the biggest opal mine in the world. You can find houses, stores, churches, galleries and even a 4-star hotel, all peculiarly built, you guessed it, underground. In a place where temperatures are sweltering during summer, its understandable the local residents would do anything they can to beat the heat.

2. Aoshima, Japan

Fancy yourself a cat person? Then pack your bags and head to Aoshima. Here youll see cats wherever you roam, because the furry little creatures outnumber humans six-to-one. Originally, the cats were brought in to deal with mice that plagued fishermens boats, but the cats stayed and multiplied. The human residents are mostly pensioners, who have remained here since the Second World War. They go about their business while more than 120 cats rule the streets.

3. Slab City, USA

Visitors may find it tricky to find Slab City, because there are no signs offering directions, and thats how the residents would like to keep it. Once a World War II training ground for Marines, the camp was later abandoned. Only a handful of chemical company workers set up trailers and stayed put. From here, the off-grid community grew, made up of vans, campers and shacks, all without running water, sewers or electricity, housing people who refer to themselves as slabbers.

4. Giethoorn, Netherlands

If youve ever dreamt of living your own fairytale, or wished you lived somewhere serene and peaceful, then you may want to consider moving to Giethoorn. Also known as Venice of the Netherlands, this magical village has no roads nor modern transportation, only canals. Locals get around by whisper boats, which have noiseless engines. The villages website claims that the loudest sound you can normally hear is the quacking of a duck or the noise made by other birds.

5. Monsanto, Portugal

Sticking to the fairytale theme, Monsanto is a boulder-friendly town. Here, the natural placement of the rocks determined the structure of the town. Rather than moving the boulders, the locals used them as walls, floors and even roofs, resulting in tiny streets carved from rock and granite and houses squeezed between giant boulders. This real life Bedrock is home to about 800 people, and the preferred mode of transport through the narrow cobbled streets is by a donkey.

6. Chefchaouen, Morocco

The small town of Chefchaouen not only holds a rich history, with beautiful natural surroundings and wonderful architecture, it is most famous for being painted entirely in shades of blue. Nicknamed heaven of the hillside, the colour was introduced by Jewish refugees in 1930, who considered blue to symbolise the sky and heaven. The colour was then adopted by all residents, who repaint their homes every spring.

7. Burano, Italy

If youre a fan of the whole rainbow, not just blue, a move to Burano is probably a better fit. Long ago, the fishermen of this island painted their houses in bright colours so they could locate them through thick fog as they sailed home. The result is this rainbow-like town, bursting with colour. Fun fact: residents are required to send a letter to the government if they want to repaint their house. They are then sent a list of colours theyre allowed to use and risk jail time if they use the wrong colour.

For more interesting information:



Copyright Disclaimer: Under Section 13 of the Malaysian Copyright Act 1987, allowance is made for fair dealing for purposes such as non-profit research, private study, criticism, review or the reporting of current events. The Operator and author(s) of TsemRinpoche.com, a not-for-profit blog, do not claim ownership on the intellectual property rights of the contents, images and/or videos reproduced in this article. Any subsisting intellectual property rights shall belong to the legal owner of the contents, images and/or videos.
By PTI: disease

New Delhi, Sep 16 (PTI) Chikungunya is likely to be soon declared a notifiable and dangerous disease as the Delhi government today initiated the process for it in the wake of an outbreak of the vector-borne disease in the city.

Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain has issued a notice, saying the step would ensure proper monitoring of the situation and requisite remedial action.

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The then unified Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) had declared dengue as a notifiable disease after the 1996 outbreak, during which 10,252 cases and 423 deaths were reported.

"In light of the prevailing chikungunya outbreak, it is hereby directed that the issue of notifying chikungunya as dangerous/notifiable disease under the relevant sections of the municipal corporations/local bodies acts and rules be immediately taken up with the local bodies concerned for the issuance of such notification," the notice says.

Medical Health Officer of SDMC P K Hazarika said local bodies have power to declare a disease as notifiable.

"We have received the notice and maybe by tomorrow we would declare it as notifiable. Last time the MCD had declared dengue as a notifiable disease after the 1996 outbreak," he told PTI.

A notifiable disease implies hospitals, clinics and nursing homes have to report its cases to the government for proper monitoring. Chikungunya is generally considered as non-fatal.

Hazarika said chickenpox, smallpox, cholera and tuberculosis fall under the category of dangerous diseases.

The government notice said, "This is to be done on priority to ensure that every hospital, nursing home, laboratory, shall furnish the data of chikungunya patients to the concerned government agencies without failure, which is imperative for monitoring the situation and to take requisite remedial action."

In a separate notice issued by Jain, the Delhi government also announced that in the event of chikungunya outbreak "mohalla clinics, polyclinics and dispensaries shall remain open on all days, including Sundays and gazetted holidays during their working hours till October 30".

The health minister said the issue of reporting of the number of cases was raised during the review meeting held on September 14. It was then decided to declare it notifiable.

"The protocol is that when a vector-borne disease case is reported in a household, then the civic bodies send staff to fog the area within a certain radius of that household. And, if proper reporting of cases is not there, then proper fogging cannot be done.

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"Hence, it was decided in the meeting to get chikungunya declared as notifiable as so many cases are being reported in Delhi," Jain told reporters.

12 people have died due to complications triggered by chikungunya in Delhi this season while over 1,700 people have been affected by it. PTI KND AAR SC GVS

--- ENDS ---
Dear friends around the world,

What I like about the USA and many democratic countries around the world is that you have full religious freedom and protected by state and federal governments. The Satanic temple would have scared many religious people and churches back in the middle dark ages, but today we live in an age of enlightenment where everyone is entitled to practice whatever religion they prefer or even remain atheist. I find this article interesting because the Satanists have every right to practice in USA where a hundred years back they would have been condemned. USA has come along way. Yes, there are some church groups afraid and want to counter whatever they are afraid of from the Satanists, but the point is, anyone can practice what they like and the church groups are private individuals and not the government.

Within the Tibetan leaders and Exile government (CTA) in India, there is persecution of the Jonangpa sect where they dont allow representatives from them in the Tibetan parliament in Dharamsala, India. Also no representatives are allowed from the Dorje Shugden sect of Buddhism either. In fact if you are a follower of Dorje Shugden, then you are not allowed to enter any Tibetan schools, hospitals and public sectors. It is strictly barred because of your religion. This is happening today. I am sure this will change one day soon. It has too. There are many intelligent and educated young Tibetans speaking out against this now. I hope this trend continues. Tibetans need to be united and harmonious and not divided by religion. may His Holiness the Dalai Lama bless us that there will be no more religious segregation within the Tibetan communities and may he live long.

No government should condemn any religion, path for faith of their citizens. Citizens should have the choice to choose what suits them. This is true religious freedom and reflective of a mature and advanced governance.

Tsem Rinpoche

To Counter Satanic Invocation, Arizona State Rep. Will Hold Prayer Rally to Protect Phoenix

While the Phoenix City Council in Arizona is deciding whether or not members of The Satanic Temple can deliver an invocation prayer at a meeting on February 17, State Rep. Kelly Townsend isnt taking any chances.

Shes organizing a prayer rally to counteract whatever damage the Satanists may cause:

Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton has approved a satanic group request should come and give Opening prayers at the City Council on February 17th of this year. Although they had a First Amendment right to practice their religion, we do not want to bow down as a government to such darkness. For all those who are concerned, come and join us as we pray for a prayer hedge of protection around the City of Phoenix while this is going on.

Forget Donald Trump and his wall on the border of Mexico. Townsend will create a hedge of protection around Phoenix! (And I bet shell try to get the Satanists to pay for it, too.)

Im not sure what she needs protection from, given that the Satanic Temples seven fundamental tenets are about as loving and respectful of people as any religious document youll ever read.

But shes an evangelical Christian. When it comes to groups that oppose her faith, she reacts first and thinks later. If Satans name is invoked, it must be a horrible, horrible thing.

Maybe if she actually listened to what they had to say, shed realize shes flipping out over nothing.

Source: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2016/01/31/to-counter-satanic-invocation-arizona-state-rep-will-hold-prayer-rally-to-protect-phoenix/



Copyright Disclaimer: Under Section 13 of the Malaysian Copyright Act 1987, allowance is made for fair dealing for purposes such as non-profit research, private study, criticism, review or the reporting of current events. The Operator and author(s) of TsemRinpoche.com, a not-for-profit blog, do not claim ownership on the intellectual property rights of the contents, images and/or videos reproduced in this article. Any subsisting intellectual property rights shall belong to the legal owner of the contents, images and/or videos.
Within minutes of becoming an American citizen on Friday, Sanjuana Alvizo registered to vote.

The 28-year-old was brought to the country illegally at age 8. After she was adopted by an American family at age 12, it took nearly nine years, $15,000 and the intervention of former U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn to obtain legal residency.

During this time, immigration officials warned that if the application wasnt complete by age 21, she would likely be deported to her home country of Mexico to wait 10 years before starting the process over.

After receiving her residency, also known as a green card, the law requires she wait five years to apply for citizenship. She started the paperwork as soon as she could.

It feels amazing to not be worried if Trump gets voted in that you would be kicked back to a country you dont know. This is home to me. This is where Im from, she said.

She was one of 67 immigrants from 21 countries to be naturalized as American citizens Friday at the U.S. District Court in Tulsa by Chief District Judge Gregory Frizzell.

Alvizo graduated from the Tulsa School of Arts and Sciences, completed a degree from Tulsa Community College and works at the University of Oklahoma, where she is studying social work and plans to enter the nursing program. This makes her the first in her biological family to graduate from high school and earn a college degree.

She said immigration will play a significant role when she votes. In the upcoming presidential election, Alvizo says her vote will not be for Republican candidate Donald Trump, who has vowed to deport the 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. and build a wall at the Mexican border.

Ill vote because itll help my family and friends as well who cannot vote, Alizo said. I have lived this. I have been through it from illegal, to legal, to citizen. I know the whole process and what it takes.

Mexican immigrant Ray Olivas Enriquez, who has lived in America for more than a decade, called Friday one of the most important days of his life.

The main reason I am doing this is for my wife and children, but the second half of it is to vote, Enriquez said. I dont want Trump to get into there. His legacy is about going against immigrants. He would hurt other people who want to do this.

Even though most filled out their voter registration cards at the League of Women Voters table outside the courtroom, the day wasnt about politics.

It was about taking on the responsibilities of American citizenship, swearing sole allegiance to the country. The U.S. does not recognize dual citizenships.

Flor Flores, a Mexican immigrant who has lived in the country for 16 years, said she wanted to be an American like her children.

Ive been here half my life. This is my country. My life is here  all my family is here, my kids are here, Flores said. Its a big day.

While immigration is part of her political concern, shes undecided between Trump, Democratic candidate Hilary Clinton, Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson and Green Party contender Jill Stein.

I really dont want to choose with these candidates, Flores said. I dont know which one to vote for. Im not sure. To be a citizen, I want to be for sure about my vote. We still have time to look at this. Its a big role.

Among the new Americans was 21-year-old Adriana Maldonado, who was brought to the country as a baby without authorization. She graduated from Sapulpa High School but it took 15 years to obtain legal residency. She waited the mandated five years to seek citizenship.

This is my home. This is all I have ever known, Maldonado said. Even for my parents, they still see Mexico as home. For a young person, this is really emotional. This is a very special day for me. Im very excited to say Im a citizen of this country.

Maldonado said she was bullied on school playgrounds for her ethnicity. She never spoke of her undocumented status, but people often assumed it.

Its something I never really would talk about because people dont understand, she said. I never spoke about those things until I got older.

A lot of people are ignorant of the immigration process. It seemed to me that this is my home, and I should have a say in my home even if I wasnt born here. Im just as passionate as anyone about my country.

I wish people understood how hard it is to get here.

Maldonado is now a personal banker and active as a volunteer in several community organizations as a volunteer.

Im forever thankful my family left what they knew to come here, where I have been offered so many opportunities I couldnt have had there, she said.

The lone immigrant from El Salvador, Alex Saravi, pumped his fist in the air with excitement after taking the oath. He arrived in California on Sept. 11, 2001.

That was weird. But, this is a big country and everyone pulled together, Saravi said. I came to this country, adapted to this country. My kids are citizens of this country. I love this country. I feel a lot of love and a lot of opportunity here.

This is a pinnacle of my life.

Naturalization ceremonies are celebratory events, full of American flags and hugs. Children are heard cheering on mom and dad. Family and friends come bearing gifts.

For Karla Lopez, a Mexican immigrant who has lived in the U.S. for 15 years, its a teary one, too. When the national anthem was sung and President Barack Obamas recorded speech was played, she got choked up.

The words the president was saying and the song just really got to me, Lopez said. I wanted to be able to vote. I wanted to have the full taste of America and not just half. I wanted to be a citizen.
The Payne County District Attorneys Office has submitted a list of more than 200 witnesses it may call to testify in the trial of a Stillwater woman charged with killing four people and injuring more than three dozen others in a crash at Oklahoma State Universitys Homecoming parade.

The information provided Tuesday by District Attorney Laura Austin Thomas sheds new light on the state of mind of defendant Adacia Chambers according to people who spoke with the 26-year-old on the day of the crash. Chambers faces four counts of second-degree murder and 42 counts of assault and battery with means likely to produce death. She is set to appear in court Oct. 5 for a pretrial hearing.

The collision during the Oct. 24 Sea of Orange Homecoming parade killed 65-year-olds Marvin and Bonnie Stone, 23-year-old University of Central Oklahoma graduate student Nikita Nakal, and 2-year-old Nash Lucas.

Chambers defense attorney, Tony Coleman, submitted his clients witness list of about 30 people on Thursday, the deadline the court set for evidence material to be exchanged by both sides.

Thomas told the Tulsa World on Thursday that the sheer number of possible witnesses makes the case logistically difficult, although she doesnt expect to have to call all 207 people to the stand. She said she believes the trial will last at least a month.

Its a mass casualty case, and those are rare, she said. Theres 46 counts, so that alone means you have to have at least a victim and witness per count. Thats before you get to the law enforcement and the investigation.

Nathan Oglesby, a witness to the collision, is expected to testify that he talked to Chambers immediately after she stopped driving and that she indicated she wanted to die. Numerous witnesses, according to the document, have given statements indicating Chambers made no effort to slow down when she approached the parade at Main Street and Hall of Fame Avenue.

When asked what happened, she had a gentle smile and said she was trying to kill herself, Thomas wrote of Oglesbys account of his conversation with Chambers. Confirmed (with Chambers) again. She wanted to be free.

Another man attending the parade claimed he noticed Chambers palms were on the front face of her steering wheel with her fingers wrapped around the top as if bracing for impact just before she crashed into an unmanned Stillwater Police Department motorcycle and numerous spectators.

A probable cause affidavit in the case alleges Chambers was heard saying she was going home forever just before the crash, and that she later told Stillwater jail staff she was suicidal at the time of the incident but not at the time she was booked.

The list submitted by Coleman includes some of the states witnesses, members of Chambers family and mental health professionals at three northeast Oklahoma hospitals who have worked with her in the past.

Coleman filed a motion June 3 informing the court of the defenses intent to raise questions about Chambers mental health and sanity at the time of the collision. In a June 1 hearing, Associate District Judge Stephen Kistler approved Colemans request that the state pay for Chambers to retain Edmond-based psychologist Shawn Roberson as an expert witness on her behalf.

Roberson completed an evaluation of Chambers shortly after her arrest and wrote in a report, which has since been retroactively sealed, that she appeared to have a mental illness that could affect her competency for trial. The report from Roberson contradicts the findings from officials at the Oklahoma Forensic Center in Vinita, who determined she understands the case against her and ruled she is competent.

Coworkers of Chambers had previously reported to police she left her shift at Freddys Frozen Custard & Steakburgers early the day of the crash, but Chambers boss also revealed to the state that she filed a two-week notice that morning because she said she missed her family. Another coworker claimed Chambers told her she had broken up with her boyfriend, Jesse Gaylord, and wanted to leave because she did not feel well.

Chambers has been at the Payne County Jail in lieu of $1 million bond since her arrest.
On 60 Minutes, a black market in donor eggs, campaigns against sentencing and an interview with Neil Finn & Nick Seymour.

Baby Business

For many Australian couples unable to be parents the desperation can be overwhelming. As a result, more and more of them are now paying donors for eggs. Its a dangerous path to go down because its against the law in this country. If caught they face harsh penalties including prison sentences of up to 15 years. On the other side of this baby business, an increasing number of young women are realising the value of their eggs and eager to cash in. Some are demanding up to $20,000, with no guarantees their eggs will even lead to babies. In a 60 Minutes investigation Allison Langdon reveals a cruel black market trade in human eggs and warns of an urgent need to make our complicated donor laws fairer.

Reporter: Allison Langdon

Producer: Steve Jackson

Life From Death

In 2004, a judge in the United States had no hesitation in sentencing Michael Flinner to death. He described the murderer and rapist as a classic sociopath. Since then Flinner has had plenty of time to contemplate his execution as he waits on death row, deep inside San Quentin prison in California. And, after a lifetime of evil, he has decided he wants to do something good. With the help of his son Jonathan he has started a controversial campaign to allow prisoners to donate their organs. He wants to save lives from death row  but who would be prepared to accept the heart of a murderer?

Reporter: Tara Brown

Producer: Phil Goyen

House Proud

When he was told hed be interviewing rock stars Neil Finn and Nick Seymour, Charles Wooley was expecting stories about sex, drugs and rock and roll. Instead he got cops, rabbis and missing money. But Neil and Nicks beloved Australian  and Kiwi  band Crowded House has always been a little bit different. It seems like only yesterday they first sang their way into our heads and hearts, but in fact theyve been writing and performing their hit songs for 30 years. So to celebrate the milestone, Neil and Nick took Charles on a nostalgic journey back to where it all started.

Reporter: Charles Wooley

Producer: Phil Goyen

Beware

Psychiatrist Ong Ming Tan used his position of influence to sexually molest four young women. It was disgraceful behaviour and when he was caught he went to prison for two years. Now released, he has just been struck off the medical register for five years. But one of his victims, 24-year-old Samantha Barlow, says that punishment is woefully inadequate and she has started a campaign to warn us about this deviate doctor.

Reporter: Peter Overton

Producer: Jo Townsend

8:30pm Sunday on Nine.
On Monday A Current Affair turns its attention to the recent knife attack in Minto once again with Tracy Grimshaw to interview Wayne Greenhalgh.

Greenhalgh was set upon and repeatedly stabbed in the abdomen, chest and neck while out walking his dog last Saturday afternoon.

The frenzied attack, which was caught on camera, shocked the nation.

Now the grandad they call The Tank will open up to the nation about the moment he stared death in the face and survived to tell the tale.

In this incredible interview, Tracy Grimshaw will visit the Greenhalgh house in the south-western suburbs of Sydney which became a war zone last weekend.

Plus, youll see Wayne Greenhalghs emotional reunion with the heroic neighbour who came to his rescue, armed with a fence paling.

7pm Monday on Nine.
The surprise resignation of former Minister for Communications Stephen Conroy may help clear a hurdle in media reform proposals.

The Victorian Labor senator has been against the removal of the two out of three rule, which prevents media companies from owning a newspaper, TV station and radio network in the same market.

The Australian Financial Review reports media executives believe Senator Conroys resignation is the removal of a significant roadblock to getting the governments changes over the line. Sources within the government suggested negotiations with Labor will be easier without Conroy in parliament.

The Turnbull government reintroduced its media reform bill to Parliament nearly three weeks ago.

Senator Conroy was minister for broadband, communications and the digital economy under the previous Labor government, announcing the NBN and redrafting the Anti-Siphoning List.

He said he was resigning to spend more time with his daughter.
The missing person had on September 4 called his family and told them that he has been abducted.

By Tanseem Haider: In a strange case, Delhi police solved a case that involved a person who fabricated a story of his own kidnapping. On September 4, Delhi Police received a call regarding abduction of a person from the Lawrence Road area. On receiving the call, the police reached the spot and found that one Mahesh had gone to Shakurpur in the evening at about 6pm for shopping.

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Later on, Mahesh called up his sister Sita and his relative Suresh from his own phone and told them that he has been abducted by four persons near petrol pump, Shakurpur and was kept locked inside a room.

Also read: Delhi shocker: 2 girls out for a walk gangraped in park, 4 arrested



TRACKED HIS PHONE



On September 5, the family of Mahesh tried to look for him on the basis of his last known location. Mahesh used to call his family in between whenever his mobile phone was switched on but he did not tell his family where he was kept. With the help of Delhi Police, the technical surveillance revealed that Mahesh was still at Mohan Cooperative Estate, Mathura road, Delhi.

A police team along with the people of the locality went to Mohan Cooperative Estate, Mathura Road and a comprehensive search was started in the locality.

Also read: 1,000 iPhones worth Rs 2.25 crore stolen in Delhi



On the evening September 6, Mahesh again called up his sister who this time succeeded to get his current location at Badarpur Border. The police team and the family went to Badarpur Border and recovered him from that place.

Mahesh was questioned by the Delhi Police and after investigation he disclosed that had planned his abduction story himself. Mahesh revealed that as he had not been able to adopt the lifestyle of Delhi, he wanted to go back to his village in Rajeshtan, but no one in his family supported his idea.

Therefore, he made a plan to go back to his village.

--- ENDS ---
"We had requested Mr Nadda to reserve at least 10 per cent beds (1,000 beds) in the central government-run hospitals, for treatment of dengue and chikungunya cases, to which he (Nadda) agreed," Satyendar Jain said.

By Indo-Asian News Service: The central government has agreed to reserve 10 per cent of the beds in its hospitals for treatment of dengue and chikungunya patients, according to Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain.

Jain's remarks came after meeting Union Health Minister JP Nadda at his office here on Friday.

"We had requested Mr Nadda to reserve at least 10 per cent beds (1,000 beds) in the central government-run hospitals, like All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Safdarjung Hospital, Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital, etc., for treatment of dengue and chikungunya cases, to which he (Nadda) agreed," Jain said.



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Also Read: South Delhi hit hardest by dengue-chikungunya outbreak



SATYENDRA JAIN SEEKS JP NADDA'S HELP

Earlier, Jain had sought an appointment with Nadda and also written him a letter requesting the Union Minister to convene a meeting of the health ministers of neighbouring states.

He urged Nadda to ask health ministers of neighbouring states like Uttar Pradesh and Haryana to set up fever clinics in order to reduce excessive patient inflow in the hospitals of Delhi.

"The government should also advertise about these fever clinics, so that people could know about it," he added.

Also Read: Blood racket unearthed in top Delhi hospitals amid dengue outbreak



WILL NEIGHBOURING STATES BE OFFERED HELP?

Asked whether Delhi will take patients from other states, Jain said, "We are not denying treatment to anybody coming to Delhi for treatment."

He also said that in Delhi government hospitals more than 1,500 beds are available, and there is no need for panic. "We are working day and night," he added.

At least 14 people have died in the national capital since the outbreak of the vector-borne disease in last a few days.

Also Read

Delhi shivers, hospitals quiver under dengue-chikungunya outbreak



--- ENDS ---
Militants launched 30 attacks on positions of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in Donbas over the past day.

This is reported by the ATO Headquarters press center.

In particular, terrorists violated ceasefire 12 times in Donetsk direction. The militants shelled Avdiyivka (18km north of Donetsk), Verkhniotoretske (22km north-east of Donetsk), and Zaitseve (67km north-north-east of Donetsk), using grenade launchers, heavy machine guns, and small arms.

Two ceasefire violations were recorded in Luhansk direction. The terrorists shelled Novooleksandrivka (65km west of Luhansk), using small arms.

In Mariupol direction, 16 ceasefire violations were spotted. The militants used grenade launchers and small arms to shell Shyrokyne (20km east of Mariupol), Marinka (35 km south-west of Donetsk), and Novotroitske (32km south of Donetsk).

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Senior officials of the Ministry of Defence and Armed Forces along with MPs discussed 2017 budgeting of the Armed Forces of Ukraine during a joint session of the Board of the Ministry of Defence of Ukraine and Committee of Verkhovna Rada for National Security and Defence.

This has been reported by Government's portal.

The Verkhovna Rada Committee supported the proposal of the Ministry of Defence and decision of NSDC of Ukraine concerning 2017 defence budget.

According to Defence Minister of Ukraine Stepan Poltorak, the financial resource will encourage accomplishment of army tasks and partially deliver modernized military equipment to military units.

Next year financial resources will be also allocated to renew the Ukrainian Navy, develop the Special Operations Forces, develop infrastructure of training fields, repair armament and military equipment, and implement reforms to achieve the NATO standards.

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No Ukrainian servicemen were killed, three soldiers were wounded in eastern Ukraine over the past day.

Spokesman for the Presidential Administration on the ATO, Colonel Andriy Lysenko said this at a briefing in Kyiv, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

No Ukrainian servicemen were killed, but three soldiers were wounded and one soldier was shell-shocked in eastern Ukraine over the past day, Lysenko said.

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The European Union will earmark about EUR 16 million to support the Ukrainian state anti-corruption agencies.

Commissioner for European Neighborhood Policy and Enlargement Negotiations Johannes Hahn said this at a press conference in Kyiv, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

According to the EU Commissioner, the EU decided to allocate about EUR 16 million to render support to the Ukrainian government in implementing measures aimed at combating corruption and for these measures be carried out efficiently.

He also noted that the Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA) will implement this project in Ukraine.

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The European Parliaments Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs is to adopt the report and the draft legislative resolution on granting Ukraine visa-free regime on September 26.

The vote on Bulgarian MP Mariya Gabriel's report will start at 18:40 Kyiv time, an Ukrinform correspondent reports from Brussels.

At the previous two meetings, the relevant committee supported the draft legislative resolution on putting Ukraine on the list of the third countries whose nationals are exempt from the visa requirements for short-term trips to EU countries (except the UK and Ireland) and the countries of Schengen area.

Further, according to the procedure, the European Parliament, the Council of the EU and the European Commission are to start the inter-institutional negotiations on visa-free regime for Ukraine.

The decision is expected to be put to a vote at the European Parliament session in October.

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Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko says he will not bargain with Crimea for returning Donbas, eastern Ukraine.

President Poroshenko said this when opening a plenary sitting of the 13th YES Annual Meeting, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

We will never accept [the annexation of Crimea] and will never bargain with Crimea for a good settlement [of the situation] in Donbas. Crimea is the Ukrainian territory. And thats why Im sure of support from this people, because it is a very dangerous precedent, which is taking place in the center of Europe in the 21st century. We must not allow this precedent to take place in principle, he said.

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Canadian policy continues not to recognize the occupation of Crimea by Russia and condemns the illegal actions of Russia in Ukraine, an Ukrinform correspondent learnt from Canadian Foreign Ministry spokesman Austin Jean.

"Canada condemns violations by Russia of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine and remains steadfast in its position of non-recognition of the illegal occupation of Crimea," he said.

He stressed that Canada regularly calls on Russia to respect the sovereignty of Ukraine. "Canada considers Crimea an integral part of Ukraine and continues to call on Russia, including within the OSCE and other multilateral arenas, to respect the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine," the Foreign Ministry spokesman said.

pd
Remembrance Day for Ukrainian journalists, which was established in 2007 at the initiative of the National Union of Journalists of Ukraine is being marked today.

Its aim is to honour the memory of journalists who passed away in the past few decades - was killed, died under mysterious circumstances or forced to commit suicide.

This year's Remembrance Day coincides with the day of memory of the founder of Ukrayinska Pravda, Heorhiy Gongadze, who was murdered and kidnapped on Sept. 16, 2000.

Most crimes against journalists remain unsolved, and in the best cases only those who carried them out and not those who ordered themhave been discovered.

Some of these cases are sensational, loud, the names of slain journalists are well known and are discussed all the time. Others may be mentioned in a general report but then their names disappear. Remembrance Day for Ukrainian journalists is the opportunity to mention all of them.

pd
On 12 July, ED arrested FTIL founder Jignesh Shah (now on bail) on charges of money laundering and for allegedly not cooperating with investigations.

By Virendrasingh Ghunawat: Due to Ganesh Visarjan event in Mumbai, the enforcement directorate (ED) were not able to complete the attachment process against Financial Technologies of India Ltd (FTIL). But Friday is a hectic day for the agency, as the officials have to wrap the attachment proceedings, before the weekend starts.

Sources confirm Indiatoday.in that the agency is likely to issue a provisional attachment order against FTIL (renamed 63 Moons) and National Spot Exchange Ltd, where assets over Rs 1200 crore would get attached.

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"The legal proceedings for the attachment have been completed. It's just a matter of time that the provisional attachment order under sub-section (1) of Section 5 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002, would be issued to NSEL and FTIL via post, any time from now. It could either by Friday evening or in next two days", the source said.

ALSO READ | NSEL scam: The investor who shook Jignesh Shah's empire



The list includes both movable and immovable properties of FTIL. "The total value of assets is around Rs 1253 crore, which includes some debt funds, growth funds, income funds and so on", the source said.

EOW OF MUMBAI POLICE EXPECTING NOTIFICATION



Interestingly, the Economic Offence Wing (EOW) of Mumbai Police is also expecting a notification, within next 36 hours, to attach the assets belong to FTIL under the Maharashtra Protection of Interest of Depositors (MPID) Act, worth Rs 2000 crore.

On 20th July, Mumbai Police had secured the company's Andheri office, its cash deposits, bonds and mutual funds. As per the process, security the property is the first step towards its attachment, which would be subsequently liquidated by the competent court and proceeds would be given to the investors.

In 2014, EOW seized assets worth Rs 5,200 crore belonging to suspected defaulters such as Mohan India, Loil Group firms, NK Proteins, PD Agroprocessors and Tavishi Enterprises Pvt. Ltd.

NSEL FRAUD



The NSEL fraud surfaced in July 2013 after the spot exchange was found offering futures contracts. It was a Ponzi scheme that came out to light after the NSEL failed to pay its investors in commodity pair contracts after 31 July 2013. Around 13000 investors from India lost about Rs 5,600 crore when the fraud was discovered and it was found that NSEL had neither the money nor the stocks to pay them back.

ED registered a criminal case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in 2013 to probe the case, along with EOW. On 12 July, ED arrested FTIL founder Shah (now on bail) on charges of money laundering and for allegedly not cooperating with investigations.

When asked, a spokesperson for FTIL said the company has not received any attachment order from the agency, till now.

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ALSO READ:

Two company chiefs quizzed by ED in Rs 5,600-crore NSEL scam

Multiple probe agencies bad for cases: Experts





--- ENDS ---
Partners; the United Nations Development Programme, United Nations Foundation, SDG Action Campaign and Project Everyone come together for the inaugural Global Goals Week

UN Secretary General, PGA, Special Adviser for the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, DPI and SDG Advocates including Forest Whitaker, Andrea Bocelli, Dr. Alaa Murabit and Richard Curtis call on all world leaders to implement the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030

Global Girls bus will tour New York, blasting messages from women and girls around the world from the #whatireallyreallywant campaign

Next week will mark the first anniversary of the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals, signed by 193 world leaders on 25th September 2015 at the UN General Assembly. In the 7 days following, news of these Global Goals reached 40% of the worlds population, around 3 billion people.

This year in order to keep up momentum and ensure all 17 Goals are achieved, the UN and partners from around the world are launching #GlobalGoals Week  an annual week of action, awareness and accountability for Sustainable Development. At the centre of this week will be SDG Year 1, a special session at the UNGA Opening which will call on all world leaders to implement the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030 and mark progress in 2016. It will include films, produced by writer, film-maker and SDG Advocate Richard Curtis, and feature SDG Advocates Forest Whitaker, Andrea Bocelli, Dr. Alaa Murabit, the President of the General Assembly Peter Thomson and the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.

Throughout the week, UNDP, UN Foundation, SDG Action Campaign and Project Everyone, the founding partners of #GlobalGoals Week, will work with events and organisations such as the Social Good Summit, Global Citizen Festival, the office of the Special Adviser for the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the Worlds Largest Lesson and UNICEF, Leave No-One Behind partnership, Global Compact, Every Women Every Child, GSMA, the UN Department of Public Information and many more to promote action, accountability and awareness of the Goals. So this September starts the countdown for the next 14 years to ensure no one is left behind.

As part of #GlobalGoals Week and in the year Girl Power went Global, the messages from people around the world inspired by the film #WhatIReallyReallyWant, will be brought to NYC as world leaders gather. Issues like quality education, an end to violence, an end to child marriage and equal pay for equal work need to be top of every governments agenda in order to give the Goals the best possible start. With 110 million views, 40 million impressions on Twitter and global media coverage, produced by MJ Delaney and supported by original Spice Girl, Victoria Beckham and Mel C, the film inspired an overwhelming response on social media with people from all over the world sharing images of what they really want for girls and women. These messages will be brought to New York on a Global Girls bus with performers from the video and influential women at key events and moments throughout the week.

#GlobalGoals Week: 18th  24th of September 2016

10 #GLOBALGOALS WEEK EVENTS IN NEW YORK

1. SDG Year 1 at the UNGA Opening Session  A unique SDG accountability moment including films, produced by writer, film-maker and SDG Advocate Richard Curtis, and featuring SDG Advocates Forest Whitaker, Andrea Bocelli and Dr. Alaa Murabit, the President of the General Assembly Peter Thomson and the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon. This moment will call on all world leaders at the UN General Assembly to implement the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030 and mark progress in 2016.

2.The Young Leaders Initiative  launched by the Office of the UN Secretary Generals Envoy on Youth, is announcing 17 Young Leaders (1930) and champions for the SDGs recognized for their leadership and contribution to a more sustainable world, and representing every region in the world.

3. The Social Good Summit  will launch Global Goals Week with UNDPs Helen Clark, the UN Foundations Kathy Calvin, Mashables Pete Cashmore, the 92nd Street Ys Henry Timms and Yusra & Sarah Mardini from Syria. UNDP will spread the word of the Goals to over 80 countries including Yemen, Iran, N. Korea and Iraq.

4. UN Global Compact Private Sector Forum  350 CEOs, government leaders, UN agencies and civil society will come come together to focus on the role of business in advancing sustainable development to prevent global instability.

5. Global Goals Awards Dinner  in partnership with the SDG Advocates, Unilever and UNICEF focusing on Global Girls and giving awards to those who have helped make progress towards Girl Goals. This will be the first annual dinner to mark accountability for the Sustainable Development Goals, and will call on all sectors  from the public, to civil society, government, media and business  to do more, and work together to achieve their implementation over the next 14 years.

6. Solutions Summit  a summit highlighting projects and creative solutions advancing the achievements of the Global Goals

7. Global Citizen Festival  The fifth Global Citizen Festival will focus on the achievement of the SDGs, bringing together musicians including Rihanna, Coldplay and Ellie Goulding, celebrities and world leaders in an effort to enact major policy commitments toward the issues of girls and womens equality, education, health, water and sanitation, environment, finance and innovation, and food and hunger.

8. The Worlds Largest Lesson  in partnership with UNICEF has reached 160 countries since launch, and in 2016 is launching in India with Bollywood Actress Sonam Kapoor and youth organisations in 120 countries sending volunteers to teach lessons to younger children.

9. The Global Goals Mobile Campaign 2016  includes an official SDG Action app produced by the GSMA, Project Everyone and DPI, participation of 17 mobile operator groups with 2 billion customers being asked to support the campaign, and 900 million people receiving a Global Goals text message. A live Mobile Show featuring the best of Global Goals week and in partnership with Global Citizen, will be made free to view on mobile, and a fun interactive feature will enable millions to text Mr. Bean and world leaders about what they love most in their world.

10. The Global Girls Bus  As leaders attend a Special Session inside the UN Chamber on the SDGs, a Global Girls bus will begin a loud tour of New York, ensuring the messages received from women and girls around the world this year from the #WhatIReallyReallyWant campaign are heard loud and clear. The bus will bring together performers from the #WhatIReallyReallyWant video with leading womens rights activists and public figures to shout about the progress that still needs to be made for women and girls.

Helen Clark, Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme, said: The UN has an ambitious agenda to end poverty, fix climate change, and address inequalities over 15 years. Now we need everyone to help make this a reality. Everyone needs to know about the Goals, and every September when world leaders gather for the opening of the UN General Assembly, we must emphasize the importance of delivery on the promises of the Sustainable Development Goals.

Forest Whitaker, Actor, Director, Producer and SDG Advocate said: Our collective commitment to the 17 Global Goals is our most important defense in ensuring that the benefits of our modernizing world are shared among all nations and people and not just by the privileged few. These goals are intended to serve the interest of every woman, man, and child on our planet. And that means that achieving these goals is up to all of us. This has to be an international movementa coming together of people and a rallying around a common cause on a scale. I believe we have the tools and the passion to make the Global Goals a reality.

David Nabarro, Special Adviser to the Secretary General for the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and Climate Change said: In this first year anniversary  SDG Year 1  more than 50 governments, and also numerous businesses, scientists and civil society organizations have stepped up their efforts to make the SDGs a central framework for their policies and actions, and have increased their focus and investment on data collection and analysis to guide decisions and leave no on behind. The first anniversary of the adoption of the SDGs is an opportunity to celebrate all achievements made, to do more to make SDGs a reality and most importantly to thank the governements, businesses, civil society groups and young people around the world for all their efforts.

Sir Ken Robinson, author, speaker and international advisor on education, said: The Global Goals are an enormous opportunity for positive and creative change. We have to continue to raise everyones awareness of them and especially excite the curiosity of children and young people. Of course we need the support of world leaders but global change also has to come from the ground up. The Worlds Largest Lesson and The Global Goals campaign are taking a creative approach to inspiring this kind of action and Im proud and excited to continue my work with them this year.

Richard Curtis, Writer, Director, & SDG Advocate, said: Every year counts in trying to achieve the high ambitions of the new Goals. I am encouraged that a series of traditions is starting  Awards for people working for the Goals, the Worlds Largest Lesson, the Social Good Summit, the Global Citizen Festival and mobile show, focusing on the Goals and most important, a special session at the UN itself  all of which which adds to the pressure on all of us to work towards fulfilling the SDGs.

Kathy Calvin, President and Chief Executive Officer of the United Nations Foundation, said: This week is not just about the numbers. Its about what the numbers can do when they come together around real solutions for real people. What kicks off with the Global Goals week announcement at the Social Good Summit will include important moments where the UN and partners are coming together around tangible, scalable solutions for progress. The Solutions Summit on September 21st is a good example of how much energy and creativity is coming around these goals. Its a smart approach that puts numbers to work and helps turn words into action.

Media ASSETS

Plan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lesuDcxitg8

#WhatIReallyReallyWant: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSf-SBUwYwc

Global Goals channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRfuAYy7MesZmgOi1Ezy0ng

ICONS GIFS: https://wdrv.it/acc540c10

For further information, please contact:

Lottie Dodson

freuds

Tel: +44 7825 707145

Email: lottie.dodson@freuds.com

Notes to Editors:

SDG Year 1 key achievements

Over 50 countries have already integrated these new Goals into their national planning  and 22 presented their plans in detail at the High Level Political Forum.

At the Paris climate conference in December 2015, 195 countries adopted the first-ever universal, legally binding global climate deal  which has now been officially ratified by 27 countries.

Great strides are being made towards making child marriage a thing of the past  with Gambia, Zimbabwe, Tanzania declaring it illegal.

The Global Fund is about to announce substantial replenishment in the fight against AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. This money is expected to save an extra 8 million lives  and this comes at the same time as the announcement that Sri Lanka has become totally malaria free.

And to chart and analyse the progress on the Goals an Interactive Executive Agency has been created to accelerate the collection and dissemination of quality Data about all 17 of the SDGs.

The United Nations is engaging one million people to be activated so that they are in a position to promote the SDGs, and through them, two billion people to know about them and appreciate their significance all by the end of 2017.

The agenda encourages all stakeholders to be accountable for their actions in relation to the Agenda, and all people everywhere to call stakeholders to account.

Activities underway on climate change, risk reduction, humanitarian action, mass migration, womens empowerment, involvement of less-able people and financing for development all connect into the 2030 Agenda. It has an explicit commitment to ensuring that the people hardest to reach can access essential services and that planetary renewal focus on the most essential actions needed.

About Project Everyone and the Global Goals campaign

Project Everyone was devised by filmmaker and campaigner, Richard Curtis and founded Gail Gallie and Kate Garvey to make the Global Goals famous, so that they stand the greatest chance of being achieved.

In order to achieve the enormous reach over the 7 days following the agreement of the Goals, success was driven by: creation of the logo and icons for the Goals in partnership with Jakob Trollback, texts sent to 925 million people, radio programmes in 75 countries on 700 stations, millions of school children in 160 countries receiving a lesson on the goals and why they matter, a 1-hour TV programme shown in over 150 countries, homepage takeovers of Google, YouTube, Baidu, MSN, Bing and many others and significant advertising presence with 140,000 poster sites around the world, and a film shown in cinemas in 35 countries.

In July 2016 Project Everyone focused on Girls and Women because Goals Progress equals Girls Progress. 20 years on, it released a remake of the Spice Girls Wannabe video, featuring artists from India, Nigeria, South Africa, UK, USA and Canada, to tell world leaders what girls and women really really want in 2016 to achieve the Global Goals. in partnership with Getty Images and SAWA, the global cinema advertising association,#WhatIReallyReallyWant is playing in cinemas around the world and has been viewed online 110 million times. MJ Delaney of Moxie Pictures directed the remake and with artists from around the world including Gigi Lamayne and Moneoa from South Africa, Seyi Shay from Nigeria, Bollywood actress Jacqueline Fernandez from Sri Lanka, M.O from the UK, Taylor Hatala from Canada and Larsen Thompson from the USA.

Project Everyone partners include: Getty Images, SAWA, Aviva, Pearson, Gates Foundation, GSMA

www.globalgoals.org www.projecteveryone.org
The number of South Sudanese refugees sheltering in neighbouring countries has this week passed the 1 million mark, including more than 185,000 people who have fled since fresh violence erupted in the country in Juba on July 8. With this milestone, South Sudan joins Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia as countries which have produced more than a million refugees.

Most of the recent arrivals have crossed into Uganda (143,164), but a surge of people have entered western Ethiopias Gambella region in the past week and others have been heading to Kenya, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Central African Republic. These countries have commendably kept their doors open to the new arrivals.

The violence in July came as a major setback to peace efforts in South Sudan, coming as the fledgling country prepared to celebrate its fifth anniversary and amid a short-lived peace deal between supporters of President Salva Kiir and former First Vice President Riek Machar.

The fighting has shattered hopes for a real breakthrough and triggered new waves of displacement and suffering, while humanitarian organizations are finding it very difficult for logistical, security and funding reasons to provide urgent protection and assistance to the hundreds of thousands in need, including 1.61 million internally displaced people.

Most of those fleeing South Sudan are women and children. They include survivors of violent attacks, sexual assault, children that have been separated from their parents or travelled alone, the disabled, the elderly and people in need of urgent medical care.

Uganda is hosting the lions share of South Sudanese refugees, with 373,626, more than a third of them arriving since early July. They keep coming; over the past week more than 20,000 new arrivals were recorded, primarily through the Oraba crossing in the northwest. New arrivals report increased fighting across the Greater Equatoria region and attacks by armed groups that kill civilians, loot villages, sexually assault women and girls, and recruit young boys. Many refugees arrive exhausted after days walking in the bush and going without food or water. Many children have lost one or both of their parents, some forced to become primary caregivers to younger siblings.

A surge of people, more than 11,000, many of them from the Nuer tribe, have crossed into Gambella during the past week, bringing the number of South Sudanese refugees in that country to more than 292,000. The majority were women and children, including some 500 children travelling alone. Most had fled from Nasser, Maban, Mathiang and Maiwut in Upper Nile and cited insecurity and fears of renewed conflict after seeing significant troop movements. New arrivals from Jonglei talked of food shortages as one reason for fleeing.

Neighbouring Sudan hosts the third largest number of South Sudanese refugees, 247,317, and people continue to come to the countrys East Darfur, South Darfur and White Nile states. Those in the two Darfurs cite growing unrest and heightened food insecurity, especially in the north-western states of Northern Bahr El Ghazal and Warrap, as their reasons for flight. White Nile state has 41% of all South Sudanese refugees in Sudan. Currently, an average of nearly 1,800 people are arriving per month. Floods are preventing others from leaving South Sudan.

Smaller numbers have been fleeing to Kenya, DR Congo and Central African Republic since the return to conflict in July. About 300 people a week have been crossing into Kenya, citing insecurity, economic instability and drought and reporting that the flight corridor between Torit and Kapoeta remains dangerous due to armed bandits. Kenya has over 90,000 South Sudanese refugees.

The DR Congo is currently experiencing an influx into Ituri province close to the border with South Sudan and Uganda. An estimated 40,000 South Sudanese refugees are said to be in the country and we are continuing registration.

UNHCR field staff report that new arrivals are camped in schools and churches, while the less fortunate sleep in the open. Refugees lack food and basic household items. An estimated 5% of the children are unaccompanied, and many women and girls said they were sexually assaulted during their flight. Early this month, refugees near the city of Doruma (Haut-Uele province) were attacked, their food rations stolen, and a health centre looted by unknown attackers.

Insecurity in South Sudans Central Equatoria has also significantly affected UNHCRs ability to access and assist thousands of refugees inside South Sudan itself. In Lasu settlement, some 40 km south of Yei, nearly 10,000 refugees from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Central African Republic and Sudan have not received their monthly food rations since late June this year.

Without further funding and support, we and our partners will struggle to assist the needy with even the most basic assistance. UNHCR is calling on donors to provide US$701 million for South Sudan refugee operations, of which 20% has been funded.

For more information on this topic, please contact:
A family of refugees from Syria pose beside a shelter at Azraq camp in Jordan, in this 2015 file photo.  UNHCR/Tanya Habjouqa

NEW YORK  We asked you to show solidarity with millions of refugees and more than 1.3 million of you have come forward and signed UNHCRs #WithRefugees petition. Thank you.

To ensure the call is heard in the highest places, it will now be handed in to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the President of the UN General Assembly, Peter Thomson, this afternoon in New York.

The appeal will be delivered by UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi, together with refugees and prominent UNHCR supporters, in a symbolic gesture just days before the UN Summit on Refugees and Migrants on September 19.

When the petition was launched in June, Grandi spoke about why UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, was making such a public call to support refugees.

We are in a period of deepening conflict and turmoil in the world, which is causing many more people to flee their homes than before, said Grandi. It affects and involves us all, and what it needs is understanding, compassion and political will to come together and find real answers for the refugee plight. This has become a defining challenge of our times.

In 2015, millions of people were newly displaced, adding again to the global refugee and internal displacement totals. Overwhelmingly, it was countries of the developing world that were most affected, but Europe too witnessed dramatic scenes, as hundreds of thousands of people crossed the Mediterranean in search of safety and refuge. Thousands died along the way.

The petition calls on representatives of the 193 governments attending the Summit to make sure all refugee children can go to school; that all refugees have a safe place to live and that all refugees can work and contribute to their local community.

The handover will feature a live performance by award-winning slam poet Emi Mahmoud of her ode to drowned Syrian refugee toddler Alan Kurdi, and a recitation of the petition by UNHCR supporter Ben Stiller and comments by UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador, model and former refugee Alek Wek.

Grandi said that at the height of the refugee crisis in Europe, many ordinary people had come forward to help. There was an extraordinary outpouring of empathy and solidarity, as ordinary people and communities opened their homes and their hearts to refugees, and some countries have welcomed new arrivals even while already hosting large numbers of refugees.

After making history at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Refugee Olympic Team swimmer Yusra Mardini from Syria and runner Yiech Pur Biel from South Sudan will also be in attendance, as will resettled refugees living in the United States, who will speak in support of the petitions main asks.

The hand-in event will be the culmination of a week of global broadcasts by UN Refugee Agency celebrity supporters on Facebook Live, encouraging people in every region to sign the #WithRefugees petition, which will remain active until all its goals are achieved.

These broadcasts were launched by UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador Cate Blanchett, premiering a film she produced with Facebook entitled What They Took with Them. Taken from the poem of the same name written by Jenifer Toksvig, it lists things refugees carried with them when they fled, and expresses the trauma when conflict and persecution force people to leave their homes.

The film will also be shown at the event, which is being broadcast on Facebook Live.
Recently arrived refugees from South Sudan wait at the UNHCR Elego collection point in Northern Uganda.  UNHCR /Will Swanson

GENEVA  The number of South Sudanese refugees sheltering in neighbouring countries has this week passed the 1 million mark, including more than 185,000 people who have fled since fresh violence erupted in the country in Juba on July 8, UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, said today.

With this milestone, South Sudan joins Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia as countries which have produced more than a million refugees, UNHCR spokesperson Leo Dobbs told a news briefing in Geneva on Friday (September 16).

Most of those fleeing South Sudan are women and children. They include survivors of violent attacks, sexual assault, children that have been separated from their parents or travelled alone, the disabled, the elderly and people in need of urgent medical care, Dobbs said.

Many refugees arrive exhausted after days walking in the bush and going without food or water."

He noted that more than three quarters  143,164  of the recent arrivals have crossed into Uganda, but a growing number of people have entered Ethiopias western Gambella region in the past week and others have been heading to Kenya, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Central African Republic (CAR).

These countries have commendably kept their doors open to the new arrivals, Dobbs told reporters at the Palais des Nations.

The violence in July came as a major setback to peace efforts in South Sudan, coming as the fledgling country prepared to celebrate its fifth anniversary and amid a short-lived peace deal between supporters of President Salva Kiir and former First Vice President Riek Machar.

The fighting has shattered hopes for a real breakthrough and triggered new waves of displacement and suffering, while humanitarian organizations are finding it very difficult for logistical, security and funding reasons to provide urgent protection and assistance to the hundreds of thousands in need, including 1.61 million internally displaced people, Dobbs said.

Uganda is hosting the lions share of South Sudanese refugees, with 373,626, more than a third of them arriving since early July. They keep coming; over the past week more than 20,000 new arrivals were recorded, primarily through the Oraba crossing in the northwest.

A young refugee from South Sudan at the Numanzi Transit Center where meals and temporary accommodation are provided by UNHCR in Adjumani, northern Uganda.  UNHCR /Will Swanson

New arrivals report increased fighting across the Greater Equatoria region and attacks by armed groups that kill civilians, loot villages, sexually assault women and girls, and recruit young boys.

Many refugees arrive exhausted after days walking in the bush and going without food or water. Many children have lost one or both of their parents, some forced to become primary caregivers to younger siblings, Dobbs said.

A surge of people, more than 11,000, many of them from the Nuer tribe, have crossed into Gambella during the past week, bringing the number of South Sudanese refugees in that country to more than 292,000. The majority were women and children, including some 500 children travelling alone.

Most had fled from Nasser, Maban, Mathiang and Maiwut in Upper Nile and cited insecurity and fears of renewed conflict after seeing significant troop movements. New arrivals from Jonglei talked of food shortages as one reason for fleeing.

Neighbouring Sudan hosts the third largest number of South Sudanese refugees, 247,317, and people continue to come to the countrys East Darfur, South Darfur and White Nile states. Those in the two Darfurs cite growing unrest and heightened food insecurity, especially in the north-western states of Northern Bahr El Ghazal and Warrap, as their reasons for flight.

"Many children have lost one or both of their parents, some forced to become primary caregivers to siblings."

Smaller numbers have been fleeing to Kenya, DRC and CAR since the return to conflict in July. About 300 people a week have been crossing into Kenya, citing insecurity, economic instability and drought and reporting that the flight corridor between Torit and Kapoeta remains dangerous due to armed bandits. Kenya has over 90,000 South Sudanese refugees.

DRC is experiencing an influx into Ituri province close to the border with South Sudan and Uganda. An estimated 40,000 South Sudanese refugees are said to be in the country.

UNHCR field staff report that new arrivals are camped in schools and churches, while the less fortunate sleep in the open. Refugees lack food and basic household items.

An estimated five per cent of the children are unaccompanied, and many women and girls said they were sexually assaulted during their flight. Early this month, refugees near the city of Doruma (Haut-Uele province) were attacked, their food rations stolen, and a health centre looted by unknown attackers.

Insecurity in South Sudans Central Equatoria has also significantly affected UNHCRs ability to access and assist thousands of refugees inside South Sudan itself. In Lasu settlement, some 40 kilometres south of Yei, nearly 10,000 refugees from DRC, CAR and Sudan have not received their monthly food rations since late June this year.

Without further funding and support, we and our partners will struggle to assist the needy with even the most basic assistance. UNHCR is calling on donors to provide US$701 million for South Sudan refugee operations, of which 20 per cent has been funded.
President of the General Assembly Mogens Lykketoft, President of the General Assembly Peter Thomson, UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, and UNHCR High Commissioner Filippo Grandi attend UNHCR WithRefugees petition handover at UN General Assembly.  Slaven Vlasic/Getty Images/UNHCR

NEW YORK  UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today received a petition  #WithRefugees  from UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, signed by more than 1.2 million people expressing solidarity with millions of people across the world driven from their homes by conflict and persecution.

Taking receipt of the appeal at the UN General Assembly in New York, together with Assembly President Peter Thomson, Ban noted the global scope of support for refugees.

"We cannot let innocent people be buried by indifference, said Ban, who noted he too had to flee when he was only six years old. We cannot let indifference condemn families to tragedy, he added. We stand with refugees.

Powered by compassion this global solidarity for refugees has mobilized thousands of volunteers and ordinary people to reach out and help those fleeing war or persecution, Ban said previously. Their actions and their voices have countered messages of intolerance and hate.

Powered by compassion this global solidarity for refugees has mobilized thousands of volunteers."

The appeal was delivered by UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi, together with refugees and prominent UNHCR supporters in a symbolic gesture just days before the UN Summit on Refugees and Migrantson September 19.

The petition calls on representatives of the 193 governments attending the Summit to make sure all refugee children can go to school; that all refugees have a safe place to live and that all refugees can work and contribute to their local community.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon receives the UNHCR WithRefugees petition.

The #WithRefugees petition is about compassion and solidarity. And its about standing together with people who have left everything behind  except their hopes, dreams, and determination, Grandi said.

We need governments to stand #WithRefugees too  and to pledge to work together so that all refugees can find a place of safety; can learn, work and flourish; and can find solutions that allow them to build a secure future, he added.

The petition comes at a time when wars and persecution have driven more people from their homes than at any time since UNHCR began keeping records. At the end of 2015, 65.3 million people were displaced worldwide, of whom 21.3 million were refugees

The handover featured a live performance by award winning slam poet Emi Mahmoud of her ode to drowned Syrian refugee toddler Alan Kurdi, and a recitation of the petition by UNHCR supporter Ben Stiller, who added his voice to the #WithRefugees petition and campaign.

I met with Syrian, Iraqi and Afghan refugees in Berlin earlier this year and heard their family stories about what forced them to flee their countries. They escaped horrific violence and lost everything, Stiller said earlier. I am honoured to be here today to help underscore the need for governments to take action and find lasting solutions to this global crisis.

We need governments to stand #WithRefugees too  and to pledge to work together."

UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador, model and former refugee Alek Wek also spoke.

There is no doubt that I would not be where I am today if people had not stood with me when I was a refugee, Wek said prior to the ceremony. The #WithRefugees campaign demonstrates that people all over the world want to see governments come together and support refugees.

After making history at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Refugee Olympic Team swimmer Yusra Mardini from Syria and runner Yeich Pur Biel from South Sudan also attended, as did resettled refugees living in the United States who spoke in support of the petitions main asks.

The handover was the culmination of a weeks worth of global broadcasts by UN Refugee Agency celebrity supporters on Facebook Live encouraging people in every region to sign the #WithRefugees petition, which will remain active until all its goals are achieved.

These broadcasts were launched by UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador Cate Blanchett premiering a film she produced with Facebook entitled What They Took with Them. Taken from the poem of the same name written by Jenifer Toksvig, it lists things refugees carried with them when they fled, and expresses the trauma when conflict and persecution force people to leave their homes.

The film was also shown at the event, which was broadcast on Facebook Live.
A Facebook user describes her ordeal of living with an abusive brother and a mother who do not support her or stand up for her. The post is now going viral on Facebook.

By India Today Web Desk: This Facebook post reveals the ground reality of our system and society.

Facebook user, Rashi Bhatnagar, wrote a post explaining how her 17-year-old brother harassed her, and her mother is okay with it.

Also Read: 18-year-old sues parents for sharing embarrassing childhood photos on Facebook





Rashi described that her brother, Aryan Bhatnagar, studying in Presidium, Delhi, often abuses and beats her. She called the police one day but her brother escaped and as an elder sister she thought she should not lodge a written complaint against her "own" brother.

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But that did not scare Aryan. A similar incident happened again and Rashi called the police. "As usual he wasn't scared as according to him "it is India, not America" which implies that he can beat me being a male and of course nobody can do anything to him because the police don't care and women helplines in Ghaziabad don't respond, and obviously my mother is always on his side", wrote Rashi in the post.

Also Read: After losing 8-year-old daughter to cancer, mother shares haunting photo to raise awareness



When the police came, Rashi's brother and mother told the police that she was a mentally disturbed person, so the policeman asked Rashi to file a complaint in Indrapuram police station.

She went there and asked for a female officer. Rashi described her situation to Mrs Rawat (the female police officer) who told her "apne bhai ke liye aisa nahi bolte (don't say such things for your own brother)".



"After briefing her with the verbiages that Aryan Bhatnagar uses, she felt the need to take my complaint and as I thought at that time, understood why I feel that I can be raped anytime", the post read.

She told them that "my own brother beats me, my own brother harasses me and my own brother abuses me". She had to narrate her story to different policemen and when she asked Mrs Rawat for a copy of her FIR, she refused in an indirect manner.

Rashi took the matter to the SHO and told him the whole story. He asked Mrs Rawat to let Rashi do the procedures but Mrs Rawat did not stamp the FIR despite the SHO's commands.

"She was trying to fool around just because a girl was forging an FIR against her brother. Isn't women police there to help women in the first place?", she wrote in the post.

When Rashi inquired about the FIR, she was told by a police officer that "jo hoga woh hoga. baar baar questions mat pucho" (whatever has to happen will happen, don't ask questions again)

Rashi claims that the female officer kept her giving misleading information. She told her mother over the phone that she will go back to the house only when "Aryan Bhatnagar is made to understand that he shouldn't hit, abuse, threaten, and harass me just because he is a male".

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After the conversation she had with her mother, Rashi went to Mrs Rawat and told her that she could be in greater trouble now. Mrs Rawat then told her that they were trying to locate Aryan as he had run away. She waited for a response for 3 hours but did not get any response.

"I was crying badly and felt more stressed. me being the victim, rather than being consoled I was being harassed and fooled around."

Rashi in her post said that she has figured out that her brother and mother were right and that in India "you won't be heard here or given any justice for physical and emotional violence".

She talks about the plight of a person who cannot afford a lawyer's hefty fees and has no contacts.

After reaching her apartment, she saw her brother "enjoying himself", so she called the Indirapuram police again but they hung up as soon as they figured out that it was her. She called again and reminded them that the call gets traced to which the policeman replied that they will be there in 15 minutes.

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Half an hour later Rashi called again and this time she was taken aback. "He literally kissed me over the phone, 'mwah beta mwah, abhi aa rahe hai mwah' is what he said," Rashi wrote.

Despite the misbehaviour, she tried to give one last shot and got the reply that the police has other things to do as well. Seven hours later too, no one came to help her.



Here is the post.





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By PTI: London, Sep 16 (PTI) Parents, take note! Engaging in fantasy play could boost creative thinking in your children, a new study suggests.

"We wanted to test whether children who engage in fantasy play are more creative," said lead researcher Dr Louise Bunce of Oxford Brookes University in the UK.

"This is because, theoretically, playing in make-believe worlds requires imagination to conceive of the world differently to its current reality, which is also necessary to think creatively," said Bunce.

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Bunce and her team interviewed 70 children aged four to eight years old to assess the extent to which their fantasy play involved pretending in a way that mirrored real-life, pretending in a way that involved events that were improbable in reality or pretending in a way that involved impossible events.

The children also completed three creativity tasks.

In the first task, children had to think of as many things as possible that were red, in the second task they had to demonstrate as many ways as possible of moving across the room from A-B, then the third task asked them to draw a real and pretend person.

In the first two tasks children received points for the number of responses they gave and how unique those responses were. Their drawings were rated for their level of creativity according to two judges.

As the researchers expected, analysis showed that children who reported higher levels of fantastical play also received higher creativity scores across all three tasks, although the findings were stronger on the first two tasks than on the drawing task.

"The results provide evidence that engaging in play that involves imagining increasingly unrealistic scenarios is associated with thinking more creatively, although at the moment we dont know the direction of this relationship," Bunce said.

"It is possible that children who enjoy fantasy play are subsequently more creative, and it is equally possible that children who are more creative subsequently engage in more fantasy play," she said.

The results provide encouraging evidence for parents and teachers who could consider encouraging children to engage in fantasy play as one way to develop their creative thinking skills, researchers said.

The study was presented at the British Psychological Societys Developmental Psychology Section annual conference in Belfast, Ireland. PTI SAR SAR

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UNICEF Executive Board

The Executive Board is the governing body of UNICEF, providing intergovernmental support and oversight to the organization, in accordance with the overall policy guidance of the United Nations General Assembly and the Economic and Social Council.
Our cover story, written by Executive Editor Damayanti Datta, looks at the effects of this overlooked epidemic affecting such large sections of our population. We examine what has led to the problem and what are the measures needed to combat it.

As we head to work in the mornings, sit back at home for dinner with the family or go out on the weekend for a grocery run, ignoring aches and niggles as routine irritants, a vast majority of Indians are unaware that their bones are slowly being eaten away from within. Vitamin D deficiency has reached epidemic proportions in the country. More than 70 per cent of the population is deficient and another 15 per cent has insufficient quantities of the 'sunshine vitamin' in their bodies.

This is leading to a host of debilitating problems. Vitamin D deficiency can cause osteoporosis and rickets, apart from cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, cancer, infections such as tuberculosis and even depression. In extreme cases, the bones become like butter. A bit of pressure could leave a dent, an awkward twist could lead to a fall and even bending forward could snap the spine. But the symptoms of vitamin D deficiency-being low on energy, unaccounted aches and pains, frequent muscle injuries, longer healing time-are so insidious that they are often brushed aside as regular lifestyle problems, and there is no diagnosis until most of the damage has been done.

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Vitamin D, which is more a hormone than a vitamin, is the only nutrient that is made in the body. It is essential for bone health and is produced when bare skin is exposed to the sun's ultraviolet B rays. While vitamin D deficiency is a pandemic across the western world, particularly in Nordic countries that don't get enough sunshine, what is alarming is that the problem is growing exponentially even in sunny India.

Our march 2013 cover

It's only over the last two decades that Indians have started recording an abysmally low vitamin D status-now reaching 80 per cent across India, according to estimates by the International Osteoporosis Foundation. Though the problem was initially associated with Indian women over 50, even children in the age group of 11 to 15 do not have adequate levels of vitamin D. Doctors and researchers say this primarily comes down to changing lifestyles. Now that we stay indoors or in cars, and get exposed to the sun only when fully clothed, almost no one gets the 10 minutes of direct high sun-on the whole body, between 11 am and 3 pm-needed to produce the vitamin D that is required for good bone health.

In many other countries, where similar lifestyle patterns have reduced exposure to the sun, vitamin D needs are met through fortified food, especially milk, some juices, margarine and breakfast cereals. India, which is slowly waking up to the problem, is currently reviewing a proposal for musculoskeletal diseases to be brought under the National Health Policy of the Union ministry for health. The other big reason for hope is that milk is going to be fortified with vitamin D and A to address malnutrition among the Indian masses. But while these measures may provide some succour, there is no substitute for getting vitamin D directly from the sun.

Our cover story, written by Executive Editor Damayanti Datta, looks at the effects of this overlooked epidemic affecting such large sections of our population. We examine what has led to the problem and what are the measures needed to combat it. As part of her research, Datta got herself tested and found that, like many other urban professionals, she had inadequate, though not deficient, vitamin D quantities in her body. She has been put on a monthly medicine by the doctors.

Though action is needed on various fronts, including raising awareness and government intervention, the solution also lies with us. Good health is the greatest of blessings. Though the grand march of progress has changed our lives dramatically, it is important that we don't become victims to our lifestyle. So let's start by getting some sun.

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Gendry Baratheon, the illegitimate son of Robert Baratheon might make a comeback in the next season of Game of Thrones.

By India Today Web Desk: We last saw Gendry Baratheon, the illegitimate son of Robert Baratheon in the third season of Game of Thrones. Gendry was also a friend of Arya Stark and whom Melisandre tried to send to Dragonstone to be a "royal blood" sacrifice for Stannis, but was eventually set free by Davos and sent on a boat to an unknown destination.

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Loyal fans of GoT believed that he is still alive. And it looks like, he might be seen in Season 7 afterall.

Also read: Death by dogs: The truth behind GoT's Ramsay Bolton's death scene



And we have a reason to believe this. Fan site Watchers on the Wall spotted Joe Dempsie, the actor who plays Gendry, at an airport in Belfast, Northern Ireland, where Game of Thrones films.

So, will he be shooting for GoT soon?

We are sure, there couldn't be a better news for Game of Thrones fans than this.

GoT 7 shoot will start soon. The production of the seven-episode seventh season will be based in Northern Ireland, while additional portions will be filmed in Spain and Iceland.

The premiere of the seventh season is slated for summer 2017 on HBO internationally and on Star World Premiere HD in India.



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School Choice Movement advocates in Texas have recently proposed an education savings account or ESA for students who do not wish to attend public school. The savings account will give parents more freedom of choice regarding their child's education.

They further argued that aside from the freedom of choice, parents can also use the said savings account for other educational purposes, such as home schooling curriculum, tutors, or college credit courses. The more freedom students have in their education, the more opportunities they have further after graduation.

The proposed education savings account or school vouchers were first implemented in 1990 in the Milwaukee Public Schools where parents receive tax money for their child's education. The money which was originally meant to pay for a public school was used to get a private school education.

This proposal was met by strong opposition from public school advocates saying that these educational savings accounts are actually private school vouchers in masquerade. According to the group, these accounts favor private schools more than the students because they get more profit without a strong sense of accountability.

They further argued that a voucher system will just encourage racial, ethnic, social, and religious discrimination. In an argument drafted by the National Education Association or NEA, a strong opponent of the school voucher system, most private schools are religious and vouchers are unconstitutional because they subsidize religious institutions.

"We need to invest in our community schools rather than create a completely separate, parallel system and expand government," argued Charles Luke of the Coalition for Public Schools.

Elgin school district superintendent Jodi Duron supported Luke's argument saying that such system does not really promise more choice but accept students just because they have a school voucher.

The proposal for creating an education savings account for students and other possible school choice legislation will further be discussed by the Senate Committee on Education.
Not a lot of people realize that the past of a celebrity or artist can reveal so much about them. This does not mean this article talks about rumors and ex-boyfriends. It is something better and more valuable. Education plays a key part in a person's life.

Which is why the Duchess of Cambridge, Kate Middleton, studied art history. Born in 1982, the wife of Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, grew up in Chapel Row. It is a village near Newbury, Berkshire, England and Glamour cites that she is one of the many celebrities that went on to do great things. Even though some of it is unrelated to her degree.

At a young age, Kate started her schooling in an English-language nursery school. But she attended the school in Jordan where her father worked for the British Airways in Amman, Jordan. A few years later, she returned to her hometown Berkshire. At four years old, she attended St. Andrew's School. St. Andrew's School is a private school near Pangbourne in Berkshire.

She attended various schools and houses. Kate Middleton attended the Downe House School. It is a boarding school for girls. Later on, she boarded Marlborough College. Marlborough is a co-ed school. It is described as an independent boarding school in Wiltshire.

In 2005, she graduated from the University of St. Andrews in Fife, Scotland. She received her undergraduate Master of Arts degree. She majored in Art History.

Within a year, she took on jobs to support her. She was an accessory buyer with Jigsaw, a clothing line. She also worked during 2011 at Party Pieces. At the same time, she continues to support her family's business.

Now, Kate Middleton is known for her fashion sense. It is called the "Kate Middleton Effect" and she is called as one of the most influential people in the world.

Get to know her as the Duchess in this video below:
A lockout for nearly two weeks has been cut short after Long Island University and protesters have reached an agreement. This comes after about 400 faculty members were locked out of campus for rejecting the school's proposed contract.

The Associated Press reported that a 12-day lockout of professors at Long Island University has ended. This comes after the professors, represented by the Long Island University Faculty Federation, have reached an agreement with the school.

The teachers' contracts have been extended to May 31, 2017, which gives them more time to bargain with the school. About 400 faculty members were locked out of the school before classes started last Sep. 7. Apparently, the professors rejected a proposed contract that would cut salaries for new adjunct teachers while offering each existing faculty member an average raise of 13 percent over five years. Also, the union has confirmed that Long Island University has accepted their proposal to engage as a mediator between both parties.

"Surrounding students with the uncertainty of five more weeks of bargaining, which could still result in a strike -- as has been the pattern in five out of the last six contracts with the Brooklyn faculty union -- is not in the best interests of our students," Gale Haynes, vice president, chief operating officer and university counsel at LIU, said in a statement defending the rejection of the faculty union's proposal last week. "We believe the time to resolve is now and will continue to negotiate in good faith."

According to Kevin Pollitt, a labor relations specialist with New York State United Teachers, via The Nation, this appeared to be the first time that higher education faculty have ever been locked out. He also noted that the school has been putting economic pressure on the faculty, which began with LIU president Kimberly Cline's administration.

Students were also reported to have walked out on the second day of professor lockout, Gothamist reported. They protested the administration's continued lockout of the professors, which they deem as compromising their education and the rights of both students and teachers.
Several universities have faced backlash for naming controversies in the buildings of its campuses. Georgetown University is reportedly seeking to make amends for its historical ties to slavery. The school will be changing the names of two residence halls on campus and will be providing legacy admissions advantages to the descendants of the 272 slaves who were sold to Louisiana plantations in 1838 to fund the university.

Yale, too, made the headlines after a controversial decision of keeping the name of Calhoun College. There were protests about how John C. Calhoun, a 19th-century alumnus and with whom the building is named after, was an ardent supporter of slavery.

There has been a lot of controversy around the name of Calhoun College. It gained new attention last year, though, when protesters on various campuses across the country urged universities to address the legacies of historical figures. John C. Calhoun was a member of Yale's 1804 class. He was a U.S. vice president and senator from South Carolina.

The Wall Street Journal noted, though, that instead of focusing on Calhoun, Yale University should start at the top - with Elihu Yale. Apparently, the philanthropist who helped found the institution was notorious for slave trade.

In a post on its official website, Yale announced that there will be a discussion on naming controversies on Sep. 26, Monday, from 12:00 p.m. to 1:30 p.m. in Rm. 120 of Yale Law School, 127 Wall St. The event is entitled "What's in a Name? The Naming and Symbolism Controversy on University Campuses."

The school has also created the Committee to Establish Principles on Renaming which consists of a select group of leading decision-makers and faculty from universities all over the country. The event will focus on a moderated conversation on naming and symbols on campuses.

Panelists will be from the University of Richmond, University of Texas-Austin, Harvard University, Georgetown University as well as Princeton University. The event will be moderated by John Fabian Witt, chair of the committee.
The assailants also thrashed the victims' boyfriends before tying them up to a tree in the park. They dragged the girls to some nearby bushes and took turns to rape them.

The teens were raped by five youths at a park in the Capital.(Picture for representation)

By Mail Today Bureau: Two girls, aged 17 and 18, out on a walk with their boyfriends at a park in outer Delhi's Aman Vihar area were allegedly gangraped by five youths on Wednesday evening.

The assailants also thrashed the victims' boyfriends before tying them up to a tree in the park. They dragged the girls to some nearby bushes and took turns to rape them.

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On Thursday, the police nabbed four of the suspects based on the description provided by the girls and their boyfriends.

Police said some of the nabbed youths have claimed to be minors and their age has to be verified. One of them is pursuing BA through correspondence whereas the other four are school drop-outs.

The girls belong to the Kirari area and are factory workers. "One of the couples was cosying up when the accused youths approached the two couples and demanded that the girls should oblige them sexually," said a senior police officer.

When the couples objected to their demands, the five youths allegedly began assaulting the girls' boyfriends with sticks, threatening to get them arrested, said the police. A case was subsequently registered under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO) at Aman Vihar police station.

Subsequent raids led to four of the suspects being captured. The accused have allegedly confessed to the crime and have revealed the name of their fifth accomplice who is still absconding.

Reacting to the incident, Congress leader from the area, Pratyush Kant, called for increased police presence. "Few policemen are visible in this part of the Capital. There is an urgent need to review the policing here and install CCTV cameras," said Kant.

ALSO READ:

We were gangraped for 'eating beef', says Mewat woman







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By PTI: New Delhi, Sep 16 (PTI) In a decision which would help students, Delhi High Court today rejected a plea of some foreign publishing houses against the sale of photocopies of their textbooks, saying copyright in literary works does not confer "absolute ownership" to the authors.

Justice Rajiv Sahai Endlaw also lifted a ban on a photocopy shop located at the Delhi University campus from selling photocopies of chapters from textbooks of some international publishers to the students.

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"Copyright, specially in literary works, is thus not an inevitable, divine, or natural right that confers on authors the absolute ownership of their creations. It is designed rather to stimulate activity and progress in the arts for the intellectual enrichment of the public.

"Copyright is intended to increase and not to impede the harvest of knowledge. It is intended to motivate the creative activity of authors and inventors in order to benefit the public," the court said.

The court said the action of making a master photocopy of relevant portions of the books of these publishers "does not constitute infringement of copyright under the Copyright Act".

"If the facility of photocopying were not to be available, they would instead of sitting in the comforts of their respective homes and reading from the photocopies would be spending long hours in the library and making notes thereof.

"When modern technology is available for comfort, it would be unfair to say that the students should not avail thereof and continue to study as in ancient era. No law can be interpreted so as to result in any regression of evolvement of the human being for the better," it observed.

In 2012, a group of publishers, including Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press (UK), Cambridge University Press India Pvt Ltd, Taylor and Francis Group (UK) and Taylor and Francis Books India Pvt Ltd, had moved court alleging that Rameshwari Photocopy Service in DU was infringing their copyright over the text books.

Reacting to the judgement, the publishers in a joint statement said, "it is unfortunate that the courts decision today could undermine the availability of original content for the benefit of students and teachers."

"We brought this case to protect authors, publishers and students from the potential effects on the Indian academic and educational book market caused by the widespread creation and distribution of unlicensed course packs by a copy shop operating from within the premises of the University, where a legitimate and affordable licensing scheme is already in place," the statement said. (More) PTI PPS ABA RKS ARC

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By PTI: From Lalit K Jha

Washington, Sep 16 (PTI) After a brief hiatus due to illness, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton has hit the election campaign trail with new vigor and energy as she announced rolling out detailed plans in 38 different policy areas.

"From now until November 8, everywhere I go I am going to talk about my ideas for our country. You know, my campaign has rolled out detailed plans in 38 different policy areas," she said at an election rally yesterday in North Carolina, which was her first this week.

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"... You see, I have this old-fashioned notion that if you are running for president, you should say what you plan to do, how you are going to get it done and how you are going to pay for it," she said.

Clinton fell ill on Sunday during a 9/11 memorial ceremony in New York where she was seen stumbling limp-legged into her vehicle. She was later detected with pneumonia.

"I tried to power through it, but even I had to admit that maybe a few days of rest would do me good. And Im not great at taking it easy, even under ordinary circumstances. But with just two months to go until election day... sitting at home was pretty much the last place I wanted to be," she said.

"But it turns out, having a few days to myself was actually a gift. I talked with some old friends. I spent time with our very sweet dogs. I did some thinking. The campaign trail doesnt really encourage reflection," she added.

The White House aspirant was quick to turn her attention on criticising the policies of her 70-year-old Republican rival Donald Trump.

"We dont need a president who says the minimum wage is too high. We need a president who knows that Americans deserve a raise to get to a living wage. We dont need a president that wants to take away peoples health coverage. We need a president who wants everyone to have quality, affordable health care," she said amidst applause from the audience.

"We dont need a president who apparently thinks only married people deserve paid leave and only mothers ever stay home with the kids. We dont need someone who rushes out a half-baked plan just weeks before an election after decades of ignoring or putting down working moms. We need a president who has spent years fighting for these issues, who has a plan to support all families in all their various shapes," she said.

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Recalling Michelle Obamas speech at Democratic Convention she said, "The real choice is not between Democrat or Republican. It is about who will have the power to shape our children for the next four years of their lives."

"Its also about the kind of country we want to be and what we want to leave behind for future generations...Are we going to work with our allies to keep us safe? Or are we going to put a loose cannon in charge who would risk everything generations of Americans have worked so hard to build?" she asked. PTI LKJ KIS

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Vinaconex Clean Water Joint Stock Company (Viwasupco) said that the pipeline, which brings tap water from the Da River Water Plant in the northern province of Hoa Binh to Hanoi, was ruptured at Km21+600 on the Thang Long Highway at around 8pm yesterday.

The company discovered the incident during a periodic maintenance of the water pipeline system.

About two hours later, Viwasupco cut off water supply to over 70,000 residential households living in six of Hanois inner districts.

Workers and equipments were immediately sent to the site to repair the pipeline. The pipeline was fixed and the water supply was restored at 12am today.

This is the 19th time a breach has been detected in the Da River pipeline since it began operations in late 2008. The most recent rupture took place on July 11 at Km27+600, also on the Thang Long Highway (the section that passes through Thach That, Hanoi).

Hanois municipal government has reportedly requested a special mechanism for the implementation of a third water pipeline to meet the peoples demands.
In this undated photo provided by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, an18-karat gold toilet is shown in the museum's 14th floor restroom at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York. (photo source: Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum via AP/Kristopher McKay)

The working toilet, cast in brightly gleaming gold, has been installed in a fourth-floor bathroom for the private use of the public, taking the notion of an intimate setting for art to a new level.

The installation, "America," is the first piece that Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan has exhibited since his 2011 retrospective at the Guggenheim.

Starting Friday, it can be used as if an ordinary unisex toilet by the museum's visitors, Katherine Brinson, curator of contemporary art at the museum, told AFP.

Visitors "will have a remarkably intimate and unusual encounter with this particular artwork," she said.

A guard will be posted outside the bathroom door, said the museum, which has refused to put a dollar value on the piece.

Brinson said the work had "many layers, many possible interpretative lenses that one can bring to it."

"One can see the title as a critique but also as idealistic. After all this is a work about creating access and opportunity for all for a very wide public, even though it is this lavish luxury item."
Photo : nasa.gov

The US space agency had already pushed back the launch by a day to Tuesday.

If technicians are able to finish their repairs as planned, Discovery and its six American astronauts will now launch from Florida's Kennedy Space Center at 3:52 pm (1952 GMT) Wednesday, NASA test director Jeff Spaulding said.

The flight to the orbiting International Space Station is the fourth and final shuttle flight of the year, and the last scheduled for Discovery, the oldest in the three-shuttle fleet that is being retired in 2011.
A farmer harvest rice in the Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta.

During the event, representatives of about 30 Vietnamese provinces and cities invited French investment in nearly 60 projects, hoping to raise more than US$7.1 billion in investments.

In the delta alone, Long An Province called for $18.3 million in investments in a food storage centre in the ong Thap Muoi area. Ca Mau Province called for $3.5 billion in investments in Hon Khoai seaport.

Can Tho introduced a hi-tech farming zone project worth $26 million. Con Son tourism complex sought $100 million in investments.

An Giang Province called for investments in a heart hospital and an urban upgrade for a climate change adaptation project.

Truong Quang Hoai Nam, vice vhairman of the Can Tho Peoples Committee, said these were all key projects of the localities.

Nguyen Phuong Lam, deputy director of the Viet Nam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI)s Can Tho branch said the delta is the largest agricultural production region of the country, accounting for more than 40 per cent of agricultural yield nationwide.

Rice and aquacultural products from the region each represented roughly 56 per cent of national yields.

The Mekong Delta region also contributed significantly to some of the countrys value chains with export values exceeding $1 billion, such as rice, tra fish and shrimp exports.

Lam said the Delta, with it population of 17-million-people, was worth investing in because of its proven track record of economic growth and good investment climate with proper infrastructure.

The Mekong Delta is also one of the regions impacted most strongly by climate change, which has opened up significant investment opportunities for foreign businesses.

Nicolas Du Pasquier, chairman of the French Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Viet Nam, said France could share important experience coping with climate change with local provinces and cities.

CIRAD, a French research institute in Viet Nam, has already helped the Delta improve catfish cultivation.

According to VCCI Can Tho, France currently ranks 16th among 116 countries and territories investing in Viet Nam, with 469 projects and a total investment capital of $3.43 billion.

As of September, there are 22 French projects in the Delta, with a combined registered capital of nearly $115 million.

Entrepreneurs from 50 Vietnamese businesses and 20 French companies, plus representatives from the French cities of Brest, Choisy-le-roi, Rennes and Le Grand Perigueux, attended yesterdays seminar.

The seminar was part of the 10th Viet Nam  France co-operation conference which opened Wednesday and ends today.

Deputy Prime Minister Vu uc am told attendees Viet Nam would create more favourable conditions for French businesses to invest in the country.
By PTI: against each other

New Delhi, Sep 16 (PTI) India and Nepal today committed that they will "not allow" their territory to be used against each other and also agreed to set up an oversight mechanism to review the progress of economic and development projects on regular basis.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal earlier held talks on several areas of partnership between the two countries.

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In a joint statement issued by the two sides later, they gave various details related to strengthening of ties.

"They stressed the need to ensure that the open border, which has facilitated economic interaction and movement of people and goods on both sides of the border and has been a unique feature of India-Nepal bilateral ties, is not allowed to be misused by unscrupulous elements posing security threats to either side," it said.

The Nepali side also reiterated its support for Indias candidature for permanent membership of the UN Security Council.

"Both sides also agreed to set up an oversight mechanism comprising senior officials from the Indian Embassy in Kathmandu and the Government of Nepal, which will review progress together with respective project implementing agencies/developers of ongoing economic and development projects on a regular basis, and take necessary steps to expedite their implementation," it said.

The Prime Minister of Nepal shared with his Indian counterpart the efforts made by the present government to take all sections of Nepali society on board for effective implementation of the constitution.

"The Prime Minister of Nepal thanked the government and people of India for their goodwill, support and solidarity in Nepals peace process," it said, adding, "Both sides agreed to hold the next session of the India-Nepal Joint Commission in 2016."

The two Prime Ministers stressed on the need for early development of infrastructure at integrated check posts (ICPs) to facilitate smooth and faster movement of people and goods.

"They noted with satisfaction the progress in construction of ICPs at Raxaul and Jogbani, and agreed that work on the Raxaul-Birgunj ICP project will be expedited with the objective of completing it by December," the joint statement said.

The two Prime Ministers reviewed the progress made in implementation of the two ongoing India-Nepal cross-border rail-link projects and agreed that both sides will take further measures necessary for expeditious completion of both the projects.

Both sides agreed that steps will be initiated to facilitate development of three other agreed cross-border rail-link projects so that the land acquisition can commence on the Nepali side. (MORE) PTI KND MPB KND NSD SC NSD

--- ENDS ---

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NA Chairwoman Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan. - VNA/VNS Photo An ang

According to the proposal, tax reduction and exemption would be applied not only to farmers but also to other individuals or entities in order to encourage people and businesses to take part in large-scale agricultural production and rural development.

At present, the total tax reduction and exemption for agricultural land use is worth VN7 trillion (US$318 million), the report said.

The lawmakers agreed that the tax exemption was a good policy because farmers incomes were unstable and low.

However, many deputies urged the Government to review agricultural land use, especially forestry farms, by State entities.

NA Vice Chairman o Ba Ty said many farms misused the forest land areas allocated to them, including cases of farm heads illegally transferring the land for personal gain.

The Government should carefully check situation and consider whether to offer tax exemption to such farms, said Ty.

NA Vice Chairwoman Tong Thi Phong and Chairman of the Economic Committee Vu Hong Thanh said sanctions should be applied in cases of agricultural land misuse.

Report on Formosa, East Sea

Viet Nams lawmakers also instructed the Government to report to them on the Formosa steel plants activities to remedy the shortcomings that resulted in a mass fish killing and environmental disaster in April.

The legislatures also asked that the reports, to be presented at the upcoming National Assembly session scheduled to open on October 20, address the Government policy in light of the recent decision by the Hague international tribunal on the East Sea.

NA Chairwoman Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan said the Government must prepare the reports well, as the lawmakers requested.

She said We could not put it off any more. The NA must know all issues affecting to the country.

Speaking at a meeting of the National Assembly Standing Committee (NASC), deputy Phan Xuan Dung, chairman of the NA Science and Environment Committee that has been monitoring the Formosa disaster, said his committee had proposed to the Government and the NA that the company be allowed to resume operation once it complies with its commitments on the treatment of waste.

The chairman of Finance and Budget Committee, Nguyen uc Hai, said the report should discuss how to allocate Formosas compensation money to those affected and the progress of the firms environmental commitment implementation .

Deputy Ha Ngoc Chien, chairman of the NAs Ethnic Affairs Council, said the report was required because this issue was a big concern for voters.

Chien also asked for a report on the East Sea situation after the ruling by the international arbitration on the Philippines petition against China.

Many issues were considered sensitive but they were just reported briefly. I thought this would limit the role of the NA, said Chien.

Both deputies and voters need to know important issues of the country, he added.
US President Barack Obama was to address the first day of the Our Oceans meeting where representatives of some 90 countries will meet environmental experts and activists. (Photo: AFP/Olivier Douliery)

Obama addressed the first day of the Our Ocean conference, where ministers and envoys from some 90 countries met with environmental experts to announce conservation measures.

Building on two previous annual meetings, delegates brought plans to protect the marine environment from pollution, overfishing and the effects of climate change.

And they heard Obama's announcement of the 4,913-square-mile (12,725-square-kilometre) Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument.

This is an area in the Atlantic off the coast of New England with three deep undersea canyons and five submerged mountains, home to rare deep-sea coral and whales.

Commercial fishing will be restricted in the area, where scientists have warned that warming ocean temperatures are a threat to stocks of salmon, lobster and scallops.

"I grew up in Hawaii. The ocean's really nice there," Obama said. "If we're going to leave our children with oceans like the ones that were left to us, then we're going to have to act, and we're going to have to act boldly."

The new reserve follows Obama's recent expansion of the huge Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument off Hawaii, and 20 other countries are to declare new areas.

"These are problems we can solve. And part of the power of conferences like this is to insist on human agency, to not give in to hopelessness," Obama said. "Nature's actually resilient if we take care to just stop actively destroying it. It'll come back."

Britain was one of the first to show its hand, announcing a plan to double the area of protected ocean around its far-flung overseas territories.

Fully protected marine reserves are to be set up around the Pitcairn Islands in the South Pacific and St Helena, Tristan da Cunha and Ascension in the South Atlantic.

The plans impose a permanent ban on commercial fishing in an additional one million square kilometres (386,100 square miles) of ocean, according to Britain's Foreign Office.

Meanwhile, the Global Environment Facility, the Wildlife Conservation Society, the Blue Moon Fund and the Waitt Foundation announced US$48 million to help developing countries create and expand tropical marine reserves.

Delegates hope that by 2020, 10 per cent of the world's oceans will become protected reserves, with fishing and oil exploration banned or tightly restricted.

And American movie star Leonardo DiCaprio unveiled a new crowd-sourced technology, Global Fishing Watch, to help concerned people track illegal fishing by satellite.

OCEAN PROTECTION

The conference was hosted by US Secretary of State John Kerry, who hopes the Our Ocean summits that he pioneered will continue after he leaves office next year.

The first Our Ocean summit was held in Washington in 2014, followed by Valparaiso in Chile last year. Next year's meeting will be hosted by the European Union.

"I think Kerry will continue to be a champion of the oceans because this is his strong passion," UN Environment Program executive director Erik Solheim told AFP. "But they have also institutionalised it, the EU and Malta will host it next time ... This is gaining speed in so many different ways now."

Kerry recalled that at the previous summits, nations from across the world committed to designate over six million square kilometres (2.3 million square miles) of ocean.

Kerry said over two days the delegates would announce 120 preservation projects and US$2 billion in new funding to protect more than two million square kilometres of sea.
There is an increasing risk that Viet Nam's public debt will exceed a national red line, the Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI) said in its latest report.- Photo cafef.vn

This announcement followed mid-year reports from the Ministry of Finance, which said that the ratio of public debt was close to the National Assembly-set ceiling of 65 per cent of the country's gross domestic product (GDP).

In Viet Nam, public debt includes Government debt, debts underwritten by the Government, and debts incurred by provincial and municipal authorities.

Government debt alone, which is domestically and internationally incurred by the Government and the finance ministry, exceeded a cap of 50 per cent of GDP.

The Voice of Viet Nam (VOV) reported that the inefficient use of the State budget nationwide exposed the risk for public debt.

The VND12 trillion (US$533.33 million) Ninh Binh fertiliser plant of the Viet Nam National Chemical Group in nothern Ninh Binh Province was struggling with annual losses of VND2 trillion.

Operations at the VND7 trillion Dinh Vu polyester factory, in which the Viet Nam Oil and Gas Group held a controlling stake, halted more than a year after it went on stream in 2014. The facility in the northern Hai Phong City remains idle now.

Ha Noi's VND8.77 trillion Cat Linh  Ha Dong elevated railway project was expected to be completed last year, yet it has not come into operation even with a hike of nearly VND7 trillion in investment capital.

Investment capital in a project to expand National Highway 5 in the capital city has nearly doubled from VND3.53 trillion to VND6.66 trillion, due to a delay of up to six years in implementation progress.

"Implementation costs doubling or trippling initially-estimated levels show inefficiency in public investments. Misspending has caused public investments less reliable," economist Pham Chi Lan told VOV.

The finance ministry also said that there are about 7,000 unnecessary vehicles allocated for civil authorities nationwide. For example, there are some 170 redundant vehicles at the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, and nearly 60 similar units at the Ministry of Industry and Trade.

Many ministries, sectors and localities still proposed new vehicle purchases, however.

State enterprises

The State Audit Office of Viet Nam reported last year that many enterprises with State capital still suffered business losses over the last few years.

Among them were the Viet Nam National Shipping Lines, which lost on average VND3.4 trillion every year, and PetroVietnam Construction Corporation, whose annual losses averaged VND3.5 trillion.

Industry insiders said the Government still regularly assists these firms either with capital supplements, or debt wiping, or swap-moves that require it to issue bonds and cause public debt hikes.

Nguyen Duc Kien, Vice Chairman of the National Assembly's Economic Committee told VOV: "In a normally operating economy, enterprises pay debts themselves. Still in the developing domestic economy where businesses need flexible conditions to develop, the Government must guarantee their loans while they are responsible for debt payment."

The latest MPI data revealed that State budget revenues totaled VND603.70 trillion, while budget spending reached VND715.20 trillion in the first eight months of this year. This meant that overspending amounted to VND111.30 trillion in the period.

Economic uncertainty

Bui Ngoc Son, from the Institute for World Economics and Politics, told VOV that budget collection was likely to miss targets in a context that economic growth prospects remained uncertain.

He hinted at situations where the country had to use new loans to cover old debts in recent years.

Economist Ngo Tri Long said Viet Nam must closely control borrowing sources while enhancing transparency in public investments. It will be vital for the country to crack down on corruption and misspending, he added.

This issue has clearly been recognised at the highest levels, yet whether drastic actions will be taken remains "to be seen", he reportedly said.

The Prime Minister said in a recent directive that Viet Nam will temporarily halt granting Government guarantees for loans to new projects next year to ensure a secure level of public debt. Government-backed loans were gradually tightened this year.

National Assembly deputies speaking at a legislature session in Ha Noi in July urged the strengthening of financial discipline in the wake of official reports showing a rise in the budget overspending as well as shortcomings in budget operations.

"The Government has made commitments to ensure public debt sustainability and to rebuild fiscal buffers. It is important that this commitment is now followed through with concrete actions to balance the budget over the medium term," said Sebastian Eckardt, lead economist for the World Bank in Viet Nam at a July meeting.

"Efforts to rein in fiscal imbalances will have to be balanced with reforms to create fiscal space to maintain investments in critical infrastructure and public services," he said.
Vietnamese tra fish exports and many other Siluriformes fish products have had to struggle with the USDA's final inspection rule.- Photo vov.vn

The move follows a message sent to the National Agro, Forestry and Fisheries Quality Assurance Department (NAFIQAD) by the US Department of Agriculture (USDA)'s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), reporting a number of regulations relevant to the export of Siluriformes fish to the United States.

FSIS is conducting an evaluation of the Vietnamese food safety control system on Siluriformes fish. Once completed, FSIS will consider adding new businesses to the list of qualified exporters.

According to the United States' 2014 Farm Bill, which came into effect in March this year, catfish exports will fall under the regulatory jurisdiction of FSIS and not the US Food and Drug Administration.

Under the bill, Vietnamese tra fish exports and many other Siluriformes fish products have had to struggle with the USDA's final inspection rule.

The final regulation, released by FSIS, will be applied on both locally raised and imported Siluriformes fish.

From March 2016, an 18-month transitional implementation period for both domestic and international producers will begin. Therefore, FSIS's regulations will be wholly applied from September 2017.

During the 18-month transitional implementation period, FSIS will only allow those Vietnamese businesses to be added to the list that previously exported Silurifomes fish products to this market.

Director of NAFIQAD Nguyen Nhu Tiep said FSIS required all businesses processing Siluriformes fish products for the United States market, from slaughtering, filleting, freezing to packaging, to have their names included on the list of businesses eligible for export to the North American country, released on the FSIS website.

Tiep said NAFIQAD had sent a proposal asking FSIS to avoid applying this rule for all Vietnamese processing units, instead making it applicable only for those businesses that were executing the final processing phase before exporting the fish products to the United States. As for the remaining units, NAFIQAD would be in charge of examining and certificating food safety conditions.

While waiting for the FSIS's reply, NAFIQAD said processing businesses and exporters should buy Siluriformes fish products from units which had already been included on the eligible list released on the FSIS website.

Viet Nam, currently, has 60 businesses eligible for exporting Siluriformes fish products to the United Stated, mentioned on the FSIS website.
Residents gather to clean up a flooded street in Xiamen, China's eastern Fujian province after Typhoon Meranti made landfall on Sep 15, 2016. (Photo: AFP)

The storm, described by the official Xinhua news agency as the world's strongest typhoon this year and the worst to hit Fujian province since records began in 1949, had killed seven people by Friday morning, the civil affairs ministry said in a statement.

Another nine people were missing and more than 330,000 residents had been relocated, it added. The typhoon, which had earlier skirted the southern tip of Taiwan, made landfall in Xiamen early Thursday packing winds of around 170kmh and bringing downpours across the province, said the statement.

Flooding destroyed an 871-year-old bridge that was a protected heritage site in Yongchun county, Xinhua reported Friday.

At one point more than 3.2 million homes had their electricity cut off and water supplies for many communities in Xiamen were disrupted, it added. The storm had weakened to a tropical depression on Friday.
Audience will have chance to experience the Korean clubbing scene and culture as the two famous DJs will be spinning the night with their greatest mixes.

The event will also attract the participation of Vietnamese DJs, including Trang Moon.

SODA came to Hanoi for the first time in 2015 and thrilled her fans with remix hits such as Talk Dirty and New Thang.


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By PTI: New Delhi, Sep 16 (PTI) As Nepal grapples with a fractious political transition, India today conveyed to its new Prime Minister that its Constitution should be implemented by accommodating aspirations of all sections and also pledged support to rebuild its infrastructure. After wide-ranging talks between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal, the two sides inked three pacts including one on India extending USD 750 million for Nepals post-quake reconstruction and another on laying of roads by India in Terai region. Nepals economy was wrecked by last years devastating quake. The decisions assume significance amidst Chinas growing efforts to expand its influence over Kathmandu. Modi and Dahal, who is popularly known as Prachanda, had extensive discussions on the political situation in Nepal and decided to ramp up trade, improve rail and road connectivity and ensure speedy completion of major infrastructure projects being implemented by India in Nepal. Dahal, who is here on his first visit abroad after becoming Prime Minister for the second time, said his government was trying to "bring everyone on board" in implementing the new Constitution some provisions of which have been strongly opposed by the Madhesi community, mostly of Indian-origin.

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The Madhesis have been saying that certain provisions in the Constitution will politically marginalise it. The prolonged protests and economic blockade by Madhesis few months back had triggered tensions between Nepal and India.

"You have been a catalytic force of peace in Nepal. I am confident that under your wise leadership, Nepal will successfully implement the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating the aspirations of all sections of your diverse society," Modi told Dahal during a joint media interaction after the talks.

Nepal has been battling uneasy political transition in the last few months. KP Sharma Oli had to quit the post of Prime Minister in July following fresh political turmoil due to protest of Madheshi community against the new Constitution.

On his part, Dahal said, "You are aware that my government has made serious efforts to bring everyone on board as we enter the phase of implementation of the Constitution in the interest of all segments of Nepalese society."

Modi said as immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability and economic prosperity (Shanti, Sthirta aur Samrudhi) of Nepal is "our shared objective."

He further said, "We share our burden during difficult times, just as we celebrate each others achievements. Indeed, our friendship is time-tested and unique.

"As immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability, and economic prosperity of Nepal is our shared objective. At every step of Nepals development journey and economic progress, we have been privileged to be your partner."

Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar said India has agreed on what would constitute next line of credit and heeded to a request by Nepal to increase granting Rs 3 lakh instead of Rs 2 lakh in building 50,000 houses in quake devastated regions of the Himalayan nation. MORE PTI MPB GSN

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Fishermen living along the Tonle Sap river and the Mekong tributary system are increasingly concerned for their livelihoods, as fish catches have dropped drastically in the past decade.

Each year the Tonle Sap lake  known as the beating heart of Cambodia  gives life to one of the worlds most productive water ecosystems as the lake swells to several times its dry season size.

But many living along the river that snakes south of the lake and support themselves through fishing now say they are unable to support themselves as they once could.

Eng Kim Chhour, head of the fishing community in Kompong Svay district, Kampong Thom province, says in the three decades in which he has fished from the river things have never been so bad.

Before I could find from 50 to 60 kilograms [of fish], some days it reached 100 [kilograms]. These days, I can find only 4 or 5 kilograms. Prices of goods has increased; we dont really earn enough and our kids are growing and have to attend school, he said.

Four of his children have already migrated to Phnom Penh to find work as maids.

According to a report by the Global Nature Fund, the Tonle Sap is considered one of worlds the most threatened rivers.

The lake is a major source of protein for Cambodians, but human activities such as the use of poisons, explosives and electric fishing techniques, and the construction of hydropower dams, may have irreversibly damaged the waterways.

Kim Chhour is among 800 other families in Kompong Svay who are suffering the same fate. Many have already let to seek work in the cities and overseas, joining the annual mass migrations of largely undocumented Cambodians who head to Thailand and other countries in the region on the promise of a better life.

Eang Nam, another fisherman from B6 lake, Prek kuy commune, Kampong Cham province has given up fishing and become a Tuk Tuk driver.

If we look at the past 10 years, the amount of fish is very different. Now there is nothing left. Fishermen who cant earn a living emigrate to find another job in Phnom Penh or Thailand, because the fish have all vanished, he said.

I decided to stop fishing because there is no fish. We used to find 10 to 20 kilogram per day, but now we cant even find a single kilogram.

Kim Chhour thinks both man-made and natural factors have played a role in the decline of fishing in the area.

Human factors include the use of tiny webbed cast nets that gather all the fish, including tiny fish he said. One more is that the water keeps going down. Normally, this month as we approach [the national holiday] Pchum Ben, the water would reach three or four meters in depth. But now its not even two meters.

Nao Thuk, a secretary of state at the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, said the government was discussing what we should do in order to maintain the Tonle Saps longevity, as well as to improve the fishery environment.

Tek Vannara, executive director of the NGO Forum, said many factors had led to the downturn, including a reduction in mangrove forests, falling water levels and rising aridity in the lake.

As much as $2 billion of Cambodias annual revenue is generated by the fishing industry, while two-thirds of Cambodians eat fish every day, according to Conservation International.
Civil society groups in Cambodia have called for an environmental impact assessment to be carried out before a highway is built leading into the at-risk Areng Valley.

Prime Minister Hun Sen personally approved the project in August, telling Uk Rabun, the minister of rural development, that construction should begin after the annual monsoon season and would promote tourism in the area.

If there are more tourists visiting there, the loggers would be a bit scared as well. This road is not for you cutting the trees, meaning its for carrying tourists and facilitating the people for medical treatment, he said.

Chhit Sam Ath, country director of the World Wildlife Fund for Nature, said that the road could further endanger at-risk species in the valley.

I think that we should conduct a study on the environmental impact before we begin construction, because we ... dont want that road to have an impact on the environment and forest or wildlife, he said.

The valley is rich in flora and fauna, including numerous rare and endangered species.

Local people, however, welcomed the announcement that the road would be built, because it would help them transport agricultural produce to market.

But Ven Vorn, a Chong ethnic minority representative and activist, cautioned that it could also lead to increased illegal logging and other destructive practices.

For our community, we welcome to have a road built and we are happy with the government that provides this road for us. But our concern is that we worry strongly that there will be people seizing this opportunity to cut and transport wood when there is a road, he said.

Sao Sopheap, an environment ministry spokesman, could not be reached.

Bun Leut, the provincial governor of Koh Kong, where the valley is located, said the authorities had received positive feedback from locals when the project was discussed, adding that the local government would work with the Areng communities to ensure environmentally destructive practices were kept to a minimum.

A large hydropower dam project planned for the Areng was shelved by Hun Sen after a prolonged campaign by locals and activist groups.
The US Congress has passed a resolution condemning the Cambodian government for its attacks on the countrys main opposition, saying that if relations between the major parties did not improve, there would be consequences for Prime Minister Hun Sens administration.

Rep. Alan Lowenthal (D-CA) introduced House Resolution 728 on Monday, saying it was intended as a strong message of support for human rights and democracy in Cambodia.

Thats why it is so important for us to pass this resolution and show that the United States stands with the people of Cambodia. We will send an important signal to the Cambodian government that political violence of any kind will not be tolerated and the Cambodian people must be able to enjoy the freedom to choose their own leaders. Only under these conditions can elections in Cambodia be considered free and fair by the international community, he said.

In an interview with VOA Khmer on Tuesday, Lowenthal said if the government ignored the resolution and did not institute major reforms, stop persecution against the opposition, there would be consequences, without elaborating on what they might be.

Prior to the passing of the resolution, members of congress took to the floor to speak on issues affecting Cambodia, such as the targeting of the leadership of the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party by the courts.

Republican Ed Royce, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, said that since deeply flawed elections in 2013, there had been significant attacks on those Cambodians peacefully opposing their government.

Republican Ed Royce, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, said that since deeply flawed elections in 2013, there had been significant attacks on those Cambodians peacefully opposing their government.

Hun Sens thuggish regime continues to crack down on his political opposition and other activists, arresting and beating those who oppose his rule. As noted in this resolution, Freedom Houses most recent report rated Cambodia as Not Free, noting restrictions on  and harassment of  the governments political opposition, he said.

Last year, opposition lawmaker and U.S. citizen Nhay Chamreoun was attacked by men later linked to Prime Minister Hun Sens Bodyguard Unit, who repeatedly assaulted him outside the gates of parliament.

In July, Kem Ley, a popular Cambodian political commentator, was murdered in broad daylight.

Hun Sen took yet another step to consolidate his grip on power, sentencing the de facto leader of the Cambodia National Rescue Party, Kem Sokha, to five months in prison on the spurious charge of refusing to appear for questioning in a politically motivated case that was brought against him, Royce said.

This systematic persecution of the governments opposition completely undermines the legitimacy of upcoming local elections, as well as the countrys 2018 national elections. Without the full and free participation of the CNRP, future elections will be deeply flawed and cannot be accepted. Hun Sens continued attack on his political opponents is something we simply cannot accept.

Hun Sen has since said that he could use the armed forces to crackdown on a planned opposition demonstration, while a senior general said the military was ready to arrest Kem Sokha  who has been holed up in the part headquarters since May  if ordered.

Phil Robertson, deputy director of Human Rights Watch, told VOA Khmer that it was time for Prime Minister Hun Sen to recognize that his game of trying to exterminate the opposition through the use of intimidation, the control of security forces, the control of the court is being seen by the international community a further distention to the dictatorship in Cambodia.

Prom Saonora, honorary president of the Cambodia-America Alliance (CAA), which lobbied for the resolution to be passed, said that if the upcoming elections in 2018 were viewed by the United States as illegitimate, there could be moves in Congress to limit economic cooperation with Cambodia.

Im not sure what that would take until we have full discussion of that issue. We are hoping that the prime minister will follow what was agreed upon by both the CNRP and the CPP. But if he doesnt, I will tell you that there will be consequences.
By PTI: New Delhi, Sep 16 (PTI) It was an attempt by a CSIR laboratory to make wine from tea in order to avoid wasting over-grown tea leaves, but the technology is now in demand in Mozambique where it will be replicated using local tea leaves.

The Institute of Himalayan Bio-resource Technology (IHBT), a laboratory of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), has recently signed a MoU with a company from Mozambique under which the technology will be transferred to the company.

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"The company, which is owned by a person of an Indian origin, will make wine from tea found locally. Our scientists will go to the African nation to set up machines," IHBT Director Sanjay Kumar said.

Improving tea production in Kangra region of Himachal Pradesh and value addition to tea are the focus areas of IHBT.

The tea produced in the Himalayan state is also known as Kangra tea. Like the Darjeeling tea, Kangra tea is also famous whole leaf orthodox tea available in the country.

"Tea is a very labour intensive crop. The tender apical bud and subtending two leaves are picked at the right stage by trained pluckers and processed in the factories to give the famous Kangra tea," Kumar said.

He said, during the recent years, tea plantations are faced with labour shortage due to which there is delay in plucking of tea shoots, thereby hampering the quality of the leaves.

This delay of two-three days in plucking produces less succulent overgrown tea shoots severely affecting the processing of orthodox black teas, thus, lowering the tea quality and severely affects the economy of the tea plantations, he said.

"To overcome the problem of un-remunerative low grade made teas, the Institute has come up with value addition of these teas by processing them into tea wines," Kumar said.

He said the institute has further made wines using tea with local fruits/berries having health benefiting properties.

"In our technology portfolio we have tea wines (from only tea) and tea herbal wines (tea with local fruits). The wines take a little more than a year for processing. The wines can be made sweet or dry on demand. The alcohol content can also be varied," Kumar said. PTI PR SMN

--- ENDS ---
While Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton pack thousands into campaign rallies, candidates in small communities across America are finding more personal ways to reach out to voters. VOAs Katherine Gypson travels to rural Maine to find out why a handshake is sometimes better than a speech.
Al-Shabab militants have captured a key Somali town near with the border with Kenya, according to witnesses.

Residents in El Wak told VOA's Somali service that heavily armed Shabab fighters attacked the town from two directions late Friday and now control it.

"The soldiers were attacked by al-Shabab; government forces were overpowered," said a resident who declined to give his name due to security concerns.

Witnesses say at least four people  among them two government soldiers and two civilians  were caught in crossfire near a military base and killed.

Immediately after entering El Wak, Shabab fighters attacked the government base on the southern side of the town. Witnesses say they saw Somali government soldiers fleeing across the border into Kenya.

Fighting subsided as night fell and civilians stayed indoors. Al-Shabab "battle wagons"  pickup trucks with large guns mounted on the back  were reportedly patrolling the town.

"No one can step outside; we dont know how long they will stay in the town," another resident said of the militants, speaking to VOA on condition of anonymity.

Witnesses say the Shabab force consists of about 200 fighters with a dozen battle wagons.

The towns telecommunication network was disconnected earlier Friday. Residents blame al-Shabab for taking down the phone network.

El Wak is a strategic town and a main supply route for Kenyan troops operating in southwestern Somalia. Al-Shabab lost the town in 2011 to Somali government forces.
U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter presented flags Friday to the families of two men who never joined the U.S. military - but died fighting the Islamic State group in Syria - after their bodies returned to Colorado on Friday.



The caskets of Levi Shirley, 24, Jordan MacTaggart, 22, along with that of William Savage, 27, arrived Wednesday at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport after a complicated journey back to the U.S. without ceremony.



From there, Shirley and MacTaggart arrived by train in Denver, while Savage was being transported to North Carolina, where his father lives.



In Denver, the bodies were delivered to their sobbing loved ones in plain, gray caskets. A team of pallbearers unloaded the caskets from an Amtrak train and lifted them into hearses as sleepy passengers watched curiously.



"Though they did not fight as members of our armed forces, they are Americans and as Americans we have a responsibility to bring these young men home and to give the families relief and closure,'' Perlmutter said in a statement.



The men died separately in combat after joining the People's Protection Units, the main Kurdish guerrilla group battling the Islamic State in Syria.



Turkey's tense relationship with the Kurds and the U.S. since July's failed coup stalled efforts to bring the men home.



The remains of Keith Broomfield of Massachusetts, believed to be the first American to die alongside Kurds fighting Islamic State, were returned to the U.S. through Turkey last year.



But Kurdish groups determined it would be too dangerous to repatriate the bodies of Shirley, MacTaggart and Savage through Turkey and instead shipped them hundreds of miles east to Iraq. The bodies were then flown to Amman, Jordan, and on to Chicago.



Susan Shirley said she worked with the State Department to bring her son's body home, and her friends contacted Perlmutter to help navigate the frustrating terrain. He enlisted aid from people at the White House.



"It took extraordinary measures by many people to get these men from Syria to the U.S., especially given the ever-changing and dangerous geopolitical dynamics in the Middle East,'' Perlmutter said. "It seems we are in the final stages of this long and sad situation.''



Susan Shirley said her son was in Syria "as an American to protect Americans.''



But unlike fallen members of the armed forces, the young men had no military escorts to accompany their caskets and no 21-gun salute.



Still, Susan Shirley said she appreciated the homecoming for her son and extended her condolences to families that have lost military members in action.



"You can do all the pomp and circumstance you want, but those families aren't getting their sons back, either,'' Shirley said.



Veterans groups said they had no problems with the honors planned for the three men.



"They went to fight for the right side,'' said Joe Davis, spokesman for the national Veterans of Foreign Wars. "You can't fault a state for honoring their own.''



Shirley, of Arvada, Colorado, was killed by a land mine July 14. MacTaggart, of Castle Rock, Colorado, died Aug. 3 while fighting in a squad that included two Americans and a Swede in Manbij, Syria.



Savage, of St. Mary's County, Maryland, also died in Manbij on Aug. 10.


Cameroons government says it is clamping down on unlicensed private security firms in an effort to improve public safety and enforce regulations.

It plans to close all but nine of the countrys nearly 50 private companies. The sector's numbers have risen sharply in the two years since the militant group Boko Haram began carrying out attacks in the countrys northern region. Cameroon has an estimated 70,000 private security guards, compared with about 15,000 armed policemen.

The closings could leave tens of thousands of people jobless, authorities say, but they contend the sector has become rife with crime.

Criminal suspects are all too common among the ranks of private security guards, according to Senior Police Commissioner Ossomba Ansleme. He said two guards had been taken into custody as suspects in a rape case being investigated this week in the capital.

Police reportedly still are hunting for five people suspected of attacking Chinese gold miners last week in the town of Ngaoundere. Authorities killed one alleged assailant  and then realized the dead man, and possibly his five peers, had been hired as guards by the victims.

More regulation supported

Kuma Emmanuel, who owns a private security firm, doesnt dispute the need for more regulation.

"We have companies that  just get a truck, open up and then young guys come in," he said. Such firms merely "dress them up as security guards."

A poorly trained guard, he added, "does not know where his powers begin and where his powers end. Obviously, there is a problem. Most of these workers that you see you see putting on uniforms  let me say 80 percent of them have not been trained."

But government inefficiency also was faulted. Some owners said it could take authorities years to process applications for security businesses.

Promoting public safety

The man handling the shutdowns is Issanda Issanda Alain Solomon, the Ministry of Territorial Administrations director of political affairs. He said public safety is the top concern.

He said any well-trained guards losing their jobs because of the closings will find new opportunities with authorized private security companies. The law permits licensed firms to recruit up to 5,000 guards, yet most have 2,000 or fewer.

Issanda Issanda said guards for authorized security companies should wear yellow uniforms.

He dismissed local media criticism that the proliferation of private firms reflected the governments failure to provide adequate security.

In June, the government reported that at least 1,400 people have died in Boko Haram attacks and related fighting. The actual figure is likely higher, as many people die in the bush and are not accounted for.
China said Friday that a Canadian citizen it detained for two years over spying allegations was allowed to leave the country after a local court issued a verdict in his case, but it refused to say what the verdict was or why he was detained at all.

Kevin Garratt's return to Canada was announced Thursday by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who said he had pressed Garratt's case with top Chinese officials.

Garratt had been indicted by prosecutors in Dandong, a city on the North Korean border where he and his wife ran a popular coffee shop and conducted Christian aid work for North Koreans. He and his wife, Julia, were arrested in August 2014 by the state security bureau. While his wife was released on bail, Garratt remained in custody.

China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in a faxed statement Friday, said Garratt had been treated "according to law." It said China "fully guaranteed all kinds of procedural rights of Kevin Garratt, and fully respected and implemented the consular rights of the Canadian side."

But the ministry declined to say what investigators found or what the outcome of the trial was. A person who answered the phone at the court on Friday, a Chinese state holiday, said officials were not available to discuss the case.

Chinese state media have previously reported that authorities found evidence that implicated Garratt in accepting tasks from Canadian espionage agencies to gather intelligence in China.

Courts in China are widely seen as a tool of the ruling Communist Party and issue decisions in line with the government's thinking on a case.

Garratt's release comes as both sides pledged to strengthen economic ties during Trudeau's visit to China earlier this month for the Group of 20 economic summit, and one week before Premier Li Keqiang is to visit Canada for talks with Trudeau.
Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos has publicly acknowledged the government's role in the killings of leftist activists in the 1980s.

During a ceremony at the presidential palace Thursday, Santos apologized to surviving members of the Patriotic Union party (UP). Some wearing shirts with the saying "They can cut the flowers, but they can't stop the birth of spring."

"That tragedy should have never happened and we must recognize that the government didn't take sufficient measures to impede and prevent the assassinations, attacks, and other violations even though there was evidence the persecution was taking place," Santos said in front of 200 survivors and family members of UP.

Some 3,000 people were killed by paramilitary groups during peace talks between the government and UP members in the 1980s, which Colombians frequently refer to as political genocide.

"The persecution of the members of the Patriotic Union was a tragedy that led to its disappearance as an organization and caused untold damage to thousands of families and our democracy," Santos said.

The president's speech comes less than two weeks before he is scheduled to sign a peace accord with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia - FARC. The agreement is the end of a civil war that has killed more than 220,000 people and displaced millions. Some 7,000 FARC fighters will be incorporated into society and permitted to form a political party.

On Monday, FARC rebels apologized for the "great pain" they caused by kidnapping thousands of people to fund half a century of conflict through ransoms.

FARC said in a video recording late Sunday that it had taken captives over the years but would not do so again.

Some 27,000 people were kidnapped between 1970 and 2010, according to official figures. As many as 90 percent of those were seized by the FARC.

The rebel group amassed a fortune from kidnappings, extortion and the drug trade.

The two sides are scheduled to sign the peace agreement on September 26. The deal will then be put to a vote on October 2, allowing Colombians to decide whether to accept the accord.
European Union leaders pledged Friday to create a new road map to reinvigorate the bloc following Britain's vote to leave the union.

The 27 leaders committed themselves to deciding on a clear strategy and practical steps to rebuild trust in the EU when they meet again in six months. That regular summit in early 2017 also will mark the 60th anniversary of the EU's founding treaties.

During Friday's talks in the Slovak capital, Bratislava, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the European Union's current situation was very serious.

Not only the decision by British voters to break away from the EU but other serious problems as well have have contributed to "the critical situation" that confronts the European partners, Merkel said. "We must jointly agree on an agenda" and forge "a working plan to be able to handle the respective issues."

European Union leaders want to come up with a post-Brexit strategy by March, although it is unclear how long it will take Britain to actually exit the union. British Prime Minister Theresa May, who did not attend the summit, is not expected to trigger the process until early next year.

The president of the European Council, Donald Tusk, said the mood among the remaining members of the political and economic alliance was "sober but not defeatist." He said the bloc wanted to "correct the past mistakes and move on with new solutions."

However, despite those pledges to arrive at a plan to move forward, disagreements continued over how to handle the influx of refugees into Europe.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, one of the most critical voices on the issue, said there should be no more "lawmaking tricks" from EU institutions, such as the European Parliament's move to require member states to accept refugee resettlement quotas.

EU members also are deeply divided about the economic effects of immigration and asylum issues.

France and Germany, two of the alliance's oldest and most influential members, also pushed Friday for closer EU defense and security collaboration, another subject that has divided the bloc.
As the Islamic State group's arsenal of sophisticated weaponry dwindles, IS fighters are creating more homemade armaments.

Commanders in the battlefield in Iraq told VOA this week that months of separate bombing campaigns by the U.S. coalition, Russian, and Iraqi government planes have wiped out much of the terror group's heavy weapons and equipment that it collected in recent years.

That is forcing IS fighters to turn to these strange weapons, said Jamal Syare, the commander of a Kurdish force on the Khazir frontline north of Mosul.

The weapons are made from gas canisters and thick iron pipes filled with explosives or, sometimes, fertilizers, Syare said, as he looked over a display of the homemade arsenal uncovered by Kurdish forces.

WATCH: IS Turns to Homemade Weapons

Losing territory means no more armories to loot

When IS fighters overran Iraqs second largest city of Mosul in June 2014, Iraqi government forces abandoned their weapons and retreated, giving IS access to huge caches of U.S.-made weapons, including thousands of arms, ammunition and other equipment like Humvees. And as IS made more territorial advances in Iraq and Syria, they seized more weaponry, helping them substantially strengthen their position in their self-proclaimed caliphate.

In the past 10 months, however, IS has lost large swaths of territory and strategic towns in Iraq and Syria without much significant territorial gain, making it hard for the militants to obtain more weaponry through the spoils of war.

Additionally, the U.S-led coalition airstrikes have been consistently pounding IS positions, especially targeting weapons storage areas. The Pentagon this week reported that it destroyed an IS chemical weapons factory in Iraq.

And as a major allied assault looms on ISs Iraq stronghold in Mosul, advancing troops are finding that IS is attacking with more rudimentary  and far less accurate  weaponry such as bombs and mortars made of explosives and nails.

IS fighters are increasingly attacking our frontline with these homemade weapons, said Syare, the Kurdish commander.

The homemade bombs can reach as far as five kilometers but often miss their targets, according to Syare and other Kurdish fighters who spoke to VOA.

Taha Rasul, a Kurdish Peshmerga fighter on the Telskuf frontline, told VOA that the weapons are so inaccurate that they can backfire on IS fighters.

Sometimes the weapons pass us, sometimes they fall near us, and other times they just fall (near) the IS fighters, Rasul told VOA.

Still, the fallout from the blasts can range from annoying to creating some serious injuries, Rasul said.

These weapons can spread a terrible smell or a loud sound when they fell near our frontline, he said.Terrorists are very weakened and they want to prove they still exist by firing these stinky and loud bombs.

Tactics honed during Iraq War

The homemade bombs harken back to a tactic used against U.S-coalition forces by insurgents after the invasion of Iraq in 2003, Kurdish commanders say. IS fighters are learning from their leaders who used to serve as officers during the former Iraqi Ba'ath regime.

No matter how inaccurate, these weapons need some degree of expertise, Syare told VOA. The terrorists are obtaining that expertise from the former Baath generals who play a big role in keeping IS resilient.

While mortar shells made out of gas canisters and pipes often cause minimal damage, IS homemade improvised explosive devices (IED's) can be deadly, according to Syare, who said he has detonated 130 tons of explosives in recent weeks.

IS fighters plant IED's in everything they leave behind, Syare said. Theyve planted explosives in animal corpses, power fuses, cooking pots and anything you can think of. You open a refrigerator and the next thing you see is an explosion.

Syare has been working with a group of U.S. and British advisers to raise awareness among his fellow Kurdish fighters who generally lack knowledge about encountering unconventional IS weapons.

Sometimes the terrorists have planted bombs under a Quran, he alleged. So many Peshmerga have lost their lives picking up the Quran thinking terrorists will not use the book of God for their evil purposes; but, we need to be prepared. We cant trust or touch anything IS leaves behind.
Its a hot day in late summer on a back road in Lewiston, Maine, and first-time candidate Roger Fuller cant be happier. Armed with his bag of campaign leaflets and a big black Sharpie pen for signing personal messages, Fuller is well on his way to his goal of knocking on the door of every one of the 8,000 houses in his district at least three times.

Fullers aim to talk with all of his potential constituents before Election Day is a time-honored political tradition and a reminder that while Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton pack thousands into campaign rallies, candidates in small communities across America have to find personal ways to reach out to voters.

Small-town Maine is a long way from the high-stakes political world of Washington, D.C., but the real work of candidates connecting with voters happens in neighborhoods during county fairs and at all of the hundreds of little events in between that make up the life of a community.

Fuller has had doors slammed in his face and as he winds his way through the neighborhoods, theres often no answer when he knocks.

"There can be long spaces between some of the homes," he says. "But still  going to every home, meeting people, seeing how they live, listening to them, its worth every step."

After 42 years as a teacher, Fuller says it was time to give back to the city that has been so good to him. He doesnt look for houses with any known party identity or affiliation, saying that he wants to talk to all residents about the issues this election season. But he ultimately understands that those discussions may not be as important as the face-to-face contact.

"Politics is personal," he says, repeating an idea that guides every candidate here this election season. "If they know the person, theyre more likely to vote for the person."

Making an impression dripping wet

For Eric Brakey, the youngest state senator in the entire country, the hard work of campaigning is crucially important. Despite his age, he represents a county of mostly older voters. He says the ability to connect with them on a personal level allowed him to overcome the age barrier.

"Look at it on paper," he says, from the storefront office of the Maine Republican Party in downtown Lewiston. "Twenty-five-year old kid. No one has ever heard of him before, hes never been a candidate before, hes never held elected office before  what chance does he have to win a campaign against an incumbent state senator who is very well known?"

The answer, he says, was to knock on doors to dig deep into the issues in his district: the desire for welfare reform and a strong belief in Second Amendment gun rights.

"Once you talk to people, once you are able to discuss some of the issues that they really care about and propose real solutions, I think that really worked to my advantage."

Brakey heads out from the Republican Party offices to travel the back roads of Poland, Maine, planting his blue and white re-election signs on lawns. Just last week, he put out a call to neighbors to volunteer putting together signs and mail campaign literature. So many people answered the call he was able to finish the job in half the time  and now his signs have sprouted everywhere in this small town.

Brakey keeps a good sense of humor about the less serious side of politics. He recently took a turn in the dunk tank at the county fair to support a charity, saying that even soaking wet, "Its always an opportunity for people to see you and say, Oh! Its Senator Brakey  oh, I had an issue. I wanted to call."

Marching in the Potato Blossom Festival

Emily Cain hasnt forgotten her days campaigning for the Maine state legislature. Like Brakey, Cain went through the ritual of knocking on doors in her district. Now that she is running in one of the most hotly contested U.S. congressional districts this election season, she says, "Im trying to take that to a bigger scale."

Today, that means her monthly lunch date at the Franco-American Center in the economically challenged former mill town of Lewiston. The room is filled with members of the aging French-speaking community that has held an important place in Maine history for centuries. But scattered throughout the room are new Somali immigrants who are helping keep that linguistic tradition alive. Its the perfect mix of old and new in a congressional district that spans 11 counties and more than 27,000 square miles.

"I come to this lunch so that I can hear peoples stories," says Cain, as she moves among the tables, hugging and talking, careful not to interrupt the meals of chipped beef, mashed potatoes and sheet cake.

"One of the best parts of American politics is really getting to know someone personally, getting to know their story and where they come from. So these events are not much about me talking at all," she says.

Cain reels off just a few of the places she has been able to connect with voters: milking cows at a farm, drinking a beer at a racetrack, marching in the Potato Blossom Festival parade and handing out prizes at the Whoopie Pie Eating Contest. Shes had voters tell her directly they didnt vote her into the state legislature but would vote her into Congress because they had finally had a chance to meet with her and now trusted her.

These events "are about me listening, answering peoples questions and really trying to get at what they care about," Cain says, "so that when I get to Congress, Im able to tell their story about what really matters right here in Maine."

In these small communities, it is actually possible to meet every single voter and transfer personal moments into campaigning  and these small interactions add up to votes on Election Day.
Sculptures of 40 horses were installed around Rome's Colosseum and along the ancient forum as part of an exhibition exploring migration throughout history.

Technicians started assembling the fragmented figures of "Lapidarium, Waiting for the Barbarians" by Mexican artist Gustavo Aceves, and moving them by crane around the Italian capital's landmarks as darkness fell.

When the city awoke Thursday, the cracked figures made from bronze, wood, granite, marble and iron  some up to 12 meters (40 feet) long  had been set on columns and in deconstructed boats.

Aceves said the work reflected the oppression and violence that led to diasporas and forced migration, with none of the victoriousness often associated with the figure of the horse.

"It speaks about wandering and exile. But, as the backdrop of all this, there is the issue of contemporary migration, the phenomenon that day after day makes victims, so many that they are already impossible to count," Aceves said.

Inspired by Ancient Greek culture, Aceves wanted the boats to recall the journey across the mythological River Styx that separates the land of the living from the dead.

Some of the sculptures are hollow and contain models of human skulls, in a nod to the myth of the final battle of Troy, which Greek soldiers won by smuggling themselves into their enemies' city inside a wooden horse.

The horses, forged in Pietrasanta in Tuscany, were put on show in Berlin last year, and will also go on display in Istanbul, Paris and Venice after the Rome exhibition closes in January.

Aceves is gradually adding to their numbers, and plans to display 100 at the end of the tour in Mexico City in 2018.
With the army having launched Operation Calm Down in South Kashmir the main focus of the intelligence operation is to isolate the ideologues and the trouble makers.

The focus of the mission is to zero in on the leaders and the funders of the agitation, who have been fomenting unrest in the Valley for the last two months.

By Gaurav C Sawant: A massive intelligence operation is being launched in the Kashmir valley to identify and weed out the 'hidden leadership' that has been fomenting unrest for the last two months.

The focus of the mission is to zero in on the leaders and the funders of the agitation. With the army having launched Operation Calm Down in South Kashmir the main focus of the intelligence operation is to isolate the ideologues and the trouble makers, sources said.

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"This is a multi-pronged strategy. At one level access, the access of funds to trouble makers has to be choked. Simultaneously, efforts are being made to ensure the contact between ideologues, handlers and the mischief maker is curtailed especially in rural areas," top sources told India Today.

The 'hidden leadership' of the agitation, according to top sources was identified and prepared in the weeks ahead of Burhan Wani's killing. "Preparations were underway to create unrest.

Separatist leaders in early June had begun travelling to South Kashmir and plans were underway to create unrest.

Rowdy elements at Mohalla level were identified and local leadership made initial payments. The false narrative of victimhood circulated post the killing led to a spiral of violence," said an official.

UNREST PLANNING STARTED BEFORE WANI WAS KILLED

With an initial go-slow against protesters and stone pelters, the hidden leadership was further emboldened and spread itself wider, officials said. Information flow was not directly through the Hurriyat leadership but other channels from across the Pir Panjal. All of that is now being choked with bringing normalcy to rural Kashmir taking centre stage.

The Jammu and Kashmir Police (JKP) also have details about the pivots of the agitation. With the army having moved in to South Kashmir - the State police and the Central Reserve Police will be further strengthened and emboldened to move deeper into villages and curtail the area of operations of the anti-national elements.

Tral, the home of Hizbul Mujahideen terrorist Burhan Wani whose killing in an anti-terror operation led to the current cycle of unrest is being strengthened by the forces in the phase-I of the operation to reclaim the territory.

"The army and the police together had brought peace into the valley, including south Kashmir in the past several years. That is when to reduce army's footprint in civilian areas, several army camps were removed on orders of the state government. That weakened the grid.

Now the army is dominating the terrain,'' says Lt Gen (retd) Ata Hasnain, former Chinar Corps Commander. Whether in Tral or Shopian, Kulgam or pockets of Anantnag the presence of the army will send out a signal both to terrorists and the secret leadership of the current agitation. The army will dominate the area - the police and CRPF will manage crowds. The State government will provide relief as part of the multi pronged strategy.

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"There is a multi-agency operation currently underway to stabilize the valley. The National Investigation Agency (NIA) is probing Naeem Gilani, son of Pro Pakistan Hawk Syed Ali Shah Geelani. The Income Tax Department is probing not only SAS Geelani but several other Hurriyat leaders. Several fake and shell companies are also under the scanner. The police is in control in urban areas and gradually moving back into rural areas too," sources added.

ALSO READ:

Operation Calm Down: Army introduces bullet-proof vehicles to counter Kashmir stone pelters





--- ENDS ---
India and Nepal have put diplomatic relations, that had frayed in the past year, back on track during a visit to New Delhi by Nepal's new prime minister, Pushpa Kamal Dahal, popularly known as Prachanda.



Prachanda's three-day trip to India less than a month after he assumed office is seen as an effort to re-balance ties after his predecessor had steered the tiny Himalayan country closer to its other giant neighbor, China.



Before landing in New Delhi, Prachanda said relations with India had become frosty for some time and he wanted to remove "the bitterness."



New Delhi, which has been concerned about Beijing's growing influence in the strategically located country, took the opportunity to woo Nepal back into its fold.



India's foreign ministry called it a "very warm visit" and said discussions focused on development projects in its landlocked neighbor that remains one of the world's poorest countries.



Agreements signed



Three agreements signed on Friday include a $750 million credit line in aid for reconstruction work relating to the deadly earthquake that devastated Nepal last year. Two others relate to road projects. Discussions were also held on a long rail link from east to west Nepal and power projects.



Indian Foreign Secretary Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said that "a lot of it was really about getting the Nepali economy back on track, getting the reconstruction program moving."



The Nepalese leader also emphasized the need for development in his country. "I am convinced that without economic property, political transformation cannot be sustainable. This has become all the more important for my country."



After meeting his Nepalese counterpart, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi called the friendship "time-tested and unique."



"As immediate neighbors and close, friendly nations, peace, stability and economic prosperity of Nepal is our shared objective," he said.



Relations between the two countries soured after the picketing of the Indo-Nepal border for five months last year by ethnic Nepalese created crippling shortages in Nepal.

Kathmandu said the blockade was mounted with the tacit support of India, which supports the demands of the ethnic community for more representation in the country's new constitution.



As anger with India flared in Nepal, former prime minister Khadga Prasad Sharma Oli signed a series of trade deals with China.



But as New Delhi and Kathmandu restore the bonhomie in their ties after the recent rocky phase, the Nepalese leader spoke of the need to build trust.



"Trust and confidence are the prerequisites of this strong and sustainable, friendly relation and to ensure this we should respect each other's sensitivities and concern in spirit of good neighborliness," said Prachanda.



Rebuilding ties



Political analysts say while rebuilding ties with India, Nepal will also continue to cultivate China, which has invested millions of dollars to help the country build roads, hospitals and other infrastructure. Beijing has made rapid inroads in Nepal in recent years as part of its broader strategy of gaining a foothold in South Asia.



However Nepali media say that Beijing has put off a planned visit by Chinese President Xi Jinping later this year due to lack of progress on Nepal's part on the projects agreed to between the two countries.
The International Criminal Court said Thursday that it will start focusing on crimes linked to environmental destruction, the illegal exploitation of natural resources and unlawful dispossession of land.

The United Nations-backed court, which sits in The Hague, has mostly ruled on cases of genocide and war crimes since it was set up in 2002.

Now, in a move widely hailed by land rights activists, the court said that environmental destruction and land grabs could lead to governments and individuals being prosecuted for crimes against humanity.

The court, which is funded by governments and is regarded as the court of last resort, said it would now take into consideration crimes that have been traditionally underprosecuted.

Land grabbing has become increasingly common worldwide, with national and local governments allocating private companies tens of millions of hectares of land in the past 10 years.

The anti-corruption campaigners from Global Witness say this has led to many forced evictions, the cultural genocide of indigenous peoples, malnutrition and environmental destruction.

"This shift means it can start holding corporate executives to account for large-scale land grabbing and massive displacement happening during peacetime," Alice Harrison of Global Witness told Reuters.

The move comes ahead of a decision by ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda on whether to investigate a case filed by human rights lawyers in 2014 accusing Cambodian officials and businessmen of engaging in illegal land dispossession.

The firm representing the Cambodian plaintiffs said the ICC's policy shift opens the door for the case to be investigated by the court.

Cambodia's government has dismissed the case as politically motivated and based on "fake numbers of people being affected by land grabbing."

Last year was the deadliest on record for land rights campaigners, with more than three people killed each week in conflicts over territory with mining companies, loggers, hydroelectric dams or agribusiness firms, Global Witness said.
Police in Indian Kashmir have detained a prominent human rights activist, Khurram Parvez, two days after he was prevented from leaving India to attend the ongoing session of the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva.



Police officials did not say under what charges the spokesperson of Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Societies (JKCCS) was picked up from his home late Thursday in Srinagar.



On Wednesday, the campaigner was stopped at the New Delhi airport from boarding a flight to Geneva where he was due to submit a report and brief U.N. officials about alleged human rights violations in Indian Kashmir, which has witnessed a wave of unrest since July.



Speaking to VOA before his arrest, Parvez said airport authorities did not cite a reason for stopping him, only telling him it was a directive from the Intelligence Bureau.



Street protests turn spotlight on rights violations

The activist said he feels he is being targeted for the work he has done highlighting alleged violations in Kashmir.

He told VOA We feel they dont want people internationally to know all this, what is happening in Jammu and Kashmir.



Parvez added that one of the reasons was that they wanted to punish me. I have been going out to different countries and doing this work. They feel bad about my work.



His group, JKCCS, has drawn attention to thousands of mass graves in remote parts of Indian Kashmir and has called on the government to investigate who the dead were. It has also documented alleged rights violations by Indian troops posted in the Muslim majority region, where anti-Indian sentiment is strong and many favor independence.



The campaigner says a report being submitted by his group to officials at the UNHCR session highlights how India at the institutional level is involved in carrying out violence against the people of Jammu and Kashmir.

The president of JKCCS, Parvez Imroz, slammed Parvezs detention as an attempt to intimidate and restrain his human rights work.



Police use of force against protesters

Indian authorities have not commented on why Parvez was detained or barred from traveling to Geneva. But at the UNHCR session, which began this week, Indian officials have accused Pakistan of instigating the violence in Jammu and Kashmir.



Street protests that have wracked Kashmir in recent weeks have claimed the lives of more than 80 civilians and turned the spotlight on rights violations in the restive region. Most of the people died as security forces tried to quell street protests.



In a statement at the UNHCR earlier this week, Indias ambassador, Ajit Kumar, put the blame for the current wave of unrest on the cross-border terrorism sponsored by Pakistan which has provided active support since 1989 to separatist groups and terrorist elements.
Up to 500 men and women, former "lost boys and girls" from South Sudan, could soon return to their homeland to help rebuild it if the U.S. Congress passes a bill introduced this week.

The bill would pay transportation costs for former lost boys and girls who are working in the United States and want to put their expertise to work at home.

One of the former lost boys is David Acuoth, a legislative fellow for Representative Karen Bass, a California Democrat, and one of the authors of the bill. He said many Sudanese refugees educated in the United States have acquired professional skills in medicine, education or health care that could help the people of South Sudan.

There are not enough hospitals across South Sudan, and we have so many South Sudanese who are working here as nurses, as physician assistants," Acuoth said. "What we will do is give these people opportunities to go to South Sudan. They can be teaching others to become nurses and physician assistants, while at the same time delivering health services to the population.

Origins in mid-'80s

The diaspora that became known as "the lost boys of Sudan" began in the mid-1980s, a time of civil war in Sudan, which had not yet been divided into two countries. Over 20,000 boys who were displaced or orphaned during two decades of civil war endured many hardships as they traveled on foot to refugee camps in Ethiopia and Kenya.

The United States took in about 3,800 lost boys in the first eight months of 2001. The program was halted after the terrorist attacks on the United States on Sept. 11, 2001, then restarted in 2004, when thousands more Sudanese refugees were admitted. Those in the United States as well as those resettled in Canada and European countries experienced post-traumatic stress and cultural isolation as a result of their arduous path to a new life, and in some cases racism made their assimilation in their new homes difficult.

The term "lost boys," first popularized by aid workers, was revived after South Sudan gained its independence and a new round of violent clashes broke out in 2013. That phase of the diaspora was marked by the displacement of many women and girls, who fled to avoid being abused, sold into slavery or trafficked abroad.

The bill introduced this week in the House Foreign Affairs Committee calls for transporting up to 500 skilled workers to South Sudan, but the number could be revised upward if the need arises, Acuoth said.

For now, if we can get 500 well-qualified individuals  and we are not only looking at people who have gone to college, but people who have done certain work for a very long time [and] have become expert at that field  that would allow us to expand the field to more than 500 in the future, he said.

Previous outlays

The U.S. has spent $1.7 billion on aid for South Sudan before, during and after the conflict that erupted in December 2013, when fighting broke out between political factions loyal to President Salva Kiir and opposition leader Riek Machar. Acuoth insists that any further funds spent on a proposed infrastructure program will not be wasted, because the project will be closely monitored by the U.S. State Department.

There will be accountability for individuals to bring results. I have to push for what I think I can sell to members of Congress and their constituencies, and the only way we could get something done was to do it as a 'lost boys, lost girls' project, but there is room for expansion, Acuoth said.

But since fighting in South Sudan has continued for more than a year after a peace agreement was signed by Kiir and the opposition, some lawmakers may have their doubts that this program will work.

You always have to worry, but the objective way of looking at the current crisis is how to cut the cord of the cycle of violence," Acuoth said. "And the answer to that is to start with grass-roots reform, by bringing in people with skills."

A clause in the bill stipulates that the State Department must declare that conditions in South Sudan are such that the former lost boys and girls can return and work safely there. Mayom Bul Achuk, a former lost boy who came to the U.S. in late 2000, said he thought the bill could open up possibilities for people like him who are eager to go back.

Earlier return

Bul returned to South Sudan in 2013 after earning two masters degrees in the United States, in international development and in Christian leadership. He said he wanted to use his skills and experience to help the people of South Sudan, but those plans were derailed by the fighting that erupted. The United States eventually evacuated its citizens, including Bul.

Bul still is fearful of the security situation in South Sudan, but he remains hopeful that the bill before Congress can make a difference, so he can return to his homeland once again.

If this bill gets passed, it will be very nice, Bul said, because the U.S.-backed program "will be the backbone of the diaspora knowledge transfer to South Sudan.

Jacob Ruei, another former lost boy, studied information technology in the United States, and he wants to teach South Sudanese how to use computers. He's aware that it could take a time for the House bill to become law, but he is convinced that helping members of the South Sudanese diaspora return to their home country is the best way to help South Sudan develop and prosper.

You cant build the country based only on physical infrastructure," Ruei said. "You do need human capital. We are part of that community, and we hope and we feel like we can contribute like other people back home. Most of us here do believe that if we do go back, we will build the country that way.
Facing an increase in drug trafficking, some Southeast Asian nations are planning on creating a centralized data source for law enforcement and carrying out joint patrols.

Thailand has been playing a central role in promoting the increased cooperation.

Thai Justice Minister Paibul Koomchaya recently told regional narcotics officials, Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) members, donor nations and agencies that there is a need to increase the number of cooperative projects to curb regional narcotics production.

Paibul also called on the region to focus on health care and jobs for drug addicts as part of ASEANs 10-year anti-drug action plan.

ASEAN faces a conflicting debate over the policy steps needed to cope with rising production of illicit drugs, largely methamphetamine-type stimulants and heroin. In Thailand, Indonesia and Brunei, methamphetamine use is on the rise. Officials told VOA that heroin is a bigger problem in Indonesia.

Thailand, Laos and Vietnam are attempting to refocus policy towards drug user rehabilitation.



But the crackdown on drug pushers and users by the Philippine administration of President Rodrigo Duterte has left over 3,000 killed and has sparked international condemnation from human rights advocates.

Manop Kamato, an anthropologist in the Faculty of Medicine at Khon Kaen University, who attended the regional officials conference, said the meeting promoted more cooperation and assistance given the regions drug trafficking and social concerns.

We can go there and we train them to make their own report and try to start to standardize a data base and raise them up equal to other countries, Manop told VOA.

Right now we have a problem, yes. Because like Laos, like Cambodia their infrastructure is not so good, so they may take more time  but if we can help, then how do we do it? he said.

Growing challenge

According to United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) data, South East Asia faces a growing challenge from drug trafficking networks.

The UNODC says seizures of crystal methamphetamine in East and South East Asia have reached historic levels, reaching 30 tons in the past year.

The U.N. drugs body reported methamphetamine seizure levels in 2016 are forecast to rise. Also evident has been a rise in production and trafficking of new psychoactive substances (NPS)  synthetic drugs not yet covered by international controls.



In May, the Mekong Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on drug control, brought together officials from Cambodia, China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam  the MoUs co-signatures  and India, a key source of precursor chemicals needed in drug production.

Chuanpit Choomwattana, a project coordinator on the ASEAN Drug Monitoring Network, says sharing information can play a major role in stemming the flow of drugs in the region.

"If we share information and we cooperate more closely, then we can stop drugs from coming into the region. Most ASEAN identify ourselves as transit countries not the producer and part of the drugs spill-out in the region  so we become the market, she said.

When seven of the 10 ASEAN countries carried out self-analysis, they recognized they were the transit country and market  they are the victims, not the producer, she said.

But Chuanpit said there remain substantial information gaps for several countries, undermining policy and drug prevention programs.

They are very concerned they cannot provide information compared to other countries. And this is one point we can coordinate and support like training for countries that want to improve their capacity in providing this information, she added.



Joining forces

Thailand, Laos and China have been carrying out joint patrols under the Safe Mekong Joint Operations, along the Mekong River bordering Thailand and Laos.

Thailand recently reported the joint operations destroyed a major drug smuggling group of 26 networks across the region.

Jeremy Douglas, UNODC Asia Pacific representative, in emailed comments to VOA said the Safe Mekong program provided operational law enforcement to the Mekong regional agreement on drug control.

The overarching drug strategy for the Mekong area supports threat assessments and analysis, development of procedures, and plans for joint or multilateral operations, training and capacity building, across a spectrum of law enforcement, justice and even drug use and health issues, Douglas said.

UNODC officials say Laos continues to struggle in dealing with drugs as a transit country as well as providing rehabilitation programs.

The Lao government has approved a new drug control master plan to guide policy efforts in the country until 2020.

But UNODC Lao Program Officer Erlend Audunson Falch said the challenge for Laos is that it is a vital transit country for illicit drugs into Vietnam, across land borders with China and Laos.

Laos has severe challenges both when it comes to drug use, opium cultivation and drug trafficking, Falch said in emailed comments.

While these issues are a high priority for the government, there is limited funding available to implement policies, he said.
The Nigerian military has made tremendous progress against the Boko Haram terrorist group, the countrys chief of army staff told VOA Daybreak Africa.

Visiting our Washington studio, Lieutenant General Tukur Buratai praised the collaboration with troops from neighboring Cameroon, Chad and Niger.

It is interesting to note that the ability of the Boko Haram terrorist group to move freely as they were doing before, the ability to hold ground, the ability to take on territories or ransack large communities and towns has been virtually eliminated, he said.

Boko Haram released a video this week that shows hundreds of supporters, suggesting the group is still potent.

Buratai dismissed the video as propaganda.

Virtually they want to show that they are still around. To the best of our knowledge and all well-meaning Nigerians who know the happenings in the northeast, they know that those are just empty, boastful positions of the Boko Haram terrorists. They have nothing to show and indeed they are just trying to show their prowess in terms of propaganda, Buratai said.

Boko Haram, which pledged allegiance to Islamic State last year, has been embroiled in an apparent leadership struggle. The military claimed to have wounded the sects longtime leader, Abubakar Shekau during an air raid in August.

Buratai said the army continues to receive leads on the whereabouts of people kidnapped by Boko Haram in the northeast, including the more than 200 Chibok schoolgirls still missing more than two years after their abduction.

The terror group released a video in August that featured as many as 50 of the Chibok girls, prompting renewed pressure on the government to bring the girls home.

The army chief told VOA they are pursuing a holistic approach aimed at freeing all those abducted by Boko Haram.
President Barack Obama, joined by a bipartisan group of political, security and business figures, urged the U.S. Congress to ratify the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement, saying it is time for Congress to get this thing done.



With about four months left in office, Obama re-stated his case for the massive trade deal that is effectively the economic cornerstone of his strategic rebalance to the Asia Pacific.



It is important for America to set the rules for the global economy, he said before an oval office meeting with a diverse group of TPP backers.



Obamas legacy in the region may well hinge on whether the U.S. Congress ratifies the pact signed by 12 Pacific Rim nations.



He described the Asia Pacific as the most populous, fastest-growing part of the world, adding that with TPP we have the potential to sell American goods, promote American business and help American workers.

He added that export industries tend to pay higher wages.



Even with bipartisan support for TPP, Obama faces an uphill battle as he works to persuade lawmakers to ratify the deal during a presidential election year in which trade has been blamed for lost jobs.

Key opposition

Both major party presidential candidates, Republican nominee Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, have spoken out against it.



Trump has called the agreement a disaster and Clinton has said she will oppose TPP and any trade deal that hurts the American worker.



Obama expressed frustration with current political rhetoric against the trade pact, which he blamed on misinformation" about TPP.

"If you're frustrated about rules and trade that disadvantage America, if you're frustrated about jobs being shipped overseas and other countries selling goods into our country freely then you want to get this thing passed, you want to get this thing done," said Obama.

The TPP is a high standard trade agreement, he said, arguing it will lower tariff barriers on U.S. goods and force other countries to raise their labor and environmental standards to level the playing field for U.S. workers and businesses.

Powerful advocates

Obama brought together a prominent group to support his position. It included former New York mayor and billionaire businessman Michael Bloomberg, Democratic Governor of Louisiana John Bel Edwards and the Republican Governor of Ohio John Kasich. Also attending, former Treasury secretary Henry Paulson, and Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed (D); IBM CEO Ginni Rometty and former NATO supreme allied commander James Stavridis.

Obama has argued his strategic re-balance to the Asia Pacific is critical to Americas future prosperity and security.

"Right now China is pushing hard to create their own trading regime in Asia," Obama warned. "I promise you that China is not going to be setting up a bunch of rules that are going to be to the advantage of American companies and businesses."

After the meeting, Governor Kasich said the trade deal was geopolitically critical for the U.S. "That economic underpinning is absolutely going to lead to a strengthened sense of American influence in Asia," he told reporters.

Mayor Reed touted its economic benefit in communities throughout the nation, saying small businesses back up the backbone of their economies. Still, he pointed out, only a small number of them are engaged in international trade.
London Mayor Sadiq Khan, while on a trip to the northern U.S. city of Chicago Thursday, argued that new immigrants in America should not have to assimilate into American culture, but the government should instead do more to help them build cohesive communities.

"One of the lessons from around the world is that a laissez faire or hands-off approach to social integration doesn't work. We need rules, institutions and support to enable people to integrate into cohesive communities and for the avoidance of doubt, I don't mean assimilation, I mean integration, and there's a difference, Khan said. People shouldn't have to drop their cultures and traditions when they arrive in our cities and countries."

Khan, Londons first Muslim mayor, did not mention Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump by name, but went on to criticize positions Trump has taken regarding Muslim immigrants.

In the past, Trump called for a total ban on Muslim immigration into the U.S., but has since softened his position and said he would only ban immigration from countries with a proven history of terrorism.

"We play straight into the hands of those who seek to divide us, of extremists and terrorists around the world, when we imply that it's not possible to hold Western values dear and to be a Muslim," Khan said.

The London mayor said he is a big fan of Democrat Hillary Clinton, and called her arguably the most experienced candidate to run to be president.

He went on to say, "As the father of two daughters, I think the message it sends when the most powerful politician in the world is a woman is phenomenal, and hope she wins."

Khan and Trump have a history of friction. Shortly after taking office in May, the London mayor called Trump ignorant for his comments about Muslim immigration.

Frances recent move to ban the burkini and Britains decision to break away from the European Union could be traced back to anti-immigrant sentiments, much like those espoused by Trump, Khan said, and the only way to avoid these ridiculous situations is through social integration.

"We need to be sure that minority communities have a sense of belonging, so that they are as resilient as possible to extremism and radicalization. We should create the right conditions for new migrants to fully integrate into their new neighborhoods, providing clear advice on our values and expectations, he said.

Khans first official trip to North America as Londons mayor began earlier in the day Thursday when he met with Canadas Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Khan is in the U.S. along with several leaders in Britains tech industry to promote trade between the two countries.
Afghanistan's president made a two-day trip to India this week, where New Delhi pledged $1 billion in developmental aid and signed other deals for extraditing criminals and terror suspects. That has raised concerns in India's rival, Pakistan, which has long viewed New Delhi's ties to Afghanistan with suspicion.

Nafees Zekria, spokesman for Pakistan's Foreign Ministry, told VOA Thursday that when two sovereign states establish a close relationship, Pakistan "does not want to comment." However, he warned that "if India uses Afghanistan's soil against Pakistan's interests," Islamabad will not remain silent.

"Afghan soil should not be used against the interests of Pakistan, Zekria said. If you look at the past events, we have on a number of occasions raised our concerns that there are elements in Afghanistan who are using the soil of Afghanistan to hurt the interests of Pakistan and to cause instability in Pakistan."

Afghanistan has long accused Pakistan of giving safe haven to the Taliban and other militant groups, allowing them to organize attacks back across the border. Pakistani authorities have denied those charges, and have pointed to military offensives in their tribal region as evidence of Islamabad's commitment to fighting militant groups.

"We do not allow our own soil to be used against any country, and we do not like to see any other country's soil to be used against Pakistan," Zekria said. "Pakistan knows and has the capability to defend its interests, defend its territory, and will take all measures to safeguard our interests."

Pakistan and terrorism

Shah Hussian Murtazawi, deputy spokesman for Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, responded to Zekria by telling VOA that instead of focusing on relations between Afghanistan and India, Pakistan should take more action against militants' safe havens.

"If [Pakistan] believes in fighting terrorist groups, instead of thinking which country has presence or [does not] have presence in Afghanistan, Pakistan had better expel safe havens of terrorist groups such as the Haqqani network, al-Qaida, Taliban and the Quetta Shura," said Murtazawi, adding that Pakistan cannot "prescribe to us which country we should have relations with."

Pakistan says it, too, is a victim of terrorism, a view that U.S. officials endorse.

Richard Olson, the U.S. special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, said Thursday that Islamabad has made good progress against terrorist groups such as al-Qaida, but more needs to be done.

"While the progress is laudable, [Pakistan's] struggle with terrorism will not come to an end until it makes a decisive shift in its policy of tolerance toward externally focused groups," Olson told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

If Pakistan does not make that sort of "decisive shift," Olson told senators at a Capitol Hill hearing, then the fight against terrorism will not succeed.

"U.S. officials have been very clear with the most senior Pakistani leadership that Pakistan must target all militant groups without discrimination, including those that target Pakistan's neighbors, and close all safe havens," Olson added.

Significance of deal

Afghan and Indian officials described the aid package agreed to this week in New Delhi as intended purely for developmental projects. However, some analysts perceive a greater geopolitical significance.

Nijla Ayubi, an executive board member of the Women's Regional Network, which operates in Afghanistan, Pakistan and India, says "each country has its own political and strategic interests in the region."

"In the past we have seen that Pakistan has used Afghan land against India," she said. "[Thus] there is a possibility that India would use the land of Afghanistan."
Coalition forces killed one of the Islamic State terror groups most senior leaders in a precision strike in Syria this month, the Pentagon said Friday.

Wail Adil Salman al-Fayad, Islamic States so-called minister of information, who also went by the name Dr. Wail, was targeted and killed by an airstrike on September 7, Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said.

Fayad was targeted in Raqqa, the terror group's self-proclaimed capital. At the time of the strike, Fayad was sitting on a motorcycle next to a house, a defense official who saw footage of the strike told VOA Friday.

Cook said Fayad was a prominent member of the terror groups Senior Shura Council, the governing authority of the IS that hands down orders and ensures they are followed. He oversaw the production of IS propaganda videos, which promote executions and torture.

According to the Pentagon, Fayad was a close associate of Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, the IS spokesman and chief strategist who was hit and killed by a coalition airstrike August 30 near Al Bab, Syria. U.S. forces confirmed his death September 12.

A defense official told VOA the strikes on Adnani and Fayad had further isolated IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who heavily relies on a small circle of people to pass down orders and collect information.

Thats two of his closest confidants, whom hes spent years developing a trusting relationship with. Two dead within just a couple of weeks, the defense official said.

Adnani was directly involved in recruiting foreign fighters and also directed IS's major attacks outside its strongholds in Syria and Iraq.

"Significant operations carried out on his watch include the Paris attacks, the Brussels airport attack, the Istanbul airport attack, the downing of the Russian airliner in the Sinai, the suicide bombings during a rally in Ankara and the attack on a cafe in Bangladesh," the official said. "In total, these attacks killed over 1,800 people and wounded nearly 4,000."
By Naseer Ganai: Noted human rights defender, Khurram Parvez, was arrested and detained on Thursday night, Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS), an amalgam of different human rights organisations, said.

"He has been detained, without formal arrest or notifications, and in violation of his rights to information, and legal counsel. He has not been provided with any written document, court order or the reasons for his detention," Parvez Imroz, president, JKCCS, said.



His arrest follows his detention on September 14 at the New Delhi international airport. Following which, he was barred from travelling to Geneva, Switzerland.



Khurram Parvez is the Programme Coordinator of JKCCS and its spokesperson, and Chairperson of the Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances, a collective of 13 non-governmental organisations from ten Asian countries that campaign on the issue of enforced disappearances.



Khurram Parvez was scheduled to attend the 33rd UN Human Rights Council Session in Geneva to brief UN bodies, including the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and foreign governments on present Kashmir situation.



At least 80 civilians have been killed and over 10,000 injured, by government forces firing bullets and pellets at stone and rock-throwing protesters. Police says two policemen have been killed and 4000 government forces have been injured in the clashes.



A prolonged curfew, communication blackouts including internet blockade and everyday crackdown have failed to stop pro-Azadi protests and processions in Kashmir. The separatists are giving prolonged strike calls.



The protests after the killing of Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Muzaffer Wani on July 8.



Khurram Parvez is presently detained at the Kothi Bagh Police Station in Srinagar.



"The unlawful detention of Khurram Parvez is a violation of internationally recognised and non-derogable civil and political rights, and India's own constitutional guarantees. It is a clear indication of reprisal, an attempt to intimidate and restrain Khurram Parvez and his human rights work. In doing so, it seeks to isolate him and silence the critical concerns of Kashmir from being heard by the international community," the JKCCS said.



"Unlawful arrests have been consistently used by the Indian state in Jammu and Kashmir to repress all space for dissent. Tellingly, the action on Khurram Parvez closely follows India's rejection of the UN High Commissioner's request for access to Jammu and Kashmir for a UN fact-finding mission," the JKCCS said.



JKCCS said an urgent appeal has been sent by JKCCS to the President of the UN Human Rights Council, UN High Commissioner, and Special Procedures of the UN Human Rights Counsel, including the Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders and the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention.



"The unlawful arrest and detention of Khurram Parvez is a threat to the principles that Khurram Parvez so courageously represents through his long-standing human rights work in Indian-administered Kashmir: of truth, justice, equality and fundamental rights and freedoms. Khurram Parvez must be released immediately and his rights and freedoms restored," the JKCCS said.

--- ENDS ---

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Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta said on Thursday that ending diseases like AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria in Africa was within reach if countries spent more on healthcare which would ensure their people stayed healthy, and boost their economies.

In an exclusive blog for the Thomson Reuters Foundation, Kenyatta credited international donors for helping Africa to make "tremendous gains" in fighting these diseases, which in the 1990s killed millions of people on the continent every year.

But more investment from African governments was needed, he said.

"We are at a point where we can defeat these diseases and end them as public health threats," Kenyatta wrote. "To achieve that, we must invest more. We must commit ourselves more."

In the last decade, HIV-related deaths in Africa have halved to 790,000 in 2014, while malaria deaths fell 54 percent between 2000 and 2013, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

But these diseases remain a threat with malaria alone killing an estimated 437,000 African children before their fifth birthday in 2013, the WHO says.

Through its partnership with the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, which was set up in 2002 to raise money to tackle these epidemics, Kenya has been able to save 300,000 lives, Kenyatta said.

Kenya has pledged $5 million to the Global Fund for its next funding cycle, he added.

The Global Fund, a public-private partnership, is seeking $13 billion from international donors for its 2017 to 2019 funding cycle at a conference due to begin on Friday in Montreal, Canada.

If Kenya and other developing countries are to meet the U.N. Sustainable Development Goal to end these epidemics by 2030, they need to strengthen their health systems, experts say.

"We all must come together and contribute to create enough impetus against HIV, tuberculosis and malaria and other health concerns that continue to devastate our people," Kenyatta wrote.

In Kenya, 37 percent of healthcare is funded by patients, 35 percent by donors and 28 percent by the government, the government says.
Since time immemorial, the mighty Mekong River has meandered through the nations of Southeast Asia, making its way south from China's Tibetan plateau until it spills into the South China Sea, some 4,000 kilometers away.

But for the past few years, fishing communities along its banks have complained that fish stocks are drying up, and many blame construction projects underway upstream.

The iconic waterway  among the world's longest  is seeing unprecedented change. Huge hydropower dams and irrigation systems designed to power modern farms across the Mekong region are changing how people interact with the river.

Recently, Thai government officials announced a sweeping new project that would funnel tens of thousands of cubic meters of water from the Mekong to plantations and industry in the country's northeast.

The Kong-Loei-Chi-Mun project  named for tributaries the so-called "mega-diversion" scheme would draw from  is the biggest irrigation project ever undertaken in the region, and it is prompting concerns from locals, environmentalists, and some development experts.

'No one will continue this'

Like many living along Thailand's Loei River, a Mekong tributary that courses through the country's Chiang Khan region, Wachira Nantaprom has been fishing since he was a teenager. Under the new project, Wachira  also like many  could be facing resettlement.

"I am concerned that if this dam project gets constructed at this point of the Mekong River, there may be no longer a place to make a living, because we always do fishing to make a living," he told VOA's Khmer Service. "The fish will be partly gone. We already don't catch fish as much as in the past. This career may be gone from the Chiang Khan area."

Moreover, he said, an entire way of life will vanish.

"No one will continue this ... in terms of the next generation," he said. "If there's a dam, we have to change careers; we'll go to the city to be day laborers or do odd jobs."

Chhanarong Wongla, a fishing industry representative based in Loei Province, said a July project review by the Royal Irrigation Department (RID) only confirmed their fears.

"My concern is about the ecosystem, the varieties of fish and lives of people in the region," he said. "We are concerned that if there is construction here, there would be no flowing of water. It will stay still. People generally have different lifestyles based on the changes of the river. If the water is still, their lives will be entirely changed."

Decades in the making

Unveiled by Thai officials in the 1960s, Kong-Loei-Chi-Mun is one of numerous proposals to develop elaborate irrigation systems that never got off the ground.

However, a 4-year RID feasibility study that concluded in 2012 showed that construction connecting the Mekong to six smaller rivers, including the Chi and Mun, would provide water to the entire northeast and irrigate 32 million hectares of farmland. With an estimated cost of $75 billion, researchers say the 9-phase project would take some 16 years to complete.

"Project proponents claim it would increase farm incomes from an average of just under 68,000 baht [$1,947] per family per year, to 199,000 baht [$5,700], and improve the lives of 1.72 million families," wrote Hanoi-based environmental reporter Mai Lan. Her report, published by Mekong Commons, a regional development blog run by researchers and scholars, also says economic viability studies continuing through 2016 will ultimately determine whether the project will get a green light.

According the project's website, however, environmental and social impact studies conducted in 2011 showed that, if it does get off the ground, thousands would likely face resettlement.

For some, including Tanusilp Inda, a village chief in Ban Klang village, the consequences of such a large-scale project are grave.

"They don't want it to be constructed," he said of his own villagers, adding that they would "resist [the project] to their deaths."

Tek Vannara, executive director of the Phnom Penh-based NGO Forum on Cambodia, says the project would also siphon water from neighboring Mekong Basin countries that are already experiencing water shortages.

"The reduction of water would impact biodiversity  [and] agricultural practices which depend on water from the Mekong," he said, adding that more than 60 million people rely on the fish and other produce derived from the river. "Climate in the region [would] also be affected on the ground."

Echoing concerns of Wachira, the Thai fisherman, Tek explained that drastically altered water levels impact the size of fish-spawning areas, and thereby the livelihood of thousands, which ultimately transforms the distinct culture of an entire region.

Learning from the past

With more than 30 other hydropower dams currently planned for the Mekong region, even policy and development experts such as Dr. John Ward, a Laos-based natural resources research scientist at the Mekong Region Futures Institute, are beginning to sound the alarm.

Ongoing competition for short-term economic gains among Mekong Basin countries, he told VOA, has already forced long-term environmental concerns to the back burner. Documented risks from prior dam projects in the region, he said, should inform today's large-scale undertakings.

"Other countries have gone through this," he said. "They've gone from the river and unmodified system to the hardly developed one, and there are lots of lessons to learn from that.

"It's better to avoid the problems in the first place," he added. "And certainly in the U.S., in Europe, in Asia, and Australia, there are lots of examples of transboundary problems like the Mekong  and lots of lessons to be learned  [about] how to avoid future problems in the first place."

Organized talks involving all regional stakeholders, Ward added, should be held before it's too late.

Viroj Jiwaranga, the Loei provincial governor, acknowledged the impact the project would have on the region's biodiversity and cultures, but said the project would be good for the local economy and could go some way toward solving water-scarcity issues in Thailand's northeast.

Fishermen like Wachira, however, are not convinced.
SpaceX on Thursday said efforts to develop and certify a space taxi for NASA were not being slowed by an investigation into a launchpad fire that destroyed its rocket and a $200 million Israeli communications satellite.

Boeing Co. and SpaceX, owned and operated by technology entrepreneur Elon Musk, are building spaceships to fly NASA astronauts to the International Space Station, a $100 billion laboratory that flies 250 miles (400 kilometers) above Earth.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is looking to turn over crew transport to SpaceX and Boeing before the end of 2018, breaking a Russian monopoly. SpaceX is aiming for its first test flight to the station in 2017.

"We're full steam head for certification. We're still trying to remain on schedule," Abhishek Tripathi, director of certification for SpaceX, said during a webcast panel discussion at an American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics conference in Long Beach, California.

"I know what I need to do in the next day and in the next month," Tripathi said, adding that his work was not being affected by the accident investigation.

Fire during refueling

SpaceX, with oversight from the Federal Aviation Administration, is working to figure out why one of its Falcon 9 rockets burst into flames on September 1 as it was being fueled for a routine prelaunch test at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. The blaze destroyed the communications satellite, owned by Israel's Space Communication Ltd., which was scheduled to be carried into orbit two days later.

SpaceX has not yet disclosed how much damage was done at its primary launch site.

SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said Wednesday that the company was hoping to resume flights in November at a second, nearly complete launchpad at NASA's Kennedy Space Center, adjacent to the Air Force base.

The company, which has a backlog of 70 missions for NASA and commercial customers, worth more than $10 billion, also flies from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.
The Obama administration is warning Russia that their military cooperation in Syria will not go forward unless humanitarian aid begins to reach Aleppo and other besieged areas.

In a statement released by the State Department, Secretary of State John Kerry told Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov that the U.S. has "concerns about the repeated and unacceptable delays of humanitarian aid, and emphasized that the United States expects Russia to use its influence on the Assad regime" to allow the deliveries to move forward.



Russian warplanes Friday launched airstrikes on a rebel base in Aleppo. Russian officials said they did so because of rebel refusal to pull back from a key road leading into eastern Aleppo.

Under the cease-fire deal both the rebels and Assad regime forces are meant to withdraw from the Castello Road, a key supply route for the rebels, handing security control to the Russians. Rebel leaders say this would be tantamount to just handing their hard fought positions to Assad.

United Nations aid trucks packed with supplies for civilians trapped in the besieged Syrian city of Aleppo were still stuck at the Syrian border Friday, as officials wait for confirmation that Syrian troops and rebels are committed to upholding the shaky cease-fire agreed to last week.

A spokesman for the U.N. humanitarian affairs office said 40 trucks are waiting at the border between Turkey and Syria until officials receive word that it is safe to enter the country.

Syrian state television broadcast images appearing to show bulldozers clearing the main road into rebel held neighborhoods of Aleppo in preparation for the aid convoys.

Jens Laerke said the United Nations does not need authorization from Syria to deliver the supplies across the border, but the trucks are sitting in a special customs zone until it is safe.

"We know that theres at least a quarter of a million people in eastern Aleppo who are potentially all of them in need of some kind of aid," Laerke said. "We are as ready to go as we can possibly be...its highly frustrating  we know the world is watching."

The United Nations has described the cease-fire as a critical window of opportunity to deliver the supplies in the rebel-held eastern districts of Aleppo, but rocket fire and shelling in the area on Friday hindered the trucks' movement.

Syrian state media claim clashes between troops and rebels had broken out in Aleppo, in violation of the cease-fire. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reports the fighting also broke out in the Damascus neighborhood of Jobar, the home of several different rebel factions.

Rebels plan Sunday meeting

Meanwhile, Syrias armed rebel factions are planning to meet Sunday to discuss whether to continue to observe the now fragile four-day-old cease-fire brokered by the United States and Russia  a truce no one consulted them about and one they fear will be exploited by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to renew an offensive on insurgent strongholds in the besieged city of Aleppo.

The rebel observation of the cease-fire, which took effect Monday evening to coincide with the start of the major Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha, has so far been a begrudging one and marked by distrust of American intentions toward a revolution that has left more than 400,000 people dead and half of the countrys population displaced.

There is, however, no overall unity among rebel factions about how to move ahead, although most rebel leaders contacted by VOA say they sense the cease-fire is a trap and marks a further sign of U.S. reluctance to back the revolution.

Its breakdown is inevitable, they say.

U.S. officials see the cease-fire  the second negotiated this year by Washington and Moscow over the heads of rebel militias - as a possible trigger for subsequent serious negotiations about a political transition for the war-wracked country. Rebel leaders, however, dont believe President Assad  or his foreign backers Russia and Iran  have any wish to negotiate a political settlement and argue the weaker the insurgents become, the less likely that is to happen.



The armed groups on the ground are still discussing what they should do about the cease-fire, Gen. Salim Idris, former chief of the staff of the Western-backed Free Syrian Army, told VOA.

Lack of transparency

The lack of transparency in the superpower deal-making is adding, he said, to suspicion about the entire deal, making it appear murky, which is adding to rebel distrust of Western intentions toward the revolution. I am sorry to say there isn't any trust, he said.

On Thursday, U.S. State Department spokesman Mark Toner told reporters in Washington that the full text of the deal worked out with Russia on the truce in Syria will not be made public. It does deal with sensitive issues that we believe, if made public, could potentially be misused, he said.

Confusion about the deal, which among other things is meant to ground Assads warplanes, even appeared to wrong-foot U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, who said on Monday that the U.S. and Russia could permit President Assad to launch new airstrikes against jihadists fighting alongside more moderate rebel factions.

His remarks were quickly walked-back by a spokesman, who said later there were no provisions under the nationwide truce for U.S.-Russian authorization of bombing missions by Assad's forces.

A letter sent to rebel factions by Michael Ratney, U.S. Special Envoy for Syria, explaining the cease-fire, has added to confusion and suspicion. He noted in the letter that militias will need to pull their fighters back from some strategic locations, including the Castello Road, a key route that swings around northern Aleppo and into the insurgent-held eastern part of the city.

The envoy, however, was vague about locations and what is expected of the armed groups, several of whom have responded by asking for clarification.

Even in his letter, Ratney noted his own suspicions of the Russians, saying he did not think they were being honest, according to Gen. Idris.

Russian firepower

Other rebels note Russia plans to move to the Mediterranean next month the aircraft carrier, the Admiral Kuznetsov, for its first combat deployment. The warplanes abroad will be equipped with some of Russias latest targeting systems and air-to-surface missiles, adding to the firepower the Assad regime would have available for a renewed Aleppo offensive.

As the rebels continue their discussions about whether to continue to observe the shaky cease-fire, some commanders say U.S. leverage on the factions is weaker than earlier this year because of the increasing reluctance of the U.S. to resupply rebel factions with arms and ammunition.

In recent months, Zakaria Malahefji, an official with Fastaqim Kama Umirt, an Aleppo-based Free Syrian Army militia, said most U.S. and Western support has mainly been just of logistical equipment and not desperately-needed arms and ammunition. Some arms supplies have come from the Turks, he said, but he was reluctant to go into details.



So far, the cease-fire has seen a significant reduction in violence. But the pro-opposition monitoring group  the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a network of activists on the ground for its reporting  said Thursday witnessed a dramatic escalation in violations committed by both regime and rebel forces.

It reported regime warplanes renewed airstrikes in the northwestern countryside of Aleppo and in the northern countryside of Hama, wounding rebel fighters as well as civilians.

Russian military officials accused rebel armed groups of a total of 55 cease-fire violations on Thursday, 23 of which they said occurred in Aleppo.

Limited patience

As rebels debate whether to continue to observe the cease-fire deal, a Russian official Friday told Britains BBC that Moscow could resume airstrikes on rebel groups in Syria unless the U.S. does more to get them to disassociate themselves from former al-Qaida affiliate Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, previously known as Jabhat al-Nusra.

The cease-fire deal does not cover JFS, a key group in the defense of rebel-held districts of Aleppo and of insurgent strongholds in the neighboring province of Idlib.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov told the BBC there were limits to Russian patience. We're waiting, but there are limits," he added.

Tthree civilians were killed Friday when regime warplanes carried out airstrikes on rebel-held areas in Idlib province. They are the first since the cease-fire started Monday in an area covered by the truce.

US-Turkish cooperation

Meanwhile, American officials confirmed that U.S. forces have begun working with Turkish forces in northern Syria to take on Islamic State (IS).



A U.S. official told VOA the group of U.S. Special Forces is now accompanying some Turkish forces in the area of al-Rai, with the hopes of helping push south and east toward the IS-held town of Dabiq.

Dabiq is considered significant in part because it plays a key role in the terror group's apocalyptic beliefs.



But already, the U.S.-Turkish efforts may have hit a snag. Video posted Friday to social media appears to shows a handful of U.S. commandos forced to pull out of al-Rai and back toward the Turkish border.



In the video, rebel forces in al-Rai appear to be shouting and chanting anti-U.S. slogans.
World leaders will gather Monday in New York to tackle two of today's biggest global challenges: the war in Syria and the refugee crisis it has created.

They will meet at the annual U.N. General Assembly. This will be Barack Obamas final such gathering as U.S. president, and it also will be the last for U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, whose decadelong tenure at the helm of the organization will end December 31.

Across the planet, there are a staggering number of refugees and displaced persons: 65 million men, women and children. They are on the move because of conflict, natural disasters or extreme poverty.

On Monday, the U.N. chief will convene a special summit about their plight, with the aim of addressing the root causes and agreeing on separate global compacts in the next two years on refugees and migrants.

I sincerely hope that, through this summit meeting on Monday, we will have a framework on how we can share these responsibilities, Ban told reporters recently. No one country can address this issue. Therefore, there should be global responsibility and global compassion on addressing this issue."

But before the summit has even taken place, some NGOs are already saying it will be ineffective.

Opportunity missed

The U.N. had initially proposed an ambitious plan, but the European Union, Russia and China were among those who sacrificed refugees rights for national self-interest and missed a massive opportunity to back a global solution to the crisis, said Salil Shetty, secretary general of Amnesty International.

The U.N.s initial plan was to ask governments to resettle 10 percent of the worlds refugees each year. But in the summits outcome document, there is no requirement that countries take specific numbers of people.

On Tuesday, Obama will co-chair a leaders summit on refugees, along with leaders from Canada, Ethiopia, Germany, Jordan, Mexico and Sweden.

Some 20 million of the worlds displaced population are refugees. This conference will focus on increasing refugee financing, doubling the global number of resettled refugees through legal channels, and expanding work and education opportunities for them. A pledge is required for governments to participate in the meeting.

We are not going to solve the refugee crisis on Tuesday, said Samantha Power, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. But I think you will see an important show of political will from leaders around the world.

Summit co-host Germany is on the front lines of the refugee and migration crisis in Europe. Last year, the nation took in over 1 million refugees, and in the first six months of this year, 460,000 refugees have arrived from Syria, the source of most of the worlds refugees.

Germanys U.N. Ambassador Harald Braun said Berlin wants to see the summit address all issues related to the crisis, meaning the situation in the countries of origin, transition and integration, as well as the return of refugees.

Preventing a lost generation

The leaders summit hopes to make progress in providing education for displaced children, raising by 1 million the number of refugee children in schools worldwide.

Former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who is the U.N.s global education envoy, said there are 30 million displaced children worldwide, 10 million of whom are refugees.

The majority of them are not going to school at all, he told reporters. Two million of them are Syrian refugees in neighboring countries, while another 2 million are in Syria, where none of them are getting the education they need.

The costs of educating refugee children are often minimal. In Lebanon, Brown said, it is only $10 a week per child, and he urged leaders to pledge the necessary funding at the summit.

Bloodshed in Syria

Leaders realize that the human exodus from Syria will not end until peace and stability are restored.

A nearly week-old deal between Russia and the United States to reduce the violence and distribute aid is still a work in progress, but its success or failure is likely to be a large part of discussions in New York.

The Security Council will hold a high-level session on Syria on Wednesday, which could issue a statement or adopt a resolution endorsing the deal, if it is still holding. Members of the International Syria Support Group will also be in New York and could decide to meet. The group's members are those foreign powers and global organizations who began talks in Vienna in October 2015 to try to resolve the Syrian conflict, following previous peace initiatives had failed.
U.S. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has ended five years of questioning the country of President Barack Obama's birth by declaring he "was born in the United States, period."

The Republican nominee in 2011 was a force behind a movement arguing, without evidence, that Obama was born abroad. Since then, he has refused to directly say what he believes, until he ended the ambiguity Friday.



In a campaign appearance Friday, Trump again blamed Clinton for starting the controversy, during the 2008 election when she was running against Obama. Numerous news media outlets have investigated the allegation and found there is no evidence to support it.

News organizations ditch Trump hotel tour

After Trump's statement, he was expected to lead journalists on a tour of his new Washington hotel. But when the Trump campaign announced only still photographers and camera operators would be allowed to participate, and a television producer was physically barred from joining them, Washington bureau chiefs of various news organizations all pulled out of the tour and erased their video of it.

Fox News Washington bureau chief Bryan Boughton, speaking as a representative for the group of news outlets, said: "The television pool members chose not to participate in a tour of the Trump Hotel in Washington, D.C. today because our editorial team member was barred from going on the tour with a videographer. The TV pool traditionally doesn't participate in events that our reporters or producers are not allowed to attend."

Clinton, also in Washington Friday, dismissed Trumps efforts to raise questions about the presidents birthplace.



Speaking before The Black Womens Agenda Symposium on her second day of campaigning since falling ill during a September 11 commemoration ceremony, Clinton said, For five years, he has led the birther movement to delegitimize our first black president. His campaign was founded on this outrageous lie."

He is feeding into the worst impulses, the bigotry and bias that lurks in our country. Barack Obama was born in America, plain and simple, and Donald Trump owes him and the American people an apology, Clinton added.

WATCH: Clinton slams Trump on Obama birther issue

Trump's appearance Friday occurred just a few blocks from the White House, at his new luxury Trump International Hotel, where he paid tribute to several Medal of Honor recipients.

After Trumps campaign event, Clintons campaign manager Robby Mook issued a statement describing Trumps actions Friday as disgraceful.

After five years of pushing a racist conspiracy theory into the mainstream, it was appalling to watch Trump appoint himself the judge of whether the President of the United States is American. This sickening display shows more than ever why Donald Trump is totally unfit be president.

President Obama addressed the issue Friday, telling reporters at the White House he will not comment on the matter anymore. We got other business to attend to. I was pretty confident where I was born. I think other people were as well, and my hope would be that the presidential election reflects more serious issues than that.



WATCH: Obama responds to reporter question about Trump/birther issue



In an attempt to put an end to the controversy, Obama produced his birth certificate in 2011. It showed he was born at the Kapiolani Medical Center in Hawaii on August 4, 1961.

After Trump retreated from his claims, members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) criticized Trump on CNBC for his role in the birther movement and demanded that he apologize to Obama. CBC chairman G.K. Butterfield said Trump was a "disgusting fraud." Congressman Hakeem Jeffries called Trump a "two-bit racial arsonist" while Congresswoman Barbara Lee said Trump was a liar.

Trumps unfounded claims since 2011 helped launch his political career, as it further raised his national profile and endeared him to citizens on the far right.

But as the race for the White House tightened, the issue became a liability for Trump among African American, Latino and moderate voters who are needed to win the presidential election.

Latest polls

The birther saga continues to make waves as the latest opinion polls show the two presidential candidates locked into what amounts to a statistical tie at a time when third party candidates could alter the race.

The latest New York Times/CBS News Poll shows Clinton ahead of Trump by a slim 46 percent to 44 percent margin among likely voters nationwide. The RealClear Politics national average shows Clinton clinging to a narrow 45.7 to 44.2 lead.

Friday evening in Miami, Trump told an audience that Clinton's bodyguards should stop carrying guns because Clinton wants to overturn the Second Amendment, which upholds a citizen's right to bear arms.

"I think that her bodyguards should drop all weapons," Trump said. "They should disarm, right? Take their guns away, she doesn't want guns....and let's see what happens to her. Take their guns away. OK, it would be very dangerous."

Clinton has never said she wants to overturn the Second Amendment. Instead, she has called for tighter access to guns, including universal background checks.

Clinton campaign manager Mook said in a statement that Trump's remarks about Clinton's bodyguards fall into Trump's pattern of inciting people to violence. "Whether this is done to provoke protesters at a rally or casually or even as a joke, it is an unacceptable quality in anyone seeking the job of Commander in Chief."

Both candidates' bodyguards are armed with guns.

The Clinton campaign is trying to regain what was once Clintons sizable lead over Trump by making a concerted effort to win over disillusioned voters who are leaning toward Libertarian Party candidate and former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson and Green Party nominee Jill Stein.

These voters, many of whom are millennials (born between the early 1980s and early 2000s), live in states that have fallen on hard economic times due primarily to a dramatic decline in the manufacturing sector.

Clinton hopes to get a boost among these voters on Saturday when Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, two politicians young liberal voters are loyal to, hit the campaign trail on her behalf. The senators will campaign in the battleground state of Ohio, where Clinton and Trump are tied in the polls.

Trump has turned his attention to the political battleground state of Florida, where recent polls show him increasing his lead over Clinton. His Friday evening rally in Miami will be followed by another Sunday in Fort Myers.
Officials in Washington and Moscow on Friday expressed a desire to extend their week-old cease-fire pact for Syria and confirmed aid deliveries had not yet begun, but agreed on little else concerning the tenuous situation in the war-torn country.

Forty trucks carrying desperately needed relief for the divided city of Aleppo were idling at a special customs checkpoint at the Turkish border, and the U.S. blamed the Syrian government for the holdup.

"Those trucks should be going in and that aid should be getting delivered with or without the arrangement that was arrived at in Geneva," State Department spokesman John Kirby said. "It is the [Syrian] regime that is blocking the movement."

U.N. officials said conditions were not yet safe for the vehicles to cross into Syria.

'Whole world is watching'

"We know that there's at least a quarter of a million people in eastern Aleppo who are ... in need of some kind of aid," said Jens Laerke, a spokesman for the U.N. humanitarian office. "We are as ready to go as we can possibly be. ... It's highly frustrating. We know the whole world is watching."

Syrian government troops had withdrawn from Aleppo but were then fired upon by rebels, prompting the soldiers to return to their previous positions, according to Russian officials, who also blamed Washington for not using its influence to quell cease-fire violations by rebel groups.

The Americans have a different view, with Secretary of State John Kerry expressing concern in a Friday phone call to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov "about the repeated and unacceptable delays of humanitarian aid," according to a State Department statement.

Meanwhile, in New York, the U.N. Security Council canceled a meeting on Syria that was scheduled for late Friday. The cancellation came at the request of the U.S. and Russia.

Under the cease-fire agreement Kerry and Lavrov announced in Geneva a week ago, hostilities should have paused Monday (the start of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha) to clear the way for humanitarian aid to flow unhindered into Syria. Starting next Monday  if those conditions are met  the United States and Russia are to begin joint coordination of airstrikes against the Islamic State and Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, formerly known as the al-Nusra Front, which are not parties to the truce.

Delays could threaten agreement

The White House indicated Friday that the next phase of the deal would not move forward until the aid was moving freely.

In a statement, the White House said President Obama emphasized to his National Security Council that "the United States will not proceed with the next steps in the arrangement with Russia until we see seven continuous days of reduced violence and sustained humanitarian access."

If the deal does falter, Kirby told reporters "we're back to regrettably where we have so long been: innocent civilians being barrel-bombed and gassed."

Over the last several days, there have been acts of violence "committed by all sides," according to Kirby.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said U.S. special forces  believed to be only five or six personnel  entered the Syrian town of al-Rai on Friday to coordinate airstrikes against Islamic State militants.

Video posted on the internet purportedly of those forces leaving the town showed fighters of the U.S.-backed Free Syrian Army chanting anti-American slogans and hurling insults, adding that they would not fight alongside the Americans.

U.S. officials on Friday would not confirm the authenticity of the video. But if the slurs were uttered by supposed allies in the fight against IS, it is "unacceptable and reprehensible," Kirby told reporters.

The U.S. Defense Department has previously acknowledged its special operations teams are accompanying Turkish and some Syrian opposition armed personnel in the area and further east, near Jarablus.

Meanwhile, Turkish-backed rebels, according to Ankara, have been involved in deadly clashes with IS in northern Syria with the support of Turkish warplanes and tanks.

Political transition

It is hoped that the truce forged by the United States and Russia will clear the way for negotiations about a political transition in Syria. But rebel leaders say they expect the cease-fire to collapse and do not believe Syrian President Bashar al-Assad  or his foreign backers, Russia and Iran  want to negotiate a political settlement.

"The armed groups on the ground are still discussing what they should do about the cease-fire," General Salim Idris, former chief of the staff of the Free Syrian Army, told VOA.
With two weeks remaining in the U.S. fiscal year, refugee aid agencies around the country are in the middle of what is projected to be one of the busiest months for arrivals in at least a decade, following a surge to bring in more Syrians fleeing civil war and Islamic State militants.

As of September 15, nearly 79,000 refugees from 78 countries have come to the U.S. since October 1, 2015, a figure that hasnt been reached in 17 years, according to official data.

The U.S. refugee program, which is run by several federal agencies, including the State Department, still expects to reach the target of 85,000 arrivals by the end of this month.

Weve set a goal for 85,000 and that's where we're going to shoot, and that's where I think we're going to end up, Mark Storella, deputy assistant secretary at the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration, told VOA this week.

Plenty of plane tickets

Michel Tonneau, global program coordinator of the U.S. refugee program at the International Organization for Migrations Washington bureau, said his agency had booked enough plane tickets for the targeted number of refugees. September is frequently a peak time for arrivals as the federal government closes out its budget for the year and the refugee program tries to get close to the designated ceiling without exceeding it.

"Its a remarkable year. I've been in this program for probably 30 years. I do not recall we've ever been able to match the admission level number, Tonneau said.

The actual number of refugees often falls just shy of the target, as was the case last year, when the ceiling decided by the president in collaboration with the State Department was 70,000 refugees and the country admitted 69,933.

As Europe struggled to process hundreds of thousands of refugees and asylum-seekers in 2015, the Obama administration announced an increase in the number of refugees the U.S. would accept for resettlement in fiscal 2016 to 85,000 from 70,000. The decision, which included the goal of 10,000 Syrian refugees, placed increased pressure on local groups that help the newcomers.

'Crazy' months

As those Syrian families filtered through an expedited processing system in Jordan, the summer months saw a jump in arrivals.

July and August were so crazy. We definitely felt the push, said Aerlande Wontamo, regional director for Lutheran Social Services of the National Capital Area. The group finds immediate housing for refugee families, picks them up at the airport, helps enroll children in school and supports their adjustment to a new home country.

They and other resettlement groups say they can meet the demand of additional refugees and have advocated for an increase to as high as 200,000.

The government originally set a goal of 100,000 for the coming fiscal year, which begins October 1. Media reports this week have indicated the president will raise that target to 110,000.

Were excited to hear more refugees are going to be coming, said Wontamo. Thats a great need.

Relatively few relocated

Though the U.N. refugee agency registered 16.1 million refugees in 2015, only about 107,000 of those individuals were relocated to so-called third countries that volunteer to take in the displaced, like the U.S., Canada and Australia. There are simply too few offers to match the needs of people who cannot go back to their home countries and cannot stay in their asylum countries.

Bill Canny, who heads migration and refugee services for one of the countrys longest-serving resettlement agencies, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, believes the current effort is just not good enough.

Those figures are incredibly low relative to need, Canny said. We can all do better, including the United States.
The United States has expressed concern about China's influence in Australias domestic politics and wants reforms to eliminate Beijings ability to use financial donations to influence Australian politicians.

In an exclusive interview with the daily newspaper The Australian, departing U.S. Ambassador John Berry said he is worried about China's influence in Australias domestic politics. Berry said the United States objects to Beijing's ability to advance its interests by funding Australian politicians during an election campaign and said Washington was "surprised" at the extent of the involvement of the Chinese government in Australian politics.

He said the United States hopes Canberra will protect Australia's "core responsibilities against undue influence from governments that do not share our values."

The ambassador's comments follow the resignation of opposition Labor senator Sam Dastyari, who had asked a company connected to the Chinese government to pay part of a travel bill.

The affair has prompted a widespread discussion about the influence that foreign financial donors are having on Australian lawmakers.

Peter Jennings, executive director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, says even if there is no direct evidence that Chinese funds have swayed political decisions, his concern is that Australian policy on China has been amended to suit Beijing.

There is no doubt the Chinese government is interested in using its diaspora communities to lobby for Chinese interests. And I think we've seen that very recently over the South China Sea, where there was an intense campaign on the part of Beijing to try to get countries to moderate their reactions to the legal judgment that was brought down in the Hague a month or two ago, said Jennings.

Both major parties in Australia have received hundreds of thousands of dollars from donors with overseas interests. Members of the opposition Labor party and the Australian Greens believe now is the time to ban such practices.

But former Australian prime minister John Howard believes that would be a bad move.

I certainly do not agree with the suggestion that we should further limit the amount people can contribute or companies contribute. Fundamentally it is an attack on freedom of political activity and expression, said Howard.

There have been attempts to regulate foreign donations. A Labor government introduced a bill to ban foreign donations to Parliament in 2010, but it never became law. Conservative government ministers have, so far, blocked a similar bill proposed by the Greens party, arguing there is no need for reform.

China is Australias biggest trading partner, and its future prosperity depends, in large part, on a smooth relationship with Beijing. Australia, however, must balance its commercial ties with China with its longstanding military alliance with the United States.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Saturday global cooperation was need to confront terrorism in the wake of an Islamist militant attack targeting foreigners in a luxury hotel in Mali that killed 19 people.

Friday's assault on the Radisson Blu hotel in Bamako came a week after militants killed 130 people in a spate of gun and bomb attacks in Paris claimed by Islamic State. France on Friday extended a state of emergency until February as police pursued raids and investigations, with over 250 people detained.

The bloodshed in Mali, a former French colony, was the latest sign of the problems faced by French troops and U.N. peacekeepers in restoring security in a West African state that has battled rebels and militants in its desert north for years.

Commandos end siege

The assault on the Radisson Blu hotel, claimed by jihadist groups Al Mourabitoun and al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), ended when Malian commandos stormed the building and rescued 170 people, many of them foreigners.

President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita said two militants were killed in the commando operation.

His government increased security at strategic points around Bamako at the start of a declared 10-day state of emergency.

Chinese President Xi Jinping condemned the "cruel and savage" attack, whose dead included three Chinese executives of a state-run railway firm.

The head of a Bamako hospital told Russian television channel LifeNews that at least two Russian citizens were killed.

RIA news agency said Russians were among the dead, citing Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova.

Confront terrorism

Putin sent a telegram of condolences to Keita and said "the widest international cooperation" was needed to confront global terrorism, according to a statement by the Kremlin.

On Tuesday, Putin promised to hunt down Islamist militants responsible for blowing up a Russian airliner over Egypt on Oct. 31 as well as intensified air strikes against militants in Syria, after the Kremlin concluded a bomb had destroyed the plane, killing 224 people.

WATCH: Related video report by VOA's Mariama Diallo

Putin and French President Francois Hollande also spoke by phone on Tuesday and agreed to boost coordination of their military actions in fighting jihadist militants in Syria.

One American and a deputy from a regional parliament in Belgium were also killed in the Bamako hotel attack, though French Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said he was not aware of any French nationals killed.

The attack began at 7 a.m. on Friday when gunmen killed guards at the entrance of the hotel and barged inside.

Rescued hostages

Malian commandos subsequently stormed the hotel and rescued around 170 people, many of whom had been hiding under beds or in side-rooms and rushed terrified from the building to safety as shooting continued inside.

By around 4 p.m. the hotel was secured but Malians woke on Saturday to a sense of shock at the latest high-profile raid by Islamists this year.

"I feel bruised by this atrocious act, which cannot be justified. No nation, no human life deserves such criminal barbarity," said Oumar Fomba, a teacher. "I urge the Malian government to fight more fiercely against terrorism."

In a speech on the sidelines of a summit with Asian nations in Malaysia, U.S. President Barack Obama described the raid in Mali as "another awful reminder of the scourge of terrorism."

"Once again, this barbarity only stiffens our resolve to meet this challenge. We will stand with the people of Mali as they work to rid their country of terrorists and strengthen their democracy. With allies and partners, the United States will be relentless."

Blow to France

The attack was another jolting blow to France after the shock of the Paris carnage. France has stationed 3,500 troops in northern Mali to try to restore stability after a rebellion in 2012 by ethnic Tuaregs that was later hijacked by jihadists linked to al Qaeda. "We (France) have proved to be as blind as the Malian elite.

Nothing changes in Mali. The elite continues to act like it always has as does the international community," said Laurent Bigot, former undersecretary in charge of West Africa at France's foreign ministry, alluding to U.N. peacekeepers.

"People have been ringing the alarm bell for a long time, but it doesn't do any good," Bigot, who now works as a consultant, told Reuters.

The attack also cast a spotlight on a veteran leader of Al Mourabitoun, Mokhtar Belmokhtar, a few months after reports, never confirmed, that he was killed in an air strike.

Northern Mali was occupied by Islamist fighters, some with links to al Qaeda, for most of 2012. They were driven out by a French-led military operation, but violence has continued.

Claims responsibility

Al Mourabitoun has claimed responsibility for a number of attacks, including an assault on a hotel in the town of Sevare, 600 kilometer (375 miles) northeast of Bamako, in August in which 17 people including five U.N. staff were killed.

One of its leaders is Belmokhtar, blamed for a large-scale assault on an Algerian gas field in 2013 and a major figure in insurgencies across North Africa.



In the wake of the Paris attacks, an Islamic State militant in Syria told Reuters the organisation viewed France's military intervention in Mali as another reason to target France and French interests.

"This is just the beginning. We also haven't forgotten what happened in Mali," said the non-Syrian fighter, who was contacted online by Reuters. "The bitterness from Mali, the arrogance of the French, will not be forgotten at all."
The Jet Airways flight 9W 272 had to return to the Indira Gandhi International soon after take off when the pilot noticed some glitch midway.

By Anindya Banerjee: A Jet Airways flight today had to make a U-turn and precautionary landing at New Delhi's Indira Gandhi International (IGI) airport after an unclaimed passenger bag was noticed midway.

The pilot of Jet flight 9W 272 was informed about the unclaimed baggage soon after it took off from the IGI for Bangladesh's capital city Dhaka. The Air Traffic Control asked the pilot to make a U-Turn.

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All passengers and crew members were safe on landing. After a thorough check stipulated by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation on any precautionary landing, the flight took off finally for Dhaka.

Jet Airways in its statement said, "Jet Airways flight 9W 272 from Delhi to Dhaka did an air turn back at Delhi, to offload baggage of a guest who was not able to make the flight connection in time. As safety of our guests and crew is our upmost priority, we regret any inconvenience caused to our 135 guests on-board the Boeing 737 aircraft."



--- ENDS ---
South Africa, Ghana and Senegal rake in cash from their tourism industries, but not Africas second-largest economy, Nigeria. A report released this week suggests tourists may pick where to visit based on how easily they can get visas.

Ghana and Nigeria are often seen as sister countries in West Africa. But one way they diverge is in their success at attracting visitors.

A report released by Londons Renaissance Capital this week says Nigeria gets about $500 million in revenue from tourism each year. That is just 0.1 percent of its $481 billion economy.

Ghana, in contrast, reaps a huge benefit from the tourist trade, according to Renaissance Capital global chief economist Charles Robertson.

Now 0.1 percent of GDP is so much, so much lower than say Ghana, a couple of countries away, which gets over two percent of GDP, in fact it is 25 times more money, relatively, in Ghana than Nigeria, said Robertson.

Ghana, in fact, ranks among the continents best tourism performers, along with Tanzania, Rwanda and Senegal. Nigeria is near the bottom, second only to the Democratic Republic of Congo.

These countries practice varying forms of democracy. But that is not what brings in tourists, Robertson says. Morocco and Jordan are monarchies and also major tourist destinations.

The continents top attractions are also free of the war and insecurity that pervades some African states. But that is not what attracts tourists either. South Africa is home to some of the most dangerous cities in the world but still gets between two and three percent of its GDP from tourism.

Robertson said people travel to countries like Senegal and Tanzania because they are easy to get in to.

A lot of the countries that do well from tourism have a very easy visa regime, said Robertson.

Rwanda recently overhauled its visa process to increase access, and is seeing benefits, Robertson said.

They have introduced this open visa regime system as well, and they get four percent of GDP. That is at least 40 times more than what Nigeria does, he said.

Meanwhile, Nigerias official tourism website does not even work, and visa costs can run into the hundreds of dollars.

Robertson says some African countries maintain tight visa requirements because their own citizens face onerous processes to get visas to other countries.

But with Nigerias economy in a recession, thanks in part to drops in the price and production of the countrys top export, oil, Robertson said growth in Nigerias tourism sector could only help.
A wildfire burning in the Peruvian Amazon that has charred some 20,000 hectares (49,421 acres) of rainforest and destroyed crops planted by indigenous communities was raging toward a national park and another protected area, authorities said Thursday.

Firefighters battled hot spots spanning 20 kilometers (12 miles) along the Ene River in the jungle region of Junin, said Julio Jeri, an official with SERFOR, Peru's forest service. He said the first rainfall in weeks did not appear to have contained the blaze.

Some 14 hectares of native croplands have been destroyed, and protected areas for the Ashaninka Amazonian tribe and the Otishi National Park were in the fire's path, he said.

About a tenth of the Amazonian rainforest is in Peru. A decline in rain related to climate change and last year's El Nino weather pattern have made the Amazon drier than usual, scientists have said.

The fire most likely started over the weekend as indigenous farmers were burning debris to prepare lands for planting, Jeri said. Forest officials became aware of the fire Monday.

No injuries or deaths had been reported by Thursday. The region is sparsely populated, and villages did not appear to be in harm's way, Jeri said.

Climate change most likely increased the risk of wildfires spreading rapidly in the region, said SERFOR Director Fabiola Munoz. "The forest is very dry in that area. It hadn't rained for several weeks," he said. "We're worried it might go further."
Rangers in South Africa's biggest wildlife park are killing about 350 hippos and buffalos in an attempt to relieve the impact of the region's most severe drought in more than three decades.

The numbers of hippos and buffalos in Kruger National Park, about 7,500 and 47,000 respectively, are at their highest level ever, according to the national parks service. Officials plan to distribute meat from the killed animals to poor communities on the park's perimeter.

The drought has left millions of people across several countries in need of food aid.

Hippos and buffalos consume large amounts of vegetation, and many animals are expected to die anyway because of the drought, said Ike Phaahla, a parks service spokesman. A drought in the early 1990s reduced Kruger park's buffalo population by more than half to about 14,000, but the population rebounded.

Rangers are targeting hippos in small natural pools where they have concentrated in unnatural high densities, defecate in the water, making it unusable to other animals, Phaahla wrote in an email to The Associated Press.

Parks officials have described drought as a natural way of regulating wildlife populations. Earlier this year, they said they didn't plan any major intervention to try to save wild species in Kruger park, but the drought's impact intensified. Hippos are in particular trouble because they can't feed as widely as other animals, returning to water by day after grazing by night.

South Africa's parks service stopped killing elephants to reduce overpopulation in 1994, partly because of public opposition.

Around 1900, hunting had cleared out elephants in the area that became Kruger park. Today, there are an estimated 20,000 elephants there. Poachers killed 36 elephants this year in the park, raising concerns that the Africa-wide slaughter of elephants for their ivory is finally affecting South Africa.

Poachers have already killed large numbers of rhinos in the park, which borders Zimbabwe and Mozambique and is almost the size of Israel.

Generations ago, an estimated 15,000 people lived in the area that was officially proclaimed as Kruger park in 1926. Some communities were removed from the wildlife reserve under white minority rule at that time.

These people were pure hunter-gatherers and we greatly underestimate their role in shaping this ecosystem, Phaahla said. We have removed this important driver from the Kruger ecosystem and we are researching ways to simulate the return of their role again and the removals or offtakes (of some animals) aim to do just that.
We, the Heads of State and Government and High Representatives, meeting at United Nations Headquarters in New York on 19 September 2016 to address the question of large movements of refugees and migrants, have adopted the following political declaration.

I. Introduction

1. Since earliest times, humanity has been on the move. Some people move in search of new economic opportunities and horizons. Others move to escape armed conflict, poverty, food insecurity, persecution, terrorism, or human rights violations and abuses. Still others do so in response to the adverse effects of climate change, natural disasters (some of which may be linked to climate change), or other environmental factors. Many move, indeed, for a combination of these reasons.

2. We have considered today how the international community should best respond to the growing global phenomenon of large movements of refugees and migrants.

3. We are witnessing in todays world an unprecedented level of human mobility. More people than ever before live in a country other than the one in which they were born. Migrants are present in all countries in the world. Most of them move without incident. In 2015, their number surpassed 244 million, growing at a rate faster than the worlds population. However, there are roughly 65 million forcibly displaced persons, including over 21 million refugees, 3 million asylum seekers and over 40 million internally displaced persons.

4. In adopting the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development one year ago, we recognized clearly the positive contribution made by migrants for inclusive growth and sustainable development. Our world is a better place for that contribution. The benefits and opportunities of safe, orderly and regular migration are substantial and are often underestimated. Forced displacement and irregular migration in large movements, on the other hand, often present complex challenges.

5. We reaffirm the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations. We reaffirm also the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and recall the core international human rights treaties. We reaffirm and will fully protect the human rights of all refugees and migrants, regardless of status; all are rights holders. Our response will demonstrate full respect for international law and international human rights law and, where applicable, international refugee law and international humanitarian law.

6. Though their treatment is governed by separate legal frameworks, refugees and migrants have the same universal human rights and fundamental freedoms. They also face many common challenges and have similar vulnerabilities, including in the context of large movements. Large movements may be understood to reflect a number of considerations, including: the number of people arriving, the economic, social and geographical context, the capacity of a receiving State to respond and the impact of a movement that is sudden or prolonged. The term does not, for example, cover regular flows of migrants from one country to another. Large movements may involve mixed flows of people, whether refugees or migrants, who move for different reasons but who may use similar routes.

7. Large movements of refugees and migrants have political, economic, social, developmental, humanitarian and human rights ramifications, which cross all borders. These are global phenomena that call for global approaches and global solutions. No one State can manage such movements on its own. Neighbouring or transit countries, mostly developing countries, are disproportionately affected. Their capacities have been severely stretched in many cases, affecting their own social and economic cohesion and development. In addition, protracted refugee crises are now commonplace, with long-term repercussions for those involved and for their host countries and communities. Greater international cooperation is needed to assist host countries and communities.

8. We declare our profound solidarity with, and support for, the millions of people in different parts of the world who, for reasons beyond their control, are forced to uproot themselves and their families from their homes.

9. Refugees and migrants in large movements often face a desperate ordeal. Many take great risks, embarking on perilous journeys, which many may not survive. Some feel compelled to employ the services of criminal groups, including smugglers, and others may fall prey to such groups or become victims of trafficking. Even if they reach their destination, they face an uncertain reception and a precarious future.

10. We are determined to save lives. Our challenge is above all moral and humanitarian. Equally, we are determined to find long-term and sustainable solutions. We will combat with all the means at our disposal the abuses and exploitation suffered by countless refugees and migrants in vulnerable situations.

11. We acknowledge a shared responsibility to manage large movements of refugees and migrants in a humane, sensitive, compassionate and people-centred manner. We will do so through international cooperation, while recognizing that there are varying capacities and resources to respond to these movements. International cooperation and, in particular, cooperation among countries of origin or nationality, transit and destination, has never been more important; win-win cooperation in this area has profound benefits for humanity. Large movements of refugees and migrants must have comprehensive policy support, assistance and protection, consistent with States obligations under international law. We also recall our obligations to fully respect their human rights and fundamental freedoms, and we stress their need to live their lives in safety and dignity. We pledge our support to those affected today as well as to those who will be part of future large movements.

12. We are determined to address the root causes of large movements of refugees and migrants, including through increased efforts aimed at early prevention of crisis situations based on preventive diplomacy. We will address them also through the prevention and peaceful resolution of conflict, greater coordination of humanitarian, development and peacebuilding efforts, the promotion of the rule of law at the national and international levels and the protection of human rights. Equally, we will address movements caused by poverty, instability, marginalization and exclusion and the lack of development and economic opportunities, with particular reference to the most vulnerable populations. We will work with countries of origin to strengthen their capacities.

13. All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law. We recall that our obligations under international law prohibit discrimination of any kind on the basis of race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Yet in many parts of the world we are witnessing, with great concern, increasingly xenophobic and racist responses to refugees and migrants.

14. We strongly condemn acts and manifestations of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance against refugees and migrants, and the stereotypes often applied to them, including on the basis of religion or belief. Diversity enriches every society and contributes to social cohesion. Demonizing refugees or migrants offends profoundly against the values of dignity and equality for every human being, to which we have committed ourselves. Gathered today at the United Nations, the birthplace and custodian of these universal values, we deplore all manifestations of xenophobia, racial discrimination and intolerance. We will take a range of steps to counter such attitudes and behaviour, in particular with regard to hate crimes, hate speech and racial violence. We welcome the global campaign proposed by the Secretary-General to counter xenophobia and we will implement it in cooperation with the United Nations and all relevant stakeholders, in accordance with international law. The campaign will emphasize, inter alia, direct personal contact between host communities and refugees and migrants and will highlight the positive contributions made by the latter, as well as our common humanity.

15. We invite the private sector and civil society, including refugee and migrant organizations, to participate in multi-stakeholder alliances to support efforts to implement the commitments we are making today.

16. In the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, we pledged that no one would be left behind. We declared that we wished to see the Sustainable Development Goals and their targets met for all nations and peoples and for all segments of society. We said also that we would endeavour to reach the furthest behind first. We reaffirm today our commitments that relate to the specific needs of migrants or refugees. The 2030 Agenda makes clear, inter alia, that we will facilitate orderly, safe, regular and responsible migration and mobility of people, including through the implementation of planned and well-managed migration policies. The needs of refugees, internally displaced persons and migrants are explicitly recognized.

17. The implementation of all relevant provisions of the 2030 Agenda will enable the positive contribution that migrants are making to sustainable development to be reinforced. At the same time, it will address many of the root causes of forced displacement, helping to create more favourable conditions in countries of origin. Meeting today, a year after our adoption of the 2030 Agenda, we are determined to realize the full potential of that Agenda for refugees and migrants.

18. We recall the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030 and its recommendations concerning measures to mitigate risks associated with disasters. States that have signed and ratified the Paris Agreement under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change welcome that agreement and are committed to its implementation. We reaffirm the Addis Ababa Action Agenda of the Third International Conference on Financing for Development, including its provisions that are applicable to refugees and migrants.

19. We take note of the report of the Secretary-General, entitled In safety and dignity: addressing large movements of refugees and migrants, prepared pursuant to General Assembly decision 70/539, in preparation for this high-level meeting. While recognizing that the following conferences either did not have an intergovernmentally agreed outcome or were regional in scope, we take note of the World Humanitarian Summit, held in Istanbul, Turkey, on 23 and 24 May 2016, the high-level meeting on global responsibility-sharing through pathways for admission of Syrian refugees, convened by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees on 30 March 2016, the conference on Supporting Syria and the Region, held in London on 4 February 2016, and the pledging conference on Somali refugees, held in Brussels on 21 October 2015. While recognizing that the following initiatives are regional in nature and apply only to those countries participating in them, we take note of regional initiatives such as the Bali Process on People Smuggling, Trafficking in Persons and Related Transnational Crime, the European Union-Horn of Africa Migration Route Initiative and the African Union-Horn of Africa Initiative on Human Trafficking and Smuggling of Migrants (the Khartoum Process), the Rabat Process, the Valletta Action Plan and the Brazil Declaration and Plan of Action.

20. We recognize the very large number of people who are displaced within national borders and the possibility that such persons might seek protection and assistance in other countries as refugees or migrants. We note the need for reflection on effective strategies to ensure adequate protection and assistance for internally displaced persons and to prevent and reduce such displacement.

Commitments

21. We have endorsed today a set of commitments that apply to both refugees and migrants, as well as separate sets of commitments for refugees and migrants. We do so taking into account different national realities, capacities and levels of development and respecting national policies and priorities. We reaffirm our commitment to international law and emphasize that this declaration and its appendices are to be implemented in a manner that is consistent with the rights and obligations of States under international law. While some commitments are mainly applicable to one group, they may also be applicable to the other. Furthermore, while they are all framed in the context of the large movements we are considering today, many may be applicable also to regular migration. Appendix I to the present declaration contains a comprehensive refugee response framework and outlines steps towards the achievement of a global compact on refugees in 2018, while appendix II sets out steps towards the achievement of a global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration in 2018.

II. Commitments that apply to both refugees and migrants

22. Underlining the importance of a comprehensive approach to the issues involved, we will ensure a people-centred, sensitive, humane, dignified, gender-responsive and prompt reception for all persons arriving in our countries, and particularly those in large movements, whether refugees or migrants. We will also ensure full respect and protection for their human rights and fundamental freedoms.

23. We recognize and will address, in accordance with our obligations under international law, the special needs of all people in vulnerable situations who are travelling within large movements of refugees and migrants, including women at risk, children, especially those who are unaccompanied or separated from their families, members of ethnic and religious minorities, victims of violence, older persons, persons with disabilities, persons who are discriminated against on any basis, indigenous peoples, victims of human trafficking, and victims of exploitation and abuse in the context of the smuggling of migrants.

24. Recognizing that States have rights and responsibilities to manage and control their borders, we will implement border control procedures in conformity with applicable obligations under international law, including international human rights law and international refugee law. We will promote international cooperation on border control and management as an important element of security for States, including issues relating to battling transnational organized crime, terrorism and illicit trade. We will ensure that public officials and law enforcement officers who work in border areas are trained to uphold the human rights of all persons crossing, or seeking to cross, international borders. We will strengthen international border management cooperation, including in relation to training and the exchange of best practices. We will intensify support in this area and help to build capacity as appropriate. We reaffirm that, in line with the principle of non-refoulement, individuals must not be returned at borders. We acknowledge also that, while upholding these obligations and principles, States are entitled to take measures to prevent irregular border crossings.

25. We will make efforts to collect accurate information regarding large movements of refugees and migrants. We will also take measures to identify correctly their nationalities, as well as their reasons for movement. We will take measures to identify those who are seeking international protection as refugees.

26. We will continue to protect the human rights and fundamental freedoms of all persons, in transit and after arrival. We stress the importance of addressing the immediate needs of persons who have been exposed to physical or psychological abuse while in transit upon their arrival, without discrimination and without regard to legal or migratory status or means of transportation. For this purpose, we will consider appropriate support to strengthen, at their request, capacity-building for countries that receive large movements of refugees and migrants.

27. We are determined to address unsafe movements of refugees and migrants, with particular reference to irregular movements of refugees and migrants. We will do so without prejudice to the right to seek asylum. We will combat the exploitation, abuse and discrimination suffered by many refugees and migrants.

28. We express our profound concern at the large number of people who have lost their lives in transit. We commend the efforts already made to rescue people in distress at sea. We commit to intensifying international cooperation on the strengthening of search and rescue mechanisms. We will also work to improve the availability of accurate data on the whereabouts of people and vessels stranded at sea. In addition, we will strengthen support for rescue efforts over land along dangerous or isolated routes. We will draw attention to the risks involved in the use of such routes in the first instance.

29. We recognize and will take steps to address the particular vulnerabilities of women and children during the journey from country of origin to country of arrival. This includes their potential exposure to discrimination and exploitation, as well as to sexual, physical and psychological abuse, violence, human trafficking and contemporary forms of slavery.

30. We encourage States to address the vulnerabilities to HIV and the specific health-care needs experienced by migrant and mobile populations, as well as by refugees and crisis-affected populations, and to take steps to reduce stigma, discrimination and violence, as well as to review policies related to restrictions on entry based on HIV status, with a view to eliminating such restrictions and the return of people on the basis of their HIV status, and to support their access to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support.

31. We will ensure that our responses to large movements of refugees and migrants mainstream a gender perspective, promote gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls and fully respect and protect the human rights of women and girls. We will combat sexual and gender-based violence to the greatest extent possible. We will provide access to sexual and reproductive health-care services. We will tackle the multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination against refugee and migrant women and girls. At the same time, recognizing the significant contribution and leadership of women in refugee and migrant communities, we will work to ensure their full, equal and meaningful participation in the development of local solutions and opportunities. We will take into consideration the different needs, vulnerabilities and capacities of women, girls, boys and men.

32. We will protect the human rights and fundamental freedoms of all refugee and migrant children, regardless of their status, and giving primary consideration at all times to the best interests of the child. This will apply particularly to unaccompanied children and those separated from their families; we will refer their care to the relevant national child protection authorities and other relevant authorities. We will comply with our obligations under the Convention on the Rights of the Child. We will work to provide for basic health, education and psychosocial development and for the registration of all births on our territories. We are determined to ensure that all children are receiving education within a few months of arrival, and we will prioritize budgetary provision to facilitate this, including support for host countries as required. We will strive to provide refugee and migrant children with a nurturing environment for the full realization of their rights and capabilities.

33. Reaffirming that all individuals who have crossed or are seeking to cross international borders are entitled to due process in the assessment of their legal status, entry and stay, we will consider reviewing policies that criminalize cross-border movements. We will also pursue alternatives to detention while these assessments are under way. Furthermore, recognizing that detention for the purposes of determining migration status is seldom, if ever, in the best interest of the child, we will use it only as a measure of last resort, in the least restrictive setting, for the shortest possible period of time, under conditions that respect their human rights and in a manner that takes into account, as a primary consideration, the best interest of the child, and we will work towards the ending of this practice.

34. Reaffirming the importance of the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime and the two relevant Protocols thereto, we encourage the ratification of, accession to and implementation of relevant international instruments on preventing and combating trafficking in persons and the smuggling of migrants.

35. We recognize that refugees and migrants in large movements are at greater risk of being trafficked and of being subjected to forced labour. We will, with full respect for our obligations under international law, vigorously combat human trafficking and migrant smuggling with a view to their elimination, including through targeted measures to identify victims of human trafficking or those at risk of trafficking. We will provide support for the victims of human trafficking. We will work to prevent human trafficking among those affected by displacement.

36. With a view to disrupting and eliminating the criminal networks involved, we will review our national legislation to ensure conformity with our obligations under international law on migrant smuggling, human trafficking and maritime safety. We will implement the United Nations Global Plan of Action to Combat Trafficking In Persons. We will establish or upgrade, as appropriate, national and regional anti human trafficking policies. We note regional initiatives such as the African Union-Horn of Africa Initiative on Human Trafficking and Smuggling of Migrants, the Plan of Action Against Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the European Union Strategy towards the Eradication of Trafficking in Human Beings 2012-2016, and the Work Plans against Trafficking in Persons in the Western Hemisphere. We welcome reinforced technical cooperation, on a regional and bilateral basis, between countries of origin, transit and destination on the prevention of human trafficking and migrant smuggling and the prosecution of traffickers and smugglers.

37. We favour an approach to addressing the drivers and root causes of large movements of refugees and migrants, including forced displacement and protracted crises, which would, inter alia, reduce vulnerability, combat poverty, improve self-reliance and resilience, ensure a strengthened humanitarian-development nexus, and improve coordination with peacebuilding efforts. This will involve coordinated prioritized responses based on joint and impartial needs assessments and facilitating cooperation across institutional mandates.

38. We will take measures to provide, on the basis of bilateral, regional and international cooperation, humanitarian financing that is adequate, flexible, predictable and consistent, to enable host countries and communities to respond both to the immediate humanitarian needs and to their longer-term development needs. There is a need to address gaps in humanitarian funding, considering additional resources as appropriate. We look forward to close cooperation in this regard among Member States, United Nations entities and other actors and between the United Nations and international financial institutions such as the World Bank, where appropriate. We envisage innovative financing responses, risk financing for affected communities and the implementation of other efficiencies such as reducing management costs, improving transparency, increasing the use of national responders, expanding the use of cash assistance, reducing duplication, increasing engagement with beneficiaries, diminishing earmarked funding and harmonizing reporting, so as to ensure a more effective use of existing resources.

39. We commit to combating xenophobia, racism and discrimination in our societies against refugees and migrants. We will take measures to improve their integration and inclusion, as appropriate, and with particular reference to access to education, health care, justice and language training. We recognize that these measures will reduce the risks of marginalization and radicalization. National policies relating to integration and inclusion will be developed, as appropriate, in conjunction with relevant civil society organizations, including faith-based organizations, the private sector, employers and workers organizations and other stakeholders. We also note the obligation for refugees and migrants to observe the laws and regulations of their host countries.

40. We recognize the importance of improved data collection, particularly by national authorities, and will enhance international cooperation to this end, including through capacity-building, financial support and technical assistance. Such data should be disaggregated by sex and age and include information on regular and irregular flows, the economic impacts of migration and refugee movements, human trafficking, the needs of refugees, migrants and host communities and other issues. We will do so consistent with our national legislation on data protection, if applicable, and our international obligations related to privacy, as applicable.

III. Commitments for migrants

41. We are committed to protecting the safety, dignity and human rights and fundamental freedoms of all migrants, regardless of their migratory status, at all times. We will cooperate closely to facilitate and ensure safe, orderly and regular migration, including return and readmission, taking into account national legislation.

42. We commit to safeguarding the rights of, protecting the interests of and assisting our migrant communities abroad, including through consular protection, assistance and cooperation, in accordance with relevant international law. We reaffirm that everyone has the right to leave any country, including his or her own, and to return to his or her country. We recall at the same time that each State has a sovereign right to determine whom to admit to its territory, subject to that States international obligations. We recall also that States must readmit their returning nationals and ensure that they are duly received without undue delay, following confirmation of their nationalities in accordance with national legislation. We will take measures to inform migrants about the various processes relating to their arrival and stay in countries of transit, destination and return.

43. We commit to addressing the drivers that create or exacerbate large movements. We will analyse and respond to the factors, including in countries of origin, which lead or contribute to large movements. We will cooperate to create conditions that allow communities and individuals to live in peace and prosperity in their homelands. Migration should be a choice, not a necessity. We will take measures, inter alia, to implement the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, whose objectives include eradicating extreme poverty and inequality, revitalizing the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development, promoting peaceful and inclusive societies based on international human rights and the rule of law, creating conditions for balanced, sustainable and inclusive economic growth and employment, combating environmental degradation and ensuring effective responses to natural disasters and the adverse impacts of climate change.

44. Recognizing that the lack of educational opportunities is often a push factor for migration, particularly for young people, we commit to strengthening capacities in countries of origin, including in educational institutions. We commit also to enhancing employment opportunities, particularly for young people, in countries of origin. We acknowledge also the impact of migration on human capital in countries of origin.

45. We will consider reviewing our migration policies with a view to examining their possible unintended negative consequences.

46. We also recognize that international migration is a multidimensional reality of major relevance for the development of countries of origin, transit and destination, which requires coherent and comprehensive responses. Migrants can make positive and profound contributions to economic and social development in their host societies and to global wealth creation. They can help to respond to demographic trends, labour shortages and other challenges in host societies, and add fresh skills and dynamism to the latters economies. We recognize the development benefits of migration to countries of origin, including through the involvement of diasporas in economic development and reconstruction. We will commit to reducing the costs of labour migration and promote ethical recruitment policies and practices between sending and receiving countries. We will promote faster, cheaper and safer transfers of migrant remittances in both source and recipient countries, including through a reduction in transaction costs, as well as the facilitation of interaction between diasporas and their countries of origin. We would like these contributions to be more widely recognized and indeed, strengthened in the context of implementation of the 2030 Agenda.

47. We will ensure that all aspects of migration are integrated into global, regional and national sustainable development plans and in humanitarian, peacebuilding and human rights policies and programmes.

48. We call upon States that have not done so to consider ratifying, or acceding to, the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families. We call also on States that have not done so to consider acceding to relevant International Labour Organization conventions, as appropriate. We note, in addition, that migrants enjoy rights and protection under various provisions of international law.

49. We commit to strengthening global governance of migration. We therefore warmly support and welcome the agreement to bring the International Organization for Migration, an organization regarded by its Member States as the global lead agency on migration, into a closer legal and working relationship with the United Nations as a related organization. We look forward to the implementation of this agreement, which will assist and protect migrants more comprehensively, help States to address migration issues and promote better coherence between migration and related policy domains.

50. We will assist, impartially and on the basis of needs, migrants in countries that are experiencing conflicts or natural disasters, working, as applicable, in coordination with the relevant national authorities. While recognizing that not all States are participating in them, we note in this regard the Migrants in Countries in Crisis initiative and the Agenda for the Protection of Cross-Border Displaced Persons in the Context of Disasters and Climate Change resulting from the Nansen Initiative.

51. We take note of the work done by the Global Migration Group to develop principles and practical guidance on the protection of the human rights of migrants in vulnerable situations.

52. We will consider developing non-binding guiding principles and voluntary guidelines, consistent with international law, on the treatment of migrants in vulnerable situations, especially unaccompanied and separated children who do not qualify for international protection as refugees and who may need assistance. The guiding principles and guidelines will be developed using a State-led process with the involvement of all relevant stakeholders and with input from the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on International Migration and Development, the International Organization for Migration, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and other relevant United Nations system entities. They would complement national efforts to protect and assist migrants.

53. We welcome the willingness of some States to provide temporary protection against return to migrants who do not qualify for refugee status and who are unable to return home owing to conditions in their countries.

54. We will build on existing bilateral, regional and global cooperation and partnership mechanisms, in accordance with international law, for facilitating migration in line with the 2030 Agenda. We will strengthen cooperation to this end among countries of origin, transit and destination, including through regional consultative processes, international organizations, the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, regional economic organizations and local government authorities, as well as with relevant private sector recruiters and employers, labour unions, civil society and migrant and diaspora groups. We recognize the particular needs of local authorities, who are the first receivers of migrants.

55. We recognize the progress made on international migration and development issues within the United Nations system, including the first and second High-level Dialogues on International Migration and Development. We will support enhanced global and regional dialogue and deepened collaboration on migration, particularly through exchanges of best practice and mutual learning and the development of national or regional initiatives. We note in this regard the valuable contribution of the Global Forum on Migration and Development and acknowledge the importance of multi-stakeholder dialogues on migration and development.

56. We affirm that children should not be criminalized or subject to punitive measures because of their migration status or that of their parents.

57. We will consider facilitating opportunities for safe, orderly and regular migration, including, as appropriate, employment creation, labour mobility at all skills levels, circular migration, family reunification and education-related opportunities. We will pay particular attention to the application of minimum labour standards for migrant workers regardless of their status, as well as to recruitment and other migration-related costs, remittance flows, transfers of skills and knowledge and the creation of employment opportunities for young people.

58. We strongly encourage cooperation among countries of origin or nationality, countries of transit, countries of destination and other relevant countries in ensuring that migrants who do not have permission to stay in the country of destination can return, in accordance with international obligations of all States, to their country of origin or nationality in a safe, orderly and dignified manner, preferably on a voluntary basis, taking into account national legislation in line with international law. We note that cooperation on return and readmission forms an important element of international cooperation on migration. Such cooperation would include ensuring proper identification and the provision of relevant travel documents. Any type of return, whether voluntary or otherwise, must be consistent with our obligations under international human rights law and in compliance with the principle of non refoulement. It should also respect the rules of international law and must in addition be conducted in keeping with the best interests of children and with due process. While recognizing that they apply only to States that have entered into them, we acknowledge that existing readmission agreements should be fully implemented. We support enhanced reception and reintegration assistance for those who are returned. Particular attention should be paid to the needs of migrants in vulnerable situations who return, such as children, older persons, persons with disabilities and victims of trafficking.

59. We reaffirm our commitment to protect the human rights of migrant children, given their vulnerability, particularly unaccompanied migrant children, and to provide access to basic health, education and psychosocial services, ensuring that the best interests of the child is a primary consideration in all relevant policies.

60. We recognize the need to address the special situation and vulnerability of migrant women and girls by, inter alia, incorporating a gender perspective into migration policies and strengthening national laws, institutions and programmes to combat gender-based violence, including trafficking in persons and discrimination against women and girls.

61. While recognizing the contribution of civil society, including non-governmental organizations, to promoting the well-being of migrants and their integration into societies, especially at times of extremely vulnerable conditions, and the support of the international community to the efforts of such organizations, we encourage deeper interaction between Governments and civil society to find responses to the challenges and the opportunities posed by international migration.

62. We note that the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on International Migration and Development, Peter Sutherland, will be providing, before the end of 2016, a report that will propose ways of strengthening international cooperation and the engagement of the United Nations on migration.

63. We commit to launching, in 2016, a process of intergovernmental negotiations leading to the adoption of a global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration at an intergovernmental conference to be held in 2018. We invite the President of the General Assembly to make arrangements for the determination of the modalities, timeline and other practicalities relating to the negotiation process. Further details regarding the process are set out in appendix II to the present declaration.

IV. Commitments for refugees

64. Recognizing that armed conflict, persecution and violence, including terrorism, are among the factors which give rise to large refugee movements, we will work to address the root causes of such crisis situations and to prevent or resolve conflict by peaceful means. We will work in every way possible for the peaceful settlement of disputes, the prevention of conflict and the achievement of the long-term political solutions required. Preventive diplomacy and early response to conflict on the part of States and the United Nations are critical. The promotion of human rights is also critical. In addition, we will promote good governance, the rule of law, effective, accountable and inclusive institutions, and sustainable development at the international, regional, national and local levels. Recognizing that displacement could be reduced if international humanitarian law were respected by all parties to armed conflict, we renew our commitment to uphold humanitarian principles and international humanitarian law. We confirm also our respect for the rules that safeguard civilians in conflict.

65. We reaffirm the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and the 1967 Protocol thereto as the foundation of the international refugee protection regime. We recognize the importance of their full and effective application by States parties and the values they embody. We note with satisfaction that 148 States are now parties to one or both instruments. We encourage States not parties to consider acceding to those instruments and States parties with reservations to give consideration to withdrawing them. We recognize also that a number of States not parties to the international refugee instruments have shown a generous approach to hosting refugees.

66. We reaffirm that international refugee law, international human rights law and international humanitarian law provide the legal framework to strengthen the protection of refugees. We will ensure, in this context, protection for all who need it. We take note of regional refugee instruments, such as the Organization of African Unity Convention governing the specific aspects of refugee problems in Africa and the Cartagena Declaration on Refugees.

67. We reaffirm respect for the institution of asylum and the right to seek asylum. We reaffirm also respect for and adherence to the fundamental principle of non refoulement in accordance with international refugee law.

68. We underline the centrality of international cooperation to the refugee protection regime. We recognize the burdens that large movements of refugees places on national resources, especially in the case of developing countries. To address the needs of refugees and receiving States, we commit to a more equitable sharing of the burden and responsibility for hosting and supporting the worlds refugees, while taking account of existing contributions and the differing capacities and resources among States.

69. We believe that a comprehensive refugee response should be developed and initiated by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, in close coordination with relevant States, including host countries, and involving other relevant United Nations entities, for each situation involving large movements of refugees. This should involve a multi-stakeholder approach that includes national and local authorities, international organizations, international financial institutions, civil society partners (including faith-based organizations, diaspora organizations and academia), the private sector, the media and refugees themselves. A comprehensive framework of this kind is appended to the present declaration.

70. We will ensure that refugee admission policies or arrangements are in line with our obligations under international law. We wish to see administrative barriers eased, with a view to accelerating refugee admission procedures to the extent possible. We will, where appropriate, assist States to conduct early and effective registration and documentation of refugees. We will also promote access for children to child-appropriate procedures. At the same time, we recognize that the ability of refugees to lodge asylum claims in the country of their choice may be regulated, subject to the safeguard that they will have access to, and enjoyment of, protection elsewhere.

71. We encourage the adoption of measures to facilitate access to civil registration and documentation for refugees. We recognize in this regard the importance of early and effective registration and documentation, as a protection tool and to facilitate the provision of humanitarian assistance.

72. We recognize that statelessness can be a root cause of forced displacement and that forced displacement, in turn, can lead to statelessness. We take note of the campaign of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to end statelessness within a decade and we encourage States to consider actions they could take to reduce the incidence of statelessness. We encourage those States that have not yet acceded to the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons and the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness to consider doing so.

73. We recognize that refugee camps should be the exception and, to the extent possible, a temporary measure in response to an emergency. We note that 60 per cent of refugees worldwide are in urban settings and only a minority are in camps. We will ensure that the delivery of assistance to refugees and host communities is adapted to the relevant context. We underline that host States have the primary responsibility to ensure the civilian and humanitarian character of refugee camps and settlements. We will work to ensure that this character is not compromised by the presence or activities of armed elements and to ensure that camps are not used for purposes that are incompatible with their civilian character. We will work to strengthen security in refugee camps and surrounding local communities, at the request and with the consent of the host country.

74. We welcome the extraordinarily generous contribution made to date by countries that host large refugee populations and will work to increase the support for those countries. We call for pledges made at relevant conferences to be disbursed promptly.

75. We commit to working towards solutions from the outset of a refugee situation. We will actively promote durable solutions, particularly in protracted refugee situations, with a focus on sustainable and timely return in safety and dignity. This will encompass repatriation, reintegration, rehabilitation and reconstruction activities. We encourage States and other relevant actors to provide support through, inter alia, the allocation of funds.

76. We reaffirm that voluntary repatriation should not necessarily be conditioned on the accomplishment of political solutions in the country of origin.

77. We intend to expand the number and range of legal pathways available for refugees to be admitted to or resettled in third countries. In addition to easing the plight of refugees, this has benefits for countries that host large refugee populations and for third countries that receive refugees.

78. We urge States that have not yet established resettlement programmes to consider doing so at the earliest opportunity. Those which have already done so are encouraged to consider increasing the size of their programmes. It is our aim to provide resettlement places and other legal pathways for admission on a scale that would enable the annual resettlement needs identified by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to be met.

79. We will consider the expansion of existing humanitarian admission programmes, possible temporary evacuation programmes, including evacuation for medical reasons, flexible arrangements to assist family reunification, private sponsorship for individual refugees and opportunities for labour mobility for refugees, including through private-sector partnerships, and for education, such as scholarships and student visas.

80. We are committed to providing humanitarian assistance to refugees so as to ensure essential support in key life-saving sectors, such as health care, shelter, food, water and sanitation. We commit to supporting host countries and communities in this regard, including by using locally available knowledge and capacities. We will support community-based development programmes that benefit both refugees and host communities.

81. We are determined to provide quality primary and secondary education in safe learning environments for all refugee children, and to do so within a few months of the initial displacement. We commit to providing host countries with support in this regard. Access to quality education, including for host communities, gives fundamental protection to children and youth in displacement contexts, particularly in situations of conflict and crisis.

82. We will support early childhood education for refugee children. We will also promote tertiary education, skills training and vocational education. In conflict and crisis situations, higher education serves as a powerful driver for change, shelters and protects a critical group of young men and women by maintaining their hopes for the future, fosters inclusion and non-discrimination and acts as a catalyst for the recovery and rebuilding of post-conflict countries.

83. We will work to ensure that the basic health needs of refugee communities are met and that women and girls have access to essential health-care services. We commit to providing host countries with support in this regard. We will also develop national strategies for the protection of refugees within the framework of national social protection systems, as appropriate.

84. Welcoming the positive steps taken by individual States, we encourage host Governments to consider opening their labour markets to refugees. We will work to strengthen host countries and communities resilience, assisting them, for example, with employment creation and income generation schemes. In this regard, we recognize the potential of young people and will work to create the conditions for growth, employment and education that will allow them to be the drivers of development.

85. In order to meet the challenges posed by large movements of refugees, close coordination will be required among a range of humanitarian and development actors. We commit to putting those most affected at the centre of planning and action. Host Governments and communities may need support from relevant United Nations entities, local authorities, international financial institutions, regional development banks, bilateral donors, the private sector and civil society. We strongly encourage joint responses involving all such actors in order to strengthen the nexus between humanitarian and development actors, facilitate cooperation across institutional mandates and, by helping to build self-reliance and resilience, lay a basis for sustainable solutions. In addition to meeting direct humanitarian and development needs, we will work to support environmental, social and infrastructural rehabilitation in areas affected by large movements of refugees.

86. We note with concern a significant gap between the needs of refugees and the available resources. We encourage support from a broader range of donors and will take measures to make humanitarian financing more flexible and predictable, with diminished earmarking and increased multi-year funding, in order to close this gap. United Nations entities such as the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East and other relevant organizations require sufficient funding to be able to carry out their activities effectively and in a predictable manner. We welcome the increasing engagement of the World Bank and multilateral development banks and improvements in access to concessional development financing for affected communities. It is clear, furthermore, that private sector investment in support of refugee communities and host countries will be of critical importance over the coming years. Civil society is also a key partner in every region of the world in responding to the needs of refugees.

87. We note that the United States of America, Canada, Ethiopia, Germany, Jordan, Mexico, Sweden and the Secretary-General will host a high-level meeting on refugees on 20 September 2016.

V. Follow-up to and review of our commitments

88. We recognize that arrangements are needed to ensure systematic follow-up to and review of all of the commitments we are making today. Accordingly, we request the Secretary-General to ensure that the progress made by Member States and the United Nations in implementing the commitments made at todays high-level meeting will be the subject of periodic assessments provided to the General Assembly with reference, as appropriate, to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

89. In addition, a role in reviewing relevant aspects of the present declaration should be envisaged for the periodic High-level Dialogues on International Migration and Development and for the annual report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to the General Assembly.

90. In recognition of the need for significant financial and programme support to host countries and communities affected by large movements of refugees and migrants, we request the Secretary-General to report to the General Assembly at its seventy-first session on ways of achieving greater efficiency, operational effectiveness and system-wide coherence, as well as ways of strengthening the engagement of the United Nations with international financial institutions and the private sector, with a view to fully implementing the commitments outlined in the present declaration.

Appendix I

Comprehensive refugee response framework 1. The scale and nature of refugee displacement today requires us to act in a comprehensive and predictable manner in large-scale refugee movements. Through a comprehensive refugee response based on the principles of international cooperation and on burden- and responsibility-sharing, we are better able to protect and assist refugees and to support the host States and communities involved. 2. The comprehensive refugee response framework will be developed and initiated by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, in close coordination with relevant States, including host countries, and involving other relevant United Nations entities, for each situation involving large movements of refugees. A comprehensive refugee response should involve a multi-stakeholder approach, including national and local authorities, international organizations, international financial institutions, regional organizations, regional coordination and partnership mechanisms, civil society partners, including faith-based organizations and academia, the private sector, media and the refugees themselves. 3. While each large movement of refugees will differ in nature, the elements noted below provide a framework for a comprehensive and people-centred refugee response, which is in accordance with international law and best international practice and adapted to the specific context. 4. We envisage a comprehensive refugee response framework for each situation involving large movements of refugees, including in protracted situations, as an integral and distinct part of an overall humanitarian response, where it exists, and which would normally contain the elements set out below. Reception and admission 5. At the outset of a large movement of refugees, receiving States, bearing in mind their national capacities and international legal obligations, in cooperation, as appropriate, with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, international organizations and other partners and with the support of other States as requested, in conformity with international obligations, would: (a) Ensure, to the extent possible, that measures are in place to identify persons in need of international protection as refugees, provide for adequate, safe and dignified reception conditions, with a particular emphasis on persons with specific needs, victims of human trafficking, child protection, family unity, and prevention of and response to sexual and gender-based violence, and support the critical contribution of receiving communities and societies in this regard; (b) Take account of the rights, specific needs, contributions and voices of women and girl refugees; (c) Assess and meet the essential needs of refugees, including by providing access to adequate safe drinking water, sanitation, food, nutrition, shelter, psychosocial support and health care, including sexual and reproductive health, and providing assistance to host countries and communities in this regard, as required; (d) Register individually and document those seeking protection as refugees, including in the first country where they seek asylum, as quickly as possible upon their arrival. To achieve this, assistance may be needed, in areas such as biometric technology and other technical and financial support, to be coordinated by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees with relevant actors and partners, where necessary; (e) Use the registration process to identify specific assistance needs and protection arrangements, where possible, including but not exclusively for refugees with special protection concerns, such as women at risk, children, especially unaccompanied children and children separated from their families, child-headed and single-parent households, victims of trafficking, victims of trauma and survivors of sexual violence, as well as refugees with disabilities and older persons; (f) Work to ensure the immediate birth registration for all refugee children born on their territory and provide adequate assistance at the earliest opportunity with obtaining other necessary documents, as appropriate, relating to civil status, such as marriage, divorce and death certificates; (g) Put in place measures, with appropriate legal safeguards, which uphold refugees human rights, with a view to ensuring the security of refugees, as well as measures to respond to host countries legitimate security concerns; (h) Take measures to maintain the civilian and humanitarian nature of refugee camps and settlements; (i) Take steps to ensure the credibility of asylum systems, including through collaboration among the countries of origin, transit and destination and to facilitate the return and readmission of those who do not qualify for refugee status. Support for immediate and ongoing needs 6. States, in cooperation with multilateral donors and private-sector partners, as appropriate, would, in coordination with receiving States: (a) Mobilize adequate financial and other resources to cover the humanitarian needs identified within the comprehensive refugee response framework; (b) Provide resources in a prompt, predictable, consistent and flexible manner, including through wider partnerships involving State, civil society, faith-based and private sector partners; (c) Take measures to extend the finance lending schemes that exist for developing countries to middle-income countries hosting large numbers of refugees, bearing in mind the economic and social costs to those countries; (d) Consider establishing development funding mechanisms for such countries; (e) Provide assistance to host countries to protect the environment and strengthen infrastructure affected by large movements of refugees; (f) Increase support for cash-based delivery mechanisms and other innovative means for the efficient provision of humanitarian assistance, where appropriate, while increasing accountability to ensure that humanitarian assistance reaches its beneficiaries. 7. Host States, in cooperation with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and other United Nations entities, financial institutions and other relevant partners, would, as appropriate: (a) Provide prompt, safe and unhindered access to humanitarian assistance for refugees in accordance with existing humanitarian principles; (b) Deliver assistance, to the extent possible, through appropriate national and local service providers, such as public authorities for health, education, social services and child protection; (c) Encourage and empower refugees, at the outset of an emergency phase, to establish supportive systems and networks that involve refugees and host communities and are age- and gender-sensitive, with a particular emphasis on the protection and empowerment of women and children and other persons with specific needs; (d) Support local civil society partners that contribute to humanitarian responses, in recognition of their complementary contribution; (e) Ensure close cooperation and encourage joint planning, as appropriate, between humanitarian and development actors and other relevant actors. Support for host countries and communities 8. States, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and relevant partners would: (a) Implement a joint, impartial and rapid risk and/or impact assessment, in anticipation or after the onset of a large refugee movement, in order to identify and prioritize the assistance required for refugees, national and local authorities, and communities affected by a refugee presence; (b) Incorporate, where appropriate, the comprehensive refugee response framework in national development planning, in order to strengthen the delivery of essential services and infrastructure for the benefit of host communities and refugees; (c) Work to provide adequate resources, without prejudice to official development assistance, for national and local government authorities and other service providers in view of the increased needs and pressures on social services. Programmes should benefit refugees and the host country and communities. Durable solutions 9. We recognize that millions of refugees around the world at present have no access to timely and durable solutions, the securing of which is one of the principal goals of international protection. The success of the search for solutions depends in large measure on resolute and sustained international cooperation and support. 10. We believe that actions should be taken in pursuit of the following durable solutions: voluntary repatriation, local solutions and resettlement and complementary pathways for admission. These actions should include the elements set out below. 11. We reaffirm the primary goal of bringing about conditions that would help refugees return in safety and dignity to their countries and emphasize the need to tackle the root causes of violence and armed conflict and to achieve necessary political solutions and the peaceful settlement of disputes, as well as to assist in reconstruction efforts. In this context, States of origin/nationality would: (a) Acknowledge that everyone has the right to leave any country, including his or her own, and to return to his or her country; (b) Respect this right and also respect the obligation to receive back their nationals, which should occur in a safe, dignified and humane manner and with full respect for human rights in accordance with obligations under international law; (c) Provide necessary identification and travel documents; (d) Facilitate the socioeconomic reintegration of returnees; (e) Consider measures to enable the restitution of property. 12. To ensure sustainable return and reintegration, States, United Nations organizations and relevant partners would: (a) Recognize that the voluntary nature of repatriation is necessary as long as refugees continue to require international protection, that is, as long as they cannot regain fully the protection of their own country; (b) Plan for and support measures to encourage voluntary and informed repatriation, reintegration and reconciliation; (c) Support countries of origin/nationality, where appropriate, including through funding for rehabilitation, reconstruction and development, and with the necessary legal safeguards to enable refugees to access legal, physical and other support mechanisms needed for the restoration of national protection and their reintegration; (d) Support efforts to foster reconciliation and dialogue, particularly with refugee communities and with the equal participation of women and youth, and to ensure respect for the rule of law at the national and local levels; (e) Facilitate the participation of refugees, including women, in peace and reconciliation processes, and ensure that the outcomes of such processes duly support their return in safety and dignity; (f) Ensure that national development planning incorporates the specific needs of returnees and promotes sustainable and inclusive reintegration, as a measure to prevent future displacement. 13. Host States, bearing in mind their capacities and international legal obligations, in cooperation with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, where appropriate, and other United Nations entities, financial institutions and other relevant partners, would: (a) Provide legal stay to those seeking and in need of international protection as refugees, recognizing that any decision regarding permanent settlement in any form, including possible naturalization, rests with the host country; (b) Take measures to foster self-reliance by pledging to expand opportunities for refugees to access, as appropriate, education, health care and services, livelihood opportunities and labour markets, without discriminating among refugees and in a manner which also supports host communities; (c) Take measures to enable refugees, including in particular women and youth, to make the best use of their skills and capacities, recognizing that empowered refugees are better able to contribute to their own and their communities well-being; (d) Invest in building human capital, self-reliance and transferable skills as an essential step towards enabling long-term solutions. 14. Third countries would: (a) Consider making available or expanding, including by encouraging private sector engagement and action as a supplementary measure, resettlement opportunities and complementary pathways for admission of refugees through such means as medical evacuation and humanitarian admission programmes, family reunification and opportunities for skilled migration, labour mobility and education; (b) Commit to sharing best practices, providing refugees with sufficient information to make informed decisions and safeguarding protection standards; (c) Consider broadening the criteria for resettlement and humanitarian admission programmes in mass displacement and protracted situations, coupled with, as appropriate, temporary humanitarian evacuation programmes and other forms of admission. 15. States that have not yet established resettlement programmes are encouraged to do so at the earliest opportunity. Those that have already done so are encouraged to consider increasing the size of their programmes. Such programmes should incorporate a non-discriminatory approach and a gender perspective throughout. 16. States aim to provide resettlement places and other legal pathways on a scale that would enable the annual resettlement needs identified by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to be met. The way forward 17. We commit to implementing this comprehensive refugee response framework. 18. We invite the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to engage with States and consult with all relevant stakeholders over the coming two years, with a view to evaluating the detailed practical application of the comprehensive refugee response framework and assessing the scope for refinement and further development. This process should be informed by practical experience with the implementation of the framework in a range of specific situations. The objective would be to ease pressures on the host countries involved, to enhance refugee self-reliance, to expand access to third-country solutions and to support conditions in countries of origin for return in safety and dignity. 19. We will work towards the adoption in 2018 of a global compact on refugees, based on the comprehensive refugee response framework and on the outcomes of the process described above. We invite the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to include such a proposed global compact on refugees in his annual report to the General Assembly in 2018, for consideration by the Assembly at its seventy-third session in conjunction with its annual resolution on the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
By Charu Thakur : Superheroes will be back, judwaa bhais will be back, rock bands will be back and so will the courtroom dramas. Come November, and Bollywood will witness a storm of sequels. If Farhan Akhtar's musical drama Rock On will get a fresh lease of life on screen with a new story, Salman Khan's 1997 cult film Judwaa be back on 70mm with Varun Dhawan in the lead. And if this wasn't enough, Bollywood's first superhero Krrish will yet again save the world, and Chulbul Pandey will win the hearts of many with his antics all over again.

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ALSO READ: Hrithik Roshan to return as superhero in Krrish 4

ALSO READ: Varun Dhawan steps into Salman Khan's shoes for Judwaa 2



As soon as the world decided to get over the trauma of bearing a mind-numbing Flying Jatt, Rakesh Roshan's wish to bring back the real superhero on screen kicked in. Papa Roshan is all set to make Krrish aka Hrithik Roshan fight more aliens in the fourth instalment of the franchise.

While the first two instalments got a thumbs-up from audience as well as the critics, the same can't be said about Krrish 3. But Roshan Sr is in no mood to take a cue from it and kill the franchise; instead, he is throwing his lot behind Krrish 4.

After fighting aliens in the last two instalments with special effects, no one has any idea what is in store for them, come Krrish 4. But there is still a flicker of hope: Mr Roshan doesn't disappoint the intelligence quotient of Bollywood fans with this new film in the franchise.

Here's a look at the sequels that have Bollywood fans waiting with bated breath.

Judwaa 2

Back in 1997, Salman Khan delivered one of the biggest hits of his career with Judwaa. If the playful Raja charmed everyone, the coy and dapper Prem made women go weak in the knees. Salman's dual role in David Dhawan's Judwaa worked wonders for his career. And 20 years later, Varun Dhawan hopes the same. David Dhawan is back with the sequel, and his younger son will play the leading role(s) in Judwaa 2. Ever since the announcement of the project, Judwaa 2 has got Dhawan's fans excited. But only time will tell if David and Varun are able to recreate the same magic with the sequel.

Rock On 2

The trailer is out and so is the first song - Jaago. Farhan Akhtar and his band 'Magik' are back to cast their spell on the audience, but with a new twist - Shraddha Kapoor. The makers have decided to take the story forward but with this new addition to the story. However, it is hard to tell if Rock on 2 will be able to surpass the box-office business of Rock On.

Dabangg 3

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Arbaaz Khan is still in the process of writing the script for Dabangg 3, but this very piece of news has caught the fancy of Salman Khan's fans. They can't wait to watch the inimitable inspector Chulbul Pandey return to the silver screen. The film is set to go on floors in 2017. While the first two instalments turned out to be huge hits, the same is expected from Dabangg 3 as Arbaaz promises it will be bigger and better than the first two films.

Dhoom 4



Its time for an adrenaline rush. Stay tuned! #DhoomReloaded pic.twitter.com/BzkLTKO8Bm Yash Raj Films (@yrf) December 17, 2015

In the winter of 2015, Yash Raj Films took fans by surprise when they dropped heavy hints about Dhoom 4. The production house posted a video on Twitter, teasing that Dhoom Reloaded is in the offing. And this was enough to pique curiosity of people. And soon began the speculation about the actor playing the baddie in this Dhoom. After John Abraham, Hrithik Roshan and Aamir Khan, eyes are on Shah Rukh Khan and Salman Khan to fill in their predecessors' shoes. But there has been no official confirmation from the makers regarding the cast.

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Jolly LLB 2

Jolly LLB, based on the Sanjeev Nanda hit-and-run case of 1999, turned out to be a sleeper hit back in 2013. And Subhash Kapoor is back with yet another court drama. While the first film rode high on content, the sequel has some star power in the form of Akshay Kumar. The subject of Jolly LLB 2 has been kept under wraps, and the film has already grabbed attention.

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Michael C. Hall has been singing David Bowie songs for almost a year, thanks to the Bowie-penned musical Lazarus, so itd be pretty concerning if he wasnt super good at channeling Bowie by now. Even so! Michael C. Hall is really quite something at singing David Bowie songs, and its worth mentioning. Hall proved it again during the Mercury Prize ceremony, where he kept his Lazarus muscles loose between starring in the show in New York before Bowies death and taking the musical to London next month. He sang Lazarus and sounded a lot like Bowie singing Lazarus, which is to say, very good.
Joseph Gordon-Levitt in Snowden. Photo: Jurgen Olczyk

Oliver Stones Snowden is pretty good. Or pretty bad. It depends on your criteria. Stone has come to praise his subject, Edward Snowden, the CIA analyst turned classified-document dumper, not to raise  even tangentially  questions about Snowdens character or the ramifications of his actions on national security. This is the same Snowden we met in Laura Poitrass Oscar-winning documentary Citizenfour: the unequivocal patriot who cant abide his governments malpractice and heroically upends his life by turning over tens of thousands of classified documents to Poitras and journalist Glenn Greenwald. Poitras and Greenwald are major characters in Stones movie, which opens with the wary first meeting of Snowden (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), Poitras (Melissa Leo), and Greenwald (Zachary Quinto) in a luxe but dim and film-noir-shadowy Hong Kong hotel. As Snowden talks to Poitrass camera, the movie flashes back to his aborted military training (broken legs demolished his hopes of joining the Special Forces), his CIA education, his romance with a lefty yoga teacher (Shailene Woodley), and his growing dismay over his agencys unchecked powers of surveillance. Its a classic political conversion narrative, not unlike Stones Born on the Fourth of July and even Wall Street.

Here I have to admit that I largely share Stones view of his protagonist. Although Snowdens critics (not all of them raging neocons) have argued that his willy-nilly plundering of classified material has compromised Americans safety, Poitrass Citizenfour made a better case for disclosure. Even if you will yourself to believe the best-case scenario  that the data mining of American citizens has been done responsibly  youre still left with an unassailable truth: that the U.S. has constructed an immense, multi-tentacled, and historically unprecedented surveillance machine that can be used by even less scrupulous people for even less scrupulous reasons. The more you take the long view, the more you believe in the essential rightness of Snowdens actions.

Which makes me wish that Stone had given the people who think otherwise more stature  that hed made a real drama instead of a melodrama that Snowdens detractors (and admirers, like me) can walk all over.

In interviews, the real Snowden can come off as a cold fish, but no matter how much Gordon-Levitt strives to immobilize his puppy-dog features, the eyes behind his glasses are warm. There isnt a moment in Snowden in which you wonder about the nature of his idealism or the aptness of a patronizing colleagues nickname for him: Snow White. You could even be forgiven for thinking that he has eventually come to embrace his girlfriends crunchy politics  though in reality Snowdens Ayn Randstyle libertarianism has been remarkably consistent. (Hes contributed to Ron Paul in the past.) Stone is so intent on making Snowden an icon that he scrubs him of his nuances, his individuality.

He also turns the role of Snowdens CIA mentor, filled by Rhys Ifans as Corbin OBrian, into the glibbest kind of fop, a man so utterly sanguine about the constitutional integrity of the secret fisa court that he comes across as simpleminded. (Ifans has a fine American accent, but his affect is pure Colonel Blimp.) In one scene, Snowden is appalled when an NSA agent (Ben Schnetzer) whos exuberantly invasive (Facebooks my bitch!) uses an innocent Muslim womans own computer to watch her remove her burqa and strip to her underwear; Snowden later breaks off making love to his girlfriend to cover his laptop camera. (I went home and put black duct tape over mine  and you should, too.) Not once, though, does Stone suggest that the NSA and CIAs surveillance equipment could actually be used to protect Americans instead of, say, blackmailing foreign officials on behalf of an unscrupulous military-industrial complex or using drones to wipe out unlucky families. Bush II was bad, Obama is worse: We should turn off the cameras because theres nothing to see.

It should be said that Snowden isnt the work of the conspiracy-monger who made JFK  which was wildly entertaining but nuts. Possessing concrete evidence that the CIA and NSA are, indeed, watching us all (Hi, guys! Like my review so far?), he has made a relatively sober film. Its spooky, though. The soundtrack teems with humming wires and distant, ghostly modem squeals, and the lighting in the Hong Kong hotel seems more suitable for vampires than people poring over documents. Stone gets Expressionistic in one scene, in which an image of the planet crackling with electricity transforms into Snowdens crackling eyeball. A short time later, Snowden falls to the floor with an epileptic seizure, as if the surveillance state had penetrated the blood-brain barrier.

If Gordon-Levitt makes Snowden a shade too likable, hes still fun to watch. Leos bedraggled, nurturing Poitras is an astonishing feat of sympathetic mimicry, while Quinto makes the best case for Greenwalds abrasiveness. Woodleys scenes are hackneyed (her Lindsay complains to Snowden, We dont talk about anything anymore!), but her bouncy, wood-sprite rhythms have their charm. Nicolas Cage plays the crusty caretaker of ancient computers  the voice of old-school integrity  with the jerkiness of a high-school actor, waving his arms under too-rigid shoulders. But hes a welcome hoot. Any director whod put Cage in the bowels of CIA headquarters must have a good sense of humor.

*This article appears in the September 19, 2016, issue of New York Magazine.
Photo: Andrew Lipovsky/NBC

Looking at Twitters reaction to Donald Trumps appearance on The Tonight Show last night, three themes emerge: (1) I cant believe how terrible Jimmy Fallon was; (2) he did a great job interviewing our beloved future president, get off his back, liberals; (3) LOL, did you just now realize that Jimmy Fallon sucks? Good or bad (it was bad), it doesnt matter, last night will be remembered as when Fallon went from a person some people thought was obsequious to someone a lot of people think is undeniably shitty  all while not affecting his large ratings one bit. In other words, last night Jimmy Fallon became Jay Leno.

Every year, for the last 20 years, comedian Andy Kindler has acted as the comedy worlds ombudsman of sorts, giving a State of the Industry speech at the Montreal Just for Laughs festival. Kindler is a Letterman guy, and jokes about Jay Leno have always been a major part of his speech. Ever since Fallon got Late Night, and then replaced Leno at The Tonight Show, Fallon has been a primary target for Kindler.

Jokes like this one from this years festival  Before going on the show, candidates will have to ask themselves, How will making balloon animals affect my image?  reflect that, to the most discerning comedy audiences, Fallon has always been a hack. Other examples include a Conan writers Twitter rant that called Fallon prom-king comedy. Or a joke on this season of Difficult People that said that Jimmy Fallon turned The Tonight Show into a kids birthday party. Maybe most severe was Fallon getting hit by a bus on BoJack Horseman.

Still, this assessment never seemed to cross over to non-comedy insiders  until last night. Here are some of the responses from journalists:

I don't fault Jimmy Fallon for not being a journalist. I do fault him for his willingness to serve as hell's court jester.  Mark Harris (@MarkHarrisNYC) September 16, 2016

why is jimmy fallon only getting dragged for being an evil jester NOW? the man loosed the plague of lip sync battle upon Earth.  Kate Knibbs  (@Knibbs) September 16, 2016

I'm more surprised that Jimmy Fallon didn't challenge Trump's hair to a game of Boggle or something  Drew Magary (@drewmagary) September 16, 2016

Jimmy Fallon's really living up to that Leno legacy.  Scott Wampler (@ScottWamplerBMD) September 16, 2016

Fallons inoffensiveness has become offensive to cultural elites; his harmlessness is now a liability. For Leno, the perception that he stole The Tonight Show from Letterman brought a sourness to peoples view of his frivolousness. Fallons Trump interview will create a similarly bad taste that will probably linger, unlike other backlash that hasnt. Even when years pass and many forget this specific incident, the effect it has on the perception of him will likely stick.

And like Leno, it will likely have no effect on The Tonight Shows ratings. Theres a quote attributed to Michael Jordan (that has been disputed): Republicans buy sneakers, too. Well, they also watch TV. Being perceived as overly partisan, especially in an election year, essentially cuts your potential audience in half. And currently Fallon gets about twice the viewership of his competitors. Will the interview hurt his standing with liberals? Of course. But he will still get guests because of his ratings and because they know hell make it easy for them. Just like Leno. Now, we just need to see what he looks like in all denim.
Next General Election to the Lok Sabha is scheduled for 2019. Elections for Vidhan Sabhas of 5 states are scheduled for 2017, 13 states will go to polls in 2018, 9 states in 2019, 1 in 2020 and the remaining are scheduled for 2021.

By Kumar Vikram: Political parties might have different views on holding simultaneous elections to the Lok Sabha and state assemblies, but majority of the people appear to be in favour of the idea.

Thousands have submitted their suggestions on the citizen engagement platform 'Mygov' in support of holding polls simultaneously. Suggestions were invited on Mygov website following a debate sparked by the PM and the President in favour of simultaneous polls.

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About 4,000 people have submitted their views over the last one week, suggesting that state polls and Lok Sabha polls be held together. Sources said that following the suggestions of people on the Mygov, government may call an all-party meeting very soon to have to take the issue forward.

SUGGESTIONS WERE INVITED ON MYGOV

Moreover, it could also be debated in the next Parliament session. The discussion was opened after President Pranab Mukherjee's remarks on September 5, wherein he mentioned that with some election or the other being held throughout the year, normal activities of the government come to a standstill because of the code of conduct.

"This is an idea the political leadership should think of. If political parties collectively think, we can change it... The Election Commission can also put in their idea and efforts on holding polls together and that will be highly beneficial," the note quoted Mukherjee as saying.

In recent months, PM Narendra Modi has also spoken several times on the subject. He spoke about this idea and called for a national debate in two recent TV discussions.

Many political parties are also of the view that there should be debate on the issue. "All pros and cons should be discussed before reaching a conclusion. It should be discussed that whether it is practically possible or not," said Congress spokesperson Meem Afzal.

While inviting the suggestions, Mygov has commented that the desirability of holding simultaneous elections for the Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabhas has been discussed at various levels.

"A considered view is that simultaneous elections will not only keep alive the enthusiasm of voters, but will also result in huge savings to the public exchequer as well as avoiding repetition of administrative effort. It is also expected to control the expenses of political parties. Simultaneous elections will also avoid repeated enforcement of the Model Code of Conduct which affects administrative actions by the government," it said.

ALSO READ:

BJP-RSS yet to project their CM candidate for UP Assemble elections





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Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said Texas must not become complacent with its success in attracting businesses and outlined several priorities for keeping the states good fortunes going during a State of the State speech Thursday in Waco.

First, we must ensure that existing companies considering expansion and those looking to come here have access to a well-trained, qualified workforce, he said. I attended the grand opening of an Amazon fulfillment center near San Antonio, and I asked officials with the Seattle company why they were expanding so much into Texas. I expected them to say something about taxes being lower or Texas having better a business climate. But, no, they did not hesitate to comment on our high-quality workforce.

The session touched on Texas sterling reputation as a hotbed for business, changes in the states demographics and population, and challenges in education and transportation, including completing the widening of Interstate 35 through Waco.

Abbott, a Republican who was elected governor in 2014, spoke to a crowd of nearly 400 people at the Baylor Club of McLane Stadium.

Tate Christensen, chairman of the Waco chamber, introduced Abbott and reminded the audience that he and the state in March received the 2015 Governors Cup from Site Selection magazine for having 702 economic development projects completed last year, the most in the nation and up from 689 in 2014, when Texas also came in first.

Abbott said the concentration of professional talent in Dallas has caused it to become the preeminent banking and finance center in the United States, surpassing New York and Boston, because it is filled with people qualified for finance-sector jobs.

Waco for a long time has been considered a center for finance and insurance, he said.

Maintaining the flow of business to Texas means making companies feel welcome, and Abbott said little acts of kindness often make a difference.

Jamie Dimon, chairman of JPMorgan Chase, visited Houston a few months ago to celebrate its 150th anniversary in that city, Abbott said. I couldnt make it down there, but I did call to congratulate JPMorgan. Dimon said he appreciated the gesture, that he couldnt even get the mayor of New York to take his calls.

To mark the occasion, Chase awarded a $1 million grant to Neighborhood Centers Inc. to help train 1,000 Houston residents in crafts that provide higher wages. The $1 million grant is part of a $5 million commitment to workforce training in the nations fourth-largest city and a $250 million effort nationwide.

Texas tells business, We want you to succeed. We need you to succeed. When you succeed, we succeed, because there is a symbiotic relationship. 

Finding well-paying jobs

To meet the employment needs of business and industry, the Texas Workforce Commission, Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board and the Texas Education Agency hope to create an entity that would work with high schools, two- and four-year colleges and the private sector to determine the skills most needed by business and industry and train students in those areas, Abbott said. High school students would receive college credits and find themselves on the fast track to well-paying jobs, Abbott said.

Abbott, who uses a wheelchair, said during his campaign for governor that he can move faster than traffic on some Texas roadways.

I noticed there is construction on Interstate 35 almost every mile from near Salado to Waco, he said of his drive from Austin to McLane Stadium.

With that in mind, Abbott said the 2017 Unified Transportation Program allocates $70 billion in 10 years to building new roadways and highways, primarily to relieve the 100 most severe problems with congestion in the state. He said taxpayers should not fear that all the money will go to Texas largest cities.

Interstate 35, which stretches through Texas and beyond, is critical to the states transportation system, he said, and a choke point in the middle would disrupt the entire process. He said Central Texas can expect to receive funding to complete the widening of I-35 through Waco.

On another transportation front, Abbott said the Port of Houston Authority and Texas A&Ms Freight Shuttle International are collaborating on a system that would allow freight to be hauled near the port by driverless electric vehicles that would run on tracks instead of 18-wheelers.

This would reduce congestion and pollution, Abbott said.

Texas A&M owns the patents, so there is a lot of money to be made if this idea spreads, he said.

Abbott said Texas ranks No. 2 in the nation in the number of businesses owned by women, and that 60 percent of the growth in women-owned businesses comes from new ventures being launched by blacks, Hispanics and Asians. He said that is significant because Texas has become a state where minorities have become the majority.
Wacos leisure and hospitality industry has grown by 800 people in the past year, part of an increase of 2,300 jobs in the area since August last year, according to figures released Friday by the Texas Workforce Commission and Bureau of Labor Statistics.

A total of 11,900 people are employed in the leisure and hospitality sector in the Waco Metropolitan Statistical Area, which includes McLennan and Falls counties.

Other job sectors with sizable increases include education and health services, with an increase of 700, and professional and business services, with a jump of 500.

The workforce commission reported that the Waco MSA saw its jobless rate drop from 4.6 percent in July to 4.4 percent in August. And though the number of people employed the past year has increased considerably, the jobless rate in August last year actually was lower at 4.2 percent.

The workforce commission said more people are looking for jobs, noting that the Waco MSAs civilian labor force, which includes the unemployed and employed, increased from 119,600 in August last year to 122,300 this year.

Several factors are creating demand for workers in leisure and hospitality, said Carla Pendergraft, director of marketing for the Waco Convention and Visitors Bureau.

First of all, weve had three new hotels open this year, and each must be staffed, Pendergraft said. Then, we have the third-highest occupancy rate in the state at 74.7 percent, which is behind only Austin-Round Rocks 79.1 percent and Dallas 76.5 percent. The statewide average is 65.9 percent.

Such occupancy rates mean there are more people cleaning rooms, taking phone calls and taking care of people, Pendergraft said.

The new hotels that opened this year are the TownPlace Suites at Legends Crossing; Candlewood Suites at New Road and Interstate 35; and Home2 Suites by Hilton near Bagby Avenue and South Valley Mills Drive, in the mixed-use development anchored by the Gander Mountain outdoors store.

Pendergraft said restaurant employees are included in the leisure and hospitality tally, and just think of how many new ones of those we have.

Magnolia Market at the Silos, Sixth Street and Webster Avenue, has become a tremendous magnet for visitors, Pendergraft said. Its appeal has steadily grown, and it welcomes an average of 35,000 visitors a week, she said. That translates into 1.8 million guests per year for the Silos and Waco.

Statewide, Texas employers added 190,600 jobs since last August, workforce commission Chairman Andres Alcantar said in a press release.

The fact that our state has added jobs for 16 of the last 17 months is a credit to the diversity and resilience of employers in Texas, Commissioner Ruth R. Hughs said in the press release.

Texas seasonally adjusted jobless rate increased to 4.7 percent in August, up slightly from 4.6 percent in July.

The Amarillo Metropolitan Statistical Area recorded the lowest unemployment rate for August, at 3.4 percent. The Austin-Round Rock MSA had the second-lowest rate at 3.5 percent, followed by the Lubbock MSA with a rate of 3.8 percent, according to the press release.

A report prepared by the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows the national unemployment rate remained at 4.9 percent in August for the third month in a row.
Analisa Villarreal, a junior at Vanguard College Preparatory School, took part this summer in the Global Young Innovators Initiative.

Analisa attended the six-day conference held at the University of Chicago, one of four campuses nationwide that hosted the program.

Students were divided into groups and collaborated via Skype and email with business leaders in Nigeria to address a challenge facing the local community during the Leadership Initiatives Innovation Simulation.

Analisa, the daughter of Yvonne and Judge Fernando Villareal, was in a group that worked with Nigerian businessman Danliti Abdullahi.

She was able to talk with the business owner through Skype. Throughout the week she worked with the group to come up with solutions to fix the business problems Abdullahi said he faces in his shoemaking business. Those challenges included a means of advertising, business logo and new shoe designs.

The group presented its solutions to the business partner, the judges and the rest of the scholars at the program.

-----

Analisa Villareal photo

Analisa Villareal (far left) poses with her Carson Cobbling team members. The group worked with a shoemaker in Nigeria to help his business during the program.
Maharashtra's Tribal Development Minister Vishnu Savara had gone to the locality to express his sympathies to the deceased kid's family, 15 days after the kid died.

By Mayuresh Ganapatye, Kamlesh Damodar Sutar: Maharashtra's Tribal Development Minister Vishnu Savara was shown the door by angry mother of a malnutrition victim in Mokhada on Thursday.

Savara had gone to the locality situated outside Mumbai city to express his sympathies to the deceased kid's family, 15 days after the kid died.

The tribal belt of Mokhada is in media glare as 10 kids died due to severe malnutrition during the last 3 months. A tribal organisation has alleged that 600 children in this area have died in the last one year.

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Verbal battle ensued after minister Savara defended his late going and indifference. Crowd gathered at the spot argued with Savara and questioned him what his government has done for the tribal children. They also heckled the minister who got angry immediately. The high drama, which was captured on mobile phone, also went viral on social networking sites.

GOVERNMENT APATHY



The mob got angry because Savara visited the family after 15 days of the incident when he stays just 55 kilometers away from Mokhada.

Victim's father criticised the minister for visiting them after getting the information about their plight form newspapers. The victim's mother said, "Where were you when we needed support of government, what have you done for us?"

Maharashtra Governor C Vidyasagar Rao also took cognisance of deaths due to malnutrition in Mokhada and Jawhar. He directed the state government to take effective steps towards it. The governor had called for convergence of schemes and coordination among departments to tackle malnutrition. Rao asked the ministers to make a comprehensive plan that would include long-term as well as short-term measures to tackle malnutrition in the state.

Maharashtra has a terrible record of malnutrition deaths. Especially, in Jawhar, Mokhada - the tribal area. With Savara being a tribal, as the seat is reserved (tribal), one would have expected more sincere efforts.

WATCH VIDEO | Vegetarianism causes malnutrition: Modi



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David Zahirniak testified Friday that his former girlfriend killed herself because she was depressed. She surrendered a pistol to him previously because she contemplated suicide, Zahirniak said.

He spent about an hour on the witness stand Friday morning before 54th State District Judge Matt Johnson recessed the murder trial about noon.

Zahirniak will continue his testimony when the trial enters its sixth day Monday morning.

Zahirniak, 45, of West, is charged in the April 2014 shooting death of his estranged girlfriend, Caitlyn Reed, 21, at her rented trailer home near West.

Zahirniak started a chronological review of their relationship in testimony Friday and had not progressed yet to the day she died before court recessed for the weekend.

Investigators testified this week that the forensic evidence found at the home, Zahirniaks escalating violence toward Reed and his conflicting versions about what happened led to his arrest for murder.

Two county inmates jailed with Zahirniak testified he confessed to killing Reed.

Zahirniak told detectives he found Reed with a single gunshot wound to the chest when he went to check on her after she didnt show up for work.

Defense attorneys Alan Bennett and Jessi Freud have laid the groundwork that Reed suffered from a troubled mental state because she struggled financially, abused anxiety medication, was going through a divorce and was afraid of getting her probation revoked and losing her two sons.

Zahirniak, who served prison time for methamphetamine possession in 2009, acknowledged their relationship was stormy but denied prosecution testimony that he put Reed in the hospital two weeks before her death by beating her with a cane.

Reed reported the assault, and Zahirniak was jailed briefly on aggravated assault charges. He later texted her that he was going to rape and kill her, according to trial testimony. That led to Reed changing her phone number and having the locks changed at her house.

Before the recess Friday, Bennett was trying to introduce into evidence a tape recording Zahirniak said he made during an April 1, 2013, visit to Reeds home. He said he took a woman with him as a witness and recorded their conversation to protect himself from additional allegations.

The jury did not hear the tape because prosecutors Hilary LaBorde and Robert Moody wanted to listen to it first to see if they had objections to its admissibility.

In a two-minute portion of the 20-minute tape heard outside the jurys presence, Reed is heard saying, Im the only f------ person on earth that knows this is my last day.

Court officials said the majority of the tape is muffled sounds of Reed and Zahirniak having sex. They also discussed their jobs at Slovaceks, so it is unclear if Reed was talking about her last day at work or something darker.

Zahirniak said his relationship with Reed, who was married at the time, grew after he moved in with her and her husband when his home was destroyed in the April 2013 explosion in West.

He said they tried to hide their relationship, but everybody in the small town could see what was happening. He said Reed left her husband and they moved in together.

They could not afford the rent, so Reed went back to live with her husband even though they had filed for divorce.

Zahirniak went to live with his parents. He and Reed started messing around again in late December 2013 after they both got jobs at Slovaceks store in West. She still lived with her estranged husband, but in February 2014, she moved to a trailer house on Tokio Loop.

Zahirniak said he helped pay the bills there and helped her get an SUV, which later was repossessed.

In other defense testimony, Edward Hueske, a crime scene reconstruction consultant, told the jury that he cant be certain, but signs in photographs and reports point to suicide.

Those signs, Hueske said, include evidence that women typically dont shoot themselves in the head, but the body. Women most often shoot themselves on a bed and typically fire a test shot to make sure the gun is working, he said.

Zahirniak said he found Reed sitting on the bed but dragged her into the hallway to start CPR.

Investigators also found a bullet hole in the doorway leading to the hall that was fired from the living room.

Multiple markers point to this being a self-inflicted gunshot wound as opposed to homicide, Hueske said.
WAHOO  The Lower Platte North Natural Resources District will be asking for less dollars from their taxpayers this coming year.

The NRD board of directors approved the new tax levy at its meeting on Monday. The new levy rate is .038278, or about three cents per $100 of property valuation.

NRD Board Chairman John Hannah pointed out the new tax rate is a decrease of 14.5 percent from last years rate.

I dont know how many other boards can say they did that, he said.

At last months meeting, the board approved the new budget for the fiscal year. In an effort to get to a substantial drop in tax asking, the budget expenditure that would have cleared the books on Lake Wanahoo construction debt was removed.

With the final valuations in hand from all counties in the district, Hannah said the path was clear for the decrease in tax request this month.

The tax request for the coming year is about $3.5 million, a 10.4 percent decrease from last year.

In other business, the board decided to take no action on a claim filed by Larry and Cindy Ourada of Prague and ask legal counsel to contact the Ouradas lawyer to see if resolution can be found.

The Ouradas own property along an upstream dam and reservoir built by the NRD and the Corps of Engineers. The lake has been an ongoing matter for the NRD, who earlier this year settled another complaint of another property owner.

According to a letter written by the Ouradas attorney, damage was caused to the Ouradas property during previous mitigation efforts.

NRD Attorney Jovan Lausterer told the NRD board Monday he has been trying unsuccessfully to get a response from the Ouradas attorney as to what specifically they are asking for in damages.

There was no mention of a dollar amount or injunctive relief, he said.

He said the six-month window for a response from the NRD was approaching, as the complaint was sent to the district in April.

An action to deny the claim would allow the Ouradas to proceed with filing a court claim, if they so wished.

But even though they were up against the deadline, Board Member Don Kavan asked for one more chance to contact the Ouradas attorney and ask for negotiations to take place.

This is not the way neighbors act, he said. Lets settle this without a damn lawsuit.

Kavan said it was the NRDs action that initially set the course for the ongoing issues. He said the NRD should now be good neighbors and try to work with the neighbors to find resolution.

I am confident we can settle this with compromise. We dont have to go to court, he said.

Board Member Bob Meduna agreed.

Thats the question we have to ask ourselves: whats the right thing to do, he said.

Lausterer said because a claim had been filed and another lawyer is involved, it would be inappropriate for him or board members to contact the Ouradas directly. However, at the direction of the board, he will contact the Ouradas attorney and ask for a meeting and offer mediation.
According to reports China has invited scientists from Pakistan, Germany, France, Italy, Russia and the EU to watch the launch of Shenzhou 11 capsule from Inner Mongolia next month.

By Press Trust of India: China has invited scientists from Pakistan, Germany, France, Italy, Russia and the EU to watch the launch of its next month's manned space flight to send two astronauts to join a space lab which has been put into orbit, a media report said on Friday.

The scientists are invited to watch the launch of Shenzhou 11 capsule from Inner Mongolia next month, Hong Kong- based South China Morning Post reported.

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WHAT IS THE LAUNCH ABOUT

The capsule will be propelled by a Long March 2F rocket similar to the one which put the experimental space lab Tiangong-2 into orbit last night without a hitch.

The Tiangong-2 launch was telecast live on state TV.

Also Read: Heavenly Palace: China just launched its second space station into orbit

CHINA ASSISTS PAKISTAN'S SPACE PROGRAM

China has been helping Pakistan's space programme. It has launched Pakistan's communication Satellite PAKSAT-1R in 2011.

Recent reports from Islamabad said the two countries had signed an agreement to launch a remote sensing satellite in 2018 to monitor the USD 46 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CEPC).

The invitation to scientists from Germany, France, Russia and EU showed China's growing confidence in its space programme, a commentator on state-run CCTV said last night.

The two astronauts will spend 30 days in orbit on the lab, twice as long as the last crew on Tiangong 1, and conduct over 40 studies.

CHINA'S GROWING PROWESS IN MISSILE TECHNOLOGY



The experimental space lab was part of efforts by China to build its manned space station by 2022, the time when US-led International Space Station is expected to go out of service.

Also analysts say that the heavy rocket being used to lift large payload like the space lab also demonstrates China's growing prowess in missile and rocket technology.

Meanwhile state-run Xinhua news agency reported on Friday that China's space lab Tiangong-2 may serve for over five years and coexist with China's first space station expected to crash to earth next year.

With a designed life of two years, Tiangong-2 was originally built as a backup to Tiangong-1, which completed its mission in March, Zhu Congpeng, chief designer of Tiangong-2 told Xinhua.

"But we expect Tiangong-2 to serve for more than five years given the introduction of an in-orbit propellant technique for the first time," Zhu said.

In April 2017, China's first cargo spaceship Tianzhou-1 will be sent into orbit to dock with the space lab, providing fuel and other supplies.

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"If the fuel-supply experiment goes well, China will then become the second country after Russia to master the in-orbit propellant technique," Zhu said.

While in space, the 8.6-tonne space lab will maneuver itself into orbit about 393 kms above the Earth's surface.

As it is higher than past manned space missions, which were conducted at 343 kms the Tiangong-2 will be more cost-effective and have a longer lifespan, Zhu said.

Though it looks similar to Tiangong-1, Tiangong-2's interior living quarters and life support system have been improved to allow longer astronaut stays.

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The big fall in coal prices in recent years tells us the supply of coal now exceeds demand. Credit:Robert Rough We push the world price down even further. Since the average cost of electricity from renewable sources is, as yet, higher than for coal-based power, this would worsen the comparison further, slowing the shift away from fossil-based electricity. It would also lower the prices being received by our existing coal exporters, threatening employment in their mines. So a moratorium would benefit our pockets as well as the environment. But how much would we lose by not building any more coal mines nor extending existing ones? The Australia Institute set out to answer this question with help from modelling by Professor Philip Adams, of the Centre of Policy Studies at Victoria University, Melbourne.

Illustration: Glen LeLievre The study found that, even with a ban on new mines, Australia's coal production would decline only gradually as existing mines reached the end of their economic lives. Existing mines and those already approved could still produce tens of millions of tonnes of coal into the 2040s, assuming other countries still wanted to buy them. The modelling suggests the nation's economic growth would be barely affected, with the level of gross domestic product being just 0.6 per cent less than otherwise by 2040. Whether we did or we didn't, nominal GDP would roughly have doubled to $3 trillion by then. Because coal mining is so capital intensive, the effect on national employment would be even smaller. By 2030, the level of employment would be 0.04 per cent lower than otherwise, but by 2040 this difference would have gone away. Similarly, the value of our total exports of goods and services is projected to be only 1 per cent lower then otherwise by the final years of the period.

But our coal production is concentrated in NSW and Queensland, so the adverse effect on those state economies would be greater. By 2040, the level of gross state product would be, respectively, 1.3 per cent and 3.8 per cent less than otherwise, while the other states' GSP would be a little higher than otherwise. Now, I trust that by now you've learnt to be cautious about accepting the results of modelling exercises, especially when they've been sponsored by outfits using the results to advance their cause, as is the case here. The simple truth is that no-one knows what the future holds, and that's just as true for the econometric models economists construct. Their models of the economy are more comprehensive and logically consistent than the model we hold in our heads. But relative to the intricacy and complexity of the actual economy, models are still quite primitive (this one doesn't have the official data to let it distinguish between steaming coal and coking coal, for instance). Models are built on a host of assumptions, some based on economic theories about how the economy works and some about what will happen in the future.

The strength of this particular modelling exercise is that it's a lot franker about the model's limitations and about the specific assumptions. It uses a dynamic "computable general equilibrium" model designed to capture the interrelationships between 79 industries, divided into states and regions. The model takes account of "resource constraints" - it acknowledges that land, labour and capital are scarce; that everything you do has an opportunity cost. This means that, unlike much "modelling" produced for the mining lobby, it doesn't assume that the skilled workers needed for a new mine just appear from nowhere rather than having to be attracted from jobs elsewhere, nor that when a new mine isn't built, all the labour and materials that could have been used sit around idle. As is normal, the modelling starts by establishing a business-as-usual "baseline" projection out to 2040. For instance, real GDP is assumed to grow at an average annual rate of 3 per cent for the first five years, then 2.6 per cent for the remaining 20 years.
Clive Palmer's lawyers have failed in calls for a break in his grilling over the collapse of Queensland Nickel.

They argued the adjournment was to give their client a chance to apply to have the public examination halted, awaiting a High Court hearing in November.

The self-declared billionaire's lawyers challenged the hearing in the High Court on Thursday, looking for a ruling preventing their client from being called back for a further grilling.
When Mr Ferguson, who is now with newly created Palmer company Queensland Nickel Sales, left QNI, Mr Palmer told him in regards to paying the loan within 30 days that he "didn't need to worry about it", the court heard. According to Mr Palmer, that constituted the JVOC waiving the requirement in the contract. Mr Palmer defended issuing the loan in the first place as being in the interests of the joint venture. "I think he had pressing financial problems outside of Queensland and we were concerned we might lose his services to the business up in Townsville and we had no qualms with lending him our money," he said. Mr Palmer said the original contract contained a "mistake", in referring to QNI instead of the parent companies or the JVOC.

"It was a legal mistake by a lawyer," he said. "Lawyers always make legal mistakes in documents, I find." Barrister Cathy Muir, for special purpose liquidators PPB Advisory, put it to Mr Palmer that Mr Ferguson was an "old friend", which he rejected as "press conjecture". Mr Palmer earlier denied an administrator request for $16.4 million from Queensland Nickel's controlling companies sparked a move to secretly replace the refinery operator with his own newly created company. The request came in February, when Mr Palmer said a sore foot was "taking top priority" in his thinking, not the failing business.

Several bizarre moments broke up hours of circuitous questioning of the former politician, who at one stage on Friday morning refused to admit he knew the Townsville refinery employed workers in 2015. Grilled on whether he knew insolvent trading was a serious breach of the Corporations Act that same year, Mr Palmer laughed loudly. "You're really getting desperate now mate. Of course I'm aware of that," he said, before claiming he "shouldn't be cross-examined on things of this nature". Registrar Murray Belcher told him to answer the questions. The resources magnate previously said he did not fully understand the responsibility a company director had to prevent it from continuing to trade while unable to pay its debts (insolvent).

Throughout 3 days of questioning over the collapse of QNI, Mr Palmer repeatedly declared a willingness to put his own money into the business but maintained he was not asked until a request for wages payment at the tail end of 2015. Barrister Tom Sullivan, QC, put it to Mr Palmer that when a request was eventually made, it was denied. "I don't agree with that," Mr Palmer said. Administrators FTI Consulting went to Mr Palmer's nephew and QNI managing director Clive Mensink and its chief financial officer Daren Wolfe with a request for $16.4 million on February 24. They called on the joint venture owners, fully Palmer-owned companies QNI Resources and QNI Metals, to make the payment to meet expenses incurred by the venture, including ore shipments and wages.

But the committee that Mr Palmer had ultimate control over by virtue of a complicate agreement, which had purportedly been changed repeatedly by resolutions he would "jot down" in pencil in an old green notebook, refused. In court on Friday, the self-declared billionaire said he believed the expenses had already been paid, the request "wasn't real", and he did not want to give the administrator money to "line his own pocket". Mr Palmer denied the request sparked a resolution by him and Mr Mensink to remove QNI as manager of the refinery and replace it with a new Palmer company, Queensland Nickel Sales, on March 3. The former Sunshine Coast MP was repeatedly dodged questions about how much he knew about what was happening within the company, saying he didn't recall. "I had a difficult problem in my foot that I was concerned about at that time," he said, when questioned about the refinery's need for ore in February.

"My foot took top priority in my thinking." Mr Palmer repeatedly refused to answer questions about redundancies, before eventually refusing to even acknowledge QNI had employes in 2015. "Why is it difficult for you to acknowledge that you subjectively knew there were employees employed within Queensland Nickel," a frustrated Mr Sullivan asked. Loading Mr Palmer's questioning will continue on Friday afternoon, with the Federal Court expected to sit again for one day next week to allow his barrister to re-examine him.
Mother of three and her boyfriend were hanged from a tree after the family found out about their 'extra-marital' affair.

By India Today Web Desk:

In yet another case of honour killing in Pakistan, a mother of three and a man she allegedly had an affair with, were hanged from a tree on Thursday.

The woman's husband, brother and father have confessed to the crime and have been arrested. The incident occurred in the village of Chak 56, around 55 km from Multan.

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"A woman and her alleged boyfriend were hanged to death by the woman's family after the woman was caught with her boyfriend in the backyard of her house," Sardar Afzal Dogar, chief of the local police station said.

The victims were identified as Khalida Bibi, who was in her late 20s, and her alleged 19-year-old boyfriend, Mukhtiar Muhammad.



"They were beaten up before being hanged," another officer said.

Pakistan's law minister in July had announced that a legislation aimed at tackling "honour killings" and improving convictions in rape cases would soon be voted in parliament.

This had come close on the heels of the honour killing of social media starlet Qandeel Baloch by her brother.

The proposed law aims to do away with the clemency option in cases of honour killings.



--- ENDS ---
The collapse of South Korea's Hanjin Shipping Company is causing headaches for importers and exporters and could result in fewer presents under the Christmas tree this year.

Any disruption to the supply chain means items ordered by retailers and customers are sitting in containers unable to be unloaded.

The container ship Hanjin Boston is unloaded at the Port of Los Angeles on Tuesday. Credit:REED SAXON

Hanjin filed for bankruptcy protection on August 30. Almost immediately this caused major upheaval in global freight shipments as ports around the world refused to handle cargo from Hanjin ships over concerns about the shipper's ability to pay docking fees.

The official legal status of the group remains confusing. But according to AP, Hanjin Shipping says it has received $44.6 million from its current and former chiefs to relieve its global cargo crisis and that it has started unloading in some US ports.
Iranian Kurd Fazel Chegeni, who died on Christmas Island. Credit:Refugee Action Coalition While debate about Australia's border protection regime has focused on the plight of those in limbo on Manus Island and Nauru, the situation of many of those on Christmas Island is more troubling in two respects: the asylum seekers are terrified of their fellow detainees and this is happening on Australian soil. So says Curr, who travelled the 5000 kilometres from Melbourne to Christmas Island last month with Sister Brigid Arthur, who has run the Brigidine Asylum Seekers Project in Melbourne since 2001. "What we witnessed was a group of men utterly without hope, almost all of them broken human beings," she tells Fairfax Media. Pamela Curr and Sister Brigid Arthur. Credit:Eddie Jim The difference between those on Christmas Island and those on Manus and Nauru is that they reside in a high-security prison where three or four asylum seekers are placed in 50-person compounds with criminals who, they say, boast about the crimes they committed on the mainland, including armed robbery and rape.

"Some were shaking and clearly unwell, others were cowed and scared," says Curr. "But they all had the same request: 'Please get me out of here!'" The riot at Christmas Island after the death of Fazel Chegeni. Credit:Peter Dutton's Office Next week the Prime Minister will attend the United Nations general assembly's refugee summit in New York, which has been billed as "a historic opportunity" to come up with a blueprint for a better international response to the world's biggest refugee crisis since World War II. The next day, Malcolm Turnbull will attend President Barack Obama's leaders' meeting on refugees, when heads of government are expected to announce their plans to increase their refugee intakes, commit more funding to international agencies and increase the self-reliance of refugees. Just what Australia will offer is still to be revealed, but Turnbull's message will be emphatic: that strong border protection policies are essential if countries are to increase their humanitarian intakes and maintain public support for their programs.

"I'm not going to foreshadow what we'll be saying there, but I think the Australian experience is one that a lot of other countries are very interested in," the Prime Minister told Fairfax Media this week. Problem is, there is a dark side to that experience and two key United Nations agencies, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and Human Rights Council, have regularly drawn attention to it. It was highlighted this week in two substantial reports urging the government to move from a policy with a singular focus on deterring boat arrivals. One, produced by Save the Children and UNICEF, revealed the cost of the policy had been $9.6 billion since 2013  a figure higher than the UNHCR's total global budget for programs this year. The UNHCR's regional representative, Thomas Albrecht, recently told a visiting delegation of Danish MPs that after 30 years of working with refugees he expected nothing could shock him, yet on Nauru he saw greater hopelessness than anywhere else. The message from Curr and Sister Brigid after their Christmas Island visit is that the existence of the asylum seekers there is similarly defined by loneliness, despair and fear  and a denial of basic human rights.

Why did they go there? "We knew that people were being ferreted out there, that it's a secret place where you can't make contact with people easily," Curr says. "We were concerned about what was being done to these people." The $7000 cost of the trip was split between the Asylum Seekers Resource Centre, where Curr is the detention advocate, and the Brigidine Congregation, a Catholic order focusing on education that Sister Brigid, 81, joined more than half a century ago. They were given permission to visit 14 men, some known to them from their detention experience in Melbourne, and others who asked to see them when they became aware of the visit. By the end of their eight-day stay, they had interviewed 25. "It was like a fruit salad of the detention population," recalls Curr. "Some who came by plane; most by boat; some who have had their refugee claims rejected, but can't be returned to their country; some midway through having their claims assessed; at least two who are stateless." Each morning they would arrive at the centre, pass through a security system that involved seven sets of doors, and interview the asylum seekers who were escorted individually to the reception area in one-hour blocks. They could not record interviews or take in their own notebook and had to rely on single sheets of paper to take notes.

They make for an odd couple: Curr, tall, fiesty and occasionally combative; Sister Brigid, diminutive and softly spoken, but every bit as passionate. "Each afternoon, we drove home shattered," says Curr, 67. "It's hard to stare into the face of misery and be so powerless to do anything about it." One asylum seeker told them he had not had a visitor in two years. Another said he was too frightened to leave his room. One who left the biggest impression carried the scars of torture and presented as "a totally beaten, helpless human being". What emerged was a snapshot of a Kafkaesque world where rules change frequently and govern every aspect of life; transgressions are dealt with harshly; and the asylum seekers live in fear of those detainees who are hardened criminals and of some of the guards, who work 12-hour shifts, six days a week that would test the patience of any human being. "Most of them described constant fear of being attacked by the '501s' (Australian residents without citizenship whose visas are cancelled by the minister after being charged or convicted of serious offences or linked to outlaw motorcycle gangs)," says Curr.

"They said the 501s call them 'boaties' and blamed them for their transfer to Christmas island because the detention centre was originally built only for asylum seekers." Like the 501s, the guards are a mixed bag. "Some Serco officers will give you a hug if they are in a good mood," one of the asylum seekers reported. "And if they are in a bad mood  Oh my God!" Dutton said this week that he had cancelled more visas on character grounds than any previous minister, including 24 for murder and 63 for rape  "and the community is a safer place as a result". But Curr and Sister Brigid said the detainees they interviewed had been charged with minor offences or had not been charged with any offence at all and had no inkling why they were forcibly transferred to the island. Refugee Legal's David Manne tells the story of an Iraqi who worked as an interpreter for Australian soldiers after the US-led invasion.

"He was in Sydney when he was charged with using offensive language, resisting arrest and driving without a licence. The two serious charges were dropped and no conviction was recorded on the driving offence, but his bridging visa was cancelled and he was sent to Christmas Island. "Here was someone who had suffered trauma and torture and had a strong claim for refugee protection, but he gave up and went back to danger [to Iraq] before being able to receive legal assistance." Sarah Dale, senior solicitor at the Sydney-based Refugee Advice & Casework Service who has been to Christmas Island several times, says one of the biggest hurdles for lawyers is being unable to call their clients directly and to have to make appointments and share documentation with the security provider and the immigration department. "That denies clients confidentiality, which is a fundamental legal right." Being in detention also means many of those who have been charged with offences, some serious, some minor, either miss court hearings or appear by video link, denying them the opportunity to fully engage with the process.

"We are aware of many people whose cases were dismissed and they were still detained for many, many months or even years," says Dale. Manne goes further. "The real risk is serious miscarriages of justice, which result in people being left in legal limbo and indefinite incarceration. None of us is safe when fundamental liberties are denied." Then there is the sheer remoteness of the island and cost of getting there, which means detainees are separated from family, friends and others capable of providing support. A report from the Commonwealth Ombudsman late last year highlighted the case of a man with a history of trauma and torture who had spent more than 900 days in detention. A visiting psychologist had reported eight months earlier that the man was suffering chronic post-traumatic stress disorder and major depression to the extent that he had lost all hope and had suicidal thoughts. Reminding the government of its duty of care to immigration detainees and the serious risk to mental and physical health posed by prolonged and indefinite detention, the ombudsman recommended the man be transferred to the mainland and released from detention or transferred to a facility near his family. At the time of going to press Fairfax Media is still waiting for an update on the man's fate.
"Australians are smarter than this," Dodson said of ignorance and vilification.

Lambie shares some of Hanson's hostility to Islam and did not criticise the Queenslander's first speech but praised McCarthy's as the one that mattered.

"It does give other Indigenous people out there an opportunity and some hope in their bloody lives that they will make it and that is more important, more empowering than anything else that can come out of anybody else's mouth," she said, emphasising the importance of finding "common ground".

Six years ago, there were no Aboriginal MPs in federal Parliament. Now there is representation from around the country, five symbols of the diversity of Australia's Indigenous nations.

As well as influencing debate, Wyatt - of Noongar, Yamatji and Wongi heritage - said the group could support each other through stress and criticism. All have agreed to meet together again.
"I was probably wearing a heavy metal T-shirt and he had a tweed jacket on. I didn't know where Woollahra was at that stage ... but I found myself thoroughly enjoying his company. He was so decent and kind, he was universally well-liked, notwithstanding his unfashionable views." His views didn't get any more fashionable. When Leeser left university he worked as an associate for conservative High Court judge Ian Callinan. There followed stints as an adviser for Tony Abbott and Philip Ruddock and at law firm Mallesons, before he was poached to head the Liberal Party-aligned think-tank the Menzies Institute. He also snuck in a Harvard fellowship and for the past few years he's been a senior executive at the Australian Catholic University. Federalism was, and is, one of Leeser's passions, and it is his political ambition to help resolve the tension between state and federal governments, where he believes there is much service duplication and financial waste. He adores the constitution, which he says is "unique and worthy of celebration" and beautiful in the sparseness of its language.

Leeser's policy credentials could not be dryer or more serious, but he also loves theatre, musicals and the books of Clive James, and he chose to begin his parliamentary life with the most personal possible story  that of his father's suicide when Leeser was a "self-absorbed 20-year-old". About 250,000 people have viewed the moving speech on Leeser's Facebook account. "I thought it would get some attention but what amazed me is the sheer number of people who have seen it. I have been overwhelmed by emails, calls and messages. "I wanted to say, 'I have had this experience.' I could write you an elegant treatise on mental health and it would sink like a stone. Telling the story made an impact." Former prime minister Tony Abbott has known Leeser since he was a young man and says he has "future cabinet minister stamped all over him".

"He's got a really good mind, he's got deep and good values and shrewd judgment to match," Abbott tells Fairfax Media. "We need more thinkers in our Parliament. The Liberal Party needs more convinced conservatives in its ranks and to be frank, far fewer game players. He says what he means and he does what he says." "Leeser invited Abbott to campaign for him in Berowra during the election, "and given that I'm not exactly flavour of the month with everyone in the Liberal Party " The former prime minister pauses to break into laughter. "It showed a bit of political courage."

As for ego, Leeser "almost lacks it", says his ally and neighbouring MP Alex Hawke. "He won't be on the extroverted end of the circus. He's the guy you want solving the problem, not the guy wearing the clown suit like some of us do." How Leeser will deal with the grubbier aspects of politics will clarify over time, but he has already shown the ability to quietly build branch support before taking over from retired MP (and his former boss) Philip Ruddock. Ruddock represented the area for 43 years before Leeser took his place. Both men deny a political "rolling" but Ruddock will admit to a conversation between the men in his library on a Sunday morning, in which Leeser let the older man know he would be a preselection candidate for the seat. Ruddock says he had already made the decision to retire from politics (he is now a United Nations human rights envoy).
About 20 staff at the National Gallery of Australia have been told their jobs will not exist on Monday.

Letters delivered in person to staff and seen by Fairfax Media show many will become "excess officers" but retain their rights as employees.

Staff at National Gallery of Australia told their jobs won't exist on Monday. Credit:Jeffrey Chan

The gallery's deputy director, Kirsten Paisley, told staff that management would consider transferring them to other areas of the gallery or offer voluntary redundancies.

Union sources indicate the job cuts represent about 8 per cent of the workforce, including some senior positions.
Feuds over whether children should go to private or public schools are increasingly being fought out in nasty divorce proceedings, lawyers say.

But as parents battle in the courts over school preferences, family law experts warn children are the ones who lose out.

"The school has become the currency for the debate" in divorce proceedings. Credit:AFR

"The parents keep going on that cycle of trying to prove one school is better than the other," Slater and Gordon family law specialist Heather McKinnon said.

"But the irony is that every bit of research says kids from high-conflict family law break-up cases score poorly on all indicators, from education to psychology.
Breaking free from one stereotype after another is the nonchalant Miss Moti--a series of comics by New-York based Kripa Joshi.

By Somya Abrol: When was the last time someone called you fat?

Oh wait, we're sorry. With all this body-shaming humdrum of late, we're sure those instances have reduced in number. But we're also sure that growing up 'not exactly thin' or 'not exactly fair' in this country obsessed with looks wasn't exactly easy, was it?

No wonder then that you think twice before wearing that short, figure-hugging skirt you bought so excitedly, or buying that tube top you saw in the window a few weeks ago.

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While most of us quietly absorb these emotions, some people--like Kripa Joshi right here--direct them towards creating something that would make so many women all over the world feel better.

Meet Miss Moti, the happy-go-lucky, nonchalant, fat, dark-skinned girl who couldn't care less about what the world thinks of her body. And mind you, 'dark-skinned' and 'fat' are not bad words.

Picture courtesy: Facebook/Miss Moti

Nepal-based comic artist and illustrator Kripa Joshi channelised all those negative emotions--of being called 'Moti'--into a comic named Miss Moti.



Please note here that Moti can also be a pearl, and they're both Hindi words, so you should've known that. Anyhow, that was the premise of Kripa's comic too--it represents a woman who was plump and also displayed a sense of purity and innocence. The Miss Moti logo reflects the same.

New Miss Moti logo! It has been nine years since first Moti on Moti (pearl) image and a lot has changed! :) A photo posted by Miss Moti (@missmoti_vation) on Jul 26, 2016 at 8:44am PDT

A graduate from Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, Kripa went on to pursue her MFA in Illustration from the School of Visual Arts in New York City, which is when she came up with Miss Moti.

"The emphasis of 'beauty' in our society leads many people to have a negative body image about themselves, especially when it comes to weight. Humans also tend to compare themselves to animals to describe a characteristic. The term "as fat as a hippo" is derogatory. However, it is ironic that the animals themselves do not have any anxiety about the way they look," details Kripa's website, missmoti.com.

Picture courtesy: Facebook/Miss Moti

A painting Kripa made during her post-grad years led her to build the character of Miss Moti, which took the shape of a couple of self-published comics--Miss Moti and Cotton Candy and Miss Moti and the Big Apple. Since then, there have been many shorter stories of varied themes that have appeared in various anthologies like Rabid Rabbit, Secret Identities and Strumpet. These have been collected in Miss Moti and her Short Stories.

If Miss Moti has indeed caught your fancy, you can follow Kripa's works here .

--- ENDS ---
At the invitation of Europol and the Slovak Presidency of the Council of the European Union, WCO Secretary General Kunio Mikuriya attended the Europol meetings held at Europol Headquarters in The Hague, Netherlands, on 14 and 15 September 2016.

At the opening of the Europol Meeting of Directors General of Customs Administrations on 14 September, Europol Director Robert Wainwright welcomed delegates to this second edition of the meeting first held last year.

In his opening address, Secretary General Mikuriya stressed the importance of Customs-Police cooperation which had featured among the major topics at the July 2016 WCO Council Sessions. He explained Customs contribution to security through the SAFE Framework of Standards and the WCO Security Programme, referring to preparations for Operation Chimera addressing firearms smuggling using postal and express packages, and money laundering including cash smuggling.

The meeting explored ways to enhance cooperation and information sharing between Customs and Police, drawing on recent operations and initiatives by some national Customs administrations and the European Commission.

Together with the President of the Slovak Financial Administration, Mr. Frantisek Imrecze, representing the Slovak Presidency of the Council of the European Union, Secretary General Mikuriya had a bilateral meeting with Director Wainwright on strengthening future Customs-Police cooperation and reactivating the Memorandum of Understanding signed between the WCO and Europol in 2002.

On the following day, the plenary meeting of the Europol Police Chiefs Convention comprised three panels on Terrorism, Migration and Digital Transformation. Secretary General Mikuriya contributed to the session on Terrorism, describing the WCO Security Programme and the need for information exchange between Customs and Police based on trust and leadership. In his concluding remarks he encouraged Police Chiefs to share information with Customs, including the outcomes of criminal investigations, to recognize Customs role in deterring illicit trade and to improve on-the-ground cooperation.

The Europol meeting was a positive step towards improved cooperation between the two organizations aimed at enhancing border security.

---------------------------------

Photos:

From left to right:

1. President of the Slovak Financial Administration Frantisek Imrecze, representing the Slovak Presidency of the Council of the European Union; Europol Director Robert Wainwright; WCO Secretary General Kunio Mikuriya.

2. WCO Secretary General Kunio Mikuriya during his opening address.
Pakistan is the pilot country for the new Air Cargo segment of the UNODC-WCO Container Control Programme (CCP), which seeks to establish Air Cargo Control Units at selected airports to detect illicit goods.

The proven and successful organizational concept and structured training approach of the Container Control Programme is now also being implemented in the air cargo environment.

WCO cooperates closely with UNODC and ICAO (International Civil Aviation Organization) in implementing this new branch of the CCP, which started activities in late 2015.

It is particularly rewarding for the international organizations involved that the pilot unit at Karachi International Airport successfully implemented the CCP Air Cargo training, provided by trainers of the UK Border Force and WCO, and recently seized separately 2 shipments destined for Damman (Saudi Arabia) and Dubai (UAE).

A total of 4.6 kg of heroin and 8.9 kg of ICE (crystal meth) were concealed in marble handicrafts. Three persons were arrested in Pakistan as an initial result of the investigations.

The establishment of the Air Cargo Control Unit in Karachi was financially supported by the governments of Denmark and USA.

WCO, UNODC and ICAO will expand the Air Cargo segment of the Container Control Programme to other airports in Asia, Latin America and the MENA region.
On the morning of September 10, even the monsoon cooperated. By 7:26 am, when Mohammad Shahabuddin, convicted murderer and four-time member of Parliament, walked out of Bihar's Bhagalpur Central jail, unhurried and relaxed, to a boisterous welcome by thousands of supporters, the skies had cleared as if in deference to the don.

Draped in a white kurta so crisp it might have been steam-pressed that morning, Shahabuddin was affable, calling journalists "yaar" and breaking into a smile when he was asked why people feared him. The holder of an MA and a PhD, Shahabuddin would have passed for a professor in his reading glasses, book tucked under his arm. He walked among his supporters, shaking hands, making small talk, without any noticeable security. He was genial and accessible, but his body language - the hint of a swagger, the disdainful shrug of his shoulders, the jabbing of the finger to make a point - expressed his remarkable self-assurance. This was a man in charge.

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The authority was manifest in the 150-car convoy that escorted him on the 13-hour journey to his hometown, Pratappur, in Siwan. As the massed ranks of SUVs swept through, cars swerved to the side to let the convoy pass and some half dozen or so tollgates were raised without a single operator daring to ask for a fee. All of Bihar, it seemed, had once again fallen in line.

Even Nitish Kumar, who became Bihar chief minister in 2005 and ensured Shahabuddin would feel the full force of the law, appeared keen to stay out of the fray. He was in Jharkhand, unable, or unwilling, to respond when Shahabuddin mocked him as the "accidental chief minister". The placid demeanour, the scholarly appurtenances, it appeared, were all for show. Shahabuddin was more than happy to bare his political fangs. His comments also succeeded in annoying the Janata Dal (United), his party's purported allies. Nitish has tried to rise above it, claiming he has the people's mandate and "doesn't care what others have to say", but the support of some Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leaders for Shahabuddin's "accidental" comments have led to clear tensions. "Lalu is our leader," said the RJD national vice-president Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, "the leaders of the alliance partners had decided to make Nitish Kumar the chief minister...I did not favour it." This led to immediate calls from JD(U) leaders, who had striven to ignore Shahabuddin, to call on Lalu to control his party. Lalu's only response has been to claim Shahabuddin had said nothing against Nitish but was only expressing his support and loyalty to the RJD and its chief.

Shahabuddin was granted bail on September 7 by the Patna High Court in the 2014 Rajiv Roshan murder case in which he is named as a conspirator. The Roshan case is being tried separately from the murders of the victim's's two brothers, in Siwan in August 2004, for which Shahabuddin had already been given a life sentence in December last year. He was also sentenced to life in prison in 2007 for the 1999 abduction and murder of a political rival.

He walked out of prison last week after 11 years in judicial custody. He's been convicted and sentenced to varying prison terms in eight separate cases, but as appeals grind on, he finds himself, temporarily at least, back in the public eye. Despite a further 11 cases lodged against him awaiting trial, Shahabuddin's years in prison and legal travails have not worn him down. He retains his thick hair and clear skin, and with his freshly shaven cheeks, he looked as if he had stepped out of a barber shop rather than a prison.

Why His Bail Raises Eyebrows

BJP senior leader Sushil Kumar Modi has accused the Lalu-Nitish duo of enabling Shahabuddin's bail. The Patna HC's bail order reads: "Finding no progress in the trial and further considering the period of detention, the petitioner is directed to be released on bail." For over two years, the government failed to take the Rajiv Roshan murder case to trial. It even failed to honour the HC's directions of February 3 to conclude the trial within nine months. Bail was also made possible as the police chose not to invoke the Crime Control Act (CCA), as it had done once to keep Shahabuddin in jail on the grounds that he could influence the trial.

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Modi said had the government wanted, it could have begun Shahabuddin's trial through video-conferencing from Bhagalpur, where the Siwan strongman was shifted after the murder of Siwan-based journalist Rajdeo Ranjan in May. The journalist's family has accused Shahabuddin of masterminding the killing. "Why wasn't he booked under the CCA," asks Modi, "when he is involved in so many cases? Instead, the CCA was imposed on Mokama MLA Anant Singh (another dreaded don) to prevent him from coming out of jail even though he hasn't been convicted. The state has conspired to weaken the case." He also questioned why the state had not engaged top lawyers to oppose Shahabuddin's bail, having spared no expense to hire a crack legal team to represent the state when the prohibition decree was challenged in court.

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Who is Shahabuddin?

Shahabuddin, or 'Saheb', as he is described in Siwan, first became an RJD MP in 1996, serving until 2008, when his political career was cut short by prison. He had never lost an election from Siwan until his criminal convictions made him ineligible to run. Shahabuddin's electoral success began in 1990, when he won an assembly seat as an independent. He caught Lalu's attention, and in 1995, won another assembly term with the RJD. Lalu then rewarded Shahabuddin with a ticket for the Lok Sabha polls; his faith was well placed with Siwan becoming a safe seat for the RJD till 2008.

Former Bihar DGP D.P. Ojha once observed that "had Siwan been a kingdom, Shahabuddin would have been its shahenshah". His writ was all-pervasive. The story, possibly apocryphal, goes that in Siwan no one spat or urinated in the vicinity of a Shahabuddin poster. Ojha had a 256-page dossier on Shahabuddin, detailing his network of 500 criminals, arsenal of AK-47s and Rs 100 crore empire. But in December 2003, two months before his superannuation, Ojha was unceremoniously removed from his post by then chief minister Rabri Devi, Lalu's wife. In the 15 years that Lalu and his wife ran Bihar, Shahabuddin enjoyed complete autonomy in Siwan. Businessmen would hang pictures of Saheb on the walls of factories and offices.

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The Fall and Rise

If he seemed to believe he could act with impunity, it was because he could. In 1996, SP S.K. Singhal, survived a murder attempt. Shahabuddin and two of his bodyguards were convicted for their part in the plot. Even when Lalu's brother-in-law, Sadhu Yadav, was involved in a vicious turf war with Shahabuddin, Lalu spoke up for his protege. It was the start of the estrangement between Lalu and Sadhu. "Lalu," says an RJD leader, "always considered Shahabuddin as the sole custodian of Siwan's Muslim votes." In March 2001, Shahabuddin's private army fired at a Bihar police team, who had been ordered to raid his Pratappur house, killing 11 people including two policeman.

Shahabuddin's fortunes nosedived days before his mentor Lalu Prasad was formally unseated from Bihar. The state was then under President's rule and an assembly election (the second in the same year) was under way when, in November 2005, a joint team of the Bihar and Delhi Police arrested Shahabuddin from an official bungalow on Bishambar Das Marg in the capital; the arrest was related to the discovery of foreign-made firearms, ammunition and undeclared foreign currency in a raid on his house in Pratappur. Shahabuddin's political fortunes suffered a corresponding decline, with the JD(U)-BJP alliance winning a comfortable majority and ruling Bihar from 2005 to 2013; in those years, Shahabuddin was convicted on a number of charges and his wife, Hena Shahab, lost successive Lok Sabha elections in 2009 and 2014.

But, Shahabuddin, behind bars, made something of a comeback when Lalu formed an alliance with Nitish after both suffered a drubbing by the BJP in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. The alliance won a massive mandate to govern Bihar in the 2015 assembly polls. The RJD-JD(U) alliance won six of the eight seats in Siwan, a performance that established Shahabuddin's continued hold over Muslim voters.

Since June 2014, though, there have been four sensational murders in Siwan and each time fingers have been pointed in Shahabuddin's direction. The first was the murder of Rajiv Roshan, killed, as his father Chanda Babu says, just days before he was scheduled to give his testimony. Then, in November 2014, local BJP spokesperson Srikant Bhartiya was killed on his way home from a wedding. The suspect, Shailesh, confessed in custody that he had been paid to kill Bhartiya (who had played an important role in Hena Shahab's electoral defeat). He has not implicated Shahabuddin, though. In March 2015, another BJP leader was murdered, and in May this year, Rajdeo Ranjan, the Bihar bureau chief of a Hindi newspaper, was killed. Investigators working on Ranjan's murder found that a mobile phone at the scene of the crime had received some 36 calls from a number that was traced to Siwan divisional jail, where Shahabuddin was being held. Six days later, when cops raided the jail, they found Shahabuddin holding a 'durbar' with as many as 63 people in attendance. The police seized 43 phones and several SIM cards, including one issued from an international location. Soon after, the Nitish Kumar administration shifted him to Bhagalpur jail, a move most observers described as an attempt to save face. Nitish also recommended a CBI probe.

Ranjan's suspected killers identified Azaharuddin Beg, alias Laddan Mian, as the man who had paid for the murder. Beg is a close aide of Shahabuddin, and though he has been arrested, the police have failed to establish any conspiracy between the two. Much of Ranjan's hard-hitting reporting had targeted Shahabuddin. He had also released a photograph of a clandestine meeting between Abdul Ghafur, the Bihar social welfare minister, and Shahabuddin at Siwan jail, which went viral, embarrassing the government no end. Ranjan's wife Asha says the journalist had been summoned to the jail but had refused to go.

BJP protesters burn Nitish-Lalu effigies in Patna after Shahabuddin's release.

Why He is Attacking Nitish Kumar

Convictions, 11 pending cases and mounting circumstantial evidence in recent murders have not been enough to prevent Shahabuddin from getting bail. Anyone else might have refrained from criticising the CM under whose watch bail had been granted. Not Shahabuddin, who was launching vitriolic attacks against Nitish Kumar only minutes after his release. A senior RJD leader attributes this in part to Shahabuddin's long-standing dislike of Bihar's CM, but mostly to "Lalu's long-term plan". Shahabuddin is the RJD's great Muslim hope, their means to salvage lost ground and squeeze out competitors. "Lalu," says the RJD leader, "has agreed to back a Nitish Kumar-led government only for the current term. He has ambitions for his son, and Shahabuddin has a big role to play in his electoral calculations." On the day Shahabuddin was released in Bihar, Lalu declared his support for Mulayam Singh Yadav and promised to campaign for Samajwadi Party in UP, even as Nitish has launched an independent election campaign there. But can Shahabuddin, a byword for criminality in Indian politics, stay out of jail long enough to play the role envisaged for him by his great benefactor?

Follow the writer on Twitter @Amitabh19



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So that no other mom loses her son to an illness we all end up taking a little too lightly.

By India Today Web Desk: Imagine someone you love having a tiny infection, and without you even realising it, losing them to it.

That's what happened to this mom from UK, who lost her son to sepsis. Now, she's doing everything she can to tell people about the life-threatening illness that most of us end up taking a little too lightly.

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For the uninitiated, sepsis is a life-threatening illness caused by your body's response to an infection. Your immune system protects you from many illnesses and infections, but it's also possible for it to go into overdrive in response to an infection, according to healthline.com.

Sepsis develops when the chemicals the immune system, released into the bloodstream to fight an infection, cause inflammation throughout the entire body instead. Severe cases of sepsis can lead to septic shock, which is a medical emergency.

This mother, Melissa Mead from Cornwall, UK, posted a video on her Facebook account recently, in which she's seen holding hand-written cards that recite her heart-wrenching story; and she's done this as part of a JustGiving campaign to raise money for the UK Sepsis Trust.

"Hi all, if you haven't shared my video yet or even if you have, please share. I can't quite believe the number of people who've viewed it. Including those that have viewed it via shares as well it's approaching 24 million, I still can't quite believe it. We've received nearly 20,000 in donations too. Please, please if you can, share my original post below. Thank you so so much for being part of Williams legacy," reads Melissa's recent Facebook post. Here's her video:



Melissa Mead's son, William, suffered from sepsis after suffering a chest infection and pneumonia. She has now started a blog called A Mother Without a Child about the journey she's been on William's been gone.



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Sharif met Hurriyat leaders from PoK and assured them that he would raise the Kashmir issue at the UN General Assembly next week.

By Press Trust of India: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif today met Hurriyat leaders from Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) and assured them that he would "emphatically highlight" the Kashmir issue at the 71st session of the UN General Assembly next week.

Sharif met with the leaders of All Parties Hurriyat Conference PoK chapter at Muzaffarabad. PoK 'President' Sardar Masood Khan and 'Prime Minister' Raja Farooq Haider were also present at the meeting.

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"PAKISTAN WILL CONTINUE TO SUPPORT KASHMIRIS"

"Pakistan will continue to extend moral, diplomatic and political support to Kashmiris," Sharif said, alleging that atrocities in Kashmir had touched extremes.

"Oppression is destined to end, and truth will prevail," he said in reference to the ongoing violence in Kashmir.

Also read:

Hurriyat hawks exposed: How funds flow from Pakistan to fuel Kashmir unrest

NIA calls Syed Ali Geelani's son for questioning over suspicious financial transactions, Hurriyat cries foul



He said the Kashmiris' demand for their right to self-determination was just, which had also been acknowledged by international community.

"THE MOVEMENT OF KASHMIRIS WILL SUCCEED"

Calling upon the UN to fulfill its obligation in accordance with its own resolutions, he said: "The movement of Kashmiris will ultimately succeed as the history has precedents that such movements could not be suppressed with oppression. Pakistan will raise voice for the resolution of Kashmir dispute at all fora."

Hurriyat leaders thanked Sharif for taking them into confidence before his visit to UNGA.

Sharif is likely to deliver a speech at the UN General Assembly session on September 21.

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AptarGroup, Inc. provides a range of dispensing, sealing, and material science solutions primarily for the beauty, personal care, home care, prescription drug, consumer health care, injectable, and food and beverage markets. The company operates through three segments: Pharma, Beauty + Home, and Food + Beverage. The Pharma segment provides pumps for nasal allergy treatments; and metered dose inhaler valves for respiratory ailments, such as asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases in pharmaceutical market; elastomer for injectable primary packaging components; and active material science solutions. The Beauty + Home segment primarily sells pumps, closures, aerosol valves, accessories, and sealing solutions to the personal care and home care markets; and pumps and decorative components to the beauty market. The Food + Beverage segment offers dispensing and non-dispensing closures, elastomeric flow control components, spray pumps, and aerosol valves to the food and beverage markets. It sells its products through own sales force, as well as independent representatives and distributors in Asia, Europe, Latin America, and North America. The company has a strategic partnership with PureCycle Technologies LLC to develop ultra-pure recycled polypropylene into dispensing applications; and a collaboration with Sonmol for developing a digital therapies and services platform targeting respiratory and other diseases. AptarGroup, Inc. was incorporated in 1992 and is headquartered in Crystal Lake, Illinois.
Royal Bank of Canada operates as a diversified financial service company worldwide. The company's Personal & Commercial Banking segment offers checking and savings accounts, home equity financing, personal lending, private banking, indirect lending, including auto financing, mutual funds and self-directed brokerage accounts, guaranteed investment certificates, credit cards, and payment products and solutions; and lending, leasing, deposit, investment, foreign exchange, cash management, auto dealer financing, trade products, and services to small and medium-sized commercial businesses. This segment offers financial products and services through branches, automated teller machines, and mobile sales network. Its Wealth Management segment provides a suite of advice-based solutions and strategies to high net worth and ultra-high net worth individuals, and institutional clients. The company's Insurance segment offers life, health, home, auto, travel, wealth, annuities, and reinsurance advice and solutions; and business insurance services to individual, business, and group clients through its advice centers, RBC insurance stores, and mobile advisors; digital, mobile, and social platforms; independent brokers; and travel partners. Its Investor & Treasury Services segment provides asset servicing, custody, payments, and treasury services to financial and other investors; and fund and investment administration, shareholder, private capital, performance measurement and compliance monitoring, distribution, transaction banking, cash and liquidity management, foreign exchange, and global securities finance services. The company's Capital Markets segment offers corporate and investment banking, as well as equity and debt origination, distribution, advisory services, sale, and trading services for corporations, institutional investors, asset managers, private equity firms, and governments. The company was founded in 1864 and is headquartered in Toronto, Canada.
By PTI: Barwani (MP), Sep 16 (PTI) Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar today favoured a nationwide ban on liquor after flagging off a rally against alcohol abuse here.

"Nationwide ban on alcohol should be imposed. Madhya Pradesh should be stopped from becoming Madh (liquor) Pradesh," Kumar said addressing a meeting organised by Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) here.

He said Madhya Pradesh has ample jungles and fertile land and the people of the state are hard working.

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"The development in the state should not be done at the cost of fertile land. No injustice should be done to farmers and poor for the sake of development," Kumar added.

"We should not meddle with environment to damage it," Kumar said, adding, the dams and big projects should be build keeping in view of the ecological balance and their negative impact.

He also said farmers should get land against land as compensation so they are rehabilitated.

"I have come from Patna to extend support to the agitation on the side of river Narmada here," he added.

The rally will cover 25 districts of Madhya Pradesh and culminate in Katni district on September 28. PTI COR LAL MAS NRB RCB

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Even with 5-0 lead, Verlander can't get 1st World Series win
By Tim Brockwell Sep. 15, 2016 | 05:26 PM | PADUCAH, KY





Chiz Cabz, Inc. has had their license to operate in Paducah reinstated, after a 15-day suspension for employing drivers who had criminal records.Owner Nicole Doran said her company got a letter from Paducah City Manager Jeff Pederson on Aug. 31 stating that its license to operate within Paducah city limits was suspended for the entire month of September. The letter said two drivers who had been working for the company had been previously denied taxi licenses because they had criminal records.Chiz General Manager Brian Ross said the company appealed the decision, and their attorney was able to negotiate a shorter suspension period. "Jeremy Ian Smith has been dealing with the city attorney in the appeals process, Ross said. "He was able to get it to where we have a 15-day suspension, and our drivers have to have a taxi license."The drivers in question have been terminated, according to Ross, and the company's drivers are now compliant with all regulations. Ross said that while the suspension was a big economic hardship, it has allowed them to branch out into other geographic areas. "We lost quite a bit of money," Ross said. "We've been taking calls out of the county, like Calvert City and Benton. I think we're gonna start branching out more. In the last 15 days we've picked up quite a few people from those areas."Ross said the company has also implemented a few other changes to help make customers' experience more pleasant in the future."I think we'll get more customers calling back because we're gonna make sure all of our vans are clean, and we are starting a no smoking policy in our vans at midnight tonight." Ross said.
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By West Kentucky Star Staff Sep. 15, 2016 | 10:23 PM | MCCRACKEN COUNTY, KY

A three-vehicle wreck Thursday night in McCracken County injured two people and left one of them facing charges.

The McCracken County Sheriff's Office said the crash happened at 5:30 pm in the 1900 block of North Friendship Road. Deputies said 38-year-old Amanda Wiersma of Paducah was southbound on North Friendship when she lost control of her vehicle in a curve and side swiped a northbound vehicle, driven by 52-year-old Sandu Satnum of Florida.

Wiersma's vehicle then crossed into northbound traffic and struck another vehicle, driven by 26-year-old Kristen Bickerstaff, of Paducah. Police said Wiersma was not wearing her seat belt and was thrown from her vehicle. Wiersma and Bickerstaff were transported to a nearby hospital for treatment of their injuries.

Deputies said Wiersma was operating her vehicle while under the influence of alcohol. She was cited and released at the hospital due to her injuries.

The investigation is ongoing and deputies said further charges are expected.
By West Kentucky Star Staff Sep. 16, 2016 | 10:10 AM | DRAFFENVILLE, KY

A Mayfield man faces charges, including assault, after an incident at a Marshall County restaurant.

According to the Marshall County Sheriff's Office, a deputy was dispatched to a Draffenville restaurant Thursday night in reference to a fight. When the deputy arrived, he reportedly observed 41-year-old Micah Keeling trying to fight all the patrons in the restaurant.

The deputy took Keeling by the arm and tried to take him away but Keeling resisted and was taken to the ground. Police said Keeling continued to yell obscenities and threaten people at the business.

The deputy was eventually able to place Keeling into handcuffs and transport him to the emergency room at Marshall County Hospital. At the emergency room, Keeling reportedly knocked over a bedside tray and created a disturbance.

Keeling reportedly found a piece of wire and tried to pick the handcuffs, which were in front, so he could more easily treated by hospital staff. Upon seeing this, the deputy attempted to move the handcuffs behind Keeling's back. Keeling resisted, grabbed the deputy by the hand and attempted to twist it. The deputy deployed his taser and regained control.

Keeling is charged with alcohol intoxication, disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, assaulting a police officer, criminal mischief and escape. He was lodged in the Marshall County Detention Center.
State prosecutors to challenge Oscar Pistorius' six-year murder sentence after failing with a similar bid at a lower court.

By Reuters: South African state prosecutors will approach the Supreme Court of Appeal for leave to challenge Oscar Pistorius' six-year murder sentence after failing with a similar bid at a lower court, the National Prosecuting Authority said on Thursday.

State prosecutors, led by advocate Gerrie Nel, will file an application to appeal on Friday, NPA spokesman Luvuyo Mfaku told Reuters.

Judge Thokozile Masipa dismissed a request by state prosecutors to appeal Pistorius' sentence last month, saying she was not persuaded that there was a reasonable prospect of success at another court.

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Pistorius was sentenced to six years in prison after being found guilty of murdering his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp on appeal last December. He had initially received a five-year sentence for manslaughter in 2014.

The jail term was less than half the 15-years sought by prosecutors, who said Pistorius had shown no remorse for the 2013 shooting.

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By West Kentucky Star Staff Sep. 16, 2016 | 12:02 PM | MAYFIELD, KY

The Graves County Sheriff's Office is searching for a man wanted in connection to a shooting earlier this week.

Sheriff Dewayne Redmon said deputies responded to Jackson Purchase Medical Center on Tuesday after receiving a call that someone had possibly been shot and was on their way to the hospital. Upon arrival, deputies learned that Eric Caldwell was being treated at the hospital for a gun shot wound to the face.

Police said Caldwell and another man, William T. Robinson, had been in a fight earlier in the day. According to deputies, as Caldwell was driving away, Robinson fired a shot from a handgun through the back windshield, striking Caldwell in the cheek.

A warrant has been issued for Robinson for assault and wanton endangerment. Anyone with information on Robinsons whereabouts is urged to contact the sheriffs office.
By The Associated Press Sep. 15, 2016 | 07:30 PM | FRANKFORT, KY

Democratic Attorney General Andy Beshear says Republican Gov. Matt Bevin's decision to abolish and replace the University of Louisville board of trustees could affect the accreditation of all the state's public universities.

During a hearing on Thursday, Beshear's office presented testimony from an expert on accreditation who said all of the state's public colleges and universities would have trouble keeping their accreditation if the governor was allowed to replace their boards at any time.

Bevin's attorney, Steve Pitt, noted nothing in state law requires universities to be accredited at all. And he said the state legislature has the final say over Bevin's actions. It will reconvene in January after the fall elections.

Franklin County Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd will rule on the case soon. Any decision will likely be appealed to the state Supreme Court.
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Tennessee Williams' late, little-performed play takes place in a tiny flat in St Louis in the 1930s, on a sweltering Sunday afternoon. Michael Oakley's revival production at the Print Room in Notting Hill happened to open on a day with much the same climate. It was absolutely boiling. As the characters talked tantalisingly about heading out on a picnic by the cool breeze of the lake at Creve Coeur Park, sweat trickled down the audience's backs and programmes quietly fanned the air from the stalls.

It was suffocating and uncomfortable, which, incidentally, is a little like life for the characters in A Lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur. Civics teacher Dorothea and the good-hearted Bodey are roommates in a down-at-heel flat. Dorothea  who has a touch of Blanche DuBois about her  is somewhat grandiloquent and slightly lazy, and believes her recently acquired beau is about to turn up to whisk her off her feet. The middle-aged Bodey fears the truth  that Dorothea's squeeze has no such intention  and she wants her friend to instead get together with her cigar-smoking, booze-swigging twin brother Buddy.

The Sunday of the play starts in the morning, as Dorothea begins her exercises and Bodey fries chicken for their picnic. Though they are as different as they could be, there's a jovial warmth between the two women and their relationship is homely and easy. This happy balance is tipped by the arrival of the prickly, pompous Helena, another teacher (who is shocked by the chintzy apartment) who wants Dorothea to move to a more expensive flat with her, in a fashionable part of town. Later still, the recently bereaved German woman from the upstairs flat  who is inexplicably catatonic  arrives to mix up the dynamic further.

Four unattached women bouncing off the walls in a sad city flat. You can see Williams' recurring themes  dreams of transcending a current life, escaping smothering roots, faded and fading women, loneliness  coming through. But A Lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur is far less delicate than some of his earlier works. The situation feels heavy-handed and the characters touch on caricature. There's humour in the first half that feels misplaced, too: Williams pokes too much fun at these unhappy ladies. There are glimpses of poetry in one or two of the speeches, but not many.

It's also a little long and though Oakley's strong production is blessed with some very fine performances  Debbie Chanzen is superb as Bodey, while Hermione Gulliford is beautifully catty as Helena  the show drags. Much time is spent on arguments between Bodey and Helena and though it has two acts, it would have worked just fine with one. It's intriguing, to see a work so rarely performed, but it seems there is a reason or two why it's so often left on the shelf.

A Lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur runs at the Print Room until 7 October.
By PTI: Srinagar, Sep 15 (PTI) PDP, which is struggling to contain the over two-month-long unrest in Kashmir, today suffered a jolt when its founding member Tariq Hameed Karra quit the ruling party and his Lok Sabha seat as well, protesting against "brutal policies" of BJP at the Centre and "complete surrender" of the state government before it. Karra, who was elected from Srinagar parliamentary constituency in 2014 on PDP ticket, also hit out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

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Talking to reporters here, the 61-year-old MP said he has decided to disassociate himself from the primary membership of the PDP and from the membership of the Parliament. He said he would be submitting his resignation to Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajans office tomorrow after which he would be deciding on the future course of action.

"The decision was tough as I have invested my youth in my party. I was opposing the alliance for last 16 months and I say it with pain that I have failed," he said, adding that he was not resigning out of any "compulsion or convenience but because of conviction".

Karra alleged that Modi has pushed the country towards Hinduisation and turned "Incredible India into Intolerant India"

"The Prime Minister has pushed the country towards Hinduisation and by doing so undermined Indian nationalism which has liberal space and place for diversity built into it.

"Though he couldnt convert his jingoistic promises made during general elections even to the people of Ladakh and Jammu into reality, one must give devil his due for converting highly publicised Incredible India into Intolerant India," he said.

The MP, who was once tipped to head the Jammu and Kashmir government with support of Congress when political stalemate had dogged the state after the death of Mufti Mohammed Sayeed in January this year, alleged that the Central and state governments policies of "unabated genocide", continued denial of the dangerous ground realities, insensitive and adhoc approach towards Kashmir issue led to his resignation.

He also said a blatant policy of dealing with Kashmiris by way of "oppressive, repressive and suppressive measures" adopted by the state and Centre were the other reasons for his resignation.

"My heart is bleeding and my soul is crying for the people of my homeland. My conscience cannot take it any longer," Karra said.

He said PDP was floated in 1999 to safeguard lives, property, honour, dignity, self respect and political aspirations of the people. "But today, in the present tragic circumstances, (PDP) made a U-turn and treated its subjects much worst than the Nazi forces. I feel still continuing with them would be equally subscribing to the administratively inhuman and politically unethical blunders."

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He said the PDP was formed to act as buffer between the Centre and the state. "The launch of this new political dispensation was on the premise as facilitators rather than collaborators or obstructionists for the permanent, peaceful and everlasting resolution of Kashmir issue."

"I was forcefully consistent on it so that PDP buffer character would be saved which had blood and sweat of thousands of dedicated and selfless workers in it," Karra said defending his decision to resign after 69-days of unrest in Kashmir in which nearly 80 people have been killed and thousands of others have been injured. PTI MIJ MNG SKL GSN GSN

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Crystal Palace boss Alan Pardew has confirmed that Pape Souare is on the mend after being cut out of his vehicle and airlifted to hospital last weekend.

Souare was involved in a two-car crash on the M4 motorway last Saturday, just outside Heathrow Airport. The other driver involved escaped with only minor injuries.

Pardew confirmed that, as well as a few cuts and bruises, the full-back suffered a broken femur which is likely to keep him sidelined and out of action for several months.

That said, he is expected to make a full recovery and is likely to be discharged from hospital tomorrow.

AP: Hopefully Pape will be out tomorrow. It was a terrible accident. We owe a huge debt to the @LDNairamb and the surgeons who helped him.  Crystal Palace F.C. (@CPFC) September 16, 2016

AP: We think hell make a full recovery.  Crystal Palace F.C. (@CPFC) September 16, 2016

AP: Hes very lucky his injuries arent as bad as they could have been. The extent of some of the muscular injuries are still not known.  Crystal Palace F.C. (@CPFC) September 16, 2016

AP: I dont think we have any concerns [about Pape returning]. It was a broken thigh, that should repair as normal.  Crystal Palace F.C. (@CPFC) September 16, 2016

Asked specifically how long the Senegalese defender would be out for, Pardew replied that he should be up and running again in four, five, maybe six months.

AP: 4, 5 months. Maybe 6, he should be up and running again.  Crystal Palace F.C. (@CPFC) September 16, 2016

Heres wishing Souare the very best of luck in his convalescence.
By Indrajit Kundu: Security forces have apprehended eight hardcore Karbi People's Liberation Tiger (KPLT) militants from West Karbi Anglong district in Assam in a series of joint operations. The operation is being carried out jointly by the Assam police and the army since September 13.



Joint forces launched the raid following local intelligence inputs about the presence of top KPLT leaders and cadres in the area. Following the raids, security forces apprehended eight rebels including its self-styled Commander-in-Chief Sunder Dera alias Rijak Dera in the operation.



The remaining arrested rebels are KPLT Vice Chairman Longbi Timung, area commander John Rongphar, Rain Ronghang, Starphill, Bida RamTerang, Dhan Singh Hanse and an arms supplier indentified as Romjan Ali.



Five rifles including one AK-47 along with grenades and ammunition were recovered from the militants. Notepads, extortion receipts and tax collection notices by the group were also recovered from the group. The security forces are continuing the operation in region.

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By PTI: Mumbai, Sep 16 (PTI) Integrated milk and dairy product company Prabhat Dairy has received its first export order for its cheddar cheese to Iraq.

The order is placed by a leading brand in Iraq, the company said in a release issued here today.

Prabhat Dairy has Indias third largest cheese manufacturing plant at Shrirampur, Maharashtra, which commissioned last year.

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A few months ago, it had exported their first order of sweetened condensed milk to a leading ice cream brand in Dubai, said the release.

Prabhat Dairy had already supplied its other products like ghee, skimmed milk powder and whole milk powder to countries like Mauritius, Nigeria, Malaysia, Algeria among others. PTI SM NRB ABI

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Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 12/09/2016 (2239 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

This is the second of a two-part series exploring how Winnipeg can co-exist with an entrenched railway system built a century ago. Read Part 1: Winnipegs past, present and future collide in relocation debate

Imagine a Winnipeg without rail lines.

Its circa 2035, and the Weston yards that have occupied the steel-lined landscape for more than a century have vanished and re-emerged as a new neighbourhood, complete with boutique shops and residential apartments. There is a sprawling park under the shadow of the Arlington Street Bridge.

The original Canadian Pacific Railway line, which since 1885 has served as the Great Cultural Divide between north and south Winnipeg, is no more.

The two-kilometre-long trains disrupting commutes to and from the most populated suburbs are a bad memory. Over- and underpasses that were projected to cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars  and only getting more expensive with time  are no longer required.

The Canadian National line that snakes through the citys heart is gone, eliminating the physical barrier between Main Street and The Forks. Abandoned lines have been converted to rapid transit corridors that stretch like spider webs from Main Street and Broadways revitalized Union Station to the city limits.

Is it conceivable? Sure, there are politicians, commuters and city planners who daydream at the notion.

Mike Deal / Winnipeg Free Press The Arlington Yard has served as a cultural divide since the early days of Winnipeg.

What sort of improvement could we do if we took all the money that governments and the railways are going to spend over the next 25 years and ask, What can we accomplish? offered Saint BonifaceSaint Vital MP Dan Vandal, who, since his days as a city councillor, has championed rail relocation. I think its a wonderful idea, but lets make it more than an idea.

One big move in 140 years, added Winnipeg businessman Art DeFehr, the Palliser Furniture CEO who has long advocated rail relocation. A clean city.

Indeed, any relocation or rationalization of Canadian Pacific and Canadian National railway lines would mark a historic break with the citys past.

Let the record show the first rail track in Winnipeg was laid in Saint Boniface  using the might of the Countess of Dufferin steam locomotive  and it stretched to St. Paul, Minn. The last spike was hammered on Dec. 5, 1878, to much civic flourish.

The last rail is laid  the last spike driven!, declared the Manitoba Daily Free Press. Manitoba, after many vexatious delays is now connected by rail communication with the outer world.

Huzzah, right? But flash forward 138 years and the biggest question facing Saint Boniface in the 21st century is whether or not to build an underpass at Marion and Archibald Streets that local Coun. Matt Allard fears could cost upwards of $500 million.

I want to find something else that would involve less expropriation, less cost and would enjoy support from the community, which this one does not, Allard said in a recent interview, citing not just area but city-wide objections. This is too big. Its like killing a fly with a sledge hammer.

Thanks a lot, Countess.





MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS The tracks at Marion and Arlington can cause significant disruptions, but Coun. Matt Allard (St. Boniface) wonders if there is a less costly option to mitigate the problem.

Sticker shock a sticking point

Winnipeg isnt alone. Debates over rail relocation in urban centres are playing out across the country. From Montreal to Toronto, from Calgary to Edmonton.

In most cases, the circumstances are similar: the cost of over- and underpasses to allow trains to co-exist with vehicles is skyrocketing. Meanwhile, the price of inner-city land now occupied by rail right-of-ways is spiking (at least in Winnipeg) for the first time in decades. In other words, the extravagant cost of relocating tracks might now  and in the future  be offset by gains to municipalities of repurposing rail lines and yards and long-term savings in reduced infrastructure.

In January, the then-provincial NDP government announced a task force, headed by former Quebec premier Jean Charest, that was to spend the next two years coming up with the answers to the multimillion-dollar (up to multibillion-dollar) questions around rail relocation in Winnipeg.

Manitoba committed $400,000 to the task force. Then-premier Greg Selinger called moving the rail lines a historic opportunity to reshape our city capital for the future.

Wayne Glowacki / Winnipeg Free Press files Former Quebec premier Jean Charest was to lead the rail relocation task force.

Not long after, Selingers NDP government was routed by Brian Pallisters Conservatives in Aprils provincial election.

Initially, Pallister was non-committal about the future of the Charest task force. When questioned about the Tories commitment to the study in early June, the premiers response was ambiguous.

I think its a great idea, Pallister said. Its been a great idea for 40 years. And the NDP government did nothing about it in their entire 17-year term. Now they are telling me to get Johnny-on-the-spot and take care of a problem they ignored for two decades? Cmon. Lets be real here.

Last week, the Pallister government cancelled the study.

Manitobas new government was elected to fix the provinces finances, and therefore we will not be proceeding with the task force, Indigenous and Municipal Relations Minister Eileen Clarke said.

Prior to the governments decision, Winnipeg Mayor Brian Bowman said he is a proponent on moving forward with the task force, if only to get accurate information on (whether) the cost is something that would benefit the discussion.

The first step is getting some numbers so we have a better idea of what were talking about, the mayor told the Free Press recently.

Bowman reiterated his position several days after Pallisters decision. Bowman is hopeful he can convince provincial and federal officials to revisit the topic, with Ottawa helping to cover the cost.

MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Winnipeg MP Dan Vandal isnt convinced Premier Brian Pallister has the same zeal for rail relocation.

Vandal, who was to represent the federal government on the task force, was also realistic prior to the governments decision, suggesting Pallister might not have the same sort of excitement for the project.

The short answer is no.

Selinger has for decades championed rail relocation, in particular the Weston yards, back to his days as a community activist in the 1980s. On the eve of his governments defeat, Selinger acknowledged a Pallister government could have a dramatic impact on the task force. They could cancel it tomorrow if they want to, he said.

If anything, the change in provincial government only underlines the difficulties in addressing generational projects such as rail relocation. The federal Liberal government ran on a platform of infrastructure spending, which could include moving rail in urban areas. Bowman has at least expressed support for investigating a cost-benefit analysis.

And not only were all three levels of government on board with the Charest task force, but both CN and CP had agreed to participate.

Selinger argues, regardless of any task forces or public debates, the issue of rail in urbanized settings isnt going away.

Were back in the same dilemma, he said. The infrastructure is really old that goes over and under railways. Theres going to be a big bill that has to be paid to address that. Rather than pay that bill  bridge by bridge, underpass by underpass  the opportunity to look at a big decision could save hundreds of millions of dollars on infrastructure.

There is a point where the do-nothing option poses hundreds of millions of dollars in costs for renewing existing infrastructure. That is the inflection point to look at a more global approach to change and urban renewal.

Mike Deal / Winnipeg Free Press To get all involved parties on the same track is a monumental task.

Its more realistic now that its ever been, Selinger said. And we need the leadership to move it forward. And the railways are not saying no. Without that political will, it aint happening.

And thats the rub: Pallister was right in saying the NDP government was in power for 17 years and only in the waning days of their reign was the task force announced. So what held even a noted proponent such as Selinger back?

One long-time NDP insider suggested, perhaps tellingly, it wasnt the political will of the NDP that stalled rail relocation: it was the perceived lack of will on the part of taxpayers who might blanch at the up-front cost estimates, with little or no guarantee of future payback.

Even Selinger conceded: Everybody likes the idea of rail relocation. But people are quite skeptical of the feasibility. And sticker shock is one of the big things. Its like, Id love to buy a Cadillac but I aint buying a Cadillac, right?

For example, the immensity of moving the CP Weston yards  regardless of the cost of rebuilding the Arlington Street Bridge or the long-held belief the rail lines have been a literal economic divide between north and south  has historically been a roadblock to concrete action.

As far back as 1972, the city has been debating rail relocation of the CP yards. Nothing happened. In 1980, the federal government pegged the cost of moving the main line and the marshalling yards at $169 million over five years and the future cost of overpasses and bridges at $65 million. Nothing happened.

In June 2016, a study on replacing the Arlington Street Bridge  built in 1912 and recommended to be decommissioned by 2020  estimated the cost at $300 million. The study alone cost $2 million.

Mike Deal / Winnipeg Free Press It is expected to cost $300 million to replace the aging Arlington Street Bridge.

There are those, such as prominent Winnipeg businessman and longtime relocation proponent Art DeFehr, who will resist the notion relocating the CP yards and track will cost in the billions, if only because no serious cost study has ever been done.

Its not going to cost billions, DeFehr said, during an interview at his furniture company headquarters in Transcona. Why would anybody say that?

Last year, DeFehr produced a five-page position paper that estimated relocation cost at $1 billion by constructing a track south of Winnipeg, from Elie to south of Oak Bluff, then south of the Winnipeg floodway back up to the existing main line.

Its almost empty there, Fehr said. You could run a 10-line highway through there and hit five houses. Winnipeg is the only place in Canada where theres a pathway around the city with nothing on it. But we have no imagination. They dont spend their time even think about it. Were talking about underpasses.

The Weston yards, said DeFehr, could be relocated along the new line near Oak Bluff.

But even the best plans for laid track around the city are inconsequential without extensively studied proposals that would take years to develop. The Charest task force, had it been implemented, would have taken at least two years to present credible cost-benefit analysis.

Because it should be noted while its often assumed major rail companies, such as CN and CP, are steadfastly opposed to any relocation, its incumbent on the local governments to produce a feasible relocation plan.

Mike Deal / Winnipeg Free Press Businessman Art DeFehr estimates it will cost $1 billion to relocate a track south of Winnipeg.

Indeed, CPs standard position on relocation is even posted on its website: if a community wants to move the lines, CP may participate. However, the relocation of rail lines and yards is a complex and serious issue that would involve CP, local and national customers, regulators, local community organizers and all levels of government.

According to the federal Railway Relocation and Crossing Act, established in 1985, the Canadian Transportation Agency has the power to order companies to relocate, but only on the condition a rail company must not gain or lose financially by moving. Relocating must be a break-even proposition for the rail companies.

The federal governments contribution to relocation costs, including studies and planning, is capped at 50 per cent. The CTA can also make orders determining who pays what for relocation, based on accurate financial information that must be provided by the city, province and rail companies.

Tracks in Canadian cities

Free Press requests to interview executives with both CN and CP were declined. However, Michael Bourque, president and CEO of Railway Association of Canada, which represents both railways, said the potential cost of significant rail relocation, although yet to be accurately determined, would present a challenge.

Youre really talking about a giant project, in the case of Winnipeg therefore thats going to be many billions of dollars, Bourque said. Then the city has to ask themselves: where are they going to find that money and is that the best use of that kind of (tax) money? Is that what society would want to spend that money on?

  

Mike Deal / Winnipeg Free Press Some argue there will be a time when CN realizes it is no longer economic feasible to run its train through the heart of the city.

Efficiency equals velocity

So how much power do the railways have when it comes to relocation? Or, rather, not relocating?

Lots, said Harry Finnigan, Winnipegs former chief planner who now is a partner in MacKay Finnigan Associates, consultants for urban redevelopment. They really dont need to do much if they dont want to do it. Certainly, they have way more power than any other corporation that a municipality or any level of government has to try to work with.

Diane Gray, CEO of CentrePort Canada, a 20,000-acre transportation hub in northwest Winnipeg designed to attract rail-intensive business, noted railways are probably more powerful than the average layperson can imagine.

And that is because they largely pre-existed most western (city and provincial) governments, Gray said. And their corridors and right-of-ways are pretty much sacrosanct. To assume governments could force them to do what they dont want to do they will respond vigorously to protect their own interests. They will not give up corridors without there being a better solution. And they dont have to.

At the same time, Finnigan and Gray believe with the evolving nature of rail transport  where yards are not nearly as active and more trains are simply passing through urban centres  management at CN or CP should be more open to any proposal that speeds delivery.

It would be good to know what portion of goods that are transported through our city are intended to stay in our city, Finnigan said. I would think, compared to 40, 50 years ago, its a lot less percentage than it is now. So, fundamentally, whats the need for them to go through the city from a business perspective? It would probably be advantageous for them to go around the city, just like trucks using the Perimeter Highway.

Ive got to think there will be a benefit for them (railways) if so much of their tonnage is not destined for businesses or customers in Winnipeg. Theyre just going through the city and they have to slow down.

Added Gray: They want to build and run long trains quickly. Thats where they make their money.

Yet, every single CN train that travels across the country must slow to a crawl while navigating the elevated line that passes through The Forks. Every. Single. Train.

So despite his reservations about relocation, even Bourque acknowledges speed is essential in rail transportation.

Mike Deal / Winnipeg Free Press Urban redevelopment expert Harry Finnigan believes the economic argument for rail lines to move is getting stronger.

In theory, if someone can create a railway that goes around, that is going to be quicker and be made whole for that, sure, he said. Railways would be in favour of that. Thats why well always have that discussion.

At some point, these things become practical for a variety of reasons; because of density, because of opportunity, Bourque said. In the railway business, efficiency equals velocity. Railways want their trains to run from point A to point B quicker because thats what gives them an advantage over trucking.

So what are the citys options? One is to start small.

Gray believes focusing first on major projects such as the Weston yards  because of the enormity of the task  might work against any relocation effort.

I like the idea of success and momentum rather than biting off the biggest problem first and having everyone stymied by it, Gray said. It makes all parties not only look good, but progress can be made. And trust can be built without having to go to the full-meal deal all at once.

We are dealing with three different private rail companies here and theyre competitors. All of this isnt a slam dunk. Theres going to have to be wins for everyone. It wont be that simple.

One example of small-scale relocation, according to advocates, would be the Burlington Northern and Santa Fe spur line that now runs between Taylor and Corydon avenues along Lindsay Street in River Heights.

Local residents balked a few years ago when BNFS Railway erected silos along the line to store water used to spread over dirt roads outside the city limits.

Joe Bryksa / Winnipeg Free Press Rail relocation proponents suggest starting small and target spur lines, such as the Burlington Northern and Santa Fe tracks running through River Heights.

They want to do industrial activity and its all residential around them, said River HeightsFort Garry Coun. John Orlikow. Thats a problem that occurs.

Orlikow wants the spur line relocated outside to city to the inland port.

Really what they (BNSF) need to do is get to CentrePort, Orlikow said. They would be more successful. CentrePort would be more successful. They dont want to be there either. They dont want to drive into the city and drive back out again. They just dont have many alternatives.

Orlikow and provincial officials have been working with BNSF on an alternate route on an existing CN line for months now, with no results. The councillor remains confident an agreement can be reached.

And what would occupy that space if the lines were removed?

All of us dream and we do it well, Orlikow said. Theres lots of opportunities to really benefit the neighbourhood.

Maybe a dog park. A bicycle path. An urban forest.

Orlikow believes similar opportunities to relocate and redevelop spur lines exist elsewhere.

The grand vision, thats wonderful, he said. Im very excited to look at the number of spur lines opening up opportunities for green space development or whatever. Id love if all the lines could go around the city but eventually were going to grow out there, too.

Trevor Hagan / Winnipeg Free Press files CentrePort has a role in the rail relocation debate.

Chief city planner Braden Smith isnt opposed to plans to move the Weston yards. Just not as the first order of business.

Exactly, Smith said. The reality is from a planning perspective, the City of Winnipeg is a slow-to-moderate growth community. So its good to look at the monumental fixes for land-use issues. But my approach is I think its the small and incremental changes that we need that actually pay the largest dividends in the long run.

I mean, we can talk pie-in-the-sky and teddy bears and lollipops. But my focus is on what are some of those low-hanging fruits.

Which begs the question: if a city planner could pick one rail relocation project in Winnipeg, what would that be?

For Smith, the answer is The Forks: transforming the existing CN rail lines not being used at Union Station into a rapid transit bus corridor.

I think theres some synergies there. I think thats a great opportunity, Smith said. Weve got this wonderful Via station. Using it as a main hub for downtown would be interesting, I think. It could really act as a catalyst because its a beautiful building as well.

Such a project could merge with the southwest rapid transit corridor, linking Union Station with the University of Manitoba. Future lines could stretch in all directions, making the refurbished, 105-year-old station a central transportation hub of the city again.

  

Boris Minkevich / Winnipeg Free Press files It is hoped Union Station can enjoy a renaissance as a transportation hub.

A paradox

Meanwhile, Bill Menzies, former manager of service development for Winnipeg Transit, relishes the idea of removing the so-called CN Hi-Line that snakes through The Forks, past Shaw Park, then across the Red River into Saint Boniface.

Menzies, who spent 32 years with the city, said relocating the line would eliminate the physical barrier between Main Street and The Forks.

That would be awesome, he said from a downtown apartment that overlooks The Forks. I dont know if it would be in my lifetime. It depends on the political will. These things take a long time.

Menzies should know. He worked extensively in making the southwest rapid transit project a reality. Menzies was first handed the project by mayor Bill Norrie in 1990. The first phase was completed in 2012.

Perhaps thats why Menzies isnt shy about relocating the Weston yards under the Arlington Street Bridge, either. Because he can envision what redeploying rail lines in the city could accomplishment for rapid transit potential. Or even just potential development, period.

Theres a lot of land there and a huge city-building potential, he said. Not only physical development of the city but social development. Those lines right now are a big barrier.

(But) things like that are pretty transformative. Its probably going to be a multi-decade endeavour  if its affordable, feasible and everybody is on board.

Thats the paradox of the prospect of rail relocation in Winnipeg: its difficult to find a politician of any stripe who is dead set against some form of the concept. It is generally considered safer, less intrusive on day-to-day city life, better connects neighbourhoods and opens up a number of recreational, residential and business development opportunities.

Even the railways dont deny skirting populated areas would be good for business.

At the same time, the general consensus among those in the rail industry, or related ventures, is the same forces putting pressure on relocation  urban sprawl and rail traffic within city limits  will continue to trend up.

Theres going to be rail growth whether you like it or not, said CentrePort vice-president of marketing and communications Riva Harrison. Were a rail city. So you might as well do it in a way that makes strategic sense and doesnt add to your woes.

Added Gray: We dont need rail rationalization or relocation to occur for CentrePort to happen. Its happening regardless. But I do believe the time is right for the community  and that means government at all levels, rail companies and shippers  to look at the broader issue of the future of Winnipeg as a rail city.

What does a modern Winnipeg look like as a rail city, is the question before the community.

MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Diane Gray says its time to examine how a modern Winnipeg and modern rail industry co-exist.

But ask those same players if progress on potential relocation can be made, the answer is far less decisive.

My guess is it will come down to political and community will even if its incremental over time, something will happen. If there isnt, well, then it wont, Gray said.

Theres a lot community support for the issue. But I also believe theres a lot of skepticism about the ability to pull anything concrete off. With big changes, theres always going to be sticker shock. But if we dont make any changes theres going to be other infrastructure big-ticket items that are going to have to be paid for. (And) theres going to be more of that over time, not less.

Finnigan, the former city planner, doesnt need to be convinced of the potential for relocation or rationalizing of rail. After all, it was during his tenure with the city The Forks was developed on land that once served as the citys largest rail yard.

Today, The Forks is widely considered the most successful developments in a generation  and thats not including the planned development of an urban community behind Union Station. Winnipeggers gather at The Forks by the thousands every year. They hold celebrations. They skate on river trails. They eat in pop-up winter restaurants. They shop at markets that were once railway company stables.

Mike Deal / Winnipeg Free Press Winnipeggers dont have to look far to find a successful relocation project  The Forks has transformed the city.

Theres got to be a better use for that land, Finnigan said. Youve got a right-of-way from one point of the city to another. Its a natural for transit.

Brent Bellamy, architect and creative director at Number Ten Architectural Group, argued relocating rail, especially in developed areas of the city, would help curtail urban sprawl.

We all know the city is broke and cant afford to balance its books anymore, said Bellamy, recently named to the board of CentreVenture Development Corp. Our roads are crumbling and services are being cut, fees and taxes are increasing. This is due in very large part to the way the city has sprawled. The city has grown by three-quarters in area since 1970 but only one-third in population. That lower density has made the city unsustainable.

Infill growth is the only solution. (Relocating) the rail lines and yards provide a major opportunity to achieve this. Imagine what a large new residential population would do for the businesses of the North and West End. What about the lines in River Heights and Tuxedo? How much would the tax base grow if those prime lands were allowed to be redeveloped?

It could be the anchor of a rejuvenated North End that rarely sees investment.

Relocation would also mean less noise, less air and ground pollution, improved traffic circulation and reduced risk of accidents and derailment, he said.

At the very least, Bellamy and Finnigan argue before the city becomes too invested in going over or under the rail, the relocation task force  in some form  should not be abandoned.

It may be in spite of everything nothing changes, Finnigan said. Its such a complicated issue, it hasnt been dealt with. But I think its worth having that discussion. If theres a will, theres a way. But its got to be based on proper data.

Mike Deal / Winnipeg Free Press Until there is firm data supporting or opposing relocation, the debate will continue for years.

So I hope there will be some resources that go into getting that information. Just not throwing your hands up and saying, Well, its way too complicated and The railways wont budge anyway, so lets not even go there. I think thats whats happened, generally, in the past.

Thats always the caveat, even from relocation proponents: without proof, relocation can ultimately be profitable  not just for the city, governments and taxpayers, but equally for the railways  whats the point? The rest is just theory and hope.

Meanwhile, planners and city councillors face immediate infrastructure updates, such as road maintenance, sewer and water line upgrades, and funding community centres. Facing ever-growing deficits and service cuts, rail relocation might seem like a luxury, if not a financial impossibility.

Barry Prentice, a professor at the Transportation Institute at the University of Manitoba, wouldnt deny those realities. But he has his own, too.

Prentice is a staunch defender of the economic value of railways and their integral place in the citys history. But he also believes while the citys past was defined by railways running through its core, its future health depends on their removal.

I know its in the millions of dollars, Prentice said. But the argument is, and I support the notion, that its going to happen eventually. Those right-of-ways are very valuable for moving people, whether its rapid transit or LRT, whatever it is. Thats the future of our city. So sooner is much better than later because it will never get less expensive.

It also means the sooner we do it, the more the city will grow and adjust to the new environment without the railways.

How can a city plan significant rail relocation for tomorrow while at the same time debating and deciding today about over/underpasses that are projected to cost in the hundreds of millions of dollars?

Mike Deal / Winnipeg Free Press Winnipegs past was defined by rail lines. Its future hinges on their removal.

To wit, why build underpasses at Marion Street and Waverley Avenue  with a combined estimated cost of upwards of $800 million  then turn around and pay even more to relocate those same rail tracks 10 years in the future? By the time they are completed, the two phases of the Arlington Street Bridge project (phase 2 is either a tunnel between Sherbrook and McGregor streets or reconstruct the McPhillips Street underpass) could total $1 billion alone. What? Then rip out the CPR yards?

So many questions, so few definitive answers. Which might explain why after years of hypothetical and fruitless debates, Vandal is growing weary.

To be honest, Im tired of talking about it, the MP said. We need some facts and we need a strategic plan to see if it can be done. As long as I remember, weve been talking about it but nobody has any germane facts at their fingertips.

We need to look at the capital budgets of all three governments, and by that I mean how much money is the city going to spend on infrastructure over the next 10, 15 years? How much money is the federal government going to spend on the City of Winnipeg? Same with the province. And then look at the private rail lines. How much are they going to spend reconstructing, modernizing their infrastructure?

Thats where it begins, Vandal said. Lets get some facts in front of us and see if its something thats doable on paper. Take away all the political intangibles. Lets just look at the numbers and what can be done.

If it makes sense, Im as hard-core as anybody. If it doesnt make sense, lets move on.

Mike Deal / Winnipeg Free Press MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS The Arlington Bridge crosses over the CP Arlington Yards in this aerial image looking east. 160628 - Tuesday, June 28, 2016
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 16/09/2016 (2235 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Justin DeRoo of 17 Wing Winnipeg has his sights set on being one of Canadas top sharp-shooters.

A native of Brandon, 2nd Lt. DeRoo is already among this countrys elite marksmen. The 32-year-old is among 450 shooters and support staff who were selected to participate in the Canadian Armed Forces Small Arms Concentration (CAFSAC) in Ottawa, a 13-day competition which ends Saturday.

The CAFSAC includes male and female marksmen from the Canadian Armed Forces, several Canadian police forces and some international teams who are competing in the challenging and physically demanding events to test and improve their shooting ability and accuracy, combat skills and combat fitness.

SUPPLIED / THE CANADIAN FORCES 2nd Lt. Justin DeRoo

DeRoo competed in eight events, including long-distance shooting from 500 metres, which is a significant distance, as it is considered outside the capabilities of the standard-issue C7A2 rifle.

Live rounds are used in all events  it is a controlled and operationally-focused environment, but its not just a drill when there are real bullets flying around.

Youve got to use live ammunition. Otherwise, youre not really training like you fight, said DeRoo, a graduate of Crocus Plains High School. He competed in eight events over the course of the competition. Ive learned a lot and I would love to come back. My marksmanship has improved greatly, since I got here, from my peers and mentors.

Skill at arms is expected of anybody in the Canadian Forces regardless of their trade, whether youre a trucker or an infantry soldier, you could be finding yourself in a position where this could save the lives of you and your colleagues or others.

DeRoo, a 15-year Canadian Forces member, completed a tour of duty in Afghanistan in 2006 when he spent six months in armed conflict.

Ive been shooting for a long time and I honestly think the attention to detail required is reflective as to how one can live ones life, DeRoo said.

The way I look at it, any serious marksman has to take every shot individually. Shooting every individual round is a process. You dont focus on the result as much as the process. The result will speak for itself. Thats a really good way to look at ones life. If you try to do well at every little part of the process, the results will be there.

DeRoo competed on the 12-member Royal Canadian Air Force team along with Major Ken Barling, also from 17 Wing Winnipeg. Barling is a three-time winner (2012-2014) of the Queens Medal  the competitions top honour  as the top rifle marksman with the highest aggregate score in each of the Regular Force and Reserve Force.

DeRoo said his favourite event was the gruelling Military Biathlon in which teams of shooters run seven kilometres in total with different targets throughout at different distances.

Youre having to carry casualties and things like ammunition cans while wearing 35 to 40 pounds of gear. They have dummies that are about 200 pounds and, since its a team event, we had a stretcher and we had to run with him for a while after we did some shooting, DeRoo said. It really isnt just a test of your marksmanship, its a test of your physical fitness and your thinking under pressure. I had a very good time doing it but I definitely tripled my water intake on that day.

Another challenging event is called the Close-Quarter Battle House which is shooting inside a course set up with walls to simulate the interiors of buildings. Shooters have to make split-second decisions as they are confronted with different targets, some which are silhouettes of civilians. There are heavy penalties for hitting a no-shoot, an unarmed target.

ashley.prest@freepress.mb.ca
By PTI: Mumbai, Sep 16 (PTI) Integrated milk and dairy product company Prabhat Dairy has received its first export order for its cheddar cheese to Iraq.

The order is placed by a leading brand in Iraq, the company said in a release issued here today.

Prabhat Dairy has Indias third largest cheese manufacturing plant at Shrirampur, Maharashtra, which commissioned last year.

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A few months ago, it had exported their first order of sweetened condensed milk to a leading ice cream brand in Dubai, said the release.

Prabhat Dairy had already supplied its other products like ghee, skimmed milk powder and whole milk powder to countries like Mauritius, Nigeria, Malaysia, Algeria among others. PTI SM NRB ABI BAS

--- ENDS ---
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 16/09/2016 (2235 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

While his fellow officers were risking their lives to get illegal drugs and weapons off city streets, one bad cop is alleged to have been stealing the seized evidence and funnelling it back onto the streets.

Cocaine, methamphetamine, Oxycodone, Ecstasy, Percocet and marijuana  drugs that do untold damage to society  were discovered after search warrants were executed on the rogue cops Oakbank home.

Those drugs and many illegal weapons, also found during the police raid, were familiar to police since they had already been taken off the streets once.

Its believed the bad cop had been helping himself to police evidence for half a dozen years. Police noticed the discrepancies and began investigating about a year ago. An arrest  of one of their own was made on Wednesday.

WAYNE GLOWACKI / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS No one was answering the door at the home of WPS Const. Trent Milan in Oakbank Mb. Friday. He has been charged with numerous criminal charges.

Calling it a dark chapter for the Winnipeg Police Service, Deputy Police Chief Danny Smyth said a veteran officer is facing dozens of charges  and more could be coming.

Const. Trent Milan, 42, an 18-year veteran police officer, had been charged with 34 offences including criminal breach of trust, attempting to obstruct justice, and possession of drugs for the purpose of trafficking seized during police investigations.

Smyth said Milan, who was working general patrol in the west district, has been placed on administrative leave.

This is a dark chapter for the Winnipeg Police Service, Smyth said on Friday during a news conference that had been rescheduled from the day before after police realized Milan hadnt been officially charged yet.

I can tell you, during the course of this investigation, my emotions have run from disbelief to anger to disappointment to resolve and now here today, to actually some relief that we have brought this member essentially to justice now, he said.

I also want to say to people that we serve that incidents like this are rare. The Winnipeg Police Service does not tolerate this type of behaviour.

Smyth said the allegations first came to light about a year ago but the offences date back to 2010, when Milan was part of the departments street crime unit. He said he expects more charges could be laid, but he stressed no other officers were involved.

Smyth said illegal drugs and prohibited weapons were found in the officers home after a search warrant was executed.

According to court documents, the weapons include several brass knuckles, centrifugal force knives, and butterfly knives.

Milan is also charged with two counts of stealing jewelry worth more than $5,000.

The breach of trust allegation is that he was benefiting personally by his police related duties, while another charge alleges he gave confidential police information to somebody outside the service to attempt to obstruct, pervert or defeat the course of justice.

Maurice Sabourin, president of the Winnipeg Police Association, said other officers were shocked when they heard the allegations against Milan.

My members are in disbelief. They dont think this individual is capable of committing these offences.

Sabourin said the association has a duty to pay Milans legal costs, but that stops when it determines something illegal has been done.

If we determine there is wrongdoing, the individual would be on their own, he said.

Smyth said while the investigation is ongoing, it was crucial that they brought the matter forward at this time in light of the seriousness of the charges that have led to Milans arrest and his removal from active duty.

Milan was released on a promise to appear.

Smyth said in keeping with Winnipeg police regulations, Milans employment status will be reviewed by the chief of police once the investigation has been completed.

I can tell you, during the course of this investigation, my emotions have run from disbelief to anger to disappointment to resolve, and now here today, to actually some relief that we have brought this member essentially to justice now Winnipeg Police ServiceDeputy Chief Danny Smyth (left)

Smyth also said the Director of the Independent Investigations Unit (IIU) was informed early on about the investigation. He said the IIU has been monitoring the investigation from the onset, and was briefed prior to Milans arrest and regarding the conditions of his release.

WAYNE GLOWACKI / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Deputy Chief Danny Smyth at news conference Friday regarding a Winnipeg Police Service member charged.

Meanwhile, while Milan has been charged with numerous criminal offences, his neighbours on his street only knew him as a friendly helpful guy.

Dave Lochhead, a neighbour across the street from Milans home, said he had nothing bad to say about him.

I think hes a good guy, Lochhead said on Friday.

Hes the nicest neighbour. I cant believe all this, I just saw it on the news.

When we first moved in here right away he was the first one to come over with a bottle of wine and asking if there was anything he could do to help.

But Lochhead said he knew his neighbour was in some type of trouble when police descended on the quiet street on Wednesday.

They took him away in handcuffs, he said.

Police were here all day. They were banging on the door and one guy had his gun out at the side of the house.

I just cant stress what a good neighbour he is.

Another resident, who didnt want to be named, said Milan was always friendly and never held loud parties.

We never had any problems with him, the resident said.

Nobody answered the door at Milans single storey bungalow in the newer subdivision in Oakbank. A large dog could be heard barking inside.

kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 15/09/2016 (2236 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

OTTAWA  Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan threw a reality check on the notion he is considering giving direct power to First Nations to call in the military when they feel their rights or communities are being threatened.

Sajjan met with indigenous leadership in Winnipeg Wednesday as part of his national defence policy review. At that meeting Ron Swain, vice-chief of the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, which represents all off-reserve status and non-status First Nations, Metis and Southern Inuit, raised the issue of needing the military to come to the aid of indigenous peoples trying to defend their rights or territories.

That could, for example, include protests against pipelines or other development, taking place without First Nations consent.

Adrian Wyld / The Canadian Press Files Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan

After the meeting Wednesday, Sajjans office was non-committal but indicated the request was one of a whole host of things Sajjan would consider as part of the policy review. But Sajjan told the Free Press in an interview Thursday he didnt think the system needs to be changed.

We do have a good system in place and they just need to be reassured the system that is there will serve them as a priority, Sajjan said.

The Canadian military is deployed at home almost entirely to help during natural disasters such as the Winnipeg flood in 1997, to help fight wildfires such as last springs disastrous blaze that razed parts of Fort McMurray, Alta., or the much maligned call for help from Toronto during an extended snow storm in 1998.

He said most of the assets and infrastructure to help is kept at the municipal or provincial level. The military is there as a last resort, he said.

Sajjan said the military is there to help First Nations affected as well but he said the process in place is for the province to seek help from Public Safety Canada, which has the lead on emergency preparedness. If the public safety minister feels additional resources are needed, he then turns to the defence minister to send in some troops.

Much of the discussion during the event Wednesday wasnt specific to disasters but for help defending traditional territory or treaty rights. Sajjan did not want to open that door.

When it comes to the protection of Canadians, it is a responsibility within the municipal and provincial responsibilities when it comes to public safety. The military is mainly there for dealing with foreign threats, he said. This goes more to why they are raising some of these concerns. It was a question that was raised by one person so we had a discussion about it. The biggest thing is making sure every Canadian, especially indigenous communities, feel they are properly served by all levels of government.

Swain could not be reached Thursday for comment.

mia.rabson@freepress.mb.ca
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 16/09/2016 (2235 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A suggestion by St. Boniface Coun. Matt Allard to abandon fines for overdue childrens book may become reality.

The administration has embraced Allards proposal, urging council to eliminate fines on overdue children and teen reading material.

This would be a quick win for society at not a huge cost, Allard said. There are some parents who wont want to be put in a situation where they might have to pay fines and as a result, some kids arent reading who should be.

RUTH BONNEVILLE / FREE PRESS FILES A teen browses through books at the Winnipeg Millenium Library. Elimination of overdue book fines would cost city hall about $102,000 annually.

The administrative report, authored by former manager of library services Rick Walker just before he retired in August, said that while the city will lose revenue with the scheme, it will help children in the long-run.

If library overdue fines on childrens and young adult materials could be removed, the library will be in a stronger position to support parents and caregivers in preparing their children and young adults in their literacy and educational needs, Walker stated in his report.

The report said elimination of fines would cost city hall about $102,000 annually and recommends the policy be adopted now and the financial issue dealt with in the 2017 budget deliberations.

Allard raised the issue during the March 2016 budget deliberations and the idea was forwarded to the administration for a report, which is being presented to a council committee Monday morning.

Allard is a member of the library board and he said when he asked members going into the 2016 budget deliberation for their priorities, the elimination of childrens fines was the top of their list.

Im thrilled that the public service agreed with me that the fines should be removed, Allard said. Im hoping the rest of council sees it the same way too.

The report said that several libraries across Canada and the U.S. have eliminated fines for children and teens with no noticeable increase in the amount of unreturned materials but a marked increase in the number of borrowed books by children and teens and an increase in the number of library users.

Walker said one of the observations from the librarys recent strategic planning process was that the public expects the librarys strategic priorities to include the advancement of early literacy skills, which he said would be assisted by the elimination of the fines.

The city collected $105,000 in overdue fines from children and young adults in 2015 but there is another $122,000 outstanding. The childrens and young adult fine revenue accounts for 15 per cent ($550,000) of total fine revenue annually.

Fines are levied to encourage timely return of reading material, which can be shared by all library users. For children, the fine is 20 cents per book per day up to a maximum of $4.50.

The library policy is to allow the public to continue borrowing books while accumulating up to $15 in outstanding fines  at which point, borrowing privileges are suspended until the outstanding amount is brought under $15. However, privileges are suspended if outstanding fines arent paid off by the end of the year.

The report said the librarys outreach program found that many parents in high needs neighbourhoods are reluctant to let their children join the library out of concern of accumulating fines they cant afford to pay off.

If books arent returned after 30 days past their overdue date, the borrowers are sent invoices for the cost of the material. If the material isnt returned after 45 days, the account is forwarded to a collection agency. If the collection agency cant collect, the matter is sent to a credit agency.

Walkers report said the library is not recommending a change in the policy for unreturned materials but only on the fines.

Walked noted the library allows children and teens to write off their fines through a reading program. Last year, that program cost the city $12,833 in fine revenue.

Walker offered council an alternative to the elimination of fines: Reducing the daily fine to 10 cents and the cap per book to $2.25.

aldo.santin@freepress.mb.ca
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 15/09/2016 (2236 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Manitoba teen who was the follower in a group of boys who killed a 52-year-old Bloodvein First Nation man has been handed a six-year sentence for second-degree murder.

The teen, who cant be identified, was 15 when he and two 17-year-old boys stabbed Cliff Malnyk to death in his home, then set the house on fire in February 2014. Malnyk was stabbed with a knife and a table leg. He died from a combination of blood loss and smoke inhalation.

Crown attorney Brian Sharpe and defence lawyer Dave Phillips asked the judge to approve a six-year sentence for the teen, with 2.5 years to be served in custody and 3.5 years to be served under conditional supervision. The teen was also sentenced to 30 days in jail  which hes already served  because he was caught by police out after midnight with a screwdriver in his pocket, in violation of his probation curfew conditions.

Cliff Malnyk was found dead early Saturday morning, February 8 2014, inside his burned-out house on Bloodvein First Nation, Manitoba.

Judge Robert Heinrichs delivered the sentence, asking the now-18-year-old to imagine it was his own grandfather who had been killed. Court heard the teens grandfather had died prior to him committing the crime, resulting in the teen drinking heavily with his mother and other family members on the night of the murder.

Try to imagine what it would have been like if youd got the news that a bunch of kids had gone into his house, or broken into his house, and stabbed him and beat him and then set the place on fire, and thats how he ended up dying. Imagine how youd feel, the judge said to the teen.

Theres no taking it back once it happens. Dead is dead and its done, so, very horrible circumstances that you got involved in.

The three teens were trying to get revenge on Malnyk, court previously heard, because they believed he ordered someone to smash the window at a house party they attended. They planned to rob him, stealing cash and alcohol the father of four was believed to have been bootlegging in the community of about 1,000 people about 200 kilometres north of Winnipeg.

In this case, the teens probation officer described him as the least bad of the three, court heard.

I think its recognized that (the accused) is more of the follower in the group, and (his probation officer) had been trying for some time to encourage him to stay away from these other people. He didnt, and now finds himself in a very unfortunate position, his lawyer said.

He was assessed as a high risk to re-offend and has ties to a gang, though he told his probation officer he dropped out. He now has a child of his own, and he told court he wants to further his education and support his family.

I just want to say Im sorry for what Ive done. I take full responsibility for my actions, he said, reading from a written statement.

Im not the same person I was when I got arrested.

All three co-accused pleaded guilty and one of them received a seven-year sentence in June, and was ordered to serve three years in custody and four years of community supervision. The maximum youth sentence allowed for second-degree murder in Canada is four years of incarceration plus three years of community supervision. The third teen is set to be sentenced next month.

katie.may@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @thatkatiemay
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 16/09/2016 (2235 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Calling all artists  the Winnipeg Art Gallery wants you.

The WAG is seeking submissions, from which three will be chosen for Art Expressd/Art Exprime, a special project billed as a coast-to-coast artistic journey.

Next summer, three six-metre metal shipping containers transformed into mobile art studios will travel in separate directions across Canada  east, west and south, stopping for several days in 15 communities.

RUTH BONNEVILLE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Local art teacher Nereo II painted the outside of a cargo container for the launch of the Winnipeg Art Gallerys 150 Countdown Event.

Were really excited to kick this off, this year, here, uniting the art and uniting the country with the art, WAG director and CEO Stephen Borys said Friday.

This project will highlight Canadas unique, natural geography, its linguistic power and diversity in culture. It will also speak to our deeply rooted history of travel, transport, exploration and communication.

The project has been selected as a Canada 150 Signature Initiative, making it an official part of Canadas 150th birthday celebrations in 2017.

The federal government is contributing $300,000 to the project.

The shipping containers will each be led by one of the three contemporary artists selected. In each of the communities visited, the artists will lead a collaborative art-making project designed to inspire members of the public to explore their visions of Canada. Before the trips begin, the exteriors of the containers will be designed and painted, in conjunction with Graffiti Art and Art City.

A container painted by Winnipeg artist Nereo II was on display at Fridays announcement at the WAG. It featured a multicoloured design with a stylized Maple Leaf.

I thought, in the most simple form, of creating a fabric of colours to represent the many layers of Canada, the many fabrics of our country, you could say, said Nereo II, 32, of his design he completed in two evenings. He said he will have to apply to be one of the three artists.

This (project) will be showcasing the diversity of the country. What Im most excited about is working with kids and in the different communities, if my application were selected.

A group of Grade 4 students from Sister McNamara Elementary School attended the media conference and displayed their designs on miniature versions of the containers.

The deadline for submissions is Sept. 30. Submissions are to be a creative concept or project that will reflect how participants understand themselves as Canadians and how they view their diverse histories and interests.

Borys said the WAG, Canadas oldest civic art gallery, will host the only Canada 150 Signature Initiative organized by a major art gallery in the Art Expressd project. For more information go to canada150.wag.ca.

ashley.prest@freepress.mb.ca
Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 16/09/2016 (2235 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Manitoba government recently terminated the task force set up under the previous government to consider moving the Canadian Pacific rail yards out of inner-city Winnipeg. While we dont know what will happen next, this move was needed.

Considering what can be done about the rail yards is a huge, complex, political and costly matter. Setting up a public task force to deal with all these issues under the leadership of former Quebec premier Jean Charest was premature. High-level negotiations will be needed to direct any change in land use, but strategic positioning and timing are important. The former government went public when a great deal of work behind the scenes was needed first.

The current government had to create its own process for addressing this opportunity. Its customary that new governments put their brand on important ongoing initiatives.

RUTH BONNEVILLE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS View of the CP rail yards in Winnipeg's North End. Relocating the rail yards has been the topic of much debate recently.

Second, the government needs to get its own intelligence in place on the technical, logistical, commercial and political requirements involved and to see how a development process can be managed. As the Social Planning Council of Winnipeg reported in 2012, a feasibility study is needed to provide research-based knowledge. This knowledge is needed to give all levels of government the perspective needed to make preliminary decisions and to replace speculation with substance. This advice is even more pertinent today.

The councils report pointed to research needed for assessing the costs of moving the rail yards, soil remediation, building new infrastructure and measuring the impact on local industry. Equally important, the report also advocated investigating the tax potential of residential and commercial development, cost savings of avoiding bridge replacement, alternative uses of the rail right-of-way through the city (for rapid transit for example), energy-reduction savings and other opportunities for generating revenue from this land.

In 2012, when public discussions were facilitated by the Free Press on the merits of a rail-yard development, two things were clearly evident. On one hand, people were operating on the basis of supposition and personal opinion rather than facts or research. This approach persists today. On the other hand, once we started taking about practical possibilities and tangible opportunities, everyone agreed a development of the rail-yards property would be a tremendous benefit for the city and all residents, now and for the next century.

Third, any change for the railway through the city has to be initiated by the City of Winnipeg according to the federal Rail Relocation and Crossings Act (1985). Therefore, the province and the city need to think through their interests and common issues involved in initiating a move for the rail yards. While the mayor and council are far more visionary than the last regime and will be receptive to thinking about a development process, they also need some basic information before they can commit to negotiations with CP Railway.

So lets be patient but supportive and encouraging of the city and provincial governments. Developing this parcel of real estate is going to happen, and it will be good for city residents, all three levels of government and the railway corporation. Im convinced the economic, environmental and social benefits of a change in land use can justify the costs and massive effort involved.

And with business-oriented governments at all three levels now, I think there will also be a stronger support for developing the rail yards for community as well as corporate benefit. Recent developments with CentrePort and the growing concern with public safety of rail traffic through urban areas only add to the opportunity and motivation for change.

Dennis Lewycky is the former executive director of the Social Planning Council of Winnipeg..
Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 16/09/2016 (2235 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Last year, Canadians were justly proud of the fact our country decided to welcome 25,000 Syrian refugees in just a few months. Last month, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) estimated that in just three weeks, it processed 37,491 refugees from South Sudan who were fleeing to neighbouring Uganda  8,200 arrived in a single day.

The largest number of those South Sudanese refugees joined 138,000 who were already at a nearby settlement in Adjumani, which I visited in January, before the influx caused by renewed fighting in the civil war.

The settlement is run for the UN by the Lutheran World Federation Uganda and the work is supported by Winnipeg-based Canadian Lutheran World Relief. The Lutheran World Federation also manages the reception centre at the border and July 19, staff counted 41 refugees per minute.

In all my career, Ive never had a situation where we were receiving over 8,000 refugees a day and international media had not picked up on it, and thats something thats surprised us all, says Kamstra, a veteran of emergency relief in Africa and the man who toured me and my group through the Adjumani settlement earlier this year.

Stepping up to assist for now are Canadian churches: early in August, the Canadian Lutheran World Relief made an emergency donation of $20,000, matched by $30,000 from the Anglican Churchs Primates World Relief and Development Fund.

You cant even begin to image how timely this contribution is, Kamstra wrote when he thanked them. Yesterday, we got confirmation that we have a cholera outbreak in our settlement.

The outbreak was later contained with help from Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders).

South Sudan seemed to be a good-news story a few years ago. It achieved independence from Sudan in 2011, ending Africas longest-running civil war against the government in the north. But bad news followed in December 2013 when a civil war began between political rivals in the new nation, divided on tribal or ethnic lines. The result has been one of the worlds biggest humanitarian crises: millions displaced, malnutrition, forced military recruitment of boys and men and sexual violence against girls and women.

Adjumani is a settlement, not a camp, because in Uganda, the government has not only allowed in over half a million refugees  an extraordinary achievement for a small country  but allows them freedom of movement, as well as the right to work and set up businesses. When I visited, I learned in return for allowing the settlement, Uganda asked the Lutheran World Federation to support local schools South Sudanese and local children attend together.

The settlement is an active place, where families receive not just shelter, but plots of land to grow their own food, and residents get paid employment, such as helping build housing for the elderly or the handicapped who cannot build their own.

When he spoke to my group earlier in the year, Kamstra was optimistic Adjumani could serve its purpose and close again one day, which has happened before. Another settlement in the same location emptied out when the previous civil war ended and peace came to South Sudan. As he explained to me, the South Sudanese are herders, and they do not like to stay away from their cattle for long.

The support the Canadian churches have provided to refugees in Adjumani would not have been nearly as effective without contributions from the Government of Canada, such as $875,000 for safe water, hygiene and other relief in 2015-16, as well as $1.14 million for youth in 2016-17, just as it has helped organizations such as the Winnipeg-based Canadian Foodgrains Bank provide food assistance in South Sudan itself.

But now Canadians need to ask themselves what more they can do: we should make donations for the South Sudanese to charities we trust. We should call on our government to step up its efforts to support both the victims and peace-making efforts to halt the fighting. And our media also need to play a role: they should turn their eyes to Africa, where not only great disasters are occurring, but great efforts are being made that it is time for us to join.

David Schulze is a Montreal lawyer who serves on the board of Canadian Lutheran World Relief. In January, he and his family took part in the CLWR Global Encounter 2016 tour to Uganda.
Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 16/09/2016 (2235 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

OTTAWA  Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberal government are heading toward their sophomore year in power as Parliament resumes for its fall sitting next week, and from many angles, the sunny skies are still winning the day.

As far as the polls go, Trudeau and the Liberals can barely see the competition right now. Most polls have the Liberals pulling close to 50 per cent support, and Trudeaus approval numbers are through the roof.

Much of this, of course, is due to the fact both the Conservatives and the NDP are regrouping and are without permanent leaders. But it is worth noting some of the negative press that plagued the Liberals in August around his cabinet ministers and their spending habits either didnt have an impact on peoples opinions or didnt get through to them at all.

ADRIAN WYLD / THE CANADIAN PRESS FILES Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaking in the House of Commons in May. The House resumes sitting Monday, and it would appear the Liberals are maintaining their popularity.

It is an enviable position for the government as MPs return to the House of Commons Monday, and it gives it some political capital to ride as it faces some tough decisions ahead.

With the notable exception of the issue of assisted suicide, which had a Supreme Court-imposed deadline for action, the Liberals have been able to put off most tough calls thus far by sending everything out to consultations, but at the end of consultations, people expect decisions. The government has promised to take a direction on three big-ticket items with voters by next spring  the Canada Post review, how to legalize marijuana and electoral reform.

Whichever positions they take, all three will prove a challenge to sell.

Still, the Liberals are aiming to go into this fall session with a less adversarial approach than was seen in their first session, when the use of closure for legislation and the ill-advised Motion 6 to strip opposition parties of almost any power over Parliamentary procedure caused an uproar.

In August, Trudeau replaced Dominic LeBlanc as House leader. One Liberal insider said LeBlanc, who is now the fisheries minister, was pushed aside in large part because he hadnt handled the job the way Trudeau wanted. In his place, Trudeau put rookie MP Bardish Chagger. Chagger is liked on both sides of the floor and should have a less adversarial approach to the job than LeBlanc.

The Conservatives will spend a lot of time this fall trying to ram home the image of the Liberals lavish spending habits on limousines and photographers, as well as keep the pressure on to have a referendum to determine electoral reform. Both issues can be tough sells for the Conservatives, who have their own skeletons on both fronts. But at least on the referendum side, they have traction with a not-insignificant sector of Canadians.

The Conservatives might do better to push the government on things such as saving the trade agreement with Europe that is in jeopardy because of Brexit, getting the TransPacific Partnership signed against the tough field of an American presidential campaign and figuring out the pipeline problem.

The pipeline issue has become a major thorn in the Liberals side, and Natural Resources Minister Jim Carr now has to appoint new members to the National Energy Board and get the Energy East hearings back on track. He has been fond of saying the Conservatives pro-pipelines approach didnt actually build any major pipelines, but thus far the Liberals havent shown their approach is any better.

The Conservatives biggest hurdle, however, may be the growing divide in the party between MP Kellie Leitchs anti-Canadian-values screening and those who want a less confrontational approach to immigration.

And then theres the NDP. Oh, the NDP. At this point, with poll numbers in the toilet, fundraising reports grim and infighting over whether Tom Mulcair should stick around as the leader for another year, one almost wants to feel desperately sorry for Team Orange. Its like watching a crew try to bail out a sinking ship with teaspoons.

The caucus just emerged from its pre-session retreat in Montreal putting on a brave, unified face with a decision to keep Mulcair in the leaders chair until his replacement is chosen a year from now. But the grumblings about him arent going to stop, and there is nobody in the race to replace him. The hand-wringing that started over the summer over the lack of interested candidates is turning into full-blown anxiety.

The NDP intends to use the fall to distinguish themselves from the Trudeau Liberals, trying to point out all the ways the Liberals are just Harper-light. But if the NDP leadership race doesnt show signs of a contest by Christmas, the faces in that party are just going to get grimmer.

Mia Rabson is the Free Press parliamentary bureau chief.

mia.rabson@freepress.mb.caTwitter: @mrabson
By Tatsam Mukherjee: Raaz Reboot is the kind of movie which might spout a lot of Romanian folklore, but it is the good ol' mangalsutra which saves the day. Here's our Raaz Reboot movie review.

Raaz Reboot movie cast: Gaurav Arora, Kriti Kharbanda, Emraan Hashmi

Raaz Reboot movie director: Vikram Bhatt

Raaz Reboot movie rating: (0.5/5)

One can imagine how Vikram Bhatt pitched the fourth instalment of the Raaz franchise, Raaz Reboot, to the Bhatts. Imagining portions of the conversation where Vikram says, "The Raaz franchise is becoming predictable, we need to reboot this franchise with two unknown faces. The money we save in hiring two newcomers, we'll invest in shooting in Romania. For the nostalgia value we have Emraan Hashmi, who will play a role he has never essayed before - a creepy, stalker-ish ex-boyfriend. We'll include some Romanian folklore, but in the end the spirit will be exorcised by praying to Vishnu bhagwaan." The Bhatts clap and agree to bankroll the movie.



ALSO READ: In Vikram Bhatt's Raaz Reboot, how many F-words are f***ing enough?



ALSO READ: The abysmal state of Indian horror movies since 2000



Kriti Kharbanda makes her debut in Raaz Reboot.

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Raaz Reboot is the kind of movie where the 'hero' runs for several kilometers so he can break down by a lake, and thus let the director capture the scenic beauty of Romania. It is a *subtle* way of suggesting to the audience - please like our movie, we've spent a lot of money on it. Bro, why don't you just cry in your living room, any way no one cares about you or the film.

Vikram Bhatt might as well take a break and reconsider life choices. It is a well-known fact, that he got his first success with 2002's Raaz starring Dino Morea and Bipasha Basu, after which he began being called the 'master of horror' in Bollywood. And he probably began taking the title a little too seriously. Yes, the standards are that low. Even if his biggest success was a watered-down, sanitised version of a blah Hollywood film - What lies Beneath. Does that mean he will go on making the same kind of drivel all his career? We hope not.

Emraan Hashmi Emraan Hashmi

Raaz Reboot pushes the envelope with its story-telling as it employs the shining, new plot of a couple moving into a new house which might be possessed by a spirit. And being a Bhatt film, the spirit will haunt the woman in the house. Even if it is actually the man of the house it wants to hurt (as we later find out). Because spirits in Bhatt films are sexist. And floating, possessed women make for better cinema? Not really. The film follows the usual drill of the woman getting harassed by a spirit, and when she complains to her husband, he just laughs it off as "Chal hatt pagli! Bhoot-woot jaisi koi cheez nahi hoti".

The scares are nothing we've not seen before. An eye peeking out of the sink, creaking doors, a woman sitting in the middle of a room with too much foundation on her face and hair like you wake up with on a Sunday morning with bad hangover. Mr Bhatts (Vikram, Mukesh, Mahesh) - all this ceased to be scary back before India's Independence. Please invest some brains, if you're going to be investing money in stuff like this. Hire a competent writer, whose way of fighting spirits will not have dialogues like, "Mera bhagwaan humein bachaayega." Who's gonna save us though?

Gaurav Arora makes use of that in-shape jawline while crying. Gaurav Arora makes use of that in-shape jawline while crying.

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To be honest, Raaz Reboot is not a boring film. It is so unintentionally hilarious that they might as well have marketed this as India's first 'unintentionally-hilarious-horror-comedy with violins and sex'. The music of the movie is scored by Jeet Ganguly, who churns out melodies to justify his monthly paycheck from Vishesh Films. Same old Arijit Singh wailing in the recording studio and the same old melodies. The movie has some of the most OMG dialogues like - "Pagal woh nahi jise bhoot dikhta hai, pagal woh hai jise insaan nahi dikhta."

Raaz Reboot might still go on to make money, like its predecessors in the franchise. But do we as the Indian audience need to assaulted with such banal, comical horror every single time the Bhatts have some money to make a film? Nope. So if you still go ahead and spend money on a movie like this, you DESERVE more movies like these. And thou shalt not complain about the poor state of horror movies in India. Thou absolutely shalt not.

--- ENDS ---

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Goodview wants to be open for business.

The city is following up the formation of an economic development authority in 2015 with a continuing effort to encourage development and additional business.

Dan Matejka, Goodview city administrator, said the EDA had levied for funds in 2016 and is looking at doing so in 2017, while looking for opportunities to promote the businesses new and old.

Were trying to establish a pot of funds, Matejka said. To help them come to Goodview or stay in Goodview.

Simultaneously, community members are being brought together to discuss strategies.

In mid-July, the organization SE MN Together facilitated a group of residents and guests from state and county groups to discuss challenges faced in the community and business environment, including in Goodview.

Nearly 30 businesses and residents attended the event, where they were asked various questions about what their thoughts were of the city of Goodview  where it has been and where it should go.

Areas of exploration recommended in the discussion include comprehensive planning, developing community events and spaces, and building an identity for the city.

Aside from forming a volunteer committee to further explore recommendations, Matejka said one step that has been discussed for several years is developing a long-term, comprehensive development plan to guide growth, which they currently dont have.

The volunteer committee recommended by the SE MN Together discussions would be composed of community members and explore models for communities and potential available resources.

A potential first step for the group would be surveying the community to explore pros and cons of the community, as well as available assets and goals to work toward.

Natalie Siderius, one of the core members of the SE MN Together and co-chair of the Winona County EDA, said Goodview faces similar issues to smaller rural communities in the area.

Resource availability, a workforce shortage and aging populations all remain common struggles throughout southeast Minnesota, making the discussion of development  whether of businesses or housing  about more than just bringing an entity into the community.

Transportation options, for instance, can affect whether an older person is still able to get around, be it to a hospital or grocery, which in turn affects whether that person will stay in a rural home or community, or move to a different city.

And while that can make a difference in whether someone stays, affordable housing availability can decide whether a new family comes in the first place.

Siderius said the countys EDA has worked to help cities with community planning, bringing in businesses, lending money and other activities.

We try to stay very involved, Siderius said.

Currently many area cities are in the planning stages, somewhat like Goodview, forming EDAs and having larger conversations about the future of the community planning.

Matejka said that while Goodview also has limited space to grow outwards, it is interested in new development of all types, be it residential or industrial.

Were not going out and zeroing in on a particular industry, Matejka said.
The United States is a far better place, Chong Yang said, than the one she left behind.

Until September 2004, Yang lived in Thailand, in a run-down camp where adults did not work and children did not attend school. Advised by the United Nations, Yang and her family moved first to St. Paul and then to Winona, settling in a country that has begun now to feel like home.

Here, Yang said Thursday through an interpreter, my children have a chance.

Yang and a small group of other naturalized citizens from Winona gathered Thursday at the Winona County office building to celebrate Constitution Day, or Citizenship Day. The federal observance marks the signing of the U.S. Constitution in 1787 and recognizes all people who are citizens of this country.

For many people, citizenship is a culmination of their hopes and dreams, said Fatima Said, executive director of Project FINE, a Winona nonprofit that hosts the annual celebration. Its a happy occasion. Its a powerful thing.

Said moved to the United States from Bosnia and Herzegovina during the fighting there in the 1990s.

Gatherings like Thursdays, she said, play an important role in helping newcomers meet new people and engage in their communities.

People who came got a miniature American flag and a generous slice of marble cake. At one point, all the naturalized citizens crowded together for a group photo.

The League of Women Voters was also there, registering newcomers to vote.

We need to take this election seriously, Said said. This is our home.

John Keller, executive director of the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota, gave a speech about the significance of citizenship in this country.

Its permanent, he said. It can never be taken away. You have every right of a natural-born citizen, except for one: Naturalized citizens cant run for president.

In Minnesota, Keller said, there are 75,000 people annually who are eligible to apply for citizenship. Only 10,000 or so actually do, usually discouraged by the cost  its nearly $700 to apply  or their inability to pass the required test.

People should reach out, he said. There are programs that can help with both.

Winona was recently designated as the first Welcoming City in the state by Welcoming America, a national organization that aims to serve immigrants and refugees, and evaluates communities based on their commitment to helping those people.

The Winona City Council approved the membership in June, and a number of city officials attended Thursdays celebration.

Marleny Gernes came, too, with her family. She moved to the United States from Peru in 2008  March 14, 2008, she said.

It was her husband-to-be, Cletus Gernes, who pulled her here. The couple now has two young children.

Marleny has returned twice to Peru; she misses her family, she said, and the food.

But, she said Thursday, as her son climbed her leg to reach the cake on her plate, this feels like home.

(Citizenship is) permanent. It can never be taken away. John Keller, executive director of the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota
Winona School district taxpayers should see their school property tax bill drop by a little more than 8 percent if the 2017 district property tax levy gains final approval.

The WAPS school board gave unanimous approval to a preliminary levy totaling just more than $11 million  $978,000 less than was assessed to district property owners in 2016.

The total includes $6.67 million raised by the districts voter-approved operating levy.

Local property taxes comprise about 20 percent of the districts $41 million general fund budget and is second only to state general education aid as a source of school district funds.

District finance director Sarah Slaby explained that changes in the state aid funding formula puts more state money into the district capital budgets, reducing the portion raised by the local property tax levy.

Because the levy and state aid numbers provided by the state arent finalized by the time school districts are required to submit their preliminary budgets, districts will typically set their preliminary levy at the maximum provided by law to allow for fluctuations in the final state funding figures, Slaby said. The final levy certified by the district can be lower than the preliminary levy submitted to the state, but it cannot be higher, she said.

State statutes require all Minnesota school districts to approve a preliminary levy and submit it to the state for its blessing before Sept. 30. The board is required to present the preliminary levy as approved by the state to the public at a mandatory Truth-in-Taxation hearing by Dec. 1, and vote to certify the final levy amounts by Dec. 15, 2016.
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker has asked the U.S. Small Business Administration to view flood damage and meet with local and state officials in Buffalo County. The information gathered could be used to request the SBA to provide federal low-interest loans to locals and businesses that suffered damage during the flooding on Aug. 11. SBA damage assessments of homes and businesses in Buffalo County is expected to begin Friday.

Many homeowners and businesses are still trying to recover from the flash floods that hit the area last month, Walker said in a statement. By reaching out to the U.S. Small Business Administration, were working to ensure disaster aid is provided to these families and businesses quickly so they are able to get back on their feet.

Up to eight inches of rain cased flash flooding and mudslides on Aug. 11, 2016. Numerous roads were damaged and homes were flooded. Recent damage assessments issued by Buffalo County Emergency Management last week indicate 16 homes with major damage and more than 200 homes with minor flood damage.

Under an SBA declaration, home and personal property loans, business physical disaster loans, and economic injury disaster loans are offered.

The Wisconsin Disaster Fund continues to assist local governments recover some of their costs incurred in responding to the flooding and repairing road damage. The state provides 70 percent of eligible costs with the local share of 30 percent.
Saint Mary's University invites the public to discuss the role faith plays in exercising citizenship. As part of International Lasallian Day of Peace, Saint Mary's University's Office of Campus Ministry is hosting guest speaker Jason Adkins, executive director of the Minnesota Catholic Conference, as he presents on Faithful Citizenship," from 7 to 8 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 28, Slavi Lecture Hall on the third floor of Saint Mary's Hall.

Adkins has been in his current position since March 2011. Prior to his advocacy work for the church, he was an attorney at the Institute for Justice, a public interest law firm. Adkins teaches at the St. Paul Seminary and writes a regular column that appears in diocesan newspapers around Minnesota.
Farmers Implement LLC. announced the retirement of Lawrence Olson from his sales role.

Lawrence dedicated over 70 years of his life to the agriculture industry. A celebration commending his career took place on Aug. 25 with a cake and ice cream social held at the dealership.

In his early years he was a local farmer and operated and owned Olson Implement Inc. His dealership specialized in Allis Chalmers and Gleaner farm equipment. It was there that he found his true passion for the grain handling and storage markets and realized there was a need in the local community.

Olsen then partnered with MC, Super Steel and Shivvers Corp and became the Grain Bin Godfather. After he sold Olsons, he joined the team at Enerson & Eggen in Cambria in grain handling sales, which was bought out in 2007 by Farmers Implement.

Farmer Implement thanked Lawrence for his years of service in the agricultural industry and local communities.
After the Bihar government and Chandrakeshwar Prasad moved Supreme Court on Friday appealing cancellation of bail to him, Shahabuddin said that he would abide by law and judiciary.

By Rohit Kumar Singh: Don-turned-RJD politician Mohammad Shahabuddin said he was ready to go back to jail if the Supreme Court cancelled his bail. Speaking Exclusively to India Today, the dreaded don said that he would abide by law and judiciary.

The Bihar government and Chandrakeshwar Prasad, father of three sons who was killed allegedly by Shahabuddin, both, moved the apex court on Friday appealing cancellation of bail to Shahabuddin. It may be noted that the Siwan administration also in its report to the state government had said there was atmosphere of fear in Siwan after Shahabuddin returned.

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'I AM A LAW-ABIDING CITIZEN'

"This is the matter of the law. Court has granted bail to me and if the court tells me to go back, I am willing to go back. It's not a issue for me. Why won't I not go to jail? I am a law-abiding citizen of this country", said Shahabuddin.

'NO FRICTION BETWEEN LALU AND NITISH'

On the issue of building friction between RJD President Lalu Prasad and Bihar CM Nitish Kumar over the release of Shahabuddin, the don said that there was no need for the two Bihar leaders to develop tension between themselves over him.

"There is no friction between the two and there is also no need for a friction over me. Media is only creating this tension. There is no possibility of tension between the two leaders", said Shahabuddin.

DEFENDS TEJ PRATAP

The four time RJD MP also downplayed the controversy over pictures of his alleged sharpshooters Mohammad Kaifi and Javed Mian appearing with Health Minister Tej Pratap Yadav. Shahabudin defended Tej Pratap pointing out that pictures of the alleged sharpshooters have appeared with other persons also.

"Their pictures have also come with Siwan journalist Rajdev Ranjan and also DM of Siwan. Does that mean everyone has links with the sharp shooter?", questioned Shahabuddin.

Shabuddin again re-iterated that it was RJD President Lalu Prasad who was his only leader.

ALSO READ:

Dreaded Bahubali from Bihar: All you need to know about Shahabuddin, the don who made Siwan tremble



Shahabuddin's bail challenged by Nitish govt in Supreme Court



--- ENDS ---
In 1956 a group of Columbus women organized a hospital auxiliary for the purpose of rendering service to the hospital in Columbus and its patients through ways approved or proposed by the governing board of the hospital.

The first meeting of the quxiliary, then known as St. Marys Hospital Auxiliary was held Sept. 21, 1956, with about 30 women. Since that day, the Volunteers of CCH have evolved to be a group of more than 100 strong men, women and students who assist the Columbus Community Hospital team in fulfilling our mission.

Community members are invited to join in the 60 year celebration during the week of Sept. 19 by partaking in special events and activities planned by the Volunteers of CCH.

An information table will be set up in the hospitals main entrance Sept. 1923 from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. each day. The table will include information about the Volunteers of CCH, health information, fun facts, history, and giveaways.

A skin cancer screening clinic will be hosted by the Volunteers of CCH and CCH providers Sept. 20 from 5-7 p.m. at Columbus Community Hospital. Please call 920-623-1280 to register for this free screening or for more information.

The Volunteers of CCH are sponsoring a coffee day Sept. 21 from 9 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Visitors who stop by the information table will receive a coupon for one small coffee at the Perk Avenue Cafe (good for Sept. 21 only).

Join the Volunteers of CCH for a special brick dedication ceremony on the CCH Wellness Walkway Sept. 21 at 4 p.m. The dedication will commemorate the first meeting of the hospital auxiliary held 60 years ago on Sept. 21, 1956.

Current and past members of the Volunteers of CCH are invited to a 60th anniversary luncheon at the Columbus Country Club on Sept. 22. All current and past members are asked to register for the luncheon by calling 920-623-1280.

A 34-page commemorative booklet honoring the Volunteers of CCH from 1956 to the present is available for a $5 donation to the Volunteers of CCH. A reprint of the original 1961 cookbook from the Volunteers of Columbus Community Hospital will be available for purchase at the Gift Shoppe. The book also includes select recipes from the 1991 and 1993 volunteer cookbooks.
Trump platform built on hate, fear

Bernie Sanders calls Donald Trump the worst candidate in modern history, dangerous, a demagogue, and says that, the cornerstone of his campaign is bigotry.

Democracy? Trump has pledged $20 million of his own money toward a super PAC to make sure Ted Cruz and John Kasich, who did not support him, will never hold political office again.

Dont let the gun rights, pro-birthers or anti-lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender people convince you that Trump isnt a madman. He is, and the fascist playbook he follows with his racist rhetoric is giving the radical right-wing the platform of hate and fear it loves while feeding on the uninformed and sowing division in America for his own gain. Lying is second nature to Trump, proclaimed Trumps ghost writer Tony Schwartz.

Barbara Bush said she didnt know how anyone could vote for Trump after what he has said about women.

Trump challenged Russia to hack into United States security; Hillary Clinton is now winning over Republicans who see her as a placeholder who will take care of our nuclear codes until 2020.

Clinton is smart, tough and has been over-scrutinized and vindicated for decades. Vote Clinton. If not, well suffer under bankrupter Trump.

Susan Holmes, Baraboo
Items are listed under the day of the event only, running as space permits prior to the event. To submit items, call 745-3511, email jcutsforth@capitalnewspapers.com or visit www.portagedailyregister.com. Include name and phone number.

TODAY

Bingo: 2 p.m. Community Bingo with beverages and snacks, Our House Senior Living, Portage. Everyone welcome.

Museum: 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Portage World War II Museum, 119 E. Cook St., Portage. Free tours for veterans every Thursday, Friday and Saturday. The tours take 2 1/2 hours. For information, call 608-697-3690.

Theatre: Zona Gale Young Peoples Theatre presents Shilly: A Musical! an original musical by local playwright and theatre education professional Dr. Tom McEvilly, with music by Dan Evans, 7 p.m. Portage Center for the Arts, 301 E. Cook St., Portage. Tickets available at the PCA office and online, or at the door. Adults are $15, children 12 and younger are $8. Family Night $35 (two parents and up to five of their children, Saturdays only). For more information, call 742-5655.

Unique Singles: 5 p.m. Cimarolis, Highway 127, Portage. All single men and women older than age 50 welcome. The group is strictly social with no dues or officers.

SATURDAY, SEPT. 17

Community free meal: 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. St. John the Baptist Episcopal Church, 207 W. Pleasant St., Portage.

Festival: 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. 19th annual Kids Day, Culvers parking lot, 2733 New Pinery Road, Portage. Health, safety and environmental awareness information, free child ID kits, spinal, eye and dental screenings, bouncy house, prizes, food, tours of fire truck, police car, ambulance, bus and tow truck. Donate to the Portage Food Pantry for a chance to win an iPod Shuffle. All proceeds will go to further support the Portage Family Skate Park.

Brat fry: 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Portage Family Skate Park brat sale fundraiser, Pierces Marketplace Brat Hut, New Pinery Road, Portage.

Museum: 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Portage World War II Museum, 119 E. Cook St., Portage. Free tours for veterans every Thursday, Friday and Saturday. The tours take 2 1/2 hours. For information, call 608-697-3690.

Theatre: Zona Gale Young Peoples Theatre presents Shilly: A Musical! an original musical by local playwright and theatre education professional Dr. Tom McEvilly, with music by Dan Evans, 7 p.m. Portage Center for the Arts, 301 E. Cook St., Portage. Tickets available at the PCA office and online, or at the door. Adults are $15, children 12 and younger are $8. Family Night $35 (two parents and up to five of their children, Saturdays only). For more information, call 742-5655.

SUNDAY, SEPT. 18

Bingo: 5 to 7 p.m. VFW Hall, 215 W. Collins St., Portage. Doors open at 4:30 p.m. Hard cards are $1 and chips are available. All are welcome. Runs the first and third Sunday of each month.

Pancake breakfast: 7 to 11 a.m. Knights of Columbus Hall, 918 Silver Lake Drive, Portage. Cost is $6.

Theatre: Zona Gale Young Peoples Theatre presents Shilly: A Musical! an original musical by local playwright and theatre education professional Dr. Tom McEvilly, with music by Dan Evans, 2 p.m. Portage Center for the Arts, 301 E. Cook St., Portage. Tickets available at the PCA office and online, or at the door. Adults are $15, children 12 and younger are $8. Family Night $35 (two parents and up to five of their children, Saturdays only). For more information, call 742-5655.

MONDAY, SEPT. 19

Auditions: 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. The Christmas Gift written and directed by Dr. Tom McEvilly, Portage Center for the Arts, 301 E. Cook St., Portage. Prepare a short song. Callbacks will be scheduled on an as-needed basis. Auditions are open to youth actors ages 10 to 16; limited adult roles may also be available. Cast size can range from 10 to 20 characters. Casting, especially lead and supporting roles, will be based on auditions and availability to rehearse starting in October. For more information, call 608-742-5655, email portagecenterforthearts@frontier.com or visit www.portagecenterforthearts.com.

Clinic: 8 a.m. to noon, Columbia County Public Health Walk-In Clinic, Columbia County Health Department, 2652 Murphy Road, Portage. Use door 4. Bring childs immunization record. Visit www.co.columbia.wi.us for more information.

Clinic: 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Marquette County Immunization Clinic, Marquette County Health and Human Services Building, 428 Underwood Ave., Montello. Bring childs immunization record.

Portage Historical Society: 5:30 p.m. Museum at the Portage, MacFarlane Road, Portage.

Card party: 6:30 p.m. Euchre card party, Bethlehem Lutheran Church, W8267 Highway 33 East, Portage. Public welcome. Contact: Cloe, 429-2363.

Brat fry: 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Portage Family Skate Park fundraiser, Pierces Marketplace Brat Hut, New Pinery Road, Portage.

Biking: 6 p.m. Portage Pedalers Monday night ride, meet at Portage Public Library, 253 W. Edgewater St., Portage. Wear a helmet and bikers under 18 must ride with a parent.

Library event: 3:30 to 4:15 p.m. Curiosity Day Curious George party, Portage Public Library, 253 W. Edgewater St., Portage. Open to children in pre-kindergarten programs (including preschool, home school and Head Start) through second grade only (please, no younger or older siblings). Games, activities and crafts that feature Curious George the monkey, and the man in the yellow hat. Registration is not required. For more information, call 742-4959, ext. 211 or check the Portage Public Library: Childrens Department Facebook page.

Seniors Bowling Social: 2 p.m. Fireball Lanes, 817 E. Wisconsin St., Portage. Cost is $6 and includes three games of bowling and shoe rental.

TUESDAY, SEPT. 20

Prayer time: 8 to 8:30 a.m. First Presbyterian Church, 105 S. Main St., Pardeeville. The church will be open for quiet, personal time for reflection, thought and prayer. There is no planned service or leader. For more information, call 608-429-2646.

Portage Family Skate Park public meeting: 5 to 6:30 p.m. Gerstenkorn Administration Building, 305 E. Slifer St., Portage. All interested people are welcome to attend. If the Portage Schools are closed or released early the PFSP meeting will be canceled and announced on our Facebook page with a new meeting location as soon as possible.

WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 21

Bingo: 5:30 p.m. 131 Restaurant, North Main Street, Pardeeville. Bingo will be played every Wednesday, except the first one of the month.

Clinic: 8 a.m. to noon, Columbia County Public Health Walk-In Clinic, Columbia County Health Department, 2652 Murphy Road, Portage. Use door 4. Bring childs immunization record. Visit www.co.columbia.wi.us for more information.

Cooking class: 6 p.m. free healthy cooking class, Seventh-day Adventist Church, 2100 Highway 33 East, Portage. This class features Luscious Lunches, with samples and recipes. All welcome.

Free clinic: 9 a.m. to noon, St. Vincent de Paul free medical clinic, Wilz Drugs lower level, 140 E. Cook St., Portage. No appointments needed. Information needed is name, date of birth and a contact number. A chiropractor is available from 10 a.m. to noon Wednesdays. A foot clinic is available every week. The clinic can do exams and prescribe medications. Physical therapist available. Discounted medications are available at Wilz and Wal-Mart. Call Bonny Oestreich, RN, at 608-234-0159 for information.

Card party: 6:30 p.m. Texas Hold em card tournament, VFW Hall, 215 W. Collins St., Portage. Register at 6 p.m. Entry fee is $20. One hundred percent payout. Open to the public. For information, call the VFW Hall at 742-5350.

Senior meal: 11:30 a.m. Portage Area Senior Citizens Group, Municipal Building, 115 W. Pleasant St., Portage. The meal will be provided by the Columbia County Nutrition Center. If you wish to have a meal, call Lois Williams at 608-697-5800 by noon Tuesday to register. The cost is a cash donation which will be directly put back into the nutrition program. The meeting will start at noon with cards to follow.

Biking: 6 p.m. Portage Pedalers Wednesday night ride, meet at Pat and Dougs house, W7956 Douglas Center Road (East of Briggsville on Highway 23 North via 3rd Avenue). Wear a helmet and bikers under 18 must ride with a parent.

Screening: 1 to 5 p.m. free blood pressure screenings, Divine Savior Healthcare, 2817 New Pinery Road, Portage. No appointment necessary. Call 745-6405 for more information. Do not eat, smoke, drink caffeine or exercise for 30 minutes prior.

Senior meal: 11:30 a.m. Wednesday Soup, Salad and Sandwich Bar, Portage Senior Dining Site, lower level of the Portage Municipal Building, 115 W. Pleasant St., Portage. For seniors age 60 and older; suggested donation $4. Order by noon the day before by calling 608-742-8726.

Zumba: 5:30 p.m. 1208 Northport Road (the former Freedom Carpeting building). This is a $5 drop-in class. For more information, contact Deb at DJMACK00001@yahoo.com or Rena at 697-6713.

THURSDAY, SEPT. 22

Bingo: 6:30 p.m. Endeavor Lions Club Bingo, Endeavor-Moundville Fire Department, Endeavor.

Blood drive: 11:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Portage Red Cross blood drive, Portage United Methodist Church, 1804 New Pinery Road, Portage. Download the American Red Cross Blood Donor app, visit www.redcrossblood.org or call 800-733-2767 to make an appointment or for more information. All blood types are needed. A blood donor card or drivers license or two other forms of identification are required.

Prayer time: 4:30 to 5 p.m. First Presbyterian Church, 105 S. Main St., Pardeeville. The church will be open for quiet, personal time for reflection, thought and prayer. There is no planned service or leader. For more information, call 608-429-2646.

Clinic: 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Marquette County Immunization Clinic, Marquette County Health and Human Services Building, 428 Underwood Ave., Montello. Bring childs immunization record.

Museum: 1 to 4 p.m. Thursday through Saturday, Museum at the Portage, 804 MacFarlane Road, Portage. Admission is free.

Card party: 7 p.m. Open Texas Hold em, Sport Club 22, Pardeeville. For information, call 566-9655.

Museum: 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Portage World War II Museum, 119 E. Cook St., Portage. Free tours for veterans every Thursday, Friday and Saturday. The tours take 2 1/2 hours. For information, call 608-697-3690.
Artists at all levels are invited to join the plein air painting event which will be held Oct. 3-8 at Durwards Glen Retreat and Educational Center, W11876 McLeisch Road, Baraboo. The public is invited to come watch the artists work as they paint scenes from the grounds and surrounding area during the day Oct. 3-6. The artwork created during this event will be available for sale off the easel during the week, or from 6 to 8 p.m. Oct. 7 at the Artists Reception and from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday during the Fall Festival.

Roberta Condon and Debra Grall will judge the event. Condon has a gallery and studio in Portage. Her work has been on display throughout Wisconsin, and in exhibits in New York and Ohio. Grall is an emeritus professor of art from Northern Illinois University, now living in Baraboo. She is an accomplished artist and teacher of the fine arts.

Plein air, a French word, literally translates as open air, and is defined as painting or drawing done outside, in the open air. The trick is to try to re-create what you see in front of you on the canvas before the scene changes  with passing clouds, changing weather, and the continual movement of the sun.

Durwards Glen is a great location to try your skill with this painting style. The grounds are located within the Baraboo Bluffs and include over 37 acres of hiking trails, the Glen, Prentice Creek, the pond, multiple Catholic shrines and grottoes, and multiple historic structures, such as, the Hermitage, the Artist Cottage, the Chapel, and the Log Lodge. Some of these structures are on the National Historic Landmark Register.

Registration materials for artists are available at www.durwardsglen.org. See the events page for guidelines for the competition and associated fees and prizes.

Individuals who would like to volunteer during the event should email Durwards Glen at theglen150@gmail.com or call 608-356-8113.
Information is taken from the records of the Portage Police Department and does not represent a comprehensive list of police activity. Each individual named in this report is presumed to be innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

New Pinery Road: Victor B. Reynolds, 53, Portage, was arrested Sept. 6 on a charge of obstructing/resisting an officer after police stopped his vehicle for reports he was driving without a valid license.

West Pleasant Street: Tomi C. Clark, 35, was cited Sept. 7 for operating a vehicle after license suspension, third offense, and no insurance.

West Pleasant Street: Thomas Morales was arrested Sept. 7 for violation of parole after failing a preliminary alcohol breath test.

New Pinery Road/West Slifer Street: Ryan K. Novander, 31, was cited Sept. 7 for failure to yield right-of-way following a traffic crash.

Town Street/New Pinery Road: David J. Lehman, 36, was arrested Sept. 7 fon charges of possession of methamphetamine, drug paraphernalia, carrying a concealed weapon and violation of parole.

Adams Street: Cory Calkins was arrested Sept. 7 on charges of OWI fifth offense after police were called to a residence for a truck vs. utility pole crash. Two children under the age of 16 were in the vehicle. Police could smell alcohol as Calkins spoke and intoxicant impairment was observed.

Village Road: Quincy S. Crawford, 33, was cited Sept. 8 for operating a vehicle after license revocation, fourth offense, after police stopped him for a defective signal.

Franklin Street: Jonathan J. Rehdantz, 35, was arrested near Rusch Elementary Sept. 8 on charges of possession of a dangerous weapon on school grounds, felony bail jumping and possession of drug paraphernalia. A Rusch Elementary staff member called police to report a male pacing outside the building and trying to get inside and who would not show his face to the camera. An officer asked Rehdantz if he had any weapons and he became agitated. Rehdantz was immediately handcuffed and patted down for weapons when police found a knife and pot pipe in his pockets. Rehdantz was reported to be upset over a custody dispute.

DeWitt/East Howard streets: Clayton L. Broesch, 63, was cited Sept. 8 for criminal operating a vehicle after license revocation, first offense, after police stopped him for driving the wrong way on a one-way street.

West Pleasant Street: Eric A. Scheriger was arrested Sept. 8 on a warrant after he was found walking behind the police department garage during a shift change.

Jefferson/East Pleasant streets: Alex John Murray was cited Sept. 9 for first-offense OWI after police stopped his vehicle for defective exhaust and no vehicle registration. Murray was reported to be falling asleep while talking to the officer. He submitted to a blood test and was released to a responsible party.

West Howard Street: Andre R. Parker, 37, was arrested Sept. 9 for second-offense possession of THC after police responded to a welfare check. Parker was found to be highly intoxicated and had facial injuries from an apparent fight.

Armstrong Street: Jordan A. Denman, 24, Pardeeville, was cited Sept. 9 for operating a vehicle after license suspension, fifth offense, and no insurance.

Winnebago Avenue: Rebecca Dennman, 27, Madison, was cited Sept. 10 for operating a vehicle after license suspension, fifth offense.

Albert Street: Nicholas R. Thompson, 24, Madison, was cited Sept. 10 for criminal operating a vehicle after license suspension, second offense.

Interstate 39: Billy Mateske, 30, Portage, was cited Sept. 10 for sixth-offense operating a vehicle after license suspension.

Village Road/Northridge Drive: Eric J. Roeker, 47, Endeavor, was arrested Sept. 10 for third-offense OWI after police stopped his vehicle for a defective brake light.

DeWitt/East Pleasant streets: Sterling Jiran, 20, Lodi, was arrested Sept. 10 on a charge of second-offense OWI after police stopped his vehicle for a defective brake light and possible possession of THC, second offense.

West Wisconsin/Dunn streets: Maureen K. Doody, 46, Pardeeville, was arrested Sept. 10 on a charge of first-offense OWI after police stopped her vehicle for expired registration. Doody was also cited for open intoxicants behind the drivers seat and was released to a responsible party.

Brooks Street: Jasper Gray, 18, Portage, was cited for disorderly conduct Sept. 11 after police responded to an altercation.

MacFarlane Road: Joshua Norton, 29, was cited Sept. 12 for operating a vehicle after license suspension, second offense, and no insurance.

Northridge Drive/New Pinery Road: Trista Rodriguez, 28, Montello, was cited Sept. 12 for operating a vehicle after license suspension, eighth offense, after police stopped her vehicle for failing to stop at a stop sign.

New Pinery Road: Donald Yeadon, 19, Portage, was arrested Sept. 14 on a charge of retail theft of less than $500 and misdemeanor bail jumping. Yeadon is accused of stealing headphones from Wal-Mart.
ENDEAVOR  Protect Pensions members are keeping a close eye on a Senate bill that would restore pension benefits and health care for coal miners, telling anyone wholl listen that no retirement is safe with criminals in high places.

It doesnt have a direct impact, but it gives us the mood of Congress, said Milwaukee chapter leader Bernie Anderson regarding the Miners Protection Act. Anderson regularly speaks in meetings of Protect Pensions Endeavor, which meets on the second Saturday of each month at the Endeavor/Moundville fire station, led by Bob Brockway.

This could mean all kinds of stuff, but the main thing is Congress is open to helping out the issue of pension funds, Anderson said.

About 25,000 retirees across Wisconsin have been awaiting word on possible investment and assessment plans they hope will save them from massive cuts to their pensions  cuts that are still on hold after the U.S. Treasury Department rejected the Central States Pension Fund recovery plan in May. The rejected plan would have cut pensions by up to 70 percent for 400,000 participants in the U.S.

If the Miners Protection Act fails, more than 20,000 miners will reportedly lose health care benefits beginning in December and into next year. The funds that pay out the benefits to miners are facing insolvency over the next couple of years  a situation affecting 120,000 retired coal miners in the U.S.

The bill had been scheduled to be heard in the Senate Finance Committee this week but has already been delayed.

Opponents of the Miners Protection Act claim the bill serves as a taxpayer bailout that sets a dangerous precedent for failing pension funds, an argument Protect Pensions groups are all too familiar with, Anderson and Brockway said. At issue, Protect Pensions groups have said, is the Multi-Employer Pension Reform Act of 2014 that did away with pension guarantees for 10 million Americans  this occurring after trillions of dollars had been handed out to financial institutions in the form of Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) funds after the Great Recession.

To put in perspective the massive banking bailouts that occurred in the U.S., an even $1 trillion would amount to $3,100 for every man, woman and child in America. Yet pension funds, affecting millions of American workers, received no TARP funds.

Its our money, Brockway said. It wasnt given to us. The government shouldnt be able to take it away. They should learn to keep their hands off the money.

Central States Pension Fund, for example, lost $12 billion in 2008-09, and we werent alone, Anderson said. Protect Pensions groups this month showed U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan the Central States tax bill that demonstrated Central States lost 42 percent of its worth at the end of 2008.

This was the first time hed seen that, and you could just see his eyes go, Holy crap, Anderson said.

Protect Pensions groups have long said the massive losses for pension funds in the U.S. suggest many high-risk investments  in high places  were made, illegally, investments that are presently the subject of a Government Accountability Board investigation into the U.S. Department of Labors oversight of the Central States Pension Fund.

Protect Pensions groups and lawmakers are hoping to draft and ultimately pass investment plans that would involve all 1,200 multi-employer pension funds in the U.S., of which about 200 are reportedly facing insolvency. Investment plans, Anderson said, wouldnt constitute taxpayer bailouts. Moreover, the federal governments multi-employer pension insurance program, Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., is going broke, meaning Central States problems are only the tip of the iceberg. PBGC protects the retirement incomes of more than 41 million American workers, according to its website.

Even if we have to pay $30 a month to the PBGC to build them up and guarantee our pension, thats what well do, Brockway said.

The entire pension system in the country is in trouble because of 2008, Anderson said. They didnt put pensions into the mix  they put financial systems and banks into it.

Lawmakers, Protect Pensions and other groups are working on solutions to the pension crisis but need more time, Anderson said. The deadline, it seems, is whats being called phase two of MPRA, which would cut pensions even further.

By the end of the year, should MPRA 2 pass Congress, pension funds that can somehow prove pending insolvency within 50 years will be allowed to make cuts, Anderson said.

They basically want to eliminate pensions, Anderson said of the push for MPRA expansion, efforts led by Rep. John Kline, R-Minnesota, chairman of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce.

We know a lot of people in Congress dont like pensions  and we know theres structural problems to pensions, but a guaranteed income for retirement is certainly more stable than 401(k), Anderson said. The biggest reason any retirement, including 401(k)s, arent safe is because market collapses like 2008s seem to happen every seven to nine years, Anderson said.

People who think they have a couple hundred thousand dollars (in 401Ks) and can retire  that just isnt going to do it.

I believe to retire comfortably in a 401(k) you need $800,000 to $1 million, to retire in your 60s. If you do the math, and retire even at 70 and live 20 more years, if you take out $20,000 a year, you wont make it. Thats $400,000  and you dont make it  and thats if the stock market is nice to you.

The quality of life for all Americans, then, is why everyone should be paying closer attention to the pension issue, Brockway said.

People as old as we are shouldnt be fighting for what we earned. We should be enjoying our lives. Im 75 years old  so I have maybe 15, 20 years left? And I have to go through this after 35 years working?

These congressmen dont have a clue of whats going on with people, Brockway added. I wish we could take their pensions and hospitalizations away  then theyd know what were going through.
The Guardian US, the U.S. edition of the British newspaper, has done a tremendous public service by obtaining and publishing nearly 1,500 pages of documents compiled during the John Doe probe into whether Scott Walkers campaign violated the law during the 2011-12 recall elections  documents which, if the Wisconsin Supreme Court had had its way, would have long ago been destroyed.

The states high court shut down the probe in 2015, and at the time called for all the documents to be destroyed, a decision that, thankfully, it later modified.

The Guardians report reveals a stunning level of collaboration between Walker, his recall election campaign, and the special-interest organization known as the Wisconsin Club for Growth in soliciting hundreds of thousands of dollars from the rich and powerful to give Walker a huge money advantage over his Democratic opponent, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett. The Club for Growth also supported other Republican candidates in the spate of recall elections occurring around that time.

Walker counseled these donors to send their money to the supposedly independent, tax-exempt group, making it clear that then their identities wouldnt have to be reported.

The governor and his people still contend that they did nothing illegal, but the documents, which include a revelation that a lead paint manufacturer got special legal protection after pouring $750,000 into the Club for Growth, show just how corrupt Wisconsin government has become under this governor and his cabal.

The Guardians disclosures also reveal how closely state Supreme Court Justice David Prossers re-election campaign was linked with the Scott Walker donors. In one of the documents, Walker wrote to Republican strategist Karl Rove, Club for Growth-Wisconsin was the key to retaining Justice Prosser.

The leaked John Doe documents make it even more clear that Prosser should have recused himself from participating in the courts decision to kill the John Doe probe and declare that the states longstanding anti-coordination campaign laws were unconstitutional.

We can now understand why the states high court was originally hellbent on destroying those John Doe documents.

Walkers reign as governor has been one questionable edge-of-the-law maneuver after the other. But because his party holds sway over not just the Legislature, but now also has the states high court stacked with his enablers, he and his cohorts have carte blanche to do as they please.

It underscores just how accurate is the old British axiom: Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Too bad we have to witness that truth right here in Wisconsin.
By PTI: Vadodara, Sep 16 (PTI) A report on removing the 25 MW cap for hydro power projects to treat it as renewable would be put out soon for public consultation.

"Indias renewable energy capacity could touch 225 GW by 2022 if hydroelectricity is added to the renewable category as is being done the world over," Goyal told PTI after his visit to the city and Limkheda in Dohad yesterday.

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"It is only in India where hydro projects below 25 MW are considered renewable and those above are considered non-renewable. I had asked officials to look into removing this distinction," he said.

The report is almost complete and will soon be put out for public consultation, he said.

The minister visited Limkheda for reviewing arrangements for the visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi tomorrow for launching several tribal welfare schemes, including providing drinking water facilities.

During his visit to Vadodara, Goyal met officials of the state government and Gujarat Urja Vidyut Nigam which along with Union Power Ministry will host the international Switch conference on energy sector here from October 6 to 10.

A comprehensive policy to promote hydropower generation is likely to be announced soon with viability gap funding for projects, compulsory hydropower purchase obligations for distribution companies and a set of good practices that states have to follow.

The idea is to address factors that drive hydropower costs up way above those of other sources of power and give policy support in its market development.

The ministry will also expand the scope of power distribution companies renewable power purchase obligations to include hydropower from projects with a capacity greater than 25 MW. At present, only power from those with less than 25 MW is considered renewable.

Goyal had earlier said that the new hydropower policy will be comprehensive.

"It will explore the possibility of providing to hydroelectric projects beyond 25 MW the benefits that are at present available to renewable energy," he said. PTI CORR GK GK ANU BAS

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Graham Holdings Company, through its subsidiaries, operates as a diversified education and media company worldwide. It provides test preparation services and materials; data science and training services; professional training and exam preparation for professional certifications and licensures; and non-academic operations support services to the Purdue University Global. The company also offers training, test preparation, and degrees for accounting and financial services professionals; English-language training, academic preparation programs, and test preparation for English proficiency exams; and A-level examination preparation services, as well as operates three colleges, a business school, a higher education institution, and an online learning institution. In addition, it owns and operates seven television stations; and provides social media management tools to connect newsrooms with their users, as well as produces Foreign Policy magazine and ForeignPolicy.com website. Further, the company publishes Slate, an online magazine; and two French-language news magazine websites at slate.fr and slateafrique.com. Additionally, it provides social media marketing solutions; home health and hospice services; burners, igniters, dampers, and controls; screw jacks, linear actuators and related linear motion products, and lifting systems; pressure impregnated kiln-dried lumber and plywood products; cybersecurity training solutions; digital advertising services; and power charging and data systems, industrial and commercial indoor lighting solutions, and electrical components and assemblies. The company also owns and operates 11 restaurants and entertainment venues; and engages in automobile dealerships business. The company was formerly known as The Washington Post Company and changed its name to Graham Holdings Company in November 2013. Graham Holdings Company was founded in 1877 and is based in Arlington, Virginia.
Huntington Ingalls Industries, Inc. engages in designing, building, overhauling, and repairing military ships in the United States. It operates through three segments: Ingalls Shipbuilding, Newport News Shipbuilding, and Technical Solutions. The company is involved in the design and construction of non-nuclear ships comprising amphibious assault ships; expeditionary warfare ships; surface combatants; and national security cutters for the U.S. Navy and U.S. Coast Guard. It also provides nuclear-powered ships, such as aircraft carriers and submarines, as well as refueling and overhaul, and inactivation services of ships. In addition, the company offers naval nuclear support services, including fleet services comprising design, construction, maintenance, and disposal activities for in-service the U.S. Navy nuclear ships; and maintenance services on nuclear reactor prototypes. Further, it provides life-cycle sustainment services to the U.S. Navy fleet and other maritime customers; high-end information technology and mission-based solutions for Department of Defense (DoD), intelligence, and federal civilian customers; nuclear management and operations and environmental management services for the Department of Energy, DoD, state and local governments, and private sector companies; defense and federal solutions; and unmanned systems. Huntington Ingalls Industries, Inc. was founded in 1886 and is headquartered in Newport News, Virginia.
The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc. provides insurance and financial services to individual and business customers in the United States, the United Kingdom, and internationally. Its Commercial Lines segment offers workers' compensation, property, automobile, liability, umbrella, bond, marine, livestock, and reinsurance; and customized insurance products and risk management services, including professional liability, bond, surety, and specialty casualty coverages through regional offices, branches, sales and policyholder service centers, independent retail agents and brokers, wholesale agents, and reinsurance brokers. The company's Personal Lines segment provides automobile, homeowners, and personal umbrella coverages through direct-to-consumer channel and independent agents. Its Property & Casualty Other Operations segment offers coverage for asbestos and environmental exposures. The company's Group Benefits segment provides group life, disability, and other group coverages to members of employer groups, associations, and affinity groups through direct insurance policies; reinsurance to other insurance companies; employer paid and voluntary product coverages; disability underwriting, administration, and claims processing to self-funded employer plans; and a single-company leave management solution. This segment distributes its group insurance products and services through brokers, consultants, third-party administrators, trade associations, and private exchanges. Its Hartford Funds segment offers investment products for retail and retirement accounts; exchange-traded products through broker-dealer organizations, independent financial advisers, defined contribution plans, financial consultants, bank trust groups, and registered investment advisers; and investment management and administrative services, such as product design, implementation, and oversight. The company was founded in 1810 and is headquartered in Hartford, Connecticut.
By India Today Web Desk: Yesterday, there were reports of Rishi Kapoor slapping journalists and misbehaving with them during the Kapoor Khaandaan's Ganpati Visarjan ceremony. The ceremony was carried out under heavy downpour, and a few establishments reported that a drunk Rishi Kapoor misbehaved with the photogs, journalists covering the event. Some also reported that son Ranbir, and brother Randhir slapped a few journalists.



ALSO SEE: Ranbir Kapoor and family celebrate Ganeshotsav

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ALSO READ: Randhir Kapoor pushes irritating reporter aside during Ganpati visarjan

Clarifying on behalf of the first family of Bollywood, Rishi Kapoor said to a leading gossip website, "I feel it is very unfair, what the news channels have shared everywhere. First of all we have no PR. We never invite anybody. You yourself come to my Ganpati. There have always been thousands and thousands of people coming to see this Ganpati of RK. They came to see Ganpati, not us. Over 64 years they have been coming to see the immersion. When the Ganpati leaves RK studio, everybody is excited."

When asked if he had misbehaved with any of the journos present there, Rishi said, "This evening there was heavy rainfall. There were so many people and so much media. We have not called them. It is impossible when there is so much rain and public (to not lose your temper). When we are respecting God, these small-time journalists poke the damn camera on your face."

Asked if reports about Ranbir and Randhir slapping the journos to discipline them was true, he said, "If I have indeed slapped them why don't you show the clip of me slapping? I was behaving like the Mumbai police, trying to monitor the situation. You come because you know we are important and you are giving me bull**** saying that I have hit you? They say Ranbir hit them, Ranbir would not hit a fly, how would he hit them?"

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Mastercard Incorporated, a technology company, provides transaction processing and other payment-related products and services in the United States and internationally. It facilitates the processing of payment transactions, including authorization, clearing, and settlement, as well as delivers other payment-related products and services. The company offers integrated products and value-added services for account holders, merchants, financial institutions, businesses, governments, and other organizations, such as programs that enable issuers to provide consumers with credits to defer payments; prepaid programs and management services; commercial credit and debit payment products and solutions; and payment products and solutions that allow its customers to access funds in deposit and other accounts. It also provides value-added products and services comprising cyber and intelligence solutions for parties to transact, as well as proprietary insights, drawing on principled use of consumer, and merchant data services. In addition, the company offers analytics, test and learn, consulting, managed services, loyalty, processing, and payment gateway solutions for e-commerce merchants. Further, it provides open banking and digital identity platforms services. The company offers payment solutions and services under the MasterCard, Maestro, and Cirrus. Mastercard Incorporated was founded in 1966 and is headquartered in Purchase, New York.
Argan, Inc., through its subsidiaries, provides engineering, procurement, construction, commissioning, operations management, maintenance, project development, technical, and consulting services to the power generation and renewable energy markets. The company operates through Power Industry Services, Industrial Fabrication and Field Services, and Telecommunications Infrastructure Services segments. The Power Industry Services segment offers engineering, procurement, and construction contracting services to the owners of alternative energy facilities, such as biomass plants, wind farms, and solar fields; and design, construction, project management, start-up, and operation services for projects with approximately 15 gigawatts of power-generating capacity. This segment serves independent power project owners, public utilities, power plant equipment suppliers, and energy plant construction companies. The Industrial Fabrication and Field Services segment provides industrial field, and pipe and vessel fabrication services for forest products, industrial gas, fertilizer, and mining companies in southeast region of the United States. The Telecommunications Infrastructure Services segment offers trenchless directional boring and excavation for underground communication and power networks, as well as aerial cabling services; and installs buried cable, high and low voltage electric lines, and private area outdoor lighting systems. It also provides structured cabling, terminations, and connectivity that offers the physical transport for high-speed data, voice, video, and security networks. This segment serves state and local government agencies, regional communications service providers, electric utilities, and other commercial customers, as well as federal government facilities comprising cleared facilities in the mid-Atlantic region of the United States. Argan, Inc. was incorporated in 1961 and is headquartered in Rockville, Maryland.
Red Hat, Inc. provides open source software solutions to develop and offer operating system, virtualization, management, middleware, cloud, mobile, and storage technologies to various enterprises worldwide. It offers infrastructure-related solutions, such as Red Hat Enterprise Linux, an operating system platform that runs on hardware for use in hybrid cloud environments; Red Hat Satellite, a system management offering that helps to deploy, scale, and manage in hybrid cloud environments; and Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization, a software solution that allows customers to utilize and manage a common hardware infrastructure to run multiple operating systems and applications. The company offers application development-related and other technology solutions, such as Red Hat JBoss Middleware, a solution for developing, deploying, and managing applications; integrating applications, data, and devices; and automating business processes in hybrid cloud environments; The company's application development-related and other technology solutions also includes Red Hat cloud offerings, a software solution that enables customers to build and manage various cloud computing environments; Red Hat Mobile, a software development platform that enables customers to develop, integrate, deploy, and manage mobile applications for enterprises; and Red Hat Storage, a software solution that enables customers to manage large, unstructured, or semi-structured data in hybrid cloud environments. It also provides consulting, support, and training services; and realtime operating system, distributed computing, directory services, and user authentication. Red Hat, Inc. has collaboration with Juniper Networks Expand to provide a unified solution for enterprises designed to manage and run applications and services. The company was formerly known as Red Hat Software, Inc. and changed its name to Red Hat, Inc. in June 1999. Red Hat, Inc. was founded in 1993 and is headquartered in Raleigh, North Carolina.
Samajwadi Party continues to remain in the throes of a family feud with party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav's younger brother Shivpal Yadav reportedly having submitted his resignation from the cabinet as well as the organisation.

By Maha Siddiqui: Samajwadi Party continues to remain in the throes of a family feud with party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav's younger brother Shivpal Yadav reportedly having submitted his resignation from the cabinet as well as the organisation. CM Akhilesh Yadav, who had antagonised his uncle by stripping him of plum ministerial portfolios earlier this week, however, refuses to accept his resignation.

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Late last evening the main protagonists in the drama met at 5, Kalidas Marg, the CM's official residence. The meeting between the nephew and uncle was a brief one and lasted about 15 minutes. Shivpal Yadav refused to divulge any details of what transpired inside the CM's residence. But the short duration of the meeting and Shivpal's sullen mood indicated that it did not go off well.

Minutes after the meeting, where Shivpal is believed to have handed over his reaignation, sacked minister Raj Kishore Singh landed up at Shivpal's official residential to meet him. After spending a good twenty minutes inside he left hastily in a bid to avoid questions by the media.

Meanwhile, it was a day of many more meetings in the Samajwadi Party camp to douse the fire. Ramgopal Yadav came down to Lucknow from Saifai to meet Akhilesh. The meeting lasted over 75 minutes but Ramgopal could not broker peace. Ramgopal Yadav seemed to back Akhilesh, justifying his action against Shivpal as a reaction to his unceremonious ouster as state party chief.

Mulayam Singh Yadav landed in Lucknow at 2.30pm. Shivpal Yadav met the party chief early evening after which he went and submitted his resignation to the Chief Minister. Akhilesh did not meet his father all afternoon and early evening. Sources indicated he had already communicated to Mulayam that he will not budge on the decisions taken earlier this week of sacking the chief secretary Deepak Singhal and two cabinet ministers Gayatri Prajapati and Raj Kishore Singh apart from reinstating his uncle's portfolios.

Meanwhile, outside Shivpal Yadav's residence his supporters were seen shouting slogans as the news of his resignation spread. Slogans like 'Chacha tum sangharsh karo hum tumhare saath hain' (We are with you in your struggle) have been echoing from Saifai to Lucknow. Clearly, Shivpal Yadav has decided not to go down without a good fight and a show of strength.

ALSO READ: All is well in family and SP govt, claims Shivpal after 4-hour long meeting with Mulayam



Samajwadi Party feud: What happened beyond public gaze

Shivpal says Mulayam's word is final, ready to sacrifice for him

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The following companies are subsidiares of Kroger: 84.51 HQ Building Company LLC, 84.51 LLC, Alpha Beta Company, Ansonborough Square Investors I LLC, Ansonborough Square Retail LLC, Ardrey Kell Investments LLC, Bay Area Warehouse Stores Inc., Beech Tree Holdings LLC, Bleecker Ventures LLC, Bluefield Beverage Company, Box Cutter Inc., CB&S Advertising Agency Inc., Cala Co., Cala Foods Inc., Cheeses of All Nations Inc., Country Oven Inc., Crawford Stores Inc., Creedmoor Retail LLC, Dillon Companies LLC, Dillon Real Estate Co. Inc., Dillons, Distribution Trucking Company, Dotto Inc., Edgewood Plaza Holdings LLC, Embassy International Inc., FM Inc., FMJ Inc., Farmacia Doral Inc., Food 4 Less GM Inc., Food 4 Less Holdings Inc., Food 4 Less Merchandising Inc., Food 4 Less of California Inc., Food 4 Less of Southern California Inc., Fred Meyer, Fred Meyer Inc., Fred Meyer Jewelers Inc., Fred Meyer Stores Inc., Glasswing Labs LLC, Glendale/Goodwin Realty I LLC, Grubstake Investments LLC, HT Fuel DE LLC, HT Fuel NC LLC, HT Fuel SC LLC, HT Fuel VA LLC, HTGBD LLC, HTP Bluffton LLC, HTP Plaza LLC, HTP Relo LLC, HTPS LLC, HTTAH LLC, Harris Teeter, Harris Teeter LLC, Harris Teeter Properties LLC, Harris Teeter Supermarkets Inc., Harris-Teeter Services Inc., Healthy Options Inc., Henpil Inc., Home Chef, Hood-Clayton Logistics LLC, Hughes Markets Inc., Hughes Realty Inc., I.T.A. Inc., IRP LLC, ITAC 119 LLC, ITAC 265 LLC, Inter-American Foods Inc., Inter-American Products Inc., J.V. Distributing Inc., Jondex Corp., Jubilee Carolina LLC, KCDE  2013 LLC, KCDE-2 LLC, KCDE-3 LLC, KCDE-4 LLC, KCDE-5 LLC, KGO LLC, KPF LLC, KPS LLC, KRGP LLC, KRLP Inc., KV Anderson LLC, Kee Trans Inc., Kessel FP, Kiosk Medicine Kentucky LLC, Kirkpatrick West Retail LLC, Kroger Community Development Entity LLC, Kroger Dedicated Logistics Co., Kroger Fulfillment Network LLC, Kroger G.O. LLC, Kroger HQ LLC, Kroger LM Real Estate Holdings LLC, Kroger Limited Partnership I, Kroger Limited Partnership II, Kroger MC Holdings LLC, Kroger MTL Management LLC, Kroger Management Co., Kroger Management  Corryville LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Athens I LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Champaign I LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Champaign II LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Cincinnati I LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Dallas I LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Danville I LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Logansport I LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Missouri I LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Oak Ridge I LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Olney I LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Omaha I LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Portsmouth I LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Starkville I LLC, Kroger Management  NMTC Topeka I LLC, Kroger NMTC Fremont I LLC, Kroger OZ1 Inc., Kroger OZ1 LLC, Kroger OZ2 Inc., Kroger OZ2 LLC, Kroger OZ3 Inc., Kroger OZ3 LLC, Kroger Opportunity Fund I Inc., Kroger Prescription Plans Inc., Kroger Specialty Infusion AL LLC, Kroger Specialty Infusion CA LLC, Kroger Specialty Infusion Holdings Inc., Kroger Specialty Infusion TX LLC, Kroger Specialty Pharmacy CA LLC, Kroger Specialty Pharmacy FL 2 LLC, Kroger Specialty Pharmacy Holdings 2 Inc., Kroger Specialty Pharmacy Holdings 3 Inc., Kroger Specialty Pharmacy Holdings I Inc., Kroger Specialty Pharmacy Holdings Inc., Kroger Specialty Pharmacy Inc., Kroger Specialty Pharmacy LA LLC, Kroger Texas L.P., LCGP3 Home Cooking Inc., Latta Village LLC, Local Mkt LLC, Main & Vine LLC, Matthews Property 1 LLC, Mega Marts LLC, Michigan Dairy L.L.C., ModernHealth LTC, Murrays Cheese LLC, Murrays Cheese LLC, Murrays LIC LLC, Murrays Table LLC, Pace Dairy Foods Company, Paramount Logistics LLC, Pay Less Super Markets Inc., Peyton's-Southeastern Inc., Plum Labs LLC, Pontiac Foods Inc., Queen City Assurance Inc., RBF LLC, RGC Southeast Properties LLC, Ralphs Grocery Company, Relish Labs LLC, Rocket Newco Inc., Roundy's, Roundys Acquisition Corp., Roundys Illinois LLC, Roundys Inc., Roundys Supermarkets Inc., Second Story Inc., Shop-Rite LLC, Smiths Beverage of Wyoming Inc., Smiths Food & Drug Centers Inc., Southern Ice Cream Specialties Inc., Stallings Investors I LLC, Sunrise R&D Holdings LLC, Sunrise Technology LLC, TLC Corporate Services LLC, TLC Immunization Clinic LLC, TLC of Georgia LLC, The Kroger Co. of Michigan, The Little Clinic LLC, The Little Clinic Management Services LLC, The Little Clinic of Arizona LLC, The Little Clinic of Colorado LLC, The Little Clinic of IN LLC, The Little Clinic of Kansas LLC, The Little Clinic of Mississippi LLC, The Little Clinic of Ohio LLC, The Little Clinic of TX LLC, The Little Clinic of Tennessee LLC, The Little Clinic of VA LLC, Topvalco Inc., Ultimate Mart LLC, Ultra Mart Foods LLC, Vandervoort Dairy Foods Company, Vine Court Assurance Incorporated, Vitacost, Vitacost.com Inc., Woodmont Holdings LLC, and YOU Technology.

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Aetna Inc. operates as a health care benefits company in the United States. It operates through three segments: Health Care, Group Insurance, and Large Case Pensions. The Health Care segment offers medical, pharmacy benefit management service, dental, behavioral health, and vision plans on an insured and employer-funded basis. It also provides point-of-service, preferred provider organization, health maintenance organization, and indemnity benefit plans, as well as health savings accounts and consumer-directed health plans. In addition, this segment offers Medicare and Medicaid products and services, as well as other medical products, such as medical management and data analytics services, medical stop loss insurance, workers' compensation administrative services, and products that provide access to its provider networks in select geographies. The Group Insurance segment offers life insurance products, including group term life insurance, voluntary spouse and dependent term life insurance, group universal life insurance, and accidental death and dismemberment insurance; disability insurance products; and long-term care insurance products, which provide the benefits to cover the cost of care in private home settings, adult day care, assisted living, or nursing facilities. The Large Case Pensions segment manages various retirement products comprising pension and annuity products primarily for tax-qualified pension plans. The company provides its products and services to employer groups, individuals, college students, part-time and hourly workers, health plans, health care providers, governmental units, government-sponsored plans, labor groups, and expatriates. Aetna Inc. was founded in 1853 and is based in Hartford, Connecticut.
NextEra Energy, Inc. is the largest electric utility holding company in the US. It operates a network of power generation and distribution facilities that include fossil-fuel-generated and green energy. As of mid-2022, the company was capable of generating 58 GW of electricity with nearly 60% of the load produced by green sources including wind and solar. In their view, going green isnt an option, its the solution. NextEra Energy has been recognized multiple times as a leader in clean energy and ESG practices and was ranked the #1 electric and gas utility on the Forbes list of Most Admired Companies.

The company is the result of several mergers that begin with FPL Group. FPL Group is now a subsidiary of NextEra Energy and the third-largest provider of electricity in the US servicing nearly half of Florida. FPL and its affiliates are the single largest provider of renewable energy generated from wind and sun. The group changed its name in 2010 following a decision to shift focus onto renewable energy sources.

Today, NextEra Energy, Inc through its subsidiary FPL serves about 12 million people in eastern and southwestern Florida. The company employs nearly 14,900 people who service 5.8 million accounts. The company is in business to generate, transmit, and distribute electricity to retail and wholesale clients. Electricity is generated through wind, solar, nuclear, natural gas, and coal-fired facilities.

The company is also engaged in the construction and operation of new facilities, specifically renewable power generation, storage, and delivery facilities, and can offer custom solutions tailored to any need. Offerings include tailored services to assist businesses with their transition to clean energy.

NextEra Energy also owns and operates 7 nuclear power stations in Florida, New Hampshire, and Wisconsin generating power for the wholesale market.

Unlike other companies that are targeting net-zero emissions, NextEra Energy has a plan to reach real zero and is investing heavily to reach that goal by 2045. The company had invested nearly $50 billion in green energy infrastructure and initiatives by mid-2022. The plan is to first work on reducing its own emissions and then take its knowledge and expertise to the world.
Devon Energy Corporation is an independent oil and gas company headquartered in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The company was incorporated in 1971 by John Nichols and his son J. Larry Nichols and later went public in August 2000. The company has since grown to be included in the S&P 500 and is one of the first energy companies to introduce resolutions requiring the company to monitor its impact on global warming. One time a major player in the global oil market, Devon has since sold off its offshore holdings in an effort to focus on US production and its transition to a lower-carbon future.

Devon Energy merged with WPX in early 2021 in an all-stock merger of equals. The new company is primarily engaged in the exploration, development, and production of oil, natural gas, and natural gas liquids in the US midwest. The company operates more than 5,100 wells in Oklahomas Delaware Basis, Eagle Ford Group, and the two locations in the Rocky Mountains. As of late 2022, the company laid claim to 1.625 million barrels of reserves including 44% petroleum, 27% natural gas liquids, and 29% natural gas. Daily production was running in the range of 300,000 BPD in petroleum liquids, 125,000 BPD in natural gas liquids, and 920 million cubic feet of natural gas.

Rick Muncrief, formally CEO of WPX, is now the head of Devon Energy. Mr. Muncrief comes to the table with more than 40 years of experience including 27 years with one of the US Big Three Oil Companies. WPX Energy (Williams Production and Exploration) brought properties in the Williston and Permian Basins to the combined company. Its proven reserves were roughly 527 million barrels of oil and equivalents. The company also owns and operates a midstream network of pipelines and storage facilities it uses to market and deliver its products.

Devon Energy Corporation has pledged to reduce its GHG impact to net zero by 2050. This will be done by a variety of methods that include improving efficiency and leakage, a reduction in flaring, and the electrification of its operations. Near-term goals include a 50% reduction in GHG by 2030 including a 65% reduction in methane release and a 100% reduction in flaring. The company is also focused on reducing its environmental impact by relying on recycled water wherever possible and plans to reduce freshwater usage by 90% in the most active areas. Total greenhouse gas emissions have been in decline since 2018 and fell 17% between 2018 and 2020 alone.
The following companies are subsidiares of Bristol-Myers Squibb: 1096271 B.C. ULC, 345 Park LLC, A.G. Medical Services P.A., AHI Investment LLC, AbVitro LLC, Abraxis BioScience Australia Pty Ltd., Abraxis BioScience Inc., Abraxis BioScience International Holding Company Inc., Abraxis BioScience LLC, Abraxis BioScience Puerto Rico LLC, Acetylon Pharmaceuticals Inc., Adnexus, Adnexus a Bristol-Myers Squibb R&D Company, Allard Labs Acquisition G.P., Amira Pharmaceuticals, Amira Pharmaceuticals Inc., Amylin Pharmaceuticals, Apothecon LLC, B-MS Generx Unlimited Company, BMS Benelux Holdings B.V., BMS Bermuda Nominees L.L.C., BMS Data Acquisition Company LLC, BMS Forex Company, BMS Holdings Sarl, BMS Holdings Spain S.L., BMS International Insurance Designated Activity Company, BMS Investco SAS, BMS Korea Holdings L.L.C., BMS Latin American Nominees L.L.C., BMS Luxembourg Partners L.L.C., BMS Omega Bermuda Holdings Finance Ltd., BMS Pharmaceutical Korea Limited, BMS Pharmaceuticals Germany Holdings B.V., BMS Pharmaceuticals International Holdings Netherlands B.V., BMS Pharmaceuticals Korea Holdings B.V., BMS Pharmaceuticals Mexico Holdings B.V., BMS Pharmaceuticals Netherlands Holdings B.V., BMS Real Estate LLC, BMS Spain Investments LLC, BMS Strategic Portfolio Investments Holdings Inc., Blisa Acquisition G.P., Bristol (Iran) S.A., Bristol Iran Private Company Limited, Bristol Laboratories Inc., Bristol Laboratories International S.A., Bristol Laboratories Medical Information Systems Inc., Bristol-Myers (Andes) L.L.C., Bristol-Myers (Private) Limited, Bristol-Myers Middle East S.A.L., Bristol-Myers Overseas Corporation, Bristol-Myers Squibb (China) Investment Co. Ltd., Bristol-Myers Squibb (China) Pharmaceuticals Co. Ltd., Bristol-Myers Squibb (Israel) Ltd., Bristol-Myers Squibb (NZ) Limited, Bristol-Myers Squibb (Proprietary) Limited, Bristol-Myers Squibb (Shanghai) Trading Co. Ltd., Bristol-Myers Squibb (Singapore) Pte. Limited, Bristol-Myers Squibb (Taiwan) Ltd., Bristol-Myers Squibb (West Indies) Ltd., Bristol-Myers Squibb A.E., Bristol-Myers Squibb Aktiebolag, Bristol-Myers Squibb Argentina S. R. L., Bristol-Myers Squibb Australia Pty. Ltd., Bristol-Myers Squibb Axia Limited, Bristol-Myers Squibb B.V., Bristol-Myers Squibb Belgium S.A., Bristol-Myers Squibb Business Services Limited, Bristol-Myers Squibb Canada Co., Bristol-Myers Squibb Canada International Limited, Bristol-Myers Squibb Delta Company Limited, Bristol-Myers Squibb Denmark Filial of Bristol-Myers Squibb AB, Bristol-Myers Squibb EMEA Sarl, Bristol-Myers Squibb Egypt LLC, Bristol-Myers Squibb Epsilon Holdings Unlimited Company, Bristol-Myers Squibb Farmaceutica Ltda., Bristol-Myers Squibb Farmaceutica Portuguesa S.A., Bristol-Myers Squibb GesmbH, Bristol-Myers Squibb GmbH & Co. KGaA, Bristol-Myers Squibb Holding Germany GmbH & Co. KG, Bristol-Myers Squibb Holdings 2002 Limited, Bristol-Myers Squibb Holdings Germany Verwaltungs GmbH, Bristol-Myers Squibb Holdings Ireland Unlimited Company, Bristol-Myers Squibb Holdings Limited, Bristol-Myers Squibb Holdings Pharma Ltd. Liability Company, Bristol-Myers Squibb Ilaclari Inc., Bristol-Myers Squibb India Pvt. 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By Javed M. Ansari : After days of high drama, Mulayam Singh Yadav finally stepped in and got his warring family members to bury the hatchet at least for now. He held multiple meetings with his brother Shivpal Yadav and his son Akhikesh Yadav and then met them together to hammer out a compromise.

Shivpal Yadav will continue as state chief and minister, the chief minister will have a say in the ticket distribution and Gaytri Prasad Prajapati, one of the sacked minister, will be reinstated as minister but not with the lucrative mining portfolio.



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FAMILY REACHES COMPROMISE



Mulayam Singh Yadav worked assiduously behind the scenes to bring the warring members of his family together. He massaged Shivpal Yadav's hurt ego, calmed down his son, worked on the sacked ministers to bring about the compromise.

Also read: Yadav clan reaches a truce: Shivpal to remain state party chief, Akhilesh gets big say in ticket distribution

This was a crisis, the likes of which had not been seen in the SP in its 24 years of existence. It brought out the deep fault lines in the family like never before. It pitted not just the nephew against his uncle but also saw Mulayam and Akhilesh differ openly, with Akhilesh finally asserting himself in front of his father.



MULAYAM PREVAILED



Ultimately, the SP supremo prevailed, pulling the party he founded back from the edge of a precipice. But several questions remain unanswered, like the future of the party, the role that Amar Singh will play and whether the question of Mulayam Singh Yadav's successor has been finally settled or will it rear up its head after the elections.

Also read: Standpoint: Why Yadav clan feud in UP is advantage BSP and worry for BJP

The party has been severely wounded just months ahead of the polls. The next round of factional feud could well spell its doom.

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Main accused in the Samjhauta Express blast case, Swami Aseemanand, was today granted bail on a personal bond of Rs 1 lakh and two surety bond of Rs 1 lakh each.

By India Today Web Desk: Swami Aseemanand, who is the main accused in the 2007 Samjhauta Express blast case, was granted bail today by a special NIA court in Haryana's Panchkula district.

The bail was granted to Aseemanand by the National Investigation Agency court on a personal bond of Rs 1 lakh and two surety bonds of Rs 1 lakh each.

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WATCH THE VIDEO HERE:



The case refers to multiple blasts that had occurred in the Samjhauta Express near Dewana station in Panipat, killing 68 people, mostly from Pakistan.

The blasts had occurred on the intervening night of February 18 and 19, 2007.

A number of NIA witnesses have turned hostile in the case, including one of the three witnesses presented today before the court.

Also Read

Samjhauta Express blasts: Ex-head of SIT accuses government of foul play

Samjhauta blast: NIA says it has no link to Lt Col Purohit



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Governor appoints John Littel to W&M Board of Visitors

Committed to W&M John E. Littel was first appointed to the Board of Visitors in 2012. Photo by Stephen Salpukas Photo - of - Hide Caption

Former Board member succeeds Ted Dintersmith

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe announced today that John E. Littel has been appointed to succeed Ted R. Dintersmith on the William & Mary Board of Visitors.

Dintersmith 74, who was appointed to a four-year Board term that commenced July 1, has resigned from the William & Mary Board of Visitors because of time constraints. Littel, a Board member from July 2012 to June 2016, will serve the remainder of Dintersmiths term.

Littel is the senior vice president of external affairs for Magellan Health, where he is responsible for the companys business development, communications and government relations strategies. Previously, he served as interim senior vice president of government affairs for WellPoint and, before that, executive vice president of external affairs for Amerigroup.

We are thrilled to have John Littel return to the Board. He has been a strong contributor the past four years, and we look forward very much to working with him again, said President Taylor Reveley. At the same time, we will miss Ted Dintersmith. His insight into the future of education in the United States is compelling.

Littel has worked at both the federal and state levels of government in such roles as senior counsel at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, deputy secretary of health and human services in Virginia, and director of intergovernmental affairs for the White Houses Office of National Drug Control Policy under George H.W. Bush.

In addition to his service on the William & Mary Board of Visitors, Littel was also a member of the William & Mary Public Policy Board of Advisors. He received a bachelors degree in philosophy and political science from the University of Scranton and a law degree from the Columbus School of Law.

The 17-member Board of Visitors is the universitys governing body, appointed by the Virginia governor. Led by Rector Todd Stottlemyer 85, the full board, including its 10 committees, works closely with university officials on W&Ms long-term goals, planning and budgeting.

Since being appointed to the Board in 2012, Littel has served in a number of roles, including most recently as chair of the Richard Bland College Committee, and vice chair of both the Committee on Financial Affairs and the Committee on Strategic Initiatives and New Ventures. He also served on the Committee on Audit and Compliance.

John Littel has been a real leader on the Board and played an especially important role as the Boards primary liaison with Richard Bland College. Were delighted hell be joining us again, Stottlemyer said. We were also looking forward to having Ted Dintersmith on the Board, but we understand his concerns about balancing his time and commitments. Ted remains an active alumnus, and we look forward to working with him in other ways to support the university.

Dintersmith, who graduated in 1974 with a degree in physics and English, has maintained strong connections to his alma mater. He is a former member of the William & Mary Alumni Association Board of Directors and served on the William & Mary Foundation Board of Trustees, chairing its investments committee. A proponent of project-based learning, Dintersmith helped found the W&M Honors Fellowship program in 2008. In 2014, he delivered the keynote address at the universitys Opening Convocation ceremony.

Dintersmith informed the university and governors office recently that he planned to step down.

I was genuinely enthusiastic about joining this distinguished group and enjoyed participating in the Board Retreat in late July, Dintersmith said. However, I have now come to realize that the reality of ongoing commitments and travel schedules will simply not permit me to devote the time necessary to meaningfully contribute to this Board. I remain available to assist the College and the Commonwealth on a personal basis.
By PTI: * Electronics giant Samsung today said its Vice Chairman Jay Y Lee called on Prime Minister Narendra Modi and reiterated the companys long-term commitment to India as a strategic partner.

Lee apprised the PM of Samsungs business operations and citizenship activities in the country. He explained how Samsung is actively partnering the Make in India and Digital India initiatives, Samsung said in a statement.

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The company is committed to growing India as an important production base and central R&D hub, it added. * * * * * * * JNPT commences Holding Yard Operations *

Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT), the countrys top Container Port, has commenced the holding yard operations to ease out congestion and streamline traffic.

"JNPT has commenced the holding yard operations in a six-hectare land at JNPCT (Jawaharlal Nehru Port Container Terminal) approach roads...This holding yard, which has been developed within the centralized parking plaza, will be utilized for parking Tractor Trailers (TT) awaiting the final documentation," Ministry of Shipping said in a statement.

Commencement of holding yard at JNPCT is already showing results and has reduced the congestion by 90 per cent at the port gate roads, it said.

It said 600 TTs can be accommodated in this holding area at one time. (MORE) PTI SR NAM MR

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By PTI: New Delhi, Sep 16 (PTI) The Supreme Court today commuted the death sentence of a man for raping and murdering a seven- -year-old girl in Jabalpur in 2011 and sentenced him to 25 years imprisonment without remission, holding that the offence does not fall under the category of "rarest of rare" case.

A bench of Justices J Chelameswar, Shiva Kirti Singh and A M Sapre while sentencing the man for 25 years considered the fact that there may be probabilities of such crime being repeated in case the convict is allowed to come out of the prison on completing life imprisonment of 14 years.

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"The occurrence is of the year 2011 when the appellant was said to be about 27 years old. Considering the fact that the deceased, a helpless child fell victim of the crime of lust at the hands of the appellant and there may be probabilities of such crime being repeated in case the appellant is allowed to come out of the prison on completing usual period of imprisonment for life which is taken to be 14 years...

"We are of the view that the appellant should be inflicted with imprisonment for life with a further direction that he shall not be released from prison till he completes actual period of 25 years of imprisonment," the bench said while dismissing the appeals of convict Tattu Lodhi alias Pancham Lodhi and modifying the sentence.

The bench said the facts of this case did not make out a "rarest of rare" case so as to confirm the death sentence of the appellant.

"The death penalty is therefore not confirmed," the court said, noting the submission of counsel for the convict who sought 20 years in jail while Madhya Pradesh government which earlier sought confirmation of death sentence but later demanded jail term for the entire natural life.

The bench upheld the findings of trial court and High Court in convicting Lodhi for kidnapping the victim and later murdering the minor after subjecting her to sexual abuse.

"We find no good reason to interfere with the findings of the trial court, duly confirmed by the High Court, that the appellant-accused kidnapped the victim and after subjecting her to sexual abuse, throttled her to death," the bench said rejecting Lodhis submission that the chain of circumstantial evidence is not complete and does not prove the guilt of accused. (More) PTI MNL SJK RKS ARC

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Bihar government also moved the Supreme Court with its appeal against the release of Shahabuddin saying the state was not properly heard.

By India Today Web Desk, Press Trust of India: The Supreme Court will hear on Monday a plea seeking cancellation of bail granted to convicted gangster-turned-politician Shahabuddin by Patna High Court. Shahabuddin is involved in a case pertaining to the killing of a youth in Siwan town of Bihar.

The Nitish Kumar led Bihar government had also moved the Supreme Court earlier in the day with its appeal against the release of Shahabuddin saying the state was not properly heard.

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Also read: Shahabuddin's bail challenged by Nitish govt in Supreme Court

A bench of Chief Justice T S Thakur and Justice A M Khanwilkar accepted the first plea for urgent hearing on September 19.



PLEA FILED BY CHANDRAKESHWAR PRASAD

Bihar state government's appeal comes after Swaraj Abhiyan leader Prashant Bhushan filed a plea on behalf of Chandrakeshwar Prasad, whose three sons were allegedly killed by Shahabuddin.

Prasad in his petition had said that the High Court order is totally unacceptable as it completely overlooked the fact that Shahabuddin was a dreaded criminal, who has absolutely no respect for the law. Granting bail to him in the present case would be grossly unfair as he is still facing trial in several other cases.

Also read: CBI inquiry in Bihar journalist murder case

Prasad, in his petition, said that Shahabuddin, has been apparently booked in at least 58 criminal cases, of which in at least 8, he has been convicted and awarded life sentence in two of them and despite that he has been allowed to walk free out of jail.



CHARGES AGAINST SHAHABUDDIN



Shahabuddin has been debarred from contesting elections since 2009. The charges he is facing include murder, attempt to murder, kidnapping or abducting with intent to murder, extortion, theft, rioting with deadly weapons and treason.

The state government also said the High Court ignored the crucial aspect brought by it earlier that key witnesses did not turn up to depose in these cases due to fear and the clout wielded by the dreaded gangster, who before pronouncement of judgement in the murder case of Prasads two sons, allegedly conspired from the jail to eliminate his third son, Rajiv Roshan, the prime witness in the case.



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Achieving 1000 GWe of new capacity by 2050

16 September 2016

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The nuclear industry can achieve the momentum required to create an additional 1000 GWe of new capacity by 2050, Agneta Rising, director general of the World Nuclear Association, said yesterday. This target is essential, she said, if the world is to ensure the International Energy Agency's 2 Degree Scenario on climate change.

Opening the World Nuclear Association's 41st Annual Symposium in London, Rising referred to the IEA's annual report, Energy Technology Perspectives 2016, which notes that connections of new nuclear power units doubled in 2015 to ten new reactors each year compared with five in 2014 and similar numbers in previous years.

Only nuclear power can ensure the clean, affordable and reliable electricity needed to meet increasing global energy demand whilst ensuring climate goals can also be achieved, Rising said.

She proposed the following schedule: 50 GWe of new capacity in 2016-2020, 125 GWe in 2021-2025 and 825 GWe in 2026-2050. That means a yearly connection rate of 10 GWe, 25 GWe and 33 GWe, respectively.

Facts and myths

"Nuclear energy is the world's second largest energy source now and for those countries with low emissions, nuclear is a key part. No country in the world has decarbonised without using nuclear energy," Rising said.

"It is quite a big task to deliver 1000 GWe of new nuclear capacity by 2050. So this is the plan: in the coming five years we need to deliver 10 GWe and in years after that have to step up to a 25 GWe connection rate per year. And in the last 25 years there needs to be an around 33 GWe per year connection rate. You can roughly say that 1 GWe is one large reactor," she said.

"In the last 25 years we have been below a five and sometimes down to a zero connection rate," she noted. "In 2015 it doubled to 10 GWe, but we need to double again and then again."

In the mid-80s, some 31 GWe of new nuclear capacity were delivered and connected each year, she noted. "I am so sure that we can do better now. We have more technologies, more experience, more companies and a lot of need to have this low-carbon electricity that is so reliable."

The Association's World Nuclear Performance Report 2016 shows there have been "a lot of reactor start-ups in the last 12 months in different parts of the world, including China, India, the USA, South Korea and Russia", Rising said.

"Altogether they are delivering a connection rate of 11.3 GWe and the target for this period is 10 GWe, so already in the first year now we are delivering on that target. But there is much to do if we are going to ramp this up," she said.

And construction periods are getting shorter. "Even in the industry, I hear people say that nuclear has long construction times. No. Construction times are coming down. There has been a 5.5 year average construction time for last five years. Of course there are examples where there have been big delays - delays in decision making and delays in construction, but overall, on average, it's a very great result," she said.

In addition, each reactor built is delivering more and more electricity, she said. "The capacity factor - what you deliver compared to what you are constructed to deliver - is climbing up. In the 80s, it was about 60% and now it is around 80%." These percentages are based on the International Atomic Energy Agency's Power Reactor Information System, or PRIS, database, which includes Japanese reactors even though they are not in operation currently. "That means, if you look at the reactors that are running - the capacity factor is above 80%," Rising said. "If you look at many of the other energy sources, I don't think there is any that has such high capacity factors as nuclear. For example, solar and wind have a capacity factor of 10-15% on average."

Rising also dispelled the myth that old nuclear reactors are not as efficient and new technology, explaining that maintenance and upgrade work over the years has increased their capacity factor to the same high level. "And when you have a new reactor, it has that high capacity factor from the start," she said.

Sweden, Rising's home country, is a good example of "how quickly a country can ramp up nuclear", she said. This fact dispels the myth that "small countries cannot do nuclear", she said. The United Arab Emirates is also proving that a small country can rapidly build nuclear capacity, she added.

Regarding the levelised cost of electricity, including the system cost, Rising said that Nuclear Energy Agency data for France, the UK, the USA and South Korea show that, "in nearly all of these cases nuclear is the cheapest".

Harmony

To achieve 1000 GWe of new capacity, the industry must address the three pillars of the World Nuclear Association's Harmony initiative, which Rising presented for the first time at the 2015 Symposium. These are a level playing field, harmonised regulatory processes and an effective safety paradigm.

A level playing field for all low-carbon technologies would value not only the environmental qualities of an energy source, but also its reliability and grid system costs.

Markets should be reformed to, Rising said, to support capital investments, include grid system costs, eliminate nuclear-only taxes, reform subsidies, give credit for low-carbon emissions, value 24/7 reliability and support innovative finance solutions.

A level playing field for nuclear cannot be achieved as long as power markets are distorted, Rising said, with low wholesale prices reflecting renewables that are supported by subsidies. Current gas prices may be low in the USA, but this does not reflect the cost of emissions that fossil fuelled plants account for, she added.

There also needs to be enhanced standardisation; streamlined licensing processes; harmonised and updated global codes and standards; the enabling of international trade; as well as efficient and effective safety regulation. In addition, nuclear innovation requires the development and timely licensing of new technologies.

Nuclear power development has been hindered, Rising said, by national energy policies that are not aligned. She gave nuclear taxes in Sweden and Belgium as an example of this.

The safety paradigm means increasing genuine public wellbeing from a societal perspective, Rising said. It also means ensuring global nuclear safety and confidence in the management of nuclear technology and operations.

"The alternatives to nuclear are far more dangerous - even including accidents," Rising said. Citing a 1998 report by the Paul Scherrer Institut, which looked at accidents related to energy facilities and concluded that of 1943 accidents with more than 5 fatalities, hydro was by far the most dangerous, then coal and then gas.

Researched and written

by World Nuclear News

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Iran ready to share nuclear experience

16 September 2016

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Iran is ready to share its nuclear experience with other nations in the Persian Gulf through a regional nuclear scientific contact group, Atomic Energy Organization of Iran president Ali Akbar Salehi told the World Nuclear Association's Annual Symposium today.

Iran's long-term energy plans recognise the importance of clean and affordable electricity, Salehi said. The country currently has one operating nuclear power plant, a 1000 MWe unit at Bushehr. With demand growing at 6% per year more reactors are planned, with desalination projects alongside them. Foundations were laid for two new units at Bushehr on 10 September, and the country has a long-term target of 20 GWe of nuclear capacity.

The country is also looking to utilise small modular reactors (SMRs) of up to 100 MWe for electricity production and desalination in remote areas of the country, Salehi said, citing financing considerations as well as the adaptability of SMRs to the country's industrial infrastructure. SMRs would be built close to areas of demand, saving on the costs of transmitting electricity, while their integrated design will have enhanced safety characteristics, he said.

Expanding cooperation



Since the establishment of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) on the peaceful use of nuclear power last year, Iran has taken major steps to expand international nuclear cooperation efforts, including with the International Atomic Energy Agency.

"Our long-term peaceful nuclear activity embodies further development of the entire fuel cycle, from extraction at mines, to uranium enrichment, to fuel production, safe storage of [used] fuel, radioactive waste management and construction of new nuclear power plants," Salehi said.

"We would like to reiterate our readiness to share our valuable accumulated experience in the nuclear industry with our Persian Gulf neighbours through establishing a regional nuclear scientific contact group," he said. The JCPOA could be used as a template to resolve intricate regional and global issues, he said. "It is incumbent on the international community to uphold the integrity of this important achievement," he said, calling on all the parties to deliver on their respective commitments.

Researched and written

by World Nuclear News

Related topics
History of Colonial Bridgetown

Bridgetown is the capital of Barbados, a Caribbean island nation. When British settlers began arriving here in 1628, the area was no longer inhabited by indigenous populations. The new settlers found an old bridge crossing the swamp, evidence left behind by previous inhabitants. Residents designed the city based on an early medieval English street plan. The city became one of the most important port towns in the British Atlantic trade route soon after its establishment. Later on, Bridgetown became the seat of the Windward Island Union, former British colonies, from 1800 until 1885. By 1958, Bridgetown residents established a local government. Today, however, the Barbadian Parliament administers political affairs for the city.

Environmental and Cultural Significance

In 2011, the historic part of the city and its garrison were inducted as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. This is the first Barbadian site to be included. Culturally, this area is important because of its well-maintained examples of 17th, 18th, and 19th Centuries' British colonial architecture. This historic district is made up of winding and curving alleyways that are in stark contrast to the Spanish and Dutch colonial city planning of the same region and era. The architectural style found here is often referred to as Caribbean Georgian, a combination of Georgian style with functionality for the tropical weather. Additionally, the nearby military garrison has also been included. It holds importance as the prior Eastern Caribbean headquarters of the British Army and Navy. Not only was this city important for the trade of goods and slaves, but it also helped to spread ideas regarding Atlantic New World colonial ventures. Today, the city continues to reflect a unique culture, the result of blending Creole and Anglophone cultures. This World Heritage Site allows visitors to imagine life here over 200 years ago.

The city is currently undergoing a suburban change that is concentrating development and population growth in the northern, northwestern, and eastern sections of town. Given the urban setting, not many animals are found living in Bridgetown although the rest of the island has a few different species of introduced animals. The bay is home to diverse marine life such as sponges, coral, reef fish, parrotfish, barracuda, and nurse sharks.

Tourism Activities

Tourists coming to this city have a wide variety of activities to choose from to partake in. History buffs may want to visit the Barbados Museum to learn more in regard to the history of the island and for a chance to view the old military prison. A city walking tour allows visitors to glimpse the previously mentioned Caribbean Georgian architecture in both old churches and homes. The Careenage is now a pleasant walkway around the bay filled with restaurants and shops and gives a glance at port life. Given that sugarcane is an important crop on the island, rum tasting tours are another popular activity here.

Conservation Efforts

When the site became protected under UNESCO, Barbados established the Barbados World Heritage Committee (BWHC). The BWHC is responsible for managing protection over the area. Some of their administrative plans include protecting, preserving, and enhancing heritage, education, capacity building, and research, as well as tourism management. The group is also planning to focus preservation efforts on traditional wooden houses of the site. They will also implement a special study program that specifically teaches traditional building conservation, crafts, and materials.
The Supreme Leader of Iran, better known in Iran as the Supreme Leadership Authority, is the highest ranking religious and political leader in the country, and the Head of State of Iran. The Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran established the post of the Supreme Leader.

The office of the supreme leader is more powerful than the office of the president. The supreme leader is responsible for appointing senior officials in the military, judiciary, and the civil government. Initially, the Constitution reserved the office for the highest ranking cleric on religious laws, in 1989, the constitution was amended to allow lower ranking clerics with proficiency in Islamic laws to occupy the office. The Assembly of Experts elects the Supreme Leader and oversees his position. The Supreme Leader is in charge of the office for an 8-year term without prohibitions regarding the limiting of the number of terms. Since the position was established, the office has been occupied by two supreme leaders. The first was Ruhollah Khomeini, who became Irans Supreme Leader immediately following the Iranian Revolution, occupying the office from 1979 until his death a decade later. The incumbent Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, took charge of the office shortly thereafter in 1989.

Ruhollah Khomeini

Ruhollah Khomeini was an Iranian revolutionary and religious leader. He was essential in the founding of the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979 by assisting in the overthrow of the Pahlavi monarchy which was led by Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. Before joining politics, he had been a lecturer, a position in which he taught political philosophy, ethics, and law. He also had interest in poetry and was influenced by Greek philosophers Socrates and Aristotle. Following the death of religious leaders Sayyed Husayn Borujerdi (1961), and Abol-Ghasem Kashan (1962), Khomeini, aged 61, took to the political scene by openly denouncing the Shar programs that Mohammad Reza Shah, the son of anti-clerical modernizer Reza Shah Pahlavi was enforcing. In November 1964, Khomeini was arrested and jailed for six months. He was later exiled to Iraq. On February 1, 1979, he returned to Iran and was received by a large crowd. In 1979, a new constitution was adopted, and Khomeini was instituted as the Supreme Leader. His health condition declined before his death, and he spent eleven days in the hospital where he suffered five heart attacks in ten days. He died on June 3rd, 1989.

Ali Hosseini Khamenei

Ali Hosseini Khamenei became Irans second Supreme Leader in 1989 following the death of Ruhollah Khomeini. Before his political life, Khamenei taught in religious schools under the supervision of Ruhollah Khomeini. After the resignation of Hussein-Ali, Khomeini appointed Khamenei to the post of post of Tehran's Friday prayers Imam. He served as the Deputy Minister of Defense. In 1981, he survived an assassination attempt that left his right arm permanently paralyzed. In 1981, the president of Iran was assassinated and Khamenei was elected president. In 1982, he successfully led the expulsion of Iraqi forces from Iran and opposed Khomeinis decision to invade Iraq. In 1985, he was reelected as the president. After Khomeinis death, the Assembly of Experts him as a temporary Supreme Leader. On August 6th, 1989, he was confirmed as the new official Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran, a position he has held ever since.
A young man wanted to make a point about racism in the United States, but his plan backfired when he was exposed for a liar by police. 20-year-old Khalil Cavil of Texas was working at the Saltgrass Steak House in Odessa when he claimed he was discriminated against because of his Muslim name. Cavil took


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         2013 .         9          .    .
Bihar govt has moved SC seeking cancellation of the bail granted to gangster-turned-politician Shahabuddin by the Patna HC.

By Anusha Soni: The noose around gangster-turned-politician Mohammed Shahabuddin is now tightening with the Bihar government moving the Supreme Court seeking cancellation of the bail granted to him by the Patna High Court.

Bihar state government's appeal comes after Swaraj Abhiyan leader Prashant Bhushan filed a plea on behalf of Chandrakeshwar Prasad, whose three sons were allegedly killed by Shahabuddin.



READ: Nitish upset with Lalu's silence on Shahabuddin's attacks, may use Crime Control Act to jail don



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Chandrakeshwar Prasad in his petition said, "The High Court order is totally unacceptable. The HC order completely overlooked the fact that Shahabuddin was a dreaded criminal, who has absolutely no respect for the law. Granting bail to him in the present case would be grossly unfair as he is still facing trial in several other cases."

READ | Shahabuddin and Sushasan cannot go hand-in-hand: Sushil Modi to Nitish Kumar

Both the petitions, including the one filed by the Bihar government, point out that at Shahabuddin has been booked in at least 58 criminal cases and he has been convicted in at least eight of them.



Being a two-time MLA and a four-time MP from Siwan makes Shahabuddin a very influential person and this may impact the trial.

Shahabuddin has been debarred from contesting elections since 2009. The charges he is facing include murder, attempt to murder, kidnapping or abducting with intent to murder, extortion, theft, rioting with deadly weapons and treason.



Also Read:

Stung over Shahabuddin's release, Nitish asks Bihar's law officers to diligently argue in courts

Siwan administration recommends sending Shahabuddin back to jail

Lalu's son spotted with Shahabuddin's sharpshooter, creates controversy Siwan strongman Shahabuddin walks out of jail to a hero's welcome, takes a swipe at Nitish



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By PTI: Colombo, Sep 16 (PTI) Sri Lankas proposed Truth Seeking Commission, a Reparations Office and a Judicial Mechanism will be decided by mid-October after the Consultation Task Force on Reconciliation hands over its report, a top diplomat has said.

Sri Lankas Permanent Representative to the UN Ravinatha Aryasinha informed the ongoing UN Human Rights Council sessions in Geneva that wide-ranging consultations are being carried out by the 11-member task force for this purpose.

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"In all these processes, the government and government institutions work closely and in consultation with the UN system and the OHCHR as well as other international experts," the ambassador said yesterday.

"We are also working closely with ICRC, especially in the area of dealing with the missing, including the technicalities of the establishment of the Office on Missing Persons, the training and capacity building requirements as well as obtaining expertise and sharing experiences of other countries that have similar mechanisms," Aryasinha said.

Sri Lanka has to respond to the UN Human Rights council resolution adopted in 2014 which called for an independent investigation into alleged war crimes blamed on both the government troops and the LTTE during the countrys civil war.

The UN has estimated that 40,000 people died, many of them civilians, during Sri Lankas civil war that lasted nearly three decades.

At last Octobers sessions in Geneva, the UN Human Rights Council had adopted a resolution co-sponsored by Sri Lanka which called for an international investigation with foreign judges prosecutors and investigators.

Aryasinha said that his government has already taken steps to implement the recommendations of the UN group of disappearances which visited the island nation last year.

"We believe that engagement with the UN system and the Human Rights Mechanisms is in the best interest of the people of our country, to obtain advice and views, and also expertise and technical assistance that will benefit us in terms of capacity building and ensuring the strengthening of our own local institutions," the Lankan envoy added. PTI CORR ZH TRK

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In another industrial tragedy in Bangladesh, the Tampaco Foils factory near Dhaka caught fire on Saturday, and then collapsed. The number of workers killed had risen to 34 by yesterday. With around 50 people injured and six still missing, the death toll may further increase.

This disaster highlights the unsafe conditions and shoddy construction for which Bangladesh is now notorious. It is the largest factory fire in the country since the Tazreen Fashions fire in November 2012, in which 112 workers were burnt to death. In another catastrophe, the Rana Plaza building collapsed near Dhaka in April 2013, killing around 1,200 apparel workers.

The blaze engulfed the multi-storey Tampaco Foils factory in the Tongi industrial zone, killing 23 workers immediately. Because inflammable chemicals were stored in the food and cigarette packing factory, the inferno spread quickly. An explosion occurred around 6 a.m., when workers were nearing the end of the overnight shift. A boiler eruption was suspected but investigators said they were also examining whether a gas leakage caused the blast.

The initial rescue operations were difficult because there were still flames here and there as there are a lot of chemicals in the factory, senior fire service official Masudur Rahman told Reuters on Sunday. Ajit Kumar Bhoumik, a senior fire department official, added: We do not know when the search will be completed as it is a huge task. He said more excavators and trucks were needed to clear debris, as well as more manpower and other resources.

In a show of support and force, the army was called into work with civil defence and police personnel, who used cranes and other equipment to pull away rubble and remove slabs of the collapsed building.

Thirteen people were treated at the Dhaka Medical College hospital, including six in critical conditions. Victims families were devastated. Mina Rani Dey, the mother of a missing cleaning worker, Rajesh Babu, told reporters: He came to work early in the morning on Saturday. He has not returned. His father has become sick because our son has not returned.

The plant was congested because production had been expanded to meet rising orders. The factory owner, Syed Mokbul Hossain, a former member of parliament, claimed it was fully compliant with safety standards. However, police later told Reuters that the factory owner and seven other top managers went into hiding as the death toll rose.

Farid Ahmed, deputy inspector general of the countrys factory inspection department, said police had filed a case by the family of one of the victims, and expected to receive more complaints.

In a display of official concern, Mikail Shipar, secretary of the Ministry of Labour and Employment, said: We checked the design of this factory and initially it is our understanding that it was a one floor building and later the floor had been raised, similar to [the] case of Rana Plaza.

Knowing that the disaster will again raise the issue of the lack of industrial safety in Bangladesh, Shipar claimed that the ministry would investigate the safety measures of all factories in the Tongi industrial zone. It would also formulate a project to inspect all the factories in all four industrial zones in the country.

Such pledges are made after every tragedy. The obvious question is why the government had not previously scrutinised the safety of the factories.

As with previous disasters, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasinas Bangladesh Awami League-led government is looking for scapegoats. Industries Minister Amir Hossain Amu told reporters on Sunday: Stern action will be taken against those responsible for the fire. No one will be spared.

This is just rhetoric to deflect the mass anger, locally and internationally, over the governments callous attitude toward those toiling in poor working condition in such factories.

The factory made food and cigarette packaging for local and global brands, including British American Tobacco, Nestle and Nabisco Biscuit & Bread, a unit of food giant Mondelez International.

In a bid to cover-up its responsibility for the disaster, according to one report, Nestle said it was shocked and saddened by the deaths and the injuries, and its thoughts were with those affected. But such conglomerates make use of such factories, precisely because of the low costs, which necessarily entails, shoddy construction and appalling working conditions, as well as poor wages.

It was likewise with Bangladesh agro-processed food products chain Pran, which conceded that it is a customer of Tampaco, which supplied it with flexible packaging material for snacks and confectioneries. A spokesman said: After this fire we will meet our other suppliers and review their safety measures as well  Our supply management team does routine visits to all our suppliers plants and we will strengthen these more now.

Government officials said they had mainly focused on safety in garment factories but were now going to consider other industries as well. This is another pretence. The editorial of the Bangladeshi newspaper, New Age commented on Tuesday: [T]here has so far hardly been any example in which errant owners or government officials were punished, although the country witnessed several hundred such disasters in different industrial sectors in the past few decades.

Referring to the Rana Plaza case, the newspaper noted: [I]t is also true that as the trial has already taken several years to start for various reasons, none can say for certain the victims will get justice, at least, in near future.

The Awami League-led government is determined to keep production costs low, particularly via cheap labour conditions, in order to attract foreign investment, regardless of the cost in workers lives. Whatever cosmetic changes are made in the industrial sector, there will be no genuine improvement of workers safety conditions and living standard under the corporate profit system.
A new report from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri details the social and economic cost of imprisoning 2 million people in the United States. The study, The Economic Burden of Incarceration, from the universitys Concordance Institute for Advancing Social Justice, assesses the economic costs to individuals, families, and communities.

The United States imprisons more people than any other country on earth, per capita and in absolute numbers. The increase in incarceration since 1980 is staggering, from approximately 490,000 in all institutions to 2 million by 2014. The budgeted cost of US federal and state prison systems is $80 billion per year.

The Washington University study rejects that figure, saying the actual cost, when considering all the social impacts of removing so many people from economic and social life for such long periods of time, is closer to $1 trillion (1,000 billion dollars).

The authors introduce their study by stating, Estimating social costs of incarceration is problematic because it is difficult to disentangle the effects of incarceration from the effects of poverty. The burden, in any case, is the mass poverty of millions of people. The social consequences of imprisonmentlifetime earnings loss due to lower chance of employment, erosion of work-related skills, and loss of social capitalare estimated at $1.9 billion to $4.9 billion per year, depending on education level.

For the sake of the study, figures were underestimated so the social costs may be much higher than $1 trillion. The statistics generated in this study are shocking. Having one parent in prison increases infant mortality by 40 percent. The cost, in extra child lives lost per year, is estimated at $1.2 billion per year. Having one parent in prison increases high school dropouts by 10 percentby the numbers, 62,731 children per year. Thirty percent of the new foster care cases are due to the higher incidence of women in prison, a mind-boggling 716 percent increase since the 1980s.

Costs borne by families through monthly visits, evictions, moves and divorces are all discussed in the study. The cumulative costs to families is over $27 billion a year. The economic cost of the psychological effects of imprisonment are also tallied. Lifelong financial losses due to depression, PTSD, and anxiety suffered by prisoners are totaled at $10.2 billion per year.

These cumulative totals demonstrate in financial terms the human cost of incarceration. Although the average prison term is 2.25 years per this study, racial and economic disparities in sentencing shift this figure significantly. Sentences for white collar crimes are commonly served in minimum security detention for short periods of time. According to the Transactional Records Clearinghouse (TRAC), the Justice Departments white collar prosecution rate is down 92 percent from 20 years ago. Judges adjudicating white collar crimes have discretion over sentencing guidelines and frequently give much shorter sentences.

Poor defendants, lacking adequate representation, plead guilty more often in hopes of leniency. A study by Megan Stevenson in Baltimore found only 51 percent of those charged with bail of $500 or less were able to pay the minimum 10 percent required to go free within three days. Sentences for minor crimes like drug possession can turn into life sentences with current mandatory minimum sentences and three strikes laws. In Louisiana, one of the poorest states, 91.4 percent of the nonviolent black prisoners serving life without parole are doing so because of such laws.

Hyperincarceration, as its termed in the study, is criticized for being unnecessary, counterproductive, and prohibitively expensive. The financial crash of 2008 highlight[s] the fiscal unsustainability of hyperincarceration, i.e., the federal and state burden of continued funding for jails and prisons. These costs are delineated by Henrichson and Delaney, a reference cited for the Economic Burden study, as budget items such as employee benefits, capital costs, in-prison education services, or hospital care for inmates. Giving the incarcerated housing, education, and health care is considered too costly. For the ruling class, every bit of capital that is not returning to Wall Street is considered a burden.

Why have incarceration rates gone up so much in the last 40 years? Since the 1980s, workers have seen an assault on living standards from all sides: deindustrialization, globalization, and the financialization of the economy; Clintons welfare reform; Bushs repeated budget cuts in social programs; Obamas cuts to federal assistance in housing and food stamps; and the nationwide erosion of funding for public education.

Persistent unemployment continues. As of July this year, the level of long-term unemployment remains at more than 25 percent of total unemployment. The desperation among the poor is explained by the economic and social conditions they have been subject to for generations.

Crime itself is a social phenomenon. Petty crimes of theft, gangs and criminal enterprises, all are a direct result of capitalist exploitation in destroying legitimate and sustainable jobs. When people cant find legal work, they turn to the alternative economy for subsistence. Once in it, they enter a vicious cycle, going through courts, jails and prisons, being further brutalized and alienated.

Like most such academic studies, however, the report on the economic burden of incarceration offers no broader insights into the meaning of its findings. Its conclusion offers a passing criticism that the US prison system is perhaps too large, beyond that which is socially optimal. This soporific phrase testifies to the political blinders on the reports authors, who have documented the vast extent of an American gulag, apparently without ever questioning what vast, hidden social tensions require such a hideous apparatus of coercion and repression.
The Turnbull government and the political and media elite as a whole are consciously exploiting the anti-immigrant One Nation party of Pauline Hanson to try to channel seething working class discontent in xenophobic and militarist directions.

That is clear from the response to Hansons first speech in the Senate this week, after she and three other One Nation candidates secured seats in the July 2 double dissolution election. Employment Minister Michaelia Cash effusively hugged Hanson on the Senate floor after her speech, a gesture that was symbolic of the wider embrace of Hansons return to parliament.

Hansons address, which was given wall-to-wall media coverage, focused on vilifying Muslims, China and welfare recipients, and blaming them for the job destruction, poverty and deteriorating social conditions inflicted on millions of people by successive governments, both Liberal-National Coalition and Labor.

Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said Hanson had rightly taken her seat in the Senate and was entitled to her views. Former Prime Minister John Howard declared that she was entitled to be treated in a respectful fashion by the rest of the parliament. Government backbencher George Christensen told parliament he too was concerned about the rise of Islamism in this country and those who are willing to commit violence in the name of that ideology.

Labor and Greens leaders only criticised Hanson for being divisive. The Greens staged a theatrical walkout during her speech. They are just as responsible as the rest of the parliamentary establishment for enforcing the ever-greater inequality and social misery that enabled Hansons outfit to profit from the political disaffection that saw a quarter of voters reject the three main establishment parties on July 2.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull offered no comment, except to say he disagreed with Hanson on the benefits of migration. Significantly, Turnbull asked for a meeting with Hanson after the election, during which she accepted his offer of access to ministers and government staff for information to help One Nation make the right decisions on behalf of her supporters and constituents. He was very gracious and opened with congratulations on my win, which I appreciated, Hanson said.

The advice that Hanson has received since then was undoubtedly reflected in her half-hour speech. She declared that the country was in danger of being swamped by Muslims, dominated by sharia law and overcome by terrorist violence. It was also being taken over by the oppressive communist Chinese government via land and asset purchases, the kind of foreign takeover that Australians had fought and died in wars to prevent. At the same time, welfare handouts and rorting of the public health and education systems were crippling Australia.

Hanson called for a ban on Muslim immigration and wearing burqas, and the monitoring of mosques, combined with the cutting of welfare to young unemployed workers and single mothers. She advocated the introduction of an Australian identity card, with an identification chip, a photo and electronic fingerprint to access government services.

Her diatribes feed directly into the underlying agenda being pursued by the corporate and political elite. This includes whipping up anti-Muslim fear-mongering as a means of justifying escalating involvement in the US-led wars in the Middle East and the ongoing overturning of basic legal and democratic rights, both in the name of the fraudulent war on terror. It also features fomenting an anti-China witch-hunt as a means of overcoming popular opposition to Australia taking a frontline role in US plans for war with China.

Hansons denunciations of single parents and jobless youth as thieves collecting thousands of dollars a week boosts the bipartisan Coalition-Labor austerity agenda of slashing social spending to meet the demands of the financial markets for the gutting of welfare, the imposition of lower wages and the cutting of corporate taxes. Her proposals for an ID card dovetails with the constant bolstering of the surveillance and other powers of the police-intelligence-military apparatus.

The demonization of Muslims, Chinese people and welfare recipients seeks to divide the working class along ethnic and communal lines, and pit Australian workers against their fellow workers globally. Above all, One Nations pitch aims to divert workers and youth from turning toward a socialist perspective to unite the working class against the private profit system, which is the source of austerity and the lurch toward war.

Hanson spoke of growing unemployment queues, schools bursting at the seams, patients waiting longer for life-saving operations, housing costs soaring, city roads becoming clogged and the aged and the sick left to fend for themselves, or rely on charities. By feigning sympathy for ordinary Australians facing this economic and social devastation, One Nation picked up much of its 4.5 percent national vote in the most destitute regions, especially in Hansons home state of Queensland, where mining-related job losses have helped create areas of deep poverty.

By posturing as an anti-establishment party, One Nation is playing a vital diversionary role for the corporate and political elites that Hanson claims to oppose. They live in fear of a politically independent movement of the working class against the entire capitalist set-up.

Similar processes are underway in the US and Europe, with fascistic demagogues like Donald Trump, Frances Marin Le Pen and Britains UKIP leaders feeding off the discontent produced by decades of social reversal enforced by conservative and social democratic governments alike. In every case, the primary political responsibility for the emergence of these extreme right-wing nationalist elements rests with the labour and trade union apparatuses, and their supporters, that have long suppressed the struggles of workers.

Amid the blanket media coverage of Hansons remarks, comparisons were made to her inaugural parliamentary speech, in 1996, during which she railed against Asians who were swamping Australia, Aboriginal people and the welfare system.

Hanson won a seat in 1996 by capitalising on the landslide defeat of the Hawke and Keating-led Labor government of 19831996, which ruthlessly enforced the restructuring of the economy in the interests of global capital, working hand-in-glove with business and the trade unions via Labors prices and incomes Accords.

Then too, Hanson preyed upon the resulting social insecurities and distress, channelling these sentiments in a reactionary and nationalist direction to blame immigrants, Aborigines and welfare recipients for unemployment and poverty.

Taking up where Hawke and Keating left off, Howards incoming Coalition government, together with the corporate chiefs and media proprietors found in Hanson a convenient vehicle for shifting official politics even further to the right. Both the Coalition and Labor adopted much of One Nations agendaescalating the persecution of refugees, forcing welfare recipients into low-paid work and boosting police powers.

Two years later, when One Nation threatened to destabilise the two-party parliamentary order, the media suddenly turned on it, pointing to its connections with ultra-right wing and neo-Nazi outfits. After a filthy campaign orchestrated by elements within the Liberal Partyincluding future Prime Minister AbbottHanson was sentenced to three years jail on trumped-up charges under Queenslands reactionary electoral laws. That political frame-up was only overturned on appeal three months later.

Today, Hansons embrace once more by the political powers-that-be was underscored by a well-publicised meeting she held with Abbott. In a video posted on Hansons Facebook page, Abbott said: Pauline, its good to catch up with you again after all these years. Hanson responded: Yeah I think it is great too. I really appreciate you coming to my office and saying hello and welcoming me to the parliament.

In other words, under conditions of an even deeper social and political crisis, the ruling elite once again has a use for Hansons right-wing nationalism, as long as it can be utilised to implement the corporate assault on the working class. Her comeback, and the rise of other right-wing populists in the Senate, is a warning to workers and youth of the need to build a new socialist leadership in the working class.

The author also recommends:

The rise and decline of Pauline Hansons One Nation

[9 March 1999]
Indias Hindu supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government is resorting to increasingly desperate measures to quell the wave of popular protests that have engulfed Jammu and Kashmir, Indias only Muslim-majority state, for the past ten weeks.

To bring the situation under control, the government has dispatched an additional 4,000 Indian army troops to the state with a promise that more will be sent later. And for the first time since 2004, Indias government has ordered the paramilitary Border Security Force (BSF), which has been waging a counterinsurgency war against separatists who operate from camps in Pakistan, to take up law and order duties in the states summer capital, Srinagar.

On Tuesday, the first day of the Muslim festival of Eid, the government ordered all major Muslim holy sites in the state closed so as to prevent large congregations of people. Noting that this has never before happened in our history, Omar Abdullah, a former BJP ally and ex-Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister warned of a huge backlash. People, said Abdullah, are saying that it is the rule of Jan Sangh (the BJPs even-more stridently Hindu communalist forerunner) and thats why the doors of every major mosque and shrine have been locked by this government.

The mass protestswhich have been focused in the states northern, Kashmir Valley region, where the Muslim population is concentratederupted after Indian security forces on July 8 cornered and killed Burhan Wani, a 22-year old commander of the Hizbul Mujahideen, a separatist and Islamist group.

The popular eruption completely caught the BJP government, the state governmenta coalition between the BJP and the Peoples Democratic Party (a party of the local Muslim elite which favors greater autonomy for Jammu and Kashmir)and the entire Indian establishment by surprise.

With Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi personally setting the tone, the Indian authorities have characteristically responded with reaction, violence, and brutality. Modi and Home Minister Rajnath Singh have repeatedly issued statements vowing no compromise with those indulging in violence.

Willfully ignoring the evident mass disaffection of the Muslim population, the BJP has blamed the protests on the machinations of Indias archrival, Pakistan, and ratcheted up tensions with Islamabad. At an all party meeting on the Kashmir crisis last month, Modi signaled a more belligerent stance against Pakistan by trumpeting Indias claim to the Pakistan-held part of the former British Indian Empire princely state of Jammu and Kashmir, and by suggesting that India could support the anti-Pakistan insurgency in Baluchistan.

While large sections of the population of Jammu and Kashmir were risking life and limb to defy the Indian authorities, Modi declared, Pakistan Occupied Kashmir is ours.

In suppressing the protests, Indian security forces have killed at least 85 people, most of them youth. A further 8,000 have been injured, with many of these suffering debilitating injuries such as damage to internal organs and loss of eyesight. To impose the writ of the Indian government, security forces have indiscriminately fired pellet guns and tear gas shells, regularly raided villages to preempt local demonstrations, and mounted nighttime raids to arrest alleged activists and terrify their families and neighbors.

Under the direction of the Chief Minister and PDP leader Mehbooba Mufti, the state government has imposed blanket curfews and news blackouts, suspended Internet and cell phone access and banned all gatherings. As a result daily life has largely been brought to a halt, further inciting anger at the authorities.

The protests are being fueled by the long pent-up popular discontent of the Kashmiri masses at the repression and daily indignities they have suffered at the hands of the half-a-million Indian security forces that have been garrisoned in the state for the past two-and-a-half decades. Mass disaffection with the Indian state is also being fed by mass unemployment, especially among the youth, chronic poverty, and the Hindu communalist agenda of the BJP. The latter includes harsh legal penalties for beef-eating and abolishing Jammu and Kashmirs oft-violated special status within the Indian Union.

The Indian military forces in Jammu and Kashmir operate under the blanket legal immunity granted them under the 1990 Armed Forces (Jammu and Kashmir) Special Powers Act. Secure under the protection provided by AFSPA, they have committed mass crimes and untold atrocities, all in the name of fighting terrorism. Thousands of persons have been kidnapped, tortured and disappeared over the past 25 years.

At the four-hour August 13 all party meeting, the Congress Party and the Stalinist parliamentary parties made a few perfunctory criticisms and suggestions, such as reduced use of pellet guns and restricting the AFSPAs writ. But otherwise they gave their full-throated support to the governments efforts to restore peace to the Kashmir Valley, i.e. to its brutal repression.

However, by late August, with the protests showing no signs of abating, pressure began to build within the Indian ruling elite for the government to make some gesture in the direction of Modis hollow August 13 pledge to win the confidence of the people in Jammu and Kashmir.

Reluctantly, the BJP agreed to send a 28-member parliamentary delegation, comprised of both government and opposition members, to meet with political leaders in the state, including separatist leaders under house arrest. The delegation traveled to the Kashmir Valley for a two-day visit in early September.

A notable aspect of the delegation was the prominent part played in it by Sitaram Yechury, the General Secretary of the Stalinist CPM [Communist Party of India (Marxist)] and a member of the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of Indias parliament.

Yechurys role was to give the utterly discredited BJP and Indian state a left face. All of the separatist leaders under the umbrella organization, the Hurriyat Conference, boycotted the official delegation, but a group of moderate separatists met a four-member team led by Yechury.

In an interview with the Times of India after the delegations empty-handed return, Yechury praised the BJP governments decision to use chili-based PAVA shells instead of pellets, while calling for unconditional dialogue with all stakeholders and urging the restart of the peace process with Pakistan, which has been effectively in limbo since 2008.

Yechurys actions underscore the CPMs role as an integral part of the Indian bourgeois establishment. While adopting a more moderate tone than the BJP, the Stalinists are no less committed to upholding Indian rule in Jammu and Kashmir. Moreover, they have provided pivotal support to the Indian elite in its reactionary military-strategic conflict with Pakistan and in pursuing its great power ambitions, as attested by their support for Indias rapid military expansion since 1998.

The Kashmir tragedy is an outcome of the national bourgeoisies suppression of the anti-imperialist movement that convulsed South Asia in the first half of the 20th Century. This found its bloodiest and starkest expression in the Congress Party of Gandhi and Nehru joining hands with the Muslim League and the departing British colonial overlords to impose the 1947 communal partition of the subcontinent into a Muslim Pakistan and a Hindu India.

The princely state of Jammu and Kashmir was coveted by the rival ruling elites of the new misbegotten states. In 1947-48, during the first of the three declared wars that India and Pakistan have fought, it was itself partitioned into an Indian- and Pakistan-held Kashmir, thereby dividing the Kashmiri people.

Kashmir has remained central to the conflict between the now nuclear-armed India and Pakistan, with both states claiming sovereignty over all of Kashmir while trampling on the democratic rights of Kashmiris.

The separatist organizations offer no way out of this nightmare. Most are politically aligned with Pakistan and steeped in a reactionary communalist perspective. They articulate the selfish class aims of sections of the local Kashmiri elite that calculate they can wield greater influence and have more favorable conditions for exploiting their own working class through the fusion of Kashmir into Pakistan or the creation of an independent capitalist Kashmir.

The only force that can overcome the foul legacy of partition, put an end to the threat of a catastrophic war between India and Pakistan, and fulfill the democratic and social aspirations of all working people is a united movement of the working class of the entire subcontinent committed to eradicating social inequality, capitalism, and its outmoded nation-state system and to forging the Socialist United States of South Asia.
Federal prosecutors in Brazil have accused former Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of having presided as the maximum commander of the massive corruption scheme that was responsible for siphoning an estimated $12.6 billion out of the state-run oil conglomerate Petrobras.

A judge is expected to decide within the next few days whether the case against Lula, a former metalworkers union leader who became Brazils first Workers Party (PT) president in 2003, will go to trial. If it proceeds, the prosecution threatens to further deepen the crisis of the PT in the wake of the August 31 ouster of President Dilma Rousseff, Lulas handpicked successor, who was impeached on trumped-up charges of manipulating the federal budget.

Lula himself is considered the partys best hope for a return to power as its presidential candidate in 2018, after the remainder of Rousseffs term is completed by her former vice president, Michel Temer of the PMDB (Brazilian Democratic Movement Party).

The charges of corruption and money laundering against the ex-PT president stem from the Operation Car Wash (Operacao Lava Jato) investigation that began as a probe of money laundering and uncovered a massive scandal involving the awarding of inflated Petrobras contracts to construction firms and other private contractors, who in turn funneled kickbacks to company officials, politicians and political party coffers.

In addition to Lula, those charged by the prosecutors include his wife Marisa Leticia (money laundering), Leo Pinheiro, the ex-president of the OAS construction giant (corruption and money laundering), four other OAS executives facing similar charges and Paulo Okamotto, the former metalworkers union official who heads the Instituto Lula, who is also charged with money laundering.

The case against Lula began with a criminal investigation into claims that OAS, which benefited from lucrative Petrobras contracts, had financed the purchase and renovation of a luxury seaside apartment for the ex-president and his wife. Presenting the case at a press conference in Curitiba on Wednesday, prosecutor Deltan Dalagnol went much further, however, charging that Lula had appointed several senior executives at Petrobras so that they could raise money for political parties in the governing coalition. He added that without Lulas decision power, there would not be a criminal scheme.

The prosecutors indicated that their case has been built in large part on the basis of testimony by former Petrobras officials, politicians and businessmen who have been charged in the scandal.

Lula responded to the charges Thursday at a PT rally in Sao Paulo, delivering a rambling and demagogic speech defending his entire record, from his days as a union leader through his eight years as president. He described the prosecutions case as pure fiction designed to prevent him from running for president again. Only Jesus Christ can beat me here in Brazil, he boasted. He went on to compare his prosecution to the hanging and quartering of the 18th century advocate of an independent Brazilian republic, Tiradentes.

Supporters greeted the ex-president with chants declaring him a warrior for the Brazilian people and asserting that the fascists will not pass.

PT functionaries and the partys pseudo-left apologists have increasingly denounced the federal prosecutors, the congressional politicians who impeached Rousseff and her successor Michel Temer, along with his cabinet, as fascists.

However, the prosecutors were appointed under the PT government; Lula was himself engaging in political horse trading with the congressional politicians, the PTs erstwhile partners, in an attempt to forestall the impeachment; and Temer was Rousseffs vice president, 2010 running mate and political ally until late last year.

There is no question that every one of Brazils bourgeois partiesand, according to one recent survey, 60 percent of the congress members who voted on impeachmentare up to their necks in corruption.

It is also the case that the corruption scandal has been manipulated to bring down the PT government, even though the charges against Rousseff were totally unrelated to the bribery scheme at Petrobras, whose board she chaired from 2003 to 2010.

The ouster of Rousseff and the PT was brought about to placate Brazilian and international finance capital under conditions of the countrys worst capitalist crisis in 100 years. It served as a demonstrative signal that all measures would be taken to place the full burden of this crisis on the backs of a working class already suffering from an unemployment rate of over 11 percent, falling real wages, rising poverty and deepening social inequality.

Nonetheless, virtually all of the reactionary policies now being pursued by Temer (and denounced as fascist by the PT and its apologists), from labor and social security retirement reform to privatizations and caps on spending, had been proposed by Rousseff and the PT and would have been implemented had she remained in power.

In his speech Thursday, Lula declared, I take deep pride in having created the most important party of the left in Latin America.

Having governed Latin Americas largest country and biggest economy for the last 13 years, there is no arguing with the PTs importance. And its shipwreck is a central component of the crisis of all of the so-called left turn bourgeois governments, from chavismo in Venezuela to left Peronism in Argentina and the presidency of Evo Morales in Bolivia. Like the PT, all of them diverted a small share of the revenues generated by the commodities boom to fund social assistance programs aimed at dampening class tensions, while adopting a limited left nationalist posture. With the end of the commodities and emerging markets booms, all of these governments have been either ousted or severely undermined.

From its founding in 1980, in the midst of militant strikes and student unrest that led to the fall of Brazils 20-year US-backed military dictatorship, the PT and the trade union federation with which it is affiliated, the CUT, have served as instruments for diverting the revolutionary strivings of the Brazilian working class back under the domination of the bourgeois state.

As it gained local and state offices and proved its ability to administer bourgeois state structures, it emerged by 2003 as the favored party of Brazilian capitalism and a darling of the International Monetary Fund and Wall Street, whose interests it zealously protected.

Alongside union functionaries like Lula, Catholic activists and academics, the pivotal role in creating the PT fell to a collection of pseudo-left groups which promoted it as an alternative to the construction of a mass revolutionary party and the struggle for the development of socialist consciousness in the Brazilian working class.

The most important of these consisted of organizations affiliated with international tendencies led by figures like Ernest Mandel, Nahuel Moreno and Pierre Lambert, who had broken in an earlier period from Trotskyism and the International Committee of the Fourth International to adapt themselves to Castroism and other forms of bourgeois nationalism, along with Stalinism and social democracy.

All of these tendencies, and their present incarnations in the form of the Morenoite PSTU and MRT, the Pabloite Insurgencia group and similar tendencies orbiting the PT, its parliamentary split-off, the PSOL, the CUT trade union apparatus and the PT-affiliated social movements bear responsibility for the grave crisis now confronting the Brazilian working class.

All of them are tainted by the political corruption that lay at the heart of the PT, whose leading figures from Lula on down are now being dragged into the multibillion-dollar bribery and political kickback scandal surrounding Petrobras.
On the picket lines at five Allina Health hospitals in the Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota area, rank-and-file nurses are engaged in intense discussions on how to take their struggle forward. Nearly 5,000 nurses walked out on September 5 to oppose the hospital chains demands to destroy their long-standing health care benefits and increase the workloads on the already overstretched hospital staff.

While nurses remained determined to beat back Allina Health and the powerful corporate and financial interests behind it, the Minnesota Nurses Association (MNA), its parent union, National Nurses United (NNU), and the national union federations have left the nurses to fight this battle alone. The MNA has ordered some 7,000 of its members at other area hospitals to remain on the job.

Well aware of the role of the MNAwhich has already offered to accept the companys major concession demandsAllina executives have remained intransigent while bringing in 1,500 strikebreakers to keep operations going.

On Monday, September 13, the National Nurses United (NNU) web page published a letter written by Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders about the strike. In the letter, he states he wants to offer his strong voice of support, and offer [his] encouragement to the Minnesota Nurses Association and National Nurses United in your fight for proper staffing, nurse and patient safety, and health care access for yourselves and your families.

The first thing that must be said is that Sanders letter does absolutely nothing to strengthen the strike. Nurses do not need empty rhetoric hurriedly written down on a form letterthey need a strategy to mobilize the broadest support among workers and young people throughout the Twin Cities and across the country.

The real purpose of the letter is to provide a cover to the MNA and NNU executives who are opposed to any struggle that would disrupt their relations between the Democratic Party and corporate management. Sanders attributes the fight for proper staffing, nurse and patient safety, and healthcare to the MNA and NNU, not to rank-and-file nurses. However, before the strike began, the MNA had already capitulated to Allinas main demands that the nurses surrender their four union-sponsored health care plans.

The union officials have sought to cover up their abject capitulation by claiming that the surrender was a tactical maneuver to demonstrate Allinas stubbornness. When Allina rejected this offer, the MNA was forced to carry out their strike. The only thing the MNA executives want is to be in a position to grant its consent to cuts of five percent or more.

Conscious of the growing concern over the isolation of the strike, the MNA and NNU have solicited phony statements of solidarity from Sanders and other Democrats, such as US Congressman Keith Ellison. This goes hand-in-hand with pathetic appeals to the conscience of corporate board members who are executives at US Bank, Buffalo Wild Wings and General Mills. If you add up all of this support, it comes to the total of a big zero.

While NNU Executive Director RoseAnn DeMoro gushes over Sanders, saying, nurses love Bernie all over the United States, she deliberately conceals the treacherous role the Vermont Senator has played over the last year.

During his presidential bid, the self-described democratic socialist called for a political revolution against the billionaire class. On this basis Sanders won 13 million votes from workers and young people and defeated Hillary Clinton in Minnesota and 20 other states. He promptly endorsed Clinton, a warmonger and the favored candidate of the billionaire class.

Sanders is no socialist. He defends the capitalist system and Obamas wars and promotes the lie that the Democratic Party can be turned into a party of working people. The Democrats, however, are no less a party of Wall Street and the Pentagon than the Republicans.

In the end, the purpose of the Sanders campaign was to corral social opposition and the growing interest in socialism, contain it within the Democratic Party and smother it. A whole host of pseudo-left organizations, including Socialist Alternative (which plays a prominent role in the MNA), have helped to perpetuate the political fraud by Sanders.

A common struggle against the attacks on health care and working conditions would mean that workers would come into direct conflict with the Democratic Party and the misnamed Affordable Care Act (ACA), or Obamacare. Sanders was a part of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, which is one of the two committees tasked with putting the ACA legislation together, and during the Democratic debates earlier this year Sanders even boasted that he helped write the ACA.

As so many have come to realize, ACA has been used to shift the cost of health care from employers and the government onto the backs of workers and force them to accept inferior coverage. It has also resulted in an increase of insured patients being admitted to hospitals, but in order to maintain profits, the hospital systems have not hired new nurses to compensate for the increase in patients.

Sanders and other Democratic Party hacks sold Obamacare as a progressive reform when they knew full well that the opposite was the case.

Nurses should ask themselves: is it any coincidence that the letter was published one day after the Socialist Equality Partys presidential candidate, Jerry White, visited the picket lines at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis? Nurses gave a warm welcome to White and engaged in a serious discussion of the political issues raised by the strike. He explained the role of the MNA/NNUs alliance with Sanders and the Democrats and urged nurses to take the conduct of the struggle in their own hands in order to fight for the mobilization of the entire working class against Allina and its corporate and political backers.

Until this week, Sanders had said nothing about the nurses strike. On the day the walkout started, the Vermont Senator was shilling for Hillary Clinton alongside her at an AFL-CIO-sponsored Labor Day event in Lebanon, New Hampshire.

Sanders and the MNA/NNU are busy trying to provide a cover for each other, while together they try to contain the growing militancy of nurses and the whole working class. The last thing they want is a growing strike wave in the midst of Clintons election campaign.

If nurses are to defend their jobs and conditions, they must reject the subordination of their struggle to the Democrats and the capitalist system they defend. The World Socialist Web Site calls on nurses to expand their struggle, send out delegations of the rank and file into other sections of the working class, mobilize students on the university campus, and take the fight against Allina for what it really is: a struggle against the entire capitalist system.
The National Media Museum (NMM) in the northern city of Bradford experienced a 40 percent drop in the number of visitors last year, compared to 2008, the time of the financial crisis.

In 2001, nearly a million people visited the attraction, but by 2012 this had more than halved. However, the museum is beginning to see a recovery in the number of visitors, recording an 11 percent increase for the year 2015/2016 compared to the previous year.

The NMM is part of the Science Museum Group (SMG), which also includes the Science Museum in London, the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester (MOSI), the National Railway Museum (York) and the National Railway Museum (Shildon). Overall, the SMG saw a 4 percent increase in the number of visits to its museums for the year 2015/2016.

Museums in the SMG group receive around two thirds of their funding from the government Department for Culture Media and Sport (DCMS). The previous Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition government threatened to cut the budget for the groups museums, and proposals were made that one of SMG museums, though not Londons Science Museum, would have to close. It triggered off a campaign in which each museum had to try to justify why it should not be the one to be closed. It also fuelled a reactionary north-south divide over the fight for dwindling cultural resources.

A campaign to save the NMM, which attracted the support of well-known figures such as Martin Scorsese, Michael Palin and David Hockney, led to over 40,000 signatures on a petition. The petition was handed in to the Science Museum in South Kensington. In the end, the proposed closure of one of the SMG museums was averted. The DCMS budget cut of 8 percent overall went ahead, but the burden on museums was reduced to a 5 percent cut which came into effect in 2015 and has impacted staffing.

As part of the deal to keep the NMM open, it had to emphasise the science aspect of the exhibits and downplay its artistic character. A Guardian article on February 7 of this year noted that minutes of an SMG board meeting stated that proposals to re-vision the National Media Museum began as long ago as September 2013.  At the same meeting, trustees discussed changing the museums name. The Guardian has since learned that Science Museum North is one of the names under consideration.

In line with this, it was announced at the beginning of the year that the NMM would no longer host the Bradford International Film Festival. In the past, this event attracted prestigious figures from the film industry, such as Kenneth Branagh, Alan Bennett and John Hurt, to the city. Film industry insiders fear that this could threaten Bradfords status as a UNESCO city of film.

Speaking to the Bradford local paper, the Telegraph and Argus, museum director Jo Quinton-Tulloch explained that the museum was developing a festival based on computer games.

She explained, Film remains a very important part of our future plans, but the festival programme needed changes to make it more sustainable and aligned with the museums new focus on the science and culture of light and sound technologies.  [W]e are working towards a festival looking at games and gaming.

The announcement confirmed the fears of those who believed the cancellation of the festival last year was just the prelude to it being abandoned altogether.

The decision follows on from the earlier decision to move the 400,000 objects comprising the Royal Photographic Society held in Bradford to the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. The collection includes photographs by the pioneer William Henry Fox Talbot, around 8,000 cameras and the first-ever negative image.

In a Yorkshire Post article of February 2, the renowned international photographer, Ian Beesley, whose works are part of the museums collection, opposed the decision to move the collection:

As a photographic resource its second to none. Its well used by students across the north.  I cant help but feel that once a museum starts shipping off its crown jewels, the end is really nigh.

In line with the SMGs policy of narrowing the focus of the media museum, Quinton-Tulloch told the Yorkshire Life magazine, This refocus means concentrating our resources on what we do best.  In a time of limited resources and as we refocus our mission, we can no longer do everything we once did.

The renewed threat to the NMM is part of the ongoing onslaught on museum and art gallery provision. Local Authority cultural resources are at the sharp end of this, as councils are faced with ever increasing government spending cuts.

An article on the Museums Association (MA) web site on July 6 was titled Museums across the UK face closure threatMA voices concern about disturbing number of venues at risk.

Highlighting just some of the museums under threat due to the governments cultural vandalism, it noted that Kirklees Council in West Yorkshire was proposing to halve the museums it runs, including the Red House Museum, which has connections with Charlotte Bronte and is featured in her novel Shirley. It also proposes to close the Tolson Museum, which houses world-class collections.

The article also mentioned the plans to close the Dudley Museum and Art Gallery in the West Midlands as well as plans by Shropshire County Council to slash its 800,000 tourism and museum budget to zero by next year.

The MA director, Sharon Heal, said, While we recognise that local authorities are under pressure and have to make tough spending decisions, there is a danger that whole communities will be left without museums and the rich and diverse stories they can tell.

Responding to the autumn statement in November of last year by then-chancellor George Osborne, the director of the Art Fund, Stephen Deucher, told the Museums Association, Todays statement is just the beginning, as it is forthcoming local authority settlements that will determine the fate of the majority of the UKs museums and galleriesthe hundreds of installations across the country that are already under-resourced and vulnerable.  [W]e must work hard to ensure the survival of free cultural provision on everyones doorstepbeyond the protected nations museums and galleries.

In a commentary on the future of what museums should look like in 2020 in a Guardian article dated March 2015, cultural historian Robert Hewison noted: National museums are now having to absorb cuts of a third in public funding. Some of those funded by local authorities are suffering even more. Some may not survive.  [T]he outlook is bleak. ...
The presidential contest in the United States has tightened considerably, with Democrat Hillary Clinton leading Republican Donald Trump by the barest of margins. Trump has erased most of the lead of eight to ten points Clinton enjoyed a month ago.

Thursdays New York Times headlined the results of the latest CBS/Times poll, Clinton, Trump Locked in Tight Race, with its survey showing Clinton with a two-point lead over Trump head-to-head, 46 percent to 44 percent, and tied with Trump at 42 percent each in a four-way race, when Libertarian Gary Johnson and Green Party candidate Jill Stein are included.

Statewide polls showed Trump closing the gap or taking small leads in such battleground states as Iowa, Nevada, Ohio, Florida and New Hampshire, although Clinton remained ahead in Colorado, Pennsylvania, Virginia and North Carolina and was competitive in previously Republican states like Arizona and Georgia.

It is significant that the trend in the polls is at least as much a decline in support for Clinton as it is a rise in support for Trump. Clinton is doing particularly poorly with younger voters, who flocked to support Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders in the Democratic primaries. A Gallup poll last week found Clintons approval rating among voters age 18 to 29 was only 33 percent, the lowest for any age group.

There is enormous disaffection with the choice that the two-party system presents to the American people, particularly among younger voters and those not affiliated with either the Democratic or Republican parties. In a Quinnipiac poll, 52 percent of independents and 62 percent of young people aged 18 to 34 said they would consider voting for a third-party candidate.

The obvious question is why, in the face of widespread popular revulsion, particularly among young people, against the racist bigotry and bullying authoritarianism of Donald Trump, the most unpopular figure ever nominated by one of the two major capitalist parties, the Clinton campaign is so obviously struggling.

The answer is that the Democratsand Clinton in particularare themselves deeply reviled. As a political organization, the Democratic Party represents an alliance between dominant sections of Wall Street, the military-intelligence apparatus and the most privileged sections of the upper middle class. Behind its empty rhetoric, the attitude of these layers to the working class is one of hostility and contempt.

Clinton, in an unguarded moment before wealthy donors last week, let slip the outlook of the Democrat Party when she said that half of all Trump supporters made up a basket of deplorables, speaking of broad sections of the population as if they were another species. Those backing Trump, she said, were racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobicyou name it.

There is no question that Trump has appealed to all those forms of bigotry in the course of his campaign. However, he has also made an appeal, in an entirely demagogic way, to deep-seated economic grievances. Among white men without a college education, he leads Clinton by as much as 50 percentage points.

If there is unrest among white workers, the apologists of the Democratic Party claim, it is due entirely to racism, exacerbated by eight years of the administration of the first black president. President Obama repeatedly asserts that conditions in America are pretty darn great, and liberal pundits hailed, falsely, the latest Census report on income as proof that claims of widespread economic distress in America had no factual basis (see: Further considerations on the household income report: Poverty and inequality in America).

In fact, what is ultimately fueling social and political discontent is the enormous decline in living standards, over which the Democrats no less than the Republicans have presided. The association of the Democratic Party with liberal social reform belongs to a particular historical periodbetween the inauguration of Franklin Roosevelt in 1933 and Lyndon Johnsons Great Society programs of the mid-1960s.

Since then, a half century has passed without a single meaningful social reform, as the Democrats have moved continuously to the right. During his time in office from 1977 to 1980, Jimmy Carter laid the foundation for the social counter-revolution that took place under Reagan during the 1980s. And during the years of Bill Clinton, the Democrats oversaw the dismantling of welfare, the end of the Glass-Steagall restraints on the banks and other right-wing measures.

Throughout this period, the trade unions transitioned from their alliance with the Democratic Party on the basis of ferocious anti-communism into outright instruments of the corporations and the state. They have and continue to collaborate in the orderly shutdown of factories and mines, after pushing through wage and benefit cuts on the bogus pretext of saving jobs.

The Democratic Partys liberalism consists, not in advocating economic reforms, but in promoting identity politicssetting aside a portion of the profits and perks of the ruling elite for a small section of highly privileged blacks, women, gays, etc., to give a veneer of diversity to an increasingly unequal and undemocratic social order.

This reached its culmination in the election of Obama, the first African-American president, who promised hope and change and delivered war and economic stagnation. Now we have the candidacy of Hillary Clinton, who would be the first female president, presumably giving a feminine touch to the delivery of cruise missiles and 500-pound bombs and the evisceration of Social Security, Medicare and other social programs in the interests of big business.

What passes for left politics in the United States, from the Sanders wing of the Democratic Party to its supporters in the pseudo-left, is completely bankrupt. Yet this bankruptcy is an expression of a broader crisis of political legitimacy of the state apparatus as a whole.

In the end, the actual policy differences between Clinton and Trump are comparatively small. The next administration, regardless of who heads it, will escalate the drive to war against Russia and China, and intensify the ongoing assault on jobs, living standards and social benefits. But the rise of Trump points to new dangers in the political situation. The Trump campaign is tapping into the same social anger, and giving it a noxious right-wing expression, as similar political movements that have developed over the past decade in Europe.

The urgent conclusion that must be drawn from the political crisis in the United States is the necessity for building a revolutionary socialist movement--to unite working people across all lines of race, gender, sexual orientation, immigration status, etc., in a struggle for common class interests: jobs, decent living standards, the rebuilding of the social infrastructure of roads, schools, water systems and hospitals, and an end to imperialist war and police violence.

It is to build a socialist leadership in the working class that the SEP is running candidates, Jerry White and Niles Niemuth, in the presidential elections. We urge workers and young people to support the SEP campaign and attend the conference that concludes the campaign, November 5 in Detroit, Socialism vs. Capitalism and War.
As the Kollywood grapevine, director Soundarya Rajinikanth and husband Ashwin Ramkumar have approached a family court for a divorce.

By India Today Web Desk: It seemed like a mere rumour at first. But according to reports, superstar Rajinikanth's second daughter Soundarya and husband Ashwin Ramkumar have filed for a divorce at a family court in Chennai.

Soundarya, who married Ashwin, an industrialist in 2010, has taken this decision after they have been having a difference of opinion for a few years now.



ALSO READ: Oppam- Kamal Haasan to reprise Mohanlal's role in the Tamil remake?

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ALSO READ: Is Nayanthara part of Mahesh Babu's next with AR Murugadoss?

According toDC, Rajinikanth, who turned from the US, stayed with Soundarya and tried to compromise his daughter. However, Soundarya decided to go ahead with a legal separation.

Soundarya and Ashwin have a son Ved, who turned one recently.

Also, when Ashwin was asked about this, he refused to comment on the issue.





After amalapaul - Al.Vijay now #Kollywood next celebrity couple to apply divorce is Soundarya - Ashwin. meyyappan (@meyyappanram) September 16, 2016

Soundarya, who started her career as a graphic designer, went on to direct India's first motion capture film Kochadaiiyaan with father Rajinikanth in the lead role.

Notably, it was Soundarya who introduced director Pa Ranjith to Rajinikanth for his blockbuster gangster film Kabali. She's currently working on her next feature film, which is touted to be a romantic comedy.

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In yet another brutal police killing of a young person, Columbus, Ohio cops shot and killed a 13-year-old boy Wednesday following a short foot chase. The youth died a little while later in the hospital. No officers were injured.

Police said they were responding to a report of an armed robbery when they spotted three people, all African American, they say matched the description of the suspects. Two fled on foot with the cops in pursuit. Police said one of the pair pulled a gun and one officer fired, hitting the victim, Tyre King, multiple times. The weapon King allegedly brandished turned out to be a BB gun.

Demetrius Braxton, one of the youth who was with King, was not injured. He disputed police claims that King brandished a weapon. He told the Columbus Dispatch newspaper that he saw the shooting. Braxton said police started chasing them and they ran. The cops said to get down. We got down but my friend (King) got up and ran.

He started to run. When he ran the cops shot him. He said that police fired four or five times.

I didnt think a cop would shoot. Why didnt they tase him? Braxton said.

The officer involved in the shooting, Bryan Mason, was a nine-year veteran of the force. He has been placed on administrative leave while police conduct an internal investigation. In 2012 an officer with the same name was involved in another fatal shooting. The Columbus police department has not confirmed if it was the same officer.

Columbus was the scene of several protests against police violence earlier this year. The mayor and other city officials called for calm in the wake of the shooting of King and asked the support of religious and community leaders in an attempt to diffuse social anger.

The shooting of King is the latest in an unending series of police atrocities. According to the website, killedbypolice.net, already 40 people have been killed by police in the US this month. The immense and growing level of police violence is rooted in widening inequality and growing social tensions.

King was the second youngest person killed by police this year. The shooting follows the killing of 12-year-old Ciera Miller during an eviction in Pennsylvania. In another incident, a six-year-old child was shot and wounded by police in Louisiana while they were apprehending the boys father.

The police killing in Columbus comes in the wake of the shooting two years ago of 12-year-old Tamir Rice in Cleveland. Police claimed they mistook a toy pistol carried by the child for a real gun. No warning was issued. Video of the event shows the police gunning down Rice within seconds of arriving on the scene. However, a grand jury refused to indict the cops involved.

According to a report in the Washington Post, police have shot and killed at least 60 people holding what later turned out to be toy guns since 2015. In 2014, police shot and killed 22-year-old John Crawford in a WalMart store located in Beavercreek, Ohio, just outside Dayton. Crawford had picked up a BB gun from an opened box in the store and was walking around with it while talking on a cell phone. A store video of the event shows an officer firing immediately on arrival without giving any verbal commands to drop the alleged weapon. A grand jury later refused to indict any of the cops involved.

The city of Columbus has seen more than 170 police shootings since 2004. Police officials have claimed virtually all were within policy guidelines. Earlier this week, the City of Columbus agreed to a $780,000 settlement in a case involving the accidental shooting of a 4-year-old girl by Columbus police. Ava Ellis was shot in the leg by an officer who was trying to shoot the family dog, which he claimed had threatened him. The girl suffered scarring and will require future surgeries.

While prosecutors routinely refuse to indict police involved in unjustified fatal shootings, a recent case in West Virginia sheds further light on the institutionalized violence employed by police. Stephen Mader, a police officer in Weirton was fired following an incident where he decided not to fire his gun at a mentally disturbed man and instead tried to de-escalate the situation.

Mader responded to a domestic incident and encountered an armed man. Rather than using his weapon, the officer attempted to calm the man. He noted that the suspect was not pointing a gun at him and was asking the officer to shoot him. I thought I was going to be able to talk to him and de-escalate it, the officer told the Pittsburgh Gazette. I knew it was suicide by cop.

Two additional officers arrived, and one fatally shot the man in the head after he allegedly waved his gun in the air. The weapon turned out to be unloaded.

After being placed on administrative leave and investigated, Mader was terminated from the department in June for failing to eliminate a threat, thereby putting other officers at risk.
German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere ordered the arrest of three terrorist suspects on Tuesday morning in a major police operation in the state of Schleswig-Holstein. More than 200 officers from the Federal Criminal Agency (BKA), the federal police and police from several states participated in raids on three refugee accommodation centres and a number of apartments.

The special forces unit GSG9 arrested three men, aged 17, 18 and 26, all of whom turned out to be Syrians, in Ahrensburg and Grohansdorf, east of Hamburg, and in Reinfeld near Lubeck. The authorities allegedly secured thousands of dollars, false passports and mobile telephones from the suspects. The accused are now in investigative detention.

The operation was immediately exploited by politicians and the media to encourage xenophobic sentiments and to campaign for a strong state.

De Maiziere declared to the media, According to what is known so far, information from the BKA suggests the perpetrators had connections to the Paris attackers. There was the suspicion that the detainees came to Germany on behalf of Islamic State. Their passports were produced in the same workshop of a smuggling organisation that produced those for the Paris attackers, who killed 130 people last November. The three allegedly passed themselves off as refugees in November 2015 to travel through Greece and the Balkan route to Germany.

Although de Maiziere added the obligatory sentence that one could not place all refugees under suspicion, this is merely a cynical cover for his right-wing rhetoric. He immediately added that there were refugees who sympathise with terrorism.

Bavarias interior minister Joachim Hermann (Christian Social Union) spoke out and demanded strict border controls and clear identification of those who come to us in this country. Hermann claimed, The obvious gaps in control of the immense influx of refugees, above all last autumn, has had dire consequences. ISIS was exploiting the security gaps deliberately to smuggle attackers to Europe concealed as refugees.

The ruling class is using the same propaganda methods that dominated the media in the wake of the New Years Eve events in Cologne. While at the beginning of the year, they associated foreigners and refugees with criminals and rapists, they are now trying to stigmatise refugees as terrorists. This campaign plays directly into the hands of the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD), which commented confidently on its web site, Once again, the warnings of the AfD Schleswig-Holstein have been confirmed by reality. Chancellor Merkel had opened the borders of the federal republic and has left our country in a virtually defenceless state.

The same message was taken up by the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung in an article by Reinhard Muller, headlined, The consequences of openness without limits. Muller asserted that there was a high abstract risk from fundamentalist attackers, and called on the federal government to speak out clearly about what the result of openness without limits is. The opening of the borders remained a big experiment with literally many unknowns. His solution was a stronger state: In the Middle East, in the core area of the Islamist terror organisation, Germanys influence is limited. But hopefully not here at home, according to Muller.

The jurist Reinhard Muller was among those journalists calling last year for a military intervention in Syria. In a piece titled Need of the hour he called not only for an intervention in Syria, but also for the deployment of the German army domestically.

The limited information surrounding the anti-terror intervention in Schleswig-Holstein leaves open many questions. As the interior minister himself had to admit, there was, according to the current stage of the investigation, no evidence of concrete plans for an attack. At no point had any risks been associated with the people involved. The domestic intelligence agency had been spying on the men for nine months. According to the Suddeutsche Zeitung, a foreign intelligence agency cracked their coded chat messages with ISIS.

Why would such a suspected terrorist group be taken out in a major police operation now? The timing of the operation has clearly been guided by political motives. Days before the Berlin election, in which the CDU has led the way with a law-and-order campaign, the federal government wants to create an hysterical atmosphere and demonstrate the strength of the state.

Several government representatives and politicians praised the actions of the security forces. They were alert and acted decisively, according to de Maiziere. Federal justice minister Heiko Mas (Social Democratic Party, SPD) declared that the arrests showed that our authorities act decisively against suspected terrorists. And the interior minister of Schleswig-Holstein, Stefan Studt (SPD), praised the cooperation between federal and state police officers.

The true circumstances and background surrounding the anti-terror operation in Schleswig-Holstein remain unclear for now. But all politicians and journalists are silent on the real origin of terrorism. The imperialist wars in the Middle East, in which Germany actively participates, have not only destroyed entire societies and created the conditions that nourish terrorism. At the same time, the major powers, above all the United States, have armed and funded Islamist organisations to enforce their interests in the region.

In the Syrian civil war, they support so-called rebels, made up chiefly of the former al-Nusra Front, which are composed of Islamist jihadis fighting for the overthrow of the government.

The World Socialist Web Site has pointed to the connection between war policies and the domestic buildup of the state, writing, The Western powers are cooperating in Syria with the same forces which serve at home as the pretext for constructing a police state and for military interventions in the name of the war against terrorism.
The SP family feud between Mulayam Singh Yadav's brother and son finally seems to have settled down.

By India Today Web Desk: As the Samajwadi Party family feud has been in the open for the last five days now, we take a look at who is on whose side in the family.



Graphic by Mohak Gupta

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TALLAHASSEE, FL -- A community celebration returning to the Tallahassee this month represents local festivals held throughout the Philippines.

'Pista Sa Nayon' is a way for local Filipino-Americans to give back to Tallahassee.

As the annual event helps to provide local and international scholarships to students and also benefits local charities.

The 5th Annual 'Pista Sa Nayon' will be Saturday, September 17 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Kleman Plaza.

The event is free and open to the public.
TALLAHASSEE, FL (WTXL) - A hospital has reached an agreement with to pay $14,500 to the Agency for Health Care Administration after a woman died after being forcibly removed.

The AHCA filed a complaint against the the Calhoun-Liberty Hospital in February. The fine was originally $45,000 but they managed to reach a settlement agreement of $14,500.

Under the agreement, the hospital has until April 3rd, 2017 to pay the fine.

Our hospital is a vital part of our community, and we appreciate this opportunity to continue our operations knowing we will be able to satisfy not only our financial obligation, but also our commitment to high quality patient care. Recent visits from AHCA have indicated we are making tremendous progress, and we are immensely grateful to those who have made this development possible," said Ruth Attaway, the chair of the hospital board.

The balance of the fine, which is over $40,000, will be held for two years pending the hospital follows the new measures the agency has put in place.

On Dec. 21, 57-year old Barbara Dawson died of a blood clot in her lungs after collapsing in the hospital parking lot while being handcuffed. Dawson refused to leave the emergency room after complaining of shortness of breath.
GEORGIA (WTXL) - What with all the rumors of clowns with white vans creeping around children in other states, South Georgia police are speaking out against the panic, claiming there is no credibility to the alleged "clown sightings".

On a Facebook post, Gene Scarbrough, Tift County's Sheriff, said that he spoke with the county's school superintendent and he has found no validity in the claims.

"Mr. Atwater [Superintendent] advised me that the schools have been flooded with parents calling the schools concerning these rumors. He advised me that he has checked with every school principal about the rumors and each of them have absolutely no information concerning clown activity at their respective school," said Sheriff Scarbrough.

According to the Associated Press, the rumors come after several reports of clowns being spotted around children in other states, though authorities have determined some of those cases to be false.

Bainbridge Public Safety said on their Facebook page that the clown reports could also be blamed on social media.

The organization posted that, "The internet and social media sites have been plagued with reports of clowns, attempting to lure children into the woods or otherwise terrorizing communities around the world... Bainbridge Public Safety will continue to take these calls seriously, and would like to make it clear that this kind of behavior is neither funny or amusing."

They also said that many of the complaints in their area were found to be false, which has resulted in arrests.

As for what concerned parents are to do about the clown reports, Sheriff Scarbrough told parents to avoid acting irrationally.

"I ask and plead with you to not get on social media and post anything in regards to this activity unless you have verified the information with either the Tift County Sheriff's office or Tifton Police Department. This only causes panic among the population and we certainly don't need that, especially if it started as a malicious rumor," said the Sheriff.

Bainbridge Public Safety, however, expects more of these "clown-sightings" as Halloween approaches.
By PTI: Mumbai, Sep 16 (PTI) City-based SpeedJet Aviation has joined hands with Gulf Aviation Academy (GAA) of Bahrain to train pilots, cabin crew and other airline personnel as their demand in the domestic market was on the rise.

As part of the tie-up, SpeedJet Aviation, which offers training courses for cockpit and cabin crew and ground handling personnel, plans to churn out around 600 pilots by 2019, SpeedJet Aviation director Dharamraj Shukla told PTI.

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Last year, SpeedJet Aviation trained over 100 pilots for various type of aircraft including Airbus A320, Boeing 737 and Embraer E170/190, besides churning out than 150 cabin crew, Shulka said.

The academys range of training programmes includes pre-pilot training (12-15 months), type rating, cabin crew and ground handling.

Under the partnership with GAA, which is a part of Bahrain Mumtalakat Holding Company, the investment arm of the Bahrain government, the Mumbai-headquartered academy would be sending its students, enrolled for pilot and cabin crew courses, for training sessions at GAAs state-of-the-art facility in the Gulf country, Shukla said.

"The aviation industry is on a high-growth trajectory with India likely to become the third-largest aviation market by 2020.

"As of now, Indian airlines are reporting increased profitability; low-cost carriers have placed heavy orders for new aircraft. All these factors combined will lead to a sharp spike in demand for trained aviation personnel," Shukla said.

Domestic aviation market has been posting more than 20 per cent growth for over a year on account of low fuel prices and low airfares.

The Sydney-based aviation think-tank Centre for Pacific Aviation (CAPA), in its recent report, has projected that there could be further orders for 250-300 aircraft in the pipeline from SpiceJet, Vistara and Premier Airways, in addition to the huge orders already placed by carriers like IndiGo, Jet Airways and GoAir.

The tie-up offers Indian students a competitive advantage in the aviation industry that is at par with international norms, according to SpeedJet Aviation.

This move is a first-of-its-kind for GAA in the Asian market to offer a comprehensive range of structured training programmes for all aviation personnel including pilots, cabin crew, engineers and ground staff, it said.

India being one of the largest and fastest growing air travel market provides great opportunities for individuals to pursue a career in the aviation sector, GAAs Chief Executive Officer Dhaffer Al Abbasi said.

"Our state-of-the-art course equipment enables us to offer a comprehensive and modern aviation training infrastructure, besides the students also get access to various training facilities around the world through our global affiliates," he said. PTI IAS SMN

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Wapato police officer Michael Campos will remain on leave even after Yakima Countys top prosecutor ruled that he was justified in fatally sho
If You Go

 What: In the Shadow of a Master: The Art of Alfredo Arreguin and Doug Johnson

 When: Today through Jan. 7, with an opening reception at 5 p.m. today

 Where: The Yakima Valley Museum, 2105 Tieton Drive, Yakima

 Cost: Opening reception free; regular museum admission thereafter ($5 adults, $3 students and seniors, free for children under 5, $12 for families)

 Information: www.yakimavalleymuseum.org
Pete Bansmer, a member of the Downtown Yakima Rotary Club, stacks boxes of donated food Saturday, Oct. 3, 2015, during the Operation Harvest food drive at the Salvation Army parking in Yakima, Wash. Dozens of volunteers helped gather food during the annual event. (MARK MOREY/Yakima Herald-Republic)
You are the owner of this article.
By PTI: Colombo, Sep 16 (PTI) Sri Lanka has said it will build a power plant at eastern Trincomalee district, days after it ended a joint venture with Indias National Thermal Power corporation (NTPC) to develop a coal power plant at the same site.

The government conveyed the decision to the Supreme Court yesterday in response to a complaint filed by an environmentalist organisation.

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Sri Lankas Minister of Power and Energy Ranjith Siyambalapitiya told reporters that the decision to stop the joint venture with India was taken to reduce the use of coal as a power generating source.

"The decision is limited to doing away with using coal as a power generating source. It doesnt mean that a power plant would not be built in Sampur," Siyambalapitiya said.

He said the government was trying to strike a balance between coal power and other sources in building generating plants in the future.

The government, however, has not said who will assist in building the power plant.

"There is a strong school of thought that coal fire would be a cheaper source for power generation as opposed to other sources," Siyambalapitiya said.

The decision to stop the coal fired plant at Sampur town in Trincomalee was due to environmental concerns, he said.

"The government has taken a policy decision to minimise the use of coal for power generation," he added.

The Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) the state power entity had entered into an agreement with Indias NTPC to build the coal-fired power plant at Sampur in 2006.

The Sri Lankan government on Tuesday had told the Supreme court that it will not go ahead with the joint venture after strong objections from environmentalists and the public. PTI CORR MRJ AKJ MRJ

--- ENDS ---
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That the relations between the White House and the Israeli government are tense is indisputable. There is, however, a dispute over whose fault it isUS President Barack Obama or Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu's supporters say Obama, Obama's supporters say Netanyahu, but here's a surprise: there is one key issue in which both of them are in the same boat and are both guilty.

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An article recently published by the Washington Post shed new light on how the negotiations on the American military aid to Israel for the next 10 years became so complicated. Here's a short reminder: the current agreement, which expires in early 2018, gives Israel $3.1 billion a year. In addition, Congress has approved special aid for Israel for the development of missile systems, which raises the total to some $3.5 billion a year, part of it going toward the funding of IDF purchases from Israel's defense industries.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (L) and US President Barack Obama (Photo: Amit Shabi, MCT)

During the battle over the agreement with Iran, the administration expressed its willingness to raise the annual sum to $4 billion, as long as Israel retrained its attacks on the administration in Congress. Netanyahu refused. He insisted on speaking against the administration at a joint session of the two Houses of Congress.

His gamble did not pay off: after the Iran agreement was approved, the administration reduced the sums and aggravated the conditions. One of the conditions was that the funding of the IDF's purchases in Israel would be gradually stopped. This was very bad news for Israel's defense industries.

Our defense establishment sought an agreement that would continue the current situation. The White House would add several hundred millions of dollars a year in compensation for the deal with Iran, and Congress would continue to allot the money separately, as it does today. Obama and Netanyahu thought differently: they insisted on uniting both channels into one package. The administration would give more, and Israel would pledge not to ask Congress for an additional allocation of funds, no matter what.

This isnt a technical issue. As the Godfather said, it's all personal. Obama wanted to leave behind an impressively large package, which would position him as the president who was most concerned about Israel's security, more than all of his predecessors. That would be his response to his Republican rivals' criticism. That would be his legacy. Netanyahu wanted to reach an impressively large package in order to establish the claim that his attacks on the administration actually benefitted Israel rather than causing damage, and that he overpowered Obama with his own words.

But it's not that simple. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, chairperson of the Senate's Committee on Appropriations, didn't like the agreement . He didn't want to let Obama present himself as Israel's greatest friend, and marked up a bill of his own that would give Israel $3.4 billion next year, in addition to other sums.

White House officials understood the trick and were furious. According to the American paper, they demanded that Netanyahu call Graham and ask him to drop the bill. Netanyahu made the phone call, but Graham refused. "The Israeli prime minister told me the administration is refusing to sign the MOU (memorandum of understanding) until I agree to change my appropriation markup back to $3.1 billion," Graham said. "I said, 'Tell the administration to go F themselves.'"

Graham made it clear that the demand, which Netanyahu accepted, to avoid lobbying Congress for additional money in the next 10 years, was invalid. "Im offended that the administration would try to take over the appropriations process," he said. "If they dont like what Im doing, they can veto the bill. We cant have the executive branch dictating what the legislative branch will do for a decade based on an agreement we are not a party to."

And so Israel got caught up once again in the internal political conflict in Washington. Obama, who wanted to gain a headline without paying too much, encountered a stubborn rival, who did everything in his power to embarrass him; Netanyahu, who wanted to turn the agreement into a victory celebration, got caught in the eye of the storm. And most importantly, our defense establishment remains in a state of uncertainty. Government workers on both sides have worked for two weeks to reachso they hopeunderstandings that everyone would be able to live with.

With fewer ego issues, the first plan could have been implemented, allowing the administration to allot funds and Congress to add to that. America is very generous towards us; why destroy it?
The Israel Police's Traffic Division warned on Thursday that from 11:30pm on Friday to Saturday at 8:30am, improvement construction works will be carried out on the Savidor Center Train Station in Tel Aviv that is located on the Ayalon highway (Highway 20) between the Hahalacha Interchange and Arlozorov Interchange.

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During the construction, three of the four southbound lanes will be closed in that section. In addition, the on-ramps from KKL Interchange and Rokach Interchange will be closed.

The Ayalon Highway (Photo: Avi Moalem)

Further, from Sunday to Wednesday from 11pm to 4am each night, infrastructure works by the Israel Electric Corporation will be carried out which will close Highway 6 between the Iron Interchange and the Baka Interchange in both directions. The immediate area is also to be off-limits due to the transfer of power lines.

These changes in traffic join the eight days of Tel Aviv train stations' closing from Monday. Only Hagana Station will remain operational as usual as stations Tel Aviv University, Savidor Center, and HaShalom cease all activities while infrastructural work gets underway on the electrification of an Israel Railways train which will travel between Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Herzliya.

The affected stations will close at 12:15am on Tuesday September 19 and reopen on Tuesday September 27 at 5am.
By PTI: New York, Sep 16 (PTI) Researchers, including one of Indian-origin, in the US have launched a clinical trial to determine whether infusing an experimental antibody into HIV-negative men and transgender individuals will prevent the deadly HIV infection from developing.

The study, known as the Antibody Meditated Prevention (AMP) is done by Rutger Universitys New Jersey Medical Schools Clinical Research Center (NJMS-CRC) in the US.

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"It is the first study of this magnitude to see whether an antibody infusion can help prevent new HIV infections. If it proves effective, it could potentially pave a way for developing a vaccine for HIV infection," said Shobha Swaminathan, an infectious disease specialist and the NJMS-CRC site leader.

Antibodies are one of the natural ways the human body fights infection. The antibody being studied was initially detected in an individual who was able to successfully control HIV infection without taking any medications for HIV.

At the current time, HIV infections can be treated with many medications but only one medication is available to prevent new infections, and it is not always effective due to noncompliance and other issues, Swaminathan said.

HIV continues to be a major global public health issue, though the rate of infection has fallen significantly in recent years.

Beyond indicating whether the antibody VRC01 is likely to prevent HIV infection, the study also will have an important ancillary result, she said.

Enrollment activities will provide opportunities for high-risk individuals who have not been tested before to both get tested for HIV and also be educated about risk reduction strategies.

"The study is providing ways for Rutgers to effectively partner with and engage the community effectively to ensure a positive impact that will last long after the study is completed," Swaminathan said.

AMP study sites are recruiting a combined 2,700 HIV-negative men and transgender individuals whose sexual partners are men, the highest-risk demographic for HIV infection, to test the efficacy of VRC01.

Those enrolled will either be given intravenous infusions of VRC01 or a placebo every eight weeks for a total of 10 infusions.

Participants will be closely monitored for approximately 22 months for safety and also to determine whether theyve remained HIV-negative. PTI NKS AKJ AMS

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Did you get to the store this week and realize that there's no fresh chicken? Don't worry, the chicken shortage that's been going on over the past two weeks is about to be over  and by Monday fresh chicken is supposed to return to supermarket freezers.

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The Ministry of Agriculture released a statement saying that there would be a chicken shortage throughout the month of September, specifically between the 12th and the 16th.

The reason for the shortage is because the majority of the Muslims who work in the slaughterhouses are on vacation for the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha. The holiday commemorate when, according to Islamic tradition, God told Ibrahim to sacrifice Ismail, then sent down the angel Jibril (Gabriel) and told Ibrahim that although he hadn't gone through the act of sacrificing his son, the sacrifice had been accepted.





There will be a poultry shortage until Monday (Photo: Yaron Brenner)

Although the holiday ended Wednesday, the slaughterhouse workers will only return to work on Sunday, and fresh chicken will be seen in stores as usual starting on Monday.

Sources in the poultry industry said that the preparations for this year's poultry shortage have been more successful than in the past due to the higher rate of slaughter before the holiday started.

These same sources said that there is a lot of tension between the poultry association and the Ministry of Agriculture due to the poultry growers waiting for a new cartel to be created for poultry growers under the supervision of the poultry council.

The Ministry of Agriculture said in response that the ministry is currently determining the best way to deal with the issue in order to ensure that the poultry council continues to exist, and to protect the farmers and the welfare of the animals.

Meanwhile, Rami Levy and Supersal supermarket chains have reported that the chicken shortage will be over by Monday.
The heads of the Orthodox parties, the Health Minister Rabbi Yaakov Litzman, Interior Minister Rabbi Aryeh Deri, and MK Rabbi Moshe Gafni, have once again expressed strong protest over Tel Aviv infrastructure projects, which according to them, are unnecessary as they are not vital for saving lives. The main religious factions added that the work will be carried out on Friday night , even though it can be conducted any other night during the week.

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In a joint statement released Thursday night, the three said, "Conducting work on Friday night is extremely serious and we strongly protest this attack on the honor of Shabbat."

Moshe Gafni, Yaakov Litzman and Aryeh Deri (Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg, Alex Klomoisky and Gil Yohanan)

Traffic police announced that starting Friday at 11:30pm, work will be carried out on the Savidor train station in Tel Aviv, located on the Ayalon Highway between the Halacha and Arlozorov interchanges. The work is expected to last until 8:30am Saturday.

Out of the three projects scheduled for work on Saturday, one was cancelled by the Ministry of Labor and moved to another day in the middle of the week. Currently, there are two projects scheduled for Shabbat and the Ministry of Labor has dramatically cut the number of Jewish workers taking part.

Ultra Orthodox party leaders point out, "While the work and the amount of Jewish workers have been reduced, we still vehemently protest the conduct of the police, who are acting unprofessionally by enforcing work on Friday night, when it can be done on another day.

"It is unfortunate that this important decision was made without trying to prevent the holy Shabbat from being desecrated. We demand an immediate meeting with the chief of police to impress upon him the seriousness of things."
Four days have passed since the Syrian cease fire began, and it seems that despite it's fragility, the signatories by and large still haven't broken it. Despite this, the Russian Defense Ministry counted 45 ceasefire violations on Thursday, pointing an accusatory finger at the United States.

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"(The Americans) are making it more difficult to fight against the terrorists, and the rebels which they support are violating the ceasefire," the Russians said.

Meanwhile, the UN said that "Assad is not permitting aid trucks to get to Aleppo." At the same time, the Assad regime has washed its hands of any and all blame, saying that they have stopped attacks against rebel positions.

Destruction in Aleppo (Photo: Reuters)

The Russian government clarified that it has completely stopped all joint strikes with the Assad regime on Rebel positions, and that Russian soldiers have begun to withdraw from the main roads leading to Aleppo. They also said that the only place where the ceasefire isn't in effect is in the fight against ISIS.

Despite this, Al-Jazeera, which is aligned with the rebel groups, reported that the Assad regime has continued to attack and violate the ceasefire in conjunction with Russian jets. The Syrian regime put up cameras with a constant live stream of Aleppo to prove to the world that they aren't violating the ceasefire.

Despite the fact that the ceasefire was created after unprecedented cooperation between the US and Russia, the Russians have expressed harsh criticism at American conduct during the cessation of hostilities.

A Syrian soldier in a tank outside of Aleppo (Photo: AFP)

"The Americans aren't standing by their agreements, aren't sending the exact locations of the positions of the moderate rebel groups, and the groups which (the US) supports aren't respecting the ceasefire."

'The Assad regime isn't allowing aid trucks to go through'

Aleppo continues to burn (Photo: AFP)

Meanwhile, the UN claims that the Assad regime has been preventing aid trucks from reaching Aleppo  aid which was supposed to have reached the besieged city on Friday.

"The humanitarian aid, which represents a huge change for the citizens of the city  apart from the bombs  has run into problems," said the UN Special Envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura.

He added that the expectation was that the Assad regime will respect its commitment to opening up roads to aid, however, the regime has yet to do this.





The US and Russia sign the ceasefire deal (Photo: AP)

"The commitment is to give a final approval to the UN to be able to send the aid to the people who need it," he continued. "We still haven't received the approval; thats a fact. It's a shame that we are wasting time. These are days that we need to use to send the aid convoys, especially because there is no fighting. This is the agreement which was reached between the Russians and the Americans, and it needs to be carried out immediately."

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported on Wednesday that no one was killed during the first two days of the ceasefire. The Russians reported a long list of violations of the ceasefire during this time, while SOHR claimed that Assad regime violations were three times as many as what the Russians reported for the rebels.

However, strikes against ISIS have continued.
Russia's deputy foreign minister says the future of President Bashar Assad is an internal Syrian issue and the US-Russia Syria agreement does not deal with it.

Assad has been accused of war crimes in the Syrian civil war and his opponents inside and outside the country have insisted that his departure is a prerequisite for a peace settlement.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov said in an interview with the RIA Novosti news agency on Friday that Assad's future is "purely Syrian business" and that the cease-fire deal that the United States and Russia signed last week did not discuss Assad's future in any way.
A Jordanian man attempted to stab a Border Police soldier at the Damascus gate in the Old City of Jerusalem on Friday following afternoon prayers.

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Border Police soldiers opened fire on the man after he ran at them while yelling "Allahu Akbar." The man was neutralized. He did not cause any injuries in his attack, and has succumbed to his wounds.

The Jordanian attacker after being neutralized.

Knives that the Jordanian attacker had in his possesion.

He was found to be carrying a Jordanian indentification card, and had two knives in his possesion.

Scene of the terror attack

X

The Israel Police Spokesperson's Unit said that "the terrorist was a Jordanian resident, who was entering the Old City of Jerusalem via Damascus Gate. The Israel Border Police identified the suspect, and carried out the proper protocols. The terrorist quickly approached the officers with his hand raised and clutching a knife. The officers acted professionally, and identified him as an attacker, whereby they neutralized him.

The scene of the attack. (Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg)

The terrorist had a knife in each hand, and was found to have a third knife on his person.
PARIS- A court in Corsica has convicted five people for violence on a beach that was initially believed linked to a woman wearing a full-body burkini swimsuit.

The mayor of Sisco, where last month's clash occurred, said on France-Info radio Friday he hoped the town could now turn the page on this "painful affair." Several people were wounded in the violence between a group of sunbathers of North African origin from a nearby town and local villagers.

Mayor Ange-Pierre Vivoni banned burkinis in his town after the violence, though later conceded he didn't know whether a burkini was involved.
NANTES- Egypt took delivery of a second French Mistral helicopter carrier on Friday, part of a $1 billion deal signed last year.

Egypt took over the ship at a ceremony in the Atlantic coast port of Saint-Nazaire. It was the second of two France agreed last year to sell to Egypt.

The two ships were originally built for sale to Russia, but that sale was cancelled after Russia's annexation of Crimea.
Over 5,500 IDF "lone soldiers" gathered at Israel's largest water park outside of Tel Aviv for a "Fun Day" hosted by Friends of the Israel Defense Forces (FIDF) in partnership with the IDF and Yachad Lemaan Hachayal (The Association for the Wellbeing of Israel's Soldiers and The LIBI Fund). This was the largest "Fun Day" for lone soldiers ever held.

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IDF lone soldiers are soldiers with no immediate family in Israel, or are Israelis who do not have any contact with their parents.

There are some 6,400 lone soldiers from 80 countries serving in the IDF today. About 880 are American, 530 are Russian, 520 are Ukrainian, and 460 are French.

Lone soldiers at the Lone Soldier Fun Day (Photo: Scally Photography)

Sixty-eight percent of all lone soldiers in the IDF are men, while 32 percent are women.

The FIDF Fun Day at the Shefayim Water Park just north of Tel Aviv benefitted lone soldiers from all over the IDF. In addition to the parks many attractions, the Fun Day featured a pool party with leading Israeli DJ Eran Barnea, gift care packages including wireless headphones, an all-day smorgasbord of barbeque and desserts and performances by Israeli superstars Static and Ben El Tavori.

Lone soldiers at the Shefayim water park (Photo: Scally Photography)

The FIDF cares for all lone soldiers serving in the IDF through the Lone Soldiers' Program, which helps support them financially, socially, and emotionally during and after their military service.

Lone soldiers at the Fun Day (Photo: Serena Carsley-Mann)

They also sponsor flights for lone soldiers to visit their families and friends in their countries of origin.

In addition to the 5,500 lone soldiers, there were also various IDF unit commanders, high-ranking officers, 1,000 IDF social welfare non-commissioned officers and FIDF supporters at the festivities to meet and personally thank these men and women in uniform for their service.
A suicide bomber shouted "Allahu akbar" and blew himself up in a packed mosque in northwestern Pakistan, killing at least 25 people and wounding 30 during Friday prayers, a local official said.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing in Payee Khan, a village in Mohmand Agency that is part of the lawless Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) bordering Afghanistan.

Akbar added that some fatalities appear to have been caused when part of the mosque caved in from the force of the blast. "A portion of the mosque and verandah collapsed in the blast and fell on worshippers. We are still retrieving bodies and the injured from the rubble of the mosque," he said.
Sgt. Elor Azarias trial for shooting and killing neutralized terrorist Abdel Fatah al-Sharif in Hebron last March continued on Thursday, with a new point of contention. Prof. Yehuda Hiss, the former head of the Abu Kabir Institute for Forensic Medicine, which submitted an autopsy report finding that al-Sharif was killed by Azarias bullets, spoke for the Defense. Hiss claimed that the autopsy was improperly carried out, and that it failed to supply key information that could affect its conclusions.

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According to Hiss, the evidence supplied by Abu Kabirs report is inconclusive so that while al-Sharif did appear to have died from being shot six timeswhich had caused one of his lungs to collapse as well as brain injuryAzaria was not necessarily the one who had delivered the fatal gunshot.

Elor Azaria in court (Photo:Motti Kimch)

Hiss based his own testimony on the autopsy report written by the staff at Abu Kabir and headed by Dr. Gibbs, with the Defense claiming that it was not given the opportunity to examine the body.

Prof. Yehuda Hiss (Photo: Motti Kimchi)

When asked whether al-Sharif died as a result of an embolism, he answered that he did. There were no head injuries that would indicate (a cause of) death, said Hiss, who rejected the notion that al-Sharif died due to a bullet entering his brain. Hiss also criticized the lack of laboratory work that would have been of use in determining what had actually happened.

Hiss also refuted Dr. Gibbs stating that bleeding had occurred. She herself understands that what she wrote in her conclusions is not right. It is possible that Dr. Gibbs imagined seeing bleeding. I would have documented it correctly.

Psychiatrist finds Azaria to be suffering from post trauma

Psychiatrist Issaschar Herman was also called upon to testify for the Defense. Prosecutor Nadav Weisman asked about certain discrepancies between Azarias different testimonies. Specifically, Weisman referred Herman to Azaria stating that he had read all of the previous testimonies he gave the militarys Criminal Investigation Division (CID), while telling Herman contradictory information.

L to R: Psychiatrist Issaschar Herman and Defense Attorney Ilan Katz (Photo:Motti Kimchi)

Herman acknowledged that Azaria told him something different, but explained that the question to be asked here was whether Azaria gave Herman a false account of what happened, whether Azaria told him something different because he was embarrassed he could not read (a claim based on his learning disabilities), or whether he was exhausted and unable to read due to a lack of sleep.

When asked by Judge Sitbon why Herman rules out that Azaria shot al-Sharif out of a sense of vengeance, Herman replied, My impression is that this particular soldier does not have a vindictive personality. He elaborated on this point, describing how I asked him whether he was mocked at school. He said that he was, but I did not detect anger or a desire to take vengeance on them. The same goes for the way he sees his company commander, who he is angry at. He talked about how he disengages, but nothing beyond that. Instead, Herman told the court that He suffers from posttraumatic stress disorder, and his condition will worsen as the trial goes on. This needs to be wrapped up as quickly as possible.

During the trial meeting of the trial, Azarias former sergeant, Staff Sgt. T., defended him and described Azaria as professional and caring, adding that He never expressed himself in an attacking manner against Palestinians and that Azaria did not behave like thug.
Supreme Court today extended the parole of Sahara chief Subrata Roy till September 23. In May Roy was granted parole till September 23 because his mother had passed away.

By Press Trust of India: Supreme Court on Friday extended the parole of Sahara chief Subrata Roy till September 23, granted to him in May on humanitarian grounds after his mother passed away.

The parole continued later to enable him arrange money to refund his investors.

The decision to extend the relief was taken by a bench headed by Chief Justice TS Thakur in-chamber as his parole was to end on Friday.

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Also Read: Sahara's Subrata Roy granted 4-week parole to attend mother's last rites

The regular special bench of CJI and Justices AR Dave and AK Sikri was not available.

Sahara's lawyer Keshav Mohan said that a draft of Rs 353 crore has been deposited in the SEBI-Sahara account.



RELIEF EXTENDED

The bench extended the relief to 68-year-old Roy till September 23, the next date of hearing.

The apex court on September 2 had asked the Sahara Group to come clean by disclosing its sources from where it had raised Rs 25,000 crore and paid its investors in cash, observing that it is "difficult to digest" as such a huge amount "cannot fall from the heavens."

It had earlier extended Roy's parole on August 3 till Friday with a condition that he has to deposit to Rs 300 crore with SEBI.

The apex court had granted parole to Roy on May 6 for four weeks on humanitarian ground following the death of his mother Chhabi Roy in Lucknow after prolonged illness.

Besides Roy, the court had also granted parole to a jailed Sahara director, Ashok Roy Choudhary.

It had said they were free to meet prospective buyers of properties and move within the country under police escort.

Roy has been lodged in Tihar jail since March 4, 2014 on the orders of the apex court in relation with a long running dispute with market regulator SEBI.

Also Read

Disclose source of funds raised: Supreme Court to Sahara





--- ENDS ---
The Pentagon said on Friday that a US-led coalition air strike on Sept. 7 killed an ISIS leader who oversaw the militant group's propaganda.

Pentagon Spokesperson Peter Cook said in a statement that the air strike took place near Raqqa, Syria, and targeted and killed Wa'il Adil Hasan Salman al-Fayad, also known as Dr. Wa'il.

ISIS controls parts of Iraq and Syria and has broadcast its beheadings of journalists and aid workers over the past few years. The group has sympathizers in several countries who have carried out bombings and shootings of civilians.
Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who oversees the US foreign aid budget, said Friday that Israel made a mistake by signing a new $38 billion security agreement with the Obama administration. Graham has reportedly already voiced his emphatic objections to the aid deal over the last few days.

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Sen. Graham, R-S.C., said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu could have gotten a better deal if he had waited until President Barack Obama left office.





Sen. Lindsey Graham (Photo: Reuters)

Graham said there is ample support in Congress among Republicans and Democrats for providing Israel with more military aid. And a new US president, either Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump, would be more generous too, he said on a conference call arranged by the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs.

"They left money on the table," Graham said of Israel.

The security agreement, which begins in the 2019 budget year, is set to last 10 years and amounts to $3.8 billion annually. The current deal expires in 2018 and gave Israel $3.1 billion in military assistance each year.

L to R: Sen. Lindsey Graham with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (Photo: EPA)

Graham, who chairs a Senate Appropriations subcommittee, said Congress isn't a party to the agreement and shouldn't be bound by the deal. He said he intended to test in the coming weeks a provision that restricts lawmakers from providing for more money than the deal mandates by pushing for a supplemental budget that would give Israel an additional $1.5 billion over what the administration has proposed.

The Obama administration is trying to "neuter" Congress but undercutting its ability to appropriate money, according to Graham. "I will not stand for that," he said.

Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, seemed to side with Graham on that point. Corker said in a statement Wednesday that the agreement "sends an important signal about our long-term commitment to Israel," but the amount of money "is ultimately up to Congress to decide."

The US and Israel signed the agreement Wednesday after months of negotiations conducted amid the tension between the two nations created by the nuclear deal with Iran. Netanyahu acknowledged the strain but stressed that the agreement proves that "relations between Israel and the United States are strong, powerful."

Obama's national security adviser Susan Rice, who witnessed the signing, called it a sign of Washington's "unshakable commitment" to the security of the Jewish state.

Others, however, voiced ther criticism of the deal ad of Netanyahu. One of them was Netanyhu's former security advisor, Prof. Uzi Arad, who said Netanyahu "gambled and missed an historic opportunity."

The total includes $33 billion in foreign military financing fundswhich is money used to buy materiel and ammunitionas well as $5 billion in missile defense funding. Under the previous arrangement, Congress approved funds for Israel's "Iron Dome" missile defense system separately and on an annual basis.

The new agreement eliminates Israel's ability to spend a fraction of the funds on fuel for its military. In another apparent concession, Israel has agreed not to ask Congress to approve more funds than are included in the deal unless a new war breaks out, according to US officials.

Graham said lawmakers this year wanted to give Israel $600 million for missile defense$100 million more than the agreement proposes to provide in 2019 when the threats Israel is facing from Iran and extremists groups are expected to be even more pronounced. Graham said he also pushed for a $300 million hike in the foreign military financing account.

Iran, Graham warned, will view the new agreement as a "watering down" of the US commitment to Israel.
This has been a long time in the making, but in our continuing pursuit to bring only the best of firearms, 2nd Amendment and defence related news to our readers, we are very excited to announce the next step in our evolution as a company.

As of 2020, Minuteman Review is now the proud owner and operator of Your Defence News, a website with a long history of breaking huge news stories and investigative journalism.

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Keep an eye. Big things are coming soon. We couldn't be more excited.

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By PTI: Peshawar, Sep 16 (PTI) At least 25 people, including five children, were killed and 30 others injured when a suicide bomber shouting Allahu Akbar blew himself up inside a mosque packed with worshippers for Friday prayers in Mohmand Agency in Pakistans restive northwest tribal region.

The attacker blew himself when the prayers were in progress at the mosque in the Anbar tehsil of the agency bordering Afghanistan.

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"A suicide bomber was in the mosque. He shouted Allahu Akbar and blew himself up," Assistant Political Agent Naveed Akbar told reporters.

He said that Friday prayers were being offered around 2 PM when the powerful blast took place.

At least 25 people, including five children, were killed in the attack and 30 others injured, Pakistani media reported, citing officials.

"Many people were gathered inside the mosque when a suicide bomber blew himself up," an eyewitness said.

Rescue teams and police rushed to the spot. The bodies and the injured are being shifted to local hospitals for medical treatment.

Injured were also taken to hospitals in Bajaur Agency, Charsadda and Peshawar for treatment.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban routinely targets courts, schools and mosques.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has expressed his grief over the loss of lives in the blast.

"The cowardly attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the governments resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country," he said in a statement.

The attack came on a day when Sharif vowed to continue the war against militancy and terrorism till elimination of the last terrorist.

During a meeting with Army chief General Raheel Sharif today, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy.

The army had launched operation Zarb-e-Azb in June 2014 to flush out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas. PTI AYZ/MZ/ZH CPS AKJ CPS

--- ENDS ---
According to HIA chief economist Harley Dale, there are certain bright spots, despite the below expectations result for housing finance.

The lending profile over the three months to July signals no cause for alarm, said Dale.

Lending for the purchase of new dwellings increased over the quarter (+2.2%), while the number of loans to owner-occupiers for new dwelling construction eased very moderately (-1%). The number of loans for established dwellings fell by 2% over the July quarter.

Dale added that the latest figures only reinforce the fact that the overall housing market has peaked.

Investment lending is also on the decline  down 19% from its peak. However, lending for new property is up 22%.

It is rather ironic that without the policy uncertainty generated by proposed changes to superannuation and persistent headlines regarding negative gearing amendments, lending for existing investment properties would be lower and the counterpart new home building component would be even healthier, said Dale.
Commissioned by the Property Investment Professionals of Australia (PIPA), the annual survey further revealed that more than half are actually looking to buy property within the next 6-12 months.

According to PIPA chair Ben Kingsley, investors are focusing on the long-term benefits of property investment.

Most property investors are looking past short term challenges, remaining focused on the long-term wealth benefits that are available from residential real estate, including the potential for capital growth and rental income, said Kingsley.

Brisbane remains to be the preferred destination of 50% of the investors  far ahead of Melbournes 20%, Sydneys 11%, Adelaides 9%, and Perths 4%.

The two key reasons that Brisbane still attracts investors, in spite of concerns around oversupply, are affordability and the potential for attractive yields, said Kingsley.

Brisbane is investing in infrastructure to make the city more liveable and investors are clued on to this.

However, 87% of investors said that more education about the pros and cons of property investment is needed. 89% even believe that the property investment industry should be regulated and licensed just like other professions.

PIPA is committed to raising the professional standards of this industry and will continue to lobby the government to regulate property investment advice and educate investors to help them make informed investment decisions, said Kingsley.
By PTI: Peshawar, Sep 16 (PTI) At least 28 people, including five children, were killed and 30 others injured when a Taliban suicide bomber shouting Allahu Akbar blew himself up inside a mosque packed with worshippers for Friday prayers in Mohmand Agency in Pakistans restive northwest tribal region,

The attacker blew himself when the prayers were in progress at the mosque in the Anbar tehsil of the agency bordering Afghanistan.

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"A suicide bomber was in the mosque. He shouted Allahu Akbar and blew himself up," Assistant Political Agent Naveed Akbar told reporters.

Jamat-ul-Ahrar, a splinter group of Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, today claimed responsibility for the attack.

He said that Friday prayers were being offered around 2 PM when the powerful blast took place.

At least 28 people, including five children, were killed in the attack and 30 others injured, Pakistani media reported, citing officials.

"Many people were gathered inside the mosque when a suicide bomber blew himself up," an eyewitness said.

Rescue teams and police rushed to the spot. The bodies and the injured are being shifted to local hospitals for medical treatment.

Injured were also taken to hospitals in Bajaur Agency, Charsadda and Peshawar for treatment.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban routinely targets courts, schools and mosques.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has expressed his grief over the loss of lives in the blast.

"The cowardly attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the governments resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country," he said in a statement.

The attack came on a day when Sharif vowed to continue the war against militancy and terrorism till elimination of the last terrorist.

During a meeting with Army chief General Raheel Sharif today, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy.

The army had launched operation Zarb-e-Azb in June 2014 to flush out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas. PTI AYZ/MZ/ZH CPS AKJ SUA

--- ENDS ---
Latest News

Washington, DC - Secretary of State John Kerry: "On the International Day of Democracy, we remember that freedom and democracy remain the greatest safeguards to peace, security, and prosperity worldwide.

"More and more people around the world today are calling for representative governance that is rooted in the will of the people. A generation of young people is using technology in new ways to speak out against repression and to hold their governments accountable.

"Women, persons with disabilities, LGBTI persons, and marginalized populations are increasingly exercising their rights to participate in the political process, and civil society continues to be a catalyst for social, political, and economic change.

"At the same time, some transitioning democracies have experienced setbacks in their struggle for a new political direction. Repressive regimes, threatened by calls for open and accountable governance, suppress freedom of expression, silence opposition voices, squander public resources, and resort to arbitrary tactics and sanctioned brutality.

"This does not mean that democracy is in retreat. Rather, these events are a reaction to empowered individuals from every nation demanding transparency and civic inclusion. Our message continues to be that when governments violate the basic rights of their people and ignore calls for accountability, what follows is not control and order but instability and violence.

"The violence and oppression that threatens one nation, threatens every nation.

"The United States will continue to support the development of democratic, rights-based institutions, through our leadership in the Community of Democracies, our efforts in the Open Government Partnership, and our continued diplomatic engagement.

"As we celebrate the International Day of Democracy, we reaffirm our commitment to safeguarding human rights and civil liberties and promoting effective and accountable institutions around the world."
Latest News

Washington, DC - Secretary of State John Kerry: "On behalf of President Obama and the American people, congratulations to the people of Papua New Guinea as you celebrate the 41st anniversary of your independence on September 16.

"Our two countries share a long-lasting friendship and diplomatic relations going back to your independence day 41 years ago. Throughout those 41 years, weve worked together on numerous issues of mutual interest in the realms of fisheries, protecting biodiversity, and economic development, among many others. In the past year alone weve collaborated on APEC trade and investment liberalization issues, and we look forward to continuing to work with you as you prepare for your APEC host year in 2018.

"We appreciate your leadership as the largest of the Pacific Island nations, and were grateful for our long, productive friendship. Please accept my best wishes on this special occasion and for the year ahead."
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Our Center for Government Insights produces groundbreaking research to help government solve its most complex problems. Through publications, forums, and immersive workshops, we engage with public officials on a journey of positive transformation, crystallizing insights to help them understand trends, overcome constraints, and expand the limits of what is possible.

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Senior BJP leader has slammed Nitish government for not challenging the bail granted to Shahabuddin before the Supreme Court.

By Rohit Kumar Singh: Former deputy chief minister and senior BJP leader Sushil Modi has launched a scathing attack on Nitish Kumar government questioning as to why the state government did not challenge bail granted to the dreaded mafia don Md. Shahabuddin in March this year in the killing of two brothers Satish and Girish.

Both, Satish and Girish, sons of noted Siwan businessman Chandrakeshwar Prasad were drenched in acid tank and killed by Shahabuddin in 2004.

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"Shahabuddin was serving life imprisonment in the two brothers killing. He got bail in this case in March this year. Why did the Nitish government not challenge his bail in higher court?" asked Sushil Modi.

Modi dared Bihar chief minister to move the apex court for challenging the bail granted to Shahabuddin after killing Rajiv Roshan, the third son of Chandrakeshwar Prasad which paved way for the don's release from jail.

SLAMS BIHAR MINISTERS



"Comments made by Bihar government ministers that law will take its own course and rule of law was prevailing in the state is all sham and a drama," said the BJP leader.

Also read: Siwan administration recommends sending Shahabuddin back to jail



Modi questioned the state government as to why several cases where Shahabuddin was granted bail earlier have not been challenged in the Apex Court.

"If the government has the courage, the status of all the trial cases of Md. Shahabuddin should be made public," dared Modi.



On the other hand, Chandrakeshwar Prasad has sent all legal documents to noted Supreme Court advocate Prashant Bhushan who would be moving the Apex court soon to challenge bail to Shahabuddin.

Also read: Tejaswi defends brother Tej Pratap over pictures with Shahabuddin's sharpshooters



"We are already destroyed and have nothing to look forward. We just want justice for our sons. Shahabuddin's bail should be cancelled and he should be given death sentence for my killing my sons," said Chandrakeshwar Prasad.

Also read: Lalu's son spotted with Shahabuddin's sharpshooter, creates controversy







--- ENDS ---
Imagine everyone calling you big ears. <br><br>Not that big ears are bad things to have; think of all the extra earrings you could wear (for girls) and all the extra earrings you could wear (for boys)! But for a minimalist like me who cant really stand jewellery, having big ears becomes a bitermheavy on the head. <br><br>So, before all those who rejoice in reminding me of my twin assets (OFCOURSE, ears I mean), I drop names of some personalities with similar anatomy- Gandhi, Buddha, Ganesh.the last name warms ones heart, no? But as far as Ganesh goes, I am happy that the similarities end at ears.<br><br>For, imagine everyone calling you big nose, big paunch, elephantine and toothy, apart from big ears. Of course, only the ignorant can call Ganesh such names intending literal meanings. There, I wish, were more similarities between Him and me. <br><br>Ganesh doesnt have a pan-India approach for nothing. With Mallus cladding Him in mundu, Gujaratis depicting Him as the ideal dandiya boy, the northerners happy to see Him perched on a rat and the ancient Afghans sculpting Him in their traditional turban et al, I dare say Ganesh one of most popular Gods of the Indian pantheon and with the unique position of being prayed to first. <br><br>And, as I said, its not for nothing.<br><br>Such is the appeal that from the millennia old Rig Veda to the Shahrukh Khan starrer Don, no one can do without a swish of His ears and the aroma of His modak. Though the Rig Veda, contend a few, may not be referring to the Ganesh that we welcome to our homes every year with a lot of pomp and show.<br><br>May we worship Ganapati,<br>The Protector of Noble People,<br>The Best Poet,<br>The Most Honourable,<br>The Greatest Ruler and<br>The Treasure of all Knowledge<br><br>(Rig Veda 2.23.1)<br><br>goes an invocation to Lord Ganapati in the oldest Veda. This probably is the only reference to Ganapati- another name of Ganesh. But is that the same elephant headed God who is being sung about in the Veda? Cant say, for the imagery that we associate with Ganesh appeared only in the Gupta period. <br><br>But, better late than never!<br><br>We should thank Ganesh for appearing and Adi Shankaracharya for categorizing Him as one of the 5 eternal deities of Hindu religion (the other 4 being: Sun, Vishnu, Shiva, Durga) <br><br>Just imagine (again) whom would we call upon to clear our path of obstacles had it not been for Ganesh; the Karmayogi Krishna (would probably say: You will reap as you sow) or the Mahayogi Shiva (would just mutter Ommm)? <br><br>But why is Ganesh called Vighneshwara, the Lord of Obstacles, if he is supposed to destroy the obstacles? In Hinduism and Buddhist tantra, Vinayakas were four mischief-making entities. If they were propitiated, they obliged one by not causing any trouble. Some just point out that it is Ganeshs job to give trouble to those who are up to no good, thats why the name. <br><br>Whatever the history/hearsay, the reason that Ganesh endures as the God of small and big things even today is that He is so real and ideal at the same time. <br><br>He is the child in all of us. He wants to be loved by His parents- even more than His sibling. Even if He has to forsake his desires (symbolized by flashy mounts viz lion, bull, peacock etc.) and choose the humble mouse, he will happily do so just so His parents favour Him. <br><br>Like a good, obedient lad He will follow instructions of the mother even if He has to risk His ego (symbolized by the human head that Shiva axed). In return, He got the dignity, respect and wisdom that are captured only in the head of an elephant. That wisdom made him circumambulate his parents when he was asked to take the round of the Earth- Shiv Parvati are His world. <br><br>With that one sacrifice, Ganesh the boy became Ganesh the God. <br><br>And he is loved by millions because He is always ready to listen. His big ears are a solace to those who have been wronged and need to empty their troubled souls. His trunk helps Him discriminate between right and wrong- as also indicating His great reach. His beady eyes enable Him to see only the good in people. His single tooth signifies that there is only One God, that He is all wisdom (elephant head) & love (the modak). <br><br>Bowing to Ganesh means understanding and appreciating all of the above, hence attaining the Truth. The 10-day Ganesh festival also has a deep meaning to it. Though an ancient tradition, it was turned into the grand affair that it is today by Lokmanya Tilak to drum up nationalistic pride and unity among people. <br><br>But Ganesh is beyond any country. He has got nothing to do with national pride (though, internationally, He is an India icon) but everything to do with existential essence. <br><br>For Ganesha is called Pranavakaar- in the shape of OM. <br><br>To You whom the wise exclaim<br>As the single-syllabled Supreme sound,<br>Stainless & peerless<br>Primeval One, I bow in adoration<br><br>(Adi Shankaracharya in Ganesh Bhujangam) <br><br>Ganeshs form resembles OM and in that He is a universal entity, present at the very core of Being. <br><br>Welcoming of Ganesh means bringing out the Lord that resides within us, in order to thank Him and serve Him. For 10 days, everything & everywhere becomes Ganesh i.e one sees the good aspect within all. At the end of the festival, we ask Ganesh to not just remain outside but enter our stream of consciousness- that is Visarjan. And all of it is done with joy and playfulness- as Ganesh likes it. <br><br>For thats what being Ganesh is: giving up the ego, remaining above materialism (symbolized in His one feet always being above the ground and one on the seat), yet using materials when needed, being an exceptional leader (Gana-pati) and yet keeping humble (He travels on a mouse). In short, living it and loving it too. <br><br>So this time, when you are grabbing a modak after prayer and somebody calls you Big Paunch, just know that there is someone else who is a big paunch and its doing a lot of good!
DMK leader Kanimozhi and MK Stalin were courted arrest during protests in Tamil Nadu over the Cauvery water dispute with Karnataka.

By India Today Web Desk: Majority of the shops, private schools, transport services like auto-rickshaws, private buses, fuel outlets did not function on Friday owing to the shutdown strike called by various organisations representing farmers, traders, transporters and others.

DMK leader MK Stalin was arrested while attempting to stop trains and his sister Kanimozhi was staging a road block in Chennai.



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The general strike called by different organisations demanded Cauvery river water and protested against attacks on Tamils and their property in Karnataka.

READ| Cauvery row: How 7 men and a boat keep two fighting states at bay



Several buses and trucks from Tamil Nadu were burnt to ashes by the hooligans in Karnataka over Supreme Court's order to release Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu couple of days back.

There were incidents of Tamil Nadu truck drivers humiliated and assaulted by the demonstrators in Karnataka.

READ| Cauvery row: Siddaramaiah urges Jayalalithaa to protect Kannadigas in Tamil Nadu



STRIKE IN PEACEFUL MANNER

Meanwhile, the shut down strike is on in a peaceful way with no untoward incident being reported while the normally crowded places like bus stands, commercial centres and roads wore a deserted look.

Large number of policemen were deployed outside bus stands, railway stations and other places.

While government owned public transports, government offices, schools, colleges, banks and others carried on with their routine, majority of shops remained closed across the state.

Many private schools also declared holiday while majority of auto-rickshaws, taxis and private buses remained off the roads.

Pudukkottai (TN): DMK workers holding 'Rail Roko' protest over Kalasa Banduri Canal issue detained by police. pic.twitter.com/yC5pVx5tfp ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

The vegetable wholesale market in Koyambedu here was closed.

READ| Cauvery row: Naam Tamilar cadre sets himself ablaze during anti-Karnataka protest in Chennai, hospitalised

Cadres of some political parties who were trying to stop trains at some places, were taken into custody by the police.

However, essentials like milk delivery by the state government undertaking -- Aavin was not affected while supplies by private dairies were affected.

Privately owned fuel outlets remained shut but those owned by the oil marketing companies were functioning.

Barring the ruling AIADMK party that is silent on extending support to the strike, all other major political parties have extended their support.

READ| Cauvery dispute: SC pulls up Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, says maintain peace



The BJP, while supporting the strike cause, condemned those organisations that planned demonstrations outside the central government offices.

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In Trichy MDMK leader Vaiko was prevented by the police from holding protest blocking the rail traffic.

Speaking to the media, Vaiko said the Bharatiya Janata Party led central government is also adopting the same policy like the earlier Congress government when it comes to the Cauvery river water sharing issue.

The central government is not setting up the Cauvery Management Board and Cauvery Water Regulatory Authority.

In Chennai, the DMDK party is holding a hunger strike while its founder A Vijaykant citing health reasons did not participate in the protest as announced earlier.

DMK leader MK Stalin tried to hold protest in Egmore Railway Station and was taken into custody by the police.

DKM Rajya Sabha MP Kanimoazhi was also protesting and taken into custody.

In the neighbouring Puducherry too shops remained closed while the government buses operated in lower numbers and private transport services remained off the roads.



MDMK Chief Vaiko has also been detained in Tiruchirappalli during protest.



SUPREME COURT ORDER



In its September five order, the apex court had directed the state to release 15,000 cusecs of Cauvery water for 10 days to ameliorate the plight of farmers of the neighbouring state, which had triggered strong protests from farmers and pro-Kannada outfits with Karnataka observing a bandh against it on September nine.

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--- ENDS ---
Tejaswi Yadav defended his elder brother Tej Pratap Yadav and said that when a person is a public figure then thousands of people meet them and get pictures clicked with them.

By Rohit Kumar Singh: Deputy CM Tejaswi Yadav has defended his elder brother and Health Minister Tej Pratap Yadav over the pictures of the latter with two sharpshooters of dreaded mafia don Shahabuddin going viral. Tejaswi defended Tej Pratap and said, "when a person's life is in the public domain, thousands of people meet and click pictures with you".

"It is not possible to meet people after getting their character certificate. It is possible that BJP leaders may be meeting people only after seeing one's character certificate as they are capitalists in nature," said Tejaswi Yadav.

Tej Pratap with Md. Kaid.

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READ: Lalu's son spotted with Shahabuddin's sharpshooter, creates controversy

Tej Pratap's pictures with Shahabuddin's two sharpshooters Md. Kaid and Javed Mian went viral on social media. Tej Pratap had also defended himself claiming that he did not know Kaif as thousands of people meet him every day.



Tejaswi said that there was not a single celebrity, filmstar, sportsman or politician who first checks the character certificate of a person and then meets him or gets clicked with him.

Tej Pratap is seen with Javed Mian in this picture.

Tejaswi questioned as to why the media remained silent when pictures of PM Narendra Modi with sex racket kingpin Tinu Jain, with rape accused Asaram Bapu and Swami Nityanand are also on the social media.

"If media channels run anything against the PM, it is the fear of the channels being closed by the govt which forces the media houses not to run pictures of PM with tainted personalities", alleged the deputy CM.

READ: Tej Pratap Yadav spotted with another Shahabuddin strongman



Tejaswi blamed the media for tarnishing the image of regional parties like JDU, RJD, AAP and SP.

"These media houses are upset as these regional parties have defeated the BJP in the elections earlier. Media can never run a positive story on Bihar", alleged Tejaswi.

Also read:First ask Modi to resign: Tej Pratap hits back, releases photographs of PM with sex-racket accused



--- ENDS ---
Washington: Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, one of the leaders of the "birther" movement that questioned President Barack Obama`s US citizenship, believes Obama was born in the United States, the Trump campaign said in a statement on Thursday.

In an interview with the Washington Post released earlier in the day, Trump declined to say whether he believed Obama was born in Hawaii.

"Ill answer that question at the right time. I just dont want to answer it yet," Trump told the newspaper.

Those comments drew criticism from Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, who expressed dismay at Trump`s response during remarks to a gathering of Hispanic leaders in Washington.

"He still wouldnt say Hawaii. He still wouldnt say America. This man wants to be our next president?" Clinton said.

"When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry? Now hes tried to reset himself and his campaign many times. This is the best he can do. This is who he is," she said.

A few years into his presidency, Obama, the first African-American to win the White House, released a longer version of his birth certificate to answer those who suggested he was not U.S. born.

"In 2011, Mr. Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate," Trump senior communications advisor Jason Miller said in a statement late on Thursday.

"Having successfully obtained President Obamas birth certificate when others could not, Mr Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States," he said.

Trump has been trying to drum up support among black voters, who overwhelmingly supported Obama in his 2008 and 2012 elections. Many African Americans object to Trump`s involvement in the "birther" movement and the implication that Obama`s presidency was illegitimate.
District of Columbia: Donald Trump`s hair -- a crusty, complex, yellowish affair that has become one of the enigmas of a very weird US presidential race -- got messed with big time on Thursday.

The usually brash presidential candidate talked in subdued tones and played the good sport as he appeared on one of America`s most popular late-night broadcasts, "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon."

Fallon did his very popular impression of Trump`s speaking style, ribbed him right and left and concluded his interview with a request.

"Can I mess up your hair?" Fallon said.

The comic explained that this might be the last time he could ask to do something unpresidential with Trump, lest he win election in November against Hillary Clinton.

The crowd went nuts over the idea.

Trump grinned and agreed.

Fallon reached out with his right hand and mussed Trump`s hair with a vigorous, repeated rub. The Republican nominee endured it with a broad smile.

Trump, 70, has an elaborate hair-do centered on what seems to be an ambitious comb-over.

Nothing fell off with Fallon`s intervention but the result was not very pretty as Trump`s long locks ended up pointing messily every which way.

On other matters, Fallon christened what he called Trump`s "bromance" with Vladimir Putin as "Vlump", and asked him about his penchant for eating fast food.

"At least you know what you`re getting," Trump said. He added that if he went to an unknown place, "If they don`t like me ... I don`t know. I`m better off with fast food."

Fallon also thanked Trump for providing what he described as grist for so much comic material.

"You say some shocking things," Fallon said.

"But I`m trying not to anymore," Trump replied.
Beirut: Three civilians including two children were killed in air strikes on a rebel-held town in northwest Syria today, the fourth full day of a strained truce, a monitor said.

Another 13 civilians were wounded in the strikes on Khan Sheikhun in Idlib province, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said they were the first deaths in air strikes on an area not held by the Islamic State jihadist group since the truce came into force on Monday.

The Britain-based monitoring group could not identify which war planes carried out the raids, although the government and its Russian ally have regularly bombarded Idlib province.

Like almost all of Idlib, Khan Sheikhun is held by an alliance of rebels, hardline Islamists and jihadists like Fateh al-Sham Front, which changed its name from Al-Nusra Front after breaking ties with Al-Qaeda.

Under the truce deal negotiated by Moscow and Washington, which came into force on Monday evening, fighting is to halt across the country except in areas where jihadists are present.

Observers have noted that the deal will be particularly difficult to implement in areas where Fateh al-Sham has formed strong alliances with local rebels, like in Idlib province.

A video posted online by activists in Khan Sheikhun showed two columns of white smoke emerging from a neighbourhood of concrete buildings.

More than 300,000 people have been killed since Syria's conflict started in March 2011 and millions have been forced to flee their homes.

The new truce deal is the latest effort to put an end to the unrest, which began with anti-government protests but has since evolved into a multi-front war that has drawn in world powers.
Islamabad: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Friday met Hurriyat leaders from Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) and assured them that he would "emphatically highlight" the Kashmir issue at the 71st session of the UN General Assembly next week.

Sharif met with the leaders of All Parties Hurriyat Conference PoK chapter at Muzaffarabad.

PoK 'President' Sardar Masood Khan and 'Prime Minister' Raja Farooq Haider were also present at the meeting.

"Pakistan will continue to extend moral, diplomatic and political support to Kashmiris," Sharif said, alleging that atrocities in Kashmir had touched extremes.

"Oppression is destined to end, and truth will prevail," he said in reference to the ongoing violence in Kashmir.

He said the Kashmiris' demand for their right to self-determination was just, which had also been acknowledged by international community.

Calling upon the UN to fulfil its obligation in accordance with its own resolutions, he said: "The movement of Kashmiris will ultimately succeed as the history has precedents that such movements could not be suppressed with oppression. Pakistan will raise voice for the resolution of Kashmir dispute at all fora."

Hurriyat leaders thanked Sharif for taking them into confidence before his visit to UNGA.

Sharif is likely to deliver a speech at the UN General Assembly session on September 21.
Islamabad: Pakistan army chief General Raheel Sharif today called on Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif ahead of the premier's visit to the US where he will address the UN General Assembly and is expected to rake up the Kashmir issue.

Sharif is likely to deliver a speech at the UN General Assembly session on September 21. Sharif today met Hurriyat leaders from Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) and assured them that?he would "emphatically highlight" the Kashmir issue at the UN General Assembly next week.

During the meeting with Raheel, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy till the elimination of last terrorist.

"Vowing to continue the war against militancy and terrorism (till elimination of the last terrorist), the prime minister expressed his satisfaction over the security situation in the country," PM House said in a statement after Raheel called on Sharif.

The premier and the army chief?discussed internal and regional security, it said.
New Delhi: Top security experts from SAARC countries will meet here for two days next week to strengthen the anti-terrorism mechanism for South Asia.

The second meeting of the High-Level Group of Eminent Experts from South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries will be held on September 22 and 23, an official statement said.

The aim of the meeting is to strengthen SAARC anti-terror mechanism, it said.

The first such meeting was held in New Delhi in February 2012.

The agenda of the meeting includes functioning of SAARC Terrorist Offences Monitoring Desk (STOMD) and the SAARC Drug Offences Monitoring Desk (SDOMD), countering terrorism and strengthening anti-terrorism mechanisms in SAARC, intelligence sharing and police cooperation, human resource development and relationship building, combating corruption and cyber crimes, among others.
Patna: Nitish Kumar-led Bihar government on Friday moved Supreme Court against the bail granted to former Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) MP Mohammad Shahabuddin.

It is being said that the decision to challenge the bail granted to Shahabuddin was taken in the wake of protests by opposition.

Shahabuddin was released on bail in connection with the murder of a witness in the killing of two brothers in Siwan district.

Earlier today, Chandrakeshwar Prasad whose three of four sons were murdered allegedly by the criminal-turned politician, filed appeal in apex court challenging Patna High Court's order granting bail to the former RJD MP.

The controversial RJD strongman was released from Bhagalpur jail on September 10, after being there for 11 years in connection with dozens of cases against him.

Roshan was a witness to the murder of his brothers Gitish and Satish, who were drenched with acid in 2004. The trial for Roshan's murder is yet to start.

Meanwhile, facing flak over Shahabuddin's release from jail, the Bihar government is also reportedly considering filing an appeal in the Supreme Court against the bail granted to him.
New Delhi: Chandrakeshwar Prasad whose three of four sons were murdered allegedly by former Mohammad Shahabuddin, on Friday filed an appeal in Supreme Court challenging Patna High Court's order granting bail to the former Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) MP.

Noted apex court lawyer Prashant Bhushan will represent Prasad in the case.

Shahabuddin was last week released on bail in connection with the murder of a witness in the killing of two brothers in Siwan.

The controversial RJD strongman was released from Bhagalpur jail on September 10, after being there for 11 years in connection with dozens of cases against him.

Roshan was a witness to the murder of his brothers Gitish and Satish, who were drenched with acid in 2004. The trial for Roshan's murder is yet to start.

Meanwhile, facing flak over Shahabuddin's release from jail, the Bihar government is also reportedly considering filing an appeal in the Supreme Court against the bail granted to him.
The robbery took place on September 13, when the truck was carrying the mobile phones from Okhla area of south Delhi to Dwarka in south-west Delhi.

By Tanseem Haider: Apple's latest phones are yet to reach India but that doesn't mean the older iPhones, especially iPhone 5S, have lost their attraction. According to Delhi police, two persons were arrested from Mahipalpur area of south Delhi for allegedly robbing a truck carrying over 1,000 iPhone 5s mobile phones worth Rs 2.25 crore.

The accused have been identified as Mehtab Alam, 24, and Arman, 22, both residents of Mahipalpur. Mehtab Alam was arrested from Mahipalpur while Arman was arrested from Rangpuri area of south Delhi, the police said.

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The police recovered over 900 iPhone mobile phones and the car used in the crime from them.

According to the police, the robbery took place on September 13, when the truck was carrying the mobile phones from Okhla area of south Delhi to Dwarka in south-west Delhi.

The two, along with their accomplices, held the truck driver captive before robbing the mobile phones near Rajokri flyover, Deputy Commissioner of Police (south) Ishwar Singh told reporters.

The officer said the robbers then dumped the driver near Dwarka Link Road.

"During investigation it was found that two robbers -- Bhola and Pradeep -- were the former drivers of the truck, and had left their jobs two weeks ago," the officer said.

"We also found that on the day of the incident both the drivers had followed the same route which was used by the truck carrying the mobile phones," Singh said.

The accused have also confessed to having committed the crime along with their accomplices Bhola, Rahul and Jitender, the officer added.

The police was conducting raids to arrest the remaining gang members.

With IANS inputs



--- ENDS ---
New Delhi: The Centre today sought a detailed report from Delhi government on deaths due to dengue and chikungunya, including medical history of the deceased, in the national capital where vector-borne diseases have claimed at least 30 lives and affected nearly 3,000 people.

Earlier in the day, Health Minister J P Nadda also met Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain to discuss the situation and assured all support to the city government even as he asserted that no patient is being turned away without treatment and there is no shortage of doctors and drugs.

The Union Minister also assured support to the Haryana and Uttar Pradesh governments for tackling the vector-borne diseases.

"We have asked for a detailed report on the deaths taking place due to the vector-borne diseases in the city. Also, we have sought medical history of the deceased patients, whether they had any co-morbid conditions," Nadda said on the sidelines of a symposium held here on liver transplantation.

Chikungunya and dengue have wreaked havoc in Delhi with the death toll from the two vector-borne diseases climbing to 30 even as the number of affected people has crossed 2,800.

"Many of the patients diagnosed in Delhi are coming from NCR region and so fever clinics could also be set up there. We are resolving this matter with Haryana and other governments in the NCR.

"I have spoken to Haryana government (and UP) on this and our officers are working on it and in touch with them," he said.

Nadda said adequate numbers of fever clinics are also operating in the central government hospitals for treating the upsurge of patients.

"Have assured all support to the Delhi government and the governments of Uttar Pradesh and Haryana for tackling the rising cases of dengue and chikungunya," Nadda said.

Seven of the 12 chikungunya victims belonged to Uttar Pradesh, including two from Ghaziabad, and five from Delhi.

The Health Minister during the meeting with Jain also assured that while they have adequate strength of beds in the central government hospitals, all measures will be taken to enhance them.

"No patient is being turned away without treatment in these hospitals. There is no shortage of doctors, paramedical staff, drugs, testing kits, labs etc, for treatment of the patients," Nadda said.
New Delhi: Delhi High Court on Friday issued notice to the Centre on a public suit seeking to declare as unconstitutional certain provisions of the Representation of Peoples Act that allow a convicted person to contest elections six years after their conviction.

A division bench of Chief Justice G Rohini and Sangita Dhingra Sehgal sought a response from the Ministry of Law and Justice as well as the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs on the plea filed by advocate Ashwini Upadhyay contending that convicted people should be barred for their lifetime from contesting elections.

The petitioner said sections eight and nine of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 should be declared unconstitutional as they restrict disqualification period to only six years.

The disqualification rule for convicted persons cannot be applied differently on the executive, the judiciary and the legislature, the suit said.

"Hence section eight and nine of the Part-II, Chapter-III (disqualification for member ship of parliament and state legislature) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 is violative of the fundamental rights, unconstitutional and inconsistent with Article 13 and 14 of the Constitution of India," the plea stated.

In the executive and judiciary, when one is convicted for any criminal offence, he or she is suspended automatically and their services are terminated for lifetime.

However, this rule is applied differently in case of a convicted person in a legislature, said the plea.

Even after conviction and undergoing sentence, one can form a political party, become the office bearer of a political party, contest the election, and become member of legislature after expiry of six years from the date of their conviction, Upadhyay said.

The petition questioned why should not there be a lifetime ban on convicted person on contesting elections, forming a political party and becoming office bearer of a political party.

The petition sought direction to set minimum educational qualification and maximum age limit for contesting candidates.

"Direct the law ministry to implement the Election Commission's Proposed Electoral Reform and Law Commission Report No-244 and 255, which is necessary for de-criminalisation and de-communalisation of politics," the petition stated.

Certain immediate measures need to be taken feasibly to mark the first successful step towards an attempt to cleansing the electoral system, it said.

The Representation of the People Act has not provided for any proper guidelines in the form of minimum educational qualifications, good character and conduct, the petition said.
New Delhi: The Delhi Police has detained four of the five teenagers accused of gang-raping two girls, including a minor, in outer Delhi's Aman Vihar area.

The incident took place on Wednesday at around 8.30 pm near Mundka metro station when the girls and their male friends were out on a walk, a senior police officer said.

The accused spotted one of the girls in a compromising position with her male friend following which they beat them up and held hostage, the officer said.

Then they took turns to rape the two girls, aged 18 and 17 years, in the isolated area near Mundka metro station, the officer said.

They threatened the victims of dire consequences if they reported the matter to police, the officer said.

A medical examination of the girls confirmed rape and a case under sections 323 (punishment for voluntarily causing hurt), 376 (punishment for rape) IPC and relevant sections of Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO) has been registered, the officer said.

Police are trying to determine whether the accused are minors, the officer added.

(With PTI inputs)
New Delhi: Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain on Friday urged everyone to co-operate with the government to to tackle the outbreak of Dengue and Chikungunya and not play politics.

Speaking to the mediapersons, said, It is wrong to say that patients are denied beds, at least 1500 beds are vacant at hospitals under Delhi Goverment.

The Delhi Health Minister said many of the dengue and chikungunya patients come to Delhi hospitals from other states. He stressed on segregating the data.

According to municipal corporation data, the number of dengue, chikungunya and malaria infection in Delhi stood at 1,158, 1,057 and 21 respectively.

According to the civic bodies, the highest dengue cases were reported in 2015 when 15,876 people were infected by the vector-borne disease and 60 people died.
New Delhi: While the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) sees a conspiracy in the manner in which the media is questioning foreign junkets of Delhi ministers, Lieutenant Governor Najeeb Jung appears to have taken it upon himself to correct the situation.

As per a report in NDTV, Jung has asked Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia to return from Finland as soon as possible.

The LG's order comes at a time when Delhi is battling an outbreak of dengue, chikungunya, and other vector-borne diseases.

Sisodia, who holds the education portfolio, is currently in Finland to study the country's education system.

However, the AAP leader has remained unrepentant.

Learning from across the world is not a sin. It's a sin to defame an educational tour as a 'holiday'. I'm in Finland. We need to learn a lot from their education system, the best in the world (sic), he tweeted.

Meanwhile, Chief Minister Kejriwal is currently at a hospital in Bengaluru where he underwent a surgery to treat his chronic cough.
Stockholm: A Swedish appeals court on Friday upheld an arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange over a 2010 rape accusation, rejecting his request to have it lifted.

The court announced in a statement that Assange "is still detained in absentia", adding that it "shares the assessment of the (lower) district court that Julian Assange is still suspected on probable cause of rape... and that there is a risk that he will evade legal proceedings or a penalty."

The 45-year-old Australian has been holed up in the Ecuadoran embassy in London since June 2012, seeking refuge there after exhausting all his legal options in Britain against extradition to Sweden.

Assange has refused to travel to Stockholm for questioning over the rape allegation, which he denies, due to concerns Sweden will extradite him to the United States over WikiLeaks` release of 500,000 secret military files on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

This is the eighth time the European arrest warrant has been tested in a Swedish court. All of the rulings have gone against him.

The appeals court said Assange`s four-year embassy sequestration "is not a deprivation of liberty and shall not be given any importance in its own right in the assessment of proportionality."

The length of his embassy stay and "the earlier passivity" of police investigators were "arguments for setting aside the detention," it noted.

"However, the relatively serious offence of which he is suspected means that there is a strong public interest (in) the investigation being able to continue."

"At present, continued detention therefore appears to be both effective and necessary so as to be able to move the investigation forward. The reasons for detention therefore still outweigh the intrusion or other detriment that the measure entails for Julian Assange."

Swedish prosecutor Marianne Ny hailed the decision.

"The public interest in having the investigation proceed still carries a lot of weight, in our opinion. The court has here shared our opinion that upholding the arrest warrant is in line with principle of proportionality," she said in a statement.
Chandigarh: As many as 322 dengue cases and 6,695 cases of malaria have been reported in Haryana this season, a senior health official said today.

The Health Department is fully alert and prepared to check the spread of vector-borne diseases like dengue, chikungunya and malaria, Director (Malaria) Dr Vijay Garg said.

He said so far 322 cases of dengue have been reported in the state of which 26 patients have been admitted to hospitals and 201 have been discharged after treatment. Besides, 95 patients are undergoing treatment in OPDs.

Garg said 6,695 cases of malaria have also been reported in the state of which 4,409 have come from Mewat.

Nine cases of chikungunya have been reported so far, he added.

Meanwhile, Health Minister Anil Vij has directed the officers concerned to complete fogging drive in the state within next ten days to effectively check the spread of vector-borne diseases.

Vij, who was presiding over a meeting to review the measures being taken for checking the spread of dengue and malaria in the state, reprimanded the officers "for not carrying out the work in a time bound manner".

He urged the people to observe Sunday as 'drying day' by cleaning utensils and coolers to check breeding of mosquitoes.

Vij directed the officers to make available facilities and kits for detection of dengue in all districts.

He directed officials to maintain vigil on private hospitals so that they do not charge more than prescribed rates for conducting 'ELISA' test. Besides, he also asked them to ensure that dengue test results were confirmed by the laboratories of state-run district hospitals.
New Delhi: India is all set to grant citizenship to Baloch leader Brahumdagh Bugti, who is currently living in exile in Switzerland, Pakistani media reported late Thursday.

Brahumdagh Bugti, the president of the Baloch Republican Party (BRP), is the grandson of Baloch nationalist leader Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti who was killed in an encounter with the Pakistani Army 10 years ago.

Geo News quoted sources as saying that India will also give citizenship to Brahumdagh's Switzerland-based key lieutenants, including Sher Muhammad Bugti and Azizullah Bugti.

A BRP source told Geo that Brahumdagh and Indian officials started negotiations regarding the Indian citizenship earlier this year, much before Prime Minister Narendra Modi highlighted Pakistan's human rights atrocities in Balochistan province.

"We will use Indian papers to travel around the world to campaign against Pakistan and to highlight our case. We have openly thanked Narendra Modi for his support and we are no more hiding anything. We have no other option. We do not care what our opponents think of our support for Modi and his support for us," the BRP source has been quoted as saying.

After fleeing his hometown Dera Bugti in Balochistan in 2006, Bugti lived in Afghanistan as a state guest. He was later flown to Switzerland in October 2010.

The report says that Bugti will formally apply for Indian citizenship in Geneva, Switzerland, after a meeting of BRP's officials on September 18-19.

"India has facilitated Dalai Lama against the pressure from a powerful country like China. It helped Sheikh Mujeeb-ur-Rehman as well. It will help Brahumdagh and his colleagues as well. Brahumdagh has asked for Indian citizenship for himself and all his colleagues. There are 15,000 Bugtis stuck in Afghanistan. Around 2,000 are in various countries including European countries. Their asylum applications have been either approved or are in process. Brahumdagh would like all these people accommodated along with his own case," the BNP source told Geo News.

Bugti has demanded a referendum of Baloch people under the supervision of the United Nations. Earlier, he said Modi's remarks during his Independence Day is the "most powerful statement" in the last seven decades.

"I am thoroughly indebted to Prime Minister Modi. I thank Prime Minister Modi for speaking raising the voice of Baloch people in his Independence Day address," he had said and alleged that Pakistani crime against people is a shocker to the global community.
New Delhi: The Defence Ministry has handed over a set of key documents to the CBI, including minutes of the meetings where the decision to purchase of three Embraer aircraft was taken, to help the agency in its probe into allegations that kickbacks were paid in the deal.

Though the deal was inked in 2008, the process had started much earlier.

Major decisions regarding the purchase of Embraer aircraft was taken at the Services level in 2006.

Then IAF chief S P Tyagi, who is under scanner in the VVIP chopper scam, did not respond to calls or messages on Whatsapp asking if he was aware of the role of middlemen.

It is expected that the CBI will reach out to all key officials who were part of the decision-making process.

The allegations of corruption in the deal surfaced in a Brazilian newspaper which alleged the Embraer had taken the services of middlemen to clinch the deal of aircraft supply in Saudi Arabia and India.

DRDO had purchased three aircraft from the Brazilian company in 2008 and customised them for air-borne radar system, known as airborne early-warning and control (AEW&C) systems, for the Indian Air Force.

The CBI team, which is probing the VVIP chopper scam, is also looking into the files sent by the Defence Ministry.

CBI sources said officials are going through the reference and any decision to start a probe in the matter will be taken soon after analysing all the documents.

If the agency is satisfied that it has enough prima facie evidence to initiate an FIR, it will start or else it might register a preliminary enquiry to gather enough material for registering a regular case, they said.

DRDO has already sought a report from the Brazilian firm, which said it has been looking into graft allegations over the last five years.
Margarita Island: Vice President Hamid Ansari arrived here on Friday to attend the 17th NAM Summit during which India is expected to raise its concerns over terrorism besides deliberating on key issues like UN reform, climate change and nuclear disarmament.

Ansari was received by Venezuela's Executive Vice President Aristobuli Isturiz at the Santiago Mari'o Caribbean International Airport here and was accorded a ceremonial welcome.

The Vice President is leading the Indian delegation in the absence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is only the second Indian Premier to give the Cold War-era bloc's summit a miss after Charan Singh in 1979.

While briefing reporters on his way to the summit being held in Venezuela's Margarita Island, Ansari had said India will strongly take up its concerns about terrorism at the summit as it has been doing so at all international forums.

"Yes we are doing it (raising concerns over terrorism) on all fora and certainly it (NAM) is an important forum and we will take it up, no question about it," Ansari told reporters on his way to attend the NAM summit.

"Terror is something which impedes everything. If our objective is development, then terror cuts right across it. We need peace, we need social peace, we need international peace both these are being interrupted by terror," he had said.

During his three-day visit from Friday evening (early Saturday morning India time) to Sunday, Ansari will also hold bilateral meetings with world leaders on the sidelines of the summit.

"The summit is expected to deliberate on issues of contemporary relevance and concern such as terrorism, UN reform, the situation in West Asia, threats to peace and security, UN peacekeeping operations, climate change, sustainable development, economic governance, south-south cooperation, refugees and migrants, and nuclear disarmament," according to the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).

"All these issues are of relevance in the context of the discussions that will take place at the United Nations in coming months," the MEA said in a statement.

The Non Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit brings together leaders from 120 developing countries that are its members. The NAM Summits are among the largest gatherings of countries, after the United Nations.

India is one of the founding members of the NAM and it had hosted its 7th summit in 1983 in New Delhi. The last NAM Summit was hosted by Iran in 2012.

The membership of NAM comprises 53 countries from Africa, 39 from Asia, 26 from Latin America and the Caribbean and 2 from Europe (Belarus, Azerbaijan). There are 17 countries and 10 international organisations that are Observers at NAM.

The NAM came into being 55 years ago when leaders of 25 developing countries met at the 1961 Belgrade Conference.

The summit comes amid political and economic turmoil in this oil-rich country which has skidded into crisis as global crude prices have plunged since mid-2014, pushing President Maduro's socialist model to the brink.
By PTI: From Lalit K Jha

Washington, Sep 16 (PTI) Appreciating Indias generosity, the US has welcomed USD one billion aid by New Delhi to help war-torn Afghanistan become a stronger country with a capacity to defend itself and provide security to its people.

"We obviously support Indias generosity and focus on Afghanistan and willingness to help Afghanistan become a stronger, independent country that has the stronger economic growth, certainly, and also has the capacity to defend itself and provide security to its people," State Department Spokesman Mark Toner told reporters yesterday.

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He was responding to a question on the pledge made by India this week to allocate USD one billion for Afghanistans capability building in spheres such as education, health, agriculture, skill development, empowerment of women, energy, infrastructure and strengthening of democratic institutions.

"The fact that India is willing to invest in that future (of Afghanistan), we view it as a very positive sign and we appreciate Indias effort," Toner said.

India has emerged as one of the largest donors of civilian aid to Afghanistan. PTI LKJ KIS ZH AKJ ZH

--- ENDS ---
On Board Special Aircraft: Downplaying Prime Minister Narendra Modi skipping the NAM Summit, Vice President Hamid Ansari has said there is no shift in India's foreign policy and asserted that it is participation that matters as it is "not a conference of Prime Ministers".

Ansari is leading the Indian delegation for the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit in Venezuela's Margarita island in the absence of Prime Minister Modi, who is only the second Indian Premier to not go for the conference after Charan Singh in 1979.

Asked what kind of message was India sending with Prime Minister Modi skipping the 17th NAM Summit, Ansari said, "India is participating. NAM is not a conference of Prime Ministers.

"Prime Ministers have been going but there have been occasions when Prime Ministers for a variety of reasons have not been able to go but India's participation remains," he said.

He also asserted that India will strongly take up its concerns about terrorism at the summit as it has been doing so at all international forums.

"Yes we are doing it (raising concerns over terrorism) on all fora and certainly it (NAM) is an important forum and we will take it up, no question about it," Ansari told reporters on his way to attend the NAM summit.

"Terror is something which impedes everything. If our objective is development, then terror cuts right across it. We need peace, we need social peace, we need international peace both these are being interrupted by terror. Whatever the form terror takes, it is terror, it is terrorising civilian populations and therefore if the population is terrorised then it cannot devote itself to its normal pursuits, foremost amongst them is development. So it very much has to be taken up," he asserted.

Asked if there has been a shift in India's foreign policy with the strengthening of the Indo-US partnership and if NAM has become less important, Ansari said there has been no such shift.

"There was a methodology in 1961. The methodology underwent changes in the 70s, 80s, and 90. Again the methodologies are being adjusted but the objectives have not changed...I don't think we have shifted (in our foreign policy) and I don't think it should be seen as black or white, it is always shades of grey," he said.

Vice President, however, emphasised that the Non Aligned Movement has been evolving and must continue to evolve to stay relevant to the times.

"It (NAM) has continuously evolved since its inception in 1961 and therefore it must evolve. Any organisation if it does not respond to the requirements of the day loses its relevance. So whatever our priorities of the day are that is to be determined collectively by consensus. Those priorities have to be addressed there is no way out of it," he said.

Ansari stated that the group of countries that now number 120 came together because there were common concerns and common interests. "Over the years NAM`s agenda has partly remained the same, partly it has evolved with the requirements of times. But a few things remain constant...Every country has the same priority in its agenda which is development and development not according to somebody else's perception or diktat but on its own perceptions," Ansari said, adding that the basic objectives remain the same.

Noting that the chairmanship has now moved to Venezuela, he said the priorities of this conference are peace, sovereignty and solidarity for development.

"Basic point is how do you devote your energies to development unless there is peace. If peace does not prevail then attention gets diverted. So we need peace, we need solidarity with the group of countries with a more or less converging objectives and development remains our priority. That is the purpose for which this gathering is taking place," he stressed.

Asked what was India's stand on the economic and political turmoil in NAM's host country of Venezuela, Ansari said India does not have a point of view on what is happening in Venezuela or any other country within their domestic realm.

"It is always been an article of faith with us that we do not interfere in the affairs of other countries. But as long as the policy of the state of Venezuela is subscribing to the basic objectives of NAM we are with them and they are with us," he said.

India is one of the founding members of the Non-Aligned Movement and it had hosted the 7th NAM Summit in 1983 in New Delhi. The last NAM Summit was hosted by Iran in 2012.

The membership of NAM comprises 53 countries from Africa, 39 from Asia, 26 from Latin America and the Caribbean and 2 from Europe (Belarus, Azerbaijan). There are 17 countries and 10 international organisations that are Observers at NAM.

The Non-Aligned Movement came into being 55 years ago when leaders of 25 developing countries met at the 1961 Belgrade Conference.

The summit comes amid political and economic turmoil in the oil-rich country which has skidded into crisis as global crude prices have plunged since mid-2014, pushing President Nicolas Maduro's socialist model to the brink.
New Delhi: India and Nepal on Friday committed that they will not allow their territory to be used against each other and also agreed to set up an oversight mechanism to review the progress of economic and development projects on regular basis.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal earlier held talks on several areas of partnership between the two countries.

In a joint statement issued by the two sides later, they gave various details related to strengthening of ties.

"They stressed the need to ensure that the open border, which has facilitated economic interaction and movement of people and goods on both sides of the border and has been a unique feature of India-Nepal bilateral ties, is not allowed to be misused by unscrupulous elements posing security threats to either side," it said.

The Nepali side also reiterated its support for India's candidature for permanent membership of the UN Security Council.

"Both sides also agreed to set up an oversight mechanism comprising senior officials from the Indian Embassy in Kathmandu and the Government of Nepal, which will review progress together with respective project implementing agencies/developers of ongoing economic and development projects on a regular basis, and take necessary steps to expedite their implementation," it said.

The Prime Minister of Nepal shared with his Indian counterpart the efforts made by the present government to take all sections of Nepali society on board for effective implementation of the constitution.

"The Prime Minister of Nepal thanked the government and people of India for their goodwill, support and solidarity in Nepal's peace process," it said, adding, "Both sides agreed to hold the next session of the India-Nepal Joint Commission in 2016."

The two Prime Ministers stressed on the need for early development of infrastructure at integrated check posts (ICPs) to facilitate smooth and faster movement of people and goods.

"They noted with satisfaction the progress in construction of ICPs at Raxaul and Jogbani, and agreed that work on the Raxaul-Birgunj ICP project will be expedited with the objective of completing it by December," the joint statement said.

The two Prime Ministers reviewed the progress made in implementation of the two ongoing India-Nepal cross-border rail-link projects and agreed that both sides will take further measures necessary for expeditious completion of both the projects.

Both sides agreed that steps will be initiated to facilitate development of three other agreed cross-border rail-link projects so that the land acquisition can commence on the Nepali side.
New Delhi: As Nepal grapples with a fractious political transition, India today conveyed to its new Prime Minister that its Constitution should be implemented by accommodating aspirations of all sections and also pledged support to rebuild its infrastructure.

After wide-ranging talks between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal, the two sides inked three pacts including one on India extending USD 750 million for Nepal's post-quake reconstruction and another on laying of roads by India in Terai region. Nepal's economy was wrecked by last year's devastating quake.

The decisions assume significance amidst China's growing efforts to expand its influence over Kathmandu.

Modi and Dahal, who is popularly known as Prachanda, had extensive discussions on the political situation in Nepal and decided to ramp up trade, improve rail and road connectivity and ensure speedy completion of major infrastructure projects being implemented by India in Nepal.

Dahal, who is here on his first visit abroad after becoming Prime Minister for the second time, said his government was trying to "bring everyone on board" in implementing the new Constitution some provisions of which have been strongly opposed by the Madhesi community, mostly of Indian-origin.

The Madhesis have been saying that certain provisions in the Constitution will politically marginalise it. The prolonged protests and economic blockade by Madhesis few months back had triggered tensions between Nepal and India.

"You have been a catalytic force of peace in Nepal. I am confident that under your wise leadership, Nepal will successfully implement the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating the aspirations of all sections of your diverse society," Modi told Dahal during a joint media interaction after the talks.

Nepal has been battling uneasy political transition in the last few months. KP Sharma Oli had to quit the post of Prime Minister in July following fresh political turmoil due to protest of Madheshi community against the new Constitution.

On his part, Dahal said, "You are aware that my government has made serious efforts to bring everyone on board as we enter the phase of implementation of the Constitution in the interest of all segments of Nepalese society."

Modi said as immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability and economic prosperity (Shanti, Sthirta aur Samrudhi) of Nepal is "our shared objective."

He further said, "We share our burden during difficult times, just as we celebrate each other's achievements. Indeed, our friendship is time-tested and unique.

"As immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability, and economic prosperity of Nepal is our shared objective. At every step of Nepal's development journey and economic progress, we have been privileged to be your partner."

Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar said India has agreed on what would constitute next line of credit and heeded to a request by Nepal to increase granting Rs 3 lakh instead of Rs 2 lakh in building 50,000 houses in quake devastated regions of the Himalayan nation.
New Delhi: Leaders of Left parties and Dalit outfits today attacked the NDA government, claiming a rise in cases of atrocities against community members even as they questioned Prime Minister Narendra Modi over his dispensation's alleged inaction against cow protection groups.

Speaking during a rally here, the leaders including CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury accused the government of "destroying" the country's social fabric and warned of launching widespread protests over the issue of atrocities against Dalits.

"The protest is to tell the government that the atrocities which have risen sharply against the Dalits in the name of cow vigilantism...On this, action should be taken against the culprits.

"Why are you not banning these cow vigilantism groups? Why are you not giving the rights of equality to Dalits as provided in our Constitution?" Yechury asked during the rally.

Referring to Modi's "hit me, but don't hit Dalits" remarks in the wake of alleged attacks on Dalits in the recent past, Yechury suggested that giving mere statement will not serve the purpose and insisted the Prime Minister declare that "law of the land" will prevail if Dalits are targeted.

"But he has not assured it yet," the Rajya Sabha member said.

He pitched for empowering Dalits, saying they should be allotted five acres of agricultural land to be economically strong and also insisted eradicating practice of manual scavenging.

"You do something about that. Otherwise, what is happening in our country is completely destroying our social fabric and the atrocities against the Dalits continue to be committed," he rued.

Speaking about the rally, organised by Dalit Swabhiman Sangharsh - an umbrella body of Left parties and Dalit outfits, Yechury said it is a "struggle for self-respect" by Dalits seeking "equality" as provided in the Constitution.

The Marxist leader said the rallies will be held in all state capitals in coming days before the outfits re-converge in the national capital when Winter session of Parliament begins.

Taking part in the rally, Jignesh Mevani, who floated the Dalit Atyachar Ladhai Samiti following flogging of Dalits in Gujarat's Una, seconded Yechury and said his front will struggle for self-respect of community members in the light of the alleged attacks and also for ensuring "roti, kapada aur makan" for them.

He also sought to pick holes in the Gujarat model of development, accusing the BJP-led state government of not keeping electoral promises on providing housing facilities and employment.

"We will expose this hollow development model...Besides protesting casteism, we want to expose this hollow Gujarat model of development," he added.

CPI general secretary Sudhakar Reddy, party's national secretary D Raja, BRP-Bahujan Mahasangh President Prakash Ambedkar and mother of Hyderabad Central University student Rohith Vemulla, Radhika and others addressed the rally.
Attari: The Mahant of Shri Panch Mukhi Hanuman Mandir in Pakistan's Karachi city has reportedly arrived in India with the ashes of 160 Hindus who had wished them to be immersed in Ganga at Haridwar, a media report said.

According to the Times of India, mahant Ramnath Mishra, along with his 14 -year-old nephew Kabir Kumar, arrived at the Attari border on Thursday.

The report added that earlier they were denied entry into India for want of some formalities by the Pakistan customs department.

In 2011, the mahant had reportedly brought 135 urns filled with ashes of Hindu residents of Karachi to immerse them in the Ganga.

TOI reported that he is also the president of Hindu Cremation Ground Association, besides being a co-ordinator of Inter-Religious Peace Alliance.

Although ten people had applied for visas, only he and his nephew were granted, the report said.

"There are 40 more urns in the temple which couldn't be brought, as the relatives of some of them wanted to come to India with them," he added.

The Hindus of Pakistan either preserve the ashes of their dead ones in temples, or make a 'samadhi' in their house, and in many cases, the ashes were immersed in sea water, TOI reported.
New Delhi: In a major cause of concern for the Indian authorities, a US-sponsored study has now claimed that the banned CPI-Maoists are the fourth dreaded terrorist outfit in the world after Taliban, Islamic State and Boko Haram.

As per the figures, which are part of the data collected by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism contracted with the US State Department, India witnessed a total of 791 terror attacks in 2015, of which 43% were carried out by Naxalites, in which 289 people died.

The report further claimed that the CPI (Maoist) carried out a total of 343 attacks in 2015 killing 176 Indians. Taliban were involved in a massive 1,093 terror attacks, which took 4,512 lives.

The study found that as many as 28,328 people were killed and 35,320 injured in the 11,774 terror attacks witnessed by the world in 2015.

Shockingly, the study claimed that India was the fourth worst-affected country after Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Islamic State, on the other hand, launched 931 attacks which left 6,050 people dead. Boko Haram, Nigerias militant Islamic group, carried out 491 attacks killing a total of 5,450 people.

Over half of the 791 terror attacks witnessed by India took place in four states  Chhattisgarh (21%), Manipur (12%), Jammu & Kashmir (11%) and Jharkhand (10%). Chhattisgarh, which has been a victim of Left-wing extremism, suffered double the attacks as compared to 2014  167 as compared 76 in 2014, it said.

The report further revealed that the number of people held hostage by terrorists and rebel groups in India almost tripled in 2015  from 305 in 2014 to 862, of which Naxals alone kidnapped 707 people.

However, the data collected by Home Ministry also revealed that as many as 2,162 civilians and 802 security personnel were killed by Naxals between 2010 and 2015.
New Delhi: External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj called on visiting Nepal Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal "Prachanda" here on Friday.

"EAM @SushmaSwaraj calls on PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal 'Prachanda' at Rashtrapati Bhavan," External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup tweeted along with a picture of the two leaders.

Prachanda is scheduled to hold bilateral talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi later in the day following which some agreements are expected to be signed between the two sides.

Prachanda arrived here on Thursday on a four-day visit to India.

The new Maoist-led government in Nepal assumed power early last month after the ouster of KP Sharma Oli as Prime Minister.

Apart from Sushma Swaraj, Prachanda is scheduled to meet Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Minister of State for Power Piyush Goyal later in the day before calling on President Pranab Mukherjee.

He will also attend a joint business event organised by Assocham in the evening.

Earlier on Friday, he was accorded a ceremonial welcome at the Rashtrapati Bhavan here.
On Board Special Aircraft: Downplaying Prime Minister Narendra Modi's skipping of the NAM Summit, Vice President Hamid Ansari has said there is no shift in India's foreign policy and asserted that it is participation that matters as it is "not a conference of Prime Ministers".

Ansari is leading the Indian delegation for the Non- Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit in Venezuela's Margarita island in the absence of Prime Minister Modi, who is only the second Indian Premier to not go for the conference after Charan Singh in 1979.

Asked what kind of message was India sending with PM Modi skipping the 17th NAM Summit, Ansari said, "India is participating. NAM is not a conference of Prime Ministers.

"Prime Ministers have been going but there have been occasions when Prime Ministers for a variety of reasons have not been able to go but India's participation remains," he said.

He also asserted that India will strongly take up its concerns about terrorism at the summit as it has been doing so at all international forums.

"Yes we are doing it (raising concerns over terrorism) on all fora and certainly it (NAM) is an important forum and we will take it up, no question about it," Ansari told reporters on his way to attend the NAM summit.

"Terror is something which impedes everything. If our objective is development, then terror cuts right across it. We need peace, we need social peace, we need international peace both these are being interrupted by terror. Whatever the form terror takes, it is terror, it is terrorising civilian populations and therefore if the population is terrorised then it cannot devote itself to its normal pursuits, foremost amongst them is development. So it very much has to be taken up," he asserted.

Asked if there has been a shift in India's foreign policy with the strengthening of the Indo-US partnership and if NAM has become less important, Ansari said there has been no such shift.

"There was a methodology in 1961. The methodology underwent changes in the 70s, 80s, and 90. Again the methodologies are being adjusted but the objectives have not changed...I don't think we have shifted (in our foreign policy) and I don't think it should be seen as black or white, it is always shades of grey," he said.

Vice President, however, emphasised that the Non Aligned Movement has been evolving and must continue to evolve to stay relevant to the times.

"It (NAM) has continuously evolved since its inception in 1961 and therefore it must evolve. Any organisation if it does not respond to the requirements of the day loses its relevance. So whatever our priorities of the day are that is to be determined collectively by consensus. Those priorities have to be addressed there is no way out of it," he said.

Ansari stated that the group of countries that now number 120 came together because there were common concerns and common interests.
Srinagar: Curfew like restrictions were imposed by authorities in Srinagar and other parts of Kashmir Valley on Friday to prevent separatists called protests.



The authorities did not mention if there would be curfew anywhere in the valley on Friday, but deployed security forces were disallowing all pedestrian and vehicular movement in old city areas of Srinagar as well as other major cities and towns in the valley.



With the death of two more injured youths, the toll in the ongoing unrest in the valley since July 9, has risen to 88.



Basit Mukhtar, 21, who was injured in clashes with the security forces in Pulwama district on September 5, succumbed to his injuries in a hospital on Friday.



Rasiq Ahmad Bhat, 25, another youth injured in Kulgam district on September 5 had died in the hospital on Thursday.



The separatists on Friday issued their fresh weekly protest calendar which is harsher than the ones they had been issuing during the previous weeks of the unrest.



While calling for daily protests and rallies during the next seven days, the separatists said there would be no relaxation in the protest shut down during this period.



In their previous weekly protest calendars, separatists had been allowing opening of markets and passage of people from 6 pm to 6 am.



All educational institutions, main markets, public transports and other businesses have remained closed in Kashmir Valley for the past 70 days.


Vahbiz Dorabjee trashes reports of her dating actor Vipul Roy, saying there is no third party involved in her split with Vivian.

By India Today Web Desk: Vivian Dsena and Vahbiz Dorabjee's split has taken an ugly turn with media reporting about the latter's alleged proximity with Vipul Roy.

Initially, it was said that the telly couple was reportedly calling off their marriage because of compatibility issues. But a recent set of reports suggested that Vahbiz's proximity with Vipul is the reason behind the couple's separation.

lang="en" dir="ltr">It is strictly betwn Viv & Me.We need our space.Every marriage goes through ups and downs.We r dignified people and plz dont make it ugly.. Vahbiz Dorabjee (@Babiejaan) September 15, 2016

advertisement

Also read: It's personal: Vivian Dsena confirms separation from wife Vahbiz Dorabjee



Vahbiz has, however, trashed reports of involvement of a third party in her marital troubles. "It is strictly betwn Viv & Me. We need our space. Every marriage goes through ups and downs. We are dignified people and please don't make it ugly," Vahbiz took to Twitter to put across her point.



lang="en" dir="ltr">I request the media to plz stop taking advantage of the situation and cooking up CHEAP stories.There is no 3rd person involved betw Viv & Me Vahbiz Dorabjee (@Babiejaan) September 15, 2016

She has also requested the media to stop speculating about them and respect their privacy. "I request the media to please stop taking advantage of the situation and cooking up CHEAP stories. There is no 3rd person involved between Viv & Me," she wrote.



Vivian and Vahbiz met on the sets of Pyaar Kii Ye Ek Kahaani and got married in 2013. While Vivian is playing the lead in Colors' Shakti Astitva Ke Ehsaas Ki, Vahbiz is playing the role of Maggie Kant in Bahu Humari Rajni_Kant.



--- ENDS ---
Srinagar: As Kashmir continues to remain tense, it has been learnt that the separatists are receiving funds through the 'hawala' route.

Reports say that the separatists are getting Rs 50-60 lakhs every month, which is being used to fuel the protests in the Valley.

Terror outfit Hizbul Mujahidden is helping the separatists in receiving the money.

Earlier, a report published in OneIndia had said several lakhs of rupees are smuggled in Jammu and Kashmir in gas cylinders. Money is stitched to salwar kameez donned by women to deflect the attention.

Kashmir has been witnessing unending violence ever since terror outfit Hizbul Mujahidden's poster boy Burhan Wani was killed in an encounter on July 09.

There are several terrorist training camps in PoK of various outfits like Lashkar-e-Toiba, Hizbul Mujahideen, Jaish-e-Mohammad which are used for training and subsequently for infiltrating trained militants into Jammu and Kashmir.

The separatists on Friday issued their fresh weekly protest calendar which is harsher than the ones they had been issuing during the previous weeks of the unrest.

While calling for daily protests and rallies during the next seven days, the separatists said there would be no relaxation in the protest shut down during this period.

In their previous weekly protest calendars, separatists had been allowing opening of markets and passage of people from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m.

All educational institutions, main markets, public transports and other businesses have remained closed in Kashmir Valley for the past 70 days.
Srinagar: Another youth injured in clashes last week succumbed on Friday, taking the toll to 80 including two policemen in the unrest that has gripped the Kashmir Valley since July 8.

Basit Mukhtar was injured by a tear gas shell in clashes on September 5 in South Kashmir's Pulwama. He died at a hospital here during treatment. With this 80 persons have died in the violent clashes that broke out a day after Hizbul militant Burhan Wani was gunned down in an encounter with security forces in south Kashmir.

Curfew was reimposed in many parts of Kashmir today, including summer capital Srinagar, due to apprehension of violence after Friday prayers, even as normal life in the Valley remained paralysed.

"Curfew has been imposed in Srinagar city and towns of Baramulla, Pattan, Anantnag, Shopian and Pulwama," a police official said.

The youth was injured by a tear gas shell in clashes on September 5 in South Kashmir's Pulwama district.

The official said curbs have been imposed to maintain law and order as there have been protests and clashes after Friday prayers in the Valley which has been hit by violence following the killing of Hizbul commander Burhan Wani in July.

The official said restriction on the assembly of people continues to remain in force.

Meanwhile, normal life continued to remain paralysed in Kashmir for the 70th consecutive day due to restrictions and separatist-sponsored strike

The separatists have extended the protest programme till September 22. They have not announced any relaxation in the strike even in the evening hours.

Shops, business establishment, and petrol pumps continued to remain shut while public transport was off the roads.

Schools, colleges, and other education institutions also remained closed due to the strike called by the separatist to protest the deaths of civilians.

As many as 80 people including two policemen have been killed in the unrest that broke out a day after Wani was gunned down in an encounter with security forces in south Kashmir on July 8.
Kochi: Kerala government is exploring all legal options, including filing a curative petition, in the Supreme Court in the sensational rape and murder case of Soumya, a top law officer said on Friday.

A day after apex court dropped the murder charge against the accused, state Advocate General C P Sudhakara Prasad said all legal options, including filing a curative petition, were being considered to ensure maximum punishment to Govindachamy, who raped the 23-year old sales representative after pushing her down from a train in 2011.

"Steps are being taken in this direction," he told reporters here.

He, however, said a final decision would be taken only after consulting with the people concerned.

In its 22-page verdict, the apex court had discharged Govindachamy under section 302 (murder) of IPC, in which the maximum sentence is capital punishment, saying there was no intention on his part to kill the victim but only to sexually assault her by keeping her in a supine position.

The bench comprising justices Ranjan Gogoi, P C Pant and U U Lalit, however, upheld trial court verdict awarding life imprisonment to Govindachamy for raping the 23-year-old sales representative.

The verdict had come as shock for the victim's family which dubbed it as "heart breaking" and expressed anguish over the "failure" of the state prosecutor to "properly" present the case in apex court.

Political parties in the state have attacked the LDF government accusing it of not properly presenting the case in the Supreme Court.
Mumbai: Senior Congress leader Prithviraj Chavan today accused the NCP of having "back-stabbed" his party by withdrawing its support from the Maharashtra government ahead of the 2014 state Assembly polls.

His comments came after senior NCP leader Praful Patel had recently accused the Congress of pulling his party down even as it "sank" itself by wrongfully charging it with involvement in scandals.

"The NCP back-stabbed the Congress by withdrawing its support from the Maharashtra government ahead of the 2014 state Assembly polls," Chavan told reporters here.

He also refuted Patel's contention that he had ordered a probe against the NCP leaders in the Rs 70,000 crore irrigation scam.

"It was late Maharashtra Home minister R R Patil, who had given the permission to conduct an inquiry into the alleged Rs 70,000 irrigation scam," Chavan said.

"Even I was shocked by reading news reports of the (then) government's approval to conduct a probe into the (alleged) irrigation scam. I did not even know about the decision which was taken by R R Patil," he said.

The Congress leader claimed that Patil had given the approvals to conduct a probe through the Anti Corruption Bureau against NCP leaders Ajit Pawar and Sunil Tatkare on September 20, 2014, a day before the Assembly was to dissolve.

"I am not sure whether R R Patil had held discussions about it with any of his party leaders before taking such a big decision. This could be a result of internal politics," Chavan claimed.

He termed the allegations levelled against him by Patel as "baseless."

"It was mentioned in 2011 economic survey report that despite spending Rs 70,000 crore over irrigation schemes, only 0.5 per cent land came under irrigation. My stand behind publishing white paper on irrigation was only to find out the mistakes and loopholes in planning that could be restored in future planning," he said.



Chavan, who is an MLA, added that a white paper does not necessitate an inquiry against the concerned department or the minister.

"If that was my motive, I would have chosen to hand over the issue to the ACB instead of announcing to publish a white paper," he added.
Shillong: The National Green Tribunal (NGT) constituted committee has asked the Meghalaya government to take up a pilot project for preparing a comprehensive ecological restoration plan for coal mine areas in the state.

The committee would be headed by the Secretary of Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC).

Informing this while replying in the Assembly, Chief Minister Mukul Sangma said the committee was constituted after the state government had submitted the Mining Plan/Guidelines to the NGT on January 1.

He said the state government has also submitted its comments and status on the matter before the committee headed by MoEFCC Secretary in its first meeting held on May 4.

The meeting decided that the National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (NEERI) would be conducting site visit during May 30 to June 31 and submit the report to the committee.

In its order issued on July 21, the NGT has directed the MoEFCC, Ministry of Coal and the state government to hold a meeting to finalise the mining plan and policy including the scheme for restoration of environment and ecology, he said.

Stating that the second meeting of the committee was held on August 30, the CM said "It has recommended the state government to carry out a pilot study of a cluster of rat-hole mines in Jaintia Hills taking them on watershed basis for treatment and ecological restoration in the background of their findings and to use the learnings from preparing a comprehensive ecological restoration plan for the entire mine area."

As a follow up action of the NGT's direction, Sangma said the suggestions of NEERI regarding 'sealing of abandoned' rat-hole mines by engineering interventions was asked to be examined by the state in consultation with reputed mining/geotechnical institute for an appropriate decision considering the magnitude and extent of the problem as well as feasibility.

On the other hand, the Meghalaya State Pollution Control Board would carry out regular monitoring of surface and ground water pollution, he said.

A detailed note in this regard along with the long term data shall be submitted to the NEERI to arrive at the trend analysis and suggest adequate mitigation measures, he said while quoting the tribunal committee's recommendations.

The MoEFCC has filed a compliance affidavit before the National Green Tribunal on September 9, he added.
Itanagar: In a big setback for Congress, all but one of its 45 MLAs, including Chief Minister Pema Khandu, on Friday resigned from the party and joined the People's Party of Arunachal Pradesh, triggering a major political crisis in this northeastern state.

PTI quoted sources as saying that Khandu, who became chief minister two months ago in a development that restored the Congress government, along with 43 Congress MLAs joined the PPA and virtually converted it into a PPA government.

All but one of 45 Cong MLAs including Chief Minister Pema Khandu join People's Party of Arunachal.  Press Trust of India (@PTI_News) September 16, 2016

Earlier, news agency ANI had also confirmed the development through a tweet.

42 Cong MLAs in Arunachal Pradesh, including CM Pema Khandu,resign from the party, will join Peoples Party of Arunachal: Sources  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

The only MLA who has stayed with the Congress is Nabam Tuki, who was replaced as Chief Minister when the Congress, in an effort to control the rebellion in its ranks replaced him with Khandu in July.

Khandu had on July 16 become the chief minister after months of political turmoil that unseated Tuki, who himself was reinstated as chief minister by the apex court only two days before.

In a House of 60, the Congress had 44 MLAs with one seat falling vacant after former chief minister Kalikho Pul committed suicide on August 9, while the BJP has 11 members including two Independents.

The status of two Congress MLAs is yet to be decided as they put in their papers before the recent series of political developments that led to first Tuki government falling in January this year, imposition of President's Rule and installation of the late Kalikho Pul government on February 19 for a short span.

Pul was forced to resign in July 13 following a Supreme Court judgement. On March 3 last, Pul along with 29 Congress MLAs joined the PPA.

PPA CWC chairman Kameng Ringu termed the development as a "homecoming" after a short temporary self exile of the party.

It remains to be seen whether the PPA will align with BJP, which has 11 MLAs in the House. In the Assembly of 60, Congress had 47 MLAs, BJP 11 and two independent.

With PTI inputs
Bhubaneswar: Holding Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik responsible for Mahanadi river water row with Chhattisgarh, Congress on Friday said if the tripartite meet called by the Centre fails to resolve the issue, the state government must demand formation of a water dispute tribunal.

"If the exercise fails to reach an understanding to protect Odisha's interest, the state government should ask the Centre to constitute Mahanadi Water Dispute Tribunal as per provisions of Inter-state Water Dispute Act, 1956," a white paper on Mahanadi water issue released by state Congress said.

The white paper was released here by Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) President Prasad Harichandan a day before the tripartite meeting called by Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti in Delhi tomorrow.

Demanding immediate halt to construction of all dams, barrages and other projects on the upper reaches of the Mahanadi river by Chhattisgarh government, the white paper said river water was meant for the life and livelihood of the people of both states and not for business.

While hoping that the meeting would succeed in resolving the issue and safeguard Odisha's interest, the PCC chief said Mahanadi river water issue should never be allowed to assume the shape of Cauvery water dispute.

Stating that a water sharing agreement should be signed with Chhattisgarh with emphasis on protecting the interest of Odisha, Harichandan said a river corporation or board should be formed for the development of Mahanadi and the river valley as per provisions of the constitution.

Hitting out at the BJD Government, the white paper alleged that after having failed to protect Odisha's rights over Mahanadi river water, Naveen Patnaik regime was doing politics over the issue by launching agitation despite being in power.

Targeting the chief minister, the Congress white paper claimed that Patnaik, who is also in charge of water resources department, was fully responsible for Mahanadi river water controversy which is taking the shape of a major dispute.

"He (Patnaik) is accountable for negligence in protecting state's interests," Harichandan said quoting the white paper.

Odisha Government should prepare a comprehensive document on all projects being constructed and the existing ones on the upstream of Mahanadi river before Hirakud dam, their impact on environment, he said, adding it should also include assessment of water requirements of both states at present and for next 100 years.
Bhubaneswar: Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik today vowed to fight for the rights of the people at the tripartite meeting scheduled to be held in New Delhi tomorrow on the Mahanadi water issue.

During his visit to Delhi, the Chief Minister would meet his Chhattisgarh counterpart Raman Singh at the meeting convened by Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti.

Patnaik, who was given a ceremonial send off at the airport by ruling BJD ministers, MPs, MLAs and party workers, said Mahanadi was the lifeline for crores of people living in 15 districts of the state and he would strongly fight for the rights of the people.

"I assure each one of you I will put my best efforts forward and leave no stone unturned in the fight for the people of our state," Patnaik said.

"I am going with a lot of hope that the Centre will listen to the voice of Odisha and do justice to the people of our state on the sensitive Mahanadi issue," he said, adding his government had already lodged protest against neighbouring Chhattisgarh's act of constructing projects on the upstream of river Mahanadi.

The Chief Minister, who met the members from the public and political parties for three days, thanked those who came forward with valuable suggestions in the larger interest of the state.

"I am extremely grateful to our people who have come from all over the state to voice their concern and give their suggestions on this very important issue," he said.

Stating that he would like to personally thank everyone who came and met him, Patnaik said "I also express my deepest gratitude to the four and half crore people of our state who are concerned about this issue and continue to support me for the interest of the state."
Chapaar (Ludhiana): Terming the Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party as "anti-Punjab", Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today said even the shadow of these parties was bad for the state.

Addressing a political gathering on the occasion of the Chapaar fair, the chief minister said both these parties were inimical to the interests of the state and its people.

He alleged that these parties don't have any sympathy for the people of Punjab and were hostile to the interests of the state and cautioned the people against the "nefarious designs" of these parties.

The CM said the upcoming Assembly polls would be "decisive as it would make or break the future of Punjab" and the fight was between SAD and "enemies of the state" like AAP and Congress.

If "pro-people force" like the SAD-BJP alliance was voted to power again, the state's development would get a major fillip, he said, adding if anti-Punjab forces, like Congress and AAP, get a chance the situation would turn for the worse.

Badal asked the people to be cautious during the election as they would have to choose between enemies and friends of the state.

The Congress has "irrelevantly meddled" in the social, political, economic and even religious affairs of the state, he alleged.

He said the erstwhile Congress governments at the Centre had "deliberately denied" the state its capital Chandigarh and even its legitimate share in river waters.

"No sincere Punjabi can ever forgive the Congress for its sins like Operation Blue Star and killing of innocents in 1984 anti-Sikh carnage," he alleged.

"The Congress is perpetrator of a deep rooted conspiracy to deprive the state of its waters, by constructing the Sutlej Yamuna Link (SYL) canal. This canal was aimed at ruining the state by snatching its only available natural resource," he claimed.

Coming down heavily on AAP, the CM said, "The affidavit submitted by the Arvind Kejriwal government in Supreme Court on the SYL issue has exposed AAP's anti-Punjab mindset."

"Kejriwal hails from Haryana, so he is naturally inclined towards his native state. The anti-Punjab stand taken by his government in the apex court has proved it," he stated.

Describing AAP a "house of cards", he said it was likely to collapse before the state Assembly polls.

"AAP's leadership neither has character nor ideology. Their sole motive is to come in power and plunder the state," he alleged.
Lucknow: A day after Shivpal Singh Yadav resigned from the Akhilesh Yadav Cabinet and also quitted as state party chief, a meeting is likely between the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister and Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav.

Mulayam will today chair a parliamentary board meeting of the Samajwadi Party in Lucknow to put an end to the fight between his son Akhilesh Yadav and brother Shivpal.

Meanwhile, Shivpal addressed his supporters outside his residence and reiterated that Mulayam is the supreme leader and he will abide by his orders.

He urged his supporters to gather outside party office, where he is scheduled to meet his elder brother Mulayam.

Protesters were heard chanting "Ram Gopal ko bahar karo" slogans during Shivpal's address to supporters.

According to CNN-News18, Shivpal wants Mulayam to remove Akhilesh and Ram Gopal, says he is not interested in mere holding onto portfolios.

Shivpal's resignation on Thursday exposed the bickering in the Yadav clan in the run-up to the state Assembly polls just a few months away.

Close aides of the former Public Works Department minister informed that Shivpal has returned all government perks and facilities, like official staff and vehicles, and will be vacating his official residence, 7, Kalidas Marg today.

Unconfirmed reports suggest that the Chief Minister has returned the resignation of his uncle. Shivpal's official residence is adjacent to the official 5, Kalidas Marg, the residence of CM Akhilesh Yadav.

Soon after Shivpal sent his resignation to his nephew Chief Minister, his son and chairman of the Uttar Pradesh Pradeshik Cooperative Federation, Aditya Yadav, also quit the post. Shivpal's wife Sarla also gave resignation from the post of District Cooperative Bank chairperson, Etawah.

Shivpal Yadav took the decision to quit the Cabinet and party post after a meeting with his elder brother and party Chief Mulayam Singh Yadav.

Akhilesh Yadav had on Tuesday stripped his uncle Shivpal from the plum posts of PWD, Cooperative and Irrigation minister.

Earlier, as the first family of Uttar Pradesh battled an open war within, Mulayam Singh rushed to Lucknow and met Shivpal and Akhilesh separately to douse the flames.

As soon as he reached here, the SP chief summoned Shivpal and held closed-door meeting with him.

Shivpal later met Akhilesh at his official residence, sources said, adding the meeting came at the behest of Mulayam.

Immediately thereafter, Mulayam met his Chief Minister son Akhilesh, the sources said.

Earlier, Mulayam's cousin and SP's national general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav, who is seen as backing the Chief Minister, said the leadership had committed an unintentional "mistake" by removing Akhilesh as party's UP president.

Ram Gopal, who had met the Chief Minister, said the "differences" had arisen due to some "misunderstanding".

He blamed "outsiders" for the crisis, an apparent reference to Amar Singh who recently returned to the party after a number of years.

He claimed that "Akhilesh is not angry with anyone and the decision of netaji (Mulayam) is final in the party."

The same was said by Shivpal at his press conference.

The feud had spilled into the open after the Chief Minister stripped Shivpal of key ministerial portfolios two days back, hours after he was replaced with Shivpal as the party's state unit chief by his father.

In a related development, former chief secretary Deepak Singhal, whose sudden removal is said to have triggered the whole controversy, was on Thursday posted as Chairman of State Vigilance Commission.

Sources say, Singhal who had been put on waiting list after his removal, was hurriedly posted to this new post so that the issue is closed for the time being. Mulayam Singh Yadav, hours after his removal, had asked Akhilesh to reinstate him, which he refused.

(With Agency inputs)
Ranbir Kapoor and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan's sizzling chemistry is too hot to handle in Bulleya, the new song from Ae Dil Hai Mushkil.

By Hardeep Dugal: The song opens with Aishwarya saying, "Main kissi ki zaroorat nahin, khwahish banna chahti hoon". Wow, now that's something we all had been waiting for.

Karan Johar's Ae Dil Hai Mushkil's second track 'Bulleya' featuring Ranbir and Aishwarya's sizzling chemistry has released, and man, the video sure is too hot to handle.

ALSO READ: Ranbir, Anushka, Aishwarya, Fawad in Ae Dil Hai Mushkil together. What is the film about?

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ALSO READ: Can Karan Johar make the best 'Karan Johar film' with Ae Dil Hai Mushkil?



With over 60,000 views in less than 2 hours, the first few glimpses of the track will surely give you goosebumps seeing Ranbir and Aishwaya's romance that looks pure, effortless, lusty, classy, passionate and much more.

Aishwarya plays a seductress to the T in one of her most glamorous outings till date and Ranbir matches her oomph in every frame.

Music director Pritam hits the nail on the head yet again with this soulful, rustic Sufi track. Amit Mishra does justice to Amitabh Bhattacharya's wonderful lyrics that form a strong foundation to the on-screen magic between Ranbir and the Bachchan bahu.

Bulleya is also likely to transport you to the sets of Imtiaz Ali's superhit Rockstar with quite a few scenes similar to Sadda Haq that became a sort of college anthem back then.

Infact, Ranbir's character 'Ayan seems to be a reincarnation of his Rockstar avatar, only this time he looks slightly mature and unlike the rebel Jordan with long hair that he played in 2011.

One can also see Anushka Sharma and Fawad Khan in the song yet it is Ranbir and Aishwarya's images that cloud your mind throughout the video. It is the rollicking intensity of their relationship that is undoubtedly the highlight of this latest track. All we can say is, keep it coming!



Watch the video of Bulleya here:





--- ENDS ---
Lucknow: Four persons were shot dead on Friday in Bijnore in Uttar Pradesh in communal clashes after some boys allegedly teased a group of school girls, police said.

Some people opened fire during the violence, leaving four persons from the minority community dead and at least five others injured, the police said.

The injured were rushed to nearby medical facilities, a Home Department official told IANS.

The deceased were identified as Ehsaan, Sartaaz, Anees and Rizwan. The injured were identified as Furkan, Ansar, Saleem, Aladdin, Shahnawaz and Sarfaraz.

Their furious family members and relatives went on a rampage, pelting stones and setting several shops and vehicles on fire. They also jammed a highway with the bodies.

Two policemen - a sub-inspector and a constable -- were suspended following the violence.

Five persons have been arrested for inciting the mobs and are being interrogated, a police officer said.

Angry locals complained that some school girls were being routinely teased by some people but the police did not act despite many complaints.
Udaipur: Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh on Friday evaded questions on the ongoing feud in the party in Uttar Pradesh.

"As per a pre-decided schedule, I am here to attend a programme. I would say hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil," the Rajya Sabha MP told reporters here at a function.

He refused to comment on the ongoing tussle in the party.
New Delhi: Amid the ongoing power tussle in the Samajwadi Party, Union Minister and BJP MP Sanjeev Balyan on Friday alleged that Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav is trying to hide his government`s failures with this `family drama`.

"There is a family drama going on in the state. The people of Uttar Pradesh are well aware of it and the government has been totally paralysed in this drama. Everyone is aware of the fact that Samajwadi Party will no longer form a government here (in Uttar Pradesh)," Balyan told ANI here.

He also alleged that the ruling party was looting the people of Uttar Pradesh."This family has been looting Uttar Pradesh. The districts have been divided among the family members to loot the people," he said.

He further said the Chief Minister should have at least put his attention toward the development of the state.

Meanwhile, Shivpal Singh Yadav, who yesterday resigned from all posts of the Uttar Pradesh Government held by him and the Samajwadi Party (SP), today urged his supporters to work towards strengthening the party.

However, Shivpal asked his supporters to work towards strengthening the party and stand united in support of Mulayam Singh Yadav.

"We`ve to work towards strengthening the party, I urge you all to go to the party office where Netaji will be coming. We all stand by Netaji (Mulayam Singh Yadav). `Unka sandesh humare liye adesh hai.` (His message is a command for us)," he told his supporters.

Shivpal, who held a clutch of important departments, quit the government as well as his position as chief of Samajwadi Party`s state unit yesterday.

However, the Chief Minister rejected Shivpal`s resignation from the cabinet.The development came after a day after the Samajwadi Party boss and the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister held separate meetings with Shivpal.

Earlier on September 13, Akhilesh stripped Shivpal of key ministerial portfolios, hours after Mulayam replaced him with his uncle as the party`s state unit chief.

Earlier, Shivpal had reportedly announced the party`s first list of 142 candidates for the 2017 assembly polls.

Disagreements between Akhilesh and his uncle have been reported on several occasions, including on the choice of official to be appointed as the state`s chief secretary after Alok Ranjan`s term ended and the postponement of Qaumi Ekta Dal`s merger with Samajwadi Party.
Lucknow: The high-voltage drama in Uttar Pradesh's ruling Samajawdi Party came to its logical end with Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Friday rejecting his uncle Shivpal's resignation from the state government and party chief Mulayam batting for unity in family.

Playing a peacemaker, SP patriarch Mulayam said that there can be no divide in the party till he is alive. As part of the peace deal, Gayatri Prajapati, the sacked minister, has been reinstated.

Hailing Shivpal, Akhilesh today said, ''He is my chacha (uncle) and I have always respected him . I can't accept his resignation.''

''Every body respects Netaji and his words will be final and acceptable to all,'' the Chief Minister added.

The move came shortly after Shivpal resigned from the state cabinet and all party positions.

Shivpal Yadav also displayed a show of strength outside his home in Lucknow this morning.

Hundreds of supporters of Shivpal protested outside his house demanding senior leader Ramgopal Yadav's resignation. They said Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav has undermined Shivpal's position in the party and that he should apologise for this.

Shivpal, however, made it clear that he will continue to follow Mulayam's orders.

"I wish to strengthen the Samajwadi Party. We are all with Netaji (Mulayam). Netaji's wishes are our command. Today, Netaji will come to the party office. In every situation, we will be with him. We are with Netaji and will state our viewpoint to Netaji," Shivpal said.

The feud within the party broke out a few months before the crucial Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections which are due in early 2017. Shivpal being a prominent leader in the party, his resignation came as a huge setback.

Moreover, Shivpal is not an easy nut to crack and has now asked Mulayam that both Akhilesh and Ram Gopal Yadav must be removed from the party, said sources. He has told Mulayam that he is not interested in holding mere portfolios and that equality to chief minister's post is paramount, the sources said.

In a meeting with Shivpal, Mulayam told his younger brother that Akhilesh is not listening to him.

Sources said that Akhilesh wants to settle the leadership issue once and for all. The CM might agree to return the portfolios, but Shivpal is now asking for much more.

Shivpal had resigned on Thursday evening and submitted his resignation to Mulayam and Akhilesh. Shivpal's wife Sarla too resigned from her post at the Etawah District Co-operative Bank.

With PTI inputs
Dehradun: President Pranab Mukherjee will be on a four-day visit to Uttarakhand from September 27 during which he will go to Kedarnath to pay obeisance at the Himalayan shrine along with his family and take part in the Ganga Arti at Haridwar.

Mukherjee will be received at the Jollygrant airport by Governor K K Paul, Chief Minister Harish Rawat, Chief Secretary Shatrughna Singh and DGP M A Ganpati on September 27, an official release said.

An announcement was made after a meeting chaired by the Chief Secretary to review the preparations of the presidential visit.

The President will inaugurate the renovated Ashiyana building in the city on September 27 where he will also stay during his four-day visit concluding on September 30.

He will leave for Kedarnath on September 28, where he along with his family members, will visit the Himalayan temple to offer prayers and return to Dehdradun in the afternoon.

He will also visit Haridwar on September 29 and take part in the Ganga Aarti before returning to Dehradun.

He will leave for Delhi on September 30.

The President had to return to Delhi without paying obeisance at the Himalayan shrine in June this year as his chopper had failed to land due to bad weather.
Durgapur (WB): Police today recovered 15 to 20 live bombs stacked in two bags and about 7 sharp weapons from a CPI-M party office in Benachitty market area of the steel town today.

Police said several sharp weapons were also recovered during the raid which was launched following a tip off.

The bombs were later defused, the police said adding none was detained or arrested in connection with the incident so far.

CPI-M zonal secretary Pankaj Roy Sarkar ruled out the party's involvement in the storing of bombs and weapons in its office and said it was a conspiracy to defame the party.

Prabhat Chatterje, local INTTUC leader said efforts were on by the leftist party to create fear in the minds of the people.
Kolkata: Alleging discrepancies in the new electoral list prepared by the Election Commission, Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee today asked the party leaders and elected representatives to compare it with the old list.

Banerjee, at the meeting of party's decision making committee, asked the party leaders to prepare themselves for the Panchayat elections slated in 2018 in the state.

"Mamata Banerjee said that the list has been prepared without consulting political parties. She has asked the public representatives and leaders to compare the old voter list with the new voter list," a senior party leader, who was present in the meeting, said.

The senior party leader said that there was no similarity in the master roll and the revised roll prepared by the Election Commission.

"We feel that there is a discrepancy and the BJP is behind it," he alleged.
Damascus: Fierce fighting and clashes between regime forces and rebels rocked the eastern edge of Syria's capital on Friday, a correspondent and military source said, despite a fragile truce across the country.

"The Syrian army is blocking an attack by armed groups that tried to enter the capital's east via Jobar... Leading to intense clashes and rocket fire," a military source told AFP.

A barrage of rocket fire and shelling could be heard coming from the Jobar district, a rebel-held eastern suburb of Damascus.

The district has been a battleground for more than two years and nearly all of its pre-war population has fled.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group also reported the clashes and said more than 21 shells and rockets hit parts of Jobar.

Two shells also hit the Bab al-Sharqi neighbourhood of Damascus but did not result in any casualties, the Observatory said.

Rami Abdel Rahman, who heads the Britain-based monitor, said both Islamist faction Faylaq al-Sham and the Fateh al- Sham Front - formerly Al-Qaeda's Syrian affiliate - were present in Jobar.

He did not have immediate information on casualties.

Under the truce deal negotiated by Moscow and Washington, which came into force on Monday evening, fighting is to halt across the country except in areas where jihadists are present.

Observers have noted that the deal will be particularly difficult to implement in areas where Fateh al-Sham has formed strong alliances with local rebels.
Washington: A surging Donald Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, has reduced popularity gap with his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton to almost ties, according to a latest poll.

Clinton was now leading New York-based business tycoon by just one percent among likely voters, said the national poll by Fox News.

It said in a four-way matchup, Clinton got 41 percent support among likely voters, while Trump a 40 percent and Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson and Green Party nominee Jill Stein eight and three per cent, respectively.

However, in a head-to-head match, Trump (46 percent) leads Clinton (45 percent) by one percentage point.

This is the first poll which was conducted after the 9/11 anniversary incident in which Clinton had to leave the New York memorial due to illness. She was diagnosed with pneumonia. After a few days of rest, she resumed her campaign yesterday.

Clinton's drop in lead over Trump is also reflected on RealClearPolitics, which monitors top national polls. As per its latest count, Clinton's average lead over Trump has dropped to just 1.5 percentage points which was around eight per cent about a month ago.

"The presidential race is tight. Hillary Clinton tops Donald Trump by just one point among likely voters in the four-way ballot.?In the head-to-head matchup, Trump's up by one point," Fox News said.

The first presidential debate is set for September 26 and it will be followed by two more on October 9 and 19.
Jerusalem: Israel`s army estimates that thousands of rockets could slam into the Jewish state in any future conflagration, military sources said Friday ahead of a nationwide civil defence drill.

"Total war on several fronts, destruction of essential equipment and infrastructure and heavy rocket bombardment" all form part of the scenario for the exercise, which runs from Sunday until September 21, the army said.

The drill is based on projections of the army`s Home Front Command, which estimates 1,500 rockets crashing into the country each day, military sources said in a briefing to Israeli reporters, local media reported.

The projectiles could be launched simultaneously by Lebanon`s Shiite militia Hezbollah across Israel`s northern border and to a far lesser extent from Hamas-ruled Gaza in the south.

Hamas is said to have been left seriously weakened after a 2014 Gaza war against Israel, but it still holds thousands of rockets, according to a military official.

Hezbollah has at least 100,000 and probably more, said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Only around one in 100 rockets is likely to hit a building, military sources say, with the rest falling on open ground or being intercepted by Israel`s Iron Dome missile defence system.

They say 95 percent of rockets fired will likely carry a light payload and have a range of less than 40 kilometres (25 miles), but Hezbollah can hit densely-populated central Israel with dozens of rockets each day.

The Home Front Command, tasked with leading and coordinating civil defence, regularly publishes maps showing the maximum time, by location, that Israelis have to take shelter after air raid sirens sound.

In Tel Aviv, Israel`s seaside commercial and leisure capital, the time to scramble to safety has been reassessed from 90 seconds at present to 60 in the next conflict.

After a 2006 war with Hezbollah, an official inquiry criticised authorities for lack of preparedness and organisation in civil defence procedures.

During that conflict, the Shiite militia rained about 4,000 rockets on Israel and sent a million civilians into shelters, many of them dilapidated and cramped.

The 34 days of fighting took the lives of more than 1,200 on the Lebanese side, mostly civilians, and 160 Israelis, almost all soldiers.
The internal family feud between Akhilesh and his uncles Shivpal Yadav and Ram Gopal Yadav has further dented the image of the party and the government.

By Kumar Shakti Shekhar: The ruling Samajwadi Party (SP) was already facing anti-incumbency in Uttar Pradesh (UP). The ongoing bitter internal feud in the Yadav clan will further damage the party, helping its arch rival the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) the most and hurting the prospects of the BJP.

The SP had come back to power in 2012 with the solid backing of its vote bank of Yadavs and Muslims who constitute 15 per cent and 18 per cent of the state's population respectively. However, the Muslims are not favourably disposed towards the Akhilesh government, riled as they are because of the riots which have taken place in the last four-and-a-half years.

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Also read: Yadav clan reaches a truce: Shivpal to remain state party chief, Akhilesh gets big say in ticket distribution



KEEPING BJP AT BAY

As it is, power in UP has been getting rotated alternately between Mayawati's BSP and the SP for the past four elections since 2002. With the chances of Muslims deserting the SP bandwagon, their next choice will be Mayawati. The Muslims will view the BSP as a party which can keep the BJP at bay.

The Congress was also an alternative for the Muslims but the party is still seen to be struggling to improve its rank from the fourth position, which it has been holding for the last two decades.

The BJP still hoped that the Muslim votes might get split between the SP, BSP and the Congress. But the internal family feud between Akhilesh and his uncles Shivpal Yadav and Ram Gopal Yadav, with the SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav trying to broker peace, has further dented the image of the party and the government.



SP FAMILY DRAMA



The "drama" in the SP family - as Mayawati and the BJP call it - will force the Muslims to put their weight behind Mayawati. The BSP's loss following desertions of senior leaders like Swami Prasad Maurya, RK Chaudhary and Brajesh Pathak will get offset with the Muslims returning to its fold. Any consolidation of the Muslim votes will harm the prospects of the BJP and the SP both.

Also read: Rahul is a good boy, we can be friends, says Akhilesh Yadav

Till the Shivpal-Akhilesh spat had broken out, the SP hoped for a hung Assembly. It was looking to a tie up with the Congress as Akhilesh had praised Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi last week calling him a "good human being and a good boy" and hoping that if he spends more time in UP, they can forge friendship.

But a tie-up with the Congress would be possible only if the SP is the single largest party even though it fails to touch the magic figure of 202 seats. However, the internal family tussle may push the SP to the third position.



THE MAIN CONTEST



On its part, the BJP is aggressively wooing the Brahmins, other upper castes, non-Yadav OBCs and also the Dalits to come to power on its own.

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A pre-poll survey recently concluded that the main contest would be between the SP and the BJP and that the BSP would come a poor third. In order to undermine the BSP, the BJP has also been harping that its main rival is the SP.

Also read: Mayawati woos Dalits, Muslims at Saharanpur rally; accuses BJP of engineering communal tension in UP

Though the main contest may not be between the SP and the BJP, the manner in which developments are unfolding, it surely is advantage BSP and a cause of worry for the BJP in UP.

--- ENDS ---
Washington: Japan will step up its activity in the contested South China Sea through joint training patrols with the United States and bilateral and multilateral exercises with regional navies, Japanese Defense Minister Tomomi Inada said on Thursday.

Inada said in a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank, that Japan`s increased engagement in the area, where Japan shares US concerns about China`s pursuit of extensive territorial claims, would include capacity building for coastal nations.

Japan also has its own dispute with China over territory in the East China Sea.

Inada said that if the world condoned attempts to change the rule of law and allowed rule bending to succeed, the "consequences could become global."

"In this context, I strongly support the US Navy`s freedom-of-navigation operations, which go a long way to upholding the rules-based international maritime order," she said.

"Japan, for its part, will increase its engagement in the South China Sea through, for example, Maritime Self-Defense Force joint training cruises with the US Navy and bilateral and multilateral exercises with regional navies," she said.

Japan would also help build the capacity of coastal states in the South China Sea, said Inada, before heading for talks with US Defense Secretary Ash Carter at the Pentagon.Japan said this month it was ready to provide Vietnam with new patrol ships, in its latest step to boost the maritime law-enforcement capabilities of countries locked in territorial rows with China.

It also agreed to provide two large patrol ships and lend up to five used surveillance aircraft to the Philippines, another country at odds with China over sovereignty issues in the South China Sea.

In response to Inada`s comments, the US Navy said in a statement: "The United States welcomes Japan`s interest in expanding its maritime activities in the South China Sea. We continue to explore ways to enhance US-Japan cooperative efforts to contribute to the security and stability of the region."
Fairfax: Stepping deeper into the political fray, Michelle Obama on Friday warned young voters against being "tired or turned off" in the 2016 election. She urged them to rally behind Hillary Clinton, "particularly given the alternative."

Mrs. Obama is emerging as one of Clinton's most effective advocates, especially with voters who backed President Barack Obama but are less enthusiastic about his potential Democratic successor. The Clinton team's biggest challenge regarding Mrs. Obama is getting the reluctant campaigner to commit to more events.

Today's rally in Virginia was Mrs. Obama's first solo campaign event for Clinton and comes nearly two months after her star turn at the Democratic convention. Speaking to mostly students at George Mason University, she repeatedly jabbed Trump without mentioning him by name, declaring that being president "isn't anything like reality TV."

The first lady pointedly called out those who continue to question the president's citizenship "up to this very day." Drawing on a frequently quoted line from her convention speech, Mrs. Obama said her husband had responded to those questions by "''going high when they go low."

Hours earlier, Trump stated for the first time that the president was born in the United States, though he did not apologize for devoting years to promoting false allegations that Obama was not an American citizen.

Beyond her ability to take on Trump with a smile, Mrs. Obama's real value to Clinton is her wild popularity with Democratic voters, particularly young people and blacks.

She vouched repeatedly for Clinton's resume and character, urging voters motivated by her husband's history-making campaigns to feel the same way about the first woman nominated for president by a major U.S. Party.

"When I hear folks saying that they don't feel inspired in this election, well let me tell you, I disagree I am inspired," Mrs. Obama said.

Clinton aides want Mrs. Obama in battleground states as much as possible between now and Election Day. Today's rally in northern Virginia, less than an hour drive from the White House, is the only event she's publicly committed to, though the Clinton campaign expects her to make additional appearances.

Jennifer Palmieri, Clinton's communications director and a former Obama adviser, called the first lady "an advocate without peer."

"There is no other surrogate with the reach, credibility and respect she has," Palmieri said.
Washington: Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi urged businesses to invest in the Southeast Asian country on Thursday as a way to advance its democratic transition, a day after US President Barack Obama pledged to lift long-standing sanctions on the country.

Suu Kyi, speaking in Washington, said that economic development spurred by foreign investment was needed to show the impoverished nation of more than 50 million people that democracy could improve their livelihoods and promote further change.

"Economic success is one of the ways that we can persuade everyone in our country, including the military, that democracy is the best way forward for our union," Suu Kyi told a dinner of business officials, diplomats and government officials hosted by the US-ASEAN Business Council.

"In order to make the political transition work, we have to have the economic expectations of our people fulfilled as well," she added.

Sanctions were imposed on the country, formerly known as Burma, in 1997 after decades under a military dictatorship that stifled dissent and showed little regard for human rights.

Suu Kyi`s National League for Democracy swept to power in November elections, the first free national vote in 25 years.

But the Nobel Peace laureate has been criticized by the private sector for not focusing on business reforms and failing to put forth comprehensive economic policies.

Obama said on Wednesday that he would lift remaining sanctions on Myanmar, a move supported by Suu Kyi, who said she recognized that some believed the move came too soon.

Obama`s announcement drew swift condemnation from rights groups, which said it forfeited leverage on Myanmar`s military.

In some ways it is a risk, it as much a political risk as an economic risk, because there are those who believe it is not yet time for us to remove the sanctions, but we think that it is time now for our people to depend on themselves, to go forward with the help of our friends," Suu Kyi said of the decision.

When sanctions are lifted, it will clear US businesses to work with companies and individuals that were previous off limits, including some of Myanmar`s most prominent businessmen.

Conglomerate Asia World, blacklisted for alleged ties to Myanmar`s military, welcomed Obama`s pledge to lift sanctions.

"AWC (Asia World Company) expects to see a stronger economic growth and foreign investments in Myanmar with the removal of the sanctions," the company said by e-mail.
United Nations: Nadia Murad, a former ISIS sex slave, has been appointed as Goodwill Ambassador for the Dignity of Survivors of Human Trafficking by United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).

The Nobel Peace Prize nominee, who survived trafficking at the hands of IS, will be appointed UNODC Goodwill Ambassador today.

The 23-year-old Yazidi woman from Iraq endured a three-month nightmare as a sex slave of the Islamic State (IS) group.

After her harrowing escape with the help of a fake religious ID nearly two years ago, Murad has a message for world leaders striving to crush the extremists: IS leaders must stand trial for genocide.

The IS group has said it despises the Kurdish-speaking group because Yazidis are not "people of the book", meaning their faith does not adhere to the theological tradition that begins with Abraham of the Old Testament and extends through the Koran.

She was taken by ISIS from her home village of Kocho near Iraq's northern town of Sinjar in August 2014 and brought to Mosul.

"The first thing they did was they forced us to covert to Islam," she said. "After conversion, they did whatever they wanted to do."

In a December speech at the UN Security Council, Murad recounted her so-called "marriage" to one IS captor, who subjected her to horrific abuse.

"I was not able to take any more rape and torture," she told the council, so she decided to flee.

On the run in Mosul, Murad said she was terrified that no one would take her in, but she ultimately found shelter with a Muslim family in the city.

"They made me an Islamic ID," she said, which she used to cross the border into Iraqi Kurdistan.

There she lived in a camp for displaced people and, with the support of the Yazidi welfare organisation Yazda, relocated to Germany, where she now lives with her sister.z
Abuja: Nigeria opened negotiations with Boko Haram over the release of the kidnapped Chibok girls last year, but the talks were derailed due to a split in the extremist group, a minister said Friday.

Speaking at a press conference in the capital Abuja, information minister Lai Mohammed said the Department of State Services (DSS) started negotiations with the Islamists in July 2015.

In exchange for the girls, who were kidnapped in April 2014 from a school in the remote northeastern town of Chibok, Boko Haram demanded the release of some of its fighters.

Out of the 276 girls kidnapped, scores escaped in the hours after the kidnapping, while another was rescued earlier this year.

Mohammed said that by August 2015 the government was close to clinching the swap deal when Boko Haram issued a new set of demands. "This development stalled what would have been the first release process of the Chibok girls," Mohammed said.

New talks that began in November were eclipsed by a leadership struggle happening in Boko Haram at the time.

The first signs of a rift appeared after longtime chief Abubakar Shekau pledged allegiance to IS in March 2015 and changed Boko Haram`s name to Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP).

By August this year, Abu Musab al-Barnawi -- the son of Boko Haram`s founder Mohammed Yusuf -- was appointed head of the group, with recent reports of clashes between rival factions in northeast Nigeria`s Borno state, near Lake Chad.

Mohammed said Nigeria was committed to rescuing the remaining 218 Chibok girls still held captive by Boko Haram, who have killed at least 20,000 people in northeast Nigeria in a wave of raids, suicide attacks and bombings since 2009.

"In spite of the current division amongst members of the terrorist group, which has seriously affected efforts to release the girls, renewed efforts have commenced using our trusted assets and facilitators," Mohammed said.
Islamabad Capital Territory: Pakistan, estimated to have the world`s fastest-growing nuclear stockpile, could be building a new uranium enrichment complex according to commercial satellite imagery analysed by Western defence experts.

The construction of a new site, based in the town of Kahuta some thirty kilometres (miles) east of Islamabad, provides fresh evidence of how Pakistan is seeking to boost its atomic arsenal -- a goal which is inconsistent with the principles of the Nuclear Suppliers Group the country is seeking to join, said the analysis.

The analysis was conducted by IHS Jane`s Intelligence review using satellite images taken by Airbus Defence and Space on 28 September 2015 and then again on 18 April 2016.

Pakistan, which conducted its first nuclear tests in 1998 is believed to have around 120 nuclear weapons, more than India, Israel and North Korea.

A 2015 report written by scholars at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Stimson Center said Pakistan could increase its stockpile by 20 warheads a year and have the world`s third largest in a decade.

"The area of interest is approximately 1.2 hectares and is located within the secure area of the Khan Research Laboratories (KRL), in the southwestern part of the complex," said the statement.

Karl Dewey, a proliferation analyst at IHS Jane`s added: "It is sited within an established centrifuge facility, has strong security and shows some of the structural features of a possible new uranium enrichment facility. This makes it a strong candidate for a new centrifuge facility."

The structure of the site also bears a strong resemblance to facilities built by nuclear fuel company URENCO which also operates several nuclear plants in Europe, it said.

"This may be more than coincidence as A.Q. Khan, considered by many to be the founder of Pakistan`s nuclear programme, worked at URENCO before stealing centrifuge designs and returning to Pakistan," said Charlie Cartwright, an imagery analyst for IHS Jane`s.

Pakistan is currently seeking to join the 48-member Nuclear Suppliers Group that seeks to prevent nuclear proliferation by controlling the export of materials, equipment and technology that can be used to manufacture atomic weapons.

"It is difficult to see how these actions are consistent with the principles of the Nuclear Suppliers Group, a group of responsible nuclear exporters which Pakistan is seeking to join," said Ian Stewart, head of research group Project Alpha at King`s College London.

Pakistani physicist A.H. Nayyar told AFP if the site was indeed a centrifuge, "then primarily because they are being built inside KRL I would conclude they are being for weapons," adding that the country`s nuclear power plants were supplied by imported uranium from China.

He, however, cautioned it was not possible to be definitive about the site`s purpose based on imagery alone.
Peshawar: At least 25 people were killed and 29 others injured when a suicide bomber shouting 'Allahu Akbar' blew himself up inside a mosque packed with worshippers for Friday prayers in Mohmand Agency in Pakistan's restive northwest tribal region.

The attacker blew himself when the prayers were in progress at the mosque in the Anbar tehsil of the agency bordering Afghanistan.

"A suicide bomber was in the mosque. He shouted 'Allahu Akbar' and blew himself up," Assistant Political Agent Naveed Akbar told reporters.

He said that Friday prayers were being offered around 2 PM when the powerful blast took place.

At least 25 people were killed in the attack and 29 others injured, Pakistani media reported, citing officials.

"Many people were gathered inside the mosque when a suicide bomber blew himself up," an eyewitness said.

Rescue teams and police rushed to the spot. The bodies and the injured are being shifted to local hospitals for medical treatment.

Injured were also taken to hospitals in Bajaur Agency, Charsadda and Peshawar for treatment.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban routinely targets courts, schools and mosques.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has expressed his grief over the loss of lives in the blast.

The attack came on a day when Sharif vowed to continue the war against militancy and terrorism till elimination of the last terrorist.

During a meeting with Army chief General Raheel Sharif today, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy.

The army had launched operation 'Zarb-e-Azb' in June 2014 to flush out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas.
Copenhagen: A Swedish appeals court on Friday decided to maintain the arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange over a rape accusation.

Swedish authorities began investigating Assange in 2010 on allegations of sexual assault and rape against two women. The sexual assault allegation was dropped after time ran out to bring charges last year, but officials said they would continue to pursue the rape investigation. Assange denies the allegations.

His defence team requested the warrant be annulled in February after a United Nations report concluded that the order for his arrest was arbitrary, Efe news agency reported.

"After reviewing the existing investigative material and what the parties have stated, the Court of Appeal finds that Julian Assange is still suspected on probable cause of rape," NBC news cited the ruling issued by a three-judge panel in Stockholm.

The ruling, which can be disputed before the country`s Supreme Court, also stated that active measures are being taken to interrogate Assange, referring to Ecuador and Sweden`s deal to have him interrogated by an Ecuadorian prosecutor on October 17.

Two years ago, an attempt to annul the arrest warrant, also failed.

Assange has been taking refuge in the Ecuador embassy in London since 2012 after a long trial ruled in favour of him being extradited to Sweden.

His intention is to avoid being deported, as he could then be sent to the United States, where he would have to face a military trial for leaking American security documents on Wikileaks.
Washington: Donald Trump's hair -- a crusty, complex, yellowish affair that has become one of the enigmas of a very weird US presidential race -- got messed with big time.

The usually brash presidential candidate talked in subdued tones and played the good sport as he appeared on one of America's most popular late-night broadcasts, "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon."

Fallon did his very popular impression of Trump's speaking style, ribbed him right and left and concluded his interview with a request.

"Can I mess up your hair?" Fallon said.

The comic explained that this might be the last time he could ask to do something unpresidential with Trump, lest he win election in November against Hillary Clinton.

The crowd went nuts over the idea.

Trump grinned and agreed.

Fallon reached out with his right hand and mussed Trump's hair with a vigorous, repeated rub. The Republican nominee endured it with a broad smile.

Trump, 70, has an elaborate hair-do centered on what seems to be an ambitious comb-over.

Nothing fell off with Fallon's intervention but the result was not very pretty as Trump's long locks ended up pointing messily every which way.

On other matters, Fallon christened what he called Trump's "bromance" with Vladimir Putin as "Vlump", and asked him about his penchant for eating fast food.

"At least you know what you're getting," Trump said. He added that if he went to an unknown place, "If they don't like me. I don't know. I'm better off with fast food."

Fallon also thanked Trump for providing what he described as grist for so much comic material.

"You say some shocking things," Fallon said.

"But I'm trying not to anymore," Trump replied.
Jerusalem: Two Palestinians rammed a car into a bus stop used by Israelis in the occupied West Bank today, causing injuries before troops killed one of the assailants, the army said.

The attack came shortly after Israeli police said they shot dead a Palestinian who tried to stab police officers in annexed east Jerusalem.

"Two assailants rammed a vehicle into a civilian bus stop at the Elias junction near the community of Kiryat Arba," the Israeli military said in a statement.

It said three people were wounded.

"Forces at the scene fired at the vehicle resulting in the death of one of the assailants while the other was wounded," the army said.

The Palestinian health ministry identified the dead suspect as Fares Khadour.

Kiryat Arba is an Israeli settlement in the southern West Bank close to the flashpoint Palestinian city of Hebron.

It was the second violent incident today, after a 28-year-old man was shot dead in Jerusalem while attempting to stab police officers.

That attack came at the Damascus Gate entrance to east Jerusalem's tourist-heavy Old City, the main entrance for Palestinians.

Violence since October has killed 227 Palestinians, 34 Israelis, two Americans, one Eritrean and a Sudanese.

Israeli forces say most of the Palestinians killed were carrying out knife, gun or car-ramming attacks. Others were shot dead during protests and clashes.
United Nations: The UN Security Council will hold an urgent meeting on Friday to hear details of a US-Russian deal on Syria as it weighs whether to endorse the agreement, diplomats said.

Council members will meet at 5:30 pm (2130 GMT) for the closed-door consultations called as a UN aid convoy was blocked at the Syrian border.

Under the deal, all sides were due to allow deliveries of food and other basic supplies to the battleground city of Aleppo after a ceasefire went into effect on Monday.

Once aid is delivered and the ceasefire holds, the United States and Russia were to begin cooperating in jointly targeting Islamist rebel fighters in Syria.

Russia, Syria`s key ally, is pushing for the Security Council to endorse the agreement, but France and other council members have said they first need to learn more details about the deal.

Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said the council could adopt a resolution backing the agreement during a high-level meeting on Wednesday.

US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov are due to attend the council talks, held on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly meeting.

US President Barack Obama was due Friday to gather top national security aides in Washington to discuss the shaky ceasefire and assess prospects for the latest effort to end the five-year war.
District of Columbia: The United States on Friday designated French jihadist recruiter Omar Diaby a "global terrorist" subject to US economic sanctions, the State Department said.

The 40-year-old Al-Nusra Front militant, who also uses the name Omar Omsen, became notorious last year for faking his own death in order to leave Syria for surgery.

According to the designation, Diaby leads a group of 50 French volunteers who traveled to Syria and signed up with the Al-Nusra Front, Al-Qaeda`s franchise in the region.

Nusra says it broke with Al-Qaeda in July and has rebranded itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham.

"Although assumed killed in August 2015, Diaby re-emerged in May 2016, claiming his death was a ploy to allow him to travel to Turkey for an operation," the designation said.

"Diaby came to the attention of French intelligence due to his involvement with a French extremist group and his online propaganda video series," it added.

"Diaby`s videos have been credited as the chief reason behind why so many French nationals have joined militant groups in Syria and Iraq."

Diaby`s parents reported him dead last year but in May he surfaced again, giving an interview by Skype to France 2 television to explain he had traveled for surgery.

France 2 also broadcast footage of a training camp in western Syria housing around 30 young French jihadists, many of them from Diaby`s home region near Nice.

While Diaby had not then been directly linked to attacks in France, he has expressed approval for the January 2015 shootings at the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo.

"I wish I`d been chosen to do that," he told France 2.

And Diaby -- or "Emir Omar Omsen" -- has been in the crosshairs of French intelligence for some time.

He was a member of Forsane Alizza, a small Islamist group that was broken up in 2012 by the French government for fomenting extremism among young French Muslims.Diaby, a Frenchman of Senegalese descent, was known at first for producing radical propaganda videos but he is said to have traveled to Syria in 2013.

His hometown of Nice was the victim of a jihadist attack in July this year, when 86 people were killed as an attacker drove a truck into a Bastille Day crowd.

Diaby is known to recruit in the Nice area and intelligence agencies have long feared that militants returning from Syria will bring the war with them.

French police sources have also told AFP that Diaby`s name came up in March as officers in Paris investigated a suspect arrested for "planning violent acts."

Now that Diaby is a "Specially Designated Global Terrorist" under US law, American firms and individuals are barred from associating or doing business with him.

dc/ec


Washington: The United States today designated French jihadist recruiter Omar Diaby a "global terrorist" subject to US economic sanctions, the State Department said.

The 40-year-old Al-Nusra Front militant, who also uses the name Omar Omsen, became notorious last year for faking his own death in order to leave Syria for surgery.
Wells Fargo paid $185 million in fines as it admitted that employees had boosted sales figures by opening some two million deposit and credit accounts in customers' names without their knowledge

The powerful Financial Services Committee of the US House of Representatives announced Friday they will investigate allegations that Wells Fargo fraudulently opened millions of unauthorized customer accounts.

Wells Fargo, the second largest US bank by market value, this month paid $185 million in fines as it admitted that employees had boosted sales figures by opening some two million deposit and credit accounts in customers' names without their knowledge.

Bank staff did so, regulators said, to generate millions of dollars in improper fees from the accounts and earn performance bonuses for themselves.

The bank said last week it had fired 5,300 employees connected to the problem, but questions remain over whether bank executives may have escaped unpunished.

The House committee said it would summon John Stumpf, the bank's chairman and CEO, to testify this month.

"In addition, the committee is requesting that Wells Fargo and regulators provide internal documents relating to the discovery and timing of these practices, and is asking company officials to appear for transcribed interviews," the committee said in a statement.

Others called for transcribed interviews will include the bank's chief financial officer, chief operating office and chief risk officer, the committee said.

The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that federal prosecutors had also opened a probe.

The policy activist organization Public Citizen on Friday also announced it had lodged a shareholder resolution calling on Wells Fargo to explore the possibility of breaking itself up.

"Rather than acknowledging a management break-down, CEO John Stumpf blamed a minority of bad employees," the proposed resolution said, noting that Stumpf has publicly said bank employees had no incentive to commit wrongdoing.

"Taking CEO Stumpf at his word, then, we believe he effectively argues that his firm is so large as to be unmanageable."

Bartlett Naylor, the Public Citizen advisor who filed the resolution, told AFP he had submitted similar proposals since 2014 to JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup and Bank of America, all without success.
Millionaire presidential candidate Donald Trump was a vocal birthersomeone who insinuates Barack Obama was not born in the United Statesuntil at least 2014. Today, he's supposedly going to denounce this position for good, following some recent equivocation on his part.

Adds Trump: "We have to keep the suspense going."

This sort of statement enrages liberals because it reminds them of how easily Trump manipulates the political media's hunger for a horse raceespecially now he's neck and neck with rival Hillary Clinton in national polls and there's no sign of them realizing he understands them better than they understand him.

The fear today is of equivocating headlines such as "Trump, Clinton trade accusations on Birtherism," allowing him the plain lie of a she-did-it-first controversy.

But days of Trump benefiting from a smarmy rehabilitation narrative, when the most nakedly racist dogwhistle in American politics is still glistening with his saliva, is what's almost too much to bear. Here's Josh Marshall:

1. We need your help today. We're going to be closely monitoring which journos treat it as done and in the past if Trump simply says   Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) September 16, 2016

2: Obama was born in US and I helped prove it. If you see examples pls flag here and add #birtherwhitewash hashtag. We'll ag them together.  Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) September 16, 2016

Accusing his opponent of whatever he is accused of is one of the three key tools in Trump's media arsenal, used over and over again to amazing effect (the others: "I'll tell you tomorrow" and "Something's going on.") Journos are defensively, cynically attached to a supposedly objective voice from nowhere that conceals editorial judgment in the framing of subject matter, and Trump's been doing well since Hillary switched her focus to the "Romney moderates" most influenced by it.

Right-wing provocateurs are eager to help the media avoid contaminating balance with facts. One hot emerging term is "post-factual" (cf. Post-truth) which describes both the mainstream journalistic practices they've lucked into and the world they hope will emerge from them.

Slate collects all of Trump's birther quotes in once place, for whatever they're worth.

Made in America? @BarackObama called his 'birthplace' Hawaii "here in Asia." http://t.co/dQka2PIr  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 18, 2011

Let's take a closer look at that birth certificate. @BarackObama was described in 2003 as being "born in Kenya." http://t.co/vfqJesJL  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 18, 2012

.@BarackObama is practically begging @MittRomney to disavow the place of birth movement, he is afraid of it and (cont) http://t.co/eHvjlV0S  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 29, 2012

I want to see @BarackObama's college records to see how he listed his place of birth in the application.  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 30, 2012

In his own words, @BarackObama "was born in Kenya, and raised in Indonesia and Hawaii." This statement was made, (cont) http://t.co/nIsSypv9  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 30, 2012

I wonder what the answer is on @BarackObama's college application to the question: place of birth? Maybe the (cont) http://t.co/E8q0xakY  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 17, 2012

Congratulations to @RealSheriffJoe on his successful Cold Case Posse investigation which claims @BarackObama's 'birth certificate' is fake  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 18, 2012

Why does HI Revised Statute 338-17.8 allow an HI resident who doesn't have to be US citizen to procure an official Hawaii birth certificate?  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 18, 2012

Via @BreitbartFeedwhy doesn't @BarackObama release his original book proposal which says he was born in Kenya?http://t.co/pDDHJcjH  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 19, 2012

With @BarackObama listing himself as "Born in Kenya" in 1999http://bit.ly/JaHQW0 HI laws allowed him to produce a fake certificate. #SCAM  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 20, 2012

Read this@BarackObama's birth certificate "cannot survive judicial scrutiny" because of "phantom numbers" http://t.co/DIv9sLI2  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 23, 2012

An 'extremely credible source' has called my office and told me that @BarackObama's birth certificate is a fraud.  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 6, 2012

Why do the Republicans keep apologizing on the so called "birther" issue? No more apologiestake the offensive!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 27, 2012

.@BarackObama is petrified of the birther issue so they go on the offensive to try & make the Republicans feel (cont) http://t.co/HVvlnsvh  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 27, 2012

Media silent when @BarackObama called @MittRomney a murderer & felon. Mitt mentions 'birth certificate' and they go nuts. Double standard!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 28, 2012

What a coincidenceMichelle Obama called Kenya @BarackObama's "homeland" in 2008 http://t.co/lQKQ2C7n  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 29, 2012

Wake Up America! See article: "Israeli Science: Obama Birth Certificate is a Fake" http://t.co/f7esUdSz  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 13, 2012

In debate, @MittRomney should ask Obama why autobiography states "born in Kenya, raised in Indonesia."  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 1, 2012

A lot changed when David Letterman said " he was probably born in this country" the word probably is a total disaster for Obama.  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 28, 2012

Dave Letterman @Late_Show said during my interview that Obama was "probably" born in the USthe word "probably" is a disaster for Obama.  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 29, 2012

"TRUMP HITS BACK AT CHRIS MATTHEWS' BIRTHER RANT: 'HE USED TO BE A MUCH MORE INTELLIGENT MAN'" http://t.co/bBlm1jymlr @MadeleineBlaze  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 18, 2013

"@CTrain_: @realDonaldTrump Honestly who gives a shit where Obama was born? It's where he lives now that's the problem" Interesting!!!!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 22, 2013

"@artlab: @realDonaldTrump Still waiting for the apology on the birth certificate thing. You must be kidding joker!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 7, 2013

"@davidrhythmguit: @realDonaldTrump @Chuffman48 Mark Cuban accepts the fact that the President of the United States was born here." Doubt it  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 1, 2013

@jonkarl interviews me on This Week during which time he stated that he was "pretty sure" President Obama was born in the U.S. Bad question!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 11, 2013

Why are people upset w/ me over Pres Obama's birth certificate?I got him to release it, or whatever it was, when nobody else could!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 22, 2013

People should be proud of the fact that I got Obama to release his birth certificate, which in a recent book he "miraculously" found.  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 22, 2013

"@HoppMar: @realDonaldTrump I saw his brother in Kenya interviewed, HE may be wiser, actually." I'm so surprised his brother lives in Kenya  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 20, 2013

"If you like your healthcare plan you can keep it." = "I was born in Hawaii."  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 31, 2013

How amazing, the State Health Director who verified copies of Obama's "birth certificate" died in plane crash today. All others lived  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 12, 2013

Pres. Obama is about to embark on a 17 day vacation in his 'native' Hawaii, putting Secret Service away from families on Christmas. Aloha!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 19, 2013

"@johnnyb23390: @realDonaldTrump  the only confidentiality agreement he signed was for his real birth certificate. keep up the great work!"  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 15, 2014

"@Boycottmaypac: @realDonaldTrump He got the president to show his Birth Certificate! He has clout my friend! He can really stir things up!"  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 4, 2014

Always remember, I was the one who got Obama to release his birth certificate, or whatever that was! Hilary couldn't, McCain couldn't.  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 29, 2014

Attention all hackers: You are hacking everything else so please hack Obama's college records (destroyed?) and check "place of birth"  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 6, 2014
By Rod Nickel WINNIPEG (Reuters) - Canada's Agrium Inc will woo reluctant shareholders next week in Toronto to support its proposed merger with Potash Corp of Saskatchewan Inc , and seek to appease concerns that it has little to gain by marrying its fertilizer rival. The $26-billion, all-stock merger would combine Potash's crop nutrient production capacity, the world's largest, with Agrium's farm retail network, North America's biggest. It represents a major shift for Agrium Chief Executive Chuck Magro, who at its annual meeting in May sounded neutral at best on potash, said John Goldsmith, vice-president of Montrusco Bolton Investments, a top 20 Agrium investor. "Something must have happened to make him bet the farm on the potash commodity," Goldsmith said, adding that he is concerned the new company would be too linked to the slumping commodity. On Monday, Magro said potash will be "a terrific business longer term." Montrusco would need a compelling new rationale from Agrium for it to vote for the deal, Goldsmith said. Shareholders, including Montrusco, plan to meet with Agrium on Tuesday in Toronto. Agrium shareholders generally dislike the deal, while Potash investors are pleased, Scotiabank analyst Ben Isaacson said in a note on Tuesday. Agrium stock fell 6 percent in Toronto from the deal announcement on Monday, to Wednesday, before recovering ground on Thursday. The deal, scheduled to close in mid-2017, would give Potash investors 52 percent of the new company and requires two-thirds approval from shareholders of each company. Agrium and Potash said in a joint statement on Thursday that they were "very pleased with the overwhelming support" from many of their biggest shareholders. The crop nutrient potash, which has fallen this year to decade lows on oversupply and tumbling crop prices, is worth 10 percent of Agrium's EBITDA on average, but would account for 35 percent of the merged company's earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization. Agrium's farm retail business, currently worth 48 percent of EBITDA, would account for just 19 percent of the new company, a level that dismays shareholders like Michael Sprung. "We really liked the balance between retail (and) wholesale," said Sprung, president of Sprung Investment Management, of Agrium's existing business. He said he is considering whether to vote against the merger or sell his shares over concerns about prospects for potash. "We're not sure that the net benefit is there for Agrium," he said. Cidel Asset Management, also meeting with Agrium on Tuesday, is concerned about dilution of the retail business and that Potash investors would benefit from a higher dividend, said portfolio manager Robert Spafford. To be sure, creating a crop nutrient champion with almost triple the enterprise value of the next biggest fertilizer company, appeals to some. "Agrium gets the benefit of scale. In a fiercely competitive environment that gives them an advantage," said Mohsin Bashir, portfolio manager at Stone Asset Management, another Agrium investor. "They're getting a larger network when the price for potash is rock bottom." If either Agrium or Potash were to terminate the deal, the company backing out of the merger would pay a hefty $485 million break up fee. The penalty may discourage another suitor for Agrium, as would protectionist Canadian sentiment. In 2010, Ottawa blocked a foreign takeover approach for Potash Corp. (Reporting by Rod Nickel; Editing by Andrew Hay)
By Allison Lampert MONTREAL (Reuters) - Germany's economy minister said on Thursday he expected the country's Social Democrats, a junior partner in the ruling coalition, to vote in favor of a free-trade agreement between Canada and the European Union at a party meeting on Sept. 19. "We will get a majority vote," German Vice Chancellor and Economic Affairs Minister Sigmar Gabriel told reporters in Montreal. Canada and Europe have spent years negotiating the trade deal, called the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement, or CETA. Canada Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland said on Monday the Canadian government hoped to sign the deal in October. It faces opposition from anti-globalization groups, as well as some members of Gabriel's SDP party. Freeland said she would attend the SDP conference in Wolfsburg, Germany, on Monday, where she will highlight the deal's progressive elements. Gabriel said it would not be necessary to reopen negotiations for the agreement. He also said clarifications made in talks with Canada would help address the concerns of German trade unions. "There is no renegotiation of CETA and Sigmar and I discussed that," Freeland said. Separately, Freeland there were no plans to change the parts of the trade deal relating to the Canadian dairy industry. The deal, reached by negotiators two years ago after five years of talks, could get the green light from EU member states next month before it is signed during Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's visit to Brussels on Oct. 27. (Additional reporting by Jeffrey Hodgson in Toronto; Editing by G Crosse and Peter Cooney)
A Wells Fargo branch is seen in the Chicago suburb of Evanston, Illinois, U.S. on February 10, 2015. REUTERS/Jim Young/File Photo (Reuters)

By Karen Freifeld

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Wells Fargo & Co, embroiled in a scandal over the opening of sham accounts, was sued on Friday by customers who accused the bank of fraud and recklessness for its behavior.

The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court in Utah, and seeks class-action status on behalf of hundreds of thousands of customers nationwide.

Wells Fargo did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Last week, the San Francisco-based lender agreed to pay $190 million to settle regulatory charges that employees opened some 2 million accounts without customers' knowledge, in order to meet sales targets.

Wells Fargo, the country's third-largest bank by assets, has said it has fired 5,300 people over the matter and would eliminate sales goals in its retail banking on Jan. 1, 2017.

Federal prosecutors have begun examining Wells Fargo's practices, and the bank's Chief Executive Officer John Stumpf is scheduled to testify before Congress next week.

In the complaint, three plaintiffs said customers were hurt by "abusive and fraudulent tactics" used by employees who felt they had to "do whatever it takes," including selling products they did not need or want, to meet sales quotas.

It was not immediately clear how the three named plaintiffs were specifically harmed by the bank's alleged wrongdoing.

The case is Mitchell et al v. Wells Fargo Bank NA et al, U.S. District Court, District of Utah, No. 16-00966.

(Reporting by Karen Freifeld; additional reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)
- By David Goodloe





NWQ Managers (Trades, Portfolio) invested in 12 new holdings in the second quarter. The firm bought shares in a variety of companies, among them an airline, a retailer and a pharmaceutical company.





Its largest acquisition was a 2,746,706-share stake in Novanta Inc. (NOVT), a Massachusetts-based provider of industrial and health care technology solutions formerly known as GSI Group. NWQ Managers (Trades, Portfolio) paid an average price of $14.95 per share in a deal that had a 0.71% impact on the portfolio.

The stake is 7.98% of Novanta's outstanding shares and 0.71% of NWQ Managers (Trades, Portfolio)' total assets. NWQ Managers (Trades, Portfolio) is Novanta's leading shareholder among the gurus.

Novanta has a price-earnings (P/E) ratio of 30.89, a price-book (P/B) ratio of 2.37 and a price-sales (P/S) ratio of 1.61. GuruFocus gives Novanta a Financial Strength rating of 6/10 and a Profitability and Growth rating of 6/10 with return on equity (ROE) of 8.00% that is higher than 60% of the companies in the Global Scientific & Technical Instruments industry and return on assets (ROA) of 4.62% that is higher than 62% of the companies in that industry.

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Novanta sold for $17.3 at market close Friday. The DCF Calculator gives Novanta a fair value of $5.99.

NWQ Managers (Trades, Portfolio) bought 552,911 shares in Southwest Airlines Co. (LUV), a Dallas-based commercial airline, for an average price of $42.83 per share. The deal had a 0.37% impact on the portfolio.

PRIMECAP Management (Trades, Portfolio) is Southwest's leading shareholder among the gurus with a stake of 73,363,893 shares. The stake is 11.83% of Southwest's outstanding shares and 3.06% of PRIMECAP's total assets.

Southwest has a P/E of 9.68, a forward P/E of 9.07, a P/B of 2.91 and a P/S of 1.17. GuruFocus gives Southwest a Financial Strength rating of 6/10 and a Profitability and Growth rating of 8/10 with ROE of 33.30% that is higher than 73% of the companies in the Global Airlines industry and ROA of 11.32% that is higher than 81% of the companies in that industry.

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Southwest Airlines sold for $36.59 per share Friday. The DCF Calculator gives Southwest a fair value of $77.14 with a 53% margin of safety.

Southwest Airlines reached an agreement in principle with the union representing its flight attendants on Sept. 9.

NWQ Managers (Trades, Portfolio) invested in a 1,243,252-share stake in Sagent Pharmaceuticals Inc. (SGNT), a biopharmaceutical company based in Illinois, for an average price of $12.84 per share. The purchase had a 0.32% impact on the portfolio.

The stake is 3.78% of Sagent's outstanding shares and 0.32% of NWQ Managers (Trades, Portfolio)' total assets. NWQ Managers (Trades, Portfolio) is Sagent's only shareholder among the gurus.

Sagent has a forward P/E of 46.73, a P/B of 2.82 and a P/S of 2.39. GuruFocus gives Sagent a Financial Strength rating of 7/10 and a Profitability and Growth rating of 1/10 with ROE of -9.63% that is lower than 77% of the companies in the Global Drug Manufacturers - Specialty & Generic industry and ROA of -7.02% that is lower than 76% of the companies in that industry.

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Sagent sold for $21.76 per share Friday. The DCF Calculator gives Sagent a fair value of $-8.24.

NWQ Managers (Trades, Portfolio) acquired 321,179 shares in Nordstrom Inc. (JWN), a Seattle-based retailer, for an average price of $44.59 per share. The deal had a 0.21% impact on the portfolio.

HOTCHKIS & WILEY is Nordstrom's leading shareholder among the gurus with a stake of 3,594,094 shares. The stake is 2.07% of Nordstrom's outstanding shares and 0.59% of HOTCHKIS & WILEY's total assets.

Nordstrom has a P/E of 21.98%, a forward P/E of 18.15, a P/B of 9.52 and a P/S of 0.67. GuruFocus gives Nordstrom a Financial Strength rating of 5/10 and a Profitability and Growth rating of 7/10 with ROE of 32.21% that is higher than 93% of the companies in the Global Department Stores industry and ROA of 5.07% that is higher than 67% of the companies in that industry.

1474052269665.png

Nordstrom sold for $51.28 per share Friday. The DCF Calculator gives Nordstrom a fair value of $26.57.

NWQ Managers (Trades, Portfolio) purchased 149,805 shares in Apartment Investment & Management Co. (AIV), a Denver-based owner and operator of apartment communities, for an average price of $41.55 per share. The transaction had a 0.11% impact on the portfolio.

Jim Simons (Trades, Portfolio) is Apartment Investment & Management's leading shareholder among the gurus with a stake of 1,355,160 shares. The stake is 0.87% of the company's outstanding shares and 0.11% of Simons' total assets.

Apartment Investment & Management has a P/E of 20.76, a forward P/E of 39.84, a P/B of 4.23 and a P/S of 6.98. GuruFocus gives Apartment Investment & Management a Financial Strength rating of 4/10 and a Profitability and Growth rating of 6/10 with ROE of 20.08% that is higher than 92% of the companies in the Global REIT - Residential industry and ROA of 5.53% that is higher than 69% of the companies in that industry.

1474053007225.png

Apartment Investment & Management sold for $43.78 per share Friday. The DCF Calculator gives Apartment Investment & Management a fair value of $7.38.

NWQ Managers (Trades, Portfolio) bought 235,000 shares in MGM Growth Properties LLC (MGP), a real estate investment trust that owns 10 casinos and leases them to its majority owner, MGM Resorts International (MGM), for an average price of $23.76 per share. The deal had a 0.11% impact on the portfolio.

Ron Baron (Trades, Portfolio) is MGM Growth Properties' leading shareholder among the gurus with a stake of 2,373,714 shares. The stake is 4.13% of MGM Growth Properties' outstanding shares and 0.34% of Baron's total assets.

MGM Growth Properties has a P/E of 18.88, a forward P/E of 23.87, a P/B of 1.11 and a P/S of 13.22. GuruFocus gives MGM Growth Properties a Financial Strength rating of 3/10 and a Profitability and Growth rating of 2/10 with ROE of -4.11% that is lower than 90% of the companies in the Global REIT - Hotel & Motel industry and ROA of -1.90% that is lower than 92% of the companies in that industry.

1474053679065.png

MGM Growth Properties sold for $25.32 per share Friday. The DCF Calculator gives MGM Growth Properties a fair value of $14.02.

MGM Resorts International recently reached its 52-week high.

NWQ Managers (Trades, Portfolio) obtained 106,761 shares in TriState Capital Holdings Inc. (TSC), a Pittsburgh-based bank holding company, for an average price of $12.96 per share. The transaction had a 0.03% impact on the portfolio.

Chuck Royce (Trades, Portfolio) is TriState's leading shareholder among the gurus with 509,552 shares in the portfolio. The holding is 1.81% of TriState's outstanding shares and 0.05% of Royce's total assets.

TriState has a P/E of 18.05, a P/B of 1.35 and a P/S of 3.93. GuruFocus gives TriState a Financial Strength rating of 6/10 and a Profitability and Growth rating of 6/10 with ROE of 7.47% that is lower than 57% of the companies in the Global Banks - Regional - US industry and ROA of 0.74% that is lower than 60% of the companies in that industry.

1474054518000.png

TriState sold for $15.7 per share Friday. The DCF Calculator gives TriState a fair value of $9.31.

NWQ Managers (Trades, Portfolio) also acquired less than 100,000 shares each in State Street Corp. (STT), UBS Group AG (UBS), iShares Russell 1000 Value (IWD), Ensco PLC (ESV) and Lloyds Banking Group PLC (LYG).

Disclosure: I do not own any stocks mentioned in this article.

Start a free seven-day trial of Premium Membership to GuruFocus.

This article first appeared on GuruFocus.






English Latvian

Riga, 2016-09-16 12:16 CEST (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) --

1. Issuer Name: AS Latvenergo

2. Registered office: Pulkveza Brieza 12, Riga, LV-1230, Latvia

3. LEI: 213800DJRB539Q1EMW75

National company register number: 40003032949

4. Home Member State: Latvia

5. Triggering event: Issuer of other securities

6. Member State(s) where the issuer's securities are admitted to trading:

Shares Debt securities < 1000 Other securities Latvia X

7. NCAs the form is required to be filed with: The Financial and Capital Market Commission

8. Date of notification: 16 September 2016

9., 10. -

11. Contact details:

Issuers address: Pulkveza Brieza 12, Riga, LV-1230, Latvia

Person responsible within the issuer for the present notification: Inese Vilcina

E-Mail address: investor.relations@latvenergo.lv

Telephone: +371 67 728 767

Additional information:

Janis Irbe

Group Treasurer

Phone: +371 67 728 239

E-mail: investor.relations@latvenergo.lv

www.latvenergo.lv

About Latvenergo

Latvenergo Group is a pan-Baltic energy company, engaging in electricity and thermal energy generation and supply, electricity distribution services and lease of transmission system assets. Latvenergo Group holds one-third of the entire Baltic electricity market, thus ensuring its leadership in the Baltic electricity supply. Latvenergo AS has been acknowledged as the most valuable company in Latvia for several years in a row. International credit rating agency Moodys has assigned Latvenergo AS an investment-grade credit rating of Baa2/stable.

Latvenergo Group includes the parent company Latvenergo AS (electricity and thermal energy generation and supply) and its subsidiaries Latvijas elektriskie tikli AS (lease of transmission system assets), Sadales tikls AS (electricity distribution), Elektrum Eesti OU (electricity supply in Estonia), Elektrum Lietuva UAB (electricity supply in Lithuania), Energijas publiskais tirgotajs AS (administration of electricity mandatory procurement process) and Liepajas energija SIA (electricity and thermal energy generation and supply).
NEW YORK, Sept. 16, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- PHI Group (www.phiglobal.com) (OTC Markets:PHIL), a U.S. diversified holding company engaged in mergers and acquisitions, announced today that shareholders of the previously announced South African target company (TARGET), representing 77% of the total issued share capital and its major lenders, have approved PHI Groups revised offer to acquire the TARGET.

Majority shareholders agreed to exchange their shares for PHI Groups stock, which will have been dually-listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange or represented in a South African listed entity to comply with the respective Fund Rules and the South African regulatory framework. The exchange rate will be determined on the basis of 10 days Volume-Weighted Average of both companies stock prices.

In the event that they elect to exit for cash, existing TARGET shareholders will be granted a put option at the transaction value price three months after the transaction implementation date.

The TARGET and PHI Group will work closely together to reach imminent milestones and close this transaction by the end of November 2016 or as soon as practical.

The TARGET is a leading company in the natural resource and construction material space in South Africa with average annual revenues of approximately $70 million during the last two years. The closing of this transaction is expected to add $6 million monthly revenues to PHI Group, not to mention new initiatives to capitalize on TARGETs capabilities to expand and grow both its domestic and international business.

PHI Group has also identified a Broad Based Black Economic Empowerment (BBBEE) consortium led by Opilong Group (Pty) Ltd., a woman-owned Johannesburg-based investment holding company as required by the laws of South Africa. The Opilong Chairwoman will be traveling to Australia in the coming weeks as she intends to bring in a valuable long-term contract for the TARGET from the BBBEE component to PHI and the TARGET.

Henry Fahman, PHIs Chairman and CEO, said, We are very pleased to have received the consent of the TARGETs majority shareholders and major lenders for the revised offer. We strongly believe our post-acquisition initiatives to internationalize TARGETs operations will be able to create very significant value for our shareholders and all other stakeholders.

This signals exciting times for PHI and the TARGET as our legal team that is led by our managing partner Mojca Lukancic is preparing for the closing of the transaction. Milost Advisors will begin to look for lucrative targets in South Africa that can form a strong basis for strategic vertical integration to grow the market share of the TARGET, stated Bonisile Mtsweni, Vice President of M&As at Milost Advisors Africa.

About PHI Group, Inc.

PHI Group, Inc., a U.S. publicly traded company established in 1982, is engaged in mergers and acquisitions and is currently in the process of acquiring controlling interest in a number of targets in select industries with intention to build a critical mass and uplist to a senior exchange as soon as practical.

Safe Harbor: This news release and the featured interview contain forward-looking statements that are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from those projected on the basis of such forward-looking statements. Such forward-looking statements are made based upon management's beliefs, as well as assumptions made by, and information currently available to, management pursuant to the "safe-harbor" provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995.




As of August 26th, 2021 Yahoo India will no longer be publishing content. Your Yahoo Account Mail and Search experiences will not be affected in any way and will operate as usual. We thank you for your support and readership. For more information on Yahoo India, please visit the FAQ
When protestors took to the streets of Ferguson, Mo., in 2014 in response to the police killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown, they also turned the nations attention to a related issue: the growing militarization of local law enforcement. Images of suburban police threatening demonstrators with armored vehicles and assault rifles prompted changes to the controversial 1033 program, through which the Department of Defense (DOD) transfers surplus military equipment to police departments nationwide.

President Obamas May 2015 announcement that he would freeze giveaways of certain gear drew outrage from law enforcement groups such as the National Association of Police Organizations (NAPO), which later charged that the banned equipment was essential in protecting communities against violent criminals and terrorists. After shooters targeted and killed uniformed police officers in Dallas and Baton Rouge in July, NAPO and other groups doubled down on criticisms that the administration was putting officers lives at risk. On July 21, Reuters reported that, following a meeting with police groups, Obama had agreed to revisit the ban.

But an In These Times investigation provides evidence that, in practice, the presidents much-ballyhooed reforms to the 1033 program have done little to stem the flow of battlefield gear to cops.

In fact, the total value of equipment distributed through the program actually increased in the year following the ban, according to figures provided to In These Times by Michelle McCaskill, media relations chief for the DOD's Defense Logistics Agency (DLA), which oversees the shipments.

So far in fiscal year 2016, (Oct. 1, 2015 - September 13), the DLA has transferred $494 million worth of gear to local police departments, In These Times learned from McCaskill.

That far exceeds the $418 million of equipment sent to police in FY 2015 (Oct. 1, 2014 - Sept. 30, 2015). According to an analysis published in May by the transparency organization Open the Books, 2015 was already a peak year for such shipments within the past decade, exceeded only by 2014's $787 million. Since 2006, more than $2.2 billion of hardware has found its way into the hands of police, according to the report.

Many police accountability advocates warned from the outset that last years reforms were too limited in scope. Of seven items on the list of prohibited equipment, only one had actually been given to police departments in recent years, noted a May 2015 article in the Guardian. While the Obama administration placed additional requirements on the transfer of certain aircraft, armored vehicles and riot gear considered especially intimidating to civilians, hundreds of pieces of such equipment are still finding their way into the hands of local police. So far this year, for example, cops have acquired more than 80 mine-resistant ambush protected vehicles (MRAPs)15-ton vehicles that were originally designed to withstand roadside bombs in war zones.

A second life for lethal weaponry

The 1033 program, which refers to a section of the 1997 National Defense Authorization Act that created it, is a popular way for cash-strapped local law enforcement agencies to get gear on the cheap. Police departments typically are responsible only for the costs of shipping and maintaining the equipment.

Advocates also say the 1033 program allows underutilized Pentagon inventory to find a second life. Since the American taxpayers have paid for this equipment already, does it not make more sense to share this equipment with local law enforcement agencies, as opposed to asking for the taxpayers to buy the same equipment twice? asks Jim Franklin, executive director of the Minnesota Sheriffs Association, in an email to In These Times.

ACLU Minnesota legal director Teresa Nelson says that she is sensitive to the needs of law enforcement. Nobody wants the police to be unsafe, she says. At the same time  when you have police in armored vehicles that look like tanks, you really change the dynamic between the police and the communities they serve.

In January 2015, Obama responded to growing criticism of the program in the wake of Ferguson by issuing Executive Order 13688, which created a federal interagency group to investigate police militarization and come up with recommendations. As a result of this investigation, police were prohibited from receiving certain equipment, including bayonets, tracked armored vehicles, firearms and ammunition of .50caliber or higher, grenade launchers, camouflage uniforms and weaponized aircraft.

Critics said the reforms were superficial. Last year, an NPR analysis of 10 years of DLA data showed that of all the aircraft given to local police through the 1033 program, none were weaponized. The investigation further revealed that nearly 87 percent of the hundreds of armored vehicles being used at the time by local police ran on wheels, not tracks. Peter Kraska, a professor at Eastern Kentucky Universitys School of Social Justice Studies and one of the leading researchers of police militarization, told the Guardian that the new rules were nothing more than a publicity stunt.

The ongoing transfer of armored vehicles, such as MRAPs, epitomizes these criticisms. Since the vehicles run on wheels, they arent on the new list of banned transfers. Nevertheless, their heft and design for use in warfare illustrates what critics see as the increasingly blurry line between police and military.

According to the DLA, police departments have received 708 MRAPs through the 1033 program since 2011, when the drawdown of troops in Iraq and Afghanistan first created a large reserve of unused equipment. At press time, 84 police departments had received the armored vehicles this year. More than 100 others have been approved and are awaiting delivery, according to DLA records obtained by In These Times through a Freedom of Information Act request.

As part of the Obama administrations reforms, law enforcement agencies receiving controlled items, such as MRAPs, must demonstrate that they plan to train officers on proper use. But training materials used by various California police departments, obtained by the website MuckRock in June, show that instructional time for MRAPs ranges from 20 hours to as little as 15 minutes.

Coming to a town near you?

Previously, only large urban police departments would have had the resources to justify acquiring the armored vehicles, which can cost upwards of $1 million. In 2014, Bill Johnson, executive director of NAPO, told USA Today that the 1033 program allows smaller police forces to play catch-up: Its their turn to get some of this equipment.

That may explain why the 1033 program is particularly popular in states with significant rural populations such as Minnesota, where 74 of 87 county sheriffs have received surplus military equipment since 2005mostly assault rifles and armored vehicles.

Jason Dingman, sheriff of sparsely populated Stevens County, Minn., told In These Times that an MRAP arrived this summer with only 56 miles on it. Virtually brand-new, the armored vehicle will just need a paint job and a fresh battery before being ready for use by West Central SWATa multi-agency task force that carries out tactical operations along the South Dakota border, but is called to the scene just six to eight times per year. If were just executing a search warrant then we wont bring [the MRAP] out, Dingman says.

But if the bad guy starts shooting at us then its a different situation and we can call out the MRAP to give our officers more protection.

The DLAs data show that police agencies receiving MRAPs in 2016 included those serving such tiny municipalities as Fallon, Nev. (pop. 8,458), and Westwego, La. (pop. 8,542). Even the police force in rural Pigeon Forge, Tenn. (pop. 6,171), found the need for an MRAPperhaps to more effectively repel potential terrorist attacks on Dollywood, the towns Dolly Parton-themed amusement park.

While police contend that equipment such as MRAPs are used defensively, renewed concerns arise whenever protests are met with a show of force. Following the police killing of Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge in July, a local reporter videotaped an armored vehicle pushing up against a crowd of protestors.

John Lindsay-Poland, who has researched the topic for the anti-militarism group American Friends Service Committee, thinks that the 1033 program fosters a warrior mentality that can further corrode police-community relations. If we do not want our police to be at war in our communities, he tells In These Times, then we shouldnt equip them with war-fighting equipment.
The DTSA panel shares best

practice to reasonably protect

your trade secrets

Although there is great reliance on patents, because software is becoming increasingly important in the context of whole system solutions, know-how is becoming incredibly valuable. Trade secret protection is therefore important. Companies have to establish a whole system of policies. Because you are operating in a company where your engineers want to collaborate with numerous people across the globe, it is not always easy to physically control the flow of information between tens of thousands of people and products. There is no way to track them all, so we have to exercise control with policies. Internal alerts are important so that you are notified when employees start downloading numerous files or any other activity that is not keeping with that user's profile. Keeping logs is crucial. If you do not have detailed logs, you have no evidence. Auditing is incredibly important. If you are being reasonable in your IT system protection, you should not legally lose your trade secret protection just because someone is more clever. But whatever system you have put in place, you need to check it periodically to make sure it is being implemented. You therefore need to establish internal audit processes to check the physical security (camera, swipe card access) and electronic access (to make sure people are following policies).

All of these considerations and measures will help to show, under the DTSA (like under state law) that you have taken "reasonable efforts" to maintain secrecy. Of course this will always be a grey area because reasonability will depend on the particular facts of a case. However, it was suggested that looking to the body of Federal Trade Commission law is a helpful starting point. Lily explained that a lot of companies are facing privacy issues and have to deal with obligations that the FTC is actively enforcing. If you are an IP counsel and you are looking into trade secrets issues, you should look into FTC enforcement actions as that area of law will give you a lot of information as to what is the bare minimum for what may constitute reasonable security measures from a consumer perspective. The FTC is not pushing forward a "gold standard" ideal, but the case law does provide you with an indication as to the "floor" of security measures.





The panel also cautioned about the security risk of laptop cameras. Just because you have a secure R&D room with swipe card access, physical monitoring with cameras and assurances that your engineers in the R&D room follow the letter of your trade secrets policy, this does not mean you are safe. For example, even if your engineers follow your instructions to disable the camera features on their laptops, this, we have realized, is not enough. This may still not be construed as a reasonable effort to secure your trade secrets, because their laptop cameras can be hacked into remotely without anyone noticing. The FTC has recently issued guidance on this.

She was therefore quick to rush to the Defend Trade Secrets Act (DTSA) session that was moderated by Chief Intellectual Property Officer, Nike ). Jeanine explained that years and years are spent on product development at Nike which is tied to very public marketing campaigns only at the last stage. Trade secret protection during the product development is therefore exceptionally important. The DTSA was driven substantially by industry who recognize that trade secrets is an important right (see the AmeriKat's reports on the legislation here ). A reason for the big push for the DTSA was the need for consistency around the enforcement of the right. There are good state laws, Jeanie noted, many of which are similar as between each other, but from a corporate perspective there needed to be ease of efficiency.A big difference between state laws and the DTSA is the ability for ex parte seizure orders Finnegan ) explained that the provision is completely new, but is meant to be rarely used. In order to get such an provision into the DTSA, Lily explained there was a lot of negotiation to neuter the provision by way of numerous safeguards. Previously, a plaintiff could obtain a temporary restraining order (TRO) or engage with the FBI and government attorneys on the criminal side. Now, private practitioners have an extraordinary remedy available to them that gives them a lot more power behind what they do in that, when we are talking about trade secret theft which occurs within seconds, they now have the ability to act quickly to stop the theft across state lines. Being able to obtain a quick remedy is therefore crucial and theseizure order provides for this. However, Lily explained, we haven't seen a whole lot of action yet. We have seen applications fororders, but she is still unaware of any orders that have been granted. Instead, temporary orders for holding information have been granted. Nevertheless, theprovision has opened a door to get to the courthouse faster, irrespective of whether or not when you leave the courthouse you walk away with anseizure order or a TRO. Kirkland & Ellis ) explained that you often have seizures in trade mark cases and/or those cases where there is a criminal or close to criminal element. She suspected that theseizure order was going to require the same showing, with a higher proof as to what a plaintiff says is a trade secret and that it is going to be misused imminently. Now that theprovision is expressly in the legislation, it was commented that this may give federal judges more comfort in orderingrelief. "A lot of the time when you seek TROs, the judge asks if I have called my adversary, as there seems to be a reticence from federal judges in granting a TRO." She continued, "I would not be surprised if people will go to court on anseizure order but also ask for a full blowninjunction - if you are going to write the brief, you may as well get it all done." Too right, agrees the AmeriKat, it is what we do in the UK after all!Judge Beth Freeman ( District Judge, US District Court of the Northern District of California ) stated, to laughter, that theseizure order "may be your shiny new toy, but it is not my shiny new toy". She commented that time is the most critical element in these cases, for example, where someone is at the airport ready to flee the jurisdiction with a bag of trade secrets. You have to get the wheels of justice moving quickly. Filing your brief on PACER and hoping the law clerk sees it in 1-2 days is fine, but it may not work very well in many cases. Judge Freeman commented that in the very urgent cases, parties may need to be on the courthouse step and calling the clerks to alert them that an application is on its way. Another issue is the need to describe the trade secret and theft with particularity. If ordered, the judge will be ordering a federal marshal to show up somewhere to look for something. The plaintiff needs to carefully describe what it is they are looking for and where it is likely to be, especially because the information is likely to be intermingled with personal information like children's photos and other documents on a personal computer. Specificity is key.Because the DTSA does not preclude the state law route, there may be a dual track. If you suspect that you are going to be in federal court, most people will plead state law claims as well (as why not). The state law claims may have different requirements and statute of limitations. Plaintiffs should also consider whether certain trade secrets cases really need to be in federal court. Indeed, there are advantages of being in state court (i.e. no need for a unanimous jury or endless depositions). When you are thinking about forum, these are issues that should be considered.An in-house perspective from the semi-conductor industry flagged up a few key issues:The panel also agreed that having a trade secrets protection/security policy was better in showing that you were mindful of protecting trade secrets, than having no policy at all. However, the biggest vulnerability for plaintiffs is evidence that you have a policy but that you have not followed it. If you have hired a consultant who has developed a very sophisticated policy for your trade secrets protection, that you initially followed but then neglected, then that is going to beevidence that you thought protection was necessary but were then reckless with your own trade secrets. This is an easier route in for the defence in order to dismember your complaint than focusing on the reasonableness of the policy itself.The panel closed by debating how the pleading requirements may change under the DTSA. For example, in California there are discovery rules that require a plaintiff to disclose trade secrets first. When plaintiffs do not have to disclose this information and the defendant is first forced to explain what it is that they are doing, it follows that the plaintiff immediately says that everything the defendant has done is trade secret misuse. What will happen under the DTSA? Well, the panel concluded, we need a case first.....
With the presidential debates right around the corner, I can't help but wonder if the debates are a lose-lose for Donald Trump, regardless of whether he attends or skips them. If he skips the debates out of protests over unfairness (or whatever constitutes unfairness in his mind), then he leaves himself wide open to be painted as being feeble and unable to tackle hard questions or hard scenarios (i.e., how can he be a head of state if he can't even handle a debate), and thus unfit for office. Plus, it would a huge opportunity for Hillary Clinton to regain her footing and potential lead in the race, because it would end up being 2 hours devoted simply to her, which she could use to plug her experience and credentials and win back swing voters. On the other hand, if Trump attends the debates, in all likelihood he'll get creamed because his total lack of policy and substance, plus his ill-temperment, will be on full display for swing voters to see, and thus he can be painted as unfit for office. Now, realizing that Trump is also a master at media manipulation, do you foresee any way whatsoever where he could come out on top? All I can see him doing is crying the same fouls as before (i.e., that the election is rigged, that the moderators are unfair to him), which is really only going to be heard by his base, and probably won't win him any more swing voters.
IS Fighters in Somalia Call Muslims to Pledge to Baghdadi, Threaten to Attack Enemies, Churches, Parliaments
Unilever (UL) is reportedly in early-stage discussions to buy Honest Company, a baby care product retailer co-founded by actress Jessica Alba, a deal that would add to the Anglo-Dutch company's recently active list of shopping. The purchase could also bulk up the company's monthly subscription offering.

The Wall Street Journal reported the news citing people familiar with the situation.

The London-based Unilever could buy Honest for more than $1 billion but much less than $1.7 billion, the report said citing the people, adding that the company was valued at $1.7 billion in a fundraising round last year. The report also said the discussions are still in early stages and Honest could instead seek an initial public offering.

The Santa Monica, CA-based Honest was founded in 2011 by Alba, Christopher Gavigan, and two others. It sells eco-friendly products ranging from baby diapers and feeding products to laundry detergents to sun screens. Since its inception, it has raised $222 million in four rounds from 10 investors, according to database Crunchbase. Investors include Institutional Venture Partners, Alliance Bernstein, and General Catalyst Partners.

Honest reportedly generates about $300 million in annual revenue and the majority of consumers buy products through the website on a monthly subscription package.

Over the past couple of months, Unilever has been on a shopping spree to boost its personal care line-up. In July, the company acquired the Venice Beach, Calif.-based Dollar Shave Club in a deal reported to be worth $1 billion.

Founded in 2012 and based in Venice Beach, Calif., Dollar Shave Club gives its 3.2 million members a lot of bang for their buck. It peddles "a great shave for a few bucks a month," selling a range of bargain-priced blades-at $1, $6 and $9, razor handles included-and grooming products from Dr. Carver's Shave Butter to One Wipe Charlies billed as "peppermint tingling flushable buttwipes for men."

in August, it purchased Stockholm-based Blueair for an undisclosed value. Blueair makes indoor purifying systems for homes and businesses.

Unilever, currently valued at market cap of around 123 billion ($138 billion) owns more than 400 brands, including Dove, Knorr and Ben and Jerry's. It booked 53.3 billion in revenue in 2015.

Unilever shares recently dropped 0.3% to 3,536 pence.
Drive Safety Work Week 2016 Set for Oct. 3-7

DSWW 2016's theme is "Drowsy, Distracted or FocusedYour Decisions Drive Your Safety." Employers can preview and download the free campaign toolkit at www.trafficsafety.org.

NETS, the Network of Employers for Traffic Safety, is conducting its 20th Drive Safely Work Week (DSWW) early next month. DSWW 2016's theme is "Drowsy, Distracted or FocusedYour Decisions Drive Your Safety." Employers can preview and download the free campaign toolkit at www.trafficsafety.org.

NETS chose the theme because, according to NHTSA, driver behavior contributes to 94 percent of all traffic crashes, which means almost all crashes are preventable. The 2016 campaign addresses this by highlighting drowsy driving and other risky driving behaviors, as well as countermeasures.

The campaign is an opportunity to reach all employees, not just company drivers, with road safety outreach, according to NETS Executive Director Jack Hanley. The organization, a nonprofit, is located in Vienna, Va.; to follow its related Facebook posts, visit https://www.facebook.com/DriveSafelyWorkWeek.

Although the week will be observed Oct. 3-7, the materials are undated and can be used at any time during the year ahead, he says.
SEATTLE, WA(Marketwired  September 15, 2016)  PayByPhone, the worlds leading parking payment provider, continues to solidify its global reach with recent contracts in Las Vegas, the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea (RBKC), and 3 additional cities in France. Implementing the PayByPhone service was an obvious choice based on the companys market leading service, world class apps and history of high adoption in major cities such as Vancouver, Canada (50%), Miami (67%), and Massachusetts Transportation Authority in Boston (90%). Combined with a suite of location aware services that allow the app to automatically adapt to a user specific situation, PayByPhone offers a completely seamless experience in over 300 locations around the world.

PayByPhone, who will be replacing both Passport Parking and Parkmobile, will be live in Las Vegas as early as this fall. The city is set to join the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) and a huge network of west coast installations that make up millions of North American users already enjoying the service. The availability of PayByPhone in over 11,000 spaces across Las Vegas and UNLV offers a new level of convenience and payment security for residents who are parking. Residents will also appreciate that the entire service, including live 24/7 customer support, offers Spanish language support which is essential for the Citys 184,000 Spanish speakers.

In the United Kingdom, PayByPhone has been the pilot mobile payments provider for RBKC since 2015 and has already driven adoption past the 50% mark in trial areas. PayByPhones new contract with RBKC increases the services availability to over 800 locations across the London Borough. The new contract solidifies PayByPhones presence in London across residential, rail and retail parking spaces.

Within Europe, PayByPhone has seen exceptional growth and development in France with new launches in Caen, Orleans, and Noisy-le-Grand. This is in addition to 10 cities that recently joined the PayByPhone network in the first half of the year.

Las Vegas, the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, as well as our rapid expansion in France truly demonstrates PayByPhones global scale as we continue to connect with more cities every year, explains Kush Parikh, President and CEO of PayByPhone. With one app, we are not only helping to efficiently manage each citys parking assets, but we are also providing a seamless and secure payments experience for all our users, no matter where they live or where they are traveling.

Recently the PayByPhone app was featured in Apples Summer of Apple Pay campaign which was released nationwide in the United States. The program has resulted in positive adoption of Apple Pay in many major cities, including San Francisco, where up to 25% of users use Apple Pay when completing a PayByPhone transaction.

ABOUT PAYBYPHONE

PayByPhone is one of the fastest growing mobile payments companies in the world, processing more than $300 million in payments annually. Through the companys mobile web, smartphone and smartwatch applications, PayByPhone helps millions of consumers easily and securely pay for parking without the hassles of waiting in line, having to carry change or risking costly fines. Registration is quick and easy and the app reminds the user when their parking is about to expire, allowing them to top up from anywhere, at any time.

Many of the largest and most complex parking operations in the world use PayByPhone including San Francisco (30,000 spaces), Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority in Boston (25,000 spaces), Seattle (12,000 spaces), London (40,000 spaces) and Paris (155,000 spaces).

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* PermaKat Eleonora Rosati received the 2022 Adepi Award

* PermaKat Eleonora Rosati listed as one of the World Intellectual Property Review's "Influential Women in IP" of 2020.

* PermaKat Eleonora Rosati listed as one of the Managing Intellectual Property magazine's "Fifty Most Influential People" of 2018.

* IPKat founder and Blogmeister Emeritus Jeremy Phillips listed as one of the Managing Intellectual Property magazine's "Fifty Most Influential People" of 2005, 2011, 2013, and 2014.

* Recommended by the European Patent Office as reading material for candidates for the European Qualifying Examinations, 2013.

* Listed as "Top Legal Blog" in The Times Online, March 2011.

2010 ABA Journal 100. * One of the only two non-US blogs listed in the Blawg100.

* Court Reporter Top Copyright Blog award winner, November 2010.

* Number 1 in the 2010 Top Copyright Blog list compiled by the Copyright Litigation Blog, July 2010.

* Selected by the United States Library of Congress for inclusion in its historic collections of Internet materials related to Legal Blawgs as of 2010.

* Top Patent Blog poll 2009: 3rd out of 50 in the "Favourite Patent Blog" poll and 2nd out of 50 in the "Most-read" poll.

Blog of the Year, 20 August 2008. * ComputerWeekly IT Law and Governance, 20 August 2008.
World oil prices barrelled lower this week on gloomy market forecasts, profit-taking and ever-present worries over the global supply glut, ahead of a producers' meeting later this month.

The Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA) set the tone on Tuesday, warning that oil demand growth was slowing while supply was rising.

Crude futures had netted gains during the previous week amid hopes of an OPEC-Russia deal to tackle oversupply -- which has sent prices crashing in recent years -- at the meeting in Algeria.

"There's a couple of things behind the decline in oil markets this week," Oanda analyst Craig Erlam told AFP on Friday.

"The first is that the gains last week were built on unsustainable and temporary factors that never warranted such a move.

"The other is the IEA forecasts which once again highlighted the slowing demand growth and higher output expectations, thereby exacerbating the problem that drove prices this low in the first place.

"If we get no deal in Algeria... then oil may face further downside pressure this month," he added, noting that traders were also taking profits this week.

In late afternoon London deals, European benchmark Brent North Sea crude for November delivery slipped 45 cents to $46.14 per barrel compared with Thursday.

West Texas Intermediate (WTI) for delivery in October slid 58 cents to $43.33 a barrel.

Over the course of the week, Brent is down about 3.9 percent while WTI has lost approximately 5.6 percent in value.

Hopes for a sustained rebound in demand were dashed this week by fresh warnings a global supply glut would persist for longer than previously thought.

The IEA -- which advises oil consuming nations on energy issues -- forecast continuing oversupply in 2017 in its latest market assessment.

The organisation reversed its previous projection that stubborn global oversupply would be soaked up by demand in the latter part of 2016.

Instead, it warned that the glut would linger "at least through the first half of next year".

Story continues

The news followed a report Monday by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) predicting that non-member countries would see output rise in 2017, revising its previous expectations of a drop.

"There seems to be no end to the bad news on the oil market," said Commerzbank analyst Carsten Fritsch.

"Another shock report came courtesy of the IEA: it now believes that balance will not be restored on the global oil market until mid-2017.

"This is partly due to a combination of two factors: oil demand this year is set to grow by 100,000 barrels per day less than previously thought, while non-OPEC supply is likely to be 100,000 barrels per day higher both this year and next."

Meanwhile, the clock is ticking towards OPEC's informal gathering in Algiers.

The 14-nation OPEC oil exporting group will meet with non-member producers on the sidelines of the International Energy Forum from September 26 to 28.

rfj/kjm
World oil prices sank lower this week on gloomy market forecasts, profit-taking and ever-present worries over the global supply glut, ahead of a producers' meeting on September 26-28.

The Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA) set the tone on Tuesday, warning that oil demand growth was slowing while supply was rising.

But fresh data showing mounting US stockpiles of crude and products, and Libya's pledge to sharply boost production and exports within weeks, added to the downward pressure on prices.

At the same time, Nigeria -- Africa's biggest crude producer -- appears set to also increase its oil exports, traders said.

On Friday in London trading, European benchmark Brent North Sea crude for November delivery slipped 82 cents to $45.77 per barrel from late Thursday.

West Texas Intermediate (WTI) for delivery in October slid 88 cents to $43.03 a barrel.

That left Brent down 4.5 percent for the week, while WTI lost 6.6 percent.

Crude futures had netted gains during the previous week amid hopes of an OPEC-Russia deal to tackle oversupply -- which has sent prices crashing in recent years -- at the meeting in Algeria.

Oanda analyst Craig Erlam told AFP on Friday that the gains last week "were built on unsustainable and temporary factors that never warranted such a move."

"If we get no deal in Algeria... then oil may face further downside pressure this month," he added, noting that traders were also taking profits this week.

Hopes for a sustained rebound in demand were dashed this week by fresh warnings that a global supply glut would persist for longer than previously thought.

But the prospect of Nigeria and Libya restoring lost output was also key.

"Libya and Nigeria have probably the major impact on today's market," said James Williams of WTRG Economics.

The IEA -- which advises oil consuming nations on energy issues -- forecast continuing oversupply in 2017 in its latest market assessment.

The organisation reversed its previous projection that oversupply would be soaked up by demand in the latter part of 2016.

Instead, it warned that the glut would linger "at least through the first half of next year".

"There seems to be no end to the bad news on the oil market," said Commerzbank analyst Carsten Fritsch.
Its flat growth is better than the 10.6% contraction a month ago.

Singapore's non-oil domestic exports may be on its way back to regaining strength as it generated a flat growth in August.

According to UOB analyst Francis Tan, August figures are better than the 10.6% YoY contraction recorded in July as well as the 3.3% contraction market expectations.

"The trend of a better export picture in August compared to July was also exhibited in the recent export numbers released in China and Indonesia," he said.

On a MoM basis, NODX fell 1.9% in the August following a similar contraction a month ago.

Tan argued that the problem with analyzing MoM export growth numbers is that it is unpredictable.

"It notoriously swing so much that one months excitement may lead to the next months disappointment. In the end, there is no clear consensus/conclusion on the state of the economy or export conditions. There simply is too much noise as one attempts to analyse y/y export numbers," he pointed out.

The analyst said cancelling the noise would give a better picture that the city-state's NODX is already on board to recovery.

"Zooming into the data since 2009, it also appears that NODX is on track to a recovery, as the trough of the current period of weakness was from Oct 2015 to Jan 2016, and it had been improving since," he said.







More From Singapore Business Review


Reuters

NEW DELHI (Reuters) -The Indian government on Friday announced amendments to its information technology (IT) rules that will apply to social media companies, in a move likely to be seen as a reining in of big tech firms. Under the amended rules, which will come into effect from Oct. 28, a government panel would be formed to hear complaints from users about content moderation decisions of social media platforms. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government has had strained relations with many big tech companies, and New Delhi has been tightening regulation of firms such as Facebook, YouTube and Twitter.
Four former top brass from Vietnam's state-run oil and gas giant PetroVietnam have been arrested for allegedly costing the firm nearly $150 million in losses, the government said Friday.

They are the latest executives to fall foul of the communist country's crackdown on mismanagement and graft in its sprawling state-run sector.

The group was arrested for "intentionally violating state regulations on economic management causing serious consequences" amounting to $147.9 million in losses, the Ministry of Public Security said on its website.

The four businessmen, who worked for the PetroVietnam Construction (PVC) subsidiary, include former director Vu Duc Thuan, former deputies Nguyen Manh Tien and Truong Quoc Dung and former chief accountant Pham Tien Dat.

Their arrests come after the detention last year of former company chairman Nguyen Xuan Son, who was accused of abuse of power and "deliberate wrongdoing causing serious economic consequences".

His predecessor is also under investigation for involvement in PetroVietnam's losses, though he has gone under the radar since he was stripped of a government posting earlier this year.

Communist Vietnam has been struggling to clean up its vast and inefficient state-run sector for years.

After the collapse of state shipping giant Vinashin in 2008, the government ordered all state-run enterprises to divest from non-core investments, though many have still not complied.

In recent years there have been a string of high-profile arrests and prosecutions of wealthy businessmen and executives.

However analysts often view such cases as the result of political infighting rather than a genuine commitment to reform.

Last week, a Vietnamese court convicted the former chairman of Vietnam Construction Bank and 35 other employees for stealing more than $400 million from the joint-stock bank.
Huang Hong Ji Interior

For 33 year old Wai Hoong, the nephew of Wong Choon Kwok and Soo Lai May aged 60 and 56 respectively, porridge isnt what most of us are accustomed to. Its because of their seemingly different interpretation of what porridge should be which makes Huang Hong Ji Porridge stand out from others in the business of porridge.

Tradition  it has a different meaning depending on the individual. When it comes to food, most of us are set on how we enjoy certain dishes, especially those we grew up on, introduced to us by the generations before us.

Huang Hong Ji porridge has been around since the days hawkers peddled their food on the streets. From their trishaw, the business established itself at Tanglin Halt Food Centre during the 1970s.

Huang Hong Ji Wong Choon Kwok

Fast forward to the present day, the purveyors of authentic Cantonese porridge are now ladling out bowls of it a short 10 minute walk from Punggol MRT station and Waterway Point at Blk 269A Punggol Field #01-197 from 6:45am to 8pm daily, only taking a day off on alternate Mondays.

Huang Hong Ji Menu

A local culinary dynasty now in its third generation, Huang Hong Ji has no intention of surrendering the more unique items on its menu any time soon.

Huang Hong Ji Signature Porridge

The first item on their menu is the signature porridge ($4.00), the closest thing youll get to Cantonese porridge in Singapore from a bygone era with a mix of fish, pork and cuttlefish buried like hidden treasure.

Earthy pork blood cakes are all but a memory in our hygienic city, in its place are delicate slices of Ikan Parang (fish) a saltwater fish which is more flavourful than the more commonly used snakehead (Toman), cuttlefish with a crunch of freshness and tender meatballs squeezed by hand, all hidden under the ladles of silky porridge.

All of this is topped off with what is now my new favourite crispy pork item deep fried pigs intestine.

Huang Hong Ji Fried Intestine

Eating at Huang Hong Ji has been a gastronomical revelation of sorts. Oh what a tragedy it would be if deep fried pigs intestine were to disappear from our local culinary landscape.

Story continues

Huang Hong Ji Porridge and Bee Hoon

Besides the deep fried pigs intestine, a side order of fried bee hoon ($1.20) can be mixed in and eaten with porridge. The fried bee hoon is the Cantonese alternative to youtiao (fried dough sticks)  commonly served with porridge as a long lost tradition not many locals know about.

To round the meal off, an additional side of handmade yam cakes ($2.00), only available over the weekend, is recommended for the full authentic Cantonese porridge experience. But of course, theres no strict way to eat your porridge and its recommended to have it in whichever way you prefer.

New age demand

Huang Hong Ji Pei Dan

Cuttlefish + Peanut + Century Egg ($3.50)

To meet the demands of the new generations of customers, an array of the usual suspects such as luncheon meat, ngoh hiang and lup cheong which are commonly found at other places selling porridge and economical bee hoon are offered too.

Yes its all very sinful and tempting, and almost too hard to resist.

However, it would be a great shame to have a meal at Huang Hong Ji without at least trying the signature porridge and if youre feeling particularly peckish, the full experience which is the signature porridge with sides of both fried bee hoon and yam cake work out to be ($7.20). Satisfying comfort food.

With Punggol being a relatively new estate, its crisp new streets flanked by blocks of white and grey apartment buildings dont do a whole lot in helping convey the heritage and tradition that this wholly owned family business brings.

Back at Tanglin Halt food centre, they used to clear out by 10am. Now at Punggol where the owners have concentrate their cooking efforts, they wont be going anywhere till 8pm, and the same goes for the crispy pork intestine  fingers crossed.

Expected damage: $4  $6 per pax

Huang Hong Ji Porridge: Blk 269A Punggol Field #01-197, Singapore 822269 | Opening Hours: 7am  2pm daily (Closed every alternate Monday)

The post Huang Hong Ji : Serving Authentic Cantonese Porridge for 40 Years, Now In Punggol appeared first on SETHLUI.com.
The layback air is a much maligned skateboarding trick, condemned by many to the forgotten dustbin of 80s vert trickery and yet to be unearthed and dusted off in any real way by the current trend for resurrecting tricks once thought outdated. But, as with nearly any trick in skateboarding, in the right hands the layback air is transformed into a thing of pure excitement. It stands as one of those tricks that, even when performed badly, feels incredible, with a few managing to convert that feeling visually as well.

Here are some of those who can throw it down, whether that be the Todd Twist inverted variation or the humbler body parallel with the coping, front leg pointed example.

Bill Danforth

Patron saint of mongo pushers Bill Danforth is definitely in the running for best layback air of all time  upside down, held and pivoted back in with the right balance of style and aggression. Both his runs from the Duel at Diable include examples!
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) has been cooperating with war-torn Libya and other nations to remove consequences of the leakage of components for chemical weapons from Libya's storage tanks, the organizations spokeswoman told Sputnik on Friday.

On Thursday, the Russian Foreign Ministry urged the OPCW to clarify the circumstances of disappearance of more than 200 metric tons of precursor materials for chemical weapons at Libya's Ruwagha storage site. According to the OPCW, chemical components did not go missing, but rather leaked or evaporated due to corrosion in storage tanks.

"The OPCW Technical Secretariat has been working with Libya and other countries to develop a plan for environmental clean-up at the site where the leakage occurred," the organization said.
BISHKEK (Spuntik)  The opening ceremony was attended by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. During the ceremony, Head of Sputnik Kyrgyzstan Yelena Cheremenina spoke about the editorial offices multimedia opportunities and gave a tour of the centers website section, radio studio, and high-tech press center. After the tour, Sergei Lavrov gave his best wishes to the Sputnik Kyrgyzstan team.

It is very symbolic that the opening of a new editorial center coincides with the anniversary summit of the CIS. Sputnik has successfully tackled the integration objectives in the media by developing a multicultural and multipolar platform. A technologically intensive press center that can connect to almost anywhere in the world by video linkup gives Kyrgyzstan a unique opportunity to become part of the global information environment and to participate in dialogue with access to all means and tools, Yelena Cheremenina said.
"The upshot is war in Yemen, a growing arms race in the Persian Gulf and a deepening breakdown in Syria," he asserted.

This policy has led to tensions with Russia, Lazare noted.

"Since the US seems to regard the region as its own private market, it also means growing confrontation with Russia, which, for its own security reasons, is unable to stand by while the Middle East goes down the tubes," he explained.

Washington and its defense contractors need continued conflict in the region to ensure demand for their wares remains strong, Lazare added.

"If too many weapons are chasing too few customers, then the solution that the administration has come up with, consciously or unconsciously, is to expand military conflict in order to stimulate demand," he said.

According to Lazare, Obama has proved unwilling or incapable of reversing this trend.

Whoever succeeds Obama as president is almost certain to continue using arms sales to spark the US economy, foreign-affairs analyst and author Joe Lauria said.

"Both [Democratic candidate Hillary] Clinton and [Republican nominee Donald] Trump have fallen over each other praising the Israel of Benjamin Netanyahu. Even the so-called tension between Obama and Netanyahu resulted in this obscene arms transfer," he remarked.

Lauria predicted that the Palestinian resistance is ending and the Israelis now have more than enough firepower to crush it forever.
She has been held in Evin prison since June 6 on the charges on national security for her academic work.

The human rights advocates state that Hoodfars academic work does not pose a threat to Iranian security and she should be released.

Their statement read: We stress that Iran is breaching its national constitutional principles by arbitrarily arresting and detaining people for simply expressing their opinion and conducting academic research, as is their professional right and duty.

Her family revealed that the Iranian probe into the retired professors work to improve the world for women and girls.

The investigators state that Iran is violating its own laws in detaining her.

They wrote: It is unclear how feminism is a threat to Iranian national security, given that Iran has committed itself to the Sustainable Development Goal #5, which is gender equality.

The judge in Hoodfars case refused to accept her choice of lawyer and appointed one of his own.

Hoodfar has a severe neurological condition but the Iranian authorities are refusing to allow an independent specialist to check in on her.

Almost 5,000 academics have signed a petition demanding her release and some staged a protest outside the Iranian Embassy in Dublin last week.
According to a new report by Sweden's Employment Service, this trend is reinforced by a stronger labor market in big cities that drains smaller municipalities of labor.

"Rural areas will see an increased labor shortage in the next 15 years. It is a trend that will only become stronger. By 2030, rural municipalities are expected to lose up to a third of their working age population," the Employment Service's chief analyst Annika Sunden told Swedish Radio.

Globalization has led to increased international competition. The increasingly specialized jobs are mostly located in big cities, where even jobs in education, health care and social services are situated. According to the Employment Service, urban and metropolitan areas are about to grow further, whereas medium and small municipalities will dwindle. The loss of manpower is expected to peak in rural municipalities at 28 percent.
Auditors became particularly upset with the Defense Forces extravagant spending on excessive wining and dining. According to examiners, the Finnish army spent over 13,000 euros on a "reception" at Hartwall Areena, organized by the General Staff HQ and attended by 148 people, of which only 43 were related to the army. Almost 30 percent of the money was spent on liquor, Finnish national broadcaster Yle reported.

Another interesting expense was a Christmas trip to the Santa Claus village in Lapland. The trip, which according to the military documents was designated as a "military exercise" and a "conference with army officials," involved more than 400 people. However, the two-day program included only 50 minutes of training, and was full of festivities, which could have set Finnish Army budget back hundreds of thousands of euros.

Criticism was also directed at a military conference at the four-star Scandic Rosendahl Hotel in Tampere, where only 28 of the 43 participants were related to the army.
Several Russian porn actresses praised the decision by local telecommunications watchdog Roskomnadzor to blacklist Pornhub.

The girls expressed hope that restricting access to free adult-rated content will help increase revenues from sales of pornographic videos, according to RIA Novosti.

  Ally Breelsen (@ally__breelsen)  13 2016  12:53 PDT

"If you want to read a new book, you buy it. If you want to view a premiere of a new movie, you buy a ticket. And if you want new porn, you should just buy it  its not that expensive. In Russia they created free websites, so porn here is no longer treated as something that has value," a porn actress named Angelina Doroshenkova (whose porn name is Ally Breelsen) said.

Her concerns were echoed by her colleague, Lyubov Bushueva, also known as Lola Taylor in the adult world.

small girl     (@lola_taylor)  6 2016  11:25 PDT

"People in our country dont like to pay; they prefer to get everything for free Porn actresses earn little now, big wages have become a thing of the past. Now you go to work in the porn industry simply to make a name for yourself," Bushueva complained.

However, another porn actress who calls herself Kristall Rush argued that the Pornhub ban is largely pointless as web users will simply find another adult video website which the Internet has no shortage of.

Pornhub is a pornographic video-sharing website and the largest pornography site on the Internet.

In 2015 the Russian-language version of Pornhub was blacklisted by the local telecommunications watchdog Roskomnadzor, and on September 14, 2016 the website was banned in Russia completely.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  Speaking at a premier showing of his movie "Battalion" on Thursday, Ugolnikov said that "Americans' interest in Russian culture emphasizes that they acknowledge the significant value of restoring US-Russia relations."

"The two nations went through difficult times during the Cold War, but all that is in the past," he stressed.

The Russian Embassy in Washington, DC organized the movie screening at its Tunlaw Theater. Both American and Russian guests were invited to watch the movie, which is a drama based on First World War events.
Irwin was killed on September 4, 2006, after he was stabbed in the chest hundreds of times by the barb of a stingray. He remains massively popular even a decade after his death.

"It's about time we paid our respects to the all time greatest Australian bloke, Steve Irwin. Let's make a change for something in the history of our country," the petition states. "With a list a mile long of all the good Steve had accomplished in our world, let's show our appreciation to a great, true blue Australian by putting Stephen 'Steve' Irwin on our country's currency."

Irwin was not only a passionate conservationist, wildlife expert, and television regular, he and his wife also owned and operated the Australia Zoo, founded by his parents.
TOKYO (Sputnik)  The latest ballistic missile tests carried out by Pyongyang show that the precision of North Koreas missiles is improving, South Korean government sources told the Yonhap news agency on Friday.

Meanwhile North Korea's Foreign Minister Ri Yong-ho warned that Pyongyang is ready to take further action in response to what it considers as provocations from the West.

"North Korea is ready to launch another attack in defiance of the provocations by the United States," Ri Yong-ho stressed on Thursday, as quoted by Yonhap.
TOKYO (Sputnik)  South Korea's Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se and Japan's Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida are expected to hold a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) session in New York on September 18 to discuss countermeasures in the light of the recent nuclear test carried out by Pyongyang, the South Korean Foreign Ministry said on Friday.

According to the Yonhap news agency, citing the ministry, the diplomats will discuss potential introduction of new sanctions against Pyongyang. Besides, Kishida and Yun will also discuss signing of the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) between the two countries on the exchange of classified information, the media reported.

Seoul and Tokyo reached an understanding to sign such a document in 2012. However, since then, the sides did not make progress on the issue due to political disputes over Japan's occupation and colonialism during World War II.
TOKYO (Sputnik)  Japan relies on the Chinese and Russian support of tougher UN Security Council's (UNSC) measures against Pyongyang in the light of its recent nuclear test, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said Friday.

"We expect the global manifestation of hardline approach, including China's and Russia's, as they have influence on North Korea," Yoshihide Suga told reporters at a regular briefing in Tokyo.

According to the Japanese government, a new range of sanctions should be introduced to make Pyongyang abandon development of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.
TOKYO (Sputnik)  According to the Kyodo news agency, the Naha branch of the Fukuoka High Court made a ruling that Okinawa's former government had legally provided the land for relocation of the US air base from Okinawa's highly-populated district in the city of Ginowan to the Henoko coastal area of Nago city.

The relocation decision has met resistance from Okinawa's local authorities, with many Okinawa residents wishing to see the base gone rather than relocated. Okinawa Prefecture Governor Takeshi Onaga convinced the central government to temporarily halt construction in August 2015. In late October 2015, the Japanese government resumed construction of a US military base in Okinawa, having negated a regional government veto on it.
New Delhi (Sputnik)  India's less than cordial relationship with neighboring Pakistan has worsened as it has adopted an aggressive position regarding alleged human rights violations in Balochistan, a mostly arid province in western Pakistan which borders Iran and Afghanistan. It has vowed to continue to raise the issue until justice is brought to the Balochs.

Balochistan is one of Pakistan's largest but most sparsely populated regions. An independence movement exists within its ethnic group, the Balochs.

We will continue to raise the Balochistan issue as long as repression and violations of the fundamental rights of Balochs exist, spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs Vikas Swarup told the press on Thursday.
The CPJ also notes that the bill suffers from vague language, much like the vague language that governs the states enforcement of crimes such as insulting sanctities or enmity against God, which are frequently utilized to punish political prisoners. Because of this, the CPJ speculates that the Iranian Media System could lead many journalists to self-censor and avoid coverage of topics and events that are not state-sanctioned, such as spontaneous protests. This has in turn led to a number of commentators arguing that the Ministry of Cultures draft bill could be a major step toward the end of independent journalism in the Islamic Republic.

The CPJ article discussed the Iranian Media System in the context of the UN General Assembly, which started on Tuesday and will see speeches from members of the Rouhani administration. It noted that the Iranian president had formerly promised to reinstate an independent organization called the Association of Independent Journalists, which essentially functioned as a union for reporters outside of the state media system. The Rouhani administrations current support for the Iranian Media System underscores the fact that it would essentially replace the Association of Independent Journalists and stand alongside a variety of other Rouhani-supported initiatives to tighten control over the media in Iran.

Among these initiatives are various bans on news outlets and individual journalists that have failed, in one way or another, to toe the states official line. News reports indicated on Tuesday that such bans are still very much ongoing. It reported that at least five websites had been forced to shut down on September 4 alone, only days after another was also blocked by Irans Working Group for Identifying Criminal Content.

It is not clear what sort of criminal content was identified in these cases, as even the owners of the websites were not informed of the reasons for the closures. But reports suggest that at least two of the sites may have been targeted because of their reporting on a corrupt housing scheme involving Tehran city officials, police officers, and a member of the Iranian parliament.

The Working Group is comprised of 13 members, including key ministers in the presidential cabinet. Their apparent contribution to suppressing criticism of the government is another in a long series of indicators that the Rouhani administration has betrayed campaign promises for a freer and more open Iranian society. And in light of this, the CPJ argues that the UN General Assembly would be a good forum for Rouhani to address his record in this area  and to be challenged on it  before seeking reelection next year.

It remains to be seen whether the international community will give serious attention to Irans domestic affairs in that forum. This is especially uncertain in light of the fact that human rights defenders have criticized Western policymakers for focusing too much attention upon nuclear negotiations and trade agreements, at the expense of ongoing human rights violations and media suppression. And this relative lack of scrutiny has in turn been blamed for the Rouhani administrations maintaining an evasive and deceptive narrative about Irans human rights record.
LONDON (Sputnik)  Iranian nuclear energy strategy will focus on the development of small modular reactors (SMRs) and Tehran is currently assessing potential partners for cooperation in the field in addition to Russia, Ali Akbar Salehi, the President of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) , told Sputnik on Friday.

"We have not entered into serious negotiations with any country with regard to SMR's but this is our strategy. So we are working on it and making the assessment as to whether it is feasible for us or not and then we will look around and see which countries are willing to co-operate with us in the development of SMRs," Salehi said.
A suicide bomber screamed "Allahu Akbar" and detonated himself in a packed mosque in Pakistan. As a result at least 16 people were killed and 25 were injured.

"The suicide bomber was in crowded mosque, he shouted 'Allahu Akbar' (God is greatest) and then there was a huge blast," Reuters citing Naveed Akbar, deputy administrator of Mohmand agency as saying.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban in particular routinely attack soft targets such as courts, schools and mosques.
The explosion, which took place in the mosque in the Mohmand region, killed at least 25 people and wounded 30 others, DunyaNews Pakistan said.

Those wounded were transferred to the region of Bajaur and nearby hospitals.
"Many of these states signed agreements in the framework of partnership with NATO structures. For a long time, governments in the region cooperated both with Russia (through the Collective Security Treaty Organization) and with NATO." For some time, this approach was thought to be only logical, with countries looking to maximize their security resources to counter domestic threats and those emanating from Afghanistan.

"At the beginning of the 21st century, the situation changed, and Central Asian states became potential allies for the US in its operation against the Taliban in Afghanistan. For this purpose, US bases were built, and broader cooperation began. But this also allowed the US to penetrate more deeply into these countries, which not every government found to be reassuring. Turkmenistan did not allow foreign organizations to work on its territory, Uzbekistan did, but then closed them, and Kazakhstan has kept them under control. On the whole, each country developed a specific mechanism to counter US 'soft power'."

"In recent years," Lukyanov emphasized, "US regional policy has been thrown into confusion. This has to do with Barack Obama's promise to withdraw troops from Afghanistan, something that has proven very difficult. The US is afraid of withdrawing troops completely, because the regime they have built there could collapse." In effect, the expert noted, the US is currently trapped in Afghanistan, "without any real understanding of what they want from the country, or from Central Asian leaders."

Adzar Kurtov, an expert at the Russian Institute for Strategic Studies, told Svobodnaya Pressa that "as a rule, if Americans enter a region, they will not leave voluntarily; the circumstances must exist to compel them to do so."

Accordingly, the analyst explained that "if we were to compare current US capabilities in the region with those which existed in the 1990s, and after they entered, under pretext of getting support for operations against the Taliban, in late 2001, one can confidently say that [US influence] has declined."

At the same time, Kurtov noted that while the growth of Russian geopolitical influence and activity in the region has been an important factor in explaining declining US influence, it has not been the central one. "The fact is that another power  China, has significantly increased its activity in the region."
"Roughly rectangular in shape and approximately 140 x 80 meters, the new structure is surrounded by scrubland and trees that provide an additional measure of security on the ground," IHS Jane reports.

The report is based on satellite surveillance of the site, located in the town of Kahuta, roughly 30 kilometers east of Islamabad.

"It is sited within an established centrifuge facility, has strong security and shows some of the structural features of a possible new uranium enrichment facility. This makes it a strong candidate for a new centrifuge facility," said Karl Dewey, an analyst with IHS Janes, according to the Indian Express.
"The United States welcomes Japans interest in expanding its maritime activities in the South China Sea," the statement reads. "We continue to explore ways to enhance US-Japan cooperative efforts to contribute to the security and stability of the region."

At the heart of the conflict is Beijings construction of a series of artificial islands in the South China Sea. While the US has accused China of attempting to establish an air defense zone, Beijing maintains it has every right to build within its own territory and that the islands will be used for primarily civilian purposes.

To protest these land reclamation projects, the Pentagon has conducted freedom of navigation patrols within the 12-mile territorial limit of the islands.
One of the clusters is based in Roslyakovo near Murmansk. Its a former shipyard. Work is just beginning there, with documentation being processed. All licensing and other documents should be finalized before the end of the year, he said.

The expert added that Zvezda, a Far Eastern shipyard and ship maintenance center at Bolshoi Kamen Bay in the Primorye Territory, is the most interesting, important and wide-ranging project in this area.

Zvezda should become the biggest shipyard of its kind in Russia and one of the largest in the world.

Ships that can be built at this shipyard are already in demand. Initial orders have been placed for 237 ships, including 35 platforms for exploration drilling on the shelf. The rest are ships of various classes, including natural gas carriers that at present are built solely by South Korea, Tankayev said.

Small ice-class ships will also be built, which will support various kinds of operations at Arctic Ocean ports.

Only ships with deadweight up to 50,000 metric tons can move along the Northern Sea Route. Ships of this class will be built at the Zvezda shipyard operated by Rosneft, he said.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  The statement said that the parties "reviewed the substantial progress being made [on TTIP] and discussed next steps for moving forward."

"We have directed our teams to make as much progress as possible during the next round, scheduled for the week of October 3 in New York."

On Monday, a diplomatic source told RIA Novosti that substantial progress could not be expected before the end of June 2017 on efforts to finalize the TTIP agreement, which seeks to establish a free trade zone between the European Union and the United States.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  Alekperov said in an interview with the Russian Kommersant newspaper that the company has "two agreements with the government of Iran to study both huge regions, including the offshore area of the Persian Gulf, and specific fields that are of interest to us We are also interested in considering a part of the Caspian Sea, adjacent to Iran."

The LUKoil CEO said he plans to visit Irans capital, Tehran, at the end of September, or the start of next month, in order to meet with Iranian representatives to get more detailed information on the current and prospective agreements.

Iranian Minister of Communication Mahmoud Vaezi said last month that he saw good opportunities for his country to cooperate with LUKoil now that the sanctions against Iran had been lifted.
In 2013, the Russian company LUKoil was awarded two licenses for exploration and drilling on the Norwegian continental shelf in the Barents Sea, prompting it to create a subsidiary with offices in Oslo. Cooperation between Norway and Russia in oil and gas exploration has proceeded despite the Brussels-imposed sanctions against Russia and Moscow's subsequent counter-sanctions.

In 2015, LUKoil received a total of 162.3 million NOK (nearly $20 million) for its exploration projects on the Norwegian shelf, almost twice as much as the year before, Norwegian newspaper ABC Nyheter reported. According to the Russian newspaper Kommersant's interview with LUKoil's president Vagit Alekperov, the company is preparing for drilling in a former "grey area" of the shelf which had been disputed between Russia and Norway for decades. The successful delimitation of the Norwegian-Russian aquatic border in the Barents Sea in 2010 led to a surge in bilateral oil and gas projects.

In May, LUKoil was offered a 20-percent stake in two license blocks located directly along the Norwegian-Russian maritime border. This step was defended by Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg, who during her US visit stressed specifically that Oslo was seeking cooperation with Russia in the far north.
His belief is that while the growth and profitability patterns that worked well over the past 20 years have exhausted their potential by now, it is time to look at other spheres of economic activity. These won't be as lucrative, and would require a painful readjustment, but roads, pipelines, buildings, cars, and consumer goods manufacturing can provide moderate sustainability to US business activity, releasing the private sector from the paranoia of high volatility that dominated the economy since at least the late 1990s. More importantly, the dull and boring assembly lines and construction sites could provide the labor force with better paychecks, without necessitating a minimum wage hike the current economy can't afford.

To ensure a boost in business activity, Trump proposed $4.4 trln in tax cuts, calculated as $2.6 trln under a dynamic growth model, which is how taxes should be scored, he noted. Subsequently, as the new individual income-tax brackets will be 12pc, 25pc, and 33pc  three instead of the current seven  and low-income workers (those who earn below $25,000/year) won't pay income taxes, the new fiscal stimulus would release a lot of hard-earned money into the domestic consumer market. People will have more money on hand to spend, as with consumption driving about 72 percent of the US GDP, a boost to growth wont take long to reveal itself.

Trade agreements, Trump said, must help US growth, not hinder it. These can't be static, as the landscape of international trade is ever-changing, meaning a constant process of adjustment and renegotiation could be helpful.

The US regulatory framework, Trump said, should be modern, with less bureaucracy and corruption, and demand more responsibility from the actual participants in economic activity. His idea is to stop new federal regulations and thoroughly revise the contradictory bulk of the existing ones.

On energy, the GOP nominee discussed unleashing an energy revolution, with the US increasing the output. Keystone XL is likely to be granted approval under the Trump administration and shale oil might enjoy an influx of investment  currently the ultra-low Fed rates are draining investment from oil into the coffers of Wall Street.

And boy, oh boy did [the economy] used to grow, Trump remarked, with retrospective infatuation audible in his voice for just a moment. He went on to explain that while his team can ensure 3.5% growth a year  just above the all-time average  this is just a preliminary target, as that is, in Trumps view, where the economic performance could be now.

My great economists dont want me to say this, but I think we can do better than that, he said, hinting at 4% annualized growth, which would usher in an era of new prosperity.
Clintons campaign team later said she was suffering from pneumonia, which forced her to take three days off from political rallying this week. She has since resumed the stumps, having apparently made a recovery.

However, after weeks of dismissing claims about Clintons ill-health as wild conjecture, the Washington Post then gives vent to the even wilder notion that the Democrat candidate has been poisoned by Russian agents.

The Post, on one hand, half-acknowledges that the theory is far-fetched. Yet, the newspaper  one of Americas top publications  also sneakily adds credence by going on in the same article to reiterate baseless British claims that Russias Putin ordered the poisoning of Kremlin critic Alexander Livitnenko while he was living in exile in London in 2006.

Livitnenkos death from Polonium poisoning was more likely caused by shady rivals in the criminal underworld. There is no evidence that Russian state agents were involved in his demise. But the claims have provided Western media with plenty of material to continue demonizing Moscow and Vladimir Putin in particular, as the Washington Post article demonstrates.

The latest claim that Clinton has been poisoned by Kremlin agents plays into a litany of false narratives portraying Russia as an evil foreign enemy. From the alleged annexation of Crimea, to alleged destabilizing of Ukraine, to the alleged shooting down of a Malaysian civilian airliner in 2014, to alleged state-sponsored doping of Olympic athletes.

With this mass media campaign of vilification against Russia and inculcation of pejorative public perception, it is in many ways a logical next step that American spooks in the CIA and closely aligned news outlets like the Washington Post would attempt to implicate Russia in incapacitating Clinton as presidential candidate.

After all, US media in concert with their favored Clinton presidential campaign have been pushing claims that Russian state-sponsored cyber hackers are interfering in the US elections by leaking damaging private information against Clinton. The identity of these hackers may well be American citizens opposed to Clinton.
"On the policy questions, which I think are the most important thing for the public understanding, its as close to real as you can get in a film," Snowden told The Financial Times on Friday.

The whistleblower said that Stone's characterization made him uncomfortable, with the super-deep gravelly voice, but thats because one never hears own voice the way other people do.

Snowden's lawyer Kucherena said that the movie left his client deeply touched as he never planned to make his life public.

"It wouldn't be true to say that Edward [Snowden] is strongly affected by this [Russian] premiere, I would describe his attitude as neutral. He never wanted to make his life public knowledge and he does not enjoy all the attention he is getting," Snowden's lawyer Kucherena said to the film's press office.

Film's director Stone said that the movie was tackling very important issues like mass surveillance and cyberwarfare.

"The government lies about it all the time. And what they're doing is illegal, and they keep doing it What's going on is pretty shocking. This story not only deals with eavesdropping but mass eavesdropping, drones and cyberwarfare As Snowden said himself the other day, Its out of control, the world is really out of control,'" Oliver Stone said at the Toronto International Film Festival where "Snowden" was shown.

Igor Lopatonok, the film's executive producer, told Sputnik that the new movie will make people re-evaluate their views on Internet privacy and social media.
BRUSSELS (Sputnik)  Upon his return from Strasbourg, where he observed discussions at the European Parliament session around a report on the EU situation, Chizhov said that "pro-Russian sentiments are growing in different political factions."

Earlier in the day, Brussels upheld sanctions against Russian and Ukrainian individuals and enterprises imposed in March 2014 over alleged violation of Ukraine's territorial integrity and independence.

The sanctions imposed by Brussels stipulate entry bans and freeze the bank accounts of the black-listed individuals and enterprises. The black list includes Russian officials and celebrities, as well as leaders of the self-proclaimed Donetsk Peoples Republic (DPR) and Luhansk People's Republic (LPR) of Ukraine's southeast.
BELGRADE (Sputnik)  Earlier on Friday, the News Front news agency quoted its head Konstantin Knyrik as saying that the head of the News Front Serbian edition, Oksana Sazonova, and video operator Sergey Belous were detained in Velika Hoca when they were filming a story about Orthodox churches and the coexistence of Albanians and Serbs in the region.

According to Knyrik, the journalists were detained over alleged violations of visitors requirements in Kosovo. They were taken from Velika Hoca to Kosovos capital, Pristina.

"The journalists are in a police detention center for foreigners in Pristina. They are safe. They are suspected of violating the conditions of residence in Kosovo. On Friday, they will probably face restrictive measures. Most likely, it will be deportation," a police source told RIA Novosti on Friday.
Therefore, the issue of migration is likely to be high on the agenda, especially, considering fierce opposition by countries like Hungary against European Commissions refugees quotas.

On Tuesday, Luxembourg's Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn urged that Hungary should be suspended or expelled from the European Union, blaming Budapest for challenging EU fundamental values. According to the minister, Hungarian authorities has been violating the freedom of the press and the independence of the judiciary, while sealing borders to counter migrant influx, which is against EU norms.

"We cannot accept that EUs basic values are being greatly undermined. Those who, like Hungary, build fences to deter war refugees or violate press freedom and judicial independence should be temporarily or, if need be, permanently excluded from the EU," Asselborn said.

FISCAL CRISIS

Despite the best efforts, several European economies, most notably, Greece, Italy and Spain, are struggling and thus ways to help them will be discussed.

According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Greek government debt will reach 174 percent of the countrys GDP by the end of the decade.

"The revised projections suggest that debt will be around 174 percent of GDP by 2020, and 167 percent by 2022," the IMF stated. In addition, the fund has lowered its long-term growth assumption for Greece to 1.25 percent.

The Italian public debt reached a historic high in June, exceeding 2.249 trillion euro ($2.518 trillion).
KIEV (Sputnik)  Ukraine is currently unprepared to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and this issue is not on the short-term agenda of the military bloc, German Ambassador to Ukraine Ernst Wolfgang Reichel said Friday.

"Ukraine is currently not ready to join NATO. During the latest summit in Warsaw this July there was a Ukraine-NATO meeting, where the Alliance member states made a joint statement about the development of future relations between Ukraine and the bloc. NATO member states' leaders confirmed their commitment to the open door policy, which provides Ukraine with the opportunity to join NATO in the future in case of implementation of all the obligations. Though, this issue is not on the agenda for the near future," Reichel told the Ukrainian Novoe Vremya magazine.

In December 2014, Ukraine suspended its non-aligned status and confirmed its intention to join NATO. In September 2015, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko signed a military doctrine, stipulating the need for the country's armed forces to match NATO standards by 2020.
STRASBOURG (Sputnik)  The European Union policy regarding the migration crisis must be based on the establishment of peace and growth in the refugees' countries of origin and the sharing of responsibility among the EU member states, which should accept their fair share of the refugees, Speaker of the Hellenic Parliament Nikolaos Voutsis told Sputnik.

The policy must be based on the two pillars. The first is the pillar of peace and growth in those countries that have been destabilized throughout the last years, that is the Middle East and Northern Africa, so people do not want to leave their countries. That is the key goal for the international community. The second pillar concerns the refugees that have been already produced these last years. It is important for the European Union to assume its own share of the responsibility and the burden. Each country of the EU must accept to take up a few thousands of the refugees, Nikolaos Voutsis said.
STRASBOURG (Sputnik)  The program of reforms being implemented in Greece excludes radical austerity measures in order to avoid escalation of tensions inside the country, Speaker of the Hellenic Parliament Nikolaos Voutsis told Sputnik.

We are on a good track in terms of reforming our finances. We are applying reforms after discussions and agreements with our partners and creditors, but we are trying to implement reforms that do not have the smell of blood, Nikolaos Voutsis said on the sidelines of the European Conference of Presidents of Parliament in Strasbourg.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) will increase the number of its observers tasked with monitoring elections to Russias lower house of parliament to more than double the number of monitors it sent in 2011, a German newspaper reported on Friday, citing the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights

According to Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, the current election observation mission will consists of 466 observers, compared to 215 specialists in 2011.

In 2012, 216 OSCE observers were deployed to monitor the Russian presidential election.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  Moscow hopes that Russian journalist Oksana Sazonova, who has been detained in Kosovo, will be released as soon as possible, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Friday.

"Russia is concerned about the reported detention of Russian journalist Oksana Sazonova and her colleague, Ukraine's citizen Sergei Belous, in the Autonomous Province of Kosovo in the Republic of Serbia overnight into September 16. According to the available preliminary data, Kosovo police accuse them of illegally crossing the administrative line between Kosovo and the rest of Serbia," the ministry said.

The Foreign Ministry noted that "the Russian Embassy in Serbia and its office in Pristina are making strenuous efforts through the United Nations Mission in Kosovo and the European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo for the prompt release of journalists."
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  The Swedish Court of Appeal said Friday it was upholding the detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, accused of sexual assault in the country.

"Today the Svea Court of Appeal issued its decision in the case concerning the detention of Julian Assange. The Court of Appeal refuses his request to have the detention order set aside. This means that Julian Assange is still detained in absentia," the court said in the statement.

The court also refused Assanges request for a hearing.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  The European Commission's mechanism of mandatory quotas for the relocation of refugees, under which EU member states are obliged to provide refugees with asylum, is not functioning, European Parliament Martin Shulz said Friday.

"[European] Commission takes the initiative, sends that to the European Parliament and to the Council and then it is decided in the Council with qualified majority it happened in the frame of the European rules, but we see on the other hand that despite the correct legal way it does not function I belong to those, who say that a mandatory solution does not function, but we get a voluntary one, which is effective," Schulz said during a press conference at the informal meeting of EU leaders in Bratislava.

In September 2015, the European Commission announced a quota scheme for each EU member state depending on its size, population and social and economic indicators, providing for the resettlement of 160,000 refugees throughout EU countries over the next two years.
Commenting on the economic aspect of the idea that it would save Europe money otherwise wasted on separate military missions, Aleksandar Radic said that this was just an excuse, as throughout the last decade the European countries have considerably reduced the percentage of their gross domestic product (GDP) spent on defense needs.

He added that if compared to the money spent on funding the military 25 years ago, recent military spending has decreased by a half.

"However the most serious issues with the creation of the EU army lie not in the economic but in the political sphere," the expert said.

"It is absolutely impossible to imagine that Washington would agree to a strong European partner within NATO as this can alter the security architecture of the whole of western civilization," Radic explained.

The expert also pointed out that if agreed upon, the creation of the European army is a long-term project. Its final set-up might take decades, however formally it might be established in any suitable political moment.

"Decades are needed to set up a solid, clear idea which will unite all the [European] armed forces. However the cooperation within NATO would be the best basis for establishment of such a defense union," the expert finally stated.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  The European Union member states should work together to address the core causes of the migration crisis and jointly tackle its consequences, President of the Senate of the Netherlands Ankie Broekers-Knol told Sputnik.

What would be effective to reduce the migrant flow, we cant do this tomorrow, is to help on the root causes of the migration question. To help people and to stop enormous fighting that is going on the Middle East for instance, Broekers-Knol said on the sidelines of the European Conference of Presidents of Parliament in Strasbourg.
Hungary's president Viktor Orban, has been publicly dismissive of the EU's official policy of mandatory migrant quotas, calling for a reduction in Brussels' power.

Hungary is to hold a referendum in October on whether to reject the EU's migrant policy in what would be a serious challenge to the EU.

One significant challenge to EU authority has, of course, already landed in the form of the UK's decision on June 23rd to leave the EU.

British Prime Minister Theresa May has yet to formally begin exit negotiations with the EU, and the swirling uncertainty throughout Europe as to what impact such a schism will have, continues to cause anxiety.

On the eve of the Bratislava conference, European Council President Donald Tusk, said:

"We haven't come to Bratislava to comfort each other or even worse to deny the real challenges we face in this particular moment in the history of our community after the vote in the UK," Tusk said.

"We can't start our discussion with this kind of blissful conviction that nothing is wrong, that everything was and is OK. We have to assure our citizens that we have learned the lesson from Brexit and we are able to bring back stability and a sense of security and effective protection."

However, some critics of the EU, say it has not learn such lessons at all.

One of the key narratives emerging from the UK referendum was that there is a perception that Brussels has too much accountable power, to the detriment of control within each nation state.

Yet on Wednesday, in his annual 'State of the Union' address to the European Parliament in Strasbourg, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker called for even further federalization, with the creation of an EU-wide military force.
It gained intense notoriety as it was unveiled on the same day that Labour politician Jo Cox was murdered by a man witnesses claim shouted "Britain first!" as he shot and stabbed her.

Farage was unswayed, insisting that the image showed "the truth" of the migrant crisis and that "being part of a European Union isn't working".

However, despite the cheers, the elephant in the room was UKIP's future: where is it possible for UKIP to go now? Is there a room in British politics for a pro-Brexit campaigning party, now Brexit has been achieved.

.@Nigel_Farage: "We weren't afraid to talk about immigration  nobody else would touch the subject," #UKIPConf  UKIP (@UKIP) September 16, 2016

One woman who thinks that the answer is a clear 'no', is none other than one of Nigel Farage's closest aides, Alexandra Phillips.

In an embarrassing example of jumping ship, Phillips has chosen the same day as the UKIP conference to announce that she has defected to the Conservative Party.

Phillips led UKIP's media operation for three years, but says that the party has now been rendered obsolete, and has "disintegrated".

She claimed that Conservative Prime Minister Theresa May has delivered on all key elements of UKIP's 2015 election manifesto "within a matter of months".

"I think ideologically the Tories are doing the UKIP dance now," she said, highlighting policy standpoints on Brexit, immigration, grammar schools and fracking.

Former Ukip aide Alexandra Phillips is on Sky News saying she's left Ukip partly because of "bickering" and the "toxic" atmosphere  John Ashmore (@smashmorePH) September 16, 2016

However, despite the discomfort of such a senior defection, perhaps one of Farage's political legacies is that his views once considered on the fringe of what was publicly acceptable to discuss, have become more mainstream.

In 2006, David Cameron dismissed UKIP as a bunch of "fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists". Ten year's later, a campaign partly instigated by UKIP's leader, had toppled him from being a world leader.
WARSAW (Sputnik)  Poland hopes to become a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council in 2017 and some countries have already expressed support for country's bid, Polish President Andrzej Duda said Friday.

"The issue of Poland's bid for the UN Security Council non-permanent membership is a matter of extreme importance and prestige for us There are countries, which have already declared their support for Poland's candidacy. We hope that Poland will fulfill this responsible, important and very prestigious mission," Duda said at a press conference.

The Polish leader reminded that country's bid for the non-permanent member of the UN Security Council had been declared by the previous government. According to Duda, the time has come to promote the Polish candidacy for this position.
Antonov President Alexander Kotsuba tried to put a brave face on things, suggesting that US and Canadian companies, including CMC Electronics and Esterline, would be able to replace Russian components, bringing the share of Russian parts in the aircraft from its current 30-40% down to zero. However, Kotsuba admitted that even that would become possible only at the end of 2017.

Nonetheless, the company remains defiant, vowing to eliminate Russian components not only from new planes, but even from many existing aircraft, including the seven heavy transport An-124s operated by Ukraine's Antonov Airlines. The planes are set to have their Russian avionics, brake systems and tires swapped for Ukrainian and Western systems.

After the rift in relations between Kiev and Moscow following the 2014 Maidan putsch, the former Soviet giant, already limping along for most of the post-Soviet period, went into a tailspin. Antonov was forced to break off its joint venture with Russia's United Aircraft Corporation (OAK) by authorities in Kiev, and to terminate the joint Ukrainian-Russian project to build the An-70 military transport plane. After that, Antonov halted its supply of components to Russia's Samara International Aviation Corporation, where the An-140 turboprop airliner used by the Russian Defense Ministry was assembled.
About Me

Name: Carl in Jerusalem Location: Jerusalem, Israel

I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com

View my complete profile
The EU's summit of 27 countries in Bratislava this week, the first such meeting after the UK's decision to leave the Union, sets the stage for a showdown between the EU's rival factions, German news magazine Fokus.de reported

Leaders of the 27 EU member states invited to the conference arrived in Slovakia on Friday morning. Following the Brexit vote, UK Prime Minister Theresa May was not invited to the meeting, at which the EU Council intends to hammer out the future of Europe.

Brexit was not on the agenda of the summit, which is an ostensibly informal event aimed at forging unity ahead of the Rome summit next March, which marks the 60th anniversary of the establishment of the European Community, the EU's predecessor.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  According to Ansa news agency, Ciampi has been hospitalized for several days at the Pio XI hospital in Rome after his health condition had worsened.

Italy Ciampi: former president who championed euro dies at 95  https://t.co/mhzZhFlDyg  francesco pizzetti (@francopizzetti) 16  2016 .

Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi expressed condolences to Ciampi's wife, Franca Pilla, and stressed that the former president had served the country with passion.

Ciampi, who is said to play a major role in the country's adoption of the euro as its currency, served as prime minister from 1993 to 1994 and as president from 1999 to 2006.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  The European Union is in critical situation and the EU leaders must take steps to show that the bloc can better deal with a number of challenges it faces including those in the sphere of security, economic growth and migration, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Friday.

"We are in a critical situation. So we must show with our steps that we can be better in sphere of security, internal and external security; fight against terrorism; cooperation in the defense sphere; that we can be better in the sphere of growth and [creating] workplaces; can agree on the digital agenda and digital markets; [can be better in the sphere of giving] hopes and chances to young people in Europe and that we of course we can deal with existing issues of protecting our external borders and fighting the roots of migration," Merkel said ahead of the EU summit in Bratislava.

The leaders of 27 EU member states are meeting on Friday in the Slovakian capital of Bratislava for the informal summit to push forward reforms within the bloc regarding the protection of external borders, the fight against terrorism and various economic and social issues. The summit will be the first EU leaders' meeting without the United Kingdom in 43 years following Britain's decision to leave the bloc.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  The massive refugee crisis as well as continuous terror attacks in Europe threaten the stability of the union, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said in a report on Friday.

"These large-scale migrations, as well as attacks linked to groups harbored in MENA [Middle East and North Africa], are already undermining important achievements in the European project, such as the free movement of people across national borders, and are contributing to a growing sense of insecurity," the report stated.

The IMF said some 1.7 million refugees have arrived in Europe since 2014, while 3 million of people fleeing conflicts settled in Turkey, putting economic pressure on the country.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon may call a new referendum on the independence from the United Kingdom in 2018 as the UK government is unlikely to engage her in the Brexit talks, former Scottish leader Alex Salmond said.

Salmond led the campaign to leave the United Kingdom in 2014, however Scotland was among the main pro-remain areas of the country in the Brexit referendum held in September.

I expect there will be a Scottish referendum in roughly two years time, Salmond told the RT broadcaster in an interview.
When I finished serving Belgium, my father passed away. Me and Maria got married just a year after his death, said Alexander.

In 1999, the couple opened the International Pushkin Foundation with two main objectives. First, to popularize the poets master pieces in Belgium and Europe, and second, to help Russian children ill with cancer.

We cannot have children of our own so we decided that our main task should be to help children in Russia. We raise money for the Children's Oncology Center in St. Petersburg. Over the past 10 years, we have bought new medical equipment and healthcare supplies for the hospital, said Maria.

During our first arrival, we were horrified by the hospitals state. It was awful. Today, the situation has changed, added Alexander.

The couple raises money by hosting the annual charity event Russian Population in Chateau du Lac, Belgium.

In addition, we organize tourism trips to Russia for French and Belgium citizens so they can learn about Russian culture. We travel to Saint Petersburg and Moscow as well as to small provinces, said Alexander. Once we arrived to some local celebration in the ancient city of Izborsk. We immediately became welcomed guests of the celebration. Everyone was pleasantly surprised by the local hospitality.

According to Alexander, these trips might help Europeans understand Russian culture and people.

Recently, Alexander and Maria arrived to the Saturn International Youth Camp, which was held for the second time in a Belgian spa resort town. The camp received a generous present from the International Fund of Pushkin  a check to the value of 1000 euros.
In addition, donkeys are being used in therapy for elderly people and people with disabilities.

Many Italians buy donkeys as pets, simply because they require little upkeep, compared to dogs.

According to Borghi, one Italian man bought two donkeys for his 10th wedding anniversary, while a girl asked for a donkey as a present for her engagement. Last year, the Pope himself received two donkeys as a gift, and now they live at his summer residence near Rome.

In general, donkeys cost from 400 to 1,000 euros.

Borghi's farm Montebaducco offers a range of products, from donkeys to natural food to milk powder. By 2017, Borghi plans to open a cheese factory.
But previous research by the ODI has found that social networks and information flows strongly influence migration decisions. There are issues around whether these routes are potentially more dangerous than others.

"The various covert routes differ greatly in their mortality rate. For example, traveling overland concealed in vehicles will be more dangerous than overstaying a visa. However, there is data to support the fact that as various sea routes across the Mediterranean have closed, the new ones that have opened up have higher mortality rates," a spokesperson for ODI told Sputnik.

The ODI said that many refugees who come to the EU find it difficult to claim refugee status and apply for asylum.

"We have a number of people arriving in Europe whose journeys we know little about. Legal migration pathways would allow governments to monitor and more effectively manage these flows. It would allow them to make pragmatic decisions about quotas, skills gaps, housing costs, and would enhance their benefit to the economy. These pathways can be tailored to different countries and sit alongside the global asylum system that continues to guarantee protection for vulnerable refugees," a spokesperson for ODI told Sputnik.

The solution to all of this, according to ODI, is for European governments to facilitate and increase legal pathways so that they can monitor and more effectively manage flows of refugees and migrants.
Mr. Johnson added that he thinks many Europeans agree that the UK is still an important part of Europe:

"I think that there is every reason to be optimistic about these talks."

In typical flamboyant style, Johnson told Gentiloni that Britons drank about 300 million liters of Italian prosecco a year, as part of his attempt to persuade EU leaders to not shut the UK out of trade deals.

Clocking off (which is hard to do when you're freelance). It's now OPT  Official Prosecco Time pic.twitter.com/zQxSDDgxJ4  The Prosecco Diaries (@Sairey_bearey) September 9, 2016

"No one would want to see any tariffs on Prosecco from Italy. We are the biggest drinkers of Italian wine in Europe. No one would want to see any tariffs on Italian wine any more, I think, than the Italian government would want to see any detriment to the interests of the City of London," Johnson said.

Boris Johnson is one of British Prime Minister Theresa May's most senior cabinet members. He's known to be desperate for the UK to maintain access to the EU's single market  a customs union that allows the tariff-free exchange of goods and services across the EU.

Many of his colleagues disagree with him, that for the UK to fully gain independence from the EU, all trade deals must be renegotiated in a totally new UK-EU relationship.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  Two people were detained in Belgium on Friday on suspicion of terrorism links, Belgian federal prosecutors office said.

"As part of a federal investigation into involvement in terrorist group activities three searches have been conducted today upon request of the judge in charge of terrorism-related cases," the communique said.

The searches were carried out in Brussels and Liege, it added. The decision on a possible extension of arrest will be made after interrogation of the suspects.
Maybe he should have just said 'Judenrein'?

When pressed, defenders of the Palestinian position characterize the demand as no settlers rather than the uglier-sounding no Jews. The claim is hard to take at face value, as the Palestinians have never objected to Israeli Arabs settling across the Green Line, as they have in significant numbers. But, granting its sincerity, what does international law say about the demand to remove settlers as part of a solution to a territorial conflict? To answer this question, as part of a larger research study on settlements, I examined the fate of settlers in every occupation since the adoption of the Geneva Conventionseight major situations in total. The results highlight how extraordinary the Palestinian demand is.

There is simply no support in international practice for the expulsion of settlers from occupied territories. In the many situations involving settlers around the world, the international community has never supported expulsion, and consistently backed plans allowing the settlers to remain in a new state.

Settlement activity is the rule rather than the exception in situations of belligerent occupation around the world. In places like Western Sahara and northern Cyprus, the settlers now make up a majority of the population. In most other places, they account for a much higher percentage of the territorys population than Jews would in a potential Palestinian state. In all these cases, the arrival of the settlers was accompanied with the familiar claims of seizure of land and property, and serious human rights abuses. Unlike the Israeli situation, it was also accompanied with a large-scale expulsion of the prior inhabitants from the territory.

In internationally-brokered efforts to resolve these conflicts, the question of the fate of the settlers naturally arose. The answer, across all these very different situations, has always been the same: the settlers stay. Indeed, the only point of dispute has typically been what proportion of settlers receive automatic citizenship in any newly-created state and what proportion merely gets residence status. Thus, when East Timor, for example, received independence in an internationally-approved process, none of the Indonesian settlers were required to leave. The current U.N.-mediated peace plan for Western Sahara and Cyprus not only presupposes the demographically dominant settler population can remain, it also gives it a right to vote in referenda on potential deal.

This is not because these settlers are beloved by the surrounding population. The opposite is true. In the Paris peace talks to end the Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia, representatives of the latter tried to raise the possibility of expelling the nearly million Vietnamese settlers. Their arguments were familiar: the settlers remind them of the occupation, rekindle ancient hatreds, and destabilize the peace. Yet the Cambodian demand for the mass removal of ethnic Vietnamese was rejected outright by diplomats: One simply cannot ask for such things.

Indeed, uniform international practice shows that the removal of settlers is an obstacle to peace. In those occupations that have been resolvedEast Timor, Cambodia, Lebanonsuch demands would have been a complete deal-breaker. And those still subject to international diplomacy, however slim the chances of resolution, there would not even be a pretense of negotiation had demands similar to the Palestinians been made.

In short, the Palestinians couching their objection as one about removing settlers rather than Jews does not change the harsh reality. There is simply no precedent in international practice for the demand. Whatever term one uses for such a demand, Netanyahu was clearly right to call attention to the extraordinary nature of the demand. It is also disappointing that, instead of exercising moral leadership on this issue, the ADL went against its mission by seemingly excusing singular treatment for Jews.

A reminder once again that I am in Boston where the local time as I begin this post is 4:29 pm. It is still more than two hours before the Sabbath starts, although it started in Israel quite some time ago.I'm sure that many of you heard Prime Minister Netanyahu's 'ethnic cleansing' remarks last week. For those who did not, let's go to the videotape.Netanyahu's speech brought outrage from President Obama , from United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon , and from Anti-Defamation League director Jonathan Greenblatt But as Northwestern University Law Professor Eugene Kontorovich points out, Netanyahu is right. The demand that 'settlers' (in this case another way of saying 'Jews') be removed from a territory as part of ending an 'occupation' is unprecedented Perhaps, instead of referring to a 'Palestinian' demand for 'ethnic cleansing,' Netanyahu should have spoken about a 'Palestinian' demand for a Judenrein state. That would have put the 'Palestinian' demand into its proper context.

Labels: ADL, Ban Ki-Moon, Barack Hussein Obama, Binyamin Netanyahu, ethnic cleansing, Jonathan Greenblatt, Judenrein, occupation, Palestine must be Judenrein
KIEV (Sputnik)  Ukraine will impose sanctions on Russian defense firms and financial institutions, as well as transportation companies operating on the Crimea Peninsula, President Petro Poroshenko said Friday.

According to Poroshenko's statement posted on his official website, the restrictive measures will be applied to Russian defense companies and financial institutions allegedly providing military equipment and financing for self-proclaimed Donetsk and Lugansk people's republics in eastern Ukraine.

The sanctions will also affect shipping and air transport operators that violate Ukraine-imposed ban on entry to Crimean ports and airports, Poroshenko added.
BERLIN (Sputnik)  The European Union is going to stop or at least to reduce illegal migration and wants to fight the roots of the problem, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Friday after an informal meeting of EU leaders in Bratislava.

We said that we want, if possible, to stop illegal migration, at least to reduce it very significantly We want to conclude agreements with fare more states and help them to improve the situation on the ground so that people do not need to flee, Merkel said during a press conference.

The European Union is currently struggling to manage a massive refugee crisis, with hundreds of thousands of people fleeing conflict-torn countries in the Middle East and North Africa. The EU border agency Frontex recorded more than 1.8 million illegal border crossings into the bloc in 2015.
According to the organization's website, the rallies will be also held in such German cities as Hamburg, Stuttgart, Cologne, Munich, Leipzig and Frankfurt.

The TTIP deal, which seeks to establish a free trade zone between the United States and Europe, has caused a major public backlash, with European fearing it could seriously violate ecological standards, as well as give tremendous power to the international corporations.

In August, German Vice-Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel said the negotiations with US officials on TTIP had "de facto failed" because Europeans do not want to subject themselves to US demands. However, on September 9, Chancellor Angela Merkel denied that the TTIP deal was doomed and urged to grasp this opportunity to create new jobs.
ATHENS (Sputnik)  Earlier in the day, a group of Greek officials comprising Greek Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos, Economy Minister Giorgos Stathakis and Deputy Finance Minister Giorgos Huliarakis met with the creditors to discuss the progress of the implementation of reforms needed for the disbursement.

According to the source, the conditions needed for the Eurogroup to approve the loan would be implemented within the next few days.

The tranche is part of the bailout package worth 86 billion euros ($96 billion) agreed in 2015 between Athens and Greece's international creditors in return for reforms and austerity measures to be implemented in the debt-stricken country.
The results have been disputed by Egyptian authorities, who claim they did not allow French officials to examine the debris in detail, according to French newspaper Le Figaro. While Cairo has expressed a desire to write a joint report to validate the presence of explosive material, Paris has refused.

The flight crashed into the Mediterranean in May while flying from Paris to Cairo. While the official cause of the crash remains unknown, the planes flight recorder revealed evidence that a fire had been reported onboard ahead of the crash.
MBDA leads Dragonfire, a consortium of companies including BAE Systems, Leonardo-Finmeccania, Marshall Defence and Aerospace, and Qinetiq. Under the agreement, MBDA will deliver the one-off demonstrator prototype by 2019.

The MoD said that it will show "how this technology can be exploited in the future. MBDA UK Ltd will assess how the system can acquire and track targets at range and in varying weather conditions over land and water, with sufficient precision to enable safe and effective engagement."

A new laser weapon is expected to "complement or replace existing weapons systems with the potential for significant benefits," including defending ships from missile attack.

Development of the prototype will be conducted under a program considered to be a UK catch-up effort on laser weapon development. Britain has not seen development in the sector for over a decade, according to Defense News.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  The leaders will meet on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly to discuss the Colombian peace agreement, Rhodes told reporters.

We will be discussing both the state of play as it relates to the peace agreement and how we can be a partner going forward in its implementation, Rhodes said in a press call on Friday previewing Obamas trip to the UN gathering in New York next week.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  Kahraman said at the conference of European Presidents of Parliaments on Thursday that Turkey "will achieve compliance with the Constitution and all the human rights conventions" in which it is engaged.

An attempted military coup took place in Turkey on July 15. It was suppressed the following day. Turkish authorities have accused US-based dissident cleric Fetullah Gulen of having incited the coup and demanded his extradition. Following the coup, thousands of people, mostly officials, legal and educational workers, were detained or dismissed, commonly over alleged ties to Gulenists.

"There are malevolent forces in the West, who have made statements that Turkey violates human rights, the rule of law. These are hollow, false statements," Kahraman stressed on Thursday.
Lippman recalled that Ehud Olmert, while serving as Israels prime minister from 2006 to 2009, once came to Washington, DC seeking a reduction in US assistance to his country.

"He asked for a cut in aid: We dont need it," Lippman quoted Olmert as saying.

However, support for Israel among members of Congress from both US political parties was so strong, the aid continued anyway, with yearly increases, Lippman said.

"Such is the American political system," he remarked.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  The political process in Syria should not be held hostage to the destructive forces unwilling to participate in talks between government and opposition forces, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov told Sputnik on Friday.

The hitch is primarily in the fact that the HNC constantly violates the principle of not putting forward preconditions to pursue contacts with official Damascus. In principle, we cannot allow the political process to become a hostage of the destructive forces that do not wish to participate in the intra-Syrian negotiations, Bogdanov said.

The latest round of UN-mediated talks in Geneva on April 13-27 ended with a walkout staged by the High Negotiations Committee (HNC) opposition delegation. The group formed in Saudi Arabia said it would take part in negotiations only if conditions for their success were created. The UN has said it would not arrange intra-Syrian negotiations without the HNC.
[September 15, 2016] Top 3 Trends Impacting the Traffic Safety Products Market in the US Through 2020: Technavio

Technavio's latest report on the traffic safety products market in the US provides an analysis on the most important trends expected to impact the market outlook from 2016-2020. Technavio defines an emerging trend as a factor that has the potential to significantly impact the market and contribute to its growth or decline. Abhay Sinha, a lead analyst from Technavio, says, "The increase in road traffic and congestion is one of the major reasons behind the increased fatalities on the US transportation network. This drives the demand for traffic safety products that help reduce congestions, re-route traffic, lower the risk of accidents, and ultimately, reduce fatalities." In 2015, over 38,000 people were killed and over four million sustained injuries in road accidents in the US. This marked an 8% rise in the number of deaths from 2014, compared with a less than 0.5% increase in 2014 from 2013. Request a sample report: http://www.technavio.com/request-a-sample?report=52595 Technavio's sample reports are free of charge and contain multiple sections of the report including the market size and forecast, drivers, challenges, trends, and more. The top three emerging trends driving the traffic safety products market in the US according to Technavio research analysts are: Introduction of technologically advanced safety vests

Increasing innovations in traffic safety products

Increasing concern about worker safety Ask an analyst: http://www.technavio.com/content/ask-analyst?report=52595 Ask Technavio's lead analysts a question about this market and they will have your answer within 24 hours. Introduction of technologically advanced safety vests An average of one person is killed, and 153 are injured every 15 seconds, globally. In order to maximize the safety of workers on the roads, manufacturers invest in new safety equipment and technologies. Manufacturers are installing LED lights on high-visibility vests, which further increases the visibility of the workers at night. For instance, Visijax, one of the manufacturers of high-visibility jackets, has introduced jackets with LED lights, which are visible from more than 1,300 feet away. This further reduces the risk of collision. These LED lights are powered by a rechargeable lithium-ion battery, which offers over 20 hours of continuous light in normal use. The lights can be rechared using a USB cable. It has three settings operated by touch-control: slow flash, quick flash, constant and rapid-flash for the low-battery warning. Other vendors have also launched high-visibility jackets with LED lights that can operate for longer hours on alkaline batteries.



Additionally, researchers at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Virginia have introduced the InZoneAlert vest. This vest has radio sensors and GPS tracking, which can be worn inside or on the vest, coupled with connected vehicle technology. Connected vehicle technology uses GPS units and short range radios to connect vehicles to each to avoid collisions. The vest contains radio receivers that will alert the workers of a potential collision. The vests are in the prototype stage and cannot be marketed until connected vehicle technology is prevalent. However, in the future, this technology is expected to significantly reduce worker fatalities on roads. Increasing innovations in traffic safety products

Manufacturers and researchers across the globe are introducing advanced traffic cones to increase traffic safety. For instance, a research team at the Queensland Institute of Technology, along with its industry partner Centurion Barriers, has developed portable, water-filled road safety crash barriers made of composite, steel, and plastic. These barriers have the potential to reduce the severity of high-speed collisions, which lead to injuries, fatalities, and damage in work zones. Another attempt to reduce traffic fatalities, the Safelane project was initiated by Highway Resource Solutions in the UK in 2014. A wireless defense system using intelligent traffic cones and alarm sounders can secure roadside perimeters by warning workers of incoming vehicles. The intelligent traffic cone includes a battery-powered lantern along with a contact sensor that will alert the workers if it detects an impact. It is also equipped with a communications module that will send an automated text message to the site supervisor to organize remedial work, inform the system web portal, and initiate message sign to give a visual warning. These innovations available in the global market, can also be adopted in the US to reduce worksite fatalities on roadside construction sites. Increasing concern about worker safety Many roads, bridges, and highways need repair in the US. It is estimated that more than USD 3.3 trillion will be required to repair and replace old infrastructure in the country. With the aging highway infrastructure, many transportation organizations are focusing on improving and rebuilding existing roadways. As roadwork activities are increasing and the construction work is carried out at night to avoid the heavy traffic during peak hours, there is increased concern about the safety of the workers. One of the leading cause of injuries and fatalities in road construction is the collision with construction vehicles, equipment, and other objects. Over 20,000 workers are injured in road construction work zones in the US every year. So, workers use high-visibility jackets to be visible to the drivers on fast moving traffic roads. Additionally, barricade tapes, traffic cones, flags, and other accessories are used to demarcate the work in progress and divert traffic. "Thus, with the rise in road construction and repair works in the country, the demand for high-visibility traffic vests, cones, and tapes is expected to increase," says Abhay. Browse Related Reports: Global Automotive Traffic Sign Recognition System Market 2016-2020

Global Intelligent Transport System Market 2016-2020

Traffic Safety Market in India 2015-2019 Do you need a report on a market in a specific geographical cluster or country but can't find what you're looking for? Don't worry, Technavio also takes client requests. Please contact [email protected] with your requirements and our analysts will be happy to create a customized report just for you. About Technavio Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. The company develops over 2000 pieces of research every year, covering more than 500 technologies across 80 countries. Technavio has about 300 analysts globally who specialize in customized consulting and business research assignments across the latest leading edge technologies. Technavio analysts employ primary as well as secondary research techniques to ascertain the size and vendor landscape in a range of markets. Analysts obtain information using a combination of bottom-up and top-down approaches, besides using in-house market modeling tools and proprietary databases. They corroborate this data with the data obtained from various market participants and stakeholders across the value chain, including vendors, service providers, distributors, re-sellers, and end-users. If you are interested in more information, please contact our media team at [email protected]. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160915005069/en/

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ANKARA (Sputnik)  According to Turkeys Haberturk broadcaster, the three suspected terrorists were detained in Ankara, and another one in Istanbul. Their links to Daesh, a terrorist organization outlawed in Russia and multiple other states, including Turkey, are being investigated.

According to the media, the four people are suspected of planning terrorist attacks against the two diplomatic missions that could have taken place on September 13-17.

The UK's Embassy in Ankara on Thursday announced that it would be closed on Friday due to security reasons. The German diplomatic mission in Turkey will also be closed until the end of the week.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  Russia has no plans to open an embassy in Libya for security reasons, let alone send ground forces to the conflict-torn North African country, Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov told Sputnik on Friday.

"To date, there is neither Russian military nor civilian presence in Libya. For now, we are not planning to restore it, including on security grounds. We are not even mentioning military presence," Bogdanov said.

Libya has been in a state of civil war since 2011, when Arab Spring protests led to sectarian violence and the overthrow of long-time leader Muammar Gaddafi.
BRUSSELS (Sputnik)  The European Unions Operation Sophia (EUNAVFOR Med Sophia) vessels started to intercept ships in the international waters attempting to import weaponry to Libya in order to enforce UN arms embargo , an EU diplomatic source told RIA Novosti on Friday.

"The ships involved in EUNAVFOR Med Sophia started operations under the framework of the UN Security Council Resolution 2292," the source said, adding that smugglers would be towed to the French port of Marseilles.

The UN Security Council imposed arms embargo on Libya in February 2011, after the country became politically unstable. It requires all UN member states to prevent the sale or supply of arms and related materiel of all types, including weapons and ammunition, military vehicles and equipment and spare parts, to the country.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  The US-led coalition against the Islamic State (ISIL or Daesh) launched 10 airstrikes in Syria on Thursday, destroying the terror groups oil assets and infrastructure, the US Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve said in a press release.

"Near Abu Kamal, six strikes destroyed five ISIL [Islamic State] supply routes, two oil well heads, six oil tanker trucks, a bulldozer, and a bobcat," the release said on Friday.

Three strikes near the city of Deir Ezzor destroyed eight Daesh oil tanker trucks and seven oil well heads, the Task Force stated. An additional strike near Shadaddi destroyed an Daesh vehicle and engaged one of the groups tactical units.
CAIRO (Sputnik)  He added that boosting defense capability would provide Egypt with an opportunity to reaffirm its leadership in different spheres, MENA news agency reported.

Rabie made these remarks at the ceremony marking the official handover to Egypt of the second Mistral helicopter carrier currently stationed in the French port of Saint-Nazaire.

The first Mistral ship, named after the second Egyptian president, Gamal Abdel Nasser, reached Egypt's port of Alexandria in June after a 14-day journey from Saint-Nazaire. The second Mistral was earlier reported to be named after former Egypt's President Anwar Sadat assassinated by Islamists in 1981.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  The US-led anti-Daesh coalition did not launch airstrikes near the Syrian town of al-Mayadin on September 15, which resulted in civilian casualties, Operation Inherent Resolve spokesman Col. John Dorrian stated on Friday.

"CJTFOIR [Coalition for Operation Inherent Resolve] is aware of civilian casualty report at al-Mayadin 15 Sept; no coalition strikes in that area," Dorrian said in a Twitter message.

Local media reported on Thursday that more than 20 civilians died in airstrikes near Al-Mayadin in Deir Ezzor Province.
The expert noted that such actions contradict international laws and norms which specify that the use of the satellites should be purely for peaceful purposes.

"Israel is using these satellites for espionage and provocative military actions in Middle Eastern states. Israel's actions put the national security of the whole region under threat," the political analyst said.

The expert added that these satellites were constructed and launched with the participation of the US, which supplies Israel with the advanced equipment for the construction of these telecommunication spies.

There are no doubts that Iran and other countries of the region are within direct sight of these spy satellites.

The political analyst noted that there are no restrictions for the Israeli espionage and surveillance activities, all of which are supported by the US.

Hence, he said, Iran and other countries are within their rights to react to these spy activities.

Seyed Mohammad Marandi, professor of North American Studies and dean of the Faculty of World Studies at the University of Tehran, told Sputnik that the recent launch is not an outstanding event for the US as it already has a number of powerful spy satellite systems and high technological equipment operating.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  The list of moderate Syrian opposition groups the United States provided to Russia contains formations that are linked to the Nusra Front militant group, the Russian Foreign Ministry said Friday.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and US State Secretary John Kerry spoke on the phone earlier in the day.

"He [Lavrov] noted that the list of groups who signed an agreement with the United States on adhering to the ceasefire provided by the US side contains a series of blatantly terrorist formations cooperating closely with Nusra Front," the ministry said in a statement.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  The Russian General Staff said Friday that the situation with the implementation of the ceasefire regime in Syria had not improved as the Russian military registered another 39 violations in the past 24 hours.

"Unfortunately, we have to admit that no positive changes in the situation around the implementation of the ceasefire have taken place," Lt. Gen. Viktor Poznikhir, first deputy chief of the General Staff's Main Operational Department, said at a news briefing in the Russian Defense Ministry.

"Thirty-nine violations have been registered in the past 24 hours, bringing the total since the announcement of the Russia-US brokered ceasefire to 144," Poznikhir said.
Daesh terrorists used chemical weapons in artillery attacks on two settlements in the north of Syria's Aleppo province on Friday, poisoning at least eight people, a source in the Kurds militia said.

According to the source, the attacks took place on Friday morning amid the nationwide ceasefire in the war-torn Syria.

"Five civilians and three militants from Jaish al-Siwar armed group were injured in the shelling," the source told RIA Novosti, adding that the victims lost consciousness and showed signs of poisoning two hours after the attack.
[September 15, 2016] First Orion Launching PrivacyStar App for iOS 10

LITTLE ROCK, Ark., Sept. 15, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- First Orion today announced its PrivacyStar app for iOS 10 will soon protect iPhone users by identifying and blocking unwanted nuisance calls. The new PrivacyStar app for iPhone gives users more control over their phones and provides three levels of protection, including: Basic - Blocks All Known Scammers

- Blocks All Known Scammers Enhanced - Blocks All Known Scam, Telemarketing and Debt Collection Calls

- Blocks All Known Scam, Telemarketing and Debt Collection Calls Maximum - Blocks All Known Scam, Telemarketing and Debt Collection Calls as well as Political, Market Research and other unwanted calls With the introduction of iOS 10 and the CallKit API feature, First Orion enables iPhone users to protect themselves and preserve their privacy. This service has previously only been available to Android users until this iOS update. U.S. consumers are harassed by over 30 million spam calls a day and First Orion will now give iPhone users the ability to block unwanted calls or texts, and even file a complaint directly with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). In fact, First Orion's PrivacyStar is the leading source of call complaint data to the FTC and has filed 31% of all complaints, according to the recent FTC Consumer Sentinel Network Report. "The PrivacyStar app currently blocks millions of nuisance calls and now iPhone owners can enjoy what Android users have benefited from for some time," said Rob Sewell, VP of Products and Service at First Orion. "When your iPhone rings, you will now know exactly who's calling and why. With the numbe of spam calls getting worse all the time, this capability is more important than ever."



PrivacyStar Features

Free Version - ALL features are available during the 7 day trial period; features available after the 7 day trial has expired: Automatically Blocks all Known Scammers

Known Nuisance Callers will be identified by Caller ID Type (e.g., Telemarketers)

File a report against any number that will be submitted to the FTC PRO Version  all FREE features plus:

Block any phone number

Caller ID Name displayed for known or suspected nuisance calls (e.g., "Acme" Telemarketing)

Unlimited Reverse Number Lookup for any phone number providing additional details

Add Phone Numbers to an Approved List so they will never be blocked

Automatically Block Known Robocallers

Automatically Block Calls from Reported Nuisance Callers (e.g., Telemarketers, Robocallers, Political Calls, Surveys, etc.)

Customize Protection Settings to create a custom blocking profile by selecting any combination of call types Pricing and Availability

PrivacyStar will soon be available as a FREE download in the Apple App Store, this comes with a 7-day trial of the PRO service. PrivacyStar also offers the PRO Version with additional features available at $0.99 per month. Customers who elect not to subscribe to the PRO version may continue to use the Free service once the trial is completed. PrivacyStar for iPhone will also be released in the United Kingdom later this year. About PrivacyStar

The PrivacyStar solution includes ScamBlock, Caller ID/YD with Robocall Detection, real-time caller ID and call blocking as well the ability to report abusive calls and texts directly to federal agencies. PrivacyStar is available as a free download for Android smartphones and iPhones and powers call management solutions for many leading mobile carriers. Each month, PrivacyStar blocks millions of calls and files hundreds of thousands of call complaints on behalf of customers directly with the Federal Trade Commission for Do Not Call, Fair Debt Collections Practices Act and TCPA (Telecommunications Consumer Protection Act) violations. PrivacyStar is a First Orion company. About First Orion

First Orion is dedicated to providing phone call transparency by empowering both consumers and businesses with world-class data. The company helps businesses utilize authoritative data to ensure that they are properly contacting the right customers or validating their customer data with accurate information. First Orion is headquartered in Little Rock, Arkansas with offices in Dallas, Seattle and London. For regular updates, please visit www.FirstOrion.com. PrivacyStar and First Orion are registered trademarks of First Orion Corp. All registered or unregistered trademarks are the sole property of their respective owners. Media Contact:

Mishelle Fiebiger

FortyThree, Inc.

831.401.3175

[email protected] Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160915/408521 To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/first-orion-launching-privacystar-app-for-ios-10-300329065.html SOURCE First Orion

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According to a report recently released by the European Council on Foreign Relations, a proper approach to a dialogue with Moscow and Tehran may afford Brussels a chance to make Syrian President Bashar Assad to step down from the political arena.

The reports author claims that the EU authorities should not try and drive a wedge between Russia and Iran because the regime change in Syria can only be made possible via the cooperation between these two nations, and that Moscow or Tehran alone would never be able to help Brussels achieve this goal.

However, Mahmoud Shoori, head of the Eurasia Program at the Center for Strategic Research in Tehran, told Sputnik that this approach is doomed to fail.

"After several years of close cooperation in this area, Russia and Iran share a similar stance on Syria because our countries have mutual interests. Furthermore, both Moscow and Tehran are well aware of the kind of attitude the West has regarding President Bashar Assad and the methods employed to fight terrorism and violence in the region. Therefore, I believe that any attempts by the EU to drive a wedge between Russia and Iran, or to change our nations stances on Syria wont be effective," Shoori said.
On Friday, the Pentagon announced that dozens of US Special Operations Forces had been deployed to Syria to fight alongside the Turkish military and so-called moderate Syrian rebels.

"At the request of the government of Turkey, US special operations forces are accompanying Turkish and vetted Syrian opposition forces as they continue to clear territory from ISIL [Daesh] in and around the area of the Syrian border near Jarabulus and Ar Rai," Pentagon spokesman Jeff Davis told reporters.

These joint ops appear to be off to a rocky start.
Earlier on Friday, US media reported that hundreds of additional US troops had arrived at the Qayyarah airbase 40 miles south of Mosul in anticipation of the operation.

The Islamic State, which is outlawed in Russia and many other nations, captured Mosul in 2014. In July, the United Nations warned that the military operation to retake the city could displace 3.4 million people and create a humanitarian crisis.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  Last week, media reports emerged suggesting that Syrian activists and rescue workers blamed government forces for an alleged chemical attack in Aleppo. A suspected chlorine bomb was dropped on the city, reportedly injuring dozens.

"I have seen the press report but I cant speak to the veracity of it," Kirby stated when asked about reports that the Syrian military was responsible for a chlorine attack.

On August 24, 2016, the UN and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons released the results of a joint probe into chemical weapons attacks in Syria in 2014 and 2015, according to which Damascus forces were allegedly involved in two and Daesh terrorists in one chemical weapon attacks. The mission's mandate is due to end on September 23 and the group is expected to prepare one more report by this time.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  Humanitarian access, along with seven days of reduced violence, is a condition of the Syria ceasefire agreement announced last week by Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

If the conditions are upheld, Russia and the United States will work together to establish a Joint Implementation Center and carry out joint airstrikes against terrorist groups in the war-torn country, according to the deal.

"If, by Monday we have continued to see reduced violence and no humanitarian access there will be no Joint Implementation Center," Kirby told reporters on Friday.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  Earlier in the day, disturbing video emerged showing Turkish-vetted and US-supported factions of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) making anti-Christian remarks and threatening to kill US Special Operations forces near Aleppo, several media outlets reported.

On specific [Turkish] vetting procedures, that is really beyond me to speak to, Kirby told reporters, commenting on the report.

Kirby said that although he had not seen the video, the United States opposes such bombastic and pugilistic rhetoric against the United States or any other forces that are fighting against Daesh (the Islamic State/IS).
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications Ben Rhodes said on Friday that the leaders will focus on the operation to liberate the Iraqi city of Mosul, which is considered to be Daesh' major stronghold in the war-torn country.

"The two leaders will have a chance to check in on the counter is campaign and preparations ahead of the operation to liberate Mosul," Rhodes said.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  Earlier in the day, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told US Secretary of State John Kerry in a phone call that the entire package of US-Russian agreements on Syria should be made public. Lavrov, in addition, implored Kerry to ensure the opposition abides by the ceasefire.

"Our view on that issue has not changed," Kirby said when asked if the United States was ready to make the Syria ceasefire deal public as called for by Russia.

Kirby claimed the United States does not need to be reminded of its responsibility with respect to the opposition complying with the Syrian ceasefire.
Shortly after this, and when the NSA adopted the more intrusive Trailblazer program, which collects mass amounts of bulk data, Binney decided to blow the whistle.

As a public advocate against mass surveillance, he has starred in a new documentary called 'A Good American', which held its UK premiere this week. It explores the intriguing suggestion that the NSA could have prevented the 9/11 attacks, and other terrorist atrocities around the world.

Knowledge is Power

Binney told Sputnik that he sees the huge influence of money and power in the US as interfering with attempts to focus on security threats.

"Look at it this way  all of this data collection is knowledge and knowledge is power over anybody  whether you're in the Supreme Court, the Attorney General of the US or anybody in the US Congress or any of the generals or the joint chiefs of staff."

"This is how Edgar Hoover [the first Director of the FBI] worked. This is how he was chief of the FBI for 40 years. He had knowledge of everybody and everybody knew it. And those who didn't know that he had it, thought he did. So it didn't make any difference either way  he won. This is fundamentally wrong on every count."

Binney claims that this drive to maintain access to power can be seen in the scrapping of his 'Thin Thread' wiretapping system, in the influence of private lobbyists in Washington.

"[Before 9/11] We knew several things going on at the time, basically from staffers on the intelligence committees, telling us that the companies who wanted to have contracts with NSA, to fill these massive programs they wanted to do, they were down in Congress lobbying against our programme internally."

"This was a government program being run inside a government agency and here are these private contractors lobbying in Congress to get our programme cancelled because they didn't want it to exist at all. That was competition that showed you that you already had this problem solved, so why do you need to spend all this money?

"They wanted the money, they wanted to feed on the money, so they were down there doing that. And the people in the administration, the people at the NSA at the time, and the DOJ and the FBI, and CIA  they all supported this because it was a vast influx of money, at that point, for them to do what they wanted  and that's mass collection, massive spying on everybody. That was the reason they got us cancelled."

A Needle in a Haystack

The US has instead chosen to back a strategy of bulk data collection  a move that Binney insists has had fatal consequences worldwide.

"Bulk surveillance kills people. The reason I said that is that the analysts can't see threat coming in all this bulk data in sufficient time to be able to alert people to stop it. And people end up getting killed."

"And I would point out one of the definitions that I think Einstein talked about was people who do the same thing and more of the same thing over and over again expecting a different outcome is a form of insanity."

"This is like saying bulk data  we need more of it and give us more money to get more of it and more people to analyze more of it. And instead what they're doing is taking in more and more and complicating and magnifying the problem that's keeping them from succeeding."

The director of 'A Good American' Fritz Moser, told Sputnik that he hopes his new documentary will put more pressure on governments to debate the issue of mass data surveillance more critically.

"I do hope that the politicians present bring this story and this knowledge into their different political groups. I think what politicians need to overcome is 'more is more'  sometimes 'less is more'. This is precisely true for this case. Less data gives you an advantage in time so you get to what you need to know earlier, almost in real time."
Itongadol.-Archaeologists digging in Jerusalem found a rare gold coin bearing a portrait of a young Roman Emperor Nero issued some 2,000 years ago.

The coin has been dated to 56 CE, about 23 years after Christians believe Jesus was crucified, and 14 years before the destruction of the Jewish Temple. It was minted just two years after Nero, the last emperor in the Julio-Claudian dynasty, acceded to the throne in 54 CE.

The coin, showing Nero bare-headed, was discovered by archaeologists from the University of North Carolina digging atop Mount Zion in Jerusalem, the university said this week.

The coin was found in rubble outside the ruins of Jewish homes dating to the first century, which the researchers say may have belonged to wealthy members of the priestly caste (Cohanim).

Dr. Shimon Gibson, the architect who led the study, called the coin exceptional, adding that this is the first time that a coin of this kind has turned up in Jerusalem in a scientific dig. Coins of this type are usually only found in private collections, where we dont have clear evidence as to place of origin.

He added: The coin probably came from one of the rich 2,000-year old Jewish dwellings which the team have been uncovering at the site. These belonged to the priestly and aristocratic quarter located in the Upper City of Jerusalem. Finds include the well-preserved rooms of a very large mansion, a Jewish ritual pool (mikveh) and a bathroom, both with their ceilings intact.

One side of the gold piece bears a likeness of Nero facing to the right, with the inscription NERO CAESAR AVC IMP meaning Nero, Caesar, Ab Urbe Condita [a counting system dating to the beginning of the Roman Empire], Emperor.

On the other side is a relief of an oak tree and the inscription EX S C and the dedication MAX TR P III, which enabled archaeologists to date the coin to the year 56 CE.

The image of Nero is significant in that it shows the presence of the Roman occupation and provides a clear, late date for the occupation of the residences, the university said. There is no historical evidence that Nero ever visited Jerusalem.

James Tabor, UNC Charlotte professor of religious studies, noted that the coin dates to the same year of St. Pauls last visit to Jerusalem, which resulted in his arrest (on the charge of taking Gentiles into the Temple) and incarceration in Caesarea.

Nero was viewed by the Romans as compulsive and corrupt, according to Roman senator and historian Gaius Cornelius Tacitus, who lived at around the same time.The emperor executed his mother Agrippina the Younger, his first wife Claudia Octavia and, according to some historians, his second wife Poppaea Sabina.

A great builder, he is believed to have set fire to Rome in order to make room for the construction of the Domus Aurea, a large villa on the Palatine Hill. Sources from the period say the city burned for five days.

A rumor associated with the identification of Nero as the arsonist says he was playing the lyre and singing an ode lamenting the sack of Troy while watching Rome smoldering.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  Moscow sees no reason for India to be concerned about upcoming Russian-Pakistani joint military exercises, the Russian Foreign Ministrys director of the Second Asian Department said Friday.

The Druzhba-2016 ("Friendship-2016") tactical drills will be held on September 24-October 7 in the Army High Altitude School in northern Pakistans Rattu and at a special forces training center in Cherat. The exercises aim to strengthen and develop cooperation between the countries armed forces.

"We were informed by the Russian Defense Ministry that these exercises will not be carried out in [disputed] areas, and a place was chosen that has nothing to do with this. Hence there is no reason for India to worry about it," Zamir Kabulov told RIA Novosti.
The goal of the new 100-pages-thick handbook is to promote equality in the army through imposing a gender perspective in military operations. According to Swedish army bosses, this step will strengthen Sweden's position as an international model and improve the Armed Forces recruitment and operational impact. At present, Sweden is considering a gender-neutral draft and hopes to be able to recruit from entire Swedish population.

"Gender perspective is just as important as taking into account the weather and enemy combat value," Jan Thornqvist, Chief of Operations of the Swedish Armed Forces, told Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter.

According to Thornqvist, the goal is to reach a greater operational efficiency and a better work environment. The new manual includes both theoretical discussions about gender equality and concrete examples of how it should be implemented in operations and exercises.
JOHANNESBURG (Sputnik)  Russia will deliver 12 multipurpose Mi-35 helicopters to Nigeria by 2018 as the African country is carrying out the modernization program of its armed forces, the deputy head of Russia's Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation said Friday.

"As for the contract for the delivery of Mi-35M helicopters, signed in October 2015, it is in the process of implementation by 2018. It has been planned to supply two vehicles until the end of 2016," Anatoly Punchuk told RIA Novosti at the Africa Aerospace and Defense-2016 (AAD 2016) exhibition, adding that the contract provides for the supply of 12 helicopters.

He added that Nigeria was one of the most promising Russian partners in the field of military-technical cooperation.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  The Boeing EA-18G Growler is an American carrier-based electronic warfare aircraft, a specialized version of the two-seat F/A-18F Super Hornet.

"[T]he EA-18G Green Growler completed flight testing of a 100-percent advanced biofuel at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland," the report stated. "What we have seen is that the 100-percent bio-JP-5 appears to be basically transparent. It looks just like petroleum JP-5 in the airplane. So far, everything looks good and we haven't noticed a difference," flight test engineer Mary Picard told USNI.

The catalytic hydrothermal conversion-to-jet process 100 percent alternative fuel performed as expected on the first test flight, Naval Air Systems Command engineer Rick Kamin told the US Naval Institute.
F-15 fighters have been used by the Israeli Air Force (IAF) for some 40 years, and the two-seater version is used both as a trainer and for air-to-air combat. The Israeli fleet will now include the F-35I Adir and F-15s. Several F-15s will be used in combat-ready squadrons and some will be used for spare parts.

The IAF stated "The new aircraft serve as a technical and maintenance opportunity. Their arrival will allow us to use them as spare parts, improving the operational availability of the Buzz fighter jets," according to Jerusalem Online.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  Ambassador Fu, speaking during a Carnegie Endowment discussion on the future of nuclear disarmament, said that "the Six-Party talks is still a viable option." He further emphasized the need to discuss the "common objective" of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula.

In a veiled reference to recent US deployments of a controversial missile defense system in South Korea, Fu warned that the deployment of "systems that may antagonize or undermine the interests of those countries who are helping to resolve the issue" are not "the best way forward."

On September 9, North Korea conducted its fifth nuclear test in blatant violation of international law. The international community condemned the nuclear test, and imposed harsh sanctions on Pyongyang following an earlier test in January.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  The sanctions, which target 146 individuals and 37 legal entities accused by the European Union of playing a role in Crimea's rejoining with Russia and threatening eastern Ukraine's territorial integrity, will remain unchanged for another six months, the European Council said in an official statement.

The European Union introduced restrictive anti-Russian sanctions in March 2014 after Crimea became part of Russia earlier that year. The West also accused Moscow of meddling in the conflict in eastern Ukraine, imposing further political and economic sanctions on Russia. The Kremlin has repeatedly refuted the accusations and introduced counter measures as well as warning that the Western sanctions are counterproductive and undermine global stability.

The restrictive targeted sanctions imposed by Brussels include EU entry bans and bank account freezes for the black-listed individuals and enterprises. The list includes Russian officials and celebrities, as well as leaders of the self-proclaimed Donetsk Peoples Republic (DPR) and Luhansk People's Republic (LPR).
Ukrainians must decide whether "a proper Ukrainian gets to be determined by the four western provinces or is it going to be a more open identity which accepts the legitimacy of Ukrainians who speak Russian and accept Russian culture as their native culture," he offered.

Ukraine has the ability to resolve its crisis of identity but lacks the political and cultural will, Petro opined. One reason for the ongoing crisis is that "regionalism is off the table for nationalists, because they have misidentified it as undermining Ukrainian unity. In fact, federalism as a historical form of regionalism provides the unity to countries with multiple identities within their borders."

According to Petro, whether Ukrainian nationalists are in fact pro-Western remains to be seen. Hardcore nationalists are willing to create a "Ukraine for Ukrainians" which would be anti-Russian, even if it requires sacrificing the possibility of EU membership.
"A lot of progressives really-really-really hate Russia. They look at it as at almost a failure that ruined this "great progressive experiment" called communism and they really resent it and hate it. So you actually find much more Russophobia in the US on the progressive side today," the former diplomat said.

James George Jatras also explained the rationale behind the harsh comments about Trump from the Democratic camp and the overall attitude towards the Republican nominee.

Hillary is the candidate of the "deep state", of the oligarchy, he said. In effect. the way the script was supposed to run was that the corresponding co-candidate should have been Jeb Bush so that "we have "Tweedledee  Tweedledum" choices like we usually get."

However there were "insurgencies" in both parties. Bernie (Sanders) on the democratic side and Trump on the Republican side.

"Bernie was stump through the rigged system. However Trump somehow, nobody quite understands how, managed to beat the oligarchy in the Republican party. And that is why you see so much in the establishment, not just in the Democratic party, but a lot of the Republican establishment plus all the media and all the people connected with all the big money and politics are all against Trump and for Hillary," he said.
"The current administration," Baker wrote , "failed to anticipate the outcome of Tunisia's protests and seemed highly disorganized as events there unfolded. It rushed to press former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak to step down, before Islamists rose to power" Since the return of the military, US-Egyptian relations have cooled. "In Libya," meanwhile, "the US president led the war 'from behind' before leaving the country to warring militias."

As for the rise of Daesh (ISIL/ISIS), which metastasized in Iraq at the start of the decade before spreading to neighboring Syria, amid US efforts to destabilize and overthrow Bashar Assad, Baker called the phenomenon 'unprecedented'.
Why Obama's 'Pivot to Asia' Strategy Has Been Proven Ineffective

As Obama's second term is ending, can we say that his Pivot to Asia strategy has failed?

"Without a scintilla of doubt!" Mathew Maavak, geostrategic analyst and doctoral candidate in Security Foresight at Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) told Sputnik.

"Washington virtually sent an armada to rebuff so-called Chinese aggression in the South China Sea, and expected the Philippines to be its military pivot in Southeast Asia. Instead, President Rodrigo Duterte called his American counterpart a 'son of a b***' and is now requesting the exit of US Special Forces from the southern Philippines," he noted.

"I will be charting a [new] course [for the Philippines] on its own and will not be dependent on the United States," Duterte stressed after elections, as quoted by Reuters.

Furthermore, the new Philippines President announced recently that he is mulling purchasing arms from China and Russia and may end joint patrol with the US in the South China Sea, prompting experts to speculate about a "dramatic shift in the geostrategic picture of the region," as Bloomberg noted.

"Generally, US efforts in this area [the South China Sea region] have not been successful. It is trying hard to cultivate special ties with Vietnam  using the South China Sea card  but Hanoi is hedging its cards well by engaging Moscow and New Delhi as well," Maavak pointed out.

"The US may have lost the plot  and the pivot  but does it still possess the capability to destabilize Southeast Asia? That's the worrying question" he remarked.
New Delhi (Sputnik)  Putting all speculation to rest, it is now confirmed that India considers Russia its most reliable friend. One of the most senior diplomats in Indias External Affairs Ministry has asserted that despite Indias growing cooperation with the US on many global agendas, Russia remains the one friend that India believes will be the first to respond to a crisis call.

Indias Ministry of External Affairs is currently preparing for a crucial diplomatic summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Russian President Vladimir Putin to be held in Goa in Indias south next month on the sidelines of the BRICS summit.

A senior diplomat involved in the preparations for the summit, told reporters on condition of anonymity in New Delhi, Diplomats often wonder where they would place their first call if India faced a security challenge. The answer is Russia.
These resources, used in coordination, have helped the US to reach its strategic goals, the analyst emphasized. This includes know-how in so-called color revolutions.

As to the intensification of US intelligence activities against Russia, Ermakov believes that it signals that the deterioration of Russian-US relations have passed a "point of no return. [It] means that restoring relations with the US to normal  to the level of five years ago, will no longer occur. Instead, a tough exchange of some sort is brewing between the two countries, although it's difficult to say at this point what form it will take."

But that doesn't mean that there isn't a struggle going on among the US political establishment regarding what course the next president will have toward Russia, the analyst added.

Asked how Russia might respond to the growing US threat, Ermakov suggested that it's necessary, first and foremost, for some elements of the Russian political elite, particularly its liberal wing, to break with the illusion that Russia has "done something wrong," and that "if we agree to a compromise with the US now, everything will calm down and return to normal."

"This is impossible. Moscow and Washington face a chasm in their positions, as a result of which the two sides have presented each other with a whole list of charges; Western countries have shifted to a serious stance against Russia in all directions, a process which has gained its own momentum."

For example, the analyst noted, "perhaps someone thinks that the anti-Russian doping scandals in the Rio Olympics and Paralympics, or the accusations against Russia for hacking attacks, are just an unfortunate coincidence. This is a profound mistake. These events are links in one chain. They are designed to legitimize a global image of Russia as an enemy whose aggression must be repelled"
In his article for the American Thinker Jonathan F. Keiler, a political commentator and former captain in the Army's Judge-Advocate General Corps, explains why Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump was "absolutely correct" when he said that Vladimir Putin's leadership is superior to Obama's.

During the recent televised NBC's Commander-In-Chief forum Trump stressed: "Certainly in that system, he's [Vladimir Putin] been a leader, far more than our president [Barack Obama] has been."

Predictably, Trump's remark triggered a heated debate in the Western media. But was Trump that wrong?
In early September the Pentagon raised the alarm when the USS Firebolt was reportedly "harassed" by Iranian ships in the Persian Gulf.

Commenting on the incident Brigadier General Masoud Jazayeri, deputy chief of staff of Iran's armed forces, denied the Pentagon's allegations, stressing that Iranian vessels acted in full accordance with international law.

As Iranian defense minister Gen. Hosein Dehghan said in an interview to Tasnim news agency: "If any foreign vessel enters our waters, we warn them and if it's an invasion, we confront."

While US officials were beating the drums over Tehran's "provocative behavior," no one asked what American heavily armed destroyers did near Iranian coasts.

"No one seemed to question why it was not provocative for the United States to sail a heavily armed destroyer (along with other warships) six thousand miles away from the American homeland to operate within a few miles of the Iranian coast," Carpenter emphasized, referring to the incident, which happened near the Strait of Hormuz.
"What causes the Republican Party to lose it whenever the name of Vladimir Putin is raised?" Buchanan pondered. "Putin," the commentator noted, "is no Stalin, whom FDR and Harry Truman called 'Good old Joe' and 'Uncle Joe.' Unlike Nikita Khrushchev, he never drowned a Hungarian Revolution in blood. He did crush the Chechen secession. But what did he do there that General Sherman did not do to Atlanta when Georgia seceded from Mr. Lincolns Union?"

Moreover, Buchanan noted, "Putin supported the U.S. in Afghanistan, backed our nuclear deal with Iran, and signed on to John Kerrys plan have us ensure a cease fire in Syria and go hunting together for ISIS and al-Qaida terrorists."

"Still, Putin committed 'aggression' in Ukraine, we are told. But was that really aggression, or reflexive strategic reaction? We helped dump over a pro-Putin democratically elected regime in Kiev, and Putin acted to secure his Black Sea naval base by re-annexing Crimea, a peninsula that has belonged to Russia from Catherine the Great to Khrushchev. Great powers do such things."
UNITED NATIONS (Sputnik)  As of Thursday, we had 86 heads of state signed up for the general debate, one crown prince, five vice-presidents, 49 heads of government, 51 ministers and three observers, Stephane Dujarric said.

The General Assembly debate in 2015 had 193 speakers, two fewer than this year, he added.

There are 545 meetings scheduled for the weeklong General Assembly, including side events.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  White House Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes noted that Obama will address North Koreas September nuclear test "in the broader nonproliferation context" during his address to the UN General Assembly on Tuesday.

"Speaking about US approaches [to North Korea's nuclear program] entails also getting other countries to step up and not simply sit back and expect the United States to do it singlehandedly," US representative to the United Nations Samantha Powers said in a Friday conference call.
UNITED NATIONS (Sputnik)  Earlier on Friday, planned UNSC consultations on Syria were cancelled at the initiative of the United States and Russia. UNSC reportedly wanted to hear details on the US-Russia agreement on Syria on Friday afternoon.

Churkin told journalists on Friday that the meeting was cancelled "because the United States is not prepared to share the documents with the members of the Security Council."

"If they are not prepared to even describe the documents in detail why have the meeting?" Churkin said, adding "I dont think we are going to have a resolution of the Security Council in support of those documents because we believe that we cannot ask members of the Security Council to support something the content of which they dont know."
I don't think that emoji can become a language on their own. Given that they lack a lot of functions that languages have. The host John Harrison asked Dr Cohn how this can be, when he can communicate with people in another country who dont speak or write his language, using emoji. Dr Cohn answered: Certainly you are experiencing communication. Most definitely, emoji have the capability of transferring meaning, just as we do through gestures, or drawings. But just being communicative does not mean that something is a full language. In order for it to be a full language you have to have not only the channel through which it is being expressed, such as graphics; but also a grammar, that is a system that governs the sequences in which the language is used. Grammar allows you to produce long sequences of speech that are constrained and which allows you to understand someone. Emojis dont have that.

Ancient languages like Aztec used pictographs, but they were also writing systems, in the same way that writing systems today map sounds to graphics.They would have purely visual information; in the same way that todays comic books combine pictures with text.On their own, they would not convey information. A few emoji are acquiring a phonetic version such as I heart New York. If they do, emoji would become a writing system.
Wapo also noted that  .. once the Senate confirmed him in 2014, Selig got a tour of his suite of offices and balked. He told his staff the offices looked awful, with chipped and peeling paint, a stained carpet, exposed wiring and furniture that didnt match. When asked by investigators, his staffers   described them as (being) pretty much what government offices look like.

In order to spruce things up, Seligs approved budget to remodel the place was 5k, but  That amount didnt cover the cost of the carpet, which was recommended by an interior designer for one of the luxury hotel chains he stayed at on official business. In fact, he ended up spending 50k to have  New ceiling tiles, completely refurbished bathrooms, refinished doors with brass kick plates and more. Sounds pretty good, right?

His staff also told investigators they bent the rules because they believed that political appointees of Seligs caliber were entitled to stay in luxury hotels, unlike other federal employees. Thats right. To paraphrase Orwell, Everyone is equal, but some are more equal than others.

And speaking of some being more equal than others, Jill Stein, the other female candidate running to be the United States next President, and apparently not as connected as Hillary Clinton, was just charged with a crime. Thats right. According to Time  Stein and her running mate were charged with criminal trespassing and mischief after Stein spray-painted I approve this message in red paint on bulldozer blade. But what was she approving?

Business Insider is reporting that  Thousands of protesters have gathered in Cannon Ball, North Dakota to protest the building of the Dakota Access Pipeline, a proposed 1,172-mile pipeline enabling North Dakota-produced oil reach refining markets in Illinois. But, why are they protesting it?

The article continues by noting  The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe have attempted to block the project because it passes through North Dakota's Lake Oahe, a sacred burial site and a major water source for the Standing Rock Sioux. Thats right. It passes through an Indian cemetery. A place of rest for those that have passed. That seems a no-brainer. A popular meme floating around the web suggests that if you wouldnt be comfortable digging up just any old graveyard, why would it be ok to do this to an Indian graveyard?

Although some in the media covered the story in the beginning, others have begun to drop that coverage. In fact, The Verge noted that  Facebook has admitted to censoring a video posted by activists protesting the Dakota Access pipeline. Of course, Facebook immediately blamed the censorship on an algorithm, so take that for what it is worth.

The New York Times noted in an op-ed that  Its a familiar story in Indian Country. This is the third time that the Sioux Nations lands and resources have been taken without regard for tribal interests. The Sioux peoples signed treaties in 1851 and 1868. The government broke them before the ink was dry.

It continued by writing  When the Army Corps of Engineers dammed the Missouri River in 1958, it took the riverfront forests, fruit orchards and most fertile farmland to create Lake Oahe. Now the Corps is taking clean water and sacred places by approving this river crossing. Whether its gold from the Black Hills or hydropower from the Missouri or oil pipelines that threaten our ancestral inheritance, the tribes have always paid the price for Americas prosperity.

So, what do you think dear listeners  Have American Indians paid a heavy price for Americas prosperity?

We'd love to get your feedback at radio@sputniknews.com
Follow that, we analyze the implications of Chinas New Silk Road finally reaching Afghanistan, with rail cargo having passed through Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan in linking together eastern China and northern Afghanistan for the first time ever. Then we take a look at how General Khalifa Haftar and his forces seizure of Libyas main oil terminals deals a heavy blow the countrys UN-recognized Government of National Accord. Once thats done, we talk about the US-Indian military exercises going on right now in the Chinese-bordering province of Uttarakhand, and Russias curious decision to hold its own drills with Pakistan sometime in the near future. Lastly, we analyze the Russian-American cessation of hostilities agreement in Syria and explain why its more about Raqqa than Aleppo.

We'd love to get your feedback at radio@sputniknews.com
Todays main stories: A report from Human Rights Watch has highlighted the dangerous conditions faced by Somalian refugees returning to their home land from Kenyas Dadaab refugee camp. The human rights group claim that refugees are being pressured to leave through fear and cash incentives, in violation of the 1951 Refugee Convention. We speak to Human Rights Watchs Laetita Bader.

As the voters of Colombia get ever closer to a referendum this October 2nd on whether or not to ratify the peace accord with the FARC rebels, the country is already seeing major moves in anticipation of a Yes vote. This week alone saw the beginnings of widespread landmine clearances, as well as a public acknowledgement from President Juan Manuel Santos and FARC Commander Ivan Marquez. We speak to Dr Eduardo A. Gamarra from Florida International University.

You can find previous editions of World in Focus here.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  The artillery drills were carried out in the Zabaikalsky Territory of Russias Siberian Federal District.

"The servicemen carried out an artillery reconnaissance mission using optical and radar equipment in a hilly area. They also used sounding systems to determine the coordinates of the simulated enemy artillery, providing an adjustment of fire for their units," Astafyev said.

Russian Deputy Defense Minister Gen. Dmitry Bulgakov is currently on a visit to Chita, the administrative center of Zabaikalsky Territory, with the aim of inspecting the preparedness of the Eastern Military District for the winter period.
BANGKOK (Sputnik)  Born in 1974, Smolnikov is accused by the Russian authorities of bribing an official with a large amount of money. He has been wanted by Interpol since February 2016. Police arrested Smolnikov last month, in the Thai southern province of Songkhla.

"Smolnikov has been deported from Thailand and has left for Moscow on an Aeroflot flight at 10 in the morning, accompanied by members of the Russian National Central Bureau of Interpol," Sosnov said on Friday.

According to media reports, Smolnikov was a city council member from the United Russia party, who was expelled from the party in February 2016 in connection with the criminal case on embezzlement and bribery.
"In particular, a servicemen's uniform will be made of aramid fiber, while bulletproof vests and protective helmets will be produced with the help of armor ceramics which will contain boron carbide," the spokesperson said.

The new body armor will be used both for Ratnik-2 and Ratnik-3 infantry combat systems, he said, adding that the use of new materials will allow the producer to slash the weight of the bulletproof vest without sacrificing its durability.

Ratnik New future soldier russian soldier individual gear equipement sys https://t.co/aI7kDRNc27 via @YouTube  Ernesto MX  (@lic_ernesto_jgs) 9  2016 .

"With the current bulletproof vest in its complete configuration, including the protection of the groin, forearm and neck, weighing about 15 kilograms, the new body armor's weight will be reduced by 20-30 percent", he said.

As for boron carbide, an extremely hard boroncarbon ceramic and covalent material used in tank armor, it is already produced by the experimental production enterprises Bifors and NEFS-Soyuz in Russia, according to the spokesperson.
Love was first arrested in October 2013 for alleged offences under the UK's Computer Misuse Act.

Then in July 2015 Love was arrested again by UK officials  this time at the behest of the US government, who had issued several indictments and corresponding extradition warrants.

The FBI and Department of Justice allege that Love has been involved in hacking into various governmental agencies, including the US Army, NASA, the Federal Reserve and the Environmental Protection Agency.

Accused cyber hacker Lauri Love sings defiantly outside Westminster Magistrates' Court pic.twitter.com/Jw9fkLm971  Georgina Stubbs (@georginafstubbs) 16 September 2016

Lauri's campaign group, the Courage Foundation, who also funded his defence, spoke to Sputnik.

Donate to help #LauriLove in his fight against both the US and UK authorities! https://t.co/B0XOvf8M2T #NoLove4USGov pic.twitter.com/uNSwQ0H7aX  Free Lauri Love (@NoLove4USGov) March 31, 2016

Sarah Harrison, director of the Courage Foundation said that this was a very "disappointing ruling."

"I know that Lauri's legal team will apply to appeal this ruling, and the Courage Foundation will continue to support Lauri until his safety is assured," Ms. Harrison told Sputnik.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  Neil Peterson, 38, and Linda Raja, 43, both of Singapore, have been arrested by authorities in Singapore at the request of the US government, the statement reads. they "were each charged with one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States with respect to claims; one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud; and multiple counts of making false claims.

The charges and arrests are part of a long standing Justice Department criminal investigation into foreign defense contractor Glenn Defense Marine Asia (GDMA) billing practices in which Navy personnel accepted bribes in exchange for warning GDMA officials of impending audits by Navy accounting and finance personnel.

Including Peterson and Raja, 16 individuals have been charged in connection with the GDMA criminal investigation with 11 of them current or former Navy officials.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  New York City Police Chief James O'Neill said one officer did fire a taser at the suspect, 32-year-old Akram Joudeh, but he still did not stop running. Bratton said that the officer was wounded while trying to detain the man.

"The officers approached him, started to take him in custody, during which time one of them received a very significant injury to his face at which time the officers fired sufficient rounds to stop the attacks on the officers," Bratton stated on Thursday evening. "The officer with the most significant injury was off duty at the time and chose to intervene."

After Joudeh slashed the off-duty detective, causing a six-inch gash from his temple to his jaw, other officers fired 18 rounds at him, O'Neill stated.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik), Leandra Bernstein  The US Congress will not be bound to the annual funding limits agreed in the US-Israel memorandum of understanding (MOU) on the military aid, US Senator and former Republican presidential candidate Lindsey Graham told Sputnik.

"They can sign it, its up to them, but I will not consider the MOU as binding on Congress and we can appropriate based on our own view of the situation," Graham said regarding the agreement signed by US and Israeli representatives on Wednesday.

In its 2017 budget, the US Senate appropriated $3.4 billion for Israeli defense plus $600 million aimed to boost the Israeli missile defense, a figure that goes beyond the yearly $3.3-billion funding agreed in the Obama administrations ten-year aid package.
However, Sanders eventually had to step down, having managed to attract 45 percent of votes during the primaries. However, the results of these elections for some reason deviated from the exit poll data, prompting concerns about possible foul play.

"Were talking about hackers tampering with voting results in certain states and at polling stations where voting machines are not being supervised by anyone," he explained.

According to Kerans, in some states the voting results were altered by up to 10 percent in Clintons favor, even though it is quite possible that she wasn't aware of this tampering. The voting machines were apparently rigged to register every one of Sanders' vote as 0.8 points and every one of Clinton's as 1.2 points.

Sanders' supporters learned that the voting machines used during the elections are not subjected to any form of oversight by the authorities, with both hardware and software being supplied by private companies. The only state exempt from this tendency is Oklahoma, where the government has the right to inspect the machines software  and strangely enough, it is in that very state Sanders scored a decisive victory during the primaries.

"We can't accuse Clinton directly, but she never raises a voice when the election process is being doubted. She just keeps quiet. She treats this situation as a gift from above, and that fact alone tells a lot," Kerans remarked.

He also added that many members of the US academic circles became disenchanted with domestic political system, as the election results are being shamelessly manipulated, political parties completely depend on their sponsors and theres no way to fight this. The recent revelations made by WikiLeaks, which shed light on the Democratic partys elite collaboration with certain mainstream media outlets also did little to instill trust in the current iteration of the American democracy.

"Back in the day we paid considerable attention to the opinion of civic organizations and labor union leaders. Now however they are bought out too, so we essentially have a nomenklatura system being formed within the country," Kerans said.

At the same time, he pointed out, people in the United States are becoming increasingly aware of the existing political systems flaws and of the ability of politicians and ultra-rich to act with impunity, while the country is facing want, stress and instability.

"Previously the level of social mobility in the United States, the ability to move up in the world, was very high. Your fate was in your hands. Now however, people here have fewer chances than those living in Europe The market effectively excluded half of the population, which is unable to use its intellectual power, from the society. This is inefficient, and young people understand it. And the mentality is rapidly changing," Kerans concluded.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  US voters who are considering support for a minor-party candidate in this years presidential election should instead back Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, Senator Bernie Sanders said in a television interview on Friday.

"Let us elect Hillary Clinton as president, and the day after, let us mobilize millions of people around a progressive agenda," Sanders told MSNBC.
Caldicott also pointed out that Building No. 7 of the World Trade Center complex in New York fell to the ground hours after the Twin Towers were razed, even though it hadnt been hit by either of the hijacked jets and appeared unscathed by the larger buildings collapse.

"Building 7 came down [in] late afternoon for no apparent reason. It was clearly imploded, I think, like the other two [buildings], as most structural engineers and architects will say," she observed.

The Australian-born Caldicott, who formerly headed Physicians for Social Responsibility, a Nobel Peace Prize-winning group, also questioned whether a hijacked airliner really crashed into the Pentagon outside Washington, DC. She said a missile might have caused the damage to the building.

"There was absolutely no evidence that a plane went into the Pentagon; no parts [were] recovered. It almost certainly was a missile," she asserted.

Caldicott also pointed out that numerous relatives of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden were secretly flown out of the United States on September 12, 2001 even though all civilian air traffic had been grounded for security reasons.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  US presidential candidate Donald Trump has won the endorsement of 44 additional admirals and generals, bringing to 164 the total number of flag officer endorsements to 164, according to a statement issued by the candidates campaign on Friday.

"Working with our armed forces is the most important responsibility of the presidency," Trump said in the statement. "I thank each of these strong leaders for their dedicated service to our country and their confidence in me to serve as commander-in-chief."

On September 7, the campaign of Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton announced that 95 generals and admirals supported her bid for the presidency.
In 2014, the Federation of American Scientists estimated the nation had between 80 and 400 nuclear weapons, but reported that the number is probably closer to 80 than 400. Powells figure in the email, sent in March 2015, more than doubles their figure, the Times of Israel notes.

I dont trust Iranians  almost went to jail over Iran-Contra, Powell also asserted in the emails.

Powell also doubted estimates on how long it would take for Iran to develop a nuclear weapon.

They [the Iranians] say, correctly, that they have every right to enrich [uranium] for energy. Russians helped build a power reactor at Busher. Cant get enough sanctions to break them. Lots of bs around about their progress. Bibi likes to say a year away, as do our intel guys. They say it every year. [It] aint that easy to do, Powell stated.

In the emails, Powell also referred to Donald Trump as a national disgrace and an international pariah, called Hillary Clinton greedy, not transformational, and asserted that Bill Clinton is still dicking bimbos."
An informant had tipped off police that there were drugs and guns in the home, and where they were located.

We got some pretty detailed information from (an) informant, police spokeswoman Heidi Davidson told the Associated Press. The name we were given was associated with the address. It just wasnt current.

The department will be replacing the windows, door, and carpet that was littered with broken glass.

Believe me, our officers and deputies are extremely committed to accuracy, and no one wants to make a mistake like that, Grand Junction Police Chief John Camper said.

Neighbor Joey Slaughenhaupt told KJCT 8 that he had witnessed law enforcement agents all armored up and pointing AK-47s at the windows.

I can only imagine being a kid, I wouldn't sleep for awhile, he stated. It's just bad for the kids in general. I don't know how you make that up.
Democratic and Republican supporters almost equally approve of having lawful residents from other countries, the poll found. Over 90 percent of respondents who identified as Democrats thought positively of legal immigration, while 88 percent of Republicans expressed that view.

However, 51 percent of Americans said they are either "very concerned" or "somewhat concerned" about "allowing immigrants who hold different values into the US," according to the poll.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  In 2013, Snowden revealed classified documents to two reporters exposing the mass surveillance practices of the US government at home and abroad. Snowden faces espionage and other charges that could land him in prison for up to 30 years.

"Any thought to pardoning Edward Snowden should be immediately dismissed by President Obama, or anybody seeking to hold the office of the president," Cotton stated.

Cotton claimed that Snowdens revelations have done "irreparable harm" to the national security of the United States.
The proposal, which would be the first of its kind in the nation, is supported by mayor Ed Murray, as long as it can be done in a way that reduces the negative impacts on communities, the Seattle Times reports.

If its a strategy that saves lives  then regardless of the political discomfort I think it is something we have to move forward, King County executive Dow Constantine said told reporters on Thursday.

The 32-member task force, made up of health providers, law enforcement, social-service agencies and others, is calling for two locations to be identified, one in Seattle and one outside the city.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik) Stewart was charged with threatening to murder a United States official and transmitting in interstate commerce, a communication containing a threat, according to the DOJ release.

"A Murfreesboro, Tennessee, man was taken into custody this morning by FBI agents and US Capitol Police, after a criminal complaint was issued."

Stewart sent threatening emails and posted threatening videos on his Instagram account, the release noted.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  According to the statement, Assistant Secretary for Arms Control, Verification and Compliance Frank A. Rose will travel to Australia and Hawaii September 17-24 for meetings and to participate in events focused on international security, strategic stability, and space security.

Rose will participate in security discussions at Australians defense and foreign-affairs ministries, and in Hawaii he will deliver a keynote address on space situational awareness at the Advanced Maui Optical and Space Surveillance Technologies Conference.

On September 23, Rose will meet with senior leaders from the US militarys Pacific Command in Hawaii to discuss a number of strategic-security matters.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  "A date stamp indicated that it was manufactured on Jan 23, 2002, and consistent with the May 31, 2002, delivery date for MH370," Liow said on Thursday, as quoted by The Star newspaper on Friday. He added that "all identification stamps have a second OL number which are unique identifiers relating to the part."

According to the transport minister, the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) and the MH370 Safety Investigation Team have both verified that the numbers, appearance and dimensions of the debris, found on Pemba Island of the Zanzibar Archipelago in June, match those of an outboard flap section of the Boeing 777 aircraft.

Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, disappeared from radar screens on March 8, 2014, less than an hour after takeoff. There were 227 passengers and 12 crew members on board the Boeing 777 aircraft.
Educated refugee children have the prospect of getting a good job and making a contribution to society and the development of their home country.

"The concern is that the capacity for refugees to contribute to the societies where they have found asylum will be very hampered by the lack of education, and also when these refugees return home after the situation that made them flee has changed, they will not be in a position to rebuild that country."

"So this has a very serious impact not only on individuals, whose lives will be blighted and much poorer as a consequence of this lack of education, but on countries, regions and the whole world."

The cost of providing education for these children must be considered in light the future social and economic consequences of not providing it, Spindler said.

"So far, the response to refugee situations has mainly revolved around the issues of emergency food, accommodation, water and, sanitation, the basic things to keep people alive. But now we have to look at more than that, we need to give them a sense of purpose in their lives and the possibility to contribute, and that's why education is so important."
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  Russia is in consultations with the United States to release their latest conditional ceasefire agreement in Syria at the UN Security Council, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov told Sputnik on Friday.

"That is what we are talking about with our US partners. The idea of upholding these agreements, in our view, is useful. But it is not reasonable to ask our partners to support something they do not know," Bogdanov said in an interview.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and US Secretary of State John Kerry announced a new plan on September 9 aimed at reducing violence in Syria, including a new nationwide ceasefire that took effect Monday. The pact envisions Russian-US anti-terrorism coordination through a Joint Implementation Center if the truce holds up without violations for a week.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  Russia does not hide secret plans to resolve the Syrian conflict, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov told Sputnik on Friday.

"In contrast to public statements by some Western and Arab representatives that they have a certain plan B, we say regularly that we have no secret plans B or C," Bogdanov said in an interview.

The diplomat said Russia maintains the course of adhering to and calling on others to adhere to agreements reached in Vienna and at the UN Security Council.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  Moscow is in contact with Israel and Palestine negotiating on the details of the potential meeting between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas in Moscow, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov told Sputnik on Friday.

"In principle, the two leaders supported this idea, expressed readiness for such a meeting. Currently, we are holding talks with the Israelis and the Palestinians to determine convenient time," Bogdanov said.

According to Bogdanov, during the meeting the parties may agree on further steps toward the settlement in the region.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said on Friday that he would meet with his US counterpart Barack Obama on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly next week.

I will meet with President Obama, Poroshenko said at the Yalta European Strategy annual meeting in Kiev.

He added that he was also going to meet with both US presidential candidates. Hillary Clinton reportedly has agreed to meet with Poroshenko while Donald Trump has not given the answer yet.
BISHKEK (Sputnik)  A Russian-US ceasefire agreement in Syria envisions the fight against both Daesh terrorist group and the fundamentalist militants formerly known as the Nusra Front, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told Sputnik Radio on Friday.

"The documents that we endorsed with [US Secretary of State] John Kerry sets out in black and white that we will coordinate our actions against the Nusra Front and against the Daesh," Lavrov said.

The September 9 Russian-US pact that entered into force on Monday foresees the countries' anti-terrorism coordination through a Joint Implementation Center if the truce holds up successfully for a week.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  A potential agreement between Argentina and the United Kingdom on the removal of restrictions on exploitation of resources in the South Atlantic will be a huge mistake, Parlasur President Jorge Taiana told Sputnik.

Earlier this week, the United Kingdom and Argentina agreed on the first joint positive statement on the South Atlantic and Falklands issue, including on the work toward removing restrictive measures around the oil and gas industry, shipping and fishing.

"Argentina would have granted [to the United Kingdom] removal of restrictions and sanctioning on the illegal exploitation of our non-renewable and renewable natural resources, which is a major error," Taiana said Thursday.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  Russia insists on participation of not only political but also military specialists at the upcoming meeting of the UN Security Council permanent members on nuclear doctrines, Russian Foreign Ministrys Deputy Director of the Department for Nonproliferation and Arms Control Vladimir Leontyev told Sputnik.

According to the official, Russia plans to bring up a number of issues related to US missile defense, nuclear weapons in Europe and NATO deployment at the upcoming P5 nuclear talks.

"It is clear that the discussions of these issues require the presence of not only our political specialists, but also the military ones," Leontyev said.
However it further outlines some of the potential problems involved in ceasing the hostilities in Syria, "much less to reach a lasting solution" to the conflict.

"Though its agenda in Syria may be largely aligned with Russia's for now, the United States will have a hard time isolating the rebel groups it proposes to target jointly with Moscow," it suggests.

Another suggestion is that "Turkey will stay focused on limiting Kurdish expansion and will use the cease-fire in Syria as an opportunity to fortify the rebel groups it supports."

Saudi Arabia, in turn, "unnerved by a US-Russian alignment on Syria that favors Iran, will also try to strengthen rebel factions it backs."

Moreover, Iran and Syria, it suggests, "are unlikely to agree to a power-sharing arrangement."

Yet the efforts of the two countries have not been in vain, the article says. "After all, a cease-fire is a small but necessary step toward ending either conflict."

The author however does not stop there and suggests that there is "a similar agreement which appears to be taking shape in another theater of the standoff between Moscow and the West."
One of the key tasks that ecologists face is to determine whether human activity is the main culprit behind global warming.

Ice samples give us valuable information regarding the concentration of greenhouse gases in the past. Thus, we can determine past temperatures present on the continent. We can then analyze the air composition contained in Antarctic ice as at the moment of its formation; these bubbles have been completely isolated from the outside world. After we collect all the results, we can determine changes in the concentration of greenhouse gases in the Antarctic climate, he added.

Over the past 650,000 years, the concentration of CO2 in Antarctica has increased by 30 percent, while the amount of methane (CH4), a more potent greenhouse gas, has increased by 100 percent.

An increase in the concentration of greenhouse gases since the mid-19 century has been tightly linked to climate change, meaning that human activity might have an impact on these climate parameters, Sanchez added.
MOSCOW (Sputnik)  Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov reiterated his proposal to make public the entire package of recent Russia-US agreements on Syria in phone talks with US State Secretary John Kerry on Friday, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

"The Russian minister once again called for making public the whole package of Russia-US agreements coordinated during the meeting between Lavrov and Kerry on September 9, 2016, as well as for approval of this package by the UN Security Council," the ministry said in a statement.
The military aid package agreed upon between the US and Israel will allow the latter to upgrade most of its fighter aircraft, improve its ground forces' mobility and strengthen its missile defense systems.

The deal also includes major concessions granted by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Israel agrees not to seek additional funds from Congress beyond what will be guaranteed annually in the new package.

It also agrees to phase out a special arrangement that has allowed Israel to spend part of its US aid on its own defense industry instead of on American-made weapons.
UNITED NATIONS (Sputnik)  The special event began with a minute of silence in memory of Karimov, who died on September 2 after suffering a stroke. Attending were representatives of UN member-states, the president of the General Assemblys current session and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

I join with all of you in extending our condolences to the bereaved family of the late president of Uzbekistan, Mr. Islam Karimov, Ban told the audience. As the first president of the independent Republic of Uzbekistan, Mr. Karimov undertook wide-ranging efforts to further the economic and social development of his country.

The secretary-general also credited Karimovs promotion of the Central Asian Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone, a treaty that took effect in 2009 and comprises the regions five former Soviet republics.
STEM

New AIR Report Offers Vision for Accomplishing STEM for All

In another 10 years the studies of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) could be as pervasive and effective in the K-12 classrooms of America as the use of the blackboard was at the launch of the 19th century. An aspirational vision for STEM education is set out in a 73-page report just issued by the American Institutes of Research and written by one of the foremost national experts on the subject.

As "STEM 2026: A Vision for Innovation in STEM Education" summarized, "The complexities of today's world require all people to be equipped with a new set of core knowledge and skills to solve difficult problems, gather and evaluate evidence, and make sense of information they receive from varied print and, increasingly, digital media. The learning and doing of STEM helps develop these skills and prepare students for a workforce where success results not just from what one knows, but what one is able to do with that knowledge."

A new report from American Institutes of Research lays out an aspirational vision for the next decade of STEM education.

A strong STEM education, author Courtney Tanenbaum, noted, "is becoming increasingly recognized as a key driver of opportunity, and data show the need for STEM knowledge and skills will grow and continue into the future."

The challenges of achieving STEM for all are daunting. Recent results from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, for example, showed that 43 percent of white students and 61 percent of Asian students scored at the proficient level in eighth-grade math, while only 19 percent of Hispanic students and 13 percent of black students did so. Eighth-grade students with disabilities and students eligible for free or reduced-price lunch scored nearly 30 points below their peers in science and mathematics; English learners scored almost 40 and 50 points below their peers in those two subjects.

STEM 2026 offers ways to reverse these trends, by providing examples of promising programs from around the country.

The report drew on the ideas and recommendations offered by STEM researchers and educators during a set of workshops held last year by AIR and the United States Department of Education. The goal of those gatherings was to figure out how to improve STEM teaching and learning on a large scale. Tanenbaum condensed the findings and recommendations into six "interconnected components" that will be essential for success:

Vigorous communities of practice among schools and STEM professionals who can serve as mentors;

Opportunities for "intentional play and risk," such as games that invite "creative expression of ideas, while still engaging diverse students in complex content and difficult content";

Challenging students with big problems, in the areas of water availability, food, housing, transportation or other aspects of the world that touch their lives;

New types of learning spaces that are flexible and technology-enabled;

Innovative forms of assessment that go beyond measuring "core content knowledge" and help to identify the "skills and personal qualities that undergird academic tenacity and competence;" and

Promotion of diversity and opportunity in STEM for all students to counter the stereotypes and "mitigate" the historic biases that have beset STEM fields.

With those elements in place, by 2026, "all members of the community [will] feel invested and empowered to engage in STEM teaching and learning," the author wrote. STEM won't be "perceived as being thrust upon them or outside their purview but as culturally appealing and relevant." People will understand where STEM fits into their lives, no matter what their "race or ethnicity, disability, language spoken, gender, neighborhood or geographic location."

"Effective STEM education that's accessible and inclusive of all students is increasingly important," said Tanenbaum in a prepared statement. "In today's world, all youth need teaching and learning experiences that empower them with the belief they can understand and shape the world through STEM."

The full report is available on AIR's website.
Industry News

Brian Lewis Steps Down as CEO of ISTE

Brian Lewis is no longer CEO of the International Society for Technology in Education, the ed tech organization announced this week. No reason was given for his departure.

The ISTE Board of Directors issued a statement to THE Journal Friday: Brian Lewis concluded his employment as ISTE CEO on September 10, 2016. The ISTE Board has engaged Cheryl Scott Williams as interim CEO and is embarking upon a search to fill the CEO position. The ISTE Board wishes Brian well in all of his future endeavors.

Lewis joined ISTE as CEO in June 2012, after 25 years in both public and private sectors. The announcement of his hiring was made just prior to the ISTE conference in 2012 in San Diego. He had previously been the chief strategy officer and interim CEO for the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards.

ISTE is a prominent trade organization, representing some 100,000 education professionals involved in education technology. Its activities include professional development, political advocacy, information dissemination and standards development. The organization publishes digital literacy standards for teachers, students and administrators. It also works to advocate policies to expand the use of technology in schools.

ISTE may be best known for its large annual conference it stages every summer, which draws thousands of educators, administrators, companies and press. ISTE organizes hundreds of workshops, panels, lectures, presentations and exhibits for the conference, which was held in Denver at the end of June. ISTE 2017 will be held June 25-28 in San Antonio, TX.

Lewis could not be reached for comment. In its statement, the ISTE Board of Directors said, The ISTE Board continues to be dedicated to its members and to providing resources and a network to support them as they leverage the power of technology to transform learning. Moving forward, the Board is focused on finding a CEO who is aligned to our missions and commitment to our members.

ISTE plans to formally announce Williams as the new interim CEO Monday in a statement. She is a past board president of ISTE, and also served as executive director of the Learning First Alliance, a partnership of education organizations, from 2010 to 2015.
"A little fill here and there may seem to be nothing to become excited about. But one fill, though comparatively inconsequential, may lead to another, and another, and before long a great body may be eaten away until it may no longer exist.

Our navigable waters are a precious natural heritage, once gone, they disappear forever," wrote the Wisconsin Supreme Court in its 1960 opinion resolving Hixon v. PSC and buttressing The Public Trust Doctrine, Article IX of the Wisconsin State Constitution.
The logo of Boeing (BA) is seen in Los Angeles, California, United States, April 22, 2016. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson/Files

COPENHAGEN (Reuters) - Boeing formally challenged a decision by the Danish government to pick Lockheed Martin's F-35 fighter jet over its own Super Hornet, saying on Thursday the choice was based on a "flawed evaluation process".

Boeing said it had submitted a request to the country's ministry of defence that would require it to provide all materials related to the procurement evaluation and decision announced in June.

"We believe the ministry's evaluation of the competitors was fundamentally flawed and inaccurately assessed the cost and capability of the F/A-18 Super Hornet," said Boeing vice president Debbie Rub.

In May, Boeing challenged the Danish government's recommendation to buy 27 fighter jets from Lockheed Martin, questioning data which suggested its Super Hornet fighter jet was a more expensive option.

Denmark's Defense Minister Peter Christensen confirmed that Boeing would get access to the requested information.

"I note that we had a very thorough and transparent process before the Danish choice of fighter jet. This led to a broad political agreement," Christensen said in an email.

A ministry report in May evaluating each fighter jet candidate was based on data estimating that the Super Hornet would have a service life of 6,000 flying hours, while Boeing thinks the right figure for Denmark is 9,500 hours.

The report also concluded that the total cost of the F-35 jet is 42.2 billion Danish crowns ($6.4 billion) while the Super Hornet would cost 60.6 billion crowns.

($1 = 6.6284 Danish crowns)

(Reporting by Jacob Gronholt-Pedersen; Editing by Alexander Smith)
KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 15 (Reuters) - Malaysia, the world's second-largest palm oil producer after Indonesia, will raise its crude palm oil export tax to 6.5 percent in October from 5 percent in September, according to a circular on the Malaysian Palm Oil Board website on Thursday.

The Southeast Asian nation calculated a reference price of 2,879.47 ringgit ($698) per tonne for October. A price above 2,250 ringgit incurs a tax, which starts from 4.5 percent and can reach a maximum of 8.5 percent.

Malaysia last raised the tax in July from 5.5 percent in June.

($1 = 4.1250 ringgit) (Reporting by Emily Chow; Editing by Joseph Radford)
WARSAW, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Poland's state-owned railways PKP said on Friday it had asked a Warsaw court to annul last year's sale of its utility arm PKP Energetyka to global equity fund CVC (Taiwan OTC: 4744.TWO - news) [CVC.UL}.

CVC bought PKP Energetyka from PKP in July last year for 1.41 billion zlotys ($366.75 million) excluding debt, or 1.97 billion zlotys including debt.

The sale was criticised by the then opposition party Law and Justice (PiS), which won parliamentary elections in October. PiS has said PKP Energetyka is key to Poland's energy security and should not be controlled by a private fund.

"We confirm filing a motion (to the court)," a PKP spokeswoman said, confirming a report by state-owned news agency PAP.

PKP Energetyka and CVC were not immediately available to comment.

Since coming to power, PiS has called a halt to privatisations, changed management in almost all state-run companies and questioned the rationale and pricing of the previous government's stake sales.

For example, it has questioned its predecessor's privatisation of chemicals group Ciech (LSE: 0LS7.L - news) and the sale of some of the state's shares in miner KGHM.

In April, anti-corruption agency CBA raided the Warsaw offices of chemicals group Ciech and its majority owner Kulczyk Holding in an investigation into the privatisation of Ciech.

Market sources have told Reuters that CVC is eyeing a number of assets for sale in Poland, including Nasper's Allegro, convenience store chain Zabka owned by private equity firm Mid Europa, as well as central and eastern European beer brands put on sale by SABMiller (Xetra: BRW1.DE - news) .

($1 = 3.8446 zlotys) (Reporting by Agnieszka Barteczko; Editing by Mark Potter)
By Agnieszka Barteczko

WARSAW, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Poland's state-owned railway company PKP has asked a Warsaw court to annul the sale last year of its utility business PKP Energetyka to private equity fund CVC Capital Partners, PKP said on Friday.

CVC (Taiwan OTC: 4744.TWO - news) bought PKP Energetyka from the state railway company in July last year for 1.41 billion zlotys ($367 million) excluding debt, or 1.97 billion zlotys including debt.

The sale was criticised by the then opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party, which won elections in October. PiS has said PKP Energetyka is key to Poland's energy security and should not be controlled by a private fund.

"We confirm filing a motion (to the court)," a PKP spokeswoman said, confirming a report by state-owned news agency PAP.

CVC said it did not know the content of the motion, nor any circumstances during the privatisation process that would justify filing such a motion.

"The privatisation process was fully transparent, in line with the law and has been verified by the prosecutors office and the Supreme Audit Chamber revealing no irregularities," said the representative of CVC for Poland, Krzysztof Krawczyk.

PKP Energetyka's spokesman said the situation was not affecting the functioning of the company.

Since coming to power, PiS has called a halt to privatisations, changed management in almost all state-run companies and questioned the rationale and pricing of the previous government's stake sales.

For example, it has questioned its predecessor's privatisation of chemicals group Ciech (LSE: 0LS7.L - news) and the sale of some of the state's shares in miner KGHM.

In April, anti-corruption agency CBA raided the Warsaw offices of and its majority owner Kulczyk Holding in an investigation into the privatisation.

Market sources have told Reuters that CVC is eyeing a number of assets for sale in Poland, including Nasper's Allegro, convenience store chain Zabka owned by private equity firm Mid Europa, as well as central and eastern European beer brands put on sale by SABMiller (Frankfurt: 891295 - news) .

($1 = 3.8446 zlotys) (Editing by David Clarke)
spain rajoy

Reuters

Spain's political troubles are well documented. Two general elections in a year have failed to produce an effective government, with Mariano Rajoy acting as a prime minister in a caretaker government that is pleasing no one.

The country is now staring down another general election before the end of 2016 if no solution can be found for the lack of a functioning government.

So far, Spain's economy has coped admirably with having very little direction in terms of policy and a vast amount of political uncertainty. Unemployment has fallen from 21% at the start of the year to 20% now, and PMI surveys of Spanish industry have picked up in recent months, shrugging off any impact from Britain's vote to leave the EU.

However, HSBC economist Fabio Balboni now argues that the economic impact of Spain's crippling political status could be about to hit, especially if the country fails to ratify a budget for 2017 soon. HSBC essentially argues that should no budget for 2017 be approved, spending will be frozen at 2016 levels, which could, in turn, have a substantial impact on growth in the country next year.

Here is an extract from Balboni's research, circulated to clients on Thursday (emphasis ours):

"The lack of a government might have more serious economic consequences from here. If the 2017 budget cannot be approved by the end of the year, all of the main spending items will be frozen at current levels, including wages and pensions. That would be equal to spending cuts of about 1% of GDP. This might help to reduce the deficit, but it would also have negative consequences for growth. This risk should also provide a strong incentive for the political parties to avoid a third election."

And here is HSBC's handy chart illustrating the timeline for a new budget to be announced in the country:

Spain election timeline

Reuters

To make things even more worrying, Spain is also staring down potential sanctions from the European Union next month over failures to address its budget deficit, and reduce it to levels mandated by Brussels. Spain (along with Portugal) has already swerved EU fines for missing targets, but a new set of negotiations could end in some form of punishment, with the worst outcome being the suspension of structural funds from the EU to Spain.

Story continues

As Balboni notes: "In October, Spain also faces a new round of negotiations with Brussels. The biggest risk is the suspension of the EU's structural funds, worth about 1% of GDP. He continues:

"At stake for Spain are not only the financial penalties, which have not been applied by Brussels so far, but also the possible loss of "all, or part of the EU structural and investment funds" (see European Council decision, 8 August 2016). A similar measure has already been applied in the past by Brussels, for example to Hungary in 2012, and in our view is a more credible threat."

While the withdrawal of structural funds and a big fine is a serious threat for Spain, Balboni points out that given the swell of anti-austerity feeling in Europe, as well as growing Euroscepticism, Brussels may be lenient with Spain, if as looks likely, Spain misses its targets. "Given the anti-austerity mood prevailing in Europe at the moment, and the political situation, we don't think the European Commission will be too tough."

Even if this is the case, the continued political uncertainty that wracks the southern European nation could be about to transmit into the economy. Any way you look at it, that is unlikely to be good news.

NOW WATCH: STIGLITZ: It makes me crazy that everyone gets this wrong about the economy

See Also:

SEE ALSO: People are starting to get seriously worried about the looming crisis in Portugal

DON'T MISS: Election re-run in Spain would result in another hung parliament: poll
(Adds comments from chief of Anglo's copper business, background details)

SANTIAGO, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Anglo American (LSE: AAL.L - news) said on Friday it had reached a wage agreement with two unions at its flagship Los Bronces copper mine in central Chile (Stuttgart: 704599.SG - news) , ending a strike that began a week ago.

The process of "normalizing" operations at Los Bronces began earlier on Friday and the impact on overall production will be reported in the company's quarterly results, Anglo American said.

"We value the deal we reached with the workers of Los Bronces, which will allow us to sign a new collective contract (valid through) 2010," said Hennie Faul, the head of Anglo American's copper business.

The company said workers eventually accepted the same wage deal they had initially rejected before going on strike, including a bonus of around $13,000 per worker.

Los Bronces is the major operating mine in the Anglo American Sur complex, which produced 437,800 tonnes of copper last year, out of top copper exporter Chile's total 5.76 million tonnes.

Anglo holds just over 50 percent of the venture, with state-run Codelco, and Japan's Mitsui and Mitsubishi (LSE: 7035.L - news) also holding stakes.

(Reporting by Anthony Esposito; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Bernadette Baum)
WPT National Ireland Day 1a: Tony Dunst Tops the Counts

September 16 2016 Matthew Pitt Editor

The 1,100 World Poker Tour national Ireland Main Event kicked off in Killarney on September 15 and saw 46 players take to the WPT-branded felt. After the completion of 10 hour-long levels, only 11 of those starters had chips in front of them, and nobody had more chips that partypoker ambassador Tony Dunst.

WPT National Ireland Day 1a Chip Counts

Place Player Chips 1 Tony Dunst 274,900 2 Daniel Tighe 191,300 3 Thomas OShea 147,100 4 Ian Simpson 144,900 5 Shane McElhinney 143,400 6 Tadhg Ryan 138,000 7 Natalia Breviglieri 109,000 8 Gatis Cibulis 102,700 9 Peter Murphy 71,300 10 Radek Seidl 37,700 11 Lukasz Jankowski 20,400

Dunst already has a WPT title on his poker CV having won the $3,500 WPT Caribbean in November 2013, a result that netted the popular professional $145,000. More recently, Dunst was the runner-up in the 2016 Aussie Millions Main Event, which added A$1,000,000 to his lifetime winnings, and the WPT analyst bagged himself a bracelet in Las Vegas this summer.

He was already flying high in the chip counts when Lady Luck shone down on Dunst to propel him to the top of the chips counts. Dunst found himself on the right end of a straight-over-straight situation against the talented youngster Louis Salter, a hand that saw Salter bust and Dunst climb to 215,000.

Another of partypokers players in the field was their sponsored pro Natalia Breviglieri who ended the day with 109,000 chips. Breviglieri almost won a World Series of Poker bracelet this summer, falling in fourth-place in the $10,000 Ladies event, and recently won the Womens event at the UKIPT Super Series.

Other who made it through to Day 2 include Daniel danielt999 Tighe, former Irish Open champion Ian Simpson, and Irish grinder Peter Murphy.

Needing to re-enter on Fridays Day 1b if they want to grab a slice of the prize pool are the likes of Richard King, Richard Milne, Yiannis Liperis, David LHonore, and the aforementioned Louis Salter.

Day 1b kicked off at 1:00 p.m. on September 16 alongside the 250,000 guaranteed Irish Grand Prix, the latter costing a mere 115 to get involved with. Two online Day 1s for the Irish Grand Prix remain, one at 9:00 p.m. on September 16 and the final online Day 1 at 9:00 p.m. on September 17. Both of those online legs are played at partypoker, and if you Partypoker via UK & Ireland PokerNews, use the bonus code UKPNEWS when making your first deposit, partypoker awards you with a 100% bonus up to 250.

Lead image courtesy of the WPT live updates team

Get all the latest PokerNews updates on your social media outlets. Follow us on Twitter and find us on both Facebook and Google+!
CHARLESTON -- Traveling from an area with a population of 7.1 million to Charleston with a population of 21,000, a man predicted to be Hong Kongs next head of government will speak at Eastern Illinois University on the role Hong Kong plays in world politics.

The university will be the only stop Jasper Tsang will make in the U.S. before flying up to Canada, according to Jim Irwin of the EIU Public Policy Institute.

Tsang is set to give a 20-minute lecture at 7 p.m. Wednesday followed by a question-and-answer period in the Lumpkin Hall auditorium on campus.

According to a press release, Tsang, who has, for the past eight years, served as president of Hong Kongs Legislative Council and, as such, Speaker of the Hong Kong Parliament, announced in July his candidacy for Chief Executive of Hong Kong.

The election, set to take place in March, will have him vying against the incumbent, Leung Chun-ying, and Financial Secretary John Tsang. A win seems likely for the 69-year-old who, according to an annual survey conducted by the University of Hong Kong, is the citys most popular lawmaker.

Irwin said Tsang also served on a previous committee which became an internationally renowned model for addressing and dramatically eliminating corruption, for which Hong Kong was previously known. He is also recognized as a bridge-builder between the city and mainland China.

July 2017 will mark the 20th anniversary since the sovereignty of Hong Kong was transferred from the United Kingdom to the Peoples Republic of China. And, although the city remained semi-autonomous after the transfer, friction between many Hong Kong residents and the mainland government has continued.

As a result of that friction, Hong Kong has increasingly become a major focus of world attention. In late 2015, for example, five bookstore owners disappeared; although they later returned to their homes in Hong Kong, many believe they were detained by Chinese officials for selling political books considered banned in mainland China.

Additionally, the latter part of 2014 saw thousands of sit-in protests -- part of the movement in Hong Kong advocating that the city be declared an independent sovereign state.

These events, as well as the occupation of Central Hong Kong, the issue of a democratic election of the Hong Kong governor (chief executive), and the election of the Hong Kong Parliament have served to keep the city in the world news.

A public reception will take place from 8:30 to 9:30 p.m. in the Lumpkin Auditorium foyer. The lecture is free and open to the public.
Early this year, a railroad worker who had just been briefed on his duties for the day was discovered in a restroom, dead from an overdose of illegal prescription drugs. In the months that followed, tests conducted after three railroad accidents resulted in six employees testing positive for drugs.

Testing in 2016 has shown that nearly 8 percent of workers involved in rail accidents were positive for drug use, including marijuana, cocaine, ecstasy, benzodiazepine, OxyContin and morphine, according to internal federal documents obtained by The Washington Post.

The number of post-accident drug-positives was the highest since the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) began keeping records in 1987 and three times greater than it was 10 years ago.

Overall, the number of railway workers  including engineers, train crew and dispatchers  who tested positive for drug use in random tests soared about 43 percent last year, the documents show. The number rose to 256 last year from 2014s figure.

After rail accidents in 2014, no one tested positive for drugs, and just two people did last year. With more than three months left in this year, 16 rail workers have shown positive in post-accident tests.

Railroads transported 565 million passengers and 14.2 million carloads of freight last year. Their workers rank among the most heavily drug-tested employees in the country, faced with drug screening before they are hired, random on-the-job testing and another round of testing every time they make a significant mistake.

But after several years in which heroin and illegal opioid use has increased in the general population, there is hard evidence that the use of those and other drugs may be on the rise in the railroad industry.

Faced with the initial positive test results, federal regulators began sounding an alarm this spring. This month, the heads of all of the nations freight and passenger rail lines were summoned to Washington for a closed-door session to deal with a crisis that federal officials fear has put workers and train travelers at risk.

Officials from the FRA, National Transportation Safety Board and the Office of National Drug Control Policy spelled out their concerns and asked the railroads to help them address the growing problem.

This week they had a similar private session with railroad unions.

Weve discussed in depth the kind of data that we are seeing, the uptick in positive post-accident tests, the significant rise in positives in our random testing pool, FRA Administrator Sarah E. Feinberg said in remarks prepared for the Railroad Safety Advisory Committee on Thursday. We are seeing a trend going in the wrong direction, and we must address it immediately.

The popularity of illegal prescription drugs and heroin has increased dramatically in recent years, with some analysts suggesting that efforts to crack down on illegal prescriptions have encouraged addicts to use heroin instead.

A record 28,647 people died from heroin and prescription opioid use in 2014, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and opioids caused more than 6 in 10 overdose fatalities. The CDC said deaths by powerful synthetic opioids such as fentanyl rose by more than 80 percent. Overall, 47,055 people died from drug overdoses in 2014, the CDC said.

Despite drug testing protocols, transportation workers are as susceptible to trends as the rest of society. The U.S. Department of Transportation drug-tests about 7 million people who hold commercial drivers licenses, as well as railroad and transit workers, and the U.S. Coast Guard.

In the past five years, the DOT tests have shown sharp increases in use of amphetamines and natural opiates.

Among the railroad workers subject to random testing, however, the about 50,000 tests each year had shown no appreciable increase since 2009. Then they shot up by 43 percent last year. Whats more, the number of railroad workers found to be using drugs in the aftermath of rail accidents jumped dramatically this year.

We know that the country is struggling with an opioid epidemic  and there is no reason why our industry would be immune from an epidemic affecting the entire country, Feinberg said. Workers who are struggling with addiction need, and deserve, our help. Workers who are intoxicated on the job are a danger to themselves, other workers, passengers, and anyone else who may cross paths with a train.

Among the about 25,000 railroad workers who repair train engines and rail cars, FRA testing found that alcohol use was five times higher than that of railway workers who performed other tasks.

Railroad drug testing is limited to about 120,000 workers who are considered safety sensitive  those whose performance puts lives at risk. The train-repair workers and about 70 percent of the 37,000 workers who maintain track beds and railroad right-of-ways are not required to undergo the same drug testing.

Alarmed by the overall increase in drug use, Feinberg in May finalized a new rule that would require maintenance of way workers, as the track workers are known, to undergo the same random drug testing as other workers.

The railroads, however, are resisting the proposed rule, which is scheduled to take effect April 1. They have petitioned to delay the testing for an additional 14 months, contending it will require training supervisors on the signs and symptoms of drug use.

The Association of American Railroads (AAR), which joined regional railroads, railroad construction and transit firms in petitioning for the extension, said the freight railroads it represents would meet the April 1 deadline for testing maintenance workers it employs.

This is an issue that is evident throughout todays society that requires attention, and the freight rail industry is ready to work with the FRA to further enhance the safety of the nations rail network, AAR spokesman Ed Greenberg said.

Freight railroads not only comply with federally mandated drug and alcohol testing regulations, but go beyond those measures with stringent railroad-specific programs, Greenberg said. That said, the freight rail industry recognizes the seriousness of this situation and will work together with the FRA to make the rail system even safer, including supporting the expansion of testing to include items such as synthetic opioids.

Officials said Feinberg views any delay in implementing the rule as unacceptable.

The FRA and the railroads it regulates have been in the forefront of drug testing since 1987, when an Amtrak train collided with three Conrail freight locomotives linked together just north of Baltimore.

The engineer and 15 others on the Amtrak train were killed; 174 other people on the trains were injured.

Investigators determined that the engineer of the Conrail train and his brakeman had shared a marijuana joint as they made their way from the rail yard. The engineer, Ricky Lynn Gates, was convicted on state and federal charges and served four years in prison. In 1993, he told the Baltimore Sun that smoking marijuana was the cause of the crash and that it was not the first time he had done it on the job.

The FRA moved quickly in the aftermath of the crash to implement a drug-testing program for railroad workers. Less than four years later, Congress took the next step, requiring drug testing for safety sensitive workers in all industries regulated by the U.S. Department of Transportation.

trains-drugs-2ndld-writethru
A former magic shop owner on trial for a third time on child sex abuse charges was found guilty of five counts Thursday and acquitted on three others.

Neil Stammer, 49, was convicted of four counts of criminal sexual contact of a minor by a person in a position of authority and one count of bribery of a witness. Jurors found him not guilty of one count of criminal sexual penetration and two counts of criminal sexual contact. The charges stem from incidents in the late 1990s.

Stammer spent several years in Nepal before being arrested in 2014 by the FBI.

A sentencing hearing will take place before District Court Judge Benjamin Chavez in about 60 days. Stammer already is facing a 54-year sentence in a separate case tried late last year. In that case, he was convicted on four felony counts related to a 12-year-old male victim. He was acquitted in a separate trial of similar charges involving another child.

A Bernalillo County jury deliberated throughout Wednesday afternoon and through much of the day Thursday, returning a verdict about 3:30 p.m.

Stammers attorney Scott Wisniewski could not be reached for comment.
DALLAS  A Dallas police officer who won reinstatement to the department last year filed a lawsuit Thursday against the city and police Chief David Brown alleging they have not paid him his entire back salary.

Officer Jesus Martinez was fired in 2014 after a bystander videotaped the end of an altercation in which he pinned a panhandler to the ground. A grand jury decided not to charge Martinez with misdemeanor official oppression and he was reinstated by a civil service review board.

Martinez and his attorneys contend that the city failed to fully reimburse him after that 2015 civil service decision. He said at a press conference Thursday that the city deducted the income he had made working part-time jobs during his almost yearlong effort to get his job back.

The city wrongfully fired me. Then it wanted to penalize me for getting my job back, Martinez said.

Martinez said he has not felt other retaliation since being reinstated to the force. A handful of officers in uniform stood in the back of the room during his press conference at a venue in the Deep Ellum neighborhood.

A spokeswoman for the Dallas Police Department referred questions to the city attorney. The city attorneys office did not respond to messages seeking comment, but a city spokeswoman said the city attorney is reviewing the lawsuit and did not have an immediate comment.

Martinezs attorney, Andy Atkins, said he would not discuss the amount of back pay deducted, saying the officer, wished to be made whole. The lawsuit also seeks damages for suffering and undermining Martinezs reputation.

Community members rallied around Martinez during his appeal, making T-shirts that said, Save Jesus and marching to City Hall alongside Dallas Police Association members who also supported him.

He used to hang out here when he was a kid, and now he patrols this neighborhood, said Raine Devries, a member of the group Deep Ellum Neighbors. I was gutted when I heard the citys decision (to fire him). Jesus is one of the good ones. He takes the time to get to know the community and the residents.

Atkins alleged that the investigation conducted by the city and department was biased toward firing Martinez. He said many witnesses to the full encounter in 2014 were never interviewed.

The lawsuit recounted some of the details including that Martinez was having trouble seeing because of blow back from pepper spray and that the man continued to resist arrest even after being on the ground.
MISURATA, Libya  The room where Moammar Gaddafis bloodied body once rested is now cluttered with dusty boxes, and the freezer that held his sons corpse is long gone.

But the Libyan dictator and the forces unleashed by his death five years ago still drive Anwar Sawans life.

Hours after Gaddafi and his son were killed in the uprisings that shook the Arab world, Misuratan fighters brought their bodies to this battle-hardened city like trophies.

The corpses spent the first night in Sawans familys house, burnishing his revolutionary credentials. Today, his own home, a transformed shipping container, is a support center for the citys militias and their quest for influence.

Saved inside his canary-yellow phone are hate messages from Gaddafi loyalists who believe that Sawan played a role in the deaths and knows their leaders secret burial place.

Were coming to get you, you bastard, reads one.

In a nation where violence is the cadence, Sawan is one of its virtuosos. Involved in nearly every conflict that followed Gaddafis death, he has helped fuel his countrys chaotic trajectory  from the rivalries and dysfunction that emerged after four decades of authoritarian rule to the struggle afterward for power, oil and territory.

Ive entered every war since 2011 with the same enthusiasm, declared Sawan, a sharp-nosed, 45-year-old former business executive with a raspy, commanding voice.

For Misuratas militias, among Libyas most powerful armed factions, he buys guns and ammunition, most left over from Gaddafis stockpiles, bulletproof jackets, food, and water  anything that will give them an edge over their tribal, regional and political rivals.

Since May, Sawan has supplied weapons to militias combating the Islamic States Libyan affiliate in the coastal city of Sirte, 120 miles east of here. Backed by U.S. airstrikes, the fighters have pushed deep into the center of the militants stronghold, delivering a blow to their aspirations of widening their caliphate into North Africa.

But in Sawans post-Arab Spring world, there are always more battles to fight, more enemies on the horizon.

We have other Gaddafis in Libya today, he said.

  

On a recent night, a white Toyota pickup parked inside Sawans compound was filled with metal boxes of bullets and rows of mortar shells stacked like cucumbers in a supermarket.

Earlier in the day, Sawan had driven to the capital, Tripoli, as he often does. With cash collected from sympathetic Misuratan business executives and the militias military command, he visited people he described as war merchants who trade in the remnants of Gaddafis arsenal and the illicit smuggled weaponry that flooded the country after his demise.

On this trip, he said, some people donated boxes of bullets from their personal stockpiles.

Five times a week a truck like this goes to Sirte, said Sawan, bearded and dressed in a tan traditional gown and cap.

How long will the ammunition in the truck last?

Three hours, he said, half-jokingly. Our fighters waste a lot of bullets.

Five years ago, Sawan owned an aluminum smelter and an animal-feed factory. Like many Libyan professionals, he picked up a gun and joined the revolution. Misurata, Libyas third-largest city, became a major battleground, with intense clashes and daily shelling between the rebels and Gaddafis loyalists. Backed by NATO airstrikes, the rebels took the city in May 2011.

On Oct. 20, 2011, Gaddafi and his son Mutassim were killed in Sirte, and Misuratan fighters brought their bodies to a militia barracks here. Outside, crowds demanded to see the corpses. The local military council wanted a doctor to conduct a forensic examination to prove their identity, and Sawan offered his family house.

People respected my house, he said. And nobody would have the courage to enter someones house.

The next day, the bodies were taken to a market area, where they were displayed in an industrial freezer for three days.

Over the next months and years, as Libya atomized into factional violence, Sawan found his true calling. He joined Misuratas militias as they fought tribes sympathetic to Gaddafi in the city of Bani Walid and rival militias in Tripoli.

Wherever our fighters are, I go and support them, said Sawan, who had flown to the southern city of Sabha a day earlier to deliver supplies to other Misuratan factions.

The container where he lives is fitted with cushions, carpets and WiFi. On most nights, it serves as a war room of sorts, where supporters of the militias in Sirte help Sawan procure and dispatch supplies to the front and exchange news of the campaign against the Islamic State.

I will marry and have children only when Libya becomes stable, Sawan said.

Youll be 80 years old, a friend seated nearby quipped.

  

Koranic verses, handwritten in large, curvy script, cover the walls of the container. A T-shirt pinned up in one corner is a tribute to the prophet Muhammad, emblazoned: I (heart symbol) Muhammad.

Its not just an indication of Sawans devoutness. It reveals his political leanings. He supported a loose coalition of pro-Islamist militias, mostly from Misurata, known as Libya Dawn, that attacked Tripolis airport and seized large areas of the capital in the summer of 2014. Protected by the militias, a self-appointed Islamist-led government took control of Tripoli, while a rival government ruled in the east.

Now, a Western-backed unity government, brokered by the United Nations in December, is also asserting authority.

The Misurata military council coordinating the fighters in Sirte has aligned itself with the unity government, which is led by Prime Minister Fayez al-Serraj. But Sawan has not, revealing a rift within the militias.

The international community brought him to power, Sawan said. They forced him on us.

But the biggest threat for Sawan, of more concern than the Islamic State, is Gen. Khalifa Hifter, a military strongman whose forces control swaths of eastern Libya. The general, who lived in exile in Northern Virginia for two decades, does not support the unity government and is going to keep Sawan in business for a long time.

Hifter is the new Gaddafi, Sawan said.

Pointing to a corner of his container, he added, Youll soon see Hifters body here.

The Misurata council is increasingly wary of Sawans influence with their militia commanders and his outspokenness against the unity government.

Anwar is a showman, said Brig. Gen. Mohamed al Ghasri, spokesman for the councils military operations. He likes to appear that hes at the center of everything. In fact, hes just an ordinary guy.

  

A slim man walked into Sawans container, his face solemn. A militia commander had been injured fighting the Islamic State in Sirte. Shrapnel from a mortar hit him in the face, Mohammed Gilwan said. He is still alive.

Sawan picked up his phone and called to see whether the militia needed more weapons. The truck outside would head to Sirte at dawn.

If the West sent us ammunition, we would have finished Daesh a long time ago, he said after he got off the phone, using the Arabic acronym for the Islamic State.

The fight for Sirte, Sawan hopes, will give Misurata greater influence in a region where much of Libyas oil is produced. He said a plan is being discussed to leave 1,000 fighters to protect and secure the city. And what if Sirte, a rival of Misurata, doesnt want the militias? The city, after all, is Gaddafis home town, where his tribe remains dominant.

Whoever liberates Sirte should protect it, Sawan said. If they didnt want the Misuratans there, why didnt they liberate their own city?

Gilwan, who was Gaddafis personal cameraman in the late 1980s, noted that when the Misuratans helped liberate Sirte in 2011, they agreed to hand over the city to its residents. But the residents allowed Gaddafis loyalists, and later the Islamic State, to retake the city.

We will not make the same mistake again, Gilwan said.

What will unite Libya is force and money, Sawan said. Its like bringing up a child. You give him nice clothes and toys, but when he makes a mistake, you hit him with a stick.

Gaddafi used the same strategy to control Libya.

  

Once, Sawan said, Gaddafis relatives offered him $25 million for the location of the dictators grave. Sawan turned them down.

I said, once you bring your elders and wise men and you say, We are responsible for what Gaddafi did in the last 40 years, then I will give you his body, Sawan recalled. But they told me, We are not responsible for what Gaddafi did. 

Misuratan community leaders have kept the graves location a secret, worried that their militia fighters would desecrate the site or that Gaddafis followers would make it a shrine, like their Vatican, Gilwan said, as Sawan nodded in agreement.

Misuratans say eight people witnessed Gaddafis burial. Was Sawan among them?

Even if I knew, I will not tell anybody, Gilwan said. Everybody who witnessed Gaddafis burial, they swore an oath not to tell anybody.

Sawan refused to be drawn into the conversation.

Moments later, he walked outside to inspect the ammunition in the truck, his phone tucked into his pocket. Although his life revolves around war and is in constant peril, he doesnt regret the uprisings that upended his country, possibly for years to come.

Said Sawan: The worst day today is better than any of the good days under the Gaddafi regime.

arms-dealer
Health officials are investigating the source of a parasitic illness caused by consuming raw milk products that has sickened six Bernalillo County residents this month.

The New Mexico Department of Health recommends discarding any raw milk products, which are the apparent source of the microscopic parasite, Cryptosporidium. The parasite causes an illness commonly called crypto that is particularly dangerous for children, older people and those with compromised immune systems.

Raw milk has not undergone pasteurization, an accepted food safety process that involves heating milk to destroy a variety of disease-causing germs, the agency said.

Raw milk products may be contaminated with a variety of infectious pathogens, said Secretary of Health Designate Lynn Gallagher. We are particularly concerned about the very young, the elderly and others with compromised immune systems who may develop more severe illness if exposed to contaminated raw milk products.

Common symptoms of crypto include diarrhea, stomach cramps or pain, dehydration, nausea, vomiting, fever and weight loss. Dehydration is especially dangerous for children and older people. Symptoms usually begin two to 10 days after infection and normally last for one to two weeks. Once a person is infected, the parasites live in the intestines and are passed in the stool.
SANTA FE  Two of the three founders and a former board member of the Indigenous Fine Art Market have created their own organization and set up a Native arts market to take place in the Railyard Aug. 17-19, 2017  the same time that IFAM normally would have been held there.

The new organization, We Are The Seeds, has no connection with IFAM and wants to make something wonderful and beautiful happen this (coming) August, said Tailinh Agoya, spokeswoman and co-founder.

IFAMs website no longer lists any names of staff and an email from the Journal bounced back with the message that the mailbox was full. The Journal also left a voice message on the listed number seeking comment.

John Torres Nez, one of the co-founders and executive director of IFAM, pleaded not guilty in June to two counts of embezzlement relating to an alleged misappropriation of funds collected to benefit victims of a 2011 tsunami in Japan. His name no longer is listed on the IFAM website.

Asked if IFAM still existed, Agoya said, As far as I know We have all moved on with our lives I am not in touch with anyone with IFAM.

Just as IFAM was founded three years ago by people unhappy with the Southwestern Association for Indian Arts running of Santa Fe Indian Market and scheduled their new market to overlap with Indian Market, We Are The Seeds has been founded by people who left IFAM and have scheduled their market for the same time frame.

Agoya and Seeds co-founder Paula Mirabal had helped found IFAM, while the third Seeds collaborator, Sharon Lucero, had served on the IFAM board, Agoya said.

Agoya said she left IFAM because Johns vision wasnt aligned with mine. She did not elaborate, but did say that the market her new group is organizing will be more intimate, hosting only 100 artists whose work would be juried into the show.

Applications will be online on Oct. 1 at wearetheseedsart.com, and the organization will reach out to help artists apply who are not comfortable with the Internet or who dont have easy access to it.

In addition, Agoya said the Seeds group is hoping that indigenous artists from around the world will apply, not just those in the Southwest region or North America.

Were creating a really special space that will be comfortable for people to walk through and visit and interact and enjoy each other, she said. A special section will be set aside especially to highlight and honor the contributions of indigenous women artists, according to the news release.

Agoya said the market will be open to both contemporary and traditional work by indigenous artists.
SANTA FE  Ravyn Martinez has a rather unusual name, but she claims State Police and Department of Corrections officers mistook her for someone with a similar name and slapped handcuffs on her in her Colfax County home.

According to a lawsuit filed in Santa Fe District Court Wednesday, a total of nine State Police agents and Adult Probation and Parole officers descended on Martinezs house on June 18, 2015, during a warrant round-up operation, claiming they had an arrest warrant for Martinez for absconding from Probation and Parole in Espanola. State Police Agent Hector Vacio placed her in handcuffs  but officers were supposed to arrest Raven Lee Martinez, a completely different person.

Ravyn Martinez is now suing the Department of Public Safety, Corrections and Vacio for deprivation of civil rights and claims that officers were trespassing when they came onto her property without a valid warrant or probable cause. She also claims Vacios handcuffing her hands behind her back constituted assault and battery, false arrest and false imprisonment.

Martinez is asking the court for compensatory damages and attorney fees and is asking for a jury trial.

The suit says the arrest order for Raven Martinez said she is 5 feet 2 inches tall and weighs 130 pounds, but Ravyn Martinez is 5 feet tall and weighs 165 pounds, which is a demonstrably different height and weight than the other Raven Martinez, and that the two women have different tattoos and piercings.

A search of a New Mexico court database revealed no criminal history for Ravyn Martinez within the state. The suit says the woman police were looking for lives in southern New Mexico.

The law enforcement agents entered Ravyn Martinezs home after she refused to meet them outside. After Vacio grabbed Plaintiff by the arm and put her in handcuffs, the officers told her she would be released if she was not the correct suspect.

The complaint says Martinezs handcuffs were removed when officers confirmed she wasnt the right person.

The lawsuit says Corrections Office of Security Threat Intelligence gave officers the wrong suspect information, but it still claims the officers were in the wrong.

No reasonably competent law enforcement officer could reasonably have believed that the Plaintiffs residence was in fact a location where the other Raven Martinez for whom the Defendants had an arrest warrant would be located, the complaint says.

Corrections Deputy Secretary Alex Sanchez and Department of Public Safety spokesman Herman Lovato said their departments had not seen the lawsuit and wouldnt comment.
TOLEDO (JG-TC) -- A Neoga woman was sentenced to prison Friday for the death of a 1-year-old child who was in her care.

Natasha L. Gordon, 22, received a three-year sentence for her conviction for involuntary manslaughter, a charge to which she pleaded guilty in June.

Gordon was charged in connection with the Aug. 27, 2015, death of 1-year-old Arianna R. McNeal of Neoga.

The infant was found unresponsive in the water of a bathtub while she was in Gordon's care. An ambulance crew took the infant to Sarah Bush Lincoln Health Center, where she was pronounced dead.

There was no firm agreement on Gordon's sentence when she pleaded guilty, but the prosecutor did agree to ask for no more than three years in prison.

The conviction could have brought a prison term of two to five years, though prison time wasn't required.

Cumberland County Circuit Judge Millard Everhart imposed the sentence based on recommendations from Matthew Goetten of the Illinois Appellate Prosecutor's Office and defense attorney Todd Reardon.
Jasmine Russsell selling handmade crafts at The Moonlight Market. (Roberto E. Rosales/Albuquerque Journal) The Moonlight Market is an open-air nighttime market that celebrates regional artisans and craft makers. (Roberto E. Rosales/Albuquerque Journal) A painting for sale by artist Katie Calico. (Roberto E. Rosales/Albuquerque Journal) The Moonlight Market is an open-air nighttime market that celebrates regional artisans and craft makers. It runs Thursday-Saturday through Oct. 22. (Roberto E. Rosales/Albuquerque Journal) The Moonlight Market is an open-air nighttime market that celebrates regional artisans and craft makers and features local musicians and food trucks. (Roberto E. Rosales/Albuquerque Journal) Prev 1 of 5 Next

You dont have to be up at sunrise anymore to enjoy a local market.

Moonlight Market is giving night owls an outlet to enjoy and buy art from local artisans as well as take in music from local performers and savor some local eats from area food trucks. The market has been in operation for about a month and has received an influx of support, so much so that it has added more days and extended its hours.

Moonlight Market is in the Warehouse District, near four popular Albuquerque breweries as well as two distilleries, which the market hopes to plan events with in the future.

The market features about 50 local artisans showcasing a vast array of their offerings, including jewelry, handmade soaps, fine art, custom clothing, home decor and more. There are also hopes to expand and provide a space where vendors can teach classes or showcase their work outside Moonlight Market hours.

The market is the brainchild of Lisa Maury and her partners, Michelle Maury, who is also Lisas sister, and Jessica Steele. Lisa has a background in fundraising. Michelle and Jessica each have backgrounds in putting on fairs and events as well as other marketing and retail experience.

We opened it because both of my partners are crafters and a lot of the regular shows fill up really fast, Lisa Maury said. A lot of them are more for produce vendors instead of art vendors, so we felt like there was room for another market. While we do sometimes have produce and food there, it was primarily focused on local craftmakers and artisans just because there are so many amazing artists in this city.

Lisa Maury was inspired to create the market after visits to Frenchmen Art Market in New Orleans.

I actually go to New Orleans as often as I can. I love it, she said. But the last time that I went was in November, and I had been to the market several times before that. We made sure to stop at the market because I loved it. The ambiance is really nice, and I feel like both Albuquerque and New Orleans have very unique cultures that celebrate local culture and artists. And while we have wonderful markets in the city already, its really a unique experience and we wanted to focus more on the art than the produce or food.

In addition to featuring local food trucks and musicians, Moonlight Market has various activities scheduled as well. Recently, the market held a Pokemon Go event.

The market also has a stellar sort of ambiance with each vendor creatively lighting up their booth areas.

The thing that makes our market unique is that it is at night and it is just pretty, Lisa Maury said. Things are much prettier when theyre glowing with lights, so its just a very pleasant environment to be in. All of our vendors have their own light set up to display their work.
Over the years, the film industry has grown in New Mexico.

With professional projects being produced in the state, many students get an opportunity to work in film.

The New Mexico Film Foundation has opened up a showcase to feature short films at the collegiate level.

Its the first time at this level, says Dirk Norris, executive director of the NMFF. There is a spectrum of quality and some great stories and innovative stuff.

The New Mexico Film Foundation worked with faculty from San Juan College, Eastern New Mexico University, Santa Fe Community College and students from Santa Fe University of Art and Design to develop the program.

Each New Mexico postsecondary school was asked to submit up to three student videos of no more than 15 minutes each, plus and optional special-effects reel of up to one minute in length.

Nine schools submitted a total of 27 videos.

Films are meant to be seen. and the student showcase gives the film students of New Mexico a chance to exhibit their work to the public and to let people see the great talents and opportunities we have in our state, says Jon Barr, assistant professor of digital filmmaking at Eastern New Mexico University. The screening itself also gives our future filmmakers a chance to network and build connections with their peers who will likely be future collaborators, and our hope is that this will have a lasting positive impact on homegrown filmmaking in New Mexico.

Luke Renner, associate professor of digital media arts and design at San Juan College says when people discuss film and media education, thoughts immediately go to programs in Los Angeles and New York.

We are focused on having New Mexico higher education in the conversation. The strategy is to have professionals outside view our student work, Renner says. The second part is that the films showcased are also viewable online, unlike a typical film festival. This allows anyone outside our state to see the caliber and quality of the work created by New Mexico students.

SEND ME YOUR TIPS: If you know of a movie filming in the state, or are curious about one, email film@ABQjournal.com. Follow me on Twitter @agomezART.

New Mexico Student Filmmaker Showcase

WHEN: 6:30 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 22, at South Broadway Cultural Center, 1025 Broadway SE; 2 p.m. Sept. 24, The Screen, 1600 St. Michaels Drive, Santa Fe; 2 p.m. Sept. 26, Violet Crown, 1606 Alcaldesa Street, Santa Fe

HOW MUCH: $8 for Albuquerque screening; $10 for Santa Fe shows. Students free with ID.
Theres blame to be shared for the major disruption caused when a Los Alamos National Laboratory physicist brought a suspicious-looking device to the Albuquerque International Sunport and Transportation Security Administration officers promptly shut the airport down for several hours on Sunday.

Sunday was the 15th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, so its likely tensions were already high. But, in the end, a Metropolitan Court judge found no probable cause to arrest or detain Jeremy Danielson, the physicist who brought a mock-up of a technical apparatus in his carry-on luggage to the Sunport.

Danielson was on his way to Washington, D.C., for a Department of Energy conference. According to his attorney, Danielson alerted TSA staffers that they probably should look in his carry-on bag when he went through screening. He told the screeners he was taking the device to use in a demonstration at the conference.

But the TSA called in the Albuquerque Police Departments bomb squad to check it out. Danielson was charged with a fourth-degree felony of having a facsimile or hoax bomb or explosive. On Tuesday, Metro Court Judge Courtney Weaks threw out the charge.

There are several takeaways from this incident: People should be more aware of what they bring to the airport. It doesnt take a rocket scientist to conclude it wouldve been a good idea on the anniversary of 9/11 to let airline or TSA officials know before he reached the gate that he was carrying an unusual object.

And TSA workers should be able to apply a bit of common sense when handling a situation like this. Its understandable they would be especially cautious on the 9/11 anniversary. But once it was determined the device wasnt dangerous, perhaps they could have taken him aside and let business continue rather than disrupting flights for several hours.

It would appear that more training is in order at the lab and the TSA.

This editorial first appeared in the Albuquerque Journal. It was written by members of the editorial board and is unsigned as it represents the opinion of the newspaper rather than the writers.
WASHINGTON  Libertarian candidate Gary Johnsons chances of being included in the presidential debates appear slim, but the former New Mexico governor racked up another influential newspaper endorsement this week.

The New Hampshire Union Leader  the leading daily in the first-in-the-nation primary state  on Wednesday endorsed Johnson and his running mate, former Massachusetts Gov. William Weld, as a bright light of hope and reason in otherwise dark times.

The editorial marked the first time in 100 years that the conservative-leaning newspaper opted not to endorse a Republican in the presidential race.

The front-page piece was penned by the newspapers publisher, Joseph W. McQuaid.

Americans are being told that we have to choose the lesser of two evils. No, we dont, McQuaid wrote. Libertarians Gary Johnson and Bill Weld are on the ballot in all 50 states. Their records (as Republican governors in politically divided states) speak well of them. They would be worth considering under many circumstances. In todays dark times, they are a bright light of hope and reason.

McQuaid also took some hard shots at Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton and Republican contender Donald Trump. He characterized Clinton as a selfish, self-centered, sanctimonious prig and Trump as a liar, a bully, a buffoon.

Johnson said the endorsement was a huge boost to his long-shot campaign.

All across the country, voters are looking for an alternative to the polarizing candidates of the Republican and Democratic parties, he said in a statement. To have a newspaper with the history, tradition and respect of the Union Leader endorse Bill Weld and me as reasonable, credible choices is a huge boost, and we deeply appreciate it.

The New Hampshire newspapers endorsement came on the heels of two other recent Johnson endorsements by prominent regional newspapers. The Richmond (Va.) Times-Dispatch and the Winston-Salem (N.C.) Journal also endorsed Johnson this month.

But the media praise may be too little too late for Johnson to earn a place in the presidential debates with Clinton and Trump. The Commission on Presidential Debates mandates that a candidate poll at 15 percent support nationally in five major polls. Johnson is just below 9 percent in three of those polls with results available so far.

He is campaigning from Maine to Florida to Washington state in hopes of closing the gap. The commission is expected to announce the debate participants based on those polls any day now.

Even Johnsons campaign manager acknowledged that reaching that threshold is unrealistic.

The debates are the best chance for the relatively underfunded former New Mexico governor and medical marijuana entrepreneur to become more than a protest vote.

Because of the widespread voter disgust with the two major-party candidates, Johnson has gotten more attention and support than many other recent third-party challengers, but his resources are still dwarfed by those of Clinton and Trump. For example, Johnson stirred excitement last month when he announced he had raised $2.9 million in the first two weeks of August. Clintons campaign said it raised $143 million that month and the Trump team reported a $90 million haul.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
SANTA FE  Advertising highlighting child poverty in New Mexico that parodies a state tourism campaign and has rankled the administration of Republican Gov. Susana Martinez is now the target of an ethics complaint.

A Republican lawmaker, Rep. Monica Youngblood of Albuquerque, alleges that the New Mexico Truth campaign constitutes lobbying and that the organization behind it  a Roman Catholic health care system  should have registered as a lobbyist and reported its expenditures.

She filed a complaint Aug. 31 with Secretary of State Brad Winters office.

Allen Sanchez, president of CHI St. Josephs Children, said there was no violation.

This is not lobbying, he said Thursday. Lobbying asks for something. These ads ask for nothing. Theyre purely educational.

He suggested the complaint was retaliation because the Martinez administrations pushback after the ads first ran in January was unsuccessful and the organizations free speech rights were affirmed.

The governor had accused St. Josephs of hijacking the states New Mexico True campaign to score cheap political points and the Tourism Department complained of copyright infringement.

But a month later, the Tourism Department acknowledged in a letter to St. Josephs that it did not consider the use of the New Mexico Truth brand in the organizations social advocacy and informational campaign to be an infringement.

The ads were aired on television and radio from Jan. 12 to Feb. 10, and again with slight revisions from Aug. 14-27, at a cost of about $240,000, according to Jessa Bunker of CHI St. Josephs Children.

They cited New Mexico statistics, such as the highest childhood poverty rate and the third-highest child hunger rate in the nation.

Youngblood says the ads constitute lobbying because they aired during the 2016 legislative session with the clear intent to influence legislation  they have admitted as such in the press.

Therefore, this group should have registered with your office and disclosed to the public information about their lobbyist advertisement campaign, she wrote in the complaint. She said Winters office should investigate and appropriately fine them if there was a violation.

Youngblood cited an Associated Press article published in January. It quoted Sanchez as saying the intent of the advertising was not to criticize the tourism campaign, but that his organization wanted state officials to address childhood poverty by expanding early childhood education, which would be paid for by increasing the annual distributions from one of the states permanent funds.

Sanchez, who has registered as a lobbyist for CHI St. Josephs Children and for the New Mexico Conference of Catholic Bishops, has advocated for higher distributions from the Land Grant Permanent Fund.

But he said the New Mexico Truth campaign is bigger than any one piece of legislation.

In the paid ads, theres not a reference to any legislation or to any political party or to any action, he said.

The Secretary of States Office sent Sanchez a letter Sept. 9 requesting a response to the complaint within 15 days.
A national credit rating agency may downgrade the credit scores of New Mexicos research universities.

Moodys Investors Service said the review of the universities was prompted by its decision to review the state of New Mexicos credit rating, announced earlier this week,

Each of the institutions credit fundamentals are closely tied to the health of the state economy and to the states credit, a news release said.

Moodys said the University of New Mexico, which has an Aa2 rating, New Mexico State University (Aa3) and the New Mexico Institute of Technology and Mining (A1) are all currently under review along with the New Mexico Military Institute (Aa2).

We will also examine each institutions contingency plans to cope with and adapt to the potential direct and indirect impacts of the states current fiscal and economic challenges, as well as potential pressures on local government support, the release said.

The report said the impact on each university could be different. A lower bond rating would lead to higher rates for future borrowing. Current bonds would not be affected.

Andrew Cullen, a UNM associate vice president who deals with the budget, said any credit review demands a serious response.

That said, we are confident in the universitys finances and programs, with steady student enrollment figures and the Innovate ABQ initiative moving forward, Cullen said in an email to the Journal.

Cullen said a lower bond rating wouldnt necessarily mean fewer capital construction projects, such as new buildings, in the future.

Angela Throneberry, a NMSU vice president for administration and finance, said the review was expected given the states recent economic challenges. She said NMSU employees have worked over the past three years to find savings for the university.

We believe Moodys analysts will consider these efforts and resulting successes as part of their review, Throneberry said.

New Mexico Tech President Stephen Wells said the university in Socorro is awaiting the result and hoping there is not a significant change.

Robert McEntyre, spokesman for the state Higher Education Department, said it makes sense that Moodys would be looking at the state universities budgets given the recent crashes in oil and gas prices.

That being said, its encouraging that these institutions are taking proactive steps to maintain stability, he said in an email to the Journal.

The Moodys review is the latest sign of economic turmoil for a state that has seen plenty in recent months.

After depleting its cash reserves, New Mexico is facing an estimated budget shortfall of $458 million for the fiscal year that started in July, along with a $131 million deficit for the just-ended budget year.

Martinez ordered state agencies last month to reduce their spending by at least 5 percent, but that directive did not apply to public schools and universities.

Still, more spending cuts may well be enacted after a special legislative session that Martinez is expected to call later this month. Some lawmakers have said steep budget cuts for higher education have been discussed, possibly in excess of 5 percent.
THE WEST

A wit once wisely observed that anyone who represents himself has a fool for a client. Now theres proof: Representing himself before a federal judge in Portland, Ore., one of the occupiers of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge declared himself an idiot, adding that he is incompetent and am not required by any law to be competent.

Ryan Bundys statement was one of several decidedly odd declarations sent to U.S. District Court Judge Anna Brown, who, after reading his motions, called them not legally cognizable. All along, Bundy has insisted that he is not a U.S. citizen because he is a sovereign citizen of the Bundy society. He also says he cannot be legally defined as a person because he was created by God and is therefore not subject to laws created by people.

Unmoved, Judge Brown reminded Bundy at his most recent hearing that if he keeps denying the federal courts jurisdiction, he risks forfeiting his right to self-representation. The conspiracy trial of Ryan and Ammon, the Bundy brothers, who led the 41-day refuge occupation, was set for Sept. 7, reports Oregon Public Broadcasting.

THE WEST

In an upscale resort town like Sun Valley, Idaho, wheres a teacher, cop or restaurant worker supposed to live? An estimated 12,500 homes and condos are available for working people, as well as tourists, reports the Idaho Mountain Express, but these days, just try to get a landlord to sign a long-term lease. Not likely.

Homeowners who once rented out places for a year or more are now making much more money by renting to short-termers through Airbnb, VRBO and other internet rental sites.

In the Wood River Valley, for example, a large house close to the ski area now rents for $1,400 per night. Even the low end can be lucrative: A treehouse with a path to the bath (and a zipline) rents for $60-$70 per night.

Before the internet turned so many into opportunistic landlords, the average three-bedroom, down-valley house rented for $1,600 a month. In just 20 days, however, that same house can produce $6,500.

Its much the same story in the resort town of Crested Butte in western Colorado. Bartender Alex Shelley told the Crested Butte News that hes moved five times in two years. Now, just before he was supposed to renew his current lease, he lost his rental. Something has got to give.

SOUTH DAKOTA

In the small town of Freeman, S.D., 150 people gathered recently at a nursing home to fete a woman who just retired from a nursing career that spanned 72 years. Older than many of the homes residents, at 93, Alice Graber was delighted to reunite with former patients and some of the nurses shed trained since she started out in nursing during World War II.

I was just flabbergasted, she told The Week magazine. Given her lifelong vocation, her retirement plans arent surprising: She intends to volunteer at the nursing home where shes worked for the past 20 years.

OREGON

When a regional girls softball team started selling raffle tickets, with an AR-15 assault rifle as a prize, a pastor in Lake Oswego, Ore., decided he definitely wanted to win that weapon. He used $3,000 from a church discretionary fund and a bunch of member donations to buy 150 raffle tickets and, as luck would have it, the Rev. Jeremy Lucas of Christ Church Episcopal Parish bought the winning ticket.

Lucas said he had two reasons for wanting to win the rifle: to help the girls team get to a tournament in California and, more importantly, to take the weapon out of circulation.

After he won the gun, he asked a parishioner to keep the rifle locked up in a gun safe, reports the Portland Tribune, but that may have violated a tricky state law. In order for that transfer of possession to be legal, the parishioner should have undergone a background check at a licensed gun dealer while Lucas, as the guns owner, was present.

One commenter suggested that Lucas would not be charged for political reasons, while another called the state law stupid and designed to harass lawful gun owners. If the minister gets that now-confiscated gun back, he hopes to transform it into a work of art.

MONTANA

Self-incrimination is turning out to be a wonderful feature of the internet. In Helena, Mont., a ranch hand was so proud of himself for chasing a grizzly bear in his pickup truck, he posted a video on social media. Federal wildlife officials noticed and Lawrence Kennedy of Browning was fined $400 for unlawfully harassing a threatened species.

Betsy Marston is the editor of Writers on the Range, the opinion service of High Country News (hcn.org). She welcomes tips and photos of Western oddities at betsym@hcn.org.
Eleven years ago, Mark Roosevelt came to Santa Fe to marry and planned to settle down here with his new wife, Dorothy.

Five months into his initial time here, he was offered a job I had to take, he said of his move to head the public school system in Pittsburgh for more than five years.

Finally, hes back where he wants to be. And after a special piano performance by Seymour Bernstein at 5:30 p.m. today, hell be formally inaugurated as president of St. Johns College, whose reins he actually took over at the beginning of this year.

Or at least it will be as formal as things can get with a guy who greets visitors with a series of straight-faced, but kidding, comments and appears to glory in being an untypical person leading an untypical college.

Todays events are limited to the St. Johns community and invited guests, but members of the public are welcome to a panel discussion and master class Saturday taught by Bernstein to two St. Johns students, as well as Los Alamos High School sophomore Presley Gao, who was selected for the honor through video auditions sent in by high school musicians from northern New Mexico.

Roosevelt didnt know Bernstein until he saw the film Seymour: An Introduction (2014) and was so moved by it that he contacted the musician. As part of the inaugural activities, the film was screened last night at the Lensic Performing Arts Center, followed by a Q&A with Bernstein and New York Times arts and architecture critic Michael Kimmelman.

Oh, my God, hes such a beautiful man, Roosevelt said of Bernstein. Hes a concert pianist who decided to become a teacher  an extraordinary teacher.

Adding that hes not terribly interested in traditional inaugural events, noting that many come with an air of pomposity, Roosevelt said Bernsteins work does offer an answer to one of his enduring questions: How does one pass on beauty and knowledge?

I was spent

That will be far from Roosevelts only concern as the seventh president of St. Johns Santa Fe campus. In a reorganization and streamlining that, after some controversy, still leaves a president in place at the original Annapolis, Md., campus, but one who will answer to Roosevelt, certain administrative functions common to both campuses were combined. In the process, some 30 people were laid off at the two campuses.

But those moves took care of only about $4.5 million of a $12 million structural deficit. That amount doesnt refer to the actual amount of red ink at the end of the budget year, Roosevelt explained, since donations generally are used to fill the gap. But those donations, he added, really should be going into the endowment fund and not into daily operating costs.

Asked what he would do to erase the remaining $7.5 million annual operating shortfall, Roosevelt said, We are analyzing every single thing we do. The college has more than 100 ancillary activities, he said. Do they contribute financially? Thats the kind of question that will be answered at both campuses, he said, with an eye toward seeing what might be cut.

But the local campus Music on the Hill wont be one of the items on the chopping block, Roosevelt added. The popular summer program is one of the successful ways the college reaches out to the local community, which still often looks at the college as an elite institution disconnected from the rest of Santa Fe, he noted.

Roosevelt said he does want to do more community outreach, but the financial issues take precedence at the moment.

Its not as if he has no experience in making some tough decisions.

During his time heading Pittsburgh schools, he said, he closed the largest number of schools ever closed in any one year. Pittsburgh had gone from 1.2 million to 450,000 students (in public schools) without closing any schools. It had an elementary school built for 1,000 students with only 90 kids, he said. And, as people in Santa Fe know, attempts to close schools arouse a great deal of public opposition.

In describing the difficulty of that job, Roosevelt repeated very three times before the word hard.

He was offered a contract renewal, he said, but he left that job because I was spent.

From there, he moved to head Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, which had numerous campuses and, when the university board decided to close the original one, the alumni bought it. I was hired to reinvent it, Roosevelt said. It was hard. The economics of a small liberal arts college is hard.

Fighting family fame

Yet he expects his role at St. Johns to be easier than his previous two jobs  although he adds that his expectations about his jobs often turn out to be wrong.

Roosevelt actually started his career in politics after earning an undergraduate and law degrees from Harvard University. He joined the Massachusetts Legislature in 1986, becoming chairman of the House Education Committee in 1990, where he shepherded the passage of a 1993 education reform act.

He also was chief sponsor of the Gay Rights Bill that made Massachusetts the second state to outlaw discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Asked why he left politics, Roosevelt pointed to his 1994 race for governor. I got the hell beaten out of me, he said, in his race against Republican incumbent William Weld, who garnered almost 71 percent of the vote to Roosevelts 28 percent. Weld, incidentally, is running on the Libertarian presidential ticket this year with former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson.

Politics might seem a natural for Roosevelt, even though he winces when asked about his famous family name. He is a great-grandson of President Theodore Roosevelt  but youre more likely to see multiple images of Abraham Lincoln in his office.

Its been his lifes ambition, he said, that his obituary would not mention his famous relative, although he has become resigned to the fact that it probably will. Roosevelt said he doesnt believe in trying to skate by on a famous name.

More influential than his family connections, he said, has been the fact that he was a sickly child and had heart surgery when he was 9 years old. That transformative experience, he said, can spur ambition and give rise to a sense that life is precarious.

Especially for someone born privileged  and I was privileged  sickness can undercut that sense of privilege, he said.

Married to Dorothy Roosevelt, the college president is father to 10-year-old Juliana, adopted from Guatemala, and 30-year-old Matthew, who was adopted from Korea and is studying in North Carolina for a degree in technology systems management.
After a long absence  maybe as long as a couple of centuries  a celebration of Mexicos independence from Spain will return Saturday to Santa Fes downtown Plaza, where so much of the City Differents rich history has taken place.

The city has held an El Grito de Independencia celebration for about a dozen years, but those events took place at Franklin Miles and Ragle parks, closer to the concentration of immigrant and Mexican-American residents on the south side.

There is much more tradition to the event, Mexican Consul Efren Leyva said of holding El Grito in the citys central plaza.

In Mexico, El Grito is traditionally celebrated in city plazas.

Speaking through a translator, Leyva said the event is an opportunity for people of all ethnic backgrounds to experience a Mexican tradition and for people with roots in Mexico to feel at home.

Its important that the Mexican community still has the culture and tradition so they dont feel lost in another country, Leyva said.

The Mexican Consulate in Albuquerque approached Santa Fe Mayor Javier Gonzales last spring about moving the event downtown. It fit in with the mayors People to the Plaza initiative, which aims to draw community members (and not just tourists) to the downtown area, create a more vibrant scene and stimulate the economy.

Mexican Independence Day is recognized as Sept. 16, the date in 1810 when Padre Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla made his el Grito de Dolores, or cry of Dolores, urging townspeople of the small central Mexico village of Dolores to revolt against the oppression of the Spanish rule. The Santa Fe event takes place a day late, on Saturday, which is Sept. 17, from 3-9 p.m. on the Plaza.

The consulate said festivities will include Mexican music, dancing, food and fun.

The climax of the celebration, scheduled for 7 p.m., involves  as it does across Mexico  the ringing of a copper bell and the actual El Grito. Its a call-and-response cheer praising a list of heroes of the Mexican revolution, with the crowd responding Viva! after each line and ending with the repetition of Viva Mexico! three times.

Mariachi Ciudad Juarez will perform afterward. The governor of the Mexican state of Guerrero is scheduled to appear during the event.

A similar program will be held at Albuquerques Civic Plaza on Sunday.

Party like its 1822

Santa Fe held its first celebration of Mexican independence on the Plaza on a January day in 1822, the year after Mexico won the drawn-out war with Spain during which El Grito became a battle cry. New Mexico didnt become a United States territory until the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended the Mexican-American War.

Details of the 1822 event can be found on the Office of the State Historian website in an article titled An Unforgettable Day: Facundo Melgares on Independence. It contains the translated account of Melgares, governor of the New Mexico territory when Mexicos independence was won, who was writing for the Gaceta Imperial, the official government newspaper.

It also contains an insightful commentary on the governors account edited by renowned historian David J. Weber, whose research focused on Americas Southwest and the transition from Spanish to Mexican to U.S. rule.

The New Mexican governors official account maintains Santa Feans were caught up in patriotic ecstasy over Mexican independence. The pen cannot express the growing pleasure and great patriotism aroused in Santa Fe on this occasion, Melgares wrote.

But Webers article also quotes another mans account of the celebration that paints the picture differently. It was penned by Thomas James, who was charged with orchestrating the flag-raising ceremony during that first Santa Fe celebration.

What Melgares described as solemn and beautiful, Thomas James saw as sordid and crude, Weber wrote. Discrepancies in the two accounts illustrate how differently an episode can be perceived from two cultural perspectives.

According to Weber, who died in 2010, Melgares may have exaggerated in telling the tale owing to the fact he was a government official writing for the national newspaper and because he was trying to cover up New Mexicos earlier lack of enthusiasm for Independence.

New Mexico was, and still is, 1,200 miles from Mexico City and was rather isolated from the conflict. Consequently, Weber says the upper class in Santa Fe embraced independence reluctantly or indifferently.

The only certainty seems to be that Santa Fe officials were reluctant rebels who received Independence by mail and celebrated it when told to do so, he summarized.

Melgares wrote that the celebrations theme centered on the revolutions Three Guarantees: Independence, Religion and Union.

In the center of the plaza, on a white flag nailed very high, the Three Guarantees were imprinted within a tricolor heart, as if resting upon pervasive peace, he wrote, adding that when the Three Guarantees were unfurled, At once the crowd left for the principal street, serenading and showing inexpressible merriment.

Melgares and James agree merriment abounded and the party lasted for five days. They may not all have been celebrating Mexican Independence, but they were celebrating something.

All classes abandoned themselves to the most reckless dissipation and profligacy, James recalled years later. I saw enough during this five days revelry to convince me that the republicans of New Mexico were unfit to govern themselves or anybody else.

Universal carousing

It sounds like a heck of a party. James said cannon fire drew people to the Plaza from all around, and for five days the square was covered with Spaniards and Indians from every part of the province. During this whole time, the city exhibited a scene of universal carousing and revelry.

Weber wrote that despite Melgares declaration that the day New Mexicans learned of independence was an unforgettable day and that the celebration should be perpetual, it appears it was soon forgotten. There seems to have been no further celebration of Mexican Independence in Santa Fe, Weber writes.

But, on Saturday, the party will resume on the citys historic Plaza and cries of Viva Mexico! will be heard again.

El Grito de Dolores:

Spanish:

Mexicanos!

Vivan los heroes que nos dieron patria!

Viva Hidalgo!

Viva Morelos!

Viva Josefa Ortiz de Dominguez!

Viva Allende!

Vivan Aldama y Matamoros!

Viva la Independencia Nacional!

Viva Mexico! Viva Mexico! Viva Mexico!

English:

Mexicans!

Long live the heroes who gave us our homeland!

Long live Hidalgo!

Long live Morelos!

Long live Josefa Ortiz de Dominguez!

Long live Allende!

Long live Aldama and Matamoros!

Long live the independence of our nation!

Long Live Mexico! Long Live Mexico! Long Live Mexico!
A quiet revolution is underway on the campus of the Institute of American Indian Arts, where visual and computer technicians are doing work that could someday transform how we experience the world.

And while much of the work is being applied to the arts, since thats the colleges focus, its funding is coming from the Department of Defense  not an agency one usually thinks of as being interested in the arts.

Im just guessing, but Im thinking the simulation part is what THE DOD is interested in, said Mats Reiniusson, assistant professor and manager of IAIAs Digital Fulldome theater.

It can be used in any type of training, combat or rescue.

The it he is talking about involves various ways of rendering virtual reality, which the latest grant will help advance in the project for which Reiniusson is principal investigator: Interactivity and Simulation in Immersive Virtual Environments. This is the second three-year grant his program has applied for and received from the DOD, which this time is giving $500,000 to buy new equipment.

If youve visited the dome for screenings before, youre probably used to leaning back in reclining seats while images unfold in 180 degrees above you. New equipment being acquired by the school will allow filming in 360 degrees, completely surrounding someone in a visual environment  and an aural one, as well, since new equipment is intended to make the sound accurate in terms of its perceived origin in space.

Also, a person will be able to attach sensors to his or her body that will allow interaction with the projected images.

One student already has asked about developing an immersive lacrosse game, which has its origins among the Iroquois people, Reiniusson said.

But the software and equipment just as easily could be used as training materials for various situations  emergency responders in the state, for example, have inquired about the options for simulation training for their personnel, he said.

He estimated that only 10 institutions around the world have the advanced level of the type of technology IAIA has.

The Santa Fe school got a leap ahead when Charles Veasey, software developer and educator, developed a playback engine called vDome, according to Reiniusson. With six projectors transmitting images into the dome, it used to require eight computers to slice up the image into six pieces, with the resulting data then put into a different machine to reintegrate them into a complete image that could be projected.

VDome plays back any kind of image directly to the dome, Reiniusson said. Im teaching film production and now I can have students do a project, plug it in and play it back rather than waiting days to see it.

Along with the new technology, IAIA has been adding curriculum to teach students how to use it.

Last semester, we offered our first programming class, Veasey said, adding that IAIA also is starting a new interactive programming class. Media arts job postings, these days, often require applicants to have programming skills, he added.

Veasey is working on developing a virtual museum, in which people can walk through a gallery and browse all of the artworks in IAIAs collection. They also could be available online in three dimensions so that viewers can manipulate an object, viewing it from all angles and zooming in on details. Thirty to 60 images are used to create the 3-D model, he said, adding that the program template will be made available to anyone who wants to adapt it for their own uses.

But thats not all  hes looking to develop a social aspect so that people in various locations can look at the same images and discuss the object  have an intelligent conversation in real time with people of all backgrounds and knowledge about what they see, he said.

Again, this particular application is being used for museum objects, but could be applied to literally anything.

The recent flooding of the Seine into the basement of the Louvre, where staffers were hastily moving stored artworks to higher floors in hopes of avoiding damage to them, has stepped up interest in such virtual museums, he said.

And the destruction of antiquities across the Middle East by ISIS and other revolutionary groups makes one wish that such detailed models existed for them before they were lost to history. So much is disappearing of our ancient heritage, Reiniusson noted.

Augmented reality, in which computer graphics can be incorporated into an actual scene being viewed, also is being explored, he said.

Some of the most transformative effects, though, might appear in film production, Veasey said, calling the 360-degree camera the next wave of camera.

Its a new toy to play with and new technology to consider, he said, noting that filming equipment has been essentially the same since the 1920s, at least in terms of the square or rectangle through which filmmakers viewed the world. It can redefine what movie-making is.

That, in turn, could create greater impact for filmmaking with a political message, Reiniusson said.

Imagine, for instance, taking a 360-degree camera to Syria and transmitting the images to the United States, immersing viewers in events there and heightening their emotional reaction, he said.

Ultimately, IAIA has an advantage in that it doesnt have to focus on developing a marketable product through its experimentation with the technology, Veasey said.

One of the freedoms we have as an art school is we get to be the ones who can really explore it, he said. We can simply investigate it.

We can come up with things no one else will, Reiniusson agreed. Were very excited about this.
Copyright  2016 Albuquerque Journal

LAS CRUCES  Like a penchant for politics, sicknesses including alcoholism, depression and heart disease have long run in the Kennedy family line. And yet, from an early age, Patrick Kennedy said, his doctors treated his physical health and ignored the very real risks to his brain.

Mental health care is still not equal to health care, Kennedy told more than a thousand people at the Domenici Public Policy Conference at New Mexico State University. And until it is, he said, mental illness will remain stigmatized and undertreated.

The best anti-stigma campaign is when my children grow up and dont know the difference between mental health care and health care, he said in an emotional speech in which he shared his own struggle with addiction and mental illness.

Elected the youngest member of the House of Representatives at age 27 representing Rhode Island, Kennedy was a rising star when his struggle with bipolar disorder and addiction to prescription painkillers came crashing in on him. In 2006, he drove his car into a vehicle barrier on Capitol Hill and hours later publicly stated he would seek treatment for addiction.

He published A Common Struggle: A Personal Journey Through the Past and Future of Mental Illness and Addiction in 2015 and has become a vocal advocate for mental health treatment.

Kennedy has been stumping loudly for the government to enforce the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008, co-sponsored by New Mexicos former Sen. Pete Domenici, for whom the conference is named.

That legislation is supposed to require insurers to make access to mental health treatment no more restrictive than for physical ailments.

It says that if you provide it for the cancer patient, if you provide it for the heart disease patient, if you provide it for the diabetic or any other physical condition  you must do the same for the those suffering from chronic illnesses of the brain.

That means that we pay for all that chronic care and acute care that we have today, he said. We have people sleeping on our streets. We have people languishing in our jails. This is an indictment on our country.

New Mexicos  and the nations  struggle to understand and treat mental illness was the heart and soul of the Domenici conference in its ninth year, drawing speakers including a mother whose son struggles with bipolar disorder; a Florida judge who has led reforms to keep the mentally ill out of jail; and a research scientist who is looking at the future of treatment for serious mental disorders. Consultant John Edelman, who would speak about public trust in institutions, choked up as he opened his speech with a reflection on his mothers battle with bipolar disorder.

The two-day conference offered multiple ways to improve care  and pay for it. Likewise, speakers said early treatment could mean less costly care and less risk of incarceration.

Kennedy hammered many of their key points home on Thursday, calling for civil rights for the mentally ill.

Demographers have said that our life expectancy as Americans is actually flatlining or going down due to increases in fatal drug overdoses and suicide, Kennedy said. It is shocking when you think about the size and scope of this public health epidemic that we have not heard more from all branches of government about how we are going to address this crisis.

Domenici, who attended the conference, served New Mexico in Congress for 36 years and made mental health legislation a cornerstone of his legacy.

Kennedy said, My call to all of you is, you love this man, he has served this state and this country. Let us make sure we become stewards, that mental health is not a separate and unequal health care system, but mental health is considered part of our health care system.
Pope killed my great-grandma.

Im not kidding.

Of course, you have to go back 12 generations from me to get to her.

Her name was Damiana Dominguez de Mendoza, and she was killed on Aug. 12, 1680  the third day of the Pueblo Revolt.

She wasnt a soldier or a threat to anyone. She was, for those times, an old lady.

Perhaps if I had been educated in the modern way of thinking, because of this offense 336 years ago I would hate the Pueblo people and their traditions and find offense in their feast days  especially their annual celebrations of Pope that have sprung up in recent years.

But I dont. I couldnt. The very idea is anathema to me.

So is the idea of disrupting a solemn ceremony with the yelling of insults and loud noises, as some protesters did during the recent Fiestas de Santa Fe. All I could think of was, shame.

Great-grandma Damiana was born on Oct. 4, 1628, in Mexico City to Juan Bartolome Dominguez of Cartagena de Levante, Spain, and Elena Rodriguez de Mendoza of Veracruz, New Spain  my 13th generation grandparents in this particular line.

After marrying Alvaro de Paredes, Damiana and her husband ventured north to the frontier of New Mexico. There, in 1655, they had a daughter named Maria de Paredes.

Unfortunately, Alvaro de Paredes died in June 1662 after being struck by lightning in Santa Fe.

At some point, Damiana married Agustin de Carvajal.

On Aug. 12, 1680, according to several genealogy sources, both Damiana and her husband were killed during the Pueblo Revolt at their home in Angostura, near present-day Algodones. She was 51, and he was 55.

Damianas daughter, Maria, who had given birth to Maria Antonia Montoya de Paredes in 1679, was able to escape with her young daughter. Most of the refugees fled south to El Paso.

Of the 2,800 or so settlers in northern New Mexico at the time of the Pueblo Revolt, 21 Franciscan priests and 380 other men, women and children were killed by the revolutionaries.

Of those who escaped the bloodshed, fewer than 1,200 survived the arduous flight to El Paso.

Of course, hundreds of Pueblo fighters also died in the revolt. Death is the unfortunate side effect of war. People who understand history understand that.

But conditions change, and only the foolish would consider events that happened centuries ago and hold them against their contemporary neighbors.

In 1692, Don Diego de Vargas reconquered New Mexico for Spain  thats the event commemorated annually in the Fiestas de Santa Fe.

Maria de Paredes was able to return to New Mexico, where she died in 1703.

Her daughter, Maria Antonia, gave birth to Catalina Martin in Chimayo in 1699.

And that line of my mothers side of the family has remained in northern New Mexico through today, if you consider Albuquerque to be north.

New Mexico remained under Spanish dominion until 1821 and then was under Mexican rule until 1848, when the Americans took over.

And we  all of us New Mexicans  have remained under American rule ever since.

The Pueblo Revolt kept the New Mexico colonists  or conquering forces, depending on your point of view  away for just 12 years, but the effects were substantial.

The colonizers learned a lesson and began treating the tribes with greater respect and dignity. By the time the Americans came along, it was impossible for them to handle the Indians in the same devastating way they had in the East, or would along the West Coast.

The 1680 revolt is one big reason that in New Mexico you still find Native Americans living on ancestral lands, speaking ancestral tongues and practicing their ancestral religions.

Thats Popes true accomplishment. Thats why he deserves a statue in the halls of Congress, joining one of Sen. Dennis Chavez, a civil rights pioneer.

And thats one reason why I just cant understand the thinking by some people today that it is OK to disrespect anothers cultural heritage by calling them racist and other names for celebrating who they are. Arent all people entitled to be proud of their roots?

It wouldnt hurt to remember that over the centuries there were marriages between Pueblo and non-Pueblo people. Love is the great, uncontrollable connector.

At some point in my life, I have visited every Pueblo in New Mexico, from Acoma to Zuni, and have met genuinely friendly people wherever I have gone.

My family has been invited into homes at several pueblos for food and conversation, sometimes by total strangers. Or, to stay after the dances, when at some pueblos things are thrown off the rooftops of homes to much merriment. What you catch, you keep  but watch out for water balloons!

I have watched dancers from Taos to Ohkay Owingeh to Paguate, being quietly respectful and in awe of how much I cant comprehend.

And I just cant imagine shouting insults at the gracious people there today who had nothing to do with the death of great-grandma Damiana.

UpFront is a daily front-page news and opinion column. Comment directly to editorial page editor Dan Herrera at 823-3810 or dherrera@abqjournal.com. Go to ABQjournal.com/letters/new to submit a letter to the editor.
WASHINGTON  Creating the Atlantic Oceans first marine national monument is a needed response to dangerous climate change, oceanic dead zones and unsustainable fishing practices, President Barack Obama said Thursday.

The new Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument consists of nearly 5,000 square miles of underwater canyons and mountains off the New England coast. Its the 27th time that Obama has created or enlarged a national monument.

If were going to leave our children with oceans like the ones that were left to us, then were going to have to act and were going to have to act boldly, Obama said at a State Department conference. More than 20 countries represented at the meeting were also announcing the creation of their own marine protected areas.

Monument designations come with restrictions on certain activities. The White House said the designation will lead to a ban on commercial fishing, mining and drilling, though a seven-year exception will occur for the lobster and red crab industries. Others, such as whiting and squid harvesters, have 60 days to transition out. Recreational fishing will be allowed within the monument.

Supporters of the new monument say protecting large swaths of ocean from human stresses can sustain important species and reduce the toll of climate change. Fishermen worry it will become harder for them to earn a living as a result of Obamas move.

This is deplorable, said Grant Moore, president of the Atlantic Offshore Lobstermens Association, in describing the designation.

White House officials said the administration listened to industrys concerns, and noted the monument is smaller than originally proposed and contains a transition period for companies. Obama said helping oceans become more resilient to climate change will help fishermen.

Jon Williams, president of the Atlantic Red Crab Company in New Bedford, Massachusetts, said his company will survive, but the changes designed to address some of the industrys concerns dont sway him about the merits of the monument.

Weve been fishing out there for 35 years, Williams said. Its a big blow to us.

Obama said the world was asking too much of its oceans. He said the investments the U.S. and other nations were taking with new marine protected areas were vital for their economy and national security, but also vital to our spirit. He noted that he had spent his own childhood looking out over the ocean shores and being humbled by the endless expanse.

I know that in a contest between us and the oceans, eventually the oceans will win one way or the other, he said. So its up to us to adapt, not the other way around.

In all, the Atlantic Ocean monument will include three underwater canyons deeper than the Grand Canyon and four underwater mountains. It is home to such protected species as the sperm, fin and sei whales, and Kemps ridley turtles. Expeditions also have found species of coral found nowhere else on earth.

Environmental groups pushed the effort to designate the new monument and sought to make the case it was as important to be good stewards of the ocean as it was the land and air. They described the monument, located about 130 miles off the coast of Cape Cod, as one of the least fished areas in the U.S. Atlantic, which is part of why it was chosen.

Their efforts proved persuasive with a president who is also looking to establish his own legacy as a protector of the environment. Obama noted that he has protected more land and water through monument designations than any president in history.

On Capitol Hill, Rep. Rob Bishop, the Republican chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, said Obama will certainly leave his legacy  on the backs of fishermen and our entire domestic seafood supply.

But Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said the monument will protect countless species and habitats from irreversible damage, advance key research, and support critical jobs that depend on healthy oceans.
WASHINGTON  The Drug Enforcement Administration has received a torrent of backlash from patients with chronic pain and former opiate users after announcing plans to ban kratom, a plant gaining popularity across the United States for its opiate-like effects.

Kratom, which originates in Southeast Asia, has become more widespread in the United States in the past decade, fueled by online testimonials from users and a lack of federal regulation. Advocates say the plant  typically crushed and mixed or brewed with water  poses few health risks while helping users relieve severe pain and overcome addictions to powerful prescription painkillers.

A DEA spokesman told The Washington Post that the agency has received a surprising number of comments about the ban and could ease the restrictions after further research.

The Food and Drug Administration began seizing some kratom shipments from overseas in 2014. This summer, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that annual calls to poison-control centers related to kratom use jumped from 26 in 2010 to 263 in 2015. States have been quietly banning the substance: Alabama and Arkansas outlawed it earlier this year, joining four others  Indiana, Wisconsin, Vermont and Tennessee  according to the American Kratom Association.

The DEA recently announced a temporary federal ban on kratom beginning Sept. 30. The active chemicals in the plant will be placed on Schedule 1 of the Controlled Substances Act, the most restrictive regulatory category, designated for substances with no medical use and a high potential for abuse.

The placement of these opioids into schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act is necessary to avoid an imminent hazard to the public safety, the DEA wrote in the Federal Register. The agencys notice cited reports of 15 deaths linked to, though not necessarily attributable to, kratom use between 2014 and 2016.

The ban would automatically sunset after two years unless the DEA acts, and spokesman Melvin Patterson said he could see the agency moving kratom from the highly restrictive Schedule 1 to the less-restrictive Schedules 3 to 5, reserved for minimally addictive drugs with accepted medicinal use.

I dont see it being Schedule 2 [or higher] because that would be a drug thats highly addictive, he said. Kratoms at a point where it needs to be recognized as medicine. I think that we are going to find out that probably it does.

He cautioned that research would be necessary to know for sure how to best regulate the drug, and its safest to put kratom on Schedule 1 in the meantime. Still, Patterson noted that public response to the ban has been overwhelming.

That was eye-opening for me personally, he said. I want the kratom community to know that the DEA does hear them. Our goal is to make sure this is available to all of them. he said.

John Hudak, a drug policy expert at the Brookings Institution, says its fairly common for the DEA to temporarily ban a drug and later ease the restrictions, often as a result of lobbying and research from pharmaceutical companies hoping to sell them. Its less common for a scheduled drug to be removed from the list of controlled substances altogether, but it does happen.

Still, Hudak said, the strict scheduling of kratom would make it harder for researchers to access the drug, which could limit the very research that the DEA says is necessary to determine whether it has medical benefits.

A lower scheduling might actually spur that type of research for these natural substances, Hudak said. Its not necessarily going to happen under Schedule 1.

  

Kratom has been used in the Southeast Asia for recreational and medical purposes for centuries, according to a 2011 report from the Transnational Institute, a research and advocacy organization. Traditionally, people in the region chewed it to produce a mild stimulant effect, similar to coffee.

At stronger doses, the plants effects mimic those of opiate drugs: A 2015 review of users self-reported experiences with the drug found that kratom users reported relaxation, a sense of well-being and pain relief, along with typical opiate side-effects, including upset stomach upset, vomiting, itching, and mild sedation, the researchers wrote in the Journal of Psychoactive Drugs.

Over the past decade, the recreational use of kratom has become more popular in Western countries, spurred largely by mentions of the plant in online forums where users share their experiences using various drugs. The lack of federal restrictions on the drug has facilitated the growth of a small industry of U.S.-based retailers who import it from overseas and sell it online or in head shops.

The drug has become popular enough that a non-profit group, the American Kratom Association, was founded in 2014 to represent kratom users and educate the public on the drug and its effects.

Some researchers say that the DEAs reasoning for the ban is shaky and that cracking down on kratom could push users to more dangerous and addictive opiates.

The people using kratom are often in pain or addicted to other drugs, said Marc Swogger, a clinical psychologist at the University of Rochester Medical Center, who has published research on kratom use. Those are two groups that need options for improving their situations. Without those options, Im not sure what theyre going to do. Will they begin to take heroin? Will they show up for treatment and get the appropriate treatment?

Moreover, Swogger says, the DEAs own data do not indicate there is any public health reason for this.

In a paper last year, Swogger and co-authors wrote that, in all of the fatal overdose cases involving kratom, the users had either taken other drugs, too, or had a history of alcohol- or heroin-abuse that also could have caused or contributed to the death.

We just dont know what actually caused the kratom-related deaths, Swogger said in an interview.

The research indicates that this is a pretty mild substance, he said. Criminalizing kratom use is insane to me.

Melvin Patterson, the DEA spokesman, said in an interview that one of the deaths was directly attributable to kratom alone  a 36-year-old man who died in Colorado in 2013. His family told local media he was using the drug to combat anxiety and became addicted. Relatives said he showed no signs of being sick.

  

Still, advocates for the drug say the research that has been done shows that kratoms effects are mild compared to opiate painkillers, and say that the plant has helped many people kick dependencies on hydrocodone, oxycodone and other powerful prescription painkillers.

Kratom has helped millions of people suffering chronic and acute mental and physical conditions, the American Kratom Association says. A fact sheet published by the group says that today Americans use kratom for things like fatigue, pain, depression, anxiety, PTSD, to ease themselves off opiates and to help manage addiction. Much of the evidence for this comes from testimonials from the groups own members, as published research into kratom use is rare.

Domestically, kratom is often sold online by vendors based in the United States and overseas. Some deal in kratom exclusively, while others sell kratom along with other so-called natural supplements.

The drug is also commonly found in brick-and-mortar smoke shops across the United States. Because theres no regulation, the quality and purity of the product can vary widely.

Government surveys do not ask about kratom use, so theres no official tally of the number of users. Susan Ash, director of the American Kratom Association, estimated that between between 3 million and 5 million Americans have used the drug at some time in their lives, based on information from retailers.

We are your neighbors, she said. We are your everyday people. We are not people who should be turned into felons for consuming a plant.

On Tuesday, Ash and hundreds of advocates demonstrated at the White House in protest of the upcoming ban. More than 120,000 people have signed a petition asking the White House to stop the DEA ban.

Aaron Walker was one of them. Hes a U.S. Navy veteran who now works for a kratom company called Edens Ethnos. He began using the drug to deal with the symptoms of a back injury suffered while he was in the service.

I went to the VA a year ago for my back. I couldnt walk, he said. They gave me dilaudid, hydrocodone and oxycontin, and they gave me x-rays and then sent me on my way. Thats all they do is just give you pills.

Walker says he prefers to self-medicate with kratom, which he calls the only thing that mitigates the pain. Plus, he says, hes more comfortable using a natural drug instead of powerful synthetic opiates.

The dangerous drugs are the ones that are being prescribed by doctors, he said.
DENVER  The Latest on American men killed fighting Islamic State coming home (all times local):

8:20 a.m.

U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter presented flags to the families of two men, who never joined the U.S. military but died fighting the Islamic State group in Syria, after their bodies arrived back in Colorado on Friday.

The caskets of Levi Shirley, 24, Jordan MacTaggart, 22, along with that of William Savage, 27, arrived Wednesday at Chicagos OHare International Airport after a complicated journey without ceremony.

Shirley and MacTaggart returned by train to Denver.

The bodies were delivered to their sobbing loved ones in plain, gray caskets. A team of pallbearers unloaded the caskets from an Amtrak train and lifted them into hearses while sleepy passengers watched curiously.

Savage, of Maryland, was being transported to North Carolina, where his father lives.

___

7:15 a.m.

Relatives of two Colorado men killed fighting the Islamic State group in Syria are huddling together at a train terminal waiting for their bodies to be returned home.

The bodies of Levi Shirley and Jordan MacTaggart are being repatriated Friday after a long and complicated journey.

Standing beside a pair of hearses, the families embraced to keep warm in the morning cold at Denvers Union Station.

U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter says he plans to present the families with a pair of flags flown atop the U.S. Capitol as a sign of respect.

The body of a third American, William Savage of Maryland, is being transported to North Carolina, where his father lives.

___

12:30 a.m.

Three young Americans who never joined the U.S. military but died fighting the Islamic State group in Syria will return home to military-type honors.

The caskets of Levi Shirley, Jordan MacTaggart and William Savage were due to arrive home Friday after a complicated journey without ceremony.

Shirley and MacTaggart are from Colorado. Savage, of Maryland, will be transported to North Carolina, where his father lives.

Their families will each be presented with a flag flown over the U.S. Capitol.

The men died separately in combat after joining the Peoples Protection Units  the main Kurdish guerrilla group battling the Islamic State in Syria.

Turkeys tense relationship with the Kurds and the U.S. since Julys failed coup hindered efforts to bring the three men home.
LAS CRUCES  A leader of a powerful New Mexico prison gang pleaded guilty Thursday to conspiring to murder two high-ranking Corrections Department officials, including Secretary Gregg Marcantel.

Roy Paul Martinez, aka Shadow, pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy to murder in aid of racketeering before U.S. Magistrate Gregory B. Wormuth in federal court in Las Cruces.

In accepting a plea agreement, Martinez, who is currently serving prison time for first- and second-degree murder, admitted Thursday that he joined the prison gang known as Syndicato de Nuevo Mexico, or SNM, in 1995 and later became one of its leaders.

He further admitted that between 2013 and 2015, he conspired with the gangs other leaders, Anthony Ray Baca, aka Pup, and Robert Martinez, aka Baby Rob, to kill Marcantel and Dwayne Santistevan, the director of the Corrections Departments Security Threat Intelligence Unit.

Shackled and wearing a yellow jumpsuit, Martinez said on Thursday that Baca became angry with the Corrections Department in 2013 because officials had moved him to a prison outside New Mexico. As a result, Baca ordered the murders of Marcantel and Santistevan, Martinez said.

In 2015, Martinez said he wrote letters instructing the gangs foot soldiers to carry out the planned killings.

I conspired with other leaders (of SNM), and I wrote letters to get people under me to kill the secretary of the Corrections Department and the head of the STI Unit, he told Wormuth. I was a leader (of SNM) at that time, he added.

He also told Wormuth that he wrote the letters to maintain and increase my position in the SNM.

The SNM formed in the early 1980s at the Penitentiary of New Mexico in Santa Fe County, after the deadly riot in February 1980. During the riot, 33 inmates were killed and 14 correctional officers were taken hostage, many who were seriously assaulted and raped.

During the 1980s, the gang boasted as many 500 members. Currently, prison officials estimate that there are about 200 SNM members throughout prisons in New Mexico, according to an FBI search warrant affidavit that was unsealed this week.

In March 2015, the FBI, along with the Corrections Department and the Bernalillo County Sheriffs Office, launched an investigation into the criminal activities of the SNM, which federal prosecutors say operates as a racketeering enterprise in New Mexico and elsewhere.

The investigation, which has been designated as Operation Atonement by the U.S. Department of Justice, began when authorities learned of the threat made against Marcantel and Santistevan.

The threat culminated late last year, the affidavit says, when Baca directed Chris Garcia, a member of SNM who was on the street, to obtain firearms and murder the NMCD officials or their families.

According to the affidavit, Garcia acquired two firearms and provided a handgun to a second member of SNM, who was working as a confidential human source, or CHS, for the FBI. The source was ordered to use the handgun to kill Marcantel.

A third member of SNM, Mandel Lon Parker, aka Chuco, also agreed to assist in the killings, the affidavit says. But unbeknownst to him (Parker), Garcia instructed the CHS to kill Parker after the mission was complete, because Garcia did not trust Parker, the affidavit says.

By December 2015, FBI agents and federal prosecutors in New Mexico had executed Phase 1 of Operation Atonement. At that time, the prosecutors and agents presented a portion of the SNM investigation to a federal grand jury, which returned more than 40 indictments against SNM members and associates, who were charged with various drug, firearms and racketeering violations.

After the indictments were handed down, FBI agents and members of other law enforcement agencies served dozens of search warrants on SNM members and associates. In the months that followed, several additional SNM members and associates were arrested by federal authorities on criminal complaints for allegedly carrying out various violent crimes, including murder, in aid of racketeering.

By April, Phase 2 of Operation Atonement had been carried out. Additional evidence against SNM was presented to another federal grand jury, and two supplementary indictments were obtained against 39 gang members, including Roy Paul Martinez, Robert Martinez and Baca, and associates.

At sentencing, Roy Paul Martinez faces up to 20 years in prison for the two conspiracy charges, according to the plea agreement. He will be sentenced at a later date.

Marcantel was unable to comment on Thursday, a spokeswoman for the Corrections Department said.

Carlos Andres Lopez can be reached 575-541-5453, carlopez@lcsun-news.com or @carlopez_los on Twitter.



2016 the Las Cruces Sun-News (Las Cruces, N.M.)

Visit the Las Cruces Sun-News (Las Cruces, N.M.) at www.lcsun-news.com

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

_____
About a dozen volunteers showed up by mid-morning Wednesday at the 10-acre site where 12 members of the Alto wild horse herd are expected to be penned for a 21-day isolation period when they are returned to Lincoln County while awaiting a court ruling.

Land owner Shelley McAlister said she expected the pens to be ready with extra fencing and water troughs added, and then the only addition needed would be installation of multiple security cameras. The property should be ready for its guests by Friday (Sept. 16), she said, pledging to make sure the community is notified of their arrival time at 384 Fort Stanton Road in Alto.

They (the New Mexico Livestock Board) want us to get them back in the next few days, McAlister told about 50 people attending a public meeting Tuesday for updated news about the herd.

William Bunce, executive director of the livestock board, said Wednesday that his agencys attorney as well as the attorney for the Wild Horse Observers Association were contacted that morning by McAlister.

Ive not seen any final documentation, he said. (But we were) made aware that the volunteers were getting a site location ready to go. Everyone is working intently to ensure a legal procedure and positive outcome.

This has never been an isolated group, this has always been a community (fighting for the horses), Teeatta Lippert said during the Tuesday meeting. Obviously, we are all here and are all concerned. This is all of our effort, all of our hard work, all of our noise leading to the judge granting the temporary restraining order at this point.

That order stopped the sale of the horses until a court decides their status as wild horses or estray livestock, which also ties to whether the New Mexico Livestock Board has jurisdiction.

(The judge) said he saw how if he did not grant this that the ball would just keep rolling down the hill and without stopping it before these horses disappeared, there would be no conflict and with no conflict, theres no horses and with no horses, no trial, Lippert said. There are a few things we have to follow and one is that we have to stop calling the livestock board. They have agreed to give them back. We have to stop harassing them, even though they did what they did. They are complying with what the judge told them to do and they got back to us as soon as possible.

McAlister was contacted at 3 p.m. Monday about the return of the horses, she said. So we will do everything as a community to make sure these horses are safe and cared for, Lippert said. Everything the judge signs off on, we are going to comply with 100 percent. We give (the livestock board) absolutely no reason to ever come here and do this again.

McAlister said the livestock board offered to bring the mares and foals back by transport truck. But they also left open for volunteers to pick them up. A quick vote of those at the meeting determined that the livestock board should bear that responsibility and expense, because it took the horses away. They also voted to use McAlisters property for the isolation period and then evaluate any offers of more land with pastures that could allow the horses to be less dependent on human care and to feel more wild. The owner must be horse savvy and there must be adequate fencing.

The isolation requires fencing that will not allow nose to nose contact with other horses. A veterinarian is on board to treat them, if anything is needed.

The money we raised will take care the vet bills, Lippert said. If people want to volunteer to help take care of them, to feed them or do whatever is needed, we have a sign up list and will set up a schedule. Anyone who wants to be involved, can be.

The stallion was spotted that morning and reportedly visits some local homes every evening to graze on overgrown grass. He cannot be allowed into the pens with the herd. The court order says he can be around them, but he cannot be let in with him, because technically then, we are capturing him and he is subjected to the same stuff, McAlister said. With a double fence, he can come around and he will know they are there and be happy hanging around them.

Thats why using land in Alto is important, because he probably will find them, she said. When they bring them in, they are going to start talking because they will know where they are, McAlister said. Hes going to find them.

The ultimate goal is eventually to turn them loose as wild horses, she said. The case brought by WHOA against the livestock board for taking possession of the herd should require no more than 120 days to resolve, she said the judge estimated. If the ruling is against release, then adopted homes will be found for the horses, she said.

Seven people will be needed to sign papers accepting responsibility for mare and foal pairs, one mare and one filly. At the end, if it turns out in our favor, that goes away, McAlister said. If it doesnt, the person signing takes them home. If too many people want them, we can devise a selection process.

While they are responsible, those signing will bear the liability that exists with having any horse, she said. The livestock board was denied a request to have bonds posted covering the horses and those signing will not be charged for the expense of caring for the herd since it was taken to Santa Fe, McAlister said.

People who donate fencing panels, water troughs and other equipment will be able to reclaim the items after the time of isolation.

None of the colts were gelded, they were too young, McAlister said. But all of the horses have been microchipped and vaccinated. When the livestock board or anyone picks them up, those horses will show as wild horse, so it is not a bad thing, it is a good thing, McAlister said.

They will know they have to let them go and cant do something silly as they did in the past, Lippert said, referring to a herd member two years ago that may have been sold for slaughter after being picked up by a brand inspector. All of the numbers are there, so we will know who they are.

The horses are in good health, but one filly was run off by the stallion two months ago and has to be kept away from the others, even in transport, she said. That horse probably will have to be adopted, because of her special mental issues and because the other horses abuse her.

Some attending the meeting worried about the agency bothering the stallion or two other wild herds in the area, but McAlister and Lippert said they doubted livestock officials want to get mired in another situation like the existing one.

The court decision in the Alto case should set a precedent for how other wild horses are handled in the future, she said.

They are following this in Montana, so what we do and how we act, how we treat this, our community is the base for how they go forward with every other case in the country, Lippert said. We will be referenced. Thats why it is so important that we follow everything that this judge is asking us to do. (The case) is a stepping stone for every other case going forward. They are kind of holding us to a higher standard with other judges watching.

Everything decided at the meeting including the isolation site and those who will sign for responsibility to care for the horses must be submitted to the attorneys and the judge for approval, McAlister said.

People who want to pay for or donate feed for the horses can contact Harveys Feed, and donations also can be submitted at any City Bank branch made out to the Wild Horses of Lincoln County. Donations are tax exempt. To date, the fund sits at about $27,000. Lippert said while the gofundme account has been good for people to use from out of state, the entity takes a 7.9 percent cut to cover its expenses and a transfer fee for when the money is moved to a bank account. That cut can be avoided with direct donations to the bank.

The attorney working on the Alto and Placitas cases, Steven K. Sanders, has been paid $5,000 from money collected, Lippert said.

If the herd is returned to the wild, some additional attention may be needed in the future to control its population, possibly darting mares with birth control mixtures that will last one year, McAlister said.



2016 the Ruidoso News (Ruidoso, N.M.)

Visit the Ruidoso News (Ruidoso, N.M.) at www.ruidosonews.com

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

_____
LOS LUNAS  State Police and Albuquerque officers told jurors Friday morning about their roles in the manhunt that ensued in the hours after Rio Rancho officer Gregg Benner was killed in May 2015.

Testimony presented in the half day of trial Friday centered on the way police officers from multiple agencies worked together to take Andrew Romero into custody and to process the evidence found at multiple scenes related to the shooting.

Romero is on trial on murder and other charges in connection with Benner's death. The trial continues Monday morning in Valencia County before state District Judge George Eichwald.

State Police investigator Mitch Bengston said he and another officer received updates from a police helicopter as it tracked a Chevrolet Impala carrying Romero and two others.

Bengston said he followed the vehicle as it stopped at a gas station on Rio Grande NW before driving through a nearby neighborhood. They eventually attempted to initiate a felony stop on Interstate 25 near the Albuquerque International Sunport exit after they learned that the Impala had been involved in a robbery at the gas station, he said.

I engaged my lights, Bengston told jurors. The vehicle initially slowed, and then the brake lights went off and the vehicle sped up very quickly.

The officers pursued the car and sheriff's deputies joined in. The Impala finally came to a stop in a gas station parking lot near Broadway and Rio Bravo.

Bengston said several more law enforcement personnel were on scene as he shouted commands to the car's occupants, instructing each one individually to exit the vehicle and walk backward to officers who took the trio, including Romero, into custody.

Later, Bengston said, he noticed a pistol lying in the gas station driveway. A gas station employee said she had seen it thrown from the window of the Impala.

Bengston said he reviewed footage taken with an infrared camera on the helicopter, which showed that an object had been thrown from the front passenger seat of the car, which is where Romero was riding.

Rodger Brunson, a member of the State Police crime scene team, said that firearm was a loaded 9mm Beretta.

It was ready to fire, Brunson said on the stand. There was a round in the chamber and the safety lever was in firing position.

Brunson said there were at least 10 more rounds in a magazine.

Albuquerque Police Department Detective Diane Dosal reviewed surveillance images that she said showed Romero robbing the gas station on Rio Grande.

He's holding a handgun in his right hand, Dosal said, describing one image. Reviewing a second, she said Romero was making statements to the cashier.

His demands, she said.
Under intense court security this morning in state District Court, the trio indicted in the drugging, rape and murder of 10-year-old Victoria Martens were mum as their attorneys entered not guilty pleas to the charges against them.

Judge Christina Argyres decided to raise the bond for Martens mother Michelle Martens from $1 million to $1.5 million cash only.

Prosecutors asked for a no bond hold pending trial for the defendants in the case that has horrified the community.

Noting that she was required by state law to set some kind of bond in the case, Argyres kept the original $1 million cash only bond for co-defendants Fabian Gonzales and Jessica Kelley, who was wheeled into the courtroom in a wheelchair. Kelley broke her leg jumping from outside the second story apartment after Martens was killed.

Michelle Martens, 35, Fabian Gonzales, 31, and Jessica Kelley, 31, are each facing first degree murder, criminal sexual penetration and 17 other counts in an indictment returned a week ago. Each were being held in jail on $1 million bond.

Martens, who was Victorias mother and has a younger child, is alleged to have stood by and watched between Aug. 23 and the morning of Aug. 24 while Gonzales raped the girl and Kelley held Victoria down. The girl was later strangled and stabbed and dismembered. The trio is charged with tampering with evidence for allegedly hiding her underwear and other items.

According to a search warrant affidavit, Martens told Albuquerque police she had allowed other men to sexually assault her daughter and said she had sought out the men online and at work.

She told police she had set up encounters with at least three. Gonzales told police he met Martens about a month prior to the killing on an online dating website. Police are continuing to pursue leads about the other men.

So far, the charges pertain solely to Victoria Martens slaying.
ISTANBUL  Clashes erupted Friday between Syrian rebels and government forces just outside Damascus, state media and activists said, puncturing days of calm under a cease-fire brokered by Russia and the United States.

The battles did not appear to seriously threaten the truce or immediately spark wider unrest, although the fighting between Syrian troops and anti-government rebels in the Damascus suburb of Jobar underscored the fragile hold of the cease-fire since it took effect Monday.

Of primary concern to U.S. and United Nations officials, however, was the failure of aid agencies, for the fourth day in a row, to reach besieged populations in the city of Aleppo and other areas, including embattled sites near Damascus.

The largest impediment is [Syrian President Bashar] Assad not giving the green light to trucks coming across the border to reach Aleppo, an Obama administration official said in Washington.

The official said that the Syrians were claiming that government offices were currently closed and unable to issue the required documentation because of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha.

Under the cease-fire deal, Russia is responsible for ensuring Syrian compliance with its terms. What we think is going on is that the Russians dont appear to have the leverage on Assad that they said they have, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. Until this aid comes through, I think its hard to see implementation of other parts of the agreement.

A second phase of the deal spells out potential U.S.-Russia military coordination against militant groups, including the Islamic State and a former al-Qaida faction. Implementation of that phase requires seven consecutive days of reduced violence in Syria, and delivery of the aid.

In a morning telephone call with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Secretary of State John Kerry warned that the United States would not establish the Joint Implementation Center, where the coordination is supposed to take place, unless and until the agreed terms for humanitarian access are met, State Department spokesman John Kerry said.

The violence Friday near Damascus was the fiercest reported this week.

The state-run Syrian Arab News Agency said militants attempted to launch raids on military checkpoints near the capital. The army responded with a counteroffensive, the agency said.

Rebels, however, claimed Syrian troops attacked the area first, launching a three-pronged assault that began in the early morning. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based activist network, said the government targeted Jobar with surface-to-surface missiles.

The regime forces tried to advance under the cover of tanks and mortars, said Muhammad Abu Yaman, an activist with the opposition-aligned Jobar Media Center. We never believed in the truce because we never trusted the regime.

It was not possible to independently verify the accounts, although the Obama administration official charged that Assad was the lead spoiler. But the clashes highlighted the challenges facing the cease-fires broader objectives.

The United States, which has supported opposition rebel groups, and Russia, which backs the Assad government, have hoped the accord would ultimately pave the way for political negotiations to end the bloodshed.

While the truce has reduced the level of violence, disputes have emerged over the most basic tenets of the deal. Under the agreement, combatants are expected to withdraw from Castello Road, the only way in and out of the besieged part of eastern Aleppo. Each side has accused the other of failing to pull back.

A retreat from the road would allow U.N. agencies and other aid groups to bring life-saving assistance to desperate civilians in Aleppo, now blockaded for more than a month. But a test of security arrangements along the road is only possible once the Syrian government allows the trucks to enter the country, the administration official said.

On Friday, a coalition of at least 100 Syrian and international nongovernmental organizations released a statement urging the United States and Russia to pressure the government and Syrian opposition to allow aid to get through during the rare period of calm.

Sporadic and temporary cessations of violence cannot become ends in themselves, said the statement, which was signed by organizations including Oxfam and Save the Children. The lives of innocent Syrian civilians are in their hands.

Brita Haji Hasan, president of the opposition council in Aleppo, said in an interview that residents also want access to Castello Road. There are also patients who need to be evacuated for urgent medical care.

The U.N. said that fuel and commercial traffic are, of course, important, but that its not under their jurisdiction, Hasan said. He vowed that the opposition would not reject the U.N. aid.

But what is happening is unreasonable, he said. There is no clear plan for anything.



Heba Habib in Berlin and Karen DeYoung in Washington contributed to this report.

syria-1stld-writethru
Picture use

Unless otherwise stated all photos on this site are copyrighted  Jim Budd. They should not be used without authorisation and due credit. Please contact me on budmac@btinternet.com for all use. There will usually be a charge for use in commercial publications  papers, magazines, websites etc. and for other commercial uses. Photos that are used for commercial use without permission will be charged double  the fee for the use of photo and for breach of copyright. Commercial organisations asking to use photos for no payment may not always receive a polite response.
North Koreas accelerating nuclear and missile programs, including its recent nuclear test, pose a grave and expanding threat to security, stability and peace in Asia and the rest of the world. This threat affects close U.S. allies  South Korea and Japan  and U.S. personnel and facilities in the region. In the coming months and years, it will create increasing danger for the United States. It is likely that the next president will face a North Korea that has gained the capability to strike the United States with nuclear weapons.

President Barack Obamas administration has succeeded in strengthening U.S. alliances in Asia and deterring a war, but, like its predecessors, has failed to change Pyongyangs assessment that defiance is preferable to conciliation. It is clear that the next president will have to sharpen Pyongyangs choice: offer greater benefits for cooperation and promise greater costs for continued defiance.

For the past several months, we have led a task force to assess the state of U.S. policy toward North Korea and to propose a new comprehensive strategy for the region.

Our goal  and most of the worlds goal  is a stable and nuclear-free Korean Peninsula, at peace in the region and with the world. To achieve that, the worlds leading nations must come together as never before to address North Koreas nuclear and ballistic missile programs, prevent it from spreading nuclear and missile technology to dangerous actors, and address its unconscionable human rights record. We do not seek to promote conflict  we seek to promote peace.

We make four principal recommendations, to be implemented in parallel:

1. Addressing the North Korean threat must be a front-burner issue for the United States and China. China can help get North Korea back to the negotiating table by working with the United States, South Korea, Japan and Russia on both diplomatic and economic approaches that will help restart negotiations with North Korea. To encourage China to participate, the United States should offer a new dialogue on the future of the peninsula that includes discussion of the disposition of U.S. forces. This dialogue should coordinate planning in the event of a crisis and convey that it is not U.S. policy to cause the collapse of the North Korean regime.

2. New and genuine incentives should be offered for North Korea to participate in substantive talks. These talks would include the possibility of a comprehensive deal in which North Korea, South Korea and the United States  supported by China  signed a peace agreement that would finally end the Korean War and gradually normalize relations in exchange for complete nuclear disarmament and progress on human rights. A new diplomatic approach could potentially freeze North Koreas nuclear and missile programs and lay the groundwork for a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula.

3. Further steps must be taken to increase economic sanctions that more severely restrict the regimes funding sources. The Obama administration laid a foundation for this with the strong sanctions recently achieved by the U.N. Security Council with the support of China and Russia. We recommend creating a standing multilateral mechanism to coordinate the implementation of Security Council resolutions. This should be facilitated by the sharing of intelligence, coordinating enforcement operations and distribution of resources donated by partners outside the region. Strictly enforcing the new Security Council sanctions, including the mandate to inspect all North Korean cargo and apply serious economic pressure, can help curb criminal activity from the regime, and, most important, prevent the spread of nuclear and missile materials and technology. Current enforcement of sanctions is far too lax.

4. The United States should secure its interests and those of its allies against the North Korean nuclear and missile threats by expanding U.S.-South Korea-Japan cooperation and strengthening its joint deterrence profile. The Pentagon should step up its work with U.S. allies to build the capacity necessary to enhance deterrence on the peninsula, enforce sanctions and impede North Korean missile programs. Expanded naval capacity will be needed to interdict North Korean vessels, detect submarine activity and intercept North Korean missile launches.

If Pyongyang refuses to negotiate, the United States and its allies should judiciously apply new military measures to deny North Korea the benefit of its actions and to strengthen deterrence against military attacks. This can include the United States, South Korea and Japan jointly signaling that future North Korean aggression would be met with an active and proportionate self-defense response, including inside North Korea.

We also recommend that the United States and its allies jointly build the capacity to intercept all missiles originating from North Korea with a range-payload capability greater than existing Scud missiles (approximately 1,000 kilometers)  whether they are declared to be ballistic missile tests or civil space launch vehicles.

These responses to North Koreas continued defiance of U.N. resolutions will not be easy and are not without risk. We do not support a policy of inducing a collapse of the North Korean regime, and these steps will have to be carefully implemented.

North Korea continues to commit unconscionable crimes against its citizens. We recommend working through the United Nations to increase pressure on North Korea to abide by internationally recognized standards for human rights, including by suspending North Koreas credentials.

North Korea presents one of the most dangerous international security challenges facing the world. In April, Chinese President Xi Jinping told a group of foreign diplomats that his country will never allow war or chaos on the peninsula, a statement that seemed to apply to all parties. The United States and China have a shared and vital national interest in preventing this from occurring. The time to act on that interest is now.

  

Mike Mullen, a retired U.S. Navy admiral and former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Sam Nunn, a former Democratic senator from Georgia, are co-chairs of the Independent Task Force on U.S. Policy Toward North Korea, which was sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations.

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The first of three planned presidential debates will take place at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y., on Sept. 26. Maybe its good the debate is slated for a gym. If Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are really serious about proving their physical vigor and stamina, they can do laps in the arena while they answer questions.

Clinton, of course, had to leave a 9/11 commemoration in New York early last Sunday, suffering from dehydration and a case of pneumonia. The infection had been diagnosed two days earlier, after she saw a doctor for a cough that had drawn intense interest from the ready-to-pounce conservative media. The only real health issue the illness raised is whether she had received the recommended vaccines to prevent pneumonia in people over 65  something the 70-year-old Trump should be asked, as well.

The episode, and Trumps appearance on Dr. Oz and release of a letter from his own doctor summarizing a recent physical on Thursday, made it feel like the presidential campaign had been replaced by a plenary session at an American Medical Association conference. Doctors and pundits spent the week analyzing the candidates health, weight and stamina. One medical wag even suggested that Clinton had fallen ill because Russian President Vladimir Putin had managed to have her poisoned, an extremely difficult diagnosis to make based entirely on TV footage and news photos.

If the political furor over Clintons pneumonia lingers longer than the illness  which should clear up in a few weeks  that would be a sharp break with history. Voters pay little attention to their own health, and up to now, they havent paid much more to the health of the people who want to be president.

Neither Clinton nor Trump is interested in demonstrating their health in any meaningful way, beyond showing that theyre physically up to the demands of the job. Clinton sought to keep important medical information to herself; Trump chose to let Mehmet Oz tell us what he thinks we should know about how he is doing.

With little evidence of serious health issues, how did the physical condition of the candidates grab center stage in this campaign?

The political weaponization of medical diagnoses started with Trump as the target. A parade of Clinton allies this summer began offering, unsolicited, to pronounce Trump a pathological narcissist. This unsupportable assessment even made the cover of the Atlantic. Trump supporters in the conservative press, meanwhile, had been waiting for a chance to impugn Clintons health ever since she was treated for a blood clot in a vein in her head in 2013. The psychological mudslinging on the left seemed to amplify the screwy diagnoses coming from the right  some from people with licenses in something or other, some from campaign staffers and even some from physicians who had a relevant medical specialty. Without examining Clinton, talking to her or knowing her full medical history, conservative media outlets declared that she suffered from the effects of a stroke, many strokes, Parkinsons, epilepsy and various other maladies.

To endorse Trumps fitness for office, his gastroenterologist wrote a letter late last year that said Trump would be the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency and that his lab results were astonishingly excellent. The doctor later admitted he had written the letter in five minutes while a limo waited outside his office to deliver it to Trumps campaign. Until Trumps release Thursday of a later letter and his interview with Oz, a surgeon who does not perform physicals, offered his show as an examination room, that was all we knew about Trumps physical condition. (He told Oz, I feel as good today as I did when I was 30, and that his hand motions during campaign speeches are a form of exercise.)

Clintons campaign put out its own health bulletin Wednesday, releasing a letter from her physician, Lisa Bardack, that described her pneumonia as mild and non-contagious, and ran through her vital statistics, from blood pressure to cholesterol, essentially unchanged from a good review she released in July 2015.

If we really care about Trumps or Clintons health, the way to find out about it is not to ask them, their staffers, their doctors, Dr. Oz, Dr. Phil or Dr. Who. It is to have them supply their medical histories and submit to a thorough examination by an independent panel of doctors from areas such as internal medicine, oncology, geriatrics, psychiatry and neurology. The panel could be appointed by the National Academy of Sciences or the National Institutes of Health. It would tell presidential candidates to show up in August for a two-day physical, with the results to be reported before the end of the month. It is not too late to ask the candidates to take a day or two and do this now, if we really are keen to know whether they are fit enough to serve.

Is this sensible solution going to ever happen? No. Because while discussions of Clintons pneumonia and Trumps weight make for employment for medical TV wanna-bes and help fill empty air on cable news channels, you dont need to be all that healthy to be president, much less a politician.

For every muscular bodybuilder turned California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, there are hundreds of paunchy, stressed-out, overweight and possibly mentally impaired occupants of legislatures at all levels of government and in Washingtons highest offices. Our candidates run for office while smoking, drinking, frequenting tanning booths, engaging in unsafe sex, skipping vaccinations,driving recklessly, avoiding exercise and abusing prescription drugs. Judging by election results, voters dont seem to care. We have had people in or near the White House with bad hearts  President Dwight Eisenhower and Vice President Dick Cheney both had heart attacks while in office. Weve had presidents who abused alcohol and pain medications, such as John F. Kennedy, Richard Nixon and, before he took office, George W. Bush. And at least one president surpassed any missteps exhibited by Clinton, frequently stumbling, tripping or banging his head: Gerald Ford.

Despite the sparring  among candidates, doctors and surrogates  over who has the better urine output or blood-pressure number, and despite the medias taste for solemn disquisitions on narcissism, coughing, obesity and pneumonia, the American people dont seem to care. Polls show voters arent worried that either Trump or Clinton would be among the oldest presidents ever to take office (though a majority do want to see health records from the candidates, which most previous candidates have released). And while surveys show voters now think Clinton is less healthy than they used to, half of them say that wont affect which candidate they vote for.

Thats no surprise. Since most of us do little to heal ourselves, it is fair to predict that this election wont pivot on an arthritic hip. The same voters who will choose the next president are part of a population with escalating obesity rates, helmet-less motorcycle and bicycle operation, untouched treadmills, and billions of dollars in junk-food sales. Why would anyone expect the electorate to put vastly more importance on the presidents health than on their own?

The current obsession will pass. The election will be decided on other issues. Still, if we want to know more about the fitness of candidates for the presidency, the current approach to informing us clearly does not work. Independent, objective assessment by a panel of doctors is the right prescription  if only the voters and the politicians would follow it.

  

Caplan is the director of the Division of Medical Ethics at NYU Langone Medical Centers Department of Population Health.

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When Secretary of State John Kerry traveled to Chile in October to attend an international conference on ocean preservation, he carried something that had nothing to do with environmental collaboration. The computer disk he brought contained 282 newly-declassified records on Gen. Augusto Pinochets role in a brazen act of international terrorism in Washington, D.C. The car bombing in Sheridan Circle that occurred 40 years ago this week took the lives of former Chilean ambassador Orlando Letelier and his 25-year old colleague Ronni Karpen Moffitt. Kerry personally handed the disk of documents to Chilean President Michelle Bachelet.

Last month, when Kerry flew to Buenos Aires for trade talks, he carried another disk, this one loaded with 1,078 pages of records on the Argentine dirty war of repression during the military dictatorship between 1976 and 1983. Kerry gave those documents to President Mauricio Macri and promised more to come in the future.

Alongside the traditional instruments of statecraft, the Obama administration has developed an entirely new tool: declassifying decades-old secrets of state to share with other governments and their societies. President Barack Obama has used this declassification diplomacy to mend fences with other countries, advance the cause of human rights and even redress the dark history of Washingtons support for repression abroad. Allies are grateful and historians are delighted. And given the depth and range of still-secret U.S. Cold War records, declassified diplomacy has the potential to go much, much further.

Obamas very first decree as president was intended to strengthen access to information. Executive Order 13489 rescinded restrictions on the Presidential Records Act imposed by his predecessor, George W. Bush. For a long time now, theres been too much secrecy in this city, the new president declared on Jan. 21, 2009. This administration stands on the side not of those who seek to withhold information but those who seek to make it known  an admirable goal but one his administration has not always advanced, especially with regard to Freedom of Information Act requests from reporters.

Among those who have sought to know what information remains withheld in the secret vaults of the U.S. national security agencies are Latin American countries such as Brazil, Chile and Argentina, where human rights advocates, lawyers and judges continue the quest for accountability for crimes against humanity committed by past military regimes. Just as thousands of victims were disappeared by those regimes, the military dictatorships managed to disappear the documentation of their atrocities. Vast troves of evidence remained beyond their destructive reach, however  in the United States. Indeed, the only positive outcome of the dark role the United States often played in the repressive histories of these and other nations is the detailed paper trail now residing in the vaults of the CIA, the FBI, and the Defense and State departments.

The Clinton administration was the first to recognize the political currency of these secret records and to use the presidents executive authority to declassify them. After The Washington Post published a major expose on the Reagan administrations approval of military massacres and death-squad operations in El Salvador, President Bill Clinton ordered more than 15,000 confidential documents released, creating a new, publicly accessible archive of information on the U.S. role in El Salvadors infamous counterinsurgency war. After the New York Times broke the story of CIA support for a Guatemalan colonel who ordered the killing of an American hotel owner living in Guatemala, as well as the torture and disappearance of a guerrilla leader who was the husband of another U.S. citizen, the Clinton administration released several thousand more secret records relating to that scandal and the U.S.-backed counterinsurgency efforts in that country.

After the October 1998 detention of Chilean Gen. Pinochet in London, Clinton responded to demands from the families of Pinochets victims, human rights advocates and the U.S. Congress by authorizing the Chile Declassification Project, an 18-month multi-agency review of secret U.S. documents dated between 1968 and 1991. It yielded about 23,000 never-seen-before records on repression during the Pinochet regime  as well as on the covert CIA intervention that helped bring him to power. We declassified more documents than any other administration, Clinton proudly told me years later.

The Bush administration was not nearly as zealous about access to information. The State Department released more than 4,000 records on Argentinas dirty war, but the project had been initiated in the final months of Clintons presidency. The State Departments Latin America bureau also expedited a small release of documents on Ecuador, as a positive gesture to the often hostile government of Rafael Correa.

While Clinton employed his executive declassification authority in response to major scandals and events, the Obama administration has used declassified records as a tool of statecraft. Take the example of Brazil: In 2012, Brazils National Truth Commission, newly created to investigate human rights violations during the military dictatorship from 1964 to 1985, asked the White House for relevant papers. Officials planned to have Obama provide them to then-President Dilma Rousseff during a White House state dinner scheduled for October 2013. But after Edward Snowdens files showed that the United States had tapped her cellphone, Rousseff canceled her visitto Washington.

Relations between the two countries were tense until the next June, when Vice President Joe Biden traveled to Brazil to try and mend the breach. As a peace offering, he gave Rousseff a disk of declassified documents on repression in Brazil. I hope that in taking steps to come to grips with our past, we can find a way to focus on the immense promise of the future, Biden told Rousseff, who, as a young leftist, was tortured and imprisoned in the 1970s by her countrys military dictatorship.

The Obama administration also took dramatic steps for Chile, a nation that Washington has tried to cultivate as an economic, environmental and political ally in the region. In early 2015, the White House agreed to a formal request from the government of Bachelet  who was also a victim of human rights abuses during the military era  for still-secret records relating to Pinochets role in the September 1976 car bombing that killed Letelier and Moffitt, in downtown Washington. Under the direction of David McKean (now ambassador to Luxembourg), the State Departments policy planning office expedited the declassification of hundreds of detailed records on this act of international terrorism  in time for Kerry to personally carry them to Santiago last October.

Among the documents was a secret 1987 memorandum titled Pinochet and the Letelier-Moffitt Murders: Implications for US Policy, from Secretary of State George Shultz to President Ronald Reagan. In an intelligence review, the CIA had compiled convincing evidence that President Pinochet personally ordered his intelligence chief to carry out the murders, Shultz advised the president. This is a blatant example of a chief of states direct involvement in an act of state terrorism, one that is particularly disturbing both because it occurred in our capital and since his government is generally considered to be friendly. The CIAs stark conclusion about Pinochets role in a savage act of international terrorism created an uproar in Chile and generated headlines around the world.

The impact of this new diplomatic tool depends partly on the keepers of secrets in the U.S. intelligence community. Because the CIA cares more about protecting the covert nature of its operations than about diplomacy and the accuracy of the historical record, the agency has not been eager to cooperate in these declassification projects. During Clintons declassification on Chile, for example, the CIA twice reneged on its commitment to release its records on covert operations against the elected government of Salvador Allende. Only after Clintons national security adviser, Sandy Berger, personally interceded with CIA Director George Tenet did the agency finally comply. To date, the CIA has rejected Freedom of Information Act efforts by my organization, the National Security Archive, to release even one sentence of the secret intelligence review on Pinochet that Shultz cited in his dramatic memorandum to Reagan on the Letelier assassination. Without that document, the historical record on an act of terrorism in downtown Washington will remain incomplete. The CIA seems not to have gotten Obamas directive that no information may remain classified indefinitely.

That position will be tested by Obamas special declassification project on Argentina. During his trip to that countryin March, Obama put his presidential imprimatur on the practice of declassification diplomacy. Just before he left for South America, he authorized a major declassification review of hundreds of intelligence-community and Defense Department records relating to the massive human rights violations committed by the Argentine military between 1976 and 1983. I believe we have a responsibility to confront the past with honesty and transparency, Obama stated during a visit with human rights activists and victims in Buenos Aires on March 24, the 40th anniversary of the military coup that, with U.S. support, ushered in seven years of the most brutal repression ever seen in the southern half of the continent.

If the intelligence community cooperates with this project, the release promises to supply evidence for ongoing human rights cases in Argentina. The documents are also likely to shed light on U.S. policy toward the coup and the repression that followed. Their declassification will provide not only the honesty and transparency Obama advocates but a modicum of historical atonement for the support his predecessors gave to the Argentine military in the days and months after the coup.

There are plenty of other countries for which a special declassification of U.S. records would help heal the wounds of history and advance an alliance  among them Laos and Japan, where Obama recently visited; U.S. efforts to rebuild relations with Iran might similarly benefit. Indeed, in his final few months in office, Obama faces plenty of opportunities to expand the practice of declassification diplomacy. A special declassification on Colombias counterinsurgency war would help local officials implement the recently signed peace accord between the government in Bogota and the FARC rebels. The ongoing rapprochement with Cuba could benefit from a gesture of declassification regarding key Cold War conflicts between Washington and Havana.

Even the Chileans are hoping for another round of documents when Bachelet visits the monument to Letelier and Moffitt in Sheridan Circle this coming week to commemorate their assassination 40 years ago. Pinochet is no longer alive to be judged in a court of law. But declassified records would help provide the lasting judgement of history.

  

Kornbluh is a senior analyst at the National Security Archive and the author of The Pinochet File: A Declassified Dossier on Atrocity and Accountability.

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NEW PALTZ, N.Y.  Anyone driving into Bernie Sanderss rally here, anyone with a radio tuned to ABC News, could hear the low-key voice of Libertarian presidential nominee Gary Johnson. In 60-second radio spots, the former governor of New Mexico introduces himself as a pragmatist who, like most voters, resented a presidential choice between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.

Our economic challenges will be conquered not by force, but by cooperation and mutual respect, Johnson says in one of the ads. For the independent majority of Americans who feel as I do, I say: Why wait one more day?

At the rally itself, Sanders continued making the pitch hes been honing since he returned to the campaign trail: This isnt a year to vote third party. Mentioning Clintons name sparingly, Sanders told several hundred voters  many still wearing gear from the Democratic primary  that their votes could stop the election of a Republican who thinks climate change is a hoax.

Sanders, who was the most prominent independent in American politics even before his run, is gradually embracing a role as a third party critic, a spoiler of the spoilers. As Democrats contemplate ways to tamp down a protest vote for Johnson, or for the Green Partys Jill Stein, Sanders is already arguing that anyone who voted for him would set the movement back by voting against Clinton. In an interview after the rally  the first in a three-state weekend tour for Democratic candidates  Sanders said that Democrats and the media need to focus on Clintons actual policies more than they have been, in a campaign dominated by back-and-forths about Trumps gaffes.

This is not the time for a protest vote, in terms of a presidential campaign, Sanders said. I ran as a third-party candidate. Im the longest-serving independent in the history of the United States Congress. I know more about third-party politics than anyone else in the Congress, OK? And if people want to run as third-party candidates, god bless them! Run for Congress. Run for governor. Run for state legislature. When were talking about president of the United States, in my own personal view, this is not time for a protest vote. This is time to elect Hillary Clinton, and then work, after the election to mobilize millions of people to make sure she can be the most progressive president she can be.

The journey from Clinton primary foe to Clinton surrogate has been awkward for Sanders. At high-profile moments during the Democratic National Convention, including an address to his delegates, he mentioned his endorsement near the top of his remarks and was blown back by jeers and boos. Since then, Sanders has tucked his endorsement later in his speeches, after rundowns of exactly what concessions his campaign got from the Democratic Party, and what a Trump presidency would undo.

That spoonful-of-sugar approach has led to less obvious backlash; its also truer to Sanderss long-term goals. His campaign performed most strongly in open primaries and caucuses, where independent voters could play without registering as Democrats. He did worse than expected in New York, and cited the states onerous registration standards, which require voters to be members of a party for six months before voting in their primaries. The states Working Families Party, which endorsed and organized for Sanders, found itself in a bind.

In the run-up to the Democratic convention, Sanders unsuccessfully lobbied for the party to open all of its primaries to all voters. Since then, he has confirmed that he will seek reelection as an independent. And on Thursday night, Sanders keynoted the 18th annual Working Families Party gala, mentioning Clintons name just twice in the context of his political revolution. One of those times, Sanders beseeched anyone who backed Clinton to vote for her on the Working Families Party line.

New Yorks unique fusion laws, which allow candidates to seek multiple party nominations and aggregate their votes toward a winning total, give Sanders the opportunity to back Clinton while growing a force outside of the Democratic Party. In two dozen interviews at the New Paltz rally, four voters said they had contemplated voting for a third party but were rethinking that after polls showed Trump gaining ground.

Eli Campbell, 21, arrived at the rally with a photoshopped portrait of Trump and Clinton wearing crowns in front of the White House. (The original photo was taken at Trumps wedding to his third and current wife, Melania, which Clinton attended.) People like me have been told that it doesnt matter if we want a world that works, said Campbell, as other voters, many from the nearby university, snapped photos. We have to wait for it.

Campbell said he was leaning toward supporting Stein, but he, too, had seen polling that suggested Trump might win the presidency. If it seemed that his vote would be decisive, Campbell admitted that he could vote for Clinton.

Bernie pushed her a lot further left than she wanted to go, said Campbell. I mean, if its close, I think Ill vote for the lesser evil.

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Wang Wenliang, a Chinese billionaire and donor to the Clinton Foundation and Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe has been expelled from Chinas top legislature after being caught up in a widespread cash-for-votes scheme.

On Tuesday, Chinas national legislature expelled 45 of its nearly 2,900 members in a massive vote-buying scandal, all from the northeastern province of Liaoning. The move was part of an investigation into corruption in Liaoning and a much larger national anti-corruption campaign launched by President Xi Jinping.

Wang, who made his fortune in construction and running a strategic port near the North Korean border, also has been a big donor to New York University, Harvard University and the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

Wangs $2 million donation to the Clinton Foundation in 2013 made waves when it was disclosed last year because of his ties to the Chinese government. More recently, his name surfaced amid news that McAuliffe, a Democrat, was the subject of an FBI investigation.

McAuliffe expressed confidence in May that Wang, who gave a combined $120,000 to his 2013 gubernatorial campaign and 2014 inauguration, was a legitimate donor.

A spokesman for Wang said his ouster was the result of a political purge carried out on behalf of Xi.

They get rid of people who are not part of his team, spokesman Sig Rogich said.

He said Wang and the others ousted had only lobbied decision-makers with meals and token gifts. He wined and dined them and gave them a gift, Rogich said. Its not like they gave them cash.

On Friday, McAuliffes attorney, James W. Cooper, said the governor knows nothing about Mr. Wang and his legal situation in China.

Spokesmen for the Clinton campaign and the Clinton Foundation did not respond to requests for comment.

Wangs construction conglomerate, Rilin Enterprises, controls the Port of Dandong and processes significant volumes of soybeans shipped out of Virginia. It also helped build the new Chinese Embassy in Washington, assembling and overseeing a team of artisans who would be loyal to both the Chinese government and the principles of feng shui.

Theres a lot of security involved, Rogich said. Theyre also artistically knowledgeable about what the Chinese want. Theres a lot of feng shui that goes into this, evidently  depictions of the four seasons. . . . Certain colors are not allowed.

Wangs $2 million pledge to the Clinton Foundation drew attention last year, first from CBS News and then other outlets, because of his connections to the Chinese government  both as a member of the National Peoples Congress and as a contractor entrusted to help build Chinas embassies around the world.

Wangs political donations to McAuliffe reflect sizable overlap in Clinton and McAuliffe donors. Critics say the pattern suggests contributions to McAuliffe, a close friend of Bill and Hillary Clintons, are intended to curry favor with a former president and an aspiring one. McAuliffe supporters say the overlap is the natural outgrowth of personal and political bonds the governor has forged over a long career as a Clinton fundraiser.

Foreign nationals are prohibited under federal law from making political contributions. So are American subsidiaries of foreign corporations if they are financed in any way by their parent companies or if individual foreign nationals are involved in the decision to make the donation.

But a foreign national can donate personally or through an American subsidiary if he holds a green card, which Rogich said is the case for Wang.

Wangs name surfaced again in May, when news leaked that the FBI was investigating McAuliffe. CNN, citing anonymous sources, reported at the time that investigators were interested in a contribution the Chinese citizen had made to McAuliffe.

The FBI probe remains ongoing, two people familiar with the investigation told The Post this week, and Wang is one piece of it, one of the people said.

Investigators also are assessing whether McAuliffe ran afoul of the Foreign Agents Registration Act, an obscure statute that regulates U.S. citizens lobbying of the U.S. government on behalf of foreign governments. They also are examining financial transactions dating back to when he was chairman of the Democratic National Committee, trying to determine if the DNC benefits were illegally linked to Democratic donors, two people said. They are focused on foreign contributors, including Wang and someone from Saudi Arabia, one of the people said.

One of the people said there is some skepticism among those supervising the case that criminal wrongdoing occurred  particularly in light of the recent Supreme Court ruling that tossed out the corruption case against former Virginia governor Robert McDonnell, a Republican.

Cooper said that McAuliffe had done nothing wrong, that the investigation was unrelated to Wang and that the McDonnell case had no bearing on the McAuliffe probe.

This is not a corruption investigation, Cooper said. McDonnell was a bribery case. This is not a bribery case. It has nothing to do with it.  This is an investigation mainly into whether theres a Foreign Agents Registration Act [violation].

The shake-up in China, which was first reported by The New York Times, affects Chinas National Peoples Congress. The body is usually seen as a rubber stamp body to provide a cloak of legal legitimacy to Communist Party rule. Its members meet only once a year for around two weeks to receive reports from government ministries and the provinces, and to approve polices as well as the appointment of top leaders, including the president.

The NPCs members are themselves elected every five years from provincial, county and township bodies, although the process is tightly controlled by the party and very opaque.

Membership of the NPC conveys not only status and prestige but access to the top levels of the party and business elite that runs China. Many of Chinas top business leaders are also members of the NPC.

Wangs connections to the Chinese government run deep. He once worked as an economic adviser to the municipal government in his home town of Dandong in Liaoning. He was a guest at a banquet to welcome Xi on his state visit to Washington last year.

Wang, who was born in 1954, has generated some favorable press for sponsoring a conservation project in Chinas largest wetlands near the North Korea border and for donating to a mangrove restoration project in Naples, Florida.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., last year recognized Wangs efforts to restore Dandong Yalu River Estuary Wetland in China, making a statement on the Senate floor, according to a news release issued by Rogichs Las Vegas-based firm. Reids office did not respond to requests for comment.

In China last week, the Liaoning state prosecutor announced it was investigating the former vice head of the provincial legislature, Zheng Yuzhuo, for taking bribes and other illegal acts relating to elections. The provinces former Communist Party chief, Wang Min, was also taken into custody in August and expelled from the party on suspicion of taking bribes.

Some 740,000 officials have been disciplined or punished in Xis anti-corruption campaign, according to state media, which is just under 1 percent of the total party membership, although experts say the campaign has also been used to purge rival factions within the party.

It was unclear why Liaonings legislature has been targeted for such a clear-out  either as a warning to other provinces or because it had offended the leadership in some other way. It is a bastion of state-run heavy industry and may have been dragging its feet in implementing the kind of economic reforms the central government is demanding, some analysts said.

Most of those caught up in the probe included top business leaders and executives of state-run organizations. It was unclear if further legal action would be taken against them.

What has happened to the Standing Committee of Liaonings provincial Peoples Congress is unheard of in the history of China since the Communist Party takeover in 1949, Li Jianguo, a vice chairman of the NPC Standing Committee was quoted as saying.

But in fact, all that is unusual is that people are paying the price for buying votes, independent experts said.

This is really common in China, it is not a new thing, said Zhang Ming, a politics professor at Renmin University of China in Beijing. A huge number of people are spending money on this, including big bosses from state-owned enterprises, officials and big bosses from private companies.

He said the scandal had not caused any real outrage in China because it was not a surprise.

  

The Washington Posts Matt Zapotosky contributed to this report from Washington. Congcong Zhang and Jin Xin contributed to this report from China.

china-donor
PORTLAND, Texas  William Schuetzs U.S. history class fell silent once he closed the door and walked into his classroom last May.

I dont expect you to believe anything I tell you over the next eight days, Schuetz told his students.

I came up with the idea of Conspiracy Week as a reward, Schuetz told the Corpus Christi Caller-Times (http://bit.ly/2cD1n6g). Im not telling (the students) but Im secretly still trying to educate them and make them curious.

Schuetz covers events unconfirmed by the government. He started the week with the Philadelphia Experiment, a top-secret operation in the 1940s intended to mask naval ships from radar detection that went wrong. By the end of his series this year, he had made his pitch to students about the existence of UFOs and why Elvis Presley didnt die until recently.

The chase for the truth traces back to when the teacher was a seventh-grader in a Beaumont junior high school. Over the PA came an announcement that would change his life.

President (John F.) Kennedy was shot in Dallas,' Schuetz recalled. I have been researching the Kennedy assassination since that time.

Schuetz gets all of his research from books, his self-proclaimed vice. His colleagues rarely see him without one.

Hes always reading something, Charlotte Brown, the schools drama teacher, said. Its his passion and thats why his conspiracies are so good.

He works meticulously to put his conspiracies together, which requires years of research. Even when he hits a dead end, he doesnt give up.

Im resilient in the fact that I dont accept setbacks, Schuetz said. If Im researching and I hit a brick wall, Ill find a way around it.

Schuetz is only satisfied once he fits all the pieces together. He views his research like an archaeologist digging for bones.

Im digging in the ground for years and years and looking for that one stone tablet, Schuetz said. That would be incredible.

Conspiracy Week has become almost folklore for students. Brianne Dubose, now a senior at Gregory-Portland High School, heard about the lectures from her older sister, her mom and her friends before hearing it from Schuetz.

Hes a very convincing speaker, she said. It definitely makes you question everything.

Through the years, Schuetz said teachers, principals and even school board members have stopped by to hear his conspiracies. Kyde Eddleman, the high school principal, said he enjoys sitting in for the lecture.

Hes one of the most fascinating people Ive ever met, Eddleman said. His conspiracies get the kids thinking and opens up all sorts of discussions for the kids.

The teachers fascination began with a refusal to believe what he was told. Likewise, he doesnt want his students to buy into the conspiracies on his word alone.

Im trying to challenge them, he said. I want them to go check out a book and read up on something.

Most students leave Schuetzs class with a new perspective on several events in American history, but the teacher hopes his students apply his lesson in their futures.

Theyre going to go to college and be exposed to incredible ideas, Schuetz said. Dont discount them, listen, research and make up your own mind.

___

Information from: Corpus Christi Caller-Times, http://www.caller.com

Editors note: This is an AP Member Exchange shared by the Corpus Christi Caller-Times.
WASHINGTON  Is Laura Bush trying to tell us something?

For months now, most of her family  in a drastic break with tradition  has been resolutely quiet on the 2016 presidential race. The Bushes have been at the forefront of Republican politics for nearly four decades, but after Jeb Bush dropped out of the GOP nomination race, they have declined to endorse Donald Trump and mostly stayed out of the news.

But who was Laura Bush hanging out with in Washington this week? Some establishment Republicans on Capitol Hill in need of a reelection boost? Or the fundraisers trying to bolster the partys control of Congress?

Nope. Bush was here for an appearance with none other than Michelle Obama. They were sharing a stage to promote one of the most nonpartisan of issues  their work on behalf of military families  in their fourth event together in recent years.

It is no secret that the former and current first ladies are fond of each other. I like this woman, Obama has said of her predecessor.

At the National Archives on Friday morning for an American University conference on the service of the nations first ladies, Obama and Bush bantered as old friends do. They discussed their shared experiences worrying over military veterans and their families while their husbands serve as commander in chief, raising daughters and being part of the small club of presidential spouses.

First ladies have been active forever, Bush said, describing the advocacy work that comes with the office.

Talk about Eleanor Roosevelt, Obama chimed in. Drop the mic on that one.

The fact is, you really have a podium always. I mean, people still listen to Barbara Bush. Dont you think? Laura Bush said, referring to her formidable mother-in-law. I certainly do!

The first ladies had a good laugh at that one.

If the event reflected a long-running mutual admiration between the two women, it also couldnt help but draw attention to the Bushes decisions in this divisive political campaign. They are picking and choosing who they want to be associated with, and Laura Bush clearly likes the Obamas.

She and her husband will join the current first family again next week when they attend the opening ceremony for the Smithsonians National Museum of African American History and Culture. George W. Bush was president when the museum shifted from mere hope and dream to a tangible construction plan. Earlier this summer, the families were together in Dallas for the memorial honoring the police officers slain by a gunman during a Black Lives Matter protest. The former president sat next to Michelle Obama during the service and, for a while, held her hand.

The friendliness between the families during this nasty election cycle underscores the nations flailing tradition of bipartisanship and comity, said Cokie Roberts, who was a moderator for a 2014 panel they took part in and has interviewed both women.

They are friends and. . . they wanted to do [this] together because they like doing it together, which is so heartening in our troubled times, Roberts said.

In her subtle way, Obama seemed several times to tweak Republican nominee Donald Trump  though, as in her now-famous Democratic convention speech in July, she never used his name. On the sobering experience of visiting wounded military veterans, she said Friday, thats something a commander in chief thinks about before they pop off about going to war. Because when youve spent time on a base and you know these men and women and you know their families, you dont just talk about war like there are no implications.

Its serious business, and lives are changed forever. So I would hope that any commander in chief that would have the privilege of serving would understand that these are real lives and their families are impacted.

She also spoke of her admiration for Gold Star families  those who have lost a loved one in military service. Following the Democratic convention, Trump disparaged Humayun and Ghazala Khan, the parents of a Muslim U.S. serviceman killed in Iraq, after they came out in support of Hillary Clinton.

The easy conversation onstage recalled other times the two women have held events together. In 2013, Bush hosted Obama at a summit in Tanzania attended by the first ladies of many African nations. The following year, Obama hosted Bush at the Kennedy Center for a White House-led conference with many of the same women. Then, last September, Bush invited Obama to sit with her for a George W. Bush Presidential Center event on how first ladies can advance gender issues; Obama, who was preparing for the popes visit to Washington, videoconferenced in and apologized for not attending in person.

As you all know, I deeply admire and respect Laura. And I think that its important to collaborate with people you admire and respect, regardless of party, Obama said then. Thats what makes a democracy work, truly.

Laura Bush concurred: Its also a great example for the world to see that women of different political parties in the United States agree on so many issues. . . . When you watch television, you think that everyone in the United States disagrees with everybody else. But in fact, we as Americans agree on so many more things than we disagree on.

At the Archives on Friday, moderator Bob Woodruff kept the conversation focused on the military; the 2016 campaign never directly came up. Bush probably wouldnt have said much about it anyway. As Bush was giving interviews earlier this year to promote a childrens book, a reporter wanted to know whether she would vote for Trump. Dont ask me that, she pleaded.

But silence can speak volumes. And in Washington, who you sit beside matters.

Hours after sharing the stage with Bush, Obama headed to Northern Virginia, where she held her first solo campaign rally in support of Clinton.

first-ladies
Cities across New Mexico are struggling as a drop in economic activity disrupts their budgets.

And the state government faces financial challenges so stiff that it may be out of compliance with state law, one official said.

These were among the points that emerged from a summit of New Mexico mayors who gathered in Downtown Albuquerque on Friday; it was sponsored by Mayor Richard Berry.

The mayors heard presentations from state Senate Finance Committee Chairman John Arthur Smith, D-Deming; David Abbey, director of the Legislative Finance Committee; and others.

Were sincerely suffering across the state, Gallup Mayor Jackie McKinney said. I dont see an end in sight.

The drop in oil and gas prices has hammered the state budget, of course, but struggles in the energy industry have rippled across the economy and damaged revenue sources for cities, too, officials said.

In Eunice, near the Texas state line, gross receipts taxes were down more than 55 percent in July and August compared with last year, according to one summary distributed at the summit. Theyre down about 2 percent in Gallup, 3 percent in Albuquerque and 34 percent in Bloomfield.

Two factors offer a little hope. Revenue from gross receipts taxes often fluctuates from month to month, so the dramatic declines may smooth out as more revenue rolls in.

And July and August are the first two months of the budget year, so municipalities still have time to adjust their budgets, however painful it might be.

Revenue from gross receipts taxes  which are similar to a sales tax paid by shoppers on most goods and services  is a critical revenue source for city operating budgets in New Mexico.

In Albuquerque, city leaders say theyre keeping an eye on the monthly revenue reports and are ready to make changes. A 3 percent decline, if it were to continue all year, would leave the city with about $9 million less in gross receipts taxes than last year.

We will continue to be pragmatic in our management practices, Berry said, and will make appropriate adjustments for a balanced budget, just as we have done for the past seven years.

At the state level, the mayors heard that New Mexico has overspent its reserves. The state faces an estimated budget shortfall of $458 million for the fiscal year that started in July and a $131 million deficit for the budget year that just ended.

Abbey, of the Legislative Finance Committee, said spending and revenue are so out of whack theyre at odds with state law. He cited two state statutes: One prohibits the state government from paying money from a fund unless it may reasonably be expected that at the end of the fiscal year the balances in that fund  will be fully restored.

The other law prohibits state officials from making payments when they know, or should know, that there isnt enough money to cover them, with certain exceptions.

Nobody likes it when we say this, Abbey told the mayors. Were really not in a lawful situation.

Smith said the state faces enormous challenges, which will make it harder for the state to help cities with capital projects.

And in the long term, he said, the state must make changes that help address the budget damage caused by volatile oil and gas prices.

By God, its like trying to turn the Titanic around, Smith said.
Scores of scientists and administrators from 22 federal laboratories descended on Old Town this week to network and share information about how best to push new technology out of the labs and into the marketplace.

The Federal Laboratory Consortium held its annual Mid-Continent and Far West regional meeting at the Hotel Albuquerque from Sept. 13-15, attracting lab representatives from 15 states. Participants discussed how to inspire more scientists and researchers to engage in technology transfer, and how to build partnerships with entrepreneurs, universities and communities to help accelerate technology commercialization.

For Sandia, it provided an opportunity to showcase many of its accomplishments, said Jackie Kerby Moore, Sandia manager of technology and economic development.

We wanted to host this event because we have a lot to share, Kerby Moore said. Sandia has been a leader in technology transfer at the national level.

Sandia won three regional awards at the conference for technologies developed in cooperation with private companies. Those include a new system to test operational safety at hydrogen fueling stations, new software to rapidly design heat exchangers that can improve efficiency in power generation and industrial processes, and eye-tracking software to help designers improve information displays.

The U.S. Department of Energy modeled a new Small Business Vouchers program, which launched last year, on the successful efforts of Sandia and Los Alamos national labs to help firms around the state develop or improve new technologies.

At the conference, Sandia discussed its efforts to change internal lab culture by encouraging scientists and engineers to consider real-world applications for new technologies from the earliest stages of projects.

The lab also launched a new Center for Collaboration and Commercialization in 2014 at Sandia Science and Technology Park to facilitate more interaction between lab personnel and entrepreneurs in New Mexico and elsewhere. The center now conducts monthly roundtables, office hours, and forums for businesspeople and Sandia personnel.

Weve built a new entrepreneurship network through the center, with 500 people from the lab and 500 business professionals, Kerby Moore said. Were bringing in leaders and educators to meet and train people.

Sandia mechanical engineer Matthew Carlson said he participated in a new program at the center that provides training in entrepreneurial concepts.

Its an intensive training program like what is offered at business accelerators, but for Sandia staff, Carlson said. It was all new to me.
Three private-equity firms are looking to acquire a minority stake in Los Alamos National Bank through a $52 million recapitalization, which the banks leader said helps put the financial institution on more solid footing.

Trinity Capital, parent company of LANB, said it has entered into a stock purchase agreement with Castle Creek Capital Partners, Patriot Financial Partners and Strategic Value Bank Partners. In addition to the cash infusion, the agreement also permits the company to conduct, within one year following completion of the agreement, a rights offering to existing shareholders of up to $10 million in voting common stock.

The transaction with the new investors should close in early October once regulators sign off on the deal. The two lead investors, Castle Creek and Patriot, will each have 9.9 percent voting common ownership interest and representatives appointed to LANBs board of directors.

The companys president and CEO said the pending capital boost is a sign of an improving financial picture at the bank, which, under previous leadership, paid more than $1.5 million to settle allegations of civil accounting fraud regarding loans that dropped in value during the recession.

We are encouraged that our new investors have confidence in our turnaround efforts, said John Gulas, president and CEO of both Trinity and LANB. We believe this new capital enables us to address the most difficult remaining challenge in restoring the company to a safe and sound condition.

The bank currently has $1.4 billion in total assets.

Gulas joined LANB in May 2014 from Farmers National Banc Corp., where he was president and chief executive officer. He had been recognized by the American Bankers Association for leading Farmers to become one of the top community banks in the country.

Gulas said the placement by the private-equity investors will retire some of the debt remaining from $35.5 million in funding from the federal Troubled Asset Relief Program that Trinity received in 2009.

The community bank, started in 1963 by scientist George Cowan with his own money, is the fourth-largest ranked by deposits in New Mexico and has 85 percent of all the banking business in Los Alamos County, according to financial filings.

With 75,000 customers and 300 employees, LANB has six branches in Los Alamos, White Rock, Santa Fe and Albuquerque, where the company is expanding its footprint in a new 24,000-square-foot branch slated to open in the first quarter of 2017. The new branch at 7445 Pan American NE, will be in a building LANB purchased for $4 million to house its Duke City headquarters.
KHAR, Pakistan  A suicide bomber attacked a Sunni mosque in northwest Pakistan on Friday, killing at least 24 worshippers and wounding 28 others, officials said. Several children were also among those killed or wounded in the deadly attack.

A breakaway Taliban group later claimed responsibility for the bombing.

The attacker shouted God is Great as he entered the mosque in the village of Ambar in Pakistans Mohmand tribal region, government administrator Naveed Akbar told The Associated Press. He said rescuers had transported the dead and wounded to nearby hospitals, where some of the wounded were listed in critical condition.

Akbar said about 200 worshippers were inside the mosque at the time of attack.

Pashin Gul, the head of local tribal police, confirmed that it was a suicide attack. He said the bombing took place during Friday prayers, adding that several of the wounded were in a critical condition.

Ahsanullah Ahsan, a spokesman for Jamaat-ul-Ahrar  the breakaway Taliban faction  claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement to media. He claimed the attacker targeted members of a pro-government militia.

The White House in a statement Friday condemned the attack, saying it is an appalling reminder that terrorism threatens all countries in the region and said the U.S. would continue to work with the Pakistani government to fight terrorism.

Saeed Khan, in charge of the hospital in the town of Khar, said an army helicopter was being used to transport the critically wounded to Peshawar, the main city in northwestern Pakistan.

One of the wounded, 41-year-old Ghulam Khan, 41, said he heard a deafening explosion during the prayers and then he fell down. I cried for help, but no one came to me  there were other bodies  wounded worshippers, who were reciting verses from Quran and waiting for help, he told The Associated Press from his hospital bed.

Khan said local residents and tribal police helped ferry the wounded to hospital.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for Fridays attack, which targeted a Sunni mosque. Previous such large-scale attacks have usually targeted Shiite mosques.

The country has witnessed several large-scale militant attacks this year, claimed by an offshoot of the Pakistani Taliban and the Islamic State group. Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan issued a statement, condemning the attack.

Pakistans tribal regions, which border Afghanistan, were considered to be strongholds of Pakistani Taliban militants until 2014, when the military launched a major operation there, evicting and killing large numbers of insurgents. However, violence has continued in some of the tribal regions.

Fridays attack came hours after army chief Gen. Raheel Sharif met with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to discuss security issues. According to a government statement, Sharif pledged to continue the war against terrorism.

The military says some 18,000 civilians and 5,000 soldiers have been killed in militant attacks in Pakistan since the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, when Islamabad threw its support behind Washington in the war on terror.

____

Associated Press writers Munir Ahmed in Islamabad; Riaz Khan in Peshawar, Pakistan, and Darlene Superville in Washington contributed to this report.
PHOENIX  A man accused in a double murder in Tempe six years ago has been sentenced to two terms of natural life in prison.

Maricopa County Superior Court officials say 39-year-old Craig Michael Devine was sentenced Friday on two counts of first-degree murder.

Tempe police say the bodies of 53-year-old James Mosteller and 19-year-old John Call Jr. were found in a warehouse in August 2010. Both had been shot to death.

Devine and another man were arrested and charged.

Court documents show Devine was released from prison in 2009 after serving seven years for the attempted murder of a man he thought was having an affair with his girlfriend.

Authorities say Devine had been looking for Calls father, who reportedly cooperated with police during the investigation of the 2002 attempted murder.
Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan may have exceeded his authority by ordering public school systems to start after Labor Day, according to the state attorney generals office, whose opinion was sought by Democratic lawmakers opposed to the Republican governors action.

I can not say unequivocally that the Labor Day executive order exceeds the Governors authority, but I believe it likely that a reviewing court, if presented with the issue, would conclude that it does, Adam D. Snyder, a lawyer in the office of Attorney General Brian E. Frosh, D, wrote in a 24-page letter that was given Friday to state Sen. Paul G. Pinsky, D, and Del. Anne R. Kaiser, D.

Snyder also wrote that the General Assembly has the authority to pass legislation to override Hogans executive order.

Kaiser said the mandate infringes on local control and is not good education policy.

Ive heard from professionals up and down the line who have said that the governors executive order does nothing to help education, teachers, students and schools, she said.

The governors office had no immediate comment on Friday afternoon.

The review from Froshs office comes more than two weeks after Hogan ordered the states 24 school systems to start after Labor Day and to end by June 15 starting next year. Systems may petition the state Board of Education to be exempt from the order.

The governor said a post-Labor Day start would provide a boost to tourism-based businesses and give families more time together. Democratic lawmakers and many school officials said the order would limit flexibility in the school calendar, cut into learning and test-preparation time and add to the financial burden on families who are struggling economically and need to provide child care.

Snyder wrote that his letter was advice to Pinsky and Kaiser, not an official opinion from the attorney generals office.

After reading it, Pinsky said he would advise the states school systems to ignore the governors executive order.

They should set a calendar that is appropriate to them and their students, he said. The governor can choose to take 24 school systems to court, and he would have a weak case.

He said he does not think that legislation is warranted but that he would be willing to participate or lead a legislative effort to overturn the order if necessary.

Doug Mayer, a spokesman for Hogan, scoffed at Snyders letter and sought to minimize its significance. Even by lawyer standards, taking 24 pages to reach a I dont know, is unprecedented, Mayer said in an email.

Since Hogan signed the order Aug. 31, school district administrators have complained that the mandate upends their calendars. As they have begun planning for next school year, many have warned that the change could lead to a shorter spring break.

Democratic lawmakers have been trying to figure out how to respond, arguing that the idea of extending summer break might be popular but is not good policy.

Their main complaint: Hogan pushed it through using an executive order instead of the legislative process.

There might be a legitimate argument to this, but you dont do it by executive order, House Speaker Michael E. Busch, D, said after Hogan issued the order.

Hogan said he took the action because the General Assembly would not, noting that the measure has been proposed in the legislature before but never made it out of committee. A bipartisan task force appointed by Hogans predecessor, Democrat Martin OMalley, also recommended a post-Labor Day start.

Hogan has blamed the teachers union for blocking the bill. But the legislation was also strongly opposed by the school boards association, state PTA and school superintendents.

Michael Myerson, who teaches constitutional law at the University of Baltimore School of Law, said he would not be surprised if the Court of Appeals has the last word on the issue.

School calendars are traditionally a county decision, and the legislature has always been the entity passing laws governing the length of the calendar, Myerson said. This is a novel intrusion into the role of both the legislature and the counties.

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Biel/Bienne, 16.09.2016 - Targeted support measures are required to ensure that equal opportunities become a reality in the information society. This was the unanimous conclusion of some 160 representatives from government, business, academia and civil society who took part in the Digital Inclusion Summit in Bern today. In his opening speech, Philippe Horisberger, Deputy Director of the Federal Office of Communications (OFCOM), pointed out that equal opportunities is one of the core objectives of the 'Digital Switzerland' strategy.

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Ares Management is reportedly seeking to raise more than $45bn for its latest batch of funds.
Published On Sep 16, 2016 12:03 PM By Khan Mohd. for Tesla Model S

Tesla Motors said that its investigating the fatal accident involving its car in China. However, the carmaker is still perplexed as to how to figure out whether the semi-autopilot mode was engaged during the time of the crash. The company also said that theres no way of knowing it since the car was unable to transmit data due to the massive impact on its transmitting system during the collision.

The trouble started for the electric technology giant when its Tesla Model S crashed into a road sweeper truck on a highway on January 20 near Handan, China, killing the 23-year-old car driver, Gao Yaning. Post the incident, the victims family filed a lawsuit in Beijing against Tesla and the dealer who sold the car to them.

This is not the only fatal accident involving a Tesla. In May this year, a similar incident occurred when a car engaged in Autopilot mode collided at high speed with a tractor-trailer that had turned in front of it in Florida, USA.

In its CCTV footage report, a police officer said about the crash in China: When it was approaching the road sweeper, the car didnt put on the brake or avoid it; instead, it crashed right into it. However, this doesnt tell us whether it was a failure of the autopilot mode or the fault of the cars driver.

Speaking about the incident, Tesla spokesperson Alexis Georgeson said in the companys statement: Because of the damage caused by the collision, the car was physically incapable of transmitting log data to our servers, and we therefore have no way of knowing whether or not Autopilot was engaged at the time of the crash.

We have tried repeatedly to work with our customer to investigate the cause of the crash, but he has not provided us with any additional information that would allow us to do so, she added.

Interestingly, the incident happens to be just three days after Elon Musk, CEO, Tesla Motors, delineated the changes planned for the Autopilot feature so that such crashes can be prevented.
Congress passes JASTA, which expands liability under the Anti-Terrorism Act

13 September 2016

On September 9, 2016, the US House of Representatives unanimously passed The Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act, which would narrow sovereign immunity and expand civil liability under the federal Anti-Terrorism Act. In May, the Senate similarly unanimously approved JASTA. As a result, the Act is on its way to President Obama for approval, though he has threatened to veto the bill. If President Obama vetoes the bill, it will return to Congress for a possible override of the President's veto, which could occur later this year.

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Wet weather is prolonging this years harvest across Scotland, northern England and especially Northern Ireland, which is seeing one of the worst harvests on record.

Northern Ireland has born the brunt of poor, wet weather in recent days and this is taking its toll on harvest progress as well as crop yields.

At Carse Hall, Ballykelly, Londonderry, Robert Craigs winter barley yielded 25% less than expected, with Cassia and Glacier averaging 8.6t/ha. He has 28ha of spring barley ready to cut, but its too wet to get on.

See also: Combine buyers guide 2017

This is typical across the North West; the Irish Farmers Association is offering free transport of combines from the South to the North to help finish harvest, says Mr Craig.

His neighbouring farms have wheat yields that are 20% down on last year and fields of oats lying flat and having to be ploughed in.

We had 18mm of rain last weekend (10/11 September) and my drying costs are already over double last years.

In southern Ireland, Irish Farmers Association National Grain Committee chairman Liam Dunne says harvest has now turned into a salvage operation for many growers with later sown and later maturing crops, particularly on the heavier soils in peripheral areas due to heavy and incessant rain.

In some regions, 25%-30% remains in the field. The West, North West and the northern part of the country have been worst hit, he says.

Scotland

Over the water in Scotland, the patchy weather is prolonging the end for Mike Cumming at Lour Farms, Angus, with 57ha of spring barley still to cut.

He grew Bazooka and Quadra winter barley, which yielded 9.8t/ha and 9.6t/ha, respectively. The hybrids did especially well, says Mr Cummings. They averaged a surprisingly good 65kg/hl specific weight.

He had less success with his oilseed rape, which suffered from club root and pod shedding caused by strong winds. The worst affected fields yielded 2.5t/ha, whereas his best fields reached 4.5t/ha.

Of the 200ha of spring barley, Concerto came off at 6.2t/ha with Chronicle slightly higher at 6.7t/ha. At 7.4t/ha Warrior yielded best but quality proved disappointing with 20% skinning.

The winter wheat is well under way at Lour Farms, with Beluga, Istabraq and Zulu all in the barn.

Zulu has really impressed me, it was drilled later and in poor conditions and it was no worse on yield or quality, says Mr Cummings. It is averaging 9.8t/ha with Revelation still to cut.

The Revelation looks seven days away; I wont be looking to grow much more of it.

South of the river, Craig Peddie has completed a successful cereal harvest at Cornceres Farm, Anstruther, Fife, with a promising crop of beans left to cut. The beans are looking good, Im hoping theyll come off at over 5t/ha, he says.

Mr Peddie grew Meridian and Bazooka winter barley, which averaged 8.9t/ha  slightly down on last year. His Catriona spring barley came off at 6t/ha, with 1.8% nitrogen, 18% moisture and screenings of under 6%.

Our winter wheat did very well, we were really impressed with the Leeds, says Mr Peddie. Along with Viscount it averaged 11t/ha.

But strong winds battered his oilseed rape, which had already suffered from slug damage  lowering the yield to 3t/ha. In future I think well be dropping oilseed rape, its becoming too difficult and expensive to grow.

North East

Slug damage was also the story for Glen Sanderson at Eshott South Farm, Northumberland.

The oilseed rape has been really disappointing but weve had a good crop of slugs, he says. His crop of high oleic, low linolenic acid (HOLL) and Incentive averaged 3.4t/ha.

The HOLL was especially disappointing; it looked good but the yield was awful whereas the Incentive outperformed it but looked scruffy, he says.

Winter barley yielded 7.7t/ha. It was better than we had expected but the yield needs to be higher for it to be profitable.

Mr Sanderson also grew winter wheat, which is still in the dryer. The Skyfall has been particularly pleasing, and the Reflection was also very good, whereas the Revelation was late and the straw was very green so it wasnt very good to combine.

North West

On the other side of the country Stephen Sant has finished his harvest at Model Farm, Staffordshire. It wasnt anything exciting, we were too spoilt last year.

His Extrovert oilseed rape averaged 3.5t/ha, with Glacier winter barley at 6t/ha. His final crop of Grafton and Diego wheat averaged 8t/ha with a specific weight of 74kg/hl.
Hundreds of activists are calling on state leaders to send a message by dropping their investments in one of the companies behind the controversial Bakken pipeline.

Philadelphia, PA, September 9, 2016  Hundreds of Food & Water Watch activists are calling on state officials to drop investments in Energy Trust Partners (ETP), one of the companies behind the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline, which has been the target of ongoing protests in North Dakota.The activists' petitions were delivered today to a Public School Employees Retirement System (PSERS) board of trustees meeting in Mechanicsburg.As revealed by Philadelphia Daily News columnist Will Bunch, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a major investor in the company, holding 5 million shares that are worth close to $200 million. Much of that is tied to PSERS, the pension fund for public school employees.Protests against the Bakken oil pipeline are being led by local indigenous communities seeking to protect water supplies and tribal lands belonging to the Standing Rock Sioux Nation. Over the weekend, private guards used pepper spray and attack dogs against protesters."Our tax dollars should not be used to support climate catastrophe and the destruction of sacred land for oil company profiteering," said Sam Bernhardt, senior organizer at Food & Water Watch. "Governor Wolf and the PSERS board must seize this opportunity to send a powerful message of support for the Standing Rock Sioux Nation, and to repudiate the disgraceful tactics of this dirty energy corporation."Ellen Gerhart, a retired special education teacher from Huntingdon County, is calling on PSERS to stop supporting the project. "I am appalled that my retirement pension is aiding and abetting a morally corrupt pipeline company (Energy Transfer Partners) that attacks peaceful protectors. The desecration of sacred ground of the Standing Rock Sioux Nation and the inevitable damage to the environment is horrific. PSERS must immediately divest any and all funds which support fossil fuel and pipeline companies. It is the only ethical choice."On September 7, State Rep. Leanne Krueger-Braneky also called on PSERS to divest from the company, saying that Pennsylvania "cannot lower itself to enabling the type of jackboot thuggery were seeing in North Dakota."Food & Water Watch
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Friday, September 16, 2016 Wrapping The Week with The Facebook Frenzy, KAFB Jobs And DA Doings Joe Monahan The Facebook frenzy will soon fade in New Mexico, its meager addition of several dozen jobs barely a blip and the fantasy that the data center in Los Lunas is the start of the next big thing for the state economy will be crushed. It's no fun saying it, but as Uncle Walter used to tell us, "That's the way it is." From the



. . . As technology giants like Amazon, Google and Microsoft race to build networks of unprecedented size to provide services over the Internet, a technology trend known as cloud computing. Local people, along with many economists and officials, often think these data centers are a key to an industrial revival. But the reality is less impressive.



And from Iowa where data centers seem as plentiful as the corn fields, the



. . .Iowa data centers combined have or will spend upwards of $8 billion developing their facilities, and they will employ 733 jobholders when all is said and done sometime in 2022. Thats a goodly number of jobs, but the cost per job in local and state. . . tax collections is immense. And just to make clear the level of tech job that is being created, that overall sector in Iowa paid annual wages and salaries per job of $56,947 in 2015  thats probably more, by the way, than what many data center workers in Iowa make. The U.S. average in that broad sector was $98,616. A difference that, I assure you, has nothing to do with Iowas lower cost of living.



Iowas heavily subsidized and sought-after data centers provide so-so pay to a comparative handful of mid-tech workers. The Iowa economy hardly notices the growth, the state subsidies never gets paid back in the form of net new state tax collections, and when all is said and done, the flow of benefits is decidedly one-sided  out of Iowa, that is. Im quite sure Microsoft, Google, and Facebook shareholders are quite happy with the arrangement.



Sorry to be the one to take the punch bowl away from the euphoric politicos and the economic planners, but it's time to sober them up. These data centers are all over the place, akin to electrical transformers. They are not the forerunner of a high-tech economy.



KAFB JOBS



We reported this week on



DA DOINGS



All the candidates for Election '16 statewide are official now and listed by the



BernCo Dem District Attorney candidate Raul Torrez is already celebrating victory. His lone GOP opponent withdrew earlier this year and the R's did not replace him.



Many of you have wondered just what billionaire George Soros was up to in the primary election when the liberal activist pumped



The billionaire financier has channeled more than $3 million into seven local district attorney campaigns in six states over the past year - a sum that exceeds the total spent on the 2016 presidential campaign by all but a handful of rival super-donors."



- "His money has supported African-American and Hispanic candidates for these powerful local roles, all of whom ran on platforms sharing major goals of Soros', like reducing racial disparities in sentencing and directing some drug offenders to diversion programs instead of to trial. It is by far the most tangible action in a progressive push to find, prepare and finance criminal justice reform-oriented candidates for jobs that have been held by long-time incumbents and serve as pipelines to the federal courts - and it has inspired fury among opponents angry about the outside influence in local elections."



While the involvement of Soros in DA races may have "sparked fury" elsewhere, it has been greeted with a yawn here. Of course, if Torrez ever gets the idea of seeking higher office the R's could get plenty furious over his indirect Soros connection.



That's it for this week. Thanks for stopping by.



This is the home of New Mexico politics.



E-mail your news and comments. (jmonahan@ix.netcom.com)



Interested in reaching New Mexico's most informed audience? Advertise here.



( c)NM POLITICS WITH JOE MONAHAN 2016





The Facebook frenzy will soon fade in New Mexico, its meager addition of several dozen jobs barely a blip and the fantasy that the data center in Los Lunas is the start of the next big thing for the state economy will be crushed. It's no fun saying it, but as Uncle Walter used to tell us, "That's the way it is." From the NYT And from Iowa where data centers seem as plentiful as the corn fields, the true story of data center development:Sorry to be the one to take the punch bowl away from the euphoric politicos and the economic planners, but it's time to sober them up. These data centers are all over the place, akin to electrical transformers. They are not the forerunner of a high-tech economy.We reported this week on the news of 327 layoffs by Lockheed Martin at Kirtland Air Force Base. That blow came on the same day as Facebook announced it was building a data center in Los Lunas. That news is not quite as bad as thought at first blush. Officials say "most" of those workers will be hired by a new contractor. However, even if they take on 70 percent of those getting the axe, that's still about 100 lost high-paying jobs. We don't think Facebook will be hiring any of them.All the candidates for Election '16 statewide are official now and listed by the Secretary of State BernCo Dem District Attorney candidate Raul Torrez is already celebrating victory. His lone GOP opponent withdrew earlier this year and the R's did not replace him.Many of you have wondered just what billionaire George Soros was up to in the primary election when the liberal activist pumped over $100,000 into a SuperPAC on behalf of Torrez. Here's the answer While the involvement of Soros in DA races may have "sparked fury" elsewhere, it has been greeted with a yawn here. Of course, if Torrez ever gets the idea of seeking higher office the R's could get plenty furious over his indirect Soros connection.That's it for this week. Thanks for stopping by.This is the home of New Mexico politics.
The High Plains of Nebraskas Panhandle are bean country -- Great Northern beans that is.

For farmers like Dean Keener, who works ground near Scottsbluff, the beans are a financial bright spot this year, one of the few row crops in his rotation turning a profit.

"There is kind of a ring of optimism out there. I know I'm kind of optimistic about where we're headed with beans," he said.

That was not the case last year. The market for Great Northerns was crushed by turbulent world events. Islamic State militants were killing truckers in the Middle East, Russia had a ban on food imports from the United States and West Coast dock workers were on strike.

So many of the white beans languished in bins and processors could barely give them away.

The tumult started back in 2013 and 2014 with some seemingly routine sales. Buyers in Turkey were signing lucrative contracts to feed the beans in refugee camps filled by people who fled fighting in Iraq and Syria.

American processors looked to farmers to meet demand, and the farmers delivered, planting Great Northerns in record numbers.

We wouldnt have ever gone out and contracted those beans (to be grown) had we not had the business in hand, said Kevin Kelley, president and CEO of Scottsbluff-based Kelley Bean Co., one of nations largest bean processors.

Great Northern bean acres planted in the United States jumped from 75,500 in 2013 to 107,000 acres in 2014, according to figures from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Growers planned to have those beans hauled to the West Coast to be loaded onto ships destined for Turkish ports and finally packed into trucks destined for the refugee camps in Iraq and Syria.

Then the Islamic State began assassinating truck drivers.

As you can imagine, they didnt get a lot of volunteers to drive trucks through Iraq and Syria, Kelley said.

Without drivers to move the beans Turkish traders reneged on their contracts, leaving American processors with a glut of product.

About that same time, the Russian military annexed Crimea from Ukraine, causing the United States, European Union and others to impose sanctions. Russia retaliated by banning all food imports from those countries, cutting off another important market for Nebraska beans.

Meanwhile, a strong dollar made U.S. exports less attractive and new markets harder to break into.

Then, West Coast dock workers went on strike, snarling shipping traffic at ports, holding up beans and causing more contracts to be lost.

It was like the perfect storm of problems for our small little industry, Kelley said.

With so many beans in the larder, processors stopped buying them from farmers entirely for parts of spring and summer 2015, said Courtney Schuler, a Gering-based field representative for Trinidad Benham Corp., a merchandising, packaging, trading and distribution company with corporate offices in Denver.

Unlike corn, which is a worldwide commodity with futures markets and massive storage capabilities, Great Northern beans are a niche product without a commodity market and limited storage capacity.

The (new) crop was at a risk of not being able to be purchased at harvest by the processors, said Schuler, who is chairwoman of the Nebraska Dry Bean Commission. To buy the new crop, we needed some assistance in being able to get rid of that overproduction.

Nebraskas industry began lobbying to get the USDA to buy beans using a food purchasing program that dates back to the Great Depression called Section 32, which was part of the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1935.

They enlisted Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts, who wrote a letter asking the USDA to buy 25 million pounds of dry edible beans.

Late last year, the USDA authorized purchase of about half that amount and spent $14.5 million on surplus Great Northern and pinto beans for distribution to schools and community charities like food banks and disaster relief.

Section 32 has been controversial in recent years, with critics questioning its effectiveness in supporting the price of commodities, one of its stated goals. Its funding is pegged to 30 percent of annual customs receipts, a portion of which goes to buying surplus food when market prices get out of whack -- usually fruits, berries, vegetables and some meat.

The surplus food purchases peaked in 2009 during the Great Recession at $319.5 million and dropped to $171 million by 2012. The spending has gone back up in recent years, reaching $306 million in fiscal year 2015 and $312 million for the fiscal year that ended in September, according to figures provided by the USDA.

The program often has more impact in terms of politics and supporting food assistance than it does in moving markets, said Brad Lubben, a farm policy analyst at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Earlier this year, the USDA announced plans to buy $20 million in cheese to help ailing milk prices and $11.7 million on eggs, among other things.

The day after the USDA announced plans to buy cheese, prices for that commodity dropped. The industry had asked the federal government to buy $150 million in cheese, more than seven times what was approved.

Its possible to have a much bigger impact on a small market like dry beans, but you get into the dairy market and you purchase $20 million worth of cheese ... While it is an important signal that were purchasing supplies for distribution, it is a small amount that doesnt move the market very far, at least for the major commodities, Lubben said.

Ricketts said hes pleased with the USDAs reaction to the needs of Nebraskas bean farmers and the outcome of the purchase.

For Great Northern beans, the Section 32 purchase, along with farmers cutting back on planted acres, has helped prices rebound from $18 per 100 pounds last fall to $30 this year.

It looks to me like were on solid ground again, said Keener, who is in the midst of harvesting this years beans. Its a different year. Its a different story.
A sushi restaurant in the Haymarket plans to close its doors by late next month and a new Chinese restaurant plans to reopen in the same location soon after.

Dozo Sushi Grill and Lounge at 151 N. Eighth St. plans to close after five years as its owners pursue new ventures, said Matthew Bittinger, assistant manager at the restaurant.

In its place, a Madison, Wisconsin-based Chinese restaurant called Ichiban Sichuan will reopen. Jason Diong, owner of Ichiban Sichuan, said the restaurant will feature Sichuan cuisine, a style of cooking that no Nebraska restaurants currently feature but is popular in China.

We are planning on introducing the concept, Diong said during a phone interview. "It fits the demographic.

He said he would like to open by the end of October, though that timeline has been complicated by his need to replace much of the cooking appliances in the Dozo location. A decision by a city advisory committee Thursday to reject Diongs request for two signs on his restaurant also may postpone the restaurants opening, he said.

The Historic Preservation Commission voted this week to allow Diong to place one of two signs he requested on the restaurant but not both. Several commissioners said allowing both signs to be placed on the restaurant would be too obstructive to the building.

Diong said the restaurants location on the periphery of the Haymarket, away from the busiest lanes of pedestrian traffic, requires a bolder set of signs than a typical downtown restaurant.

Ichiban Sichuan has two other locations, in Madison and Lafayette, Indiana.

Diong said he focuses on college towns because they offer the right mix of young professionals and customers who enjoy quality Chinese cuisine.

"The Haymarket has all of those demographics, he said. "Thats one of the reasons why we chose that location.
- Former Katsina state governor, Ibrahim Shema, has turned himself in

- This is coming two days after he was declared wanted by the EFCC over allegations of fraud

Ibrahim Shema, the immediate ex-governor of Katsina state, who was declared wanted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has turned himself in.

Shema reportedly arrived at the EFCC office in Abuja at about 9.30 am on Friday, September 16, Vanguard reports.

Former Katsina governor, Shema

The ex-governor was declared wanted on Wednesday for allegedly diverting N18 billion of governments fund to his private account.

His spokesperson, Oluwabusola Olawale, said Shema turned himself in because he is a law abiding citizen who has absolutely nothing to fear.

READ ALSO: Alleged fraud: Group asks EFCC to arrest Patience Jonathan

According to him, Shema went to submit himself to the anti-graft agency even though they they had not been fair to him in handling his case.

It is yet unknown if the former governor reported at the EFCC office with his lawyers.

Recall that the EFCC had said that Shema, a member of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party, was declared wanted after efforts to get him to respond to the allegations against him through invitations failed.

In a swift reaction, the former governor denied allegations that he was on the run. He described EFCC notice declaring him wanted as malicious and misleading. He added that he was seriously embarrassed, disturbed and surprised by the commission's notice that declared him wanted.

Source: Legit.ng
Costco has formally applied to build a store near the corner of 14th Street and Pine Lake Road.

The Washington-based retailer submitted plans to the Lincoln-Lancaster County Planning Department earlier this week for a 156,000-square-foot warehouse store along with a 16-stall fueling station on about 20 acres between 16th Street and Hazel Scott Drive on the north side of Pine Lake Road. The plans differ slightly from what was shown at a neighborhood meeting last month.

Neighbors' biggest concerns about the site plans Costco representatives showed at the Aug. 31 meeting focused on increased traffic and the safety of people using a city bike trail that runs along the north side of Pine Lake Road.

In the formal plans submitted to the city, Costco has added a new sidewalk on the north side of the property that would start at Hazel Scott Drive on the east and go to 14th Street.

The plan also shows several features on the bike trail meant to alert both drivers and bikers to the entrances at 18th and 16th streets on Pine Lake Road.

Costco also has added a proposed traffic signal at the 16th and Pine Lake entrance that would allow for controlled movement of traffic in all four directions. An earlier plan would have closed off some of the access at that intersection.

And Costco is proposing to slightly realign Hazel Scott Drive to make the natural movement of the road for northbound drivers westerly into the Costco parking lot rather than easterly into the Ridge neighborhood.

Steve Henrichsen, the Planning Department's development review manager, said Costco has scheduled another meeting for neighborhood residents at 5:30 p.m. Sept. 27 at Scott Middle School.

The application tentatively is scheduled for a public hearing at the Oct. 12 meeting of the Planning Commission, Henrichsen said.

Costco is seeking a Comprehensive Plan amendment, zoning change and use permit. Its plans also include a two-acre pad site on the northeast corner of the land it is developing that it eventually would sell to someone else to develop.

Lincoln Memorial Funeral Home, which is selling the land to Costco, also plans to develop three pad sites on the corner of 14th and Pine Lake.

Costco officials declined to comment.
- The Delta state government insisted that it is not part of Biafra

- The state also warned agitators for an independent state to stay off

The Delta state government has publicly denied being a part of Biafra and has warned its agitators to stay clear off the state.

The agitation for an independent Biafra state has risen with different protests and by members of separatist groups being organised in different parts of the country.

READ ALSO: Opinion: Roads decay and south east governors

The arrest of Nnamdi Kanu has also raised the level of protest and call for an independent state but the Delta state government has rejected the notion that it is part of the proposed Biafra.

The Guardian reports that Mr. Festus Ovie Agas who is the Secretary to Government of the state noted that the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) and the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) have intensified their agitation.

Faced with this situation, it has become imperative for the Government of Delta State to make this clarification to avoid any confusion or misunderstanding regarding the status of Delta State in the renewed Biafra agitation.

While some communities in the state may have cultural affinity with the people of the South-East, it is clearly a patent error for anybody or group to suggest or insinuate that Delta State, or more specifically, the Anioma people have been or are part of the South-East that is supposed to make up the proposed Biafra Republic.

READ ALSO: Fani-Kayode speaks for Biafrians

He explained that the state has always occupied a unique place and has never been part of Biafra agitation.

He rejected the inclusion of Delta State without her consent in the proposed Biafra Republic.

He also warned against any form of protest or rally in the pursuit of Biafra.

Meanwhile, IPOB lamented the continued detention of Kanu by security operatives.

Guardian reports that the pro-Biafra group claimed that Kabiru Umar, popularly known as Kabiru Sokoto, who was sentenced to life imprisonment for mass murder in 2013 has been released by President Muhammadu Buhari while Kanu was still in detention.

In a statement released by the spokespersons of the group, Emma Nmezu and Dr. Clifford Chukwuemeka Ironya, IPOB claimed most of its members arrested were either injured or dead.

Source: Legit.ng
The National Examination Council (NECO) has released the result of the 2016 June/July Senior School Certificate Examination.

The Nation reports that the result was released on Friday, September 16 with 88.51 per cent of the candidates obtaining five credits pass and above in English Language and Mathematics.

READ ALSO: WAEC moves to avoid clashes with INEC in the future

Prof. Charles Uwakwe who is the registrar of NECO announced the release of the result at the headquarters of the exam body in Minna, Niger state.

He noted that there was a one per cent increase in the general performance of candidates in this years compared with 2015.

905,011 which makes up 88.51 per cent out of the 1,022,474 candidates that sat for the examination in Nigeria and other countries got five credits and above, while 84.54 per cent got credit pass and above in English Language and 80.16 per cent obtained credit pass and above in Mathematics.

Uwakwe noted that 14 schools have been derecognized by NECO for examination malpractice while 194 schools were involved in mass cheating.

He expressed shock at the alarming growth of examination malpractice in the country and warned that any school involved in malpractice will be derecognised.

He attributed the increased candidates performance in the examination to the staff of NECO. He also applauded the contributions from his predecessors who have laid a good foundation and the seriousness of the candidates.

READ ALSO: Student gives 'unusual' reason for dropping out of university

Uwakwe said: I want to solicit for support from all our stakeholders. NECO should be seen as a Nigerian baby that requires the care and support of all to enable her attain that first class international status. We are working hard to ensure NECO makes her mark in the global assessment industry.

He also applauded the students for their good performance and said the results could be accessed on the examinations website.

Source: Legit.ng
A prominent female activist from the Niger Delta, Ankio Briggs, on Friday, September 16, 2016, painted a picture of the suffering in the Niger Delta wondering why the federal government continues to think the use of force would resolve the situation in the tensed region.

She also mocked the government of the country telling those in search of the Niger Delta Avengers and other agitators where to find them.

Ayo Adebanjo, Professor Pat Utomi and Annkio Briggs at the event

The woman also told a large gathering at the second edition of the Tunji Braithwaite symposium organized in Lagos state by The Tunji Braithwaite Foundation that Nigeria was never created by God, but the British colonialists for their own economic benefit.

According to her, nobody wants Nigeria to break up, but what the Niger Delta Avengers and other agitators want is for the region to be developed with the money that comes from the oil explored in the area.

READ ALSO: TUC pleads with Nigeria for attitudinal change

Nigeria was not created by God. Nigeria was created by a man called Lord Lugard for selfish economic reasons, Ms Briggs who has been an activist for over 18 years said.

She maintained that Nigeria is too big for the crop of leaders that have ruled so far and that are still ruling, adding that this is the reason these leaders remain confused.

She noted that because of oil, we have leaders who cannot think."

"When you have 36 states and you are depending on nine states to sustain those states, then it is unfortunate.

Soldiers are currently on an Operation Crocodile Smile in the Niger Delta region

"When you have eight local governments in Bayelsa state and you have 44 in Kano state and that Kano takes 44 of what Bayelsa produces, and you say you are looking for the Avengers"

She wondered why Nigeria still makes it look like it is being ruled by the western world.

They tell us the resources that we have, they tell us how much of those resources that we have, they tell us when the resources would run out, they tell us how much they would buy the resourcesthey used to buy it (crude oil) for $150, I cant stop asking myself how the price went down. What mechanism did they use to bring the price of crude oil down?" She asked.

READ ALSO: Burutai asks Niger Delta militants to unite

She urged the people to know that bad governance is not an accident but the result of the peoples silence.

We produce over 96 percent of the countrys resources today and yet we get about 13 percent and somebody asks: what are you doing with it? The I ask what are you doing with the other 87 percent?"

Recently, the minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, also said violence will not resolve the Niger Delta crisis which now includes attacks on oil installations by militants and other agitators.

Source: Legit.ng
Two reports from Nebraska economists show weakening economic conditions in the state.

The Creighton University Rural Mainstreet Index sank for September and remained below growth neutral for the 13th straight month, according to the monthly survey of bank CEOs in rural areas of a 10-state region.

The index, which ranges between 0 and 100, fell to 37.3 from 41.1 in August and 49 in September 2015.

The survey also measures each of the 10 states' individual economies. Nebraska saw its Rural Mainstreet Index fall from 64.5 in August to 61.2 in September; however it continued to rank highest among the 10 states.

Creighton University economist Ernie Goss, who compiles the survey, said farm income is expected to decline 12 percent over last year, and that is limiting spending by farmers and hurting the economy in rural areas.

The leading economic indicator from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's Bureau of Business Research showed worsening conditions for August.

The indicator, a composite of economic factors that predict economic growth six months into the future, fell by 0.32 percent in August.

The drop in this months leading indicator negates a similar increase during July, said economist Eric Thompson, director of the Bureau of Business Research. Taken together, the leading indicator values for the last two months suggest slow economic growth in Nebraska at the beginning of 2017.

Manufacturing activity and jobless claims were areas of weakness in August. There was an increase in initial claims for unemployment insurance and a drop in manufacturing hours during the month, Thompson noted.

However, there also were some positive findings in the August data. Business expectations were positive, with businesses expecting to increase both sales and employment over the next 6 months. There also was a drop in the value of the U.S. dollar, which reduces competitive pressure on Nebraskas export-oriented businesses.

The see the full leading economic indicator report, go to the UNL Bureau of Business Research website, http://www.bbr.unl.edu.

To see the Rural Mainstreet Index report, go to: https://www.creighton.edu/economicoutlook/mainstreeteconomy/
Stefano Fassina points out that in my article Europes Left After Brexit I did not discuss his preferred option for Eurozone member-states: Stay in the EU but leave the euro. Of course the reason my article did not discuss that position is that it was focusing on Brexit and addressing Lexiteers like Tariq Ali and Stathis Kouvelakis who are arguing, from a left-wing position, for leaving the EU altogether  i.e. Brexit-like moves. But I am more than happy to comment on Stefanos preferred option (In the EU, Out of the Euro) here.

Klicken Sie hier fur eine deutsche Zusammenfassung des Beitrags.

An amicable divorce for the Eurozone?

Stefano invokes Joe Stiglitz who, in his recent book on the euro, recommends an amicable divorce that would lead to the creation of at least two new currencies (one for the deficit and one for the surplus countries). Since I have recently discussed this with Joe Stiglitz it is perhaps us...
September 16, 2016

Help discover the species of bees that inhibit Homestead National Monument of America by joining rangers during the Bee Bioblitz on Sunday, October 2, 2016.

To celebrate 100 years of stewardship, the National Park Service is planning a shared Nationwide quest to discover and document biodiversity- the variety of living organisms in a place. You are invited to be part of the National Park Service Centennial celebration during this engaging event to discover the biodiversity within YOUR national parks.

This bioblitz will be an intense period of biological surveying in an attempt to record all the species of bees at Homestead National Monument of America. Groups of scientists, naturalists, and volunteers (that's you!) will be conducting this intensive field study.

Schedule of Events

- 10 a.m. Orientation for Bee Bioblitz- Education Center Multi-Purpose Room

-10:30 a.m. - 2 p.m. collection and identification of bees

-1 p.m. - 4 p.m. Special games for kids (and the young at heart) and displays to learn about bees

-2 p.m. Presentation on Bees by Dr. Doug Golick from the University of Nebraska Lincoln

-4 p.m. 2016 Centennial Bee Bioblitz is complete!

------

To record observations on October 2, Homestead National Monument of America is utilizing a smart phone app called iNaturalist. You can download this free application to your device before arriving to the monument, or while at the monument utilizing our free wireless internet.The iNaturalist application allows you to upload images of the species that you discover.Once uploaded you record the information that you know about your species, and other iNaturalist users will collaborate to identify and confirm the identification of the species that you capture.

"Pollinators like the native bees help bring us one out of three bites of food, this event will allow us to learn more about bees while helping the National Park Service celebrate its centennial ," said Superintendent Mark Engler,.

Remember, Homestead National Monument of America has an exciting schedule of events planned for 2016, the Centennial year of the National Park Service. Keep up with the latest information by following us on Twitter (HomesteadNM) and Facebook (Homestead National Monument of America).

Homestead National Monument of America is a unit of the National Park Service located four miles west of Beatrice, Nebraska and 45 miles south of Lincoln. Hours of operation are 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Admission is free of charge. For additional information, please call 402-223-3514 or visit https://www.nps.gov/home/.
A new reason to savor brunch (and maybe even get there earlier) in New York, and A-B InBevs surprising latest acquisition highlight this weeks roundup of craft beer news. Also, Hootie and the Blowfish.

Governor Andrew Cuomo signed into law last week a bill that will allow restaurants to start serving booze at 10 a.m. as opposed to noon. Restaurants and bars can also apply for a set number of special permits per year to start serving as early as 8 a.m. Beyond the boon to brunches, the bill will change restrictions that have stymied growth among the states breweries and winemakers.

Hootie & the Blowfish are back and fans of the ubiquitous 90s rock band have craft beer to thank. The band will perform in St. Petersburg to help publicize Hooties Homegrown Ale, which will be available in cans in Florida, Georgia and South Carolina. The blonde ale was brewed in conjunction with Tampas Rock Brothers Brewing and had previously only been available in the taproom.

Our penchant for documenting our beer drinking odysseys has led the University of Kentucky Department of Writing, Rhetoric and Digital Studies to schedule the second Craft Writing: Beer, the Digital and Craft Culture symposium. The idea is to showcase the writing that is being done in the craft beer industry, explained Jeff Rice, professor and symposium organizer. Theres a lot of really interesting and fascinating writing going on whether its historical, archival, memoir, industry news, the uses of social media, web developmentand so what were doing is bringing together professional writers and as well as brewers who write. The event is free and open to the public and takes place September 30 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Jacks Abby Craft Lagers, the bottom fermenting-centric Framingham brewery producing some of the states most highly rated beers, is expanding in size and on course to brew 36,000 barrels in 2016. Founded in 2011 by three brothers, the brewery has experienced rapid growth in that short timeframe. After opening a new drinking space and restaurant last year the newly leased space will grow the operation to 130,000 square feet and include a larger taproom and the ability to advance the brewerys barrel aging program.

Fresh on the heels of its $100+ billion acquisition of SABMiller, A-B InBev is buying Belgiums Brouwerij Bosteels for a reported $225 million. Bosteels  brewers of Tripel Karmeliet, DeuS and Pauwel Kwak  has been family-owned and operated since 1791. Antoine Bosteels, who represents the seventh generation of Bosteels involvement, will continue to run the business for now.
If youre looking for a cheap and fast getaway this winter, weve got a hot ticket for you. For a limited time, during the months of November and December 2016, American Airlines is offering $200 roundtrip tickets to Havana, Cuba. You can fly out of Miami ($200), Baltimore ($271), Chicago ($311) or Dallas ($318) and arrive in Havana in just a matter of hours.

Not sure what Havana has to offer during our chilliest months? Just because its our winter doesnt mean the sizzling town of Havana is any less exciting. During November, dance lovers can enjoy the International Ballet Festival of Havana, a prestigious event that started in 1960. For global movie enthusiasts, the Havana Film Festival will be taking place Dec. 8-18 showcasing top films from Latin America, all day every day. Festival Jazz Plaza, an international jazz extravaganza, will also be in December and last for nine days.

If dance, film, or music is your forte, Havana might be your perfect winter vacation. Even if these events dont end up on your itinerary, take a few days to learn the island culture and soak up some much-needed sunshine. Just think of a $200 roundtrip ticket as an early Christmas present for yourself.

McGee Nall is a travel intern with Paste and a freelance writer based out of Athens, Georgia.
Three years ago, Edward Snowden, a National Security Agency contractor, turned over a trove of secret government documents to a trio of journalists, exposing a massive, international data collection program by the National Security Agency that sucked up all the data, including phone calls, created by millions of Americans.

Branded a spy, Snowden fled from Japan, where he met with the journalists, to Russia, where he has been stranded since after the U.S. revoked his passport. He's now seen by many as a whistleblower, whose revelations of the illegal, or at least overreaching, data collection program led to reforms passed by those who called him a hacker and traitor.

In Snowden, director Oliver Stone tells Snowdens story, beginning with the meetings between Snowden, effectively played by a bespectacled Joseph Gordon-Levitt, documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras (Melissa Leo) and journalists Glenn Greenwald (Zachary Quinto) and Ewen MacAskill (Tom Wilkinson).

As Snowden turns over the documents via computer, the film flashes back through his life -- washing out in the Army, getting into the CIA and meeting his girlfriend Lindsay Mills (Shailene Woodley), a liberal who aims at converting the very conservative Snowden to her side.

That process, which begins when Snowden was posted to Geneva by the CIA, slowly leads him to risk everything to expose the NSA and CIA abuses -- which makes for the political thriller portion of the film.

But what sets Snowden apart from a standard spy story is its concentration on the relationship between Snowden and Mills, repeatedly torn apart by his secretive work.

Written by Stone and Kieran Fitzgerald from a pair of books about Snowden -- The Time of the Octopus and The Snowden Files -- the picture, which is billed as a dramatic re-creation, adheres relatively closely to events, incorporating television footage wherever appropriate to drive home the realism.

Thats not to say that the precise dialogue between Snowden and Mills was spoken by the couple or that Snowdens meetings with his CIA mentor/handler Corbin OBrian (Rhys Ifans) and his work in a secret underground Hawaiian fortress are 100 percent accurate. Thats not possible for a feature film, especially one about the shadowy world of espionage.

But the dramatization works well enough to make the film feel real. That is until its compared with Citizenfour, Poitras Oscar-winning documentary that follows the events in the hotel room with Snowden, Greenwald and MacAskill, thats a true heart-pounder. Perhaps Snowden works like that for those who havent seen Citizenfour.

What Snowden and Citizenfour share is a black-and-white, good guys-bad guys point-of-view. The hero of both films, of course, is Snowden, who literally emerges into the light as he pulls off the theft of the documents in Stones picture. The bad guys are the CIA and NSA officials who ran and hid the data collection program and President Obama.

There are also, in typical Stone fashion, plenty of speeches aimed at making his -- and Snowdens -- argument against ever-encroaching government control and monitoring of the entire public under the guise of security against terrorism.

Thankfully, those speeches fit with the story and dont derail the globe-trotting picture, which is taut enough to hold interest for its 2-hour running time. That can be attributed to Stone, who, when hes on his game, is a talented political filmmaker, able to effectively dramatize real events and people.

That is what hes done with Snowden, his best political film since 1995s Nixon.
The EPI Special Opportunities 4 (EPISO 4) opportunity fund, advised by Tristan Capital Partners, has acquired four local shopping centres in the Greater Stockholm region and a retail park in northern Sweden for a total of around 94 million (SEK 900 million) from a fund managed by Aberdeen Asset Management.

[]
Last month, Kawasaki India was in the news for all the wrong reasons. Their dealer in Navi Mumbai, SNK Palm Beach had taken payment for at least 11 bikes in full, but had not delivered them bikes. For some customers, it has been over six months that they have paid the amount in full and have not received their bikes.

After the story was reported across various media channels, Kawasaki India was forced to take action. The logical thing to do by Kawasaki India at this point of time is to either return the money, or deliver the bikes to those customers. Guess what they did. They went ahead and cancelled the SNK Palm Beachs dealership contract.

Now how is this going to be helpful to those dozen buyers, half of those have already started paying emis for a bike they will probably never see. In the meantime, the owner of SNK Palm Beach, Satyen Karandikar, who had promised to return money of all the customers, has stopped responding to phone calls and gone missing from the scene.

It is not clear as to what will happen next. Kawasaki India has been the first one to leave the sinking ship. With their dealer absconding, there is very little hope that those buyers will see their money or bike ever again.

Luckily, there is one customer who managed to smell the rat much before the disaster shook Kawasaki India. Mohammed Mubarak from Chennai had booked a 2016 Kawasaki ZX-14R with the same SNK Navi Mumbai dealership. The reason he had booked the bike from Mumbai, as the model was not available with any other dealer in the country.

Satyen told Mohammed that if he pays the full amount in advance, he will get the bike delivered in 20 days. Thus, Mohammed paid the amount of INR 17.9 lakhs in full. However, despite full payment and continuous follow-ups the delivery never happened. It came to a point that Satyen and his dealership started ignoring Mohammeds phone calls. Mohammed then decided to fly down to Mumbai and confront the dealer.

At the dealership, Mohammed told them that he was going to file a police complaint right away, unless they returned his money or give him the bike. Finally the dealer agreed to hand over the display bike, which Mohmmad got registered in Pune itself.

Mubarak decided to ride the bike to Chennai. On the first day of riding, he started facing problems with the clutch which was making strange noises. He immediately called the Mumbai dealer who told him to visit the Bangalore dealer, as that was the closest from where he was at that point of time.

He visited the Bangalore dealer, where he was told that there was no problem with the bike and he can continue with the journey. But that was not the case as Mohammed realized a few hours later when a bolt of his bike came off. He again called Mumbai dealer, who promised to send a technician from Delhi to attend to the issue.

Till date no one has helped Mohammed solve his problem as his new ZX-14R continues to make strange noises. But, atleast he managed to get a bike from the rogue dealer.

UPDATE  Kawasaki India delivers motorcycles to those who were conned by SNK Palm Beach dealer
Earlier this week, it was revealed that Toyota India is planning on bringing their entry level car brand Daihatsu to India. Now, Perodua Axia, which is nothing but a rebadged Toyota Agya / Daihatsu Alya, has been spied in India.

The car was spotted without any camouflage in Mumbai. Wearing international license plates, it is unclear at this time if this was actually a test car or that of a private owner who is on a road trip across countries.

New Perodua Axi was launched back in 2014 as the peoples car. Features offered are easy driving, eco-friendly, spacious and economical aspects along with Asean NCAR 4 Star rating. It is also an energy efficient vehicle (EEV) as per the Malaysian standards. In the past two years, the car has been well received in Malaysia.

Speaking about variants of Perodua Axia, it is available in Standard E variant  which is priced at RM 24,600 features 14 inch steel rims, power windows, two airbags, Eco Drive indicator and LED combination rear lamp. It also receives fabric seating and power steering.

Axia Standard G variant is priced at RM 29, 800 (Manual) (Rs 5.64 lakhs) and RM 32, 800 (Auto) (Rs 6.21 lakhs) receives all the features of Standard E variant with additions of 14 alloy wheels, alarm and keyless entry, reverse sensor, seatbelt reminders, retractable and electric control side mirror and height adjustable driver seats. Four speaker audio with CD player, ISOFIX anchors for child seats and rear wiper defogger are also available.

Axia SE with a price of RM 36,800 (Manual) (Rs 6.96 lakhs) and RM 39,800 (Auto) (Rs 7.53 lakhs) is seen with added features such as side skirts, projector headlamps, aero bumper, rear spoiler and front parking sensors. Interiors sport door trim fabric and fabric semi bucket seats while interiors are finished in chrome and silver.

Axia Advanced with a price tag of RM 42,130 (Rs 7.97 lakhs) has all the features available on the three lower trims with added features such as touch screen DVD player with Bluetooth and Navigation, leather seats and leather wrapped steering wheel.

Powered by a 1.0 liter engine, the size of the car is perfect to entice majority of small car buyers, that is if Toyota decides to launch this car here.

via carwale
First launched in 1966, Toyota Corolla is currently being produced at more than 16 plants across the world. Over the last 50 years, a total of 44 million Corollas have been sold and the number is growing faster than ever before.

Another interesting fact to note is that every fifth car Toyota has ever sold in its 79 years of existence, is a Corolla.

Speaking about the latest Corolla, 2017 Toyota Corolla Altis facelift gets a sportier design, thanks to exterior and interior updates. But retains its engine specifications, as seen on its current counterpart.

It will take the place of the current generation model, which is on sale in 150 countries across the globe. New Corolla is set to launch in India sometime in early 2017.

2017 Toyota Corolla Altis facelift will receive a larger bumper design, LED headlamps, DRLs, round fog lamps and a host of chrome accents in the front. A new set of wheels are seen on its sides while at the rear, it gets LED tail lamps and new graphics.

Interiors of the Altis facelift will be seen with new HVAC controls and HVAC vents on either sides. Quality of materials used in its cabin sees a notable improvement. The central console is fitted with a new Touch 2 system, navigation as standard and an instrument cluster with 4.2 MID display. Leather upholstery, heated steering wheel, keyless entry, cruise control and arm rests with cup holders will also form its interior features.

No changes in engine specifications are expected on the 2017 Toyota Corolla Altis facelift which will come in with the same 1.8 liter, 140 hp petrol engine and 1.4 liter, 88 hp diesel engine. The engines will continue to be mated to 6 speed manual and 7 speed CVT transmission options. Pricing in India on launch should range between INR 13.5 lakhs and INR 18.5 lakhs.
Heres the story of how it was done. First, a fake ad on torrent listings linked the site to a Latvian bank account, an e-mail address, and a Facebook page.

Using basic website-tracking services, Der-Yeghiayan was able to uncover (via a reverse DNS search) the hosts of seven apparent KAT website domains: kickasstorrents.com, kat.cr, kickass.to, kat.ph, kastatic.com, thekat.tv and kickass.cr. This dug up two Chicago IP addresses, which were used as KAT name servers for more than four years. Agents were then able to legally gain a copy of the servers access logs (explaining why it was federal authorities in Chicago that eventually charged Vaulin with his alleged crimes).

Using similar tools, Homeland Security investigators also performed something called a WHOIS lookup on a domain that redirected people to the main KAT site. A WHOIS search can provide the name, address, email and phone number of a website registrant. In the case of kickasstorrents.biz, that was Artem Vaulin from Kharkiv, Ukraine.

Der-Yeghiayan was able to link the email address found in the WHOIS lookup to an Apple email address that Vaulin purportedly used to operate KAT. Its this Apple account that appears to tie all of pieces of Vaulins alleged involvement together.

On July 31st 2015, records provided by Apple show that the me.com account was used to purchase something on iTunes. The logs show that the same IP address was used on the same day to access the KAT Facebook page. After KAT began accepting Bitcoin donations in 2012, $72,767 was moved into a Coinbase account in Vaulins name. That Bitcoin wallet was registered with the same me.com email address.
New research confirms that an innovative procedure combining MRI and ultrasound to create a 3D image of the prostate can more accurately locate suspicious areas and help diagnose whether it's prostate cancer.

Using specialized equipment needed, physicians at UT Southwestern Medical Center's Harold C. Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Center began using the fusion biopsy procedure about three years ago for its ability to blend live ultrasound images with captured MRI images. The fused image creates the 3D model, and flags anomalies that could be areas of concern. That helps guide urologists to get tissue samples called biopsies to determine whether cancer is present.

UT Southwestern's early adoption of the cutting-edge technology allowed researchers to report on the superior diagnostic performance of this novel approach compared to traditional methods for diagnosing prostate cancer. Furthermore, these researchers have partnered with colleagues in Brazil to conduct follow up studies that now show the technique consistently improved detection of clinically significant prostate cancer under a wide variety of conditions, even when radiologists were using different equipment and protocols.

"In the past, we diagnosed prostate cancer by random biopsies of the prostate in men with elevated PSA values. With fusion biopsy, we actually find more cancer, we can differentiate between dangerous tumors and less aggressive tumors, and in some cases we perform fewer biopsies," said Dr. Daniel Costa, Assistant Professor of Radiology and with the Advanced Imaging Research Center (AIRC) at UT Southwestern.

Prostate cancer is the second most common cancer diagnosed in men, after skin cancer. Prostate cancer risk increases with age, with most cases occurring after age 60. According to the National Cancer Institute (NCI), about 180,890 men will be diagnosed this year, and about 14 percent of men will be diagnosed sometime during their lifetime.

The procedure, technically known as MRI-TRUS (magnetic resonance imaging/transrectal ultrasound) fusion targeted prostate biopsy, requires special imaging capabilities and high level training for both radiologists and urologists, so its use has not become widespread.

It works like this: after the urologist identifies a patient at risk for prostate cancer, radiologists use a state-of-the-art MRI examination to identify potentially suspicious areas. If present, the MRI images are then sent to a device that blends those with an ultrasound used by urologists to take a biopsy or sample of the tissue in question to determine whether it has cancer.

"In many instances, MRI-TRUS biopsies performed at UT Southwestern have allowed us to diagnose and treat aggressive prostate cancer in patients whose prior biopsies failed to find the cancer," said Dr. Ivan Pedrosa, Chief of the Division ofMagnetic Resonance Imaging, Associate Professor of Radiology and with the Advanced Imaging Research Center, who holdsthe Jack Reynolds, M.D. Chair in Radiology. "Because of its improved precision, patients and physicians are better informed to choose the most appropriate treatment. This helps to avoid surgery in patients with less aggressive disease, and ensures that patients with more aggressive cancers are identified earlier."

The fusion biopsy technique has been used for nearly 1,000 patients at UT Southwestern.

"Patients diagnosed at a later stage of disease, or with a more aggressive cancer, have lower rates of survival, making it vital that we quickly identify those who are at the highest risk,"said Dr. Claus Roehrborn, Chair and Professor of Urology, who holds the E. E. Fogelson and Greer Garson Fogelson Distinguished Chair in Urology and the S.T. Harris Family Chair in Medical Science, in Honor of John D. McConnell, M.D. "The close collaboration between radiology and urology, and the ability to exchange the images and information across a common network, enhances the productivity of this collaboration and the outcomes for our patients."

Prostate cancer forms in tissues of the prostate, a gland in the male reproductive system found below the bladder and in front of the rectum. The prostate surrounds the urethra, the tube through which urine flows. A healthy prostate is about the size of a walnut. If the prostate grows too large, it squeezes the urethra. This may cause difficulty in urinating, burning or pain during urination, more frequent urges to urinate at night, loss of bladder control, and blood in the urine. These symptoms may also have a different cause, so men with prostate symptoms should speak with their physician, Dr. Roehrborn said.
Cure rates for multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) in Europe have been estimated to be twice as high as previously thought, according to a research team at Queen Mary University of London (QMUL).

The Tuberculosis Network Clinical Trials Group (TBNET), an international consortium of clinicians and scientists, documented the management of 380 patients with Multidrug-Resistant Tuberculosis (MDR-TB) at 23 different sites across Europe over five years.

The study, published as correspondence in the New England Journal of Medicine, found that cure rates in Europe were 61 per cent according to TBNET's new definitions, compared to only 31 per cent when using the standard criteria proposed by the WHO.

MDR-TB has been on the increase worldwide over the past decade, with the largest number of patients living in the European WHO region. Despite treatment with expensive drugs, cure rates were thought to be very low.

The WHO definition for 'cured' patients includes having three cultures of sputum (mucus from the respiratory tract) that test negative for MDR-TB, taken at least 30 days apart during the continuation phase of treatment.

The researchers found that the WHO criterion for 'cure' could not be applied in the majority of patients. This was because most patients who had successful treatments did not produce sputum (normally produced as the result of infection) after eight months of therapy and therefore could not give a sample.

TBNET proposed new definitions for 'cure' and 'failure' of MDR-TB treatment based on the sputum culture status at six months after the initiation of therapy, and whether patients were free from disease recurrence one year after the end of therapy.

Dr Heinke Kunst, on behalf of the TB research group at QMUL, said: "The results from our study are very encouraging and may give hope to patients who are affected by MDR-TB. But there is still much to do to improve treatment outcomes, as 30 per cent of MDR-TB patients still cannot be cured in Europe.

"We need new drugs and shorter regimens which are more effective, less toxic and widely available in the European region. We are optimistic that outcomes can be improved with novel medicines and individually-tailored treatments, rather than programmatic one-for-all courses of therapy."
Visualization was enabled by designing a new artificial magnetic material. The finding means remarkable possibilities to materials research.

Researchers at Aalto University and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have demonstrated that polaron formation also occurs in a system of magnetic charges, and not just in a system of electric charges. Being able to control the transport properties of such charges could enable new devices based on magnetic rather than electric charges, for example computer memories.

Polarons are an example of emergent phenomena known to occur in condensed matter physics. For instance, an electron moving across a crystal lattice displaces the surrounding ions, together creating an effective quasi-particle, a polaron, which has an energy and mass that differs from that of a bare electron. Polarons have a profound effect on electronic transport in materials.

Artificial spin ice systems are metamaterials that consist of lithographically patterned nanomagnets in an ordered two-dimensional geometry. The individual magnetic building blocks of a spin ice lattice interact with each other via dipolar magnetic fields.

Researchers used material design as a tool to create a new artificial spin ice, the dipolar dice lattice.

'Designing the correct two-dimensional lattice geometry made it possible to create and observe the decay of magnetic polarons in real-time,' says postdoctoral researcher Alan Farhan from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (USA).

'We introduced the dipolar dice lattice because it offers a high degree of frustration, meaning that competing magnetic interactions cannot be satisfied simultaneously. Like all systems in nature, the dipolar dice lattice aims to relax and settle into a low-energy state. As a result, whenever magnetic charge excitations emerge over time, they tend to get screened by opposite magnetic charges from the environment,' explains Dr. Farhan.

The researchers at Berkeley used photoemission electron microscopy, or PEEM, to make the observations. This technique images the direction of magnetization in individual nanomagnets. With the magnetic moments thermally fluctuating, the creation and decay of magnetic polarons could be imaged in real space and time. Postdoctoral researcher Charlotte Peterson and Professor Mikko Alava at Aalto University (Finland) performed simulations, which confirmed the rich thermodynamic behavior of the spin ice system.

'The experiments also demonstrate that magnetic excitations can be engineered at will by a clever choice of lattice geometry and the size and shape of individual nanomagnets. Thus, artificial spin ice is a prime example of a designer material. Instead of accepting what nature offers, it is now possible to assemble new materials from known building blocks with purposefully designed functionalities,' says Professor Sebastiaan van Dijken from Aalto University.

'This concept, which goes well beyond magnetic metamaterials, is only just emerging and will dramatically shape the frontier of materials research in the next decade,' adds Professor van Dijken.
The sense of touch may play a more crucial role in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) than previously assumed. The main findings of the doctoral research of Eliane Deschrijver, which are now published, show that individuals with ASD may have difficulties to determine which tactile sensations belong to the action of someone else.

ASD: social problems and sensory sensitivities

Many individuals with ASD are over- or undersensitive to sensory information. Some feel overwhelmed by busy environments such as supermarkets, others are less sensitive to pain, or dislike being touched.

Large-scale queries in the scientific literature had reported already that the severity of daily social difficulties of individuals with ASD is strongly related to the extent to which they are sensitive to touch, more so than to the extent to which they show visual or auditory sensitivities. To determine why this is the case, Eliane Deschrijver and her colleagues investigated how the brain of individuals with and without ASD uses own touch to understand touch sensations in the actions of others.

Prof. dr. Marcel Brass clarifies: We think that the human brain uses the own sense of touch to distinguish one's self from others: When I perform an action that leads to a tactile sensation, for instance by making a grasping movement, I expect to feel a tactile sensation that corresponds to this. If my own touch tells me something else, the tactile sensation will probably belong to the other person, and not to me. The brain can thus effectively understand others by signaling tactile sensations that do not correspond to the own sense of touch."

Neuroscientific research

In a series of experiments with electro-encephalography (EEG) conducted at Ghent University, the scientists showed that the brain activity of adults with ASD differs from that of adults without ASD while processing touch.

The research showed that the human brain of individuals without ASD indicated very quickly when a tactile sensation does not correspond to the own sense of touch. This means that the human brain is able to signal that a tactile sensation of a finger that touches a surface does not correspond to own touch.

This process occured otherwise in the brain of adults with ASD however. Their brain signaled to a much lesser extent when the external touch sensation did not correspond to their own touch. Those individuals that experienced stronger sensory difficulties showed a stronger disturbance of the neural process, while they were also the ones that experienced more severe social difficulties.

"It is to my knowledge the first time that a relationship could be identified between the way individuals with ASD process tactile information in their brain, and their daily social difficulties. The findings can yield a novel and crucial link between sensory and social difficulties within the autism spectrum," concludes Eliane Deschrijver.

"These findings primarily lead to a better understanding of the complex disorder, and of associated difficulties. It is yet too early to conclude on the impact on interventions. If the results can be confirmed in future studies of other groups with ASD, such as (young) children, they could provide a target for optimizing treatment," according to prof. dr. Wiersema.

The research was conducted within the novel research centre EXPLORA at Ghent University, led by prof. dr. Roeljan Wiersema and prof. dr. Marcel Brass (also promotors of the PhD dissertation). The findings regarding ASD were published online last week in Social, Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience last week, a journal in which the findings regarding adults without ASD were also published in 2015.
William Shakespeares Romeo and Juliet could potentially be the pinnacle of romantic tragedy. Or, is it?

Nebraska Wesleyans current production of the classic sets a somewhat different course for the play, exposing the comedic elements of Shakespeares work in the productions first act, followed by the dramatic intensity of the second act -- essentially forcing a jarring juxtaposition for the audience to absorb.

While certainly there are comedic elements in most of Shakespeares works, the Wesleyan production accentuates the comedy in the first act of Romeo and Juliet to a level that almost seems extreme and could be a little more restrained. Nevertheless, this Jack Parkhurst-directed interpretation delivers a strident comparison/contrast that is challenging.

Scenographer Michael Reeses set of several monochromatic columns allows for open and free movement by the cast, as well as the opportunity for mood and locale change via subtle lighting upon those columns.

The staging for the plays cast is comfortable, allowing them to move smoothly and with easy familiarity -- whether it be during one of several sword fights or the plays balcony scene between the two young lovers.

Alexander MacAlpine has the task of turning a somewhat ribald Romeo in the first act into a suffering and despairing lover by the second act. A fine effort communicating his euphoria during the balcony scene sets the stage for his anguish in Act Two, but the character's initial bawdiness is a bit much.

Similar overstatement is the key to James Hamricks disappointing supporting performance as Mercutio -- too loud, too coarse, just too much.

Brooke Bosworths Juliet has her moments and while her facial and bodily movements work dramatically, often her lack of projection and rushed speech are the cause for her words to be lost to the audience.

Two supporting performers deserve recognition for taking their roles and delivering solid, robust efforts -- Ian Garthwaite as Capulet, Juliets father, and Nadia Yakan as Juliets nurse were very pleasing.

Wesleyans Romeo and Juliet has some kinks to work out -- and I would like to see some toning down of the comedy -- but it is a work that pleasantly confronts pedestrian concepts.
The promotion of legal alternatives, rather than the risk of prosecution, is more likely to change unlawful file sharing behaviour, according to new research.

The study by academics from the University of East Anglia (UEA), Lancaster University and Newcastle University found that the supposed benefit of online file sharing predicts unlawful behaviour, but not perceived risk, suggesting that either current laws are not enough of a deterrent or threatening people with prosecution is not effective.

The researchers say that in order to compete with unlawful file sharing (UFS), easy access to information about the benefits of legal purchases or services should be given in a way that meets the specific benefits UFS offers in terms of quality, flexibility of use and cost.

The team looked at the extent to which the unlawful sharing of music and eBooks is motivated by the perceived benefits as opposed to the legal risks. Involving almost 1400 consumers, the research explored people's ability to remain anonymous online, their trust in the industries and UK legal regulators such as Ofcom, and their downloading behaviour.

The findings, published in the journal Risk Analysis, show that people who trust regulators think file sharing is riskier. Those who think file sharing is risky do not think it is beneficial and vice versa, which indicates what the researchers' call emotional and non-rational thinking. This non-rational thinking increases with more perceived trust and less perceived anonymity.

Lead researcher Dr Steven Watson, who conducted the study while at UEA and is now at Lancaster University's Department of Psychology, said the results call into question the legally-focused media industry strategy where the impact on consumer behaviour may be limited.

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"Given that we observe a much more powerful predictor of behaviour in perceived benefit, changes to legal frameworks may not be the most effective route to change behaviour," he said. "Specifically, one strategy to combat unlawful file sharing would be to provide easy access to information about the benefits of legal purchases or services, in an environment in which the specific benefits UFS offers are met by these legal alternatives."

Co-author Dr Piers Fleming, from UEA's School of Psychology, said: "It is perhaps no surprise that legal interventions regarding UFS have a limited and possibly short-term effect, while legal services that compete with UFS have attracted significant numbers of consumers.

"Our findings suggest that it may be possible to diminish the perceived benefit of UFS by increasing risk perception, but only to the extent that UFS is considered emotionally, and users trust industry and regulators. Increasing trust in industry and regulators may be one route toward encouraging UFS to be considered in emotional rather than rational terms. However, given the limited impact of risk perception upon behaviour, a better strategy would be to provide a desirable legal alternative."

Downloading music, TV programmes, movies and other media is a widespread activity, one that has been accused of harming the creative industries. A previous study by Ofcom revealed that one in six online users report consuming at least some unlawful content online, while other research has found that peer-to-peer file sharing networks account for up to a third of all internet traffic.

In this new study, funded by CREATe, the UK research centre for copyright, the authors point to the success of services such as Spotify and Apple's iTunes, which they say has partly been achieved by providing benefits to consumers that previously could only easily be obtained via UFS. These include rapid access to a very wide catalogue of content, and the capacity to selectively consume created content -- that is, consumers no longer need to buy entire albums if they wish to only access individual songs.

In the study downloading was fairly common among the participants, with 21.9 per cent of respondents engaged in unlawful sharing of music and 14.6 per cent in sharing eBooks. There was no difference in perceived risk of unlawful downloading between media, contrary to expectations based on users' knowledge or experience of legal prosecutions.

There was a slightly larger perceived benefit to unlawful music downloading compared to eBooks, while trust in the book publishing industry was greater than trust in the music industry. Regulating authorities were also seen as more trustworthy in the context of eBook downloading than music downloading.

An increase in legal risk for UFS was not associated with any statistically significant decrease in self-reported UFS for either eBooks or music. However, the perceived benefits of UFS did significantly predict increased self-reported UFS behaviour for both eBooks and music.

'Risk, benefit and moderators of the affect heuristic in a widespread unlawful activity: Evidence from a survey of unlawful file sharing behaviour', Steven Watson, Daniel Zizzo and Piers Fleming, is published in Risk Analysis.
Remnants of extinct monkeys are hiding inside you, along with those of lizards, jellyfish and other animals. Your DNA is built upon gene fragments from primal ancestors.

Now researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have made it more likely that ancestral genes, along with ancestral proteins, can be accurately identified and reconstructed. The researchers' insights could also help scientists use ancient gene sequences to synthesize better proteins to battle diseases.

For some 20 years, scientists have used algorithms to compute their way hundreds of millions of years back into the evolutionary past. Starting with present-day gene sequences, they perform what's called ancestral sequence reconstruction (ASR) to determine past mutations and figure out the genes' primal forerunners.

But ASR algorithms have faced logical criticism. Species based on those primal genes are long extinct, and scientists can't travel back in time to observe mutations that have happened since. So, how can anyone find any physical benchmark to verify and gauge ASR?

Time travel substitute

A team of researchers led by Eric Gaucher, an associate professor at Georgia Tech's School of Biological Sciences, did it by building an evolutionary framework out of myriad mutations. Then they benchmarked ASR algorithms against it -- no time machine required.

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Their results have shored up confidence that the widely used algorithms are working as they should.

"Most of them did a very good job -- 98% accurate," Gaucher said of contemporary algorithms' ability to compute ancient gene sequences. Their determination of proteins encoded by those sequences was virtually perfect.

Gaucher, research coordinator Ryan Randall and undergraduate student Caelan Radford published their results in the journal Nature Communications. Their research has been funded by the NASA Exobiology program, E.I. du Pont de Nemours and Company (DuPont) and the National Science Foundation.

"With the help of ASR, we can now actually build those ancient genes in the laboratory and express their encoded ancient proteins," Gaucher said. "And we can do it with confidence." In a separate project, his lab is computing ancient proteins that were very effective in blood clotting 80 million years ago, in hopes of using them to fight hemophilia today.

Holographic tree branches

Ancestral sequence reconstruction is like making a family tree for genes.

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The many twigs and branches at the treetop would be sequences from species alive today. Shimmying down the tree, called a phylogeny in genetics, you would find their common ancestors, millions of years old, in the lower branches.

There's a caveat; none of the lower branches exist any longer. They vanished in the extinction of the species bearing those genetic sequences.

ASR computes them back into place using algorithms based on scientific models of evolution. It's like replacing missing branches with holographic duplicates.

Algorithm horse race

The accuracy of those evolutionary models has been a historic sticking point. And doubts about the algorithms based on them linger in some circles that hold on to an old, tried-and-true algorithm.

So, Gaucher and researcher coordinator Randall pitted the contemporary model-based, or "maximum likelihood," algorithms in a race against the generic, or "parsimony," algorithm.

"Parsimony follows the simplest notion of evolution, which is that very little mutation occurs," Randall said. The models behind contemporary "maximum likelihood" algorithms, by contrast, are laced with filigree details.

For the race, Randall made a track of sorts by putting a gene sequence through multiple mutations to construct a real-life phylogeny. She used methods that closely mimicked natural evolution, but that were much, much faster.

Rainbow racetrack

In cells, enzymes called polymerases aid in DNA duplication. They work very efficiently, but their rare mistakes are the most common source of mutations, and Randall took her lead from this.

"We used a polymerase that is error-prone to speed up mutations, and speed up evolution," she said.

The genes used at the starting point of the lab evolution made a protein that fluoresced red when placed in bacteria. As significant mutations arose, the proteins began changing color. Bacteria containing green fluorescing proteins popped up among the red ones.

Randall divided bacteria with major mutations into new groups, creating branches in the phylogeny, as she went. Many mutations produced new colors -- yellow, orange, blue, pink -- and Randall ended up with a gene family tree in rainbow colors.

Show me the phenotype

The colors reflected not only new gene sequences but also new phenotypes -- the actual proteins they produced, the organism's working molecules.

"What counts is phenotype," Gaucher said. "When you analyze DNA strictly by itself, it ignores the context, in which that DNA is connected to phenotype," he said.

DNA can mutate and still encode the same amino acids, protein's component parts. Then the mutation has no real effect. But when mutations cause DNA to encode different amino acids, they're more significant.

A worthy test of ancestral sequence reconstruction algorithms must therefore include phenotype. And Randall took this into account when selecting mutated proteins.

"I selected for variants to purposely make it hard on the algorithms to infer the phenotypes," she said. The race ensued, and the algorithms got limited information to infer the evolutionary tree's many dozens of past mutations.

A sure bet

Though the tried-and-true parsimony algorithm performed well, maximum likelihood performed better. "Even though it got the same number of residues (DNA sequences) wrong as parsimony, the incorrectly inferred sequences were still more likely to encode the right phenotypes," said undergraduate student Caelan Radford, who analyzed the experiment's statistics.

The margin of error was so tiny that it would not interfere in the determination of past species.

The experiment's outcome was not too surprising, because prior simulations had predicted it. But the researchers wanted the scientific community to have physical proof that feels trustier than proof from a computer. "It's a computer algorithm. It will do what you will tell it to do," Gaucher said.

Short history of ASR

Doubts about ancestral sequence reconstruction -- and maximum likelihood algorithms in particular -- go far back. The idea of performing ASR first came up in 1963, but it didn't get started until the 1990s, and back then, researchers battled fervently over wide-ranging methods.

"People would come up with the craziest notion as to why one model was best," Gaucher said. "They'd say, 'Well, if I simulate this weird mode of evolution along these branches here, my algorithm will work better than your algorithm."

The parsimony algorithm was a way of reigning in the chaos that grew out of a lack of data in evolutionary models at the time. "When the model is wrong, 'maximum likelihood' fails miserably," Gaucher said.

But, now, a multitude of data and analysis give scientists a great picture of how evolution works (and it's not a parsimony principle): For ages, nothing moves, then change bursts forth, then things stabilize again.

"You get this quick evolution, so lots of stuff works and lots of stuff fails, and the stuff that works then goes on and kind of maintains its status and doesn't change," Gaucher said. By confirming the high accuracy of the algorithms, the Georgia Tech team has also corroborated the validity of current evolutionary science they're based on.
Many galaxies are found to have an extremely bright core powered by a supermassive black hole. These cores make "active galaxies" some of the brightest objects in the Universe. They are thought to shine so brightly because hot material is glowing fiercely as it falls into the black hole, a process known as accretion. This brilliant light can vary hugely between different active galaxies, so astronomers classify them into several types based on the properties of the light they emit [1].

Some of these galaxies have been observed to change dramatically over the course of only 10 years; a blink of an eye in astronomical terms. However, the active galaxy in this new study, Markarian 1018 stands out by having changed type a second time, reverting back to its initial classification within the last five years. A handful of galaxies have been observed to make this full-cycle change, but never before has one been studied in such detail.

The discovery of Markarian 1018's fickle nature was a chance by-product of the Close AGN Reference Survey (CARS) , a collaborative project between ESO and other organisations to gather information on 40 nearby galaxies with active cores. Routine observations of Markarian 1018 with the Multi-Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) installed on ESO's Very Large Telescope revealed the surprising change in the light output of the galaxy.

"We were stunned to see such a rare and dramatic change in Markarian 1018," said Rebecca McElroy, lead author of the discovery paper and a PhD student at the University of Sydney and the ARC Centre of Excellence for All Sky Astrophysics (CAASTRO).

The chance observation of the galaxy so soon after it began to fade was an unexpected opportunity to learn what makes these galaxies tick, as Bernd Husemann, CARS project leader and lead author of one of two papers associated with the discovery, explained: "We were lucky that we detected the event just 3-4 years after the decline started so we could begin monitoring campaigns to study details of the accretion physics of active galaxies that cannot be studied otherwise."

The research team made the most of this opportunity, making it their first priority to pinpoint the process causing Markarian 1018's brightness to change so wildly. This could have been caused by any one of a number of astrophysical events, but they could rule out the black hole pulling in and consuming a single star [2] and cast doubt on the possibility of obscuration by intervening gas [3]. But the true mechanism responsible for Markarian 1018's surprising variation remained a mystery after the first round of observations.

However, the team were able to gather extra data after they were awarded observing time to use the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, and NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory. With the new data from this suite of instruments they were able to solve the mystery -- the black hole was slowly fading because it was being starved of accretion material.

"It's possible that this starvation is because the inflow of fuel is being disrupted," said Rebecca McElroy. "An intriguing possibility is that this could be due to interactions with a second supermassive black hole." Such a black hole binary system is a distinct possibility in Markarian 1018, as the galaxy is the product of a major merger of two galaxies -- each of which likely contained a supermassive black hole in its centre.

Research continues into the mechanisms at work in active galaxies such as Markarian 1018 that change their appearance. "The team had to work fast to determine what was causing Markarian 1018's return to the shadows," comments Bernd Husemann. "Ongoing monitoring campaigns with ESO telescopes and other facilities will allow us to explore the exciting world of starving black holes and changing active galaxies in more detail."

[1] The brightest of the active galaxies are quasars, where the brilliant nucleus outshines the rest of the galaxy. Another, less extreme, class are known as Seyfert galaxies. Originally a method was developed that used brightness and the emission spectrum -- the plot of the strength of radiation emitted at different wavelength -- to distinguish between just two types of Seyfert galaxies, Type 1 and Type 2, but extra classifications such as Type 1.9 Seyferts have since been introduced.

[2] Such a tidal disruption event occurs when a star strays too close to a supermassive black hole and is torn apart by the extreme gravitational tidal force. This results in a sharp rise in the brightness of the central region that slowly declines over a period of years. The observed brightness variations of Markarian 1018 were found not to match the profile of such an event.

[3] Gas obscuration can affect the classification of an active galaxy by blocking the line of sight, drifting in front of the galaxy's bright core like fog in front of a car's headlights, and dimming the light passing through. This also affects the spectrum of galaxy, perhaps changing its classification.
Rutgers' New Jersey Medical School's Clinical Research Center (NJMS-CRC) is participating as a clinical trial site in a novel study that could signal a new way of protecting people from developing HIV infection, the virus that causes AIDS.

The study -- known as the AMP study (for Antibody Meditated Prevention) -- will determine whether infusing an experimental antibody (VRC01) into HIV-negative men and transgender individuals who have sex with men, will prevent the acquisition of HIV.

"This is landmark study," said Shobha Swaminathan, an infectious disease specialist and the NJMS-CRC site leader. "It is the first study of this magnitude to see whether an antibody infusion can help prevent new HIV infections. If it proves effective, it could potentially pave a way for developing a vaccine for HIV infection."

Antibodies are one of the natural ways the human body fights infection. The antibody being studied was initially detected in an individual who was able to successfully control HIV infection without taking any medications for HIV. Subsequently, scientists at the NIH were able to model its structure and recreate this antibody in the laboratory.

At the current time, HIV infections can be treated with many medications but only one medication is available to prevent new infections, and it is not always effective due to noncompliance and other issues, Swaminathan said.

HIV continues to be a major global public health issue, though the rate of infection has fallen significantly in recent years. In 2014, gay and bisexual men accounted for an estimated 83 percent of all new HIV infections among men in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC).

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Though the number of new HIV diagnoses fell 19 percent from 2005 to 2014, certain demographic groups showed increases in the infection. For instance, infections among Hispanic/Latino gay and bisexual men rose by 24 percent; among African American men having sex with men (MSM) and bisexual men, infections rose 22 percent from 2005 to 2014. Therefore, it is exciting that this study is available as one HIV prevention option for the high-risk groups (i.e., African American MSM and bisexual men).

NJMS-CRC, the only site in New Jersey conducting the AMP study was selected in part because it is located in Newark, a hot-spot for HIV infection. Essex County, where Newark is located, has the highest proportion (40 percent) of African Americans in New Jersey living with HIV/AIDS.

Beyond indicating whether the antibody VRC01 is likely to prevent HIV infection, the study also will have an important ancillary result, Swaminathan said. Enrollment activities will provide opportunities for high-risk individuals who have not been tested before to both get tested for HIV and also be educated about risk reduction strategies.

"The study is providing ways for Rutgers to effectively partner with and engage the community effectively to ensure a positive impact that will last long after the study is completed," Swaminathan said.

AMP study sites are recruiting a combined 2,700 HIV-negative men and transgender individuals whose sexual partners are men -- the highest-risk demographic for HIV infection -- to test the efficacy of VRC01. Those enrolled will either be given intravenous infusions of VRC01 or a placebo every eight weeks for a total of 10 infusions.

Participants will be closely monitored for approximately 22 months for safety and also to determine whether they've remained HIV-negative.

VRC01 was chosen because in laboratory tests the antibody has shown to be effective against 90 percent of HIV-1 isolates that were tested. This broadly neutralizing antibody (bnAb) is unique in that it acts at the site where HIV virus attaches to the host CD4 or T cells. T-cells are white blood cells that play a vital role the human immune system's ability to fight infection and the CD4 cells are the primary target for HIV-1 viruses.

More than 1.2 million people in the United States are living with HIV, and about one in eight don't know it, the CDC says.

"According to CDC estimates, only about 25 percent of people who are HIV-positive have it under control," says Swaminathan. "That's why this study is so important. We have to make an impact on this epidemic. It's one of the major problems facing our cities."
Researchers at North Carolina State University have developed a new type of inverter device with greater efficiency in a smaller, lighter package -- which should improve the fuel-efficiency and range of hybrid and electric vehicles.

Electric and hybrid vehicles rely on inverters to ensure that enough electricity is conveyed from the battery to the motor during vehicle operation. Conventional inverters rely on components made of the semiconductor material silicon.

Now researchers at the Future Renewable Electric Energy Distribution and Management (FREEDM) Systems Center at NC State have developed an inverter using off-the-shelf components made of the wide-bandgap semiconductor material silicon carbide (SiC) -- with promising results.

"Our silicon carbide prototype inverter can transfer 99 percent of energy to the motor, which is about two percent higher than the best silicon-based inverters under normal conditions," says Iqbal Husain, ABB Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at NC State and director of the FREEDM Center.

"Equally important, the silicon carbide inverters can be smaller and lighter than their silicon counterparts, further improving the range of electric vehicles," says Husain, who co-authored two papers related to the work. "And new advances we've made in inverter components should allow us to make the inverters even smaller still."

Range is an important issue because so-called "range anxiety" is a major factor limiting public acceptance of electric vehicles. People are afraid they won't be able to travel very far or that they'll get stuck on the side of the road.

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The new SiC-based inverter is able to convey 12.1 kilowatts of power per liter (kW/L) -- close to the U.S. Department of Energy's goal of developing inverters that can achieve 13.4 kW/L by 2020. By way of comparison, a 2010 electric vehicle could achieve only 4.1 kW/L.

"Conventional, silicon-based inverters have likely improved since 2010, but they're still nowhere near 12.1 kW/L," Husain says.

The power density of new SiC materials allows engineers to make the inverters -- and their components, such as capacitors and inductors -- smaller and lighter.

"But, frankly, we are pretty sure that we can improve further on the energy density that we've shown with this prototype," Husain says.

That's because the new inverter prototype was made using off-the-shelf SiC components -- and FREEDM researchers have recently made new, ultra-high density SiC power components that they expect will allow them to get closer to DOE's 13.4 kW/L target once it's incorporated into next generation inverters.

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What's more, the design of the new power component is more effective at dissipating heat than previous versions. This could allow the creation of air-cooled inverters, eliminating the need for bulky (and heavy) liquid cooling systems.

"We predict that we'll be able to make an air-cooled inverter up to 35 kW using the new module, for use in motorcycles, hybrid vehicles and scooters," Husain says. "And it will boost energy density even when used with liquid cooling systems in more powerful vehicles."

The current SiC inverter prototype was designed to go up to 55 kW -- the sort of power you'd see in a hybrid vehicle. The researchers are now in the process of scaling it up to 100 kW -- akin to what you'd see in a fully electric vehicle -- using off-the-shelf components. And they're also in the process of developing inverters that make use of the new, ultra-high density SiC power component that they developed on-site.

A paper on the new inverter, "Design Methodology for a Planarized High Power Density EV/HEV Traction Drive using SiC Power Modules," will be presented at the IEEE Energy Conversion Congress and Exposition (ECCE), being held Sept. 18-22 in Milwaukee. Lead author of the paper is Dhrubo Rahman, a Ph.D. student at NC State. The paper was co-authored by Adam Morgan, Yang Xu and Rui Gao, who are Ph.D. students at NC State; Wensong Yu and Douglas Hopkins, research professors in NC State's Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering; and Husain.

A paper on the new, ultra-high density SiC power component, "Development of an Ultra-high Density Power Chip on Bus Module," will also be presented at ECCE.
Results of a new study at the University of Haifa have found that no difference in the risk of developing schizophrenia between second-generations Holocaust survivors and those whose parents were not exposed to the Holocaust. However, an examination of various sub-groups showed that second-generation survivors whose parents were babies during the Holocaust are at higher risk of suffering from a more severe course of schizophrenia.

"Likely these are transmitted from the parental environment to the child" commented Prof. Stephen Levine, the lead author of the study. The study was undertaken by Prof. Stephen Levine and Prof. Itzhak Levav of the Department of Community Mental Health at the University of Haifa, together with Ms. Inna Pugachova, Ms. Rinat Yoffe, and Ms. Yifat Becher of the Ministry of Health. The study was based on information on 51,233 individuals who immigrated to Israel through 1966, and was made possible thanks to the cooperation with the Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry of Health, with funds from Israel Science Foundation and published in Schizophrenia Research. The research population included individuals who experienced the Holocaust directly, while the comparison group comprised of individuals who immigrated to Israel before the Holocaust began in their respective country of origin. All the second-generation subjects were born between 1948 and 1989, and were followed through 2014 to ascertain whether or not they suffered from schizophrenia.

The question of the impact of exposure to the Holocaust among second-generation survivors is the subject of disagreement among researchers. Clinic-based studies have found that trauma increases psychopathology in the offspring of Holocaust survivors, while community based studies have found that there is no such effect among adult s, as noted by Levav and collaborators in two large representative samples in Israel

The researchers sought to examine whether parental Holocaust exposure is associated with schizophrenia among second-generation survivors. The good news is that the association was not significant.

However, a more specific inquiry showed that offspring to mothers with Holocaust exposures in the womb only were 1.7 times more likely to have a more severe course of the disorder. Similarly, offspring to mothers exposed to the Holocaust in the in the womb and thereafter were 1.5 more likely to have a more severe course than persons not exposed. Among offspring to fathers exposed in the womb and thereafter were 1.5 times, and those whose fathers exposed at ages 1-2 had offspring with similar risk to have a worse course of the disorder than persons not exposed.

Transgenerational genocide exposure was unrelated to the risk of schizophrenia in the offspring, but was related to a course of deterioration in schizophrenia during selected parental critical periods of early life. This implies an epigenetic mechanism -- namely arising from environmental influences on the way genes expressed themselves. The findings inform health policy decision makers about refugees who suffered from extreme adversity, and extend existing results regarding the transgenerational transfer of the effects of famine and stress in parental early life.
Computer programs have defeated humans in Jeopardy!, chess and Go. Now a program developed at Case Western Reserve University has outperformed physicians on a more serious matter.

The program was nearly twice as accurate as two neuroradiologists in determining whether abnormal tissue seen on magnetic resonance images (MRI) were dead brain cells caused by radiation, called radiation necrosis, or if brain cancer had returned.

The direct comparison is part of a feasibility study published in the American Journal of Neuroradiology today.

"One of the biggest challenges with the evaluation of brain tumor treatment is distinguishing between the confounding effects of radiation and cancer recurrence," said Pallavi Tiwari, assistant professor of biomedical engineering at Case Western Reserve and leader of the study. "On an MRI, they look very similar."

But treatments for radiation necrosis and cancer recurrence are far different. Quick identification can help speed prognosis, therapy and improve patient outcomes, the researchers say.

With further confirmation of its accuracy, radiologists using their expertise and the program may eliminate unnecessary and costly biopsies Tiwari said. Brain biopsies are currently the only definitive test but are highly invasive and risky, causing considerable morbidity and mortality.

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To develop the program, the researchers employed machine learning algorithms in conjunction with radiomics, the term used for features extracted from images using computer algorithms. The engineers, scientists and physicians trained the computer to identify radiomic features that discriminate between brain cancer and radiation necrosis, using routine follow-up MRI scans from 43 patients. The images were all from University Hospitals Case Medical Center.

The team then developed algorithms to find the most discriminating radiomic features, in this case, textures that can't be seen by simply eyeballing the images.

"What the algorithms see that the radiologists don't are the subtle differences in quantitative measurements of tumor heterogeneity and breakdown in microarchitecture on MRI, which are higher for tumor recurrence," said Tiwari, who was appointed to the Department of Biomedical Engineering by the Case Western Reserve School of Medicine.

More specifically, while the physicians use the intensity of pixels on MRI scans as a guide, the computer looks at the edges of each pixel, explained Anant Madabhushi, F. Alex Nason professor II of biomedical engineering at Case Western Reserve, and study co-author.

"If the edges all point to the same direction, the architecture is preserved," said Madabhushi, who also directs the Center of Computational Imaging and Personalized Diagnostics at CWRU. "If they point in different directions, the architecture is disrupted -- the entropy, or disorder, and heterogeneity are higher. "

In the direct comparison, two physicians and the computer program analyzed MRI scans from 15 patients from University of Texas Southwest Medical Center. One neuroradiologist diagnosed seven patients correctly, and the second physician correctly diagnosed eight patients. The computer program was correct on 12 of the 15.

Tiwari and Madabhushi don't expect the computer program would be used alone, but as a decision support to assist neuroradiologists in improving their confidence in identifying a suspicious lesion as radiation necrosis or cancer recurrence.

Next, the researchers are seeking to validate and the algorithms' accuracy using a much larger collection of images from across different sites.
Cancer stem cells resist therapy and are a major cause of relapse, long after the bulk of a tumor has been killed. A University of Colorado Cancer Center study published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute provides the most comprehensive picture to date of head and neck cancer stem cells, identifying genetic pathways that cancer stem cells hijack to promote tumor growth and visualizing the process of "asymmetric division" that allows a stem cell to create tumor tissue cells while retaining its own stem-like profile. The study is the result of seven years of research and innovation, including the development of novel techniques that allowed researchers to identify, harvest, and grow these elusive stem cells into populations large enough to study. This major body of work provides specific targets for the development of new cancer therapeutics.

"We wanted to determine the relationships between key genetic alterations and how head and neck cancer stem cells harness those alterations to drive initiation and growth," says CU Cancer Center investigator Antonio Jimeno, MD, PhD, the Daniel and Janet Mordecai endowed professor for cancer stem cell research, director of the University of Colorado School of Medicine's Head and Neck Cancer Clinical Research Program, and the paper's senior author. The current project was performed in collaboration with the Gates Center for Regenerative Medicine of which Dr. Jimeno is a faculty member. Jimeno started his work with cancer stem cells as a post-doc at Johns Hopkins University, but as he explains, "I focused on head and neck cancer stem cells because there has been an increase in head and neck cancer incidence of about fifty percent over the past ten years in the U.S. and we need to better understand what is at the root of this disease."

Previously, a major challenge in characterizing cancer stem cells has been gathering a cell population large enough to study.

"There is a lot of 'noise' in cells and you need a lot of them because with only a few cells, it's impossible to tell which of these genetic differences are meaningful features of cancer stem cells and which are just genetic noise," says first author Stephen Keysar, PhD, research assistant professor in the Jimeno lab.

To solve this problem, the group first gathered tumor samples from a larger number of head and neck cancer patients -- 10 patients in all -- more than in any previous study. These samples represented both tumors associated with alcohol and tobacco use and tumors caused by the human papilloma virus (HPV).

"It is important to always remember that we were able to make a difference thanks to the generosity of our patients, who enabled us to work with representative cancer models," Jimeno says.

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These tumors were then grown in mice. Subsequently, the group undertook the painstaking process of isolating enough cells for genetic studies and one-by-one transplanting these patient-derived tumor samples onto new mice to study how cancer stem cells initiate tumor growth.

"Sometimes it took a year just to get enough cells to study," Keysar says.

"Antonio is a great example of perseverance," says Dennis Roop, PhD, director of the Gates Center and also an investigator at the CU Cancer Center and the individual whom Jimeno credits with 'much of the philosophy behind this work.' "Antonio was submitting all these grants, and the reviewers were saying, 'There's no way you can do this; there's no way you'll get enough cells to characterize.' He simply found ways to prove them wrong."

This included leveraging private research funding, primarily from the Gates Center for Regenerative Medicine, the Daniel and Janet Mordecai Foundation and the Peter and Rhondda Grant Fund.

"Private funding allowed Antonio to do the groundwork and develop the techniques that eventually made his proposals to the NIH so compelling that he was able to get support. In the case of those of us who are driven to do what we do, you just find a way to get these things accomplished. This is a great example of how bridge funding from the private sector can move research forward," Roop says.

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Here is what the group found:

First, head and neck cancer stem cells are, in fact, distinct from the rapidly dividing cells that form the bulk of tumors, and there is little difference between cancer stem cells in HPV- and HPV+ cancers. Both are marked by CD44 expression and aldehyde activity, and both use the key pathway PI3K to drive their survival, growth and resistance to anti-cancer therapies. The group found that the PI3K pathway, which is the most common alteration in head and neck cancer, then deploys SOX2, a transcription factor, to activate programs that modulate 'stemness' within the cell's nucleus. For example, SOX2 was found to control aldehyde activity, which is a common cancer stem cell marker and a well-known driver of cancer stem-cell-mediated tumor growth.

"In normal cells, PI3K is used as a sensor for energy," Jimeno explains. "For a cancer cell to act cancerous, it needs metabolic flexibility -- it needs to be able to over-use energy -- and so this 'energy sensor' is a pathway it wants to hijack. After chemo, PI3K helps the cell shut down and weather the storm. Then when the chemo is gone, PI3K helps cancer stem cells start back up again."

Chemotherapies kill rapidly-dividing cells. PI3K shuts down a cancer stem cell's metabolism, placing the cell in a dormant state. This gives cancer stem cells the ability to evade the trap of chemotherapy.

So what happens when you remove this ability? When the group eliminated SOX2 in mouse models of head and neck cancer, tumors became sensitive to therapies that previously had failed. But when the group amplified SOX2, tumors became even more resistant.

"This molecular thread from PI3K to SOX2 to aldehyde was responsible for all the features that define cancer stem cells," Keysar says. Further, "Since SOX2-expressing cells fully behave like cancer stem cells, we now have a new laboratory tool to study cancer stem cell biology and therapeutics."

The work also allowed the group to witness an event of the stem cell cycle that had, at best, been only partially characterized in head and neck cancer.

"It was like the snow leopard of the Himalayas," Jimeno says. "We knew it existed because of the tracks, but no one had taken a picture of it -- that is, until someone patiently perched on a frozen ridge for two years with a camera. We did just that."

The event Jimeno refers to is "asymmetric division" of cancer stem cells. When a normal cell divides, it creates two identical copies of itself. However, if stem cells divided symmetrically, it would result in two stem cells but no differentiated cells, or two differentiated cells with the loss of the original stem cell. In either case, symmetrically dividing stem cells would not be able to promote tumor growth while also retaining their stemness.

The group was able to document that when cancer stem cells divide, "they don't divide into two of the same," Jimeno says. "One cell retains a stem profile, and the other goes a step beyond into differentiation."

Overall, this seven-year line of inquiry offered three major advances: it characterized head and neck cancer stem cells; it documented asymmetric division in head and neck cancer stem cells; and it identified genetic mechanisms that allow these cancer stem cells to grow and resist therapy. Importantly, identifying these genetic mechanisms of resistance may also help researchers and doctors overcome it.

"SOX2 and aldehyde inhibitors are now under exploration, and we've also done trials of early PI3K inhibitors here at CU Cancer Center," Jimeno says.

"This has been an excellent example of team science," Roop says. "You have Antonio -- a brilliant young clinician-scientist -- leading a group that includes basic scientists, pathologists, bio-informaticians and statisticians, and their expertise can combine to attack a problem in a way that no individual would be able to do on their own. This work will provide the basis for the development of new therapeutic strategies."




In recent years, consumers have increasingly been looking for "natural" ingredients in their food products. But when it comes to one of the world's most popular flavors, vanilla, meeting that demand has been difficult. So food scientists are scrambling for new ways to produce vanillin -- the main vanilla flavor molecule -- without losing the natural label, according to an article in Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN), the weekly newsmagazine of the American Chemical Society.

Melody M. Bomgardner, a senior editor at C&EN, notes that less than 1 percent of vanilla flavor comes from vanilla orchids. Some of the rest has been made from pine bark, clove oil, rice bran and lignin. And the vast majority -- about 85 percent -- is synthesized from guaiacol, a petrochemical. This ratio poses a problem as consumers demand more natural products. Responding to the shift, major food company Nestle announced it would eliminate artificial additives, which would include vanillin, from its chocolates for the U.S. market. How they and others in the industry will make the change is unclear, but potential solutions are in the works.

Some companies could turn to vanilla made from various plant extracts that could still be labeled natural. To boost its production from the purest source, companies are setting up grower programs in Madagascar, where the vanilla is known for its rummy taste and sweet aroma. And, in parallel, researchers are using genetics to coax yeast, plants, even the vanilla orchid itself, to produce more of the cherished flavor.

See more at: http://cen.acs.org/articles/94/i36/problem-vanilla.html
Intensive treatment to lower systolic (top number) blood pressure to below 120 would save more than 100,000 lives per year in the United States, according to a study led by Loyola University Chicago researcher Holly Kramer, MD, MPH.

Two thirds of the lives saved would be men and two thirds would be aged 75 or older, according to the study, which was presented at the American Heart Association's Council on Hypertension 2016 Scientific Sessions. Current guidelines recommend keeping systolic blood pressure below 140 mm Hg.

"When the treatment goal was lowered to a maximum of 120 mm HG, there was a huge reduction in mortality," said Dr. Kramer, the study's first author. "Few other medical interventions have such a large effect."

Dr. Kramer is an associate professor in the Department of Public Health Sciences and in the Division of Nephrology and Hypertension in the Department of Medicine of Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine.

To determine whether intensive treatment to lower systolic blood pressure could alter mortality, Dr. Kramer and colleagues applied findings from a multicenter study called SPRINT to the U.S. adult population. (SPRINT stands for Systolic Blood Pressure Intervention Trial.)

Loyola University Medical Center was among the centers that enrolled patients in the SPRINT trial, which included more than 9,350 adults ages 50 and older who had high blood pressure and were at high risk for cardiovascular disease. The SPRINT trial found there was a 27 percent reduction in mortality from all causes when systolic blood pressure was lowered to below 120 mm Hg, compared to the standard care of lowering blood pressure to below 140 mm Hg.

While saving lives, an intensive blood pressure regimen also would cause serious side effects. The study by Dr. Kramer and colleagues estimated that approximately 55,500 more episodes of low blood pressure, 33,300 more episodes of fainting and 44,400 additional electrolyte disorders would occur annually with implementation of intensive systolic blood pressure lowering in U.S. adults who meet SPRINT criteria. Most of these effects would not be expected to have lasting consequences and would be reversible by lowering blood pressure medications, Dr. Kramer said.

High blood pressure, or hypertension, is a leading risk factor for heart disease, stroke, kidney failure and other health problems. An estimated 1 in 3 people in the United States has high blood pressure. Blood pressure is measured in millimeters of mercury (mm Hg). Systolic blood pressure refers to the pressure in the arteries when the heart beats. The bottom number, diastolic, refers to the pressure between beats.

In the SPRINT study, patients who were treated to achieve a standard target of less than 140 mm Hg received an average of two different blood pressure medications. The group treated to achieve a target of less than 120 mm Hg received an average of three medications. (The study excluded certain patients, including diabetics and smokers.)

Using data from the National Health & Nutrition Examination Survey, researchers determined that more than 18.1 million American adults met the criteria of patients enrolled in the SPRINT trial. Dr. Kramer and colleagues estimated that, among these 18.1 million adults, fully implementing an intensive regimen to lower systolic blood pressure below 120 mm Hg would prevent approximately 107,500 deaths per year.
Theatrix, the student-run theater company at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, will open its 2016-2017 season with Paula Vogel's "The Baltimore Waltz."

Performances are 7:30 p.m. Thursday through Sept. 24 in the Lab Theatre on the third floor of the Temple Building, 12th and R streets.

When Anna is diagnosed with a terminal illness, she and her brother Carl must journey across Europe in search of a cure. Along the way they find life in the people they meet, learn the importance of family, and discover just how far someone will go to save a loved one. Three actors will portray up to 15 different characters of various nationalities while using production design in surprising ways.

Inspired by the playwrights own relationship with her brother Carl, "The Baltimore Waltz" is a dramatic comedy that focuses on themes of coping with illness, loss and living life to the fullest. It contains mature language and themes that may not be suitable for all audiences.

Amy Almond directs, with Desiree Bartels, Jorden Charley-Whatley and Nick Howard as cast members.

Tickets are $7 and are available in advance at unltheatretickets.com or at the door (cash only) one hour prior to performance.
Every living thing leaves a genetic trail in its wake. As animals, plants and microbes shed cells and produce waste, they drop traces of their DNA everywhere -- in the air, soil and water.

Researchers are now able to capture the cells of animals, sequence their DNA and identify which species were present at a point in time. Think of it as genetic fingerprints that leave a trace of past activity.

New University of Washington and Northwest Fisheries Science Center research has applied this technique to broadly measure the effects of human activity on the environment. Their paper, appearing this week in the journal PeerJ, used DNA in the waters of Puget Sound, Washington state, to characterize the amount of animal life along highly urbanized shorelines, such as Piper's Creek in Seattle, and in more remote areas with fewer humans, like Vashon Island.

This is believed to be the first study that uses genetic markers to understand the impact urbanization has on the environment -- specifically, whether animal diversity flourishes or suffers.

"It is now possible to use genetic traces in water samples to look at the effects of human activities on ecosystems," said lead author Ryan Kelly, a UW assistant professor of marine and environmental affairs. "It's totally remarkable to me that what appears to be plain water can tell you all of this information about what animals are present."

Using environmental DNA -- or eDNA, for short -- the researchers found that urban Puget Sound shorelines support a denser array of animals than in remote areas. In particular, clams and other mud-dwellers congregate more densely along urban beaches -- a surprising finding, Kelly said.

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"Clams and other things that live in mud seem to like living near cities, which is really interesting," Kelly said. "It suggests that maybe humans are subsidizing mudflats, or it may just as well be the converse -- maybe humans tend to live in really protected areas that are the same environment clams happen to like."

While urban beaches in Puget Sound had more abundant fauna, these areas were also more homogenous in the kinds of species that lived there, the researchers found, suggesting a tradeoff between different kinds of diversity between more- and less-urban areas.

Genetic tools allow researchers to paint a representative mosaic of animal life in particular areas without having to physically count critters. In conventional ways of measuring environmental impacts, scientists choose a select number of species and count how many they see before and after development. Or they might survey a small section of shoreline and try to document everything they find.

These methods are inherently time-consuming and probably don't fully capture what is present, Kelly explained.

"We can go out, take a sample of water, and the DNA from thousands of species appears," Kelly said. "This way, we don't have to decide if we are going to count snails or orcas when we look at environmental impacts. Instead, we can just look at what's there."

The researchers collected liters of water from urbanized and remote beaches around Puget Sound, then filtered out cells larger than bacteria. They then extracted DNA from these cells, using a molecular tool to detect animal genes.

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After sequencing the DNA, they could identify specific animals present where the water was collected. They detected more than 1,600 unique genetic signatures -- many representing different species -- across Puget Sound, including porpoises, salmon, starfish, barnacles, eagles -- and even humans.

Kelly and his collaborators have spent years testing and refining the process of obtaining eDNA in water. They first worked in the Monterey Bay Aquarium, a controlled setting where they could make sure their DNA sampling was actually detecting the creatures living in the water. In subsequent work, they found that an animal's DNA tends to stay within a few hundred feet of where it was initially deposited; it remains in the water for one to two days.

The methods described in this study could be used to evaluate the effects of humans and development in other urban waterways, such as Chesapeake Bay or the Hudson River. Scientists in the Midwest have started using eDNA as a surveillance tool to monitor lakes for invasive Asian carp.

As genetic traces become more reliable, they could take the place of expensive, time-intensive environmental impact statements or environmental monitoring, the researchers said.

"I'm excited because I think if you can make it easier for people to do these sorts of broad scale surveys, they will do it. It's a much more powerful method," Kelly said.
A Colorado State University-led study of air pollutant emissions from northern Front Range oil and gas operations has been presented to state officials.

Jeffrey Collett, professor and head of CSU's Department of Atmospheric Science, was the principal investigator for the three-year North Front Range study, funded by the state of Colorado. Collett presented his team's findings at a Sept. 15 meeting of the Air Quality Control Commission.

Health risk assessment forthcoming

Data from the North Front Range Oil and Gas Air Pollutant Emission and Dispersion Study -- and a similar Garfield County study completed in June 2016 -- will be used in a state health-risk assessment, to be completed by summer 2018.

The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment will coordinate the health-risk assessment using the data from Collett's studies, and is contracting this work to a third-party consulting company. The department is soliciting formal proposals for the assessment and expects to have a contract in place by December.

Fracking, flowback, production

The CSU study was designed to quantify emissions from three specific oil and gas development activities:

Hydraulic fracturing or "fracking."

Flowback (of liquids after fracking).

Production operations.

CSU researchers conducted 18 experiments to quantify air emission rates and dispersion of air toxics, ozone precursors and greenhouse gases from each of the three processes.

Overall, production emissions (which may continue for many years) were found to be lower than the shorter-term fracking and flowback emissions, which last for a few days to a few weeks. Emissions in the North Front Range were slightly lower than in Garfield County, but contained heavier-weight organic compounds, likely due to differences in the geology between the basins.

Data from these two studies represent one of the most comprehensive assessments of air toxics, ozone precursors and greenhouse gas emission rates from oil and natural gas well operations to date.

Dr. Larry Wolk, CDPHE's executive director and chief medical officer, said: "These studies will provide us with critical information to design a detailed and accurate health risk assessment so we can answer questions related to potential health concerns related to oil and gas operations."
Researchers from the University of Maryland Fischell Department of Bioengineering and the University of Maryland School of Medicine report a new way to "turn off" the harmful immune attack that occurs during autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis (MS), while keeping healthy functions of the immune system intact.

"Our lab is combining immunology and nanotechnology to reprogram how the immune system responds to self-cells in the brain that are mistakenly attacked during MS," said BIOE Assistant Professor Christopher Jewell, corresponding author on the new report. "The finding, conducted in cells and pre-clinical animal models of MS, could lead to new approaches for reversing paralysis in MS, or better therapies for other autoimmune diseases."

The group's findings were published September 13 in the journal Cell Reports. Collaborator Dr. Jonathan Bromberg from the University of Maryland School of Medicine said, "The studies show it is possible to treat and cure inflammatory disease with a single dose of therapeutics loaded in biodegradable polymers targeted directly to lymph nodes -- the tissues that coordinate immune function in the body."

In MS, the immune system incorrectly recognizes myelin that insulates and protects nerves fibers in the brain. Immune cells enter the brain and attack, leading to slow loss of motor function and other complications. Current therapies for MS work by decreasing the activity of the immune system; but, they do so in a broadly-suppressive way that often leaves patients vulnerable to infection. There are also no cures for MS, type 1 diabetes, and other autoimmune diseases.

"The goal of our work -- and that of others in the field -- is to expand cells that are both myelin-specific and regulatory in nature," said Lisa Tostanoski, first author on the paper. "The hope is that these cells can directly suppress inflammation without targeting healthy immune function."

Jewell's team is working to reprogram the function of lymph nodes: instead of generating inflammatory cells that attack myelin, the lymph nodes are "instructed" to promote regulatory immune cells that control the attack against myelin. To carry out the "reprogramming," degradable polymer particles that incorporate regulatory signals are delivered to lymph nodes using a unique intra-lymph node injection technique. Once in the lymph nodes, these particles slowly release immune signals to promote regulatory immune cells that mature and migrate to the central nervous system to suppress the attack against myelin.

In order to test their strategy, the team is using two rodent models of MS. The results are promising thus far, demonstrating that a single particle treatment can permanently reverse paralysis. Importantly, these effects were found to be myelin-specific, and correlated with local changes in the function and types of cells in lymph nodes and the central nervous system.

"Moving forward, our team is working to show the therapeutic effects result from repair and remyelination in the brain," Jewell said. "That represents a goal that is a critical criterion to improve on human MS therapies."

To support this breakthrough research, the National Multiple Sclerosis Society has awarded the team more than $600,000 in research funding.

"This innovative research has the potential to open up a new, highly selective approach to treating multiple sclerosis," said Bruce F. Bebo, Ph.D., Executive Vice President of Research at the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. "We are pleased to have helped launch this work with early pilot and full research grants, and hope that the further research required to translate these results to people is equally successful."

"This kind of institutional collaboration can yield tremendous results," said UM SOM Dean E. Albert Reece, MD, PhD, MBA, who is also vice president for medical affairs at the University of Maryland and the John Z. and Akiko K. Bowers Distinguished Professor. "If we are to tackle the most critical and complex diseases, we must utilize multiple specialties across departments, schools and campuses to develop new treatments."

The additional authors on the work are BIOE researchers Dr. Yu-Chieh Chiu, Joshua Gammon, and James Andorko, and Dr. Thomas Simon at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.
The relation between Zika virus and microcephaly is widely assumed to be causal because of strong evidence of an association. However, evidence so far comes from case reports, case series, modelling studies, and preliminary reports from cohort studies - none of which have included appropriate control groups.

Today, researchers from Brazil and the UK report the preliminary findings of the first case-control study examining the association between microcephaly and in utero Zika virus infection. The study, published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases journal, was requested by the Brazilian Ministry of Health to investigate the causes of the microcephaly epidemic that was declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern in 2016.

The study included all infants born with microcephaly delivered in eight public hospitals in Pernambuco State in North Eastern Brazil between 15 January and 2 May 2016. For each case, two controls were selected. Controls were the first two infants born the following morning without microcephaly in one of the eight hospitals. Controls and cases were matched for region of residence and expected date of delivery.

Blood samples from cases and controls were collected and samples of cerebrospinal fluid were collected from cases with microcephaly. Samples were tested for Zika virus and Zika virus antibodies. Blood samples were collected from mothers and analysed for Zika and dengue virus. Infants with microcephaly had their head circumference measured and most underwent brain imaging.

24 of 30 (80%) mothers of infants with microcephaly had Zika virus infection, compared with 39 of 61 (64%) mothers of controls. 13 of 32 cases (41%) tested positive for Zika virus infection in blood or cerebrospinal fluid samples, and none of the 62 controls tested positive for Zika virus infection in blood samples. A high proportion of mothers also tested positive for dengue and other infections such as cytomegalovirus (a type of herpes), rubella, and toxoplasma but there was no significant difference between mothers of cases and controls. Additionally, only seven of the 27 cases with microcephaly who had a brain scan had brain abnormalities, suggesting that congenital Zika virus syndrome can be present in neonates with microcephaly and no brain abnormalities.

"A high proportion of mothers of newborns with and without microcephaly had been infected with Zika virus, reflecting the rapid spread of Zika infection in this region. However, when we compared laboratory confirmed Zika virus infection in newborns with and without microcephaly, we found that about half of the cases with microcephaly had laboratory confirmed Zika virus infection, compared to none of the healthy controls. The presence of Zika virus antibodies in the cerebrospinal fluid indicates infection in the neural system of the neonate, but interestingly not all cases of microcephaly had brain abnormalities," says article author Dr Thalia Velho Barreto de Araujo, Federal University of Pernambuco, Recife, Brazil.

The authors warn that preliminary analyses can overestimate the strength of an association, so the true size of the effect needs to be treated with caution. The full study, which will include 200 cases and 400 controls will help quantify the risk more precisely and shed light on the role of co-factors.

The authors add that detecting the presence of Zika virus or antibodies in blood and cerebrospinal fluid is the only current method of testing for Zika virus in newborns but the reliability of this method, especially when infections occur early in pregnancy, is not fully understood. The authors say that these limitations might partly explain why 19 (59%) of microcephaly cases were not confirmed as positive for Zika virus.

"This is the first case-control study to examine the association between Zika virus and microcephaly using molecular and serological analysis to identify Zika virus in cases and controls at the time of birth. Our findings suggests that Zika virus should be officially added to the list of congenital infections alongside toxoplasmosis, syphilis, varicella-zoster, parvovirus B19, rubella, cytomegalovirus, and herpes. However, many questions still remain to be answered including the role of previous dengue infection" says Dr Thalia Velho Barreto de Araujo.

The study was led by Fiocruz-Pernambuco, Federal University of Pernambuco, State University of Pernambuco, the Pan American Health Organization and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (UK).

Writing in a linked Comment, Dr Patricia Brasil, Fiocruz RJ, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and Professor Karin Nielsen-Saines, Department of Pediatrics, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA, USA, write: "as acknowledged by Araujo and colleagues, microcephaly remains a poorly defined disorder, and a uniform diagnostic approach is urgently needed. There is much debate in Brazil and worldwide about ascertainment of microcephaly, and the issue of disproportionate and proportionate microcephaly needs further clarification. Infants might be diagnosed with microcephaly when in fact they are globally small -- ie, small for gestational age, without true isolated microcephaly. This issue deserves attention, especially because in-utero growth restriction leading to the birth of small-for-gestational age infants is also a feature of congenital Zika virus syndrome. Although disproportionate microcephaly has been the most publicised feature of congenital Zika virus infection, proportionate microcephaly is also identified in the setting of in-utero growth restriction caused by maternal Zika virus infection during pregnancy, not unlike other congenital infections such as cytomegalovirus. The distinction, however, is important because there might be distinct prognostic implications. Although microcephaly has been associated with poor outcome in children with congenital cytomegalovirus disease, other researchers have not found such an association. A possible source of discrepancy is failure to adjust the head size to the weight of the infant when defining microcephaly." They add: "As our knowledge of the clinical repercussions of congenital Zika virus infection advances, it becomes apparent that microcephaly is only one possible adverse outcome among a range of disorders that might be part of congenital Zika virus syndrome."
Active monitoring is as effective as surgery and radiotherapy, in terms of survival at 10 years, reports the largest study of its kind, funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR).

Results published in New England Journal of Medicine show that all three treatments result in similar, and very low, rates of death from prostate cancer. Surgery and radiotherapy reduce the risk of cancer progression over time compared with active monitoring, but cause more unpleasant side-effects.

The ProtecT trial, led by researchers at the Universities of Oxford and Bristol in nine UK centres, is the first trial to evaluate the effectiveness, cost-effectiveness and acceptability of three major treatment options: active monitoring, surgery (radical prostatectomy) and radiotherapy for men with localised prostate cancer.

Chief investigator Professor Freddie Hamdy from the University of Oxford, said: 'What we have learnt from this study so far is that prostate cancer detected by PSA blood test grows very slowly, and very few men die of it when followed up over a period of 10 years, -- around 1% -- irrespective of the treatment assigned. This is considerably lower than anticipated when we started the study.

'However, treating the disease radically, when found, reduces the number of men who develop spread of prostate cancer, but we do not know yet whether this will make a difference to them living longer or better, and we have been unable to determine reliably which disease is lethal, and which can be left alone.'

Between 1999 and 2009, 82,429 men aged 50-69 across the UK were tested and 1,643 diagnosed with localised prostate cancer agreed to be randomised to active monitoring (545), radical prostatectomy (553) or radical radiotherapy (545). The research team measured mortality rates at 10 years, cancer progression and spread, and the impact of treatments reported by men.

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The research team found that survival from localised prostate cancer was extremely high, at approximately 99%, irrespective of the treatment assigned.

The rate of cancer progression and spread was reduced by more than half in men in the surgery and radiotherapy groups, compared with active monitoring; cancer progression occurred in one in five in the active monitoring group, as opposed to less than one in 10 in the surgery and radiotherapy groups. However, surgery and radiotherapy caused unpleasant side-effects, particularly in the first year after treatment.

There was some recovery from side-effects over two to three years. But after six years, twice as many men in the surgery group still experienced urine leakage and problems with their sex life, in comparison with those in the active monitoring and radiotherapy groups. Radiotherapy caused more bowel problems than surgery or active monitoring.

Overall quality of life, including anxiety and depression, were not affected by any treatment at any time. Half of the men stayed on active monitoring over the 10-year period and avoided treatment side effects.

'This is the first time radiotherapy, surgery and active monitoring treatments for prostate cancer have been compared directly. The results provide patients and clinicians with detailed information about the effects and impacts of each treatment so that they can make an informed decision about which treatment to have,' said co-investigator Professor Jenny Donovan, from the University of Bristol. 'Each treatment has different impacts and effects, and we need longer follow up to see how those balance out over the next 10 years.'

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Professor David Neal, a co-investigator from the University of Oxford, said: 'Interestingly, we saw that disease spread was reduced by half in men who were assigned to radical treatment, but no difference in survival outcomes with either surgery or radiotherapy, and no progression of the disease in three quarters of the men in the active monitoring treatment group, over the 10 years. We need to continue to study these men to find out whether prevention of cancer progression by surgery or radiotherapy leads to better cancer control and survival in the longer term.'

Professor Freddie Hamdy added: 'Longer follow-up is now required to determine the 'trade-off' that patients need to make between cancer outcomes and quality of life, and further research to understand how we can distinguish lethal from non-lethal disease.

'It is important that this research was conducted and that wouldn't be possible without the NIHR and its infrastructure enabling large scale randomised clinical trials to be carried out across the NHS.'

The findings of the study will play a key part in the decision to screen for prostate cancer, and are being used as part of a study investigating the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) testing for screening for prostate cancer, the CAP study.

Anne Mackie, Director at Public Health England Screening said: 'The National Screening Committee has been following the ProtecT trial closely. The results of this study will provide men and their doctors with key information needed to manage localised prostate cancer.'
Growth in the use of e-cigarettes in England has been associated with a higher rate of successful attempts to quit smoking, reveals a study published by The BMJ.

In 2015, use of e-cigarettes may have resulted in an additional 18,000 long-term ex-smokers in England, the study estimates, and the authors say "although these numbers are relatively small, they are clinically significant because of the huge health gains from stopping smoking."

They explain that a 40-year-old smoker who quits permanently can expect to gain nine life years compared with a continuing smoker.

Nevertheless, as with any observational study, firm conclusions about cause and effect cannot be drawn, they say.

Meanwhile, no clear evidence emerged for an association between e-cigarette use and rate of quit attempts, use of nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) bought over the counter, overall use of prescription treatment, or use of NHS stop-smoking services.

The authors explain that the results "conflict with the hypothesis that an increase in population use of e-cigarettes undermines quitting in general."

However, e-cigarette use in quit attempts was negatively associated with use of NRT on prescription, perhaps because patients using e-cigarettes having already tried NRT, explain the authors. They say more research would be needed to confirm this.

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The team of UK based researchers used a time series analysis to explore the relation between changes in prevalence of e-cigarette use and changes in prevalence of quit attempts, success of those attempts, use of licensed and prescribed medication on prescription and over the counter, and behavioural support.

They assessed data from the Smoking Toolkit Study, which involves monthly household surveys of a representative sample of individuals aged 16 years and older in England. Data were aggregated on 43,000 smokers between 2006 and 2015.

Statistics on the use of NHS stop smoking services were obtained from the NHS Information Centre, which reported a total of 8,029,012 quit dates being set with the programme during the same period.

The researchers tried to take account of tobacco control policies, mass media expenditure and smoking prevalence in their analyses.

In a linked editorial, John Britton from the University of Nottingham, says the results suggest that "successful quitting through substitution with electronic cigarettes is a likely contributor to the falling prevalence of smoking."

A number of potential factors -- both those measured and unaccounted for -- may have influenced the results, and "it therefore remains unclear whether, or by how much, the availability of e-cigarettes has influenced quitting behaviour in the UK," he explains.

Nevertheless, he notes that the significant year-on-year fall in smoking "indicates that something in UK tobacco control policy is working, and successful quitting through substitution with e-cigarettes is one likely major contributor. The challenge for public health is to embrace the potential of this new technology, and put it to full use."
A study published by The BMJ finds that surveillance systems in Europe could detect increases in microcephaly (babies born with an abnormally small head) due to the Zika virus of a similar magnitude to those observed in Brazil.

However, the smaller increases expected in Europe (due to the Aedes mosquitoes not being indigenous in Europe) would be unlikely to be detected.

While Zika virus is an unlikely threat in much of Europe, the researchers call for clear diagnostic criteria for microcephaly to be adopted across Europe.

Zika infection during the first trimester of pregnancy increases the risk of microcephaly. The emerging microcephaly epidemic across South America was confirmed by congenital anomaly registries -- highlighting the importance of ongoing, accurate surveillance to evaluate the severity of any new epidemic.

In Europe, congenital anomalies are monitored by a network of registers known as EUROCAT (the European Surveillance of Congenital Anomalies).

A team of researchers, led by Professor Joan Morris from Queen Mary University of London, set out to estimate the prevalence of microcephaly in Europe, find out if the diagnosis of microcephaly is consistent across Europe, and evaluate whether changes in prevalence would be detected by the EUROCAT system.

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24 EUROCAT registries in 15 countries reported 100 cases of microcephaly not associated with a genetic condition among 570,000 births annually.

Sixteen registries responded to a questionnaire of whom seven (44%) used the EUROCAT definition of microcephaly (a reduction in the size of the brain with a skull circumference more than 3 standard deviations (SD) below the mean for sex, age and ethnic origin).

Three registries (19%) used a less stringent 2 SD cut-off, while five (31%) were reliant on the criteria used by individual clinicians. One registry changed criteria between 2003 and 2012.

The researchers found that the reported prevalence of microcephaly across Europe varied considerably, due to the different diagnostic criteria applied and varying levels of ascertainment. Overall prevalence was 1.53 per 10,000 births with registries varying from 0.4 to 4.3 per 10,000.

There was no indication that registries employing a more stringent diagnostic criteria had a lower prevalence compared with those with less stringent criteria. Registries with the 3 SD cut-off reported a prevalence of 1.74 per 10,000 compared with those with the less stringent 2 SD cut-off of 1.21 per 10,000.

The prevalence of microcephaly in Europe would need to increase by over 35% in one year or by over 300% in a single registry to be identified as a statistically significant increase.

In a linked editorial, Dr Russell Kirby at the University of South Florida says that surveillance is an essential part of the response to Zika and must be improved.

While birth defects registries perform a vital population health function, registers of pregnancies affected by Zika virus with long term follow-up of both mother and child "must be set up urgently to fully understand the natural history of the Zika syndrome and its impact on child growth and development," he concludes.
A study published by The BMJ finds a consistent association between higher blood glucose (sugar) levels during pregnancy and increased risk of complications around the time of birth, but there is no clear evidence of a threshold effect.

The researchers say there is now an urgent need to work out the best threshold to balance the benefits and harms of treating women with high blood glucose levels during pregnancy.

Gestational diabetes -- high blood glucose (sugar) levels during pregnancy -- is associated with increased risk of a range of adverse outcomes around the time of birth and can affect the longer term health of mother and infant.

Although treatment can reduce the risk of these outcomes, the optimal glucose threshold to define gestational diabetes is unknown.

So a team of researchers, based across the UK and Republic of Ireland, set out to examine the association between blood glucose levels in pregnant women without pre-existing diabetes and birth outcomes, such as whether they needed a caesarean section.

They searched for all studies that had looked at the association between pregnancy blood glucose and outcomes for the mother and her baby.

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They found 23 studies involving over 200,000 women and their infants, mainly from high income countries across Asia, Australasia, Europe and North America. There was no evidence from sub-Saharan Africa and little evidence from other low and middle income countries.

Although they cannot tell us about cause and effect, meta-analyses involving observational research are useful for pulling evidence together.

When the researchers combined results from all studies there was a straight line association between glucose levels and caesarean section, induction of labour, a heavy baby, and shoulder dystocia (the baby getting stuck as their mother gives birth).

This means that, for each blood glucose increase, the risk of these problems increased by a similar amount -- and there was no clear evidence of a threshold effect.

This straight line pattern was similar when the team looked at studies separately to explore the potential impact of study quality, type of glucose exposure and different geographical regions.

These results show that there is no obvious level to diagnose gestational diabetes, say the authors.

"What we now need to work out is what the best threshold is for balancing the benefit of preventing pregnancy and birth problems by detecting and treating women with high blood glucose levels against the costs of detection and treatment and the problems of over treating some women and causing problems," they conclude.
An "automatic assumption" to link terrorist acts with mental illness unfairly stigmatises the millions of people with mental health problems and impedes prevention efforts, warn psychiatry experts in The BMJ.

In an editorial and podcast, Professor Kamaldeep Bhui and colleagues argue that the government's counterterrorism strategy is "shrouded in secrecy" and call for careful media reporting of terrorist events, similar to the reporting of suicides, to reduce copycat episodes.

They explain that terrorist groups and networks seem to avoid recruiting people with mental health problems, "probably because they share some of the same stigmatised views as the rest of society and see people with mental health conditions as unreliable, difficult to train, and a security threat."

Recent attention has shifted to "lone actor" terrorism, in which mental illnesses are more common, they say. However, they point out that no single diagnosis is associated with "lone actor" terrorism -- and that a psychiatric diagnosis where appropriate "does not explain motivation"

They report that many health practitioners are concerned about the government's counterterrorism strategy (Prevent), which outlines a public duty to assess, report, and prevent radicalisation if this may lead to extremist violence.

They point to a lack of transparency which means there is a "paucity of published evidence" for the effectiveness of the programme. This undermines trust and has alarmed many health practitioners, "who are concerned about acting as agents of the state."

Speaking in the podcast, Simon Wessely, Professor of Psychiatry at King's College London, says that we should follow the example of the Royal Colleges by drafting sensible and voluntary guidelines for media reporting of terrorist events, similar to those developed for the reporting of suicide.

These should include guidance on not glamorising events or the perpetrator, and not focusing on methods or details, to avoid copycat incidents.

He argues that the single best thing we can do to improve services, is make it easier for people to be referred, improve treatments that they get -- that will improve mental health -- and may also reduce risk to the public of these extremest acts. And he adds that psychiatrists are not in the role to deal with extremism, but are there to help those with mental health problems.

"An effective counterterrorism strategy, which is in all our interests, will be more successful if it engages fully with mental health professionals, public health agencies, and communities, making the research evidence and recommended actions as transparent as possible without undermining genuine security concerns," conclude the authors. "This will create more trust and support for Prevent from all quarters."
Prisons Director Scott Frakes turned in his long-anticipated request for state funding Thursday, his first such proposal.

Frakes is asking Gov. Pete Ricketts and the Legislature for an increase of $15.3 million in state general funds, and 164.5 Corrections worker positions in the next two fiscal years.

Combined with other funds, including money for construction projects, the total rises to $54 million over the two fiscal years of 2017-18 and 2018-19.

The $15.3 million general fund proposal would add to a $208 million budget base.

Frakes said he believes the governor is supportive of his request, but now Ricketts has the task of working in the prisons' financial and personnel needs with the many other agency requests for next year's budget proposal, which could total more than $8.7 billion.

Going into the budget process, Frakes acknowledged his agency had significantly fewer resources than he was accustomed to in Washington, where he last worked. It had a clear maintenance backlog that needed to be addressed and employee pay challenges -- all accumulated before he was brought in by a newly elected Ricketts 19 months ago.

But in terms of meeting the needs of the department into the future, Frakes said he felt Ricketts was responsive, thoughtful and had good insight.

His budget request includes a $75 million reception and treatment center at Lincoln Correctional Center, with $40.3 million proposed in the next two-year budget and another $35 million in the following two-year budget.

The new construction would combine the existing Diagnostic and Evaluation Center and the Lincoln Correctional Center on the West Van Dorn Street campus.

It would house the intake center for male prisoners and residential mental health beds, including 32 additional mental health beds for the sickest and most dangerous mentally ill men. It would also house a 32-bed skilled nursing facility for acute and serious medical needs.

"This to me is so important to create this," he said. "We'd have properly designed space for the people that are actively psychotic, treatment resistant, violent."

Lincoln Sen. Kate Bolz was among a small group of senators and legislative staff who were briefed Thursday on the Corrections request. She serves on both the Appropriations and Corrections special investigative committees.

"I think it's pretty clear that there's real need for protective services staff," Bolz said. "And I think they're making some smart investments in programming and education staff positions."

What may need more work, she said, are the needs for significant pay increases for corrections officers and other protective services staff, investments in their health insurance and longevity pay.

The department also has critical needs for recruiting and retaining behavioral health staff for the prisons, she said.

"I don't know that we saw a really specific proposal or investment around that area," Bolz said.

She also has questions about the $75 million proposal for the reception and treatment center. More thorough discussion is necessary on how those needs will be met and how the plan intersects with needs and demands of the Lincoln Regional Center, she said.

The Department of Correctional Services Special Investigative Committee has three more hearings scheduled in the next couple of months to better determine the department's needs. And employee salary negotiations are ongoing and still a question mark.

The proposal will not be available on the Department of Administrative Services budget division website until next week, but Frakes held a briefing on the funding request Thursday for reporters in a effort, he said, to be transparent and accountable.

The funding requests are consistent with the department's staffing analysis, master plan and the need to provide programming to prepare prisoners to transition back into the community.

"Our priority, reflected in this budget, is to keep people safe, he said.

Other highlights of the budget include:

* Hiring 96 protective services staff over the two years, including 44 for Lincoln Correctional Center, four for the Diagnostic and Evaluation Center, 25 for the Nebraska State Penitentiary, 20 for Omaha Correctional Center and three for Tecumseh State Correctional Institution. They would be phased at 12 per quarter in both years.

* Seven positions would be created for a transportation unit to coordinate transfers between prisons, pick up out-of-state parole violators, and for absconders and medical transports, for example.

* Seven positions would be hired to support the cognitive behavioral interventions program.

* The practice of sending inmates to contracted county jails to ease prison crowding would end. Frakes added the projected decrease of about 800 inmates in the prisons by next June -- due to changes in sentencing laws in the past two years -- may take a few more months than expected.
The dog showed every sign that someone had loved her before she was abandoned. She was gentle, eager to kiss and seemed especially fond of having her chin rubbed. She seemed to like having her beautiful face framed by human hands.

This browser does not support the video tag. Friends of Bossier City Animal Control

But after giving so much of her life to someone, it seemed the only sign that mattered was the crude cardboard one she was left with outside an animal shelter in Bossier City, Louisiana. "Her name is Cookie," someone had scrawled on it.

Dodo Shows Faith = Restored Couple Meets A Beach Dog In Mexico Who Changes Their Life

We don't know why Cookie was left outside of a closed animal shelter. The people who found her could only piece together details. Cookie is heartworm positive. She's about 6 years old and weighs 45 pounds. And at some point, she had love in her life. That much is obvious.
<p><em>Debbie Davidson</em><span></span></p>

A 13-year-old chow mix named Bagel escaped the yard he called home in Central Islip, New York, earlier this year, after suffering nearly a lifetime of neglect.

Debbie Davidson

The scruffy chow was found sitting on a busy sidewalk by animal advocate Debbie Davidson, who happened to be driving past. Bagel was missing patches of fur and his skin had hardened, leading Davidson to believe he was a stray.

Debbie Davidson

As Bagel was about to step into the road, Davidson stopped and got out to make sure he didn't get hit by oncoming traffic. It came as a complete surprise to Davidson, however, when a woman exited a nearby house to call Bagel back inside an open gate leading to a yard. The woman tried to brush Davidson away, but she was persistent in asking why the dog was so unhealthy. She recalled the foulness of the yard as though it were yesterday. "It was disgusting, poop everywhere," Davidson told The Dodo. "[Their] food and water bowls were filthy, the water was dirty. It was just horrible, and the poor pups smelled awful."

Dodo Shows Faith = Restored Couple Meets A Beach Dog In Mexico Who Changes Their Life

Debbie Davidson

In addition to Bagel, there was a female German shepherd in the house, roughly 8 or 9 years old, who was also exhibiting poor skin condition and signs of hip dysplasia, according to Davidson. Both dogs' nails were so overgrown that they had to hunch over to walk, and it was clear to Davidson that they hadn't been bathed or groomed in a very long time.

Debbie Davidson

Finally, and perhaps most heartbreaking of all, she met a 5-year-old cat in that same filthy yard who could only move by dragging his hind legs along the ground behind him.

Debbie Davidson

The woman Davidson had been talking to said that she had recently lost her mother and that her father, the pets' primary owner, was selling the house in order to live at a retirement home. He had been driving around the neighborhood, asking anyone he could find to take in the animals.

Debbie Davidson

Davidson said both dogs were at least 20 pounds underweight, despite the woman telling her they were "fine." The owners were so uninvolved in the animals' lives that they did nothing about Toby's hind legs, assuming he was paralyzed and couldn't feel anything, according to Davidson. In order to help the animals as quickly as possible, Davidson convinced the animals' owners to let her find them new homes herself. She put out a plea on Facebook for help, and within 24 hours the Pets4Luv Foundation (with the aid of Road to Home Rescue) had all three pets in their care.

Tracy Mazzaro

The animals were in worse shape than they had first appeared, with Bagel and Chloe harboring parasitic worms, bacterial and yeast infections, which caused the hardened black skin, and ear infections. Bagel's ear infection was so bad that she is now deaf. Toby the cat's suspected paralysis actually turned out to be a genetic disorder - he was born without the connectors keeping his knee caps in place. "It is clear to see when pain is affecting Toby the most because he will act differently," Bobbi Anne Thomas, a Pets4Luv volunteer, told The Dodo. "For example, just lying on the couch and not playing with the others."

Laurie Mitchell Iglesias

"It's absolutely amazing what was done and what these animals went through, and how affectionate they are," David Bernacci, head of the Pets4Luv Foundation, told The Dodo.

Pets4Luv Founder David Bernacci with Bagel (left) and Chloe (right) | Bobbi Anne Thomas

Now referred to as "The Islip Three" by rescuers who share their story on social media, Bagel, Chloe and Toby have been waiting for several months to find a loving home. They are favorites among the shelter's volunteers, yet only a couple of people have called to ask about the bonded senior pair and no one has followed up afterward.

Chloe and Bagel are in much better spirits and health these days. | Bobbi Anne Thomas

The dogs have been medically treated since their ordeal and their coats have grown back in nicely, but they are still in need of more extensive work on their ears, teeth and leftover skin problems - Chloe still needs to have surgery for her hardened skin, which is causing her discomfort. Pets4Luv was able to raise enough money to do surgery for one of Toby's back legs and his torn ACL, but still desperately needs money to perform a costly procedure on his second knee.

Bobbi Anne Thomas

Bagel and Chloe are a senior bonded pair that must stay together, and prefer each others' company to that of other dogs. Both pups love cats. Toby is great with everyone, but would be best with older children who can be gentle with his injuries.

Bobbi Anne Thomas
<p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10157486289760252&set=a.419881840251.376688.509295251&type=3&theater" target="_blank">Facebook/Antony Rubin</a><span></span></p>

In a disturbing video that made waves on social media back in July, a man held a 5-month-old dog by the scruff of her neck. He smiled at a camera - his accomplice recording the entire affair - and then threw her right off a very high roof. The dog cried out loud when she hit the ground. Then, two weeks later, she was found alive, barely able to walk, in Chennai, India. She was terrified and shivering once she made it into the safe arms of her rescuers, but even so, the puppy, who was later named Bhadra, wagged her tail.

Bhadra with Shravan Krishnan, one of her rescuers | Facebook/Shravan Krishnan

Bhadra was taken to Madras Veterinary College to recover from her injuries - not only was she in a state of shock, but she also suffered from fractures on her right hind leg and spine. Veterinarians said it would take up to two months for the puppy to fully recover - but they were hopeful.

Dodo Shows Dodo Heroes Woman Devotes Her Life To The Stray Dogs Of Bali

After Bhadra's story went viral, offers to adopt her came in from all over the world. She also became something of a local celebrity, with people visiting the home of one of the animal welfare advocates involved in her rescue, Shravan Krishnan, in the hopes of taking a photo with her. But Bhadra wasn't flown to the U.S. or anywhere else.

Instead, she spent the rest of her recovery in a foster home in Ramapuram, a suburb in Chennai. Her caretaker, Karthik Dhandapani, had never owned a pet until he volunteered to take in Bhadra - because his mother, who lives with him, had never approved of them. But on Wednesday, Bhadra's rescuers announced that Dhandapani decided to keep Bhadra, who is now 7 months old, forever. "Bhadra loves my mother's chapatis just as much as she loves chasing crows," Dhandapani told The New Indian Express. Bhadra also likes to play outside on Dhandapani's terrace several times a day.

"It has been a desire of six years ... coming from a family that has no connection to animals, being inspired to do something for them, turned an animal lover, spending time with them outside and not able to have one at home," Dhandapani wrote on Facebook. "But today, I am very, very happy to share that Bhadra is FAMILY ... She came home as a foster after she was found thrown off by the two medical students, and since then started ruling our hearts like she did the world."
They're lean, mean (not really) and ready to play - and they're also In-Sync Exotics Wildlife Rescue and Education Center's newest wildcats.

Sage | In-Sync Exotics/Karin Saucedo

"We were contacted by Washington's Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) asking if we had room for three orphaned cougar cubs," Angela Culver, media director at the Texas rescue, told The Dodo. WDFW contacted three sanctuaries in total asking them to rehome the kittens, and In-Sync Exotics was the first to respond and make arrangements to pick them up.

Sage and Outlaw | In-Sync Exotics/Karin Saucedo

The three cougar cubs had been reported as orphans wandering on their own without a parent in sight - but WDFW didn't take those reports at face value. Passersby often believe wild baby animals have been orphaned, when, in fact, the mother is off hunting or defending her territory, Culver said.

Scarlett | In-Sync Exotics/Karin Saucedo

Officials monitored the three cougar cubs for several days to make sure that they would not be pulling the cubs away from their mother prematurely. "After several days, she still hadn't returned, so the department went in and rescued the cubs by hand," Culver said. "Unfortunately, we have no idea what happened to their mother."

Dodo Shows Faith = Restored Couple Meets A Beach Dog In Mexico Who Changes Their Life

Sage | In-Sync Exotics/Karin Saucedo

A few days after the three cougar cubs were picked up, a fourth slightly older cub appeared, also parentless, near an area where a forest fire had occurred.

Malice, the oldest of the cubs | In-Sync Exotics/Karin Saucedo

In-Sync exotics agreed to take in the fourth kitten as well. But only after all methods of returning them to the wild were exhausted.

The four cougar cubs | In-Sync Exotics/Vicky Keahey

"We tried to find a facility that could rehabilitate the cubs so that they could be released back into the wild, but the very few places we found who had even attempted it had such low success rates we felt that their chances of surviving after release were pretty slim at best," Culver said.

In-Sync Exotics/Adriene Goforth

After a veterinarian gave the cougar kittens an initial checkup and a clean bill of health, all four were taken to Texas - and to their new lives at the sanctuary.

Outlaw showing off his claws | In-Sync Exotics/Karin Saucedo

Currently, the cougars are housed in the sanctuary's on-site vet clinic for a mandatory 30-day quarantine period. After that period ends, they'll be moved an outdoor enclosure with a playground area that will allow them plenty of room to run, play, climb and sunbathe.

Outlaw | In-Sync Exotics/Karin Saucedo

"Though only three of the cubs are siblings, they have accepted the older, unrelated female as a sister," Culver said. "They all play and snuggle together, and are settling in quite well.

Scarlett | In-Sync Exotics/Karin Saucedo

"We do not have exact ages on them, but they all still have their spots, which begin to fade at 12 to14 weeks. They are on solid food and especially love chewing on bones just like their mother would've taught them to do in the wild," Culver continued.

Outlaw | In-Sync Exotics/Adriene Goforth

The sole male, Outlaw, is the curious, outgoing one of the bunch.

Outlaw taking a cat nap | In-Sync Exotics/Karin Saucedo

Sage is the lightest in color and, while more reserved than Outlaw, she loves getting in some playtime with her brother. Scarlett, who's darker in color, is sweet but also the shyest, Culver said.

Sage and Outlaw | In-Sync Exotics/Vicky Keahey

As for the older female cub, Malice - she's feisty but loves to settle down and curl up with her two adopted sisters come nap time.

Malice and Outlaw | In-Sync Exotics/Karin Saucedo

Although these baby wildcats have lost their mothers, they now have each other to grow up with and depend on for fun, comfort and everything in between, for the rest of their lives.

In-Sync Exotics/Michelle Buchanan

Want to help In-Sync Exotics continue doing good work for big cats in need? Consider "adopting" a cat or making a donation here.

Outlaw | In-Sync Exotics/Brooke Engel
<p>Shutterstock</p>

"The bigger you are, the more likely you are to be facing extinction," says Jonathan Payne, paleobiologist at Stanford University. It's simply put, but this groundbreaking finding of Payne's just-published study shows that what's happening in our era, the sixth mass extinction in the history of our planet, is very different from what has happened before.

Shutterstock

While humans have pretty much always played a role in killing off the largest animals, like the wooly mammoth, for food, humans didn't have the resources to hunt at such a large scale in the oceans - until recently.

Dodo Shows Faith = Restored Rescued Wild Horse Loves To Play With A Little Donkey

Shutterstock

"Marine systems have been spared up to now, because until relatively recently, humans were restricted to coastal areas and didn't have the technology to fish in the deep ocean on an industrial scale," Noel Heim, co-author of the study, says. "[W]hat is happening in the modern oceans is really different from what has happened in the past."

Engraving from the 19th century shows British whaling ships hunting sperm whales. | Steve Estvanik/Shutterstock

Payne and his team of researchers looked at the patterns of the previous five extinctions to predict what will happen in this one, which scientists said in 2014 had just begun. "This 'sixth mass extinction' may approach or exceed the magnitude of the five major extinctions of the past 550 million years," the paper, which appears in Science, says. "We've found that extinction threat in the modern oceans is very strongly associated with larger body size," Payne says. "This is most likely due to people targeting larger species for consumption first."

The results of the study add to the evidence that human beings are to blame for the sixth mass extinction, which threatens to obliterate 41 percent of all amphibian species, 26 percent of mammal species and 13 percent of bird species over the next 100 years.

Squid drying at massive fishing operation in Thailand | Shutterstock
The car: Renault Torino

The owner: Unknown; spotted on the streets of Paris

The story: Rome sits on seven hills, Paris not so many. There is Montmartre, famous for La Basilique Sacre Coeur and overrun with tourists. Go for the view, retreat to a cafe.

During a trip to France in May 2012, on the lower slopes of the hill, while looking for a restaurant, we found a vintage car parked by the curb.

It looked foreign but oddly familiar. My Quebecois spouse gave me a tug, Jai faim. But I took a picture and another and walked around the car.

Despeche toi (hurry up). But I said, look at that. A Rambler.

The pictures show the car that evening, bathed in the yellow high-pressure sodium streetlight Paris is phasing out.

Michel suggested, cest un Renault. Voyez, la, and yes, there was the badge. Renault Torino.

After dinner whatever-it-was  Renault, or Torino, or Rambler, or AMC, or all of the above  was gone.

That was the end of it until I spotted an archived Wheels article with the headline, still doing an honest days work. The Stars Bill Taylor had been to South America, where many old cars and trucks are daily drivers.

One picture appeared to be of the model we saw at Montmartre.

The cars are two-door hardtops, sleek and roguish; the cutline Bill wrote for his image reads, This Renault sporting an old Ford name, Torino, is basically a reworked Rambler American.

It seems so; what are we to make of the front styling, which messes with Richard Teagues original by using different-sized sets of headlights and the Renault badge in the grill?

But the mystery is not solved. Parisians, default Renault experts, were looking over weirdly from their cafe tables. Queest-ce que cest?

Googling later we spotted a hint that meshed with reporter Taylors picture, at a less-known auto classified site, bringatrailer.com.

Rare in the USA: 1977 Renault Torino, is the heading, with a note under it, This Renault sold today to a best-offer of $15K, with info that the car was a rare Argentine model based on a Rambler and styled by Pininfarina.

In the description there was a further clue: Were wondering what people in France think of Renaults that were made in South America.

Given the stares from the patios of Montmartre, we dont think they ever had them. There werent any Torinos for sale on French classified sites, while the Argentine Mercado Libre turns up pages of Bills reworked Americans.

The offerings, in all states of repair, have features regular Ramblers did not: the later AMC paddle door handles; centre armrests in the back seat; sunroofs; chunky Renault steering wheels; Audi-like rear ends.

Wikipedias entry for the hybrid car correctly attributes the design to Richard A. Teague, who was AMCs long-time chief stylist, and Pininfarina, and offers a decent summary of what it was all about:

The IKA Torino, later Renault Torino, is a mid-sized automobile made by Industrias Kaiser Argentina under an agreement with American Motors Corporation.

The 1966 Torino was IKAs first integral national product and IKA was eventually bought out by Renault in 1975. The Torino was built on the same hybrid AMC platform all the way through 1981 in both two-door hardtop and four-door sedan variants.

It has been called Argentinas national car.

Many auto buffs know about Kaiser Industries South American adventures, which were complicated, one expects, by the eras thuggish dictators  can you imagine trying to do business? But because of Kaiser, not only the Rambler American but the Kaiser Manhattan and less-known Willys Aero lived on, and on, in South American markets.

Theres more to the Torino story. We see that three cars shipped to Europe did well in the 1969 Nurburgring race when, according to the Arizona-based Rambler Rogue Registry, Argentinians lay awake at night when the Torino raced in Germany; radios played in the offices and in the factories they stopped the production lines.

We see that the cars badge may be derived from the city of Turin, Italys coat of arms.

And that fan clubs and specialist garages in South America have kept the parts flowing and the cars going.

Perhaps its how the web now works, but the day after doing research for this story online I got an email from one Gabriel Brinez, in Columbia.

He wrote, in reasonable English, that his shop in Bogota attended the Nash, Hudson, Rambler and AMC brands, has engine, transmission, suspension parts, and some luxuries.

In one commentary at hooniverse.com, the hybrid Renault is called gorgeous, which isnt often said of the Rambler American.

You kind of see what Pininfarina was doing, Europeanizing the American car for Latin American consumers.

Imagine a new hardtop, windows down, 8-track playing Barry Manilow singing Copacabana, on the boulevards bordering the very beach, in the future Olympic metropolis of Rio. Or on the smart streets of Nice, if Renault Torinos were sold at retail in France which, as Ive said, seems not the case.

But though Pininfarina is a stylish name, I prefer the look of the American American.

Its proportions are uncluttered, appropriate. Neat and trim lines with pleasing simplicity is an online view of Rambler Americans I support, the front being crisper with single headlights and no hint of ersatz Ferrari.

When the American was a new model, friends in Montreal, the Van Walsoms, drove my family to Upper Canada Village in their new white station wagon.

We  the Holdens, then of Pte. Claire, Que.  were a Volkswagen family. By comparison the Van Walsoms American was a palace. Roomy and nice-riding, an ideal family car in 1964.

Remember, or imagine, how recent the Fifties and fins were, at that time, and so how clean-lined those Americans must have seemed. Their tall greenhouses with curved side windows were, if anything, Mercedes-like. You hear people say that, about Sixties Ramblers. But those AMCs were built before the Mercedes 250 that they resemble had appeared.

The official Renault website, group.renault.com, comments on the automakers virtual archive of hybrid Renault models, the Torino being one of many (others you may know: Alliance, Encore, Medallion).

Over the years, vehicles have been redesigned to match the special characteristics of world markets, the erstwhile American Motors partner states today. New models have been created by adapting names, signing partnerships and restyling bodies.

Others played the same game, with this very Rambler  there were incarnations in Australia, in Mexico, in Iran, where the Sherkate Shami Jeep Co. built their version in a factory dedicated by the Shah.

It makes for fascinating American history. To adapt the saying of an American ally, the French, to the topic of the Renault Torino: vive les differences. Which translates to Spanish as Larga vida a las diferencias for Argentina, where Americans that were certainly different were made for the masses.

Show us your candy: Got a cool custom or vintage car? Send us a picture of you and your family with your beauty, and your story. We like photos  the more the better  of the interior, trim, wheels, emblems. Email aholden@thestar.ca and be sure to use Eye Candy in the subject line. For a whole library of Wheels sweetest collectibles just Google Toronto Star Eye Candy.

More eye candy at thestar.com

Replacing a beloved Mister Jeep

A wheel-less Volvos spin on safety

1978 Mercury Bobcat a keeper of family memories

Readers 59 Austin a smoker

1986 Volkswagen Vanagon

My stylish midlife crisis  a 1973 Volvo P1800

The Dyane I courted for decades

Heirloom 86 Prelude draws looks, offers

A vintage Lincoln with political connections

How me and a 1961 Austin Healey healed each other END

My teen fantasy: a 1971 Mercedes-Benz coupe

1974 AMC Ambassador 3-seat wagon

66 Malibu gave me love of my life, fright of my life

1928 Chevrolet that was in A Christmas Story

Christine lite  my 1964 Rambler American

One of those good Studebakers

The 1966 Ford Ive bought and sold twice

My Honda CBX  a bona-fide locomotive of a motorcycle

Pre-1920 Ford made it to Midland

Sporty Saturn a rarity

My globe-trotting diplomats Mercedes

It has to be a Chevy:A family project on a low budget

An MG that fits a family

How two old Plymouths morphed into one

Our 1942 Pearl Harbor Buick

Sons breathe new life into old family Volvo wagon

1964 Studebaker Avanti

1939 Chrysler Royal

1981 Trabant De Luxe

1956 Studebaker President Pinehurst wagon

1973 Corvette and 1968 Camaro

1953 MGTD

1954 Willys Aero Lark

2004 Mazda MX-5 Miata sport

1966 Chevrolet Impala 2-door hardtop

2004 Porsche Boxster S

1972 Ford LTD convertible

1968 AMX

For even more of readers vintage and customized cars enter Toronto Star Eye Candy in your favourite search engine.

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Someone stole a Ford pickup in Saunders County and led multiple agencies on a chase that reached Interstate 80.

Saunders County Sheriff Kevin Stukenholtz said dispatchers received a call at 1:30 a.m. Friday about a stolen truck in Prague. A short time later, deputies saw the truck heading southbound on U.S. 77.

They attempted a stop, but the driver accelerated. Eventually, the Lancaster County Sheriffs Office picked up the chase with assistance from the Nebraska State Patrol.

Stop sticks were deployed when the truck got on Interstate 80, but the driver was able to avoid them. The truck hit a guardrail near the Waverly interchange and the suspect ran, Stukenholtz said.

Heavy rain at the time ruled out aerial assistance and prevented police dogs from finding the suspects track.

Sometime later, troopers found a woman covered in mud walking along U.S. 6. Stukenholtz said she was unable to provide a plausible explanation for why she was there and is a person of interest.
The smallest aircraft made by Boeing Co. and Airbus Group SE are about to find a new role operating trans-Atlantic routes previously the preserve of some of the worlds biggest planes.

The re-engined 737 Max and A320neo jets offer a 15-per-cent fuel saving meant to cut costs on the shortest inter-city services.

At the same time the revamp has added about 800 km. or so to their range  just enough to enable the narrow-bodies to span the 4,830 km. between the eastern U.S. and Western Europe.

While eight hours on a 130-ft. plane with three toilets and one gangway might not immediately appeal to travellers used to the spacious cabins of an Airbus A380, airlines say the smaller jets will open up direct routes that wouldnt otherwise be viable.

That would do away with the need to switch between flights at a busy hub.

At the same time, people can look forward to competitive fares as carriers seek out smaller airports where access charges are lower.

Norwegian Air Shuttle ASA, JetBlue Airways Corp. and Portugals TAP are among airlines buying the jets for trans-Atlantic routes. NAS is set to lead the way when it becomes one of the first carriers to get Boeings Max 8 next year. Its initial flights may link Edinburgh, Birmingham in England and Cork and Shannon in Ireland to smaller airports in New England and the New York area.

The Max is very competitive, Norwegian Air Chief Executive Officer Bjorn Kjos said in an interview in London.

It has huge potential from the smaller cities along the Atlantic coast.

But you cant go into New York as you do with wide-bodies.

You must target airports with a totally different cost structure.

Boeings 757, currently the worlds longest single-aisle airliner with around 200 seats and a range in excess of 6,435-km., has been plying the Atlantic for years. Some companies, including United Continental Holdings Inc., are still deploying the model on routes such as Newark, New Jersey, to Birmingham, England.

Production ceased in 2004, however, leaving those 757s still flying in the twilight of their lives, their fuel consumption way in excess of that of modern jets.

The 737 is itself a fifty-year-old design, still in production but much-tweaked. It and the A320 were designed for much shorter flights. The original 737-100 seated just 85 people and was limited to trips of about 1,930 km. While ranges have increased, the 5,310-km. reach of the 737-800 and -900 is insufficient for fully laden operations on trans-Atlantic routes, where jets must carry enough reserve fuel to fly about 800 km. in an emergency.

There is also talk, on such industry websites as AirInsight, of Bombardiers CSeries twin-engined airliner being used over the Atlantic in a dedicated business-class service, or carrying heavier loads if it turns out, as some have been saying, that the new Canadian jet has greater range than expected.

A handful of carriers operate the older narrow-body planes on services at reduced capacity, which cuts the weight of a plane and increases its range. SAS AB serves Boston from Copenhagen using an 86-seat 737-700 and British Airways connects London City airport and New York with an Airbus A318 carrying just 32 passengers.

The only current trans-Atlantic 737 or A320 services with a near-normal load are flown by Canadas WestJet Airlines Ltd. and link St. Johns, Newfoundland, with Dublin, at a distance of about 3,220 km., and Halifax, Nova Scotia, with Glasgow in Scotland. The 737-700s used have 136 seats.

The U.K. and Irish routes planned for Norwegians 189-seat Max 8s will span about 4,830 km. Subsequent flights could serve Stavanger, Trondheim and Bergen in Norway and Aalborg in Denmark, although theyll likely involve a long-range version of Airbuss A321neo known as the LR and able to fly more than 6,435 km. using extra fuel tanks, spokesman Lasse Sandaker-Nielsen said. Norwegian ordered 30 of the planes with 220 seats in a single class in July.

JetBlue and TAP also plan to deploy the model, which is due to be available from 2019. The U.S. carrier has agreed to buy 30 A321neos with an option to take some as LR variants, saying it wants an aircraft with trans-Atlantic range. TAP has orders for 10 A321neoLRs, saying it could use them to serve Brazil and possibly the U.S. Its Lisbon base is about 5,630 km. from both New York and Recife, the South American countrys sixth-largest city. Irelands Aer Lingus is also a likely operator of the A321neoLR across the Atlantic, Willie Walsh, CEO of parent company IAG SA, said in July, adding that the jet represents a fantastic opportunity. It already flies 757s to locations including Hartford, Connecticut, typical of the cities smaller planes could serve.

With the LR emerging as a favoured successor to the 757, Boeing is studying designs for a stretch of its biggest Max 9, dubbed the Max 10, that would offer much of the range and payload of the A321 and could be ready by the decades end, or a more elaborate revamp using the larger engines developed for the Airbus jet. Its also working on a new family of mid-range aircraft that would debut about five years later, CEO Dennis Muilenburg said Wednesday.

Passengers seem certain to be making longer trips on the smallest class of jetliners in coming years.

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OTTAWAThe Trudeau government is consciously discriminating against 163,000 children in its delivery of child welfare services on reserves, First Nations advocate Cindy Blackstock said Thursday as a human rights tribunal issued a second compliance order on the issue.

Blackstock  executive director of an organization that together with the Assembly of First Nations spent nine years fighting the federal government over child welfare services  said Canadians need to know that the Trudeau government is not following a legal order.

It is saying, really, in its actions that the government of Canada is above the law and sadly, that First Nations children are below the law, Blackstock said.

And that should no longer be allowed in this country, not after the residential schools.

In its latest ruling, the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal delivered a series of directives to the government, including an order that the Indigenous Affairs Department provide clear information about how it is implementing the tribunals original January decision.

Last winter, the rights body ruled that Canada discriminated against First Nations kids in the delivery of services.

The tribunal is also calling for Canada to apply Jordans Principle  a policy designed to ensure First Nations children do not get caught up in bureaucratic wrangling over money  both on and off reserve.

Blackstock pointed to a recent court case involving a young Alberta girl who requires dental treatment to ensure she can talk and eat without pain.

The federal government has spent $32,000 in legal fees fighting the matter as opposed to the $8,000 that would have been required for treatment, she said.

We need a government who is not going to just talk, that will actually act and alleviate that discrimination, because there are kids out right now who are living in very difficult circumstances, Blackstock said.

We are losing another generation of First Nations children to wayward federal policies and that has to stop.

The government must act immediately, AFN National Chief Perry Bellegarde said Thursday, noting the tribunals original findings were clear.

We want to work with them to fix this, with all levels of government to fix this, Bellegarde said.

It is really about the best care for these most vulnerable of our society, these young First Nations men and women. Its all about working together.

The government is currently reviewing the tribunals latest compliance order and will determine appropriate steps, Indigenous Affairs Minister Carolyn Bennett said in a statement.

We know that the child welfare system on reserve needs to be overhauled, and that is why we are engaging with First Nations youth, First Nations leadership, service providers, the provinces and Yukon Territory, Bennett said.

Our government is committed to changing the status quo and we are taking action to ensure that we get this right for First Nation children and families on reserve.

In the federal budget, the Liberals earmarked nearly $635 million over five years in new funding with $71 million set to flow as immediate relief.

Blackstock says this money falls short of what is needed, pegging the actual shortfall at around $200 million this year.

The government has also failed to provide concrete details on a July announcement on Jordans Principle that involved $382 million over three years, she noted.

We know nothing about that, Blackstock said.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau needs to personally address the reserve child welfare issue, NDP indigenous affairs critic Charlie Angus said Thursday, noting he fears the dispute could lag on for years.

This prime minister is the minister of youth  if he was serious about it, he would act, Angus said.

I dont know what this government doesnt understand about a ruling that says their government is systematically and racially discriminating against indigenous children.

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EDMONTONThe lawyer for a man found guilty of second-degree murder in the deaths of an Alberta couple says hes appealing the conviction in the hope of getting an acquittal or a new trial.

Brian Beresh filed the appeal Friday  less than 24 hours after Travis Vader was found guilty in the deaths of seniors Lyle and Marie McCann  and says it hinges on what he calls a major error in the ruling.

There are a number of grounds  one of which is the reliance upon a section of the Criminal Code that has been declared unconstitutional  and then errors in relation to inferences drawn from the evidence which we have suggested are unreasonable, Beresh said Friday.

Justice Denny Thomass ruling on Thursday was broadcast live from Edmonton Court of Queens Bench, a first for an Alberta criminal trial.

Some legal experts immediately noted that Thomas used Section 230 of the Criminal Code in his ruling. The section allows for a murder verdict if a wrongful death occurs during the commission of another crime, such as robbery.

However, Section 230 was found unconstitutional in 1990 by the Supreme Court of Canada.

The McCanns were killed in July 2010 while driving to British Columbia for a camping trip. Their bodies and a murder weapon were never found. The complex case that involves DNA and cellphone evidence has been in and out of court since 2012.

Bret McCann, the couples son, said he was celebrating the guilty verdict Thursday night at home with family and friends when they learned about the Section 230 issue.

It was disconcerting, McCann said. But after reflecting on what he called the crazy twist in the case, he said it was still important for his family to hear Thomas lay out the facts and say Vader was responsible for the death of his parents.

His guilt was established yesterday and I dont think that this Section 230 issue affects that, McCann said. It may affect what sentence he receives ultimately. The penalty is kind of a minor thing to us.

McCann said it is too soon to say whether he would attend an appeal or a new trial. He said he and his wife, Mary-Ann, may just follow through with their plan to live in Australia to be near their daughter and grandchildren.

Albertas Justice Department declined comment on the Section 230 issue and the appeal.

As the case is still before the court, including as it has been appealed, it would be inappropriate for the Crown to comment, Alberta Justice spokesman Dan Laville wrote in an email.

Beresh said nothing can happen with the appeal until Vader is sentenced on the second-degree murder conviction.

Vader is to appear in court Oct. 3 to set a date for a sentencing hearing and to determine if he should undergo a psychiatric assessment.

This preserves Mr. Vaders right to appeal, but before the Court of Appeal is engaged . . . the case has to be concluded in Queens Bench. A sentence has to be passed, Beresh said.

There are a number of options that will be explored, but presently that is the next appearance date.

Although Section 230 has not been in force since 1990, it has never been repealed and remains in the Criminal Code.

Peter Sankoff, a University of Alberta law professor who specializes in legal issues in criminal trials, said old laws are rarely repealed by Parliament.

The federal justice department said there is no legal obligation for Parliament to amend the Criminal Code to reflect Charter rulings by the Supreme Court.

But Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould said in a statement she has already ordered a review of Criminal Code provisions found to be unconstitutional with a view to updating the Criminal Code to reflect these decisions.

This review is ongoing and is one part of the larger review of the criminal justice system that I have undertaken, she said.

Thomas was appointed to Court of Queens Bench in 2005 by the federal Liberal government of former prime minister Paul Martin.

At the time, his biography noted his background in environmental regulatory law and said he was a frequent panellist and lecturer for the Canadian Bar Association and the Law Society of Alberta.

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OTTAWAWhen Ti-Anna Wang of Montreal heard that fellow Canadian Kevin Garratt had been released Thursday after spending two years in a Chinese jail, she was happy for his family.

But her feelings of goodwill were quickly overwhelmed by the overriding sadness that has gripped her for the 14 years that her father, Wang Bingzhang, has been in solitary confinement in China.

With Chinas premier poised to visit Ottawa next week, Wang is asking Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to personally champion the case of her aging parent  whose time in Canada opened his mind to democratic freedom, and paved the way for what has been a torturous imprisonment.

I also hope that the release of Mr. Garratt will not mean that Canada will now go easy on the Chinese government on human rights, Wang, 27, said Friday.

I actually think this is a good sign that they do respond to pressure and that our PM should be pressing even harder for the release of my father and other Chinese political prisoners.

The elder Wang was among the first generation of Chinese students permitted to travel abroad a generation ago, and got his doctorate at Montreals McGill University in the early 1980s.

In 2002, Chinese agents abducted him while he was on a trip to Vietnam, and brought him to China, where he stood trial, in court proceeding widely derided as a sham. He is serving a life sentence in solitary confinement for trying to foster democracy in China from abroad.

Its been eight years since Wangs daughter has been permitted to see him, and his health has been failing.

Im glad for Mr. Garratt and his family, Wang said.

Im glad that the PM and government are clearly pressing their Chinese counterpart on human rights issues, but I question whether or not they are doing enough on really difficult cases like that of my fathers.

Wang does not have Canadian citizenship, but many of his family members now do. But that simply does not matter, said former Liberal MP Irwin Cotler, a human rights lawyer who has fought for Wang and numerous other political prisoners.

Wang has strong connections to Canada through children that were born and now live here; meanwhile the United Nations and the Canadian House of Commons have denounced his imprisonment and called for his release, said Cotler, now the head of the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights in Montreal.

He was effectively inspired by Canadian democracy and the rule of the law, said Cotler.

He said he has urged the government to intercede with the Chinese on Wangs behalf.

If nothing else, they should release him on humanitarian grounds, Cotler said. Hes suffered enough. I would hope that they allow him whatever time he has left, to be reunited with his family.

Wang has suffered multiple strokes while in prison, and he has had no face-to-face contact with family since August 2015, when his son was permitted a visit.

We are still exchanging sporadic letters and his writing tells us that his spirits are, understandably, very low, Ti-Anna Wang said Friday.

His only chance of release is if the PM prioritizes, specifically requests/demands and personally negotiates my fathers release. Anything short of that will simply not be enough.

Trudeaus office did not initially respond to a request for comment on Friday.

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It is a quaint courtesy of Canadian judges that defendants at trial are always addressed by an honorific, no matter the ugliness of the crimes for which they stand accused. So it was always Mr. Bernardo and Mr. Shafia and Mr. Magnotta, convicted murderers all.

Because courts are venues of strict civility, even for monsters.

Only in the closing passages of a verdict from the bench or a sentencing would a justice remark on the particular horrors of the acts committed, the bench allowing itself a moment to express revulsion on behalf of society.

Ontario Court Judge Marvin Zuker disposed of all propriety when he convicted a 29-year-old man of sexual assault in July and again on Wednesday when he imposed the maximum sentence of 18 months on Mustafa Ururyar.

Earlier Zuker had denied Ururyar bail pending sentencing. That was hastily overturned on appeal.

This week, Zuker revoked Ururyars bail pending his appeal of both conviction and sentence. That revocation, too, was overturned Thursday by an Ontario Superior Court judge on consent from the Crown.

I suspect Ururyar will get his appeal and a new trial. Zuker, with his astonishingly hostile and berating commentary  a no-holds-barred polemical rant infused with academic dogma about rape myths and overt character assassination  practically guaranteed his finding will not survive the scrutiny of finer legal minds.

A portent of what might unfold on appeal can be found in remarks made by Superior Court Justice Michael Quigley in granting the first bail request. That was a jaw-dropper, said Quigley, referring to the slew of academic references  and Virginia Woolf and Maya Angelou  cited in Zukers judgment, musing aloud that the judge had a mind that may be a little too full of the texts that had so pleased many of Grays supporters in the courtroom. That raises the question of having a predisposed mind.

Zukers mind certainly appeared to have been well made up against the accused, cleaving from start to finish on the complainants unsupported version of events; sex which she was adamant had been non-consensual. Though, on the evening in question, Jan. 31, 2015, Mandi Gray had sent a text to Ururyar inviting him to join her at a bar to drink and then we can have hot sex. Then she went home with Ururyar  had already asked if she could stay with him that night  despite, she testified, Ururyar demeaning and insulting her during their walk back to his place, calling her a needy, drunken slut. Once behind closed doors, Gray continued, Ururyar forced her to perform fellatio and then raped her, saying: This is the last time Im going to f--k you and youre going to like it.

The frailty of the evidence in a he-said she-said case underscores the problematic parameters of sexual-assault prosecutions where there are rarely witnesses to the crime, especially in date-rape scenarios. Activists argue the burden of proof is fundamentally unfair to victims, traumatized by their experience, memories often impaired, with credibility turning on inconsistencies not germane to the event.

As if reading from The Gospel of Feminism 101: The Early Years, Zuker gave the court an earful of his own biases against the accused, landing repeatedly on what he determined to be the utter twaddle of Ururyars testimony, sarcastically ticking off alleged touching as sexual assault number two and sexual assault number four. The entire 180-page judgment drips with contempt and sneering.

Im mystified by Zukers naked animosity towards the defendant. This man and this rapist, who apparently represents all men and all rapists, although what I read in the court transcripts (I didnt cover the trial) was an accused who, while he may not have been a pleasant person, offered a narrative no less credible than what Gray put on the record. Never happened, Zuker snorted about Ururyars version, as if hed been right there in the room with them.

There are many misguided conceptions of what constitutes a real rape or how a real victim of sexual violence should behave, Zuker wrote. That is absolutely correct and too many times Ive seen how those stereotypes are exploited in sexual-assault trials, with victims sliced and diced on the stand, the palpably guilty waltzing away on acquittal.

But Zuker soared off into a rape-myth screed that had zero relevance to what was in front of him. For much of our history, Zuker writes at one point, the good rape victim, the credible rape victim has been a dead one.

And rape, he reminded, is a weapon of war.

Indisputably and wretchedly yes it is. The significance of that observation, in this context, is unfathomable.

But perhaps that doesnt matter to Zuker, co-author with the late June Callwood of a book titled The Law is Not for Women. He turns 75 this year, the age of mandatory retirement for judges. Excoriating Ururyar was like smacking the rump of his hobby horse before galloping into the sunset.

Rape is the ultimate violation of self, short of murder, except that it can be the murder of a soul, Zuker told us, reading from his sentencing decision Wednesday. Those who commit the crime of rape must understand they do so at their peril.

I take extreme exception to the first part of that statement. And Zuker, as a sitting judge for decades, should know better.

For one thing, rape as an offence doesnt even exist in Canadas Criminal Code, though Ive long argued that it should be returned to the legislation. The charge is sexual assault, along a spectrum of violation. But Zuker levelled the term at Ururyar repeatedly in his finding of guilt. Where Ururyars crime sits on that spectrum  the sexual assault inflicted on Gray, fellow PhD student and York University teaching assistant, with whom hed had a casual sexual relationship for a couple of weeks before the night when Zuker decided he raped her  is difficult to assess.

It should be noted, however, that the Crown chose to proceed by summary conviction, which typically is considered less serious than an indictable offence. Theres no preliminary inquiry  the alleged victim wont be required to testify twice  no right to trial by a jury and lower maximum sentences. Sexual assault as an indictable offence carries a maximum sentence of 10 years.

More infuriating to me is the message Zuker sent: That victims of rape are irreversibly damaged, soiled even, never again to be whole and healed. Zuker is so far behind the curve. His dialectic, intended to crucify Ururyar, perpetuates victim shame, with their murdered souls and all.

I am a feminist and that is un-feminist thinking in the hoary extreme.

Rosie DiManno usually appears Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.

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Leslievilles famed mural is dead. Long live Leslievilles famed mural.

Residents, merchants, and business leaders of the downtown east-end neighbourhood gathered Thursday to applaud the new street art on the wall of a shop at the northeast corner of Jones Ave. and Queen St. E.

They snapped photos of the big depiction of neighbourhood pioneer Alexander Muir, sitting under a famous maple tree. They smiled, they lined up to chat with artist Elicser Elliott and they munched on free pizza.

But replacing the previous mural, which depicted Muir  who composed The Maple Leaf Forever in 1867  and quickly became synonymous with the gentrifying district, almost took a very different turn.

Building owner Andrew Elia, who about 12 years ago agreed to let some students from nearby Ralph Thornton Centre paint the first mural, knew the crumbling wall needed fixing. The peeling paint was tough to match and people kept changing Muir to look like the Joker or Adolf Hitler.

Elia agreed to let an artist replace it with a new vision. That vision was Ashbridges Bay in its original marshy form.

Councillor Paula Fletcher saw the design, done with a city grant, and raised the alarm. It was very nice but it was essentially a swamp and I said The community will not be happy if we just go ahead and paint this over a beloved, iconic piece of art, she said.

Elia was skeptical people would care but agreed to a process, conducted through the citys StreetARToronto program, that saw three designs subjected to community consultation and a winner chosen

She was right, he says now. A lot of people loved the old mural and if we had just put up a new one, the crap would have hit the fan.

The old work featured the tree across the street that inspired The Maple Leaf Forever, which was a contender to become Canadas anthem, and Leslievilles name printed in stylized lettering on a warm yellow backdrop.

The new one, designed with cues from residents submissions, features Muir sitting under the tree, a pencil behind his ear, apparently seeking inspiration.

The lettering, full of flourish, is similar to those in the original, as are the colours. Muirs face is now high enough that only a very determined graffiti artist could reach it.

Leslieville needed a fresh outlook on the landmark, said the artist, who goes by Elicser. Its hard to let go of nostalgia but we did our best to improve it.

Fletcher approves. This is still Alexander Muir, the composer and first principal of Leslieville School, but hes updated  hes kind of hip looking, she said.

The process was educational for the five-year-old StreetARToronto program, which has helped enliven neighbourhoods across the city, said project manager Lilie Zendel.

Street art is by nature ephemeral, we think five years is usually going to be the lifespan, so we can use this as a model of how to say to a community: We know you love the work but its time for something new,  she said.

The Maple Leaf might be forever, but not this new mural.

I hope it has a long life, Zendel told the crowd as they admired the fresh art, but I hope it isnt forever.

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A St. Catharines veterinarian was suspended by the College of Veterinarians of Ontario after hitting and choking animals in his care, but former employees who brought the allegations forward say its not enough.

The college, though, says the punishment is sufficient.

A group of former Skyway Animal Hospital veterinarian technicians submitted a complaint to the CVO against Mahavir Rekhi in 2014, which included 12 videos from the clinics surveillance system appearing to show Rekhi roughly handling animals in 2012 and 2013.

Rekhi pleaded guilty to professional misconduct at a CVO hearing July 21 and received a 10-month licence suspension, which may be reduced to six months if he completes sessions on animal restraint and behaviour modification techniques. He must also pay the college $10,000 and will be subjected to three unannounced inspections each year for two years following the suspension.

The Star tried to contact Rekhi but calls and messages to a phone number and email associated with Skyway Animal Hospital Thursday went unanswered.

The decision is just a slap on the wrist, complainants Jessica Hamilton and Larissa Engels told the Star. That should be enough to get his licence taken away . . . Its really messed up, Hamilton said.

The CVO definitely let us down big time.

Hamilton worked at the clinic for six months in 2013, and Engels for a month in 2014; on top of videos, both said they witnessed abuse first-hand.

In one video, Hamilton is off to the side as Rekhi appears to choke and slam a chihuahua against an examination table, an incident Hamilton said she had nightmares about.

It was intense . . . I kept saying, Stop, please stop. Why are you doing this?  Hamilton recalled. And he said, He deserves it because he wasnt a nice patient, he wasnt a nice chihuahua.

He really took it out on him, and this is a six-pound dog youre talking about, a muzzled, six-pound dog.

Engels told the Star about a similar incident where she said Rekhi held a Shih Tzu by the neck and slammed him into the table when the dog didnt hold still.

(I was) telling him, Thats not necessary, theres no reason for you to be doing this, let him go,  Engels said. He said, If you treat them badly enough, theyll learn their lesson, and theyll remember. And they did. Just about every animal that came through the back door that was a prior client remembered him . . . they were terrified of him.

Hamilton said the group got the videos instead of intervening with Rekhi so they had solid proof to submit with the CVO complaint. Theyd hoped the college would ensure he didnt practice again; that Rekhi could have his licence restored in six months makes her very mad.

CVO registrar and CEO Jan Robinson said the penalty imposed on Rekhi is already very serious, pointing out that suspensions are typically two to three months long, the college usually charges just $2,000 to $2,500 and rarely imposes the unannounced inspections condition.

Revocations across any profession are also exceptionally rare, she said, noting that only four members have had their licences revoked in the past 20 years. One revocation was overturned. Of the other three, one veterinarian was found criminally negligent in the area of sexual abuse towards staff; another was under the influence of a substance while driving and got into an accident that killed someone, Robinson said.

The college really applaud(s) the group for taking the videos and filing the complaint, she added.

Were really pleased that they did despite how upsetting it is, she said.

Ontario SPCA investigator Kevin Strooband, of Lincoln County Humane Society, told the Star Thursday hes opened an investigation after seeing the videos on the news.

Im going to listen to whatever information I get, he said, adding that the statute of limitations for charges under Ontario SPCA Act is six months but that certain animal cruelty provisions in the Criminal Code have no limitation.

At Queens Park, Community Safety and Corrections Minister David Orazietti told reporters he was very shocked at details of the abuse.

Any Ontarian who brings their pet to a clinic expects a certain standard of care and certainly doesn't expect this type of result, he said, adding that there may be need for further review of regulations governing the powers of the veterinary college to discipline its members.

The CVO issued Rekhi a licence on June 18, 1999, according to the colleges website, and it was active until it was suspended Aug. 20 this year. An end date for the suspension has not been posted.

Rekhi took over Skyway Animal Hospital in 2007, according to a Meet The Team page on the clinics website. In his spare time, the profile continues, he likes to read about new information to keep himself up to date in his chosen profession, play with his kids, and cat, watch movies and swim.

His profile has since been removed from Skyways website.

With files from Rob Ferguson

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KHAR, PAKISTANA suicide bomber attacked a Sunni mosque in northwest Pakistan on Friday, killing at least 24 worshippers and wounding 28 others, officials said. Several children were also among those killed or wounded in the deadly attack.

The attacker shouted God is Great as he entered the mosque in the village of Ambar in Pakistans Mohmand tribal region, government administrator Naveed Akbar said. He said rescuers had transported the dead and wounded to nearby hospitals, where some of the wounded were listed in critical condition.

Akbar said about 200 worshippers were inside the mosque at the time of attack.

Pashin Gul, the head of local tribal police, confirmed that it was a suicide attack. He said the bombing took place during Friday prayers, adding that several of the wounded were in a critical condition.

Saeed Khan, the in charge of hospital in the town of Khar, said an army helicopter was being used to transport the critically wounded to Peshawar, the main city in northwestern Pakistan.

One of the wounded, 41-year-old Ghulam Khan, 41, said he heard a deafening explosion during the prayers and then he fell down. I cried for help, but no one came to me ... there were other bodies ... wounded worshippers, who were reciting verses from Quran and waiting for help, he said from his hospital bed.

Khan said local residents and tribal police helped ferry the wounded to hospital.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for Fridays attack, which targeted a Sunni mosque. Previous such large-scale attacks have usually targeted Shiite mosques.

The country has witnessed severallarge-scalemilitant attacks this year, claimed by an offshoot of the Pakistani Taliban and Daesh, also known as ISIS and ISIL. Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan issued a statement, condemning the attack.

Pakistans tribal regions, which border Afghanistan, were considered to be strongholds of Pakistani Taliban militants until 2014, when the military launched a major operation there, evicting and killing large numbers of insurgents. However, violence has continued in some of the tribal regions.

Fridays attack came hours after army chief Gen. Raheel Sharif met with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to discuss security issues. According to a government statement, Sharif pledged to continue the war against terrorism.

The military says some 18,000 civilians and 5,000 soldiers have been killed in militant attacks in Pakistan since the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, when Islamabad threw its support behind Washington in the war on terror.

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Prince William came to the aid of an elderly dignitary whod fallen on Friday during an official visit to a school by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

As William shook hands and greeted officials at the Stewards Academy in Harlow, Jonathan Douglas-Hughes, vice lord lieutenant of Essex, was standing behind him when he suddenly took a backwards stumble.

The Duke immediately turned around and reached down to help Douglas-Hughes back up, along with two other women and another man who rushed to his aid.

Douglas-Hughes, 72, is the Queens representative in the county east of London.

William and Kate were visiting the Academy in honour of the Heads Together campaign for mental health.

RELATED:Will and Kate are bringing the children to Canada

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They stand, conspicuously Western, in the vast expanse of Beijings Tiananmen Square: Eighteen-year-old Justin Trudeau seemingly at ease, confident. His smaller, blonder 16-year-old brother Alexandre more guarded.

But it was Alexandre who had urged his father, Pierre Trudeau  then retired from office  to take the brothers to China, one year after the bloody 1989 crackdown on protesters that made the country a pariah and sparked sanctions by Ottawa.

Unsurprisingly, he says in his new book Barbarian Lost, the tourist hotels were empty  some of the characteristics of earlier Chinese periods, such as stark authoritarian rule and lack of contact with the outside world, had reappeared.

The book shows how head-spinningly things have changed. And it closes the circle for the Montreal documentary filmmaker as first the son, then the brother of a Canadian prime minister, who himself made a recent state visit to China.

Alexandres journey  sleeping in modest lodgings and travelling like many ordinary Chinese  was light years away from the rare if stodgy trip, that the family made in 1990 under the watchful eyes of numerous minders. Pierre had first been to China in 1949, during the communist revolution, and returned in 1960 with friend Jacques Hebert: a landmark event that produced a book, Two Innocents in Red ChinaTwo Innocents in Red China, and a brief encounter with Chairman Mao Zedong.

As prime minister, Trudeau opened diplomatic relations with China in 1970, two years before President Richard Nixons much-vaunted visit.

Alexandre inherited his fathers fixation with the Middle Kingdom in my mothers belly, when a seven-months-pregnant Margaret Trudeau accompanied her husband on an official visit in 1973. The recent trip is his 10th, but will not be his last. China is with me, he says.

You and your father were magnetically drawn to China. What is it about the Trudeaus and China?

It was a symbolically important part of my fathers travel tales when we were growing up. He went to China in the final throes of the revolution, a time of great change, and it left a very strong impression on him. He became associated with it as a Western leader who said we should recognize the government of China, not of Taiwan. It was with the opening of trade both in the U.S. and Canada and other Western nations that China became the country it is now, and has had such a prominent role in our lives as the manufacturer of the products we so eagerly consume.

I was interested as a geopolitical documentary filmmaker. Whether in the Middle East or Africa, China was an increasingly important player. It attracted me for so many reasons.

What are the changes you saw since that trip in 1990?

Back then Beijing was a dusty, lowrise metropolis. Now its a modern, glitzy, busy place. There were few cars then, now its packed with cars. Thats a short time for it to have moved from a kind of remote, slightly backward place. Now the Chinese are travellers, consumers, and the landscapes of Chinas cities have completely changed. Sometimes they dont even realize how much themselves.

Your brother, Justin Trudeau, went on his first official visit to China after you made your book trip. Did you give him any advice?

No, but he did read my book a week before. He told me he found it very insightful and it gave him a sense of what China was about these days. I dont bother him with advice on geopolitics. We have a much more playful, boyish relationship  even now. He needs that. When we see each other we get our kids together and play.

Were there things about China that worried you on your recent trip?

Im not terribly worried about China. I think its evolving positively. Its had political challenges which are only slightly beginning to become real. The Chinese dont expect what we expect from the government. There is a historical notion called the heavenly mandate. A government that is seen to bring about prosperity seems legitimate. If they are prospering, they say that is the government we should have.

There will be change, but it will come slowly. I think it will come when prosperity slows down. When people feel that the communists got us this far, but we need something different to move on to the next step.

Does the West go about understanding China in the right way?

Theres a simplistic way of looking at it through a political prism, based on what we expect politically. Theres no understanding of what the precedents are in China, what the Chinese want, or what they themselves are comfortable with. You need history and philosophy if you want to get to where it is, and where it came from.

Your picture of China is sometimes quite bleak: unrestrained development, corruption, environmental ruin. Where do you see the most hopeful signs?

I didnt mean it to be bleak, though there are a lot of bleak moments. Its a juggernaut that crushes and rolls over the (now-extinct) Yangtze dolphin and chews up little people. But my impression is that its also a happy place. The Chinese are very conscious of how far and how quickly they have come.

In 1990, China was far more bleak than now. If you compare it to what China experienced 60 years ago, the bubonic plague was still rampant. There was typhoid, polio, violence was rife. (Earlier) there were warlords and people were bought and sold like slaves. Its not good enough for Canadians, but its a lot better than it was.

Your China travels have gone full circle, from when your father was famous as a groundbreaking leader, to now, with your brother in office. Is your family still revered in China?

I wonder how the Chinese authorities will look at me now. Im prominently connected, but the place of (Dr. Norman) Bethune and Trudeau the father in China  a lot of them say thats the old mythology. The new mythology is something different, not filtered through a political lens. Maybe Justin has restored it. They are big fans of fresh, charismatic, good-looking politicians.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

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A 25-year-old Lincoln woman was charged Thursday with possession of methamphetamine with intent to deliver and possession of a controlled substance.

A Nebraska State Patrol trooper stopped Tressie Felker for driving 83 mph on Interstate 80 about 2:30 Thursday. Troopers searched the car after they smelled marijuana, according to an affidavit.

They said they found a marijuana joint and a plastic bag with eight oxycontin pills and arrested Felker.

At the jail, Felker changed her clothes and handed officers two Ziploc bags holding a total of 1.4 ounces of meth, according to court documents. Her bond was set at $50,000, and she remained in jail Thursday evening.
WASHINGTONIn a brazen campaign stunt on Friday, Donald Trump promoted his new Washington hotel, touted his endorsements from military heroes, lied, and then, quickly, admitted an obvious fact he has disputed for five years: President Barack Obama was born in the United States.

His 10-word renunciation of birtherism, which followed 203 words on the hotel, included no explanation or apology for his relentless peddling of absurd and arguably racist conspiracy theories intended to delegitimize Americas first black president.

And he prefaced it with blatant lies about the saga, falsely claiming that opponent Hillary Clintons 2008 campaign started the outlandish controversy and that he had finished it.

The Republican presidential nominee made the one-sentence acknowledgment  President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period  after more than 20 minutes of speeches from national-security figures.

Then he said, Now, we all want to get back to making America strong and great again, thank you, and he walked away.

Reporters shouted questions at him: Why did you change your mind? What do you have to say to African-Americans? But Trump could not hear them over the applause from the six rows of supporters he had stationed between himself and the press in the hotels four-chandelier presidential ballroom.

The event, initially billed as a news conference, left media outlets fuming. Though Trump has been open about his contempt for both specific outlets and the press as a whole, never during the campaign had he designed an entire event to deceive the media into providing extensive coverage of his self-promotion.

We got played, again, by the Trump campaign, which is what they do, said CNN correspondent John King.

Obama, who was born in Hawaii, said he was not that shocked the issue had returned.

Its fairly typical, he said in the Oval Office. Weve got other business to attend to. I was pretty confident about where I was born. I think most people were as well. And my hope would be the presidential election reflects more serious issues than that.

Clinton posted a Twitter message that read, What Trump just did is a disgrace.

As often, Trumps motivation was not immediately obvious. But his reversal comes as he is making a nominal (and frequently insulting) effort to reach out to black voters, who overwhelmingly dislike him, and to convince moderate white voters that he is not a racist.

From 2011 on, though, he was Americas most famous doubter of the fact that Obama, whose father was from Kenya, was indeed born in Hawaii. He did everything from alleging a suspicious death to claiming he had dispatched private investigators to Hawaii.

It was entirely unclear why he now considers the matter finished. In 2012, a year after Obama released his long-form birth certificate to try to quell the rumours, Trump wrote on Twitter: An extremely credible source has called my office and told me that Barack Obamas birth certificate is a fraud.

The claim that Clinton initiated the conspiracy theory in 2008 has been widely debunked. While some diehard Clinton supporters did circulate emails questioning Obamas birth, there is no evidence that the campaign itself had anything to do with them.

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The Rev. Gretta Vosper and her heretics  pardon, congregants  had their brief moment at the Inquisition yesterday  pardon, hearing. The deciders in the United Church of Canada will now pray, ponder, then render judgment.

Vosper is charged with not believing in God, Jesus Christ or the Holy Spirit, for which she could be defrocked  a term sounding newly pertinent in the era of the burkini. She calls herself an atheist, as regards the traditional God but says she understands god (she prefers lowercase) in her own way; so she both denies and affirms.

This isnt Richard Dawkinss atheism. The issue surfaced when she wrote an open letter on the Charlie Hebdo massacre saying bad things can be done in the name of God  hardly controversial or atheistic either. You could even argue that the Bibles second commandment against worshipping false gods makes exactly her point.

As a teen, at Holy Blossom Temple, I read a novel by a rabbi, As a Driven Leaf, about a Talmudic-era sage named Elisha ben Abuyah, who raised impudent theological questions. He was in effect excommunicated and henceforth referred to as the other but remained revered by some sages and in subsequent tradition. Heresy in the name of faith and the truth  especially about the divine  has always been an intrinsic part of religions.

So, starting in the 1200s, a book known as The Atheists Bible  attacking Moses, Jesus and Mohammed  was denounced by religious authorities  and it didnt even exist. Eventually, centuries later, it got written, as if it was necessary. In the 1960s, there was a Death of God movement inside U.S. Protestantism.

Vosper is in this tradition. Shes obsessed with god and writes books defining her concept. She says she believes in a metaphorical God, as a symbol for a set of values. She argues we create god, which in turn empowers us.

So yes, shes being metaphorical but in theology, what isnt? Surely most Greeks didnt think actual gods lived up there on Olympus. Theres a developed theology of demythologization in Christianity. Atheism could end up as just another metaphor. One minister insisted the United Church typically affirms something beyond material reality  more than the eye can see. Okay, but who in the era of quantum physics wouldnt affirm that? There are also groups of clergy who, like Vosper, no longer hold supernatural beliefs. But even that seems murky since its unclear what supernatural means today.

UCC clergy are expected to be in essential agreement with basic church doctrines but that can get pretty metaphorical too (God is Holy Mystery  Mother, Friend, and Comforter), leaving, says the UCCs own journal, plenty of leeway, God-wise. And just how much is agreement really worth? Conrad Black, in his press lord days, apparently considered buying the Star so he was shown the leftish Atkinson Principles, which are legally built into the papers DNA. He looked at them and said something like, Yah, I could sign on to that.

If theres anything innovative in Vospers challenge, it may be her serious treatment of the term, atheism. New atheists, such as Dawkins, just toyed with it, setting up simplistic, primitive versions of religion that they then debunked, like naughty kids in Sunday school. Vosper agonizes over the word, searching for any meaning it might have in religious settings. Such efforts keep religions vital.

In my own transition out of seminaries, for a long time Id call myself an agnostic, till one day I thought, Oh hell, Im an atheist. It wasnt dramatic, more like the way a snake sheds its skin or, perhaps, being defrocked. In Obamas first inaugural he mentioned atheists respectfully, which may have been a step along the way to rehabilitating the term in the U.S. context.

I used to ask people I knew at Union (protestant) seminary in New York how serious they were about Christian doctrines, like sin and salvation. Or was their Christianity just an autobiographical accident of birth through which they got attached to certain rituals, music, images etc., they were reluctant to abandon. I think those remain issues, especially in a globalizing world. In a way, Vosper is just stating the obvious and her opponents, merely postponing the inevitable.

She and her flock sound like they simply want a little meaning in their lives that feels really  meaningful. Can the United Church accommodate that?

Rick Salutins column appears every Friday.

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Its a welcome trickle, since its the first serious money flowing to provide flood protection for Torontos Port Lands. But, given the scope of whats necessary, the $65 million announced on Wednesday is no more than a mere rivulet.

A billion-dollar river of government funding (a torrent, according to Mayor John Tory) is necessary to make this derelict district safe for revitalization. And its not at all clear when that might come.

Until it does, what has correctly been called one of the biggest economic opportunities in North American will continue to lie fallow, awaiting the promise of a clean, green neighbourhood with jobs, parks, public transit and homes for thousands of people.

That said, at least a small first step is being taken. A stretch of water along the shore, at Essroc Quay off Cherry St., is to be filled in to help stabilize this zone against floods. The federal government is providing $32.5 million for the project, while the city and the province are each supplying $16.25 million.

Thats just a fraction of the massive work required to provide flood protection for the area. This includes rerouting the Don River to the middle of the Port Lands, cleaning the areas contaminated soil, and creating a bold swath of new parks and wetlands.

Its a huge job, but well worth doing. The Port Lands present a unique opportunity. They encompass 356 hectares of prime waterfront land, and no other North American city has a plan to revitalize such a huge section territory. Unfortunately, most of the area is at high risk of flooding from the Don.

The city received a taste of what could happen in 2013 when the Don River suddenly overflowed its banks, trapping a GO train, forcing drivers to abandon their cars, and causing widespread basement flooding. That risk is only likely to worsen because of climate change. Port Lands development obviously cant proceed until this threat is removed.

Final approval is required from Toronto city council for the Essroc Quay lake-filling project, and it should be granted as quickly as possible. Once that is in hand, work is expected to start early next year and finish in about 18 months.

Ideally, the next phase of flood protection would start immediately after that with a fresh injection of funds from Ottawa, Queens Park and the city.

All three levels of government are watching their budgets. But its the view of city hall insiders that future provincial support is the least reliable, given the cash-strapped Liberal governments already-massive commitment to expanding public transit and the new obligations it announced this week, including a major expansion of child care and a permanent hydro rebate.

When questioned on this, Ontario infrastructure minister Bob Chiarelli said, Well be at the table from here on in. One can only hope thats true.

It would be unfortunate if the long-term, multi-billion-dollar development opportunity represented by the Port Lands went unfulfilled because of politically motivated, short-term needs.

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Toronto is a haven for newcomers like the people fleeing from war-torn Syria, and a key factor in helping them adapt is the United Way. With immigrants arriving every day, demand for services is high and the charity has responded by boosting its annual fundraising goal to $101.5 million.

Its a target that deserves strong support.

Money donated to United Way Toronto and York Region strengthens a network of more than 200 member agencies. Together, they mend lives by helping to house the homeless, feed the hungry, give support to the disabled and shelter to the abused, among a host of other services.

As reported by the Stars Megan Dolski, support for new immigrants is an important focus of the coming years efforts. They need language support and they need help finding jobs, said RBC president and CEO Dave McKay, who is leading the 2016 campaign. The need keeps growing in Toronto and York, so we felt strongly we had to increase what we felt was already a large goal.

Last years $100-million target was topped, with 23,000 volunteers and 760 participating workplaces managing to raise $100.2 million. That was deemed an amazing community response, but even better will be required for 2016, given the United Ways more ambitious campaign goal.

It can be reached, but only through determined effort from business, labour, community organizations, schools, churches, service clubs and thousands of individual donors.

Showing the way, the charity announced a gift of up to $1 million from long-time supporters Mike and Martha Pedersen. The grant will be distributed to match donations of $1,200 or more.

Its vital that the United Way succeed. The annual campaign is about more than raising money; its about bettering peoples lives. Whether rich, poor, or somewhere in between, when we support this worthy cause the community we strengthen is ultimately our own. Please give.

Correction  September 19, 2016: This article was edited from a previous version that misspelled the name of the Mike and Martha Pedersen Grant.

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Re: Draining Ontario dry, Editorial Sept. 6

Draining Ontario dry, Editorial Sept. 6

I was interested in comparing the rates that commercial water bottlers pay for their water, which they sell for profit, with those paid by residential home owners like me with a very small patch of grass.

In 2016, I am paying $3.45 for a cubic metre of water, which translates into 1,000 litres. Ontario is charging commercial bottlers a little more than that ($3.71) but thats for each million litres of water drawn.

And  I guess I should not be surprised  corporations also pay less tax than I do, so Im wondering: What do I have to do to get myself declared a corporation so I can get these great rates too?

Celia Featherby, Toronto

The City of Toronto seemed to be on the right track a few years ago when they put a bottled water ban in place. Evidence of its effectiveness is sorely lacking, though.

One would almost think it was compulsory to use bottled water. We have fantastic water in this city. I'm guessing that every municipality in Ontario has good quality water in the wake of the Walkerton disaster.

I attended Buskerfest and the CNE on Labour Day weekend and bottled water was widely available for sale at both, contrary to the spirit of the ban at the very least. Toronto Water had one of their trailers set up at Buskerfest. Good on them but they should be given more prominence.

The policy is quite flexible but I think it's time to tighten it and its enforcement up.

Sean Moore, Weston

The Stars extensive recent coverage of the bottled water issue is certainly relevant, but is it based on facts or emotion?

As in this editorial, most of the Stars coverage of this topic quotes people who reside in the areas where water is being taken or lobby groups such as Wellington Water Watchers. Why is there no discussion of the views of watershed experts?

For example, Guelph is in a borderline drought situation and yet council has not complained about Nestles continued pumping of water from the Aberfoyle area south of the city. Why not? Because experts consulted by the Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change indicate that the pumping does not affect the citys water supply.

Although these subwatersheds are all located in the Grand River watershed, the environmental effects from water-taking activities in the Mill Creek subwatershed dont extend to the Speed and Eramosa [River] subwatersheds . . . , according to Mayor Cam Guthrie, quoted in the Mercury Tribune (Aug. 29, 2016).

While this aspect is only a small part of the entire bottled water issue, it does confirm that there are other perspectives that should be addressed through investigative journalism and discussions with the ministry and technical experts.

Peter K. Burian, Guelph

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Re: Tax corporate sales rather than profits, Letter Sept. 8

Tax corporate sales rather than profits, Letter Sept. 8

Don Buchanan makes an excellent point. It is surprising that the business community has not lobbied for this change.

For global competitiveness reasons, we replaced the Manufacturers Sales Tax with a revenue neutral sales tax, and we should do the same for Corporate Income Tax, and employer premiums for Employment Insurance and Canada Pension. Such taxes are ultimately paid by the consumer in higher prices.

This would lower the cost of doing business, and make Canada more competitive in the global economy.

In a recent C.D. Howe paper McMaster Professor William Scarth advocates a similar strategy on page 15: Revenue-neutral fiscal package . . . of lower payroll taxes (to lower the costs of domestic producers) and higher sales taxes (to finance the payroll tax cut and to raise the relative price of imports).

Joseph Polito, Etobicoke

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NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Shares of Baidu (BIDU) were higher in late-afternoon trading on Thursday as the Chinese Internet search provider received a permit from California's Department of Motor Vehicles to test its self-driving cars in the state, according to Reuters.

The company has already tested the vehicles on Chinese roads and highways. Baidu unveiled its autonomous car in China last December.

Nvidia (NVDA) said earlier this week that it developed an artificial intelligence computer that would be used in Baidu's self-driving cars.

California is considered a prime testing ground for autonomous vehicles due to the technological innovations being made in Silicon Valley, Reuters reports.

Baidu opened an office in Silicon Valley in April and said it plans to have more than 100 researchers and engineers working there by the end of 2016.

Baidu joins several other companies who received authorization from California's DMV, including Ford (F) and Alphabet's (GOOGL) Google.

Separately, 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:

TheStreet Ratings team rates Baidu as a Buy with a ratings score of B-. This is driven by some important positives, which it believes should have a greater impact than any weaknesses, and should give investors a better performance opportunity than most stocks it covers. The company's strengths can be seen in multiple areas, such as its solid stock price performance, revenue growth, notable return on equity, reasonable valuation levels and largely solid financial position with reasonable debt levels by most measures. The team feels its strengths outweigh the fact that the company has had sub par growth in net income.

You can view the full analysis from the report here:

BIDU

BIDU data by YCharts
NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Shares of Novavax (NVAX) were plunging 84.17% to $1.32 in after-hours trading on Thursday after the company said its RSV-F vaccine candidate for lower respiratory tract disease did not meet its primary and secondary goals in a clinical trial.

The vaccine was well-tolerated by patients. But it did not demonstrate efficacy in preventing RSV-associated lower respiratory tract disease or reducing the occurrence of all symptomatic respiratory disease, according to a company statement.

Novavax was "surprised and disappointed" by the outcome, according to Gregory Glenn, president of research and development.

"Our initial analyses and review of the key aspects of the trial do not indicate issues with trial execution, data collection, data integrity, or drug product quality," he added.

The Gaithersburg, MD-based vaccine company will take a closer look at data in the upcoming weeks to better understand the results.

More than 15.57 million of the company's shares traded hands today vs. the 30-day average volume of 5.3 million shares.

Separately, 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 rated this stock as a "sell" with a ratings score of D.

The company's weaknesses can be seen in multiple areas, such as its feeble growth in its earnings per share, deteriorating net income, disappointing return on equity, weak operating cash flow and generally high debt management risk.

You can view the full analysis from the report here: NVAX
Although many missed it, Islam Karimov died two weeks ago.

He was the president of Uzbekistan, a country in Central Asia that used to be part of the Soviet Union. Karimov's death could be the beginning of some big changes in this largely ignored part of the world.

Karimov was Uzbekistan's first and only leader after the end of the Soviet Union in 1989.

According to The Financial Times, he ran "one of the world's most repressive dictatorships, with thousands of political prisoners and a gruesome record of torturing its opponents."

Karimov wasn't a nice guy.

He also didn't prepare the country for his eventual death and/or succession. So Karimov's death has set off a power struggle.

A few days after his death, Foreign Affairs magazine wrote, "In the worst-case scenario, the transition could trigger a revolt among rival officials."

So far it hasn't unfolded that way, but the risk remains that the succession process could deteriorate into chaos.

Even thought it is more than a little morbid, death is a tremendous investment catalyst. A key leader passing away doesn't happen very often, and when it does happen, it can create a huge opportunity to go along with all the uncertainty.

The so-called death watch investment strategy doesn't work in every market. In certain countries such as ones under a dictatorship, where one person holds a lot of power, death can be a big driver of asset prices.

But in other countries such as developed democracies the sudden passing of a president or prime minister wouldn't fundamentally change the government or the direction of the economy, even though it would be big news.

These countries normally have strong, stable institutions such as the presidency, the judiciary and the parliament.

There is a clear set of rules that everyone follows that allows the government and country to continue operating generation after generation, regardless of what happens to the leader of the government. Thanks to the rules in place, there are few questions about who takes over and what happens next.

However, in many countries, institutions don't hold all the power, individuals do. These governments operate at the whim and will of the supreme leader, and the entire governing structure can be thrown into chaos when that person is gone.

There may be an official succession plan, but there is no guarantee it will be followed. Lack of a strong parliament or judiciary means that things can quickly turn into a political free-for-all, just like what is happening in Uzbekistan.

Although what happens in Uzbekistan matters to the Central Asian regional balance of power, for most investors what happens in Uzbekistan doesn't matter much. Only the bravest of frontier investors even has it on their radar.

But it is a different story for Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan's neighbor. For most people, it is just another "stan," one of the former Soviet Union countries that is hard to find on a map and that is a mess for one reason or another.



But Kazakhstan is important, partly because it is one of China's main commodity suppliers. It produces more uranium, the fuel for nuclear power, than anywhere else.

Kazakhstan has the ninth-largest oil reserves in the world, most of which is sold to its neighbor, China. It also has large amounts of chromium, copper, gold, iron, lead and zinc.

If there was no Kazakhstan, China would need to look elsewhere for many of the inputs needed to fuel its economic growth.

Kazakhstan's leader is Nursultan Nazarbayev, and he is from the same mold as Uzbekistan's Karimov. He has been the country's president since 1990 and has never received less than 90% of the vote during elections, not because he is that popular but just because that is how elections work in Kazakhstan.

The country's media get their walking orders from him, and anyone who is brave enough to speak up gets the sharp end of a steel boot.

But Nazarbayev is 76 in a country where the average man lives to 64. Yes, he could keep going for many more years, but he is living on borrowed time as even a dictator can't overturn the laws of nature.

In more developed democracies, the vice president or another member of parliament steps in when the president or prime minister dies, thanks to a carefully crafted constitution. But Kazakhstan isn't like that.

Kazakhstan does, in theory, have a plan in place. But in practice, it could turn into Uzbekistan when Nazarbayev dies.

Plus, one reason Nazarbayev has been in power for 26 years is partly because he hasn't trained anyone to be a successor.

Meanwhile, Kazakhstan's other giant neighbor, Russia, is positioning itself to take advantage of any Kazakhstan weakness.

In September 2014, according toThe Moscow Times, Russian "President Vladimir Putin has said Kazakhstan's history of independent statehood is scant and its people's desire for closer ties with Russia is profound, a rhetoric reminiscent of Moscow's stance on Ukraine, and inhabitants of Kazakhstan are worried."

Kazakhstan's stock market hasn't done much for years.

It reached its all-time high in 2007 and is still down 61% from that level. The stock market has never recovered from the 2008 global economic crisis and regained its status as an intriguing frontier market investment destination.

It is unclear whether Nazarbayev's death would be a good or bad thing for Kazakhstan. Some people in the country may be worried about a power vacuum if he died suddenly.

On the other hand, if Nazarbayev does die soon, it could remove a lot of uncertainty and open the door to enormous positive change.

That is why Kazakhstan is also on the death watch list. If its leader dies soon, there could be a lot of exciting investment opportunities in this commodity-rich Central Asian giant.

Kim Iskyan is the founder of Truewealth Publishing, an independent investment research company based in Singapore. Click here to sign up to receive the Truewealth Asian Investment Daily in your inbox every day, for free.

This article is commentary by an independent contributor.
NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- American International Group (AIG) has agreed to sell its stake in financial adviser Ascot Lloyd's syndicate Ascot Underwriting Holding and related syndicate-funding subsidiary Ascot Corporate Name to Canada Pension Plan Investment Board for $1.1 billion.

The insurer will receive about $240 million in net cash proceeds after Canada Pension Plan Investment Board recapitalizes syndicate funds.

The proceeds reflect AIG's 20% stake in Ascot Underwriting and its ownership of Ascot Corporate Name. Ascot and AIG founded the managing agency and syndicate in 2001.

AIG will maintain its strategic partnership with Ascot Underwriting Bermuda.

Shares of the New York City-based company were flat in pre-market trading on Friday after closing at $58.59 on Thursday.

Separately, TheStreet Ratings team rates the stock as a "hold" with a ratings score of C+.

AIG's strengths such as its increase in net income, good cash flow from operations and growth in earnings per share are countered by weaknesses including disappointing return on equity, a generally disappointing performance in the stock itself and poor profit margins.

You can view the full analysis from the report here: AIG

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 article's author.
Without any fanfare or discussion Friday, the University of Nebraska Board of Regents approved a 6.3 percent salary increase for Hank Bounds, now in his second year leading the university system.

Bounds contract extends through 2020. He'll earn $510,400 this academic year, with an additional $20,000 coming through private funds. Regents set his salary at $480,000 when he was hired in early 2015.

A study by the Chronicle of Higher Education found the average salary of a public university president was $428,000 last year, while a look at the growth in base salary for senior leaders at public institutions by Inside Higher Ed shows they have outpaced those at private colleges in the past two years.

Attracting and retaining top talent is a goal of NU, said Regent Tim Clare of Lincoln, and that can come with a price.

I dont look at it as an arms race necessarily, he said. We think the work Hank has done is exceptional, and hes provided tremendous leadership. We have to retain that top talent.

Studied against Bounds immediate predecessor, J.B. Milliken, the case could be made that NU is taking part in that arms race.

Milliken earned $431,276 annually in his last year leading NU, but when he left for City University of New York, his salary jumped 55 percent to a yearly $670,000, nearly $90,000 more than the previous CUNY chancellor.

In a similar vein, when Central Michigan University President George Ross dropped out of the NU presidents search in the final weeks to stay in Mt. Pleasant, Michigan, he got a 15.9 percent salary bump from the universitys Board of Trustees.

Governing boards for colleges and universities around the country have demonstrated they are willing to pay for top leaders.

University of Illinois President Timothy Killeen, who started in May 2015, receives a base salary of $600,000 with a potential performance bonus of $100,000, while his predecessor Robert A. Easter received total compensation of $478,892.

Among the seven university systems NU compares itself to  a separate array from the individual campuses  including the Illinois system, Bounds salary falls below the midpoint.

* Texas A&M University system Chancellor John Sharp recently got a pay increase that puts his base salary at a reported $900,000, with his total compensation package totaling $1.1 million.

* University of Oregon system President Michael Schill, a former University of Chicago law dean who started in July 2015, makes $660,000.

* University of Tennessee head Joe DiPietro in 2015 received a base pay increase to $488,899 with a contract extension that includes an annual 5 percent increase that will grow to $565,962 in 2018.

* University of Wisconsin President Ray Cross, whose salary was $227,250 when he led the universitys colleges and extension efforts, now makes $525,000 leading the system.

* University of Missouris Interim President Michael Middleton, who was appointed to lead the system after Timothy M. Wolfe resigned late last year, receives the same base salary as his predecessor of $477,544.

* University of Colorado President Bruce D. Benson, an oil magnate whose company made him a millionaire before he joined academia, has declined a pay raise every year since he was hired in 2008, leaving his salary at $359,000.

The array of comparable university systems is an important factor to consider, as are the accomplishments of other senior leaders across the country, said Regent Jim Pillen of Columbus.

I believe when you really assess presidents of great universities across the country, (Bounds) is in that market, Pillen said. You could look back and say gee whiz we brought Hank on board and paid him significantly less than what market would be.

So while the 6.3 percent pay hike regents gave the NU president on Friday sounds like a lot, Pillen said Bounds has demonstrated the data-driven, accountability style of leadership they sought to lead the university  thats something they want to keep at NU.

Wed be foolish to sit here and think Hank didnt get calls, Pillen said.

Clare said as part of the strategic framework the Board of Regents operates under, keeping quality faculty, staff and administrators is a top priority.

So is keeping tuition low and ensuring access to NU, providing new research opportunities for faculty and students, and making sure what the university is doing is benefiting Nebraskas economy.

We work it all together and this is what weve determined is necessary, Clare said.
NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Shares of Chevron (CVX) were sliding in early morning trade on Friday despite the company approaching the sale of its Asian geothermal energy units for about $3 billion, sources told Bloomberg.

State-owned China General Nuclear Power has been invited to place a second-round bid on the integrated energy and chemical company's assets.

PT Medco Power Indonesia is also reportedly looking to place an offer in a consortium including Marubeni, a Japanese trading house and Aboitiz Power, a Philippine energy company.

Citigroup, Chevron's advisor for the transaction, will ask for second bids by the end of September, sources said, Bloomberg notes.

Separately, oil prices were falling this morning on rising Iranian exports, negatively affecting San Ramon, CA-based Chevron's stock.

Crude oil (WTI) was down 2.28% to $42.91 per barrel while Brent crude was lower 2% to $45.66 per barrel this morning.

Separately, 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 rated this stock as a "hold" with a ratings score of C.

The company's strengths can be seen in multiple areas, such as its solid stock price performance and largely solid financial position with reasonable debt levels by most measures. However, as a counter to these strengths, we also find weaknesses including feeble growth in the company's earnings per share, deteriorating net income and poor profit margins.

You can view the full analysis from the report here: CVX
Today, Im excited to share that a special class of Mobile Phone Numbers in the Netherlands are now available in beta. These numbers with a +3197 prefix are designated for cloud-based communications, including Application-to-Person (A2P) messaging. That means you can send and receive messages using a Dutch Twilio Phone Number while complying with local regulations.

Prior to these new numbers, you had the ability to send messages in the Netherlands with a non-Dutch Twilio number. Weve been working closely with Dutch providers to add in-country numbers, so you can reach your customers with a familiar local number.

In the process, we uncovered a few important intricacies. The Dutch regulator dictates that regular mobile phone numbers with the +316 prefix cannot be used for programmatic A2P messaging. Instead, telco regulation requires that this use case be done through a special Machine-to-Machine or M2M class of numbers (with +3197 prefix). And theyre serious about it. Users are at risk of disconnection or fines if apps are not using +3197 mobile numbers for messaging.

You can get the special class of Dutch Mobile Phone Numbers through the Twilio Console and the Phone Number API.
Your snapshots are obviously works of art all on their own  but do you ever want to give them a little boost? Prisma takes the concept of a filter and amps it up another level, transforming your photos according to different art styles. Now you can transform a photograph into a beautiful line-art drawing, or draw on the concepts of modern art with something like the Mondrian (as in Piet) or Roy (as in Lichtenstein) filter. Users can apply these filters as heavily or lightly as they want.

The app can take a bit of time to process the filters, but that makes sense given that its essentially redrawing your photos. The company releases new art styles regularly, so even if you arent that keen on what they have on tap, you may get something you really like down the line. Sure, adding these filters dont make your photos true to life, necessarily, but you may find one that lets you show off your photos with something that says more about your personality than a standard photo can.

Free, for iOS and Android devices.
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump revealed the newest details of his tax plan on Sept. 15. Here's what he said, in three minutes. (Peter Stevenson/The Washington Post)

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump revealed the newest details of his tax plan on Sept. 15. Here's what he said, in three minutes. (Peter Stevenson/The Washington Post)

When billionaire investor Carl Icahn speaks, Donald J. Trump apparently listens.

The Trump economic blueprint initially issued Thursday took aim at an obscure program designed to promote the blending of ethanol with gasoline. The program sets minimum levels for renewable fuel use and creates tradable certificates that refiners must turn in to prove that the targets have been met.

These requirements have turned out to be impossible to meet and are bankrupting many of the small and midsize refineries in this country, the fact sheet on Trumps economic plan said initially. These regulations will give Big Oil an oligopoly by destroying the small to mid-size refineries.

The program is hardly the stuff of populist campaign rhetoric. But Icahn, who has been a strong supporter and close adviser to Trump, happens to be chairman and majority owner of a pair of those small refineries, and things havent been going so well there.

Icahns two refineries are expected to pay more than $200 million to buy enough renewable fuel certificates to fulfill its obligations under the governments volume-based rules, according to a J.P. Morgan note to investors in July. The purchase of those certificates has become the refineries biggest operating cost, J.P. Morgan said. Icahns stake in the refineries has lost about $1.7 billion in value, according to a calculation by The Post.

Donald Trump has called Carl Icahn one of the world's greatest businessmen. The presidential candidate also said he would pick Icahn to oversee trade deals. So who is the man that some have labeled everything from an activist investor to a corporate raider. (Jorge Ribas/The Washington Post)

Icahn said in an interview Friday that he recently sent Trump a public letter he wrote about the issue. When Politico called the Trump campaign about a possible link on Thursday, the online fact sheet was revised to eliminate any mention of the renewable fuel standard.

The episode, like other comments Trump has made about energy policy, suggest that the GOP presidential candidate has a tendency to embrace policy positions and rhetoric from his business friends. In a North Dakota speech on energy earlier this year, Trump closely echoed anecdotes as well as ideas long sounded by shale oil tycoon Harold Hamm.

This time, Trump, who has indicated a desire to put Icahn in his cabinet, echoed Icahn, who has complained in the past about the specter of an oil oligopoly.

I give him ideas to talk about here and there on the economy, Icahn said. Sure I have an agenda. George Washington had an agenda too, he added citing the founding fathers land holdings. But having an agenda doesnt mean youre not doing the right thing.

Icahns refineries, one in Coffeyville, Kan. and one in Wynnewood, Okla., are part of a complex ownership structure under CVR Energy and related master limited partnerships that help minimize taxes. Amid a glut of refined products, the stock price of the refining company, which is 82 percent owned by Icahn, has plunged to less than half of what it was early this year.

That prompted Icahn to write an open letter to Environmental Protection Agency administrator Gina McCarthy on Aug. 9 urging her to overhaul the program, which he called the quintessential example of a rigged market. has become the mother of all short squeezes,  where retailers dont want to blend ethanol or choose to hoard their certificates until the last minute to get a better price.

Icahn said the system was threatening to bankrupt companies like his.

Yeah Im losing money from a year ago on it, Icahn said, but from where I bought it Im making a lot of money. Nobodys going to cry for me and I dont expect them to. But its sad for the investors in the refining business in general. He said that, counting dividends, he has made about $1.5 billion since buying the refineries.

The rumpus over the market for the certificates, known as renewable identification numbers or RINs, has stirred up controversy within the oil industry. Some refiners agree with Icahn while others have quietly learned to profit from the tradable RINs, and to love a regulatory program they have long criticized.

Heres how it works: Legislation in 2005 and 2007 gave EPA the job of designing a program to reach rising thresholds of ethanol use. The idea was to promote efficiency as well as incentivize the use of ethanol both to cut greenhouse gas emissions and to bolster national security by reducing oil imports.

Currently the nation uses about 14 billion gallons of ethanol and about two billion of biodiesel. Each one of the gallons of ethanol produced in the United States gets a 38-digit RIN that can be detached and bought and sold, in some cases by investment banks or other trading companies. At the end of the day, the blenders generate RINs but refiners are required to turn them in to the EPA  in the systems jargon, the refiners are the point of obligation.

With prices of RINs lurching from pennies to well over $1 a piece, the market is $10 billion to $15 billion in size.

The board of the American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers,whose 400 members include both small and large refiners, voted by a narrow margin to file court papers demanding an adjustment. Instead of requiring refiners to submit to the government enough RINs to cover the refined gallons produced, EPA should shift that burden to the companies that actually mix the ethanol with the gasoline, the group said. Because ethanol corrodes pipelines, it cannot be mixed together with gasoline or diesel at refineries, which are therefore in a poor position to implement standards.

But the American Petroleum Institute, a long-time critic of the RIN program, now says there shouldnt be any effort to alter it short of abolishing it, which is unlikely to happen. Industry sources, who asked for anonymity to maintain business relationships, say that over the past five years some of the countrys biggest integrated oil giants have purchased blending facilities, which generate RINs. That has helped them capture hundreds of millions of dollars in profits from the RIN market. Change could hurt them now.

In a conference call earlier this week, Frank Macchiarola, APIs director for refining and marketing, said the renewable fuel standard was broken and needs to be repealed or significantly reformed. But he opposed the AFPM position. Efforts to tinker. . .at the margins will simply not work, he said, adding that moving the obligation to buy certificates from refiners to blenders was a mere distraction from the real issue at hand.

Where you stand on this issue depends on where you sit in the value chain, Stephen H. Brown, vice president for federal government affairs at Tesoro. Those refiners who took steps to mitigate their exposure to a volatile RINs market by establishing blending capacity do not feel the need to change the point of obligation. Those refiners who did not take those steps feel differently.

Icahn puts in bluntly. The EPA is doing for Big Oil what they could never do for themselves: Get rid of all the competitors in the refining business, he said.

Major companies arent the only ones cashing in on the program. The long chain of producers, refiners, pipeline owners and blenders  as well as the lack of oversight  made the program a ripe target for corruption, according to a report by Doug Parker, a former EPA investigator who has taken part in inquiries into the Deepwater Horizon spill and Volkswagens deception over its cars fuel efficiency.

Despite the size of the RINs market, there is no equivalent of a commodities exchange or regulator.

This is a total black box in many ways, Parker, now president of consulting firm E&W Strategies, said in an interview about the RINs market. He said the opaque market was overseen by one or two capable-but-overstretched EPA officials, and that the agency has found $270 million of fraud in a handful of cases.

To make it trickier, EPA can alter the mandatory levels for ethanol and has often done that late in the year, throwing off companies calculations. The 2007 legislation set quotas for ethanol use, but the oil industry says that many cars cannot use fuel with more than 10 percent ethanol. EPA has lowered quota targets, acknowledging what is known in the business as the blend wall, but many refiners want it to be lower still.

Many refiners choose to export their products as a way to legally circumvent the RINs requirements.

So Icahn isnt alone in his view of the RINs market. Valero, the largest refiner in the country, has weighed in on Icahns side, asking for an adjustment in the program.

No refiner has invested more in renewable fuels than Valero. We are the third largest ethanol producer and the largest advanced biodiesel producer, Rich Walsh, senior vice president and deputy general counsel, said in a statement Thursday. But he said adjusting the program was not part of an effort to discourage renewable fuels. He said, It is a simple market structure change that levels the playing field and ends windfalls that hurt the program.

But few companies have the ear of Trump or the gumption and resources of a corporate raider and activist investor like Icahn. Last year, Icahn formed a Super PAC with $150 million to target tax inversions. In August, his general counsel Jesse Lynn, told Reuters that he might start a new PAC focused on regulatory reform.

On Friday, Icahn said that the architects of this [RINs] plan dont understand the markets and the disastrous effects this plan is having. There are going to be terrible repercussions because I believe there will be a scandal as there was with mortgage-backed securities.

Trading in those securities helped trigger the 2008 financial crash and Great Recession.

The irrational regulation promulgated by the EPA is just one of a number of irrational rulings issued by regulated agencies, Icahn said in his letter to McCarthy. These regulations over the last eight years have caused a crisis of confidence on the part of companies.
ECONOMY

Medical costs push prices up in August

U.S. consumer prices edged up 0.2 percent in August as a surge in medical costs offset flat readings for food and energy.

The result follows an unchanged figure in July.

Core inflation, which excludes the volatile categories of food and energy, rose 0.3 percent in August, the Labor Department reported Friday. It was the biggest monthly increase since February. The increase was led by a record 0.9 percent jump in drug prices and the biggest rise in doctor and hospital charges  0.9 percent  in 25 years.

For the past 12 months, core inflation is up 2.3 percent, but overall inflation has risen 1.1 percent, well below the Federal Reserves 2 percent target for annual increases in inflation.

Food costs were unchanged; the category that covers meat, poultry, fish and eggs fell for the 12th month in a row.

U.S. household wealth rose at a solid pace in the April-June quarter, pushed by healthy gains in home values and stock portfolios. (Frederic J. Brown/AFP/Getty Images)

Energy costs also were flat in August as gasoline dropped by 0.9 percent.

 Associated Press

AUTO INDUSTRY

Firm probes claim of Musk pretender

Quest Integrity Group said it is looking into a claim that its finance chief impersonated Tesla chief executive Elon Musk in an email to get inside information on Tesla Motors. But Quest described as absurd the electric-car makers allegation of a conspiracy in the oil industry against alternative-energy firms.

Tesla alleged in a lawsuit Wednesday that Quest executive Todd Katz used the email ElonTesla@yahoo.com last month to try to prompt Teslas chief financial officer to give him more detailed data than the company released publicly in its second-quarter financial results.

The Seattle-based oil pipeline engineering and inspection firm said Thursday it had started an internal investigation in response to the complaint filed in a California state court.

However, it is clear that unsubstantiated allegations of an alleged conspiracy among Quest Integrity, Team Industrial Services or our major oil company clients are absurd, said the companys general counsel, Butch Bouchard.

Tesla said in its complaint that the email was part of an oil-industry effort to undermine the push for energy-efficient transportation alternatives.

 Bloomberg News

Also in Business

 From news services
The following review appears in The Washington Posts 2017 Fall Dining Guide.



Buffalo-Style Crispy Pig Ear with Blue Cheese & Crystal Hot Sauce. (Dixie D. Vereen/For The Washington Post)

Field & Main

(Good/Excellent)

When he was studying at the Culinary Institute of America in the early 2000s, Neal Wavra imagined his ideal restaurant to be a relaxed, community-focused place where, as he says, youd see farmers dining next to you. Field & Main is the restaurateurs bricks-and-mortar reality, a cozy gathering place for local winemakers and other producers to eat unfussy food. Just a year old, the place hums along as if everyone has been pampering you for decades. Encouraged in part by an adventurous clientele, chef Anthony Nelson has broadened his menu to include more international accents  scallops might arrive in coconut broth  while shining a light on whats seasonal. Summers chicken confit fit corn in both a salsa and grits tricked out with huitlacoche (a.k.a. corn smut). From the wood-burning oven exit such simple pleasures as a pork chop gussied up with Nelsons all-purpose SMR sauce, a soy-mirin reduction shot through with foie gras puree. How rich! The cant-miss dish, though, is a whole onion, softened in the hearth and stuffed with brie, brioche croutons and beef jus. Who knew French onion soup could be improved on  or polished off with a fork?

2 1/2 stars

Field & Main: 8369 W. Main St., Marshall, Va. 540-364-8166. fieldandmainrestaurant.com.

Prices: Mains $18-$40.

Sound check: 71 decibels / Must speak with raised voice.

Previous: Espita Mezcaleria | Next: Fiola

---

The following review appeared in The Washington Posts 2016 Fall Dining Guide.



Field & Main sous-chef Matt Gaddis, left, tends the 10-foot-wide wood-fueled hearth that was designed for the restaurant by chef Anthony Nelson, right. (Dixie D. Vereen/For The Washington Post)

New as of Labor Day, this rural restaurant already counts a fan club. Owners Neal and Star Wavra excel as hosts, Anthony Nelson cooks like a dream, and whats not to like when some of the folks sharing the arty dining rooms happen to be purveyors? Consider that a tip to try a glass of red from the nearby RDV Vineyards or beef from Martins Farms in The Plains, Va. The latter benefits, as do so many dishes in this rambling structure, from a Nelson-designed wood-fired hearth. Other early draws include chicken-filled raviolo, salads built around grains, blushing roast beef and side dishes worthy of center stage (dig the garlicky potatoes). Next to the restaurant is a sandwich shop, Riccordinos, serving memories from Wavras Chicago-area youth. Dont even think of asking for ketchup on your hot dog.

--

The following was originally published Sept. 16, 2016.

Field & Main, reviewed: Hearth-warming, and nicely done



Owners Neal and Star Wavra stop to visit with customers at Field & Main in Marshall, Va., in Fauquier County. (Dixie D. Vereen/For The Washington Post)

After a customer at Field & Main sings the praises of its sparkling green salad, the owner of the long-awaited restaurant in Marshall, Va., tells her the guy behind the salads dressing and the owner of Lindera Farms Vinegars, Daniel Liberson, is right upstairs!

The takeaway: Community connections are so strong here, some of what you eat or drink is bound to have come from someone sitting near you.

Its been two years since Neal Wavra and his wife and business partner, Star, left the Ashby Inn in nearby Paris to begin plans for a rural restaurant that spoke to area residents. They found what they were looking for on Main Street in Marshall: a vacant two-story building that had been a tavern once, albeit in the late 1800s. Back then, says Neal Wavra, area roads ran from the field to the main street. Hence the name of the couples restaurant, which debuted just before Labor Day with 80 seats spread over multiple spare dining areas, including a kitchen counter.

The floors slant a bit. Simple linen curtains try to block out the sun. Since opening, Field & Main has grown artier, on the walls in particular. Already a hit with locals, the second-floor bar entertains patrons with more than good libations. On the wall is a life-size image of a sheep standing before the Blue Ridge Mountains, a scene enlarged from a photograph taken by Molly Peterson of Heritage Hollow Farms in Sperryville. (Her subjects name is Brian.)

Field & Main taps the know-how of chef Anthony Nelson, a Colorado native who graduated from the Culinary Institute of America in 2004 with Neal Wavra and most recently cooked at the reputable Lockland Table in Nashville. I could make a meal of just the first courses, whimsies that include a risotto of sorghum berries, their faint sweetness set off with sauteed mushrooms and a drift of goat cheese, and fried julienned pig ear, treated like a Buffalo chicken wing with hot sauce, blue cheese and shaved celery. Sweet scallops atop lightly charred cabbage leaves bridge the haute and the humble. A shareable snack, creamed spinach dip is loose enough to suggest soup; intrigue comes by way of smoked butter in the spread, which is dropped off with fingers of flatbread. To retain the greens essence, Nelson adds the spinach to the hot cream to order.



Cookies served with a glass of chocolate milk. (Dixie D. Vereen/For The Washington Post)

From the Hearth is a collection of entrees prepared in a 10-foot-wide hearth designed by the chef and fueled with oak, hickory and cherry woods. Although whole-roasted rockfish took on more char from the fire than ideal, every other ingredient I sampled from the hearth, including brined chicken, had benefited from its time there. The beef in particular makes extraordinary eating, be it blushing slices of roast beef or thick rib-eye steak, simply seasoned with salt and pepper. Both cuts come from Martins Beef in The Plains, Va., and are served with a soy-mirin sauce enriched with pureed foie gras  unnecessary, but heady.

Common side dishes reveal uncommon flair. Collard greens pick up heat from Sriracha and depth from bacon that has been hung over smoking grapevines. Desserts are basics done (mostly) right. Head for the cookie plate, then, rather than the bacon-maple-chocolate cake whose stiff frosting bends at the touch of a fork.

Table-hopping turns out to be as much an activity as chewing. Isnt that Brian Noyes, the owner of Red Truck Bakery across the street? Elsewhere, winemaker Rutger de Vink of RdV Vineyards is shaking hands like a politician. When someone compliments Wavra on the beef, the host encourages the diner to meet its producer  sitting a dining room away.

To the side of the newcomer is another Wavra enterprise, Riccordinos, a small sandwich shop that makes use of leftover parts from the restaurants whole-animal butchery and offers the kinds of basics Neal Wavra, a native of suburban Chicago, grew up eating. So there are sandwiches with meatballs, shaved beef and Italian sausage, as well as hot dogs, the Windy Citys great unifier. Vegetarian novelty comes by way of a whole cooked carrot, spiced with coriander and mustard and slipped into a bun.

The point? We welcome all, says Wavra. The way he sees it, a $4 hot dog is within everyones reach.
Rudolph W. Giuliani, left, joins Donald Trump and Eric Trump on a tour of the new Trump International Hotel, where a journalist there to cover the event said she was restrained. (Mike Segar/Reuters)

Representatives of Donald Trumps presidential campaign physically restrained a reporter from accompanying Trump on a scheduled press tour of his new hotel in Washington, in the latest episode involving an altercation between officials and Trumps press corps.

ABC News producer Candace Smith was set to join Trump Friday as he gave a promotional tour of the Trump International Hotel in Washingtons Old Post Office Pavilion to a pool of journalists. Smith was the designated producer of the pool, a small group of journalists that provides footage to other news organizations of newsworthy events occurring in restricted spaces.

Attempted to go on pooled tour, as is customary, Smith tweeted Friday. Was physically restrained from accompanying the camera. She did not identify who had kept her from the tour. Other journalists said they witnessed the incident.

She later tweeted, Blocked is perhaps better term. Tried to go through the door, was gently pushed back as door was closed.

Smith, who did not respond to requests for comment, also noted that Trump permitted only TV cameras, not reporters, to accompany him on his press tour. She noted in a later tweet, But this is all irrelevant. The fact is Trump didnt allow the official pool to go with him, successfully avoiding answering any questions after declaring at the hotel that he had reversed himself about President Obamas place of birth after years of questioning whether he was born in the United States.

1 of 29 Full Screen Autoplay Close Skip Ad  The new Trump International Hotel opens in D.C. View Photos The first day of business is marked with last-minute preparations-- and demonstrations. Caption Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump officially christened his new hotel in Washington as protesters gathered outside. Oct. 26, 2016 Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, accompanied by his wife, Melania, and his children, from left, Donald Jr., Eric, Tiffany and Ivanka, cut a ribbon during the grand opening ceremony for the Trump International Hotel in Washington. Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post Wait 1 second to continue.

With no reporters allowed on the tour, the networks agreed to suspend their camera coverage of an event that was beginning to appear sheerly promotional. Bryan Boughton, the Fox bureau chief, speaking as the chair of the TV pool, said in a statement that the TV Pool traditionally doesnt participate in events that our reporters or producers are not allowed to attend.

Trumps campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

The incident involving Smith continues a string of episodes in which reporters have been subjected to physical restraint, even manhandling, while covering Trump.

The most notorious was in March when Trumps then-campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, yanked a Breitbart News reporter, Michelle Fields, who had been questioning Trump after a news conference in Florida. Lewandowski initially denied his restraint of Fields and called her account delusional, although closed-circuit footage of the encounter later supported Fields.

Lewandowski, who declined to apologize to Fields, is now a pro-Trump commentator for CNN.

In addition to Fields, who was bruised by Lewandowski, two other journalists have been slightly injured in the course of covering Trump. Time photographer Christopher Morris was choke-slammed by a Secret Service officer after he sought to take pictures of protesters at a Trump rally in Virginia in February; CBS News correspondent Sopan Deb suffered a minor cut in March when he was thrown to the ground and arrested by Chicago police while recording an unruly protest outside a Trump rally.

A Washington Post reporter, Jose DelReal, was barred from entering a campaign rally for Trumps running mate, Mike Pence, in July and patted down by police officers summoned by a campaign volunteer.
The latest state test scores released Friday wont be used to classify school and district performance because Nebraska education officials are taking a year to tweak a new accountability system.

Several changes are happening at once, said Nebraska Education Commissioner Matt Blomstedt, and allowing them to play out before reclassifying schools seems prudent.

For one thing, the state Department of Education is updating its math standards and creating a new English Language Arts assessment. The latter will assess not only reading skills but writing skills by asking students to write paragraphs analyzing what theyve read.

Those new language arts assessments -- along with the ACT college entrance exam being given to all high school juniors -- will replace the state writing exam, which has been plagued with problems over the past few years.

State officials decided late Thursday not to release the 2016 writing scores because of possible problems with calculating the exam data.

Earlier problems occurred when the test was given. That didn't happen this year, but after some districts raised questions about the way the data was calculated, state officials decided to review it. Lincoln Public Schools officials were among those with questions, saying they couldnt explain a significant drop in their scores.

Reading, math and science scores were released Friday.

In addition to changes in assessments, the state is working with the federal government to use its new system for federal reporting purposes. The new federal law that replaces No Child Left Behind allows schools to create their own accountability systems.

It makes sense, Blomstedt said, to be sure the U.S. Department of Education accepts the system before moving forward.

Nebraska was one of just a few states that didnt apply for a waiver from No Child Left Behind's rigid student achievement benchmarks and is not bound by the sometimes equally rigid requirements of those waivers. That puts the state in a good position, Blomstedt said.

This is really our time to define this and do it our way and not be forced into a corner by different elements of policy, he said.

One of the hallmarks of the accountability system released a year ago was using factors beyond state test scores to gauge school performance.

Called Accountability for a Quality Education System, Today and Tomorrow, the system classified the states 1,130 schools and 245 districts into four levels: excellent, great, good and needs improvement.

It selected three so-called priority schools from the lowest tier and will work with them until they reach certain goals. Then new priority schools will be identified based on the classifications.

Test scores still are a major driver of those classifications, as are graduation rates. But the system also gives credit to schools where scores improve over three years and those where individual students improve from year to year.

The state also asked schools and districts to fill out a survey on various policies and practices shown to help improve student performance. Schools that used many of those practices could help them move to a higher classification.

State education officials want to better define how schools report those practices, and ask for evidence to show schools are using them. Some schools also want to be able to explain why they may have investigated but rejected certain practices.

Although the state Education Department wont reclassify schools this year, it will release more information including how subgroups of students performed later this fall.
MARYLAND

Man, 23, fatally shot through his window

A 23-year-old man was fatally shot through a window in his home in Clinton on Thursday night in what Prince Georges County police said was not a random incident.

Police officers went to the residence in the 5700 block of Alan Drive for a reported shooting about 9:35 p.m., police said in a statement. They found Kevin Maurice Washington Jr. in his bedroom suffering from a fatal gunshot wound.

 Dana Hedgpeth

and Justin Wm. Moyer

Ellicott City eligible for federal flood assistance

Ellicott City, which in July experienced one of the worst floods in Maryland history, has been declared a major disaster by the federal government, making it eligible to receive federal assistance to help pay for the costs of the response and recovery. The devastating flood killed two people, displaced hundreds of residents and damaged scores of buildings.

Gov. Larry Hogan (R) said he was notified about the declaration on Friday.

The governor thanked Marylands congressional delegation for working with his administration to get the declaration, which will help Howard County and Maryland pay for infrastructure repair and replacement, hazard mitigation projects, debris removal and other costs associated with the July 30 flood.

 Ovetta Wiggins

VIRGINIA

Second man chargedin drug death at party

A second man has been charged in the death of a Centreville teen who died this year after taking a mix of prescription drugs and drinking at a house party.

Daniel Armando Urrego, 19, of Manassas was charged with distributing a morphine pill that Alexia Springer, 17, got from a classmate at Centreville High School and took at the Clifton, Va., party in February.

The new arrest comes after the classmate, David Evers, 18, of Centreville, pleaded guilty to giving Springer the pill in exchange for an oxycodone. Prosecutors said Springer, Evers and other teens snorted the drugs in a basement as a parent sat upstairs during the party attended by 20 to 30 students from Centreville and other schools.

 Justin Jouvenal

U-Va. reserve fund projects approved

The University of Virginias governing board on Friday approved $26 million in academic, research and technology projects, the first to be financed through income from a controversial $2.2 billion reserve fund.

U-Va. also said that it is developing a proposal to raise the number of students it enrolls from within the state and that it will soon consider other measures to expand access and affordability. About 69 percent of undergraduates at the public flagship are from Virginia. In-state enrollment and tuition are key issues for many Virginia families.

The Strategic Investment Fund, as U-Va. calls it, is separate from the universitys $6 billion endowment and represents reserves accumulated over several years. University officials say the reserves, enough to fund about nine months of expenses, are essential to provide stability for academic and medical operations. Skeptics have asked why so much reserve funding is needed and whether some of it could be diverted to lower the price of attendance.

 Nick Anderson
Rescue workers look at the destruction caused by a flash flood along Main Street in Ellicott City, Md., on July 31. (Astrid Riecken/for The Washington Post)

Ellicott City, which experienced in July one of the worst floods in Marylands history, has been declared a major disaster by the federal government, making it eligible to receive federal assistance to help for the costs of the response and recovery of the devastating flood that killed two people, displaced hundreds of residents and heavily damaged scores of buildings.

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) said he was notified about the declaration on Friday.

The governor thanked Marylands congressional delegation for working with his administration to get the declaration, which will help Howard County and Maryland pay for infrastructure repair and replacement, hazard mitigation projects, debris removal and other costs associated with the storm.

When this devastating storm hit, we assured residents and leaders in Howard County that our administration would pursue all avenues of support to help our communities rebuild, Hogan said in a statement. The governor made the request to President Obama in August.

Howard County Executive Allan H. Kittleman (R) called the declaration welcome news for the people of Ellicott City.

[She lost her home, business and car in a historic flood. Now she needs to rebuild.]

Kittleman said the federal resources will help to rebuild the historic city that sits on the Patapsco River to become a model resilient community.
Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) and first lady Yumi Hogan will host their daughters wedding Saturday at the governor's mansion. Tents have been erected on the front lawn. (Ovetta Wiggins/The Washington Post)

For the first time in more than a decade, a wedding will take place at the governors mansion in Maryland.

Massive white tents have been assembled on the front lawn of Government House in Annapolis where 150 guests will celebrate the nuptials of Gov. Larry Hogans daughter on Saturday afternoon.

[Larry and Yumi Hogan, a love story]

Julie Kim and Taesoo Kim, both in their early 30s, are the first couple to wed at the mansion since 2002, when then-Gov. Parris Glendening (D) married Jennifer Crawford, a former deputy chief of staff, in a brief ceremony.

In 1971, then-Gov. Marvin Mandel (D) gave away his daughter, Ellen, during a wedding at Government House.

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)

Julie Kim is one of Yumi Hogans three daughters from her first marriage. Gov. Hogan refers to his wifes daughters as his daughters, and they call him Dad.

Doug Mayer, a spokesman for Hogan, said the governor will give Kim away and the pair will dance to Tim McGraws Live Like You Were Dying, a song that became a favorite of the governor during his bout with cancer last year.

[Tim McGraw dedicates song to Hogan during benefit concert]

Mayer said the Hogan family will pay for the cost of the wedding. The couple, whose shared last name is a common Korean surname, met each other while working overseas in Japan. Both graduated from the University of Michigan and still live in that state.

Hogan has another family wedding coming up in a couple of weeks. After a trade mission in Israel, he will stop in Italy for the wedding of Tim Hogan, his half-brother. The governor will return to Maryland on Oct. 2.
Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan may have exceeded his authority by ordering public school systems to start after Labor Day, according to the state attorney generals office, whose opinion was sought by Democratic lawmakers opposed to the Republican governors action.

I can not say unequivocally that the Labor Day executive order exceeds the Governors authority, but I believe it likely that a reviewing court, if presented with the issue, would conclude that it does, Adam D. Snyder, a lawyer in the office of Attorney General Brian E. Frosh (D), wrote in a 24-page letter that was delivered Friday to state Sen. Paul G. Pinsky (D-Prince Georges County) and Del. Anne R. Kaiser (D-Montgomery).

Snyder also wrote that the General Assembly has the authority to pass legislation to override Hogans executive order.

[Hogan orders Md. schools to start after Labor Day beginning next year]

The review from Froshs office seems certain to fuel the partisan battle that began more than two weeks ago, after Hogan ordered the states 24 school systems to start after Labor Day and to end by June 15 starting next year. Systems may petition the state Board of Education to be exempt from the order.

The governor said a post-Labor Day start would provide a boost to tourism-based businesses, give families more time together and keep students out of hot classrooms. Democratic lawmakers and many school officials said the order would limit flexibility in the school calendar, cut into learning and test-preparation time and add to the financial burden on families who are struggling economically and need to provide child care.

Snyder wrote that his letter was advice to Pinsky and Kaiser, not an official opinion from the attorney generals office.

After reading it, Pinsky said he would advise the states school systems to ignore the governors executive order.

They should set a calendar that is appropriate to them and their students, he said. The governor can choose to take 24 school systems to court, and he would have a weak case.

He said he does not think that legislation is warranted but that he would be willing to participate or lead a legislative effort to overturn the order if necessary.

Doug Mayer, a spokesman for Hogan, scoffed at Snyders letter and sought to minimize its significance.

Even by lawyer standards, taking 24 pages to reach a I dont know, is unprecedented, Mayer said in an email. The Attorney Generals office has a lot of political opinions, and we agree with almost none of them, including this halfhearted one.

Since Hogan signed the order Aug. 31, school district administrators have complained that the mandate upends their calendars. As they have begun planning for next school year, many have warned that the change could lead to a shorter spring break.

[Governors mandate leaves Democrats squirming]

Democratic lawmakers have been trying to figure out how to respond, arguing that the idea of extending summer break might be popular but is not good policy.

Their main complaint: Hogan pushed it through using an executive order instead of the legislative process.

There might be a legitimate argument to this, but you dont do it by executive order, House Speaker Michael E. Busch (D-Anne Arundel) said after Hogan issued the order.

Kaiser said Hogans mandate infringes on local control. Ive heard from professionals up and down the line who have said that the governors executive order does nothing to help education, teachers, students and schools, she said.

Hogan said he took the action because the General Assembly would not, noting that the measure has been proposed in the legislature before but never made it out of committee. A bipartisan task force appointed by Hogans predecessor, Democrat Martin OMalley, also recommended a post-Labor Day start.

Hogan has blamed the teachers union for blocking the bill. But the legislation was also strongly opposed by the school boards association, state PTA and school superintendents.

Michael Meyerson, who teaches constitutional law at the University of Baltimore School of Law, said he would not be surprised if the Court of Appeals has the last word on the issue.

School calendars are traditionally a county decision, and the legislature has always been the entity passing laws governing the length of the calendar, Meyerson said. This is a novel intrusion into the role of both the legislature and the counties.
The Atlantic Plumbing apartment building is seen in the Shaw neighborhood in this file photo. (Goran Kosanovic /For The Washington Post)

When JBG Companies purchased three large parcels of land five years ago in the District, the developer had trouble pitching its luxurious urban vision in the Shaw neighborhood to prospective retailers.

Most of the prospective businesses assumed that the project was a half-mile south in Shaw, home to a burst of high-profile new development.

JBG decided it needed a name for its project, sprawled near the 9:30 Club at Eighth and V streets NW, that distinguished it from other developments and offered a sense of its location. The company floated the name Eastern Part of U but eventually settled on North End of Shaw to market the development to prospective tenants.

Five years later, four new apartment buildings are full of tenants, and about 40 retailers are open. An old warehouse and parking lot were transformed into trendy shops, a movie theater and luxury condos, where rent for a one-bedroom apartment can run upward of $3,000 a month.

Some signs and businesses now refer to the neighborhood by the developers moniker, local blogs have hyped restaurants in North End of Shaw and earlier this month the New York Times published an article about the five best places to go in North Shaw.

It wasnt meant to rename the neighborhood in any way. . . . We wanted to fit in the neighborhood, said Robin Mosle, JBGs executive vice president. I dont really know ultimately where the name will end up. If people end up calling it the North End of Shaw, then thats a decision for the people.

Such is life in the District, where developments seemingly spring up overnight, new residents with no historical knowledge of the city move in and concocted neighborhood names emerge  often to the consternation of longtime residents who complain that trendy new names are nonsensical and another sign of gentrification.

The D.C. Office of Planning says it doesnt recognize official neighborhood boundaries, but in the past 20 years, such neighborhood names as NoMa, Hill East and Capitol Riverfront have emerged, with some catching on better than others. Even Penn Quarter, now an established neighborhood name, came from efforts to revitalize the neighborhood.

The developers might not have intended for North End of Shaw to become a neighborhood, but to nonresidents, it can be difficult to discern a marketing term from a neighborhood name.

[NoMa? SoNYA? This D.C. neighborhood-naming foolishness must end.]

Christopher B. Leinberger, chairman of the Center for Real Estate and Urban Analysis at George Washington University, said new neighborhood names are booming across the country as urban areas flourish.

I think thats just a natural consequence of urbanization, he said. People need to have a name, identity so that they feel like they belong.

Shaw, a neighborhood with a rich African American history, already has a strong identity, but Leinberger said new neighborhood names typically refer to areas far smaller than Shaw. Shaws unofficial boundaries seem to expand with its trendiness, as real estate agents and developers market properties as being in the neighborhood. The names and boundaries can change as property owners and real estate companies seek to associate or dissociate themselves with certain places depending on fast-changing trends.

One of the Districts most successful neighborhood rebranding efforts is NoMa  short for North of Massachusetts Avenue  a former industrial neighborhood now filled with high-rise apartment buildings near Union Station.

Robin-Eve Jasper, president of the NoMa Business Improvement District, said that while the name has entered into mainstream vernacular in the past decade or so, it dates back to the 1990s.

When the Districts finances were in shambles, it received grants to rebuild parts of the city and created a proposal called The Economic Resurgence of Washington, D.C. Tucked within its pages was a plan for an area that was a sea of parking lots and abandoned warehouses dubbed NoMa. It stuck.

When the BID was created in 2007, the organization worked to rebrand the neighborhood as NoMa. In 2011, the nearby Metro station was renamed NoMa-Gallaudet U, which helped cement the name.

There were people, predominantly property owners, who thought maybe there would be more panache calling this neighborhood Capitol Hill North, Jasper said. The name refers to a general area where people have a community of interests around transit, building typology, retail. A lot of people here have this shared experience of creating a new neighborhood together, and I think that the name is just a shorthand for all of that.

Other neighborhood rebranding efforts have fallen flat. In 2012, there was a brief push to call the southern part of Adams Morgan  the commercial blocks south of Kalorama Road NW along 18th Street and Florida Avenue  SoMo to highlight new retail. The name was ridiculed  no organization put money into the rebranding, and it flopped.

[And SoMo was its name-o]

I was pretty vocal about it being a bad idea, said Kristen Barden, executive director of the Adams Morgan Partnership Business Improvement District. Adams Morgan is already a pretty clearly defined neighborhood, and its pretty small, and subdividing it even more doesnt make sense.

The four new buildings that JBG has opened in its North End of Shaw project have created 708 rental and condo units. Three more buildings are set to break ground in the fall, including one that will have a 40,000-square-foot Whole Foods supermarket.

[D.C.s organic mile: Two Whole Foods, Trader Joes and Yes! Organic Market]

For now, residents seem to view North End of Shaw as a way for JBG to push its development. But when new residents flock to these buildings  many of whom wont know of a time when these massive developments didnt exist there  theres no telling what residents will call it.

Its an ambiguous area. I would never tell someone I live in North Shaw, said Even Callihan, who lives in one of the JBGs new apartment buildings. I will say I live in Shaw or the eastern part of U Street.
William C. Bill Holmberg, then a captain in the U.S. Marine Corps and a Marine attache to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, met with President Lyndon B. Johnson on July 13, 1967, at the White House. (Courtesy of family/Courtesy of family)

William C. Holmberg, a retired Marine Corps lieutenant colonel who received the Navy Cross for his actions on a Korean battlefield and later spent decades as an advocate on Capitol Hill for renewable energy and environmental causes, died Sept. 8 at a hospital in Palm City, Fla. He was 88.

The cause was cancer, said a son, Mark Holmberg.

A strapping 6-foot-4, Col. Holmberg signed up for the Marines at 15, lying about his age to serve in World War II. He went through boot camp and was about to go to the Pacific when he was found out and sent home. He later reenlisted and graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis in 1951.

The next year, he was leading a rifle platoon during the Korean War when he embarked on a mission deep in enemy-held territory for which he was awarded a Navy Cross, the services highest decoration for valor after the Medal of Honor.

Col. Holmberg, then a second lieutenant, engaged in a fierce hand-to-hand battle while under an intense concentration of hostile mortar, machine-gun and small-arms fire, the citation accompanying the medal read. Although severely wounded during the engagement, he refused to be evacuated and, while receiving first aid, continued to issue orders and to direct the offensive operations of his unit.

In an interview, his wife, Anne Ruthling Holmberg, said much of the unit was killed. Her husband, suffering severe stomach wounds that he thought would be fatal, grabbed two Korean prisoners, put one of them one under each shoulder, held grenades to their heads and forced them to carry him back to Allied lines.

When he got there, she added, he was triaged into the group that could not be saved. Fortunately a doctor . . . recognized him and took him into the surgery tent and saved his life.

After his military retirement in 1970, Col. Holmberg joined the Environmental Protection Agency. He had grown up in Washington state amid vegetable fields and fruit orchards and felt a renewed sensitivity to protect the planet after seeing the waste and devastation of war, his family said.

He spent many years directing the Energy Departments Office of Alcohol Fuel, where he began championing ethanol as a sustainable, alternative energy source. He also worked on the staff of Sen. Ben Nelson (R-Neb.) and managed associations promoting solar and wind energy initiatives as well as legislative support for environmental measures.

In 2001 Sen. Tom Daschle (D-S.D.), then majority leader, praised Col. Holmberg in the Congressional Record not only as a war hero but an indefatigable champion of the environment.

William Carl Holmberg was born in Sumas, Wash., on July 12, 1928. His son, Mark Holmberg, a columnist for the Richmond Times-Dispatch, described him in the newspaper as the son of a renegade German immigrant who abandoned him as a toddler along with his five older sisters and mother.

At 3, William Holmberg was helping his mother pick strawberries, cucumbers and tomatoes in commercial fields, his son wrote. Later he delivered newspapers and worked in a factory on cannery row.

After being sent home as an underage Marine, he worked nights in a pulp mill while attending high school during the day. Union members at the mill and madams at houses of prostitution where he had delivered newspapers persuaded political friends to get him an appointment to the Naval Academy, according to Mark Holmberg.

Following his tour in Korea, Col. Holmberg learned Russian at a language school in Germany, served on military missions to Moscow and Budapest, was a Marine Corps aide to two chiefs of naval operations, and served in combat assignments during the Vietnam War.

He retired in 1970 on a medical discharge after having had a heart attack while serving as a battalion commander on Okinawa.

In 2014, Col. Holmberg moved to Palm City from Vienna, Va.

His first wife, Mary Termohlen, died in 1986. Survivors include his wife of 14 years, Anne Ruthling Holmberg of Palm City; three sons from his first marriage, Eric Holmberg of Cleveland, Mark Holmberg of Richmond and Karl Holmberg of Vista, Calif.; two half-sisters; 16 grandchildren; and nine great-grandchildren.
The last major figure in the off-the-books financing scheme for Vincent C. Grays 2010 mayoral campaign was sentenced Friday to three months in a halfway house and six months of home confinement.

U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly went further in her punishment of public relations consultant Jeanne Clarke Harris than federal prosecutors had recommended for the friend and business associate of the man who funded the shadow campaign.

After presiding over the campaign corruption cases for four years, the judge said she hoped Harriss sentence would send a message to others involved in local politics in the nations capital.

The culture of corruption in D.C. elections and politics has to be stopped, Kollar-Kotelly said. No longer should it be said that there will be corrupt politics as usual in this city.

The probe uncovered $2.5 million dollars in illegal political contributions to local and federal candidates from former D.C. businessman Jeffrey E. Thompson, and led to the convictions of half a dozen people tied to Grays successful bid to defeat then-Mayor Adrian M. Fenty.

Harriss attorney, Frederick D. Cooke Jr., said in court papers filed ahead of Fridays hearing that his 79-year-old client, who entered the courtroom in a wheelchair, should receive probation.

Harris, once a well-connected political player in the District with her own consulting business, told the judge that she had used extremely poor personal judgment and acted in part out of misguided loyalty to Thompson.

I allowed myself to get blinded by my desire to help a client and friend. . . . I didnt think it through, said Harris, who will have to wear a location-monitoring device and abide by a curfew during her home confinement and at the community corrections facility or halfway house. She also was sentenced to one day in jail, which she already has served.

Four years ago, Harris pleaded guilty to conspiring with Thompson to evade campaign-finance limits and to obstruct the federal investigation. Thompson funneled more than $650,000 through Harriss companies that she then spent to buy campaign materials and to hire workers to help elect Gray in 2010.

The deal Harris initially struck with prosecutors called for prison time of up to 37 months and a fine of up to $60,000.

Harriss cooperation was critical to helping prosecutors understand the inner workings of the secret, illegal funding scheme. She came forward more than 18 months before Thompson, whose plea deal limited his jail time to no more than six months.

She did not quibble. She did not obfuscate. She admitted wrongdoing, Cooke said.

Prosecutors recommended six months of home confinement for Harris and noted in their court filing that she had provided substantial assistance in the investigation of Gray, identified in the filing as mayoral candidate A. Her plea agreement in July 2012 put people on notice that they would be prosecuted, Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan P. Hooks told the judge Friday.

Gray has long denied any knowledge of the illegal spending. The investigation was concluded in December, and Gray was not charged. He won the Democratic primary in June for the D.C. Councils Ward 7 seat and is expected to rejoin the council in January.

Before sentencing Harris, Kollar-Kotelly said she had considered the motivations  and punishments  of the others involved in the campaign finance schemes, including Grays friend and political adviser Vernon Hawkins, who had worked closely with Harris. Kollar-Kotelly gave Hawkins six months in prison. She sentenced Thompson in August to three months behind bars.

[Shadow campaign donor and mastermind sentenced to three months]

The judge said that Thompson was the more culpable mastermind and that Harris had provided large pieces of the puzzle to prosecutors about the conspiracy. But Kollar-Kotelly said she could not give Harris probation because of a conviction from the 1980s that involved filing false invoices with the D.C. government.

Most troubling is that this is the second time she has lost her moral compass, Kollar-Kotelly said. To give Harris probation, she said, would not serve as a deterrent to those contemplating the undermining of our Democratic ideals of free and fair elections.
On Sept. 18, author Chigozie Obioma will read a selection from his award-winning novel, "The Fishermen," at 2 p.m. at the Bennett Martin Public Library, 136 S. 14th St.

The reading is the latest in a collection of free events in conjunction with the 2016 One Book-One Lincoln program.

Obioma, an assistant professor of literature and creative writing at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, traveled extensively last year in support of "The Fishermen," which won the 2016 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Debut Literary Work and was a finalist for the Man Booker Prize for Fiction. The novel was a top three finalist for One Book-One Lincoln as well.

The Fishermen takes place in Obiomas hometown, Akure, in the Ondo State of Nigeria. The story of a family grappling with the ramifications of a madmans prophecy unfolds during the 1990s, a seminal decade in the nations history. (As of Sept. 16, there were 21 copies of the novel available at the Bennett Martin branch.)

After Obioma presents on Sept. 18, Lincoln City Libraries will host one more event this month connected to One Book-One Lincoln.

On Sept. 25 at 2 p.m., at the Gere Branch Library, 2400 S. 56th St., there will be a presentation about hospice care that is tied to this year's selection, "Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End.

"Being Mortal" author and practicing surgeon Atul Gawande wrote about how the medical profession can enhance the quality of life even to the end. At the Gere library, Dr. Bob Bleicher, medical director of HoriSun Hospice, will discuss services provided by hospice care. Those who attend the event can learn about the benefits of palliative care that focuses on providing relief from the systems and stress of serious illness with the goal of improving the quality of life for both the patient and the family.

For more information on the events, and the One Book-One Lincoln finalists, go to lincolnlibraries.org.
A Maryland man was arrested Friday after a man he allegedly shot walked into a hospital in Prince Georges County, and then later died, police said.

Officers were called to a hospital about 10:55 p.m. Thursday after 21-year-old Eulises Alvarado-Reyes, of Hyattsville, showed up with a gunshot wound, Prince Georges police said in a statement. Alvarado-Reyes died shorty after he arrived at the hospital, which police did not name.

After a preliminary investigation, police said in the statement, they determined that Alvarado-Reyes was shot in the 5000 block of 56th Place by a friend, Henry Reyes, 18, of Hyattsville, who was handling a firearm at the time. The victim was then driven to the hospital by witnesses, police said.

Reyes was charged with manslaughter and a weapons charge, according to police.

Police asked anyone with information about the shooting to call 301-772-4925 or submit a tip at pgpolice.org.
D.C. interim police chief Peter Newsham announces an arrest in the killing of Deeniqua Dodds. (Clarence Williams/The Washington Post)

A Maryland man was arrested Thursday in the July killing of a transgender woman in Northeast Washington, police said.

On July 4, 22-year-old Deeniqua Dodds, born Gregory Dodds, was shot in the 200 block of Division Avenue NE. She died July 13.

Doddss killing drew attention as some wondered whether she was targeted because of her gender and whether the slaying was a hate crime.

[We just want to be accepted. At a vigil, transgender people mourn one of their own.]

Police announced that they arrested Shareem Hall, 22, of District Heights, Md., in Doddss killing. He was charged with first-degree felony murder, police said.

Asia Baker, far left, and Bela Muney. (Clarence Williams/The Washington Post)

The arrest was swift in this case and the motive appears to be robbery, D.C.s interim police chief, Peter Newsham, said at an afternoon news conference on his first day since former police chief Cathy L. Laniers departure.

Newsham said it did not appear that Dodds, who was a sex worker, and Hall knew each other. He did not explain how Hall was linked to the crime.

[D.D. wanted to live, thats all: Family and friends remember Deeniqua Dodds]

Asia Baker, a friend of Doddss who was at the news conference, described her as an extrovert.

Its a shame she had to lose her life this way, but we are happy that she can probably rest in peace now, Baker said.

However, Baker did say some were skeptical that Dodds was not targeted because of her gender.

The T is very silent in LGBT, said Bela Muney, another friend of Doddss. They slide us under the rug. Most of our crimes go cold.

Dodds is not the only transgender person slain in the D.C. area this year. In April, a transgender woman was killed in a hotel in Rockville.
Three people are in custody after a robbery in Montgomery County Friday led to a police chase and car crash, authorities said.

At around 2 p.m., officers responded to a CVS in the 19500 block of Fisher Avenue in Poolesville for the report of a felony theft, Montgomery County Police tweeted.

Officers pursued the suspects vehicle on Route 28, where it crashed into another at Dufief Mill Road, police said. Three people fled from the vehicle, and all were taken in custody, according to police.

Two people involved in the crash were transported to a local hospital with non-life threatening injuries, police said. It was not immediately clear whether the suspects were among those hospitalized.

No further information about the suspects was immediately available.
One man was shot dead and another stabbed Thursday night in Southeast Washington.

D.C. Police said the stabbing happened around 10 p.m. Thursday in the 3300 block of 23rd Street SE, which is about a mile from the Congress Heights Metro stop. The man was taken to an area hospital, and the extent of his injuries was not disclosed.

The shooting occurred around midnight Thursday in the 600 block of Mellon Street SE  about two miles away from the stabbing incident. When police arrived, they found a man with multiple gunshot wounds. He was taken to an area hospital, where he was later pronounced dead.

He was identified as Darnell Peoples, 35, of District Heights, Md.

Police said they do not believe at this time that the two incidents are related.
WASHINGTON, DC- Rep. Barbara Comstock, (R-VA) at an event in the Capitol's Rayburn Room on Thursday July 14, 2016 in Washington, DC. (Photo by: Amanda Voisard) (Amanda Voisard/For the Washington Post)

Democrats say U.S. Rep. Barbara Comstock (R-Va.) is benefiting from the fundraising prowess of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump even as she tries to distance herself from her partys controversial nominee.

Trump headlined a high-dollar fundraiser Friday at the McLean home of donors to Comstock, the proceeds of which will be used by the state Republican Party to help the congresswoman and other down-ballot candidates.

More than half of the two dozen Republicans listed on the invitation have given directly to Comstocks campaigns.

Comstock is seeking reelection to a second term in a moderate suburban Virginia district flush with independent women and minority voters, and many have said they are turned off by Trump.

Democratic challenger LuAnn Bennett has tried to paint Comstock and Trump as allies, saying they both oppose abortion, favor defunding Planned Parenthood and have targeted illegal immigration.

Other Republican candidates in moderate districts across the country are facing a similar challenge.

Comstock has not endorsed the nominee, did not attend the Republican National Convention in Cleveland and earlier this year gave a $3,000 donation from Trump to her 2014 campaign to two veterans recuperation centers in her district. She backed Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) in the primary.

But through a joint fundraising arrangement, the state party will use dollars raised at Fridays luncheon and other events to bolster their efforts to reelect Comstock and her House GOP colleagues through voter outreach, such as going door to door and using phone banks.

Through a spokesman, Comstock declined to comment on the fundraiser.

John Whitbeck, chairman of the Virginia Republican Party and former head of the party committee in her congressional district, defended the practice used by both parties.

Despite the fact that she hasnt formally endorsed Trump, of course the Comstock campaign is going to be pleased with anything that is helpful to her cause, he said. Especially considering this is a race that is heavily targeted by Democrats.

Whitbeck said Comstock has the crossover appeal of her mentor and predecessor, former longtime congressman Frank Wolf.

But Wolf complicated matters for Comstock last month when he endorsed Trump at a rally for his running mate, former Indiana governor Mike Pence, as first reported by the Loudoun Times-Mirror.

At the national level, both parties consider the race among the most competitive House contests.

Comstock supporters are counting on voters in the district  which spans Loudoun, Fairfax and Prince William counties  to split their ticket, as they have in the past. She garnered more votes in 2014 in Loudoun than did Republican Ed Gillespie, who came close to unseating Sen. Mark R. Warner (D) and is considering a run for governor next year.

Win or lose, Donald Trump is not going to impact Barbara Comstock within the margin of error in the largest jurisdiction in her district, Whitbeck said.

Comstock, who leads in fundraising, has focused on local issues, including opioid abuse and human trafficking, and resists attempts to nationalize the contest.

Rather than rely on Republican Party field offices dedicated to electing Trump, Comstock and other Virginia Republicans, she has opened standalone offices in Chantilly, Winchester and Sterling.

A poll released Thursday shows that the race for president may be tightening in Virginia. Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton is ahead of Trump by 3 percentage points in the state, which is within the margin of error, according to the University of Mary Washington poll. A Washington Post survey last month put her lead at 7 points.

[How did deeply red Virginia become such a challenge for the GOP in a single decade?]

Riding high on new polling data, Trump attended Fridays midday event, held at the home of real estate developer Giuseppe Cecchi and his wife, Mercedes Cecchi.

Commercial developer Milt Peterson and Florida-based home builder Dwight Schar are also listed as co-chairs. All three are Comstock donors, as are several members of the events host committee, including building suppliers Rob and Gene Frogale, real estate developer Lola Reinsch and investors Lorna and David Gladstone.

Comstock did not attend the lunch, where the price of entry ranged from $10,000 per couple to a promise to give or raise $100,000.

These are some of the biggest names in the Northern Virginia business community, Whitbeck said.

Not all have been steady supporters of Trump. Virginia developer Bob Pence, who helped Rubios presidential campaign raise money, is a co-chair, although he did not attend.

Lindsay Walters, a spokeswoman for the Republican National Committee, did not respond to a request for the total amount raised by the lunch event.

Bennett, Comstocks Democratic challenger, said the fundraiser shows that the congresswoman has selectively embraced Trump.

Barbara Comstock is a political operative through and through, campaign spokesman Robert Howard said in a statement. Shes happy to use Trump to fill her bank account, yet refuses to tell the voters where she stands with him. Shes in line with her party and their presidential nominee, and its time she admits as much to her constituents.

But Marc Lampkin, a GOP lobbyist and former adviser to then-House Speaker John A. Boehner, considers Comstock a friend and added that her situation is not uncommon.

In 2014, then-Sens. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) and Kay Hagan (D-N.C.) distanced themselves from President Obama but accepted support from the Democratic National Committee, he said. Both lost their reelection bids.

I think its perfectly reasonable and, in fact, historically quite consistent for Barbara to benefit from the money that Trump-Pence is raising in Virginia or elsewhere, he said. Theres no oath of fealty to someone just because they raise the money.
Alexandria is considering adding a new stormwater management fee to local property tax bills in 2018 that would help cover the cost of reducing polluted runoff into the Potomac River, and avoid state and federal fines that could cost the city up to $25,000 per day.

The stormwater management fee would cost the owner of a typical single family home between $120 and $145, and owners of single-family homes larger than 2,800 square feet between $200 and $242 per year. Townhouse owners would pay about $50 to $60 and condo owners would pay about $35 to $40 per year under the preliminary fee estimates.

Commercial property owners, including apartment owners and institutions such as federal government properties, would pay about $360 to $435 per year, depending on how much of their land is paved or covered by buildings, city officials said in a briefing to reporters Thursday.

Stormwater runoff washes pollutants such as sediment, nitrogen and phosphorus from pavements and hard surfaces into the Potomac and the Chesapeake Bay, where the runoff contributes to flooding. In the past 25 years, federal and state regulations have required communities to begin planning to eventually eliminate that runoff by 2028. That is done by creating ponds or catchment areas where rainwater is held and filtered as it soaks into soil, adding amenities such as green roofs or natural buffer zones, and reducing runoff at its source.

Alexandria, which calculates that 42 percent of its land is covered in asphalt and other impervious surfaces, has been paying for its stormwater management with a half-cent of each property owners real estate taxes. In the next 10 years, the city will spend $50 million to $60 million for its planned stormwater management efforts.

The fee is expected to replace the property tax money dedicated to the same project, said Yon Lambert, the director of the citys transportation and environmental services department, but the ultimate decision on that is up to the City Council.

Other northern Virginia cities and counties rely on a variety of methods, such as real estate taxes, utility fees and special tax districts, to cover these costs. Any money raised by the fee in Alexandria would be dedicated only to stormwater management, Lambert said.

Given the increased costs of the tougher federal mandates, officials said they need to raise more money. They also said the tax burden of addressing the problem has fallen more heavily on the citys 21,000 residential landowners, although two-thirds of the impervious surfaces are on non-residential properties. The fee would equalize the burden, the environmental services officials said.

The city also is working on a fee reduction and credit policy so those who make changes to their land to reduce runoff can get a break on the fee.

The fee is far from certain. The City Council last spring ordered the transportation and environmental services department to come up with a plan to address the problem.

In the next two months, the city will hold meetings with civic associations, business groups and nonprofit organizations to explain the project and the fee. It will go to the City Council for consideration in the fiscal year 2018 budget and the first billing to landowners would not occur until May 2018.
Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe answers questions from the media in May, as news broke that he was the subject of an F.B.I. investigation. (Win Mcnamee/Getty Images)

Wang Wenliang, a Chinese billionaire and donor to the Clinton Foundation and Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, has been expelled from Chinas top legislature after being caught up in a widespread cash-for-votes scheme.

On Tuesday, Chinas national legislature expelled 45 of its nearly 2,900 members, all from the northeastern province of Liaoning, in a huge vote-buying scandal. The move was part of an investigation into corruption in Liaoning and a much larger national anti-corruption campaign launched by President Xi Jinping.

Wang, who made his fortune in construction and running a strategic port near the North Korean border, also has been a big donor to New York University, Harvard University and the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

Wangs $2 million donation to the Clinton Foundation in 2013 made waves when it was disclosed last year because of his ties to the Chinese government. More recently, his name surfaced amid news that McAuliffe (D) was the subject of an FBI investigation.

McAuliffe expressed confidence in May that Wang, who gave a combined $120,000 to his 2013 gubernatorial campaign and 2014 inauguration, was a legitimate donor.

[McAuliffe in shock over FBI investigation of campaign money, personal finances]

A spokesman for Wang said his ouster was the result of a political purge carried out on behalf of Xi.

They get rid of people who are not part of his team, spokesman Sig Rogich said.

He said Wang and the others ousted had only lobbied decision-makers with meals and token gifts. He wined and dined them and gave them a gift, Rogich said. Its not like they gave them cash.

On Friday, McAuliffes attorney, James W. Cooper, said the governor knows nothing about Mr. Wang and his legal situation in China.

Spokesmen for the Clinton campaign and the Clinton Foundation did not respond to requests for comment.

Wangs construction conglomerate, Rilin Enterprises, controls the Port of Dandong and processes significant volumes of soybeans shipped out of Virginia. He was courted in 2011 by Gov. Robert F. McDonnell (R), who encouraged Wangs firm to buy 100,000 metric tons of soybeans from Maryland-based Perdue Agribusiness and ship them from Chesapeake, Va., to China.

Wangs company also helped build the new Chinese Embassy in Washington, assembling and overseeing a team of artisans who would be loyal to both the Chinese government and the principles of feng shui.

Theres a lot of security involved, Rogich said. Theyre also artistically knowledgeable about what the Chinese want. Theres a lot of feng shui that goes into this, evidently  depictions of the four seasons. . . . Certain colors are not allowed.

Wangs $2 million pledge to the Clinton Foundation drew attention last year, first from CBS News and then other outlets, because of his connections to the Chinese government  both as a member of the National Peoples Congress and as a contractor entrusted to help build Chinas embassies around the world.

Wangs political donations to McAuliffe reflect sizable overlap in Clinton and McAuliffe donors. Critics say the pattern suggests contributions to McAuliffe, a close friend of Bill and Hillary Clintons, are intended to curry favor with a former president and an aspiring one. McAuliffe supporters say the overlap is the natural outgrowth of personal and political bonds the governor has forged over a long career as a Clinton fundraiser.

[Scores of Clinton donors pumped millions into McAuliffe coffers]

Foreign nationals are prohibited under federal law from making political contributions. So are American subsidiaries of foreign corporations if they are financed in any way by their parent companies or if individual foreign nationals are involved in the decision to make the donation.

But a foreign national can donate personally or through an American subsidiary if he holds a green card, which Rogich said is the case for Wang.

Wangs name surfaced again in May, when news leaked that the FBI was investigating McAuliffe. CNN, citing anonymous sources, reported at the time that investigators were interested in a contribution the Chinese citizen had made to McAuliffe.

The FBI probe remains ongoing, two people familiar with the investigation told The Post, and Wang is one piece of it, one of the people said.

Investigators also are assessing whether McAuliffe ran afoul of the Foreign Agents Registration Act, an obscure statute that regulates U.S. citizens lobbying of the U.S. government on behalf of foreign governments. They also are examining financial transactions dating back to when he was chairman of the Democratic National Committee, trying to determine if the DNC benefits were illegally linked to Democratic donors, two people said. They are focused on foreign contributors, including Wang and someone from Saudi Arabia, one of the people said.

One of the people said there is some skepticism among those supervising the case that criminal wrongdoing occurred  particularly in light of the recent Supreme Court ruling that tossed out the corruption case against McDonnell.

Cooper said that McAuliffe had done nothing wrong, that the investigation was unrelated to Wang and that the McDonnell case had no bearing on the McAuliffe probe.

[McAuliffe lawyer: Governor did nothing wrong]

This is not a corruption investigation, Cooper said. McDonnell was a bribery case. This is not a bribery case. It has nothing to do with it. . . . This is an investigation mainly into whether theres a Foreign Agents Registration Act [violation].

He also slammed the fact that news of an investigation had leaked to the public.

I cannot overstate how improper it is for government officials to put out information  particularly false information  about matters they have under inquiry, he said.

The shake-up in China, which was first reported by the New York Times, affects Chinas National Peoples Congress. The body is usually seen as a rubber-stamp body to provide a cloak of legal legitimacy to Communist Party rule. Its members meet only once a year for around two weeks to receive reports from government ministries and the provinces, and to approve policies and the appointment of top leaders, including the president.

The NPCs members are elected every five years from provincial, county and township bodies, although the process is tightly controlled by the party and is very opaque.

Membership in the NPC conveys not only status and prestige but access to the top levels of the party and business elite that run China. Many of Chinas top business leaders are also members of the NPC.

Wangs connections to the Chinese government run deep. He once worked as an economic adviser to the municipal government in his home town of Dandong in Liaoning. He was a guest at a banquet to welcome Xi on his state visit to Washington last year.

Wang, who was born in 1954, has generated some favorable press for sponsoring a conservation project in Chinas largest wetlands near the North Korea border and for donating to a mangrove restoration project in Naples, Fla.

Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) last year recognized Wangs efforts to restore Dandong Yalu River Estuary Wetland in China, making a statement on the Senate floor, according to a news release issued by Rogichs Las Vegas-based firm. Reids office did not respond to requests for comment.

In China last week, the Liaoning state prosecutor announced it was investigating the former vice head of the provincial legislature, Zheng Yuzhuo, for taking bribes and other illegal acts relating to elections. The provinces former Communist Party chief, Wang Min, was taken into custody in August and expelled from the party on suspicion of taking bribes.

According to state media, some 740,000 officials have been disciplined or punished in Xis anti-corruption campaign, which is just under 1 percent of the total party membership. Experts say the campaign has also been used to purge rival factions within the party.

It was unclear why Liaonings legislature has been targeted for such a clear-out  either as a warning to other provinces or because it had offended the leadership in some other way. It is a bastion of state-run heavy industry and may have been dragging its feet in implementing the kind of economic reforms the central government is demanding, some analysts said.

[In China, a ghost town points to shifting fortunes]

Most of those caught up in the probe included top business leaders and executives of state-run organizations. It was unclear if further legal action would be taken against them.

What has happened to the Standing Committee of Liaonings provincial Peoples Congress is unheard of in the history of China since the Communist Party takeover in 1949, Li Jianguo, a vice chairman of the NPC Standing Committee was quoted as saying.

But in fact, all that is unusual is that people are paying the price for buying votes, independent experts said.

This is really common in China, it is not a new thing, said Zhang Ming, a politics professor at Renmin University of China in Beijing. A huge number of people are spending money on this, including big bosses from state-owned enterprises, officials and big bosses from private companies.

He said the scandal had not caused any real outrage in China because it was not a surprise.

Matt Zapotosky contributed to this report from Washington. Congcong Zhang and Jin Xin contributed to this report from China.
In this July 26, 2016 file photo, Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe waves on stage at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia. (Paul Sancya/AP)

According to a poll released Friday, Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) can eliminate one person from consideration for Tim Kaines U.S. Senate seat if Democrats win the White House: himself.

More than 80 percent of likely voters do not want McAuliffe to appoint himself to a vacancy that would arise if Kaine wins the vice presidency, a survey commissioned by the University of Mary Washington found.

Political observers say McAuliffe is one of the few people who can raise the cash, is qualified for the job and has already proven he can win statewide  all qualities necessary to compete in what would be a high-stakes election.

The governor, who is limited to one term in Virginia, has repeatedly said he has no interest in serving in the Senate.

But the poll also found 53 percent of residents approve of his performance in his current job.

There is something sort of unseemly about appointing yourself to a job, said Stephen J. Farnsworth, a political scientist at the University of Mary Washington. We like our politicians to express a little humility now and then.

The last time a governor tapped himself, in the late 70s, voters were not pleased: Democrat Wendell Anderson of Minnesota, who died recently, was rejected by voters in his state.

Depending on the outcome of this years Senate races, the seat could determine the balance of power in the Senate, and a President Hillary Clinton would need a majority to confirm her nominees for the Supreme Court and other federal benches.

[Bobby Scott: The congressman who could make history. Again.]

Pollsters also asked voters about Rep. Robert C. Bobby Scott, a longtime congressman from Newport News who many consider the front-runner for the seat because of his experience and potential to make history as the first African American from Virginia in the Senate.

The poll found 17 percent of likely voters favor Scott, followed by 12 percent who prefer Attorney General Mark R. Herring (D). The states other Democrats in Congress  Northern Virginia Reps. Don Beyer and Gerald E. Connolly  each garnered 8 percent. Another 13 percent did not choose any of those four options, and 37 percent said they did not know.

In the case of a Senate vacancy, McAuliffe could appoint Kaines successor to serve for about a year. Then there would be a special election in November 2017, followed by an election for the full term one year later.

Back-to-back races would require a candidate who can raise at least $20 million in consecutive years, experts say.

The survey is based on cellphone and landline interviews from Sept. 6 to 12, with 1,006 Virginia adults. The margins of error range from plus or minus 3.6 to 4.4 percentage points.
First, the fast-flowing floodwaters of the Salt Creek tore up the citys Jamaica North Trail, and then the slow pace of government delayed its repairs.

Until now.

Contractors from a Martell construction firm have started rebuilding the 6.5-mile stretch of damaged hiker-biker trail between Pioneers and Saltillo Road. Most of the work should be finished by the end of October -- nearly a year and a half after the swollen Salt Creek washed parts of the trail away.

Everybody was used to using that trail, and then it went away, said Sara Hartzell, a planner for the citys Parks and Recreation Department. It really makes it hard when you see it sitting there and it looks like nothing was happening.

Work was being done, just not on the trail surface. The city sought federal funding, which required FEMA inspectors to assess the damage and determine how much material was swept away (7.2 million pounds of rock and limestone chips, and more than 1,000 square yards of membrane).

Getting the government to pay 75 percent of the repair bill takes time, Hartzell said. She dealt with FEMA projects when she worked for the Nebraska Emergency Management Agency, and she lived in Hallam when it was nearly leveled by a 2004 tornado.

It took eight years to get the town's fire hall and community center rebuilt.

I know projects, when youre working with FEMA, can be very long, she said. Were going to be at about 18 months when we get this project done. This has actually moved pretty fast.

The May 2015 flood also eroded a bridge abutment north of 14th Street and pushed part of the creek bank too close to the trail, requiring a 500-foot reroute to the east.

Olsson Associates did the engineering work, and the Parks Department asked for bids from contractors, hoping to have the trail reopened by the end of September.

That wont happen. The search for a contractor slowed when it got to the citys Purchasing Department, which can get log-jammed near the end of the fiscal year, Hartzell said.

They had all of these contracts come in at the same time my bids were coming in. It slowed us down a little bit.

The city ultimately hired High Plains Enterprises for just under $380,000. The company already has finished the short stretch south of Saltillo that connects with the Homestead Trail, said project manager Kevin Mack, and is working its way north.

Mack and others scouted the trail beforehand, so they knew what to expect when they arrived with their heavy equipment.

But they didnt expect to see so many people walking and biking through their construction site, or crowding their trucks at the Saltillo Road trailhead, despite all of the signs and barricades.

Hed like room for his crew to work, he said.

Its kind of a pain, Ill be honest. Theyre blocking it, congesting it.
Skylar Dore, the former police chief of Jonesville, La., was fired after he posted a profane message on Facebook criticizing President Obama's response to recent attacks on police. (Courtesy of Skylar Dore)

Sunday sermons had just ended when residents of this river town learned that a lone black gunman had killed three police officers in Baton Rouge. Before the news could sink in, a profane message appeared on Facebook.

Hey Mr. Bulls--- president, it began. When are you going to grow a f---ing pair. And tell it like it is. These are terrorist. That have declared f---ing war on my brother. (White police officers) enough is enough.

The author was Skylar Dore, Jonesvilles white chief of police.

The post instantly cleaved the community in two. Many black residents, who make up 70 percent of Jonesville, saw it as a racist rant. Some whites defended Dore, saying he had the right to speak his mind. Two days later, the majority-black town council fired the young chief.

If his post had stirred anger, then his firing provoked outrage. Dore received encouragement, even employment offers, from across the country. But he also received death threats. When a friend organized a march on Dores behalf, the sheriff persuaded him to call it off for fear it could turn into a shootout.

Today, Jonesville remains on edge. Some whites think the towns black officials are putting political correctness ahead of public safety. Some blacks see ugly hints of the racial violence that has long haunted the Deep South in Dores profane post and the online debates that followed.

In Jonesville  as in many places across the nation  both black people and police feel under attack.

Dore says he is not a racist. He says he is fighting for his First Amendment rights.

I was upset with the president. Quite frankly, I still am, he said, saying President Obama failed to act aggressively against black nationalist terrorists, such as the Baton Rouge shooter, Gavin Long. Im a police officer. Im a chief. But Im also an American citizen, and I have just as much rights as any other American citizen.

His critics, however, say Dores post not only exposed his racist views but also raised questions about his past, including ones tied to unsubstantiated allegations that he caused the death of a black man in custody. That the majority-black town had entrusted Dore with the badge compounded the sense of betrayal.

This has brought out the real intentions of people, what they really think and really feel, said Sharon Stevenson, a black resident who led the campaign to fire Dore. The mask has come off.

I was too nice

Jonesville sits at the crux of four flood-prone rivers, surrounded by fields of cotton and soy and the occasional old plantation house, a vestige of the slavery-based economy that once enriched white families. Towering Native American mounds that once stood here are now small piles, their dirt long ago appropriated for construction projects.

The town of 2,200 has also shrunk  by half since a clothing plant closed in the late 1980s.

Theres nothing here. Theres no jobs, said Dore, who runs FleX Fitness, the towns only gym.

Dore is built like an Olympic wrestler, with bulging arms covered in tribal tattoos. He grew up in New Iberia, the heart of Cajun country, and says tragedy in his youth pushed him to become a cop. First, his older brother was killed by a drunk driver. Then his mother drowned in an auto accident that Dore insists is an unsolved murder.

Dore took a job at the Iberia Parish jail, then became a police officer in the nearby town of Baldwin. There, he had his first brush with controversy. In May 2012, Dore was leading Damon Abraham to a holding cell when Abraham, a black man wanted for failure to appear in court, bolted. Dore chased him through the streets and into the woods, where he used a stun gun on Abraham at least twice. Back in the jail, Abraham stopped breathing. Dore performed CPR, but Abraham died.

Several witnesses told investigators that Dore used the stun gun on Abraham while he was handcuffed. One said Dore also threatened to arrest his black ass. In a letter to the U.S. Justice Department, Abrahams family called it a clear-cut murder of an innocent man.

But Louisiana State Police found no probable cause to arrest Dore, and Dore says he did nothing wrong.

If anything, I was too nice, he said, lamenting his failure to handcuff Abraham from the start. It bit me in the behind.

Two months later, Jonesville hired Dore as a police officer. Last year, financial trouble forced the town to gut its police department. Dore went from being one of 14 full-time officers to being in charge of just two.

At 30, he was chief of police.

I lost my cool

Dore was vacationing in Florida with his wife, who serves as the town judge, and his stepdaughter when he heard about the Baton Rouge shooting. Already upset about the slaying of five officers 10 days earlier in Dallas, he was devastated to learn that Matthew Gerald, with whom Dore had trained, was among the dead in Baton Rouge.

Baton Rouge residents have been rocked by the shooting deaths of police officers in their city. But they remain hopeful that people can find common ground and move forward from tragedy. (Daron Taylor,Ashleigh Joplin/The Washington Post)

Dore immediately took to Facebook.

How many police officers have to die trying to protect the citizens of this country, he fumed. Any other president would have declared full on war on this group. Since when in our f---ing history do we stand idle to the ambush murders of law enforcement. It has to STOP NOW!!!!!

On the drive back to Louisiana, Dores phone began ringing. His post was spreading quickly. People in Jonesville and beyond were accusing him of racism.

Dore reread his post.

I said, Damn. Thats not how I meant for it to come out.  Dore said that he was quoting Long, the Baton Rouge shooter, when he wrote white police officers. And that the group he mentioned was not the activist group Black Lives Matter but black sovereign citizens, the sometimes-violent separatist organization of which Long claimed to be a follower.

When that Cajun blood gets a-runnin, we get mad. The filter comes off. And Im a hundred percent guilty of that, Dore said. I lost my cool, and I let my emotions get the best of me. But by no means am I racist. 

Bewildered and surprised

Sharon Stevenson watched in horror as Dores post tore through Jonesville. She had learned about it from her youngest son, who worked out at Dores gym. That the post came from a man her son considered cool made it all the more shocking.

Soon, the comments on Facebook took a dark turn. Some black residents demanded that Dore resign. Some whites said he was a victim of a witch hunt. According to Stevenson, at least one commenter appeared to threaten violence against blacks.

It was terrifying, she said. I said, He is going to set a fire in this little town. 

Decades earlier, Stevenson, 56, had been one of the first black employees in the local welfare office. The post reminded her of attitudes once expressed openly in Jonesville. Whites here overwhelmingly resisted desegregation, and the community had brushes with Ku Klux Klan violence, including the 1964 firebombing of a church not far from town.

Hiram Evans remembers seeing crosses burn. Now the first black mayor of Jonesville, Evans said he was bewildered and surprised when Stevenson called about Dore. Evans had taken a chance on the young white officer after the Baldwin incident. Now he wondered: Had he hired a racist?

Other black residents were wondering the same thing.

A lot of people were upset that they hired him because he had already been accused of killing a black guy, said Lucretia Duncan, a local event planner. When he expressed his views about the president and his white brothers, that kind of threw people for a loop.

Two days later, the mayor summoned Dore to a public hearing. The hall was filled to capacity, and the atmosphere was tense. Stevenson and two other women called for Dore to step down, saying the black community could no longer trust him.

Dore offered an apology but refused to resign.

I should not have allowed my emotions to get the best of me, Dore told the crowd.

Im sorry, but you should have thought about it before you even hit those keys, Stevenson replied.

The council voted to fire him.

50 different death threats

Dores termination made news statewide. Within hours, he was inundated on Facebook with messages of support and job offers from sympathetic police departments in several states.

He also received probably 50 different death threats, he said.

Its a shame those whackos didnt get you rather than [the] other officers, one message said.

In Jonesville, his firing divided neighbors and co-workers along racial lines. People who once said hello to one another now looked the other way.

Tillman Jolly, a white carpenter whose Facebook page includes a photo of a gun atop a Bible, urged people to march to town hall and demand Dores reinstatement. Jolly thought Dores post had been tough but fair and that Jonesville had axed its best police chief over political correctness.

The people in charge of Jonesville are 90 percent black, Jolly said. It pissed them off that he bashed their president.

Within hours, more than 1,500 people had pledged to attend the Aug. 6 rally, including several motorcycle gangs. But then the Catahoula Parish sheriff called and said the state police believed outside elements planned to attack officers at the rally. So Jolly canceled it.

Dore approved of the decision. I dont want any more police officers being murdered, he said. Besides, he said, it would be suicide to return to his old job. I assure you I would eventually be shot and killed.

While Dore said he plans to sue Jonesville for wrongful termination, the mayor allowed that Dore may not be a racist: Thats a situation between him and God, he said. But he said he does not regret firing his chief.

We need to have this conversation, Evans said. Otherwise, we are going to continuously fuel the fire.
ILLINOIS

Chicago police officer indicted in 13 shooting

A Chicago police officer who was videotaped firing shots that injured two black teenagers inside a car was indicted on federal civil rights charges.

U.S. Attorney Zachary Fardon said in a statement that Marco Proano, 41, was indicted Thursday on two counts of deprivation of rights after he allegedly used unreasonable force while on duty Dec. 22, 2013. Each count of the indictment is punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

The release doesnt detail the allegations, but police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said that the indictment stems from an incident captured on dashboard-camera video that was released last year by a retired judge who had handled a criminal trial involving one of the teenagers.

The two teenagers, who posed no apparent threat, had been pulled over for speeding.

The indictment is the latest blow to a department that has been under intense scrutiny since last Novembers release of a video showing white police officer Jason Van Dyke fatally shooting black teenager Laquan McDonald in 2014.

 Associated Press

FLORIDA

Man who shot at Zimmerman convicted

A Florida man who fired a gun at George Zimmermans vehicle during a road-rage incident was convicted Friday of attempted second-degree murder.

Last years confrontation was not the first encounter between Matthew Apperson, 37, and Zimmerman, the former neighborhood watch volunteer who fatally shot unarmed teenager Trayvon Martin in 2012. Apperson alleged in September 2014 that Zimmerman threatened him in a road-rage encounter but did not press charges at the time.

 Associated Press

NEW YORK

Police commissioner is honored in send-off

William Bratton, the police commissioner who led departments in Boston, Los Angeles and New York and saw his crime-fighting strategies copied across the nation, ended his law-enforcement career with a ceremonial send-off Friday.

Commanders lined up in formation outside of New York Police Department headquarters to bid farewell to the 68-year-old Bratton.

 Associated Press
When Secretary of State John F. Kerry traveled to Chile in October to attend an international conference on ocean preservation, he carried something that had nothing to do with environmental collaboration. The computer disk he brought contained 282 newly-declassified records on Gen. Augusto Pinochets role in a brazen act of international terrorism in Washington, D.C. The car bombing in Sheridan Circle that occurred 40 years ago this week took the lives of former Chilean ambassador Orlando Letelier and his 25-year-old colleague Ronni Karpen Moffitt. Kerry personally handed the disk of documents to Chilean President Michelle Bachelet.

Last month, when Kerry flew to Buenos Aires for trade talks, he carried another disk, this one loaded with 1,078 pages of records on the Argentine dirty war of repression during the military dictatorship between 1976 and 1983. Kerry gave those documents to President Mauricio Macri and promised more to come in the future.

Alongside the traditional instruments of statecraft, the Obama administration has developed an entirely new tool: declassifying decades-old secrets of state to share with other governments and their societies. President Obama has used this declassification diplomacy to mend fences with other countries, advance the cause of human rights and even redress the dark history of Washingtons support for repression abroad. Allies are grateful and historians are delighted. And given the depth and range of still-secret U.S. Cold War records, declassified diplomacy has the potential to go much, much further.

Obamas very first decree as president was intended to strengthen access to information. Executive Order 13489 rescinded restrictions on the Presidential Records Act imposed by his predecessor, George W. Bush. For a long time now, theres been too much secrecy in this city, the new president declared on Jan. 21, 2009. This administration stands on the side not of those who seek to withhold information but those who seek to make it known  an admirable goal but one his administration has not always advanced, especially with regard to Freedom of Information Act requests from reporters.

Among those who have sought to know what information remains withheld in the secret vaults of the U.S. national security agencies are people in Latin American countries such as Brazil, Chile and Argentina, where human rights advocates, lawyers and judges continue the quest for accountability for crimes against humanity committed by past military regimes. Just as thousands of victims were disappeared by those regimes, the military dictatorships managed to disappear the documentation of their atrocities. Vast troves of evidence remained beyond their destructive reach, however  in the United States. Indeed, the only positive outcome of the dark role the United States often played in the repressive histories of these and other nations is the detailed paper trail now residing in the vaults of the CIA, the FBI, and the Defense and State departments.

The Clinton administration was the first to recognize the political currency of these secret records and to use the presidents executive authority to declassify them. After The Washington Post published a major expose on the Reagan administrations approval of military massacres and death-squad operations in El Salvador, President Bill Clinton ordered more than 15,000 confidential documents released, creating a new, publicly accessible archive of information on the U.S. role in El Salvadors infamous counterinsurgency war. After the New York Times broke the story of CIA support for a Guatemalan colonel who ordered the killing of an American hotel owner living in Guatemala, as well as the torture and disappearance of a guerrilla leader who was the husband of another U.S. citizen, the Clinton administration released several thousand more secret records relating to that scandal and the U.S.-backed counterinsurgency efforts in that country.

After the October 1998 detention of Chiles Pinochet in London, Clinton responded to demands from the families of Pinochets victims, human rights advocates and the U.S. Congress by authorizing the Chile Declassification Project, an 18-month multi-agency review of secret U.S. documents dated between 1968 and 1991. It yielded about 23,000 never-seen-before records on repression during the Pinochet regime  as well as on the covert CIA intervention that helped bring him to power. We declassified more documents than any other administration, Clinton proudly told me years later.

The Bush administration was not nearly as zealous about access to information. The State Department released more than 4,000 records on Argentinas dirty war, but the project had been initiated in the final months of Clintons presidency. The State Departments Latin America bureau also expedited a small release of documents on Ecuador, as a positive gesture to the often hostile government of Rafael Correa.

While Clinton employed his executive declassification authority in response to major scandals and events, the Obama administration has used declassified records as a tool of statecraft. Take the example of Brazil: In 2012, Brazils National Truth Commission, newly created to investigate human rights violations during the military dictatorship from 1964 to 1985, asked the White House for relevant papers. Officials planned to have Obama provide them to then-President Dilma Rousseff during a White House state dinner scheduled for October 2013. But after Edward Snowdens files showed that the United States had tapped her cellphone, Rousseff canceled her visit to Washington.

Relations between the two countries were tense until the next June, when Vice President Biden traveled to Brazil to try to mend the breach. As a peace offering, he gave Rousseff a disk of declassified documents on repression in Brazil. I hope that in taking steps to come to grips with our past, we can find a way to focus on the immense promise of the future, Biden told Rousseff, who, as a young leftist, was tortured and imprisoned in the 1970s by her countrys military dictatorship.

The Obama administration also took dramatic steps for Chile, a nation that Washington has tried to cultivate as an economic, environmental and political ally in the region. In early 2015, the White House agreed to a formal request from the government of Bachelet  who was also a victim of human rights abuses during the military era  for still-secret records relating to Pinochets role in the September 1976 car bombing that killed Letelier and Moffitt in downtown Washington. Under the direction of David McKean (now ambassador to Luxembourg), the State Departments policy planning office expedited the declassification of hundreds of detailed records on this act of international terrorism  in time for Kerry to personally carry them to Santiago last October.

Among the documents was a secret 1987 memorandum titled Pinochet and the Letelier-Moffitt Murders: Implications for US Policy, from Secretary of State George Shultz to President Ronald Reagan. In an intelligence review, the CIA had compiled convincing evidence that President Pinochet personally ordered his intelligence chief to carry out the murders, Shultz advised the president. This is a blatant example of a chief of states direct involvement in an act of state terrorism, one that is particularly disturbing both because it occurred in our capital and since his government is generally considered to be friendly. The CIAs stark conclusion about Pinochets role in a savage act of international terrorism created an uproar in Chile and generated headlines around the world.

The impact of this new diplomatic tool depends partly on the keepers of secrets in the U.S. intelligence community. Because the CIA cares more about protecting the covert nature of its operations than about diplomacy and the accuracy of the historical record, the agency has not been eager to cooperate in these declassification projects. During Clintons declassification on Chile, for example, the CIA twice reneged on its commitment to release its records on covert operations against the elected government of Salvador Allende. Only after Clintons national security adviser, Sandy Berger, personally interceded with CIA Director George Tenet did the agency finally comply. To date, the CIA has rejected Freedom of Information Act efforts by my organization, the National Security Archive, to release even one sentence of the secret intelligence review on Pinochet that Shultz cited in his dramatic memorandum to Reagan on the Letelier assassination. Without that document, the historical record on an act of terrorism in downtown Washington will remain incomplete. The CIA seems not to have gotten Obamas directive that no information may remain classified indefinitely.

That position will be tested by Obamas special declassification project on Argentina. During his trip to that country in March, Obama put his presidential imprimatur on the practice of declassification diplomacy. Just before he left for South America, he authorized a major declassification review of hundreds of intelligence-community and Defense Department records relating to the massive human rights violations committed by the Argentine military between 1976 and 1983. I believe we have a responsibility to confront the past with honesty and transparency, Obama stated during a visit with human rights activists and victims in Buenos Aires on March 24, the 40th anniversary of the military coup that, with U.S. support, ushered in seven years of the most brutal repression ever seen in the southern half of the continent.

If the intelligence community cooperates with this project, the release promises to supply evidence for ongoing human rights cases in Argentina. The documents are also likely to shed light on U.S. policy toward the coup and the repression that followed. Their declassification will provide not only the honesty and transparency Obama advocates but a modicum of historical atonement for the support his predecessors gave to the Argentine military in the days and months after the coup.

There are plenty of other countries for which a special declassification of U.S. records would help heal the wounds of history and advance an alliance  among them Laos and Japan, where Obama recently visited; U.S. efforts to rebuild relations with Iran might similarly benefit. Indeed, in his final few months in office, Obama faces plenty of opportunities to expand the practice of declassification diplomacy. A special declassification on Colombias counterinsurgency war would help local officials implement the recently signed peace accord between the government in Bogota and the FARC rebels. The ongoing rapprochement with Cuba could benefit from a gesture of declassification regarding key Cold War conflicts between Washington and Havana.

Even the Chileans are hoping for another round of documents when Bachelet visits the monument to Letelier and Moffitt in Sheridan Circle this coming week to commemorate their assassination 40 years ago. Pinochet is no longer alive to be judged in a court of law. But declassified records would help provide the lasting judgement of history.

Twitter: @peterkornbluh

Read more from Outlook and follow our updates on Facebook and Twitter.
The Sept. 11 editorial Shuttering an option for students asserted that ITT Technical Institutes were the victims of unfair federal aggression when, in reality, they were for-profit colleges providing value and innovation by serving nontraditional students.

The editorial neglected to point out the unfair, aggressive tactics advanced by the school chain as it plunged its poorer, older and minority students into bait-and-switch institutional lending schemes that have resulted in their financial ruin for life. Students, who were subjected to marketing pushes and threatening tactics, ended up with loan products that have default rates projected at 60 percent.

The editorial board should not endorse innovation and value when they amount to a subprime lending scam that victimized its students.

Christine Lindstrom, Boston

The writer is higher education program director of the U.S. Public Interest Research Group.

The editorial boards defense of ITT Technical Institutes and attack on the Obama administrations regulatory enforcement actions were premised on a claim that not a single allegation of wrongdoing has been proven against ITT. This is a hollow claim in light of the fact that ITT used one-sided contracts of adhesion to bind students and employees to secret and confidential arbitration as a means of suppressing claims against it. Not only did ITT require students to arbitrate claims, but also it mandated that students who seek justice in court pay the cost of ITTs lawyers. The chain even made the baseless claim that the New Mexico attorney general, having sued the school for bilking consumers in the state, had to submit to arbitration. That litigation has been tied up for years as a result of ITTs stall tactics. The use of such arbitration agreements and its aggressive enforcement thereof surely qualify ITT as one of those shady for-profit colleges . . . that take advantage of students that the editorial purported to deplore.

Eileen Connor, Boston

The writer is director of litigation for

the Project on Predatory Student Lending of the Legal Services Center of Harvard Law School.
SAN DIEGO -- People always complain that Latino immigrants displace native-born Americans from jobs and neighborhoods.

But this year, Latinos have been displaced from the political pecking order by the new kids on the block: working-class whites.

Que paso? The 2016 presidential election was supposed to let Latinos flex their muscles. After years of demographic growth, Latinos were ready to pick a president. It's about numbers; an estimated 12 million Latino voters are expected to cast ballots, out of more than 26 million Latinos who are eligible to vote. And atonement: Four years ago, the autopsy for Mitt Romney's failed presidential bid suggested that the GOP must make amends with Latinos in order to survive.

Given who they chose as their nominee, Republicans must have decided that survival is overrated. Now they're smitten with working-class whites.

These voters are Donald Trump's bread and butter. On their behalf, the GOP nominee promises to renegotiate trade deals and return manufacturing jobs.

And Hillary Clinton is also interested in these voters. Many of them are union members, and organized labor is a cornerstone of the Democratic coalition. And so Clinton has stopped giving speeches on Wall Street and started her working-class rap about how the American Dream is out of reach for many working-class Americans.

Yet, the courtship can get complicated when Clinton tries to dismiss Trump by attacking his supporters. Half of those folks, she told those gathered at a New York City fundraiser last week, fit in a "basket of deplorables" because they're "racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic."

The remarks were shameful and condescending, and Clinton should never have made them. And despite the spin from her enablers in the media, she didn't really apologize. What she said in a statement was: "Last night I was 'grossly generalistic,' and that's never a good idea. I regret saying 'half' -- that was wrong." Then she changed the subject and laid out a litany of things about Trump that she found deplorable. Some apology.

Clinton wants to cherry pick Trump voters and make a pitch for the redeemable 50 percent who "feel that the government has let them down" and are "desperate for change." Those are the folks who, she says, need empathy from the enlightened Manhattan elites.

The former Secretary of State has even visited the working class in their natural habitat. In July, she toured a steel-wire-product manufacturer in Pennsylvania's Cambria County, which is more than 90 percent white. She told the crowd that she would defend "places that have been left out and left behind."

So when did Latinos get left out and left behind in this election?

For Republicans, interest may have tapered off in February after a GOP debate in South Carolina where Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio got into a verbal shoving match over who was el mas macho, where Cruz actually challenged Rubio to argue en espanol. The cringe-worthy spectacle suggested that Latinos aren't ready for primetime.

Meanwhile, Democrats probably stopped courting Latinos a couple months later when it became clear that Trump was on track to secure the GOP nomination. The businessman had by then so deeply offended Latinos that they gladly flocked to the Democratic Party without requiring anything in return.

In the big picture, Latinos and working-class whites have been on a collision course for decades. When blue-collar workers gripe about losing a job, the culprit is often either a Latino immigrant or a trade deal with Latin American countries.

Just listen to the white reader who was furious over my Labor Day column telling working-class folks to quit whining. "Maybe if the 1 percent were not so greedy as to ship the jobs to Mexico, working whites would still have jobs," he wrote.

Others blame lost jobs on immigrants -- especially if they come from Mexico and Latin America. In his immigration speech in Phoenix, Trump advanced the sketchy claim that "most illegal immigrants are lower-skilled workers with less education who compete directly against vulnerable American workers."

This thesis is simplistic and self-defeating. Americans don't have bad trade deals. And we're not attracting bad immigrants. But we do have some native-born people with a bad attitude, some of whom made bad decisions and bad mistakes such as thinking they were entitled to keep the same job for 30 years. Now they're looking for someone to be the bad guy. And, in the long-term, that'll be bad for them and the country.
The veteran CBS reporter, who moderated three presidential debates, looks back at key moments from those clashes and gives advice to his 2016 counterparts. (Adriana Usero,Erin Patrick O'Connor/The Washington Post)

The veteran CBS reporter, who moderated three presidential debates, looks back at key moments from those clashes and gives advice to his 2016 counterparts. (Adriana Usero,Erin Patrick O'Connor/The Washington Post)

Bob Schieffer, a political contributor to CBS News, hosted Face the Nation from 1991 to 2015.

I moderated presidential debates in 2004, 2008 and 2012, and its an experience like no other.

People dont believe me when I say I dont get nervous on television, but I dont. Ive done it so long that it has become second nature to me  like a veteran ballplayer getting so zoned in that he forgets hes playing in front of a crowd.

But as I was standing backstage before my first debate  George W. Bush and John Kerry in 2004  I looked down at my hands and realized I was shaking like a leaf. I hadnt had stage fright in 30 years. Yet, as I stood there thinking how the race for the most powerful office in the world could be influenced by what happened that night while millions upon millions of people were watching, it made me a nervous wreck.

Then it came to me. For sure, this was the World Series of politics, but the people who should be nervous were the players. I was just the umpire. With that in mind, I settled my own nerves.

Its also why I believe the most important advice I can give to a moderator is this: Remember that nobody goes to a ballgame to watch the umpire. Were not electing a national moderator; were electing a president. If you keep that in mind, the whole thing gets easier.

Over the years, Ive been asked to define the moderators role. To me, the moderators main responsibility is to give the viewers a better and more complete understanding of who the candidates are, and its more than where they stand on issues.

A vote for president is different from any other vote we cast. We often vote for local government candidates strictly on issues, such as Candidate A wants to put a stoplight at a certain intersection. If were for that, we vote for him; if were against it, we vote for the other person.

Not so for presidential elections.

Issues are important. Party affiliation is important. But in presidential elections, I believe most Americans cast their votes for the person they feel most comfortable with in time of crisis.

So the moderators must do their best to help viewers understand not only where the candidates come down on the issues but also how they react under pressure, whether they seem to know their stuff and whether they appear to have the poise and, yes, the courage to handle the awesome responsibilities of the presidency.

In the 2004 debate, I noted that like me, both Bush and Kerry were married to smart women and had two daughters, so I asked, What is the most important thing youve learned from these smart women?

Bush said to listen to them.

Referring to his wealthy wife, Kerry brought down the house when he said, The president and you and I are three examples of lucky people who married up. And some would say maybe me more so than others.

I thought it showed a side of both men we hadnt seen.

A good laugh also keeps people awake.

One of the toughest assignments for the moderators is fact-checking in real time when they dont have the luxury of looking something up. All the moderators this year are veteran journalists, so Im confident they will have done their homework and be familiar with the issues before the debates.

But its more complicated than that.

I believe the chief fact-checkers are the candidates. If one of them says something that is dead wrong or inconsistent with what he or she has said previously, the other candidate should have the first opportunity to call his or her opponent on it.

This gives the viewers a chance to judge how knowledgeable both of the candidates are.

If neither candidate catches the inaccuracy, then the moderator must step in, set the record straight and, if necessary, ask a question about it. With more and more misleading, distorted and downright wrong information finding its way into campaign dialogue this year, moderators should be prepared to say, Candidates, for the record, there is no evidence to support that, or words to that effect.

The moderators greatest challenge in this years debates may not be fact-checking but keeping the candidates from hogging the 15 minutes allotted to discuss each of the 10 topics.

The last two debates I moderated, I sat at a table with the candidates. Having them in close proximity made reining them in easier. Maybe Im wrong, but I also thought it made them more reluctant to hurl personal insults.

Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump so despise each other, I doubt either would agree to sit at the same table.

If they do get out of line, the moderator must remind them  forcefully, if necessary  that voters expect them to abide by rules they both agreed to.

And one final tip to moderators: If the candidates start throwing things, just dive under the table. Considering what weve seen this year, well all understand.
Jesse Hughes of the Eagles of Death Metal interacts with the crowd at the 2016 Sweetlife Festival at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia. (Photo by Kyle Gustafson/For The Washington Post)

Joel Hurewitz and Maria Alvarez, based in Columbia, are members of HoCoSoundSense.

Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia creates the best of times for those in the area who love concerts, but it creates the worst of times for those who just want to spend a peaceful evening at home.

To those dancing on the grass, it is music; to those cursing sounds from inside their homes, it is noise.

Howard County is recognized as a great place to live, and Merriweather is recognized as a great music venue. But when the sound permeates the community miles and miles away  the noise from the latter ruins the greatness of the former.

While many music fans plan their summers around performances by their favorite bands at Merriweather, residents in Columbia plan vacations around the events at Merriweather so they can get out of town to avoid the anxiety, aggravation and angina from the pounding bass.

Merriweather has been in Columbia for nearly 50 years, so obviously anyone who chose to live in the Town Center area should have known that they would hear the music. But new development in downtown Columbia, including the construction of the new One Merriweather building where trees once stood, is not the true cause of the increased noise. The cause of the complaints about the noise from Merriweather is a tale of two cities  for something that happened in Annapolis caused problems for the people of Columbia and surrounding areas.

In 2013, the Maryland General Assembly passed a law intended to protect Merriweather by raising the permitted decibel levels only in Howard County. This law now harms the very constituents of the politicians who voted for it. The entire Howard County delegation, except for former delegate Liz Bobo, endorsed the change. The delegation included current County Executive Allan Kittleman.

Fortunately, Stu Kohn, president of the Howard County Citizens Association, strongly suggested a meeting take place with our elected officials. They agreed to meet with us at 7 p.m. Tuesday at the George Howard Building in Ellicott City.

The law is confusing and may violate the Home Rule Amendment of the Maryland Constitution. The law effectively raised the A-weighted decibel level, a measure of environmental noise known, also known as dBA, allowed to emanate from Merriweather to 95 until 11 p.m. The state does not allow any other venue in Maryland to exceed 75 decibels at any time. Permanent hearing loss can occur after four hours of exposure to 95 decibels.

It is not just people living in Town Center who are complaining. People in Columbias Wilde Lake village and those near Route 108, Centennial Lane and parts of Route 40 in Ellicott City are also adversely impacted. One mother complained that her 2-year-old cannot get a restful nights sleep because the pounding bass and the noise of rattling windows inside her house keep the child awake until 11:30 p.m. (and sometimes later). And there are other residents who feel compelled to move out of Howard County to avoid any more noise.

For the past three years, Merriweather has been a nuisance to the community. Numerous complaints have been made to the police and health departments. Many people have contacted their representatives. Merriweather keeps wailing away, knowing full well its noise is unwelcome in many neighborhoods.

Now after years of complaints and months of negotiations, the Howard County Council and the countys state delegation have agreed to hold a meeting to discuss Merriweather, the state law and what changes can be made. Hopefully, the delegation will agree to repeal the law in the next General Assembly session and return the noise limit at Merriweather to a safe and sane level.
LESS THAN two months ago, President Obama approved a presidential policy directive spelling out how the federal government would respond to significant cyber incidents. In the shadowy world of cyberconflict, this is often a difficult problem: how to identify the source of an attack and respond appropriately. Mr. Obama set benchmarks. He defined a significant incident as one that is likely to result in demonstrable harm to the national security, economy or foreign relations of the United States, or to the public confidence, civil liberties, or public health and safety of the American people.

In recent weeks, according to private security experts and government sources, hackers associated with Russias government have carried out high-profile intrusions intended to weaken that public confidence and disrupt the U.S. election campaign. Mr. Obama should do something about it.

The most spectacular act was the hack of the Democratic National Committee on the eve of the partys convention, in which 20,000 embarrassing internal emails were stolen and then made public through WikiLeaks. The leaked emails showed that DNC staffers leaned against Bernie Sanders; party Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz was forced to quit, and the campaign of Hillary Clinton was damaged, probably as Russia intended. This was followed by an upload this week of internal DNC data such as private phone numbers and email addresses. And in an assault that seems aimed at besmirching Ms. Clinton and sowing discord, hackers obtained and released emails from former secretary of state Colin Powell that maligned her and Republican nominee Donald Trump.

This adds up to a full-blown attempt by Russia to interfere with the U.S. election cycle and weaken public confidence. It probably wont work  we dont think Americans are so easily cowed. But it calls for a forceful response. The administration has been hesitating, in part because of fragile negotiations with Moscow over the war in Syria. The FBI probe is not complete, and some senior officials have told The Posts Ellen Nakashima they want to wait for the results.

Mr. Obama ought to put his foot down, and soon. The cyberattacks are of a piece with a larger attempt by Russian President Vladimir Putin to subvert Western democracies and the ideals of a liberal, rule-based international order. Mr. Putins broader campaign has included incitement of war in Ukraine, seizure of Crimea, support for right-wing groups and candidates in Europe, and using a tide of war refugees from Syria to create instability.

In responding, Mr. Obama must take advantage of the strength of an open society and call out the perpetrators, telling the American people what is happening. Mr. Obama does not need to release sensitive intelligence to effectively make the point. Second, Mr. Obama should order the preparation of economic sanctions against Russian individuals under an executive order he signed that permits sanctions against people linked to malicious cyber-acts. He must put Russia on notice that such disruptive active measures, as the KGB once called them, will not be tolerated. If Mr. Putin thinks he can get away with generating fog and doubt, the best answer is to drag him and his dirty tricks into the sunshine.
Douglas Brinkley is a professor of history at Rice University and author of Rightful Heritage: Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Land of America.

Just a few months before Pearl Harbor, when isolationist zealotry was high in the United States, President Franklin D. Roosevelt received an insistent memorandum from Gen. George C. Marshall bemoaning the lack of military preparedness among misguided civilians. Roosevelt had been working around the clock to awaken isolationists to the looming danger of World War II and to improve the U.S. military forces. Therefore, the playful Roosevelt responded by mocking Marshall, good-naturedly paraphrasing his unnecessary note:

In effect you say:

The boys in camp are O.K.

The parental influence hurts the morale of many of them.

"His Final Battle: The Last Months of Franklin Roosevelt" by Joseph Lelyveld (Knopf)

Please, Mr. President, do something about this weakness on the part of the civilian population.

Got any ideas?

As Pulitzer Prize-winning author Joseph Lelyveld writes in His Final Battle  a psychologically intense analysis of FDR in 1943, 1944 and early 1945  this teasing left Marshall with a salient reminder: U.S. presidents dont command civilian sentiment in the way a five-star general orders troops. As Marshall later admitted to a biographer, Roosevelt always had a wider point of view, of necessity, than I did. This little Roosevelt-Marshall exchange is also illustrative of the overarching thesis of Lelyvelds probing study: Others in Washington officialdom perhaps had the right strategic ideas about the world at large, but only Roosevelt knew how to methodically turn isolationists into internationalists and then organize the U.S. armed forces and industrial facilities to win a global two-theater war with Allied nations in tow.

Throughout the book, Lelyveld constantly weighs the scales for evidence as to whether FDR was too sick to run the government during the later war years, and by the end he leans in favor of Roosevelt as an emblem of the indispensible-man theory.

Pinning down FDRs innermost thoughts is always an elusive goal for a scholar, but Lelyveld  who spent nearly four decades as a top-tier reporter and editor at the New York Times  has the fortitude and skill to properly analyze FDRs decision-making process. What makes His Final Battle so exceptional is Lelyvelds admirable ability to write nonfiction with highly stylized lyrical beauty. The narrative depicts such important events as framing the United Nations, promoting a democratic Poland and reassuring the Soviet Union of American high-minded intentions with great evenhandedness. A close student of paradoxical behavior, Lelyveld considers Roosevelt in his many guises as egotistic, humanitarian, a restless operator, a fatigued president, an over-optimistic diplomat, a cagey opponent, a jocular friend, a charming actor and a devious Machiavellian. He is amazed that in 1944 and early 1945 Roosevelt was able to juggle Big Three diplomacy, battlefield strategy, personnel appointments and the presidential election, even though his precarious health was compromised.

Getting at the root of how Roosevelt struggled in his enfeebled last 18 months is the overriding concern of His Final Battle. Because most of Roosevelts medical records were destroyed, Lelyveld relies on personal observations and often-contradictory assessments of the extant polio, chronic sinusitis, high blood pressure, arterial disease and congestive heart failure. Yet the verdict on whether these conditions affected Roosevelts leadership skills as commander in chief  with the possible exception of the Yalta conference  remains unclear. Quite movingly, Lelyveld describes Roosevelt visiting wounded soldiers at a military hospital, lifting the morale of many recent amputees, bravely allowing these men to see his wasted-away legs.

The covering up of Roosevelts myriad illnesses is ably explored throughout. Just how ill Roosevelt was at the start of his fourth term is made abundantly clear by the fact that he died in only the 12th week of that term (the third-shortest tenure after William Henry Harrisons 32 days in 1841 and Abraham Lincolns mere six weeks in 1865). News photos and newsreels shown in movie theaters  offering little more in wartime than approved footage and uplifting propaganda  almost invariably showed him seated: at his desk, in a car, at a head table, greeting visitors, Lelyveld writes of the concealment effort, his head typically tilted back at a jaunty angle, his cigarette holder held aloft, an animated, hearty expression on his countenance.

There is, however, to my mind, a fundamental shortcoming to Lelyvelds analysis of how FDR envisioned the postwar world. Obsessed with the ghost of Woodrow Wilson and the failed League of Nations following World War I, Lelyveld gives short shrift to the gigantic role his distant cousin Theodore Roosevelt played in FDRs geopolitical thinking. For his entire life FDR followed the TR blueprint: Harvard, New York state legislator and governor, assistant secretary of the Navy, ardent conservationist and so forth. When FDR decided to promote his pet United Nations idea around the leading postwar powers that he called the Four Horsemen  the United States, the Soviet Union, Britain and China  it was pure TR realpolitik in action. Not for a minute did FDR ask himself what Wilson would do if he were in his shoes. The lessons of Wilson were what not to do. But because both Wilson and FDR were plagued by chronic illness at the end of their respective wars, Lelyveld cant resist constantly linking them together; its too convenient. In his attempt to oversell Wilson, Lelyveld also fails to mention that some of FDRs top advisers he writes about  such as Henry Stimson and Harold Ickes  were Bull Moosers back in 1912, backing TRs Progressive third party.

The ghost that FDR really channeled in 1944 and 1945 was TR the realist, not Wilson the ivory-tower idealist. To his credit, Lelyveld recognizes that in private musings, FDR dwelled on the Four Policemen more than the Four Freedoms, but he misses the opportunity to illuminate how the presidents great-powers thinking was derivative of TRs approach to world affairs. Lelyveld, however, does lurch in the right direction when he examines the extraordinary April 1943 Saturday Evening Post article by staff writer Forrest Davis in which FDR, in plain sight, presented his foreign policy blueprint as being anti-Utopian, a half-year before meeting Joseph Stalin in Tehran. According to the article, which FDR approved, the president firmly believed  like TR before him  that genuine association of interest on the part of the great powers must precede the transformation of the united nations military alliance into a political society of nations.

Lelyveld is also overly enamored with the diary of FDRs cousin and confidante Daisy Suckley. Its an outstanding source, to be sure, but Lelyvelds dependence also reflects a shocking flaw in the book. Somewhat mysteriously he pretends that Eleanor Roosevelt  who barely warrants a couple of cameo appearances in these pages  is irrelevant. Yet the first lady was a living embodiment of Wilsonian idealism whose views on the United Nations order were profound. None of her best biographers  Blanche Wiesen Cook or Allida Black  is mentioned in the long bibliography.

The best parts of His Final Battle come when Lelyveld stops playing physician and deals with Roosevelts shrewd diplomacy and geopolitical chess playing. The chapter on the Tehran Conference of 1943, for example, when Roosevelt meets Stalin for the first time, is an utterly riveting set piece of writing. The fencing between Roosevelt and Stalin over Poland, Vichy France, a remilitarized postwar Germany and Imperial Japan that November and December is indeed world history writ large. As Lelyveld sees it, Tehran ranks as a high-water mark of Roosevelts World War II diplomacy. Neither Churchill nor Stalin saw the point of including an enfeebled, half-occupied, riven China, but, with some foresight as we can now appreciate, Roosevelt insisted, Lelyveld writes. China would serve as a symbolic marker for the future; the world he imagined would not forever be dominated by whites.

Lelyvelds assessment of FDR at the Yalta conference is not so glowing. Deeply fatigued, unable to hear well, hands shaking, dark rings under his eyes, the presidents bad health shocked Winston Churchill, who admitted that his American counterpart was a pale reflection of his former self. That Roosevelt died on April 12, 1945, in Warm Springs, Ga.  with Hitler, Stalin and Churchill outliving him  is treated by Lelyveld with an unforgettable, ethereal sadness. Having micro-invested in the vicissitudes of Roosevelts varied illnesses, Lelyveld shows his last breath to be an American tragedy as surely as the assassinations of Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy.
A statue depicting track and field athletes Tommie Smith, center, and John Carlos, right, at the new National Museum of African American History and Culture, which opens Sept. 24. (Jahi Chikwendiu/The Washington Post)

Robert L. Wilkins, a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, served on the presidential commission created by Congress to plan the National Museum of African American History and Culture. His book on the creation of the museum, Long Road to Hard Truth, was released this month.

Lewis Fraction never imagined that his death would help inspire work toward a museum on the Mall.

Brother Fraction and I were mentors in a church youth program when he died 20 years ago, just shy of his 60th birthday, leaving behind a wife and four grown children. While at his home to comfort his family and remember his life, I was struck by the stories told by the elders gathered there.

Stories about the myriad joys of youth  the courtship rituals, old dance steps, swooning over Sam Cooke. Stories about all-black, one-room, ramshackle schoolhouses and the nurturing but stern teachers who presided over them. Some described never seeing a whole piece of chalk or a new textbook  just broken bits and beaten-up books handed down from white schools. There were stories about countless indignities, major and minor, and the psychological wounds they inflicted.

Magnificent stories. Awful stories. Profound stories.

As we drove home that evening, I asked my wife, Why dont we have a museum to tell all of those stories?

This question came with a lot of background. I had spent six years on the front lines of the criminal-justice system as a public defender and seen so much tragedy. When I started on the job, the nation was still in the middle of the crack epidemic and the District was known as the Murder Capital of the Nation. I had seen too many gunshot wounds, autopsy reports and bloody crime-scene photos. I had visited far too many victims in hospital beds, clients in jail cells, family members in dingy apartments and witnesses on dangerous street corners. One day I was looking for a witness in the middle of the afternoon when a dilapidated station wagon drove slowly down the street with four or five guys inside. The front passenger was holding an AK-47 rifle pointed upward and at the ready. Fortunately, the car drove past without incident.

Back then, folks called those war wagons. I was growing weary of the war.

I was also weary of feeling as if I were always on defense. I knew what it meant to be treated differently as a black man. In May 1992, while returning home from my grandfathers funeral in Chicago, three family members and I were detained by Maryland State Police so they could carry out a search by a drug-sniffing dog.

It didnt matter that we refused to sign a consent-to-search form, or that we explained that we were returning from a funeral, or that I told the officer the name and date of the Supreme Court case that his actions violated. As we learned after filing a lawsuit, the only thing that mattered was that we fit a written directive given to the troopers, instructing them to target blacks in rental cars traveling along that stretch of highway.

The settlement of our lawsuit in 1995 required Maryland State Police to document their search practices, including the race of those searched and information on what, if anything, was found. The resulting data revealed an astonishing disparity. The reports showed that the number of black people found with drugs was four times as high as the number of whites found with drugs. But here was the remarkable part: Four times as many blacks were searched in the first place.

It was disillusioning and depressing. So on that evening in 1996, remembering a loved one, I was inspired to become part of something positive. I wanted to help build a museum, so that those stories  the painful and the wonderful  would finally have a home. And they could serve a broader purpose. Young people who skipped school or found themselves in trouble with the law could learn about the brave youths of prior generations who were threatened, cursed and spat upon as they sought to attend better schools; they could see and hear the countless stories of how African Americans with little hope and even fewer resources were able to fight for freedom, seek justice and change laws and attitudes. This could be a place of optimism.

And after witnessing so much racial division throughout my life, those stories could serve another important purpose: unity. Even though relating this past would cause some pain, and some shame, an honest examination of this history could help us learn from the past and think about how we can come closer together as a nation.

Many others had this same inspiration. The first were in 1916, when a group of African American leaders came together to create a National Memorial Building dedicated as a tribute to the Negros contribution to the achievements of America.

Now, 100 years later, the Smithsonian Institution is set to open the National Museum of African American History and Culture. A journey that began against the backdrop of D.W. Griffiths racist movie, The Birth of a Nation, being screened at the White House, will end, four generations later, with an opening ceremony presided over by an African American president and witnessed by luminaries such as Oprah Winfrey and Cicely Tyson, who promote positive images of African Americans on film.

That itself is a great story. I wish Brother Fraction were here to see it.
When Hillary Clinton announced a diagnosis of pneumonia last week, soon after leaving a Sept. 11 memorial service, she elicited a predictably partisan response. Fans of Donald Trump speculated that she wouldnt survive the year, while her own supporters pointed out that hardworking people get sick all the time. Both presidential candidates have been pressured to release more information about their health. But this information may not be as useful as we think. Past assumptions about the health of presidents and candidates often have been shrouded in myth.

Myth No. 1

The Soviets got Eastern Europe because FDR was sick.

As the Soviet Union took control of more and more of Eastern Europe after World War II, critics of Franklin D. Roosevelt argued that he  increasingly lethargic and confused because of illness  had been unfit to negotiate. The sick man of Yalta, according to this theory, had been duped by his Soviet counterpart, Joseph Stalin. Lord Moran, Winston Churchills physician who attended the 1945 Yalta conference that divided territory after the war, wrote that Roosevelt intervened very little in the discussions, sitting with his mouth open. . . . I doubt, from what I have seen, whether he is fit for his job here.

The reality was much more complex. It is true that Roosevelt was suffering from severe hypertension and congestive heart failure, which the medications of the era could not effectively treat. And the trip to Yalta, located in the Crimea region of the Soviet Union, had been arduous. Roosevelt had suffered periods of extreme fatigue. But his personal physician Howard Bruenn, who was also at Yalta, observed that the presidents mental faculties remained intact. His memory for both recent and past events was good, Bruenn wrote in a 1970 article in the Annals of Internal Medicine. His behavior toward his friends and intimates was unchanged and his speech unaltered.

Moreover, Yalta represented a complex series of negotiations on many postwar issues, not only the fate of Eastern Europe. Churchill, who was surely of sound mind, had participated in the negotiations and had trusted Stalin as well. And, as historian James MacGregor Burns has argued, the West had only so much leverage over the Soviets, who, after all, had suffered the greatest human sacrifices in defeating Hitler. Roosevelt, Burns wrote, was a realist who had reached the limit of his bargaining power. His illness did not determine the fate of postwar Europe.

Myth No. 2

Sick presidents arent good at the job.

Several books appeared in the 1980s and 1990s detailing the secret illnesses of American presidents and other leaders. With titles such as The Impact of Illness on World Leaders and Ill-Advised: Presidential Health and Public Trust, the authors of these volumes showed that medical cover-ups were frequent in the White House. As Jerrold Post and Robert Robins wrote in their book on the topic, such leaders became both incompetent and manipulable. And its true that Edith Wilson, wife of Woodrow Wilson, essentially ran the United States after her husband suffered several strokes while in office.

But there is no clear relationship between a presidents performance and his well-being. For instance, Dwight D. Eisenhower had a series of medical issues while in office, including a heart attack, a bowel obstruction and a stroke. But historians have written approvingly of his presidency and his ability to achieve consensus. In a 2015 ranking of the presidents from a survey of political scientists, he came in seventh.

Perhaps one of the sickest presidents in the countrys history was John F. Kennedy, who suffered not only from a failure of the adrenal glands, known as Addisons disease, but also from debilitating back pain. A physician, Janet Travell, treated Kennedy with narcotics, stimulants and various hormones. Most worrisome, Kennedy retained the services of a shady physician named Max Jacobson, who injected him with amphetamines. Yet while some of Kennedys decisions, such as the ill-fated Bay of Pigs invasion, involved poor judgment, Kennedy biographer Robert Dallek found no definitive evidence that the illnesses or medications were the cause. And historians have praised many aspects of Kennedys tenure, such as his handling of the Cuban Missile Crisis and his efforts to improve poverty and race relations.

Myth No. 3

A healthy candidate is a good predictor of a healthy president.

The revelations about past cover-ups led to calls for better disclosure from candidates and officeholders. In 2008, a group of prominent doctors proposed forming an independent panel of physicians who would examine all potential presidents and vice-presidents. Connie Mariano, who was the White House physician in the Bill Clinton and George W. Bush administrations, favored this strategy, comparing it to the screening of airline pilots or military personnel. The message, she told CNN, would be: Okay, Im good for four to eight years.

But being healthy at one point in time may have little relevance to what happens during a future presidential term. George H.W. Bush was healthy when he assumed office in 1989, but in 1991 he developed atrial fibrillation, a potentially dangerous heart rhythm. Doctors subsequently diagnosed Graves disease, an excess of thyroid hormone that had caused the heart abnormality.

Perhaps the most telling example of false reassurance was the case of Ronald Reagan. Reagan, who was 69 when he ran for the presidency in 1980, authorized the release of information from his doctors. They raised no concerns, describing him as in excellent health. But many commentators, including Reagans son Ron, now think that Reagan was showing signs of Alzheimers disease by the time of his second term. Even during the campaign, Ron Reagan said, his father looked tired and bewildered during a debate against Walter Mondale.

Myth No. 4

Presidents doctors tell the public the truth.

When Eisenhower suffered his heart attack in 1955, he decided that Americans deserved to know what had happened. As he recuperated, his doctors held news conferences to educate the public about heart disease and to detail the presidents condition. This type of disclosure became routine over the years, as in the aftermath of the assassination attempt on Reagan in 1981. Reagans doctors took this task seriously; one doctor stated that the hospital recognized the need to provide accurate information to the news media.

In practice, however, presidential physicians have lied, often blatantly. Ross McIntyre, Roosevelts first White House physician, continually characterized his patients shortness of breath  from congestive heart failure  as a sinus problem. The most egregious lie, perhaps, was one of omission. When Paul Tsongas was running for president in 1992, his hematologist confirmed his patients history of lymphoma but not that the disease had recently recurred and thus probably was incurable. Tsongas died two days before what would have been the end of his first term in office.

Myth No. 5

Presidents shouldnt be, and havent been, mentally ill.

In July 1972, Thomas Eagleton, the vice-presidential nominee of George McGovern, was forced to withdraw his candidacy when reporters discovered that Eagleton had been hospitalized for depression three times, including receiving electroshock therapy. Common consensus held that he could not serve. McGovern, one newspaper editorial read, does not need the added burden of a presidential running mate with a precarious health problem in the area of mental illness. In 1988, presidential candidate Michael Dukakis aggressively denied any history of depression when rumors surfaced. Dukakis, his physician told the news media, has had no psychological symptoms, complaints or treatment.

A 2006 study of the first 37 presidents concluded that 18 of them had some type of psychiatric disorder during their lives, ranging from depression to anxiety to alcoholism. Ten exhibited symptoms while in office. Although the paper concluded that these conditions had negatively affected aspects of their presidencies, some of those affected were nevertheless extremely successful leaders. One of them was Abraham Lincoln, who is routinely at or near the top of best presidents lists, but had a major depressive disorder with psychotic features. Woodrow Wilson, who suffered from depression and anxiety in office, was listed at number 10 on the 2015 list. And Teddy Roosevelt, the study concluded, probably had bipolar disorder during his presidency, but his symptoms did not interfere with his effectiveness or performance.

Twitter: @barronlerner

Five myths is a weekly feature challenging everything you think you know. You can check out previous myths, read more from Outlook or follow our updates on Facebook and Twitter.
Environmentally, Los Angeles in the 1950s was a terrible place to grow up. But I was lucky: Most summers, my parents would load my six brothers and sisters and me into the car to visit great state and national parks. At home, kids of all colors and classes struggled to breathe in the yellow smog. But because my parents could take summer vacations and we had a drivable  if badly overcrowded  car, we could enjoy clean air, clean water and abundant wildlife.

National Park Service Director Jonathan B. Jarvis recently wrote in The Post that our national parks are the collective expression of who we are. But tens of millions of people  those who live in urban areas and cant easily drive to see the wonder of the great national parks  are mostly missing from the picture.

Twenty-two months ago, I was part of a group that met with Jarvis and Interior Secretary Sally Jewell to discuss Anacostia Park, a 1,200-acre federal property along the Anacostia River, managed since 1933 by the National Park Service. Jewell spoke with passion about how the National Park Service needs to update its brand to appeal more to a younger, more urban and more racially and culturally diverse America. The Park Service has taken steps in that direction by developing an urban agenda. But as it begins its second century, it needs to get serious about bringing parks to Americans where they live. That means investing a lot more time, money and energy in its urban parkland.

Anacostia Park is where that should happen first.

Nearly a century old, larger than New York Citys Central Park and San Franciscos Golden Gate Park, sitting at the foot of Capitol Hill on a gentle estuary with outstanding natural biodiversity, Anacostia Park ranks among the biggest wasted opportunities in the nations capital. This National Park Service property is sadly underinvested, almost entirely unprogrammed, toxic in several places and simply barren in others. Yet its potential to contribute to the District and the nation is stunning. More than 21 million people visit the District each year. Some would seek out a great Anacostia Riverside National Park and bring their disposable income to spend in the eastern part of the District.

What if the park sponsored daily educational enrichment activities for the young people in nearby neighborhoods? What if a section of the park were similar to Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts, with programs oriented to more contemporary urban music? What if the park had a permanent interpretive display of Washingtons vibrant African American communities of the mid-20th century?

Dreaming aside, there is a great opportunity right now for Anacostia Park. A new superintendent was just named, and the parks own 100th anniversary is just around the corner. The new superintendent should convene a second-century advisory group of the best urban park experts in the nation to design a truly great Anacostia Riverside National Park, and then put in place the kind of public-private park partnership that has proved successful in New York, San Francisco and many other places. Cutting-edge capital and program investments could eventually be shared among the Park Service budget, private contributors and perhaps the District.

Anacostia Riverside National Park could be a shining example of how to creatively design, build and program a great national riverside urban park in the very heart of Washington.

Anniversaries are occasions to look back and celebrate accomplishments. But the time has come to roll up our sleeves and create permanent, positive change. It is now time for the National Park Service to commit to creating a new generation of great parks for Americas urban citizens, starting right here in the nations capital.

The writer, who was D.C. mayor from 1999 to 2007, is chief executive of the Federal City Council and chairman of the Anacostia Waterfront Trust.
Regarding the Sept. 4 Arts & Style article Making a mark:

Please note that the first painting by an African American artist to be part of the White House permanent collection was Sand Dunes at Sunset, Atlantic City by Henry O. Tanner. Its a magnificent painting that was added to the collection on Oct. 29, 1996. Jacob Lawrences The Builders and Alma Thomass Resurrection  are recent additions to the collection. Hopefully, there will be many more to come.

Ann Stock, Washington

The writer was White House

social secretary from 1993 to 1997.

I was pleased to read about the Obamas interest in the arts but surprised by the statement that the painter Alma Thomas was the first African American artist featured in the building. The portraits of Bill and Hillary Clinton in the White House are by Simmie Knox, a well-known local African American artist; Bill Clinton was president when a landscape by Henry O. Tanner was acquired for display in the Executive Mansion. Acknowledgment of these artists should be part of the record.

Alan Fern, Chevy Chase

The writer was director of the National Portrait Gallery from 1982 to 2000.

In the Sept. 4 Arts & Style section, The Post bemoaned the fact that the Obamas have rarely visited local museums, such as the National Gallery of Art. I know of two recent instances when the Obamas visited local major art museums. On the Aug. 2 visit described in one of the articles, I had to wait with others in front of barriers and security guards at the gallery while Michelle Obama visited the West Building in conjunction with a special event.

I am a docent at the National Portrait Gallery. One Monday within the past year, a visitor-services employee told me that she had guided the Obama family through the portrait gallery and the adjacent Smithsonian American Art Museum the evening before, after regular museum hours; she said the president and first lady were interested and friendly. I imagine the first familys outings are not always announced by the White House or covered in the media and, as appropriate for their private enjoyment, not widely reported.

Walter Albano, Washington

Having served in the National Gallery of Arts press office starting in 1988 and as its head from 1996 until my retirement this year, I frequently assisted with official visits of the president and first lady to the gallery. While reading Philip Kennicotts Sept. 4 Critics Notebook article, Focused on the art of the moment  [Arts & Style], I recalled numerous visits by the Clintons and Bushes.

The most memorable for me took place on Oct. 23, 2001, when first lady Laura Bush brought her mother, her staff and members of the media to see the exhibition Virtue & Beauty: Leonardos Ginevra de Benci and Renaissance Portraits of Women. The gallery, like many museums and monuments around the country, had seen a huge drop in attendance in the weeks following the 9/11 tragedy.

As the first lady toured the show with gallery director Earl A. Rusty Powell III, I waited with the press corps. When she finished her tour, Bush turned to us and said she had something important to say to the American people. She spoke eloquently about the stunning masterpieces she had viewed and then made an impassioned plea for all Americans to come out of their homes, resume their normal lives and visit the venues in their communities that celebrate our rich cultural heritage. For a nation still in shock, it was exactly what many of us needed to hear.

Deborah Ziska, Washington
A Koran, a $49 half-bottle of wine and very little that's made in America. (Adriana Usero/The Washington Post)

A Koran, a $49 half-bottle of wine and very little that's made in America. (Adriana Usero/The Washington Post)

A bit after 4 p.m. Thursday, the doorbell rang in my hotel room, Room 446 at the new Trump International Hotel in Washington. It was my Koran. I had ordered it from housekeeping.

I had checked in to experience the just-opened hotel, spending $856 of Jeff Bezoss money, not including taxes, the $59 I spent on a salad and the $49 for half a bottle of undrinkable bubbly from the Trump winery.

Examining my posh surroundings  Italian bed linens, French table linens, Chinese duvet, Korean TV and, yes, Mexican tequila ($14 for a shot of Patron Silver) in the minibar, er, private bar, I came across the Gideon Bible in the nightstand with a note on TRUMP HOTELS  stationery:

If you would like to continue your spiritual journey, we also offer the followings [sic]: Talmud. Quran. Gita. Avesta. Tripitaka (Pali Canon). Shri Guru Granth Sahib. Book of Mormon. Kindly contact Housekeeping should you wish to have one delivered to your room.

Sure enough, minutes after my call to housekeeping, a pleasant woman arrived with a copy of The Glorious Quran in Arabic and English, along with a brown prayer rug and a compass pointing in the direction of al Kaaba in Mecca. I expressed skepticism to her that the hotel also kept a copy of the Talmud: millions of words and many volumes of Jewish law.

I will find it for you, she vowed.

I tipped her $4 for bringing the Koran and declined the Talmud.

The exchange, which I undertook wearing a made-in-China Trump Hotels bathrobe and Trump slippers, says everything you need to know about Donald Trump. Trump the candidate has talked of banning Muslims from the country and forcing those here to register and submit to surveillance. But Trump the hotelier welcomes Muslims with Korans and prayer rugs.

[Greg Sargent: Donald Trump is a racist conspiracy theorist. Dont let him lie his way out of it.]

It was a further reminder, as if one were needed, that the man who would take up residence just five blocks up Pennsylvania Avenue from his new hotel is a charlatan.

He campaigns on an America First theme  yet about the only American-made thing I could find in my hotel room was the small package of milk-chocolate Trump gold bullion ($25).

He portrays himself as a populist friend of the little guy, yet he makes money renting out a presidential suite for $18,000 a night (a sign informed me that the maximum nightly rate for my room was $5,600).

He derides the establishment but makes his living catering to it. The hotel lobby features a Brioni boutique and 3-foot-tall bottles of Veuve Clicquot sharing a bar top with Dom Perignon; the room comes with a copy of Wine Spectator (The Cheese Issue); the hotel charges $15 to launder a shirt, $12 for Peanut M&Ms and $26 for a hamburger (sorry, no taco bowls).

In my room, I found a Trump logo bathmat and towels from India, bone china from Japan, Italian cutlery and tiles, two telephones from Malaysia, a Swiss refrigerator, German coffee cups, Trump soaps and lotions from Canada and, from China, all four lamps, the coffee machine, the bathroom scale, the valet stand and the shower cap. The hotels managing director is from France. Most hotel workers I met during my stay had Caribbean or African accents.

Accepting the Republican presidential nomination, Trump portrayed a nation and world facing the End of Days: moment of crisis . . . violence in our streets . . . chaos in our communities . . . we dont have much time . . . disasters unfolding . . . worse than it has ever been . . . poverty and violence . . . war and destruction.

Trumps new hotel suggests things may not be quite so bad. Moments after I arrived, a waiter came unbidden with a white chocolate model of the Capitol dome, delicate macaroons, truffles and chocolate-covered strawberries. The in-room bar had Macallan 12-year-old single-malt Scotch and Johnnie Walker Blue Label. A sign on the desk informed me that the Trump Attache Service would put me in a VIP frame of mind, where desires are intuited and requests anticipated. A marketing brochure told me that the still-unopened Spa by Ivanka Trump would create pathways for each guest to inner health and external beauty. My welcome letter promised Wine by the Spoon.

There was a feeling that the opening had been rushed to precede a certain date  say, Nov. 8  and, indeed, Trump scheduled a news conference at the hotel for Friday morning. Utility workers were laying cable outside, and my confirmation letter referred to me as Mr. **. There was also symbolism in the naming of the second-floor meeting rooms: Eisenhower, Bush, Roosevelt, Reagan, Wilson, Adams, Kennedy and Jefferson  Jeff in the marketing brochure  and, among them, the DJT Boardroom.

In this one aspect  hubris  Trump the hotelier and Trump the candidate are the same.

Twitter: @Milbank

Read more from Dana Milbanks archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook.
American voters have received, we are told, all they are going to get from their presidential candidates in the way of medical information. In light of Hillary Clintons initially (and, if she had her way, permanently) undisclosed pneumonia, in light of Donald Trumps unhealthy body mass index and buffoonish physician, in light of both candidates relatively advanced ages, this move-right-along admonition is unsettling and unsatisfying.

Experts have raised reasonable questions about Clintons medical care and history, including her record of blood clots and the use of the blood thinner Coumadin to treat them. And you dont have to be an expert to know that there are reasonable questions about Trumps health, given the willingness of his doctor to issue the assurance that unequivocally Trump will be the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency. No one should trust a doctor like that.

One proposed solution would be for the candidates to submit to the full McCain, a reference to the Arizona Republican senators decision to allow reporters to review his full medical records, albeit for a single, three-hour window.

This approach is tempting. After all, running for president  and being president  essentially means giving up any claim to privacy. The unique power of the office, combined with the risk of a president suffering from undisclosed health issues and the history of presidents hiding such problems, argues for tipping the scales in favor of more disclosure, not less.

And yet, the implications of making such disclosure a matter of routine expectation in the end tilt against such a demand. Medical records are more intimate and more susceptible to ignorant misinterpretation than tax returns. The totality of a candidates medical history is not as important as his or her current health, including whether past issues raise the prospect of future problems.

Consider some scenarios. A future female presidential candidate has had an abortion. The decision to terminate her pregnancy has no bearing on her health but could be politically explosive and is, in any event, a decision that she should be able to choose to keep private.

Or she has a history of miscarriages, about which she has never spoken publicly. Or a male candidate has a low sperm count or other problem that made it difficult for him to father a child and led the couple to use artificial insemination, something they have not previously revealed. Or he has erectile dysfunction. Are we really comfortable forcing such facts into public view?

How should we think about cosmetic surgery? Trump is reported to have had scalp reduction surgery to fix a bald spot. Theres lots of unsupported online chatter about whether Clinton has had some work done. This information feels more prurient than informative.

Likewise, and even more difficult because of the strength of arguments either way, are matters of mental health. A female candidate was treated for postpartum depression. A candidate, male or female, sought marital counseling. Or treatment for depression or anxiety. Relevant or immaterial?

Do we really want to establish disincentives for would-be presidents (they have a history of thinking about this for decades in advance, after all) to seek appropriate help? At the same time, is there not some public interest in knowing whether a past history of mental-health issues might be relevant to ability to perform in office?

What about attention deficit hyperactivity disorder? According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 14 percent of boys between 5 and 17 have been diagnosed with ADHD. Have their parents just ruined their presidential chances? Assuming their grown-up selves are functioning effectively, with or without medication, is this information relevant?

One proposed and intriguing alternative to the full McCain is having a panel of esteemed and independent physicians conduct a thorough assessment of the nominees.

There may be an even easier way. Presidents routinely release the results of the physicals conducted by the White House physician, who is generally an active-duty military officer.

The candidates could have a similar checkup, consistent with what they would receive as president. A military physician would be considered an independent and trustworthy source, someone who could use his or her judgment to determine what in a candidates medical history is relevant in the present.

Surely, the president has authority to order government resources dedicated to this enterprise. And surely the voters are entitled to more information, from a more trustworthy source, than they are now receiving.

Read more from Ruth Marcuss archive, follow her on Twitter or subscribe to her updates on Facebook.
On Aug, 17, Sherry Wounded Foot died, nearly two weeks after she was found beaten and unconscious behind a building in Whiteclay, the tiny northwest Nebraska town, population 12, where four beer stores sold the equivalent of 3.5 million cans of beer last year -- nearly all of it to residents of South Dakotas Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, where alcohol is banned, but alcohol-related problems run rampant.

Wounded Foots death, which is under investigation, is the fifth mysterious death in the unincorporated village and the third death authorities agree was caused by violence.

Wounded Foots death prompted Native activist Frank LaMere and documentary filmmaker John Maisch last week to call on the Nebraska Liquor Control Commission to shut down the stores -- an ongoing effort that is repeatedly rebuffed by the commission citing a lack of evidence that the beer stores had committed any violations that would allow their licenses to be revoked.

The law, however, does allow license holders to be prosecuted if alcohol is found to be illegally consumed on adjacent properties, which regularly occurs in Whiteclay and likely took place with Wounded Foot.

A state Whiteclay task force established by Gov. Pete Ricketts earlier this month released six recommendations for addressing the villages problems, including full-time law enforcement in the area, getting rid of abandoned buildings, creating a detoxification and treatment center and seeking authority to enact ordinances aimed at panhandling, vagrancy and other problems.

But none of those recommendations directly addresses the true Whiteclay issue -- the sale of 147,000 cases of beer by the four stores last year.

The only way to address that problem is to shut down the stores, period. Wounded Foots murder should trigger the commission to revoke the licenses. That action will be challenged in court. But it needs to be taken, starting the process that, hopefully, will end beer sales in Whiteclay.

Shutting down the stores wont end the alcohol problems on Pine Ridge. But it would remove the source of much of the alcohol that makes it onto the reservation while removing a blight on Nebraska.
William C. Smith Jr. and Pam Queen, both Democrats, represent Montgomery County in the Maryland House of Delegates.

Frederick Douglass said, It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.

As Maryland lawmakers who serve on the House Judiciary Committee, we jumped at the chance to spend a day at a Maryland state prison. Without the inmates knowing who we were, we joined participants in a workshop organized by the Alternatives to Violence Project, a volunteer-led organization that works with inmates on anger management, violence issues, conflict resolution and communication.

This experience was all the more edifying given the problem our state faces regarding the amount of money and resources we expend every year on our corrections system. In 1980, there were 11,152 people incarcerated in Maryland. Today, there are roughly 20,000 inmates behind bars, and in 2015 we spent about $1.3 billion on corrections. Although we have made significant strides in recent years, our state still spends almost $40,000 to incarcerate an individual and only $13,000 per public school student a year. We indeed have a moral math problem here in Maryland.

The conditions inside the facility were reminiscent of a prison movie: stale air, dim hallways, only the bare necessities. The prisoners described getting about an hour and a half of physical recreation per day, but, depending on where you fell in the lineup for the yard, that could be cut to 45 minutes. Prisoners are allowed outside recreation only four months of the year: June through September. The rest of the year, they are told, is too cold to go outside. Because of lengthy construction projects, some inmates had not been outside for recreation time in more than a year.

On a day when outside temperatures reached 100 degrees, we quickly realized that cellblocks in most state correctional facilities are not air conditioned. Its so hot that inmates sleep on the floor with their feet in toilet water. Rats infested the food and gnawed through walls.

Of the 15 inmates we spent the day with, two had been wards of the state since childhood, only one had an immediate family member who had gone to college, none had schooling beyond high school before being incarcerated, most were incarcerated for crimes of violence stemming from drugs, and all were poor.

As Maryland legislators, we believe the premise of our correctional system is not merely punitive; it is also restorative. At least 95 percent of all state prisoners will be released, as the country moves toward justice initiatives intended to reform people so they can return to society. As policymakers, we believe it is socially and fiscally responsible to invest in equipping this population with the tools needed to succeed when they eventually assimilate into the community. A recent report by the U.S. Education Department showed that two-thirds of state prison inmates have not completed high school; furthermore, a black man between 20 and 24 without a diploma has a greater chance of being incarcerated than being employed.

Vocational training and college courses can be transformative for these people. One inmate came to prison as a high-school dropout, but he will leave as a college graduate. He told us, I have achieved the skills needed to live out a future I can be proud of. But he was among the last in the Maryland correctional system to have had the opportunity to pursue an education while incarcerated because the vast majority of certificate programs and college courses have been cut thanks to a lack of federal and state funding. Fully funding educational training and certification programs is proven to reduce recidivism and should be a fiscal priority for the state.

We encourage other legislators to seek firsthand experiences such as these to better inform the laws we make. Our day in prison has already got us thinking more critically about our work on the House Judiciary Committee. We look forward to promoting policies that provide incarcerated Marylanders access to training and educational opportunities to help them reform and reintegrate into the community.
Winston Churchill, right, was captured in an ambush during the Boer War and sent to a prisoner-of-war camp. He found prison intolerable because it kept him from winning glory on the battlefield. (Historical Papers Research Archive/University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Barnett Collection)

Lynne Olsons latest book, Last Hope Island: Britain, Occupied Europe and the Brotherhood That Helped Turn the Tide of War, will be published in April.

In her first two books, The River of Doubt and Destiny of the Republic, Candice Millard won widespread acclaim for providing fresh, perceptive ways of looking at her respective protagonists, former presidents Theodore Roosevelt and James Garfield. For her third, Hero of the Empire, Millard focuses on Winston Churchill, one of the most written-about men in modern history, and the event that catapulted him into international prominence  his daring escape from a prison camp during the Boer War.

This is well-trodden territory, and, unlike in her earlier works, Millard offers few new facts or insights about Churchill and his South African adventure. Yet, thanks to her formidable storytelling skills, she has succeeded in infusing this familiar narrative with color, excitement and life. Particularly effective is her clear-eyed view of the young Churchill as a bumptious self-promoter whose exploits in Africa were as farcical as they were courageous.

When Britain declared war against the Boers in October 1899, Churchill, then 24, saw it as a heaven-sent opportunity. Although he had served in several previous military campaigns as a cavalry officer and a war correspondent, none had brought him the fame and fortune he so ardently sought. Just a few months before the war began, he failed in his first attempt to win a seat in Parliament. Churchill had no money, no occupation and, it appeared, no one who believed in him quite as much as he believed in himself, Millard writes. What he needed, he thought, was another war.

His countrymen shared his war fever. For decades, the British had been vying with the Boers, descendants of early Dutch settlers in South Africa, for control of the region. When huge deposits of gold and diamonds were discovered in the Boer republic of the Transvaal, armed conflict became inevitable.

"Hero of the Empire: The Boer War, a Daring Escape, and the Making of Winston Churchill" by Candice Millard (Doubleday)

As most Britons saw it, their empire, the mightiest in the world, would crush the upstart Boers in a matter of weeks, if not days. Desperate to get to Africa before that happened, Churchill persuaded a London newspaper, the Morning Post, to make him its war correspondent. Laden with an enormous cache of provisions that included 18 bottles of 10-year-old Scotch, he arrived in Cape Town at the end of October.

Two weeks later, Churchill accompanied an armored British train on a reconnaissance mission. When a large Boer force ambushed it, he took control of the chaotic situation, helping to clear derailed cars from the tracks and loading injured soldiers onto the engine, which managed to escape. He was captured, along with some 60 British troops.

Much to Churchills surprise, the Boers treated him and the other prisoners with civility and respect. He was sent to a British officers camp housed in a former teacher training college in the Boer capital, Pretoria. There, he and his fellow prisoners were allowed to receive visitors, buy cigarettes and extra food, and even hire a barber for weekly shaves. As lenient as his confinement was, however, Churchill considered it intolerable because, as Millard notes, it denied him the glory of battle and an opportunity for recognition and advancement.

Determined to escape, he learned that two other prisoners had already come up with a plan. When he pressured them to include him, they initially resisted, arguing that he was physically unfit and, more important, couldnt keep a secret. After his relentless demands wore them down, he immediately proved the validity of their fears by informing other inmates that he was about to leave.

He also disregarded his co-conspirators order that, no matter what happened, he could not go it alone. On Dec. 12, the night chosen for the escape, the two chief plotters decided to postpone it because of the vigilance of the Boer sentries guarding the camps perimeter fence. But when the sentries turned their backs for a moment, Churchill couldnt resist. He rushed to the fence and clambered over it.

Hiding in bushes on the other side, he suddenly realized the implications of his rash decision. His fellow plotters had acquired the provisions needed for a successful escape, including a compass, a map and food. Churchill had nothing  not even the remotest idea about the direction in which he should initially head.

For more than a day, he followed railroad tracks that he hoped would lead east  across 300 miles of Boer territory to Portuguese East Africa and freedom. His resourcefulness in evading the Boers massive manhunt for him was matched by extraordinary luck, including a chance encounter with John Howard, the manager of a coal mine in the Transvaal and one of the few Englishmen whom the Boers had allowed to remain in their territory. For several days, Howard hid Churchill in his mine, then, with the help of several friends, smuggled him onto a freight train to Lourenco Marques, the capital of Portuguese East Africa.

Less than two months after his arrival in Africa, Churchill found himself the celebrity he had always wanted to be. Newspapers in Britain and elsewhere had avidly covered his exploits on the ambushed train, his imprisonment and escape, and the Boers relentless search for him. It didnt matter that the ambush had been an insignificant skirmish rather than a major battle. As it happened, all the major battles thus far had been won not by the vaunted British army but by the supposedly inferior Boers. Stunned by their countrys string of defeats and huge list of casualties, the British public needed a hero as much as Churchill wanted to be one.

It took 2 1/2 more years for the British to finally vanquish the Boers. Little more than a decade later, the staggering human cost of that conflict would be eclipsed by the bloodbath of World War I. Churchill, meanwhile, returned to Britain in the summer of 1900 and was elected to Parliament soon thereafter. It is clear to me from the figures, he wrote, that nothing but personal popularity arising out of the late South African War, carried me in.

Forty years later, he would win lasting fame in World War II when, as British prime minister, he rallied his countrymen to stand alone against Nazi Germany. In those dark days of 1940, Churchill finally achieved the greatness he had always sought.
Michelle Obama asked voters to consider the temperament of this years presidential candidates during her first campaign event for Hillary Clinton since endorsing her at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia in an emotionally stirring speech.

When you are making life-or-death and war-or-peace decisions, a president cant just pop off, she said Friday at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va.

As the first lady did in her convention address, she pointedly criticized Donald Trump as a poor role model  but without mentioning his name.

To start with, we need someone who is going to take this job seriously, she said, describing herself as someone who has seen the presidency up close and knows what it takes to do the job. Someone who will study and prepare and know the issues better than anyone on their team. The president can hire the best advisers on earth, but let me tell you that five different advisers will give five different [answers].

The president has to make the call, she said. We need someone who is compassionate . . . someone who will be a role model for our kids. . . . If a [candidate] is erratic, if [they] disrespect our fellow citizens . . . let me tell you, that is who they are. A candidate is not going to suddenly change once they get in office. . . . And at that point, it is too late. They are the leader of the worlds largest economy.

First lady Michelle Obama campaigns for Hillary Clinton at the Johnson Center at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va., on Sept.16, 2016. (Photo by Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post) (Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post)

[Michelle Obama gave the best speech of the Democratic Convention]

With 53 days until Election Day, she steadily emphasized character, alongside policy, as she especially targeted young voters, encouraging them to get involved.

Clintons support among millennials is soft, but such audiences are among Michelle Obamas favorite crowds. She seemed to feed off the energy of the college students who dominated the audience. Near the top of her remarks, Obama noted that her family is almost at the end of our time.

My husbands going to need a new job. Im going to have to find a job. Were going to have to get the old house cleaned up so we can get our security deposit back, she joked. The crowd interrupted her, chanting Four more years! for more than 20 seconds.

You have me and Barack working on your behalf for the rest of our lives, she said.

Although the majority of her speech focused on Clintons credentials, Obama couched the candidates vision for the United States as an extension of the progress she said her husband has made in righting the economy, extending health care and pushing for greater equality for the LGBT community.

First, she called Clinton the most prepared person in history to take on the presidency, echoing language used by her husband. And, yes, she happens to be a woman, the first lady added.

First Lady Michelle Obama campaigns for Hillary Clinton at The Johnson Center at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. (Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post)

Then, the first lady painted a picture of the nation as headed in the right direction.

Do you want to go back to the way things were before Barack Obama was elected? she asked.

Obama, who came to the national stage as a reluctant political spouse, has not loved campaigning but became effective at it. Until Friday, she had not been on the political stump since her husbands last race. But during her time in the White House, on the trail for him,she has honed the art of subtle messaging and staying out of the partisan fray.

Being president isnt anything like being on reality TV, she said to cheers.

[Clinton: Trump owes Obama an apology over birther issue]

Then, of course, there were those who questioned and who continue to question for the past eight years, and up to this very day, whether my husband was even born in this country, Obama said, referring to Trumps embrace of the false birther theory about her husbands birthplace. Well, during his time in office, I think Barack has answered those questions with the examples he set, by going high when they go low. And hes answered these questions with the progress weve achieved together.

In her husbands campaigns, his aides called her the Closer because she would urge crowds to take the tangible actions needed to win. Speaking to donors, she would ask them to max out. And among students, she would elicit pledges to go to the polls and take their friends along.

She asked the crowd to do the same for Clinton, pointing to Virginia as a crucial swing state.

Young voters provided the margin of victory in 2012 for Obama in Virginia, she said.

If you start to feel tired by all the negativity in this election, if you just want to hide under the bed and not come out, [know that] on November 8th you will decide whether we have a president who . . . believes in science and will fight climate change, or not, she said. You will decide whether we have a president who will honor our proud history as a nation of immigrants, or not. You will decide whether we have a president who believes women have the right to make their own choices about their bodies, or not.

The first lady has a pattern of bookending her more partisan moments with those that are purely rooted in pop culture, and the crowd seemed to notice. Before she gave one of the most well-

received speeches of the Democratic nominating convention, she drove around with comedian James Corden for one of his Carpool Karaoke segments on CBSs The Late Late Show. In it, she sang and talked about her work supporting girls education around the world.

[Michelle Obama joins Carpool Karaoke]

Similarly, she started this week by co-hosting Ellen DeGeneress talk show  which included a wacky shopping trip through a CVS store, where the women poured cups of boxed wine for patrons. Amid the antics, Obama was burnishing her legacy and that of her husband, telling DeGeneres that they have seen themselves as role models and have tried to make sure what kids are seeing is something they can be proud of.

That theme, of course, was a big part of her remarks in support of Clinton, and at one point an audience member interrupted to mention the Ellen DeGeneres Show appearance.

Democrats are hoping that the pop-culture cachet and star power that the first lady has built through such appearances will help turn out voters for Clinton  especially young people.
Donald Trump now says Obama was born in the U.S.  but falsely blames Clinton for starting rumor (Video: Peter Stevenson/The Washington Post)

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Donald Trump is, at heart, a showman. He rose to national fame thanks to star turns on reality TV in which he played the tough-talking boss to a group of aspirants hoping to become as successful as he has been in business. His great gift is the ability to draw attention  and then use that attention for his own, usually commercial, purposes.

Trump may have outdone himself on Friday morning. He and his campaign touted a "major" announcement at his newly opened hotel in Washington, D.C., at 10 a.m. The word was that Trump would walk away from his past skepticism about President Obama's citizenship while also laying the blame for the birther movement at the feet of Hillary Clinton. (That, of course, isn't true  according to numerous fact-checkers  but no matter: Trump planned to say it anyway.)

And say it he did. "Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it," Trump said. "President Obama was born in the United States. Period."

Trump's assertions about Clinton's role in the birther movement are wrong. His simple statement that Obama was born in the United States directly contradicts myriad statements he has made questioning the president's birthplace over the past five years.

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But neither of those things were the most amazing part of that Trump event. The most amazing thing was that it took the Republican nominee 29 minutes to deliver those three sentences. The event was slated to start at 10 a.m. Eastern time. It wasn't until 11 a.m. that it actually began  with Trump touting his new hotel and proclaiming that it is likely to be one of the best in the world. He then ceded the stage to a parade of decorated military veterans who testified to his toughness, his judgment and his temperament.

Cable networks seemed to not know what to do. All three of them  MSNBC, Fox News and CNN  stayed with the generals' testimonials for the better part of 20 minutes. That's a remarkable amount of free cable time to dedicate to a series of surrogates testifying how great one of the two party nominees is.

When was the last time CNN covered a full Clinton event with multiple surrogate speakers? This is unreal.  Guy Cecil (@guycecil) September 16, 2016

The networks eventually cut away from the generals, but then Trump was back at the mic  roughly 90 minutes after his event was originally slated to start. Meaning that he drew an hour and a half of live coverage for:

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1. An empty podium.

2. A series of military endorsements/testimonials.

3. Three sentences from Trump himself  one that is totally false and two others that represent a total reversal from a position he held as recently as, well, Thursday night.

It was a low moment for politics and political coverage. A nothing-burger filled with falsehoods covered as though it was the Super Bowl. But for Trump, it might have been his crowning achievement: All eyes on him with the chance to direct the play in whatever way he saw fit. The ringmaster  calling the shots in all three rings of the circus. It was peak Trump.

What Donald Trump is doing on the campaign trail Share Share Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Reddit Share on LinkedIn MailSolid Email this link View Photos View Photos Next Image MANCHESTER, NH - NOVEMBER 7: Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks during a campaign event at SNHU Arena in Manchester, NH on Monday November 07, 2016. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)

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Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump falsely claimed on Sept. 16 that Hillary Clinton was responsible for starting the birther movement that accused President Obama of lying about his birthplace. (The Washington Post)

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump falsely claimed on Sept. 16 that Hillary Clinton was responsible for starting the birther movement that accused President Obama of lying about his birthplace. (The Washington Post)

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump on Friday acknowledged for the first time that President Obama was born in the United States, ending his long history of stoking unfounded doubts about the nations first African American president but also seeking to falsely blame Democratic rival Hillary Clinton for starting the rumors.

Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it. I finished it. You know what I mean, Trump said Friday morning at his newly opened luxury hotel in Washington. President Barack Obama was born in the United States. Period.

This is not the first time that Trump has accused Clinton of sparking speculation over Obamas birthplace, an assertion that has been repeatedly disproved by fact-checkers who have found no evidence that Clinton or her campaign questioned Obamas birth certificate or his citizenship.

Trumps 35-second statement included no apology, and he did not disavow the birther movement that he effectively led for more than five years.

Earlier Friday morning, Clinton said Trump owes Obama an apology for promoting the false theory. She did not directly address Trumps accusation that her 2008 campaign promoted the same theory, but her current campaign flatly rejected that claim.

Donald Trump spent a lot of time raising doubts over President Obama's birth certificate in 2011. He finally admitted Obama was born in the U.S. on Sept. 16, but falsely accused Hillary Clinton's campaign of starting the rumor. (Peter Stevenson/The Washington Post)

For five years, he has led the birther movement to delegitimize our first black president, Clinton said at a gathering of black women at a Washington hotel. His campaign was founded on this outrageous lie. There is no erasing it in history.

[Fact Checker debunks Trump claim that Clinton started birther movement]

Obama told reporters Friday that he already was pretty confident about where I was born. First lady Michelle Obama noted at a Friday rally in Fairfax, Va., that there are those who still question whether my husband was even born in the country.

White House press secretary Josh Earnest said that with regard to an apology, I dont think the president much cares.

Trumps statement came as he promoted his newly opened hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue NW. The event began more than an hour late and, for the first 25 minutes, consisted of a series of military veterans talking about why they support Trump. The lineup included retired Lt. Gen. Thomas G. McInerney, who has publicly questioned the presidents place of birth.

Many of the major cable networks carried the event live, although several cut away as it dragged on. Afterward, Trump took no questions from reporters, who were seated behind several rows of cheering supporters. Reporters stood on chairs and shouted at Trump, with one of them yelling, Take some questions!

For years, Trump has been the most prominent backer of the birther movement, which lurked in the dark corners of the Internet until Trump, with the help of conservative media, brought it into the mainstream. Beginning in 2011, Trump tried to drum up publicity for his own possible run for the White House by loudly questioning Obamas qualifications for office. Trump never said where he thought the president was born, but he demanded to see the presidents long-form birth certificate and other records. Trump also claimed to have hired investigators who traveled to Hawaii.

Donald Trump, shown in New Hampshire in 2011 as he weighed a presidential bid, spent more than five years raising unfounded doubts about President Obamas birthplace. (Jim Cole/AP)

Birtherism is far from the only conspiracy that Trump has embraced. Trump has also accused the father of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) of being connected to the murder of President John F. Kennedy. Trump has raised suspicions over the deaths of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia in February and Vince Foster  a deputy White House counsel in President Bill Clintons administration  in 1993. Trump claimed that on 9/11 he watched thousands and thousands of Muslims on rooftops in New Jersey celebrating the destruction and has warned that Syrian refugees might be a Trojan horse waiting to destroy the United States.

[Trump: Never wrong, never sorry, never responsible]

Questions about Obamas birthplace surfaced in 2007 as he faced Hillary Clinton in the Democratic presidential primaries. In the spring of that year, some Clinton supporters circulated anonymous emails questioning Obamas citizenship, but there is no evidence the campaign encouraged such messages.

Trump campaign officials on Friday pointed to a 2007 memo sent by the Clinton campaigns pollster at the time, Mark Penn, suggesting that Clinton should focus on Obamas lack of American roots, but the document made no mention of his birthplace.

The Trump campaign also highlighted a Friday CNN interview with former Clinton campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle in which she said the campaign removed a volunteer in Iowa who had forwarded an email promoting the conspiracy theory.

Hillary made the decision immediately to let that person go, she said. We let that person go.

In April 2011, after renewed questions raised by Trump, Obama released his long-form Hawaiian birth certificate, and Trump congratulated himself by saying that he had accomplished something that nobody else has been able to accomplish.

But Trump did not revise his position, and he repeatedly questioned the validity of the birth certificate. In an October 2011 interview with CNN, Trump said that if you check out the Internet, many people say it is not real. In August 2012, Trump tweeted that an extremely credible source has called my office and told me that @BarackObamas birth certificate is a fraud.

Days before the 2012 election, Trump said in an online video that Obama is the least transparent president in the history of this country and demanded that Obama release his college records and applications, along with passport records. Trump said that if he ran for president, he would release his tax returns  something that he now refuses to do, because he says several years of his returns are under audit by the Internal Revenue Service. Trump is the first nominee from a major party since 1976 to not release his returns; he has also declined to release documentation of his wifes immigration from Slovenia, his full medical records and other documents typically shared by nominees.

When Trump launched his then-long-shot presidential bid in June 2015, he continued to say in interviews that he did not know whether Obama was born in the United States, although he did not dwell on the issue as he once had. At rallies, Trump repeatedly suggested that the president might not be Christian or that he might sympathize with Islamic State terrorists. In January, Trump said on CNN that he did not know where the president was born.

Who knows? Who knows? Who cares right now? Trump said on Jan. 6 on CNN. Were talking about something else, okay? I mean, I have my own theory on Obama. Someday Ill write a book. Ill do another book, and it will do very successfully.

[Clinton: Trump owes Obama an apology over birther issue]

A sizable minority of voters agreed with Trump. A 2010 Washington Post-ABC News poll found 20 percent saying Obama was born in another country, while 77 percent said he was born in the United States. Those believing Obama was foreign-born plummeted to 10 percent in a 2011 Post-ABC poll after Obama released his long-form birth certificate, but a CNN-ORC poll last September found the number had returned to 20 percent.

In the CNN survey, the belief that Obama was born outside the United States peaked at 26 percent among Republicans and 34 percent among self-identified tea party supporters, compared with 19 percent of independents and 12 percent of Democrats. Among all those who said Obama was born outside the United States, about half thought there was solid evidence for their view, while the rest said it was only their suspicion.

The attacks on the qualifications of the countrys first black president were particularly offensive to many African American voters. As Trump began to make a pitch to minority voters in August, there was renewed debate over Trumps role in the birther movement.

Democrats seized on Trumps statement Friday in an attempt to galvanize African American voters around Clintons bid, ramping up their effort to portray Trump as a racist. While polls show Clinton drawing an overwhelming share of the black vote, the concern for Democrats has been whether African Americans, particularly younger voters, will feel compelled to turn out in numbers approaching those that Obama drew.

Members of the Congressional Black Caucus political action committee called for an apology on Friday. For them, Trumps comments came across as insulting and pandering, considering how many years Trump had promulgated the birther theory.

He founded it, and that catapulted him into his campaign for the presidency, said Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), who suggested the election would be a referendum on bigotry.

Rep. James E. Clyburn (D-S.C.) said that while he is used to dog whistles in politics, he has had a difficult time adjusting to these howls of wolves.

These are howls. These are not whistles, Clyburn said. . . . This is not just about the contest for the presidency. This man is on a mission to heap as much insult on this president, to do as much as he possibly can to delegitimize his presidency and to play into a narrative that has been floated in this country for over 200 years.

[Sullivan: Its time for TV news to stop playing the stooge for Trump]

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee sent out a fundraising appeal on Friday that bluntly stated, We dont want to see this racist man become our President.

Republican former presidential candidate Ben Carson  who now advises Trump, especially on race issues  said on CNN earlier this month that Trump could immediately improve his relationship with African American voters by apologizing for questioning the presidents place of birth.

On Labor Day, reporters aboard Trumps plane asked him where the president was born, and Trump refused to answer.

I dont talk about it, because if I talk about that, your whole thing will be about that, Trump said. So I dont talk about it.

In an interview with The Washington Post reported online Thursday, Trump was again unwilling to say that Obama was born in the United States, even though several surrogates had said in recent weeks that he now believed it.

I just dont want to answer it yet, Trump said.

That night, Trumps campaign said in a statement that the candidate does believe Obama was born in the United States and that Trump deserves credit for putting to rest questions about Obamas birth.

Early Friday, Trump said in an interview on Fox Business that he would make a big announcement about his stance on the presidents birthplace during the hotel campaign event.

You watch my statement, Trump said. We have to keep the suspense going. Okay? So you watch.

Before Trump took the stage, Clinton addressed the Black Womens Agenda group at a hotel less than a mile away from Trumps new one.

Donald Trump looks at President Obama after eight years as our president; he still doesnt see him as an American, Clinton said. Think about how dangerous that is. Imagine a person in the Oval Office who traffics in conspiracy theories and refuses to let them go, no matter what the facts are.

Karoun Demirjian, John Wagner, Sean Sullivan, Scott Clement and David Nakamura contributed to this report.
Its hard work to be on a board of directors, but your home is your investment, and you certainly want to protect it as best you can. (Michael Nagle/Bloomberg)

I have just been elected president of our new condominium. Our new board of directors has just taken over from the developer, but frankly we are at a loss as to where and how to go. Any suggestions?  Harry

Harry, my condolences. Being a board member is not fun; the hours are long, the pay is zero and no one ever thanks you for your hard work. They do, however, complain a lot.

What many condo owners  especially first-time home buyers  do not understand is that many associations are big businesses, with budgets in the millions of dollars. Unless owners get involved, learn the process and hire competent professionals, the association may be headed for disaster  financially as well as emotionally.

A condominium board comes into existence when the condo documents are recorded among the land records in the county or city where the property is located. The developer selects the first board of directors, which manages the association until turnover of control is accomplished. In general, the laws in the surrounding jurisdictions require that control be turned over to the owners within so many years after the first sale, or when a certain percent of the homes have been sold, whichever comes first. The turnover requirement is spelled out in your associations governing documents.

[More Kass: In a crisis, condo board needs its own attorney]

Transition between developer and owner control is perhaps the most important aspect of any community association. If done properly, the association will be off to a good start; if done poorly, it may take a long time to get back on track. And some associations never succeed.

Once the owners are in control, there are four mandatory steps that must be taken by the new board:

Select a management company: The new board must decide whether to retain the existing management company  which had been selected by and may be too loyal to the developer  or select a totally independent management company. The association may decide to forgo hiring such a company and become self-managed, but I personally do not recommend this, even for a small association. If the board gets involved in everything from collecting condo fees to arranging to shovel snow and cut the grass, burnout will take place quickly. The boards role is to make sure that management is doing its job and reporting monthly to the board.

Audit the books : An independent auditor or a certified public accountant must examine the associations books. It is important for members of the new board to satisfy themselves (and the owners they represent) that during the time the developer was in control, all money collected and all expenses paid were properly accounted for. Keep in mind that while the developer is in control of the association, the developer also has access to the association funds. You want to make sure that funds that should have been paid by the developer are not inadvertently (or purposely) paid out of association proceeds.

[More Kass: Be careful in buying a time-share. Trying to sell it later can be hard.]

Sometimes, the developer-controlled board may have allowed owners to become seriously delinquent in paying their association fees. The new board must establish a comprehensive collection policy that will be applied uniformly. I am a strong believer in not letting owners get more than one month behind. Its easier to collect when the owner does not owe a lot of money.

My advice to condo boards: Your policy should be zero tolerance but with a heart. Clearly, if owners have legitimate financial problems, you should try to work with them and develop a comfortable payment schedule. But you have a fiduciary duty to those who elected you, and making sure you are not going into debt is part of your obligations.

Retain legal counsel : The association should retain a lawyer knowledgeable about community association laws. The lawyer will have to handle a wide variety of issues, ranging from developer problems  such as warranty and other transition issues  to assisting the association in its day-to-day activities. A community association is not only a mini-democracy  it is also a business and must function in that capacity as well. Issues ranging from zoning to criminal, labor to health are some of the problems that associations encounter.

Physical inspection of the property : The board should hire a licensed engineer to inspect the common areas of the complex. The engineer should determine whether there are any warranty defects that should be called to the attention of the developer. The engineer can also help the board determine the proper level of reserves that are needed for future repairs. This is known as a reserve analysis study.

The professional engineer determines the useful life of the major components in the complex  the roof, elevators and other common areas  and the projected cost to replace them at the end of their life. On an annual basis, sufficient funds should be placed in reserve so that when the component wears out, there will be enough money in reserve to pay for its replacement.

Otherwise, each owner may face a large special assessment. Financial organizations, such as Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Housing Administration, all look at an associations budget when determining whether to approve a loan for a purchase or even a refinance. And having adequate reserves is very important to those lenders.

Turnover of developer control is the most important aspect in determining the future success of a community association.

Good dialogue among unit owners, the developer and the board goes a long way toward creating a successful association. Its hard work to be on a board of directors, but your home is your investment, and you certainly want to protect it as best you can.

Benny L. Kass is a Washington and Maryland lawyer. This column is not legal advice and should not be acted upon without obtaining legal counsel. Send questions to blkass@ kmklawyers.com.
I attended a party recently and was speaking with a young woman who expressed her dismay regarding the choice of candidates for president. She said she thought she might not vote. Instead of talking with her about the choice she faced, I said nothing. I regret that so, now, I am addressing that woman and others who think there is no good choice.

In my mind, there is only one choice and that is to vote for a woman who has championed women and children for decades, who believes that women have the right to quality reproductive health care services. The choice is for a woman who believes in the right to education and the right to health care for all Americans. She thinks that the right to vote is an amazing opportunity and believes in the Second Amendment but also supports expanded background checks and thinks that not everyone should need to carry an assault rifle. My choice is for a woman who believes that all Americans have the same right to live with dignity, security and respect, regardless of who they are or who they love. It's for a woman who believes in the right of freedom of religion and freedom of speech and is favor of fair wages for all, who believes that women deserve equal pay for equal work.
German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen attends a news conference in Berlin in July. She says that Britains decision to leave the European Union offers an opportunity for greater military cooperation in the bloc. (Markus Schreiber/AP)

European leaders gathered Friday to discuss the torrent of challenges facing their continent after Britains decision to leave the European Union, offering broad new defense efforts amid growing concerns that they are too dependent on the United States for security.

Deeply divided about how to keep the bloc from further spiraling apart, leaders found little unity on a specific vision for a Europe without Britain. But there was more agreement that Europe should increase military coordination, after a tough push from both President Obama and Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump over their lagging defense spending.

[Top E.U. official: Trump is a problem for the whole world]

The proposals, including a Franco-German idea to create a centralized European military headquarters in Brussels, were part of a wide-ranging conclave held in Bratislava, Slovakia, on how to combat a rising tide of public skepticism about the European Unions value. Security has become a central focus, but military spending in most E.U. nations also falls below the levels desired by NATO: Only four NATO countries apart from the United States meet the bar, and the United States spends more than twice as much as all the other nations combined.

Although E.U. nations have mustered other joint military efforts in recent years, they have often been criticized for being slow to move during crises, reflecting the difficulty of mobilizing members of a 28-nation bloc on an ad hoc basis.

Stronger coordination among European countries could bolster militaries that have relied on American firepower as a crutch, reducing duplication among countries in the name of creating a continent-wide force to defend the bloc of 500 million citizens.

Let everyone know that if the United States makes a choice to pull back, Europe must be able to defend itself, French President Francois Hollande said Friday as he entered the talks.

The endeavors could offer a retort to both Democrats and Republicans, who have questioned Europes reliance on the United States for defense. But critics say resources could be better spent in partnership with NATO, the existing military alliance that includes the United States and most E.U. countries. A Europe that is more independent militarily would also be more capable of pursuing a foreign policy path more distinct from the United States, potentially widening cracks in Western unity, although few experts believe this is likely.

[NATO allies respond to Trumps suggestion that the U.S. might not protect them from Russia]

The attempt to improve security was a rare spot of unity for a summit of 27 leaders  British Prime Minister Theresa May was not invited  with seemingly 27 different plans for Europe. The discussion comes after the migration crisis swept millions of asylum seekers into Europe last year, fueling worries from Paris to Prague that the borderless E.U. was a burden, not a boon.

We are in such a critical situation in Europe after the referendum in Britain, German Chancellor Angela Merkel told reporters after the day-long meeting that was held in part on a pleasure boat that cruised down the Danube. She said leaders had agreed to put together a reform plan by March of next year.

The leaders made little secret of their disagreements, from the virtues of economic austerity to Brussels role in handling threats from Russia and the Islamic State. The discord left little room for an older, loftier view of the E.U., rooted in its post-World War II history as a project to bring peace to Europe.

I am not going to follow a script to show that we are all united, Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi said after the meeting broke up. The summit accomplished too little, he added on Twitter. Without changing policies on the economy and immigration, Europe risks a lot.

Ahead of Fridays meeting, France and Germany unveiled a proposal for increased cooperation that would create a permanent headquarters to run E.U. military operations. Those military efforts currently include an anti-people-smuggling operation in the Mediterranean and an anti-pirate campaign off the coast of Somalia.

European nations would also team up to bolster capabilities in areas where they lag, such as air-to-air refueling. In the past, they have been forced to turn to the U.S. military for assistance. E.U. nations would also share aerial reconnaissance information and work to make combined European military battalions more ready to deploy into combat at short notice.

Other E.U. leaders have proposed jointly owned drones and other commonly held equipment that could supplement European deployments.

The discussions about bolstering defense cooperation are supported by an unusual coalition of leaders. Central European leaders who have been some of the most strident opponents of taking in migrants have embraced the idea of a full-fledged E.U. military force, warning that Britains exit from the E.U. will significantly sap the continents defense capabilities.

Britain, which has Europes most powerful military, long blocked any discussion of centralizing European military might, in part because the E.U. was so unpopular domestically. The dissolution of the Soviet Union also left many E.U. nations feeling that they faced no obvious military threat.

[The Baltics tangled geography that has both sides feeling surrounded]

But Russias annexation of Crimea renewed fears along Europes eastern flank. And the migration crisis forced a recognition that Europes borders were being defended by some of its weakest countries.

The efforts to pool European defense would touch one of the core aspects of national sovereignty: the military, years after many European countries agreed to share a single currency and rely on one another for border controls.

In those fields, many European citizens feel stung after the euro crisis highlighted sharp differences in how best to spur growth and the migration crisis ushered a stream of refugees into Europe amid disagreements about how and whether to house them.

E.U. leaders warn that if the bloc fails to ensure security for its citizens, it could rapidly fall apart. The Syrian conflict may once have seemed far away to European citizens, but not after last years flood of migrants and a cascade of Islamic State-inspired terrorist attacks.

The borders between internal and external security have simply evaporated, said Jo Coelbart, a retired Belgian general who works on European defense policy at the Brussels-based Egmont Foundation.

That challenge has spurred the new defense proposals.

It was a sad moment for Europe when the British people decided to leave, and so it requested an honest diagnosis, said European Council President Donald Tusk, summing up conversations that extended beyond security to issues of prosperity, migration and a host of other challenges. People are concerned about what they see as a loss of control.

Despite the range of views, defense cooperation may be among the least-divisive projects for Europes future, particularly with American commitments to European security the most questionable since the end of World War II. Trump has said that he would not automatically come to the defense of other NATO alliance members but would first review how much those nations have done for their own defense. Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, like Obama, has encouraged European nations to bolster defense spending but has said she will hold firm to U.S. defense commitments.

With Trump jumping up and down saying hell tear up the NATO treaty if the Europeans dont shape up, theres a desire to show progress, said Nick Witney, a fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations who ran the European Defense Agency, an E.U. institution whose efforts face strict limits because of the European reluctance to hand over security powers to Brussels.

There are plenty of things that could be done to get more bang for the euro by avoiding the endless national duplication, he said.

Read more

Turkeys migrant deal with Europe may collapse under post-coup-attempt crackdown

Anger in France over Nice attack focuses on apparently lax security

Nice attack propels anti-immigrant sentiments into Frances mainstream

Todays coverage from Post correspondents around the world
Russian President Vladimir Putin, left, talks to the head of Moscow State University, Viktor Sadovnichiy, during a visit to a laboratory that contains the Lomonosov supercomputer in 2014. (Mikhail Klimentyev/AP)

The recent spate of embarrassing emails and other records stolen by Russian hackers is President Vladimir Putins splashy response to years of what he sees as U.S. efforts to weaken and shame him on the world stage and with his own people, according to Russia experts here and in the U.S. intelligence world and academia.

Putin is seeking revenge and respect, and trying to reassert Russias lost superpower status at a time of waning economic clout and an upcoming Russian election, according to interviews with specialists here and in Washington, with a senior U.S. intelligence official, recently retired CIA operations officers in charge of Russia, and the last three national intelligence officers for Russia and Eurasia analysis in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

Hes saying, if you think you have the chops to do this  well, we do, too! said Fiona Hill, a national intelligence officer for Russia during the George W. Bush and Obama administrations who is now at the Brookings Institution.

First came the electronic break-ins of senior U.S. officials emails, followed by the Democratic National Committees email server just before the convention, then a few state election records. And this week, the medical files of celebrated American Olympians marked tit-for-tat revenge against the ouster of Russian athletes found to be illegally doping from this years Olympics.

Hes giving us the finger . . . and the hacks are meant to intimidate the hell out of us, said Hill, who went through five troubled iPhones in six months after the release of her 2015 book, Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin.

The Posts Ellen Nakashima goes over the events and discusses the two hacker groups responsible. (Jhaan Elker/The Washington Post)

Where the Chinese government takes a long-term, strategic approach to stealing U.S. secrets  vacuuming up millions of security clearance resumes for future espionage use, and commercial and military trade secrets to aid its own development  the Russian game is a tactical one where context and timing matter greatly, experts agreed.

After years of keeping its hacking activities secret, Russia picked this particularly unsettling moment in U.S. politics to make its exploits public. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump already has said the U.S. political system cannot be trusted and has hinted that the election results may be rigged. Now, after public revelations of Russian hacking, the Democrats as well as U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies are worried about the integrity of the elections.

This is his countrys major adversary, and he sees a chance to exploit its weakness at a crucial moment, said a senior diplomat based in Moscow, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the record.

It all plays into Putins narrative that his democratic critics are simply U.S. agents and that American democracy is as politically corrupt as any other form of government. Some in Russia see a mirror image in the American response to the hacking.

I find the political reaction from the United States very harmful to democracy all over the world, said Alexander Baunov, a former Russian diplomat and now a senior associate at the Carnegie Moscow Center. They do the same that Putin does, ascribing every problem possible . . . to interference from abroad. You cant imagine how much harm it does. . . . The image we see here is the Putinization of American politics.

The antics have also forced world attention back to Putin, giving him the aura of a superpower leader. On Wednesday, for example, three of the six front-page stories in the New York Times were about Russia  its role in Syria, its latest high-profile hack and its secret influence campaigns in Europe.

Putin is still recovering from belittling remarks that Obama made when he described the country as a regional power, said Angela Stent, national intelligence officer for Russia from 2004 to 2006. Its a way of reasserting Russia. Whatever the truth, Russia is back.

U.S. intelligence and law enforcement officials have increased monitoring of what they see as a broader Russian covert influence campaign that could include tampering with the upcoming presidential election.

According to a senior U.S. intelligence official, Russia is using the playbook it has used in Europe to try to destabilize public trust in government, weaken support for the NATO military alliance and sway voters to candidates more amenable to Putins views and goals.

The campaign involves investing in Kremlin-controlled media such as RT and Sputnik, planting disinformation and other covert activities.

Moscow appears to be looking to demonstrate its importance as a dominant regional player and world leader, but faces limitations in its capacity, given a stagnant economy, demographic decline and often ham-fisted foreign policy approaches, noted the intelligence official. Russia also seeks to counter U.S. leadership and influence in the international system.

For more than a decade, Moscow has accused Washington of meddling in its sovereign affairs, alleging that the State Department sponsors political dissent while the CIA orchestrates coups detat in the Kremlins sphere of influence.

The color revolutions  pro-democracy street protests that toppled governments from 2003 to 2005 in several former Soviet republics, including Ukraine  marked a turning point in relations between Russia and the United States. After Russias disputed 2011 parliamentary elections sparked demonstrations, Putin claimed that then-

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had sent a signal to protesters by declaring the elections neither free nor fair.

Russian military planners began treating color revolutions as a new approach to warfare and power projection. In 2014, when protesters toppled Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych amid a broader debate about whether Ukraines future lay with Russia or the West, Putin claimed he had intelligence that the demonstrators had been paid and trained by instructors abroad.

What I believe is absolutely unacceptable is the resolution of internal political issues in the former U.S.S.R. republics, through color revolutions, through coups detat, through unconstitutional removal of power, Putin said on the 60 Minutes news program in September 2015. That is totally unacceptable.

Experts who have worked in Russia said the security services budgets for influence and cyber-operations are ample and their operational skills, so active during the Soviet era, have only been sharpened since.

U.S. intelligence agencies, which have been overwhelmingly focused on countering terrorism abroad and at home, are now expanding spying operations against Russia on a greater scale than at any time since the end of the Cold War, U.S. officials told The Washington Post this week.

Russia has smarted over the Obama administrations refusal to sign a formal treaty banning the use of attacks in cyberspace, especially after it was revealed that the United States and Israel had developed a malicious cyberweapon, Stuxnet, to sabotage Irans nuclear program.

Moscow and Washington disagree over the definition of cybersecurity. The United States wants the agreement to cover only computers and networks, the technology of cybersecurity. Russia wants it to include the content that moves on the Internet, which Washington interprets as condoning censorship.

The United States signed a cybersecurity agreement last year with China.

Its an emotional story of Russia not being treated like a superpower and, for many of them, its a personal story, said Andrey Soldatov, an expert on Russian Internet surveillance and the countrys security services.

Soldatov said the recent anti-Russia rhetoric is quite sad, to be honest. . . . Before, only Russians spoke about interference from outside countries during elections. And now we see the use of exactly the same words from the Americans. It gives a trump card to the Russians. . . . They can say, Well, you started it, and were just defending ourselves. 

Far from worrying about retaliation, Russias leadership is probably enjoying the attention, said Gleb Pavlovsky, Putins former political strategist and now an independent political consultant out of favor with the Kremlin.

The kinds of statements from the United States about Russian hackers make the Kremlin happy, he said. They show the Kremlin is capable of affecting the U.S. elections. All thats left is for Russia to affect the stock market in New York and everything will be perfect.

Priest reported from Washington.

Read more

As Russia reasserts itself, U.S. intelligence agencies focus anew on the Kremlin

Syria shows that Russia built an effective military. Now how will Putin use it?

Trump advisers public comments, ties to Moscow stir unease in both parties

Todays coverage from Post correspondents around the world
Clashes erupted Friday between Syrian rebels and government forces just outside Damascus, state media and activists said, puncturing days of calm under a cease-fire brokered by Russia and the United States.

The battles did not appear to seriously threaten the truce or immediately spark wider unrest, although the fighting in the Damascus suburb of Jobar underscored the fragile hold of the cease-fire since it took effect Monday.

Of primary concern to U.S. and United Nations officials, however, was the failure of aid agencies, for the fourth day in a row, to reach besieged populations in the city of Aleppo and other areas, including embattled sites near Damascus.

The largest impediment is [Syrian President Bashar al-] Assad not giving the green light to trucks coming across the border to reach Aleppo, an Obama administration official said in Washington.

The official said that the Syrians were claiming that government offices were closed and unable to issue the required documentation because of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha.

Under the cease-fire deal, Russia is responsible for ensuring Syrian compliance with its terms. What we think is going on is that the Russians dont appear to have the leverage on Assad that they said they have, said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. Until this aid comes through, I think its hard to see implementation of other parts of the agreement.

A second phase of the deal spells out potential U.S.-Russia military coordination against militant groups, including the Islamic State and a former al-Qaeda faction. Implementation of that phase requires seven consecutive days of reduced violence in Syria as well as delivery of the aid.

In a morning telephone call with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Secretary of State John F. Kerry warned that the United States would not establish the Joint Implementation Center, where the coordination is supposed to take place, unless and until the agreed terms for humanitarian access are met, said State Department spokesman John Kirby.

Washington expects Moscow to use its influence with Assad to allow U.N. humanitarian convoys to reach Aleppo and other areas in need, Kirby said in a statement.

[Despite mistrust of Moscows aims, Pentagon accepts cease-fire plan]

Fridays violence near Damascus was the fiercest reported this week.

The state-run Syrian Arab News Agency said militants attempted to launch raids on military checkpoints near the capital. The army responded with a counteroffensive, the agency said.

Rebels, however, claimed that Syrian troops attacked the area first, launching a three-pronged assault that began in the early morning. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based activist network, said the government targeted Jobar with surface-to-surface missiles.

The regime forces tried to advance under the cover of tanks and mortars, said Muhammad Abu Yaman, an activist with the opposition-aligned Jobar Media Center. We never believed in the truce because we never trusted the regime.

It was not possible to independently verify the accounts, although the Obama administration official charged that Assad was the lead spoiler. But the clashes highlighted the challenges facing the cease-fires broader objectives.

[Remains of Americans killed in Syria finally heading home]

The United States, which has supported opposition rebel groups, and Russia, which backs the Assad government, have hoped the accord will pave the way for political negotiations to end the bloodshed.

While the truce has reduced the level of violence, disputes have emerged over the most basic tenets of the deal. Under the agreement, combatants are expected to withdraw from Castello Road, the only way in and out of the besieged part of eastern Aleppo. Each side has accused the other of failing to pull back.

A retreat from the road would allow U.N. agencies and other aid groups to bring lifesaving assistance to desperate civilians in Aleppo, now blockaded for more than a month. But a test of security arrangements along the road is possible only once the Syrian government allows the trucks to enter the country, the administration official said.

On Friday, a coalition of at least 100 Syrian and international nongovernmental organizations released a statement urging the United States and Russia to pressure the government and Syrian opposition to allow aid to get through during the rare calm.

Sporadic and temporary cessations of violence cannot become ends in themselves, said the statement, which was signed by organizations including Oxfam and Save the Children. The lives of innocent Syrian civilians are in their hands.

Brita Haji Hasan, president of the opposition council in Aleppo, said in an interview that residents also want access to Castello Road. There also are patients who need to be evacuated for urgent medical care.

The U.N. view is that fuel and commercial traffic are, of course, important, but that its not under their jurisdiction, Hasan said. He vowed that the opposition would not reject the U.N. aid.

But what is happening is unreasonable, he said. There is no clear plan for anything.

Heba Habib in Berlin and Karen DeYoung in Washington contributed to this report.

Read more

Todays coverage from Post correspondents around the world
An Israeli police officer stands guard near the entrance to the Jewish settlement of Kiryat Arba, where a couple allegedly tried to ram a bus stop with a pickup truck on Sept. 16. (Abed Al Hashlamoun/European Pressphoto Agency)

Three suspected assailants were shot and killed Friday in a series of knife and vehicle attacks in Jerusalem and Jewish settlements in the West Bank that left several Israelis lightly injured.

The attacks did not appear to be related, authorities said, but instead carried hallmarks of lone wolf strikes by Palestinians targeting Israel and Jewish settlements in the past year. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for Fridays attacks.

Earlier this week, President Obama and U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon expressed concern about soaring tensions in Israel and the West Bank amid a long-stalled peace process.

After three weeks of relative quiet, a 28-year-old assailant lunged toward Israeli border police stationed at Jerusalems busy Damascus Gate, an entrance to the Old City popular with tourists and Arab residents from East Jerusalem, Israeli authorities said.

The attacker, identified as Saeed Amro, had crossed into Israel from Jordan a day earlier, security officials said. Many Palestinians also have Jordanian passports.

Israeli police said the man rushed at the officers with a knife in each hand before being shot and killed. Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld posted a photograph on Twitter showing three knives placed on the ground.

One witness told the Israeli newspaper Haaretz that Israeli officers thought the man looked suspicious and asked him to raise his shirt. The man shouted Allahu akbar (God is great) and was shot by police. The witness told Haaretz that he didnt see the man attacking anyone.

An hour later, a man and woman allegedly tried to ram a bus stop and run over people at the entrance of the Jewish settlement of Kiryat Arba in the West Bank.

Video of the scene shows a small pickup truck with a smashed front bumper. The man in the car was fatally shot by soldiers, and the woman was wounded and taken to an Israeli hospital, the Israeli army said.

The Palestinian Health Ministry identified the dead Palestinian as Firas Khadour, according to the Agence France-Presse news agency. The Palestinian news agency Maan reported that the wounded woman was his fiancee and said both were 18.

According to the Palestinian report, the wounded woman is the sister of another young Palestinian who was fatally shot by Israeli soldiers at the same junction in June during a similar attempt to ram a car into pedestrians.

In the third attack, Israeli medics said a Palestinian man with a knife attacked soldiers guarding a Jewish settlement in the old city sector of Hebron in the West Bank. The alleged assailant was shot dead, and an Israeli soldier was lightly wounded.

Late Thursday, another Palestinian was killed by Israeli soldiers during a raid in the Hebron area. Israeli news media said the Palestinian was shot as soldiers tried to arrest him.

Since October, there have been hundreds of Palestinian attacks. More than 220 Palestinians have been killed, as well as 34 Israelis and two American visitors.

Israeli leaders have blamed incitement by Palestinians for the spate of attacks. Palestinian officials counter that their youth are frustrated and desperate and are lashing out against Israels almost 50-year military occupation.

Read more

Todays coverage from Post correspondents around the world
This image from a 2013 video shows Warren Weinstein, an American development worker who was kidnapped in Pakistan by al-Qaeda and later accidentally killed in a U.S. drone strike. (AP)

The Obama administration has agreed to pay nearly $3 million to the family of an Italian aid worker who was killed in a CIA drone strike in Pakistan last year, but it has yet to reach a settlement with relatives of an American who was also killed in the attack, U.S. officials said.

The agreement with the family of 39-year-old Giovanni Lo Porto marks the culmination of nearly 18 months of negotiations since President Obama publicly apologized for the deaths of the two aid workers  who were being held hostage by al-Qaeda  and the White House pledged that their families would be compensated.

But the administration remains at an impasse with relatives of Warren Weinstein, a Rockville, Md., resident who was abducted by al-Qaeda in 2011 while working in Lahore, Pakistan, on a U.S. government development contract. Weinstein was 73 when he was killed.

Weinsteins widow said in a statement that she was heartened to hear that the Lo Porto family had reached a settlement with the U.S. government. We hope that this brings them some measure of closure, Elaine Weinstein said. As they and we know all too well, no settlement will ever replace the hurt we feel in our hearts for the unnecessary loss of our loved ones.

The Weinstein family is continuing to work with the government to come to closure on outstanding issues, according to the statement.

The White House declined to confirm details of the payment to the Lo Porto family or discuss the ongoing talks with the Weinstein family. When we announced Mr. Lo Portos death in a U.S. government counterterrorism operation last year, we affirmed that the United States would provide a condolence payment to his family, said Ned Price, a spokesman for the National Security Council. We did so knowing that no dollar figure could ever bring back their loved ones.

Both Weinstein and Lo Porto died in a January 2015 drone attack that raised troubling questions about a CIA program that the administration has frequently touted as peerless in its accuracy and governed by rules that require near certainty no civilians will be killed.

The payment to Lo Portos family was first disclosed Friday by the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, citing documents showing that the agreement was signed July 18 and called for a payment of 1.18 million euros as a donation in the memory of Giovanni Lo Porto.

U.S. officials confirmed the agreement but said the actual sum was closer to 2.6 million euros, or nearly $3 million.

Weinsteins family has been locked in a long and difficult negotiation with the U.S. government since his death was announced early last year. In recent months, the White House has played a lead role in trying to bring those talks to a close and has significantly increased the governments initial offer of compensation.

The two sides have been divided over the process for determining the size of the condolence payment. From the outset of the talks, the U.S. government has largely declined to explain in detail how it arrived at the amount it was offering and has declined requests for an outside arbiter.

The CIA had been conducting drone surveillance of the suspected al-Qaeda compound hit in the early 2015 attack for weeks but failed to detect that Weinstein and Lo Porto were inside until after aerial footage showed two unaccounted-for bodies being removed from the rubble.

Obama pledged an investigation of the incident and was forced to issue an extraordinary public apology four months later when the two aid workers identities were confirmed. I profoundly regret what happened, Obama said in April last year. On behalf of the United States government, I offer our deepest apologies to the families.

The CIA faced additional criticism from senior lawmakers when it was subsequently disclosed that the agency had detected an apparent Western hostage being held by al-Qaeda months before the botched strike but did not keep that person under surveillance.

U.S. officials said that the footage showing a possible hostage was inconclusive, but lawmakers accused the agency of dropping a potential lead on an al-Qaeda captive to keep its drone resources focused on hunting suspected terrorists.

Julie Tate contributed to this report.
Muslims pray to celebrate the Eid al-Adha holiday at a mosque in Islamabad, Pakistan, on Sept. 13, 2016. (B.K. Bangash/AP)

A suicide bomber touched off a deadly blast Friday inside a crowded mosque in Pakistans tribal area near the Afghan border, killing at least 24 people marking the end of a Muslim festival, a government official said.

Naveed Akbar, the assistant administrator in the area of the attack, predicted that the death toll could rise. More than two dozen people were reported wounded, many seriously, he said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but the tribal areas are strongholds of various militant groups that include one faction blamed for recent assaults in the vicinity.

The attack came a day after a woman was killed in the same area, Mohmand district, when militants threw grenades at and opened fire on the house of a pro-government tribal elder, officials said.

The suicide bomber entered a village mosque as more than 300 worshipers were attending weekly prayers just after noon. Shouting God is great, he detonated the explosive, an official said.





The attack came just after the final day of Eid al-Adha, a Muslim festival that includes animal sacrifices and several days of celebration. The Friday prayers were a final ritual after a busy week of feasting and family gatherings.

Akbar, the assistant administrator, said that the suicide bomber and his facilitators appeared to have timed the attack to create a high casualty ratio, since Friday prayers are the most heavily attended of the week.

Officials said they suspected that Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a splinter group of the Pakistani Taliban, was responsible for the attack. The group had claimed it carried out the killing of a Mohmand tribal elder last week.

The same group also claimed responsibility for a recent suicide bombing that killed 14 people outside a courthouse in nearby Mardan and also for a massive bombing outside a hospital in the southern city of Quetta in August, which killed more than 70 people, most of them lawyers.

Pakistans army launched a massive operation two years ago against the Taliban and other armed militant groups in the countrys border tribal areas. Many of those groups fighters were driven into Afghanistan and took up arms against the Kabul government, some in alliance with Islamic State militants.

Constable reported from Islamabad, Pakistan.

Read more:

Muslims in Pakistan and across the world prepare to celebrate Eid al-Adha

Pakistani lawyers gather to reflect a month after shooting and suicide bombing

Todays coverage from Post correspondents around the world
People march to demand the resignation of Mexico's President Enrique Pena Nieto in Mexico City, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, one day before the country's independence day. (AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo) (Eduardo Verdugo/AP)

Donald Trumps rhetoric about immigrants has haunted Mexico for months. On Thursday, the candidate cast a shadow over the countrys independence day celebrations, with protesters criticizing President Enrique Pena Nieto for having met with the Republican presidential hopeful.

A lot of people, including me, see this as treason, said Eduardo Martinez Rodriguez, a psychology student marching against the president. Pena Nieto invited him and didnt say to his face what he said earlier in an interview, when he compared Trumps rhetoric to Hitler and Mussolini. This guy [Trump] basically came and vomited in Los Pinos (the presidential palace).

Mexicos president traditionally gives the Grito or shout of Viva Mexico! at night on Sept. 15 from the balcony of the Palacio Nacional in the downtown Zocalo square, in a re-enactment of a parish priests cry in 1810 that helped launch the fight for independence from Spain.

Thursdays protest began with an evening march to the Zocalo demanding Pena Nietos resignation,but was halted by heavily armed police at the entrance to Mexico Citys historic center.

1 of 14 Full Screen Autoplay Close Skip Ad  Photos from Donald Trumps trip to Mexico to meet with President Pena Nieto View Photos In his first formal international trip as the Republican presidential nominee, Donald Trump visited a country where he is broadly despised for his vilification of illegal immigrants. Caption In his first formal international trip as the Republican presidential nominee, Donald Trump visited a country where he is broadly despised for his vilification of illegal immigrants. Aug. 31, 2016 Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, right, shake hands with Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto after their joint statement at the Los Pinos presidential residence in Mexico City. Dario Lopez-Mills/AP Wait 1 second to continue.

The demonstrators list of grievances was long and reflected in their signs and chants: a botched investigation into the kidnapping and killing of 43 teacher trainees in 2014, corruption scandals touching the top levels of government, and an underwhelming economy  with the peso sliding precipitously as polls put Trump closer to the White House.

He represents the worst of all thats happened in Mexico, said Angel Cespedes, a musician, who admitted marching for the first time ever in a protest  one drawing heavily from the countrys middle class, a rarity in Mexico City. If [Pena Nieto] resigned it would unite people of all social classes. That doesnt happen very often in Mexico.

Then theres the presidents ill-fated invitation to Trump and the fallout from the candidates quick trip to Mexico City on Aug. 31. Trump met with Pena Nieto in Los Pinos, the presidential palace, and escaped without a tongue-lashing for his past comments that Mexican migrants were rapists and robbers, and that the United States should build a giant border wall, paid for by Mexico.

[After subdued trip to Mexico, Trump talks tough on immigration]

Mexico achieved nothing from the visit. Trump only used it as a springboard and it has been very profitable for him. Just look at the polls, said Rodolfo Soriano-Nunez, a sociologist in Mexico City, reflecting sentiments that Pena Nieto made the candidate appear presidential.

Todays will be one of the ugliest Gritos in Mexican history, he predicted.

Pena Nieto has defended the decision to invite Trump, telling Milenio TV he preferred dialogue to insults.

In an interview with The Posts Robert Costa and Philip Rucker Sept. 12, former Mexican president Vicente Fox warned Americans against voting for Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump. (The Washington Post)

But 85 percent of Mexicans regarded the meeting as an error, according to a survey by the newspaper Reforma. Finance Minister Luis Videgaray  the presidents closest collaborator and the person who reportedly promoted the trip as a way to calm jittery financial markets  resigned last week, though an exact explanation wasnt offered.

[Mexicans are angry at their own president for meeting with Trump]

The situation has left many Mexicans feeling underwhelmed on whats often a night celebrating Gritos in town squares across the country, eating traditional dishes like pozole (a pork and hominy soup) and adorning homes and businesses in the national colors of red white and green. The actual independence day is Sept. 16, but the festivities begin the night before.

I dont think theres a lot of spirit this year, said Gerardo Priego Tapia, a former lawmaker with the right-leaning National Action Party (PAN) but now president of a nongovernmental group working with kidnapping victims and their families. Everyone is upset or hurt by something in the country. Too many things have happened.

Some see the discontent as part of a trend of turning the independence celebrations into a time for political protest. It started seriously in 2006, when supporters of that years presidential election runner-up, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, set up a protest camp in the Zocalo to assail a vote they considered rigged.

Others have jeered the president in recent years, though Pena Nieto has tried drowning out the boos by bussing in partisans and others from the nearby state of Mexico, where he was once governor. Photos started surfacing on social media sites Thursday of acarreados (people herded by parties to political events) with boxed lunches boarding buses to attend this years Grito.

We do say that every year, said Esteban Illades, editor of the magazine Nexos, referring to the sour sentiments on celebrating independence day. But I have seen fewer flags draped over buildings or flung from cars. There also seem to be less ambulantes [itinerant vendors] selling the stuff.

Pena Nieto has taken steps to calm any controversy. He canceled a traditional and lavish dinner in the Palacio Nacional  perhaps out of place after promoting austerity in the 2017 budget. First lady Angelica Rivera even promised to recycle a gown for her Grito appearance.

Presidential spokesman Eduardo Sanchez also told the Televisa network, There is absolute openness for criticism and any kind of expression of this kind.

The president is one of the most unpopular in decades, suffering an approval rating of less than 25 percent.

Its a September 16 [independence day] with a very diminished president, said Ilan Semo, historian at the Iberoamerican University. There are many people, who for the first time, feel the president isnt speaking for the nation.

Read more

Inside Mexicos bizarre decision to invite Trump

On the Mexican border, a surge of migrants ahead of a Trump Wall

Halfway through his term, Pena Nieto has tumbled in the polls

Todays coverage from Post correspondents around the world
It was a sad story but not one that Mr. Trump understands. Farmers this year can't afford to purchase new machines, big buildings or expand due to the low crop prices that hardly cover the cost of crop production. The economic drop in purchasing power from rural agriculture will spread to the small towns and bigger cities. This is the way rural life has been for the 80 years that I remember. Small business depends on the purchasing ability, as do the larger cities. The John Deere plant is a huge and wonderful place to visit but they only produce what can be sold, as any well run business would.
Yesterday, thousands of workers and youths marched and protested across France against the Socialist Party's (PSs) reactionary labour law. Even though the trade unions themselves stopped all strike action against the legislation during July and August, at which point the PS had it formally adopted, there is still deep popular opposition. In spring, polls found that over 70 percent of the population opposed the law as it was introduced by the PS.

There were 169 demonstrations across France yesterday, including in Paris, and workers took strike action in a number of sectors, including airlines and mass transit. Trade unions said 170,000 protesters had marched across the country, while police claimed the number was 78,000, as large numbers of students also came out to the demonstrations.

The eastern city of Belfort was a focal point of the protests, as train-maker Alstom is threatening to shut down a locomotive factory in Belfort, where the company made its first steam train in 1880. Some 400 jobs are threatened. Demonstrators marched across the city chanting, Alstom is Belfort, Belfort is Alstom.'

Clashes erupted in several cities, including Paris; 62 people were arrested and 32 taken into custody. Five policemen were injured in Paris, including one hit by a petrol bomb, which somehow evaded the police's attention even after they stopped and thoroughly searched everyone entering Bastille Square for the protest.

As protests begin again over the labour law, workers and youth opposed to the law face even more explicit opposition and hostility from trade unions and pseudo-left political parties that are long-time political allies of the PS.

The trade unions negotiated this labour law, which allows them to negotiate contracts violating France's Labour Code with employers, with the PS government and big business groups before organising protests against it starting this spring. Their purpose in calling the protests was not to stop the law, however, but to ensure that they maintained political control over strikes and protests against the PS's austerity agenda. Now that the PS has passed the law, however, they are even more explicitly hostile to the protests.

"We're not going to have another wave of demonstrations, but there are other ways of fighting the labour law," Workers Force (FO) union leader Jean-Claude Mailly told France2 television on Bastille Square. 'We are taking our foot off the accelerator pedal for now. We are not going to do this every week.'

Philippe Martinez, of the Stalinist General Confederation of Labour (CGT) union, declared that workers should be "fighting tooth and nail" to stop the law. Nonetheless, he downplayed calls for more mass protests, stating that there should be "other axes for social mobilisation, including the courts and workplaces."

WSWS reporters spoke to protesters in Paris, however, who denounced the PS government and its austerity agenda and called for escalating social opposition.

Frederico said, "I read the labour law. In fact, its different provisions all go against the interests of French workers, be they labourers or managers, all the different layers. I think it is a step backward for all of France, because for 200 years we have been fighting to improve social conditions."

He noted that the population had been thoroughly disappointed by the PS government. "First, they put through gay marriage, that was a step forward. It was good, except that as things went on, we realised that they are totally incapable of running the French economy. Austerity has brought us no good over all these years."

His friend Hannah said, "Politicians want to make France a place that is financially attractive as a place to do business, but there is the people. We elect the politicians, and it is not so that we will bepardon the termscrewed by the politicians."

She added that the PS "is going frankly to the right," adding: 'We need a fundamental political reform, because what we have is no longer true socialism. The existing political parties are all the same. It is an alignment of political parties for profits and for their interests.'

The WSWS also spoke to Leila, a university student. She said, 'I am here because it has been four months that we have been protesting in the streets before summer vacation against this labour law. We don't want it, it is more than 70 percent of the population that does not want it, but during vacation [Prime Minister] Manuel Valls and the entire government passed it anyway, using article 49-3 of the constitution [to avoid voting on the bill in the National Assembly]. Enough is enough, it is a question of a revolt in the streets.'

Leila attacked the state of emergency in France, imposed after the November 13 terror attacks in Paris, which the PS government and police have used as a justification to attack protests against the labour law since they began in the spring. "The state of emergency was put in place after the attacks," Leila said, "it is for them an excellent excuse to place their hands over the people and to prevent us from assembling together, for example."

"I would never break things," she added, "but in fact I understand how people have been led to do it, because the situation is absolutely impossible today, we are monitored and checked everywhere. We are not criminals. We are simply people who are upset because of this labour law and the entire political system today."

Leila strongly criticised the reactionary role of the PS government, elected in 2012 based on promises to modify the austerity policies of the previous right-wing government, but then attacked the workers even more harshly. She said, "Whether they say it is right or left, I think everyone agrees that there isn't a clear opposition between right and left anymore today, it is all the same old crap, I'm sorry to use that term."

Speaking of the Socialist Party, she said, "In my opinion, it must be dissolved. We need to start over again totally, on a correct basis. But there is nothing of that today. We are manipulated, you just have to look at the media to see that. People here are not here just because of the labour law, they are here because of everything. They have had enough. The labour law was the pretext that drove people into the streets. But they are going into the streets because they have had enough of this state of affairs."
For more news videos visit Yahoo View.

The family of Stacey Stanley, one of the three women whose remains were recovered Tuesday as a result of a desperate 911 call placed by an allegedly abducted woman, is remembering her as a devoted mother who turned her life around following a years-long struggle with heroin.

Argil Stanley, Staceys uncle, tells PEOPLE that his 43-year-old niece was a very loving person with a big heart who enjoyed dancing and singing. She was reported missing on September 8.

She loved her two little dogs and adored her kids  [and] she was just a normal girl, Stanley says. Everybody loved her  [and] she didnt deserve this.

Police in Ashland, Ohio, received a 911 call Tuesday from a woman alleging she had been abducted by a man shed met a month earlier. As her alleged captor slept, the caller was able to lead authorities to the abandoned house where she was allegedly being held against her will.

Investigators have charged Shawn Grate, 40, with one count of abduction. Additional charges are expected to be filed in the coming days, authorities tell PEOPLE.

Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Click here to get breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases in the True Crime Newsletter.

After arresting Grate, who is homeless, detectives searched the remainder of the deserted residence and the surrounding area and found the bodies of three women. At this point, police have only identified Stacey Stanley as one of the three deceased victims.

It is a sad situation, especially the way she died, Argil Stanley says. She was beaten to death. The cops said she was unrecognizable from the beating. (Police have not confirmed Staceys cause and manner of death.)

Stanley says Staceys extensive family is in mourning and has been going through a lot of hurt the last two days. Relatives were gathering this afternoon to plan Staceys funeral, and a candlelight vigil is planned for Thursday evening in Ashland from 6:30 p.m. until midnight.

Story continues

Argil Stanley says his niece made the decision to conquer her demons more than six months ago.

She was a heroin addict and had been fighting her addiction for years, Stanley tells PEOPLE. She had been off of the stuff the last six months and was living with sister, going to work every day. She was sober and was taking care of herself. She had reclaimed her life.

Grate is being held without bail at the Ashland County Jail. He has not been charged with Stanleys murder, and does not appear to have legal counsel. Grate had yet to enter a plea or appear in court.
After 59 years of marriage, family and friends werent surprised things ended the bittersweet way they did for Margaret and Don Livengood.



The couple  inseparable since the day they met  spent their last few days holding hands, side by side in a single hospital room, and died within hours of each other.



It was normal for them to be holding hands, their love was so precious, the couples daughter, Pattie Beaver, tells PEOPLE. But it was the sweetest, most precious thing you can imagine to see them holding hands in the hospital.



Beaver brought her parents to the hospital on the same day. Margaret, 80, was suffering from cancer, while Don, 84, was fighting to breathe because of pulmonary fibrosis and bilateral pneumonia. When they arrived, they were one floor apart at Carolinas Healthcare System Northeast in Concord, North Carolina.



It broke my heart, Beaver says, recalling how shed have to run from floor to floor to help care for her parents. She couldnt stand the thought that they couldnt see each other and pleaded with hospital staff to bring them together.



Hospital Chaplain Beth Jackson-Jordan was working with the family and says the doctors and nurses had gotten to know the couple in recent months as each came in for treatment and knew they belonged in the same room.





The need for them to be together overrode any of the other normal concerns, she says.

Dr. Randy Schisler treated both Margaret and Don and says the hospital staff truly came together to make it happen.

Im really proud. We stretched as far as we could with the rules to allow things that arent typical because it was the absolute right thing for these patients and for this family, he tells PEOPLE.

After four days apart, nurses moved Margarets bed into her husbands room and positioned them so that they could see each other, and of course, hold hands.

Once they were together, it was just that sense of everything was going to be okay  we knew because they were together, Beaver says.

Story continues

Dr. Schisler says hes never seen anything like it. This is one of those case I dont think any of us is ever going to forget. Seeing these two people who had spent their lives together, together in the same room as they took their last breaths, none of us are ever going to forget this.

One of the other hospital chaplains, Denise Hopper, tells PEOPLE, I remember her beside him even when she wasnt able to communicate I remember him holding her hand and everybody in the room could feel and see the connection. It was very touching to know they had journeyed their entire lives  and as it came to the end of their lives, they were able to be together.

Despite losing both of her parents in the same day, Beaver says, It gave me comfort to know that this is exactly what they would want and the hospital was able to make that happen. In the most horrific grief Ive ever had in my life, I still had comfort because they were together.

Margaret died around 8 a.m. on August 15. Don passed away later that day, shortly after 5 p.m.

Don was alert until the end, telling his daughter he was grateful he and Margaret could take this last journey together.

Beaver remembers sitting at her fathers bedside and being in awe when he said of his wife, When we get to heaven, we can walk in together, just like were getting married again. Another honeymoon.
Wall Street has chimed in on the significance of a multiyear worldwide deal between John Malone's Liberty Global and Netflix that will see the international cable giant integrate the latter's service in more than 30 countries across Europe and Latin America.

The partnership follows the successful U.K. launch of Netflix on Liberty Global-owned cable giant Virgin Media in 2013, which marked Netflix's first integration of its streaming subscription VOD service into a pay TV offering. Netflix has since launched in most countries of the world.

Morgan Stanley analyst Benjamin Swinburne in his report's title summarized the deal this way: "Liberty Global Distribution a Nice Addition."

He wrote: " It is no secret that recent European launches by Netflix have been slower than earlier waves. To that end, expanding Netflix integration from Liberty's U.K. footprint to its about 24 million-25 million global video footprint is a long-term positive to growth."

Discussing the size of the opportunity, the analyst wrote: "We estimate that the immediately (next 12 months) addressable subscriber base for Liberty's Netflix set-top box integration is approximately 3.5 million-4 million next-gen video subs outside of the U.K."

Swinburne added: "Liberty's footprint in Germany, Belgium and Switzerland are likely to be the most important markets near-term, given Netflix's lower broadband household penetration in those countries. In particular, Liberty has about 6.5 million video subscribers in Germany, which has not ramped as quickly as earlier wave European markets for Netflix, so the vast majority of those customers are not Netflix households today. ... We think set-top integration, including co-marketing and promotional plans and reducing friction for usage, have proven very helpful in many international markets."

Swinburne concluded the broader takeaway from the deal, saying: "From foe to friend, big cable is embracing Netflix, OTT." He added: "We expect Netflix integration in the U.S. with Comcast, likely by year-end, on its next-gen service X1, and ultimately Charter as well."

Story continues

Drexel Hamilton analyst Tony Wible called the Netflix-Liberty Global agreement "a big deal" for the same reason. "The deal is more important as its signifies a shift in [pay TV operator] focus, changes the competitive advantages for other [pay TV companies] and perpetuates a vicious cycle for TV networks that will help Netflix over the long run," he wrote. "We increasingly see some of Netflix's competitors becoming distribution partners."

The most underappreciated aspect of the integration deal may be the effects on viewing, Wible suggested. "We see Netflix use spiking in integrated homes as its content becomes more accessible. This would hurt TV ratings, pressure ad revenue and perpetuate the vicious cycle that helps propel Netflix's business. The weaker TV networks become, the less they have to pay for content and the more dependent they are on Netflix for monetization. It also pushes more consumers to cut/shave the cord (more discretionary money for Netflix) and incentivizes [pay TV operators] to emphasize their data business."

FBR analyst Barton Crockett addressed whether the news would boost Netflix's stock price. "Our main caveat is that this kind of news is arguably already embedded in a stock that is expected to be adding over 10 million new subs internationally per year," he wrote.

Read more: John Malone's Liberty Global to Integrate Netflix Worldwide
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Child stars cant be trusted with the money they earn, so it usually goes straight into the bank accounts of the parents But are Mum and Dad really any more trustworthy? These are the 10 child stars whose parents were skimming off the top

Macaulay Culkin

Credit: Getty

The 16-year-old star was well and truly richie rich when he sued his parents to relinquish their control over his money, and was emancipated from his mother and father, ensuring that he spent that Christmas home alone. 13 million of his hard-earned cash was removed from the accounts of Patricia Brentrup and Kit Culkin (talk about getting even with Dad) and was placed under the control of family accountant Billy Breitner until Macaulay, the good son, turned 18. The court case saved him a(n Uncle) buck or two and, as child stars so often do, Culkin went on to become a party monster. (There are no more Macaulay Culkin movie title puns that are relevant, we checked).

Mischa Barton

Credit: Getty

The star of The Sixth Sense certainly didnt have any extra-sensory perception when it came to figuring out her mother was dipping into her own daughters coffers. For years, Mischas manager and mother Nuala Barton reportedly lied about the wages that Mischa was paid and pocketed the difference. It was only when an adult Mischa discussed payment with producers on a 2013 horror movie that she realised Mama Barton was getting rich off her, more so than she had already made her, so Mischa filed a lawsuit claiming her mother stole her money to buy a 5.9 million house. Barton withdrew the lawsuit in early 2016.

Gary Coleman

Credit: Getty

We cant imagine the chutzpah required to sue ones own parents, but Gary Colemans parents counter sued him right back after the diminutive actor took them to court for misappropriating his money, having found his war chest was practically empty upon turning 18. The Diffrent Strokes star won the case and was awarded approximately 1 million damages, but after lawyers had taken their share, the actor squandered the rest on bad investments and filed for bankruptcy in 1999 with no more than 76 in his bank account.

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Leighton Meester

Credit: Getty

The Gossip Girl star has always had a strained relationship with her mother, who gave birth to her in prison. Later in life, Constance Meester fleeced her daughter for 5,700 a month which she claimed was going towards medical bills for Leightons brother, but it transpired she was using the cash to fund an increasingly lavish lifestyle, including cosmetic procedures. Leighton sued her own mother in 2011, and during the case she claimed that Constance threatened to sue her back for 2.3 million if she didnt start sending her even more money every month. Leighton won the case and presumably now has one fewer Christmas card to write every year.

Amanda Bynes

Credit: Getty

The formerly bright and perky child star took a turn for the Lohan in 2014 when she went on a series of mad rants on Twitter, some of them addressed to her parents and their alleged management of her money. Im so mad at my parents, she tweeted. They are withholding my belongings and money from me so I dont have new clothes or enough money to rent an apartment. Whether or not Bynes mother and father were actually mismanaging her finances is up for debate, as they were only given conservatorship over her estate after a mental health episode in which Amanda was hospitalised and kept under evaluation for 72 hours.

Ariel Winter

Credit: Getty

As Alex Dunphy, the smarty-pants kid in TV sitcom Modern Family, Ariel Winter was used to clashing with her parents, but it was nothing like the problems she faced with her mother in real life. Chrystal Workman was alleged to have abused her actress daughter both physically and emotionally, slapping her in the face and insulting her constantly. As far back as 2012, Winter tried to wrangle back control of her earnings but the court did not grant her request until 2014 when permanent guardianship was given to her older sister, Shannelle Gray, along with control over her earnings.

Jena Malone

Credit: Getty

In 1999, the young Contact actress accused her mother of squandering over a million dollars of her earnings, taking Debbie Malone to the Supreme Court because she was unable to pay her own taxes. At the same time, Jena Malone sought emancipation from her mother after claiming her acting income was being handled improperly; Mom then threatened to move Jena, then 14, to an apartment in Vegas, which would have effectively ended her career in Hollywood. Supposedly, Jena should have had an account with at least 275,000 in her name  instead it only contained 60,000. When she turned 15, Jena was granted emancipation and moved out to live on her own.

Corey Feldman

Credit: Getty

Teen dreamboat Corey Feldman must have thought his parents were magicians when he was growing up: they made his fortune disappear. Feldman began emancipation proceedings at age 15  he claims he started the trend  and despite being told he was worth a million dollars, by the time court-ordered bank records were returned, it was revealed Feldmans parents had only left him with 30,000. I knew how to read a contract by 10 years old, but I didnt know what it meant for somebody to come in and tell me they loved me and kiss me goodnight, says Feldman.

Shirley Temple

Credit: Getty

The original child star, Temple was pulling in an astonishing rate of 190 per week from 20th Century Fox in the 1930s  now thats a lotta lollipops  but Temple only saw 20 bucks of pocket money each week after her mother and father took their share. When she grew into her stardom, Temple was pulling down upwards of 7,600 a week, but again, her parents didnt know how to handle her money and her fortune was largely squandered by her father, against whom Temple claimed she held no grudge. When she retired at age 22 with 44 feature films under her belt, the 2.4 million Shirley had acquired was actually more like 33,000.

Jackie Coogan

Credit: Getty

Coogan was the kid that changed everything. The child star, who made his debut alongside Charlie Chaplin in 1921s The Kid, leapt to stardom immediately; by the age of 18 he already had 19 movies to his name. Talented? Check. Famous? Check. Rich? Not so much. Jackies mother and stepfather took ALL of his $4 million fortune and didnt give him a penny. No promises were ever made to give Jackie anything, said his mother. Every dollar a kid earns before he is 21 belongs to his parents. Coogan sued in 1938 but was only awarded 96,000. When his case got media attention, it led to the creation of the California Child Actors Bill, now commonly known as The Coogan Law, which requires that a child actors employer must ensure at least 15% of his or her earnings is placed in a trust for them and them only.

Read more:

10 Films That Got Science Really Wrong

10 Famous Actors That You Didnt Know Were In Star Trek

How James Arthur Sabotaged His Career
With Constitution Day happening on Friday, heres a look at 10 essential constitutional resources we use in our quest to explain and understand our founding document.

constitutionday

Constitution Day was established by federal law in 2004 to mandate the teaching of the Constitution in schools that receive federal funds, as well as federal agencies. But the day has grown into much more, as a week-long celebration of the Constitution in towns and at universities and schools.

The day is celebrated on September 17, unless that day is on a weekend. This year, Constitution Day is commemorated on September 16.

Here are 10 key Constitution Day online resources you can use in various ways to learn more about the Constitution, and to help others celebrate.

1. See the actual law that established Constitution Day. It is part of Public Law 108-447, an appropriations bill.

Link: Read the bill

The exact wording: Each educational institution that receives Federal funds for a fiscal year shall hold an educational program on the United States Constitution on September 17 of such year for the students served by the educational institution.

2. Read a copy of the Constitution. We use our Interactive Constitution at the National Constitution Centers website. Here is the link: http://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution.

Of course, there are other online versions of the Constitution that come in handy, too. The official U.S. Archives page has text  and photos of the original documents. And it has a very good review of the Constitutional Convention of 1787.

Another handy version is at Cornells Legal Information Institute website. This is clear and informative, and it has links to Supreme Court decisions.

3. Look at a list of the signers of the Constitution. This question comes up all the time at the Center, especially since we have a whole room full of statues dedicated to the signers  and a few dissenters.

You can read bios of the 39 Founders who signed the Constitution and the three who refused, at this link on our website.

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4. Try a cool interactive tool about the Constitution. Personalize the experience by taking our Which Founding Fathers Are You interactive quiz. Just answer 11 short questions and find out if youre more like James Madison or Benjamin Franklin.

5. Get Frequently Asked Questions list of constitutional questions. Weve compiled these answers based on several years of taking thousands of questions from students in our live Constitution Day chat room. Once youve mastered this list, you can impress your friends and family members.

Here is a link to the list: http://wp.me/p13iVO-4NB

Typical questions include: how many bathrooms are in the White House, and why dont we have constitutional conventions all the time?

6. Test your basic constitutional knowledge with a pop quiz. Weve developed a simple, 10-question quiz you can take as a refresher on Constitution basics: You never know who may quiz you about the Bill or Rights or where the Constitution was signed!

Link: Our Constitution Pop Quiz

7. Share lesson plans with your teacher friends. Most of us who arent educators have friends, relatives or acquaintances who are teachers. Make their day with the gift that keeps on giving: lesson plans!

Our Constitution Day website has lesson plans, videos, games and instructional materials at three different learning levels. The link: http://constitutioncenter.org/constitution-day

8. Take a sample naturalization test. Citizenship is a great gift and honing your skills at taking a naturalization test is a great reminder of why our country is important.

Weve compiled some sample questions on our Constitution Day site at the following link: http://constitutioncenter.org/constitution-day/constitution-day-resources/naturalization-test

9. Dont forget we had another Constitution. Our current Constitution replaced the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, the document used by the United States in various ways between 1777 and 1789, when our current Constitution was ratified.

The Articles created a loose confederation of states in 1781 with a weak central government. The need for a stronger Federal government quickly became obvious as the Founders decided to convene a Constitutional Convention in 1787.

The Library of Congress has an excellent overview of the Articles at http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/ourdocs/articles.html. And you can read the Articles of Confederation at Yales Avalon project.

10: And new for 2016: our Interactive Constitution app! Once you download the app from iTunes or Google Play, you wont need an Internet connection to read the Constitution, along with dozens of essays from academics who present a balanced analysis and arguments about our Founding document.

Related Constitution Day Stories

Live Chat: Constitution Hall Pass 2016

20 questions kids ask the most on Constitution Day

Top 10 myths about the Constitution on Constitution Day
wall street trader sad

Work can be a mixed bag sometimes. Even if you enjoy your job, there's probably at least one aspect of the gig that you're not super excited about.

That's why the Business Insider recently asked you to tell us your least favorite part of your job.

You responded with everything from tales of solitude to "nano-managers" to misbehaving coworkers.

Here are some of your stories:

Having to take the blame for other people's mistakes

"I hate having to take the blame for the mistakes of senior employees. I have to do it to save face for the business. I guess these are just the woes of an administrator."  Anonymous

Lack of appreciation

"The worst part of my job is that I am expected to do all of my lesson planning and grading papers on my own time (outside of a 40 hour work week). However, if I need to take time off, I have to use personal or sick time accrued between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. What about the hours and hours I work on weekends, before 8 a.m. and 4 p.m.? I don't get paid overtime, yet I am treated like an hourly employee during the work day."  Kim, Georgia, US

Moronic bosses

"I hate being the smartest guy in the room. The worst part of job is the fact that my bosses are morons."  Anonymous

Back-stabbing coworkers

"The worst part of my job was being on a team with this one stupid guy. His only goal was to make the most money  even if everyone else had to suffer. He'd look at my screen to see my client orders. I eventually couldn't deal with him anymore. We had a very heated argument. My boss spoke to both of us, but took his side and got on my case. Within three months, I was left with no clients. I decided to leave the firm. Before I left, I warned my boss that this guy would be gone in four quarters. My boss thought I was just being jealous, but I turned out to be half right  the guy left in 2.5 quarters. Still, I had to leave something I loved doing. I've been looking for something to replace it since then."  Anonymous

Story continues

An understaffed company

"I work as a systems engineer. However, because my company is understaffed, I get pulled away to work the help desk every five networks. Instead of defending networks and configuring servers, I plug in mice and wonder why monitors don't turn on."  Charles T.

A dominant CEO

"The worst part of my job is our CEO. He is far too dominant and conservative. He just pushes everyone around. He's pretty much a walking stereotype, the way he dominates all the middle managers."  Anonymous

Too many 'cooks in the kitchen'

"We have too many cooks in the kitchen. I have one actual manager along with another two division managers who constantly try to interfere with my workload. Plus, they technically outrank my line manager. I find myself not knowing who I'm meant to listen to. The fact they don't know anything about my role makes it worse."  Hayden, UK

Loneliness

I hate the fact that I could go the whole day without saying a word, but I'd still get my work done. That's not how we're built as humans."  Anonymous

Unreliable coworkers

"My colleague is incredibly nice. They say they will do x, y and z  but they'll absolutely never actually do what they say. It's impossible to work around this person, but I also can't rely on them. They're excellent at managing up, but they don't really care about anyone else (lateral or below). Everyone who has to work with this person has the same frustrating experience. Everyone this person manages ends up quitting. The majority of management is oblivious about this issue."  Anonymous

Boring tasks

"There's one part of my job that I just can't stand. I hate updating costumer databases. It's so boring."  Khalil, Casablanca, Morocco

Micromanagers

"I have a micromanaging manager. Forget that, I have a nano-managing manager. They're so meticulous about every single detail (e.g. document layout  the way we lay out any content has to be as according to the manager's strictly defined format). Even email responses are constantly looked at and commented on. They focus too much on such insignificant details, rather than looking at the bigger picture. They drive people away. Managers play an important role in establishing the best or worst part of any job.  Anonymous

Lazy coworkers

"I have to work more than one coworker. They're always slacking off or sleeping at work! Still, we get pretty much the same pay. That's the worst part of my job."  Anonymous

NOW WATCH: 5 professions that are more profitable than playing in the NFL





More From Business Insider


Kinshasa (AFP) - At least 16 DR Congo opposition activists have been detained in Kinshasa after meeting to discuss how to stop President Joseph Kabila illegally prolonging his stay in power, the UN said Friday.

"At least 16 people were arrested between yesterday and this morning after a meeting on respect for constitution and handover of power," Jose-Maria Aranaz, of the UN's human rights office in DR Congo, told AFP.

Rights group Amnesty International had on Thursday accused authorities in mineral-rich DR Congo of "systematic repression" of those seeking Kabila's departure when his third term runs out on December 20.

Government spokesman Lambert Mende said he was surprised by the accusations, adding that authorities had freed several political prisoners in August.

Kabila, who has ruled DR Congo since 2001, is banned under the constitution from running again -- but he has given no sign of intending to give up his job in December.

No elections have been announced and it would be practically impossible to organise a poll in the time left before his mandate runs out.

Protests erupted after the Constitutional Court ruled in May that Kabila, who took power after his father's assassination, could remain in office in a caretaker capacity beyond the end of the mandate.

Authorities have been in talks with a minority opposition group this month to discuss ways out of the political crisis that has gripped DR Congo since Kabila's disputed re-election in 2011.

But the main opposition party led by political veteran Etienne Tshisekedi is refusing to take part, saying the talks are a distraction designed to illegally prolong Kabila's stay in power.

Tshisekedi's group has urged people to take to the streets in nationwide protests next Monday to demand that the electoral commission calls a vote and that Kabila quits power on December 20.
As part of our Constitution Day celebration, we host a live chat with schools all across America. And a lot of students had the same questions about the Constitution and this years hottest topic, the presidency.

In all, we receive about 3,000 questions from classrooms each year, asking everything from what the real estate value was for the White House (around $250 million, without the furnishings) to who was the cutest president (we didnt have an answer for that).

But many questions were serious, and many of the same topics were brought up. Here are the 20 questions kids in middle and high school ask about the Constitution, the Founding Fathers, and the president.

What is the Constitution?

Answer: The Constitution sets forth our form of government and describes how it is it is supposed to work. Also, the Constitution protects the rights and freedoms we enjoy every day.

Why does the president have 35 bathrooms in the White House?

Answer: There are a lot of people who work in the White House besides the presidentso those bathrooms come in handy!

Who wrote the Bill of Rights and when was it added to the Constitution?

Answer: The Bill of Rights was proposed by James Madison and was ratified on December 15, 1791.

How long did it take to create the Constitution?

Answer: The Constitutional Convention lasted about four months, from May 25 to September 17, 1787.

When did the Liberty Bell crack?

Answer: No one is exactly sure when the Liberty Bell cracked, as it was not recorded. The first mention of a crack is in February 1846, when it was published in the Philadelphia Ledger that Philadelphia wanted to repair the crack in the bell so that they could ring it for George Washingtons birthday.

I dont really understand the Electoral College. Can I get any clarification?

Answer: The Electoral College is technically the group that elects the president. It represents the states based upon the numbers of representatives and senators from each state. Most states base their electoral votes on the winner of that state, but some are divided. One reason for the electoral college is to keep all of the states involved in the process. Another is that some of the framers were fearful of a strictly democratic election, as they worried about people electing popular leaders rather than able leaders.

Story continues

How long did it take to build the White House? How old is it?

Answer: The original White House took 8 years to be built, from 1792 to 1800. President John Adams and his wife, Abigail, were the first to live there. The White House is 216 years old. It has undergone many renovations and expansion projects.

Who ran against Washington in the first election?

Answer: Washington was elected easily as the first president, but John Adams, John Jay and several other Founders received votes under a system that allow electors to cast two votes.

Why havent we had a Constitutional Convention in recent years?

Answer:The majority of people support the current Constitution. It is difficult to amend the Constitutionit has only happened 27 times in the last 225 years. To have another convention would take years and would be a very complex matter.

Who was the youngest president? The oldest?

Answer: The youngest president was actually Teddy Roosevelt. He was 42 years old when he became president on the death of William McKinley. John F. Kennedy was elected at the age of 43. Ronald Reagan was the oldest to be elected, at the age of 69.

Why have there been no girl presidents?

Answer: There have been two adult women who have run for vice president as a major party nominee: Geraldine Ferraro and Sarah Palin. Hillary Clinton is the first woman to be a major-party presidential nominee.

How many delegates were there during the signing of the Constitution?

Answer: During the signing there were 41 delegates present. 38 signed. OneGeorge Readalso signed for John Dickinson who was home sick that day. 55 different men had been in Philadelphia over the course of the Convention.

What was the average age of the delegates at the Constitutional convention?

Answer: The 39 signers of the Constitution varied in age. The average age was 42 years old. The youngest signer of the Constitution was 26-year-old Jonathan Dayton of New Jersey. The oldest signer was Benjamin Franklin at 81 years old.

Are taxes specifically mentioned in the Constitution?

Answer: Article I , Section 8, starts of that Congress shall have the Power to lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises. The 16th Amendment gives the power to create an income tax.

Why was George Washington on the $1 bill?

Answer: The federal government has the power to design and print money. According to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing:

A special committee  determined that portraits of Presidents of the United States have a more permanent familiarity in the minds of the public than any others. This decision was somewhat altered by the Secretary of the Treasury to include Alexander Hamilton, who was the first Secretary of the Treasury; Salmon P. Chase, who was Secretary of the Treasury during the Civil War and is credited with promoting our National Banking System; and Benjamin Franklin, who was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. All three of these statesmen were well known to the American public. Treasury Department records do not reveal the reason that portraits of these particular statesmen were chosen in preference to those of other persons of equal importance and prominence.

Did George Washington really cut down his dads cherry tree?

Answer: No. George Washington never actually cut down his dads tree. The story is a myth that illustrates Washingtons honesty.

Can someone please tell me what the New Jersey Plan is in a short sentence?

Answer: The Virginia Plan proposed apportioning representation based on population. The New Jersey Plan wanted to apportion representation by state



Which president was the tallest?

Answer: The tallest president we had was Abraham Lincoln. He was 64.

Which president lasted the longest in office?

Answer: Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected to four terms and served 12 years in office. He will always be the president who served the most termsunless we amend the Constitution again to allow a president to serve more than two.

Who was the first president to live in the White House?

Answer: The first president to live in the White House was John Adams and his wife Abigail.

Related Constitution Day Stories

Live Chat: Constitution Hall Pass 2016

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OMAHA -- Attorney General Doug Peterson quickly found himself thrust into the role of Nebraskas highest-profile opponent of legal marijuana when he took office last year.

Now a fellow elected official is publicly opposing him -- arguing not only to allow medical cannabis, but to decriminalize pot entirely in Nebraska and to regulate its distribution.

Im not advocating the use of marijuana, Lancaster County Public Defender Joe Nigro said Thursday. I simply take the position that prohibition has failed, and we shouldnt treat a health issue in the criminal justice system.

Nigros comments came during a forum with Peterson hosted by Nebraskas chapter of the National Association of Social Workers.

It wasnt a major stage: About 25 people paid to hear the remarks in a conference room at Omahas Ramada Plaza. But Nigro, also in his second year of elected office, said hell repeat his message to anyone who asks.

He also criticized Peterson -- who had already left the forum -- for continuing to pursue legal action with Oklahoma against Colorado over its marijuana policies.

Youre being silly, Nigro said. Every lawyer I know thought this lawsuit was the biggest joke they ever heard.

Peterson later defended the lawsuit, saying in an email that the effort is backed by all nine former administrators of the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, who served presidents from both political parties. Two U.S. Supreme Court justices also supported allowing the case to proceed before the nations high court.

The other justices disagreed, and Petersons office has since brought the issue before a lower federal court.

Nigro argues legalization could shift resources for marijuana enforcement from the criminal justice system toward regulation, and that taxing cannabis would generate millions in revenue for schools, other law enforcement, and mental health and substance abuse treatment programs.

Marijuana enforcement unfairly targets non-white people, particularly blacks, Nigro said, and many of the historical circumstances which led to the demonization and banning of marijuana in the U.S. were rooted in political calculations and bias against non-white people.

Nigro, a Democrat, and Peterson, a Republican, both grew up in the 1970s, but that experience left them with starkly contrasting perspectives on marijuana.

Peterson contends pot is more potent now, because legalization in other states has led to competition and the rise of Big Marijuana.

When you bring free-market forces into the impairment industry, what is the goal? You wont find any advertisements about flavor, aroma, he told the social workers. Its all about potency.

Pot from those states -- along with edible products or concentrated forms of cannabis like "hash," "way," "dab" and "shatter" -- are now flooding Nebraska and raising the stakes for gangs and law enforcement, Peterson said.

Higher potency doesnt make marijuana more addictive or cause overdoses, Nigro argued.

If it did we would hear about those kinds of incidents nonstop, but we dont.

Four states have already legalized marijuana for recreational use. Five more, including California, will vote on this issue in November.

I just dont see us going back, Nigro said. I think this trend is going to continue.

Peterson doesnt recall anyone asking him about marijuana while he was campaigning for attorney general.

But his predecessors decision to begin pursuing the lawsuit against Colorado, along with a well-documented battle in the Legislature over medical marijuana, have turned the fight against pot legalization into one of the defining issues of his term.

I dont want to ignore it and have the mentality be: Gee, we all did it, no one died, so its no big deal, Peterson said.
stephen king

Renowned author Stephen King has written over 50 books that have captivated millions of people around the world.

In his memoir, "On Writing," King shares valuable insights into how to be a better writer. And he doesn't sugarcoat it. He writes, "I can't lie and say there are no bad writers. Sorry, but there are lots of bad writers."

Don't want to be one of them? Here are 22 great pieces of advice from King's book on how to be an amazing writer.

1. Stop watching television. Instead, read as much as possible.

If you're just starting out as a writer, your television should be the first thing to go. It's "poisonous to creativity," he says. Writers need to look into themselves and turn toward the life of the imagination.

To do so, they should read as much as they can. King takes a book with him everywhere he goes, and even reads during meals. "If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot," he says. Read widely, and constantly work to refine and redefine your own work as you do so.

2. Prepare for more failure and criticism than you think you can deal with.

King compares writing fiction to crossing the Atlantic Ocean in a bathtub, because in both, "there's plenty of opportunity for self-doubt." Not only will you doubt yourself, but other people will doubt you, too. "If you write (or paint or dance or sculpt or sing, I suppose), someone will try to make you feel lousy about it, that's all," writes King.

Oftentimes, you have to continue writing even when you don't feel like it. "Stopping a piece of work just because it's hard, either emotionally or imaginatively, is a bad idea," he writes. And when you fail, King suggests that you remain positive. "Optimism is a perfectly legitimate response to failure."

3. Don't waste time trying to please people.

Stephen King

According to King, rudeness should be the least of your concerns. "If you intend to write as truthfully as you can, your days as a member of polite society are numbered anyway," he writes.

Story continues

King used to be ashamed of what he wrote, especially after receiving angry letters accusing him of being bigoted, homophobic, murderous, and even psychopathic.

By the age of 40, he realized that every decent writer has been accused of being a waste of talent. King has definitely come to terms with it. He writes, "If you disapprove, I can only shrug my shoulders. It's what I have." You can't please all of your readers all the time, so King advises that you stop worrying.

4. Write primarily for yourself.

You should write because it brings you happiness and fulfillment. As King says, "I did it for the pure joy of the thing. And if you can do it for joy, you can do it forever."

Writer Kurt Vonnegut provides a similar insight: "Find a subject you care about and which you in your heart feel others should care about," he says. "It is this genuine caring, not your games with language, which will be the most compelling and seductive element in your style."

5. Tackle the things that are hardest to write.

"The most important things are the hardest things to say," writes King. "They are the things you get ashamed of because words diminish your feelings." Most great pieces of writing are preceded with hours of thought. In King's mind, "Writing is refined thinking."

When tackling difficult issues, make sure you dig deeply. King says, "Stories are found things, like fossils in the ground ... Stories are relics, part of an undiscovered pre-existing world." Writers should be like archaeologists, excavating for as much of the story as they can find.

6. When writing, disconnect from the rest of the world.

Writing should be a fully intimate activity. Put your desk in the corner of the room, and eliminate all possible distractions, from phones to open windows. King advises, "Write with the door closed; rewrite with the door open."

You should maintain total privacy between you and your work. Writing a first draft is "completely raw, the sort of thing I feel free to do with the door shut  it's the story undressed, standing up in nothing but its socks and undershorts."

7. Don't be pretentious.

Stephen King

"One of the really bad things you can do to your writing is to dress up the vocabulary, looking for long words because you're maybe a little bit ashamed of your short ones," says King.

He compares this mistake to dressing up a household pet in evening clothes  both the pet and the owner are embarrassed, because it's completely excessive.

As iconic businessman David Ogilvy writes in a memo to his employees, "Never use jargon words like reconceptualize, demassification, attitudinally, judgmentally. They are hallmarks of a pretentious ass." Furthermore, don't use symbols unless necessary. "Symbolism exists to adorn and enrich, not to create an artificial sense of profundity," writes King.

8. Avoid adverbs and long paragraphs.

As King emphasizes several times in his memoir, "the adverb is not your friend." In fact, he believes that "the road to hell is paved with adverbs" and compares them to dandelions that ruin your lawn. Adverbs are worst after "he said" and "she said"  those phrases are best left unadorned.

You should also pay attention to your paragraphs, so that they flow with the turns and rhythms of your story. "Paragraphs are almost always as important for how they look as for what they say," says King.

9. Don't get overly caught up in grammar.

According to King, writing is primarily about seduction, not precision. "Language does not always have to wear a tie and lace-up shoes," writes King. "The object of fiction isn't grammatical correctness but to make the reader welcome and then tell a story." You should strive to make the reader forget that he or she is reading a story at all.

10. Master the art of description.

"Description begins in the writer's imagination, but should finish in the reader's," writes King. The important part isn't writing enough, but limiting how much you say. Visualize what you want your reader to experience, and then translate what you see in your mind into words on the page. You need to describe things "in a way that will cause your reader to prickle with recognition," he says.

The key to good description is clarity, both in observation and in writing. Use fresh images and simple vocabulary to avoid exhausting your reader. "In many cases when a reader puts a story aside because it 'got boring,' the boredom arose because the writer grew enchanted with his powers of description and lost sight of his priority, which is to keep the ball rolling," notes King.

11. Don't give too much background information.

Stephen King

"What you need to remember is that there's a difference between lecturing about what you know and using it to enrich the story," writes King. "The latter is good. The former is not." Make sure you only include details that move your story forward and that persuade your reader to continue reading.

If you need to do research, make sure it doesn't overshadow the story. Research belongs "as far in the background and the back story as you can get it," says King. You may be entranced by what you're learning, but your readers are going to care a lot more about your characters and your story.

12. Tell stories about what people actually do.

"Bad writing is more than a matter of shit syntax and faulty observation; bad writing usually arises from a stubborn refusal to tell stories about what people actually do  to face the fact, let us say, that murderers sometimes help old ladies cross the street," writes King. The people in your stories are what readers care about the most, so make sure you acknowledge all the dimensions your characters may have.

13. Take risks; don't play it safe.

First and foremost, stop using the passive voice. It's the biggest indicator of fear. "I'm convinced that fear is at the root of most bad writing," King says. Writers should throw back their shoulders, stick out their chins, and put their writing in charge.

"Try any goddamn thing you like, no matter how boringly normal or outrageous. If it works, fine. If it doesn't, toss it," King says.

14. Realize that you don't need drugs to be a good writer.

"The idea that the creative endeavor and mind-altering substances are entwined is one of the great pop-intellectual myths of our time," says King. In his eyes, substance-abusing writers are just substance-abusers. "Any claims that the drugs and alcohol are necessary to dull a finer sensibility are just the usual self-serving bullshit."

15. Don't try to steal someone else's voice.

As King says, "You can't aim a book like a cruise missile." When you try to mimic another writer's style for any reason other than practice, you'll produce nothing but "pale imitations." This is because you can never try to replicate the way someone feels and experiences truth, especially not through a surface-level glance at vocabulary and plot.

16. Understand that writing is a form of telepathy.

"All the arts depend upon telepathy to some degree, but I believe that writing is the purest distillation," says King. An important element of writing is transference. Your job isn't to write words on the page, but rather to transfer the ideas inside your head into the heads of your readers.

"Words are just the medium through which the transfer happens," says King. In his advice on writing, Vonnegut also recommends that writers "use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted."

17. Take your writing seriously.

"You can approach the act of writing with nervousness, excitement, hopefulness, or despair," says King. "Come to it any way but lightly." If you don't want to take your writing seriously, he suggests that you close the book and do something else.

As writer Susan Sontag says, "The story must strike a nerve  in me. My heart should start pounding when I hear the first line in my head. I start trembling at the risk."

18. Write every single day.

stephen king

"Once I start work on a project, I don't stop, and I don't slow down unless I absolutely have to," says King. "If I don't write every day, the characters begin to stale off in my mind ... I begin to lose my hold on the story's plot and pace."

If you fail to write consistently, the excitement for your idea may begin to fade. When the work starts to feel like work, King describes the moment as "the smooch of death." His best advice is to just take it "one word at a time."

19. Finish your first draft in three months.

King likes to write 10 pages a day. Over a three-month span, that amounts to around 180,000 words. "The first draft of a book  even a long one  should take no more than three months, the length of a season," he says. If you spend too long on your piece, King believes the story begins to take on an odd foreign feel.

20. When you're finished writing, take a long step back.

King suggests six weeks of "recuperation time" after you're done writing, so you can have a clear mind to spot any glaring holes in the plot or character development. He asserts that a writer's original perception of a character could be just as faulty as the reader's.

King compares the writing and revision process to nature. "When you write a book, you spend day after day scanning and identifying the trees," he writes. "When you're done, you have to step back and look at the forest." When you do find your mistakes, he says that "you are forbidden to feel depressed about them or to beat up on yourself. Screw-ups happen to the best of us."

21. Have the guts to cut.

When revising, writers often have a difficult time letting go of words they spent so much time writing. But, as King advises, "Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler's heart, kill your darlings."

Although revision is one of the most difficult parts of writing, you need to leave out the boring parts in order to move the story along. In his advice on writing, Vonnegut suggests, "If a sentence, no matter how excellent, does not illuminate your subject in some new and useful way, scratch it out."

22. Stay married, be healthy, and live a good life.

King attributes his success to two things: his physical health and his marriage. "The combination of a healthy body and a stable relationship with a self-reliant woman who takes zero shit from me or anyone else has made the continuity of my working life possible," he writes.

It's important to have a strong balance in your life, so writing doesn't consume all of it. In writer and painter Henry Miller's 11 commandments of writing, he advises, "Keep human! See people, go places, drink if you feel like it."

This is an update of an article written by Maggie Zhang.





More From Business Insider


Chinas economy gained traction last month, which makes us believe that it doesnt require further stimulus measures. While factory activity touched its highest level in almost two years, service activity also expanded. Increased government spending on infrastructure coupled with solid retail sales also bear evidence of economic strength.

Given such upbeat trends, the addition of mutual funds having significant exposure to Chinese securities could be a lucrative investment option. Now, we will take a quick look at some of the encouraging data that raised hopes of stable economic growth in China.

Manufacturing Hits Highest Level in Almost Two Years

The official manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) increased in August to 50.4 from the July reading of 49.9. The nations manufacturing activity touched its best level since October 2014. Significant improvement in new orders and increase in production led the manufacturing PMI to enter the expansion zone last month.

Moreover, industrial output also advanced 6.3% year over year in August from the 6% increase in July. Industrial production posted its best increase in five months. Steady growth in Chinas steel industry contributed to this increase in industry output.

Services Continue to Expand in August

Chinas services PMI fell slightly from 53.9 in July to 53.5 in August, but the countrys non-manufacturing activity continued to expand last month. Service activity expanded in China on the back of steady growth in telecommunications, construction and transportation sectors.

Following economic slowdown in the beginning of this year, China focused more on the performance of the service sector. Now, the service sector holds at least 50% of its GDP and is expected to register steady growth in the coming months.

Government Spending and Retail Sales Register Progress

In the first eight months of this year, government spending on infrastructure grew 21.4% year over year. Rise in government infrastructure spending indicated administrative efforts to stabilize the countrys economy.

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Moreover, property investment progressed 6.2% year over year last month, much higher than an increase of only 1.4% in July. Additionally, gains of 13.1% in auto sales led to a strong rise in retail sales. In August, retail sales increased 10.6% in, better than a 10.2% rise in July.

Buy These 3 China Mutual Funds

The aforementioned positive data clearly indicated stabilization in the Chinese economy and raised hopes that the worlds second biggest economy might reach its full-year GDP growth target of 6.5% to 7% in the coming months.

Moreover, the Shanghai Composite Stock Market Index gained 4.5% in last three months. Additionally, mutual funds related to Chinas equity market also registered strong returns. According to Morningstar, the China region equity mutual fund posted 3-month, year-to-date (YTD) and 1-year returns of 15%, 7.6% and 12.6%, respectively. The following reading was much better than other international equity funds.

This upbeat backdrop calls for investors attention to three China mutual funds that boast a Zacks Mutual Fund Rank #1 (Strong Buy) or 2 (Buy). Moreover, these funds have impressive year-to-date (YTD) returns. They also have minimum initial investment within $5000 and low expense ratios.

We expect these funds to outperform their peers in the future. Remember, the goal of the Zacks Mutual Fund Rank is to guide investors to identify potential winners and losers. Unlike most of the fund-rating systems, the Zacks Mutual Fund Rank is not just focused on past performance, but also on the likely future success of the fund.

Invesco Greater China Y AMCYX seeks growth of capital for the long run. AMCYX invests more than 80% of its assets in securities of those companies which are situated or have operations in Greater China. The fund also invests nearly one-fifth of its assets in equity and debt securities of companies around the world.

AMCYX has an annual expense ratio of 1.63%, lower than the category average of 1.66%. The fund has YTD returns of 10.7% and has a Zacks Mutual Fund Rank #1.

Fidelity Advisor China Region A FHKAX invests the lions share of its assets in common stocks of companies located in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. FHKAX generally invests around 35% of its assets in that industry which holds more than one-fifth of the Chinese, Hong Kong and Taiwanese market. The fund seeks capital appreciation for the long run.

FHKAX has an annual expense ratio of 1.26%, lower than the category average of 1.66%. The fund has YTD returns of 1.1% and has a Zacks Mutual Fund Rank #2.

Matthews China Dividend Investor MCDFX seeks returns through income growth. MCDFX invests the majority of its assets in dividend-paying securities of those companies which are based in China. The fund not only invests in equity securities but also convertible debt instruments.

MCDFX has an annual expense ratio of 1.19%, lower than the category average of 1.66%. The fund has YTD returns of 8.3% and has a Zacks Mutual Fund Rank #1.

Want key mutual fund info delivered straight to your inbox?

Zacks free Fund Newsletter will brief you on top news and analysis, as well as top-performing mutual funds, each week. Get it free >>



Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report



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It's easy to set the 401(k) and forget it. After you select the initial amount to take out from your paycheck, it's often best not to overreact to the ups and downs of the market.

But Alex Foster, a financial advisor in Atlanta, wanted to know about the fees a client of his was charged in the 401(k). When the two looked at the disclosure together, it was clear something was wrong.

The fee disclosure form had provided the "wrong fund for the wrong fee," says Foster, who runs AF Capital Management. And it included "funds that were no longer part of the plan."

The 401(k) fee issue landed in the national spotlight last month when employees sued Massachusetts Institute of Technology, New York University and Yale University. The professors claimed that the universities did not do enough to prevent high fees in their 403(b) plans, which are non-profits' version of a 401(k).

[See: 7 Dividend Stocks to Buy That Pay More Each Year.]

The amount of fees in a 401(k) can have a drastic impact on lifetime savings. The National Association of Retirement Plan Participants says that over a lifetime median salary of $30,000, the difference in paying 0.25 percent in fees compared to 1.25 percent is more than $120,000. And that gap gets bigger, the more one makes.

NARPP also found that 58 percent of people participating in a 401(k) don't know that fees are taken out. These folks don't "understand the impact that (fees have) on their life savings," says Laurie Rowley, president of NARPP, a nonprofit that advocates retirement plan improvements for employees.

In order to protect yourself from the impact these fees can have against your retirement, evaluate your own 401(k) by asking these three questions:

Are the right funds available to you? Investors should receive a disclosure that outlines the fund choices in a 401(k). This disclosure form is important because it highlights options the plan offers.

Story continues

When Foster's client received the form that outlined the different fund choices, none of them included an index fund. Instead, portfolio managers actively managed all the options, and many had fees near 3 percent. Foster advised his client to ask for some low-cost index funds, since the managed funds were so expensive.

"If they're not using index funds, the managed funds could just be robbery," he says.

Companies are now required to provide some low-cost options to their 401(k) offerings and, considering the lawsuits filed against universities and other companies, most businesses will add index funds quickly when asked.

But investors also have to understand how fees are charged. Rowley says that of those people that knew they were charged fees on their funds, only 25 percent knew how the fees were actually calculated. Many thought they "only get charged fees on the amount of growth on the account," she says.

That's not the case. The fee is on the entire amount placed within the specific fund. So if you have $100,000 in your 401(k), and 50 percent of that is in an index fund based on the U.S. stock market with a fee of 0.2 percent, then the fee would count against the $50,000 you have in the fund. That's why you have to check all the funds your money is a part of, since one fund may charge 0.2 percent and another fund may charge 2 percent.

Foster tries to make sure his customers have a total fee exposure less than 1 percent, if possible, within the 401(k).

[See: 6 Famous Flameouts of Famed Investors.]

Is the administrative fee in line with your company size? The fees for the fund aren't the only ones within a 401(k). You'll also have to check the administrative fee, which is paid to the company that manages the 401(k). This fee is sometimes difficult for people at home to easily find and calculate, since it's just a line in a document, with a low percentage next to it.

And that's one of the big problems with 401(k) fees, says Rowley. Since these fees typically range from 0.1 percent to 3 percent, people see them and think 'that's not very much' because they compare them to the 10 percent or more charged in interest on a credit card statement or mortgage payment. But investors "can't compare the two," adds Rowley, since these fees accumulate over 30 years or more.

Brightscope found that smaller companies that have less assets within their 401(k) since they have fewer employees contributing, will have higher fees. The range for a plan that has $1 million in assets can be from nearly nothing to 4.5 percent. Larger companies, with plan assets over $10 million, typically have fees of less than 0.5 percent.

Should you take your money out of the 401(k)? When Foster's client went to his bosses and asked for some index fund options, they quickly obliged. Foster thinks it only took two emails for everything to work out.

But that's not always going to be the case, particularly if administrative fees are already set. That doesn't mean an investor should exit the plan if a 401(k) charges fees greater than 2 percent. "The tax savings (of the retirement plan) trumps the high fees," Foster says.

Investors don't pay income tax on money that goes into their 401(k), because they can delay that payment until retirement and their income drops -- putting them in a lower tax bracket. The difference between paying 28 percent on earned income now versus paying 2 percent fees and a reduced tax later makes staying in the 401(k) the best option, even without a company match.

[See: 15 Money Management Tips for College Students.]

Remember, though, if you don't like the fees in your plan, "don't be afraid to complain about the 401(k)," Foster says, because your company will typically force a change.

Ryan Derousseau is a journalist with nine years of experience writing about investing and leadership issues. His work has been read in Fortune, Money, CNNMoney and Fast Company, among other publications. You can find more from him on Twitter @ryanderous.
Heroin-related overdoses have almost quadrupled over the last decade in the U.S., leading to more than 10,000 deaths in 2014 alone. And in the last few weeks, its only gotten worse. Fentanyl and carfentanil, two powerful synthetic opiates, have been linked to a string of overdoses in the Midwest and Appalachia that local officials say are unprecedented even for areas that have long battled drug addiction. An estimated 300 overdoses since August have been linked to the opiates, including in Ohios Hamilton County, which saw 208 overdoses between Aug. 15 and Sept. 4, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration. So far at least eight deaths have been linked to carfentanil, which is so potent that just a few granules the size of table salt can be lethal.

Law enforcement has responded by cracking down on drug traffickers to cut off supplies of heroin and synthetics. But beyond the typical law-and-order response, some areas are taking unique approaches to battle drug addiction. Heres a look at what cities are trying across the U.S. and beyond:

1. Safe-injection sites

The idea: Supervised injection centers where addicts can use a small amount of heroin in a safe environment. Others allow users who are already high to visit as an alternative to being on the street. Advocates say it will keep users alive and potentially open the door to treatment.

The challenges: Safe-injection sites have been in Europe and Canada for years but have only been proposed in a few U.S. cities, including Ithaca, N.Y., and Seattle. The idea has received significant backlash from lawmakers who say it would essentially provide a government-endorsed site to abuse drugs.

2. Prescribe heroin

The idea: A similar approach to providing safe-injection sites, this strategy gives doctors the ability to prescribe small amounts of heroin to those who have a chronic dependency. Earlier this week, the Canadian government approved new drug regulations allowing doctors access to a pharmaceutical-grade heroin that could be given to addicts when traditional options have been tried and proven ineffective.

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The challenge: Opponents say the government is not only endorsing the use of an illegal drug but doing nothing to help people actually break their addiction. Critics believe that methadone clinics, which have been used for years to help those who are addicted, would be a safer alternative.

3. Medication-assisted treatment

The idea: Increase the number of treatment facilities that offer medications like buprenorphine, known by its brand name Suboxone, which can ease withdrawal symptoms and suppress the cravings for opioids. The Obama administration has expanded access to these treatment centers, increasing the number of patients each physician can treat with buprenorphine from 100 to 275.

The challenge: Opponents say these centers foster government-sponsored addiction that merely move addicts from one drug to another and argue that addicts arent being treated if theyre simply addicted to another drug.

4. Naloxone for all

The idea: Allow anyone access to naloxone, a medication that blocks the effects of an opioid overdose. The nasal spray has been widely used by emergency responders to revive heroin users. Leana Wen, Baltimores health commissioner, issued a standing order last year allowing any city resident the ability to access the drug. Her office also conducted naloxone training for inmates and drug users.

The challenge: Some say the widespread use of naloxone encourages drug use and doesnt address addiction itself. But it may be the cost of the drug that is the biggest challenge. Naloxone has increased from about $20 to $40 per dose in the last year, up from $1 a decade ago.

5. Marijuana as medicine

The idea: Legalize marijuana as a heroin treatment because it help people shed their addiction. Supporters point to a study in the Journal of Pain showing those suffering from chronic pain reduced their use of prescribed opiates by using medical marijuana. Doctors in Massachusetts and California are currently using marijuana as a potential treatment.

The challenge: There are few studies showing the efficacy of using cannabis to break an opiate addiction. Many of the states with the worst opiate addictions, including Kentucky and West Virginia, dont appear close to legalizing medical marijuana for any condition.

6. Dont arrest addicts, treat them

The idea: Police should look to push non-violent drug offenders into treatment rather than throw them in jail. A number of police departments in Huntington, W. Va., Santa Fe, N.M., Seattle, and Gloucester, Mass., have invited heroin addicts to come to them for guidance regarding treatment as part of a program called Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion.

The challenge: Opponents say police should be more concerned about cracking down on dealers and drug supplies making their way to U.S. cities. They say police are already stretched thin and shouldnt have to worry about getting drug abusers into treatment.
7 incredibly spooky facts you need to know about the Lost Colony if youre watching American Horror Story

7 incredibly spooky facts you need to know about the Lost Colony if youre watching American Horror Story

This is your official American Horror Story spoiler warning! Stop reading unless you want the first episode of AHS SPOILED FOREVER.

So, with American Horror Storys Season 6 return last night (after weeks and weeks of agonizing teasers!), were sure youre curious about the Roanoke Colony, which is the foundation for the television shows sixth season.

Officially titled AHS: My Roanoke Nightmare, it takes place in Roanoke, North Carolina, which centers around one of historys biggest mysteries. Before you watch any more episodes, you should know a little bit about one of the spookiest things to have ever happened on U.S. soil. (And maybe itll help you decipher all the craziness about to go down this season.)

1. The mystery behind Roanoke Island began with a baffling disappearance in the 1500s.

Englishman John White brought 100 settlers to the island from before he went back to his home country (England) to gather supplies. Three years later, he returned to Roanoke after being delayed by a war with Spain, and the Roanoke settlement had completely disappeared.

2. The colony left two vague clues behind that archaeologists have been using to investigate.

White found no trace of his settlers, other than a word carved into a fence post  Croatoan  and CRO carved into a tree. Croatoan was assumed to represent Croatoan Island, where the settlers may have gone to wait for White. Today, Croatoan is known as Hatteras Island. White tried to reach the Croatoan himself, but he encountered a storm that forced him to abandon the trip.

Colonial America

3. A non-profit foundation was created a few years ago dedicated to the Roanoke search.

Since its formation in 2004, the First Colony Foundation (FCF) has worked with researchers and archaeologists to examine the history of settlements in North Carolina, and has played a major role in attempting to solve the mystery of the Roanoke colony.

Story continues

4. The FCFs most recent discovery led archaeologists to Site X, where theres a possibility of finding some answers.

The FCF prompted the British Museum to examine John Whites map of the area more closely using modern technology. Their efforts revealed a blue and red symbol hidden underneath one of Whites patches, which supposedly marked a new location the settlers were headed for. It was about 60 miles from Roanoke, which matches a plan White had to move the settlement 50 miles inland once he returned. Researchers have named it Site X.

Gravestone commemorating The Lost Colony at Roanoke, NC (Photo by Visions of America/UIG via Getty Images)

5. Site X has yielded evidence of 16th century settlers since digging began in 2013.

Between 2013 and 2015, archaeologists discovered more than 30 artifacts during excavations at Site X, led by British archaeologist Mark Horton. Although many of the articles were dated after the Roanoke colonys time, ceramic shards known as Surrey  Hampshire Border ware helped archaeologists to connect the site to Roanoke. Settlers of the Virginia company used the ceramics frequently, but the company failed in 1624. Its likely that the Roanoke colony used the material as well.

6. A drought may have driven the settlers to Site X.

Karen Ordahl Kupperman, a historian at New York University, wrote about a mega-drought in her book, Roanoke: The Abandoned Colony. Caused by an El Nino, it was the worst drought the area had seen in 800 years. A Spanish colony in South Carolina abandoned their land in 1587 as a result of the drought, leading researchers to believe the Roanoke colony may have done the same.

colony

7. The mystery continues.

Some researchers are not entirely convinced that Site X is where the Roanoke colony decided to relocate, since theres no real concrete evidence yet. However, archaeologists, scientists, and even the public are still so intrigued by the lost colony, that the search for the reason behind their disappearance will continue.

The post 7 incredibly spooky facts you need to know about the Lost Colony if youre watching American Horror Story appeared first on HelloGiggles.
Jodi Jacobson/iStock

During my nieces last move from Manhattan to Boca Raton, FL, a steak knife she packed carelessly punctured the box  and the movers hand. This became a very, very messy move. Luckily no stitches were required, but blood was shed and a pall cast over this already stressful day. Moral of the story: The last thing you need on moving day is to piss off your movers.

But not all irritants are as easy to spot (or as potentially deadly) as a sharp blade.

Here are eight things clients do that seriously annoy movers, and should be avoided at all costs. Or, at the very least, remedied with an apology and a substantial tip.

1. Not having stuff ready

If movers are scheduled to arrive at 9 a.m., all your belongings should be packed in boxes, taped, and labeled by 8 a.m. In other words, give yourself lots of wiggle room.

They dont want to stand around; they want to start moving immediately, says Wes Taft, who developed the MoveCheck app. If your move is scheduled to take a half-day, they probably have someone else scheduled for the other half. Plus, if youre paying by the hour, that extra time is deducting money from your wallet.

2. Packing stuff carelessly

We know: Packing is overwhelming, and if youre short on time, you may just start tossing things into boxes with no rhyme or reason. Just get it done, right? Wrong! You need to pay attention to how you wrap and box possessions if you want them to arrive safelyfor all concerned.

Some people think they can just throw stuff in garbage bags and move them that way, Taft says. Not so. Pack all possessions in boxes that you seal and clearly label. Wrap sharp objects (like kitchen knives!) in bubble wrap or towels, and write razor-sharp cutting instruments on the box so movers know to be extra-careful.

3. Needing plants, pets, and other tricky items moved

Unless your pet can move some boxes, keep them out of the movers way. AnatoliYakovenko/iStock

In the moving world, potted plants are the equivalent of contrabandmovers will not take them in their trucks because they could spill dirt or spread bugs. Other no-nos include any live pets like turtles or goldfish; propane tanks from grills; open bottles of caustic items like weed killer or bleach; fireworks; and bullets. You can ship firearms, but you must alert the movers and provide make, model, and serial numbers, says Brian Carey of Carey Moving in Charlotte, NC.

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4. Opening packed boxes

Movers hate when a panicked client tries to retrieve some life-saving medication he packed in that box way over there. Some things should never leave your hands, including daily or emergency medication (like EpiPens), valuable jewelry, house deeds, stock and bond certificates, and cash. Buy a lockable case you can stuff with valuables and bring with you on moving day.

5. Letting your kids or pets run wild

Your movers probably wont find this as cute as you do. mediaphotos/iStock

Movers do not, as a rule, inherently dislike kids, but they sure arent fans of the ones playing hide-and-seek amid the boxes on their trucks or vans. If you cant find a playdate for your kids on moving day, keep them occupied away from the main traffic of the move. If you have pets, kennel them in a quiet room where they cant run out the door and trip (or worse, bite!) movers carrying large boxes. Better yet, find a friend who will take the pets during moving day, which can be as stressful for animals as it is for humans.

6. Hovering

Movers hate hoverers and hand-wringers who spend the entire day shouting, Watch it, thats fragile! Theyre not a big fan of being told to lift with their knees, either. Before movers arrive, micromanage all you wantlabel boxes with a number, room, and item (#1, Kitchen, Chocolate Fondue Maker) and keep a master list. But when the professionals show up, power down and have faith youve chosen a good moving company and things will all work out in the end.

7. Haggling about price

Dont even think about haggling over costs or changing the scope of a move after the professionals have arrived. Successful moves take premeditation and preparation, which is reflected in a contract you signed before moving day. Attempting to shave off a few dollars at the last minute is terrible moving etiquette. And changing the scope of the move by suddenly adding or subtracting itemsor asking your college buddies to contribute some free laborwill only add to the chaos. If changes cant be helped, talk to the moving company, which will communicate changes to the muscle.

8. Disappearing in the middle of the move

Some clients are less skilled at multitasking than they think, and run last-minute errands when they should be at home signing paperwork so the movers can start their engines and deliver furnishings to storage or their new home.

Without signing, we cant move the truck, Carey says. Clients should never leave the house while movers are still working. If you must pick up the dry cleaning, make sure you leave an adult at home to sign on the dotted line.

The post 8 Things That Drive Your Movers Completely Insane appeared first on Real Estate News and Advice - realtor.com.
Detroit lawsuit

A lawsuit filed in federal court Tuesday against Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder and other state education officials paints an abysmal picture of schooling within the Detroit Public Schools Community District (DPSCD), the state's largest public-school district that serves nearly 50,000 students.

Filed on behalf of seven black and Latino students who attend five of the lowest performing schools in Detroit, the suit describes "slum-like conditions" at the schools, "lacking the most basic educational opportunities." They also serve more than 97% low-income students of color.

Because of these conditions, the suit argues, students remain "separate and unequal" and can't attain "the level of literacy necessary to function," in addition to proficiency in other subjects. As such, the suit alleges the district violates their due process and equal protection under the 14th Amendment.

"For years, classrooms and campuses have been unable to satisfy minimal state health and safety standards, let alone deliver basic education," the suit reads.

We are concerned with the literacy levels of all children in Michigan, State Superintendent Brian Whiston told Business Insider in an email. However, we have not received the lawsuit yet and cannot speak directly to its claims.

A spokesperson from the Michigan Department of Technology, Management, and Budget said it doesn't respond to pending litigation, and the office of the governor did not respond to Business Insider's requests for comment.

Specific allegations in the suit range from a lack of teachers and supplies to classroom temperatures that induced fainting and vermin infestations.

For instance, none of the plaintiffs can take his or her books home from school, making homework nearly impossible. Many students at the schools must also share books, often damaged beyond readability. Some books are even older than the students reading them, according to the suit.

Story continues

Detroit lawsuit

Detroit lawsuit

Many schools also lack basic supplies, like paper, pencils and even toilet paper, the suit alleges. Wealthier schools in the area either donate these items, or teachers purchase them out of pocket, according to the suit.

The suit also alleges a deficiency in clean and safe classroom space to accompany the dwindling supplies. As many as 50 students sit in some classrooms, elbow-to-elbow or on the floor, according to the suit. As a result, classrooms, with either no or minimal air conditioning, can reach as hot as 90 degrees. At Hamilton Academy, a charter school attended by one of the plaintiffs, excessive temperatures caused students and teachers to vomit and faint during the first week of this school year, according to the suit.

In one fourth-grade classroom in a school not attended by any of the plaintiffs but still within the district, a leaking hole in the ceiling created "the lake," as students and teachers refer to the area in their classroom surrounded by yellow caution tape.

Detroit lawsuit

Aside from general disrepair, mice, cockroaches, and mold plague classrooms, bathrooms, and other areas of the schools, the suit alleges. At Hamilton, teachers keep Raid on their desks. Students also routinely find bullets, sex toys, and used condoms around the school, according to the suit.

Detroit lawsuit

Hiring and maintaining an adequate teaching staff also poses a problem for the district, according to the suit.

Last year, the seventh- and eighth-grade math teacher at Hamilton left the school due to frustration about class size and lack of support. After a few failed attempts finding a replacement, the "highest performing" eighth-grade student took over teaching both grade levels for a month, the suit alleges.

"As a direct result of the State's failure," the suit says, proficiency rates at the plaintiff's schools hover around zero for all subjects. Students often struggle to write complete sentences, let alone essays or longer assignments. In one instance, an eleventh grader asked how to spell the word "the."

Despite recent attempts at reform, Detroit schools suffer from some of the worst test scores and graduation rates in the country, not to mention crushing financial difficulty. The new suit comes just eight months after Detroit teachers staged a massive "sickout" during President Barack Obama's visit to the city to call attention to the unsafe and unhealthy conditions across the district.

In June, Snyder, Michigan's governor, signed a $617 million bailout which split the system in two districts: one for tax collection and another for educating new students. Of the funds, $467 million went toward paying off operating debt at the former and $150 provided the start-up cost for the latter, debt-free district.

The package, however, had its critics.

Detroit school board president Herman Davis told The Detroit News at the time that the legislation eliminated "the rights of kids in Detroit to an equal education" and was "messing around with things like uncertified teachers and taking technology out of the classroom."

The suit against Snyder and others does allege that allowing non-certified instructors to teach inflamed the already problematic environment within DPSCD.

The plaintiffs seek relief in the form of classes focused on bringing students up to proficiency, literacy screening to prevent them from falling behind in the first place, and state monitoring of the district as well as reimbursement for costs associated with the suit.

Editor's note: This post was updated at 9/16 at 9:18 a.m. to reflect Brian Whiston's statement.

NOW WATCH: Here's footage of Brock Turner leaving jail after serving half of his 6-month sentence





More From Business Insider


A 9-foot-long Burmese python was caught slithering around a Florida high school, but instead of freaking out, a teacher used it as the perfect opportunity to teach the class a lesson.

Read: Horrified Parents Watch Alligator Chase Their Children Around the Neighborhood

Earlier this week, an enormous Burmese python was spotted outside Homestead Senior High School, and quickly apprehended by Miami-Dade school officers.

Never a dull moment @miamischoolspd officers capture snake outside of a school. Great job #schoolsafety #safetyfirst pic.twitter.com/1xPG3SjYP1  Community Outreach (@mySchoolCOP) September 14, 2016

Instead of keeping his students away from the scene, Joe Gonzalez, a teacher at the school, brought his entire class out to meet the unexpected visitor.

"It just so happens that the topic we're teaching is related to a surprise they had for me outside," Gonzalez told WSVN. "[Students] were able to see it here in real life, an example of invasive species coming onto our territory."

Read: Students Surprised By Family of Ducks Who Waddle Through Hallways And Out of the School

Eventually, Miami-Dade Fire Rescue's Venom Unit came to remove the animal from the scene and turned it over to Florida Fish and Wildlife.

Watch: Gator Takes a Stroll Around College Campus Looking to Mingle With the Co-Eds

Related Articles:
fast food eating lunch break burger unhealthy

Back in school, lunch was always a pretty great time. The cafeteria might have only served cardboard-flavored pizza, but at least you got a break from classes and the chance to talk to your friends.

In the working world, however, this midday meal often takes a backseat. In fact, lunch breaks are becoming increasingly endangered.

One study discovered that 42% of respondents either rarely or only occasionally take a lunch break, while 39% of participants eat at their desks, according to U.S. News & World Report.

That's not good. In fact, successful people tend to use their lunch breaks to boost their productivity.

Unsuccessful folks sabotage themselves by misusing their allotted midday breaks.

Here are nine things successful people rarely do during lunch:

1. Eat at their desks

I'm a total hypocrite. I'm writing this article as I'm eating a falafel bowl at my desk.

Still, it's probably a good idea to break out of your "desk lunch" routine. The reality is, eating at your desk deprives you of the benefits of a midday break. You might feel more productive, but taking a break is actually a good thing for your creativity and efficiency.

2. Work right through lunch

The most successful people take a break.

Working straight through lunch may provide you with more time, but it does nothing for the quality of your work.

"We know that creativity and innovation happen when people change their environment, and especially when they expose themselves to a nature-like environment, to a natural environment," workplace psychology expert and University of California professor Kimberly Elsbach told NPR.

And when you do go to lunch, don't check email the whole time.

3. Forget about lunch altogether

Successful people don't forget about lunch. They schedule it into their day and actually take the break.

4. Make unhealthy choices

Fast food is tempting for a whole number of reasons. It's delicious. It's cheap. Perhaps most importantly, it's fast. When you're trying to rush through your lunch break, it sounds like the perfect option, right?

Story continues

Successful people don't wreck their health for the sake of convenience.

5. Spend a ton of money eating out

Eating out constantly isn't cheap, especially if you live in a city. Start packing your own lunches.

6. Eat alone every day

Humans are social beings  we're not meant to sit around for hours without interacting with others. You don't even have to hang out with anyone from your office. Make lunch plans with a friend.

7. Take a break, but don't eat anything

If you starve yourself throughout the day, you risk binging later in the afternoon or evening. If you're not super hungry around lunchtime, consider a small, healthy snack to tide you over.

8. Stay inside (when the weather is nice)

Successful people know how important it is to get some fresh air.

Lunchtime is most likely your one major opportunity to spend some time in the sun during the week. Don't let it go to waste. Even if you're not looking to have a huge meal, try taking a walk around the block. Just get outside.

9. Take a two-hour lunch

Taking a break in the middle of the day is a great way to get yourself on track. It'll allow you to tackle the afternoon with gusto. That being said, you shouldn't leave the office for an extended period of time, unless you talk to your boss and they approve it.

NOW WATCH: We tried Shake Shack's new Bacon CheddarShack burger  here's the verdict





More From Business Insider


TLCs 90 Day Fiance is as much about culture shock as it is about rushing into marriage  and Sundays episode is no exception.

In a first-look clip made available exclusively to TheWrap, Nicole is wowed by the beauty of Azans Morocco, but she doesnt dig its anti-PDA culture. This proves to be a problem for the very touchy-feely American, who gets pretty lovey-dovey over buying some napkins.

Azan turns down her hug advances, which only makes the public display of affection more important to Nicole. Of course, hes got to live there, shes just visiting. You know, for now.

Also Read: '90 Day Fiance' Sneak Peak: Jorge's Girlfriend Is the Absolute Worst (Exclusive Video)

Nicole, 21, and Azan, 23, met through a messenger app but have never met in person. Nicole has a 20-month-old daughter and has never traveled outside of America. Nicoles family is nervous for her to travel alone and skeptical of Azans intentions because they think he is using her for a green card.

So, classic 90 Day Fiance stuff.

Watch the video above.

Also Read: '90 Day Fiance' Clip Puts Family's Fears on Full Display (Exclusive Video)

In addition to those two, here are some other couples that probably wont make it:

Narkyia (Camp Hill, Pennsylvania) and Olulowo Lowo (from Nigeria, living in Vietnam)

Narkyia, 36, and Lowo, 28, met on a Facebook group called Beautiful Big Women, when Lowo privately messaged Narkyia. Lowo tried catfishing Narkyia by pretending to live in Alabama, along with other far-reaching lies. Narkyia fears that she cant fully trust him.

Matt (Williamstown, Kentucky) and Alla (from Ukraine)

Matt, 42, and Alla, 30, met on an international dating site. Matt, married and divorced 3 times, had traveled to Ukraine looking for love. There he found Alla but bringing her to America also means bringing her 7 year old son.

Also Read: TLC Reality Star Toby Willis Arrested on Child Rape Charge

Jorge (Los Angeles, California) and Anfisa (from Moscow, Russia)

Jorge, 25, and Anfisa, 20, met when Jorge stumbled on Anfisas Facebook page and began courting her. Soon he was taking her on expensive trips across Europe. Now he plans to show Anfisa a life of luxury in America where he hopes she will fit in with his large family, which includes protective older sisters.

Story continues

Chantel (Atlanta, Georgia) and Pedro (from Dominican Republic)

Chantel, 25, and Pedro, 24, met when Chantels former Spanish teacher pointed her to Pedros Facebook page so she could learn Spanish faster. Chantel has hidden the truth about her relationship with Pedro from her family. They think he is entering the US on a student visa and have no idea that Pedro has only 90 days to marry Chantel or leave the country.

90 Day Fiance airs Sundays at 9/8c on TLC.

Related stories from TheWrap:

'Little People, Big World' Lands Season 12 Renewal From TLC (Exclusive)

TLC's Second 'Baby Story' Live Birth Delivers 280,000 Facebook Views (Exclusive)

'My Giant Life' Gets Season 2 at TLC (Exclusive Video)

Watch DIY Guru Erica Domesek Throw a Last-Minute Dinner Party on New TLCme Show (Exclusive Video)

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London (AFP) - Cats have taken over a London underground train station in a campaign to challenge advertising norms, attracting hordes of sightseers -- and leaving dog lovers dismayed.

Passengers travelling through Clapham Common station this week have noticed something is awry, with dozens of cats peering down from posters which previously displayed advertising.

The Citizens Advertising Takeover Service (CATS) project is the brainchild of Glimpse, a creative collective aiming for positive social change.

James Turner, who founded Glimpse earlier this year, said the group chose cats due to their online popularity, and set up a crowdfunding page to pay for the new posters.

More than A23,000 ($30,000, 26,900 euros) was raised on the Kickstarter website, funding 68 adverts at Clapham Common on the Northern Line.

Turner, who works in communications, said he was surprised by the huge response to the two-week campaign.

"It really has gone global now and we're just delighted to see that. You can see if you walk around the station today, children smiling, people taking photos on their phones," he told AFP.

The portraits are either of cats from shelters in need of a home, or those owned by people who donated A100 or more to the project.

The campaign comes three months after London Mayor Sadiq Khan announced a crackdown on advertising on the Tube network, banning posters which pressure people to conform to an unrealistic or unhealthy body shape.

At Clapham Common in south London, staff from operator Transport for London said hundreds of people have visited the station to take photographs of the images, including one group of 25 Chinese tourists who travelled across London especially.

Anne Broderick, employed in social work, said the feline photos made her realise how often people are exposed to advertising.

"I'm delighted to see Clapham Common has been taken over by cats," said the 41-year-old, visiting from Scotland.

Story continues

Her partner Dale Meller, 45, said the campaign has improved the atmosphere:

"There's a feeling of happiness in the station. There's a sense of humour and wellbeing," she said.

But not everyone is pleased. India Steel, an 18-year-old restaurant worker, said she was completely opposed to the idea.

"I absolutely hate cats. I detest them with amazing passion. They seem kind of cute when you see them on posters but in real life I just hate them," she said.

While aware some people may prefer dogs or have a phobia of cats, Turner said overall the campaign has had the desired impact.

"People just think a little bit differently after seeing it and wonder if the things that they thought were fixed in the world, like advertising, could actually be changed," he said.
By Libby George LAGOS (Reuters) - Much of Africa's population is being choked by deadly fuels that are banned in Europe and the United States, a campaign group said on Friday, blaming the international trading firms that sell high-sulfur fuels to the continent. Public Eye, a Swiss-based group that campaigns on fair trade, public health and other issues, said low quality standards that permit on average 200 times the sulfur content of Europe's fuels allowed the sale of dirty-but-cheaper products that will "jeopardize the health of millions of people." "Swiss traders and others maximize profits by taking advantage of weak regulations to produce and sell harmful fuels," Public Eye said. "This form of regulatory arbitrage ignores the serious risks to public health." In its report, "Dirty Diesel", it calls on Swiss-based firms Trafigura, Addax & Oryx and Vitol, to sell only fuels that meet higher regulatory standards. It described the issue as a "ticking time bomb" as cities grow across Africa and populations boom in places such as Nigeria's Lagos and Ghana's Accra. Vitol said it complied with all government regulations, and could not control by itself the quality of fuel sold at the pump. Puma Energy, partially owned by Trafigura, with retail stations and infrastructure across Africa, said it complied with national specifications and that selling fuel at higher specification was logistically impossible. Addax & Oryx did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The African Refining Association (ARA), a non-profit group that represents the continent's downstream sector, said that changing the actions of the trading houses alone would not fix the problem. "If Swiss traders followed the report recommendation today their role would be filled by (possibly less reputable) traders from other nations," the ARA said. "The role of improving fuel quality in Africa clearly rests with African governments, not with the fuel suppliers." The ARA said it had been pressing governments in tandem with the United Nations Environment Programme. Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Morocco have increased fuel quality requirements. But higher quality means higher costs, and with many countries facing severe shortages in public finances, they are wary of angering their populations with higher pump prices. "The bottom line is that governments have competing priorities for available funds," said David Bleasdale, of CITAC Africa Ltd, a consultancy that focuses on the African downstream sector. (Additional reporting by Julia Payne in London; Editing by John Stonestreet and Robin Pomeroy)
By Lisa Lambert

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. watchdog for consumer finance scored a major victory last week when it was part of the government group that forced Wells Fargo & Co <WFC.N> into a $190 million settlement of fraud charges, but the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau still faces an ugly fight to justify its own existence.

The agency, which has taken on businesses ranging from small car dealers and major financial institutions, is at the center of a philosophical debate about the value and limits of regulation. Both presidential candidates have offered opinions on the five-year-old agency, and Republicans and Democrats have worked to rally public opinion against and for the agency, which was created in the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform law in response to the widespread deception and abuse of borrowers that helped lead to the financial crisis.

The CFPB could lose its first battle as early as Friday, the earliest that a U.S. District Court could rule on whether the CFPB's single-director structure is unconstitutional. The lawsuit, brought by mortgage servicer PHH Corporation over a fine for allegedly taking kickbacks for referring customers to an insurance company, is the most serious legal test the agency has faced.

PHH contends that the CFPB's structure is unconstitutional because the agency's director is not directly answerable to the president or to Congress.

Should PHH prevail, the CFPB would likely appeal. But any ruling against the agency would give its critics - primarily regulated industries and Republicans on Capitol Hill - ammunition in the longer-term fight to dismantle or reorganize the agency.

In the meantime, lawmakers have been fighting the agency on two other fronts: power and money. On Tuesday, the House of Representative Financial Services Committee approved a bill that would cut the CFPB's powers and require that its funding from the Federal Reserve be made dependent on the more typical Congressional appropriations process. Democrats argued doing that would wipe out the agency's ability to go after financial wrongdoers, which is its main reason for existing.

Story continues

And in the days after the Wells Fargo settlement, Republican Speaker of the House Paul Ryan repeated his calls for a reorganization of the agency and tweeted: "The #CFPB supposedly exists to protect you, but instead it tries to micro manage your everyday life."

STUMP SPEECH STAPLE

Any real change to the activist agency will not likely come until after the November elections. The CFPB, which has taken on (and drawn opposition from) the payday lending and debt collection industries, was originally championed by Senator Elizabeth Warren, who is now stumping for Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.

A victory by Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump would strengthen the Republicans' reform efforts, said Benjamin Saul, a partner at law firm White & Case who has represented clients in CFPB cases.

Republicans' main argument has been that there is too much power vested in the director, resulting in the agency not being accountable to anyone. Republicans have pushed for a five-member commission to govern the agency and for lawmakers to decide its budget.

Questions posed by one of the PHH case's three judges during oral arguments at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit this spring have led many to expect that the bureau's structure, with a single director in charge of both rule making and enforcement, will be dealt a serious blow.

The panel could decide the entire structure is unconstitutional, or merely that a clause saying that the director can only be dismissed "for cause" is unconstitutional. PHH has argued that the clause keeps the director from being accountable to either the president or Congress.

"It's a full-frontal constitutional attack on the CFPB ..., and it's in front of a panel of judges in the D.C. circuit who seemed very hostile toward the CFPB during the oral arguments," said Alan Kaplinsky, who chairs the Consumer Financial Services Group at law firm Ballad Spahr.

A decision against the agency "will literally cast a cloud over everything the CFPB has done since it was created," he added.

The losing side could appeal to the Supreme Court or ask for a review from the entire district court. The CFPB declined to comment for this story.

For now, the agency is pushing ahead on several fronts, including proposing a rule that would ban forced arbitration clauses from financial contracts.

"The likelihood of the bureau fading into the background is low," said Quyen Truong, a partner at Stroock & Stroock & Lavan in Washington who was the assistant director and deputy general counsel for the CFPB until earlier this year.

"The CFPB's leadership is fervently committed to its mission. Their intent is to move forward zealously regardless of which administration is in place."

(Reporting by Lisa Lambert; Editing by Linda Stern and Leslie Adler)
By Lisa Barrington and Osman Orsal BEIRUT/CILVEGOZU, Turkey (Reuters) - The United States and Russia said on Friday they wanted to extend the four-day-old ceasefire in Syria they have co-sponsored, although the agreement looked increasingly shaky, undermined by increasing violence and a failure to deliver aid. The second attempt this year by the Cold War-era superpower foes to halt the conflict has succeeded so far in curbing the fighting, but it remains a risky gamble in a war that has made a mockery of all previous peace efforts. Washington and Moscow, which support opposite sides in the war between President Bashar al-Assad and insurgents, have agreed to share targeting information against jihadist fighters that are their common enemies, if the truce holds. Although the details of the pact remain secret, that could see them wage war on the same side for the first time since World War 2. But such unprecedented cooperation would come at a time of deep mistrust between the two countries, whose relations are at their worst for decades. On the ground, the ceasefire has been reluctantly accepted by rebels who call it skewed in favor of Assad but say they have no choice because of the desperate humanitarian condition of civilians in besieged areas. Assad's government, which holds its strongest position on the battlefield since the early days of the war, is also in no hurry to compromise. Moscow, which holds the key to delivering the cooperation of its ally Assad, said it was ready to extend the truce by 72 hours and called on Washington to press rebels to abide by it. Washington said it agreed that an extension was important, but also voiced alarm over the failure of aid to arrive. Secretary of State John Kerry, who personally hammered out the agreement despite scepticism among some U.S. administration colleagues, told Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov that Washington would not start the agreed joint targeting of militants until aid arrives. CLASHES SPREAD The main dispute of the truce so far is over aid to Aleppo, Syria's biggest city before the war, divided between rebel and government-held zones for years. Pro-government forces encircled the rebel zone this month, trapping an estimated 300,000 civilians there with no way to bring in food. The United Nations pointed the finger at the government for holding up aid by denying letters guaranteeing access. "In order to actually initiate the actual movement of these convoys we need the facilitation letters. They have not come," U.N. humanitarian affairs spokesman Jens Laerke said in Geneva. "It's highly frustrating." After three days which saw a marked decrease in violence and no deaths, the first civilians since the start of the truce were killed on Thursday, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring body. Three more died and 13 were injured in air strikes in rebel-held Idlib province on Friday, the Observatory said. A number of shells were also fired by insurgents into two besieged Shi'ite villages. Clashes hit areas east of Damascus on Friday. Residents in the city center were woken up by a large explosion, a witness said, and shells fell near its eastern limits. The Britain-based Observatory said the violence stemmed from clashes between rebels and government forces in the Jobar district on Damascus's eastern outskirts. Each side said the other had attacked first. Both sides accuse each other of failing to withdraw from Aleppo's Castello Road, the main route into the rebel-held area, which would be used to bring aid. Moscow said on Friday the Syrian army had withdrawn from the road but returned its troops there after they came under fire from rebels. Insurgent groups in Aleppo said they had seen no such withdrawal from the government side, and would not pull back from their own positions until it did so. "The regime has not withdrawn from the area," Zakaria Malahifji of the Aleppo-based Fastaqim rebel group told Reuters. Two aid convoys destined for Aleppo were still stuck on the Turkish border after several days while the sides argued over how the supplies were to be delivered. The trucks contain flour for more than 150,000 people and food rations for 35,000 people for a month, a U.N. spokesman said. "OUT OF CONTROL" Moscow is still talking up the agreement. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call: "In general, we can still state that the process is moving forward, despite some setbacks." But a Russian defense ministry official said the situation in Syria "could get out of control" unless Washington forced the rebels to comply with the ceasefire. "We expect decisive measures from the American side, aimed at influencing the armed groups under their control to rigorously carry out the Sept. 9 agreement," Lieutenant-General Viktor Poznikhir said. Outside the scope of the truce, the United States is leading an international bombing campaign against Islamic State fighters who control territory in both Syria and neighboring Iraq. The Pentagon said on Friday that the coalition had killed a senior Islamic State leader, Wa'il Salman al-Fayad, in an air strike last week near the group's de facto Syrian capital, Raqqa. The United States and Russia had planned to brief United Nations Security Council members on the deal behind closed doors on Friday, but canceled the meeting at the last minute without explanation, diplomats said. Russia is pushing for the council to adopt a draft resolution next week endorsing the deal. Assad appears as uncompromising as ever. He vowed again this week to win back the entire country, which has been splintered into areas controlled by the state, a constellation of rebel factions, Islamic State jihadists and Kurdish militia fighters. A Western diplomat told Reuters the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons would issue a report next week to the Security Council blaming Syrian army units for attacks using chlorine gas. East of Aleppo, a small number of U.S. military personnel entered the rebel-held town of al-Rai near the Turkish border as part of operations to coordinate air strikes against Islamic State, a senior rebel source said. The Americans were forced to leave the area after Turkish-backed rebels protested against their presence, the source said. One U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said initial reports appeared to confirm the incident involving a small group of U.S. forces. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the incident, but it acknowledged that U.S. special operations forces are accompanying Turkish and Syrian opposition forces battling Islamic State in and around the area of the Syrian border near Jarabulus and al-Rai. (Additional reporting by Ellen Francis and John Davison in Beirut, Tom Miles in Geneva, Dmitry Solovyov in Moscow, Idrees Ali, Phil Stewart and Yeganeh Torbati in Washington, Michelle Nicols at the United Nations and Anthony Deutsch in The Hague; Writing by John Davison and Peter Graff; Editing by Mark Trevelyan and James Dalgleish)
By Lisa Barrington and Osman Orsal BEIRUT/CILVEGOZU, Turkey (Reuters) - The United States and Russia said on Friday they wanted to extend the four-day-old ceasefire in Syria they have co-sponsored, although the agreement looked increasingly shaky, undermined by increasing violence and a failure to deliver aid. The second attempt this year by the Cold War-era superpower foes to halt the conflict has succeeded so far in curbing the fighting, but it remains a risky gamble in a war that has made a mockery of all previous peace efforts. Washington and Moscow, which support opposite sides in the war between President Bashar al-Assad and insurgents, have agreed to share targeting information against jihadist fighters that are their common enemies, if the truce holds. Although the details of the pact remain secret, that could see them wage war on the same side for the first time since World War 2. But such unprecedented cooperation would come at a time of deep mistrust between the two countries, whose relations are at their worst for decades. On the ground, the ceasefire has been reluctantly accepted by rebels who call it skewed in favour of Assad but say they have no choice because of the desperate humanitarian condition of civilians in besieged areas. Assad's government, which holds its strongest position on the battlefield since the early days of the war, is also in no hurry to compromise. Moscow, which holds the key to delivering the cooperation of its ally Assad, said it was ready to extend the truce by 72 hours and called on Washington to press rebels to abide by it. Washington said it agreed that an extension was important, but also voiced alarm over the failure of aid to arrive. Secretary of State John Kerry, who personally hammered out the agreement despite scepticism among some U.S. administration colleagues, told Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov that Washington would not start the agreed joint targeting of militants until aid arrives. CLASHES SPREAD The main dispute of the truce so far is over aid to Aleppo, Syria's biggest city before the war, divided between rebel and government-held zones for years. Pro-government forces encircled the rebel zone this month, trapping an estimated 300,000 civilians there with no way to bring in food. The United Nations pointed the finger at the government for holding up aid by denying letters guaranteeing access. "In order to actually initiate the actual movement of these convoys we need the facilitation letters. They have not come," U.N. humanitarian affairs spokesman Jens Laerke said in Geneva. "It's highly frustrating." After three days which saw a marked decrease in violence and no deaths, the first civilians since the start of the truce were killed on Thursday, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring body. Three more died and 13 were injured in air strikes in rebel-held Idlib province on Friday, the Observatory said. A number of shells were also fired by insurgents into two besieged Shi'ite villages. Clashes hit areas east of Damascus on Friday. Residents in the city centre were woken up by a large explosion, a witness said, and shells fell near its eastern limits. The Britain-based Observatory said the violence stemmed from clashes between rebels and government forces in the Jobar district on Damascus's eastern outskirts. Each side said the other had attacked first. Both sides accuse each other of failing to withdraw from Aleppo's Castello Road, the main route into the rebel-held area, which would be used to bring aid. Moscow said on Friday the Syrian army had withdrawn from the road but returned its troops there after they came under fire from rebels. Insurgent groups in Aleppo said they had seen no such withdrawal from the government side, and would not pull back from their own positions until it did so. "The regime has not withdrawn from the area," Zakaria Malahifji of the Aleppo-based Fastaqim rebel group told Reuters. Two aid convoys destined for Aleppo were still stuck on the Turkish border after several days while the sides argued over how the supplies were to be delivered. The trucks contain flour for more than 150,000 people and food rations for 35,000 people for a month, a U.N. spokesman said. "OUT OF CONTROL" Moscow is still talking up the agreement. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call: "In general, we can still state that the process is moving forward, despite some setbacks." But a Russian defence ministry official said the situation in Syria "could get out of control" unless Washington forced the rebels to comply with the ceasefire. "We expect decisive measures from the American side, aimed at influencing the armed groups under their control to rigorously carry out the Sept. 9 agreement," Lieutenant-General Viktor Poznikhir said. Outside the scope of the truce, the United States is leading an international bombing campaign against Islamic State fighters who control territory in both Syria and neighbouring Iraq. The Pentagon said on Friday that the coalition had killed a senior Islamic State leader, Wa'il Salman al-Fayad, in an air strike last week near the group's de facto Syrian capital, Raqqa. The United States and Russia had planned to brief United Nations Security Council members on the deal behind closed doors on Friday, but cancelled the meeting at the last minute without explanation, diplomats said. Russia is pushing for the council to adopt a draft resolution next week endorsing the deal. Assad appears as uncompromising as ever. He vowed again this week to win back the entire country, which has been splintered into areas controlled by the state, a constellation of rebel factions, Islamic State jihadists and Kurdish militia fighters. A Western diplomat told Reuters the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons would issue a report next week to the Security Council blaming Syrian army units for attacks using chlorine gas. East of Aleppo, a small number of U.S. military personnel entered the rebel-held town of al-Rai near the Turkish border as part of operations to coordinate air strikes against Islamic State, a senior rebel source said. The Americans were forced to leave the area after Turkish-backed rebels protested against their presence, the source said. One U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said initial reports appeared to confirm the incident involving a small group of U.S. forces. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the incident, but it acknowledged that U.S. special operations forces are accompanying Turkish and Syrian opposition forces battling Islamic State in and around the area of the Syrian border near Jarabulus and al-Rai. (Additional reporting by Ellen Francis and John Davison in Beirut, Tom Miles in Geneva, Dmitry Solovyov in Moscow, Idrees Ali, Phil Stewart and Yeganeh Torbati in Washington, Michelle Nicols at the United Nations and Anthony Deutsch in The Hague; Writing by John Davison and Peter Graff; Editing by Mark Trevelyan and James Dalgleish)
For a little while, the snake-bit F-35 fighter plane seemed to be on a roll. This week, the U.S. and Israel signed a military assistance deal that will help Tel Aviv pay for dozens of the state-of-the-art aircraft at a price tag of more than $100 million per plane. Before that, it satisfied the military brass that it can integrate successfully with the Aegis missile defense system. All that good news came just weeks after the Air Force declared its first squadron of the new jets to be combat ready on Aug. 2.

Well, that was then. On Tuesday, according to Bloombergs Anthony Capaccio, the Air Force informed Congress that it had been forced to ground 15 of the jets because of a problem with the lines that deliver coolant throughout the plane.

Related: US Navy Tries to Convince the Public the F-35 Is Ready

Citing a statement sent by the Air Force to Congressional oversight committees, Capaccio reported that mechanics working on the planes had found peeling and crumbling insulation on the lines that carry coolant to the planes massive onboard computers and its combat systems. The letter warned that if the insulation were to get loose, it could find its way to other parts of the plane and cause serious damage.

The problem appears to be with the construction of the lines and not related to the design of the plane itself.

Nevertheless, its another embarrassing hiccup in the long saga of the plane that began life as the joint strike fighter and which was meant to save huge amounts of money by developing a plane that various U.S. military service branches could use, with moderate customization for their different needs.

Over its more than two decades in development, the cost per plane of the program has ballooned dramatically from the $50 million originally forecast, even as a plague of design flaws and other problems delayed deployment.

Related: Here's Why the F-35 Will Lose a Dogfight With the Russian Su-35

The latest issue with the coolant lines should be relatively minor compared to some of the other delays the plane has run into. But it will affect planes already under contract with U.S. allies around the world, and could cause more second guessing from foreign buyers about the wisdom of placing future orders.

Top Reads from The Fiscal Times:
From ELLE DECOR

A favorite with celebrities and everyday nomads alike, Airbnb is the cool kid on the block in the lodging industry. A standard hotel with a piece of chocolate on the pillow? Pffft. We'll take a Van Gogh bedroom or private island, please and thank you.

But the company isn't stopping with unique lodging options. It's now dipping its toes in taking over the tour guide industry, with a local twist.

Airbnb is testing City Hosts, multiday programs that pair travelers with city residents for true "local" experiences. Let's say you're visiting London. City Hosts helps you meet up with a record scout for a tour of London's Grime music scene. Or if you're in San Francisco, you can get kite surfing lessons from a pro, reports Lonely Planet.

Honestly, we wouldn't mind swapping a stuffy bus tour for those vacay itineraries.

Photo credit: Getty Images

Prices vary, but most hover around $200, according to Brit + Co. The program is still in the private beta testing stage - and only available in 11 cities, such as San Francisco, Paris and Havana - but you can get on the waitlist on the City Hosts landing page.

Airbnb isn't spilling any more details. According to the company, the program is still super under wraps. (Literally, the City Hosts website says, "This is still under wraps.")

"Airbnb is constantly looking at new ways to enhance and improve the platform by testing different user features," an Airbnb representative told ELLEDecor.com.

By our count, City Hosts appears to be the latest development in Airbnb's strategy to infuse easy-to-access experiences with travel. Last year, Airbnb also experimented with Airbnb Journeys, which involved the company booking entire trips complete with accommodations, transportation, daily meals and tours, for a flat fee. That program apparently never left the beta testing phase.

Here's hoping City Hosts will have a different outcome - and to consequently kite surfing in San Fran.

Story continues

One caveat: You do need to book a place to stay through Airbnb to snag access to the tours. But if you're booking an Airbnb tour, you were probably going to do that anyway, right?

Photo credit: Getty Images

h/t: Brit + Co

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CBS Television Studios has signed an overall deal with Star Trek: Discovery executive producer Alex Kurtzman for his new production company, Secret Hideout. The pact succeeds the overall deal Kurtzman and former producing partner Bob Orci had at the studio for their K/O Paper Products. The new pact, which came after a lengthy transitional period, gives CBS Studios exclusive rights to Secret Hideouts TV content.

Former WBTV executive Heather Kadin, who was president of television for K/O under the companies deals at 20th TV and then CBS TV Studios, serves in the same capacity at the new company.

The first show produced under the new banner is the upcoming series Star Trek: Discovery, co-created and executive produced by Kurtzman and Bryan Fuller. The drama is set to bow on CBS and SVOD platform CBS All Access in May 2017. Over its lifespan, K/O Paper Products has yielded such series as Hawaii Five-0 (CBS), Sleepy Hollow (Fox), and Scorpion & Limitless (CBS).

Kurtzman is an executive producer on all K/O and Secret Hideout series currently on the air. Kadin serves as an executive producer on Sleepy Hollow, Scorpion, and Star Trek: Discovery. Former VP of Television at K/O Paper Products, Aaron Baiers, will also stay on with Secret Hideout as VP of Television where he will serve as a producer for Star Trek: Discovery.

(CBS TV Studios president) David Stapf and his team have been incredibly supportive and tremendous creative collaborators, said Kurtzman and Kadin. As Secret Hideout begins to develop and produce new properties and ideas and as the landscape of television evolves, we are thrilled to be working alongside them for the next four years.

Secret Hideout is repped by CAA and attorney Michael Gendler.

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Open Friday

BLAIR WITCH. This horror sequel is nothing but a pale imitation of The Blair Witch Project  void of all creativity and originality. R. (Grand, East Park, Edgewood, SouthPointe) Grade: F

BRIDGET JONES'S BABY. Renee Zellweger charms again as Bridget Jones, who has to determine which of two men is the father of her baby, in this well-done reset of the series. R. Girand, East Park, Edgewood, SouthPointe). Grade: B

COMPLETE UNKNOWN. Rachel Weisz is an ever-changing woman who turns up at the birthday party of old flame Michael Shannon in this contemplative, captivating film. R. (Ross) Grade: B

DYING TO KNOW: RAM DASS & TIMOTHY LEARY. The lives of '60s counterculture icons Ram Dass and Timothy Leary are explored in this documentary that adds vintage film and photographs to a long conversation between them. Not Rated. (Ross) Grade: B

HILLSONG - LET HOPE RISE. The popular Australian Christian band plays stadium shows and spreads the mission of its namesake church around the world in this documentary that was not screened in advance for critics. PG. (Grand).

SNOWDEN. Joseph Gordon-Levitt gives a solid performance as Edward Snowden in this ripped-from-the-headlines film about the NSA document leaker from director Oliver Stone. R. (Grand, East Park, SouthPointe). Grade: B

Now Showing

BAD MOMS. The problem with Bad Moms isnt the concept, or the message about the struggle to raise good people in the world  its the execution. From the micro level to the macro, the film is a hasty, shoddy mess. R (Grand) Grade: C

THE DISAPPOINMENTS ROOM. Kate Beckinsale stars in this never-thrilling tired psychological thriller about a couple that moves into a mansion with a haunted room. R. (Grand) Grade: D

DON'T BREATHE. A team of teen burglers break into the house of a blind man who isn't as helpless as he would seem in this intense movie that's another instant horror classic of 2016. R. (Grand, Edgewood, SouthPointe) Grade: B+

HELL OR HIGH WATER. Two Texas Rangers chase bank-robbing brothers in this film that works equally well as a thriller, character study or pointed social commentary. R. (SouthPointe) Grade: A

JASON BOURNE. Star Matt Damon and director Paul Greengrass return to the action franchise for an intense ripped-from-the-headlines story of escaping from government surveillance. PG-13. (Edgewood) Grade: B

PETE'S DRAGON. As part of Disney's continuing effort to remake its animated classics in live-action, "Pete's Dragon" has been confidently reborn as an earnest tale of green-winged wonder. PG. (SouthPointe) Grade: B

SAUSAGE PARTY. This animated smack in the face of good manners set in a supermarket starring a hotdog and bun is surprising and strange, often delightfully so. R. (Grand) Grade: C+

SUICIDE SQUAD. The characters are the ultimate in squad goals, but theyre far more fun than the actual story itself. PG-13. (Grand, East Park). Grade: C+

SULLY. Director Clint Eastwood and star Tom Hanks combine to effectively tell the heroic story of Capt. Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger, who landed his damaged plane on the Hudson River in 2009. PG-13. (Grand, East Park, Edgewood, SouthPointe) Grade: B+

WHEN THE BOUGH BREAKS. Morris Chestnut and Regina Hall star in this thriller about a married couple who finds a surrogate mother only to have the wife become obsessed with her husband's behavior in this sloppy "Fatal Attraction" knockoff. PG-13. (Grand, East Park, SouthPointe). Grade: D

THE WILD LIFE. This animated take on the Robinson Crusoe story is only for the youngest viewers. PG. (Grand, East Park, Edgewood) Grade: C-

NOTE: Theaters are for Friday only and are subject to change the other days of the week.
Amazon Prime is launching the new series, "The Grand Tour," on November 18, starring Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May.

The highly anticipated motoring series will run for 12 weeks, exclusively for Prime members. "The Grand Tour" will be available via the Amazon Video app for TV, Fire TV and other connected devices, mobile devices and online at www.amazon.com/thegrandtour.

The trio has been traveling the world for the past year to film the series, with studio audience recordings filmed inside their large traveling tent. They head to California later this month, after a stint in Johannesburg.

The team agreed to produce the series after leaving the BBC series "Top Gear."
Amazon has revealed the launch date of its keenly anticipated auto series The Grand Tour, hosted by former Top Gear trio Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May. New episodes will be released weekly, every Friday, from Nov. 18 on its streaming platform Amazon Prime Video.

The first episode will feature a giant traveling tent that acts as the shows studio throughout the series, which will be located for that episode in California. The studio sequence is being filmed in front of a live audience later this month. In the first episode, Clarkson, Hammond and May will compare three of the latest hybrid hypercars: the Ferrari LaFerrari, McLaren P1 and Porsche 918 Spyder. Matt Damon and Charlize Theron are among the shows guests in Season 1, according to a report in The Sun newspaper.

Customers have been desperate to find out when they can watch their favorite team back on screen, so we are very excited to announce the launch date of one of the most globally anticipated shows of 2016, said Jay Marine, VP of Amazon Prime Video EU. The guys have been having a blast filming the show around the world, and we cant wait for fans to see it.

Clarkson, Hammond and May have committed to three seasons of The Grand Tour as part of a landmark global TV deal, and for the past year the team has been traveling the world filming the first season. As well as California, the traveling tent has been to Johannesburg; more worldwide locations will be announced soon.

Prime members can watch the show via the Amazon Video app on smart TVs, streaming media players  including FireTV and FireTV Stick  Xbox, PlayStation, Wii, Wii U, on iOS and Android phones and tablets, and on the web.

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Amber Rose gives us the scoop on this amazing new lash tool

Amber Rose gives us the scoop on this amazing new lash tool

When it comes to false lashes, not everyone has been able to master the art of application. While some of us would rather opt for pricey lash extensions or stick by our tried-and-true mascaras, others are always looking for new ways to achieve those perfect Bambi eyes.

Thankfully, beauty icon, inspiring mom, feminist activist, author, talk show host, and all-around badass woman, Amber Rose, has teamed up with Flirt Cosmetics for the launch of a lash tool that is going to CHANGE OUR LIVES. (And lashes, OBV.)

A photo posted by Amber Rose (@amberrose) on Sep 15, 2016 at 1:21pm PDT

Flirt Flashes is an innovative lash applicator that sort of looks like a cute, little, correction tape dispenser. This is how it works: The applicator dispenses false lash buds and locks into place while you apply a thin layer of lash adhesive to them before sticking them on. The unit holds 40 lash buds, plus an extra four.

FLIRT Flashes A Step-by-Step Guide part 1 click on link for full video! #flashyourflirt #bitchesbuythedamnglue A video posted by FLIRT Cosmetics (@flirtcosmetics) on Sep 15, 2016 at 7:44am PDT

If youve ever tried applying falsies with just your fingers and got frustrated at them sticking everywhere except your eyes, this tool might be the thing youve been dreaming of.

Flirt Flashes

Rose joined forces with Donald Robertson, creative director of Flirt Cosmetics and creative director at-large at The Estee Lauder Cos, to bring Flirt Flashes to life. Robertson is also behind the cute illustrations accompanying the tool.

To get the scoop on this totally intriguing invention, we asked Rose what faux lash newbies can expect. Its super easy to use just put the applicator up to your lashes and click away! she told HelloGiggles.

And dont be afraid to try it a few times and mess up before mastering it. I had to play with it a little to figure out exactly what to do, now its like second nature.

Story continues

This is totally getting us excited.

We had to ask Rose to share her life-changing beauty secrets, but she played coy. Its hard to name one!, she says.

My makeup artist Priscilla Ono gives me a million tips a day, just follow her on snapchat @priscillaono and youll see.

One look at Onos Instagram and you can see what products she uses to glam up Roses mug, such as Iconic Londons Multi-Use Powder Contour Pallette, and MAC Cosmetics classic red shade, Ruby Woo.

Love my @iconic.london Multi use powder contour pallette! Love using it with their EVO 002 brush! @amberrose loves her "Contourrrr" #MakeupByPriscillaOno #IconicLondon A video posted by Priscilla Ono (@priscillaono) on Jul 13, 2016 at 5:09pm PDT

When it comes to beauty trends, Rose doesnt follow the crowd.

I honestly really like to do my own thing, she explains.When I see something and I like it, I try it. I dont really like to follow trends.

But do you mind if we follow the trends YOU start, Amber?

Flirt Flashes is available now for $28 on FlirtCosmetics.com.

The post Amber Rose gives us the scoop on this amazing new lash tool appeared first on HelloGiggles.
- A major hurdle for financing a new stadium in Las Vegas to lure the NFL's Oakland Raiders was cleared Thursday. The Southern Nevada Tourism Infrastructure Committee approved $750 million in public funding for the proposed $1.9 billion venue, which would also have $500 million coming from the Raiders and $650 million from casino owner Sheldon Adelson, chief executive of the Sands. The public funding is still to be approved by Nevada state lawmakers. The planned 65,000-seat stadium would give the Raiders a new home and a third different market to call home. Founded in Oakland, they moved to Los Angeles from 1982 through 1994 and then back to Oakland from 1995 until now.

AFP
Oslo (AFP) - Norway was accused of authorising the "mass slaughter" of its endangered wolf population on Friday after announcing that 47 of the predators would be killed by hunters.

The move, which follows previous efforts to control the population, was hailed by farmers but condemned by outraged environmental groups.

Only 65-68 wolves were registered last winter in Norway, according to the specialised body Rovdata, but their numbers will have increased after the birth of an unknown number of pups in April and May.

At least another 25 wolves were observed in the border region with neighbouring Sweden last winter.

"This is pure mass slaughter," blasted Nina Jensen, the head of the Norwegian branch of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF).

"We haven't seen anything like this in almost 100 years, when the policy at the time was to exterminate all the big predators," she added.

Farmers complain regularly about wolves attacking their sheep.

"We find the reason (for the killing) justified and intelligent, especially the potential damage that these wolf packs represent to farming," Erling Aas-Eng, a regional official for a farming association, told broadcaster NRK.

Without setting an exact overall number of wolves allowed, the Norwegian parliament agreed in early June to limit the number of litters to between four and six per year, including at least three for the Norwegian wolf population and the rest in the cross-border packs.

The Norwegian wolf population currently has seven packs with one reproductive couple, which is "above the national population target" since each pack can be expected to deliver a new litter every year, the Norwegian environmental agency said.

Wolves are listed as "critically endangered" on the 2015 Norwegian list of endangered animals.
Here are some of the stocks the Yahoo Finance team will be watching for you today.

Apple (AAPL) is relatively flat this morning after a 12% jump in the stock the past week. The iPhone 7 officially went on sale today. People from Sydney to Shanghai were waiting at stores to be the first people with the phone. Apple stock is at its highest point since the beginning of the year.

Oracle (ORCL) is down slightly as the company reported earnings and revenue for the quarter ending in August that missed Wall Street expectations. Steep declines in Oracles software licensing business undercut strong sales in its cloud-computing unit. Oracle is trying to catch up to Microsoft and Amazon in cloud computing. Shares of Oracle are up 14% this year.

Deutsche Bank (DB) was down 9% before the bell. This after word that the US Justice Department wants the German bank to pay $14 billion to settle claims it packaged toxic mortgage securities before the financial crisis. Deutsche Bank said in a statement it doesnt expect to settle for anywhere near $14 billion. Analysts have said the bank may end up paying between $2 billion and $5 billion.

Unilever (UL) is in talks to buy Honest Company, the business co-founded by actress Jessica Alba, according to reports. The Wall Street Journal says Unilever is discussing a deal worth more than $1 billion. Honest sells disposable baby diapers, beauty products and natural cleaning products.
More than 170 years ago, British explorer Capt. Sir John Franklin and crew embarked on a journey to navigate the fabled Northwest Passage, but the expedition never made it back. Now, the second ship of that doomed voyage may have been found in the appropriately named Terror Bay, The Guardian reports.

Cued by Inuit word of mouth, archaeologists with the Arctic Research Foundation on Sept. 3 found what they think is the HMS Terror. The ship sits in about 80 feet (24 meters) of water and is nearly intact, according to The Guardian.

"This vessel looks like it was buttoned down tight for winter and it sank," Arctic Research Foundation spokesperson Adrian Schimnowski told The Guardian. "Everything was shut. Even the windows are still intact. If you could lift this boat out of the water and pump the water out, it would probably float." [In Photos: Arctic Shipwreck Solves 170-Year-Old Mystery]

Lost Expedition

Franklin launched the expedition to the Arctic in 1845, commanding two ships, the HMS Erebus and the HMS Terror. He and his men were attempting to navigate the Northwest Passage, the sea route that connects the Atlantic and Pacific oceans through the Arctic Ocean and was long-sought as a trade route by several explorers. In September 1846, during the attempt, the two ships became stuck in ice. A note found on King William Island in 1859 revealed that the ships were deserted in April 1848 and that Franklin himself had died on June 11, 1847. Eight other officers and 15 men had also died at the time of that writing  April 25, 1848  meaning that 106 men were left to face their fate. None would ever be heard from again.

Since 2008, a Parks Canada-led mission has been searching for the Franklin ships. In 2014, researchers discovered the wreck of the HMS Erebus in Victoria Strait. Divers discovered artifacts aboard the ship, including a bronze bell, a 680-lb. (310 kilograms) cannon, patent-medicine bottles and uniform buttons. [Photos: The HMS Erebus' Bronze Bell]

Story continues

Lucky tip

A remotely operated vehicle entered the possible HMS Terror wreck on Sept. 11 and spotted plates and a can on the shelf of a food pantry, as well as wine bottles and a desk with open drawers. The wreck was found 60 miles (96 kilometers) south of where archaeologists had expected to find it. They were tipped off by an Inuit crewmember, Sammy Kogvik, 49, of Gjoa Haven, who had seen a hunk of wood in sea ice while on a fishing trip years before. Kogvik took pictures of the wood but lost his phone later that day, he told The Guardian.

He didn't tell anyone the story until joining the crew of the research vessel Martin Bergmann, which was searching for the wreck. Because of his tip, the vessel detoured to head toward the spot where the Terror was resting.

The next step, according to Parks Canada spokesperson Meaghan Bradley, is to confirm the wreck as the HMS Terror.

"The discovery of HMS Terror would be important for Inuit communities and Canada, reflecting the ongoing and valuable role of Inuit knowledge in the search and making a significant contribution to completing the Franklin story," Bradley wrote in a statement sent to Live Science.

Canadian government officials likewise heralded the discovery and the tip from the Intuit community that led to it.

"The multiyear contribution from Parks Canada and its partners in the Arctic has led to the discovery of two of the most famous and mysterious ships in Canada's history," Catherine McKenna, Canada's minister of the environment and climate change, said in a statement. "HMS Erebus was found through a unique combination of Inuit tradition knowledge and cutting-edge science, and Inuit knowledge was again central to this amazing discovery. This latest discovery will offer another unique and incredible opportunity for archaeological exploration and the sharing [of] Inuit history and culture with the world."

Original article on Live Science.

Editor's Recommendations

Copyright 2016 LiveScience, a Purch company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
RACINE  Racine Public Library officials will know by the middle of October if adding a third floor to the Lake Avenue facility is feasible and realistic.

The library is considering expanding by adding a third floor and a curved outdoor patio. The architectural firm of Product Architecture + Design is calculating the cost of the project, while Library Strategies, a consulting group based in Saint Paul, Minnesota, is conducting a feasibility study on the proposal.

Consultants from Library Strategies will interview nearly two dozen community leaders during the first week of October to determine the level of support for the modifications, Library Board member Sandy Riekoff said Thursday.

Consultants from Library Strategies plan to present their findings to the Library Foundation Board on Oct. 13, Riekoff told the Library Board Thursday.

We will know then if there is buy-in or not, Riekoff said. The project wont go forward until we hear yea or nay.

Based on the findings of the feasibility study, the Foundation Board would advise the Library Board whether or not to move forward with a capital campaign to pay for the project. The Library Board is scheduled to meet Oct. 20.

Im excited about being able to possibly offer more space for the community, Library Director Jessica MacPhail said.

Library officials reviewed several expansion options with the architects in June. The board decided to pursue adding a third floor, something the building was designed to have anyway, architects said.

The biggest benefit of adding the third floor would be an enclosed meeting space, which could hold between 200 and 250 people, according to the architects. The meeting room would make the library a Racine destination, the architects said.

The library has mulled several expansion plans in the past several years. In 2014, the library explored the idea of a second library in Mount Pleasant, but that concept was rejected by a steering committee representing municipalities east of Interstate 94.
SYDNEY/SHANGHAI, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Apple Inc fans from Sydney to Tokyo, the first to snap the new iPhone 7 off the shelves, cheered as they left stores on Friday brandishing their purchases, flanked by applauding sales staff.

But underneath the usual fanfare, and despite complaints that the larger size of the new phone and the new jet black colour were sold out, crowds were smaller than in past years.

Some 200 people were gathered in Sydney light drizzle for the privilege of being the first worldwide to hold an iPhone 7. Apple will launch in its key Asian market China later on Friday.

"It feels great to be the first in the world to have the iPhone 7. It was 100 percent worth it," said Marcus Barsoum, a 16-year-old "diehard Apple fan" who spent two nights camped outside the Sydney store.

Weary but elated, Barsoum charged in to the store at 8 a.m. to the cheers of Apple staff. He emerged with a matte black iPhone 7 although he had wanted a 7 plus in jet black.

Dale Adams, who works at J.P. Morgan in Sydney, arrived only 15 minutes before the store opened and was able to buy a 7 Plus, having ordered it online more than a week ago.

"I'm certainly not one of the hardcore Apple fans but I think the bigger capacity, better battery, better camera, that's enough to make the jump," he said.

Chatter about the launch on Chinese microblog Weibo has been far more muted than when the iPhone 6 debuted in 2014. An index of searches on Baidu Inc, China's equivalent of Google, shows the new phone lagging both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 5.

Sales in China will be the acid test for Apple's year ahead: the mega success of the iPhone 6 in China drove sales last year, while the slower-burn 6S contributed to Apple's first global revenue drop in over a decade earlier this year.

Stores open in China later on Friday, a holiday.

(Reporting by Tom Westbrook in SYDNEY, Sijia Jiang in HONG KONG and Adam Jourdan in SHANGHAI; Editing by Stephen Coates)
By Adam Jourdan, Tom Westbrook and Julia Love

SHANGHAI/SYDNEY/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Apple employees enthusiastically counted down the last moments before stores from San Francisco to Shanghai opened on Friday to launch the iPhone 7, but the ranks of shoppers were notably thinner than in previous years.

Apple Inc <AAPL.O> fans assembled at stores around the world to be among the first to buy the iPhone 7, the retail phenomenon that accompanies the launch of the company's updated flagship product each year.

The tech giant announced earlier this week that the larger iPhone 7 Plus had sold out, prompting some who had set up camp outside Apple's marquee store in San Francisco to pack up their bags and head home.

To be sure, online pre-orders have made lines unnecessary for all but diehard fans, and in Chinese stores only those who had ordered in advance were queuing to collect.

Yet in markets like China, online interest in the new phone has also been muted, as cheaper local brands amp up their design and marketing.

Wu Ting, a 28-year-old from Nanjing, was surprised to find herself first in line at a downtown Apple store in Shanghai on Friday, a holiday in China.

"I found last year that there were crowds of people, but this year almost no one. I came an hour early thinking I'd have to wait a long time before getting seen," Wu said.

The stakes for the iPhone 7 are high after sales of the gadget dropped during two straight quarters this year, the first declines in its history. The iPhone is Apple's lifeblood, accounting for more than half of the company's revenue.

But some on Wall Street fear that the world's most valuable company is due for a disappointing year as the redesigned phone features largely incremental improvements, such as an enhanced camera and new headphone technology.

Sales in China will be a key harbinger for Apple's prospects: The success of the iPhone 6 in China propelled the company to record heights in 2014, while the 6S contributed to the company's first global revenue drop in over a decade earlier this year.

Story continues

Apple will not release first-weekend sales of the phones this year, a break with previous policy. The figure has become a reflection of supply more than demand, the company said.

An index of searches on Baidu Inc <BIDU.O>, China's most popular search engine, shows the new phone lagging both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 5.

Apple's Greater China sales dropped by a third in April-June, albeit after more than doubling a year earlier, while its market share has fallen to around 7.8 percent, placing it fifth behind local rivals Huawei, OPPO and Vivo.

"From Steve Jobs to Tim Cook, Apple has never had any marketing strategy tailor-made for China," said Zhou Zhanggui, a Beijing-based strategic consultant. "Apple risks losing out more if it does not better cater to local demands in its marketing as well as product design."

In Beijing's fashionable Sanlitun shopping district, several people who had already grabbed new iPhone 7s were hawking them for a markup just outside a flagship store.

LOYAL FANS LINE UP IN SYDNEY

But Apple has not lost its shine for all customers.

Marcus Barsoum, a 16-year-old who described himself as a "diehard Apple fan," spent two nights camped outside the Sydney store. By morning, some 200 people were gathered in light rain to be the first customers globally to own iPhone 7s.

Weary but elated, Barsoum charged into the store at 8 a.m. to the cheers of Apple staff. He emerged with a matte black iPhone 7, although he had wanted a larger 7 plus in jet black.

"It feels great to be the first in the world to have the iPhone 7," he said. "It was 100 percent worth it."

Omar Nofal, a 26-year-old doctor in San Francisco, was all smiles as he emerged from the Apple Store with a silver iPhone 7, his first upgrade in four years. He said he was tempted to hold off until next year, when many predict Apple will redesign the iPhone to mark the gadget's 10th anniversary, but his phone has a cracked screen.

"I couldn't wait another year," he said.

(Additional reporting by Ben Blanchard in BEIJING, Sijia Jiang in HONG KONG, Shanghai Newsroom; Writing by John Ruwitch in SHANGHAI; Editing by Stephen Coates and Cynthia Osterman)
Stockholm (AFP) - WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy in London since 2012, after Sweden issued him with an arrest warrant over a 2010 rape accusation.

The Australian has long demanded that it be lifted, fearing that if he returns to Stockholm he will be extradited to the United States to face charges over secret documents leaked by his organisation.

On Friday, a Swedish court will rule on the warrant for the eighth time. All previous appeals have gone against Assange.

THE ALLEGATION

During a trip to Stockholm for a series of conferences, Assange is accused of having sex with a WikiLeaks supporter in her thirties without a condom while she was asleep on 17 August, 2010.

The statute of limitations on the rape allegation, which could lead to up to four years in prison, expires in August 2020.

An accusation of sexual misconduct by a second woman in the Swedish capital a few days earlier reached its statute of limitations in 2015.

Assange denies all allegations, insisting that the women gave their consent and that there is a political motivation for the investigations.

THE PROCEEDINGS

In November 2010, Swedish prosecutor Marianne Ny issued a European arrest warrant for Assange to bring him back to the country for questioning.

He was arrested by British police on December 7 that year. On June 19, 2012, having failed in every attempt to avoid extradition to Sweden, the former hacker sought refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy in London.

The small South American nation offers protection to people sought by the United States to face charges for crimes "of a political nature".

Former National Security Agency intelligence contractor Edward Snowden requested political asylum there after leaking thousands of classified documents revealing vast US surveillance.

Since entering the Ecuadorian embassy, Assange has categorically refused to travel to Sweden. In March 2015, Swedish judges agreed to allow questioning to take place in London -- fearing limitations and the charges being dropped.

Story continues

A first meeting is due to take place in London on October 17 but there is no indication he will be formally questioned that day.

AFTER THE RULING

Whether the Swedish court decides to maintain or lift the warrant will have little immediate effect on Assange's situation.

If it is lifted, prosecutors are likely to appeal to the Supreme Court, which would not announce a ruling for several months. If it is maintained, Assange's lawyers will similarly launch an appeal.

And even if the Swedish warrant is ultimately lifted, the 45-year-old is liable to arrest in London for having evaded justice after his appeals against extradition were rejected, a spokesman for the British police said Thursday.
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The big hit eluded the Phillies in Game 2 of the World Series against Astros lefty Framber Valdez, who was filthy. Was he, perhaps, too filthy? Here's what the Phils had to say about Valdez' curious mannerisms on the mound. By Corey Seidman
Geneva (AFP) - August equalled July as the hottest month in modern times, the UN's weather agency said Friday, warning that extraordinary temperatures were "set to become the new norm".

The United Nations Meteorological Organisation (WMO) also forecast that 2016 will prove to be the warmest year on Earth over 137 years of record-keeping.

"It is looking likely that 2016 will (be) the hottest year on record, surpassing the incredible temperatures witnessed in 2015," WMO chief Petteri Taalas said in a statement.

The August figures were an especially jarring reminder of soaring temperatures on the planet, since July has typically proven to be the hottest month of each year.

Citing data from the European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting and the US space agency NASA, the UN said August "wound up tied" with July "for the warmest month ever recorded."

The average temperature last month was 0.16 degrees warmer than the previous hottest August, which was in 2014.

Last month was also 0.98 degrees warmer than the average August temperature from 1950-1980, the WMO said.

Scientists say the heating trend is being driven by fossil-fuel burning, and is made worse by the ocean warming phenomenon known as El Nino, which came to an end in July.

"We have witnessed a prolonged period of extraordinary heat which is set to become the new norm," Taalas said.

WMO further urged global leaders to sign and implement the landmark pact agreed in Paris last year.
Warwick Thornton, the Australian director whose Samson & Delilah, won the Camera dOr for best first film at Cannes in 2009, is next poised to shoot Sweet Country. The 1920s set tale of lawlessness focuses on an Aboriginal cattle herd who is tried for murder.

The film has received funding approval from federal film body Screen Australia, as well as regional organizations the Adelaide Film Festival, Screen NSW and South Australian Film Corporation. Casting is now underway ahead of a shoot at the end of the year in South Australia and the Northern Territory. Post-production will take place in New South Wales.

Sweet Country is to be produced by David Jowsey (Goldstone,) Greer Simpkin (The Code,) and David Tranter (Nganampa Anwernekenhe) with distribution in Australia by Transmission Films.

Warwick is a fearless, hugely creative filmmaker whose work is profound and deeply affecting, said Courtney Gibson, CEO of Screen NSW. The creative team behind Sweet Country is extraordinary and they have developed a really compelling project for which Northern South Australia will supply a magnificent backdrop, said SAFC CEO Annabelle Sheehan.

Thornton, who is also a leading cinematographer (The Turning, The Sapphires) wrote the screenplay with Steven McGregor. In 2013 he also directed The Darkside, a documentary about indigenous ghost stories.

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From Popular Mechanics

When blasted with a cacophony of manmade noise, these hunting bats have no problems adapting. They'll switch from eavesdropping to echolocation, deftly choosing whichever hunting strategy works best.

A team of biologists has just discovered that a certain species of bats are masters at stalking prey through artificially noisy environments, like areas around cities and near highways. Led by Wouter Halfwerk, an animal ecologist at VU University in the Netherlands, the scientists made their discovery by crafting a fascinating experiment using 12 bats, a large cage strung with microphones and speakers, and a handful of inflatable robotic frogs. They break down the results of their experiment today in the journal Science.

"On average, we found that bats will send out roughly twice as many ultrasonic [echolocation calls] when in these noisy environments," Halfwerk says. "Because we can listen to and track these calls, that gives us a detailed picture of which senses the bats are relying on as they hunt."

Inflatable Robot Frogs

Photo credit: Wiki Commons / Karin Schneeberger

Halfwerk and his colleagues were studying a species of bat called fringe-lipped bats, native to Central and South America. Like North America's pallid bat or Europe's long-eared bats, these fringe-lipped bats hunt by eavesdropping on their prey rather than relying solely on echolocation-the process through which bats perceive objects via the echoes of their own ultrasonic chirps.

Fringe-lipped bats hunt certain frogs that send loud, croaking mating calls at night. Halfwerk's team wanted to know how these bats would respond if those mating calls were obscured by background noise. So, he and his colleagues set up an experiment where cage-bound bats would be subjected to a din of artificial noise while they tried to track and hunt a pair of stationary, robotic frogs.

Both robotic frogs produced a loud recorded croak, but the scientists made it so only one of the frogs could be easily detected with echolocation. That's because just one of the robot frogs would be inflating and deflating a fake, silicone balloon in its neck. In the wild, frogs naturally inflate a vocal sac as they croak and bats can pick up this movement via echolocation.

Story continues

"Because we can listen to and track these calls, that gives us a detailed picture of which senses the bats are relying on as they hunt."

Like the real thing, these inflatable robotic frogs were pretty small-less than an inch long. To inflate their silicone necks, Halfwerk's team ran a small tube of pressurized air to the robots from outside the cage. To make sure the bats didn't tire of hunting fake, inedible prey, every third run of the experiment a small piece of fish was placed on top of the frogs.

Listen and Strike

Halfwerk's team let their bats hunt the robotic frogs under a few different noisy conditions in the large cage, all the while tracking and recording their ultrasonic chirps. When the cage was filled with ambient, natural noise, bats would hunt and attack both the stationary and inflating robots frogs indiscriminately. It didn't matter, they both made noise. But once the scientists turned on a cacophony of artificial noise, the bats would send out twice as many echolocative calls and would heavily prefer hunting the inflating frog rather than its still twin. That showed that the bats were using those extra calls to find prey.

Photo credit: Rachel Moon

According to Halfwerk, this shows that the bats are "pretty flexible with their hunting strategy," he says, "and it might explain why some species are much better at adapting to the noisy conditions around areas like highways or cities, which are heavily polluted with [man-made] noise."

This switch between eavesdropping and echolocation is pretty intuitive. We should know, Halfwerk says. "We humans experience things like this all the time. Most people, when trying to listen to someone in a noisy bar or train, will adapt and adopt different perceptual strategy, like paying more attention to lip movements."

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CALEDONIA  His fingers danced across the strings. James Campeaux, 65, is playing the blues. His blues.

The song he plays is his own. One of more than 250 he has written in his life. Each a song-worthy moment jotted down after he was inspired by a conversation, thought or a memory from his life. Each he keeps safely filed in a trash bag.

As he strums a tune that sounds like it is played when traveled to the boondocks, his long, straight gray hair bounces slightly sometimes covering his tinted glasses. At the conclusion of the song, he puts his guitar down and grabs his miniature walking stick.

This cane helped him when he was 58 and first diagnosed with Epstein virus, a rare form a mononucleosis that Campeaux describes as mononucleosis on steroids. It helped him the second time he was diagnosed with Epstein again when he was 61 and after he was injured in a car crash in August 2015. It will surely help him take the stage Friday night as he plays for the first time since the crash. He is using it now as he returns with a resonator guitar.

Im a die-hard survivor, Campeaux said. This is my passion.

A stack of lyrics sits on the music stand. He is re-memorizing them for his gig. With nearly 300 songs, it is tough to memorize all of the words, but each he is more than willing to play you. If he could, he would play them all.

For now he begins to play another. A song about his dismay for TV commercials. His fingers dance again. The story from his life begins.

The Racine blues

Racine is Campeauxs home.

Here is where his mom bought his first guitar from Sears for $29 when he was 10. Here is where he took the bus to the former Soulville Records store where he fell in love with the stylings of Johnny Winters. This was the birthplace of his passion for music.

Campeaux remained here almost all of his life. He worked at Case as a semi-truck driver and earned a pension after 16 years there.

His music never stopped though while he worked. There were stints with bands here and there playing both the Milwaukee and Chicago circuits.

His career was put on pause when he was originally diagnosed with leukemia in 2011. That diagnosis turned out to be false when it turned out to be Epstein virus. This essentially immobilized him for three years.

I basically slept for almost three years, Campeaux said. My guitars were not of interest to me. I just wanted to sleep.

Upon his return, Campeuax found Mocha Lisa, 2825 4  Mile Rd., in the summer of 2014. Playing original songs was a tough sell for bar and restaurant crowds, but was perfect for the open mic scene.

Hes got a lot of different things going on, said Matt Story, another Racine musician. Country, blues, jazz and hes writing songs that are incorporating bits of pieces of that.

A small following formed. The regulars at the shop became staples of the open mic night. People would attend just to hear their music.

Then in August 2015, Campeaux was driving down Washington Avenue. He stopped at the light at Lathrop Avenue. He was not far from his apartment. He looked in his rearview mirror; a car was racing toward him. He was a sitting duck.

The car rammed the rear of Campeauxs vehicle. The airbags did not deploy. Campeauxs arm was broken, his right hand was crushed, he had massive injuries to his lower back and his knee needed replacing.

I looked in my mirror and then bam, Campeaux said. It totaled my Jeep I had one more payment on.

Again the road to recovery began. This healing was just as tough mentally as physically. Campeaux, who has a masters degree in psychology, said his post-traumatic stress disorder from the crash keeps him from driving much anymore.

However, he could never put his guitar down. After receiving his seventh epidural shot last Friday, he was back in the studio preparing to take the stage for the first time since the crash.

Retaking the stage

Mocha Lisa was the first place that came to mind when Campeaux thought about performing again.

He called up the owner, Sue Brucker, and promised her 100 people in the door. She obliged.

He has quite a good drawing of people who follow him, Brucker said. I think its going to be a wonderful concert. Hes a great guy with great music.

His return was confirmed. He reached out to everyone. His session will go from 6-9 p.m. Friday night. He isnt nervous. Stage fright has never been his thing. He is just anxious to get that foot tapping, his fingers sliding down the neck of his resonator and playing his stories. It is free and open to the public.

I know the group of us that used to play with him at Mocha Lisa are happy to see him come back, Story said. They are happy to see him back in the saddle.
* Rationale is to develop new product combinations

* Such products could be years away; some farmers sceptical

* Rival BASF says better to keep products separate

By Ludwig Burger

FRANKFURT, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Bayer's $66 billion purchase of Monsanto amounts to a long-term bet that farmers will grow to trust combinations of seeds and pesticides rather than continue to pick from ranges of separate products.

In the short term, the German drugs and chemicals firm hopes to benefit from a marketing and sales force that can promote combinations of the two groups' existing products.

But Bayer has said the main reason for buying the world's biggest seeds company is to develop entirely new product combinations, such as weed killers and crops that resist them.

Some farmers, though, are wary about a merger between two of the largest players in the agricultural supplies market, concerned they will have less choice and that product bundles will be expensive.

"They sell you the seed and their special herbicide. I was offered one deal of that (by Monsanto) and I turned it down because it locked me into one supplier," said North Dakota corn, soy and grain grower Justin Sherlock. "You can't find it from a different company."

The idea of integrating different farm products has been around for a while, but has a patchy record.

Switzerland's Syngenta has pursued it since 2011, with some success in emerging markets in Asia and South America, but less in the all-important North American market.

That depressed its share price to a point where it became a bid target - first for Monsanto and then, after that failed, ChemChina, which agreed a takeover deal last year.

BIG BET

Bayer, the world's No.2 crop chemicals firm behind Syngenta, argues better research tools such as gene editing mean compelling product combinations could only be a few years away.

Chief Executive Werner Baumann, a collector of 1980s cars, explains his vision with a repair-and-paint shop analogy: "You can go and buy your own diluents (thinning agent), the first cover, the clear coat and so on and you're not sure how the different components interact with each other and you don't have the guarantee of an optimal surface. What you have with an integrated offering is the promise of an optimal outcome."

Story continues

It's a big bet.

Bayer's bid for Monsanto is the largest ever all-cash takeover offer. Analysts at Deutsche Bank and Jefferies have warned the financial burden could drain funding from Bayer's pharmaceutical business, which is struggling to sustain the rate of past blockbuster drug launches.

The German company is paying a hefty premium now for the promise of a business model that some say could be up to a decade away. That's in contrast to Dow Chemical and DuPont, whose shareholders will share future spoils and risks of a combined agribusiness in a merger of equals.

What's more, Germany's BASF, the world's No.3 pesticides maker, thinks product bundles are a non-starter.

"Farmers don't want to lock into any particular combination of seeds and crop chemical at an early stage," said Markus Heldt, the head of BASF's crop protection business.

"You can sell the two in the bundle, but only if you happen to have the best product in each category. Not even the biggest companies could secure such a dominant position."

'BEHEMOTH'

Combining products has long been a goal for Bayer, and its determination to agree a deal with Monsanto - which saw it raise its bid three times - was driven partly by concerns it could get left behind by a rival tie-up, sources close to the matter say.

During Monsanto's pursuit of Syngenta last year, the head of Bayer's crop protection division Liam Condon branded the proposed combination in internal discussions as a "behemoth" in the making, according to people who spoke to him at the time.

Monsanto CEO Hugh Grant agrees product bundles are the future, and said on Wednesday there was no longer any point developing new products with seeds and chemicals as separate businesses.

"Consolidation in the industry is a prerequisite to further investment in R&D," he added.

But according to one industry expert who has advised all the major global suppliers, it could take 7-10 years for newly developed product combinations to have an impact. He spoke on condition of anonymity.

Complicating their quest for a new business model, Bayer and Monsanto have said digital services - a combination of data gathering, predictive software and precision farming gear - will have to serve as a "hub" in any product suite of farm supplies.

Also, innovation is not just the preserve of established players, with independent, venture capital-backed start-ups looking to break into the market too.

For the time being, though, farmers may take some convincing they should tie their fortunes to a product suite from a single supplier.

"It might make sense in some cases, but in the end farmers should decide for themselves where to buy their crop protection and their seeds," said Bernhard Kruesken, secretary general of Germany's farmers association.

(Additional reporting by Diane Bartz in Washington, Patricia Weiss in Frankfurt and Ben Hirschler in London; Editing by Mark Potter)
After months of negotiations, Bayer AG BAYRY announced Thursday that it signed a definitive merger agreement to acquire Monsanto Company MON for $128 per share in an all-cash deal worth $66 billion. If the buyout successfully makes it through the regulatory process, the agriculture and farming industry will certainly be changed forever.

The German drug and crop chemicals maker and the worlds largest seeds firm will merge to create a global agriculture superpower. The combined entity will leverage Monsantos expertise in the Seeds & Traits and Climate Corporation platform and Bayers Crop Protection product line to create a true giant in the industry (also read: Bayer to Boost Agriculture Suite with $66B Monsanto Buyout).

The Times They Are A-Changin

Bayer and Monsantos consolidation of businesses is the latest in what is becoming a completely different chemicals and agriculture landscape. Just a few weeks ago, the merger between Bayer rival Syngenta SYT and ChemChina was approved by regulators, and industry giants Dow Chemical DOW and DuPont DD are working on receiving approval for their own merger in the EU.

Syngenta, which currently sits just above Bayer as the worlds largest crop chemicals producer, was sold to state-owned ChemChina for $44 billion. The deal faced an uphill battle to receive approval after a group of U.S. senators urged the government to dissect the deal due to concerns over its effects on food security and the American agriculture industry as a whole (also read: Syngenta Stock Rallies 10% on ChemChina Deal Approval).

The Dow Chemical and DuPont merger has also hit a snag, as EU regulators seem to be taking their time on an antitrust probe that was launched to investigate the deal. In July, shareholders of both companies approved a merger that would value the newly-formed company at approximately $130 billion (also read: Dow (DOW) and DuPont (DD) Shareholders Approve Merger).

Story continues

While DowDuPont isnt quite a guarantee, the recent trend of collaboration within this industry is noteworthy. The leaders within the greater agriculture sector are desperately trying to consolidate in an effort to protect their current market share, while also expanding their international presence.

For some, like Dow and DuPont, merging is also a method of increasing efficiency; once approved, DowDupont plans on separating its business into three independent, publicly traded companies focused on agriculture, material science, and specialty products.

A Real Impact

The reason why its important to understand these changes in the agricultural industry lies within the inherent importance of the industry itself. While farming may seem like an outdated occupation to some, its an essential piece of our economy that impacts every person on earth.

When things change in the agriculture industry, things change in the entire food supply chain. Consumers might not realize how much these companies matter, but basically anyone who eats food in North America interacts with Monsanto on some level on a day-to-day basis.

Critics of these deals will point to food safety concerns and anti-competitive business practices that can harm consumers; proponents of these deals will assert their importance for maintaining healthy businesses. Regardless of which side of the debate you happen to fall on, its important to be paying attention.

For more coverage of the Bayer-Monsanto deal, check out the latest episode of the Zacks Friday Finish Line podcast:

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House of Cards creator Beau Willimon and five other incumbents won re-election to two-year terms for council seats for the Writers Guild of America East.

Voting opened on Aug. 24, with about 4,000 members eligible to cast ballots. The WGA East announced the results on Thursday.

Willimon was one of 16 candidates vying for seven open freelance seats. Three other incumbents  John Auerbach, Kyle Bradstreet, and Christopher Kyle  also won, along with newcomers Lisa Takeuchi Cullen, A.M. Homes, and Theresa Rebeck.

Gail Lee and Kathy McGee were re-elected to open staff seats, along with Matt Nelko, from six available candidates.

The WGA East negotiates jointly with the WGA West on the master contract with production companies. That deal expires on May 1 with no negotiations set yet.

Willimon promised in his candidate statement that he would be active in negotiations.

Should I be re-elected to Council, I plan to be very involved in the negotiating process, he said. Having worked for almost a decade with major film studios and having been at the forefront of launching streaming television, I have a unique on-the-ground perspective that I believe will be useful voice in making sure we remain strong as a union moving forward.

The WGA West is set to announce its voting results on Monday.

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* Official opening of unique beer pipe Friday

* Some 350,000 euros raised in beer-for-money crowdfunding

* Pipe to cut emissions, damage but also for expansion

By Philip Blenkinsop

BRUGES, Belgium, Sept 16 (Reuters) - A Belgian brewery is turning on the taps of a pipeline buried beneath the medieval city of Bruges to transport its beer to a bottling plant some 3 km (2 miles) away.

Four years in planning and five months in construction, the Halve Maan (Half Moon) brewery will officially open a pipe that will rid the historic city centre and its tight cobbled lanes of beer-laden trucks weighing more than 40 tonnes.

The brewery bid farewell on Thursday to the last of those trucks, one of between 10 and 15 per week, from streets designed for a horse and cart and now packed with tourists.

Half Maan's managing director, Xavier Vanneste, said the idea of a pipe had seemed crazy until he saw local workmen laying underground cables and started looking into it.

The brew master, five generational lines down from founder Henri Maes, said he could have moved the brewing to beside the bottling plant built in 2010 and kept the old site as a museum. But he wanted to retain the beers as products of the old city.

"People want to see something that is alive and not just some dusty museum," he said.

Before World War Two, the city had some 30 beer makers, but Halve Maan is the last of the old guard left and on a site where an earlier "Halve Maan" brewery operated 575 years ago.

The current site still brews the staple blond and brown Brugse Zot and the maltier and stronger Straffe Hendrik, but also welcomes visitors to its bar and more than 100,000 to its museum, both clear adverts for the brands for Belgians and foreigners.

The picture-perfect centre of Bruges is a magnet for some 6.5 million tourists per year and a Unesco world heritage site home to early Flemish painters and filled with Gothic brick buildings, canals and historic churches.

It's not just the pipeline that is novel. The way it was funded is too.

Story continues

The pipeline cost some 4 million euros ($4.5 million). Halve Maan received a subsidy from the Flemish regional government, but also raised about 350,000 euros through crowdfunding, among the largest ever in Belgium, paying contributors back in beer.

Those paying the top-rate 7,500 euros will be rewarded with a bottle of Brugse Zot every day for the rest of their lives.

Halve Maan should also benefit too after volumes grew by 30 percent to some 5 million litres (8.8 million pints) last year and are set for 20 percent expansion in 2016.

"We could potentially increase by a factor of four or more with the new pipe. The bottleneck has been the trucks," Vanneste said. ($1 = 0.8897 euros) (Additional reporting by Marilyn Haigh; Editing by Alexander Smith)
In the half-year since Bruce Rosenblum departed Legendary, the veteran TV executive has been primarily focused on his pro bono work for the TV Academy. That changes on Monday, when he formally takes the reins as president of business operations at the Disney/ABC Television Group.

It's a departure for Rosenblum, who famously spent 26 years at Warner Bros. - and nearly a decade as president of the company's sprawling and lucrative TV Group. The shift over from the creative side of the industry sees him tasked with building revenue for Disney/ABC at a time when viewer consumption is changing on an almost monthly basis. Rosenblum, joined by his new boss, Disney Media Networks co-chairman and Disney/ABC Television Group president Ben Sherwood, spoke with The Hollywood Reporter about how he plans to tackle the job.

Bruce, are you going back to work the morning after the Emmys or are you taking a day off?

Rosenblum I've taken the last six months [off] since I left Legendary. (Laughs.) I'm fired up and ready to get back to work. I promised Ben I wouldn't stay at the HBO [Emmy] party for too long on Sunday night so I could get here for work by 8:30 on Monday morning.

How did this conversation start?

Rosenblum There wasn't really a pitch. I was having a lunch back in June with a recruiter to talk about some board opportunities. I wasn't looking to go back to work - but at the end of the lunch, I asked if he was working on any interesting searches. He told me about this opportunity, and I jumped across the table. I have always admired the Walt Disney Company. I've watched their success from about a mile and a half down the road for decades. They have a tremendous group of senior executives, from Ben on down, and their portfolio of assets can't be compared with any. This was the ideal job for me.

Sherwood We have been working for some time on this plan to make our organization more effective, more efficient and more focused on growth. We were looking internally and externally at a number of terrific candidates. I was flagged that Bruce had put his hand up and was interested. We hadn't actually had him on the radar for this role, so we met for a burger not far from the lot and started a conversation. That conversation carried on over the last two months and came together over the last few weeks. I think our shared desire is to grow our television business worldwide, make our organization faster, smarter and better. Bruce's proven track record as a leader and an innovative dealmaker and his interpersonal skills across the television and media world made us think he's the perfect leader for this moment at Disney/ABC. We've got a great team here, and Bruce will make us even better.

Story continues

Bruce, what do you consider your mandate?

The fundamental core responsibility is making great content. Once that is made, what I see the responsibility being is maximizing revenue opportunities, finding efficient and effective ways of expanding existing revenue streams and finding new ones; with our great, existing executives, to expand distribution opportunities; to look toward the digital space and find more opportunity to connect more directly with the consumer - from both a programming and targeted advertising standpoint. Ideally, we want to create new direct-to-consumer digital platforms moving forward. I am not involved at all on the creative side. My charge is one of growing and expanding the business side of the Disney/ABC Television Group.

As the TV business model continues to shift, how do you view this role's priorities in terms of networks vs. studio and buying vs. selling?

Sherwood The way the job is organized, you have to boil it down to this: Bruce is going to run the revenue side of our business. That's ad sales, digital and distribution - both global and international. We're all involved in the constant conversation of the present and future of the television business. We read about the disrupters and the different challenges. Bruce has great experience wrestling with these challenges, and he also has a proven record of finding great opportunities.

Rosenblum I can hopefully bring a set of fresh eyes and added value, but this is not a new conversation. It's a continuation of one Ben and his team have been having for some time.

Sherwood I've been here for two years, and we've been in an ongoing conversation as we see rapid change in consumer behavior and consumption and in distribution and technology. Part of the emphasis of this role is to get ourselves even more focused on some of those key decisions and moving quickly. We think Bruce is going to help accelerate some of our work.

Rosenblum This company is so well positioned, from an asset diversity standpoint, to attack those challenges and take advantage of the opportunities and grow into the future.

Jointly overseeing ad sales, I'm wondering how you'd both like to see that narrative evolving one year or five years from now - in terms of capitalizing on multiplatform views and a more comprehensive measurement of how your content is being consumed?

Sherwood I'd like to see more revenue, more relevance for the consumer, new and creative advertising products for clients, and more data-driven targeting and directly inserted advertising into the people's various feeds and streams. That's basically the kitchen sink. (Laughs.) That's the wish list.

Rosenblum It still fundamentally comes down to great content. Advertising is attracted to that, and the creative executives here are at the top of their game. I have reason to believe we'll be able to monetize and maximize the revenue from their work product.

Read more: Disney/ABC TV's Ben Sherwood on a 'Star Wars' Series, "Mistakes" in Michael Strahan's 'Live' Exit and Bob Iger's Future
Berlin (AFP) - Berlin prides itself on being hip, multicultural and tough on the racist far-right -- but that image could take a beating as an anti-migrant party eyes election gains Sunday.

Many in Germany's left-leaning party capital are terrified by the likely strong showing for the right-wing populist Alternative for Germany (AfD), which is polling at up to 14 percent.

They worry that a win for the Islamophobic AfD -- which is especially popular in poor areas of the city's former communist east -- will undo Berlin's long struggle against neo-Nazi groups such as the NPD party.

"Careful, Berlin!" Mayor Michael Mueller of the centre-left Social Democrats wrote on Facebook Thursday, warning of the rise of "Nazis" who "stoke hate and violence".

He said laid-back Berlin -- a city known for its IT start-ups and all-night techno raves -- could not just "shrug off" a 10-14 percent AfD win that would be "seen throughout the world as a sign of the resurgence of the right and of Nazis in Germany".

"Berlin is not just any city," he wrote. "Berlin is the city that has evolved from the capital of Hitler and of Nazi Germany to a shining beacon of freedom, tolerance, diversity and social cohesion."

The AfD's top candidate for Berlin, Georg Pazderski, fired back, charging that Mueller was branding "hundreds of thousands of voters" as Nazis with rhetoric that could incite violence against AfD members.

- 'Brown Street' -

Berlin authorities, in their effort to promote a diverse and tolerant city, point to the success story of Schoeneweide, a former neo-Nazi stronghold in the southeast that has been transformed into a more diverse and artistic student district.

Once skinheads waxed nostalgic about the Third Reich at the notorious local bar "Zum Henker" ("The Hangman's"), which operated from 2009-11.

Today the space hosts the pizzeria "Anima e Cuore" ("Heart and Soul"), managed by Hanan al-Kassem and her Lebanese-born father, while the racist graffiti outside has vanished under a coat of white paint.

Story continues

In the same street -- Brueckenstrasse, once dubbed "Brown Street", after the Nazis' khaki uniforms -- the Berlin leader of the NPD party, Sebastian Schmidtke, was forced in 2014 to close his military accessories store -- ironically, making way for a shisha shop.

Key to chasing them out was a regulation in the city-state that allowed for the termination of leases if tenants engaged in extreme right-wing activities, but also neighbourhood initiatives such as festivals "for democracy and tolerance".

As a result, "Schoeneweide today is no longer a Nazi stronghold", said Berlin government spokesman Oliver Fey, who called the city-state "a national frontrunner" for such initiatives.

All major parties in the capital have agreed a "Berlin consensus" against the extreme right and for an "open city with cultural diversity".

Berlin's budget for programmes against the extreme right, racism and anti-Semitism rose from 2.5 million euros ($2.8 million) in 2015 to 3.2 million this year.

- 'Shift to right' -

Berlin's past progress, many fear, could now vanish as the influx of one million refugees and migrants to Germany last year has reignited xenophobic sentiment.

"The political discourse has shifted to the right," said Bianca Klose of the anti-fascist advocacy group MBR.

The AfD, she said, "benefits from the fact that people with racist ideas have dared to emerge from the shadows and become visible in the streets."

Mueller has warned that the AfD could gain control of "one or two district administrations," the local government units in the city of 3.5 million.

"The AfD would end up with executive responsibility ... affecting millions of actions and hundreds of employees."

Even the ultranationalist NPD -- which is currently fighting a government case in Germany's highest court to ban it -- hopes to win some local district seats on Sunday.

Its Berlin leader, Schmidtke, predicted that, even if the neo-Nazis' bars and shops in Schoeneweide are gone, the party will still make ballot box gains, thanks to its silent supporters.

On election day, he said, "we will see that nothing has changed. After all, the people are still there, and so are their ideas."
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders has some advice for those considering casting a protest vote for a third-party candidate in the upcoming presidential election.

This is not a governors race, its not a state legislative race, this is the presidency of the United States, Sanders told the hosts of MSNBCs Morning Joe on Friday. And I would say to those people out there who are thinking of the protest vote, think about what the country looks like and whether youre comfortable with four years of a Trump presidency. Sanders, the longest serving Independent member of Congress in U.S. history, was on the show making the case for voting for his former opponent in the Democratic primary Hillary Clinton.

Let us elect Hillary Clinton as president, and the day after, let us mobilize millions of people around the progressive agenda, Sanders said.

After a grueling primary, Clinton and Sanders made amends in July at the Democratic National Convention, where she became the partys presidential nominee.

When asked about Clintons lack of support from younger voters, a group that leaned very heavily towards Sanders in the primary, the Democratic socialist had more counsel.

I would just simply say to the millennials and to anybody else, look at the issues. Dont get hung up on Trumps kids and whatever the story of the birther issue, Sanders told Morning Joe. Stay focused on the issues of relevance to your life. I think Clinton is, far and away, the superior candidate.
By Benjamin Kang Lim and Michelle Nichols BEIJING/UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - China is in a bind over what to do about North Korea's stepped-up nuclear and missile tests, even though it is annoyed with its ally and has started talks with other U.N. Security Council members on a new sanctions resolution against Pyongyang. China shares a long land border with North Korea and is seen as the only country with real power to bring about change in the isolated and belligerent nation. However, Beijing fears strengthening sanctions could lead to collapse in North Korea, and it also believes the United States and its ally South Korea share responsibility for growing tensions in the region. China is in a difficult spot, a source close to the Chinese leadership told Reuters when asked if Beijing's attitude to North Korea had changed after its fifth nuclear test last week. "On the one hand, China is resolutely opposed to North Korea developing nuclear weapons for fear of triggering a nuclear arms race in the region," the source said, referring to Japan and South Korea following in Pyongyang's footsteps. "On the other hand, North Korea is a big headache but regime change is not an option," the source added. "Collapse of the regime would lead to chaos in (China's) northeast" bordering North Korea, the source said, requesting anonymity. The prospect of a unified Korea under Seoul's leadership and the possibility of U.S. troops on China's borders has long been a nightmare for Beijing. A collapse in North Korea, sending a flood of refugees across the relatively porous border into China's rustbelt northeastern provinces, would also be deeply destabilizing to Beijing's rule as well as a huge economic cost. Those concerns have been around for years, but now Beijing is also deeply angered by a U.S. decision to deploy an advanced anti-missile system in South Korea, the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system. It has said its own security has been compromised and that North Korea's recent belligerence is due to this deployment. Publicly, China has not linked the THAAD deployment with whether it will support sanctions on North Korea. It condemned the latest missile and nuclear tests but said sanctions alone could not resolve the issue and has called for a resumption of talks with Pyongyang. Beijing has also said it will work within the United Nations to formulate a necessary response to its fifth nuclear test. "We're in negotiations on a U.N. Security Council resolution," Samantha Power, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said on Thursday. Diplomats said the talks were at an early stage and negotiations were likely to be long and tough. IRRITATION AND CONSENSUS One senior U.N. diplomat said Beijing made displeasure with Pyongyang clear at an earlier Security Council meeting called after North Korea tested three medium range missiles at an embarrassing time - when U.S. President Barack Obama and other world leaders were gathered for the G20 summit in the eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou this month. "The tone of the whole discussion was much more consensual, it didn't feel like there was two camps fighting arguing with each other," said the diplomat. "Of course there continue to be different views about sanctions." The United States has called on Beijing to use its influence to get North Korea to give up its nuclear ambitions, and to close sanctions "loopholes", since the existing ones had done little to prevent Pyongyang from pursuing its nuclear and missile programs. Shen Wenhui, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told influential state-run newspaper the Global Times last week that crippling sanctions would cause a "humanitarian disaster" in North Korea. "In putting sanctions on North Korea, the international community must reduce the effect on ordinary people to the greatest possible extent," Shen wrote. China's concerns also include the larger issue of what Beijing sees as Washington's attempts to surround it under Obama's strategic "rebalance" towards Asia. Besides THAAD, the dispute in the South China Sea, cybersecurity and human rights have marred ties between the world's two biggest economies. Chinese officials also say that the West over-estimates its influence with North Korea. "I think any idea to ask North Korea to abandon nuclear weapons would fail, and any idea to ask South Korea to abandon THAAD would fail," said Shen Dingli, a professor at Shanghai's elite Fudan University and director of the school's Program on Arms Control and Regional Security. North Korea is useful for China, Shen added. "China needs North Korea to counter the United States." In Seoul, some are already accepting that China will not do much more to punish North Korea. "The sanctions that North Korea will not be able to endure will be all blocked by China even without being asked by the North," Chun Yung-woo, a former South Korean national security adviser, told Reuters. "So the North is hiding behind that and comfortably pursuing the nuclear programmer's." (Additional reporting by Michael Martina in Beijing, James Pearson, Jack Kim and Ju-min Park in Seoul and David Brunnstrom in Washington; Writing by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
On Tuesday, Orlando's dance music community turned a moment of tragedy into a night of tribute after losing one of its own.

Mad Decent Artist Big Makk Killed in Car Crash

Friends, fans, and artists came together to celebrate the life of Samisoni Koroitamudu, known to many as DJ and producer Big Makk, who was killed in a car accident in Cassleberry, Florida, on Aug. 29. The tribute event, held in partnership with local party crew Shake 'N Bass (of which Koroitamudu was a co-founder), raised $8,000 in donations, with all proceeds going to Koroitamudu's family. Performers on the night included Ookay, Astronomar and Ricky Remedy.

"Through his music he will live with us forever," Gilt Nightclub wrote on Facebook of the event's success.

Koroitamudu began DJing as a young teen and is credited by the Orlando Weekly as an "early innovator of the moombahton EDM sub-genre." His music was released on labels including Mad Decent, Dim Mak and Main Course. He was scheduled to perform at EDC Orlando in November. Koroitamudu's debut album, The Makk Tape, was released shortly after his death.

Big Makk's Posthumous LP Shows Unique Voice and Versatility: Listen

"For those that didn't know Sam, he had 3 loves in his life; His Family/Friends, His Music, & His Shoes (mainly Vans)," wrote Koroitamudu's management with The Makk Tape SoundCloud upload. "We also know there is nothing more he would have wanted than for everyone to listen and share this music as was planned. We miss you Sam and we couldn't think of a better way to honor your beautiful soul than to have your music live on forever."

A GoFundMe page for Koroitamudu is still accepting donations.
The states largest teachers union, which has experienced a big drop in membership after lawmakers curtailed public-sector collective bargaining, is selling its Madison headquarters.

The Wisconsin Education Association Council is asking $6.9 million for its 51,000-square-foot building and nearly 40 acres as the union seeks to stem the tide of diminishing funding since Republicans in 2011 passed Act 10.

John Walsh, a real estate broker for commercial real estate firm Lee & Associates, confirmed that the property, at 33 Nob Hill Road on the citys South Side, is for sale. An online listing shows a posting date of Feb. 8.

I think theyre downsizing because of Act 10, said Walsh, who deferred further comment to WEAC.

A newsletter written in November by WEACs new vice president, Peggy Wirtz-Olsen, notes, WEAC voted to put the WEAC building up for sale at an October meeting.

WEAC spokeswoman Christina Brey said this week that despite the listing and despite the union vote last year, theres nothing in the works for a sale at this time.

I think you have all the facts right, Brey told the Wisconsin State Journal. While we are exploring options around the building, there are no immediate plans for a sale.

She said the union has shifted staffing to a new regional structure, creating 10 regions to which members belong instead of a centralized location in Madison. Brey would not say how many members are in the union.

After all, our union isnt a building. Our union is teachers and support professionals who work in public schools, she said. Our strength is in parents, communities and educators who unite around the shared value of public education  not around brick and mortar.

According to federal tax records from 2013, the latest year available, the organization had $52,435 in cash and $126,246 in savings. Total assets, including their property, totaled $3.7 million, while the organizations liabilities totaled $1.6 million.

WEACs membership has decreased by more than half from the unions 98,000-member levels before Gov. Scott Walker signed Act 10 in 2011.

As of February 2015, a WEAC official told the State Journal the union represented about 40,000 public school employees.

At the same time, WEACs lobbying dollars also have dropped dramatically.

A decade ago, WEAC spent $1.5 million on lobbying during the 2005-06 legislative session, state records show.

The next session, that figure was $1.1 million. During the two sessions leading up to the passage of Act 10, WEAC spent $2.5 million and $2.3 million, respectively.

But during the 2015-16 session, the union spent just $109,888 on lobbying and had one lobbyist aside from its president and communications director.

During the 2011-12 session  when Walker signed Act 10  the union had 13 authorized lobbyists listed.
On the latest Billboard 200 albums chart (dated Sept. 24), Travis Scott scored his first No. 1 with Birds in the Trap Sing McKnight, as the set earned 88,000 equivalent album units in the week ending Sept. 8 (according to Nielsen Music).

The Billboard 200 chart ranks the week's most popular albums based on their overall consumption. That overall unit figure combines pure album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA).

Travis Scott Scores First No. 1 Album on Billboard 200 Chart With 'Birds in the Trap Sing McKnight'

Now, let's take a closer look at some of the action on the latest Billboard 200 chart:

- Sia, This Is Acting - No. 13 - As Sia's new single, "The Greatest" featuring Kendrick Lamar, scores the Hot Shot Debut on the Billboard Hot 100 at No. 52 (marking her 10th chart hit), her album This Is Acting zooms 22-13 on the Billboard 200. The set earned 24,000 equivalent album units in the latest tracking week -- owed in part to tracks and streams of "The Greatest." The track was added to the album's tracklist on the Google Play edition of the album.

- Various Artists, Epic Lit - No. 27 - Epic's compilation of current and rising hits debuts with almost 15,000 units. The 19-song album's debut is mostly powered by streaming equivalent units: a little more than 10,000. A bit more than 4,000 units were generated by track equivalent units.

A tiny handful of units -- 0.05 percent -- were powered by traditional album sales. Why such a small number of sales for the album? Likely because of its limited availability and its high price: It's sold only through the iTunes Store -- for $24.51. That's far higher than the typical price of a compilation album, which is around $9.99.

The Chainsmokers & Halsey Lead Hot 100 as Charlie Puth & Selena Gomez Hit Top 10

Epic Lit follows Epic's earlier compilation, Epic AF, which peaked at No. 5 on the Billboard 200. That set was only available on streaming services, and not sold as an album. Epic AF falls off the latest chart, though it was No. 70 in the previous week. The album suddenly lost momentum because two of its tracks also appear on Epic Lit, and now Epic Lit is earning track and streaming units for those songs, instead of Epic AF (French Montana's "No Shopping" and "Lockjaw").

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- Fleetwood Mac, The Very Best of Fleetwood Mac - No. 50 - The greatest-hits package flies from No. 156 to No. 50 thanks to a 99-cent sale price in the Google Play store. It earned 10,000 units (up 118 percent) and sold 6,000 copies (up 91 percent). It's the highest rank for the album since 2002 (Nov. 16; No. 44).

Rory Feek Opens Up for the First Time About Losing Wife Joey: 'Hearing the Music, She's Still Alive'

- Joey + Rory, Hymns - No. 95 - Joey + Rory's Hymns jumps back onto the Billboard 200 at No. 95, thanks to buzz generated by a Sept. 4 interview with Rory Feek on CBS Sunday Morning. The album -- which debuted and peaked at No. 4 in March -- returns to the list with 6,000 units (up 78 percent), with just over 6,000 in traditional album sales (up 79 percent). It's the album's best sales week since the chart dated July 16 (7,000).

On CBS Sunday Morning, Feek discussed the passing of his wife, Joey, their marriage and rise to fame, and his new documentary film To Joey, With Love.

Hymns has sold 456,000 copies, according to Nielsen Christian SoundScan, and it is Joey + Rory's best-selling album. It is also the top-selling Christian or gospel album of the year, and the No. 2 biggest-selling country set, behind only Chris Stapleton's Traveller (874,000).

Joey + Rory are nominated for vocal duo of the year at the upcoming Country Music Association Awards (CMA Awards), which will be held Nov. 2. It's their third nomination, following previous nods in the same category in 2010 and 2009.

Chris Stapleton, Eric Church & Maren Morris Lead 50th Annual CMA Awards Nominations

- Various Artists, The Dolan Twins: Tunesdays - No. 96 - One step below Joey + Rory on the Top Album Sales chart is the latest curated compilation from Heard Well Records, The Dolan Twins: Tunesdays. The 13-song album includes tracks by K.Flay, Hoodie Allen and Ryan Hemsworth.

With 6,000 copies sold in its first week, it's the best sales frame yet for the Heard Well label. The company -- co-founded by social media star Connor Franta -- specializes in compilations curated by social media influencers like Franta, Tyler Oakley, Lohanthony, JC Caylen and Andrea Russett.

On the Compilation Albums chart, the new Tunesdays set bows at No. 2. It's the ninth charting effort from Heard Well on the tally, and the highest charting yet.
By Steve Holland and Emily Stephenson WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on Friday abandoned his false claim that Barack Obama was not born in the United States after spending five years peddling conspiracy theories that the country's first African-American president started life as a foreigner. But, never one to let a controversy go without fanning its flames, Trump accused Hillary Clinton, his Democratic rival in the Nov. 8 election, of starting the so-called birther movement in her failed 2008 presidential campaign against Obama, a claim that does not stand up to scrutiny. Trump, who has won back some ground in opinion polls and made the White House race more competitive after he went through a summer slump, made his announcement in an attempt to clear the air as he prepares for the first of three televised presidential debates with Clinton on Sept. 26. "President Barack Obama was born in the United States. Period," said Trump, a real estate developer. "Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again," he said at an event in Washington at a new Trump International Hotel down the street from the White House. Devoting only about 30 seconds to the subject, Trump did not apologize and did not expand upon his abrupt decision to shift from a stance he held for five years. The New York businessman brought up the birther controversy as far back as 2011, appealing to a right-wing fringe of voters who formed the early base of his support when he launched his presidential bid last year. The birther conspiracy movement is aimed at challenging the legality of Obama's presidency - the U.S Constitution requires that a president be a natural-born citizen. During his presidential campaign, Trump has readily trafficked in other theories that are the stuff of American supermarket tabloids. There was his declaration that the father of U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, one of Trump's many rivals for the Republican nomination, might have been linked to the assassin of President John F. Kennedy. And there was his false claim that thousands of Muslims in Jersey City, New Jersey, cheered when the World Trade Center twin towers collapsed in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. In making his announcement on Friday, Trump advanced a widely debunked claim that Clinton and her 2008 campaign had been the original birthers. "Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it. You know what I mean," he said. His campaign directed reporters to a 2007 memo from then-Clinton adviser Mark Penn, who had encouraged the Clinton campaign to go negative against Obama by saying that his Hawaiian birth and boyhood in Indonesia gave him limited roots in American values and culture. Penn eventually left the Clinton campaign, and his advice was never acted upon. "A NEW LIE" The Democratic National Committee on Friday condemned Trump's bid to link Clinton to the birther idea. "He had the audacity to spout a new lie about the birther movement that he helped to build," it said. Clinton, who leads Trump by 4 percentage points in the latest Reuters/Ipsos poll, on Friday demanded Trump apologize to the president for having helped spread the birther idea and said Trump had tried to "delegitimize our first black president." "His campaign was founded on this outrageous lie. There is no erasing it in history," Clinton said in an address to the Black Women's Association in Washington. Clinton seized on the issue after struggling to overcome the fallout from her remark a week ago that half of Trump's supporters are in a "basket of deplorables" and her initial secrecy about her pneumonia diagnosis. Obama, who produced the longer version of his Hawaiian birth certificate in 2011 to prove doubters wrong, had famously mocked Trump over the issue at a White House Correspondents Association dinner as the wealthy businessman sat in the audience fuming. Still, Trump clung to the contention that Obama was foreign-born, tweeting in August 2012: "An 'extremely credible source' has called my office and told me that @BarackObama's birth certificate is a fraud." On Friday, Obama was asked for his reaction to the latest Trump declaration. "I'm shocked that a question like that has come up at a time when we have so many other things to do. Well, I'm not that shocked actually. It's fairly typical. We've got other things to attend to," he said. "I was pretty confident about where I was born." Trump's embrace of the birther movement has incensed black Americans, whose votes Trump has been trying to court. Members of the Congressional Black Caucus held a news conference on Friday to urge African-American voters to resist any temptation to support Trump. "I'm wondering when this country is going to awaken from this reality show," said Representative Brenda Lawrence, a Democrat. First lady Michelle Obama told a crowd in Fairfax, Virginia, that her husband has set a strong example for those who have doubted "whether my husband was even born in this country." "Well, during his time in office, I think Barack has answered those questions with the example he's set: by going high when they go low. And hes answered these questions with the progress that weve achieved together," she said. At a rally in Miami later on Friday, Trump pushed back on the idea that he and his supporters were racist, saying that when Democrats are in trouble politically, "they always pull out the racist word." He walked out at the rally to a song from the musical "Les Miserables" in front of a backdrop that read "Les Deplorables," a reference to Clinton's comment last week about his supporters. The issue of Obama's birthplace has not been a factor in the campaign leading up to the November presidential election, but it resurfaced in recent days, taking the focus of Trump's White House bid away from topics such as immigration, trade and the economy, which he has been using to hit Clinton. Trump revived the birther controversy on Thursday in an interview with The Washington Post when he declined to say whether he believed Obama was born in Hawaii. Trump had promised "a big announcement" about the birther issue on Friday, giving the impression it was the purpose of the event at his hotel. Instead, he held off saying anything about it through more than 20 minutes of endorsements from military veterans. Only then did Trump make a brief statement about Obama's birth. Trump devoted more time at the beginning of the event to talking about his hotel where the event took place. He ignored reporters' shouted questions. (Additional reporting by Amanda Becker, Doina Chiacu, Susan Heavey and Jeff Mason; Writing by John Whitesides; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Leslie Adler)
By Eric M. Johnson

(Reuters) - The death of a mentally ill black man who reportedly begged for drinking water while jailed in Milwaukee and died of dehydration has been ruled a homicide, a county medical examiner said on Thursday.

Terrill Thomas, 38, was found dead on April 24, nine days after he was arrested on suspicion of shooting a man at a casino, the Milwaukee County Medical Examiner's Office said. Thomas had bipolar disorder and was being held in solitary confinement based on the nature of the charge against him and his behavior in jail, the medical examiner's office said.

The Journal Sentinel newspaper reported in July that inmates near Thomas had heard him beg for water days before his death and saw that the water faucet in his cell had been shut off.

The newspaper reported that corrections officers had told other inmates that Thomas' water had been shut off because he had flooded his previous cell and his behavior was erratic.

The jail in which Thomas was incarcerated is overseen by the Milwaukee County Sheriff's office, which posted a notice on its website that it was not commenting on the incident until the investigation had been completed.

The medical examiners office said that the Milwaukee Police Department was conducting an independent investigation into Thomas' death. The police department did not respond to a request for comment.

Thomas' family told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel newspaper that he was in the midst of a mental breakdown when he was arrested and that when he died he was awaiting a court-ordered psychiatric examination.

The treatment of inmates who are mentally ill and the length of time they must wait for a mental heath evaluation has drawn fierce criticism from families and human rights activists in a number of U.S. states.

In Washington state, the family of a mentally ill man who died of dehydration and malnutrition in 2015 after officers placed him in a jail cell without running water reached a $4 million settlement agreement with authorities last December.

(Reporting by Eric M. Johnson in Seattle; Editing by Toni Reinhold)
By Maiya Keidan

LONDON (Reuters) - An $8 billion (6 billion pounds) hedge fund run by billionaire Michael Platt has yet to give investors all their money back nine months after the fund was shuttered, a spokesman for the fund and three of its investors told Reuters.

BlueCrest, which ran more than $30 billion at its peak, making more than $22 billion for investors since it launched 15 years ago, was best known for bets on macroeconomic trends.

But Platt shut BlueCrest late last year. He told investors in a letter on Dec. 1, seen by Reuters, that a decision to close the firm was prompted by increased costs and investor pressures. He told investors in the Dec. 1 letter they would get 90 percent of their money by late March.

That initial timetable has slipped and the company has told investors it needs more time to pay back what is owed, which for the three investors amounts to millions of dollars.

Lengthy payouts can be common when hedge funds close, a scenario not often anticipated by most investors. But as the list of hedge fund closures outpaced launches globally for the third consecutive quarter, according to data from Hedge Fund Research, it is more crucial than ever that investors understand all terms and conditions before signing on the dotted line.

While some BlueCrest investors have been happy to see their money returned gradually to protect returns and avoid a firesale of assets, one of the three investors that spoke to Reuters said the process had taken too long.

This investor, who declined to be named, said he was frustrated by the slow payout from AllBlue Limited, a BlueCrest fund of funds.

"We are frustrated that (the fund) provided quarterly liquidity when we decided to invest and it's still not clear how long it will take to get all of our money back," he said.

"If a hedge fund offers quarterly liquidity, it should take a maximum of six months to liquidate and that's being generous."

AllBlue Limited had advertised that investors could access their capital every quarter with a 33-day notice period - known as quarterly liquidity, documents seen by Reuters showed.

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At the end of the first quarter, AllBlue Limited, which invested in a number of the BlueCrest's individual funds, had paid out about 79 percent of investors' cash, approximately 11 percent shy of initial hurdles, a spokesman at BlueCrest told Reuters.

Investors would have received more than 91 percent of their investment in AllBlue Limited by the end of the third quarter, he said, but he declined to say when the remainder would be paid out.

"Inevitably, the exact timing of each portfolio liquidation will be determined by the assets comprised in it and prevailing market conditions," the spokesman for BlueCrest said.

BlueCrest ran seven funds, including BlueCrest Capital International, BlueCrest Multi Strategy Credit, BlueCrest Mercantile, BlueCrest Quantitative Equity, BlueCrest Emerging Markets, BlueCrest Equity Strategies and BlueTrend, which was managed by Systematica Investments, according to the firm's Dec. 1 letter seen by Reuters.

Investors were also offered the opportunity to invest in AllBlue Limited, which gave them access to all seven underlying funds.

Platt said in his letter on Dec. 1 that BlueCrest would aim to pay back about 75 percent of cash by the end of January 2016 in its AllBlue funds, growing to 90 percent by the end of March 2016, with the remainder "as soon as practicable."

London's Camden Pension fund, one of the three investors, said in a statement on Aug. 26 that the AllBlue fund-of-funds was still waiting to get money back from three underlying funds - Capital International, Multi Strategy Credit and Mercantile.

"It is expected that remaining funds will be sold and funds returned in due course," the pension fund, which had invested 58 million pounds ($76.73 million), said.

It was not known how much investor cash in total was allocated to the AllBlue Limited fund when it shut on Dec. 1. BlueCrest's spokesman said the suite of AllBlue funds had $8.1 billion.

The three investors told Reuters they were still awaiting payment, but the payouts were in line with a revised timetable, given after Dec. 1, but not made public.

Camden Council told Reuters via email they had received just over 79 percent of their money by the end of the first quarter. U.S.-based Stamford Police Pension Fund, which had $3 million invested with BlueCrest, confirmed in documents seen by Reuters it had also received funds according to BlueCrest's updated timetable.

BlueCrest's spokesman said investors had received quarterly update letters providing a detailed progress report on each fund's asset-liquidation programme, including expected timings of future distributions and summaries of the remaining asset portfolios. He declined to comment on the payout schedule for the remaining AllBlue funds.

Thomas Deegan, managing director at investment consultant Clearbrook, who advises the Stamford Police Pension on its investment in BlueCrest, said BlueCrest had done "an honourable job" of keeping it abreast of repayments and managing an orderly liquidation of assets.

(Additional reporting by Lawrence White. Editing by Jane Merriman)
After accepting a plea deal earlier this month that could have him serving up to seven years in prison, rapper Bobby Shmurda and his GS9 cohort Rowdy Rebel spoke with Complex about taking the deal, how they are spending their time behind bars and the hip-hop takeover they are plotting upon their release.

Shmurda (real name Ackquille Jean Pollard) was arrested in December 2014 at New York's Quad Studios on gun, conspiracy and drug charges at the height of his success with his 2014 breakout hit "Hot Boy." He said he accepted the seven-year deal to help lessen his co-defendant Rebel's sentence. "I did it for Rowdy. They offered me five [years] and offered Rowdy 12," he said. "They said the only way they'll give him seven is if I took seven, too. So, you know, I had to take one for the dawgs." Rebel (born Chad Marshall) and other co-defendant Nicholas McCoy also accepted the deal.

Rebel and Shmurda then spoke of their relationship with Epic Records after the label did not pay the $2 million bail. "The situation with Epic is the reality: We made our own bed and got to lay in it," said Rebel. "We did expect for them to help us and get us out, but from my knowledge it wasn't on Epic to bail us out, it was Sony, because Epic's under Sony. So when it came to it, Epic was willing to do it, but Sony had to sign off the checks to get us out and they didn't want to sign. I don't hold no one responsible for nothing." Shmurda added, "It's business. These people are going to look at you a certain way when these charges come up."

Bobby Shmurda Accepts Plea Deal, Will Serve Seven Years

Shmurda also commented on how circumstances would have been different had they made bail. "If we made bail, I would've beat the case," he said. "We look guilty in these orange jumpsuits. If you put Al Sharpton in a orange jumpsuit and accuse him of having a gun, he's going to be found guilty. They just look at our skin color, and look at where we're from. I didn't get caught with anything on me and the cops lied, saying they seen me with a gun in my hand. I explained the whole situation to Epic and they were behind me all the way. We had big-money lawyers and they still couldn't do nothing because of the judge, who looked at us like black thugs."

Story continues

Being incarcerated for almost two years doesn't appear to have dimmed their spirits as both Rebel and Shmurda have been working on several mixtapes like The Last of the Real and Rebel's forthcoming project Shmoney Keep Calling Pt. 2. Shmurda says he will also be releasing some books and is working on a movie that he describes as "better than Get Rich or Die Tryin' and Belly put together," referencing the films from rappers 50 Cent and DMX. Shmurda and Rebel have also been listening to other up-and-coming rap stars like Kodak Black, Lil Uzi Vert and Young M.A.

Shmurda adds that he has spoken with other artists while cooped up in the pen. "I talked to Travis Scott, Shy Glizzy, Migos, that's about it. Meek Mill always asks about us, too. He could feel my pain. I feel like a lot of n---as in the rap game ain't do what I did in these streets and a lot of n---as in the streets ain't do what I did in the rap game. I still feel like a lot of people don't feel where we come from."

The official sentencing for Shmurda, McCoy and Rebel is scheduled for Oct. 19.
Movie celebrities live a busy life. Whether they are shooting for their films or hopping from one city to another to promote their work  movie stars are always on the go. So it is nice to see them sometimes let their hair down and relax with their families. It is even better for fans when these actors share pictures of their vacation on their social media pages.

Here are some pictures of Bollywood actors recent family vacations.

Akshay Kumar: The Khiladi of Bollywood celebrated his birthday on 9th September and took off for the weekend with wife Twinkle and kids Aarav and Nitara. The Kumar family went for a short trip to Maldives and here are some pictures that Akshay shared.

Shilpa Shetty Kundra: Shilpa too celebrated her birthday recently and took off to Dubai with husband Raj Kundra and son Viaan. They stayed in Atlantis in Dubai and here are some of their pictures.

Aishwarya Rai Bachchan: The world might be raving about her beautiful looks in Ae Dil Hai Mushkil but Aish only has eyes for husband Abhishek and daughter Aaradhya on this family vacation in Dubai.



Also read:

5 moments from Bulleya that show Ranbir-Aishwaryas crackling chemistry



Celebrity talk shows we cant wait to watch
EDINBURGH (Reuters) - Scotch whisky exports rose 3.1 percent in the first six months of 2016, driven by booming demand in India, a market that whisky's trade body says should be a top trade priority for Britain as it navigates its exit from the European Union.

Demand in India, where the market grew 41 percent by volume and 28 percent by value, helped drive total global sales to 533 million bottles equivalent. That marked the first increase in global whisky sales volumes in three years, the Scotch Whisky Association (SWA) said on Friday.

In value terms, total Scotch exports fell by 1 percent, still an improvement on the near 3 percent decline it recorded in the first half of 2015.

Global demand for Scotch appears to be strengthening thanks to "an emphasis on craftsmanship and provenance, backed by investment", SWA head David Frost said in a statement.

Indian tariffs of 150 percent are a hurdle for exporters, but its spirits market is set to expand 3 percent in 2016, according to industry data specialist IWSR, and Scotch distillers are keen to capitalise. The SWA is calling for a new trade agreement with India to be top of the list as Britain reshapes its global relationships.

The industry says it will face no tariffs to the EU, which made up nearly a third of its 3.86 billion pounds ($5.10 billion) in exports last year. But it remains concerned about Brexit, because Scotch may no longer benefit from being under the wing of the EU for trade with countries outside the bloc.

The weakness of the British pound, which fell against major currencies after the vote to leave the EU on June 23, would boost revenues in sterling from exports in the short term, the SWA predicted. But it called on the government to provide clarity as soon as possible on the future trade relationship with the trading bloc.

Scotch whisky accounts for nearly a quarter of all British food and drink exports on an annual basis, and around a third of Scotch exports are destined for the EU. France is the biggest Scotch drinker not only in the EU but in the world, quaffing 91 million bottles in the first half of the year.

($1 = 0.7573 pounds)

(Reporting By Elisabeth O'Leary, editing by Larry King)
Brazilian TV star Domingos Montagner died from drowning in the northeastern state of Sergipe, Thursday, September 15, the Associated Press reports. He was 54.

PHOTOS: Celebrity Deaths in 2016: Stars Weve Lost

Per the AP, the incident occurred close to where he shot scenes for his popular soap opera, Velho Chico  a detail that may have tragically contributed to his death. After a day of filming, he and costar Camila Pitanga decided to go swimming in the Sao Francisco River in Caninde.



Montagner was apparently dragged away by a strong current, and he was found 1,000 feet from where he was last spotted several hours later. His body was lodged between two rocks 60 feet below the surface.

PHOTOS: Celebrity Injuries

Pitanga told police that she was able to pull herself up on a rock and tried to grab Montagner's hand twice. She reportedly cried for help while trying to save Montagner before contacting authorities. Locals, however, didn't intervene because they thought the stars were shooting a scene for the show.

"[The stars] thought the area they picked to swim was safe, but, in fact, it's one of the most dangerous places to bathe," Antonio Francisco Filho, a local government official said in a statement, via AP. "This is a part of the river in Caninde that isn't common for bathers."

Celebrity Health Scares

Montagner was a circus performer before his TV career took off. In a previous episode of Velho Chico, his character was shot and left for dead in the Sao Francisco River.

Montagner is survived by his wife, actress Luciana Lima, and three children.







Related Content:
LONDON (Reuters) - A rainy London kicked off five days of catwalk shows on Friday, with questions over what consequences Brexit may have on Britain's apparel industry looming over fashionistas. Picking up the runway calendar baton from New York, London hosts its first fashion week since Britain's shock vote to leave the European Union, with a mix of luxury and high street labels unveiling their spring/summer 2017 offerings to buyers and magazine editors from around the world. A survey by the British Fashion Council (BFC) ahead of the June referendum showed that more than 90 percent of 290 designers said they wanted to remain in the bloc. "We have a point to prove to our guests that the vote to leave the EU doesn't mean we're going to end our international partnerships and collaborations," BFC Chief Executive Caroline Rush was quoted as saying in London's Evening Standard paper. "People want to know if London feels different. We need to send them a clear message that London is open to outsiders and the UK is a place of business opportunity." According to figures cited by the BFC, Britain's fashion industry contributes some 28 billion pounds to the UK economy, up from 26 billion pounds in 2013. Prime Minister Theresa May kicked off proceedings on Thursday night with a reception for fashion industry insiders at Downing Street. "From our home grown start-ups to international fashion houses  every business in the industry will play a major role in ensuring we make a success of Brexit," she said. "By taking advantage of the opportunities that leaving the EU gives us and playing to our strengths as a great trading nation - we can build a fairer economy that works for all, not just the privileged few." While the September shows have usually been associated with solely womenswear, labels like Burberry will present collections both for women and men this fashion week. Burberry will also offer catwalk items immediately for purchase after its show. Some 83 designers will showcase their lines in London, a city known for nurturing new fashion talent. Among those presenting collections on Friday were Eudon Choi, Teatum Jones and PPQ. (Reporting By Marie-Louise Gumuchian and Reuters Television; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
Ahead of the 2016 presidential election, look back on 25 years of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton references in rap music.

1991, The Coup

"The Coup" (The Coup EP, Polemic)

"We gives a f - if you've got money and the millions / Cause motherf - er we've got a posse in the billions / Break yourself Trump, it's collection day.../You stole the shit from my great granddaddy anyway"

The political hip-hop group was an outlier when it came to knocking The Donald: In the '90s, everyone from UGK to Raekwon used "Black Trump" as a compliment.

VOTE FOR: CLINTON

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1993, YO YO

"Girl's Got a Gun" (You Better Ask Somebody, East West/Atlantic)

"The devil don't know who the man be / Come and check it out, I got the fat artillery / Harriet Tubman's spirit instilled in me / F - Bill Clinton and Hillary"

Five months into Bill Clinton's presidency, why was Yo Yo so mad? It might have been the first couple's attack on Sister Souljah and gangsta rap in the wake of the Los Angeles riots - or maybe she just hates the saxophone.

Story continues

VOTE FOR: TRUMP

1998, Method Man

"Cradle Rock" featuring Booster and Left Eye (Tical 2000, Def Jam)

"Bad vibes filling me with thoughts of conspiracy / Whitewater scandals with Bill Clinton, Hillary / Too hot to handle, too well put together to dismantle / F - er, you heard me"

Also on Tical 2000: A voicemail from Trump, who says, "Hey, Method Man. This is Donald Trump, I'm in Palm Beach and we're all waiting for your album. Let's get going, man. Everybody's waiting for this album."

VOTE FOR: TRUMP

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2005, Nelly

"Grillz" featuring Paul Wall, Ali, Gipp, Brandi and Jermaine Dupri" (Sweatsuit, Universal)

"Where I got 'em you can spot 'em, on the top, on the bottom / Got a bill in my mouth like I'm Hillary Rodham"

Assuming this is a reference to the presidential package, wasn't it a dated reference even 11 years ago, when Ali of St. Lunatics dropped this rhyme? Listeners were apparently unfazed: The song hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 2006.

VOTE FOR: ABSTAINS

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2007, Trina

"Single Again" (Still Da Baddest, Slip-N-Slide)

"Like Hillary Clinton, / I'm the boss / Dude came back 'cause / He know where it's at"

In 2007 Hillary was riding high, fresh off her first term as senator and gearing up for a White House run. With Trina's name-drop, Clinton received her first truly positive reference in song - the same year Gorilla Zoe compared her to cocaine (and meant it as a compliment).

VOTE FOR: CLINTON

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2010, Lil B

"Bitch I'm Bill Clinton" (Red Flame, BasedWorld)

"I need Bill Clinton to light up the weed / Shout-outs to Hillary Clinton / You 'bout to win that president shit / For me you going to be president soon, baby"

Barack Obama was still in his first term when the Bay Area icon offered this endorsement of then-Secretary of State Clinton. No wonder, then, that when Lil B switched his support to Bernie Sanders in 2015, CNN saw fit to report the news.

VOTE FOR: CLINTON

2011, Mac Miller

"Donald Trump" (Best Day Ever, Rostrum)

"Take over the world when I'm on my Donald Trump shit / Look at all this money, ain't that some shit"

When this dropped, Trump was flattered, calling Miller "the next Eminem." But just two years later, he tweeted (among many other things): "Little @macmiller, I'm now going to teach you a big boy lesson about lawsuits and finance. You ungrateful dog!" In 2016, Miller responded on The Nightly Show, calling him "a racist f - wad of a human."

VOTE FOR: CLINTON

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2016, Rich Da Kid

"Rich the GOAT" (I'm the GOAT, Rich Forever Music)

"Hillary hit the dab, I'ma vote (Hillary!)"

Clinton made headlines when she learned to Whip and Nae Nae on The Ellen DeGeneres Show in September 2015. But it took her dabbing on the same show to win the coveted Rich Da Kid endorsement. Though it may not be a great reason to vote, there's plenty worse - deporting millions to Mexico, for instance.

VOTE FOR: CLINTON

2016, YG

"FDT" featuring Nipsey Hussle (Still Brazy, Def Jam)

"F - Donald Trump / F - Donald Trump / Yeah, n - a, f - Donald Trump / I don't like your ass, n - a / Yeah, yeah, f - Donald Trump / Yeah, f - Donald Trump / This for my grandma! / Yeah, yeah, f - Donald Trump, yeah"

Breaking: YG and Hussle (and G-Eazy and Macklemore on the remix) don't like Donald Trump.

VOTE FOR: CLINTON

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This article originally appeared in the Sept. 24 issue of Billboard.
FLORENCE, Italy (Reuters) - A European Union naval force deployed in the Mediterranean should turn back migrant boats after they leave Libya and prevent them from reaching Italy, British Foreign Minister Boris Johnson said on Thursday. Italy is on the frontline of Europe's migrant crisis, taking in more than 400,000 refugees over the past three years, many of them saved from rickety boats pushed out to sea by people smugglers based in north Africa. The European Union launched Operation Sophia in 2015 in response to the crisis, with a mandate to disrupt the people trafficking networks and destroy smugglers' boats. Johnson said part of the mission's work was to return boats back to shore after they had put to sea. "I think personally (the boats) should be turned back as close to the shore as possible so they don't reach the Italian mainland and that there is more of a deterrent," Johnson said, speaking alongside his Italian counterpart Paolo Gentiloni. "I think I am right in saying we have turned back about 200,000 migrants," Johnson said, before a nearby diplomat hastily corrected him. "Sorry, saved, saved. Thank you. We have saved 200,000 migrants and turned back 240 boats." It is illegal to turn back migrant boats once they reach international waters and a U.N.-backed government in Libya has not invited European ships into its territorial waters, saying this would undermine its own state-building efforts. It was not immediately clear in what context the boats mentioned by Johnson were turned back to land. There was no immediate comment from Operation Sophia officials in Rome. Johnson was in Italy for talks about Britain's decision to abandon the European Union. (Reporting by Crispian Balmer; Editing by Keith Weir)
By Orhan Coskun and Paul Carrel ANKARA/BERLIN (Reuters) - Turkish authorities detained four people in an investigation into a potential threat against British and German diplomatic missions but found no links to any terrorist groups, a Turkish official said on Friday. The investigation was prompted by intelligence about a potential Islamic State plot against the embassies, the official said. "Four people were detained in relation to a potential act against the two embassies. Security remains at the highest level. We continue to cooperate closely and share information with the foreign missions," the official said. Three of the suspects were detained in the capital Ankara and one of them in Istanbul, state-run Anadolu Agency said. Britain shut its embassy in Ankara on Friday for what its foreign office said were security reasons, without giving further details. A spokesman for Germany's foreign ministry confirmed its diplomatic offices were closed this week, citing both a four-day public holiday in Turkey and information, which he described as "not completely verifiable", about a potential attack. "We take such leads seriously," the spokesman told reporters at a regular news conference in Berlin. "So we decided to keep our diplomatic missions and German schools in Turkey closed this week. It was a precautionary measure." He said the government would make a decision after the weekend on whether the missions would reopen on Monday. Government offices and financial markets were closed in Turkey from Monday to Thursday for the Muslim Eid al-Adha holiday. Turkey has suffered a series of suicide bombings and attacks by Islamic State and Kurdish militants over the past year. It launched its first major military incursion into Syria last month to push the jihadists away from its border and prevent Kurdish fighters from seizing territory as they retreated. In its latest travel advice, Britain's foreign office urged against travel to within 10 km (6 miles) of the Syrian border and to Diyarbakir, the largest city in the mainly Kurdish southeast, hit by violence after a ceasefire with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) broke down last year. (Reporting by Orhan Coskun and Tuvan Gumrukcu in Ankara and Can Sezer in Istanbul; Writing by David Dolan; Editing by Nick Tattersall and Louise Ireland)
London (AFP) - A former Manchester United stadium steward was jailed Friday for the Islamic State group-inspired murder of an imam who practised a form of healing which he saw as "black magic" incompatible with Islam.

Mohammed Syeedy, 21, was sentenced to a minimum of 24 years as the getaway driver in the killing of Jalal Uddin.

Uddin, 71, was bludgeoned to death with a blunt instrument, possibly a hammer, in a children's play area in Rochdale, northwest England in February.

The man who allegedly delivered the blows, Mohammed Kadir, fled Britain three days after the death and is now thought to be in Syria.

Judge David Maddison said Uddin was a "gentle" man who had been attacked because he practised Ruqya faith healing.

"You and your co-offender saw the practice as a form of black magic that could not be tolerated within Islam," he told Syeedy as he sentenced him at Manchester Crown Court.

Prosecutors said Uddin, who reportedly moved to Rochdale from Bangladesh 15 years ago, had made amulets designed to bring good luck to the person who wore them.

They said his attackers were followers of Salafism and believed this practice was punishable by death.

They added that Syeedy had been radicalised by the IS group and that police found IS-related videos on his phone as well as flags and a headband featuring jihadist symbols at his home.

Sue Hemming, head of the Crown Prosecution Service's special crime and counter-terrorism division, said after the sentencing: "The prosecution proved that Syeedy believed Jalal Uddin to be practising black magic and, inspired by the teachings of Daesh (another name for the IS group), that the victim deserved to die for that belief.

"Syeedy and his accomplice stalked Jalal Uddin round the streets before attacking him and leaving him to die.

"The poisonous ideology of Daesh cannot be allowed to sow division in our society and those who carry out or encourage violence in its name will be prosecuted."
London (AFP) - A British man accused of hacking into thousands of United States government computers can be extradited to the US to face trial, a court in Britain ruled Friday.

Lauri Love, 31, faces a lengthy prison term if convicted of charges including hacking into the networks of the US Federal Reserve, US Army and NASA, among others in 2012 and 2013.

Love's supporters said he would appeal the decision.

US prosecutors argue that Love disseminated the personal information of US citizens including serving members of the military.

District judge Nina Tempia granted the US's extradition request in a hearing in London but also gave Love leave to appeal the decision to a higher court.

"I'm going to extradite Mr Love, but what I mean by that is I'm going to send his case to the Secretary of State" (for final approval of the decision), Tempia told the hearing.

Love argues he should face justice in Britain rather than the US and believes that his Asperger Syndrome condition would get worse if he was sent to an American prison.

"If you have come for justice then you have missed it," Love told journalists after the decision.

"We shouldn't look on this as even nearly the end... we will continue to fight because we're doing what's right," he added outside court.

Sarah Harrison, director of the Courage Foundation which runs a fund and campaign supporting Love, said: "This is a very disappointing ruling."

She added: "I know that Lauri's legal team will apply to appeal this ruling and the Courage Foundation will continue to support Lauri until his safety is assured."
Obama Seeks Ratification of UN Arms

Trade Treaty Before Leaving Office

By AWR Hawkins. September 13th, 2016

With only months left before before leaving office, President Obama is committed to securing ratification of the United Nation's Arms Trade Treaty (ATT).

ATT has been an on again off again project of the Obama administration during both terms of his presidency, particularly his first term.

In 2013 the NRA warned: "This treaty threatens individual firearm ownership with an invasive registration scheme [and is full of regulations and requirements that are] blatant attacks on the constitutional rights of every law-abiding American." The treaty does this, in part, by "[urging] record keeping of end users, directing importing countries to provide information to an exporting country regarding arms transfers, including 'end use or end user documentation' for a 'minimum of ten years.'"

To require recording keeping on end users is nothing other than requiring registration of end users. In fact, Breitbart News warned that firearm registration must proceed from the ATT if it is to be enforceable. This is a logical but freedom-crushing consequence when part of the treaty's focus is stopping the movement of "small arms [and] light weapons" across borders. How are agents tasked with enforcing this treaty going to ascertain the origin of smuggled weapons without a comprehensive registration on file? .......

This is the United States of America - NOT a sub division of the UN, and it carries something called the Constitution. Within that is the Second Amendment which is sacrosanct. This sword of Damocles has been hanging over our heads for a long time, but it would seem that as a presidency limps its way to a conclusion, efforts may be made to achieve final ratification. This would be an unconstitutional disaster if it were to get enough votes - contact your representatives.

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After playing Gillette Stadium in Foxboro, Mass. on Sept. 14, Bruce Springsteen is slated to make a series of decidedly more intimate live appearances - at bookstores and The New Yorker festival. Having performed for 2.1 million fans and grossed $232 million (according to Billboard Boxscore) on his globe-spanning The River Tour, the Boss will next attempt to convert those listeners to readers when he embarks on the promotional campaign for his autobiography, Born to Run, out Sept. 27.

With the $10-million advance Simon & Schuster is reported to have paid him, Springsteen, who turns 67 on Sept. 23, may well have received the highest payout ever for a music memoir. (The publisher declined to confirm the amount.) Given his fan base, the book will certainly do well, but publishing insiders wonder whether Simon & Schuster can earn back its investment.

100 Greatest Music Books of All Time

There is some precedent. Keith Richards' Life, published in 2010, sold one million copies internationally in its first year -- 554,000 in the United States, according to Nielsen BookScan -- going a long way toward recouping his reported $7 million advance. Written with British journalist James Fox, Life made headlines with its saucy revelations about Richards' sexual conquests, his formidable drug habits, and the size of Mick Jagger's manhood. But it also drew near universal acclaim from critics for its literary merit, which extended its readership beyond Rolling Stones obsessives. The book's success helped propel a new wave of memoirs by rock n' roll legends including Pete Townshend, Bob Dylan, Elvis Costello, and Kim Gordon.

Hear Bruce Springsteen Read From 'Born to Run' Memoir

"There was a time when there were a lot of really shitty as-told-to music memoirs, and [Life] was so well done that it pushed a lot of people to do it at that level," says Carrie Thornton, editorial director of Dey Street books, which published Gordon's 2015 book, Girl in a Band, and is releasing books by The Smiths' Johnny Marr and Joy Division's Peter Hook this fall. "Bruce may have the same effect. It's going to be a real treasure."

Story continues

While there is no recipe for a great autobiography, publishing veterans agree that the more sensational trappings of rock n' roll are not sufficient ingredients. "A bad rock memoir is one that is 90 percent about groupies and drugs and fights in the band," says Sean Cassidy, president of the public relations firm DKC, which repped Joe Perry's book, Rocks: My Life In and Out of Aerosmith. "I want to come away with an understanding of how the band made it. And they didn't make it because of groupies and drugs."

The quality of the narrative depends in part on a star's reasons for writing his or her story in the first place. Money is an obvious factor. "With multimillion dollar advances being thrown around, there's a pretty strong motivation for rock figures to apply themselves in this area - especially with the music business being as shaky as it is in terms of sales," says Gerald Howard, who edited Chrissie Hynde's 2015 coming-of-age memoir, Reckless: My Life as a Pretender.

Bruce Springsteen, Jerry Seinfeld, Jon Stewart Will 'Stand Up For Heroes' At Benefit

Another impetus is the opportunity for a star to burnish their legend or set the record straight. "Lots of people write a memoir because they're vain and they want a book," says David Ritz, one of the top ghostwriters in the business. Or, he says, "You have a publicist who wants to build your audience - books are a way to expand the brand." But the better ones have loftier aspirations. Ritz, who has co-authored 37 autobiographies including Perry's, Ray Charles' and Willie Nelson's (and is working on Lenny Kravitz's), says, "Most books turn out good when the artists approach [them] as a way to understand themselves."

For Patti Smith, whose memoir Just Kids won the National Book Award in 2010 and has sold an impressive 479,000 copies to date (hardcover and trade paperback, according to Nielsen), the motivation was especially personal. "I had never planned to write a memoir," she says in an email. "I wrote mostly poetry, prose poems and quite a bit unpublished fiction. But on March 8, 1989, the day before he died, Robert Mapplethorpe [her close friend and a celebrated photographer] asked me if I would write our story. I promised that I would. It was often a painful, yet sometimes an exhilarating learning process."

Like Smith, Springsteen is said to have written every word of his book himself. Born to Run has been embargoed until its release, which has led some to speculate that Simon & Schuster might want to keep it from critics. But as Springsteen's lyrics and his concert banter make clear, he's a natural storyteller - especially when it comes to his fraught relationship with his father, a major theme of the book according to early readers. And if the recent Vanity Fair cover profile of Springsteen is any indication, the book will be more introspective than your typical sex-and-drugs rock memoir: The only drugs Springsteen discusses at length are antidepressants.

A version of this article originally appeared in the Sept. 24 issue of Billboard.
Sofia (AFP) - Until recently, most migrants entering Bulgaria from Turkey would not hang around, seeking to continue their journeys towards western Europe. But now they are finding themselves stranded in the EU's poorest country.

The reason is that tighter border controls introduced since July have made it much harder for people to follow the usual route of crossing from Bulgaria into Serbia, and from there further west.

And if they do make it to Serbia, then getting into Hungary -- which last year erected a fence topped with razor wire -- has become tougher still with authorities expelling any migrant caught near the border.

Iraqi Kurd Azhuan Arhwanssara, for instance, says that after laying low "20 to a room" in a Roma ghetto in Sofia, he took his chances this summer and tried to cross into Serbia -- but was turned back by Serbian border guards.

"We didn't come this far to give up," the 22-year-old musician told AFP at a migrant shelter at Vrajdebna in the outskirts of the Bulgarian capital. He's not abandoning his dream of making it to "England or Canada".

Ivan Penkov, director of the now overflowing shelter, said that Arhwanssara's story has become more common in recent weeks, and that in August his facility's 320 places "were filled up in less than 10 days".

"Since July, several groups of migrants disappeared from our refugee centre," Penkov told AFP in a visit this week. "But then they came back, having failed to cross into Serbia."

Alan, a 13-year-old Syrian, is another case in point. He broke his leg in a forest while trying to cross into Serbia and was turned back, together with his companions, by Bulgarian border police.

- Drowned -

And going north from Bulgaria into Romania can be dangerous, since it means crossing the raging Danube river that marks the border between the two countries and where crossing points are rare.

Earlier this week a boat capsized on the river. Three migrants drowned and three went missing, some of them children.

Story continues

Police are finding ever more migrants hidden in vehicles on the bridge linking the two countries at Ruse, said local police chief Dimitar Chorbadzhiev.

Fewer than 20 percent of the 5,310 places available in Bulgarian reception centres were filled at the end of May. Now they are almost full.

"Before, more than 90 percent of those who arrived in Bulgaria left again (for somewhere else). Now they have nowhere to go," said Georgy Voynov, a lawyer with rights group the Helsinki Committee.

Estimated at around 10,000, the number of migrants stranded in Bulgaria remain modest compared to the roughly 60,000 stuck in Greece or the almost 130,000 who have crossed the Mediterranean to Italy so far this year.

But the Bulgarian government is still worried that it will become a "buffer state" between Turkey and the rest of the European Union where migrants are stuck, according to Interior Minister Rumiana Bachvarova.

Prime Minister Boyko Borisov's response has been to seek help from fellow EU leaders, who are meeting in Bratislava on Friday, to help stop migrants entering Bulgaria in the first place.

Bulgaria has already strung up a barbed wire barrier that will soon cover most of its 259-kilometre (160-mile) border with Turkey.

"I want more than statements of solidarity," Borisov said while visiting Bulgaria's border with Turkey this week. "At the Bratislava summit I will insist on 160 million euros ($180 million) being granted immediately."

He appears to have won the backing of EU President Donald Tusk and European Commission head Jean-Claude Juncker who said this week that 200 EU border guards and 50 vehicles would be deployed.

At the same time Borisov has visited Ankara and Berlin in recent weeks trying to ensure that the EU's crucial deal with Turkey, under which Turkey stops migrants entering the EU, does not fall apart.

"The consequences of a failure (of this agreement) would be catastrophic," Borisov said.
Lifeway Foods, Inc. (LWAY) is cashing in on the probiotics craze. This Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) is expected to grow earnings by 216% this year.

Lifeway Foods is a supplier of the probiotic fermented beverage known as kefir. It has drinkable kefir in smoothies, including the yummy blueberry smoothie, frozen kefir, specialty cheeses and a ProBugs line for kids.

Headquartered in Illinois, its products are available in the United States but it is slowly growing its business in Canada, Latin America and the United Kingdom.

Probiotics are commonly called "healthy bacteria" by the rest of us and it's supposed to be good for your gut.

Big Earnings Beat in the Second Quarter

On Aug 17, Lifeway reported second quarter results and blew by the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 9 cents. Earnings were $0.13 versus the consensus estimate of $0.04.

Sales rose 4.4% to $31.1 million from $29.8 million in the year ago quarter on higher sales of its kefir products.

Margin expansion was boosted from lower milk prices and manufacturing efficiencies, including lower packaging costs, improved labor productivity and improved manufactured costs related to increased production at the Waukesha facility.

It saw its highest second profitability in company history.

Shareholder Friendly

Lifeway has cash and cash equivalents of $6 million as of June 30, 2016. That's up from $5.6 million at the end of 2015.

It has been spending some of that cash repurchasing shares. In the six months ending June 30, 2016, it repurchased about 69,000 shares at the cost of $738,000.

Lifeway has 1.2 million shares remaining on its repurchase plan. There's no expiration date for the plan and the company is under no obligation to continue it. It can be suspended or discontinued at any time.

Restatement of the First Quarter Completed

There was the messy business of needing to restate its first quarter numbers. This hampered the stock earlier in the year.

Lifeway is a small cap company with a market cap of just $232 million. With probiotics now becoming more of a mainstream food item, it will likely experience some growing pains as momentum picks up.

Story continues

The good news for investors is that the restatement entailed actually increasing most of the reported numbers, including earnings which went up $0.02.

The analysts are feeling better about what they are hearing.

2 estimates have been raised for 2016 and 2017 since the earnings report.

The 2016 Zacks Consensus Estimate jumped up to $0.38 from $0.20 in the last 30 days. That's earnings growth of 216% as the company only made $0.12 in 2015.

The growth is expected to continue in 2017 as the Zacks Consensus Estimate rose to $0.44 from $0.35. That's another 17% earnings growth.

Shares Have Soared

Shares are up 36% since the second quarter earnings report.

They're no longer cheap either. Lifeway trades with a forward P/E of 38.

But the niche food market is proving to have sustainability as Americans look to be healthier so the analysts are banking on big growth.

For investors looking for a way to play the probiotics, Lifeway is definitely a stock to keep on your short list.

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OUAGADOUGOU (Reuters) - Burkina Faso authorities detained a former prime minister on Friday in connection with the violent attempts to put down a protest that ousted ex-President Blaise Compaore, the High Court prosecutor said. Compaore's 27-year rule over Burkina Faso, Africa's fourth largest gold producer, ended in October 2014 when hundreds of thousands of demonstrators angered by his attempt to extend it further forced him out. Security forces initially tried to crush the demonstration and rights groups said they shot dead at least 10 people. Compaore and several of senior members of his government, including the former prime minister Luc Adolphe Tiao, were afterwards indicted by the then transitional government for various offences. Tiao was charged with "intentional assault, complicity in intentional assault, murder and complicity to murder," Prosecutor Armand Ouedraogo said. He is accused of signing an order authorizing the army to crush the protest. The former prime minister returned voluntarily this week from exile in Ivory Coast, where Compaore also resides and has been given citizenship. The fall of Blaise Compaore, despite attempts to repress the protests, inspired activists across the continent to hope it would usher in people-power revolutions to oust autocrats in other African countries. But such protests have been suppressed and many leaders have successfully extended their terms in office. (Reporting by Mathieu Bonkoungou; Writing by Tim Cocks; Editing by Tom Heneghan)
Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton are making small business owners cautious, historically cautious.

In the most recent NFIB Small Business survey, 39% of small business owners cited the political climate as a reason they are not planning to expand their business. This is the highest level ever recorded in the survey going back to its start in 1994, according to Bank of America Merrill Lynch US economist Michelle Meyer.

It's not just small businesses that are feeling this way. Even Wendy's CEO Todd Penegor made the case that the fast food chain's sales were down in part because of caution on the part of consumers ahead of the upcoming election.

Meyer also noted that the political uncertainty is showing up in other measures of the economy as well. In the note, Meyer said that there were seven mentions of the election in the most recent Federal Reserve Beige Book on economic conditions. To the BAML economist's point, the seven mentions don't sound particularly encouraging.

One mention in the Beige Book discusses the impact on construction.

"Contacts in several Districts cited only modest expectations for sales and construction activity moving forward, due in part to economic uncertainty surrounding the November elections," said the release.

Even the Dallas Fed mentioned the uncertainty was weighing on retail sales.

"Contacts were more uncertain in their outlooks this reporting period, mainly because of the presidential election and its impact on consumers and consumer confidence," said the Dallas Fed.

Meyer also said that the presidential election is hurting other economic releases as well.

"We remain concerned about how uncertainty around the election spills into the real economy, particularly given the weakness in the September Empire and Philly Fed indices, the sharp declines in the August ISM manufacturing and non-manufacturing indices and slip in U of Michigan consumer sentiment," wrote Meyer.

As the election gets closer and closer, it appears to be making business owners more and more nervous.

Story continues

election worries COTD

NOW WATCH: KRUGMAN: Obamacare was done 'on the cheap' and now it is struggling





More From Business Insider


When you're buying a home, you're undoubtedly doing everything in your power to make sure the process goes smoothly. But as Tim Walters, broker and owner of The Buyer's Agent in the Minneapolis metro area, relates, real estate transactions tend to be a bit like airplanes.

"You never hear about the safe landings or takeoffs, but you sure hear about the plane crash," Walters says.

It's far more common that a home will successfully change hands once an offer has been accepted, but as a homebuyer, you should always be prepared for the worst-case scenario.

There are a number of ways a real estate deal can fall through, the most common of which include a lender's rejection of the mortgage application, the home appraises for less than the sale price and the inspection reveals significant defects in the home. Even if it means walking away from a home the buyer was eager to purchase, he or she continues to have options moving forward.

Depending on the scenario, the buyer can work to move forward with the same deal, though in many cases real estate agents recommend moving on to find a home better suited for the investment. Here's how you can determine the best course of action, and how you can better set yourself up for success when you find the right home.

[Read: Sellers: Your Real Estate Deal Fell Through. What's Next?]

When your lender doesn't approve your mortgage. You may have worked hard to improve your finances and it may have been years since that one credit mishap, but surprises arise that can prevent you from being approved for a mortgage once you've entered a contract on a house.

"You can always try another lender, or you can go back to the underwriter" and discuss the reason your application was rejected, says Linda Sowell, owner and principal broker of Sowell & Company, a real estate firm in Memphis, Tennessee.

But when the reason for the rejection has to do with your financial history, it's often best to move on from the deal and re-evaluate your budget to a home price more likely to be approved by the lender, Sowell says.

Story continues

To be more confident with your finances on the next home you put an offer on, Walters notes it's important to seek preapproval -- not just prequalification -- for a mortgage.

"You really want all your ducks in a row and your finances in [to the lender] right away or even before you make an offer on a house, so you don't have any surprises," she says.

[See: The Best Apps for House Hunting.]

When the home doesn't appraise for the sale price. Your mortgage approval may additionally hit a wall if the appraisal ordered by the lender comes out to less than the contracted sale price. While a seller may benefit from getting a second opinion for a future deal, as a buyer relying on that mortgage approval, you may be unable to convince the lender the agreed-upon sale price makes for a solid investment.

"If [the buyer] wanted to pay the difference between the appraisal and purchase price, they can do that, but many buyers aren't in that situation," says John Myers, owner and qualifying broker of Myers & Myers Real Estate Inc. in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

You've likely set aside money for a down payment on the home and you'll need to have a budget for closing and moving costs, so in many situations paying extra out of pocket simply isn't possible. Myers also notes that in a particularly hot real estate market, you may come to expect sale prices to jump beyond what a property appraises for due to bidding wars and stiff competition.

When presented with the appraisal obstacle, Walters says he typically presents his buyer clients with three options: pay the difference, walk away from the deal outright or renegotiate the sale price with the seller. "Being a buyer advocate, I like the [last choice] because the seller's going to be in the same position again, potentially, if they just cancel the contract," he says.

[Read: Before You Buy: Conducting Due Diligence on a Property.]

When the home inspection uncovers problems. Any home inspection will reveal issues or room for improvement in a home -- be it a pest problem, dry rot or gutters that need replacing.

Because your home is likely one of the largest investments you'll ever make, you should carefully weigh every problem uncovered in the inspection, and ask whether it's something you feel significant enough to either demand a lower price or choose to back out of the deal entirely.

"In most cases I advise my buyers to walk away from a deal and find a home that's in a much better condition," Myers says.

Not all sellers are willing to put in the effort and money that goes into making a major repair before they hand the home over to a new owner. In that case, unless you're able to successfully negotiate the price down to make up for the cost of repair, walking away will likely be the best decision in the long run. You'd also need to be motivated to make repairs immediately if you stick with the deal -- major issues like a leaking roof or asbestos in a popcorn ceiling can become catastrophic if you delay.

If you ultimately decide to step away from the deal due to revelations in the inspection, it should be easy to jump back into house hunting with a clear mind for what projects you would or would not be willing to take on in a new home.

"[The buyer] absolutely should have no problem canceling and moving on, because the last thing you want to do is move forward and be stuck with one of the biggest investments of your life" and it be something you regret, Walters says.





More From US News & World Report


A California man was rescued by two swimmers after he took a leap of faith, 173 feet off a cliff in Hawaii.

Read: Danger in Paradise: Drownings on the Rise in Hawaii Tourist Hotspots

Shiloh Shahan, 21, was recently visiting Hawaii and wanted to jump off the Wailua Falls on the island of Kauai.

In the video posted to YouTube September 3, Shahan took a deep breath, got a running start and jumping off the waterfall and into the bottom of the water. When he landed, he was knocked out

Nearby swimmers can be seen in the video coming to Shahan's aid.

When posting the video to YouTube, he said: I did get knocked out when I hit the water and completely lost my memory for about five minutes after being pulled out of the water. If I had not been pulled out of the water by two people who I respect dearly I could have died.

He told InsideEdition.com that jumping off the falls felt right and he always tries to follow his heart.

There are signs and fencing around the falls that warn tourists not to jump.

Addressing the two people who rescued him, Shahan said: I hope that you are blessed immensely.

Read: Tourists Take Part in Cliff-Jumping Craze That Kills Dozens Each Year

When he returned back home to California, he says his mother encouraged him to go to the hospital where he checked out fine.

It was confirmed that no bones were broken and my brain was still in great condition, he said.

He said he would do it again if given the opportunity, adding: It was one of the most amazing experiences in my life to date. I would say it was worth living for.

Watch: Navy Vet Stop Suicidal Man From Jumping on Train Tracks

Related Articles:
The past few years have seen their fair share of ups and downs for former UFC Heavyweight champion Cain Velasquez, to put it lightly. After missing all of 2014 and most of 2015 battling the injuries that have plagued his run as one of the most gifted heavyweights to ever step foot in the octagon, the NJCAA national champion was booked in the main event of the UFCs inaugural trip to Mexico  a country where he has served as a brand ambassador for the sport since basically his UFC debut  at UFC 188 last year only to be absolutely dominated by Fabricio Werdum before being submitted in the third round.

Even when Velasquez was granted an immediate, inexplicable rematch with Werdum at UFC 196, he was unable to seize the opportunity when yet another injury forced him out of the bout just two weeks before the event. In his absence, Stipe Miocic was called up to take on Werdum at UFC 198 and proceeded to knock out the Brazilian in just under 3 minutes, ushering in a new reign of the heavyweight division while Velasquez was forced to watch from the sidelines.

Related Links:





But with a dominant victory over Travis Browne at UFC 200 now under his belt, it looks like the finally maybe healthy Velasquez is ready to once again assert himself as the divisions kingpin. Speaking with training partner and light heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier on last nights UFC Tonight, the former champ laid out his plans for the future and called out two opponents specifically.

[Miocic] looked good, he moves around very well, said Velasquez. Hes hard to put away. Hes out there for the grind. If Stipe doesnt want a break, I want him. If he wants to fight in 2017, Id like to fight Werdum in December. This is personal.

The good news? It looks like hes already been granted his wish! According to MMAJunkie, a bout between the two former champs has already been offered to both parties for UFC 207 on December 30th. Though the fight has yet to be made official, it is expected that both Werdum (who has also stated his desire to face Velasquez in December) and Velasquez will sign the agreement in the coming days.

Of course, when/if the bout agreement is actually signed, who knows how long itll be before its cancelled due to injury. My guess is the weekend of UFC 207, when Cain will go down with a back injury after slipping in the sauna.
BOCA RATON, FL / ACCESSWIRE / September 16, 2016 / There are hundreds of car accidents in Florida every day. They often result in serious injuries or deaths of drivers, passengers, and pedestrians. Boca Raton car accident attorney Joe Osborne represents those injured in vehicle accidents caused by the negligence of others. He talks about how a lawsuit resulting from an accident should be handled in a podcast available on YouTube.

Osborne says some of the most important steps occur at the start of the process. "It's absolutely critical that an investigation is done properly and it's done early," he says. That can involve a number of different factors,

How the accident is caused. While that may be clear in some situations at other times it's not, so accident experts can be hired. They can reconstruct accidents and make determinations about who was the real party at fault.

Victims need to be treated by hospitals or doctors. The initial evaluation may be done in an emergency room but later specialists take over the care of accident victims.

That care and treatment can involve a number of things: physical therapy, occupational therapy, MRI's, CT-scans and surgery.

Osborne works very closely with the physicians to make sure that he has a good understanding of the injuries. These physicians may testify in the case. He makes sure they are prepared to help his clients in court.

Osborne says car accident victims may be reluctant to file a lawsuit or even talk to a car accident lawyer because they fear they won't be able to afford it. "Florida has a contingency fee system meaning that as a lawyer I only get paid a fee if I make a recovery in your case. The benefit to the client is that if I'm willing to take on that case then I also advance the cost of the case so what I mentioned, hiring the expert, getting medical records, meeting your doctor, we will front those costs so that you have the opportunity to bring the case without having to pay car accident attorney's fees."

Story continues

Osborne says the contingency system allows people who don't have the resources to hire a car accident lawyer to get legal representation. It levels the legal playing field and allows accident victims to hire the best car accident lawyers to prosecute their case.

What could a person obtain in a personal injury case? Two types of damages, economic and non-economic.

"If you're in a car accident that's caused by somebody else's negligence then typically you're going to have repair bills for your vehicle. From a property standpoint, we make sure that you are made whole if your car is declared a total loss; we will get the other the other driver's insurance company to pay the replacement cost for the vehicle. If you've lost wages because you can't work because of your injury or incurred medical bills that you have to pay for, these are all economic damages."

"Non-economic damages are compensation for pain and suffering that you have endured due to your injuries, medical treatment, and recovery. We make sure that all of your pain and suffering damages both in the past and in the future are part of the case," Osborne says.

He says depending on the complexity of the case, the extent of the injuries and if the insurance company is denying their policyholder is liable for the accident a car accident lawsuit may generally take from three months to two years to resolve. Osborne says his office can get a case to trial in 18 to 24 months in South Florida.

He says insurance companies try to draw out the process and pay as little as possible. "Our insurance companies fight vigorously in these kinds of cases. They are incredible. They're very quick to collect your premium when you buy insurance but when it comes time to pay out money and they're contractually obligated to pay for somebody's medical bills or pain and suffering if one of their insureds hurts somebody, they become very, very stingy with the money."

"The insurance companies will do everything they can to save every dollar in their pocket and not pay it to you, which is exactly why you need help from someone who's experienced in this area of law who deals with these insurance carriers all the time. It's important to remember that insurance companies in these situations aren't your friend," Osborne says.

If you or a family member have any questions about car accident law or have been injured in an auto accident in the South Florida area, contact Boca Raton car accident attorney Joe Osborne at (561) 800-4011 or fill out this online contact form. You can discuss your case, how the law may apply and your best legal options to protect your rights and obtain compensation for your injuries.

Press Contact:

Personal injury lawyer Joseph Osborne

561-800-4011

source: http://www.oa-lawfirm.com/car-crash-cases-handled-boca-raton-car-accident-attorney-joe-osborne/

SOURCE: Personal injury lawyer Joseph Osborne via Submit Press Release 123
* Forint at strongest levels since early March vs euro * Polish stocks ease, state-run firms eye EDF unit (Adds Hungary's rating upgrade) By Sandor Peto and Jakub Iglewski BUDAPEST/WARSAW, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The forint jumped to its firmest levels since early March on Friday after a surprise upgrade in Hungary's credit rating from Standard & Poor's.

Investors had expected the agency to keep Hungary's ratings unchanged in 'junk' category at 'BB+/B' and some analysts projected a rise in the rating outlook to positive.

But the agency improved the rating to 'BBB-/A-3', citing an improved debt outlook. This is the second upgrade to investment grade for Hungary, which Fitch upgraded in May.

Local markets were already closed when the upgrade came, but the forint jumped in international trade to 307.79 against the euro, a 6-1/2-month high.

At 1636 GMT it traded at 308.36, stronger by 0.4 percent from Thursday, while the zloty firmed 0.2 percent and the leu eased 0.1 percent.

Analysts said the change could also boost government bonds when markets reopen on Monday as some investment funds, mainly in Europe, can buy Hungarian papers now that the country has been upgraded twice.

The Hungarian central bank is seen giving further support to government bonds on Tuesday as it is expected to announce a cut in the amount that commercial banks can deposit with it in its 3-month instrument, its main tool for controlling liquidity.

Any decline in yields may be limited and temporary as a rating upgrade has been priced in, only the timing was the surprise, said Gergely Szabo Forian, fund manager at Pioneer Investments in Budapest.

Hopes for rating upgrades have also helped Budapest's main stock index become the region's best performer, with 17.5 percent gain since last year.

In Poland, investors have feared rating downgrades due to tension with the European Union over the rule of law in Poland, rising burdens on banks and the government's drive to increase its influence over businesses including banks.

Story continues

Societe Generale analysts said in a note that the forint's rise against the zloty this year was overdone.

"We like PLN/HUF higher, premised on overdone bearishness regarding Poland's political backdrop and its imminent implications for the country's sovereign rating," they said.

Warsaw's bluechip index led a fall of equities in the region on Friday, shedding 0.7 percent.

Its decline followed a newspaper report that PGE and other state-run companies - Energa and a subsidiary of oil and gas firm PGNiG - are working on a bid for the EDF business.

PBNig stocks fell 3.4 percent and PGE shed 1.7 percent.
We tallied up the clicks on realtor.com this week and werent shocked to see a celebrity home at the very top of the list. It belongs to a man with serious ties.

Family Ties, you might say.

The Connecticut getaway of actor Michael J. Fox topped our weekly look at the most popular homes in the country. Situated on over 87 acres of land, the home itself isnt ostentatious. Its a classic farmhouse with unbeatable views of natural beautythe greenery of Northern Connecticut is gorgeous. Tucked away on the border of New York, the prime property comes with a private pond, horse barn, and cozy guesthouse. All that for just $4.25 million. Time-traveling DeLorean not included.

Beyond the star power of the man who will forever be Marty McFly (at least to us!), you were also compelled to click on a megamansion in Hidden Hills, a renovated Massachusetts home near the water, and an enticing 20-acre opportunity in Big Sky Country.

We wont ask you to go back to the future, honest. We only ask that you simply scroll down and peruse this weeks most popular homes.

Price: $135,000

Why its here: This cute two-bedroom starter home just north of Atlanta was sold seven months ago for $55,000. Back on the market after a top-to-bottom renovation, its still an affordable purchase for a first-time buyer looking for a sweet deal.

Marietta, GA realtor.com



Price: $869,000

Why its here: Already in pending status after just a week on the market, this classic bungalow is located in a desirable neighborhood, according to listing agent Ken Riel. The four-bedroom home has the ever-enticing blend of a lot of charm, but with the current updates buyers want, according to Riel.

Charlotte, NC realtor.com



Price: $419,000

Why its here: This thoroughly renovated home faces the waters of Hull Bay and is only a short ferry ride to Boston. Listing agent Danielle Hoelschen told us shes received nothing but positive feedback about the basically new three-bedroom house. The price of the home was just reduced by $15,000, putting it in a sweet spot for buyers looking for a seasonal getaway or a year-round residence. The agent said a home like this one could rent for upward of $3,000 a month during the peak season.

Story continues

Hull, MA realtor.com



Price: $275,000

Why its here: North of Birmingham, this 8-acre mountaintop spread is in need of a little TLC. Repairs aside, were most interested in the custom-built safe room in the barn.

Springville, AL realtor.com



Price: $469,000

Why its here: Another week, another appearance for New Orleans. However, this quaint home doesnt have the citys signature shotgun-style layout. This quaint Victorian is right on the edge of the hot Audubon neighborhood and offers oodles of vintage charm. Perhaps thats why its already in pending status after less than two weeks on the market.

New Orleans, LA realtor.com



Price: $374,900

Why its here: Listing agent Jay Schmitt told us the size and large lot contributed to this classic brick homes popularity. However, Schmitt said the largest enticement is that its right on the border of Maryland and Pennsylvaniaand folks prefer paying Pennsylvania taxes. He added the location is essentially rural and offers a nice cushion from neighbors, but its not far from the metropolises of Maryland. A perfect city-country balance means Schmitt has already fielded offers on the home.

Littlestown, PA realtor.com



Price: $349,900

Why its here: Its a cave! Last weeks winner slid three spots to the fourth position. If you buy this fascinating cave dwelling, we need to hear from you ASAP. Deal?

Festus, MO caveland.us



Price: $210,000

Why its here: We dont find many entries from Montana cracking our top 10, so this affordable four-bedroom home was a welcome surprise. With over 2,000 square feet of living space plus an additional 20 acres of land, its ultra-affordable if youre willing to brave the winters here.

Shepherd, MT realtor.com



Price: $16,500,000

Why its here: This megamansion in prime Kardashian Kountry has been on and off the market since 2013. Done in a French Normandy style, the eight-bedroom estate belongs to hedge funder Jeffrey Feinberg. In 2015, his wife, Stacey Feinberg, told Calabasas Style magazine her favorite room in the enormous house is the huge home gym.

Hidden Hills, CA realtor.com



Price: $4,250,000

Why its here: Its Michael J. Foxs home! Fans were eager to see the inside of this Connecticut farmhouse, listed on the final day of August. The actors spread includes 87 acres with a horse barn and private pond.

Sharon, CT realtor.com

The post Which Celebritys Home Tops This Weeks Most Popular Listings? appeared first on Real Estate News and Advice - realtor.com.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A committee of the world's major central banks said on Friday it has launched a task force to examine cyber security in cross-border banking and to ensure interbank payments are protected, confirming an earlier Reuters report.

"Recent incidents of cyber fraud are of significant concern for the central banking community, and we are working to make sure there are adequate checks and balances in place at each stage of the payments process," Benoit Coeure, chairman of the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures, part of the Bank for International Settlements, said in a statement.

Coeure, also a European Central Bank executive board member, added it was too soon to predict the result of the work that had just begun. The Basel, Switzerland-based committee will decide how to proceed based on a review of current practices, he said.

Reuters reported the formation of the task force on Thursday, noting it was prompted by the February cyber heist of $81 million from Bangladesh Bank's account at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

That hacking incident exposed vulnerabilities in the global wholesale payments infrastructure, and in the messaging network called SWIFT, that banks and states rely upon for daily funding.

(Reporting by Jonathan Spicer; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Alan Crosby)
From Popular Mechanics

China successfully launched its second space station, Tiangong-2, at 10:04 a.m. EDT this morning on a Long March 2F rocket. The space station will serve as a laboratory and research facility for international science experiments as well as a stepping stone for a third, self-sustained space station that the People's Republic hopes to launch in the coming years.

Today's mission is the latest achievement in China's ambitious space program. Tiangong-2 (Heavenly Palace 2) will have an operating lifetime of only two years, but the station will be used to demonstrate a number of new technologies that China hopes to build upon, including a new docking station for both astronauts and supplies. The station will launch to about 380 kilometers (236 miles) in altitude before continuing up to 393 kilometers (244 miles) in preparation for the arrival of astronauts, according to Xinhua News Agency, the official press agency of China.

The first Chinese astronauts, or taikonauts, will arrive at the 8.6-ton, 60-foot-wide space station for a 30-day stay in October, traveling in a Shenzhou spacecraft. A resupply mission is slated for April 2017, which will be the first launch of a Tianzhou-class cargo spacecraft.

Tiangong-2 is part of a broader overall plan for the expansion of China's space program, which includes launching the larger Tiangong-3 space station by 2022 on a Long March 5 (a rocket currently under development by the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology), sending a probe to explore the dark side of the moon (which has never been done) and a rover to Mars in 2020, launching an advanced space telescope that would orbit near Tiangong-3 and have the capability to dock with it, and finally putting a person on the moon by 2036.

Today's launch is "a reminder that China has a manned space program, including the ability to put its own astronauts into space, something the Americans cannot do," Dean Cheng, a Chinese space policy expert at the Heritage Foundation in Washington DC, told New Scientist. (NASA astronauts are currently shuttled into space by Russia's space program.) "It's about national pride, but it's also, as the Chinese would put it, 'very dense in high technology.' And it has military implications, and they are very upfront about this. All of these are elemental to why are they doing this."

Story continues

Fourteen science experiments will be housed on Tiangong-2, including a gamma-ray burst instrument that will be operated in conjunction with Swiss and Polish scientists. The international science cooperation comes after the China National Space Administration (CNSA) announced that it would allow U.N. member nations to not only conduct experiments on Tiangong-2, but send astronauts to the space station as well.

A highly precise atomic clock-accurate to one second over the course of 30 million years-will be used on Tiangong-2 to measure fluctuations in microgravity. Atmosphere-monitoring instruments will be used to measure air pollution, and the space station will house experiments to study quantum communications, plant-cultivation in space, and the cardiovascular health of astronauts.

Tiangong-2 also has a new mechanical arm and larger living quarters with improved exercise and recreation facilities compared to China's first space station, Tiangong-1, which is now abandoned and losing altitude. Scientists lost communication with Tiangong-1 in March, and the space station is expected to re-enter Earth's atmosphere in late 2017.

Despite the loss of Tiangong-1 and other recent losses from CNSA (it is assumed a Long March 4C launch failed in September), the successful launch of Tiangong-2 represents a return to space exploration progress for China. If the country can achieve their lofty goals in the coming years, we can expect exciting discoveries to start pouring in from CNSA.

Source: Xinhua News Agency via New Scientist

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BEIJING (Reuters) - China launched its second experimental space laboratory on Thursday, part of a broader plan to have a permanent manned space station in service around 2022. Advancing China's space program is a priority for Beijing, with President Xi Jinping calling for the country to establish itself as a space power, and apart from its civilian ambitions, Beijing has tested anti-satellite missiles. China insists its space program is for peaceful purposes, but the U.S. Defense Department has highlighted its increasing space capabilities, saying it was pursuing activities aimed to prevent adversaries from using space-based assets in a crisis. In a manned space mission in 2013, three Chinese astronauts spent 15 days in orbit and docked with an experimental space laboratory, the Tiangong 1, or "Heavenly Palace". Its successor, Tiangong 2, lifted off on a Long March rocket just after 10 p.m. (1400 GMT) from the remote launch site in Jiuquan, in the Gobi desert, in images carried live on state television. The Shenzhou 11 spacecraft, which will carry two astronauts and dock with Tiangong 2, will be launched sometime next month. The astronauts expect to remain in Tiangong 2 for about a month, testing systems and processes for mid-term stays in space and refueling, and conduct medical and other experiments. The smooth launch imparts a high-tech sheen to week-long celebrations of China's National Day, starting on Oct. 1, as well as this week's shorter Mid-Autumn Festival holiday that coincides with the full moon. China would start building its space station starting as early as next year, Xinhua quoted Zhou Jianping, chief engineer of the manned spaceflight program, as saying. The station would be more economically efficient than the International Space Station and use "more data", he said. "Once the lab mission comes to an end, China will start building our own space station," Zhou was quoted as saying. China will launch a "core module" for the station some time around 2018, a senior official said in April, part of a plan for a permanent manned space station in service around 2022. China has been working to develop its space program for military, commercial and scientific purposes, but is still playing catch-up to established space powers the United States and Russia. China's Jade Rabbit moon rover landed on the moon in late 2013 to great national fanfare, but soon suffered severe technical difficulties. The rover and the Chang'e 3 probe that carried it there were the first "soft landing" on the moon since 1976. Both the United States and the Soviet Union had accomplished the feat earlier. (Reporting by Ben Blanchard in BEIJING and John Ruwitch in SHANGHAI; Editing by Ralph Boulton and Nick Macfie)
A chance for a fresh start

PMs visit could be an opportunity to ensure age-old ties move with the times
1more triple driver headphones

Im astounded by the 1More Triple Driver.

Forget how clunky and unfamiliar that name is for a second: This is a pair of in-ear headphones that look, feel, and sound like they should cost much more than their $100 going rate. Everyone wants to upgrade those dinky earbuds that came with their phone, right? Well, this is how you do it.

Some context: 1More is a young OEM that the Wall Street Journal once called Chinas answer to Beats. I wouldnt go that far, but it has sold millions of headphones in its home country, and it does have close ties to a big smartphone maker in Xiaomi. 1More made its big push into the US late last year, with its whole schtick being that itd provide quality audio at affordable prices.

Of course, everyone says that. But here, at least with the Triple Driver, it's true.

Everything about the Triple Driver screams attention to detail. The aluminum earpieces are smooth and substantial. You pick them up and realize youre not dealing with a toy.

This means theyre a bit weighty  enough for me to tell you to look elsewhere if you looking for something to take running  but they balance that heft well. They dont drag down your ears. They always have a presence, but I never found them uncomfortable. The Kevlar cable doesnt make any noise, either, and it has both a mic and a useful three-button remote.

1more triple driver headphones

They also create a very tight seal. Whenever a friend asks me about which headphones to get, the topic of noise-cancelling inevitably comes up, and most of the time I tell them to stay away. In-ears like Triple Driver are why: Unless your job involves being in or around an engine room, chances are you will not hear the outside world with these things in, and the music on.

Now, my ears are not your ears. If you cant find a good fit, though, 1More puts nine sets of extra tips in the box, each of which come in different sizes and/or materials. Thats a ton. Theres a leathery little carrying case, a shirt clip, and an airline jack adapter in there too. Even the box itself is nice. It all feels like a flagship product.

Story continues

All of this would amount to lip service if the Triple Driver sounded like junk, but that's entirely not the case. The name Triple Driver comes from the fact that 1Mores put, well, three drivers in each earpiece. Without getting too deep into the technical weeds, just know that drivers are the vibrating bits of a headphone that create the sound you hear, and that very few earphones under $100 include three of them.

1more triple driver box

The idea is to make it so the Triple Driver can hit more frequency ranges, and in practice, thats largely the case. Bass is punchy and impactful, but not bloated. It strikes a wonderful balance between being fun and not being inaccurate. Highs are clean and clear  things like the harmonica solo on Bob Dylans Queen Jane Approximately break through the mix without feeling dull or overly harsh. Even the mids, which tend to get lost with smaller in-ears, are given (relatively) good depth and detail.

All told, this is a rich, well-measured sound thatll appeal to cheapie audiophiles and regular people alike. No one part of it dominates the others, but it doesnt go for that ultra-flat sound that can make high-end cans feel boring. Instead, its exciting, without selling out everything but the bass to get there. There's even some width to it.

So, yeah, its great. I could wish for a little more oomph in the sub-bass, a little more smoothness in the treble, or a sweatproof design, but for $100, this is as out-and-out nice as in-ear headphones get. If you still own a phone with a headphone jack, go buy them. Even if you dont, and you care about audio, they might make using that dongle worth it.





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Chloe Grace Moretz has no problem getting vocal on social media, and heres why

Chloe Grace Moretz has no problem getting vocal on social media, and heres why

Chloe Grace Moretz is a firecracker. Known for her acting, her relationship with son-of-Posh Brooklyn Beckham, and getting into a Twitter feud or two, the young star sat down to chat with the famous Julianne Moore (her fellow 30 Rock alum) about whats to come, and why voicing your opinions on social media isnt totally bad. Or at least, something shes not ashamed of.

In the Teen Vogue feature, Moretz mentioned that shes a huge advocate for LGBT rights, especially after witnessing the attitudes and backlash her brothers faced after they came out. And part of that activism has to happen on social media.

I just think  especially in the world we live in right now with Trump doing what hes doing  its a time in which we all need to speak up, especially as millennials. Thats what social media is for, she said.

pump

She also credits social media for helping her generation become so outspoken.

I hope that we actually use the Internet and social media for the betterment of society. To continue to inform people about police brutality and about the amount of institutionalized racism within America, Moretz noted.

CGM

But best of all, she talked about how you shouldnt feel pressured to post certain things on your social media account.

I remember when I first got Twitter when I was 11 years old and learning what selfies are and realizing when I was 15 that when my friends posted a photo of themselves in a bikini they got triple the amount of likes, she said. I think its definitely been hard to decide what I want to show.

If you remember her feud with Kim Kardashian on showing too much skin, youll probably predict how her feelings have formed on the topic.

People will post a lot and then theyll complain about X, Y, and Z happening, and its hard to say theyre allowed to complain if theyre posting that much, she said. You have to be very aware of what youre putting out there on social media and how youre portraying yourself.

Story continues

moretz

All in all, Moretz thinks youre way more than your Facebook and Instagram posts, which is a healthy point of view. And shes right  everyone should think hard before posting anything to their account that they may someday regret. But while Moretz seems slightly wary about using these sources for personal branding, she thinks theyre amazing to help spread the world on causes that are truly important.

The post Chloe Grace Moretz has no problem getting vocal on social media, and heres why appeared first on HelloGiggles.
Washington (AFP) - Hillary Clinton has returned to the White House campaign trail seeking to regain the momentum lost to Donald Trump during her battle with pneumonia, especially in the country's key battleground states.

Clinton rejoined the race at a critical moment, as polls show the lead she has held over Trump narrowing sharply. One survey gave her just a two-point margin, down sharply in a matter of weeks.

The former secretary of state, 68, signalled she was raring to go, quickly going on the attack Thursday against her Republican rival at a rally in North Carolina and later in Washington at a celebration marking Hispanic Heritage Month.

"It's great to be back on the campaign trail," Clinton told cheering supporters in Greensboro, North Carolina -- a key battleground state.

"With two months to go until election day, sitting at home is the last place I wanted to be," she added. "The heat is on."

She announced stops for next week in states where Trump has started closing the gap, including Florida -- a must-win for both candidates.

Her cough was gone, but her voice still seemed scratchy at times.

But Trump didn't skip a beat, pummelling her economic record and that of President Barack Obama -- and releasing new medical records showing the 70-year-old billionaire real estate mogul to be in "excellent physical health."

The presidential hopefuls are going to pound the pavement in the 10 days to come before their first of three highly anticipated debates on September 26 in New York.

- Fit to serve -

Clinton fell ill Sunday during a 9/11 memorial ceremony in New York, where she was seen stumbling limp-legged into her vehicle, an episode that raised tough questions about her overall health and her campaign's transparency.

With the candidates' wellbeing suddenly at the forefront of the campaign, Clinton looked to head off further scrutiny by releasing new medical records Wednesday indicating that she was "fit to serve" as president.

Story continues

The disclosure came as the media-savvy Trump, 70, presented new health data of his own during the taping of a nationally televised medical chat show called The Dr. Oz Show, before publishing more details later on Thursday.

The one-page letter from his longtime doctor lists various lab results, including for cholesterol, blood pressure and liver and thyroid function -- all deemed to be within the normal range.

While Trump was shown to be slightly overweight, his doctor Harold Bornstein declared the Republican nominee to be "in excellent physical health."

Clinton appeared to lose her patience with the drama.

"Look at the show he put on with Dr Oz today," she said in Greensboro.

"I'll never be the showman my opponent is -- and that's ok with me."

- 'Welfare check' -

Trump had made a point of refraining from harsh attacks on his convalescent rival -- but the candidates swiftly resumed their jousting with Clinton back in action.

In an address to the Economic Club of New York, Trump slammed the policies of Clinton and Obama as having doubled the national debt and promised his presidency would bring about "an American economic revival."

There would be "no limit" to American job growth if the government were to slash taxes, remove destructive regulations and unleash the energy sector, he said, warning that the nation would tumble into "dwindling prosperity" and see more people grow dependent on handouts if Clinton were elected.

"The only thing she can ever offer is a welfare check," he said.

- Narrowing gap -

Recent opinion polls show the Clinton-Trump gap narrowing with less than seven weeks before election day.

A CBS News/New York Times survey found Clinton had just a two-point edge (46 to 44 percent) over Trump in a two-way matchup among likely voters.

When third party candidates Gary Johnson and Jill Stein were included, the race was tied at 42 percent each.

Trump appears to have flipped the momentum in all-important battleground states as well. A recent Bloomberg poll puts him up by five points in Ohio, while a CNN survey now has Trump ahead of Clinton by three points in Florida.

Also Thursday, the Trump campaign released a statement in which it said Trump now believes Obama was born in the United States. For years Trump has been an outspoken voice in the 'birther' movement, which alleged that Obama was born outside the US and thus was ineligible to be president.

"Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States," campaign spokesman Jason Miller said in a statement.

It was released after Trump, in an interview with the Washington Post, refused to say if he now thought Obama was born on US soil.

"I'll answer that question at the right time," Trump said. "I just don't want to answer it yet."
Hillary Clinton

The Hillary Clinton campaign released a statement on Friday blasting Donald Trump for holding a press conference to state that he now believes President Barack Obama was, in fact, born in the United States.

"Trump's actions today were disgraceful," said Robby Mook, Clinton campaign manager. "After five years of pushing a racist conspiracy theory into the mainstream, it was appalling to watch Trump appoint himself the judge of whether the President of the United States is American."

He continued: "This sickening display shows more than ever why Donald Trump is totally unfit be president."

During the press conference, Trump also blamed the birther movement on Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee.

While no one in Clinton's 2008 campaign ever advanced any charge that Obama was born outside the US, the birther movement did have some roots in the 2008 Democratic primary. David Plouffe, then Obama's campaign manager, said at the time that the Clinton campaign was guilty of "shameful offensive fear-mongering" by circulating a photo calling attention to Obama's African heritage.

"Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy," Trump said Friday. "I finished it. I finished it. You know what I mean."

During the 2012 election cycle, Trump, now the Republican presidential nominee, repeatedly called on Obama to release his birth certificate to prove that he was born in the US. While rumors had circulated before 2011 about Obama's birthplace, Trump is widely credited with bringing birtherism into the mainstream.

Trump demanded publicly for months that Obama release his longform birth certificate. As the issue gained more attention, Obama eventually relented and released the document.

NOW WATCH: Why you won't find a garbage can near the 9/11 memorial





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Jake Tapper

CNN anchor Jake Tapper on Friday used a popular internet meme to describe a stunt Donald Trump pulled on the press, saying the Republican nominee for president managed to "Rick-roll" journalists into giving free media coverage to the real-estate mogul's new hotel in Washington, DC.

Trump hinted early in the morning that he would make a "major" announcement about his thoughts on President Barack Obama's birthplace, sending the media into a frenzy and resulting in wall-to-wall cable news coverage before the event.

When the campaign event finally commenced, however, Trump instead trotted out a group of decorated military veterans who lauded the Republican presidential nominee for over 20 minutes. Trump then very quickly said he believed Obama was born in the US.

Tapper compared the move to "Rick-rolling," a late-2000s viral prank in which people would pretend to share real links that would instead send those who clicked on them to the music video for Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up."

"While these American heroes are people who we should all show reverence and respect  they're much greater men than Rick Astley  it's hard to imagine this as anything other than a political Rick-roll," Tapper said.

Tapper argued that while it was a smart ploy to garner free attention on cable TV, it undermined trustworthiness in the campaign.

"It was very clever on one level. On another level, it speaks to the integrity of the Trump campaign," Tapper said. "They told us something was going to happen, and it's not happening."

Other CNN political analysts agreed.

CNN analyst John King said after Trump finished his speech that the Trump campaign fooled reporters who were curious whether Trump would apologize for his yearslong questioning of Obama's birthplace.

"We just got played. And voters can decide what to make of that," King said.

He added: "After four or five years of leading a fraudulent, reckless campaign against the legitimacy of the president of the United States, you get four or five words saying he's decided it's over. I guess he gets to decide that."

Story continues

Both King and Tapper acknowledged that some prominent Hillary Clinton supporters also fed fuel to the birther fire in 2008, but noted that no one from Clinton's campaign ever embraced the theory, which Trump espoused despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

After leading the birther crusade in 2011, Trump has largely attempted to avoid the subject, admitting as late as January that he still was unsure about Obama's birthplace.

NOW WATCH: Watch Trump finally admit that President Obama was born in the US





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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Pentagon said on Friday that a U.S.-led coalition air strike on Sept. 7 killed an Islamic State leader who oversaw the militant group's propaganda. Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said in a statement that the air strike took place near Raqqa, Syria, and targeted and killed Wa'il Adil Hasan Salman al-Fayad, also known as Dr. Wa'il. Islamic State controls parts of Iraq and Syria and has broadcast its beheadings of journalists and aid workers over the past few years. The group has sympathizers in several countries who have carried out bombings and shootings of civilians. The Pentagon said Wa'il was minister of information and prominent member of Islamic State's Senior Shura Council, or leadership group. A U.S. Defense Department official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said Wa'il was targeted by the air strike while he was on a motorcycle outside his house. "Wa'il oversaw ISIL's production of terrorist propaganda videos showing torture and executions," Cook said in the statement, using an acronym for the group. "He was a close associate of Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, the ISIL spokesman and leader for plotting and inspiring external terror attacks." On Aug. 30, Islamic State said Adnani was killed in a U.S. air strike in Syria, which was later confirmed by the Pentagon. On Friday, the Pentagon acknowledged that U.S. special operation forces are accompanying Turkish and vetted Syrian opposition forces battling Islamic State in and around the area of the Syrian border near al-Rai and the town of Jarablus, further east. (Reporting by Idrees Ali and Yeganeh Torbati; editing by Grant McCool)
Bratislava EU meeting: Merkel says bloc in 'critical situation'

The European Union is in a "critical situation", the German chancellor has said, as leaders meet in Slovakia to discuss ways to regain trust after the UK's vote to leave the bloc.
Washington (AFP) - A coalition air strike in Syria has killed a senior Islamic State operative considered the group's information minister, a week after another raid eliminated a top IS strategist, the Pentagon said Friday.

Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said that Wa'il Adil Hasan Salman al-Fayad, also known as "Dr. Wa'il", was killed in a precision strike on September 7 near Raqa, the Syrian city that is the de facto capital of the Islamic State jihadist group.

"Wa'il oversaw ISIL's production of terrorist propaganda videos showing torture and executions," Cook said, describing him as "one of ISIL's most senior leaders" and a close associate of Abu Mohamed al-Adnani, the IS group spokesman killed on August 30.

US officials "will continue to work with our coalition partners to build momentum" in the campaign to deal the IS group "a lasting defeat," he added.

The IS group is also referred to as ISIL and Daesh.

The announcement comes as air strikes and clashes are testing a fragile ceasefire in Syria.

Under the deal, Moscow must pressure Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Washington must work with Syrian rebels to silence their guns.

If the truce, which began on Monday, lasts seven days and humanitarian access is granted, Russia and the United States are to work together to target jihadists, including the IS group and former Al-Qaeda affiliate Fateh al-Sham Front.

Russia said that although only Moscow and the Syrian regime were fulfilling the truce deal, it was ready to extend the agreement by 72 hours.

The Pentagon also said that it had deployed dozens of US Special Operations Forces to Syria's border with Turkey to fight the IS group at Ankara's request in support of the Turkish military and "vetted" Syrian rebels.
By Laila Kearney

(Reuters) - Columbus, Ohio, officials on Friday evening will discuss the shooting death this week of a black 13-year-old boy by a white police officer responding to an armed robbery call, to try to maintain calm, city officials said.

Mayor Andrew Ginther and Police Chief Kim Jacobs will answer questions "to facilitate healthy dialogue during a painful community tragedy," said a statement from Central Seventh-Day Adventist Church, which is hosting the event. The officials will also march with members of the African-American church.

"It's a very difficult time for the city, and we want to make sure we're available to listen and answer questions," city spokeswoman Robin Davis said.

Officer Bryan Mason shot Tyre King multiple times in a Columbus alley on Wednesday evening after the teenager drew what appeared to be a handgun, police said. It was later determined to be a pellet-shooting BB gun.

Police were responding to reports of an armed robbery. The victim told officers a group of males had demanded money, threatening him with a gun.

Soon afterward, officers found three males, including King, matching the descriptions of the suspects, police said.

While trying to apprehend King, Mason shot the teenager after he pulled out the BB gun, police said.

King's family said in a statement released by a Columbus law firm it retained to investigate the shooting that witness accounts conflicted with the officer's version of the events.

An internal police probe of the shooting and a separate investigation of the reported robbery are under way. A grand jury will ultimately decide whether Mason will face criminal charges, police said.

King's death comes nearly two years after the fatal shooting of 12-year-old Tamir Rice, who was black, by a white Cleveland police officer responding to reports of a suspect with a gun in a city park.

An investigation revealed Rice had a replica gun that shoots plastic pellets.

Story continues

Rice's death became a rallying point for the Black Lives Matter movement and was one of a number of deaths that led to nationwide demonstrations against the use of excessive force against minorities, especially young black men, by police.

Columbus has remained calm since King's death. Family and friends held a prayer vigil on Thursday near where the boy was shot.

"My eyes are still swollen, and my head still hurts," the Columbus Dispatch quoted Kings 13-year-old sister, Marshay Caldwell, as saying. "Hes really not coming back."

(Reporting by Laila Kearney; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn)
black friday shopping bags kohl's consumer confidence

The University of Michigan's preliminary consumer sentiment index for September was 89.8, unchanged from the final August reading.

According to Bloomberg, economists estimated that the index increased to 90.6.

The survey found that consumers believed that the economy would continue to improve modestly, but weren't as bullish about their income prospects and buying plans.

"Buying plans suffered from the perception that no additional price discounts would be offered," said Richard Curtin, the survey's chief economist, in the release.

"Even the more optimistic outlook for the economy had little if any impact on the expected growth rate in new jobs. Importantly, all of these changes were relatively minor."

The final August index unexpectedly fell, missing economists' expectations, as young people expressed worries about their personal finances.

Their optimism was pegged on the expectation for low inflation, which would boost their real incomes.

NOW WATCH: Krugman reveals the economic risks of a Trump presidency





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Share price of The Cooper Companies COO rallied to a new 52-week high of $190.75 on Sep 15, eventually closing a tad lower at $189.90. This represents a strong year-to-date return of approximately 41.5%, better than the S&P 500s 5% over the same time frame.



Currently, Cooper Companies carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). The stock has a market cap of $9.04 billion and long-term expected earnings growth rate of 11.8%.



Growth Catalysts



A solid product pipeline is a major positive for the company in our view. Especially, the launch of Avaira Vitality in the U.S. buoys optimism as the product is expected to drive margins over the long haul. Additionally, the rollout of MyDay in Japan is a noteworthy development as it is expected to fortify the companys market position.



Meanwhile, we note that each and every business segment of the company contributed toward the current growth trend. The CooperVision segment (CVI) of the company posted a stellar performance in the last-reported third quarter of 2016, raking in revenues of $409.9 million (up 6% at constant currency). Particularly, the Toric, Multifocal and Sphere lenses deserve special mention here. The CooperSurgical (CSI) unit of the company performed exceptionally well as well, enhancing the growth trajectory.

COOPER COS Price and Consensus

COOPER COS Price and Consensus | COOPER COS Quote

In this regard, Cooper Companies reported an impressive third quarter of 2016 with revenues of $514.7 million improving 6% year over year at constant currency. Notably, adjusted earnings of $2.30 per share beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 2 cents, up 16.8% on a year-over-year basis.



Estimate Revisions

The companys current year estimate revision trend is also looking quite promising with 8 estimates moving higher over the past two months, compared to one downward revision. The consensus estimate trend has also seen a boost for this time frame, increasing by 3 cents to $8.41 per share.

Story continues

Key Picks



Better-ranked stocks in the broad medical sector include Halyard Health Inc HYH, INC Research Holdings Inc. INCR and Lonza Group Limited LZAGY. Notably, all the companies sport a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

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Don't you know you're not supposed to squeeze the Charmin toilet paper  or charge sales tax on it?

A New Jersey couple on Friday filed a class-action lawsuit against Costco Wholesale (COST) and several of its stores, claiming the membership-only warehouse giant has been illegally overcharging them  and potentially hundreds of thousands of other customers  by charging sales tax on toilet tissue purchases in violation of state law.

Toilet tissue sold for household use is exempt from New Jersey's 7 percent sales tax.

But the couple, Jacqueline Taufield and Robert Arnold, said that they were charged the tax when they purchased Charmin toilet tissue on July 26, 2015, from a Costco in Wayne, New Jersey, and then again when they picked up some more Charmin in a Costco in Hackensack five days later.

The suit said that when the Leonia couple complained to Costco management after realizing they had been charged sale tax improperly, "they refused to issue a rebate to them."

The couple's lawyer, Rosemarie Arnold, said, "Rather than refund [Robert's] money, they told him, 'Well, if you believe that, you have to mail your receipt to the corporate headquarters along with a letter and tell the corporate headquarters how you were improperly charged tax.'"



The couple was "annoyed and angry" about the charge, and that response, said Arnold, who is not related to Robert.

"The obvious solution is to say, 'You're absolutely right ... we made a mistake, here's your money back,' " the lawyer said.

The suit says that Costco "despite being aware of the illegality of their actions... continues to cheat their customers, causing them to incur monetary damages when they purchase toilet tissue."

The claim, filed in Bergen County Superior Court, alleges violation of the New Jersey Consumer Fraud Act, breach of contract, unjust enrichment, negligence, violation of the state's "Truth-in-Consumer Contract," and fraud.

A Costco spokeswoman, when asked for comment on the suit, said, "Unfortunately, we are not able to provide a response at this time."

Story continues

Arnold, the plaintiffs' lawyer, said the amount of tax charged improperly in the couple's case is less than $1.50 in each purchase.

But nonetheless, Arnold said, "I think it's huge problem" for Costco and its customers because of the likelihood that the couple were not the only ones subject to the incorrect tax charging.

Costco has 19 warehouse locations in New Jersey, according to the company's website. And the suit says the class of potentially affected customers is more than 100,000 people.

Arnold said the potential damages for the class would be in the "millions of dollars."

"Everybody uses toilet paper," Arnold said. "You have to figure that a patron of Costco is always going to buy toilet paper."

The lawyer also said it's an open question of whether Costco "is actually paying the taxes to the government, or keeping the money?"

"Most likely, it's the latter, because if they submitted tax resolutions to the government, the government would say, 'This is an non-taxable item, it's toilet paper,' " Arnold said.

A spokesman New Jersey's Treasury Department, which oversees tax regulations, declined to comment on the lawsuit. But the spokesman noted that "large chain stores have point-of-sale cash registers that are programmed to charge sales tax on a variety of items."

The spokesman also noted that the department does investigate complaints about stores improperly collecting or not collecting sales tax, and that anyone can file such a complaint anonymously.





More From CNBC


Following an admission from the Transportation Security Administration that air marshals have not been allowed to board U.S. commercial flights to Cuba, some lawmakers havecalled for the flights to be suspended.

I think we need to unite across the aisle and basically say no matter how you feel about Cuba policy, we all agree that travel to Cuba should be safe, no less safe than travel to the Bahamas, no less safe than travel to the Dominican Republic, no less safe than travel to Mexico, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio said.

He also pointed to the security necessity of having air marshals on flights following the terror attacks that took place on 9/11: You now have flights 90 miles from our shores that could theoretically be commandeered, he said, the Hill reported.

Rubios remarks came after TSA authorities revealed that despite statements affirming that U.S. marshals were onboard some of the commercial flights to Cuba that began in late August, Cuba has not yet signed an agreement that would allow marshals onboard.

U.S. Rep. John Katko, who chairs theHouse Homeland Security Subcommittee on Transportation Security and has also accused the TSA of deception, criticized Cuban airport security earlier this month, arguing that the U.S. needed more clarity on Cuban screeningcapabilities before continuing the flights.

"They haven't told us whether or not there have been any inspections done," Katko told local news source the Auburn Citizen, adding,"They haven't told us anything."

JetBlue began the first non-chartered flights to Cuba at the end of August. American, Frontier, Silver Airways, Southwest, and Sun Country have also either begun flights or obtained permission to do so.

Diplomats have hailed renewal of the U.S.-Cuba routes after five decades as a landmark moment between the two nations. President Barack Obama in particular has looked to rebuild ties with the U.S. neighbor to the south since December 2014.

Related Articles
The year 2016 so far has not been as good as the last two years for the cyber security stocks. Numerous data breaches at high-profile business houses and government agencies prompted the need to impose tighter security measures last year, which in turn had led to a rally in cyber security stocks.

These stocks may again witness momentum owing to the recent data breach at The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). The latest data breach was reported this week.

The Story So Far

The WADA has revealed that two Russian hacker groups  Tsar Team and Fancy Bear  have broken into the agencys database, and stolen drug-test results and confidential medical data related to Rio Olympics 2016. The day before, the hackers had posted confidential medical information on noteworthy U.S. Olympic athletes including Simone Biles, Elena Delle Donne, Serena and Venus Williams.

The website used to leak the information was created on Sep 1. The cyber-criminal groups have threatened to disclose more confidential data on other nations athletes in the future.

Following the leak, the U.S. government started a probe, suspecting the involvement of the Russian government to undermine public confidence ahead of the Presidential Election.

The issue has been given utmost importance, particularly because one of the hacker groups, Fancy Bear, is already suspected of hacking into the Democratic National Committee's (DNC) computer network this June. It was then that CrowdStrike, a firm hired by DNC to investigate the attack, had determined that Fancy Bear was probably working for the Russian military.

In fact, Fancy Bear has been actively involved in a number of security breaches and propaganda operations. As per The Washington Post, last April, Fancy Bears had hacked the French TV5Monde station and keep the network off the air for as long as 18 hours.

The U.S. governments suspicions on the involvement of Russia could be attributed to the ban of 119 Russian athletes from Rio Olympics 2016 after the WADA unearthed had a widespread state-sponsored doping scheme.

Story continues

The U.S. believes that this could be a form of retaliation by the Russian government through which it seeks to raise doubts on the integrity of individual athletes as well as the various Olympic bodies.

However, Russian presidential spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov has denied any involvement of the Russian government in the whole episode.

How Will Cyber Security Stocks Benefit?

The silver lining to this episode would be the increased demand for security-related purchases by both companies and governments that would be spurred by such a high-level security breach.

While the incident is a major jolt for the U.S. government as well as the International Olympic Committee (IOC), it could well bring cyber security stocks back into the limelight.

Note that the financial well-being, brand image and reputation of enterprises and governments are always exposed to the risk of cyber threats. Consequently, cyber security has become a mission-critical, high-profile requirement.

Clearly, cases of data breaches drive the need to beef up cyber safety measures, thereby increasing demand for the services offered by Internet security companies.

Furthermore, with rapid technological advancement, organizations are increasingly adopting the bring your own device (BYOD) policy to enhance employee productivity with anytime/anywhere access. This trend, in turn, calls for stricter data security measures.

Moreover, various independent research firms forecast strong demand ahead. According to a Markets and Markets report, worldwide cyber security spending will reach $101 billion in 2018 and $170 billion by 2020. Gartner had earlier revealed that IT security spending peaked to $75 billion in 2015.

Some Well-Placed Stocks in the Cyber Security Space

We expect the aforementioned developments to drive growth for cyber security companies. Here are some favorably-placed stocks in this sector, which may gain momentum in the short term.

Infoblox Inc. BLOX, sporting a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), has a long-term EPS growth rate of 18%. This is much higher than the industry average of 14.6%. The company has also surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate thrice in the last four quarters with an average positive surprise of 69.1%.

Proofpoint Inc. PFPT carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy) and has a long-term EPS growth rate of 29.3%. This is much higher than the industry average of 14.6%. Further, the company has surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate in each of the last four quarters with an average positive surprise of 14.4%.You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

VASCO Data Security International Inc. VDSI, carrying a Zacks Rank #2, has a long-term EPS growth rate of 15%. This is much higher than the industry average of 12%. Moreover, the company has surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate thrice in the last four quarters with an average positive surprise of 105.2%.

Science Applications International Corporation SAIC carries a Zacks Rank #2 and has a long-term EPS growth rate of 5%. The company has also surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate in each of the last four quarters with an average positive surprise of 9.8%.

Looking Ahead

Apart from data breach episodes, these stocks have managed to grab the spotlight with their notable performances, supported by solid earnings and impressive growth projections. These factors make us more or less sure that investing in these stocks would yield strong returns for your portfolio in the short term.

Interested in IPOs? Check out the special edition of Zacks Friday Finish Line below, where Editor Maddy Johnson and Content Writer Ryan McQueeney interview Kathleen Smith of Renaissance Capital about the IPO market in 2016 (see part two here).

Now See Our Private Investment Ideas

While the above ideas are being shared with the public, other trades are hidden from everyone but selected members. Would you like to peek behind the curtain and view them? Starting today, for the next month, you can follow all Zacks' private buys and sells in real time from value to momentum . . . from stocks under $10 to ETF and option moves . . . from insider trades to companies that are about to report positive earnings surprises (we've called them with 80%+ accuracy). You can even look inside portfolios so exclusive that they are normally closed to new investors. Click here for Zacks' secret trades >>



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To read this article on Zacks.com click here.



Zacks Investment Research
Building trust main objective of visit: PM

Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal said on Thursday that his visit to India was aimed at trust building.
Damian "Jr. Gong" Marley today announced the opening of Stony Hill, a new weed dispensary he is opening in partnership with Colorado-based dispensary company Tru Cannabis. The new retail space, which opens next Thursday (Sept. 22), will feature a full line of cannabis-based retail products, including edibles, extracts and a variety of different strains.

Marley's entry into the dispensary game marks the first time a major music artist has opened a pot retail space. "I didn't know in my lifetime I'd be opening a dispensary," Marley tells Billboard. "We've always been advocates of legalizing marijuana and we always had the hope in our lifetime that we'd be involved in something like this, but I didn't predict this would happen."

Damian Marley Announces Fourth Album

Marley, 38, is the late Bob Marley's youngest son and personally helped develop and test the dispensary's namesake and signature, Stony Hill, which is also the name of his fourth album due out next year. The name has a special place in Marley's life.

"Stony Hill is a place in Jamaica I grew up so it has a lot of significance," Marley says of the area in St. Andrew's Parish near Kingston.

Though Marley won't yet go into detail, the Grammy-winning artist says he has more cannabis business ventures to announce soon. Meanwhile he is hosting a brand launch party for the dispensary on Sept. 22 at Denver's Field House.

Stony Hill's new single "Nail Pon Cross" was just released and his new "Road to Stony Hill" fall club tour kicks off today (Sept. 16) at Boston's Brighton Music Hall.

While Stony Hill obviously has a double meaning, the dispensary's location near the home field of the Denver Broncos may also give the sports venue's name a new dimension: Mile High Stadium.
More than two years after the July 2014 execution-style shooting of Florida State University law professor Dan Markel in the garage of his Tallahassee home, police are still investigating whether his ex-wife's family had something to do with the killing.



In an exclusive clip from an upcoming ABC News 20/20 special, an undercover officer is seen approaching Donna Adelson, the mother of Markel's ex-wife, Wendi Adelson.



The officer poses as the brother of one of the men arrested in Markel's murder, 33-year-old Luis Rivera, and asks the woman for payment for Rivera's alleged services.



"I want to let you know that my brother, he helped your family with this problem you guys had up north," the officer, dressed in casual clothing, tells Adelson. "He's going through some rough times and I want to make sure that you take care of what he's going through."





Dan Markel Killing: Never-Before-Seen Clip Shows Police Sting Against Mother of FSU Professor's Ex-Wife| Crime & Courts, Death, Murder, Shootings, True Crime, True Crime



Adelson appears confused, and tells the man that she didn't know what he was talking about.



 Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Click here to get breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases in the True Crime Newsletter.



Along with Rivera, 34-year-old Sigfredo Garcia was arrested and charged in Markel's death. Both have pleaded not guilty and are expected to be tried in November.



However, investigators asserted that Rivera and Garcia's alleged involvement in the murder is just the tip of the iceberg, according to probable cause affidavits obtained by PEOPLE.





Dan Markel Killing: Never-Before-Seen Clip Shows Police Sting Against Mother of FSU Professor's Ex-Wife| Crime & Courts, Death, Murder, Shootings, True Crime, True Crime



Investigators have pointed a finger at Charlie Adelson, Wendi's brother, alleging that he, Rivera and Garcia are "responsible for the murder of Daniel Markel."



The affidavits allege that Charlie Adelson had previously looked into hiring a hitman and that a person connected to Garcia began receiving checks from the Adelson family's dentistry practice after the killing  and that Rivera and Garcia purchased several cars and motorcycles.



However, State Attorney William Meggs told the Tallahassee Democrat that officials would not move forward against Charlie because his involvement cannot be proven.



"My opinion after reading those documents is there is no probable cause here to make an arrest," he said.



"We kind of believe they were involved according to the police. But what we believe and what we think doesn't count. What evidence do we have?"



Charlie Adelson's lawyer commended the prosecutor's decision.



"Mr. Meggs has spent the past 40 years as a prosecutor, with 30 years as State Attorney, and before that was a decorated police officer," attorney David Oscar Markus told PEOPLE in a statement. "He is one of the most experienced State Attorneys in the nation and he knows probable cause when he sees it. We are thankful that he faithfully and honorably fulfilled his duties and did not approve this document, which amounted to no more than simple speculation after a truly exhaustive investigation."
LOS ANGELES, CA / ACCESSWIRE / September 15, 2016 / Lundin Law PC (the "Firm") announces that a class action was filed against CytRx Corporation ("CytRx" or the "Company") (CYTR) concerning possible violations of federal securities laws between November 18, 2014 and June 11, 2016 inclusive (the "Class Period"). Investors who purchased or otherwise acquired shares during the Class Period should contact the Firm in advance of the September 23, 2016 lead plaintiff motion deadline.

To participate in this class action lawsuit, click here. You can also call Brian Lundin, Esquire, of Lundin Law PC, at 888-713-1033, or e-mail him at brian@lundinlawpc.com.

No class has been certified in the above action. Until a class is certified, you are not considered represented by an attorney. You may also choose to do nothing and be an absent class member.

The complaint alleges that during the Class Period, CytRx made materially false and misleading statements and/or failed to disclose material facts, specifically: that the clinical hold placed on the Phase 3 trial of aldoxorubicin for soft tissue sarcomas would prevent enough follow-up for patients involved in the study; that nearly half of all patients would be excluded from the data since the study was disturbed by a partial clinical hold; that the Company would likely conduct a second analysis as a result; and that the results of the trial could be materially affected and/or approval of aldoxorubicin for soft tissue sarcomas could be delayed. On July 11, 2016 the Company issued a press release revealing that the Phase 3 clinical trial of aldoxorubicin did not show any improvement from other commonly used cancer drugs and that nearly half of the patients in the Phase 3 trial were excluded from the data since the study was disturbed by a partial clinical hold on November 2014. When this news was released, shares of CytRx fell in value, which caused investors harm.

Lundin Law PC was founded by Brian Lundin, a securities litigator based in Los Angeles dedicated to upholding shareholders' rights.

Story continues

This press release may be considered Attorney Advertising in certain jurisdictions under the applicable law and ethical rules.

Contact:

Lundin Law PC

Brian Lundin, Esq.

Telephone: 888-713-1033

Facsimile: 888-713-1125

brian@lundinlawpc.com

http://lundinlawpc.com/

SOURCE: Lundin Law PC
This Deadpool and Spider-Man cross-over is the stuff superhero dreams are made of

This Deadpool and Spider-Man cross-over is the stuff superhero dreams are made of

If youve wanted to watch Deadpool and Spider-Man bond in film, look no further than this fantastic mashup by YouTuber Zach Ace. Even though the pair of smart-mouthed superheroes havent always gotten along in the comics, there is a friendship there  one that, alas, we probably wont see on screen any time soon.



Fox owns the film rights to Deadpool, as well as the X-Men and the Fantastic Four, meaning that a deal would have to be hammered out in order for the character to appear in a Marvel production.

Of course, thats totally possible! Just think about how how Spider-Man, whose film rights belong to Sony, came to be in Captain America: Civil War, after all!! Were all superhero friend shere, so we can make it work. And speaking of Spidey, seeing such a young, impressionable Peter Parker interact with Ryan Reynolds take on the Merc with a Mouth would be super interesting.

Luckily, a moment like this exists!! Clocking in at only 45 seconds, it only gives us a taste of delectable mashup goodness, and we need so much more. In it, Spider-Man fights Captain America, then jumps onto a large vehicle  where Deadpool happens to be sitting, drawing a picture of himself embracing Spidey. Awww.

Using audio from Deadpool and Civil War, Ace lets the pair introduce themselves to one another, before Spider-Man swings off to rejoin the battle.

The mashup even caught the attention of Reynolds himself, who shared the piece with the simple comment This happened. Which, we think, understates the glorious nature of the mashup, but thats just our opinion.

Maybe these two will come face to face at some point. Reynolds has expressed the desire for Deadpool and Spider-Man to meet, and once said in a Twitter Q&A, I could definitely imagine doing something with Spider-Man at some point.

For now, though, this mashup is all weve got if we want to see Tom Hollands adorable Spidey meet Reynolds Deadpool  so were going to watch it a few (hundred) more times.

The post This Deadpool and Spider-Man cross-over is the stuff superhero dreams are made of appeared first on HelloGiggles.
When it comes to deliciously complicated back stories (and sideshows), movies dont get better than Fences, the soon-to-be Oscar contender based on a Pulitzer Prize-winning August Wilson play starring and directed by Denzel Washington, with Scott Rudin among its producers.

Back in 1987, Wilsons play was set up at Paramount as a potential vehicle for Eddie Murphy, who was looking for a serious role. He had his eye on a part as the older son of Troy Maxson, the aging former ballplayer currently played by Washington in both a stage version of the play and the movie. As it turns out, Murphys dramatic turn is only now arriving, with Bruce Beresfords Mr. Church (since Dreamgirls, for which he had an Oscar nomination, was musical dramedy).

By December 1988, the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, now extinct, had Murphy rewriting his own character, which, according to the paper, he thought came off too wimpy in the play.

Eventually, he left the writing to Wilson. But the project became tangled in the playwrights insistence that Fences, which deals with racial barriers and intricate family relations, should have a black director. Until the industry is ready to hire a black to direct De Niro or Redford, blacks should at least be able to direct their own experience, he said in January 1990, at a conference sponsored by the California Afro-American Museum.

Wilson elaborated in a piece written for Spin magazine that year. I usually have to repeat my request, I want a black director, as though it were a complex statement in a foreign tongue, he wrote.

He added: White directors are not qualified for the job. The job requires someone who shares the specifics of the culture of black Americans.

Actually, Paramount was trying to accommodate. A black executive, Kevin Jones, worked on the film. By 1992, Paramount was in talks with John Singleton, who was then 24 years old, and riding high on his success with Boyz N The Hood.

Ultimately, Singleton bowed out, as did Murphy, who donned a fat suit and made gazillions of dollars with The Nutty Professor.

Story continues

Rudin, who declined to be interviewed for this piece, appears to have gotten involved in about 1997, when he was still a powerhouse producer at Paramount. He was doing his share of silliness in those days. Remember, Sister Act and Sister Act 2 were his. But he was already yearning for a New York stage career; and Fences was a chance to work with Wilson.

Eventually, Rudin sent Wilsons script to Washington, as a potential director. Washington, according to people who have tracked the project through the years, said yes; but he wanted to revive it first on Broadway, which he did, playing opposite Viola Davis, who is now in the film.

Wilson died in 2005. But his one-man campaign for black-directed film became something of a movement  leading to some further complications and sideshows this year.

Fences, which wont be finished until mid-November and opens nationwide Christmas Day, is beginning to look like a serious rival to Nate Parkers The Birth Of A Nation. That one is from Fox Searchlight, where Rudin has had some signal successes, including The Grand Budapest Hotel, which had four Oscars and nine nominations, including one for best picture, in 2015.

In a further complication, Birth and Fences  now competing, along with Barry Jenkins Moonlight from A24 and perhaps others, to carry the torch for black cinema  share a production company, Canadas Bron Studios, which has credits on both.

But Rudin, of course, is a past master at handling complexities. Back in 2007, for instance, he had both No Country For Old Men and There Will Be Blood in the works, each set up at Miramax and Paramount Vantage. He shared a Best Picture Oscar as a producer of No Country, and helped Daniel Day-Lewis to the Best Actor award, as an executive producer of Blood.

With some guidance from Rudin, maybe Bron can parlay its split hand into the same kind of win-win.

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"Fan Pens", Gender Inequity And Armenian Genocide In 'The Promise' Bring New Problems To Toronto
A company specializing in T-commerce, which entails enabling consumers to buy products they see on TV screens, has filed for Chapter 11.

Delivery Agent is seeking bankruptcy protection after an apparent failed bid for an initial public offering. The strategy is aimed at finding a buyer for the San Francisco-based company, which wont cease operations.

Delivery Agent counts dozens of TV networks and pay-TV services as its clients, which looked to the company to help create a new revenue stream by empowering viewers to buy merchandise related to what they are watching.

This is a very positive development for our company and our customers, said Delivery Agent CEO Mike Fitzsimmons in a statement. Through these proceedings were initiating a process that preserves company value, allows the company to reorganize its business affairs, and establishes a necessary foundation for future growth and profitability.

Hillair Capital Investments has already emerged as a potential suitor in a bankruptcy auction, according to The Wall Street Journal, which reported that Delivery Agent has $65 million in unsecured debt on its balance sheet.

The company disclosed in May that its T-commerce platform, ShopTV, was embedded in 50 million devices from manufacturers including Sony, Roku, Samsung and LG. Among the companys media clients include Fox, CBS, HBO, Showtime and Discovery.

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The Justice Department has suggested that Deutsche Bank (XETRA:DBK-DE) pay $14 billion to settle a number of investigations related to mortgage securities, the bank confirmed on Thursday.



Deutsche said in a statement it "has no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited." The bank emphasized that negotiations have just started and that it expects the outcome to be "similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts."



The Wall Street Journal first reported the figure, citing sources familiar with the situation.

The bank's Frankfurt-listed shares were among the worst-performers on the Stoxx600 Friday morning, down 9.3 percent.



The company previously thought that a settlement between $2 billion and $3 billion would be fair, as it had already paid $1.9 billion in 2013 to resolve similar claims, the Journal said.

Reuters reported that, in January, Goldman Sachs said it would pay more than $5 billion to settle claims it misled mortgage bond investors during the financial crisis. The following month, Reuters reported that Wells Fargo reached a $1.2 billion settlement over mortgage fraud allegations. The news service also reported that Bank of America came to a $16.65 billion settlement in 2014 and that JPMorgan settled for $13 billion in 2013.

The Justice Department declined to comment to CNBC.





More From CNBC


* Deutsche to fight shock $14 billion DoJ demand

* Bill could force bank to raise fresh capital

* German finance ministry expects "fair result" (Recasts with market reaction)

By Arno Schuetze

FRANKFURT, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Deutsche Bank said it would fight a $14 billion demand from the U.S. Department of Justice to settle claims it missold mortgage-backed securities, a shock bill that raises questions about the future of Germany's largest lender.

The claim against Deutsche, which is likely to trigger several months of talks, far exceeds the bank's expectations that the DoJ would be looking for a figure of only up to 3 billion euros ($3.4 billion).

The demand adds to the problems facing Deutsche Bank's Chief Executive John Cryan, a Briton who has been in the job for a year.

The bank only scraped through European stress tests in July and has warned it may need deeper cost cuts to turn itself around after revenue fell sharply in the second quarter due to challenging markets and low interest rates.

Deutsche Bank shares, which have lost around half their value this year, tumbled 7.6 percent to 12.10 euros in Frankfurt on Friday, with analysts saying the bank may need to raise fresh funds from investors or sell assets to shore up its capital ratios.

The cost of insuring Deutsche Bank debt against default rose by around eight percent.

The bank, which employs around 100,000 people, said it regarded the DoJ demand as an opening shot.

"Deutsche Bank has no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited," it said in a statement.

"The negotiations are only just beginning. The bank expects that they will lead to an outcome similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts."

Analysts said that even a hefty reduction in the bill was likely to weigh heavily on Deutsche Bank's finances.

"If the final bill is at 5 billion euros or more Deutsche Bank will not be able to avoid a capital hike anymore," said Ingo Frommen, banking analyst at LBBW.

Story continues

POLITICAL BACKING?

Deutsche Bank's problems are likely to alarm political leaders in Europe's largest economy and the home to the European Central Bank.

The German finance ministry said on Friday that the government expected a "fair result" from the negotiations but that the talks were a matter for the bank and the American authorities.

Finance minister Wolfgang Schaeuble took the unusual step of voicing public support for the bank earlier this year and a senior opposition figure said he expected the government to step in as a last resort if needed.

"The question would be how much damage would it do to the economy if the bank were to topple," said Green Party financial spokesman Gerhard Schick.

The DoJ has taken a tough stance in settlement negotiations with other banks, requesting sums higher than the eventual fine.

A recent European Union ruling that Apple must pay up to 13 billion euros in taxes to the Irish government and the forthcoming U.S. election could complicate Deutsche Bank's efforts to whittle down the demand.

One of Deutsche's top 10 investors said he expected the bank to have to pay 4-5.5 billion euros for the mortgages case. "But because of the election campaign it may end up higher - at maybe 6 or 7 billion."

In 2014, the DoJ asked Citigroup to pay $12 billion to resolve an investigation into the sale of shoddy mortgage-backed securities, sources said. The fine eventually came in at $7 billion.

In a similar case, rival Goldman Sachs agreed in April to pay $5.06 billion to settle claims that it misled mortgage bond investors during the financial crisis.

Deutsche Bank's settlement will comprise a different list of recipients from the Goldman case, a source close to the matter said, adding that the lender had already settled some claims three years ago.

In late 2013, Deutsche Bank agreed to pay $1.9 billion to settle claims that it defrauded U.S. government-controlled Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, America's biggest providers of housing finance, into buying $14.2 billion in mortgage-backed securities before the 2008 financial crisis.

LIST OF LEGAL PROBLEMS

A $14 billion fine, or even half that sum, would still rank among one of the largest paid by banks to U.S. authorities in recent years.

Deutsche Bank has not said what it has set aside in anticipation of a settlement over the sale and packaging of resident mortgage-backed securities before 2008.

Its overall legal provisions stood at 5.5 billion euros at the end of June, and according to a person close to the bank 2.5-3 billion of that had been reserved for the mortgages case.

Deutsche was once one of Europe's most successful players on Wall Street. Like many of its peers, it has since faced a slew of lawsuits that often trace back to the boom years before the crash. Its litigation bill since 2012 has already hit more than 12 billion euros.

Claims filed by individuals, companies and regulators against Deutsche, outlined in the bank's 2015 annual report, relate to mis-selling of subprime loans and alleged manipulation of foreign exchange rates or gold and silver prices. Other lawsuits are for the rigging of borrowing benchmarks Libor and Euribor, used to set the price of mortgages and derivatives.

In July, Chief Executive Cryan said he hoped to close the four largest remaining litigation cases this year.

These are the mortgages and FX cases, an investigation into suspicious equities trades in Russia and allegations of money laundering.

(Additional reporting by Suzanne Barlyn in New York, Paul Carrel and Caroline Cropley in Berlin)
Constitution amendment: Dahals busy schedule likely to delay process

CPN (Maoist Centre) Pushpa Kamal Dahal was elected the prime minister on August 3 after the Madhes-based parties threw their weight behind him in return for his commitment to address their concerns through constitution amendment, the process for which was, as per an understanding, should have been initiated within a month.
By Arno Schuetze

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Deutsche Bank <DBKGn.DE> said it would fight a $14 billion demand from the U.S. Department of Justice to settle claims it missold mortgage-backed securities, a shock bill that raises questions about the future of Germany's largest lender.

The claim against Deutsche, which is likely to trigger several months of talks, far exceeds the bank's expectations that the DoJ would be looking for a figure of only up to 3 billion euros ($3.4 billion).

The demand adds to the problems facing Deutsche Bank's Chief Executive John Cryan, a Briton who has been in the job for a year.

The bank only scraped through European stress tests in July and has warned it may need deeper cost cuts to turn itself around after revenue fell sharply in the second quarter due to challenging markets and low interest rates.

Deutsche Bank shares, which have lost around half their value this year, tumbled 7.6 percent to 12.10 euros in Frankfurt on Friday, with analysts saying the bank may need to raise fresh funds from investors or sell assets to shore up its capital ratios.

The cost of insuring Deutsche Bank debt against default rose by around eight percent.

The bank, which employs around 100,000 people, said it regarded the DoJ demand as an opening shot.

"Deutsche Bank has no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited," it said in a statement.

"The negotiations are only just beginning. The bank expects that they will lead to an outcome similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts."

Analysts said that even a hefty reduction in the bill was likely to weigh heavily on Deutsche Bank's finances.

"If the final bill is at 5 billion euros or more Deutsche Bank will not be able to avoid a capital hike anymore," said Ingo Frommen, banking analyst at LBBW.

POLITICAL BACKING?

Deutsche Bank's problems are likely to alarm political leaders in Europe's largest economy and the home to the European Central Bank.

Story continues

The German finance ministry said on Friday that the government expected a "fair result" from the negotiations but that the talks were a matter for the bank and the American authorities.

Finance minister Wolfgang Schaeuble took the unusual step of voicing public support for the bank earlier this year and a senior opposition figure said he expected the government to step in as a last resort if needed.

"The question would be how much damage would it do to the economy if the bank were to topple," said Green Party financial spokesman Gerhard Schick.

The DoJ has taken a tough stance in settlement negotiations with other banks, requesting sums higher than the eventual fine.

A recent European Union ruling that Apple <AAPL.O> must pay up to 13 billion euros in taxes to the Irish government and the forthcoming U.S. election could complicate Deutsche Bank's efforts to whittle down the demand.

One of Deutsche's top 10 investors said he expected the bank to have to pay 4-5.5 billion euros for the mortgages case. "But because of the election campaign it may end up higher - at maybe 6 or 7 billion."

In 2014, the DoJ asked Citigroup <C.N> to pay $12 billion to resolve an investigation into the sale of shoddy mortgage-backed securities, sources said. The fine eventually came in at $7 billion.

In a similar case, rival Goldman Sachs <GS.N> agreed in April to pay $5.06 billion to settle claims that it misled mortgage bond investors during the financial crisis.

Deutsche Bank's settlement will comprise a different list of recipients from the Goldman case, a source close to the matter said, adding that the lender had already settled some claims three years ago.

In late 2013, Deutsche Bank agreed to pay $1.9 billion to settle claims that it defrauded U.S. government-controlled Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, America's biggest providers of housing finance, into buying $14.2 billion in mortgage-backed securities before the 2008 financial crisis.

LIST OF LEGAL PROBLEMS

A $14 billion fine, or even half that sum, would still rank among one of the largest paid by banks to U.S. authorities in recent years.

Deutsche Bank has not said what it has set aside in anticipation of a settlement over the sale and packaging of resident mortgage-backed securities before 2008.

Its overall legal provisions stood at 5.5 billion euros at the end of June, and according to a person close to the bank 2.5-3 billion of that had been reserved for the mortgages case.

Deutsche was once one of Europe's most successful players on Wall Street. Like many of its peers, it has since faced a slew of lawsuits that often trace back to the boom years before the crash. Its litigation bill since 2012 has already hit more than 12 billion euros.

Claims filed by individuals, companies and regulators against Deutsche, outlined in the bank's 2015 annual report, relate to mis-selling of subprime loans and alleged manipulation of foreign exchange rates or gold and silver prices. Other lawsuits are for the rigging of borrowing benchmarks Libor and Euribor, used to set the price of mortgages and derivatives.

In July, Chief Executive Cryan said he hoped to close the four largest remaining litigation cases this year.

These are the mortgages and FX cases, an investigation into suspicious equities trades in Russia and allegations of money laundering.

(Additional reporting by Suzanne Barlyn in New York, Paul Carrel and Caroline Cropley in Berlin)
By Steve Slater

LONDON, Sept 16 (IFR) - Deutsche Bank faces the prospect of having to tap shareholders for more cash after the US Department of Justice asked Germany's flagship lender to pay US$14bn to settle an investigation into alleged mis-selling of mortgage-backed securities.

The DoJ move was only the first salvo in what could be a lengthy negotiation over the size of the fine, but it raised fears the final penalty will be far higher than expected.

Deutsche Bank said on Friday it has "no intent" to settle the issue at "anywhere near the number cited".

"The negotiations are only just beginning. The bank expects that they will lead to an outcome similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts," it said.

Several banks, including Citigroup and Goldman Sachs, have faced similar initial requests from the DoJ and ended paying far smaller amounts, people familiar with the matter have said. But France's BNP Paribas still paid almost US$9bn in July 2014 for violating US trade sanctions, and bankers said Deutsche needs to tread carefully.

The Department of Justice declined to comment.

A fine of more than US$4bn could force Deutsche Bank to once again raise capital from shareholders, analysts said. That would be its fourth rights issue since 2010, which have raised almost 22bn, including 8.5bn in the most recent one in June 2014.

Deutsche Bank shares slumped 7% to 12.18 on Friday.

With its shares trading at less than one-third of book value, and little sign of a turnaround, some analysts and bankers reckon the German government may need to step in to participate in any fundraising, given the strain on its capital.

Its Additional Tier 1 bonds plummeted as the threat of a hefty fine renewed concerns about the bank's ability to pay coupons on the securities.

A 1.75bn 6% perpetual non-call April 2022 lost over six points in early trading, dropping to a cash price bid of 76.85 from 82.96, though it steadied back to 78.98, according to Tradeweb prices.

Story continues

Deutsche had litigation reserves of 5.5bn at the end of June.

BNP Paribas analysts estimated about 2bn was likely to have been set aside for the RMBS fine. They estimated any fine of more than 6bn would likely lead to AT1 coupon deferrals.

Every 1bn loss is also equivalent to around 25bp in CET1 capital, the analysts estimated. On a fully loaded basis, the bank had 60.7bn of regulatory capital at the end of June, including 43.5bn of common equity Tier 1 capital and 12.6bn of Tier 2 capital. The bank's fully loaded CET1 ratio was 10.8% at the end of June, below most rivals and short of its target of 12.5% by 2018.

RBS SWEATS

Several other European banks are also being targeted for alleged mis-selling of US RMBS, including Royal Bank of Scotland, which analysts had expected to pay a bigger fine than Deutsche. RBS shares fell 4% on Friday.

Fines for the US mis-selling are complex because several authorities are involved, including the DoJ and the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA).

The fines relate to allegations that banks mis-sold US mortgage-backed bonds during the housing bubble and misled clients about the quality of the assets, which rapidly lost value when the mortgage market collapsed.

Banks are keen to settle the issue, and some settlements are expected to come in October before the US presidential election in November. The FHFA has pursued 18 banks for wrongdoing, and settled with many of them already.

A US mortgage fine of more than US$4bn would be a worry for Deutsche, as it could also face a penalty of US$1bn-$4bn related to alleged misconduct in its Russian operations, said JP Morgan analyst Kian Abouhossein.

"We see capital as key with any material charge creating capital at risk potentially leading to similar concerns as we saw in early 2016," Abouhossein said in a note on Thursday.

The bank's litigation bill since 2012 has already hit more than 12bn, including paying US$1.9bn in 2013 to settle claims over RMBS with US agencies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Deutsche chief executive John Cryan has said he wants to close the major litigation cases this year so the bank can move on with its turnaround plan.

RBS is also keen to put its looming US mortgages fine behind it.

Abouhossein estimated RBS could face a fine of US$9.6bn related to the issue. That includes a payment of US$5bn for the FHFA, and US$3bn for other authorities including the DoJ and US$1.6bn for related lawsuits. The range of analysts' estimates for RBS's potential fine have ranged from US$5bn to as much as US$13bn.

Based on recent settlements with other banks, Abouhossein estimated Deutsche Bank could be fined US$3bn-$3.5bn and Credit Suisse faced a fine of US$2bn.

UBS faces a settlement of US$2bn, while Barclays is expected to pay out less than US$1bn, he estimated. UBS and Barclays have already paid some fines related to US mortgages.

All the banks have significant litigation reserves, including US$10bn at RBS for litigation and redress payments.

(Additional reporting by Helene Durrand, Arno Schuetze and Gareth Gore)
Bournemouth (United Kingdom) (AFP) - Nigel Farage on Friday said UKIP had "changed the course of British history" with Brexit as he handed over leadership of the eurosceptic party, which faces an uncertain future without its charismatic figurehead.

Plainspoken Farage, one of the key faces in the campaign that secured Britain's shock decision in June to leave the European Union, quit soon after the referendum saying his lifelong ambition had been accomplished.

Diane James, an MEP, was announced as his replacement at the party's annual conference in the seaside resort of Bournemouth where Farage used his farewell speech to hail the "fairytale" Brexit result.

"Without us there would have been no referendum, without you and the people's army there would have been no ground campaign," he said, as the crowd of mostly older supporters waved Union Jack flags.

"Together we have changed the course of British history," added Farage, who has campaigned for Britain to leave the EU since the early 1990s and has famously clashed with EU leaders as an MEP in the European Parliament -- a role he will retain.

"Nigel Farage will go down as one of the most important politicians of his era," Matthew Goodwin, a University of Kent politics professor and expert on the rise of UKIP, said on Twitter.

James, the party's home affairs spokeswoman and a former pharmaceutical industry executive, is in comparison little known by the wider British public.

A poll by YouGov this month found that just eight percent of respondents knew who she was.

- Brexit for Christmas? -

The new party leader vowed that UKIP would keep up the pressure on the government to deliver on Brexit.

She urged Prime Minister Theresa May to "give UKIP the best Christmas present we could ever have" and invoke Article 50, the formal procedure for an EU exit, before the end of this year.

"Until we get a signature, we're still in, they still tell us what to do," she told party members.

Story continues

Asked about the legacy of Farage, James said she would not be a "Nigel-like, not even Nigel-lite".

Farage co-founded UKIP in 1993, growing it into Britain's third biggest party by the number of votes cast at last year's general election.

He too said the party would continue pressuring May to go ahead with Brexit, warning UKIP would sweep up discontented voters from both right and left if the government failed to push ahead with the departure.

He said he would remain active in political life -- with plans to travel across Europe and the US to meet similar political movements -- but would not seek to influence James.

- Infighting -

Five candidates ran for the party leadership, with James the bookmakers' overwhelming favourite.

She takes over a party facing an uncertain future, torn by infighting over its direction after the Brexit vote.

"In the aftermath of the vote for Brexit, the party has become seriously divided between separate factions and might also struggle to sustain public support from social conservatives in the new political landscape," Goodwin told AFP.

The anti-EU party won 12.6 percent of the vote in the 2015 general election, though it only has one MP to show for it under Britain's first-past-the-post system.

The government's new slant under May has also "restricted political space for the populist right", Goodwin said.

Nonetheless, UKIP is hoping to consolidate its post-Brexit popularity by boosting its tally of MPs in the next general election slated for 2020.
From ELLE

I heard it. Clear as a bell. It's a girl, and she needs your help.

Seventy-two hours after the first contractions gripped my pelvis, the baby was nowhere close to arriving. Days earlier, I had exhausted the home-birth pain management techniques, each less effective than the last. Drape my whale-ish form over an exercise ball? Done. Hang my head over an ylang-ylang oil diffuser and inhale, wishing for opioids? Done. Press repeat on the Eternal Om CD until the calming chant transformed to an ominous drone? You bet. I had been awake with searing contractions, two minutes apart, since Wednesday at dawn. Now it was Saturday, and we were still at home in our two-bedroom, purple-walled condo, which only a year earlier had been our dreamy, newlywed paradise.

Natural childbirth, like motherhood, had been a given in my mind. At some point after peeing on the stick, I decided the baby train was going my way and would reach an inevitable end: a drug-free, old-fashioned labor and delivery achieved by me in the company of my beloved husband. In the breezy first trimester, I made some reasonable concessions: a hospital birth only if I could choose a midwifery practice (I did). A handshake with the practice's surgeon as long as it was for the first and last time.

It's hard to pinpoint when the easygoing, newly married professional in me intensified into someone who saw only through a fierce, narrow tunnel of domesticity. I suspect this happens to many pregnant women, although the genteel term "nesting" doesn't begin to explain the weird ferocity. At my anxious beckoning, my husband and I had turned our one act of procreation into a year-long hobby, throwing much of our identity as individuals and artists right out the window. We spent hours reading technique books. Our birthing classes replaced pleasant evenings out. We had not read What to Expect When You're Expecting. It was not our kind of book, I had decided. It was a book for the medicalized birth, full of hypothetical complications, highlighting each hazard around the next trimester's corner. Instead we purchased copies of The Birth Partner, several books on attachment parenting by The Sears Family, and a homeopathic family medicine book. Books that emphasized the journey, not the dangers. We spent evenings composing a birth plan like a symphony. I had decided on biodegradable diapers, homemade vegetables instead of jarred baby food, and, naturally, a family bed.

Story continues

I realize enthusiasm is par for the course for most first-time pregnant women, but I had always been someone who knew myself, who could identify when I'd gone overboard long before I was drowning. It only struck me when our once-adult home gave way to piles of baby stuff, bassinets, handmade blankets, nursing pillows, a changing table, an ugly glider and pumping station, that our elegant, contemporary vision of our lives had been eclipsed.

When, that Saturday morning, my cervix proved to be no wider than a penny after three days of agony-it generally dilates to the size of a large grapefruit when the baby is ready to come out-an internal alarm went off: I am losing control of this process, this plan. I must not lose control.

My husband wanted to call the hospital. Dehydrated and exhausted, I reminded him of our intention: we would labor at home until either my water broke or, if we could stick it out, until the contractions got even closer. He pointed out, kindly, that the contractions had actually gotten further apart. That the baby wasn't moving. Perhaps a call to the hospital wouldn't hurt.

Reluctantly, I hobbled to the car.

We checked into the upscale hospital on Chicago's North Shore, got the room with the birthing bathtub, and were greeted by my midwife team with plucky enthusiasm. The main midwife, who had become a friend, assured us labors that started on Wednesday and ended up in the hospital on Saturday were not all that unusual. In my peripheral vision, I saw one of the hospital nurses roll her eyes. I let the nurses prep me, tight-lipped while taking my vitals.

"I don't want any interventions," I told them. "I'm uncomfortable but I can still walk, I can still make decisions." I had seen enough videos of women bearing down in Baltic countries, having their babies outdoors or in rivers, the right way. I had a clear vision of pulling my own son out of me in the birthing tub when the time came. "It doesn't feel like anything is wrong," I told the nurses. "He's just taking his time." I knew I could handle pain. What I could not handle was the idea of giving up.

They checked my chart. "It says here you didn't get the amnio, and that you elected to not know the sex."

"Yes," I said confidently. "But I'm pretty sure it's a boy."

Again, an eye roll.

After determining the baby's heart rate was dangerously irregular, the nurses administered a low dose of the inducing agent Pitocin. As the first contraction shot through me, the nurse nodded with satisfaction. Pitocin, used to start a labor in an overdue pregnancy, or keep a lagging labor like mine going by increasing the frequency, duration, and intensity of contractions, was like a Red Bull for my uterus. The nurse seemed almost pleased.

"You'll be holding your baby by 5 P.M. tonight," she said.

But 5 P.M. came and went with not much dilation. They raised the levels of the stimulating hormone, broke the water bag, found infection, and determined the baby was indeed in distress. I could no longer hold onto the tidy certainty of the midwife's promise. With every "intervention," I slid further away from "natural" childbirth; the only naturally occurring process was my frustration. I shuttled to and from the tub. I squatted and bounced. I dry heaved and cried. After suffering through three days of contractions with no pain medication, I feel I can assert that my pain threshold was high, but as 9 P.M. and then 10 P.M. passed, I began hyperventilating every two minutes. My senses shut down. I don't remember seeing or being able to talk. I had been awake for almost 80 hours.

I could hear the warning beeps of the heart monitor machine, the opening and closing of curtains and doors. I heard my labor, and its failure. I had chosen midwives who wouldn't offer me an epidural or a C-section on purpose, but when my husband quietly insisted on an epidural just so I could sleep, I agreed. The shot into my spine was a dull pinch compared to the past four days of agony. I fell asleep asking myself: Where is my baby? Where is he?

When I woke, I heard a voice, as clear as a bell: It's a girl, and she needs your help.

I know, I know. "I heard a voice." Whose voice? Was it a voice in the room? Was it a man's voice or a woman's voice? Did it shout? Did it whisper? None of the above. The voice did not come from anyone in the room-not the nurse or the midwife or my husband. The voice had no vocal quality. It didn't sound like a deceased grandmother or elderly aunt. It was more like the narrating guide at an art exhibit at the Tate Modern or the MoMA. It was more like dialogue you hear in your head while reading a good book-no sound, but you hear it. More physical than a memory or my own thoughts, but too authoritative to question or doubt. I had never heard anything like this clear, calm, and intelligent voice before, and I could not ignore the message.

Before this experience, if someone had told me they had heard a voice during their childbirth, I might have listened with sincere curiosity and invisible judgment. I would have questioned their past, their current mental state. I had no history of severe emotional distress, took no medications. While I do consider myself spiritually minded, there had never been a direct, independent voice instructing me. There had never been a moment of "clairaudience," as psychics and mediums call it, in which I heard a spirit talking. And yet.

It's hard for me to understand, even now, many years later. Research shows pregnancy often gives rise to changes in hearing, that hormonal surges displace the fluids in the inner ear, shift the basal metabolism, and lead to alterations in the auditory pathways. Some women lose hearing, experience tinnitus, ear fullness, or vertigo. But this was different. I had more hearing capacity, not less. I was getting a message from some source that didn't feel like me.

So often when we talk about hearing voices, terms like postnatal psychosis, invasive thoughts, and schizophrenia arise. The idea that people who hear voices are out of touch with reality is still dominant in our culture. But new research shows hearing voices is much more common than the medical field initially thought. They occur in about 4 percent of the population in the United Kingdom, the same percentage of those with asthma. The Harvard Review of Psychiatry proposes that it may be useful to think of hearing voices, what's known as "auditory hallucinations," like coughs-common experiences not always symptomatic of a larger illness. For me, an inner dialogue is often running, multiple points of view cross my mind in any social or professional situation, and sometimes they sound like dissenting voices. Most people can recall the experience of talking to themselves, if they're honest, or having a moment of intuition that seems to come out of thin air.

But often it takes a crisis of life or death for people to listen to their inner voices, a moment in which seconds matter, and trust is the only response. In my case the voice brought new information, and although I look back on the moment with unquestionable clarity, I also see the conflicting sentiment it entailed. Listening to that guiding voice, whatever it was, meant radically changing course. It meant giving up my agenda and to some degree my identity as a certain kind of mother. It meant surrendering my body and giving in to the unknown. Which is exactly what parenthood is all about.

The midwives weren't sure they understood when I repeated what I heard. "It's a girl, and she needs help," I said.

"You're fully dilated," one told me, announcing the moment I had been waiting days for-when, ostensibly, my baby was ready to be delivered. "Do you want to try to push?"

The voice echoed in my mind: It was a girl and she needed help. I shook my head no.

The staff stood waiting, open-eyed. We were at the finish line, awake, and able to still grasp one shred of a "natural" birth. I didn't care. Everything before this moment was gone.

"Call the surgeon," I said, trusting the voice and letting the hard work of the last nine months, my trying, wanting, and failing to control everything, fall away.

Photo credit: Courtesy Suzanne Clores

When I woke, the surgeon had arrived. The one whose hand I shook exactly once. He was wearing a tie and a professional intensity that could wither any hospital employee in moments. He scolded the midwives and nurses as they jumped into action to prepare for surgery. "This isn't an experiment," I heard. "This patient is over 35 and two weeks late and days into labor." A half dozen new surgical staffers scurried instudents and residents and some so young I wasn't sure they were out of collegeall wearing scrubs and masks, making jokes as they slid me from bed to gurney, past the windows of 100-year-old oaks in full August green. Curtains went up and I recognized my husband's eyes behind a mask, with me as the rest of my delivery ran as smoothly as a primetime medical drama.

There was some prodding in my arm to start a saline drip, and then more prodding around my belly. Twenty minutes later, the surgeon pointed below my waist, which I couldn't see. "Here she is. The cord is around her neck." He held up her long, wiggling body.

Photo credit: Courtesy Suzanne Clores

It was in fact a girl, and she had in fact needed help. It's still unclear exactly what went wrong. A nuchal cord-having the umbilical chord wrapped around the baby's neck-is common, occurring in up to one-third of full-term deliveries. Even after the fact, my medical team was hard-pressed to pinpoint the real problem. When there's such a long labor with so many complications-irregular heartbeat, infection in the amniotic fluid-and yet another mother and child are brought together at the end of the day, the doctors and nurses tend to focus on the happy outcome.

For the first sixth months of my daughter's life I was at odds with the experience. My body was a mess: exhausted, weak, scarred. Healing from a C-section is no joke, and during recovery it was easy to slip into disappointment, even shame, for not being able to push her out the natural way. Part of me omitted the whole "voice" incident, as is common for people who have anomalous experiences, wishing to minimize what's hard to understand. But the sense of failure faded away as my daughter smiled, laughed, and spoke for the first time.

My daughter's birth had one true natural moment: a voice that woke me from blind devotion into living, breathing, maternal instinct.

Suzanne Clores is the author of Memoirs of a Spiritual Outsider (Conari, 2000) and is at work on a book about extraordinary experiences.

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After months of dodging, and after years of raising questions about President Barack Obamas birthplace, Donald Trumps campaign is asserting that the GOP presidential nominee no longer doubts that Obama was born in the United States.

In a statement Thursday night, released after Trump once again declined to weigh in personally on the issue, his campaign communications director said Trump believes the issue is settled. In Trumpian fashion, the statement claims Trump did a great service to the President and the country by raising doubts about Obamas birthplace, which led to Obama releasing his long form birth certificate in 2011 proving his Hawaiian birth.

But the statement seeks to whitewash years of Trump statements that continue to raise doubts about Obamas eligibility to serve as President  a controversy long viewed as racially tinged by even Obama detractors  and blames Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton for raising the issue in the first place.

Hillary Clintons campaign first raised this issue to smear then-candidate Barack Obama in her very nasty, failed 2008 campaign for President, Trump spokesman Jason Miller said in the statement.

This type of vicious and conniving behavior is straight from the Clinton Playbook. As usual, however, Hillary Clinton was too weak to get an answer. Even the MSNBC show Morning Joe admits that it was Clintons henchmen who first raised this issue, not Donald J. Trump. In 2011, Mr. Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate. Mr. Trump did a great service to the President and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised. Inarguably, Donald J. Trump is a closer. Having successfully obtained President Obamas birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.

Story continues

Friday morning, Trump told Fox Business, We have to keep the suspense going, OK? But he then said hell be making a major statement about the controversy, Politico reports.

Clinton herself took to Twitter to attack Trump for his birther history, calling it racist, but didnt address Trumps claim that she began the birther issue.

President Obamas successor cannot and will not be the man who led the racist birther movement. Period.  Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) September 16, 2016

Trumps statement came just hours after he once again refused to state definitively that Obama was born in Hawaii. Ill answer that question at the right time, Trump told the Washington Post in an interview published Thursday. I just dont want to answer it yet.

Obama released his long-form birth certificate just days before the 2011 White House Correspondents Association Dinner, in which both the President and comedian Seth Meyers lambasted the reality-television star and businessman for his comments questioning Obamas birthplace.

In 2011, Trump claimed that he had sent investigators to Hawaii in a bid to show that Obamas birth certificate was fraudulent, calling it one of the greatest cons of all time. I have people that have been studying it and they cannot believe what theyre finding, Trump continued at the time, though he never offered any evidence of their supposed findings.

For Trump, the issue was hardly settled in 2011, as his campaign now claims. Trump continued to spread conspiracy theories about Obamas place of birth even after the release.

How amazing, the State Health Director who verified copies of Obamas birth certificate died in plane crash today. All others lived  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 12, 2013

An 'extremely credible source' has called my office and told me that @BarackObama's birth certificate is a fraud.  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 6, 2012

Always remember, I was the one who got Obama to release his birth certificate, or whatever that was! Hilary couldn't, McCain couldn't.  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 29, 2014

Trumps personal silence on the issue all but assures that he will continue to face questions about the birther controversy over the remainder of the presidential campaign.

Earlier this month, Trumps running mate, Mike Pence, said he had no doubts about Obamas birthplace, drawing contrast with the top of the ticket.
Word leaked out early Thursday evening that Jimmy Fallon had fingered Donald Trumps follicles during a taping of The Tonight Show. Can I mess your hair up? asked Fallon, his face distorted in his standard rictus of wild hilarity. Trump was clearly not surprised by the request. He grimaced coyly and looked out at the audience with a should-I-be-a-naughty-boy-and-play-along? glance. The crowd whooped and cheered as Fallon executed The Great Muss. The media fell into line with notable gullibility.



He smiled as he let it happen! was the breathless sub-head on Time.coms story, which continued in amazement: Donald Trump allowed Jimmy Fallon to mess up his famous hair on national television during a Thursday taping of The Tonight Show. That national television was a nice grace-note, as though Trump usually appeared only at small-town, local TV stations.



Over on Fox Newss The Kelly File, a chyron beneath the host proclaimed, Trump Shows Sense of Humor On Late Night TV. Megyn Kelly found it extraordinarily encouraging that Trump should submit to Fallons mild joshing, and suggested that Hillary Clintons recent drop in some polls might be ascribed to some degree by the Democrats lack of Trump-style wild-and-crazy-guy-ness.



Breaking news, folks: Before the taping, producers discuss with guests what theyll talk about and do with hosts! You can be sure that if Fallon hadnt cleared The Muss with Trump before the Tonight Show began, one of Trumps security detail would have had Jimmy pinned to his desk before his digits reached Trumps nimbus of hair-spray.



Related: Donald Trump Reveals to Dr. Oz that He Considers Oz a Doctor

The actual interview was toothless even by Fallons gummy standards. Fallon thanked Trump for giving us the material that we are doing. He said Trump has been amazing to follow: You say some shocking things that I cannot even believe. Thus does Fallon join the ranks of TV journalists in normalizing Trumps most incendiary comments. In this case, I cannot even believe is code for How are you continuing to get away with this stuff?



Alas, guest Norm Macdonald appeared after Trump  it would have been interesting to see one of the worlds greatest talk-show guests join in the chat with Trump. Macdonald, there to plug his new book Based On A True Story, did say he shook hands with Trump backstage and that his hand was enormous like Andre the Giants, or Johnny Bench with his catchers mitt on.

The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon airs weeknights at 11:35 p.m. on NBC.
Dahals visit not urgent, says Oli

Former PM and CPN-UML Chairman KP Sharma Oli has criticised Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal for going on an insignificant visit to India.
While promoting his newest hotel in Washington, D.C. on Friday, Donald Trump finally put to rest the birther controversy he has so often fueled with persistent suggestions over at least five years that President Obama was really born in Africa.



"President Barack Obama was born in the United States  period," Trump said out loud, at last.



In a more than 30-minute appearance, Trump spent 20 seconds reversing himself on the birther issue.



The ugly controversy was reignited on Wednesday when he wouldn't admit to The Washington Post that Barack Obama was born in Hawaii.







"I'll answer that question at the right time," he told the newspaper. "I just don't want to answer it yet."



After Trump's brief remarks Friday, Democratic Rep. Gregory Meeks, chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, accused Trump on CNN of pulling a PR stunt to benefit his new Washington, D.C. hotel. Earlier Friday, Trump acknowledged as much when he teased on a morning TV news show that he wouldn't talked about his birther controversy at that moment because he wanted to "keep the suspense going" for his hotel opening.



Obama  who provided his verified short form birth certificate first in 2008 and his verified long form birth certificate again in 2011  icily responded Friday morning.



"I'm shocked that a question like that has come up at a time when we have so many other things to do," the president said. "Well, I'm not that shocked actually. It's fairly typical. We got other things to attend to. I was pretty confident about where I was born. I think most people were as well. My hope would be the presidential election reflects more serious issues than that."





RELATED VIDEO: Donald Trump Debunks Wig Rumors By Letting Jimmy Fallon Mess Up His Hair on The Tonight Show

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Story continues



Meanwhile, Clinton, who is back on the campaign trail after battling pneumonia, addressed the issue while giving a speech at the Black Women's Agenda Symposium Workshop in Washington, D.C. Friday.



"He's trying to restrain himself and clean up his image. But as Maya Angelou once said, 'When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.' "



"And we know who Donald is," she continued. "For five years he has led the birther movement to delegitimize our first black president. His campaign was founded on this outrageous lie. There is no erasing it in history. Just yesterday, Trump again refused to say with his own words that the president was born in the United States.



"He is feeding into the worst impulses  the bigotry and bias  that lurks in our country," she also said.



"Barack Obama was born in America, plain and simple, and Donald Trump owes him and the American people an apology. There is no new Donald Trump. There never will be. Donald Trump looks at President Obama after eight years as our president, he still doesn't see him as an American. Think about how dangerous that is.



"Imagine a person in the Oval Office who traffics in conspiracy theories and refuses to let them go no matter what the facts are. Imagine someone who distorts the truth to fit a very narrow view of the world. Imagine a president who sees someone who doesn't look like him and doesn't agree with him and thinks that person must not be a real American."



Trump's campaign said in a statement Thursday that he settled the birther controversy in 2011 "by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate." But in reality the GOP nominee continued to raise questions about Obama's citizenship even after the president released his birth certificate. Here are some of Trump's tweets on the topic over the years:





An 'extremely credible source' has called my office and told me that @BarackObama's birth certificate is a fraud. a Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 6, 2012







Wake Up America! See article: "Israeli Science: Obama Birth Certificate is a Fake" http://t.co/f7esUdSz a Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 13, 2012







People should be proud of the fact that I got Obama to release his birth certificate, which in a recent book he amiraculouslya found. a Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 22, 2013







How amazing, the State Health Director who verified copies of Obamaas abirth certificatea died in plane crash today. All others lived a Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 12, 2013







Always remember, I was the one who got Obama to release his birth certificate, or whatever that was! Hilary couldn't, McCain couldn't. a Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 29, 2014







Attention all hackers: You are hacking everything else so please hack Obama's college records (destroyed?) and check "place of birth" a Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 6, 2014





As recently as 2014, Trump was still suggesting that Obama's birth certificate was a fake.
Today will be remembered as the day TV news outlets broadcast Donald Trumps own lips saying President Obama was born in the United States.

Hillary Clinton, and her campaign of 2008, started the birther controversy. I finished it. I finished it. You know what I mean, Trump said. President Barack Obama was born in the United States. Period. Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again. Thank you.

His statement on the birther issue came at the end of a campaign event in Washington D.C. that also touted his newly opened hotel in the city. After reading his 33-second statement, Trump took no questions and left the stage as reporters shouted questions at him. Then, according to press reports, the pool reporter was physically restrained from accompanying the candidate as Trump toured the hotel.

But, in anticipation of his statement, media outlets moved on to dismiss his claim Clinton started the birther movement, as well as his claim he finished it.

Todays Trump announcement came a day after the news outlets screwed up the courage to dismiss the same information from Trump campaigns senior communications advisor Jason Miller. Having successfully obtained President Obamas birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States, Miller said in a statement.

Some media outlets noted that, as recently as this week, Trump declined to disavow his belief Obama was not born in the U.S., when asked by WaPo, saying it was not the right time to address.

Related stories

Hillary Clinton Campaign Decries Donald Trump's "Disturbing Behavior" After GOP Rival Urges Secret Service To "Disarm"

Bill Clinton Tells Trevor Noah United States "Less Racist, Less Sexist, Less Homophobic" But "More Siloed"

Jimmy Fallon Messes Up Donald Trump's Hair; Republic Still Standing
Getty Image

Silicon Valley entrepreneur Peter Thiel is currently famous for two reasons. First, hes partially responsible for the dissolution of Gawker Media and its flagship website, Gawker.com. And second? He happens to be a gay Libertarian who supports Republican nominee Donald Trumps bid for the White House. As of this morning, however, Thiels name is now famous for a third reason  one with important connections to his vocal (and financial) support of Trump, and former Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalias still-vacant seat.

Yes, thats right. Thiel is Trumps top choice for the ninth seat on the Supreme Court of the United States if the general election goes his way. Or at least thats according to Thiel himself, whose private boasting was relayed to the Huffington Post by two anonymous sources  one with close to the PayPal co-founder who claims Thiel has told friends all about the Donalds intention to nominate him, and another close to Trump who suggests the Republican nominee deeply loves Peter Thiel and often talks about the potential nomination.

Then again, that second source has not spoken to Trump directly about Thiel being nominated to the court, and reminded the Huffington Post that Trumps offers often fail to materialize in real life. As for an official comment from either Trump or Thiel themselves, no such thing has happened yet. However, Trump campaign spokesperson Hope Hicks told the outlet in no uncertain terms, There is absolutely no truth to this whatsoever. Thiels own official spokeperson, Jeremiah Hall, reiterated his counterparts sentiment: Peter hasnt had any conversations about a Supreme Court nomination and has no interest in the job.

Venture capitalism and hedge-fund managing notwithstanding, Thiel graduated from Stanford Law School with a J.D. in 1992 and clerked for the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit. Yet his law career quickly transformed into derivatives trading, which earned him a great deal of money in the mid 90s. So yes, Thiel would be the richest Supreme Court nominee in the branchs history, and he does possess some law experience.

Story continues

Some.

(Via Huffington Post)
(WASHINGTON) Black voters reacted skeptically Friday to Republican presidential nominee Donald Trumps admission that he now believes the nations first black president was indeed born in the United States. Many said the fact that Trump spent years questioning President Barack Obamas national origin was disrespectful, and an insult to all black Americans.

Despite the fact that Obama himself said he viewed this renewed burst of commentary about his birth as fairly typical and not surprising, members of the Congressional Black Caucus were clearly angry. During a heated news conference Friday during the CBCs annual legislative conference in Washington, several lawmakers denigrated Trump for perpetrating birther falsehoods for so long.

He owes an apology to President Barack Obama, he owes an apology to African-American community and he owes an apology to the United States of America, said Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., adding that he considers Trump to be nothing but a two-bit racial arsonist.

Reps. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, and G.K. Butterfield, D-N.C., called Trump a cheap racist and a disgusting fraud, respectively.

Many blacks gave Trump no credit for finally letting go of the long dispelled notion that Obama, born in Hawaii in 1961, actually hailed from outside the country he now leads. They said they believed it was some sort of political calculation by Trump in hopes of getting votes from blacks or moderate whites.

In the black community, its always been viewed as kind of offhanded racism, said Preston Thymes, a Scottsdale, Arizona, marketing manager.

Roosevelt Brown, 56, said he felt black voters, at least, werent buying Trumps about-face. I dont believe in his heart hes saying what he really believes, said Brown, a special investigator in California.

Hes a backtracker, said Bailey Billings, 25, of Madison, Wisconsin. He says whatever he thinks he should say, what hes directed by his team to say, to make him seem like a better human that we should all vote for.  I just dont care for anything that he says.

Story continues

And Trumps attempt to pull Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton into the fray by claiming she endorsed birther tactics against Obama during their 2008 race didnt seem to sit well with some black voters either.

Hes a big liar and hes just trying to put people against Hillary, said Wilma Brown, a 66-year-old Detroit housewife.

Trumps political rise was fueled in part by his presence among birthers, and as recently as this week, he declined to say where he believed Obama was born. In reversing his stance Friday, Trump did not say why, or when, he changed his mind.

Questions about Obamas legitimacy strike a nerve with many black voters, said Corey Fields, a Stanford University sociology professor and author of Black Elephants In The Room, a book about black Republicans.

Its an effort to delegitimize a very powerful and compelling achievement by an African-American political leader, Fields said. Often black voters can translate this to their own lived experience moving through the white professional (world) where the legitimacy of your achievements are often called into question. This is a very similar process on a large scale. This is something that can resonate at an individual level.

Several black Republicans have also expressed disgust at Trumps connections with the birther movement.

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell criticized Trump in leaked emails released earlier this week. All his lies and nonsense just pile up, Powell wrote. I just go back to the unforgivable one. Trying to destroy the President elected by the American people with his fictitious investigation into this source of birth. Absolutely disgraceful. Powell has not denied the leaked emails authenticity.

Others questioned why Trump and his campaign would not squash the issue immediately, with the November election so close. Renee Amoore, who is leading black voter outreach efforts for Trump in Pennsylvania, said Trump has gotten better and been on message in recent weeks, and is not sure why Trump chose to respond to his role in the birther movement now.

For whatever reason, somebody thought this was part of the message, said Amoore, referring to Trumps campaign, which released a statement late Thursday on the issue.

Daphne Goggins, 53, a longtime registered Republican who serves as a ward leader in Philadelphia, still blames Clintons surrogates for propagating the issue, and is angry that Trump is being held responsible for the false claims that Obama was not an American.

Im not understanding how she can dump this on Trump now, Goggins said. Who knows? They may have even been doing it together. But who cares? It shouldnt be an issue.

Rufus Bartell, a Detroit businessman and founder of a retail and consulting group, said theres been too much damage for Trump to make up with many black voters, who have been a powerful voting bloc during Obamas time in Washington.

In presidential election years, the percentage of black voters eclipsed the percentage of whites for the first time in 2012, when 66.2 percent of blacks voted, compared with 64.1 percent of non-Hispanic whites and about 48 percent of Hispanics and Asians.

I think its too late, regardless of what he does. But if he really wants a relationship with the African-American community, then its certainly not too late to start a relationship. It just wont impact this election, Bartell said.
At a campaign event at his new hotel in Washington, D.C., GOP nominee Donald Trump told a crowd of military veterans and members of the press that he believes President Obama was born in the United States. While Trump put to bed the "birther" issue, a group of veterans used the opportunity to advocate for his presidential ambitions.
Donald Trump speaks to the American Legion National Convention on Thursday, Sept. 1, 2016, in Cincinnati. (Photo: Evan Vucci/AP)

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump would not say, in an interview with the Washington Post that was conducted on Wednesday night, whether he believes President Obama was born in the United States.

Ill answer that question at the right time, Trump said. I just dont want to answer it yet.

Shortly after the interview was published on Thursday night, the Trump campaigns senior communications adviser, Jason Miller, emailed a statement to reporters insisting Trump does not have questions about Obamas birthplace.

Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States, he wrote.

Trumps comments in the Washington Post interview contradicted other statements made by his campaign.

In a television interview on Wednesday, Trumps running mate, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, said they both accept that Obama was born in the United States. Trumps campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway, has also said Trump believes Obama was born in the country. However, in his interview with the Washington Post, Trump suggested Conway was expressing her personal opinion.

Its OK. Shes allowed to speak what she thinks. I want to focus on jobs. I want to focus on other things, Trump said.

Trump spent much of 2011 raising questions about so-called birther conspiracy theories that contend that Obama was not born in the country. At one point, Trump even suggested he had a team of investigators looking into the matter. In April 2011, the White House released the presidents long-form birth certificate, one of multiple pieces of evidence invalidating the theories, and Trump boasted that he had helped push Obama to produce the document.

Today, Im very proud of myself because Ive accomplished something that nobody else has been able to accomplish, Trump said in 2011. I am really honored, frankly, to have played such a big role in hopefully getting rid of this issue.

In the Trump campaigns emailed statement about the Washington Post interview, Miller accused Trumps Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, of first bringing up the questions about Obamas birthplace in 2008. Miller also credited Trump with pushing the White House to release the presidents birth certificate and suggested the document convinced Trump Obama was born in this country.

Story continues

In 2011, Mr. Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate. Mr. Trump did a great service to the President and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised, Miller wrote, adding, Inarguably, Donald J. Trump is a closer. Having successfully obtained President Obamas birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.

Although he initially implied that the issue had been put to rest after Obamas birth certificate was released, Trump continued to raise questions about where the president was born. As recently as November 2014, he posted comments on Twitter suggesting that Obamas birth certificate might be a forgery.

Trump has previously suggested that Clinton started the birther movement when she ran against Obama in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary. While there is no record that Clinton or any staffer on her 2008 campaign pushed the conspiracy theories, some of her supporters did play a part in fueling the rumors during her primary battle with Obama.

Nevertheless, Miller directly blamed Clinton in his statement, which included links to a strategy memo written by Clintons former campaign manager, Mark Penn, in 2007, that suggested emphasizing Obamas lack of American roots and the fact the president spent part of his childhood in Indonesia. Miller also linked to footage of MSNBC host Joe Scarborough accusing the Clinton campaign of having started and spread the birther rumors.

Hillary Clintons campaign first raised this issue to smear then-candidate Barack Obama in her very nasty, failed 2008 campaign for President. This type of vicious and conniving behavior is straight from the Clinton Playbook, Miller wrote, As usual, however, Hillary Clinton was too weak to get an answer. Even the MSNBC show Morning Joe admits that it was Clintons henchmen who first raised this issue, not Donald J. Trump.

While Trump has never personally indicated that he was fully convinced Obama was born in the United States, he has preferred to sidestep the issue since announcing his presidential bid last year. On multiple occasions when he has been queried about it on the campaign trail, Trump has said its something he doesnt talk about any more. Clinton has used the question to undermine his credibility.

Today he did it again, Clinton said Thursday night in Washington, D.C. He was asked one more time where was President Obama born. And he still wouldnt say Hawaii. He still wouldnt say America. This man wants to be our next president. When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry? Hes tried to reset himself and his campaign many times. This is the best he can do. This is who he is.

Clinton is currently leading Trump in the polls, but the race has tightened in recent weeks. His campaign has attributed these gains to Trumps adopting a more disciplined and positive approach.

Additional reporting by Liz Goodwin in Washington, D.C.

This story was updated at 10:45 p.m. with the Trump campaigns statement.
Out of the fertile '60s British music boom, Donovan stood out from his contemporaries by imbuing his songs with an affection for mythology and mysticism several years before it was in vogue. He also, unlike many other folkies, composed songs that were structured like folk songs of yore; sure, "Sunshine Superman" is psychedelica and "Catch the Wind" is lilting pop, but more often than not on his early albums, he's drawing on centuries of Irish and British folk tradition.

Even so, when Donovan played Carnegie's Zankel Hall on Thursday (Sept. 15) night and spoke of "old songs," it was slightly jarring to realize he wasn't talking about tracks from albums like Sunshine Superman (which celebrates its 50th anniversary this year), but rather songs that predate the era of recorded music. So while everyone at the 70 year old's intimate concert was ready for hits from years past, they may not have been prepared for a night that was as much Merlin as "Mellow Yellow."

Donovan Reflects on 50th Anniversary of 'Sunshine Superman'

That's because the 'greatest hits' version of Donovan's career typically overlooks the Tolkien territory he toyed with on early albums. But at Carnegie, Donovan revisited some of his less-heralded songs that mine the kind of mysticism you find in early W.B. Yeats poems. Much like that Irish poet, Donovan would go on to bigger success (and more memorable material) when he focused less on the ancient past and more on the then-present, but there's still a captivating quality to his intricately constructed (if somewhat lyrically dippy) folk-folk songs.

From the medieval "Guinevere" to the modern "Jennifer Juniper," Donovan's backwards-gazing folk music and melodic folk-pop were both well-represented at Carnegie.

His predilection for storytelling was front and center, too -- it seemed like at least a fourth of the evening was occupied by Donovan the Raconteur vs. Donovan the Troubadour. Thankfully, the stories were uniformly charming and filled with famous names (Jimmy Page, Paul McCartney, Keith Moon) to keep the baby boomer audience engaged. Whether sharing the story of how he contributed key lyrics to "Yellow Submarine" or recalling the time a pre-stoner Graham Nash chided him for smoking weed backstage, Donovan - sitting cross-legged the whole show -- frequently ended his stories with the admission, "I lived it, and I barely believe it myself."

Story continues

Donovan to Be Honored With John Lennon Real Love Award

But obviously, people weren't there for storytime -- they were there for the songs, and Donovan duly delivered most of the material you'd want to hear. His guitar fingering was impeccable, and his voice was respectable for a performer his age -- only during the high notes on "Wear Your Love Like Heaven" did he seem to be stretching beyond his limit. On the other hand, his otherworldly vibrato was stunningly powerful on "Hurdy Gurdy Man," one of the night's strongest moments. (For comparison, and for those familiar with the 21st century touring abilities of '60s alumni, Donovan's voice is far more assured than Brian Wilson's, but not quite as strong as McCartney's these days.)

But Donovan's secret weapon has always been his effortless charm. Even though his cherub face disappeared decades ago, he still exudes a sense of wonder at the world. When speaking of the Irish folk songs his mother sang when he was a child, he seemed as enamored of them Thursday night as he was six decades ago. And though he listed at least a dozen rock legends in his stories, it never felt like name-dropping -- he seemed to be filled with delighted disbelief at his good fortune to have been part of history.

It was ultimately that charm that turned what could have been an acoustic parade of golden oldies into something special: An evening that felt as much like a concert as it did a shared experience.
Back in late May, as he boarded the first rail service to connect downtown L.A. with Santa Monica since 1953, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti proclaimed that hundreds of thousands of people in this dedicated "car culture" would ride "the train connecting skyline to shoreline."

Now, a little more than three months after the groundbreaking rail service on the expanded Expo Line began, new ridership data and surveys released this week by Metro offer strong evidence that the mayor's hopeful pronouncements are accurate. In fact, weekend ridership on the line has nearly doubled in just the span of a few months.

"We're literally rewriting history with this train," Garcetti told THR at the first official preview of the Metro's westward extension on May 9. "Anyone who's ever been stuck in that weekend crunch on the 10 should be excited about this new service."

Los Angeles once was interlaced with train lines - in fact, 90 years ago no fewer than three train lines connected downtown L.A. and Beverly Hills to the beaches of Santa Monica and Venice. But then came the reign of the automobile, causing rail ridership to decline and complaints about trolley traffic on Santa Monica boulevard, Venice boulevard and elsewhere to rise. The last streetcars run by Pacific Electric stopped running to the beach in 1953. The westward extension, which officially began service on May 20, includes seven new stations and 6.6 miles of light-rail track passing through Westwood, West L.A. and Santa Monica.

Read more: The Ultimate Commuting Race Across Los Angeles: Car vs. Train (vs. Bike)

New data, which offers a monthly breakdown of weekday and weekend ridership through the end of August, indicates that use of the line has already surpassed predictions made in May. Overall, ridership grew more than 53 percent in the three months after the extension was launched. Between June and August, an average of 44,030 people rode the Metro line each weekday compared to 30,073 in the February-April timeframe. That's a 33 percent jump in weekday use.

The bump in rail ridership on weekends and holidays was far more pronounced in those same time periods. This summer, use of the Expo line grew 62 percent on Saturdays. On Sundays and holidays, the jump was far greater, rising 135 percent in the June-to-August timeframe.

A rider survey conducted and recently released by the Los Angeles Country Metropolitan Transportation Authority - known to locals simply as Metro - sheds some light on the rider habits that have driven these numbers. According to that survey, which is based on interviews with riders at the seven new stations and the existing Culver City station, 70 percent of the people using the expanded Expo Line are new riders and 44 percent of them used to drive. Additionally, two thirds of the new riders who were surveyed in Culver City used the Metro Line to travel westward to Santa Monica.
Ducati North America CEO Jason Chinnock

There are few brands in the world of motorcycles more sought after than Ducati.

Known for its line up of exotically styled, high performance motorcycles, Ducati has certainly captured the imagination of American consumers with 14% sales growth in 2015.

In fact, the US is Ducati's top market  ahead of its homeland of Italy.

The man in charge of the historic Italian marque in the US is Ducati North America CEO Jason Chinnock.

Chinnock, a long-time Ducati-guy, rejoined Ducati North America as CEO in January after a couple of years at fellow Audi-owned brand Lamborghini.

Recently, Chinnock spoke with Business Insider about the Ducati and his career in the motorcycle and automotive industries.

On what Ducati stands for

According to Chinnock, the Ducati brand stands for three things: style, sophistication, and performance.

"When someone sees a Ducati, it must be unmistakably a Ducati," Chinnock said about the style conveyed by his company's bikes.

As for sophistication, Chinnock believes Ducatis are more than just an engine, two wheels, and a seat. "It's about the engineering and the technology that allows riders have a great experience," Chinnock said.

And then there's performance. It's the element for which Ducati is most famous.

"The brand is rooted in racing and performance is something that comes quite naturally to us," he said. "Our aim is to build an emotional connection between the motorcycle and rider."

On where Ducati is headed

While Ducati is best known for its sport and super bikes, the legendary Italian marque is set to explore a different segment of the market.

"The cruiser market is new to us, but it's the single largest market opportunity for us in North America," the chief executive said. The cruiser market has traditionally been dominated by American and Japanese brands such as Harley-Davidson, Indian, Yamaha, and Honda.

According to Chinnock, the cruiser market represents around 115,000 bikes annually and the brand would be very pleased with just one or two percent of that pie.

Story continues

"It'll bring new people to the brand," Chinnock added.

Ducati 1299 Panigale S Anniversario 55

The bike chosen to take Ducati into this new frontier is the new XDiavel. While cruisers aren't necessarily known for the kind of fire-breathing performance synonymous with Ducati, Chinnock assured us that the new XDiavel "doesn't compromise the company's performance reputation."

On his time at Lamborghini

In 2013, Chinnock left his position as Ducati North America's sales and marketing development director to become a marketing manager at Lamborghini. He spent nearly three years at the supercar maker before returning to Ducati.

The executive told us that his time at Lamborghini was time well spent.

"I picked up the automotive industry's attention to detail and high level of professionalism," Chinnock told us. "In addition, it also allowed me to view Ducati more from the perspective of a consumer and gather new ideas for how to elevate the brand."

On his time in the US Army

After graduating from Colorado State University, Chinnock served as a tank pilot in the US Army. According to Chinnock, his time in the Army instilled within him an added sense of discipline and team focus.

Ducati XDIAVEL

"It was an invaluable experience for someone between the age of 18-21," he told us. "It helped me mold my drive and determination with an understanding that there was a whole world out there and that I could do anything I set my mind to."

On the possibility of an electric Ducati

A couple of years ago, Harley-Davidson unveiled an electric motorcycle called the Project LiveWire. But Ducati isn't quite ready to jump on that bandwagon yet.

Citing the sentiments of Ducati's Global CEO Claudio Domenicali, Chinnock said that Ducati will go electric "when the technology is at a point where we can deliver an experience commensurate with the spirit of the brand."

NOW WATCH: This super slick 3D-printed motorcycle is like nothing youve ever seen





More From Business Insider


Diarrhoea outbreak grips Saptari's village

Saptari's Jamuni Madhepura-2 is in the grip of a diarrhoea outbreak from the past three days. District Health Office confirmed that 69 people from the area have taken ill due to the disease.
The newest additions to the Dutch National Police (DNP) are North American "immigrants": bald eagles that are specially trained to take down airborne drones.

The initiative is a first for law enforcement, according to DNP officials. They announced in a statement, released Sept. 13, that the DNP is currently the only police force in the world to include raptors on its roster for drone defense.

For the past year, the DNP has tested eagles' prowess against flying drones, collaborating with a private company called Guard from Above that trains raptors to snatch drones out of the sky. The tests were so successful, the DNP reported, that the police force recently purchased juvenile bald eagles that it plans to train. Agents will work with the eagles hand in glove  literally, because eagle talons are extremely sharp. [Send in the Eagles! Dutch Police Use Avians to Deter Drones | Video]

The young eagle recruits have wingspans that currently measure about 3.3 feet (1 meter) long. When the eagles are fully grown, their wings could extend between 5.9 and 7.5 feet (1.8 and 2.3 m). The DNP expects that the eagles will be ready for action in about six months, according to the statement.

Michel Baeten, an operational manager for the DNP, told news agency Agence France-Presse (AFP) that using birds of prey is one of several methods Dutch police employ to combat drones, alongside electromagnetic pulses and laser technology.

Baeten called eagles "one of the most effective countermeasures against hostile drones," the AFP reported.

So, what drones might be considered "hostile"? These aerial vehicles could be a threat, for instance, to visiting diplomats, as the DNP demonstrated Sept. 9 in a mock "attack." In the department's test setting  enacted on video  a man playing a VIP emerged from a motorcade at a public location. As he greeted people, a drone flew toward him, and it was quickly intercepted by a trained bird.

Story continues

The eagle-eyed trainees are taught to see drones as prey and respond accordingly, officials said in the statement. Just as eagles capture prey and bring it to their nests, the trained eagles not only disable the drones but also relocate a safe distance from crowds.

Tough, scaly skin on eagles' feet protects them against bites from most of their usual prey, and likewise protects them from being harmed by small drones' propellers. Larger drones, however, might prove more damaging. The DNP reported that the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research (TNO) will design a special "claw protector"  called klauwbeschermer, in Dutch  that it will use to keep the eagles from being injured in the line of duty.

Original article on Live Science.

Editor's Recommendations

Copyright 2016 LiveScience, a Purch company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
NANTES, France (Reuters) - Egypt took delivery of a second French Mistral helicopter carrier on Friday, part of a $1 billion deal signed last year. Egypt took over the ship at a ceremony in the Atlantic coast port of Saint-Nazaire. It was the second of two France agreed last year to sell to Egypt. The two ships were originally built for sale to Russia, but that sale was canceled after Russia's annexation of Crimea. "It has been a very complicated, uncertain period to manage, but thanks to the French government's support, we were able to find a navy that needed it," a spokesman for the state-backed shipbuilder DCNS told Reuters. The French naval contractor had to strip out all the ship's information systems and instructions written in Cyrillic script and replace them with Arabic and English lettering. The "Anwar El-Sadat" will sail from Saint-Nazaire early next week for joint exercises with the French navy before setting off for Alexandria. The Mistral is known as the "Swiss army knife" of the French navy for its versatility. Capable of carrying vessels and tanks, the will serve as command centers for the Egyptian fleet. Cairo has tried to boost its military power in the face of a two-year insurgency in northern Sinai and fears that civil war in neighboring Libya could spill over. Egypt has also ordered four corvettes, 100-metres long, that will be built in two years, and negotiations are under way to order two more, the spokesman for DCNS told Reuters. (Reporting by Guillaume Frouin,; writing by Maya Nikolaeva, editing by Larry King)
(Reuters) - U.S. drugmaker Pfizer Inc's breast cancer drug, Ibrance, should be given marketing approval, an advisory committee at the European Medicines Agency recommended. The Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) gave a positive opinion for Ibrance to be used in combination with two existing therapies in women who have received prior endocrine therapy. The CHMP's opinion will now be reviewed by the EMA, Pfizer said in a statement on Friday. Ibrance, approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in February 2015, contributed about half a billion dollars of Pfizer's total revenue of $13.1 billion in its latest quarter. Novartis is also testing an experimental breast cancer pill which belongs to same drug class as Pfizer's Ibrance. In May, tests on the drug were stopped early because of good results. Pfizer's shares were off slightly in premarket trading on Friday. (Reporting by Rahul B in Bengaluru; Editing by Savio D'Souza)
(Adds background, shares)

Sept 16 (Reuters) - U.S. drugmaker Pfizer Inc's breast cancer drug, Ibrance, should be given marketing approval, an advisory committee at the European Medicines Agency recommended.

The Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) gave a positive opinion for Ibrance to be used in combination with two existing therapies in women who have received prior endocrine therapy.

The CHMP's opinion will now be reviewed by the EMA, Pfizer said in a statement on Friday.

Ibrance, approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in February 2015, contributed about half a billion dollars of Pfizer's total revenue of $13.1 billion in its latest quarter.

Novartis is also testing an experimental breast cancer pill which belongs to same drug class as Pfizer's Ibrance. In May, tests on the drug were stopped early because of good results.

Pfizer's shares were off slightly in premarket trading on Friday.

(Reporting by Rahul B in Bengaluru; Editing by Savio D'Souza)
Remember Corky from the 2007 tween thriller Nancy Drew? Well he's all grown up and still friends with his former leading lady Emma Roberts!



The actress shared a photo of her meet-up with Nancy Drew costar Josh Flitter on Instagram and Twitter Thursday.



"How's this for #TBT ?! 10 years ago @flittography and I did #NancyDrew together," Roberts, 25, captioned her then-and-now collage.





How's this for #TBT ?! 10 years ago @flittography and I did #NancyDrew together !!!! A photo posted by Emma Roberts (@emmaroberts) on Sep 15, 2016 at 4:06pm PDT









Flitter, 22, also explained, "an insane #tbt .. seeing @emmaroberts for the first time in 10 years! so happy to hang with you again! #corkyandnancy4ever #nancydrew."



The pair reunited on the Los Angeles set of Roberts' hit Fox show Scream Queens, thanks to Chanel #5 Abigail Breslin.



"When yo friends visit you during a long day on set," Breslin, 20, captioned her latest photo with Flitter.





When yo friends visit you during a long day on set #truebluethruandthru #joyfulforjosh #allthatFLITTERSisgold A photo posted by Abigail Breslin (@abbienormal9) on Sep 14, 2016 at 11:27pm PDT





Since starring on Nancy Drew almost 10 years ago (gasp!), Flitter graduated college from the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan, and continues to act in minor roles in addition to voice acting.



While Roberts has found much success in Ryan Murphy-created series such as American Horror Story and Scream Queens.



Season two of Scream Queens returns Sep. 20 at 9 p.m. EST/PST.
Sorry, Einstein: It looks like the world is spooky  even when your most famous theory is tossed out.

This finding comes from a close look at quantum entanglement, in which two particles that are "entangled" affect each other even when separated by a large distance. Einstein found that his theory of special relativity meant that this weird behavior was impossible, calling it "spooky."

Now, researchers have found that even if they were to scrap this theory, allowing entangled particles to communicate with each other faster than the speed of light or even instantaneously, that couldn't explain the odd behavior. The findings rule out certain "realist" interpretations of spooky quantum behavior. [Infographic: How Quantum Entanglement Works]

"What that tells us is that we have to look a little bit deeper," said study co-author Martin Ringbauer, a doctoral candidate in physics at the University of Queensland in Australia. "This kind of action-at-a-distance is not enough to explain quantum correlations" seen between entangled particles, Ringbauer said.

Action at a distance

Most of the time, the world seems  if not precisely orderly  then at least governed by fixed rules. At the macroscale, cause-and-effect rules the behavior of the universe, time always marches forward and objects in the universe have objective, measurable properties.

But zoom in enough, and those common-sense notions seem to evaporate. At the subatomic scale, particles can become entangled, meaning their fates are bizarrely linked. For instance, if two photons are sent from a laser through a crystal, after they fly off in separate directions, their spin will be linked the moment one of the particles is measured. Several studies have now confirmed that, no matter how far apart entangled particles are, how fast one particle is measured, or how many times particles are measured, their states become inextricably linked once they are measured.

Story continues

For nearly a century, physicists have tried to understand what this means about the universe. The dominant interpretation was that entangled particles have no fixed position or orientation until they are measured. Instead, both particles travel as the sum of the probability of all their potential positions, and both only "choose" one state at the moment of measurement. This behavior seems to defy notions of Einstein's theory of special relativity, which argues that no information can be transmitted faster than the speed of light. It was so frustrating to Einstein that he famously called it "spooky action at a distance."

To get around this notion, in 1935, Einstein and colleagues Boris Podolsky and Nathan Rosen laid out a paradox that could test the alternate hypothesis that some hidden variable affected the fate of both objects as they traveled. If the hidden variable model were true, that would mean "there's some description of reality which is objective," Ringbauer told Live Science. [Spooky! The Top 10 Unexplained Phenomena]

Then in 1964, Irish physicist John Stewart Bell came up with a mathematical expression, now known as Bell's Inequality, that could experimentally prove Einstein wrong by proving the act of measuring a particle affects its state.

In hundreds of tests since, Einstein's basic explanation for entanglement has failed: Hidden variables can't seem to explain the correlations between entangled particles.

But there was still some wiggle room: Bell's Inequality didn't address the situation in which two entangled photons travel faster than light.

A little wiggle left

In the new study, however, Ringbauer and his colleagues took a little bit more of that wiggle room away. In a combination of experiments and theoretical calculations, they show that even if a hidden variable were to travel from entangled photon "A" to entangled photon "B" instantaneously, that would not explain the correlations found between the two particles.

The findings may bolster the traditional interpretation of quantum mechanics, but that leaves physicists with other headaches, Ringbauer said. For one, it lays waste to our conventional notions of cause and effect, he said.

For another, it means that measurements and observations are subjective, Ognyan Oreshkov, a theoretical physicist at the Free University of Brussels in Belgium, told Live Science.

If the state of a particle depends on being measured or observed, then who or what is the observer when, for instance, subatomic particles in a distant supernova interact? What is the measurement? Who is "inside" the entangled system and who is on the outside observing it? Depending on how the system is defined, for instance, to include more and more objects and things, the "state" of any given particle may then be different, Ringbauer said.

"You can always draw a bigger box," Ringbauer said.

Still, realists should take heart. The new findings are not a complete death knell for faster-than-light interpretations of entanglement, said Oreshkov, who was not involved in the current study.

The new study "rules out only one specific model where the influence goes from the outcome of one measurement to the outcome of the other measurement," Oreshkov said. In other words, that photon A is talking to photon B at faster-than-light speeds.

Another possibility, however, is that the influence starts earlier, with the correlation in states somehow going from the point at which the photons became entangled (or at some point earlier in the experiment) to the measured photons at the end of the experiment, Oreshkov added. That, however, wasn't tested in the current research, he said. [10 Effects of Faster-Than-Light Travel]

Most physicists who were holding out for a nonlocal interpretation, meaning one not constrained by the speed of light, believe this latter scenario is more likely, said Jacques Pienaar, a physicist who was recently at the University of Vienna in Austria.

"There won't be anybody reading this paper saying, 'Oh, my God, I've been wrong my whole life,'" Pienaar, who was not involved in the current study, told Live Science. "Everybody is going to find it maybe surprising but not challenging, they'll very easily incorporate it into their theories."

Beyond Bell's Inequality

The new study suggests it may be time to retire Bell's Inequality, Pienaar said.

"I think that people are too focused on, too obsessed with Bell Inequalities," Pienaar said. "I think it's an idea which was really amazing and changed the whole field, but it's run its course."

Instead, a tangential idea laid out in the paper may be more intriguing  the development of a definition of causality on the quantum scale, he said.

If people focus on cracking quantum entanglement from these new perspectives, "I think lots of cool discoveries could be made," Pienaar said.

Original article on Live Science.

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LOS ANGELES, CA / ACCESSWIRE / September 16, 2016 / Lundin Law PC (the "Firm") announces that a class action lawsuit has been filed against Goldcorp Inc. ("Goldcorp" or the "Company") (GG) concerning possible violations of federal securities laws between March 31, 2014 and August 24, 2016 (the "Class Period"). Investors, who purchased or otherwise acquired shares during the Class Period, should contact the Firm in advance of the October 24, 2016 lead plaintiff motion deadline.

To participate in this class action lawsuit, click here. You can also call Brian Lundin, Esquire, of Lundin Law PC, at 888-713-1033, or e-mail him at brian@lundinlawpc.com.

No class has been certified in the above action yet. Until a class is certified, you are not considered represented by an attorney. You may also choose to do nothing and be an absent class member.

According to the Complaint, Goldcorp made false and/or misleading statements and/or failed to disclose: that Goldcorp's mine in Penasquito was leaking selenium into the groundwater well near the mine as early as October 2013; that the Company informed the Mexican government about the rise of selenium levels in the groundwater in October 2014; that in August 2016 the Company informed the Mexican government of contaminated water found in other properties near the mine; and as a result of the above, Goldcorp's public statements were materially false and misleading at all relevant times. When this news was disclosed to the public, shares of Goldcorp fell in value, which caused investors harm.

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SOURCE: Lundin Law PC
Geneva (AFP) - A United Nations expert on Friday called on Eritrea's government to urgently reveal the fate of around two dozen senior government officials and journalists arrested 15 years ago.

The group of senior cabinet ministers, members of parliament and independent journalists, including a Swedish national, were seized in a draconian purge on September 18, 2001 and the days that followed.

The government of Eritrea's authoritarian leader Issaias Afeworki has said those arrested were a threat to national security, and have never disclosed their whereabouts or state of health.

"Those arrested have been detained incommunicado and in solitary confinement," said Sheila Keetharuth, the UN special rapporteur on the human rights situation in Eritrea.

"Even family members have never been allowed to have any contact whatsoever with them," she said in a statement issued ahead of the 15th anniversary of the arrests.

They are all still being held in secret locations, although media reports indicate several may have died after being held for years in horrendous conditions.

Among those seized was Swedish-Eritrean journalist and author Dawit Isaak.

Despite efforts by Sweden, the EU and others to ensure his release or at least receive assurances that he is still alive, the diabetic journalist has been held incommunicado since then, accused of spying but never charged or sentenced.

Those arrested 15 years ago are not the only victims of rights abuses in Eritrea.

Keetharuth warned that "the 2001 clampdown set in motion a chain of egregious, widespread and systematic human rights violations that continues to this very day".

She listed arbitrary arrests, incommunicado detention, disappearances and torture among the continuing abuses.

Keetharuth served on a UN Commission of Inquiry that concluded earlier this year that Eritrean officials were guilty of "crimes against humanity".
BRATISLAVA (Reuters) - There can be no granting Britain access to the European Union's single market unless London also accepts the freedom of movement of workers that lies at its foundation, the EU's top officials said on Friday after an EU summit in Bratislava. "We want to have very good, very close relation with the UK. At the same time, it is not possible for these negotiations to damage our interests," the head of the executive European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker told a news conference. "Concerning the freedom of movement of workers and of persons ... we are sticking to that position and this is not a game between prime ministers leaving and prime ministers remaining, this is about people in Europe," Juncker said. "So I cannot see any possibility of compromising on that very issue," he said. The chairman of the EU summit Donald Tusk said divorce negotiations with Britain should be held only after a notification from London and should be run in the interest of the remaining 27 countries of the bloc, rather than Britain's. "It's absolutely clear that our procedures, our rules, described very precisely in our treaties, are to protect our interests, of the 27 countries, not the leaving country," Tusk told a news conference in Bratislava after the first meeting of EU leaders with Britain after the June 23 Brexit referendum. He also reiterated that talks with Britain cannot begin without a formal notification by the British government. He added that British Prime Minister Theresa May told him that talks may be formally triggered in January or February. (Reporting by Francesco Guarascio and Jan Strupczewski)
Edward Snowden hits out at critical report into his activities

Edward Snowden has dismissed a report by the House of Representatives intelligence committee that heavily criticised his activities.
Bratislava (AFP) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel warned on Friday that the EU faces a "critical situation", as European leaders sought to plot the bloc's post-Brexit future at a summit without Britain.

The 27 leaders -- minus British Prime Minister Theresa May -- gathered at Bratislava's towering castle overlooking the River Danube, determined to respond to the challenges of mass migration, security, globalisation and a stuttering economy.

The aim was to thrash out a "roadmap" of reforms during talks in the Slovak capital's towering hilltop castle, and a boat trip down the Danube.

Merkel said the bloc simply had to improve but her influence as leader of the EU's biggest economy has been undermined by her unpopular decision to open Germany's doors last year to nearly a million refugees.

"We are in a critical situation. We have to show with our actions that we can get better," Merkel said as she arrived at the special summit.

French President Francois Hollande, the other half of the EU's "power couple" with Merkel, was equally blunt.

"We face either break-up, weakening -- or we choose the opposite, together giving Europe a purpose," said Hollande, who has made common cause with Berlin on boosting EU defence cooperation.

- 'Brutally honest' -

EU President Donald Tusk had warned on the eve of the summit that leaders must "have a sober and brutally honest assessment of the situation."

The leaders want to launch a "Bratislava Process" of reforms at this summit, to be further discussed in Malta early next year and then agreed in Rome in March 2017 to mark the 60th anniversary of the founding of the EU.

An EU official said the initial discussions had been "honest, without recriminations" while Tusk had submitted his "roadmap" in the afternoon session.

European Commission head Jean-Claude Juncker had meanwhile submitted his version on Thursday but there were no major differences and it "mirrored" what was being discussed, the official said.

Story continues

Greeted by soldiers in bright blue uniforms and ceremonial plumes, the leaders held a first round of talks in the castle then lunched on a river cruise on a German-flagged boat down the Danube to informally discuss Brexit.

The 27 leaders have insisted there will be no formal Brexit talks until Britain triggers the two-year divorce process and says what it wants.

Maltese Premier Joseph Muscat quipped in a tweet: "Bratislava summit was so far a straightforward discussion of options for EU to move ahead. We are all on the same boat, literally."

Boosting defence cooperation is a key issue for the leaders who hope it will give them something to rally around after deadly terror attacks in France and Belgium.

Juncker earlier this week proposed an EU defence headquarters and a common defence force, both ideas that Britain had previously nixed because they might overlap with NATO.

- Cracks everywhere -

But cracks in the union are evident everywhere.

The migration crisis is the most divisive issue, with many Eastern European leaders blaming Merkel for opening the continent's doors to refugees from conflict in Syria and elsewhere.

Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, who is hosting the summit, said all wanted unity but a "very honest" exchange of views was needed to make that possible.

Yet Fico himself has been a divisive figure on the migrant issue, refusing to allow in a "single Muslim" and taking the EU's compulsory refugee-sharing policy to court.

The Visegrad Four, which groups Slovakia with Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic, largely holds the same view.

In a statement, the group said it was committed to reform of an EU in which closer integration allowed for strong national parliaments and free movement of people -- while member states should be able to decide their own policy on refugees.

Tensions had bubbled up earlier this week when Luxembourg's foreign minister called for Hungary to be suspended from the EU for treating refugees from war-torn Syria and other countries like "animals".

Meanwhile thrice-bailed out Greece last week gathered mostly centre and centre-left southern EU leaders in Athens to urge their northern counterparts to share more of the migrant burden and ease up on austerity.

The EU, a bloc of 500 million people, has been under siege since the 2008 global financial crash.

Russia's intervention in Ukraine, the migrant crisis and deadly Islamic State attacks in France and Belgium have eroded confidence that the EU can protect its citizens.
BRATISLAVA (Reuters) - The Bratislava Declaration Today we meet in Bratislava at a critical time for our European project. The Bratislava Summit of 27 Member States has been devoted to diagnose together the present state of the European Union and discuss our common future. We all agreed on the following general principles. Although one country has decided to leave, the EU remains indispensable for the rest of us. In the aftermath of the wars and deep divisions on our continent, the EU secured peace, democracy and enabled our countries to prosper. Many countries and regions outside still only strive for such achievements. We are determined to make a success of the EU with 27 Member States, building on this joint history. The EU is not perfect but it is the best instrument we have for addressing the new challenges we are facing. We need the EU not only to guarantee peace and democracy but also the security of our people. We need the EU to serve better their needs and wishes to live, study, work, move and prosper freely across our continent and benefit from the rich European cultural heritage. We need to improve the communication with each other  among Member States, with EU institutions, but most importantly with our citizens. We should inject more clarity into our decisions. Use clear and honest language. Focus on citizens expectations, with strong courage to challenge simplistic solutions of extreme or populist political forces. We committed in Bratislava to offer to our citizens in the upcoming months a vision of an attractive EU they can trust and support. We are confident that we have the will and the capacity to achieve it. We welcomed the State of the Union speech of the President of the Commission. We held a broad debate on the key priorities for the coming months. On this basis, the President of the European Council, the Presidency of the Council and the Commission proposed the following work program (the "Bratislava roadmap"): The Bratislava Roadmap I. General diagnosis and objective - Determined to make a success of the EU at 27 - Many common challenges ahead of us: people concerned by a perceived lack of control and fears related to migration, terrorism, and economic and social insecurity. Need to tackle these issues as a matter of priority over the coming months - Working together, the EU27 have the means to tackle these challenges. We are determined to find common solutions also as regards issues where we are divided; priority here and now to show unity and ensure political control over developments in order to build our common future - Need to be clear about what the EU can do, and what is for the Member States to do, to make sure we can deliver on our promises II. Migration and external borders Objective - Never to allow return to uncontrolled flows of last year and further bring down number of irregular migrants - Ensure full control of our external borders and get back to Schengen - Broaden EU consensus on long term migration policy and apply the principles of responsibility and solidarity Concrete measures a) full commitment to implementing the EU-Turkey statement as well as continued support to the countries of the Western Balkans b) commitment today by a number of Member States to offer immediate assistance to strengthen the protection of Bulgaria's border with Turkey, and continue support to other frontline States c) before the end of the year, full capacity for rapid reaction of the European Border and Coast Guard, now signed into law d) migration compacts for cooperation and dialogue with third countries to lead to reduced flows of illegal migration and increased return rates, to be assessed by the December European Council e) work to be continued to broaden EU consensus in terms of long term migration policy, including on how to apply the principles of responsibility and solidarity in the future III. Internal and external security - Internal Security Objective - Do everything necessary to support Member States in ensuring internal security and fighting terrorism Concrete measures a) intensified cooperation and information-exchange among security services of the Member States b) adoption of the necessary measures to ensure that all persons, including nationals from EU Member States, crossing the Union's external borders will be checked against the relevant databases, that must be interconnected c) start to set up a Travel Information and Authorisation System (ETIAS) to allow for advance checks and, if necessary, deny entry of visa-exempt travelers d) a systematic effort against radicalization, including through expulsions and entry bans where warranted as well as EU support to Member States' actions in prevention - External Security and Defence Objective - In a challenging geopolitical environment, strengthen EU cooperation on external security and defense Concrete measures a) December European Council to decide on a concrete implementation plan on security and defense and on how to make better use of the options in the Treaties, especially as regards capabilities b) start implementing the joint declaration with NATO immediately IV. Economic and social development, youth Objective - Create a promising economic future for all, safeguard our way of life and provide better opportunities for youth Concrete measures a) in December: decision on extension of the European Fund for Strategic Investment in light of evaluation b) Spring 2017 European Council: review progress as regards delivering on the different Single Market strategies (including Digital Single Market, Capital Markets Union, Energy Union) c) October European Council to address how to ensure a robust trade policy that reaps the benefits of open markets while taking into account concerns of citizens d) in December - decisions on EU support for Member States in fighting youth unemployment and on enhanced EU programs dedicated to youth V. Way ahead - Deliver on promises: strengthen the mechanism for reviewing the implementation of decisions taken. Loyal co-operation and communication of Member States and institutions - Bratislava is the beginning of a process. The coming formal European Council meetings will allow for concrete follow up on the themes mentioned here. The Heads of the 27 will meet informally at the beginning of 2017 in Valletta. The March 2017 celebrations of the 60th anniversary of the Rome Treaties will bring together Heads in Rome and will be used to round off the process launched in Bratislava, and set out orientations for our common future together. (Reporting By Jan Strupczewski)
By Noah Barkin and Jason Hovet BRATISLAVA (Reuters) - European leaders, struggling to overcome an historic crisis following Britain's vote to leave the EU, agreed on Friday to explore closer defense cooperation and boost security at their external borders, but could not hide deep divisions over refugees and economic policy. Meeting in the Slovak capital with the British conspicuously absent, the 27 other EU members unveiled a six-month "road map" of measures designed to restore public confidence in Europe's ailing common project. But several leaders, including Italy's Matteo Renzi and Hungary's Viktor Orban, shattered the facade of unity as soon as the meeting ended, underscoring how divided the bloc remains after years of economic crisis, a record influx of migrants and a series of deadly attacks by Islamist militants. "I'm not satisfied with the (summit) conclusions on growth or on immigration," said Renzi, apparently miffed at being excluded from a joint news conference given by Germany's Angela Merkel and France's Francois Hollande at the end of the summit. "To define as a step forward today's document on migrants would require a form of fantasy, a verbal high-wire act," the Italian prime minister added. Orban criticized Merkel for refusing to agree to a ceiling on the number of migrants entering Europe, calling her welcoming stance towards refugees "self-destructive and naive". Until the policy was corrected, the Hungarian premier said, a "suction effect" would continue to draw masses to Europe. People who were in the summit room said that neither Orban nor Renzi had raised serious complaints with other leaders during the talks, which were described as cordial. "This is clearly about domestic politics," one senior official said. "EXISTENTIAL CRISIS" The post-summit barbs tarnished a meeting that had been meant to send out a message of unity. The Brexit vote in June triggered what European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has described as an "existential crisis" for the EU. After more than a half century of closer integration, concerns are rife that the bloc may now be breaking apart because its 500 million citizens no longer see it as a guarantor of peace and prosperity. Far-right or anti-EU parties are leading in polls in France, the Netherlands and Austria. In Germany, a new anti-immigrant party, the Alternative for Germany, is causing panic among Merkel's conservatives before a national vote a year from now. In a joint declaration by the leaders, they said were committed to offering their people "a vision of an attractive EU they can trust and support". Their "roadmap" is a list of objectives and measures that will be debated in more detail over the next six months. The aim is to present a list of concrete reforms at a summit in the Italian capital in late March that coincides with the 60th anniversary of the EU's founding Rome Treaty. The leaders vowed to strengthen protection of Bulgaria's border with Turkey, intensify cooperation between their security services and bolster a European investment fund meant to foster growth and create jobs. Merkel, Europe's dominant leader for years but now under pressure at home for her refugee policies, said the EU needed more solidarity and cooperation, the values it was founded on by Germany, France, Italy and the Benelux countries in 1957. There has been tension between Merkel and ex-communist eastern states which have refused to take in asylum-seekers, many of them Muslims, even as she let in a million people last year. But Merkel also said she now accepted their argument for "flexible solidarity", by which they could help in the migrant crisis in ways other than by taking refugees in. FRANCO-GERMAN COUPLE Hollande, standing alongside her, said the summit had demonstrated that the EU was capable of moving forward after the Brexit vote. It was Germany and France that drove the bloc's foundation on the ashes of World War Two. But the Franco-German "motor" has stalled in recent years, with Germany playing an increasingly dominant role and France struggling with a weak economy, and more recently, a string of deadly Islamist attacks. By appearing together, the two leaders appeared intent on sending the message that they are determined to work together to reinvigorate the European Union post-Brexit. But the deeply unpopular Hollande is widely expected to lose power in a presidential election next spring, and speculation is rife in Germany about whether Chancellor Merkel will decide to run for a fourth term at next year's parliamentary election amid a fall in her popularity and infighting among her conservatives. The leaders touched on the looming divorce negotiations with Britain only briefly, with European Council President Donald Tusk leading a discussion over lunch on a boat on the Danube. (Additional reporting by Alastair Macdonald and Tatiana Jancarikova; Writing by Noah Barkin; Editing by Alastair Macdonald)
LONDON, Sept 16 (Reuters) - European shares edged lower in early trading on Friday and headed for their second straight week of losses, with Deutsche Bank slumping after saying the U.S. government was asking it to pay a huge amount to settle the mortgages case.

Shares in Deutsche Bank fell 6.7 percent, the top decliner in the pan-Europen STOXX 600 index, after Germany's flagship lender said the U.S. Department of Justice was asking it to pay $14 billion to settle an investigation into its selling of mortgage-backed securities.

Royal Bank of Scotland and Credit Suisse fell 4.8 percent and 4.5 percent respectively, pushing the European banking index 1.5 percent lower.

The STOXX Europe 600 index fell 0.1 percent in early trading. The index is down 1.6 percent so far this week, the biggest weekly loss since mid-August, after falling 1.4 percent in the previous week.

(Reporting by Atul Prakash, editing by Alistair Smout)
(BRATISLAVA, Slovakia)  With policy splits among European Union countries putting their bloc under existential threat, national leaders agreed Friday on a six-month time table to come up with solutions for the multiple crises hobbling their union. But they delivered few concrete commitments on ways to bridge the deep differences.

While not on the agenda, Britains decision to leave the EU hung over the meeting, reinforced by the absence of British Prime Minister Theresa May. But the 27 leaders attending talks in the Slovak capital had plenty of other divisive issues to discuss: Migration, a common European defense policy, worrying unemployment and the anemic state of the economy

In the end, the leaders committed to have a clear roadmap of the way ahead and some practical results when they meet in late March to mark the 60th anniversary of the EU founding Treaty of Rome in the Italian capital.

Europe can, must move forward, as long as it has clear priorities: protection, security, prosperity and the future of the youth, said French President Francois Hollande in a joint news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Merkel called the current situation in the EU critical, not only because Britain voted in June to leave the EU, the first ever member to do so.

She noted the migration crisis and economic problems that have fed growing disenchantment with the EU among many member states. Still, she said there was a common willingness to bounce back beyond the many issues that divide and even anger individual EU nations.

EU Council President Donald Tusk agreed, saying the mood in the EU now was sober but not defeatist.

Still, comments by some leaders as they left the meeting suggested hard work ahead.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, the staunchest opponent of liberal EU migration policies, again blamed Germany for refusing to set limits on migrant arrivals under Merkel. Unless Berlin caps arrivals, he said, the flood will continue because everyone sees  that there is a place in Europe where the good life can be achieved, where they are welcomed and where their needs are taken care of.

Story continues

Orban said Hungary should be praised instead of criticized for erecting a razor-wire barrier at its southern borders. Our job is to stop at the Hungarian border the negative consequences of the suction effect of German domestic politics, he said.

The refugee emergency has been particularly divisive and Orban has been one of the most abrasive voices as he makes common cause with other countries to the East  Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Poland  to oppose solutions coming out of EU headquarters in Brussels.

At the end of a difficult day of consultations, Orban said the good news is that all 27 remaining EU members said they would stay in the union and work together to improve it. But he complained that the current self-defeating and naive migration policies would remain.

Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, whose country holds the EUs rotating presidency, frankly acknowledged the divisions. There are different views, different ideas, he said. We need to be more concrete in the future.

Still, some of Orbans allies noted recent give by Brussels on the notion of mandatory refugee resettlement.

It is of great importance that we are leaving today with a new political agenda that will open the process of EU reforms, Polands Prime Minister Beata Szydlo said. We are opening the process of reforming Europe.

Others also noted some progress in discussions on how to heighten security and defense cooperation, secure external borders and get Europes unemployed youth back to work.

EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said a decision was taken to award 108 million euros ($121 million) in emergency funding to Bulgaria for border management at one of the most porous borders, with Turkey  a decision praised by Orban. Other EU nations committed extra equipment and personnel.

Added urgency for EU reform comes from planned elections in France and Germany next year where far-right and populist parties are seeking to exploit uncertainty generated by Britains decision to become the first country to walk out of the EU.

Hollande is trailing in the polls ahead of next Mays French presidential elections. His far-right opponent from the National Front, Marine Le Pen, has already said she will call for an in-out referendum on EU membership if she wins.

Europes weak economy also hampers EU efforts to make common cause. Greece remains in the zone of EU nations using the euro after its third international bailout. But it is still struggling to deliver on its promises to creditors. How to deal with the euros problems remains divisive  on one side are pro-austerity countries led by Germany, on the other, more social-minded governments.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, whose country has been at the center of the regions debt crisis and seen the arrival of hundreds of thousands of migrants, mostly from Turkey, over the last year, said things cannot continue as they are.

What Europe should not do is to continue sleepwalking in the wrong direction, he said.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, whose country was one of the EUs founders, insisted internal quarrels were not new.

When we started with six nations, they were there too, he said. We have to make sure we can fix them.
By Gabriela Baczynska and Robin Emmott

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Union's commissioner for industry will propose later this month that EU states issue joint bonds to expand the European defence industry, as part of the response to Britain's decision to leave the bloc.

Greater EU cooperation on defence has been frequently proposed but never materialised. The individual EU countries jealously guard their national defence industries, and Britain in particular opposed such proposals.

With Britain's decision to quit the EU, ideas for creating - and paying for - closer security and defence ties are re-emerging. Among them is a joint, permanent command headquarters for EU civilian and military missions.

"Our defence budgets are shrinking ... If you look at Russia increasing its defence budget by 97 percent and China by 160 percent, while the EU's has fallen 9 percent, it is really frightening," Industry Commissioner Elzbieta Bienkowska said in an interview.

"We are considering pooling national budgets to fund common defence projects and issuing joint EU bonds," she said, adding she would present the proposal to 27 EU defence ministers on September 27 in Bratislava, when they meet without Britain.

"Britain never expressed support, there was always resistance. But with Brexit we found interest, we have the momentum. The mood is quite different," Bienkowska told Reuters on Friday.

Bienkowska, who is in charge of the industrial part of the EU's new defence and security strategy, wants to create a European Defence Fund that could finance development of technology that the 27 states agreed they all need.

She said the funding could initially come from a new line in the existing European Fund for Strategic Investment (EFSI) specifically for development of defence projects.

The EFSI was set up last year as a three-year scheme to finance infrastructure, energy, research and development in the EU. It works by leveraging 15 times its own 21 billion euros with private investor money. Brussels wants to increase the fund and extend it, although member states have yet to endorse that.

Story continues

Bienkowska said EFSI could start funding defence projects next year but did not have a date for joint defence bonds. Germany has in the past opposed issuing common EU debt.

FINANCING

The European Commission has already proposed assigning 90 million euros in 2017-2020 for joint defence research, an idea awaiting approval by EU states and lawmakers.

Bienkowska hopes her proposals will help develop joint EU defence capabilities to make it less reliant on imported technology.

Ideas include developing a European drone, cyber defence or maritime surveillance technology. She wants to offer more VAT exemptions for joint EU defence programmes but opposes allowing deducting new defence spending from national debt, as some countries have proposed.

Italy has called for financial incentives for both technology development and joint purchases, proposing scrapping sales taxes for purchases and allowing deduction of some defence spending from national deficit calculations.

France and Germany, however, said in a recent joint proposal that any fiscal measures to build up a common defence market should not distort competition.

In addition, the European Investment Bank, a key source of funding for EFSI, has so far refused to invest in defence projects. Bienkowska hopes to change that.

"It's not only about using momentum of Brexit. It is about global challenges, technological shifts and the different threats we face ... There is growing awareness that some common idea of defence is really needed," Bienkowska said.

(Writing by Gabriela Baczynska, editing by Larry King)
By Gabriela Baczynska and Robin Emmott BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Union's commissioner for industry will propose later this month that EU states issue joint bonds to expand the European defense industry, as part of the response to Britain's decision to leave the bloc. Greater EU cooperation on defense has been frequently proposed but never materialized. The individual EU countries jealously guard their national defense industries, and Britain in particular opposed such proposals. With Britain's decision to quit the EU, ideas for creating - and paying for - closer security and defense ties are re-emerging. Among them is a joint, permanent command headquarters for EU civilian and military missions. "Our defense budgets are shrinking ... If you look at Russia increasing its defense budget by 97 percent and China by 160 percent, while the EU's has fallen 9 percent, it is really frightening," Industry Commissioner Elzbieta Bienkowska said in an interview. "We are considering pooling national budgets to fund common defense projects and issuing joint EU bonds," she said, adding she would present the proposal to 27 EU defense ministers on Sept. 27 in Bratislava, when they meet without Britain. "Britain never expressed support, there was always resistance. But with Brexit we found interest, we have the momentum. The mood is quite different," Bienkowska told Reuters on Friday. Bienkowska, who is in charge of the industrial part of the EU's new defense and security strategy, wants to create a European Defense Fund that could finance development of technology that the 27 states agreed they all need. She said the funding could initially come from a new line in the existing European Fund for Strategic Investment (EFSI) specifically for development of defense projects. The EFSI was set up last year as a three-year scheme to finance infrastructure, energy, research and development in the EU. It works by leveraging 15 times its own 21 billion euros with private investor money. Brussels wants to increase the fund and extend it, although member states have yet to endorse that. Bienkowska said EFSI could start funding defense projects next year but did not have a date for joint defense bonds. Germany has in the past opposed issuing common EU debt. FINANCING The European Commission has already proposed assigning 90 million euros in 2017-2020 for joint defense research, an idea awaiting approval by EU states and lawmakers. Bienkowska hopes her proposals will help develop joint EU defense capabilities to make it less reliant on imported technology. Ideas include developing a European drone, cyber defense or maritime surveillance technology. She wants to offer more VAT exemptions for joint EU defense programs but opposes allowing deducting new defense spending from national debt, as some countries have proposed. Italy has called for financial incentives for both technology development and joint purchases, proposing scrapping sales taxes for purchases and allowing deduction of some defense spending from national deficit calculations. France and Germany, however, said in a recent joint proposal that any fiscal measures to build up a common defense market should not distort competition. In addition, the European Investment Bank, a key source of funding for EFSI, has so far refused to invest in defense projects. Bienkowska hopes to change that. "It's not only about using momentum of Brexit. It is about global challenges, technological shifts and the different threats we face ... There is growing awareness that some common idea of defense is really needed," Bienkowska said. (Writing by Gabriela Baczynska, editing by Larry King)
By Madeline Kennedy (Reuters Health) - In the decade after Belgium legalized doctor-assisted death, the number of patients using it to end their lives rose nearly eight-fold, according to records of the national euthanasia control committee. Most patients choosing this way to die between 2003 and 2013 were younger than 80 and had cancer. But the largest increases in euthanasia cases over that period was among people older than 80, those without cancer and those not expected to die in the near future, researchers report in the Canadian Medical Association Journal. Belgium legalized euthanasia in 2002, and the new regulations allow a doctor to end a patients life if the patient requests it, has full mental capacity and has constant, unbearable physical or mental suffering, the researchers write. Recipients do not need to have a deadly illness, but their illness must be incurable, said senior author Kenneth Chambaere of the University of Brussels. There are a lot of concerns about the practice worldwide, and Belgium has come to be viewed as an example to learn from, Chambaere told Reuters Health by email. Also in Belgium the debate goes on, and this study is very helpful in gaining an overarching view of the practice, he added. Worldwide, The Netherlands, Belgium, Colombia and Luxemburg have legalized euthanasia, in which a doctor ends a persons life, usually by administering barbiturate drugs. In Switzerland, Germany, Japan and Canada, doctor-assisted suicide, where patients take the final action themselves, is legal. In the United States, physician-assisted dying is legal in only five states, Oregon, Vermont, Washington, California and Montana. To determine how the practice of euthanasia has evolved since it was legalized in Belgium, the study team used data on cases recorded between 2003 and 2013 by the Federal Control and Evaluation Committee on Euthanasia. The total number of doctor-assisted deaths over the decade after legalization was 8,752, with a steady increase each year. In 2003, there were 235 euthanasia cases, representing 0.2 percent of nationwide deaths, and in 2013, there were 1,807 cases, which was 1.7 percent of deaths. In 2013, people with cancer made up 69 percent of all cases, and 65 percent were under age 80. Among cases reported from Dutch-speaking parts of the country, the proportion involving people who were expected to die in the near future fell from 94 percent in 2003 to 84 percent in 2013. In French-speaking parts of Belgium, there was no significant change in this category. Throughout the decade, palliative, or quality of life, care teams came to be consulted more often for euthanasia requests, even beyond what the law required. The study findings might suggest an increase in euthanasia requests as patients became familiar with the law, and an increase in willingness to perform euthanasia as doctors became more experienced and society grew accustomed to the practice, the researchers write. Among the studys limitations is that the committee records did not contain details about the patients clinical circumstances and the exact nature of suffering that caused them to seek euthanasia, they add. Marcel Zwahlen, a researcher at the Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine at the University of Bern in Switzerland, noted that not all societal groups approve of euthanasia. Most of the concerns surround the free will of the patient and whether the decision to get help in committing suicide is really free, especially for cases with neuropsychiatric conditions, Zwahlen said by email. People may also fear that more vulnerable patients may be coerced into the decision, especially if they cannot afford care, said Zwahlen. There have been no large scandals in Belgium, however, and the practice is becoming more normal, Zwahlen noted. Although cancer was historically the most common cause, people suffering from Lou Gehrigs disease, lung or heart problems and psychiatric issues may choose euthanasia. There is more ongoing debate about psychiatric patients, Chambaere said, adding that this will be the focus of his teams future research. Chambaere stressed the importance of continuing to monitor the practice of euthanasia, as issues can always arise in the future. He is optimistic, though. The study has a clear message that Belgium has had a predominantly positive experience in implementing euthanasia practice, Chambaere said. SOURCE: bit.ly/2c957I4 Canadian Medical Association Journal, online September 12, 2016.
First International Youth Conference on October 1

The first International Nepali Youth Conference is set to take place in Bhaktapur from coming October 1.
From Delish

Update: Nov. 1, 2016 at 5:01 p.m. EST

If you don't happen to live near one of these new cheesecake restaurants, don't let the FOMO set in-we've found a way for you to make it yourself at home and have it taste as authentic as the real deal. Pinterest let us in on their ~trendiest~ dessert of the moment, which just so happens to be a Japanese cheesecake. Searches for the dessert are up 42 percent this year, and this recipe in particular has been saved over 200k times. Wowza.

Original Post: Sept. 15, 2016 at 6:06 p.m. EST

Get ready for a new trendy food to take over your Instagram feeds, because Japanese cheesecake has come to the U.S., and it's about to blow up. Seriously, it's such a big deal that two restaurants have opened just to sell the foreign dessert. But wait-what the heck actually is Japanese cheesecake? If you don't know, you definitely aren't alone.

Japanese cheesecake is nothing like any cheesecake you've had before. Seriously, mad love for New York and all, but the Japanese cheesecakes are legit. They have a more fluffy, sponge-like texture than classic cheesecake, thanks to the Japanese technique of whisking the egg whites separately before incorporating them by hand for aeration, but they've still got that rich, creamy goodness that you love. Another big difference? Though you can have them cold, they're also eaten hot, fresh out of the oven, so they literally melt in your mouth. Um, where can we get one, like ASAP?

Good news-Uncle Tetsu has opened up two cheesecake restaurants in the United States! But they're currently only in Hawaii and California. Given the insane popularity of this dessert, expansion is no doubt on the horizon, but until then, you're going to have to book a plane ticket if you don't happen to live in one of those two states. But hey, at least it's a shorter flight than going all the way to Japan.

Follow Delish on Instagram.

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edward snowden

In June 2013, The Guardian reported the first leak based on top-secret documents that then 29-year-old Edward Snowden stole from the National Security Agency. At the time, Snowden worked as an intelligence contractor for Booz Allen Hamilton in Hawaii.

That leak would certainly not be the last. In the years since, journalists have released more than 7,000 top-secret documents that Snowden entrusted them with, which some believe is less than 1% of the entire archive.

Now, with the film "Snowden" premiering Friday, it's worth taking a look back at what secrets Snowden actually revealed. We've compiled every single leak that came out in the first year of the Snowden saga, though there were many more that came later.

Snowden downloaded up to 1.5 million files, according to national intelligence officials, before jetting from Hawaii to Hong Kong to meet with journalists Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras. After he handed off his treasure trove of documents, he flew from Hong Kong and later became stranded in Moscow. His future was far from certain, as the journalists he trusted started revealing his secrets.

Here is everything that Snowden's leaks revealed between 2013 and 2014:

 With a top-secret court order, the NSA collected the telephone records from millions of Verizon customers.  June 6, 2013

NSA PRISM slide

 The NSA accessed and collected data through back doors into US internet companies such as Google and Facebook with a program called Prism.  June 7, 2013

 An 18-page presidential memo shows Obama ordering intelligence officials to draw up a list of overseas targets for cyberattacks.  June 7, 2013

 Documents reveal the NSA's Boundless Informant program, which gives the agency near real-time ability to understand how much intelligence coverage there is on certain areas through use of a "heat map."  June 8, 2013

 The NSA was hacking computers in Hong Kong and mainland China, few of which were military systems.  June 13, 2013

Story continues

 Britain's GCHQ (its intelligence agency) intercepted phone and internet communications of foreign politicians attending two G-20 meetings in London in 2009.  June 16, 2013

 Top-secret procedures show steps the NSA must take to target and collect data from "non-US persons" and how it must minimize data collected on US citizens.  June 20, 2013

 Britain's GCHQ taps fiber-optic cables to collect and store global email messages, Facebook posts, internet histories, and calls, and then shares the data with the NSA.  June 21, 2013

 The NSA has a program codenamed EvilOlive that collects and stores large quantities of Americans' internet metadata, which contains only certain information about online content. Email metadata, for example, reveals the sender and recipient addresses and time but not content or subject.  June 27, 2013

 Until 2011, the Obama administration permitted the NSA's continued collection of vast amounts of Americans' email and internet metadata under a Bush-era program called Stellar Wind.  June 27, 2013

 The US government bugged the offices of the European Union in New York, Washington, and Brussels.  June 29, 2013

 The US government spies on at least 38 foreign embassies and missions, using a variety of electronic surveillance methods.  June 30, 2013

 The NSA spies on millions of phone calls, emails, and text messages of ordinary German citizens.  June 30, 2013

 Using a program called Fairview, the NSA intercepts internet and phone-call data of Brazilian citizens.  July 6, 2013

 Monitoring stations set up in Australia and New Zealand help feed data back to NSA's XKeyscore program.  July 6, 2013

 The NSA conducts surveillance on citizens in a number of Latin American countries, including Venezuela, Colombia, Argentina, Panama, Ecuador, Peru, and others. The agency also sought information on oil, energy, and trade.  July 9, 2013

 The Washington Post publishes a new slide detailing NSA's "Upstream" program of collecting communications from tech companies through fiber-optic cables to then feed into its Prism database.  July 10, 2013

 Germany's Federal Intelligence Service, BND, helps contribute data to the NSA's XKeyscore program.  July 20, 2013

NSA2

 NSA analysts, using the XKeyscore program, can search through enormous databases of emails, online chats, and browsing histories of targets.  July 31, 2013

 The US government paid Britain's GCHQ roughly $155 million over three years to gain access and influence over its spying programs.  August 1, 2013

 Seven of the world's leading telecommunications companies provide GCHQ with secret, unlimited access to their network of undersea cables.  August 2, 2013

 The NSA provided surveillance to US diplomats in order to give them the upper hand in negotiations at the UN Summit of the Americas.  August 2, 2013

 The NSA sifts through vast amounts of Americans' email and text communications going in and out of the country.  August 8, 2013

 Internal NSA document reveals an agency "loophole" that allows a secret backdoor for the agency to search its databases for US citizens' emails and phone calls without a warrant.  August 9, 2013

 NSA collection on Japan is reportedly maintained at the same priority as France and Germany.  August 12, 2013

 The NSA broke privacy rules thousands of times per year, according to an internal audit.  August 15, 2013

 NSA analysts revealed to have sometimes spied on love interests, with the practice common enough to have coined the term LOVEINT, or love intercepts. (It was unclear whether this report came from Snowden docs.)  August 23, 2013

 Britain runs a secret internet-monitoring station in the Middle East to intercept emails, phone calls, and web traffic, The Independent reports, citing Snowden documents. Snowden denies giving The Independent any documents, alleging the UK government leaked them in an attempt to discredit him.  August 23, 2013

 The top-secret US intelligence "black budget" is revealed for 2013, with 16 spy agencies having a budget of $52.6 billion.  August 29, 2013

Black Budget

 Expanding upon data gleaned from the "black budget," the NSA is found to be paying hundreds of millions of dollars each year to US companies for access to their networks.  August 29, 2013

 The US carried out 231 offensive cyberattacks in 2011.  August 30, 2013

 The NSA hacked into Qatar-based media network Al Jazeera's internal communications system.  August 31, 2013

 The NSA spied on former Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto (then a candidate).  September 1, 2013

 Using a "man in the middle" attack, NSA spied on Google, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications, and the Brazilian oil company Petrobras.  September 2, 2013

 A US intelligence "black budget" reveals Al Qaeda's effort to jam, hack, and/or shoot down US surveillance drones.  September 3, 2013

 A joint investigation by ProPublica, The New York Times, and The Guardian finds the NSA is winning its war against internet encryption with supercomputers, technical know-how, and court orders.  September 5, 2013

 The NSA has the ability to access user data for most major smartphones on the market, including Apple iPhones, BlackBerrys, and Google Android phones.  September 7, 2013

 The NSA shares raw intelligence data (with information about American citizens) to Israel with an information-sharing agreement.  September 11, 2013

 The NSA monitors banks and credit institutions for a comprehensive database that can track the global flow of money.  September 16, 2013

 Britain's GCHQ launched a cyberattack against Belgacom, a partly state-owned Belgian telecommunications company.  September 20, 2013

 The NSA spies on Indian diplomats and other officials in an effort to gain insight into the country's nuclear and space programs.  September 23, 2013

 The NSA's internal "wiki" website characterizes political and legal opposition to drone attacks as part of "propaganda campaigns" from America's "adversaries."  September 25, 2013

 Since 2010, the NSA has used metadata augmented with other data from public, commercial, and other sources to create sophisticated graphs that map Americans' social connections.  September 28, 2013

 The NSA stores a massive amount of internet metadata from internet users, regardless of whether they are being targeted, for up to one year in a database called Marina.  September 30, 2013

 The NSA and GCHQ worked together to compromise the anonymous web-browsing Tor network.  October 4, 2013

 Canada's signals intelligence agency, CSEC, spied on phone and computer networks of Brazil's Ministry of Mines and Energy and shared the information with the "Five Eyes" intelligence services of the US, Canada, Britain, Australia, and New Zealand.  October 7, 2013

nsa computer spying

 The NSA collected more than 250 million email contact lists from services such as Yahoo and Gmail.  October 14, 2013

 NSA surveillance was revealed to play a key role in targeting for overseas drone strikes.  October 16, 2013

 The NSA spied on French citizens, companies, and diplomats, and monitored communications at France's embassy in Washington and its UN office in New York.  October 21, 2013

 The NSA tapped the mobile phone of German Chancellor Angela Merkel.  October 23, 2013

 The NSA spied on Italian citizens, companies, and government officials.  October 24, 2013

 The NSA monitored the phone calls of 35 world leaders and encouraged other government agencies to share their "Rolodexes" of foreign politicians so it could monitor them.  October 25, 2013

 The NSA spied on Spanish leaders and citizens.  October 25, 2013

 The NSA stations surveillance teams at 80 locations around the world.  October 27, 2013

 A joint program between the NSA and Britain's GCHQ called Muscular infiltrates and copies data flowing out of Yahoo and Google's overseas data centers. One slide boasted of "SSL added and removed here!" with a smiley face.  October 30, 2013



 The NSA spied on the Vatican. (The Panorama website did not cite Snowden as the source.)  October 30, 2013

One slide boasted of "SSL added and removed here!" with a smiley face.

 Australia's intelligence service has surveillance teams stationed in Australian embassies around Asia and the Pacific.  October 31, 2013

 One document reveals tech companies play a key role in NSA intelligence reports and data collection.  November 1, 2013

 Britain's GCHQ and other European spy agencies work together to conduct mass surveillance.  November 1, 2013

 Strategic missions of the NSA are revealed, which include combatting terrorism and nuclear proliferation, as well as pursuing US diplomatic and economic advantage.  November 2, 2013

 Australia's Defense Signals Directorate and the NSA worked together to spy on Indonesia during a UN climate change conference in 2007.  November 2, 2013

 The NSA spied on OPEC.  November 11, 2013

 GCHQ monitored the booking systems of 350 high-end hotels with a program called Royal Concierge, which sniffed for booking confirmations sent to diplomatic email addresses that would be flagged for further surveillance.  November 17, 2013

 Australia's DSD spied on the cellphones of top Indonesian officials, including the president, first lady, and several cabinet ministers.  November 18, 2013

 The NSA spied on millions of cellphone calls in Norway in one 30-day period.  November 19, 2013

 The British government struck a secret deal with the NSA to share phone, internet, and email records of UK citizens.  November 20, 2013

NSA

 A NSA strategy document reveals the agency's goal to acquire data from "anyone, anytime, anywhere" and expand its already broad legal powers.  November 22, 2013

 The NSA infected more than 50,000 computer networks worldwide with malware designed to steal sensitive information.  November 23, 2013

 The NSA gathers evidence of visits to pornographic websites as part of a plan to discredit Muslim jihadists.  November 26, 2013

 Working with Canadian intelligence, the NSA spied on foreign diplomats at the G-8 and G-20 summits in Toronto in 2010.  November 28, 2013

 The Netherlands' intelligence service gathers data on web-forum users and shares it with the NSA.  November 30, 2013

 A draft document reveals Australia offered to share information collected on ordinary Australian citizens with the NSA and other "Five Eyes" partners.  December 1, 2013

 The NSA siphons billions of foreign cellphone location records into its database.  December 4, 2013

 Widespread spying is revealed in Italy, with the NSA spying on ordinary Italians as well as diplomats and political leaders.  December 5, 2013

 Swedish intelligence was revealed to be spying on Russian leaders, then passing it on to the NSA.  December 5, 2013

 A document reveals the extent of the relationship between NSA and Canadian counterparts, which includes information-sharing and Canada allowing NSA analysts access to covert sites it sets up.  December 9, 2013

WoW World of Warcraft video game

 Intelligence operatives with NSA and GCHQ infiltrate online video games such as "World of Warcraft" in an effort to catch and stop terrorist plots.  December 9, 2013

 Piggybacking on online "cookies" acquired by Google that advertisers use to track consumer preferences, the NSA is able to locate new targets for hacking.  December 10, 2013

 The NSA has the ability to decrypt the common A5/1 cellphone encryption cipher.  December 13, 2013

 The NSA secretly paid the computer security firm RSA $10 million to implement a "back door" into its encryption.  December 20, 2013

 A document reveals how Britain's GCHQ spied on Germany, Israel, the European Union, and several nongovernmental organizations.  December 20, 2013

 With a $79.7 million research program, the NSA is working on a quantum computer that would be able to crack most types of encryption.  January 2, 2014

 Using radio transmitters on tiny circuit boards or USB drives, the NSA can gain access to computers not connected to the internet.  January 14, 2014

 The NSA scoops "pretty much everything it can" in untargeted collection of foreign text messages for its Dishfire database.  January 16, 2014

 The NSA scoops up personal data mined from smartphone apps such as Angry Birds.  January 27, 2014

 A GCHQ program called Squeaky Dolphin monitors YouTube, Facebook, and Blogger for "broad real-time monitoring of online activity."  January 27, 2014

The NSA scoops "pretty much everything it can" in untargeted collection of foreign text messages.

 The NSA spied on negotiators during the 2009 UN climate change conference in Copenhagen, Denmark.  January 29, 2014

 CSEC, Canada's national cryptologic agency, tested a pilot program with the NSA that captured metadata from users who had logged into free airport Wi-Fi.  January 30, 2014

 Britain's GCHQ waged war on hacker groups such as Anonymous and Lulzsec, mounting Distributed Denial-of-Service attacks and infiltrating their chat rooms.  February 5, 2014

 The NSA reportedly monitored former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroder in the run-up to the Iraq war.  February 5, 2014

 Britain's GCHQ used "dirty tricks" such as computer viruses and sexual "honey traps" to target adversaries.  February 7, 2014

 The US's "targeted killing" program of drone strikes relies mostly on cellphone metadata and geolocation, rather than on-the-ground human intelligence.  February 10, 2014

 An American law firm was monitored by the Australian Signals Directorate while representing the government of Indonesia during a trade dispute.  February 15, 2014

 The NSA and Britain's GCHQ reportedly monitored traffic to the WikiLeaks website and considered a move to monitor communications going to or from WikiLeaks and the Pirate Bay.  February 18, 2014

 Britain's GCHQ conducts covert operations to disrupt and shape online discourse.  February 24, 2014

NSA headquarters

 Britain's GCHQ, using a program called Optic Nerve, intercepted and stored webcam images from millions of Yahoo users, then passed them on to the NSA's XKeyscore database.  February 28, 2014

 The NSA shared intelligence that helped the Dutch navy capture a ship hijacked by pirates off Somalia, and the Netherlands regularly shares information with the NSA regarding Somalia and Afghanistan.  March 5, 2014

 The NSA has an advice columnist similar to "Dear Abby" who writes an "Ask Zelda" column distributed on the agency's internal network.  March 7, 2014

 NSA developed sophisticated malware "implants" to infect millions of computers worldwide. In one example, the NSA posed as a fake Facebook server to infect a target's computer and steal files.  March 12, 2014

 Document reveals that, while many foreign governments share information with NSA, few senior officials outside of the intelligence or defense sphere have any knowledge of it.  March 13, 2014

 The NSA built a system capable of recording "100%" of a foreign country's phone calls with a voice intercept program called Mystic. The Washington Post did not name the countries where the program was used.  March 18, 2014

 The NSA specifically targets foreign systems administrators to gain access to their networks.  March 20, 2014

 The NSA closely monitored the Chinese technology firm Huawei in attempt to reveal ties between the company and the Chinese military. The agency also spied on Chinese banks and other companies, as well as former President Hu Jintao.  March 22, 2014

 Malaysia's political leadership is a high-priority intelligence target for the US and Australia  March 30, 2014

 NSA and Britain's GCHQ discussed various methods of deception, use of propaganda, mass messaging, and pushing stories on social media sites  April 4, 2014

 The Norwegian Intelligence Service is developing a supercomputer, called Steel Winter, to decrypt and analyze data from Afghanistan, Russia, and elsewhere.  April 26, 2013

NSAPhotos

 Britain's GCHQ asked the NSA for "unsupervised access" to the NSA's vast databases. It was unclear whether the request was granted.  April 30, 2014

 The NSA physically intercepts routers, servers, and other computer networking equipment before it's exported outside the US, implants "back door" surveillance tools, then repackages them with a factory seal and ships them out.  May 12, 2014

 The NSA is intercepting, recording, and archiving virtually every cellphone call in the Bahamas and one other country, which The Intercept redacted. It also reveals metadata collection on Mexico, Kenya, and the Philippines.  May 19, 2014

 After giving journalist Glenn Greenwald a 72-hour warning to reveal the nation redacted from his previous report on mass surveillance of an entire country, WikLeaks reveals the country in question is Afghanistan.  May 23, 2014

 The NSA harvests millions of faces from web images for use in a previously undisclosed facial recognition database.  May 31, 2014

Author's note: I've tried my best to be thorough in sifting through the hundreds of leaks that have come to light thus far. I have not included Snowden's movements, legal situation, or any of the political drama surrounding the leaks. This timeline only shows the many reports stemming from documents the ex-NSA contractor handed over to journalists.

If I have missed any leaks in the hundreds of news stories on these items, that mistake is mine alone.

This post relied upon a similar timeline from Al Jazeera America, as well as a catalog at Lawfare Blog, and an article at the National Journal.





More From Business Insider


Dr. Phil is standing by Burke Ramsey.

Audiences have reacted strongly to the talk show host's three-part interview with JonBenet Ramsey's brother, in particular the 29-year-old's seemingly inappropriate smiling while discussing his sister's murder. However, Dr. Phil insists Burke's smile is just a result of anxiety.



WATCH: JonBenet Ramsey's Brother and Father Address Theories of Who Killed Her: 'I Know We Were Suspects'

ET caught up with Dr. Phil on Thursday, where he spoke more about Burke, and defended him against naysayers.

"Burke is not and has never been a suspect in this case," he simply stated. "I think people have considered him otherwise because, in the very beginning, the DA and the Boulder PD have acknowledged and admitted they put out misinformation to the media, to the public, to try to put pressure on the Ramseys to either make a mistake or break or confess."

"Burke has been the missing link in this whole thing because in 20 years, he's never spoken," he continued. "He is, as I say, the only other person known in the house."

JonBenet's body was found on Dec. 26, 1996 in the basement of her family's Colorado home by her father, John, hours after police had already searched the home. John and his wife, Patsy, had initially contacted police upon discovering a ransom note demanding $118,000 for the 6-year-old beauty queen's safe return. John, Burke and Patsy -- who died of ovarian cancer in 2006 -- were ultimately cleared of any wrongdoing by police in 2008.



WATCH: JonBenet Ramsey's Brother Burke Reveals Why He Stayed in His Room After Sister Went Missing

As for Burke's critics, who find his ability to smile when talking about his sister's murder unsettling, Dr. Phil says he's just shy.

"People have commented on his smile, which is purely from anxiety," he explained. "He's kind of a loner. He's socially uncomfortable."

Story continues

"When people are anxious, they do different things. They pull on their hair or fiddle around, or whatever for him, it's a nervous smile," he said, adding that he thinks some have gotten used to Burke's seemingly odd facial expression. "I think they've gotten past that and listened to the sincerity of his answers and said, 'OK, he's just nervous.'"

Dr. Phil also offered insight into Burke's life at home, saying that while he's been "moved around" and "lived in isolation," he now "has a very nice life."

"He's a very private individual, but he has a great career and has a good relationship with his father," he shared. "They're not together all the time. They live half a country apart."

WATCH: EXCLUSIVE: Dr. Phil Asks Burke Ramsey if He Murdered JonBenet in Upcoming Interview

Instead, Dr. Phil says Burke is keeping himself busy with a job in the computer industry, and enjoying the company of his girlfriend. "He's in a relationship with a very nice young woman," he said, adding that he was shocked by Burke's "brilliance."

"He works in [computer] security, and I started asking him questions. I wasn't through the second question before he was so far beyond my understanding, I just kind of glazed over," Dr. Phil recalled. "He's very bright, very sophisticated, very well educated, and very sophisticated in what he does, and has a lot of pride in it actually."

"The interesting thing about the passage of time is you don't have to speculate about who someone is. It's been 20 years since this happened and in that time, Burke's never been in trouble with the law. He's never had any problem with assault or violence or anything like that. It's totally consistent with him not being a suspect," he concluded, before teasing viewers with what lies ahead in the final installment of his interview with Burke.

"On our final episode, what you're going to hear is Burke's very specific theory about who killed his sister," he promised.

WATCH: JonBenet Ramsey's Brother Speaks Out on Sister's Unsolved Murder Nearly 20 Years After Her Death

Part three of Dr. Phil's interview with Burke will air Monday, Sept. 19.

See more about Burke's interview in the video below.

Related Articles
On Friday, Sept. 16, the popular pot-themed web series High Maintenance makes its debut on HBO with six brand-new, half-hour episodes.

Offering a glimpse into the eccentric lives of New Yorkers, High Maintenance connects the narratives of seemingly unrelated people through their shared weed dealer. In each episode, The Guy, a fly-on-the-wall deliveryman played by Ben Sinclair, introduces audiences to a new customer as he makes his routine deliveries. From there, what unfolds are often funny, sometimes unexpectedly heartfelt stories about strangers in New York City.

Those strangers are brought to life by an eclectic group of actors -- from A-listers to an adult film star  that creators (and married couple) Sinclair and Katja Blichfeld have asked to guest star on the series.

MORE: Creators of HBO's 'High Maintenance' Take Fans Behind the Scenes of Original Web Series

Many of them, such as Broadway star Helene Yorke, Greta Lee (Sisters and Inside Amy Schumer), Downton Abbey's Dan Stevens and Orange Is the New Black actress Yael Stone, return for the HBO run after first appearing -- in Stone and Yorke's cases, multiple times -- on the show when it was a web series streaming on Vimeo.

"I was like, 'How can I possibly find a way to be part of this amazing thing?'" Stone tells ET about being a self-proclaimed superfan of the show. "It was a little stalk-y. It was a little Lorna Morello."

In her HBO episode, "Grandpa," Stone -- taking time away from her life as Morello inside Litchfield -- plays a dog walker named Beth, who has some serious hipster style and just happens to be what the actress wears off-screen. "Now, I've blown my cover on the subway. My kooky grandma glasses that keep me well-disguised are not going to be much a disguise anymore."

HBO

An Emmy-winning casting director, Blichfeld first worked with Yorke and the actress's on-screen roommate and gay bestie, Max Jenkins, on 30 Rock before bringing them in for the web series.

Story continues

"I'm not surprised people love it," Yorke says of High Maintenance. When the Broadway star first worked on the show, it was very much a low-budget affair ("It was real scrappy," as Sinclair puts it), with only five people on the crew. Now, it's a much bigger experience.

MORE: Kelly Ripa Gets Drunk and High in Totally Unexpected, Hilarious 'Broad City' Cameo

But Yorke says that fans of the HBO series should eventually watch the original episodes (streaming on HBO Go and HBO Now). "It's fun to see the evolution of what this project is," she says of not only the production values, but the story and recurring characters. "You get that progression. It's like, 'Oh sh*t, this is where these people came from.'"

Yorke and Jenkins' characters, who were collectively known as "A**holes" in the web series, return for the premiere ("Meth(od)"), where their relationship comes to a poignant head, leading Max straight into the arms (and bed) of random hookup played by gay porn star Colby Keller. "I don't remember who contacted me, but it was like, 'Yes, sign me up now,'" Keller says, unsure how he came across Blichfeld or Sinclair's radar. (At the show's HBO premiere party, Blichfeld had nothing but adoration for Keller in his first major scripted role.)

Getty Images

A first-timer on the series, Kelly was also a fan -- like many of the new guest stars to join the HBO season. "I was obsessed with that show when it was a web series," Miriam Shor, the Younger star who makes her debut in episode two ("Museebat"), says. "I think it's one of the finest shows I've ever seen."

Shor, like many of its guest stars ET spoke to, has nothing but praise for Sinclair and Blichfeld. "I stopped the creators and forced them into having a meeting with me so they would be my friends," she says, a tactic that eventually landed her a role. "They were like, 'Fine. We'll put you in an episode.'"

"I'm always impressed by the beautiful community of people they have around them," Stone adds.

While Shor couldn't spoil anything about her appearance, we can assure fans it's a funny episode that sees the return of Stevens' women's couture enthusiast and newcomer Amy Ryan, adding some A-list appeal to the series of friends getting high together.

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Long Island-born comedian Kevin James scored a big win for his birthplace, as his new show, Kevin Can Wait, is the first sitcom to actually shoot there.

ET's Kevin Frazier was invited to the set, where James dished on some of the biggest perks of shooting in the New York State community.

WATCH: Kevin James on How New 'Kevin Can Wait' Role Differs From His 'King of Queens' Character

"We will not go, I'd say 45 minutes, without a gyro being offered to you," James tells ET. "I have a pizza oven here that's going live every Friday night."

Another benefit is its close proximity to James' East Coast home.

"It's about 10 or 15 minutes away!" says the married father of four. "I'm good."

WATCH: Kevin James Feels Right at Home in New Series 'Kevin Can Wait'

In the series, James stars as a retired police officer looking forward to spending quality time with his wife and three kids, but he has a rude awakening when he learns that being at home presents tougher challenges than anything the mean streets can dish out.

Kevin Can Wait premieres Sept. 19 on CBS.

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Fashion is usually associated with cities like New York and Paris, but many of your favorite models came from America's heartland, thanks to Jeff and Mary Clarke, the husband and wife behind Mother Model Management.

"Mary walked up to me and said, 'You need to do this,'" Iowa native Ashton Kutcher said in a 1997 interview. "So I entered a fresh faces contest."

WATCH: Ashton Kutcher Reveals His 'Secret Passion for Singing,' Says He Wants Blake Shelton on 'The Ranch'

Kutcher and fellow Midwesterner Karlie Kloss are just two of the talented people the Clarkes discovered. Kutcher was still in college when Mary, who also hails from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, spotted the young man in a bar and put him on the path that would lead to his illustrious career.

"It is really powerful to see even him up on stage talking to everybody," Mary told ET at the Back Porch Festival last month. "You can't help but think it was 20 years ago and look at everything that has happened. It's pretty incredible."

According to Kutcher, the Clarkes' effect on his life didn't stop at launching his career. They were also there for him when times got tough.

WATCH: Candace Cameron Bure Is 'So Proud' of Daughter Natasha's Runway Debut

"I'll tell you a little story about what makes them unbelievable," Kutcher told ET. "I started doing really well right off the bat, and then I went to Chicago, and I was really struggling. I was on my last dime and to the point where I was like, 'I don't know if I can do this anymore.' I called them and they loaned me $300. And they got me back on my feet and got me back going."

The couple found Kloss at a local benefit fashion show and Vogue cover girl Grace Hartzel was just 14 when Mary approached her at a Cheesecake Factory in St. Louis.

Jeff and Mary scour the country for men and women with runway potential, but Mary explained why Iowa stands apart from anywhere else in the nation.

Story continues

WATCH: Mila Kunis' 7 Most Candid Revelations About Ashton Kutcher

"There is a genuine, heartfelt difference," Mary said, "and they are physically beautiful and people are really tall because of that corn. The secret is the corn!"

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By Anthony Deutsch, John Irish and Michelle Nichols THE HAGUE/UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - An international inquiry has identified two Syrian Air Force helicopter squadrons and two other military units it holds responsible for chlorine gas attacks on civilians, a Western diplomat told Reuters. The finding by the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), the global chemical weapons watchdog, is based on Western and regional intelligence, the diplomat said. "It was the 22nd Division, the 63rd Brigade and the 255 and 253 squadrons of the Syrian government," the envoy said. The identification of specific military institutions responsible for attacks could strengthen a push by some Western members of the U.N. Security Council for a robust response, focused on sanctions and accountability. President Bashar al-Assad's government has denied using toxic gas on the battlefield, and said it will cooperate with the OPCW over accusations it has used poison gas against insurgent-held areas during Syria's civil war. Responding to the new finding, a Syrian military source told Reuters: "The Syrian state ... and we, the Syrian Arab army, have said more than once that the army has not and will not use any banned weapon, especially chemical or poison weapons." "This issue is completely void of truth. We consider the United Nations to be a tool in the hands of some countries which support terrorists," the source said, adding that the U.N. had not responded to Syrian requests to investigate alleged use of chemical weapons by insurgents. The year-long joint U.N. and OPCW inquiry, which is investigating reports of attacks between April 11 2014 and Aug. 21 2015, is due to submit its fourth report to the U.N. Security Council next week. The third report, in August, blamed Syrian government troops for two chlorine gas attacks and Islamic State militants for using sulfur mustard gas. It is unclear whether the fourth report will assign blame to individuals. The inquiry has focused on nine attacks in seven areas of Syria, where a separate OPCW fact-finding investigation concluded that it is likely chemical weapons have been used. Eight of the attacks investigated involved the suspected use of chlorine. The inquiry said it had not yet been able to reach a conclusion in six cases, though it said three of those cases warranted further investigation. "At least two others were chlorine and were carried out at the hands of the Syrian Air Force," the diplomat said. "There is no indication that any opposition groups used chlorine." Syria agreed to destroy 1,300 tonnes of declared chemical weapons in 2013 under a deal brokered by Moscow, Damascus's main international backer, and Washington, which supports the Syrian opposition. In a separate confidential report seen by Reuters, OPCW inspectors concluded in July after 16 visits to Damascus since April 2014 that Syria had failed to explain "scientifically or technically" the discovery of banned agents by its inspectors, including sarin and VX nerve agents. The latest suspected use of chlorine gas was last week, when rescue workers and a monitoring group said there were dozens of cases of suffocation in an opposition neighborhood in the city of Aleppo. POSSIBLE SHOWDOWN Chlorine's use as a weapon is prohibited under the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention, which Syria joined in 2013. If inhaled, chlorine gas turns to hydrochloric acid in the lungs and can kill by burning the lungs and drowning victims in the resulting body fluids. The new finding, blaming specific military units, could set the stage for a showdown at the Security Council pitting the United States, Britain and France against Russia and China. Beijing and Moscow have veto powers as permanent Council members and have protected Syria's government from action by blocking several resolutions, including an attempt to refer the situation in Syria to the International Criminal Court. Syria is not a member of the ICC, so any war crimes cases against suspects has to be referred by the U.N. Security Council to the court in The Hague. Some Western diplomats worry that the Security Council could respond weakly to the reported chemical weapons attacks or that the issue could be sidelined because of the fragility of a Syria ceasefire deal agreed by Moscow and Washington. "We don't want the (U.N./OPCW) report to be taken hostage by the political process in Syria," said a senior Security Council diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity. A second senior Security Council diplomat said: "Normally on Syria policy, when we go down this U.S.-Russia track, either nothing happens because they can't agree ... or if something does come out it tends to be Russian-flavored." "Neither of those outcomes is good," the envoy said. Some diplomats said U.N./OPCW investigators may ask for more time to finish their fourth report, in which case the Security Council may renew the mandate for the inquiry for a short time. Samantha Power, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said on Thursday it was important those compiling the inquiry "go as far as they can" to identify individuals and entities involved in the attacks. The United States planned "to push to extract from the council as much as we can" on a response, she said. "We're in very close contact with other council members about what that might look like," Power said. "We also retain the ability to take what's in the report and act nationally and multilaterally in order to ensure real consequences for those actors who are named." U.S. President Barack Obama initially said the use of chemical weapons in Syria would cross a "red line," but he did not follow through with threatened air strikes after a sarin gas attack in August 2013 killed as many as 1,400 in the Ghouta neighborhood of Damascus. French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said on Tuesday he would fight vigorously for sanctions on those responsible for the gas attacks being investigated. A French diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Paris had been working on "the contours of what a satisfying resolution would look like for us." "The American position is not as firm on this issue as ours," the French diplomat said. "What's at stake goes well beyond the Syrian conflict. It's about not making the use of chemical weapons a banality." (Additional reporting by John Davison in Beirut, Editing by Timothy Heritage)
A pair of passionate Donald Trump supporters living abroad were surprised to learn this week that the Republican presidential candidate no longer wanted their money.

Henryk Zaleski, a 64-year-old retired U.S. Navy veteran who now lives in Norway, has given Trump $275. He told the Center for Public Integrity that he was floored when he discovered Trumps campaign had returned his contributions.

Likewise, 52-year-old investment banker Ben Gelfand of Toronto was thrown to hear that the Trump campaign had rejected his $1,000 donation from June.

Gelfand said he provided the Trump campaign with information affirming his U.S. citizenship earlier this year. They know Im a U.S. citizen, he told the Center for Public Integrity.

Apparently, the Trump campaign does not.

On Monday, Trumps campaign told the Federal Election Commission that it had returned the donations from Zaleski, Gelfand and a third donor, Marc Pierrot of Hong Kong, who could not immediately be reached for comment.

If a contribution is received with a foreign address, the committee sends a request for a copy of a valid U.S. passport and rejects contributions from contributors whose status cannot be confirmed with a passport, Trump campaign treasurer Timothy Jost wrote to the agency.

This story is part of Buying of the President 2016. Tracking the candidates, political committees and nonprofits that are making this presidential election the most expensive in history. Click here to read more stories in this investigation.

Don't miss another Politics investigation: Sign up for the Center for Public Integrity's Watchdog email.

Josts letter came just hours after the Center for Public Integrity revealed how a foreign national  Shahriyar Nasir of Toronto  had illegally donated $225 to Trumps campaign in April.

Neither the Trump campaign nor the FEC had spotted Nasirs illegal donation, though Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks said Nasirs money has now been returned.

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But the FEC, last month, did flag the contributions from Zaleski, Gelfand and Pierrot as potentially impermissible.

Alerting candidates that theyve received money from foreign addresses is routine for the agency, and it doesnt itself mean the donations are prohibited.

Americans living outside the country may legally donate to politicians, but foreign nationals may not. Only foreigners with permanent resident status in the United States may make political donations.

Its generally up to campaigns to verify whether someone is legally allowed to make political contributions.

Neither Jost nor Hicks of the Trump campaign responded to requests for comment for this story.

For his part, Gelfand, who is registered to vote in Ohio, said he backed President Barack Obama in both 2008 and 2012. Now, however, hes on the Trump train.

Im a guy that votes by candidate, not by party, Gelfand said.

Related story: Trump accepted illegal contribution from proud Muslim in Canada

Meanwhile, Zaleski said the Trump campaign had contacted him this week to review his voter registration information  but not to request proof of his citizenship.

I have a lot of patience for people who make mistakes due to inexperience, Zaleski said. But we sure wasted a lot of time for no reason.

Zaleski added that he, earlier this week, had voluntarily mailed the Trump campaign a copy of his passport, a copy of his Florida voter registration card and a copy of his retired military ID card. Hes also (again) attempting to donate to Trumps campaign  he enclosed a check along with the documentation.

Mr. Obama thinks himself to be a king of sorts, and Hillary [Clinton] is not the answer to counter the Obama years, Zaleski said. Let's make America great again. I strongly believe we can with [Trump] at the helm.

Brett Kappel, a campaign finance lawyer in the Washington, D.C., office of Akerman LLP, said tracking down donors who live abroad can be a time-intensive activity for campaigns.

Obtaining copies of U.S. passports, Kappel said, is a task that would take a great deal of staff time per contribution, assuming the contributors are even willing to provide their passport to anyone in an age of rampant identity theft.

This story is part of Buying of the President 2016. Tracking the candidates, political committees and nonprofits that are making this presidential election the most expensive in history. Click here to read more stories in this investigation.

Related stories

Copyright 2016 The Center for Public Integrity. This story was published by The Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit, nonpartisan investigative news organization in Washington, D.C.
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.
Best Actor, Drama: Rami Malek, Mr. Robot

In a field of mostly newbies, Critics Choice winner Rami Malek is the favorite to take the Emmy now that perennial nominee Jon Hamm is out of the running.

Best Actress, Drama: Robin Wright, House of Cards

While she has stiff competition from How to Get Away With Murders Viola Davis, Robin Wright is the favorite to take home Best Actress after a tour-de-force season on House of Cards.

Best Supporting Actress, Drama: Lena Headey, Game of Thrones

With three Game of Thrones ladies in the category, Headey has the best chance to take home her first Emmy.

Best Drama: Game of Thrones

Its already the most awarded show in Emmy history following a strong showing at the Creative Arts Emmys, and that momentum should carry Game of Thrones to its second consecutive Best Drama win.

Best Supporting Actor, Drama: Kit Harington, Game of Thrones

Peter Dinklage has dominated this category in the past, but this past season was all about Jon Snow, so its probably Haringtons turn to take home an Emmy  with his first nomination  for Game of Thrones.

Best Comedy: Veep

Veep not only survived show creator and original showrunner Aarmondo Iannucci leaving after Season 4, it thrived, more biting and witty than ever. The Emmy voting body will likely reward it for the second year in a row.

Best Actress, Comedy: Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Veep

Veep has been better than ever lately, and so has Julia Louis-Dreyfus, whos a pretty sure thing to win her sixth Best Actress, Comedy statue.

Best Limited Series: The People v OJ Simpson: American Crime Story

Theres no contest here, People v OJ is expected to sweep its categories, including the big one, for Best Limited Series.

Best Actress, Movie/Limited Series: Sarah Paulson, The People v OJ Simpson: American Crime Story

Sarah Paulson finally winning her first Emmy after five worthy nominations, for what may be her best performance yet, is an undeniable storyline.

Story continues

Best Actor, Movie/Limited Series: Courtney B. Vance, The People v OJ Simpson: American Crime Story

Best Supporting Actress, Comedy: Allison Janney, Mom

CBS comedies are Emmy gold, especially when it comes to trophies for its actors, and Allison Janney has all the momentum and good will to win it for the third year in a row.

Best Supporting Actor, Movie/Limited Series: Sterling K. Brown, The People v OJ Simpson: American Crime Story

Browns uncanny turn as prosecutor Chris Darden will make it a clean sweep for People v OJ Simpson in all its major categories.

Best Supporting Actress, Movie/Limited Series: Jean Smart, Fargo

While People v OJ Simpson is going home with the lions share of the Limited Series categories, the just as worthy Fargo should score at least one win, for the very deserving Jean Smart.

Related stories from TheWrap:

Henry Winkler to Honor 'Happy Days' Creator Garry Marshall at Emmys

Creative Arts Emmys 2016: The Complete Winners List for Night 1

Kit Harington, Laverne Cox, Chris Rock Topline Second Wave of Emmys Presenters
By Dena Aubin and Karen Freifeld NEW YORK (Reuters) - New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman faces an uphill climb in building a case against Exxon Mobil Corp for not writing down assets amid the oil-price slump because of the broad leeway that energy companies have enjoyed reporting under U.S. rules, accounting experts said. Schneiderman is investigating Exxon's accounting practices and why the oil giant has not taken writedowns even while oil prices have fallen, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters. The price drop of more than 60 percent since 2014 has forced many integrated oil producers around the world to write down the value of their wells, leases and equipment, and Exxon is the only major producer to hold off so far. Oil in many wells can no longer be profitably recovered, and failing to write them down could give a misleading picture of a company's financial health. But accounting experts said it was far from clear that Exxon's lack of writedowns signaled any wrongdoing. Accounting rules give companies a choice of methods for valuing and impairing their assets, and writedowns can vary sharply based on the method used and other factors, they said. "This is an extremely subjective area," said Tom Selling, author of The Accounting Onion blog. "Everyone will have a different pattern of writedowns depending on how old their fields are and how much they cost to develop." Doug Cohen, spokesman for the AG's office, declined comment. An Exxon spokesman on Friday told Reuters its accounting follows rules of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the Financial Accounting Standards Board, which sets reporting standards for U.S. public companies. The largest U.S. oil companies have historically not taken large charges to write down the value of their assets when commodity prices tumble, said Brian Youngberg, oil company analyst at Edward Jones in St. Louis. Companies are reluctant to take writedowns because they reduce income and assets on the balance sheet, and once assets are written down, they cannot be written up, said Larry Crumbley, accounting professor emeritus at Louisiana State University. Accounting rules do not require companies to take impairments for a temporary drop in oil prices, but the rules do not define the timeframe of a temporary slump, said Terry Crain, accounting professor emeritus at the University of Oklahoma. "Is it a month or two, or several years?" Crain said. "It falls in a gray area." Chevron Corp, which took $2.8 billion of impairments and other charges in the second quarter, may not look at the current slump as temporary, Crain said. But Robert McTamaney, a lawyer with Carter, Ledyard & Milburn, said if companies believe prices will soon rise again, taking an impairment is the wrong move. He also noted that Exxon, as one of the nation's oldest oil producers, may be already carrying many of its rigs and other equipment at much lower prices, making writedowns unnecessary. "From glancing at it, I think Exxon has substantial arguments that their accounting is correct," he said. New York attorneys generals have a powerful tool for fighting accounting misconduct with the Martin Act, the state's securities fraud statute. The act allows for both civil and criminal charges, and the attorney general does not have to prove an intent to deceive. Exxon is not the first company whose accounting has come under the scrutiny of the New York attorney general's office. Former American International Group chief executive officer Maurice "Hank" Greenberg went on trial in New York state court Sept. 13, in a case stemming from a probe of AIG's accounting practices. McTamaney, who has been critical of the use of the Martin Act by New York attorneys general over the last decade or so, said he wondered why Schneiderman is bringing a case that "if it belongs anywhere, should be with the SEC." The SEC in 2013 questioned why Exxon had not taken an impairment charge despite stating it was making "no money" on U.S. natural gas due to falling prices, according to a letter published on the commission's website. The SEC declined comment on Friday on whether it is still looking into Exxon's accounting. (Reporting By Dena Aubin and Karen Freifeld; Additional reporting by Anna Driver; Editing by Anthony Lin and Bernard Orr)
(Reuters) - Fannie Mae , the largest U.S. home funding source, elected Ryan Zanin to its board of directors. Zanin, who has over 30 years of experience in financial services, specializing in risk management, recently served as the president and chief executive of the restructuring, strategic ventures, and insurance group at GE Capital. Fannie Mae said Zanin had been appointed to the risk policy and capital committee and the strategic initiatives and technology committee. (Reporting by Diptendu Lahiri)
(Adds quotes, context, details on customer response)

By Adam Jourdan and Tom Westbrook

SHANGHAI/SYDNEY, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Apple Inc fans from Sydney to Shanghai, the first customers worldwide to snap the new iPhone 7 off the shelves, cheered as they left stores on Friday brandishing their purchases, flanked by applauding sales staff.

But underneath the usual fanfare, the crowds of enthusiasts and overnight campers were smaller than in past years. Some customers complained after the larger version and models with the new jet-black colour sold out.

In part, online pre-ordering has made queues unnecessary for all but diehard fans, and in Chinese stores only those who had ordered in advance were queuing to collect.

Yet in markets like China, online interest in the new phone has also been muted compared to past launches, as cheaper local brands amp up their features, design and marketing.

Wu Ting, a 28-year-old from Nanjing, was surprised to find herself first in line at a downtown Apple store in Shanghai on Friday, a holiday in China.

"I found last year that there were crowds of people, but this year almost no-one. I came an hour early thinking I'd have to wait a long time before getting seen," Wu said.

Sales in China will be the acid test for Apple's year ahead: the success of the iPhone 6 in China drove sales last year, while the slower-burn 6S contributed to Apple's first global revenue drop in over a decade earlier this year.

Chatter about the iPhone 7 launch on Chinese microblog Weibo has been far more muted than when the iPhone 6 debuted in 2014. An index of searches on Baidu Inc, China's most popular search engine, shows the new phone lagging both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 5.

Apple's Greater China sales dropped by a third in April-June, albeit after more than doubling a year earlier, while its market share has fallen to around 7.8 percent, placing it fifth behind local rivals Huawei, OPPO and Vivo.

Apple has been slower to adapt, consumers and analysts say: the new iPhone has few major changes to win over fickle shoppers and the firm's marketing has been generic.

Story continues

"From Steve Jobs to Tim Cook, Apple has never had any marketing strategy tailor-made for China," said Zhou Zhanggui, a Beijing-based strategic consultant.

"Apple risks losing out more if it does not better cater to local demands in its marketing as well as product design."

In Beijing's fashionable Sanlitun shopping district, several people who had already grabbed new iPhone 7s were hawking them for a markup just outside a flagship store.

But Apple has not lost its shine for all customers.

Marcus Barsoum, a 16-year-old who described himself as a "diehard Apple fan", spent two nights camped outside the Sydney store. By the morning, some 200 people were gathered in light rain to be the first customers globally to own iPhone 7s.

Weary but elated, Barsoum charged into the store at 8 a.m. to the cheers of Apple staff. He emerged with a matte black iPhone 7, although he had wanted a larger 7 plus in jet black.

"It feels great to be the first in the world to have the iPhone 7," he said. "It was 100 percent worth it."

(Additional reporting by Ben Blanchard in BEIJING, Sijia Jiang in HONG KONG, Shanghai Newsroom; Writing by John Ruwitch in SHANGHAI; Editing by Stephen Coates)
Germany migrants: Residents battle asylum seekers in Bautzen

Residents have clashed with asylum seekers in a town in eastern Germany that has become a flashpoint for anti-refugee sentiment.
Copenhagen (AFP) - Danish-Palestinian bad-boy poet Yahya Hassan, who stormed onto Denmark's literary scene in 2013 and quickly became a household name, was Friday sentenced to jail over a shooting, casting a pall over a short, tumultuous career.

Hassan's debut poetry collection sold a record 100,000 copies in just a few months in 2013, in a country where poetry collections are usually printed in the hundreds.

Writing in all caps without any punctuation, he used street slang and blunt word play to deliver a damning indictment of his parents' generation of immigrants who came to Denmark in the 1980s, describing domestic violence, benefits fraud and religious hypocrisy on the Aarhus housing estate where he grew up.

In the poem "Satellite dish" he writes: "WE HAD NO DANISH CHANNELS/WE HAD AL JAZEERA ... WE HAD NO PLANS/BECAUSE ALLAH HAD PLANS FOR US."

But on Friday, an Aarhus court handed the 21-year-old a one year and nine month prison sentence for shooting and injuring a 17-year-old man and for 34 other offences ranging from driving under the influence to stealing 64 kroner (8.6 euros, $9.7) worth of beer in a bar.

The writer claimed to have been acting in self defence after the unarmed 17-year-old hit him.

In 2013, Hassan, a tall, gangly teenager with curly hair pulled back in a trademark ponytail, became an instant media sensation after claiming the children of immigrants "were not let down by the system, but by our parents."

The anti-immigration Danish People's Party (DPP) hailed his message, which they saw as confirming what they have said about immigrants all along.

"I think it's really hypocritical that people who buy his books and praise him have previously been so opposed to what the DPP has said for many years," the party's co-founder, Pia Kjaersgaard, told tabloid Ekstra Bladet at the time.

Aged 13, Hassan was placed in the first of a series of institutions for juvenile delinquents where social workers said they were unable to handle him.

Story continues

At 16, he was introduced to literature by a female teacher who was later fired for having had a sexual relationship with him.

- Downward spiral -

Two years later, living in Copenhagen, he had won several literary prizes and had become the darling of Denmark's cultural elite.

But he seemed unwilling -- or unable -- to shake off his past, moving back to Aarhus a few months after his breakthrough.

Many young Danes of immigrant origin disliked Hassan for his negative views on their communities and their religion.

In November 2013, he was assaulted in Copenhagen's main train station by a 24-year-old man previously convicted of trying to commit an act of terror.

Death threats against him began appearing in social media, meaning he had to live under the protection of the Danish Security and Intelligence Service, which he later renounced.

An attempt to enter parliament for a political party targeting the immigrant vote failed, and he was kicked out of it following a series of controversies that included driving under the influence of drugs.

Hassan began writing increasingly aggressive Facebook posts, and a confused television interview in February had many questioning his mental health.

Danish author Kaspar Colling said the former wunderkind was living with a double threat: from Islamists as well as immigrant youth who viewed him as a "traitor".

"I met him one day when he had been assaulted three times. He had only been to (supermarket) Netto," he told daily Politiken.

The writer's publisher should have removed some of the wider criticism of Islam that was non-essential to his work, since an 18-year-old was unable to foresee the consequences, he argued.
Mexico City (AFP) - Five people -- and not 15 as a bus driver had initially claimed -- were abducted in Mexico's violence-plagued northern state of Tamaulipas, an official said on Friday.

The driver had reported the kidnapping of what he believed were 15 passengers on Thursday after he reached a security checkpoint in the neighboring state of Coahuila and police saw that some of the vehicle's windows were broken.

The story alarmed many in Mexico, a country plagued by a relentless wave of murders and disappearances linked to drug gangs.

But it proved to be inaccurate, according to Tamaulipas interior chief Herminio Garza.

He said other bus drivers indicated gunmen had boarded the vehicle in question, but that they made five people get off.

The first bus driver said he did not report the abductions for fear he would be targeted. But he changed his story when he spoke with the authorities.

Tamaulipas is one of Mexico's most violent states as the Zetas and Gulf cartels fight for control of drug-trafficking routes.

More than 28,000 people have been reported missing in Mexico in the past decade, including 5,700 in Tamaulipas alone.

In one of the country's most notorious mass abductions, police in the southern state of Guerrero snatched 43 students in September 2014 and handed them over to a drug cartel, which allegedly slaughtered the group in a case that remains unsolved.
Brazils former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva vigorously denied charges of corruption in his first official public statement since an indictment was made against him Wednesday

According to Reuters, 70-year-old Lula said the charges were fabrications designed to derail his second run for office in 2018. He added that he would be cooperating with prosecutors because he was innocent.

He said if charges against him were proved, he would walk to the police station and hand myself in.

Lula, who was in power from 2003 to 2010, faces allegations of taking bribes disguised as favors from a company connected to the scandal-plagued state-run oil company Petrobras. A criminal conviction would render him ineligible for office for eight years.

Lula, who was a popular working-class President, is being indicted just weeks after his chosen successor Dilma Rousseff was impeached on charges that she mismanaged the economy.

His wife has also been charged in connection with the ownership of a luxury apartment.
Ouagadougou (AFP) - Luc Adolphe Tiao, the last prime minister of former Burkinabe president Blaise Compaore, has been detained and charged with murder over unrest that saw the latter unseated in 2014, the supreme court prosecutor general said Friday.

Compaore lost power after 27 years following a popular uprising in October 2014 against his attempts to change the constitution to remain in office and last year the country's transitional council indicted him and senior members of his government on charges of high treason.

The supreme court prosecutor told AFP Tiao had been detained and charged as part of its mandate to investigate the "popular insurrection" which accompanied the collapse of the Compaore regime.

"Former prime minister Luc Adolphe Tiao has been placed in detention and was taken to a prison facility at Ouagadougou this morning," chief prosecutor Armand Ouedraogo told AFP.

"He has been charged with murder, beating and deliberate wounding and complicity" in violence in connection with military attempts to put down the uprising, which cost 33 lives according to an official toll.

Ouagadougou prosecutor Maiza Sereme last week decried the "difficulties" encountered in pursuing the case against Tiao and former regime leaders citing a lack of "cooperation" from state authorities.

Tiao spent a year-and-a-half in exile in Ivory Coast but returned voluntarily to Burkina Faso last weekend after questioning of several members of his former cabinet who remain in the country

Several sources have told AFP that former journalist Tiao is accused of having signed an order for the army to use force in putting down the popular uprising.

"Everybody knows it was him who gave authorisation to fire on demonstrators," said Ouedraogo, who added he could not say if other ministers in the government Tiao headed would also be detained.

In total, police have questioned 16 ministers from the Tiao government in connection with the killings linked to the anti-Compaore demonstrations at the end of 2014.

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The remainder are in exile and some have found employment with international organisations abroad.

Following the suppression of the unrest, Amnesty International released a report on the anti-Compaore demonstration accusing the presidential security unit (RSP) of being behind the violence. The RSP was dissolved following last year's abortive coup.

Compaore is currently in exile in Ivory Coast and the transitional council has also accused him of high treason and of abusing the constitution in seeking to stay in power.

He is the subject of an international arrest warrant in connection with the murder of former president Thomas Sankara, killed in the 1987 coup which brought Compaore to power.

Not least because it does not extradite to countries retaining the death penalty, there seems little chance that Ivory Coast will expel Compaore, who has taken Ivorian citizenship and who is a long-time ally of Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara.
Mehgan Merriott and boyfriend Robert Cooper's routine sonogram turned into an unforgettable moment on Monday after their baby surprisingly honored his father's service.



After trying for nearly 30 minutes to get the 12-week-old baby to wake up for their obstetrician, Dr. Daniel Eikleberry, Merriott tells PEOPLE that their bundle of joy arose with a start.



In a quick second, the baby raised its hand in the air, seemingly saluting Merriott, 22, and Cooper, like a mini soldier.



"It was pretty amazing, because my boyfriend was a Marine for four years, and served two tours  one in Iraq and one in Afghanistan," the mom-to-be says. "Pretty crazy."









Former Marine's Baby Salutes Him and Girlfriend in Sweet Sonogram Photo| Babies, Real People Stories, The Daily Smile, Marines

The Columbus, Georgia, resident and her boyfriend are more than ready for parenthood: "We started trying in March, and found out on July 16," she says.



 Need a little inspiration? Click here to subscribe to the Daily Smile Newsletter for uplifting, feel-good stories that brighten up your inbox.





Former Marine's Baby Salutes Him and Girlfriend in Sweet Sonogram Photo| Babies, Real People Stories, The Daily Smile, Marines

And Merriott has already had some practice  her son, Cambden, (from a previous relationship) is 3.





RELATED VIDEO: My Best Advice: Moms Share the Tips They Wish They Knew Before Kids



"We'll find out the gender on the 23rd [of September], and we're going to have a gender reveal on the 24th," Merriott tells PEOPLE, adding, "I am hoping for a girl, because I already have a boy, but really I just want the baby to be happy, healthy and everything to go well."





Former Marine's Baby Salutes Him and Girlfriend in Sweet Sonogram Photo| Babies, Real People Stories, The Daily Smile, Marines

Merriott is due on March 24, and, she says, "ready to have a bitty baby again."
(ORANGE, Calif.)  The father of former NASCAR driver Robby Gordon strangled his wife then shot himself in their Southern California home, police said Thursday.

The deaths of Robert Gordon, 68, and Sharon Gordon, 57, were an apparent murder-suicide, Orange police Lt. Fred Lopez said a day after the bodies were found. No further details on the motive or circumstances were released.

The couple were the father and stepmother of ex-NASCAR star Robby Gordon, who fought back tears and expressed disbelief Thursday outside the home on a Southern California hillside where he grew up and developed his love of racing.

Gordon recalled how his father, known as Baja Bob and a racer in his own right, instilled in him a love for competition and motorsports in the Orange County neighborhood, where many residents own horses and dirt riding trails line the suburban streets.

Im so sad and I cant believe it, the racing star told reporters near the gated house 30 miles (48.3 kilometers) southeast of Los Angeles where police discovered the bodies Wednesday after receiving a 911 call from a neighbor making a welfare check at the request of a relative.

The younger Gordon currently races in an off-road series he created in 2013 called Speed Energy Formula Off-Road, following the path of his father.

He taught me at a young age that 1 horsepower wasnt going to be enough  go do something different, Gordon recalled his father saying. And I was fortunate enough to do something different.

Residents in the upscale neighborhood shared stories about the couples friendly ways  swapping jokes with neighbors, gifting tickets to racing events and delivering feed personally to local equestrians.

I can still see them walking hand in hand, walking their dogs down the street, said John Reina, who lives across the street. To kind of wrap your head around this tragedy is very hard to do.

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Robby Gordon said he would speak about the deaths in more detail once authorities conclude their investigation. He thanked the auto and horse racing communities for their support and prayers.

The truth will come out, what went down there, he said.

Racer Dale Earnhardt Jr. tweeted that he was praying for the Gordon family. Hope they find strength and support, he said.

Heartbreaking news this morning. Thinking of the Gordon family and friends, NASCAR star Jimmie Johnson said on Twitter.

Gordon, 47, has raced on numerous racing circuits, from NASCAR to IndyCar to Champ Car and IROC.

Known for his aggressive style, he earned three wins in parts of 19 seasons in what is now the NASCAR Sprint Cup. He was a full-time driver early last decade and finished a career-high 16th in the points standings in 2003 driving for Richard Childress Racing. Gordon last raced in the Sprint Cup in 2012.

Gordon is one of only four drivers, joining John Andretti, Tony Stewart and Kurt Busch, to compete in the Indianapolis 500 and NASCAR Coca-Cola 600 on the same day. He nearly won the 1999 Indy 500 before running out of fuel in the closing laps.

Gordon said an event featuring his off-road racing team scheduled for this weekend in Orange County will go on as planned.

Gordons sister, Beccy, is married to 2014 Indianapolis 500 winner Ryan Hunter-Reay. The driver tweeted Wednesday that his wife had given birth to a boy. Hunter-Reay would appear as scheduled in a weekend race in Sonoma County, Gordon said.
Growth spurt predicted for hospitality industry

Nepals hospitality industry has suffered myriads of problems in the past years, and is still struggling to recover from the repercussion; yet the industry has optimistic projections.
The first teaser for former Top Gear hosts Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James Mays new Amazon series The Grand Tour looks, well, a hell of a lot like Top Gear.

The brief clip features the three taking some insanely fast cars out for a ride on a racetrack. It also reveals a Nov. 18 launch date for the new show, which has a three season commitment on Amazon.

Clarkson was fired by the BBC last year after assaulting a Top Gear producer, and Hammond and May resigned shortly thereafter.

Also Read: Former BBC Boss Say Firing Jeremy Clarkson From 'Top Gear' Was a Mistake

Clarkson reportedly spent 20 minutes berating Oisin Tymon before physically assaulting him during a fracas over the lack of hot food after filming.

Hammond and James May said that they wouldnt return to the show without their colleague, calling the idea a non-starter that just wouldnt work.

British radio personality Chris Evans and former Friends star Matt LeBlanc took over hosting duties for Top Gear, but fans declared the new duo Flop Gear upon their debut.

Also Read: Matt LeBlanc on Returning to 'Top Gear': 'I Don't Know - Call the BBC'

Ratings for Top Gear plummeted soon after, with the series finale drawing an all-time low of 1.9 million viewers in the U.K. Evans stepped down as a host of the series after just one season.

Related stories from TheWrap:

'Top Gear' Hosts' DriveTribe Nabs $6.5 Million Investment From 21st Century Fox

Ex-'Top Gear' Host Chris Evans Won't Be Charged Over Sexual Assault Allegations

'Top Gear' Fans Declare New Hosts, Series 'Flop Gear'
netflix ceo reed hastings

Fox is suing Netflix for allegedly poaching employees from the company.

In a statement provided to Business Insider, Fox says: "As our complaint explains, we filed this lawsuit because we believe Netflix is defiantly flouting the law by soliciting and inducing employees to break their contracts. We intend to seek all available remedies to enforce our rights and hold Netflix accountable for its wrongful behavior."

The legal complaint was filed by Twentieth Century Fox and Fox 21, a TV production subsidiary, in Los Angeles County, West District, TheWrap reports.

Fox claims that Netflix is encouraging its employees to violate contracts in order to go work for the streaming giant, which has done "great and irreparable harm" to Fox.

Netflix did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

NOW WATCH: This popular fan theory perfectly explains 'Stranger Things'





More From Business Insider


21st Century Fox is accusing Netflix in a lawsuit of running a "brazen campaign to unlawfully target, recruit, and poach valuable Fox executives by illegally inducing them to break their employment contracts with Fox to work at Netflix."

Fox is now seeking an injunction from a Los Angeles Superior Court judge that prohibits Netflix from interfering with its contracts with executives.

The lawsuit follows Netflix' hiring of programming executive Tara Flynn and marketing executive Marcos Waltenberg.

According to the complaint, Flynn had an employment agreement with Fox that began in 2013, ran for two years, and gave Fox the option of extending the term for an additional two years. In November 2015, Fox and Flynn are said to have amended their agreement for additional compensation with Fox getting the right to have her employed through most of 2019. She specifically worked for Fox 21 Television Studios and was focused on developing dramas and comedies for cable.

As for Waltenberg, his two-year deal is reported in the complaint to have run through 2016 with Fox having the right to extend an additional two years.

Read more: The Netflix Backlash: Why Hollywood Fears a Content Monopoly

Netflix allegedly became aware of the agreements before inducing the executives to breach it. The suit represents a rare move by a Hollywood studio to address executive flight, but the rise of Netflix has sparked trepidation on the part of some big content companies.

Fox is represented by star litigator Daniel Petrocelli at O'Melveny & Myers and is also seeking compensatory and punitive damages.

In a statement, Fox says, "We filed this lawsuit because we believe Netflix is defiantly flouting the law by soliciting and inducing employees to break their contracts. We intend to seek all available remedies to enforce our rights and hold Netflix accountable for its wrongful behavior."

A Netflix spokesperson issued the following statement: "We intend to defend this lawsuit vigorously. We do not believe Fox's use of fixed term employment contracts in this manner are enforceable. We believe in employee mobility and will fight for the right to hire great colleagues no matter where they work."

The Wall Street Journal first reported news of the lawsuit.
Twentieth Century Fox filed a lawsuit Friday accusing Netflix of poaching two of its executives.

Netflix recently hired Marcos Waltenberg, Twentieth Century Foxs vice president of promotions, and Tara Flynn, who was a creative executive at Fox 21. The suit, filed in Los Angeles Superior Court, alleges that Netflix has embarked on a strategy of stealing Foxs executives.

The suit accuses the streaming company of a brazen campaign to unlawfully target, recruit, and poach valuable Fox executives by illegally inducing them to break their employment contracts with Fox to work at Netflix.

Netflix hired Flynn in August, and Waltenberg in January. According to the suit, Flynn was under contract at Fox through November 2019. Waltenbergs Fox contract was set to expire at the end of 2016, though Fox had an option to extend it for an additional two years.

As a result of the poaching, the suit contends, Fox has suffered great and irreparable harm, including loss of Foxs ability to contract for a stable workforce, for the disruption to Foxs corporate planning, and for the injury to Foxs business reputation and goodwill.

As our complaint explains, we filed this lawsuit because we believe Netflix is defiantly flouting the law by soliciting and inducing employees to break their contracts, a Fox spokesman said in a statement. We intend to seek all available remedies to enforce our rights and hold Netflix accountable for its wrongful behavior.

Netflix vowed to fight the lawsuit vigorously.

We do not believe Foxs use of fixed term employment contracts in this manner are enforceable, a Netflix spokesman said. We believe in employee mobility and will fight for the right to hire great colleagues no matter where they work.

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Bratislava (AFP) - France can take the lead in European defence cooperation, but cannot do it all on its own, French President Francois Hollande said Friday as EU leaders held crunch post-Brexit talks.

"France is making the main effort on European defence but it cannot be alone and does not want to be alone," Hollande said as he went into the summit in Bratislava with security top of the agenda.

Hollande, whose country will be the bloc's top military power after Britain's departure, has joined forces with Germany to push the idea of a "more active" defence policy to restore confidence shaken by terror attacks, the migrant crisis and globalisation.

Hollande said France wanted to work with its partners to assure Europe's defence, in line with the alliances it has, namely with the United States in NATO.

But at the same time, Europe was ready to stand on its own two feet if need be, he said, apparently referring to remarks by US Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump that in a crisis the US-led alliance might think of its own interests first before its NATO commitments.

"Let everyone know that if the United States chooses to draw back, Europe must be able to defend itself," Hollande said.

The 27 European Union leaders are meeting without Britain to map out a post-Brexit future, with increased defence cooperation a key issue to rally a disillusioned public.

European Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker this week proposed an EU defence headquarters, underscoring how the EU is keen to move on now it no longer has to worry about Britain's long-term opposition to any European Union army which would undermine NATO's role.
The European Space Agency this week unveiled the first set of data from Gaia, its latest mission to collect more information for the ESA Star Mapping project, a 3D galaxy map that helps us better understand the placement of stars within our 13-billion-year-old solar system.

The European Space Agency released the image above, which was taken by the new Gaia mission, on Wednesday.

This map shows the density of stars observed by Gaia in each portion of the sky. Brighter regions indicate denser concentrations of stars, while darker regions correspond to patches of the sky where fewer stars are observed, the ESA said in a statement. The Milky Way is a spiral galaxy, with most of its stars residing in a disc about 100,000 light-years across and about 1,000 light-years thick...Darker regions across the Galactic Plane correspond to dense clouds of interstellar gas and dust that absorb starlight along the line of sight.

The ESAs original star mapping project began with the launch of the Hipparcos satellite in 1989, which collected data for 117,955 stars and reported their positions with unprecedented accuracy and gave estimates of their distance from the Earth and motions through the Galaxy.

It was a huge advance on the best catalogues compiled from ground-based observations, said the ESA.

With Gaia, the ESA plans to create the most advanced star catalogue ever recorded. The Gaia satellite uses two telescopes, 10 mirrors, and one camera to take a census of the galaxy.

Launched in December 2013 from Europe's spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, Gaia is just 1,000 days into its mission. Gaias new data set contains a catalogue of 1.1 billion stars with precise measurements of their position and brightness. The Milky Way is estimated to contain more than 100 billion stars.

European Space Agency Gaia Infographic

Gaia is going to be a revolution, Gerry Gilmore, one of the projects founders who is at Cambridge University, told the BBC. It's as if we as astronomers have been bluffing up until now. We're now going to see the truth.

Story continues

The ESAs interactive star mapping website allows users to visualize the data and explore the three-dimensional distribution of almost 60,000 stars from the Hipparcos Catalogue. Stars are represented by their brightness and color, as well as names and parent constellations for the brightest stars. You can view the ESA Star Mapper on the agency's website.

Christopher Tkaczyk is the Senior News Editor at Travel + Leisure. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @ctkaczyk.

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(Repeats story published late on Thursday)

* German banks have up to $100 bln of ship loans -financiers

* Shipping industry slump could land them with big losses

* Lenders want to sell their debt but there are few buyers

* Graphic on global shipping slide: http://tmsnrt.rs/2cq2WWj

By Jonathan Saul and Andreas Kroner

LONDON/FRANKFURT, Sept 15 (Reuters) - German banks are struggling to recoup tens of billions of dollars of loans as a global shipping industry slump hits them hard.

The lenders - among the biggest backers of shipowners over the past 20 years - are behind up to a quarter of the world's $400 billion of outstanding shipping loans, three shipping financiers told Reuters.

This would make them collectively more exposed than banks from any other single country in terms of outstanding debt to the sector.

These institutions are now grappling with a near decade-long slump of parts of the shipping sector since the 2008 financial crisis that is also hurting European peers, such as Britain's Royal Bank of Scotland.

"German banks account for close to $100 billion of shipping debt out of a world total of around $400 billion," said Dagfinn Lunde, who spent more than a decade as head of shipping at Germany's DVB Bank until the end of 2013.

The same estimates of German bank exposure and total sector debt were made by two other shipping finance executives, who declined to be named, citing the confidentiality of their business dealings.

Lunde, now a board member of Norway's Maritime and Merchant Bank, said German lenders had been "throwing money" at the sector when shipping business was brisk. "When the values tumbled, they were left with massive exposure to toxic debt."

As worsening conditions in the shipping sector leave some shipowners unable to meet payments, it is unlikely that many banks will see a full return on their investments. This could leave them having to sell down their debt at a discount to distressed buyers or to write off some of their loans.

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The shipping difficulties come at a time when European banks are already bogged down by a sluggish economy and face tough capital demands from regulators which are eroding profitability.

SHIPPING 'IMPLODING'

Segments of the shipping industry are suffering their deepest downturn ever as international trade slows. Around 90 percent of world trade is transported by sea.

South Korean container line Hanjin, which filed for receivership on Aug. 31, is the latest casualty in a crisis exacerbated by a glut of ships, many of which were built before the financial crisis when the global economy was healthier.

"It seems like the shipbuilding and ship finance sectors are ... imploding," Anthony Gurnee, chief executive of ship operator Ardmore Shipping Corp, told an industry conference in London last week.

His comments echo remarks made by Stefan Ermisch, the chief executive of shipping finance specialist HSH Nordbank, who recently described the shipping sector as "on the floor".

Before the financial crisis, when a dry bulk ship or oil tanker could earn over $200,000 a day, German banks were among the most prominent financing players. Such vessels now command around $10,000-$15,000 a day.

Banks' exposure varies widely across German lenders such as Deutsche Bank, Commerzbank and state-backed lender NordLB. Part of the risk stems from exposure to closed investment funds - called KG houses - which bought ships and leased them to big shipping companies.

Commerzbank and Deutsche Bank declined to comment on its shipping finance activities and plans.

"For German shipowners, Hanjin is bad news as for them a large company falls away with which they can charter their ships," Oliver Faak, global head ship and aircraft finance at NordLB, told Reuters.

He warned the outlook for the oil tanker market was worsening. "Many shipping companies have ordered tankers that are now being delivered. Supply is rising but the demand hasn't changed."

OFFLOAD DEBT

Bankers said the scale of the lenders' potential losses from the loans now depended on how strict the European Central Bank would be in forcing them to tackle the problem.

In June, people familiar with the matter said the ECB had launched a review of banks' shipping finance, raising concerns among lenders that they may be required to set aside more capital to cover possible losses.

A regulatory source familiar with ECB policy said the review was an initial step. The ECB is currently analysing the data and will likely take further measures afterwards, said the source, adding: "The ECB suspects some European banks use too optimistic models to calculate the value of shipping loans and ships."

The ECB declined to comment.

In the meantime, banks are trying to offload some debt.

Sources have told Reuters RBS is trying to sell its Greek shipping business, which is valued at around $3 billion, as well as up to $500 million of a separate portfolio of Turkish shipping loans.

NordLB said in August it was selling a $1.5 billion portfolio of shipping loans to KKR Credit, part of private equity firm KKR, and a sovereign wealth fund.

But one of the three shipping financiers said there were few buyers. "The market is awash with distressed debt. Once again the banks will be stuck."

Nicholas Tsevdos, managing director of Ocean Way Navigation, a London-based shipping investor and asset manager, said the outcome of RBS efforts to sell off its shipping exposure was among the test cases being watched.

"If they fail to get buyers for the full books, it is not a great incentive for others to do the same," said Tsevdos, whose firm has advised on bank financing deals in recent months.

NordLB said earlier this year it aimed to cut its overall shipping exposure to 12 to 14 billion euros ($16 billion) within the next three years from 19 billion euros at the end of 2015.

NordLB's Faak said the banks would achieve "reduction targets because they have to reach them".

"The only question is, at what price?"

($1 = 0.8903 euros) (Editing by John O'Donnell and Pravin Char)
BERLIN, Sept 16 (Reuters) - German Vice Chancellor and Economic Affairs Minister Sigmar Gabriel will visit Russia next week to hold talks with Russian government officials about the state of bilateral trade relations, his ministry said in a statement on Friday.

Gabriel, who will be in Russia on Wednesday and Thursday, will take a business delegation with him, the ministry said, saying his visit came at a time when trade between the two countries was declining.

Trade between German and Russian companies fell by 13.7 percent in the first half of 2016 compared to a year earlier, it said, and German exports to Russia were also down.

"Planned among other meetings are talks with several members of the Russian government on bilateral economic relations between Russia and Germany and the European Union," the ministry said.

"In addition, a meeting with representatives of German companies that are located in the Russian Federation is planned."

European Union sanctions imposed over Moscow's role in the Ukraine crisis remain in place as do Russian retaliatory counter sanctions banning many EU food products. The Kremlin is keen for the EU to lift the sanctions, while German companies have lobbied the German government in the past over the issue complaining the sanctions are hurting their business.

Chancellor Angela Merkel has said she wants Russia to do more to help the shaky peace process in eastern Ukraine before the EU considers lifting the sanctions.

(Reporting by Caroline Copley; Writing by Andrew Osborn; Editing by Dmitry Solovyov)
(Adds Kremlin comment on Putin meeting, context, edits)

BERLIN, Sept 16 (Reuters) - German Vice Chancellor and Economic Affairs Minister Sigmar Gabriel will visit Russia next week to hold talks with Russian government officials about the state of bilateral trade relations, his ministry said in a statement on Friday.

Gabriel will be in Russia on Wednesday and Thursday and will take a business delegation with him, the ministry said. Russian officials were working to set up a meeting between President Vladimir Putin and Gabriel, the Kremlin said.

Russia is likely to be keen to discuss the impact that European Union sanctions imposed on Moscow over its role in the Ukraine crisis are having and to ask what the prospects are for them being lifted.

Germany's Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy said Gabriel was making his visit at a time when trade between Russia and Germany was declining because of the state of the Russian economy, which is mired in a grinding crisis, and because of the weakness of the rouble and the knock-on effect that has had on consumer purchasing power.

Trade between German and Russian companies fell by 13.7 percent in the first half of 2016 compared to a year earlier, the ministry said, and German exports to Russia were also down.

"Planned among other meetings are talks with several members of the Russian government on bilateral economic relations between Russia and Germany and the European Union," the ministry said in its statement.

"In addition, a meeting with representatives of German companies that are located in the Russian Federation is planned."

Russian retaliatory counter sanctions banning many EU food products remain in place and Moscow has been keen to highlight the damage it says the row over Ukraine is causing European economies.

German companies have lobbied the German government in the past over the issue, complaining that the EU sanctions on Russia are hurting their business. Chancellor Angela Merkel has said she wants Russia to do more to help the shaky peace process in eastern Ukraine before the EU considers lifting them.

(Reporting by Caroline Copley in Berlin and Dmitry Solovyov in Moscow; Editing by Andrew Osborn)
By Caroline Copley BERLIN (Reuters) - The political future of Germany's vice chancellor may hinge on the outcome of a vote next week by his Social Democrats (SPD) over whether to back a trade deal between the European Union and Canada. SPD leader Sigmar Gabriel has championed the Comprehensive Economic Trade Agreement (CETA) as part of his remit as economy minister, and to demonstrate the center-left party's business credentials. But critics on the SPD's left wing are skeptical about the benefits of the deal and believe it would give multinationals greater access to European markets without creating jobs. A failure to secure a majority of delegates at Monday's SPD convention in favor of the accord could scupper Gabriel's chances of standing as the party's candidate for chancellor in national elections next year. It might also unleash a damaging power struggle within the party, the junior partner in the coalition government led by Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives. "If he loses the vote and if he decided to step down on the back of it, then there would be chaos," said Gero Neugebauer, analyst at Berlin's Free University. That would further upset the balance within the coalition at a time when Merkel is looking to the SPD to counter a growing rift between her CDU party and its conservative CSU allies in Bavaria over her refugee policy. A majority SPD vote in favor of CETA, however, would give a much needed shot-in-the arm to Gabriel, who languishes behind Merkel in approval ratings despite her popularity taking a hit from her decision a year ago to open Germany's borders to refugees. TIGHT VOTE Gabriel ruffled feathers last month when he said talks on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) - a parallel trade deal the EU is negotiating with Washington - had "de facto" failed. But he views CETA, due to be signed by Brussels and Ottawa next month prior to full ratification by EU member states' parliaments, as a chance for the West to set new standards for trade deals and act as a counterweight to China's increasing economic clout. In a late attempt to win over doubters within his party, Gabriel traveled to Canada on Thursday and wrested guarantees for clarifications on ambiguous parts of the treaty from Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Critics want Gabriel to set out what precise improvements to the treaty text - for example the issue of transparent courts to settle disputes rather than private arbitration - are needed before the SPD can lend its support. "It's not acceptable in its current form," said Tobias Afsali, who is voting on behalf as a proxy for an SPD delegate from Bavaria, where the party branch has recommended members reject CETA. Overall, analysts expect Gabriel to clinch a narrow victory. Hoping to crank up the pressure ahead of the vote, opponents of CETA and TTIP have organized demonstrations against both accords in seven German cities for Saturday. Organizers expect more than 250,000 to attend. Domenico Lombardi, from Canadian think-tank the Centre for International Governance Innovation, said CETA risked being derailed by concerns about TTIP: "If you want to kill TTIP, it's enough to kill CETA first." (Additional reporting by Holger Hansen; editing by John Stonestreet)
Godsmack frontman Sully Erna's upcoming second solo album, Hometown Life (out Sept. 30), is a bit of a family affair. Not only does the 10-song set include a couple of songs inspired by his teenage daughter; It also features a performance by Erna's 71-year-old father Salvatore on trumpet for the track "Turn It Up!," which is premiered exclusively below.

"As the song developed, I realized it was gonna be a real swanky kind of jazzy blues thing, and I was like, 'This needs horns,'" Erna tells Billboard. "And when I was thinking of horn players and was like, 'I'm gonna put this one on it and that one on it,' but then I was like, 'Oh...My dad!' this was a perfect opportunity to pull my dad into this. He started me in music; I was 3 and a half years old and I used to just sit in the basement and watch his band play -- little jazz bands and Italian marching bands and stuff he did. But I never got to play with my dad and certainly never got to record with him, and this was just the perfect opportunity to do so."

Godsmack's Sully Erna Talks '1000hp'

The collaboration -- which included the elder Erna sitting in on the song during a July show at the Mohegan Sun Casino in Connecticut -- also further cemented a relationship that has had ups and downs over the years. "We didn't have a good relationship growing up. We were very distant from each other," Erna recalls. "He was a completely different guy when I was young and he and my mom split at an early age, and we didn't have a good relationship. But then so many years back we rehabilitated it and it's really strong and now we have a really great relationship.

"He was so honored and you could tell he was almost nervous to do this, but he's a great player and he came in and it sounded great. For me it's just a proud moment to be able to take that with me, 'cause at some point he won't be here and at least I have that, and it's just a blessing."

Story continues

"Turn It Up!," meanwhile, reflects some of the inspiration that Erna got from his father. "Its a song about giving back to the music," he explains. "That song is just all about music and how it makes you feel and how it makes you want to stand up and tap your feet and move your body and how it passes through you."

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As on 2010's Avalon, Erna steers clear of Godsmack's headbanging ways on Hometown Life. It goes even further afield than his solo debut, in fact, embracing a country feel on "Different Kind of Tears," Caribbean motifs on "Your Own Drum," tribal touches for "Father of Time" and string-laden ambience on "Blue Skies," "Forever My Infinity" and "Falling to Black." "I was hoping to keep it new and fresh for people and take them on another left turn," explains Erna, who wrote most of the material on acoustic guitar and collaborated on a pair of songs with Nashville hitmaker Zac Maloy. Avalon for sure took people into a whole new path; I think they kind of expected me to do a solo rock record, and I think when they heard Avalon they were just like, 'Whoa, what is this...?!' But that's what made it work was it was a real departure from Godsmack, so I just started thinking, 'How do I flip this [album] into a little bit different kind of feel again, without it sounding like Avalon."

Erna will be touring to support Hometown Life, first with a stripped-down acoustic duo tour starting Oct. 26 in Atlanta, then hopefully full-band dates in early 2017. Godsmack, meanwhile, is on ice until at least late summer of next year. But the group -- which has switched labels from Universal to BMG -- is planning a follow-up to 2014's "1000hp," probably timed to the 2018 20th anniversary of Godsmack's first album.

"I think the general plan is gonna be to try to get together and start writing and recording by late next year," Erna says. "We could've done something this year and dropped it next year, but we thought it would be cooler to wait until [the 20th anniversary]. We don't know how much longer we're gonna go for; We may do another five, 10 records, or this may be the last one. But if we decided not to do it any more I Think a better way of being remembered is going out and doing a real theme-based show around the first album, play the whole first record front to back and then all the hits and the new stuff and the fun stuff. So that's why we're gonna wait; We'll record late next year and do an early 2018 release and then do a world tour with that."
The grandmother pictured slumped over in a car  allegedly suffering from a heroin overdose  with her grandson in the back seat has pleaded no contest to charges of endangering a child and public intoxication.

Read: 4th Case of ODing Parents With Kid Nearby Is Latest Example of Heroin Plight Gripping America

On Thursday, Rhonda Pasek, 50, was sentenced to six months in an East Liverpool, Ohio, court.

Police there shared shocking photos of the scene on social media with the boy's face clearly visible last week to bring attention to the local heroin scourge they claim has reached epidemic proportions.

The child in the photo represents thousands and thousands of other children in similar circumstances, prosecutor John Gamble told reporters after the sentencing.

Pasek's boyfriend, James Acord, 47, who was behind the wheel of the car in the photo, was sentenced to nearly a full year in prison after pleading no contest to child endangerment and operating a vehicle under the influence last week.

Pasek spoke only briefly, to answer questions from the judge.

Read: Cops: Photos of Adults Overdosing With Child, 4, in Car Shed Light on 'Epidemic'

The boy was being raised by the grandmother after his mom reportedly lost custody.

When she saw those disturbing photos, the mother said: "I bawled for four days straight."

A Juvenile Court judge has granted custody of the boy to relatives in South Carolina.

According to The Canadian Press, Pasek's attorney says her client is embarrassed by the international attention the photos have received and wanted the case over with.

Watch: Canine Nearly Dies After Man Tosses 17 Bags of Heroin Over Fence and Into Doggy Day Care

Related Articles:
Rhonda Pasek, the woman who overdosed on heroin in a car while her grandson sat in the backseat, has been sentenced to 180 days in prison.



Per the Associated Press, Pasek, 50, pleaded no contest to a child endangering charge on Thursday, September 15. A Juvenile Court judge in Ohio granted custody of the 4-year-old boy  his name has not been disclosed  to relatives that reside in South Carolina.

PHOTOS: Stars at Court

As previously reported, Pasek and her boyfriend, 47-year-old James Acord, passed out in their Ford Explorer in East Liverpool, Ohio, on Wednesday, September 7. Acord, who was driving the vehicle, pleaded no contest to child endangerment and operating a vehicle under the influence, the AP reports. He will serve 360 days behind bars.

Authorities released the graphic photos of Pasek and Acord slouched over and unconscious on the City of East Liverpool, Ohio, Facebook page. According to a police report, officer Kevin Thompson followed the couple when he noticed that the car was "weaving back and forth." He approached them once they stopped behind a school bus.



PHOTOS: Celebrity Mugshots

"We are well aware that some may be offended by these images and for that we are truly sorry, but it is time that the no drug using public sees what we are now dealing with on a daily basis," the photo caption read via Facebook. "The poison known as heroin has taken a strong grip on many communities not just ours, the difference is we are willing to fight this problem until its gone and if that means we offend a few people along the way we are prepared to deal with that." According to an attorney, Pasek is embarrassed that the photos made headline-making news.

Celebrity Health Scares

According to Fox 17, the little boy later talked about the situation with his great-grandmother Barbara McCullough and knew his grandmother Pasek "got in trouble."

"And I said, Well, honey, your grammy's maybe a little sick,'" McCullough told the outlet. "He was not raised like that. No way."

Story continues





Related Content:
Athens (AFP) - Cash-strapped Greece will adopt before month's end a new package of measures designed to mollify EU and IMF creditors, Athens' finance ministry said Friday.

The ministry said a government bill to be drawn up next week would identify 15 reforms including better transparency for electronic transactions as well as new means of restructuring company debt.

Greece's creditors this week resumed an audit of the country's finances after Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said an EU-IMF rift was delaying progress on attempts to unlock 2.8 billion euros ($3 billion) of bailout loans pending since June.

Tspiras has made debt solution a top priority and Friday saw a first round of discussions with the European Union and International Monetary Fund on how to do so.

Last Sunday, he complained that disagreement over Greek fiscal targets was holding up progress.

The EU's Economic Affairs commissioner Pierre Moscovici says Greece must deliver on 15 reforms, with only two achieved so far.

The Washington-based IMF, a key player in Greece's three bailouts, says it will refuse to contribute to the latest one until it sees a concrete plan from the Europeans to substantially cut the country's massive debt burden.

IMF and EU creditors disagree on how much Athens can improve its stressed finances through ongoing reforms.

The Greek finance ministry said an evaluation of proposed further reforms would be discussed next month at a meeting of EU finance ministers.

Greek Economy Minister Georges Stathakis said Thursday that "the climate is positive" and added outstanding "technicalities" would be soon overcome, including on the thorny issue of who heads up a new Greek privatisation fund.

A French finance ministry source indicated last week that Jacques Le Pape, formerly deputy director of cabinet for IMF director Christine Lagarde when she was French finance minister, could take on the task.

But Athens has not confirmed this and Greek media have reported disagreement between the creditors and government on appointments to the fund's supervisory council.

Creditors will get to choose the president and his deputy, with Athens nominating three further positions.
Indian External Affairs Minister Swaraj calls on PM Dahal

Minister of External Affairs of India, Sushma Swaraj has paid a courtesy call on Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal, who is on a four-day state visit to India, at Rastrapati Bhawan New Delhi on Friday.
By Tom Hals

(Reuters) - A lawyer for Hanjin Shipping Co Ltd , the failed South Korean container carrier, said on Thursday a U.S.-bound vessel was held "hostage" by disputes over payments, adding to the struggles in getting $14 billion of cargo off its ships stranded at sea.

"There is no clear visibility yet on what will happen with this business," Hanjin lawyer Ilana Volkov said at a hearing, when asked by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge John Sherwood whether Hanjin was liquidating.

Hanjin, the world's seventh-largest container line, filed for bankruptcy last month, leaving more than 100 ships and their cargo at sea and threatening to snarl U.S. freight traffic as the year-end shopping season approaches.

Some ships chartered to Hanjin have been sold and more are up for sale.

Last week, Hanjin said a Korean judge authorized $10 million to pay tug operators, ports and cargo handlers to unload four of its U.S.-bound vessels.

Since then, the Hanjin Boston, Hanjin Greece and Hanjin Gdynia have begun to unload. But the fourth ship, the Hanjin Jungil, remains at sea off the coast of California, according to the Marine Exchange of Southern California.

"Were negotiating with every service provider and they are saying 'I'm not going to let this ship berth,'" said Volkov at the Newark, New Jersey hearing. "My client is being held hostage."

She told the court that the Korean court had postponed hearing Hanjin's request to authorize another $50 million that would allow at least four more Hanjin ships to unload U.S. cargo.

As of Wednesday, of Hanjin's 97 container ships, 36 were waiting outside of overseas ports, according to South Korea's finance ministry. Of the reminder, 37 had yet to unload and planned to return to Korea, and 24 had unloaded in Korea and elsewhere, the ministry said.

In addition to the nine "base ports" already identified for Hanjin ships to unload, the ministry said efforts were being made for Bangkok, Jebel Ali, Kobe, Melbourne and Valencia to be available for unloading Hanjin ships.

Story continues

The company was seeking stay order this week that would allow its ships to unload safely in Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and Italy, the ministry said, with more to follow.

The ministry said efforts were underway to enable unloading in New York and Singapore by this weekend.

Hanjin still has at least 10 U.S.-bound ships, although Volkov said some ships may not have picked up U.S.-bound cargo.

Cargo owners such as consumer products maker Dorel Industries Inc (DIIb.TO) and the U.S. unit of musical instrument maker Yamaha Corp (7951.T) complained they were the hostages.

They said they were forced to make additional payments to get their cargo or were forced to retrieve it from the wrong location.

"This could destroy American businesses," said Alan Brody, a lawyer for Yamaha Corp of America.

Darren Azman, an attorney for Bermuda-based container owner Textainer Group Holdings Ltd (TGH.N), said Hanjin rejected leases on its 20,000 containers but failed to return the boxes to Asia as required.

However, the judge balked at Azman's suggestion that Textainer could force cargo owners to pay to return Hanjin's containers to Asia to get their goods.

"I will do whatever I can to stop you," said Sherwood.

(Reporting by Tom Hals in Wilmington, Delaware; Addtiional reporting by TOny Munroe in Seoul, editing by Peter Henderson, Bernard Orr and Lincoln Feast)
Americans celebrate Mexican heritage on Cinco de Mayo, but Mexicans themselves chose September 16 as their national day.

On September 16, 1810, the priest of a small town near Guanajuato summoned his followers to revolt against the colonial government of Spain. This incident is conventionally regarded as the opening of the long war that eventually brought independence to Mexico in 1821.

National histories are usually shot through with myth, and Mexicos perhaps more than most. The uprising of September 16 rapidly ended in tragic failure, brutally suppressed by royalist troops. Independence arrived a decade later only after the government back in Madrid adopted reforms too liberal for the liking of the victorious counter-revolutionary elite in Mexico. The local upper class then switched sides, establishing Mexico as an authoritarian Catholic empire under the most successful of the generals who had defeated the insurgents of 1810.

Recommended: The War Debate America Isnt Having

Imagine that the British had sent George Washington, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson to a firing squad in 1777. Imagine that it had been Benedict Arnold who achieved American independence, pronouncing himself Emperor Benedict I, banning all religions except the Church of England, and concentrating land ownership in the hands of a few grand Tory familiesand you have some idea of the Mexican outcome in 1821.

Paradoxes like that run through Mexican history, and into Mexicos present.

Is modern Mexico a successful or unsuccessful country?

Success: Mexico ranks as the worlds 15th-largest economy. Mexicos output of around $9,000 per person ranks about on par with Romania and Turkey, a little ahead of Braziland well ahead of Chinas $7,900.

Success: Mexico transitioned to multiparty democracy in the mid-1990s. Elections since 1996 have been generally regarded as free and fairand the Mexican voting process in many ways superior to that of the United States, overseen by an agency whose political independence is internationally acclaimed.

Story continues

Success: Net migration to the United States has slowed and even reversed. Between 2009 and 2014, more Mexicans returned home from the United States than left Mexico for the United States.

Unsuccessful: While Mexico is not a poor country, Mexicans remain poor people. Nearly half the population lives below Mexicos poverty line. Even middle-income Mexican families spend more than 40 percent of their incomes on food, beverages, and tobacco, about the same proportion as American families on average spent on similar goods in 1900. Barely one-third of adults aged 25-64 have completed high school; even literacy is not universal.

Recommended: How Much Do Parents Matter?

Unsuccessful: Mexican politicians may now be elected, but extrajudicial killings and disappearances are terrifyingly common. There are many places where the line between local authorities and criminal gangs is blurry, to the extent it exists at all. 103 journalists were murdered and 25 disappeared between 2000 and late 2015. Some 90 percent of crimes against journalists go unpunished.

Unsuccessful: Mexicos economy has stagnated since 1980. Real GDP per worker still remains below the peak level set that year. Narrowing opportunities at home have sent Mexican workers into exile: Some 10 million people have emigrated from Mexico since 1980, almost all to the United States, more than half of them illegally.

Real GDP per working-age person in Mexico

Recommended: Photos of the Week: 9/10-9/16

The question of why Mexico has not done better remains ferociously controversial. Marxist ideology remains a living presence in the Spanish-speaking world. For non-Marxists, however, the explanation should run more or less as follows:

Mexico grew fast between 1950 and 1980 for the same reasons many Southern European countries grew fast over those same years: a migration of rural people to cities and towns, where they found more productive work. There the parallel stops. Spain and Italy opened their economies to trade and investment. They stepped on the escalator of continuing productivity improvement and therefore income growth. Mexico, by contrast, remained a much more closed and regulated economy, burdened by disincentives against innovation and investment. The migration of rural labor to the cities conferred only a one-time bump, rather than setting in motion the kind of growth we see in advanced economies. Sooner or later, even the most rural economy runs out of peasants. As the flow of people from rural areas to the cities slowed after 1980, Mexicos growth stalled.

Even when Mexico finally did open up, it continued to protect supposedly strategic industries like energy and telecommunications. Overcharges by the countrys telecommunications monopoly are estimated to cost 2 percent of Mexicos total economic output. That monopoly earns profits almost double those of its U.S. and Canadian counterparts. Unsurprisingly, the monopolys owner, Carlos Slim, ranks among the worlds richest men. The Mexican state-dominated energy industry also remains staggeringly inefficient, paralyzed by privileged labor unions and starved of investment by a Mexican government that demanded the energy monopoly Pemex pay its profits into the national treasury, rather than use them to maintain fields and modernize equipment.

At the same time, Mexico failed to invest adequately in education and skills. Mexico has almost the very lowest enrollment in secondary education of any of the 35 countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development: 53 percent of people aged 15-19. Only Colombia and China score lower. Mexican teachers unions are famously committed to protecting members sinecures regardless of student performance, and theyre epically corrupt. In 2013, Mexican authorities arrested the head of the teachers union on charges of misusing $200 million of union money. Tim Johnson of McClatchy reported at the time:

Some of the money was wired to accounts in Switzerland, [the attorney general] said, while other funds were used on plastic surgery. Some $2.1 million was spent at the Neiman Marcus store in San Diego, Calif. Authorities arrested Gordillo, 68, when she arrived near Mexico City on private jet from San Diego. Gordillo maintains a $1.6 million home in La Jolla, a San Diego suburb.

How can this be tolerated? This is the master key to Mexicos disappointing performance: the historic weakness of Mexican institutions. Just one example: Mexico is a dry country that cannot afford to waste water. Yet close to 40 percent of the Mexico City water supply is lost to leaky pipes.

Mexican institutions fail for many reasons. Corruption heads the list. In a 2013 survey by Transparency International, 60 percent of Mexicans admitted that a member of their family had bribed a police officer, and more than 50 percent said that a family member had paid a bribe to a court official. The same organization ranks Mexico 95th out of 167 in its 2015 global corruption perceptions list. No comparably affluent country outside the former Soviet bloc ranks so high. (Turkey, for comparisons sake, ranks 66th; Brazil, 76th.)

Mexicos president Enrique Pena Nieto is widely acclaimed as a modern-minded reformer. Yet he has been caught at the center of a baffling scandal about his living arrangements. His wife, a former soap opera actress, has enjoyed the use of houses owned government contractors: A $7-million mansion in a posh Mexico City suburb and an apartment in Key Biscayne, Florida. Exactly howand on what termsthe first lady acquired the homes has never been clear. She claimed to have bought them, but they remained registered to the contractors, who also seem to have paid the taxes on them. She then claimed to have returned them, which raised questions whether she had ever paid anything in the first place. A federal investigation cleared the Pena Nietos of any wrongdoingbut the comptroller in charge is a long-time crony of Pena Nietos. Meanwhile, the journalist who brought the property dealings to light has been fired from her job at a Mexican media conglomerate and is being sued.

Even now, Mexico remains a society of rulers and ruled.

Unlike the United States and Canada, settler societies built after the original inhabitants were displaced and expelled, in Mexico the European newcomers formed a thin elite atop a subjugated and exploited native population. The antagonistic relationship between conquered and conqueror still shapes the interactions of state and society. Even now, Mexico remains a society of rulers and ruled. Agencies of the state, notably the police and army, deploy violence with impunity. In 2014, Mexican judges received 2,400 complaints of torture in police custody. These complaints might or might not be valid: Well never know, since they are almost never investigated. Confessions allegedly based on coerced testimony are regularly accepted by Mexican courts. Only since 2014 have allegations of army abuses against civilians been required to be heard by civilian courts.

True, Mexico is fighting a deadly drug war. Civilian in the Mexican context does not necessarily mean innocent civilian. The 122 million people of Mexico suffer more homicides than the 320 million people of the United Statesand something around half of them are attributed by local media to organized crime. Yet its also by no means clear that police and army violence is used more against criminals than it is in their service. The double escapes from maximum-security prisons of the famous El Chapo were not works of derring-do, but paid for by bribery. The relations between many officials and other gangsters are equally cozy.

These arrangements disgust many Mexicans, of course. And this leads to the final explanation of Mexicos failure to transition to fully developed status: easy exit to the United States for the disgruntled. Emigration has been a political strategy for the Mexican state, as well as an economic strategy for the Mexican people. When Donald Trump opened his now-famous comments on Mexican immigrants with the words, When Mexico sends its people  he was touching upon an important truth.

Most countries that experience large-scale emigration perceive it as a huge problem. When Sweden sent almost one-fifth of its people to the United States before the First World War, the Swedish state saw a national crisis. It convened a commission to investigate the population loss and recommend ways to persuade Swedes to stay at home. The modern Swedish welfare state had its origins in the commissions researches.

Mexico has seen no such effort. To the contrary, Mexican authorities have actively encouraged out-migration as a substitute for the jobs and opportunities they cannot provide at home. In the 1986 words of Doris Meissner, who would serve as director of the Immigration and Naturalization Service under President Bill Clinton, Mexicos government declines to discuss bilateral approaches [to control immigration], supposedly to avoid impinging on U.S. sovereignty. Spanning at least a decade, a succession of migration consultative mechanisms, technical information exchange groups and joint committees has failed to produce cracks in that armor. Mexico's Realpolitik is to perpetuate the status quo. The migration safety valve compensates for widespread underemployment more fully and efficiently than any other system within reach. American leaders have also often quietly fretted that more effective immigration controls on the U.S. side of the border could plunge Mexico into revolutionary upheaval.

Revolution looks less likely in Mexico today than it did even a generation ago. Mexico is an aging country. The median age in Mexico, already 28, will reach 42 by 2050. The worst threat for the future of the country is less upheaval than lost opportunity. As the world moves from industrial economy to knowledge economy, the transition from poor to rich seems to be getting more difficult. What South Korea and Chile did, China and Mexico seem increasingly unlikely to do. Mexicans are emigrating less, not so much because they are finding more opportunity at homebut because they face more difficulty getting ahead in an American economy that demands more skills and higher qualifications.

Independence is a concept that has resonated powerfully in Mexico since 1810. Poor Mexico: so far from God, so close to the United States is a national witticism based on hard experience. But the independence most relevant to modern Mexico on this September 16 is not independence from another country, but from the mistakes of the past and the callous aloofness of its leadership class.

Read more from The Atlantic:

This article was originally published on The Atlantic.
harry reid

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid fired back a blistering response to Donald Trump on Friday after the Republican nominee made fun of his brutal 2015 injury.

The Republican nominee was asked by The Washington Post about Reid's recent comment that the Manhattan billionaire was "not slim and trim."

"Harry Reid?" Trump said, apparently grimacing and waving his hand. "I think he should go back and start working out again with his rubber work-out pieces."

That was a clear reference to Reid's exercise band that snapped last year and caused Reid to fall and break a number of ribs and facial bones. He wore an eye bandage for a prolonged period and lost vision in his right eye.

"Donald Trump can make fun of the injury that crushed the side of my face and took the sight in my right eye all he wants  I've dealt with tougher opponents than him," Reid said in a statement. "I may not be able to see out of my right eye, but with my good eye, I can see that Trump is a man who inherited his money and spent his entire life pretending like he earned it."

"In Searchlight, we learned a thing or two about hard work that Trump may not have learned at his boarding school," the Senate minority leader continued. "Trump rips off working people with scams like Trump University. And while the people he ripped off suffer, Trump sits at the posh resort he bought with his daddy's money, with no understanding of the misery he caused."

The Nevada Democrat, who is retiring after his term is up at the end of the year, said Trump's business ties in foreign countries, in addition to his "Ponzi-scheme fraud of a 'charity'" make clear that the billionaire "intends to scam all of America."

"Trump can insult me all he wants but the American people deserve answers to these questions: Why did Trump appear to use his charity to enrich himself and bribe elected officials who were investigating his scams? Why does Trump refuse to cut ties with business interests that would allow him to exploit American foreign policy to enrich himself? What is Trump hiding in his tax returns?" he said. "If Trump wants to be president, he should be properly vetted."

Story continues

Reid called on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan to lead an investigation into those and other questions "with a fraction of the energy and taxpayer money Congressional Republicans used to pursue Huma Abedin's maternity leave records," referring to a top aide to Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.

"But Senator McConnell and Speaker Ryan want to leave town for another two months, just a few weeks after returning from the longest summer recess in more than half a century," he said. "And the Republican Congress has shown nothing but blind obedience to Trump, going to far as to hold a Supreme Court seat open for six months in the hopes that Trump can fill it."

"If the Republican Congress refuses to do its job, the media has an even greater responsibility to get answers to these questions," he continued. "We know how to spot a con artist in Las Vegas. And Donald Trump is a con artist."

NOW WATCH: Watch Donald Trump attempt to explain why he thinks Hillary Clinton is a bigot





More From Business Insider


The FBI is investigating whether the alleged murder of a transgender woman by a soldier in El Paso, Texas, was a hate crime, according to multiple reports.



On Tuesday, police arrested Anthony Michael Bowden, 21, charging him in the the August 8 death of Erykah Tijerina, 36, whose legal name was Eric Tijerina, according to a police news release obtained by PEOPLE.



Keith A. Byers, assistant special agent in charge of the FBI in El Paso, told the El Paso Times, "The priority is to apprehend the person or the persons responsible and to make sure that we attain justice for the victim."



On August 8, a witness discovered Tijerina's body at her public housing complex and notified police, who found "obvious signs of foul play" upon entering her apartment, police say.



Forensic evidence led investigators to Bowden, who joined the Army in July 2013 and was stationed at Fort Bliss in El Paso, police say. Police would not say what that evidence was or comment further on the case.





Hate Crime? FBI Investigating Alleged Murder of Transgender Woman by Texas Soldier| Crime & Courts, Murder, True Crime



 Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Click here to get breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases in the True Crime Newsletter.



In late August, Tijerina's family and friends held a memorial honoring her.



Tijerina's sisters told KFOX14 they believe her killing might be a hate crime.



"We're still in shock about it," Pearl Tijerina told KFOX14. "It was unexpected."



She said Erykah was generous, funny and courageous. "She's the one that told me to stay strong and not care," she told KFOX14.



Bowden remains in jail on a $750,000 bond. Court records did not list an attorney for him.



The case remains under investigation.



The FBI and El Paso Police did not immediately return PEOPLE's calls for comment.
Many people think they are a healthy eater, but it turns out many of the foods we eat are actually not healthy and some are worse than many of your favorite indulgences!

The Doctors look into some food items that might be tricking you into thinking you are eating well and compare them to some other food options that you wont believe have less calories.

Energy bar vs. Bagel

ER physician Dr. Travis Stork says that energy bars often have a high amount of sugar and sweeteners and can have the exact same number of calories as a bagel. He recommends eating a Greek yogurt for a morning snack, which is higher in protein, contains probiotics and does not have an excessive amount of sugar.

Watch: Hidden Food Dangers

Smoothies vs. Donuts

Dr. Stork explains that many smoothies can have upwards of 60 grams of sugar, which is the same as eating 6 glazed donuts! He also notes that smoothies can easily be a healthy choice, but that we often pick ones that are filled with unhealthy ingredients. Try making your morning smoothie using fresh ingredients to cut down on processed sugars.

Watch: Foods That Fight Fat

Vitamin-Enhanced Water vs. Energy Drink

While you might think the beverage with vitamins would be healthier, in our test comparison the vitamin-enhanced water had 31 grams of sugar, while the energy drink only had 27 grams of sugar. Before hydrating, make sure to compare the calorie counts.

The Doctors suggest paying closer attention to your foods ingredients and remember that just because it claims to be healthy doesnt mean that it actually is!
The recent floods in Louisiana were devastating, killing 13 people, and wreaking havoc on thousands of homes. The Doctors are joined by a flood victim, whose world was forever changed by the rising waters.

Lindsey, who has severe cerebral palsy, has been able to successfully live independently in a home behind her mothers house. When the flooding began in Livingston Parish, where 21 inches of rain fell in just 24 hours, her home was destroyed, her wheelchair was wrecked and her wheelchair accessible van was damaged beyond use.

Watch: Surprise for Boy with Rare Disorder

She joins The Doctors to share her story, explaining that one of the hardest aspects was losing her wheelchair.

It was my legs and independence that I lost, she says.

Just as difficult, was the loss of her wheelchair accessible van. She used the special automobile to travel back and forth between home and a daycare center where she volunteers.

Watch: Surprise for Woman Who Lost Limbs

In an attempt to help Lindsey in this difficult time, The Doctors surprise her with a new wheelchair from our friends at Quantum Rehab. The surprises did not stop there! We also surprise her and her family with new appliances and home furnishings, from Maytag and Panama Jack. Mobility Ventures also gifted Lindsey with something that is bound to change her life for the better, see the big reveal in the video below!

If you would like to help those affected by the Louisiana floods, text LAFLOODS to 90999 to make a $10 donation or visit this website for a list of organizations you can donate to.
Everyone should know what to do for someone who is severely bleeding, experts say.

Teaching people a few basic steps, similar to how people are taught CPR, could help someone who is severely bleeding survive until help arrives, said Dr. Matthew Levy, an associate professor of emergency medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore.

In addition, special bleeding control kits  containing items such as gauze and tourniquets  could be placed in public areas, similar to the placement of automated external defibrillators (AEDs), Levy and his co-author, Dr. Lenworth Jacobs, the director of the Hartford Hospital Trauma Institute in Connecticut, wrote in an opinion piece published today (Sept. 15) in the journal JAMA Surgery.

In the piece, the doctors described the importance of being able to recognize and respond to severe bleeding.

Severe bleeding is a major cause of mortality in trauma victims, the researchers wrote. More than 35 percent of patients with severe bleeding die before they get to the hospital, they wrote. [11 Surprising Facts About the Circulatory System]

And severe bleeding doesn't only occur in major emergencies such as mass shootings or natural disasters, Levy said. It can also come from car accidents, industrial injuries or at-home accidents, he said.

Controlling severe bleeding starts with being able to recognize what severe bleeding looks like, Levy told Live Science.

Signs to look for include blood gushing very quickly out of a wound, clothing soaked through with blood or a large pool of blood spreading on the ground, Levy said. If the person who is bleeding heavily is also not acting normally, he or she may be going into shock because of blood loss, Levy added.

To slow the bleeding, a person doesn't necessarily need any special tools or a bleeding control kit, Levy said. "It's all about finding the severe bleeding and stopping it," Levy said. He also stressed the importance of calling 911.

Story continues

The first thing a person should do is put his or her hands on the wound and apply pressure, Levy said. Ideally, this would be done wearing gloves, but if there aren't any available, try to find some sort of barrier to a possible infection, such as a clean cloth, he said.

Put pressure strongly and continuously on the bleeding area, Levy said. That could even mean kneeling on the wound with your knee, he added.

"At the end of the day, what we're talking about is very simple physics," Levy said. "It's like a leaking hose: the leak will stop if the pressure that we can exert on it is greater than the pressure that's coming out of it," he said. [Circulatory System: Facts, Function & Disease]

If the wound is particularly large, it's important to look for the source of the bleeding within the wound, Levy said. That's where you want to focus the pressure you're applying  wherever the blood is coming from, he said.

For large wounds, people should also know how to pack a wound, Levy said. This involves simply stuffing gauze or clean cloth into the wound to add more pressure and help the blood to clot more quickly, he said. "Find where the blood is coming from and shove the gauze into the area," he said.

Levy noted that in situations where applying direct pressure doesn't work to control bleeding, or if a bleeding person needs to be moved, using a tourniquet is a reasonable thing to do. "We don't want people to be afraid to use a tourniquet if they need to," he said.

Tourniquets can be used only on the arms or legs, Levy said. But because tourniquets need to be applied closer to the heart than where the wound is, they can sometimes be problematic, he said. For example, if a wound is located in a person's armpit or groin, there's no place to put a tourniquet, he said.

Commercially available tourniquets are the best choice when possible, Levy said. And while experts don't advocate "improvised" tourniquets, they also acknowledge that sometimes you have to use what's available, he said. Certainly there were reports after the November terrorist attacks in Paris of EMTs using their own belts to slow bleeding, he said.

If you do have to make an improvised tourniquet, the best-case scenario would be to look for something that's at least 1.5 inches wide, Levy said. Improvised tourniquets are more likely to cause damage when they're very narrow, he said.

Originally published on Live Science.

Editor's Recommendations

Copyright 2016 LiveScience, a Purch company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Https%3a%2f%2fblueprint-api-production.s3.amazonaws.com%2fuploads%2fstory%2fthumbnail%2f21048%2fman_crawling_down_pipe

LONDON  If you don't like the thought of small, cramped spaces, you might want to turn away now.

On Wednesday, during a grouse shoot at Invermark Estate in Angus, Scotland, a cocker spaniel named Jazz disappeared.

SEE ALSO: Lost dog swims 6 miles, returns home thanks to Facebook

The story of how Jazz was found and eventually rescued by gamekeepers was shared on the Angus Glens Moorland Facebook group, where it quickly racked up more than 400 shares and 2.5K reactions.

Here's the story in full.

Image: facebook/angus glens moorland group

The group also shared photos of the heroic rescue operation.

The pipe in which Jazz was found.

Image: facebook/angus glens moorland group

Jonny Stevenson crawls head-first down the pipe to retrieve Jazz.

Image: facebook/angus glens moorland group

"Our head keeper stopped the shoot to look for her and managed to located her down a pipe hole, which is an underground peat chamber that lets the water run, by listening for her breathing," gamekeeper Jonny Stevenson, the man who crawled down the hole, told STV.

"After digging about 6 ft of wet peat, we broke through and pulled the dog out.

"It was very happy to see us."

Gamekeepers dig into the peat around the pipe.

Image: facebook/angus glens moorland group

After clearing a space, they reach in for Jazz.

Image: facebook/angus glens moorland group

Jazz is pulled from the pipe by the two gamekeepers.

Image: facebook/angus glens moorland group

Muddy, but safe.

Image: facebook/angus glens moorland group

Jazz has now been safely reunited with her owner, Karen da Rosa.

"She actually came out toasty warm and happy as punch," she told STV.

"I thought she'd be freezing and in shock, but I think the mud kept her warm.

"One lucky little dog and owner."
This year, the college application process is getting a bit of a makeover, thanks to a new online platform developed by a group of more than 90 selective universities across the country.

The platform was created to "transform" the application experience by equipping students with a set of free tools that guide them through the college search process and allow them to create a portfolio of their work, customize their applications and get feedback from teachers and friends, says Audrey Smith, vice president for enrollment at Smith College in Massachusetts.

Smith is part of the group, which calls itself the Coalition for Access, Affordability, and Success. Also on board: all eight Ivy League universities and about three dozen public universities, including Clemson University in South Carolina, Ohio State University--Columbus and the University of Florida.

The platform is also intended to improve college access for low-income students. To belong to the coalition, a private school must provide enough financial aid to meet the full demonstrated need of every U.S. student admitted, and a public must offer affordable tuition and need-based aid to in-state residents.

Schools also must graduate at least 70 percent of undergraduates within six years. So far, approximately 90 out of the 140 or so colleges and universities that meet these qualifications have joined.

Organizers of the coalition see their application portal as an alternative to, not a required replacement for, the Common Application, which is used by nearly 1 million applicants to 600-plus schools annually. A virtual "locker" will house students' papers, projects, awards, videos, artwork and other materials in one place, similar to Google Drive or Dropbox.

[Get tips and advice on applying to college.]

Once a student has stored work in the locker, parents and teachers can be invited to take a look, share feedback and suggest whether the material might enhance an application. The hope is that this collaborative tool will give students who attend high schools without strong counseling programs a way to get helpful guidance, says Barbara Gill, associate vice president for enrollment management at the University of Maryland--College Park.

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Students can start adding to their locker as early as ninth grade, a feature coalition leaders anticipate will inspire more top students from high-need schools to start planning for college sooner. Some critics, though, have raised concerns that ninth grade is too early to start worrying about college.

"We want to signal to these students that there are a lot of schools where they are welcome" and might get generous aid, says James Nondorf, coalition president and vice president for enrollment and student advancement at the University of Chicago. The online platform will offer tools and application tips to students who might not have access to college-prep courses, Smith says.

[Discover how to use all four years to prep for college.]

Once a student is ready to apply, the coalition platform will allow him to seamlessly import background details and required documents into an application, while also permitting him to elect which items get shared from the locker on a school-by-school basis. Someone applying to a competitive music program, for instance, might opt to submit a recording of a performance to one school but not to another.

The coalition will have a set of essay prompts that any school can use as part of its application requirements -- "What is the hardest part of being a teenager now?" for example -- but students will have to fulfill any extra requirements of a school and pay application fees for each; waivers may be available.

Teachers and counselors will upload recommendation letters to the portal, and applicants can choose which letters to send to which schools. You won't be able to read the recs, however.

To learn more or to create an account and get started, visit coalitionforcollegeaccess.org. The coalition application opened in July, and more than 50 schools plan to start accepting it this fall.

This story is excerpted from the U.S. News "Best Colleges 2017" guidebook, which features in-depth articles, rankings and data.
PHILADELPHIA, PA / ACCESSWIRE / September 16, 2016 / A hit and run accident can be a living nightmare. You or a family member may have been seriously injured, your car severely damaged and the person who caused it is nowhere to be found. Hit and run accidents comprise about 10% of all accidents, causing about 1,500 deaths each year, according to the AAA Foundation for Safety. In a podcast available on YouTube Philadelphia car accident lawyer, Rand Spear says there are steps you can take now to lessen the harm that can be caused by a future hit and run accident.

As part of your auto insurance, you should have under or uninsured motorist coverage. Spear says, "Uninsured motorist coverage is important. It's relatively inexpensive. If you don't have it on your policy you definitely want to look for it because it enables you to bring a claim directly against your insurance company as if they were the other driver's insurance company," car accident attorney Spear says.

He says to take advantage of this coverage there are steps you must take "In Pennsylvania, you need a police report contemporaneous with the accident. Call the police, make sure they come and take down a complete report of exactly what happened, where and how. Give them as much information as you can because the law requires that you do everything to the best of your ability to protect the information so that the insurance company doesn't think someone is just making up a bogus claim."

"In Pennsylvania and New Jersey there's also the assigned claims plan which is a fund set up so each insurance company contributes to it, enabling you to bring a claim against them if you don't own a motor vehicle," Spear says.

It's a resource that can be used if a vehicle strikes you but does not stop so you don't know who drove the vehicle or who owns it so there's no other source of recovery. Generally, the policy limits for the assigned claims plan is $15,000 plus medical benefits of five thousand dollars. "It's not a big recovery," Spear says, "But it was designed to help and assist injured victims who get hurt through no fault of their own and simply have nowhere to go for insurance coverage for either medical bills or pain and suffering."

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Spear says his clients in hit and run accidents give what information they have and his office investigates the accident, including photos of the accident scene and the damage done to vehicles. Spear says if accident victims are able to they should take as many photos or videos of the scene at or near the time of the accident.

If you are injured in a hit and run accident Spear suggests speaking with a car accident attorney sooner rather than later. "The longer you delay and wait the more the insurance company may suspect that something is not right. I like to have these claims reported within 48 hours after the client calls me. They come in or we go to them right away. We get all the information and we put the insurance company on notice, we put the assigned claims plan on notice we put everybody on notice so there's no problem."

Spear says depending on the circumstances without the proper insurance hit and run victims may end up paying for the harm done. "I have clients who come in and see me who don't have uninsured motorist coverage and for one reason or another, they're just not entitled to a fair recovery. We find it to be very distressing but unfortunately there is a hole in the law and occasionally someone falls into that hole and is not able to get fair compensation. In essence, they end up footing the bill and it's really just a horrific situation."

If you or a family member are injured in a hit and run vehicle accident in Pennsylvania or New Jersey, contact Philadelphia car accident lawyer Rand Spear today at 888-373-4LAW or through his website for a free consultation. You can discuss what happened, how the law may apply and your best options for obtaining compensation for your injuries.

source: http://randspear.com/2016/09/14/hit-run-says-philadelphia-car-accident-lawyer-rand-spear/

SOURCE: Rand Spear via Submit Press Release 123
Mobile Expo draws huge crowds

Mobile Expo 2016 has been drawing a large number of visitors every day, as huge discounts offered by different vendors are luring droves of cell phone enthusiasts.
THE STARTUP UNICORN: "I understood at a young age that real estate agents didn't get enough support from their firms," says Robert Reffkin, co-founder and CEO of Compass - and the son of a real estate agent mother. Headquartered in New York, Compass opened L.A. offices in November and recently raised $75 million, pushing the total it has raised from investors to $210 million. Part brokerage, part tech startup, it offers agents a suite of tools that help register open-house visitors and capture contact information, download information from the MLS to create marketing documents and provide up-to-the-second valuations and profiles of other agents for anyone looking to co-broker a deal. Andrew Rhoda, a Beverly Hills Compass agent who previously worked at Coldwell Banker and Douglas Elliman, says the tools set him up for one of the best years of his career. A free consumer app powered by the company's 50 in-house engineers offers data updated by the second. Compass, which has 900 brokers and offices in nine cities - including the L.A. agents it poached from Coldwell, The Agency and Nourmand & Associates - has reached a valuation of more than $1 billion (it's real estate's unicorn), with rumors of an IPO in the near future.

Read more: Hollywood's Top 25 Real Estate Agents

THE HANDS-ON BOUTIQUE: Mercer Vine, which opened its West Hollywood headquarters in July, is headed by founding partner Adam Rosenfeld (previously of Hilton & Hyland and John Aaroe Group). "What I learned from working at other places is that things are not collaborative," he says. "It's a knife fight. So we decided to create something where there is always someone there to answer your question." Most of Mercer Vine's 32 agents work in the traditional model, but Rosenfeld also is leading a team that will consult with developers on land acquisition and guide them through permitting, design, build and sale. The team has 55 projects set to hit the market during the next three years, ranging in price from $2 million to $100 million.

This story first appeared in the Sept. 23 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe.
(WASHINGTON)  A House intelligence committee report is calling National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden a serial exaggerator and fabricator who doesnt fit the profile of a whistleblower.

Snowdens attorney denounced the committees report, released on the eve of the opening of the movie Snowden, and called him a genuine American hero.

Separately, all members of the committee sent a bipartisan letter to President Barack Obama on Thursday urging him not to pardon Snowden.

Snowdens revelations about the agencys bulk collection of millions of Americans phone records set off a fierce debate that pit civil libertarians concerned about privacy against more hawkish lawmakers fearful about losing tools to combat terrorism. Democrats and libertarian-leaning Republicans pushed through a reauthorization of the USA Patriot Act last year that ended the program.

Mr. Snowdens claim that he stole this information and disclosed it to protect Americans, privacy and civil liberties is undercut by his actions, the letter said. Rather than avail himself of the many lawful avenues to express legal, moral, or ethical qualms with U.S. intelligence activities, Mr. Snowden stole 1.5 million classified documents from National Security Agency networks.

The Republican-led committee released a three-page unclassified summary of its two-year bipartisan examination of how Snowden was able to remove the documents from secure NSA networks, what the documents contained and the damage their removal caused to U.S. national security.

Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the ranking Democrat on the House intelligence committee, said the probe revealed that the vast majority of what Snowden took had nothing to do with American privacy.

The majority of what he took has to do with military secrets and defense secrets, Schiff said in an interview Thursday for C-SPANs Newsmakers. I think thats very much at odds with the narrative that he wants to tell that he is a whistleblower.

Story continues

Snowden was an NSA contract employee when he took the documents and leaked them to journalists who revealed massive domestic surveillance programs begun in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. The programs collected the telephone metadata records of millions of Americans and examined emails from overseas.

Snowden fled to Hong Kong, then Russia, to avoid prosecution and now wants a presidential pardon because he says he helped his country by revealing secret domestic surveillance programs.

The Obama administration has urged Snowden to return to the U.S. and face trial. Justice Department spokesman Marc Raimondi has said there is no question his actions have inflicted serious harms on our national security.

Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., chairman of the House intelligence committee, said Snowden betrayed his colleagues and his country.

He put our service members and the American people at risk after perceived slights by his superiors, Nunes said in a statement. In light of his long list of exaggerations and outright fabrications detailed in this report, no one should take him at his word. I look forward to his eventual return to the United States, where he will face justice for his damaging crimes.

Snowden insists he has not shared the full cache of 1.5 million classified documents with anyone. However, the report notes that in June, the deputy chairman of the Russian parliaments defense and security committee publicly conceded that Snowden did share intelligence with his government.

Ben Wizner, Snowdens attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union, said the committee report was an attempt to discredit a genuine American hero.

After years of investigation, the committee still cant point to any remotely credible evidence that Snowdens disclosures caused harm, Wizner said. In a more candid moment, the NSAs former deputy director, who was directly involved in the governments investigation, explicitly said he didnt believe Snowden had cooperated with either China or Russia.

The committee, on the other hand, called Snowden a disgruntled employee who had frequent conflicts with his managers.

According to the committee, Snowden began mass downloads of classified material two weeks after he was reprimanded for engaging in a spat with NSA managers. The committee also described Snowden as a serial exaggerator and fabricator.

A close review of Snowdens official employment records and submissions reveals a pattern of intentional lying, the report said. He claimed to have left Army basic training because of broken legs when in fact he washed out because of shin splints. He claimed to have obtained a high school degree equivalent when in fact he never did. 

The report said Snowden claimed to have worked for the CIA as a senior adviser, when he was a computer technician.

He also doctored his performance evaluations and obtained new positions at NSA by exaggerating his resume and stealing the answers to an employment test, the report said.

Speaking by video link from Moscow, Snowden said Wednesday that whistleblowing is democracys safeguard of last resort, the one on which we rely when all other checks and balances have failed and the public has no idea whats going on behind closed doors.

The 33-year-old addressed a New York City news conference where advocates from the ACLU, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International announced an online petition drive to urge Obama to pardon Snowden before he leaves office.
(This story corrects origin of report as source, not negotiator) DUBAI/SANAA (Reuters) - A senior U.S. diplomat has presented a proposal for a comprehensive ceasefire in Yemen to the country's dominant Houthis at a meeting in Oman, a source close to the Houthi negotiating team said on Thursday. Negotiators will return to Houthi-controled Sanaa on Friday carrying the plan offered by U.S. Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas Shannon in talks in Muscat, the source said. Shannon met the Houthi team, officials of the allied General People's Congress (GPC) party and an Omani mediator in Muscat on Sept. 8 and 9 to discuss how to end a war that has killed over 10,000 people and displaced more than 3 million. In Washington, U.S. officials said the plan was an "extension of the efforts Secretary (of State John) Kerry initiated in Jeddah." The source did not disclose details of the proposal. Kerry said in Saudi Arabia on Aug. 25 he had agreed in talks with Gulf Arab states and the United Nations on a plan to restart peace talks on Yemen with a goal of forming a unity government. Yemen's crisis began in September 2014 when the Iran-allied Houthis seized the capital, Sanaa. A Saudi-led Arab alliance intervened in support of the country's internationally recognized government led by President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi. U.N.-sponsored negotiations to end the fighting collapsed last month. Peace talks foundered after the Houthis and the GPC announced the formation of a 10-member governing council on Aug 6., ignoring a U.N. warning that such a move would violate Security Council resolutions on how to solve the conflict. The Houthi negotiating team has been in Oman since the collapse of the peace talks, after Saudi authorities in control of Yemen's airspace refused to grant the Houthi team access to Sanaa, the source added. Saudi authorities have now agreed to allow the negotiating team to return to Yemen in a U.N. airplane, the source said. In a statement on the Kerry proposal on Thursday, the governing council reiterated that its willingness to restart peace talks depended on implementation of a full ceasefire, including the lifting of the no-fly zone and siege imposed by the Saudi-led coalition. Forces allied to the Houthis attacked across the border into Saudi Arabia's southern Jizan province on Thursday, with both sides claiming victory and giving conflicting casualty tolls. Sources in the Saudi-led coalition said Saudi forces at the Jabal Dukhan mountain repelled the attack by Yemeni Republican Guard troops loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, killing about 25 and wounding 30. In the Yemeni capital, Sanaa, a Houthi official said the clash resulted in the Houthi capture of the mountain as well as a place called Al Romaih. The commander of a Saudi rapid intervention force was killed in the fighting, he added. (Reporting by William Maclean in Dubai, Mohammed Ghobari in Sanaa and Lesley Wroughton in Washington; Writing by Katie Paul; Editing by Andrew Roche and Peter Cooney)
Bob Lord

When Bob Lord announced he was leaving AOL in November last year, most people knew he was going to end up landing a big new role  not least because he told The Wall Street Journal he wanted to run a public company or a company about to IPO.

Lord spent more than a decade at ad agencies, ending up as global CEO at Publicis Groupe's digital technology division, presiding over almost 8,000 employees and $1.8 billion in revenue.

In 2013, he left agency land to join AOL as its president, helping to grow revenue from $1.5 billion to more than $3 billion. Verizon, one of AOL's large clients, became so impressed with its programmatic advertising offering that it ended up acquiring the company for $4.4 billion in June last year.

Lord is now at IBM, in the newly-created chief digital officer role. Lord hasn't quite replaced Ginni Rometty to run the company, but he has been charged with transforming "Big Blue" into a much slicker operation that he hopes will appeal as much to Silicon Valley techies as its traditional enterprise customers.

IBM wants to go after developers by removing laggard big business processes

The business Lord presides over now is six times the size of AOL, which he thinks gives him the platform to not just transform IBM, but an entire industry. His mission is to bring the idea of "cognitive computing"  artificial intelligence, machine learning, natural language processing, and so on  to the masses.

Lord told Business Insider: "[At AOL] we really pushed the industry to the programmatic landscape faster than it would have moved [without us], educating clients that they should be doing paid media in an automated way. Using that analogy, at IBM we are looking at how cognitive computing can help businesses pivot differently, using different insights."

Asked what he hopes his biggest achievement at IBM will be, Lord  who describes himself as a "transformation junkie"  said: "I just know I want people to know that my fingerprint is on making the pivot; for IBM to be known as the premier cloud and cognitive computing company."

Story continues

watson jeopardy ibm

IBM had already been moving a fair distance in that direction without the help of Lord. IBM's Watson cognitive computing system has been in development since 2005. It famously competed and won on the "Jeopardy!" TV quiz show in 2011, and now it's being used in everything from movie trailers, to becoming replacement concierge at the US Open, and being the brains behind a new healthcare center in Finland.

But Lord wants to help IBM reach a new generation of customers: developers, entrepreneurs, and startups.

"Developers that work for companies make a lot of choices that are very strategic to the company. So we shouldn't just worry about the the CMO and CIO experience. Entrepreneurs and startups, a lot of those people are developers, people that code all the time and have a crazy wacky idea that becomes Facebook," Lord said.

"The key is, if they don't know about IBM products, they go to competitors. The challenge is that we can't market to developers. You have to inspire them to join a revolution and they have to come on a journey with you. The journey is to the cognitive era of computing. If you want to be a developer that teaches a computer how to code, you want to be with IBM. This huge aspirational thing is such an opportunity for IBM to really lead the market," he added.

Lord's plan to enthuse developers includes participating in developer events and meet-ups for the first time, integrating into Github, Slack, and Twilio, and also making Watson easier for them to try out. That could include anything from data tracking mechanisms so a system can tell when someone has arrived at a restaurant, or imaging indexing to help healthcare administrations look at images of moles to determine insights on potential treatments for melanoma.

"I'm chopping down the steps. When you come from a legacy of being an enterprise-ready software company, there's lots of security protocols put in place. I'm eliminating some of those steps just so someone can try a cognitive API insight: trial it for 24 hours, let them get inspired, and then wrap around the security," Lord said. "It's just a different mindset  the company needs to twist."

Aside from aiming to appeal to developers, Lord has been using this mindset to improve the IBM experience for its traditional customers.

think marketing

Earlier this week, IBM launched "THINK Marketing"  a content channel that uses Watson technology to recommend news and opinion pieces from across the web to each individual visitor. Later down the line, IBM wants Watson to get to know THINK Marketing's interests, skills, and business challenges to present them with the most suitable articles. THINK Marketing will be the first of many verticals.

"Everyone kept telling me how slow IBM operates but we started [on THINK Marketing] in August, from ground-zero up. I'm really impressed with it," Lord said.

IBM and ad tech? "That ship has sailed"

In recent months, people in the ad industry have speculated whether IBM might follow the likes of Oracle (with its acquisitions of Datalogix and BlueKai) and use its financial clout, data assets, and strong links with marketers to make a leap into ad tech. (IBM has made lots of buys in the "martech" space, but hasn't really encroached on the ad tech space.)

With Lord's experience in the sector, we asked whether it was a consideration.

"Our job isn't to build a competitor programmatic platform. I think that ship has sailed, quite honestly. It's not like we are going to build a search engine. But we will leverage those components [from other ad tech companies]. We want to put cognitive capabilities on top of current platforms to make them smarter and more effective," Lord said.

What then of Verizon's plan, in acquiring AOL and Yahoo, to create a third force to challenge the online ad duopoly of Google and Facebook? We asked Lord's opinion of Verizon's Yahoo acquisition.

IBM's PR representative politely reminds us we're going off topic.

"It's a logical move," Lord said.

NOW WATCH: A dentist reveals the most effective way to whiten your teeth





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From Esquire

If you thought woven leather was invented by the Italians, think again. To celebrate its 150th anniversary, British shoe brand Grenson has created-or rather recreated-some milestone styles, like the woven 1970s derby featured in a four-minute film devoted to its construction.

It's one of seven styles in the aptly named Archive Collection. All of them were pulled from Grenson's long history in Rushden, just down the road from Northampton, England, the epicenter of British shoemaking (think names like John Lobb, Edward Green, Crockett & Jones), where the brand was founded by one William Green in 1866.

Green's son had the bright idea of morphing the company name into a brand, one of the first of its kind. Green and Son became Grenson in 1913, one of the earliest registered brands in British shoemaking. The 20th Century saw the company manufacture for the war effort-twice-making boots and shoes for allied soldiers in both WWI and WWII. But as the years progressed, increasing low-cost competition put Grenson, like many British brands, into a long, slow decline.

That changed in 2005 when shoemaker and marketeer Tim Little joined the company as creative director with a mandate to revitalize it. Five years later Little bought Grenson and embarked on an ambitious plan to put it back on the shoemaking map.

Photo credit: Grenson

Making both in Rushden and in India (to provide an accessibly priced fashion range), Little and his team were instrumental in making the chunky brogue a thing for several years running and for adding a women's collection to the range. Together they helped bring a new, more fashionable idea of Grenson to the fore-and in the process earned a new popularity with customers, press, and retailers alike.

Photo credit: Grenson

In 2012 Little instituted an apprenticeship scheme for the first time in 30-odd years to train a new generation of shoemakers and instill a new sense of local pride in Northampton's shoemaking tradition. And in 2013 the company moved addresses for the first time since 1895.

Story continues

All of which means that 150 years of continuous shoemaking is great-but it's far from being the only thing the brand has to celebrate. Happy birthday, Grenson.

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We issued an updated research report on Illinois Tool Works Inc. ITW on Sep 16, 2016. The machinery company is renowned globally for its highly engineered products and specialty systems.



Illinois Tool Works, with $41.7 billion in market capitalization, has strong fundamentals, supporting growth. Below we briefly discuss the companys tailwinds.



We believe that product & end-market diversification have been Illinois Tool Works biggest strength over time, providing it competitive advantage over its peers. The company has a diversified and technologically advanced product portfolio, including an array of highly engineered fasteners and components, equipment and consumable systems, and specialty products and equipments. It serves a vast clientele in the industrial, automotive, food, welding, construction, beverages and others end markets. The combined impact of solid products and vast customer base is likely to boost Illinois Tool Works organic growth in the years ahead.



Also, Illinois Tool Works long-term Enterprise Strategy (20122017) will help it ensure maximum profitability through development of new, improved products and effective cost-control. These strategies include Business Structure Simplification, Portfolio Management and Strategic Sourcing. Overall, this strategic trio is expected to save approximately $600$800 million in structural costs, enabling the company to achieve its targets of organic revenue growth of 200 basis points (bps) or more above global the Gross Domestic Product, an approximate operating margin of 23%, and return on invested capital of above 20%.



Also, the continuous application of its 80/20 business process (to focus more on 20% of the items which account for 80% of the value and less on 80% of the items which account for 20% of the value) for both existing businesses and new acquisitions will help Illinois Tool Works achieve higher operating margins, better capital efficiency and solid return on invested capital. Moreover, accelerated share buybacks and dividend payments are expected to boost shareholders returns.



For 2016, Illinois Tool Works increased its earnings guidance to $5.50$5.70 from the previous expectation of $5.40$5.60 per share. Operating margin is expected to exceed 22.5%, driven by more than 100 bps contribution from the companys enterprise initiatives.



We believe these tailwinds of Illinois Tool Works more-than-offset any adverse impacts from forex woes, geopolitical issues, global uncertainties, huge debt-level, stiff industry rivalry, volatilities in input price & supply and difficulties or delays in research and development or production and services.



Conclusion



Illinois Tool Works currently carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). Other stocks worth considering in the machinery industry include DXP Enterprises, Inc. DXPE, Tennant Company TNC and Gorman-Rupp Co. GRC. While both DXP Enterprises and Tennant Company sport a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), Gorman-Rupp carries the same Zacks Rank as Illinois Tool Works. You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.



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Washington (AFP) - IMF chief Christine Lagarde pressed Mozambique's President Filipe Nyusi to allow an independent international audit of companies involved in a loan scandal that forced an IMF and World Bank aid cutoff.

Meeting at International Monetary Fund headquarters in Washington, Lagarde told Nyusi the country needed "more decisive efforts to improve transparency" after the government was shown to have hidden off-budget some $1.4 billion in debt, according to IMF spokesman Gerry Rice.

Those efforts would specifically include "an international and independent audit of the companies that were funded under the loans disclosed in April 2016," according to Rice.

The IMF and World Bank suspended aid to Mozambique in April after news surfaced that the impoverished country had spent $40 million on a new aircraft for the president and had hidden the $1.4 billion in borrowing.

In May, a group of 14 donors including Britain, Canada, the European Union, France and the African Development Bank also cut off aid to Mozambique, which is heavily dependent on foreign support.

The unreported borrowing included financing support for two companies, ProIndicus and Mozambique Asset Management, and bilateral credit from another country.

Mozambique has said that most of the money was to fund maritime security and shipyards.

According to Rice, Nyusi indicated to Lagarde that he would support the audit.

"The managing director welcomed that the president indicated the Government of Mozambique's willingness to work with the IMF on the terms-of-reference for this process -- to be initiated by the office of the attorney general -- and to implement it," he said in a statement.

He said that an IMF staff team would visit the country next week.
By Suchitra Mohanty and Nita Bhalla NEW DELHI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Women's health activists on Friday cheered a ruling by India's top court ordering the government to shut down "sterilization camps" within three years following the deaths of hundreds of largely poor rural women across the country. In a judgment on Wednesday, the Supreme Court said 363 women died between 2010 and 2013 during or after surgery in sterilization camps due poor management by local authorities which included doctors using dirty equipment and expired drugs. It called on the federal government to ensure the country's 29 states and seven union territories halt the camps, provide adequate compensation for victims and their families, and hold negligent doctors accountable. Activists have long campaigned for better regulation of sterilization camps - where women are gathered for mass surgeries to sever or seal their fallopian tubes - and more investment in alternative forms of contraception. "We welcome the Supreme Court judgment which we consider a landmark one. Providing quality services to and upholding the dignity of women will now be placed strongly on the national agenda," said Poonam Muttreja, executive director of the Population Foundation of India (PFI). "This judgment has the potential to shape India's family planning program into a program of national significance." India's efforts to rein in population growth have been described as the most draconian after China. Birth rates have fallen in recent decades, but population growth is still among the world's fastest. According to a study by PFI, 85 percent of the country's family planning budget for 2013/14 was spent on promoting and conducting sterilizations on women. Only 1.5 percent was spent on other forms of contraception. The world's top sterilizer of women, India came under global scrutiny for its sterilization drive in November 2014 when 15 women died and scores of others were hospitalized after surgery at a sterilization camp in the eastern state of Chhattisgarh. Investigations found the deaths in Bilaspur district were due to unhygienic conditions, dirty medical instruments and equipment and an overall lack of care for the patients who were poor tribal and low-caste women. Authorities have put in place guidelines and are training health workers on conducting safe and sanitary surgeries, but incentivised, target-driven sterilization continue. Doctors, nurses and health workers receive cash incentives for promoting and carrying out sterilizations. Patients are also given compensation - ranging from 600 rupees ($10) to 1,100 rupees ($17) for tubectomies and vasectomies respectively. The Supreme Court ruling was in response to a civil petition filed by women's health activist Devika Biswas alleged widespread mismanagement at camps in various states. The ruling mentioned how a doctor sterilized 53 women over a period of two hours "in an unprofessional and unethical manner" in a village school in the eastern state of Bihar in January 2012. The sterilizations were conducted under torch light with the women laying on school desks, the surgeon did not have any gloves and there was no running water available, it said. The patients, it added, were also not given any pre-operative tests, counseling and were not aware of the potential dangers and outcomes of sterilization. "A sterilization surgery does not appear to be complicated and yet several deaths have taken place across the country over the years," said Justice Madan B. Lokur in his order. "Undoubtedly, this needs looking into by the Government of India and the state governments and remedial and corrective steps need to be taken." (Reporting by Suchitra Mohanty and Nita Bhalla. Writing by Nita Bhalla, Editing by Ros Russell; Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women's rights, trafficking, corruption and climate change. Visit news.trust.org)
Srinagar (India) (AFP) - Indian police said Friday they have arrested a prominent Kashmiri activist who was this week prevented from travelling to Geneva, where he had been due to brief UN officials on the strife-torn region.

Khurram Pervez was arrested late Thursday after returning to his home in Srinagar, which has been roiled for months by violent protests over the killing of a young militant by Indian soldiers.

Police superintendent Faisal Qayoom confirmed his arrest but did not say what the charges were.

"We are looking into it. For the moment we've taken him into custody," he said.

Pervez's wife Samina told AFP police had come to the family home late on Thursday to arrest him. He can be held for up to six months without charge under India's Public Safety Act.

More than 80 people have been killed in Indian-administered Kashmir since the militant leader's death on July 8, in one of the deadliest bouts of violence since a full-blown armed rebellion was at its peak in the 1990s.

Most have died in clashes between protesters and police and paramilitaries who have fired tear gas and pellet guns at demonstrators.

Authorities this week banned prayers to mark the Eid festival at the main mosque in Srinagar, capital of India's only Muslim-majority state.

Internet and mobile networks have also been cut off in a bid to prevent a repeat of the protests.

Pervez, coordinator of the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS), was scheduled to brief a UN Human Rights Council session on the situation, but immigration officials blocked him from boarding his flight at Delhi's main airport.

Both India and neighbouring Pakistan lay claim to the whole of the Himalayan territory, which has been divided between the two since they separated seven decades ago.

The two countries, which are both now nuclear powers, have twice gone to war over the territory and accuse each other of stoking violence.
NOC slashes aviation fuel prices by 5pc

Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) has slashed the price of aviation fuel sold to international and domestic carriers by about 5 percent.
By Hidayat Setiaji and Gayatri Suroyo

JAKARTA (Reuters) - Indonesia's finance minister said on Friday she had asked neighbour Singapore not to hinder her government's tax amnesty scheme, and won assurances that Indonesians with assets in the city-state would not come under suspicion for participating.

Sri Mulyani Indrawati said she got the promise from Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam, who she called after Reuters reported on Thursday that private banks in Singapore were passing the names of clients joining the amnesty to a local police unit dealing with financial crime.

Launched in July, the tax amnesty is a top priority for President Joko Widodo, who wants the repatriated funds to help pay for Indonesia's large budget deficit and broaden the country's tax base. A large majority of the offshore assets declared so far were from Singapore.

"I have stressed to the Singapore government that the Tax Amnesty Law clearly mentions that Indonesian taxpayers have the right to join the amnesty programme and be pardoned for all their tax crimes and administrative sanctions," Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati told reporters.

"I will monitor this and all Indonesians that feel they have been hindered, we will follow up," said the former World Bank managing director.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore has confirmed it advised banks in Singapore to encourage clients to use tax amnesty programmes and that banks have to file a suspicious transaction report (STR) when handling tax amnesty cases.

MAS said participation in an amnesty in and of itself would not attract criminal investigation in Singapore.

Indrawati late Thursday told Indonesian media that the news on names being shared "could potentially disturb our taxpayers."

'PROTECTED BY LAW'

She said many in Indonesia asked her about Singapore's reporting requirement as some taxpayers became worried that when they join the amnesty to clear up their tax records, it could be seen as money laundering activity by Singapore authorities.

Story continues

"There is no reason to be afraid. Joining the tax amnesty is a good action, it is legal and protected by law," Indrawati said on Friday.

Indonesians hold an estimated $200 billion in private banking assets in Singapore.

As of Friday, the government has collected 22.7 trillion rupiah ($1.73 billion) of tax amnesty revenue or almost 14 percent of its ambitious target of 165 trillion rupiah. Around 552.7 trillion rupiah of assets have been declared by more than 60,000 taxpayers.

As of Sept. 6 - the last breakdown available from Indonesia's finance ministry - Singapore accounted for 85.4 percent of assets declared outside Indonesia, followed by Australia with 6.7 percent, the United State 2.5 percent and Switzerland 1.8 percent.

($1 = 13,125 rupiah)

(Writing by Randy Fabi; Editing by Richard Borsuk and Andrew Heavens)
Indonesia is planning to ban gay networking apps, in the latest demonstration of the countrys growing intolerance toward the LGBT community.

A government official confirmed that authorities are already moving to block at least three apps  Grindr, Blued and BoyAhoy  after a request from police, Agence France-Presse reports.

But the ban could be much broader. According to Buzzfeed, more than 80 websites and applications geared toward sexual and gender minorities could fall under the injunction.

We are starting to block LGBT applications, AFP cited communications ministry spokesperson Noor Iza as saying, adding that the move was intended to target services that promote sexual deviancy.

Read More: LGBT Rights in Indonesia Are Coming Under Unprecedented Attack

The spokesperson said that letters had been sent to three online service providers requesting that the apps be blocked, but it is unclear whether they will adhere to the bid.

Google and Apple are reportedly among the private companies that will be asked to remove the apps from their digital stores. Neither company immediately responded to TIMEs request for comment.

Those who support the ban claim that apps geared toward the LGBT community are prone to hosting pornography and other content viewed as inappropriate for Indonesias conservative society.

The recent bust of a pedophile-ring allegedly linked to Grindr and several other networking apps was reportedly the chief impetus for the ban, but rights advocates believe that officials used the operation as a convenient excuse to advance a discriminatory agenda.

The decision to ban the apps, which Buzzfeed reports was made during a closed-door meeting of government officials on Wednesday, is the latest move in what is viewed as an unprecedented crackdown on the LGBT community in the Muslim-majority Southeast Asian nation.

Homosexuality is not illegal in Indonesia, but calls for criminalization and cures have gained public support throughout what Human Rights Watch said has been a year of regression on LGBT rights in the country.

This ban on what Indonesian authorities called LGBT applications is discriminatory online censorship, pure and simple, and yet another blow against the rights of LGBT persons in the country, Phil Robertson, deputy director of HRWs Asia division, told TIME in an email.

In a damning report published in August, HRW said that 2016 saw a combination of government officials, militant Islamists and mass religious groups stoking anti-LGBT intolerance.
To tap the ever increasing opportunities and cater to the growing demand for cloud computing, Ingram Micro Inc. IM recently extended its Cloud Marketplace to Portugal. Through this, its channel partners and professionals can avail the required cloud services.

Cloud Marketplace was first launched in North America and received a favorable response, which prompted the company to launch it globally. We note that just yesterday the company announced the availability of the same platform in Brazil. Currently, IngramMicro Cloud Marketplace is also available in Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.

Featuring Microsofts MSFT Office 365 via the Microsoft Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) program, Ingram Micro Cloud Marketplace will be extremely beneficial for channel partners as it will enhance the customers overall support experience and accelerate the growth of cloud businesses.

Moreover, it will broaden Ingram Micros capabilities as a cloud solution provider, thereby helping it to capitalize on the increasing opportunities in the cloud computing market. It will also be a good source of monthly recurring revenues for Ingram Micro.

The Ingram Micro Cloud Marketplace has more than 200 cloud-based solutions from over 70 vendors, which include salesforce.com CRM, VMware VMW and AVG Technologies.

According to Juame Soler, executive director of Ingram Micro Portugal and Spain, We are pleased to provide a flexible and customizable infrastructure to our channel partners in Portugal and empower them to focus on their core competencies rather than divert valuable resources to building a cloud platform infrastructure." He added "The Ingram Micro Cloud Marketplace presents a true competitive advantage for our partners by helping them reduce time-to-market and deliver streamlined cloud management solutions through a single online portal."

Ingram Micro's initiative comes at an opportune moment as cost benefits of cloud computing are compelling companies to engage in massive information technology restructuring and upgrades.

Story continues

Further, according to IDC, Brazil is witnessing a huge demand for cloud services. Public cloud services in 2015 were valued at $645 million. Moreover, the same is projected to increase to $1531 million by 2018, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 33.4%. We expect this to work in favor of distributors like Ingram Micro.

Ingram Micro has been striking distribution deals with a number of original equipment manufacturers, thus expanding its product portfolio. Moreover, Ingram Micro's exposure in cloud computing products is expected to remain its key growth driver.

Though Ingram Micros high debt burden is a concern, we remain fairly optimistic about its strategic relationships with network giants such as Juniper Networks Inc., Cisco and International Business Machines Corp.

INGRAM MICRO Price

INGRAM MICRO Price | INGRAM MICRO Quote

Ingram Micro carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

Interested in IPOs? Check out the special edition of Zacks Friday Finish Line below, where Editor Maddy Johnson and Content Writer Ryan McQueeney interview Kathleen Smith of Renaissance Capital about the IPO market in 2016 (see part two here).

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In September of 1787, the Founding Fathers signed the United States Constitution. As America celebrates this occasion on Constitution Day this Friday, 229 years later, TIME spoke with one of them, the man known as the Father of the Constitution: James Madison.

(Well, by James Madison we mean Bryan Austin, a Madison historical interpreter who works with the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation.)

Heres what James Madison wishes he could have added to the Constitution, what he thinks of Alexander Hamilton and whether he would support a woman for president.

TIME: What year is it?

James Madison: The year at present is 1791. We have seen just within this year the ratification of the first ten amendments of our Constitution, the Bill of Rights, which I have had the distinct and unmerited honor of serving as architect of. It is equally at present a great dilemma of our politics that we have descended into artificial factions, that of party.

What is your favorite part of the Constitution?

There are those at present who would dub me with that honorary Father of the Constitution. I should proffer that government is not like that fabled Goddess of Wisdom, the work of one mind. No, instead it takes the work of many heads and many hands. So I suspect in that degree the greatest virtue of our federal Constitution is that it is indeed the work of compromise. But I should say equally, it is to my mind a document that fixes perfectly the balance necessary to government to ensure that power does not corrupt, but ensures equally the energy necessary in government to ensure this Republican democratic experiment need not denigrate into anarchy.

What do you think the biggest flaw is in the Constitution?

One of the greatest defects I have found in that federal Constitution is initially the lack of establishing a federal university. This was something both unique to my mind as well as the mind of General Washington, by which we can establish one singular university to ensure that gentlemen, and perhaps one day ladies, from the thirteen of these United States as we grow could come together, consolidate the systems and virtues of our government and from there learn the virtue of unity outside the local peculiarities of their state.

Story continues

I am somewhat abashed to say I was also not in favor of a federal Bill of Rights. To my mind, it was my opinion that an enumeration that was not complete was not safe. If we are to be a society of rights, we cannot enumerate what rights above others we should uphold.

What do you think of Alexander Hamilton?

(Laughs) Mr. Hamilton has been a creature of great controversy and I think great relevance as well. Mr. Hamilton is of the opinion, and it is not invalid, that wealth is necessary to ensure liberty, happiness, and above all virtue in a society. [But] if we are to prove a more enlightened society, if we are to prove to the whole of the rest of the world that this experiment that we began in 1776 can succeed, that men are capable of governing themselves not out of fear, not out of passion, but instead out of reason, logic and compromise, we must in every instance mirror it in our systems of government. To my mind, the former Secretary of the Treasury endeavors to upset that balance [in the government] for the hope of glory. I will confess he was a great ally and friend through the course of this last decade.

Get your history fix in one place: sign up for the weekly TIME History newsletter

What do you think the most important qualities in a President?

He must in every regard be able to act with that expedience and sometimes secrecy that the office often warrants. A man who in every regard can cherish friendly intercourse with all nations of a correspondent disposition. A man who is capable of maintaining sincere neutrality towards belligerent nations. A person who in all cases would prefer amicable discussion, reasonable accommodation of differences, than a decision made out of any sort of impulse for an appeal to arms. He must be a man of conviction.

We have seen over the the course of time varying degrees of demagogues who issue promises and luxury, will grant the people their utmost desire. Happily for America, we rely on lessons of experience where we hallow and raise not men but ideas and virtues. I should add when writing the Constitution we had our shining example of who the chief magistrate should be, President Washington.

Do you think its better for the president to be an accomplished politician, or a citizen new to government?

I confess, Madam, I am somewhat abashed at the question. Having entered politics at 25 years of age in the old colonial council of Williamsburg, Virginia, I have, outside of my income as a planter and a planters son, served as a career politician.

Were a country of hyphenates, wherein man need not be defined only by statesman or politician, but equally by the various other degrees. Any person seeking the office of the president should hold in some regard, even if it is not necessarily by experience, knowledge regarding the various tenets, virtues, and indeed history of [government] as well as an avowed love not only for America but for the Constitution.

Could you see ever supporting a woman for president?

Oof, thats a novelty. Speaking of their aptitude, the evidence of the female for studies of the highest order cannot be questioned, so I suspect wheresoever posterity should travel over the course of government, it should fall to them and they should judge equitably. Radical, indeed, but curious.

How did you celebrate signing the Constitution?

[The members of the Constitutional convention] retired to the City Tavern several blocks from Independence Hall wherein President Washington funded a dinner for the gentlemen who attended, constituting three bottles of Madeira at least to a man, nine bottles of beer, eight punch bowls you forgive me for not remembering a figure. But as we toasted to the success of the Constitution, needless to say we were very lubricated.
From House Beautiful

It's not unreasonable to expect a freshly washed set of sheets on your hotel room's bed - but according to a new report from Inside Edition, some hotel room sheets might not be as clean as you'd hope they'd be.

On a visit to a Residence Inn by Marriott in New York City, Inside Edition reporters used a harmless spray paint, which can only be seen under ultraviolet light, to mark the sheets and pillowcases of a hotel room bed. The next day, they checked into the room under a different name ... and found that the previous day's sheets - and the spray paint messages - were still there.

Upon learning that the bedding hadn't been washed, investigators confronted the manager of the hotel, who told them that it's a custom to "change every checked-out room's sheet." She wasn't sure, however, about exactly what had happened in this situation. The Marriott Corporation apologized for the incident and told Inside Edition that an inspection would be conducted.

Needless to say, the investigators' findings at this hotel were pretty alarming. But the Residence Inn wasn't the only hotel in which Inside Edition investigators found evidence of unwashed bedding: Of the nine hotels that the reporters visited, a shocking three of them were found to have left dirty sheets on the bed for the next guest. Gross.

Once you arrive at a hotel, determining the cleanliness of your bed sheets can be a little bit tricky. Bringing your own black light is an option (which, as USA Today reports, would help you check the room for spots and stains), but it's hardly a practical one.

To give yourself greater peace of mind (even without the help of a black light), remember this piece of advice from a 2011 CNN investigation: Bring your own pillows and toss the hotel comforter to the side when you settle in for the night, because pillowcases and comforters are are the pieces of hotel bedding that often go unwashed the longest.

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Here's to happy (and clean) travels!

[h/t Inside Edition]

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By Paul Kilby

NEW YORK, Sept 16 (IFR) - News of PDVSA's bonds swap left markets in two minds this week as the Venezuelan oil company sought relief from a wall of maturities falling due over the coming months.

After months of speculation, PDVSA's president Eulogio Del Pino finally came clean when he announced the company's intention to swap existing 2016s and 2017s for a new amortising 2020 issue.

If successful, the transaction will provide much-needed breathing space to the state-owned company, which faces billions of dollars in bond maturities over the next year or so.

In the swap, PDVSA is targeting the 5.125% 2016s, the 5.25% 2017s and the 8.5% 2017s. That amounts to about US$8.26bn in outstanding debt, according to Thomson Reuters data.

But many on Wall Street doubt that the company can pull off a transaction whose ultimate success rests on heavy participation from foreign accounts.

As of Thursday, few details had been announced, but analysts say that PDVSA will have to dangle some alluring incentives to bring international holders on board.

"They will have to make the economics work so it is not viewed as a distressed exchange, which I think they will want to avoid," one investor told IFR.

Getting holders to relinquish short-term debt that could benefit from a pull to par may be tough going, however, especially if investors don't believe a default is imminent.

The 2016s were trading at a mid-market price of 94.95 on Thursday, while the old and new 2017s were respectively quoted at 73.00-74.00 and 78.80-79.60, according to Thomson Reuters data.

"You are forfeiting [up to] 28 points for being in the trade," said Siobhan Morden, head of Latin American strategy at Nomura, who thinks investors will have to be generously rewarded for giving up that capital gain.

Pricing on a new 2020 is still a matter of speculation. But Morden calculates it should come at 62 on an 8.75%-9% coupon, while Citigroup analysts have prices ranging from 50 to 52 depending on the coupon.

Story continues

At that level, investors are still accepting a dollar price well above what most would consider recovery values, exposing holders of the new bonds to further downside in the event of default.

And while a successful swap will provide some short-term debt relief, the risks of a credit event are still very real over the medium term.

"You can kick the can down the road, but they need the oil prices to be more favourable and policies that the financial burdens," said Sean Newman, a senior portfolio manager at Invesco.

FAR FROM CERTAIN

For a country still grappling with severe economic and political crises, such an outcome is far from certain - as is a bounce in crude prices.

To make the transaction NPV positive for investors, PDVSA would also have to issue 1.4-2.0 times more bonds for every dollar of debt retired, according to Citigroup.

The bank calculates that an exchange of this type could lead to over US$10bn in extra debt amortisation between 2017 and 2020, heightening the risks of a credit event further down the road.

Collateral in the form of shares of Citgo, PDVSA's US unit, which Del Pino also announced this week, may act as a sweetener, but few believe this will tip the balance and many doubt whether such a structure would work at all.

Valuing such stock may prove difficult given that Citgo shares have already been pledged on an earlier bond offering from the US-based borrower.

"Clients are somewhat concerned about the collateral," said Morden. "On the Citgo bonds there are some covenants that restrict pledging collateral."

A preliminary prospectus supplement seen by IFR when Citgo was marketing its 2020s bonds showed that a pledge of Citgo Petroleum stock was increased from 49% to 100%.

"One has to question the nature of the collateral and where it has been pledged," said a buyside trader.

"With another US$7bn of debt [collateralised with equity] there would obviously be material dilution. At this point, it is hard to quantify the extent of participation from external bondholders."

LIMITATIONS

Robert Matz, an analyst at Covenant Review, agrees that there would be significant limitations in pledging shares of the operating company under the terms of the holding company's bonds, but it may work with shares from the holding company.

"If the idea is to pledge holdco shares - the entity that owns the opco shares - it is not subject to covenants under the holdco or opco bonds as long as the change of control put is not triggered," he said.

Ultimately, however, foreign participation is expected to come down to whether the transaction is net present value-positive for investors.

"I don't think anyone cares about the Citgo shares," said a second investor. "I would price this as a normal bond, looking at the exchange ratio and whether it is NPV positive." (Reporting by Paul Kilby and Davide Scigliuzzo; Editing by Matthew Davies)
Not your usual visit

This time around Nepal will also discuss what it can contribute to regional stability
Tehran (AFP) - Iranian President Hassan Rouhani set off Friday for a tour of Venezuela and Cuba before heading to New York for next week's UN General Assembly, official media reported.

Rouhani will take part in a summit of Non-Aligned Movement countries and hold separate talks with Venezuelan counterpart Nicolas Maduro, the IRNA news agency said.

The 120-nation group was founded more than 50 years ago to represent countries resentful of being squeezed in the power-struggle between the United States and the Soviet Union.

Rouhani's trip comes amid a global oil glut that has seen prices fall dramatically in recent years.

Venezuela has the world's largest oil reserves and has been hit hard by the price slump.

Iran -- which has nearly doubled oil and gas exports in the past year -- has so far resisted pressure from fellow members of the OPEC oil cartel to back a production freeze.

Speaking to journalists before leaving Tehran, Rouhani described Cuba as a "friendly and revolutionary country" and said he would meet President Raul Castro, and his brother and revolutionary leader, Fidel.

"For us, peace and non-interference in domestic affairs of other countries, their national sovereignty, consultation and coordination on issues of the developing and entire world are important," Rouhani said.

World leaders will convene in New York starting Monday for the 71st UN General Assembly, with the global refugee crisis and the Syria war likely to top the agenda.

Iran is a key backer of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, and is currently engaged in a war of words with regional rival Saudi Arabia.

Iran and world powers signed a landmark deal last year to curb Tehran's nuclear programme in exchange for the lifting of punishing economic sanctions.
Baghdad (AFP) - Several thousand supporters of populist Iraqi cleric Moqtada al-Sadr demonstrated in central Baghdad on Friday, calling for reforms that politicians have been quick to promise but slow to carry out.

Iraq's government is mired in corruption, struggles to provide basic services, and positions have for years been shared out based on political and sectarian quotas that protesters have demanded be scrapped.

Friday's demonstration had a festive atmosphere, with protesters at Tahrir Square in central Baghdad waving flags, dancing to pro-reform songs and chanting slogans calling for change.

"The government is not serious," Kadhim Hussein, a 41-year-old labourer, told AFP.

"They made some changes but the most corrupt are still here. They must all go," he said.

Sadr's movement this week called for a mass demonstration on Friday following a lull in what were weekly protests earlier this year.

The demonstration was peaceful, with security checks performed by members of the Sadrist movement and police forces deployed in smaller numbers than on previous occasions.

Protests in central and southern Iraq broke out in the summer of 2015 calling for improvements to abysmal services, a platform that later expanded to include curbing corruption and implementing reforms.

The initial protests fell off, but the movement was revitalised earlier this year by Sadr, who drew on his wide support base to stage mass demonstrations.

Protesters broke into the fortified Green Zone several times, storming parliament and the prime minister's office.

Security forces later took a harder line, causing several deaths and injuries as they dispersed protesters.
ABIDJAN (Reuters) - Building work has started in Ivory Coast on a 372-megawatt power plant worth 500 million euros financed mainly by China Construction Bank and set to open in 2018, Richard Amon, chairman of Star Energie 2073, said on Thursday. The bank is providing 75 percent of funds for the Songon power station near the commercial capital Abidjan, while 25 percent will come from companies including General Electric and Star Energie 2073, which is an Ivorian firm and the project leader. China Energy Engineering Corporation will lead construction of the plant's three turbines, which are provided by General Electric. The plant comprises two gas turbines of 126 MW and one 120-MW steam turbine. "Work has already started on the ground and the first megawatts will be online in the second half of 2018," Amon told Reuters. Ivory Coast, the world's top cocoa grower, has emerged from a decade of crisis as one of Africa's economic stars but rapid growth has placed a strain on its power sector. Demand for power is rising by about 10 percent per year and the government is seeking investment to double output to 4,000 MW by 2020. Ivory Coast has reliable electricity and exports power to Burkina Faso, Benin, Ghana, Mali, Togo and Liberia. (Reporting by Loucoumane Coulibaly; Editing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Japan will step up its activity in the contested South China Sea through joint training patrols with the United States and bilateral and multilateral exercises with regional navies, Japanese Defense Minister Tomomi Inada said on Thursday. Inada said in a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank, that Japan's increased engagement in the area, where Japan shares U.S. concerns about China's pursuit of extensive territorial claims, would include capacity building for coastal nations. Japan also has its own dispute with China over territory in the East China Sea. Inada said that if the world condoned attempts to change the rule of law and allowed rule bending to succeed, the "consequences could become global." "In this context, I strongly support the U.S. Navy's freedom-of-navigation operations, which go a long way to upholding the rules-based international maritime order," she said. "Japan, for its part, will increase its engagement in the South China Sea through, for example, Maritime Self-Defense Force joint training cruises with the U.S. Navy and bilateral and multilateral exercises with regional navies," she said. Japan would also help build the capacity of coastal states in the South China Sea, said Inada, before heading for talks with U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter at the Pentagon.Japan said this month it was ready to provide Vietnam with new patrol ships, in its latest step to boost the maritime law-enforcement capabilities of countries locked in territorial rows with China. It also agreed to provide two large patrol ships and lend up to five used surveillance aircraft to the Philippines, another country at odds with China over sovereignty issues in the South China Sea. In response to Inada's comments, the U.S. Navy said in a statement: "The United States welcomes Japan's interest in expanding its maritime activities in the South China Sea. We continue to explore ways to enhance U.S.-Japan cooperative efforts to contribute to the security and stability of the region." (Reporting by David Brunnstrom; Additional reporting by Idrees Ali; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Leslie Adler)
jay z

In less than five minutes in a new viral video, Jay Z sums up all the ways the US war on drugs has been what he calls an "epic fail."

The musician, who teamed up with visual artist Molly Crabapple to make the 4-minute video, which appeared online at The New York Times, gets two key things right about the science of drugs and addiction.

1. Addiction is not a moral failing.

In his description of the beginnings of the drug war in the 1980s, Jay Z says, "No one wanted to talk about Reaganomics and the ending of social safety nets. The defunding of schools and the loss of jobs in cities across America." Instead, he continues, "Young men like me who hustled became the sole villain and drug addicts lacked moral fortitude."

This perception of drug addiction as a moral failing continues to pervade discussions of addiction, but it's not aligned with the science.

Numerous neuroscientific studies reveal that addiction is a learned behavior  a "disease of learning," as Harvard neurobiologist Steven Hyman has called it  that results in measurable changes to the brain. As such, young people learn to use and abuse drugs and alcohol, perhaps as a coping mechanism, and this results in fundamental brain changes that continue to affect them as they grow and develop. "Repeated drug use leads to long-lasting changes in the brain that undermine voluntary control," write the authors of a 2004 study in the journal Nature.

Addiction "is a form of pathologic learning," Maia Szalavitz, a neuroscience journalist and the author of the book "Unbroken Brain," recently told Business Insider. "With addiction, overwhelming changes occur in the brain region involving areas that evolved for things like love and sex and feeding."

2. Powder cocaine and crack cocaine are the same drug, but they do have slightly different effects.

Towards the middle of the video, Jay Z says " the Feds made distinctions between people who sold powder cocaine and crack cocaine even though they were the same drug."

Story continues

"The only difference," he says, "is how you take it.

cocaine britain

That's largely true. Powder cocaine is usually snorted, but it can also be dissolved in water or melted and injected, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA). A powder cocaine "high" from snorting the drug typically hits the user in a matter of minutes, while its effects peak at around 15 minutes. Overall, the high lasts roughly 30 minutes.

Crack cocaine, on the other hand, refers to powder cocaine that's been processed with a base, like baking soda. This allows the body to absorb it very rapidly when it's smoked. A "high" from inhaled crack cocaine can hit the user in seconds, and its effects peak in 3-5 minutes. The high lasts roughly 10 minutes.

Powder cocaine can also be injected, and this method typically "speeds up" the high, making it almost identical to the effects of crack cocaine, the NIDA reports.

In spite of all that, penalties for the possession of crack cocaine were historically much more severe. "The sentencing laws appear to unfairly target the poor," NYU researcher Joseph J. Palamar told Vocativ. "Blacks ultimately [experienced] high incarceration rates as a result."

It's because of these two misconceptions, says Jay Z, that the war on drugs has been what he calls "an epic fail."

NOW WATCH: EX-DEA AGENT: Trumps border wall would 'serve no purpose in the war on drugs





More From Business Insider


Jessica Alba's consumer goods company Honest Co. is subject to a $1 billion takeover from European giant Unilever according to a report on Thursday in the Wall Street Journal.

Unilever, the company behind Axe men's grooming products and Dove soap, is in talks to acquire Honest significantly below its $1.7 billion valuation that was set during a fundraising round last year sources familiar to the matter told the WSJ. Takeover talks are at an early stage and Honest could still rule out a deal and go ahead with a IPO.

Alba co-founded Honest Co. in 2012 following a desire to create "a trustworthy lifestyle brand that touched everything in your home, that was nontoxic and affordable and convenient to get."

While talks are underway, Honest is still considering an initial public offering instead of a sale, especially given the $1 billion price Unilever is offering is $700 million less than the valuation set last year during a fundraising round.

Besides Alba, equity stakeholders in Honest include General Catalyst Partners, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Fidelity Management & Research and Wellington Management.

If Honest is sold, it has pledged to pay some investors double their investment, according to the Journal.

Honest, which sells disposable diapers and beauty product primarily to young mothers, generates about $300 million in sales each year. The company was founded five years ago.

Unilever, best known for products like Dove Soap and Axe body spray, is looking to tap further into the market for the sort of "natural" products Honest is famous for.

Honest sells its products through its website via monthly subscriptions and at traditional retail outlets like Whole Food Markets and Target.

More to come....
Porto (Portugal) (AFP) - Every Friday at the start of the Jewish Sabbath Porto's imposing synagogue positively buzzes with the sound of chatter -- not just in Portuguese but also in English, French and Spanish.

It's in this unexpectedly animated atmosphere that the Jewish community in northern Portugal, wiped out in the 15th century, is currently undergoing a rebirth, welcoming Jews who feel threatened in Europe and elsewhere -- some coming from as far as India.

"Anti-semitism is growing in Europe but Porto seems to be a safe haven. It's good to be a Jew here," said Sam Elijah, who heads a community that numbered only 20 four years ago.

It has since increased to 200 made up of no less than 21 different nationalities.

Now, the community -- which is orthodox but is open to all Jews -- does not hesitate to advertise the attractions of the city abroad and anticipates a big boost in numbers in coming years, in particular from France and Turkey.

The Zekris, a family of four, who did not want to give their full names, took the plunge in August 2015. They are among 50 French Jews already settled in Porto, Portugal's second city and the largest in the country's north.

After living in Israel, the family moved to Toulouse in France to "support the community after the terrorist attacks of March 2012".

The jihadist Mohamed Merah had just murdered three children and a teacher at a Jewish school in the southwestern city.

"We experienced anti-semitism," said Mr Zekri, adding that it was also the reason for the family's move to Portugal.

On this Friday in September, the family is working hard to prepare the Sabbath, during which Jewish tradition forbids work, driving or the use of electricity.

- Carefree in a Kippah -

The cooking is done in advance, the timers set to turn off the lights at the exact hour. "It's always a bit of a rush, but afterwards it's total rest," adds Mr Zekri.

Story continues

"Here I stroll carefree in a kippah (a small Jewish skullcap) and quite often people stop me and tell me 'We love Jews'," he said.

"I have never heard this kind of talk elsewhere, in France or in Europe," added the father-of-two, who is studying dental medicine.

At the end of September, the first family from Turkey is due to arrive thanks to a new law, which came into force in 2015 offering Sephardi Jews Portuguese nationality by way of reparation for the expulsions and persecution suffered by their ancestors at the end of the 15th century.

Others are preparing to follow suit. Around 500 descendants of expelled Jews have already been granted Portuguese citizenship with the help of an intermediary in Porto, of which 70 percent are Turkish.

Eliran Graedge, who arrived from Israel in 2007 with his wife and daughter, was one of the first to arrive.

Today he says he feels completely at home in Portugal.

"This is a wonderful country to live in," he said.

- Part of the city --

And it is not just Jews from Europe and the Middle East who have joined the community in Porto. Others have also come from Asia or the Americas.

Dan Capriles, 39, has no regrets about leaving Colombia. He appreciates the people of Porto who he says "know that the Jews have always been part of the city's history".

At the start of the Sabbath, Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews, from the two main branches of Judaism, meet at the synagogue -- the Kadoorie Mekor Haim synagogue built between 1929 and the late 1930s -- to pray in Hebrew.

"The language difficulty arises with the drashot (sermon)," said Rabbi Daniel Litvak who preaches in Hebrew, Spanish or English depending on the language of the majority of those present.

Many Jews do not attend the synagogue for religious ceremonies, but the building located not far from the centre of Porto remains a focal point for services to develop the community, including a mini-supermarket selling kosher products and a day nursery for very young children.

A school is due to open soon and on the first floor there is a museum tracing the history of Jews in the city.

Built in an impressive mix of Art Deco and Moroccan styles and with an interior lined with painted ceramic tiles, the synagogue is the largest on the Iberian peninsula and has been completely renovated since 2012 thanks to donations from across the world.

According to the community, Porto also welcomed around 10,000 Jewish tourists in 2015, with a hotel just a few steps from the synagogue set up to meet their needs.

"We have a second kitchen which prepares kosher meals," said Liliana Castanheira, manager for the Musica Hotel.

"And during the Sabbath, the automatic hotel doors remain permanently open so customers do not have to use the electricity," she added.
Just hours after Donald Trumps much-hyped appearance on The Dr. Oz Show was aired, the Republican nominee was back before a live studio audience for another appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.

The highlight so far, according to pool reporters and a clip released from NBC: Trump lets Fallon mess up his hair.

The people in New Hampshire, where I am going an hour from now, I hope they understand, Trump says.

Fallon also thanked Trump for giving us the material that we are doing. He added that Trump has been amazing to follow because you say some shocking things that I cannot even believe.

But Im trying not to anyway, Trump responded.

Hillary Clinton will appear on Fallons show next week.

Its unclear whether Fallon asked Trump serious questions, like a recent Washington Post report that he used money from his foundation to buy a six-foot-tall portrait of himself. In contrast to Stephen Colbert and Trevor Noah, Fallon generally focuses on drawing out humorous moments via skits and stunts with his political guests.

In his interview with Mehmet Oz, Trump said that he feels as good as I did when I was 30. He compared himself to Tom Brady, saying that I feel the same age as him. Its crazy.

Trumps campaign released a letter from his personal doctor, Harold Bornstein, describing him as in excellent physical health. Bornstein went on to describe the results of a recent examination.

Trump also described his campaign appearances, in which he waves his arms when speaking before a large crowd, was a form of exercise.

Oz has said that he has invited Clinton on his show, but she mocked Trumps appearance on in a speech on Thursday.

Ill never be the showman my opponent is, and thats OK with me, she said. Look at the show he put on with Dr. Oz today.

Update: Fallon is being criticized for not venturing into any controversy with Trump.

What did you do tonight? I tousled a racist's hair to make him seem more likeable because I do NOT do politics.  Jon Lovett (@jonlovett) September 16, 2016

I don't fault Jimmy Fallon for not being a journalist. I do fault him for his willingness to serve as hell's court jester.  Mark Harris (@MarkHarrisNYC) September 16, 2016

Jimmy Fallon does a lot of great impressions but his Sean Hannity tonight was one of his best.  stuart stevens (@stuartpstevens) September 16, 2016

Photo: Andrew Lipovsky, NBC

Story continues

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Philippines President Duterte 'once killed man with Uzi'

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte allegedly once shot dead a justice department agent with an Uzi submachine gun while serving as mayor of Davao.
John Stamos is giving us the daytime TV expose weve all been waiting for.

The TV vet has partnered with uber producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron to develop a drama series set in the world of 1980s soap operas, Deadline reports.

RELATEDFuller House Recast: Hal Sparks to Play D.J.s Ex-Boyfriend Nelson in Season 2

Loosely based on Stamos early days on General Hospital, the potential series  which will be shopped around to cable  is said to explore how a decade defined by Reaganomics, greed, excess, indulgence and materialism shaped what went on behind-the-scenes of TVs most popular soap operas. It will be told through the eyes of a young man thrust into stardom as he attempts to navigate temptations of sex, drugs and fame.

As youll recall, a then-teenaged Stamos cut his acting teeth playing Blackie Parrish on GH in the early 80s. He exited the soap in 1984, three years before landing his breakout role as Jesse Katsopolis on Full House.

RELATEDScream Queens Season 2: John Stamos, Taylor Lautner Arrive in New Promo

In addition to his forthcoming role on Scream Queens, Stamos continues to recur on Fuller House, which recently wrapped production on Season 2. He previously collaborated with Zadan and Meron on the 2000 miniseries Beach Boys: An American Family and the 2002 TV-movie Martin and Lewis.

Would you tune in for a drama based on what was going on behind-the-scenes of your favorite soaps?

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Jonah Hill has canceled his remaining press events for War Dogs in France after he was humiliated by a TV weather reporter there.

The Oscar nominee was mocked on CanalPlus program Le Grand Journal by Ornella Fleury, The Hollywood Reporter reports, who told him her sexual fantasy would involve Hill making her laugh then all of a sudden, [bringing his] friends DiCaprio and Brad Pitt, and then going away.

Im glad I came on this show to get ridiculed by your local weather girl, Hill responded. He later canceled the rest of his press tour in France.

Fleury has since issued a formal apology. Jonah, the problem is that for 10 years I have lived with you through your films, she said, according to The Local. In fact, Jonah, I really had the impression that I knew you so last Friday I thought I was just messing around with a friend, but the reality is that we are not friends.

Hill stars alongside Miles Teller in War Dogs, the true story of childhood friends who exploited a government procurement opportunity to land a $300 million contract to supply the Afghan army in 2007.
Stockholm (AFP) - WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange faced another setback in his legal stand-off with Sweden Friday after an appeals court rejected his request to lift an arrest warrant for him over a 2010 rape accusation.

The Stockholm appeals court upheld a district court's ruling to maintain the European arrest warrant, and also rejected Assange's request to hold a hearing over the matter.

Assange "is still detained in absentia", the court said, adding that it "shares the assessment of the district court that Julian Assange is still suspected on probable cause of rape... and that there is a risk that he will evade legal proceedings or a penalty."

Assange's lawyer Per Samuelson told AFP he would appeal against the ruling.

The 45-year-old Australian has been holed up in the Ecuadoran embassy in London since June 2012, seeking refuge there after exhausting all his legal options in Britain against extradition to Sweden.

Assange has refused to travel to Stockholm for questioning over the rape allegation, which he denies, due to concerns Sweden will extradite him to the United States over WikiLeaks' release of 500,000 secret military files on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

This is the eighth time the European arrest warrant has been tested in a Swedish court. All of the rulings have gone against Assange.

The appeals court said Assange's four-year embassy sequestration "is not a deprivation of liberty and shall not be given any importance in its own right in the assessment of proportionality."

Assange's lawyers had urged Sweden to follow the non-binding ruling of a UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, which said his confinement in the embassy amounted to arbitrary detention by Sweden and Britain.

The appeals court noted that the length of his embassy stay and "the earlier passivity" of police investigators were "arguments for setting aside the detention."

Story continues

"However, the relatively serious offence of which he is suspected means that there is a strong public interest (in) the investigation being able to continue."

"At present, continued detention therefore appears to be both effective and necessary so as to be able to move the investigation forward. The reasons for detention therefore still outweigh the intrusion or other detriment that the measure entails for Julian Assange."

Swedish prosecutor Marianne Ny hailed the decision.

"The court has here shared our opinion that upholding the arrest warrant is in line with the principle of proportionality," she said in a statement.

Even if the Swedish warrant were ultimately lifted, Assange is still liable to arrest in London for having evaded justice after his appeals against extradition were rejected, according to British police.

- Fears extradition to US -

Assange is accused of having sex with a WikiLeaks supporter in her 30s without a condom while she was asleep on August 17, 2010.

The statute of limitations on the rape allegation, which could lead to up to four years in prison, expires in August 2020.

Assange denies the accusation, insisting that the sex was consensual and that there is a political motivation for the investigation.

He fears Stockholm will send him to the US, though Washington has not asked for his extradition.

Technically, Sweden could hand him over to the US. It has repeatedly stressed that it cannot guarantee Assange it won't extradite him until there is an actual extradition request to consider -- because it needs to know on what charges the US wants him.

Sweden does not extradite people facing charges that carry the death penalty.

Friday's ruling came a day after WikiLeaks released medical records claiming Assange's mental health was at risk if he remained confined in the embassy.

"Mr Assange's mental health is highly likely to deteriorate over time if he remains in his current situation.... It is urgent that his current circumstances are resolved as quickly as possible," said a report published by the organisation on Twitter.

Ecuador announced earlier this week that Assange had agreed to answer questions from Swedish investigators at the embassy from October 17.

Despite Assange's confinement, Wikileaks has continued to release documents influencing world events.

These include a trove of US Democratic Party emails in July showing how party chiefs sought to undermine potential presidential candidate Bernie Sanders.
"Talk about real estate as a metaphor for politics: buyer's regret, indeed," Keith Olbermann told The Hollywood Reporter after word spread that his former condo inside Trump Palace at 200 East 69th Street was already back on the market (for $3.9 million).

Olbermann rejoiced on Twitter after he sold the 1,750-square-foot, two-bedroom apartment in July, even though he took a $400,000 hit on what he originally paid in 2007.

"I got out with 90% of my money and 100% of my soul!" Olbermann tweeted at the time.

The current owner is Syrian businessman Harry Nasser, according to press reports. Nasser's broker, of Sotheby's International Realty, told Luxury Listings NYC that the quick flip had nothing to do with politics, rather his client simply wanted to move closer to Central Park.

Olbermann debuts his new online series called The Closer With Keith Olbermann this week on GQ.com, which will provide him with ample opportunity to further lash Donald Trump.

Asked why Nasser may have so quickly departed his new abode, Olbermann said, "I assume like anybody else who actually fell for the Trump name, he realized - sooner than later - that the gold on the building was as phony as the gold in Trump's hair."

Read more: Jay Leno Thinks Donald Trump Needs "The Crap Beat Out of Him Just Once"
So Far in 2016, Keypoint Solutions has Bought 157 Homes, 45 of which were in New Mexico

ALBUQUERQUE, NM / ACCESSWIRE / September 16, 2016 / The founders of Keypoint Solutions, one of the top home buyers in New Mexico, are proud to announce that the company has achieved an impressive milestone. So far this year, the group of real estate investors from Keypoint Solutions has purchased 157 homes, with 45 of those homes being in New Mexico.

To learn more about Keypoint Solutions and their fast, easy and low-stress way of buying homes, please visit http://newmexicohousebuyers.com/.

The 45 clients in New Mexico who worked with Keypoint Solutions during the first part of 2016 will not be surprised that the company is having a banner year. Since the company first opened, it has earned a well-deserved reputation for being exceptionally easy to work with.

To watch an informative video that explains how Keypoint Solutions buys NM houses fast for cash, please check out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crK2cAUJdr8.

As a company spokesperson for http://newmexicohousebuyers.com/ noted, there are numerous benefits to selling a home through Keypoint Solutions. In addition to not having to pay any fees or commissions, the company pays all of the closing costs that are associated with the transaction. This alone can help save clients a great deal of money.

"We're a local Albuquerque company that can buy your house in any condition, regardless of what you owe or if you're in foreclosure. We can sincerely help," the spokesperson said, adding that most people will get cash in their hands within a few days or even a few hours after contacting the company.

"You can sell fast with no rush to move. You don't have to move out right away, you can stay in your home for awhile until you locate another house."

Keypoint Solutions is also accredited with the Better Business Bureau, where it has earned an A+ rating.

About Keypoint Solutions:

Keypoint Solutions is the largest home buyer in New Mexico. They have been offering real estate solutions to home sellers for over ten years. Their services allow local home sellers to avoid many of the traditional transaction fees associated with selling a home. For more information, pleases visit http://newmexicohousebuyers.com/.

Story continues

Keypoint Solutions

9808 Cody Court

Albuquerque, NM 87114

Contact:

Laura LaFond

laura@keypointsolutions.com

(505) 227-8865

SOURCE: Keypoint Solutions
PM Dahal meets Indian Finance Minister Jaitley

Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal who is presently on a four-day state visit of India held a meeting with India's Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Friday.
The first United States prisoners of war did not fare well: during the American Revolution, more men were killed as POWs of the British than they were on the battlefield, according to Dr. Robert Doyle, a professor of history at the Franciscan University of Steubenville and author of multiple books about POWs, including The Enemy in Our Hands: Americas Treatment of Prisoners of War from the Revolution to the War on Terror.

And when the men who did survive were released, nobody said anything.

Nobody said, Thank you very much, Doyle says. They turned em lose, sent them home, gave em a pension and that was it.

On National Prisoners of War/Missing in Action (POW/MIA) Recognition Day, which is observed on the third Friday in September, that treatment of prisoners of war can be hard to fathombut it continued for centuries. Doyle, who is a veteran, says it was not until after the Vietnam War that the United States changed the way it acknowledged its POWs. Perhaps surprisingly, it took a divisive war to change attitudes. As Doyle explains it, the lack of unanimous support for the war meant that POWsin contrast to soldiers who were fightingwere broadly accepted as heroes.

In 1979, through a proclamation from President Jimmy Carter, POW/MIA Recognition Day was first acknowledged. From then on, each president has signed an annual proclamation for the commemoration. And in 1997, President Bill Clinton officially made National POW/MIA Recognition Day one of six days when the POW/MIA Flag is required by Congress to be displayed in certain locations.

Doyle says the POW world is a specifically difficult one, no matter which war youre dealing with, and that makes it difficult to educate the public about their experiences. But their importance is now much more widely recognized than it once was.

Wars are not won or lost because of POWs, theyre won or lost in spite of them, he says. Tactically, theyre not important. Theyre important as symbols of resistance to the enemy or as propaganda pieces.

Story continues

Get your history fix in one place: sign up for the weekly TIME History newsletter

Still, however, the day of recognition passes unnoticed for many. And though POWs appear frequently in pop cultureBrody from Homeland; Bowe Bergdahls season of Serial; Angelina Jolies film Unbroken, about WWII POW Louis Zamperiniexperts say theyre still widely misunderstood.

Part of the problem is how difficult it is to tell the true stories of men and women whove suffered this way, says Jim Brockman, a veteran who works as the curator of the Defenders of Bataan & Coregidor Museum and Study Center in Wellsburg, W.V.

Brockmans museum is the largest collection in the world dedicated to a specific time period of WWII when, shortly after Pearl Harbor, American soldiers stationed in the Philippines were forced to surrender to the Japanese after a months-long battle to protect the Pacific. The surrender resulted in the taking of 12,000 to 16,000 American POWs by the Japanese, and their infamous 60-mile march to prison camps.

In May of 2016, President Obama signed into law the POW/MIA Remembrance Act, which directs the Architect of the Capitol to place a chair in the Capitol that honors American POWs or soldiers who are MIA. The act passed unanimously in the House and the Senate, perhaps signaling acknowledgement for some veterans whove never received it.

Brockmanwho remembers being spit on at the airport for wearing a uniform when he returned from Vietnamappreciates that the times are changing for veterans, but he still doesnt think enough has been or is being done for POWs. That becomes especially important as fewer and fewer of those who experienced imprisonment in past wars are around to share their memories. Just this past week, he received a notice that two former POWs from Bataan and Coregidor had passed away.

History needs to be studied, he says. It needs to be in the classroom so you can find out what happened and so it doesnt happen again, so it becomes something that we dont just know about but that we remember.
Kristen Bell and Dax Shepard have finally shared a photo of their daughter (sort of).

The Good Place actress took to Instagram on Thursday to share a snapshot of her little girl's "first daddy daughter swim in Lake Michigan." However, the pic was framed to make her husband and their daughter look tiny, and as if they were standing on the palm of her hand.

First daddy daughter swim in Lake Michigan-a right of passage for any Mitten baby  A photo posted by kristen bell (@kristenanniebell) on Sep 15, 2016 at 7:53am PDT

PHOTOS: Stars Share Pics of Their Cute Kids

Pretty neat trick using perspective to obfuscate your family photo, Bell! In fact, Shepard is so far away it's not even possible to tell if he's in the water with their 3-year-old daughter, Lincoln, or their 1-year-old daughter, Delta.

The couple have been very vocal about keeping their children out of the spotlight and away from the lenses of prying paparazzi, making a photo of either of their kids something of a rarity. Clearly, they've found a way to respect their kids' privacy while still sharing adorable family photos.

NEWS: Kristen Bell Says Her Kids 'Could Care Less' About 'Frozen'

Bell, a Michigan native, called the lake swim "a [rite] of passage for any Mitten baby," referring to the distinctive shape of her home state.

Bell and Shepard, who also happens to hail from The Great Lakes State, celebrated their return to their stomping grounds with a beaming beach selfie on Wednesday, which Bell captioned, " MICHIGAN you dirty old mitten...you still make us happy after all these years. #lakemichiganbeach"

MICHIGAN you dirty old mitten...you still make us happy after all these years. #lakemichiganbeach A photo posted by kristen bell (@kristenanniebell) on Sep 14, 2016 at 3:19pm PDT

MORE: 7 Times Kristen Bell Was the Cutest Person Ever

For more adorableness from the super cute couple, check out the video below to see some sweet snapshots from their simple, heartfelt courthouse wedding back in 2013.

Story continues

Related Articles
By Dan Whitcomb LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A Los Angeles Department of Water and Power spokesman on Friday defended the utility's practice of rinsing artificial turf at its facilities in face of a local TV report that portrayed the move as a waste of water during California's four-year drought. The DWP spokesman, Joe Ramallo, said that the fake grass at several department properties required regular rinsing to alleviate odors from animals and homeless people who urinate there. The turf was installed as part of a successful program began in 2011 to replace grass with drought-tolerant landscaping at 71 DWP facilities, he said. "All told this program has removed over 1.3 million square feet of grass and replaced it with California-friendly landscaping," Ramallo said. "Thats enough water to (serve) to 314 single-family homes in Los Angeles each year." Local KCBS-TV captured videotape of what it said were sprinklers "watering" fake grass at the DWP's substation in south Los Angeles for six minutes, saying the move angered nearby residents who had been threatened with citations for wasting water. "They're quick to fine us for certain things, over watering or whatever," resident Amber Gordon told the station, adding that she has allowed her lawn to go brown to save water during the drought. KCBS said in an online version of its story that the excess water ran off down the sidewalk and toward a street, in violation of city code. Ramallo said artificial turf had been installed at a total of 19 of the 71 DWP properties included so far in the program and that five of them were rinsed twice a week to combat the urine problem and that doing so was in compliance with city water conservation ordinances. The other 14 locations with fake grass were rinsed less, "as needed", he said, adding that in all instances less water was used than would be required for natural grass. At the location filmed by KCBS, Ramallo said, residents complained when the natural grass was removed and specifically requested that it be replaced by artificial turf. (Reporting by Dan Whitcomb; Editing by Alan Crosby, Bernard Orr)
The Middleburg Film Festival has booked La La Land as its Centerpiece selection on Oct. 22 and a keynote conversation with Cheryl Boone Isaacs, president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

La La Land, starring Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling, opened the Venice Film Festival, where Stone won the Best Actress award. The musical romance also screened at the Telluride and Toronto festivals and will open the Chicago International Film Festival on Oct. 13.

La La Land director Damien Chazelle will appear at the screening at Middleburg, which is located in Northern Virginia. Lionsgate is opening La La Land in the U.S. on Dec. 2.

Boone Isaacs was heavily involved in expanding the membership of AMPAS this year to become younger and more diverse.

We are honored to have Cheryl Boone Isaacs join us at this years festival, said Middleburg Film Festival Founder and Chair Sheila C. Johnson. We are inspired by Cheryls work and applaud her commitment to changing the numbers for women and people of color working in the film industry, both in front of and behind the camera. Last years festival featured films from seven women directors, and our 2016 program will again showcase and celebrate the talents of a diverse group of filmmakers.

Boone Isaacs will discuss her role at the Academy and how the organization supports a range of initiatives to promote the art and science of the movies.

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Over 150 firefighters were called to a hospital in the northwestern German town of Delmenhorst, located just outside Bremen in Lower Saxony, to put out a large blaze on Friday, September 16. Some 20 outpatients were located in the burning building of the Josef Hospital campus, all of whom were reportedly evacuated. The fire broke out in a section of the building that was under renovation and partly collapsed its roof. Credit: YouTube/Abomann 24
Many try to make it in the Las Vegas food and beverage scene but sadly, many dont. What does it take to stand out in a city full of culinary choices for every palate and paycheck? Owner Stephan Galdau and chef David Schneider have taken the challenge on creating a true locals hangout and are pouring their knowledge, expertise, and hearts into the endeavor.



I want to create dishes that are fresh, innovative, and are supported by the best ingredients that I can source, including vegan options, said chef Daniel Schneider. Chefs creativity in crafting an egg with the taste and texture to please every type of diner is clearly seen in the vegan deviled eggs. Some other menu highlights are the nocturnal burger a blend of lamb, grass-feed ground beef, and pork fat topped with watercress and juniper pickled onions and the dixie land delight, which is a perfectly prepared chicken dinner that includes greens, mashed potatoes, and a piece of homemade pecan pie to satisfy your late night sweet tooth.



With a large, warehouse-type space and indigo blue walls, the space seems a bit bleak; but soon the walls will be adorned with local art that gives Las Vegas artists the ability to display, sell, and keep 90 percents of their own profits. The 10 percent will be matched by Galdau to support local arts education programs. His open mike night provides local comedians and performers a place to share their jokes and music. Galdaus heart for the community can felt in the eclectic mix of music playing and lack of gaming which gives patrons the incentive to mix, mingle, drink, and dine and most importantly have a great time.

OWL keeps the taps flowing and the drafts doling with 24 taps dedicated to Nevada producers, including Tonopah Brewing Co. and Joseph James, plus 120 beers in cans and bottles. The beers are cold and handcrafted cocktails such as the Owl margarita or the Owl fashioned are standards with a wise twist of ingredients, giving liquid refreshment on the hottest of Vegas nights. Locals and tourists are showing up to beat the heat with a hoot and a holler out to friends to join them at OWL.



For more Las Vegas dining and travel news, click here.
From Popular Mechanics

After decades of talk, planning, and construction, Smithsonian's National Museum of African-American History (NMAAHC, for short) is ready to open to the public on September 24. While tickets to get inside opening weekend are hard to come by, one need only stand outside to witness one of the new museum's biggest draws: the building itself.

Sitting on five acres of land on the National Mall and adjacent to the Washington Monument, the 400,000-square-foot building enveloped in a bronze cast-aluminum lattice is a sight to behold. About 60 percent of the building is below ground, a choice made for both form and function. Steven Davis, a partner at the architecture firm Davis Brody Bond that helped to design the NMAAHC, says that the museum's narrative is supported by the building, "There's a real synergy between the exhibition strategy and the architecture design strategy."

It has taken a century for a Smithsonian museum dedicated to African-American history and culture to become reality. According to NPR, in 1916 at the behest of black veterans of the Civil War, Rep. Leonidas C. Dyer of Missouri (who would later author an anti-lynching bill) proposed to Congress HR 18721. The bill asked for the creation of a commission to look into "plans and designs for a monument or memorial to the memory of the negro soldiers and sailors who fought in the wars of our country." Later, Dyer offered another bill that called for the monument to be placed in D.C., perhaps even on the National Mall.

Photo credit: Smithsonian / NMAAHC

Plans fizzled out over money concerns. Civil Rights hero and longtime Georgia Congressman John Lewis (who's now in his 29th year in office) brought the issue back to the forefront in 1988 when he introduced a bill that called for a museum dedicated to African-American history. It was rejected. But Lewis tried again the next year, the year after that, and every year for 15 straight years. Finally, in 2003, his bill passed and was signed into law by President Bush. In 2012, the project finally broke ground (with a original scheduled 2015 opening). With the federal government contributing just $270 million dollars of the cost that totaled more than a half-billion, private contributions came rolling in from notables like Oprah Winfrey, Samuel L. Jackson, Bill and Melinda Gates, Lebron James, and Michael Jordan to make up the rest. Now, finally, NMAAHC is ready to open its doors.

Story continues

While the museum has a tremendous and weighty collection of artifacts, from Emmett Till's glass-topped casket to the uneven-bar grips gymnast Gabby Douglas used at the 2012 Olympics to Garrett Morgan's Safety Hood, the structure itself is quite a draw. Los Angeles Times' architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne called it "The most impressive and ambitious public building to go up in Washington in a generation."

Photo credit: Smithsonian / NMAAHC

The lead designer is British-Ghanaian architect David Adjaye, who also built the Nobel Peace Center in Oslo and was considered for Obama's presidential library. In Adjaye's design, which looks to combine the symbolic with the practical, the most-talked about feature is the "Corona," the bronze cast-aluminum 3,600 panel exterior. It's based on the three-tiered crowns that were used in West African Yoruban art. But it also draws inspiration from the intricate 19th century slave-made ironwork that can be still found in Southern cities like Charleston and New Orleans. However, as Robert Anderson of Davis Brody Bond explains, the Corona also holds a practical purpose: "It has the capacity to provide shade and doesn't allow direct daylight into the building. It's physical performing as a sunshade."

Davis Brody Bond was responsible for more than 60 percent of the building's design, including the underground, multi-leveled, chronological "History Gallery." The lowest levels of the gallery are darker and more confined, meant to invoke the suffocation one would feel on a slave ship. This was also done to limit the light exposure to particularly sensitive, and older, artifacts. As visitors move up, the galleries become lighter, more open and expansive. This symbolizes hope and progress, and it also helps with visitor flow. "Large numbers of people (will move) through this museum," says Davis, who also designed the 9/11 Memorial Museum in New York, "So, designing a procession which follows through a logical narrative is essential."

Photo credit: Smithsonian / NMAAHC

Prior to the NMAAHC, the last Smithsonian museum to be built on the National Mall was the National Museum of the American Indian (which opened in 2004). With nearly a dozen Smithsonian buildings, "America's front yard" is running out of room and the NMAAHC could be the last of its kind. "The Mall is a finite place," Davis says, "So, this is likely to be the last great museum on the Mall."

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From ELLE

Today, Orlando Bloom made his Instagram public, giving the world an intimate look at his life, his thoughts, and just what fascinates the man Katy Perry is dating.

While most celebs' debuts come with at most one post (recent example: Tom Hiddleston's), Bloom's came with a whopping 103. They are great. They are liked by Katy Perry and ex-wife/mother of his child Miranda Kerr (both women also follow him). And they say so much more about this former pirate than any paparazzi photo could. Specifically....

1. He can't help himself, and Katy Perry and Miranda Kerr both like that (as in publicly liked that first my-Insta-is-official post):

Miranda gave her support:

Photo credit: Instagram

2. He officially joined Instagram July 27, 2015 to send love to his elders:

3. He sees all people:

4. Orlando made it kind of Insta-official with Katy Perry in a helicopter on March 3 (you know, just days after the paparazzi spotted them on vacay in Hawaii on February 29).

5. He was at Burning Man (because of COURSE he was):

6. He's quick-witted, coming up with a cute response (hi, abs!) to a nude photo scandal...a month later.

7. He really likes elephants:

I mean, really, really likes them:

8. LOVES elephants:

9. His dad jokes are actually kind of next-level meta and good:

10. He has a sex tape (jk it's another dad joke!):

11. He loves his beautiful dog:

Even if death does them part a year later, which he, uh, commemorates like this:

12. He really likes Katy Perry's dog, Nugget, too:

13. His first selfie was in front of the Taj Mahal on December 20, 2015:

14. He has friends of all sizes:

15. He is deep:

On January 2016, he was very deep indeed:

Kind of:

16. He knows how to surprise Katy (listen in):

17. One time, he captured the sun:

18. He and his five-year-old son, Flynn, kick it sometimes in NYC:

19. He is an abstract artist. See: these captionless shots of random things.

Although, is that...?

20. He's into horses and Katy is into that:

Photo credit: Instagram

21. He asks the big questions:

22. His choice of action soundtrack is...interesting:

23. He really likes rainbow things (you know, as a way to brighten his feed):

Story continues

24. He plays with his food:

25. He's into bikes:

Like, super into them:

26. He is Zen:

27. He was thirsty:

...then he took care of it:

And now, somehow, we are thirsty. Thanks a lot, Orlando.

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PM Dahal receives guard of honour at Rastrapati Bhawan

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi officially welcomed Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal who is on a four-day official state visit of India, at Rastrapati Bhawan in New Delhi on Friday.
From LennyLetter

Spanning 1,500 miles, the chain of coral heads, cays, and islands known as the Great Barrier Reef occupies as many square miles as Italy. It is Earth's largest living structure, a complex limestone lattice constructed by colonies of coral polyps that feed on algae and light. From space, it looks like an aquamarine spine that hugs the contours of Australia's eastern coast. Close up, it is a riot of color and life, hosting hundreds of thousands of species of fish, worms, mollusks, sharks, turtles, and whales.

According to scientists, 2016 is on track to be the hottest year in history, and the high temperatures have lead to widespread coral die-offs, putting the rich ecosystem of the Great Barrier Reef and the rest of Earth's reefs at risk. For more than ten years, science journalist Margaret Wertheim has been raising awareness about the looming threat to corals by organizing an effort to reproduce the reef in yarn and string. With her artist twin sister Christine, she founded the Institute for Figuring, which has mobilized thousands of contributors to learn advanced mathematical concepts that allow them to knit the ample frills and plumes and pom-poms of underwater creatures. The rainbow reef they have assembled is now a traveling exhibit named Crochet Coral Reef: Toxic Seas, which will be shown at New York's Museum of Arts and Design starting this month.

This project is just one incarnation of Wertheim's lifelong mission to engage people who wouldn't otherwise have access to or interest in learning scientific concepts. After studying physics at the University of Queensland, she worked as a science journalist, writing for the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, LA Weekly, New Scientist, the Guardian, and others, and she has published six books on the cultural history of science, most recently Physics on the Fringe: Smoke Rings, Circlons and Alternative Theories of Everything. I got her on the phone to talk about why she thinks it's important to write about science for a mainstream audience, institutional sexism in the sciences, and how she got the idea to handicraft a great coral reef.

Story continues

Rose Lichter-Marck: Why did you decide to study physics?

Margaret Wertheim: I fell in love with math when I was about six years old. Later, I realized that physics is a way of seeing the world through math. Mathematicians consider numbers and geometric shapes as things in themselves, but physicists say, "How can math help us understand the physical, material world around us?"

As a science communicator, I want to make science and mathematics more accessible by showing the cultural and aesthetic dimensions of those fields. I'm interested in the sheer beauty that math and science embody, but also I'm trying to understand how science is shaped by wider cultural forces, and once the science is developed how it in turn shapes society.

An obvious example of this is the shift from a geocentric cosmology to the modern heliocentric system. Medieval thinkers believed that humans were at the center of everything, including God's attention. But in the heliocentric cosmos, we're just one planet floating around one star in a vast void. These transitions in our scientific thinking have huge impacts on how we conceptualize what it means to be a human being.

RLM: Why do you think it's important to reach people who are not necessarily scientists, and specifically women, on these topics?

MW: Science plays a huge role in the practicalities of our daily lives - cell phones, medicine, pharmaceuticals, transportation - all of these things have been brought about by scientific theorizing. For that reason alone, I think it's important that a wider group of people have some understanding of science.

The other reason is that in the modern era, since the scientific revolution, science has become the foundation of our worldview. In the past we looked to religion for our values, but now we get them, to a large degree, from science. I think it's critical that people understand what comprises that worldview. And why is understanding important particularly for women? I would simply say that women are people, too. The majority of readers of science magazines are well-off white men over 40. That's a fact. I think it's an oversight on the part of the science communication world, and I'm trying to do something about it. I believe that a huge number of people in our society are deeply interested in science, but they're just not being given the opportunity to engage with it in ways that are accessible, or even interesting, to them.

RLM: Is that belief what drove you to start the Institute for Figuring?

MW: About fifteen years ago, I got bored with science communicating and writing as it was always presented. I would come across things that I thought were fascinating, like hyperbolic crochet, which is an intersection of mathematics and women's handicrafts, and I would have trouble convincing science magazines to let me write about such things. I became more and more interested in using methodologies that are associated with the arts to reveal the beauty and the power of science. My identical twin, Christine Wertheim, is an artist and professor at the California Institute of the Arts. We've had parallel lives in art and science, and we've experienced each other's specialties vicariously. We see our fields as allied, but divided by having different discourse, different values. So we decided to start an organization with the mission to bring people into science and math by showing the aesthetic and poetic dimensions of those subjects.

We think of the IFF as a play tank, not a think tank. We want to give people access to ideas through play. That's not to say that play is in opposition to thinking; we just believe that playing with ideas and materially constructing stuff, like crocheting coral reefs and making fractals out of business cards, is in itself a form of thinking. It's amazing how many high-powered math and science ideas people absorb through our workshops. There are different ways of knowing. You can absorb concepts from textbooks, or by doing things with your hands.

RLM: The biggest accomplishment of the IFF so far is the Crochet Coral Reef, which is just reaching its ten-year anniversary. How did that project begin?

MW: Our coral-reef project grew out of mathematics, handicraft, Marine science, collective art practice, and feminism - things that, in our society, are not often brought together. Since the nineteenth century, mathematicians have been trying to illustrate hyperbolic geometry, the underpinning of modern physics, particularly Einstein's General Theory of Relativity. Euclidean geometry, which we all learn in school, describes the way lines and shapes behave in flat space, while hyperbolic geometry is a set of postulates that accounts for curved surfaces. It wasn't until 1997 that Dr. Daina Taimina at Cornell University showed you could make models of hyperbolic forms by knitting or crocheting them out of yarn. Suddenly you could hold models of this amazing mathematical structure in your hand, and you could stitch theorems onto the surface to show how basic geometric shapes behave differently in hyperbolic planes than they do in Euclidean space. It's a really powerful teaching tool.

Christine and I learned handicrafts from our mom, so when we heard about Dr. Taimina's work, we thought it was such a groovy way to combine the loves of our lives. We started making these mathematical crochets, but there's only so much you can do if the mathematics are perfect, and one day Christine said, "I'm done making mathematically perfect ones; I'm going to make wonky ones." As soon as she started to do that, they stopped looking like models and they started to look like natural, living things. We were watching episodes of Xena: Warrior Princess, and there happened to be a few bottles of cheap champagne involved, and we had a little cluster of knitted forms sitting on our coffee table. We saw them there and said, "My gosh, it looks just like a coral reef. We could crochet a coral reef."

When we were starting the project in 2005, scientists were finally beginning to realize that all of these big coral-bleaching events are actually caused by global warming. We're from Queensland state in Australia, where the Great Barrier Reef is located. And we joked at the time that if the Great Barrier Reef ever died out, our crochet coral reef would be something to remember it by. Now it's not a joke. Scientists are saying that the Great Barrier Reef really could die out.

RLM: Has the project changed over time?

MW: The community dimension of the project keeps getting stronger. I think that's because there's a hunger in our society to do things together. Everybody who participates in the project gets their name on the gallery wall. And the work itself is bigger, more beautiful, and more powerful for that collaboration.

Coral reefs are collective projects, too. A head of coral is made up of thousands of individual coral polyps, each an insignificant tiny little thing that could achieve little on its own, but together, thousands of coral polyps build a beautiful head of coral. Together, millions of heads of coral made the Great Barrier Reef, which is the largest living organism on planet Earth. The project parallels the thing it's emulating.

RLM: I understand that a large proportion of the people who have worked on the coral reef are women.

MW: Yes, 99.99 percent of the people who've worked on it are women, and that surprised us. We thought that if the project took off, there would be more women than men - but my guess would have been two-thirds women and one-third men.

RLM: How do you think that has affected the reception of the crochet coral reef?

MW: Although the project has foundations in mathematics and ecology and created so much awareness about one of the most important environmental issues of our time, our support comes exclusively from the art world. I've never seen a science outreach project have this kind of grassroots traction, and yet we have not been able to get a single dollar of support from any science fund. A major science foundation said to me, "Margaret, we have basically a bunch of retired physicists running our organization. I don't think I would be able to convince them that there's any real science in a bunch of women knitting." That's a quote from a man whose job it is to give away money to support innovative public science engagement, and one of the stated missions of his foundation is to encourage women into science. I tried to apply a second time, thinking, OK, when we've really proved ourselves in the national arena; maybe they'll look differently on it, and the same man said, "Don't even bother putting in an application, we won't even consider it."

I have done everything in my power to avoid this conclusion, but if that's the kind of attitude among science foundations whose job it is to support innovative science communication, then we have a very serious sexism problem. The science establishment keeps saying, "We need more people interested in science." Well, what kind of people do you want? The message that I've received is that engaging women is not as valuable as engaging men. There's an endemic sexist attitude about what constitutes science and who gets to say what real science is, and on the whole, that's men.

RLM: But at the same time, wouldn't you be bothered if someone said to you, "Women can't handle hard science; they need to access it through these other ways"?

MW: Well, to turn that around, how is science represented? Have a look at most physics textbooks: people are letting off rockets, doing stuff with cars. Now, girls can be interested in rockets and cars, too, but a lot of them aren't. These activities are not neutral. I went through my entire physics degree never seeing an example about anything that related to my life. We've gotten so used to seeing physics represented in activities that tend to have interest for men that we simply can't see it; that's why it stands out when the representation isn't stereotypically male, like handicrafts. Let's not kid ourselves that representation is devoid of context.

This interview has been condensed and edited.

Rose Lichter-Marck is a writer living in Brooklyn. She also takes pictures, some of which are posted here. You can find her on Twitter.
Following their excellent collaborative EP with Big Boi under the name Big Grams last year, Phantogram have shifted the focus to their upcoming third full-length studio album (appropriately titled Three). Building on previous singles "You Don't Get Me High Anymore," "Run Run Blood," and "Cruel World," the New York duo shared "Same Old Blues" this afternoona powerful song that follows through on their promise of a dark, heavy album.

"Sarah, you know, lost her sister during the making of this album. Right in the middle of it, literally," producer Ricky Reed explained to SPIN about the heavy-hearted nature surrounding the album's creative process. "We were about five or six songs in. Becky passed away, and then we took time off, of course, and got back to work, and even before then it was a pretty dark album, and of course, you can imagine after. So, I think it might surprise people: a) how dark it is and b) how heavy it is at times. Its really heavy; its very affronting."

Check out a stream of the new song above and watch a mini-documentary about the creation of Three (set for release on October 7) below.

Continue Reading On Complex
This little girl was not thrilled to meet Donald Trump, and the photo is going viral

This little girl was not thrilled to meet Donald Trump, and the photo is going viral

The name Amariyanna Mari Copeny should be familiar to you. Perhaps you know the incredible, change-making 9-year-old activist a bit better as Little Miss Flint.

Mari, or Little Miss Flint, came to national attention after she penned a letter to President Obama, alerting him to the actions she is taking in her hometown of Flint, Michigan to combat the horrific public health crisis. As you absolutely should already know, the water supply in Flint, Michigan was contaminated by lead in 2014  and the government tried to sweep it under the rug.

Hey world in case you didn't realize #Flint is still in crisis #LittleMissFlint pic.twitter.com/dJAityto9s  Little Miss Flint (@LoveMeLuLu22) September 15, 2016

Queen Mari wrote to Obama, telling him:

I am one of the children that is affected by this water, and Ive been doing my best to march in protest and to speak out for all the kids that live here in Flint.

Mari hugging President Obama in May 2016

Mari hugging President Obama in May 2016

And when she asked the President to come meet with the community in Flint, thats exactly what Obama did  and she could not contain her excitement.

Story continues

Thats definitely not what Mari looked like when she met somehow-Presidential candidate Donald Trump yesterday  and, as noted by BuzzFeed, the internet is satirizing the moment perfectly.

The look on Little Miss Flint's face perfectly encapsulating the American electorate, 2016. pic.twitter.com/YbyqdwQ6V9  Colin Dickey (@colindickey) September 15, 2016

Trump visited Flint yesterday, and people cant help but compare Maris meetings with both men.

Little Miss Flint is all of us in 2016. pic.twitter.com/grsNmSTBnd  Abraham White (@abwhite7) September 15, 2016

Twitters takedown of Trump is on point, as per usual.

Little Miss Flint bravely deals w yet another toxic, orange-ish mess. pic.twitter.com/VHUxzQQhgM  Allie Gross (@Allie_Elisabeth) September 15, 2016

This is not what a queen deserves.

Poor Little Miss Flint. I don't think she knew that wearing the crown would subject her to this. pic.twitter.com/CpCwQyaTI6  Tim Woody (@icybikes) September 16, 2016

In GIF format  in case you didnt understand the gravity of her expression.

Little Miss Flint meeting Donald Trump is all of us watching this election unfold: https://t.co/zDlNiY3gwt pic.twitter.com/kkjG42e8t7  Mic (@mic) September 15, 2016

The voice of the people

Little Miss Flint showing the perfect representation of how most of us currently feel. pic.twitter.com/UsecHGG4gQ  Ed (@EdbrohamLincoln) September 15, 2016

Little Miss Flint, you are truly the greatest also the realest.

The post This little girl was not thrilled to meet Donald Trump, and the photo is going viral appeared first on HelloGiggles.
Following months of behind-the-curtains discussion, the U.S. has finally signed a landmark agreement with Israel, under which the later will receive military aid worth $38 billion in total over a period of 10 years. This deal represents the largest ever military aid pledged by the U.S. to any foreign nation.

The new aid package reflects an increase of $700 million over the existing contract between the two nations under which Israel is receiving $3.1 billion annually. The existing deal will expire in 2018 and will be followed by the latest one, wherein Israel will get $3.8 billion every year from 2019 through 2028, effective Oct 1, 2018.

We note that the U.S. has been providing military assistance to Israel for a little less than a decade now, amounting to cumulative defense aid worth almost $24 billion.

How will the Deal Help the U.S. Defense Sector?

The memorandum of understanding (MOU) for the newly signed deal reveals that the terms and conditions have been structured such that the majority of the Israeli defense spending goes to U.S. companies.

For instance, under the new arrangement, Israel can utilize only 26.3% of the foreign military fund (FMF) it receives from the U.S. on home-grown defense products. On the other hand, Israel has to spend as much as $1.2 billion per year on the advanced military equipment that only the U.S. can provide.

Clearly, the deal aims to not only boost Israels military strength but to substantially improve the profits earned by defense majors in the U.S.

Which U.S. Companies will Benefit?

Pentagons two prime defense contractors  The Boeing Company BA and Lockheed Martin Corp. LMT  are expected to gain the most from the latest U.S.-Israel deal. Under this deal, Israel will upgrade its fleet of fighter jets by acquiring a handful of Lockheed Martins F-35 fighter jets.

Using the newly assigned FMF, Israel will receive 33 F-35 jets, of which the first two will be delivered in Dec 2016 and the last one expected to be received around 2021. This will make Israel the first foreign partner to take delivery of this fifth-generation fighter aircraft, which incorporates advanced stealth, full-fused sensor information and network-enabled operations.

Story continues

The deal also calls for the delivery of 10 Boeing F-15 aircraft to Israel. This twin-engine, all-weather superior fighter jet is considered the backbone of the U.S. Air Force.

Apart from these two fighter jets, constituting the lions share of the FMF, Israel will also receive several C-130 heavy-lift cargo planes, four SAAR 6 Corvettes, Merkava tanks and Namer Armored Personnel Carriers, Hellfire missiles, the Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM), and other Precision Guided Munitions.

Our View

Note that Israel has to spend a major portion of its gross domestic-product (GDP) on defense equipment due to terrorist attacks across the country. Last year, the countrys military budget, excluding U.S. aid, comprised 5.4% of its GDP.

With no sign of improvement in this situation any time soon, we believe that the latest military deal will encourage Israel to spend more in defense missiles, aircraft and other equipment. This in turn should benefit U.S. defense majors particularly, Lockheed and Boeing, in the days ahead.

Stocks to Consider

Both Boeing and Lockheed currently carry a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). A couple of better-ranked stocks in the aerospace and defense sector include Engility Holdings, Inc. EGL and Ducommun Inc. DCO, both of which sport a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy).You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

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By Dave McKinney CHICAGO (Reuters) - London's first Muslim mayor, Sadiq Khan, voiced support for Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton on Thursday, warning that anti-Muslim views like those espoused by Republican Donald Trump plays into the hands" of Islamic State. During a stop in Chicago on his first visit to the United States, Khan said he was "a big fan" of Clinton and hoped she would win the presidential election in November. Shes arguably the most experienced candidate to run to be the president, Khan told reporters following a speech to more than 250 academics, diplomats and business people. As the father of two daughters, I think the message it sends when the most powerful politician in the world is a woman is phenomenal, and hope she wins, said Khan, who as mayor of London is arguably one the most influential member of his faith in western Europe. Immediately after taking office in May, Khan tangled with Trump over his proposed ban on allowing Muslim immigrants and refugees into America, deriding his plan as ignorant. During his roughly 45-minute speech before the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, Khan did not mention Trump by name but attacked the positions the New York developer has staked, such as tightening Muslim immigration into the United States. I think to suggest somehow that Muslims arent welcome in the U.S.A., to suggest somehow that being a Muslim isnt compatible with being western, unintentionally plays into the hands of daesh or so-called ISIS, Khan said. Trump has offered an evolving stance on Muslim immigration into the United States since his original December 2015 call for a ban on Muslims entering the country. Earlier this summer, he voiced support for limiting the ban to only countries with known terrorist links. Last month, he appeared to moderate somewhat on an outright ban by touting the idea of the United States undertaking extreme vetting of incoming Muslim immigrants, refugees or visitors. (Reporting by Dave McKinney; Editing by Michael Perry)
From Harper's BAZAAR

22-year-old Luisana Gonzalez just finished up her first New York Fashion Week season with an impressive roster of shows for a new face, but she had a bit of a helping hand from Nicolas Ghesquiere. Gonzalez's career really took off after she was casted for Louis Vuitton an exclusive for Spring 2016 and Fall 2016. A year later, Gonzalez has landed in New York and conquered the runways at Alexander Wang, Proenza Schouler, Rodarte and Michael Kors, just to name a few. Before she jetted off to taken on London Fashion Week, we chatted with the Dominican beauty about her rise to the top, her favorite show of New York and her favorite beauty products right now.

HB: How did you get discovered?

LG: I won a local modeling competition and landed a contracted with Ossygeno agency in the Dominican Republic. Soon after, I was placed with Ford Models in New York and Paris.

HB: Did you always want to be a model?

LG: No, I was not interested in modeling at first...but a friend of mine insisted that I to go to an open call. I did always like fashion, but I never thought much about it. I mean, I never really saw myself in the industry.

HB: What would you be doing right now if you weren't at NYFW?

LG: Sleeping. Fashion week can be exhausting. I'd probably be relaxing in Santo Domingo if I weren't doing the shows.

HB: What do you miss about home?

LG: My family, friends and Dominican food.

HB: Have you seen any tourist sights in NYC?

LG: I have been to Central Park, but I have been so busy that I haven't had the chance to go sight-seeing.

HB: What's been your favorite show of the week?

LG: It's hard to pick just one, there were so many good shows! But if I have to pick, I'd say Alexander Wang.

HB: Are there any models that you look up to?

LG: Joan Smalls & Ysaunny Brito

HB: Whose style do you admire?

LG: I really love Diane Von Furstenberg style!

HB: What's your favorite emoji?

LG: 

HB: Favorite form of social media?

LG: Instagram

Story continues

HB: Favorite beauty products right now?

LG: For hair, I love the Balmain Silk Perfume spray and Redken's Curvaceous Curl Refiner. Bioderma and Shiseido make some of my favorite moisturizers. Also, loving the the Yves Saint Laurent Rouge Pur Couture Star Clash Edition Lipstick right now.

HB: What are you always carrying in your bag?

LG: My passport and my phone.

HB: What are you listening to right now?

LG: Sam Smith

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Property details: 4,848 civil servants miss submission deadline

The Department of Civil Personnel Records has made public the number of civil servants who are yet to submit their property details in the current fiscal year.
Tan and Wong pleaded guilty at the State Courts on Friday (16 September) and were jailed for their offences. (Yahoo file photo)

A Malaysian couple involved in a counterfeit casino chip scam in Marina Bay Sands (MBS) were given jail sentences at the State Courts on Friday (16 September).

Tan Teck Sing, 41, and his girlfriend Wong Wan Yee, 26, were given jail terms of 14 months and 12 months respectively, after they pleaded guilty to five charges under the Casino Control Act. Another 26 charges were taken into consideration.

Appearing before District Judge Crystal Ong, the pair kept their heads down as the charges were read out to them in Mandarin via a translator.

Transnational syndicate

Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Jordon Li revealed that the duo were part of a transnational counterfeit casino chip syndicate and were recruited to exchange more than 1,000 fake $1,000-denomination casino chips at MBS in November 2015.

Court papers revealed that the duo, along with four other Malaysians arrived in Singapore on 22 November 2015 and were tasked to exchange the chips at MBS by a recruiter from the syndicate.

They were given a sum of money as a reward for each chip that they managed to exchange. The quantum of the reward depended on how many chips each person was able to exchange.

According to court papers, they were instructed to exchange a few counterfeit chips at gaming tables for genuine chips of smaller denominations and thereafter mix the genuine chips with the counterfeit ones, which would later be exchanged for cash at the casino counters.

To avoid detection, they were told not to exchange more than $5,000 worth of chips at any given time.

MBS suffered S$1 million lost

The counterfeit chips were detected by MBS on 29 November 2015. MBS then conducted an immediate recall exercise for all $1,000 chips and reported the matter to the police.

The casino suffered total losses exceeding $1 million as a result.

Subsequent investigations led to the arrest of multiple persons connected with the syndicate, including the suspected mastermind, recruiters, runners and a lookout.

Story continues

In mitigation, the couples lawyer Foo Ho Chew pointed out that they were remorseful for their actions.



Foo said that Wongs culpability is of a significantly lower level than many others involved in the alleged syndicate in question while Tan had cooperated fully with the authorities.

In passing her judgement, Judge Ong said that such offences are hard to detect. The two of you do not reside or work in Singapore but came here to commit the crime, she said.
Sit-in at DPRK Embassy

Activists on Friday staged a sit in for an hour in front of Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) Embassy at Hariharbhawan to protest the latest test of a powerful nuclear bomb.
mad fientist.JPG

In August, Brandon  better known as the Mad Fientist  retired at just 34 years old.

To get there, Brandon (who doesn't use his last name online for privacy reasons) chose to live frugally in rural Vermont, where he managed to save and invest about 70% of his after-tax income.

In 2014, Brandon and his wife who has no interest in retiring early and keeps her finances largely separate from her husband's  moved to Scotland, where he continued to work for a few more years, eventually putting away enough to allow him to retire at 34.

"It's always been about 'financial independence' for me and not really 'early retirement,'" he told Business Insider. "I never wanted to stop working, but rather I wanted to have the time and freedom to work on things that are important to me."

But his journey to financial independence taught him a valuable lesson: Saving isn't everything.

When an audience member asked Brandon and this panelists to share what kept them motivated on the path to financial independence during an episode of his "Financial Independence Podcast," he responded that instead of struggling to stick to his savings goals, he coped with putting away too much.

"[I] went so hardcore that I made myself really unhappy during the process," he says. "I just didn't want to do anything that involved spending money. I just wanted to get there as soon as possible."

While Brandon advocates financial independence, he stresses that anyone striving for early retirement should avoid becoming so obsessed with it that they isolate themselves.

"Focus on the power that you're getting along the way with all that money that you're saving up, and use that power to make your life a lot better along the way," he says. "Don't sacrifice happiness for that final number in the bank."

Early retirement is supposed to be freeing and empowering, not constricting. By avoiding anything that involved spending money, Brandon ended up dodging his friends and depriving himself of even the little things that brought him joy.

Story continues

"One extra dollar in your bank account is not going to make you really happier," he warns.

NOW WATCH: Don't be afraid to cancel cable  here's how to watch all of your favorite shows for less than $42 a month





More From Business Insider


WINNIPEG, Manitoba (Reuters) - The Canadian province of Manitoba, a big piglet exporter to the United States, has confirmed its first case in three months of the deadly PED hog virus, amid concerns that dirty trucks may be carrying the virus across the border. Manitoba's government confirmed on its website the Sept. 14 case of Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea on a sow farm. The latest case, and all others in the province dating back to 2014, are located in the province's southeast region. The Manitoba hog industry had complained in May when Canada's food inspection agency revived a requirement that trucks delivering pigs to U.S. farms be washed before returning to Canada. Three Manitoba infections in spring fueled concerns among Canadian farmers and veterinarians that commercial U.S. washes are contaminated with the virus. There is no evidence of this, however. Two years ago, during a U.S. outbreak of the virus that ultimately killed 8 million pigs, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency suspended the rule requiring that trucks carrying swine be washed in the United States before returning to Canada. The agency ended the exemption after U.S. infections of the virus had dropped due to better farm sanitation and animal immunity. Manitoba's neighboring province of Ontario has confirmed 14 PED cases this year between January and June. (Reporting by Rod Nickel in Winnipeg, Manitoba; Editing by Bernadette Baum)
Photo: Getty Images

From Harpers BAZAAR

The lines between artistic expression and political or cultural correctness are growing murkier.

I felt this deeply today when I stepped backstage at Marc Jacobs spring 2017 show. The look was all about meticulously-weaved, colorful dreadlocks, which took hours to craft. Once all the extensions were secured, the pastel rainbow locs were tied into a knot on top of the models heads. Was the hair beautiful? Absolutely. But that didnt stop my stomach from dropping the second I saw them.

I couldnt help but wonder how people would react to a hairstyle that holds such an important place in certain cultures. And despite references of club kids and Harajuku girls being thrown around backstage, the issue of cultural appropriation was never mentioned. Even though hippies, ravers, and other fringe cultures have appropriated this Rastafarian style for decades, it is a staple of the African-American community; a cultural touchstone.

Lets just look at the facts: the colorful look was inspired by Lana Wachowski, who recently starred in one of Marc Jacobs campaigns. We were also looking at other girls that were inspiring to Marc, and certain types of cultures, like rave culture, club culture, acid house, Boy George and Marilyn, said hairstylist Guido Palau backstage.

To achieve the look, the team needed a massive amount of wool hair extensions. After a Google search online, Guido stumbled upon Dreadlocks By Jena, a small Etsy shop run by Jena Counts, based near Jacksonville, Florida. Counts and her daughters spent days dyeing and re-dyeing the wool extensions to get the colors just right.

The interesting thing about Marc is how he takes something so street and so raw, and because of the coloration of the hair and the makeup, it becomes a total look, explained Guido. Something that weve bypassed on the street and not really looked at, or seen a million times, he makes us look at it again in a much more sophisticated and fashionable way.

Story continues

As soon as the first model hit the runway, comments and questions about the controversial hairstyle began blowing up on social media . Here are a few Twitter reactions rolling in immediately after the show:

*sits back and waits for my timeline to fall apart once they see Marc Jacobs is featuring a dreadlock only runway. pic.twitter.com/GvuQBu3fFb - Colin Anderson (@BallinWithColin) September 15, 2016

An unknown black man/woman has dreads it is assumed they smoke and or are unprofessional. Marc Jacobs has a model with dreads its boho chic - IgottheKeiz (@keikei_xo) June 16, 2016

@marcjacobs So, I guess this means POC can wear our locs freely now and not be blocked from a promotion or job in general? - Imani Ashante (@dopuhmean) September 15, 2016

Everyone has dreads at the Marc Jacobs show including the non-black models. Well thats over, its cancelled! - daphne (@heavenlyjenner) September 15, 2016

A few hours after the show, Marc Jacobs jumped on Instagram to offer his response to the allegations of cultural appropriation.

Then, on Sunday, Marc Jacobs posted on Instagram again to clarify his earlier comments and encourage fans to keep the conversation about cultural appropriation going, but in a productive way.

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In a series of tweets on Friday, billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban challenged Donald Trump to an interview, offering to give $10 million to the charity of Trumps choice if he could grill the Republican nominee on his policies for four hours.

Cuban has frequently taken to social mediaand late-night talk showsto taunt or criticize Trump throughout the presidential campaign. Cuban also said he would have considered being Hillary Clintons running mate.

Trump, who has faced scrutiny over following through on charitable donations, has not yet responded to the challenge. Cuban proposed a one-on-one detailed interview that makes no mention of Clinton.

Ill add an option. If you need it, Ill write you the check and you can keep the money rather than give it to charity, Cuban wrote on Twitter.

.1) @realDonaldTrump $10mm to the charity of YOUR choice if you let ME interview you for 4 hrs on YOUR policies and their substance.  Mark Cuban (@mcuban) September 16, 2016

2) @realDonaldTrump groundrules are that you cant mention the Clintons or discuss anything other than the details and facts of yr plans and  Mark Cuban (@mcuban) September 16, 2016

3) @realDonaldTrump and no one else is in the room to help. Just me, you and a broadcast crew. Deal ?  Mark Cuban (@mcuban) September 16, 2016

4)@realDonaldTrump I'll add an option.If you need it, I'll write you the check and you can keep the money rather than give it to charity  Mark Cuban (@mcuban) September 16, 2016
Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban offered Donald Trump an unusual deal on Friday: $10 million in exchange for a four-hour interview.

In a series of tweets, Cuban initially said Trump could have the money go to the charity of his choice. But he subsequently suggested that the GOP nominee, who says hes worth more than $10 billion, could actually use the money.

Ill add an option. If you need it, Ill write you the check and you can keep the money rather than give it to charity, he jabbed.

Cuban also listed a few terms for the interview, including that the interview is only about Trumps policy proposals and that no one besides a broadcast crew joins them in the room.

Mark Cuban. (AFP Photo/Doug Pensinger)

The billionaire Shark Tank star, who frequently taunts Trump on Twitter, issued the offer hours after Trump slammed him in a Fox Business interview Friday morning. Trump dismissed Cubans intelligence when asked about the Mavericks owners prediction that the markets would tank if Trump won the presidency.

I know Mark. And the problem with Mark, hes not smart enough to understand what were doing. Hes really not smart enough, in my opinion, to understand whats going on, Trump said. Ive known him for a long time. He tweets me all the time. He sends me so many tweets.

Cuban and Trump have had an on-again, off-again relationship over the years. They used to trash each other on Twitter, but Cuban warmed to Trump at the start of the campaign and even said he would consider being the GOP nominees vice president. Trump held a rally last summer in the Mavericks arena.

But things have clearly soured since then.

View Cubans Friday tweets offering Trump $10 million below:

.1) @realDonaldTrump $10mm to the charity of YOUR choice if you let ME interview you for 4 hrs on YOUR policies and their substance.  Mark Cuban (@mcuban) September 16, 2016

2) @realDonaldTrump groundrules are that you cant mention the Clintons or discuss anything other than the details and facts of yr plans and  Mark Cuban (@mcuban) September 16, 2016

3) @realDonaldTrump and no one else is in the room to help. Just me, you and a broadcast crew. Deal ?  Mark Cuban (@mcuban) September 16, 2016

4)@realDonaldTrump I'll add an option.If you need it, I'll write you the check and you can keep the money rather than give it to charity  Mark Cuban (@mcuban) September 16, 2016

5) @realDonaldTrump In the inmortal words of YOU. "What do you have to lose ?"  Mark Cuban (@mcuban) September 16, 2016




Mark Cuban has an eight-figure offer for fellow billionaire Donald Trump.

The Dallas Mavericks owner has pledged to pay the GOP nominee $10 million  to be paid directly or to a charity of his choice  if he sits down with him for a four-hour interview.

Cuban isnt going for any lighthearted Jimmy Fallon-style chat however, and has specified that it has to be about his policies and their substance, he said in a series of tweets on Friday.

Also Read: Donald Trump Finally Acknowledges That President Obama Was Born in the U.S.

The Shark Tank personality laid down some other strict ground rules, including restrictions on talk about the Clintons or anything other than facts and details of his plans. He also stipulated that no one else would be allowed in the room to help, aside from a broadcast crew.

According to Forbes, Cuban has a net worth of $3.3 billion and is an outspoken critic of Trump. He has also questioned Trumps claims of being a billionaire, telling Vanity Fair in June: We know without any question that as of May 27, Donald doesnt have more than $165 million in cash and securities and bonds. And trust me, Ive got a lot more than that in cash, securities, and bonds, he said, citing Trumps F.E.C. filings.

While he has yet to respond to the Twitter challenge, Trump told the Fox Business Network earlier on Friday that the Mavericks owner and self-made billionaire wasnt smart enough to understand his policies after Cuban had questioned his economic plan.

Also Read: Donald Trump Lets Jimmy Fallon Mess Up His Famous Hairdon't (Video)

Well, I know Mark and you know, the problem with Mark, he is not smart enough to understand what we are doing, he said in an interview with Maria Bartiromo.

Hes really not smart enough in my opinion to really understand whats going on. Ive known him for a long time. He tweets me all the time.

And, I think this, look, I think that this plan is a great plan. Were in trouble, he continued. Explain to Mark, we have $20 trillion in debt, we have high taxes in this country, very high taxes.

Story continues

Also Read: 'Dr. Oz Show' Edits Out Donald Trump Comment About Kissing Daughter Ivanka

See Cubans tweet below.

Related stories from TheWrap:

Mark Cuban Says Donald Trump Would Bomb on 'Shark Tank' So Fast 'It Would Make Your Head Spin' (Video)

Mark Cuban Volunteers to Be Hillary Clinton's VP, for Real (Video)

Mark Cuban Doubles Down on F-Bombs, Hit With $30K Fines
Mark Wahlberg's request to be pardoned for the assaults he committed as a teenager has come to an end.



A Massachusetts Parole Board spokesman told the Associated Press on Thursday that Wahlberg never responded to a letter asking if he wished to keep his petition open, and therefore the matter has been closed.



In 1988, when Wahlberg was 16, he was convicted as an adult of assault and other charges stemming from a convenience store robbery. He was sentenced to three months in jail and said in request for pardon that he was released after serving about 45 days.



Wahlberg also noted in the application that he turned his life around and became a successful music artist, actor and film and television producer. He also mentioned that he has raised millions of dollars for charity and donated his time and efforts for philanthropic causes.







The request proved controversial, with his victims saying they were divided on whether the actor should be pardoned.



Wahlberg, now 45, told reporters at the Toronto Film Festival this week that he regrets asking for the pardon, but he's grateful that the process allowed him to meet and apologize to one of his victims.



"Some good did come out of it," he said.
Syaphrubesi-Rasuwagadhi road blocked by rockslide

Around 150 Kathmandu-bound goods containers have been stranded at Nepal-China border point of Rasuwagadhi for the last five days after a rockslide blocked the Syaphrubesi-Rasuwagadhi road section.
By William James and Kate Holton LONDON (Reuters) - Britain gave the go-ahead for a $24 billion (18.1 billion) nuclear power plant on Thursday, ending weeks of uncertainty that had strained ties with China, which will help pay for it, and France, which will build it. Prime Minister Theresa May's government signalled it would take a more cautious approach in future over foreign investment in big infrastructure projects than her predecessor David Cameron. But ultimately, after stunning Paris and Beijing by putting the deal on hold in July after May took office, it agreed to go ahead with the Hinkley Point C project in southwest England. Britain's first new nuclear power plant in decades will be built by French state-controlled utility firm EDF , backed by $8 billion of Chinese cash. The deal is part of a recovery of the global nuclear power industry following a slump caused by the 2011 Fukushima disaster in Japan. The government drew fire for approving it without renegotiating the price British consumers will pay for electricity. The opposition Labour Party supports the project in principle but says its guarantee to pay a minimum of roughly double the current market price for electricity for 35 years is a rip-off. May's government said a new investment policy would give it greater control over future deals when foreign states are involved in "critical infrastructure", a departure from the more open approach pursued by Cameron. May inherited the deal from Cameron, who quit as prime minister after losing Britain's referendum to stay in the EU. In one of her first acts, she put the project on hold, hours before a contract was due to be signed, saying she needed time to assess it. "The government has decided to proceed with the first new nuclear power stations for a generation," business minister Greg Clark told parliament on Thursday, setting out changes to the deal and British policy on foreign infrastructure investment. "These changes mean that while the UK will remain one of the most open economies in the world, the public can be confident that foreign direct investment works always in the public interest," he said. Supporters of the project said Britain needed to protect its relations with major economies after voting to leave the European Union, and show it was open for business. The Chinese Foreign Ministry said it welcomed the decision while Chancellor Philip Hammond said it continued the strategic partnership between the two countries. VERY HAPPY Under the new plan, the government will be able to block the sale of EDF's controlling stake before or after completion of the project - a proviso it said it would apply to significant stakes in all future nuclear projects. EDF said it had agreed with the government to retain control of the project and would sign the deal "in the coming days". China General Nuclear Power Corporation (CGN) - the project's Chinese state-backed investor - and business lobby groups also welcomed the decision on Hinkley. "We are very happy the British government has approved the project," CGN said in a statement. The two new reactors at Hinkley Point are scheduled to be running by the middle of next decade and provide around 7 percent of Britain's electricity, helping to fill a supply gap as the country's coal plants are set to close by 2025. Critics have focussed on the guaranteed price for electricity, which they say does not reflect falling energy prices since the deal was drawn up, or anticipated declines in the costs of rival clean technologies like wind and solar power. "It is extraordinary that they have not reviewed the price per unit of power," said Barry Gardiner, the opposition Labour Party's energy spokesman. The deal also affirmed the government's commitment to replace its old nuclear power stations. Nearly all of Britain's eight functioning nuclear plants will have to shut down by 2030. Environmental lobby groups, some opposition political parties, and a former board member at EDF said that was a mistake. "The decision to go ahead with Hinkley Point is a bad choice for both France and the UK," former EDF board member Gerard Magnin told Reuters. Magnin resigned from the board in protest at the company's nuclear strategy before a vote that narrowly approved the project. "By concentrating technical and financial means in this investment on both sides of the channel, the respective governments and EDF will deprive their citizens and small companies of the opportunities for jobs and innovation that would come from inventing the 21st-century energy world." INVESTMENT POLICY The decision to go ahead with Hinkley goes some way to respond to concern that May, a former Home Secretary, was less receptive to foreign investment, particularly from China which has plans to invest billions in British infrastructure. According to a former colleague, ex-business minister Vince Cable, May had expressed wariness at the "gung-ho" attitude that Cameron took towards courting Chinese investment. Addressing those concerns, the government said it would take a "special share" in future nuclear projects to ensure that significant stakes could not be sold without its consent. Simon Taylor, academic director of the Master of Finance Programme at Cambridge University, said he thought the policy was largely cosmetic. "The UK really needs investment in infrastructure. There are very few nuclear operators around the world. Most are already seeking to invest in the UK and so it's not clear who they would regard as unwelcome, beyond Russia," he said. CGN plans to make a number of investments in British nuclear power including the building and operating of a new station with EDF at Bradwell-on-Sea, southeast England. Bradwell would be a Chinese-led project, using Chinese reactor technology. The government also said it was introducing broader rules to increase scrutiny of the national security implications of foreign ownership and control of critical infrastructure, including the need for continuous government approval of foreign owners and a review of takeover rules. It did not specify what sort of projects would be included. A source close to CGN said it was not concerned by the new ownership rules and planned to move ahead with Bradwell project and another minority investment, in the development of a new power station at Sizewell, in eastern England. Horizon, a nuclear new build group in Britain owned by Japan's Hitachi's <6501.T>, said it too was "entirely comfortable" with the new approach. China's Xinhua news agency, which offers a reflection of official thinking, welcomed the decision albeit with a thinly-veiled criticism of the delay. "Let us hope that London quits its China-phobia and works with Beijing to ensure the project's smooth development," it said in an editorial published on Thursday. (Additional reporting by Kate Holton, Karolin Schaps, Ben Blanchard in Beijing, Geert De Clercq and Richard Lough in Paris; Writing by Elizabeth Piper and William James; Editing by Pravin Char and Peter Graff)
A white, blond-haired Kansas State University student has been expelled from school after Snapchatting a photo of herself and a friend wearing black clay face masks with the caption Feels good to finally be a nigga.

The young woman, Paige Shoemaker, posted the image to her Snapchat story, meaning it could be seen by any of her followers, on Tuesday night. But the trouble started when a fellow student, Desmund Weathers, posted the image to Twitter, where it swiftly went viral  prompting public outcry, a formal response from the university, and a Facebook apology by Shoemaker on behalf of herself and her friend, Sadie Meier.

Welcome to Kansas State University. Where breakfast in the morning is some K-State Family with a side of Racism. pic.twitter.com/Vmdkl5g27g  Des. (@JustDesmund) September 15, 2016

We clearly understand that what was said and done was completely disrespectful, she wrote, in part, in her Thursday post, since shared more than 1,300 times. I did want to inform everyone that it was NOT black face, but it was a LOreal clay facial mask. The signs that were thrown also is an inside joke between our friends that represents West Coast is the best coast. We never intended for the picture to offend anyone.

Shoemaker added, We accept that there will be people who wont forgive us, but something had to be said. Ask anyone who knows us, we are the most accepting and least racist people. We know that we will ride up and learn from this mistake. We will be better.  We know what we did was wrong.

Kansas State University interim associate provost for diversity Zelia Wiley addressed the situation with a post to the schools website on Thursday. On Sept. 15, the university received notice that a derogatory social message and photo was sent out via social media. The involved person is not currently enrolled at the university. It is our understanding the second individual in the photo is not associated with the university, Wiley began. This racially offensive photo with a derogatory message has upset the K-State family and is not in concert with our principles of community. Such messages on social media are harmful to all.

Story continues

She concluded, As members of the K-State family, we should always visualize and work toward a safe, welcoming environment for our community. I and other members of the CCRT [Campus Climate Response Team] welcome the opportunity to speak with our affected students and employees as we continue create a culture of inclusion for the entire K-State family.

The message was in response to the hundreds of messages that flooded the universitys Facebook page.

The post of Shoemakers Snapchat image, by @JustDesmund with the caption Welcome to Kansas State University. Where breakfast in the morning is some K-State Family with a side of Racism, has been retweeted more than 14,000 times. Its prompted tweets of support, from smfh this is so unacceptable to Truly indefensible. There are complete morons out there, and sadly Trump has empowered/brought out some of the worst of them, but also plenty of comments suggesting he was taking Shoemakers post too seriously.

@JustDesmund who cares ? quit being a baby and scared of racists. Im brown and dont fear the world like you.  RJ (@AcquiesceRJ) September 16, 2016

@JustDesmund Youre an oversensitive baby. Its clearly a joke.  Cellardoor (@Applemilk17) September 16, 2016

Shoemaker, speaking on camera to local news station WGAL, said, Well, I wouldve been a senior before being kicked out of school. She then added, about her use of nigga in the caption, That word just kind of happens in our friend group, cause we know  were a big family, so that word does not offend anyone in our group.

Civil rights journalist Shaun King was among those who retweeted the image, without comment, spurring a lengthy dialogue on oppression, blackface, and racist intent.

In addition to getting booted from school, the young womans former sorority, Zeta Tau Alpha, made it clear she was no longer in the sisterhood. While she did join the Beta Upsilon Chapter at Kansas State University in 2013, she has not been a member since spring 2015 and is no longer affiliated with the organization in any capacity, a Facebook post noted about Shoemaker. Her words and actions certainly do not reflect the values and principles of Zeta Tau Alpha. Our Creed teaches us to look for the good in everyone and to seek understanding in order to gain true wisdom.

Lets keep in touch! Follow Yahoo Beauty on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest.
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McDonald's is rolling out a new kind of restaurant in Paris that doesn't sell burgers or fries.

The restaurant, called McCafe, more closely resembles an upscale coffee and dessert shop than a McDonald's restaurant.

It has an open kitchen and 30 seats for dining in, Le Figaro reports.

On its website, it says it's dedicated to selling "coffee and delicacies."

The McCafe sells treats and desserts like macaroons, cupcakes, tiramisu, flan, muffins, marshmallow bars, and brownies, as well as a variety of plain and flavored coffee drinks including espressos, macchiatos, and lattes.

There are no Golden Arches or signage related to McDonald's on the outside of the building. Inside, there's a refrigerated bar of to-go items like yogurt and sandwiches.

McCafe Paris

It looks a lot like the inside of a Starbucks store.

McCafe Paris

Here's a closer look at some of the desserts:

Post by Aime Yarbough .

There are also heartier dishes like bagels toasted with salmon and pastrami, Grub Street reports.

McCafe Paris

The decor is all coffee-themed; it looks nothing like a regular McDonald's.

McCafe Paris

These markers appear to be used for table service.

McCafe Paris

McCafe is the name of McDonald's coffee brand. The company started opening standalone McCafes in urban areas of Canada last year.

The Canadian McCafes serve coffee, Danish, breakfast sandwiches, and croissants, as well as heartier meals like quinoa-edamame-mandarin salad, a kale-and-Brussels-sprouts salad with mixed veggies, classic grilled cheese on stoneground multigrain bread, and an apple-and-Brie croissant with honey.

"Were putting the cafe in McCafe and making the brand a destination in its own right," John Betts, president and CEO of McDonalds Canada, told Business Insider last year. "The new standalone McCafe locations allow us to build on our strong coffee credentials and create even stronger connections with our brand by offering our guests the more complete cafe menu theyve been asking us for."

Story continues

NOW WATCH: Why mens and womens shirts button on opposite sides





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The cast of the forthcoming TV movie about the JonBenet Ramsey case, which continues to captivate the nation 20 years later, has opened up about the real-life characters they are portraying.

Read: 20 Years After Her Death, JonBenet Ramsey's Pageant Friends Open Up About 'Fun-Loving Kid'

Inside Edition went behind the scenes on the Vancouver set, where the new lifetime movie Who Killed JonBenet? is being filmed.

Payton Lepinski, who plays JonBenet, is the spitting image of the 6-year-old child found murdered in her Boulder, Colorado, home on Christmas Day in 1996.

Full hair and makeup treatments have the other actors remarkably made to look just like the famous characters in the real story.

Julia Campbell plays Patsy Ramsey. She says she headed into the role with some preconceived notions of the case.

Read: Does the Brother of JonBenet Ramsey Hold the Key to Finding Her Killer?

When I started this my opinion of Patsy was exactly what the tabloids had out, she said.

Michael Gill plays John Ramsey. He said: Jon really made sure he was protecting everybody.

The film will air later this fall.

Watch: JonBenet Ramsey's Brother Tells Dr. Phil Her Funeral Was 'Traumatizing' for Him

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Elite police departments are dedicated to recruiting the best of the best, but this department's newest member is breaking the mold for his lazy habits and often sleeping on the job.

Read: Jake the Pitbull Becomes Honorary Firefighter After He's Rescued From a Devastating Fire

Meet Troop Cat Ed, the 2-year-old tabby brought on the New South Wales Police Force in Australia.

The purple jacket-wearing kitten spends his days patrolling the stables on high alert for pests in support of the police department's mounted unit, but Ed appears to be most frequently photographed in the middle of a cat nap, or checking out a bird on the window sill when he's supposed to be on duty.

The troop cat was recently under fire after a video surfaced of him sleeping on the job, while rats freely roamed the stables nearby.

In a video posted to the Mounted Unit - NSW Police Force Facebook page, Ed can be seen snoozing away on the seat of a tractor as rats scour a hay bale right next to him.

Read: 'Holy Sh*t, Is That A Cat?' Man Claims to Own New York's Largest Pet Feline, Weighing 28 Pounds

But whether he's working hard or hardly working, one thing's for sure: This sneaky feline is an irreplaceable addition to the department. Just ask the horses.

Watch: Sixth Sense Kitty: Tom the Cat Comforts Patients Near the End of Their Lives

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(This Sept 15 story corrects "asked" in first paragraph to "raised with" California lawmakers) By Gabriel Stargardter MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto, who has proposed liberalizing his country's drug laws, privately raised with California lawmakers visiting Mexico a state measure to legalize recreational marijuana, a state legislator said on Thursday. A delegation of California Democratic lawmakers visiting Mexico talked for an hour on Wednesday with Pena Nieto about trade and the state's border with Mexico. During the meeting, Pena Nieto brought up the November ballot measure without getting into details, California state Senator Ben Allen said in an interview. "But they're clearly paying close attention," he added. If California votes to create a legal cannabis market, it would place great pressure on Mexico, which is mired in combating its vast drug-trafficking networks, to follow suit. There was no mention of the California marijuana initiative in the presidency's report on the meeting, and Pena Nieto's office did not immediately respond to request for comment. Pena Nieto has said the United States and Mexico should not pursue diverging policies on marijuana legislation and in April proposed a bill to allow Mexicans to carry up to an ounce of marijuana has stalled in Congress. California's proposal would allow people over 21 years to possess up to an ounce of marijuana for private use and establish a system to license, regulate and tax sales of cannabis. Recent polls show a majority of Californians favor legalizing marijuana. Four U.S. states plus the District of Columbia already allow recreational use for adults. Voters in several more states, including the southern border state of Arizona, will consider similar legislation in November. Long regarded as a conservative on drug policy, Pena Nieto has modified his stance since he took office in 2012, reflecting growing Latin American disenchantment with the war on drugs. A bill to legalize medical marijuana remains in Congress. Ethan Nadelmann, the executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance, said he eventually expects Mexico to be swayed by the fiscal opportunities of regulated cannabis, which he believes could earn California around $1 billion a year in tax revenue. (Reporting by Gabriel Stargardter; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)
By Eric Auchard

FRANKFURT, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Mobileye NV said in a U.S. securities filing on Friday that its top executives were assured by Tesla Motors Inc Chief Executive Elon Musk that drivers of the company's electric cars would not be allowed to take their hands off the wheel when using the "Autopilot" driving assistance system, but Tesla later allowed hands-free driving over Mobileye's objections.

Mobileye said that in product-planning communications between the top executives of Mobileye and Tesla going back to May 2015, the supplier expressed safety concerns regarding Tesla's plans to allow drivers to remove their hands from the wheel while driving.

"It has long been Mobileye's position that Tesla's Autopilot should not be allowed to operate hands-free without proper and substantial technological restrictions and limitations," Mobileye said in its filing, which it said was made in response to inquiries.

Mobileye, an Israeli company that is a leader in vision systems for vehicles, further alleged in its filing that Musk promised in a subsequent face-to-face meeting with Mobileye Chairman and Chief Technology Officer Amnon Shashua that its Autopilot system would require drivers to keep their hands on the wheel.

However, Tesla later backed off this pledge, Mobileye said in its filing with the U.S. Securities Commission, launching hands-free activation features late last year.

A Tesla spokeswoman said on Thursday that Mobileye collaborated with Tesla to develop Autopilot over the past three years. The Silicon Valley electric luxury car maker did not have an immediate reply after Mobileye's statement was filed on Friday.

Reuters could not independently verify the details in the filing, including that the top-level executive exchanges that Mobileye referred to took place.

Mobileye declined to supply specific evidence beyond what it disclosed in its regulatory filing. It said it had commented fully on the breakdown in its ties with Tesla and would provide no further comment.

Story continues

Tesla said in a statement on Thursday that relations broke down with Mobileye over Tesla's plans to develop its own, competing vision system to help drivers avoid collisions. (http://reut.rs/2ctM5CG)

Tesla has said that drivers received warnings from their vehicles to keep their hands on the wheel while operating on Autopilot.

On Sunday, Tesla said it would update Autopilot to make it more difficult for drivers to ignore warnings to keep hands on the wheel. Those changes and others, Musk said, would probably have prevented the death in May of a Model S driver using Autopilot, which thrust the technology into the pubic spotlight.

Musk also said the revised system will allow a driver's hands to be off the wheel for up to three minutes while following a car at highway speeds.

The statements in the filing by Mobileye intensified a dispute with Tesla over what led to an acrimonious and unusually public rupture between Mobileye and Tesla. Mobileye's chairman told Reuters on Wednesday the company broke ties with Tesla because it was "pushing the envelope in terms of safety" with Autopilot.

(Additional reporting by Tova Cohen in Tel Aviv; editing by Grant McCool)
Rhonda Beckford has been searching for answers ever since her daughter, Kara Kopetsky, went missing on May 4, 2007.



The 17-year-old was last seen leaving her Belton, Missouri, high school during a free period. She was never seen or heard from again.



Four or five people saw Kara in the hallway before she was seen on the school's security cameras leaving campus, Beckford says, but no one knew where she went.



"That's the big question," Beckford tells PEOPLE. "What happened?"



Now, Beckford hopes she is on the path to an answer. Kylr Yust, 28, once a suspect in her daughter's disappearance, has been arrested in connection to another missing Missouri woman.



Jessica Runions was last seen leaving a party on Sept. 8 with Yust, a friend of her boyfriend, according to police. On Sunday, authorities discovered Jessica's empty and burned SUV on the side of the road.



Yust was arrested in Benton County, Missouri, on Tuesday for allegedly knowingly burning Jessica's vehicle. He has not been charged with the 21-year-old's disappearance.



 Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Click here to get breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases in the True Crime Newsletter.



Kara and Yust dated for nine months when they were teenagers in 2007, Beckford tells PEOPLE. Days before she went missing, Kara filed a restraining order against Yust, alleging he was violent towards her, a Cass County official tells PEOPLE.



"We tried to tell her that he wasnat good for her but that just drew them closer together," Beckford tells PEOPLE.



Finally, a week before her disappearance, Beckford says Kara decided she'd had enough.



"[She] started to mature and see him for who he was," Beckford tells PEOPLE. "They say that [that moment of realization] is the most dangerous time because the abuser doesnat want to let the abused go."



Police questioned Yust about Kara's disappearance but the then 18-year-old told authorities he was out of town visiting a sick relative. (Yust's family declined PEOPLE's request for comment.) He was never charged.



"You have to hold on to some sort of hope that she's out there but as time went on we realized that she wasn't going to come home," Beckford says.



Beckford says Kara's room hasn't been touched since she went missing. Recently, Beckford has thought about cleaning it out.



"It's emotionally hard [to see it every day], especially when you know she's not coming home," Beckford tells PEOPLE. "But [her brother] says even if you clean it out it's still going to be Kara's room."





Story continues

A History of Violence

Since his ex's disappearance, Yust has been in trouble with the law, according to court documents obtained by PEOPLE.



In September 2011, Yust pleaded guilty to domestic violence after choking and striking his then-pregnant 18-year-old girlfriend, according to a police report obtained by PEOPLE. The victim claimed Yust told her, "I've killed people before, even ex-girlfriends out of sheer jealousy. I will kill you," the report states.





Mother of Missouri Woman Missing Since 2007 Sees Eerie Similarities in Current Case of Missing Woman| Crime & Courts, True Crime



The victim also alleged Yust told her he had killed her three kittens and would kill her family if she went to police, the report states. A Kansas City judge filed an order of protection, but the order was later dismissed, court records show.



In 2013, Yust was sentenced to four years for drug trafficking. He was released after serving three years, according to court documents.



Beckford says she and her family make a point of having a family member at every one of Yust's court hearings.



"Kara has not been forgotten and we're not going away," Beckford says. "We're not giving up."





Jessica's Family: 'We're Heartbroken'

Jessica Runions' family tells PEOPLE they're staying positive by leaning on each other and their faith since her disappearance.



"We're heartbroken," Jessica's grandmother, Linda Runions, tells PEOPLE. "We're hoping to hear something soon."



Jessica was a baker at a local retirement home and was hoping to attend culinary school, her family tells PEOPLE.





Mother of Missouri Woman Missing Since 2007 Sees Eerie Similarities in Current Case of Missing Woman| Crime & Courts, True Crime



Rhonda Beckford tells PEOPLE she understands what Jessica's family is going through  especially her mother.



"Her world has changed and she doesn't know how to adjust to it. Nobody does. You shouldn't have to," Beckford says.



On Wednesday, investigators searched the home of Yust's grandfather looking for items belonging to Jessica including an iPhone, purse, and car keys, according a search warrant obtained by PEOPLE.



Authorities left the home with a blue plaid shirt, a Q-tip with blood and an alcohol pad with blood, the warrant states.



Yust has not been assigned an attorney and is being held on a $50,000 bond. A Jackson County judge entered a plea of not guilty on behalf of Yust. Both Kara's and Jessica's family plan on attending his trial.



"[Kara], we're never going to give up," Beckford says she's telling her daughter. "When you're found and brought home we're going to put you to rest like you should be."
By Alastair Sharp TORONTO (Reuters) - (This version of the story corrects name to Ella Purnell from Kelly Macdonald in the last paragraph) The mother of a Reuters photojournalist killed in Somalia in 1993 wants a film about her son's life to empower others to strive to change the world. "My great desire is that this film will be a spark to ignite a movement of young people and the young-at-heart to believe they have a role to play in changing the world around them," said Kathy Eldon, mother of Dan Eldon and the film's producer. "The Journey Is The Destination," which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival on Wednesday, chronicles the final three years of Dan Eldon's life during which he fell in love, raised money for refugees, drove across Africa to deliver it and became a photojournalist. "The Eldon family are miraculous to me," said director Bronwen Hughes. "They have taken this story of their son and transformed it into a movement for global positive change." The British-American photographer joined journalists on an assignment to cover a civil war and famine in Somalia and the UN-mandated and U.S-led mission to secure humanitarian relief. After scores of civilians were killed and wounded in a U.S. bombing that was targeting Somali warlords, journalists documenting the aftermath were attacked by a mob. Eldon and three other journalists were killed. He was 22. Kathy and Dan's sister Amy founded the Creative Visions Foundation after Eldon's death to build on the efforts of other activists using media and art to cause social change. The film drew heavily on journals Eldon kept, a collection of which his family published after his death. "Dan had left us a visual map to the way to tell his story and I determined that had to be the visual language for the film," Hughes said. The film, which does not yet have distribution, stars Ben Schnetzer as Dan, Maria Bello as Kathy, and Ella Purnell as Amy. (Reporting by Alastair Sharp; Editing by Chris Reese)
The mother of a man who was the victim of a thrill kill helped write a bill that would send insane killers to jail. The man who confessed to killing her son is in a mental institution instead of jail because he was found not guilty by reason of insanity.
Unwanted waters

If water dominates Prachandas Delhi-visit, how will Nepal handle it? It does not even have a water resources ministry
Earlier this week, when the latest ceasefire in Syrias long-running civil war took effect, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad seized the opportunity to embark on a triumphant tour of a place that has long defied him. He paid a visit to the city of Daraya, a Damascus suburb where rebels managed to resist his forces for four long years until they finally agreed to give up control in the last week of August.

For those four years the government threw everything it had at Daraya. The troops surrounding it tried to starve it out, refusing to let aid convoys bring food to residents. Syrian helicopters pounded the city with barrel bombs, weapons of indiscriminate terror that have little or no military utility. In August, the Syrian air force used rockets and napalm to obliterate the citys last surviving hospital. Some observers believe this was part of a calculated effort to make the place completely uninhabitable.

Weve seen the same brutality in far too many places in this war. But there was something different about Daraya  something that helps to explain why Assad was so keen to celebrate its fall.

If you only follow the headlines, you can be forgiven for seeing this war primarily as a fight between two equally nasty alternatives: the totalitarian Baath Party regime of Assad or the totalitarian theocracy of the Islamic State and other jihadist groups. But this is a drastic simplification  one that both Assad and the terrorists want their own supporters, and the world, to believe. But it is certainly truer today than it was back at the beginning of the conflict. By their very nature, civil wars have a tendency to foster extremes. The ruthless are rewarded, while the moderates and the evolutionary reformers tend to get culled out.

Thats exactly what has happened in Syria. Today, five years later, its easy to forget that Syrias revolution started off amid the optimism of the Arab Spring. The first protests against Assads dictatorship were peaceful: Demonstrators were demanding democracy, not rule by Al Qaeda.

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And Daraya was one of the birthplaces of this movement. In the revolutions early stages it was the home of the activist Ghiyath Matar, known as Little Gandhi for his quixotic embrace of non-violence. When Assads soldiers arrived to crush local protests, he greeted them with flowers and water. They responded by torturing him to death. His corpse was later returned to his family with its throat torn out. The countrys downward spiral began.

In The Morning They Came for Us, her bloodcurdling account of the early stages of the war, journalist Janine di Giovanni explains what happened next. When she visited Daraya in 2012, locals gave her detailed accounts of a massacre conducted by government troops who had briefly managed to wrest the town away from the rebels. It was punished, she told me, because it was a symbol of peaceful resistance.

Yet even amid the descending darkness, the people of the city tried to hold on to their ideals. When Assads generals realized they couldnt take the place back, they placed it under siege. Hunger became the governments most potent weapon. What did you eat today? Id ask them, di Giovanni recalls. Grape leaves, some salt. They took leaves from the trees and made soup out of them. Much of the population left, but several thousand locals, many of them activists, remained. In October 2012 they set up a council to govern themselves, and in the years that followed, even as life became nearly impossible, they persisted in holding regular elections  every six months, inside every single office and department of the local government, says Hussam Ayash, a spokesperson for the local council.

Most importantly of all, he told me, the local government persisted in maintaining its independence from the citys militia, a non-jihadist unit of the rebel Free Syrian Army. In many other rebel-controlled parts of Syria, Ayash explained, local governments have frequently fallen under the sway of fighters, many of them Islamist extremists. By contrast, Al Qaeda and its ilk never managed to get a foothold in Daraya. We had no services, says Ayash. We had no communications. We had no water. But also nobody could get in or get out. The only fighters in Daraya were the local people. So we had no jihadists.

Ayash spoke to me on Skype from northern Syria, where he is now living after being evacuated from Daraya by government forces in the days following the citys surrender on August 25. When the Syrian army managed to capture a key position on the outskirts of the city, Darayas leaders saw the writing on the wall, and accepted a government offer of safe passage to the north in return for their surrender of control over the community. This uncharacteristically lenient gesture by Assad was a shrewd move, one that enabled him to finally seize control of a key rebel stronghold at relatively low cost to his own troops. It was also calculated to undermine the resolve of rebel holdouts in other hard-pressed areas, who may now see a deal with the government as a more palatable option than continued resistance.

Its hard to overestimate the psychological impact of the citys fall. Fadi Mohammed, another Daraya activist, told me that the city embodied the hopes of the many Syrians who reject extremists of all stripes. He cites one occasion, early on, when protesters formed a human chain around the local government building to protect it from attack by pro-government forces, and recalls the citys devotion to the principle of civilian control. If the experience in Daraya had been protected and supported by the international community, it could have been a model, he says. Many people around Syria regarded Daraya as something special. Thats a big if, of course. But its hard to dismiss the thought out of hand.

The loss of Darayya is a watershed in Syrias war, wrote analyst Sam Heller of The Century Foundation in a recent blogpost. For many in Syrias opposition, Darayya represented the best of the Syrian revolution  a bastion of civil activism and nationalist, Free Syrian Army rebels that held together and persevered for years against overwhelming odds, even as rebel-held areas elsewhere slid sideways into jihadism and factional infighting.

To be sure, Daraya is also a place of considerable military significance. As Faysal Itani, an analyst at Washingtons Atlantic Council, points out, the city is just a few miles south of Damascus proper, and close to a key government airfield. My own perception has always been that this is the most important geography of the war, he told me. The surrender of Daraya and other areas near Damascus to government forces are, he says, the most significant military victories of the war  victories that owe a great deal, he says, to Russias forceful intervention on Assads behalf.

Now the government has succeeded in completely emptying the city of the people who lived there, and there are rumors that Assad intends to replace its rebellious Sunnis with members of other sectarian groups who are loyal to his regime. What happened in Daraya is ethnic cleansing, says di Giovanni, who notes that the practice of expelling civilians and replacing them with others is a direct violation of international law. This will set a terrible precedent. The situation is so dire that even the otherwise mealy-mouthed United Nations has seen fit to utter a few critical words about the expulsion of the citys last inhabitants.

Darayas supporters often speak of it as an experiment in self-government and democratic practice. The question now is whether that experiment should be regarded as a failure, or whether its survivors can keep it alive at a time when their spirit of moderation and pragmatism looks like a throwback to a distant era.

Its example remains tantalizing. Here is a case where Syrians stubbornly stuck to the principles of civilized government even under the most forbidding circumstances. And that, clearly, amounts to a particularly potent challenge to Assads ruling Baath Party. This idea of the choice, that you only have Assad or ISIS, its not right, as Ayash put it. Actually you have another choice, and this choice is us. We are looking for a future, and we think that well have a decent future if we are free, with dignity.

The sad reality, though, is that Darayas fall is a huge blow to this dream, and democratically minded Syrians everywhere are mourning. And this is precisely why the Syrian president decided to take his victory lap there. Its a real coup for Assad, says di Giovanni. He hated Daraya. It was everything he loathed.

The photo shows a March 9, 2016 protest by local women and children in Daraya, who were calling on the government to allow for the delivery of food to the besieged city.

Hussam El Ahmed /Anadolu Agency/Getty Images
This yoga loving mum is able to pull some amazing poses while breastfeeding her newborn [Photo: Instagram/carleebyoga]

For many mums-to-be pregnancy yoga is a gentle way to exercise and get in some precious bonding time with your baby. And many mums carry on the practice post-birth taking their little ones to mama and bubba yoga. But one mum has been busy sending Instagram into meltdown by posting mindblowing pictures of her intricate yoga poses while simultaneously breastfeeding her new baby.

Carlee Benear, 29, from Texas, who is mum to Milam, five, Cale, two, and Maramaylee, five weeks, first developed a love of yoga after gaining weight during her first and second pregnancies. So when her third baby arrived, she was keen to get straight back on the yoga mat, with her newborn bubba in tow.

Multi-tasking mama! [Photo: Instagram/carleebyoga]

Taking to her Instagram account to share gravity-defying poses with her tiny baby latched to her breast, Carlees followers have been quick to express their awe at the mums multi-tasking abilities.



Wow, how!? latch first and feet up?, one follower wrote.



Great photo! So beautiful #normalizebreastfeeding, added another.



Gives new meaning to breastfeeding in public [Photo: Instagram/carleebyoga]

The new mum believes that combining yoga and breastfeeding has help strengthen the bond she has with Maramaylee.



I flourished in my yoga practice throughout my entire pregnancy, Carlee explained to The Huffington Post UK.



Once my daughter was born, we were inseparable. After a few weeks of staring at her every move I felt the urge to get back on my mat and step back into my practice with this fresh new joy surrounding me.

Breastfeeding and caring for a newborn are a full-time job on their own. So, gradually I took her on the mat with me.



Once we started feeding and flowing, a spark ignited. We were connected again in harmony.



Seriously impressive! [Photo: Instagram/carleebyoga]

And the multi-tasking mum is keen to stress that despite her complicated poses she never puts her daughter at risk.

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Thats the funny thing about some poses, she explained. It may look impossible to the untrained eye especially, until you discover how its done and what your own body is capable of.



I used to be very clumsy, yoga changed that. Yoga helped me understand gravity and the grace that comes along with it.



Do you think breastfeeding while doing yoga is a good idea? Let us know @YahooStyleUK

Fitmum Exercises While Breastfeeding Baby Two Weeks After Giving Birth

Does This Jools Oliver Photo Put Pressure On New Mums To Lose Their Baby Weight Quickly?
Last winter, after Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump delivered a landmark speech calling for a ban on all Muslims traveling to the United States, 9-year-old Jibran Ali came home from his Virginia school with an urgent question.

Am I still going to be allowed to be friends with Axell? he said, referring to his best friend.

For his mother, the Defense Departments most senior Muslim American civilian, it was a disturbing moment.

As a special advisor to Secretary of Defense Ash Carter, Iram Ali oversees the hundreds of White House political appointments to the Pentagon. Her mandate, as tasked by the Obama administration, is to recruit and attract people of all ethnic, educational, and religious backgrounds  a policy the White House believes will foster a better-informed and more effective class of national security leaders.

That commitment to inclusiveness is something she tells her son is a bedrock principle of the United States. But for Ali and other Muslim Americans working in U.S. defense jobs, such ideas are increasingly under assault in an election year when a major party nominee is calling for special ID cards and a database to register all Muslims, insulting the Muslim parents of a U.S. soldier killed in Iraq, and castigating Islam as incompatible with Western society.

My husband told our son theres always been people who were viewed as the negative part of society, Ali said during an interview at her office in the Pentagon. Its our turn now, and itll be OK.

The Defense Department and other federal agencies dont have an accurate breakdown of their civilian workforces based on employees religious beliefs. But as of June, almost 4,000 active-duty military service members voluntarily identified as Muslim. And at the State Department, CIA, and National Security Council, Muslim Americans hold senior and mid-level positions  although many of them declined to comment for this report.

Those who did speak to Foreign Policy pointed to an irony: The public discourse in America surrounding Islam has never been more disparaging, but due to concerted efforts by the Defense Department to accommodate a diverse workforce, theres never been a better time to be a Muslim at the Pentagon.

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I cannot think of a single time at the Pentagon when I felt anything but completely supported by my leadership and peers, said Jasmine El-Gamal, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council who advised Carter and three previous Obama administration secretaries of defense on Middle East policy.

Carter said thats exactly the type of culture the Pentagon needs if its going to recruit civilians and military personnel who are versed in the languages and religions of the Middle East and South Asia  where America fights its wars.

Tolerance isnt just a virtue for us; its a practical necessity, Carter told FP.

During the Obama administration, that has meant scrubbing military training materials found to have anti-Islamic content, cracking down on service members who use demeaning cultural epithets, and punishing discriminatory hazing practices. A particularly embarrassing example of the latter surfaced this week when the Washington Post reported that a Marine drill instructor was accused of ordering a Muslim recruit into an industrial clothes dryer, turning it on, and calling him a terrorist.

Groups that monitor anti-Islamic discrimination, and that are often highly critical of U.S. policies, say the Defense Department has vastly improved the way it treats Muslims  and that instances of discrimination have become increasingly rare.

The military has made great strides and become one of the most racially and religiously diverse institutions in the U.S., said Robert McCaw, the government affairs director at the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

Although he said bigoted behavior continues to surface in the barracks, the Pentagon has cleaned up the anti-Islamic content in military training materials and allowed cadets to wear turbans in the ROTC program. Were encouraged by these continued positive changes, he said.

The growing presence of Muslims at the Pentagon was on display at the Defense Departments annual iftar dinner to celebrate the holy Islamic month of Ramadan. In July, about 200 Muslims and guests from the department and other branches of government attended the event, including Gold Star mother Elsheba Khan, Korean War veteran Ghayth Nur Kashif, and World War II veteran Sheikh Nazeem Abdul Karriem. Air Force Lt. Col. Jawad Farooq narrated the celebration.

It was incredible to see all these people of diverse backgrounds, said Ali, who also attended the event.

But amid this spirit of inclusiveness inside the Defense Department, many American Muslim communities remain skeptical of a Pentagon still associated with the excesses of the war on terrorism. That has put some American Muslims serving in the Defense Department in a difficult position, especially amid increasingly anti-Islamic campaign rhetoric this year.

Ali, whose parents lived in India and Pakistan before moving to the United States, said shes had a number of arguments with her large extended family back in Detroit about the U.S. government.

Usually I just end up keeping my mouth shut, because unfortunately some of my family, if theyve been affected by something, theyre not going to [accept my] argument, she said.

Before her current position as the White House liaison to the Defense Department, Ali worked as a subcommittee staff director on the House Intelligence Committee, focusing on terrorism and human intelligence. Born in Karachi, Pakistan, she became a naturalized citizen at the age of 4 in Buffalo, New York.

Her father immigrated to the United States in the 1960s for a Ph.D. in biology while her mother, a biochemist, followed soon after.

Growing up in the Detroit area, Alis parents made her take Urdu lessons and go to Sunday school. At the time I hated it, but now Im really grateful because Im fluent in reading and writing Urdu and Arabic, she said.

Working in the national security bureaucracy, Ali said her religion rarely comes up in conversation. But when it pertains to her work, she tries to offer a perspective her colleagues might not have. She recalled a classified briefing during her early years on the Intelligence Committee when an official briefed lawmakers on an individual suspected of nefarious activity because he prayed five times a day.

I just turned to the chairman of the committee and said, My dad prays five times, and hes the most patriotic American youll ever meet.'

That was a different time, and things have evolved a lot since then, she said.

Gamal, who served as the country director for Iraq, Lebanon, and Syria while at the Pentagon, said the Iraq War and the chaos that followed the U.S.-led invasion in 2003 remains a sore spot in her family, especially those living in Egypt.

I try to explain my experience working at the Pentagon and how we have a massive humanitarian assistance component, she said. I talk about seeing firsthand our mobilization during the Ebola crisis, the typhoon in Thailand, etc.

I also tell stories about the individuals I work with, how they are hardworking and want to do good and often are trying to genuinely make a positive difference, Gamal added. Its not just a 9-to-5 job for a paycheck for many of us.

But Gamal said defending the U.S. government can be challenging when her fellow Muslims see Trump proclaim that Islam hates us and that Muslim Americans know about terrorists but dont speak out.

Trumps rhetoric on Islam has been conflicting and confusing at best. Last year, when asked by CNN whether Muslims pose a threat to the United States, Trump called the religions followers great people and said, I love the Muslims. Asked whether he would consider putting a Muslim in his cabinet, he said, Absolutely, adding, No problem with that.

His campaign spokeswoman, Hope Hicks, declined to elaborate in more detail for this story.

But the vitriol has taken its toll and spurred suspicions, among at least some of the defense experts who are in a uniquely valuable position to advise the government on issues in the Muslim world. Gamal, for example, said it would be very challenging for her to accept a job in a potential Trump administration in any capacity.

As a civil servant, I have thought about that a lot, she said. I very much believe in working to fix things from the inside but only if the system allows you to do so.

Trumps claim last November that thousands of Muslims in New Jersey cheered the destruction of the World Trade Center on 9/11  which he has been unable to substantiate  still stings Gamal.

I would only work for him if he took back every damaging thing he has said about Muslims to date, to include correcting his statement that people in New Jersey were celebrating by the thousands after 9/11, she said.

Perhaps Trumps most infamous clash with the American Muslim community came in July after Khizr Khan, the father of an Army captain killed while serving in Iraq, questioned what the Republican front-runner had ever sacrificed for his country.

Holding up a pocket Constitution during a prime-time speech at the Democratic National Convention, Khan offered to lend it to Trump. You have sacrificed nothing and no one, he said.

Trump shot back in an interview with ABC News, saying his business successes amounted to sacrifices. I think Ive made a lot of sacrifices, he said. I work very, very hard.

He also targeted Ghazala Khan, Khizrs wife, who stood next to him during his speech without addressing the crowd. Trump implied that she was not allowed to speak because of her religion.

She had nothing to say, Trump told ABC News. Maybe she wasnt allowed to have anything to say. You tell me.

In subsequent interviews, Ghazala Khan said she was invited to speak but declined because she was too upset to talk.

Back at the Pentagon, Ali demurred from discussing the incident that for days afterward dominated the political campaign.

But what I will say, Ali said, is that all Gold Star families are revered and appreciated, and their sacrifice cannot be talked about in any words.

Its beyond the pale, she added.

The wall-to-wall TV coverage of the 2016 campaign has not been lost on Alis son, who often comes home from school with questions about what Trump is saying. Her message to him is to take it in stride and that the ongoing angst the Trump movement has directed toward Muslim and Arab Americans in the United States eventually will pass.

My husband and I really try to make him focus on being a Muslim and prayers, she said. This is going to go away.

Photo credit: USAF/Getty Images
By Wa Lone YANGON (Reuters) - A Myanmar military court has jailed seven soldiers for five years each with hard labor for murdering five ethnic minority villagers in June, state media said on Friday, in a rare prosecution of military personnel. The seven, including four officers, will serve their time in civilian prisons, said a report from a court martial in northeastern Myanmar. Soldiers have often been accused of serious human rights abuses in Myanmar's long-running wars with ethnic armed groups, but the allegations are rarely acknowledged, let alone heard in court. Sai Kaung Kham, an activist who helped residents of northern Shan state's Mong Yaw village demand justice for the June killing of their family members, said he was surprised the military had taken action at all. The fact they have been sentenced to imprisonment is better than nothing," he said. Myanmar's army ran the country for almost five decades before initiating a transition to civilian rule that saw Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi take power in April. Military leaders, keen to build military-to-military ties with Western armies, have made efforts to present the still-powerful army as a responsible partner in country's transition. After the killings in Mong Yaw, one of the military's highest-ranking officers held an unprecedented news conference in July to say that soldiers were responsible for the deaths of five residents. Lieutenant General Mya Tun Oo said at time the military would support the victims' families. [L4N1A63AJ] Witnesses have told Reuters that soldiers entered Mong Yaw - populated mainly by members of the Shan and Palaung ethnic groups - on June 25 and rounded up dozens of men they suspected of aiding the Ta'ang National Liberation Army, a Palaung militia that has been fighting government forces in the area for several years. Five badly beaten corpses were later pulled from shallow graves and identified as missing villagers. The military has not accepted responsibility for the deaths of two other men killed fleeing the village on a motorcycle. Suu Kyi urged U.S. businesses to invest in Myanmar on Thursday as a way to advance its democratic transition, a day after U.S. President Barack Obama pledged to lift long-standing sanctions. (Additional reporting by Aung Hla Tun; Writing by Simon Lewis; Editing by Nick Macfie)
Seven Myanmar soldiers have been sentenced to jail for killing villagers during an interrogation, the military said, a rare ruling in the former junta-run country where the army has long operated with impunity.

The army controlled Myanmar for half a century in a brutal reign rife with rights abuses, including allegations of torture, rape and recruiting child soldiers.

Although it has loosened its grip since ceding power to a quasi-civilian government in 2011, the army seldom admits to misconduct among its troops.

The sentencing handed out by a military court on Thursday suggests the Tatmadaw, as it is known, is looking to revamp its image as the country hurtles toward democracy and opens up to the West.

"Seven Myanmar army soldiers are sentenced to five years for killing local people in Mong Yaw village in Lashio township, Shan State," the military said in statement on Facebook.

"They all have to be sentenced to five years with hard labour in country side prison," it added.

The five villagers were killed in June after skirmishes between ethnic rebels and soldiers around Mong Yaw in northeastern Shan State -- one of many regions riven by decades-long insurgencies.

Locals accused the officers of murder after their bodies were found buried in shallow graves several days later.

The military said that four of the jailed were officers.

The country's new civilian leader, democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi, has made ending the ethnic warfare a top priority since her party took power in March following landmark polls.

But bringing peace to the country's borderlands will ultimately depend on the military, a powerful player that still controls key government bodies.

On Wednesday, US President Barack Obama vowed to lift decades-old sanctions, imposed when the former military junta was in power, during a visit by Suu Kyi to the White House.

While details are still unclear, the move will likely scrap the blacklist that bars Americans from doing business with more than 100 military leaders, their companies and so-called cronies.

Story continues

Activists have condemned the move however, saying it removes a key lever for applying pressure on the army.

Last year the deaths of two ethnic Kachin teachers triggered public outrage, as activists accused soldiers of raping and murdering the pair in the village where they worked in Shan State.

No one has yet been charged with the killings.
By Newzstreet Media Desk

Leh, (Ladakh), Sept. 15: With the Naropa Festival in full swing, monasteries in Ladakh are swarming with devotees and tourists alike and resonating with prayers, music and dance. But the main activity of the festival is centred in and around Hemis Gompa , the largest monastery of its kind. It belongs to the Drukpa Kagyu order and is a living hub of Tibetan Buddhism.

Every great town or region anywhere has its own character and flavour. And in Ladakh, Buddhist monasteries make for a unique spiritual experience. For Ladakhis, who are predominantly of Tibetan descent, its the monasteries which set the pattern of their daily life, culture and celebrations. Indeed, Ladakh is known as the land of lamas.

Hemis Monastery has a special place in the hearts of Buddhists, especially those belonging to the Drukpa Kagyu order. Nothing in the region can match its size, architectural beauty and calming effect on the mind. Rising on the western bank of the Indus River on the Leh-Manali Highway, its 50 km from Leh town.

The King of Ladakh, Singey Namgail, who was himself an architect, designed the shrine. He is said to have invited a Buddhist monk, the first reincarnation of Stagsang Raspa Nawang Gyatso, in 1620 to establish the monastery.

The central courtyard of the gompa is 60 metres long and 18 metres wide. Its in this courtyard where dances take place during festivals and other religious occasions. The monastery also has some mesmerising wall paintings of Sakyamuni (the historical Buddha), other Buddha figures and paintings of Tantric deities. So Ladakh provides a visual feast wherever a visitor steps out to explore.
From Harper's BAZAAR

Welcome to Girl Rising, our new recurring interview series featuring the female newcomers on the verge of It-girl stardom. This week, Stranger Things' Natalie Dyer on love triangles and life in the Upside Down:

There was a moment, roughly three-and-a-half episodes into my three-day binge of Stranger Things, when I realized I had severely underestimated Natalia Dyer's Nancy Wheeler. Introduced through nerdy Dustin Henderson's eyes as the unattainable best-friend's-older-sister archetype, Nancy seemed sweet-if uninteresting-at first. She makes out with her boyfriend in the school bathroom before turning down a date invite to study; she calls her brother a douchebag when he brings up said boyfriend at dinner.

It isn't until two episodes later-after her best friend (RIP Barb) goes missing at a party where Nancy's busy losing her virginity-that a worried Nancy stops playing nice and starts looking for answers. The classic "good girl" subverts expectations by abandoning her boyfriend and his slut-shaming friends, joining forces with the high school outcast and morphing into a gun-toting, bat-swinging bad-ass monster hunter. When I ask Dyer about the challenges of bringing that transformation to life, she demurs: "Nancy's level of engagement in monster-hunting activities, swinging a bat and swinging a gun, are things I also never do, so as she was starting to do them, so was I," the 19-year-old actress points out. "That's kind of organic." Below, Dyer opens up the actual challenges of filming Stranger Things (the Upside Down presented its own difficulties, of course), Nancy's '80s wardrobe and her personal thoughts on Steve vs. Jonathan.

Harper's BAZAAR: How did you get the role of Nancy? What was the audition process like?

Natalia Dyer: The audition process was a fairly normal, fairly standard audition. I'm living in New York, and went in for the first audition and callbacks as well. It was mysterious. It was one of those things where you get sides [i.e. scenes] and you don't really get the script at first. You don't entirely know what's going on, so you just go in there to make your best guess as to what they're looking for. I do remember feeling not so good about either audition, coming out of them.

Story continues

HB: Once you landed the role, how far in advance did you understand Nancy's trajectory? Did you know where she was going in the series?

ND: They doled out scripts to us as we were filming. We all got together and read them together. It was really fun to basically read this book together and have this mystery, and get to think about how fun it was going to be, and what we got to do. I guess at first I got the very surface-level Nancy, the perfectionist, the good girl. Then as more was given to us, and as the Duffers actually finished writing, I was very stoked to see where she got to go. It was kind of unfolding to us, much like watching the series.

Photo credit: Netflix

HB: It's great that you were together, because then you get to see how everyone is reacting to the fate of their own characters.

ND: Oh, yeah. Five and six especially were really fun to read with everybody. The scripts for the show are written so well that they almost stand alone. You can read them like a book.

HB: What was the hardest scene for you to film?

ND: The tree scene, for sure. It was a big night. They had this tree out in the middle of this forest-it was very practical, actually. I was covered in this nether goo and they kept putting it back on me take after take, just slathering me with it. I had to crawl in the tree and then get pulled out of the tree. You know, you look back and you're sitting there like, "What am I doing? I'm out here in the middle of a forest covered in goo, climbing into a tree." There are moments where you're like, "Hm, never thought I'd be doing this." But it all pays off.

HB: Did you find the concept of the show scary at all?

ND: To some extent I was almost surprised. I think in filming it I got so wrapped with the character relationships and the heart of the show that the scary elements weren't at the forefront. Then watching it I realized it's scarier than I thought it would be. I never thought it was going to be like Saw, or like a crazy horror film, but it definitely does have a nice thriller element. There's some moments that are like, "Ugh!" For me, honestly, Stranger Things is about the level of thriller I want in my life. Beyond that it's a bit much.

"What am I doing? I'm out here in the middle of a forest covered in goo, climbing into a tree."

HB: The only scene that got me bad was when Eleven found Barb dead. I was horrified.

ND: Yeah, that was nasty! I hadn't seen it until it came out. It was crazy.

HB: What was it like to film the scenes in the Upside Down?

ND: A lot of the stuff was very practical effects. Our art department really went to town on this forest in Georgia, just turned it into this crazy, creepy forest with lighting and these particles of who-knows-what floating around. It was really eerie-and fun-to get to run around. You do have this monster, like a live man in a monster costume, running around with you in this creepy forest. It's a pleasure to get to work in that kind of an environment instead of just having to do it all in your head [with a green screen].

Photo credit: Netflix

HB: With this being your biggest role to date, did anything surprise you about the making of the show?

ND: There's been a lot of things. It was my first time on a studio lot, so that was crazy. Honestly, the art department really blew my mind. The sets they created in and out of the studio were amazing. I think the thing that really impressed me the most was how nice and easy to work with everybody was. No big egos anywhere. That's a really nice thing to find coming into that environment for the first time. Everyone was so cool. I made some great, genuine friends on this set, and that's always end goal.

HB: Who were you closest to on set?

ND: Definitely the teens, the love triangle. We spent a lot of time together off-set as well. None of us are from Atlanta or really knew Atlanta, so we explored together and got really close. Then, believe it or not, when Tommy [Chester Rushing] and Carol [Chelsea Talmadge] were in town we would chill with them, and Barb when she could, Shannon [Purser] came around. It's funny, I think in general, the generations you see on the show kind of correlated in real life.

HB: Were you surprised that Nancy chose Steve?

ND: [Laughs] Yeah! At first it didn't seem like the obvious choice. You know, I respect that, but you don't want to do the opposite just to do the opposite. The [Duffer] brothers talked to us about it and it really just makes the most sense, if you think about it. I know everyone is really shipping Nancy and Jon-Jancy, I guess, is the word-but the whole thing takes place over a couple days. For Nancy to end up with somebody that she just met, even though she has a boyfriend who really does care about her, just didn't quite make sense. I think it ended the most logically, for sure.

Photo credit: Giphy

HB: Are you personally Team Steve or Team Jonathan?

ND: [Laughs] I don't know! They're both so dreamy. You know, it's hard to say, because it'd be very different directions for Nancy. They'd be very different boys for her, very different relationships. It's hard to say. I'm excited to find out where this goes. If she ends up with no one, that's fine, too. Nancy's a strong girl.

HB: Do you have a favorite memory from filming?

ND: We had so many beautiful nights, but one of the best nights was filming the pool scene. It's just the teens and it was an overnight shoot playing around in this pool in this crazy, beautiful house in this old neighborhood. We shot until morning and you have great times when you're shooting stuff like that on set and you get everyone together. That and the monster stuff was really fun. And being in the school was amazing just because again, the art department did a wonderful job of putting this school together with all of these impeccably-dressed extras. It was really like a time warp. You walk on set and you're like, "I am in the '80s. This is the '80s right now, right here."

You walk on set and you're like, "I am in the '80s."

HB: What did you think of Nancy's wardrobe?

ND: I loved it so much! [Laughs] I really don't dress at all like Nancy in real life but it was really fun to play with. The thing about it is, she's kind of an understated side of '80s. She's not like, crazy colors and Farrah Fawcett hair and leg warmers. It's a simpler side, which I appreciate. What I came to understand is there is a big difference between late '80s and early '80s, and because we're set in 1983, 1984, that's still a borderline '70s kind of vibe, which I actually dig a lot. I think I was picturing off-the-shoulder Jane Fonda '80s. Crazy hair '80s. I think I'm glad that we're not quite there yet.

Photo credit: Getty

HB: What was it like working with Winona Ryder?

ND: It was wonderful. She's such a lovely lady and has a lot of grace and a lot of talent. Also, she can be goofy. She can joke around with the best of them. It's really humbling, but also really fun to work with her and get to watch her work.

HB: Do you see any part of yourself in Nancy? Could you relate to her at all?

ND: Yeah, especially in high school, thinking back. Trying to find your social group and figuring out who your real friends are. I think everybody can relate to that. And that determination, a little bit of good girl-I didn't do anything crazy. So far Nancy has me beat on that. No monster hunting for me in high school.

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Comedy writer-producer Suzanne Martin is reteaming with Sean Hayes and Todd Milliners Hazy Mills for another comedy series project. The single-camera half-hour has been set at NBC. Universal TV, where Hazy Mills is based, is the studio.

Written by Martin, the untitled comedy centers on a sweet, funny but lonely funeral director who decides to have a one-night stand on his birthday with his complete opposite and winds up with a big, instant, messy family. It follows the lives and loves of this new family and the families they are connected to as well as the unusual business that connects them daily with matters of life and death.

Martins previous collaborations with Hazy Mills have yielded three series  all created by Martin  Hot in Cleveland and spinoff The Soul Man on TV Land and Crowded on NBC.

At NBC, Hazy Mills has drama series Grimm, which is heading into its sixth and final season, and game show Hollywood Game Night.

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Upper Karnali hydel project: IBN yet to decide on extension of financial closure deadline

The deadline to arrange funds for building the 900MW Upper Karnali Hydroelectric Project (PKHP) will expire on Sunday, but the concerned government body, which is overseeing the projects implementation, is still undecided as to whether the time limit should be extended as demanded by the project developer.




Nick Gordon has been found "legally responsible" in his girlfriend Bobbi Kristina Brown's July 2015 death, despite an ongoing criminal investigation into the January incident which initially left her unresponsive  a decision not too uncommon, an expert tells PEOPLE.



Gordon failed to appear twice in an Atlanta, Georgia, court in response to the wrongful death lawsuit filed by 22-year-old Brown's estate last year, Fulton County Superior Court Judge T. Jackson Bedford said. Thus, anything alleged by the plaintiff is admitted through omission, the judge said.



Now, the judge will determine how much Gordon must pay in damages to Brown's estate, her attorney R. David Ware said in a press conference filmed by 11 Alive outside of court.



"In court today, we finally finished a long journey for justice for Bobbi Kristina Brown," Ware said. "The court agrees with us, by striking Mr. Gordon's answer that he is legally responsible for her death. The only thing left to prove is the value of her life. We intend to do that."



Gordon has never been criminally charged in Brown's death, yet a source in the Fulton County District Attorney's office told PEOPLE that the criminal investigation is "still ongoing."



"This won't change anything in the criminal case. Generally speaking, it tends to be the other way around: a criminal conviction is used in a civil case," the source explained. "Obviously, if he had taken the stand in a civil case, we could have used what he said. But that's not what happened here. The case is still ongoing, but there are no new updates at this time."





How Nick Gordon Being Ruled 'Legally Responsible' for Bobbi Kristina Brown's Death Is Like the O.J. Simpson Civil Suit| Crime & Courts, Death, True Crime, Crime, Bobbi Kristina Brown





But how can someone be found civilly but not criminally responsible in a case?



Jeffrey Backman, shareholder and complex class action defense attorney at Florida's Greenspoon Marder, explains to PEOPLE, "In terms of the difference between civil and criminal, the best example is O.J Simpson."



"O.J. was found not guilty [in the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman] because... in the criminal trial, the jury did not think that the state met its burden of proof and that there was not proof beyond a reasonable doubt that he committed those crimes," Backman explains. "In a civil trial, the standard is really one that they call a 'preponderance of the evidence.' Which, in layman's terms, is nothing more than saying, 'It's more likely than not that he did it.' "



Backman adds, "So you can see the disparate level of proof that's required and the amount of convincing that would be needed to get a jury to find you civilly liable, but not criminally liable."





Story continues

How Nick Gordon Being Ruled 'Legally Responsible' for Bobbi Kristina Brown's Death Is Like the O.J. Simpson Civil Suit| Crime & Courts, Death, True Crime, Crime, Bobbi Kristina Brown





In regard to the judge making a decision despite Gordon's absence, Backman explains, "It's likely that the court entered a default against him, which is what happens in a civil case if you don't appear."



"So if you get sued or someone files a wrongful death complaint against you, if you don't show up or respond to that complaint within  in most cases it's 20 or 21 days, depending on the court that you're in  the court can enter what's called a default," he says, "meaning the claims that are made in a complaint are deemed to be true against you."



The allegations are therefore considered to be true, Backman says. The plaintiff has the opportunity to contest the lawsuit or move to set aside the default, but if there is still no response, a further hearing will be conducted to determine whether or not an actual judgement should be entered.



"It's easier to convince somebody in a civil courtroom that it's more likely than not that person A committed a crime as opposed to proving beyond a reasonable doubt," Backman says, again addressing the difference between civil versus criminal cases. "I don't think it's unusual for a wrongful death suit to be brought prior to, or even contemporaneously with, the loss of a criminal case."





Related Video: Nick Gordon Breaks Down During Dr. Phil Intervention

Dr. Phil Intervention" data-ad-channel="peoplenow" data-ad-subchannel="peoplenownews" data-auto-play="no">



Gordon has long maintained that he wasn't involved in Brown's death, but her father Bobby Brown has adamantly suggested the opposite.



He said during a recent 20/20 interview, "The same thing that happened to my daughter is what happened to [her mom Whitney Houston]."
Nick Gordon was found liable for the wrongful death of Bobbi Kristina Brown on Friday, after being a no-show at the hearing on the civil lawsuit filed against him by the estate, ET has confirmed.

In August 2015, Brown's conservator, Bedelia Hargrove, filed a $10 million wrongful death civil suit, alleging that Gordon physically abused and stole thousands of dollars from her. In an amendment to that suit, it is alleged that Gordon gave Brown a "toxic cocktail, rendering her unconscious and then put her face down in a tub of cold water causing her to suffer brain damage."

Brown was found face down in a bathtub in her Georgia home on Jan. 31, 2015. After spending nearly six months in a coma, she died in hospice care last July 26 at the age of 22.

WATCH: How Bobby Brown Thinks Bobbi Kristina's Death Could Have Been Avoided

"Gordon did not appear. The judge struck his answer and entered default judgment against him," Craig Terrett, the attorney representing Bobbi Kristina's father, Bobby Brown, told ET on Friday. "The only issue now is damages, which will likely be tried before a jury, possibly in November."

When asked if counsel appeared on behalf of Gordon on Friday, Terrett said, "No one appeared on behalf of Mr. Gordon. He is currently unrepresented as far as we know."

Hargrove's attorney, David Ware, spoke out about the judgment in a statement to ET.

"In August 2015, Bedelia C Hargrove, Administrator of the Estate of Bobbi Kristina Brown, began the arduous, but necessary, process of establishing that Nicholas Gordon was legally responsible for Bobbi Kristina's injuries and death," the statement reads. "Today, the court agreed with her in her pursuit of justice for Bobbi Kristina. We look forward to having a Fulton County jury determine how much Mr. Gordon will have to pay. Once that is established, Ms. Hargrove will approach collection of the judgment with concomitant zeal and fervor."

Story continues

No criminal charges have been filed against Gordon. In response to the judgment, Fulton County District Attorney Paul L. Howard, Jr. issued a statement to ET.

"As we have stated on numerous occasions and we will repeat again today, this case remains under active investigation by our Office," Howard said. "Our investigation will encompass all relevant facts and circumstances, including the body and content of the civil action holding Nick Gordon civilly responsible for the death of Bobbi Kristina Brown."

Bobbi Kristina's aunt, Leolah Brown, also spoke outside of the court room in Fulton County, Georgia, on Friday. "It's been a long time. Bobbi Kristina has been dead for how long?" she told Atlanta's NBC affiliate WXIA-TV. "It's been a long time, hasn't it? ... He should have been arrested. I'm angry because I want to see some justice."

Gordon's lawyers released a statement last August regarding the lawsuit filed against their client, claiming it is both "slanderous and meritless."

"Nick has been heartbroken and destroyed over the loss of his love and it's shameful that such baseless allegations have been presented publicly," the statement reads. "Nick has engaged civil counsel and intends to defend the lawsuit vigorously and expose it for what it is: a fictitious assault against the person who loved Krissy most."

WATCH: Bobbi Kristina Brown: Where Things Stand One Year After Her Death

The Fulton County, Georgia, medical examiner listed Brown's official cause of death as pneumonia in March. Brown died from complications caused by her face being immersed in water, along with drug intoxication, the medical examiner said in a statement.

"The underlying cause of death is the condition which starts the downhill course of events leading to death and in this case is the immersion associated with drug intoxication," the statement read. "The pneumonia and encephalopathy [brain damage] are more immediate causes which resulted from the immersion and drug intoxication."

The toxicology report found marijuana, alcohol, "a cocaine-related substance," anti-anxiety medication, and morphine in her system.

Watch below:

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Lagos (AFP) - A Nigerian man whose pet dog shares the same name as Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday asked the court to dismiss criminal charges against him.

In a statement sent by his lawyer, the owner of 'Buhari' the dog Joachim Iroko said he had a "legal right" to name his pet whatever he wanted.

"The name is not exclusive to the president, Buhari can just be a name given to any living creature just for identity," Iroko's lawyer Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa told AFP.

Iroko appeared in court in Ota in the southwest state of Ogun in August after being charged with "conduct likely to cause breach of peace" after naming his dog Buhari, Adegboruwa said.

He was due back in court on Monday, September 19.

Police allege, however, that Iroko wrote the name Buhari on the sides of his dog to antagonise his neighbour, whose father's name is Buhari.

"The man was not arrested for naming the dog Buhari but the conduct surrounding the attitude or the actions of the man," Ogun state police spokesman Muyiwa Adejobi told AFP.

"The man has been having issues with one of his neighbours whose father's name is Buhari, it has nothing to do with the president."

Iroko denies the claims, with Adegboruwa saying that the animal was usually chained near his warehouse to deter thieves.

Adegboruwa says that the four-legged Buhari, a chocolate-brown coloured dog, has now gone missing.

"We are all looking for the dog," Adegboruwa said, "maybe it is with the police, we still don't know".

The lawyer said that he hoped that the government would drop the "frivolous" case.
When Donald Trump appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on Thursday, the show once again succeeded in getting a viral video moment: The host fussing with the Republican nominees hair.

But unlike Trumps previous lighthearted appearances on the show, Fallon also is getting a lot of blowback for keeping his appearance lighthearted and not grilling the Republican nominee.

In such a charged moment for the presidential campaign, Fallon had the opportunity to do somethinganythingthat could challenge the candidate, wrote David Sims of The Atlantic. He had hundreds of different issues he could have called Trump on. He decided to mess up his hair.

Critics were more biting on Twitter.

I don't fault Jimmy Fallon for not being a journalist. I do fault him for his willingness to serve as hell's court jester.  Mark Harris (@MarkHarrisNYC) September 16, 2016

Jimmy Fallon mussed the hair of a white nationalist suck-up.  Matt Zoller Seitz (@mattzollerseitz) September 16, 2016

It raises a question: Do late night talk show hosts, or daytime hosts, for that matter, have a responsibility to ask tough questions?

They are not journalists, but they are giving campaigns valuable exposure. In fact, its now a given that as part of their media schedule, candidates will turn to such soft-talk shows as a way to reach non-news audiences and boost their own likability.

Fallon, like other late-night hosts, has featured politicians and told political jokes. But unlike Stephen Colbert or Trevor Noah, he generally avoids the partisan thicket, just as Johnny Carson did in his day.

Fallon does not purport to be a probing interviewer. Rather, his show emphasizes comedy and laughs, and has been particularly successful in generating viral videos of celebrities and politicians that get wide traction the next day. Hillary Clinton, scheduled to appear on The Tonight Show on Monday, participated in a skit a year ago in which she spoke by phone to Fallon, playing Trump. It got more than 11 million views on YouTube.

Story continues

The difference between then and now is that the stakes are higher, with just seven weeks to the general election. Candidate appearances, wherever they are, are subject to much more scrutiny. Its as if the late night antics of a year ago are no longer just fun and games, but measured for their impact on the presidential race. Fallons critics pointed to the incongruity of yukking it up with Trump while not asking him about controversies about his foundation giving or birtherism.

Dont expect Jimmy Fallon to be Edward R. Murrow, says Robert Lichter, director of the Center for Media and Public Affairs at George Mason University. This is what Fallon does. He gives soft interviews to politicians, and they love it, whether its Barack Obama slow jamming the news or Donald Trump trying to sound presidential.

He adds, Theres a widespread feeling that Trump is getting away with murder on the campaign trail, and if only someone would expose him, his deluded supporters would drift away and the republic would be spared. So every public appearance he makes becomes a missed opportunity if the host doesnt go for the jugular. But that isnt the way politics works in this media environment.

Trump is also unlike any other recent candidate and, as much as he has been a source of late night humor, he also presents a challenge.

In an interview with CNNs Brian Lowry in June, Fallons predecessor Jay Leno suggested that Trump posed a different challenge than other politicians given his rhetoric.

How do you play fair? How do you do a pro-Donald Trump joke? You cant. At least with Bush or Clinton, you could go back and forth. But this.

Asked how hed treat Trump, Leno said, Im sure Id be polite. I couldnt see myself being overly gracious. I would try to nail him down and keep him from hitting all the stupid talking points. Its just uncomfortable to watch.

Daytime talk shows also have to reckon with the downside of featuring candidates. Trumps appearance on The Dr. Oz Show came with criticism that the soft-talk daytime show was giving him a platform to trumpet the release of his medical records. In the days before the interview, Mehmet Oz said that he wouldnt be engaging in a confrontational interview, and he ended up giving Trump his blessing that he was in fine health.

Likewise, there is bound to also be scrutiny when Tim Kaine, Hillary Clintons running mate, appears on The Ellen DeGeneres Show on Aug. 21. DeGeneres contributed $100,000 to the Hillary Victory Fund in April, according to the Federal Election Commission.

Should DeGeneres disclose her support next week? There are no legal requirements, and campaign finance watchers are mixed when it comes to the ethics of the question.

Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics, said via email that even though reporters would need disclose donations or gifts, theres no real ethical obligation for an entertainer like DeGeneres. I guess an argument could be made, and it certainly would be ideal from the standpoint of promoting transparency wherever politics comes into play. However, it seems pretty weak since she isnt generally viewed as someone who holds herself out to be either a neutral observer or a political expert.

Meredith McGehee, policy director of the campaign legal center, said that there is no legal obligation for [DeGeneres] to disclose. That being said, she should.

When DeGeneres interviewed Clinton in May, her enthusiasm for the Democratic candidate was pretty apparent. A watcher would probably not come away thinking DeGeneres had an affinity for Trump. She has said that he would be welcome to come on the show, which he has not done since announcing his candidacy. A spokeswoman for the show did not return requests for comment.

Other hosts have tried to avoid the situation altogether. After she endorsed Barack Obamas 2008 presidential campaign, Oprah Winfrey decided not to use my show as a platform for any of the candidates, as she wrote back then. In previous cycles, she had invited the presidential candidates to appear on the show, and they eagerly accepted.

Lichter, who co-authored Politics is a Joke! How TV Comedians Are Remaking Political Life, suggests that there is another way of looking at talk shows penchant for soft interviews.

He notes that hosts like John Oliver and Colbert have tried using humor to go after Trump, to no obvious effect.

Maybe its not such a bad thing to permit a lighter moment in the midst of this dark presidential campaign.

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kimmie

WASHINGTON, D.C.  In the wake of North Korea's latest nuclear test, a panel of experts discussed the possible implications of a nuclear weapons "no-first-use" policy on global security at the Heritage Foundation on Thursday.

A "no-first-use" policy calls for a country to not use nuclear weapons first and only in response to an attack.

Last week, Pyongyang carried out its largest nuclear test, which was the second one this year and fifth since 2006. In response, experts highlighted the importance of deploying America's Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system despite upsetting near-peers like Russia and China.

"THAAD is a reaction. It is a defensive reaction against the North Koreans' audacious attitude towards the South and towards Japan by testing ballistic missiles and its nuclear weapons test," Franklin Miller, former Senior Director for Defense Policy and Arms Control on the National Security Council, told Business Insider.

"The whole point of THAAD is to devalue the North Korean missile threat to its neighbors," Miller added.

North Korea has the dishonorable distinction of being the only country to test nuclear weapons in this century.

"The North Korean problem is a very concerning one. If you look at the trend lines they are all in the wrong direction," Matthew Kroenig, Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council's Brent Scowcroft Center on International Security, told Business Insider.

"They're producing more nuclear material  best estimates are now that they may have enough material for up to 21 nuclear warheads and the capability to produce about 6 new warheads a year."

"So for a long time we kind of assumed that they would have a couple of nuclear weapons, what's the big deal? Well now they're on their way to an arsenal of perhaps dozens," Kroenig said.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is pictured during a test-fire of strategic submarine-launched ballistic missile in this undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in Pyongyang August 25, 2016. REUTERS/KCNA

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Thomas Karako, director of the Missile Defense Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, echoed similar thoughts.

"North Korea appears to be on the cusp of significant advances towards longer-range missiles, mobile and potentially sea-launched missiles," Karako told Business Insider in a prior interview.

"So the missile threat isn't going down  it's going up. And I think you're going to see increased missile-defense activities from the United States, Japan, and South Korea," he said.

Later this weekend, US Secretary of State John Kerry will meet with his Japanese and South Korean counterparts in New York to discuss responses to North Korea's latest nuclear test.

NOW WATCH: Meet THAAD: Americas answer to North Korean threats





More From Business Insider


Gaithersburg, MD-based biotech company, Novavax, Inc.s NVAX shares plunged 82% in the pre-market trading after the company announced disappointing top-line data from a couple of studies on its experimental respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) F-protein recombinant nanoparticle vaccine candidate (RSV F Vaccine) in older adults.

Phase III Study Fails to Hit Efficacy Goals

The randomized, observer-blinded, placebo-controlled phase III Resolve study on RSV F Vaccine that was conducted in 11,856 older adults aged 60 years and above, failed to meet the pre-specified primary or the secondary efficacy objectives. Also, the vaccine candidate failed to show efficacy. However, it was found to be well tolerated.

We note that the primary objective of the study was to establish efficacy in the prevention of moderate-severe RSV-associated lower respiratory tract disease, as defined by the presence of multiple lower respiratory tract symptoms. The attack rate for the phase III primary objective was about 25% of that observed in the phase II study.

Novavax said that initial analyses and review of the key aspects of the study do not raise concerns related to the execution of the study and data collection, among other things. The company expects preliminary immunogenicity data over the upcoming weeks and expects to analyze the study data in further detail.

Phase II Study Also Shows Lack of Efficacy

Novavax also reported top-line data from the phase II rollover study on RSV F Vaccine in older adults. The study enrolled 1,329 older adults from the previous phase II study. The primary objectives of the study evaluated safety and serum anti-F IgG antibody concentrations in response to immunization with the RSV F Vaccine.

Data revealed that this study showed immunogenicity in all active vaccine recipients, and there was a 6-fold increase in anti-F IgG in the placebo-vaccine arm, which was found to be consistent with the phase II efficacy study. However, the low attack rates and the absence of efficacy of a single immunization observed in this study were also seen in the Resolve study.

Story continues

The company anticipates improved vaccine efficacy from the second year of dosing. Complete evaluation of immune responses will help further analyze these data. Novavax expects to provide a detailed update at the companys investor and analyst meeting scheduled for next month.

Target Market

Per the companys press release, the spread of RSV, which occurs annually, has an incidence rate of 2.5 million infections per year in the U.S. This respiratory infectious disease is increasingly being accepted as a significant cause of morbidity and mortality in the population of 64 million older adults. Moreover, RSV is accountable for nearly 207,000 hospitalizations and 16,000 deaths among adults older than 65 each year.

Given that there are no vaccines available to prevent RSV, there exists significant unmet need for treatments options as well as healthcare costs associated with the treatment for this disease.

NOVAVAX INC Price

NOVAVAX INC Price | NOVAVAX INC Quote

Considering that RSV F Vaccine is a key candidate for Novavax, results from these studies fail to impress. On the second-quarter 2016 conference call, the company had noted that results from Resolve and rollover would support discussions with regulatory agencies. The company had even said that positive Resolve study results would allow the company to file for FDA approval in 2017.

Novavax has projected RSV F Vaccine to generate peak revenues of $6$8 billion worldwide, subject to approval.

In addition to older adults, the company is evaluating RSV F Vaccine for two other susceptible target populations  infants via maternal immunization and children six months to five years of age (pediatrics).

With no approved product in the company's portfolio at the moment, and RSV F Vaccine being its most advanced pipeline candidate, investor focus is expected to remain on updates pertaining to its development.

Novavax is a Zacks Rank #4 (Sell) stock. Some better-ranked stocks in the health care sector include ANI Pharmaceuticals, Inc. ANIP, Anika Therapeutics Inc. ANIK and Geron Corporation GERN. All the three stocks carry a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

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By Nikolaj Skydsgaard COPENHAGEN (Reuters) - Novo Nordisk's experimental injectable diabetes drug semaglutide reduced cardiovascular risk by 26 percent, according to results released on Friday, paving the way for a new and bigger study on the drug's benefits. Semaglutide is the third diabetes drug to show such heart benefits, after Novo's Victoza injectable and Eli Lilly and Boehringer Ingelheim's Jardiance pill. Novo is already planning a longer study of semaglutide similar to Leader, specifically aimed toward getting a label-claim, Novo's chief science officer Mads Krogsgaard told Reuters, referring to Novo's 9,000 patient Victoza study, which lasted five years. "The idea is to launch the study the moment semaglutide gets approved," Krogsgaard said. Semaglutide, which has proved highly effective in reducing glucose levels in patients with type II diabetes, is viewed as a pivotal product for Novo, which competes in the GLP-1 market against several rivals including Eli Lilly's Trulicity. "This is a molecule which Novo will examine from every possible angle, also in regards to new disease areas such as liver complications and obesity," Krogsgaard told Reuters. Novo's so-called SUSTAIN 6 study, presented on Friday, showed that semaglutide significantly reduced the risk of heart complications in patients. Because about half of the deaths in people with diabetes are caused by heart disease, reducing the risk such as heart attacks and strokes is seen as essential. Novo announced in April that the SUSTAIN 6 trial had significantly cut the risk of major adverse cardiovascular events, but the scale of the benefit was only disclosed this week at a meeting of diabetes experts in Munich. The study presented of Friday also found that semaglutide caused an "unexpected higher rate" of retinopathy complications, such as blindness. "But depending on the cause, a large study might "wash away" this effect and maybe even show an improvement", Krogsgaard said. Semaglutide, which is designed to be given once a week, belongs to a class of medicines known as GLP-1 analogues that increase the body's insulin production when blood sugar levels are raised. The excessive blood sugar levels that come with diabetes can cause long-term damage to blood vessels, increasing the risk of heart attack, heart failure or stroke. Novo intends to file for regulatory approval of semaglutide in the United States and Europe in the final quarter of 2016. Consensus analyst forecasts suggest annual sales could reach $2.2 billion in 2022. Jefferies predicted an approval decision on semaglutide in the second half of 2017. Novo Nordisk, which in September presented a new CEO to take over by the beginning of next year, is facing headwinds in the United States, its biggest market, due to tough competition and pricing pressure. "We expect investor confidence to rise and over time switch away from the current risks of insulin pricing," Deutsche Bank wrote in a note to clients, predicting instead a new focus on the expansion of the GLP-1 market. "Semaglutide is one of the drugs which is going to drive growth for Novo Nordisk in the coming years - their entire GLP-1 business in fact," said Sydbank analyst Soren Lontoft. The Danish company is also working on an oral version of semaglutide, which would be the first GLP-1 to be given as a pill rather than an injection. Shares in Novo Nordisk were up 1.9 percent at 310.50 crowns by 0730 GMT. (Editing by Greg Mahlich and Jason Neely)
By Roberta Rampton WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Ohio's Republican governor, John Kasich, took over the White House briefing lectern on Friday to praise the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership, an unusual move that shows how hard President Barack Obama will push for the trade deal's approval. Obama, a Democrat who is leaving office in four months, met with the governor, who fell short in his bid to be the Republican presidential candidate, in the White House Oval Office to discuss strategies for overcoming domestic political angst over the TPP. The unlikely partnership comes as the White House makes a final full-court push to persuade Republican congressional leaders to approve the deal in a "lame duck" session after the Nov. 8 election. Both Republican and Democratic candidates have pilloried the TPP. "We cannot get to the point in America that because a Democrat wants something, you can't agree with them," Kasich said in an impassioned plea to Republican lawmakers to back the deal, which is a key part of Obama's foreign policy legacy. Kasich said the deal is vital for the U.S. economy and also to counter China and Russia, and said business leaders need to apply pressure on lawmakers to approve it. "Right now, China is pushing hard to create their own trade agreement," Obama told reporters in the Oval Office ahead of the meeting, saying U.S. businesses were at risk of being "cut out" of Asia, the world's fastest-growing market. "I promise you that China's not going to be setting up a bunch of rules that are going to be to the advantage of American companies and American businesses," Obama said. Other business and political leaders also attended the meeting, including former Republican Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, International Business Machines Corp Chief Executive Officer Virginia Rometty and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Republicans traditionally have backed free trade deals, but the party's presidential candidate, Donald Trump, has blamed the agreements for U.S. job losses and threatened to tear them up should he win. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has said the TPP would not get a Senate vote this year, and House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan has said he does not see enough votes for it to pass. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has also opposed the deal, which is unpopular with labor unions and environmental groups. Obama has said he hopes opposition cools after the election. The White House has pointed to opinion polls showing most Americans support trade as a sign that the TPP could still squeak through Congress. "If you're frustrated about rules of trade that disadvantage America, if you're frustrated about jobs being shipped overseas ... then you want to get this thing passed," Obama told reporters. On his final trip to Asia as president earlier this month, Obama spent time reassuring nervous partners that the United States would finalize the TPP. But on Friday, Vietnam's parliament indicated it would not ratify the deal quickly. White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Vietnam's decision was not a setback. "I think the real stumbling block, the real impediment, the obstacle here is (the U.S.) Congress," Earnest said, noting there was "every indication" that Vietnam would proceed as long as Congress approved the TPP. (Reporting by Roberta Rampton; Additional reporting by Ayesha Rascoe; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Leslie Adler)
US election: Comeback Clinton vows: 'I'll never walk away'

Hillary Clinton has vowed she will never give up as she hit the campaign trail again following a three-day rest after being diagnosed with pneumonia.
(Updates with Obama quotes from Oval Office)

By Roberta Rampton

WASHINGTON, Sept 16 (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama on Friday engaged Ohio Governor John Kasich, a high-profile political foe, to help press Republicans to approve the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal before he leaves office in four months.

Obama discussed strategy for how to overcome domestic political angst over the TPP with Kasich, who fell short in his bid to be the Republican presidential candidate, and arranged for him to speak with reporters afterward from the White House briefing room lectern.

The unusual move was a sign of how the White House intends to make a final full-court push to persuade Republican leaders in the U.S. Congress to approve the deal in a "lame duck" session after the Nov. 8 election, where the TPP has been pilloried by both Republican and Democratic candidates.

"Right now, China is pushing hard to create their own trade agreement," Obama told reporters in the Oval Office, saying American businesses were at risk of being "cut out" of Asia, the world's fastest growing market.

"I promise you that China's not going to be setting up a bunch of rules that are going to be to the advantage of American companies and American businesses," Obama said.

Kasich was joined by other business and political leaders, including former Republican Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, International Business Machines Corp Chief Executive Officer Virginia Rometty and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Ahead of the meeting, Kasich told CNN that he knew he would be criticized for meeting with Obama but said passage of the trade deal was vital.

"The two most vociferous opponents of the trade agreement are (Russian President) Vladimir Putin and (Chinese President) Xi (Jinping), one of the most repressive leaders in the history of China," he said. "That in and of itself can tell you why this agreement is so important."

Republicans traditionally have backed free trade deals, but their presidential candidate, Donald Trump, has blamed the agreements for U.S. job losses and threatened to tear them up should he win.

Story continues

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has said the deal would not get a Senate vote this year, and House Speaker Paul Ryan has said he does not see enough votes for it to pass.

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has also opposed the deal, which is unpopular with labor unions and environmental groups.

Obama has said he hopes opposition cools after the election. The White House has pointed to opinion polls showing most Americans support trade as a sign that the TPP could still squeak through Congress.

"If you're frustrated about rules of trade that disadvantage America, if you're frustrated about jobs being shipped overseas ... then you want to get this thing passed, you want to get this thing done," Obama told reporters.

On his final trip to Asia earlier this month, Obama spent time reassuring nervous partners that the United States would finalize the deal. But on Friday, Vietnam's parliament indicated it would not ratify the deal quickly.

(Reporting by Roberta Rampton; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn and Jonathan Oatis)
President Barack Obama on Friday painted the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the massive but faltering trade deal between 12 Pacific nations, as a simple choice: Either the U.S. will write the trade rules in Asia or China will.

Its an argument the president has made before. But this time, he did it alongside Ohio Gov. John Kasich, the former GOP presidential candidate. Its part of a last-minute push to get Congress to pass the deal during the upcoming lame duck session, despite opposite from both presidential candidates and warnings from congressional leaders that Obama doesnt have the votes to pass it.

Right now, China is pushing hard to create their own trading regime out in Asia, the president said, referring to the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, a Beijing-backed Asian trade deal that does not include the United States. Despite claims from GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump that TPP benefits Beijing, China is not a signatory to the tentative deal that covers 40 percent of the worlds economy and was negotiated in secret over five years.

 I promise you that China is not going to be setting up a bunch of rules that are going to be to the advantage of American companies and American businesses, Obama said at the White House. If we are not in there and making sure that fair trade is established in the Asia market were going to be cut out.

Kasich, for his part, told CNN ahead of the meeting that he knew he would take heat for meeting with the Democratic president. But he said the deal was vital.

The two most vociferous opponents of the trade agreement are (Russian President) Vladimir Putin and (Chinese President) Xi (Jinping), one of the most repressive leaders in the history of China, Kasich said. That, in and of itself, can tell you why this agreement is so important.

Obamas hope is that the antipathy toward the deal will die once the election is over. But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has said there will be no vote on TPP this year. House Speaker Paul Ryan has said there arent enough votes to get it through. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, while on the campaign trail, also has said she does not support the deal  although she backed it when she was Obamas secretary of state.

Story continues

Obama staked his economic legacy on the TPP. If he fails to secure it, and if his successor kills it, Americas credibility in Asia would also take a hit.

Photo credit: NICHOLAS KAMM/Getty Images
Washington (AFP) - US President Barack Obama will meet his Iraqi counterpart at the United Nations next week, US officials said Friday, amid mounting preparations to seize control of Mosul from the Islamic State group.

Top Obama aide Ben Rhodes said Obama would meet Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi on the margins of the UN General Assembly on Monday.

"The two leaders will have a chance to check in on the counter-ISIL campaign," said Rhodes, using another acronym for the Islamic State group. "Also the campaign to liberate Mosul."

The United States deployed an additional 400 troops to Iraq earlier this month as local forces prepare for an assault on Iraq's second city.

Allied forces have been carrying out "shaping operations" around the northern city, working on an airfield near the town of Qayyarah that will provide a staging area and striking suspected IS chemical weapons facilities nearby.

Jihadists seized the city in 2014 and it is now their last major stronghold in Iraq.

The meeting between Obama and Abadi is also likely to offer support for the Iraqi leader, who faces growing internal challenges.

Cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has been flexing his considerable political muscle, mustering thousands-strong demonstrations to demand government reforms.

During the UN meeting Obama is also expected to hold bilateral meetings with Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari and Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos.

Rhodes said there were no plans to hold a rescheduled meeting with the Philippines's leader Rodrigo Duterte.

Obama cancelled a planned meeting with him in Laos earlier this month after the firebrand leader's barbed remarks insulting the US president.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama expressed deep concern that the Syrian government continues to block the flow of humanitarian aid despite decreased violence in the country following a truce arranged by the United States and Russia, the White House said on Friday. Obama, in a meeting with his national security aides, also "emphasized that the United States will not proceed with the next steps in the arrangement with Russia until we see seven continuous days of reduced violence and sustained humanitarian access," the White House said in a statement. (Reporting by Mohammad Zargham, editing by G Crosse)
President Obama in the Oval Office on Friday. (Photo: Carolyn Kaster/AP)

President Obama on Friday scolded the news media for asking about Donald Trumps latest flirtation with the racist birther movement the GOP nominee has long championed, telling reporters to focus on more serious issues in the 2016 race for the White House.

I am shocked that a question like that has come up at a time when we have so many other things to do, Obama said with evident annoyance in the Oval Office, before adding, Im not that shocked, actually; its fairly typical.

But we got other business to attend to, the president said. I was pretty confident about where I was born, I think most people were as well, and my hope would be that the presidential election reflects more serious issues than this.

Obamas comments came after Trump, who for years was a proponent of the discredited racist theory that the nations first black president was not born in the United States and may therefore be in office illegitimately, refused to say in a new story, published late Thursday, whether he had changed his mind.

Ill answer that question at the right time, Trump said in an interview with the Washington Post. I just dont want to answer it yet.

Not long after that coy answer, the Trump campaigns senior communications adviser, Jason Miller, told reporters in a statement that the Republican presidential nominee does not doubt that President Obama was born in the United States.

Obama spoke to the media at a White House meeting designed to shore up weak support in Congress for the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement. The president has made approval of the deal, a political long shot, a top priority of the end of his term.
By Kim Palmer

CLEVELAND (Reuters) - An Ohio man was held on $1 million bond on Friday after being charged with kidnapping and murder in connection with the discovery of two bodies by police earlier this week.

Prosecutors said Shawn Grate, a 40 year-old homeless man, took a woman on Sunday against her will for the purpose of engaging in sexual activity and held her in a vacant home in Ashland, Ohio, 80 miles (129 km) north of Columbus.

The woman, who was not identified, was able to make a 911 emergency call on Tuesday when Grate fell asleep, authorities said. Ashland police took Grate into custody on Tuesday and after questioning him discovered the two women's bodies on the property.

Grate was charged with two counts of murder and one count of kidnapping. Ashland County Common Pleas Judge Ronald Forsthoefel set the bond in a court proceeding on Friday. Grate faces 15 years to life in prison if convicted.

"We have evidence to believe that Shawn Grate abducted three women and killed two of them," Ashland County prosecutor Christopher Tunnell said in a video statement via Twitter.

Efforts to reach Grate's attorney on Friday were not immediately successful.

Prosecutors said in Ashland County Court that Grate was homeless at the time of his arrest and had broken into the house where he brought the woman he kidnapped. Grate has a long criminal history in the Ashland area dating back to 1994, including domestic violence, felony abduction, drug possession, breaking and entering and identity theft, Tunnell said in court.

One of the victims whose body was found in the home was Stacey Hicks Stanley, 43, of Huron County, Ohio, according to court documents. She had been missing since Sept. 8 and was last seen dealing with a flat tire.

Investigators believe the other woman, identified as 29-year-old Elizabeth Griffith, was killed after Aug. 16, according to court documents and prosecutors.

Grate is being held in Ashland County jail. He has a competency hearing scheduled for Monday.

(Reporting by Kim Palmer; Editing by Matthew Lewis)
All eyes will be on The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story at the Emmy Awards on Sunday, as Cuba Gooding Jr. vies for his first Emmy win. The only person who might not be watching is O.J. Simpson himself.

The FX limited series, which told the story of Simpson's double-murder trial and eventual acquittal, could sweep the Emmys with nominations for stars Gooding Jr., Courtney B. Vance, Sarah Paulson, Sterling K. Brown, John Travolta and David Schwimmer as well as directors Ryan Murphy and John Singleton, but prison guards at Lovelock Correctional Center in Lovelock, Nevada, could prevent Simpson from seeing the live results.

WATCH: JonBenet Ramsey Gets the OJ Simpson Treatment

Simpson has been serving time in the Nevada jail since he was found guilty in a robbery and kidnapping case in 2008. While inmates are allowed to watch TV, it is still up to the guards to decide whether showing the event, airing on ABC, could create a security issue.

When ET asked a prison rep about the five-part ESPN documentary O.J.: Made in America, we were told, "It is inappropriate and can be a safety and security risk to transmit information about an inmate to the rest of the inmate population."

While Simpson probably didn't see the ESPN series, he does keep up with the channel.

"He watches ESPN day and night on his TV," Simpson's former prison guard told ET. "He will sleep with ESPN on and his headphones on."

WATCH: Host Jimmy Kimmel Previews What to Expect From the Emmy Awards

Lovelock Correctional Center reportedly doesn't get FX, which aired The People v. O.J. Simpson, but that apparently didn't stop Simpson from commenting on Gooding Jr.'s portrayal of him.

According to Page Six, Simpson criticized the Oscar winner for being "not tall enough" and calling his head "too small."

The 68th Primetime Emmy Awards will air live from The Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles this Sunday on ABC.

Story continues

Related Articles
Frankfurt (AFP) - One year ago, Volkswagen's cheating on emissions tests for millions of its diesel cars erupted into public view, leaving the mammoth carmaker battling an unprecedented crisis.

Barely a week has passed since that has not seen a fresh twist in the saga, which has tarnished Germany's proud auto industry and called the future of diesel as a whole into question.

On Friday alone, two heavyweight legal claims landed on Volkswagen's doorstep, with Blackrock -- the world's largest investment manager -- saying it would pursue legal action against the car giant for misleading shareholders, echoed by the German federal state of Hesse.

Volkswagen has sought to make amends with mass recalls and a fresh focus on building cleaner cars, but a mountain of legal complaints and ever-louder demands for compensation have made it difficult for the auto giant to turn the corner.

The scandal "has had huge effects on Volkswagen and the whole sector," said industry expert Stefan Bratzel of Germany's Center for Automotive Management.

VW built itself over decades into Europe's car champion and now sells vehicles under 12 separate brands -- from Seat, Skoda and Volkswagen to luxury brands Audi and Porsche.

The firm rakes in 200 billion euros ($225 billion) in sales each year and employs 600,000 people globally.

But the Wolfsburg-based group was rocked to its core when US regulators on September 18, 2015 accused it of deliberately skewing emissions data.

VW then publicly admitted it had installed so-called "defeat devices" in 11 million diesel-powered vehicles around the world.

The software is able to detect when cars are undergoing regulatory tests and lowers their emissions accordingly, giving them the appearance of being less polluting than they really are.

In response to the revelations, Martin Winterkorn resigned as chief executive while insisting he had known nothing of the scheme, leaving then-Porsche boss Matthias Mueller to take over the whole group.

Story continues

- Legal tangle -

But no change of the guard could protect VW from a barrage of lawsuits and compensation claims from the authorities, customers and investors.

So far VW has put aside 18 billion euros in legal provisions, which pushed the company last year into its first annual loss in more than 20 years.

When the crisis broke, investors watched in horror as VW stock lost 40 percent of its value in just two days -- burning up 30 billion euros of market capitalisation.

One year on, VW remains valued around 20 percent lower than it was before last September.

The scandal didn't trigger a collapse in sales for the Volkswagen brand, which reported on Friday it saw sales fall by just 0.2 worldwide in January-August 2016 compared with the same period in 2015.

That period, though, saw 30,000 fewer cars with the famous circular VW logo drive off lots in the United States -- a drop of 13 percent.

- Miles to go -

"One year after 'dieselgate', Volkswagen has maybe gone 50-60 percent of the way, but there's still a lot to do," Ferdinand Dudenhoeffer, director of the Center for Automotive Research at the University of Duisburg-Essen told AFP.

In the United States, the firm was able to reach a deal settling some of the claims, agreeing to pay almost $15 billion in fines and in compensation to some 480,000 car owners.

But VW still faces other legal claims in the United States as well as lawsuits and probes around the world, including in Australia, South Korea, Germany, France and Italy.

And European authorities are stirring in Brussels, animated by the charge that American VW customers are being treated better than EU citizens affected by the scandal.

So far, VW has refused to compensate Europeans or buy back their vehicles. Instead, it plans to retrofit the 8.5 million vehicles concerned to meet emissions standards.

Experts predict the total bill for Volkswagen could reach between 25 and 35 billion euros, leaving the firm once again raiding its piggy bank but not threatening its survival.

- 'Turning point' -

Dudenhoeffer suggests that 'dieselgate' could in the end be a "boon for Volkswagen".

New CEO Mueller has adopted a bold strategy, promising dozens of new electric vehicles in coming years as well as pushing into fields like car-sharing services and self-driving cars.

VW's cheating has also seen regulators step up scrutiny of the whole industry, shining a spotlight on the harmful effects of polluting engines.

The scandal has been a "turning point for diesel," said Bratzel of Germany's Center for Automotive Management.

From September 2017, carmakers will submit vehicles for on-road testing as well as laboratory probes, forcing them to invest in more effective anti-pollution systems.

With time, European roads -- where diesels have long held a larger market share than elsewhere -- will see fewer such vehicles as the technology becomes more expensive, leaving an opening likely to be filled by electric cars.
US election: Trump campaign acknowledges Obama was born in US

The Trump campaign has acknowledged in a statement that President Obama was born in the US.
By William James Bournemouth, England (Reuters) - Nigel Farage, the firebrand of Britain's Brexit campaign, used his final speech as leader of the UK Independence Party on Friday to demand that his successor pushes for a "hard" EU exit that meets the demands of his party's voters. UKIP played a crucial role in the June 23 European Union referendum, tapping into anger at Brussels and rising anti-establishment sentiment to fuel a surprise 52-48 percent exit vote which rocked global financial markets. But the party has suffered a series of bitter rows over its future direction since then and, with its main star Farage stepping down, faces a struggle to retain its influence over voters. His successor is due to be named later in the day. Making his valedictory address at the UKIP annual conference in the southern English resort of Bournemouth, Farage said his party had "changed the center of gravity" of British politics. But he warned that his successor must not let the government water down the terms of Britain's EU exit. "We can be very proud of the fact that we won the war but we now must win the peace," he told a crowd of cheering activists. "The only mechanism to put pressure on the government to keep the debate live and to make sure that those 17.4 million people (who voted 'Leave') get what they voted for is for UKIP to be healthy and for UKIP to be strong." Commentators say UKIP has become so synonymous with Farage, who first led the party from 2006 until and 2009 then took over the reins again the following year, that his departure leaves a huge gap which will be hard to fill. His speech drew rapturous applause from supporters crowded into the conference hall to see the party's star performer. It set out three criteria by which the success of the government's Brexit negotiations should be judged: whether Britain is outside the single market and free from European regulation, whether it has control of fishing rights in its territorial waters, and whether it has got rid of EU passports. After the referendum result, Farage said he would step down as leader, and has since lent his experience of leading a popular political uprising to U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump's campaign. "I intend this autumn to travel around some other European capitals to try and help independents and democracy movements in those countries too," he said. (Additional reporting by Tina Bellon in London; Editing by Andrew Heavens)
Deutsche Global Infrastructure S (TOLSX) a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy) seeks total return from both capital appreciation and current income. The fund invests the majority of net assets in the securities of U.S. and non-U.S. infrastructure-related companies.

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London (AFP) - Crystal Palace's Senegalese full-back Pape Souare could be sidelined for up to six months after breaking his thighbone in a serious car crash, manager Alan Pardew said on Friday.

"It was a terrible accident and we have a huge debt to the air ambulance and the terrific surgeons he's had," Pardew told a press conference.

"We hope he'll be released from hospital on Saturday and we think he'll make a full recovery. In four, five, six months, he should be up and running again."

Pardew said Souare, 26, was in "good spirits" after the accident on the M4 motorway near London Heathrow Airport, which also left him with jaw injuries.

Souare, a Senegal international, joined Palace from French club Lille in January 2015.

The south London club host Stoke City in the Premier League on Sunday.
A Palestinian was killed after trying to stab a police officer at the entrance to the Old City in occupied east Jerusalem, police said. Two other Palestinians rammed a bus stop used by Israelis in the West Bank causing injuries before one of the attackers was shot dead by Israeli troops.
Paris (AFP) - Police in Paris on Friday evacuated a tent camp where some 2,100 migrants were living in squalid conditions, the latest operation to dismantle camps sprouting up around the French capital.

Police moved in at dawn to remove the migrants, mainly from Sudan, Eritrea and Afghanistan, who were sleeping in tents and on mattresses in the camp in northern Paris.

Housing Minister Emmanuelle Cosse, who was present at the operation, said 2,083 people were evacuated to around 60 shelters in the Paris area.

The camp was already cleared of some 700 people a month ago.

France has received only a tiny proportion of the million-plus migrants who have crossed into Europe in the last 18 months, with many refugees seeing it mainly as a transit country to other destinations.

But it has struggled to accommodate them.

Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo announced last week that the city would open its first refugee camp in mid-October in a bid to take thousands off the streets.

Friday's operation was the second major camp evacuation in the Paris area since July 22 when 2,500 people were taken to shelters.

Nearly 30 such evacuations involving some 19,000 people have been carried out since June 2015.

Many of those who land in Paris are bound for the port of Calais on the Channel coast, where they hope to stow away on trucks crossing to Britain.

The Socialist government came under intense fire from right-wing critics this week over plans to create new migrant centres notably to house thousands moved from the notorious Jungle camp in Calais.

According to a leaked interior ministry document, the government believes some 12,000 places are needed by the end of the year, much more than previously thought.

The insalubrious Jungle camp is home to at least 7,000 migrants. Charities say the number might be as high as 10,000 after an influx this summer.

Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve has vowed to close the camp "as quickly as possible" but said it would be done in stages.
michelle obama hillary

Michelle Obama slammed Donald Trump on Friday over his previous questions about President Barack Obama's birthplace.

In a speech at George Mason University, the first lady criticized the Republican presidential nominee's assertions that her husband was not born in the US, despite evidence to the contrary.

"Then, of course, there were those who questioned, and who continue to question for the past eight years, and up to this very day, whether my husband was even born in this country," Obama said, alluding to Trump's questions. "Well, during his time in office, I think Barack has answered those questions with the examples he set, by going high when they go low. And he's answered these questions with the progress we've achieved together."

Obama's comments came several hours after Trump announced that after years of publicly questioning Obama's birthplace, he now believes Obama was born in the US.

During Friday's speech, the first lady laid into Trump's temperament, calling the real-estate magnate "erratic" and "threatening," and telling the audience that "a president can't just pop off."

The first lady lauded Hillary Clinton, arguing that she is one of the most qualified people to ever seek the presidency, but also acknowledged that many voters feel pessimistic about the way the election has played out in the media.

"As you are working your heart out for Hillary, if you start to feel tired or discouraged by all the negativity in this election. If you want to hide under the bed until it's all over, I want you to remember what's at stake," Obama said, rattling off numerous Obama administration positions that Trump has promised to roll back.

She also attempted to counter Trump's vision of a worsening America, echoing her comments at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia in which she touted herself and her husband as examples of American economic opportunity.

Story continues

"We live in a country where a girl like me from the South Side of Chicago whose great-great-grandfather was a slave could go to some of the finest universities on earth. We live in a country where a biracial kid from Hawaii named Barack Obama, the son of a single mother, can become president," Obama said, citing the ability for immigrants to come to the US and achieve economic success.

Obama's speech came as the Clinton campaign deployed high-profile surrogates to key battleground states amid the Democratic presidential nominee's sinking poll numbers.

NOW WATCH: Watch Donald Trump attempt to explain why he thinks Hillary Clinton is a bigot





More From Business Insider


From Esquire

"Without clarifying the cost of his tax plan"

That clause, from the Bloomberg News account of Donald Trump's latest Big Economic Speech-this one on Wednesday, to the Economic Club of New York-marks the Republican nominee's final conversion to the Reformed Church of Arthur Laffer. That's always been the perfect window into the notion that, the more you cut taxes for rich people and for corporations, the more tax revenues the government will accrue. That is the definition of what Paul Krugman calls "the magic asterisk" without which, for example, Paul Ryan's many fanciful "budget" plans would dry up and blow away. The cost is never "clarified" until it's far too late to do anything about it.

Anyway, El Caudillo del Mar-A-Lago gave a speech on the economy that nonetheless was remarkable for its deliberate proposals to make an existential planetary crisis even worse. Even if you believe the smoke and mirrors economic proposals, the environmental impact of a Trump stewardship over the economy would drive people to invest in Indiana oceanfront futures.

I've proposed a moratorium on new federal regulations that are not compelled by Congress or public safety, and I will eliminate all needless and job-killing regulations now on the books. This includes eliminating some of our most intrusive regulations, like the Waters of The U.S. Rule. It also means scrapping the EPA's so-called Clean Power Plan which the government itself estimates will cost $7.2 billion a year. This Obama-Clinton directive will shut down most, if not all, coal-powered electricity plans in America. Remember what Hillary Clinton said? She wants to shut down the miners, just like she wants to shut down the steel mills. We're going to put our great miners and steel workers back to work. Energy reform is central to our plan as well. According to the Heritage Foundation, by 2030, President Obama's energy restrictions will eliminate another half a million manufacturing jobs, reduce economic output by $2.5 trillion dollars, and reduce incomes by $7,000 dollars per person. Hillary Clinton wants to go even further, and her plan could cost the economy $5 trillion dollars. A Trump Administration will lift restrictions on all sources of American energy production.

Story continues

This, too, marks Trump as a conventional Republican of the modern era. For example, earlier this week Ryan himself dropped an op-ed in which he, the putative leader of serious conservative Republicans, sounded not a whit different from Trump, except Ryan substitutes portentious historical nonsense for know-nothing bloviating.

The president is now at a 58 percent approval rating. There was some really good economic news. And here the two of them are.

Click here to respond to this post on the official Esquire Politics Facebook page.

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From Country Living

Two of our all-time favorite fall activities include visiting our local farm to walk the corn maze and re-watching It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown-so we were overjoyed to hear that this year they're converging in celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Peanuts classic.

Next month, over 90 farms across America will take part in honoring 50 years of Charles Schulz's timeless Halloween tale by hosting corn mazes featuring the beloved Peanuts characters designed by The MAiZE Inc., a company that specializes in corn maze design and cutting. If their past work is any indication, these are going to be some pretty cool looking mazes:

According to the Chicago Tribune, some of the mazes will nod to the election season with "Snoopy for Prez" designs. The farms will also screen the TV special, and offer food and various other fun fall activities.

To see if a 'Great Pumpkin' maze will be popping up at farm near you this October, visit peanuts.com.

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Valley celebrates Indra Jatra

The Indra Jatra festival was observed in Kathmandu Valley on Thursday.
By Joseph Ax

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - As he seeks re-election to his U.S. Senate seat this November, Pennsylvania's Pat Toomey can make an unusual claim. He is the sole Republican nationwide running with the endorsement of top U.S. gun control advocates Gabby Giffords and Michael Bloomberg.

That pair of endorsements could give the first-term senator an edge over Democratic challenger Katie McGinty, a former environmental official in the White House and the Pennsylvania governor's office. The race is one of a handful of close contests on Nov. 8 that could determine whether Republicans, currently with a 54-46 majority, maintain control of the Senate.

Both candidates are targeting educated moderate voters, particularly in the Philadelphia suburbs, many of whom may be turned off by the rhetoric of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, according to political analysts in Pennsylvania.

McGinty, who calls her support of gun control measures stronger than Toomey's, is working hard to dismiss his endorsements from Giffords and Bloomberg, and has touted her own endorsement by a Pennsylvania anti-gun violence group.

Giffords, considered a hero by many gun control advocates, is a Democratic former U.S. congresswoman from Arizona who survived being shot in a 2011 assassination attempt and has become an activist for gun restrictions. Bloomberg is the billionaire former New York City mayor who considered a run for the presidency this year and, since leaving office, has focused much of his energy on gun control.

McGinty has called Toomey's commitment to gun safety "paper thin" and notes that the Republican incumbent received an "A" rating from the influential National Rifle Association gun rights lobbying group during his first Senate run in 2010.

The issue of gun rights is potent in a nation where the right to "keep and bear arms" is enshrined in Constitution's Second Amendment. The NRA opposes candidates who support gun control efforts including restricting the types of firearms people can own or expanding background checks required for gun buyers. Many Republicans side with the NRA, while many Democrats support gun control.

Story continues

Opinion polls show Toomey's race as virtually tied, even as Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton leads Trump by several percentage points in a state that has voted Democratic in the past six presidential contests, starting in 1992.

Pennsylvania is home both to rural communities where hunting is a popular pastime and big cities including Philadelphia and Pittsburgh where crime and gun violence are major concerns. Shifting attitudes on guns in the state have emboldened both parties in Pennsylvania to distance themselves from the NRA's stance opposing almost any effort to restrict gun rights.

The state's law mandating background checks for private handgun sales already goes beyond federal law, said Terry Madonna, director of the Franklin & Marshall College Poll in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.

"Pennsylvania has a very substantial hunting and fishing culture," Madonna said. "But hunters aren't opposed to that."

'HARD THING TO DO'

Toomey's position on guns sets him apart from most of his Republican U.S. Senate counterparts, as he tries to attract moderates while keeping conservative voters in his column.

In a telephone interview, Toomey said the Giffords and Bloomberg endorsements recognized "that what I did was a very hard thing to do politically." He also emphasized his belief that most gun owners share his position.

"I'm a strong Second Amendment supporter," Toomey said. "I see no contradiction between that support and insisting on background checks, so that people who've got no right to the Second Amendment because they're dangerous criminals or they're dangerously mentally ill or they're terrorists, should be denied a firearm any way we can."

Giffords has also endorsed Illinois Senator Mark Kirk, another Republican running for re-election, though Bloomberg has not weighed in on that race.

In an email, McGinty told Reuters Toomey is "no moderate" when it comes to gun violence.

"Time and again, he has sided with the gun lobby instead of doing what's right to keep communities safe," McGinty said. "Pat Toomey has completely run away from legislation to expand background checks, since it failed to pass the Senate three years ago."

Toomey made headlines in 2013 following an elementary school massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, when he and Democratic Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia introduced legislation to expand background checks for gun buyers nationwide.

That legislation, fiercely opposed by the NRA, failed in the Senate, but Toomey gained praise from Democrats for bucking the majority of his party.

He voted for a similar bill after the mass shooting last year in San Bernardino, California, and supported Republican-backed legislation in Congress this year following the Orlando nightclub shooting to restrict access to firearms for people on official "terrorism watch lists."

McGinty backed a stricter Democratic-backed version. None of the measures passed.

McGinty, who called Toomey's gun control positions weak, favors more sweeping restrictions such as bans on military-style "assault weapons" and high-capacity ammunition clips that Toomey opposes.

In a recent television ad, McGinty used a clip of Toomey telling voters this summer that he had a "perfect record" with the NRA. The NRA has not yet released ratings or issued an endorsement in the race.

Toomey called McGinty a "political opportunist" and again pointed to his support from Giffords and Bloomberg.

"The idea that somehow they've all got it wrong and Katie McGinty, my opponent, has it right is just laughable," he said.

(This story corrects Senator Mark Kirk's home state to Illinois from Ohio in 15th paragraph.)

(Reporting by Joseph Ax; Editing by Scott Malone and Will Dunham)
The multicolored synthetic dreadlocks at the Marc Jacobs show upstaged the actual clothing. (Photo: Getty Images)

The latest subject of the ongoing debate between stylistic expression and cultural appropriation is designer Marc Jacobs, who sent models down the runway of his spring 2017 New York Fashion Week show in multicolored dreadlocks on Thursday. The models sporting the controversial look included major names like Gigi and Bella Hadid, Kendall Jenner, and Adriana Lima. The locks played up the vibrant rainbow of hues that made up his latest fashion line.

@bellahadid and @kendalljenner backstage at our Spring '17 show  #MJSS17 A photo posted by Marc Jacobs (@marcjacobs) on Sep 15, 2016 at 3:02pm PDT

According to US Weekly, Jacobss inspiration came from transgender director Lana Wachowski, who the designer features in his spring-summer 2016 ad campaign. In the ads  and in her everyday life  50-year-old Wachowskis statement-making style includes a head full of pastel dreads. Jacobs called the campaign, for which Wachowski, who is white, was the first to be signed, a personal diary of people who inspire him, according to the Daily Mail. Wachowski and her sister, Lilly, also transgender, are best known for directing The Matrix series and V for Vendetta.

But many people were not as impressed with Jacobss muse, her controversial style, or its use in the NYFW show. Oh yeah. I just realized its #MarcJacobs appropriating black culture with white models, wrote one angry Twitter user. I really dont understand like why? Why do this when you can get beautiful black women who can model better than them? another questioned. A third echoed the sentiment, adding, Was super cool until I realized the pastel hair was in dreads. Like a commenter above me said, if that was the look you were going for, use models of color. Wouldve been a great way to be more inclusive and have an amazing show with an otherwise amazing aesthetic.

Oh yeah. I just realized its #MarcJacobs appropriating black culture with white models. Again. https://t.co/OAs2HKzMrA  oregon_girl (@oregon_girl3) September 16, 2016

I really don't understand like why?Why do this when you can get beautiful black women who can model better than them pic.twitter.com/wAwDBzvKIu  Lizeth???? (@radical_lizeth) September 16, 2016

Marc Jacobs just basically said shut up about culture appropriation, and also said he doesn't see color pic.twitter.com/89LhueQQU5  Affinity Magazine (@TheAffinityMag) September 16, 2016

A writer on XO Jane recently addressed Jacobss point  which others have made  about white women failing to accuse black women of cultural appropriation when women of color straighten their hair. White culture is imposed upon  not adopted by  black people, said author Chi-Chi Okonkwo.

Story continues

Jacobs set the wheels in motion for the controversial, colorful dreadlocked look three months ago, when he sent a photo of Wachowski to hairstylist and Redken Global creative director Guido Palau, asking the stylist to help replicate the look for his show. Palau found Jena Counts, who has been dying wool hair extensions in the small town of Palatka, Fla., for about a year. The self-taught pro learned her technique online and has since made 200 to 300 different shades. It comes in a roping, and you cut it and roll it, Counts tells Yahoo Beauty. You can wash them with sulfate-free shampoo to keep the colors. She sells her custom rainbow-colored creations on Etsy for up to $155 a set.

Please take your seats, our Marc Jacobs Spring '17 show is about to begin. Watch it live now on marcjacobs.com #MJSS17 A photo posted by Marc Jacobs (@marcjacobs) on Sep 15, 2016 at 10:54am PDT

Timid in nature, but supremely talented in skill, Counts told a group of beauty editors backstage hours before the show that she and her daughter dyed a whopping 12,500 yards of wool dreadlocks by hand over a six-day period. They traveled all the way from Florida with extra dyes packed in suitcases, as Palau says Jacobs is very particular about the details.

Addressing the cultural appropriation controversy after the runway show, Palau told the Cut, I dont really think about that. I take inspiration from every culture. Style comes from clashing things. Its always been there  if youre creative, if you make food, music, and fashion, whatever, youre inspired by everything. Its not homogeneous. Different cultures mix all the time. You see it on the street. People dont dress head-to-toe in just one way.

Lets keep in touch! Follow Yahoo Beauty on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest.
People are saying this teacher is dressing inappropriately  but were not convinced

Too often, it can feel like women literally cant leave the house without society commenting our bodies and the way we dress ourselves. Sadly, this is now even happening to our teachers. Thats right: Patrice Brown, who teaches the fourth grade in Atlanta, Georgia, is being heavily criticized because of the way she dresses when she teaches students. And the hashtag #TeacherBae was started just so that people could take to Twitter to discuss whether or not the womans outfits are truly inappropriate or not. Like, what?

I hope shes not a teacher, that outfit isnt appropriate for school pic.twitter.com/ky0Vw8ySnM  Respect. (@UATheFirst) September 12, 2016

@Bossip she knows what shes doing, this is disturbing  Che'Rie (@mrsdemples) September 12, 2016

@Bossip Absolutely inappropriately (for school) This is a place of business not a date, come on now!!!!   Dez  (@cinderelladesi) September 12, 2016

We are far from convinced that these criticisms are fair, however. Take a look at some of the shots shes posted to her Instagram account below:

Wow I cant believe this blew up! A photo posted by @cashylauren on Sep 12, 2016 at 5:09pm PDT

. A photo posted by @cashylauren on Sep 12, 2016 at 5:11pm PDT

My other account was hacked A photo posted by @cashylauren on Sep 12, 2016 at 5:29pm PDT

As Maria Guido points out at ScaryMommy, Brown is completely covered, with dresses to her knee, jeans, and loose fitting tops. There is nothing suggestive or revealing about her clothing, which leads us to wonder: Just what do critics want her to wear? As a woman with curves, should she be permitted only a shapeless sack, and if so, why?! And why are so many critics okay with women teaching their children, but not trusting they have the ability to dress themselves appropriately?

Story continues

For more TMZ videos visit Yahoo View.

.

Thankfully, many people are calling out this sexism (and body-shaming) on social media.

If a Black woman has a curvy body shes immediately judged and sexualized for something she has no control over #teacherbae  #BLACKLIVESMATTER (@BlackDynamiteJC) September 12, 2016

I bet y'all wouldnt have nothing to say if she was built like this #teacherbae pic.twitter.com/eNQibGwdK8  Wave Bari (@stackztootrill) September 12, 2016

#teacherbae grown men and women sexualizing and criticizing a fourth grade teacher because of her body type and choice of attire HOW OLD R U  shae(lyn) (@ActuallyShae) September 12, 2016

Y'all focused on her body and not the TYPE of teacher she is? If shes a good teacher helping youth grow why y'all sweating her? #teacherbae  Jay Warren  (@jywrrn) September 12, 2016

The fact of the matter is, it seems that people are protesting Browns clothing because of her figure. Sadly, this speaks to how overly sexualized womens bodies, especially black womens bodies, are.

It seems that women literally cannot do their jobs without people weighing in on what they should or shouldnt be wearing. As Guido points out, some critics expressed concern that students in her class may be distracted by her figure and outfits. If that happens, thats a great teachable moment about how to respect women. And isnt teaching what school is all about?

The post People are saying this teacher is dressing inappropriately  but were not convinced appeared first on HelloGiggles.
Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte makes a

Since the Philippines' President Rodrigo Duterte took office in July, he has threatened to eat Filipino rebels, encouraged vigilante violence, disparaged US President Barack Obama, and overseen a bloody crackdown on drug use that has left more than 2,000 people dead.

While his brash words and actions at home have earned him international criticism, Duterte also appears to be advancing a foreign policy that could have outsize implications for the region and for himself.

Since assuming office Duterte has taken a much more antagonistic stance toward the US and its legacy in the Philippines, while at the same time making overtures to China. In light of ongoing tensions over the South China Sea, the Philippine president appears to be walking a fine line between the two most powerful countries in the region.

Duterte's blunt comments directed at Obama brought much of the world's focus to him, but the statement (Duterte's remarks were translated as calling Obama a "son of a whore") fits with Duterte's rhetorical style, and it was reflective of how the new Philippine president would approach relations with the US.

"He's got a sort of deeply held suspicion of the United States, which dates back to his time as mayor of Davao City. He's an avowed socialist as well," Prashanth Parameswaran, the associate editor at The Diplomat, said during the magazine's Asia Geopolitics podcast, adding:

"If you look at the statement that was issued where he expressed regret following the remarks, it states there that despite the fact that regret was expressed, the Philippines is trying to chart a more independent foreign policy for itself. And you can read that in various ways, but the major one is ... it does want to pursue a closer relationship with China, and it's a little bit more cautious in terms of how it approaches the United States."

Story continues

After inveighing against Obama, Duterte did meet with the US president on the sidelines of the ASEAN regional summit in Laos earlier this month, but since then he appears to have reiterated his wariness of the US, calling for US military trainers to depart the country, which he said was for concerns about their safety.

Ash Carter US Philippines military alliance cooperation

There are only a few such military trainers in the country, and "Demanding they leave is especially odd given that [Duterte] has repeatedly talked about modernizing the Armed Forces of the Philippines and counterterrorism as his key security focuses  both of which are assisted by U.S. Special Forces training," Gregory Poling, director of the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told Business Insider.

No US soldier has been kidnapped by any terrorist organization in the southern Philippines, Poling said. "The Philippine military, at least, seems to be skeptical that this was more than bluster," he added, "as theyve said no official order to throw out the American trainers has been issued by the government." And as of earlier this week, US officials had gotten no such order.

The current Philippine foreign minister has added to the tension, saying that while his country would respect alliances, it wouldn't accept being treated as "the little brown brothers of America."

map south china sea

Duterte has coupled these rebuffs of US personnel with statements about reducing cooperation with the US.

This week he said his country shouldn't take part in joint patrols of the South China Sea  in the Philippines exclusive economic zone, the foreign minister clarified  in order to avoid a "hostile act."

Thus far, Duterte hasn't taken concrete action to undermine US-Philippine cooperation  he doesn't appear to have mentioned the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Act, which gives US troops access to Philippine bases  but he has also made overtures to China and Russia, suggesting wavering commitment to US rebalancing efforts against Chinese ambitions in East Asia.

Duterte has been open to Chinese investment in Philippine infrastructure, saying prior to his election and to a July 12 international court ruling that dismissed China's claims in the South China Sea that he would be willing to "shut up" about disputes in the sea if China provided aid.

In the wake of that July 12 decision, which China rejected, Duterte voiced interest in bilateral talks with China, saying the ruling put the Philippines in a better negotiating position. In August, former Philippine President Fidel Ramos went to Hong Kong for informal talks with Chinese officials. The US, for its part, encouraged the resumption of talks between Manila and Beijing (though the Philippine foreign minister recently cast doubt on those talks).

"I think something we need to keep in mind is also the external stimuli that China is providing here, and I think China has been very good in reading Duterte," Ankit Panda, an editor at The Diplomat, said on the magazine's Asia Geopolitics podcast.

Li Keqiang and Rodrigo Duterte

"And essentially the overtures we've seen after the July 12 ruling has been in big part enabled by the fact that China hasn't really pushed to change facts on the water in the South China Sea, which might force Duterte to take some sort of drastic action," Panda added.

More recently, Duterte expressed interest in buying weapons from Russia and China, saying that even though he didn't want to cut the "umbilical cord" with allies, he wanted to purchase arms "where they are cheap and where there are no strings attached and it is transparent."

Duterte also said his defense secretary would visit Beijing and Moscow "and see what's best," a move that suggests he's doubling down on his break from US policy in the region.

The Philippine president is a little over three months into his term, and while a July poll found him with 91% support, the numerous initiatives he has advanced  the war on drugs, talks with rebels groups, reassessing ties with China  and the bluster with which he has advanced them could pose a risk to the political capital he has accrued.

"Duterte's early moves are, in part, an attempt to consolidate power in Manila," the geopolitical analysis firm Stratfor wrote in late August. "He is capitalizing on his present popularity while laying the foundation he thinks is key to the country's long-term modernization."

It's possible that Duterte is trying to play the US and China against each other to wring favorable terms from both of them. Going forward, however, he could find himself in an increasingly perilous position, having antagonized both a longstanding but at times overbearing ally in the US and a growing world power with little incentive to make concessions in China.

At home, fractious relations with the US, which has supplied about 75% of the country's arms imports since 1950 and extensive military support, could alienate Duterte from the Philippine military leadership, a group he needs in his fold if negotiations with communist rebels are to advance.

afp duterte threatens to pull philippines out of un

Elsewhere, Duterte's emphasis on enforcing tax collection and other regulations could run afoul of the Philippines' business interests, and powerful figures involved in illegal narcotics may soon find his crackdown on the drug trade discomfiting.

In Manila, the "primary risk is that Duterte will open up power struggles on too many fronts and find himself at odds with too many powerful enemies," Stratfor noted.

Moreover, coming terms with China could backfire on Duterte if those terms are seen as unfavorable by Filipinos.

"It's possible that could really hurt him at home," Panda said during The Diplomat podcast. "This is a raw nerve, and I think there's a lot of constituencies in the Philippines that want to see a resolution that really doesn't concede anything to China."

And while the US is loathe to let longstanding relations with the Philippines wither, if Duterte holds to his current line, US-Philippine ties will certainly suffer.

"As for the long-term balance, that will depend on whether Duterte climbs down from this constant stream of anti-American rhetoric that weve seen over the last week," Poling, of CSIS, told Business Insider.

"The U.S. is not willing to walk away from the alliance, but fears are growing that Duterte is determined to severely degrade it. If that happens, the Philippines will find itself in a much worse position in the face of Chinese bullying."

NOW WATCH: Obama canceled a meeting with the Philippines president after he called him a 'son of a b----'





More From Business Insider


A large piece of debris found off the coast of Tanzania belongs to the ill-fated Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, Australian investigators confirmed Thursday.

The fragment was discovered on the Tanzanian island of Pemba in June. The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB), who are assisting Malaysian authorities with identifying debris, said that the piece was a section of an outboard flap from the right wing of the Boeing 777 passenger jet.

The flap section will be further examined for evidence of what state it was in when it came apart from the planes wing, ATSB said in a report released Thursday. Investigators said the results of the analysis could shed light on the circumstances surrounding the planes disappearance. The Malaysia Airlines flight was en route to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur when it disappeared in March 2014 with 239 people on board.

A number of pieces of debris have been discovered scattered on coastlines in the Indian Ocean, some confirmed to have come from the missing jetliner. A section of a wing called a flaperon on Reunion Island and two pieces uncovered off the coast of Mozambique were confirmed to be almost certainly from MH 370.
FRANKFURT/BERLIN (Reuters) - German pilots' union Vereinigung Cockpit (VC) said that informal talks with Lufthansa had ended with no agreement, dashing hopes that talks on a wide-ranging pay deal could be resumed quickly.

"There will be no further talks of this form," a spokesman for VC told Reuters on Friday.

Lufthansa has been in talks with the pilots union for four years in a long-running dispute that has seen more than a dozen strikes hit one of Europe's largest carriers.

The airline is trying to cut costs at its main brand in Germany in order to better compete with low-cost rivals in Europe and fast-growing long-haul carriers such as Emirates and Turkish Airlines.

It has already agreed wide-ranging pay and pension deals with cabin crew and ground staff.

Formal talks with the VC union collapsed last month, and an end to informal talks risks derailing Lufthansa's goal of reaching an agreement with its pilots by the end of the year.

(Reporting by Maria Sheahan and Klaus Lauer; editing by Jason Neely)
Wild elephant kills two

Two persons were killed in an elephant attack at Dalla area of Suryapatuwa  4 on Thursday.
Https%3a%2f%2fblueprint-api-production.s3.amazonaws.com%2fuploads%2fcard%2fimage%2f212166%2f0c2a56ea373d470aa14782c7850181c5

Police dogs are known for their ferociousness, but there are some jobs that a canine can't do. Enter Ed  the latest recruit keeping cat crime in check.

It all started when police in New South Wales, Australia recently had a pest problem in the horse stables that cosily house their horse troops. The cops enlisted the cat to keep vermin away from the Sydney Mounted Police, according to Sergeant Kylie Riddell. Now she's part of gang.

SEE ALSO: Police help 9-year-old with cerebral palsy fulfill his bucket list

The nap-loving cat has got a pretty good deal it seems. Riddell told 702 ABC "He (Ed) struts through, past all the constables while they're being given their daily duties. After that he patrols the stables while the grooms are mucking out. And usually after that, it's nap time."

Troop cat Ed is testament to the fact that even the smallest and constantly tired can make a difference in the community.
Detective Brian O'Donnell left a New York City hospital, Friday, just one day after being injured during a police stand-off with a man allegedly wielding a meat cleaver outside of Penn Station, reports NBC New York.



O'Donnell was gashed from his forehead to his jaw when he tackled the man, who had allegedly been running from police. The detective was off-duty at the time and was walking to Penn Station to catch a train home to Long Island.



He was wheeled out of Bellevue Hospital with a cast on his left arm and an visible cut on his face, NBC reported. Other officers cheered as he exited the hospital.



 Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Click here to get breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases in the True Crime Newsletter.



The incident happened just before 5:00 p.m., Thursday, at 32nd Street and Sixth Avenue, New York Police Department Det. Hubert Reyes confirmed to PEOPLE. The suspect had allegedly been trying to remove a boot from his car, reported NBC New York.



"Upon arriving at the scene the officers encountered a male who removed a 11-inch meat clever from his waistband and fled west bound," the NYPD wrote on Twitter Thursday.



Officers allegedly pursued the man on foot and attempted to taser him "to no effect," the NYPD said. After O'Donnell tried to subdue the man and was injured, responding uniformed officers fired at the suspect, "striking him several times."



Reyes confirmed to PEOPLE that the suspect  identified as Akram Joudeh, 32, of Queens  was subsequently hospitalized in critical condition. (The NYPD could provide no update Friday on his condition.) Police said he was believed to be living in his vehicle ahead of the alleged attack.



No charges have been filed, the NYPD tells PEOPLE.



Two other officers were transported to the hospital with non-life threatening injuries, police said.
Spanish, Italian and Belgian police have shut down an international car theft ring responsible for stealing $3.3 million of luxury vehicles. The Italian and Moroccan gang are suspected of stealing Range Rovers, BMW and Mercedes cars and selling them across Africa and Europe.

Italian Police opened an investigation after noticing an uptick in car thefts using the same modus operandi. Investigators discovered that the alleged thieves had obtained genuine keys for the vehicles from dealerships using counterfeit documents and personal information on the victims obtained from Italys vehicle registry.

Europol, the European Unions law enforcement wing, said four suspects were arrested in Belgium, six in Spain, and 18 in Italy in a statement.

This video shows Spanish police making arrests in Pontevedra, Galicia. Credit: YouTube/Guardia Civil
(Reuters) - An initiative on California's November ballot aimed at reining in prescription drug prices is favored by 66 percent of state voters, according to a new poll released on Thursday. The California Drug Price Relief Act, also known as Proposition 61, seeks to restrict state-run health programs from paying more for medications than prices paid by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, which is billed about 25 percent less for drugs than other government agencies. The poll of more than 1,900 registered voters conducted by University of Southern California (USC) and the Los Angeles Times found that 23 percent opposed the measure. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points. Opponents of the measure, led by pharmaceutical companies like Pfizer Inc, Merck & Co Inc and Amgen Inc, have raised $87.5 million to try to stop the measure. Proponents, led by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation and AARP, have raised around $10 million. The Yes on Prop 61 coalition estimates that its plan would save California taxpayers and consumers billions of dollars and "ultimately force the drug companies to moderate price increases across the board." But opponents, which include some labor unions and patient advocate groups like the California Chronic Care Coalition and the Lupus Foundation of Southern California, worry that a new price system could result in a long bureaucratic process, limiting patient access to vitally-needed medications. Most participants in California's low-income health program, known as Medi-Cal, are covered through private insurance plans that are paid a fixed fee for individual enrollees. That means that Proposition 61, if approved, would apply to around 4.5 million Californians, including Medi-Cal fee-for-service, state employees, university teachers and prisoners. It would not affect private employer-sponsored insurance plans, Medicare, or insurance sold on Obamacare exchanges. (Reporting By Deena Beasley; editing by Diane Craft)
By John Whitesides

LINCOLN PARK, Ga. (Reuters) - Louis Brooks, 87, has walked to cast a vote at his neighborhood polling place in Georgias predominantly black Lincoln Park neighborhood for five decades. But not this year.

Brooks says he will not vote in the presidential election for the first time he can remember after local officials moved the polling station more than 2 miles (3 km) away as part of a plan to cut the number of voting sites in Upson County.

"I can't get there. I can't drive, and it's too far to walk," said Brooks, a black retired mill worker and long-time Democratic Party supporter. He said he does not know how to vote by mail and doesn't know anyone who can give him a ride.

A Reuters survey found local governments in nearly a dozen, mostly Republican-dominated counties in Georgia have adopted plans to reduce the number of voting stations, citing cost savings and efficiency.

In seven of those counties, African-Americans, who traditionally back Democrats, comprised at least a quarter of the population, and in several counties the changes will disproportionately affect black voters. At least three other counties in Georgia dropped consolidation plans under public pressure.

While polling place cutbacks are on the rise across the country, including in some Democratic-run areas, the South's history of racial discrimination has made the region a focus of concern for voting rights advocates.

Activists see the voting place reductions as another front in the fight over Republican-sponsored statewide voting laws such as stricter ID requirements that disproportionately affect minority and poorer voters who tend to vote for the Democratic Party.

Several of these have recently been struck down by courts that ruled they were designed to hinder minority voting.

There is a history in those states of using different strategies to cut voting in minority communities, said Leah Aden, senior counsel at the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Legal Defense and Education Fund.

Story continues

"Hogwash," said Robert Haney, chairman of the Upson County Board of Elections, denying that race was a factor in his board's decision.

"Nobody is trying to keep anybody from voting," said Haney, adding that officials would send a ballot to the home of anyone who needed it. He said the cut in polling sites from nine to four was designed to increase efficiency by closing low-turnout sites, saving about $20,000.

The Nov. 8 election will be the first presidential contest since the Supreme Court ruled in 2013 that Georgia and all or parts of 14 other states with a history of racial discrimination no longer need federal approval for election law changes like polling place consolidations.

Since the court ruling, the Reuters survey found, more than two dozen local governments in eight of those states have implemented new cuts in polling places. Two thirds of those were met with public opposition.

Four of the states - Arizona, Georgia, Florida and North Carolina - could be election battlegrounds in the fight for the White House and control of the U.S. Senate.

"IMPACT CAN BE DISASTROUS"

"This is part of the story of voting in the South," said Willie Williams, a black small business owner from Daphne, Alabama, where polling stations were cut to two from five during last month's municipal elections over the objections of black voters.

Williams, who still keeps his father's receipt for his poll tax - the tax some blacks in the South had to pay to qualify to vote before civil rights laws in the 1960s eliminated it - says the reduction was "just another tool in the tool kit for shaving off minority votes."

Daphne city officials denied any racial motivation, saying the changes were meant to improve safety and create better access and parking for voters.

Still, Isela Gutierrez, a research director at the liberal group Democracy North Carolina, says the effects of such cutbacks can be wide ranging. "The elections boards aren't lying when they say some of these locations have low turnout and it makes better administrative sense to close them - but the impact can be disastrous.

Numerous academic studies have found people are less likely to vote the farther they must travel and the longer they must wait in line, which becomes more likely with fewer voting sites.

"Some of these changes individually may affect only a small number of voters, but in the aggregate across the country it will be a very large number of voters," said Danielle Lang, voting rights counsel at the Campaign Legal Center, a Washington-based voting rights and campaign finance group.

The issue gained prominence in a March primary in Arizona's Maricopa County, where more than 30 percent of residents are Hispanic. A decision to slash polling places left voters in lines for up to five hours. Republican county officials said they misjudged turnout.

CONSOLIDATIONS

Georgia has been an epicenter for efforts to reduce polling places since the Supreme Court decision. And in that state, which has not backed a Democrat in a presidential election since 1992, polls show Republican Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in a close battle for the presidency that could be decided by turnout of minority voters.

"If you want to restrict voter turnout in minority and disadvantaged communities, a good way is to move a polling place somewhere they can't get to," said Stacey Abrams, Democratic leader in the Georgia state legislature.

Hans von Spakovsky, a senior legal fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation, said race was being unfairly inserted into the debate on polling place changes.

"It's election officials making adjustments based on the changing ways people are voting," he said.

A Reuters analysis, using voter registration lists for 2012 and 2016, found at least two Georgia counties where the changes disproportionately affect blacks.

A consolidation plan in Macon-Bibb County closed six polling places in black-majority neighborhoods, and only two in white majority areas. McDuffie County's decision to eliminate three polling places means two-thirds of the county's black voters, and one-third of its white voters, will now vote in one location.

Other changes have had little impact on minority voters. In Georgia's Lumpkin County, for example, where blacks are just 2 percent of the population, officials consolidated seven polling locations into one to make the county compliant with federal disability laws.

Voting rights groups in several states have tried to form patchwork networks to track the changes, which are not well publicized, and then fight back where necessary with threats of lawsuits, petition drives or complaints to federal officials.

In Upson County, Haney said, the elections board dropped a proposal to close a polling site in heavily black Salem, a sparsely populated rural area, after residents pointed out the hardship of traveling an extra 10 miles (16 km) or more.

But the Lincoln Park site, which had just 230 voters cast a ballot in person on Election Day 2012, was more easily combined with a polling place in the center of the nearby town of Thomaston, he said.

Kay King, the only African-American member of the elections board in Upson County and the only one to vote against the voting site closures, said she knew it meant some Lincoln Park residents would not be able to vote.

"They walk to the store, they walk to church - when you don't have transportation to get to something like this, it makes you not want to do it, you just throw your hands up," she said.

(Additional reporting by Andy Sullivan in Washington; Editing by Jason Szep and Ross Colvin)
Jerusalem (AFP) - Former Israeli president and Nobel laureate Shimon Peres remained stable Saturday, four days after a major stroke, his doctor said.

The 93-year-old remained sedated and on a respirator after suffering a stroke and internal bleeding on Tuesday, Peres's personal physician and son-in-law Rafi Walden told AFP.

His condition has improved since, however it is still described as serious but stable.

Israeli public radio said early Saturday that Peres "had a quiet night" in the hospital near Tel Aviv where he is being treated but his life remained in danger.

Israeli President Reuven Rivlin visited his predecessor and spoke to his relatives at the hospital on Saturday evening but did not discuss his medical condition with reporters.

"We pray for the improvement of Shimon's condition and send our support to his family and the medical staff," Rivlin said.

"There's no greater fighter than Shimon Peres -- if it depends on him he will win."

Peres has held nearly every major office in Israel, serving twice as prime minister. He was president, a mostly ceremonial role, from 2007 to 2014.

He won the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize jointly with prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat for his role in negotiating the Oslo Accords, which envisioned an independent Palestinian state.

The former hawk turned dove is widely respected both in Israel and abroad, regularly meeting world leaders and celebrities.

Pope Francis wrote to Peres on Thursday saying he had "prayed for strength for the family and for a full recovery".

The letter said the Pope held a special prayer for Peres alongside Rabbi Abraham Skorka of Argentina.

Peres and the Pope last met two months ago when Peres visited the Vatican, while in 2014 they made a joint prayer for peace alongside Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.

US Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump also wrote to wish Peres a "swift recovery".

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"You are among the last of a generation of leaders who fought for the right of the Jewish people to shape their own destiny," Trump wrote.

Trump's Democrat rival Hillary Clinton, former British prime minister Tony Blair and Russian President Vladimir Putin have also enquired about his condition.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told the Security Council Thursday he was hoping for a "swift and full recovery", calling Peres "tireless in seeking peace between Israelis and Palestinians".

He said that unfortunately, 23 years after the first Oslo Accord, "we are further than ever from its goals".
By Jeff Mason FAIRFAX, Va. (Reuters) - Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton's campaign deployed a popular surrogate on Friday to gin up enthusiasm amid young voters who could be critical to victory on Nov. 8: Michelle Obama. The U.S. first lady and wife of President Barack Obama, who won the White House in 2008 and 2012 with high levels of support from young voters, told a crowd of students in Virginia that they could mean the difference between a Clinton win or a loss to Republican nominee Donald Trump. "Lets be clear, elections aren't just about who votes, but who doesnt vote. And that is especially true for young people like all of you," she said, noting that voters under the age of 30 provided the margin of victory for Obama in the swing states of Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida and Virginia in 2012. "Without those votes, Barack would have lost those states and he definitely would have lost that election. Period, end of story," she said. A New York Times/CBS poll this week showed Clinton with more support from people under 30 than Trump but still well below the levels Obama achieved. Though she has not yet been a frequent presence on the 2016 campaign trail, Mrs. Obama has proven to be an especially powerful advocate for Clinton, her husband's one-time rival. Her speech in support of Clinton at the Democratic convention in July was praised as one of the best of that event. Im inspired," she said, listing Clinton's positions in public service and rejecting arguments that Clinton was not an inspiring figure. The current first lady praised the former first lady as one of the most qualified people for the office of president in history. "So we cannot afford to squander this opportunity, particularly given the alternative. Because here is what we know: that being president isnt anything like reality TV," Mrs. Obama said, referring to Trump, a former reality television host. A president could not just "pop off" when making life or death decisions about war and peace, she said without naming Trump. Mrs. Obama noted that the country was in a time of transition, just like her family, which was about to move into a new house. She joked that they had to make sure the White House was cleaned up so they could get their security deposit back. Then she referred to the transition in 2008 with a dig at Trump for questioning whether Barack Obama was born in Hawaii. On Friday he finally conceded that Obama was U.S. born. "There were those who questioned, and continued to question for the past eight years, up through this very day, whether my husband was even born in this country," she said to boos. "I think Barack has answered those questions with the example hes set: by going high when they go low." (Reporting by Jeff Mason; Editing by Chris Reese)
Lisbon (AFP) - Portugal's prime minister on Friday said he had called for "clarifications" from European Commission head Jean-Claude Juncker that there would be no "discriminatory treatment" of his EC predecessor Jose Manuel Barroso, whose decision to work for Goldman Sachs has sparked controversy.

"I asked for clarifications from the president of the Commission on the decision taken in relation to Mr Barroso," said Antonio Costa, quoted by the Portuguese news agency Lusa, on the margins of Friday's EU summit in Bratislava.

"We must ensure that there is no discriminatory treatment" in particular "compared to other former members of the commission who might be in similar situations," prime minister Costa said.

Former commission head Barroso, prime minister of Portugal from 2002-2004, earlier this week accused Brussels of discrimination after it ordered an ethics probe into his new role at US investment bank Goldman Sachs.

"Not only are these actions discriminatory but they appear to be inconsistent with decisions taken in respect of other former members of the Commission," Barroso said in a letter to Juncker, who succeeded him in the top Brussels job.

In his sternly-worded letter dated Tuesday, Barroso deplored claims "that the mere fact of working with Goldman Sachs raises questions of integrity."

These "baseless and wholly unmerited" claims are "discriminatory against me and against Goldman Sachs", he said.

The probe, which Juncker notified to the European Union's official watchdog on Monday, marked a significant U-turn by the Commission which had previously defended Barroso.

Juncker also said Barroso will now be received at the Commission, the executive arm of the 28-nation bloc, as a simple lobbyist rather than with the pomp and protocol due a former head.

Barroso said he took particular offence to the "specific suggestion ... that Goldman Sachs is employing me as a lobbyist and adviser in relation to the forthcoming Brexit discussions."

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"I have not been engaged to lobby on behalf of Goldman Sachs and I do not intend to do so," Barroso said.

French President Francois Hollande has previously attacked Barroso's appointment at Goldman Sachs as "morally unacceptable".

Goldman Sachs was heavily involved in selling complex financial products, including high-risk sub-prime mortgages that many blame for causing the global financial crisis in 2008.

Critics believe the company was also key to the complex finance mechanisms that helped Greece hide the true state of its public finances in the lead-up to the debt crisis.

Barroso headed the Commission from 2004 to 2014, overseeing membership for several former communist states in Eastern Europe, the response to the global financial crash and the ensuing eurozone debt crisis.
* Yields extend rise after Thursday's sell-off

* Budget warning, bailout talk feed investor nerves

* S&P scheduled to review country's credit rating

* Review seen as cue for bigger rating test ahead

By John Geddie

LONDON, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Portuguese bonds reeled from their worst day since June on Friday, before a ratings review that will serve as a prelude for a more crucial test of the country's creditworthiness next month.

Standard and Poor's is not expected to alter its junk rating for Portugal on Friday. But any warnings on its economy -- such as those from Portugal's budget watchdog on Thursday -- may feed fears that DBRS will remove the country's last investment-grade rating, which Lisbon needs to qualify for ECB bond purchases on Oct. 21.

Losing the support of the central bank could raise the prospect of a second bailout for Lisbon in five years, as its anti-austerity government battles a banking crisis and is at loggerheads with Brussels over its budget deficit.

Local media reported on Thursday that Prime Minister Antonio Costa rejected claims there will be another bailout -- but analysts at Commerzbank said the mere mention of the word had spooked investors.

"It may become a self-fulfilling prophecy," Commerzbank strategist David Schnautz said.

While all other euro zone yields fell on Friday, Portugal's 10-year yields rose 4 basis points to 3.45 percent , extending a rise of some 15 bps on Thursday after the country's budget watchdog warned of a slowdown in the economy and a deficit that would miss EU targets.

Thursday's sell-off marked the biggest daily rise in yields since Britain's vote to leave the European Union rattled markets on June 24.

It is against this backdrop that investors are giving such keen attention to a routine assessment of the country's rating by Standard and Poor's, due to be released after markets close on Friday.

Standard & Poor's currently rates Portugal below investment grade at BB+, with a stable outlook. But it said at its last review in March that it expected Lisbon's recovery to moderate throughout 2016.

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Another agency Moody's, which has the same rating and outlook as S&P, said this week that a fragile banking sector, stuttering economy and high debts were exerting downward pressures on the country's rating.

Similar warnings by S&P would not bode well for bigger tests next month.

First, Lisbon's coalition government has until Oct. 15 to submit its 2017 budget to the European Commission. Analysts say keeping all parties happy while tightening the belt to meet EU demands may prove difficult.

If this creates any more friction with Brussels, it could prove ominous for the second big test a week later, when DBRS assesses Portugal's rating.

DBRS's BBB (low) rating for Portugal -- the only investment- grade rank of the four ECB-recognised rating agencies -- has been a vital prop, allowing Portuguese bonds to remain part of the European Central Bank's 1.7 trillion euro buying programme.

The rating carries a stable outlook, giving Lisbon some breathing space, but DBRS's sovereign ratings chief told Reuters last month that pressures are building on Portugal's creditworthiness.

"A number of factors are conspiring to see Portugal have by far the highest country-specific risk sensitivity of any of the major euro zone countries," Rabobank said in a note on Friday.

For Reuters new Live Markets blog on European and UK stock markets see reuters://realtime/verb=Open/url=http://emea1.apps.cp.extranet.thomsonreuters.biz/cms/?pageId=livemarkets (Editing by Larry King)
Before Donald Trump finally affirmed his belief that President Obama was actually born in the U.S., President Obama responded to Donald Trumps earlier refusal to weigh in at the top of a meeting in the Oval Office on Friday.

The president was meeting with business leaders and state and local officials at the White House to discuss the Trans Pacific Partnership when he answered a shouted question about Trumps birtherism from the press pool.

At first, the president said he was shocked that a question had come up when we have so many other things to do. Then, it seems, he thought about what year it was and responded accordingly.

Well, Im not that shocked actually. Its fairly typical. We got other things to attend to, Obama said. I was pretty confident about where I was born. I think most people were as well. My hope would be the presidential elect, election reflects more serious issues than that.

Trump has long been one of the most prominent members of the birther movement, calling into question President Obamas country of origin and therefore the legitimacy of his presidency. Amid his campaign reboot, however, Trump campaign officials have been suggesting their candidate now accepts that the president was in fact born in the U.S. But Trump himself had yet to utter the words himself before putting the issue to rest during a press conference at the new Trump Hotel in Washington on Friday morning.

Its no secret that President Barack Obama is disappointed in the direction much of the campaign to succeed him has taken. During a rally for Hillary Clinton in Philadelphia earlier this week he laid out a fierce rebuke of Donald Trump, a man he believes is neither qualified nor prepared to lead the U.S.
Prince William to the rescue!

During a royal engagement with Kate Middleton in Harlow, England, on Friday, the Duke of Cambridge rushed over to help 72-year-old Vice Lord Lieutenant of Essex, Jonathan Douglas-Hughes, who took a scary tumble while welcoming the couple to Stewarts Academy.

WATCH: Kate Middleton and Prince William Promote Children's Mental Health

Getty Images

William offered a helping hand, bringing the dignitary to his feet. Once upright, the Lord flashed a smile, letting onlookers know he was OK.

Getty Images

During the incident, Middleton, clad in a $2,150 powder blue Altuzarra Aimee polka dot button-front dress which featured a bold slit, stood nearby and watched as her husband performed the heroic move.

Getty Images

WATCH: Kate Middleton Makes a Style Statement in $30 Pants From the Gap

The Duke and Duchess were at the secondary school to discuss the importance of mental health in schools, and to promote the Heads Together campaign, which the royal couple established in May with the help of Prince Harry "to change the conversation on mental health from shame to support."

The official Twitter for Kensington Palace shared highlights from the day, writing, "Thanks @StewardsAcademy for such an incredibly warm (and loud) welcome, despite the rain @heads_together."

Thanks @StewardsAcademy for such an incredibly warm (and very loud) welcome, despite the rain  @heads_together pic.twitter.com/NpKHgkFUdn  Kensington Palace (@KensingtonRoyal) September 16, 2016

NEWS: Kate Middleton and Prince William Meet a Baby Dinosaur

Ahead of their appearance, William penned a blog post, detailing how much this campaign means to him, especially now being a father to two children -- Prince George, 3, and Princess Charlotte, 1.

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"The truth is, for many young people, the changing schools or starting a new academic year is really difficult to deal with," he wrote. "Catherine and I have young children who will be going through this themselves in a short period of time, and like all parents we will want to make sure that our children are not just able to achieve their academic potential at school but are also happy and emotionally supported."

"Talking can make us realise we are not alone," he added. "If we could end the old fashioned idea that feeling down is something to be ashamed of, something that you shouldn't burden others with, we would make our society a much happier and healthier place. By encouraging children to talk and to get support, we could stop these feelings developing into more serious problems that continue into adulthood."

WATCH: Princess Charlotte Is Headed to North America on Her First Royal Tour!

Related Articles
Prince William wrote in a blog post prior to his tour of a school north of London that he hopes his children George and Charlotte will be "emotionally supported" at school.



When he he arrived at Stewards Academy in Harlow on Friday, he had to lend some physical support  after a local dignitary, Vice Lord Lieutenant of Essex, Jonathan Douglas-Hughes, accidentally tripped and fell over while welcoming him and Princess Kate.



The prince rushed to Douglas-Hughes' aid and helped the shaken man to his feet.



Princess Kate looked on in shock as the scene unfolded.







"I'm fine thank you," Douglas-Hughes, who serves as the Queen's representative in Essex, told PEOPLE. "The duke was very concerned but I reassured him I was perfectly all right."



William and Kate, who wore a blue patterned dress by New York-based designer Altuzarra, visited Stewards Academy to highlight how educators and parents can support children through difficult times in school, especially at the start of the new academic year.



Before the visit, William penned a blog post for Heads Together, the mental health campaign he shares with Kate and brother Prince Harry.



"For many young people, the changing schools or starting a new academic year is really difficult to deal with," he wrote. "Catherine and I have young children who will be going through this themselves in a short period of time, and like all parents we will want to make sure that our children are not just able to achieve their academic potential at school but are also happy and emotionally supported."

Prince William Rushes to Help Dignitary Who Fell Over at School Tour with Princess Kate| The British Royals, The Royals, Kate Middleton, Prince William





WATCH: Do You Want a Job in Buckingham Palace?



At the school, "the emotional health of children is regarded as highly as the students' academic performance," William wrote in his blog post.



A key is the help provided by one of Kate's charities, Place2be, and by an atmosphere of openness about asking for help.



"All of us who are adults remember how daunting it was, but we sometimes take it for granted that children will be able to cope with the change," William wrote.





Prince William Rushes to Help Dignitary Who Fell Over at School Tour with Princess Kate| The British Royals, The Royals, Kate Middleton, Prince William



 Want to keep up with the latest royals coverage? Click here to subscribe to the Royals Newsletter.



Asking for help is okay William wrote, "talking can make us realize we are not alone."



"By encouraging children to talk and to get support, we could stop these feelings developing into more serious problems that continue into adulthood. We all need someone to turn to at some point in our lives  even if it's an anonymous phone line or web-chat service; or a friend, teacher or family member. Someone who we can trust. That's what Catherine, Harry and I are working towards  we know it's a big ambition, but we think it's important.



In a speech inside the school, William said that he and Kate "are really impressed by what we have seen of Stewards Academy, as we're both strong believers in schools where the emotional well-being of young people is nurtured and protected just as much as your learning and academic skills."



"It is particularly good to see the role played in this positive culture by Place2Be, a charity that is in the team that Is part of our Heads Together campaign."




By Chris Arsenault RIO DE JANEIRO (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - The Amazon rainforest holds the biological keys to kick-start a "fourth industrial revolution" if its biodiversity is protected, said a study published on Friday. New digital technologies such a 3-D printing and quantum computing create the potential for the Amazon's unique plants to drive major advances in medicine and engineering, said the study by Brazilian scientists. "Leveraging the Amazon's vast biomimetic and biodiversity assets, we can aspire to develop revolutionary innovations in multiple fields," said Juan Carlos Castilla-Rubio, one of the study's authors and chairman of Space Time Ventures, a Brazilian technology company. "For example, a long-lasting foam produced by a species of frog has inspired the creation of new technologies for capturing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere." Amazon plants could also lead to breakthroughs in antiseptics, anti-wrinkle creams, gynecological medicines and anti-inflammatory drugs if they are coupled with new technologies, said the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Deforestation and climate change are threatening to turn the world's largest tropical forest into dry savannah land, destroying its biological promise, said the study. If more than 40 percent of the forest is cleared, the resulting "savannization" process could become irreversible, said the study. Currently about 20 percent of the Amazon basin rainforest has been cut down, said Castilla-Rubio. "If business as usual continues, the Amazon will transform into savannah... this has massive consequences," he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. Brazil has reduced the rate of illegal deforestation by nearly 80 percent in the last decade, the study said, meaning there is still time to stop the rainforest from becoming savannah land. Protecting indigenous land rights, combating climate change and providing the right incentives for businesses to move away from extracting natural resources are crucial for further reducing the deforestation rate, Castilla-Rubio said. Much of the forest was cleared for economic activities such as mining, cattle ranching, agriculture or logging, but the study shows the Amazon has more value if left standing, he said. (Reporting By Chris Arsenault; Editing by Ros Russell; Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women's rights, trafficking and climate change. Visit news.trust.org)
Arizona State University

Nearly 1 million international students study at colleges and universities across the United States, up 40% from a decade ago.

These students are heading stateside to gain access to some of the best higher education in the world  and they're paying top dollar for it.

In fact, recent data from SelfScore, a company providing financial services to international students, reveals that foreign students pay up to three times more than in-state students at public universities, "effectively subsidizing tuition costs for domestic students and functioning as a bailout for universities."

International students are crucial to the US economy in two primary ways: They're financing a chunk of education costs for public universities and their domestic students, and they're fueling the US tech industry.

The data suggests the relationship between US public colleges and foreign students grows increasingly interdependent.

In 2015, the country's public universities gleaned more than $9 billion in tuition and fees from foreign students, according to SelfScore's analysis. That's about 28% of annual tuition revenue coming from foreign students, who make up an average of just 12% of the student population. Private institutions are no exception to enrolling high numbers of international students, but data is more difficult to come by, and their tuition costs will vary less student-to-student.

At Arizona State University, the public university with the largest number of international students (10,678 students, or about 14% of the total student population), in-state undergraduates pay $10,370, non-Arizona resident undergraduates pay $26,470, and international undergraduates pay $28,270 in base tuition and fees for the 2016-17 academic year.

On top of paying significantly higher tuition costs, international students are largely paying out of pocket for their education at public colleges. According to SelfScore, American banks don't recognize foreign students' credit histories often until after they've graduated and entered the US labor market, disabling them from securing financial aid or student loans.

Story continues

About 72% of funding for international college students comes from personal and family funds, as well as home country government or university assistance, according to the US Commerce and Education departments.

As of 2015, China, India, and South Korea sent the highest numbers of students to US colleges. And they're not only helping out colleges and domestic students. In the 2014-15 academic year, international student enrollment supported about 373,300 total US jobs and contributed more than $30 billion to the US economy.

Foreign students are also fueling Silicon Valley

Of the 974,926 foreign undergraduate and graduate students studying in the US, about half are currently studying science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) topics, thus "creating a solid pipeline of talent for jobs in the US technology sector," writes Kalpesh Kapadiam, cofounder and CEO of SelfScore, in an article for Tech Crunch.

Elon Musk

In fact, a National Foundation for American Policy report found that "nearly one-quarter (20) of the 87 billion-dollar US startup companies  and almost half of the companies with an immigrant founder  had a founder who first came to America as an international student."

But while the students  and eventually graduates  are an asset to both colleges and the tech economy, a Wall Street Journal analysis recently revealed that at several schools foreign students are more likely to disrupt academic integrity by cheating.

In their study, The Journal requested data from 50 public universities with student bodies heavy with foreign enrollment. Of the 14 that were able to provide complete data for the 2014-15 academic year, reports of cheating involving foreign students ranged from twice as high to eight times as high at some institutions.

But universities aren't quick to punish foreign students who cheat. Rather, any concerns are trumped by their desire to retain those students paying higher tuition costs.

"I can assure you that somewhere someone at the university is doing a calculus about how much tuition they would lose if they start coming down hard on students who cheat," Beth Mitchneck, a University of Arizona professor, told The Journal.

NOW WATCH: Don't be afraid to cancel cable  here's how to watch all of your favorite shows for less than $42 a month





More From Business Insider


On Sep 13, 2016, we issued an updated research report on Netherlands-based molecular diagnostics provider Qiagen NV QGEN. The company offers innovative technologies and products for pre-analytical sample preparation and molecular diagnostics solutions.

The companys promising second-quarter results reflect Qiagens constant efforts to strengthen its molecular diagnostics test menu. Notably, given the advantages of precise genetic information over traditional tests, Qiagens molecular diagnostics customer class succeeded in delivering high single-digit growth during the second quarter, excluding HPV headwind in the U.S.

Also, the huge potential of the global in-vitro diagnostics market buoys optimism. The company has witnessed growth across all international regions, with the Europe, Middle East, Africa region leading the show. Although Qiagen continued to face declining sales during the second quarter in Japan, management expects the trend to reverse in the second half of 2016.

Further, Qiagen is forging ahead with its test menu expansion strategy. Recently Qiagen added liquid biopsy as a sample type option for its QIAact actionable insights tumor panel, which is the first in a family of panels designed for use on the GeneReader system. This is the first targeted gene sequencing panel that can be used with either liquid biopsy or tissue samples.

On the flip side, Qiagen faces a tough competitive landscape, considering the wide gamut of services it provides. Moreover, the markets for some of Qiagens products are rather competitive and price sensitive. As a result, similar manufacturers may have significant advantages in terms of financial, operational, sales and marketing resources as well as experience in research and development.

Additionally, strong reliance on its tie-ups with companies to co-develop companion diagnostics paired with drugs that those companies either market currently or are developing for future use, js another downside for Qiagen. This is because future sales of companion diagnostics depend to a high degree on the commercial success of the related medicines for which the tests have been designed for determining their use in patients.

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Currently, Qiagen carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).

Key Picks in the Sector

Some other favorably ranked med-biomed/generic stocks are ANI Pharmaceuticals, Inc. ANIP, Anika Therapeutics Inc. ANIK and Heska Corporation HSKA. All the three stocks hold a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy).You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

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By Jeffrey Hodgson TORONTO (Reuters) - Racial tensions in the United States and a polarized electorate make a new film about President Lyndon B Johnson relevant for modern audiences, director Rob Reiner says. "LBJ", which had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival on Thursday evening, stars Woody Harrelson as the Texas politician unexpectedly brought to power by the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963. The film follows Johnson from the years just before his selection as vice president, to his battle to pass landmark civil rights legislation. Reiner, who has directed films as diverse as legal drama "A Few Good Men" and the comedy "This Is Spinal Tap", said he was struck by how the issues of race at the center of "LBJ" are very much present in the U.S. presidential election campaign. The campaign has seen Democrat Hillary Clinton blast Republican Donald Trump as a divisive candidate, stoking racist groups. Trump has said Clinton let black Americans down. Reiner, who has actively supported Clinton, said Trump has "basically unearthed" racism in the country that had been submerged for some time. "It's a weird thing because we're talking about these issues in the film and these issues are still existing now and we're seeing a candidate from a major party giving voice to them," he said in an interview ahead of the premiere. The director said he wanted to capture the complexity of Johnson, a seemingly confident leader who harbored deep insecurities and went from opposing civil rights to using his considerable political skill to advance the cause. Harrelson said taking the role was a daunting prospect. The film depicts Johnson's famous capacity for vulgarity, as well as his ability to plead, bully, cajole, charm and threaten politicians to achieve his objectives. "It was scary to try to pull it off because he's a bigger than life character," Harrelson said. Before taking the part, Harrelson said he didn't like Johnson because of his role in escalating the Vietnam war, but noted as president he seemed to care about advancing civil rights legislation. "It would be impossible not to see the relevance of the race related stuff to what goes on right now. That was also one of the aspects of the film that I felt most inspired by because it really does apply to these times," he said. (Reporting by Jeffrey Hodgson; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore)
In Bridget Jones's Baby, the beloved British heroine of the 2001 hit Bridget Jones's Diary has experienced a few changes: she's landed a big job in television, is typing her diary entries on an iPad, and, of course, suddenly gotten pregnant (by either her longtime love interest Colin Firth or new beau Patrick Dempsey).

But what's remained the same in the Universal threequel, out today, is Renee Zellweger, who originated Helen Fielding's single and self-deprecating character onscreen. "She was still gorgeous and beautiful and talented," Sharon Maguire, who also directed Bridget Jones's Diary, tells The Hollywood Reporter. "All I saw was an actress who had aged fifteen years, and I thought, 'Fantastic, that's exactly what we need for this.'"

Maguire chats with THR about digitizing Bridget's diary, listening to her inner Obama voice and shutting out naysayers who critiqued Zellweger's appearance: "We should photograph them naked and look at what they looked like fifteen years ago, and then see how different they look now. We can all sit around scrutinizing [their looks] rather than what they actually have to say or contribute to the world and culture."

Read more: Renee Zellweger on Aging in Hollywood, Gender Inequality, Politics and Her Six-Year Break

How did it feel to return to Bridget Jones after 15 years?

It was scary and exhilarating all at the same time, to be honest. But I was one of those mothers in my forties that didn't actually get married until I was after fifty, so I felt I knew that there was a good story here, one with authenticity and humor. Then I thought, "Yes, I've missed them all so much, we need to continue the journey together." And to bring in new characters too [played by Patrick Dempsey, Emma Thompson and Sarah Solemani] as new sources of humor.

Emma Thompson and Renee Zellweger in Bridget Jones's Baby. Photo credit: Universal Pictures.

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How important was incorporating today's technology into the plot?

Yes! Bridget, I would imagine, was a bit resistant to it all, as I was for a while, but she's had to get with the project because otherwise she'd fall off the face of the Earth. But that's very much how we diarize our lives these days. There was a nice, interesting debate at one time about whether she would still keep a written diary. Myself and the writers, we all talked about it for ourselves, and it's very much on a computer or an iPad. Then we came up with the idea of having her make mistakes - I always type my zeroes instead of o's - to personalize the idea of the [digital] diary.

At the beginning of the movie, Bridget announces she's reached her goal weight. Why?

It was a specific thing. We liked the idea that this character thinks she's evolved in certain ways, but hasn't really. In the first movie, she was depending on those like a religion in some ways: she counted her calories, she counted cigarettes, she liked to watch her weight, and all of that was really a substitute for finding some meaning in her life. So we liked the idea of pulling the rug from under her even more in this one: she's got down to her ideal weight and she's given up cigarettes, but she still hasn't found meaning in her life.

Do you envision more Bridget Jones installments in the future?

Well, there's a whole book that hasn't been filmed yet, another story that hasn't been made, that's all I'm saying. But I don't know. That's a question for the studio and Helen [Fielding]. I guess maybe we'd have to see how this one does. Let's hope so.

Read more: Renee Zellweger Reveals Her "Very Bridget Jones Moment" From 2001 Premiere

]

Bridget Jones's Diary was your first feature. What advice would you give those getting behind the camera?

I would say all of movie-making is tough. I'm sorry; it's probably what I shouldn't be saying, but to bring something in on-time and on-budget - we had three-and-a-half hours worth of material to shoot in ten weeks - it's really, really hard to do that. Every day I woke up feeling a bit sick; I'm thinking, "We're never going to do it, oh my god." And then I'd go, "Yes you can, come on." Your little Obama voice: Yes you can. Listen to your inner Obama-voice. The truth is, I have that voice everyday - not just about filmmaking, which goes, "You'll never do it, you'll never pull it off, you can't do it." Then I just go, "Ah, f - it, yes you can." And if you fail, you fail. Just fail good. But keep going and don't listen to the naysayers, and don't listen to your own naysaying voice. That is the most important thing. You are going to screw things up, and you are going to mess it up, but just be persistent. If you've got a story to tell, just keep going with it.

Colin Firth, Renee Zellweger, director Sharon Maguire and Patrick Dempsey at the Madrid premiere of Bridget Jones's Baby. Photo credit: Getty Images.

What was a particularly tough moment while making this movie?

We started filming a rom-com at the beginning of winter - which we really shouldn't have done, because you need long, nice, sunny days. But nearly every time we took the camera outside, there was a storm with a name - Storm Howard or a Storm Clifford or some other bloody storm would turn up. We were filming against the elements, so that was all quite hard. It was all hard!

What's one of your favorite moments while making this movie?

One image comes to my mind: We filmed a little scene with Mr. Darcy [Colin Firth] on her doorstep - that was a moment for me, because I've got that big poster on my wall of that scene with her [from Bridget Jones's Diary]. I said I wanted to take a real moment with the actors, and they just laughed out loud at me because of my ridiculous sentimentality. They were, "Oh, shut up. Come on, get on with it."

Read more: 'Bridget Jones's Baby': Film Review

This third film zooms in on Bridget in her forties - an uncommon age for a heroine in Hollywood, unfortunately.

Yes! It was fantastic. It's like we don't go to the movies and want to see films about ourselves, no more than whatever else is in. It's great to have loads of Marvel movies, but the movies that reflect our lives - that's why I came to the movies, and that's what I love. I want to see stories about my life being reflected back at me, and there's not that many of those anymore. It's a real shame. TV seems to have taken over in that department, the actors say. It is great and it is needed. And because there are so many amazing actresses in that age bracket. So hopefully there's more. I hope this film does well, and that tells people that if you make movies like that, there's money to be made as well.

Renee Zellweger in Bridget Jones's Baby. Photo credit: Universal Pictures.

Bridget Jones was one of the original single female characters onscreen - a type of character that's changed a lot over the past fifteen years. Is Bridget Jones still relevant?

Yeah. I loved Sex in the City - my god, I watched every one. And I love Girls because it's so very different from Sex in the City; it just took a whole different slant and it's brutally honest. And there's another one here that's just started on British TV called Fleabag - that's totally dark, so politically incorrect and, as a result, very, very funny. But I think there's room for them all. I do think the authenticity of Bridget is still there - there are still Bridgets in all of us - and then I partly see lots of my younger friends in Girls. I love them all. I think anything that tries to be honest about reflecting a part of our lives is great.

What was your reaction to the comments regarding Zellweger's appearance when the film's trailer debuted?

I was away shooting something in Malaysia when that all. When I think back at Renee, all I saw was an actress who had aged fifteen years, and I thought, "Fantastic, that's exactly what we need for this." She was still gorgeous and beautiful and talented. What she wrote was so eloquent and so honest; I don't think there's any more to be said about it. And I think the people that write about that stuff - I think we should photograph them naked and look at what they looked like fifteen years ago, and then see how different they look now. We can all sit around scrutinizing [their looks] rather than what they actually have to say or contribute to the world and culture.
By Steve Barnes

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (Reuters) - Rats have been evicted from the Arkansas governor's mansion but the lingering effects of a rodent infestation, including noxious odors, require its study to be demolished and rebuilt, officials said this week.

The rodents, in a non-partisan manner, have been a problem for former Governor Mike Beebe, a Democrat who served from 2007 to 2015, and for current Governor Asa Hutchinson, a Republican who has served since then.

"You can walk in (the study) today and still smell the rat stench. It looks fine, but it's hideous smelling," current first lady Susan Hutchinson told a commission on the mansion this week, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported.

The vermin nested in the walls of the governors home office until Beebe summoned exterminators. The odors emanate from remaining rat feces and corpses.

The first lady is helping secure a $1.1 million grant from the Arkansas Natural Resources Council for structural improvements to the 66-year-old mansion, including more than $60,000 to repair the governors study, a preservation official said.

A spokesman for the governor said the rats had created more than cosmetic problems.

"They caused some structural damage, gnawing at joists and sub flooring, said J.R. Davis, the incumbent governors press secretary.

The white-columned Georgian mansion, completed in 1950, rests on eight acres in Little Rocks historic Quapaw Quarter neighborhood. The governors study and its adjoining conference room are contained in a semi-detached building formerly used as a guest house.

(Reporting by Steve Barnes; Editing by Jon Herskovitz and Cynthia Osterman)
Raytheon Company RTN has won a contract from the U.S. Navy for offering cyberspace science, research, engineering, and technology integration. Valued at $98.1 million, this is a three-year contract that includes one two-year option ordering period which, if exercised, would raise the potential value of this contract to $165.9 million.

Majority of the work will be executed in San Diego and a very minimal percentage at other continental U.S. and outside continental U.S. locations. Work is expected to be over by Sep 14, 2019.

This contract was awarded by the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center Pacific, San Diego, CA, and will utilize research, development test and evaluation, operations and maintenance as well as other procurement funds.

RAYTHEON CO Price

RAYTHEON CO Price | RAYTHEON CO Quote

Under the terms of this contract, services to be rendered by Raytheon include technology assessment, development and transition; requirements analysis; systems engineering; operational and technical support; experimentation support; hardware and software development and prototyping; modeling and simulation; training; and security engineering/cybersecurity.

Meanwhile, this defense giant has also grabbed another contract for the manufacture and delivery of 18 AN/APG-79 Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) radars for Navy F/A-18E/F and EA-18G aircraft. Valued at $63 million, this contract was awarded by Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, MD.

Majority of the work will be performed in Forest, MS; Dallas, TX; while the rest in El Segundo, CA; and Andover, MA. Work is scheduled to be over in July 2018.

Under this contract, Raytheon will also offer procurement of two AN/APG-79 AESA radars in support of testing associated with the AESA configuration D upgrade, and one AN/APG-79 radar for the government of Australia. This particular contract will primarily utilize fiscal 2016 aircraft procurement and, to a lesser extent, foreign military sales (FMS) fund.

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Notably, Raytheons combat-proven AN/ APG-79 AESA radar system represents a significant advance in radar technology, which substantially increases the power of the U.S. Navy's F/A-18E/F Super Hornet aircraft in particular, making it less vulnerable than ever before. Currently this radar system also serves the Royal Australian Air Force.

Our View

With the U.S. fiscal 2016 bill emphasizing cyber programs, cyber-oriented work is expected to yield solid growth in the coming years. In recent years, Raytheon has invested more than $3.5 billion to expand its cybersecurity capabilities, as cybersecurity incidents have escalated an average 66% on a yearly basis between 2009 and 2014 globally.

Being one of the best-positioned large-cap defense players, Raytheons next-generation radar systems also offer advance defense solutions that attract potential customers like the U.S. Navy and defense administrators of foreign countries, thereby enhancing demand for Raytheons Integrated Defense Systems (IDS) products. Accordingly, we expect the aforementioned contracts to boost up the revenues that the company earns from its IDS business segment.

Strong Buy

Raytheon currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). A few better-ranked stocks in the aerospace and defense sector include Engility Holdings, Inc. EGL, General Dynamics Corp. GD and Ducommun Inc. DCO. While Engility and Ducommun sport a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), General Dynamics carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

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LONDON (Reuters) - Royal Bank of Scotland shares fell on Friday after U.S. authorities demanded $14 billion (10 billion pounds) from Deutsche Bank to settle mis-selling claims, raising fears about how much RBS might have to pay for similar misconduct.

The British state-backed lender has waited many months to hear how U.S. authorities including the Department of Justice (DoJ) and Federal Housing Finance Agency intend to punish its alleged mis-selling of asset-backed securities in the run up to the financial crisis.

Shareholders think RBS may need to shell out the biggest fine in its history, dwarfing the $612 million it had to pay for rate rigging in 2013. Friday's hefty claim against Deutsche was higher than the German bank expected and has raised questions about whether RBS should set aside more cash.

"At first sight, the cross-read is ugly, as it seems the DoJ is increasing its fines for every new settlement. There comes a point where it makes sense to go to trial, and in the DB case, we're well over that line at $15bn," Xavier van Hove, investment director at GAM, told Reuters.

"RBS needs to defend its interests vigorously and not let DoJ dictate the terms to them," he said.

At the end of June, RBS - which is more than 70 percent owned by the UK taxpayer - had $6.61 billion reserved against costs for litigation and fines, a sum which the bank said did not include penalties imposed by the DoJ.

Analysts at Jefferies has estimated the penalty at $2 billion while JPMorgan said on Wednesday they expected the bank to pay $3 billion to the DoJ.

JPM expects RBS to provision an additional $4.2 billion by the end of 2017, to cover a series of litigation and conduct issues which may include settlement of a U.S. style class action brought by investors who claim they were misled about the bank's financial health at the time of its rights issue in spring 2008.

The investors have already rejected a settlement offer in the region of 700 million pounds.

Story continues

For every $1 billion in additional litigation costs above that total, the British lender's core capital ratio - currently at 14.5 percent - would fall by 0.34 percent, JPMorgan said.

RBS declined to comment. Its shares were down nearly five percent at 184.5 pence at 1300 GMT.

The bill for settling RBS's legal cases could further stress the bank's capital position, which was scrutinised in the European Banking Authority's (EBA) stress tests on July 31.

The EBA said that under adverse conditions the bank's capital level could fall by 7.5 percentage points, the third worst outcome among 51 banks tested.

RBS had 43.4 billion pounds in Tier 1 capital at June 30 2016, according to company data, and total regulatory capital of 56.5 billion pounds.

Another investor source, who declined to be named, said efforts by the bank's senior management team to set aside cash to cover the U.S. fines had been complicated by accounting rules, which prohibited provisioning in the absence of solid data to support the estimate or guidance on timing.

Earlier this month RBS Chief Financial Officer Euan Stevenson told a conference that the bank now expected its negotiations with the DoJ to be in 2017.

"If Ross (McEwan) and Euan had their way, they would have more set aside for this. It's a debate for the auditors," the investor said.

(Reporting By Sinead Cruise and Lawrence White, additional reporting by Andrew MacAskill; Editing by Elaine Hardcastle)
LONDON (Reuters) - Royal Bank of Scotland <RBS.L> shares fell on Friday after U.S. authorities demanded $14 billion from Deutsche Bank <DBKGn.DE> to settle mis-selling claims, raising fears about how much RBS might have to pay for similar misconduct.

The British state-backed lender has waited many months to hear how U.S. authorities including the Department of Justice (DoJ) and Federal Housing Finance Agency intend to punish its alleged mis-selling of asset-backed securities in the run up to the financial crisis.

Shareholders think RBS may need to shell out the biggest fine in its history, dwarfing the $612 million it had to pay for rate rigging in 2013. Friday's hefty claim against Deutsche was higher than the German bank expected and has raised questions about whether RBS should set aside more cash.

"At first sight, the cross-read is ugly, as it seems the DoJ is increasing its fines for every new settlement. There comes a point where it makes sense to go to trial, and in the DB case, we're well over that line at $15bn," Xavier van Hove, investment director at GAM, told Reuters.

"RBS needs to defend its interests vigorously and not let DoJ dictate the terms to them," he said.

At the end of June, RBS - which is more than 70 percent owned by the UK taxpayer - had $6.61 billion reserved against costs for litigation and fines, a sum which the bank said did not include penalties imposed by the DoJ.

Analysts at Jefferies has estimated the penalty at $2 billion while JPMorgan said on Wednesday they expected the bank to pay $3 billion to the DoJ.

JPM expects RBS to provision an additional $4.2 billion by the end of 2017, to cover a series of litigation and conduct issues which may include settlement of a U.S. style class action brought by investors who claim they were misled about the bank's financial health at the time of its rights issue in spring 2008.

The investors have already rejected a settlement offer in the region of 700 million pounds.

Story continues

For every $1 billion in additional litigation costs above that total, the British lender's core capital ratio - currently at 14.5 percent - would fall by 0.34 percent, JPMorgan said.

RBS declined to comment. Its shares were down nearly five percent at 184.5 pence at 1300 GMT.

The bill for settling RBS's legal cases could further stress the bank's capital position, which was scrutinized in the European Banking Authority's (EBA) stress tests on July 31.

The EBA said that under adverse conditions the bank's capital level could fall by 7.5 percentage points, the third worst outcome among 51 banks tested.

RBS had 43.4 billion pounds in Tier 1 capital at June 30 2016, according to company data, and total regulatory capital of 56.5 billion pounds.

Another investor source, who declined to be named, said efforts by the bank's senior management team to set aside cash to cover the U.S. fines had been complicated by accounting rules, which prohibited provisioning in the absence of solid data to support the estimate or guidance on timing.

Earlier this month RBS Chief Financial Officer Euan Stevenson told a conference that the bank now expected its negotiations with the DoJ to be in 2017.

"If Ross (McEwan) and Euan had their way, they would have more set aside for this. It's a debate for the auditors," the investor said.

(Reporting By Sinead Cruise and Lawrence White, additional reporting by Andrew MacAskill; Editing by Elaine Hardcastle)
By Joe Bavier ABIDJAN (Reuters) - Rights groups have accused Ivory Coast authorities of failing to provide a minimum level of support when they evicted tens of thousands of illegal cocoa farmers from a national park, leaving them vulnerable and putting pressure on local communities. The government rejected the criticism on Friday. Park authorities and security forces started evicting the farmers and their families in July from the 34,000-hectare Mont Peko National Park as part of a nationwide operation to save rapidly disappearing forests. The United Nations estimated last month that as many as 53,000 people had been driven from the park. "The evacuation of Mont Peko resembles a forced expulsion carried out without sufficient regard for the rights of populations inside it and in surrounding areas," Ivorian rights group RAIDH's coordinator Bamba Sindou said. Government spokesman Bruno Kone rejected the criticism, saying the park's inhabitants had been repeatedly told over several years to prepare to leave. "The government is doing everything it can," he said. "All this time was intended to allow the population to leave with the least possible inconvenience." Ivory Coast is the world's leading cocoa producer, and exports make up about 15 percent of GDP. But it lost 80 percent of its virgin forest between independence from France in 1960 and 2010, according to the European Union, most of it due to agriculture. Hundreds of thousands of illegal farmers invaded its national parks and forest reserves during a decade of political turmoil that ended in a 2011 civil war. The government has pledging to restore forests on 20 percent of its national territory from less than 12 percent today. New York-based group Human Rights Watch (HRW) said in a statement that, while farmers were notified of the impending evictions, the authorities failed to ensure that villages bordering Mont Peko could shelter and feed them. The result has been a crush on resources - including food, health and sanitation - in an area that was already a hotbed of tensions left over from years of land conflicts and civil war. "International law protects anyone who occupies land from forced evictions that either do not provide adequate notice or do not respect the dignity and rights of those affected, regardless of whether they occupy the land legally," HRW said. (Editing by Louise Ireland)
EXCLUSIVE: As much as any film that played the 2016 Toronto Film Festival, Jackie emerges with real momentum as a genuine Oscar contender. The Pablo Larrain-directed film with Natalie Portman in a career performance as Jackie Kennedy locked a Fox Searchlight deal and a December 9 release date here. I was having lunch with the films screenwriter, Noah Oppenheim, the moment his email pinged with news he had just been awarded the screenplay prize by the Venice jury. I was curious how a guy whos poised to be the next hot movie scribe happens to have this second identity. He also is the executive in charge at NBCs Today and has helped steer it back to the top of the morning news show ratings. It turns out these disciplines are intertwined in a most unusual career progression. Here, Oppenheim explains how he runs a four-hour network morning program and yet scripted a touching drama about a subject most hadnt considered: Jackie Kennedys grace-under-fire handling of the days following her husbands assassination.

A political junkie since his teens, Oppenheim said he wrote articles in the high school newspaper and continued in college, completely at sea over how he was going to pay back the kind of student loan debt one accrues when they matriculate at Harvard. My senior year, I got lucky, he said. A couple of guys from NBC News were driving from New Hampshire back to New York, a week from the New Hampshire presidential primary. They stopped off at Harvard Square and started talking to some undergraduate girls at a bar. They followed them to a late-night party at the newspaper building, and one picked up a copy of the paper and read an article Id written about the presidential race. They asked these girls who wrote it, and they pointed to me  the drunk idiot in the corner. They waved me over, said they work for NBC and how would I like to come be on television and talk about the election from the youth perspective? I thought they were middle-aged con artists trying to crash a college party, but I gave them my number and, thankfully, they were legit. The next thing I knew, I was on MSNBC with Chris Matthews, talking about the election on primary night. After, he asks what I wanted to do. I said, given the magnitude of my student loans, hopefully Goldman Sachs. He laughed and said, Dont do that. He offered me a job, and I spent eight years at NBC News on Hardball, on Joe Scarboroughs first show, doing field work in the Middle East and then producing the first hour of the Today Show. I had an amazing experience though my 20s doing that but had always loved the movie business, and movies, and drama. I got to the point where I realized if I didnt take a chance and try to make that move, I was never going to do it.

Story continues

Oppenheim found that his news background was worth little in Hollywood, until he met Elizabeth Murdoch. Nobody knew what to make of me, this guy coming from television news, he said. Liz Murdoch had just bought Reveille from Ben Silverman and was folding it into Shine. She took a chance on me, figuring news and reality TV were close enough to qualify me to do reality and digital programming for that company. I did that, then got antsy because it still wasnt getting me to my real love: scripted drama.

He commiserated with a colleague on the scripted side of Reveille, who gave him his stark options. She said, You can start over as an assistant, which at the time didnt sound like a great idea since my wife was pregnant with our first child, Oppenheim said. Or, she said, Write something yourself. Id written some nonfiction books and pieces by then and figured what the hell? I bought that Syd Fields book on screenplays from Barnes & Noble, and got Final Draft.

While the form was new, Oppenheim knew the story he wanted to tell. Chris Matthews is a Kennedy aficionado and scholar, and he and I spent a lot of time talking about them. Id always been fascinated by that family, but the idea in the back of my mind was about Jackie and how, like so many women in history, she had never gotten her due. Whenever she was examined, particularly through a popular-culture lens, she was always the betrayed wife, the style and fashion icon. Which, of course, she was, but she had never gotten the credit she deserved for being a public relations genius and a master of image sculpting. In fact, she was the person who crafted the whole mythology of Camelot, which we strongly associate with Kennedys time in office. That was all her idea. I thought, here was this woman, thought of in superficial terms, and no one had ever really tried to look at the substantive role she played in shaping her husbands legacy.

Even though it was his very first crack at a script, Jackie didnt take long. I had that burst of inspiration you read about, like I have never had since, and I vomited out this draft in a few weeks, he said. So now what? Franklin Leonard was a friend from college who now runs the Black List but then was an executive at Universal. I sent him an email Im sure he usually dreads. Hey, would you mind reading this? He did, and less than 24 hours later, I was on the phone with CAA and they were telling me they would get this in the hands of Steven Spielberg and he would read it.

Oppenheim had two thoughts. It was an extraordinary turn of events for me but also embarrassing, since I hadnt even spellchecked it, he said. But less than a week later, I find myself sitting with Steven Spielberg in his office on the Universal lot, which to this day remains one of the highlights of my life. I worshiped his films, and the idea Id be having a conversation about something Id written, which he was taking seriously and asking me questions about, was mind blowing. Then, Darren Aronofsky expressed interest, and it ended up coming together with him and Fox Searchlight. My script ended up No. 2 on the 2010 Black List.

Then, reality kicked in: Aronofsky dropped out, And then it took six years to happen in a different form, Oppenheim said. But it launched me into a full-time screenwriting career.

That included the films Maze Runner and Allegiant. Then, NBC News called.

NBC reached out to me, out of the blue, seven years after I left, he said. Would I be willing to come back and take over the Today show? It came at a rough patch in the shows history, and they wanted to get it back on top. It was a difficult decision, to postpone my writing career, but I have an irrational and deep-seated love of the news business and a particular emotional affection for NBC and the Today show in particular. And selfishly, the idea of having a front-row seat for this election cycle, I couldnt pass that up. I moved with my wife and kids back to New York, and that the show is back at No. 1 in the news demo is phenomenal. I love news and politics, and movies. I dont think the success as screenwriter would have been possible without the journalistic background. Theyre both time consuming, but they fuel and reinforce each other.

Finally, Jackie came back around with Larrain, Natalie Portman, Billy Crudup and a strong supporting cast. Fox Searchlight, which always seemed the likely distributor with a first and last matching right, finally committed. While Oppenheims immediate focus will be on the bitter battle for the White House between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, that race will be settled by the time Searchlight opens the film in December in the heat of the awards race. Oppenheim hopes it also fuels a reassessment of the films subject.

When I started doing my research, you find out quickly that while we talk about Camelot as though that label was always associated with the Kennedys in the White House, it was Jackie who crafted that. She was the first to use the word, in a Life magazine interview published a week after her husband was killed. She had the wherewithal to make that association that is now cemented in everyones mind. Consider her husband had just been murdered, shot in the head, sitting right next to her, Oppenheim said. On the most visceral level, the idea that she witnessed that, and she was covered in his blood for the remainder of the day, and that she had two young kids she had to steer through this. She had to vacate the home she lived in. And she was only 34 years old. And yet, she had the presence of mind to understand this was the last opportunity she had, to dictate how her husband would be remembered. And she pulls off the Camelot feat. Its absolutely unbelievable.

Related stories

Oscar Launches, Deals & Diversity: Cameron Bailey Calls 2016 Toronto A Success

Natalie Portman On 'Jackie': "She Took This Real Control Over Her Family's Story" - Toronto Studio

Pablo Larrain & Gael Garcia Bernal On 'Neruda', Risky Filmmaking And The Poetry Of Rage - Toronto Studio
From ELLE

If looking good is the best revenge, Rodarte appears to be winning. Months after Pulitzer Prize winning Washington Post columnist Robin Givhan asked readers, "Does Rodarte Actually Exist?"and asserted that the brand was not "particularly influential," the label clapped back through a runway show jammed with potential hits, including studded leather bombers, suede fringe jackets, and some aggressively pretty maxidresses in floaty, sheer fabric. (Elle Fanning, those are for you.)

Later at the Jane Hotel in Manhattan, the fashion house debuted a new collaboration with Tumblr-a limited-edition version of its "Radarte" tees created especially for the online platform. (Much like the label, the Rodarte x Tumblr T-shirt definitely exists. I'm wearing it right now.)

We spoke with designer Laura Mulleavy about the latest line, the drawbacks of overalls, and how long you can really wear eye shadow....

You told friends this party had an overalls theme. But you're not wearing them!

I know. And I feel really bad, because I made it an overalls theme. Then I put them on and I was like, "Nope, I can't dance in overalls." So I wore this old Cheers T-shirt instead. I hope it's funny enough that they'll forgive me.

Cheers was not a reference for your latest collection. What was?

We had three. One was this film called The Spirit of the Beehive. It's one of my favorite films. And then Janis Joplin. And then bees and pollen, which went together in my mind with the movie.

And why the Tumblr tee?

Our biggest social media platform is Tumblr. I think it's really conducive to having a lot of imagery in a larger format, which I obviously love. I discovered it through my friend [photographer] Autumn [de Wilde], and I got pretty obsessed with it. The first time we worked with them, we brought some of their artists to our show, and they made their own interpretations. Now we did a shirt with them. And we wanted to because their community is full of artists who are very pure in their intent, and their mission statement is very geared towards creativity and interacting with the world through art. Which is what we do, too. They're a cool group of people.

Story continues

Yahoo bought Tumblr for a billion dollars in 2013.

Oh, nice.

Would you sell Rodarte for a billion dollars?

I mean, I don't think so! That's a hard question. That implies that you'd take the billion dollars, but you'd have to work for another person. Which isn't something I'm sure I could do.

Can we talk for a second about the Washington Post piece?

Sure.... I mean, I think it's kind of obvious that we exist.

How do you respond to a story like that?

It's a great question. I think people need to support people that want to remain independent and fight for an independent voice and I think it's ridiculous that a group of people wouldn't choose to support that, and would question the intent of it instead. Our sole purpose is to have integrity in what we do, and I think that should be valued.

From Autumn de Wilde to Kirsten Dunst, many of the people you work with are your friends. How do you make sure your artistic vision is happening and still keep the friendship intact?

All our friends are really cool and easygoing. So are we-most of the time. Really value and respect their opinions and what they mean to you, and that means you're good to go. It's also good to remain professional.

Last question: In the fashion sphere, you're known for your fantastic eye makeup. You've done the winged liner look since before it was 'cool.' What do you use?

You want me to really tell you what it is?

Is it a secret?

No, it's just funny. The eyeliner, NARS makes a really nice one, and I like one from Revlon that's a really dark pencil. But the shadow? It's a Cover Girl eye shadow that is dead stock. They don't make it any more, and I've never found a color that matches it. So when they stopped, I hoarded it.

How long ago did they stop?

[This shadow is] 10 years old. I don't care! It's in the refrigerator, and I pretend it doesn't matter that it's so old. I use less and less of it, to keep it from diminishing too much. But I can't give it up. I've worn it since I was 13.

Your mom let you wear eye makeup when you were 13?!

I had really big glasses, so I'm not sure my makeup really mattered back then!

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Bucharest (AFP) - Timisoara, the cradle of Romania's 1989 revolution against communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, was named Friday by the EU as the European capital of culture for 2021.

The western Romanian city will be the country's second to secure the EU cultural showcase honour, after Sibiu in 2007, the year Romania joined the bloc.

"I am confident that Timisoara will give visitors from Europe and all over the world the opportunity to discover the city and its cultural assets," said Tibor Navracsics, European Commissioner responsible for Education, Culture, Youth and Sport.

"I am convinced that the title will bring Timisoara significant long-term cultural, as well as economic and social benefits, as we have seen with many previous European capitals of culture," he added.

Simona Neumann, who worked on the city's campaign to win the EU honour, said it reflected Timisoara's commitment to "tolerance, multiculturalism and (being) multi-faith,"

"It also reflects the internal light, the civic energy of our citizens .. which culminated in the revolution of 1989 and which has gone out for a few years.

"These civic values must be revived," she added.

The project to prepare Timisoara for its year in the EU spotlight will have a budget of 48.5 million euros ($54 million) over six years from 2017, including 25 million euros provided by local authorities.

Romania's third biggest city, with some 320,000 inhabitants including ethnic Hungarian, Serb and German communities, Timisoara saw the start of the uprising which brought down Ceausescu on Christmas Day, December 25, 1989.

Three other Romanian cities had been in the running: the capital Bucharest, Baia Mare in the north and Cluj-Napoca in Transylvania.

The EU will choose two other European cultural capitals for 2021, a Greek city and another from a country which is a candidate or a potential candidate to join the bloc, later this year and next year.
Moscow (AFP) - Russia said it was ready to extend a Syria truce set to run out Friday evening for a further 72 hours, despite accusing the US and rebels of not fulfilling the deal.

"We are prepared to extend the cessation of hostilities for a further 72 hours," senior Russian officer Viktor Poznikhir announced at a televised briefing, adding that Moscow was waiting for Washington to uphold its end of the bargain.
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's Defense Ministry said on Friday that the Syrian army had withdrawn arms from the Castello Road near the city of Aleppo, while Syrian opposition forces backed by the United States had not done the same, Russian news agencies reported. The Syrian opposition violated the ceasefire 39 times in the last 24 hours, the agencies quoted the ministry as saying. (Reporting by Jack Stubbs; Writing by Dmitry Solovyov; Editing by Christian Lowe)
Two-and-a-half years after Moscow annexed Crimea from Ukraine, residents are gearing up to vote Sunday in their first polls to elect deputies to Russia's national parliament. Since seizing control, the authorities have harshly suppressed the Crimean Tatar indigenous Muslim group that largely opposed Moscow's takeover. Leaders of the community, who make up some 14 percent of its population, have called for a boycott of the polls.
MOSCOW, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) records leaked by hackers raised a lot of questions, TASS news agency reported. "It raises a lot of questions. It seems as if healthy athletes are taking drugs legally that are prohibited for others," TASS quoted him as saying. WADA said on Wednesday a fresh batch of athlete data had been leaked by a Russian cyber espionage group. (Reporting by Jack Stubbs; Editing by Christian Lowe)
Is calling women who date younger men cougars sexist? Some say it is. (Photo: Getty Images)

Women dating younger men certainly isnt anything new, but its more common than you might think. The online dating site PlentyOfFish surveyed 500 female members across the country, asking about their dating habits and the ages of the guys they have corresponded with. According to MySanAntonio.com, the survey found that 65 percent of women between the ages of 40 and 60 said theyve dated a man at least seven years younger.

Based on the survey results, the site evaluated the top 10 Cougar Towns in the United States, with San Antonio ranking the highest.

But is calling someone a cougar at best outdated  and at worst sexist? In 2015 on Ellen, Jennifer Lopez, who has dated younger men, including her backup dancer Casper Smart, said it was. I hate that they have a label for a woman who would date a younger guy, said Lopez, according to ET Online. If a younger guy is interested in you, whats the big deal? Whats the word for the man whos after younger girls? Im not after younger guys. If younger guys like me, then thats one thing.  They have no name. No label. Theres a little bit of an imbalance there. Not fair.

Katie Couric shares Lopezs disdain for the label. Its silly and sexist, Couric told Parade back in 2012. You dont hear men who date women 30 years younger being called cougars. What is the equivalent word? There is no equivalent.

Yashar Ali, a writer for the Good Men Project, noted that while there are some women who dont object to the label, in general the term is misogynistic and offensive. Cougar carries a connotation of predatory behavior, he wrote. As if, a) the woman could only get the younger man by chasing after him like a rabid animal, and b) the womans personality has no part in the relationship, that the guy shes dating must only be with her so he can have wild, crazy sex, or because shes rich.

Ali added: There is no male equivalent. We dont commonly refer to a man over 40 who sleeps with younger women as a tiger, lion, or any equivalent animal reference. So, we have an imbalance. When an unnecessary disparity exists in language thats sexist, thats when misogyny creeps in and spreads like a virus, compounding the damage already done.

Story continues

Elizabeth Lombardo, Ph.D., clinical psychologist and author of Better Than Perfect: 7 Steps to Crush Your Inner Critic and Create a Life You Love, agrees theres a disparity. There are certainly double standards for men and women, she tells Yahoo Style. Men who date younger women are men. Women who date younger men are a type of mountain lion.

Lombardo adds: There is nothing wrong with dating someone who is younger than you, as long as they are psychologically of the same maturity as you  and over 18. Some feel a need to label them cougars because this type of relationship has been less publicized than for men, for whom it is almost commonplace.

But rather than invent an equivalent term for men who date younger women in the interest of fairness, why not do away with these stereotypes entirely? And  in the case of two consenting, mature adults  just call it what it is: dating.



Follow us on Instagram, Facebook and Pinterest for nonstop inspiration delivered fresh to your feed, every day.
Director Emmanuelle Bercot begins 150 Milligrams with a rare stab at lyricism in what is otherwise a bluntly literal, plain-as-day procedural drama. As the opening credits flash by, a woman swims determinedly in a choppy ocean, her head nearly enveloped by Prussian blue waves; her legs are shown dangling vulnerably below the surface, as ominous synths swarm on the soundtrack. Uninformed viewers could be forgiven for expecting yet another Jaws knockoff, and thats no accident: Bercots rather unsubtle visual metaphor instead sets her protagonist up for one corporate shark attack after another in the hazardous waters of Big Pharma.

Telling the true story of Irene Frachon, the French pulmonologist who, between 2009 and 2011, waged a one-woman war against the makers of a seemingly life-threatening diabetes drug, 150 Milligrams will play to audiences in its native France as a ripped-from-the-headlines enterprise: The culmination of Frachons fight was extensively documented across the media there, while her own bestselling memoir filled in the gaps. Beyond borders, the film is counting on the irresistible, age-old popular appeal of the woman-against-the-system premise to work its magic: Many viewers may not know who Frachon is, but if theyve seen Erin Brockovich, or even the less upbeat Silkwood, theyll know how to invest in her. Would that the film, however, had quite as much gumption as its whistleblowing heroine: Televisually presented and arduously overlong at 127 minutes, 150 Milligrams cant always separate the compelling personal stakes of its narrative from its surfeit of informational minutiae.

Still, just as it was Frachons sheer, persistent force of personality that kept her little-supported campaign afloat through numerous legal and practical obstacles, Bercots film has a charismatic human face to carry viewers through its drier expanses of factual content. Fresh off a Cesar win for her French-language debut in last years Courted, Danish star Sidse Babett Knudsen (The Duke of Burgundy, TVs Borgen) is an inspired choice to play the Brest-based Frachon, and not just for regional reasons: Knudsens best roles to date have called upon her guarded sense of cool, so its a surprise to see her channeling near-manic reserves of pluck here to play the good doctor. Frequently pop-eyed and given to animated gesticulation, whether in enthusiasm or anger, its a performance that occasionally teeters over the line from endearing to irritating  which, were led to believe, wasnt untrue of Frachon herself.

The films earliest stages are perhaps its least digestible, as Bercot plunges viewers into a dense assemblage of medical facts and figures concerning the troubling effects of the prescription medication Mediator, which Frachon believes heightens the risk of valvular heart disease in patients. (Digestible certainly isnt the word for the films commendably visceral sequences of open-heart surgery: Squeamish viewers are hereby advised to skip lunch beforehand.) Bercot, who adapted Frachons book with co-scribe Severine Bosschem, has a lot of data to relay to her audience, but sometimes presents it in frustratingly prosaic ways: At one point, printed stats from a research report are superimposed on screen in a montage set to a thriller-by-numbers motif from composer Martin Wheeler, which hardly aids viewers comprehension of their larger implications. Meanwhile, calendar dates from Frachons two-year battle routinely pop up on screen, their particular significance not always conveyed.

Bercot, the actress-turned-helmer who opened last years Cannes fest with the low-key social realism of Standing Tall, seems somewhat torn between the thorough, academic methodology of docudrama and the romantic pull of a more character-driven underdog saga. Notwithstanding a couple of misjudged forays into overt, song-scored cutesiness, 150 Milligrams actually fares better when it takes the more mainstream path, focusing on the fraught interpersonal relationships underpinning  and sometimes unpinning  Frachons quest.

Most conflicted and engaging among these is her love-hate collaboration with Antoine Le Bihan (Benoit Magimel), the medical researcher who provides the essential factual meat of her case, yet often balks at the uncompromising, sometimes unstrategic nature of her principle-led campaign. (Limp dick, she labels him, in not-quite-affectionate exasperation.) If theres a heart-versus-head undertow to their squabbles, the film resists banally taking sides, often conceding both their points. Looking almost unrecognizably careworn and light-deprived, Magimel plays Le Bihan beautifully, countering and complementing Knudsens bullish bravado with more passively seething fury over the very same injustice  the moral commonality that survives their frequently opposed professional politics.

Bercots thespian instincts serve her well in identifying and encouraging such subtle chemistries among her players; incidental domestic scenes between Frachon and her alternately proud and befuddled husband (Patrick Ligardes) and children are likewise played with utmost care and conviction. The filmmaking around these delicate human dynamics can seem indifferently utilitarian by comparison: Guillaume Schiffmans gray-toned lensing takes scant advantage of the widescreen format, while Julien Leloups editing assigns the same observational rhythm to rather too many conversational scenes. Patience isnt my forte, our heroine blusters at one point; one occasionally wishes this no-nonsense but paradoxically undisciplined film would take after her a little more.

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SAN SEBASTIAN  One of the Basque Countrys most prominent directors, Telmo Esnal (Go!) will direct Dantza (Dance), produced by Txintxua Films, a company based in Trintxerpe-Pasaia, near San Sebastian, and set up in 2008 by director Asier Altuna, directed of Amama, which scored a 2015 San Sebastian competition berth, and producer Marian Fernandez.

Also produced by Txintxua, and the only Spanish feature in the festivals now competitive Zabaltegi-Tabakalera sidebar  Ghost Ship is a feature film essay directed by short and docu-maker Koldo Almandoz associating tourism, cruisers, vampires, Bram Stoker, Murnau and shipwrecks. Ghost Ship world premiered at the Rotterdam Festival, was screened at Buenos Aires Bafici.

Dantza is a musical feature, turning on Basque dances and their ancestral symbolism, recounting the cycle of life and the history of humankind. The project yokes the talents of director Telmo Esnal, artist and sculptor Koldobika Jauregui, and scholar and folklorist Juan Antonio Urbeltz.

A social satire, turning on the status symbol importance in Spain of taking holidays, Go! (2005), the first Basque-language feature to be made in 13 years, was directed by Esnal and Altuna in 2005. It proved one of the most prominent titles at that years San Sebastian film festival, where it took the Youth Jury Award.

Dantza is a fiction feature with a very subtle narrative plot. The story flows basically through the music and dance, said Fernandez.

Its shoot is scheduled to begin in October. It will be ready for delivery at the end of 2017. Production is backed by Basque pubcaster ETB, Spains Icaa film institute and the Basque Government.

A dantzari  a traditional Basque dancer  when he was in his teens, Telmo Esnal participated at the La Habana Ballet fest some two decades ago. There, Alicia Alonso, the founder of the National Ballet of Cuba, told him that many of the movements in traditional Basque dance looked like predecessors of classic ballet steps.

Story continues

Telmo said: I see many similarities between the dance and cinema world. Ive wanted to make a movie on dance for a long time.

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(CHICAGO)  The mother of Sandra Bland, a black woman who died last summer in a Texas jail after a contentious traffic stop, has reached a $1.9 million settlement in her wrongful-death lawsuit, her attorney said Thursday.

Local officials in Texas insisted the agreement was not yet final, but the mothers attorney said the deal was absolute and that the familys lawsuit would be dismissed in several days.

Bland, who was from the Chicago area, died in her cell days after she was pulled over by a white Texas state trooper for a minor traffic offense. Her death was ruled a suicide, and Blands family later sued Waller County and the Texas Department of Public Safety.

The settlement includes a requirement that the jail have a nurse or emergency medical technician on duty 24 hours a day, the familys Chicago-based attorney, Cannon Lambert, told The Associated Press in an interview at his office.

The jail must also install electronic sensors to ensure guards are checking on detainees, and the defendants agree to help push for statewide legislation in Blands name that would require training to ensure jail personnel are properly caring for inmates, Lambert said.

Blands mother, Geneva Reed-Veal, said those requirements beyond the monetary settlement are what really mattered to her, and she vowed to make sure they are carried out.

Today is a victory for all mothers across the country, she told the AP. It was never just about Sandy. It was about all mothers who have lost their children unjustly to police brutality, to senseless gun violence.

Waller County attorney Larry Simmons confirmed that a potential settlement had been reached but said it was not final. He also said the parties agreed in writing to keep the agreement confidential until it was complete, and the county intended to honor this commitment.

Simmons said lawyers on both sides were still working through a few details and that any settlement must be approved by county commissioners. The county vigorously denies any fault or wrongdoing in Blands death, he said, and the settlement does not involve any such admissions.

Story continues

The agreement would cost the county a modest $1,000 deductible under its liability insurance, he said.

The Texas Department of Public Safety, also named as a defendant, released a statement saying it has not settled litigation regarding Sandra Bland and is not a party to any agreements between the plaintiffs and Waller County defendants.

Jeff Rensberger, a professor at the Houston College of Law, said the settlement showed that both the county and its insurance carrier wanted to get this behind them.

The cost of the settlement is good risk to them as compared to the risk what a jury might do in this case, he said.

The other provisions attached to the agreement, while unusual, are not rare or unheard of, particularly in a wrongful-death lawsuit against a government agency, Rensberger said.

Part of the motivation for bringing wrongful-death suits in cases like this is for reform purposes as well as compensation, he said. So this goes to that reform purpose.

It was unclear how much those extra requirements would cost to implement, but Lambert said the reforms would certainly benefit local authorities, too.

Bland, 28, was pulled over by a state trooper in Prairie View, northwest of Houston, for changing lanes without signaling. The stop grew confrontational, and the trooper, Brian Encinia, ordered her from the car before forcing her to the ground. She was taken into custody on a charge of assaulting a public servant but could not immediately come up with the $500 bail, according to investigators.

Video from the July 10, 2015, traffic stop shows Encinia drawing his stun gun and telling Bland, I will light you up! She can later be heard screaming off-camera that the trooper was about to break her wrists and complaining that he knocked her head into the ground. The video provoked national outrage and drew the attention of the Black Lives Matter movement.

Encinia was later fired and charged with a misdemeanor perjury charge stemming from the arrest. He has pleaded not guilty.

In an affidavit, Encinia said he removed Bland from her vehicle to further conduct a safer traffic investigation, but prosecutors said Waller County grand jurors found that statement to be false.

Bland, who attended Prairie View A&M University just outside Hempstead, was in the process of moving to Texas from the Chicago area to take a job at the school. Three days after her arrest, she was found hanging from a jail cell partition. A medical examiner ruled the death a suicide, and a grand jury declined to charge any sheriffs officials or jailers.

In their lawsuit, Blands family contended jailers should have checked on her more frequently and that the county should have performed mental evaluations once she disclosed she had a history of attempting suicide.

The familys complaint also contended that the trooper who arrested Bland falsified the assault allegation to take her into custody and that jail personnel failed to keep her safe. County officials said Bland was treated well while locked up and produced documents that showed she gave jail workers inconsistent information about whether she was suicidal.

___

Graczyk reported from Houston.
DUBAI/SANAA (Reuters) - A senior U.S. diplomat has presented a proposal for a comprehensive ceasefire in Yemen to the country's dominant Houthis at a meeting in Oman, a member of the Houthi negotiating team said on Thursday. Negotiators will return to Houthi-controlled Sanaa on Friday carrying the plan offered by U.S. Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas Shannon in talks in Muscat, he said. Shannon met the Houthi team, officials of the allied General People's Congress (GPC) party and an Omani mediator in Muscat on Sept. 8 and 9 to discuss how to end a war that has killed over 10,000 people and displaced more than 3 million. In Washington, U.S. officials said the plan was an "extension of the efforts Secretary (of State John) Kerry initiated in Jeddah." The Houthi negotiating team member did not disclose details of the proposal. Kerry said in Saudi Arabia on Aug. 25 he had agreed in talks with Gulf Arab states and the United Nations on a plan to restart peace talks on Yemen with a goal of forming a unity government. Yemen's crisis began in September 2014 when the Iran-allied Houthis seized the capital, Sanaa. A Saudi-led Arab alliance intervened in support of the country's internationally recognised government led by President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi. U.N.-sponsored negotiations to end the fighting collapsed last month. Peace talks foundered after the Houthis and the GPC announced the formation of a 10-member governing council on Aug 6., ignoring a U.N. warning that such a move would violate Security Council resolutions on how to solve the conflict. The Houthi negotiating team has been in Oman since the collapse of the peace talks, after Saudi authorities in control of Yemen's airspace refused to grant the Houthi team access to Sanaa, the Houthi source added. Saudi authorities have now agreed to allow the negotiating team to return to Yemen in a U.N. airplane, he said. In a statement on the Kerry proposal on Thursday, the governing council reiterated that its willingness to restart peace talks depended on implementation of a full ceasefire, including the lifting of the no-fly zone and siege imposed by the Saudi-led coalition. Forces allied to the Houthis attacked across the border into Saudi Arabia's southern Jizan province on Thursday, with both sides claiming victory and giving conflicting casualty tolls. Sources in the Saudi-led coalition said Saudi forces at the Jabal Dukhan mountain repelled the attack by Yemeni Republican Guard troops loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, killing about 25 and wounding 30. In the Yemeni capital, Sanaa, a Houthi official said the clash resulted in the Houthi capture of the mountain as well as a place called Al Romaih. The commander of a Saudi rapid intervention force was killed in the fighting, he added. (Reporting by William Maclean in Dubai, Mohammed Ghobari in Sanaa and Lesley Wroughton in Washington; Writing by Katie Paul; Editing by Andrew Roche and Peter Cooney)
In May, my husband and I bought a home in a New York City suburb.

When we began the process of applying for our mortgage, we were asked to submit a boatload of documents and paperwork. We each handed over two months worth of pay stubs, three years worth of W-2s, about a dozen quarterly bank statements, letters confirming our employment, retirement account balances  and the list goes on.

We spent a few days getting everything together and then dedicated one Sunday afternoon in early April to scanning and emailing everything over to our soon-to-be lender.

Before I sent the email, I carefully looked through each and every document once more to confirm we had everything they were asking for.

Yup  okay  perfect  wonderful  great  WHAT?!?!

When I looked closely at my husbands 401(k) statement, I was shocked to see the number at the very bottom.

We had both started working and contributing to our retirement accounts around the same time (late 2010) and we earned about the same amount of money  so how on earth was his balance so much higher than mine?

Tyler (my husband) and I are very open with each other about our finances  so I always knew he contributed a larger percentage of his pre-tax income to his 401(k) than I did. But I had never realized just how much more money he was actually saving until I saw the actual balance.

While I had been contributing anywhere from 2% to 4% of my pre-tax income to my retirement account since I started working, he had been contributing between 8% and 12%  increasing his contribution by about 1% each year.

That led to a pretty big disparity between his balance and mine over the six-year span. He had saved about three times what I had, to be exact.

For more from the Today Show , visit Yahoo View.

Seeing those numbers side by side was a huge wake-up call for me. I thought about our future. I wondered, If that gap is this big now, what will it look like in 40 years?

Story continues

I knew if I continued contributing and saving the way I was, hed be in way better shape come time to retire.

Sure, thats still years away  but I know from reading about saving for retirement that what you do and how you save when youre young has an immense impact on things later.

I felt silly for once feeling so proud of myself for contributing anything. I had thought, Oh, how responsible of me! But I now realized it simply wasnt enough.

I knew right then and there I had to re-evaluate.

I sat down, did the math, figured out what I could afford to contribute without feeling strapped for cash each month, and increased my contribution to 8%. I also checked off that little box next to the question on the website about whether Id like to automatically increase my contribution by 1% each year. Now I dont even have to think about it!

As Business Insiders Libby Kane recently pointed out, in order to finance 20-30 years post-work  operating on about 70% of my former annual income (at least)  I should be contributing 15% of my pre-tax income starting at age 30. (Im 28, so I have a couple of years to work my way up to that number.)

She says, according to T. Rowe Price, increasing my contribution to 15% could help me save about $600,000 more by age 65 than I would if I contributed just 10% of my income.

Sure, upping my contribution now makes my paychecks a bit smaller (maybe I have to skip a dinner out every now and then, or hold myself back from buying those sandals Ive been eyeing)  but Im sure Ill enjoy that extra $600,000 more than I will those shoes Ill probably wear twice.

Watch out, Tyler: Ill catch up before you know it!

NOW WATCH: Dont be afraid to cancel cable  heres how to watch all of your favorite shows for less than $42 a month





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On Sep 15, 2016, we issued an updated research report on South Carolina-based SCANA Corporation SCG.



SCANAs nuclear expansion project is a catalyst for future earnings growth. Given SCANAs financing plan, construction budget and schedule, we believe that the company is well positioned to fund its nuclear expansion project. Management expects its 2016 earnings in the range of $3.90$4.10 per share. It expects to achieve the target through industrial expansion and continued customer growth. Although the company's capex is likely to escalate with the new nuclear projects and the investments would be recognized in the rate base, its regulated earnings power is expected to improve.



SCANA has a low risk business with outstanding customer growth and operational efficiency, which should prove to be beneficial in a positive regulatory environment. These factors are also favorable for stable cash flow generation and growth. Another positive for shareholders is SCANAs utility business mix. The majority of the companys total earnings come from the regulated electricity and natural gas utilities business.



The companys service areas enjoy legislative and regulatory support. SCANA is a stable, relatively strong and regulated integrated electric utility and its operations are backed by favorable regional demographics and electric utility rate. Considerable upside potential exists for the company as the service industry bounces back from the recession faster than others.

SCANA CORP Price and Consensus

SCANA CORP Price and Consensus | SCANA CORP Quote

However, we are concerned about SCANAs heavy debt level and the overall business risk associated with the nuclear generation construction project. The last nuclear generation construction cycle severely affected the stocks of numerous electric utilities. This is naturally a cause for investor anxiety.



Moreover, the companys energy businesses are sensitive to changes in coal, gas, oil and other commodity prices, including their availability. Commodity price volatility always poses a risk to utility earnings potential. Rising energy costs can affect the elasticity of profit margins and retail customer demand.



SCANA also faces regulatory risks due to weakness in possible rates from regular filings needed in order to procure timely recovery of investment. Economic risks arise from the companys exposure to demand in the Southeast, which is not moderated by rate design.



Zacks Rank and Stocks to Consider



Scana currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). Some better-ranked players from the energy sector are Matador Resources Company MTDR, NGL Energy Partners LP NGL and Enviva Partners L.P. EVA. All these stocks sport a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.



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Two southern Alabama schools were put on lockdown Friday because of threatening Facebook messages and emojis posted on the now-deleted page of a group called the Flomo Klowns.

The sinister Facebook messages said Its going down tonight, followed by revolver emojis, and I love kids. A parent also contacted the Flomaton Police Department to say her child had been sent threatening messages by the group.

The entrances to Flomaton High School, which has around 400 students, and Flomaton Elementary School, which has about 300, were locked, as well as internal doors. Local officers and sheriff deputies secured the school grounds and searched the area, AL reports.

Officials have not yet ascertained whether the messages were a prank, but say they will still investigate them as a real threat unless evidence leads to something else, WGME reports.

Fridays lockdown is the latest in a recent spate of clown sightings. Last month, there were multiple reports of sightings by the edge of a wooded area in South Carolina, including by children who said that several people dressed as clowns tried to lure them into the woods by displaying money.

However, authorities have said that at least two of these reports were fabricated and surveillance footage from the area where the children reported the clowns shows no such thing.
When Queen Elizabeth attended Ladies Day at the annual Royal Ascot races in June, all eyes were on her gold-and-blue hat  which, by coincidence, perfectly matched the colors worn by winning jockey Ryan Moore.



"It was absolutely extraordinary," says Caroline de Guitaut, curator of Fashioning a Reign: 90 Years of Style from the Queen's Wardrobe.



The hat, created by her dresser and frequent designer Angela Kelly, is center stage in the third and final portion of the exhibit, opening at Windsor Castle on Saturday.



The Queen's iconic clothes and hats are also on display at Buckingham Palace and Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh, Scotland. The extraordinary collection of some 150 outfits and hats is one of the many commemorations to mark the Queen turning 90.









See the Queen's Ultimate Matching Moment  and the Gown Known as a 'Tour de Force'| The British Royals, The Royals, Queen Elizabeth II



Despite the longevity of the Queen's public life, she employed a relatively small band of designers, including Norman Hartnell, Hardy Amies, Ian Thomas and more recently Stewart Parvin and Angela Kelly. "They are quite a small group but a significant group," says de Guitaut.



"She was influenced by her mother, who admired Hartnell and in a sense she inherited him. But as demands grew, it was not possible for him to produce everything and she turned to Amies. When Hartnell died, she moved to Ian Thomas."





See the Queen's Ultimate Matching Moment  and the Gown Known as a 'Tour de Force'| The British Royals, The Royals, Queen Elizabeth II



Nor was she above doing her own shopping  when she was younger, the Queen would go to catwalk shows put on by the Incorporated Society of London Fashion Designers to pick up ideas.



One Ian Thomas ensemble on display in the Crimson Drawing Room at Windsor comes from a visit to the U.S in 1976. A departure from the more form-fitting dresses of the 1950s and 1960s, "it really softens the look," de Guitaut says of the soft, peach gown. "It is slightly more relaxed but still formal and has some embellishment."



This latest part of the show celebrates the Queen's life at Windsor, from her youth (represented by her Girl Guides uniform) to her love of horses to the diplomatic dressing for state occasions.





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See the Queen's Ultimate Matching Moment  and the Gown Known as a 'Tour de Force'| The British Royals, The Royals, Queen Elizabeth II



For a trip to Canada in 1959, she wore an Amies gown with white embroidery signifying the regional emblem of mayflowers which "would have caused a sensation," says de Guitaut. And on her historic visit to Ireland in 2011 (the first by a British monarch in 100 years) she wore a white silk-crepe gown featuring 2,091 chiffon shamrocks and a diamante harp on her left shoulder. "It was a tour de force in diplomatic dressing," says de Guitaut.





See the Queen's Ultimate Matching Moment  and the Gown Known as a 'Tour de Force'| The British Royals, The Royals, Queen Elizabeth II



Also featured in exhibits: the Queen's outfits for a variety of family celebrations. For the marriage of her youngest child Prince Edward to the then Sophie Rhys-Jones, the Queen chose a feathered headpiece rather than a full hat. She followed with the same idea in an Angela Kelly outfit when her eldest son and heir Prince Charles wed Camilla Parker Bowles six years later in 2005.





Watch: Fashioning a Reign exhibit @ Windsor Castle. The Queen's Girl Guides uniform, the Order of Garter robe, her outfits 4 weddings of Edward & Sophie, Charles & Camilla A video posted by Simon Perry (@sperrypeoplemag) on Sep 16, 2016 at 12:14am PDT







Watch: Chapeau on show! The Queen's Royal Ascot hats are among the exhibits at Fashioning a Reign at Windsor Castle from Saturday A video posted by Simon Perry (@sperrypeoplemag) on Sep 15, 2016 at 11:49pm PDT





The dresses line up alongside the costumes the then- Princess Elizabeth wore as she and her sister Princess Margaret took part in traditional Christmas holiday pantomimes of Aladdin and other shows during the WWII years.



"These are very rare pieces, the only costumes that survive," says de Guitaut. "They fit into the tradition of royals dressing up for different parties like costume balls."



At the sister exhibit at Buckingham Palace, which runs until October 2, highlights include Elizabeth's stunning wedding and coronation gowns.



The Windsor Castle portion of Fashioning a Reign runs through January 8, 2017.
United Nations (United States) (AFP) - A young Iraqi woman who survived rape and abuse as a sex slave of Islamic State fighters on Friday became a UN goodwill ambassador for the dignity of survivors of human trafficking.

Nadia Murad Basee Taha, a 23-year-old Yazidi woman, called for justice for the victims of the jihadist group and argued that the 2014 attack on the Yazidis should be recognized as a genocide.

Murad was taken from her home village of Kocho near Iraq's northern town of Sinjar in August 2014 and brought to IS-controlled Mosul, where she was gang-raped, and bought and sold many times.

"I was used in the way that they wanted to use me. I was not alone," Murad said during a ceremony held at UN headquarters.

"Perhaps I was the lucky one. As time passed, I found a way to escape where thousands others could not. They are still captive."

Her voice trembling, Murad called for the release of some 3,200 Yazidi women and girls still being held as sex slaves by IS fighters and for the captors to face justice.

"My real fear is that once ISIS is defeated, ISIS militants, ISIS terrorists will just shave off their beards and walk the streets of the cities as if nothing has happened," she said.

"We cannot let this happen."

Murad said her hope was that one day, Yazidi victims will be able to look "our abusers in the eye before a court in The Hague and tell the world what they have done to us, so that our community can heal."

As a goodwill ambassador, Murad will focus on raising awareness of the plight of victims of trafficking of persons, especially refugees, women and girls.

She is represented by international lawyer Amal Clooney, who said the Islamic State group must be held accountable for grave crimes.

"We know that what we have before us is genocide, and we know that it is still ongoing," said Clooney.

"I am ashamed as a human being that we ignore their cries for help," said Clooney, drawing applause.

As world leaders converge on the United Nations next week for the annual General Assembly debate, Iraq and Britain will on Monday launch a campaign to push for accountability for crimes committed by IS.

Murad and Clooney are due to attend that event along with Britain's Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson.
Mogadishu (AFP) - Somali government troops backed by African peacekeepers have retaken control of a town close to the Kenyan border hours after its seizure by heavily-armed Shabaab jihadists, officials and witnesses said.

Somali government forces and AMISOM peacekeepers took full control of Elwak this morning, the violent elements have fled before the forces reached them,,Elwak Commissioner Ibrahim Guled told reporters.

He said six Somali soldiers had been killed when Shabaab fighters attacked the town on Friday. We have inflicted heavy casualties on them," he added.

A local resident reached by phone told AFP that the assailants pulled out after midnight after looting the military camp. "They have taken everything they found in the camp including three vehicles," said Omar Abdukadir.

Sources said at least 12 people were killed during the clashes late Friday between Somali forces and the Shabaab militants who were disguised as Kenyan soldiers and riding in military vehicles captured from the Kenyan army.

In January, the Al-Qaeda aligned jihadist group razed a base run by the Kenyan contingent of AMISOM -- the African Union Mission in Somalia -- in El-Alde in the south, seizing arms and large quantities of munitions.

It was their third assault in months on an AMISOM base.

The Shabaab, which was forced out of the capital five years ago, continues to launch attacks against government, military, civilian and foreign targets in its fight to overthrow the internationally-backed government in Mogadishu.

The group is expected to try to violently disrupt elections due to be held in September and October.
IRVINE, CA / ACCESSWIRE / September 15, 2016 / Khang & Khang LLP (the "Firm") announces that a class action lawsuit was filed against Tokai Pharmaceuticals, Inc. ("Tokai" or the "Company") (TKAI). Investors who purchased or otherwise acquired shares between June 24, 2015 and July 25, 2016 inclusive (the "Class Period"), are encouraged to contact the Firm prior to the September 30, 2016 lead plaintiff motion deadline.

If you purchased shares of Tokai during the Class Period, please contact Joon M. Khang, Esquire, of Khang & Khang, 18101 Von Karman Avenue, 3rd Floor, Irvine, CA 92612, by telephone: (949) 419-3834, or by e-mail at joon@khanglaw.com.

There has been no class certification in this case yet. Until certification occurs, you are not represented by an attorney. You may choose to take no action and remain a passive class member.

The complaint alleges that during the Class Period, Tokai made false and misleading statements and/or failed to disclose that: there were significant structural problems with the trial design for its Phase 3 galeterone study, ARMOR3-SV; that ARMOR3-SV was unlikely to succeed in meeting its primary endpoint; the commercialization of galeterone was less likely than investors were led to believe; and as a result of the above, Tokai's statements about its business, operations, and prospects were false and misleading at all relevant times.

If you want to learn more about this lawsuit, or if you have questions concerning this notice or your rights, please contact Joon M. Khang, a prominent litigator for almost two decades, by telephone: (949) 419-3834, or via e-mail at joon@khanglaw.com.

This press release may constitute Attorney Advertising in certain jurisdictions.

Contacts

Joon M. Khang, Esq.

Telephone: 949-419-3834

Facsimile: 949-225-4474

joon@khanglaw.com

SOURCE: Khang & Khang LLP
LOS ANGELES, CA / ACCESSWIRE / September 15, 2016 / Lundin Law PC (the "Firm") announces a class action lawsuit has been filed against Corrections Corporation of America ("Corrections Corporation" or the "Company") (CXW) concerning possible violations of federal securities laws between February 27, 2012 and August 17, 2016 (the "Class Period"). Investors, who purchased or otherwise acquired shares during the Class Period, should contact the Firm in advance of the October 24, 2016 lead plaintiff motion deadline.

To participate in this class action lawsuit, click here. You can also call Brian Lundin, Esquire, of Lundin Law PC, at 888-713-1033, or e-mail him at brian@lundinlawpc.com.

No class has been certified in the above action. Until a class is certified, you are not considered represented by an attorney. You may also choose to do nothing and be an absent class member.

The complaint alleges that through the Class Period, the Company made false and/or misleading statements and/or failed to disclose: that Corrections Corporation's facilities lacked adequate safety and security standards and were less efficient at offering correctional services than the Federal Bureau of Prisons' ("BOP") facilities; that the Company's rehabilitative services for inmates were less effective than the BOP's services; that the U.S. Department of Justice ("DOJ") was unlikely to renew and/or extend its contracts with Corrections Corporation; and that as a result of the above, Corrections Corporation's public statements were materially false and misleading at all relevant times. On August 18, 2016, Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates announced that the DOJ decided to stop using private prisons, since they are less safe and less effective than federal government-run prisons. When this information was disclosed to the public, shares of Corrections Corporation fell in value, which caused investors harm.

Lundin Law PC was founded by Brian Lundin, a securities litigator based in Los Angeles dedicated to upholding shareholders' rights.

Story continues

This press release may be considered Attorney Advertising in some jurisdictions under the applicable law and ethical rules.

Contact:

Lundin Law PC

Brian Lundin, Esq.

Telephone: 888-713-1033

Facsimile: 888-713-1125

brian@lundinlawpc.com

http://lundinlawpc.com/

SOURCE: Lundin Law PC
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The 2017 edition of Heartthrobs and Hound Dogs has all the elements of a perfect calendar: Dogs in need of forever homes posing with servicemen who just happen to be completely ripped. It's the female gaze put to a good cause.

SEE ALSO: Writer and photographer team up to document the lives of senior dogs

Image: ricki beason rescue photography

Shirtless dudes + rescue dogs is a proven formula for Ricki Beason, the Texas photographer behind Heartthrobs and Hound Dogs. She told Mashable via phone that the calendar's 2016 edition featuring military veterans raised about $30,000 for rescue shelters.

"When you pair a rescue dog with a really handsome shirtless guy, people tend to take notice," she joked.

This year's calendar features firefighters, police officers and military vets, plus six rescue dogs. Each pup comes from one of the six shelters Beason selected to benefit from the 2017 edition.

Image: ricki beason rescue photography

Beason is a physical therapist by trade, but took up photography in 2014. At the time, her own adopted dog inspired her to pick up a camera and find a way to benefit the rescue community. Her initiative to photograph rural rescue dogs in need of exposure later inspired her first calendar, a 2015 edition featuring firefighters.

Two years later, the latest edition is available for order with all proceeds set to benefit shelters in Houston, Austin and Dallas.

"Having two rescue dogs myself, I know how much love they can offer you," Beason said. "I just want people to see them for just how great they are. They deserve a chance in a loving home, they deserve to find love, they deserve to be someone's most loved pet."

Image: ricki beason rescue photography

Image: ricki beason rescue photography

Image: ricki beason rescue photography

Image: ricki beason rescue photography

Image: ricki beason rescue photography

Image: ricki beason rescue photography

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Image: ricki beason rescue photography

Image: ricki beason rescue photography

Image: ricki beason rescue photography

Image: ricki beason rescue photography
Singapore's High Court has granted a temporary reprieve to troubled South Korean giant Hanjin, allowing its ships to sail into the city-state without fear of being impounded as it struggles to settle a $5.37-billion debt.

Since last month, Hanjin's vessels, sailors and cargo have been stuck in a maritime limbo as ports, wary they will not be paid for their services, refuse to let them dock and refuse to handle or free cargo already landed.

The ruling, seen by AFP on Friday, suspends "any enforcement or execution against any asset" of Hanjin and two local subsidiaries, which means that vessels can sail into Singapore without fear of being seized, pending approval of the company's recovery plan.

"I was satisfied that the Korean rehabilitation orders should be recognised and assistance rendered," judge Aedit Abdullah said in a ruling issued on Wednesday, adding this could be "to the extent of preventing arrest of ships of the Hanjin fleet."

Hanjin, the world's seventh largest shipping firm, on August 31 sought court protection in the industry's biggest-ever bankruptcy filing after creditors rejected its latest plan to get out of debt.

About two thirds of its cargo fleet is marooned at sea, while some of its ships have been seized at various ports worldwide, including one container vessel in Singapore.

The crisis has badly hit the international shipping industry, suffering from its worst downturn in six decades, with retailers fearing it may damage Christmas trade.

The ruling said Hanjin had told the Singapore High Court that its petition was part of a global effort "to prevent piecemeal and haphazard resolution of the company's difficulties" which would impair the firm's recovery.

A US court has already issued an order allowing Hanjin to unload some cargo without fear of creditors seizing its ships, a company spokesman said in Seoul on September 10.

On Saturday a key member of the Hanjin group, Korean Air, agreed to a partial bailout of its shipping unit to the tune of 60 billion won ($55 million).

Hanjin had told the Singapore court that the company is scheduled to present a recovery plan by November 25.
The sister of Tyre King, a 13-year old boy shot and killed by police in Columbus, Ohio, on September 14, spoke tearfully about her younger brothers death at a vigil organized by the Ohio Peoples Justice Project in conjunction with Kings family and their attorney, according to the uploader of the videos.

Other speakers at the vigil included local pastor Rev. Dr. Susan K Smith, and Mr. Aramis, the statewide coordinator for the Ohio Peoples Justice Project.

Tyre King was shot and killed by police during an incident in Columbus, Ohio, on Wednesday, September 15.

Police said King was involved in a robbery and was carrying a BB gun that was nearly identical to the type of guns the Columbus PD officers carry, according to Columbus Police Chief Kim Jacobs.

Kings sister was named by the uploader of the videos as Marshay Caldwell. Credit: Facebook/By Their Stranger Fruit
In circles. If one thing became clear Thursday, its that few in Washington know how theyre going to pull off the recent ceasefire deal with Russia. But theres a sense that the Pentagon and State Department are scrambling to iron out all of the known unknowns by Monday, when the deal hits the one-week mark and the two sides are supposed to start talking.

Defense officials have so far refused to offer much of a hint as to how theyll share information with their Russian counterparts should the agreement hold, or when theyll even start talking to the Russians, (though one defense official gave FP some preliminary details of how they think the information sharing will take place.) On Thursday, both State and Pentagon spokesmen declined to offer much information, insisting that plans are in flux as everyone watches events in Syria.

End transmission. We know this much: the Pentagon is trying to figure out how and when to move drones and intel analysts around in order to step up airstrikes in Syria  and monitor the terms of the ceasefire. The AP tells us that U.S. defense officials will need to take assets from other parts of the world, because U.S. military leaders dont want to erode the current U.S.-led coalition campaign against the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria.

But in order for American forces to begin talks with the Russians, Defense Secretary Ash Carter first must submit a waiver that overrides a law passed by Congress banning any military-to-military contacts between the two nations. Some on the House and Senate armed services committees thought the Pentagon should have submitted a waiver last fall when U.S. civilian defense officials began talking with their Russian counterparts.

Where it matters. But none of this matters if the guns in Aleppo and elsewhere dont fall silent. Reports from the critical supply route into the besieged city, Castillo Road, Friday morning were confused. The Russians, Syrians, and some monitoring groups say the Syrian army has started to pull back from the road, but the anti-Assad rebels say they havent seen any movement. Another report says Russian troops have deployed along the road that goes right into the rebel-held neighborhoods of Aleppo, but that fighting has broken out near Damascus, in what would be a serious violation of the ceasefire.

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What we do know is this, however. The regime in Damascus looks to have finally allowed U.N. aid trucks held up in Turkey to enter Syria, according to the latest. The 40 U.N. trucks are hauling wheat flour for more than 150,000 people, and are expected to arrive late in the day Friday. The Syrian Observatory on Human Rights said Friday, however, that a series of violations of the ceasefire have killed a number of civilians, including airstrikes in Deir Ezzor that left 23 dead.

Open society. Despite an ugly public discourse on the place of Muslim Americans in American society stoked by the campaign of Republican nominee for president Donald Trump, there are thousands of Muslims serving their country across the Defense and State Departments. FPs John Hudson spoke to a few prominent Muslim-American officials in government working on critical national security programs, and found that despite the rhetoric, and some heartbreaking personal stories, their commitment hasnt waivered. Hudson writes, those who did speak to Foreign Policy pointed to an irony: The public discourse in America surrounding Islam has never been more disparaging, but due to concerted efforts by the Defense Department to accommodate a diverse workforce, theres never been a better time to be a Muslim at the Pentagon.

I cannot think of a single time at the Pentagon when I felt anything but completely supported by my leadership and peers, said Jasmine El-Gamal, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council who advised Carter and three previous Obama administration secretaries of defense on Middle East policy.

Your shot of 2016. Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton said Thursday that the whole ceasefire rests on the back of the Russians. Whether or not this works is really up to the Russians, she told reporters after a campaign rally in North Carolina. It is up to whether or not Vladimir Putin decides that its time to do what the Russians can do to bring this conflict into a period where there can be the beginning of political discussions, a hoped-for protective zone for people who are under relentless assault from the air, and a commitment to going after the terrorist groups that pose a threat to everyone.

Good morning and as always, if you have any thoughts, announcements, tips, or national security-related events to share, please pass them along to SitRep HQ. Best way is to send them to: paul.mcleary@foreignpolicy.com or on Twitter: @paulmcleary or @arawnsley

Japan

Japanese Defense Minister Tomomi Inada says Japan will conduct joint patrols in the South China Sea with the U.S. Navy in order to help train its forces, CNN reports. Inada told at audience at the Center for Strategic and International Studies that the patrols would also include working with and providing aid to neighboring countries such as Vietnam and the Philippines. Chinas neighbors have grown increasingly concerned at its aggressive assertion of territorial rights in the South China Sea.

Philippines

In a series of recent speeches, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has proposed ending cooperation between the Philippine military and U.S. special operations forces against Islamist militants, buying weapons from Russia and China, and canceling joint patrols of the South China Sea with the U.S. Navy. However, Pentagon press secretary Peter Cook took the long view in a press conference on Thursday, according to Defense News, referring to the Philippines as a longtime ally and emphasizing that Manila and Washington have one of most enduring relationships in the region. Cook said that, regardless of Dutertes rhetoric these are issues that can be resolved and worked out.

Russia

American prosecutors are working to build a case against hackers tied to Russian intelligence and suspected of hacking into various Democratic party organizations and prominent public figures. Reuters reports that the Department of Justice is looking to see if it can muster the evidence to support an indictment. Officials tell the wire service that the Russians have stepped up the pace of breaches and leaks, promoting competition between Russian intelligence agencies.

Technology

For the record, Defense Secretary Ash Carter would like you to know that Pentagon will never give robots their own license to kill. On his way back from Austin for the opening of the Defense Innovation Unit (Experimental), Carter told reporters that whenever it comes to the application of force, there will never be true autonomy, according to Breaking Defense. Humans, Carter said, will always be in the loop  meaning that a meatbag will always have to green light any decisions to use lethal force.

Americas military enjoys its longstanding air superiority, but staying master of the skies is increasingly difficult in an era where small, cheap drones are proliferating. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is looking to help the military keep track of small, unmanned systems with what its calling the Aerial Dragnet program. Aerial Dragnet will seek to map the movements of small drones here in the United States with the goal of eventually transitioning a functioning program to the military.

Snowdens Twitter fight

The House Intelligence Committee released its own assessment on the damage from the revelation of files leaked by former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden, sparking a tweetstorm from exile himself. The assessment alleges tremendous damage from the Snowden revelations and accuses him of being a serial exaggerator and fabricator who lied on his resume, was reprimanded by his superiors, and never attempted to use existing whistleblower channels before releasing an untold number of classified documents to journalists.

Snowden responded on Twitter to the release of the report, calling it artlessly distorted and a serious act of bad faith. In response to the House panels charge that he began mass downloads of classified material shortly after being reprimanded for a dispute over software updates, Snowden said his downloading was authorized activity carried out by a program he wrote and used with senior managers permission.
Washington (AFP) - Edward Snowden was a "disgruntled employee" and not a "principled whistleblower," according to a report from Congress, which comes amid mounting pressure for a presidential pardon.

The former National Security Agency intelligence contractor leaked thousands of classified US documents in 2013 revealing the vast US surveillance put in place after the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Several prominent human rights groups have launched a campaign to convince President Barack Obama to pardon Snowden, who is living in exile in Russia.

The whistleblower is also the subject of an Oliver Stone movie set for release Friday in the United States.

But according to a summary of the two-year report prepared by the House Intelligence Committee, Snowden "was a disgruntled employee who had frequent conflicts with his managers and was reprimanded just two weeks before he began illegally downloading classified documents."

The report also finds that Snowden "did not voice such concerns to any oversight officials" at the NSA, and he should not be considered a whistleblower protected under law.

Although the 36-page report is classified, officials released a shorter, unclassified version.

Snowden "doctored his performance evaluations and obtained new positions at NSA by exaggerating his resume and stealing the answers to an employment test," the report said, adding that he took advantage of its access as network administrator to search hard drives on his colleagues' computers.

"Edward Snowden is no hero -- he's a traitor who willfully betrayed his colleagues and his country," Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes said.

Snowden put US service members "and the American people at risk," he added.

NSA and Cybersecurity Subcommittee Chairman Lynn Westmoreland said Snowden "did more damage to US national security than any other individual in our nation's history."

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- Snowden reacts on Twitter -

Reacting on Twitter, Snowden addressed several specific allegations in the report before categorically dismissing the document.

"Bottom line: after 'two years of investigation,' the American people deserve better," he wrote. "This report diminishes the committee."

"Congress spent two years writing a report to discourage you from going to see this film," he tweeted later, referring to the Oliver Stone movie. "It opens tomorrow."

Following Snowden's revelations, widespread outrage prompted Congress to adopt measures in June 2015 to regulate the NSA's collection of Americans' phone call metadata.

However, White House press secretary Josh Earnest dismissed pressure for a pardon on Wednesday, saying Snowden would enjoy legal due process at a trial in the United States, where he faces up to 30 years in prison for espionage and theft of state secrets.

"His conduct put American lives at risk and it risked American national security," he told reporters. "And that's why the policy of the Obama administration is that Mr Snowden should return to the United States and face the very serious charges that he's facing."
Aleppo (Syria) (AFP) - Instead of colourful, handmade caps for sale to Syrians and foreign tourists, Zakaria Mosuli -- the last tailor in Aleppo's battered Old City -- now sews military headwear almost exclusively for soldiers.

More than five years of war have turned Aleppo's historic city centre, a UNESCO-listed World Heritage site home to an imposing citadel, into a makeshift military barracks.

Syrian shoppers and foreign backpackers have been replaced by war-weary troops, and colourful souvenir stands have given way to checkpoints dividing the ancient market into rebel- and government-held zones.

"I am the only tailor left in Aleppo's old city," says Mosuli in his modest shop in a regime-controlled street of the district.

He snips carefully from camouflaged military-style fabric at his shop, one of a handful in the souk that are still open.

"In the past, I used to sew colourful hats for children and women and young people," he says.

"But today, my speciality is making army-style caps, as this whole neighbourhood has become a military zone and Syrian army soldiers are everywhere."

Violence broke out in Aleppo in mid-2012, more than a year after anti-government protests first erupted across Syria.

The 13-kilometre (8-mile) ancient market -- the largest souk in the world -- became a front line.

Its streets are littered with rubble and walls are scarred by years of gunfire, rockets and mortar rounds.

- 'People have all left' -

Zakaria says he and his family refused to leave and do not regret their decision.

He brings in fabric from a government-held district into Old Aleppo, crossing several checkpoints and dodging shelling and snipers along the way.

"I have loyal customers who come from inside Aleppo, but most of my customers these days are soldiers and officers."

Pointing to two small birds that swooped into his apartment, Zakaria says: "These are my only friends. The people have all left."

Story continues

Of the 200 families that once lived in the Old City, just 15 remain.

Most shops were shuttered long ago with metal gates painted in the tricolour Syrian government flag.

Other storefronts are charred black from car bombs and shelling, and many have had their windows blown in by rocket attacks.

When an AFP correspondent visited the market, soldiers were strolling through the ruined streets.

A US-Russia truce deal has seen guns fall silent in large parts of Syria, including Aleppo.

Mohammed Zakaria, a 65-year-old barber in the souk, has been wounded three times by shelling and rocket attacks on the old city.

But he says work is good as long as soldiers are still around.

"This area was especially a tourist area. My customers were all tourists or Syrians from other provinces," the hairdresser says.

"But today, as this district has turned into a military barracks, my customers are all soldiers and officers," he tells AFP.

- 'I want to die here' -

In Bab al-Faraj, a neighbourhood adjacent to the ancient souk, Yehya Qoteish stands next to a vegetable stall stocked with tomatoes, aubergines, peppers and watermelon.

"There are a lot of displaced people who fled here because the rents are very low. People have taken to living in abandoned hotels," he says.

"My customers are displaced people and soldiers," the 57-year-old says.

Further along in Khan al-Wazir, near the citadel, a pro-regime fighter carrying a baby and followed by his wife trudges home among the rubble.

Elsewhere in the Old City, 66-year-old Sarkis still sits outside his storefront every day -- even though he hasn't had a customer in years.

He learned about photography and camera equipment from his brother, and stayed in the Old City to keep their shop running, despite the increasingly dire situation.

"I got used to seeing dozens of tourists in my shop, but today, there are only soldiers who pass by just to check in on me, not to be photographed."

Sarkis says he could not bear to leave the neighbourhood where he was born and raised: "These few metres (yards) around my shop are my life, not just my livelihood."

His children visit him every week, begging him to leave the ravaged district, but Sarkis refuses.

"I was born here. I want to die here."

Still, Sarkis says, he wishes that just a single customer would come by to ask about photographic equipment or even just a camera battery.

"I'd give it to him for free!"
By Irene Klotz

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) - SpaceX on Thursday said efforts to develop and certify a space taxi for NASA are not being slowed by an investigation into a launch pad fire that destroyed its rocket and a $200 million Israeli communications satellite.

Boeing Co and SpaceX, owned and operated by technology entrepreneur Elon Musk, are building spaceships to fly NASA astronauts to the International Space Station, a $100 billion laboratory that flies 250 miles (400 km) above Earth.

NASA, or the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, is looking to turn over crew transport to SpaceX and Boeing before the end of 2018, breaking a Russian monopoly. SpaceX is aiming for its first test flight to the station in 2017.

Were full-steam head for certification. Were still trying to remain on schedule, Abhishek Tripathi, director of certification for SpaceX, said during a webcast panel discussion at an American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics conference in Long Beach, California.

I know what I need to do in the next day and in the next month, Tripathi said, adding that his work is not being affected by the accident investigation.

SpaceX, with oversight from the Federal Aviation Administration, is working to figure out why one of its Falcon 9 rockets burst into flames on Sept. 1 as it was being fueled for a routine prelaunch test at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. The blaze destroyed the communications satellite, owned by Israels Space Communication Ltd, which was scheduled to be carried into orbit two days later.

SpaceX has not yet disclosed how much damage was done at its primary launch site.

SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said on Wednesday the company was hoping to resume flights in November at a second, nearly complete launch pad at NASAs Kennedy Space Center, adjacent to the Air Force base.

The company, which has a backlog of 70 missions for NASA and commercial customers, worth more than $10 billion, also flies from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

(Reporting by Irene Klotz; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)
By Irene Klotz CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) - SpaceX on Thursday said efforts to develop and certify a space taxi for NASA are not being slowed by an investigation into a launch pad fire that destroyed its rocket and a $200 million Israeli communications satellite. Boeing Co and SpaceX, owned and operated by technology entrepreneur Elon Musk, are building spaceships to fly NASA astronauts to the International Space Station, a $100 billion laboratory that flies 250 miles (400 km) above Earth. NASA, or the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, is looking to turn over crew transport to SpaceX and Boeing before the end of 2018, breaking a Russian monopoly. SpaceX is aiming for its first test flight to the station in 2017. Were full-steam head for certification. Were still trying to remain on schedule, Abhishek Tripathi, director of certification for SpaceX, said during a webcast panel discussion at an American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics conference in Long Beach, California. I know what I need to do in the next day and in the next month, Tripathi said, adding that his work is not being affected by the accident investigation. SpaceX, with oversight from the Federal Aviation Administration, is working to figure out why one of its Falcon 9 rockets burst into flames on Sept. 1 as it was being fueled for a routine prelaunch test at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. The blaze destroyed the communications satellite, owned by Israels Space Communication Ltd, which was scheduled to be carried into orbit two days later. SpaceX has not yet disclosed how much damage was done at its primary launch site. SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said on Wednesday the company was hoping to resume flights in November at a second, nearly complete launch pad at NASAs Kennedy Space Center, adjacent to the Air Force base. The company, which has a backlog of 70 missions for NASA and commercial customers, worth more than $10 billion, also flies from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. (Reporting by Irene Klotz; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)
Spotify is currently negotiating with the major labels to get its content deals in place ahead of an expected IPO some time next year. Or is it getting its ducks in a row ahead of a sale to Facebook, instead? Not so fast.

The latter idea was floated today by Joakim Dal, an analyst at European investment firm GP Bullhound, and first reported by Swedish publication Breakit. GP Bullhound is one of Spotify's major investors, and thus has a financial interest in whether or not the streaming service goes public, as is expected.

Let's Make a Deal: Spotify Negotiating With Major Labels, Looks Ahead to Japan Launch

"We think a US IPO in 2017 is likely but also don't discard the possibility of a sale to Facebook," Dal said, as reported by Business Insider. "Historically, building social networks around its offer has been a weak spot for Spotify. In that sense a deal with Facebook would be something positive. It would also make Spotify stronger against Apple, as Apple today doesn't have a social network connected to its offer."

However, several industry sources have told Billboard that Spotify is completely focused on its IPO, and one source shot down the idea of a sale to Facebook entirely. A rep for Facebook declined to comment; a rep for Spotify did not return a request for comment as of press time.

Back in March, Spotify raised a $1 billion round of funding in convertible debt, which can be either repaid or exchanged for stock in the event of an IPO. But the terms of the investment grow more unfavorable over time, meaning the longer Spotify delays an IPO, the less valuable the deal becomes. In 2015, the company was valued at $8 billion on revenue of $2.2 billion, though its net losses increased to $206 million.

Can Spotify Survive the Impending Storm As It Prepares to Go Public?

Spotify is currently the largest music streaming service in the world, with more than 100 million monthy users -- 40 million of whom are paid subscribers, a number that is expected to grow to around 50 million by the time of its projected IPO. And GP Bullhound predicts that number could grow as high as 100 million paid subscribers by 2020; put in perspective, the IFPI's 2016 global music report said that there were 68 million paid streaming subscribers worldwide at the end of 2015, a tally that has surely risen in the past nine months but that shines a bit of light on how quickly the space is expanding.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Spotify CEO Daniel Ek have a close enough relationship for Zuckerberg to be in attendance at Ek's wedding last month, and the companies have done several integrations in the past, most recently an update to Facebook Messenger announced earlier this year. And while it's possible that the two could leverage each other's particular skill sets, an outright sale is not likely to be one of those options.
Alex Kurtzmans new production company, Secret Hideout, has signed a multiyear overall television deal with CBS Television Studios, it was announced Friday. Under the pact, CBS will have exclusive rights to produce all television content created and developed by the company.

Kurtzmans upcoming CBS series Star Trek: Discovery will be the first show produced under the new banner. Kurtzman co-created and executive produces the franchise revival along with Bryan Fuller. The series is set to bow on the network and its online streaming platform CBS All Access in May 2017.

Kurtzmans previous production company was K/O Paper Products, which was a collaboration with Roberto Orci. The shingle produced CBS Hawaii Five-0 and Scorpion, and Foxs Sleepy Hollow, which were all recently renewed for new seasons and will continue production under the new banner.

After a successful collaboration at K/O Paper Products, Heather Kadin will serve as President of Television at the new company. Kadin will continue to serve as an executive producer on Sleepy Hollow, Scorpion, and Star Trek: Discovery in her new role. Former VP of Television at K/O Paper Products, Aaron Baiers, will also stay on with Secret Hideout as VP of Television where he will serve as a producer for Star Trek: Discovery.

David Stapf and his team have been incredibly supportive and tremendous creative collaborators, stated Secret Hideouts Kurtzman and Kadin in a statement. As Secret Hideout begins to develop and produce new properties and ideas and as the landscape of television evolves, we are thrilled to be working alongside them for the next four years.

Secret Hideout is represented by CAA and attorney Michael Gendler.

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'Star Trek: Discovery': 10 Things We Know About Bryan Fuller's New Series
One of TV's most prolific partnerships is coming to an end.

Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci have parted ways on the TV side, with the former signing a new overall deal with CBS Television Studios, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.

Under his new multiyear pact with the studio, Kurtzman and his newly launched Secret Hideout banner will develop new projects and continue to executive produce CBS fare including Hawaii Five-0 and more. K/O Paper Productions will continue to produce Hawaii Five-0 (CBS), Sleepy Hollow (Fox) and Scorpion (CBS).

Heather Katin, who headed K/O Paper Products - Kurtzman and Orci's former joint production company - will follow Kurtzman and serve as president of Secret Hideout. The company's first show under the new banner will be CBS All Access' Star Trek: Discovery. Kadin will remain involved on Sleepy Hollow and Scorpion and will exec produce Star Trek: Discovery. Former K/O TV vp Aaron Baiers will remain on board in the same role at Secret Hideout and also serve as a producer on Star Trek: Discovery.

The news comes more than a year and a half Kurtzman and Orci parted ways on the film side in a bid to focus on separate franchises.

Read more: New 'Star Trek' TV Series a Go at CBS All Access

Kurtzman and Orci first started writing together on Hercules: The Legendary Journeys before working with J.J. Abrams on Alias. Together, they worked on the Transformers and Star Trek feature film franchises as well as Mission: Impossible III and Amazing Spider-Man 2. K/O Paper Products is responsible for CBS' sophomore drama Scorpion, Hawaii Five-0, rookie Limitless and Sleepy Hollow - which hails from 20th Century Fox Television, where the duo worked on Fringe before moving to CBSTVS.

While both Kurtzman and Orci co-wrote the 2009 Star Trek revival and 2013's Star Trek Into Darkness, Orci is not attached to the new TV reboot set to air exclusively on CBS' digital subscription platform CBS All Access.

Kurtzman, who has a three-year film deal at Universal, is repped by CAA and attorney Michael Gendler.
(Reuters) - A New Zealand dramedy about a teenage boy forming an unlikely bond with his new foster father touches on emotional but not sentimental themes. "Hunt for the Wilderpeople," out in U.K. theaters on Friday, follows troubled 13-year-old Ricky, played by newcomer Julian Dennison, as he goes to live with a new foster family in the New Zealand countryside. When his foster mother unexpectedly dies, he and his new foster father, Uncle Hec, played by Sam Neil, go into hiding in the nearby woods when a tenacious social worker launches a manhunt to find them. While the film weaves together comedic moments with high- stakes action and emotional scenes, Neil told Reuters that he liked "that there is no sentimentality in this film - very important. You know, it is about real feelings, but there is nothing sticky or sentimental there." Famed for his role in Spielberg's 1993 blockbuster "Jurassic Park," Neil said, "There's lots of Uncle Hecs still around in New Zealand in obscure places, and actually I have a couple of good friends who are kind of Uncle Hecs." "There is nothing in common with Jurassic Park, except both characters are a little bit grumpy at the beginning," he quipped. "Hunt for the Wilderpeople" is the highest-grossing film in New Zealand, by local filmmaker Taika Waititi, who is moving up from indie films to Hollywood blockbusters, directing the upcoming Disney-Marvel superhero movie "Thor: Ragnarok" starring Chris Hemsworth. (Reporting by Reuters TV in London; Writing by Melissa Fares; Editing by Dan Grebler)
OTTAWA, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The head of Canada's statistics agency is stepping down, the government said on Friday and media reports cited the country's top statistician as blaming his departure on a lack of independence.

Wayne Smith said Statistics Canada's independence is compromised by new government-backed technology arrangements that hamper its operations, the Canadian Press news agency reported.

Statistics Canada is responsible for producing closely watched economic data reports on everything from jobs to international trade.

The government agency was criticized earlier this year for technological issues that delayed the release of some economic data reports on its website.

Anil Arora, who previously helped run Canada's census, will become chief statistician as of Monday, replacing Smith, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a statement.

(Reporting by Leah Schnurr; editing by Grant McCool)
Because they are tailored to appeal to voters, all political platforms are, to some extent, populist. But what sets the wave of populism currently sweeping across the Western world apart from politics as usual is its impatience with constraints placed on democratic governments  in other words, its authoritarianism. When Fox News host Brett Baier suggested that the military would refuse Donald Trumps orders to torture captured jihadis, the latter responded simply, Theyre not going to refuse me. The notion that leaders elected by popular majorities can flout legal norms, constitutional rules, and democratic checks and balances is at heart of the illiberal democracy promoted by Viktor Orban in Hungary and the ethos of Polands Law and Justice Party, which has held power since October.

Although most frequently associated with political right, authoritarian populism cuts across ideological lines. True to their Maoist and Leninist precepts, the more radical members of Greeces Syriza oppose not just Greeces European creditors but also capitalism itself. In January, Spains newly elected Chamber of Deputies held its swearing-in ceremony. In a departure from tradition, many of the new deputies from the left-wing Podemos party conspicuously promised not just to abide by the constitution, but also to work toward changing it.

Support for authoritarian populists is driven by different factors in different countries. Much like Tolstoys unhappy families, each unhappy in their own way, todays populists, both on the left and right, are responding to grievances specific to each particular time and place.

Greece has gone through dramatic economic hardship since the beginning of the global economic downturn of 2008. The United Kingdom and Germany have seen large influxes of Eastern European immigrants and Middle Eastern asylum-seekers, respectively. France and Belgium have been shaken by Islamist terrorism. Some European countries are still struggling with historic legacies of nationalism, while others face a barrage of Russian propaganda. The worlds leading liberal democracy, the United States, has still other problems, which are not exactly mirrored on the other side of the Atlantic.

The academic literature seeking to explain why voters support populist parties is not always enlightening. Theres no consistent relationship between rates of immigration and support for right-wing populist parties. Neither do material wealth or social class do a good job in predicting support for such groups. Instead, support for populists is associated with certain ideological characteristics, such as opposition to multiculturalism and immigration or lack of confidence in political elites. A recent study from Flanders found that it is the perception of being vulnerable or underprivileged, rather than actual socioeconomic status, that induces individuals to support populists.

In any case, focusing on the beliefs or ideological dispositions that make individual voters fall for populists is no antidote to this disease of modern politics. If we want to find policies that could stem the tide, we have to look at the big picture.

Unlike the snapshots of survey data from different countries, this big picture is unambiguous: Financial crises lead to extremism. A recent study showed that between 1874 and 2014, financial crises increased support for far-right parties by 30 percent on average.

Indeed, the current populist onslaught is nothing new. Following the 1929 crash and the subsequent global depression, extremism of all stripes, left and right, rose across the Western world. Its growth was far more pronounced in countries that had weaker democratic traditions or by had been on the losing side in World War I. But an extended period of poor economic performance was a necessary ingredient.

A common objection to this argument is that the current wave of populism is rising in economically successful countries too. The recovery of the U.S. economy has shown it to be much more dynamic than Europes  yet American politics has given us Trump. Denmark and Austria are hardly economic basket cases. The former has a cabinet that relies on the support of the nationalist Danish Peoples Party and the latter is likely to elect a far-right candidate for president in the presidential election later this year.

But this phenomenon only shows how dramatically our understanding of economic success has shifted. Real GDP in both Austria and Denmark today is at essentially the same level as in 2006. Even the United States, often invoked as example of a successful recovery from the Great Recession, has seen an annual growth in labor productivity of only 1.3 percent since 2005, compared to 2.8 percent a decade earlier. By 2014, real median household income was off by over 7 percent from its peak in 1999. Large numbers of Americans, especially men, have withdrawn from the labor market.

As result, if you are an average Dane, Austrian, or American, the odds are that your standard of living is disappointing compared to expectations you might have formed a decade or two ago. Provided that continuous improvements in standards of living are an integral part of the social contract that gives legitimacy to democratic capitalism, the current populist turn of Western politics should not look that puzzling after all.

Nor is it too difficult to link this analysis to the alternative accounts of populism discussed above. Any of the commonly identified drivers of support for populism  whether rejection of multiculturalism, fear of foreigners, concerns about seeing your community change, or sense that politics has become distant and incomprehensible  becomes much more bearable when one is busy having a career, seizing opportunities, building a life. It is no coincidence that one encounters less resentment of immigrants in cosmopolitan London than in the UKs economically deprived areas, which have actually seen much less immigration.

Acknowledging that an economic malaise is at the heart of the current revolt against political elites gives much-needed compass to policymakers who might otherwise be tempted to stick with business as usual, or worse, try to appease the discontents by embracing populist ideas. Perhaps the most worrying example of the latter is the call by the former U.S. Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers for a responsible nationalism that would scale back the neoliberal orthodoxy of creative destruction, unfettered trade, and open immigration regimes.

The central problem with responsible nationalism is that we know that economic protectionism and immigration restrictions will only deepen the Wests economic woes  just as a return to economic nationalism deepened the Great Depression.

What is to be done? Some elements of the Wests growth problem might not respond to economic reforms. The demographic changes that are reducing the size of the labor force, and with it the rates of economic growth, do not lend themselves to easy solutions. Japans example is extreme, but a similar pattern of aging affects practically all Western societies.

Yet even demographic trends can be fought  at least temporarily  through increased immigration. And while completely open borders are neither politically feasible nor desirable, a relaxation of currently existing restrictions would generate large economic gains.

Meanwhile, advances in fields from genetics to artificial intelligence belie the notion that humankind has exhausted its ability to innovate. More plausibly, in a better regulatory and policy environment, scientific advances would translate into marked improvements in standards of living much faster. According to a recent study by economists at Duke University and the Mercatus Center, the burden of federal regulation in the United States dampens growth by 0.8 percent every year. Had regulations been held constant at levels observed in 1980, the authors conclude, the economy would be nearly 25 percent larger.

The cost of compliance with complex regulation is only a relatively minor part of the problem. More serious is the extent to which regulatory barriers have shut down commercially viable innovations. For example, the FAAs infamous 1973 ban on supersonic transport over the United States might have to do with the fact that air travel has seen very little change in the past four decades. More than a half of EU member states, including France and Germany, ban their farmers from growing genetically modified crops  despite the lack of evidence that these pose risks to humans or the environment. Its also possible that heavy-handed regulation will kill the future of commercial drones or driverless cars before these industries even get off the ground.

More pedestrian of overregulation exist as well. Occupational licensing in professions where it is not justified by public interest (think florists, barbers, or carpenters) and restrictions imposed on the so-called sharing economy hinder social mobility and lock people in poverty, all while making insiders better off.

As the EUs precautionary principle illustrates, excessive economic regulation often reflects an unjustified aversion to risk. More commonly, it also reflects a certain intellectual complacency  a belief that economic progress is sometimes not worth the disruption it comes with. But if such complacency was perhaps excusable in good economic times, it is hardly justifiable at a time when the post-war political order is coming under an unprecedented populist attack  precisely because of its failure to deliver shared prosperity.

This is not a call for a one-way ticket to a laissez-faire utopia. Of course, there is a role for government in setting and enforcing standards, preventing fraud, and protecting the marginalized and the vulnerable. But its not obvious that these goals are best served by a regulatory state that grew, as Niall Ferguson notes, by a factor of 30 since 1936  while the U.S. economy became only 12 times larger.

It has become a tired cliche to say that the victorious march of populists is a wake-up call to political elites. It is also an unhelpful one, as long as it does not specify what exactly the elites should do once awake from their slumber. Here, in contrast, is to hope that they will understand that liberal democracy cannot flourish without a robust engine of sustained economic growth.

In the photo, protesters block the entrance to the Zappeion hall in Athens on September 16 to denounce the EUs austerity policies.

Photo credit: LOUISA GOULIAMAKI/AFP/Getty Images
Katherine Dieckmanns Strange Weather will be the Southampton Opening Night film at the Hamptons Intl. Film Festival on Oct. 7. Additionally, Kenneth Lonergans film Machester by the Sea will be presented as the Saturday centerpiece film, with Mike Mills 20th Century Women to be featured as the Sunday centerpiece film.

Our Southampton opening night and centerpiece films bring an array of talented filmmakers, actors, and diverse storylines to HIFF this year, said David Nugent, festival artistic director. We are thrilled at the opportunity to screen these bodies of work.

Strange Weather stars Holly Hunter as a mother who travels the back roads of the Deep South to settle a score in an effort to deal with the grief over the death of her son. The film also stars Carrie Coon, Kim Coates, and Glenne Headly.

Starring Casey Affleck, Manchester by the Sea centers around a janitor who, after the death of his older brother, is shocked to learn that he has become the sole guardian of his teenage nephew. Written and directed by Kenneth Lonergan, the film also stars Michelle Williams, Kyle Chandler, Lucas Hedges and Kara Hayward. The film will screen Oct. 8.

Writer and director Mike Mills will present his film 20th Century Women, on Oct. 9. The film, which stars Annette Bening, Elle Fanning, Greta Gerwig, and Billy Crudup, tells the story of three women who explore love and freedom in Southern California during the late 1970s.

We are so proud to showcase films made by New York based, independent film directors, and it is an exceptional pleasure to showcase their works in these coveted festival slots, said Anne Chaisson, festival executive director. For 24 years our mission has been to celebrate independent voices, and the films of Katherine Dieckmann, Mike Mills and Kenneth Lonergan embody what the word independent truly means.

Additionally, Varietys 10 Actors to Watch will be honored at the festival.

Related Content Variety Announces 10 Actors to Watch 2016

Story continues

The 24th annual Hamptons Intl. Film Festival will runs Oct. 6-10 in East Hampton, N.Y. Individual tickets for the festival go on sale Sept. 26 and can be purchased through hamptonsfilmfest.org.

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BERLIN (Reuters) - A double-digit score for the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) in a Berlin city vote on Sunday would be seen around the world as the rebirth of the Nazis, the mayor of the German capital has warned. The right-wing AfD has gained support as voters become increasingly uneasy with Chancellor Angela Merkel's open-door refugee policy, which saw about one million migrants arrive in Germany last year. A poll by Forschungsgruppe Wahlen for broadcaster ZDF that was published on Thursday showed the AfD was set to get 14 percent in the weekend vote in Berlin, historically a left-wing stronghold. "It would be seen around the world as a sign of the return of the right-wing and the Nazis in Germany," Berlin Mayor Michael Mueller, a Social Democrat (SPD), wrote on Facebook on Thursday. "Berlin is not any old city - Berlin is the city that transformed itself from the capital of Hitler's Nazi Germany into a beacon of freedom, tolerance, diversity and social cohesion," he said. The center-left SPD runs the city of Berlin in coalition with Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU). The AfD won a shock 20.8 percent in an election in the eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern two weeks ago, meaning the party is now represented in nine of Germany's 16 state assemblies. When migrants started arriving in large numbers about a year ago, some were met with applause, cheers and gifts, but the mood has since shifted due to concerns about integration and attacks by asylum seekers on civilians this summer. On Wednesday, locals and asylum seekers clashed in the eastern town of Bautzen. About 80 young people, mainly Germans described by police as being right-wingers, chanted that the town belonged to Germans as 20 asylum seekers stood opposite them. The groups threw bottles and wooden slats at each other. The Forschungsgruppe Wahlen poll on the Berlin city election showed the SPD on 23 percent, followed by the CDU on 18 percent, the Greens on 15 percent and the far-left Linke on 14.5 percent. The pro-business Free Democrats were on 6.5 percent. (Reporting by Michelle Martin; Editing by Louise Ireland)
Legos have become the building blocks of love in one New Jersey community as students at several schools gathered Tuesday to support a terminally ill boy while breaking world records with his favorite toy.

Jamesy Raffone was only 4 years old when he was diagnosed with Duchenne muscular dystrophy, a deadly disorder in which muscle tissue degenerates over time. With no cure, the disease will likely claim Jamesy's life in his early 20s.

Read: Hundreds of Strangers Celebrate Terminally Ill Boy's 10th Birthday

Now 7, Jamesy's parents have been dedicated to raising awareness about Duchenne and funds to fight it, establishing the JAR of Hope foundation  JAR for Jamesy's initials.

Looking to spread the word about the foundation and Jamesy's rare condition, the boy's father, James Raffone, tried to think of an event that people could get behind.

[Jamesy is] going to end up in a wheelchair and the clock is ticking, so I thought I had to find a way people can understand and share about this disease said James.

On Tuesday, dozens of students from three area schools joined together to piece 200,000 donated Legos into chain links with the goal of breaking the world record for longest chain of Legos, all to raise awareness for the foundation and Jamesy's condition.

The event included more than 100 students from New Jersey elementary schools, Clark Mills (where Jamesy attends) and Milford Brook, as well as CSI high school in New York's Staten Island.

Jamesy was filled with happiness when everything unfolded. He was completely overwhelmed with the amount of support hes received for this cause and he always loved Legos.

The goal was to break not one, but three records involving Legos: The longest chain, assembling 10,000 Lego links in less than eight hours and the fastest Lego cleanup.

Story continues

Read: 400 Students Sing Hymns in Teacher's Backyard After He Stops Cancer Treatment

All told, the attendees were able to complete a chain of 913 meters. The foundation is waiting to hear back from the Guinness World Records for official word.

"Its breathtaking and its loving to know we accomplished this James Raffone said.

For more information about Duchenne and Jamesy's story, go to http://jarofhope.org/

WATCH: Boy Fighting Rare Disease Gets Surprise Pre-K Graduation in Hospital

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Washington (AFP) - Gliding stealthily through the ocean depths, attack submarines quietly shadow their quarry, ready to strike with torpedoes or missiles.

Somewhat neglected after the Cold War, they are now making a serious comeback around the world.

Militaries in Asia, Russia and the United States are aggressively stepping up the development, acquisition and deployment of the undersea craft.

That's because they have realized that even the best surface vessels and warplanes are vulnerable to anti-ship or anti-aircraft missiles, says Bryan Clark of Washington's Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, an independent think-tank.

"So they are shifting to more undersea capabilities to do some of the offensive operations that they want to carry out," he said.

Nowhere is the trend more marked than in Asia, prompted by China's rapidly expanding military might.

Beijing has established a range of maritime defense capabilities and highly sophisticated anti-aircraft systems that prevent enemy vessels from nearing its coast.

China has also worked hard to build a fleet of attack submarines, and now boasts 50 diesel and five nuclear attack subs.

Australia signed a contract this year to buy 12 submarines, non-nuclear versions of the French Barracuda attack vessel.

Vietnam has taken delivery of the fifth of six submarines it bought from Russia. Japan is expected to increase its fleet from 18 to 22 diesel subs by 2018. And India, Indonesia and Malaysia are all developing their own underwater capabilities.

The US Navy is paying close attention -- and looking at its own fleet.

Admiral Harry Harris, who heads the Pacific Command, has warned about China's military buildup in the South China Sea, saying the United States needs more attack subs in the region.

And General Philip Breedlove, former head of the US European Command, sounded similar warnings about Russia's renewed attention to submarines under President Vladimir Putin.

Story continues

In addition to providing a key military capability, submarines also act as intelligence gatherers, compiling data on enemy fleets and even monitoring what's happening on land.

The United States uses its undersea craft to monitor North Korea, China and Russia, experts say.

During wartime, submarines can cripple entire enemy fleets, while those equipped with cruise missiles can lurk off coasts and attack targets on land.

- Underwater drones -

Submarines have played roles in some of the more visible recent military operations.

The USS Florida fired 90 Tomahawk cruise missiles into Libya in 2011 to destroy the country's air defenses at the start of the campaign to oust the dictator Moamer Kadhafi.

More recently, Russia unleashed a series of cruise missiles in December at Syrian targets from a conventionally powered sub in the Mediterranean.

Aware of the stakes, the US Navy plans to halt the decline of its own fleet of nuclear attack submarines.

The fleet has dwindled to 53 from 100 or so in the 1980s and will shrink to only around 40 in 2029 if nothing is done.

The Navy is now considering whether to continue building two nuclear submarines per year instead of a planned drop to one a year in 2021.

Despite the decline in sub numbers, the United States continues to lead technologically, ensuring its vessels can keep an edge.

The Navy will equip its existing nuclear fleet of Virginia-class subs with a special new module from 2019 to enable the launch and recovery of underwater drones, which are expected to play important roles in future maritime warfare.

"Submarines will become more like a little aircraft carrier, carrying different combinations of missiles and underwater drones," Clark said.

"It will be much more about payload carrying than being the tactical platform like a fighter airplane."

Drones may lead attack and reconnaissance missions, as they will be able to sneak up on foes closer than their motherships.

In July 2015, the USS North Dakota successfully launched and retrieved unmanned underwater vehicles in the Mediterranean.

Most of the drones the Navy has been developing are roughly the size of a torpedo and can travel for just one day, Clark says.

They can "do surveillance or go try to attack if they want to."

However, the Navy is also working on two bigger drone programs.

One is for a large-diameter vehicle around 25 feet (7.5 meters) long and 21 inches (53 centimeters) wide, Clark says. "It can go out for a month."
Nairobi (AFP) - The number of refugees from South Sudan has passed the one million mark after a renewed bout of fierce fighting in July sent nearly 200,000 people fleeing the war-scarred nation, the UN said Friday.

The latest United Nations refugee agency figures see the world's youngest nation join the ranks of Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia, where conflict similarly has driven massive numbers fleeing to safety across national borders.

The large majority of South Sudanese refugees registered since it won its independence in 2011 have fled since the outbreak of a particularly brutal civil war in December 2013.

Tens of thousands of people have died and more than 2.5 million been driven from their homes.

Countless villages have been burnt to the ground, almost half the population relies on food assistance to survive, and human rights organisations say government and rebel forces have frequently used rape as a weapon of war.

"The number of South Sudanese refugees sheltering in neighbouring countries has this week passed the one million mark," UNHCR said in a statement.

Another 1.61 million people are displaced inside the country, it said.

"Five years after independence, this is a very sad milestone," spokesman Leo Dobbs told reporters in Geneva.

Neighbouring Uganda, which already shelters 375,000 South Sudanese, warned it was running out of resources and asked for support.

"The international community ... must act very fast to end this violence," Disaster and Refugees Minister Musa Ecweru told AFP. "We have maintained an open door policy ... but the resources we have cannot cope with the surging numbers."

"We appeal to donors to step up funding," he added.

Hopes of ending the three-year conflict rose in April when former rebel leader Riek Machar returned to Juba to take up the job of vice-president in a national unity government headed by President Salva Kiir.

- No end in sight -

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But fierce clashes erupted in Juba on July 8 between Kiir's guards and troops loyal to Machar, who is currently in Khartoum receiving medical treatment.

Since then, more than 185,000 people have fled, most of them women and children, according to the UNHCR.

"They include survivors of violent attacks, sexual assault, children (who) have been separated from their parents ... and people in need of urgent medical care," the UN agency said.

On September 4, the South Sudanese government first reluctantly agreed to the deployment of a 4,000-strong UN protection force to beef up the UN's peacekeeping mission of 12,000 troops.

But then it asked to re-negotiate the size of the force, irritating the international community.

On Thursday the United States threatened to push for an arms embargo against the Juba government should it block the formation of the force.

Meanwhile several civil society activists who met with a UN Security Council team last week have fled a government crackdown.

The UNHCR said refugees arriving in neighbouring countries were reporting heavy fighting across the southern Greater Equatoria region, where armed groups were killing civilians, sexually assaulting women and girls and recruiting young boys.

"Many refugees arrive exhausted after days walking in the bush and going without food or water," UNHCR said.

Most of those recently uprooted have crossed into Uganda, which counts 143,164 recent arrivals, bringing the total number of South Sudanese refugees in the country to nearly 375,000.

And there is no end in sight: over the past week alone, more than 20,000 new arrivals were registered in Uganda.

A surge of people has meanwhile also entered western Ethiopia's Gambella region in the past week, while others have headed to Kenya, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Central African Republic.

"These countries have commendably kept their doors open to the new arrivals," UNHCR said.
Sugar exchange traded notes climbed Friday, with sugar futures surging to a four-year high, on speculation of smaller harvest across major producing regions.

On Friday, the iPath Bloomberg Sugar Subindex Total Return ETN (SGG) rose 6.3% and Teucrium Sugar Fund (CANE) gained 5.1%. Sugar has staged a huge comeback in 2016, with SGG up 36.1% and CANE up 34.4% year-to-date.

SEE MORE: Production Woes Help These ETPs Experience a Sugar High

Meanwhile, ICE sugar futures increased 6.2% to $2.247 per pound.

Sugar prices jumped Friday after Brazil revealed a slowdown in production and Robobank projected a rising global deficit in the upcoming season.

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Brazils main center-south sugarcane region produced 2.54 million metric tons of sugar in the second half of August, or 14% slower than from the first half of last month, fueling speculation that there would be a weak finish to the harvest, reports Nigel Hunt for Reuters.

The trade has been spooked by more modest Brazilian production so they are wary about being short, analyst Tobin Gorey of Commonwealth Bank of Australia told Reuters.

Robobank projected that there would be a global deficit of 7.2 million metric tons in the upcoming 2016/17 season after a 7.9 metric ton shortfall in the current season.

The fundamentals that drove the rise in prices earlier this year have remained largely unchanged. Indeed, little has actually changed in the last quarter, Robobank said, according to the Financial Times.

Robobank attributed to the deficit to smaller-than-expected harvest from major producers across the globe.

Naturally, the factors that are arguably the biggest influences on the fundamental picture for global sugarnamely the size of the Indian, Thai and Centre/South Brazilian cropsare all still the subject of intense monitoring and debate, Robobanks global sugar strategist Andy Duff said. But the uncertainties about each of them are all still months away from being resolved.

Story continues

For more information on the sugar market, visit our sugar category.

iPath Bloomberg Sugar Subindex Total Return ETN
Supermodel Iskra Lawrence sat down with her photo retoucher to talk about all things body image

Supermodel Iskra Lawrence sat down with her photo retoucher to talk about all things body image

Were huge fans of supermodel and Aerie spokeswoman Iskra Lawrence. Not only is she changing the modeling game one brilliant photoshoot at a time, shes done so much to bring the body-positivity movement to the forefront of fashion.

A photo posted by iskra (@iamiskra) on Sep 12, 2016 at 4:21pm PDT

Recently, Iskra sat down with a professional photoshopper to see how her model body is transformed in pictures.

After all the glam and the glitz and everything that goes into making the image, its then retouched. That image goes from being that person to something thats not real, Iskra declared.

A photo posted by iskra (@iamiskra) on Sep 6, 2016 at 12:56am PDT

The retoucher suggested that if he was asked to fix the photo, he would slim her legs and add a thigh gap. As the photoshopping continued, Iskra told the editor,

If I was to lose weight, I wouldnt lose it like this, you know? I wouldnt be able to change my body shape.

Needless to say, the retoucher was totally gobsmacked, and responded with some Ums.

Iskra then denounced photoshopping and stressed that none of her social media photos are shopped.

As for the video itself, throughout it, Iskra appears in all kinds of amazing workout apparel while breaking a sweat (and looking so damn gorgeous doing it!)

A photo posted by iskra (@iamiskra) on Sep 7, 2016 at 10:09am PDT

Im at a place where I know that Im good enough and I can use exercise to reward myself and feel good.

Iskra tracks her activity on her Fitbit Alta, and says that true happiness comes from being true to yourself.

A photo posted by iskra (@iamiskra) on Sep 15, 2016 at 11:27am PDT

Shall we say that one more time, just because we should all hear it, loud and clear?

True happiness comes from being true to yourself.

Live it, love it, learn it! Thanks, Iskra!

The post Supermodel Iskra Lawrence sat down with her photo retoucher to talk about all things body image appeared first on HelloGiggles.
The three suspects arrested in connection to the vicious rape and murder of a New Mexico girl  including her own mother  have pleaded not guilty to all counts at their arraignments Friday.

Michelle Martens, 35, her 31-year-old boyfriend Fabian Gonzales and his 31-year-old cousin Jessica Kelley all face first-degree murder charges along with a slew of other charges in the death of Martens 10-year-old daughter, Victoria, authorities said.

Charges against the trio include intentional abuse of a child resulting in death and rape of a child under 13, KRQE reported.

Read: Mom Sought Out Men To Rape 10-Year-Old Girl Before Her Gruesome Murder: Cops

Kelley was hit with 23 charges, while Gonzales faces 20 and Martens faces 19, according to reports.

Instead of celebrating her 10th birthday on August 24 with cake and manicures, police said Victoria spent the day being tortured, first injected with methamphetamine by Gonzales and Kelley to calm her down so the pair could sexually assault her, according to a criminal complaint obtained by the Albuquerque Journal.

Her mother stood by as the attack went on and continued to do nothing as Gonzales allegedly strangled her and Kelley stabbed her before dismembering her body, the complaint said.

Read: Girl Killed by Mom's Boyfriend, His Cousin on Day of 10th Birthday Celebration: Cops

Victoria had endured multiple sexual assaults leading up to her death because her mother enjoyed it, police said.

Martens told authorities she had set up encounters with at least three men to abuse her daughter before the little girls death, using the dating website Plenty of Fish to find men who would have sex with her children, according to search warrants obtained by the Journal.

Men may have also raped Victorias younger sibling as well, police said.

Gonzales and Kelleys bonds were set at $1 million cash only, while Martens bond was set at $1.5 million cash only.

Story continues

Watch: Hear The Desperate 911 Call From Woman Being Held By Alleged Serial Killer

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By Daniel Dickson STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - The European Union has the capacity to absorb a million refugees a year, and could force through new asylum rules by majority voting if consensus cannot be reached, Sweden's migration minister said in an interview on Friday. "Europe as a continent must bear its responsibility for the global refugee crisis," said Morgan Johansson, minister for justice and migration in the center-left government. "We are the world's richest continent and it is obvious that if anyone can actually handle this, it is Europe with its 500 million inhabitants," he told Reuters. Sweden punches above its weight on migration issues in the EU because of its historically liberal policies and the fact it accepted more asylum seekers last year than any other country, in proportion to its 10 million population. But Johansson's comments highlighted the gulf separating Sweden from much of the EU at a time when central European states are fighting the imposition of quotas stipulating how many refugees they should take, and German leader Angela Merkel is under fire at home for her open-door policy. Some 1.3 million migrants reached Europe's shores last year from countries like Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, prompting bitter rows between member states over how to share responsibility. Johansson said a permanent mechanism to distribute asylum seekers among EU countries, another quota system to accept a specified number of refugees from camps outside Europe, and more harmonized asylum rules in member countries were all needed. "And if we cannot agree, there are rules for making decisions that can be used. It is majority decisions that are applied in this area too," he said. "The European Union should be able to receive 1 million refugees per year." ANGER WITH HUNGARY Sweden took a record 163,000 asylum seekers in 2015 but this is expected to fall to around 35,000 this year due to stricter asylum rules and border controls, as well as measures making it harder for refugees to enter the EU. These include a deal with Turkey to reduce the number of people crossing its territory to reach Greece. Johansson said he had summoned Hungary's ambassador last week to protest against the country's unwillingness to accept asylum seekers who first registered there before traveling on across Europe, and who should be sent back there under the EU's Dublin rules. He said he and his Nordic colleagues had also written a letter to the EU Commission saying it needed to act against Hungary, which has built a razor-wire fence to keep out migrants and is due to hold a referendum next month on whether to reject refugee quotas. "Worst case, Hungary will need to be taken to court," Johansson said. The EU depends on Turkey to keep a lid on the movement of migrants to the bloc, but the promised reward of visa-free travel for Turks has been stalled because of the EU's insistence that Ankara should first relax its anti-terrorism laws. "When it comes to that, the ball is in Turkey's court, really," Johansson said. In a reflection of the knock-on effects of migrant flows across Europe, he said Sweden needed to be sure a backlog of unregistered asylum seekers in Germany had been dealt with before it could drop controls on its border with Denmark. Sweden was also working hard to reach a deal with Afghanistan to get it to take back any rejected Afghan asylum seekers. (Editing by Alistair Scrutton and Mark Trevelyan)
Stockholm (AFP) - A Swedish appeals court will on Friday decide whether to maintain an arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange over a 2010 rape accusation which he fears could lead to his extradition to the US.

Assange has always refused to travel to Stockholm for questioning over the allegation, which he denies, due to concerns Sweden will extradite him to the United States over WikiLeaks' release of 500,000 secret military files on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Friday's hearing will be the eighth time the European arrest warrant has been tested in a Swedish court, with all seven previous rulings having gone against him.

The 45-year-old Australian sought refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy in London in June 2012 after exhausting all his legal options in Britain against extradition to Sweden.

The hearing comes a day after WikiLeaks released medical records claiming Assange's mental health was at risk if he remained confined in the embassy.

"Mr Assangeas mental health is highly likely to deteriorate over time if he remains in his current situation.... It is urgent that his current circumstances are resolved as quickly as possible," said a report published by the organisation on Twitter.

The 27-page medical report accompanied by supporting documents is attributed to an unnamed "trauma and psychosocial expert" in London and dated December 11, 2015.

Assange's lawyers have urged Sweden to respect a non-binding legal opinion by the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, which on February 5 ruled that his confinement in the Ecuadorian embassy amounted to arbitrary detention by Sweden and Britain.

A Stockholm district court, however, rejected the finding, ruling that "Julian Assange's stay in the embassy should not be considered a detention".

It said the arrest warrant against him needed to be maintained because "there is still a risk that he will abscond or evade justice".

Story continues

The appeals court will announce its decision at 11 am (0900 GMT).

- Interrogation in October -

Ecuador announced earlier this week that Assange had agreed to answer questions from Swedish investigators at the embassy from October 17.

The Swedish Prosecution Agency had asked that their own investigators be allowed to interrogate Assange in person, but Quito denied that request.

Instead, the Swedish prosecutors will provide their questions in writing and an Ecuadorian prosecutor will conduct the questioning.

Swedish prosecutor Ingrid Isgren and police investigator Cecilia Redell will however be allowed to be present.

The Swedish prosecution agency has defended itself against criticism that it has let the case drag on since 2010 without any progress.

Among other things, prosecutors insisted that Assange travel to Sweden to answer the allegations, although they dropped that demand in March 2015 and agreed to allow the questioning to take place in London.

Prosecutor Marianne Ny has insisted Assange was to blame for the lengthy delays.

"Mr Assange hasn't made himself available, which follows from the proceedings in Swedish courts," she told reporters on September 7.

Assange has meanwhile maintained that he has been sufficiently accommodating to Swedish justice officials.

The statute of limitations on the rape allegation expires on August 17, 2020.
(STOCKHOLM)  A Swedish appeals court on Friday upheld a detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, dismissing the latest attempt by the 45-year-old Australian to make prosecutors drop a rape investigation from 2010.

The decision by the Svea Court of Appeal means that the arrest warrant stands for the 45-year-old computer hacker, who has avoided extradition to Sweden by seeking shelter at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since 2012.

Assange, who denies the rape allegation, has challenged the detention order several times. He says he fears he will be extradited to the United States to face espionage charges if he leaves the embassy.

His Swedish defense lawyer, Per Samuelsson, said he would appeal the decision to the Supreme Court.

We are naturally disappointed that Swedish courts yet again choose to ignore Julian Assanges difficult life situation, Samuelsson told The Associated Press. They ignore the risk that he will be extradited to the United States.

Swedish prosecutors say they are not in contact with counterparts in the U.S. and that they would also need Britains permission should a third country seek his extradition.

Upholding a lower court ruling, the appeals court said Swedish prosecutors are actively trying to move the investigation forward and set up an interrogation of Assange at the embassy. Acting on behalf of Swedish investigators, an Ecuadorian prosecutor is set to question Assange on Oct. 17.

This means that there is at present no reason to set aside the detention order. Julian Assanges claim to that effect shall therefore be refused, the court said.

It also brushed aside the findings of a U.N. working group, which described his stay at the London embassy as arbitrary detention. The court noted that the panels finding wasnt binding on Swedish courts and that Assanges stay at the embassy is not to be regarded as an unlawful deprivation of liberty.

Story continues

The investigation stems from Assanges brief relationship with two women he met during a visit to Sweden six years ago. Allegations of sexual molestation and unlawful coercion were dropped last year when the statute of limitations expired. The rape allegation, which involves one of the women, will expire in 2020 if Assange hasnt been indicted by then.

Marianne Ny, the top prosecutor in the case, welcomed the courts decision and said the interrogation with Assange would go ahead as planned.

I have handled many rape and sex crimes cases, she told AP. I have never experienced before that someone sought shelter at an embassy. So this situation is really unusual.
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - A Swedish appeals court decided to uphold the arrest warrant for Wikileaks founder Julian Assange on Friday, prolonging the six year long legal stand off with prosecutors and clearing the way for the Wikileaks founder to be questioned in London next month. Assange, 45, is wanted by Swedish authorities for questioning over allegations, which he denies, that he committed rape in 2010. "The Court of Appeal shares the assessment of the District Court that Julian Assange is still suspected on probable cause of rape," the court said. Assange avoided possible extradition to Sweden by taking refuge in Ecuador's London embassy in 2012. He says he fears further extradition to the United States, where a criminal investigation into the activities of Wikileaks is ongoing. Per Samuelson, a Swedish lawyer representing Assange, said he had not yet talked to his client. "I assume we will appeal, it would be strange if we did not," he said. The court said the lengthy deadlock and the previous passivity of Swedish prosecutors in pursuing the investigation were arguments for setting aside the warrant, but there remained a strong public interest argument for it remaining in place. "At present, continued detention therefore appears to be both effective and necessary so as to be able to move the investigation forward," the court said. Ecuador has set an Oct. 17 date for questioning Assange at its London embassy. Swedish prosecutors have said the questioning will be conducted by an Ecuadorian prosecutor. The latest request by Assange to have the warrant for his arrest overturned came after a U.N. panel in February said his stay at the Ecuadorean embassy equalled arbitrary detention, that he should be let go and be awarded compensation. "Julian Assange is being detained arbitrarily and should be freed immediately," Ecuador's government said in a statement, adding that it would continue to protect and give him asylum in line with its traditional defence of human rights. (Reporting by Daniel Dickson, Johan Ahlander and Johan Sennero in Stockholm; Alexandra Valencia in Quito; editing by Alistair Scrutton and Diane Craft)
From Good Housekeeping

While the Pledge of Allegiance has been in the news a lot lately, one California teen's protest is nothing new. Leilani Thomas hasn't recited the words since second grade, when the Native American student reconsidered its meaning to her culture. However, that decision recently cost her when a teacher both docked her and a friend's grades for sitting down during the pledge.

"She told me I was being disrespectful and I was pretty mad," Leilani told KXTV. "She was being disrespectful to me also, saying I was making bad choices, and I don't have the choice to sit during the pledge."

In fact, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against making the pledge mandatory over 60 years ago, all the way back in 1943. Forcing students to salute the flag obviously violated their First Amendment rights. But this didn't stop the Lower Lake High School employee from punishing Thomas. Not only did she lower her participation score from a five to a three, but she also insulted her reasoning.

"Here's the deal. If you really, really have an argument and feel so strongly about, then I need to see it written out - your argument - in an essay form," the teacher said on a recording. "Like, why? Why, because here's the thing; those people, they're not alive anymore. Your ancestors."

But Thomas believes the American flag doesn't represent her or her people. "I'm not going to stand for the people who did this to my people," she told KPIX. "[The teacher] says that it represents the military and that they risked their lives for us ... and I always tell her, 'Well, my people risked our lives for our land, for our freedom. For our rights.'"

Now, the administration is coming out in support of Thomas and her friend. "Students don't lose their First Amendment rights when they walk in the door," the school district superintendent told KPIX. "We are dealing with the teacher on this." While the girls now attend another class, administrators haven't publicized consequences for the unnamed employee.

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SAN SEBASTIAN, Spain  Movistar Plus, the pay-TV unit of Spanish telecom giant Telefonica, has boarded three of Spains most prominent movie productions  part of Telefonicas goal of becoming the biggest Spanish-language fiction hub in the world.

Luis Miguel Gilperez, president of Telefonica Espana, recently announced that Telefonica will plow about 70 million ($79 million) annually into original productions. The lions share of that will go to original series.

Telefonica posted 47.2 billion ($53.1 billion) in revenues last year, more than four times Vivendis sales.

Its no coincidence that Telefonica has chosen a film festival, San Sebastian, to present its latest TV series Saturday. One key to its success in TV is forging talent relations with great screenwriters, directors and producers. Movistar Plus, which will channel Telefonicas content investment, wants to work with these talents on both the small and big screens.

Movistar Plus most recent investments, as a minority co-producer, underscore both its desire to take equity in a range of movies and to work with the best talent in the Spanish business.

Backed by Sony and Spains Zeta Cinema, the 2015 comedy Now or Never grossed $9.5 million in Spain last year, making it Sonys second-biggest hit of 2015, , after Hotel Transylvania 2.

Among the three new movie productions Movistar Plus has boarded is Ripolls Chess for Three, described by Gabriel Arias-Salgado, Telefonica film production head, as a classic My Fair Lady-style romantic comedy. The project is at first-draft screenplay stage, tracking for an early 2017 shoot.

The animated Tad 2: The Secret of King Midas features the Indiana Jones-style adventures of Tad, an ordinary Spanish Joe. The first film in the franchise, Tad, the Lost Explorer, grossed about $50 million worldwide. The sequel, which has been picked up by Paramount in a worldwide distribution deal, reunites the originals producers: Telecinco Cinema, 4Cats Pictures, Lightbox Animation Studios and Telefonica.

Story continues

The first Tad was a true-blue hit. Tad 2 has a great screenplay and should be very entertaining, said Arias-Salgado.

Gold is an upcoming Conquistador epic, co-produced by Sony Pictures, Atresmedia Cine and Apache Films. It has been acquired for distribution in the U.S., Latin America and Spain by Sony Pictures.

Spains Agustin Diaz Yanes (Alatriste) is attached to direct, adapting a short story by Arturo Perez Reverte, author of the novel that yielded Queen of the South. Directed by Diaz Yanes, based on a Reverte novel and starring Viggo Mortensen, 2006s Alatriste proved an early modern Spanish blockbuster.

Gold stars Oscar Jaenada (Cantinflas), Raul Arevalo (Marshland), Jose Coronado (No Rest For the Wicked) and Barbara Lennie (Magical Girl).

This is a Conquistador-era Western, like The Wild Bunch, with a romantic element as well. The cast is very strong. It is Agustin Diaz Yanes comeback, and Arturo Perez-Reverte has consulted on the screenplay, Arias-Salgado said.

Tripulante 9, a fourth Movistar Plus co-production, marks the anticipated debut of Hatem Khraiche, screenwriter of The Hidden Face,co-produced by Cactus Flower. Tripulante 9, produced by Spains Cactus Flower and Mono but shot in Colombia, is a romantic drama with a sci-fi context, according to Arias-Salgado. It stars Clara Lago (The Hidden Face, Spanish Affair) and Alex Gonzalez (X Men: First Class). The movie is now in post-production.

Telefonica-owned premium pay-TV operator Canal Plus pre-bought 38 Spanish films in 2015. It will continue in this line, said Arias Salgado.

But, with its quota obligation to invest in Spanish film as an IPTV reduced to virtually no obligation since November 2015, Movistar Plus is studying the possibility of abandoning minority co-production partnerships in favor of 100% backing of original movie productions from top-flight Spanish directors, Arias-Salgado said.

Since 2013, Telefonicas film production investment has been channeled through the label Telefonica Studios. Telefonica will now channel both its film and TV production through Movistar Plus.

To encourage emerging talent, Movistar Plus will be creating a third-year fellowship for four students, two at Barcelonas ESCAC, the other two at Madrids ECAM, arguably Spains top two film schools. One grant at both schools would be for direction, another for screenwriting.

For Arias Salgado. the ultimate goal of Telefonicas original-content production is to create films and TV series which set Movistar Plus apart for clients, boosting its pay-TV business and giving added value to the Movistar Plus Fusion bundle of TV, Internet, and fixed and cell telephony.

That strategy gives Movistar Plus investment a quad-play rationale, relieving some of the pressures that are being felt by traditional standalone pay-TV operators as digital platforms launch worldwide.

Branding itself as the home of premium Spanish fiction, Movistar Plus can also set itself apart from Netflix and HBO, which launches in Spain as a streaming service before the end of the year.

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Tengger Cavalry has made some impressive strides since principal member Nature Ganganbaigal relocated the band to New York from China in 2015.

The Mongolian folk metal band released fourth album Blood Sacrifice Shaman on Metal Hell Records and caught the media's eye when they sold out a Christmas Eve gig at New York's Carnegie Hall last year. In April, they logged their first North American tour, then in May, they delivered the Mountain Side EP, which featured both reworked tracks and new music.

Although they dropped two studio projects within the past year, Tengger Cavalry continues to record new music. A song called "The Struggle," which the band created after releasing Mountain Side EP, is available for sale on Bandcamp as a single. Billboard has an exclusive stream of the track. Listen to it below:

"'The Struggle' is very different from all the other Tengger Cavalry songs, because this one is a very personal song that expresses inner strife," explains Ganganbaigal. "We usually write songs about nomadic culture and traditions like horses and war. In life, we all deal with a crisis of faith or a massive life challenge, which is what 'The Struggle' is about: a person trying hard to put themselves back together when confronting a meltdown. Musically, we used a Central-Asian melody to articulate the [sorrowful] part."

Tengger Calvary heads back out for its second North American run today. Groove metal act Incite is joining as support.

Sept. 16: White Hall, Md. @ Shadow Woods (Note: Incite will not be performing)

Sept. 17: Asheville, N.C. @ The Rabbit Hole

Sept. 18: Hattiesburg, Miss. @ Tavern

Sept. 19: Austin @ Grizzly Hall

Sept. 20: San Antonio @ Paper Tiger

Sept. 21: Fort Worth, Texas @ Rail Club

Sept. 23: Phoenix @ Club Red

Sept. 24: San Diego @ Brick by Brick

Sept. 26: Los Angeles @ Whisky a Go Go

Sept. 28: Sacramento, Calif. @ Starlite

Sept. 29: Oakland, Calif. @ Oakland Opera House

Story continues

Sept. 30: Portland, Ore. @ Ash Street Saloon

Oct. 1: Vancouver @ Rickshaw Theater

Oct. 2: Bellingham, Wash. @ Shakedown

Oct. 3: Seattle @ Crockodile

Oct. 5: Salt Lake City @ Metro

Oct. 6: Denver @ 3 Kings

Oct. 7: Kansas City, Mo. @ Riot Room

Oct. 8: Champaign, Ill. @ Hi Drive

Oct. 9: Chicago @ Reggies

Oct. 10: Columbus, Ohio @ Rumba Cafe

Oct. 11: Detroit @ Smalls

Oct. 12: Toronto @ Hard Luck

Oct. 13: Ottawa, Ontario @ Mavericks

Oct. 14: Montreal @ Les Foufounes Electriques

Oct. 15: Revere, Mass. @ Sammy's Patio
Yesterday, automotive tech company Mobileye claimed that it stopped providing parts for Teslas Autopilot assisted-driving system over concerns the carmaker was pushing the envelope in terms of safety. Now Tesla is firing back, saying the breakup occurred because Mobileye was unhappy to learn that Tesla planned to take over manufacturing of some Autopilot components.

A Tesla spokeswoman tells Reuters that after Mobileye found out that an upcoming version of Autopilot would use a Tesla-built vision system, Mobileye became defensive and ultimately broke ties with the company.

Tesla claims that Mobileye tried to get the carmaker to discontinue its own development, pay the supplier more, and use only its products for future hardware.

The carmaker allegedly declined, and the two companies went their separate ways.

When Tesla refused to cancel its own vision development activities and plans for deployment, Mobileye discontinued hardware support for future platforms and released public statements implying that this discontinuance was motivated by safety concerns, the Tesla spokeswoman said.

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Teslas take on the breakup stands in stark contrast to Mobileye executives explanation given on Thursday.

The company said it had parted ways with Tesla because the electric car company was sending mixed messages that Autopilot was something that it wasnt: an autonomous driving product.

For example, Mobileye says Tesla boasted about Autopilots autonomous capabilities, while also telling drivers they must keep their hands on the wheel at all times.

Autopilotwhich steers the vehicle more actively than other automated safety systems like automatic braking, steering assist, or adaptive cruise controlhas come under heavy scrutiny following a fatal May 2016 crash during which the system was in use.

Story continues

It is not designed to cover all possible crash situations in a safe manner, Amnon Shashua, chairman for Mobileye, tells Reuters. No matter how you spin it, (Autopilot) is not designed for that. It is a driver assistance system and not a driverless system.

A spokesperson for Tesla tells Reuters that Mobileyes statements are inaccurate.

Since the release of Autopilot, weve continuously educated customers on the use of the features, reminding them that theyre responsible to keep their hands on the wheel and remain alert and present when using Autopilot, the spokeswoman said. Drivers must be prepared to take control at all times.

After the potential Autopilot connection to the fatal crash was revealed in June, Tesla announced it was taking steps to ensure the safety of drivers who use Autopilot.

In July, Musk said the company wouldnt disable the function, but would instead increase efforts to educate owners on how the system works and what to expect when using it.

Tesla says Mobileye balked after learning carmaker to make own cameras [Reuters]





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Top pick tires for 2016

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Consumer Reports has no relationship with any advertisers on this website. Copyright  2006-2016 Consumers Union of U.S.
The price of lithium has soared over the past decade from less than 50,000 to over 150,000 renminbi per metric tonne, according to Thomson Reuters data. While some attribute the dramatic rise to nothing more than speculation, others are quick to point out that rising demand from electric vehicles and energy storage justifies the increase. The truth may lie somewhere in between, and investors interested in lithium should read beyond the headlines.

Lithium%20price

In this article, well look at the lithium market and how one exchange-traded fund (ETF) has grown considerably in the face of rising prices.

Potential Lithium Demand

Lithium-ion batteries are commonly used in smartphones, laptops and other electronic devices, but the most significant driver of future demand will come from electric vehicles and energy storage applications. For example, the Tesla Model S requires 10,000 times as much lithium as a smartphone. The rise in renewable energy has also created significant demand for energy storage solutions on the part of both consumers and governments.

Battery%20supply%20chain

Demand for lithium has been difficult to forecast due to the evolving nature of these industries. In March, Tesla CEO Elon Musk told attendees of the Model 3 unveiling that the company would have to absorb the entire worlds lithium-ion production in order to produce half a million cars a year. The company expects to reach that mark by 2018 and produce a million vehicles by 2020, following the anticipated release of its $35,000 mass-market Model 3.

Expanding Lithium Supply

There is no shortage of lithium found in the earths crust, but extracting it can be costly and time consuming, so higher prices may not translate to a surge in supply. The industry could experience difficulty with expanding the lithium supply to meet Teslas projected demands over such a short time period. The market is also dominated by relatively few players that have been consolidating in recent years, which could limit new supply from coming online.

Story continues

Lithium%20supply%20v%20demand

However, theres little doubt that the lithium market appears oversupplied given its current demand. These dynamics are being exacerbated by plans to expand production at Chinas Tianqi Lithium with a $300 million processing plant, as well as a rumored plan to double output from the big Greenbushes lithium mine in the South West region of Western Australia. TRU Group analysts believe this could lead to a significant oversupply in the market through 2020.

There are relatively few ways for investors to gain exposure to the lithium market, which is why the Global X Lithium ETF (LIT B-) has become extremely popular. Since the beginning of the year, the ETF has risen nearly 20%, and attracted more than $57 million in net inflows. These are impressive numbers given that the ETF has just $106 million in assets under management and charges a relatively lofty expense ratio of 0.77%.

The ETF invests at least 80% of its total assets in securities of companies that are economically tied to the lithium industry, including those engaged in lithium mining and lithium battery production. The funds top holdings include FMC Corp (FMC) with a 21.5% weighting, Quimica Y Minera Chile (SQM) with a 12.5% weighting, and Orocobre Ltd. (OROCF) with a 7% weighting. The fund has an average of $8 billion in market capitalization and a beta coefficient of 1.25 compared to the S&P 500 index.

Investors should keep in mind several key risk factors before investing in the lithium ETF. In addition to its relatively high-expense ratio, the fund holds just 28 stocks with about 70% of its assets in the top ten holdings. FMC Corp., its largest holding, is a diversified chemical company serving a multitude of markets, which means that it may not correlate directly with the price of lithium  and the same goes for many of the ETFs other holdings.

The Bottom Line

Lithium prices have soared over the past decade as demand for batteries has accelerated. With Tesla launching new electric vehicles and energy storage demand on the rise, some investors are confident that lithium could become the new oil. Other analysts are quick to point out that lithium supply has been on the rise, and demand is contingent on these lofty projections actually materializing. Investors should consider these details when deciding to invest in the space through ETFs like the Global X Lithium ETF.

Click here to read the original article on ETFdb.com.
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Tesla Motors Inc (TSLA.O) on Thursday said its former camera supplier Mobileye (MBLY.N) disparaged the safety of Tesla's assisted driving technology Autopilot after learning the carmaker was developing its own vision system.

Once Mobileye learned Tesla would be using its own vision system in upcoming versions of Autopilot, a semi-autonomous technology that helps vehicles steer, it "attempted to force Tesla to discontinue this development, pay them more and use their products in future hardware," a Tesla spokeswoman said.

Tesla's comments came a day after Mobileye Chairman Amnon Shashua told Reuters the company had broken ties with Tesla because Autopilot was "pushing the envelope in terms of safety," prompting Tesla to respond that it "continuously" educated drivers that they should be prepared to take control of the car.

Tesla's strong defense of Autopilot underscores the huge stakes in the race to perfect self-driving and partially self-driving systems and the need to assure consumers and regulators that the innovations are safe.

Mobileye did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Tesla's Thursday charges.

The Autopilot system has been under intense scrutiny since the death of a Tesla driver in May whose Model S crashed into a tractor-trailer in Florida while Autopilot was engaged.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has been investigating Autopilot since June.

A Chinese man sued Tesla in China in July, saying Autopilot caused his son to crash into a street-sweeping vehicle. Tesla said there was no way to know whether Autopilot was engaged at the time of the accident, due to damage to the car.

Tesla's spokeswoman called the statements made by Mobileye's Shashua "inaccurate."

"When Tesla refused to cancel its own vision development activities and plans for deployment, Mobileye discontinued hardware support for future platforms and released public statements implying that this discontinuance was motivated by safety concerns," she said.

Story continues

The public fingerpointing is rare in the industry. In July, after Mobileye announced its break with Tesla, the carmaker said its former supplier had been unable to keep pace with Tesla's product changes.

Concerns about Autopilot - which is not dissimilar to systems by rival automakers - led Tesla to put new limits on Autopilot in January and on Sunday.

Chief Executive Elon Musk said on Sunday an update would temporarily prevent drivers from using the system if they fail to heed audible and visual warnings to take back control.

(Reporting By Alexandria Sage; editing by Peter Henderson and Cynthia Osterman)
Tesla just struck a deal to build one of the largest battery storage facilities in the world.

It will provide a 20-megawatt Powerpack system at a substation in Mira Loma, California. The lithium-ion battery system will store 80-megawatt hours of energy, enough to power more than 2,500 households for a day, according to a Tesla (TSLA)blog post. Tesla expects the grid to be completed by 2016. Southern California Edison owns the substation.

The contract is part of a state-mandated plan to improve grid reliability. It was originally ordered in 2013 and got expedited after a massive leak at a natural gas well in Aliso Canyon threatened power supplies.

Tesla shares rose by as much as 3 percent on Thursday.

Southern California Edison spokesman Paul Griffo told CNBC the Powerpack will charge whenever excess energy is on the grid (often during off-peak hours) and then deliver it later when it's needed.

The California Public Utilities Commission in 2013 ordered three utilities  Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric  to install 1,325 megawatts of storage capacity by 2024. After the leak, the government sped up the plan to procure the necessary storage.



Three other companies were awarded contracts to provide another 27 megawatts of battery storage services to Southern California Edison, but the Tesla system will be the only one the utility actually owns, Griffo said.

He declined to disclose the value of Tesla's contract.

CORRECTION: This article has been updated to reflect the correct units of energy storage the California Public Utilities Commission is requiring utilities to install.





More From CNBC


BRATISLAVA, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The Bratislava Declaration Today we meet in Bratislava at a critical time for our European project. The Bratislava Summit of 27 Member States has been devoted to diagnose together the present state of the European Union and discuss our common future. We all agreed on the following general principles.

Although one country has decided to leave, the EU remains indispensable for the rest of us. In the aftermath of the wars and deep divisions on our continent, the EU secured peace, democracy and enabled our countries to prosper. Many countries and regions outside still only strive for such achievements. We are determined to make a success of the EU with 27 Member States, building on this joint history.

The EU is not perfect but it is the best instrument we have for addressing the new challenges we are facing. We need the EU not only to guarantee peace and democracy but also the security of our people. We need the EU to serve better their needs and wishes to live, study, work, move and prosper freely across our continent and benefit from the rich European cultural heritage.

We need to improve the communication with each other - among Member States, with EU institutions, but most importantly with our citizens. We should inject more clarity into our decisions. Use clear and honest language. Focus on citizens' expectations, with strong courage to challenge simplistic solutions of extreme or populist political forces.

We committed in Bratislava to offer to our citizens in the upcoming months a vision of an attractive EU they can trust and support. We are confident that we have the will and the capacity to achieve it.

We welcomed the State of the Union speech of the President of the Commission.

We held a broad debate on the key priorities for the coming months. On this basis, the President of the European Council, the Presidency of the Council and the Commission proposed the following work programme (the "Bratislava roadmap"):

The Bratislava Roadmap I. General diagnosis and objective - Determined to make a success of the EU at 27 - Many common challenges ahead of us: people concerned by a perceived lack of control and fears related to migration, terrorism, and economic and social insecurity. Need to tackle these issues as a matter of priority over the coming months - Working together, the EU27 have the means to tackle these challenges. We are determined to find common solutions also as regards issues where we are divided; priority here and now to show unity and ensure political control over developments in order to build our common future - Need to be clear about what the EU can do, and what is for the Member States to do, to make sure we can deliver on our promises II. Migration and external borders Objective - Never to allow return to uncontrolled flows of last year and further bring down number of irregular migrants - Ensure full control of our external borders and get back to Schengen - Broaden EU consensus on long term migration policy and apply the principles of responsibility and solidarity Concrete measures a) full commitment to implementing the EU-Turkey statement as well as continued support to the countries of the Western Balkans b) commitment today by a number of Member States to offer immediate assistance to strengthen the protection of Bulgaria's border with Turkey, and continue support to other frontline States c) before the end of the year, full capacity for rapid reaction of the European Border and Coast Guard, now signed into law d) migration compacts for cooperation and dialogue with third countries to lead to reduced flows of illegal migration and increased return rates, to be assessed by the December European Council e) work to be continued to broaden EU consensus in terms of long term migration policy, including on how to apply the principles of responsibility and solidarity in the future III. Internal and external security - Internal Security Objective - Do everything necessary to support Member States in ensuring internal security and fighting terrorism Concrete measures a) intensified cooperation and information-exchange among security services of the Member States b) adoption of the necessary measures to ensure that all persons, including nationals from EU Member States, crossing the Union's external borders will be checked against the relevant databases, that must be interconnected c) start to set up a Travel Information and Authorisation System (ETIAS) to allow for advance checks and, if necessary, deny entry of visa-exempt travellers d) a systematic effort against radicalisation, including through expulsions and entry bans where warranted as well as EU support to Member States' actions in prevention - External Security and Defence Objective - In a challenging geopolitical environment, strengthen EU cooperation on external security and defence Concrete measures a) December European Council to decide on a concrete implementation plan on security and defence and on how to make better use of the options in the Treaties, especially as regards capabilities b) start implementing the joint declaration with NATO immediately IV. Economic and social development, youth Objective - Create a promising economic future for all, safeguard our way of life and provide better opportunities for youth Concrete measures a) in December: decision on extension of the European Fund for Strategic Investment in light of evaluation b) Spring 2017 European Council: review progress as regards delivering on the different Single Market strategies (including Digital Single Market, Capital Markets Union, Energy Union) c) October European Council to address how to ensure a robust trade policy that reaps the benefits of open markets while taking into account concerns of citizens d) in December - decisions on EU support for Member States in fighting youth unemployment and on enhanced EU programmes dedicated to youth V. Way ahead - Deliver on promises: strengthen the mechanism for reviewing the implementation of decisions taken. Loyal co-operation and communication of Member States and institutions - Bratislava is the beginning of a process. The coming formal European Council meetings will allow for concrete follow up on the themes mentioned here. The Heads of the 27 will meet informally at the beginning of 2017 in Valletta. The March 2017 celebrations of the 60th anniversary of the Rome Treaties will bring together Heads in Rome and will be used to round off the process launched in Bratislava, and set out orientations for our common future together.

(Reporting By Jan Strupczewski)
Ever since the administration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, presidents have been judged on the successes they notch during their first 100 days. Now, as Barack Obama prepares to end his historic turn on the political stage, Yahoo News is running The Last 100 Days, a look at what Obama achieved during his consequential presidency, how he navigates the struggles of his final months in office and what lies ahead for him after eight years filled with firsts. We will also look at how the country bids farewell to its first African-American president.

Its not a literal 100 days  Obama leaves office in late January 2017.

And it wont all be about policy. As Obama himself is fond of noting, he also spent his two terms as father to daughters Malia and Sasha and husband to first lady Michelle Obama. And even without much input from the White House, the cultural landscape shifted dramatically over his two terms on issues such as gay rights.

And then theres the way the president sees the presidency  not just his tumultuous years at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., but also the institution and its relationships (for better or worse) with other branches of government and with the news media.

In this sixth installment, we look at the never-ending debate over Obamas approach to government transparency and openness.

_____

President Barack Obama came into office in 2009 promising the most transparent administration in history. In 2016, the reporters who cover him only ever utter that promise as an ironic joke, typically when theyve been denied information. But Obama has a good case to make that he has kept his promise.

That assessment might get a cheer from his aides. But reporters and transparency advocates probably wont be joining in, because most transparent administration in history is measured against a terrible baseline. (Disclosure: I sit on the board of the White House Correspondents Association, which constantly argues for greater transparency and access.)

Story continues

Obamas standard has technical shortcomings. Compliance with the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is an important way to measure an administrations openness. But the law is just 50 years old, so theres no way to measure him against a majority of his predecessors on that score. And when this White House boasts (accurately) about putting more information online than any other administration, its not very meaningful as a comparison with pre-Internet presidents.

The phrase also sets a low bar. To be most transparent, Obama only needs to be even slightly less secretive than other presidents, rather than meet tougher standards set by independent open-government champions or sought by the press.

As Seamus Kraft, creator of the pro-transparency OpenGov Foundation, puts it: The president ran on an ambitious openness agenda of transparency, public participation and collaboration. Eight years later, progress has been made. But its pretty clear that in This Town, closed still trumps open.

In fact, the idea that Obama would benefit merely by being relatively more open was baked into his promises in 2008.

His ability to talk about transparency was an effective way for him to illustrate some of the differences with the (George W.) Bush administration, White House press secretary Josh Earnest told reporters at his daily briefing on Monday. President Obama was very interested in making a more forceful and clear case about the different approach to governing the country that he would pursue.

Nearly eight years later, evaluating Obamas record on questions of transparency and openness  and guessing what elements of his approach his successor might preserve or abandon  has gained fresh importance, given recent events in the presidential campaign. Hillary Clintons mishandling of her health scare on the anniversary of 9/11, and Donald Trumps refusal to abide by the decades-old, bipartisan precedent of candidates releasing their tax returns arent equivalent  his break with tradition and transparency is starker than hers. But reporters dont see an open-government champion in either.

Neither candidate has yet enabled a protective pool  a small group of reporters who follow virtually every move a presidential hopeful makes. Its an arrangement that is typically in place by the summer before an election. And its what the winner in November will find awaiting him or her at the White House, a setup based on the principle that an independent press, not merely a cadre of loyal aides, should be on hand to chronicle a presidency.

Having a protective pool wouldnt have erased all of Clintons errors on Sunday. But on the other hand, the press would not have been reduced to speculating about where she had suddenly gone, since their representatives would have been in tow. And senior aides would have had in-person opportunities to explain to reporters what was going on with the candidate and why, rather than keep quiet for most of the day, before issuing a written statement explaining that she had pneumonia, which she had been diagnosed with on Friday.

Clinton could have disclosed her illness earlier, but was hardly required to by precedent. Major politicians tend not to reveal a physical ailment before they are forced to, either in anticipation of visible evidence (see George W. Bushs pretzel incident) or because it will become public anyway when the results of their physical exams are released, as tradition now requires.

Still, her penchant for secrecy (her aides might call it privacy) unsettled some Democrats. Antibiotics can take care of pneumonia, former Obama strategist David Axelrod tweeted Monday. Whats the cure for an unhealthy penchant for privacy that repeatedly creates unnecessary problems?

As so many campaign trail flaps do, this one wound its way from the trail to the White House, where Earnest praised the press for pushing for greater transparency but delivered a sobering message to a press corps already worriedly wondering what life will be like under Obamas successor, whoever that turns out to be.

The only real constituency for transparency in government is all of you, he said. Transparency in its own right is not something that a lot of voters are going to consider.

Its not a threat, or at least not completely. Its also a Help me help you message: The people that reporters expect to push for greater access inside the White House say they need to be able to show positive results from greater openness, in order to win internal debates with those arguing for secrecy. When reporters only complain, the argument goes, they are undercutting those who might be their most effective allies.

Earnest had previewed this message on Aug. 31, first in a New York Times letter to the editor and then again in a question-and-answer session with reporters on Air Force One, each time warning reporters against griping about limited transparency.

Effective advocacy must remain credible, and preserving that credibility involves giving credit where its due, he said, suggesting that reporters failure to praise Obamas record would remove a key incentive for future presidents to embrace openness over their natural penchant for secrecy. There is, he cautioned, no built-in political incentive for any politician to do that.

Earnest is right that government transparency isnt going to displace the economy or national security from the top of most voters lists of concerns. But the constituency for government openness clearly also includes outside advocacy groups, like the Sunlight Foundation. And on specific issues, the public expresses a preference for greater disclosures. A Quinnipiac poll in August found that 74 percent of Americans said Trump should make his tax returns public, as opposed to 21 percent who said he should not.

In his briefing, Earnest also listed areas in which the administration feels it has made genuine strides and where reporters  while keeping the pressure on for more openness  ought to show a little more gratitude. He cited the White House practice of making public its visitor logs, known as WAVES, and Obamas intermittent practice of allowing a print pool reporter to attend the early portion of his fundraisers.

There arent a lot of people who are  outside of the press corps  who are checking out the WAVES records on a regular basis or reading the pool reports that you guys generate from the presidents comments at fundraisers, Earnest said.

Obama aides also defend his transparency record by pointing to the official White House websites petitions page, where citizens can lobby their president, and the unprecedented publication of 180,000 government data sets via www.data.gov.

The WAVES example is perhaps the most interesting, a genuinely worthwhile initiative that is also deeply flawed and showcases the administrations struggle to reconcile its stated commitment to openness with governments typical propensity for secrecy. Its also useful to look at because Obama aides point to the WAVES disclosure as something his successor wont be able to roll back without courting controversy.

A White House document defending Obamas record on transparency cites his voluntary, proactive disclosure of visitor logs and calls this a stark contrast to the Bush administrations decision to fight the disclosure in court.

Thats a rather rosy portrayal of the presidents record. While its true that his predecessor had fought the visitor disclosures in court, so did Obama. It was only in mid-September 2009 that, on advice of White House lawyers, the administration settled the case and announced that the records would be public.

The resulting page on the official White House web site does provide unprecedented data  5.64 million searchable visitor entries (including tourists) as of late August. The logs clearly meet the most transparent administration standard: No other president has overseen this specific kind of disclosure. Reporters have used the tool to document lobbyist access to the White House, information the administration might be expected to try to conceal.

So why dont the logs document a May 29, 2014, lunch between Obama and Hillary Clinton, who was already expected at the time to be gearing up to run for president? The answer lies in the exceptions to who gets listed in the public records. In that case, it was due to a White House policy that visitors making purely personal stops that do not involve any official or political business wont appear in the logs.

But White House officials have made clear to Yahoo News that there is no objective standard for predicting whether a visit will involve any such business, and that aides dont ask after the fact whether any business was conducted. The White House also applied the purely personal label to a June 2015 Prince (RIP) concert for 500 people, including several Wall Street CEOs. And the White House applies the same logic outside Washington. When Obama dined in June 2015 with Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg  one of the presidents biggest campaign donors  the White House first tried to keep the event a secret, then labeled it a dinner with friends.

Speaking of friends, while its true that Obama has often let print pool reporters hear his opening pitch at private events with rich donors, that access isnt guaranteed. According to data compiled by Mark Knoller of CBS News, the White House press corps unrivaled archivist, 29 of Obamas 60 political fundraisers in this cycle were closed to press coverage.

On FOIA, the White House says that the Obama administration processed a record high of 770,000 requests in fiscal year 2015, and that at least 92 percent of the requests resulted in the release of either some or all of the requested records.

But an Associated Press analysis of FOIA compliance contradicts those figures and paints a darker picture. Its figures show that the administration set a record for the number of times it reported that federal employees couldnt find a single page requested.

Critics of the administration have highlighted other practices, like requiring public affairs minders to attend journalists interviews with policy aides. Obama aides bristle when reporters point out that he has prosecuted more national security leakers than his predecessors, arguing that he is protecting vital secrets. But at least some of those punished tried at first to go through established procedures for blowing the whistle on questionable practices before going to the press. And, after a series of high-profile controversies, the administration was forced to rewrite the rules for dealing with reporters who receive leaks.

Which takes us to the question of access  broadly defined as the news medias ability to see the president at work, firsthand, and ask questions of him and top policy makers. There have been smart efforts to compare Obama to his predecessors throughout history, but one aspect of his communications strategy clearly has no precedent: the use of in-house digital content, which has reduced his White Houses dependence on the traditional press. At times, the White House excludes the media in favor of chronicling an event solely with what amounts to propaganda. As I have noted, Clinton has already embraced that communications approach, producing a podcast in which a loyal employee lobbed gentle questions in her direction.

Whether readers conclude that Obama met his most transparent standard, or that he fell so short that he deserves little credit, two things are sure. First, that the next president will draw lessons from his record. And second, that the press will keep making its case.
Charlotte Tilbury has created a lipstick honoring the Queen. (Photo by Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty Images)

British makeup brand Charlotte Tilbury announced the launch of their newest lipstick, The Queen.

I have been obsessed with the Queen forever. She is the ultimate icon; elegant, erudite, fearless, empowering and has effortless, legendary style  She is, as a leader, as a woman, and as a mother, an inspiration to women all over the world, Tilbury said in a press release.

The vintage crimson takes inspiration from the woman herself as well as other iconic British reds, like the Wimbledon strawberry picnic, the royal red in the Union Jack flag, the iconic red of the Royal Post Boxes and the Royal Variety red carpet.

The Queen (Photo: Charlotte Tilbury)

HRH The Queen once said, I have to be seen to believed, when asked about her bold color choices  and that quote really stuck with Tilbury while she was creating this shade.

I wanted to create a lipstick that honored the Queen and her enduring style  she is such an inspirational woman, and makes me incredibly proud to be British, and even prouder to have founded a British brand. This lipstick commemorates the beauty and the brilliance of our magical Queen.

(Photo by Indigo/Getty Images)

The Queen retails for $38 a tube and will be available exclusively on CharlotteTilbury.com. No word yet if the Queen is a fan.

Lets keep in touch! Follow Yahoo Beauty on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest.
[Photo: British Fashion Council]



Some of the top players in the British fashion industry headed to Downing Street last night for an audience with Prime Minister Theresa May.

The PM celebrated the British fashion industry alongside co-host Natalie Massenet, Chairman of the British Fashion Council, declaring that Britain, and London, is very much open for business in the wake of Brexit.

Mrs May wore a 120 Palmer//Harding and John Lewis collaboration belted white shirt for the occasion, paired with Amanda Wakeley black trousers and a trusty pair of Russell and Bromley lip-print loafers.

The gathering was all about lauding the continuing success of British fashion on the eve of Fashion Week, with the Prime Minister publicly declaring her support for our countrys designers, editors retailers and young workers.

Vivienne Westwood arrives at Downing Street [Photo: Getty]

Industry bigwigs including Vivienne Westwood - sporting a Theresa TALK Vivienne slogan tee - Samantha Cameron, Vogue editor Alexandra Shulman, Burberrys Christopher Bailey and Sophia Webster, joined previous BFC/Vogue Designer Fashion Fund winners at Number 10.

Mrs May told the ultra-stylish guests: British fashion is of huge importance to our country, contributing 28 billion to the UK economy and supporting nearly 900,000 jobs.

The Prime Minister is known for her penchant for stylish footwear, and chose a Vogue subscription as her luxury item when a guest on Radio 4s Desert Island Discs.

Fashion Week SS17: All The FROW Celebrity Appearances

Fashion Week SS17 Highlights
London (AFP) - More than a third of Saudi-led air strikes on Yemen have struck civilian sites including schools, hospitals and mosques, according to a survey of the conflict published in the Guardian on Friday.

The findings came from the Yemen Data Project, a group of security and human rights experts, who examined more than 8,600 air raids in the campaign between March 2015 and the end of August this year.

Out of these it found 3,577 were listed as hitting military sites and 3,158 non-military, while 1,882 strikes were classified as unknown, the Guardian said.

Over the course of the campaign led by Saudi Arabia, the survey listed 942 air raids on residential areas, 114 on markets, 34 on mosques, 147 on school buildings, 26 on universities and 378 on transport.

The study, which the report said was based on open-source data including research on the ground, showed that one particular school building was hit nine times, while one market was hit 24 times.

The project said the coalition hit more non-military sites than military in five of the last 18 months.

Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir was quoted by the Guardian as dismissing the report as "vastly exaggerated" and challenging its methodology.

He said rebel rebel fighters had "turned schools and hospitals and mosques into command and control centres. They have turned them into weapons depots in a way that they are no longer civilian targets.

"They are military targets. They might have been a school a year ago. But they were not a school when they were bombed," he said.

Saudi Arabia intervened in Yemen in March 2015 to prop up the government of President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi after Shiite Huthi rebels took over the capital Sanaa.

Since then the conflict has left more than 6,600 people dead, most of them civilians, and displaced at least three million others, according to the United Nations.

A UN report in June found the coalition responsible for 60 percent of the 785 deaths of children in Yemen last year.

Fighting has intensified since the collapse of UN-backed peace talks in Kuwait on August 6.
Employers already know candidates are qualified for the job if they make it to the interview.

Thats why WeWorks head of R&D, Josh Emig, asks an unconventional question during every interview that has nothing to do with qualifications. He wants to know what prospective employees do in their free time when they interview at WeWork, a communal work-space startup.

Im really intrigued by people who have diverse and varied backgrounds, Emig says. But whats more important is their attitude and what they do outside of work  were looking for passionate people. Employees with a side hustle tend to possess both openness and curiosity in the workplace, according to Emig.

Emig has hired a psychologist, writer, climate scientist and even a filmmaker.

I love, for example, when people on my team are working on open source projects, he says. This is a good indicator of a persons generosity and their skill.

Take Joe Kachmar, who left his job as a rocket scientist at NASA to join WeWorks R&D department this April. The move from NASA to WeWork might not seem like a natural transition, at least intuitively, Emig acknowledged to Yahoo Finance. But Emig knew Kachmar would make invaluable contributions to WeWork because of his passion for building and scaling products.

The fact that Joe came from aerospace is great because he understand the electronics, engineering, hardware and software aspects of building things, Emig says. But he was equally fascinated by what Kachmar did outside of the office.

At WeWork, Kachmar develops software and sensor hardware to help the company get a better idea of the perfect temperature, lighting, and density of people in designated spaces like conference rooms at each of their 115 office locations.

On the side, Kachmar has been working on a project that attaches two analog video cameras to a drone before its sent up in the air. This way, the video can be transmitted back to somebody on the ground and converted right away.

Story continues

But Emig emphasizes that hes not looking to integrate employees side projects into WeWork.

Its imperative that there is a separation between individual projects and what were working on as a team, he says.

With the backdrop of a tightening labor market, its no surprise that employers are trying to find candidates who are well-rounded, versatile and possess perhaps some of the soft skills like critical thinking, communication skills and adaptability that were frequently overlooked in previous generations.

More than 53 million Americans  or one in three workers  are earning income from work thats not a traditional 9-to-5 job, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.

This strategy of taking interest in and embracing side gigs could be an optimal way for employers to retain talent. It might seem counterintuitive, but companies can help employees feel more fulfilled in the office by encouraging them to pursue passion projects outside of the office.

Melody Hahm is a writer & reporter at Yahoo Finance, covering entrepreneurship, innovation and technology. Follow her on Twitter.

Read more:

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34-year-old Facebook employee sees better investment opportunities than stocks

I checked out WeWorks communal housing, and now Im considering a move

How a 28-year-old realtor used Snapchat to rent out an $80,000/month home sight unseen
A Capital One employee redefined the term customer service. (Photo: Getty Images)

Looking for your feel-good story of the day? Here it is.

Christina Grady was having a really bad day. Her fiance had broken up with her, and shed already endured the heart-wrenching experience of having to move out of their shared home, according to Cosmopolitan. On this particular day, to add insult to injury, Capital One decided to shut down Gradys credit card. The newly single behavioral therapist had been buying new furniture to be delivered to her new home when the company flagged the purchases as suspicious activity. Now Grady had to face another potential nightmare: dealing with customer service.

But things were about to turn around in a miraculous way, thanks to the kindness of one particularly empathetic customer service representative, known as Tonya KYY905. After hearing Grady tell her story, the rep did what any amazing girlfriend who happens to work at Capital One would do: She gave her a pep talk  and 4,500 free miles. According to a post on Gradys Facebook, it actually went down like this: Tonya said, Girl, I am giving you 4,500 free miles. Go on vacation. Take so many pictures of yourself all happy and post them all over that Instagram.

Five days later, according to the post, Gradys ex texted to tell her that someone had sent her flowers to the home the couple once shared. I open the card, Tonya KYY905 Capital One!!! She sent me flowers! To my ex fiances house in a sealed card!!!!!! Grady wrote. With the flowers was a note from Tonya that read, Im glad we had the chance to speak recently. Please know that you are in my thoughts and I hope that these can brighten your day! Best wishes, Tonya KYY905, Capital One. Talk about going above and beyond the call of duty!

Christina Grady holds the bouquet of flowers delivered to her by an unbelievably kind Capital One customer service representative. (Photo: Courtesy of Facebook/christina.grady.9)

Gradys post, which is public, has been shared more than 1,400 times and has inspired hundreds of comments that range from stunned to congratulatory to heartwarming. Karma, baby, karma! wrote one enthralled commenter. Every woman on earth should call Capital One and request a raise for Tonya KYY905! wrote another, half-jokingly. This is the greatest thing I have read all year, commented a third user, echoing how we are probably all feeling.

Story continues

Of course, Grady never expected such a grand gesture and was simply commiserating with Tonya in a lighthearted way, but it obviously struck a chord for the rep. I actually was just joking around and saying to her, I need furniture in my apartment to invite people over, said Grady to Cosmopolitan. We kind of got to joking; she actually told me the times she worked [at Capital One] so I could call her back if I needed to.' Grady called back later in the week to thank Tonya for her incredible gesture. [Tonya] was so excited and said, I just felt a special connection with you,' said Grady, according to Cosmo.

Now Grady is so inspired by Tonya that she has taken on a sort of What would Tonya do? attitude whenever she faces some kind of adversity. A man backed into my car today and last-week me wouldve cried, but today Im like, What would Tonya KYY905 do?! and Im good, Grady joked to Cosmopolitan.

She also wanted to clear the air for anyone who thinks the whole scenario might be a publicity stunt. She asks any skeptics to call the company and ask for Tonya KYY905 (Tonya was not allowed to give her last name) to find out for themselves that Tonya is genuine. Though Grady adds that she found out other reps had performed similarly sweet gestures, and said, I do think they [Capital One] want other people to tag their posts and say Its so nice! [but] the [rep] herself has to be nice too,' according to Cosmo.

Grady feels Tonya deserves all the accolades coming her way. TONYA KYY905, you are a genius and a role model to women looking out for women.

#TONYAKYY905ISMYHERO PLEASE share, the whole world should know how awesome Tonya KYY905 is!!!! Grady wrote on Facebook.

As for the 4,500 free miles, Grady knows exactly how shes going to use them: to fly solo to Belize, where she was set to marry her fiance before the split. Im going to go, put on my wedding dress and take pictures of me marrying pizza!, she told Cosmo. Im going to think about Tonya and how she taught me to be an independent woman.

So  whats in your wallet?

Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest for nonstop inspiration delivered fresh to your feed, every day.
Mexico City (AFP) - Thousands of people protested in Mexico City, demanding that President Enrique Pena Nieto resign over his handling of drug violence, corruption and his meeting with Donald Trump.

Demonstrators held a sign reading "Pena Nieto INEPT, RESIGN for the good of Mexico!" and waved blackened flags of Mexico on the eve of the country's Independence Day.

They marched across the capital toward the Zocalo square, where the president traditionally stands on a balcony of the National Palace the night before the holiday to replicate the "grito", or shout of independence, made in 1810.

Riot police stood near the Zocalo to block access to protesters, who marched under the rallying cry "resign now."

Parents of 43 students missing since September 26, 2014 joined the protest, with people angry at the government's failure to solve the case, almost two years after they were abducted by police and allegedly killed by a drug cartel.

Some shouted "Pena out!" while one sign read: "We're missing 43. State crime!"

"We don't have a reason to shout 'viva Mexico.' ... There are thousands of injustices," said Cristina Bautista, mother of one of the missing trainee teachers.

Ismael Padilla, a 49-year-old assistant principal at a secondary school who wore a black charro suit, said he was unhappy at Pena Nieto's decision to invite Trump last month.

The Republican White House hopeful has angered Mexicans for demanding that the country pay for a border wall and describing migrants as rapists.

"We were apparently independent," Padilla said.

"After the visit of this person who has discriminated against our brothers ... we are outraged and ashamed that he came here like a head of state, because that was the treatment he was given," he said. "We have very little to celebrate."

Nubia Medina, 64, held a sign stating that "all the inept and corrupt must go."

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"We are tired that this government has always done things badly," she said.

"It has neglected social issues. They live like princes while the people live on minimum wage. There are many who have disappeared or died."

Other protests unfolded elsewhere, with hundreds demonstrating peacefully in the western city of Guadalajara.

But in the southern city of Oaxaca police used tear gas to repel teachers from a radical union opposed to Pena Nieto's education reform. They responded by throwing rocks and launching fireworks at the officers. One person was injured.

- Several scandals -

Pena Nieto, who took office in December 2012, has seen his approval rating sink to 23 percent in a recent survey by Reforma newspaper.

Trump's visit on August 31 rocked his administration, with his finance minister, Luis Videgaray, resigning following reports that he spearheaded the unpopular meeting.

But Pena Nieto has been haunted by older scandals, notably the disappearance of the 43 students.

Parents of the students voiced outrage on Thursday after Pena Nieto named Tomas Zeron to the National Security Council shortly after he resigned as head of the Criminal Investigation Agency.

The parents have demanded Zeron's resignation since independent experts from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights said severe irregularities were committed in the investigation.

The case has put a spotlight on the plight of 28,000 other people who are listed as missing in the country.

Pena Nieto has also come under fire over his wife's purchase of a mansion from a government contractor, prompting him to issue a rare apology although the couple denied any wrongdoing.
PARIS (Reuters) - Investigators from France's institute for criminal research found traces of the explosive material TNT last week in Cairo on debris from an EgyptAir plane that crashed in May, triggering a dispute between French and Egyptian authorities, French newspaper Le Figaro reported on Friday. The origin of these traces remains unclear and Egyptian judicial authorities did not allow French investigators to examine the debris in detail, Le Figaro said, citing a source close to the investigation. Egypt wishes to write a joint report with France to validate the presence of TNT on the debris. France has refused to do this because the investigators were not able to carry out an adequate inspection to determine how the traces could have got there, Le Figaro said. A spokesman for the French national police declined to comment. EgyptAir flight MS804, an Airbus A320, plunged into the eastern Mediterranean en route from Paris to Cairo on May 19. All 66 people on board were killed, including 15 French passengers. The cause of the crash remains unknown. Audio from the flight recorder of the crashed aircraft mentions a fire on board the plane in its final moments, the investigation committee said in July. Earlier analysis of the plane's flight data recorder showed there had been smoke in the lavatory and avionics bay, while recovered wreckage from the jet's front section showed signs of high-temperature damage and soot. (Reporting by Mathieu Rosemain; Editing by Mark Trevelyan)
The Constitution is our most enduring document, but not everything you read online about the Constitution is accurate! Here are some of the top myths about the Constitution and the Founding Fathers still out there on blogs and websites.

thomasjefferson320

To be clear, these myths are not about interpretations of the Constitution; they center on people and events related to the founding document.

Myth one: The Constitution was written on hemp paper

The Constitution and the Declaration of Independence were written on parchment. The point of debate is that some working drafts of the documents might have been composed on paper made from hemp, which was widely used in that time period.

Myth two: Thomas Jefferson signed the Constitution

Thomas Jefferson didnt sign the Constitution. This is the most-popular myth at the National Constitution Center, especially when guests enter our hall of statutes of the Constitutions signers  and ask where the Jefferson statue is. In 1787, Jefferson was in Paris as the United States envoy, and he missed the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia.

Myth three: John Adams also signed the Constitution

Like Jefferson, Adams was in service for his country overseas when the Constitution was signed. He was in London as the United States minister to Great Britain.

Myth four: The same Founders who wrote the Declaration wrote the Constitution

Only six Founders signed both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution: George Clymer, Benjamin Franklin, Robert Morris, George Read, James Wilson and Roger Sherman.

Myth five: The Constitution has 39 signatures

It is true that there were 39 delegate signatures on the Constitution on September 17, 1787, but the conventions secretary, William Jackson, also signed the document. Jackson was picked over Benjamin Franklins grandson as the convention secretary.

Myth six: The Constitution says All Men Are Created Equal

That is in the Declaration of Independence. The original Constitution avoided the issue of slavery, counting each slave as three-fifths of a person to determine representation in Congress. The 13th and 14th Amendments ratified after the Civil War made the Three-Fifths Compromise obsolete.

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Myth seven: The Constitution established a democracy in the United States

The Constitution actually established a republic, as stated in Article IV, Section 4. After the 1787 convention, someone asked Benjamin Franklin what kind of government the new document endorsed: a monarchy or a republic. A Republic, if you can keep it, Franklin responded.

A democracy, in general terms, was seen as government by the majority of the people. A republic, also in general terms, added safeguards like checks and balances that ensure that a representative government guaranteed individual rights. Over the years, the use of the words became somewhat interchangeable, and their true meanings are still debated.

Myth eight: An enthusiastic country quickly embraced the Constitution

After the delegates signed the Constitution on September 17, 1787, five states quickly signed it. But then the ratification process slowed down as the anti-Federalists, who feared a strong central government and demanded a Bill of Rights, bitterly fought the Constitutions ratification at state conventions. It took until June 21, 1788 for New Hampshire, as the ninth state approving ratification, to make the Constitution a reality.

Myth nine: The convention delegates were unanimous in approving the document

When the Constitutional Convention ended in 1787, 42 delegates gathered at the Pennsylvania State House (now Independence Hall) for the signing ceremony. Among that group, 38 delegates signed the document, with George Read also signing for John Dickinson, who was ill. Three Founders, Elbridge Gerry, George Mason and Edmund Randolph, refused to sign the Constitution, unhappy with the final document for various reasons.

Myth ten: All 13 states took part in writing the Constitution

There were 13 states in 1787, but Rhode Island didnt send a delegation to Philadelphia. In fact, Rhode Island feared it would be dominated by the new federal government and thus rejected ratification of the Constitution in 1788. It finally approved the Constitution on May 29, 1790, by a margin of two votes.

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job interview

A recent New Yorker profile of Yvon Chouinard, cofounder of Patagonia, features a curious bit of information about the company's staffing process.

As Chouinard told New Yorker reporter Nick Paumgarten:

"I'm terrible at hiring. I only trust women to hire people here. In an interview I have no idea. They can bulls--- me, and I believe them."

Whether women make better interviewers than men, and specifically whether they're better at spotting job candidates who are lying, is a surprisingly understudied topic.

One of the only psychologists who's addressed this question is Nicolas Roulin, a professor at the University of Manitoba's Asper School of Business. Roulin has conducted multiple studies that suggest interviewers are notoriously poor judges of dishonesty, regardless of their experience level, personality traits  or gender.

Of all the experiments Roulin has conducted on interviewers' ability to detect deception, just one found a gender difference. In that experiment, women were slightly more likely than men to assume a candidate was lying when that person was in fact telling the truth. At this point though, the reason for those findings isn't clear.

In general, Roulin said in a phone interview, there's a common misconception that women have more soft skills in interpersonal situations.

Many people mistakenly believe that women get a "gut feeling when it comes to assessing someone else's behaviors," he said, that they have a "sixth sense." But there's little to no evidence to support these beliefs.

Bottom line: Don't race to copy Chouinard's hiring strategy.

Interviewing is hard, especially the part where you have to figure out if your smooth-talking job candidate is really as great as he says he is. So invest in training programs for your hiring managers or figure out who's already a skilled interviewer  but don't rely on popular myths about who's good at what around the office.

NOW WATCH: Starting an interview with this question will force an interviewer to focus on your strengths





More From Business Insider


Top Gear vets Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May will again put the pedal to the metal starting on Friday, Nov. 18, when The Grand Tour makes its Amazon debut.

Launching their three-season commitment, Clarkson, Hammond and May for the past year have been traveling the world filming in locations across the globe, including Johannesburg and headed to California later this month. The Grand Tour also includes studio audience recordings filmed inside their giant traveling tent.

Customers have been desperate to find out when they can watch their favorite team back on screen, so we are very excited to announce the launch date of one of the most globally anticipated shows of 2016, Amazon Prime Video EU VP Jay Marine said in a statement. The guys have been having a blast filming the show around the world and we cant wait for fans to see it, airing every Friday for 12 weeks.

Watch a teaser for The Grand Tour up above, then tell us what you think about seeing your Top Gear faves back behind the wheel.

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From newcomers to movie stars, many films at this years Toronto Film Festival provided showcases for actors looking to make a career U-turn. Some earning buzz from this years gathering, such as Emma Stone in La La Land and Natalie Portman in Jackie, are already household names who are now sure bets for Oscars nominations. Others, like Sunny Pawar in Lion, barely have a film credit on their resumes. But all leave Canada with a professional boost, as the industry heads into the fall movie season. Heres a look at nine breakout performances that galvanized Toronto.

(1) Natalie Portman, Jackie

Portman has been nominated for two Oscars before  for Closer and Black Swan, for which she won best actress  but nothing prepared me for her performance in Jackie. In portraying the iconic first lady in the days after John F. Kennedys assassination, Portman takes an elusive historical figure and channels shades of Sissy Spacek in Carrie. Its a bold, mesmerizing portrait, all the more impressive by the revelation from director Pablo Larrain that one-third of the scenes in the movie were caught with just one take. In an election year, Jackie, which distributor Fox Searchlight picked up out of Toronto, feels like a must-see triumph. -Ramin Setoodeh

(2) Naomie Harris, Moonlight

Playing Paula, the crack-addicted mother of a sensitive boy struggling with his sexual orientation, Harris is both enraging and deeply sympathetic. Viewers may be shocked by how as her descent into addiction causes her to ignore her sons emotional issues, but the actress is too skillful to simply make her character a monster. Shes a victim too, and a survivor  a woman who maintains a reservoir of love for her child, one that the drugs may mask, but wont extinguish. Her final monologue, to her now adult son, is a master class of acting, overflowing with regret and pain. Its heartbreaking work. -Brent Lang

(3) Sasha Lane, American Honey

As Star, the protagonist nomad in Andrea Arnolds road trip drama, Sasha Lane lives up to the prophecy of her characters name. Although she had never acted before  or even taken an acting class  when she was discovered on spring break by the director of Fish Tank, Lane carries almost every scene in American Honey with a movie-star glow that makes this coming-of-age story feel alive. -R.S.

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(4) Emma Stone, La La Land

With a husky voice that cracks ever so slightly, Stone can sure sell a song. Her performance in La La Land, as Mia, an aspiring actress who falls in love with a troubled jazz musician, belongs with Liza Minnellis Sally Bowles and Barbra Streisands Fanny Brice in the top ranks of movie musical heroines. Shes both strong and vulnerable, never more so than during a showboat number that sees her auditioning for a dream role. Like Minnelli and Streisand, who both captured Oscars for their work in Cabaret and Funny Girl, respectively, Stones performance could earn her a golden guy of her own. -B.L.

(5) Lucas Hedges, Manchester By the Sea

At Sundance, Kenneth Lonergans dramatic tour-de-force starring Casey Affleck as a lonely janitor who moves home to Gloucester, Mass., sold for $10 million to Amazon Studios and officially kicked off the 2016 Oscar race. The Toronto version of the movie was just as potent, but funnier, thanks to a slightly tweaked edit that played up some of the one-liners between Affleck and his nephew. As played by Lucas Hedges, Patrick is an antidote to all the darkness in the film; he just wants to get laid and work on his dads boat. But its the scene where Hedges breaks down that serves as one of the most haunting moments in Manchester By the Sea, and announces the arrival of a great character actor. -R.S.



(6) Sunny Pawar, Lion

Its almost too frightening to imagine: A five-year old boy separated from his family, sleeping on the streets, and hopelessly lost in the slums of Calcutta. So begins Lion, a true-life tale that, for its first hour, rests entirely on the shoulders of Pawar. Despite having no prior film credits, this newcomer commands the screen. With the wrong direction, child actors can be cloying and mannered, but Pawar is a natural. He lets the camera in, showing his characters fear and also his resolve. Theres never a false movement, something actors three or four times his age would be lucky to pull off. A star is born. -B.L

(7) Felicity Jones, A Monster Calls

At first glance, Felicity Jones, 32, might seem too young to play a grown boys mum  particularly because she was so good at projecting college-age innocence in Like Crazy and the first half of The Theory of Everything. But as you settle into this allegory about loss, starring Lewis MacDougall as a British adolescent who befriends a monster voiced by Liam Neeson, its Jones performance that quietly sneaks up on you. Not since Brokeback Mountain has there been such a big collective sob session in Toronto. -R.S.

(8) Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Nocturnal Animals

Movie-star good looks have made Taylor-Johnson the face of tentpoles like Kick-Ass, Godzilla and The Avengers: Age of Ultron. But director Tom Ford pulled off a casting coup by turning him into a bad guy. With a Texas drawl and goatee, hes unrecognizable as the menace who pulls up to Jake Gyllenhaals car and initiates a vengeful kidnapping. Its thrilling, and terrifying, to watch Taylor-Johnsons descent into the dark side. -R.S.

(9) Michael Shannon, Nocturnal Animals

The second breakout performance of Nocturnal Animals belongs to Michael Shannon. Bobby Andes doesnt play things by the book. The lawman with a hacking cough and a hard stare thinks nothing of beating up suspects or skipping the whole Miranda rights thing. Its an indelible performance by Shannon, one that gives Nocturnal Animals, a pulp-lish yarn that unfolds as a story within a story, a jolt of electricity. -B.L.

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Making good on the promise of his very homegrown fantasy-action hit Trollhunter, Norwegian helmer Andre Ovredals first English-language feature is something quite different: A chamber horror piece in which a corpses stillness only grows more ominously unreliable as its dissected. The Autopsy of Jane Doe stars Brian Cox and Emile Hirsch as father-and-son morticians whose slab subject seems to exert considerable supernatural will on one stormy night, despite her apparently very dead state. A raucous crowdpleaser at TIFFs midnight premiere, this taut, yet often slyly funny scarefest should do well with genre fans. IFC and Raven Banner have picked up distribution rights for the U.S. and Canada, respectively.

Ian Goldberg and Richard Naings nicely honed screenplay opens with police investigating a bloody crime scene: Four ordinary residents have been found slaughtered in their small-town Virginia home. All signs indicate that they were trying to get out  but none that an intruder actually broke in. Adding to the mystery is the discovery of an outwardly pristine young womans body (Olwen Kelly) half-buried in the cellar. With pressure to deliver some kind of news to the press by morning, the sheriff (Michael McElhatton) asks his local morticians to perform a forensic analysis immediately, in hopes of gaining any clue about just what happened.

Tilden Morgue & Crematorium has been a family-owned operation here for a century. The current generations in charge are benevolently gruff, sardonic widower Tony (Cox) and son Austin (Hirsch). Though the latter has a date with his girlfriend (Ophelia Lovibond as Emma) tonight, he postpones it a few hours in order to help dad with this rush job. Externally, the nameless, ethereally lovely victim bears no signs of harm at all  in fact, shes even curiously free of rigor mortis. But once they probe inward, its a whole different matter, with evidence of extreme abuse that really ought to have caused visible outer bruising and such.

Strange phenomena begin occurring as soon as the duo start cutting open their subject, as if some force has been unleashed. It would be unfair to spoil the various surprises that subsequently occur, but suffice it to say the protagonists soon wish they could leave their basement workspace (a neat job of production design by Matt Gant) but cannot. Also, the corpses already on ice abruptly stop resting in peace.

While Autopsy lives up to its title in providing plenty of grisly medical gore, that induces less squirming than the exacting yet playful way Ovredal keeps making us anticipate more unnatural acts as the Tildens realize something is seriously amiss. Script and direction strike a nice balance between macabre humor and pure suspense, with the very able lead thesps hitting droll notes without ever diluting the material by camping it up. Theyve got good chemistry, and while its not the sort of enterprise that requires fully dimensioned characters, both film and cast do their best to provide just that. (Kelly deserves applause of a different kind for enduring a role which must have required the patience of Job.)

In its last lap, tense action is replaced somewhat by speculative explication, and the resolution isnt quite as big a payoff as you might be hoping for. But to that point Autopsy of Jane Does thrill ride is so much fun one can forgive the climax for failing to top the buildup. Assembly is first-rate in all departments, with sharp contributions from Roman Osins widescreen lensing, Patrick Larsgaards precise editing, and an alarm-heightening score by Danny Bensi and Saunder Jurriaans.

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For his first French-language film, Japanese horror auteur Kiyoshi Kurosawa journeys to the land of cinemas birth with a tale centered around one of the earliest forms of still photography: the daguerreotype. A 19th century apparatus that captures images on a silver plate, the daguerreotype camera requires the sitter to remain absolutely motionless for a punishing span of time, and that process ends up being an unfortunate metaphor for the film itself, which demands a substantial degree of patience from its audience without fully paying it off. Heavy on moody atmospherics yet fundamentally inert, Daguerrotype (Le Secret de la chambre noire) never quite comes into focus.

Most famous Stateside for his seminal 2001 J-horror film, Pulse, Kurosawa is an expert at establishing a mood of placid unease, and that gift is on display in the opening stretches of this film. Jean (Tahar Rahim), an underemployed young Parisian, arrives at an enormous yet dilapidated mansion on the outskirts of the city for a job interview where he appears to be the only applicant.

Despite  or rather because of  his lack of photographic experience, hes hired to be an assistant for Stephane (Olivier Gourmet), a solemn, disillusioned former fashion photographer who has assembled an elaborate daguerreotype setup in his basement, believing his life-sized silver-plated images to be the only true form of photography.

The only model who can withstand the strain of posing perfectly still for hours on end  assisted by a steel back-support contraption that resembles a medieval torture device  is Stephanes daughter Marie (Constance Rousseau). Beautiful, and impeccably put-together aside from her disconcertingly twitchy eyes, Maries relationship with her father has unnerving undertones of sadism, as he pushes her for longer and longer sessions. She longs to escape the pervasive gloom of her fathers house, and clearly sees Jean as a window out.

Meanwhile, Stephanes grip on reality has become alarmingly tenuous, and hes prone to seeing visions of his perfect former model  his wife  who died a few years earlier. As Jean gets more deeply involved in his boss practice, hes roped into a very low-key conspiracy at the behest of Stephanes colleague (Mathieu Amalric) and a conniving real estate developer (Malik Zidi), who want to convince Stephane to sell his house. With Jean now acting as a sort of double-agent, it seems only a matter of time before whatever supernatural undercurrents are circulating the house start to touch him, too.

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Kurosawa has set up an intriguing batch of themes here, from the diffuse hints of a ghost story to the unspoken idea that Stephanes quest for artistic purity is slowly sapping the life-force from his subjects. He also gives us plenty of time to percolate in the sunless setting, shooting long, wandering takes as the house reveals ever more corners and oddly-angled staircases. Yet its well over an hour into the two-hour-plus running time before any of the films narrative wheels start to get moving, and never do they gain much momentum. Rather than building tension and opening up new layers as it goes, Daguerrotype reaches a peak somewhere in the middle and then starts to steadily deflate.

The cast acquits itself well throughout, though Kurosawas insistence on holding his characters at arms-length from the audience keeps them from fully connecting. Well designed and interestingly shot, Daguerrotype is always engaging to look at, but much like Stephanes joyless photo sessions, its all just too cloistered and obsessed with fastidious details to let in enough light.

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In Ed Wood, the greatest movie ever made about a godawful filmmaker, the joke  and the glory  of watching Johnny Depps Edward D. Wood Jr. direct his beyond-bad grade-Z sci-fi and horror films is that he essentially made movies like a child. He made up whatever suited him at the moment; he had no filter, no sense. His only aesthetic was: If it felt good to himwhy not? (Thats what made a movie like his 1953 transvestite confessional Glen or Glenda so sincere.) Most cinematic ineptitude isnt touched by Woods tacky purity, but the tendency toward a childs-eye view still applies. When youre watching a movie thats truly terrible, its often one in which anything goes, which is why anything can go very, very badly.

Take, for instance, Trespass Against Us, which is without a doubt the worst film Ive seen at this years Toronto International Film Festival. When you hear about it, it seems to have the elements of a watchable movie, beginning with its gifted stars, Michael Fassbender and Brendan Gleeson. They play father-and-son criminals who live, along with other family members, in a kind of makeshift domestic trailer camp. It seems a haphazard arrangement, even for grimy outlaws, and the movie gives you very little sense of how they wound up there. But thats because of the Ed Wood factor: They live in this arrangement because the director thought it would be cool. What other explanation is needed? The second awkward/childish idea is the Fassbender characters brother, a nut job who skulks around in bare chest and tight pants, setting things on fire becausethe director thought that would be cool. Im not suggesting a mentally ill movie character shouldnt exist, only that this ones craziness is played for stunted shock value and laughs, so that we never know what to think about him. Hes a real character, but hes not really a character.

The director is Adam Smith, letting loose after some work in television (he directed three Doctor Who episodes), and he creates an annoying kitchen-sink-of-the-absurd nether zone thats halfway between sitcom and Samuel Beckett, as staged by Guy Ritchie with a broken motor. The basic mood of Trespass Against Us is one of extreme stasis (people sitting around grousing at each other, the filmmaker poking you in the ribs to admire the absurdity of it all), but stasis can work if it holds out the possibility of something to discover. In this case, it doesnt. Fassbenders Chad is dimly trying to break the destructive chain that connects him to his father, whos played by Gleeson at his most tediously ill-temperedwhich signifies that hes cool! The torpor is interrupted by several car chases  its actually just one car  which Smith shoots as if he were suddenly making his action-film audition reel. Only set in the tall weeds.

Maybe its understandable that Fassbender looks even more tortured than usual. His indie-cred side has always led him to make some odd choices  like when he played a version of the papier-mache-headed English musician Frank Sidebottom in Frank, a movie that had no more psychology than a hipster greeting card. In Trespass Against Us, Chad has a wife and two kids, but the movie turns him into such a passive agent that its impossible to read him. Now hes a reckless thief. Now hes a caring family man. Now he will sacrifice himself because he is both. But mostly because Fassbender is a big actor who needs a major martyr climax. Its hard to say what the title of Trespass Against Us actually means, but then its hard to know what anything in this movie thinks its about. Even Ed Wood would have said, Needs work.

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Brie Larson in Free Fire. (Photo: A24)

If you have any lingering doubts about Brie Larsons ability to serve as Air Force major turned major-league superhero Captain Marvel  the first female Marvel hero to get a solo adventure  the new thriller Free Fire will lay them convincingly to rest. Yahoo Movies caught up with the Ben Wheatley-directed thriller this week at the Toronto International Film Festival, where the cult British filmmakers previous film, the divisive sci-fi laced drama High-Rise, premiered in 2015. Free Fire marks Larsons entry into the action genre on the heels of winning this years Best Actress Oscar for her moving performance in Room. And shes in good company: The movies cast also includes Cillian Murphy, Armie Hammer, Sharlto Copley, and Noah Taylor as gangsters negotiating a guns-for-cash deal that goes south in spectacular fashion.

Once upon a time, of course, winning an Oscar provided actors with a gateway to meaty dramatic roles. Nowadays, it often means a direct passage to comic book movie immortality. Ben Affleck, for example, donned Batmans cape and cowl in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice after accepting his Best Picture statue for Argo. Jared Leto, meanwhile, nabbed his Suicide Squad role as the Joker in the wake of his Dallas Buyers Club Best Supporting Actor victory. Now its Larsons to turn follow suit by suiting up as Captain Marvel. Her widely rumored casting was officially confirmed at this years Comic-Con in San Diego, where she joined a star-packed Hall H stage that included the casts of Guardians of the Galaxy, Doctor Strange, Black Panther, and Thor: Ragnarok.

Related: Brie Larson Braced Herself for Captain Marvel Backlash. Howd She Avoid It?

Unlike those films, Captain Marvel isnt going to be coming to theaters anytime soon; currently slated for release in March 2019, the movie is still searching for a director. (Of course, theres a chance well see Captain Marvel or her alter ego, Carol Danvers, introduced a year earlier in the first of Marvels two Avengers movies.) And while audiences will have at least a two-year wait before they see Larson throw one of Captain Marvels super-powered punches, Free Fire will be coming to theaters much sooner. The film is currently set for release in England in March 2017 (a U.S. release date is still TBD), the same month that American audiences will see Larson face off against cinemas premiere giant gorilla in Kong: Skull Island.

Watch the Free Fire trailer:





Being the only girl in a firepower-heavy boys club all too often means that you get shunted to the sidelines. Fortunately, Larson manages to remain central to the action in Free Fire, due to her own charisma as well as a script  co-written by Wheatley and his wife, Amy Jump  that makes a point of keeping her in play. As the witty, wily Justine, Larson initially tries to keep the peace between her guys, the gun purchasers, led by Murphy and Michael Smiley, and the gun suppliers, headed up by Copley. But when a heated argument between two underlings ends in gunfire, the warehouse thats serving as their meeting place is transformed into a bullet-strewn battlefield.

Smitten with his comely colleague, Murphys gallant gangster Chris tries to keep her out of the fray, even brokering a deal to let her leave while the guys carry on shooting at one another  not that she really needs his protection. Even before she demonstrates her handiness with a gun, Justine disarms explosive situations with a well-timed turn of phrase thats innocent on the surface, but wickedly funny underneath. One of the films biggest laughs, for instance, comes when Copley claims hes laid a hand on a woman in violence, and Larson responds, Right  youve never touched a woman, with a subtle eye-roll.

The cast of Free Fire. (Photo: Courtesy of TIFF)

That sense of humor is a trademark of Marvel heroes, starting with Robert Downey Jr.s Iron Man and continuing through to Tom Hollands quip-happy debut as Spider-Man in Captain America: Civil War. It certainly separates the MCU from the DC Cinematic Universe, where the heroes are grim and gritty to a fault. (Although the advance trailer for Justice League suggest that Afflecks Batman has learned how to crack wise since Dawn of Justice.) Based on Free Fire  as well as her previous brushes with comedy in 21 Jump Street, Trainwreck, and a guest-star role on the beloved TV series Community  Larsons Captain Marvel will have little trouble trading banter with the other costumed Avengers.

The actress is equally on point when the time comes for action. Where the men around her fire multiple rounds at will, Justine picks her battles carefully amid the chaos, playing the long game instead of going all-in on one big finishing move. Thats a fighting strategy that the Captain Marvel solo movie could benefit from; Marvel has been criticized in some quarters for ramping up to the same cataclysmic, destruction-heavy finale in every movie, something that Civil War directors Joe and Anthony Russo specifically said they tried to avoid with that film. In the comics, Carol Danvers was an Air Force major prior to acquiring superpowers, so it would make sense that shed approach her battles more strategically than, say, the Hulk or even a warrior like Thor.

Pitched somewhere between Reservoir Dogs and a feature-length version of the apocalyptic shoot-out at the end of Sam Peckinpahs The Wild Bunch, Free Fire is a bloody good time for fans of gangster movies. But for Larson, it could be merely a prelude to bigger adventures that will take her career up, up, and away. Ethan Alter
Tribune Media CEO Peter Liguori on Thursday told investors that he expects television advertising to become as personalized as internet advertising within the next few years.

"TV will be one-to-one for personalization," Ligouri said at a Bank of America Merrill Lynch conference at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Los Angeles. "It has the same prospects as the internet. I think economic Darwinism dictates this."

He added, "It's crystal clear to us that we're going to have to push toward that moment."

Tribune Media, which owns cable network WGN America and regional cable news channel Chicagoland Television, also runs the metadata tracker Gracenote, which helps ad buyers reach their target audiences based on factors like location and media preferences. It was purchased from Sony in 2014 for $170 million.

"We believe Gracenote has a bright future in front of it," Liguori said.

Read more: Dish Network and Tribune Broadcasting Reach Carriage Agreement

Tribune Media went searching for a buyer earlier in the year. The company reportedly looked to offload assets piecemeal, including its various TV networks as well as its metadata services. The conglomerate sold its iconic piece of real estate, The Tribune Tower on Michigan Avenue in Chicago, for $240 million to a Los Angeles-based developer in August.

The business as a whole lost almost $400 million in value over the course of 2015, a drop attributed to larger shifts within the cable landscape, including cord cutting and subscriber losses.

Liguori also addressed the retransmission consent dispute between Tribune Media and Dish that caused 42 Tribune stations in 33 markets to go dark to Dish customers in June after the companies failed to reach a deal.

"Did Dish have some impact on us?" Liguori said. "Yes, it did. That went on a bit longer than expected."

The Yale-educated executive extended his contract with Tribune Media through the end of 2017, according to an SEC filing made earlier in the year. The cable and broadcast television executive took a pay cut in 2015 after receiving a bonus in 2014 worth more than $11 million in options. Last year, he took home $5 million in stock on top of his $1.6 million salary.

Ligouri sat on the board of Yahoo! from 2012 to 2014. Prior to joining Tribune Media, he was chief of operations for Discovery Communications.
By David Ljunggren OTTAWA (Reuters) - Kevin Garratt, a Canadian held in China for two years and charged with spying, returned to Canada on Thursday in what was a diplomatic triumph for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. The Canadian leader had raised Garratt's case during an official visit to China this month when he both pressed for closer economic ties and openly discussed human rights, which is a sensitive matter in Beijing. "On Thursday, September 15th, Kevin was deported from China and has returned to Canada to be with his family and friends," the family said in a statement requesting privacy. A Canadian government official said Garratt had been formally sentenced earlier in the week and then released on bail. He flew into the Pacific city of Vancouver. In a statement, Trudeau said he was delighted that Garratt had returned safely. Garratt and his wife, Julia, were detained in August 2014 near China's border with North Korea. He was charged with spying and stealing state secrets. Julia, who was not charged, was released on bail and left the country. A source close to the case, who requested anonymity because of its sensitivity, said Garratt was tried on April 20. The release came as a surprise, since there were few signs of a breakthrough when Trudeau flew to China. Indeed, while he was in Beijing, the Garratt family expressed their frustration at the lack of progress. "We raised this case at the highest levels when we were there. It's just indicative of the mature and healthy relationship we have that we can do so," said the government official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. 'RULED BY LAW' James Zimmerman, the Beijing-based lawyer for Garratt, said: "The family appreciates the strong, persistent efforts of the Canadian government to secure Kevin's release." The affair had undermined efforts by both countries to boost economic ties. China wants a free trade deal with Canada but opinion polls show most Canadians are cool to the idea, in part because of Beijing's human rights record. The Canadian official declined to say what the Chinese might have received in return for Garratt's release. Chinese Premier Li Keqiang is due to visit Canada from Sept. 21-24. A court in the city of Dandong, near the North Korean border, ruled on Garratt's case on Tuesday, China's Foreign Ministry said in a statement emailed to Reuters. "China is a country ruled by law," the ministry said in the statement. "China's judiciary handled the case seriously and in accordance with the law, thoroughly ensuring Kevin Garratt's litigation rights and thoroughly respecting and implementing Canada's consular rights." Brock University professor Charles Burton, a former Canadian diplomat who had served two postings in China, said in an email that Beijing was likely to press for the return of what it has said are corrupt officials who had fled to Canada to avoid arrest. China does not have extradition treaties with United States, Canada or Australia, which Chinese state media say are the three most popular destinations for suspected economic criminals. (Additional reporting by Andrea Hopkins and John Ruwitch in SHANGHAI; Editing by James Dalgleish and Richard Chang)
By Jeff Mason WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, one of the leaders of the "birther" movement that questioned President Barack Obama's U.S. citizenship, believes Obama was born in the United States, the Trump campaign said in a statement on Thursday. In an interview with the Washington Post released earlier in the day, Trump declined to say whether he believed Obama was born in Hawaii. "Ill answer that question at the right time. I just dont want to answer it yet," Trump told the newspaper. Those comments drew criticism from Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, who expressed dismay at Trump's response during remarks to a gathering of Hispanic leaders in Washington. "He still wouldnt say Hawaii. He still wouldnt say America. This man wants to be our next president?" Clinton said. "When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry? Now hes tried to reset himself and his campaign many times. This is the best he can do. This is who he is," she said. A few years into his presidency, Obama, the first African American to win the White House, released a longer version of his birth certificate to answer those who suggested he was not U.S. born. "In 2011, Mr. Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate," Trump senior communications advisor Jason Miller said in a statement late on Thursday. "Having successfully obtained President Obamas birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States," he said. Trump has been trying to drum up support among black voters, who overwhelmingly supported Obama in his 2008 and 2012 elections. Many African Americans object to Trump's involvement in the "birther" movement and the implication that Obama's presidency was illegitimate. (additional reporting by Amanda Becker; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore)
By Chris Prentice NEW YORK (Reuters) - Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump on Thursday appeared to weigh into a debate over a controversial U.S. biofuels program with a proposal that would back the position of billionaire investor Carl Icahn, one of his wealthiest backers. In a factsheet on economic policy, the Trump campaign slammed a system of buying and selling biofuel blending credits that it said was bankrupting smaller oil refiners. The system is a central part of the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), the federal program that requires fuel sold in the United States to contain a minimum volume of biofuels, such as ethanol. The comments were later removed from the Trump campaign website. A Trump spokesman said an incorrect version of the factsheet was temporarily placed online. He said Trump remains committed to the Renewable Fuel Standard. It was unclear whether the comments reflected a changed stance from Trump on the country's more than decade-old RFS program, which he has previously voiced support for. But they echoed the position of Icahn, who recently called on federal regulators to level the playing field in the credits system to favor independent refiners like CVR Energy Inc , in which Icahn is the majority shareholder. Icahn's office did not return an email and call when asked to comment. "These regulations will give Big Oil an oligopoly by destroying the small to mid-size refineries," the factsheet on Trump's economic policies said. "These requirements have turned out to be impossible to meet and are bankrupting many of the small and midsize refineries in this country," it added. The comments underscored a growing schism within the oil sector pitting large oil companies against independent oil refiners. It also touches on a debate between the interests of Big oil and Big Corn, which strongly backs the mandated use of ethanol in fuels and the credit system to make it work. The RFS has hurt independent refiners, who do not always have the ability to mix biofuels into their gasoline and diesel before they send it to gas stations. To sell their gasoline without the required biofuel content, they have to buy credits from oil companies that have blended the fuels. Those credits have cost the companies billions of dollars, and 2016 looks set to be the most expensive on record to buy the credits, known as RINs.Philadelphia Energy Solutions Inc said last week that it plans to slash benefits and reduce staff, citing the high cost of buying RINs as one of the principal reasons it needed to make the cuts. Independent refiners are pressing environmental regulators for changes to the program that could increase the amount of credits the larger companies need, industry sources have said. For its part, Big Oil favors a repeal of the whole program, rather than a tweak that may land it with increased costs. Biofuels advocates also are against a change to the program. (Reporting by Chris Prentice,; additional reporting by Emily Stephenson and Jennifer Ablan; Editing by Simon Webb and Andrew Hay)
Donald Trump has ended the birther movement with a declaration that President Obama was born in the U.S., but not without a jab at Hillary Clinton, whom he blamed for sparking the controversy in the first place.

Read: Following Health Scare, Clinton Doctor Releases Her Medical Condition: 'She Is Fit to Serve'

"Hillary Clinton and her campaign in 2008 started the birther movement," he said Friday. "I finished it. President Obama was born in the United States of America."

It was his final words as he hosted an event honoring Medal of Honor recipients inside the Trump International Hotel grand ballroom.

President Obama was bemused Friday morning after the Trump campaign went on damage control about whether the Republican presidential candidate still believes if the Commander-in-Chief was born in America.

We've got other business to attend to, Obama said in the Oval Office. I was pretty candid about where I was born. I was hoping that the presidential election reflects more serious issues than that.

Trump was asked by The Washington Post in an article published Thursday whether he still believes President Obama wasn't born in America, saying: "Ill answer that question at the right time. I just don't want to answer it yet."

Obama was born in Hawaii in 1961.



His campaign quickly released a statement saying: Having successfully obtained President Obama's birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States."

Trump camp stmt: "Mr. Trump believes President Obama was born in the United States," & blames Clinton for birtherism pic.twitter.com/v2Ifz7kkYA  Nick Kalman (@NickKalmanFN) September 16, 2016

Hillary Clinton pounced on his statement Thursday during an appearance at the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute.

Story continues

Read: Melania Trump Confirms She '100%' Went Through Correct Legal Process to Become U.S. Citizen

He was asked one more time where was President Obama born, and he still wouldnt say Hawaii. He still wouldnt say America. This man wants to be our president?

In 2011, Trump ramped up the "birther" movement again ahead of the Obama's re-election in 2012 and demanded that the commander-in-chief produce his birth certificate. The president did.

Watch: Artist Uses Tractor to Write Get Well Message to Hillary Clinton in Field: 'You Must, You Can'

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Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban recently raised concerns about Republican presidential candidate Donald Trumps economic plan, commenting on Cavuto: Coast to Coast, I have my Trump hedge on. In the event Donald wins, I have no doubt in my mind that the market tanks. And so, I literally have put on more than 100% hedge

Trump responded to Cubans comments, saying, Well, I know Mark and, you know, the problem with Mark is hes not smart enough to understand what were doing, hes really not smart enough in my opinion to really understand whats going on.

Trump then pointed out Americas mounting debt crisis.

And, I think this, look, I think that this plan is a great plan, were in trouble. Explain to Mark, we have $20 trillion in debt, we have high taxes in this country, very high taxes, Trump told the FOX Business Networks Maria Bartiromo.

Trump explained that those high taxes, along with regulations, are driving companies to relocate overseas.

Our companies, much like New York but on a much larger scale, our companies are leaving, theyre leaving this country, theyre moving to other countries. Theyre leaving for lots of reasons, but theyre leaving because taxes are too high, regulations are too high and theyre leaving because they cant get money back that is their money, they cant get money back into our country, both bureaucratically and from a tax standpoint.

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Maria Bartiromo

Donald Trump ripped one of his most frequent critics, billionaire businessman Mark Cuban, in a Friday-morning interview on the Fox Business Network.

Speaking to host Maria Bartiromo, Trump responded to Cuban's claim that if the Republican nominee wins in the fall there was "no doubt in my mind the markets tank."

"Well, I know Mark, and you know the problem with Mark is, he's not smart enough to understand what we're doing," Trump said. "He's really not smart enough."

"I've known him for a long time  he tweets me all the time," Trump said. "He sends me so many different tweets and calls me, although I must say not over the last number of months cause I said this guy ... he'll send out so many tweets. I'll have to send you all of the Mark Cuban tweets and conversations."

Trump doubled down on Cuban being "not smart enough" to understand his economic plans, asking Bartiromo and her fellow Fox Business hosts to "explain to Mark" that "we're in trouble."

"He's a mixed-up guy," Trump said.

In an interview with Business Insider this week, Cuban, the owner of the NBA's Dallas Mavericks and star of ABC's "Shark Tank," said he couldn't think of "anybody more dangerous as president than Donald Trump."

"You've never heard me talk about politics all that much, and it's just  I can't think of anybody more dangerous as president than Donald Trump," he said. "I can't think of anything worse than with him not having a clue. I mean, could you imagine somebody who doesn't read and doesn't learn trying to deal with the day-to-day changes and challenges of that job?"

Cuban endorsed Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton at a rally in Pittsburgh, his hometown, in July. In recent months, Cuban has ripped Trump repeatedly on social media after souring on the Manhattan billionaire's candidacy.

NOW WATCH: Why you won't find a garbage can near the 9/11 memorial





More From Business Insider


Donald Trump

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump acknowledged on Friday that President Barack Obama was born in the United States, a major reversal from years of questioning Obama's birthplace.

"President Barack Obama was born in the United States," Trump said at a press conference. "Period. Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again."

Trump also blamed the birther movement on his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, though no one in her 2008 campaign ever advanced any charge that Obama was born outside the US.

"Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy," Trump said. "I finished it. I finished it. You know what I mean."

At the 30-minute event, during which Trump was expected to address birtherism, several generals and admirals from the US military came out and endorsed Trump. Trump didn't address the birther issue until the very end of the event, as cable networks breathlessly carried what had been billed as a "major statement" by Trump.

During the 2012 election cycle, Trump repeatedly called on Obama to release his birth certificate to prove that he was born in the US. While there had been rumors circulating before 2011 about Obama's birthplace, Trump is widely credited with bringing birtherism into the mainstream.

Trump demanded publicly for months that Obama release his longform birth certificate. As the issue gained more attention, Obama eventually relented and released the document.

The birther movement had roots in the 2008 Democratic primary. David Plouffe, then Obama's campaign manager, said the Clinton campaign was guilty of "shameful offensive fear-mongering" by circulating a photo calling attention to Obama's African heritage.

Oliver Darcy contributed to this report.

NOW WATCH: Watch Trump finally admit that President Obama was born in the US





More From Business Insider


(The September 15 story was refiled to correct to $4.4 trillion tax cut, not cost of plan in third paragraph)

By Emily Stephenson and Alana Wise

(Reuters) - Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump unveiled a plan on Thursday for $4.4 trillion in tax cuts, offering less generous tax breaks than his original $10 trillion plan but proposing to cut the current top rate for the wealthiest taxpayers.

Trump's proposal, which he detailed in a speech in New York, would reduce the top individual rate to 33 percent from the current 39.6 percent. It would raise the standard deduction and cap itemized deductions, which he said would reduce tax loopholes. Trump said his plan would not add to the federal deficit.

Trump said the $4.4 trillion tax cut would actually cost less, about $2.6 trillion, under a mechanism known as dynamic scoring, which assumes that tax cuts will lead to faster growth, which in turn would allow at least some of the tax breaks to pay for themselves.

Trump also offered a "Penny Plan" for cutting federal spending. He said he would shrink government programs outside of defense by 1 percent each year. But entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare would be shielded from any cuts.

The original tax plan laid out by the New York businessman last September was criticized by Democrats and Republicans alike for its costly price tag. Democrat Hillary Clinton, who will face Trump in the Nov. 8 election, denounced it as catering to the very wealthy and ignoring the working class.

Some economists also questioned the assumptions underpinning the plan he outlined on Thursday.

In his speech to the Economic Club of New York, Trump predicted his updated package to reduce taxes, curb government regulation and take a tougher stance on negotiating trade agreements would produce annual economic growth of 3.5 percent.

"Everything that is broken today can be fixed, and every failure can be turned into a great success," Trump said.

Story continues

He added the plan would create 25 million jobs over a decade. Trump set 4 percent as a goal for economic growth, in a message reminiscent of that of his former Republican rival Jeb Bush.

The U.S. economy last achieved 4 percent growth during the administration of Democratic President Bill Clinton in the 1990s. The economy grew 2.4 percent last year.

'IT DOESN'T SQUARE'

Oren Cass, a fellow at the Manhattan Institute and domestic policy director of Republican Mitt Romneys 2012 presidential bid, said the plan for 1 percent cuts in some programs would not be enough to pay for Trump's proposals.

"It doesn't square," Cass said. "The penny plan is an idea thats been out there for a while, but it does touch entitlement spending as well."

Maya MacGuineas, president of the bipartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, welcomed the scaling back of Trump's original tax-cut proposals but said the plan would still leave the country on an unsustainable budget path.

"He's moving in the right direction by pursuing a less costly tax plan and identifying some spending cuts to help pay for it. But the plan appears to rely on rosy assumptions and murky policy changes," she said in a statement.

Other groups have predicted more adverse effects from Trump's policies. Earlier this week, global economic research firm Oxford Economics projected the U.S. economy could be $1 trillion smaller than otherwise expected in 2021 if Trump becomes president.

(Reporting by Emily Stephenson in New York and Alana Wise in Washington; Additional reporting by Steve Holland in Washington; Editing by Peter Cooney)
Donald Trump

After largely refusing to talk about the discredited conspiracy theory for years, Donald Trump is teasing a major announcement about whether he still publicly doubts President Barack Obama was born in the US.

During an interview with Maria Bartiromo on Fox Business on Friday, the Republican presidential nominee hinted that he would address his current views on the conspiracy theory during a speech at the opening of his hotel in Washington, DC, later Friday morning.

"We have to keep the suspense going, OK?" Trump said. "So you watch. You're my friend. You watch the statement, OK? I think you'll be happy."

Trump's campaign released a statement Thursday declaring that the Republican presidential candidate "believes that President Obama was born in the United States," a departure from Trump's previous doubts about the president's birthplace.

In the statement, Trump campaign senior communications adviser Jason Miller gave Trump credit for "compelling" Obama to release his birth certificate in 2011, and claimed the document put Trump's concerns to bed.

"Inarguably, Donald J. Trump is a closer. Having successfully obtained President Obama's birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States," Miller said in the statement.

However, earlier Thursday, Trump was unwilling to say that Obama was born in the US. He has declined to do so numerous times during the campaign season.

"I'll answer that question at the right time," Trump said in an interview with The Washington Post. "I just don't want to answer it yet."

The campaign statement also conflicts with several tweets Trump posted after April 27, 2011, the date Obama released his birth certificate, which showed he was born in Honolulu, Hawaii. In the tweets, Trump cast doubt on the veracity of the document.

An 'extremely credible source' has called my office and told me that @BarackObama's birth certificate is a fraud.  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 6, 2012

Always remember, I was the one who got Obama to release his birth certificate, or whatever that was! Hilary couldn't, McCain couldn't.  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 29, 2014

Wake Up America! See article: "Israeli Science: Obama Birth Certificate is a Fake" http://t.co/f7esUdSz  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 13, 2012

With @BarackObama listing himself as "Born in Kenya" in 1999http://bit.ly/JaHQW0 HI laws allowed him to produce a fake certificate. #SCAM  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 20, 2012

How amazing, the State Health Director who verified copies of Obamas birth certificate died in plane crash today. All others lived  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 12, 2013

Read the full Trump campaign statement:

"Hillary Clinton's campaign first raised this issue to smear then-candidate Barack Obama in her very nasty, failed 2008 campaign for President. This type of vicious and conniving behavior is straight from the Clinton Playbook. As usual, however, Hillary Clinton was too weak to get an answer. Even the MSNBC show Morning Joe admits that it was Clinton's henchmen who first raised this issue, not Donald J. Trump.

Story continues

"In 2011, Mr. Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate. Mr. Trump did a great service to the President and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised. Inarguably, Donald J. Trump is a closer. Having successfully obtained President Obama's birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.

"Mr. Trump is now totally focused on bringing jobs back to America, defeating radical Islamic terrorism, taking care of our veterans, introducing school choice opportunities and rebuilding and making our inner cities safe again."

NOW WATCH: NATIONAL POLL: Trump and Clinton are virtually tied with just 8 weeks left





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MIAMI (Reuters) - Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump said on Friday that if elected he would seek to reverse President Barack Obama's moves to open relations with Cuba unless the leaders there allowed religious freedoms and freed political prisoners. "The next president can reverse them, and that I will do unless the Castro regime meets our demands," Trump said at a rally in Miami, which has a large Cuban population. (Reporting by Emily Stephenson; Editing by Leslie Adler)
Washington (AFP) - Donald Trump's hair -- a crusty, complex, yellowish affair that has become one of the enigmas of a very weird US presidential race -- got messed with big time.

The usually brash presidential candidate talked in subdued tones and played the good sport as he appeared on one of America's most popular late-night broadcasts, "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon."

Fallon did his very popular impression of Trump's speaking style, ribbed him right and left and concluded his interview with a request.

"Can I mess up your hair?" Fallon said.

The comic explained that this might be the last time he could ask to do something unpresidential with Trump, lest he win election in November against Hillary Clinton.

The crowd went nuts over the idea.

Trump grinned and agreed.

Fallon reached out with his right hand and mussed Trump's hair with a vigorous, repeated rub. The Republican nominee endured it with a broad smile.

Trump, 70, has an elaborate hair-do centered on what seems to be an ambitious comb-over.

Nothing fell off with Fallon's intervention but the result was not very pretty as Trump's long locks ended up pointing messily every which way.

On other matters, Fallon christened what he called Trump's "bromance" with Vladimir Putin as "Vlump", and asked him about his penchant for eating fast food.

"At least you know what you're getting," Trump said. He added that if he went to an unknown place, "If they don't like me ... I don't know. I'm better off with fast food."

Fallon also thanked Trump for providing what he described as grist for so much comic material.

"You say some shocking things," Fallon said.

"But I'm trying not to anymore," Trump replied.
By Olivia Oran and David Henry

(Reuters) - For Citigroup Inc (C.N) executives, being asked why they won't sell their Mexican bank subsidiary Banamex is as annoying as the yapping of a Chihuahua. But the question keeps coming up.

In some of the first signs of how some investors in Corporate America are bracing for a President Donald Trump, several large investors have expressed concern to Citi management in recent private meetings about the impact a victory for the Republican might have on the Mexican unit, according to people who attended or were briefed on the meetings.

Even if Trump did not follow through on his pledge to build a massive border wall, some investors voiced concern that his presidency would undermine cross-border trade and travel, and in turn hurt the Mexican economy and Banamex profits, the sources added, asking not to be identified because they are not authorised to speak with the media.

Trump is not the main reason investors are asking about divesting Banamex, nor is the idea a new one. But his talk of building a wall has renewed questions at a time when Citigroup stock continues to trade at a 25 percent discount to its tangible net worth. The stock is so low because investors doubt Citigroup's ability to boost its returns on equity any time soon.

Trump, who has reduced the lead held by Democrat Hillary Clinton in recent polls ahead of the Nov. 8 vote, has vowed to make Mexico fund the construction of a giant border wall to stem the flow of illegal immigrants into the U.S. He has also pledged to change North American trade agreements and impose higher tariffs on Mexican goods to bring jobs back.

At an investor conference on Wednesday, Citigroup Chief Financial Officer John Gerspach was asked why he was so positive on Banamex. The question was similar to one asked in July by CLSA analyst Mike Mayo, who has been urging Citigroup to sell Banamex for years.

Mayo told Reuters his rationale is "to unleash trapped value." He wants Citigroup to use Banamex sale proceeds to buy back its cheap stock, which would make the remaining shares more valuable, and attract more interest from investors.

Story continues

"It would make crystal clear the absurdity of Citigroup stock trading at three-fourths of tangible book," Mayo said. He said Citi could see a gain of $5 billion (3.83 billion pounds) to $10 billion (7.65 billion pounds) through a sale.

Regardless of Trump, Citi CEO Mike Corbat has more reasons now than even two years ago to keep Banamex, people familiar with his thinking say.

For one, Banamex earns about 15 percent return on shareholder equity - significantly better than Corbat's goal of at least 10 percent.

In addition, Banamex contributes about 15 percent of Citigroup's global consumer revenue, which makes Mexico second only to the United States in importance. It has the most branches, with about 1,500 compared with 700 locations in the U.S., where much of Citigroup consumer business is in cards.

Corbat has overseen the disposal of half of Citigroup's country-based consumer franchises, bringing the total down to 19. Banamex was deemed the only one in Latin America strong enough to keep.

Banamex is the second-biggest bank in Mexico, which Corbat expects will grow with the U.S. economy. He expects trade with Mexico to continue to be robust regardless of whether Trump wins.

IMPROVEMENTS SEEN

Citigroup is starting to see improvements at Banamex following management changes in 2014 and Corbat's commitment then to invest $1.5 billion in its operations. Corbat announced the investment on a podium with the president of Mexico.

The management changes followed discovery of more than $500 million of fraudulent loans that Banamex made to a Mexican oilfield services company, as well as U.S. government investigations of money laundering at Banamex offices in the U.S. Citigroup paid $140 million to settle federal regulators' probes into the money laundering matter, but a criminal investigation has yet to be publicly resolved.

Corbat has since won approval from U.S. regulators for two capital plans and an endorsement of its so-called "living will," showing how the company could be wound down without taking other banks with it. The approvals imply that regulators have found Citigroup's risk management of Banamex acceptable.

"It's accretive to our shareholders, the returns are solid," Corbat said in July. "So right now I really don't see it's an area where we would contemplate selling."

Corbat doubts that Citigroup could quickly gather proceeds from selling Banamex and then win permission from the U.S. Federal Reserve to use the money to buy back stock, said a person familiar with his thinking.

Even without a Banamex sale, Citigroup has been building up excess capital that it expects the Fed will allow it to use for additional buybacks.

In a March report, KBW analyst Brian Kleinhanzl argued that Citi should divest Banamex's consumer and small business franchise. It does not fit into Citi's consumer strategy in other emerging markets where it focuses on customers in high-growth metropolitan areas, he said.

An outright sale, Kleinhanzl wrote, could be difficult because the pool of potential buyers is small. But Citigroup could sell that portion of Banamex to investors through an IPO, commanding an $11.8 billion price tag, resulting in a $5.9 billion pre-tax gain for Citi, he estimated.

The Fed, in Mayo's view, set a precedent for Corbat to distribute Banamex proceeds, when it approved buybacks by KeyCorp (KEY.N) following the sale of an asset management business.

(Reporting by Olivia Oran and David Henry in New York. Additional reporting by Emily Flitter.; Editing by Lauren Tara LaCapra and Stuart Grudgings)
By Amanda Becker WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Donald Trump Jr. sought on Thursday to clarify his remark that the media would be warming up the gas chamber if the Republican Party behaved the same way as the Democrats during the U.S. presidential campaign, saying it was a reference to capital punishment, not the Nazi-led Holocaust. Trump, the son of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, spoke to NBC News after the Anti-Defamation League, which combats anti-Semitism, asked him to retract his statement. "Trivialization of the Holocaust and gas chambers is NEVER okay," the Anti-Defamation League tweeted. John Podesta, the chair of Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clintons campaign, told reporters on a call that the wording of Trumps remark was "extremely insensitive, divisive and probably pretty consistent with the kind of rhetoric he heard around the house when he was growing up." I think its never acceptable to use language like that, Podesta added. Nazis used gas chambers during World War Two to kill millions of Jews imprisoned in European concentration camps. Trump made the gas chamber remark during an interview with a Philadelphia radio station on Thursday morning to explain how the media would react if the Republican Party had intervened in the nominating contest the way the Democratic Party has been accused of doing to benefit Clinton over former party rival U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders. "Without the media, this wouldn't even be a contest, but the media has built her up, they've let her slide on every discrepancy, on every lie, on every DNC game, trying to get Bernie Sanders out of the thing," Trump said. "If Republicans were doing that, they'd be warming up the gas chamber right now, the nominees son added. Trump's campaign said the uproar over the comment was another example of bias among the media covering the presidential campaign. "Don Jr. was clearly referring to capital punishment to make the case that the media continues to take words out of context in order to serve as the propaganda arm of the Hillary Clinton campaign," Trump spokesman Jason Miller said in an email. (Additional reporting by Ginger Gibson; Editing by Peter Cooney)
Jerusalem (AFP) - Three alleged assailants were killed while carrying out attacks on Israelis on Friday, security forces said, shattering weeks of relative calm in Israel and the Palestinian territories.

The attacks were a reminder of persistent tensions that continue to alarm the international community and came a day after UN chief Ban Ki-moon warned the two-state solution was "further than ever" from becoming reality.

In the first incident, a man tried to stab police officers in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem and was killed on the spot.

"The terrorist was shot dead by a police officer after he had tried to stab her," a police statement said.

Police said the attacker, Saeed Amro, was 28 and held a Jordanian passport, having crossed the border between the two countries on Thursday afternoon.

Many Palestinians hold Jordanian passports, and Israeli police said they were checking if Amro also had Palestinian papers.

The attack happened at the Damascus Gate entrance to east Jerusalem's Old City, the main entrance for Palestinians.

Shortly afterwards, two Palestinians rammed a car into a bus stop used by Israelis in the occupied West Bank, causing injuries before troops killed one of the assailants, the army said.

"Two assailants rammed a vehicle into a civilian bus stop at the Elias junction near the community of Kiryat Arba," an Israeli military statement said.

"Forces at the scene fired at the vehicle resulting in the death of one of the assailants while the other was wounded."

Three young civilians were lightly injured, Israeli medics said.

The Palestinian health ministry identified the dead suspect as Firas Khadour. Local sources named the wounded attacker, a woman, as Raghad Khadour.

She was taken to hospital in serious condition after being shot in the stomach.

Kiryat Arba is an Israeli settlement in the southern West Bank close to the flashpoint Palestinian city of Hebron.

In the third attack, a Palestinian stabbed an Israeli soldier in Hebron and was killed, the army said.

Story continues

"An assailant arrived at a junction near Hebron armed with a knife and stabbed a soldier," a statement said, adding that he had been shot dead.

Following the attack the main roads into and out of Hebron were closed off.

A fourth man was killed overnight Thursday, also in Hebron, after allegedly trying to evade arrest by the Israeli military.

- Peres' dream of peace -

Friday's incidents came shortly after midday Muslim prayers on the first Friday after the weeklong Eid al-Adha holiday, and shattered a relative lull in violence in Israel and the Palestinian territories.

Previously there had not been an attack in three weeks.

In the Gaza Strip, a Palestinian medical official said troops at the border fence east of Gaza City shot and slightly wounded three Palestinian youths.

An army spokeswoman said they had been rioting.

"Earlier today a violent riot took place in the central Gaza Strip," she told AFP. "Dozens of rioters rolled burning tyres, hurled gas grenades, molotov cocktails and rockets toward the security fence."

"In order to prevent further escalation forces at the scene shot toward a main instigator," she said, adding that the soldiers noted one person was hit.

Since October, 227 Palestinians, 34 Israelis, two Americans, one Eritrean and a Sudanese have been killed in ongoing violence, according to an AFP count.

Israeli forces say most of the Palestinians killed were carrying out knife, gun or car-ramming attacks. Others were shot dead during protests and clashes.

Earlier this week Shimon Peres, the veteran Israeli leader who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994 along with Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat for his role in negotiating the Oslo peace accords, suffered a major stroke.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon on Thursday hailed Peres but said his dream of Palestinian and Israeli states living side by side in peace was "further than ever" from becoming reality.

Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967.

International powers have criticised its continued settlement expansion in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, with more than 500,000 Israelis now living in communities the international community considers illegal, as well as incitement to violence by Palestinian leaders.

"Despite warnings by the international community and the region, leaders on both sides have failed to take the difficult steps needed for peace," Ban said.

"Let me be absolutely clear: settlements are illegal under international law. The occupation, stifling and oppressive, must end," he added.

Israeli Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman has ordered ministry employees and military officials to boycott UN envoy Nickolay Mladenov over his criticism of Israel's settlement policies, Israeli media reported this week.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. House Financial Services Committee has opened a probe into Wells Fargo's sales practices and plans to call the company's chief executive before lawmakers at a hearing later in September, the committee chairman said on Friday.

Wells Fargo has settled with regulators over allegations that its staff opened more than two million bank accounts and credit cards for customers without their consent to meet internal sales goals. As part of last week's settlement, Wells Fargo agreed to pay $185 million in penalties and $5 million to customers.

Committee Chairman Representative Jeb Hensarling said the committee was "requesting all records related to the allegations of fraudulent or improper activity by Wells Fargo employees" from the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and also requested records from the company.

(Reporting by Susan Heavey)
By Megan Rowling BARCELONA (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - U.N. officials have said they are confident the Paris climate change agreement will enter into force by the end of 2016, with at least 20 countries indicating they will join it at a U.N. event on Sept. 21, adding to the 27 that have already done so. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has invited states to deposit their instruments of ratification or approval of the Paris deal at the one-hour event on Wednesday morning. Leaders whose countries are not yet ready to join but plan to do so this year have been invited to contribute videos expressing their commitment, said Selwin Hart, director of the U.N. chief's climate change support team. "When we start to look at the countries that are joining the... agreement and the countries that are going to commit to join before the end of the year, we are absolutely certain that we will have the Paris Agreement on climate change entering into force by the end of 2016," said David Nabarro, Ban Ki-moon's special advisor on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. To take effect, the Paris climate agreement needs ratification by at least 55 parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, representing at least 55 percent of global emissions. The officials told journalists in New York on Thursday that the United Nations had so far received 27 ratifications covering 39 percent of global emissions, including from the world's top two greenhouse gas emitters, the United States and China. Among those expected to join formally next week are Mexico and Brazil. Brazil completed its domestic process on Monday, but while it produces around a tenth of global carbon pollution, its share of global emissions that will count towards the Paris threshold is only 2.48 percent, as it is based on 2010 data. Experts with the World Resources Institute calculate that if all the nations that have said publicly they will join the Paris agreement this year fulfill that pledge, it could begin in 2016. Whether it will take effect even before the annual U.N. climate conference in November in Morocco is unclear. For that, the thresholds would have to reached by Oct. 7, as the deal will enter into force only 30 days after they are passed. If that does not happen in time for the Marrakesh meeting, the first talks on implementing the Paris deal will take place later in 2017. The officials said it was "remarkable" the agreement could enter into force so soon after being adopted last December - a process that can often take years or decades. All eyes are now on the European Union, which has indicated it is looking for a way to speed up its Paris ratification - a complex process involving its 28 member states. Hart said there was even a possibility the EU could now join this year - but it was a "work in progress". Under current rules, the European Union and each of the nations it spoke for in Paris must deposit their ratification documents with the United Nations simultaneously, and so far only three states - France, Hungary and Austria - have ratified the agreement. MIGRATION SUMMITS Another major focus at the United Nations next week will be two summits on strengthening the world's response to the rising numbers of refugees and migrants. A draft outcome document for Monday's U.N. meeting on that subject acknowledges that the "adverse effects" of climate change and natural disasters are among the factors causing people to leave their homes. It refers to implementation of the Paris climate agreement, as well as the Sendai framework to reduce the risks of disasters, and a set of voluntary guidelines to help those forced to cross borders due to disasters and climate change. But it does not offer new ways of formally assisting those people, who have no protection in international law, unlike refugees fleeing persecution and violence. Alice Thomas, manager of the climate displacement program at Refugees International, said the number of people uprooted each year by more extreme weather, coastal erosion and growing food and water insecurity already far exceeds those displaced by conflict, and will continue to rise sharply. Governments should next week agree to step up efforts to tackle the problem, she said. "States will need to commit to supporting the most climate-vulnerable countries to take concrete measures to avert, minimize and address climate displacement through increased investments in disaster risk reduction, building the resilience of the most vulnerable, and by addressing gaps in the international legal framework for those forced to flee climate change, she said. (Reporting by Megan Rowling @meganrowling; editing by Laurie Goering. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women's rights, trafficking, property rights and climate change. Visit http://news.trust.org)
Bournemouth (United Kingdom) (AFP) - New UK Independence Party leader Diane James has earned a reputation for tough professionalism with her colleagues, qualities she will need in abundance to unite a party rattled by Nigel Farage's departure.

The 56-year-old narrowly missed out on becoming the party's first MP in 2013 and has vowed to turn the eurosceptic movement into a "formidable winning machine."

She is also a member of the European Parliament.

Although less outspoken than the charismatic Farage, who resigned in July after achieving his political dream of helping Britain leave the European Union, James has still contributed to the controversy that often follows the anti mass-immigration party.

She apologised after warning of "crime associated with Romanians" while campaigning to become an MP, and raised eyebrows after praising Russian President Vladimir Putin.

"I admire him from the point of view that he's standing up for his country," said James, who was her party's justice and home affairs spokeswoman. "He's very nationalist. I do admire him. He is a very strong leader."

James was born in Bedford, central England, on November 20, 1959, to an engineer father and a housewife mother. She studied business studies and tourism with languages at university, becoming fluent in French and German.

- 'Ambitious and motivated' -

Her language skills helped her land a job with a German pharmaceutical company, before she moved into the healthcare sector in the 1980s, studying the US system.

"I had a very good feel for why the US model is quite frankly failing and the pitfalls that are there if the UK doesn't get it right," she told local newspaper the Southern Daily Echo in 2013.

James then set up her own consultancy business to help companies market their products in international healthcare systems.

She told the Southern Daily Echo she had been a long-time Conservative supporter until becoming "totally disillusioned" with its leadership in the 2000s.

Story continues

Her first active foray into politics came in 2006, when she successfully ran as an independent in a local council by-election in Surrey.

"I've been involved in politics for seven years now and I've learned a hell of a lot," she told the newspaper, before explaining her switch to UKIP.

"I did a lot of soul searching and I decided that UKIP was the only party that I could perceive as credible and see where I would fit."

She lost her council seat, but was elected to the European Parliament in 2014, and her profile was raised with appearances on BBC's Question Time and at Cambridge University's debating society.

Her name was mentioned as a potential leader when Farage announced he was to step down, and became the hot favourite when her main rival, Steven Woolfe, was ruled out of the race after failing to submit his application in time.

James has said she hopes to lead UKIP in becoming "the UK's official opposition party after the next election".

However, the spectre of Farage will loom large over her leadership, the outgoing leader having become synonymous with the party in the public imagination.

She also faces internal splits over the direction of the party now its main purpose has been fulfilled, but claimed she was up for the challenge during a recent article in the FT.

"UKIP needs a transparent, ambitious, motivated leader to achieve this, one who can make the party a formidable winning machine," she wrote. "I am that woman."
KIEV (Reuters) - Kiev authorities handed over to the Netherlands on Friday five masterpieces stolen from a Dutch museum in 2005 and recovered in Ukraine earlier this year. The paintings - part of a group of 24 works valued at 10 million euros when they went missing in 2005 - were said in December to have been discovered in a villa in a pro-Russian separatist controlled area of eastern Ukraine. Dating from the 17th and 18th centuries, they will now head back to Westfries Museum in Hoorn, north of Amsterdam, from where they first disappeared when thieves hid in the building before closing time and disabled the alarm system before making off with the artworks. "I can't wait to see these beautiful objects of art back in the place where they belong," Westfries Museum director Ad Geerdink said at a handover ceremony at the Dutch embassy in Kiev. "It will feel like some of our lost sons finally come home." The Dutch foreign ministry listed the five paintings as Jacob Waben's "Vrouw Wereld" (Lady World) and "Terugkeer van Jefta" (The Return of Jephta), "Keukenstuk" (Kitchen Scene) by Floris van Schooten, Hendrick Boogaert's "Boerenbruiloft" (A Peasant Wedding) and "Nieuwstraat in Hoorn" (New Street in Hoorn) by Izaak Ouwater. "It's still not clear where the other paintings are and how long it will take to recover them," it said in a statement. (Reporting by Reuters Television; Additional reporting by Marie-Louise Gumuchian; Editing by Tom Heneghan)
United Nations (United States) (AFP) - The UN Security Council on Friday canceled an urgent meeting that had been called to discuss a US-Russian deal on Syria, at the request of both the United States and Russia, diplomats said.

During the scheduled meeting, US and Russian envoys were to present details of the joint agreement that calls for a ceasefire, the delivery of aid and joint targeting of Islamist rebels in Syria.

Russia, Syria's key ally, is pushing for the Security Council to endorse the agreement, but France and other council members have said they must first learn more details about the deal.

Under the deal, all sides were due to allow deliveries of food and other basic supplies to the battleground city of Aleppo after a ceasefire went into effect on Monday.

But on Friday, aid convoys positioned at the border with Turkey had yet to receive the all-clear to begin their journey to Aleppo.

Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said Thursday that the council could adopt a resolution backing the agreement during a high-level meeting on Syria to be held on Wednesday.

US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov are due to attend the council talks, held on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly meeting.
- By Sangara Narayanan





United Parcel Service (UPS) announced Wednesday that the company expects to hire 95,000 seasonal employees to address the anticipated increase in package volume from November through January.

For a long time the full-time and part-time seasonal route has been the easiest way to get a permanent position in the company. Last year the company converted 37% of its seasonal employees to permanent positions.





No increase from last year

What is important to note here is the total number of seasonal employees - a key indicator of how much volume the company expects to process during the holiday season - has been flat for the last two years. But the company pointed to increased efficiency for the flat recruitment numbers.

"We're always looking for how we can improve efficiencies as a whole, and in doing that we tend to need less people in the long run," UPS Global Director of Recruitment Strategies Paul Tanguay told Reuters. "So the flat number is not reflective of the volumes we have coming in." - Reuters

UPS, a global logistics industry leader, faced contrary issues during the 2013 and 2014 peak seasons. In 2013 it was severely understaffed, leading to the late shipment of an estimated 2 million packages. The following year it spent $500 million on seasonal hiring but ended up being overstaffed, which hurt its earnings.

Problem solved?

UPS rectified all those problems in 2015 and, according to ShipMatrix, it had an on-time performance score of more than 98% for more than 60 million parcels on Christmas Eve 2015. The volume on that day was 70% more than the average number of packages it handles on a daily basis. However, according to ShipMatrix President Satish Jindel, even a 1% miss in on-time delivery would mean 600,000 packages not being delivered on time. The 2% miss, therefore, equaled 1.2 million late deliveries.

Story continues

One of the major factors for the improved performance of UPS last year was the company moving delivery dates forward when it had excess capacity and also pushing retailers to implement stringent purchase cutoff dates to deliver packages by Christmas. So the company obviously has the means to achieve a near-100% on-time delivery rate, and this year it will need to meet and beat last year's performance.

2016 will be critical

Achieving record volumes is, of course, not in the shipper's hands. It is entirely dependent on how well Amazon (AMZN) and other online retail brands perform. And with more and more retailers joining the ecommerce bandwagon this number is only going to keep going higher every year. It is undoubtedly a huge strain on shipping companies like UPS and FedEx (FDX), but it also boils down to who achieves the highest on-time delivery scores. The company that wins gets a significant amount of public relations for its brand, and potential clients keep looking at these metrics each year.

This year UPS is obviously confident that its efficiency initiatives will compensate for flat season staff growth, but can it exceed the 98% benchmark it set for itself last year? With Amazon looking to bolster its own shipping assets, UPS certainly wouldn't want its billion-dollar client to re-think its partnership strategies based on missed deliveries.

Disclosure: I have no positions in any of the stocks mentioned above and no intention to initiate a position in the next 72 hours.

Start a free seven-day trial of Premium Membership to GuruFocus.

This article first appeared on GuruFocus.






The High Court in Kampala had issued criminal summons ordering two artists that belong to Good Life Music group; Moses Ssekibogo aka Moze Radio and Douglas Mayanja aka Weasel to file their defence on allegations that they defamed their former manager and producer Jeff Kiwanuka.

Through his lawyers of Muwema and company advocates, Jeff Kiwanuka commonly known as Kiwa wants court to order the 2 musicians to pay him damages for allegedly uploading a video on their official facebook page accusing him of being a witch in June this year.

Kiwa says that being a senior producer with a clean 14 year record, he seeks further orders from court that the duo is permanently barred from uttering any such defamatory statements against him.

The courts deputy Registrar Alex Ajiji has given the 2 musicians 15 days within which to file their defence.

It should be noted that Jeff Kiwa produced 3 songs for Moze and Weasel including Nakudatta, Zuena and Bread and Butter before the group fell out in 2013.
Washington (AFP) - The US homeland security chief said Friday authorities have confidence in the integrity of electoral systems despite growing cybersecurity threats.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson offered his agency's assistance to state and local election authorities in protecting voting systems.

Johnson's comments come amid reports of cyberattacks on Democratic Party systems and on voter databases in some jurisdictions. Some reports have said Russia may be behind some attacks, although US officials have not confirmed this.

"In recent months, we have seen cyberintrusions involving political institutions and personal communications," Johnson said in a statement.

"We have also seen some efforts at cyberintrusions of voter registration data maintained in state election systems. We have confidence in the overall integrity of our electoral systems. It is diverse, subject to local control, and has many checks and balance built in."

Nonetheless, Johnson added that "we must face the reality that cyberintrusions and attacks in this country are increasingly sophisticated, from a range of increasingly capable actors that include nation-states, cyber hacktivists, and criminals. In this environment, we must be vigilant."

The Department of Homeland Security "stands ready to assist state and local election officials in protecting their systems" as it does for private businesses and other organizations, he added.

He noted that DHS does not take over systems or regulate them but can offer "cyber hygiene scans" and other tools to help identify vulnerabilities.

DHS also will publish "best practices" for securing voter registration databases and addressing potential threats to election systems from ransomware.

"In recent weeks, a number of states have reached out to us with questions or for assistance," he said. "We strongly encourage more state and local election officials to do so."
Washington (AFP) - The United States on Friday designated French jihadist recruiter Omar Diaby a "global terrorist" subject to US economic sanctions, the State Department said.

The 40-year-old Al-Nusra Front militant, who also uses the name Omar Omsen, became notorious last year for faking his own death in order to leave Syria for surgery.

According to the designation, Diaby leads a group of 50 French volunteers who traveled to Syria and signed up with the Al-Nusra Front, Al-Qaeda's franchise in the region.

Nusra says it broke with Al-Qaeda in July and has rebranded itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham.

"Although assumed killed in August 2015, Diaby re-emerged in May 2016, claiming his death was a ploy to allow him to travel to Turkey for an operation," the designation said.

"Diaby came to the attention of French intelligence due to his involvement with a French extremist group and his online propaganda video series," it added.

"Diaby's videos have been credited as the chief reason behind why so many French nationals have joined militant groups in Syria and Iraq."

Diaby's parents reported him dead last year but in May he surfaced again, giving an interview by Skype to France 2 television to explain he had traveled for surgery.

France 2 also broadcast footage of a training camp in western Syria housing around 30 young French jihadists, many of them from Diaby's home region near Nice.

While Diaby had not then been directly linked to attacks in France, he has expressed approval for the January 2015 shootings at the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo.

"I wish I'd been chosen to do that," he told France 2.

And Diaby -- or "Emir Omar Omsen" -- has been in the crosshairs of French intelligence for some time.

He was a member of Forsane Alizza, a small Islamist group that was broken up in 2012 by the French government for fomenting extremism among young French Muslims.

- Radical propaganda -

Story continues

Diaby, a Frenchman of Senegalese descent, was known at first for producing radical propaganda videos but he is said to have traveled to Syria in 2013.

His hometown of Nice was the victim of a jihadist attack in July this year, when 86 people were killed as an attacker drove a truck into a Bastille Day crowd.

Diaby is known to recruit in the Nice area and intelligence agencies have long feared that militants returning from Syria will bring the war with them.

French police sources have also told AFP that Diaby's name came up in March as officers in Paris investigated a suspect arrested for "planning violent acts."

Now that Diaby is a "Specially Designated Global Terrorist" under US law, American firms and individuals are barred from associating or doing business with him.
Ankara (AFP) - The American flag was flown at a Syrian Kurdish base in northern Syria close to the Turkish border on Friday, a photographer working for AFP said, a day after the US urged against doing so.

In Tal Abyad, the stars and stripes -- flown by the People's Protection Units (YPG) militia -- could be seen from the Turkish border town of Akcakale in the southeastern Sanliurfa province.

Tal Abyad in Raqa province was captured from IS by the YPG in June 2015.

Ankara regards the militia and the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) as the Syrian branch of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) which has waged a 32-year insurgency inside Turkey.

But the YPG has become a key partner of the US-led coalition fighting Islamic State (IS) extremists as part of the Kurdish-Arab Syrian Democratic Forces, much to the chagrin of Washington's NATO ally Ankara.

Turkish media said that US flags had been flown by the Kurdish fighters on Thursday but Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said he was not aware of the reports.

He repeated the US' opposition during a press briefing on Thursday, quoted on the US defence department's website.

"We would call on our partner forces not to fly the American flag on their own. I would imagine that that would be communicated if indeed that's taken place in this instance."

The flags' presence comes two weeks after Kurdish fighters displayed the US flag north of the city of Manbij liberated from IS in August, Turkey's state-run Anadolu news agency said.

Anadolu claimed that local sources said on Thursday the flags were being used as a deterrent against any possible attack.
Los Angeles (AFP) - A US federal judge denied a request for a five-week delay by Donald Trump's attorneys in a trial over whether the Republican presidential candidate's now-defunct Trump University had fleeced customers.

Lead Trump attorney Daniel Petrocelli had asked that the trial - set for November 28 in San Diego - be moved to January 2, as it interfered with another case he is handling.

An attorney representing the plaintiffs opposed the request, arguing that the trial date had been set months ago so as not to conflict with the November 8 presidential election or the end-of-year holidays.

The two class-action lawsuits against the billionaire businessman claim that Trump University students were tricked with aggressive marketing that amounted to fraud.

The suits say students paid as much as $35,000 to enroll, believing they would make it big in real estate and would be taught by experts hand-picked by Trump.

Trump's lawyers say many students have given the program a thumbs up and those who failed to succeed had nothing but themselves to blame.

Trump has repeatedly hit out against the federal judge in the case, Gonzalo Curiel, accusing him of bias because of his Mexican heritage.
Washington (AFP) - The powerful Financial Services Committee of the US House of Representatives announced Friday they will investigate allegations that Wells Fargo fraudulently opened millions of unauthorized customer accounts.

Wells Fargo, the second largest US bank by market value, this month paid $185 million in fines as it admitted that employees had boosted sales figures by opening some two million deposit and credit accounts in customers' names without their knowledge.

Bank staff did so, regulators said, to generate millions of dollars in improper fees from the accounts and earn performance bonuses for themselves.

The bank said last week it had fired 5,300 employees connected to the problem, but questions remain over whether bank executives may have escaped unpunished.

The House committee said it would summon John Stumpf, the bank's chairman and CEO, to testify this month.

"In addition, the committee is requesting that Wells Fargo and regulators provide internal documents relating to the discovery and timing of these practices, and is asking company officials to appear for transcribed interviews," the committee said in a statement.

Others called for transcribed interviews will include the bank's chief financial officer, chief operating office and chief risk officer, the committee said.

The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that federal prosecutors had also opened a probe.

The policy activist organization Public Citizen on Friday also announced it had lodged a shareholder resolution calling on Wells Fargo to explore the possibility of breaking itself up.

"Rather than acknowledging a management break-down, CEO John Stumpf blamed a minority of bad employees," the proposed resolution said, noting that Stumpf has publicly said bank employees had no incentive to commit wrongdoing.

"Taking CEO Stumpf at his word, then, we believe he effectively argues that his firm is so large as to be unmanageable."

Bartlett Naylor, the Public Citizen advisor who filed the resolution, told AFP he had submitted similar proposals since 2014 to JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup and Bank of America, all without success.
Washington (AFP) - Dozens of US Special Operations commandos have been deployed to northern Syria to help Turkey and "vetted" Syrian rebels fight the Islamic State group, the Pentagon confirmed Friday.

But as footage emerged of the rebels hurling insults and threats at the American special operators, US officials were forced to play down reports that the troops did not receive a warm welcome to the frontline.

Last month, Ankara launched an offensive into northern Syria dubbed "Euphrates Shield," ostensibly designed to cut a major IS group supply line but also to counter the advance of US-backed a Kurdish militia.

US forces are working alongside the Syrian Kurds of the YPG in the fight against the Islamic State, but Turkey regards the group as terrorists and allies of the PKK separatist group fighting within its own borders.

In Syria, Turkey prefers to work with Arab and Turkmen fighters such as those of the Free Syrian Army (FSA), which is opposed to Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad's regime but has also clashed with the Kurds in the past.

Pentagon spokesman Jeff Davis told reporters that US commandos, at Turkey's request, had joined the Turkish military and "vetted Syrian opposition forces" fighting the Islamic State group near Jarabulus and Al Rai.

But footage widely shared online by Syrian groups and experts appears to show US commandos in Al Rai insulted by FSA fighters, who call them "pigs" and "infidels" in Arabic, demanding they leave Syria.

A US defense official admitted there had been a "misunderstanding," but insisted the troops were still deployed and that the matter had been cleared up.

"There's been no violence, no one is hurt and we are still there," the official said. "I have no report of a hostile or violent action."

The special forces contingent includes several dozen troops, he added.

America's top general, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Joseph Dunford, met with his Turkish counterpart General Hulusi Akar on the sidelines of a NATO chiefs of staff meeting in Croatia on Friday to discuss the anti-IS group fight.

Story continues

His assistant, Captain Gregory Hicks, said the generals met "to advance discussions on the way forward in the fight against ISIL, and recommitted to the close military-to-military and strategic relationship the US has with Turkey."

Meanwhile, in another incident underlining the four-way tensions between Kurds, Turks, Americans and Syrian Arabs on the battlefield, Kurdish YPG fighters again flew US flags near Syria's border with Turkey.

An AFP photographer saw the stars and stripes flying over a YPG base in Tal Abyad. The use of US flags is seen as a provocation by some in Turkey and the Pentagon repeated its request for them to be taken down.

"We would call on our partner forces not to fly the American flag on their own," Cook said. "I would imagine that that would be communicated if indeed that's taken place in this instance."

There was some good news for the coalition, however.

Cook said that senior Islamic State propagandist Wa'il Adil Hasan Salman al-Fayad, known as "Dr. Wa'il," was killed in a precision strike on September 7 near Raqa, the Syrian city that is the group's de facto capital.
Washington (AFP) - Dozens of US Special Operations Forces are being deployed to Syria to fight the Islamic State group there, in support of the Turkish military and "vetted" Syrian rebels, the Pentagon said Friday.

"Pursuant to a Turkish request, US special operations forces have been approved to accompany Turkish and vetted Syrian opposition forces as they continue to clear territory from ISIL," said Adrian Rankine-Galloway, a Pentagon spokesman.
Washington (AFP) - The United States said Friday it will not set up a planned joint US-Russian military coordination cell in Syria until regime forces there allow aid into besieged cities.

US Secretary of State John Kerry called Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and condemned "repeated and unacceptable delays of humanitarian aid," a spokesman said.

A ceasefire was declared in Syria's five-year-old civil war on Monday, two days after Kerry and Lavrov signed a deal in Geneva to pressure both sides to hold their fire.

Under the pact, Russia was to restrain Bashar al-Assad's regime while Washington leans on the rebel groups opposing him, and both sides agree violence has reduced.

If the truce lasts seven days and humanitarian access is granted, Russia and the United States are to work together to target the extremist Islamic State and Al-Nusra front.

But some clashes have continued, and the United Nations has been unable to send supplies to starving civilians in areas like the besieged northern city of Aleppo.

Russia on Friday complained that only its ally, the Assad regime, is respecting the ceasefire, but nevertheless suggested that it be prolonged by a further 72 hours.

Washington, however, seems to be running short of patience.

Kerry told Lavrov that Washington "expects Russia to use its influence on the Assad regime to allow UN humanitarian convoys to reach Aleppo and other areas in need.

"The Secretary made clear that the United States will not establish the Joint Implementation Center with Russia unless and until the agreed terms for humanitarian access are met," he added, according to spokesman John Kirby.
London (AFP) - Martin Roth, the outgoing director of London's Victoria and Albert Museum, said Friday he was leaving to throw his weight into fighting nationalism across Europe, following Britain's vote to quit the EU.

The German announced last week that he was stepping down after five years in the role.

But he told BBC radio that Britain's decision to leave the European Union would make it more difficult to work with people and institutions abroad.

"I really like this country -- I like London, I like to live here," the 61-year-old said.

However, "the terms and conditions are changing," he said.

"It's worse. The UK just started it now but this new nationalism is everywhere -- it's a right-wing movement in Germany, it's in France, in the Netherlands, it's everywhere, and I think one has to do something, and that's one of the reasons why I'm leaving."

He said he feared Britain was becoming more introspective.

"I don't want to talk about 'little England', but it will change. It is already happening," Roth said.

When Britain does leave the EU, it will become harder for museums to work with other institutions abroad and share exhibits, he claimed.

He said that before the EU existed, "it was more difficult to work with other countries, with other museums. It's about the legal situation, it's about tax and trade and much, much more.

"Open borders give a completely different situation."

Roth said he was going to become the president of the Institute for International Relations, which is based in Stuttgart in Germany.

The Victoria and Albert Museum, the world's largest museum of design and decorative arts, welcomed a record 3.9 million visitors last year and won the British museum of the year award in July.
Global broadband services and technology company,ViaSat Inc. VSAT, has signed an agreement to offer new Wi-Fi service plans to the North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT) Rail Division. The service will cater to the Piedmont railway passengers traveling between Raleigh and Charlotte, NC.

Passengers will now be able to enjoy faster speed and more options when surfing the web, engaging in social media, checking and responding to email and staying connected while traveling, thanks to the tiered new service plans.

ViaSat has assisted NCDOT to launch their wireless Internet services onboard the Piedmont Rail earlier; and the new service will enable it to deliver a more consistent Wi-Fi experience with higher speed. ViaSat managed Wi-Fi services include end-to-end management of Wi-Fi networks, right from network design, installation and reporting to monitoring and end-user support.

Earlier this month, ViaSat and its long-time partner  Eutelsat  signed an agreement to provide in-flight Wi-Fi services with Finnair. The contract entails the installation of a high-speed wireless Internet network on the airlines entire Airbus A320 series short-haul fleet flying in Europe.This followed a similar contract with EL AL Israel Airlines, which is currently in the customer trials phase, and is scheduled to enter full retail service by the end of this year.

ViaSat has, to date, installed its system on about 500 commercial airplanes. This figure includes most of the United Continental Holdings, Inc.s UAL Boeing 737 fleet as well as the JetBlue Airways aircraft.

VIASAT INC Price and Consensus

VIASAT INC Price and Consensus | VIASAT INC Quote

ViaSat has been rapidly expanding its Wi-Fi business. In June, the company secured a contract to provide internet access on 100 new American Airlines Group AAL planes. The company is also reportedly supplying Wi-Fi to Air Force One and other government aircraft.

Further, ViaSat recently inked a multi-year agreement with leading aerospace company - Dassault Aviation  to deliver advanced Internet and corporate network access to operators. In addition, ViaSat secured a deal in February to deliver Wi-Fi services to the domestic fleet of Qantas Airways.

Story continues

We believe that the companys significant contract wins will boost its leading position in end-markets, allowing it to gain a competitive edge over its peers.

ViaSat expects robust growth as it capitalizes on its competitive advantage and sturdy demand for its highly cost-effective satellite bandwidth products. The company projects strong growth opportunities in satellite services and government systems segments, which are expected drive top-line growth in the coming quarters.

ViaSat currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). A better-ranked stock in the same space is Clearfield, Inc. CLFD, holding a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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High Court Judge Patricia Wasswa Basaza has ruled that the Nakawa Municipality MP Micheal Kabaziguruka is subject to military law and therefore he should be tried by the General Court Martial for offences relating to security and treachery.

The judge based her ruling on Section 119 of the UPDF Act which gives unlimited jurisdiction and powers to the Army Court to try civilians such as Kabaziguruka.

According to the judge, unless this section is repealed or invalidated by the Constitutional Court, it makes civilian suspects subject to military law for allegedly aiding serving UPDF officers to commit offences.

Justice Basaza has also dismissed Kabazigurukas claims that the Court Martial lacks impartiality to accord him justice saying the MP petitioned a wrong court which has no powers to address such a grievance.

She instead reasoned that Kabazigurka who has been on remand at Kigo Prison since June this year should have petitioned the Constitutional Court.

Kabaziguruka is jointly charged before the General Court Martial with 20 UPDF officers for allegedly contriving a plot to infiltrate defense forces and compromise its security to overthrow the government of Uganda by use of firearms .

The offences were allegedly committed between February and June this year in districts of Kampala,Wakiso and Luweero.
Russian Communists Rebrand to Attract Young Supporters

James Marson | The Wall Street Journal

The Bolshevik leader, clad in jeans and clutching a laptop, is cutting a youthful figure on posters and in campaign pamphlets for the opposition Communist Party of the Russian Federation, ahead of parliamentary elections here Sunday.

It is all part of the partys latest revolution. For years a shrinking haven for retirees nostalgic for the Soviet past, the party of the proletariat is appealing to young voters by rejuvenating its image. Other campaign literature features Joseph Stalin smoking an e-cigarette and Karl Marx wearing a leather jacket and declaring: Ill be back.

* * *

Postcards From the Hajj: The Crowds

Diaa Hadid | The New York Times

As just one of two million pilgrims, Diaa Hadid, a correspondent for The New York Times, battled huge crowds to perform the sacred rites of the hajj, even as a V.I.P. treated to helicopter rides and other perks.

Recommended: The War Debate America Isnt Having

* * *

Tensions Simmer as German Jews Fight Over Whether to Welcome Refugees

Eetta Prince-Gibson | Haaretz

Like most everything in Jewish-Germany, attitudes toward the refugees stem from the conclusions that different individuals and groups draw from the Holocaust.

Erika Stein, a PhD student in sociology researching attitudes toward the refugees, explains to Haaretz, Those who believe that the Holocaust places a moral burden on Jews continue to want to help the refugees. Those who believe that the Holocaust has given us the right to worry about our own welfare are worried about how the refugees will affect the Jewish community. Those who think that Germany has changed and learned its lessons view working with the refugees as an opportunity. Those who think that Germany really hasnt changed at all are worried that the resentment against the refugees will spill over onto the Jews.

Story continues

* * *

Hong Kong Will Throw Out a Million Mooncakes This Mid-Autumn Festival

Selina Cheng | Quartz

For those who arent familiar with the tradition, mooncakes are a savory, dense, and greasy Chinese delicacy, synonymous with the Mid-Autumn Festival. Families typically gather for dinner, eat mooncakes, then take late night strolls outdoors to enjoy the sight of the full moon. The Cantonese mooncake is a traditional pastry with thick lotus seed paste, wrapped around one whole salted duck egg yolk (or two), and covered with a thin crust that is baked often with lard.

Recommended: How Much Do Parents Matter?

Families, friends, and colleagues are expected to offer mooncake gift boxes to each other prior to the auspicious date, even though they often do not want to receive them themselves. Re-gifting is common, but even then theres a lot more mooncake being purchased than anyone really wants.

* * *

Typecast as a Terrorist

Riz Ahmed | The Guardian

To begin with, auditions taught me to get through airports. In the end, it was the other way around. Im an actor. Since I was a teenager I have had to play different characters, negotiating the cultural expectations of a Pakistani family, Brit-Asian rudeboy culture, and a scholarship to private school. The fluidity of my own personal identity on any given day was further compounded by the changing labels assigned to Asians in general.

As children in the 1980s, when my brother and I were stopped near our home by a skinhead who decided to put a knife to my brothers throat, we were black. A decade later, the knife to my throat was held by another Paki, a label we wore with swagger in the Brit-Asian youth and gang culture of the 1990s. The next time I found myself as helplessly cornered, it was in a windowless room at Luton airport. My arm was in a painful wrist-lock and my collar pinned to the wall by British intelligence officers. It was post 9/11, and I was now labelled a Muslim.

* * *

It Takes a Village to Kill a Child

Mackenzie Knowles-Coursin | Foreign Policy

Life had gotten harder in Madriya in recent years. As Boko Haram pursued its stated goal of establishing a caliphate in the Lake Chad region, it destroyed virtually everything in its path. Militants looted and burned villages, kidnapped children, and brutally murdered thousands of people. They mined fields and killed farmers as they tended their crops, strangling trade routes and hampering humanitarian access. Local markets dried up, and, like most of his neighbors, Aboubacar Yunnus was able to plant less and less each year. Food stocks dwindled, and neighbors increasingly talked about how people in nearby villages were dying of starvation.

Still, the family clung to a tenuous routine. Aboubacar ate and slept. Halima braided Houwas hair, the infant resting in his sisters lap. Aboubacar Yunnus worked the fields and checked his Nokia phone. For the first eight months of Aboubacars life, things continued like this, hunger and uncertainty forming the backdrop to daily life. Then came the violence of Boko Haram.

Read more from The Atlantic:

This article was originally published on The Atlantic.
VimpelCom Ltd. (VIP) has filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for a secondary offering. The company intends to offer 142.5 million American depositary shares (ADSs) at a price of $3.50 apiece, with an overallotment option for an additional 21.375 million. Each ADS represents one common shares of the company. At the set price, the entire offering is valued up to $573.56 million.

The underwriters for the offering are Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan, Citigroup and Credit Suisse.

VimpelCom is an international communications and technology company committed to bringing the digital world to each and every customer. Currently, the company provides voice and data services through a range of traditional and broadband mobile and fixed-line technologies, and it operates in Russia, Algeria, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Armenia, Tajikistan, Georgia, Laos, Zimbabwe and Italy.

ALSO READ: America's Richest (and Poorest) States

As of June 2016, this companys operations cover a territory with a total population of approximately 732 million. At the same time, VimpelCom boasted 214.9 million mobile customers on a combined basis, including its WIND brand, 236 million mobile customers on a combined basis, including 100% of WIND and Warid customers and 50,971 employees.

Note that the company will not receive any proceeds from the offering.

So far in 2016, VimpelCom has outperformed the broad markets, with the stock up over 10%. Over the past 52 weeks, the stock is actually down about 25%.

Shares of VimpelCom closed Thursday at $3.63, with a consensus analyst price target of $5.33 and a 52-week trading range of $2.71 to $4.98.

Related Articles
In the early 1960s, pictures of babies with tragic birth defects, including shortened or missing limbs, caused an international scare. The malformations were quickly linked to the drug thalidomide, an over-the-counter sedative that had recently been developed in Germany and was being used by pregnant women to alleviate morning sickness.

One result of the thalidomide crisis was the passage of a new law, the Kefauver Harris Amendment, that gave the U.S. Food and Drug Administration most of the power it now exerts in regulating drugs.

Related: Your Health Insurance Will Cost More Next Year  Heres Why

Today, we face a drug crisis of a much different sort. Recent drug pricing scandals are leading to calls for government action. But the prices causing so much outrage today are often then unintended result of that 1962 law and others that gave the FDA its current power. By limiting the number of drugs and other treatments available, the FDA reduces the options available to patients and gives pharmaceutical firms excessive pricing power.

Some have responded to soaring drug prices by calling for government price controls. Thats a risky option, as we can see in Venezuela, where residents are struggling to find daily necessities because of government price restrictions. In our country, gas lines, common during the 1970s owed their origins to price controls imposed by Richard Nixon. The problem with price controls is that the government entity imposing them lacks the information on supply and demand necessary to set them optimally. Thus, price ceilings will most likely be set either too high to have an impact or so low that they trigger a shortage.

A better alternative is to rely on competition to drive prices down. As many of us learned in our introductory economics classes, price equals the marginal cost of production in a perfectly competitive market. While this may not happen in the real world of imperfect competition, prices well above production costs represent an invitation to new firms to enter the market.

Story continues

Related: How Obamacare Clears the Field for a GOP Senate Win 

But FDA regulations restrict market entry. Often, the FDA gives only one company the right to produce a generic drug, creating an artificial monopoly not justified by the usual intellectual property arguments. In some cases, under an FDA program launched ten years ago, drugmakers have been granted exclusive rights to market medications that have been commonly used for decades or longer  typically at increased prices.

A drug whose patent has expired has already financially rewarded its inventor. Once patent protection lapses, any company that manufacture the drug safely and inexpensively should be free to do so. Yet in a number of cases, pharmaceutical companies have been able to raise prices on older drugs that no longer enjoy patent protection because of a lack of competition. Before the recent outrage over Mylans EpiPen price hike, Turing Pharmaceuticals raised the price of Daraprim, used to treat parasitic infections, from $13.50 to $750 per pill and Valeant Pharmaceuticals jacked up the price of Isuprel, a heart medication, by 525 percent.

Related: Heres How to Stop Price Gouging by Drugmakers Like Mylan

The FDA has also imposed an expensive and onerous new drug approval process that is preventing patients from accessing many life-saving and life-enhancing tests and treatments. Among the examples that Richard Williams, Ariel Slonim and I report in a new Mercatus Center study are a treatment for diabetic foot ulcers, cultured stem-cell therapies for orthopedic conditions, genetic tests and anti-aging treatments.

This last category is particularly telling. Because the FDA has not considered aging to be a disease, it is not clear what criteria the agency might apply to anti-aging treatments or whether it would consider them at all. Much the same is the case with treatments that increase our physical capacity: They dont treat a specific disease, so they lack a clear path to approval.

In other cases, FDA restrictions prevent terminally ill patients from taking new medications that are under review. Since these patients may not survive through the clinical trial period, they should have the opportunity to try new medications before its too late. The FDA provides exceptions to some terminal patients under its expanded use program, but qualifying for expanded use involves a lengthy bureaucratic process of its own. A more promising alternative is right to try laws enacted at the state level, which allow patients to take investigational new drugs without FDA approval.

Related: Generic Drug Prices Dropped by Nearly 60% Under Medicare Part D

The justification for the FDAs drug approval process is that it protects patients from dangerous or ineffective drugs. But the FDA cannot guarantee safety: Approved drugs used individually or in tandem can have unexpected, and sometimes fatal, side effects. Meanwhile, overly restrictive regulations can kill patients by preventing them from accessing new medications.

Even thalidomide, the widely vilified sedative, ultimately proved to be a useful treatment. In 1964, an Israeli doctor gave thalidomide tablets to a leprosy patient suffering extreme pain. The medication not only allowed the patient to sleep, but reversed his symptoms. Eventually, thalidomide became a common treatment for leprosy and was later found to be effective against AIDS and cancer. None of these indications would have been possible had thalidomide not been approved in Germany (and elsewhere) in what proponents of the Kefauver Harris Amendment regarded as an overly lax regulatory regime.

Congress is considering legislation that would expedite FDA approvals for new drugs. But even if this legislation is enacted, securing new drug approvals will continue to be an expensive and onerous process for pharmaceutical companies, with many choosing not to undertake the effort at all. The result will be continued monopoly pricing of off-patent drugs and delays in the availability of new medical innovations.

Related: We Can Find Consensus on Health Care Cost Reforms

Some more fundamental reforms would be more effective. One would be to allow multiple organizations to approve drugs, providing competition to the FDA. A private drug adjudication industry would have to be carefully structured and regulated to ensure that approving organizations do not have perverse incentives. Another option is to rely on the courts: Let pharmaceutical companies sell whichever medications they believe to be safe and effective  with the understanding that patients can win large judgments if the companies fail to produce and market their treatments responsibly.

The American people deserve access to the widest variety of affordable treatments. Rather than demanding that the government do more to achieve this goal, perhaps it is time that we ask one government agency  the FDA  to do less.

Top Reads from The Fiscal Times:
From Esquire

Up in Oregon this week, the trial of the remaining seven defendants indicted in connection with the Revolutionary Cosplay Festival in a federal bird sanctuary got under way. Naturally, the legal denouement to this opera bouffe largely is going unnoticed due to the glare and the blare of the presidential campaign. That's despite the fact that everybody's talking about the "alt-right" and its connection to the Republican candidate for president, and here's a group of the real thing, who landed blows against the empire by holding several dozen Caspian terns hostage for As Long As It Took-or until the snacks ran out, whatever came first.

Seriously, though, one of them got shot to death in a confrontation with the FBI, and what have you done for constitutional conservatism, Sheriff Joe, eh?

[contentlinks align="center" textonly="false" numbered="false" headline="Related Story" customtitles="Chilling Video of a Militia Leader's Final Moments" customimages="" content="article.43107"]

Anyway, the trial got off to a flying start when, as the AP tells us, Harney County Sheriff David Ward testified that the defendants warned him to help them, or to beware of their mighty sword, and why does everyone laugh at their mighty sword?

The sheriff testified that Bundy was polite and "an easy guy to have a conversation with," but the pair warned of civil unrest unless he told the federal government that the ranchers would not go back to prison. "I was told my responsibility was to prevent them from going to prison, and if I didn't do those things, they would bring hundreds of people to town to do my job for me," Ward said. An email from defendant Neil Wampler said the sheriff needed to protect residents from an abusive government or "see your county invaded by the most determined and organized - and armed - citizens alive in this country." A second message from Wampler warned: "We ain't playin!"

Story continues

American revolutionary rhetoric has dropped a few notches since Tom Paine died, I can tell you that.

[contentlinks align="center" textonly="false" numbered="false" headline="Related Story" customtitles="The Oregon Standoff Is Nothing Less Than Sedition" customimages="" content="article.40914"]

In a related development, a 13-year-old African American boy named Tyree King was shot and killed by a police officer in Columbus, Ohio. The officer was investigating an armed robbery call and, according to the Columbus P.D., the boy pulled out a BB gun with a laser sight. If true, this is not a smart thing to do.

So Tyree King is dead, but this guy

he's still alive. This country is a conundrum, I'll give you that.

[contentlinks align="center" textonly="false" numbered="false" headline="Related Story" customtitles="Do We Face a Threat of Armed Sedition?" customimages="" content="article.48562"]

Click here to respond to this post on the official Esquire Politics Facebook page.

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Victoria Beckham at NYFW. (Photo: FilmMagic)

Victoria Beckham may not smile, but she can strut with the best of em.

The Spice Girl turned designer, 42, took on Times Square during her recent stay in the Big Apple for New York Fashion Week. In a video her eldest son, Brooklyn, posted on Instagram, Victoria dances her way through the congested  and currently under construction  tourist spot without missing a beat.

My mum is bringing fashion to the streets. Times Square NYC ????????@victoriabeckham @davidbeckham ????@kenpaves #coolmum A video posted by bb (@brooklynbeckham) on Sep 15, 2016 at 11:21am PDT

The dance-athon is set to the Bee Gees Stayin Alive, and David Beckhams petite ladylove brings it in her simple black-and-white ensemble. The mom of four werks it while she dances with a street performer 

Image: Instagram

Pays tribute to Old Glory, while flashing her signature Posh peace sign 

Image: Instagram

Dances circles in front of a fence 

Image: Instagram

And shakes it next to a creepy costumed Elmo 

Image: Instagram

 and Cookie Monster (with Olaf).

Image: Instagram

Fun fact: She does it all in flats, which are practically against her religion. Cause not even Victoria Beckham could dance over subway grates in heels.

Image: Instagram

Brooklyn, 17, described Victoria as a cool mum in the video caption and noted that she is bringing fashion to the streets. He also tagged David, who must have been along for the nighttime groove session, and Victorias hairstylist bestie Ken Paves.

So while she danced like nobody was watching, a lot of people were  some she knew and many she didnt.
A fresh row between Parliament and journalists accredited to cover the institution has drawn the attention of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

Yesterday the Speaker of Parliament Rebecca Kadaga ordered Parliaments committee on rules and privilege to investigate journalists who wrote what she considers damning stories against the institution.

The Speaker also threatened to drag sections of media outlets to court for alleged defamation and contempt of parliament.

Kadaga was reacting to a story published by Daily Monitor indicating that parliament intends to spend Sh200 million for every MPs car and Sh68 million allocated for each MPs funeral expenses.

Parliamentary authorities are also under fire to answer queries of conflict of interest after a deal to host an Inter-Parliamentary Union conference was awarded to a hotel owned by Speaker Rebecca Kadaga.

However, in an interview with KFM, the director for freedom of expression and media development at UNESCO, Mr. Guy Berger says such threats on journalists are a clear sign of breakdown of rule of law and must stop.

When society realises there is no justice for journalists they know that the rule of law is weak and they themselves are not being protected. For example journalist who expose corruption or environmental issues, Mr Berger tells KFM.

He adds that journourlists must be protected and allowed to do their job and freely inform society.

Story By Catherine Ageno
The newest Wegman's store in Maryland will open its doors Sunday in northwestern Baltimore County. It's part of the Foundry Row development, and it's one of the first stores to open. Employees are busy making food for the big opening, sprucing up the store and meeting about the big day. The new store employs 475 people, most of them local hires.
(Recasts; adds details of suit, background)

By Karen Freifeld

NEW YORK, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Wells Fargo & Co, embroiled in a scandal over the opening of sham accounts, was sued on Friday by customers who accused the bank of fraud and recklessness for its behavior.

The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court in Utah, and seeks class-action status on behalf of hundreds of thousands of customers nationwide.

Wells Fargo did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Last week, the San Francisco-based lender agreed to pay $190 million to settle regulatory charges that employees opened some 2 million accounts without customers' knowledge, in order to meet sales targets.

Wells Fargo, the country's third-largest bank by assets, has said it has fired 5,300 people over the matter and would eliminate sales goals in its retail banking on Jan. 1, 2017.

Federal prosecutors have begun examining Wells Fargo's practices, and the bank's Chief Executive Officer John Stumpf is scheduled to testify before Congress next week.

In the complaint, three plaintiffs said customers were hurt by "abusive and fraudulent tactics" used by employees who felt they had to "do whatever it takes," including selling products they did not need or want, to meet sales quotas.

It was not immediately clear how the three named plaintiffs were specifically harmed by the bank's alleged wrongdoing.

The case is Mitchell et al v. Wells Fargo Bank NA et al, U.S. District Court, District of Utah, No. 16-00966.

(Reporting by Karen Freifeld; additional reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)
By Karen Freifeld

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Wells Fargo & Co, embroiled in a scandal over the opening of sham accounts, was sued on Friday by customers who accused the bank of fraud and recklessness for its behavior.

The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court in Utah, and seeks class-action status on behalf of hundreds of thousands of customers nationwide.

Wells Fargo did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Last week, the San Francisco-based lender agreed to pay $190 million to settle regulatory charges that employees opened some 2 million accounts without customers' knowledge, in order to meet sales targets.

Wells Fargo, the country's third-largest bank by assets, has said it has fired 5,300 people over the matter and would eliminate sales goals in its retail banking on Jan. 1, 2017.

Federal prosecutors have begun examining Wells Fargo's practices, and the bank's Chief Executive Officer John Stumpf is scheduled to testify before Congress next week.

In the complaint, three plaintiffs said customers were hurt by "abusive and fraudulent tactics" used by employees who felt they had to "do whatever it takes," including selling products they did not need or want, to meet sales quotas.

It was not immediately clear how the three named plaintiffs were specifically harmed by the bank's alleged wrongdoing.

The case is Mitchell et al v. Wells Fargo Bank NA et al, U.S. District Court, District of Utah, No. 16-00966.

(Reporting by Karen Freifeld; additional reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)
By Susanna Twidale LONDON (Reuters) - Toshiba's Westinghouse expects to receive approval from Britain's nuclear regulator for its AP1000 reactor design in the first quarter of next year, it said on Thursday. The approval is a necessary step before the reactor can be used at NuGen's Moorside project in Cumbria, north west England, which is expected to generate around 7 percent of the countrys electricity when built around 2025. "We are on track to achieve GDA (generic design assessment) in the first quarter of 2017," Jeffrey Benjamin, Westinghouse senior vice president, new plants and major projects, told reporters. All new nuclear plants in Britain need to gain approval from its Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) through its GDA process, which typically takes around four years the ONR said. Westinghouse's AP1000 approval however, has taken much longer since assessment, which first began in 2007. It was paused by the ONR at the end of December 2011 while it asked for some modifications to the design. The approval process resumed in 2014. Benjamin described the reactor design changes made as "minor to moderate". "Ultimately they are changes we are able to live with," he said, adding they related to some mechanical system alterations. Benjamin also said the approval was a vital step needed for NuGen to take a final investment decision Nugen, a joint venture between Toshiba and Engie had said it expected to make a final investment decision on the project in 2018. (Editing by William Hardy)
Canada is currently hosting the Toronto International Film Festival. Nearly 300 different movies will be played, 139 of which will be making their world premiere. Unlike other festivals, Torontos doesnt have a jury and is generally noncompetitive. That being said, it does hand one award to the film with the best rating by those in attendance. If youre looking to watch some stellar films, why not stream the past three winners of the Peoples Choice Award?

12 Years a Slave

In 2013 this movie would go on to win Best Picture at the Academy Awards. Starring Chiwetel Ejiofor as Solomon Northup, this historical epic tells the tale of a free black man kidnapped and sold into slavery. Held in captivity in Louisiana for 12 years, he endures unspeakable horrors as he desperately tries to return to his family in New York. 12 Years a Slave is available to rent on iTunes.

The Imitation Game

In 2014 another drama based on real historical events walked away the winner. Benedict Cumberbatch and Keira Knightley co-starred as Alan Turing and Joan Clarke, two brilliant minds under the employ of the British government tasked with the seemingly impossible goal of deciphering German intelligence codes. It was nominated for eight Oscars, including Best Picture, Actor, Supporting Actress, and Director. The Imitation Game is free to stream with a subscription to Showtime.

Room

And finally, in 2015 an indie novel adaptation was the big crowd pleaser. It stars Brie Larson and Jacob Tremblay as a mother and son who must figure out how to escape a locked room where theyre being held captive by Old Nick, a sadistic man who kidnapped Larsons character as a teen. She would win an Academy Award, a Golden Globe, a BAFTA Award, and a SAG Award for her performance. Room is available to rent on Amazon.

Original Robocop director didnt like the remake:

Tell us what you think! Hit us up on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram or leave your comments below.
On Friday, an old conspiracy theory about President Obama got new legs: as Obama reiterated that he was pretty confident about where [he] was born, Donald Trumpwho long questioned the Presidents place of birthmade a statement walking back that position.

President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period, Trump said.

But, Thursday night, his campaign also issued a statement tracing the rumor to his opponent, Hillary Clinton.

As PolitiFact and Fact-check.org both explain, there is absolutely no evidence that Clinton or her campaign were the source of the idea, though it did spread among some of her supporters during the 2008 primary contest between Clinton and Obamawhich would only make sense, in terms of the timing of someone questioning whether someone were qualified for the presidency. And as for Clinton herself, she said on Friday that Trumps campaign for the White House was founded on the outrageous lie that Obamas place of birth was ever in question, and called out the racism of the rumor.

Get your history fix in one place: sign up for the weekly TIME History newsletter

So where did the idea actually come from?

Theres no definite answer to that question, as the 2008 iteration of the idea was first circulated, according to a Politico history of the theory, by anonymous email. But, as the primary season came to an end, it got a publicity boost from an ironic source: the attempt by the campaign to quash rumors led some people who might have previously ignored them to wonder what was going on.

In 2008, TIME explained how that happened:

For more than a year, Obama relied on conventional means to confront the blogospheres superheated rumor millto little effect. The fact-check feature on his website, for instance, only seemed to spawn more, and wilder, rumors. A mention there of Obamas birth certificate spurred National Review Online to demand that he produce it to dispel groundless reports that Obama was actually born in Kenya and therefore would be constitutionally ineligible to be President; that his middle name is not Hussein but Muhammad; and that his mother actually named him Barry. That National Review article in turn became fodder for cable television.

Even after Obama won the election, the idea did not go away. Years later, in 2011, Donald Trump, then toying with a 2012 run for the White House, was largely responsible for bringing it back into the news.

But the cached version of that original 2008 Obama campaign response, the fact-check website fightthesmears.com, can still be found online. Senator Obama was born in Hawaii in 1961, after it became a state on August 21st, 1959, the website states. And, of course, it links to the documents that prove sonot that anyone should need to see them anymore.
[Photo: Unsplash/Greg Raines]

Modern city life, it can be lonely and hectic. Your new friends live and work all over town and few can actually be bothered to traverse the city twice on the same night for a glass of red before bed, so you stay local and make do with your housemate or least offensive work colleague. The conversation dries up and when they nip to the toilet, you text a bestie to lift your mood again. Whilst inane in jokes mean nothing to your workmates, theyll have your old mates taking off in a roflcopter. You duck out early to have a long overdue video chat and a cheeky G&T in bed.



Amongst old friends, idiosyncrasies arent tolerated, theyre celebrated. Our friend Sam is super smart, funny and honest. A guy who disassembles things to learn how to assemble them. A man of conviction and a walking library of random facts, the kind you tell everyone because they need to know. The thing is his conviction is so strong that sometimes, when he stumbles upon a particularly random random fact, he forgets to question it and before long youre telling other people Sams mistruths and youre the one that cops the blame for trying to convince someone of a fact that simply isnt true. We call these Sam facts and we wouldnt have him any other way. We just try and call him on them when we suspect

And its a blessing to have someone you love enough to have in the bathroom the same time youre doing a number 2 or get your baps out in front of in a changing room or discuss vibrators without fear of judgement. Knowing you have them is a feeling better than doing any of those things alone. Someone who knows you well enough to let you vent about petty nonsense but also to call you on your crap. Someone you can be vulnerable around without feeling fearful. Someone who knows you better than you know the words to the songs youd sing together on road trips and nights out you still talk about even after all these years.

As a free agent, meeting new people without a wingmaiden to big you up and occupy your targets obnoxious friend can be tough. Its harder to feel like the best version of yourself without them. Theyre your stabilisers. The ones who make the extra effort to come out and vet the options with you. The ones who will stay if youre hooking up and only leave when they know youre safe even when they never wanted to go out to begin with because they know youd do the same. And then theres that telepathic bond, the unspoken assurance that this is a two way street. Theres no loss of deposit, youre fully insured and backed by the bank of besties.

Story continues

And when old friends live abroad, it sucks, but ultimately you know that if you got on that plane afters years of no contact, things would remain as they were. The hugs will be stronger and words quicker but never will they carry anything less than love, because your old friends are your living history. They share years of your memories, tears and laughter. They knew your grandparents and they stroked your first pets. They sat quietly whilst your mum had a go at you over dinner and when you werent in their company, you were on the phone to them despite having just got in from school. And when youre not in the mood to talk, you wont and it wont feel bad or awkward, but you will feel the warmth and comfort of knowing that anything yet to be said is just another step on the path of friendship; and we all know by now that its not about the destination but the journey you take together.

Why You Should Have A Work Spouse



Mum Pens Facebook Post Urging Men To Take More Pictures Of Their Partners With Their Kids


 2016, The Cambodia Daily. All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reproduced in print, electronically, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without written permission.

Two assistants to opposition leader Sam Rainsy, both facing charges of forgery and incitement in Cambodia, and an assistant to now-imprisoned Senator Hong Sok Hour have been granted asylum in France, according to a senior CNRP lawmaker.At least two of the three, who have all been involved in the oppositions social media outreach, are facing up to 17 years in prison after being charged for their involvement in crimes allegedly committed by Mr. Sok Hour when he presented a fake border treaty in a video posted to Facebook.They asked for asylum from UNHCR [U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees] in the Philippines and they have been accepted in France, opposition lawmaker Mu Sochua said on Thursday, declining to say whether their asylum in France was temporary or permanent.Ms. Sochua referred further questions to Mr. Rainsy, who is himself living in self-imposed exile in France to avoid a two-year prison sentence. He declined to comment.Arrest warrants for Sathya Sambath, who was accused of producing the video, and Ung Chung Leang, the manager of Mr. Rainsys Facebook page, were issued late last year after the two were charged with forging a public document, using forged public documents and incitement to commit a felony.The two mentogether with Sambath David, an assistant to Mr. Sok Hourfled to the Philippines at the time on a tip that they would soon face arrest.On September 6, they headed for France, according to a post on Mr. Chung Leangs Facebook account.Mr. Sambath, Mr. Chung Leang and Mr. David declined to comment on the case, as did UNHCR officials in Southeast Asia and France.Prime Minister Hun Sen ordered Mr. Sok Hours arrest in August last year after the video, in which he presents a forged treaty to dissolve the Cambodian-Vietnamese border, was posted to the Facebook page of Mr. Rainsy, who has also been charged as an accomplice in the case.Phnom Penh Municipal Court spokesman Y Rin said Investigating Judge Kor Vandy was still working on the case. He declined to say whether an arrest warrant had been issued for Mr. David.For right now, Investigating Judge Kor Vandy is investigating and processing whether the group is involved with Hong Sok Hours case, he said.So the investigation is still ongoing.Mr. Sok Hour, who has been repeatedly denied bail due to what the court says is his continued threat to social order, has denied the forgery charges. Instead, he has said that he found the doctored border treaty through a simple Google search.Mr. Rainsy is set to go on trial in November over the case. He has denied any involvement in the production, and in November seemingly laid blame for the incident on his Facebook team and Mr. Sok Hour.Senator Hong Sok Hour posted his presentation/document on my Facebook page on August 12, 2015, he said in an email at the time, adding that he was then in the U.S. and Europe.My Facebook page has 2 administrators, 2 editors and 2 moderators.The three assistants are among numerous government criticsor their relativesto recently flee the country looking for asylum amid rising political tension.In July, two activist brothers received temporary asylum in Thailand amid fear for their safety after political analyst Kem Ley was assassinated earlier in the month.On August 29, the analysts wife, Bou Rachana, her four sons and members of her extended family also left the country for Thailand, where they are pursuing permanent asylum in a third country.Soeung Hai, a dissident former monk also wanted for arrest, has been living in Sweden since February, claiming that the U.N. helped him secure political asylum there.As a matter of policy, the UNHCR does not comment on individual asylum cases.
Bournemouth (United Kingdom) (AFP) - Nigel Farage, the outgoing leader of the anti-EU UK Independence Party, is known for his sharp turn of phrase.

As UKIP announces its new leader on Friday, here are some of the 52-year-old's most memorable quotes:

"Above all, UKIP will campaign for Britain to be an independent self-governing and self-confident nation. There is a huge vacuum in British politics because the three traditional parties do not offer the electorate a real choice. UKIP is now the only party saying what most people think. We will fill the void."

- After being elected the new leader of UKIP in 2006

"You have the charisma of a damp rag, and the appearance of a low-grade bank clerk. And the question that I want to ask, that we're all going to ask, is: 'who are you?'"

- In the European Parliament in 2010 addressing Herman Van Rompuy, the new president of the European Council

"The euro Titanic has now hit the iceberg -- and there simply aren't enough lifeboats to go round."

- Farage in the European Parliament at the height of the euro crisis

"We wouldn't want to be like the Swiss, would we? That would be awful! We'd be rich!"

- Farage in 2013 reacting to a speech by prime minister David Cameron, warning against being outside the EU

"June the 23rd needs to become a national bank holiday, and we will call it Independence Day!"

- Farage celebrates victory the morning after Britain voted to leave the European Union

"Isn't it funny? When I came here 17 years ago, and I said that I wanted to lead a campaign to get Britain to leave the European Union, you all laughed at me. Well, I have to say, you're not laughing now, are you?"

- Farage in the European Parliament five days after the Brexit vote

"During the referendum, I said 'I want my country back'. What I'm saying today is: I want my life back."

- Less than two weeks after the referendum, Farage announces he is stepping down as UKIP leader, his life's mission accomplished
It was a bad case of the lunchies.

Florida woman Tasha Sims, 33, was arrested Wednesday after she allegedly hid a gram of marijuana and a grinder in a pink lunch box that belonged to her niece, who was reportedly in the car with her.

Read: From Complaining About Pizza to Being 'Too High,' 7 Ridiculous Reasons People Have Called 911

Sims has been charged with possession of marijuana, driving with a suspended license, and neglect without great bodily harm, according to court records.

Police said they pulled over Sims after running the tags of her blue Infiniti and seeing that her license was suspended. When they approached her car the officer noted that it smelled strongly of marijuana and he asked her twice if she had anything illegal in the car  to which she finally admitted she did, police said.

I got some s*** in the car, Sims allegedly told police.

Smith told police she put it in there when she was being pulled over because she was scared and instructed the child not to touch it, police said.

She eventually admitted that she made a bad choice, police said

I messed up. It was wrong, she told police, according to said. Police then arrested Sims.

Read: Man Live Streams 'Zombie-Like' Behavior as 33 People Overdose on K2

The child was returned to her mom.

Did you put hide pot in a littles girls lunch box? an Orlando Sentinel reporter asked Tasha Sims on camera, to which Sims responded Are we done? and flipped her hair.

Watch: TV Meteorologist Arrested for Growing Marijuana Plants at Her Home

Related Articles:
Shannons life was saved from something she learned watching The Doctors.

During a routine trip to the dentist for a cleaning, she asked her dentist about a sore she had had on the bottom of her tongue for 6 months, after recalling an episode where The Doctors recommended that viewers ask their dentist to also examine their tongue. She inquired about the sore and her dentist told her to follow up with an ENT, as the sore appeared troubling.

During her exam with the ENT, the growth was biopsied and later she learned about the devastating results.

Watch: The Doctors Save a Life

He said the words, You have cancer, Shannon explains, revealing she was diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma on her tongue, which was quite advanced. I went from having what I thought was an infection to have Stage 4 cancer.

She was initially told she only had about a 20 percent chance of survival. If I had waited another week or 2, there probably wouldnt have been any chance, she continues.

Shannon was rushed into surgery, which lasted 12 hours and required 4 doctors. Three quarters of her tongue had to be removed. Surgeons used flesh from her arm to help reconstruct her tongue. She had to follow up her surgery with 53 radiation treatments, which caused her to lose 137 pounds.

Watch: Hot Sauce Saved My Life

Shannon and her family join The Doctors, where she encourages others, The best thing I can say is, dont wait and dont be afraid to talk to your doctor and ask. After a long battle, she was able to beat the cancer and still has the ability to speak after being told she might never be able to.

In an effort to help Shannon enjoy life a little more after overcoming such a harrowing cancer battle, The Doctors have a slew of surprises in store for her. See where we are sending her and family in the video below!
As the 2016 Paralympic Games take place in Rio de Janeiro from Sept. 7 through 18, U.S. News & World Report is looking at the challenges facing people with disabilities worldwide.

MORGANTOWN, West Virginia -- It's not always easy for West Virginians with disabilities to make their way to Jennifer Tenney's office, a generic, cream-colored building on a small hill on the outskirts of this college town. Some come from counties away, catching rides with friends or family members along Appalachian back roads.

But those who get there are among the lucky ones: They've found one of the two counselors in the entire state who can help them understand how finding work could affect their disability benefits. For some, a welcome, long-awaited return to employment is just around the corner. West Virginia, plagued by high rates of obesity, cancer and diabetes, has both the nation's highest percentage of people with disabilities and the lowest employment rate among them.

[READ: Developing Countries Struggle with Treating Mental Illness]

"The problem is huge," says Tenney, who works for the Social Security Administration's Work Incentives Planning and Assistance, or WIPA, program. "I have people coming in my office every day saying, 'I am tired of looking at these for four walls -- I want to get to work.'"

Though particularly pronounced in West Virginia, a state where only 25 percent of people with disabilities are working, low employment rates for people with disabilities are a country-wide phenomenon. According to most experts, the employment rate of working age people with disabilities in the U.S. has fallen almost continuously since the late 1980s. In 2014, only 34 percent of working age citizens with disabilities were employed -- that's compared to 75 percent of their non-disabled peers. Employment rates are often considered a better measure than unemployment figures, which don't factor in people who have stopped looking for work.

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The trend extends well beyond U.S. borders to other industrialized nations and to the developing world, where the problem is more severe. But, despite international awareness that people with disabilities have the right to work -- an entitlement enshrined in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities -- even the most advanced economies can't seem to find a way to successfully integrate them into the workplace.

Among 29 countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in the late 2000s, seven had lower employment rates for citizens with disabilities than the U.S., according to a 2010 OECD report with the most recent figures. Hungary, Ireland and Poland have particularly low employment rates for their citizens with disabilities, while the Nordic countries, Mexico and Switzerland have the highest rates.

"Some OECD countries are doing relatively better; and some countries, including the U.S. and most of the Eastern European countries, are doing especially bad," says Christopher Prinz, senior economist in the OECD's employment policy division.

Low employment rates are concerning for several reasons. As more unemployed people join disability rolls, national budgets feel the pinch. In the U.S., for example, the Social Security's disability trust fund was set to run out in 2016, and was saved only by temporarily diverting funds from another program. It's now on track to go bust in 2023.

The lack of employment also takes a toll on the disabled themselves. Even though most unemployed people with disabilities receive some form of government assistance, they have far lower incomes than their peers on average, and are at far higher risk of poverty, according to the OECD. In the U.S., for example, living on disability benefits alone often keeps people just right above the poverty line. Almost 30 percent of working-age U.S. citizens with disabilities were living in poverty in 2014, more than double the rate of their non-disabled peers.

Employment also helps guard against the physical and mental health tolls that can come from being out of work.

"It's important to have a job," says Cliff Linkous, a 40-year-old with a genetic disease called Williams Syndrome who cleans bathrooms and takes out the trash at Shoney's, a chain restaurant in Morgantown. "It makes me feel good as a person. And you get paid."

Many experts attribute the employment gap between the disabled and their peers in industrialized nations to flawed policies which can provide disincentives to work.

In the U.S., for example, disabled citizens must first prove they cannot work before receiving disability benefits. That means they can only work a minimal amount while their claims are being evaluated -- a process that can take many months.

Only after people qualify for disability benefits are they eligible for the kinds of rehabilitation services that could help them get a job. And if they find themselves ready to head back to the workforce, there's a catch: Disability payments are typically reduced when someone starts to work based on a complicated government formula. So, depending on how much her clients are set to make, Tenney sometimes finds herself in the awkward position of explaining that it might make more financial sense for them to actually work less.

"It was weird the first few times," she says. "It does make me think the system is flawed in a way."

Richard V. Burkhauser, senior research fellow at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin, agrees.

"We have incentives in our system that are at odds with our stated goals since the Americans with Disabilities Act," he says. "The problem is that once people get on the disability rolls, virtually no one gets off except for death or reaching retirement age."

Another reason for the employment gap is tied to trends in the global economy.

In recent years, globalization, changes in technology and the Great Recession have led to fewer jobs for low-skilled workers in both Europe and the U.S. Many people with disabilities want to work, researchers say, but the jobs they want -- the kind that would pay more than their benefits -- just aren't there. In West Virginia, for example, jobs have evaporated as coal mines have shuttered. With less than half of working-age adults in the workforce, competition for any job is fierce.

"The idea that they will be able to secure a job with health insurance and benefits -- it's true for some but it's not going to be true for a lot of people in these programs," says Zach Morris, a doctoral candidate focused on international disability benefit reforms at the University of California Berkeley. "They are more likely to be doing something more temporary with less security -- that's an underlying challenge."

Poor employment prospects, combined with a curtailing of pensions, early retirement schemes and other social-assistance benefits have made disability programs in Europe, the U.S. and elsewhere the "benefit of last resort for people unable to stay in, or get into, the labour market," according to the OECD.

Some experts on disability benefit reform say it doesn't need to be this way. They point to several countries in Europe that have switched to "work first policies," rules that require workers and employers to consider workplace accommodation and rehabilitation before state benefits kick in.

In the Netherlands, one of the most cited examples of effective reform, there was once such a high percentage of people receiving disability benefits that economists began referring to the challenge as "the Dutch Disease." Then in 2002 a policy switch required employers to demonstrate an effort to accommodate and rehabilitate their workers for two years, and for workers to cooperate in turn. Only when efforts are not effective are the workers able to collect state-issued disability benefits.

In the past 14 years, the country has significantly reduced the percentage of working age adults on disability, a trend Burkhauser attributes to the policy shift. His research suggests Germany and Sweden have made similar gains from moving toward work first policies.

But most experts say it's too early to draw any clear lessons from these programs. Drastic reforms can be expensive to implement, some warn, or simply drive people onto a different kind of benefit program. In some cases, they may even be unfair.

"I would be careful not to exaggerate the effects of the reforms in Europe," Morris says. He points to the case of the United Kingdom, where 2008 reforms encouraged people with disabilities to stay in the workforce and required everyone on the disability rolls to be re-assessed for their work capabilities. While the reforms moved people off the rolls, not all believe the removals were just.

"That generated a lot of controversy," Morris says. "The dust hasn't settled."

Still, Morris adds, he wishes the U.S. could find the "creative spirit" other countries have summoned to tackle the issue.

"I think we could be more ambitious," he says.

Part of the challenge for policymakers is the complicated nature of the issue. Disability is a wide spectrum. Young adults with developmental disabilities from birth, for example, will need different strategies for finding employment than adults who acquire a disability as they age. For the former group, advocates say, society needs to do a better job of prioritizing employment preparation in the education system and in supporting adults after high school.

Attitude changes, as well as policy shifts, may also be key to combating underemployment of people with disabilities.

More than 25 years after the Americans With Disabilities Act, which intended to promote inclusiveness, there's still a "culture of a lack of expectations" among some parents with children with disabilities, says David Hoff, program director at the Institute for Community Inclusion at University of Massachusetts Boston.

"We are seeing it changing in certain areas, but in terms of an expectations that, 'Yes, even though he has a disability, I still expect him to go to work,' is a relatively new and certainly not universal view," Hoff says.

People with disabilities in the U.S. are also up against decades-old myths surrounding disability assistance. Many people are under the misimpression that the second they do any work, all of their benefits evaporate, Tenney says.

Even when people do find work, some will back out the last minute. "They're scared," Tenney says.

In a tough economy, where stable jobs seem ever more elusive, they may have reason to be.

Devon Haynie is news editor, international for U.S. News. You can follow her on Twitter or email her at dhaynie@usnews.com.
Sept 16 (Reuters) - New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is investigating Exxon Mobil Corp's accounting practices and why the company hasn't written down the value of its assets despite the steep drop in oil prices, WSJ reported, citing people familiar with the matter. (http://on.wsj.com/2cKDtWe)

A more than 60 percent plunge in oil prices since mid-2014 has forced oil producers worldwide to write down the value of their assets.

Exxon Mobil and the New York Attorney General's office were not immediately available for comments.

Schneiderman's office last year had launched an investigation into whether Exxon Mobil misled the public and shareholders about the risks of climate change.

(Reporting by Arathy S Nair in Bengaluru; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila)
For Immediate Release

Chicago, IL  September 16, 2016  Zacks.com announces the list of stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the blog include Wells Fargo & Company (WFC), Comerica Inc. (CMA), Hancock Holding Company (HBHC), Associated Banc-Corp (ASB) and MB Financial Inc. ( MBFI).

Today, Zacks is promoting its ''Buy'' stock recommendations. Get #1Stock of the Day pick for free.

Here are highlights from Thursdays Analyst Blog:

Forget Wells Fargo: Buy These 4 Banking Stocks Instead

Shares of Wells Fargo & Company (WFC) has lost around 6.8% since the announcement of the $190 million penalty pertaining to opening of unauthorized banking accounts, last week. Moreover, this San Francisco, CA-based banking giant has been facing a number of challenges lately.



A probe related to Wells Fargos sales practices has been initiated by the U.S. Attorneys' Offices in Manhattan and San Francisco. The news was first reported by the Wall Street Journal. Notably, the company has temporarily suspended cross-selling of its financial products to customers via call centers.



Further, per Moodys Investors Service, the rating unit of Moody's Corp. (MCO), Wells Fargos reputation will see some serious damage. Moodys noted, [T]he regulators revelations are highly disturbing; they highlight that Wells Fargos vaunted cross-selling capabilities were inflated, its incentive structure had led to pervasive inappropriate practices, and its retail banking sales process lacked adequate and effective oversight. As such, the implications of this announcement are credit negative. Nonetheless, the rating agency did not change its rating for the company.



Additionally, the U.S. Senate Banking Committee plans to hold a hearing over the matter. Wells Fargos CEO, John Stumpf and other top executives have been asked to testify. Also, calls for Stumpfs resignation are gaining strength.



This Zacks Rank # 3 (Hold) stock, which was once considered to be one of the safest banks in the U.S., has been witnessing downward estimate revisions over the last 60 days. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2016 and 2017 has fallen nearly 1% and 1.9%, respectively.



However, it is not advisable to avoid bank stocks right now as the possibility of another Fed rate hike should make them perform better.



Selecting Winning Bank Stocks



With the help of the Zacks Stock Screener, we have zeroed in on four bank stocks with a market capitalization of over $2 billion. Further, all these stocks sport highly desirable Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) or #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank stocks here .



Here are the top four bank stocks that meet the criteria:



Headquartered in Dallas, TX, Comerica Inc. (CMA) is a banking and financial services company. This Zacks Rank #1 stock, with market capitalization of $8 billion, has been witnessing upward estimate revisions over the last 30 days. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2016 and 2017 has increased nearly 1.1% and 1.4%, respectively.

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Hancock Holding Company (HBHC), headquartered in Gulfport, MS, is a bank holding as well as financial holding company. This Zacks Rank #1 stock, with market capitalization of $2.5 billion, has been witnessing upward estimate revisions over the last 60 days. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2016 and 2017 has surged nearly 22.8% and 5.5%, respectively.



Associated Banc-Corp (ASB), based in Green Bay, WI, is a bank holding company providing various banking and nonbanking products and services. This Zacks Rank #2 stock, with market capitalization of $3 billion, has been witnessing upward estimate revisions over the last 30 days. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2016 and 2017 has jumped nearly 2.5% and 2.3%, respectively.



Chicago, IL-based MB Financial Inc. (MBFI) provides financial services to small and middle market businesses and individuals. This Zacks Rank #2 stock, with market capitalization of $2.8 billion, has been witnessing upward estimate revisions over the last 60 days. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2016 and 2017 has increased nearly 3.6% and 0.4%, respectively.

Today, Zacks is promoting its ''Buy'' stock recommendations. Get #1Stock of the Day pick for free.

About Zacks Equity Research

Zacks Equity Research provides the best of quantitative and qualitative analysis to help investors know what stocks to buy and which to sell for the long-term.

Continuous coverage is provided for a universe of 1,150 publicly traded stocks. Our analysts are organized by industry which gives them keen insights to developments that affect company profits and stock performance. Recommendations and target prices are six-month time horizons.

Zacks "Profit from the Pros" e-mail newsletter provides highlights of the latest analysis from Zacks Equity Research. Subscribe to this free newsletter today.

About Zacks

Zacks.com is a property of Zacks Investment Research, Inc., which was formed in 1978. The later formation of the Zacks Rank, a proprietary stock picking system; continues to outperform the market by nearly a 3 to 1 margin. The best way to unlock the profitable stock recommendations and market insights of Zacks Investment Research is through our free daily email newsletter; Profit from the Pros. In short, it's your steady flow of Profitable ideas GUARANTEED to be worth your time! Register for your free subscription to Profit from the Pros.

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Media Contact

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support@zacks.com

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Past performance is no guarantee of future results. Inherent in any investment is the potential for loss. This material is being provided for informational purposes only and nothing herein constitutes investment, legal, accounting or tax advice, or a recommendation to buy, sell or hold a security. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. It should not be assumed that any investments in securities, companies, sectors or markets identified and described were or will be profitable. All information is current as of the date of herein and is subject to change without notice. Any views or opinions expressed may not reflect those of the firm as a whole. Zacks Investment Research does not engage in investment banking, market making or asset management activities of any securities. These returns are from hypothetical portfolios consisting of stocks with Zacks Rank = 1 that were rebalanced monthly with zero transaction costs. These are not the returns of actual portfolios of stocks. The S&P 500 is an unmanaged index. Visit https://www.zacks.com/performance for information about the performance numbers displayed in this press release.





Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report



WELLS FARGO-NEW (WFC): Free Stock Analysis Report



COMERICA INC (CMA): Free Stock Analysis Report



HANCOCK HLDG CO (HBHC): Free Stock Analysis Report



ASSOC BANC CORP (ASB): Free Stock Analysis Report



MB FINANCL INC (MBFI): Free Stock Analysis Report



To read this article on Zacks.com click here.
For Immediate Release

Chicago, ILSeptember 15, 2016--Zacks Friday Finish Line is a podcast hosted weekly by Zacks Editor Maddy Johnson and Content Writer Ryan McQueeney that takes on the weeks biggest news from the financial and investment world.

Are Bayer and Monsanto Going to Take Over the World?

Welcome to Episode #12 of the Zacks Friday Finish Line Podcast!

Amazon Echo Gets GE Compatibility

Building on the Finish Lines love for the Internet of Things, the hosts talked about General Electrics GE updated smart appliances that are now compatible with Amazons AMZN Echo speaker.

Owners of GEs Wi-Fi-enabled ovens, dishwashers, laundry machines, and fridges can now control their appliances by speaking to their Echos using Amazons Alexa software. Its starting to look like home automation could actually be the future, and Maddy and Ryan might be a little excited!

Ford Moving to Mexico

The hosts moved on to a story that is bad news for American autoworkers; domestic car giant Ford F announced this week that it will be moving all of its small-car manufacturing from the U.S. to Mexico.

Ford will take advantage of Mexicos lower wages and weaker regulations to cut costs and hopefully boost profitability. Its yet another blow to the traditional U.S. automotive manufacturing business, which is now supported by foreign manufacturers that have created their own American plants.

Bayer Buys Monsanto

Last but not least, Maddy and Ryan covered Bayers BAYRY $128 per share takeover of Monsanto MON. After months of negotiations, both companies agreed to a deal worth $66 billion this week.

With a focus on the deals greater effects on consumers and other businesses, the hosts weighed in on the Bayer-Monsanto deal.

Want More Zacks Friday Finish Line?

Check back every Friday for a new episode that looks at each weeks biggest financial and investment news. You can follow the Zacks Friday Finish Line Podcast on iTunes, Soundcloud, and ZacksInvestmentNewson YouTube.

Story continues

About Zacks

Zacks.com is a property of Zacks Investment Research, Inc., which was formed in 1978. The later formation of the Zacks Rank, a proprietary stock picking system; continues to outperform the market by nearly a 3 to 1 margin. The best way to unlock the profitable stock recommendations and market insights of Zacks Investment Research is through our free daily email newsletter; Profit from the Pros. In short, it's your steady flow of Profitable ideas GUARANTEED to be worth your time! Register for your free subscription to Profit from the Pros.

Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/zacksresearch

Join us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/home.php#/pages/Zacks-Investment-Research/57553657748?ref=ts

Zacks Investment Research is under common control with affiliated entities (including a broker-dealer and an investment adviser), which may engage in transactions involving the foregoing securities for the clients of such affiliates.

Media Contact

Zacks Investment Research

800-767-3771 ext. 9339

support@zacks.com

https://www.zacks.com

Past performance is no guarantee of future results. Inherent in any investment is the potential for loss. This material is being provided for informational purposes only and nothing herein constitutes investment, legal, accounting or tax advice, or a recommendation to buy, sell or hold a security. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. It should not be assumed that any investments in securities, companies, sectors or markets identified and described were or will be profitable. All information is current as of the date of herein and is subject to change without notice. Any views or opinions expressed may not reflect those of the firm as a whole. Zacks Investment Research does not engage in investment banking, market making or asset management activities of any securities. These returns are from hypothetical portfolios consisting of stocks with Zacks Rank = 1 that were rebalanced monthly with zero transaction costs. These are not the returns of actual portfolios of stocks. The S&P 500 is an unmanaged index. Visit https://www.zacks.com/performance for information about the performance numbers displayed in this press release.



Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report



AMAZON.COM INC (AMZN): Free Stock Analysis Report



BAYER A G -ADR (BAYRY): Free Stock Analysis Report



FORD MOTOR CO (F): Free Stock Analysis Report



GENL ELECTRIC (GE): Free Stock Analysis Report



MONSANTO CO-NEW (MON): Free Stock Analysis Report



To read this article on Zacks.com click here.



Zacks Investment Research
For Immediate Release

Chicago, IL  September 16, 2016  Today, Zacks Equity Research discusses the Alternative Energy, including JinkoSolar Holding Co., Ltd. (JKS), JA Solar Holdings. Inc. (JASO), Trina Solar Ltd. (TSL) and Canadian Solar Inc. ( CSIQ).

Industry: Alternative Energy

Link: https://www.zacks.com/commentary/90640/alternative-energy-outlook---september-2016

The U.S. renewable energy sector witnessed a number of important decisions last year from both state and federal governments. These decisions continue to play a key role in determining this industrys future growth trajectory.

Governments, businesses and cities around the world are making concerted efforts to speed up the evolution of energy use. As the global energy system transformation is the backbone of climate action, the world has come closer under a set of major cooperative initiatives. It is these environmental considerations that are driving the demand for alternative energy sources.

A U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) report projects that electricity generation from renewable sources will increase 9.5% in 2016 and 5.8% in 2017 in the country. Generation from renewables other than hydropower is forecast to climb 11.8% in 2016 and 11.1% in 2017. A more comprehensive study by the Department of Energys National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) shows that the country will be able to generate most of its power requirements from renewable sources by 2050.

These favorable demand growth trends notwithstanding, the abundant availability of fossil fuels and the resultant drop in oil prices have emerged as key competitive challenges for the industry. The industrys long-term fundamentals, nevertheless, remain favorable.

Here, we discuss some of the major alternative energy sources:

Solar

A major growth area in the renewable space is solar energy. An EIA report indicates continued growth in utility-scale solar power capacity, which is projected to average almost 13.3 gigawatt (GW) in the 20162017 period. In spite of the rapid uptake, solar will still be just 1% of the total U.S. utility-scale generation in 2017, indicating room for immense growth.

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Solar growth has historically been concentrated in customer-sited distributed generation installations. The EIA expects utility-scale solar capacity to expand over states like California, Nevada, North Carolina, Texas and Georgia.

The solar industry in the U.S. is booming. The solar Investment Tax Credit (ITC) has gone a long way in providing the industry stability and expansion. In the last 10 years, solar has witnessed a compound annual growth rate of almost 60%, with the cost of installation dropping by over 70%.

Over the past few years, utility-scale solar has represented almost two thirds of the market, and this trend will likely continue through 2016, given the huge pipeline of projects under construction.

The Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), expects the U.S. solar market to witness strong growth in 2016 with installations peaking 14.5 GW DC, representing almost double the capacity over 2015. At the end of this decade, there will be vigorous growth across all three market segments, attaining a 20 GW annual solar market.

Solar in China: Although Chinese economic woes continue to hurt the market, the longer-term prospects for solar in China remain intact. The country has established itself as the worlds largest market for solar panels and will likely be the home to a quarter of the planets new energy capacity from solar panels in the years to come. China is speedily adding as much power generation as possible, and solar is just one source of the new energy generation coming up in the country.

In Mar 2016, China released its 13th Five-Year Plan that outlined considerable investments in the renewables sector. The countrys National Energy Administration (NEA) announced plans to triple capacity over the next five years, to reduce Chinas carbon emissions and become the worlds leader in clean energy. The nation is aiming for 110150 GW of capacity by 2020.

China had earlier pledged to attain peak carbon emissions by 2030 or earlier if possible. The country had set a daunting target of boosting the share of non-fossil fuels to 22% of its energy mix by 2030.

The following leading Chinese solar stocks are sure to make the most of the favorable government stimulus: JinkoSolar Holding Co., Ltd. (JKS) , JA Solar Holdings. Inc. (JASO) and Trina Solar Ltd. ( TSL) .

Ontario, Canada-based solar product manufacturer, Canadian Solar Inc. (CSIQ) is also well positioned with its diversified manufacturing base and project portfolio in Canada, China, Japan and the U.S.

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For Immediate Release

Chicago, ILSeptember 15, 2016Zacks.com looks back on the hottest stories of the week featured in the Stocks in the News blog, where analysts and writers discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks, the financial markets, and the greater investing world.

Here are highlights from this weeks Stocks in the News blog:

3 Reasons Why My Millennial Friends Are Not Buying the iPhone 7

The iPhone 7 is here, but competition is steeper than ever for Apple AAPL. Samsung and other cell phone manufacturers are nipping at the heels of the Cupertino giant, and investors have multiple reasons for why Apple may run into some obstacles with regards to holding onto its large market share in the smartphone industry.

Of course, people everywhere continue to be up in arms about Apples decision to remove the standard 3.5mm headphone jack from its new iPhone, but others arent sold on the device for a number of other reasons.

Here's 3 Tech Companies That Could IPO Before the End of 2016

Despite the relative sluggishness of the IPO market so far this year, several key indicators suggest that we could see IPO activity pick up during remainder of 2016. More specifically, the technology sector should see a fresh batch of companies going public throughout the fall and winter months.

PointClickCare, a SaaS health record management company; Trivago, an online hotel search aggregator owned by Expedia EXPE; and Coupa Software, a cloud-based enterprise financial services company, are all in the IPO pipeline right now.

3 Strong Buy Stocks That Resisted the Sell-Off This Week

September has a reputation for being the worst month for stocks, and this past week has confirmed that stereotype with markets around the world experiencing a volatile week. As the odds for a Fed rate hike continue to climb, this bloody September might not be over, and that means investors need to look for stocks that can resist sell-offs.

Story continues

With a combination of strong Zacks Ranks and impressive performance this week, Copa Holdings CPA, Finisar Corporation FNSR, and Lifeway Foods LWAY are three stocks that investors should be looking at right now.

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Christchurch (New Zealand) (AFP) - New Zealand raced to a 2-0 lead in their Davis Cup Asia/Oceania Group I tie against Pakistan after dominating the opening singles rubbers.

Veteran Jose Statham, playing a record 25th Davis Cup tie, downed Muhammad Abid 6-0, 6-1, 6-4 to give the Kiwis a perfect start.

Tournament debutant Finn Tearney was even more emphatic, crushing Samir Iftikar 6-2, 6-0, 6-0 to leave Pakistan on the brink in the best-of-five tie.

The winner will remain in Asia/Oceania Group I, with the loser relegated to Group II.

Pakistan are without their number one player Aisam ul Haq Qureshi, who pulled out because he was still angry about the last time the two teams met in Myanmar in 2013.

That tie was officially a "home" fixture for Pakistan -- which has not hosted Davis Cup matches since 2005 due to security concerns.

But the grass court was deemed unplayable and the match referee awarded the tie to New Zealand, even though Pakistan were winning at the time.
Harare (AFP) - Anti-government activists in Zimbabwe vowed Friday to challenge a police order barring protests in the capital Harare, on the eve of mass demonstrations planned across the country against veteran ruler President Robert Mugabe.

A coalition of opposition parties under the banner of the National Electoral Reform Agenda (NERA) is demanding reform ahead of the 2018 vote, including free access to the voters' roll.

The month-long protest ban was instituted Friday, just over a week after an earlier order was overturned by the courts.

NERA spokesman Douglas Mwonzora said the opposition parties would challenge the ban in the high court.

"This is a typical comedy of errors where the state has fallen into the very same legal trap it fell into last time," he told AFP.

"A similar order was challenged before a competent court which declared it invalid and nothing is to be gained by issuing the same order again."

Mugabe has vowed a crackdown on dissent and blasted judges for "reckless" rulings allowing previous demonstrations.

Promise Mkwananzi, spokesman for the protest group Tajamuka, said they would march on Saturday, despite the police order.

"The constitution and the high court allow for peaceful demonstrations," he told AFP.

"The police are promoting lawlessness in the country by banning peaceful demonstrations."

Mugabe's ZANU-PF party won the last general elections in 2013, which were marred by electoral fraud.

Opposition to the ageing leader's 36-year reign has grown in recent months with a surge of public demonstrations, triggered by an economic crisis that has left banks short of cash and the government struggling to pay its workers.

Two weeks ago, police detained scores of people including activists and bystanders following violent protests in the capital.

Mugabe, 92, has often used brutal force to silence his opponents and warned the protestors last week they were "playing a dangerous game".
Just when you thought there was no part of the 90s left to repackage for a new generation, along comes Marc Jacobs with a sublime Lady Miss Kier meets Ani DiFranco (especially circa her August 1997 Spin magazine cover) collection. While most of the population in the 90s was layering thermal leggings under ripped jeans and proudly sporting their flannel, another chunk was reliving the 70s, with bell bottoms, striped socks, and colorful patches.

Manhattans Hammerstein Ballroom was decorated with what looked like a million hanging tiny lightbulbs, resembling a starry night, and once that house music started blaring through the speakers and out stepped the first model, with an insane mass of (fake, possibly maybe #problematic) pastel dreadlocks atop her head, a heavily embellished Victorian-inspired silver jacket, satin hot pants and  continuing the height fetish of last season  uber-high platform Mary Janes/boots that buckled all the way to the calf, well, it was obvious that last seasons somber mood was no longer in play.

So Marc was clearly in a playful mood, and the number of places he took us throughout the 53 looks was astounding. There was a bit of the Japanese Lolita look, but it was more of a throwback to the then hard-to-find FRUiTS street-style looks than a nod to their modern counterparts. Babydoll dresses in lace, sequins, heavy taffeta, and cotton florals also had a slight kinderwhore vibe without it being too obvious. There were silver leather jackets and trousers, all with pin-thin proportions, meant to hug the body like a second skin. Shiny pastel satin made into hot pants, maxi coats, and bomber jackers wouldve made Cher Horowitz weak at the knees.

But what all this melange of influences and inspirations had in common was the fact that together it captured the essence of that other time Marc reigned supreme, the early 2000s, when he was the golden boy of fashion and had first launched his (now defunct and sorely missed) Marc by Marc Jacobs collection, as well as being the newly appointed creative director of Louis Vuitton.

Story continues

Yes, we had seen the satin hot pants before, in his Marc Spring 2004 collection, in which models wore with metallic knee-high boots. The patchwork suede pieces are an ode to the iconic Louis Vuitton Spring 2002 collection, which also featured the signature Vuitton monogrammed bags, decorated with appliques of woodland creatures by the artist Julie Verhoeven. Verhoeven returned this season, and this time her patches covered striped sweatshirts (that also brought to mind that ONE winter when Gap did really amazing striped sweaters that everyone in fashion still remembers, you know the ones), as well as boots and, of course, backpacks.

Only a few designers can get away with being this self-referential, and Marc has certainly earned the right. As such, this really seemed like a collection of his favorite things, but also a bit of an ode to the youthful spirit of Marc by Marc. We saw it in the Army green cotton jackets with big black buttons, in the striped socks worn thigh-high, in the satin bomber jackets, the skinny jeans with kooky patchworks, the florals, the stripes, the fur trims, the oversize green and orange long-sleeve polo shirt with contrasting white collar, the hot pants hot pants hot pants!

The combination of wild and demure, the fact that when this collection hits the stores the tomboys can shop next to the drag queens, next to the ladies who lunch.  Fashion is supposed to be fun, and its about escapism, and when watching the news becomes more and more depressing with each passing day, who doesnt want to throw on a pair of leather boots with tube-sock trompe loeil details and dance around the house? Groove is in the heart, baby!



Yahoo Style is live from #NYFW! Keep it here for your front row view of the best looks and buzziest moments of New York Fashion Week.


In Morgan, an artificial human is created thats virtually indistinguishable from regular people  except that shes slightly murderous.

It plays to this innate fear that we all have of artificial humans (biological or mechanical), which is that theyll destroy us if they ever gain sentience.

After all, besides our intellect, humans have very few advantages over other living creatures.

That fear also extends to robots, which are physically more capable and powerful than us. Give them human intelligence and appearance, and whats to stop them from slowly replacing humanity with tireless mechanoids that never take MC?

On the aesthetics front, weve already gotten quite close to a normal human. Check out these 5 robots that you might mistake for actual people.

1. Jia Jia (China)

This is Jia Jia - shes even got double eyelids! Like most androids these days, shes programmed to recognise facial expressions and respond to them. Not bad for something thats made in China right? But honestly, her eyes are the creepiest part about her. She looks like shes staring straight at you, analysing you, judging you.

Her Chinese is excellent though.

2. "Scarlett Johansson (Hong Kong)

The Hong Kong creator of this robot, Ricky Ma, refuses to say which Hollywood actress he modelled his robot after, probably due to copyright issues. But its pretty obvious, isnt it?

The impressive part about this robot is that 70 per cent of it, er, her was 3D-printed, and he built it through trial-and-error. If even a layman can build a robot, then anyone can do it, albeit with enough money.

And if someone can write software that allows these robots to emote better than humans, then well have our first real robot thespians in movies. No more dealing with crazy divas when that happens!

3. Sophia I will destroy all humans (America)

Although the creator meant it as a joke, its eerie to see how quickly Sophia agreed to destroy all humans.

Story continues

Her frowns and sneers also look far more realistic than her smiles and grins, which add this tinge of anger and negativity to her.

It feels like if you piss off Sophia, shell unleash her vengeance on all humanity.

4. Chihira Aico (Japan)

And then we have the Japanese android Chihira, a realistic robot hostess. Oddly enough, their robotics are on par with other robots around the world.

Youd think that Japan would be the first country to master the creation of a fully autonomous android, but thankfully they havent infiltrated society yet.

Chihira is gentle and capable of functioning without anyone visibly controlling her, which means that she might just be the first robot to achieved the objective she was built for.

Wont be long before someone slaps a maid costume on her, thats for sure.

5. Erica (Japan)

And finally, also hailing from Japan, is Erica. Her eye movements are among the most realistic of the androids produced so far, because they capture the subtleties of human movement almost perfectly.

That slight twitch here, that quick blink there  its almost as if she feels. Her lack of mouth movements give her away though, which is fortunate because if she were to get loose, she could blend straight into the crowd.

Her make-up is pretty thick though.

Kate Mara plays Lee in Morgan. (Twentieth Century Fox)

Are you afraid of advances in artificial human technology now? Biologically engineered humans arent much better, as Morgan shows us. Maybe its just wiser for us humans not to play God, and just be content building the next iteration of the iPhone or the Playstation.





Marcus Goh is a Singapore television scriptwriter. Hes also a Transformers enthusiast and avid pop culture scholar. He Tweets/Instagrams at Optimarcus and writes at marcusgohmarcusgoh.com. The views expressed are his own.


Fans of the newly released Apple iPhone 7 queued outside the Marina Bay Sands Expo and Convention Centre from the wee hours of Friday morning (16 September) for Singtels iPhone 7 launch.

Friday marks the first day of the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus sales in Singapore. The iPhone 7 has exciting new features as compared to previous models.

The latest iPhone is said to be waterproof and has double the internal capacity of the iPhone 6 released last year. In addition, this new model has done away with a headphone jack and now uses wireless earbuds.

First in line for the iPhone 7 was 38-year-old IT architect Wellson Lee who started queueing at 5.30am.

Im actually quite surprised that I managed to be first. I just wanted to be one of the first 40 people to get the iPhone so that I can go to work on time, Lee said, grinning as he clutched his black 256GB iPhone 7.

Customers can purchase their new iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus phones at the Singtel launch at Marina Bay Sands from Friday (16 September) to Sunday (18 September).
The global launch of the iPhone 7 on Friday is crucial to Apple's fortunes in China, but both it and its biggest rival Samsung, hit by a recall over exploding batteries, are struggling in the face of upstart local competitors.

The US and South Korean firms were relegated to fourth and fifth place respectively in the Asian giant's smartphone market in the first half of this year, according to consultancy Canalys.

Ahead of them came three Chinese firms, leader Huawei with a 16 percent share, then two companies little known elsewhere, Vivo and Oppo.

Apple faces "a lot of challenges and pressures in China from local manufacturers who are "developing medium- to high-end handsets and offer a lot of flagship products", said Canalys China analyst Jessie Ding.

The iPhone 7 -- which comes with an improved camera, a water resistant body and minus an earphone jack -- "doesn't have many innovative features", she said, pointing out that its double camera function was available on a Huawei smartphone six months ago, and it lacks wireless charging capabilities.

In its most recent quarterly results, Apple said Greater China dropped from second to third place among its markets in the April-June period -- when market research firm IDC says its iPhone sales collapsed by 32 percent year-on-year.

For its part, Samsung has had to recall 2.5 million of its flagship Galaxy Note 7 handsets after faulty batteries caused some to explode during charging.

The company has handled the issue badly, said Neil Mawston of Strategy Analytics, with slow decision-making, poor communications and a lack of coordination, and its image risks suffering.

"Brand loyalty is not as strong in China as in other markets," he told AFP. "It's a very crowded, fragmented market and fiercely competitive, with rivals undercutting each other with price and design. So it's not a market you can afford to falter in."

Low-priced Chinese competitors have been "particularly troublesome" for Samsung, which has in the past sought to offer phones across all price ranges, he added.

Story continues

It has responded by trying to focus on the mid- and high-end sector with improved models, which could make the recall especially damaging.

And now, he added, "the Chinese companies are producing higher-end smartphones as well -- and with a large degree of success.

"In the last three or four years, local Chinese brands have been on a roll, fuelled by a swell of national pride in 'brand China'."

- Aggressive marketing -

Chinese manufacturers' great advantage remains price: Huawei's P9 boasts similar capabilities to the iPhone 7 but is almost a third cheaper.

There is no official ranking of smartphone sales in China, and several different consultancies put out figures.

Oppo -- an unknown in the West -- has experienced a meteoric rise since it launched in 2011, and according to Counterpoint Research, it became China's number one smartphone brand in June, when its market share jumped to 23 percent.

It is aiming squarely for the low end of the market.

"Oppo has adopted a simple but effective strategy, going after the offline market... using aggressive marketing, promotions and sponsorships... beyond tier-2 and tier-3 cities," said Counterpoint Research director Neil Shah.

Vivo, part of BKK Electronics, the same conglomerate that owns Oppo -- employs similar methods, investing heavily in marketing to build up its brand image, and on a vast distribution network that extends to China's smaller and poorer cities and towns.

- Blocked services -

Apple still benefits from its luxury image and "the strong loyalty of its long-time users" in China, said Fu Liang, an independent analyst based in Beijing.

"The enduring image of Apple brand products as well as existing customer loyalty will continue very strongly," he said.

But the Californian firm sometimes has to contend with the country's Communist authorities, despite regular visits from chief executive Tim Cook, who has made two so far this year and promised in August to open a large research and development centre in the country.

Apple's iTunes Movies and iBooks services launched in China earlier this year, but were then promptly blocked by Beijing.

The firm has sometimes been targeted by state-owned Chinese media on issues of customer service, and they have prominently reported alleged security vulnerabilities on Apple devices.

More broadly, said Mawston of Strategy Analytics, "Samsung -- and Apple -- face similar challenges in China.

"There are serious distribution challenges, the fact that Chinese consumers tend to favour Chinese brands, as well as Chinese-language software that links well with Chinese social networks."
Apple's global iPhone launch Friday was marked by excitement and frustration as fans queued to find scarce models of the coveted smartphone.

Scenes in Apple stores around the world on Friday were reminiscent of days before online ordering became a norm and people camped out for days to be first to get hands on the California company's iPhone 7 and 7 Plus.

Enthusiasm was peppered with disappointment due to shortages of the large-screen iPhone 7 Plus and a jet-black iPhone 7, but it was unclear if the shortages were the result of strong demand or limited supply.

"These initial sales will be governed by supply, not demand," Apple said in a released statement which noted that the company would not provide launch weekend sales figures.

Investors evidently weren't certain of what to make of the launch as well, with Apple shares down about a half-percent to $114.92 at the close of trading on the Nasdaq exchange.

BTIG research said in a note to investors that, despite a lack of lines, analysts there expected iPhone sales in the final quarter of this year to grow 3.6 percent to 77.5 million.

At the Apple Store in the Georgetown district of the US capital Washington, dozens of consumers were still waiting in line hours after the store opening to get the new handsets.

"I tried to order it online, but I would have had to wait five to six weeks, so standing in queue was the only option," said Naval Chopra, who was visiting from India at the time of the launch and joined the waiting group at 5:30 am for an iPhone 7.

"If you're an Apple fan, there is something special about getting the new phone on the launch day."

- 'Essential part of life' -

Washington resident Isaac Combs said he had being hoping to get the large-screen iPhone 7 Plus but learned on arrival they were sold out. Still, he opted for the iPhone 7, despite the smaller display.

The iPhone, Combs said, "is an essential part of life, it's something I use every day."

Story continues

Apple sold of out the larger models quickly and had limited availability of the iPhone 7, with the new jet-black color especially scarce.

The devices chart a new path for the tech giant by eliminating headphone jacks, a move seen as setting a trend for a wireless future.

Apple is seeking to regain momentum and set new trends for the industry, but it remains to be seen if it can generate the same enthusiasm that surrounded previous versions of the iPhone.

While the company has touted total iPhone sales of one billion, the number sold in the quarter ending June 25 fell 15 percent from a year earlier, highlighting concerns over growth for the key profit driver.

Growth has become challenging with many mobile phone markets saturated and Chinese firms including Huawei increasingly popular.

Apple also faces stiff competition from traditional rival Samsung, although the South Korean giant is currently on the back foot after being forced into a massive recall because of exploding batteries of its flagship Galaxy Note 7.

Analyst Michael Walkley at Canaccord Genuity said his brokerage group's surveys suggest the new handsets will boost Apple's fortunes.

"With the iPhone 7 off to a strong start, we anticipate improving replacement sales versus the 6S and a return to iPhone unit growth," he said in a research note.

- Tight control on supply -

Analysts were divided over the cause of the shortages, with some saying the handset was more popular than expected, while others suggested the tech titan may be deliberately limiting supply or could be experiencing supply problems.

"Apple clearly controls supply tightly," said Matthew Kanterman, an analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence.

"They're possibly keeping supply artificially low, or at least lower than demand, so as to avoid having the oversupply of previous years."

As Asia woke up, consumers in Sydney who had camped out in the rain were among the first in the world to get their hands on the new phones -- though others were left bitterly disappointed.

Bishoy Behman, 17, had been sitting outside the Apple store since Wednesday morning but said he and others in the queue found out on Thursday that some models were already sold out.

"I really wouldn't have lined up if I had known that," he told AFP. "For them to have not allocated some stock is ridiculous."

In Hong Kong, some customers were seen near the Apple store in the Causeway Bay shopping district, reselling new phones at a profit.

In mainland China, a key market for Apple, scenes were energetic as crowds of customers tested out the new handsets.

Apple faces a complicated picture in China, where it ranked only fourth in the Asian giant's smartphone market in the first half of this year, facing strong competition from low-cost manufacturers.
LONDON (Reuters) - The Bank of England said on Friday it aimed to revamp the system that underpins British banking and trading in the City of London by 2020 to boost its defenses against cyber-attacks and widen the number of businesses that can use it. The BoE's Real-Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) handles transactions worth around 500 billion pounds ($659 billion) a day - equivalent to almost a third of Britain's annual economic output. It suffered a major outage in October 2014, and in June BoE Governor Mark Carney said he wanted to make it easier for smaller firms to use the system directly rather than via large incumbent banks. On Friday the BoE set out more detailed proposals and said it planned to fund the changes by temporarily increasing the charges banks pay to use the system. "The world of payments is changing rapidly, and central banks need to keep pace if we are to deliver our mission of monetary and financial stability ... whilst also enabling innovation and competition where we can," BoE executive director Andrew Hauser said. Proposed enhancements include running the system continuously, rather than just during normal working hours, and making it easier for smaller banks, brokers and payment processing firms to access the system directly. "A key enabler for delivering these changes will be a comprehensive rebuild of the RTGS technology platform. The Bank will make decisions on its resilience, including in particular its cyber defenses, in consultation with intelligence partners," the BoE said. Other goals included allowing forward-dated payments and creating an interface with the 'distributed-ledger' technology that underpins digital currencies such as Bitcoin "if/when they achieve critical mass", it said. (Reporting by David Milliken; Editing by Costas Pitas and Hugh Lawson)
By Peter Hobson LONDON (Reuters) - A London court on Friday approved the extradition of an autistic British man to the United States to face trial for hacking high-security state computers, despite warnings he might kill himself if sent to a U.S. jail. Lauri Love, 31, who has Asperger's syndrome, is accused of involvement in a series of hacks in 2012 and 2013 into computers at agencies including the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the U.S. army, the Missile Defense Agency and the Federal Reserve. He faces a lifetime in prison in the United States if found guilty, a fate which he has said could lead him to taking his own life. "If you're here for justice, you missed it," he said quietly as he emerged from the defendants' box in court after the verdict was announced. U.S. authorities say Love was connected to Anonymous, an international group of hackers, and argued his actions had caused millions of dollars' worth of damage. "I accept Mr Love suffers from both physical and mental health issues but I have found the medical facilities in the United States prison estate ... are such that I can be satisfied his needs will be comprehensively met by the U.S. authorities," judge Nina Tempia said in her ruling. Love's U.S. lawyer Tor Ekeland said the U.S. penal system would "crush" his client who suffers episodes of depression and psychosis. "They want to destroy him because they want to use him as an example," Ekeland told Reuters. The judge's decision must be agreed by Britain's Home Secretary (interior minister) and Love's lawyers said they would launch an appeal if it was ratified. Love, wearing a tartan flat cap and with a purple sash for a belt for the hearing at Westminster Magistrates Court, twisted his hands with nerves before the ruling. His face and neck were red with sores from eczema as he embraced supporters. AMERICAN "VENGEANCE" He said he would defer processing the ruling until he was in a "safe environment". He left the court on bail. His father Alexander, a prison chaplain, said the law applied to his son was flawed. "It is not fair or just that a boy whos got mental health issues can be taken away from his family who are his support network merely to satisfy the desire of the Americans to exact what I feel is vengeance," he said. Love's legal team had argued he should face any charges in Britain, pointing to new rules that make it easier for British courts to try people for crimes committed there but involving other countries. Those rules were introduced in 2012 after the extradition to the United States of Scottish hacker Gary McKinnon was blocked by then-Home Secretary Theresa May, who is now Prime Minister. McKinnon, who also had Asperger's, said he broke into U.S. state computers while on a "moral crusade" to find classified documents about UFOs. May said he was seriously ill and extradition would violate his human rights. (Editing by Andrew Heavens)
I've never been gung-ho on the prospects of an Apple branded car ever hitting the road, at least not within the compressed time frame that many analysts seemed to enthusiastically champion. Over the past few months, the excitement associated with the idea of Apple stepping into the automotive world blinded many to the myriad of complex challenges involved in researching, developing and ultimately bringing a car to market.

From a Bloomberg report claiming that Apple wanted to begin car production in 2020 to an even loftier Wall Street Journal report claiming that Apple set a "target ship date for 2019," analysts and others within the tech community quickly began to view the idea of an Apple Car not as matter of if but as a matter of when. To be sure, it was never any secret Apple was heavily researching the prospects of developing an electric car, but Apple often pours R&D dollars into projects that never ultimately get off the ground, with the company's rumored HDTV being a prime example.

DON'T MISS: This is the jaw-dropping iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus camera review youve been waiting for

For months, I've maintained that Apple developing its own electric car made little to no sense for a variety of economic and logistical issues. Just a few days ago, the New York Times reported that Apple laid off dozens of employees from its car research team amid a shift in the project's focus. According to the Times, Apple's car initiative, now spearheaded by Apple executive Bob Mansfield, will focus more on self-driving car technology as opposed to the development of a physical Apple-branded car.

With that in mind, I thought it might be an opportune time to briefly run down why Apple, in my estimation, would be foolish to release its own car.

First off, there's the issue of money. Apple's all about the bottom line and margins within the auto industry are notoriously low even for luxury automakers like BMW. Whereas Apple typically enjoys margins in the 35-40% range, margins in the 8-10% range in the auto industry are considered impressive.

Story continues

Consider a magical scenario where Apple in 2020 successfully managed to manufacture and sell 315,000 cars. I call this a "magical" scenario because 315,000 cars sold would immediately transform the mythical Apple Car into a top 10 selling vehicle in the U.S.

Now imagine that on top of selling 315,000 cars, Apple was also able to secure margins similar to what BMW enjoys. As a quick point of reference, the profits BMW enjoyed for each car it sold in 2013 was approximately $4,442.

Even if Apple manages to sell 315,000 cars and make a generous $5,000 in profit per unit sold, that comes out to $1.57 billion over 12 months. Now given Apple's deep pockets, that's not exactly a needle mover. Remember, Apple during its most recent quarter posted a profit of $7.8 billion. Also remember, with 17 million Apple Music subscribers, the company's music streaming service generates approximately $2.4 billion in revenue across 12 months. If we assume that 45% of that is pure profit, that's about $1 billion in profits.

All that said, is Apple really going to spend billions of dollars on car development and manufacturing when the profit levels would, realistically speaking, not even come close to matching what it accomplishes with Apple Music?

A more realistic scenario might have Apple selling in 2020 as many cars as Tesla delivered in 2015, which is to say somewhere in the ballpark of 50,600 units. Even if Apple can secure an even more generous profit of $8,000 per car, that's a net profit of $404 million per year. Again, that's chump change for Apple.

To be clear, the underlying issue isn't whether or not Apple can release a car and make a profit, it's whether or not the profits generated are sufficiently high enough to justify Apple's entrance into an incredibly competitive and cut-throat market filled with established and sophisticated players.

Another issue that doesn't seem to get much play in the press is that it's not entirely clear what type of innovation or differentiation Apple could deliver in the car space. As opposed to the state of the mobile market in 2006, the car industry has no shortage of innovative and sophisticated automakers who continuously deliver impressive innovations on a consistent basis. Apple's iPhone in 2007 was competing against laggard products from the likes of BlackBerry and Nokia. An Apple Car, in contrast, would be going to head to head with forward-thinking companies like Tesla, Porsche, BMW and Mercedes-Benz. That being the case, what would differentiate an Apple Car from the rest of the pack?

A few months ago I said the following:

A hypothetical Apple Car wouldnt be entering an industry plagued by backwards-thinking corporations more than happy to just sit back and bask in the glory of past successes. On the contrary, theyd be entering a vibrant and highly competitive industry consisting of incumbents with decades worth of design and manufacturing expertise. They would be entering an industry that, quite frankly, isnt necessarily in need of the famed Apple touch. BMW. Audi. Mercedes. Porsche. These are luxury brands that already embody the ethos of Apple product design.

On another note, we haven't even touched on logistical issues such as where will Apple sell these cars? Where's the requisite infrastructure? Where will repairs be made? Additionally, developing a car from scratch requires a whole lot of manpower. And while Apple's existing car-team was estimated to be in the 800-1000 range (before the aforementioned layoffs), consider that BMW has more than 100,000 employees worldwide. Tesla, meanwhile, currently boasts upwards of 14,000 employees.

As Jason Snell of Six Colors astutely pointed out a few months ago, Apple's research into developing an electric car was and remains just that, research.

The next step in this process isnt hiring a thousand people and planning a release date. Its probably setting up a team to investigate all the issues involved in entering this field. Is there something here? What are the issues with entering a new industry? What do we need to create ourselves and what do we buy from suppliers? Do we do this ourselves or with partners? Should we buy someone or invest in someone? Are we really building a car, or just subsystems for a car? And is this all a bad idea that we should forget ever happened?

With that in mind, reports that Apple is shifting the focus of its car project shouldn't come as much of a surprise.

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While some Australians were first in the world to grab an iPhone 7 from an Apple Store in Sydney Friday morning, it's much more of a challenge for those living in the outback.

Take Les Pilton, who has been running a pub in the tiny town of Barrow Creek in the Northern Territory for the past 28 years. The town has a population of 4, and Pilton's pub is the only stop in a 500 kilometre (310 mile) stretch of road.

SEE ALSO: Around the world with the iPhone 7 launch

Pilton lives a good 300 kilometres (186 miles) away from Alice Springs, in the dead centre of Australia. It'd be quite the effort to pick up a new iPhone, so mobile carrier Telstra brought one to him in person.

The brand new iPhone 7 was delivered to Pilton at 8:01 a.m. CST by the reseller's Northern Territory local area manager, Neale Wigney. It's quite the upgrade for Pilton, who was using an old 2G Nokia flip phone before the iPhone.

"This new iPhone 7 will make my life easier to run my business, run my orders online, get emails and carry all of this with me when I visit Alice Springs  this will cut the distance down," he said in a statement via email.

Image: Telstra

"It's a major step for me and will drag me kicking and screaming in to the 21st century. Living in Barrow Creek, a remote locality, your business means you need to live here and the iPhone 7 will certainly help me maintain the memories of the great sunsets and taking photographs of the area. I'm looking forward to taking shots of sunsets for the next year."

While Apple and other mobile carriers will sell plenty of iPhones on Friday, this might be the most unique way to get one on release day.

Image: telstra
Attention, Apple Inc. (ticker: AAPL): Motorola is coming for your customers.

If it wasn't clear before that there's a hefty amount of competition in the smartphone market (it was), Motorola's latest commercial leaves little room for confusion.

The company's new campaign -- dubbed Skip the Sevens -- features Apple loyalists (which the company says aren't actors) being told about a new prototype. The catch? They didn't know the product was one of Motorola's.

The phone in question (a Moto Z smartphone) has interchangeable backs (Moto Mods), including a power pack with up to 22 hours of extra battery life, a snap-on speaker and a projector.

They improved their black rectangles.



We reimagined ours: https://t.co/FPf8rhgxIc #skipthesevens #motomods pic.twitter.com/w8lSv2yZED

-- Lenovo United States (@lenovoUS)

September 15, 2016

The aggressive approach from Motorola makes sense, considering "the cult of Apple" exists, as Mashable calls it. A Motorola blog post emphasizes the company's belief that "different is better."

Could Motorola's campaign move attention its direction? If the iPhone 7 presale numbers from Sprint Corp. (S) and T-Moblie US (TMUS) are any indication, it's clear Apple is still just as formidable an opponent as ever.

Of course, #skipthesevens has already garnered attention on Twitter (including photos of a print ad).

This Motorola Ad is like Meek Mill dissing Drake out of nowhere #skipthesevens pic.twitter.com/HEkAL5dPeP

-- Litha Sokutu (@RagerVin)

September 16, 2016

Oh lord do I love the #skipthesevens campaign. Almost as much as my @Moto_USA #motoZ with @JBLaudio and @Tumitravel #MotoMods , it's genius.

-- Nic DiBella (@NicDiBella)

September 16, 2016

This is how you break a trend #skipthesevens https://t.co/l1A7mZ5WPM

-- Jhonz Talk (@jhonztalk)

September 16, 2016

Impressionable people are easy impressed by impressive new phone#skipthesevens



https://t.co/qq1FPomAFd

Story continues

-- Brian Wernham (@BrianUkulele)

September 15, 2016

Apple stock is up about 9.4 percent on the year.

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David Oliver is Associate Editor, Social Media at U.S. News & World Report. Follow him on Twitter, connect with him on LinkedIn, or send him an email at doliver@usnews.com.
Samsungs Galaxy Note 7 recall has been a huge headache for everyone involved. The company finally announced an official recall with the US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), which comes two weeks after the initial recall announcement. That means all Galaxy Note 7 sales are now illegal, and you should turn in your faulty phablet as soon as possible. Replacements are coming soon, Samsung confirmed, so theres no point walking around with a fire hazard in your pocket or purse.

DONT MISS: 10 best iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus cases weve found so far

The official notice from the CPSC says that about 1 million Galaxy Note 7 units were sold before September 15th. So far, there were registered 92 reports of batteries that overheated and exploded, which is almost triple Samsungs initial claim.

Samsung has received 26 reports of burns and 55 reports of property damage, including fires in cars and a garage, the CPSC recall press release notes.

Samsung told The Verge that only about 130,000 Galaxy Note 7 units have been exchanged to date, which means that more than 85% of the Galaxy Note 7 units bought in the US are still out there. Samsung will contact owners and enlist the help of carriers and retail stores to convince more people to return and replace their Galaxy Note 7 units. The good news is that replacements are coming soon, so you should return your unit as soon as possible to the store you purchased it.

Replacement devices will be available in the United States at most retail locations no later than September 21, 2016 Samsung told Android Central. That's the same date Samsung offered to The Verge. However, it's unclear when the phone will be back on sale. It's likely that Samsung will want to replace faulty units before taking new orders.

Samsung posted a video apology on its US website, along with the following message: "Tim Baxter, President & COO of Samsung Electronics America, addresses Samsungs exchange program and formal US voluntary recall of the Galaxy Note7 in cooperation with the US Consumer Product Safety Commission. Samsung confirms that new Note 7 replacement devices will be available in the United States at most retail locations no later than September 21, 2016." The video message is available at this link.

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By Nick Carey LOUISVILLE, Ky. (Reuters) - United Parcel Service plans to expand its 3D printing service to Asia and Europe, the U.S. shipping company has told Reuters, in a bid to fully embrace and get ahead of a trend that threatens to eat away a small but lucrative part of its business. Aside from its main package delivery service, UPS gets an undisclosed portion of its revenue from storing and shipping parts for manufacturers. If those customers were to switch to 3D printing their own parts, that business would face a drastic reduction. To counter that threat, UPS has chosen to get on board the 3D revolution, and is now looking to offer a service in which UPS will print out plastic parts - anything from nozzles to brackets to prototype soap dispensers or multi-faceted moving parts - around the world and deliver them. "3D printing is a great opportunity for us, but it's also a threat," Alan Amling, UPS vice president for corporate strategy, told Reuters. The dynamic - welcoming rather than fighting a threatening new technology - is not unlike automakers such as Toyota Motor Corp and Volkswagen AG teaming up with ride-hailing services Uber and Gett, respectively. Amling said UPS is looking at either Singapore or Japan for an Asian 3D printing factory. He did not say where the company might open a European facility, though UPS's operational hub in Europe is in Cologne, Germany. UPS has already got into the business in its home market. In May, it launched a U.S.-based 3D printing service with Fast Radius, a 3D printing company based outside Atlanta, where UPS is headquartered. UPS bought an unspecified stake in Fast Radius, which has a 3D printing factory at UPS's Louisville, Kentucky, hub. There are also now 3D printers at 60 UPS stores in the United States that print parts using industrial grade thermoplastics. Customers can upload images for printing at the Fast Radius factory or at one of those UPS stores and have the printed products shipped to any location. HOW IT WORKS A 3D printer works by laying down successive levels of material, mostly plastics at this point, to create an object. Quality printers that make metal parts cost over $500,000, while printers that use thermoplastics can cost tens of thousands of dollars. Prices are expected to come down as the technology advances. While 3D printing is still slow compared to high-speed production lines, the technology has progressed so it can be used effectively for prototypes or some components that are not needed in high volumes. Larger firms such as General Electric Co are incorporating 3D-printed parts into production. That progress is a mixed blessing for UPS. As the cost of 3D printers drops and processes improve, that could undermine UPS's efforts to develop 3D printing as a service - because customers could buy just buy their own printers. "Why wait a day for a part to arrive (from UPS) when you'll be able to innovate six times a day on your own?" said Richard D'Aveni, a professor of strategy at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College. A QUIET CORNER What Fast Radius calls its "digital manufacturing factory" is a quiet operation occupying space in a corner of the UPS building in Louisville, without any of the grime, noise or bustle associated with a standard factory. Instead, a handful of machines work noiselessly, printing parts of varying sizes and shapes. During a recent visit to the operation by Reuters, Fast Radius CEO Rick Smith said that because of 3D printing, manufacturing is about to transform from "being about where it's made to where it's needed." One of the printers was close to completing a black plastic prototype hydraulic pump for a manufacturing customer in Germany - a process that takes about 72 hours. Smith said the job illustrates the need for UPS to expand its service beyond the United States. Another customer, action camera maker GoPro Inc, is making use of Fast Radius' printers, coupled with UPS's ability to deliver a prototype the next day. Previously, if GoPro wanted to try out new designs, it would take weeks or even months to make a mock-up, senior GoPro product designer Ryan Harrison said. Now the company can innovate much quicker. "3D printing allows you to fail quicker or to stumble on moments of genius," Harrison said. BRACING FOR DISRUPTION UPS does not break out how much it makes from its supply chain services, including warehouse storage. But in 2015 it reported about $6 billion in "forwarding and logistics" revenue, or about 10 percent of its total sales. An unknown portion of that came from its warehousing operations. UPS's biggest rival, FedEx Corp, is less focused on supply-chain services and has not dipped into 3D printing. But if UPS succeeds, analysts said, FedEx could follow suit. The company declined to comment on 3D printing. German competitor DHL, a unit of Deutsche Post AG, issued a report earlier this year warning the technology could upend traditional mass-production manufacturing, in which goods are shipped around the world. UPS's foray into 3D printing is not its first experiment in other disruptive industries. In October 2015, it invested in drone maker CyPhy Works, and this February bought a stake in same-day delivery company Deliv - in both instances to understand and harness potentially industry-shaking technologies. Morningstar analyst Keith Schoonmaker said while 3D printing has not yet proved itself on a mass scale, it makes sense for UPS to incorporate a technology "that could supplement or replace its services." (Reporting by Nick Carey; Editing by Eric Effron and Bill Rigby)
TechCrunch

Twitter's stock will be delisted from the New York Stock Exchange on November 8, according to a new filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. This comes a day after Elon Musk completed the company's takeover after a lengthy ordeal late Thursday. "The New York Stock Exchange hereby notifies the SEC of its intention to remove the entire class of the stated securities from listing and registration on the Exchange at the opening of business on November 08, 2022, pursuant to the provisions of Rule 12d2-2 (a)," the filing reads.
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Tesla Motors Inc on Thursday said its former camera supplier Mobileye disparaged the safety of Tesla's assisted driving technology Autopilot after learning the carmaker was developing its own vision system. Once Mobileye learned Tesla would be using its own vision system in upcoming versions of Autopilot, a semi-autonomous technology that helps vehicles steer, it "attempted to force Tesla to discontinue this development, pay them more and use their products in future hardware," a Tesla spokeswoman said. Tesla's comments came a day after Mobileye Chairman Amnon Shashua told Reuters the company had broken ties with Tesla because Autopilot was "pushing the envelope in terms of safety," prompting Tesla to respond that it "continuously" educated drivers that they should be prepared to take control of the car. Tesla's strong defense of Autopilot underscores the huge stakes in the race to perfect self-driving and partially self-driving systems and the need to assure consumers and regulators that the innovations are safe. Mobileye did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Tesla's Thursday charges. The Autopilot system has been under intense scrutiny since the death of a Tesla driver in May whose Model S crashed into a tractor-trailer in Florida while Autopilot was engaged. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has been investigating Autopilot since June. A Chinese man sued Tesla in China in July, saying Autopilot caused his son to crash into a street-sweeping vehicle. Tesla said there was no way to know whether Autopilot was engaged at the time of the accident, due to damage to the car. Tesla's spokeswoman called the statements made by Mobileye's Shashua "inaccurate." "When Tesla refused to cancel its own vision development activities and plans for deployment, Mobileye discontinued hardware support for future platforms and released public statements implying that this discontinuance was motivated by safety concerns," she said. The public fingerpointing is rare in the industry. In July, after Mobileye announced its break with Tesla, the carmaker said its former supplier had been unable to keep pace with Tesla's product changes. Concerns about Autopilot - which is not dissimilar to systems by rival automakers - led Tesla to put new limits on Autopilot in January and on Sunday. Chief Executive Elon Musk said on Sunday an update would temporarily prevent drivers from using the system if they fail to heed audible and visual warnings to take back control. (Reporting By Alexandria Sage; editing by Peter Henderson and Cynthia Osterman)
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ALBION  It was just after 1 p.m., and Doug Keenan was looking forward to three more evening meetings  one in Cromwell, one at the Purdue Extension Office and another at the Noble County Public Library.

For such commitment to the community, Keenan, 58, was honored as the 2015-2016 Albion Rotary Clubs Citizen of the Year.

Keenan had given a program on 4-H during the Sept. 8 Rotary luncheon meeting, and was surprised when he was honored.

This is for other people, he said, not for Doug.

Keenan is in his 25th year with the Noble County Extension Office, a job that requires 50-plus hours per week. Hes been pastor at Berean Baptist Church for 22 years, which takes up an additional 20 or so hours on average.

And in his off hours?

He is a member of the Indiana Extension Educators Association. He sits on the Noble County Planning Commission and the Noble County Park Board. Also, he is the chairman for the Indiana State Fair (rabbit barn), is a part of the Emergency Management Agencys Noble County Community Organization Active in Disaster team, and is involved in Drug Free Noble County and the Farm to Fork initiative. He is also a member of the Albion Lions Club.

It makes for a daunting schedule  and life. And Keenan wouldnt have it any other way.

I love each part of it, he said. Its energizing  it really is  to be involved.

Keenan said he had excellent role models for putting community above self.

Ever since I can remember, my parents were involved in 4-H work, he said.

Keenan remembers working at the Indiana State Fair alongside his parents since he was 7.

Im still there, he said.

The bulk of his time is spent with Extension duties. Working with 4-H youngsters is not just a service to him.

I get a lot of energy from the young people I get to be with, he said.

After 25 years, he is watching children of the children he once worked with participate in 4-H.

Its a thrill to watch generations, he said. I love to watch them blossom, to grow.

Keenan remains close to many of the 4-Hers long after they have graduated from the program.

He is more apt to talk about the successes of those hes worked with than his own achievements. Central Noble school board member Chris Brazel is a 4-H grad. So is West Noble school board member Travis Stohlman. The reigning Miss Indiana? Yes, Brianna DeCamp is a former 4-H participant. Daniel McDonald, an art student at the University of Saint Francis, was a 4-Her and now is responsible for the state bicentennial mural going up in Albion.

Keenan seemed just as happy with his relationships than even their accomplishments.

Thats the thing we build in 4-H, he said, lifelong friends and relationships. Its great.

Keenan said to be honored for work in a place like Albion is something special. He pointed to many groups and organizations that give back to the town and area.

Its just an amazing community, he said. Im fascinated by the community.
FAC First Friday Art Parties Celebrate Day of the Dead

is an exceptional artist. Visit his website for photos of his work. Flo and I are proud to own a few of his pieces, especiallypictured to the right. Jerry lives in Colorado Springs and for years he has struggled against the commercial marketing and vulgarization of the celebration ofEvery October and November Jerry would point out the mistakes and gross stereotypes in various Day of the Dead events in the Colorado Springs area. The lack of respect for cultural traditions especially frustrated and upset him. Finally, it appears that at least one Colorado Springs event this year will portray the proper cultural perspective. Jerry is the curator of a special celebration and exhibition at the Fine Arts Center, and he has included several of Colorado's best and well-known artists to help him share his vision. Congratulations to Jerry on a hard-fought and successful struggle. Here's the press release:COLORADO SPRINGS (Sept 13, 2016)  Theon Oct 7 and Nov 4 present an exciting show for the timehonored Day of the Dead celebration with works on view and on sale Oct 7Nov 27, 2016. The opening reception event on Oct 7 also includes a traditional invocation dance byat 5:30p.Also known in Spanish as, this celebration honors those who have passed on to the next world with ceremonial elements rooted in Aztec culture. The FACs version of this celebration includes an invitational selection of Colorado artists whose work exemplifies traditional Day of the Dead artwork.Participating artists include:Known as Denvers Dean of the Dead, now residing in Colorado Springs, internationallyexhibited artist Jerry Vigil is a selftaught Chicano artist who creates Santos art (Saint making) and Muertos art (Day of the Dead/El Dia de los Muertos) as a statement of culture. The two styles, both set within a known and sometimes rigid formula, are at opposite ends of a cultural spectrum. Jerrys creative process contemporizes the styles by incorporating modern materials and design. Jerrys artwork has appeared on the cover ofand Denversat thein Chicago, inside, andmagazines. Jerry is a profiled artist in the 2005 ASU/Bilingual Press PublicationJerry is also a coauthor of a book on. Jerry has also receivedandawards for multiple years. Jerry has lectured on his art and art topics at all the major Front Range colleges, has artwork in theteaching collection and artwork in Museums along the Front Range, including the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center.work ranges from largescale interior and exterior murals, painted directly on existing surfaces, panels, cloth and canvas, to mosaic and sculpture. His sculpture is ever expanding and ranges from bronze to mixed media. His art is culturally diverse, inspired by tradition, history, nature, science and everyday life. He creates art using a technique calleda style of art he developed that combines the spontaneity and unpredictability of abstraction with the creativity and perception of his imagination.holds a Masters in Fine Arts in drawing and painting from the University of Colorado and is currently an associate professor for Regis University. He is the recipient of the coveted) and the. He has been a working artist and teacher for the past 33 years and is known for his vibrant, colorful artwork.Tony Ortegas lifelong goal is to contribute to a better understanding of cultural diversity by addressing the culture, history and experiences of Chicanos/Latinos through his art. His work can be found in theand the Colorado Springs Fine Art Center. He has exhibited extensively in the United States, Latin America and other parts of the world.Something else: Meet the artist(s), enjoy live music, giveaways, artist demos, and a cash barEven more: The opening reception event on Oct 7 includes a traditional invocation dance by Grupo Folklorico Sabor Latino. The performance is scheduled for 5:30p and is sponsored by. and the).But wait, theres more: October is Arts Month! Each October, Colorados Pikes Peak region celebrates Arts Month to elevate the visibility and value of arts and culture in our community. The goal is to engage the community and encourage every individual to have at least one new cultural experience with friends and family this October. Checkout a full listing of FAC Arts Month events at csfineartscenter.org/eventsIn 1919 the Broadmoor Art Academy (BAA) was established in the former home of philanthropists Julie and Spencer Penrose. After the Great Depression hit in 1929, the BAA looked at diversifying further, expanding into an entire arts district under one roof, thus leading to what is now known as the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center (FAC). The FAC, built in 1936, is a privatelyfunded, nonprofit art museum, professional theater company and arts education center. Built on the foundation of the prestigious BAA, the FAC carries the legacy of Colorados arts and cultural heritage. One of 16 charter members of the American Alliance of Museums, the FAC offers the best in visual arts via its permanent collection and travelling exhibitions, in performing arts as a TCG and Actors Equity member theater company, and in arts education through the FACs Bemis School of Art. The FAC building is considered an architectural treasure in the Rocky Mountain region, designed by John Gaw Meem, and is listed on the National Register of Historical Places. For more information, visit csfineartscenter.orgC/SJerry Vigil____________________________________________Lateris the author of several novels, short stories, poems, and non-fiction books and articles. His collection of short stories,was a finalist for the 2016 Colorado Book Award.is scheduled for publication byin October, 2016.
The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources is asking people who hunt squirrels in the Whitewater Wildlife Management Area in southeastern Minnesota to help with a study to learn more about squirrel population dynamics.

Over the past several months, about 60 squirrels in the Whitewater WMA were captured and outfitted with radio collars, then released. About the same number of squirrels were similarly outfitted in the adjacent Whitewater State Park.

By tracking the squirrels and comparing the number that die in the park, where only natural causes of death are at work, with the number that die in the WMA, where some are harvested by hunters, researchers will be able to get a better idea of how big a role hunting plays in squirrel populations over time.

Its fine to hunt radio-collared squirrels in the WMA, but hunters are asked to report any that are harvested by calling 507-642-8478 and supplying researchers with the numbers on the collar that identify the squirrel.

If its easier, hunters also can cut off the collar and drop it off at either the Whitewater WMA office or at the state park. By doing that, hunters will help researchers differentiate between squirrels that die from natural causes and those that are the result of hunting  information thats critical to the study.

This is the second year of the research project, which arose out of anecdotal reports that hunters have not been seeing as many squirrels as they used to on heavily hunted units such as Carlos Avery WMA in the north metro area and Whitewater WMA.

Results of the study will provide DNR wildlife managers with the scientific information they need to make decisions about future rules and regulations regarding Minnesotas squirrel hunting seasons.
The spirit of collaboration received some recognition this week as the city of La Crosse accepted a state-wide organizations award for its work on the Powell-Poage-Hamilton Neighborhood revitalization project.

Mayor Tim Kabat announced the award Friday, saying the city was very honored to receive Wednesday the Wisconsin Economic Development Associations community economic development award.

Its really a testament to how great we do things here in the Coulee Region, Kabat said. We see a need, we get together, and we really roll up our sleeves as a group of partners to make this happen.

The statewide group of economic development professionals chose La Crosse due to its work to revitalize the neighborhood on La Crosses South Side, which began with the creation of tax incremental financing district 16 in 2006, which led to a city partnership with Gundersen Health System and the Powell-Poage-Hamilton Neighborhood Association to combat perceptions that the area was unsafe.

It grew into partnerships that included Couleecap, Habitat for Humanity, Western Technical College, La Crosse Promise and La Crosse County, focusing on improving housing and promoting education.

City planner Jason Gilman praised the work of the citys partners saying the project earned the award because it has all the hallmarks of a tremendous economic development initiative.

It hits on some of the things like social equity and environmental sustainability and economic policy, and I think thats what sets us apart, Gilman said. Its a very unique project that people can learn from around the state.

While work in the area is ongoing, council member Francis Formanek said he has been amazed at how far its come in the past five years.

The metamorphosis and the change have been outstanding, Formanek said. As we grow in the years that are coming about, its just going to be better.

James Hill of the L aCrosse Area Development Corp. nominated the project for the award because he believed the neighborhood can set an example of what neighborhood revitalization can look like.

What we saw is that Powell-Poage-Hamilton is a story of vision, collaboration and resources, Hill said. Its a story that can be replicated throughout our area and across the state.

Hill also took a moment to remember the late La Crosse Promise executive director Jerilyn Dinsmoor, who died Sept. 4, praising her work in the neighborhood.
Mario Capecchi spent Thursday evening inspiring the next generation of scientists at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse.

Capecchi is an Italian-born American molecular geneticist who helped pioneer gene targeting in mice stem cells, for which he was co-awarded the 2007 Nobel Prize in medicine. He shared his journey from being a homeless youth in war-torn Italy during World War II to a life in science during a public lecture as the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse Distinguished Speaker in Life Sciences.

Science contributes a lot to society, Capecchi said in an interview, and is one of the biggest engines of innovation for a country. Other nations such as China are investing much more heavily in science than our nation is, so Capecchi said he visits colleges and grade schools to help spark the scientific curiosity latent in our nations youth.

Science is fun in itself, he said. Youre solving puzzles, always solving problems. Finding those solutions is interesting.

Born in Benito Mussolinis fascist Italy in 1937, Capecchi was homeless and wandering the streets of the war-torn country in 1941 after his mother was locked up as a political prisoner and the farmers she left him with ran out of money. His mother found him malnourished and in a hospital on his ninth birthday, and the two moved to the United States to live with family.

Capecchis uncle, Edward Ramberg, exposed the young boy to science. A famous physicist, Ramberg helped invent technologies used in electron microscopes and the television.

After studying at a Quaker preparatory school, Capecchi was initially interested in political science during his first quarter at Antioch College in Ohio. After that first quarter, he switched to physics as he couldnt find the science in political science.

During his presentation, he gave an overview of genetics, DNA and the work he has done with gene targeting. In his work, Capecchi discovered a way to target specific genes in mouse DNA in order to determine those genes effects on the organism.

Because mice and humans have similar genes and physiology, studying the rodents makes sense. That research could then be extrapolated to human genetics and he gave an example of targeting a gene in mice that affect nails and hair and seeing a corresponding relation in humans.

Theres an enormous amount of information in DNA, he said. All the information to take a sperm and egg and put it together to make a human or a mouse, whatever it is.

The relationships in higher education are important, Capecchi told the students. He can trace his mentors back to Italian scientist Giuseppe Levi, who mentored three Nobel Prize-winning students, one of whom mentored James Watson, one of the discoverers of the double-helix model of DNA, who in turned mentored Capecchi.

Learning from great instructors is important, he told the students. They were lucky to have fellow students and faculty who work hard to mentor and develop each others talents.

When you go to (the University of California) Berkeley, it is all about research, he said. There is no interest in undergraduates.

Capecchi will give another lecture focusing on his current work in researching different cancers and problems in neuropsychiatry Friday at 5:30 p.m. in the Brian and Lori Hesprich Auditorium in Graff Main Hall. The event is free and open to the public.
With the sale of the La Crosse landmark of Edwardos Ristorante di Pizza on the horizon, the auction of everything inside  lock, stock and barrel  is expected to draw a lot of bidders Monday.

Perhaps one of the more iconic items is, indeed, a barrel, what is billed on the website of the Golden Hills Auction Service of West Salem with the screaming description of a Unique VINTAGE SOLID BRASS BEER BARREL W/ 4 TAP TOWER.

Its a nostalgic moment, the final phase of selling the property, said Tod Edwards, who closed the business at 1930 Rose St. after the last pizzas and pastas were served on Dec. 6.

The sale of the 5,460-square-foot building on 1.26 acres, expected to close on Sept. 23, is to a local buyer Edwards declined to identify, saying only that the buyer plans an attractive development on the site.

It wont be a restaurant, Edwards added.

The sale price wasnt disclosed, but it had been listed most recently for $699,000, after an $89,000 drop, according to Realtor listings.

Edwards retained a couple of items with particularly sentimental value, he said, especially an original drawing of the Edwardos Pizza Wagon he started at the age of 18 in 1981 in Onalaska.

His parents, Dick and Rita, had opened the original Edwardos Pizza Wagon on State Street in 1960. They moved the business to Rose Street in 1993.

Tod was a partner in the enterprise until 2003, when he sold his interest to his parents and moved to South Carolina. He sold historic homes in the Palmetto State until his father died in 2010, when he came back and bought the restaurant.

Edwards cited the variety of eclectic decorations that will be sold, in particular, a 1950s-era Old Style neon sign with a grenadier clock; large, lighted Peerless beer signs, and a variety of artwork.

Edwardos stature as a La Crosse institution, combined with the historic nature of much of the merchandise, is expected to draw a large crowd of bidders, said Ron Rothering, owner of Golden Hills Auction Service of West Salem, which is in charge of the sale.

Its a nice, unique sale, with a lot of good quality memorabilia, Rothering said, also noting that the auction has generated a flood of calls to his office.

The calls Ive been getting include a lot of local people wanting stuff only for their own bars, or bar businesses, he said. Ive gotten calls from Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin.

The interest has been so strong that, even though the sale starts at 10 a.m., the doors will open at 7 for people who want to check out the merchandise, Rothering said. Smaller items, mostly things that people can carry easily, will be outside, while the large items, including the bar, booths, tables and chairs and restaurant equipment will be inside.

The sale could last six hours, he said.

It should come as little surprise that items to be auctioned from a shuttered pizza place that specialized in wood-fired pies might include some firewood.

Sure enough, the list of hundreds of items includes: 1.5 Plus cords of STACKED SPLIT DIRED WHITE OAK FIREWOOD. Presumably, thats a dire typo, but most assuredly, the wood is even drier than it was when Edwardos closed.

Edwards, who said he has retired except for taking care of his properties, said, Ill certainly miss it, but I feel fortunate to have been involved with the restaurant for almost 40 years.
Viterbo students hoping to cast their ballot this November had better have approved ID, and their student IDs wont cut it.

Wisconsins voter ID law will be in effect for the November election. In order to cast a ballot in the state, a voters will have to prove they are who they say they are by providing a photo ID that meets certain requirements, such as a Wisconsin drivers license or state-issued ID, a U.S. passport, or a tribal, veteran or military ID card.

Student IDs are also valid, as long as the cards contain the following information: issuing date, expiration date within two years and a photo. In order to vote, students also need to provide documentation proving enrollment, such as a class list. Proof of residence, such as a utility bill or drivers license with a local address, is still required to register to vote and is separate from the voter ID rules, which provide access to a ballot.

Students and staff at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse all received new IDs this year, director of student centers Larry Ringgenberg said, after the university decided to stop using a third-party vendor for the cards and provide student IDs in-house. The new student ID cards are compliant with the voter ID regulations.

Western Technical College changed its IDs in 2012 to make them compliant with voter ID laws.

Viterbos student IDs do not meet the requirements of the voter ID law, Vice President for Administration and Finance Todd Ericson said, and unlike in 2012, cant be made acceptable by affixing a sticker.

Viterbo will continue to educate its students about voter registration and ID requirements, will encourage acquisition of a Wisconsin voter ID and will encourage voting via absentee ballot, he said.

Those who dont have a valid voter ID can get one from the Wisconsin Department of Motor Vehicles, which will provide a free photo ID that can be applied for online at app.wi.gov/DLGuides. Applicants will receive a temporary ID card receipt, which is acceptable as voter ID, within six business days, or via overnight mail during election week.

This option is mainly for Wisconsin residents, Deputy La Crosse City Clerk Nikki Elsen said, as out-of-state students would need to surrender their drivers license in order to get the photo ID. Out-of-state drivers licenses are not acceptable forms of voter ID.

For those students without an acceptable form of voter ID, Elsen recommended they vote in their hometown and begin the process of obtaining an absentee ballot. Minnesota voters can apply for an absentee ballot online at the Minnesota secretary of states website, and Iowa residents can request one from their county auditor.

For those out-of-state students, they need to start thinking of their options early, Elsen said. She also recommended www.bringitwisconsin.com for those looking to receive more information about the voter ID law.

Both Western and UW-L students will be participate in get-out-the vote efforts this fall. Five members of Westerns student government are being trained to register voters. UW-L students will partner with the League of Women Voters for registration drives in early October, Student Association President Jacob Schimmel said.

Well also be having special registration deputies training geared towards students, Schimmel said. We are pushing for more students to register other students to vote.

Students who dont have a valid voter ID can apply for a free one online from the Wisconsin Department of Motor Vehicles at app.wi.gov/DLGuides
The news media are letting us down right now in a big way. Hillary Clinton gets sick and stumbles and that dominates the news cycle. She works hard, she gets sick; we work hard, we get sick. That's not newsworthy.

What is newsworthy is the fact that Donald Trump said he would be willing to shoot Iranian boats out of the water for making rude gestures to American sailors. His surrogate Rudy Giuliani says that there are no rules in warfare. The Nuremberg trials after World War II, when Nazis were executed for war crimes, proves that Giuliani's statement is wrong. And Trump's irresponsible  some might say dangerous -- statement once again shows his basic lack of judgment necessary to be an American president.
One would have hoped that 15 years out from the cataclysmic events of Sept. 11, 2001, which forever altered our sense of security, caught our elected officials by unwarranted surprise, and had the State Department scrambling for Farsi-speakers, wed be vastly more aware of the world and its conflicts. And our place in them.

Instead, some of our politicians have lurched between bombing campaigns and isolationist rhetoric without addressing the underlying causes of dissatisfaction that plague the world and fuel unrest.

So approaching a presidential election, which of these is scarier:

That Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton voted for the Iraq War based on President George W. Bushs fabricated link between those attacks and Saddam Hussein?

That Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson is clueless about Aleppo?

Or that Republican nominee Donald Trump thinks he can craft a foreign policy out of interpreting the body language of intelligence officials who briefed him?

Frankly, given the latter, Im less concerned by Johnsons ignorance of Aleppo than I am by his very presence in the race, which could result in a Trump win. I have a problem with Clintons hawkishness, but a greater one with Trumps make-it-up-as-you-go approach, which has had him extolling nuclear war, invoking the merits of banned torture methods, and inviting Russias Vladimir Putin to hack our cybersecurity systems. Plus he has no use for global treaties such as the one to lessen the impact of climate-change.

But Trumps greatest deficiency as a presidential candidate may be his abject lack of curiosity. He has yet to name a credible foreign affairs expert whose counsel he has sought. He boasts of relying on his own instincts, but even intuition demands history lessons. And being the leader of the worlds most powerful nation requires knowledge that cannot be supplanted by self-satisfaction.

In a post-9/11 America, fear-mongering politicians have found it easier to close the door on Muslim refugees than figure out how best to support legitimate pro-democracy forces in their home countries. Easier to sound alarms about mythical incursions of Sharia law into America than to read the Koran and understand what it actually says  and how moderate Muslim countries like Morocco have chosen to interpret it. Easier to blame Iraqs Saddam Hussein and Afghanistans Taliban for their actions than examine our own complicity in their rise to power. And easier to invoke radical Islam than tackle the Palestinian question, which is at the heart of a deep-seated sense of grievance in the Middle East.

That leads us to this November. We simply cant afford that attitude anymore. The upcoming election is critical, and experience and diplomacy matter. Clinton, though perhaps not as progressive as some of us might like, has White House, State Department and Senate experience. Shes savvy, seasoned and level-headed. The same cannot be said for Trump, who is volatile, utterly lacking in diplomacy and more interested in dictating than negotiating.

The race is frighteningly close, with a CNN poll last week showing only 2 points divide Clinton and Trump nationally, mirrored in some toss-up states. Its in just such situations that third-party candidates can help throw the race as spoilers. And that poses a real dilemma.

The reality is that no third-party candidate has ever come close to winning the presidency. George Wallace got 14 percent in 1968. Ross Perot got 19 percent in 1992. But in 2000, Ralph Nader siphoned away enough votes from Al Gore (3 percent) as a Green Party candidate to give Florida to George W. Bush. That put Bush in the White House and gave us the Iraq War. And the fallout from that continues.

Johnson is running as a Libertarian, and Jill Stein as a Green. Johnson has been polling in the double digits. Stein, hoping to pick up some of Bernie Sanders supporters, has said Clinton would be no better than Trump. Thats magical thinking, although third-party candidates have long used the same argument. The best they can hope to accomplish is to challenge the two-party systems dominance by winning enough votes to qualify for federal campaign financing and a place on the ballot in all 50 states next time. Thats a worthy goal, but theres the immediate future to worry about.

You can symbolically support third parties with your votes in non-battleground presidential states. You can also vote for them in local elections, where candidates have the opportunity to build credibility at the grassroots level. But as I wrote in 2004 in the face of another Nader run, that one not supported by the Green Party: A symbolic vote for a third presidential candidate  cant sign peace treaties, protect the wilderness from the logging industry, mandate health care for all or appoint Supreme Court justices to protect the Constitution.

All of those issues are still relevant today. The prospect of a Trump presidency would undermine our standing on the world stage and threaten our commitment to human rights and democracy. Johnson and Stein should think long and hard about those prospects.
Hunters who harvest deer outside the state are reminded that whole deer carcasses are no longer allowed to be brought into Minnesota from anywhere in North America.

This new restriction that includes all members of the deer family (deer, elk, moose and caribou) is an effort by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources to respond to the increasing prevalence and geographic spread of chronic wasting disease (CWD).

Hunters may bring only the following parts into Minnesota, regardless of where in North America the animal was harvested:

Meat that is boned out or that is cut and wrapped (either commercially or privately).

Quarters or other portions of meat with no part of the spinal column or head attached.

Hides and teeth.

Antlers or clean skull plates (no brain tissue attached) with antlers attached.

Finished taxidermy mounts.

Nonresidents transporting whole or partial carcasses on a direct route through Minnesota are exempt from this restriction; however, similar restrictions exist in all surrounding states.

The 2016 Minnesota Hunting and Trapping Regulations Handbook states that this rule is likely to be in place (pages 2 and 62). This rule has been finalized and is in place for the fall of 2016. The deer carcass import restrictions are at www.mndnr.gov/deerimports.
Dear reader, we're asking for your help to keep local reporting available for all today during our fall fundraiser. Your financial support keeps stories like this one free to read, instead of hidden behind paywalls. We believe when reliable local reporting is widely available, the entire community benefits. Thank you for investing in your neighborhood.

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Some apocalyptic news out of UCLA today: todays increasing greenhouse gas levels could lock the Golden State into centuries of drought.

The study, published today in the journal Scientific Reports, looked at the history of California's dry periods over the past 10,000 years. The researchers, led by UCLA professor Glen MacDonald, tracked California's historic and prehistoric climate by examining a sediment core in the Sierra Nevada mountains. They found that there were a number of natural, climactic factors (sun spots, a slight change in the earth's orbit, decreased volcanic activity) that intermittently warmed the region through a process called radiative forcing.

Radiative forcing in the past appears to have had catastrophic effects in extending droughts, MacDonald, an international authority on drought and climate change, said in a news release. When you have arid periods that persist for 60 years, as we did in the 12th century, or for millennia, as we did from 6,000 to 1,000 B.C., thats not really a drought. That aridity is the new normal.

Now, it seems there is a new source of radiative forcing on the horizon, one that could "extend drought-like conditions more or less indefinitely," according to MacDonald. Enter greenhouse gases.

Essentially, the drought lasts as long as whatever is causing the radiative forcing is present. In the past, when that forcing was caused by natural phenomena, those factors always eventually diminished as nature took its course. Sure, their devastation could last hundreds of years at a time, but it was never permanent. What makes this time different is that greenhouse gases levels are only expected to increase. The last three years were the hottest and driest in California since 1895, and there is no end in sight.

And there is even more cause for alarm when you consider how closely these processes are linked to prolonged changes in Pacific Ocean surface temperatures:

Changes in ocean temperatures are linked to El Nino and La Nina conditions, which increase and decrease precipitation in California. Until now, no one had the long, detailed record of Californias dry periods needed to show that that aridity went hand-in-hand with changes in the prehistoric climate records of the Pacific Ocean, MacDonald said.

In a century or so, we might see a retreat of forest lands, and an expansion of sagebrush, grasslands and deserts, MacDonald said. We would expect temperatures to get higher, and rainfall and snowfall would decrease. Fire activity could increase, and lakes would get shallower, with some becoming marshy or drying up.
Biddeford-Saco-OOB Courier

Those who habitually put items in their recycling bins that don't belong there are the target of the ordinance amendment, not those who make an occasional, accidental mistake, said Public Works Director Jeff Demers.
This week on our national parks journey, we explore a remote island near Michigans border with Canada. It sits within a huge freshwater lake. It is one of the least-visited national parks in America.

Welcome to Isle Royale National Park!

Isle Royale is surrounded by the deep blue waters of Lake Superior, the largest freshwater lake on Earth by area. The parks quiet forests and rocky shores offer a kind of solitude and peace not found in some of the more popular national parks.

No cars or other wheeled vehicles are permitted on Isle Royale.

There are no real roads on the island. The only way to get to the park is by boat or sea plane. The National Park Service operates shuttle boats that take visitors to Isle Royale. The boats leave from two Michigan ports. A boat trip to Isle Royale takes three to five hours. Waters are often extremely rough.

Isle Royale is the largest of the islands within the national park. It is 72 kilometers long.

The entire national park protects a total area of 230,000 hectares, including some 450 islands that surround Isle Royale. Fifty-two-thousand hectares is land. The rest is water.

Isle Royale became a national park in 1940. In 1980, officials named it an International Biosphere Reserve because of its unique ecosystem.

Its remote location is part of what makes it among the least-visited national parks. But, once they arrive, most visitors stay a while. The average stay for visitors to Isle Royale National Park is 3.5 days. The average stay for visitors to most other national parks is just four hours.

Isle Royale offers hiking, camping, boating, and even scuba diving. The extremely cold waters of Lake Superior help keep shipwrecks in excellent condition. The National Park Service protects 11 sunken boats for divers to explore. They are reminders of Lake Superiors commercial shipping history.

The sunken wooden ship called The America is one of the most popular dive sites. The America carried passengers, mail, and supplies to many towns along the shores of Lake Superior. It first launched in 1898, and was used until 1928, when it was damaged. It sank to the bottom of the lake soon after.

Today, divers can swim through the ships ballroom, bedrooms and engine room. Painted on the ships engine is an American flag. Many divers take pictures of this sight.

The Rock Harbor lighthouse is another reminder of the former shipping industry. Workers built the lighthouse in the 1850s to help guide ships safely to the islands copper mines.

The mining industry was short-lived, however. The lighthouse itself lit the way for ships for just 24 years. But, it still stands today. Inside, exhibits and information help visitors understand Isle Royales maritime history. A short hiking trail leads visitors to the lighthouse.

Visitors to Isle Royale share the trails with a well-studied population of moose and wolves. Both species migrated to the island sometime in the early to mid-1900s. Scientists believe that moose swam to the island. They think wolves walked there during a freeze of the lake sometime in the 1940s.

Scientists have closely studied the relationship between Isle Royales wolves and moose since the late 1950s. It is one of the best-studied predatory-prey relationships in the world. Researchers closely record their population numbers.

Much of the research takes place during the winter, when the trees are bare. The researchers fly over the island to observe the animals from above.

In early 2016, researchers from Michigan Tech University observed just two remaining wolves on Isle Royale.

The moose population, however, is growing. Scientists observed about 1,300 moose on the island this winter.

Animal research is the only winter activity going on at Isle Royale. The national park is closed each year beginning in late October because of the harsh weather conditions. It reopens in spring time the next year.

But for the other months of the year, Isle Royale offers refreshing lake breezes, green forests, and clear blue waters. Its stunning scenery and unusual solitude keep visitors returning year after year.

Im Ashley Thompson.

And Im Caty Weaver.

Ashley Thompson wrote this report with materials from the National Park Service. Caty Weaver was the editor.

________________________________________________________________

Words in This Story



rough - adj. not calm : having large waves, strong winds, storms, etc.

reminder - n. something that causes you to remember or to think about something

commercial - adj. related to or used in the buying and selling of goods and services

maritime - adj. of or relating to sailing on the sea or doing business (such as trading) by sea

predatory - adj. living by killing and eating other animals

prey - n. an animal that is hunted or killed by another animal for food

solitude - n. a state or situation in which you are alone usually because you want to be
Supporters of Edward Snowden have appealed to U.S. President Barack Obama to give him a pardon.

The American Civil Liberties Union, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch launched a campaign in support of Snowden this week. Several business leaders and personalities have joined the cause.

Snowden once worked as a contractor for the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA). The agency collects and studies information for the federal government.

While at the NSA, Snowden provided details to the media of secret government programs for gathering intelligence. He showed for the first time that the NSA was secretly collecting information on the telephone calls of millions of U.S. citizens.

The NSA has claimed the program was legal under the USA Patriot Act. Both houses of Congress passed the measure after the September 11 attacks on the United States.

Snowdens actions resulted in the government bringing charges against him in June 2013. He was accused of stealing government property, illegally communicating national defense information, and illegally communicating secret intelligence information.

If found guilty, he could spend up to 30 years in prison.

The governments case is based on the belief that Snowden gave away national security secrets that could put the public in danger.

Some of his supporters see him as an American activist who put his life at risk to bring attention to the secret NSA programs.

Snowden currently lives in exile in Russia, which has offered him asylum. The Russian government has rejected U.S. requests to extradite him to the United States to face trial.

The Obama administration has repeatedly stated that Snowdens actions were serious crimes. Administration spokesman Josh Earnest said the information harmed U.S. national security and put the American people at greater risk.

Earnest also said that Snowden made a mistake by deciding to release the information to the media. Instead, the government believes, he could have made his concerns known in a more responsible way.

Congress issues new report on Snowden's case

On Thursday, a U.S. congressional committee said that the material made public by Snowden caused tremendous damage to national security. The committee said its investigation makes clear that he handed over secrets that protect American troops overseas and secrets that provide vital defenses against terrorists and nation-states.

But others disagree. Dinah PoKempner is General Counsel with Human Rights Watch. She told VOA that Snowden should not be considered a criminal.

Its a real problem the way the U.S. handles people who expose wrongdoing, and it needs to be corrected. One of the best ways to start that process would be symbolic, but highly meaningful, and that would be to pardon Snowden.

Snowden lawyer cites lack of government evidence

Ben Wizner is with the American Civil Liberties Union. He is also a lawyer for Edward Snowden. He says the government has yet to provide any real evidence to support the charges.

Theres been three-and-a-half years since the revelations began, and the government has had every opportunity and every incentive to come forward with specific and concrete evidence that there has been harm. And instead, we hear the same vague, speculative language about how these things damaged national security.

President Obama can only approve a pardon before his term in office ends in January of next year. Wizner says he remains hopeful about the president acting, although the government has repeatedly said that Snowden should face the charges.

Something that may seem quite unlikely in September, might seem just a bit more likely in December, if millions of people around the world respond to this call and join our campaign.



Hollywood film 'Snowden' renews interest in case

There has been new interest in the case with the release of a film about Snowden. The film, Snowden, is directed by Oliver Stone, who recently called for a pardon. He spoke while making an appearance in support of the movie at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Mr. Obama could pardon him, and we hope so, Stone said. We hope Mr. Obama has a stroke of lightning, and he sees the way.

But he admitted a pardon is not likely to come from Obama, whom he said has kept expanding U.S. surveillance efforts.

Obama has managed to put together the most intensive surveillance state in the history of the world, Stone told The Hollywood Reporter. In the hands of the wrong president, its very dangerous what were doing.

Tanya OCarroll is an advisor on technology and human rights for Amnesty International. She said a pardon for Snowden would be an important step in the movement to limit secret government surveillance all over the world.

Pardon could have far reaching effects

Snowden himself has said this very clearly  this is not just a debate about now. It is a debate about the future. And I think if we see him walk free, thats going to be an incredibly important message  a huge, symbolic win for the fight back against mass surveillance.

Im Bryan Lynn.

Bryan Lynn reported this story for VOA Learning English, with additional information coming from Associated Press and Reuters. George Grow was the editor.

We want to hear from you. Write to us in the Comments section, and visit our Facebook page.

________________________________________________________________

Words in This Story

extradite  v. to send someone to another country where they are charged with a crime for trial

expose  v. make something public, especially wrongdoing

incentive  n. something that encourages someone to act in a certain way

concrete  adj. relating to something real, rather than general ideas or qualities

vague  adj. not clear in meaning

speculative  adj. assumption based on guesses rather than facts

surveillance  adj. intelligence-gathering
Last Friday was an unusual day for several diplomats in the U.S. state of Florida. The U.S. Department of State gathered consular officers from Africa, Europe and Latin America to pick garbage off the beach in Key Biscayne.

Their efforts supported a program called the International Coastal Cleanup of Beaches. This program aims to clean garbage out of oceans and off beaches.

The International Coastal Cleanup also tries to bring attention to the issue of pollution in the worlds oceans.

U.S. Department of State official Clifton Seagroves said protecting the worlds oceans is very important.

"We want to bring attention to  pollution, microbeads, plastics  which causes problems for the whole world."

A 2015 Reuters news service report stated scientists believe more than nine million tons of garbage are in the worlds oceans.

Uruguays consul, Lourdes Bonet, said she felt it was her duty to help with the efforts.

A person continues to live in the place where he or she lives, she said. And [they] must return all that hospitality that has been received.

Ecuadors consul, Eduardo Rivadeneira, praised the efforts to clean the beach.

I had never come to this park and I think its spectacular, he said. Everyone is from all over the world sharing this great moment.

The group was able to remove almost 550 kilograms of garbage from the Key Biscayne beach by the end of the day. This same amount usually takes a week to remove.

Im Pete Musto.

Jose Pernalete reported on this story for VOANews.com. Pete Musto adapted it for Learning English. Kelly Jean Kelly was the editor. We want to hear from you. Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page.

______________________________________________________________

Words in This Story

consular officer(s)  n. a government official whose job is to live in a foreign country and protect and help the citizens of his or her own country who are traveling, living, or doing business there

garbage  n. things that are no longer useful or wanted and that have been thrown out

hospitality  n. generous and friendly treatment of visitors and guests

spectacular  adj. causing wonder and admiration
Trump's latest letter was more detailed than a four-paragraph summary that his physician, Dr. Harold Bornstein, had issued last December. Stil
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Between the last week of school and Christmas craziness, the past two weeks have been a blur. But I have been working out and diligently ...
On his first visit to Belgrade, Rabbi Yehoshua Kaminetsky was stranded. The room he booked was taken, and no area hotel had any availability. With nowhere to go, he spent the night in a hotel lobby, and told himself that hed never move to Belgrade.

That was 8 years ago. This past September, he and his wife Miri opened a new Chabad center and a luxurious mikvehSerbias first in 70 years. (Until now the closest kosher mikvah had been in Budapest, a four or five hour trip each way.)

Joining the four hundred guests at the September 12 opening were the president, vice president, and board members of the Belgrade Jewish community, along with Israeli ambassador Alona Fisher and her deputy. Chabad emissaries arrived from Serbias surrounding countries, among them Bulgaria, Croatia, Poland, and Vienna, for the event.

Serbia is home to 3500 Jews, 2000 of whom live in Belgrade. There is also a small Israeli community of about 100 people, as well as many tourists and traveling businessmen. When the Kaminetskys first moved to Belgrade eight years ago, their Chabad House was located on the outskirts of town.

We came here with nothing, says Rabbi Kaminetsky. Now, thanks to an anonymous donor, they have been able to purchase a building on the main street of Belgrade, in the center of the city. The new facility sits right alongside the Serbian ministry buildings, government offices, and international embassies.

The new Chabad center is located in a great place, in the center of the city. Its a strong statement to the Belgradians, saysYosef Levi, former Israeli ambassador to Serbia.

Holocaust survivor Josif Baruhovic agrees. Its very representative, especially in this street of Milos the Great, the leader for whom the street is named.

The building was originally purchased three years ago, but construction permits were delayed until plans that would preserve the historical structure of the building were confirmed. Renovations finally began last November, allowing just enough time for construction to be completed by this years high holidays. The multi-million Euro center includes a ballroom, industrial kitchen, library, synagogue, kindergarten, state-of-the-art playground, guest rooms, and offices.

Professor Dejan Popov, an active member of the community, is grateful for Chabads presence in Belgrade. If it werent for Chabad, I wouldnt have the opportunity to take my children to experience the authentic atmosphere of Shabbat and the holidays.

Former Israeli ambassador Levy agrees. For me, Chabad Serbia is a success story. They started from nothing, and they built a community, they built a center, and they started activities. They have their group of followers, members, and friends, and that group is getting bigger and bigger.

Adir Elal, CEO of Airport City Belgrade, believes that the new building is a positive step forward for the community. We know theres a place in Belgrade which will always be safe, and that will remind us who we are and where we came from.
Union Finance Minister, Arun Jaitley, has done well by asking four state-run banks to check the facts on The Indian Express expose that bank staff deposited amounts as low as Re 1 in Jan Dhan Yojana accounts to reduce the number of zero balance accounts in their branches.

It shows the Narendra Modi-government isnt in a denial mode on the serious implementation flaws of one of the biggest bank account opening drives that has ever happened in the country since Independence. The Jan Dhan scheme was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in August, 2014.

Jaitley admitted that bankers in some branches of Punjab and Sind Bank, Punjab National Bank, Bank of Baroda and Bank of India may have possibly deposited Re 1 in the Jan Dhan accounts to reduce the number of zero-balance accounts.

"In case of few accounts, this issue has arisen and there are names of four banks. We have asked them. The banks are investigating from their branches whether account holders have put in money or business correspondents have done it. After that the banks will give their report to the Department of Financial Services," Jaitley said.

The expose

According to the Indian Express report, bank officials are quietly making one-rupee deposits, many from their own allowances, some from money kept aside for office maintenance, to show lesser number of zero balance accounts in their branches to their bosses (in the case of state-run banks, the boss is the government).

The report, quoting information received from an RTI query, had said that 18 public sector banks and their 16 regional rural subsidiaries held Rs 1.05 crore Jan Dhan accounts with deposits of one rupee.

As Firstpost noted in an earlier article, it is critical that the government comes clean on the allegations and fact-misrepresentation on Jan Dhan given the revolutionary nature of the scheme. It has the potential to introduce millions of unbanked population to the formal world of banking, besides laying out a bank account network to enable the larger subsidy reforms based on the Aadhaar-based Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT).

Many beneficiaries, who have opened accounts under the Jan Dhan programme, have started receiving subsidy money in their accounts under DBT, especially in LPG. This will be followed up by food, fertilizer subsidies in the future. International agencies too have lauded the initiative as a revolutionary one. In this context, FM Jaitleys willingness to take note of the factual anomalies in the scheme details is to be welcomed. Corrective actions needs to be taken to restore the credibility of the entire Jan Dhan drive.

So far, the story is fine.

Jaitley's counter

What is not right is the way Jaitley has defended the allegations on the One-rupee accounts.

Jaitley said that Rs 42,000 crore deposits in Jan Dhan accounts cannot have come from One-rupee deposits. Those 24 crore accounts mostly have people from weaker sections. Now those people have deposited Rs 42,000 crore in these accounts. The figure of Rs 42,000 crore cannot be arrived at by adding Re 1, Jaitley was quoted as saying in the PTI report.

However, the issue here is not about the quantum of deposits generated in the Jan Dhan accounts but the pressure the government allegedly passed on to mid level staff in public sector banks to technically manipulate the number of zero balance accounts. That is what the Express report exposed. It didnt appear to contest the amount of deposits in Jan Dhan accounts.

According to latest government data, the percentage of zero balance accounts currently stands at 24.43 percent, compared with the peak of 76.81 percent recorded in September, 2014. The fundamental question raised was about the accuracy of the zero balance account data shown by the government in the backdrop of the Express report.

Ever since the Jan Dhan scheme was launched, Firstpost had highlighted the possibility of massive duplication of accounts -- several accounts that are technically active but in reality are dormant with very low value transactions or, sometimes practically no transactions-due to the tight deadlines banks were given.

In many banks, the mid-level staff were in a state of panic and resorted to all sorts of jugaad, including filling these accounts with One rupee balance from their own pockets to fool the computer. By doing so, these accounts would no longer be shown up as no-balance accounts, but this is akin to fraud because such an exercise is undertaken to fool the system.

Jaitley is either missing the point here or making a vain attempt to divert attention from the actual issue.
Donald Trump's haira crusty, complex, yellowish affair that has become one of the enigmas of a very weird US presidential racegot messed with big time on Thursday.

The usually brash presidential candidate talked in subdued tones and played the good sport as he appeared on one of America's most popular late-night broadcast The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.

Fallon did his very popular impression of Trump's speaking style, ribbed him right and left and concluded his interview with a request.

"Can I mess up your hair?" Fallon said.

The comic explained that this might be the last time he could ask to do something unpresidential with Trump, lest he win election in November against Hillary Clinton.

The crowd went nuts over the idea.

Trump grinned and agreed.

Fallon reached out with his right hand and mussed Trump's hair with a vigorous, repeated rub. The Republican nominee endured it with a broad smile.

Trump, 70, has an elaborate hair-do centered on what seems to be an ambitious comb-over.

Nothing fell off with Fallon's intervention but the result was not very pretty as Trump's long locks ended up pointing messily every which way.

On other matters, Fallon christened what he called Trump's "bromance" with Vladimir Putin as "Vlump", and asked him about his penchant for eating fast food.

"At least you know what you're getting," Trump said. He added that if he went to an unknown place, "If they don't like me ... I don't know. I'm better off with fast food."

Fallon also thanked Trump for providing what he described as grist for so much comic material.

"You say some shocking things," Fallon said.

"But I'm trying not to anymore," Trump replied.
By Eepsita Guha

Katrina Kaif has been announced as the recipient of the biennial Smita Patil Memorial Award for 2016, in honour of her contribution to the film industry.

Honestly, stranger things have happened.

But as someone who follows Bollywood keenly and has witnessed Miss Kaifs acting talent (or lack thereof), this award brings as much shock to me as it must have elicited happiness in Kaif and her fans.

Lets take a look at Kaifs contribution to the film industry. One cant blame you if the first thing that comes to your mind is 'Kala Chashma' or 'Chikni Chameli' or 'Sheila Ki Jawani'. The actress has firmly established herself as the go-to person for any filmmaker who is looking for that one chartbuster song in his movie.

The British import may not have her Hindi down pat, but she sure has mastered the jhatkas and matkas  unfortunately, an essential in Bollywoods handbook for heroines. To give her credit, she does bring star value to every film that she is a part of. With her good looks, unmatched glamour quotient and mass appeal, Kaif is a star, no questions asked.

But is she an actor? That is a different story altogether.

In a career spanning 13 years, Kaif has several hits to her credit  Namastey London, Partner, Singh Is Kinng, Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani, Mere Brother Ki Dulhan, Dhoom 3, to name a few. However, her acting skills have been questionable in each of them (never mind, the wafer thin plots of these films). We've never heard of her characters being memorable to viewers after the film gets over.

Kaif has rarely shed her star status to essay the role at hand. Be it the empathetic Maya in New York, who is helping her husband build a new life after being victimised in the 9/11 aftermath, or the guileless Firdaus in Fitoor  she hardly ever goes beyond looking stunning, batting her eyelashes and parroting lines in her accent.

This stands in sharp contrast to Smita Patils knack for sinking her teeth into the characters. Compare the despair of Patils slum-dweller act in Chakra (scroll to 1:10:34 below for the scene) where she chases a water truck after days of going without water, to Kaifs in Jab Tak Hai Jaan when she fears her lover is dead after meeting with an accident.

Patil displayed her restraint as an actor in the climax of Arth (scroll to 1:31:40 below for the scene) where she, the other woman, comes face-to-face with Shabana Azmi, the wife of her lover. Kaifs is but a feeble act in Jab Tak Hai Jaan where she confronts Anushka Sharma, who much like her is also in love with Shah Rukh Khans character.

In only a 15-year-long career, Patil brought to the fore her versatility as an actor. With celebrated director Shyam Benegal, she gave us some inimitable performances in Manthan, Bhumika and then Mandi. Not to mention, her powerful acts in socially relevant movies like Ardh Satya and Bazaar.

Clearly, Kaif is no Smita Patil.

Truth be told, even Kats contemporaries are not a patch on the powerhouse performer. But the unfortunate bit is that Kaif does not even match up to her peers  be it her supposed arch rival Deepika Padukone or Priyanka Chopra (both of whom have won the Smita Patil Memorial Award previously).

Bestowing this honour upon Kaif only shows how the standards of Hindi film industry have plummeted since Patil.
Theres only so much one can do with a plot involving a shark. I mean, once you get away from the water theres little that a shark can do. Its not like it would sprout legs and start running after you on land  like the amphibian creature from the Korean movie The Host.

So as far as shark based thrillers go, The Shallows is the best film in the genre since Spielbergs Jaws. Thats really not saying much because the only other attempts in the genre over the years have been the Sharknado and Piranha movies. But since we finally have something fairly enjoyable in the B movie category, lets just go with it the flow.

Blake Lively stars as a bikini clad medical student Nancy, who after her mothers death travels to a secret beach somewhere in Mexico. It turns out to be the very same beach where her mother surfed with she was pregnant with Nancy, and it also has a small island which looks like a pregnant woman (how convenient). While surfing, a great white shark attacks Nancy and since theres no one around to help on a secret beach shes marooned a few hundred meters from land.

The film is directed by Jaume Collet-Serra, who has made the enjoyably trashy Liam Neeson action movies Unknown, Non Stop and Run All Night  you would be forgiven for not being able to distinguish which one is which. The Shallows, however is very distinguished by the fact that it has a protagonist in very tiny bits of clothing throughout the film. What Serra does well, however, is suspend your disbelief just enough to make this ridiculous scenario kind of believable. The size of the shark, and the fact that the shark often eats into metal while attacking the heroine is thrilling enough to keep you in your seats. Nancy also uses some interesting low fi methods to outwit the shark, and her medical background pays off when she knows exactly how to repair her body when the shark bites chunks out of her. Its silly fun.

The other interesting aspect of the film is that it isnt gory at all. When the shark picks out people theyre just suddenly silently pulled into the ocean  it feels a lot more real than close up shots of large jaws coming at your face. Its an interesting and subtle stylistic choice in a genre that is so inherently corny.

The only problem with the film is that it takes a good half hour for Nancy to stop being angsty and go into the ocean to be attacked by the shark. The contrived melodrama of her tragedy is quite uninteresting, and if youre paying to watch a woman kicking a sharks ass, that better start happening soon. Lively is given unintentionally hilarious slow motion shots of surfing in the sexiest possible manner and its impossible to figure out if the sequences are self aware or just pandering to the horny genre crowd. So you should watch this film, but you can walk in twenty minutes late for an even better experience, unless of course you dig endless shots of a bikini lady surfing in slow mo.
New Delhi: Handset maker Gionee has signed an agreement with the Haryana government for setting up a manufacturing unit in the state entailing an initial investment of Rs 500 crore.

The manufacturing unit will be set up over around 50 acres in Faridabad and will provide employment to over 28,000 people in the next three years, Gionee said in a statement.

With an annual capacity of close to 30 million units, Gionee plans to manufacture around six lakh mobiles per month from this facility and use it as an export hub in future, it added.

"India is one of our most important markets and Gionee has been seeing an exponential growth here, which will only increase rapidly as time progresses," Gionee Mobiles Chairman Liu Lirong said.

The company sees government policies, availability of skilled manpower and infrastructure support the state provides as other positives.

"Hence, we are confident that our investments and efforts are being made in the right direction," he claimed.

Gionee had entered the Indian market in 2013 and claims to have registered a turnover of Rs 3,250 crore by 2015-end. It plans to almost triple its turnover by the end of this year.

"Keeping in line with our Make in India initiatives, we have taken it a step further from having two facilities to setting up our own manufacturing unit in India. This unit will help us achieve the inventory levels required to take Gionee to the next level of growth," Gionee India CEO and MD Arvind Vohra said.

About 60 percent of Gionee India's devices sold in the country are manufactured locally at facilities run by Foxconn (in Tamil Nadu) and Dixon (in Noida).
India's largest online marketplace firm Flipkart is certainly pulling out all stops to make its Big Billion Day (BBD) sale a major success this year. Under the product exchange programme, the country's largest ecommerce company is looking to spruce up sales of large appliances such as televisions, washing machines and refrigerators, a Mint report said.

In the television segment, Flipkart said it will keep prices of TVs lower by asking brands to do away with select non-essential features. In effect, the company said customers will get smart TVs of some big brands at prices the basic TVs are sold. For instance, 32 inch TVs will be sold at the price of 24-inch TVs, the Mint report said quoting Flipkart's head of large appliances, Sandeep Karwa.

While the TV segment makes up for more than half of the large appliances business for the company, Flipkart has set a target to triple its market share to 20 percent of all LED TVs sold in the country in October, the report said. The online retail major has partnered with brands like BPL Ltd and Vu Technologies to drive sales of its appliances business.

The Bangalore-headquartered firm has tied up with several brands such as China's Leeco, Vu, and others such as Sansui, BPL, who will be offering their wide range of products. The etailer has also signed exclusive deals with LG, Samsung, among others to sell some of their products, a Times of India report said.

In comparison with other online retail players, Flipkart said several of these products will be offered Rs 3,000-4,000 cheaper, the ToI report added.

India's largest online marketplace firm will most probably launch its Great Festive Sale offer on 3 October. The company will reportedly spend Rs 30 crore on marketing and advertising for this year's Big Billion Day sale, even as reports suggest that the company could be facing severe fund crunch this year due to its discount offers and acquisition of companies.

At a time, when the company is battling dwindling sales and rising competition from its arch rival Amazon, Flipkart is certainly gearing up for the challenge through several initiatives.

Flipkart has also planned several initiatives for its over 1 lakh seller base. The company is looking at providing incentives for best-performing sellers such as low-cost loans for them via tie-up with State Bank of India, besides offering support at packaging, pick-up and delivery, a recent Economic Times report said.

Further, Flipkart will be looking to add temporary 10,000 odd staff to help its sellers cope up with the additional burden during the dale. The company will also include its fashion unit Myntra, which acquired rival Jabong in July, to participate in this BBD sale event.
New Delhi: Government will soon launch three expressway projects -- Delhi-Amritsar-Katra,

Delhi-Jaipur and Vadodara-Mumbai -- soon at a cost of about Rs 1,32,000 crore, Union Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari today said.

"We will soon start three important expressway projects that would reduce travel time significantly between

Delhi-Katra, Delhi-Jaipur and Vadodara-Mumbai. These would entail a total project cost of Rs 1,32,000 crore," Road Transport and Highways Minister Gadkari said here.

He hoped that the travel distance to these destinations will reduce significantly once the projects are operationalised.

As per the plan, Amritsar could be reached via Delhi in up to 3 hours after completion of the Rs 60,000-crore

Amritsar-Delhi expressway, which will reduce travel duration by over two hours.

Also on the anvil is a project connecting Jalandhar to Ajmer that will bring down the travel time to 5 hours. Meetings in this regard are scheduled with chief ministers of Jammu & Kashmir, Punjab, Haryana, Delhi and Rajasthan.

Yesterday, the Minister in the poll-bound Punjab laid the foundation stones of 12 major NH projects worth Rs 10,596.19 crore at Ropar, Samrala and Jalandhar in the state.

The road projects also include four-laning of Jalandhar-Barnala, Jalandhar-Hoshiarpur, Ropar-Phagwara,

Kharar-Kurali, Chandigarh-Kharar and Kharar-Ludhiana roads, besides an elevated road in Ludhiana city.

The projects will provide world-class road connectivity to commuters between Doaba and Malwa, along with adjoining Haryana and Himachal Pradesh, in the next 2 years, Gadkari said.

Chandigarh will also be connected with 4-lane roads with all major cities such as Amritsar, Jalandhar and Ludhiana.
Hong Kong: Move over China, India could well become the go-to destination for Hong Kong based manufacturing companies looking to uproot their facilities and relocate to cheaper destinations. Provided India plays its cards right. The huge Make-in-India push by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has attracted the attention of Hong Kong Trade Development Council (HKTDC), which has  over the last few months  conducted extensive research of advantages India provides for low cost manufacturing versus other Asian economies such as Vietnam, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and mainland China. And India seems to be a very favourbale destination in almost all parameters.

A delegation comprising research professionals with HKTDC is expected to once again visit some cities in India next month  these are destinations which the council thinks have huge potential for low cost manufacturing. Will India extend support and sops for encouraging Hong Kongs growing interest?

We believe India has a huge potential for this. For one, Indias wages are way below Chinas and many other South East Asian countries. Two, India has a huge buyers market  Vietnam has only about 90 million in domestic market size compared to about 1.3 billion people in India. Not many companies in Hong Kong are aware of Indias potential in low value added products manufacturing..we have done the research and shared it with them, says Dickson Ho, Principal Economist with HKTDC.

Ho did not provide examples of specific companies which may be interested to shift base to India, saying this would each company's independent decision after having evaluated all aspects. But Hong Kong based companies are increasingly eyeing production relocation or diversification out of mainland China due to rising production costs. HKTDC Research visited Gujarat, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka earlier this year.

It did not find the National Capital Region (NCR) viable because of rising costs for labour-intensive production. Hos research quotes factory operators in these states to say manufacturers were increasingly relocating labour-intensive operations from the NCR to other states such as Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Gujarat to take advantage of lower production costs. The five states selected have been identified as having the most potential for production relocation and diversification.

Labour

HKTDC says competitive labour costs that are expected to remain for some time in India could be our biggest advantage in attractive fresh manufacturing. Currently, Indias labour costs are lower than those in China and almost all of the countries in Southeast Asia, with the exception of Myanmar, the report says. We are a third of the wages in mainland China and roughly half those in Indonesia.

Industrial land rates

All selected states have developed industrial parks for private investors to set up their production plants. The state governments or private companies provide infrastructure and amenities such as connecting roads, electricity, water supply, sewage-treatment facilities and communication networks. This is another feather in Indias cap.

Transportation

Sea freight is an important consideration for manufacturers. Mundra in Gujarat is a port-based special economic zone; Jawaharlal Nehru Port (JNPT) in Maharashtra is Indias largest port with hinterland covering Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Karnataka and most of North India. Visakhapatnam mainly serves northeast India, Chhattisgarh and Orissa. Chennai port is the major logistic hub of South India, supporting the vibrant manufacturing activities in Tamil Nadu. So most of the manufacturing hubs identified by HKTDC are also conveniently connected with major ports.

Ease of doing business

Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh are identified as the EODB reform leaders, adopting many business-friendly measures to entice both local and foreign investment, while the other three states require further acceleration in reform. Also, all five states have made notable efforts in tax reforms to streamline registration and payment of Value Added Tax (VAT) and Central Sales Tax (CST) through online services. Such reform has greatly improved the ease of doing business for SMEs. At the national level, the Centre is working to pass the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Bill to convert India into a unified market and prevent tax-on-tax, notes HKTDC.

Tariffs on India made products

Another key consideration for factory relocation is the import tariffs levied on manufactured products originating from India and whether this country has entered into any preferential trade deals that lower the import tariffs. India has been an active player in Asia, securing free trade agreements (FTAs) inside and outside the region, including engaging in an FTA talk with the EU. Taking yarn-related products as an example, import tariff rates for India range from 0% to 5%. Further, US import tariff rates for Indian yarn-related products range between 0% and 2.7%.

So will there be a wholesale movement of manufacturing from China to India anytime soon? Ho says large shifts of manufacturing facilities in favour of India may not immediately happen. Apparel, shoes, clothing, textiles and other low value added manufacturing activities may look for the shift initially. And this too would perhaps be a trickle instead of being a deluge. But even if a handful of manufacturing units in Hong Kong consider the shift, it would be worthwhile for India.

Ho also points out that Vietnam is a strong contender along with India for large scale production shifts out of mainland China. The cost of labour there is not significantly higher than India plus it provides one other critical advantage  it is land linked with China so transportation of manufactured goods needs no sea freight. Almost 6000 manufacturing companies (not all from Hong Kong though) have left mainland China to set up shop in neighboring Vietnam already. Is India listening?

ends

(The author was in Hong Kong between September 7-10 at the invitation of the Hong Kong Trade Development Council, HKTDC)
The Centre will announce the next set of 27 cities for financing under the Modi-government flagship Smart City Mission next week, Union Urban Development Minister M Venkaiah Naidu said on Thursday.

"I am happy to tell you that 20 cities were announced in the first and another 13 in the supplementary round. Now, I am going to announce another 27 cities in the next week," Naidu said while addressing the 12th Indo-US Economic Summit here. So far, the government has announced 33 cities that will be developed as 'smart cities' which would have facilities such as assured water and power supply, sanitation and solid waste management systems, efficient urban mobility and public transportation, IT connectivity and e-governance, among others.

The Modi-government aims to transform about 100 cities by 2019-20, with the Union government providing financial support of Rs 48,000 crore over five years. Meanwhile, Naidu said the challenges before the government is to overcome the "deficits" that it has "inherited" from the UPA dispensation in "quickest possible time". "Every government inherits certain legacy from the previous one. What we have inherited was a bag load of deficits -fiscal, revenue, trade, current account and governance deficits and above all, trust deficit.

"The challenge before our governments is to overcome in the quickest possible time, these deficits," he said, adding that the government has taken up "this serious challenge in right earnest".

"I take this opportunity to assure you all that these challenges will certainly be met and the country will triumph," he said. Listing out various initiatives the Modi-government like Make in India, Skill India, Digital India, Clean India, and Start-up India, he called for ideas and innovations for development of the country.

"The need of the hour is 'Ideas, Innovation, Investments and Implementation. From promoting cleanliness to competitive manufacturing, this flow of ideas are a certain way of heralding 'acchhe din'," he said. Naidu, who is also Information and Broadcasting minister said affordable and low cost smartphones have started a "second screen phenomenon" that offers great opportunities for content creators, curators, advertisers, app developers and online streaming companies.

About 41 percent of India's total mobile users are active on social media which offers a good market for Digital Music Industry, he said, adding that successful companies are likely to be those which embrace digital technologies as a complementary part of their overall strategies. He said Indian media landscape consists of over 10,000 newspapers, 830 TV channels, 245 FM channels and about 180 community radio stations.

"There is a huge potential of growth in the regional markets with content consumption by consumers getting more and more localized. As a result of which national broadcasters are venturing into regional space and regional players are striving to strengthen their portfolio by launching niche regional channels," he said.
Vadodara: Union Power Minister Piyush Goyal asked electrical equipment manufacturers to ensure quality to face competition from China, Korea and other countries. The Minister also sought support from Indian Electrical and Electronics Manufacturers Association (IEMMA) for "exposing those who use second-grade sheets, recycled copper or any of these products which damage the life, quality or accuracy of electrical equipment, and bring bad name to country." Goyal was in city to take stock of arrangements being made for holding of first-ever Switch global expo on energy sector.

One of the largest electrical expos in the country, Switch is to be held from October 6 to 10. It represents one of the biggest networks of electrical manufacturers, innovators, technologies and partners in the industry. The event is being organised by Power Ministry in collaboration with Gujarat government and Gujarat Urja Vikas Nigam Limited (GUVNL).

Addressing reporters, the Minister said, "I brought to notice of Prime Minister Narendra Modi the incidents of electrical transformers catching fire in various parts of country, which may be due to over loading". He said that PM opined that substandard quality of the equipment was responsible for the damage.

Goyal said Ministry of Power, Central Electricity Authority (CEA) and Power Grid have come together to ensure that electrical equipment of poor quality are not produced. "This message has gone to entire industry that this government will not at all tolerate any compromise on quality. Power Secretaries of states may note that because we fund a lot of these schemes that are happening in states, all of India is one. We want best quality in states as well," he added.

As many as 24 countries have already confirmed their participation in Switch expo, he said.
New Delhi: Reliance Jio has slammed incumbent operators Bharti Airtel, Idea Cellular and Vodafone for allegedly refusing to help their mobile phone users port or switch to the new operator.

In a letter to TRAI Chairman R S Sharma, Reliance Jio said Bharti Airtel Ltd, Idea Cellular Ltd and Vodafone India Ltd are perpetrating "illegal and perverse actions" by refusing to enable the porting of mobile number connections.

"Considering that this is a clear and deliberate breach of the license conditions, TRAI must direct incumbent dominant operators to comply with their license terms and obligations ... failing which it should recommend cancellation of the respective licenses at the earliest," Jio wrote.

The three firms did not offer any immediate comment on the story.

"It is important to note that this is being done in blatant disregard to license terms and their obligations under the Telecommunication Mobile Number Portability Regulations, 2009 and TRAI directions," Reliance Jio wrote on September 14.

Jio said it has been certified as Mobile Number Portability (MNP) compliant by the Telecom Enforcement, Resource and Monitoring Cells of all service area and in this month it wrote to incumbents about commencing services.

"Inspite of being under legal and contractual obligation to port the numbers after a valid request is made, the incumbent dominant operators have rejected all the requests made for porting between September 9 and September 12," it said giving data of port requests rejected.

It said the rejections were in addition to "the rejection of MNP request of 4,919 corporate mobile numbers issued to employees and members of Reliance Industries Group by Bharti Airtel in August 2016. This was inspite of a confirmation from Bharti Airtel that there were no outstanding dues and that the MNP process could be completed."

Reliance had last month asked all its employees to shun rival mobile phone operators and shift to Jio.

"Almost all of these rejections have been made on the baseless and unsubstantiated ground of 'violation of contractual obligation'. The incumbent dominant operators have not even bothered to elaborate the contractual obligations that have been violated," it said.

The "baseless and unsubstantiated" ground of violation of contractual obligation was being raised to unnecessarily harass customers and prevent them from availing the services of Jio, the company said.

Jio asked TRAI to take serious cognizance of its complaint and intervene by taking strict action against the incumbent operators under the relevant provisions.

A Vodafone India spokesperson said, "The issue of MNP was sorted in the meeting with Trai along with Point of Interconnections."

Airtel too refuted the allegation saying it is "processing all porting requests as per guidelines".

(Disclaimer: Reliance Jio is owned by Reliance Industries, who also own Network18, the publisher of Firstpost)
Why does the Supreme Court step in whenever the monsoon fails and Tamil Nadu and Karnataka quarrel over the deficit waters? Its akin to the chicken-first-or-egg-first? conundrum.

The court comes on the scene because Tamil Nadu rushes to it in the absence of an institutional mechanism to apportion waters when the rains fail. And there is no such mechanism because the court hasnt forced the executive to constitute one. Instead, the court itself has been trying to work out water-sharing formulas in distress years.

And yet, helpless because of its technical incapability to arbitrate over this issue and deprived of the knowledge of ground realities in the rivers basin, the court has always had to necessarily rely on an outside agency before reaching a verdict. It was earlier either the Cauvery River Authority, headed by the Prime Minister and made up of the Chief Ministers of the warring states or a Monitoring Committee of officials.

And now the court is depending on the Supervisory Committee, comprising central and state officials, that has superseded the previous two bodies.

A chief reason why the Cauvery issue has remained a hard nut to crack is that its a dispute over sharing of deficit waters but not surplus waters as in the case of some other contentious rivers. Dividing anything, when there is very little of it, is necessarily a tricky business. Its not surprising that apportioning water at a time when the Cauvery simply doesnt have enough of it is a gargantuan task.

And yet, I found from my travels through the Cauvery basin in both Karnataka and Tamil Nadu in the past that the average farmer in both the states is not loath to the idea of sharing the distress. For him, its not a question of whether the states should share the water but how they should do it.

And thats a question an institutionalised official body is better placed to resolve than the Supreme Court. Be it a Management Board that the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal recommended in its 2007 award or a Monitoring Committee or the currently functional Supervisory Committee.

Call it what you will, its only such a body that can understand the issue in all its complexities. The extensive data it has access to on deficient rainfall and on what it means to reservoir water levels and how it impacts crops can help it decide in a judicious fashion on how much water Karnataka must release on a monthly or a weekly or even a daily basis, depending on situation prevailing in a deficit period.

By refusing to hear petitions whenever reservoir levels drop steeply and by ensuring that the Centre evolves a mechanism to allocate water each time monsoon plays truant, the Supreme Court could bring about a long-term solution. And for the farmers, the legal route only means avoidable delays in getting precious water.

It must be understood that the dispute is not essentially about the overall allocation of the rivers waters, though the states are challenging it. The tribunal awarded 270 tmcft (thousand million cubic feet) of water against its demand for 465, and Tamil Nadu was given 419 while it claimed 562. Kerala and Puducherry were allocated 30 and seven tmcft respectively. When the monsoon ensures copious water in the river, the states get enough and more.

But what is contentious, at least from Karnatakas point of view, is the tribunals order that Karnataka should release 192 tmcft of water to TN in every water year from June to May. The tribunal went a step ahead: it fixed schedules of water releases. For the months between June and September  the period that Tamil Nadu talks about in its latest petition before the Supreme CourtKarnataka must release water this way:

June - 10 tmcft

July - 34 tmcft

August - 50 tmcft

September - 40 tmcft

Total for four months: 134 tmcft

Tamil Nadus insistence that, come rain or shine, Karnataka must abide by these monthly allocations is laughable. This is the period when Karnataka should get rains from the south-west monsoon, but nobody doubts that rainfall has been deficient this year. The tribunal said that, in a distress year, water should be shared in the proportions of their allocations.

While the tribunals calendar of water release can be a broad basis in a deficit year, its only an official committee that can determine equitable releases that reduce the distress to the minimum in both states.

Legal pundits in both the states are also understandably anxious over what the Supreme Court will do on 18 October, when the larger issue of the petitions of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Kerala, challenging the tribunals award, is expected to come up. It remains to be seen whether the court will open the Pandoras box of the Cauvery all over again or will uphold the tribunals award and ask for its implementation.

Among constitutional experts, there is some confusion over the Supreme Courts powers to adjudicate a river water dispute in the first place. The uncertainty arises because of two competing constitutional provisions, as the authors of The Oxford Handbook of the Indian Constitution, published this year, call them. These are:

Article 131 (C) of the Constitution on the original jurisdiction of the Supreme Court, which says:

(...the Supreme Court shall, to the exclusion of any other court, have original jurisdiction in any dispute) between two or more States...

Article 262 (2) of the Constitution on inter-state water disputes, which, on the other hand, says:

Notwithstanding anything in this Constitution, Parliament may by law provide that neither the Supreme Court nor any other court shall exercise jurisdiction in respect of any such dispute or complaint as is referred to in clause (1)

At least in the case of Cauvery dispute, its no longer a question of Supreme Courts jurisdiction, especially since the court declared in 1991, while hearing a petition against the tribunals interim order:

Thus, we hold that this court is the ultimate interpreter of the provisions of the Interstate Water Disputes Act 1956 and has an authority to decide on the limits, powers and the jurisdiction of the Tribunal constituted under this Act.

Whatever happens on 18 October, the farmers in both the states are anxious about the more immediate issue of getting water for their crops. And what helps them in the long run is a permanent mechanism that, firstly, will ensure them their due share of water faster without involving the Supreme Court and, secondly, will deny the political class a chance to fish in troubled waters.

Author tweets at @sprasadindia
Chennai: With Mettur Dam witnessing steady inflows following Karnataka's release of water from the Cauvery River, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa on Friday ordered opening its sluice gates for irrigating samba crops in the delta districts.

"To enable farmers take up samba cultivation, I have directed release of water from Mettur Dam from 20 September, 2016," she said.

The government decision to release water was based on factors like the dam touching 84.76 feet (capacity 120 ft), likelihood of receiving more water from Karnataka reservoirs in view of the Supreme Court order, the Cauvery Supervisory Committee's expected decision on quantum of water for her state and an anticipated normal north east monsoon, she said.

Tamil Nadu has received 8.92 tmcft of water till 14 September at Biligundulu, the designated entry point, with Karnataka releasing water following the Apex Court order, Jayalalithaa said in a statement.

She recalled that the 2007 final award of the Cauvery disputes tribunal was published in a Central gazette in 2013 after a Supreme Court order, and blamed the Centre for not constituting the Cauvery Management Board and Cauvery Water Regulation Committee.

Since the Centre has not constituted these, "We are in a situation of approaching the Supreme Court to receive our share of water from Cauvery," she said.

The state government had earlier moved the Supreme Court seeking a direction to Karnataka to release 50 tmcft of water from Cauvery.

The court had initially directed Karnataka to release 15,000 cusecs of water for 10 days, but later modified it's order, and asked the upper riparian state to release 12,000 cusecs of water till 20 September.

Jayalalithaa said that the court's direction was sought after her government's communication to Karnataka seeking release of its share of water from Cauvery and to Centre urging its intervention did not yield any results.

As the state did not get its share of water, she had last month announced a Rs 64.30 crore package to help Delta farmers raise Samba (a form of paddy) crop, Jayalalithaa recalled.
On visiting many of the Aam Aadmi Party's (AAP) Mohalla clinics in Delhi, some surrounded by stinking heaps of garbage next to clogged drains, it becomes instantly clear that a preventive approach to the citys healthcare is missing. The recent outbreak of chikungunya and the 12 deaths caused by complications triggered due to the vector-borne disease in the capital, is reflective of the shortcoming in the healthcare policy adopted by the Delhi government.

The revolutionary project of opening free Mohalla clinics to provide primary treatment to residents of small neighbourhoods in the city is certainly a giant stride in curative healthcare. The term revolution owes to the real-life challenges faced in operating these clinics and the fact that they attempt to remove the economic disparity in healthcare by way of providing free basic medical care. All this in a city where out-of-pocket health expenditure is as high as 77 percent as per Delhi human Development Report 2013.

But a health policy opted by a government, be it central or state, is expected to address much more than just curative goals. The stakes are even higher when elections are won based on the assurance of providing universal modern healthcare facilities, as the AAP had done.

In the year 2005, the member countries of the World Health Organisation (WHO) defined universal healthcare as 'securing access for all to appropriate promotive, preventive, curative and rehabilitative services at an affordable cost.' What magic this approach of holistic healthcare can create is very well perceived in the case of Sri Lanka, that recently gained the status of being the second country in South East Asia to be malaria free.

The Sri Lankan government achieved this success by adopting both preventive and curative measures in its fight against air-borne epidemics. Massive pest control drives, use of mosquito nets and repellents along with measures for early detection of Malaria and curbing its spread did wonders for the island nation.

WHO even went on record, lauding the efforts of the Sri Lankan government, by releasing a press release saying that the use of mobile malaria clinics in high transmission areas meant that prompt and effective treatment could reduce the parasite reservoir and the possibility of further transmission (in Sri Lanka). Effective surveillance, community engagement and health education, meanwhile, enhanced the ability of authorities to respond, and mobilised popular support for the campaign."

Since October 2012, no case of malaria has been reported in Sri Lanka, a country that has historically been one of the most malaria affected countries in the world. The disease claimed more than 90,000 lives in 1935 and in 1999 infected close to 2,70,000 people. The coastal nation's achievement of becoming malaria free is seen as a stupendous success, especially given its recent history of bloody civil strifes.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, who declared the eradication of dengue from Delhi as an election promise in the 2015 Assembly election, could well take a leaf out of Sri Lankas history in its battle against another vector borne disease; not because the coastal nations challenge in this regard matched that of Indias capital city, but because it was far steeper.

The nightmare that the administration must have gone through while implementing the malaria curbing policy in Sri Lanka can hardly be imagined by any Delhiwala babu or neta. In a country that has 65 times more area and more than twice the population of Delhi, in addition to the problems arising from the countrys recent political history, implementation of any policy must have been much more difficult than in Delhi. But Lanka took on the challenge and with the sheer will of its policy makers, it won.

Hence, it is difficult to perceive why it would be so difficult for Kejriwal to follow the Lankan path, and initiate preventive measures to fight vector-borne diseases. With all the financial and administrative resources that Delhi possesses, Kejriwal could have surely done more to fulfil his election promise.

To be fair to Kejriwal, he did have a BJP-led Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) to play the role of an antagonist. It was rightly observed by a few AAP leaders that the cleaning of drains and garbage were the duties of the MCD, which ultimately it failed to deliver on and as a result the clogged drains and heaps of waste became breeding grounds for the disease spreading parasites.

But there is a catch here. Cleaning of clogged drains and garbage heaps are not the only ways to prevent vector-borne diseases, far from it. In fact, it is hard to imagine tropical regions like Sri Lanka without stagnant water and organic wastes to breed parasites.

Most of the credit to Sri Lankas success in fighting Malaria goes to the distribution of mosquito-nets, mosquito repellents and measures for early detection of the disease. To implement such preventive policies, the Delhi government would not have required the MCD's help.

Many state governments in India are implementing such measures on their own, without being seen as intruders into the territories of power and functions of the concerned urban and rural local bodies. There is no plausible reason why the Delhi government could not have taken small preventive measure when it managed to establish big-ticket items like the Mohalla clinics in curative healthcare.

Had the Delhi government opted to go the Sri Lankan way, perhaps it could have saved the lives lost to chikungunya in this rainy season and would have protected many more from getting infected. Moreover, it would have been a far matured political move on the part of Kejriwal than foul-mouthing journalists for reporting the deaths caused by chikungunya.

If Sri Lanka stands as an example of a well-conceived and holistic policy to fight Malaria, then Delhi sets the precedence of the perilous consequence of not having one. On account of the lack of preventive measures, the outbreak has spread to epidemic proportions making thousands of feverish patients rush to the Mohalla clinics, leaving the tiny institutions helpless and to some extent ineffective.

In one such over-crowded clinic, the doctor pointed to a nearby drain that had been clogged for several days and said, This is one of the reasons for the outbreak. We complained to the MCD about it. But only partial cleaning was done after that, leaving a major portion of the drain unclean.

The dirty drains in Delhi perhaps well represent the dirty politics within the MCD, which can be held equally responsible for the outbreak of chikungunya and the 12 deaths caused by the triggered complications. But whether it is the lack of a better preventive policy by the government or the inefficient implementation by the civic body, it is clear that the issue needs urgent attention.
By Nisha Susan

Haryana's police chief KP Singh has dismissed allegations that cow vigilantism had nothing to do with the gang rape and double murder in Mewat on 24 August. Never mind that one of the survivors says that the men who raped her and her sister, murdered her uncle and aunt, asked if they eat beef. The survivors have been quoted as saying, They asked if we eat beef. We said we don't, but they insisted we did. Then they said we're hurting you before so you don't and that if we tell anyone we'll be insulted.

In a sense, Singh is right that cow vigilantism has nothing to do with the rape. It just is another trump card that has been handed to violent men. It is only an extension of the many incidents of violence against Muslims and Dalits that coastal Karnataka has seen for a decade and the violence the rest of India is beginning to see in a post beef-ban world.

The Mewat case may be the first beef related rape we are hearing of. But it won't be the last. Weve known for a long time that rape is about power. What better power can men have over women, particularly poor and marginalised women, than telling them they are suspects in what was first taboo and is now a contraband commodity.

Take Daniel Holtzclaw. An American police officer, he was convicted in late 2015 of sexual assaults against 13 women in a seven-month period, on many counts of rape, sexual battery, forcible oral sodomy, among other charges. Every one of his victims was African American. Holtzclaw ran background checks on women with outstanding drug-related warrants or other drug-related petty criminal records, and systematically targeted them. How was Holtzclaw eventually caught? In 2014, he stopped a 57-year-old woman driving through a poor neighbourhood, falsely accused her of swerving and assaulted her. Unlike his previous victims, she was neither poor nor someone with any criminal history. She filed charges immediately and that was the beginning of the end for Holtzclaw. Holtzclaws legal team used a legally mandated version of Holtzclaws own strategy  attempting to undermine his victims about their drinking, petty thefts, suspended drivers licenses and marijuana use. But he was sentenced to a cumulative 263 years in prison.

Holtzclaw was an officer in Oklahoma, an American state in which a huge campaign is currently on to legalise marijuana. Even while the Holtzclaw trial was on, the government made medical marijuana legal. Research shows that while black and white Americans have roughly equal usage of marijuana but black Americans are 3.73 times more likely to be arrested. More than half of all drug arrests in the US have been marijuana-related arrests. But in recent years, several American states have legalised marijuana, leading to a multi-million-dollar industry. And if Oklahoma legalises marijuana, it is likely to see, like other states already have, a boom of middle and upper middle class white people turning it into highly profitable businesses they can run without fear of being dragged out of their homes, losing their family members, being stopped-and-frisked on the streets, being beaten or raped.

The situation is not very different from India, where now that beef is as dangerous as the suspicion of terrorism, even the poorest of farmers in drought-stricken Maharashtra are watching their cows and bullocks slowly die of hunger rather than sell them. Even small butchers selling goat meat or buffalo meat in Haryana had to worry about the goondas who are euphemistically called gau rakshaks this Eid. But we remain the worlds top exporter of buffalo meat.

Across the border from Haryana in Delhi, politicians across party lines have profited either directly or indirectly from meat exports. Sangeet Som, a vociferously anti-beef campaigner of the BJP and Uttar Pradesh MLA has been the director of not one but two meat export companies trading in halal buffalo, sheep/lamb, goat meat and hides. Som has denied any knowledge of these activities. He has also told the press earnestly that his fellow director at one of these companies, Moinudeen Qureshi, should not be confused with Moin Qureshi, a wealthy meat exporter who has been in the BJPs black books for his close links with the UPA leadership and Lutyens elite, quite apart from any allegations of crime, of course.

Last month, there was a brief moment of man-bites-dog when news broke that gau rakshaks beat a man to death in Karnataka because they believed he was transporting cows for slaughter  because the victim was a Hindu and the former president of the BJP's standing committee in Kenjur village in Udupi. But activists have said that this near-satire is an on-going affair. G Vishnu writes in Scroll about several cases in recent months where gau rakshaks have been similarly embarrassed and bewildered. In one instance, their raid ended with the capture of two cattle transporters  a taluka-level BJP leader and a BJP municipal corporator. Nothing happened to them. Or the even more Freaky Friday moment Vishnu writes about, a Muslim vigilante group waylaid a mini-truck that was transporting a calf for slaughter. The four men in the truck were members of the local Bajrang Dal unit.

Other businesses would envy this environment. Imagine when you can declare all the traditional players in the sector not just illegal, also sub-human. You can have the police, law and public opinion on your side. You can make even the suspicion that you may be profiting from the same taboo sector so unbelievable its almost blasphemous. This is how to make serious bucks in India.

Oddly it reminds me of a college classmate in Pune. One night on my way out to dinner I found him running a roadside Chinese food stand with two nimble assistants. When did you get interested in this business? I asked him later that week. Arrey, I am not interested in this particularly. Its just that my brother got into the police in Thane last month. And since I am related to him I dont have to pay anyone. Automatic profit. I dont know why he needed an MBA.

The Ladies Finger (TLF) is a leading online womens magazine delivering fresh and witty perspectives on politics, culture, health, sex, work and everything in between.
Thiruvananthapuram: Former Supreme Court judge Markandey Katju said on Friday that the apex court had "grievously erred by law" in the Soumya rape and murder case in which the death sentence of the accused Govindacahamy was commuted.

In a Facebook post, he said: "The Supreme Court has grievously erred by law by not holding Govindachamy guilty of murder."

The Supreme Court had on Thursday quashed Govindachamy's death penalty, but upheld life imprisonment for raping 23-year-old Soumya on 1 February, 2011.

The death penalty had been imposed by a fast track court in Thrissur, which was later upheld by the Kerala High Court.

The apex court had found that there was no intention on the part of the accused to kill the victim on Thursday.

It held that since it has not been proved that the accused had intention to kill, he cannot be held guilty of murder.

"What the court has overlooked is that Section 300 IPC, which defines murder, has 4 parts and only the first part requires intention to kill," Katju said.

"If any of the other 3 parts are established, it will be murder even if there was no inention to kill," the former Press Council Chairman stated.

Katju said it was "regrettable" that the court has not read Section 300 carefully.

"The judgement needs to be reviewed in an open court hearing," he said.
Maharashtra wants to skill its younger population by opting for a novel method: Make English and Mathematics optional for students who are weak in those subjects. This is how it goes, at least according to the "personal views" of the states education minister, Vinod Tawde.

It should be compulsory only till the eighth standard. And after that it should be optional only for those students who have proven to be academically weak in those subjects. For this, the academic performance from standard V-VIII will be analysed. And if it becomes absolutely clear that the student cannot improve his performance then that option should be there. Such students can later choose arts stream in college and pursue their interests. Having said that, nothing changes for those students who do not want to avail of this option, Tawde said.

This was his clarification, and it was not much different from what he had said earlier in Pune.

"We have done a statewide survey on failure in the tenth standard examinations. I have got the last five years' data of all schools. The survey reveals that maximum number of failures are in Mathematics and English. Sometimes, failure in these subjects lead students to take their lives. It's a serious issue. We are considering a policy decision on whether these subjects can be made optional for tenth standard students," Tawde said.

There is, thus, a contemplation that diluting standards by weakening the syllabus is the best way to get students ahead in their lives. This, even as parents struggle and move their children from Marathi medium to English, wanting to open up the world linked by the worldwide web in a manner that the language was essential to connect. In fact, with the love for Marathi, theres a dislike for English.

In March this year, this was what was stated by the same gentleman, as per a report in the Indian Express: The State Education Minister Vinod Tawde on Monday said that new English-medium schools would not be sanctioned in areas where Marathi-medium schools were suffering. He said Marathi-medium schools were losing their hold and making way for English-medium schools in most parts of Maharashtra.

Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis had told the visiting minister for skill development, Rajiv Pratap Rudy, as recently as 11 September that the state was striving to see that no student fails in the tenth class exam by creating a certificate as passed and fit for skills for those who either score low or are not able to clear their examinations.

It means lowering the bar in a country where students cannot read or write  including Marathi  at a third standard level when in higher classes, or are unable to do simple math sums.

Of course this debility is not limited to Maharashtra, as the 10th Annual Status of Education Report (ASER 2014) showed the abysmal standards of the students. Half of them could not read what they had learnt earlier, even if it were just a year prior. It is not that half the students in schools are dunces, but something is seriously wrong with the system where teaching methods could also be devastatingly erroneous.

When the possibility of diluting the standards despite the demand for English medium education is on the rise, year upon year, with English and arithmetic becoming optional, and no one being allowed to fail by lowering the bar, one ought to call for serious analysis and remedies that enhance skills, not lower the bar. The moves, if they fructify, are more likely to produce less skilled than those the government thinks are skilled. A new crisis is being stoked.

Tawde assures that experts would be consulted, which the state better, and that the idea was in an initial stage".

"We will form an education experts committee for opinions on whether it will be feasible or not. We have also told them to come up with alternate optional subjects in place of English and Mathematics. We want to make an easier exam system for low-performing students," Tawde said.

We havent heard anything about special help to pull up the low-performers to acceptable levels, by focusing on quality of teaching.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday held talks with his Nepal counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal, also known as Prachanda, on key issues including the political process in the Himalayan nation and ways to strengthen ties.

Fresh impetus to Nepal's development. Leaders witness signing of agreements on roads & reconstruction pjcts pic.twitter.com/OnH7YDgNCC  Vikas Swarup (@MEAIndia) September 16, 2016

Prachanda, who arrived on Thursday on a four-day visit, was earlier given a ceremonial welcome at the forecourt of Rashtrapati Bhavan. The two sides reviewed the full spectrum of relations during delegation level talks at Hyderabad House here, External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup tweeted.

Reviewing the full spectrum of #IndiaNepal relations.

Both PMs lead delegation level talks at Hyderabad House pic.twitter.com/shvn67t40V  Vikas Swarup (@MEAIndia) September 16, 2016

"Our friendship is time-tested & unique.We share our burden during difficult times,just as we celebrate each others achievements," he said. He said that as neighbours the focus should be on peace, stability and eco-prosperity.

PM:As immediate neighbours& close friendly nations,peace, stability,&eco prosperity of Nepal is our shared objective pic.twitter.com/qUanlDsivz  Vikas Swarup (@MEAIndia) September 16, 2016

Modi also complimented Prachanda on "strengthening democratic institutions in Nepal."

PM:Commend role you've personally played in strengthening democratic institutions in Nepal. Wish you every success pic.twitter.com/JlbWAPXEB4  Vikas Swarup (@MEAIndia) September 16, 2016

The Prime Minister also spoke about security in both the countries and development projects.

PM: PM and I have also agreed to focus on close monitoring and time bound completion of all development projects. pic.twitter.com/aQmR1OGokh  Vikas Swarup (@MEAIndia) September 16, 2016

External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj also called on Prachanda, who was elected as premier for the second time last month, at the Rashtrapati Bhavan.

"Infusing fresh energy into a special relationship. PM @narendramodi receives Nepal PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda," Swarup tweeted, along with a picture of the leaders shaking hands.

Infusing fresh energy into a special relationship. PM @narendramodi receives Nepal PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda pic.twitter.com/GNDGPjXPGw  Vikas Swarup (@MEAIndia) September 16, 2016

On Thursday, the government said that Nepal's Constitution making process was an "internal issue" which the Nepalese citizens will decide and that India has never been "prescriptive".

Addressing the Nepalese diaspora at an event, Prachanda said the top focus of the new dispensation led by him was to create the "right atmosphere" before the implementation of the Constitution and pave the way for necessary amendments.

"Till the time we don't take the Tharus, Madhesis and Janjatis into confidence and address their legitimate demands, the atmosphere cannot be created for implementation of the new Constitution," he had said.

With inputs from PTI
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Reports suggest that the strike called by various organisations representing farmers, traders and transporters in Tamil Nadu got mixed response. While schools and shops remained closed, public transport, government offices and banks are operating as usual. Cadres of some political parties trying to stop trains in some places were taken into custody by the police, reported IANS. Heavy security has been deployed at the karnatak-Tamil Nadu border.

The DMK workers staged a protest in front of the Egmore railway station over Cauvery water dispute. DMK leader Kanimozhi was also present. According to Times Now, MK Stalin has been taken in preventive custody. Paramilitary forces have been deployed in the state.

Chennai: DMK leader Kanimozhi, who was protesting along with other party workers over #Cauvery water dispute row, detained by police.

DMK leader Kanimozhi, who was protesting along with the other party workers, has also been detained in Chennai.

Barring the ruling AIADMK party, all other major political parties have extended their support. DMK leader MK Stalin tried to hold protest in Egmore Railway Station and was taken into custody by the police. Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi was taken into custody.

#TamilNaduBandh DMK leader MK Stalin detained in Chennai while MDMK Chief Vaiko detained in Tiruchirappalli during protest ovr #CauveryIssue

Apart from MK Stalin and Kanimozhi, police detained MDMK leader Vaiko. Speaking to the media, Vaiko said the BJP-led central government is also adopting the same policy like the earlier Congress government when it comes to the Cauvery river water sharing issue, according IANS.

Members of the Karnataka Rakshana Vedike were detained by police after they staged a protest over Cauvery water.

#FLASH Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa orders to release water from Mettur Dam from 20th September for Samba cultivation.

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa orders to release water from Mettur Dam from September 20 for Samba cultivation.

Several establishments remained shut in Coimbatore, Tirupur and Nilgiris districts, affecting normal life, in response to the bandh call.

About 20,000 small and medium scale units in and around Chennai and over 30,000 garment factories in the textile hub of Tirupur also extended support to the bandh and downed shutters, according to PTI.

Chennai: A dawn-to-dusk bandh called by several farmers and traders bodies over the raging Cauvery dispute began on Friday across Tamil Nadu amid tight security with Opposition parties, including the DMK, supporting it.

As those who had given the bandh call have said a series of protests, including "road and rail roko", will be held, thousands of police personnel have been deployed across the state to maintain law and order.

Police said tight vigil was being maintained and no attempts to mar public peace or disruption of free movement of transportation  on road or rail  would be allowed. Several local grocery shops, which usually open by daybreak, remained shut in view of the protests.

State transport corporation-run buses besides trains are being operated as usual though autos, taxis and commercial freight operators remained off the roads.

The bandh has been called in protest against the violence targeting Tamils in Karnataka and also to seek Cauvery water for the state.

Barring the ruling AIADMK, its allies and trade unions affiliated, all other Opposition parties, including the DMK, Tamil Nadu Congress, DMDK, MDMK, Left parties and the PMK, are supporting the bandh.

Thousands of police personnel, including armed reserve forces, have been deployed in Tamil Nadu and in Chennai over 15,000 policemen are on duty.

Protection was being provided for Karnataka-related business establishments, schools, institutions and areas where Kannada speaking people live, including Krishnagiri district.

With inputs from PTI
A dawn-to-dusk bandh called by several farmers' and traders' bodies over the raging Cauvery dispute began on Friday across Tamil Nadu amid tight security with Opposition parties, including the DMK, supporting it.

As those who had given the bandh call have said a series of protests, including "road and rail roko", will be held, thousands of police personnel were deployed across the state to maintain law and order.

Police said tight vigil was being maintained and no attempts to mar public peace or disruption of free movement of transportation  on road or rail  would be allowed. Several local grocery shops, which usually open by daybreak, remained shut in view of the protests.

State transport corporation-run buses besides trains are being operated as usual though autos, taxis and commercial freight operators remained off the roads.

The bandh has been called in protest against the violence targetting Tamils in Karnataka and also to seek Cauvery water for the state.

Barring the ruling AIADMK, its allies and trade unions affiliated, all other Opposition parties, including the DMK, Tamil Nadu Congress, DMDK, MDMK, Left parties and the PMK, supported the bandh.

Chennai: DMK workers stage protest over #Cauvery water dispute row, DMK leader Kanimozhi also present pic.twitter.com/8B4qNYE2Fh  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

Schools, business remain shut

Several establishments remained shut in Coimbatore, Tirupur and Nilgiris districts, affecting normal life, in response to the bandh call. About 20,000 small and medium scale units in and around Chennai and over 30,000 garment factories in the textile hub of Tirupur also extended support to the bandh and downed shutters, according to reports.

Thousands of police personnel, including armed reserve forces, have been deployed in Tamil Nadu and in Chennai over 15,000 policemen are on duty.

Protection was being provided for Karnataka-related business establishments, schools, institutions and areas where Kannada speaking people live, including Krishnagiri district.

#TamilNaduBandh disrupts normal life, vehicles off road, shops remain closed (Visuals from Coimbatore) pic.twitter.com/7oBPR1pRD5  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

Meanwhile, a youth who had set himself on fire over the Cauvery issue on Thursday, succumbed to injuries, police said. The activist belonging to Naam Tamizhar Katchi had suffered over 90 percent burns and died Friday morning.

"We were giving him all possible treatment. However, he suffered a cardiac arrest and despite our best efforts, he could not be revived," a senior hospital official told PTI.

Opposition leaders detained

DMK leaders MK Stalin and Kanimozhi were among the several leaders detained on Friday while staging protests in support of the bandh.

DMK's MK Stalin detained. PTIDMK party leader MK Stalin detained

#TamilNaduBandh DMK leader MK Stalin detained in Chennai while MDMK Chief Vaiko detained in Tiruchirappalli during protest ovr #CauveryIssue  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

Bengaluru: KRV protest against release of Cauvery water, protesters detained by police #CauveryProtests pic.twitter.com/AV0FdlyRGd  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

In Chennai, DMK treasurer Stalin led a rally from Rajarathinam stadium to Egmore Railway station. He then squatted in front of the railway terminal along with hundreds of party workers after his attempt to stage a rail roko was foiled by police, who detained him along with other party protesters.

DMK Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi, who staged a road roko on arterial Anna Salai along with DMK supporters, was later detained by police in a marriage hall. She has sought convening of an all-party meeting over the Cauvery issue.

In Coimbatore, senior leaders of various political parties, including the DMK and the MDMK and farmers associations were arrested while trying to stage rail roko near railway stations and road blockade.

The bandh did not affect functioning of state and central government offices in Tamil Nadu, which remained open.

While state transport corporation-run buses besides trains are operating as usual, some auto rickshaws, taxis and commercial freight operators stayed off the roads. Farmers' leader PR Pandian also took part in protests with farmers of various organisations.

VCK Chief Thol Thirumavalavan, who staged a rail roko with his supporters by blocking an express train, was detained by police near Basin Bridge in Chennai.

Meanwhile, DMDK leaders and party workers led by party leader Premalatha Vijaykanth, went on a fast at the party headquarters in the state capital. They held placards and raised slogans against the Centre and Tamil Nadu and Karnataka governments.

They condemned the violence against Tamils in Karnataka and sought protection for them.

In Tiruchirapalli, MDMK supremo Vaiko courted arrest while trying to block trains.

#TamilNaduBandh MDMK Chief Vaiko detained in Tiruchirappalli during protest over #CauveryIssuepic.twitter.com/OzxIAksftw

Large-scale demonstrations were witnessed in Thanjavur and the Cauvery delta region by VCK, MDMK and Left parties.

In Puducherry, an effigy of Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah was burnt outside the bus terminal by some agitators, however, the situation was brought under control by the police. A Puducherry Road Transport Corporation was stoned on Vazhudavoor road, following which it was brought to the shed. No passenger was injured, police said.

The BJP workers took out a procession and raised slogans, condemning the attack on Tamils in Karnataka and staged a picketing near the bus stand.

The party's local unit president V Saminathan told reporters that the Karnataka government had "failed" to protect Tamils and their properties.

Police said attendance in government offices was normal and government schools too functioned.

Police patrolling was intensified and all vulnerable areas were taken care of, a senior police officer said.

CM Jayalalithaa orders water release from Mettur dam

With Mettur Dam witnessing steady inflows following Karnataka's release of water from the Cauvery river, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa on Friday ordered opening its sluice gates for irrigating samba crops in the delta districts.

"To enable farmers take up samba cultivation, I have directed release of water from Mettur Dam from 20 September, 2016," she said.

The government decision to release water was based on factors like the dam touching 84.76 feet (capacity 120 ft), likelihood of receiving more water from Karnataka reservoirs in view of the Supreme Court order, the Cauvery Supervisory Committee's expected decision on quantum of water for her state and an anticipated normal north east monsoon, she said.

Tamil Nadu has received 8.92 tmcft of water till 14 September at Biligundulu, the designated entry point, with Karnataka releasing water following the apex court order, Jayalalithaa said in a statement.

She recalled that the 2007 final award of the Cauvery disputes tribunal was published in a central gazette in 2013 after a Supreme Court order, and blamed the Centre for not constituting the Cauvery Management Board and Cauvery Water Regulation Committee.

Since the Centre has not constituted these, "We are in a situation of approaching the Supreme Court to receive our share of water from Cauvery," she said, reported PTI.

The state government had earlier moved the Supreme Court seeking a direction to Karnataka to release 50 tmcft of water from Cauvery.

The court had initially directed Karnataka to release 15,000 cusecs of water for 10 days, but later modified it's order, and asked the upper riparian state to release 12,000 cusecs of water till 20 September.

With inputs from PTI
Tamil Nadu witnessed a dawn-to-dusk bandh over the Cauvery issue, with various politicians, farmers and traders bodies joining the agitation. There were demonstrations, road and rail rokos and protests to voice out indignation against violence targeted against Tamils in Karnataka.

Barring the ruling AIADMK, its allies and trade unions affiliated, all other Opposition parties, including the DMK, Tamil Nadu Congress, DMDK, MDMK, Left parties and the PMK, supported the bandh. Over 15,000 police personnel were on duty to ensure that the protests were peaceful, but many wondered whether the protests led to tangible results. On the other hand, others commended the peaceful nature of the protests. The death of a 24-year-old youth who had set himself on fire over the Cauvery issue also added to the tensions. Heres how social media reacted to the bandh.

KA trucks and cars in Chennai are being followed by Tamilnadu cops for security. Thanks TN police  #TamilNaduBandh  Avinav Beloor (@avinavb) September 15, 2016

I support #TamilNaduBandh as much as anyone.We should support to our farmers &people,those who live in karnataka. 90% Of people participates  Angel D'costa (@SnvVaibhav) September 16, 2016

Its an example of firm protest. Almost all shops are closed and private transportation is abandoned but no harm to public. #TamilNaduBandh  Er. Soumojit Dey (@djsoumo) September 16, 2016

If shutting down a state for a day solves the water crisis, shut it down for an entire month to resolve all other crises #TamilNaduBandh  Infidel, Ph.D. (@aimwand) September 16, 2016

Safe and peaceful bandh right on face of KA CM who failed to protect tamils and their vehicles at KA #TAMILNADU #TamilNaduBandh  senthil (@Senthil557) September 16, 2016

#TamilNaduBandh Peaceful demonstration all over the state. TN showing how to conduct a peaceful protest. Kudos to TN ppl, police n govt  . (@MrUthaman) September 16, 2016

So #TamilNaduBandh is not disrupting life too much. Good. Kanimozhi told @anna_isaac it's a peaceful protest  Dhanya Rajendran (@dhanyarajendran) September 16, 2016

#TamilNaduBandh situation is peaceful.

Bus r plying.No violent protest or bus burning issues. Some state must learn a lot from #TamilNadu  Saf. (@RehneDeYar) September 16, 2016

Many applauded the police's efforts to ensure that peace prevailed.

#TamilNaduBandh Over 15,000 police personnell is on duty. A big salute for those who safeguard citizens  Makhan Singh (@makhanBrar11) September 16, 2016

Deployed 90% police men across #TamilNaduBandh It's called protection & other state govt should learn it from here ,No common ppl affected  Ravindar (@ravindarmedia) September 16, 2016

Naam Tamizhar Katchi's member's self-immolation caused some discomfort amidst the protests.

Naam Tamil Katchi has officially released pictures of one of its carder setting himself ablaze. What are they trying to do? #TamilNaduBandh  Shabbir Ahmed (@Ahmedshabbir20) September 16, 2016

It was only natural that people would move to this direction with rampant bandhs these days.
The Congress on Friday lost its government in Arunachal Pradesh when 43 of its MLAs led by Chief Minister Pema Khandu defected wholesale barring former chief minister Nabam Tuki and merged with the People's Party of Arunachal, just two months after it had regained power.

Khandu, who had replaced Nabam Tuki following a dissident campaign in July, paraded 42 MLAs before Assembly Speaker Tenzing Norbu Thongdok, who accepted their joining the PPA, Assembly sources said.

The merger would be notified in the Assembly bulletin, formalising the political development that leaves Congress with governments only in Manipur, Meghalaya and Mizoram in the North East.

The dramatic development in Arunachal Pradesh brought back memories of the famous 'aya ram, gaya ram' episode involving Bhajan Lal who was heading a Janata Party government in Haryana and defected lock, stock, and barrel with all the party MLAs to the Congress after Indira Gandhi came back to power in 1980.

Tuki was the only Congress MLA who did not join PPA, a constituent of the North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA) which was formed on 24 May in Guwahati.

Khandu on 16 July had become the chief minister after months of political turmoil that unseated Tuki, who himself was reinstated as chief minister by the apex court only two days before.

In a House of 60, the Congress had 44 MLAs with one seat falling vacant after former chief minister Kalikho Pul committed suicide on 9 August, while the BJP has 11 members including two Independents.

The status of two Congress MLAs is yet to be decided as they put in their papers before the recent series of political developments that led to first Tuki government falling in January this year, imposition of President's rule and installation of the late Pul government on 19 February for a short span.

Pul was forced to resign in 13 July following a Supreme Court judgement. On 3 March last, Pul along with 29 Congress MLAs joined the PPA.

PPA chairman Kameng Ringu termed the development as a "homecoming" after a short temporary self exile of the party.

Asked for the reasons behind the development, Deputy Chief Minister Chowna Mein said that for a resource-starved state like Arunachal, it is necessary to be with a bigger party to get more development funds from the Centre.

However, Tuki, who was out of the station, could not be contacted for his comments.

The PPA had ruled the state for a brief period from 3 March to 13 July this year under late Pul. Earlier the PPA had formed the government in 1979 when Tomo Riba was the chief minister.

Riba, who took oath on 18 September, 1979, ruled the state for 46 days before being deposed on 3 November, the same year.

Meanwhile, state BJP president Tapir Gao, while welcoming Khandu's move, stated that the decision should have been taken earlier.

"We are happy that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's dream of a 'Congress-mukt Bharat' is becoming a reality now," Gao said.

While blaming the Congress high command for the mess in the party, Gao said party president Sonia Gandhi and Vice President Rahul Gandhi should have taken care of this.

Asked about the possibility of PPA MLAs merging with the BJP, Gao said the party's door was open.

Meanwhile, the Congress blamed the BJP for the unfolding fiasco in Arunachal Pradesh.

The Congress on Friday accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP of "foul play" and committing a "fraud on democracy" after Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu along with 42 Congress MLAs quit the party and joined Peoples Party of Arunachal (PPA).

"Modi's and BJP's (Bharatiya Janata Party) foul play and fraud on democracy has come to a full circle in Arunachal Pradesh today," Congress spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala told reporters in New Delhi.

"PPA is the illegitimate child of the BJP's diabolical design to decimate democracy," he alleged.

"Mandate of the people of the border state of Arunachal has been robbed in broad day light," Surjewala said.

The Congress leader's remarks came after Pema Khandu and 42 Congress MLAs defected to the PPA, an ally of the BJP in the state.

"The gross and rampant misuse of money power finally delivered an immoral government of opportunists and turncoats," Surjewala said.

He also said "Sadly the architects of extinguishing and murdering the very spirit of democracy and constitutionalism, are Prime Minister (Narendra) Modi and (BJP national president) Amit Shah who rode to power on the promise of cooperative federalism."

"Having been thwarted twice, BJP began by engineering defections, inducements, threats etc to subvert people's mandate," the Congress leader said, adding, "They sacrificed a former Chief Minister and Governor, who enjoyed their patronage."

"BJP government has annihilated the soul of constitutional supremacy," he added.

Surjewala also said that the "prodigal sons of Congress" who have jumped ship have made "massive ideological and political blunder and compromise".

"They have also destroyed trust of people of Arunachal Pradesh, who voted for them as candidates of Congress. Such politics, as we are seeing in Arunachal Pradesh, is neither tenable nor credible," the Congress leader added.

With inputs from PTI and IANS
Itanagar: Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu on Friday said that the decision of 43 Congress MLAs to join Peoples' Party of Arunachal, the lone regional party of the state, was in the interest of the state and the people.

"It is an undeniable fact that for a resource-stressed state like Arunachal it has to depend on the Centre for all its needs. It is difficult to make things done at the Centre with political difference," he told reporters during a press conference on Friday.

He said the decision to join the PPA was "conscious and unanimous" as most of the MLAs expressed their views in a meeting convened in the morning that to get more development funds from the Centre, it was imperative to go for a change. Keeping in view how to bring development to the state keeping the regional flavour and sentiments of the people and their aspirations, we have decided to join the PPA," Khandu said.

He said the state as on date had inherited a cumulative deficit of about Rs 3,700 crore out of which liabilities of about Rs 1,200 crore had been cleared out of the resources meant for 2016-17. "The present circumstances do not give us any space to

overcome the burden of finances we had inherited for which a decision in the larger interest of the state was compelling," he said.

"PPA being an alliance partner of North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA), a conglomeration of BJP and other regional political parties of the North East, we will develop a mechanism on how to get more development funds from the Centre," he said.

When asked if the decision to join PPA was to get more developmental funds from the Centre then why the MLAs did not merge with the BJP, the major ally of the NDA, Khandu said that the aspirations of the people of the state were very high.

He said that he had talked to former chief minister Nabam Tuki who is still with the Congress about the development. He said that Speaker Tenzing Norbu Thongdok had accepted the 43 MLAs' switch-over to the PPA and accordingly notified in the Bulletin Part-II of the Assembly.
German sociologist Robert Michels in his book Political Parties published in 1911, expounded a fascinating concept that fits well with the politics of AAP in 2016. Michels who gave the concept of iron law of oligarchy held that regardless of their exemplary democratic beginning, all complex organisations eventually develop into "oligarchies", which are usually detached from the masses.

AAP at its formation claimed to be antithesis of this concept. It announced the arrival of a party that was there for the people, the common man.

Eminent political scientist Neera Chandhoke in an article published in The Hindu on Friday remarked, "The Aam Aadmi Partys (AAP) strategies of connecting with citizens, particularly in the slums of Delhi, put into practice the wisdom of democratic theory: that the task of a party is to arouse political awareness by means other than the dishonourable politics of identity, evoke critical evaluations of power and its misuse, and enable the articulation of everyday needs and aspirations."

AAP created this hope that it would help in "articulating the needs and aspirations of common people" by projecting itself as a party with a difference and it helped AAP greatly in achieving the landslide victory in Delhi assembly elections.

That the new government that people of Delhi had voted for so decisively and wholeheartedly would come to their rescue in the times of disasters and distress, was one of the hopes that Delhiites had from AAP. But today the people of Delhi who helped Arvind Kejriwal and AAP achieve their political ambitions are now grappling with a grave health hazard in the form of chikungunya and dengue. A considerate approach from the top brass of the AAP to ease the sufferings of the people is simply missing. Whatever the party or the government is doing now is largely a face saver rather than an effective management of the crisis.

Pictures of Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia holidaying in Finland were shown by Times Now.

Why and how AAP, a party of common man got drifted so faraway from its people?

The transformation of AAP from "servants of masses" to "leadership class" is disappointing because of the fact that its formation belied a claim of change, of being different, of being a party with a difference. The way AAP has co-opted and adjusted with the long-settled paradigm in which political parties operate defies the very logic and circumstances of its birth.

Writing in Firstpost, eminent Indian psychoanalyst and author in the fields of cultural psychology and the psychology of religion Sudhir Kakar said, "The dilemma for the AAP is then either to temper the militancy of its idealism or to persist with its moral fervour, which can descend into a chaotic permanent revolution with violent overtones. In both cases, some loss of support will be inevitable. To become like other parties with a moral facade which people see through but still vote for because of reasons other than idealism is not an option. Establishing a connection to ones moral self was AAPs psychological offering and the reason why many, especially among youth, embraced the party. Unlike supporters of other political parties, where the psychological connection to the leaders and the ideology of the party is weak and superficial, where most leaders are affectionately regarded as hypocrites, if not rogues, the connection to AAP and its leadership involved an idealisation that has roots in deeper layers of the psyche. And here lies the danger. The rage unleashed by the loss of connection to ones own moral self and the betrayal of idealisations could decimate the party."

"These processes may be slow but they are relentless," he concluded. Rightly.
Former Maharashtra deputy chief minister and NCP senior leader Ajit Pawar, in an exclusive interview with Firstpost, pointed out that he has not doing wrong in irrigation project, stating that everything has been within the guidelines and by the book. The investigation is still underway and Pawar is quite positive about the results. He noted that the truth will be revealed and that he is not afraid of arrest should he be found guilty of any wrongdoing.

Over the course of the rest of this 30-minute interview, he criticised Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis' style of functioning and attributes the woes suffered by the state in the past two years to the chief minister's inexperience. Pawar also attacked on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's 'false dream' of Acche Din. The nephew of NCP supremo Sharad Pawar said that it's because of Modi and former chief minister Prithviraj Chavan's errors that the Congress and NCP sit in the Opposition in the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly. Elsewhere in the course of the conversation, Pawar admitted that he isn't a fan of social media and trusts the people are Maharashtra to know the whole truth about Modi and Fadnavis. Edited excerpts follow:

The next five months will see elections for 215 municipal councils and 10 municipal corporations. Will the NCP tie-up with Congress or go it alone?

A formula for the elections was decided by both parties in the past. Under this, the NCP holds two MLC seats and the Congress will have one. But the deputy chairman's post will be provided to the Congress. We fulfilled our promise to the Congress. But for the forthcoming municipal council and BMC elections, the NCP and Congress have had the first round of discussions. The second round of discussions is due to take place after Ganeshotsav. But the logic and formula will be that whichever party wins the seat, will get first preference.

Recently, senior NCP leader Praful Patel attacked on former chief minister Prithviraj Chavan's style of functioning. What is your take on it?

Look at the current BJP and Shiv Sena alliance government and how they talk about each other. In the Kalyan-Dombivali Municipal Corporation election campaign, they both attacked each other below the belt. But, we saw the result. Despite all of that, when it came to the BMC, they came together to rule. Everyday, the Shiv Sena warns the Fadnavis-led government that the chief minister's decisions have not been good for the common man. But the Sena didnt dare to withdraw the support to the government.

Sometimes, senior Congress leaders attack us too. But that's just the style of functioning of political parties. It happens. Prafullji is our senior national leader, he has spoken from his perspective. But our main focus is to sideline the Shiv Sena and BJP, who are jaatiwadi (casteist) parties. They destroy the unity of society. And so, to avoid damage to society, we always tie-up with the Congress. The main problems arise in districts where the Congress and NCP fight against each. Their karykartas dont want an alliance. We also give them (karyakartas) the freedom to take appropriate decisions.

Has Chavan's style of functioning damaged the NCP or you, personally?

I dont want to discuss the past. So many things have happened. In the last government, some mistakes were made. These mistakes damaged the Congress-NCP government and our party too. The government is to be blamed for its lack of speed in decision-making. Senior ministers have repeatedly made mistakes and as a result of that, today, we are sitting in the Opposition. I don't want to take any names, but of course, the party has suffered damage. But now, we've decided to leave the past in the past and to concentrate on stopping the BJP government that is presently in power.

Chavan has been maintaining good relations with the Shiv Sena, but he has always been thinking about cutting the NCP down to size. What is your understanding of this situation?

I dont think the Congress high command had given directions to Chavan to cut the NCP down to size. I have heard that he has a good rapport with the Shiv Sena. In the past 15 years, the Congress and NCP have been together in government. But then a string of chief ministers like Vilasrao Deshmukh, Sushilkumar Shinde, Deshmukh again and then Ashok Chavan ran the government. But, we had no problem with any of them and no complaints against them. It was only the last government (the one led by Prithviraj Chavan) in which something went wrong. Everyone has his or her own style of functioning. It's just that some mistakes led to us having to sit in the Opposition. In future, we won't not repeat these mistakes. I hope not.

Chavan will answer Patel's allegation in a day or two. What do you think he's going to say?

How can I comment before Chavan has spoken? Let him speak first, then we will see. But we've made our stand and policy known clearly on numerous occasions. Personally, I am not afraid.

How is your relationship with Chavan?

Whenever We met as part of a delegation, we stuck to our respective party lines. His party is different from mine. Also, there has been no personal communication, since Chavan's districts are different and we are both busy strengthening our own parties.

There is an ACB inquiry into the Rs 70,000-crore irrigation project underway. Did you support the investigation?

I'm aware that the ACB inquiry is going on. I personally assure you that I did nothing wrong. Whatever decisions we took in the capacity of ministers, were within the guidelines and by the book. We are fully cooperating with the investigating team.

I don't want to take any names, but of course, the party has suffered damage. But now, we've decided to leave the past in the past and to concentrate on stopping the BJP government that is presently in power

Are you afraid of arrest?

The matter is subjudice and an inquiry is ongoing. We are ready to face any inquiry and I am not afraid of anything. We did nothing wrong. The corruption allegations are baseless and they were only politically-motivated. So I can't say any more on this issue. I will offer no comment on the ACB inquiry.

Has law and order collapsed in the state?

The current government is not protecting our police force. The law and order situation has totally collapsed. There have been repeated attacks on the police and in some incidents, policemen have lost their lives. This is the sort of weak government that the people of Maharashtra have not seen before. The government failed.

Would you agree that there is no control of the administration at present?

Without the concerned minister and chief minister's approval, not a single draft can be uploaded. When the issue boomerangs on the government, the government will make an officer the scapegoat. This is a total failure.

Do you think a full-time home minister is needed?

In the government, it's the chief minister's decision as to who holds the home ministry portfolio. I dont want to weigh in on this discussion. Whether full-time or part-time, our main demand is that whosoever is in charge of the home ministry, should be capable of running the department. Nobody will then dare to attack the police force. An appropriate home minister can make the state police the strongest in the country. But in the past two years, attacks on the police have increased. Someone must take responsibility for this.

But it's not just this. In every segment, people are unhappy with this BJP government. Women, Dalits, farmers and students everywhere will tell you how the government failed to protect their security. Is this governance?

The education department is in a complete mess. Now they are thinking of meddling with Maths and English?

It's total madness by the government. We all complete our study from schools and colleges. We had English and Maths. But the current education minister has pulled out this 'great' idea to drop Maths and English for failed students. As a minister, he takes a decision based on consultations with experts from this field. But no one can fathom changing English and Maths. It's total madness by the education minister and government.

Fadnavis directly became chief minister. He has no other experience of government... Only someone with that experience can understand the style of functioning of a government.

Fadnavis is taking action against BJP leaders like Eknath Khadse, Pankaja Munde and Vinod Tawde too. Are his actions prejudiced?

It's an internal BJP matter. I am not interested in what the chief minister does with his own ministers. But yes, there is some buzz that every minister in the government is unhappy.

Your close supporter from Pune, MLA Laxman Jagtap has joined the BJP and Mahesh Landage seems to be on his way to the BJP. Whata are your thoughts?

There is no loyalty in any party. One-time allies leave us and join the BJP, but when we come to power, you see their situation. People also known that who is coming in party for what goal. But its short term goal. They always change the colours. Some people are salute the Sun who is upcoming.

Are you a chief ministerial candidate for 2019?

Prime Minister Narendra Modi showed the false dream of Acche Din to Indians. We have all seen what happened. I am not one to show false dreams to anyone. We are in 2016 and the Assembly election is in 2019. People mandated us to sit in Opposition. Now I am focusing on what the Opposition's role should be. So discussing the possibility of me as chief minister is pointless.

Will the BJP once again win the municipal council elections?

The people who brought the BJP to power at the Centre and the state are totally helpless. The promise of Acche Din was also broken by the prime minister. But, voters Know everything. So let's see what they think about the BJP government.

Women, Dalits, farmers and students everywhere will tell you how the government failed to protect their security. Is this governance?

How would you rate the chief minister's performance so far?

Fadnavis directly became chief minister. He has no other experience of government. In the past, only Manohar Joshi directly became chief minister, but apart from him, all other chief ministers had worked as state ministers or cabinet ministers. So, only someone with that experience can understand the style of functioning of a government.

Will Fadnavis complete his five-year term as chief minister?

Fadnavis' future is in the hands of Modi and BJP president Amit Shah. So as long as they want Fadnavis as chief minister, he will continue to be chief minister. At present, he has the strong support of both of them.

These days Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIN etc are being used effectively by politicians to communicate with their electorate. What is your take on social media?

Social media is not always a good thing. It's a double-edged sword since it could boomerang at any time on anyone. The chief minister and prime minister have both faced social media anger on separate instances.
Banda: Rahul Gandhi on Friday accused the Uttar Pradesh government of failure to lend support to improve situation in the Bundelkhand region, which has been battling continuous drought. "The requirement in Bundelkhand is different and it needs to be addressed differently," he said at a 'khat sabha'.

Rahul recalled that the Congress-led UPA government had given a special package to the area, but the SP government in Uttar Pradesh did not lend support to improve the situation in the region. The Congress vice president was speaking in course of his 'Deoria to Dilli kisan yatra' in Bundelkhand region, which has been facing continuous drought.

Attacking the Narendra Modi-led Central government on the much-debated Land Acquisition Act, the Congress leader said the UPA government had brought the bill on land acquisition by talking to all stakeholders, which was in the interest of farmers.

"But Modi had tried to make it (the bill) ineffective to help those who are responsible for committing maximum corruption in the country," he said.

"When we were in the government, we talked about roads and education...," Rahul said, adding that though BJP and other parties raised questions on the issue of loan waiver of farmers, the UPA government went ahead in announcing Rs 60,000 crore package to provide relief to the farming community by waiving loans of small and marginal farmers.

During his visit ahead of the 2017 Uttar Pradesh Assembly election, Rahul met family members of freedom fighter Vishweshwar Bajpai in Badausa and had lunch with them. The Congress vice president also offered prayers at the Kamtanath temple before embarking on the Kisan Yatra.

A woman asked Rahul at the 'khat sabha' held in Poddar Inter College in Sitapur about his promise of "karz maaf aur bijli half" (loan waiver and half power rates) alleging the region was not even getting four hours of power supply, to which he said Congress was neither in power at the Centre nor in UP.

However, his reply apparently failed to satisfy the woman. Meanwhile, Rahul visited Rabbani Madarsa and held a road show at Amar Talkies crossing, where he garlanded a statue of late prime minister Indira Gandhi. He later spoke to anganwadi workers and assured them that he would raise their demand regarding wage hike in Lok Sabha.
Lucknow: Locked in a turf battle with his uncle Shivpal Yadav, Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Friday laid bare his angst, saying he "felt bad" after being removed as Samajwadi Party state president and demanded that he be given a say in ticket distribution for the 2017 Assembly election.

Akhilesh said he has rejected the resignation of Shivpal and he will comply with his father and party supremo Mulayam Singh's Yadav direction to reinduct sacked Mining Minister Gayatri Prajapati, adding that "Netaji will find a solution (to the current crisis) and everyone will accept it".

The feud in the Yadav family had spilled into the open after the Chief Minister stripped Shivpal of key ministerial portfolios on September 13, hours after he was replaced with Shivpal as the party's state unit chief by Mulayam. In a dramatic development, Shivpal resigned from all party and Cabinet posts last night.

"I felt bad and you saw its effect. I'm coming here after a discussion with Netaji (Mulayam). Samajwadi Party is a family and there are no differences in the party," Akhilesh said at India TV's 'Chunav Manch' conclave here.

The Chief Minister rubbished reports that he is behind the feud in the family saying, "It's a fight for the chair. If a good person asks for the CM's post, I am ready to give it up.

"It's election time. We should all come together and work. There is no fight between Ramgopal Yadav, Akhilesh and Shivpal."

Making it clear that he wanted a say in the distribution of tickets in the upcoming state elections, Akhilesh said, "I say I will give back everything but then I will say I should have the authority to distribute tickets. It will be my 'pariskha' (test) in elections."

Apparently attacking SP Rajya Sabha member Amar Singh for fuelling feud in the family, he said, "Everyone understands who is this outsider, even you know that. I have told Netaji that if an outsider comes between us, he will be thrown out."

"Netaji and I have decided that we will not let outsiders drive a wedge between us," he said.

"If there is some issue, Netaji will find a solution and everyone will accept it. Netaji is my father and also his (Shivpal's) brother, he will find a solution to this issue," he said.

"I have said that I take some decisions on instructions of Netaji, I take some decisions on my own," he said.

On Mulayam's announcement of taking back controversial minister Prajapati, Akhilesh said, "It is my responsibility as a son to accept Netaji's decision. I accept Netaji's decision to bring Gayatri Prajapati back into Cabinet."

On removal of Chief Secretary Deepak Singhal, the Chief Minister said, "Uncle knows why he was removed, he should tell this to people."

In reply to a question, Akhilesh said, "The one who is at the top is all alone, is always lonely."

The removal of Singhal and Prajapati was seen as a bone of contention between Shivpal and Akhilesh.
Lucknow: A sense of unease prevailed in the Uttar Pradesh capital on Friday, hours after Samajwadi Party (SP) leader Shivpal Singh Yadav, his son Aditya Yadav and wife Sarla Yadav quit important party posts.

Party Chief Mulayam Singh Yadav has reportedly convened a meeting at the party headquarters here to thrash out a solution on the ongoing power struggle between his son and Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav and his younger brother Shivpal Singh Yadav.

Meanwhile, hundreds of Shivpal Singh's supporters camped outside the 7, Kalidas Marg residence of the former minister, raised anti-Akhilesh Yadav slogans demanding that all departments be restored to their leader.

The protesting supporters said Shivpal should be retained as the state president and that he was humiliated by the Chief Minister.

They demanded that Akhilesh should touch Shivpal's feet as a nephew and say sorry.

Many leaders wept openly and threatened to immolate themselves if their demands were not met.

More than two dozen legislators also met Shivpal Singh Yadav on Friday. Sacked minister Gayatri Prajapati also had a meeting with Shivpal in Lucknow.

While Shivpal quit both party post as well as the state cabinet's, his wife Sarla stepped down as chairperson of the Etawah Cooperative Bank, and son Aditya resigned as Chairman of PCF (Uttar Pradesh Cooperative Federation Ltd.) on Thursday.

The developments were seen as a family feud, as majority of the Yadav clan felt Akhilesh had not only humiliated his uncle and the former PWD minister by stripping him of important portfolios, but also viewed it as a direct challenge to the family patriarch  the SP chief.
"The young do not know enough to be prudent, and therefore they attempt the impossible, and achieve it, generation after generation."said Nobel laureate, Pearl S Buck.

Yes, you just cant come to grips with whats happening in battle-scarred Lucknow at this point of time unless you view things in the correct historical perspective.

Here three relevant examples: First, we all saw how a young Indira Gandhi, who was considered as nothing more than a baby doll by the syndicate lobby consisting of political heavyweights such as K Kamraj, Morarji Desai, S Nijalingappa, Neelam Sanjva Reddy, Atulya Ghosh and SK Patil, emerged victorious after a bitter war within the Congress in the second half of 1960s. The baby doll grew into an iron lady from there on. And now even world-history acknowledges her as one of the strongest prime ministers of all time.

Second, we also saw how an otherwise little-known Narendra Modi came into his own slowly but surely, triumphing over a towering RSS-BJP stalwart, Keshubhai Patel, in the generational transition in Gujarat at the turn of this century. Patel is now irrelevant for all political purposes while Modi rides high globally as, like Indira Gandhi, one of Indias most powerful prime ministers.

And third, we are all aware of the fate of BJPs famous but toothless Marg Darshak Mandal consisting of towering men of yester years  Lal Krishna Advani, Murali Manohar Joshi and Yashwant Sinha. All these big names have been watching helplessly the surface slip away from under their feet in more recent times. Whats perhaps even more bewildering is that there are hardly any tears for them  neither within their party nor in the society as a whole. Perhaps, we have accepted it all as a natural by-product of the generational change. It has happened in the past. Its happening now. And it shall happen in future as well.

Lets now bring back our focus on the on-going developments in the Samajwadi Party in Lucknow. The bechara boy, who had taken over as chief minister of Uttar Pradesh in his 38th year in 2012, seems to have grown into a strong young man with a spine. He has shown that he can not only take decisions but implement them ruthlessly as well.

Remember, Akhilesh was earlier known as the 5th chief minister in his own government, the first four being Mulayam Singh Yadav, Shivpal Singh Yadav, Ram Gopal Yadav and Azam Khan! This perception was based on the fact that Akhilesh was in no position to exercise his mind independently. But now things have changed in the aftermath of the surgical pruning of Chacha Shivpals portfolios.

Developing stories dont call for hurried conclusive judgements. Only time will tell us how and when the fluid scenario would crystallise. But one thing is certain: The older generation, which includes Chacha Shivpal Singh Yadav, will have to cede more elbow-room to Bhatija (nephew) Akhilesh. And as far as the fate of an outsider Amar Singh is concerned, chances are that even Mulayam Singh Yadav may not be able to save him from further disgrace this time.

Political observers arent at a loss to see the new reality in the Yadav clan: While the patriarch, Mulayam Singh, has taken a neutral position, Ram Gopal Yadav, who happens to be the partys face in Delhi, is seen to be backing Akhileshs cause solidly. This means that Chacha Shivpal stands almost alone. And thats why he rushed to resign from the Akhilesh government late last night. The chief minister hasnt accepted his chachas resignation so far. All the dramatis personae in the Yadav family-feud are awaiting the neutral patriarchs final word on the subject. Thus far Netaji has come out with a one-liner: "Akhilesh will obey my commands." But nobody knows what his commandments are. Perhaps, he shall clarify things later.

Its quite ironical that the Samajwadi Party family feud is seen to be paying the party rich political dividends ahead of elections. Yes, the party has been hogging all the limelight during the past four tumultuous days. And there is no stopping the unending debates and discussions in TV studios. It looks as if the Samajwadi Party is the only party that deserves attention. And the Yadav clan is made to look like reigning monarchs of Uttar Pradesh.

Reactions of political adversaries from the Congress, the BSP and the BJP have been consigned to the inside pages. But dont blame media for all this. For, it doesnt make news if a dog bites a man. But when a man bites a dog, its big news. Long live journalism!
On Thursday, 43 Congress MLAs left the party to join the People's Party of Arunachal Pradesh, according to NDTV.

The Indian Express had earlier reported that Chief Minister Pema Khandu, along with two-thirds of party MLAs would jump ship.

NDTV reported Pema Khandu saying, "Have met the Assembly speaker and informed him that they are merging the Congress with the People's Party of Arunachal or PPA."

In the 60-member House with an effective strength of 58, Congress had the support of 47 MLAs, including two Independents, while Opposition BJP has 11 members.

Khandu was sworn in as the ninth chief minister on 17 July after months of political turmoil in the state. In a dramatic turnaround in this land-locked state on 16 July, Congress replaced Nabam Tuki by choosing Khandu as the new Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader, who staked claim to power on the basis of support of 45 party MLAs along with two Independents.

In fast-changing developments, Kalikho Pul, the late rebel-turned chief minister, who was unseated by the Supreme Court, returned to the party fold with 30 dissident MLAs.

Hours ahead of a scheduled floor test in the Assembly, which Tuki was directed by the governor to take, the Congress Legislature Party met and elected Pema, son of late chief minister Dorjee Khandu, as its new leader.

Tuki proposed the name of Khandu while Chowna Mein, sworn in as Deputy Chief Minister, seconded it, which was unanimously accepted by 44 MLAs who were present.

With inputs from PTI
New Delhi: Leaders of Left parties and Dalit outfits attacked the NDA government, claiming a rise in cases of atrocities against community members even as they questioned Prime Minister Narendra Modi over his dispensation's alleged inaction against cow protection groups, on Friday.

Speaking during a rally in New Delhi, the leaders including CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury accused the government of "destroying" the country's social fabric and warned of launching widespread protests over the issue of atrocities against Dalits.

"The protest is to tell the government that the atrocities which have risen sharply against the Dalits in the name of cow vigilantism...on this, action should be taken against the culprits."

"Why are you not banning these cow vigilantism groups? Why are you not giving the rights of equality to Dalits as provided in our Constitution?" Yechury asked during the rally.

Referring to Modi's "hit me, but don't hit Dalits" remarks in the wake of alleged attacks on Dalits in the recent past, Yechury suggested that giving a mere statement will not serve the purpose and insisted the Prime Minister declare that "law of the land" will prevail if Dalits are targeted.

"But he has not assured it yet," the Rajya Sabha member said.

He pitched for empowering Dalits, saying they should be allotted five acres of agricultural land to be economically strong and also insisted on eradicating practice of manual scavenging.

"You do something about that. Otherwise, what is happening in our country is completely destroying our social fabric and the atrocities against the Dalits continue to be committed," he rued.

Speaking about the rally organised by Dalit Swabhiman Sangharsh - an umbrella body of Left parties and Dalit outfits, Yechury said it is a "struggle for self-respect" by Dalits seeking "equality" as provided in the Constitution.

The Marxist leader said the rallies will be held in all state capitals in coming days before the outfits re-converge in the national capital when the Winter session of Parliament begins.

Taking part in the rally, Jignesh Mevani, who floated the Dalit Atyachar Ladhai Samiti following flogging of Dalits in Gujarat's Una, seconded Yechury and said his front will struggle for self-respect of community members in the light of the alleged attacks and also for ensuring "roti, kapada aur makan" for them.

He also sought to pick holes in the Gujarat model of development, accusing the BJP-led state government of not keeping electoral promises on providing housing facilities and employment.

"We will expose this hollow development model...besides protesting casteism, we want to expose this hollow Gujarat model of development," he added.

CPI general secretary Sudhakar Reddy, party's national secretary D Raja, BRP-Bahujan Mahasangh President Prakash Ambedkar and mother of Hyderabad Central University student Rohith Vemulla, Radhika and others addressed the rally.
On Thursday Shivpal Singh Yadav resigned from the Akhilesh Yadav's Uttar Pradesh cabinet and also quit as state party chief. This brought to light the Yadav family feud which has swiftly unfolded this week.

Akhilesh Yadav had on Tuesday stripped his uncle Shivpal from the plum posts of PWD, cooperative and irrigation minister. Shivpal who has remained an integral part of the party for over two decades was miffed by the decision and this escalated to a family feud.



So who is Shivpal Yadav and why is he important for the Samajwadi Party?

Shivpal Singh Yadav was born on Basant Panchami in 1955 in Etawah, Uttar Pradesh to Sughar Singh and Murti Devi. At a young age he was introduced to Uttar Pradesh's political movement by elder brother Mulayam Singh Yadav who was an impassioned follower of Ram Manohar Lohia. The turning point in Shivpal's life came when he went to a meeting presided upon by Lohia. Shivpal was heavily influenced by Lohia's principles and supported him in many future endeavours.

In 1974, he attended the Jain Inter College, Karhal Mainpuri (UP) to complete his intermediate course. He, then graduated from KK Degree College, Etawah (Kanpur University) in 1976 and went on to Lucknow University to pursue his Bachelor of physical education which he completed in 1977.

On 23 May, 1981 he married Sarla Yadav with whom he had two children  Dr Anubha Yadav who is a medical practitioner and Aditya Yadav who is politically active. Following Shivpal's altercation with Akhilesh, Aditya resigned from the chairman's post of Pradeshik Cooperative Federation.

In 1988, Shivpal was elected as the president of the district cooperative bank in Etawah and successfully completed his tenure in 1991. In 1995 he took over as the president of district panchayat. He contested elections in the 13th Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections from Jaswant Nagar and won by a huge margin. He was then appointed as general secretary of the Samjwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh. In 2009, when the then state president passed away, Shivpal was appointed the president of the UP Sawajwadi Party unit. He was also appointed as the Leader of the Opposition when Mayawati was the chief minister.

As Leader of the Opposition he fought on issues related to poverty and women empowerment. In 2012, when SP took the reins of Uttar Pradesh with a full majority, he was appointed the cabinet minister for departments like irrigation and PWD.

Shivpal's relevance in the Samajwadi Party

Many perceive Shivpal as a grass-roots leader who is very much in sync with the problems of the people of Uttar Pradesh. This also makes him an indispensable leader who might help Mulayam win the Assembly election in 2017. The Indian Express reported that even Mulayam believes that Shivpal's exit from the party would harm it in the 2017 UP Assembly Elections. On 15 August, while addressing party workers, he had said in the presence of Akhilesh, that the SP would split if Shivpal leaves.

According to reports, various SP members call Shivpal a 'cool-headed' leader. Shivpal, a four-term MLA from Jaswantnagar constituency, has played a major role in political alliances between Samajwadi Party and other parties. He played a significant role in advocating a merge of Quami Ekta Dal (QED) and SP. This merger was later called off by party's national parliamentary board, allegedly under pressure from Akhilesh. Some reports suggest that he also played a major role in the return of senior leader Amar Singh to the party. However he maintained that from re-inducting Amar Singh into the SP to experimenting with the 'Grand Alliance', he had always followed the directions of Mulayam.

He has never publicly opposed the decisions taken by Akhilesh or Mulayam even though he may have expressed difference of opinion to them in private.
India's ramping up of diplomatic pressure on Pakistan over Balochistan and calibrated escalation of support for Baloch freedom struggle point to New Delhi's growing confidence and a new steel in its foreign policy. It also indicates that Prime Minister Narendra Modi won't limit himself to using the Balochistan brahmastra only as a strategic deterrent.

When the prime minister first dropped the Baloch bomb during an all-party meeting on 13 August, it created ripples on India's static geopolitical surface. When Modi followed it up during his Independence Day speech in presence of global diplomatic corps  referring to Pakistan's large-scale atrocities and human rights violations in Balochistan and Gilgit-Baltistan  the ripple became a wave in India and triggered an initial stunned silence in Pakistan. But there still remained pronounced doubts whether New Delhi would have the gumption to follow through its gambit.

All gloves are off now. By taking Balochistan and PoK issue to the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) India has officially jettisoned its policy of non-meddling in what it long considered to be Pakistan's "internal matter". This verily marks the beginning of a new pro-active foreign policy where decisions will be taken based on India's strategic interests, not lofty idealism of a morality play.

There are risks to this approach but New Delhi reckons that not playing the Baloch card is an even greater risk. It would not only mean allowing Pakistan a free hand to internationalise Kashmir issue but also to send a signal that India doesn't have the stomach for a fight in the intriguing game against China.

Balochistan and Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir are vital cogs in China's strategic wheels. Beijing has invested heavily in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) with an eye on building maritime supremacy. Maintaining status quo on these two sensitive regions are imperative for Asia's most powerful nation. Flagging Balochistan and PoK on international forums, therefore, presents India with a precious bargaining chip against Beijing.

That India's UN move followed Washington's refusal to play ball with New Delhi on Balochistan is even more interesting.

According to a report in The Hindu, US State Department spokesperson John Kirby said during a media briefing on Monday that "US government respects the unity and territorial integrity of Pakistan and we do not support independence for Balochistan" in reply to a question on India's reference to human rights violations in the Pakistan province.

There are broadly two reasons behind the US stance on Balochistan.

One, the Obama administration desperately wants a de-escalation of tension between two nuclear neighbours. There could also be renewed risk of a terrorist attack. As KP Nayar writes in The Telegraph, "The US is worried that if tensions between India and Pakistan continue to be ratcheted up, a terrorist attack like the one in Mumbai eight years ago cannot be ruled out..."

Two, Americans would desperately want to avoid another Middle East in central Asia. If the Baloch freedom struggle gathers pace, it could infuse fresh volatility into the region which global jihad organisations wouldn't hesitate to exploit.

Which is why for India to go ahead with the Baloch declaration at the UN indicates a tectonic shift in mindset. It is proof that India's foreign policy is no longer tied to the apron strings of global powers.

At the 33rd session of UNHRC in Geneve on Wednesday, India's Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the UN Ajit Kumar said in a statement that while "India's credentials as a peaceful, democratic, pluralistic society that is deeply committed to the welfare of its people are well established, Pakistan is characterised by authoritarianism, absence of democratic norms and widespread human rights violations across the country including Balochistan," reported news agency PTI.

Indications are that raising of issue at the UN is just the start. This shall be followed through with a calibrated diplomatic offensive.

A day later on Thursday, the Ministry of External Affairs made it clear that India shall continue to highlight Balochistan as long as atrocities continue. As NDTV reported, the issue could be brought up again later this month in New York during the UN General Assembly. "Till repression exists in Balochistan, till fundamental rights of citizens there are violated, India will raise this issue," the website quoted MEA spokesperson Vikas Swarup, as saying.

And that's not all. At around 4 pm on Friday, reports Financial Express, All India Radio would have finally launched the much-discussed multimedia service and a mobile app for AIR's Balochi service. It will reportedly have enough technological teeth to provide quality reception to listeners in the Baloch region and throughout the world to global Baloch Diaspora.

Pakistan media, meanwhile, has reported that exiled Baloch leader Brahumdagh Bugti, grandson of former Balochistan chief minister Nawab Akbar Bugti who was assassinated by the Pakistan army in 2006, is set to get Indian passport. Geo TV reports that Bugti and his key aides will get Indian passports that will make it easier for them to move around the world.

The well-regulated escalation of backing for Balochistan indicates that India is getting ready for the long haul. The Modi government evidently believes that Balochistan and PoK issues are a rare meeting point of realpolitik, strategic interest and moral duty. Let's take the pressure points one by one.

In its hurry to increase diplomatic and strategic influence, China has been investing furiously into global infrastructural projects. But many of these ventures, as a recent report shows, have come under the UN scanner over "lack of adequate protection for human rights". A VOA News report states: "Investigations by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR) show Chinese companies and financing institutions have little concern about human rights violations surrounding projects promoted and financed by them across different countries, including some in Africa."

Realpolitik considerations hold that this presents an opportunity for India. As Aprameya Rao writes in a Gateway House article, India may "highlight Chinas dismal human rights record while pursuing international projects. This strategy can pressurise Beijing to further soften its stance on Indias entry into the NSG"

As far as strategic interest is concerned, India cannot breathe easy under the yoke of a China-Pakistan axis where two countries will have a strategic depth in each other's territory through CPEC which cuts through PoK and Balochistan. The PoK and Baloch cards, hence, are of vital importance to Delhi.

Last but not the least as Afghanistan President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani, who was on a India visit, said on Wednesday, the "conflict" in north-western parts of Pakistan and Balochistan is equivalent to a "war" and the media is "not covering" this and use of force by Pakistan army enough.

"Around 2,700 (Pakistani) forces moved to the north-western province and also Balochistan; this violence needs to be covered (by media) as people need to talk about it to address it," Ghani was quoted, as saying by news agency IANS.

There have been countless reports of fresh military crackdown on Balochistan province since Modi government flagged the topic. Abdul Nawaz Bugti, Baloch Republican Party's representative at the UNHRC, told news agency ANI in a video message, "In different parts of Dera Bugti, Baloch civil populace have been attacked and more than 19 Baloch civilians, including women and children, all belonging to same family have been abducted."

Balochi activists protesting near UN headquarters in New York told NDTV that since the turn of new millennium, "more than 5,000 activists have been tortured and killed and more than 20,000 were missing."

This, then, presents India with a moral obligation as world's largest democracy to highlight the plight of Balochis. By all accounts, Modi government is not shying away.
The national security advisors of the five Brics nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) met on Thursday in a run-up to the Brics summit next month.

The advisers agreed to cooperate to deny terrorists access to finance and weapons while vowing to launch joint efforts to counter terrorism and violent extremism emanating from the West Asia and North African region (WANA).

The sixth meeting was held in Delhi and chaired by National Security Adviser Ajit Doval. Later they also met Prime Minister Narendra Modi to apprise him of their decisions.

Stronger security linkages with BRICS nations. NSA Doval chairs meeting of NSAs in Delhi in runup to @BRICS2016 pic.twitter.com/aNQJvNnIo4  Vikas Swarup (@MEAIndia) September 15, 2016

Modi tweeted that he had a very good meeting with the NSAs of the Brics nations.

Had a very good meeting with NSAs of BRICS nations. pic.twitter.com/Mim1hOfzQY  Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) September 15, 2016

Reiterating what External Affairs minister Sushma Swaraj said during her joint statement with Secretary of State John Kerry in India, MEA spokesperson Vikas Swarup said that there should not be a segmented approach on the issue of terror.

They also agreed to expand Brics counter-terrorism cooperation further to include measures for denying terrorists access to finance and terror-hardware such as equipment, arms and ammunition.

Responding to a question about blacklisting terror suspects like Masood Azhar, Swarup said the issue is well known. The Indian Express quoted him as saying, I dont think this is something which needs to be flagged at every meeting.

It (blacklisting of terrorists through the UN route) should not be governed by political considerations. A terrorist is a terrorist and should be so identified, he further said.

China had again blocked Indias bid to ban Azhar at the UN in April, 2016. After the Pathankot attack, India had written to the UN asking for immediate action to list Azhar under the Al-Qaeda Sanctions Committee.

PTI quoted some government sources as saying that China was in consultation with Pakistan, which is not on the UN Committee and had therefore, asked to hold up the banning of Azhar.

China, the country which pledged cooperation to deter terrorists by denying finance and weapons in WANA during the Brics meeting is actually fueling terrorism in South Asia in both covert and overt ways.

India had substantial evidence against Azhar and his outfits terror activities. It even told the UN Sanctions Committee that not listing Azhar would expose it and other countries in South Asia to threats from the terror group and its leader.

Conveniently acting as a prompter, Pakistan directed China to block Indias request. China also refuses to recognise the terror emanating from its all weather friend.

As David Devadas points out in this Firstpost piece, Towards the end of that year, China made it clear that it does not consider the entire state of Jammu and Kashmir to belong legitimately to India.

It has also periodically sent troops into parts of Ladakh. It is also silently helping the separatists in Kashmir, thereby propelling terrorism on the Indian soil. The India Today reported that Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani thanked Pakistan and China for their support to the "struggle of Kashmiris."

The United States also told Pakistan that it cannot "pick and choose" the terrorist groups it goes after and has to target militants who seek to harm its neighbours, taking refuge on its territory.

In an evidently hypocritical move, China is agreeing to counter terrorism in WANA but turning a blind eye to the terrorism faced by its neighbour India.

While is quite determined uproot terror modules causing unrest and violence in its volatile province of Xinjiang, even tightening legal framework to crush it, its double standards in failing to stand by India on similar grounds is appalling. As a matter of fact, Xinjiang even became the first provincial-level region in China to have released a regional interpretation of the Anti-Terrorism Law since it was implemented on 1 January.

China even initiated joint patrolling with Pakistani troops in the border connecting Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir with Xinjiang province amid reports that over 100 Uighurs have fled the restive region to join Islamic State.

China's pledge of cooperation during the Brics summit looks good on paper but unless it is implemented on ground in full spirit it would continue to remain as a hollow assurance.

With inputs from PTI.
Florence: British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said on Thursday that he favoured turning migrant vessels back towards Libya as a "deterrent" measure that would take the immigration heat off Italy.

"We are determined in the UK to help Italy. We recognise this is a European problem," Johnson told a joint press conference with Italian counterpart Paolo Gentiloni in Florence.

Johnson noted that British vessels HMS Diamond and HMS Enterprise were participating in the Rome-based EU military taskforce dubbed Operation Sophia, launched in 2015 with the aim of neutralising refugee smuggling routes in the Mediterranean.

Johnson said Operation Sophia was designed "to help turn back some of these boats ... and I think personally they should be turned back as close to the shore as possible, so they don't reach the Italian mainland and they are more of a deterrent effect" to other vessels bent on heading for Italy from north Africa.

"I think I'm right in saying we turned back 200,000 migrants, sorry saved, saved 200,000 migrants, so I do think it's the right approach," insisted Johnson without specifying which migrants he was referring to.

HMS Enterprise was involved in a rescue operation to save 750 migrants off Libya on Thursday, the Italian coastguard said.

Italy is right in the front line for migrants seeking a new life in Europe having since 2014 seen some 450,000 people reach its shores.

According to Italy's interior ministry, nearly 128,400 migrants have arrived via the Mediterranean since the start of the year, a five per cent jump over the same period last year.

Many board rickety, makeshift boats in the hopes of reaching the Italian island of Lampedusa some 300 kilometres away.

UN envoy Martin Kobler said in an interview published on Thursday that some 235,000 are ready to make the dangerous crossing from Libya to Italy.

"We have on our lists 235,000 migrants who are just waiting for a good opportunity to depart for Italy, and they

will do it," Kobler told Italian daily La Stampa.

The Operation Sophia ships can only board traffickers' vessels if they enter international waters, which they never do, and are often end up on rescue missions for migrants trying to make their way towards the Italian coast.

The EU force cannot enter Libyan territorial waters without a formal request by the UN-backed Government of National Accord which is trying to extend its shaky authority from Tripoli to the rest of the country.

Gentiloni reiterated the issue was a problem for Europe as a whole and not just Italy and would be addressed at tomorrow's EU summit in Bratislava.
Washington: WikiLeaks whistleblower and former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden hit back on Friday at a House Intelligence Committee report that described him as a "disgruntled employee" and not a "principled whistleblower".

Snowden mocked the committee's findings on Twitter, challenging several points.

"The claim I "doctored performance evaluations?" This one is amazing: I reported an XSS (hacking) vulnerability in CIA annual review system," Snowden said.

A summary of the 36-page two-year report, said Snowden "was a disgruntled employee who had frequent conflicts with his managers and was reprimanded just two weeks before he began illegally downloading classified documents".

The report said Snowden "doctored his performance evaluations" and exaggerated his resume to obtain "new positions at the NSA".

"He took advantage of its access as network administrator to search hard drives on his colleagues' computers," it stated.

According to Snowden, he "could go on".

"Bottom line: after 'two years of investigation', the American people deserve better. This report diminishes the committee," he said in his concluding tweet.

The report released on September 15, came as Snowden supporters have launched a major push to have him pardoned before US President Barack Obama leaves office, and as Hollywood film "Snowden" hits theatres in the US.

"Edward Snowden is no hero  he's a traitor who wilfully betrayed his colleagues and his country," The Telegraph UK quoted Devin Nunes, the Intelligence Committee chairman, as saying.

White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest told the media on September 12 that Snowden is "charged with serious crimes, and it's the policy of the [Obama] administration that Snowden should return to the US and face those charges", ABC news reported.

Snowden on September 13, laid out his case for presidential pardon stating that though his actions were against the law, they changed the nation for the better.
White Plains: Hillary Clinton returned to the campaign fray in a tightening race against Republican Donald Trump, who released new details of his physical fitness in response to the health scare that sidelined his rival.

Seeking to turn the page after her poorly handled bout with pneumonia, Clinton was headed to North Carolina and then the US capital Washington as she resumed the White House race after a three-day convalescence.

"Welcome back to 'Stronger Together,'" the Democratic nominee quipped cheerily to reporters on board her campaign plane. Asked how she was feeling, the 68-year-old former secretary of state replied: "I am doing great, thank you so much!"

Clinton was taken ill Sunday during a 11 September memorial ceremony in New York where she was seen stumbling limp-legged into her vehicle, an episode that raised tough questions about her campaign's transparency. With the candidates' health suddenly at the forefront of the campaign, Clinton looked to head off further scrutiny by releasing new medical records yesterday indicating that she was "fit to serve" as president.

The disclosure came as the media-savvy Trump, 70, teased new health data of his own during the taping of a medical chat show, before publishing it today in full. The one-page letter from his long-time doctor lists

various lab results, including for cholesterol, blood pressure and liver and thyroid function  all deemed to be within the normal range.

While Trump is shown to be overweight, with a body mass index of 29.5, his doctor Harold Bornstein declared the Republican nominee to be "in excellent physical health." Trump had made a point of refraining from harsh attacks on his convalescent rival  but the candidates were quick to resume their jousting.

Team Trump included a veiled jab at Clinton in a statement accompanying his health update: "We are pleased to disclose all of the test results which show that Trump is in excellent health, and has the stamina to endure  uninterrupted  the rigors of a punishing and unprecedented presidential campaign."

While addressing the Economic Club of New York, Trump slammed the policies of Clinton and President Barack Obama as having doubled the national debt as he promised his presidency would bring about "an American economic revival."

Clinton, meanwhile, slammed the brash billionaire, who has repeatedly praised Russian President Vladimir Putin, for his "alarming closeness with the Kremlin."

"Donald Trump has run a deplorable campaign," she told the Tom Joyner radio show.
New Delhi: Balochi-speaking people in the Afghan-Pakistan region and other parts of the world can now tune into AIR broadcast in the language through computers and mobile phones as India's public broadcaster on Friday launched multimedia webpage and mobile app of the service.

Prasar Bharati Chairperson A Surya Prakash, who launched the mobile app and the webpage, said the move is part of India's efforts to reach out to the neighbourhood for better people-to-people contact.

The move to launch AIR's digital platforms in Balochi came after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Independence Day speech in which he had brought up the issue of Pakistani atrocities on the people of Balochistan and PoK.

India had also raised the issue of atrocities in Balochistan at the meeting of a UN body earlier this week.

Prasar Bharati officials said the mobile app and the webpage were just "value addition" as Baluchi service of the AIR has been in existence since 1974.

"There are several languages in which services are broadcast by the AIR. Baluchi is happening today, it will also happen for other languages," Surya Prakash said.

"As the world's largest democracy, we have the responsibility to disseminate news and information across the world which is factual and correct," he said.

Asked if AIR's services could face obstruction in Pakistan given the prevailing situation, AIR DG F Shehryar said the radio service is on the short-wave which cannot be blocked.

Responding to queries, Shehryar said that while AIR does not aim at countering any kind of propaganda, it will challenge falsehoods by presenting the correct information.

Shehryar said that, at present, one hour of programming in Baluchi language is broadcast daily, but there is a paucity of programmers in the language and the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) has assured it of support in this regard.

Surya Prakash said AIR's Baluchi service had been very popular but it was now facing competition from some other broadcasters.

"But AIR has a lot of goodwill among Baluchi people, who have an emotional attachment and consider it an authentic source of information," he said.
New Delhi: India and close neighbour Nepal sought to re-script their ties and dispel the unease of the past few months, as new Nepalese Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal 'Prachanda' held talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi who described the bilateral relationship as "time-tested and unique".

Both sides inked three agreements, including one on a credit line of $750 million from India to Nepal, and decided to speed up infrastructure and hydropower projects in the Himalayan nation.

"Our friendship is time-tested and unique. As immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability and economic prosperity of Nepal is our shared objective," Modi said, in his media statement after holding talks with Prachanda.

The Nepalese prime minister, who arrived here on Thursday on a four-day visit, has chosen India for his first overseas tour -- lending significance to the ties. During his last stint as prime minister (2008 to 2009), the Maoist leader had chosen to visit northern neighbour China, which has been trying hard to stamp its presence in Kathmandu.

Modi, while commending Prachanda's role in "strengthening democratic institutions in Nepal", remarked on the strategic nature of the relations, saying the security interests of both countries are inter-linked.

"India stands ready and prepared to strengthen development partnership with Nepal. We will do so as per the priorities of the people and government of Nepal," he said.

Modi said that continued cooperation between their defence and security agencies is important to guard the open borders.

Prachanda, who took over last month after the China-friendly KP Oli government lost support, said Nepal is determined to forge an enduring partnership with India for its own development and prosperity.

He said he had exchanged views with Modi on taking concrete steps to elevate ties with India to new heights in all spheres.

"We exchanged views on our respective 'neighbourhood first' policies and agreed that this common orientation in our policies should lead to a greater and mutually beneficial partnership for 21st century based on trust and open dialogue," Prachanda said.

While stressing Nepal's friendly ties with India, Prachanda said he expressed the view that trust and confidence were the pre-requisites of strong and sustainable friendly relations.

And to ensure this, "we should respect each other's sensitivities and concerns in a spirit of good neighbourliness".

Among the agreements inked was one on an Indian credit line of $750 million to Nepal for post-earthquake reconstruction. This is over and above the $1 billion aid that India announced following the devastating earthquake in the Himalayan nation in April last year that claimed over 8,000 lives.

The two sides also signed a memorandum of agreement (MoU) for project management consultancy services for upgrade and improvement of road infrastructure in Terai area of Nepal.

Another agreement was signed on the first amendatory dollar credit line for post-earthquake reconstruction projects in Nepal.

Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar described Prachanda's visit as "very productive" and "warm".

He said that talks focused on hydropower projects, including the Pancheswar project on rive Mahakali in Nepal.

Air connectivity, goods and power trade figured in the talks.

Tourism came up for discussion and the two sides explored the possibility of joint promotion of the Buddhist circuit.

Prachanda briefed the Indian side about the new Nepalese Constitution and the political processes in Nepal.

"He conveyed that the government is in the process of bringing all sections of Nepal on board for the constitution," Jaishankar said

Ties between both sides had soured last year after the promulgation of the new Constitution in September, which Madhesi and Janjati people living in the Terai region, bordering India, said ignored their rights. A five-month-long border blockade by the Madhesis, which Kathmandu blamed on India, starved Nepal of essential fuel and other supplies from India and saw bilateral ties nosedive sharply.

The Maoist-led government of Prachanda assumed power last month after the ouster of KP Sharma Oli as Prime Minister.

India is hoping to bring back the shine in ties with Prachanda at the helm.

Earlier on Friday, Prachanda was accorded a ceremonial welcome at the Rashtrapati Bhavan.

Following this, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj called on him at the Rashtrapati Bhavan.

In the afternoon, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Minister of State for Power Piyush Goyal also called on the Nepal Prime Minister before he made a call on President Pranab Mukherjee

China's President Xi Jinping is expected to visit Kathmandu in October, while Indian President Mukherjee is visiting in early November.
The four day state visit of Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal or Prachanda (as he is popularly known) to Delhi , is an opportunity for both India and Nepal to reboot ties severely damaged by the agitation over the new Republican Constitution unveiled last September. The prime minister arrived late on Thursday morning.

Dahal who took over the reins from former prime minister KP Sharma Oli, has had a tenuous relationship with India in the past.

But this time around, Prachanda is sending out the right signals.

Unlike in 2008, when he annoyed India by visiting Beijing first, his first foreign trip is to Delhi. In numerous interviews ahead of the trip, Dahal made it clear that his visit is aimed at restoring

confidence between two neighbours tied by links of religion, culture and history.

"This is a very important visit to normalise India-Nepal ties," said Professor SD Muni, who has known Prachanda since his days as a Maoist revolutionary. "Previously, both sides had done their best to mess up ties. The former prime minister Oli played to his constituency and used the China card against India. New Delhis economic blockade, which affected people for over six months took a toll on the enormous goodwill India enjoyed in that country," he added.

Ironically when Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Kathmandu  soon after assuming office in August 2014, he had generated a groundswell of popular support. People were enthusiastic about the new prime minister who stopped his motorcade to shake hands with ordinary citizens. It is surprising that New Delhi did not build on this enormous goodwill which evaporated during the Madhesi agitation. Muni believes India made many mistakes.

For one, Delhi reacted late and while trying to give the Madhes and other marginalised communities of Nepal a better deal in the new Republican Constitution, it went about this task in a crude manner. Bureaucrats in New Delhi scoffed at what they saw as the Kathmandus elites machinations to continue to wield the levers of state power. There may be some truth that this desire to punish the hills for this perfidy led to the blockade, which the Madhes parties put in place with the active connivance of New Delhi.

Every Nepali was affected by the blockade. Even more disturbing was the fact that the Indian establishment, including former ambassadors were together in wanting to punish the Nepalese for

their anti-India stand. India with its ambitions of becoming a big power player needs to learn how to deal with its smaller more sensitive neighbours. Every country, big or small wants its sovereignty to be respected and South Block must remember this.

China Card: Land-locked Nepal is totally dependent on India for its supplies and expects New Delhis help to shore up its economy. The India-Nepal friendship treaty allows Nepalese citizens to work in India. Over eight million Nepalese live in this country. But Nepal is also crucial to Indias strategic interests. Delhi does not want China to overwhelm a region which is practically Indias backyard. Like every small country wedged between two Asian giants, Nepal often uses China to offset India. The Nepalese Royal family did this all the time.

During the road blocakade by India, Oli like other Nepalese leaders before him deftly played the China card. He signed a transit agreement with Beijing to tell Delhi that if it wanted to act tough, Nepal could turn to its other big neighbour. Since then, China had made major inroads into Nepal. In fact, Beijing which had taken care never to interfere in a countrys domestic politics, was showing signs of doing so in Nepal. The ouster of Oli was inevitable.

Chinas president Xi Jinping is expected to visit Kathmandu in October. China is annoyed with Nepal for not following through on commitments and is threatning to call off the visit. But those in the know say that this is to build pressure on Nepal to get moving and the trip has not officially been cancelled. Indian president Pranab Mukherjee is also slated to visit Nepal later in the month. The official dates have not been announced.

People in Kathmandu believe India had a major role in Olis ouster and that Prachanda has Indias strong backing. However these same local sources say that the former Maoist leader has taken to

mainstream politics like a duck to water and cannot be trusted. But as of now, the new prime minister is making the right noises and said in a recent interview that he will reassure Indian leaders that Nepalese soil will not be used for anti-India activities by any country or group.

This is a very important visit to normalise India-Nepal ties. Previously, both sides had done their best to mess up ties. The former prime minister Oli played to his constituency and used the China card against India. New Delhis economic blockade, which affected people for over six months took a toll on the enormous goodwill India enjoyed in that country

Prachanda's wish list: The prime minister has his wish list clear. He wants Indias support for the peace process that it helped to broker to bring Maoists overground. He needs substantial economic help from Delhi to shore up Nepals economy, which had been sliding downhill since last years devastating earthquake. Delhi needs to step up its earthquake rebuilding and economic presence in Nepal. It can do much in agriculture, solar power and hydel power generation. Harnessing Nepals rivers for electricity has been on the cards for several decades, perhaps something can be done now.

Rights of Madhesis: India is looking to Prachanda to give the Madhesis and other tribes living in Nepals terai region their rights in the new Constitution through amendments that are already tabled in Parliament. There is a big question mark over this as Prachanda will need the support of all parties for the two-third majority needed. Unlike during his first tenure in 2008, when the Maoists had a majority, now he is dependent on the Nepali Congress and others.

Prachandas talks with Modi and his team begins on Friday. Much professions of friendship will be made in speeches and statements by the two leaders, but for India a fair share for Madhesh in the Republican Constitution remains a major test of the new prime ministers sincerity.
The change in leadership of the Nepal government in August 2016 brought the former Maoist rebel leader Pushpa Kamal Dahal, also known as Prachanda as the prime minister of a coalition government of the Maoists and the Nepali Congress. Having replaced KP Oli of the CPN-UML, Dahal faces the uphill task of internal peace and constitutional implementation whilst having to reset and recalibrate the topsy-turvy India-Nepal ties. The recent visits by the Nepali deputy prime minister Bimalendra Nidhi and the Nepali foreign minister Prakash Sharan Mahat to Delhi has laid the groundwork for Prachanda's four-day visit to India, at the invitation of his Indian counterpart, Narendra Modi.

Background

The historical nature of the India-Nepal relationship and the people-people relations do not need any introduction. However, in recent times, the promulgation of the Constitution of Nepal, 2015 and the subsequent protests and border blockade have been a major setback in the relationship. Nepal's subsequent signing of transit and other agreements with China has been regarded by some in India as a significant loss of India's influence in Nepal. Given the history of the India-Nepal relationship, it is unlikely that any deal between Nepal's agitating forces will be resolved without Indian blessings (explicit or otherwise). For Nepal, the continuance of the constitutional crisis is a major stumbling block to peace and development and resolution of this crisis is necessary for the implementation of the Constitution which sees Nepal as a federal democratic republic. In this backdrop, the significance of Prachanda's first foreign visit should be examined to check whether both nations can steer the relationship into a positive framework to ensure that the interests and concerns of both nations can be addressed equitably

At the outset, the choice of India as the first visit by Nepal's premier is a move to reassure India that Nepal has not moved over into China's orbit and is mindful of India's 'special interest' in Nepal. It is also a moment to reassure India and hear its concerns regarding Indian interests in Nepal, including on the Constitution. The visit to India of then Nepal prime minister KP Oli in February 2016 came during one of the most challenging times of the India-Nepal relationship. The strained relationship was evident by the lack of any joint communique at the conclusion of the visit, especially as there were sticking points with regards to India's refusal to 'endorse' the Nepali Constitution.

During his previous outing as the Prime Minister of Nepal in 2008, Prachanda chose to go to China first for an 'unofficial visit', though his first 'official visit' was to India. This was seen as a snub by many in South Block, and was seen as a factor behind his resignation for which the blame was laid on India. Prachanda now seems to be a changed man, and has placed the need for cordial relations with India as a priority. His 125 member delegation includes among others ministers, Members of Parliament and representatives of political parties including from the Madhes-based parties, government secretaries, businessmen and journalists.Apart from meeting the Modi on Friday, he is also scheduled to hold an interaction with the Nepali community organised by the Nepali Embassy and visit the Nathpa Jhakri Hydropower Project in Himanchal Pradesh and the Patanjali Yogpeeth and its industries in Haridwar.

Stated specific aims of the visit

In a speech to the Nepali parliament, Dahal stated that his visit would be focused on the implementation of prior deals agreed with India, particularly related to the development of physical and economic infrastructure. Specific projects mentioned include:

1) Further Construction of the Postal Highway (also, a key developmental demand of the Madhesis and other residents of the Nepali plains)

2) Financial Support to bridge the funding gaps for providing the housing aid to the victims of 2015 earthquake (as part of the $1 billion soft loan and grants pledged by India for post-earthquake reconstruction.)

3) Negotiations on the Detailed Project Report of the 5600-MW Multipurpose Pancheswor Project on the India-Nepal border river of Mahakali (the flagship item of the controversial Mahakali Treaty of 1996, this was revived during Modi's 2014 visit to Nepal. However unresolved issues include the supposedly unequal sharing of water and electricity and the border dispute of Kalapani over the origin of the Mahakali. The environmental cost of the Project is also expected to be quite high.)

4) Second phase construction and implementation of the power trade agreement (a key requirement for energy starved Nepal which sees load-shedding for up to 80 hours per week in summers.)

5) Discussions on trade concessions (a key requirement to reduce the huge trade deficit in Nepal's trade with India.)

6) Immediate construction of Integrated Checkpoints at Biratnagar and Bhairawaha borders, the completion of the cross border railway services and ensuring that the recent agreement to allow the Indian port of Vishakapatnam to be used for Nepali cargo is operational (currently, the Integrated Checkpoint in Birgunj is operational only on the Indian side, making it cumbersome to fulfill the paperwork at the India-Nepal border.)

7) Issues regarding flooding at the India-Nepal border (a sensitive issue for citizens living on both sides of the border).

Prachanda has been under enormous pressure both within his party and from other political parties in Nepal not to sign any new deals or controversial agreements against Nepal's 'national interest'. Thus, the stated agenda of his visit seems to steer clear of contentious issues and is more of a diplomatic effort regarding the strengthening of relationship between the two nations. In a bid to defuse any potential controversies, the prime minister has also stated that no new agreements would be signed during this visit. While the agenda clearly shows a focus on trade and developmental goals, it should be pointed out that it is very likely that his diplomatic parleys with the Indian establishment will include discussions on other unstated agendas as well.

Unstated agendas

It would be naive to assume that this visit is solely about developmental issues. A lot of the issues stated by Prachanda were also agreed upon during Oli's February visit to India, and it is strange to see those agendas being repeated in this visit by the current Nepali premier. In addition, during the visit by Oli, names for the eight members Eminent Persons Group (four each from either side) whose mandate is to review bilateral relations including the treaties and agreements since the contentious 1950 India-Nepal Treaty of Peace and Friendship and recommend measures to further enhance bilateral relations, were also finalised. Thus, the spectrum of India-Nepal relationship contains many irritants, both historical and current ones, and it is inevitable that these issues will be discussed during this visit.

Constitutional Amendment

Nepal's Constitution has already seen amendments, especially with regards to proportional inclusion and the primacy of population over geography over the delimitations of election constituencies. While the Madhes-based parties did come to vote Oli out of power, and while there is an outward veneer of calm, the demands of the Madhes-based parties are far from fulfilled. While India had earlier merely 'noted' the promulgation of the Constitution, these amendments were welcomed, and India continues to push for further amendments.

While taking office, Prachanda had promised to register amendment proposals to the Constitution before embarking on his visit to India. However that has not happened, but the prime minister continues to express commitment to amend the Constitution to address the demands of the Madhes-based parties. While the remaining demands are based on language, citizenship, representation to the National Assembly, the single most contentious demand is that of the redrawing of the boundaries of the different provinces. This is however a very divisive issue in the districts concerned, given the mixed demographics and multiple claims.

It is now up to Prachanda to walk the talk and limit the trip to his stated aims, rather than search for an extra-territorial prescriptions for internal issues.

In addition, without the backing of Oli's CPN-UML, the requisite numbers for constitutional amendment cannot be mustered in the Nepali Parliament. It seems very unlikely that they would agree to such changes in the provincial boundaries.In addition, Article 274 of the Constitution of Nepal prevents the redrawing of the provincial boundaries without the approval of the provincial Assembly. If however the federal boundaries are redrawn, such changes will have to be endorsed by the future provincial assembly within three months of the formation of such provincial assemblies. Thus, any current change in federal demarcation could be potentially overturned by the future provincial assemblies and is therefore not a perfect solution for lasting peace. The constitutional amendment process is therefore getting more and more complex, with every passing day.

This brings us to the next part of Nepal's complicated transition and constitutional implementation. The issue of local body restructuring (local units at the grassroots level) is yet to be completed, and that has to be done before elections to the local, provincial and national levels can be held. The Local Body Restructuring Commission (LBRC) has proposed 565 local units across the country, but there are massive disagreements on all the different political parties over that number. Time is running out to complete these transformations, as the current Parliament only has 16 more months to complete the constitutional transformation into a federal Nepal.

Without a deal in place between Nepal's agitating parties, there is a likely scenario for the 'failure' of this Constitution. Such a scenario can only lead to more instability in Nepal, and it is very unlikely that it would be conducive to India's national interests to have an unstable neighbour with whom it shares an open border and free movement of nationals. Having already chosen sides in a very complex issue of constitutional design in a sovereign neighbouring nation, there is an onus on the Indian establishment to pave the way for an acceptable solution to the current 'constitutional mess'. However, such constitutional amendments cannot be an explicit agenda of the Indian side, nor should it be a quid pro quo for better India-Nepal relations.

'Fast track' and Indian interests

Another missing agenda is that of the Kathmandu-Nijgadh 'fast track' road. It was proposed during the prior government led by the Nepali Congress' Sushil Koirala to give the responsibility of this project to an Indian company. However, the terms of the proposed agreement were alleged to be unfavourable to Nepal and a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) remains pending at the Supreme Court of Nepal on this issue. The Oli government then decided that the 'Fast Track' road would be constructed by Nepal, instead of providing the contract to the Indian company. With the return of the Nepali Congress to power, there have been speculations that the contract will again be awarded to the Indian company.

This issue, though not as complex as the issue of constitutional amendment is an example of the never ending 'Indian interests versus national sovereignty' debate that continues in Nepal, where opposition to Indian 'hegemony' is a good way to garner public support. However, this has to be seen in the backdrop of other issues of Indian interest, where the 'big brother' activities of the Indian establishment are quite apparent, especially in attempts to micromanage events in Nepal.

Yet, it would be harmful not to listen to Indian interests in Nepal. India has traditionally looked to Nepal as within its sphere of influence. With the open border, and Nepal's location between China and India, there are security concerns as well. Nepal has always actively sought to allay India's security concerns. In addition, India has significant economic and investment concerns as well.The Indian establishment is also often frustrated with the inability of Nepali politicians to keep their promises to the Indian establishment, especially regarding investments in hydropower and related development projects, and most recently on the drafting and amendments to the Nepali Constitution.

Other issues: Nepali citizens in India

The open border between the two nations (as allowed by the 1950 treaty) facilitates significant number of Nepalis to work in India (including in the Indian Army). Similarly, Indian citizens (including those of Nepali origin) continue to work in Nepal. There is no proper method of transferring remittances from India to Nepal, and allegations of mistreatment of the returning Nepali workers by the Indian SSB, including the looting of the hard-earned money at the India-Nepal border continue to be reported. Similarly, with the introduction of the Aadhar card and stricter documentation rules, Nepalis in India continue to find it harder to continue to enjoy these rights as guaranteed by the 1950 treaty. The recently introduced 'National ID Card' pilot project in Nepal could also provide for a similar deterrent for Indian citizens in Nepal. Thus, there is an immediate need to address the vulnerabilities of Nepali citizens, without limiting the employment and educational opportunities available. This could be done through a regulation of the currently mostly-unregulated open border between these countries.

Expectations from the visit

It is likely that unlike during Oli's visit, there will be a joint communique issued at the end of this visit. The important question however, is whether that positivity actually translates to a better relationship between the two nations. The India-Nepal relationship is a close one, but filled with multiple challenges. While Prachanda has explicitly stated that there is no link between the constitutional amendment and his visit to India, it is difficult to deny the intrinsic link between the constitutional amendments and the current India-Nepal relations. However, to put that as a minimum requirement is again a huge mistake.

Given the rousing reception received by Modi during his first visit to Nepal, it is clear that developmental support is applauded by the Nepali government as well as its people. However, promised projects have to be executed on time, and should not be used as pressure tactics for micromanagement and intervention. From the Nepali perspective, it is not easy to bridge a chasm that has been built on the structure of 'constitutional intervention' and blockade politics. A blockade can never be the act of a friendly neighbour. Yet, Nepal's geopolitical limitations and India's historical role mean that India has often been the stabilising factor in Nepali politics. Nonetheless, the current actions of the Indian establishment in trying to dictate the provisions of the Nepali Constitution through both covert and overt micromanagement cannot lead to better relations between the two sovereign nations.

It is therefore time to focus on the stated agendas of trade, transit, development and investment between the two nations. The Indian establishment both bureaucratic and political; must respect the sovereignty and independence of its much smaller neighbour. "We, the people" as defined in the Constitution of India, 1950 does not envisage its amendments being discussed in bilateral discussions with other nations. Neither does the Indian establishment brook any interference from neighbours such as Pakistan over its internal affairs. There is no reason then, why "We the People" of Nepal should not be allowed to charter their own constitutional voyage and find their own solutions. The best way to bring the India-Nepal relationship back on track is therefore to just let Nepal to sort out its own political and constitutional challenges without interference from "Bade Bhai".

It is now up to Prachanda to walk the talk and limit the trip to his stated aims, rather than search for an extra-territorial prescriptions for internal issues.
A suicide bomber killed at least 16 people and wounded 35 others as they attended Friday prayers at a mosque in a northwestern Pakistani tribal area, officials said. However ANI reported that Pakistan media has confirmed the death toll as 22.

#UPDATE At least 22 killed & 29 injured in suicide blast at #MohmandAgency mosque: Pak Media  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

The bombing took place in the village of Butmana in the Mohmand tribal district bordering Afghanistan where the army has been fighting against Taliban militants.

"The Friday prayer was in progress at the mosque when a suicide bomber blew himself up killing at least 16 worshippers and wounding 35 others," a senior tribal administration official told AFP.

"The area is remote and so far I have received only this information from our sources via wireless," he said.

Another local government official confirmed the information.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban in particular routinely attack soft targets such as courts, schools and mosques.

Taliban militants stormed a school in Peshawar in December 2014, killing more than 150 people, mostly children, in Pakistan's deadliest-ever terror attack.

The army launched an operation in June 2014 in a bid to wipe out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas and so bring an end to the bloody insurgency that has cost thousands of civilian lives since 2004.

Security in the country has since improved. Scattered attacks still take place, but they are fewer and of a lesser intensity than in previous years.

The Express Tribune quoted a regional official as saying that the attack happened "in the village of Payee Khan, in the troubled region of Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) bordering Afghanistan."

"President Mamnoon Hussain and Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif have strongly condemned the blast," Radio Pakistan reported.

The report further quoted Hussain as saying that the cowardly attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the government's resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country.

Rescue operations are underway and the injured have been shifted to District Headquarters Hospital (DHQ) Bajaur Agency, Daily Pakistan reported.

Injured were also transported to hospitals in Bajaur Agency, Charsadda and Peshawar for treatment. There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban routinely targets courts, schools and mosques.

The attack came on a day when Sharif vowed to continue the war against militancy and terrorism till elimination of the last terrorist. During a meeting with Army chief General Raheel Sharif on Friday, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy.

With inputs from AFP and PTI.
Stockholm: A Swedish appeals court on Friday upheld an arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange over a 2010 rape accusation, rejecting his request to have it lifted.

The court announced in a statement that Assange "is still detained in absentia", adding that it "shares the assessment of the (lower) district court that Julian Assange is still suspected on probable cause of rape... and that there is a risk that he will evade legal proceedings or a penalty."

The 45-year-old Australian has been holed up in the Ecuadoran embassy in London since June 2012, seeking refuge there after exhausting all his legal options in Britain against extradition to Sweden.

Assange has refused to travel to Stockholm for questioning over the rape allegation, which he denies, due to concerns Sweden will extradite him to the United States over WikiLeaks' release of 500,000 secret military files on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

This is the eighth time the European arrest warrant has been tested in a Swedish court. All of the rulings have gone against him.

The appeals court said Assange's four-year embassy sequestration "is not a deprivation of liberty and shall not be given any importance in its own right in the assessment of proportionality."

The length of his embassy stay and "the earlier passivity" of police investigators were "arguments for setting aside the detention," it noted.

"However, the relatively serious offence of which he is suspected means that there is a strong public interest (in) the investigation being able to continue."

"At present, continued detention therefore appears to be both effective and necessary so as to be able to move the investigation forward. The reasons for detention therefore still outweigh the intrusion or other detriment that the measure entails for Julian Assange."

Swedish prosecutor Marianne Ny hailed the decision.

"The public interest in having the investigation proceed still carries a lot of weight, in our opinion. The court has here shared our opinion that upholding the arrest warrant is in line with principle of proportionality," she said in a statement.
Baloch leader Brahamdagh Bugti, grandson of Nawaz Akbar Khan Bugti, is set to get Indian citizenship after long negotiations with Indian authorities, reported Geo News.

However, the Baloch Republican Party quickly issued a statement to the contrary.

Brahumdagh Bugti hasnt filed papers related to asylum in India. Geo News report incorrect. Baloch Republican Party to decide on it: BRP  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

In an exclusive interview with CNN-News 18 on Friday, Bugti thanked PM Modi to give him the asylum in India. He said, "Baloch issue has got more attention after Narendra Modi talked about it in his Independence Day speech."

Recently he had thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi for raising the issue of the situation in Balochistan. He had said that Modi's remark during his Independence Day speech was the "most powerful statement" in the past seven decades.

"It is for the first time that an Indian prime minister has spoken. We believe that India should have taken this step a long time ago," he had said.

"I am thoroughly indebted to (Modi). I thank (Modi) for raising the voice of Baloch people in his Independence Day address," he had said and alleged that Pakistani crimes against people in Balochistan are a shocker to the global community.

However, talk of Bugti's citizenship in India began before Modi's Independence Day speech, reported Geo News. He had earlier alleged that the Swiss government was under pressure from the Pakistani government to not grant him Swiss citizenship.

Bugti, who is currently living in self-exile in Switzerland, has been quite vocal about seeking asylum in India. Last week, Pakistani authorities were very keen on bringing him back to the country.

According to sources of Geo News, a Pakistani media outlet, India will also give citizenship to Bugti's key lieutenants in Switzerland, including Sher Muhammad Bugti and Azizullah Bugti. Brahumdagh is founder of the Baloch Republican Party (BRP), that Pakistan has outlawed and is known in his close circles as 'Sahib'.

Brahamdagh's grandfather Akbar Bugti was killed in an army operation in Balochistan in 2006, which angered several young Balochs who took up arms.

According to the Balochistan Police, Brahamdagh has two wives named Laila Bibi and Shuli Bibim and four children.

He is from the Raheja Bugti tribe and is operating the Baloch Republican Army network from Switzerland. He fled to Afghanistan during the crackdown on Baloch rebels and moved to Switzerland when Pakistan asked Kabul to hand him over in 2010.

In Switzerland, he sought political asylum in 2011 but the Swiss government turned down his request in January 2016, citing Islamabad's decision of declaring him a "terrorist" wanted for multiple attacks.

With inputs from PTI
Beijing: China is willing to join hands with India to implement the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries and properly handle "sensitive issues" to push forward bilateral ties, State Councillor Yang Jiechi has said.

Yang who met National Security Advisor Ajit Doval in New Delhi on Thursday on the sidelines of the BRICS National Security Advisors meeting said development of bilateral ties between the two countries have maintained good momentum.

China and India pledged on Thursday to further promote cooperation among the BRICS nations and discussed issues such as cyber security, energy security and anti-terrorism, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

This is the first meeting between Doval and Yang after Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping met at Hangzhou on the sidelines of the G20 summit on 4 September.

"China is willing to join hands with India to implement the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries, deepen mutual political trust, expand pragmatic cooperation and friendly exchanges, and properly handle sensitive issues in order to push forward the development of bilateral ties in the right direction and promote Asia's development and prosperity," Yang said.

In his meeting with Xi, Modi said both countries have to be sensitive to strategic interests and promote positive convergences and prevent growth of negative perceptions.

Xi said, "China is willing to work with India to maintain their hard-won sound relations and further advance their cooperation".

Both the leaders set the direction for the development of bilateral ties for the next phase, Yang said in his meeting with Doval.
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One may ask how a band achieves longevity, especially when members have come, gone and come back again. For an answer, you need look no further than Bluey, the co-founder and leader of the jazz funk ensemble, Incognito, a band in its fourth decade that still has plenty of gas in the tank, producing uncompromising music for its international fan base. The U.K.-based ensemble of vocalists and musicians are groove masters to be sure. But it is Incognitos special brand of classic soul and funk that has continued to resonate under the guidance of Bluey and musical director Matt Cooper. And their trademark funk frosted beats have been emphatically stamped on the musical world and remain relevant in todays urban market.

Still proving its staying power as a durable collective, Incognito registers its 17th studio CD, In Search of Better Days. Besides the familiar smooth funk beats and riffs, there are a few diversions of contemporary jazz ballads, break beats and jazz rock fusion. And there are plenty of vocalists in Incognitos cast who bring the better in Better Days. Imaanis creamy alto oozes a sweet aroma on Love Born in Flames, with its swooping backing vocals and precision brass section. The warm tones of Tony Momrelle wrap around Loves Revival, a song that beckons back to seventies Earth Wind & Fire. Vanessa Haynes pours her heart out on Just Say Nothing, another seventies knee-deep-in-funk jam anchored by the clavinet, and Love Be The Messenger, punctuated with marching snares by Joao Caetano.

As per all Incognito releases, Bluey steps up to the microphone on I See The Light, this time with one of his better vocal turns, aided by guest Avery Sunshine on acoustic piano. Though In Search of Better Days shines most of the time with their talented lead voices, a few fall by the wayside such as Katie Leones wobbly performance on Crystal Walls, and Better Days, where Vulu Malinga lacks that soulful kick and the usually on-point music production of Ski Oakenfull is nearly one-dimensional.

Maysa always rises to the occasion with any kind of groove thrown in her direction, and that continues on this reunion with Incognito. Everyday Grind utilizes break beats with acoustic piano hooks: I have to find a will to leave it all behind/Before I lose my mind. Maysas honey-tinged alto and soft flowing, rich beats go hand-in-hand on Selfishly: Of course I understand Im guilty/As I am selfishly/Im happy to be free. Then theres the precious ballad in the debut single, All I Ever Wanted, decorated with a soothing elixir of brass, Fender Rhodes, guitar and percussion drips.

Though the vocalists take center stage, In Search of Better Days instrumental showcases are of the highest quality, as well. A blistering flute solo by Andy Ross sets the bar with Echoes of Utopia, a song that also echoes classic acid jazz sounds with tasty guitar and keys from Francisco Salas and Matt Cooper, and climaxed by Alistair Whites fierce trombone contribution. The jazz/rock fusion journey entitled Bridges of Fire is graced by guest guitarist Tomoyasu Hotei and Andy Ross on tenor saxophone, while Richard Bull holds down the rhythm section on bass and drums.

In Search of Better Days again highlights the huge, reliable ensemble that has kept the wheels turning impressively for over three decades. Bluey and Incognitos funk flames burn brightly again, showing why this legendary act remains as relevant and immediate in 2016 as it was in 1986. Recommended. Peggy Oliver (Courtesy soultracks.com)
Macaus Chief Executive, Chui Sai On, said in Lisbon that his government is studying the creation of a complex in Macau which will incorporate the various initiatives that are underway to promote Macau as a platform between China and Portuguese-speaking countries.

According to a statement from the Government Information Bureau (GCS), the center will be housed in a single building and bring together interests in economic and commercial areas, offering services for companies, organization of fairs, meetings and cultural exhibitions and professional training.

Chui Sai On gave no details of the project, but its announcement comes less than a month before the 5th Macau Forum Ministerial Conference in Macau, which will bring together senior officials from China and from Angola, Brazil, Cabo Verde (Cape Verde), Guinea- Bissau, Mozambique, Portugal and Timor-Leste (East Timor).

The Chief Executive, during his stay in Lisbon, led a delegation from Macau at the Portugal-Macau Joint Commission and met with the President of the Republic of Portugal, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa and with Prime Minister Antonio Costa.

According to the GCS during the meetings held in Lisbon, Macau suggested the Portuguese authorities should take advantage of the Forum for Economic and Trade Cooperation between China and Portuguese-Speaking Countries to boost dialogue and cooperation in the economic and trade area between China and Portugal and use the advantages offered by the Free Trade Zone policy within China. MDT/Macauhub
The British government yesterday approved the construction of the countrys first new nuclear power plant in more than two decades, a French and Chinese-backed project that had prompted high-level fears about national security.

The government said in a statement that it had decided to proceed with the 18 billion-pound (USD23 billion) Hinkley Point plant in southwest England, but that future foreign-funded infrastructure projects will be subject to tighter rules.

The plant will be financed by Chinese nuclear power provider CGN and French energy group EDF.

China and France welcomed the approval, which came weeks after Prime Minister Theresa May unexpectedly stalled the deal after she took office in July, saying she wanted to review it.

The delay threw into doubt the golden era of ties proclaimed by Chinese President Xi Jinping during a visit to Britain last year. Chinas ambassador to Britain warned that it left relations between the two countries at a crossroads.

Some British politicians and diplomats are wary of the enthusiasm the previous government of Prime Minister David Cameron showed for boosting ties with Beijing, and voiced concerns about the security implications of China holding a major stake in such key infrastructure.

Business and Energy Secretary Greg Clark said the Hinkley Point deal will include a series of measures to enhance security and ensure it cannot change hands without the governments agreement.

Under the deal, EDF wont be able to sell its controlling stake in the project before completion without British approval.

The British government also said it would impose significant new safeguards on future foreign investment in nuclear power and other critical infrastructure, to ensure that significant stakes cannot be sold without the governments knowledge or consent.

There will be reforms to the governments approach to the ownership and control of critical infrastructure to ensure that the full implications of foreign ownership are scrutinized for the purposes of national security, it said in a statement.

Chinas CGN welcomed the Hinkley decision and said it was now able to move forward and deliver nuclear capacity at two more planned U.K. reactors, one of which is expected to be Chinese-designed, as well as financed.

EDF chief executive Jean-Bernard Levy said the decision marks the relaunch of nuclear in Europe.

The French government, majority owner of EDF, said Hinkley Point was a major step in Franco-British energy and industrial cooperation and good news for the French nuclear industry.

Frances influential nuclear industry has been struggling in recent years as the industry has leaned toward renewables and away from costly nuclear plants, notably in the wake of the 2011 Fukushima accident.

British trade unions and manufacturers also welcomed the deal, which they said could create up to 25,000 jobs.

Nuclear power supplies about 20 percent of Britains energy, but no new reactors have been built since the 1990s.

Clark said the Hinkley Point project would inaugurate a new era of U.K. nuclear power and help cut greenhouse gas emissions, which must fall by 80 percent on 1990 levels by 2050.

Opposition politicians criticized the deals guarantee to operators of a fixed above-market electricity price for 35 years.

Labour Party lawmaker Ben Bradshaw said the government had got an absolutely dreadful deal.

And environmental groups say the plant is far too expensive, and money would be better spent developing wind and solar energy.

Greenpeace executive director John Sauven said Hinkley Point was a white elephant that was approved because it became too big to fail. Jill Lawless, London, AP


The leopards range across the snowy mountains of a dozen countries in Central and South Asia, but their numbers had declined in recent decades as hunters sought their spotted pelts and farmers killed them to protect livestock. Now they appear to be thriving, thanks to a seven-year program and a newly declared national park.

Scientists who have been tracking the shy leopards estimate there are up to 140 cats in the Wakhan National Park, established two years ago across 1 million square hectares. Stephane Ostrowski, a specialist with the New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society, says thats a healthy and sustainable number, and indicates that other species like the Siberian ibex and golden marmot  the leopards main prey  are also doing well.

The WCS believes global leopard numbers could be much higher than a previous upper estimate of 7,500, after data gathered by Ostrowski and others showed there could be more than 8,000 in just 44 percent of the animals known range. The World Wildlife Fund lists the species as endangered.

His findings are the result of research carried out in one of the most hard-to-reach places on earth. The Wakhan corridor is nestled high in the Hindu Kush mountain range and cut off by snow for most of the year. The 15-year-old war with the Taliban rages 30 kilometers (18 miles) to the south, and the nearby borders with Tajikistan, Pakistan and China are usually closed.



The United Nations Development Program funds and oversees all the WCS activities in the Wakhan, and will provide USD3 million for the snow leopard project over the next two years.

Ostrowski and the other foreign and Afghan scientists camp in yellow tents in the Sarkand Valley for months on end, monitoring and maintaining a far-flung network of cameras and traps. In just one year, they collected around 5,000 images of 38 individual cats. They managed to capture four leopards  one of them twice  and were able to fit them with collars and track them with GPS. They hope to catch another two by the end of the year.

Theyve learned that snow leopards range widely. Like house cats, they mark their territory by spraying and scratching the ground, but unlike their distant relatives, they dont mind getting wet.

These cats can cross big rivers and swim in extremely cold water, Ostrowski said. One female crossed the Amu Darya river into Tajikistan, stayed a couple of weeks and then returned.

The snow leopards have benefited from conservation programs going back to 2009, when the WCS began building enclosed corrals with mesh roofs to protect the sheep, goats and cows that are the backbone of the local economy.

It was the first step toward bringing modern conservation techniques to Wakhan, where the population of around 17,000 lives off of subsistence farming. In one of the poorest regions of one of the worlds poorest countries, the leopards had long been seen as a menace.

Hassan Beg says he lost 22 sheep and goats in one night a few years ago when a snow leopard got into his uncovered corral, and his cousin Saeed said he was attacked by one late at night. Hassan has since built his own roof over the enclosure using tree branches. We cant kill them, he said, so I just make sure it wont happen again.

A presidential decree banning all hunting countrywide was issued in 2005, but the scientists recently found a carcass with a bullet in its head. Some 400 kilometers (250 miles) to the southwest, at a crowded market in the capital, Kabul, a shopkeeper discreetly produced a snow leopard pelt with a long cylindrical tail and a face distorted by crude taxidermy. He wanted $1,800 for it.

We receive reports from all of the provinces where hunting is going on illegally, whether it is because of poverty, whether it is for hobby, whether it is for selling it at a higher price in the market, said Mostapha Zaher, director general of the National Environment Protection Agency.

But back in Wakhan, the conservation efforts appear to be catching on.

At Qala-i-Panja High School, where students say theyve never heard of the internet, theyve embraced modern notions of wildlife preservation. A snow leopard cub stares down from a poster affixed to the otherwise bare walls.

Since the ban on hunting was introduced, the numbers of wild animals are increasing here and that is attracting foreign tourists, said Simah, a 17-year-old who like many Afghans has no surname. That can be good for the economy of Afghanistan.

The snow leopard is the national parks star attraction, even if most visitors are unlikely to see one. But the region also boasts wolves, brown bears, red foxes, and the long-horned Marco Polo sheep  named for the 13th century Italian explorer who spotted one on his journey to the Far East.

Only around 100 visitors reach Wakhan every year, most entering from Tajikistan during the summer months. Wakhans poverty and isolation has insulated it from decades of war, but has also deterred all but the most adventurous travelers.

Frenchman Jocelyn Guitton, an EU diplomat, arrived in August with plans to trek to the corridors northeast and visit Kyrgyz nomads. He allows that its off the beaten track, but says he hopes tourism can bring visibility and good practices to the region.

Since declaring the national park two years ago, the government has been holding public meetings known as shuras throughout Wakhan to cultivate local support for the idea and to reassure residents who initially feared they might lose their land.

Its a new concept for these people and its a new concept for Afghanistan, so it takes time, said Ashley Vosper, a landscape expert at WCS who has taken part in the meetings.

Vosper says the park actually provides brilliant protection to residents by ensuring that no one else can use their land while bringing economic development to the region. It can be a nice two-way balance, he said.

Zaher hopes that Wakhan can one day rival Afghanistans only other national park, in the central Bamiyan province, which attracts thousands of tourists each year to the crystal blue lakes of Band-i-Amir.

When peace returns to Afghanistan  and it will, as no war lasts forever  Wakhan has great potential for ecotourism, for people who are interested in archaeology, anthropology, researchers interested in Afghanistan, people interested in glacial melt, mountaineering, the environment. Lynne Odonnell, Wakhan, AP


Edward Snowden, who cast himself as the hero of his own spy movie, gets the real thing in Oliver Stones Hollywoodized biopic of the National Security Agency whistleblower.

Who but an avid John le Carre reader would bring a Rubiks Cube to the lobby of a Hong Kong hotel as a signal for his clandestine meeting with journalists Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras? With preternatural self-awareness, Snowden knowingly stepped into a new life: a digital-era Deepthroat, a technocrat ready to don a trenchcoat.

As a protagonist, Snowden (as played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt) doesnt have the brawn of Bourne or the style of Bond. But he carries with him a moral certainty that, it turns out, can do much more. Stones Snowden seeks to frame its well-known subject as a patriot, charting his journey from unquestioning son of a proud military family to brave practitioner of civil disobedience for a greater American good.

Its the kind of combination  Stone and Snowden  that one might go into with apprehension: Just what paranoid conspiracy theories is he going to throw at me THIS time? Theres something too on the nose about the pairing.

But the surprise of Snowden is that Stone, master of left-wing political thrillers, plays it fairly straight. Snowden isnt a liberal screed, or at least not an overt one. Its a sincere, straightforward biopic that, at its worst, verges on hagiography.

That Snowden is conventional neednt be such a bad thing. Snowden, carried by Gordon-Levitt, captures the rise of surveillance by viewing it through Snowdens initially innocent eyes.

Some, of course, would argue against presenting Snowden this way, at all. The movie, perhaps ironically, isnt actually tailored for the choir, but is designed to inform  about Snowden, himself, and the intelligence community he was a part of.

Penned by Kieran Fitzgerald and Stone, the film is organized as flashbacks of Snowdens life, looking back from that Hong Kong hotel room in 2013. The scenes of the data leak meetings inevitably disappoint. Todays docudramas have it hard, given how extensively many events are captured and imprinted in our memories. But Snowden has it harder since Poitras own camera took us literally into that room, resulting in the Oscar-winning documentary Citizenfour.

Snowden has backstory on its side, though, beginning with Snowdens military training at Fort Bragg (cut short by injury) and leading into his ascent at the CIA. Whats your sin of choice? hes asked. Computers, he replies.

Hes taken under the wing of a hardnosed, all-seeing boss (an excellent Rhys Ifans) and is inspired by the more cynical musings of a CIA teacher hidden away in a basement (Nic Cage, perfect). Snowden begins to notice that getting ahead at the CIA is not necessarily connected with abiding by the rules.

And as he jumps from job to job, Snowden also sees a wider war covertly gathering. Even while whats referred to as a short-term war in Iraq is raging, attention is fixed on a below-the-surface intelligence battle with China and Russia. As the size of the NSA dragnet, not just abroad but at home, comes into focus, Snowdens concern grows and becomes personal. Soon hes taping over the laptop camera of his girlfriend (Shailene Woodley). She says she can see his inner liberal growing.

There are exaggerations and composites here that may have diluted away from a more interesting reality, one populated less by stock spy-thriller caricatures. But most of our spy movies now trade heavily off of Snowdens revelations and the threat of governmental surveillance; the recent Jason Bourne was set specifically in a post-Snowden world.

It seems only fair Snowden should get his own close-up, too. Jake Coyle, AP Film Writer

Snowden, an Open Road Films release, is rated R by the Motion Picture Association of America for language and some sexuality/nudity. Running time: 134 minutes.
A former Filipino militiaman testified before the countrys Senate yesterday that President Rodrigo Duterte, when he was still a city mayor, ordered him and other members of a liquidation squad to kill criminals and opponents in gangland-style assaults that left about 1,000 dead.

Edgar Matobato, 57, told the nationally televised Senate committee hearing that he heard Duterte order some of the killings, and acknowledged that he himself carried out about 50 deadly assaults as an assassin, including a suspected kidnapper fed to a crocodile in 2007 in southern Davao del Sur province.

Rights groups have long accused Duterte of involvement in death squads, claims he has denied, even while engaging in tough talk in which he stated his approach to criminals was to kill them all. Matobato is the first person to admit any role in such killings, and to directly implicate Duterte under oath in a public hearing.

The Senate committee inquiry was led by Sen. Leila de Lima, a staunch critic of Dutertes anti-drug campaign that has left more than 3,000 suspected drug users and dealers dead since he assumed the presidency in June. Duterte has accused de Lima of involvement in illegal drugs, alleging that she used to have a driver who took money from detained drug lords. She has denied the allegations.

Matobato said Duterte had once even issued an order to kill de Lima, when she chaired the Commission on Human Rights and was investigating the mayors possible role in extrajudicial killings in 2009 in Davao. He said he and others were waiting to ambush de Lima but she did not go to a part of a hilly area  a suspected mass grave  where they were waiting to open fire.

If you went inside the upper portion, we were already in ambush position, Matobato told de Lima. Its good that you left.

The recent killings of suspected drug dealers have sparked concerns in the Philippines and among U.N. and U.S. officials, including President Barack Obama, who have urged Dutertes government to take steps to rapidly stop the killings and ensure his anti-drug war complies with human rights laws and the rule of law.

Duterte has rejected the criticisms, questioning the right of the U.N., the U.S. and Obama to raise human rights issues, when U.S. forces, for example, had massacred Muslims in the countrys south in the early 1900s as part of a pacification campaign.

Matobato said under oath that the killings went on from 1988, when Duterte first became Davao city mayor, to 2013, when Matobato said he expressed his desire to leave the death squad. He said that prompted his colleagues to implicate him criminally in one killing to silence him.

Our job was to kill criminals like drug pushers, rapists, snatchers. These are the kind we killed every day, Matobato said. But he said their targets were not only criminals but also opponents of Duterte and one of his sons, Paolo Duterte, who is now the vice mayor of Davao.

Presidential spokesman Martin Andanar rejected the allegations, saying government investigations into Dutertes time as mayor of Davao had already gone nowhere because of a lack of evidence and witnesses.

Philippine human rights officials and advocates have previously said potential witnesses refused to testify against Duterte when he was still mayor out of fear of being killed.

There was no immediate reaction from Duterte. Another Duterte spokesman, Ernesto Abella, said at a news conference that while Matobato may sound credible, it is imperative that each and every one of us properly weigh whatever he said and respond right.

Matobato said the victims in Davao allegedly ranged from petty criminals to a wealthy businessman from central Cebu province who was killed in 2014 in his office in Davao city, allegedly because of a feud with Paolo Duterte over a woman. The presidents son said the allegations were without proof and are mere hearsay, telling reporters he would not dignify the accusations of a mad man.

Other victims were a suspected foreign militant whom Matobato said he strangled, then chopped into pieces and buried in a quarry in 2002. Another was a radio commentator, Jun Pala, who was critical of Duterte and was killed by motorcycle-riding gunmen while walking home in 2003.

After a 1993 bombing of a Roman Catholic cathedral in Davao city, Matobato said Duterte ordered him and his colleagues to launch attacks on mosques in an apparent retaliation. He testified he hurled a grenade at one mosque but there were no casualties because the attacks were carried out when no one was praying.

Matobato said some of the squads victims were shot and dumped on Davao streets or buried in three secret pits, while others were disposed of at sea with their stomachs cut open and their bodies tied to concrete blocks.

They were killed like chickens, said Matobato, who added he that backed away from the killings after feeling guilty and entered a government witness-protection program.

He left the protection program when Duterte became president, fearing he would be killed, and said he decided to surface now so the killings will stop.

Matobatos testimony set off a tense exchange between pro-Duterte and opposition senators.

Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano accused Matobato of being part of a plot to unseat Duterte. Im testing to see if you were brought here to bring down this government, he said.

De Lima eventually declared Cayetano out of order and ordered Senate security personnel to restrain him.

Another senator, former national police chief Panfilo Lacson, warned Matobato that his admissions that he was involved in killings could land him in jail.

You can be jailed with your revelations, Lacson said. You have no immunity.

Duterte has immunity from lawsuits as a president, but de Lima said that principle may have to be revisited now. What if a leader is elected and turns out to be a mass murderer? de Lima asked in a news conference after the tense Senate hearing. Jim Gomez & Teresa Cerojano, Manila, AP
The Parisian Macaos Avenue des Champs Elysees at Shoppes at Parisian was transformed into a glamorous runway on Wednesday night for an exclusive designer runway show, Front Row, to mark the start of three days of fashion events and promotions celebrating the official launch of Shoppes at Parisian.

The event was graced by over 200 invited guests. Adding star factor on the runway was one of the worlds top models, Xiao Wen, the first Chinese fashion model named as the face of Marc Jacobs, who has also walked for leading fashion designers Hermes, Louis Vuitton, Prada, Rochas and Thierry Mugler.

Australian artist Kerrie Hess, who has been commissioned by Sands Shoppes to develop a series of exclusive illustrations for Shoppes at Parisian that personify Parisian flair, also attended the event. Kerrie has created illustrations for international fashion houses such as Chanel, Cartier, Kate Spade New York and Louis Vuitton, and her illustrations have featured in luxury fashion magazines including Vogue, Tatler and Harpers Bazaar worldwide.

The event, which included a cocktail reception and after party, showcased exclusive crystal looks from Swarovski. Shoppes at Parisian is set to embrace creative luxury  a unique positioning among our Macau retail properties, commented David Sylvester, executive vice president of Global Retail, Las Vegas Sands Corp, speaking on stage during the event. Sheldon and Miriam Adelson also attended the show.

The celebrations will continue today, when shoppers will be able to see runway shows from selected retailers as part of the official launch events. A highlight of the celebration will be a special consumer shopping experience that includes exclusive gifts and complimentary samples at selected retailers.
Singapore landlords are paying the penalty for a slowing economy. Alone among the worlds major cities, the cost of renting an office with panoramic views is falling as supply outstrips demand.

Annual rents on the upper floors of Singapores skyscrapers fell 7 percent to about USD775 a square meter in the first six months, according to a 23-city index compiled by Knight Frank LLP. The biggest increase was in Shanghai, where rents climbed 7.6 percent to $774. In Hong Kong, the most expensive market, rents rose by 5.9 percent to $2,996 a square meter, the broker said.

Theres a classic imbalance in the Singapore market, said Will Beardmore-Gray, head of Knight Franks tenant representation and agency business. They had relatively high supply and this has been exacerbated by a poor-performing economy and over development.

Vacancy rates in Singapore were 9 percent in the second quarter, compared with 3.3 percent in Shanghai, Knight Frank data show. The city-states economy will shrink 0.1 percent in the third quarter, according to a survey of 26 economists conducted by Bloomberg News in the week through September 13.

Demand for Shanghai office space has been lifted by the technology and creative industries, Beardmore-Gray said. The city has created 300,000 jobs in those sectors since 2009 and is expected to add 100,000 more by 2020, he said.

Manhattan skyscraper rents increased 1.9 percent to $1,701 per square meter during the first half, the second-highest in the index, while those in Tokyo and the City of London district were unchanged at $1,610 and $1,226 respectively.

Four of the five cities with the fastest rental growth were in the Asia Pacific region, with Toronto the only center outside the region posting a comparable increase. Jack Sidders, Bloomberg
If the world of brandy is a clan, grape brandy in its various forms would be the patriarch, having for long occupied centre stage and overshadowing its poor cousin pomace brandy and its distant relative fruit brandy. The vast majority of grape brandy sees barrel maturation, the question is how brief or extensive. For pomace brandy and fruit brandy, however, barrel maturation is more of an option, not obligation. Pomace brandy, with or without barrel maturation, is appreciated for its candid flavours and rustic charm.

Fruit brandy can be  and is  made with a huge range of fruits, e.g. berries, orchard fruits and stone fruits. The French-speaking and Germans-speaking areas produce a particularly wide array of clear, unaged fruit brandies, referred to as eau-de-vie and Obstbrand respectively. Of the few fruit brandies that receive barrel maturation, Calvados is one of the most prominent.

Similar to Cognac and Armagnac, Calvados is both the name of the spirit and of the area. Whereas Cognac and Armagnac are the names of historic regions that no longer exist for administrative purpose, Calvados is a departement of France, established since the French Revolution. Before 1 January 2016, Calvados was 1 of the 3 departements of Lower Normandy (Basse-Normandie). Since 1 January 2016, Basse-Normandie and its sibling Upper Normandy (Haute-Normandie), comprising 2 departements, merged and became one region (region)  Normandy (Normandie).

Possessing some of the finest orchards in Europe, Normandy has been producing apples and pears as well as cider and perry for well over a millennium. With the invention and propagation of distillation since the 12th century, Calvados has been produced since the mid-16th century. Theoretically, Calvados can be produced in Normandy, parts of Brittany (Bretagne) and Pays de la Loire. In practise, however, production largely confined to Lower Normandy.

Some 200 varieties of apples  ranging from sweet to tart and bitter  are permitted in the production of Calvados; any Calvados is likely to make use of dozens of varieties. After harvest, the apples are pressed and fermented into cider, then distilled: either twice in traditional alembic (alambic is French spelling) still, not unlike single malt whisky, or once in continuous column still, similar to grain whisky. The number of years the spirit then spends in oak barrels determines its grades: 2 years for Fine / Trois Etoiles / Trois Pommes; 3 years for Reserve / Vieux; 4 years for Vieille Reserve / VO / VSOP; 6 years for Napoleon / XO / Extra / Hors dAge / Age Inconnu. (NB: the number of years is based on the youngest component in the blend.)

Before 1942, Calvados used to have a total of 10 appellations, but the number has since been consolidated into 3, subsequent to reforms in 1984 and 1997. Representing 70% of total production, Calvados is the basic level. Stricter and more prestigious, Calvados Pays dAuge constitutes 25% of total production. Occupying less than 5% of total production, Calvados Domfrontais is a characterful category, which requires the use of pears (at least 30%).

Boulard XO Calvados Pays dAuge

Translucent tangerine with amber-tawny reflex, the nose is tangy and vibrant, effusing dried apple, apple crumble, cider vinegar and orchard blossom. With a suave mouthfeel, the palate is expressive and fruity, emanating apple pie, toffee apple, forest honey and Applewood. Medium-full bodied at 40%, the pleasing entry continues through a layered mid-palate, leading to a tart finish.

Boulard products are available at various supermarkets and duty-free outlets.

Jacky I.F. Cheong is a legal professional by day and columnist by night. Having spent his formative years in Britain,

France, and Germany, he regularly writes about wine, fine arts, classical music, and politics in several languages
INDONESIA Two women tourists, from Austria and Germany, were killed and about 20 other people injured in an explosion on a speedboat that was ferrying them from the island of Bali to neighboring Lombok. A manifest showed that passengers were from several countries including Britain, France, Italy, Portugal, Ireland and Spain.



MYANMAR economists and businessmen welcomed President Barack Obamas announcement that the U.S. will lift economic sanctions and restore long-lost trade benefits to the Southeast Asian country as it emerges from half a century of oppressive military rule.



CHINA-UK The British government yesterday approved the construction of the countrys first new nuclear power plant in more than two decades, a French and Chinese-backed project that had prompted high-level fears about national security. The government said that it had decided to proceed with the 18 billion-pound Hinkley Point plant in southwest England.



KOREAs Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says he has never seen tensions on the Korean Peninsula as high as they are today and calls on the Security Council to take urgent action to prevent provocative actions by North Korea.



FLIGHT MH370 A wing flap that washed ashore on an island off Tanzania has been identified as belonging to missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, Australian officials say.



JAPAN-US Opponents of planned U.S. helipads on Japans southern island of Okinawa step up protests in Tokyo after the central government used military aircraft to transport equipment for the project.



JAPAN Dressed in a white pants suit, the new head of Japans main opposition party stood out as she raised her hands on stage with three other dark-suited party leaders. Renho Murata, who generally goes by only her first name, is one of three women who have assumed prominent political posts in recent weeks in a country more known for its male-dominated political and business hierarchy.

PAKISTAN Police arrest the father, husband and brother of a woman who was tortured and hanged alongside her alleged boyfriend in a so-called honor killing in the village of Mian Channu, in eastern Punjab province.



WWI Britains Prince Charles and other dignitaries honor thousands of soldiers from New Zealand and other Pacific islands killed 100 years ago in World War I.

SAMSUNG Samsungs recall of 2.5 million Galaxy Note 7 phones after several dozen caught fire and exploded may stem from a subtle manufacturing error, but it highlights the challenge electronics makers face in packing ever more battery power into ever thinner phones, while rushing for faster release dates.
Journalists were attacked and forced out of the fishing village where China has suppressed new protests five years after the village received international attention for demonstrations against land seizures.

Wukan remains under siege two days after police arrested 13 protesters on allegations that they incited violence and arrest. The Chinese government is now staging a broad crackdown on information about the village, refusing to let journalists in and heavily restricting discussion of Wukan on social media networks.

Reporters from two Hong Kong newspapers, the South China Morning Post and the Chinese-language Ming Pao, were assaulted Wednesday night while conducting interviews and later detained for several hours, both newspapers reported. Two reporters from television station Hong Kong 01 were also detained, according to the station.

The South China Morning Post reported that a group of unidentified men stormed into a home and pushed the newspapers journalist to the ground. Ming Pao said some in the group were wearing police uniforms, and that someone punched its two journalists even after they had followed orders to squat on the ground.

The journalists were later taken to a police station and questioned for several hours, the newspapers reported. According to Ming Pao, a government official asked the journalists to sign a pledge not to do any more reporting.

Both newspapers and the television station said their reporters were eventually taken to the Hong Kong border.

The BBC also reported that its journalists in Wukan were stopped from entering the village.

Wukan carries heightened symbolic importance after the success of protests in 2011, when its villagers marched against land seizures and corruption. Facing an international spotlight, the Chinese government responded by letting villagers elect their local leader, a measure Chinas ruling Communist Party has sometimes used to quell local outcry, though national and provincial government officials are all chosen by the party.

The winner of Wukans election was Lin Zuluan, a former protester. But earlier this year as Lin was set to lead a new round of protests over new allegations of land seizures, authorities detained him the day before a scheduled protest and later announced he had been charged with taking bribes from developers.

Lin went on television to state he had accepted bribes totaling 593,000 yuan. The government often broadcasts confessions as a means of winning public confidence in an ongoing anti-corruption campaign, though such confessions are often derided by human-rights groups as coerced.

His supporters staged more than 80 straight days of protests following his detention, even after he was sentenced last week to three years in jail.

After issuing warnings against further protests, the government sent dozens of police vans into the village early Tuesday, arrested protest leaders in their homes, and fired rubber bullets at protesters. Social media postings depicted bloodied villagers with apparent bullet wounds. Subsequent posts have shown police posted at street corners, and villagers contacted by The Associated Press have refused to be interviewed.

Yesterday, Chinese state media said that life in the village was back to normal.

The Global Times, a state-run newspaper, posted a column headlined, Foreign media fails to trick Wukan villagers on rumor. The column accused journalists of trying to visit Wukan to wait for conflicts.

Even though some foreign media have been unscrupulously inciting, planning, and directing chaos, local police have not resorted to violence to solve the issue, the column said.

The Hong Kong Journalists Association said it strongly condemns violence against reporters in Wukan and called on the Hong Kong government to take effective measures to protect the rights and safety of Hong Kong journalists working in the mainland. AP
TWIN FALLS  A 62-year-old Twin Falls man with several prior drug dealing convictions was sentenced Wednesday in Boise to seven years in federal prison.

Matthew John Mingoia, Jr., pleaded guilty in February to a federal count of possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute. He was indicted by a federal grand jury in May of last year on the drug count and a count of possession of a firearm by a prohibited person.

After his seven-year prison term ends, Mingoia will be placed on supervised release for three years.

Investigators searched Mingoias residence Dec. 3, 2014, after receiving information he was selling methamphetamine in the Twin Falls area, U.S. Attorney Wendy Olson said in a statement. Inside the residence, investigators found methamphetamine, a handgun, scales, surveillance cameras and other items connected to drug sales.

Senior U.S. District Judge Edward Lodge found Mingoia was a habitual offender with convictions for drug sales in 1999, 2005 and 2007, Olson said in the statement.

The case was investigated by Idaho State Police and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
TWIN FALLS  Averaging 15 miles a day, then-mayor Don Hall walked the streets of Twin Falls last October as part of the Mayors School Walking Challenge. He was trying to set a fitness example for local school kids, but along the way found many sidewalks in town were crumbling or nonexistent.

The walks got him thinking about connectivity in the city, and hes heard from residents with complaints about the condition of the citys sidewalks.

We need to start planning that infrastructure, he said last week.

In a growing city, local officials want to address the issue of connectivity for pedestrians. But a $49 million sidewalk problem isnt going to be fixed overnight  especially when property owners must foot the bill for sidewalks.

Still, the city could make a dent in the issue through a new incentive program for homeowners to repair existing sidewalks that dont meet federal standards.

For the last 50-plus years, theres been people that have been paying to repair their sidewalks, Public Works Director Jon Caton said. The program wouldnt absolve the homeowner of their responsibility, it would only help them pay for a part of it.

As planned, the city will budget $50,000 for the sidewalk incentive program, available Oct. 1. Homeowners can apply to receive a 50-percent match, up to $1,500, for repairing sidewalks, curbs and gutters that dont meet Americans with Disabilities Act regulations.

According to a preliminary study Caton presented earlier this year, Twin Falls has at least 80,000 lineal feet of sidewalk in need of repair. And, measured with roadway length, the city is missing more than 1 million lineal feet of sidewalk.

Caton noted that the purpose of these estimates was to quantify the problem so the city could determine moving forward whether it could, or should, fix it.

Its gonna take years to get caught up, but you dont get there if you dont start, Hall said.

The background

For decades, new developments outside of manufacturing zones have been required to include curb, gutter and sidewalk when platted. But some of Twin Falls older neighborhoods were planned without any of these improvements, City Engineer Jackie Fields explained.

Twin Falls was a very different place 50 to 70 years ago, she said.

Long before sidewalks were commonplace, Fields said, areas such as Filer Avenue west of Washington Street were considered rural subdivisions.

They were way out of town, she said. They were the country.

Once they were incorporated, however, Twin Falls was stuck with the problem of no sidewalks.

For at least 50 years, city code has placed the responsibility of sidewalks on the property owner. Older parts of town dont require them until an improvement is made at more than 25 percent of the total property value. Oftentimes, property owners will get a deferral on these improvements until some date in the future.

Missing sidewalks, however, are only part of the problem. The areas of damaged sidewalk can create hazards for pedestrians.

It doesnt take much for it to not meet ADA, Caton said.

A vertical deviation of more than a quarter-inch would make a residential sidewalk eligible for the incentive program. The city estimates sidewalk costs about $37.50 per square yard.

Creating connectivity

There are cases where the city will take on the cost of curb, gutter and sidewalks. These include major roadway jobs, ADA ramps, or projects where there is a drainage problem. Sidewalks can be tricky to put in because they must be at an elevation to drain with the curb and gutter, Fields said.

The city has yet to identify priority areas where sidewalk is needed, and it has to be careful. Opting to pay for sidewalks can get political very quickly, Caton said, because homeowners have had to pay for sidewalks in the past. At this time, the city will not necessarily choose to pay for any new sidewalks.

We have so much to do just taking care of the pavement we have in place, Fields said.

But there are some goals and guidelines that could help the city move forward not only with sidewalks, but with other plans for connectivity. Jonathan Spendlove, a city planner, said the Comprehensive Plan will identify where future residential growth will take place, and where people will want to get to.

Were trying to identify and connect people to the services and the recreation that they want and need, he said.

This includes schools, parks and downtown.

The Comprehensive Plan could also explore the options the city has, including calling deferrals in priority areas  requiring homeowners to install curb, gutter and sidewalks, Caton said. Zones also have specific requirements for sidewalk.

While the Comprehensive Plans goals are broad, covering the city as a whole, Spendlove expects the citys new Master Transportation Plan will include more specifics.

In that plan, youll probably see more of a broader scope than you have in the past, he said.

Unlike previous transportation plans, the new one will address transportation issues for pedestrians and bicyclists, including sidewalks, Caton said.

Were looking at the importance of pathways and multimodal transportation, he said.

While the city isnt sure how well the incentive program will be received, Hall said, he would like to see the momentum continue.

This year will be the first step, he said, of correcting the problems of the past.
BOISE  Idaho high school juniors can apply to take an aerospace class this spring, with the chance to visit the NASA Ames Research Center in Sunnyvale, Calif.

Registration will be open through Nov. 18.

The Idaho Science and Aerospace Scholars program is offered through a cooperation between the Idaho Department of Education and NASA.

Once accepted into the program, students will sign up for an online class offered through the Idaho Digital Learning Academy by going to their IDLA school site coordinator.

The class will be offered from January through May and students will receive one science elective credit for completing the class.

The class has a heavy emphasis on science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

Students may also register for two concurrent credits through Boise State University.

After finishing the competitive NASA-developed course on space exploration, the top 88 students will be invited to attend a weeklong Aerospace Scholars Summer Academy at BSU next summer.

It will include an all-expenses paid, two-day trip to the Ames Center.

With help from mentors and educators at BSU and Ames, students will simulate development of a human mission to Mars.

All of the Aerospace Scholar participants and their families will also be invited to participate in a series of regional capstone celebrations, offering interactive, Idaho-based STEM activities and tours.

To apply, students must: Be a U.S. citizen and Idaho resident; Be a current high school junior with an interest in science, technology, engineering or mathematics; Have a minimum GPA of 2.7; Be at least 16 years old by July 1, 2017; Commit to all aspects of the Idaho Science and Aerospace Scholars program; and have internet access and e-mail (home, school or public library).

Teachers also may apply to be mentors for the program and may be selected for the trip to Ames with students.

For more information, visit the program website at: http://www.sde.idaho.gov/academic/science/isas.html.
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TWIN FALLS  A new group in Twin Falls hopes to inspire people to make their hometowns great again through populist localism.

This approach involves less government and more activism, said Lee Stranahan, a reporter for the conservative news website Breitbart and also the spokesman for the group Make Your Hometown Great Again.

Julie DeWolfe, the groups executive director, told a group of reporters and supporters at a news conference Thursday at the Twin Falls Public Library, that globalism is often thrust upon communities under the name of diversity, replacing the culture that used to be passed on organically through families and local institutions with a one-size-fits-all plan.

We are a hometown already together, she said. Globalism is eradicating local culture.

DeWolfe is one of the more active refugee resettlement critics in Twin Falls. Stranahan moved here and has been writing about the issue for the past several months after three boys from refugee families were accused of sexually assaulting a 5-year-old girl at the Fawnbrook Apartments brought national attention to the city. The case is sealed and in juvenile court.

Stranahan and DeWolfe are both supporters of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, who has based much of his campaign on his opposition to illegal immigration and his populist appeals against the influence of big money and special interests in politics, and who called last year for a moratorium on letting Muslims into the country. He has since modified that to a moratorium on immigration from regions linked with terrorism. The groups name is a nod to Trumps campaign slogan, Make America Great Again.

However, our movement is open to anyone who agrees with us that change needs to happen at the national level, Stranahan said.

Stranahan said the support this year not only for Trump but for Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, and for third-party candidates such as Libertarian Gary Johnson and Green Party candidate Jill Stein, shows many people with differing perspectives are growing skeptical of the increasingly clear connection between big business and big government and the influence of campaign donors and lobbyists in politics.

Were going to combat globalism through populist localism, DeWolfe said.

Stranahan said there are problems local politicians dont want to discuss, and that the influence of companies such as Chobani, which has hired many refugees to work at its yogurt plant in Twin Falls, and the dairy industry, which employs many undocumented immigrants, plays a role.

When I talk about corruption, Im not talking about some secret backroom deal, he said. Im talking about the open corruption weve all come to accept.

Stranahan and DeWolfe pointed to illegal immigration as an issue where the left and right could find common ground  conservatives might be more concerned with stopping illegal immigration, while liberals might be more concerned with employers taking advantage of workers.

My thing is, theyre related, Stranahan said. You cant deal with one issue without the other.

As part of the group, they also plan to start a microbusiness incubator, or a place where people who want to start a business can find some resources and some cheap office space, giving them the freedom to experiment without having to take on massive debt to do so. Stranahan said they are looking at some possible locations downtown. DeWolfe said they would target millennials in particular with this, possibly making it easier for some of them to stay in the area and not move to bigger cities for work.

We want to give them that chance, she said.

For the time being, the group is operating as a limited liability company registered to Stranahan, although the structure could change as they grow. Their hope is to start chapters across the country.

We believe that this approach will work anywhere from the heartland to Harlem, Stranahan said.

They also plan to get involved in local and state-level issues. Stranahan said that, given Twin Falls size, they could have an impact quickly.

We believe changes we make here will be immediately visible, Stranahan said.
TWIN FALLS  Hundreds of Idahoans will lace up their sneakers and hit the pavement Saturday to help end multiple sclerosis.

And residents in Twin Falls are invited to join.

Two Walk MS events have been scheduled in the Magic Valley and the Wood River Valley. A walk will be held at 10 a.m. Saturday at the Twin Falls Visitor Center and St. Lukes Wood River Medical Center in Ketchum. Registration for both walks start at 9 a.m.

Participants can also register at walkmsidaho.org. Walkers are encouraged to raise a minimum of $125 to receive a walk T-Shirt. Funds raised through Walk MS go directly toward supporting cutting edge research and providing vital programs and services for people living with MS in Idaho.

The annual fall Walk MS events in Idaho are something we look forward to every year, said Melissa Mathews, president of the Utah-Southern Idaho Chapter of the National MS Society, in a statement. It is an incredible opportunity to bring the community together to help battle this devastating disease, and we are grateful to all of our participants.

The Utah-Southern Idaho Chapter based in Salt Lake City, with an office in Boise, serves more than 49,000 people impacted by multiple sclerosis.
Saudi Arabia has, through its Ambassador to the UN Abdallah al-Mouallimi, addressed a letter to the UN Security Council complaining about Irans action in the Yemeni war.

Riyadh accuses Tehran of supplying the Houthi Movement and its allies with weapons and missiles that have been fired into Saudi Arabia killing hundreds of civilians and damaging infrastructures such as schools and hospitals in the border regions of Najran, Jazan and Assir.

It pointed out the use of ballistic missile of the type ZilZal-3 (Earthquake-3) on the city of Najran on 31 August which it claimed was a short range ballistic missile produced in Iran. The total number of ballistic missiles fired into Saudi Arabian territory recently nears 30 according to the complaint.

The letter urged the Security Council to take all necessary measures to pressure Iran to comply with all the relevant Security Council resolutions and cease and desist from any illegal actions in Yemen.

Tehran is yet to react to the alleged role it is playing in fueling the Yemeni war as the Saudi Ambassador claims that several Iranian weapons have been intercepted on their way to the Houthi rebels by Australian, American and French naval forces with most of the crew members on board being Iranians. Iranian-made Anti-tank missiles, thousands of rifles and Dragonov sniper weapons, AK-47 rifles, mortar pipes, missile shells, and RPG launchers were some of the weapons seized.

The war in Yemen has been deemed as a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran as both countries seek regional supremacy. Their sectarian divide has intensified the battle.

Riyadh wants the UN Security Council to stop weapons smuggling from Iran to the rebels as it warned that it could take necessary measures to secure its border and protect its citizens. Saudi Arabia is heading the military coalition fighting in Yemen to reinstate President Hadi as the legitimate president of the country. Almost 18 months since the campaign began, the Houthis are still in control of Sanaa and most of the northern part of the country.
The Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan discussed with Prime Minister Matteo Renzi of Italy bilateral ties and means to capitalize on the resources of both nations to boost their economic and investment cooperation. Sheikh Mohammed called for broader bilateral cooperation and increased number of effective partnerships in the economic, trade and development sectors. Renzi is optimistic that their relations will continue to be fruitful.

The Italian Ambassador to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Liborio Stellino hailed the growing ties between the two countries which have been marked by a significant growth in trade.

The diplomat who described the UAE as a strategic partner for Italy said more than 600 onshore and/or offshore Italian companies are operating in the emirates.

The Crown Prince also visited the Vatican where he met with Pope Francis.

Discussions focused on the promotion of the message of co-existence, religious tolerance and humanitarian actions in a world that has been marred with violence, sectarianism, extremism and intolerance.

The Pope applauded UAEs effort to promote and support sustainable development around the world as well as their humanitarian and philanthropic initiatives to provide education and health services to the populations in need.

On his part, Sheikh Mohammed hailed the Popes strive for peace, love and solidarity in the world and expressed hope that their collaboration will help to surpass the current challenges. He underlined the need to build bridges of collaboration and dialogue between different cultures and religions, and to stand in solidarity against those who promote religious strife, sectarianism, racism and intolerance, thereby threatening the security and stability of the world.
The recent decision made by Jamaica to withdraw its recognition of the self-proclaimed SADR is undoubtedly a success for Moroccos diplomacy which dealt another hard blow to the Algeria-backed separatists.

Jamaicas decision was announced by its Foreign Affairs Ministry in a letter handed over to Moroccan Delegate foreign Affairs minister, who is currently on a visit to the Caribbean country.

Jamaica expresses its sincere hope that its position of neutrality and its continued support to the UN-sponsored peace process underway will send a strong message to the international community as to its efforts to achieve a just and peaceful solution to this regional dispute that has lasted for much too long, says the document.

Moroccos top diplomat Salaheddine Mezouar thanked Jamaica for its bold stand and backing of the North African Kingdom territorial integrity and sovereignty.

According to some analysts, the move will boost cooperation between the two countries particularly in the fields of agriculture, irrigation, security and tourism.

Since 2000, some 34 countries, including 9 states of the Caribbean region, have pulled out their recognition to the pseudo-RASD. During the latest African Summit held in Kigali (Rwanda), 28 African member countries out of 54 tabled a motion demanding the immediate suspension of the membership of the so-called RASD which was illegally admitted in 1984 through the illegitimate use of threats, deceit, coercion and dirty petrodollar money.

They also welcomed Moroccos bid to rejoin the African Union, noting that the North African country is one of the founding members of the African organization.
Jamaica announced Wednesday it decided to back off from supporting the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) after 37 years of support to the Polisario front.

Jamaica becomes the 34th country in the world and the third this year after Zambia and Surinam to have withdrawn their recognition of SADR.

In an official document from its foreign affairs and trade ministry, dated September 14, 2016, Jamaica states it withdraws its recognition of the self-proclaimed SADR, a statement from the Moroccan foreign ministry said on Thursday.

The Caribbean country, according to the official document, strongly wishes that its impartial position and its continued support for UN-led efforts will send a strong message that it endorses the international communitys effort seeking a peaceful and fair settlement of the prolonged regional conflict.

Jamaica is the ninth Caribbean country to withdraw its support for the Polisario-created state.
The international rights group Human Rights Watch (HRW) accused the Kenyan government of intimidating Somali refugees living in the Eastern-African nations Dabaab camp to repatriate them.

In a report released on Thursday, the right group said some of the 263,000 refugees in the camp say they have agreed to return home because they fear Kenya will force them out if they stay.

The Kenyan authorities are not giving Somali refugees a real choice between staying and leaving, and the UN refugee agency isnt giving people accurate information about security conditions in Somalia, refugee rights director at Human Rights Watch, Bill Frelick, was quoted as saying.

HRW interviewed 100 refugees and asylum-seekers in Dadaab, some of whom said they agreed to return home because they fear the Kenyan government will deport them if they stay.

Recently, Kenyan government said it wants to close the camp over security concerns, saying attacks on its soil have been planned there. The government has set aside $10m for repatriation.

Dadaab camp was set up in 1991 to house families fleeing conflict in Somalia, and some people have been living there for more than 20 years.

In 2014, Kenyan authorities deported more than 300 people to Somalia in a crackdown the United Nations said violated the 1951 Refugee Convention, which prohibits the forcible return of refugees to areas where their lives would be threatened.
Burkina Faso has launched disciplinary procedures against former Prime Minister General Isaac Zida, whos now seeking refuge in Canada.

The former Prime Minister joined his family in Canada in January at the end of the transition in December 2015, with permission issued by President Kabore. The permission however expired on February 15, and Zida has not heeded the return summons.

According to local media, the military court of the West-African country could try the former Prime minister in absentia.

Zida could face desertion during peacetime and disobedience charges.

All former ministers who served under the regime of ousted former president Blaise Compaore were summoned by the Burkina Faso national police last week.

They stand accused of complicity in the short-lived coup that led to the death of 30 people in October 30 and 31, 2014.

It is also alleged that they wanted to change Burkina Fasos constitution in 2014. Other charges include murder, destruction of others property, injury and assassination attempts.

Also, the cabinet members of the transitional government are targeted by an investigation into alleged embezzlement of public finances and illicit enrichment.

The countrys president said there may be criminal charges after an audit found the transitional government had improperly awarded land to government members and their families, and misspent $11 million.
Ever since their two children were diagnosed with autism, San Jose mother Renee Trevino and her husband, Michael, have done whatever it takes to help Isaiah, 7, and Ava, 4, function at higher levels.

So when Kaiser Permanente researchers asked the family if they would submit a blood or saliva test for a study surrounding the cause and new treatments for autism spectrum disorder, the Trevinos were more than willing to oblige.

"If we can do anything to help to understand why our kids are going through this, I am happy to do everything we can," said Renee.

The Trevinos are one of 1,200 families helping Kaiser Permanente's Northern California Division of Research build the Autism Family Biobank that the health care giant set up last summer for its Northern California member families with autistic children.

Through samples of saliva or blood, Kaiser researchers are collecting the genetic material of each child and his or her biological parents, as well as medical and environmental information for all three members of the family.

But to reach their goal of 5,000 families, the researchers need 3,800 more such "trios" to sign up by 2018, when the deadline - and a $4.6 million grant - runs out.

"How could you not want to do this?" asked Kaiser member and Oakland, Calif., resident Tiffany Van Buren, whose 7-year-old daughter, Devyn, is autistic. "It was so simple!"

Autism is a relatively common neurodevelopmental disorder - defined by impairments in social interaction and communication, and restricted and repetitive patterns of behavior - that occurs in 1 in 68 children, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Yet when it comes to participating in autism studies, many families still balk, saying they don't have time, while others are anxious about their privacy. Even a handful of Trevino's relatives and friends were wary of her getting involved with the study.

The New York City-based Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative is funding the project; ultimately, the data will be made available to researchers worldwide, though cleared of any identifying information.

Trevino understands why some families might worry about that aspect.

"I think that's pretty normal - people who want to keep their privacy don't want to have these samples all over the place," said the mother. "And they don't know what's being done with them."

The reluctance of some families to engage in such research might baffle outsiders - after all, the point of the research is to help their own children with autism. But these bumps in the road aren't new to Lisa Croen, director of the Kaiser Permanente Autism Research Program.

Yet they can be frustrating.

"Right now, we have a 25 percent refusal rate - but that does not mean 75 percent have said yes," said Croen. "About 50 percent are still unknown - we have not closed them out. But we would like the numbers to be much higher in terms of people saying yes."

Among a plethora of autism studies that have been launched in the U.S., this one is believed to be the largest in the country linked to electronic medical records, said Kaiser Permanente spokeswoman Janet Byron.

Key to Kaiser's Autism Family Biobank is that it's made up of only Northern California Kaiser member families, which Croen said offers multiple benefits not only involving their genetic information, but environmental influences that may be unique to the area.

"Not just toxins," Croen explained, "but information about their lifestyle, nutrition, chemical exposure, illnesses and so on."

And because Kaiser already has the families' permission to review their electronic health records, Croen's team can easily access their medical histories instead of having to obtain permission from individual health plans, a complication other researchers may face.

Of Kaiser's 3.9 million members in Northern California - which includes the Bay Area counties, Fresno and the Central Valley, as well as Sacramento Valley - there are about 21,000 member families who have an autistic child, about 17,000 of whom likely meet the criteria for eligibility: a Kaiser Permanente member of any age with autism, and both their biological parents.

Croen said she needs only 5,000 families to ensure the right amount of participants.

"A more robust number allows you to subdivide the population being studied into groups that might have different risk factors for a type of autism, or manifestations of autism," said the senior research scientist.

The veteran researcher said her 10-member team did not expect to collect the data needed from 5,000 families all at once.

"You don't send a letter out to 17,000 families," said Croen. "You could not follow up with all of them."

Rather, she said, the team anticipated that the monthly numbers would gradually increase as the team continues to reach out to more families. And while she said they are on track to hit 5,000 families, public reminders never hurt.

"It's a challenging job to raise children, especially if you have a special needs kid," said Louis Reichardt, director of the Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative, of the painstaking process of attracting participants to clinical study.

"Families are undergoing a lot of change and turmoil. School school starts and ends. Some parents don't want to put their children through blood or saliva samples," said Reichardt, a former UC San Francisco professor of cell physiology who directed that school's renowned neuroscience graduate program for 25 years before joining Simons in 2013.

Other parents aren't interested, or they may live somewhere else.

"There is every reason under the sun" not to participate, he said.

Letters are sent to families via postal and email asking them to sign up for the study. The research team then follows up with a phone call or email to find out if they're interested in participating and which sample they would prefer to donate. But Croen said it's not necessary to wait for the initial letter; families can contact the Division of Research's Autism Family Program or visit its website for more information.

The parents also are asked to fill out two brief surveys.

Though the Trevinos chose the blood test, most families, by 4 to 1, are submitting saliva samples, said Croen.

"We prefer blood because there are more things you can measure in blood, aside from genetics," said Croen. But saliva works just fine, too - and it's easier for most families.

"Whatever we get is extremely useful," she said. "As technology advances and science progresses, there will be more and more things we will be able to measure from saliva samples other than DNA."

Van Buren said that she, Devyn and Devyn's father, Sean Handran, opted for the saliva test, sent to them in the mail. The family even had some fun with the test, competing to see who could produce the most spit in one shot into a container.

Compared to past autism-related studies Kaiser researchers have asked her to participate in - including one a few years ago that required several hours of testing over a couple of days - "this was super easy," said Van Buren. So there is no excuse, in her mind, not to sign up.

"If you want medical answers," she said, "then you need to be willing to participate in the research to provide you with those answers."

Explore further Experts launch largest-ever autism research study in US

2016 The Mercury News (San Jose, Calif.)

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
(HealthDay)For American-Indians with type 2 diabetes, early administration of losartan does not slow progression of glomerular filtration rate (GFR) decline, according to a study published online Sept. 9 in Diabetes Care.

Stephanie K. Tanamas, Ph.D., from the National Institutes of Health in Phoenix, and colleagues examined whether early administration of losartan slows progression of kidney disease in a six-year trial in 169 American-Indians with type 2 diabetes. Participants with urine albumin/creatinine ratio <300 mg/g were randomized to receive losartan or placebo (84 and 85, respectively). The primary outcome was a reduction in GFR to 60 mL/min or half the baseline value (for those who entered with GFR <120 mL/min). Participants were followed for up to 12 years post-trial, with treatment managed outside the study.

The researchers found that treatment with renin-angiotensin system inhibitors was equivalent in both groups after completion of the clinical trial. During a median of 13.5 years following randomization, 29 and 35 participants originally assigned to losartan and placebo, respectively, reached the primary GFR outcome, with a hazard ratio of 0.72 (95 percent confidence interval, 0.44 to 1.18).

"We found no evidence of an extended benefit of early losartan treatment on slowing GFR decline in persons with type 2 diabetes," the authors write.

The study was funded in part by Merck, which provided the study drug and placebo tablets.

Explore further Advanced glycation end products tied to renal function loss

Copyright  2016 HealthDay. All rights reserved.
A preventable hospital admission is defined by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality as one that might have been prevented with timely access to primary care or improvements to social determinants of health. Using this definition, a study by researchers at Baylor College of Medicine was published today in Hospital Pediatrics examining the specific characteristics associated with potentially preventable pediatric admissions to Texas hospitals.

In this study, hospitalizations for five conditions were potentially preventable: asthma, perforated appendicitis, complications of diabetes, gastroenteritis and urinary tract infection. To study the risk factors of preventable admissions in these five conditions, Dr. Laura Medford-Davis, assistant professor in emergency medicine at Baylor, and colleagues identified 747,040 pediatric admissions of children aged 0 to 17 between 2005 to 2008.

These admissions resulted in an average of 71,444 hospitalization days per year, with 14 percent being potentially preventable. The costs for these visits totaled $304 million dollars in hospital charges per year in Texas alone.

The characteristics of preventable admissions

Medford-Davis found that the highest risk factors associated with preventable pediatric admissions in these five conditions included younger age (0-4 years), male sex, African American race and Hispanic ethnicity, lower income, comorbid substance abuse disorder, private insurance and admission on a weekend or to a critical-access hospital.

"The most surprising results of our study were that privately insured patients and very young patients were at the highest risk for preventable admissions," said Medford-Davis. "This could be an indicator of overuse of private insurance, which will require additional research in the future to determine the extent to which this is occurring and why. As for the age factor, we think that this risk may be due to the fact that these young children cannot yet effectively communicate with their caregivers to let them know that there may be a health issue until it has progressed to show more serious signs."

In addition to further studying possible overuse of private insurance, Medford-Davis also stressed that future research is necessary in order to understand solutions for preventable pediatric admissions as a result of the five studied conditions.

Combating preventable admissions

"To see a decrease in the number of preventable admissions among pediatric patients, we need to expand access to primary care and strengthen education efforts for parents about childhood illnesses. The best way to reduce these types of preventable admissions is to seek primary care quickly, when the child is still early in the sickness," said Medford-Davis.

Admissions that are potentially preventable represent a high burden of time and costs for the pediatric population, and strategies to reduce them have to be tailored to each diagnosis, as their associated risk factors vary across all conditions.

Explore further ACR: Most hospitalizations for gout are preventable

More information: Factors Associated With Potentially Preventable Pediatric Admissions Vary by Diagnosis: Findings From a Large State. Hospital Pediatrics Sep 2016, hpeds.2016-0038; Factors Associated With Potentially Preventable Pediatric Admissions Vary by Diagnosis: Findings From a Large State.Sep 2016, hpeds.2016-0038; DOI: 10.1542/hpeds.2016-0038
A new study from researchers at Henry Ford Hospital finds an incisionless robotic surgery  done alone or in conjunction with chemotherapy or radiation  may offer oropharyngeal cancer patients good outcomes and survival, without significant pain and disfigurement.

Patients with cancers of the base of tongue, tonsils, soft palate and pharynx who underwent TransOral Robotic Surgery, or TORS, as the first line of treatment experienced an average three-year survival from time of diagnosis.

Most notably, the study's preliminary results reveal oropharyngeal cancer patients who are p16 negative  a marker for the human papilloma virus, or HPV, that affects how well cancer will respond to treatment  have good outcomes with TORS in combination with radiation and/or chemotherapy.

"For non-surgical patients, several studies have shown that p16 positive throat cancers, or HPV- related throat cancers, have better survival and less recurrence than p16 negative throat cancers," says study lead author Tamer Ghanem, M.D., Ph.D., director of Head and Neck Oncology and Reconstructive Surgery Division in the Department of Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery at Henry Ford Hospital.

"Within our study, patients treated with robotic surgery had excellent results and survival, irrespective of their p16 status."

Study results will be presented Sunday, Sept. 18 at the 2016 American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery (AAO-HNS) annual meeting in San Diego.

Led by Dr. Ghanem, Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit was among the first in the country to perform TORS using the da Vinci Surgical System. TORS offers patients an option to remove certain head and neck cancer tumors without visible scarring, while preserving speech and the ability to eat.

With TORS, surgeons can access tumors through the mouth using the slender operating arms of the da Vinci, thus not requiring an open skin incision.

Unlike traditional surgical approaches to head and neck cancer that require a large incision and long recovery, TORS patients are able to return to their normal lives only a few days after surgery without significant pain and disfigurement.

For the study, Dr. Ghanem and his colleagues wanted to take a closer look at the effectiveness of TORS for oropharyngeal cancer patients. They reviewed overall three-year survival, cancer control and metastasis, as well as the effect of p16 status on these variables.

The study included 53 Henry Ford oropharyngeal cancer patients who had TORS. Among them, 83 percent were male, 77 percent were Caucasian, and the mean age was 60.8 years. Thirty-seven percent had TORS alone, while more than 11 percent had TORS with radiation therapy, and more than half received chemotherapy and radiation therapy.

Thirty-seven percent had TORS alone, 11.4 percent received radiation therapy, and 50 percent received chemotherapy and radiation therapy. Eighty-one percent of patients had p16+ disease.

The study shows patients with a p16 negative marker had high survival (100 percent) and low cancer recurrence when TORS was the first line of treatment, as well as when TORS was followed by chemotherapy or radiation therapy.

The majority of patients (63 percent) were able to receive a lower dose of radiation after TORS, which reduces the risk of radiation side effects.

While Dr. Ghanem notes the study's results are not enough to change clinical practice, it does demonstrate that TORS alone or in conjunction with adjuvant radiation or chemotherapy is an acceptable treatment option for oropharyngeal cancer patients regardless of p16 status.

Explore further New robotic head and neck cancer surgery preserves speech, without scarring
Credit: University of Glasgow

Scientists at the University of Glasgow have made a second significant breakthrough in the treatment of chronic myeloid leukaemia  using precision medicine to kill more than 90% of chronic myeloid leukaemia (CML) stem cells. The results are published today in the high impact journal Cancer Discovery.

CML is a rare form of blood cancer. An individual gets CML when normal blood stem cells are turned into leukaemic stem cells, or CML stem cells. These CML stem cells then produce large numbers of leukaemic cells which, if left untreated, is fatal.

At present, CML patients are treated with tyrosine kinase inhibitors, otherwise known as TKIs. Treatment of patients with TKIs alone rarely cures the disease but hold its advancement at bay. As a result, many patients need to remain on TKIs for the rest of their lives. But the drugs are expensive and can cause serious side effects in some patients. In the European Union, it is estimated that there are currently150,000 patients with CML, and the TKIs they take cost a total of 5.0 billion per year.

TKIs do not kill the CML stem cells which cause the disease and researchers at the University of Glasgow have been searching for ways to kill the CML stem cells for many years. The research teams, led by Dr David Vetrie and Professor Tessa Holyoake at the Institute of Cancer Sciences, University of Glasgow, believe they have found a new drug that could lead to a cure for CML by killing the CML stem cells.

The drug works by inhibiting the activity of a protein called EZH2. EZH2 had previously been shown to be important for the survival of other types of cancer cells, but had never before been studied in CML.

Dr David Vetrie, based at the Wolfson Wohl Cancer Research Centre in Glasgow, said: "This discovery, based on 7 years of experimental work, is a great example of precision medicine  finding drugs that target only the CML stem cells we want to kill, while leaving normal cells unharmed."

"Having a new drug that we can give to patients alongside a TKI is an ideal scenario in the clinic  TKIs kill most of the CML cells, and we believe that the EZH2 inhibitor will kill the remaining CML stem cells."

Professor Holyoake in the lab. Credit: University of Glasgow

Dr Mary Scott, first author on the paper, added: "Our aim is to take this drug into clinical trials with CML patients. Current clinical trials using an EZH2 inhibitor in other forms of blood cancer have shown some promising early results. The drug is taken as a pill, is very safe and has minimal side-effects, making it ideally suited for the CML clinic."

In early June, Professor Holyoake's team, based at the Paul O'Gorman Leukaemia Research Centre in Glasgow, reported in the journal Nature that a completely different drug combination was also highly effective at targeting CML stem cells.

Professor Holyoake said: "The findings of this paper and those of our previous Nature paper, demonstrate how the Glasgow research teams are tirelessly searching for new approaches to identify a range of drugs that will kill CML stem cells.

"No two CML patients are alike in how they respond to a drug, so it's important we develop an array of potential novel therapies to maximise the chances that CML may one day be cured in all patients. Our immediate goal is to take the drugs we have reported in both papers into a single clinical trial."

Diana Jupp, Director of Patient Experience at Bloodwise, said: "In recent years, thanks to research, this once usually fatal leukaemia has been transformed into a manageable condition for most patients.

"However, there are still some patients who do not respond to current drugs or develop resistance to them and many will experience side-effects that can have a severe impact on their quality of life. These promising findings could lead to drugs that provide a permanent cure by targeting the cancer stem cells that drive this disease, which is a hugely exciting prospect."

Dr Aine McCarthy, senior science information officer at Cancer Research UK, said: "We know that when cancer comes back it's a lot harder to treat, and a person's chances of surviving the disease decrease. That's why early research like this is exciting, as it has identified a new way to target and kill leukaemia cells that can be left behind after treatment and sometimes cause the disease to return. The next step will be to carry out clinical trials in patients to find out if this combination is effective and safe."

Explore further Combination therapy shows promise for chronic myeloid leukemia
Credit: axelle b/public domain

Physicians from Children's Hospital of Michigan, Wayne State University, UC Davis Medical Center and Nationwide Children's Hospital, in collaboration with 19 other pediatric emergency departments around the country, have established a "proof of principle" for measuring patterns of ribonucleic acid (RNA) expression in the bloodstream that can enable clinicians to distinguish bacterial infections from other causes of fever in infants up to two months old.

The diagnostic testa high through-put RNA analysis that yields specific markers known as RNA biosignaturesmeans that emergency department physicians could someday avoid ordering painful, invasive exams for many of the more than 500,000 febrile infants who arrive at hospitals each year and must be evaluated to determine whether a bacterial infection is the cause of their fevers. Results that indicate no bacterial cause would also help reduce unnecessary hospitalizations and antibiotic treatments.

The findings of a study conducted in the Pediatric Emergency Care Applied Research Network (PECARN) and led by principal investigators Prashant Mahajan, Nathan Kuppermann and Octavio Ramilo are published in the current issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association in an article titled "Association of RNA biosignatures with bacterial infections in febrile infants 60 days of age or younger."

Typically, fewer than 10 percent of infants evaluated for fever in emergency departments have serious and potentially life-threatening bacterial infections, including bacteremia (bacteria in the blood), bacterial meningitis or a urinary tract infection. But because of their age and current treatment guidelines, many febrile infants undergo invasive testing and are hospitalized and given antibiotic treatment until a bacterial infection can be ruled out.

"Finding an accurate but less invasive method to determine if babies with fevers have bacterial infections is a 'holy grail' for emergency department physicians," said Kuppermann, professor and chair of the Department of Emergency Medicine at UC Davis School of Medicine. "This proof-of-concept study demonstrates that the evaluation of RNA biosignatures could one day be that tool."

Current guidelines for evaluating young febrile infants call for culturing bacteria from blood, urine and cerebrospinal fluid samples. Cultures typically take 24 to 48 hours to determine if bacteria are present. The tests, while effective, are invasive and can be painful for young patients as well as stressful for parents. Testing also is costly, involves some degree of clinical risk and may require hospitalization, all of which pose important questions for pediatricians and emergency department physicians who do not want to miss a serious infection.

Although the RNA biosignatures approach has been shown to be valuable in detecting certain infections in older children and adults, the current study is the first to show that the test could also be used in very young febrile infants. Some physicians and researchers had concerns that RNA biosignatures may not work in this patient population because the immune cells in the blood of these youngest patients were too immature to mount a detectable response to bacterial infection.

"Despite the young age of the babies in this study, they did carry robust RNA biosignatures," said Ramilo, chief of infectious diseases at Nationwide Children's Hospital and professor of pediatrics at The Ohio State University. "Regardless of whether they had a viral or bacterial infection, their immune systems were already programmed to respond with specific patterns."

Although cultures are the current standard for diagnosing bacterial infections, they can deliver false results. If not enough blood is drawna common problem with the youngest babiesbacteria may not grow in a culture medium even if present, causing the diagnosis to be missed. In addition, bacteria can be picked up from the skin during a blood draw, contaminating the culture and leading to a false-positive result.

In contrast to blood cultures, an RNA biosignature assay requires only a small amount of blood to detect immune system responses to pathogens. DNA within white blood cells are prompted to produce different RNAs according to environmental cues, the first step in making proteins that are essential for keeping the cell functioning and able to cope with changes in the surroundings. For example, RNAs associated with inflammation are produced in response to bacterial infection, and RNAs associated with interferons (a group of signaling proteins) are expressed in response to certain viruses. By analyzing the patterns of RNAs producedthe RNA biosignaturesit can be determined with a high degree of certainty whether an individual has a bacterial infection or not.

The prospective study was conducted with infants 60 days or younger with fever (defined as having a rectal temperature of at least 38C/100.4 F). RNA biosignatures were measured on a selected group of 279 infants, of whom 89 were determined to have bacterial infections. Nineteen healthy infants with no fever served as controls.

The research team found that RNA biosignature testing was highly sensitive and specific for categorizing patients with and without bacterial infections when compared with the current standard using bacterial cultures. In infants who had bacteremia (bacteria in the blood) the test had 94-percent sensitivity; meaning it aligned with the bacterial culture in 94 percent of the cases. For febrile infants whose fever was not caused by bacteremia, the RNA biosignature test agreed with the negative culture 95 percent of the time (95-percent specificity). For all cases of serious bacterial infections, which included bacteremia, meningitis and urinary tract infections, the RNA biosignatures test had an 87-percent sensitivity for detecting bacterial infection and an 88-percent specificity for infants without bacterial infection when compared to the standard culture results. It may be that in the cases of disagreement between RNA biosignatures and standard cultures, the RNA biosignatures are more reflective of the true type of infection.

"The implications of these findings are potentially paradigm-changing," said Prashant Mahajan, professor of pediatrics and emergency medicine at Wayne State University and chief of pediatric emergency medicine at Children's Hospital of Michigan. "For 100 years, doctors have looked directly for bacteria in body fluids to make a diagnosis. We have now shown that genomic analysis to detect the response of the human immune system is also very accurate and potentially can be more rapid in determining if a young baby has a bacterial infection."

The RNA biosignatures testing was much more accurate than the Yale Observation Scale, which currently is used as a screening test in emergency departments to help determine if young infants with fever are likely to have a bacterial infection. The scale is based on behaviors such as the quality of a baby's cry, and reaction to parents and social response.

With a renewed five-year grant from the National Institutes of Health's Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, the research team will be validating the study findings on a larger patient population and evaluating whether the RNA biosignature is stable at two different time-points. They also will be testing a new RNA biosignatures polymerase chain reaction platformcurrently available only for research purposeswhich they anticipate will produce faster results and be more applicable in clinical laboratories. The new study will also determine if RNA biosignatures testing can detect the presence of a simultaneous bacterial and viral infection in a single patient.

This study was conducted through PECARN, a network of pediatric emergency departments throughout the country that has established new, evidence-based standards for managing common and important problems in pediatric emergencies. PECARN, which annually evaluates more than 4,000 febrile infants ages 60 days or younger, offers an ideal setting to evaluate the application of RNA expression analysis for diagnosing and managing young infants with fevers in a prospective manner.

In addition to the three principal investigators, 36 other PECARN researchers and physicians from the network co-authored the study.

Explore further Studies explore use of genetics to help determine appropriate treatment for fever in children
PM tasks Interior Ministry to avoid any election-related tension

By Messenger Staff

Georgias Prime Minister Giorgi Kvirikashvili has appealed to and tasked the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) to use all legal measures to avoid any election-related tensions.The PM made the statement ahead of the October 8 Parliamentary Elections.I appeal and task the Interior Ministry to ensure all legitimate measures not to let any confrontations take place in the country, Kvirikashvili said.The Ministry must provide all resources to prevent any and all violations. This protection should be extended to the opposition if such a risk existed, but the members of the ruling force also have the right to be protected, Kvirikashvili added.The PM also addressed the local authorities and Georgian Dream-Democratic Georgia (GDDG) Party supporters to ensure equal conditions for all election participants.Any violation that may take place in the pre-election period can only harm the Governments image, Kvirikashvili said.The PM stressed that over the last four years, while in power, the current Government has introduced fundamentally new and democratic standards, unlike those under the previous United National Movement Government.We refused the violations that took place previously before 2012. We have absolutely different attitud and we are able to conduct totally different, violation-free, pre-election campaigning, Kvirikashvili said.The PM stressed the current Government had invited unprecedented number of foreign observers for them to monitor the pre-election period and evaluate the positive changes the current authorities have provided over the last four years.Meanwhile the opposition reminds the by-election incident some months ago in Georgias western Samegrelo region, when several UNM leaders were beaten.The UNM says the Government stood behind the violation and those ruling party supporters who created the stir havent been punished yet.The UNM believes it is more likely that the Government will trigger confrontations rather than the opposition.It is clear if some confrontation takes place in the pre-election or election periods it will be the responsibility of the Government to quell any unrest and not the opposition. The current officials suggest that former ruling power UNM is deliberately provoking confrontation between themselves and DGGD supporters.Of course, all parties should think about the good conduct of the elections as it is in the state interest, but the main body responsible for fair and transparent elections is the current authorities.The Georgian police must be strict and intolerant to any violations, no matter who will stand behind them.
The News in Brief

Russian citizens living in Georgia to be allowed to vote in Armenia for Duma elections



As Russias CEC member Vasil Likhachov has told reporters, citizens of Russia living in Georgia will be able to participate in Russias Duma elections in the town of Gyumri, Armenia.



According to him, it is impossible to organize the process in the Embassy of Switzerland in Tbilisi.



All you have been informed that we have diplomatic and general relationships via the Swiss Embassy in Tbilisi. It is impossible to organize a polling station there due to the political status. Russian citizens living in Georgia will be able to vote in Armenia, Gyumri,Likhachov has said.



The elections will be held on September 18.

(IPN)







French Defence Minister Visits Georgia



French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian who is visiting Georgia September 10-12, met his Georgian counterpart Levan Izoria on Saturday.



Speaking at a joint news conference after the meeting, Le Drian, who is the first French Defence Minister to pay an official visit to Georgia, hailed the bilateral cooperation between the two countries and thanked Georgia for its contributions to missions in Afghanistan and the Central African Republic.



Le Drian said that within the frames of the NATO-Georgia substantial package agreed at the 2014 NATO summit, France took the lead in helping the country improve its air defence capabilities. He also said that a French air force officer has been assigned to Georgia to oversee the process.



Late last year, Georgia entered into a loan agreement with the French bank SocieteGenerale for financing the acquisition of air defence systems from France. The loan is backed by the Frances export credit agency Coface.



52.65 million Euros from the total loan amount is intended to be used for purchasing unspecified equipment and services from Thales Raytheon Systems, which produces ground-based surveillance radar and air defence command and control systems, while 24.98 million Euros is intended for acquisitions from missile manufacturer MBDA France.



At a joint news conference in Tbilisi, Georgian Defence Minister Izoria said it was reiterated at the meeting with his French counterpart that the contract on air defence systems remains in force and will be fully implemented.



On September 12, Le Drian will travel to Sachkhere in the Imereti region to participate in an event celebrated the 10-year anniversary of the Mountain Training School, which was launched with French assistance and which provides courses for Georgian and partner nations military personnel.



The two ministers said that the Sachkhere Mountain Training School is a good example of bilateral cooperation in the defence sector.



Izoria said that the French side has expressed readiness to step up efforts in this direction, specifically to contribute to the development of army mountain firing range, Abuli, in Samtskhe-Javakheti region.



Le Drian also said that French navy ship will make a port call in Georgia in October.



French navy ships made port visits to Batumi on Georgias Black Sea coast three times between April and September of 2014  a light stealth frigate FS Surcouf, an intelligence-gathering ship Dupuy de Lome, and Commandant Birot, a patrol ship.



During the visit, the French Defence Minister will meet PM Giorgi Kvirikashvili on September 11 and President Giorgi Margvelashvili on September 12.



Also on September 12, the French Defence Minister will award those Georgian soldiers who served alongside French troops in Afghanistan and the Central African Republic.

(Civil.ge)







Republican Party proposes new pension system



The Republican Party proposes a new pension system based on entitlement earned through work experience.



Appearing on Rustavi 2s election special, spokesperson Davit Usupashvili drew a line between the Republicans and other parties, which offer voters a set monthly over the board increase in pensions payments.



He said the country has to switch to a new system where each person pays into a retirement fund through his or her income tax.



I, as a citizen of Georgia, as a voter, as a son of retired parents, am insulted with the new election campaign, when political parties promise pensioners another 5-10 or 15 laris. This is a shame and we will never be able to provide for socially vulnerable people. This is why the Republican Party believes that it takes time to build long-term state projects. If we dont start long-term projects today, they will never start, he said on Wednesday.



The Republican Party proposes system of accumulative pension, when people take care of their pension as long as they work.



The plan is that part of the 20 percent of the salary which people have to pay, has to be accumulated in a retirement fund.



This is not additional expense, it is to provide our future. This way we will be provided not only in elderly years but the money will be spent for our country too, he added.



There are 716,287 people on pension today. 1.570 billion was allocated for pensions in the 2016 budget.



The monthly pension payment has been 180 laris since June. Georgian Dream, the governing party, promised to increase pension to 220-230 lari in 2012 before the parliamentary election.

(DF watch)




Montanas prisons and jails are over capacity. What changes in statute and/or funding at the state level  if any  do you think are necessary? If no changes, why not?

Stop putting Montanans in jail for having small amounts of marijuana on them and then pretending that we are so surprised that our jails are overcrowded. Next, increase state funding for our prison system instead of wasting taxpayer dollars on stupid pet projects and then crying to the taxpayer that we do not have enough funding for the primary functions of government. The answer is not more taxes, its rational budgeting.

Has the Montana Fish and Wildlife Commission adequately guided the states hunting and fishing concerns, or does the Legislature need to give the Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks more specific direction regarding topics such as land acquisition, wildlife management, predator control, and bison?

We need to prevent state agencies from making decisions that should be made by the state legislature. If legislators make policy that Montanans disagree with  we can hold them accountable at the ballot box. People are tired of state agencies making decisions that directly affect us without us having any real recourse to hold them accountable. Agency rule-making authority needs to be looked at across the board.

Many Montanans depend on the extraction of fossil fuels for jobs, yet there is a strong demand for clean and renewable energy in the region, especially since prices for the latter are falling. How do you propose to help workers in the coal, oil and natural gas industries find jobs in this new economic landscape?

We would help these workers most by stopping politicians and environmental extremists from lying to Montanans. I hope, within my lifetime, we will come up with a viable alternative to fossil fuels. I think that we will, but it is not going to happen tomorrow, or next week, or next year. Our primary source of energy is still fossil fuels. The industry provides good paying jobs to a lot of hard working Montana families. This question claims there is a strong demand for clean and renewable energy yet there is a stronger demand for affordable energy. ... The question is biased.

According to Montana University System records, as recently as 1992, the stated funded 76 percent of the university system. Now, though, state support has fallen to 40 percent, which means tuition funds 60 percent of the system  putting higher education out of reach for some Montana families. Do you as a legislator have a responsibility to help and if so, how? If not, why not?

We need to increase higher education funding in Montana, which I fought for and did during the last legislative session, securing a pay increase for teachers and getting more dollars into the classroom. The question seems to leave out the fact that the cost of attending a public, four-year college has more than doubled during that same period while family take-home income has remained stagnant. I have worked directly in university budgeting in Montana for the past four years and there is a significant level of distrust between the state Legislature and the Montana University System.

What do you regard as the most urgent problem facing Montana, and how do you propose dealing with it?

The next legislative session is going to be tough. We are going to have less money than we thought, and more priorities to spend those dollars on. We need people who know how to put together serious, responsible budgets in Helena. I went to the last legislative session with seven bills I wanted to get passed. I left the Legislature having passed six of those seven, one of which was the most responsible budgets in the past decade. The seventh was the infrastructure bill, which failed by one vote. We need people that know how to get things done.
The String Orchestra of the Rockies will open its 2016-17 with the distinctive swing of the tango.

The orchestra, comprising professionals and educators from across the state, will present its first concert of the fall, "Luminosa Buenos Aires," on Sunday, Sept. 18.

The program will feature Argentine master composer Astor Piazzolla's "The Four Seasons" the way Piazzolla intended it: with the aid of bandoneon.

Piazzolla, an Argentinian who merged the tango with with contemporary classical and jazz, was a bandoneon player himself.

"It's highly colored with tango gesture and dance moves, and tempo as well. Sometimes tango can be very sultry and seductive and slower. At other times it's quite frenzied and intense and energetic," said Fern Glass Boyd, the SOR's artistic director and a cello player.

The guest artist supplying that key sound for the SOR is bandoneon player Cesare Chiacchiaretta.

Chiacchiaretta was originally scheduled to bring his regular musical partner, guitarist Giampaolo Bandini, both of whom were coming from Italy, especially for the show. However, Bandini was forced to cancel earlier this week due to a family emergnecy.

Rene Izquierdo, a native of Cuba and graduate of Yale University's School of Music, stepped in in his absence. However, Izquierdo won't play on the Piazzolla piece.

In the first half of the program, Izquierdo will perform Vivaldi's famous Concerto in D Major for Guitar and Strings, followed by a solo set of Spanish guitar.

Boyd said the SOR is stepping outside of its norm with the tango material, and is featuring a guest soloist on bandoneon for the first time ever. She said Chiacchiaretta is one of the "most breath-taking musicians" she's seen live.

The concert is set for Sunday at the University of Montana School of Music Recital Hall.

On Saturday, the SOR will host a benefit dinner featuring the duo at 7 p.m. at the Keep.

The two will perform a sample of Sunday's concert program and share stories about their travels.

Limited seating is available. Tickets are $125 per person. Reserve a sport by calling 406-293-2990 or going to sormt.org.

All concerts take place at 7:30 p.m. at the University of Montana School of Music Recital Hall. Tickets are on sale through all GrizTix outlets, griztix.com or by calling 1-888-MONTANA. Go to sormt.org

The lineup for the rest of the season:

Sunday, Nov. 20

"Transfigured Night" featuring Maria Larionoff, violin, and Barry Lieberman, double bass

The co-founders of the American String Project in Seattle will serve as guest soloist for the title piece, a tone poem by Arnold Schoenberg. Other parts of the program will feature Larinoff, a former concertmaster for the Seattle Symphony.

Sunday, February 26

"Sound the Trumpet!" featuring Allen Vizzutti, trumpet

Vizzutti will return to his hometown for a weeklong residency, include work with local students and a headlining slot with the SOR. The program will feature some jazz standards, Baroque piccolo trumpet and his own original works for trumpet and orchestra.

Sunday, April 9

"Composers Showcase"

In conjunction with the University of Montana's three-day Composers Showcase, the SOR will premiere

"Big Sky Music" by composer Tom Morrison, a native of New York and UM graduate. Morrison is currently finishing a master's degree in composition at Juilliard School. Boyd said his work is tonal yet complex and rhythmically driven. "Big Sky" was written especially for the SOR.
Montanas prisons and jails are over capacity. What changes in statute and/or funding at the state level  if any  do you think are necessary? If no changes, why not?

Overcrowding of our prisons and jails is an indicator that more than one system or agency needs improvement. Evident is the increasing need for stronger local support systems  mental health, substances abuse, psychiatric treatments, behavior health, etc., that would help stem those that fall through the cracks of inadequate care early on. Such intervention methods would generate savings required when the high costs of incarceration becomes the only alternative. Additional changes may involve decreasing time of stay, coordinating families and local support systems in jails and prisons as well as in local communities.

Has the Montana Fish and Wildlife Commission adequately guided the states hunting and fishing concerns, or does the Legislature need to give the Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks more specific direction regarding topics such as land acquisition, wildlife management, predator control, and bison?

As a legislator, I have no intent on micromanaging an agency, especially one that seeks to perform assigned tasks and duties under the guidance of scientific evidence. However, we can present bills to address needs  such as public access woefully not adequate but needed in meeting the needs of a population that is growing in recreational and outdoor pursuits. Access must be more readily available and adequate so residents and visitors have abundant opportunity to use these public state lands and waterways. Legislators should work on better opportunities to assist in addressing access issues.

Many Montanans depend on the extraction of fossil fuels for jobs, yet there is a strong demand for clean and renewable energy in the region, especially since prices for the latter are falling. How do you propose to help workers in the coal, oil and natural gas industries find jobs in this new economic landscape?

The state lacks a defined policy to address any specific area experiencing an unforeseen blow to the economy and jobs. The path to a new future needs to be proactive and applied to areas experiencing loss of jobs or economic drivers. A policy ready to coordinate choices in education and skill enhancement can be offered with additional avenues to new jobs skills or additional education. A policy of published guidelines to workers and companies should be a lifeline offered with diverse state agencies acting together. Transition processing and focused direction can assist in building stronger economies and secure employment choice.

According to Montana University System records, as recently as 1992, the stated funded 76 percent of the university system. Now, though, state support has fallen to 40 percent, which means tuition funds 60 percent of the system  putting higher education out of reach for some Montana families. Do you as a legislator have a responsibility to help and if so, how? If not, why not?

Absolutely this scenario is wrong! Wrong for our students, wrong for our educators and woefully unsatisfactory in shirking our responsibility to make quality education affordable! We are talking about necessity  not luxury when we work to improve education and its access! Solutions are complex and need to be introduced by  legislators to address a fully funded pay plan and a reduction of tuition costs for Montana High School graduates. I will work on legislation to change our universitys broken funding system and bring back excellence and affordability that will work to improve our future in Montanas educational opportunities!

What do you regard as the most urgent problem facing Montana, and how do you propose dealing with it?

No transfer of federal lands to the state! Public lands are the foundation of our Montana heritage. The lack of federal funding to manage, improve and protect access to these lands is unacceptable and has lasting impacts on the health of our forests, local economies, water and wildlife. This funding shortfall is typically the result of the high cost of wildfire protection and redirects traditional, and already stretched fundings. Across all party lines, I will work to protect local values and reach solutions that maintain healthy forests, thriving communities, our timber industry, multiple user recreation and wild Montana places.
A lecture series exploring the histories and cultures of the countries from which Missoula is welcoming refugees will kick off Tuesday on the University of Montana campus.

Soft Landing Missoula will present Conflict, Poverty, and Identity in the Democratic Republic of Congo from 6 to 8 p.m. in the UC Theater on the third floor of the University Center. Refugee families from the Congo have been the first to arrive in Missoula in the past month, though organizers say the series wont address local refugee resettlement efforts.

Paul Robinson of Missoula will be the keynote speaker. Robinson was born in the Belgian Congo, a son of missionaries. As a boy, he fled with his family from advancing Congolese rebel militias.

Robinson was a founding member of Congo Initiative and the Christian Bilingual University of Congo in 2003 and continues to be a founding member of Congo Initiatives General Assembly in Congo.

Molly Short Carr, executive director of the Missoula International Rescue Committee, will give an overview of camps in East Africa in which Congolese refugees have spent decades.

The Congo is a nation of paradox and contradictions. With fully half of Africas abundant natural resource wealth, it is at the same time one of the worlds poorest countries and trapped in a seemingly endless cycle of violence and conflict.

UMs Department of Political Science, Montana Model United Nations and the Global Leaders Initiative are co-sponsors of the event.
Four families of Congolese have arrived in Missoula in the past month, but resettlement here will soon take on a more international flavor.

Refugees are a global crisis, Molly Short Carr told a gathering in Missoula this week, and future families or individuals could hail from many places on the map.

Carr, executive director of the Missoula International Rescue Committee (IRC) office, said some of the millions who have fled civil war in Syria will land in Missoula after going through an international screening process and orientation.

There will maybe be Iraqi refugees who will come. There may be refugees who come from Central African Republic, Chad, Sudan, Burma, Bhutan, Latin America, she told about 30 people Tuesday night at a meeting of the Missoula County Democratic Central Committee in City Council chambers.

The third and fourth Congolese families arrived in Missoula this week from camps in East Africa, even as Secretary of State John Kerry told Congress the outgoing Obama administration plans to accept 110,000 refugees into the U.S. in the next fiscal year. Thats up from 85,000 in fiscal year 2016 and from 70,000 in each of the three previous years.

Carr said ticketing problems have held up the arrival of a fifth family that was due to reach Missoula later this week.

I dont know the specifics yet of wholl be coming when, Carr told the Missoulian on Thursday. I do know we wont always have Congolese. The refugees that we resettle here will reflect the overall proportion of refugees who arrive in the United States.

Of the 85,000 refugees the Obama administration proposed for the current fiscal year, which ends this month, 34,000 were to come from the Near East and South Asia and another 25,000 from Africa.

According to a U.S. State Department report, the Near East and South Asia remain host to more than 12 million refugees, primarily Syrians, Afghans, Iraqis, Iranians, Bhutanese, Palestinians and Sri Lankans. The U.S. expedited efforts and reached President Barack Obama's goal of accepting 10,000 Syrian refugees earlier this month.

While a target for Syrian resettlements in fiscal year 2017 hasnt been announced, Obamas refugee plan is expected to welcome even more.

Thats been a topic of debate among presidential candidates and in Montana, where Missoula opened the lone resettlement office in the state just two months ago.

Carr said the abstract proposal for Missoula now calls for 150 refugees in the next year. Thats up from approximately 100 per year that Missoula County Commissioners said they would welcome in a January letter to Anne Richard, assistant secretary of the U.S. State Departments Bureau of Population, Refugee and Migration.

The bureau cited the support of the commissioners, Mayor John Engen and most of the Missoula City Council in agreeing to reopen an IRC resettlement office in Missoula. Soft Landing Missoula, which formed a year ago in response to the refugee crisis in Syria, has marshaled local support and continues to provide resources and manpower as the Congolese arrive.

Mary Poole of Soft Landing told Tuesdays gathering that Missoula is the first in the IRCs decades-old history to request a resettlement office be opened in its city. Third-country resettlement is "absolutely the least desirable" option for refugees, she said, after repatriation in their home country and integration into the country where they've fled. Those two solutions apply to more than 99 percent of the world's displaced population.

Poole pointed to a stark statistic: The world now counts more than 65 million refugees whove been forced to flee their home countries. Based on the latest estimated world population of nearly 7.5 billion, that equates to one in every 113 people on the face of the Earth.

The Congolese families who have come to Missoula from refugee camps in Tanzania, Rwanda or Uganda are here in part because Missoula has a large population of Peace Corps volunteers whove returned from Africa and speak Swahili.

Carr pointed out that Arabic is taught in the Missoula County Public Schools district and at the University of Montana, so theres a ready-made pool of instructors and students of the language common to most countries in the war-torn Middle East, including Syria and Iraq.
Although she faced a hometown crowd, Montana Supreme Court justice candidate Kristen Juras got much tougher questioning from Western Montana Bar Association members than her opponent, Dirk Sandefur.

About 70 Missoula-area lawyers, clerks and judges listened to University of Montana law professor Juras and Cascade County District Judge Sandefur at an election forum Thursday in Missoula. Supreme Court justice races are nonpartisan.

In her introduction, Juras said her experience working with farmers, ranchers and small-business owners would benefit a high court already well stocked with prosecutors and judges. She argued that a lack of business experience among the current justices and a history of unpredictable decisions and reversals made it hard for Montana citizens to know what rules of law they would be governed by.

Sandefur used his introduction to criticize Juras lack of courtroom experience and her evidence of bias against Montanas stream-access laws. He also claimed greater support from the states legal community, including endorsements from 10 retired Supreme Court justices.

Although Juras noted she had a number of former law school students in the audience, most of the questions were aimed at her past positions and qualifications. Both candidates were allowed to respond to all questions.

Juras acknowledged the difficulty of being the chief legal counsel for Crop Growers Insurance when its leaders were under investigation for money laundering and illegal campaign contributions, a case in which she was called to testify before a grand jury. Juras said she resigned from that corporation and learned an important ethical lesson about the difference between defending a corporation and defending corporate officers who may have broken the law.

Missoula attorney Tim Bechtold asked Juras about a law review article shed written where she appeared to call Montanas stream access laws both a monumental erosion of property rights and settled law.

Montana differs from many states in allowing the public to fish and boat on all streams below the high-water marks, although they may not trespass on the adjacent private land. Some states consider the stream bed part of the private property and limit recreational access.

Juras replied she did consider the 1985 stream access law a settled matter, but added that many issues remain at loose ends. For examples, she said the stream bed ownership of non-navigable waterways might be private, and bridge-access policies might depend on whether the bridge is privately or publicly owned.

Sandefur charged that Juras was hinting she was ready to pick away at the stream access laws and showing a bias that was improper on the bench.

I have opinions, Juras replied. That doesnt mean you bring a bias to the courtroom. Ask my students who are in the room. I dont bring a philosophical agenda to breaking down statutes or opinions of law.

Attorney David Paoli asked Juras about comments on her website and from talk-radio interviews about how her decision-making was driven by Judeo-Christian values, and how that might relate to her consideration of federal acceptance of same-sex marriage.

I am a Christian, Juras replied. The application will not be driven by personal values or religion. Its driven by law.

She added she did believe issues will arise regarding same-sex marriage and the free expression of religious beliefs. She said she expected the Legislature should get involved in addressing exemptions for the cake bakers and photographers who might object to working for a same-sex marriage client.

Sandefur accused Juras of using the issue to inflame the Christian community against him. Juras responded that Sandefur had referred to her supporters as haters and bigots.

I hope this country does not come to a time when Christians cannot serve in public office because of their beliefs, Juras said.

Im a Christian myself, Sandefur responded. But this isnt about whether Christians should be on the court. I said (at a Great Falls LGBT parade) my opponent believes you do not have the right to marry. My opponent believes you are all sinners. My opponent believes bigots and haters have the right to discriminate against you. And the only thing that stands between my opponents beliefs and your rights is me in this election.

Western Montana Bar Association President Hanna Stone said the group does not take positions on or endorse Supreme Court candidates.

Juras and Sandefur will hold another public forum on Monday at the Seeley Lake Community Hall starting at 5:30 p.m. That forum may also feature appearances by state Secretary of State, Attorney General and congressional candidates.
A 47-year-old Missoula man is facing a host of felony charges for allegedly drugging underage girls as young as 12 with meth, alcohol and ecstasy and violently raping them.

Erik Lee Nugent appeared in Missoula County Justice Court on Thursday. He is charged with 12 felonies, including sexual abuse of children, sexual intercourse without consent, endangering the welfare of a child and sexual assault. The incidents are alleged to have occurred with multiple girls dating back to 2008.

Nugent was reported to Missoula police detectives by coworkers who were concerned about his sexualized comments about children. A witness told detectives that Nugent told her that he had videotaped a 17-year-old performing oral sex on him, and that he also had a thing with a 14-year-old.

In an interview at First Step Resource Center, the 17-year-old told investigators that Nugent got her high, fed her drugs, called guys over to (expletive) her, choked her, cut her up, tied her down and bruised her. She said this occurred in his basement, and he would also use objects such as a hammer to have sex with her and make her call him daddy.

The girl said she used meth and alcohol with Nugent while he took pictures, and she said he told her hes done this type of thing with a bunch of other girls. She said that while she did not protest to engaging in sexual intercourse at the time, she was high on meth. She often communicated to him on Facebook.

Another witness told detectives that Nugent was bringing girls aged 14 and 15 into the woods and having sex with them. On March 3, detectives spoke with an alleged 14-year-old victim. She said she met Nugent when she was 13 and he got her hooked on meth. She recalled watching porn with him on a laptop computer, and he had asked if she wanted Adderall via the social media app Snapchat.

In one conversation, Nugent allegedly told the girl not to tell anyone that he had smoked up with her because he was afraid they would call the popo on him.

Another alleged victim who is now 15 told police that she explicitly told Nugent that she was 14 when they first met. She said she was living with Nugent and he provided drugs such as acid, mushrooms, Ritalin, ecstacy, marijuana and meth. She disclosed that when she once did molly with Nugent while several other people were present, he put his mouth and hands on her private parts. She said Nugent also took a photo of her topless with his work cellphone.

Detectives executed a search warrant of Nugents Facebook page on March 23, and found that most messages were deleted. They did discover that he had sent another victim a photo of a glass pipe with the words I love meth written on it.

In December of last year, detectives interviewed alleged victims who were 12 and 13 during an incident the previous July. They stated that an unidentified male about 40 years old picked them up at the skatepark and then they took some white pills and smoked marijuana. The girl said she was messed up but at some point the man touched her genitals and tried kissing her.

She reported in the following days after being assaulted, the male found her on Facebook and sent her messages. She later identified Nugent as the assailant from a police lineup.

Nugent is being held on $150,000 bond at the Missoula County Detention Center.
Giving credit where credit is due, one should commend the governors Montana Development Center Transition Planning Advisory Council for their good work in moving MDC clientele from the current institutional setting at MDC into a more community-based setting as instructed by Senate Bill 411. Signed and approved by the governor, SB 411 came about as an alternative method of managing the population at MDC, and continuing to keep the population safe with effective and efficient policy changes.

However, hearing of some of the recommendations from the governor-appointed commission on MDC, it would seem appropriate to remind the good people of Boulder, and Jefferson County, that the 2015 Legislature voted to close MDC, not abandon Boulder. The main objective of SB 411 may have been to close MDC, but another important objective of the bill sponsor was to repurpose the campus in Boulder and protect jobs, and thus the economy of Boulder. The good citizens from this community should be asking a lot more questions. The promise of a couple of four-bed units, and a bribe to Boulder of $500,000 to go quietly into the night, falls way short of what you deserve from the state of Montana.

Looking at other abandoned, state-owned properties like Warm Springs and Galen, the legislature should not sit idly by, potentially subjecting the buildings, and Boulder, the same fate of disrepair and abandonment. Im guessing if the people of the community are willing to stand up for themselves, they will find friends in the 2017 legislative session who would be willing to help. Friends could be as close as your local legislators, who certainly want the best for your community and the state of Montana.

It would also seem appropriate to remind the citizens of Boulder that the governor just signed a 20-year, $25 million lease agreement for forensic overflow from the Montana State Hospital, without any legislative approval or oversight. The mayor of Boulder, the Jefferson County Commission, and the citizens of the community should be asking real pointed questions as to why this economic and employment opportunity was not considered for the Boulder community. Knowing the proposed costs of remodeling what is left at MDC, and cost of remodeling Galen, I would suggest renovation costs as an excuse for not considering Boulder doesnt hold water.

Given the good work of the council in transitioning the clientele out of MDC, I would hate to see the final chapter of the council, chaired by the governors budget director, tainted for lack of legislative and community input. The good citizens of Boulder, and the state of Montana, have to know that the state has done everything possible to help with this transition. I would suggest the governor pay close attention to these recommendations. The apparent lack of input, or consideration of all possibilities, puts the success or failure of this endeavor squarely on the back of the governors office.
HELENA  Four psychiatric patients at the Montana State Hospital are suing the state and several hospital staff, claiming they were subjected to long-term isolation nearly 24 hours a day for more than a year because it was convenient and a doctor-ordered form of treatment.

The patients are represented by Disability Rights Montana, a Helena organization that has the legal authority to represent almost any person with a disability.

The suit claims the patients at Warm Springs and a forensic unit opened in nearby Galen in March suffered extreme psychological and emotional harm from nurses.

In a statement Friday afternoon, the state Department of Health and Human Services, which operates the facilities, responded:

"While we cannot comment on the specifics of this litigation, the health, safety and privacy of patients at Montana State Hospital is our primary concern at all times. DPHHS has taken steps and made significant financial investments to increase the capacity of the facility and to keep patients and staff safe  often in the face of opposition from Disability Rights Montana," spokesman Jon Ebelt said.

After the case was filed, Helena District Court Judge Kathy Seeley set a hearing on the request to remove patients from isolation while the case proceeds. The hearing is scheduled for Monday at 9 a.m.

The patients who filed the suit include Faith Swanson, 32, and Tyler Sapp, 27, who were both civilly committed and have severe mental illness. They spend most of their time in long-term, locked isolation wings, known as the Intensive Treatment Unit, according to court documents.

The two other patients are Ryan Bragg, 21, who was criminally committed to Galen after violating the terms of his probation in Ravalli County on theft and burglary charges; and Charles White, 30, who killed his mother and sister and kidnapped his nephew in Carbon County.

The suit names several nurses and psychiatrists, including Liviu Goia, a psychiatrist employed by the state hospital.

Goia is in charge of psychiatric care and treatment of patients at the Intensive Treatment Unit. Goia authorized long-term, locked isolation of Swanson and Sapp for four and five years respectively "as a matter of convenience and as a purported mode of 'treatment,' " according to court documents.

Swanson and Sapp were placed permanently in locked isolation cells and given psychotropic drugs in lieu of meaningful psychotherapy, the lawsuit states. They are denied social interaction and environmental stimulation. The isolation has caused both to deteriorate to below the level they where when they were committed in 2010 and 2012, respectively.

The cells have a small hole where Swanson and Sapp receive food and medication. They are where the patients "eat, urinate, defecate and spend endless hours staring at the blank walls inside their cells," the complaint said. Sapp and Swanson do not have books, movies or any possessions in their cells.

Their guardians have not seen Sapp or Swanson's cells for years. Swanson's guardian tried to see the cell twice in July and was denied, according to documents.

This isolation was ordered by Goia, according to documents, and was approved or sanctioned by colleagues.

Galen, the complaint claims, has an environment that emphasizes punishment and restricts possession of books, movies, music and toiletries. The lights are on 24/7, which disrupts sleeping. Patients designated Levels 1 and 2 are not allowed to sleep in the dark at night, something that is not based on judicial orders, laws or patients' treatment needs, according to documents.

The complaint asks, among other things, to move Swanson and Sapp from isolation and put them in civil patient rooms and release White from Galen and move him back to Warm Springs.

The lawsuit, filed Aug. 15 in State District Court in Lewis and Clark County, asks for a jury trial.
A victim of a triple shooting on a remote road southeast of Butte in 2015 told a county prosecutor Thursday that he and the suspect met in a Texas jail and "got along O.K."

The two men had no conflicts or issues as inmates, Steve Drury of Whitehall testified on the fourth day of Tony Dwade Sawyer's deliberate homicide trial in Butte district court before Judge Brad Newman.

But on a wintry night in early November their friendship took a violent turn when he said the Texan, 48, fired a gun at him.

"I say Tony coming at me with a flashlight," Drury said. "(He) approached me at a fast speed. I saw a flash of a gun when I got shot in my shoulder."

Sawyer also faces two counts of attempted deliberate homicide in connection with the shooting death of Joe Powers, 37, of Whitehall and injuring Drury and Hunter Smith, also of Whitehall, on Fish Creek Road.

Contrary to Wednesday's testimony from Dr. Loretta L. Bolyard, a Butte-based clinical psychologist who interviewed and assessed Sawyer for the defense, Drury said no threats were made toward Sawyer after arriving in Montana on Nov. 2 to find work.

Sawyer wanted to purchase a Hi-Point 9mm semi-automatic pistol in Drury's possession. He told his friend he could use it, testifying that Sawyer held onto it most of that afternoon and evening.

Butte-Silver Bow County Attorney Eileen Joyce queried Drury about Sawyer's request the morning of Nov. 3 to give him a ride to the homeless shelter in Butte.

In Bolyard's testimony Wednesday, she said Sawyer told her he felt stuck in Drury's home, worried about the use of methamphetamine, and believed he would be killed. Drury told Joyce he had lined up a job for Sawyer in Bozeman, adding that he told his friend, "I'm not going to beg you do something with your life."

During his cross-examination, Public Defender Ed Sheehy grilled Drury, questioning his credibility and the discrepancies in his testimony from statements made to emergency responders and law enforcement officers.

Sheehy confronted him about lying to investigators about his meth use, to which Drury said he "didn't want to admit to any meth use." Sheehy continued, accusing Drury of saying a Springfield 9mm pistol found on Fish Creek Road the night of the shooting belonged to him.

"How do we know you're telling the truth" about not threatening Sawyer, asked Sheehy.

"I did everything I could to help him start over," Drury said.

"Because he owed you," snapped the public defender.

"No, because I'm that kind of guy. I used to be," Drury replied defiantly.

In other testimony Thursday, Lynette Lancon, a Montana State Crime Lab firearms examiner, testified that seven cartridge cases found at the crime scene were fired by a Hi-Point 9mm firearm.

Lancon analyzed two 9mm pistols: a Hi-Point found with Sawyer when he was arrested in Idaho a day after the shooting and a Springfield recovered on Fish Creek Road that Drury testified he possibly dropped or it fell from a leg holster.

A court-ordered jury view on Thursday morning gave jurors an opportunity to visit the crime scene where Drury's black Chevy Equinox got stuck before Powers was shot and killed and Smith and Drury were injured.

The trial resumes Friday with prosecutors hearing testimony from police Detective Anthony Jurenic. The prosecution expects to rest its case against Sawyer in the afternoon.
The eighth annual Buttes Oktoberfest  Butte-toberfest  will be held from noon to 7 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 24, at the Original Mine.

The event features 15 Montana breweries, stein races, best-dressed contest (male, female, and couple), beard 'n' stache contest, food, live music and more.

Proceeds benefit Silver Bow Developmental Disabilities Council and furthering services for individuals with disabilities. This years funds will go toward building employment opportunities in the community (work is progressing toward a food truck).

Funds raised when you purchase food at the event benefit the Butte High History Club and the activities they do throughout the year.

Schedule of events:

3:30 p.m.  stein races begin

4 p.m.  best-dressed contest

4:45 p.m. -- beard 'n' stache contest

5:30 p.m.  taster's choice award (vote for your favorite brewery)

Music schedule:

12:30 p.m.  EJ Monthye

1:30 p.m.  Jolly Jammers

2:30 p.m.  Al Aman and Andre Grau

3:30 p.m.  Grand Jam

5 to 7 p.m.  Red Mountain Band

Tickets are $18 and includes one commemorative pint glass and four tasting tickets. Additional tasting tickets are $1 each. Only 1,500 glasses will be sold.
DEER LODGE  Live comedy will be presented by Cutler Brothers Productions every Friday at 8 p.m. through September at their theater in Deer Lodge.

The Cutler Brothers improv team Das Froot kicks off the month Friday, Sept. 16, followed by the roast of Deer Lodge native and CPA Michael Blakeley next Friday, Sept. 23. Another round of Das Froot improvisation is Sept. 30.

Das Froot, the brainchild of Cutler Brothers Productions, has been performing together for over eight years. The team consists of anywhere between four and 12 members. It has performed for numerous events across Montana, including Chamber of Commerce banquets, Museum and Arts Foundation dinner and countless comedy festivals. The Das Froot resume spans from church functions to late night bar comedy.

Two members of the Das Froot improv team have studied improvisational comedy in the subjects capital of Chicago. Kelly Cutler attended the Second City Training Center and was accepted into notorious schools conservatory. The conservatory has seen the likes of Steve Carrell, Tina Fey and Amy Poehler and others who have also played on Saturday Night Live. The other Das Froot member, Kyle Gillette, attended Chicagos other notorious comedy school Improv Olympic in the 1990s.

The troupe performs games and scenes that are 100 percent made-up on the spot based on audience suggestions.

At the Sept. 23 show, the improv team and friends of CPA Michael Blakeley will roast the tax man as well as each other. The roast panel includes Mayor Zane Cozby, journalist Rex Kendall, Matt and Kelly Cutler, Jim Cameron, Tina Saville, and city councilmen Terry Jennings and Kyler Noel.

Tickets are $7 for the improv shows on the Sept. 16 and Sept. 30 and $10 for the roast of Michael Blakeley on the Sept. 23. Tickets will be available at the door at Cutler Bros. Theatre in Deer Lodge. Details: cutlerbros.com or 406-846-4096. A no-host bar and concessions will be available for all performances.
Anacondas Oktoberfest Sept. 24

ANACONDA  Oktoberfest is from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 24, at the Copper Village Museum and Arts Center, 401 E. Commercial St.

Featured will be German food and live music. In addition, there will be a farmers market and craft booths in Friendship Park, next door. Admission is free. Details: 406-563-2422 or visit http://coppervillageartcenter.com/events/octoberfest/.

Studio hosts dance at the Elks

Five, Six, Seven, Eight Dance Studio is sponsoring a dance from 8 to 11 p.m. Friday, Oct. 7, at the Elks Lodge, 206 W. Galena St.

Dance to the hottest tunes in blues, swing and ballroom. A free dance lesson will be offered prior to the dance  7 p.m. for Level II dancers, 7:20 p.m. for Level I dancers and 7:40 p.m. for first-timers. Pre-registration for classes strongly advised as class may fill.

There will be a no-host bar, snacks and a 50/50 drawing will round out the evening. Tickets are $8 and attendees must be 18 or older. Details: 406-490-4980.

Haystack dinner set in Whitehall

WHITEHALL  The Whitehall Senior Center is hosting the Fall Festival Haystack Dinner from 4 to 7 p.m. Friday, Sept. 30, at 5 N. Division St., in Whitehall. Donations will be accepted. Proceeds benefit the senior center.

Oktoberfest polka coming Oct. 2

The Oktoberfest Polka Party is from 2 to 6 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 2, at the Elks Lodge, Montana and Galena, Uptown Butte. The event includes dinner, dessert, dancing and a free door prize drawing.

The event is open to the public. Admission is $10. Proceeds benefit the SNPJ Lodge #207 scholarship fund.

Dinner benefits Wounded Veterans

The Wounded Veterans Benefit Dinner and Auction is planned for Saturday, Sept. 24, at the Ender Ranch, 187 Jacobsen Ranch Lane, Ovando. A no-host bar starts at 5 p.m., with dinner at 6 p.m. A live auction is at 7. Entry is by donation and includes a spaghetti dinner. In addition, there will be live music by Rob Quist and Halladay Quist.

Details: Cindi Myler, 406-793-4195 or visit the website at www.k9caremontana.org.

Museum to host Scarecrow Fest

The World Museum of Minings Scarecrow Fest will be held from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Oct. 1-30 at 155 Museum Way.

Scarecrows disguised as Butte characters through World War II, designed by local groups and businesses, will be on display throughout the month of October.

General admission is required to view the scarecrows. The cost is $8.50 for adults, $7.50 for seniors; and $5 for youth (5 to 17 years old).

If you are interested in submitting a scarecrow, call 406-723-7211 for details.
TWIN FALLS  Hollywood stuntman Eddie Braun, who within days will attempt jump the Snake River Canyon at Twin Falls, Idaho, held a press conference Wednesday to answer questions about the upcoming stunt. The stunt was first attempted  unsuccessfully  in 1974 by Evel Knievel.

What time will the rocket be launched?

The launch is set for Saturday but without a scheduled time. If conditions are right, the launch could happen as early as Friday or as late as Sunday. No live broadcast is planned, and there will be no advance announcement of the countdown. It will take four hours for enough steam to build up for the rocket to launch.

What will I be able to see?

Not much, unless by chance you happen to catch sight of the rocket in flight. Both the launch and landing sites are on private property. The private event will be attended mostly by film crews and staff.

Idaho State Police will be patrolling Idaho Highway 50 near the Hansen bridge to keep traffic moving. ISP electronic reader boards will be in place reminding people not to trespass on private property. Parking will not be allowed on the highway, on the bridge, or in the right-of-way. Sheriffs offices in Jerome and Twin Falls counties plan to step up patrols on the rural roads.

How fast will the rocket go?

The steam-powered rocket will reach a speed of 430 mph.

How high will the rocket go?

The rocket will run out of steam about 3.9 seconds into the jump, which should put it at 2,200 feet over the canyon. On Wednesday, the Federal Aviation Administration gave the jump official clearance.

How far will the rocket go?

The rocket will cross the canyon at an angle, and Braun will have to clear 1,600 feet to land safely  the same distance that Evel Knievel attempted to clear. How far the rocket actually travels will depend on the wind.

From whose property will the rocket be launched?

The Evel Spirit will launch from Kelly Klostermans property in Jerome County.

Where will the rocket land?

If all goes as planned, the rocket will fall to the ground on Chuck Coiners farmland in Twin Falls County.

What if something goes wrong?

Emergency crews will be on hand in the landing zone and in the canyon.

Who is Eddie Braun?

Braun, 54, is a stuntman who lives in Manhattan Beach, California. Braun has a wife and four children ages 12 to 19 and has been a professional stuntman in television and films for more than 30 years.

Will Braun retire after this stunt?

Braun says the jump will signify the beginning of the end of his stunt career.

Why is Braun making this jump?

Braun says this jump is to pay homage to Evel Knievel, who inspired him to become a stuntman.

I get a chance to fulfill the dream of my hero, Braun said.

The jump is also a love letter to his children, he says. If he can achieve his goal with integrity, it will encourage his kids to push through any obstacle to go after their own goals.
Montana Tech has the go-ahead to offer a new bachelors degree in data science  what the Harvard Business Review calls the sexiest career of the 21st century.

Starting a year from now, Tech will begin a stand-alone Bachelor of Science degree in data science  the only one of its kind offered in the Montana University System, according to Tech.

The Montana Board of Regents approved the new degree on Thursday in Billings.

Its a cutting-edge degree, Tech professor Richard Rossi told The Montana Standard Thursday. Its an exciting new field in the information and technology sector."

Rossi, director of Techs statistics program, is co-creator of the degree program with colleague Jeff Braun, Tech computer science department associate professor.

If sexy could refer to the starting entry pay for new graduates, they could earn between $80,000 and $90,000 right out of the gate, Rossi said.

Its a great deal, said Rossi.

Such a degree could come in handy in several fields.

Its something that all researchers and analysts need to have, Barbara Wagner, chief economist for the Montana Department of Labor and Industry, told the Standard.

Data science graduates can work as data scientists, statisticians, business analysts, data warehousing and database administrators, and software developers.

I anticipate some demand for the data science program from other disciplines, added Wagner. And hopefully they are working with the other disciplines to make sure that the IT (internet technology) skills are matched with knowledge on statistics and econometrics.

Techs statistics faculty and computer science department will jointly run the new degree program.

Its been in place under statistics as a different curriculum, said Rossi. This is a new and improved curriculum we put together in the last year.

The new degree was redesigned to meet the needs of the job market, read a Tech press release.

Former mathematical sciences head at Tech, Rossi said it will help undergraduate students compete in the growing field of data science in which there is currently a tremendous demand.

He mentioned Oracle, a database management corporation in Bozeman, and government jobs as current hotspots for data scientists.

Offering such a degree will definitely serve as a recruiting tool, he added, plus it appeals to the type of student that already attends Tech:

Its the same group that would be interested in our engineering program, so were looking for students with strong quantitative skills  math and computational.

An October 2012 article in the Harvard Business Review credited Hal Varian, a Google economist, with tagging computer engineers as the sexy job of the 1990s. The article notes:

If sexy means having rare qualities that are much in demand, data scientists are already there. They are difficult and expensive to hire and, given the very competitive market for their services, difficult to retain. There simply arent a lot of people with their combination of scientific background and computational and analytical skills.

Now Tech remains a leader in the ever-changing field. It is also the only Montana university that offers a bachelor of science degree in statistics.
WASHINGTON -- NASA scientists may have noticed a wobble in Earth's axis Tuesday morning. Harry Reid, the irascible top Democrat in the Senate, had shown contrition.

The day before, Reid had attacked the integrity of Republicans, including the majority whip, John Cornyn, suggesting they were doing the bidding of the billionaire Koch brothers.

But Tuesday, Reid began his daily remarks to the Senate by declaring that "I want everyone to know that my criticism of the senior senator from Texas is not based on anything dealing with his character, his integrity."

Cornyn rose to express his "gratitude."

And then, as quickly as it had begun, the feel-good moment was over. A McClatchy reporter asked Reid about his remorse and Reid said "with great irritation" that he hadn't apologized. "He didn't ask for an apology, and he didn't expect an apology," Reid snapped.

Being Harry Reid means never having to say you're sorry. The former boxer and cop, retiring in January, is departing the Senate the way he led it: with ferocious partisanship and explosive language.

On the same day he gave his non-apology to Cornyn, he also suggested that Donald Trump is fat: "Take a look at this character that's running for president.  He's not slim and trim. He brags about eating fast food every day."

In the same news conference, Reid offered some violent imagery to describe Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) as she negotiated a spending package with Republicans: "You could put a gun to her head right now and she can't tell you what they're trying to come up with."

Just before returning to Washington from his summer break, Reid sat down with the Reno Gazette-Journal, saying it was "crazy" of Patricia Smith, whose son was killed in Benghazi, to blame Hillary Clinton. He also described Rep. Joe Heck, the Republican candidate to succeed him in the Senate, as "the most fraudulent person" he's known in 50 years of politics.

And Reid defended the false allegation he made in 2012 that Mitt Romney had not paid taxes for 10 years. "I'd do it again," Reid said. He reasoned that it's one of his strengths to "tell the truth," then added, "Maybe not the truth -- it's how I feel."

I've enjoyed covering Reid and will miss him when he's gone. His wild rhetoric made for good copy. But in this Age of Trump, I also wonder whether Reid's style -- insults, insinuations and sometimes false allegations -- helped to clear the way for worse.

To be sure, Trump is a uniquely Republican problem, created by years of GOP coddling of extremists. But I can't help thinking Reid is one who deserves some blame for the deterioration of discourse that numbed the country to Trump's vulgarity.

Reid has suggested that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, with whom he must work every day, "agrees with Trump's view that women are dogs and pigs." He's accused Republicans of being "drunk with power," "puppets," "amateurish" and "cowards" who are led by "crazies."

George W. Bush, in Reid's telling, was a "loser" and a "liar" who "betrayed the country." Former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan was a "hack" and a "fraud," and the head of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission "unethical, prevaricating," "a treacherous miserable liar," a "first-class rat" and a "tool."

Reid got in trouble for praising Obama as a "light-skinned" African American "with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one." He described Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) as a "snake oil" salesman. He likened opponents of Obamacare to defenders of slavery.

Long before Trump's campaign, Reid said that "I don't know how anyone of Hispanic heritage could be a Republican." He joked to an Asian audience, "One problem that I've had today is keeping my Wongs straight." He has instructed the American Bar Association to "get a new life," advised a reporter to "get a brain" and asked another journalist whether she spoke English, suggesting she "turn up your Miracle Ear."

Reid shows no sign of easing into retirement. He walked onto the Senate floor Wednesday with a wooden cane and, peering at his speech through black horn-rimmed spectacles, proceeded through his daily denunciation of the Republicans. He accused them ("the party of Trump, whose pal is Putin") of trying to establish an "oligarchy." From there he went on to host a photo op where he derided news photographers as a "mob" and to hold a news conference where he accused Senate Republicans of a "ploy." The bile was bountiful -- and it was only lunchtime.

Follow Dana Milbank on Twitter, @Milbank.

(c) 2016, Washington Post Writers Group
As a candidate for the Public Service Commission I have been visiting with people from across Southwest Montana. I must say, as a candidate, I love visiting with my neighbors and friends. I was born and raised in Southwest Montana and my family has lived here for more than 100 years.

As voters have visited with me one of the issues they bring up time and again has been the question of public trust. People have come to believe their institutions of government are misrepresenting their concerns. No place is this more apparent than in the all-Republican Public Service Commission. The Montana Constitution established the Commission for one purpose, to protect the consumers of Montana. Most of the voters I have spoken to do not believe that the current Commission is fulfilling that critical obligation.

Lets set the record straight. In a recent opinion piece this region's current representative on the Public Service Commission sought to assure all of us that he does not bring his political opinions to the decisions that come before the Public Service Commission. We are assured that just the facts and not personal bias drives the Commissioners decisions. We are asked to believe this in spite of the Bozeman Chronicle editorializing that, Had it come to fruition (Commissioner) Koopmans initial argument to turn away federal subsidize would have seriously harmed his constituents in the slavish adherence to the free market  that would deny basic services. The simple fact is that the Commissioners decisions and his entire career in public service has been a profile in extreme right wing ideology and any pretense that this extreme ideology can be tempered is not demonstrated in the public record.

The Commissioner has voted to shelter the salary levels of the Missoula Water CEOs, discourage alternative energy projects both in regulation and decision, remove incentives to assist folks with energy efficiency in their homes and businesses, and most importantly Commissioner Koopman has continually voted to move towards dangerous deregulation schemes, some that have already detrimentally befallen this state. We must never forget the dangers of deregulation and the record is clear, Koopman is a dangerous deregulator.

In running for his first term the Commissioner expounded that, For too long, this state, its energy and its resources have been held hostage to senseless environmental extremism and Conservationists have run roughshod over our property rights and push a green-energy-at-any-cost agenda. These statements make clear the Commissioners recent actions on wind and solar proposals have shown this Republican PSC to be hostile toward renewable generation, as well as, any incentivizing of energy conservation. Decisions on Qualifying Facilities and standard rates clearly are seeking to dismantle any incentives for small scale generation. Not because diversification of energy is bad, but because the Commissioner is just hostile to environmental regulation. Out-of-state corporate interests drive the Commissioners' decisions, not your pocketbook.

As a legislator, Commissioner Koopman not only opposed a raise in the minimum wage but opposed any legislative minimum wage at all; championed right-to-work; rejected all federal funding including any expansion of Medicaid; and recommended the dismantling of the current public school system in favor of charter schools. The Commissioner is the author of a Conservative Voting Record that found 2/3rds of the Legislature, Democrat and Republican alike, not conservative enough.

The PSC election this year is critical. The all-Republican PSC has stifled diverse opinions, not encouraged them. The truth is Commissioner Koopman is pushing, and has pushed an agenda that is not based in concern for working Montanans, but is beholden to an agenda established by forces dangerously outside mainstream Montana.

-- State Representative Pat Noonan, D-Butte, represents House District 74 and is a candidate for the Public Service Commission District 3.
How much good stuff can somebody get in one package? Seems the Blackfoot Clearwater Stewardship Project gets it all. Which part is most important depends on your point of view  but these are all important to somebody in western Montana.

Providing jobs: this project has already provided 130 jobs. I guess this means its good for the economy.

Enhancing outdoor recreation: the BCSP has it in spades, from more protected places to hunt and fish to hiking and backpacking to wintertime fun.

Preserving resources for our kids, and their kids, and then our grandkids, and for all generations to come: the BCSP conserves and protects land we love.

And finally, who is behind this? A wide cross-section of Montanans, from outdoor folks to timber folks to agriculture folks to business people to environmentalists, has worked for a decade on the BCSP.

From Seeley Lake to the Bob, a good thing is happening. I urge our senators to make this project a top priority in Washington.

-- Phil Smith, Missoula
ORIGINAL NOTICE FOR PUBLICATION

The Bank of New York Mellon Trust Company, National Association fka The Bank of New York Trust Company, N.A. as successor to JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., as Trustee for Residential Asset Mortgage Products, Inc., Mortgage Asset-Backed Pass-Through Certificates Series 2005-RS4

Plaintiff,

vs.

William R. Ramsdell; Tamara L. Ramsdell; Parties in Possession, et al.

Defendants.

You are notified that a petition has been filed in the office of this court naming you as a defendant in this action. The petition was filed on May 19, 2016, and prays for foreclosure of Plaintiffs mortgage in favor of the Plaintiff on the property described in this notice and judgment for the unpaid principal amount of $63,083.06, with 4.62% per annum interest thereon from June 1, 2015, together with late charges, advances and the costs of the action including (but not limited to) title costs and reasonable attorney's fees, as well as a request that said sums be declared a lien upon the following described premises from February 10, 2005, located in Muscatine county, Iowa:

Lot 20, in Block 4, of Brook Street Addition to the City of Muscatine, in Muscatine County, Iowa, commonly known as 112 Park Avenue, Muscatine, IA 52761 (the "Property")

The petition further prays that the mortgage on the above described real estate be foreclosed, that a special execution issue for the sale of as much of the mortgaged premises as is necessary to satisfy the judgment and for other relief as the Court deems just and equitable. For further details, please review the petition on file in the clerk's office. The Plaintiffs attorney is Emily Bartekoske, of SouthLaw, P.C.; whose address is 1401 50th Street, Suite 100, West Des Moines, IA 50266.

NOTICE

THE PLAINTIFF HAS ELECTED FORECLOSURE WITHOUT REDEMPTION. THIS MEANS THAT THE SALE OF THE MORTGAGED PROPERTY WILL OCCUR PROMPTLY AFTER ENTRY OF JUDGMENT UNLESS YOU FILE WITH THE COURT A WRITTEN DEMAND TO DELAY THE SALE. IF YOU FILE A WRITTEN DEMAND, THE SALE WILL BE DELAYED UNTIL TWELVE MONTHS (OR SIX MONTHS IF THE PETITION INCLUDES A WAIVER OF DEFICIENCY JUDGMENT) FROM THE ENTRY OF JUDGMENT IF THE MORTGAGED PROPERTY IS YOUR RESIDENCE AND IS A ONE-FAMILY OR TWO-FAMILY DWELLING OR UNTIL TWO MONTHS FROM ENTRY OF JUDGMENT IF THE MORTGAGED PROPERTY IS NOT YOUR RESIDENCE OR IS YOUR RESIDENCE BUT NOT A ONE-FAMILY OR TWO-FAMILY DWELLING. YOU WILL HAVE NO RIGHT OF REDEMPTION AFTER THE SALE. THE PURCHASER AT THE SALE WILL BE ENTITLED TO IMMEDIATE POSSESSION OF THE MORTGAGED PROPERTY. YOU MAY PURCHASE AT THE SALE.

You must serve a motion or answer on or before 21st day of October, 2016, and within a reasonable time thereafter file your motion or answer with the Clerk of Court for Muscatine County, at the county courthouse in Muscatine, Iowa. If you do not, judgment by default may be rendered against you for the relief demanded in the petition.

If you require the assistance of auxiliary aids or services to participate in a court action because of a disability, immediately call your District ADA Coordinator at 563-326-8783. If you are hearing impaired, call Relay Iowa TTY at 1-800-735-2942.

By: Jeff Tollenaer

CLERK OF THE ABOVE COURT

Muscatine County Courthouse

401 East 3rd Street,

Muscatine, IA 52761

IMPORTANT:

YOU ARE ADVISED TO SEEK LEGAL ADVICE AT ONCE TO PROTECT YOUR INTERESTS.
The Muscatine County Board of Supervisors met in regular session with Howard, Kelly, Sorensen, Sauer and Bonebrake present. Chairperson Sorensen presiding.

On a motion by Kelly, second by Sauer, the agenda was approved as presented. Ayes: All.

On a motion by Howard, second by Bonebrake, the Board waived the requirement for three readings and approved Ordinance #09-06-16-01 Rezoning Certain Real Property in Sweetland Township from A-1 Agricultural District Zoning Classification to R-1 Residential District Zoning Classification on the second and final reading. Roll call vote: Ayes: All.

Information Services Director Bill Riley presented quotes for a phone system for Community Services and DHS as follows: Access Systems (9508 Handsets) - $41,857.00; Access Systems (9508 and 9504 Handsets) - $38,937.00; Integrated Technology Partners - $39,357.83; Lucas Communications - $33,821.79; Marco (Digital) - $26,300.51; and Marco (IP) - $38,079.42; CenturyLink Hosted Solution - $3,375.00 per month. Riley stated once the cost of maintenance over several years is included, the lowest quote is from Lucas Communications. Riley stated Lucas Communications provides a 7-year warranty on the system and handsets whereas Marco (Digital) has a 1-year warranty and a $1,500 per month maintenance plan. Kelly asked about the conference bridge capabilities. Riley explained a conference bridge sets up a conference call through an email, but the Lucas solution still allows for the setup of a conference call by contacting the participants by phone. Riley stated if the Board does not go with the Lucas Communications solution, he would recommend the Marco (IP) solution. Howard asked if there are ongoing costs on top of the costs of the phone system. Riley stated the only other cost would be the monthly phone bill for service. On a motion by Kelly, second by Howard, the Board accepted a proposal from Lucas Communications in the amount of $33,821.79 for a phone system for Community Services and DHS. Ayes: All.

County Engineer Keith White updated the Board on secondary road projects.

On a motion by Howard, second by Kelly, the following utility permits were approved: Windstream - repair damaged cable at the intersection of Turner and 110th Avenue; Interstate Power and Light - replace a 2" gas main along Hwy 61, Old Hwy 61 and a portion of Fruitland Road; Eastern Iowa Light and Power - placement of new poles on 230th Street. Ayes: All.

On a motion by Howard, second by Kelly, utility permits were approved for CenturyLink to place fiber optic cable and equipment in the right-of-way as follows: along 180th Street and Tucker Avenue; along 41st Street from Burlington Road to the Muscatine city limits; along Vail Avenue; along Stewart Road from 41st Street to 57th Street; along Solomon Avenue from Hwy 22 to Eagle Ridge Court; along Wild Cat Den Road from Hwy 22 to New Era Road; along High Prairie Road from 231st Street to 215th Street; and along 180th Street from Vail Avenue to Verde Street. Ayes: All.

On a motion by Kelly, second by Sauer, minutes of the August 29, 2016 regular meeting were approved as written. Ayes: All.

Correspondence:

The Board received a letter from Hudson Law Firm regarding a DD#13 Open Ditch

Crossing at 41st Street. County Engineer Keith White stated they cleaned out the beaver dams at least twice this year, but it is a recurring problem that the Board of Supervisors needs to decide how often he needs to remove a beaver dam. White stated the culvert has never been blocked and was cleaned out thoroughly about a month ago. White stated an option would be to remove the culvert and close the road. Sauer stated it is a control issue, not an elimination issue. Sorensen stated the most cost effective solution for the County would be to remove the culvert and close the road.

Howard reported a complaint regarding a property with dumping or trash.

Howard reported a complaint regarding the quality of Burlington Road.

Howard reported a question regarding the completion status of a gun range.

Committee Reports:

Kelly attended an Eastern Iowa Mental Health Region meeting August 31st which dealt with strategic planning for mental health and disability services.

On a motion by Kelly, second by Bonebrake, the Board approved a revised Accountant/HR Assistant class specification. Ayes: All.

Administrative Services Director Nancy Schreiber updated the Board on vacancies on Boards and Commissions.

The meeting was adjourned at 10:12 A.M.

ATTEST:_

Leslie A. Soule, County Auditor Jeff Sorensen, Chairperson

Board of Supervisors
MUSCATINE, Iowa  The Muscatine Police Department is investigating an alleged robbery that happened Thursday night at Pizza Hut.

At or about 9:16 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 15, a robbery was reported at the Pizza Hut at 2512 Park Ave.

A black male allegedly approached the manager, who was standing outside, and demanded money. No weapon was displayed, according to a press release from the Muscatine Police Department.

The suspect was last seen walking east towards Park Avenue, according to the press release.

No employees or customers were harmed. A criminal investigation is being conducted by the Muscatine Police Department.

The police department is asking anyone with information about the incident to contact the Muscatine Street Crimes Unit, Det. Todd Koch at 563-263-9922 ext. 240, or Det. Anthony Arnaman at 563-363-9922 ext. 249.

Emily Wenger of the Muscatine Police Department
COLUMBUS JUNCTION, Iowa - There has been good progress in both construction and fundraising for a new addition to the Louisa County Ambulance (LCA) barn in Columbus Junction, city officials learned Wednesday.

Mayor Dan Wilson reported that LCA board member Diane Bohling and Columbus Junction Community Development Director Mallory Smith, who are helping to spearhead the fundraising effort, told the city council that over $215,000 of the estimated $450,000 project had been raised.

(The donations) have come from 35 families, 26 businesses, eight nonprofits and four different grants, Wilson said the women told the council.

According to previous discussions, an addition to the existing ambulance barn was needed because a new ambulance the LCA acquired this year does not fit into the original building. During those prior discussions, officials also indicated the Columbus Community Medical Facilities (CCMF), Inc. board, which actually owns the ambulance barn, assumed a loan that allowed work on the building to move forward.

Wilson said Bohling and Smith had reported the LCA Board will continue to raise funds to cover the full cost of the addition.

Fundraising is on-going, he said, adding the new addition is expected to be completed in November.

He also said the LCA and CCMF will host an open house at the barn on Saturday, Dec. 3.

In other action, Wilson said Kim Henningfield, Columbus Junction, provided an update on efforts to establish a PAWS (Pets Are Worth Saving) program in Louisa County.

Wilson said Henningfield reported the program will focus on spay/neuter programs, animal care education efforts, animal rescue and animal health.

There are several people locally who have initiated (the county program) and received some private funding and plan to continue with that, he said, adding the organization was not seeking any city financial help at this time.

She was just giving us an update, Wilson said, explaining Henningfield had indicated she planned to make similar presentations to other local governments.

Wilson said Henningfield had not given any date for when the group will actually begin operating on a regular basis.

They are in the initial stages and getting organized and have raised some money and working on plans for the future, he said.

In final action, Wilson said the council passed a resolution approving the citys fiscal year (FY) 2016 city street financial report. The report showed how the city spent its Road Use Tax (RUT) funding and other street spending.

According to the report, the city began the fiscal year on July 1, 2015, with an adjusted balance of $145,002, which included $83,752 in RUT funds and another $61,250 in other street revenue.

During the fiscal year it acquired another $234,677 in RUT money, bringing its total available revenue to $379,679.

Expenditures in FY16 totaled $267,572, which left an ending balance on June 30, 2016, of $112,107. Most of the expenditures covered roadway maintenance, with $176,994 in spending. Another $8,592 was spent on snow and ice removal, while $61,250 was spent on equipment. An additional $1,999 was spent on engineering and another $18,737 on bond/loan payments.

The council also agreed to install a street light at the corner of Walnut and 9th Street.
MUSCATINE, Iowa  More than 300 runners, walkers, volunteers, colon cancer survivors, and caregivers are expected to join together in the first against the nations number two cancer killer, colon cancer.

Get Your Rear In Gear - Muscatine is a family-friendly 5K run/walk at Discovery Park, planned to raise awareness and encourage screening for this largely preventable cancer.

Get Your Rear in Gear offers opportunities for celebration of survivors, support for caregivers, and remembrance of those who left us too soon. This race is planned by local volunteers with help from the Colon Cancer Coalition, a national organization that hosts nearly 50 events across the country to educate and raise funds for colon cancer screening and prevention.

Ashley Loveless is taking the reins for Get Your Rear in Gear - Muscatine this year. Previous local event director Bryan Fessier led the event since 2011 in memory of his wife, Ellen. Loveless, a Muscatine-native and Wellness Coordinator at Trinity Hospital in Muscatine, got involved to honor her fathers hard fight with colon cancer and looks forward to continuing the tradition Brian built.

I am honored to head Get Your Rear in Gear  Muscatine this year, said Loveless. I am proud that we are able to continue supporting the Rear in Gear Colon Cancer Screening Fund at Trinity Hospital. I believe that by talking openly about colon health and the importance of colon cancer screening, more lives can be saved.

We know how to detect and prevent colon cancer when it is discovered in its earliest and most treatable stages, Anne Carlson, executive director for the Colon Cancer Coalition, said. By funding programs like the Colon Cancer Screening Fund at Trinity Muscatine, we look to prevent this disease before it happens. The colorectal cancer screening rates in Iowa sits at 66 percent. This means nearly 35 percent of local residents eligible for screening are not being proactive and taking care of their health. By working with partners in the Muscatine area, we hope to encourage change and increase the local rates to at least 80 percent by the year 2018.

Just the facts about colon cancer:

One in 20 Americans will be diagnosed with colon cancer during their lifetime.

9 out of 10 patients will survive 5+ years when colon cancer is caught in early (localized) stages.

Screening for colon cancer should start at age 50, earlier for some ethnic groups and those with family history.

The Journal of the American Medical Association estimates a 90 percent increase in colon cancer and a 124 percent increase in rectal cancer diagnoses in young people by 2030.

The money raised at this event will stay in Muscatine to fund the Get Your Rear in Gear Colon Cancer Screening program at Trinity Hospital in Muscatine. To date over 120 local under- or uninsured people have received colon cancer screening through this program.

Saturday celebrates the sixth year of Get Your Rear in Gear in Muscatine. The 5K run/walk begins at 8:30 a.m. through Discovery Park. Registration information is available online at coloncancercoalition.org/Muscatine. Information about volunteering, sponsoring an event or forming a team is also posted on the website.

Local sponsors include UnityPoint Health  Trinity Hospital, Doug and Cindy Dawson, Genentech, Block Hawn Builders, and Kent Corporation. A complete list of sponsors can be found on the website.
MUSCATINE, Iowa  Muscatine Center for Social Action (MCSA) has published a childrens book BOOTS at Home at MCSA, which will be available during MCSAs Open House next week.

The book tells the story of a boy and his mother moving into the shelter. Boots the cat gives him a tour and makes him feel comfortable.

We are pleased to have this book available for the children that stay in the shelter, Charla Schafer, Executive Director of MCSA, stated. It was designed to alleviate some of the uncertainty around their transition.

Boots the cat moved into MCSA in May after a brief vacation at the Muscatine Humane Society. MCSA volunteer, Becky Whitmore, conceptualized the book and wrote the story. She worked with local artist, and former MCSA resident, Chris Anderson to bring the story into life with the illustrations.

Books will be sold to the public for $20 and will be available at MCSAs 25th Anniversary Open House on September 22 or any time after that by stopping by MCSA.

Sales from the book will be used to purchase additional books allowing MCSA to continue this welcome gift to future families as they transition to life at MCSA, Schafer stated.

MCSA operates a homeless shelter, a homeless prevention program, and a domestic violence shelter. For more information on MCSA visit www.mcsaiowa.org or call 563-264-3278.
MUSCATINE, Iowa  The Mt. Pleasant Zone of the Lutheran Women's Missionary League (LWML) will hold their annual Fall Rally on Saturday, Oct. 8, 2016, at Zion Lutheran Church, 1000 Maurer St., Wilton. Registration and coffee begins at 8:30 a.m. The meeting and program is scheduled from 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. Lunch is included.

The theme of the rally is "Be kind and compassionate" based on Ephesians 4:32. The keynote speaker is Don Johnston of the Beacon of Hope Hospice Program of Southeast Iowa who will share information on the programs and services offered by Beacon of Hope.

The LWML is a recognized auxiliary of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod (LCMS) and the Mt. Pleasant Zone consists of women from LCMS churches in Burlington, Fairfield, Ft. Madison, Keokuk, Mt. Pleasant, Muscatine, Wapello, and Wilton.

Guests are welcome to attend.

For more information call 319-653-2041.
WAPELLO, Iowa - Costs to remove dead or diseased trees on city right of way will continue to be absorbed by the city, the city council agreed Thursday while accepting a bid to remove four trees around the community.

The $2,600 bid from S & B Tree Service, Wapello, was the lone bid submitted, city clerk Mike Delzell reported. Delzell said he had also contacted a Mediapolis tree cutter who had previously provided service to the community, but that person had not submitted a bid.

Delzell said city residents had reported the trees to the city.

Is this all on us? council member Gene Arnold asked prior to the vote.

We opened this can of worms a couple of years ago, council member Kenny Marlette replied.

Delzell did not indicate when the trees would be cut.

The council also took two separate actions concerning the citys 2016 CSO Sewer Separation Project, which SulzCo, LLC, Muscatine, is conducting. The council first approved a $430 change order to cover a realignment of storm sewer because of a conflict between a storm intake and a guy wire.

The second action involved a $16,815 second payment to the company for completed work. Although that payment was approved, several city officials indicated they were frustrated with the slow pace of the work.

I think it sucks, council member Larry Wagg vented.

Delzell agreed the pace was slow and pointed to the companys decision to build several catch basins on site rather than purchase pre-constructed units as the main cause for the slow pace.

He said the contract calls for the work to be completed by Sep. 30.

Well be lucky if it will be done by the time snow flies, Wagg retorted.

Delzell said he would be talking with company officials on Friday, which prompted Mayor Shawn Maine to make a suggestion.

Tell them we would like to get our streets up and running, he said.

Maine also reported he had recently attended a park board meeting at the Fred Schwob Boat Access. Maine said all the plans to complete a development project at the access had been completed, but high water on the Iowa River was preventing work from starting.

Maine also reported the park board, Wapello Youth League, Hometown Pride Committee and others had recently met at the north park to review the master plan for the area.

Hometown Pride has taken the master plan over, Maine said, explaining the group was hoping to begin writing grant proposals to complete portions of the plan.

He said the group was planning to leave the softball fields in place and possible create a trail around the area. Maine also said the group had discussed the Youth League concession stand and the consensus seemed to be to relocate that building. He said the initial plan will be to demolish the existing large shelter in the northeast corner of the park and renovate the concession stand as a replacement shelter.

He did not announce any time frame for the work.

Council member Brett Shafer also reported he and council member Kenny Marlette had recently met with representatives of the fire department on moving forward with plans for a new fire station.

He said the firefighters were looking into constructing a 74 x 209 building on vacant property in the Patricks Subdivision and will start developing cost estimates.
MUSCATINE, Iowa  A Muscatine woman was transported by ambulance following an accident on Wednesday.

Muscatine County Sheriffs Deputies responded to a vehicle crash at Highway 61 and Vail Avenue at 4:03 p.m., Wednesday, Sept. 14, according to a press release from the Muscatine County Sheriff's Office.

A Ford Explorer, operated by Micaela Perales, 40, of Muscatine, was traveling southbound on Highway 61 when a Pontiac G6 operated by Tori Dierikx, 15, of Blue Grass, allegedly entered the southbound lanes of Highway 61, attempting to cross the road.

Perales attempted to avoid Dierikx's vehicle by swerving, but struck the Pontiac causing Perales to enter the north ditch.

Dierikx suffered minor injuries, but was not transported by ambulance, and Perales was transported to a hospital by a Durant ambulance.

According to the Sheriff's Office, both drivers were wearing safety belts, and airbags in Perales's vehicle were deployed.

Dierikx had a school learner's permit, and was on her way home from school at the time of the accident, according to the Sheriff's Office.

Investigation into the crash is ongoing by the Muscatine County Sheriffs Office. The Durant Ambulance and Durant Fire Department also assisted at the scene.

Emily Wenger of the Muscatine Journal
8 a.m.-10 p.m. Saturday  The First 2016 Fiesta West Liberty and the 20th Annual West Liberty Children's Festival will include free live puppet shows and and a street dance. The Chamber of Commerce 5K will be held from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m. on Third Street in downtown West Liberty, followed by the Childrens Festival from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Fiesta Latina, with live music, will be held from 3-10 p.m. on Third Street.
Not to be confused with the Centennial Elementary in Fargo, North Dakota, this Bismarck school scores high in both school environment and test scores.
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 []
Another delay has hit South Africas digital broadcast migration project as the agency behind the rollout of set-top boxes has temporarily halted production of these devices.

Set-top boxes decode digital signals for analogue television sets and government plans to distribute these devices to around 5 million poorer households.

The rollout is key to South Africas digital migration project, which intends to shift the SABC off of analogue signals and open up radio frequencies for faster mobile broadband services.

But the process has been dogged by delays as broadcasters fight over whether set-top boxes should be encrypted or not.

A Supreme Court of Appeal judgment in May struck down Communications Minister Faith Muthambis decision not to encrypt these boxes. Muthambi and broadcaster MultiChoice are challenging the matter in the Constitutional Court in February.

Amid this fight, Lumko Mtimde, CEO of Universal Service and Access Agency of South Africa (Usaasa), has told Fin24 that production of the devices has been put on ice.

The suspension of the production of set-top boxes is based on the analysis of the implications of the May 31 Supreme Court of Appeal Judgement and associated risks for Usaasa, Lumko Mtimde, CEO of Usaasa, told Fin24 by email.

The suspension is subject to further discussions with the minister of communications, Mtimde said.

Usaasa last year appointed 27 service providers for the supply of equipment such as Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) outdoor antennas and DTT set-top boxes.

Criticism of slow progress

Muthambi, meanwhile, was hauled over the coals on Thursday in Parliament over the countrys slow march towards digital migration.

Earlier this week, the communications ministers office said in a statement that the Broadcasting Digital Migration Project is well on track with over 30 000 households in the Northern Cape, Free State, Mpumalanga and Limpopo having registered with the South African Post Office to receive set-top boxes.

The ministry further said that in October it plans announce a switch-off date in towns located near the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) in the Northern Cape, where registration and installation has almost reached 99 percent.

But the country missed a key International Telecommunications Union (ITU) deadline in June last year to switch to digital.

And Fin24 reported on Thursday that MPs were demanding answers from Muthambi, with crticism coming from both ANC and DA benches.

Your management of this process is found wanting, said Mmamaloko Kubayi, ANC MP and chairperson of the portfolio committee on telecommunications and postal services.

This project is moving along at a snails pace, Kubayi added.

We received a presentation on this matter a year ago and a number of assurances were given. You must look at what has been promised to this committee and you must explain why youve deviated from it.

DA MP Marian Shinn, who is a member of the portfolio committee on telecommunications and postal services, also criticised Muthambi.

Minister Muthambi has been totally out of her depth since she took over this project, Shinn told Fin24 on Thursday.

Whatever has made the minister unilaterally change the policy  this has now led to a two year court battle. It is not worth the financial cost.

This is something the country is desperate for. And as long as this delay perpetuates and we have petty little point scoring going on we are holding back South Africas economic growth. It cannot be endured for much longer. We have to break the logjam, said Shinn.

Parliament also heard on Thursday that 600 000 set-top boxes, which have already been produced, are being stored at South African Post Office (Sapo) facilities.

Fin24

More on the digital migration

Parliament grills Muthambi over slow digital migration

Discovery  South Africas new digital bank of the future
Its the weekend again, and that means you get to catch up on all your favourite series.

If youve run out of shows to watch, ShowMax and Netflix South Africa have got you covered with a few great new releases this weekend.

Check out the awesome shows you can watch on ShowMax and Netflix South Africa this weekend:

Extremis

Netflix

Most Likely to Die

Netflix

Ill Sleep When Im Dead

Netflix

The In Crowd

ShowMax

Brotherly Love

Netflix

Heroes Reborn (season 1)

ShowMax

House (seasons 1-8)

Netflix and ShowMax

Meet Joe Black

ShowMax

Vikings (season 3)

Netflix and ShowMax

Atlantis (season 1-2)

ShowMax

More gaming news

Powerful Gigabyte GTX 10 Series gaming laptops  South African pricing

Pokemon Go Plus launched in South Africa

This fan-made Pokemon MMO is secretly one of the best games this year
BRATISLAVA, Slovakia  In a centuries-old castle in the middle of their fractious continent, European Union leaders on Friday anxiously sought to forge a sense of common purpose in the face of the planned departure of Britain and fundamental disagreements over everything from uncontrolled migration to the economy.

The 27 leaders, who are meeting without British Prime Minister Theresa May, hope their daylong talks in the Slovak capital will provide the broad outlines of a new "Bratislava roadmap" that should lead to a new-look EU by next spring.

The EU has been rocked by Britain's decision in a referendum in June to leave the EU and is assessing the fallout on its future. Despite the result, Britain is still a member of the 28-country bloc and will in all likelihood remain so for at least two years to come. To leave the EU, May will have to trigger a two-year departure timetable and she hasn't done it yet.

Top of the agenda is how to heighten security and better defense cooperation, secure external borders to deal with chaotic immigration and come through on measures to get the vast ranks of unemployed youth in Europe back to work.

Added urgency comes from the fact that countries like France and Germany hold elections next year where far-right and populist parties are seeking to exploit uncertainty generated by Britain's decision to become the first country to walk out of the EU.

Slovak Prime Minister  and summit co-host  Robert Fico said that "we all want to show unity and we all want to show that this is a unique project and we need to continue."

France and Germany have been the EU's driving forces since its inception over half a century ago, and they are cooperating intensely to get the project back on track ahead of a summit in the Italian capital next March, which will mark the 60th anniversary of the EU's founding Treaty of Rome.

"We are in a critical situation," German Chancellor Angela Merkel said.

"I hope that Bratislava stands for the fact that we want to work together, and we want the problems that there are in Europe to be solved,"

She immediately threw her country's economic weight behind the planned reset.

"We have to show through actions that we can make it better," she said.

French President Francois Hollande said the "Bratislava roadmap" consists of three simple themes to help restore the confidence of citizens in the European project.

"Protection, which is to say security; the preparation of the future, which means being able to be a great power on the global scale in terms of the economy and creating employment; and lastly to give hope to youth."

Hollande is under intense pressure to come with some success as he is trailing in the polls ahead of next May's French presidential elections. His far-right opponent from the National Front, Marine Le Pen, has already said she will call for an in-out referendum on EU membership if she wins.

The weeks preceding the Bratislava summit have seen an endless array of regional meetings of government leaders on how the EU should be run in the future. Divisions have emerged along geographical or ideological lines, or a mix of both.

The refugee emergency has been specifically divisive. Countries in the east  Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and others  have openly opposed proposed solutions coming out of EU headquarters Brussels and even defied the wishes of their neighbors.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has been one of the most abrasive voice coming into the summit, saying there should be no more "lawmaking tricks" from EU institutions which he said circumvent the sovereign decisions and will of the nation-states on the migration issue.

Orban said that while the EU leaders had voted for voluntary refugee resettlement quotas, the EU parliament and the EU Commission transformed them into mandatory quotas. "I asked them not to do this anymore because the nation-states cannot accept it."

The foreign minister of founding member Luxembourg last week called on the EU to consider kicking Hungary out over human rights issues.

Prime Minister Xavier Bettel sought to dampen down on that talk, describing the comments as "awkward." This was not his government's policy, he insisted.

While the EU seeks to create common cause, Europe's economy remains weak.

Though Greece may have secured its euro future last year after its third international bailout, it's still struggling to deliver on its promises to creditors. How to deal with the euro's problems remains divisive  on one-side pro-austerity countries led by Germany, on the other more social-minded governments.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, whose country has been at the center of the region's debt crisis and seen the arrival of hundreds of thousands of migrants, mostly from Turkey, over the last year said things cannot continue as they are.

"What Europe should not do is to continue sleepwalking in the wrong direction," he said.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, though, insisted such internal quarrels have always been there.

As leader of a founding nation, he should know. "Differences are of all ages. When we started with six nations, they were there too. We have to make sure we can fix them."
Aldea Children & Family Services hosted a kickoff of Courage Village, a suicide prevention and community engagement project.

The goal of the program to engage with students and community members at large to minimize the stigma associated with asking for help, according to a news release.

At a ceremony on Wednesday in Napa, Aldea honored initial funders Napa Valley Vintners, The Doctors Company, Kiwanis Club, Nova Group, Active 20-30 Club and Joseph & Patricia Harbison III with a key to the village.

Mark Bontrager, executive director of Aldea, Assemblymenber Bill Dodd and District Attorney Gary Lieberstein spoke at the event.

Aldea, meaning little village in Spanish, has been helping the community since 1972.

Aldea strives for all residents to have the opportunity to thrive, creating a community that works for everyone, said a news release.

Its vision is for all people they serve to achieve emotional wellness and become engaged residents, despite past abuse or emotional challenges.
Bay Area Development Company announced it has completed funding for Dexter Estate Landscapes in Calistoga. The financing allowed the landscape design firm to create five new, local jobs and to purchase a 1,600 square foot building located at 1314 Washington St. in Calistoga.

After working in the wholesale nursery production and soil products industry, Dave Dexter opened Dexter Estate Landscapes in 1985. Dexter and his team offer landscape design and installation, sustainable design and tree transplanting, said a news release.

Working with Citibank and with Bay Area Development Company, Dexter was able to obtain financing to purchase a larger, more efficient location. Owning the land and building allows Dexter to reinvest in his company while serving his growing client base from a facility better suited to his needs, said the release.
Napa urologist Dr. James Hendricks has been prohibited from practicing medicine after testing positive for ingesting alcohol while on probation.

Im sorry to my patients and the community that this has happened, said Hendricks in a phone interview on Thursday afternoon. My patients well-being and safety has always been my top priority.

In 2013, Hendricks was sentenced by the Medical Board of California to four years probation following a DUI charge from 2011.

His probation terms include abstaining completely from the use of alcohol, enrolling in an ethics course and undergoing therapy. During the probation period, Hendricks was able to continue to practice medicine, but would undergo random drug screenings and was not allowed to supervise physician assistants.

According to a Sept. 14 cease practice order from the Medical Board, Hendricks tested positive for drinking alcohol on Aug. 1.

After over three years of rigorous alcohol testing, I only recently had a few drinks when I was not on duty while on vacation, said Hendricks.

According to the Medical Board letter, Hendricks shall not resume the practice of medicine until a final decision has been issued. No date was given for that final decision.

Hendricks was stopped close to midnight July 12, 2011, by the California Highway Patrol on Highway 221 south of Imola Avenue after driving approximately 20 mph over the speed limit and weaving within the lane, according to documents filed by the state Medical Board. Hendricks had a blood alcohol content of .17 percent, according to the Medical Board.

In November 2011, Hendricks pleaded no contest to the DUI charge in Napa County Superior Court and was sentenced to serve four days in custody, to pay a fine, and to comply with standard conditions of probation for five years, according to the Medical Board.

After receiving notice of the arrest, the Medical Board initiated its own investigation.

Hendricks, who practices at Napa Valley Urology Associates, was issued his Physicians and Surgeons Certificate by the state Medical Board in September of 1998.

Hendricks said he remains one of the owners of the business.
Bathing suits will not become the new dress code at Dwight Murray Plaza after all.

Napa is abandoning the sprayground  a floor-mounted fountain in which children can play in its flumes  it had hoped would become the hub and magnet of a revived public square on downtown First Street. Despite strong enthusiasm among city leaders for the play fountain, officials are dropping the plan due to a three-year-old state law that governs them like public swimming pools and imposes strict safety and hygiene conditions on the devices.

Instead, city parks directors will seek out artists for a more traditional and decorative water feature for the plaza as part of its complete rebuilding over the next several months. Napa will soon publish a request for fountain designs as part of the $1.5 million project, Parks and Recreation director John Coates announced Wednesday night.

So-called interactive fountains had gained popularity in California as a way to engage park users more fully with their surroundings, and Napa public works staff embraced the idea as a plaza centerpiece that also could be switched off to create more floor space for festivals or concerts.

A 2013 addition to the California pool code, however, caught the attention of city officials in August and effectively dried up the original fountain plan. Because visitors could run through its water streams, the revised rule demands the addition of many fixtures already required at swimming centers  including permanent, separate restrooms for both genders on the premises.

Rather than risk cost overruns and delays, Coates on Wednesday told the Parks and Recreation Advisory Commission the city should put out a call to designers willing to create a traditional water installation, likely on the margin of the plaza instead of at its heart. Napa leaders aim to finish the work next spring to attract vacationers on First Street, around the expected opening dates for the Archer hotel and First Street Napa shopping emporium a short stroll west.

A conventional fountain would be, in part, a spiritual return to Dwight Murray Plazas roots. On its opening in 1974, the brick-lined gathering place near First and Main streets included a stone waterfall as one of its centerpieces, along with a broad, stepped seating pit and a timber-beam clock tower extending 70 feet above the sidewalk.

Time and shifting fashions, however, have proven unkind to an expanse the city once hoped would become the home of Napas largest, busiest gatherings. The original fountain became a target for soap-pouring vandals and eventually was turned into a planter box, while Napa dismantled the clock tower after complaints about its design and inaccuracy.

While the pit seating  largely bypassed by event organizers in favor of Veterans Memorial Park nearby  remains for now, designers plan to fill and level the depression to create a one-level surface without barriers for disabled visitors or large groups of passers-by.

Water feature aside, the reimagining of Dwight Murray Plaza  which the City Council approved in May  will be a sharp break from the squares caught-in-the-70s layout. In addition to junking the pit seating, designers will strip the brick-like paving in favor of lighter tones, while also providing parasol-topped tables, chairs, and rows of London planetrees for shade.
Winemaker Julien Fayard believes the next chapter of Napa Valley winemaking will shift the focus from producing big, powerful cabernet sauvignons to instead crafting a variety of wines that highlight the complexity and finesse of the region.

To do that, he and his wife, Elan, along with their business partners, St. Louis residents Cal and Pam Nicholson (owners of Nicholson Jones Winery) and Dave and Laura Nestor, have recently completed construction of Covert Estate winery located in the Coombsville appellation.

When my wife and I moved here from France in 2006 we discovered a new environment, new techniques, new weather, new climate, Fayard said as we toured the 4.5-acre hillside vineyards on the 12-acre property in the hills east of downtown Napa.

The Covert Estate property boasts sweeping views of rolling hills that are dotted with ancient oak trees and expansive horse ranches, with only a few other vineyards in sight. To the south San Pablo Bay shimmers in the distance. Fayard explained that the bowl-like geology of the area, coupled with its nearness to the bay, provides lower daily temperatures when compared to other Napa Valley appellations.

The grapes here ripen steadily and evenly, making for rich wines with complex nuances, he said. We often pick later than vineyards that might be just a few miles away.

Fayard grew up in the town of Saint-Etienne and spent time working at his familys winery and vineyard, cru classe Chateau Sainte-Marguerite, located in the village of La Londe-les-Maures near the French Riviera. For generations, the Fayard family has grown grapes and produced their own expression of the regions signature wine, Provencal rose.

By the age of 16, young Julien had blended his first wine. After obtaining a masters in agriculture and winemaking he worked at renowned French wineries such as Chateau Lafite Rothschild and Chateau Smith Haut Lafitte.

I met Elan in the south of France while she was studying wine and the French language, Fayard said. After we married, we moved to California so that she could be nearer to her family and I could explore making wine outside of France.

With more than a decade of experience making wine in Bordeaux, the duo moved to the Napa Valley in 2006, intent on eventually starting their own wine business in the United States. Elan, a Bay Area native, was thrilled to be home.

We both love Napa Valley and the community, she said. We moved here with little more than the shirts on our backs. Everything we owned or moved from France fit in 4 large boxes. It was a leap of trust.

Fayard teamed up with influential Philippe Melka, a fellow French winemaker behind some of Napas most sought-after Cabernets, including Dana Estates, Vineyard 29 and others.

Julien is immensely talented, Melka said. Between his French roots of winemaking, his adventurous spirit and his great knowledge of the business, he has all the tools to be the next superstar of the industry. He understands the new generation of wines: stylistically pure and fun.

Working alongside winemaker Philippe Melka taught me how to work with the multiple climates and complexities of the Napa Valley, Fayard said. Within most of France (except in Burgundy, for example) winemakers work with fairly well-defined sites that are often large. Here in Napa, winemakers work with multiple sites that can be very, very tiny. So I consider winemaking here in Napa to be much like winemaking done in Burgundy. And so having a winery where we are able to tightly control every aspect of the winemaking, down to even single barrels, is important.

To achieve this level of control, Covert Estate has built a state-of-the-art winery that is completely underground, as Juancarlos Fernandez, partner at Signum Architecture and lead architect on the project, explained.

Because of the underground layout, the winery maintains a constant ambient temperature throughout the facility, including the tank room and the barrel storage, Fernandez said. This gives Julien full control of ideal temperatures for the grapes during crush all the way to the final bottling of the wine.

As we toured the site, it became apparent why they adopted the name Covert  the winery is nearly completely hidden from view.

The winery is fully integrated with the surrounding landscape and heritage oak trees that cover the property, said Fernandez. Visitors to the winery may notice the unique curved tunnels that originate from each of the outer portals, expanding and contracting in response to the winemaking process they accommodate. Also look for the framed views of the surrounding valley from inside of each of the three portals.

Within one of these portals is the winerys tasting room, which, in contrast to the simplicity of the winery, looks like a bachelor pad with leather and fur- covered chairs and industrial-looking modern furniture, much of which is made from reclaimed wood. An enormous volcanic rock topped with a thick glass slab serves as the central tasting table. Above, a twisting and tangled chandelier of metal hangs in the center of the room, providing stark contrast with the soft-rolling hills visible through large glass doors at the caves entrance beyond.

During our tasting, three wines stood out: the 2015 Azur, a Provencale-style rose; the 2013 Covert Cabernet Franc; and the 2012 Empreinte Cabernet Sauvignon. The 2015 Azur ($32 a bottle and only 850 cases made) speaks to Fayards deep family history of producing rose wines in Provence, France, for generations. This wine is stunning, starting with its salmon hue and aromatics of rose petal and wet sea stones.

In the mouth, this wine is breathtaking, with a mix of refreshing subtle citrus notes that blends flawlessly with flint and a whisper of dried mint. The Covert Cabernet Franc ($195 and only 100 cases made) highlights Fayards skill as a winemaker.

This wine showcases how Cab Franc can display a blend of blue fruit (plum and blueberry) highlighted with red-fruit elements (raspberry and dark cherry). The wine has a wonderful blend of both jammy and bright elements, and the texture is smooth and full on the palate.

Fayard makes a few wines under the Empreinte label, and the Empreinte 2012 Cabernet Sauvignon from the Martineze Vineyard on Pritchard Hill ($225) was a show-stopper. This is a cabernet in which anyone familiar with cult-cabs around the Napa Valley will find comfort  full of dark fruit such as blackberry and cassis but also spicy with nutmeg and cloves blended together with layers of toffee and sweet oak, creating a super-rich mouth feel and a finish that lasts for minutes.

It is interesting that during our tasting, we sipped on three different wine brands: Azur, Empreinte and Covert. Each of these had their own label and if you saw them on a shelf youd never know they came from the same winery.

Additionally, the winery also produces the Nicholson Jones brand and Solace. Each brand represents an opportunity for visitors to explore different wine styles, but this unique business model also highlights a possible shift in the nature of wineries, from producing single-brand-focused wines to crafting collections of different brand concepts, providing flexibility within an ever-changing and highly competitive marketplace. Covert indeed.

I think since the 1940s the Napa Valley has shown that it can make world-class wines of power and structure, Fayard said. I believe that the next phase of winemaking will show a different side to this place, making wines that highlight complexity and refinement.

Tastings at the winery are by appointment only. For more information or to schedule a tour, visit www.covertestate.com.
China Launches Tiangong-2 Space Laboratory Module (With video)

China launched the Tiangong-2 space laboratory module on a Long March 2F rocket today. The two year year mission of Tiangong-2 will see two Chinese astronauts occupy the space lab for up to a month at a time to perform a variety of scientific experiments. In October, Shenzhou 11, will launch with two astronauts on the first mission to the newly commissioned space lab.

Keiths note: As I said on CCTV in an earlier interview today I think that it is time that the U.S. and China started to expand their cooperation in space including human space flight. This will need to be done by Congress by ending the politically-oinspired ban that is currently in place.

Marcs note: As China moves forward with its human spaceflight program should the International community and the U.S. forge closer ties with them? My position is that international cooperation in space is critical for the continual peaceful use of space, and for the commercial use of LEO, GEO, the moon and future scientific exploration beyond the moon. This then would include cooperation with China.
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg will visit New York from 19 to 22 September 2016 to attend the United Nations General Assembly.

During his stay, the Secretary General will meet with the United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon and other high level officials.

On Friday, 23 September 2016, the Secretary General will be in Boston to deliver a speech at the Harvard University.

Still and video images will be available on the NATO website after the event.

Follow us on Twitter (@NATOPress and @jensstoltenberg)
Typhoon in Philippines affects more than 932,000 people

Source: Turkey conducts 'telephone diplomacy' on food deal

Borrell: The EU urges Russia to revert its decision

Haiti PM Ariel Henry: The leader of a political party was murdered in the republic

Armenia MFA expresses condolences to South Korea over Seoul tragedy

Seoul receives more than 3,700 missing persons reports after crush

Armenian Defense Ministry: Private received fatal gunshot wound

Toivo Klaar: I emphasised the European Unions continued strong engagement in the peace process

Arrested for assaulting Speaker Pelosi's spouse faces charges

Major crush in Seoul: There are victims

Britain needs air defense in connection with war in Ukraine

President discusses latest foreign political developments around Artsakh

Azerbaijan officials considering opening embassy in Israel

Armenia PM, EU Special Representative for South Caucasus discuss regional security and peace

Nikol Pashinyan, Garo Paylan exchange views on Armenia-Turkey normalization process

Quake hits Armenia-Turkey border zone

Armenia ruling party adopting new vision regarding Karabakh conflict settlement

Russia MOD: Ukraine carried out terrorist attack on Black Sea Fleet ships, civilian ships in Sevastopol

Premier: CSTO should plan force operation, restore Armenias territorial integrity

Armenia PM: All countries consider Karabakh to be part of Azerbaijan

Armenias Pashinyan: CSTO does not exist

Kremlin responds to question on extending mandate of Russian peacekeepers in Karabakh

Armenia premier: We need to know, ultimately, what Russian peacekeepers are doing in Nagorno-Karabakh

Armenia PM: Im ready to sign document, accept that Russian peacekeepers term in Karabakh be extended 10-20 years

Armenias Pashinyan: We are ready to delegate border guard service operation to Russian border guards

Finland, Sweden promise to join NATO together

European Parliament calls on Armenia to consider diversifying its security partnerships

Visiting Armenia MPs brief Canada lawmaker on recent Azerbaijan military aggression

Armenia PM at ruling party congress: We declared repairing states foundation our primary task

Karabakh President: Russia leaders statement inspires certain hopes

Armenia ruling party congress kicks off

Man breaks into US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's home, demands to speak with her, beats husband with hammer

EU-Armenia Joint Committee on Research and Innovation first meeting to be held in November

Provincial governor of Armenias Gegharkunik: EU monitoring mission already started

US accuses Russia of disinformation regarding Washington intentions towards Armenia, Azerbaijan

Mexico fully legalizes gay marriage

Newspaper: Azerbaijan not inclined to sign anything with Armenia in Russias Sochi

Armenia ruling party convening closed convention

Italian prime minister demands that she be addressed as prime minister in masculine form

Pentagon to send Ukraine new aid package worth $275 million

Europe will ban sale of one type of car

European Commission head announces new aid and investments for Serbia

Biden calls Putin's rhetoric on nuclear weapons 'dangerous'

Lukashenko on Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict: What are you fighting for in these mountains, where not even goats walk?

Swedish authorities offer to create united northern army

Lukashenko: Conflict issue between Armenia and Azerbaijan must be resolved now - with Ilham Aliyev

Lukashenko about situation on Armenian-Azerbaijani border: Where are we racing horses, where are we rushing to?

Pashinyan: Armenia-Diaspora relations undergo profound substantive changes

Lukashenko to Pashinyan: Sit down with Aliyev and make a decision, if you don't make it today, it will be worse

Bulgarian interim government urges to speed up transition to euro zone

President of Karabakh: It is necessary to unite all national potential and efforts

IMF: China's sharp and uncharacteristic economic slowdown will stall growth in Asia by the end of 2023

Iran: Riots in country were planned by the intelligence services of the USA, England, Israel and the KSA

Steinmeier: Ukraine war caused 'epochal break' in Germany's relations with Russia

Gas prices in Europe remain high in coming years

Ararat Mirzoyan and Toivo Klaar stress importance of hosting EU civilian mission in Armenia

Armenia's ambassador-at-large: Daily false propaganda can't cover up Azerbaijani war crimes

Taiwan MFA outraged by Putin's speech on his status and Pelosi's visit

Armenia gives no response to peace treaty proposals, Bayramov says

Netanyahu expects return to power after 5th Israeli election in 4 years

Armenian gravestone found in Trabzon, Turkey neighborhood

Pashinyan: CSTO Secretary General's report mainly reflects existing realities

Azerbaijan talks possible deliveries of its gas to international Turkish hub

CSTO leaders to meet in late November: Situation on Armenian-Azerbaijani border will be discussed

Dollar, euro continue falling in Armenia

Pelosi's house attacked, her husband injured

Russias Putin to have private talks with Armenias Pashinyan, Azerbaijans Aliyev

Mher Grigoryan: CIS needs a new scientific and technical agreement

Pentagon strategy doesn't rule out use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear threats

French National Assembly plans to pass resolution proposing certain sanctions against Azerbaijan

Mher Grigoryan: There are no other corridors in the trilateral statement other than Lachin's

Konstantin Zatulin: Russia should have made maximum efforts so that there would be no war in Karabakh

The Hill: The American people deserve to know how the war in Ukraine will end

Sochi to host trilateral talks of Russian, Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders on October 31

Poland receives first Turkish drones

Hungarian government may extend price limits on fuel and some basic foodstuffs

Armenias Simonyan attends meeting of heads of EEU countries parliaments

Polish general appointed as head of EU mission to train Ukrainian troops

Russia MP: Karabakh status decision is in fact its Armenians safety guarantee

Zatulin: West seeks to push Russia out of negotiation process at any cost
An Armenian man was shot and killed after he opened the front door of his Woodland Hills neighborhood home in Los Angeles, California, expecting a pizza delivery.

Hovik Krboyan, 37, was at home with his wife and 9-year-old daughter close to midnight when he answered the front door, reported the Los Angeles Times.

A Los Angeles police detective told KTLA-TV they think Krboyan opened the door because he had ordered a pizza. Instead, he was met by unidentified assailants.

Thats when he was shot and killed outside his home, police said.

His wife and daughter were not harmed.

Ed Winter, spokesman of the Los Angeles County Department of Medical Examiner-Coroner, said detectives interviewed neighbors who reported hearing gunshots.

The pizza delivery arrived minutes after the shooting.

Police think the man knew the assailants.

We arent sure yet whats behind this mans shooting, but cases like this often stem from business or domestic disputes, LAPD Capt. Paul Vernon said in a statement.

An investigation is underway.
YEREVAN.  The Acting Foreign Minister of Armenia, Edward Nalbandian, on Friday participated in and address at the meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries.

This event, which Kyrgyzstans capital city of Bishkek hosted, was convened within the framework of the 25th anniversary of the CIS, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia informed Armenian News-NEWS.am.

Increasing the efficiency of the activities of this organization, and its modernization against the backdrop of the modern-day realties were on the agenda of this meeting.

The FMs of the CIS member countries reflected on the avenues for closer cooperation in several domains.

The discussants also conferred on and approved the drafts of more than a dozen documents.

It was decided that the next meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers of the CIS countries will be convened in April 2017 in Tashkent, the capital city of Uzbekistan.
Typhoon in Philippines affects more than 932,000 people

Source: Turkey conducts 'telephone diplomacy' on food deal

Borrell: The EU urges Russia to revert its decision

Haiti PM Ariel Henry: The leader of a political party was murdered in the republic

Armenia MFA expresses condolences to South Korea over Seoul tragedy

Seoul receives more than 3,700 missing persons reports after crush

Armenian Defense Ministry: Private received fatal gunshot wound

Toivo Klaar: I emphasised the European Unions continued strong engagement in the peace process

Arrested for assaulting Speaker Pelosi's spouse faces charges

Major crush in Seoul: There are victims

Britain needs air defense in connection with war in Ukraine

President discusses latest foreign political developments around Artsakh

Azerbaijan officials considering opening embassy in Israel

Armenia PM, EU Special Representative for South Caucasus discuss regional security and peace

Nikol Pashinyan, Garo Paylan exchange views on Armenia-Turkey normalization process

Quake hits Armenia-Turkey border zone

Armenia ruling party adopting new vision regarding Karabakh conflict settlement

Russia MOD: Ukraine carried out terrorist attack on Black Sea Fleet ships, civilian ships in Sevastopol

Premier: CSTO should plan force operation, restore Armenias territorial integrity

Armenia PM: All countries consider Karabakh to be part of Azerbaijan

Armenias Pashinyan: CSTO does not exist

Kremlin responds to question on extending mandate of Russian peacekeepers in Karabakh

Armenia premier: We need to know, ultimately, what Russian peacekeepers are doing in Nagorno-Karabakh

Armenia PM: Im ready to sign document, accept that Russian peacekeepers term in Karabakh be extended 10-20 years

Armenias Pashinyan: We are ready to delegate border guard service operation to Russian border guards

Finland, Sweden promise to join NATO together

European Parliament calls on Armenia to consider diversifying its security partnerships

Visiting Armenia MPs brief Canada lawmaker on recent Azerbaijan military aggression

Armenia PM at ruling party congress: We declared repairing states foundation our primary task

Karabakh President: Russia leaders statement inspires certain hopes

Armenia ruling party congress kicks off

Man breaks into US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's home, demands to speak with her, beats husband with hammer

EU-Armenia Joint Committee on Research and Innovation first meeting to be held in November

Provincial governor of Armenias Gegharkunik: EU monitoring mission already started

US accuses Russia of disinformation regarding Washington intentions towards Armenia, Azerbaijan

Mexico fully legalizes gay marriage

Newspaper: Azerbaijan not inclined to sign anything with Armenia in Russias Sochi

Armenia ruling party convening closed convention

Italian prime minister demands that she be addressed as prime minister in masculine form

Pentagon to send Ukraine new aid package worth $275 million

Europe will ban sale of one type of car

European Commission head announces new aid and investments for Serbia

Biden calls Putin's rhetoric on nuclear weapons 'dangerous'

Lukashenko on Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict: What are you fighting for in these mountains, where not even goats walk?

Swedish authorities offer to create united northern army

Lukashenko: Conflict issue between Armenia and Azerbaijan must be resolved now - with Ilham Aliyev

Lukashenko about situation on Armenian-Azerbaijani border: Where are we racing horses, where are we rushing to?

Pashinyan: Armenia-Diaspora relations undergo profound substantive changes

Lukashenko to Pashinyan: Sit down with Aliyev and make a decision, if you don't make it today, it will be worse

Bulgarian interim government urges to speed up transition to euro zone

President of Karabakh: It is necessary to unite all national potential and efforts

IMF: China's sharp and uncharacteristic economic slowdown will stall growth in Asia by the end of 2023

Iran: Riots in country were planned by the intelligence services of the USA, England, Israel and the KSA

Steinmeier: Ukraine war caused 'epochal break' in Germany's relations with Russia

Gas prices in Europe remain high in coming years

Ararat Mirzoyan and Toivo Klaar stress importance of hosting EU civilian mission in Armenia

Armenia's ambassador-at-large: Daily false propaganda can't cover up Azerbaijani war crimes

Taiwan MFA outraged by Putin's speech on his status and Pelosi's visit

Armenia gives no response to peace treaty proposals, Bayramov says

Netanyahu expects return to power after 5th Israeli election in 4 years

Armenian gravestone found in Trabzon, Turkey neighborhood

Pashinyan: CSTO Secretary General's report mainly reflects existing realities

Azerbaijan talks possible deliveries of its gas to international Turkish hub

CSTO leaders to meet in late November: Situation on Armenian-Azerbaijani border will be discussed

Dollar, euro continue falling in Armenia

Pelosi's house attacked, her husband injured

Russias Putin to have private talks with Armenias Pashinyan, Azerbaijans Aliyev

Mher Grigoryan: CIS needs a new scientific and technical agreement

Pentagon strategy doesn't rule out use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear threats

French National Assembly plans to pass resolution proposing certain sanctions against Azerbaijan

Mher Grigoryan: There are no other corridors in the trilateral statement other than Lachin's

Konstantin Zatulin: Russia should have made maximum efforts so that there would be no war in Karabakh

The Hill: The American people deserve to know how the war in Ukraine will end

Sochi to host trilateral talks of Russian, Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders on October 31

Poland receives first Turkish drones

Hungarian government may extend price limits on fuel and some basic foodstuffs

Armenias Simonyan attends meeting of heads of EEU countries parliaments

Polish general appointed as head of EU mission to train Ukrainian troops

Russia MP: Karabakh status decision is in fact its Armenians safety guarantee

Zatulin: West seeks to push Russia out of negotiation process at any cost

Legislature head proposes to organize, under CIS auspices, return of Armenians detained in Azerbaijan

Iran prevents bomb explosion in Shiraz crowded street

Iraqi parliament expresses vote of confidence in new cabinet

France lawmakers visit Armenian Genocide Memorial in Yerevan

Putin: Moscow is doing everything possible to normalize relations between Yerevan and Baku

Annual shopping festival kicks off in Dubai on December 15

Lazarevsky Club: Minute of silence held in memory of fallen Russian and Armenian soldiers

Bayramov and US Assistant Secretary of State discuss Yerevan-Baku relations

Expansion of cooperation with Interpol is important, Armenia PM says

Armenia defense minister briefs Austria envoy on situation due to recent Azerbaijan military aggression (PHOTOS)

Australia can't rule out energy price caps

Armenia parliament speaker: Use, threat of force undermine processes aimed at establishing peace

Garo Paylan is in Yerevan

Barack Obama tries to help Democrats win midterm elections

Azerbaijan president, Russia first deputy PM discuss North-South transport corridor project

PM Pashinyan receives France-Armenia friendship group delegation from French parliament

Taiwan urges China to start talking

Armen Grigoryan and Toivo Klaar discuss Armenian-Azerbaijani negotiation process

Matviyenko: Russia will continue mediation for signing Armenia-Azerbaijan peace treaty

Politico: Scholz and Macron threaten U.S. trade retaliation
YEREVAN. - Armenia is facing big challenges and it needs deep and comprehensive reforms, but any political force which wants to conduct reforms here needs very strong legitimacy.

The head of the EU Delegation to Armenia Piotr Switalski told the aforementioned to Radio Liberty.

I think the awareness that Armenia needs deep and comprehensive reforms is very universal, Switalski said.

He also pointed out to a recent statement by President Serzh Sarkisian, noting that the EU fully agrees with its assessment on that Armenia needs reforms.

We are ready to assist. But any political force in Armenia, if it wants to conduct reforms and move Armenia further, needs very strong legitimacy, added Switalski. For any political force, there is no better source of legitimacy than elections which are considered by the population as reflecting its will, as free and fair.

He also stressed that there is no perfect model of elections. According to the Ambassador, the democracy is not perfect in any country: there will always be disappointment and dissatisfaction on the impartiality of a certain element or the fact that it doesnt satisfy the interests of a certain group.

But despite this, Switalski thinks that now Armenia has a real chance to show that the political culture in Armenia is strong and mature and that the for the sake of the ciuntrys future Armenians can build a very strong consensual basis to serve the strategic goals of their country.

In this context, the interest of EU in Armenia is very simple and transparent: we want Armenia to develop and prosper and ensure the best possible conditions for its own development, he stressed.

Referring to the appointment of new prime minister, Switalski expressed hope that the new government will continue these initiatives, especially in regard to good governance and anti-corruption struggle. He also added that the EU is ready to support the new Government in implementing the reforms.
The US Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has required her contestant from the Republicans Donald Trump to apologize to Barack Obama for the assumptions that the latter was born outside the US and according to the constitution could not have been elected as the US president.

Trump officially accepted that Obama was born in the US territory only this week. Earlier, Trump for many years was one of the leaders of an informal movement , which claimed that Obama was born in Kenya , where the future president's father was born . The White House finally yielded to the movement 's demands , spreading a copy of Obama's birth certificate . This happened in two years, after Obama had been elected as a president.

" Barack Obama was born in America, plain and simple, and Donald Trump owes him and the American people an apology His [Trumpd]campaign was founded on this outrageous lie" said Clinton , speaking in Washington D.C. before the Union of African-American women. The speech was broadcasted by one of the American TV channels.

" We know who Donald is. For five years, he has led the birther movement to delegitimize our first black president. His campaign was founded on this outrageous lieThere is no erasing it in history," Clinton said. " Just yesterday, Trump again refused to say with his own words that the president was born in the United States," Clinton said, implying that Trump does not personally accept the fact that Obama was born in the US , but rather through his spokesman .
Hot spots of tension and resistance remain in the territory of the CIS cooperation, President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan said the aforementioned at the restricted format session of the Council of CIS Heads of States kicked off in Bishkek on Friday.

In his speech, Sargsyan first offered condolences to the prime minister and Acting President of Uzbekistan Shavkat Miromonovich Mirziyoyev in connection with the death of President Islam Karimov.

This year is a jubilee one for both CIS and our countries: We are celebrating the 25th anniversary of independence of our countries and formation of the Commonwealth. Within this period, the CIS has showed itself as an important interstate format for searching answers to complex questions, which we faced in the early 90s. The Commonwealth contributed to maintaining economic, humanitarian, political and other ties in the post-Soviet area, as well as further development in the conditions of the state construction in our countries, he noted.

According to Sargsyan, 2016 is a unique 'borderline' to give a meaning to the 25th anniversary of the Commonwealths experience, objectively and impartially analyze its activity and identify the guidelines for the further development of CIS and its adaptation to the modern reality.

In the conditions of the existence of other integration units on the post-Soviet area, increasing the effectiveness of the Commonwealth and giving new impetus to the multi-lateral cooperation in this format should become the key aim of the adaptation, he added.

Exactly in this context does the Armenian side consider and support the draft Decision on CIS Adaptation, which also stipulates delegation of a number of issues to the CIS Council of Foreign Ministers, the Economic Council and permanent authorized representatives, with which we might have even lagged behind, Sargsyan stressed.

In his words, an escalation of tension is still observed in the world, including in certain CIS regions: the activity of terrorist groups is growing, high level of economic instability retains and migration crisis continues.

The President expressed hope that the recent Russian-American agreements on ceasefire in Syria will create preconditions for the long-term settlement of this bloody conflict.

Unfortunately, spots of tension and resistance retain in the area of our Commonwealth as well. This April  for the first time after the establishment of ceasefire in 1994  the war was resumed in Nagorno-Karabakh region. These actions resulted not only in military losses, but also in casualties among the civilian population, also seriously undermining the negotiation process.

I am touching on this topic, since the Protocol on Ceasefire, which was based on the provisions of the Statement of the Council of CIS member-states (signed on 15 April 1994), was signed exactly here, in Bishkek. Nursultan Abishevich witnessed this; he also took part in the process. That is, the CIS states are in a sense guarantors of the implementation of that open-ended agreement, which underscores the necessity to achieve full settlement of the conflict exclusively through political means. We have always expressed our position, which is in line with that of the OSCE Minsk Group, i.e. settlement of the conflict through peaceful talks based on the norms and principles of the international law, as well as reasonable compromises. I reiterate, reasonable compromises, Sargsyan said.

He also expressed gratitude to the Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Russian side, which together with the other OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs  France and U.S.  takes relevant steps for the political and diplomatic settlement of the Karabakh conflict and implementation of the agreements reached during the Vienna and Saint Petersburg summits. This is first of all the unconditional implementation of tripartite open-ended ceasefire agreements of 1994 and 1995, establishment of incident investigation mechanisms and expansion of the office of the personal representative of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office. We presume that the consistent implementation of the aforementioned agreements will create relevant atmosphere for the progress of the negotiation process, Sargsyan added.

The President noted that the CIS countries are in the process of consistent enhancement of their state governance. For Armenia this is a path to ensure the rule of law, improve its system of administration, develop its economy, as well as increase the independence of the judicial system, strengthen the civil society and support the freedom of press.

To enhance the role and increase the efficiency of those institutions, last year Armenia held a referendum on constitutional reforms, he noted. The new Constitution corrects the balance between the powers and duties of the branches of government, ensuring a higher level of protection of human right and freedoms and increasing the role of public, artistic, professional and political unions.

Sargsyan also noted that for the first time in 25 years of Armenias independence, the parliamentary majority and opposition, together with the participation of the civil society, reached a consensus on the Electoral Code of Armenia this week. The parliamentary elections will take place in the country in already several months. The Republic of Armenia will send corresponding invitations to all the partners to take part in international observations missions, including in the CIS mission format, he said.

Currently new Government is being formed in Armenia. Our task is to give new impetus to the development of economy in Armenia, increase the volume of economic growth and the export of Armenian goods and services, he noted.
Ida Mae Astute/ABC via Getty Images(NEW YORK)  In an apparent contradiction to what Ivanka Trump said on Good Morning America Thursday, the Trump Organization has suggested that not all of its employees are eligible to receive eight weeks of paid maternity and adoption leave.



Deirdre Rosen, the senior vice president of human resources for the Trump Organization, told ABC News that the Trump Organization does offer an eight-week paid parental leave policy, but said that may not be the case at the various properties that comprise GOP presidential nominee Donald Trumps sprawling empire.



The Trump Organization is proud of the family friendly environment it fosters throughout its portfolio. The Trump Organization, along with the lifestyle brand, Ivanka Trump, a company separate from the Trump Organization, wholly owned by Ivanka Trump, both offer an industry leading eight-week paid parental leave policy, Rosen said in a statement. The policies and practices allowing employees to enjoy a healthy work-life balance vary from property to property. We take an individualized approach to helping employees manage family and work responsibilities.



During an interview Wednesday on Good Morning America, Ivanka Trump told ABC News anchor Amy Robach that all of Trumps employees are offered paid maternity leave and adoption leave.



Robach asked if the benefit is applicable to all Trump Organization workers. Ivanka Trump responded: It is and also adoption leave.



The Trump Organization declined to release copies of its employee handbooks to ABC News, saying, the organization is a private business and will not be providing their handbooks which are considered proprietary.



ABC News has asked the company to provide the sections in the employee handbook outlining the Trump Organization and Ivanka Trumps family leave policies. The company has not yet responded to that request.



The Trump Organization also declined to elaborate on which employees are eligible for the eight-week paid parental leave.



The Trump campaign told ABC News Thursday afternoon that the statement from Trumps company needs no further comment.



Here is the full exchange between Robach and Ivanka Trump:



ROBACH: Youre an executive vice president at the Trump Organization. You said last night that the Trump Organization headed by your father does offer paid maternity leave for its employees. Is that for all of the thousands of employees of your father?



IVANKA TRUMP: It is and also adoption leave. So its a great thing and at my own business since inception Ive offered eight weeks paid leave, only 10 percent of American companies offer that benefit, so it is quite unique and this policy is to encourage more companies and to encourage all Americans to be able to get the benefit of it should they be new mothers because its so critical and important.



ABC Breaking News | Latest News Videos

Copyright  2016, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.
Audience will serve as jury during interactive play

by Christi Mathis

CARBONDALE, Ill. -- An intense courtroom drama will be playing out at Southern Illinois University Carbondale this month and audience members will serve as the jury.

A public presentation of the Todd Logan play, Defamation, is set for 6 p.m. on Sept. 23 in the Student Center Ballrooms and everyone is welcome to attend. There is no cost.

In this interactive presentation, race, religion, class and gender clash when an African-American woman files a civil suit against a Jewish real estate developer alleging defamation. The legal battle centers on whether the plaintiff was falsely accused of stealing the developers watch, resulting in financial harm to her.

Discussions and interaction occur between the actors and the audience and at the plays conclusion, audience members are polled by the judge, both before and after deliberations, to determine the outcome of the trial. A question and answer session with the playwright and cast afterward allows those attending to further explore the issues.

Thousands of people across the United States have viewed Defamation since it premiered in late 2010. Logans goal in writing the play was to encourage greater tolerance and understanding by spurring self-examination and promoting compelling civil discourse.

Sponsors for the SIU presentation include New Student Programs, University Honors, Student Affairs, University College and the colleges of Business, Education and Human Services, Science, and Mass Communications and Media Arts.

For more information, contact Nathan Stephens at 618/453-4846 or nathan.stephens@siu.edu or Cordy Love at 618/453-1000.
Fermentation institute research provides new tools to brewers

by Tim Crosby

CARBONDALE, Ill. -- Making beer is and always has been a fairly straight-forward process. Create a solution of sugars from grain, add yeast and hops, maybe other flavorings, and let it do its thing.

But the proliferation of American craft brewers in recent decades is also leading to more experimentation, creativity and variations on this theme. Researchers at Southern Illinois University Carbondale, in cooperation with several craft brewers, recently looked at a brewing trend to help understand the science behind the process, and ultimately the all-important flavor.

Matt McCarroll, professor of chemistry and biochemistry and director of the Fermentation Science Institute at SIU, said researchers examined whether the relative bitterness of hops in beer can be used to fine-tune flavor in certain types of beers that use wild yeast and bacteria for fermentation. The experiments they ran with the help of three commercial breweries, including one in Southern Illinois, found that higher bitterness affects flavor by inhibiting such strains of bacteria.

The studys findings, presented in August at the World Brewing Congress in Denver, are the first major research from the FSI, which officially came online earlier this year. SIU researchers collaborated with Scratch Brewing Co. of Ava; Fonta Flora Brewery of Morganton, N.C., and Jester King Brewery of Austin, Texas.

The trend that researchers from the institute looked into involves using mixed cultures of bacteria and yeast that occur in the wild. Many breweries have begun using such mixed cultures in the fermentation of beers they are producing, McCarroll said, collecting them from their own, unique geographic area and bringing a sense of place to such brews.

This generally implies fermenting with a culture that is a mixture of yeast, wild yeast and/or bacteria that produce beers with complex and often sour flavors, he said. In many cases, both the yeast and the bacteria are wild, meaning they were recently collected from the environment. The basic idea of the research project was to gain additional information about how brewing conditions can affect the fermentation behavior and beer flavor in mixed fermentations.

Hops are technically flowers, and when added to the sugary brews they act as a counterpoint, bringing a bite and bitter flavor. There is a wide variety of hops for brewers to choose from, and the amount of bitterness they bring to a brew is measured in International Bittering Units, or IBUs. Brewers have used them for 400 to 500 years because of their ability to prevent spoilage of beer, as well.

Bacteria, such as lactobacillus, are known to produce sour beers through the production of lactic and other organic acids, but they are inhibited during fermentation by the bittering compounds in hops. Yeast is more resistant to the presence of hops during fermentation.

The researchers specifically tried to determine the effect that the amount of bittering hops had on the fermentation. McCarroll said collaborator and co-author of the study, Marika Josephson, of Scratch Brewing Co. in Ava, had noted this behavior in brewing beer.

Working with mixed cultures from the three breweries, researchers collected genetic material for each culture, using it to identify the various yeast and bacteria in the culture before and after fermentation. They then fermented the beer at three different IBU levels.

The researchers found the IBU level can effectively tune the evolution of the bacteria and yeast, and thereby the flavor of the finished beer.

The study provided a controlled look at the effect, including collection of the genetic data and sensory evaluation of the finished beers, McCarroll said. Although it confirmed why brewers have used hops in the production of beer, it also will help take the guess work out just how much of an impact IBUs have on the finished taste of sour and Belgian-type beers, which are growing in popularity.

While many brewers are finding great success, they have largely relied on anecdotal and empirical experience to guide their process, McCarroll said. We believe our research has the potential to provide brewers and barrelhouse managers with new tools to better understand how to control production quality and flavor profile in beers produced with mixed cultures.

McCarroll said the results of the study and the collaboration with commercial brewers is an important milepost for the newly created FSI, which uses an interdisciplinary approach on campus, as well. Other SIU research collaborators on the project include: Kelly Bender, associate professor of microbiology; Katie Strain, laboratory operations coordinator at the FSI; and Lucas Rose, a senior in fermentation science and one of the first majors in the new program.

The project is an exciting representation of the FSIs mission of fostering fermentation research on campus and supporting the fermentation industry at regional and national levels, McCarroll said. The research represents something of a maiden voyage for the FSI facilities in the McLafferty Annex. It would have been difficult to carry out the project without our pilot brewery, which required the production of 12 controlled batches of beer that differed only in the IBU level and fermentation culture.
"Reviewing the full spectrum of #IndiaNepal relations. Both PMs lead delegation level talks at Hyderabad House," External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup tweeted.

some agreements are expected to be signed following the talks.

Prachanda arrived here on Thursday on a four-day visit to India.

The new Maoist-led government in Nepal assumed power early last month after the ouster of K.P. Sharma Oli as Prime Minister.

Earlier on Friday, Prachanda was accorded a ceremonial welcome at the Rashtrapati Bhavan here.

Following this, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj called on him at the Rashtrapati Bhavan here.

Apart from Sushma Swaraj, Prachanda is scheduled to meet Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Minister of State for Power Piyush Goyal later in the day before calling on President Pranab Mukherjee.

He will also attend a joint business event organised by Assocham in the evening.

In an interview with state broadcaster Doordarshan, Prachanda said that the Nepal-India relationship was a unique one and that his visit was aimed at building "trust and confidence" between the two sides.

--IANS ab/vm

( 206 Words)

2016-09-16-13:09:43 (IANS)
Sharif will interact with the international community and the UN and discuss the right to self-determination of the people of Jammu and Kashmir in accordance with the relevant UN Security Council resolutions, a Foreign Office statement said.

Pakistan will also participate in a meeting of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) Contact Group on Jammu and Kashmir.

"The Prime Minister will also participate in the High-Level Meeting of the General Assembly to address Large Movements of Refugees and Migrants on September 19 and the Leaders' Summit on Refugees convened by US President Obama September 20," the statement said.

"Pakistan will ... urge the international community to devote adequate political attention and support for the voluntary repatriation of Afghan refugees from Pakistan and their sustainable reintegration in Afghanistan," the statement added.

On the sidelines of the UNGA, Sharif will hold bilateral meetings with a number of world leaders, including the UN Secretary-General. The Annual Session of the General Assembly will be attended by a large number of Heads of State and Government.

--IANS ask/rn

( 224 Words)

2016-09-16-22:26:09 (IANS)
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has said his economic proposals will boost the US economy to grow at a pace of four per cent a year. Trump, speaking at the Economic Club of New York on Thursday, said it was time "to reach" for four per cent growth. His plan calls for lowering taxes, removing "destructive" regulations, increasing US energy production, and negotiating new trade deals in favour of American businesses. Trump also laid out a blueprint to create 25 million new jobs in a decade, which would be more than three times as many as created since 2006. The most jobs ever created over such a period were the 24.4 million added in the 10 years ending in March 2001, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The worst stretch was the decade through March 2010, when two million jobs were lost. His challenger, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, has said she plans to boost the stock of well-paying jobs, and bring the economy to "full employment". It has been a while since the economy hit that target. Specifically, it was during former President Bill Clinton's administration when it grew an average of nearly four per cent a year, CNN reported. Growth registered four per cent in 1994 and then topped that each year from 1997 to 2000. It hit a high of 4.7 per cent in 1999. "I think we can do better than that," Trump said about that target, although he said his economists did not want him to promise that. Others have been critical of Trump's economic plans. Oxford Economics, a British forecasting firm, estimates his proposals would cut $1 trillion a year from the US economy, a much bigger hit than what occurred during the Great Recession of 2008 and 2009. The big expansion during the Clinton years was fuelled in large part by a technological revolution -- the widespread adoption of personal computers and the internet. But that kind of sustained, rapid economic growth is relatively rare. The US has only four or more straight years of four per cent growth three times since the end of World War II. Besides the Clinton years, those periods were from 1962 to 1966, and from 1950 to 1953. Economic growth has been weak since the recession ended in 2009, ranging between 1.6 per cent and 2.6 per cent a year. It has slowed to about one per cent each of the last three quarters. Trump denounced it as the weakest recovery of the last 70 years. But the Great Recession was the most severe hit to the economy since the Great Depression, and the damage it did was global in nature. Even though the US has recovered at a modest pace, it has got one of the strongest economies in the developed world. --IANS py/dg ( 477 Words) 2016-09-16-16:57:57 (IANS)
A source close to the actress revealed that she was diagnosed with the disease on Thursday and has been advised bed rest for the next 10-15 days by her doctor.

The actress had just returned from US schedule of "Kahaani 2", her forthcoming film along with "Begum Jaan".

--IANS uma/vd

( 76 Words)

2016-09-16-22:42:07 (IANS)
"Have assured all support to the Delhi government and the governments of Uttar Pradesh and Haryana in tackling the rising cases of dengue and chikungunya. The issue of helping with the bed strength in the central government hospitals was also discussed," said Nadda.

The Minister said they have adequate strength of beds in central government hospitals and measures will be taken to enhance the numbers.

He said there is no shortage of doctors, paramedical staff, drugs, testing kits or labs for treatment of the patients.

Nadda, who met Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain and spoke to the health ministers of Haryana and Uttar Pradesh over phone, said that adequate number of fever clinics are operating in the central government hospitals for treating the patients.

"There is a need to maintain hygiene and cleanliness in the surroundings. It needs to be ensured that the environment is not collecting water which could be vector breeding grounds. Importance of community participation to prevent vector breeding needs to be emphasised," said Nadda.

Delhi has so far witnessed deaths of 32 patients who were suffering from vector borne chikungunya and dengue.

--IANS rup/ask/rn

( 229 Words)

2016-09-16-17:45:58 (IANS)
He will also be accorded a ceremonial reception at the Rashtrapati Bhavan this morning. The visiting dignitary arrived in New Delhi yesterday.

On his arrival, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj met his Nepalese Prime Minister.

External Affairs Ministry said that India will take this opportunity to understand the developmental priorities of the new Nepalese Prime Minister.

He will also visit Nathpa Jhakri Hydropower Project in Himachal Pradesh tomorrow.

This is Dahal's first foreign bilateral visit after he assumed office last month.

The visit will provide an opportunity for both the sides to discuss issues of mutual interest and seek ways to strengthen the age-old friendly ties. (ANI)
Apple Inc fans from Sydney to Tokyo, the first to snap the new iPhone 7 off the shelves, cheered as they left stores on Friday brandishing their purchases, flanked by applauding sales staff.But underneath the usual fanfare, and despite complaints that the larger size of the new phone and the new jet black colour were sold out, crowds were smaller than in past years.Some 200 people were gathered in Sydney light drizzle for the privilege of being the first worldwide to hold an iPhone 7. Apple will launch in its key Asian market China later on Friday."It feels great to be the first in the world to have the iPhone 7. It was 100 percent worth it," said Marcus Barsoum, a 16-year-old "diehard Apple fan" who spent two nights camped outside the Sydney store.Weary but elated, Barsoum charged in to the store at 8 a.m. to the cheers of Apple staff. He emerged with a matte black iPhone 7 although he had wanted a 7 plus in jet black.Dale Adams, who works at J.P. Morgan in Sydney, arrived only 15 minutes before the store opened and was able to buy a 7 Plus, having ordered it online more than a week ago."I'm certainly not one of the hardcore Apple fans but I think the bigger capacity, better battery, better camera, that's enough to make the jump," he said.Chatter about the launch on Chinese microblog Weibo has been far more muted than when the iPhone 6 debuted in 2014. An index of searches on Baidu Inc, China's equivalent of Google, shows the new phone lagging both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 5.Sales in China will be the acid test for Apple's year ahead: the mega success of the iPhone 6 in China drove sales last year, while the slower-burn 6S contributed to Apple's first global revenue drop in over a decade earlier this year.Stores open in China later on Friday, a holiday.REUTERS DS0616 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0177-935623.Xml
All the shops and business establishments were closed in Madurai, Dindigul, Theni, Virudhunagar, Sivaganga, Tirunelveli, Thoothukudi, Kanyakumari and Ramanathapuram districts, besides the Delta districts of Tiruchirapalli, Thanjavur, Pudukottai, Tiruvarur and Nagapattinam. The impact is higher in the Delta region.

Majority of auto rickshaws, private buses and commercial freight operators are off the roads. However, the State transport corporation-run buses, besides trains were being operated as usual.

Preliminary reports reaching here said about 1,000 DMK men led by former Minister I.Periyasamy were arrested when they blocked the Vaigai super fast express train at Dindigul railway station. More than 300 DMK men were detained when they blocked the Rameswaram passenger train at Sivaganga Railway station.

Members of Virudhuthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK) were arrested by the police when they tried to stage rail roko agitation at Mayiladuthurai.

A number of DMK men, led by former Minister S.Raghupathy were arrested for obstructing the movement of Tiruchirapalli-Rameswaram passenger train at Pudukottai railway station.

Hundreds of farmers were detained for staging road roko agitations at different places in Delta districts.

In Tiruchirapalli district, all the 184 matriculation higher secondary schools, 200 nursery and primary schools declared a day's holiday, however the government schools and colleges remain open. The busy NSB road and Periya Kadai Veedhi housing textiles, jewellery, electrical and hardware shops wore a deserted look.

Police have stepped up security arrangements to maintain law and order. Police protection was given to the establishments owned by Karnataka government, besides commercial establishments run by Kannada people. UNI GSM CS 0950

-- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0275-935664.Xml
Normal life remained 'uncrippled' in Chennai cityand its suburbs, while it was affected in Cauvery Delta districts, as the dawn-to-dusk bandh called by various Tamil Nadu farmers associations with the backing of almost all the opposition parties on the vexatious cauvery issue, evoked mixed response today. The bandh was by and large peaceful and no untoward incident wasreported from any part of the state so far, police sources said. Almost all the opposition parties, barring the BJP and the DMDK ofActor Vijayakanth, which is holding a a separate fast, pledged their support for the one day shut down, demanding Tamil Nadu's due shareof Cauvery water from Karnataka and to condemn the violence unleashedon Tamils in the neighbouring state and their properties on this emotive issue. Life was normal in Chennai city and suburbs, as government busesplied as usual, thanks to the State Government taking adequate precautionary measures by deploying a large posse of police personnelto prevent any untoward incident. In Chennai city alone, about 15,000 policemen were drafted into security duty, by posting additional pickets at vulnerable areas. Extra security have been provided to all establishments, includinghotels and banks, owned by the Kannadigas. Schools and colleges remained open and functioned as usual. Though the Private Nursery, Primary and Matriculation Schools Association supported the bandh, some of the private schools functioned as usual. However, shops and several business establishments downed their shutters as the Tamil Nadu Vanigar Sangam Federation and the Traders Federation led by A Vikramaraja and T Vellaiyan respectively extended their full support to the bandh, following which more than 30 lakh shops across the state were closed.MORE UNI GV CS 1008 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0275-935669.Xml
Meanwhile, both the faction of Hurriyart Conference and Jammu and Kashmir liberation front(JKLF), spearheading the present agitation since July 9, a day after Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani and two militants were killed in an encounter, have extended the strike till September 22.

Official sources said that a youth Basip Mukhtar, resident of Dolipora, who was injured after security forces fired pellets and burst tear gas shells to disperse the demonstrators on September 5 in Phulwama, died in a Srinagar hospital last night.

With this, a total of 82 civilians, mostly youth, have been killed and over 8,600 others have been injured in security force action in Kashmir valley.

Fearing trouble, authorities have imposed curfew in Pulwama to prevent any demonstration today. Hundreds of security forces and state police personnel remained deployed to strictly implement curfew in Phulwama and other towns in the district where people hit the street late last night and raised 'pro- freedom' and anti-forces slogans. UNI BAS SHS ADG 1000

-- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0329-935660.Xml
More than 400 new cases of malnutrition were reported in the tribal-dominated areas of this district while more than 50 people have reportedly died during the past few days after suffering from it. "So far, 419 cases of malnutrition were reported and out of it, 112 children were severely malnourished. As many as ten teams, comprising of Woman and Child Development, UNICEF and Health Mission, were constituted and they were sent to 90 villages for the check up. The teams have toured the villages during the past four days," Collector Panna Lal Solanki has said yesterday. Mr Solanki said that in all 3,326 children were earmarked for examinations of malnutrition. Severely malnourished children were admitted to nutrition rehabilitation centres, while 307 affected children were being monitored in the villages, he added. Meanwhile, the state regime went into a tizzy as more than 50 tribal children reportedly died of malnutrition and diarrhea in Golipura and some other villages during the past ten days. Madhya Pradesh Health Minister Rustam Singh also rushed to the affected villages to take stock of the situation after the reports of deaths poured in. Principal opposition Congress also targeted the Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled State government over its 'failure' to control malnutrition as Parliamentarian and former Union Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia dashed off a missive to Woman and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi and Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan.UNI XC-BDG PS ADG 1040 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0044-935029.Xml
As many as 31 Tamil organizations along with Puducherry traders federation called the bandh to condemn the attack on Tamils in Karnataka and demanding the release of Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu as per the Supreme Court direction.

The bandh was supported by different political parties including the BJP and DMK.

Shops and business establishments remained closed here and taxis, private buses, autorickshawas and three wheeler passenger tempos were off the road.

A Puducherry Road Transport Corporation had suspended its service after the bus with students was attacked at Vazhudavur near here today. The Tamil Nadu State government buses were plying through Puducherry with police escort.

Private educational institutions declared a holiday for the day while the government schools were functioning.The government offices both Central and State, were functioning with thin attendance.Many private industries also remained closed and the cinema houses suspended their morning and matinee shows.

A large number of volunteers of the Tamil organizations were arrested when they put up A road blockade in front of the new bus stand here. The volunteers burnt the effigy of Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and courted arrest. After their arrest, the BJP volunteers led by State President V Saminathan put up road blockade at the same place and were also arrested.UNI PAB CS 1104

-- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0275-935699.Xml
"I bow to the venerable Swami Sree Narayana Guru on his Jayanti. His noble thoughts, teachings & fight against injustice always inspire", the Prime Minister said.

Sree Narayana Guru was a social reformer from Kerala who led a reform movement against casteism and promoted new values of spiritual freedom and social equality. (ANI)
"Our friendship is time tested and unique. We share our burden during difficult times, just as we celebrate each others' achievements," Modi said.

The Prime Minister was addressing a joint media conference with his visiting Nepal counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal "Prachanda" here.

--IANS sar/rn

( 85 Words)

2016-09-16-13:31:57 (IANS)
Agreeing that security interest and peace and prosperity of their two county were interlinked, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his visiting Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal 'Prachanda' today decided to deepen their border cooperation and developmental partnership. The two countries today also signed three agreements for infrastructure development and post earthquake reconstruction in Nepal after formal talks between Mr Modi and Mr Prachanda. The two leaders agreed that implementation of ongoing developmental projects should be speeded up and their monitoring intensified. Mr Modi , in his remarks to the media after the talks, assured Mr Prachanda of India's commitment to the development of Nepal. Mr Prachanda said he underlined to Mr Modi that the two countries should respect each other's sensitivities and carry their relationship further on taking into account the changes, perspective and circumstances of the 21st century.More UNI NAZ SW ADG 1415 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0091-935903.Xml
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) KarnatakaState President B S Yeddyurappa today refused to give Mayor post ofthe Bengaluru City Corporation to the Janata Dal (secular) which hadopenly stated that it would align with the party that offered Mayor post. JD(S) had already aligned with the Congress which is currentlyenjoying the post. "BJP will not give Mayor Post to JD(S). BJP leaders indulging inalliance talks with that party should note it and desist fromcontinuing any more talks in this regard," he told newsmen here. His open refusal puts an end to the talks initiated by formerDeputy Chief Minister R Ashok with JD(S) State President H DKumaraswamy, who had openly stated that his party was prepared toalign with any party which offers Mayor post to his party. Even Union Ministers and senior BJP leaders Ananth Kumar and D V Sadananda Gowda had showed inclination to have alliance withJD(S). Mayor election is scheduled for September 28. Mr Yeddyurappa's strong message against having alliance withJD(S) may also be based on his past experience as JD(S) declined tohand over the Chief Minister post to him after enjoying 20 months inpower as per Twenty:20 agreement reached before forming coalition government. Meanwhile, senior Congress leaders had talks with JD(S) NationalPresident H D Deve Gowda with regard to continuation of alliance. The stand of Mr Yeddyurappa has now given a ray of hope for thealliance to continue. Of the 269 eligible voters, Congress has the support of 112 andBJP 126. With just eight independent members, neither party canclaim Mayor post even if they were to succeed obtaining theirsupport. So, with 23 members, the support of the JD(S) is crucialfor any party looking to win the election. Despite winning 100 seats the BJP is sitting in the oppositionsince last one year due to lack of support from other parties andindependent councilors.UNI MSP CNR CS 1432 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0286-935873.Xml
Heavy police presence was witnessed in more than eight pointswhere roads connect the two states in Bengaluru, Mysuru andChamarajanagara districts.

Travelling public were forced to face hardship as they had towalk up to four kms to continue their journey in either side of thetwo states as the buses plying were stopped at the border.

Thousands of people travel for work between Hosur and Bengaluruevery day. They had to alight at the borders on the eihter side andwalk to the other side to take alternative vehicles to reach their workspace.

While some heavy duty trucks were allowed to ply onHosur-Bengaluru National Highway, many goods vehicles were seenstranded on either sides of checkposts in other places. They werenot allowed to enter as a precautionary measure.

Central Range IGP Seemant Kumar Singh visited Attibele border onthe outskirts of the city towards industrial hub of Hosur to inspectthe security arrangements.

Police said that no untoward incident was reported and strictvigil was maintained at seven checkposts.UNI MSP-BSP RS CS 1436

-- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0286-935893.Xml
Due to non-appearance of lawyers, the court adjourned the hearing of the cases.

Even the tea vendors and other shops of the court premises shut their outlets and supported the lawyers' protest.

"We are protesting against the shifting and future bifurcation of other courts," the Co-ordination Committee of All District Court Bar Associations of Delhi said in a statement.

The Committee quoted the Delhi government as saying that there are 400 chambers for lawyers in the new building.

"But the building plan reveals there is no provision for lawyers' chambers," said Committee spokesperson Sanjeev Nasiar. He said that the decision was taken unilaterally.

The strike remained successful in all the six district courts -- Patiala House, Tis Hazari, Rohini, Karkardooma, Saket and Dwarka.

--IANS akk/nir/rn

( 160 Words)

2016-09-16-16:19:59 (IANS)
The Centre today reiterated that it has assured all support to the Delhi Government and the governments of Uttar Pradesh and Haryana in tackling the rising cases of dengue and chikungunya in the National Capital Region (NCR). This was stated by Union Health Minister J P Nadda after a review meeting with his Delhi counterpart Satyendra Jain here when the latter called on him to discuss the rising cases of dengue and chikungunya in the NCR region. He also asked for a detailed report from the Delhi government on the deaths due to dengue and chikungunya. Besides coping with the unprecedented rush in hospitals, complaints have been received of patients being turned away from hospitals, inadequate staff strength and shortage of drugs. Mr Nadda stated that on the issue of bed-strength in the Central government hospitals, he assured the Delhi Health Minister that while there is adequate number of beds in the Central Government hospitals, all measures will be taken to enhance them. No patient was being turned away without treatment in these hospitals. Also, there was no shortage of doctors, paramedical staff, drugs, testing kits and labs for treatment of the patients. Mr Nadda informed that he had spoken to the Haryana and Uttar Pradesh Health Ministers and assured them all support and full cooperation in their efforts to fight the vector-borne disease in their regions. He also stated that adequate numbers of fever clinics are operating in the central government hospitals for treating the surge in patients. Mr Nadda while stressing on the importance of community participation to prevent vector breeding, again underscored the importance of maintaining hygiene and cleanliness in the surroundings. He urged people to ensure that their environs are not collecting water which could be vector breeding grounds. UNI SD SW AE 1617 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0005-936118.Xml
Four members of a family, including two children were crushed to death when a sand laden dumper hit the motor cycle in which the deceased were riding in Burdwan's Mangalkote area this morning.

The victims, identified as Shaikh Saiful (28), his sister Ismatara (26) and her two children - Aslam (8) and Amina (5).

Irate mob reacting to the bloody accident set on fire the dumper and blocked the highway disrupting traffic for hours. Later police removed the blockade.

In another car accident, a college girl was killed and four other were injured when a auto (three-wheeler) hit a passenger laden private bus at Gouribari in north Kolkata this morning.

Police said the speeding auto violating the signal and hit the bus at the crossings of Arabinda Sarani and Raja Dinendra Street resulting serious injuries of the three-wheeler passengers.

The injured were taken to the R G Kar Medical College and Hospital where Jaipuria college girl Puja Pal was declared dead.

The injured were admitted to the hospital. UNI PC AKM AE AS1649

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Senior leaders of the new political party of Punjab 'Saadi Soch' has announced that the party will contest at all 117 assembly constituencies of Punjab and promised to offer a fresh and clean option to the people. Addressing a press conference here today, party president Amrik Singh said, "we have launched 'Saadi Soch' to provide a platform to people of Punjab, to implement what they want & think is good for the state. We are a party of commoners - I am a small businessman, the vice-president is a retired Class I officer of Punjab, the general secretary is retired Chairman of Department of Physical Education (PU), he is also the Founder General Secretary of Circle Kabaddi Federation of India since 1978 & has promoted this game at the National and International levels. As our party's name suggests, our aim is only to implement the thought (Soch) of common people of the state." They said the party will strive to resolve these problems and it will implement what people of Punjab want. Its primary aims are inclusive growth and development of the state. "We appeal to honest persons and people motivated to do something for the state, to contact us and fight the assembly polls on our party's ticket. We are in touch with well meaning residents of Punjab who have a clean record to join our party," party vice-president Prem Garg said. Talking about providing the electorate with a 'dependable' voting option, Party General Secretary J P Sharma said, "we aim to remove corruption in government departments, fight against the drugs problem, find a resolution of farmers' woes like debt etc, create jobs to remove unemployment prevailing in the state and work for resurrection of ailing Industry in the state, among others." UNI DB AE 1617 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0292-936099.Xml
Union Minister of State for Road Transport, Highways and Shipping Pon Radhakrishnan today urged Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa and sought her support for the commencement of survey for preparing the Detailed Project Report (DPR) for the development of a major Port at Enayam in Colachel. Mr Radhakrishnan, who met the Chief Minister at theState Secretariat to discuss about various projects concerning Tamil Nadu, said the construction of the Port was at a place nearly one km away from Enayam. ''Hence Enayam itself will not be affected by thisconstruction. The Port will be built by reclaiming land from the sea and no existing habitation will be affected'',he told Ms Jayalalithaa, according to an official release. Ms Jayalalithaa said right from her first tenure as Chief Minister she had been keen on implementing the Colachel Port Project. ''The lack of support from successive Central Governments had meant that the project could not be implemented'', she said. The Chief Minister assured the Union Minster that theTamil Nadu Government Nadu was as keen on implementing the project as the Union Government and would provide all necessary support.MORE UNI GV 1655 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0275-936248.Xml
The Congress today held Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik squarely responsible for the Mahanadi water dispute between Chhattisgarh and Odisha. Releasing a white paper on Mahanadi water dispute prepared by Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee, party president Prasad Harichandan said the Chief Minister, who is in charge of the water resource department for the last 16 years, will be accountable to the people of the state for his incapability to protect the interest of the state. The Chief Minister, the white paper said, has betrayed the interest of the people of the state by not discharging his duty while holding the water resources portfolio for last several years. It said the Chhattisgarh government has taken the advantage of the inefficiency of the Odisha government and constructed various projects on the upstream of river Mahanadi for which people of Odisha will now face the consequences. The government, the white paper said was now shedding crocodile tears after remaining silent for so many years and raising the issue keeping the coming panchayat election in view. It said though Mr Arjun Sethi from the BJD was the water resource minister in the NDA government at the Centre from 2000 to 2004 the state government did not take any step for the protection of Mahanadi river knowing fully well about the projects by the then Madhya Pradesh government. The Congress leader said, ''OPCC released the white paper as the Naveen Patnaik government did not concede to the demand of the opposition to publish a white paper on Mahanadi to project a real picture about the damages that would cause to Odisha and the problems to be faced by the people of the state due to the construction work by the Chhatisgarh government.'' Wishing the September 17 tripartite meeting convened by union water resource ministry to resolve the dispute, Mr Harichandan hoped that the dispute between the two states would be amicably solved and the interest of Odisha would be protected at the meeting. More UNI BD-DP AKM AE AS1703 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0213-936129.Xml
The party's top leadership held a meeting at her residence in Kalighat and congratulated her for leading the party into a national party.

The All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) recently got elevated to national party by the national election office.UNI PC AKM AE AN1721

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Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik today left for Delhi to attend the tripartite meeting convened by Union Water Resource Minister Uma Bharati to resolve the Mahanadi water dispute between Odisha and Chhattisgarh. Thousands of supporters of the ruling BJD carrying party flags and shouting slogans, marched in a colourful procession from Naveen Niwas to the Biju Patnaik International Airport to see off the Chief Minister. The Chief Minister, who had convened a meeting on September 12 last to decide the stand of the government at the tripartite meeting, had sought suggestions and advice of common people, political parties and voluntary organisations on the issue. In response to the Chief Minister's appeal, more than 150 organisations including political parties and individuals from different parts of the state met him at his office in the state secretariat and offered their suggestions. Overwhelmed with the response, the Chief Minister, before leaving for New Delhi, thanked the organisations, political parties for expressing their concern and giving valuable suggestions. " It was heartening to know that many of them had done detailed research and had come up with well thought out suggestions, the Chief Minister said and expressed his deep gratitude to the people of the state." Mr Patnaik assured the people of the state that he would put his best efforts forward and leave no stone unturned in the fight for the rights of the people of the state. "I am going with a lot of hope that the central government will listen to the voices of Odisha and do justice to the people of the state in this sensitive Mahanadi issue,'' the Chief Minister said. Odisha has strongly opposed the construction of dams and reservoirs by the Chhattisgarh government on the upstream of the river saying that such construction would check the flow of water, affect irrigation, power generation, drinking water supply and life and livelihood of people in 15 of the 30 districts of the state. Both opposition Congress and BJP however described the last minute exercise of the Chief Minister as a political stunt aimed at garnering votes in the coming panchayat election in the state and alleged that the BJD government has no sincerity to resolve the Mahanadi water row and busy in making political statements as face saving measures.UNI BD-DP AKM AE AS1724 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0213-936228.Xml
Tens and hundreds of farmers and leadersof various political parties courted arrest, as the dawn-to-duskbandh called by various farmers organisations with the backing ofOpposition parties, on the Cauvery issue passed off peacefully in Tamil Nadu today. Though normal life remained unaffected in Chennai city andthe suburbs, the bandh evoked good response in several districts,including the Cauvery delta districts of the State, where shopsand business establishments were shut, schools were closed and and buses did not ply. Police sources said no untoward incident was reported from any part of the state and the bandh called by Co-ordination Committee of Tamil Nadu All Farmers Associations President P R Pandian and other farmer associations demanding due share of Cauvery waters and to condemn the violence unleashed on Tamil speaking people in Karnataka and damaging their properties over release of cauvery waters to the State on the basis of a Supreme Court order.. There was tinge of sadness as a Naam Tamizhar functionary,Vignesh, who set himself ablaze during the Cauvery Rights Retrieval Rally organised by Party founder and actor Seemanyesterday, succumbed to burns at the Kilpauk Medical Collegehospital. Hospital sources said, Vignesh suffered 93 per cent burnsand despite the best of medical treatment, he died due to acardiac arrest. His body was kept at the Party office, where public and representatives from film industry, paid their homage afterwhich it was taken to his native Mannargudi in Tiruvarur district for cremation. More than 25,000 people, including members of various farmers associations, leaders of DMK, MDMK and VCK, were arrested for staging rail and road roko agitations across the state, police said. Apart from Mr Pandian, among those arrested were DMK Treasurer M K Stalin, DMK Rajya Sabha Member Ms Kanimozhi, former DMK Ministers, MDMK General Secretary Vaiko and VCK leader Thirumavalavan. Mr Stalin, who took out a rally from the Mayor Radhakrishnanstadium, was arrested when he attempted to enter the Chennai Egmore Railway station to block trains. Later, he along with several DMK leaders, squatted in front of the station, before police arrested him. While Ms Kanimozhi was arrested on the arterial Anna Salai, Mr Vaiko was arrested in Trichy and Mr Thirumavalavan wasdetained at Basin bridge station in the city, when he attemptedto block an express train. All the arrested were released later. Almost all the opposition parties, barring the DMDK of Actor Vijayakanth, whose party held a separate fast, pledged their support for the one day shut down. The bandh had the backing of DMK, Congress, MDMk, PMK, VCK, the two left parties--CPI and CPI(M)--and the Tamil Maanila Congress led by former Shipping Minister G K Vasan and TVK. Life was normal in Chennai city and suburbs, as governemnt buses plied as usual, thanks to the State Government taking adequate precautionary measures by deploying a large posse of police personnel to prevent any untoward incident. In Chennai city alone, about 15,000 policemen were deployedon security duty and additional pickets were posted at vulnerable areas. Thousands of police personnel, including armed reserve forces, were deployed in various parts of Tamil Nadu in view of the bandh.MORE UNI GV CS 1848 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0275-936555.Xml
Punjab government advisor and Delhi Sikh Gurudwara Management Committee (DSGMC) general secretary Manjinder Singh Sirsa today urged External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to set up a separate cell in her ministry comprising senior government officials and representatives of the Sikh community to deal with racial discrimination abroad. Mr Sirsa said this would put to an end the going racial discrimination of the members of the community abroad. Upset over a report carried in media that Sikhs bearing their religious symbol "Kirpan" were denied entry in a departmental store by its staff in Toronto, Canada, he said they were point blank told not enter the store with "Kirpan" which amounted to gross racial discrimination. He said as per reports, Mr Harpal Singh Giri, who had been in Canada for the past 16 years, said he had never faced such a situation in the past. Mr Sirsa said carrying 'Kirpan' by Sikh is a religious symbol and a part of the community's dress code which has been allowed under Article 25 of the Constitution of India where it is stated in no uncertain terms that the wearing and carrying of Kirpan shall be deemed to be included in the profession of Sikh religion and the Union government must ensure that this right of the community is protected. In a letter to Ms Swaraj, he said that this was not an isolated incident and added that the reports of harassment of Sikhs continue pouring in from time to time and there is no end to these though the community has repeatedly protested to the Union government and countries of such occurrences. In the similar circumstances, a Sikh Canadian comedian was forced to remove turban at San Francisco Airport and in this regard a letter was sent to the US Ambassador in India on April 21 this year but despite this no protection was provided to the Sikhs and they continue to face discrimination in Europe as well as in US and Canada. He wrote to the Canadian High Commissioner to India to immediately take the necessary action and take up this matter with the Ministry/department concerned so that in future no such racial discrimination can be allowed in the above countries. "We, in DSGMC, are an elected Sikh religious body and are answerable to the community if such discrimination persists", Mr Sirsa said, adding that setting up a high power body would help curb themenace of racial discrimination. Mr Sirsa said he had received number of calls from India and abroad since morning and by raking this issue he was only articulating the sentiments of the community.UNI DB SW AN1808 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0292-936249.Xml
A 20 year old second year girl student of local National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT) today committed suicide by hanging herself in hostel room, police said here. Kangra Sub Divisional Police Officer (SDPO) Surender Sharma told UNI this evening that Nisha, a resident of Faridabad, was alone in her hostel room in the NIFT campus when she allegedly committed suicide. He said that her roommate, who was out, on her return found Nisha hanging. She was rushed to Dr Rajinder Prasad Govt Medical college Tanda where doctors declared her brought dead, te SDPO said. He said that no suicide note was recovered either from her body or from the room till filing of this report. He said that investigation was in progress to know the reasons for her committing suicide.Her body was sent for the postmortem, he added. NIFT Director Prof Balasidartha told UNI that immediate cause of committing the suicide by Nisha was not as yet known. He, however, said that her parents at Faridabad were informed and will be reaching here tomorrow morning. UNI XC DB CJ -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0292-936797.Xml
The state unit of Shiv Sena (Bala Ji Sahib Thackery) today appealed to the Government of India to impose Governor Rule in Jammu and Kashmir. "We are demanding Governor Rule from the last so many days but the Government of India is not taking interest in our demand and delaying the matter for one pretext or the other,'' Shiv Sena State President Dimpy Kohli here said.The leader however, appealed to people and the civil society to support the people demanding immediate Governor Rule in the state so that rule of law returns and bloodshed stops with immediate effect. "Article 370 is standing like a wall between the State of J&K and the rest of the country for 70 years,'' he added and said that Article 370 has denied the people of J&K of their fundamental rights which are shared by every Indian citizen. He accused BJP of power sharing with PDP and said that resignation given by Member Parliament Tariq Hamid Karra clearly showed that all is not well in the present coalition and PDP-BJP is an unholy alliance.UNI VBH CJ -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0364-936915.Xml
The actress had just returned to Mumbai after wrapping up theUS schedule of 'Kahaani 2', a sequel to her hit 2012 film, 'Kahaani'.

According to a family source close to her, ''Vidya issuffering from dengue and the doctors have asked her to rest for 10 days.''

The source also said that besides taking treatment ofallopathic medicines, she was also trying alternate medicines for aspeedy recovery.

Due to her illness, all her shooting schedules have beencancelled, the sources added. UNI AAA SS NP CJ

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Punjab Congress president Capt Amarinder Singh today sounded caution on the SYL issue citing the riots in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu over Cauvery dispute. The PCC chief reiterated that the Supreme Court judges must take into consideration the existing ground realities before pronouncing their judgment as a lot had changed on the ground. At the same time, he announced, come what may, he will not allow an extra drop of water to flow out of Punjab as it could render at least ten lakh acres of land in the Malwa region barren. Addressing a political conference here today, Capt Amarinder blamed Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal for the SYL mess, saying his role dated back to 1978 when he was the Chief Minister and wanted to please his friend and the then Haryana Chief Minister Devi Lal. Lashing out at the Badals and Majithia, he said the moment elections are announced and the code of conduct comes into force, the Badals will need to run for cover. "People will not let them enter their villages", he said, while adding that was the reason they were seeking extra security for themselves from the centre. He said the Badals had destroyed Punjab beyond redemption. "They destroyed the economy, agriculture and the youth by pushing them into drugs and grabbed every profit making business", he said, adding, while the Badals got richer and richer by billions of rupees, Punjab got proportionately bankrupt. Capt Amarinder cautioned people against the divisive mechanisations of Mr Badal, saying he was a master in polarising people. He said the desecration of Guru Granth Sahab in Bebal Kalan, followed by similar desecration of Quran and Geeta and attack on Sant Dhadrianwale and later on an RSS leader in Jalandhar was all aimed at creating fear and polarising people. He said Mr Badal had done it earlier and he was doing it again. Reminding people of the promises he made under oath at Bathinda in December last, the PCC chief said he will finish the scourge of drugs within four weeks and cancel all the FIRs. He said everyone in Punjab knew as who was responsible for the drugs and it will not take him more than four weeks to put them behind the bars. About the false FIRs against the Congress workers, he said not only will these be cancelled, those responsible for registering these, whether the Akali Jathedars or the police officials will also be held accountable. MORE UNI DB CJ -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0292-936830.Xml
Discussion took place on prospects of wildlife tourism, an official release said.

"Enhancing the number of domestic and foreign tourists will be in focus. In order to improve infrastructure facilities, prospects of working with private investors should be searched. More projects should be submitted to the Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority," Mr Chouhan said.

Investors will be eligible to receive grants on setting up tourism projects. One more step has been taken to give industry status to tourism. UNI AC CJ

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Union Minister for Environment and Forests (Independent Charge) Anil Dave today said both India and China were concerned about the rapid melting of glaciers in the Himalayan range. Responding to a question during a press conference at the end of two-day meeting of BRICS Environment Ministers, he said,''Climate change is the larger issue. Each and everyone has clear understanding that there is something wrong going on on the globe because 30-40 years back, those who had gone to Himalayan rangewould say there was blanket of ice but now it is said that the ice has melted into pieces.'' It was not the countries surrounding the mountains that were responsible, but it was effect of global climate change, he said, and informed that his ministry was thinking of what measures to taketo stop it. ''Melting of glaciers is a metter of concern because it is the longest range available in the world. It is not only the glaciers but ice available, availability of ice and snow on the top,'' he said. He said there was no specific reason for that but blamed the climate change at the global level for that. To a question whether China was more responsible for that, hesaid, ''This is not the right way to look at the situation becausefrom eastern side China is there but west, south and north. We arethere. They are also there in south and north and east. So we allare concerened. They (China) are also concerned. So we discuss the issues to find out solutions not blaming each other. This is not thelevel we talk like this.''UNI AKM SS HK CJ 2320 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0171-937083.Xml
The US has maintained that it would encourage Afghan President Ashraf Ghani's move of asking Pakistan to include India in the transit trade agreement for stronger trade relations between all the countries of the region. Speaking at the daily press briefing, Deputy Spokesperson of the U.S. State Department, Mark C. Toner said, "I would just say, speaking broadly, that we would support stronger trade relations within the region. And we've long said that it's a priority for the United States at least, but it should be a priority for the countries in the region to all work more cooperatively and constructively together. And a trade agreement would be part of that." On being asked by a reporter what was his position on Afghanistan asking India's inclusion in the transit trade agreement it has with Pakistan, Toner replied, "I think we would encourage, as I said, stronger trade relations between all the countries of the region." The Afghanistan-Pakistan Transit Trade Agreement (APTTA) is a bilateral trade agreement between Islamabad and Kabul. It has been renegotiated several times. The treaty was signed in 1950 which gave Afghanistan the right to import duty-free goods through Karachi. Meanwhile, on also being about Afghanistan stand that if India is not included, it would deny Pakistan the right to transit its goods to Central Asia through Afghanistan, Toner said, "I'm not going to weigh in on the negotiations between - bilateral negotiation between Afghanistan and Pakistan." He was of the opinion that Afghanistan has rights to make its own decisions with regard to who it decides to allow trade relations with. "Afghanistan is a sovereign country and it has its own rights - it has rights to make its own decisions with regard to who it decides to allow trade relations with. But broadly speaking, again, it's in the interests of the region, it's been a consistent goal of ours strategically to promote stronger relations between all the countries," he added. The APTTA treaty also allows Afghanistan to access to the dry port of Lahore, and also access to a land route up to the Wagah border with India. However, it does not allow India to use the land route to export goods to Afghanistan either. With Prime Minister Narendra Modi announcing one billion USD aid to Kabul, Toner said that the US supports India's generosity and focus on Afghanistan and willingness to help Afghanistan become a stronger and independent country. "The fact that India is willing to invest in that future we view as a very positive sign and we appreciate India's effort," he said.(ANI)
The stabbing deaths of 19 disabled people in their sleep last July and the silence surrounding their identities are forcing Japan to grapple with its attitudes toward physically and cognitively impaired persons, less than four years before Tokyo hosts the Paralympics.Almost nothing except their genders and ages - ranging from 19 to 70 - has been made public about those who died when a man went on a stabbing spree at a facility for disabled people in Sagamihara town, southwest of Tokyo, killing 19 and wounding 26 others.The silence has sparked debate about the need for change in a society where people with disabilities can still suffer stigma and shame."It is true that some may not have wanted their children to be subjected to public scorn," said Takashi Ono, stepfather of 43-year-old Kazuya, a long time resident of the Tsukui Yamauri-en facility who survived multiple stabbing wounds in the attack.Ono and his wife Chikiko are among the few relatives who have gone public. None of the families of the dead have done so."In Japan, disabled people are discriminated against so the families wanted to hide them," Ono told Reuters in an interview, adding he and Chikiko had always been open about their son, who has autism and cognitive disabilities.Japan has made progress in its treatment of the disabled. It ratified a UN rights treaty in 2014 and a new anti-discrimination law took effect in April. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe regularly mentions the disabled when speaking of plans for a more inclusive society to cope with a shrinking population.But people with disabilities, especially cognitive impairments, can still suffer from stigma and - unlike in many advanced Western countries - their families share the shame.In a statement released to Japanese media after July's stabbing spree, police in Kanagawa prefecture, where the facility is located, said that they did not release the victims' names because it was a facility for cognitively disabled people and they needed to protect the families' privacy.They also said the victims' families had requested special consideration about how the matter was reported.SECRET SHAMESeiko Noda, a prominent ruling party lawmaker who has suffered abuse on the internet for "wasting taxpayers' money" on medical care for her five-year-old disabled son Masaki, was not surprised that the Sagamihara victims' families chose anonymity."Some families are positive and try to change the world by being open about their disabled children. But the 'silent majority' still has a negative view and does not want it known that they have disabled children," Noda, 56, told Reuters.Victims' families likely also worried about being accused of abandoning their relatives by institutionalising them, experts and activists said.The identity blackout stands in stark contrast to coverage of other Japanese victims of mass killings, including seven who died in a July attack by Islamist militants in Bangladesh."Clearly, there is a difference in the treatment of those with disabilities and those without disabilities," said Kiyoshi Harada of the Japan Disability Forum, an NGO network."We cannot tell what sort of lives the victims led, what their hobbies were, what their existence was like."The suspect in the Sagamihara killings, Satoshi Uematsu, had been briefly committed to hospital as a danger to himself and others after writing to a lawmaker advocating euthanasia for the severely disabled and outlining a plan for mass murder.Some who work with disabled people worry ordinary Japanese share Uematsu's extreme views but experts say they are not mainstream.Neither euthanasia nor assisted suicide is legal in Japan. Efforts to pass a law protecting doctors who withhold life-prolonging care with the patient's consent have stalled in the face of stiff opposition from disabilities rights groups, who fear it could be a first step to legalising euthanasia.Those with cognitive disabilities, like residents of the Sagamihara facility, face greater discrimination than the physically impaired, who activists say have seen major progress in recent decades.Disabled people in rural areas also face greater hurdles to integration than residents of cities, where there is trend toward care in small group homes away from large, isolated institutions that have increasingly come under criticism."Some things do trickle down from the big city but it takes a while," said Suzanne Kamata, an American living in Tokushima, about 500 km west of Tokyo, whose 17-year-old daughter is deaf and has cerebral palsy.Preparations for the 2020 Paralympics are providing impetus for an improved barrier-free environment, at least in Tokyo, where Tokyo Metro aims to have all subway stations equipped with multi-purpose elevators by March 2019, up from 81 per cent now.Optimists say the debate itself over the Sagamihara victims' anonymity gives cause for hope."It was a bitter incident, but it is important that it is becoming a trigger for people to think about this seriously," Japan Disability Forum's Harada said. 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A Swedish appeals court decided to uphold the arrest warrant for Wikileaks founder Julian Assange today, prolonging the six year long legal stand off between prosecutors and the Wikileaks founder.Assange, 45, is wanted by Swedish authorities for questioning over allegations, which he denies, that he committed rape in 2010."The Court of Appeal shares the assessment of the District Court that Julian Assange is still suspected on probable cause of rape," the court said.Assange avoided possible extradition to Sweden by taking refuge in Ecuador's London embassy in 2012. He says he fears further extradition to the United States, where a criminal investigation into the activities of Wikileaks is ongoing.REUTERS SDR PM1441 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0431-935970.Xml
Turkish soldiers killed five Kurdish militants today suspected of involvement in the assassination this week of a politician from the ruling AK Party, security sources said, amid surging violence in the largely Kurdish southeast.The military operation in rural Semdinli, part of Hakkari province close to the borders with Iran and Iraq, targeted the suspected killers of Ahmet Budak, an AKP politician who was gunned down in front of his house on Wednesday.Three of the suspected PKK militants were killed by artillery fire in one part of Semdinli, while the other two were killed close by, the security sources said, without giving further details on the operation.Southeastern Turkey has seen a surge in violence since the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group, which has waged a three-decade insurgency for Kurdish autonomy in the region, abandoned a ceasefire in 2015. Thousands of militants, security force members and civilians have since been killed.Late yesterday, suspected PKK members killed seven village guards, two soldiers and a civilian in the eastern province of Agri, north of Hakkari, the military said.The Agri governor's office said the militants had attacked the village guards - residents armed and paid by the state to protect their communities - with long-range rifles as they were on night watch duties.The PKK is considered a terrorist group by the United States and European Union, as well as by Turkey. REUTERS AKC AS1541 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0432-936070.Xml
Aid for the divided Syrian city of Aleppo was stuck on the Turkish border on the fifth day of a fragile ceasefire today with rival factions arguing over how the supplies are to be delivered and violence increasingly undermining the truce.The provision of aid to what was Syria's largest city before the war is a critical test of the ceasefire, brokered by the United States and Russia a week ago with the aim of reviving talks on ending the conflict.Humanitarian access to Aleppo hinges on control of the main road into the besieged rebel-held part of the city, divided between the government and rebels who have been battling to topple President Bashar al-Assad for more than five years. The Castello Road has become a major frontline in the war.Russia said the Syrian army had begun to withdraw from the road yesterday, but insurgent groups in Aleppo said they had seen no such move and would not pull back from their own positions around the road until it did so."By today this morning nothing had happened on the Castello Road ... There is nothing new in Aleppo," Zakaria Malahifji, of the Aleppo-based rebel group Fastaqim, told Reuters by phone.The Kremlin said it was using its influence to try to ensure the Syrian army fully implemented the ceasefire and that it hoped the United States would use its own influence with rebel groups too."In general, we can still state that the (ceasefire) process is moving forward, despite some setbacks," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call.UN FRUSTRATIONHundreds of protesters from the Shi'ite Muslim villages of Nubul and al Zahra - which lie in government-held territory - were meanwhile heading towards the Castello Road with the aim of blocking it and obstructing the passage of aid trucks, an organisation that monitors the war said.The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said they had come out to prevent aid entering rebel-held eastern Aleppo until there were guarantees that supplies would also be sent to the besieged Shi'ite villages of Kefraya and al-Foua which have been surrounded by insurgents since April 2015.The United Nations, which says it asked the Syrian government for permission to reach all besieged areas, has voiced increasing frustration in recent days at the failure of the Syrian government to allow access."In order to actually initiate the actual movement of these convoys (to besieged areas) we need the facilitation letters. They have not come," Jens Laerke, spokesman for the UN Office of Humanitarian Affairs, told a briefing in Geneva."It's highly frustrating ... and of course we urge the authorities and everyone with influence over those authorities to push for these letters to materialise as soon as possible."Two convoys of aid have been waiting since early on Tuesday in no-man's land at the Turkish border for permission to travel into Syria. A UN spokesman said the first convoy of trucks was carrying flour for more than 150,000 people, while the second was carrying food rations for 35,000 people for a month.About 300,000 people are thought to be living in eastern Aleppo, while more than one million live in the government-controlled western half of the city.TRUCE VIOLATIONSThe government and rebels have accused each other of violating the ceasefire, although the US State Department said yesterday it was largely holding and that both Washington and Moscow believed it was worth continuing.The United States and Russia have backed opposing sides in the war, which has killed hundreds of thousands of people, forced 11 million from their homes, and created the world's worst refugee crisis since World War Two.After three days which saw a significant decrease in violence and no deaths, the first civilians since the start of the truce were killed yesterday.Three more died and 13 were injured in air strikes in rebel-held Idlib province today, the Observatory said. A number of shells were also fired by insurgents into besieged al-Foua and Kefraya.A building belonging to the Syrian Civil Defence, a rescue organisation also known as the "White Helmets" was also hit in overnight air strikes, the group and the Observatory said.Violent clashes and shells hit areas east of the Syrian capital Damascus today. Residents in the city centre were woken up by a large explosion, a witness said, and shells fell on the eastern gate of Damascus's central Old City area.The Britain-based Observatory said the violence stemmed from clashes between insurgents and Syrian government forces and their allies in the Jobar district on the eastern outskirts of the capital amid a government effort to advance in the area.The Syrian military said rebels had attacked military positions east of the city.Washington hopes the ceasefire will pave the way to a resumption of political talks. But a similar agreement unravelled earlier this year, and Russia's intervention a year ago in support of Assad has given it critical leverage over the diplomatic process.The United States and Russia will brief United Nations Security Council members behind closed doors today, diplomats said, on the deal the pair agreed to try and put Syria's peace process back on track.Russia is pushing for the UN Security Council to adopt a draft resolution next week endorsing the deal.Assad, appears as uncompromising as ever. He vowed again this week to win back the entire country, which has been splintered into areas controlled by the state, a constellation of rebel factions, Islamic State jihadists, and Kurdish militia fighters.REUTERS SDR PR1809 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0431-936443.Xml
Russian officers monitoring a ceasefire near the city of Aleppo confirmed the Syrian army was ready to withdraw from positions along the Castello Road if it was synchronized with opposition forces, the Russian Defence Ministry said today."Thus, there is de facto just one side in Aleppo which is ready to lead negotiations, observe the ceasefire and pull back troops from the UN humanitarian aid passage - this is the Syrian government army," the ministry said in a statement.It said the United States had failed to prove it had control over moderate opposition fighters, and it remained unclear if these forces would abide by the ceasefire. REUTERS SDR AS1852 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0431-936545.Xml
The members of the Uyghur and Tibetan communities in Europe staged a protest on Friday in front of the United Nations headquarters here, to highlight the ongoing human rights violations against the Uyghurs and the Tibetans in China. The demonstration consisted of a march of around 2000 people from Palais Wilson to the Broken Chair Monument across from the Palais des Nations. "We are protesting today against the wave of repression in Tibet particular in terms of freedom of religion. There is a very difficult situation for Tibet Buddhists practitioners. Here in Geneva the Tibetans and their supporters want to show and demonstrate to the world that this is an important issue and must not be overlooked," Kai Mueller, Executive Director of the International Campaign for Tibet told ANI. Being asked about their demands from the United Nations and the international community, Mueller said, "The United Nations must be very-very clear vis-a-vis the Chinese Government in terms of the restrictions and the freedom of religion in particular. Countries must seek access to Tibet and also that United Nations Expert should have clear access to Tibet and the Chinese Government must allow this because it's their duty." Earlier in a statement, Secretary General of the World Uyghur Congress, Dolkun Isa said, "The demonstration comes amid tremendous pressure against the Uyghur community in East Turkestan in terms of religious freedom and freedom of movement. Uyghurs continue to be detained and sentenced simply for religious practice conducted in their own homes - religious practice outside state-sanctioned mosques is now considered illegal," in a statement. "China's recently adopted 'Anti-Terror' Law has also legitimized continued collective punishment under the guise of security," the statement added. Isa alleged that China is using the anti-terror law to curtail all peaceful and religious activities and is using its power in the Security Council to suppress the voice of the Tibetans. "China is a member of the Security Council. Chinese Government uses this opportunity to try and block voices of Tibetans. China implemented anti-terrorist law on January 1 and uses this law to curtail all the peaceful activities, religious practices and all other activities are labelled as terrorists activities. That's why we are all coming together and raising a strong voice against the Chinese government and its policies towards Tibetans and we ask that the United Nations and all the democratic nations should pressurize China to respect the international law and give Tibetans there right," he told ANI. (ANI)
Russia's Defence Ministry said today that the Syrian army had withdrawn arms from the Castello Road near the city of Aleppo, while Syrian opposition forces backed by the United States had not done the same, Russian news agencies reported.The Syrian opposition violated the ceasefire 39 times in the last 24 hours, the agencies quoted the ministry as saying. REUTERS AKC PR1943 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0432-936731.Xml
Israeli forces shot dead three Arab assailants in separate incidents in East Jerusalem and the West Bank today, police and the military said, in a flare-up of a nearly year-old wave of Palestinian street attacks.With most anti-Israeli assaults carried out since October by individuals without any central guiding hand, it was difficult to gauge why violence had surged today. The frequency of what had been near-daily attacks had slowed in recent months.At the heavily-patrolled Damascus Gate, a main entrance to Jerusalem's walled Old City, a knife-wielding man attempted to stab police officers and was shot dead by Israeli forces, a police spokesman said.He was identified by police as a resident of Jordan. It was not immediately clear if he was a Jordanian national.The military said in a statement that a car carrying two Palestinians rammed into a civilian bus stop at a junction near the settlement of Kiryat Arba, outside the town of Hebron in the occupied West Bank."In the attack, three civilians were injured. In response to the immediate threat, forces at the scene fired at the vehicle, resulting in the death of one of the assailants while the other was wounded," the statement said.Several hours later, a Palestinian stabbed an Israeli soldier at a junction near Hebron, and forces at the scene shot the attacker dead, the military said.At least 214 Palestinians have died in violent incidents since October in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip. Of them, 143 were identified by authorities as assailants while others were killed during clashes and protests.Palestinians, many of them acting alone and with rudimentary weapons, have killed at least 33 Israelis and two visiting Americans in attacks that have waned in recent months.Earlier in the day, a Palestinian who was shot during an Israeli army raid yesterday near Hebron died of his wounds, the Palestinian Health Ministry said. The military said troops fired at him while he was fleeing arrest.In a statement, the Palestinian presidency called the killings "crimes ... that confirm once again that the Israeli government is pursuing a policy of escalation" and ignoring international peace efforts.Palestinian leaders say assailants have acted out of desperation over the collapse of peace talks in 2014 and Israeli settlement expansion in occupied territory that Palestinians seek for an independent state, with East Jerusalem as its capital.Israel says anti-Israeli incitement by Palestinian officials and on social networks have stoked attacks. REUTERS SZ PR2114 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0441-936942.Xml
US President Barack Obama today engaged Ohio Governor John Kasich, a high-profile political foe, to help press Republicans to approve the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal before he leaves office in four months.Obama discussed strategy for how to overcome domestic political angst over the TPP with Kasich, who fell short in his bid to be the Republican presidential candidate, and arranged for him to speak with reporters afterward from the White House briefing room lectern.The unusual move was a sign of how the White House intends to make a final full-court push to persuade Republican leaders in the US Congress to approve the deal in a "lame duck" session after the November 8 election, where the TPP has been pilloried by both Republican and Democratic candidates."Right now, China is pushing hard to create their own trade agreement," Obama told reporters in the Oval Office, saying American businesses were at risk of being "cut out" of Asia, the world's fastest growing market."I promise you that China's not going to be setting up a bunch of rules that are going to be to the advantage of American companies and American businesses," Obama said.Kasich was joined by other business and political leaders, including former Republican Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, International Business Machines Corp Chief Executive Officer Virginia Rometty and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.Ahead of the meeting, Kasich told CNN that he knew he would be criticized for meeting with Obama but said passage of the trade deal was vital."The two most vociferous opponents of the trade agreement are (Russian President) Vladimir Putin and (Chinese President) Xi (Jinping), one of the most repressive leaders in the history of China," he said. "That in and of itself can tell you why this agreement is so important."Republicans traditionally have backed free trade deals, but their presidential candidate, Donald Trump, has blamed the agreements for US job losses and threatened to tear them up should he win.Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has said the deal would not get a Senate vote this year, and House Speaker Paul Ryan has said he does not see enough votes for it to pass.Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has also opposed the deal, which is unpopular with labor unions and environmental groups.Obama has said he hopes opposition cools after the election. The White House has pointed to opinion polls showing most Americans support trade as a sign that the TPP could still squeak through Congress."If you're frustrated about rules of trade that disadvantage America, if you're frustrated about jobs being shipped overseas ... then you want to get this thing passed, you want to get this thing done," Obama told reporters.On his final trip to Asia earlier this month, Obama spent time reassuring nervous partners that the United States would finalize the deal. But today, Vietnam's parliament indicated it would not ratify the deal quickly. REUTERS SZ PR2125 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0441-936955.Xml
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said today the European Union's Bratislava summit had failed to change the bloc's immigration policy, which he called "self-destructive and naive."He said that without Germany imposing a firm ceiling on the number of immigrants it is willing to take in, a "suction effect" would continue to draw masses to Europe. "Something must happen in that respect," he said.Orban added that leaders of European nations along the Balkans migration route, including Austria and Germany, would meet in Vienna on September 24 to try to find a way forward. REUTERS SZ AN2329 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0441-937090.Xml
NAIROBI, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- East African business community kicked off a two-day meeting in the Kenyan capital Nairobi on Thursday to seek ways of tackling illicit trade -- a key source of revenue loss across the region.

The meeting was organized by the East African Business Council (EABC), a private sector association comprising investors involved in exporting and importing in five East African Community (EAC) member states -- Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, and Burundi -- in collaboration with the Kenya Association of Manufacturers (KAM).

Speaking during the conference, Kenya's Principal Secretary for Industry, Trade and Cooperatives, Chris Kiptoo, said efforts to combat illicit trade were underway championed by both private sector and government agencies.

The main focus of the conference was to seek practical solutions on the ever growing issue of counterfeits, piracy and other forms of intellectual property infringement, smuggling, substandard goods, transit fraud and dumping and trade in prohibited goods and products.

Lillian Awinja, EABC Chief Executive Officer, said that although progress has been made in several areas, a lot more still ought to be done to win the fight against illicit trade.

Experts are discussing the current status of the existing regional and national regulatory frameworks for combating various forms of illicit trade and strategies on how to strengthen them.

The talks also centered on how the region can achieve effective enforcement, including the need to set up inter-agency cooperation at national and regional level, the long-existing contributors to illicit trade, information exchange and consumer education.

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) estimates that EAC governments lose over 500 million U.S. dollars in tax revenue annually due to the influx of counterfeit and pirated products.

In Kenya, KAM estimates a loss of over 42 million dollars annually to illicit trade and approximately 80 million dollars loss in government revenue.
ARUSHA, Tanzania, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- A Tanzanian geologist on Thursday suggested the need for east African countries to come up with a regional center that will be responsible in surveying and monitoring geological patterns.

Elisante Mshiu, a geologist at the University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM), hopes a well-equipped center responsible for the entire region will offer timely, relevant, and useful information, thus minimizing harm in case of natural disasters such as earthquakes.

His suggestion came at a time when the country is still recovering from a deadly earthquake that killed at least 17 people, destroyed 840 houses and left thousands homeless in Kagera region last week.

"Buying equipment for earthquake detection and other gadgets is expensive for individual countries, but it's easy if countries work as a team," the expert suggested.

Mshiu also suggested the need of more cooperation among east African universities, which will enable more researches on the issue. A huge geological knowledge gap has been noticed as the earthquake hit the region last week.

Joint efforts among East African Community (EAC) member countries will help mobilize resources to empower geological institutions to at least offer warnings and detailed information of natural disasters, he said.

The expert also called for Tanzania to consider reviewing policies, especially in areas of construction, so that buildings will be more resistant to disasters.
French President Francois Hollande(R) welcomes German Chancellor Angela Merkel at Elysee Palace in Paris, France on Sept. 15, 2016. French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Thursday pressed European partners to set an agenda of reforms to overcome difficulties that Brexit has triggered. (Xinhua/Theo Duval)

PARIS, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Thursday pressed European partners to set an agenda of reforms to overcome difficulties that Brexit has triggered.

"What we want is to face the causes which had led UK leave. What we must have in mind is to give to the Europeans a clear view of what will be their future," Hollande said in a joint press meeting with Merkel.

With that aim, the French president called for a roadmap of reforms at the informal EU summit whose "first priority is security ... our border security, our security against external threats."

On the eve of the EU gathering in Bratislava, Merkel, on her visit to Paris, expressed "a real willingness to move forward."

"It is now about applying an agenda for Bratislava that makes clear we are determined to react together to the weaknesses, to the tasks we face," she added.

On Friday, European leaders will meet in the Slovak capital, the first meeting since Britain quit the European Union. They will discuss ways to better handle immigrants flows, boost growth and create more jobs for youth.
PARIS, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- Scores have been arrested and several others wounded as violence erupted across France during protests against new labor rules which make layoffs easier.

In Paris, riot police fired tear gas and water canon to disperse the crowd after a group of youths threw projectiles and stones. Scuffles also broke out in western towns of Nantes and Rennes and also in Toulouse, Grenoble and Montpelier.

15 police officials were wounded during the rallies across the country with two suffering serious injuries, French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said.

Denouncing "unacceptable violence," Cazeneuve added 62 individuals have been arrested with 32 of them placed under custody.

Police said between 12,500 and 13,500 protesters gathered in Paris, while the national turnout was at 78,000. Trade union said 40,000 demonstrated in the capital and 170,000 in other French cities.

"We won't give up the fight. We're not going to have another wave of demonstrations but there are other ways of fighting the labour law," Jean-Claude Mailly, head of the Force Ouvriere union, told French public TV channel France 2.

Under high pressure to reduce unemployment, French President Francois Hollande proposed to reform the strictly codified labor rules by offering more flexibility for enterprises to hire and fire.

The reform, approved in July, also include reducing overtime pay and economic redundancies, and making working hours and holidays open to negotiation.

However, critics say such reform would create more low-paid jobs and further weaken the pay.
UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Thursday warned that a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is heading toward a "one-state reality" if the international community failed to encourage the both sides to take the difficult steps to bring peace and security between them.

The secretary-general, while speaking at the UN Security Council on the situation in the Middle East, said, "Twenty-three years ago, almost to the day, the first Oslo Accord was signed between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organisation."

"Unfortunately, we are further than ever from its goals," Ban said. "The two-state solution is at risk of being replaced by a one-state reality of perpetual violence and occupation.

The two-state solution, widely backed by the international community, means a secure Israel to live in peace with an independent State of Palestine.

"Despite warnings by the international community and the region, leaders on both sides have failed to take the difficult steps needed for peace," he said.

Just on Wednesday, militants in Gaza fired yet another rocket into Israel, which he condemned, the secretary-general said, adding that Israel fired four missiles at targets in Gaza in response.

"Once again I reiterate that such attacks and the response they elicit do not serve the cause of peace," he said.

In the past two weeks alone, plans were advanced for yet another 463 housing units in four settlements in Area C of the occupied West Bank, he noted. "Official Israeli data shows that the second quarter of 2016 had the highest number of construction starts in three years."

"The decades-long policy that has settled more than 500,000 Israelis in Palestinian territory is diametrically opposed to the creation of a Palestinian state," he said.

"Regrettably, the reporting period also saw the continuation of statements by both sides that only perpetuate an environment of mistrust," he said.

"I am disturbed by a recent statement by Israel's Prime Minister (Benjamin Netanyahu) portraying those who oppose settlement expansion as supporters of ethnic cleansing," he said. "This is unacceptable and outrageous."

"Let me be absolutely clear: settlements are illegal under international law," he said. "The occupation, stifling and oppressive, must end."

"The international community, including the Security Council and the Middle East Quartet, universally views the expansion of settlements as an obstacle to peace," Ban added.
UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) on Thursday released a report showing that more than half -- 3.7 million -- of the 6 million school-age children under its mandate have no school to go to.

Some 1.75 million refugee children are not in primary school and 1.95 million refugee adolescents are not in secondary school, the report found. Refugees are five times more likely to be out of school than the global average.

The report, entitled "Missing Out: Refugee Education in Crisis," compared UNHCR data on refugee education with the data of United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) on global school enrolment.

Only 50 percent of refugee children have access to primary education, compared with a global average of more than 90 percent, the report said.

And as these children become older, the gap becomes a chasm: only 22 percent of refugee adolescents attend secondary school compared to a global average of 84 percent. At the higher education level, just one percent of refugees attend university, compared to a global average of 34 percent.

"This represents a crisis for millions of refugee children," said Filippo Grandi, UN high commissioner for refugees.

"Refugee education is sorely neglected, when it is one of the few opportunities we have to transform and build the next generation so they can change the fortunes of the tens of millions of forcibly displaced people globally."

The report was released in advance of world leaders gathering on Sept. 19-20 at the UN Summit for Refugees and Migrants and the Leaders' Summit on the Global Refugee Crisis, which will be held at UN Headquarters in New York on the sidelines of the annual high-level UN debate.

At both summits, the UNHCR is calling on governments, donors, humanitarian agencies and development partners as well as private-sector partners to strengthen their commitment to ensuring that every child receives a quality education. Underlining the discussions will be the target of Sustainable Development Goal 4.

"Ensure inclusive and quality education for all and promote lifelong learning" an aim that will not be realized by 2030 without meeting the education needs of vulnerable populations, including refugees and other forcibly displaced people.

"As the international community considers how best to deal with the refugee crisis, it is essential that we think beyond basic survival," said Grandi. "Education enables refugees to positively shape the future of both their countries of asylum and their home countries when they one day return."

While the report highlights progress made by governments, UNHCR and partners in enrolling increased numbers of refugees in school, the struggle is one of sheer numbers. While the global school-age refugee population was relatively stable at 3.5 million over the first 10 years of the 21st century, it has grown on average by 600,000 children and adolescents annually since 2011.

In 2014 alone, the refugee school-age population grew by 30 percent. At this pace of growth, UNHCR estimates that an average of at least 12,000 additional classrooms and 20,000 additional teachers are needed on an annual basis.

Refugees often live in regions where governments are already struggling to educate their own children. They face the additional task of finding school places, trained teachers and learning materials for tens or even hundreds of thousands of newcomers, who often do not speak the language of instruction and have frequently missed out on three to four years of schooling.

More than half of the world's out-of-school refugee children and adolescents are located in just seven countries: Chad, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Kenya, Lebanon, Pakistan and Turkey.

Exemplified by Syria, the report showed how conflict has the potential to reverse positive education trends. Whereas in 2009, 94 per cent of Syrian children attended primary and lower secondary education, by June 2016 only 60 percent of children were in school in Syria, leaving 2.1 million children and adolescents without access to education in Syria.

In neighboring countries, over 4.8 million Syrian refugees are registered with UNHCR, amongst them around 35 percent are of school-age. In Turkey, only 39 percent of school-age refugee children and adolescents were enrolled in primary and secondary education, 40 percent in Lebanon, and 70 percent in Jordan.

This means that nearly 900,000 Syrian school-age refugee children and adolescents are not in school, said the report.

In February at the Supporting Syria and the Region conference in London, donors committed to a plan to reach 1.7 million Syrian refugee and affected host-community children and youth in Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Iraq and Turkey, and 2.1 million out-of-school children inside Syria.

By the start of the new school year in September, the work by host governments is impressive, with Jordan and Lebanon reinforcing their double shift system at schools, 90 percent of Syrian refugee children enrolled in school in Egypt, and Turkey redoubling efforts to encourage enrolment. However, funding from this conference is still not fully committed, threatening to undermine some of this progress.

"The progress seen in Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey points to the potential to turn around the educational prospects of refugees, but only if the international community invests," said Grandi.

The report also looked at some of the more protracted refugee situations that receive less attention. In Kakuma refugee camp in Northern Kenya, the report profiled the remarkable story of a young South Sudanese girl, Esther, who has caught up on multiple years of missed education to reach the last year of secondary school.

Only three percent of children in Kakuma camp are enrolled in secondary school, and less than one percent make it to higher education.

Meanwhile, the report called on governments to prioritize effective inclusion of refugee children in national systems and multi-year education sector plans. In Chad, a recent transition of all schools to the national system has supported both refugee and host community children. However, lack of funding is resulting in overcrowded and under resourced classrooms.

Given the fact that the average length of displacement for a refugee in a protracted situation currently stands at 20 years, the report calls for donors to transition from a system of emergency to multi-year and predictable funding that allows for sustainable planning, quality programming and sound monitoring of education for refugees and national children and adolescents.

The report concluded with the inspiring story of Nawa, a Somali refugee who only started her education aged 16 at a community learning centre in Malaysia. Under four years later, she is due to start a foundation course at university while giving back to her school as a volunteer teacher.

"Nawa's story proves it is never too late to invest in refugee education, and investment in one refugee's education means the entire community benefits," said Grandi.
UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) on Thursday welcomed an agreement between Indonesia and the European Union (EU) to issue the world's first timber license as a major achievement in the fight against illegal logging, a UN spokesman told reporters here.

As of Nov. 15 this year, this license can accompany shipments of timber exported from Indonesia to EU member states to certify that the timber has been harvested, transported, processed and traded according to Indonesian law, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said at a daily news briefing here.

Indonesia supplies one third of tropical timber imports by value to the European Union, he noted.

Worldwide, forest crime is estimated by the UN Environmental Programme (UNEP) and Interpol to be worth between 30,100 billion U.S. dollars annually, or 10 to 30 percent of the total global timber trade, he added.
by Larry Neild

LONDON, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- Greg Clark, a member of the new British government cabinet, on Thursday praised the joint French-led nuclear project at Hinkley Point, Southern England, saying that it will binging both economic and ecological benefits for the country.

Earlier Thursday, the British government issued a statement approving the project, after it halted it for nearly two months.

Clark, Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, told a parliamentary debate that this 18 billion British pound (about 23.7 billion U.S. dollars) investment provides an upgrade in the supply of clean energy.

"When it begins producing electricity in the middle of the next decade it will provide 7 percent of the UK's electricity needs; giving secure energy to 6 million homes for 60 years," he said.

Hinkley unleashes a long overdue new wave of investment in nuclear engineering in Britain, creating 26,000 jobs and apprenticeships and providing a huge boost to the British economy, he said, adding that the electricity generated will be reliable and low carbon, and so completely compatible with the country's climate change obligations.

"All of these developments are good for Britain," he said, "It is to the infrastructure on which our future depends."

The Hinkley project will be designed and built by the French energy giant EDF, with about a third of investment from China.

In the statement given to the House of Commons, Clark said that the government decided to process with the project after making some important changes concerning security and legal frameworks.

Inquired by Xinhua about how the changes will affect China's investment in the Hinkley point, a spokesman for the Department for Business, Energy and Business Strategy said that there would be none.

As for the Bradwell project, the official spokesman said that it has always been a component of the Hinkley deal, which has not changed.

"However, the Bradwell project will also need to go through the same planning and independent regulatory processes required for all new build projects, and meet all the requirements as a result of the new regime we are bringing. This is the case for all new build projects, " the spokesman added.
JOHANNESBURG, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- South Africa on Thursday urged the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) to adhere fully to its Security Council-mandated obligations, to return to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), and to fulfil its safeguards obligations with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

South Africa shares the concerns of the international community regarding the nuclear weapon- and delivery system-related activities of the DPRK, the country's Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO) said in a statement.

The South African government has noted with serious concern the reported nuclear weapons test conducted by the DPRK earlier this month, DIRCO spokesperson Clayson Monyela said.

This follows the nuclear weapons test conducted by the DPRK on Jan. 6, 2016 and subsequent missile launches in flagrant violation of the DPRK's obligations under various UN Security Council resolutions.

South Africa supports a negotiated solution that addresses the issues of the Korean Peninsula in a holistic manner, and urges the DPRK to fulfil its commitments under the Six-Party Talks with a view to achieving the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula in a peaceful manner, Monyela said.

"We strongly urge the DPRK and all states involved to refrain from any further acts of provocation which may undermine the pursuit of such a negotiated solution or that could further increase tensions in the North East Asian region and beyond," he said.

The latest event reinforces South Africa's conviction that nuclear weapons continue to constitute a grave threat to international peace and security, said the spokesperson.

"We join the vast majority of UN Member States and the UN Secretary-General in calling for urgent action to eradicate all nuclear weapons, once and for all," said Monyela.
Guests cut the ribbon for the first Chinese Film Festival in Italy, in Milan, Italy, Sept. 15, 2016. The first Chinese Film Festival in Italy kicked off here on Thursday, with a top selection of movies, and a series of forums to address the evolution of Chinese film industry. (Xinhua/Luo Na)

MILAN, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- The first Chinese Film Festival in Italy kicked off here on Thursday, with a top selection of movies, and a series of forums to address the evolution of China's film industry.

The festival will run at the Space Odeon Cinema in Milan until Sept. 18, while related events will also take place in Venice, Rome, Florence, and Turin, according to the organizers.

Some 40 films will overall premiere during the gala, and the selection would include the best of Chinese movies released in recent years.

Milan was chosen as host-city not only for his reputation as economic and financial capital of the country, but indeed because here lives the largest, and oldest Chinese community of Italy.

"The festival aims at providing a cultural bridge between the 'new citizens' and their 'hosts' through the universal language of cinema," the organizers said.

As such, it would offer a chance of dialogue and discussion to all those who love cinema, arts, and visual language, among both Italians and Chinese.

The event also took inspiration from Italy's long tradition in cinema.

"Besides being the 'cradle' of the Renaissance, Italy also gave birth to one of the most prestigious film festivals in modern times," the organizers added.

"The Venice Film Festival, which was established in 1932, is now one of the most relevant at European and global level. It is our role model and ultimate goal in the future," the organizers added.

Some 20 professionals and experts will contribute to the festival side-events in order to address the developments of China's film market, which is expected to become the world's largest in about two years.

This rapid evolution will be discussed through different perspectives, such as the Chinese market's growth in terms of production and distribution, and the current increase in the number of theatres in China.

Chinese contemporary movies will also be analysed in terms of contents, as a way to convey the social, cultural and economic evolution of China's society to the Italian audience.

The selected movies would compete in three different sections, including a main movie competition and a documentary section.

Prominent cinema professionals from both China and Italy will constitute the Festival's jury, including Chinese director and Berlinale Silver Bear Jury Grand Prix winner Wang Xiaoshuai, Italian Academy-Award winner production designer, art director, and costume designer Dante Ferretti, and Italian cinema journalist Maria Pia Fusco.

Along with the best movie award, and best documentary award, the jury will confer a prize to the best director, best screenwriter, best actor and actress in competition.
UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- The World Food Programme (WFP) on Thursday said that it is scaling up its assistance to reach more than 1.5 million people in desperate need in the Lake Chad Basin, as further areas become accessible inside Nigeria, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters here.

"Across the Basin, the UN estimates that over nine million people need humanitarian assistance," Dujarric said at a daily news briefing here. "In the areas impacted by Boko Haram violence, almost one in three people suffers from moderate to severe food insecurity."

WFP urgently needs support to continue to provide food and nutritional assistance to displaced and host communities alike, he said, adding that 72 million U.S. dollars are required over the next six months.

The Chad Basin is the largest endorheic drainage basin in Africa, centered on Lake Chad. It has no outlet to the sea and contains large areas of desert or semi-arid savanna. The basin spans seven countries, including most of Chad and a large part of Niger.

In the areas affected by Boko Haram violence, nearly five million face hunger. Unless life-saving assistance is provided fast, hunger will only deepen during the current lean and rainy season, which lasts until September, the United Nations said in August.

The Nigeria-based extremist group Boko Haram seeks to impose strict Islamic law in northern Nigeria. Its insurgency has killed tens of thousands of people and has affected Nigeria's neighboring countries in the region.

Nigeria is heading up a multinational joint task force along with Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Benin to fight Boko Haram terrorists and bring back stability to the region.
Chinese Ambassador to Zimbabwe Huang Ping speaks during a ceremony to receive rice donated by China in Harare, capital of Zimbabwe, on Sept. 15, 2016. Zimbabwe on Thursday received rice from China to help alleviate hunger after a drought that has left up to 4 million Zimbabweans in need of food aid. (Xinhua/Zhang Yuliang)

HARARE, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- Zimbabwe on Thursday received rice from China to help alleviate hunger after a drought that has left up to 4 million Zimbabweans in need of food aid.

Chinese Ambassador to Zimbabwe Huang Ping handed over 5,500 tonnes of rice that have arrived in the country, which is part of the total 19,000 tonnes worth 24.6 million U.S. dollars donated by the Chinese government to Zimbabwe.

In his remarks, Huang said the donation was in fulfillment of the drought relief pledge made to affected African countries by Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) summit held in South Africa last December.

"Today's event again testifies the strong ties between China and Zimbabwe as all-weather partners, especially in the area of food security and agriculture," he said.

China had provided five consignments of emergency food aid to Zimbabwe over the last 10 years worth millions of U.S. dollars to help the country cope with food shortages, he added.

He said in support of Zimbabwe's efforts to ensure national food security, China would this year donate 10,000 tonnes of urea fertilizer to benefit farmers who will take part in a government maize production scheme targeting to produce 2 million tonnes of maize.

Zimbabwean Minister of Public Service, Labor and Social Welfare Prisca Mupfumira, who received the rice on behalf of government, thanked China for the donation.

She said the rice would be distributed to vulnerable groups who include orphans and the elderly.

"The Government of Zimbabwe is indeed grateful for your donation as this will go a long way in alleviating food shortages among vulnerable groups," the minister said.

She said Zimbabwe would take long to recover from the impact of the El-Nino induced drought, and appealed for more humanitarian support to help the country cope with food shortages.
Donald Trump takes the stage on the last day of the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio, the United States , July 21, 2016. New York billionaire Donald Trump officially accepted the presidential nomination of the U.S. Republican Party Thursday night on the final day of the Republican National Convention.

WASHINGTON, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- The campaign of U.S. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump released on Thursday a new brief note from Trump's doctor, claiming that the candidate is "in excellent physical health."

According to the five-paragraph note written by Trump's doctor Harold Bornstein, Trump, 70, is six feet two inches (1.88 meters) tall and weighs 236 pounds (107 kg).

"Mr. Trump was hospitalized only once, as a child of 11 years old for an appendectomy," said the note, adding that there is no family history of premature cardiac or neoplastic disease.

Trump has annual physical exam in the spring of every year, and his last colonoscopy, chest X-ray and cardiac evaluation were results. Trump also takes a low dose aspirin and a statin, rosuvastatin, used for lowering cholesterol.

It was the second time since last December that the Trump campaign had released public documentation about Trump's health.

In his last note about Trump's health in December, 2015, Bornstein declared "unequivocally" that Trump would be the "healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency."

It was later disclosed that Bornstein spent five minutes writing the note.
Donald Trump takes the stage on the last day of the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio, the United States, July 21, 2016. New York billionaire Donald Trump officially accepted the presidential nomination of the U.S. Republican Party Thursday night on the final day of the Republican National Convention.

(Xinhua/File Photo)

WASHINGTON, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- The campaign of U.S. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump released on Thursday a new brief note from Trump's doctor, claiming that the candidate is "in excellent physical health."

According to the five-paragraph note written by Trump's doctor Harold Bornstein, Trump, 70, is six feet two inches (1.88 meters) tall and weighs 236 pounds (107 kg).

"Mr. Trump was hospitalized only once, as a child of 11 years old for an appendectomy," said the note, adding that there is no family history of premature cardiac or neoplastic disease.

Trump has annual physical exam in the spring of every year, and his last colonoscopy, chest X-ray and cardiac evaluation were results. Trump also takes a low dose aspirin and a statin, rosuvastatin, used for lowering cholesterol.

It was the second time since last December that the Trump campaign had released public documentation about Trump's health.

In his last note about Trump's health in December, 2015, Bornstein declared "unequivocally" that Trump would be the "healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency."

It was later disclosed that Bornstein spent five minutes writing the note.
Demonstrators shout slogans during a rally in support of the Palestinians, after Israel's eight-day military operation in the Gaza Strip, in Rabat, Morocco, Nov. 25, 2012. (Xinhua/File Photo)

UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Thursday warned that a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is heading toward a "one-state reality" if the international community failed to encourage the both sides to take the difficult steps to bring peace and security between them.

The secretary-general, while speaking at the UN Security Council on the situation in the Middle East, said, "Twenty-three years ago, almost to the day, the first Oslo Accord was signed between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organisation."

"Unfortunately, we are further than ever from its goals," Ban said. "The two-state solution is at risk of being replaced by a one-state reality of perpetual violence and occupation.

The two-state solution, widely backed by the international community, means a secure Israel to live in peace with an independent State of Palestine.

"Despite warnings by the international community and the region, leaders on both sides have failed to take the difficult steps needed for peace," he said.

Just on Wednesday, militants in Gaza fired yet another rocket into Israel, which he condemned, the secretary-general said, adding that Israel fired four missiles at targets in Gaza in response.

"Once again I reiterate that such attacks and the response they elicit do not serve the cause of peace," he said.

In the past two weeks alone, plans were advanced for yet another 463 housing units in four settlements in Area C of the occupied West Bank, he noted. "Official Israeli data shows that the second quarter of 2016 had the highest number of construction starts in three years."

"The decades-long policy that has settled more than 500,000 Israelis in Palestinian territory is diametrically opposed to the creation of a Palestinian state," he said.

"Regrettably, the reporting period also saw the continuation of statements by both sides that only perpetuate an environment of mistrust," he said.

"I am disturbed by a recent statement by Israel's Prime Minister (Benjamin Netanyahu) portraying those who oppose settlement expansion as supporters of ethnic cleansing," he said. "This is unacceptable and outrageous."

"Let me be absolutely clear: settlements are illegal under international law," he said. "The occupation, stifling and oppressive, must end."

"The international community, including the Security Council and the Middle East Quartet, universally views the expansion of settlements as an obstacle to peace," Ban added.
LISBON, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- Portugal has approved a new rule banning people from smoking near schools and hospitals, the council of ministers said Thursday.

Under the new law, smoking is banned in children's playgrounds and in areas situated near doors and windows of health and education establishments from January next year, a statement reads.

These new rules are aimed at protecting citizens of involuntary exposure to smoke and to contribute to the prevention and control of consumption.

According to Portugal's Directorate General of Health, around 12,000 people die from smoking tobacco every year.

Portugal introduced restrictions on smoking in January 2008, however rules were more lax than in other European countries; bars smaller than 100 square meters could allow smoking and public buildings could have smoking zones if they were well ventilated.

Last year the government made the rules tighter, banning smoking in all closed public buildings. This law will only be introduced in 2020 so that public spaces which invested in works to have smoking areas can adapt to the new rules.

The country also recently introduced a new law obliging tobacco companies to use packaging carrying pictorial warnings. The government also banned words like "light" which it says can be misleading.

Cigarettes with aromatic flavors and electronic cigarettes with nicotine are also set to be banned by 2020.
HELSINKI, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- A fire that killed two children in Raahe, northwestern Finland early Tuesday is now attributed to the father's alleged drunkness, police said on Thursday.

Local police has launched a criminal investigation, as the father was ascertained to have been heavily intoxicated when the fire broke out. The father and one child managed to get out of the building, while a 6-year-old and a 10-year-old perished.

The police told local media the father was suspected of causing "general danger" besides the two deaths. The expression means in Finnish legal jargon negligence with a stove or electrical appliance or smoking in bed.

The consumption of alcohol has been a main cause of casualties in house fires in Finland.

Statistics of the Interior Ministry rescue services covering years up to the beginning of this decade indicate that 60 percent of the victims of fires in buildings were intoxicated when the fire started, while the figure in the rest of fires is 40 percent.
Donald Trump takes the stage on the last day of the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio, the United States, July 21, 2016. New York billionaire Donald Trump officially accepted the presidential nomination of the U.S. Republican Party Thursday night on the final day of the Republican National Convention. (Xinhua/File Photo)

WASHINGTON, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton' recent attacks against her Republican rival Donald Trump's supporters could hurt her campaign as the two are headed for the presidential debates.

Clinton sparked an uproar in a speech last Friday, in which she called half of Trump supporters "a basket of deplorables," because they are racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, or Islamaphobic.

The comments, which came at a time when Trump is slowly catching up in the polls, marked the first time in recent memory that a U.S. presidential candidate has attacked the opponent's supporters rather than the opponent himself.

Experts said that such comments may hurt Clinton, especially in the upcoming presidential debates that will start later September, when Trump will have a chance to paint her as an elitist who is way out of touch with the country' s working class - the bulk of Trump' s supporters.

"Clinton's remarks can be seen as elitist and classist, and that is the result of the hyperbole she used in her comments," Dan Mahaffee, an analyst with the Center for the Study of the Presidency and Congress, told Xinhua.

Darrell West, vice president and director of governance studies of the Brookings Institution, said it never is a good idea to criticize voters, since they make the ultimate decision.

"It is better to focus on the candidate and complain about his deficiencies. Being negative in voters risks sounding elitist," West told Xinhua.

He added that there is nothing for Clinton to gain from this exchange, noting Trump has already put out an ad focusing on her comments.

Trump will make this an issue in the campaign and Clinton needs to explain why her policies will do more than Trump's to help white, working class voters, West said.

Mahaffee said while Clinton correctly pointed out that Trump's base has included some racist elements far beyond the conservative mainstream, Clinton's comments backfired when she called out a larger portion of the Trump base as being part of that movement.

Had Clinton focused her comments more directly to target the leaders of these far right groups that have been energized by the prospect of a Trump presidency, she may have been able to put the Trump campaign on the defensive, rather than providing a comment that would further antagonize a broader group of working-class voters, Mahaffee said.

Still, Clinton's harsh comments could satisfy many on the left who feel that she hasn't been as assertive against a lot of the more radical elements of the Trump base, Mahaffee said.

"For the Democratic base, it feels good to be on the offensive on this topic. Furthermore, given that these comments create media attention, it is likely to bring about more stories about the radical supporters of Trump, and thus give moderates another reason to be concerned about Trump," Mahaffee said.

While Clinton is expected to clinch most votes of blacks, Hispanics and single women, Trump has galvanized white blue collar workers like perhaps no other Republican candidate in recent memory. Clinton is not expected to get much support at all from this voting bloc, according to the polls.

"By and large, I think the Democrats have looked at the voting numbers, the demographic trends, and polls, and from that information, they have largely written off that demographic to focus on women of all economic and racial backgrounds, more educated white voters, and minority voters," Mahaffee said.
CHICAGO, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) grains futures close mixed Thursday, with soybean prices rising while corn and wheat futures falling slightly.

The most active corn contract for December delivery edged down 1.75 cents, or 0.53 percent, to 3.3 dollars per bushel. December wheat delivery fell 3.5 cents, or 0.87 percent, to 3.995 dollars per bushel. November soybeans added 7.75 cents, or 0.82 percent, to 9.505 dollars per bushel.

Soybean prices gained after the U.S. Department of Agriculture said private exporters booked sales of 110,000 metric tons of soybeans for delivery to unknown destinations in the 2016-17 crop year.

A weekly report from the agency also shored up prices of the oilseeds, with the government saying net soybean sales for the week ended Sept. 8 totaled more than one million metric tons, which was in line with analysts' expectations for 800,000 to 1.7 million tons.

Grain prices declined amid projections for bulging supplies, with stockpiles of corn and wheat both forecast to rise to 29-year highs next year. While reports from the early U.S. corn harvest show variable yields, analysts say the average U.S. yield will still likely be sufficient to significantly boost inventories of that grain, keeping pressure on the market.

Wheat prices slid as investor short-covering waned and traders worried about the impact of a controversial ban by Egypt on grain imports containing trace amounts of the ergot fungus.

Global wheat stockpiles are at an all-time high, and analysts said concern is growing that Egypt's zero-tolerance policy toward ergot will cause prolong a world surplus after U.S. farmers and others harvested huge wheat crops this year.
RAMALLAH, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- A Palestinian young man was shot dead on Thursday by Israeli soldiers' gunfire in the town of Bedit Oula north of the West Bank city of Hebron, medics and eyewitnesses said.

They said that Mohamed Sarahin died of his wounds he sustained several hours after an Israeli army force stormed his house in the town and opened fire at him and his father after they had a hand fighting with the soldiers.

Eyewitnesses said that Sarahin was critically wounded, as he and his father were arrested. After a few hours, it was announced that he died of his wounds, while he was handcuffed.

Since last October, a wave of tension has been flaring between Israel and the Palestinians in the Palestinian territories, mainly in Jerusalem and the West Bank. Official figures said that 225 Palestinians and 40 Israelis were killed.

Tension between the two sides mounted following the daily Israeli settlers and Israeli security forces assaults, besides the repeated attempts of radical Jewish group of getting into al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem.
Remote control plane builder Otto Diefffenbach III holds up his planes resembling U.S. Presidential candidates Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in Carlsbad, California, U.S. September 15, 2016. (REUTERS/Mike Blake)

WASHINGTON, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton' recent attacks against her Republican rival Donald Trump's supporters could hurt her campaign as the two are headed for the presidential debates.

Clinton sparked an uproar in a speech last Friday, in which she called half of Trump supporters "a basket of deplorables," because they are racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, or Islamaphobic.

The comments, which came at a time when Trump is slowly catching up in the polls, marked the first time in recent memory that a U.S. presidential candidate has attacked the opponent's supporters rather than the opponent himself.

Experts said that such comments may hurt Clinton, especially in the upcoming presidential debates that will start later September, when Trump will have a chance to paint her as an elitist who is way out of touch with the country' s working class - the bulk of Trump' s supporters.

"Clinton's remarks can be seen as elitist and classist, and that is the result of the hyperbole she used in her comments," Dan Mahaffee, an analyst with the Center for the Study of the Presidency and Congress, told Xinhua.

Darrell West, vice president and director of governance studies of the Brookings Institution, said it never is a good idea to criticize voters, since they make the ultimate decision.

"It is better to focus on the candidate and complain about his deficiencies. Being negative in voters risks sounding elitist," West told Xinhua.

He added that there is nothing for Clinton to gain from this exchange, noting Trump has already put out an ad focusing on her comments.

Trump will make this an issue in the campaign and Clinton needs to explain why her policies will do more than Trump's to help white, working class voters, West said.

Mahaffee said while Clinton correctly pointed out that Trump's base has included some racist elements far beyond the conservative mainstream, Clinton's comments backfired when she called out a larger portion of the Trump base as being part of that movement.

Had Clinton focused her comments more directly to target the leaders of these far right groups that have been energized by the prospect of a Trump presidency, she may have been able to put the Trump campaign on the defensive, rather than providing a comment that would further antagonize a broader group of working-class voters, Mahaffee said.

Still, Clinton's harsh comments could satisfy many on the left who feel that she hasn't been as assertive against a lot of the more radical elements of the Trump base, Mahaffee said.

"For the Democratic base, it feels good to be on the offensive on this topic. Furthermore, given that these comments create media attention, it is likely to bring about more stories about the radical supporters of Trump, and thus give moderates another reason to be concerned about Trump," Mahaffee said.

While Clinton is expected to clinch most votes of blacks, Hispanics and single women, Trump has galvanized white blue collar workers like perhaps no other Republican candidate in recent memory. Clinton is not expected to get much support at all from this voting bloc, according to the polls.

"By and large, I think the Democrats have looked at the voting numbers, the demographic trends, and polls, and from that information, they have largely written off that demographic to focus on women of all economic and racial backgrounds, more educated white voters, and minority voters," Mahaffee said.
ABUJA, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- Defense authorities in Nigeria on Thursday dismissed Boko Haram's latest video as "unreal," urging citizens of the West African nation to disregard it.

In a statement made available to Xinhua, defense spokesman, Rabe Abubakar described the video clip as "diversionary and a desperate attempt by the dying Boko Haram to remain relevant."

The Boko Haram video, which has gone viral on the internet since Tuesday, showed an assemblage of worshippers in the background as a man who posed as acting leader of the group dished out threats to the Nigerian government.

The defense statement cast aspersion to the credibility of the video, saying it was a replica of a video released by the group in 2014.

It said the congregants in the video were "photoshopped" and, therefore, should be disregarded.

"The video clip is a complete show of weakness and sign that the end is near for the insurgents, hence it does not in any way pose a threat to us," the statement said.

Nigeria's northeast region has been a stronghold of the extremist group Boko Haram and has been frequently raided in the past six years.

In past months, the Nigerian government has launched several military operations to eliminate the terrorist threat.
CANBERRA, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- A large piece of airline debris found off the coast of Tanzania and examined in Australia has been determined to be from missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, authorities have confirmed.

A statement from the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) confirmed the piece, found on June 20 this year, was part of an outboard flap from the Boeing 777 jet.

"It was confirmed (the part) was the inboard section of a Boeing 777 right, outboard flap, originating from the Malaysian Airlines aircraft registered 9M-MRO," a statement released late on Thursday said.

"The part was preliminarily identified from photographs as an inboard section of a Boeing 777 outboard flap."

"On arrival at the ATSB, several part numbers were immediately located on the debris that confirmed the preliminary identification. This was consistent with the physical appearance, dimensions and construction of the part."

"A date stamp associated with one of the part numbers indicated manufacture on 23 January 2002, which was consistent with the 31 May 2002 delivery date for 9M-MRO."

The ATSB said now the part is confirmed to be from the missing Malaysia Airlines jet, work can begin to determine if the flap holds any clues as to how and where MH370 was brought down.

The Australian-led ocean search for MH370 is due to wrap up by the end of the year, as more than 110,000 square kilometers of a 120,000 square kilometer zone has been searched. Australian, Chinese and Malaysian authorities agreed that if no trace of the jet was found in the zone, the search would be suspended indefinitely.

MH370 was a scheduled passenger service from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. It disappeared on March 8, 2014 with 239 passengers and crew on board.

Related:

Debris found off Tanzania part of missing MH370 plane

KUALA LUMPUR, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- The piece of debris discovered on an island off Tanzania in June this year has been confirmed to belong to the Boeing 777 plane of Malaysia Airlines MH370, Malaysia's transport minister Liow Tiong Lai said in a statement on Thursday.

Several part numbers, along with physical appearance, dimensions, and construction have been confirmed to be an inboard section of a Boeing 777 outboard flap, while a date stamp of Jan. 23, 2002 on one of the part numbers was consistent with the delivery date for MH370, said Liow. Full story

Scorched debris thought to be from MH370 brought to Australia

CANBERRA, Sept. 12 (Xinhua) -- A piece of airplane debris featuring scorch marks, which is thought to be from missing Malaysia Airline flight MH370, has arrived in Australia for examination, local media reported on Monday.

Amateur investigator Blaine Gibson, who has found 13 of the 27 pieces of debris from the missing Boeing 777 jet, arrived in Canberra on Monday with the piece of debris which he believes could be the most significant find in the search for the missing airliner. Full story

Australian-led ocean search for MH370 expected to conclude in December: authorities

CANBERRA, Aug. 24 (Xinhua) -- The Australian-led search for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 is expected to wrap up in December, a statement from the Joint Agency Co-ordination Center (JACC) said on Wednesday.

Initially expected to conclude in August, the search for the missing Boeing 777 jet was hampered by bad weather and unexpected search vessel maintenance, but the latest release from the JACC in conjunction with the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) reaffirmed that the hunt would be suspended indefinitely if no new evidence is found once the search concludes in December. According to the latest statement, more than 110,000 square kilometers of the 120,000 kilometer search zone has been thoroughly explored. Full story

Australian MH370 search agency secretly removes "death dive" theory from website

CANBERRA, Aug. 12 (Xinhua) -- The Australian government agency in charge of the search for missing Malaysian Airlines flight 370 has reportedly secretly retracted a published theory that the plane slammed into the sea after a "death dive."

Earlier this week, the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) said it was unlikely the plane's captain glided the plane into the sea, and instead said engine failure due to lack of fuel had sparked a sudden "death dive" into the southern Indian Ocean. Full story

MH370 fell out of sky after engine failure: Australian analysis

CANBERRA, Aug. 9 (Xinhua) -- Australian defence scientists who analysed signals from missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 have revealed the Boeing 777 fell very fast before crashing into the Indian Ocean off the coast of Western Australia.
By May Oo

YANGON, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Myanmar hailed the United States' recent lifting of sanctions and reinstatement of the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program which will create better investment environment for the Asian country.

Myanmar has vowed to make appropriate preparations in order to maximize the benefits of the recent policy adjustments.

After the bilateral meeting between U.S. President Barack Obama and Myanmar's State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi on Wednesday during her first visit to Washington since her National League for Democracy-led government took office, a statement that the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program, a preferential tariff system, would be reinstated, was made.

The GSP program will be reinstated effective on Nov. 13 this year after a 60-day Congressional-notification period. This decision will give Myanmar the opportunity to export nearly 5,000 products to the U.S. duty-free, according to the statement from the Office of the United States Trade Representative in Washington.

The United States suspended the GSP benefits to Myanmar in 1989 due to labor rights concerns. In 2013, Myanmar began engaging in negotiations for the reinstatement of the GSP, compiling the GSP eligibility criteria.

After the recent bilateral meeting, Obama said that the United States is preparing to lift remaining sanctions on Myanmar and will complete the process soon.

The joint statement by both countries said that the United States will also terminate the national emergency with respect to Myanmar, which has been in place since 1997, and will revoke the executive order-based framework of the Myanmar sanctions program.

According to the statement, the move represented Washington's recognition of the progress towards democratic transition that Myanmar has achieved including through the election of a civilian-led government.

Some local experts said that sanctions such as prohibiting certain imports of jade and rubies, banning the trading of weapons, blacklisting some individuals close to former military government, should not be lifted.

Other said, however, that removing such powerful businessmen from the blacklist could have a positive affect as they are some of the Myanmar's main economic players.

Aung Ko Ko, a local economist, said that the United States may maintain such sanctions as prohibiting jade for Myanmar's jade industry as the industry is complicated and plagued with problems.

"Despite regaining preferential trade benefits under the European Union's GSP program since 2013, the country could not enjoy the benefits completely as the local businesses lack infrastructure, technology for mass production, quality management and financing," U Aung Than Oo, vice president of Myanmar Rice Federation, told Xinhua.

"As for the rice sector, we can afford just 2,000 tons of broken rice exports to the EU per month," he explained.

As a consequence, the Southeast Asian country has a limited competitive capacity in exploring global markets than other regional countries. In fact, the country is mainly depending on its neighboring countries for its export, U Aung Than Oo added.

"Myanmar will miss the chance if it does not enhance the country's productivity, trade and financial transaction systems," Ag Ko Ko also said.

The Obama administration will make a power transition later and U.S. foreign policy to Myanmar may change in accordance with the new government. Therefore, Myanmar needs to be flexible to change and shift as necessary in an effective and timely manner, he explained.

"To meet the criteria of the U.S. GSP program completely, the country will continue implementing the National Export Strategy and with an emphasis on quality management of major export items," U Aung Soe, director general of the Ministry of Commerce, told Xinhua.

The United States also lifted restrictions on Myanmar's financial institutions and certain transactions related to U.S. individuals living in the country were allowed in May this year. Seven state-owned enterprises and three state-owned banks were removed from the U.S. blacklist.

Meanwhile in May, the United States toughened restrictions on six Myanmar companies which are linked to local giant Asia World company, for the purpose of galvanizing further democratic reforms and maintaining pressure on targeted individuals, entities and the military.

Overall the United States has only 17 businesses with trade here amounting 248.216 million U.S. dollars as of August of this fiscal year 2016-2017. Bilateral trade relations restarted after a civilian government was formed in 2011. The bilateral trade value reached 196.902 million U.S. dollars in the previous fiscal year 2015-2016, which is comparatively less than with other countries.

During the former government's era, U.S. investments were made through third-party countries due to restrictions, limiting Myanmar's access to trade and income.

Lifting sanctions will create a better investment environment, said U Aung Naing Oo, director general of Directorate of Investment and Company Administration (DICA).
CANBERRA, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has warned Parliamentary colleagues that going out of their way to ostracize Muslims is 'playing into the hands' of extremist terror groups such as Islamic State (IS).

Turnbull made the plea to MPs and Senators on Friday after two members of the Australian Parliament raised concerns over Muslim immigration and their place in Australian society.

"Tagging all Muslims with the crimes of a few is fundamentally wrong and it's also counter-productive," Turnbull told Macquarie Radio on Friday.

"Seeking to demonize or denigrate all Muslims or seek to alienate all Muslims and suggest they're somehow not part of Australia, or shouldn't be in Australia, is exactly what the extremists and terrorists are saying to the Muslim community."

Turnbull's comments come after controversial One Nation Senator Pauline Hanson took aim at Australia's immigration policy. she called for a ban on Muslin immigration to Australia as the nation is at risk of being "swamped" by those of Islamic faith.

She was later joined by lower House MP George Christensen who questioned why some factions of the Islamic society are hesitant to embrace "Australian vales".

"Why did they choose to come to Australia in the first place?" Christensen said in Parliament on Thursday.

"It is not necessary to travel halfway around the world to come to Australia and demand that Australians change their culture, their society and their laws to match those of their former homeland."

Turnbull said Australia is renowned for being one of the world's leading "multi-cultural" societies, and that Muslims - like Australians of every other faith and background - contribute to the Australian culture.

"We are the most successful multi-cultural society in the world, Australian Muslims are part of that successful multicultural society," Turnbull told Macquarie Radio on Friday.
MONTEVIDEO, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- China has scored remarkable progress in agricultural development and offers valuable experience for Uruguay to learn from, said Tabare Aguerre, the South American country's minister of livestock, agriculture and fishing.

In a Thursday report by the state-run Uypress news agency about Uruguayan President Tabare Vazquez's expected trip to China next month, Aguerre was quoted as saying that while accompanying the president in China, he will visit the central province of Henan.

Henan resembles Uruguay's agricultural departments of Canelones and San Jose, "except that it has 100 million inhabitants, and sells food to the rest of China," added the minister, whose country has a population of 3.3 million.

Noting that "China has significantly developed its irrigation industry," he said that for "the great future transformation of our agriculture, we are keen to" boost dialogue and cooperation with China in that area.

According to the minister, during Vazquez's expected trip to China, the two sides are poised to sign a series of trade accords.

"China is Uruguay's main market for many products, which is why we have given it strategic and essential importance" in trade cooperation, Aguerre was quoted as saying.
China's space lab Tiangong-2 roars into the air on the back of a Long March-2F rocket from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China, Sept. 15, 2016. (Xinhua/Ju Zhenhua)

BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- China on Thursday hurled its first Tiangong-2 lab into space, marking another step forward in the country's plans to establish a permanent station by the early 2020s.

China's rapid development in space exploration within the past decade has impressed the world. Martin Barstow, director of Leicester Institute of Space & Earth Observation at the University of Leicester, told Xinhua in a recent interview that China's developing space program is another major milestone towards establishing a permanent presence in space.

"The earlier success of the first space station (Tiangong-1) shows how the program is developing and the new space laboratory will continue to add to China's status as a major space power," the professor said.

Former NASA astronaut Leroy Chiao, the first Chinese-American to be commander of the International Space Station, hailed Tiangong-2 as "another significant step for China's human spaceflight program."

"China is moving in a very deliberate and orderly fashion to advance their space capability," Chiao said. "I think the technology is good, and they are moving to get more operational experience through TG-2, before the beginning of space station construction."

Barstow also spoke highly of China's space capability, saying "China is already a key player in the international space industry," and Tiangong-2 will "enhance" its well-developed space capability.

Gao Yang, director of Surrey Technology for Autonomous Systems and Robotics (STAR) Lab, said manned spaceflight is of indicative significance in space technology, and China's rapid development in this area is well-known.

British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) said in an article published on Thursday that "Beijing has made space exploration a national priority and is the third country, after the Soviet Union and the U.S., to put astronauts into space."

INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION NEEDED

In different interviews Xinhua carried with space experts, all mentioned the need for international cooperation in space exploration. Space station programs have always been a cradle for countries to work together, Gao said.

Such collaboration has been vividly reflected in the Tiangong-2 mission, which carries, among a number of scientific experiments, an astrophysics detector that is the first space-science experiment built jointly by China with European countries.

POLAR, dedicated to establishing whether the photons from Gama ray bursts (GRBs) -- thought to be a particularly energetic type of stellar explosion -- are polarized, was built largely with Swiss funding, and with the collaboration of Swiss, China and Polish scientists and support from the European Space Agency (ESA), according to the British journal Nature.

POLAR project manager Nicolas Produit, who spoke to Nature, said U.S. law bars NASA from doing joint projects with China's space agencies, but the Chinese Academy of Sciences is discussing a number of other collaborative space projects with the ESA.

Gregory Kulacki, senior analyst and China project manager at the U.S.-based Union of Concerned Scientists' Global Security Program, said that it is encouraging that China intends to solicit international participation in its space station project.

"My hope is that the United States and China will, at an appropriate time in the future, find a way to cooperate in the peaceful exploration of space instead of competing to turn it into a battlefield, as they are now," he said.

Chiao said international coperation is "a common point of interest that helps improve overall relationships. The International Space Station is a great example of that. Many nations came together to build the amazing facility, and we are working together to further science. This helps to improve overall relations between the member countries."

Barstow believed that more and more countries are seeing the importance of space activity but this will not turn into a race. He said that to benefit smaller economies, a growth of space activity across the world will need to be nurtured by the major agencies like ESA, NASA, the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscomos) and China National Space Administration (CNSA).

CHINA'S AMBITIOUS SPACE PROGRAM

China has been actively developing a three-step manned space program since the first decade of the 21st century.

The program's first mission took place in 1999 with the launch of the Shenzhou-1 to examine the performance and reliability of the launcher and verify key technologies relating to capsule connection and separation, heat prevention, control and landing.

The first step, to send an astronaut into space and return safely, was fulfilled by Yang Liwei in the Shenzhou-5 mission in 2003.

The second step was developing advanced space flight techniques and technologies including extra-vehicular activity and orbital docking. This phase also includes the launch of two space laboratories -- effectively mini space-stations that can be manned on a temporary basis.

The next step will be to assemble and operate a permanent manned space station.

China will begin building a space station that is more economically efficient and uses more data than the current International Space Station (ISS), starting as early as 2017, chief engineer of China's manned space program Zhou Jianping told Xinhua on Thursday.

With the ISS set to retire in 2024, the Chinese space station will offer a promising alternative, and it will make China the only country to have a permanent space station after the ISS.

Related:

China's space lab Tiangong-2 blasts off

JIUQUAN, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- China on Thursday launched space lab Tiangong-2 into space, paving the way for a permanent space station the country plans to build around 2022.

In a cloud of brown smoke, Tiangong-2 roared into the air underneath a mid-autumn full moon from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on the back of a Long March-2F rocket, trailing a vast volume of flame. Full story

China acquires basic technology for manned lunar missions: chief engineer

JIUQUAN, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- China has acquired the basic technology to carry out manned lunar missions, chief engineer of China's manned space program Zhou Jianping said Thursday.

Compared with current missions, the technology used for manned lunar missions are more complex, Zhou said. Full story

China Exclusive: China to begin building space station in 2017: chief engineer

JIUQUAN, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- China will begin building a space station that is more economically efficient and uses more data than the current International Space Station (ISS), starting as early as 2017, chief engineer of China's manned space program Zhou Jianping told Xinhua Thursday.

"Once the space lab mission comes to an end, China will start building our own space station," he said, adding that China will launch a core module of the space station around 2018. Full story

Tiangong-2 "another significant step" for building China's space station: U.S. experts

WASHINGTON, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- China on Thursday took "another significant step" towards building a manned space station around 2020 with the successful launch of its second experimental space laboratory, U.S. space experts said.
BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- A police officer responding to a robbery report killed a 13-year-old black boy with a BB gun later Wednesday in Columbus, the capital city of Ohio, police said on Thursday.

According to Columbus police's statement, Bryan Mason, a police officer who shot and killed a man in 2012, was investigating a report of an armed robbery of 10 U.S. dollars Wednesday night when Tyre King, a 13-year-old black boy, pulled a BB gun from his waistband. The police officer fired and the boy pronounced dead in hospital after the shooting.

Andrew Ginther, Mayor of Columbus, said "there is something wrong in this country, and it is bringing its epidemic to our city streets," regarding the death of the boy a "call to action for our entire community."

There has been no evidence that Tyre King is related to the robbery.

The family of the boy called for a fair and independent investigation into his death.

Columbus police said on their Facebook account that the officer involved did not have a body cam when shooting the boy, which may make the investigation difficult.

People gathered on Thursday near the scene of the shooting, some of them carrying signs calling for justice for Tyre, according to a report by the Associated Press.

The public is comparing Tyre's death to the fatal shooting of a 12-year-old black boy in 2014 in the state while Columbus police rejected the comparison, saying that "the only thing similar in nature is the age, race and outcome."

Agence France-Presse said citing officials that Tyre's death "marked the 13th police-involved shooting in Columbus so far this year, five of which have resulted in deaths of suspects and another that killed an officer."

The black boy's death was preceded by several police-involved fatal shootings across the United States this year. These shootings put the use of force by police into question and some of them have prompted protests against racial discrimination and obsession with guns.

On Aug. 13, a confrontation between police and protestors turned violent in Milwaukee in the north central U.S. state of Wisconsin, after a police officer shot and killed an armed 23-year-old man.

On July 17, three gunmen killed three police officers and wounded several others in a shooting incident in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. One gunman was shot dead by the police, and the other two are still on the run.

On July 7, a 25-year-old sniper named Micah Johnson ambushed and killed five police officers and wounded seven others and two civilians in downtown Dallas, Texas. He was shot dead by the police.

On July 5, two black men were shot dead by police in Louisiana and Minnesota, which sparked angry protests by African Americans across the nation against police brutality and racial discrimination.

On March 27, a native American woman was killed by an Arizona police officer. The shooting has prompted protests by native American activists.
HANOI, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Four officials of Vietnam's National Oil and Gas Group (PetroVietnam) Construction Joint Stock Corporation (PVC) were prosecuted, said the Ministry of Public Security (MPS) on Friday.

According to a statement issued by the ministry, the MPS's police investigation agency is investigating and verifying violations that cause economic loss of nearly 3.3 trillion Vietnamese dong (some 148 million U.S. dollars) in PVC.

A case on deliberately acting against state regulations on economic management causing serious consequences and four PVC officials were prosecuted.

These officials who also faced detention and search warrants included former PVC general director Vu Duc Thuan, deputy general director Nguyen Manh Tien, former deputy general director Truong Quoc Dung and former chief accountant Pham Tien Dat.

Currently, the case is under expanded investigation, said the ministry.

In a related move, PVC former general director Trinh Xuan Thanh during 2007-2013 period was dismissed from the post of the national assembly deputy in July and expelled from the party membership on Thursday.

In early June, local media reported a private Lexus car worth over 5 billion Vietnamese dong (224,215 U.S. dollars), which was used by Thanh with a public service number plate.

Local media reports focused on three issues. Firstly, the car that picks Thanh up is a private car but holds public service number plate. Secondly, there has been a serious loss in PVC where Thanh worked as leader in 2007 and 2013. Thirdly, despite such loss, Thanh was appointed to become vice chairman of Vietnam's southern Hau Giang people's committee.
SYDNEY, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- An African acrobat accused of having unprotected sex with several Aussie women while being infected with HIV has had his Australian permanent residency cancelled and faces deportation, local media reported Friday.

A spokesman for Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said that 38-year-old Godfrey Zaburoni had failed the character test under section 501 of the Migration Act and is currently awaiting deportation to his native country, Zimbabwe.

Zaburoni who arrived in Australia in 1997 was accused of having unprotected sex with at least 12 Australian women, between 2007 to 2008 including with his Gold Coast ex-girlfriend of two years, without informing them of his medical condition.

It was earlier reported that he was diagnosed with the disease in 1998 while touring with a circus in Adelaide.

The former Australia Got Talent participant was originally sentenced to a nine-and-a-half year's jail term in 2013 by the Southport District court after becoming the second person in Queensland to be convicted of intentionally infecting someone with HIV.

However, in April the High Court overturned Zaburoni's sentencing after finding no evidence that he had intended to infect his girlfriend deliberately with the virus.

Zaburoni was then re-sentenced on a lesser charge, a five-year suspended sentence and had been released from prison with expectations that he would face deportation soon.

On Friday, without specifying on the timeline, News Corp reports that Zaburoni has been detained by immigration officials on Thursday night and will face deportation to Zimbabwe soon.
BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping and his Latvian counterpart, Raimonds Vejonis, exchanged congratulatory message on Monday to mark the 25th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between their two countries.

Noting that political, trade and cultural ties have expanded over the past 25 years since the establishment of diplomatic relations, Xi said China is ready to work together with Latvia to further consolidate their friendship on the basis of mutual respect and understanding.

Xi also called on the two sides to take the 25th anniversary of their diplomatic ties as a new starting point to further deepen cooperation in various fields.

Vejonis, for his part, said that Latvia-China relations have been progressing positively over the past 25 years.

Relations between the two countries are at an all-time high, as evidenced by frequent high-level exchanges and ever-strengthening cooperation in various fields, Vejonis said.

Noting that bilateral cooperation is full of opportunities, the Latvian president expressed the belief that Latvia-China cooperation at the bilateral, regional and international levels will witness even more remarkable achievements.
SUVA, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Tonga's Minister for Internal Affairs Sosefo Fe'aomoeata Vakata has been fired for alleged misconduct, local newspaper Nuku'alofa Times reported on Friday.

Vakata lost his cabinet seat on Sept. 13 following a recommendation made by Prime Minister Akilisi Pohiva to King Tupou VI, the Prime Minister's Office has confirmed.

King Tupou VI has accepted Pohiva's recommendation for Vakata's sacking pursuant to the constitution, the Prime Minister's Office said in a statement.

The prime minister's call for Vakata to resign was based on a letter of complaint lodged with the Prime Minister's Office by Acting Deputy Director of the Women's Division of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Tupou'ahau Fakakovikaetau, who had alleged that Vakata swore at her and threw a wine glass at her face and wounded her upper lip in late July.

Fakakovikaetau was treated at a hospital, and a doctor's report was attached to her letter of complaint, according to the Nuku'alofa Times.

Vakata was reported to be angry with the senior staff after she had sent a junior staff to an agriculture show without his approval.
BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and his Latvian counterpart Maris Kucinskis exchanged congratulatory messages to mark the 25th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties between the two countries.

In the message sent on Monday, Li said that the bilateral relationship has witnessed sound and stable development due to efforts on both sides since the establishment of the diplomatic relations 25 years ago.

China is willing to take the 25th anniversary as an opportunity to deepen ties in various fields and advance China-Latvia relations and China-CEE (Central and Eastern European) cooperation, he said.

The Latvian prime minister said in his message that Latvia-China relations have reached their highest level yet over the past few years, and economic and trade ties have deepened.

Kucinskis said that his government will strive to maintain the good momentum of bilateral relations and continue to advance Latvia-China and CEE-China cooperation.
Chinese Ambassador to Zimbabwe Huang Ping speaks at the hand-over ceremony, Sept. 15, 2016. (Xinhua/Zhang Yuliang)

HARARE, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Zimbabwe has received rice from China to help alleviate hunger after a drought that has left up to 4 million Zimbabweans in need of food aid.

Chinese Ambassador to Zimbabwe Huang Ping on Thursday handed over 5,500 tonnes of rice that have arrived in the country, which is part of the total 19,000 tonnes worth 24.6 million U.S. dollars donated by the Chinese government to Zimbabwe.

In his remarks, Huang said the donation was in fulfillment of the drought relief pledge made to affected African countries by Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) summit held in South Africa last December.

"Today's event again testifies the strong ties between China and Zimbabwe as all-weather partners, especially in the area of food security and agriculture," he said.

China had provided five consignments of emergency food aid to Zimbabwe over the last 10 years worth millions of U.S. dollars to help the country cope with food shortages, he added.

He said in support of Zimbabwe's efforts to ensure national food security, China would this year donate 10,000 tonnes of urea fertilizer to benefit farmers who will take part in a government maize production scheme targeting to produce 2 million tonnes of maize.

Zimbabwean Minister of Public Service, Labor and Social Welfare Prisca Mupfumira, who received the rice on behalf of government, thanked China for the donation.

She said the rice would be distributed to vulnerable groups who include orphans and the elderly.

"The Government of Zimbabwe is indeed grateful for your donation as this will go a long way in alleviating food shortages among vulnerable groups," the minister said.
RIO DE JANEIRO, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- Brazil's former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva made on Thursday an emotional speech challenging the prosecutors who denounced him for corruption and money laundering to find any evidence against him.

On Wednesday, prosecutors accused Lula, who served as president from 2003 to 2010, of leading a vast corruption ring at Brazilian oil company Petrobras.

In response, Lula said there is no concrete evidence against him in the document and challenged the prosecutors to find evidence that he indeed committed corruption crimes.

"Prove one act of corruption of mine and I will go to prison by myself, on foot," he said.

He also criticized the fact that, at one moment, prosecutors said they "had conviction" Lula is the mastermind of a large corruption scheme at Petrobras, but at another moment they said they did not have "definitive evidence" of Lula's involvement.

"How do they summon a press conference in a hotel, spend government money for that, to present the proof of a crime, but by the end say 'we have no proof, but we have conviction'?" he said.

"I have a clear conscience. I know where I came from, where I go, who helped me, who wants me to go away and who wants me to return," he added.

Calling the charges "judicial persecution", Lula dismissed them as an attempt to end his political career.

"As we were starting to have success in the presidency, they are trying to do with us what they did with Dilma (Rousseff, the former president impeached in August). A part of the press and a part of the judiciary already tried to oust me from the presidency in 2005," argued Lula.

"What sparked this anger was the success of our government, the best policy of social inclusion, the best policy of educational inclusion in this country," he added.

Lula did not deny or confirm definitely his intentions to run for president again in 2018. Though Lula has a strong rejection rate, he would be the most likely candidate to win 2018 presidential elections, according to a new poll in 2016 released on Friday by the Vox Populi Institute.

According to the charge sheet, the former president owns an apartment in the coastal city of Guaruja, near Sao Paulo, which was renovated for free by OAS, a construction company involved in the corruption ring. It also alleges that Lula owns an undeclared property in Atibaia, a municipality in the state of Sao Paulo.

Investigators estimate Lula received benefits worth 3.7 million reais (about 1.1 million U.S. dollars) from OAS in total.

Lula's wife, Marisa Leticia Lula da Silva, president of the Lula Institute Paulo Okamotto, and five OAS executives were also accused.

The former president also complained his family had not been treated with respect.

"They entered into the house of my son, who has never participated in politics, as if he was a bandit," he explained.

On Thursday, a Brazilian court condemned a close friend of Lula, businessman Jose Carlos Bumlai, to nine years and ten months in prison for his role in the Petrobras corruption ring.

Joao Vaccari Neto, the former treasurer of the Workers' Party, was jailed for six years and eight months for passive corruption as part of the same sentencing.
BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- A Huawei smart phone that saved its owner by taking a bullet for him in an armed robbery in South Africa has put the spotlight on phones made-in-China. But smart phones are among several kinds of high quality Chinese products and goods that continue to make their presence felt across the globe.

The following are ten kinds of leading Chinese products, ranging from infrastructure and the high-tech industry to home appliances.

-- Bridges. Since the 1088-meter-long Sutong Bridge in Jiangsu Province won a 2014 International Federation of Consulting Engineers (FIDIC) Award, Chinese bridges have continued to win FIDIC awards due to their outstanding quality.

The Beipanjiang Bridge in Guizhou province, southwest China, has just completed construction. Hanging 570 meters above a river, it renewed its record as the world's "highest bridge".

-- Satellites. China has recently made strides with the launch of the world's first quantum satellite "Micius," part of China's Quantum Experiments at the Space Scale (QUESS) program which includes 20 such satellites.

Besides the QUESS program, the well-known Chang'e program, the Chinese Lunar Exploration Program (CLEP), remains ongoing. The first two Chang'e lunar orbiters were launched in 2007 and 2010, the Chang'e 3 landed the Moon in 2013, and the fourth and fifth launches are under preparation.

-- High-speed Railways. A new railway linking Zhengzhou in central China's Henan Province with Xuzhou in eastern Jiangsu Province opened Saturday.

China's high-speed railways now exceeds 20,000 km in length. Based on its home-market success, Chinese bullet trains have won contracts in Indonesia, Russia, Iran and India.

-- Civilian drones. According to China's central TV channel, there are over 400 civilian drone companies in China, with Shenzhen-based drone maker Dajiang leading the industry.

According to the U.S. Small Unmanned Aircraft System, Dajiang drones make up 70 percent of the U.S. market in 2015. The Wall Street Journal called it the first Chinese brand "to pioneer a major new global consumer-product category".

-- Supercomputers. In June, China debuted its new supercomputer called Sunway TaihuLight, replacing its precedent Tianhe-2, which topped the list of the world's fastest supercomputer for three years.

Sunway TaihuLight can perform 93 quadrillion calculations per second, or petaflop/s, twice as fast and three times as efficient as Tianhe-2. Two of the fastest supercomputers in the world are now from China.

-- Hydropower projects. On the back of the Guinea 20,000-franc note, there is a map of the Kaleta hydro-electric dam, which was built by a Chinese company and doubled the energy capacity of the African country.

The Kaleta dam is among a long list of hydropower projects across Asia, Africa and South America constructed by Chinese companies. The source of green energy has lifted millions of people out of poverty.

-- Wind turbines. According to a survey by Japan's Nikkei, half of the growing global demand for wind turbines in 2015 were supplied by Chinese makers.

The leading Chinese wind power company Goldwind has the biggest market share of 12.8 percent, Nikkei said. The Urumqi-based company in northwest China has a presence on six continents.

-- Smart phones. Besides globally known brands such as Huawei, ZTE and Lenovo, the companies Xiaomi, Meizu, Umi and Smartisan are growing at an astonishing speed in overseas markets.

Online observers like Androidpit.com and Pcadvisor.com have both made lists of the best Chinese phones for 2016 and outlined instructions on how to buy and operate those phones.

-- Home appliances. After decades of development, Chinese home appliance makers are not only known for their lower prices but also high-quality.

Washing machine and refrigerator makers Haier and Midea, air conditioner producer Gree, and TV manufactures Hisense and Skyworth are gainning more customers across the world, as well as suprising their foreign counterparts with their ability to innovate.

-- Auto indurstry. As the world's biggest auto market by the number of cars sold, China's home market provides a solid base for the auto industry. But Chinese brands are looking abroad to grow profits.

In 2012, a record of more than one million units were exported from China to overseas markets, according to the China Automobile Dealers Association.

As of September 2014, there were 852 Chinese automotive companies and branches scattered in Europe, the United States, Central Asia and Africa with a total investment of 9.6 billion U.S. dollars, according to the Chinese Ministry of Commerce.
People enjoy lantern shows to celebrate traditional Chinese Mid-autumn Festival, in Guangzhou, capital of south China's Guangdong Province, Sept. 15, 2016. (Xinhua/Wu Lu)

BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Chinese people across the country and overseas celebrated in various ways the traditional Mid-Autumn Festival on Thursday.

Decorative lanterns were lit up in Singapore's Chinatown, which has started month-long celebrations for the festival since early September.

The dazzling lantern display tells the origin of the Mid-Autumn Festival, and this year marks the first time that Chinatown was lit up with LED lanterns, allowing for a more environmentally friendly celebration.

In Nakhon Sawan Province in Thailand, people celebrated the Mid-Autumn Festival by performing a dragon dance.

Nakhon Sawan, some 200 km north of the capital Bangkok, is a province famous for its dragon dance culture and home to many people of Chinese descent. The local dragon team decorated their dragons with colored lights, which allowed for a brilliant show inside a local shrine.

"We added fashionable lights here to combine with the traditional rituals, which make this year's celebration quite special," Said Thanakom Jongjira, governor of Nakhon Sawan.

Celebrations were also held in the United States. In San Francisco's Chinatown, a two-day celebration event was organized to hail the festival.

The Art Institute of Chicago raked through more than 3,500 pieces of art from China and will exhibit a "Chang E" painting finished in the late Yuan Dynasty or early Ming Dynasty (AD 1350-1400). It is believed that the Mid-Autumn Festival, or a harvest festival celebrated on the 15th day of the eighth month in the Chinese calendar, is inspired by the legend of Chang E, the Chinese goddess of the Moon.

The painting was originally painted on a bamboo or wood frame and functioned as a fan.

Some other rare Chinese artworks fresh from the museum's collections will also be displayed during the Mid-Autumn Festival celebration period from Sept. 10 to 18.

Meanwhile, the mooncake, a traditional pastry special regarded as an indispensable delicacy during the festival, has flown off the shelves in many countries.

In Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, a variety of mooncakes were on sale in many shops and supermarkets and drew crowds of customers.

Mom The, marketing executive of the locally well-known Apsara Bakery, said the Mid-Autumn Festival was the best-selling time of the year.

"Since Monday this week, many Cambodians of Chinese descent and Chinese people have flocked to shops to buy moon cakes," he told Xinhua. "They believe that their worship to the moon will bring them fortune and happiness."

This year, the mooncake also hit the shelves in many chain supermarkets in Los Angeles for the first time.

"In recent days, I found that many American supermarkets, like Costco and Vons began selling Chinese mooncakes as well," said Annie Zhang, an Chinese immigrant who has lived in LA County for seven years.

Upon seeing mooncakes at a local supermarket, Zhang said it made her " feel very warm."

Costco, the largest membership-only warehouse club in the United States,began selling mooncakes a month ago. "We have to refill the shelves everyday here," a Costco staff said.

Compared with Asian food retailers, American supermarkets only have limited flavors of mooncakes. Nevertheless, costumers said they tasted very authentic and the prices were acceptable.
PRAIA, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Campaigns for Cape Verde's presidential elections scheduled for Oct. 2 kicked off on Thursday by all the three presidential candidates including incumbent President Jorge Carlos Fonseca.

According to political analysts, Fonseca who is contesting for his second term, is the favourite candidate.

He is supported by the Movement for Democracy which recorded significant electoral victories this year.

Fonseca who is a constitutional lawyer, is contesting against the current vice-chancellor of Mindelo University, Albertino Graca. The latter is not supported by any particular political party.

The third candidate is Jaime Joaquim Monteiro, a former freedom fighter who is running for the presidency for the second time.

The incumbent president won the 2011 presidential elections with 54.3 percent of the votes cast in the second round, against Manuel Inocencio Sousa who was backed by the African Party for the Independence of Cape Verde (PAICV).

This year, PAICV has asked its members to freely vote for their preferred presidential candidate.

At least 361,206 registered voters will be expected to cast their votes.
Israeli security members process the scene of an attempted stabbing outside the Damascus Gate of Jerusalem's Old City, on Sept. 16, 2016. Israeli police said they shot and killed a Jordanian citizen on Friday after he allegedly tried to stab police officers outside East Jerusalem's Old City. (Xinhua/JINI)

JERUSALEM, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Israeli police said they shot and killed a Jordanian citizen on Friday after he allegedly tried to stab police officers outside East Jerusalem's Old City.

The suspect rapidly approached paramilitary Border Police officers near the Damascus Gate, waving a knife at them, Police spokeswoman Luba Samri said.

The suspect, in his 20s, was "neutralized," and a later report confirmed his death, she added.

A year-long spate of violence in Israel and the West Bank has killed at least 230 Palestinians and 34 Israelis.

Israeli leaders accuse the Palestinian National Authority of "inciting" the unrest, while the Palestinians say it is the result of 49 years of Israeli occupation of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip, home to more than five million Palestinians, where they wish to establish their own state.
BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- China, Mongolia and Russia will cooperate in seven areas to build a trilateral economic corridor, according to guidelines released this week.

The three neighbors will improve transport facilities by expanding land, air and sea connections, said the guidelines issued by the National Development and Reform Commission.

They plan to renovate ports of entry and overhaul customs procedures for easier clearance.

The three countries vowed closer cooperation in energy and mineral resources, high tech, manufacturing, agriculture and forestry.

They agreed to expand trade at border regions and widen services trade, and eyed more cooperation in education, science and technology, culture, tourism, medical care and intellectual property.

In addition, they promised to strengthen cooperation in environmental protection and push partnerships of local governments and border regions.

The guidelines were signed in June in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, following a meeting of Chinese, Mongolian and Russian leaders.
BANGKOK, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- The Thai Air Force is looking to procure a new fleet of transport aircraft in near future, an Air Force source said on Friday.

Competition for the planned procurement of new transport planes might probably emerge between Shaanxi Aircraft Corporation Y-9 and Lockheed Martin C-130J Super Hercules, said the source who spoke on condition of anonymity.

However, rivalry might as well arise from a third manufacturing country apart from China and the United States, whereas details of the procurement plan are yet to be formulated, he said.

Retiring Air Force chief Trithod Sonchaeng confirmed earlier that his service was looking to buy a new fleet of turboprop-engined transport aircraft to replace a dozen C-130H Hercules transport planes, deployed by the Thai Air Force since 1980.

His successor, newly-named Air Force chief Jom Roongsawang who is scheduled to assume the post next month, is likely to take into account such aircraft procurement plans, the source said.

Over the last several years, 15 countries have placed orders for 300 C-130J transport planes, in production line at Lockheed Martin since 1996.

Shaanxi Aircraft Corportion modernized the Y-9 as variant from the Y-8 with updated technology in avionics and cargo handling systems.

Myanmar, the western neighbor to Thailand, currently deploys 10 Y-8 transport planes, the predecessor version of the Y-9.

Though funding and time frames for the planned procurement of new transport aircraft are yet to be determined, the ageing fleet of C-130H Hercules will almost certainly be decommissioned in the next several years, the source said.

The C-130J Super Hercules is reported to cost 100 million to 120 million U.S. dollars per unit while the selling price for the Shaanxi Y-9 is not available yet.

Earlier this month, a Shaanxi Y-9 transport plane joined a multi-national, non-combat exercise codenamed AM-HEx 2016 at U-tapao naval air base in eastern Thailand.

The Chinese air force took part in the humanitarian aid and disaster relief exercise alongside those of Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and the host country.

Viewed as a derivative of the Antonov An-12, the Shaanxi Y-9 can carry 25 tons of cargo and 106 passengers or 132 paratroopers.

Late last month, two Russian-built transport planes were delivered to the Thai Air Force. The Sukhoi Superjet 100LR transport planes, each of which was sold for 34 million U.S. dollars, will fly as a passenger plane for members of the Royal Household and other VIPs.

They were meant to join the Air Force's Boeing 737 and Airbus aircraft currently deployed on similar purposes.

Meanwhile, the new Thai Air Force chief is expected to consider buying another four Saab JAS 39 Gripen fighters to add to an existing squadron of a dozen multi-role combat aircraft of the same type from Sweden.

The Air Force has 12 Gripen fighters at Air Wing 7 in the southern Surat Thani province. The Gripen squadron was procured in 2008 to replace the U.S.-made F-5E Tiger fighters.

The Swedish fighter is reported to cost about 69 million U.S. dollars per unit.
VIENTIANE, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Twenty Lao companies will be selected as sub-contractors for construction work on the Laos-China railway, Lao daily Vientiane Times reported on Friday.

"These companies must be sub-contracted by Chinese companies, who will supervise their work and provide technical assistance to ensure high quality workmanship," said the report.

Director of the Laos-China Railway construction project and Director of the Lao National Railway Company, Koung Souk-Aloun, told media on Thursday, "We will try to ensure that this multi-billion project benefits local companies as well."

"The tasks that require very high technology, such as drilling tunnels, will of course need to be given to Chinese companies. But work that involves soil levelling, concrete and other processes that do not require advanced technology can be granted to Lao companies," he added.

Lao authorities are committed to working with the Chinese to ensure that work that can be undertaken by Lao companies will be allocated to them, according to the report.

Deputy Minister of Public Works and Transport, Lattanamany Khounnivong, told a meeting held at Lao People's Revolutionary Party Central Committee Office in Lao capital Vientiane last month that the railway will entail the use of sophisticated technologies.

This includes work related to tunnels, bridges, communication systems, and railroad track construction. The Lao Construction Association had put forward the names of 75 Lao companies for selection as sub-contractors, but only 20 were chosen.

"Agreement signings with six Chinese construction companies and six consultancy firms will be finalized next month, which will pave the way for the start of construction in December," said the report.

China has agreed to pursue agreements signed between the governments of both nations in which Lao companies will contribute to the supply of construction materials, machinery, labor, and food.

The two sides have agreed to set up a joint venture company to oversee the project with Laos holding 30 percent of the project share and China being responsible for the remainder, according to the report.

The Lao government has highlighted the significance of the railway in transforming Laos from a landlocked country to a land link and attracting more foreign investment and tourists to the country.

The railroad will also serve to boost production in Laos, both for export and to spur economic growth in general.

The planned single track Laos-China railway with a 1.435-metre standard-gauge rail network would have 33 stations, of which 21 would be operational initially, according to Lao Ministry of Public Works and Transport.

There will be 72 tunnels with a total length of 183.9 km, representing 43 percent of the project's total length. The line will also have 170 bridges of 69.2 km, accounting for 15.8 percent.

Passenger trains will travel at a speed of 160 km per hour, while the speed of rail freight will be 120 km per hour.

The railway in Laos will link with the track in Thailand to form part of the regional rail link known as the Kunming-Singapore railway, covering a total distance of some 3,000 km.
ABCNews.com(FAIRFAX, Va.) -- Making her campaign trail debut for Hillary Clinton, First Lady Michelle Obama ripped into Donald Trump without directly naming him while also laying out her case for supporting Hillary Clinton as one of the most qualified people who had ever endeavored to become president."



No one in our lifetime has ever had as much experience and exposure to the presidency. Not Barack, not Bill, as he would say, nobody, and yes, she happens to be a woman, the first lady said to a roaring applause at an event in Fairfax, Virginia.



So, we can not afford squander this opportunity, particularly given the alternative. Because here is what we know: That being president isn't anything like reality TV. It is not about sending insulting tweets or making fiery speeches, she continued.



The first lady, previously dubbed the closer for her effectiveness as a campaign surrogate during her husbands presidential campaigns, was at one point interrupted by chants of four more years as she talked about the bittersweet feelings she is experiencing as her husbands final term in office draws to a close.



On a day that has been dominated by Trump saying that he believes President Obama was born in the United States after stoking a conspiracy theory for the past five years that he was possibly born outside the country, the first lady also addressed the so-called birther controversy.



"There were those who continued to question for the past eight years up through this very day whether my husband was even born in this country. Well, during his time in office, I think Barack has answered those questions with the example he set by going high when they go low," the first lady said.



Calling for steady and measured leadership, Mrs. Obama said its excruciatingly clear that theres only one person in the race that can be trusted with the keys to the White House.



If a candidate is erratic and threatening, if a candidate traffics in project, fears, and lies on the trail, if a candidate has no clear plans to implement their goals, if they disrespect their fellow citizens including folks who made extraordinary sacrifices for our country, let me tell you, that is who they are, she said.



Hillary is one of the few people on this entire planet, and clearly the only person in this race that has any idea what this job entails, she added of Clinton.

Copyright  2016, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.
by Larry Neild

MANCHESTER, Britain, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Former British Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne was Friday named as chairman of a new regional body in England to spearhead the Northern Powerhouse.

Osborne, creator of the powerhouse strategy to tackle the north-south divide in England, will head the new Northern Powerhouse Partnership. The think-tank is made up of regional politicians and northern business leaders.

It is his first major initiative since losing his job as chancellor when new prime minister Theresa May rebuilt her front-bench team after succeeding David Cameron at 10 Downing Street.

Osborne, who remains as a member of parliament (MP) for the wealthy constituency of Tatton in the South Manchester stockbroker belt came up with the idea of a Northern Powerhouse as a way of competing with the London and the south east.

The idea is that if northern towns and cities pool their collective strengths they can challenge the London economic powerhouse.

As chancellor he promoted the idea of sub regional devolution, with directly elected metro mayors, in major cities such as Manchester and Liverpool, backed by lucrative spending powers worth hundreds of millions of U.S. dollars.

Osborne said chairing the new partnership will now be a major focus of his political energies, adding: "The northern powerhouse is here to stay."

Writing in the Sun newspaper Friday, Osborne commented: "The north/south divide has been a problem in our country for decades -- and no one's been able to fix it. But that doesn't mean it can't be solved."

The new think-tank will be a not-for-profit organization that will supply ideas to help create jobs and raise living standards in the north of England.
Chinese Consul General in Houston Li Qiangmin speaks at a briefing on the outcomes of the G20 summit in Houston, the United States, Sept. 16, 2016. The recent G20 Hangzhou summit and the meeting between the Chinese and U.S. presidents have unleashed fresh opportunities for cooperation between China and southern U.S. states, Li Qiangmin said Thursday. (Xinhua/Jia Zhong)

HOUSTON, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- The recent G20 Hangzhou summit and the meeting between the Chinese and U.S. presidents have unleashed fresh opportunities for cooperation between China and southern U.S. states, a senior Chinese diplomat said Thursday.

The meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping and his U.S. counterpart, Barack Obama on the sidelines of the two-day summit, signaled joint efforts to push the bilateral relations through the U.S. election year smoothly and build a sound foundation for the next stage, said Chinese Consul General in Houston Li Qiangmin.

With expanding common interests and intertwined economies, China and the Untied States need to create healthier, more friendly and sustainable cultural and business environment for each other, Li said at a briefing on the outcomes of the G20 summit held on Sept. 4-5 in east China.

Li called for fair, just and convenient access to U.S. market for Chinese companies, saying it will benefit the United States in terms of jobs and taxes.

The diplomat also urged U.S. government and congress to lift bans on exporting high-tech and liquefied natural gas to his country, which he said, would help narrow the trade deficit between China and the United States.

On cooperation between China and southern U.S. states, Li said the two sides should focus their efforts especially on energy, infrastructure and agriculture, among other fields.

Noting that almost every of the eight southern U.S. states saw an increase between 200 percent and 300 percent of growth rate in export of services to China, Li said China's structural adjustment to the service sector offers numerous business opportunities.

Besides, he said, innovation, a highlight of the G20 gathering, has been the new engine for China-U.S. cooperation. Texas is home to top innovation hubs like Austin and Houston, while, China is at a prime time of mass entrepreneurship and innovation and welcomes U.S. high-tech and startup companies.

Environmental protection and the fight against climate change can also become bright spots in bilateral cooperation, he said, noting Texas and other southern states have both advanced technology and experience in this regard.

It's promising for American green business to invest and exploit in this field in China, he said.

Li also stressed cooperation in people-to-people exchange, saying that the total number of two-way visits between China and the United States reaches 4.75 million annually. According to a U.S. study, tourism is projected to produce more than 70,000 jobs for both countries annually.

The U.S. southern states are among the Chinese people's favorite travel destinations, Li said.
JERUSALEM, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Israel's military said troops shot dead two Palestinians after the pair attempted to drive over soldiers in the West Bank.

A statement by the military Spokesperson's Unit said that a "ramming attack" was thwarted near Kiryat Arba, a Jewish settlement near the flashpoint Hebron city.

A later statement confirmed that the suspects were dead. Local media reported that three soldiers sustained very light injuries.

The incident occurred less than an hour after Israeli police officers shot and killed a Jordanian youth who allegedly tried to stab them.

The man, in his twenties, pulled out two knives at Border Police outside East Jerusalem's Old City and was shot dead, according to police spokeswoman Luba Samri.

A year-long spate of violence in Israel and the West Bank has killed at least 230 Palestinians and 34 Israelis.

Israeli leaders accuse the Palestinian National Authority of "inciting" the unrest, while the Palestinians say it is the result of 49 years of Israeli occupation of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip, home to more than five million Palestinians, where they wish to establish their own state.
Two lovers picnic in London, Britain on Sept. 13, 2016. (Xinhua/Han Yan)

LONDON, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Young people in London aged 15 to 24 were Thursday urged to practice safe sex after results showed their age group accounted for 36 percent of sexually transmitted diseases (STIs) in Britain's capital.

Rates among young Londoners were high in STIs such as gonorrhoea, chlamydia, genital warts, genital herpes and syphilis all being diagnosed.

Public Health England (PHE) London is raising awareness of STIs among young Londoners as part of the Family Planning Association's Sexual Health Week, taking place this week.

Statistics show that from 2011 to 2015 new diagnoses of syphilis and gonorrhoea in 15 to 24 year olds in London increased by 128 percent and 61 percent respectively. Genital herpes also rose by 4 percent, with STIs affecting more than 42,000 young Londoners.

PHE said in a statement Thursday: "To reduce the number of STIs, it is important that young Londoners are familiar with the PHE recommendations for safe sexual health. These include annual STI screening and on change of sexual partner, as well as the need for re-testing after a positive chlamydia diagnosis.

Dr Yvonne Doyle, regional director for PHE London, said: "These figures show that too many young people in London are continuing to have unsafe sex, putting themselves at unnecessary risk of contracting STIs.

"Young people tend to have more sexual partners and are more likely to have unsafe sex. These factors mean they are at increased risk of contracting STIs and becoming re-infected," said Doyle.

As part of Sexual Health Week, the FPA surveyed more than 2,000 people across Britain to find out what they know and think about safe sex and STI testing.

Among 16 to 24-year-olds who have been sexually active, they found almost half have never had an STI test, while 28 percent said buying condoms can be embarrassing

Only one-third said they learnt how to confidently talk to a partner about using condoms during their sex and relationships education

Dr Doyle added: "Young people reported being more worried about going for a sexual health check, with both embarrassment and the fear of people finding out being of particular concern."

FPA's Chief Executive, Natika H Halil, said: "One huge problem is we still don't have statutory sex and relationships education, which means many young people are not given the opportunity to develop skills which can help them safely navigate sexual relationships."

London-based sexual health expert Dr Patrick French said: "Worsening sexual health remains one of the biggest public health concerns facing London, which is why it is a priority."
JAKARTA, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Singapore has given assurance that Indonesians, who have assets in the city-state and plan to join Jakarta's tax amnesty program, will not be investigated for suspicious acts, the Indonesian finance minister said on Friday.

Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati made the remarks after Indonesian taxpayers voiced concern that the government of Singapore will report them as criminals should they join the Indonesia's tax relaxation program.

The minister said she has already contacted Singaporean Deputy Prime Minister Taman Shanmugaratnam and the monetary authority of Singapore, saying that such information is not valid.

The government of Singapore plans to facilitate and will not hamper Indonesians from participating in the tax amnesty program, Sri Mulyani said.

"Because this is a very serious matter, I checked it directly to the government of Singapore. It was stressed that Indonesians who have assets in Singapore and is planning to join tax amnesty program, are not considered as suspicious transactions. So it is not an illegal act," she said.

Indonesia launched the tax amnesty program in July in an effort to repatriate a huge asset parked overseas and encourage tax payers at domestic to declare assets.

Most of Indonesians' funds are parked in Singapore private banks with a total amount of about 200 billions U.S. dollars, or 40 percent of the nation's private banking assets.

The asset repatriation is aimed in part at financing the government's deficit in development budget following shortages on tax revenues.

A total of 22.7 trillion rupiah (some 2.3 billion U.S. dollars) of tax amnesty revenue has been collected as of Friday or 14 percent of the target of 165 trillion rupiah (about 16.5 billion U.S. dollars).
ISLAMABAD, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- At least 16 people were killed and 23 others injured in a suicide blast at a mosque in Pakistan's northwestern tribal region of Mohmand Agency on Friday afternoon, officials said.

Naveed Akbar, assistant political agent of the region, said the incident took place when a suicide bomber entered the mosque and exploded his explosives laden vest amid people who were offering Friday prayer in Paye Khan village in Anbar area in Mohmand Agency, a tribal area bordering Afghanistan.

Police, security forces and rescue teams rushed to the site and shifted the bodies and injured to the central hospital of Mohmand Agency.

The seriously injured are being referred to the hospitals in cities of Peshawar and Charsadda.

According to some local reports, around 70 to 80 people were offering prayer at the mosque when the blast took place.

Security forces have cordoned off the area and launched a search operation to arrest the suicide bomber's facilitators who dropped him nearby the mosque.

The bomb disposal squad said around five to seven km of explosives along with ball bearings was used in the blast.

No group has claimed the attack yet.

Earlier on Sept. 2, at least 14 people including six lawyers and two policemen were killed and 52 others injured in a suicide attack at district courts in Pakistan's northwestern district of Mardan.

On Sept. 13, police foiled a terrorist attack at a mosque during Eid prayer when two suicide bombers attempted to enter a mosque in Shikarpur district in the country's southern province of Sindh.

At least 13 people were injured when one of the suicide bombers exploded his jacket after policemen shot him, while the second bomber was arrested by the policemen.
LHASA, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- The 11th Panchen Lama Bainqen Erdini Qoigyijabu has performed a series of religious and social activities in Tibet Autonomous Region during the past two months.

The Panchen Lama went to Ngor Monastery in Xigaze on Thursday, paying respects to Buddha and giving head-touch blessings to believers.

From July 21 to 24, a four-day Kalachakra (wheel of time) ritual was held in the New Palace of the Panchen Lama at the request of monks from the Zhaxi Lhunbo Lamasery, the home temple of Panchen Lamas, in Xigaze. It was the first large-scale kalachakra ritual held in Tibet for 60 years.

On July 29, the Panchen Lama travelled to his hometown Nagchu Prefecture by train and was warmly received by a cavalry troop and more than 2,500 local residents.

He visited students in a special education school and some poor families in Nagchu, and carried out religious rites in two local monasteries. Over 70,000 residents joined the religious activities.

On August 15, the Panchen Lama visited the regional Tibetan medicine hospital in Lhasa. He stressed the importance of developing Tibetan medicine, a precious legacy of Tibetan culture.

He went to Nyingchi City on August 18 and performed religious rites in several local monasteries.

At a meeting with Buddhist scholars from the Tibetan branch of the Buddhist Association of China, he said the living conditions of monks and nuns had improved and people's religious freedom had been fully protected in Tibet.

He urged Tibetan Buddhists to pass down good religious traditions and contribute to social harmony and stability.

The Panchen Lama will continue religious and social activities in Xigaze.

Enthroned 21 years ago, the Panchen Lama serves as vice president of the Buddhist Association of China and a member of the Standing Committee of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, the country's top political advisory body.
BRATISLAVA, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- The leaders of 27 European Union (EU) countries want to showcase their unity and prove that the bloc is a unique project, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico said upon arrival at an informal EU summit held in Bratislava Friday.

The gathering, aimed at restoring public faith in the EU, was called an "informal" summit, because any formal one has to include Britain until it leaves the union.

It was necessary to hold a meeting following Britain's referendum to leave the EU, Fico said, adding the 27 leaders will have a very sincere discussion on the state of the union and the "most important issues" in the upcoming half a year.

"I am positive that the summit will be a success from this viewpoint," he said.

Slovak Foreign and European Affairs Minister Miroslav Lajcak said that the EU has been losing the support of its citizens.

"Many populist and xenophobic political parties have won public support. We should stop this trend as soon as possible," Lajcak stressed.

The Slovak capital is hosting the leaders of all EU member states, excluding Britain for the first time.

The first session of the summit will be dedicated to comparing notes on the current situation in the EU, while the second will focus on specific steps that need to be taken in the next few months. The two sessions will be separated by an informal lunch during a boat trip on the Danube River, where the delegates will discuss the fallout of Brexit.
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg(L, front), German Chancellor Angela Merkel(C, front) and French President Francois Hollande(R, front) watch the air show during the opening ceremony of the NATO summit in Warsaw, Poland on July 8, 2016. (Xinhua/Shi Zhongyu)

BERLIN, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- The German cabinet approved a mandate on Wednesday offering military assistance in the NATO-led maritime security operation Sea Guardian in the Mediterranean Sea.

The deployment of 650 German armed soldiers will last from October 2016 until end of 2017, so as to "develop a comprehensive overview of the situation for the Mediterranean," according to the German government.

However, the Bundestag, the lower house of the German parliament, must first give their approval.

Sea Guardian was launched by NATO leaders during the two-day Warsaw Summit in July.

With the mission, crises and maritime terrorism in the Mediterranean should be detected early. It also includes the powers to check and search ships with the consent of the flag state, if the ships are suspected of having connections to terrorist organizations.
MOSCOW, Sept. 16(Xinhua) -- There is no reason for India to be concerned about the forthcoming Russian-Pakistani joint military drills, an official from the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Friday.

"We were informed by the Russian Defense Ministry that these exercises will not be carried out in disputed areas, and a place was chosen that has nothing to do with this. Hence there is no reason for India to worry about it," Zamir Kabulov, director of the Second Asian Department of the Foreign Ministry told local media.

Russia had told India the regions where the exercises with Pakistan were going to take place, he added.

Pakistan and Russia will conduct the Druzhba-2016 tactical exercises on Sept. 24-Oct. 7 in the Army High Altitude School in northern Pakistan's Rattu and at a special forces training center in Cherat.

The exercises aim to strengthen and develop cooperation between the countries' armed forces, according to the Russian Foreign Ministry.
KUALA LUMPUR, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- A Malaysian official said on Friday that 22 pieces of debris have been found so far along coasts off South Africa, Mozambique, Mauritius and Tanzania, among which two have been confirmed while another four are "almost certain" to be part of the MH370 aircraft.

Malaysia's Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai made the remarks a day after a piece of debris found on the island of Pemba, off the coast of Tanzania in June this year was confirmed to be an inboard section of the outboard flap on Malaysia Airlines flight MH370.

According to Malaysia's state news agency Bernama, Liow said Thursday's conclusion, along with the confirmation of the plane's flaperon, found on Reunion Island in July last year, could help investigators unravel how the incident had actually happened to the missing aircraft.

Apart from the two confirmed and the four pieces with high possibility, Liow said the rest were hard to determine because there were no serial number nor any other details on them.

According to a summary report posted online by the Malaysian government in August, more than a dozen items of the discovered pieces are "under evaluation."

Quoting the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, Liow added the drifting pattern of the debris showed that the search operation was within the right area.

To date, the search for the missing aircraft has covered more than 110,000 square kilometers in the southern Indian Ocean, off Australia's west coast.

The government of Malaysia, Australia and China jointly announced in July that the search operation would be suspended upon completion of the current search area, but promised to resume search should new evidence emerge.
LANZHOU, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Six officials have been punished for failing in their responsibilities after a mother murdered her four children before committing suicide, in northwest China's Gansu Province last month, according to a local government statement.

Yang Gailan, 28, of Agushan village, Kangle county, axed her son and three daughters, aged between three and six, to death before drinking pesticides and killing herself on August 26. Her husband Li drank poison and killed himself eight days later.

The murders exposed grave problems in the work of local officials, the Kangle county government said in a statement. Several officials bear inescapable responsibilities, it said.

Chen Guangjian, deputy township head, and two village level officials Li Jinjun and Wei Gonghui, were suggested to be removed from office.

Ma Yongzhong, vice head of the Kangle county, was given a warning by the Party, with two township officials, Bai Zhongming and Lyu Qiang, given a more severe warning.

At this stage, there have been no criminal proceedings.

According to the statement, there had been significant familial disputes in Yang Gailan's family, and they had little social contact with their neighbors and other villagers. However, village officials failed to mediate the disputes and communicate with the family.

Yang's home was in poor condition, but her family could not agree on renovation plans. Township and village officials failed to provide them with viable solutions.

Yang's family received a low-income allowance before 2013, but villagers voted against this as their income exceeded the poverty benchmark. Grassroots officials failed to effectively implement poverty-relief policies and did not alleviate the conditions of poverty for the family, the statement said.

Officials also failed to offer comfort to Yang's husband after the murders. Her husband Li, 31, committed suicide eight days after the murders.

Local authorities have promised harsh punishment should further investigations expose any violations of law or discipline.

Kangle county government had offered to help Yang's family to renovate their home, which was dilapidated.

An overhaul is underway in the county, so that disputes among residents can be properly settled, and the county government has been urged to step up renovation of houses in rural areas. An inspection will also be launched to investigate the handling of low-income allowances, the statement said.
CAIRO, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Egypt on Friday received the second Mistral-class Landing Helicopter Doc (LHD) warship from France, official news agency MENA reported.

Egyptian Navy Commander Osama Rabie and Chief of the French Navy Admiral Christophe Prazuck attended a ceremony marking France's handover of the warship to Egypt in the western French port of Saint Nazaire, the report said.

"Egypt seeks to protect its coasts, national security, economic resources and water," Rabie said after raising the Egyptian flag on the vessel.

He hailed as special the mutual ties between Cairo and Paris in the fields of advancing and developing Egypt's naval forces to overcome threats and challenges in the region, namely terrorism, illegal immigration, human trafficking, and weapons and drugs smuggling.

The helicopter carrier, the second of its kind in the Egyptian Navy, is named after Egypt's late leader Anwar al-Sadat.

The first vessel, which arrived at the coast of Egypt's seaside province of Alexandria in June, was named after Sadat's predecessor Gamal Abdel-Nasser.

The two vessels were sold to Egypt after France canceled their sale to Russia over the Ukrainian crisis.

Each of the sophisticated LHD vessels is capable of carrying 16 helicopters, four amphibious land craft, 70 armored vehicles and 450 soldiers.

After the ceremony, the warship will set sail toward Egypt to go into service as part of the Egyptian naval units. It is expected to arrive in Alexandria by the end of September.

Egypt is the first country in the Middle East to have owned a helicopter carrier.

Egypt seeks to develop its military capabilities amid the ongoing turmoil in the Middle East and growing conflicts in neighboring Syria, Iraq, Libya, Yemen and South Sudan.

According to experts, the two warships are expected to add a strategic advantage to Egypt, provide security to its Mediterranean Sea and Red Sea shores as well as the Suez Canal vital waterway, and enable the country to have a movable complete unit of armed forces.
LONDON, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- The political party set up to campaign for Britain to leave the European Union elected a new leader Friday to succeed Nigel Farage.

The United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP), now regarded as the country's third political party after the Conservatives and Labor, was a key player in the recent referendum, has chosen Diane James as its new leader.

James, a 56-year-old businesswoman, came a close second to the Liberal Democrats in 2013 parliamentary Eastleigh by-election.

Now an MEP for South East England, she has been the party's deputy chairwoman as well as its home affairs and justice spokesperson.

In her first speech as leader James said: "We are the political change movement in the United Kingdom."

She promised to steer the party into a winning machine, saying the referendum result was "a just heat in a running competition."

"The ink on the document is not dry and we still have to follow what Europe says," James told the conference.

She said she will campaign for UKIP to be battle ready for the next general election, due in 2020, convincing the population that UKIP was a political force that would deliver its promises.

She listed her shopping list, saying UKIP wanted a true 100 percent European exit and a sovereign independent Britain. She said UKIP also wanted Britain to be free to trade with whoever it chose and whenever it wanted to.

James said she also wanted to see an immigration policy that enabled people to come to Britain, irrespective of origin, if they had the skills and social values Britain needed.

In a message directed at Prime Minister Theresa May, James described UKIP as the "next opposition party in waiting."

Before the leadership election result was announced, Farage gave a rousing speech to the conference in Bournemouth.

"Without us there would have been no referendum," he said, adding: "together we have changed the course of history. We brought down a prime minister, we got rid of the chancellor and we got rid of a European commissioner."

He said he feared that with the main Labor opposition party "in a mess," and with the Conservatives "heading for an easy general election in 2020," there may be a temptation for Theresa May to go for a "soft Brexit".

"We won the war, now we have to win the peace," said Farage.

UKIP was formed in 1993, but still only has one MP in the House of Commons. It has 22 MEPs sitting in the European Parliament and more than 400 local councilors.
Egyptian sailors gather on the Anwarel-Sadate BPC military cruise during the flag raising ceremony on September 16, 2016 in Saint-Nazaire, western France.(AFP Photo)

CAIRO, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Egypt on Friday received the second Mistral-class Landing Helicopter Doc (LHD) warship from France, official news agency MENA reported.

Egyptian Navy Commander Osama Rabie and Chief of the French Navy Admiral Christophe Prazuck attended a ceremony marking France's handover of the warship to Egypt in the western French port of Saint Nazaire, the report said.

"Egypt seeks to protect its coasts, national security, economic resources and water," Rabie said after raising the Egyptian flag on the vessel.

He hailed as special the mutual ties between Cairo and Paris in the fields of advancing and developing Egypt's naval forces to overcome threats and challenges in the region, namely terrorism, illegal immigration, human trafficking, and weapons and drugs smuggling.

The helicopter carrier, the second of its kind in the Egyptian Navy, is named after Egypt's late leader Anwar al-Sadat.

The first vessel, which arrived at the coast of Egypt's seaside province of Alexandria in June, was named after Sadat's predecessor Gamal Abdel-Nasser.

The two vessels were sold to Egypt after France canceled their sale to Russia over the Ukrainian crisis.

Each of the sophisticated LHD vessels is capable of carrying 16 helicopters, four amphibious land craft, 70 armored vehicles and 450 soldiers.

After the ceremony, the warship will set sail toward Egypt to go into service as part of the Egyptian naval units. It is expected to arrive in Alexandria by the end of September.

Egypt is the first country in the Middle East to have owned a helicopter carrier.

Egypt seeks to develop its military capabilities amid the ongoing turmoil in the Middle East and growing conflicts in neighboring Syria, Iraq, Libya, Yemen and South Sudan.

According to experts, the two warships are expected to add a strategic advantage to Egypt, provide security to its Mediterranean Sea and Red Sea shores as well as the Suez Canal vital waterway, and enable the country to have a movable complete unit of armed forces.
ISLAMABAD, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Pakistan on Friday criticized recent statements by Afghan President Ashraf Ghani in which he expressed doubts about the country's role in fight against terrorism.

Ghani has also been claiming that Pakistan "pursues the policy of good and bad terrorists" and that it does not take action against the Afghan Taliban.

"We have noted with disappointment the unhelpful statements made by Afghan leadership in complete disregard to the efforts that Pakistan has made and continues to make for peace and stability in Afghanistan," the Pakistan Foreign Ministry said.

"We believe that it is important for both Pakistan and Afghanistan to closely work together for peace, progress and stability of our region. It requires a strong commitment for not letting our territories be used against each other. Pakistan is abiding by this solemn commitment," said the statement.

Afghan president warned last week that his government will not allow Pakistani trucks to use Afghan soil for trade with the Central Asian states if Afghan trucks were not allowed to cross the Wagah, the official border between Pakistan and India.

The Pakistani Foreign Ministry said that Pakistan has been extending all facilities for transit of Afghan exports and imports through Pakistan's ports under a transit trade agreement between the two countries.

"We have also been facilitating the transit of Afghan fruits to India through Wagah," the statement said.
ABUJA, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- The Nigerian government on Friday said it will inject funds to the tune of 1.1 billion U.S. dollars into its ailing economy, particularly to quickly address the effects of recession.

Minister of Finance Kemi Adeosun told reporters in Abuja that the government would raise 1 billion USD from Eurobonds by mid-December this year.

Adeosun said the injected amount of money is to primarily fund capital expenditure projects in the country. This would also involve support from local financial institutions and other transaction partners.

Nigeria entered a recession on Aug. 31, when figures released by the National Bureau of Statistics showed the second quarter Gross Domestic Product fell 2.06 percent year on year, after slipping 0.4 percent in Q1.

The West African country's present economic situation has already been described, both by the government and financial experts, as "the worst possible time ever", with many predicting that this recession may take up to three years before the country can come out of it.

The official said Nigeria plans to source for more funds by borrowing a total of 1.8 trillion naira (more than 5 billion US dollars) at home and abroad to fund an expected budget deficit of 2.2 trillion naira.

In addition to its solution-seeking plans, Adeosun disclosed the Nigerian government had approved an external three-year rolling plan to seek loans from the African Development Bank and the World Bank to meet the country's current development needs.

The concessional loans sought by Nigeria, she added, will go to the strategic sectors that will help to revive the economy.
BRATISLAVA, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- European Parliament (EP) President Martin Schulz on Friday expressed hope that unity and dialogue will prevail at the informal European Union (EU) summit in Bratislava.

"Following pre-summit bilateral talks I'm quite optimistic and hope that unity and dialogue will prevail at the summit in Bratislava," he said at a press conference.

Schulz called on EU leaders to show responsibility towards the EU and to refrain from criticizing it for decisions to which they themselves contributed.

The EP president said such criticism of Brussels at the national level is "detrimental" to the entire EU community, and he expects the summit in Bratislava to lead to closer cooperation between member states for the benefit of their citizens.

As for the migration crisis, Schulz said that if mandatory resettlement quotas for migrants fall by the wayside but an effective solution on a voluntary basis is found, he'll lend his support to it.

Regarding Brexit, Schulz pointed out that economic relations between Britain and the EU are mutually beneficial and that their disruption would be harmful for both sides.

However, real talks on economic ties between Brussels and London can take place only after Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty is activated and Britain officially applies to leave the Union.
TOKYO, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- A Japanese court on Friday ruled against moves made by Okinawa Governor Takeshi Onaga aimed at blocking the work necessary for the central government's plans to relocate a controversial U.S. Marine base within the prefecture, with the standoff now likely to go to the Supreme Court.

The Naha branch of the Fukuoka High Court adjudged that Onaga's revocation of a landfill permit last October previously granted by his predecessor was "illegal."

The permit was central to work necessary to the central government's plans to relocate the U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma from the crowded residential area of Ginowan to the less populated coastal area of Nago in Henoko, also on the island.

The court while also finding that Onaga's subsequent rejection of the government's calls to scrap the revocation were also against the law, said that the authorization for the land reclamation by former Okinawa Governor Hirokazu Nakaima in 2013 was "legal."

The central and prefectural government have been locked in a fierce standoff over the issue, with both sides suing and counter suing each other over the matter, leading to a court mandated settlement in March this year.

On Friday, Presiding Judge Toshiro Tamiya said there is no choice but to reclaim land at the coastal site to build the new U.S. mega facility, with its two huge V-shaped runways being built on the reclaimed land, as the move presents the safest option and one that may ultimately help ease the base-hosting burdens of the locals.

According to local media, Tamiya also said that the issuance of a landfill permit is valid even after the local Okinawans' feelings have been taken into consideration.

Okinawans are staunchly opposed to the move and want to see the base located off their island or out of Japan entirely.

Onaga on receiving the verdict vowed to contest the decision in the Supreme Court, meaning a final ruling of the highest order may be made within the current fiscal year.

"This ruling is a decision that excessively takes the side of the central government and tramples on Okinawa people's feelings," Onaga told a local press briefing.

Blasting the local court for simply complying with the central government's wishes, Onaga pledged "I will seek to repeal this unjust high court ruling."

The latest ruling will come as blow to Onaga and the people of Okinawa who feel overburdened with hosting the bulk of U.S. military facilities on their tiny island.

The island comprises just a fraction of Japan's total landmass, but the locals have to endure serious instances of ongoing noise and air pollution as well as consistent slew of violent crimes against them committed by U.S. military-linked personnel.

The landfill work will remain halted until the Supreme Court's ruling.

The central government initially inked an accord with the United States to relocate the base and return the land, but the building of a replacement facility has incensed the prefectural government and local citizens.

While the prefectural government on Friday agreed to comply with the final ruling, it will certainly pull out all the stops to find other ways to block the replacement facility's construction, Onaga intimated Friday.
A student walks past fallen trees blown down by gale at Xiamen University in Xiamen, southeast China's Fujian Province, Sept. 15, 2016. Xiamen University was severely damaged due to the effect of Typhoon Meranti. (Xinhua/Wei Peiquan)

BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Chinese marine forecasting authorities on Friday upgraded the warning for storms to "orange" as Typhoon Malakas is approaching the east coast of Taiwan.

Malakas, the 16th typhoon in 2016, will hit the coasts of Zhejiang and Fujian provinces from Saturday night to Sunday noon, China's National Marine Environmental Forecasting Center (CNMEFC) said in a statement.

The typhoon, observed 530 kilometers off Taiwan's east coast at 8 a.m. Friday, was bringing winds of up to 180 km per hour as it moved northwest and is expected to enter the East China Sea soon, the National Meteorological Center said.

Moreover, CNMEFC maintained an orange warning for ocean waves caused by Malakas as it is expected to whip up waves from seven to 11 meters off Taiwan's east coast, southern East China Sea and nearby Diaoyu Islands from Friday to Saturday. Waves up to 2.5 to 3.8 meters are also expected in the coastal regions of southern Zhejiang and northern Fujian, it said.

Coastal regions in Fujian, Guangdong and Shanghai will see storms starting from Saturday and ships operating in related waters were told to stay clear of the area, according to the document.

China's State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters has also activated a level III emergency response to cope with Malakas.

The headquarters urged local authorities in eastern China to take precautions and dispatched five work teams to Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Fujian provinces as well as Shanghai to prepare for aid and relief.

Typhoon Malakas comes hot on the heels of Typhoon Meranti, which has left at least 14 people dead and another 14 missing in the southeastern regions of China since it landed in Fujian Province Thursday morning.

China has a four-tier color-coded warning system for severe weather, with red being the most serious, followed by orange, yellow and blue.

Related:

China braces for Typhoon Malakas

BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- The State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters on Friday activated a level III emergency response to cope with approaching Typhoon Malakas. Full Story

China Focus: Typhoon Meranti leaves at least 14 dead

FUZHOU, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Typhoon Meranti, which landed in eastern China's Fujian Province Thursday morning, has left 14 people dead and another 14 missing. Full Story

Taiwan issues warning for Typhoon Malakas
NAIROBI, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- The Belt and Road initiative being championed by China will unleash global prosperity through increased cross border trade, cultural interactions and skills transfer, a Kenyan scribe said on Friday.

Charles Kerich, an editor with a local daily, The Star Newspaper, said in a commentary that China's Belt and Road initiative will have profound impact on economies and livelihoods across a large swathe of Africa, Middle East, Europe and Asia.

Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2013 launched the initiative to build a trade and infrastructure network connecting Asia with Europe and Africa along the ancient trade routes.

Kerich who recently visited China hailed China's move to revive the ancient trade routes that underpinned global prosperity in the middle ages.

The China-funded standard gauge railway (SGR) in Kenya and its future stretches in other East African nations are part of the Belt and Silk initiative, he said.

China-funded mega infrastructure projects like the SGR, sea ports and highways will catalyze industrial transformation in Kenya and the larger Eastern African region, he said.

China has as of June this year signed inter-governmental cooperative agreements or memorandums of understanding with more than 40 countries and international organizations on Belt and Road projects.

Kerich said that around half of the world's population will benefit from the Belt and Road initiative, lauding China's commitment to the speedy implementation of the initiative.
BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- A U.S. Congress report Thursday on Edward Snowden, the "whistleblower" about U.S. intelligence aggression against private phone calls, has further dimmed his hope of returning home without being punished.

The report by a Republican-led U.S. House Representative committee said Snowden, a former CIA employee and National Security Agency (NSA) contractor who has fled to Russia, is "a serial exaggerator and fabricator" instead of a whistle blower.

The Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence condemned Snowden for stealing and leaking 1.5 million classified documents from secure National Security Agency networks.

"The vast majority of the documents he stole have nothing to do with programs impacting individual interests," said the report whose purpose is apparently asking President Barack Obama not to pardon him.

This report just came one day ahead of the release of a film by Oliver Stone based on the true story of Snowden entitled after his name. A number of civil rights groups, artists and writers have also appealed to President Obama to pardon Snowden.

"After years of investigation, the committee still can't point to any remotely credible evidence that Snowden's disclosures caused harm," said Ben Wizner, Snowden's attorney, who said the report is aimed at "discrediting a genuine American hero".

Snowden's revelations about the NSA's collection of millions of Americans' phone records has set off a fierce debate in the United States about violation of private rights by the government in the name of fighting terrorism.

Now, with presidential elections set for Nov. 8, both presidential candidates Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, have expressed strong opposition of pardoning Snowden, saying he must be punished for harming the country's national security. Both are playing hardline cards on national security issue.

The Obama administration has not agreed to give Snowden a presidential pardon, and urged him to return to the United States and face trial immediately.

With his mandate running out in months, Obama would also face judicial obstacles if he intended to pardon Snowden, as according to U.S. law, the president can only pardon a person after he is convicted of a crime by a court.

If Snowden returns to the U.S. to face trial over accusations of treason and espionage, he could be sentenced to 30 years in jail.
BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- China's decision to cut tariffs on a wide range of technology products would help push the country's industrial innovation, analysts pointed out.

Starting Thursday, China, the world's largest IT products exporter, would cut import duties on 201 IT products covered by the Information Technology Agreement (ITA), a global technology trade pact under the World Trade Organization (WTO), according to the Ministry of Finance.

The products include integrated circuits, touch screens, semiconductors and medical devices. The government also promised to reduce tariffs to zero on these products within seven years.

Over 50 countries, including China, reached an agreement last year at a WTO meeting in Nairobi, Kenya, to begin implementing their tariff commitments to the ITA by July 1, 2016, while the timetable is subject to the completion of each country's domestic procedural requirements.

China's legislature passed a bill earlier this month to ratify an amendment to the ITA.

"The ratification and implementation of the amendment will be in the interests of China's drive to build an open economic system and to accelerate the development of domestic IT industry amid international competition and cooperation," said the National People's Congress Foreign Affairs Committee in a review report to the lawmakers.

The move meant that China would play a bigger role in participating in global resources relocation and move upper in the global industrial value chain thanks to lower import costs, according to Bai Ming, a researcher with the think tank of the Ministry of Commerce.

Global trade of the 201 IT products is valued at 1.3 trillion U.S.dollars, about ten percent of total world trade. China's foreign trade volume of the goods is about a quarter of the amount, according to Lou Jiwei, head of the Customs Tariff Commission of the State Council.

Based on 2014 figures, eliminating these duties will cost China 15 billion yuan (about 2.24 billion U.S. dollars) and 52 billion yuan in annual actual and potential tariff revenue losses respectively, Lou said.

The adjustment of tariffs would be conducted in a gradual manner, which would not impact China's IT industry much despite expected larger imports of less expensive IT products, said Liu Yingkui, a researcher with the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade.

Chinese IT enterprises should harness free global trade and enhance their R&D capabilities to seek wider global reach with investment, Liu added.

The Chinese government decided to raise the ratio of R&D investment on GDP from 2.1 percent in 2015 to 2.5 percent by 2020, with major breakthroughs in fundamental research and strategic technologies.
BISHKEK, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Kyrgyzstan Friday installed a panel at the foot of Lenin Peak in memory of legendary mountaineers from Russia and China, journalist and former mountaineer Erkin Toraliev told Xinhua.

The first joint expedition team from China and the former Soviet Union climbed to the Lenin Peak in 1958, said Toraliev.

The former Kyrgyz climber said that in 2008, after 50 years, veteran Kyrgyz mountaineers climbed the Lenin Peak and erected three flags of Kyrgyzstan, Russia and China.

"And this year we installed a big panel (3 meters wide and 1.5 meters high) with the picture of these joint teams and flags of the three countries on the Lenin Peak as a sign of friendship between the peoples," said Toraliev.

"The Chinese team consisted of 17 people, and in their honor this year we plan to plant personal trees in memory of each member of the expedition,because they are legend for us," said Toraliev.

The panel is installed with financial support of local private entrepreneurs.
Americans observe the Tribute in Light at the site of World Trade Center in remembrance of the September 11 attacks, on Sept. 11, 2015. (Xinhua/Li Muzi)

NOUAKCHOTT, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Mauritania is "deeply concerned" with the recent adoption by the U.S. Congress of a law dubbed "The Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act," its foreign ministry has said.

"The Islamic Republic of Mauritania is concerned over the consequences of adoption by the U.S. Congress of The Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act, given its contradiction with rules governing relations between states," the ministry said in a statement released on Thursday.

Adopted on Sept. 9, the law allows families of victims of terrorist attacks to seek justice in U.S. federal courts against foreign countries (whose citizens took part in the attacks) to get compensation, if the responsibility of these countries is established.

Mauritania's foreign ministry noted the "need to respect the principle of international law in all legislations touching on terrorism, especially the principle of judicial immunity of countries."

Mauritania equally expressed concern that "eventual interpretation of this law may lay responsibility on countries whenever their citizens carry out terrorist attacks."

"This will be application of domestic laws beyond the national territory, something which threatens the principle of sovereignty," the statement concluded.

In 2010, Mauritania adopted an anti-terrorism strategy that involved aerial bombardments against Al-Qaida in Islamic Maghreb which was operating in northern Mali. The strategy helped Mauritania end terror attacks on its territory.

The country is a major ally of Western countries engaged in the fight against terrorism across the world.
HAVANA, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- Cuban and Mongolian presidents expressed their willingness to expand economic and trade ties between their countries on Thursday.

The meeting between Cuban President Raul Castro and his Mongolian counterpart, Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj, took place in a cordial atmosphere, according to a governmental release published by the Cuban News Agency (ACN).

Speaking highly of the bilateral relations, Castro and Elbegdorj agreed on the need to strengthen the cooperation.

The two leaders also compared notes on other issues of common concern.

"With this visit, both countries hope to expand bilateral cooperation in various areas and bring us closer despite the geographical distance,"the Mongolian president said at a press conference shortly after arriving at the Havana airport late Wednesday.

During his stay in Havana, which will last till Sunday, Elbegdorj is scheduled to meet with other government officials and visit sites of economic, social and cultural interest.

Cuba was the first nation in Latin America and the Caribbean to have established diplomatic relations with Mongolia in 1960.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange (R) and Ecuadorian Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino attend a press conference at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, Britain, Aug. 18, 2014. (Xinhua/Press Association/John Stillwell)

STOCKHOLM, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) --- Prosecutors will interview WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange at Ecuador's London embassy on Oct. 17, the Swedish Prosecution said on Wednesday.

The interview will be conducted by an Ecuadorian prosecutor, but Swedish chief prosecutor Ingrid Isgren and a Swedish police investigator will be present to ask questions via the Ecuadorian prosecutor.

"I welcome the fact that the investigation will move forward," director of prosecution Marianne Ny, who is responsible for the investigation, said in a statement.

"We have waited for this interrogation for six years," Assange's lawyer Per E Samuelson told Swedish news agency TT.

The results of the interview will later be reported from Ecuador. After that, the Swedish prosecutors will decide how to proceed with the investigation.

Ny has rarely commented on the Assange case, but a week ago she and Isgren held a press conference in Stockholm. Little new information emerged during the news conference, which instead focused on running through the history of events since Swedish prosecutors issued a European arrest warrant for Assange after allegations of sexual assault related to his 2010 visit to Stockholm to give a lecture. Assange denies those claims but has been remanded in custody "in absentia" since 2010. In 2012, he applied for asylum at the Ecuadorian embassy in London and has been holed up there ever since.

At last week's press conference, the Swedish prosecutors made clear they had agreed to let Ecuadorian prosecutors interview Assange in order for the investigation to move forward. However, Ny also stressed that the fact that the Swedish investigator cannot hold the interview will mean a "loss in quality."
JERUSALEM, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Israeli troops shot dead a Palestinian after he stabbed and lightly injured a Jewish settler in flashpoint Hebron city in the West Bank on Friday afternoon, a military statement said.

A surge of violence on Friday saw the death of two more Palestinians and a Jordanian national.

At noon, police shot and killed a citizen of Jordan after he pulled two knives at them outside East Jerusalem's Old City, according to police spokeswoman Luba Samri.

Later, two Palestinians attempted to carry out a car-ramming attack outside the settlement of Kiryat Arba, according to the military.

A military spokesperson said that soldiers who guarded a bus station at the Elias Junction shot at the vehicle, killing a Palestinian man and seriously wounding a Palestinian woman in the car.

Also in the Hebron area, soldiers killed a 21-year-old man from the Beit Ula village. Local media said he was shot as he was trying to escape an arrest by the military.

A year-long spate of violence in Israel and the West Bank has killed at least 230 Palestinians and 34 Israelis.

Israeli leaders accuse the Palestinian National Authority of "inciting" the unrest, while the Palestinians say it is the result of 49 years of Israeli occupation of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip, home to more than five million Palestinians, where they wish to establish their own state.
A damaged bus is lifted by a crane after a fatal traffic accident in Brahmanbaria district, Bangladesh, Sept. 16, 2016. (Xinhua/Shumon)

DHAKA, Sept. 17 (Xinhua) -- At least 17 people have been killed and scores of others injured in separate road accidents in Bangladesh.

The ill-fated passengers were reportedly on the way back to Dhakaafter celebrating Eid al-Adha.

Muslims across Bangladesh celebrated Eid al-Adha, also known as the festival of sacrifice, on Tuesday.

At least eight people were killed and four injured as a bus hit a minibus in Brahmanbaria district, some 109 km northeast of capitalDhaka, on Friday.

In a separate road accident also on Friday in Madaripur district, some 63 km south of Dhaka, four people were killed as a bus rammed a three-wheeler.

Five more deaths have also been reported on Friday from Bangladesh's central Tangail district, some 97 km away from Dhaka, as a bus skidded off the road.

Scores of people were also injured in the road accidents.

Millions of people, braving every conceivable discomfort on creaky and congested transport, went to their village homes to celebrate the Eid al-Adha.

Apart from frequent accidents mainly caused by reckless driving, as in previous years, run-down roads have become a grave concern for the home-bound people this year.

The wreckage of a minibus is lifted by a crane after a fatal traffic accident in Brahmanbaria district, Bangladesh, Sept. 16, 2016. (Xinhua/Shumon)
Pakistani paramedics treat an injured blast victim at a hospital in Bajaur Agency near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border on Sept. 16, 2016, following a suicide bombing at a mosque in the Mohmand tribal district. (Xinhua/AFP photo)

ISLAMABAD, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- At least 16 people were killed and 23 others injured in a suicide blast at a mosque in Pakistan's northwestern tribal region of Mohmand Agency on Friday afternoon, officials said.

Naveed Akbar, assistant political agent of the region, said the incident took place when a suicide bomber entered the mosque and exploded his explosives laden vest amid people who were offering Friday prayer in Paye Khan village in Anbar area in Mohmand Agency, a tribal area bordering Afghanistan.

Police, security forces and rescue teams rushed to the site and shifted the bodies and injured to the central hospital of Mohmand Agency.

The seriously injured are being referred to the hospitals in cities of Peshawar and Charsadda.

According to some local reports, around 70 to 80 people were offering prayer at the mosque when the blast took place.

Security forces have cordoned off the area and launched a search operation to arrest the suicide bomber's facilitators who dropped him nearby the mosque.

The bomb disposal squad said around five to seven km of explosives along with ball bearings was used in the blast.

No group has claimed the attack yet.

Earlier on Sept. 2, at least 14 people including six lawyers and two policemen were killed and 52 others injured in a suicide attack at district courts in Pakistan's northwestern district of Mardan.

On Sept. 13, police foiled a terrorist attack at a mosque during Eid prayer when two suicide bombers attempted to enter a mosque in Shikarpur district in the country's southern province of Sindh.

At least 13 people were injured when one of the suicide bombers exploded his jacket after policemen shot him, while the second bomber was arrested by the policemen.
A general view taken on September 16, 2016, shows the rubble-strewn Castello Road, the main route for humanitarian assistance in to divided Syrian city of Aleppo. (AFP/Xinhua)

ANKARA, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Five Islamic State (IS) group militants were killed by Turkish army supported coalition shells in Northern Syria, Turkish General Staff stated on Friday.

Some 13 Turkish howitzers shelled six IS targets on Tuesday in Wuguf area of northern Syria as part of the Euphrates Shied Operation, the Turkish General Staff said in a statement on Wednesday.

With the latest shelling, the total number of shellings since the beginning of the operation rose to 2,245 against 524 targets, Hurriyet news added.

Turkey and U.S.-led coalition forces have intensified their joint military campaign against the IS in Syria and Iraq, according to local news.
Syrian government soldiers walk in the damaged al-Farafira souk in the government-held side of Aleppo's historic city centre on September 16, 2016. (AFP/Xinhua)

ALEPPO, Syria, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- After losing his barbershop in Aleppo's raging war, Mahmoud Abla, who has been a barber for 27 years, became an open-air barber.

Despite his hardships, Abla is still offering free haircuts for the orphans and pre-war haircut prices for the poor.

When the war hit his neighborhood in the Masaken Hanano area in the countryside of the northern province of Aleppo, the 47-year-old sought refuge inside Aleppo city.

"When I fled my area, I came to Aleppo, but I had nothing to do, with no income whatsoever," he told Xinhua.

A friend told him to be an open-air barber at the famous time-honored Sabil Park in the city to earn a living to raise his daughter and four sons.

However, being an open-air barber was embarrassing in the beginning, because it is unusual in Syria.

"At first I was so embarrassed, but later I became used to being an open-air barber," he said.

After two and a half years, the man has become famous at the park, especially among the poor.

"I am a poor person, but that doesn't make me a greedy man. I feel for the poor and displaced because I am one of them, and they have the right to look good and neat, in spite of their difficult situations," Abla said.

He promised the charges for haircuts won't be higher than the pre-war years.

"Until recently I took 100 Syrian pounds (0.20 U.S. dollars) for a haircut and face shaving, but now I have upped the price to 150, which was the cheapest haircut and face shaving ahead of the crisis five years ago," he said.

As for the children, it only costs them 75 pounds, which is near free of charge since the haircut prices have gone up at least tenfold since the beginning of the crisis.

Abla said he doesn't charge orphans who lost one parent or both during the war.

"I am the father of such children and I won't charge them, and that's something I have always done, even before the crisis," he said.

Abla's cheap services have won gratitude from his customers.

"I realized his prices were cheap and sometimes he does his job for free for those who don't have money. He is poor and he loves the poor," 71-year-old Hasan Hannoura said.

He said Abla is an example that should be followed, as people during the crisis need to help each other.

"Everybody now is having a hard time with this crisis. I personally would run a street stall if I have the chance to get money, because my pension doesn't suffice me," he said.

Abla is not the only one who seeks to have a small business, as the situation for the people in Aleppo is as tragic as in any other battered Syrian city.

A brokered truce that went into force across Syria on Monday has brought some peace in hard-hit cities, including Aleppo.

Both the government-controlled western areas and the rebel-held eastern ones in the city have witnessed a relative calm since then.

"I wish the truce could hold and succeed so that I can return to my home. Before the crisis our situation was fine," Abla said.
BUCHAREST, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- The western city of Timisoara has been selected to be Romania's European Capital of Culture in 2021, the European Commission announced Friday.

The final selection was made among four cities in the country: Baia Mare, Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca and Timisoara.

Timisoara, the capital city of Timis County, thus became the second Romanian city to host the European Capital of Culture, after the central city Sibiu in 2007.

Steve Green, chair of the international jury delegated by the European Commission, congratulated the competitors, saying that the competition has no losers.

After winning the bid, Timisoara Mayor Nicolae Robu said the title of European Capital of Culture is a huge responsibility, and the city is aware that the hard part has just begun.

According to him, the budget for preparation before the year 2021 is 48.5 million euros, 20 million of which comes from the local budget, with the rest to be contributed from the national budget, the Timis County Council and from the European Commission.

There will be two other cities titled European Capital of Culture in 2021 besides Timisoara: One will be from Greece, and another from Serbia or Montenegro. The final selections will take place later this year.

Born in 1985, the European Capitals of Culture have grown into one of the most ambitious cultural projects in Europe and one of the best known activities of the EU.

Their objectives are to promote the diversity of cultures in Europe, to highlight the common features they share and to foster the contribution of culture to the long-term development of cities.(1 euro = 1.12 U.S. dollars)
Former Brazilian President, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, reacts during a press conference on the accusations of corruption against him in Sao Paulo, Brazil, on Sept. 15, 2016. (Xinhua/Rahel Patrasso)

RIO DE JANEIRO, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- Brazil's former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva made on Thursday an emotional speech challenging the prosecutors who denounced him for corruption and money laundering to find any evidence against him.

On Wednesday, prosecutors accused Lula, who served as president from 2003 to 2010, of leading a vast corruption ring at Brazilian oil company Petrobras.

In response, Lula said there is no concrete evidence against him in the document and challenged the prosecutors to find evidence that he indeed committed corruption crimes.

"Prove one act of corruption of mine and I will go to prison by myself, on foot," he said.

He also criticized the fact that, at one moment, prosecutors said they "had conviction" Lula is the mastermind of a large corruption scheme at Petrobras, but at another moment they said they did not have "definitive evidence" of Lula's involvement.

"How do they summon a press conference in a hotel, spend government money for that, to present the proof of a crime, but by the end say 'we have no proof, but we have conviction'?" he said.

"I have a clear conscience. I know where I came from, where I go, who helped me, who wants me to go away and who wants me to return," he added.

Calling the charges "judicial persecution", Lula dismissed them as an attempt to end his political career.

"As we were starting to have success in the presidency, they are trying to do with us what they did with Dilma (Rousseff, the former president impeached in August). A part of the press and a part of the judiciary already tried to oust me from the presidency in 2005," argued Lula.

"What sparked this anger was the success of our government, the best policy of social inclusion, the best policy of educational inclusion in this country," he added.

Lula did not deny or confirm definitely his intentions to run for president again in 2018. Though Lula has a strong rejection rate, he would be the most likely candidate to win 2018 presidential elections, according to a new poll in 2016 released on Friday by the Vox Populi Institute.

According to the charge sheet, the former president owns an apartment in the coastal city of Guaruja, near Sao Paulo, which was renovated for free by OAS, a construction company involved in the corruption ring. It also alleges that Lula owns an undeclared property in Atibaia, a municipality in the state of Sao Paulo.

Investigators estimate Lula received benefits worth 3.7 million reais (about 1.1 million U.S. dollars) from OAS in total.

Lula's wife, Marisa Leticia Lula da Silva, president of the Lula Institute Paulo Okamotto, and five OAS executives were also accused.

The former president also complained his family had not been treated with respect.

"They entered into the house of my son, who has never participated in politics, as if he was a bandit," he explained.

On Thursday, a Brazilian court condemned a close friend of Lula, businessman Jose Carlos Bumlai, to nine years and ten months in prison for his role in the Petrobras corruption ring.

Joao Vaccari Neto, the former treasurer of the Workers' Party, was jailed for six years and eight months for passive corruption as part of the same sentencing.
Chinese State Councilor, head of China's national anti-drug commission and public security minister Guo Shengkun addresses the special session of the General Assembly on the World Drug Problem at the United Nations headquarters in New York, April 19, 2016. (Xinhua/File Photo)

UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Preparations are underway at UN Headquarters in New York to prepare for the week-long annual high-level debate of the 71st session of the UN General Assembly, which is set to begin next Tuesday, a UN spokesman told reporters here Friday.

As of Sept. 15, 86 heads of state have signed up for the General Debate of the 71st session of the UN General Assembly, one crown prince, five vice presidents, 49 heads of government, 51 ministers and three observers for a total of 195, which is two more than last year, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said at a daily news briefing here.

Some 1,100 bilateral requests have been received by the UN Department for General Assembly and Conference Management and 545 meetings have been requested, which include special side events and regularly scheduled meetings, he said.

"Thus far, the secretary-general has 124 bilaterals planned and he will participate in 62 events," Dujarric said.

The General Assembly meets in regular session intensively from September to December each year. At the beginning of each regular session, the assembly holds a general debate, often addressed by heads of state and government to express their views on pressing international issues.

The theme of this year's general debate is "the Sustainable Development Goals: a universal push to transform our world."

Brazil is always the first member state to speak in the general debate since the 10th session of the General Assembly in 1955; the United States as the host country is the second member state to take the floor.

For all other member states, the speaking order is based on the level of representation, preference and other criteria such as geographic balance.
Photo taken on Sept. 15, 2016 shows a night view with bright moon at Gubei Water Town in Beijing, capital of China, Sept. 15, 2016. Tourists celebrated the Mid-Autumn Festival by visiting the Gubei Water Town on Thursday. (Xinhua/Hou Jun)
Four firms bid for Clico, British American

The report said that international firm, Oliver Wyman, was engaged to advise on the sale of Clico and BATs traditional portfolios to a suitable buyer, and the sales process has begun.

From the pool of interested buyers, four firms were shortlisted for each of Clico and BAT, to submit a binding bid by July 14. The streamlining of Clico and Bats human resources has been completed, while the proceeds of the sale of the Methanol Holdings have been converted TT dollar short-term instruments.

Under the Clico Resolution Plan, in March 2015 the Government received the cash component of its first partial distribution of 85 percent of its Statutory Fund liability, as assignee of rights of statutory fund policy holders who accepted the Governments 2011 bail out offer. This first sum was $4 billion. From May 2025 to May 2016, $695 million was paid to 512 non-assenting STIP holders, representing 54 percent of total statutory fund STIP liability.

The second partial distribution of the remaining 15 percent will be paid from the sale of Methanol Holdings, said the report. A third distribution will be paid to mutual fund holders, non-resident STIP holders and the Government, paid from the realisation/sale of other assets.

The Bank has received valuations for Angostura Holdings and CL World Brands Limited, and it is now holding talks with Finance Minister (Colm Imbert). Independent valuers are now doing a valuating of Home Construction Limited (HCL), said the report. The report recapped how payouts had been made to small claimants ($347 million or 97 percent of owed value), compassionate cases ($$128 million) and big claimants that is over $75,000 in assets each ($12.3 billion, or 92 percent of value owed).
Three arrested as guns, ammo, narcotics seized

Eastern Division officers, supervised by Supt.

Robert Phillip, and including Sgt.

Mikey Williams and officers of the Eastern Division Task Force executed a warrant at a house on Quash Trace, Sangre Grande at about 4 am yesterday.

During the search, officers found and seized a Glock pistol, two revolvers, 51 rounds of assorted ammunition, 1.5 kilogrammes of cocaine and 464 grammes of marijuana worth a combined street value of $59,104. A 47-year-old man and a 43-year-old woman were arrested and charged.

Police also arrested a 27-year-old man after he was found in possession of a homemade shotgun.

According to reports, officers of the Sangre Grande Crime Suppression unit intercepted a silver Nissan B-14 vehicle at Vega De Oropouche, Sangre Grande on Wednesday. They searched the vehicle and found a home-made shotgun along with a 16-gauge cartridge.

The man was detained and is said to be assisting police with investigations up to press time.

Police say the recovery of these firearms have brought the number of guns found in the division to 35 for the year so far.
Bring in UN to help justice system

He addressed the TT Transparency Institutes (TI) AGM at Queens Park Oval yesterday, sharing details of a UN-backed body, the Commission for the Investigation of Illegal Groups and Clandestine Security Structures in Guatemala. He said he learnt about this body from Transparency International head Jose Carlos Ugaz. It allowed for the first time an independent international body, the UN, to be given the authority to act as complementary prosecutors in criminal proceedings in national courts. West said experts from such a body could work alongside local personnel in the police, DPP Office and Forensic Science Centre to enhance expertise in criminal investigations. In Guatemala this cooperation was done in judicial reform, witness protection, telephone tapping and aspects of security and justice such as the Police Service and Prison System.

West said the initiative worked so well in Guatemala that it saw the successful prosecution of the countrys Former Minister of the Interior (for corruption), Police Chief (for the homicide of seven inmates) and President (for theft of US$20 million). West said TTs politicians know of the Guatemalan initiative but so far not a word has been spoken of it. He urged TTs NGOs such as TI to champion such a measure for TT.
Stand firm, reject crime

Estrada, who was born in Laventille and migrated to the United States as a teenager, was delivering a motivational talk during a meeting with children and their parents from the Each One Teach One pre-school at the Beetham Community Centre. It was one of a series of visits and talks he will deliver in the Laventille and Belmont areas over the upcoming month.

He said it was important to have moral courage because this is what was necessary for someone to resist the pressure to make easy money quickly. I admire people with moral courage. I had to have moral courage, I Iost friends along the way because I wouldnt do the drugs, I wouldnt go to steal, I wouldnt do those things, Ambassador Estrada said. He added there is a lot of pressure on young people to do the wrong things and it called for moral courage to stand up against that pressure.

He said the students of the Each One Teach One pre-school would have to face that pressure and deal with it, including the pressure to make easy money.

Why go dig a ditch or go work as a waiter when you could sell drugs and make a lot of money real quick? I was exposed to some of those things and I refused to do it. So make the right choices. If I did not make the right choices, I would not be where I am today. The Ambassador said it was his first visit to the Beetham since his arrival in Trinidad to take up his ambassadorial duties and he had been looking forward to the visit for quite some time and planned to visit as much of the country as possible before his time was up.

Estrada said visiting such areas as the Beetham, Laventille, Sea Lots and other challenged areas is where my heart is really at. He said the pre-schoolers in the audience were the countrys future.

He said many good things happened to him in the US but the foundation was laid in Trinidad.

He said Trinidad and Tobago was a very innocent place when he left to go to the U.S. but it was a time of great turmoil over there and he faced civil rights and drug issues.

He said he also faced racism for the first time in his life. He said that in Trinidad he grew up without his father and lived with his mother who was a single parent raising four children.

Ambassador Estrada said there was a stepfather for a while and he saw his mother being beaten, an experience that could have easily made him into a man who beat women but instead it turned him into someone who disliked men who beat women. He said that in the U.S. he was exposed to drugs and saw a neighbour shot and killed, but I did not let any of that influence me in any way into making the wrong choices. I had to decide, I am not going to do the drugs, I am not going to sell the drugs, I am not going to get involved in crime. The ambassador said those were not easy decisions to make because his friends shunned him or wanted to beat him up because he would not go along with what they were doing. He said he decided to study instead. I stayed in and read and read and read until I joined the US Marine Corps. He said that decision was the beginning of a journey which shaped him into the man he is today.

Ambassador Estrada said he was happy to be back in the land of his birth. The welcome and the warmth of the people have been unbelievable, he said. It has been an emotional journey for me and its also very humbling to be serving in a capacity as I am here in Trinidad and Tobago. Also speaking at the event was the Parliamentary Representative for the area Fitzgerald Hinds and Simone de La Bastide, President of The Childrens Ark.

She said that she and others had been working with the Beetham Community since 1998 when she said she met Wayne Jordan, the organiser of Wednesdays event.

She praised Jordan as a man who decided to give back to his community by educating and helping the youth, in the process earning respect, but not wealth, from inside and outside the community.
Teen bids tearful farewell to murdered dad

At the time he was murdered, the father of three was searching for 14-year-old Shivani who at the time was missing, having failed to return home from school last week Wednesday.

She was rescued on Tuesday by police who subsequently arrested a 25-year-old man who is now a subject of interest in the murder inquiry.

Persads funeral was held under Islamic rites at his Mahabalsingh Trace, Navet Village, Rio Claro home where during the early morning hours on Sunday, he was shot.

Fighting to hold back her tears, Shivani who was dressed in all-white, was physically supported by an aunt as she stared almost transfixed at her fathers body.

Nearby, Shivanis mother Rehana Singh, also dressed all in white, sat on a chair and wept.

Delivering a brief eulogy, Shivani who read from a prepared text, described her father as a hard working family man.

He was a loving father and husband who brought joy and laughter everywhere he went.

His sudden departure has left a deep void in the family which will be hard to fill, Shivani said, adding, I hope daddy finds peace and a good resting place. Rio Claro Imam Khaleel Chadee, who delivered a brief sermon, said his remarks were meant to benefit the living and not the dead as the latter would benefit from the prayers offered by their God-fearing offspring.

He then proceeded to advise parents to fulfil their duties to their children and not allow them to be raised by the television set.

The TV se t is bringing up our children and we as parents are failing in our duty to our children if we continue to neglect them, Imam Chadee said.

A small party of police officers also briefly attended the funerals service. Persad was buried at the Rio Claro cemetery.

The 25-year-old man who was arrested on Tuesday shortly after Shivani was rescued by police at a Chaguanas mall, remains in custody assisting investigators in both the teens disappearance and her fathers murder.
Diego Martin man shot dead

According to police reports, residents of Gopaul Avenue made a report to police of shots being fired at 3.30 pm.

Officers responded and found the body of Indiana Crim La Borde, 31, under a house. He was shot several times. The area was cordoned off by police officers while Crime Scene Investigators processed the scene, recovering several spent shells.

Homicide detectives, as well as Superintendent Ramdhanie and ASP Mohammed visited the scene. A District Medical Officer ordered La Bordes body removed to the Forensic Science Centre in St James where an autopsy is expected to be conducted today.

Police sources say that La Borde was well known to them, and have indicated that he was a person of interest in several investigations.

But, up to press time, police have not yet ascertained a motive for his murder. Investigations are ongoing.
Jwala gets leave

In an oral ruling in the Port-of- Spain High Court yesterday, Justice Nadia Kangaloo granted permission to Rambarran to file for judicial review. She also held that in evidence before her, there was no inordinate delay in filing the application in July, although five months had by then elapsed since Rambarrans dismissal as CB Governor.

She pointed out that he did so after several unsuccessful attempts to secure information relative to the decision taken to advise then Acting President Christine Kangaloo to revoke his appointment.

Justice Kangaloo also noted that the Cabinet, which was named as the intended defendant in the action, suffered no prejudice by the eventual filing of the leave application, adding that it was in the publics interest that Rambarran not, at this stage, be shut out from seeking answers.

In her oral ruling - of which a written copy will be made available next week Tuesday- Justice Kangaloo said one of the basis for her granting leave was that she was inclined to take a wider interpretation and purposive interpretation of the Judicial Review Act, despite opposition from the State. Early in the case, Justice Kangaloo disclosed to Rambarrans attorneys of her familial connection to then Senate President and invited them to seek her recusal, however, Rambarran proffered no objection to the judge hearing his case.

Rambarran was present in court yesterday when the judge gave her decision on his leave application.

Rambarran, who was appointed Central Bank Governor on July 17, 2012, was dismissed by Acting President Christine Kangaloo on December 23, 2015. On several occasions between February to July, Rambarran through his attorneys, wrote several letters requesting information as to the process and procedure that was followed in coming to a decision to have his appointment revoked.

He wrote President Anthony Carmona in February and received correspondence in March, indicating that the decision to revoke his appointment was made by Senate President Christine Kangaloo, acting President at the time and referred questions to her.

A similar request for information was sent to the Senate President in April, and in May, Rambarran was told that the decision was based on advice of the Cabinet, pursuant to Section 80(1) of the Constitution and that her Excellency concluded that she was obliged to so act in accordance with the advice. Rambarran was further advised to seek his answers from the Cabinet and he did so in May under Section 13 of the Freedom of Information Act, seeking access to the Cabinet Note and minute relative to the decision to advise the Acting President to revoke his instrument of appointment; correspondence between the Office of the PM and the Ministry of Finance as well as correspondence between the Office of the PM and the Office of the President.

He received a reply on July 7, indicating that the information he sought was exempt under the FOIA, following which he filed his judicial review application in the High Court. The Freedom of Information legislation allows citizens to access the records of public authorities.

Authorities may decline requests if the items requested fall within listed exemptions.

According to his application, which was argued by Senior Counsel Anand Ramlogan, Jayanti Lutchmedial and Kent Samlal, he needed to know the true and correct reasons for his revocation so that he can be properly advised of his legal rights and the failure to provide the information has frustrated these efforts. Rambarran was given until September 29, to file his judicial review claim and the case will again be heard on November 21.

The Cabinet was represented in court yesterday by a team of attorneys led by attorney Sanjeev Lalla.
Fisherfolk eager for $$

President of the La Brea Fisherfolk, Alvin La Borde said persons impacted following recent oil spills in the seas off La Brea and Otaheite have been waiting for too long for government to offer some sort of financial assistant. He emphasized that the fisherfolk association sent numerous letters to various ministries, as well as the Environmental Management Authority (EMA).

We would like government to address this situation immediately, Mc Kellar said. Scores of fisherfolk including fishermen, hustlers, and fish vendors from these areas are expected to register in Vessigny. Deputy Perm Sec McKellar told Newsday there is still a lot of paper work to be done regarding this matter and the fisherfolk will then be given the financial assistance.

They will be asked to fill out a registration form detailing number of dependants, level of household income and monthly living expenses. La Borde spoke about the discovery of oily pellets by Petrotrin officials while conducting clean-up operations at the Karat Shed and Coffee beaches. He EMA is yet to conduct testing on not only the substance found staining the shoreline but also the testing of fish in this area.

His association has provided La Brea MP and Energy Minister Nicole Olivierre with video evidence of the source of the oil spill saying she had promised to pass the information to Petrotrin officials.

Following this oil-spill Petrotrin has been in clean-up operations in keeping with its commitments under the National Oil Spill Contingency Plan which included the services of contractors. While investigations continue activities were continuing for the scheduled plugging and abandonment of well ABM 37 by Petrotrin. This is located in the Brighton Marine field.
Crime Stoppers conference in October

The conference will be held from October 2 to 5 at the Hilton Trinidad and Conference Centre, St Anns.

In a press release issued yesterday, Crime Stoppers said the theme for this years conference, now in its 37th year, is Anonymous Reporting in the Digital Age.

Crime Stoppers said the conference will bring together members of global Crime Stoppers programs from 28 countries, organisations and persons who are involved in crime prevention, media professionals engaged with local Crime Stoppers programs, law enforcement agencies and their representatives.

Crime Stoppers recognises that someone other than criminals may have information about crime, and was developed to combat the publics fear of reprisals, public apathy, and a reluctance to get involved. It is a mechanism, which is separate from the emergency police telephone number or other standard methods of contacting police, which allows a member of the community to provide information about criminal activity anonymously, the organisation said. Crime Stoppers says its programmes have been implemented in more than 1,200 communities around the world.

Silvino Schlickmann, INTERPOLs head of Cybercrime Research will be a guest speaker at the conference.

Schlickmann is a computer science forensic expert from the Brazilian Federal Police and has nine years experience as head of forensic laboratories.
Pensioner dies after witnessing altercation

While police have not yet deemed Nelsons death a homicide, detectives are awaiting the results of an autopsy, to be done at the Forensic Science Centre in St James, to confirm that there was no foul play involved.

June Nelson, the pensioners daughter, told Newsday yesterday that her mothers death is the latest chapter in a string of confrontations which occurred between her family and the same resident, a woman in her late twenties.

At the Forensic Science Centre in St James yesterday, June said she did not blame the woman for her mothers death, but said the woman was influenced by the Devil to provoke her family.

I forgive her for how she treated our family, June said. The Devil made them believe that they could just beat up my daughter and rough up my mother and nothing would have come out of it. They were not looking to go and kill anyone, or cause anyones death. What has happened, has happened already. Right now, all I want is peace.

If the autopsy proves that there was no foul play then they would get away, but I believe that it was the fight that led to my mothers death. June said her daughter and her mother went for a walk to a nearby parlour and, on their way back, encountered the resident and her friends. An argument broke out between Junes daughter and the resident and a fight ensued. During the fracas, Nelson began complaining of pains in her chest.

Emergency services were alerted, and Nelson was rushed to the San Fernando General Hospital, but was pronounced dead on arrival.

Police said the resident was detained and questioned but was later released since eyewitness accounts did not indicate that Nelson was physically harmed during the altercation.

June described her mother as a quiet woman, who was well known for picking up bottles in the Chaguanas area and reselling them.
AG: Govt seeking legal advice

Al-Rawi also said Government has received preliminary legal advice which raises serious questions about the contents of Las Alturas Commission of Inquirys (COI) report, the inquirys cost has now climbed to $40 million and the HDC has initiated civil action in the court against China Jiangsu, the contractor for two failed buildings in the Las Alturas project. Indicating the intial advice on the Inquirys report was provided from Fyard Hosein SC, dated September 14, Al-Rawi said the additional advice which Government will seek, is in relation to the recommendation that this matter be looked at and explored with greater precision. Referring to Hoseins initial advice, Al-Rawi said the report needed to be analysed as to whether it was unreasonable, biased or whether there were breaches of natural justice.

In that exercise, Al-Rawi said, one of the issues that might present itself based upon the evidence is whether there was mischief in public office by the last government in pursuing a COI in the manner in which they did. In his legal opinion, Hosein indicated his advice was not intended to be the basis upon which to begin litigation.

Hosein explained this would be require a review of the entire record of the Commission. Al-Rawi said legal advice provided by Marc Rowlands QC of Keating Chambers in London advised the PP about the four year statute of limitation in which to act against China Jiangsu for breach of contract regarding failed Towers H and I.

Al-Rawi said Rowlands advised the PP, dont play reckless with it..

sue immediately...dont risk a claim that is statute barred...proceed fortwith. He said further correspondence in September 2014, showed that Ramlogan said he would seek further advice from Rowlands and advised the HDC to hold its hands on acting against China Jiangsu.

Al-Rawi said on October 3, 2014, Ramlogan sought further advice on the matter from Vincent Nelson QC, who said it was arguable that the four year statute of limitation could expire in March 2016. He said between November 2014 and the September 7, 2015 general elections, there were discussions between the HDC and the various defendants in the Las Alturas matter, for arbitration.

Al-Rawi observed that under the PP, it is material to note that no action of a civil nature was taken against China Jiangsu.
Imbert: JSC still planned

The Finance Minister was responding to queries from Newsday.

That is what we intend to do, Imbert said when asked of a Joint Select Committee was still planned. The Parliament adjourned on Wednesday sine die (adjourned with no appointed date for resumption), in a sign that no further sittings are planned before the session expires on September 22. However, it remains open to the Government to convene a sitting at any time, whether before or after September 22.

Had the matter been referred to a committee, that committees life would have expired with the session on September 22. Though it is open to the Government to preserve the life of any committee, that too requires a motion in the Parliament.

Still, Wednesdays adjournment of the debate on the Tax Information Exchange Agreement Bill 2016 without a specific motion to refer the legislation to a committee triggered complaints from the Opposition.

The Government on Wednesday left Trinidad and Tobago bewildered and acted in bad faith on the Tax Information Exchange Agreement Bill 2016 as it closed the session of Parliament without honouring a public commitment, stated Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar.

When next would the Parliament sit? I wish to express my deep concern over the disturbing developments, the absence of probity by the Government and its lack of good faith in discussions with the Opposition and in informing the national community. But in a statement issued through his Ministry, Imbert said the entire situation was due to the previous administration.

It is to be noted that the former PP Government started its term in 2010 with 29 votes and ended its term with 27 votes, Imbert said. At any time over the period June 2010 when the Parliament commenced under the PP Government to June 2015, when the Parliament was dissolved, prior to the last general election, therefore, the former administration could have passed the FATCA legislation on its own, but chose not to do so, leading to the present situation. On Monday, Imbert said the Government agreed to a JSC but on condition that it not be a rushed job and would, as such, seek an extension from US authorities which he expected to be granted. On Tuesday, Imbert said, I will have to wait until the Budget debate is over in October and then at some subsequent session of the House establish the Joint Select Committee. So it will be after that. Asked yesterday if a formal request for an extension had been lodged, Imbert said that matter was, in process.
Kamlas statement on US Ambassador unfortunate

Speaking at the post-Cabinet news conference at the Office of the Prime Minister in St Clair, Portof- Spain, Al-Rawi said the Opposition Leaders utterances were a continuation of her kind of diplomacy as prime minister which saw this country described as an ATM machine. After indicating that Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley has been doing extensive work in repairing damage done by Persad- Bissessars former administration to TTs relations with its foreign partners, Al-Rawi said, It critical to know that the USA has not given us an extension of time...

that we have requested one...we must wait to see if they will give us an extension of time. The AG said it was unacceptable for Persad- Bissessar to say Government should have come earlier with the bill, when documentary evidence clearly shows that for two and half years, her administration did nothing to ensure TT was FATCA compliant.

He said contrary to the Oppositions claims, the bill does not deal only with the US FATCA because there are 12 other FACTA arrangements with other countries which TT must put in place.

On the adjournment of the bill in the House of Representatives on Wednesday, Al-Rawi pointed out that Persad-Bissessar did not lift the whip to allow other Opposition MPs to disagree with her on the bill if they wanted and this was confirmed by Caroni Central MP Dr Bhoe Tewaries subsequent contribution.

Explaining that Government and the Opposition are guided by their respective whips in Parliament, Al-Rawi said, Unless the whip is lifted, you cant disagree with your leader. The leader had spoken already.

What was there to discuss? As prime minister, Persad-Bissessar lifted the whip during debate on the controversial Runoff Bill in Parliament.

Then government MPs Winston Dookeran and Carolyn Seepersad-Bachan voted against that bill.
Respect Education Ministry decision

A delegation from the Presbyterian Primary Schools Board of Education led by Moderator of the Presbyterian Church Reverend Annabelle Lalla-Ramkelawan, met with Education Minister Anthony Garcia at the Education Ministrys office on St Vincent Street in Port-of-Spain on Tuesday.

In a media statement, Garcia reiterated his commitment to work with the Presbyterian Board to resolve existing problems at the school. He also reminded that the school was condemned by the Ministry of Works and Transport (MOWT) and his Ministry could not act without the Boards input.

He said, The Ministry of Works is the authority that decides, so we cannot disregard it. The Board is also expected to meet with the PTA to decide a way forward with a subsequent meeting scheduled to be held with the Board and the Ministry of Education in early October. Presbyterian Church Moderator, Rev Lalla-Ramkelawan later told Newsday, no concrete decision had been made with a further meeting to be held with the Ministry in October.

However she said the Board had raised concerns about five other Presbyterian primary schools which were yet to be completed by government. We are concerned about the five outstanding schools which have not been completed, that is one of our concerns, secondly, that the Princes Town school, we are glad to have a school but the process of acquiring a school has to be followed by both sides and we are meeting with the Minister in the month of October to continue the discussions, she said. Among the incomplete primary schools are the Longdenville Presbyterian primary school, the Siparia/ Union Presbyterian school and the Piparo Presbyterian primary school.

At that meeting we are expected to present a proposal concerning this school, she added. However, the schools PTA head Ramjohn- Karim said the PTA was not been informed about any meeting with the Board saying parents could say repair as much as they want, the Ministry is not going to do it and I think the Board has to finally accept that. As far as I know, if the decision had been made to demolish the school, then whatever plan has to be drawn for the school, thats what has to be done so I am waiting just like everyone else and I dont know what is the purpose of the meeting with the PTA, if any, she said. She added that students were presently attending classes at the Princes Town Presbyterian primary school #2 on a shift system saying, they are still there and I dont know how long now this process is going to take, I dont know what is going to happen.
Digital India Initiative has provided a thrust to New Media in the country: Venkaiah Naidu

New Delhi, Fri, 16 Sep 2016 NI Wire

Shri M. Venkaiah Naidu confers diplomas to IIMC students

49th Convocation Ceremony held at IIMC, New Delhi

Shri M. Venkaiah Naidu, Minister for Information & Broadcasting has said that the process of making IIMC into a university was under way and once IIMC becomes a university, it would have a platform to start many innovative programs that would aim at providing wider perspective and inter-disciplinary approach to media education. It would also provide the institute with requisite resources to meet the growing demand of manpower in the industry and academia. Shri Naidu stated this here today at 49th convocation ceremony of Indian Institute of Mass Communication, New Delhi.

Speaking on the occasion, Shri Naidu urged the graduating students to stay away from sensationalism. He said that presenting the facts as they existed without any color and biases would enable then to become truthful communicators. He urged them to preserve our old age values and culture while reporting and should use Information to fight social evils such as corruption, poverty and illiteracy. While referring to the corrupt practice of paid news, the Minister urged them to not succumb to such unethical pressures and they should maintain high standards of journalism as true soldiers of fourth estate.

Emphasizing on increasing role of social & digital media in communication domain, Shri Naidu said that Social media has changed the way the communication flows. Millions of people across cultures and geographies are interacting in real time turning the world virtually into a Global Village. He further added that digital media had brought in immense opportunities and challenges because the information was shared in real time which generated instant feedback and response. Social media provided an important platform for information dissemination for the active young netizens, who were restless and expected quick solutions. Today communication is not one way but has become interactive. People per se were not taking things at face value anymore. They were questioning, analyzing and responding on issues that they had been passive about in the past and were demanding transparency, accountability and redressal of their grievances from the highest echelons of government and industry.

Speaking about the changing profiles of Media Consumers, Shri Naidu said that Indian languages had made a major impact on internet and mobile based technologies which is a significant paradigm shift and has rightly received the attention of policy makers while thinking about Skill India in media industry. Adding further, the Minister said that media strategists and planners need to keep in mind the importance of regional media while planning campaigns to reach out to a disparate set of audiences. He also mentioned that Governments Digital India initiative has propelled the New Media to grow by leaps and bounds in areas such as animation, VFX, gaming and digital advertising apart from social networking and internet.

IIMC has the distinction of being universally recognized as a Centre of excellence in the field of journalism, media and mass communication teaching, training and research. IIMC in the last six years has opened four branches in various parts of the country such as at Aizawl in Mizoram, Jammu in J&K, Amravati in Maharashtra and Kottayam in Kerala. 341 students were conferred PG Diplomas at this Convocation which included students from six Centres of IIMC. The students were conferred diplomas in many courses which included 144 students in English Journalism, 60 students in Hindi Journalism, 72 students in Advertising & Public Relations, 44 students in Radio & TV journalism and 8 students in Urdu Journalism. Catering to online students, IIMC has decided to start online courses and a training programme on community radio in addition to many other short term courses.

Source: PIB
Delhi BJP President Launches Door-to-Door Campaing to Raise Awareness for Precaution Against Diseases

New Delhi, Fri, 16 Sep 2016 NI Wire

Delhi BJP Special Control Room Gets 77 Complaints till 4 pm Refers Them To Concerned Mayor Office

New Delhi, 15th Sept: Delhi BJP President Shri Satish Upadhyay today launched the party's door to door campaign amongst the people to raise awareness towards precautions needed to safe guard from diseases like Dengue & Chikungunya.

Shri Upadhyay started the campaign in Malaviya Nagar where he went to 1 to 19 Blocks & Sarvpriye Vihar and met the residents accompanied by the South Delhi Municipal Corporation Commissioner Shri Puneet Kumar Goel and other senior officials including the Zonal Health Officer. New Delhi District BJP President Shri Suresh Sharma and General Secretary Shri Prashant Sharma were present.

Shri Upadhyay & the team of Municipal Officials held meetings with local RWAs of 1-19 Block of Malaviya Nagar, Sarvpriye Vihar, Sarvodaya Enclave, Vijay Mandal Enclave & Main Market Traders Association. He appealed to them to extend fullest co-operation to municipal staff in ensuring that there is no water logging in open spaces and proper hygienic conditions are maintained.

Later talking to media persons Shri Upadhyay said that BJP as a political party has taken upon itself the responsibility to help the civic agencies in ensuring cleanliness. He said that though municipal staff regularly tries to keep good sanitation but as the situation today is that of a crisis we have directed the municipal staff to be extra vigilant while we have appealed to the local residents and traders to extend their cooperation.

Shri Upadhyay said that the Control Room setup by Delhi BJP to help the people in the emergency today till 4 pm received 77 complaints most of them from unauthorised & rehabilitation colonies regarding water logging & general sanitation. They were referred to the concerned Mayor or Municipal Councillors office with a deadline to give action taken report within 24 hours. BJP's concerned Mandal President will also ensure relief for the citizens. Seven queries were related to need of blood and same were referred to the concerned District President of BJP.

The member of the BJP Task Force setup to ensure cleanliness in Delhi Shri Kuljeet Chahal today evening inspected the premises in and around Bada Hindu Rao Hospital. North DMC's Chairman Standing Committee Shri Pravesh Wahi & Health Committee Chairman Shri Rajpal Rana accompanied him. Shri Chahal has said that though by & large the sanitation condition Hospital vicinity is satisfactory yet we have instructed the Hospital Medical Superintendant as thousands of patient frequent the hospital every day every effort should be made to keep the area sanitised.
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A Moroccan company has won a tender to build Abidjans train station which will be a key landmark in Cote dIvoires capital.

The new station will be achieved at a total cost of 900 million dirhams ($92.7 million), said the Moroccan news outlet, hespress.com, citing an exclusive source that requested anonymity.

The new station will include several shops and recreational facilities as well as a hotel, said hespress, adding that the Ivorian government wants to emulate Casablancas train stations.

The new project will add momentum to bilateral relations between the two countries which are bound by an enduring political alliance.

In 2015, Morocco became the largest investor in Cote dIvoire supplanting France. Moroccan companies accounted for 22% of all companies operating in Cote dIvoire followed by French counterparts (16%).

Trade between the two countries grew in both value and volume. Over the 2009-2014 period, Moroccos exports to Cote dIvoire increased by 300%.
After the spate of setbacks it suffered recently, the drumbeat of bad news for the Polisario and its self-proclaimed Sahrawi republic seems to be continuing as Jamaica has announced this week that it withdraws its recognition of the Sahrawi entity.

In an official document of the Jamaican Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, dated September 14, 2016, Jamaica announced that it has decided to withdraw its recognition of the self-proclaimed SADR.

The document was handed over to Nasser Bourita, Moroccan Junior Foreign Minister, who is currently on a visit to the Caribbean country.

Jamaica expresses its sincere hope that its position of neutrality and its continued support to the UN-sponsored peace process underway will send a strong message to the international community as to its efforts to achieve a just and peaceful solution to this regional dispute that has lasted for much too long, states the official document, adding that Jamaicas decision to withdraw its recognition of SADR -that it had acknowledged in September 1979- will be duly notified to the United Nations.

Moroccan Foreign Minister, Salaheddine Mezouar, hailed Jamaicas initiative, pointing out that since 2000, some 34 countries, including 9 states of the Caribbean region, have reconsidered their support to the separatist Polisario front and withdrawn their recognition to the pseudo-RASD.

This decision opens up significant prospects for cooperation between Morocco and Jamaica, in many areas, as it was stressed during the talks between Nasser Bourita and Jamaican officials.

According to a source from the Moroccan Foreign Ministry, meetings between Moroccan and Jamaican experts have already been scheduled for the coming weeks, to finalize cooperation agreements, particularly in the areas of agriculture, irrigation, security and tourism.
Local private channel Attassia TV announced Thursday it would go ahead and air an interview with former President Moncef Marzouki despite threats from the offices of the President and the Prime minister, reports say.

Censorship of an interview with Marzouki, also leader of Al-Irada party, has been at the center of heated debate in Tunisias political circles this week.

The channel and the Tunisian political figure have accused authorities of wielding threats against the channel if it airs the interview recorded on September 03. The interview was scheduled to go on air on Wednesday, September 14.

The media says it received threats from the President Caid Essebsis office as well as menace from Youssef Chaheds.

Marzoukis party denounced authorities intention to block their leader from expressing his opinion on the situation in the country.

The Tunisian journalist union condemned threats that it deemed a breach of the freedom of the press in Tunisia.

In counter-reaction, Noureddine Ben Ticha, a senior political adviser to Essebsi and member of the Presidents office challenged the channel and Marzoukis party to produce evidences of the threats.

We defy any journalist or producer of Attessia TV or journalist union to prove that the presidency pressed to prevent airing the interview, he said.

Attassia TV reportedly called on some political parties not to associate the media to their conflicts.
Fayez al-Sarraj, head of the Presidency Council and Prime minister-designate of the Government of National Accord (GNA), is expected to meet with some members of the Tobruk-based House of Representatives (HoR) in Cairo this Friday to discuss the new cabinet members list that is yet to get the vote of confidence of the parliament.

Ageela Saleh, Speaker of the HoR, and Emhmd Shuaib who serves as the deputy head are expected to attend the meeting.

Reports have stated that UN Special envoy for Libya Martin Kobler will be arriving in Egypt on Saturday after his visit to eastern Libya to rally support for the meeting. He met with several influential figures in Misrata including Abdulrahman Sewehli, head of the State Council, on Thursday as well as some members of the HoR.

The UN-backed GNA is seemingly reviewing its position on renegade General Khalifa Haftar ahead of the talks and it is expected to count on Cairo to help it convince the military chief to cooperate with the Presidency Council. An invitation to the meeting was reportedly extended to Haftar but it is unlikely that he will honor it.

According to an announcement late Wednesday, Saleh promoted Gen. Khalifa Hifter to Field-marshal. Haftar serves as the chief of the Libya National Army, loyal to the HoR, and his power in the Libyan war was manifested over the past couple of days with the takeover of several major oil terminals from militia groups before handing them over to the National Oil Corporation. He enjoys the support of key Arab nations but is viewed in some Western powers as an obstacle to peace.
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Yuge tax cuts, plus food poisoning. Photo: Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Donald Trump has said that every position he takes is merely the opening bid in a negotiation (toward the hallowed deal, his imagined talent for which forms the basis of his self-made myth). Nowhere is that more true than on domestic economic policy, where Trumpism is a whirligig of endless motion. Trump knows so little about domestic policy, and is so susceptible to influence by whoever spoke with him last, that there is hardly any point in describing his position, since it changes so frequently. Even identifying Trumps stance at any given point in time is often impossible, since details are often sparse and contradictory, and the candidate describes them in his trademark dialect of hyperbolic sentence fragments.

The centerpiece of Trumps economic plan, as with any Republican economic plan since 1980, is a gigantic, regressive, debt-financed tax cut. The latest version of Trumps tax cut is less gigantic and regressive than the previous one, using caps on deductions to recoup some of its hemorrhaged revenue. According to Trump, the new plan would reduce tax revenue by $4.4 trillion over a decade, but Trump promises the actual revenue loss would amount to far less due to the alleged dynamic effects of tax-cutting. Anybody who recalls Republicans warnings that the 1993 Clinton tax hike would fail to increase revenue, or that the Bush tax cuts would cause a boom, or that letting those tax cuts expire in 2013 would slow down the recovery, or that tax cuts in Kansas and Louisiana would increase growth might have skepticism that the supply-side fairy dust will finally work its magic.

Trump has amusingly framed his economic plan as a bid to restore 4 percent economic growth. This is amusing because he has stolen this goal from his former nemesis Jeb Bush, who in turn swiped it from his brother George W., whose post-presidential policy center made 4 percent growth through gigantic tax-cutting its main Big Idea. (Bushs tax cuts did not produce 4 percent annual growth, but characteristically declined to let this failure shake their confidence in the theory behind the policy.) In his speech announcing his policy, Trump relied upon the magic of growth to fill in the gaping arithmetic holes in his proposals.

The rest of Trumps plans as currently constituted (or not) consist of an odd blend of moderation and dogmatism. Trump has restated the customary Republican opposition to regulation and the also-customary focus on environmental regulation. Trump proposes to allow the unlimited dumping of greenhouse-gas emissions into the atmosphere and the restoration of the coal industry. (In truth, even deregulation wont bring back coal, which is being displaced by fuels that are not only cleaner but also cheaper.) Bizarrely, he has gone on to specify other, non-environmental regulations he would dump  a subject Republicans tend to avoid because it usually leads quickly to regulations that most people actually approve of. Trump, incredibly, cites food safety as a priority for deregulation:

The FDA Food Police, which dictate how the federal government expects farmers to produce fruits and vegetables and even dictates the nutritional content of dog food. The rules govern the soil farmers use, farm and food production hygiene, food packaging, food temperatures, and even what animals may roam which fields and when. It also greatly increased inspections of food facilities, and levies new taxes to pay for this inspection overkill.

Why Trump thinks Americans want to get rid of requirements for the safe hygiene and temperature of the food they buy is very hard to say. Its possible that an overzealous libertarian intern was allowed to write this section of his speech. Or possibly it reflects Trumps authentically weird beliefs about food safety:

Per an audience member at Dr. Oz taping with Trump, he said he likes fast food because "at least you know what they are putting in it."  Jesse Rodriguez (@JesseRodriguez) September 14, 2016

On health care, Trump has probably the least coherent views of any question. He has repeated the requisite insistence that Obamacare is a disaster and must be repealed. Today he endorsed a Medicaid expansion on the grounds that We have no choice, were not going to let people die in the streets. This is unusual for many reasons. One is that the Medicaid expansion is a major feature of the Obama health-care law he insists he will repeal. After the Supreme Court altered the law to let states abstain from the Medicaid expansion, most Republican-led states did exactly that, at the urging of conservative activists. (Many Americans have died from lack of medical care as a result.) Is Trump repudiating this policy? His current health-care policy continues to advocate for a full repeal of Obamacare and a block grant of all Medicaid funding.

The rest of Trumps speech contains now-familiar references to new investment in infrastructure, his amorphous child-care plan, fabulous new trade deals fashioned through Trumps unique negotiating abilities, and immigration restrictionism. It features the usual Republican combination of decrying the debt and proposing policies that would increase the debt by trillions of dollars. The fantastical combination of promises lies broadly within the parameters of modern Republican fiscal orthodoxy. A normal Republican who proposed something like this could be accused of lying. With Trump, the assumption that the candidate knows better grants him far too much credit.


Clinton cant grow a beard, so this better work. Photo: Gabriel Olsen/FilmMagic

Will Hillary Clinton go down in history as another Democratic candidate who narrowly lost the presidency thanks in part to a third-party candidate? Not if Al Gore has anything to say about it.



The New York Times reports that Clinton staffers have been in talks with Gore aides about the former vice-president hitting the campaign trail to emphasize the point that shes the candidate most dedicated to combating climate change  and to make the case against voting for a third-party candidate.

I can assure you from personal experience that every vote counts, Gore told the Times via email. The stakes are high for so many Americans. So I will vote for Hillary Clinton and I strongly encourage others to vote for her as well.

The news is a bit of a surprise, as Gore was one of the last Democratic figures to throw his support behind Clinton; he officially backed her with a tweet on the opening day of the Democratic National Convention. Politico reported last fall that they have a complicated relationship stemming from rivalries in the Clinton White House and the 2000 election.



Ralph Nader has maintained that his campaign did not cost Gore the 2000 election, but New Yorks Jonathan Chait recently summed up the three ways the Green Party candidate aided George W. Bush:



First, by insisting Bush and Al Gore were ideological twins, Tweedledee and Tweedledum, he aided Bush, who was trying to mute the ideological dimensions of the election, cast himself as a successor to Clintons agenda, and win on personal character. Second, he forced Gore to devote resources to defending otherwise solid Democratic states. And, third, he won enough votes in Florida to put the state into recount territory, allowing Bush to prevail.

Libertarian Gary Johnson is currently performing better than most third-party candidates do at this point in the election. The Real Clear Politics polling average currently has Clinton at 42 percent, Trump at 41 percent, Johnson at 8 percent, and Jill Stein at 3 percent. Johnson will almost certainly not reach the 15 percent needed to qualify for the debates, but, as Vox explains, there are still concerns that he could present a problem for Clinton. She and Trump are both historically unpopular for leading-party candidates, but among third-party and undecided voters, half think Clinton will win and 15 percent think Trump will win.



12% of Trump vtrs support him & believe he'll lose. Only 3% for HRC. Only 15% of 3rdParty/undecided expect Trump win pic.twitter.com/W3P0mD4wkH  Will Jordan (@williamjordann) September 15, 2016

Point: many voters who support Trump or other non-Clinton options believe(d) Clinton will win anyway. https://t.co/hE1Q0G3h3P  Will Jordan (@williamjordann) September 15, 2016

In other words, they may not want to see a Trump presidency, but they dont think its imperative that they vote for Clinton to prevent that from happening.

A recent poll found that among young voters, Clinton has only a two-point lead over Johnson. The Times reports that the Clinton campaign will attempt to combat the problem in the coming days by dispatching young liberals favorite Democrats, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. Clinton will also deliver a speech aimed at millennials on Monday in Philadelphia.



Clinton aides told the paper that they will broadcast more positive commercials focusing on the candidates economic policies and history of fighting for health-care reform as well. Its still shocking to them how little people know about her, said William M. Daley, a commerce secretary for President Bill Clinton, referring to a focus group that found voters were unaware of her efforts to increase access to health insurance. Its a big problem for her.

Gore certainly has an argument to make about the perils of voting for third-party candidates, but he cant help Clinton on those last two points. Voters too young to recall the former First Ladys highly controversial health-care push probably wont be swayed by a guy who was vice-president when they were babies, and put out a climate-change documentary when they were in elementary school.


Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Hillary Clinton has spent much of the past two months arguing that Ronald Reagan would not vote for Donald Trump. At the Democratic National Convention, a series of speakers  including Barack Obama  argued that the patron saint of the conservative movement would recoil at Trumps authoritarian ethos. At a recent press conference, the Democratic nominee suggested that the Gipper would be incensed to see the Republican nominee praise Vladimir Putin while disparaging the American president. A new ad from her super pac, released this week, casts Reagans ghost as a Clinton surrogate.

The point of all this nostalgia for the man who killed off the New Deal consensus was to isolate the Republican nominee from his partys upscale wing. In polls, Trump consistently underperforms past GOP standard-bearers with college-educated whites. The Clinton campaign sought to capitalize on suburban Republicans apparent alienation from their populist nominee, by focusing on the many nonideological reasons why Trump shouldnt be president (i.e., the fact that hes a racist, misogynist, authoritarian with a taste for conspiracy theories and no experience in government). This was also the strategic logic behind Clintons alt-right speech, in which she cast Trump as the champion of a reactionary online movement that defines itself in opposition to the Republican mainstream. By the end of that address, Clinton had contrasted the hatefulness of Trumps meme-savvy minions with the principled tolerance of such statesman as Bob Dole, George W. Bush, John McCain, and House Speaker Paul Ryan.

This focus on winning over socially moderate, fiscally selfish suburbanites generated some grumbling among progressives. But their complaints centered on the possibility that the message would undermine Democrats down-ballot  not that it would undermine Clinton herself.

Trumps resurgence in recent polls calls the latter point into question. While many analysts have tied the tightening race to Clintons health and email woes, there are signs that the candidates broader strategy has also played a role.

For one thing, that strategy doesnt appear to be accomplishing its ostensible goal: Clinton boasts the support of a whopping 6 percent of self-identified Republicans in the latest Reuters/Ipsos poll  while Trump lays claim to 8 percent of self-identified Democrats.

At the same time, Clinton has failed to consolidate the support of the Democratic base. Recent polls show more than 30 percent of (largely liberal) millennials defecting to third-party candidates, while nonwhite voters are backing Clinton at lower levels than they did Obama. And the Democrats who have rallied behind Clinton are less enthusiastic about her candidacy than they were two months ago.

There are many potential explanations for these findings. Its possible that headlines about foundation donors and walking pneumonia have blunted the efficacy of Clintons appeals to light Red America.

But its also possible that, by focusing on Trumps lack of fitness  and the ugly idiosyncrasies that separate him from other Republicans  Clinton has allowed Trump to escape the unpopularity of his partys economic agenda.

Immediately after the Democratic Convention, a CNN/ORC survey put Clinton ahead of Trump by eight points. Earlier this month, that same poll put Trump ahead of her by two. That swing inspired no small amount of panic in progressives social-media feeds. But an even more dramatic change can be found beneath the headline figures:

Clinton went from winning the economic debate by two points, to losing it by 15. Considering the fact that the economy is the electorates number-one concern, this seems like a shift worth dwelling on.

While Clinton has put forward a robust economic agenda, much of her messaging has directed attention away from it: You cant make a full-throated case for a progressive economic vision and insist that this election is about more than left versus right. The second argument inevitably crowds out the first. How much moral urgency can you put into your case for expanding social welfare, while still casting Paul Ryan  a man who has worked tirelessly to cut nutritional benefits to needy children  as a kind of honorable public servant? Forced to choose between conveying a clear ideological message and courting the broadest possible coalition against Trump, Clinton opted for the latter.



This made some sense when Clinton was leading by 10 points, and looking to engineer a landslide. It makes less sense today. Especially since the center-lefts agenda is, on paper, way more popular than Trumponomics.

More than 60 percent of Americans believe the rich should pay higher taxes. Same for raising the federal minimum wage. And while polling data is limited, evidence strongly suggests that expanding Social Security is a big winner for Democrats. At the very least, tying Trump to his partys affinity for Social Security cuts couldnt hurt: More than two-thirds of Republicans dont want to see benefits reduced. Similarly, there is little appetite among voters of either party for deregulating the finance industry. And yet, the GOP nominee has committed himself to doing just that.

Throughout his campaign, Trump has deliberately branded himself as a Republican unconstrained by fealty to conservative dogma. At various points, hes feigned openness to raising taxes on the super-rich and increasing the minimum wage, explaining, Im very different from most Republicans.



But, on most areas of economic policy, he truly isnt. And by encouraging the public to see Trump as something other than a Republican, Clinton may have lent credibility to his own claim of independence from Paul Ryans losing agenda.

While Trump has struck heterodox stances on trade, infrastructure spending, and subsidized child care, he has embraced supply-side economics, Wall Street deregulation, leaving the federal minimum wage right where it is, and, most recently, the abolition of food-safety standards. Whats more, he has reportedly signaled an openness to entitlement cuts behind closed doors.

Its not hard to craft a message that connects these unpopular policies to Trumps character liabilities. Clinton and her surrogates have done it many times; they just havent centered their campaign around the charge: Donald Trump is a con artist who is trying to hoodwink working people into voting for the one-percents agenda.

To be sure, theres no guarantee that this message will prove effective. But shifting the debate to the realm of economic policy should at least help re-energize the Democratic base  calls for expanding Social Security are more likely to generate liberal enthusiasm than paeans to the moral courage of George W. Bush.

And who knows, maybe a populist economic message could flip a Trump-leaning non-college educated white voter or two. While Trumps appeal among that demographic is largely racial and cultural, theres still evidence that economic concerns are a factor. Lost amid the (warranted) celebration of the rosy economic data released this week, is the fact that, outside metro areas, wages actually declined in 2015.

Regardless, the Clinton campaign recognizes that it cant keep doing what it has been. On Wednesday in North Carolina, Clinton put less emphasis on Trumps outrages than she did on her own virtues as a conscientious technocrat. But her attack lines were still premised on Trumps personal failings, not the GOPs ideological ones.

HRC says in her first 100 days as POTUS she will reach out to Republicans to help show them that their party "is better than Donald Trump"  Liz Kreutz (@ABCLiz) September 16, 2016

Distancing Trump from the Party of Reagan hasnt worked. Tying him to that partys plutocratic agenda might.


Missouri is also an open-carry state. Photo: Scott Olson/Getty Images

The gun-rights lobby just won a major victory in Missouri. As of January 1, Missourians will be able to legally carry concealed firearms without a permit, foregoing the training course and background check the law previously required. Certain public places, such as courtrooms and jails, are still off limits to concealed carry, but now a violation of that rule will be considered a misdemeanor rather than a felony. The law also implements a stand your ground provision, adding Missouri to the list of states that no longer require an individual to retreat before using deadly force. That change goes into effect earlier, on October 14.

Missouri Republican lawmakers overrode a gubernatorial veto to approve the bill on Wednesday. Governor Jay Nixon, a Democrat, rejected the bill because, he said, it would allow individuals to legally carry a concealed firearm even though they have been or would be denied a permit because their background check revealed criminal offenses or caused the sheriff to believe they posed a danger. Republican legislators responded by quashing a Democratic filibuster and forcing a vote on the bill; it passed handily in the state House and Senate pretty much along party lines. The NRA called the approval of the new gun law a great day for freedom in Missouri.

Background checks are still required to purchase a firearm, and people can still apply for concealed-carry permits if they want them  and theyll need one to carry across state lines in those that have reciprocity. But, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, county sheriffs will now have a harder time denying people permits over red flags in background checks. Sheriff Gary Toelke of Franklin County, which borders on St. Louis County, told the Post-Dispatch: I have no problem with the original law. I could refuse a permit for somebody who has had frequent contact with the law, or who is a suicide threat. Now that person will be able to carry a concealed weapon, and that concerns me.



GOP legislators in Missouris House and Senate overrode another one of many gubernatorial vetoes on that same Wednesday, this one concerning the states voter-ID laws. Lawmakers again forced a vote, and again overrode Nixons veto on a law that requires voters to show government-issued identification at polling stations starting in 2017. However, actual voters will have the final say on that one, in a proposed constitutional amendment that will appear on this years ballot. (The Missouri Supreme Court declared its 2006 voter-ID law unconstitutional.) Even if the amendment passes, the law could face a court challenge, despite being less restrictive than some other states voter-ID laws.
Julian Assange. Photo: Carl Court/Getty Images

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assanges most recent attempt to quash the rape investigation against in him in Sweden has failed. A Swedish court again upheld the arrest warrant for Assange, who is wanted for questioning regarding 2010 rape allegations. Assange, who is still holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, has denied those allegations and has long argued that being sent to Sweden would make him vulnerable to extradition to the United States, where he could face charges for dumping classified documents on WikiLeaks.

Assanges attorney, Per Samuelsson, vowed to appeal the most recent decision, which also rejected a U.N. finding that Assanges prolonged stay in the Ecuadorian embassy counted as arbitrary detention. Per NPR, Assange hasnt been formally indicted in Sweden, but authorities say they need to question him before they can charge him with any crime. The statute of limitations in this case is up in 2020.

But Swedish prosecutors may also get something of a breakthrough in the investigation this month. An Ecuadorian prosecutor, acting as the middleman for Swedish officials, will question Assange about the rape allegations at the Ecuadorian embassy on October 17, a date the two countries just set. Ecuadorian and Swedish officials hashed out an agreement late last year and have been working out the details since. The Swedish court noted this new development in its decision, reports the Associated Press, but basically said it had no bearing. This means that there is at present no reason to set aside the detention order, the court said in its decision. Julian Assanges claim to that effect shall therefore be refused.
David Adjayes museum on the Mall in Washington. Photo: Preston Keres/AFP/Getty Images

An indispensable new presence has risen on the National Mall, a showcase of glory and shame. Its dark bronzed skin broods in the glare of morning, glows in the late afternoon sun, and at all times contrasts with the marble-white uniformity of Washingtons official architecture. You could hardly ask for a more literal, or more effective, architectural assertion of a buildings mission. The National Museum of African American History and Culture, an institution full of purpose but badly in need of a nickname, blooms out of the capitals central lawn in three expanding tiers. The shape echoes an urban-scaled version of the headdress on a Yoruba sculpture, advertising the African roots of American culture. A cantilevered canopy shades a porch vast enough to welcome a multifarious community  which is to say, all of us.

Architecture and identity rarely fuse as convincingly as they do here. Simple in form and intricate in execution, the museum performs an impossible job with grace, walking visitors through a linear tale and at the same time submerging them in the crosscurrents of black America. It educates and confuses, exalts and enrages, simplifies history and pummels visitors with hailstones of knowledge. At times a visit feels like wandering through a sprawling bibliography; each vitrine makes me want to read another book.

Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

The building sits at the capitals symbolic hinge, where the Mall meets Presidents Park and the Washington Monument. Its narrative winds through and around the one told in the Smithsonians National Museum of American History and Culture across 14th Street. That institution long ago claimed the Woolworth counter from the 1960 Greensboro sit-ins, so its younger sister has to make do with a single stool. You cant tell Americas story without also telling black Americas story. Our music sprang from the marriage of cotton-field work songs and European marches. Our notions of freedom were compromised by trying to justify oppression. Our ideals of including all comers depended on excluding many who were already here. American history consists of narratives and counter-narratives, each one cogent, sprawling, and incomplete, and to fully appreciate the relationship between them, you need both of these separate but complementary institutions.

The museums existence, decreed by President George W. Bush over the objections of some recalcitrant members of Congress, represents a triumph of tenacity and vision. Founding director Lonnie Bunch spurred the museum into being, scared up half a billion dollars, and accumulated 37,000 objects, only a tenth of which are currently on display. The Ghanaian-British David Adjaye led a design team that included two distinguished African-American architects, Phil Freelon and the late Max Bond. The result is a 400,000-square-foot building that can be clunkily obvious and underdetailed but also grand, alternately claustrophobic and vacant, triumphant and demoralizing.

Visitors enter a broad, open lobby that serves as the museums midpoint, both overture and interlude between the historical journey below and the celebratory galleries above. The first steps are easy: A twisting black staircase drops down to the theater and cafe. After that, though, you plunge farther underground, to the floor of an immense cellar walled with rough, dark concrete. The story of black America begins at the bottom of a swamp. From there, we follow a long march up a zigzagging ramp, from darkness to daylight, from the origins of the Atlantic slave trade to the Obama presidency. The architecture literalizes the metaphor of uplift, but that trajectory subsumes a lot of violence and backlash.

Photo: Preston Keres/AFP/Getty Images

The new museum makes visible the case that Ta-Nehisi Coates argues with unflinching eloquence in Between the World and Me: that American prosperity is based on the exploitation of African-Americans, and that we all still enjoy the fruits of the misery inflicted on them. Its not just the pair of rusted shackles that drive that lesson home, or the guard tower from the Angola prison, or Nat Turners bible, or the diagrams showing how slavers packed captive Africans in a ships hold for the four-month journey to the United States. Its the sheer accumulation of facts and artifacts that give the story its texture.

All museums are by definition selective; every anthology rings with omissions, and this one gives everyone something to be indignant about. Still, as the exhibit clicks from topic to topic and decade to decade, its hard to avoid a feeling of studied neutrality and extreme compression. The often vituperative feud between Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Dubois comes off as an exchange of bloodless theoretical abstractions. In short clips we see Stokely Carmichael as the clear-eyed firebrand, coolly furious in his rational dissection of history. We do not see the Carmichael who remarked: Ive never admired a white man, but the greatest of them, to my mind, was Hitler. The exhibits include a slave drivers bullwhip, but none of the Black Panthers guns. In a film clip near the end of the historical trajectory, the civil-rights legend Representative John Lewis proclaims the need for a museum that tells a peoples story plain and true, without avoiding its hard edges. And yet those edges have been neatly shaped and sanded to make them safe for public display.

On the day of the press preview, workers were still installing displays, but even when the museum finally opens to the public on September 24, it will feel at once monumental and provisional. The three-layered bloom of the building suggests that it could keep on rising toward a more brilliant future. (Washingtons height limits preclude that.) On the upper floors, broad, empty hallways encircle darkened galleries so stuffed with jangling exhibits they resemble a casino arcade. Some of the objects on display here havent quite made the transition from memorabilia to historical artifact (although I did get a charge from a close encounter with the P-Funk Mothership). Speakers bleed into each others acoustic space, so that Leontyne Prices iridescent soprano beats against an early blues guitar. The show glides over the complexities of influence or the evolutions of genre, offering instead just a series of illustrated entries. It mutters about the African roots of African-American music, then skips away to the shiny, sexy stuff, like Chuck Berrys Cadillac. I came away overstimulated and underinformed.

These faults can be tweaked as the museum evolves. The most seductive aspect of Adjayes design is also its most permanent: the buildings bronzed aluminum screen, a digital extrapolation of iron railings wrought by slaves. The pattern gets mirrored and flipped to form a four-quadrant panel, which repeats over the facades entire expanse. Despite that regularity, the filigree appears almost random from a distance, like a lattice of butterscotch swirls. That screen is a sly move, at once practical, beautiful, and emblematic of the veils that have obscured memory and made black Americans invisible to their fellow citizens. It textures the facade and shades the interior from glare, parting just enough for perfectly framed views of the Washington Monument. Standing on an indoor balcony, we look out at the capital campus through a clarifying scrim. Adjaye has reframed the nations preeminent icon as an object behind glass  an ambiguous symbol best comprehended in the context of black Americas story.
Like a certain previous Republican nominee, Donald Trump could win a narrow Electoral College majority while losing the popular vote. Photo: Jeff Swensen/Getty Images

Along with the emergence of a plausible  if still quite difficult  path to 270 electoral votes for Donald Trump is the return of a particularly painful scenario for Democrats. Thats the possibility that, for the second time since Y2K, a Republican could be elected president while losing the popular vote.

The Cook Political Reports David Wasserman laid out the scenario at FiveThirtyEight:

[I]n the event this race does tighten to a coin flip by Nov. 8, there is an unusually high chance Donald Trump could win the Electoral College while losing the popular vote  basically, Democrats version of the apocalypse.

Heres why: Several of Trumps worst demographic groups happen to be concentrated in states, such as California, New York, Texas and Utah, that are either not competitive or that arent on Trumps must-win list. Conversely, whites without a college degree  one of Trumps strongest groups  represent a huge bloc in three blue states he would need to turn red to have the best chance of winning 270 electoral votes: Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

To put it another way, Hillary Clinton would waste a lot of popular votes in noncompetitive states she is either sure to win (e.g., California) or lose (Texas), while Trumps base is concentrated very efficiently for winning battleground states.

Demographic categories where Trump is unusually weak but in ways that wont cost him electoral votes extend beyond the obvious African-American and Latino voters. There are LDS folk, too.

Trump is massively unpopular among Mormons, and its entirely possible he could win them by just 10 points over Clinton, with many opting for Libertarian Gary Johnson or independent Evan McMullin instead.

If that many Mormons defect from the GOP, it could effectively shift the national popular vote by 1.3 million in Democrats favor  more than twice Al Gores margin in 2000. Yet the exodus seems unlikely to net Clinton additional electoral votes. Trump is on track to win a plurality in Utah, and outside the Beehive State, the bulk of Mormon voters are concentrated in noncompetitive Idaho and California. They may only matter on the margins in Arizona and Nevada.

Supposing it all goes down this way and Trump squeaks through to 270 while losing the popular vote  perhaps by a much larger margin than Bush lost it in 2000  theres another factor that could make his election a shock to the system and an outrage to much of the country. Thanks to the strength of third-, fourth-, and even fifth-party candidates this year, Trump could win 270 electoral votes with significantly less than a majority of the popular vote, perhaps somewhere between 40 percent and 45 percent.

Keeping in mind the intense fear and antipathy Trump generates among his opponents, the prospect of this strange man assuming the vast powers of the presidency via a decided minority of the vote could produce a backlash far exceeding anything we saw after the Supreme Court lifted W. to the presidency. Add in the fact that Trump might have a Republican Congress elected alongside him that would be eager to instantly reverse much of the Obama administrations legacy  some by executive order, some by one of those 5,000-page budget reconciliation bills that cannot be filibustered  and youve got the ultimate nightmare for liberals.
Photo: Mark Leibowitz/Masterfile/Corbis

Two years ago, French GQ sex columnist Maia Mazaurette told the Cut why the French are better at sex than Americans. Then she took a trip to New York, joined Tinder, and fell in love with an American. This week on Sex Lives, she explains how an American actor tamed Pariss wildest bachelorette (2:55), whether her views on Frances sexual superiority have changed (35:15), how to say French kiss in French (30:00), and why the French word for rim job is beautifully poetic. With Maureen OConnor.
Photo: Takeshi Kitagawa / EyeEm/Getty Images

A new study from Japan involved the government asking citizens aged 18 to 34 if they were virgins, among other questions. And, in disappointing news to everyone involved (Japans low birth rate is a matter of national concern), a large amount responded yes.



Per the Japan Times, the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research found that 70 percent of unmarried men and 60 percent of unmarried women are not in a relationship, and around 42 percent of the men and 44.2 percent of the women admitted they were virgins. These numbers have increased since the 2010 survey, when it was 36.2 and 38.7 percent, respectively.

Ah, well  last we checked, sex is no longer cool.
Marc Jacobs Spring 2017 Beauty Photo: Getty Images

The story behind the hair at Marc Jacobss show today involves fashions most legendary hair stylist, Guido Palau, and an Etsy seller named Jen. Lets examine it by the numbers.

Three: The number of months ago that Marc Jacobs was first inspired by the multicolor textured dreadlocks of director, trans woman, and spring/summer 2016 campaign star Lana Wachowski. In July, he messaged a picture of Wachowski to Palau, who then spent weeks searching online for a purveyor who could provide hair in a rainbow of shades.

The quest eventually revealed Jen, or @DreadsbyJena, an Etsy seller from Palatka, Florida, who had been selling and hand-dyeing and hand-rolling wool-dyed hair for a year (and whose star rating will probably soar after this show). I learned on the internet, she explained. She started doing it because she saw the colors and thought they were pretty.

The next number: 300. Palau and Jen and the hair team worked with Jacobs to dye 300 different shades that would coordinate with the collection. He was like, I want to see this shade and this shade and this shade! His coloration and detailing was incredible. He would say, Could you do something in a more khaki shade? Every coloration was so important, Palau said.

Coming to New York a week before the show, Jen and her daughter holed up in an apartment and hand-dyed over 12,500 yards of yarn.

Fifty-five dreads sat atop the heads of Gigi Hadid, Kendall Jenner, Bella Hadid, Adriana Lima, Irina Shayk, Jourdan Dunn, and Karlie Kloss along with the other models in todays show. Each dread was a different color, but they were all grouped with other complementary hues and gathered into an asymmetric ponytail that rode high on the head, with the tails spilling along the sides of the face. (Palau used Redken Windblown to texturize).

There were roughly six or so different color groupings, like a pale-white blonde, pastel pink, and blue cluster; a My Little Ponylike color bouquet with lavender, coral, and royal blue; and a darker grouping with mustard, army green, and sapphire.

Although Palau said the references came from all over, he also cited the 80s, raver culture, Boy George, and Harajuku as references, explaining that with the colors many of the girls looked quite cyber.

To complement the hair, Francois Nars created six different sheer, glossy eye looks in pink, purple, silver, green, blue, and copper using shades like NARS Desdemona Dual-Intensity Eyeshadow, NARS Lysithea Dual Intensity Eyeshadow, and Interstellar Eye Paint. Lips had just gloss (NARS Triple X Lip Gloss), and the eyes were further accented with brown mascara (for softness, Nars explained). Small clusters of false eyelashes were placed along the top and lower lash line to open up the eye and give the model the slightest suggestion of dolly lashes.

To complement the pastels and sheer washes of color, manicurist Jin Soon Choi painted the models nails in one of seven pearlescent pastel shades of Marc Jacobs Beauty nail polish. The shades were created specially for the show and available afterward in a presale.

Addressing the elephant of misappropriation in the room, Cut beauty-editor-at-large Linda Wells asked Palau his thoughts on the politics of giving everyone in the show dreadlocks. He said, I dont really think about that. I take inspiration from every culture. Style comes from clashing things. Its always been there  if youre creative, if you make food, music, and fashion, whatever, youre inspired by everything. Its not homogeneous. Different cultures mix all the time. You see it on the street. People dont dress head-to-toe in just one way.

Of whether Rasta culture was an inspiration, he said, No, no at all.

Backstage, the Cut caught up with model Riley Montana to ask her thoughts on the hair look. Its so fun and different and edgy. Im going to run out of here after this show so they dont take it away from me! I feel like its appreciating a different culture and showing it with different people, different races, different cultures, and different personalities, so it works.


Washington State University, in eastern Washington, near Idaho. Photo: William Mancebo/Getty Images

Washington State Universitys Delta Upsilon chapter has been suspended after reports of sexual assault at one of the fraternitys parties, a local CBS affiliate reports. According to university officials, police were called to interview an 18-year-old woman who said that when she tried to leave the fraternity after a night of partying, an unknown man blocked the door and refused to let her out. She was then sexually assaulted and later hospitalized.

At least three more women have since come forward saying they were drugged at the same party, according to the Moscow-Pullman Daily News. At least one  a 17-year-old  was hospitalized, and police are waiting for test results to determine whether they had drugs in their system.

The fraternitys national council held an emergency meeting on Wednesday, where it voted, 23 to one, to suspend the chapter. Spokesmen for the Interfraternity Council  the organization that regulates all fraternities nationwide  said if Delta Upsilon members are found to have drugged their party guests, the chapter will face repercussions.
Rec

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still one of the best

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that and the exorcist are the scariest films ive ever seen..

i had to pause rec a couple of times my heart was beating so fast

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I can't believe I still haven't seen it.

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How is Trollhunter? It's been on my neflix queue for ages (I hope it's still on Netflix lol) but I've just never gotten around to it



I think the last found footage I watched was Cloverfield in theaters :x

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I was actually shocked that I was really rooting for the characters in Trollhunter. I thought it was going to be a dumb silly movie to watch while drunk with friends, but in the end, all of were glued to the TV during the climax and really hoping for the best for everyone involved, haha.



BUT I also was very drunk so you may have to take my recommendation with a grain of salt.

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It's lots of fun! Nordic movies are always such a hoot!

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u'll love it

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It was really good. I was surprised how it got me thinking on the ethics of troll hunting...when in truth this is entirely fiction. All the actors were great and there were no "how can you film in this situation?" questions or "there's no reason for this character to be carrying a camera".



Full recommendation.

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It's been years but I remember really liking it

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The Den was a pleasant surprise. I think that's my fave.

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Oh no wait. I did see the one with the different scary videos? That was weird. I didn't like it.

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yes! lol it felt weird thinking of old videotapes as a connection to the title but yes :3

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4dx can be fun but sometimes it's just too much. Like I saw one of the Hobbit films (can't remember which one tbh) and the 4dx plus 3d made me sick to my stomach by the end. And our 4dx theater is an hour from our house so we then had that long drive home afterwards... actually had to pull the car over on the freeway and throw up :/



4dx is best in small doses and not meant for a 3 hour film lol

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Having seen the new one twice (through free screenings), damn, I don't think I could handle watching it like that. Just the loud ass noises with all the shouting and the sounds in the woods alone would freak me out. Lol, I still have Lisa's screams of confused horror before she runs into the house stuck in my head.



And damn, I'm thinking of the tunnel scene and that would freak me out.

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I loved Quarantine back when I saw it but I only saw it once in theaters and I was a teenager so maybe my choices have changed? I'm only doubting them because I know most people don't seem to like it that much lol



Chronicle was really good

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i feel like REC was a lot better than Quarantine idk :\ u just can't beat the originals

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ugh I hate the long beak mask thing he wears in TPT. and that scene where he crawls up behind that person and injects them w that stuff nope

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I forgot how creepy this movie was. Watched a streaming version of it that was linked in an old, old ONTD creepy post.

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the fourth kind is freaky af omg



I can't wait for creepy posts again 

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mte lol

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CLOVERFIELD and Chronicle were amazingggggggg

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Is OP a real person or a bot?

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Lol this is taking me back!

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it's our punishment for banning H_B

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I didn't know we could use fan-made IMDB lists as sources.

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yasss! Thank you OP for this! I need more recs!



Still looking at it, but Lake Mungo is super good!



Edited at 2016-09-16 06:43 pm (UTC)

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I liked the V/H/S series *kanye shrug* The second film is better and creepier tho

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That's the one I saw! But I was bored with it :(

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YESSSS NOROI IS MY GO TO ; _ ;



saving this list tho

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noroi is good, there is one part with really bad sfx that took me out of the movie but overall i really liked it

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I freaking love Noroi. That was the last film to give me an uneasy feeling.

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Canadian oil companies have struggled for years to build enough pipeline capacity to get their oil out of landlocked Alberta, and more than a handful of proposed projects have been stifled by intense opposition from people living in affected areas.

Still, the industry is applying a lot of pressure on the Canadian government to allow them to build an outlet out of Alberta. Bloomberg reports that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is keen on approving at least one major pipeline in his first term. The leading candidate is the Trans Mountain Expansion, a project proposed by Kinder Morgan that would send Alberta oil to the Pacific Coast in British Columbia.

Prime Minister Trudeau is attempting a difficult balancing act, hoping to hold onto his image as a green-friendly leader, repairing Canadas image as an oily pariah in international climate change circles. But he also wants to appease the oil industry, which has issued dire warnings about the future of Canadas oil sector if no new pipelines are approved.

Trudeau hopes that a tougher regulatory process with greater environmental safeguards will thread this needle. There are at least four major projects that he is being forced to grapple with  Enbridges Northern Gateway, TransCanadas Energy East, Kinder Morgans Trans Mountain Expansion, and Petronas natural gas pipeline that would feed an LNG export terminal in British Columbia. Related: Are Hedge Funds Positioning For An OPEC Disappointment?

All of the projects face some degree of opposition from environmentalists and First Nations, not to mention provincial governments and voters in both British Columbia and Quebec. Nevertheless, it could be Kinder Morgans Trans Mountain Expansion that gets one of the few, or only, approvals. Trudeau likely sees that pipeline easier to stomach because it is simply an expansion on an existing pipeline route, a twin conduit to be built next to one already running from Alberta to British Columbia.

Trudeau seems to lean against Northern Gateway  which will run through the Great Bear Rainforest and also anger BC voters  and also is skeptical of the Energy East  which is hugely unpopular in Quebec. But he is also under tremendous pressure from the industry. Trudeau will not be able to be everybodys friend. He will upset many of his Liberal voters for approving any pipeline at all. But the approval of one line is unlikely to befriend him to Canadas oil industry.

We need pipelines, we need pipelines to the West Coast, and most advantageous for Canada of course are pipelines into the Asia-Pacific basin and Trans Mountain would certainly be helpful, Jim Prentice, former Alberta Premier and advisor to Warburg Pincus, said at a Bloomberg conference in New York this week. But he acknowledged that investors are losing interest in Canadas expensive oil, and the difficulty in exporting oil because of a dearth of pipeline capacity is only making things worse. The concern that really should alarm us as Canadians is low-cost capital is exiting the Canadian basin, Prentice said. Related: Iranian Expert Uses Climate Change To Pressure OPEC To Cut

Enbridge recently announced its decision to spend $28 billion to takeover Spectra Energy, which will make the combined company the owner of the worlds largest oil and gas pipeline network. The move was seen as a diversification away from Canada  with so many pipelines stalled in Canada, Enbridge is looking to the U.S. for a more accommodating market. Infrastructure companies have to run to the U.S. to get growth, Rafi Tahmazian, partner and senior portfolio manager at Calgary-based Canoe Financial, told Bloomberg. Weve stifled all of them from their ability to grow.

Parts of the U.S. are also unfavorable right now. Enbridge was forced to delay its plans for the Sandpiper pipeline, which would carry Bakken crude from North Dakota, through Minnesota to Wisconsin. The $2.6 billion project was put on ice for the time being because Bakken production is falling and the pipeline is no longer needed. And the Dakota Access Pipeline has been temporarily stalled, echoing the huge blow that TransCanada received last year with the denial of its Keystone XL Pipeline.

While midstream companies are getting hit hard by opposition to their projects on all fronts, low oil prices are hurting upstream producers in Canada as well. According to the Canadian Association of Oilwell Drilling Contractors, 2016 is shaping up to be the worst year on record. The oil and gas services industry is facing the most difficult economic time in a generation, CAODC president Mark Scholz said in a release. In fact, 2016 will be the worst year in our recorded drilling activity history.

By Nick Cunningham of Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
Apaches recent oil find highlights what could be a new phase in fracking. To date, fracking in the U.S. had really been all about taking explored basins and drilling new wells to get at previously untapped resources. That strategy worked well when oil prices were more than $80 a barrel. At todays prices though, drilling the old style rigs in mostly depleted fields to get at residual layers of black gold is a money losing strategy. Apaches find shows that money can be made by taking risks and looking for major new finds in areas that had been passed over previously.

Apache Corporation has struck oil in a region that no one would have expected. The believed to be clay-ridden region of the Permian Basin surprisingly contains at least $8 billion in oil, and there could be more. For years geologists have explored and drilled down to find limited resources and an abundance of clay.

Apache Corps leading competitors are Chevron and Occidental Petroleum, both of which maintain a significant presence in the Permian Basin as well. Occidental opened at $78 but closed $.87 lower on Tuesday. Their shares have since retreated to $75.85 and were downgraded to a hold. This past May, rumors were circulating that Occidental was in talks to take over Apache. The acquisition would have been worth $25 billion, if it were true. Occidental quickly put the rumor to bed and Apaches stock withdrew from its 11 percent spike. Apaches news last Tuesday threw Occidentals hopes of a takeover out the window. Alpine High could be Apaches ticket to a more competitive market share in the basin.

Unbeknownst to the public, Apache hired a team of drillers from EOG Resources in 2014 to evaluate the quality of the land. The team drilled several test holes and used 3d seismic to determine where the deposits are located. Apache is now referring to the resource rich land as Alpine High.

Apache estimates there are roughly 75 trillion cubic feet of gas and 3 billion barrels of oil in the ground. They have spent the past two years gathering land, now some 307,000 acres in preparation for Tuesdays announcement. Apache has recognized 2,000 to 3,000 potential drilling locations and claims each could be worth a net present value of $4 million to $20 million. The company is confident they will see a 30 percent rate of return on the investment. Related: Geopolitical Oil Glut: What Happens When Libya Exports 600,000 bpd in 4 Weeks?

Even more curious, they bought the land at $1,300/acre when land in this region fetches at least $20,000. The difference in price is due to the fact the more expensive land is usually developed with wells already standing. Most of the land Apache purchased is undeveloped and has little to no infrastructure nearby. Thanks to the major find though, Apache has a lock on what could be one of the most exciting finds in decades.

Apache has already constructed 19 wells, most of which are pumping natural gas, but more is likely to come once infrastructure and procedures are set. A concern for the company will be clearing land and creating necessary roads and pipelines for the oil and gas. Apache is increasing its capital investment by $200 million for the year, taking a considerable chance. It is unlikely Apache will turn to Baker Hughes or Weatherford for oil field services considering the amount of capital they will be investing.

As of Tuesday, Apaches stock was at a regular price of $51.67 a share but has since risen 14 percent to $59.40. EOG Resources recently announced they would be acquiring Yates Petroleum, increasing their share value along with collective acreage in a nearby territory.

There have already been clear signs of Apaches stock climbing but with more data and reassuring news potentially unfolding in the future, the company could stand to be a solid investment. Most of the land is undeveloped and only a few wells stand, meaning theres plenty of work to be done before this project pays off. Speculators should also study WTI oil and natural gas futures and note their price will respond negatively to production increases. Apache will be one of the few oil companies this year to see such substantial growth and increase in spending.

By Michael McDonald of Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
The Dutch parliament adopted a motion to review production at the Groningen gas field annually, Reuters reported on Thursday.

In June, the legislature passed a 5-year output bill that sought to limit the risk of earthquakes linked to production activity by limiting production from Europes largest gas field to 24 billion cubic feet a year.

On Thursday, the government took it a step further, allowing for even more possible reductions to the 24 billion cubic meter cap  a figure that Economics Minister Henk Kamp cited in June would guarantee customers, both in Holland and abroad, the gas they need to heat their homes in the winter.

Now Kamp says the limits could be made more stringent as German customers seek new energy sources.

This annual review is a new development but a prudent and understandable one in the context of the seismic concerns, Craig Lowrey, a consultant at UX Energy Services in the United Kingdom told World Oil in an email. Seeking stability for five years is likely to be welcome news to the markets given the extent of the declines in output seen over the last two years.

The government first limited production in 2014, when small tremors around the field first began. Experts warned that if output increased further, the earthquakes would continue. Residents of the area are currently pushing to shut down the field entirely.

Oilprice.coms Dave Forest reported yesterday that the cuts will likely put a sustained upward pressure on gas prices  which would help support development in other established European production hubs such as the North Sea. A stronger natural gas market might also push Europes governments to speed up shale gas development, which has a hit a lull in places like Germany due to stringent environmental regulations.

By Zainab Calcuttawala for Oilprice.com

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The Federal Bureau of Investigation is looking into several threats connected to the pipeline dispute in North Dakota. The online threats, which have appeared in YouTube videos, have been made against President Obama, North Dakota Governor Jack Dalrymple, members of the National Guard, and law enforcement.

The group, Anonymous Agents have also made threats against pipeline and construction workers, as well as the executives of Energy Transfer Partners. Speaking with KFGO radio, FBI Special Agent Kyle Loven said that the agency is working with local law enforcement on the issue, adding that law enforcement does not want the situation to become any more volatile than it already is.

North Dakota Senator Heidi Heitkamp has asked that the Department of Justice to investigate the source and credibility of the threats.

In the meantime, lawmakers and the oil industry are ramping up calls for the Obama Administration to stand down, after it temporarily suspended construction of the pipeline. The move by the President came last Friday, after U.S. District Judge James Boasberg ruled against the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, which has opposed the pipeline for two years.

The tribe wants to block the pipeline because it could cross sacred ground and burial sites and could pose health problems. The decision to block the project, which would span four states and 1,172 miles and is valued at $3.8 billion dollars, has industry leaders and legislators claiming that the federal government has overstepped its boundaries. North Dakota Representative Kevin Cramer commented: It seems more than a little confusing that moments after a federal judge issued an order stating, among other things, that the Corps of Engineers and the pipeline company did everything the law requires of them and more, the Obama Administration decides to change the rules.

Energy Transfer Partners records show that the company has moved the pipeline 140 times at its own expense in order to avoid burial sites. Ninety-nine percent of the route crosses private land.

By Lincoln Brown for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
Tesla has won a contract with Southern California Edison for the installation of what will be the biggest lithium-ion battery storage facility in the world. The project, featuring Teslas Powerpack system, will have a capacity of 20 MW/80 MWh and will be capable of supplying power to 2,500 households for a day or charging 1,000 Tesla cars, the company said.

The batteries for the Powerpack will be manufactured at Teslas recently completed gigafactory in Nevada, which will allow the company to put the storage facility in operation within three months. Once online, the system will store energy taken from the grid during off-peak hours and then release it during peak hours whenever the grid cant cope due to increased demand for energy in the winter months.

The energy storage project was tabled after a huge leak of natural gas from the Aliso Canyon reservoir, which resulted in the release of as much as 1.6 million pounds of methane into the atmosphere and displaced thousands of people.

The Aliso Canyon reservoir was closed to avoid future disasters, which left the gas peaker power plants around Los Angeles short of the gas they would need to meet energy demand in winter. Now, with Teslas storage system, energy produced outside the periods of peak demand will be used during future peaks.

An additional advantage of the Powerpack solution, Tesla points out, is that storing energy and then using it when demand is heightened will also help decrease CO2 emissions from the generation of electricity at gas-fired power plants.

Although Tesla did not disclose the size of the deal, the companys website says a 2 MW/4 MWh Powerpack system costs around US$2.22 million.

The contract is certainly very good news for the carmaker, which this year has been plagued by serious problems with its autopilot system, missed production targets, and missed sales targets. The Southern California Edison contract is also the latest indication of Teslas dedication to expanding into a one-stop-shop for energy solutions, following its August acquisition of SolarCity.

By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
You could say that Milwaukee's French Immersion School, located in the former Steuben Junior High School, 2360 N. 52nd St., has taken a grand tour  of Milwaukee school buildings, at least  over the course of its 35-year history.

"The Milwaukee French Immersion program began in 1978 as part of court-ordered desegregation," says recently retired principal Virginia McFadden.

"Anthony Gradisnik, curriculum specialist for foreign languages at that time, had the foresight to research and to develop the immersion schools in Milwaukee as an alternative to forced busing," says McFadden. "The French and German programs were housed at 68th Street School and then moved to 82nd Street School."

After some time at Lancaster School (only part of the program shifted to this school on 68th near Fond du Lac Avenue for a year due to space constraints at 82nd Street), the program moved to 88th Street School, near Morgan Avenue on the southwest side, before landing at its current location in 2004.

"The immersion schools proved to be very successful," says McFadden. "The French program continued to grow and thrive, eventually filling the 88th Street School site to capacity. Due to the desire to expand the program as well as for budgetary reasons, the program was again relocated."

That movement brought growing pains, but was also a sign of a successful and in-demand program.

"Relocating the school in and of itself had its challenges," McFadden recalls. "There were a number of people who were very opposed to the idea for a variety of reasons. Initially, the program 'lost' some families because of the move, but within a year the student population grew to surpass the population prior to the move.

"Although it was a very challenging time, the relocation allowed the program to continue to grow and to remain a vibrant part of MPS."

Enrollment stood at 338 when MFIS opened its doors in its current location. This September, it enrolled 448 students in grades K4-5.

MPS also offers immersion programs in German and Spanish  as well as immersion in numerous languages at the middle school and high school levels at Milwaukee School of Languages  and partial immersion programs in Italian (at Victory School), Mandarin (at Milwaukee Academy of Chinese Language) and Spanish (at Morgandale School). The district also offers a range of bilingual and two-way bilingual Spanish programs.

These days, Milwaukee French Immersion School is a popular place for students and for teachers. McFadden told me in 2011 that very few teachers leave the program for reasons other than retirement or to stay home with a new baby.

"The unique language element of our program is definitely our biggest draw," says former teacher Gina Bianchi, who was appointed assistant principal in charge upon McFadden's retirement. "With over 220,000,000 people around the world speaking French as their first or second language, it is truly a global language. Being able to speak French opens career opportunities over the world. Families are drawn to the successful, research-based method of immersion as a natural way for students to acquire French."

In addition, Bianchi says students in the program outperform not only district but also state averages in reading proficiency, which demonstrates that students excel in English, as well as French, at the school.

"Another draw is that our central location allows for students to come from all over the city of Milwaukee," adds Bianchi. "Parents often cite the fact that we have such a diverse population as one of the reasons they chose our school. Our student body is representative of a variety of different walks of life, socioeconomic statuses, races and cultural backgrounds."

When I visited McFadden at MFIS in early 2011, the school was ranked an eight out of 10 by Great Schools (though certainly a single number cannot capture something as complex as a school). These days it's rated a seven and that dip is perhaps a function of the funding hit the program took during the 2011-12 school year when the state cut SAGE funding, which had helped to keep class sizes small. The result was the loss of teachers and a near-doubling of the number of students in some classrooms.

"The loss of SAGE was a challenge for the school," McFadden says. "Class sizes in kindergarten through third grade increased from a maximum of 18:1 to as high as 35:1. This increase in class size made it much more difficult for teachers to provide differentiated instruction to meet the needs of the students in their classes."

McFadden, though, reorganized her resources, reassigning classroom paraprofessionals to focus on the youngest learners in the largest classes and drew in parent and community support to draw volunteers to help with student and staff support.

Now, Bianchi says things are back on track.

"There are a lot of exciting things happening right now this 2013-14 school year," says Bianchi, who was mentored by McFadden in recent years. "I am proud to say that our class sizes have reduced from the larger numbers we saw a few years ago. We have been able to add highly qualified paraprofessional assistants, some of whom are native speakers and one of whom is a certified teacher."

Bianchi says the school has a good student-to-fluent-speaker ratio, which helps boost student proficiency in French in all subjects. The school also offers a unique two-week exchange program for fifth graders at MFIS and at partner school Salon de Provence.

This year, MFIS has also added after-school sports, African dance lessons in French with a native speaker from Senegal, brought back art classes, is working with the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music to bring music instruction and created a parent resource room.

Parent and community support is another area in which MFIS has excelled. Along with German Immersion, it is one of just a handful of MPS schools that has an organized foundation to assist with fundraising.

"A group of very innovative and determined parents worked diligently to establish the Milwaukee French Immersion Foundation in order to support the K-12 French Immersion program in Milwaukee (at MFIS and Milwaukee School of Languages)," says McFadden

The foundation has helped set up language models from Francophone countries at MFIS and MSL, adds Bianchi.

"These individuals help bring the French 'alive,' working with small groups, providing a vital cultural element to our program and offering academic support to our students in the target language," Bianchi says. "We also have partnerships with several universities whose fluent French-speaking students earn credit to support instruction in the classroom."

These days, MFIS staffers are working with the district to find French-language materials that align with the Common Core standards that Wisconsin and 44 other states have agreed to follow.

"The district has been actively engaged in finding ways to help strengthen the immersion programs that do exist," Bianchi says. "The district is providing professional development tailored to the unique needs of our program. Most recently, the district connected us with a fluent French speaking mathematician to help us explore how we are meeting the new shifts in mathematics with the implementation of the Common Core State Standards. The district is also helping us explore options of a new French reading series."

On Friday, Jan. 24, MFIS hosts an 35th anniversary celebration from 5:30 to 8 p.m. that includes an open house for the community. Bianchi says there will be door prizes, self-guided tours, live kindergarten and first grade demonstration classes, musical performances, cake and more.

She hopes former and current staff, alumni, current students, families and staff will join the celebration.

"Its also a perfect opportunity for the broader community to come and see what immersion is all about," Bianchi says. "Many members of the general public do not know that MFIS is a free, city-wide public school."

And where will MFIS be located in the future? Without a crystal ball, who could say, but Bianchi doesn't sound like she's planning on moving anytime soon.

"Our current location has allowed and continues to allow us to serve more students," she says.

Qu'est qu'on est bien chez soi! Home sweet home.
Reprinted from The Nation



Governor of Wisconsin Scott Walker

(Image by Michael Vadon) Details DMCA



The first great electoral challenge to Governor Scott Walker's assault on labor rights, public education, and public services in Wisconsin came in an April 2011 state Supreme Court race. Incumbent Justice David Prosser, a former Republican legislator who had mentored Walker when both served in the legislature, faced an unexpectedly robust challenge from state Assistant Attorney General JoAnne Kloppenburg, who argued that the state's highest court needed to be independent from the governor.

The officially nonpartisan race divided the state. Walker's Republicans and conservative donors rushed to defend Prosser, while labor activists and many Democrats backed his challenger.

However, Kloppenburg endeavored to keep above the partisanship -- emphasizing that she had worked well with Republican and Democratic attorneys general, and saying, "I have not wavered in my beliefs and will not start if I am elected as a justice. My focus will be on the court without any political bias."

A lot of Wisconsinites approved. After a long night of vote counting on April 5 and April 6, preliminary results gave Kloppenburg a 204-vote lead over Prosser. Walker allies jumped into action. Among the 1,500 pages of documents from a John Doe inquiry into allegations of illegal campaign activity by Walker and his associates, which were obtained and published by the The Guardian, was a flurry of e-mails regarding the Prosser-Kloppenburg race. The basic premise outlined before the election was that keeping Prosser on the court was essential: "And if we lose him, the Walker agenda is toast," read one message.

The Walker allies talked about how to assemble a team and raise resources to challenge the initial result in what was expected to be an arduous recount. But they weren't just interested in the actual recount -- a long and highly controversial process that would eventually keep Prosser as part of the high court's Walker-friendly conservative majority. They were interested in shaping public opinion.

Click Here to Read Whole Article
by BAR executive editor Glen Ford

"The Black Misleadership Class pretends to have no memory of the Nineties and their own complicity in the Clintons' 'deplorable' racism and sexism."

Speaking to a room full of rich contributors, Hillary Clinton dumped half of Donald Trump's supporters into a "basket of deplorables... racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic -- you name it." Actually, considerably more than half of Trump's legions match up with most or all of those terms, which is why the Republicans have been the White Man's Party since the Sixties, replacing the Demo-Dixiecrats. With white supremacy as their organizing principle, Republicans have won white majorities in every national election since 1968. Clinton's husband, Slick Willie, teamed with Al Gore and other white southern Democrats to form the Democratic Leadership Council in the 1980s to stem the attrition of whites to the Republicans by mimicking the GOP on racially coded issues like welfare and crime. The former Arkansas governor reckoned he could win the White House in 1992 at the expense of Black people, who are trapped, by the very nature of the duopoly system, in the Democratic Party.

Bill Clinton appealed to the racist and sexist elements of his constituency -- and rewarded his corporate backers -- by ejecting millions of disproportionately Black women and children from the social safety net and unleashing the greatest surge of mass Black incarceration in modern history. His wife and fellow lawyer, acting as co-president, raged against young Black "super-predators" that needed to be "brought to heel" -- words she has recently been forced to regret, but not "deplore." The Clinton's destruction of Aid to Families with Dependent Children caused welfare rights advocate Peter Edelman to resign his subcabinet post and prompted his wife, Marian Wright Edelman, founder of the Children's Defense Fund, to describe the Clintons as "not friends in politics." Yet, Hillary Clinton continues to feature her youthful stint as a lawyer for the Children's Defense Fund as proof of her compassion for poor Black children, while the Black Misleadership Class pretends to have no memory of the Nineties and their own complicity in the Clintons' "deplorable" racism and sexism.

"Clinton raged against young Black 'super-predators' that needed to be 'brought to heel' -- words she has recently been forced to regret, but not 'deplore.'"

Hillary Clinton spares half of Trump's supporters the shame of reduction to deplorabledom in recognition that some "basket people" feel left out by "government" and "the economy" and are "just desperate for change." However, as the candidate of the corporate status quo, Clinton offers nothing but more of the same and must therefore -- just like Trump -- run a campaign of name-calling and demonization not witnessed since the McCarthy era. Having definitively turned their party to the Right a generation ago, the Clintons now see an opportunity to use Donald Trump's destruction of the Republican Party as-we-knew-it to forge a unitary corporate super-party encompassing all of the Democrats' base constituencies, Democrat-friendly Wall Street and Silicon Valley plutocrats, plus those oligarchs and "national security" and "defense" circles that have traditionally been linked to the GOP. Only the rump of Trump "deplorables" would be left outside the "Big Tent," along with a small and disorganized Left. That's the plan.

The lines that Hillary draws around her Big Tent are rhetorical, not substantive, since she has nothing of substance to offer to any mass constituency. The duopoly system is in terminal crisis because capitalism is no longer capable of "reform": all is crisis and chaos under the reign of hegemonic finance capital, whose captains create nothing while monetizing everything. These are the Lords of Capital that have sustained the once-and-future First Couple with $153 million in speaking fees to keep the mansion lights burning in the interim between their tours in the White House. The Clinton Foundation is a creature of Slick Willie & Wife's ongoing contract with the international ruling class.

"Only the rump of Trump 'deplorables' would be left outside the 'Big Tent,' along with a small and disorganized Left."

Hillary's global mission, like Barack Obama's, is to crush the old order of sovereign nation states regulated by international law, and impose a U.S.-enforced corporate dominion over the planet. In that sense, the Trans Pacific Partnership and its trans-Atlantic counterpart flow from the same source as drone warfare, "humanitarian" regime change warfare, and jihadist proxy warfare, and are inseparable from economic sanctions warfare and the emerging battlefield of cyberwar.

In terms of deplorability, nothing else comes close. Hillary's mission, as the public agent of multinational capital, is the triumph of capitalist Manifest Destiny -- a global nightmare that is antithetical to any vision of democracy held by any of the world's peoples. Therefore, the mission is relentlessly pursued, but never articulated. Instead, defamation becomes the language of U.S. foreign policy. Russian president Vladimir Putin becomes "Hitler" in Hillary's mouth -- an effective declaration of war or intent to assassinate. When Moammar Gaddafi was murdered by U.S.-backed jihadists in Libya, Hillary cackled, "We came, we saw, he died" -- an execration beyond deplorable, by any diplomatic or civilized standard.

Last week, she met with a "bipartisan" group of "national security leaders" -- translation: imperial warmongers that serve both parties -- to call attention to the fact that most of the spooks, warmongers and global destabilizers are in her Big Tent. She immediately read Trump -- who (sometimes, but not always) opposes "regime change" -- out of the foreign policy consensus. "National security experts on both sides of the aisle are chilled by what they're hearing from the Republican nominee," she said.

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Reprinted from Alon Ben-Meir Website

Senator Bernie Sanders' call during the primaries for a new approach to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was on-point and necessary. However, his plea for the US to adopt a policy of even-handedness in dealing with Israel and the Palestinians will not suffice. In fact, even if the incoming administration changed its approach by coercing Israel to make important concessions and stop its settlement enterprise, this will not produce the necessary conditions to make peace at this particular juncture of the conflict.

Furthermore, any new approach by the EU during the current UN General Assembly meetings to restart the talks in the traditional way, either directly or through mediation, will not lead to an agreement regardless of the pressure or incentives that may be employed to persuade Israel and the Palestinians to resume negotiations in earnest.

A process of reconciliation must precede any formal negotiations for about two years, because the conditions on the ground have dramatically changed for the worse since the Oslo Accords. For the Palestinians, hopelessness has set in, mutual distrust has deepened, and extremists on both sides have gained significant traction. Perhaps most important, the political landscape has shifted to the right in both camps, making it highly unlikely to resume peace talks with any prospect of reaching an agreement.

There is no doubt that Palestinian acts of violence against Israelis are a direct result of 50 years of occupation that continues to frustrate and incite them. Consequently, the Palestinians feel they have been left with no option but to resort to violence in an effort to end the occupation and pave the way for the establishment of their own state in the West Bank and Gaza.

Conversely, the Israelis can also make a persuasive argument that the Palestinians cannot be trusted. The Second Intifada in particular was a turning point in the mind of most Israelis, which further deepened their distrust and heightened (albeit often to exaggeration) their national security concerns.

Unfortunately, successive right-of-center Israeli governments, especially those led by Netanyahu, exploited security concerns to expropriate more Palestinian territory and build new and expand existing settlements to create so-called "secure borders."

To change the dynamic of the conflict, reconciliatory people-to-people measures becomes central to creating fertile ground for negotiations to succeed.

Such measures of reconciliation should include but not be limited to: facilitating mutual visitation, joint women activism, sporting events, student interaction, travelling art exhibitions, encouraging public discourse, hosting forums to discuss conflicting issues, and imploring the media to promote such shared initiatives.

Additional steps can be taken by leadership on both sides, including: halting mutual acrimonious public narratives, modifying textbooks, taking no provocative actions (i.e., halting settlement expansion during the period of reconciliation), and maintaining security cooperation between the two sides.

These measures are central to changing the psychological dynamic of the conflict and sociopolitical environment between them by mitigating the problem of mutual distrust, national security, and the illusion that either can rule over all of mandated Palestine. Only by adhering to such a process will they demonstrate their commitment to peace, which has been lacking but is essential to making the necessary concessions to reach an agreement.

As the process of reconciliation gets underway, the United States and the European Union should make a supreme effort to reinvigorate the Arab Peace Initiative (API) and pressure both Israel and Hamas to embrace it. The Arab Peace Initiative remains the only practical framework for peace, as it contains common denominators between Israel and the Palestinians (including Hamas) that will facilitate successful peace negotiations.

Moreover, the API is the only framework that will lead to an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement in the context of a comprehensive Israeli-Arab peace, which the vast majority of Israelis and Palestinians are seeking in order to achieve long-term stability and progress.

Finally, the turmoil in the Middle East indeed offers an opportunity to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, particularly now that the Arab world is keener than ever before to make peace with Israel because of the common Iranian threat and the violent rivalry between Sunnis and Shiites over regional hegemony.

The United States and the EU (the only powers that can bring an end to the conflict) and certainly moderate Israelis must exploit this window of opportunity and put an end to the longest and most debilitating violent conflict in modern times.

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In the days leading up to the official premiere of Snowden, Oliver Stone's eponymous biopic of America's exiled whistleblower, an international movement came together to pressure US president Barack Obama for a pardon. Executive absolution would make it possible for Edward Snowden to return from Russia without facing a show trial and a life (or even death) sentence for his heroism.

It's a fine idea. I support it. But I think it does get things backward and sends the wrong message in certain respects.

Edward Snowden shouldn't NEED a pardon. He performed a public service of inestimable value by exposing the crimes, the criminals, and the techniques of the largest espionage ring in human history: A conspiracy directed at the very public expected to pay the gigantic tab the conspirators run up. The National Security Agency's budget is classified -- of course -- but thought to be in excess of $10 billion per year. Talk about adding insult to injury.

So, who SHOULD be seeking pardons?

Well, the operational ringleaders, including but not limited to the last few directors of the NSA, are clearly habitual felons who, in any society with a functioning justice system, would be sporting leg irons and orange coveralls and writing their own letters requesting clemency about now.

Those evildoers have superiors who are equally responsible for having let them run wild. The two that come to mind are the president(s) and the congressional Intelligence Committees (the House Intelligence Committee contests the pardon movement with a classified -- of course -- report which in public summary characterizes Snowden as a mere "disgruntled employee").

If these characters weren't (with good reason) convinced of their own immunity to justice, they'd be shutting down their unprecedented warrantless search operations and finding ways to preemptively pardon each other ahead of something like a new Nuremburg Tribunal, instead of continuing to denigrate and persecute the man who exposed their vile deeds.

The only subject of truly legitimate debate over Snowden's actions is whether they were military or civilian in character. Otherwise, how are we to know whether he should receive the Medal of Honor (military) or the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal (civilian)?

Perhaps an exception should be made that lets him collect all three. Or perhaps none of them are sufficient and a new award, specific to Snowden and those who will hopefully follow in his footsteps, would be more appropriate.


Copyrighted Image? DMCA



Several weeks back I was invited to speak this coming October at a U.S. university on ending war and making peace. As I often do, I asked whether the organizers couldn't try to find a supporter of war with whom I could debate or discuss the topic, thus (I hoped) bringing in a larger audience of people not yet persuaded of the need to abolish the institution of warfare.

As had never happened before, the event organizers not only said yes but actually found a war supporter willing to take part in a public debate. Great! I thought, this will make for a more persuasive event. I read my future interlocutor's books and papers, and I drafted my position, arguing that his "Just War" theory could not hold up to scrutiny, that in fact no war could be "just."

Rather than planning to surprise my "just war" debate opponent with my arguments, I sent him what I had written so that he could plan his responses and perhaps contribute them to a published, written exchange. But, rather than respond on topic, he suddenly announced that he had "professional and personal obligations" that would prevent his taking part in the event in October. Sigh!

But the best event organizers ever have already found a replacement. So the debate will go forward at St. Michael's College, Colchester, VT, on October 5th. Meanwhile, I have just published as a book my argument that war is never just. You can be the first to buy it, read it, or review it here.

Part of the reason for advancing this debate now is that back on April 11-13th the Vatican held a meeting on whether the Catholic Church, the originator of Just War theory, should finally reject it. Here's a petition you can sign, whether or not you are Catholic, urging the church to do just that.

An outline of my argument can be found in my book's table of contents:

What Is A Just War?

Just War Theory Facilitates Unjust Wars

Preparing for a Just War Is a Greater Injustice Than Any War

Just War Culture Just Means More War

The Ad Bellum / In Bello Distinction Does Harm

Some Just War Criteria Are Not Measurable

Right Intention

Just Cause

Proportionality

Some Just War Criteria Are Not Possible

Last Resort

Reasonable Prospect Of Success

Noncombatants Immune From Attack

Enemy Soldiers Respected As Human Beings

Prisoners Of War Treated As Noncombatants

Some Just War Criteria Are Not Moral Factors At All

Publicly Declared

Waged By Legitimate And Competent Authority

The Criteria For Just Drone Murders Are"Immoral, Incoherent, And Ignored

Why Do Ethics Classes Fantasize About Murder" So Much?

If All Just War Criteria Were Met War Still" Wouldn't Be Just

Just War Theorists Do Not Spot New Unjust" Wars Any Faster an Anyone Else

A Just-War Occupation Of A Conquered Country "Is Not Just

Just War Theory Opens the Door To Pro-War Theory

We Can End War Without Waiting For Jesus

Who Would The Good Samaritan Carpet Bomb?

World War Two Was Not Just

The U.S. Revolution Was Not Just

The U.S. Civil War Was Not Just

War On Yugoslavia Was Not Just

War On Libya Is Not Just

War On Rwanda Would Not Have Been Just

War On Sudan Would Not Have Been Just

War On ISIS Is Not Just

Our Ancestors Lived In A Different Cultural World

We Can Agree On Just Peace Making

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By Taxpayer Association of Oregon

Measure 97s huge $3 billion tax will raise food, clothing & utility prices by around $1,200 for the average Oregon family. Oregon seniors share how this $1,200 cost increase impacts them.

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We must remember that these Measure 97 victims are real people with real financial pain being heaped upon them.

The utilities are already saying Measure 97 will likely lead to a 5% utility increase which will raise costs across the board.

Grocery stores will see their their total tax burden triple in size. This will have a terrible impact on prices and it is seniors who will pay the price.

We bring you these stories because it is easy to forget how vulnerable many Oregonians really are. We dont always see them or hear their stories. High taxes come at serious sacrifice to peoples lives. These seniors are people who cant afford a huge tax cost increase.

Help stop Measure 97 $3 billion tax increase

 Share your story! by emailing us at [email protected] We want to know how Measure 97 will impact you.

 Read everything you need to know here at the official Defeat Measure 97 campaign website at Defeat97.com (you can donate, read facts, join the coalition)

 Read our 10 Essential Facts on Measure 97. We encourage you to email, Tweet and Facebook these websites and articles.

Taxpayer Association of Oregon

P.O. box 23573

Tigard, OR, 97281
Contact Oyster Radio any time:





We can be reached at 850-670-8450.

You can also e-mail us at
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...
OSIRIS-REx

NASA is launching a spacecraft to visit an asteroid and return to tell the tale.

OSIRIS-REx is scheduled to blast off from Cape Canaveral on September 8, 2016, on a mission to orbit, map and collect samples from the asteroid Bennu, and return to Earth 7 years later.

Discovered in 1999 by the NASA-funded LINEAR asteroid survey, Bennu measures about 1650 feet across and weighs over 60 million tons. Imagine a boulder the height of the Empire State Buildingthat's about the size of Bennu.

So, why Bennu? Because the asteroid is interesting due to its size and composition, and it is accessible to be sampled.

Bennu is a primitive and carbon-rich asteroid. Primitive asteroids contain material that has not changed significantly since they formed over 4.5 billion years ago. The analysis of any organic material found on Bennu will give scientists an inventory of the materials present at the beginning of the solar system that may have had a role in the origin of life on earth, and potentially elsewhere.

Indeed, Dante Lauretta of the University of Arizona, Principal Investigator on the OSIRIS-REx mission says mapping and sampling the space rock "can potentially hold answers to the most fundamental questions human beings ask, like 'Where do we come from?'"

To get to Bennu, OSIRIS-REx will perform a series of deep space maneuvers, first orbiting the sun for a year and then using Earth's gravity to be slung towards Bennu.

The spacecraft will spend a year flying in close proximity to Bennu  its five instruments imaging the asteroid, documenting its lumpy shape, and surveying its chemical and physical properties.

In July 2020, OSIRIS-REx will approach Bennu and execute its touch-and-go  or TAG  maneuver. A mechanical arm that functions like a combination sample scoop and pogo stick will be extended from the spacecraft. The spacecraft will slowly approach the asteroid until the sample head at the end of the arm gives a gentle "high five" to the surface. The maneuver may be executed up to three times, and OSIRIS-REx could leave Bennu with up to 4.4 pounds of sample material from the asteroid.

Researchers will be keen to learn about Bennu for another reason, too. Bennu orbits the sun between Venus and Mars so it crosses Earth's orbit frequently and comes close to Earth every six years. In 2135, Bennu will make an especially close approach to Earth, just within the Moon's orbit. This will change Bennu's orbit, and it is more difficult to predict how much closer it may come to the Earth after that close encounter. Lauretta says, "We need to learn as much as about Bennu as we can."

Predicting a small asteroid like Bennu's exact course is somewhat tricky, due to the Yarkovsky effect. The dark asteroid absorbs sunlight and then gives it off as heat, which serves as a gentle thruster that gradually shifts its path.

Edward Beshore of the University of Arizona, Deputy Principal Investigator for OSIRIS-REx says, "We'll get accurate measurements of the Yarkovsky effect on Bennu by precisely tracking OSIRIS-REx as it orbits the asteroid."

If all goes as planned, OSIRIS-REx will fire its main engines in March 2021 and begin its journey back to Earth. The samples will arrive in September 2023, when a capsule containing bits of Bennu will land at the Utah Test and Training Range. From there, the capsule and its precious contents will travel to NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, TX, where hands-on analysis of this ancient asteroid will begin by mission scientists and then by scientists from all over the world.

Credit: NASA

Explore further Asteroid Bennu getting first visitor in billions of years

More information: For updates on the mission to Bennu and back, go to For updates on the mission to Bennu and back, go to www.asteroidmission.org
Film of lanthanum cobalt oxide shows a sequence of positively and negatively charged atomic layers. Without electronic reconstruction an enormous electrostatic field would form between the layers Credit: J.E. Hamann-Borrero & Vladimir Hinkov

Interfaces between different materials and their properties are of key importance for modern technology. Together with an international team, physicists of Wurzburg University have developed a new method that allows them to closely analyze these interfaces and to model their properties.

In his Nobel Lecture on December 8, 2000, Herbert Kroemer coined the phrase, "the interface is the device." Kroemer referred to the mature field of semiconductor heterostructures, which form the basis of all modern electronics.

However, with the advent of novel, powerful devices based on more complex and versatile topological and correlated materials, that statement is timelier than ever. Recently, physicists from Wurzburg University and coworkers from Germany, Canada, the U.S.A. and Korea have developed a new method to uncover important charge properties of correlated oxide interfaces with unprecedented atomic scale resolution. The team of Professor Vladimir Hinkov and his coworkers report about this experimental method in the current issue of the Nature journal npj Quantum Materials.

"Conventional electronic chips are based on networks of so-called p-n junctions, interfaces between semiconductors carrying positive and negative charges, respectively," says Vladimir Hinkov, describing the background of this research. There are several drawbacks to such a setup: First, the junctions are thick, often on the order of hundreds of interatomic spacings. Second, operating the network requires the movement of many electrons, which costs a lot of energy due to electrical resistance. Third, semiconductors do not intrinsically have magnetic properties and their electron configuration is very basic. "This dramatically limits the ways to build functional junctions and to realize magnetic applications," Hinkov reports.

Versatile properties require sophisticated methods

Transition-metal oxides, on the other hand, exhibit many different properties. Some of them are ferromagnetic, others are antiferromagnetic, and others in turn are high-temperature superconductors with very unconventional properties. Forming interfaces between such materials yields many phenomena that hold promise for novel applications such as different sensors, lossless computer memory and ultrafast processors. The price is that more sophisticated tools are necessary to study them. This is due to the variety of phenomena and due to the much shorter length scale over which the properties of oxides change at such heterointerfaces, which is often just a few atomic spacings.

Of crucial importance is the behavior of electrons at the interface: Do they tend to accumulate? Which orbitals do they occupy, i.e. how do the electron clouds arrange around the atoms? Is there magnetic order, i.e. do the tiny magnetic moments of the electrons called spins align relative to each other, establishing magnetic order? Physicists around the world are seeking answers to these questions.

Measurements on an atomic scale

Hinkov and coworkers developed new method and analysis software that provides answers. It is based on "resonant x-ray reflectometry," a technique exploiting X-ray light created at a synchrotron with atomic-scale resolution of less than one nanometer. The physicists apply the technique on thin films of lanthanum cobalt oxide, a material that has interesting magnetic properties.

In their present work, however, the scientists have concentrated on another aspect: "Before we can delve in the rich magnetic phenomena of this material, we first have to solve a fundamental, widespread problem," says Professor Hinkov. "Like many other materials, such as simple table salt and many semiconductors, lanthanum cobalt oxide consists of charged particles. These so-called ions form a sequence of positively and negatively charged atomic layers, stacked on a 15-nanometer-thin film. One can show that enormous electrostatic fields form between the layers, which is a problem, since they cost a lot of energy," Vladimir Hinkov says.

"Nature is economical and avoids these field energy costs. It brings positive and negative charges to the opposite faces of the film, respectively, just like between the plates of a capacitor. A new field is formed, which is opposite to the original one and which cancels it."

Corrugated interfaces constitute a problem

This accumulation of pure electronic charge at the film faces is called "electronic reconstruction." According to the physicists, this is a very elegant solution, since it preserves the film face smoothness. For materials in which electronic reconstruction is not possible, the compensating charge is provided by comparatively large ions, which results in corrugated film faces. As Hinkov explains, such corrugations are detrimental for devices based on film interfaces, especially when, like in transition-metal oxides, the material properties change on an atomic scale at the interface.

Exploiting the new method, the present work shows microscopic evidence that electronic reconstruction is realized at transition-metal oxide interfaces. The method also could enable the study of microscopic properties of such interfaces, which are not limited to electronic reconstruction, but encompass the arrangement of chemical elements, the electronic occupation of atomic orbitals and the spin orientation.

Explore further An interesting glimpse into how future state-of-the-art electronics might work

More information: Jorge E Hamann-Borrero et al. Valence-state reflectometry of complex oxide heterointerfaces, npj Quantum Materials (2016). Journal information: Nature Jorge E Hamann-Borrero et al. Valence-state reflectometry of complex oxide heterointerfaces,(2016). DOI: 10.1038/npjquantmats.2016.13

Provided by Julius-Maximilians-Universitat Wurzburg
A screenshot of the Fancy Bears website fancybear.net seen on a computes screen in Moscow, Russia, Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2016. Confidential medical data of gold medal-winning gymnast Simone Biles, seven-time Grand Slam champion Venus Williams and other female U.S. Olympians was hacked from a World Anti-Doping Agency database and posted online Tuesday Sept 13, 2016. WADA said the hackers were a "Russian cyber espionage group" called Fancy Bears. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko)

Medical data from some of the world's leading athletes has been posted to the web and the World Anti-Doping Agency says Russians are to blame. Even the hackers seem to agree, adopting the name "Fancy Bears"a moniker long associated with the Kremlin's electronic espionage operations.

But as cybersecurity experts pore over the hackers' digital trail, they're up against a familiar problem. The evidence has been packed with possible red herringsincluding registry data pointing to France, Korean characters in the hackers' code and a server based in California.

"Anybody can say they are anyone and it's hard to disprove," said Jeffrey Carr, the chief executive of consulting firm Taia Global and something of a professional skeptic when it comes to claims of state-backed hacking.

Many others in the cybersecurity industry see the WADA hack as a straightforward act of Russian revenge, but solid evidence is hard to find.

IOC President Thomas Bach said Friday he will ask Russian authorities for help to stop the hackers.

Bach said the IOC will help WADA "including communicating with the Russian authorities, to underline the seriousness of the issue and request all possible assistance to stop the hackers."

"This is an unacceptable and outrageous breach of medical confidentiality that attempts to smear innocent athletes who have not committed any doping offense," said Bach.

This is a Friday, Aug. 12, 2016 file photo of Gold medalist Bradley Wiggins of Britain as he poses on the podium of the Men's team pursuit final at the Rio Olympic Velodrome during the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Medical data being leaked, in an alleged criminal attack by Russian hackers on a World Anti-Doping Agency database leaked details of asthma medication used by Bradley Wiggins. "There's nothing new here," a statement issued on behalf of Wiggins said. "Everyone knows Brad suffers from asthma; his medical treatment is BC (British Cycling) and UCI (International Cycling Union) approved."(AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin, file)

What's known is that it was only days after scores of Russian athletes were banned from the Olympic Games that suspicious looking emails began circulating . Purporting to come from WADA itself, the booby trapped messages were aimed at harvesting passwords to a sensitive database of drug information about athletes worldwide. Among other things, the Anti-Doping Administration and Management System carries information about which top athletes use otherwise-banned substances for medical reasonsprize information for a spurned Olympic competitor seeking to embarrass its rivals.

On Sept. 1 someone registered a website titled "Fancy Bears' Hack Team." A few days later, a Twitter account materialized carrying a similar name. Just after midnight Moscow time on Sept. 13, the Fancy Bears Twitter account came alive, broadcasting the drugs being taken by gold medal-winning gymnast Simone Biles, seven-time Grand Slam champion Venus Williams and other U.S. Olympians. It followed up Thursday with similar information about the medication used by British cyclists Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome, among many others.

There is no suggestion any of the athletes broke any rules, but Russians seized on the leak as evidence that U.S. and British players were using forbidden drugs with the blessing of anti-doping officials.

"Hypocrisy" Russia's embassy to London tweeted in reaction to the news. Kremlin channel RT broadcast a cartoon showing a WADA official picking up a bulky American player's steroid bottle with a smile. "All good! You're cleared to compete!" he says.

Citing law enforcement sources, WADA said the attacks "are originating out of Russia." Russian officials dismissed the allegation; in an email, WADA said it wouldn't be commenting further.

With little to go on, independent investigators have still made some intriguing connections.

Virginia-based intelligence firm ThreatConnect said that whoever compromised WADA did so using websites registered through an obscure domain name company that also set up the fake sites used in a variety of other hacks blamed on the Kremlin, including the one that hit the Democratic National Committee. In a telephone interview, the company's chief intelligence officer, Rich Barger said he had been cautious at first about tying the WADA breach to Russian hackers but that "confidence is certainly growing as more and more people weigh in and lend their voice."

This is a Sunday, July 24, 2016 file photo of Britain's Chris Froome, wearing the overall leader's yellow jersey, celebrates with a glass of champagne during the twenty-first stage of the Tour de France in Paris. Three-time Tour de France winner Chris Froome siad Thursday Sept. 15, 2016, has "no issue" with his medical data being leaked, in an alleged criminal attack by Russian hackers on a World Anti-Doping Agency database. (AP Photo/Christophe Ena, File)

Even the meaning of the name "Fancy Bears" is unclear. California-based threat intelligence firm CrowdStrike has long applied that nickname to an allegedly Russian state-backed group, but the hackers' adoption isn't necessarily a brazen acknowledgement of CrowdStrike's research. It might be an attempt to hold it up to ridicule. Which interpretation the group favors hasn't been made clear. Repeated messages to email addresses associated with Fancy Bears have gone unreturned.

Fancy Bears' website doesn't necessarily provide any more insight. Some its artistry appears to have been lifted from a Russian clip art page. But tech podcaster Vince Tocce also found Korean script in the site's codecharacters which vanished shortly after he made his discovery public . In a telephone interview, he said that showed how difficult it was to take anything for granted.

Some pieces of Fancy Bears' infrastructure were almost certainly structured to sow confusion.

The site, for example, appears to be hosted in California but was registered at an address in the town of Pomponne, east of Paris, under the name "Jean Guillalime."

A man residing at that address, Jean-Francois Guillaume, told The Associated Press the registry information was bogus and that he was mystified as to why the hackers had picked on him.

"I have absolutely nothing to do with this," he said, adding that he ran a consulting shop and a flower business and wasn't particularly interested in sports. "I don't know any Russians," he said.

Explore further WADA confirms another hacking of its athletes database (Update)

 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
Credit: Fauna & Flora International

Fauna & Flora International has found a hot new way to minimize deforestation thanks to the introduction of small, eco-friendly steel and clay stoves.

Ideal for use in traditional households in Trung Khanh district, the improved models require less charcoal or wood, while still serving the needs of an average family. Available in steel, clay or a unique combination of both materials, the stoves are purchased for as little as USD10  USD15, with Fauna & Flora International Vietnam (FFI Vietnam) covering half the cost plus transportation.

Mr Nguyen Duc Tho, the communication and education officer at FFI Vietnam said, "This is the second time we have distributed stoves in this area. We first started this scheme in 2006. Since then we have subsidized the cost of 500 stoves, while working closely with the local community to track the effectiveness of the stoves. Following their feedback, we have commissioned the design of new models that are smaller, making them much more portable and user-friendly; thus meeting the diverse needs of local lifestyles."

A total 151 stoves were recently distributed and made available to families who desired one. Typically women in the Trung Khanh district are responsible for collecting fuelwood from the forest, previously spending as many as 22 days a month gathering wood. But thanks to the fuel efficient nature of the stoves, women are now spending as little as eight days in the forest. This means there is much less deforestation in important areas for biodiversity.

Country Director of FFI Vietnam, Dr Ben Rawson revealed that the stoves initiative is an example of the practical solutions the organisation delivers in order to further conserve wildlife and their habitats. He explained, "Trung Khanh is home to one of the rarest species on the planet  the cao vit gibbon. These fuel efficient stoves reduce the impact on the forests where these gibbons live giving them a better chance for survival. The local community benefit as well, as it saves them time and reduces the amount of fuel wood they need. It's a win-win initiative."

Trung Khanh is home to Cao vit gibbons like this mother and baby. Credit: Zhao Chao/FFI
The development of the smart power grid and the smart meter in our homes to accompany it brings several benefits, such as improved delivery and more efficient billing. Conversely, any digital, connected technology also represents a security risk. Writing in the International Journal of Smart Grid and Green Communications, UK researchers explain how a malicious third party that hacked into the metering system could manipulate en masse the data being sent back to the smart grid and perhaps trigger a power generation shortfall.

Carl Chalmers, Michael Mackay and Aine MacDermott of Liverpool John Moores University, explain how the implementation of the smart grid brings many improvements over the traditional energy grid by making use of the vast interconnected infrastructure that allows two-way communication and automation throughout the entire grid, from generator to consumer and back.

"A smart grid is a complex modern electricity system which utilises sensors, monitoring, communications, and automation, to improve the electricity system," the team writes. "Smart grids fundamentally change the way in which we generate, distribute and monitor our electricity. They dramatically improve the efficiency, flexibility and reliability of the existing electricity infrastructure," they add.

The researchers point out that a critical difference between the old "passive" electricity grid and the new smart grid, is the presence of the advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) which provides the two-way communication between consumer and generator. The flow of data between consumers and generators allows the power generation companies to match demand with generation, to spot patterns in changing demand on a day to day basis or through the changing seasons and more.

However, as the UK has shifted focus from coal- and oil-fired electricity generation to being more reliant on natural gas as the fuel of choice (irrespective of wind, solar, nuclear and other alternatives), this makes the electricity grid somewhat vulnerable to accidental and incidental problems with the flow of data and to malicious manipulation for the sake of sabotage, criminal or online military/terrorist action.

The team adds that, "Critical infrastructures in particular, present a tempting target for terrorists, military strikes and hackers wanting to cause disruption, steal information or incapacitate a country remotely." The team suggests that now we are forewarned of the possible worst-case scenario with regard to the smart grid and smart meters, we must put in place security measures to protect the infrastructure and maintain that security as the hackers advance to stay at least one step ahead of the threat.

Explore further Taking charge in electricity research

More information: Carl Chalmers et al. Securing the smart grid: threats and remediation, International Journal of Smart Grid and Green Communications (2016). Carl Chalmers et al. Securing the smart grid: threats and remediation,(2016). DOI: 10.1504/IJSGGC.2016.078954
Credit: Bruce Emerling/Pixabay

Improving race relations starts with understanding whether people feel an incident of racial discrimination was intentional or not, says a new study by UTM management professor Sonia Kang. This applies in situations ranging from a workplace to an interaction between police and demonstrators.

Typically, two approaches are applied to improving race relations. A multicultural approach uses education to highlight and celebrate differences in a group, while a colourblind approach emphasizes commonalities that a group might share. "Both approaches can and will workthe difficulty is identifying which approach to use," Kang says. "We wanted to know if there were variables that would help predict when one of those two approaches would be better to use."

Kang found that it is important to determine how a target group feels about the issue at hand, specifically whether they feel discrimination is intentional or unintentional. "Does the incident stem from intentional and deliberate malice, or does it arise from unintentional or accidental ignorance?" Kang asks. "We found that perceptions of intentionality predicted the kinds of solutions people think will be effective."

"Intentionality is important in a legal context for punishments in criminal cases. Even small kids will think about intentionalitydid someone push them on purpose, or was it an accident?" she says. "People prioritize ideas of intentionality when they're trying to decide how to make problems better, or recommend punishment or reparations."

"When people see discrimination as intentional, they prefer a colourblindness approach, which encourages looking beyond racial differences," Kang says. "When people see discrimination as unintentional, they prefer a multicultural approach, which encourages recognizing racial differences."

The paper reports on eight studies which examined a number of different predictors and outcomes, including attitudes about the recent events in Ferguson, Missouri.

The studies recorded how participants reacted to scenarios describing incidents of racial discrimination. In one example, participants were asked to award damages to an employee who had been wrongfully dismissed. Where the discrimination was perceived as intentional, study participants awarded an average of $100,000 more in damages than in scenarios where the discrimination was perceived as unintentional.

"There isn't a one-size-fits-all approach," Kang says. "But understanding whether people think racism is intentional or not can inform which is the best approach to deal with the issue at hand. It's important to tailor your approach to what's going on in the individual community you're trying to target. If , for instance, you're an employer and want to solve problems in your workplace, you will need to do a careful assessment of where your employees think the problem originates."

Explore further Repeated experiences of racism most damaging to mental health

More information: Evan P. Apfelbaum et al. From ignorance to intolerance: Perceived intentionality of racial discrimination shapes preferences for colorblindness versus multiculturalism, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology (2016). Journal information: Journal of Experimental Social Psychology Evan P. Apfelbaum et al. From ignorance to intolerance: Perceived intentionality of racial discrimination shapes preferences for colorblindness versus multiculturalism,(2016). DOI: 10.1016/j.jesp.2016.08.002
" " Easter Island Image Gallery One of nearly 900 moai on Easter Island. See more pictures of Easter Island. Martin Bernetti/AFP/ Getty Images

Much of Easter Island's haunting past remains a mystery, though archaeologists have offered many theories about the people, their culture and their fateful decline. The eerie story of Easter Island is not only a lesson in the history of [b]Oceania, but also a cautionary tale of environmental plunder.

Easter Island got its name from the Dutch admiral Jacob Roggeveen, who landed there on Easter Sunday in 1722 [source: Metropolitan Museum of Art]. For centuries, the island -- also called Rapa Nui and Isla de Pascua -- was a barren wasteland: a blank canvas for the hundreds of moai that lined its cliffs and beaches. The moai, enormous man-made stone statues, are Easter Island's most recognizable feature. Crafted from volcanic ash, the moai weigh up to 82 tons (74.39 metric tons) and loom up to 32.63 feet (9.8 meters) high [source: NOVA]. But the restored ones that stand today are a testament to modern archaeological efforts -- the original moai were torn down centuries ago.

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To understand how these magnificent statues worked, it's necessary to understand their creators. Easter Islanders hailed from Polynesia, a smattering of nearly a thousand islands in the Pacific Ocean. Polynesians are bold sailors and navigators. The sky is their compass, and the ancient islanders constructed seaworthy vessels from wood [source: NOVA]. Scholars believe that the Easter Islanders set sail from East Polynesia in 400 A.D. and that they landed on the shores of the island after two weeks adrift in a vast ocean. We can't be sure if they headed toward Easter Island with a specific purpose -- if they knew it even existed -- or if strong winds and rough seas from an El Nino-type weather pattern forced them off course [source: NOVA]. No matter the purpose of their voyage or the goal of their ultimate destination, they took refuge in a very strange land.

The Polynesian sailors who settled Easter Island are commonly identified as the Rapanui, after the Polynesian name for the island itself: Rapa Nui. For hundreds of years, the Rapanui's civilization thrived. But things were about to change drastically. The same people that erected the awe-inspiring moai would alter the ecosystem of the island forever. They would be gifted artists and engineers in the height of their civilization but ruthless warriors in their darkest, most desperate hours. Few civilizations in history have risen and fallen so fast -- and so inexplicably. In this article, we'll learn about the Easter Islanders' sophisticated civilization and their rapid descent into ruin.

Next, we'll learn about the island itself and how its settlers adapted to it.

Fine Young Cannibals According to oral accounts of Rapanui at the end of the 19th century, some islanders resorted to cannibalism. Defeated tribesmen from opposing clans would be consumed after battle, but the hungry victors ate them in seclusion, away from women and children. Scholars generally refute this idea, claiming that defeated tribesmen were probably made slaves [source: Fischer].
Douglas V. Gibbs is a proud member of the American Authors Association

Douglas V. Gibbs is a proud member of the Military Writers Society of America.
This is the latest in a series of posts about the 1916 presidential election between Democratic incumbent Woodrow Wilson and Republican challenger Charles Evans Hughes, a Glens Falls native.

Here are excerpts from a campaign speech Hughes delivered at the New York State Fair in Syracuse, as quoted on Sept. 16, 1916 in The Newark-Union Gazette.

We live at a time when the problems that are most important are economic problems. The problem of chief interest to this country is how to insure a lasting basis for prosperity, how to develop American enterprise, how to promote American efficiency.

I gather together in a comprehensive way the great need of this this day under the word Protection. I do not use that word in a narrow sense; I do not use it in a technical sense; as applied exclusively to a tariff judgment.  I want to see the people of this country alive to the necessities of conserving their most important interests.

There is one way and only one way in which we can meet all the difficulties that arise. That path is the path of reason, and that way is the way of impartial, fair, prompt investigation.

It is the plain people of this country that have won the victories of the past. This is a government of the plain people and is what they desire. It is what they have won.

The full Union-Gazette article can be read on the New York State Historic Newspapers website, a project of public libraries.

Click here to read the most recent previous post in the series.
QUEENSBURY  County supervisors in Warren and Washington counties passed resolutions Friday asking for a crackdown on the annual Log Bay Day party on Lake George, though one countys bill was changed slightly after concerns were expressed about it.

Boards of supervisors in both counties unanimously passed resolutions that called on the state and the Lake George Park Commission to take measures to curb the dangerous and destructive activities associated with Log Bay Day.

It comes in response to a fatal boat crash that was blamed on an attendee hours after the annual party on the east side of the lake.

The boat collision death of 8-year-old Charlotte McCue sparked calls and petitions demanding an end to the event, and the Park Commission, state Department of Environmental Conservation and local law enforcement agencies have had a number of meetings since late July to discuss how to address the event next summer.

We are cognizant of our right to assemble and that this is public land, but we are also cognizant of our need to do something, Queensbury Supervisor John Strough said.

The resolutions that were passed Friday were a bit different than ones that the counties committees passed in late August and forwarded on to their boards of supervisors.

At the request of Hartford Supervisor Dana Haff, language was added in both to reflect that the counties recognized the constitutional right to assemble, but that the government also was constitutionally responsible for the welfare of its citizens.

Warren County Attorney Brian Reichenbach said the Lake George Park Commission had concerns about wording in the resolution that called on responsible agencies and organizations in the Lake George area to stop advertising and promoting of the event, which some believed implied there was state sanctioning of the event.

Warren Countys resolution changed the word stop to help prevent, though Washington Countys still included the word stop.

The goal was to try to direct those who do promote the event to refrain from doing so, Reichenbach said.

Its a privately organized event, Reichenbach said.

David Wick, executive director of the Park Commission, said the re-worded resolution satisfied the concerns the Park Commission had. The fear was that using the word agencies implied that the government promoted or advertised the event when it does not.

Washington County Attorney Roger Wickes said no concerns were voiced about that aspect of the resolution, as Washington County leaders know there is no governmental sanction of the event.

The resolutions are ceremonial, as neither county has standing to force the Park Commission to take action.

Log Bay Day is held the last Monday in July each summer, with hundreds of boaters gathering in Shelving Rock Bay and others gathering on state land adjacent to the bay to party.

In addition to the boat crash, which prompted charges against boater Alexander M. West for leaving the scene and may result in a homicide prosecution, one attendee was paralyzed in a diving accident during the event this year. Critics cited the environmental damage as well as years of problems for law enforcement during or after the gathering.
LAKE GEORGE  Village Mayor Robert Blais wants help to develop a plan to protect foreign students who work in the area during the tourist season.

Blais has sent a letter to the towns of Lake George and Queensbury, seeking to set up some advocacy for the students and an office to field complaints.

Blais said he received several complaints about student-landlord problems following the Sept. 5 publication of a story in The Post-Star. Problem areas included rent deposits, apartment living conditions and work issues.

Among the complaints are the workers not getting their security deposit back for various reasons, including damage to rooms, early departures or failure to lock doors properly.

Blais said he would like to set up a smaller version of The Connection, which was an office located on Canada Street where students could raise complaints about their jobs or living conditions. That office closed in 2009 because the village was bearing the burden of paying for it, without support from businesses.

We have a little space here at Village Hall that they would use as an office and try to see if we can get our act together over the winter and put something in place for next season, he said.

Blais is not sure what the cost would be of such an operation. It could be run by volunteer labor.

Ive got a couple of folks in the community that are interested in serving perhaps as volunteers, so I told them Id follow through on it, he said.

He would like representatives from both the town and village of Lake George and the town of Queensbury to serve on a steering committee to address the issue and develop a plan for 2017. The foreign student workers are employed at businesses mainly in those communities.

Blais estimated that about 300 foreign students work in the village every summer. The village Board of Trustees in August passed amendments to its zoning code to allow officials to inspect and license rented properties. Village officials were trying to get a better handle on how many people were living in these apartments.

Town Supervisor Dennis Dickinson said he believes Blais proposal is a great idea. Problems with the student workers have gone on for longer than they should have and must be addressed, he said.

Dickinson has received complaints about living conditions for foreign student workers, he said.

They overcrowd them. They put too many people in one room. They put people in without any written contract, he said.

Dickinson recounted one story about two young women who were living in a single room at a small motel. They came home one day and found a third woman in the room who the owner had added without notice.

Another time, four students were living in a single room with two bunk beds. They had a problem with bicycles being stolen, so they had to bring their bikes into the tiny room with them.

If six people are sharing a room and they all get up at the same time to go to work, Dickinson wondered if there is going to be enough hot water to go around.

Guidelines should be established for how much space students require per person and how many people can share a single bathroom, he said.

He would like to see the establishment of a hotline for student complaints.

There are a lot of people in the community that would step up to help, he said.
The defendant was taken to Warren County Jail by the court and is also held in custody by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainer.
MILTON  The Saratoga County Sheriff's Office will host an open house Saturday at its headquarters on County Farm Road.

The event will be held between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., and there is no charge. It is part of a statewide observation of New York State Sheriff's Week, according to Saratoga County Sheriff Michael Zurlo.

The event will feature various exhibits, including a Lifenet of New York Medical Helicopter, Sheriff K-9 demonstrations, Operation Safe Child ID Cards, a seatbelt "Convincer" machine, the county Mobile Communications Center, the Sheriffs Office Dive Team, Community Ambulance, displays by the Office of Emergency Services and a simulated car extrication conducted by the Ballston Spa Fire Department that will be part of the No Texting While Driving display.

For more information about the Saratoga County Sheriffs Office, visit www.saratogacountysheriff.org.
FORT EDWARD  Impassioned testimonies to the value of the alternative-energy tax exemption led many county supervisors to change their vote at Fridays meeting.

Seven supervisors voted to stop a vote on the exemption. That was enough to keep the exemption, which allows property owners to add solar panels or other alternative energy systems without any change in the assessed value of their land.

Most property improvements lead to an increase in assessed value, which means the owner pays more in taxes.

Before Fridays meeting, officials had intended to opt out of the tax exemption. Opting out would have required all property owners to pay full property taxes on solar panels or any other alternative energy system. But two supervisors were working hard behind the scenes to persuade enough supervisors to keep the exemption.

At last months meeting, those two  Jackson Supervisor Jay Skellie and Whitehall Supervisor George Armstrong  managed to win over just one person, White Creek Supervisor Robert Shay. They voted then to try to stop the opt-out proposal from moving forward, but couldnt stop it with just three supervisors.

This time, four more supervisors joined their side, stopping the opt-out vote and saving the tax exemption.

Supervisors could still bring the issue up for a vote again.

Before the vote, the board held a public hearing that lasted almost an hour Friday, at which all but one speaker urged them to keep the tax exemption.

This is a plus for our county, said Salem resident Jay Bellanca. What if a group of farmers want to get together, do a waste-to-energy (system), do the right thing? The county should encourage more responsible ways to dispose of agricultural waste.

If the county opted-out of the tax exemption, farmers who build a methane digester to turn manure into electricity would also have to pay full taxes on the system.

A resident from Cambridge told the supervisors that the exemption also helps businesses and residents who put a few solar panels on their roofs.

There are many of us who are trying to go solar, who are trying to be more energy independent, said Valerie Reagan of Cambridge.

She said the opt-out would essentially create a new tax.

Is that the right way to go? she asked rhetorically. I say the county is at a crossroads.

But resident Lynn Clauer of Argyle said everyone should pay their fair share of taxes, rather than getting an exemption for certain improvements.

Im not a farmer, so I guess Im being very selfish, she said. Theyre not paying taxes that the rest of us are going to be shelling out.

She cant do solar at her house, she said, adding that the exemption isnt fair because she wont personally benefit from solar.

But Whitehall Supervisor George Armstrong said solar would be critical to everyone in the future.

At some point in time, its going to be so costly to extract oil that were going to be looking for alternative energy and this is a place to start, he said.

Non-renewable sources arent just used to make gasoline. Natural gas and coal are still used to make almost half of New Yorks electricity, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

The supervisors voted without commenting on the issue. Instead of voting to eliminate the tax exemption, they voted to table the resolution. Those who voted yes stopped the proposal from going forward.




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The three-day workshop brought together all front line officers in micro insurance operations to network, share experiences and also provide valuable feedback and first-hand field information to guide management strategy and decision making.

Commenting on the training, Ms. Cynthia Ewusi, the Business Development Manager for GLICO Micro Insurance, said, While a variety of elements go into creating a successful business, customer service is the most important foundation to excellent service and business profitability. If our customers are happy, they will come in for more services. Thus, at GLICO Micro Insurance, every interaction we have with our policy holders (or potential policyholders) affects our business bottom line and we work hard to get it right always.

She further emphasized that, offering customer service training to our employees does not just add value for the customer; it also gives us a competitive edge.

Ms. Ewusi encouraged the Customer Service Executives to upbeat to the changes in customer expectations in todays customer-focused business world and address them conscientiously.

Some of the Customer Service Executives shared their experiences that, they now have a heightened awareness and willingness to provide inclusive service to policyholders.

Micro insurance is a mechanism designed to protect low-income earners against risk - accident, illness, death in the family, natural disasters, among others - in exchange for insurance premium payments tailored to their needs, income and level of risk. It is aimed primarily at the informal sector that tends to be underserved by mainstream insurance schemes.

Currently GLICO Micro Insurance operates in 35 physical market locations nationwide, where the low-income earners and micro targets operate their trade. With a vision to bring insurance to the doorstep of every Ghanaian, GLICO Micro Insurance is spreading its operations to other markets in Ghana to reach out to more informal sector workers.
According to the private nurses, since the presidents directive during a media encounter at the Flagstaff House in January, their situation has actually worsened, as many of them are yet to be posted.

READ ALSO: Unemployed nurses demonstrate over delayed posting

He said failure to do so will compel them to take legitimate action or not exercise their franchise in the upcoming December 7 polls.

Our current trained nurses who should have now been living meaningful life have now become albatrosses on the neck of their families. They cant bring anything home because you dont have anything, he lamented.

READ ALSO: Mahama assures unemployed nurses of immediate jobs

The PUSAG president believes government must institute a quota system in the posting process in order to find a lasting solution to the problem.

We, therefore, employ the government through the Ministry of Health to apply a quota system in the posting process. It can either be a 65% or 75% for public nurses and the rest for the private trained nurses to start from, he added.
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...Victims receive unexpected calls indicating that some supposed relations of theirs have hit the rear of police vehicles and that the occupant police officers are demanding money instantly through a given mobile money transfer line, to drop this money, the failure of which they threaten to process the suspect for court.The public is advised to report immediately to the police whenever they received similar calls. Police hot lines are 18555 (MTN and Vodafone) and 191 on all networks.
The items, estimated about GH20, 000, included baby products, maternity gowns, washing powder, toilet rolls and drugs.

The Executive Vice President of the pro-NPP group Modesta Adjoa Darbo, who presented the items, said the gesture was to put smiles on the faces of mothers at the Hospital during the Yam Festival of the Asogli Traditional Area.

She said it was also to lessen the economic difficulties mothers faced in their quest to access quality health-care.

The Nurse in-charge at the maternity ward, Florence Patamie, expressed the heartfelt appreciation of the ward to the NPP ladies. She said the presentation was timely since some mothers were unable to afford diapers and other essential sanitary items.

Meanwhile, the youth of the NPP had earlier described comments made by President of Imani Ghana as unfortunate. Frankiln Cudjoe in a Facebook post described two ladies in an NPP loyal ladies shirt as "used and smelly".

READ ALSO: Police seeks injunction to prevent demonstration by DKM customers
He said government has approved an increase in the allowances of all soldiers who embark on peacekeeping missions.

He made this known at the graduation ceremony of the military graduation at Teshie in Accra on Friday.

President Mahama said I have approved a recommendation from the military high command and the Armed Forces Council for the introduction of a Ghana government paid leave allowance of 700 US dollars for all ranks on external peace keeping operations.

He noted that, I recall my interaction with you at the Burma Hall last month on 11th August, 2016 during my working visit to the Burma camp. A number of issues were raised and as a listening father I have considered them.

I have therefore approved a recommendation from the Military High Command and Armed Forces Council for the introduction of a Ghana government paid leave allowance of 700 US dollars for all ranks on external peacekeeping missions.

Rationed allowances for all uniformed personnel have also been increased to GHC120 and clothing allowances for civilian employees has also been increased to GHC40. These adjustments take effect from 3rd September 2016 and we shall continue to upwardly review other allowances at the appropriate time."
Such professionalism, he stated, will also help them to lift high the flag of Ghana by warding off emerging criminal activities initiated by non-state actors in the country and beyond.

He wore the uniform to the graduation ceremony of the military graduation at Teshie in Accra on Friday.

This is the second time Mahama wore the army uniform and boots.

He first wore the uniform to the commissioning of the Naval Headquarters Complex at Burma Camp in Accra.
READ MORE:Ayariga denies claims of children as delegates

In different varieties, the sanitizers have the face of Hassan Ayariga, the APCs presidential candidate, prominently plastered over it. A photo of the sanitizers was shared by the candidate on his Facebook account.

Hassan Ayariga has been struggling to shake off a perception about him as a joker because of some of his comments and actions during the 2012 elections when he was the presidential candidate for the Peoples National Congress (PNC). Some analyst attributed his bitter exit from the PNC to this.

READ ALSO:Ayariga releases highlights of APC manifesto

APC, which he formed earlier this year, has just launched its manifesto ahead of the December polls highlighting what it calls twenty feasible and doable social intervention policies under a Hassan Ayariga led government.

These include a STEM Educational Policy, Fish Pond Development Concept and Policy of Price Control & Standardization of goods and services.
The controversial politician said its not a done deal for you at all Nana (Akufo-Addo), is reported to have on Adom TV on Thursday. They (NDC) have over 30 diabolic plans to win this election.

He has thus cautioned the party against complacency and to work feverously on the ground to capture power in December from the NDC, which he said had brought suffering to the people of Ghana.

no one should be fooled that it is a done deal for the NPP just by dint of the suffering Ghanaians are going through.

Related: Gender group demands parliamentary action against Ken Agyapong

The MP for Assin Central is infamous for making wild, unverifiable and untrue allegations of this nature in the past. In June, he accused Charlotte Osei; the chairperson of the Electoral Commission (EC) saying that: she was appointed in exchange for sex. He has since then said that comment was a joke

He is also known for his sharp tongue and lack of political correctness especially during media interviews. He has previously made treasonous comments in the past that have landed him in the grip of security officials.
Speaking on Kumasi-based Ultimate FM Gunn said questioned why the voice of the Member of Parliament (MP) for Nkwanta North was missing in the audio until later.

Despite what Gunn describes as attacks on him for supporting the governing National Democratic Party, he said he will continue to support and speak for the party.

President Mahama, on Monday, August 22, 2016, freed the three men.

A statement signed by the Communications Minister Dr Omane Boamah said the decision was taken on the advice of the Council of State and was on compassionate grounds.

The Montie three, Alistair Nelson, Godwin Ako Gunn and Salifu Maase alias Mugabe were sentenced to four months in prison by the Supreme Court following contempt proceedings against them.
The event takes place at the Sunyani Coronation Park in the Brong Ahafo Region.

The Brong Ahafo regional chairman of the party Opoku Atuahene says the venue is set for the programme, adding that security agencies have assured of 'maximum security.'

President John Mahama, the NDC flagbearer, on Tuesday, September 13, presented the party's manifesto for election to the diplomatic community and party bigwigs.

The NDC manifesto, titled Changing Lives, Transforming Ghana, is hinged on four thematic areas:

Putting People First

Building a Strong Economy

Expanding Infrastructure for Growth

Transparent & Accountable Governance
According to him, "Nigeria is like some women in a relationship once they have a good husband, like the president who is ready to transform the country, they will never be patient with him, they will complain and do everything that will make them leave the relationship because they have seen a man putting on white clothes telling them sweet stories and fake promises that will make them smile all day.

What they didn't take from their ex-husband that made them leave the relationship, they will bear the worst in silence and keep defending the fake guy with empty promises. Always value what you have."

He has since taken down the post on Instagram.

Meanwhile, Delta State Governor, Arthur Okowa Ifeanyi, has endorsed the comedian.
The bail is in the sum of GH10,000 with two sureties, one to be a public servant earning not less than GH1,000.

Narrating the incident in court the prosecutor of the case said Pastor Edmund Karikari Agyei said he had a revelation concerning the member. He, therefore, asked the mother of the child to bring her to his house for prayers.

READ ALSO: Woman in police grips for allegedly stabbing boyfriend

During a conversation with the victim, the accused said he had another revelation which showed the girl had lower abdominal pains. He, later, requested to use olive oil on the painful abdomen and navel.

READ ALSO: Prophetess arrested for alleged fraud

He continued to narrate that Pastor Agyei after pulling the sweater of the victim upwards he applied the olive oil and is alleged to have kissed and fondled breast of the church member.

The victim whose name was given as Angela reported the 40-year old pastor to his mother who subsequently lodged a complaint.
The four accused were reported to have allegedly purchased Cocaine worth for Rs.2,800 (about N131,781), per gram, through their dealers from the Goa State and delivered the same for Rs.5000 and Rs.6000 (N235,000 and N282,000), to end users in Hyderabad to gain easy profit, authorities said.

According to the statement released by the police, the four were nabbed after the Narcotic officials staged a sting operation and busted their hideouts.

"Their illegal and highly dangerous activities of peddling of Narcotic Drug, i.e Cocaine, among the innocent people of Hyderabad City, have been endangering the lives of youth and innocent people, causing irreparable damage to the body parts including central Nervous System.

Their actions thereby crippled the mental and physical health of the people who are addicted to drugs, thereby adversely affecting the public order and public health at large and leaving large sections of people under the grip of shock and fear.

To control the activities of drug offenders in Hyderabad City, to promote safety and security in the City, a special drive is continuing to control activities of criminals who are indulging in unlawful acts such as the supply of Narcotic Drug."

"The drug offenders who are citizens of Nigeria, have been detained in the Central Prison pending sentencing."
ALSO READ: NSCDC arrests 2 over cow theft in Nasarawa

The Commandant of the corps in the state, Mr Muhammad Durumin-Iya, disclosed to the News Agency of Nigeria on Friday, September 16 in Dutse that the suspects were arrested in the Birnin Kudu Local Government Area of the state.

He revealed that the suspects who hailed from Tukuda village, were arrested by the officials on Thursday, September 15, in Kiyako village.

Durumin-Iya explained that one of the suspects was reportedly arrested with stolen cows valued between N130, 000 and N150, 000.

He added that an informant had approached the suspect while he was attempting to transport the cow to Azare in Bauchi state.

The second suspect was reportedly arrested for aiding and abetting the suspected cattle rustler.

ALSO READ: Agency parade 3 suspects found with human head
Read her story here:

"My name is Ethel, a 26-year-old lady. I live in Abuja and I have been here for three years. I was actually posted here for my youth service and I decided to live here. My decision to live here was made possible by a top politician I was dating.

He rented my apartment in Asokoro area and furnished it to taste, placing me on a huge monthly allowance and a car to go with it. But all these came a with a proviso: I was not to date any other man or he would withdraw all the goodies I was enjoying from him.

In return, I was to be at his beck and call, satisfying him in bed whenever he wanted.

I was not worried about this because he was paying for good sex and I made sure he got the best of it. Even when he requested for anal sex, I did not think twice because of what I was enjoying from him.

I am sure his wife would cringe at some of the things I was doing to him. I had to call off my relationship with my fiance who just waiting for me to finish my service so we could get married.

I had moved from the average girl to a wild, sex and party freak, all because of the money and material things I was getting.

But now, all those things are gradually slipping from me because my man who is now a Senator, has decided to dump me and moved on to other ladies.

What is more painful is that he decided to send me out of my mansion, collected the car and withdrew the allowance he had placed me on.

I have now been left in the cold as other girls are the ones reaping where they did not sow. The painful thing is that I did not save for the rainy day as I was busy spending my money on frivolous things.

My friends have all abandoned me since I have fallen from my pedestal. I have also lost on another front because my fiance moved on and got married to another woman.

I am so hurt that I want to expose the cheat of a man.

Ethel."

The teaser for the day was:

How Nigeria voted:

She was just greedy and should take it as a lesson - 46%

What she got is what she deserved - 21%

She should expose the man for what he is - 14%

She should be ashamed of herself - 19%
Bangkok Post reports that the Crime Suppression Division nabbed the couple at their home at Phetkasem 77 Road in Nong Khaem district, Bangkok, following a report from immigration police at Survarnabhumi airport that many people showed up at the main airport of Bangkok to bribe police and customs officials and claim parcels containing merchandise and tens of US dollars in cash which actually never existed.

Chinedu was alleged to have picked his female victims on chatting websites, claiming to be a white man who is handsome and wealthy. He would then lure the women with promises of love and proposed marriage to them.

After the women accepted the marriage proposal, he would then tell the women that he had some cargoes stuck at the airport and needed money to bribe airport authorities to get the goods, promising to share income earned from the cargoes with them.

The husband, wife scam masters, Chinaka Chinedu and Uraporn Kesawatana

Photo Credit: Bangkok Post

His wife would then send bank account numbers to the victims and told them to transfer between $30,000 and $50,000. Once they got the money, the couple would then switch off their phones while Kesawatana would then transferred part of the money to their accomplices in Malaysia.

On interrogation, Kesawatana said the scam went on for a year and they were able to swindle the women of the sum.
According to the President of the Nigeria Union in South Africa, Ikechukwu Anyene, the victim, an indigene of Agwu in Enugu State, was shot dead by the assailants who tried to rob him.

As if that was not enough, Anyene added that about 20 Nigerians resident in the city were initially arrested by the police for protesting the murder of Okorie and allegedly causing public violence.

Though Anyene said that some of the Nigerians have been released after investigations, nine of them were charged to court where they were granted free bail.

In a statement, Anyene said:

The Nigeria Union is satisfied with investigations done so far by the South African police.

Our people and government are not happy with the way cases involving Nigerians in South Africa are being handled, vis-a-vis the high success rate of prosecution of crime in South Africa."

"We have told Nigerians resident in the province to remain law abiding and allow the police to carry out a thorough investigation of the incident.
Adeosun also said what the government wants to do is to push money into the economy to jumpstart the economy.

She said What government wants to do is to step in and begin to spend and pushing more money into the economy and then get things moving again.

Since the budget was passed in May we have released and cash backed fully N420bn capital releases. As we speak now, we are about releasing another N350bn thats between May and now.

One of the sectors we spent the money on, of course the largest has been power, works and housing. Quite a lot has gone on defence because we need to rebuild the credibility of our army to continue in their efforts in the new phase, interior, transport.
Ali Sanda Umar Konduga was said to have been arrested on Wednesday, September 14, after sneaking into Ndumes home, according to Vanguard.

Konduga was reportedly released from prison last week after serving a three year sentence.

The suspect had earlier accused Ndume of being a Boko Haram sponsor leading to the senator being charged to court.

According to one of Ndumes relatives, Konduga kept on coming to the Senators house purposely to apologize to the immediate family for indicting Ndume, who was charged for providing Konduga with politicians phone numbers and not disclosing information to authorities under Nigerias Terrorism Prevention Act.

When the Maigadi (Gate man) accosted Konduga that the senator was not in the house, requested to see Justice Aisha Ndume, one of the senators wife, but was asked to come back the following day, a source told Vanguard.

As luck will have it, Konduga revisited the house on Wednesday at exactly 4pm, where he was identified by some Ndumes close associates, who accompanied the senator to the Federal High Court, Abuja then.

Policemen in charge of G.R.A police station were alerted and swooped into action leading to the re-arrest of Konduga. He is now in police custody, while Senator Ndume has been informed, the source added.

ALSO READ:Military says recent Boko Haram video was Photoshopped
IPOB also called on Buhari to release its leader, Nnamdi Kanu, who has been in detention since October 2015.

The group made the comments via a statement released by spokesmen, Emma Nmezu and Dr. Clifford Iroanya.

The statement reads:

Muhammadu Buhari freed a terrorist Kabiru Umar (a.k.a Kabiru Sokoto) but disobeyed court orders on unconditional release of Nnamdi Kanu. Is the government not sure of the ability of its legal team to make a strong case for the conviction of Kanu?

Is government impatient with the rule of law to the extent that it now wants to take the laws into its hands and resort to extra-judicial killing which has always been its second nature?

What is the rationale behind governments preference for the freedom of a terrorist and mass murderer over compliance with the rulings of courts of competent jurisdictions?

Even with his limited education and non-existent leadership training plus lack of updated skills in modern and democratic governance, Buhari should at least respect the constitution of the country he is claiming to be the president of.

IPOB lawyer, Amobi Nzelu also said that Buhari cant kill the Biafra agitation.

They should engage in a meaningful dialogue. Ideology cannot be destroyed by might or force but by what I call constructive and Pentecostal persuasion. You cannot destroy an ideology. Even if you kill the person, it is an ideology, its not a movement. Anything that is settled politically, the wound heals faster, Nzelu told Daily Sun during an interview.

It was the most inappropriate forum to have said that. Let me restate it in unmistaken terms that the issue of Biafra is not what you can settle with a wave of hand. To celebrate what he did over 40 years ago before those young corps members was uncalled for. He should better put his war experience in a book form.

Buhari has done well in fighting corruption, but he is mishandling the issue of Biafra and other ethnic agitations. He should do the needful. Nnamdi Kanu has been in detention for over 18 months now. Let the president release him.

When Mohammed Yusuf started Boko Haram, he was arrested and he died in their hands. If the issue was properly handled, we would not have had the ruin we have in the North East today, Nzelu added.
This is contained in a statement issued in Abuja on Friday by the presidents Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Mr Femi Adesina.

The statement said that the president would deliver Nigerias statement at the opening of the General Debate of the Assembly on The Sustainable Development Goals: A Universal Push to Transform Our World.

Adesina revealed that the president would also attend a high-level summit to be hosted by the UN, on Large Movements of Refugees and Migrants.

The summit, which is the first of its kind organised by the General Assembly at the Heads of State and Government level, is expected to come up with a blueprint for a better international response to enhance protection of migrants and refugees.

He also said that Buhari would deliver a keynote address on Taking Climate Action toward Sustainable Development in Nigeria and the Lake Chad Basin.

The presidents aide disclosed that leaders of member-countries of Lake Chad Basin would attend the summit, organised by Nigerian government, to highlight the urgent need to mobilise international response to the situation in the Chad Basin.

Over nine million people are in need of humanitarian assistance in the Lake Chad Basin.

He said that while in New York for the annual gathering of world leaders, the president would attend series of meetings as well as side events, which were of significant interest to Nigeria.

Adesina said that the president would equally participate in an event hosted by the UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon, on Ending Need in the Lake Chad.

On the margins of the 71st UNGA, President Buhari will sign the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, and participate in activities commemorating the 30th anniversary of the Declaration of the Right to Development.

He said that the Nigerian leader would attend the Clinton Global Initiative as well as the United Nations Private Sector Forum on Business and Global Goals organised by the Secretary General.

According to Adesina, the president will lead discussions at the United States-Africa Business Forum devoted to investing in Nigeria.

He said that the president would hold bilateral meetings with some world leaders in furtherance of his administrations commitment in ameliorating the plight of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in the country.

He said that the discussions would also focus on the presidents longstanding commitment to returning peace and security in the North-East of Nigeria.
According to reports, the government alleged that attempts made earlier was frustrated by the division in the Boko Haram sect.

This was revealed to newsmen by the Minister of information, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, according to Daily Post.

The Bring Back Our Girls (BBOG) advocacy group have been holding rallies to pressure the government to fulfil its promise of releasing the students.

Recently, Barrister Aisha Wakil aka Mama Boko Haram, revealed that the Chibok girls are receiving special treatment in Sambisa forest.

Wakil is one of those declared wanted by the Nigerian Army over an alleged link with Boko Haram.

A retired Airforce Captain, Sunday Adoba revealed that 40 of the abducted Chibok Girls were handed over to one Mala Yamari.
Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, disclosed this at a press conference to update the public on efforts of government to rescue the girls.

The Minister said the attempts were, however, stalled by a contact group and the division in the Boko Haram camp.

Mohammed reiterated the commitment of the government to trace, locate and ensure the safe and successful release of the Chibok girls.

The minister said that in July 2015, a contact group was in touch with government with credible facts attesting to the fact that some of the girls were alive.

\He said the President was briefed and he gave his assent for further negotiations on their release.

Precisely on July 17, 2015, the DSS opened negotiations process with the group holding the Chibok girls. However, in return for the release of some of these girls, the group also made some demands.

These included the release of some of their fighters arrested including some involved in major terrorist actions, resulting in several fatalities, and others who were experts in manufacturing of locally assembled explosives.

This was difficult to accept, but appropriate security agencies had to again inform Mr President of these demands, and its viewed implications.

Again, Mr President gave his assent believing that the overall release of these girls remains paramount and sacrosanct, he said.

Mohammed said the government and the security agencies worked out the modalities of the swap which included creating the safe haven, or necessary place of swap and working out the logistic details.

He said it was finally agreed by all parties that the first step for the swap would commence on August 1, 2015

On 4th August, 2015, the persons who were to be part of the swap arrangements and all others involved in the operation were transported to Maiduguri.

This team, with the lead facilitator, continued the contact with the group holding the Chibok girls.

The Service was able to further prove to the group its sincerity, as it established communication contact between it and its detained members.

All things were in place for the swap which was mutually agreed. Expectations were high.

Unfortunately, after more than two (2) weeks of negotiation and bargains, the group, just at the dying moments, issued new set of demands, never bargained for or discussed by the group before the movement to Maiduguri.

All this while, the security agencies waited patiently. This development stalled what would have been the first release process of the Chibok girls, he said.

The minister said that in spite of the setback, the government and the security agencies did not relent in the bid to ensure that the girls were released safely.

He said on Nov. 13, 2015, another fresh negotiation process with the group was initiated.

This time, there was the need to discuss a fresh component in order to avoid issues that had stalled the former arrangement.

There were, however, some problems that many may not discern, but should be expected in this kind of situation.

Some critical persons within the group who played such vital role in August 2015 were discovered to be dead during combat action or as a result of the emerging rift amongst members of the group then.

These two factors delayed the process. In spite of these, negotiation continued on new modalities

By Nov. 30, 2015 it was becoming glaring that the division amongst the group was more profound. This affected the swap process, he said.

The Minister said that by Dec. 10, 2015, another negotiation process was in place, but it failed to achieve results because of the varying demands by the group.

He said that since the beginning of 2016 the security agencies had remained committed and also taken the lead to ensure their release.

Mohammed said that renewed efforts had commenced using trusted assets and facilitators to ensure the release of the girls.

Officers and men have sacrificed their time and energy, and some have already paid the supreme price since the abduction of the Chibok girls, fighting for the safe release of the girls.

Many friendly countries and organisations have equally been very forthcoming in providing their human and technological resources to assist in the process.

They are still doing so. We cannot as a nation ignore these sacrifices, he assured.

We are with you; we feel your pains and shall not relent until we succeed in bringing home our girls and every other citizen abducted by the group, he said.
The statement reads:

The attention of the Honourable Minister of Interior, Lt General Abdulrahman Bello Dambazau (Rtd), has been drawn to the activities of some ungodly, unscrupulous and criminally minded persons, masquerading as the Interior Minister on Facebook.

These impostors have craftily opened multiple Facebook accounts bearing the name and photographs of the Interior Minister, where-in they swindle unsuspecting members of the public of their hard earned money with a promise of securing job opportunities for their victims in the Military, Paramilitary Agencies, the Nigeria Police, etc.

"For the avoidance of doubt, General Dambazau does not have a Facebook account, and does not intend to have any.

ALSO READ:Dambazau partners CMD to train staff
Buhari made the comment on Tuesday, September 13, 2016 while receiving members of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) in his hometown Daura, Katsina state.

Fani-Kayode reacted via a post on his Facebook page. The post reads:

You bathed in the blood of Biafrans, you crushed their bones and stripped away their dignity and self-respect just to keep Nigeria one. Now you say their children have no right to ask for self-determination simply because you killed their fathers and mothers during the war and shattered their dreams.

Shame on you. If Nigeria was a normal country by now you would have been at the ICC answering charges of genocide and crimes against humanity at the Hague instead of being President.

If you want the Igbo or any other southerner to stay and if u want Nigeria to remain one then treat us all as equals, offer our children and our people equal opportunities and a public apology and pay full compensation for all the atrocities that you, your people and your forefathers have committed against the people of the south and the northern minorities over the last two hundred years.

In addition to that you must defeat, destroy and dismantle Boko Haram, decommission your Fulani militias and herdsmen and put a stop to the marginalization, threats, genocide, ethnic cleansing and mass murder of our people.

It is after you have done all these things that you can make an appeal to us for the continued unity of Nigeria.
This is contained in a statement signed by its Director of Information, Commodore Christian Ezekobe, in Abuja.

In continuation of the Chief of Naval Staffs (CNS) campaign tagged `Operation Zero Crude Oil Theft (Zero COT), more illegal refineries have been destroyed in the Niger Delta region.

This time, a patrol team deployed by Forward Operation Base (FOB), Escravos in Delta conducted several raids on illegal refinery sites around Jones, Sara and Oporoza Creeks in Warri South LGA of Delta.

During the raids, the team arrested 11 suspects and destroyed 13 Cotonou boats laden with suspected stolen crude oil.

The team also recovered two speed boats and a Cotonou boat carrying 20 tanks of different capacities measuring a total of 160,000 litres of illegally refined Automotive Gas oil (AGO).

Other items recovered from the criminals include six outboard engines and four pumping machines, the statement said.

It added that in a similar operation by NNS PATHFINDER in Rivers, patrol teams intercepted and destroyed some speed boats and several drums of illegally refined AGO, mostly around Onne in Rivers.

Specifically, six speed boats conveying about 30 drums of various sizes laden with illegally refined AGO were destroyed between Sept. 10 and Sept. 11.
A recent report by Punch Newspapers indicated that some residents of Kwoi were spotted fleeing the area with their properties.

It was further reported that the fleeing residents opted for the evacuation after a re-occurrence of another tremor on Monday barely 24 hours after the tremor on Sunday.

ALSO READ:Cause of tremor still under investigation

Meanwhile, the state governor and Senator Danjuma Laah representing Kaduna South Senatorial district have called for calm amidst the tension saying residents should avoid panic.
Ogbeh said this while speaking to selected farmers in Ebonyi state.

He also revealed that the funds to sustain the importation of rice is no longer available.

He also said the Buhari administration will support farmers to engage in all year farming.

Ogbeh said The Federal Government would support you through the provision of inputs, access to financing among other interventions, to achieve improved yields from your crops.

You will also be supported to embark on all-year farming through the provision of irrigation facilities that would enhance crop yield.

The minister had earlier revealed that consuming rice in large quantity on a regular basis was a bit of a health riskadding that substituting it with potato would be welcomed development.

He said that the consumption of rice in the country was rising and that a lot of people were not aware that the rice had some degree of arsenic.
Orji told newsmen in Umuahia on Friday on the sideline of a reconciliatory meeting organised in his honour by an Umuahia sociocultural organisation, called Igurube-Egwuasa.

He expressed regrets that the recession had resulted in the closure of many companies and manufacturing concerns, while many industries were producing below capacity.

The former governor also advised the president to introduce stimulus that could help to stimulate the manufacturing and industrial sectors of the nations economy.

The president should push for an emergency law that would help to stimulate economic growth and bring the country out of recession.

The moment the manufacturing sector attains full-capacity production, there will be less dependence on importation and this will shore up the value of the naira, he said.

Kalu said that the activities of Niger Delta militants further aggravated the nations dwindling revenue, leading to a full-blown recession.

He said that he first noticed the signs of economic recession in the country in 2014, when the Federal Government borrowed to pay the salary of federal civil servants.

At that time, I raised the alarm that Nigerian economy had gone into recession but nobody believed me, instead, I was abused and castigated,  he said.

Kalu, founder Progressives Peoples Alliance (PPA), after defecting from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the twilight of his administration, said that the party was still relevant in the nations politics.

PPA is not struggling, it is as good as other parties in the country, he said.

The PPAs senatorial candidate for Abia north, also reacted to Thursdays jNational and State Assembly Election Petitons Tribunal judgment which dismissed his petition in favour of Sen. Mao Ohuabunwa of PDP.

He said the tribunal, headed by Justice James Abundaga, erred in law in its judgment that his petition lacked merit.

The tribunal erred in law but I will seek the opinion of a higher court. We will appeal the judgment.

And I am confident that another court will have a different opinion from that of the tribunal in our favour, he said.

On the reconciliatory meeting, Kalu said that he had forgiven all those who offended him politically or otherwise, including his successor and immediate-past governor, Sen. Theodore Orji.

The former National Chairman of PPA, Chief Larry Essien, who was at the meeting, commended the conveners and expressed delight over their disposition to enthrone peace in the area.

Essien urged Ndigbo to unite and pursue their common objective of producing the next Nigerias president of Igbo extraction.

He said that Kalu, who he described as a prominent and detribalised Nigerian, represents the future of Ndigbo, and asked the people to rally support for him.

The other speakers, included a former Chairman of PDP in the state, Chief Tony Ukasanya, the paramount ruler, Ibeku Ancient Kingdom (Umuahia), Eze Samuel Onuoha, Chief Laz Onwuneme (Igwe Ohuhu) and the Traditional Prime Minister of Ibeku, Chief Uche Akwukwaegbu.

They all appealed to Kalu to forgive them for having at various times abandoned him when he needed their support, especially during his political face off with Sen. Orji.

We are very sorry for all our weaknesses and sins against you. We know how you defied all odds and invested your resources to make our son, Theodore Orji, the governor.
Other defendants in the case are Skye Bank, former Special Assistant to ex-president Goodluck Jonathan on Domestic Affairs, Waripamo-Owei Dudafa, Pluto Property and Investment Company Limited, Seagate Property Development and Investment Company Limited, Transocean Property and Investment Company Limited and Globus Integrated Service Limited.

The bank accounts were opened for the above named companies, who have pleaded guilty to charges of money laundering filed by the EFCC.

Mrs Jonathan had earlier claimed to be the owner of the money in the restricted accounts.
The information is contained in a statement issued by Mr Owei Lakemfa, Head, Media and Communications, PAP, in Abuja on Thursday.

Arrangements have been completed to bring them back on Sept. 19, he promised..

Boroh added:  Some students had complained about a six-week delay in their In-Training-Allowances or delay in returning home.

Such minor delays should not be a basis for protests or agreeing to be used to write frivolous petitions against the programme.

The Amnesty Office has sent all such allowances and any delay being experienced is due to the process of foreign exchange transfer and not the PAP because the programme does not owe school fees.

What is required of you, the students, is for you to study and return to contribute to the development of the Niger Delta region and the country.

He urged students under the scholarship scheme to protect the programme rather than endanger it.

He said rather than listen to people who sought to politicise the programme for private gains, the students should seek creative means of contributing to the stabilisation of the Niger Delta and sustenance of the overseas scholarship programme.

The coordinator said while crisis and insecurity in the Niger Delta would affect the economy of the country, the people in the region would be more affected.

He said if the region remained unstable, investors would not be comfortable investing in it.

The coordinator commended the Imo Government for facilitating the disarmament of hundreds of militants in the state.

He urged the state government to follow through with the full reintegration of the ex-agitators into the society as the Federal Government alone could not execute such a programme.
For today, September 16 2016:

THE GUARDIAN NEWSPAPER

Nigerian millitary misses out on global race for submarines

Nigeria is missing out in efforts by countries across the world to build and launch submarines to defend themselves against foreign aggression.

Four firms plead guilty in alleged $15m fraud by Jonathans ex-aide

Four companies implicated in a $15 million fraud case involving a former aide to former President Goodluck Jonathan, Waripamo Owei-Dudafa, have pleaded guilty to the charge at the Federal High Court, Lagos.

More residents flee Kaduna community over tremor

More residents of Kwoi in Jaba Local Government Area of Kaduna State have fled, following earth tremors that hit the community last Sunday. READ MORE

THE VANGUARD NEWSPAPER

Four firms linked to Mrs Jonathan plead guilty to $15m fraud charge

LagosFour companies, Pluto Properties and Investment Company, Seagate Property Development Company, Trans Ocean Property and Investment Company Ltd, and Avalon Global Property Ltd, all of which allegedly have links with former First Lady, Dame Patient Jonathan, yesterday, pleaded guilty to alleged $15 million fraud charge brought against them before a Federal High Court sitting in Lagos.

Buhari begs Nigerians for support, cooperation as ministers gear up to fight recession

ABUJAAlarmed by the dwindling fortunes of Nigeria, President Muhammadu Buhari, yesterday, brainstormed with his key ministers and financial experts from the public and private sectors, to find ways of fixing the troubled economy.

PDP is shameless for asking Buhari to quit FG, APC

ABUJA The Federal Government and All Progressives Congress, APC, yesterday, slammed Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, for once again asking President Muhammadu Buhari to quit, calling the former ruling party a shameless irritant which was bent on distracting the government from its rescue mission and returning the country to Egypt. READ MORE

THE NATION NEWSPAPER

Jonathans wifes $15m: Four firms plead guilty

Four companies linked to former First Lady Patience Jonathan, yesterday pleaded guilty to laundering $15,591,700 (about N5billion).

Govt to reorder MDAs capital votes in 2017, says Buhari

There will be a change in the capital allocations to the Federal Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) in next years budget, President Muhammadu Buhari said yesterday.

CBN mulls raising N183b Treasury Bills

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is planning to raise N183.24 worth of Treasury bills (T-bills) to settle short-term obligations. The issue will come with mixed yields on all tenors, data from Debt Management Office (DMO) has shown.

THE PUNCH NEWSPAPER

EFCC wants Patience Jonathan to forfeit $15m

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission is set to file an application in court seeking the total forfeiture of $15,591,700, belonging to Dame Patience Jonathan, the wife of the immediate past President, Goodluck Jonathan.

Brass gas project: Police probe withdrawal of $3.2bn cash

The police have begun investigations into the depletion of a $3.7bn account of the Brass/Liquefied Natural Gas Company.

Recession: Think outside the box, Buhari tells ministers
According to their lawyers, no monetary figures were announced in the settlement between the Fort Worth schoolteacher, Jennifer Pedroza and Amanda Hayward of Australia.

According to reports, the women were among the original partners in The Writers Coffee Shop, an online community which went on to become a small independent publisher of ebooks and originally published the "Fifty Shades" trilogy in 2011 as an e-book and print-on-demand book.

Following Pedroza's allegations in 2015 that she had been cheated out of royalties, a judge in Fort Worth ordered Hayward to set aside $10 million for Pedroza after a Fort Worth jury concluded in February 2015 that she was defrauded out of her fair share of the royalties.

Mike Farris, an attorney for Pedroza said, "I believe everyone is pleased."

"It's nice to have the whole thing resolved. The settlement puts an end to the disagreements they had," said David Keltner, a Texas-based attorney for Hayward.

The rights for the E.L. James authored "Fifty Shades" books, were sold for over $40 million to Random House, a deal which led to the sale of more than 100 million copies around the world.

In 2015, the Fort Worth jury agreed with Pedroza's lawyers who argued that she was cheated out of her share of the money after Hayward fraudulently presented a restructuring agreement for the sale to Random House.

Texas District Court Judge Susan McCoy, reportedly ordered that the $10 million be set aside while further investigations into the sale were underway in a bid to find out the exact amount owed to Pedroza, while satisfying the jury verdict.

ALSO READ: Christian Grey is back in 1st look at sequel

A final judgment early this year finally entitled Pedroza to $11.6 million. However, Hayward appealed the rulings.
What better way to ease off the stress of the week than watch a good movie.

With that in mind, check out our list of movies currently showing in cinemas across Lagos, Abuja and Port Harcourt.

Starring: Bovi Ugboma, Ini Dima-Okojie, Toni Tones Adefuye, Omoni Oboli, Shaffy Bello, Najite Dede, Amanda Ebeye, Adunni Ade, Gregory Ojefua, Thelma Ezeamaka.

Synopsis: when a man proposes to foot the bill for the wedding of his bride, little does he know that she will stop at nothing to have a fairytale wedding; even if it requires his funeral to achieve it.

Showing:

Friday - Thursday: 4:20pm, 6:35pm, 8:50pm

Friday - Thursday: 1:10PM, 4:50PM, 7:05PM

Friday - Thursday:12:40PM, 2:50PM, 5:00PM, 7:10PM

Daily: 3:15 PM, 7:45 PM, 10:05 PM

Starring: Morris Chestnut, Regina Hall, Romany Malco

Synopsis: A surrogate mom for a couple becomes dangerously obsessed with the soon-to-be father.

Showing:

Fri - Wed: 2:40 PM, 4:50 PM, 7:00 PM, 9:20 PM

Thu: 2:40 PM, 4:50 PM, 7:00 PM, 9:20 PM

VIP Shows

Daily: 3:25 PM

Fri - Wed: 8:05 PM

Friday - Thursday: 12:05PM, 2:45PM, 7:05PM, 9:15PM

Friday - Thursday: 2:15pm, 4:15pm, 6:15pm, 8:15pm

Friday - Thursday: 12:30PM, 2:40PM, 4:50PM, 7:00PM, 9:10PM

Starring: Tom Hanks, Aaron Eckhart, Laura Linney

Synopsis: The story of Chesley Sullenberger, who became a hero after gliding his plane along the water in the Hudson River, saving all of the airplane flights 155 crew and passengers.

Showing:

Friday - Thursday: 2:30PM, 6:20PM, 8:20PM

Friday - Thursday: 7:20PM

Friday - Thursday: 3:00pm, 4:50pm

Daily: 11:00 AM, 1:05 PM, 5:35 PM

4.

Starring: Jackie Chan, Johnny Knoxville, Bingbing Fan

Synopsis: A detective from Hong Kong teams up with an American gambler to battle against a notorious Chinese criminal.

Showing:

Friday - Thursday: 3:50pm, 6:00pm

Fri: 8:00 PM, 10:20 PM

Sat - Thu: 8:00 PM, 10:20 PM

(--VIP SHOWS--)

Sat - Thu: 5:40 PM

Friday - Thursday: 10:55AM, 9:00PM

Friday - Thursday: 12:05PM, 2:10PM, 6:20PM

Starring: Mark Rylance, Ruby Barnhill, Penelope Wilton

Synopsis: A girl named Sophie encounters the Big Friendly Giant who, despite his intimidating appearance, turns out to be a kindhearted soul who is considered an outcast by the other giants because, unlike them, he refuses to eat children.

Showing:

Friday - Thursday: 10:00am

Friday - Thursday: 12:00PM, 4:20PM

Friday - Thursday: 10:45AM

Daily: 12:20PM

6.

Starring: Jason Statham, Jessica Alba, Tommy Lee Jones

Synopsis: Arthur Bishop thought he had put his murderous past behind him when his most formidable foe kidnaps the love of his life. Now he is forced to travel the globe to complete three impossible assassinations, and do what he does best, make them look like accidents.

Showing:

Friday - Thursday: 3:05pm, 5:00pm, 7:00pm, 9:00pm

Friday - Thursday: 2:10PM, 5:10PM, 9:30PM

Friday - Thursday: 1:20PM, 3:20PM, 5:20PM, 7:20PM, 9:20PM

Daily: 12:20 PM, 4:55 PM, 9:20 PM

VIP Shows

Daily: 1:15 PM

7.

Starring: Jason Statham, Jessica Alba, Tommy Lee Jones

Synopsis: Arthur Bishop thought he had put his murderous past behind him when his most formidable foe kidnaps the love of his life. Now he is forced to travel the globe to complete three impossible assassinations, and do what he does best, make them look like accidents.

Showing:

Friday - Thursday: 11:15am, 1:15pm

Friday - Thursday: 5:20PM

Friday - Thursday: 9:20PM

Starring: Stephanie Beatriz, Robert Cardone, Neil deGrasse Tyson

Synopsis: Manny, Diego, and Sid join up with Buck to fend off a meteor strike that would destroy the world.

Showing:

Sat-Sun: 10:00am

Friday - Thursday: 1:05PM

Starring: Nse Ikpe-Etim, Anthony Monjaro, Seun Akindele

Synopsis: Arthur Bishop thought he had put his murderous past behind him when his most formidable foe kidnaps the love of his life. Now he is forced to travel the globe to complete three impossible assassinations, and do what he does best, make them look like accidents.

Showing:

Friday - Thursday: 10:30am

Friday - Thursday: 10:30AM, 4:05PM

Friday - Thursday: 11:40AM, 1:20PM, 5:10PM

Starring: Miles Teller, Bradley Cooper, Ana de Armas

Synopsis: Romance Is Overrated is a tapestry of 3 independent but mutually inclusive short films which reveal young individuals who are struggling with their illusions of the idea called love. This unfolds in 3 chapters. Slow Fade, Romance is still Overrated and Two Colors of Rainbow.

Showing:

Friday - Thursday: 3:00PM

Friday - Thursday: 2:00PM

Starring: Blake Lively, Oscar Jaenada, Brett Cullen

Synopsis: A mere 200 yards from shore, surfer Nancy is attacked by a great white shark, with her short journey to safety becoming the ultimate contest of wills.

Showing:

Fri-Thur: 2:05pm

Friday - Thursday: 3:25PM, 5:40PM

Friday - Thursday: 12:20PM, 4:20PM

Starring: Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, Kate McKinnon

Synopsis: 30 years after Ghostbusters took the world by storm, the beloved franchise makes its long-awaited return. Director Paul Feig brings his fresh take to the supernatural comedy, joined by some of the funniest actors working today.

Showing:

Friday - Thursday: 11:00am

Starring:Ellen DeGeneres, Albert Brooks, Ed O'Neill

Synopsis: The friendly-but-forgetful blue tang fish begins a search for her long-lost parents, and everyone learns a few things about the real meaning of family along the way.

Showing:

Friday - Thursday: 11:00AM

15.

Starring: Kevin Spacey, Jennifer Garner, Robbie Amell

Synopsis: A stuffy businessman finds himself trapped inside the body of his family's cat.

Showing:

Daily: 10:40 AM, 12:40 PM, 2:40 PM

Friday - Thursday: 11:40AM, 12:40PM, 4:30PM

Friday - Thursday: 12:40PM, 5:20PM

Friday - Thursday: 10:00am, 11:40am, 12:10pm

Starring:Margot Robbie, Cara Delevingne, Jared Leto

Synopsis: A secret government agency recruits imprisoned supervillains to execute dangerous black ops missions in exchange for clemency.

Showing:

Fri-Thur: 1:50pm, 6:40pm

Friday - Thursday: 1:30PM, 4:00PM, 6:30PM, 9:00PM

Friday - Thursday: 12:35PM, 9:15PM

Starring:Mila Kunis, Kathryn Hahn, Kristen Bell

Synopsis: When three overworked and under-appreciated moms are pushed beyond their limits, they ditch their conventional responsibilities for a jolt of long overdue freedom, fun, and comedic self-indulgence

Showing:

Fri-Thur: 1:05pm

Friday - Thursday: 6:00PM, 8:00PM

Starring:Angela Dixon, Nigel Whitmey, Lisa Eichhorn

Synopsis: A single mother on vacation, takes the law into her own hands to take back her abducted child.

Showing:

Friday - Sunday: 10:35AM

Starring: Bimbo Akintola, Keppy Ekpeyong Bassey, Gideon Okeke

Synopsis: 93 Days is a historic gripping documentation of the deadly disease starting from the day the day the Ebola virus came into Nigeria to the day the country was declared Ebola-free.

Showing:

Fri - Wed: 2:30 PM, 7:05 PM, 9:30 PM

Thu: 2:30 PM, 7:05 PM, 9:30 PM

VIP SHOWS

Fri - Wed: 5:45 PM

Fri-Thur: 1:20pm, 3:40pm, 6:05pm, 8:25pm

Friday - Thursday: 2:30PM, 4:10PM, 8:30PM

Friday - Thursday: 11:00AM, 5:10PM, 7:05PM

Starring:Jonah Hill, Miles Teller, Steve Lantz

Synopsis: Based on the true story of two young men, David Packouz and Efraim Diveroli, who won a $300 million contract from the Pentagon to arm America's allies in Afghanistan.

Showing:

Fri-Thur: 12:10pm

Starring:Zac Efron, Adam Devine, Anna Kendrick

Synopsis: Two hard-partying brothers place an online ad to find the perfect dates for their sister's Hawaiian wedding. Hoping for a wild getaway, the boys instead find themselves out-hustled by an uncontrollable duo.

Showing:

Fri-Thur: 8:55pm

Starring:Salma Hayek, Adrien Brody, Shohreh Aghdashloo

Synopsis: Prior to the Iranian revolution it was a place where people of all religions were allowed to flourish. This is the story of a prosperous Jewish family who abandon everything before they are consumed by the passions of revolutionaries.

Showing:

Fri-Thur: 11:50am, 8:15pm

Daily: 4:40 PM, 7:00 PM

Friday - Thursday: 10:30AM, 7:25PM, 9:20PM

Starring:Joelschild, Eniola Agboluaje, Lizzy Anjorin

Synopsis: The Dance Movie Project (#TDMP) is inspired by real-life events. The plot follows a dancing duo of brothers, Femi and Wale, known as some of the best underground competition dancers in Lagos, Nigeria, who despite the disapproval of their single mother, continue to chase their passion for dance.

Showing:

Fri-Thur: 10:00am

Fri-Thur: 2:20PM

Starring: Angelique Kidjo, Jimmy Jean Louis, Wale Ojo, Fatym Layache, Nico Ranagio, Kemi Lala Akindoju, veteran actress Hilda Dokunbo

Synopsis: Set mainly on a beautiful beach resort on the outskirts of Lagos in Nigeria .The CEO is a mystery-thriller surrounding five top executives from across Africa who are dispatched on a 1-week leadership retreat by a multinational telecommunication firm, to determine which one to appoint as the firms new CEO. Things go awry when one by-one the executives are eliminated in sudden death circumstances, and the finger falls on the last two remaining executive as prime suspects. As the threat of a possible death sentence for multiple homicide looms over them.

Showing:

Friday - Thursday: 1:00PM

Friday - Thursday: 6:30PM, 8:40PM

Starring: Alexander Skarsgard, Rory J. Saper, Christian Stevens

Synopsis: Tarzan, having acclimated to life in London, is called back to his former home in the jungle to investigate the activities at a mining encampment.

Showing:
As part of the programme, an opportunity to engage with the delegates attending the festival from Nigeria was created, featuring filmmakers including Kunle Afolayan, Omoni oboli , Genevieve Nnaji, Izu Ojukwu, Kemi Adetiba, Niyi Akinmolayan, Daniel Oriahi, Abba Makama, and Uduak-Obong Patrick.

ALSO READ: undefined

Check out 10 important things that were said:

1. "This is the biggest exposure that Nollywood has gotten since existence, because we have first time directors on this panel. I have never seen this happen anywhere." - Kunle Afolayan.

2. "What has got us here is being true to ourselves. Original stories." - Izu Ojukwu.

3. "Just Not Married" broke the norm that you really don't need a superstar to have a good run anywhere, even in the cinemas - Uduak-Obong Patrick.

4. "I had a lot of big names on the set of "The Wedding Party", so I had to manage egos, skill, and everyone knows this is your first film, so, everyone is probably sceptical, but they are trusting you with their skill." - Kemi Adetiba.

5. "Nollywood has fresh stories. It's original, it's fresh, if there are bored, they should look to us. Look to Nollywood. We have great stories, beautiful African stories." - Omoni Oboli.

6. 'I feel like we don't have films that the young people can really relate with the characters" - Abba Makama

7. "Titanic" is a Nollywood story. Rich family, they don't want a poor kid in their family, but if you tell it on a sinking boat, then it's everything. The African culture is built on stories. Imagine if we can take some of our stories and put them on a larger scale. Witchcraft is great story telling if you know how to do it." - Niyi Akinmolayan.

8. "We have the numbers if we even look at it as a business. I think it's about time they start to look onto us the way they look at Bollywood. Our numbers don't end with us, they transcend across Africa. We do have a following, it is a matter of taking advantage of the numbers." - Genevieve Nnaji.

9. "If we are making films, we are not necessarily doing it to get validation from America. We just want to make films good enough for anyone, anywhere to watch. And hopefully, we will get some recognition from that." - Niyi Akinmolayan.

10. "We are independent filmmakers working with very limited funds, and we have to do the best we have to do to make the films." - Daniel Oriahi.

ALSO READ: undefined

The press conference was anchored by the artistic director of the Toronto International Film Festival, Cameron Bailey.

On Tuesday, August 16, 2016, TIFF announced eight Nollywood movies which will screen as part of the City to City programme.

The eighth year for the City to City programme showcases filmmakers living and working in Lagos, regardless of where their films are set.
As part of the programme, an opportunity to engage with the delegates attending the festival from Nigeria was created.

Filmmakers including Kunle Afolayan, Omoni oboli , Genevieve Nnaji, Izu Ojukwu, Kemi Adetiba, Niyi Akinmolayan, Daniel Oriahi, Abba Makama, and Uduak-Obong Patrick took part in the press conference, which was led by the artistic director of the Toronto International Film Festival, Cameron Bailey.

ALSO READ: undefined

The filmmakers discussed what Nollywood should keep from its successes so far, what the industry needs to do next, the strengths they would love to maintain, among other interesting topics.

The Toronto International Film Festival earlier announced that the 2016 City to City programme will focus on Lagos, Nigeria. The eighth year for the City to City programme, will showcase filmmakers living and working in Lagos, regardless of where their films are set.

ALSO READ: undefined

On Tuesday, August 16, 2016, TIFF announced eight Nollywood movies which will screen as part of the City to City programme.

The movies include "Okafor's Law," "The Arbitration," "The Wedding Party," "Taxi Driver," "Just Not Married," "Green White Green," "76," and "93 Days."
Adesanya told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Akure on the Thursday that if the primary was nullified, it would lead to unending crisis within the party.

He warned that if the Sept. 3 governorship primary of the party is nullified, the party may lose the Nov. 26 election in the state.

NAN reports that a former President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Mr Rotimi Akeredolu (SAN), had emerged as the candidate of the party in the primary after defeating other 23 aspirants.

NAN recalls that some aspirants, who had earlier congratulated Akeredolu, had petitioned the primary appeal committee of the party alleging irregularities in the delegates list used in conducting the election.

According to him, cancelling the Ondo State governorship primary held on Sept. 3 will not be in the best interest of the party in the state.

I want those who are clamouring for the cancelation to know that such step will lead to disunity, acrimony and unending crisis that will derail the party from winning the Nov. 26 governorship election, he said.

The party spokesperson noted that the appeal committee would anytime from now submit its report to the leadership of the party at the national level.

Adesanya said the national leadership of the party would take a position on the report of the appeal committee and appealed to aggrieved aspirants to embrace dialogue in the interest of the party.

The aspirants are leaders in Ondo State and we hold them in high esteem.

They have rights to ponder on the primary but we should not throw away the baby with the birth water.

l want to appeal to the aspirants in the interest of the party and the people of Ondo State, who had contributed for the development of the party, to sheath their swords and let us move on.

The present crisis should be seen as a disagreement between twins which we will get over soon.

We are confident that APC will win the governorship election because the party is the only alternative to the ruling party in the state, Adesanya said.
The party expressed the view in a statement released to newsmen in Abuja by its National Secretary, Alhaji Mai Mala Buni.

The party said, our attention is drawn to the latest ridiculous demand by a faction of the PDP that the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari return the country to the voodoo economics and reckless fiscal policies the country was subjected to during the immediate-past PDP administration.

Also, PDPs silly call for the resignation of President Muhammadu Buhari is not worth the ink it is written with. Hence the APC will not dissipate energy responding.

The PDP faction by its demand to return the country to the years where looting of the public treasury was the order of the day, has taken its orchestrated plot to deflect attention from the economic mess it left behind to new insensitive and shameless heights.

Instead of this charade by the PDP, we advise the PDP and their cronies to apologise to Nigerians and toe the path of honour by returning public funds stolen under its watch.

The party said the wild looting and embezzlement by the PDP administration had traumatised Nigerians and appealed to Nigerians to be more patient with the current administrations policies.

It said the benefit of the current administrations policies would be evident soon.

The party accused PDP of attempting to fraudulently re-write history and misrepresent facts on its misrule of the country.

It said Nigerians are traumatised on a daily basis on disclosures of the startling level of pillage of the countrys commonwealth perpetuated under its (PDPs) watch.

Instead of saving for the rainy day, past PDP administrations and their cronies literally looted the public treasury blind, using the loot to build luxury hotels and other properties, stashing loot in farmlands and hidden bank accounts.

The APC-led administration is open to, and welcomes positive and constructive contributions on resolving the countrys economic challenges, the party stated.

It assured Nigerians that the Buhari administration was employing all legitimate and innovative means to restore the countrys battered economy back to health in the quickest possible time.

The results of the fiscal and economic agendas embarked by the President Buhari administration to tackle the effects of the countrys diminishing crude oil revenues, falling value of the Naira and resuscitate the economy will be evident soon, it said.
Frank also urged the lawmakers to tell Buhari the truth, not minding if some of the Presidentseven if some ministers will lose their jobs..

He also commended the leadership of the Senate, as well as that of the House of Representatives for their effort in ensuring that Buhari succeeds.

According to him, Nigerians expect more from the APC at this point in time.

Frank said Nigerians are anxiously waiting for the resumption of their representatives to the National Assembly so as to join President Muhammadu Buharis team in the struggle to bring succour to Nigerians.

I want to commend the leadership of the Senate under Senator Bukola Saraki and the leadership of the House of Representative under Mr. Yakubu Dogara for their commitment at ensuring that the APC government succeeds.

I must, at this point in time, tell the National Assembly leadership not to shy away from telling the executive the bitter truth even if it will cost some ministers and managers of our economy their jobs for the sake of Nigerians and the betterment of our economy.

In the light of this, I want to support the promise made by the Senate President recently that, upon resumption, the National Assembly will make tough recommendations to Mr. President. Nigerians are waiting.

Both the Senate and the House of Representatives should employ the services of experts on what to do urgently to take the nation out of recession before it gets to depression. May God forbid. Even our opposition lawmakers, at this point, should forget about their political affiliations and join hands with the countrys leadership for the sake of Nigeria.
I was offered the ticket at a price but I rejected it because I could not come to terms morally and in good conscience with purchasing a ticket to contest election to serve, he said.

Some people even tried to pay the price but I stopped them. Insiders are fully aware of these details. Just setting records straight with respects. I voluntarily declined, as I was engaged to coordinate President Jonathan's campaign in the SouthWest for PDP, while supporting most of our cheated candidates who went to PPN at that time.

The crisis in the PDP in the build up to the 2011 election, which led to the change in the leadership of the party has been well documented in my memoirs 'Daniel in the Lion's Den', he added.
The Osun government said further that it never received any allocation for ecological funds while the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was in power.

The governments comments were contained in a statement released by Governor Rauf Aregbesolas spokesman, Semiu Okanlawon.

The statement reads:

Osun did not receive any ecological fund from the disastrous PDP Federal Government from November 27, 2010 to May 29, 2015. We have depended on our legitimate revenues from all sources to annually dredge our waterways up till 2015 when revenue decline hindered our efforts.

We are concerned with the agony of our citizens and shall do all in our power to limit the pains and prevent a re- occurrence, as we are committed to eliminating all hindrances to free flow of water in the canals, drainage systems and waterways in the state.

All obstructions to free flow of water in these channels will be removed, while property blocking easy access to the drainage channels thus preventing adequate management of them will be separated.
On Sunday the British tabloid posted an article about longtime President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo alleging the strongman skinned opponents alive and ate their testicles, brains and livers.

The New Democrat reprinted certain elements of the piece by journalist Thomas Burrows on its Wednesday front page, attracting the ire of the information minister.

Festus Poquie, editor of the New Democrat newspaper, was then detained by plain-clothed police and locked in a cell for several hours before his release on Thursday afternoon.

"The Liberia National Police can confirm that its Crime Services Division is holding a conversation with a senior Editor of the New Democrat, Festus Poquie," a police statement sent to AFP read.

Liberia's information minister Eugene Nagbe had already contacted the country's press union to complain about the article and demand action be taken against the New Democrat.

"Considering that the conduct of the publisher of New Democrat marks a most dangerous departure from the principles of professional journalism, we demand and insist that the paper be penalised," read a letter signed by Nagbe.

The Press Union of Liberia described his arrest as "an act of intimidation against the freedom of press in Liberia," at a moment of high tension between the media and the government.

Earlier this month journalist Jallah Grayfield lodged a complaint with police after alleging she received intimidating texts from a junior minister, while the government shut down two radio stations known for their critical stance on President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf this summer.

Reporters Without Borders said the public had "a right to hear all opinions, even those that are critical and irritate the current government," following the case of the minister.

Obiang, who heads sub-Saharan's Africa's third largest oil producer, is the continent's longest serving leader and has served since taking power in a coup in 1979.
"The key is that oil won't be diverted to anyone else other than the... recognised government of Libya," Jonathan Winer told AFP on Wednesday, referring to the Tripoli-based Government of National Accord (GNA).

Winer was speaking from Washington after forces loyal to a rival authority in eastern Libya seized four key ports in the country's so-called "oil crescent" this week and handed them over to the National Oil Company.

On Thursday, the NOC announced an "immediate" resumption of oil exports from two of those ports.

"Oil needs to be produced throughout the country to generate the revenues necessary to pay for salaries for the Libyan people to have the government be able to function and to be able to" provide services, Winer said.

The oil "has to be exported according to lawful contracts with the proceeds going into the central bank of Libya whose main offices are in Tripoli," he added.

"If the oil is going in the government's revenues and the government supports that, there is no action for the international community to take," he said.

But "if oil were to be diverted towards any particular group, new bank accounts to be set up, oil being sent to parties who have not had contracts for the oil already... the US will seek to enforce UN Security Council resolutions," Winer said.

If the GNA asked for international support to prevent oil from being exported, he said, the international community was "likely to provide that support".

Libya has been in turmoil, with rival administrations and militias fighting for control of the oil-rich country since the 2011 revolt that ousted longtime dictator Moamer Kadhafi.

The unity government has been working in Tripoli since March, but has struggled to assert its control over the country, which with an estimated 48 billion barrels holds Africa's largest oil reserves.

US warplanes are supporting pro-GNA forces in a battle to expel the last Islamic State group jihadists from the coastal city of Sirte, previously their North African stronghold, west of the oil crescent.

The jihadists seized Sirte in June last year.

"The US does not want Libyans fighting with other Libyans," said Winer. "We want Libyans to unite to fight the security threats."
A second regional official confirmed the bombing in the village of Payee Khan, in the troubled Mohmand region of the lawless Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) bordering Afghanistan.

"The suicide bomber was in crowded mosque, he shouted 'Allahu Akbar' (God is greatest) and then there was a huge blast," Naveed Akbar, deputy administrator of Mohmand agency, told Reuters.

Shaukat Khan, another official in the northwestern FATA region, said at least 24 people were wounded.

"Many people were gathered inside the mosque where a suicide bomber blew himself up," he said.
A coalition of opposition parties under the banner of the National Electoral Reform Agenda (NERA) is demanding reform ahead of the 2018 vote, including free access to the voters' roll.

NERA spokesman Douglas Mwonzora said the opposition parties would challenge the ban in the high court.

"This is a typical comedy of errors where the state has fallen into the very same legal trap it fell into last time," he told AFP.

"A similar order was challenged before a competent court which declared it invalid and nothing is to be gained by issuing the same order again."

Mugabe has vowed a crackdown on dissent and blasted judges for "reckless" rulings allowing previous demonstrations.

Promise Mkwananzi, spokesman for the protest group Tajamuka, said they would march on Saturday, despite the police order.

"The constitution and the high court allow for peaceful demonstrations," he told AFP.

"The police are promoting lawlessness in the country by banning peaceful demonstrations."

Mugabe's ZANU-PF party won the last general elections in 2013, which were marred by electoral fraud.

Opposition to the ageing leader's 36-year reign has grown in recent months with a surge of public demonstrations, triggered by an economic crisis that has left banks short of cash and the government struggling to pay its workers.

Two weeks ago, police detained scores of people including activists and bystanders following violent protests in the capital.
Officials from the U.N. Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan were speaking at a news conference in Juba the day after the editor of a prominent newspaper in the five-year-old nation said his publication had been shut down by the authorities.

Fighting erupted in South Sudan at the end of 2013 between soldiers loyal to President Salva Kiir and those backing his former deputy Riek Machar. A peace deal signed in 2015 proved shaky and fresh clashes flared again in the capital in July.

Machar has since left the country.

Yasmin Sooka, who led the U.N. commission team, listed concerns that included "the diminishing space for civil society which includes intimidation and harassment of its members", adding that many activists have fled abroad.

She cited worries about media freedoms "and the continued intimidation and harassment of journalists", alongside concerns about restrictions on the U.N. mission UNMISS and aid organisations that prevent them reaching the needy.

Fighting has left many in the oil-producing nation of 11 million people, already one of the world's poorest, in desperate need of food and support.

Sooka also cited "the ongoing impunity and lack of accountability for serious crimes as well as human rights in South Sudan, without which lasting peace cannot be achieved."

The government insists it does not condone rights abuses and deals with perpetrators. However, both sides in what was an ethnically fuelled conflict have been accused of actions that could amount to war crimes.

Sooka also voiced concerns about "the escalation of sexual violence against women and girls, perpetrated by armed men in uniform."

Members of the commission, established in March 2016 to report on the rights situation since war flared in December 2013, said they met senior government officials, and proposed "the establishment of the hybrid court" to deal with abuses.
But never one to let a controversy go without fanning its flames, Trump accused his Democratic rival in the Nov. 8 election, Hillary Clinton, of beginning the so-called birther movement in her failed 2008 presidential campaign against Obama, a claim that does not stand up to scrutiny.

Trump, who has won back some ground in opinion polls and made the White House race competitive again after he went through a summer slump, made his announcement in an attempt to clear the air as he prepares for the first of three presidential debates with Clinton on Sept. 26.

"President Barack Obama was born in the United States. Period," said Trump. "Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again," he said at an event at a new Trump International Hotel down the street from the White House.

The New York businessman had brought up the birther controversy as far back as 2011 to make a mark in American politics in a way that would eventually prompt him to run for office this year.

During his presidential campaign he has readily trafficked in other theories that are the stuff of American supermarket tabloids, such as declaring that the father of Republican former rival Ted Cruz might have been linked to the assassin of the late President John F. Kennedy.

In making his announcement, Trump advanced a widely debunked claim that Clinton and her 2008 campaign had been the original birthers.

"Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it. You know what I mean," he said.

His campaign directed reporters to a 2007 memo from then-Clinton adviser Mark Penn, who had encouraged the Clinton campaign to go negative against Obama by saying that his Hawaiian birth and boyhood in Indonesia gave him limited roots in American values and culture.

Penn eventually left the Clinton campaign and his advice was never acted upon.

"A NEW LIE"

The Democratic National Committee condemned Trump's bid to link Clinton to the birther idea. "He had the audacity to spout a new lie about the birther movement that he helped to build," it said.

Clinton on Friday demanded Trump apologize to the president for having helped spread the birther idea and said Trump had tried to "delegitimize our first black president."

"His campaign was founded on this outrageous lie. There is no erasing it in history," Clinton said in an address to the Black Women's Association in Washington.

Obama, who produced his Hawaiian birth certificate in 2011 to prove doubters wrong, had famously mocked Trump over the birther issue at a White House Correspondents Association dinner as the wealthy businessman sat in the audience fuming.

Still Trump clung to the notion that Obama was foreign-born, saying in 2012 that the birth certificate was a fraud.

On Friday, Obama was asked for his reaction to the latest Trump declaration.

"I'm shocked that a question like that has come up at a time when we have so many other things to do. Well, I'm not that shocked actually. It's fairly typical. We've got other things to attend to. I was pretty confident about where I was born," he said.

The birther conspiracies, which aim to challenge the legality of Obama's presidency, incense black Americans whose votes Trump has been trying to court.

"I'm wondering when this country is going to awaken from this reality show," said Representative Brenda Lawrence, a Democrat.

The issue has not been a factor in the campaign for this year's presidential election, but it resurfaced in recent days, taking the focus of Trump's campaign away from topics such as immigration, trade and the economy, which he has been using to hit Clinton.

Trump had revived the birther controversy on Thursday in an interview with The Washington Post when he declined to say whether he believed Obama was born in Hawaii. A U.S. president must be a natural-born citizen.

Trump had promised "a big announcement" about the birther issue on Friday, giving the impression it was the purpose of the event at his hotel.

But, instead, he held off saying anything about it through more than 20 minutes of endorsements from military veterans. Only after that did Trump make a brief statement about Obama's birth.
Turning the ship before it hits the iceberg
When Hamid Karzai took power in Afghanistan soon after 9/11, aided by U.S. diplomats and Special Forces, he was celebrated in the West as a new kind of Afghan leader: He wasnt a warlord with thousands of fighters at his beck and call but a cosmopolitan diplomat who was fluent in English and several other languages. He was the scion of an illustrious tribe that had long ruled Afghanistan, and he rose above the countrys often fractious ethnic politics. American menswear designer Tom Ford even called Karzai the chicest man on the planet because of his habitual, distinctive ensemble of colorful cape and astrakhan fur hat.





When Karzai left office in 2014, he was widely derided as the mayor of Kabul, and he had exhausted the patience of key U.S. officials with his continual, public criticism of Americans, whom he described as demons when he met with ordinary Afghans. Karzai also presided over one of the most corrupt countries in the world, and members of his family had vastly enriched themselves during his tenure.





Was Karzai a bridge-building president, as he was first portrayed, or was he a wily pol adept at playing the great game of Afghan politics but inattentive to his chance to become his nations George Washington? Or was he always a bit of both? And what of his brothers, such as Ahmed Wali Karzai, the de facto ruler of southern Afghanistan: Was he a drug-dealing plutocrat, as was rumored? Or was he the glue that kept the south together, as many CIA and U.S. military officials believed? And was his other brother, the blustery businessman Mahmood Karzai  Afghanistans version of Donald Trump  a big-time crook or a bona fide entrepreneur just trying to make something of his country?





For many American generals and diplomats, Karzai was a maddeningly mercurial leader and at times infuriating. Yet he had to navigate the constantly shifting vagaries of U.S. policy in Afghanistan. Partlow points out that by the time the Afghan president left office, he had been lectured on military operations by twelve ISAF commanders from seven different countries. Hed received the American presidents messages from five U.S. ambassadors. Add to that the fact that almost all U.S. soldiers and diplomats serving in Afghanistan were on one-year tours, and its not surprising that the mordant cliche about the Afghan war was so accurate: It wasnt a 10-year war, but a one-year war fought 10 times.

-
Beyond the lights of Pahrump, youd be excused for not recognizing James Oscarsons name.

Beyond the lights of Pahrump, youd be excused for not recognizing James Oscarsons name.

The Republican Assemblyman from the Nye County metropolis had no real political career highlights to speak of as he entered his second term this year. A trained nurse, hed worked in various capacities for several health care providers and most recently has served as Director of Community Relations at Pahrumps Desert View Hospital. The family man has won a few Rotary Club awards, according to his website, and believes his professional experience gives him insight into the health care needs of Nevadans.

If after reading so far youre finding it difficult to stifle a yawn, youre getting my point. Oscarsons political portfolio hasnt been punctuated with many exclamation points.

That all changed this past weekend when, depending on your perspective, he did either a very brave or very hypocritical thing by announcing he was moving from the right to the center and agreeing to vote for Gov. Brian Sandovals record $1.1 billion budget package.

In agreeing to stand with the majority  and telegraphing it with a long, almost pleading missive to the press  Oscarson distinguished himself among his conservative peers.

Governor Brian Sandoval set the tone of this legislative session when he declared that the Senate and Assembly must transform Nevada with substantial reforms in education, health care, tort law, construction, collective bargaining, economic development, and more, Oscarson began. I shared Governor Sandovals vision for Nevadas future. The status quo was no longer acceptable.

After listing some of the impressive successes of what I call the Sandoval Sweep, Oscarson concluded, I came into office committed to the good fight against more taxes and more spending. Whats more, I proudly represent the most fiscally conservative district in Nevada. Torn between taxes and the Governors plan, I faced one of the most difficult choices of my life.  Having spent the session passing good reforms, and wading through the Governors recommendations, I am now convinced that the budget we will pass is reasonable, prudent, and transformative.  And while I believe supporting the Governor is the right thing for Nevada, it is not the easy thing, especially for me.

I suspect its about to get a lot harder.

Although some conservatives suspected Oscarson was secretly pretty squishy politically, his late-session defection invited a large target to be painted on his back. By Sunday, he began taking fire.

Prolific right-wing political blogger Chuck Muth, the Luca Brasi of the Republican Assemblys staunchly conservative mob, went after Oscarson with something called a Brush Fire Alert.

Fresh off his useful idiot performance as a member of the Not-So-Great-Eight in killing campus carry for this session, Assemblyman James Oscarson on Saturday joined the ranks of Republican sell-outs supporting Gov. Brian Americas Worst Governor Sandovals $1.5 billion tax hike, Muth roared, exhorting Nye County Republicans to contact Oscarson immediately to remind him of his betrayal to conservative political principles, God, Flag, and so forth.

Measured, Muth aint.

He plays a key role in keeping the Legislatures conservative soldiers in line, in no small part by reminding them theyll get whacked if they even consider raising a tax or questioning whether a company doing business in Nevada is paying its fair share. If they go sideways, Muth calls them a RINO (Republican in Name Only) or something more colorful.

Except, according to the cover of his website, Oscarsons not even a RINO. Theres scant mention of his Republican Party status. That, too, is likely to get him vilified by the locals who voted for him believing he was going to hold the line on taxes.

Like it or not, Muth and his conservative comrades were rolled in the Sandoval Sweep, and Oscarson played a role in that victory. Will the defectors sleep with the fishes?

Hero or heretic, James Oscarson is anonymous no more.

John L. Smith is a columnist for the Las Vegas Review-Journal. E-mail him at jsmith@reviewjournal.com or call 702-383-0295.
A man convicted as a juvenile of murdering Augustus "Gus" Nance in 1996 is getting another chance at parole.

When Romeo Hardin was resentenced in 2014 to life in prison without the possibility of parole, Scott County District Judge Joel Barrows said at the hearing that Hardin acted alone in the Nance shooting, has shown "little remorse" and has been a discipline problem in prison.

Hardin already was serving life in prison without parole when the Iowa Supreme Court vacated his sentence in 2013 on the grounds that mandatory life sentences without parole for juveniles violate the constitutional protection against cruel and unusual punishment.

Barrows believed in 2014 he had discretion in these cases and gave Hardin the same sentence.

"We're all hoping for more guidance from the Supreme Court," Barrows said after deciding to keep Hardin locked up for life. "How do we handle these cases, and what specifically should the criteria be?"

Hardin appealed the judge's decision. The Supreme Court is siding with Hardin and has vacated the sentence that Barrows handed down.

In its decision filed Friday, the high court referred to its ruling on another case this year  State v. Sweet  holding that under the cruel and unusual punishment clause of the Iowa Constitution, juvenile offenders may not be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. The justices' opinion is not being published, according to the filing.

The Sweet case ended that judicial discretion, according to Hardin's state appellate defender Theresa Wilson.

"The Iowa Supreme Court believed it was too difficult and speculative to predict which juvenile offenders were irredeemable, and that is why they prohibited any life without parole sentence for juvenile offenders," she said.

Hardin was 15 when he was accused of killing Nance. Hardin testified in 2014 that he was running with gangs, and his gang identified Nance's home on West 6th Street, Davenport, as a rival's hangout.

The gang picked Hardin, the youngest member, to shoot at the house. He fired eight rounds. Two struck Nance, a 21-year-old former gang member and convicted killer who had just been paroled from prison at the time.

At Hardin's trial in 1997, it was learned the two were friends.

Scott County Attorney Mike Walton is not surprised about Friday's ruling.

"This ruling was expected after the Supreme Court ruled all life sentences are unconstitutional in State v Sweet," Walton said.

Hardin's case is returning to Scott County to be resentenced "consistent with Sweet," Friday's ruling states.

"I hope this now gives him an opportunity to prove his value to society and the fact that he is redeemable," Wilson said.
CEDAR RAPIDS  Both major party vice presidential candidates will be campaigning in Iowa Monday.

Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia will be speaking about 2 p.m. at Iowa State University in Ames, and Indiana Republican Gov. Mike Pence will be visiting Mason City and Dubuque.

According to Hillary for Iowa, Kaine and his wife, Anne Holton, will talk about whats at stake in the 2016 election and urge Iowans to vote early starting Sept. 29. They will talk about Hillary Clintons vision an economy that works for everyone. They will have a special focus on involving young voters in their campaign and how the Clinton agenda will support them, including her plan to make college debt-free for all Americans.

To RSVP, visit hillaryclinton.com/events.

Pence will have a town hall meeting at 3 p.m. at Music Man Square in Mason City. Hell also have a 7 p.m. rally at Giese manufacturing in Dubuque.

Iowa is considered a swing state in the presidential election, and polls, for the most part, have shown the race to be tight, but a Monmouth University poll this week showed GOP nominee Donald Trump leading Clinton by 8 percentage points. The RealClearPolitics.com poll average shows Trump leading in Iowa by 4.3 percentage points.
MUSCATINE, Iowa  A motorcycle accident injured two Moline residents Wednesday morning.

At 11:11 a.m., Wednesday, Sept. 14, Muscatine County Sheriffs Deputies responded to the area of 260th Street and Independence Avenue in Letts, according to a press release from the Muscatine County Sheriff's Office.

A Honda motorcycle, operated by William Moon, 60, of East Moline, Ill., was traveling southbound on Independence Avenue near 250th Street in Letts when he lost control of the motorcycle according to the press release.

The grade of the road changes to gravel at the intersection and Moon allegedly did not expect the change in grade.

He and a passenger, Tina McDaniel, 50, also of East Moline, Ill., were thrown from the motorcycle and both sustained injuries according to the Sheriff's Office.

Neither parties were wearing helmets.

Moon and McDaniel were transported by Letts Ambulance to UnityPoint Health-Trinity Muscatine.

Investigation into the crash is ongoing by the Muscatine County Sheriffs Office. The Letts Ambulance, and Letts Fire Department also assisted at the scene.

Emily Wenger of the Muscatine Journal
CEDAR RAPIDS  Armed with data showing millennials are passionate about clean energy and climate change and find Donald Trump offensive, a super PAC trying to bring environmental issues to the forefront of the presidential campaign is making an unprecedented and historic push on Iowa campuses.

Students do respond well to the issues of climate change and clean energy, NextGen Climate state director Zack Davis said Thursday. They need to be engaged, and  our organization believes talking to students face-to-face is where we can make a difference.

Its a difference that likely will benefit Democrat Hillary Clinton. According to NextGen polling, she is gaining support among undecided millennials as well as those who would have preferred Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders as the Democratic nominee. Although lagging behind President Barack Obamas performance among 18- to 36-year-old voters, Clinton is picking up support as millennials learn more about the differences between her and Trump, especially on climate and energy issues, according to the NextGen/Project New America Battleground Millennial Survey of 1,652 millennials in 11 states, including Iowa, released Thursday.

NextGen spent $74 million in 2014 and, according to records, it had spent $395,124 in independent expenditures as of June, nearly all in opposition to Trump.

In Iowa, NextGen said its $1.19 million operation will be larger than any other campus program in the state. It will have 12 field organizers and 50 fellows on 23 Iowa campuses where more than 173,700 students are enrolled.

We know that we have to increase our effort in Iowa as the race continues to tighten, Davis said.

The Trump campaign is not ceding college campuses to Clinton and NextGen. The campaign has multiple staffers and volunteers solely dedicated to energizing the youth vote, Trumps Iowa spokesman James Rockas said. Additionally, it is partnering with the Republican National Committee to target millennials.

NextGens plans call for emphasizing voter-to-voter contact, to try to enable as much direct contact between voters and enable people to have that deeper conversation, NextGen Climate President Tom Steyer said on a conference call. The NextGen poll, first conducted in July and updated in August, shows that as people get more information, they make better decisions.

Millennials care about more issues than climate change and energy, Rockas said. The Trump campaign thinks millennials will be swayed by a bold economic plan (that) showed millennials and all Americans that he is the only candidate who is serious about improving Americas future.

By contrast, Hillary Clinton will protect the status quo  more of the same overregulation, over-taxation, and bloated bureaucracies, he said. Millennials know we can do better than a third Obama term from a career Washington politician.

Rockas also questioned the validity of a poll conducted in August, before Clinton called half of Americans deplorable or desperate just because they disagree with her politics.

As a result of this offensive comment and her pay-to-play scheme at the State Department, Hillarys popularity in Iowa and nationwide has plummeted, he said, referring to a new Monmouth University poll that shows Trump leading Clinton 45 percent to 37 percent in Iowa.

Hillary for Iowa declined to comment on the poll.
JOHNSTON, Iowa  Iowa is crucial to both presidential candidates Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, according to two veteran campaign operatives who discussed the state of the race Friday during taping for this weekends episode of Iowa Press on Iowa Public Television.

Iowa has been one of the most competitive states in polling on the presidential election, most showing Trump or Clinton leading within the polls margins for error. Although Trump has been gaining in recent polls, a Monmouth University Poll published this week showed Trump ahead by 8 percentage points in Iowa.

Still, most election prognosticators say the Electoral College map shapes up better for Clinton.

The tightening race means Iowas six Electoral College votes will be important to either candidates hopes for becoming the next president.

At this point  it is incredibly important to both, and I think both candidates would, both of their campaigns would tell you that, said Brad Anderson, who ran Barack Obamas successful 2012 re-election campaign in Iowa. And we saw this in 2012. We saw, at the end of the day, it will come down to five or six states, and Iowa will be one because the math just doesn't work in a lot of ways without the electoral votes from Iowa.

John Stineman, who ran Steve Forbes 2000 presidential campaign in Iowa, said Iowa is crucial to Trump because of the difficulty presented to him by the Electoral College map.

I would say that its undeniable that the Electoral College at this point in time favors the Democratic candidate, Stineman said. And the math is there that there is a path for Trump. And whether Trump or any other Republican, it is a much more challenging path to 270 (the number of electoral votes needed to win), and I think that theres no way to shake it out other than to say that Iowa matters a great deal for Trumps victory scenario.

Trump already has campaigned in Iowa four times during the general election. Clinton has been in Iowa once and held a Labor Day event in the Quad-Cities, just across the river from Iowa in western Illinois.

On Monday, both of the candidates running mates will be in Iowa: Democrat Tim Kaine will campaign on the Iowa State University campus and Republican Mike Pence will host a town hall event in Mason City and a rally in Dubuque.
DES MOINES  A leader for Iowas renewable fuels producers said Friday he is not concerned with the haggling between the presidential campaigns of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton this week over Trumps support for the federal ethanol mandate.

A policy piece published Thursday by the Trump campaign said he would repeal a piece of the ethanol mandate that is popular in Iowa because of the mandates reliance on corn.

An updated version of the policy piece does not list the ethanol mandate as a program Trump would cut in any way. The Trump campaign said the original piece was published in error.

Democrats pounced, claiming it showed the Republican candidate is wavering in his support for the ethanol mandate and said Clinton is an ardent supporter.

Donald Trump showed Iowans his true colors with his secret plan to destroy the Renewable Fuel Standard, Pam Johnson, a past president of the National Corn Growers Association and a corn grower from Floy, said in a statement released by the Clinton campaign. Iowans are proud of our states renewable fuel economy, and Donald Trumps dangerous policy proposal would damage Iowa's economic security and our rural communities.

Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller said in a statement the campaigns commitment to the Renewable Fuel Standard is unshakeable and unchanging.

Eric Branstad, the son of Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad, led an advocacy organization that pressed candidates to support the mandate during the Iowa caucuses and now serves as Trumps state director in Iowa.

Mr. Trumps position has not changed; the fact sheet on the website accurately reflects his positions, Branstad said in a statement.

Monte Shaw, executive director of the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association and a former Republican candidate for Congress, said he is not concerned Trump may not be supportive of the ethanol mandate. Shaw said the policy publication incident is typical of campaigns.

Somebody apparently inadvertently put up an unapproved fact sheet, they took it down and said, Hey, that wasnt right. That stuff happens in campaigns, Shaw said. I think Iowans always pay more attention to what comes out of the lips of the candidates themselves.

To that point, Shaw noted Trump has repeatedly expressed his support for the ethanol mandate in public speeches.

To be honest with you, Im not any more worked up over this than I was when some Clinton staffer went out to California and floated the (idea) of replacing the RFS with their low-carbon fuel standard, Shaw said.

The Clinton campaign in August confirmed a campaign aide discussed Californias low-carbon fuel standard and the ethanol mandate with a state official but said Clinton does not wish to replace the ethanol mandate with Californias fuel standard.

I guess Im not too excited about it, Shaw said of the campaigns disagreements over the ethanol mandate.
NATION

2nd womans body IDd in Ohio case

Authorities have identified a second woman whose body was found in Ohio after a 911 call from a home where another woman said she was being held captive.

The Ashland County prosecutor on Friday identified the second woman as 29-year-old Elizabeth Griffith, of Ashland. Police found the bodies of Griffith and 43-year-old Stacey Stanley in the Ashland home where the 911 call was made Tuesday morning.

Police freed the abducted woman at the home and arrested 40-year-old Shawn Grate. Police say Grate then confessed to killing a woman in June and led them to her body in a wooded ravine in neighboring Richland County. She hasn't been identified.

Police commissioner Bratton retires

William Bratton, the police commissioner who led departments in Boston, Los Angeles and New York and saw his crime fighting strategies copied across the nation, ended his unparalleled law enforcement career with a ceremonial send-off Friday in the city that was the setting of his biggest triumph.

Commanders lined up in formation outside of New York Police Department headquarters to bid farewell to the 68-year-old Bratton as he left the building for the last time as commissioner.

Applause mixed with anti-Bratton slogans shouted by protesters behind barricades amid the sound of bagpipes.

WORLD

Nearly 20K cases of Zika in Puerto Rico

The number of Zika cases keeps climbing in the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico.

Health officials said Friday that more than 2,000 cases were reported in the past week for a total of nearly 20,000 cases. The total includes 1,706 pregnant women, a growing concern because Zika can cause severe birth defects.

Officials said 150 people have been hospitalized, including several of the 48 people diagnosed with a temporary paralysis condition linked to Zika known as Guillain-Barre. One person has died from that condition after becoming infected with Zika.

Japan court rejects military base issue

A Japanese court ruled Friday that Okinawa's governor exceeded his legal authority by revoking a permit to reclaim land for the relocation of a U.S. military base, allowing the central government to proceed with the plan despite protests by local residents.

The decision is part of an ongoing legal battle between the southern island of Okinawa and Japan's government over plans to move the base to a less-populated part of the island, which have stalled for 20 years.

Okinawa said it will appeal the ruling by the Fukuoka High Court to the Supreme Court.

1M people flee South Sudan

More than one million refugees have fled South Sudan's ongoing civil war, overwhelming aid agencies and creating one of the world's worst humanitarian disasters.

The United Nations said Friday that South Sudan joins Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia as countries that have produced over one million refugees.

"This is a very sad milestone," said Leo Dobbs, a spokesman for the U.N. refugee agency.

South Sudan gained independence from Sudan in 2011, but civil war erupted two years later and tens of thousands have been killed. New fighting in July in the capital, Juba, created a surge of more than 185,000 refugees. Most people fleeing are women and children.
It is somewhat ironic that Meade County Commissioner Alan Akers, the man who used a chainsaw to reclaim a handrail that he claims he wasnt paid for, has stopped attending commission meetings but nonetheless still feels he is entitled to his monthly paycheck.

Akers, who stopped going to county commission meetings two months ago, is apparently mad or had his feelings hurt by his fellow commissioners who suspended him from the board after he was charged with intentional destruction of private property, a felony, and trespassing, a misdemeanor.

The charges arose after Akers, a contractor, decided to resolve a dispute with a customer with his chainsaw. A Meade County jury, however, found him not guilty of trespassing and failed to render a verdict on the felony charge, which surprised a number of people since Akers never denied what he did. Later, the Lawrence County states attorney said his office had decided it wasnt worth the expense to try Akers a second time for the felony charge.

Akers anger at his fellow commissioners was evident upon his return in September to board meetings when he chastised them for suspending him. The commissioners then voted to restore his pay for the four months he was suspended,
The man who ran into a rodeo ring and was tackled by a clown last month in Rapid City pleaded guilty Tuesday to disorderly conduct and was sentenced to a fine and court costs.

A judge suspended 15 days of county jail time on the condition that Edward Mashburn pay a $100 fine and $66 in costs.

Mashburn, 35, of Quinn, dashed into the rodeo ring twice during an Aug. 25 performance of the outdoor Range Days Rodeo at the Central States Fair.

During his first trip into the ring, Mashburn ran around on the dirt during a break in the action and then hopped back over the fence and evaded security personnel.

Minutes later, he was back. He jumped into the ring as a saddle bronc ride was ending, only to suffer a blindside tackle by a sprinting rodeo clown, Justin Rumpshaker Rumford. The slender Mashburn, whose weight was listed as 173 pounds on his disorderly conduct citation, later told the Journal that getting tackled by the 275-pound Rumford felt like getting hit by a truck.

Authorities hauled Mashburn away after the tackle, and Pennington County Sheriffs Deputy Kevin Climis cited Mashburn for disorderly conduct.

After being cited, Mashburn was let go on his promise to appear in court. During Thursday's brief proceeding at the courthouse in Rapid City, Magistrate Judge Marya Tellinghuisen asked Mashburn how he wished to plea.

That depends on what youre going to throw at me, Mashburn said.

Tellinghuisen told Mashburn the typical sentence for disorderly conduct, and he then pleaded guilty and was immediately sentenced.

In an interview with the Journal for a story published earlier this month, Mashburn denied being under the influence of drugs or alcohol during the evening of the rodeo. But that claim is contradicted by a written report from Deputy Climis that has since become part of Mashburns public court file.

In that report, Climis wrote that he interviewed Mashburns female companion at the rodeo, and she said Mashburn had been drinking pretty much all day.

The report also said Mashburn and his companion had come to Rapid City from Austin, Texas, several months previously. The Journal searched Austins municipal court website Thursday and found a number of items on Mashburns record there, including an outstanding warrant that was issued in February for his failure to appear on a charge of theft in an amount less than $100.
PIERRE | The state Board of Minerals and Environment decided Thursday to hold a hearing to determine whether an oil well hole left unplugged near Wasta poses an environmental danger to drinking water wells in the area.

A lawyer for the company behind the Quartz Northern Points well recently notified the board that the company is insolvent, lacks the money to plug the hole, and is willing to surrender the $130,000 bond it posted for the project.

The drilling rig hired by the company stopped work when the bit lodged several thousand feet deep to the hole near Wasta in northeastern Pennington County. The concern now is that water from the Minnelusa aquifer could affect the Inyan Kara aquifer above it by rising through the well hole. State officials have estimated fixing the broken bit and closing the well could cost about $2 million.

The board authorized the state Department of Environment and Natural Resources to proceed with subpoenas against the people involved in the project and to obtain information about their finances.

The leader of the failed well project, Natali Ormiston of Deadwood, from the Ferley oil-exploration family, had hoped to find oil by drilling 9,700 feet deep. Ormistons company was formed in 2013 and had hired Louis Loehr of Gillette, Wyo., as drilling manager.

The board previously issued a notice of violation on the project. The board decided Thursday it would proceed with the Nov. 17 contested case hearing.

Ellie Bailey, a state assistant attorney general, said South Dakotas bad actor law would allow state government to deny additional permits to the company if its permit is revoked.

Bob Townsend, who oversees the states minerals and mining program, didnt sound enthused about holding the hearing but acknowledged there is a question of principle.

The point is, this is a compliance issue for DENR. Is it an environmental nightmare? No, Townsend said.

Townsend agreed it may become an issue later. We cant say it will, he said.

He added, The original principals have been long gone.

Charles McGuigan, South Dakota chief deputy attorney general and the boards lawyer, said the board has the authority to use subpoena power because it would be a contested case.

McGuigan said the board also could request production of documents from the company as part of the discovery process.

Bailey said the departments position is that nothing be done at this time and the bond money be used for monitoring in the future.

But the board gradually tilted strongly in learning more about the well and the people behind it.

Im still concerned about the long-term effects, board member Dennis Landguth of Rapid City said.

Landguth wants professional opinions from people who arent in the state department.

Townsend said the issue would be total dissolved solids coming from the Minnelusa into the Inyan Kara. If there is a problem, he said, it would be constrained to a radius of 1,000 feet from the well hole.

Landguth asked the price of a monitoring well. Townsend said the department already has data from all of the wells in the area including several at Wall that tap into Inyan Kara.

Clearly we can monitor those wells now, Townsend said. If we see a trend, that will tell us something needs to be done.

Townsend said hes not familiar with another case where a well hole went uncapped in South Dakota. Its happened a lot in other states, he said. To my knowledge this is the only one we currently have.

Board member Bob Morris of Belle Fourche said the public and prospective operators of wells should be made aware the board doesnt want the situation to occur again.

To me the issue becomes a compliance issue and theres the matter of why, Morris said. He described the hearing as a due-diligence inquiry.

Landguth said he wants an independent evaluation apart from that of the department.

I just feel we need some additional assurance from someone that agrees with the department in this regard, he said.

Bailey said the department hasnt made a formal presentation to this point. She said the board doesnt have the information at this time and the hearing could serve that purpose.

Board chairman Rex Hagg of Rapid City said the hearing would help the members to refresh ourselves on those things and take some testimony.  I think we have a duty to do that.

Morris wants the original permit application filers to come to the hearing and hed like to see proof its an insolvent company.

The formal roll call was 6-0 to allow subpoenas to be issued and information to be sought.
Russian student charged with attempting to join ISIS goes on trial

MOSCOW, September 27 (RAPSI)  A criminal case against Varvara Karaulova (Alexandra Ivanova), the Moscow State Universitys student, who stands charged with attempting to join the Islamic State militants in Syria, has been forwarded to court, her attorney Sergei Badamshin told RAPSI on Friday.

The case will be considered by the Moscow District Military Court.

Earlier, Karaulova (Ivanova) requested to close her case but investigator denied the motion.

As previously reported the second-year student of the Moscow State Universitys Faculty of Philosophy, allegedly decided to join the Islamic State, the organization banned in Russia, and secretly started off for Istanbul on May 27.

On June 4, she was arrested near Turkey's border with Syria along with 13 other Russian citizens when attempting to cross into the territory occupied by Islamic State militants. On June 11, she returned to Russia under escort of Interpol employees.

In October, Karaulova, who had changed her name to Alexandra Ivanova, was again arrested in Moscow and put in jail.

She has been found sane by the psychiatric evaluation.

The student did not plead guilty and stated that she was not going to become a terrorist.




FRS help sought in establishing source of $130 mln seized from Russian officer - report

MOSCOW, September 16 (RAPSI)  Investigators in the case of Dmitriy Zakharchenko, a senior anticorruption officer at the Russian Interior Ministry charged with bribery, turned to the US Federal Reserve System seeking assistance in finding out the origins of a 130 million trove of US dollar banknotes seized in his apartment, Kommersant newspaper reports on Friday.

According to Kommersant, some of the discovered banknotes were still packed in their original bill-strap paper bearing seals of US FRS banks.

Having seized the money, investigators requested FRS assistance asking to provide information about Russian banks which ordered the delivery of the banknotes in an effort to find out how this pile of money landed in Zakharchenkos apartment.

An undisclosed source from law enforcement community told Kommersant about a new line investigation is currently pursuing on suspicion that the money could be kickbacks to top managers of Russian oil and natural gas companies, since Zakharchenko was temporarily in charge of the Interior Ministrys anticorruption unit responsible for keeping an eye on this sector of the national economy.

The newspaper's source noted that officers under Zakharchenko took strong interest in awards of contracts for construction of pipelines, replacement and repairs of pumping equipment, construction of settlements and roads.

Price tags for such projects make millions of dollars, whereas kickbacks in the oil industry may be as high as 30 per cent of the total costs, Kommersant notes.

Investigators believe that Zakharchenko and his subordinates could follow such sketchy deals to take over at the moment money changed hands and demand a share in return for promises of no prosecution.

According to Vladimir Markin, the Russian Interior Ministrys official spokesman, Zakharchenko is suspected of obtaining 8.5 billion rubles ($130 million) by criminal means.

As yet, Zakharchenko has been officially charged with abuse of office, hindering the conduct of preliminary investigation and large-scale bribery.

Last Saturday the Presnensky District Court of Moscow detained Zakharchenko until November 8 as a part of a large corruption case. Zakharchenkos lawyers appealed against this ruling. The officer denies any connection to the seized funds.




Ex-CEO of construction firm gets 4 years in jail for tax evasion

MOSCOW, September 16 (RAPSI, Lyudmila Klenko)  Former head of the Mostovik construction firm Oleg Shishov, charged with 500 million rubles tax evasion ($7.8 million), had been sentenced to four years in prison, a judge assistant in the case told RAPSI on Friday.

Shishov will serve his term in a general regime penal colony, according to the court representative.

The prosecution earlier demanded a 5.5 year prison sentence for Shishov.

As it has been reported earlier, Shishov fully admitted his guilt and requested his case to be reviewed under a special procedure envisaging no examination of the evidence.

According to investigators, in 2009-2011 Shishov forged financial documents and tax declarations of Mostovik, falsely reporting completion of construction works in Vladivostok and other cities by outside contractors. Investigators claimed that these contractors did not do any works and the projects were completed by employees of Mostovik itself. As a result, investigators said that Shishov evaded paying over 478 million rubles ($7.4 mln) in taxes.

Additionally investigators alleged that Shishov embezzled 526 million rubles ($8.2 mln) received as advance payment for construction of the Omsk ring road.

The case materials made 221 volumes.








Ex-FSB officer suspected to be bribed by Turkish company calls case provocation

MOSCOW, September 16 (RAPSI, Lyudmila Klenko)  Vlad Novikov, a former officer of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) had said the criminal case against him and Karen Krayukhin, an officer still in FSB service, was a provocation, RAPSI was told by a representative of the Moscow Garrison Military Court on Friday.

Two men were arrested in a fraud case on suspicion of receiving a bribe from the Turkish construction firm Esta Construction. Investigators claim that Esta Construction has been fined over 37 million rubles ($570,000) for violation of migration legislation. The companys lawyer in order to avoid payment of the fine asked the suspects for help in the termination of the case for 5 million rubles ($77,000).

The case resulted from a provocation on the part of the alleged victim, who embezzled the money and now tries to deflect the blame on the defendants, Novikov said when being convoyed to the courtroom where the decisions on the detention of the suspects were to be taken.

Esta Construction is a contracting company established by Bahattin Demirbilek in Moscow in 2006 and operating as a general contractor and project designer in international construction market, the firms website says.




Pobeda airline proposes to introduce black lists of passengers

MOSCOW, September 16 (RAPSI)  Pobeda lowcost carrier has proposed to all airlines to create black lists of passengers, which may prevent unstable passengers from being aggressive during the flights, the lowcoster has announced.

Pobeda also brings attention of Russian authorities towards attack perpetrated by a group of passengers against airlines office in the Vnukovo airport on September 13. According to the airline, 10 people entered the office demanding to delay the flight and beat representative of the airline while also destroying equipment of the company.

The airline has noted that it is going to fight every manifestation of aggressive behavior during flights. As such no violation of rules by the passengers will be without consequences. "Any passenger who shows aggressive behavior to an employee of the airline or other passengers is to immediately be refused carriage with subsequent recovery of losses incurred by the carrier in case of flight delays caused by said passenger, the announcement reads.
Listeners can hear the history of the Bitterroot National Forest, management practices and the far-sighted people from the era that formed todays policies at a presentation at 6 p.m. in the North Valley Public Library on Tuesday, Sept. 20.

Author Frederick Swanson wrote Where Roads Will Never Reach: Wilderness and Its Visionaries in the Northern Rockies and The Bitterroot and Mr. Brandborg: Clearcutting and the Struggle for Sustainable Forestry in the Northern Rockies, which won the 2010 Wallace Stegner Prize in Environmental and American Western History.

Swanson said he became interested in the forest while attending graduate school at the University of Montana, from 1974 to 1976.

I visited the Bitterroot Valley frequently because my aunt and uncle lived in Hamilton, Swanson said. They knew the Brandborgs through a civic organization and I remember listening to Brandy talk.

For the Tuesday presentation, Swanson said he will talk about timbering, the early Forest Service, Ranger Charles McDonald, and Bitterroot National Forest Supervisor Guy Brandborg, as well as the environmental issues of the past half-century.

Ill talk about the clear-cutting controversy of the late 1960s, Swanson said. Brandborgs life in the 1930s and 40s and how he went on to orchestrate public management practices. Ill look at the ideas he had, the influence he had on forestry and the events surrounding clear cutting.

Swanson said he decided to write The Bitterroot and Mr. Brandborg as a biography and a look at how conservation thinking has evolved over the last 100 years.

Where Roads Will Never Reach focuses on wilderness issues and how wilderness areas were established.

Ill talk about the Selway Wilderness and how it came to be protected later on, Swanson said. I will look at controversial issues, but it was the Forest Service that brought the idea of conserving forest to the western states in the 1900s. Ill talk about the people in the agency during that time; I was very impressed with their dedication.

Swanson will have a book signing after the presentation.

The North Valley Public Library is located at 208 Main St., in Stevensville. For more information, call the library at 406-777-5061.
CLEVELAND, Ohio - A planned residential tower on Euclid Avenue won its second set of design approvals this week, taking another step toward a late-2016 construction start.

The Cleveland City Planning Commission gave a thumbs-up Friday to more fleshed-out images of the Beacon, a 19-floor apartment building that will sit above the existing 515 Euclid Ave. parking garage. On Thursday, a design-review committee dedicated to the downtown area also gave its nod to the project team's request for schematic approval.

Stark Enterprises aims to begin site work late this year or early next and to open the 187-unit apartment building in spring 2018. The developer still needs permission from the Cleveland Board of Zoning Appeals to erect a taller, more densely populated tower than the current zoning allows. And the planning commission will see the project at least one more time, for final approval, before construction starts.

Members of the design-review committee asked for a deeper examination of Stark's lighting plan, which is a critical part of the project. Nighttime renderings show a tower that's lit from underneath, where the first residential floor meets the top of the glassy garage. Nadaaa and Westlake Reed Leskosky, the architecture firms behind the design, also showed LEDS on alternating floors at the metal-clad building's edges, creating a zipper-like look up the sides.

The most noticeable - and complicated - lighting feature is on the 21st floor, the only floor where residents will have balconies. Renderings depict that floor as a band of light at night. Katherine Faulkner of Nadaaa said the designers are working on ways to ensure that the tower is illuminated to stand out without causing disruptions for tenants.

"It is probably our biggest design challenge," Faulkner told the design-review group.

Tom Yablonsky, a committee member, said such distinctive features often get left on the cutting room floor as developers of downtown projects try to keep costs down and make the numbers work. The Beacon will be much less interesting if that happens, he said.

"The lighted balcony is a unique design feature I'd like to see you keep," said Yablonsky, executive director of the nonprofit Historic Warehouse District Development Corp. and Historic Gateway Neighborhood Corp.

Other design-review committee members asked the architects to revisit the appearance of the roof, where a rooftop deck for tenants and mechanical areas sit side-by-side. They asked for more detailed images of the first floor, where storefronts lined Euclid and the entrance to the garage sits on East Sixth Street. And some members said a rooftop sign bearing the Beacon name was too large and needed to shrink by 10 to 15 percent.

The city's economic-development department is talking to Stark about assisting with the project, department executive Kevin Schmotzer told the planning commission. The city doesn't have a specific proposal yet. But members of the project team have talked about trying to extend a tax-increment financing district that gives real estate owners the ability to reallocate a portion of new property-tax revenues from their projects to repaying construction debt.

The Beacon is the fruit of a joint venture between Cleveland-based Stark and Reuven Dessler, the managing partner of an investor group that owns the 515 Euclid garage.
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SOME WORRY that our outspoken President may be unnecessarily antagonizing the United States for our countrys own good, while sounding deliberately gentle with Chinain the name of pursuing an independent foreign policy. This pieces title notwithstanding, I am not about to argue here that we must choose one over the other. Its fair to say that historically, both of them have helped us, and wronged us as well. In the overall scheme of things, it may not be obvious who has been and who will prospectively be the better friend or worse foe to us Filipinos. It has been argued that our independence would be best asserted by being on good terms with everyone. Indeed, it would be in our best interest as a small country to be seen as impartial in dealing with other countries, particularly the world powers, and in defining our countrys standing in the global community.





Still, I thought it might be interesting to assess and compare the nature of our economic linkages with the two countries, as this looms large in any reckoning of our relationships with either of them. I will steer clear of the political and other dimensions of those relationships, as that would be straying beyond my own area of expertise. On economic relations, the most obvious measures for which we have the data are those pertaining to trade, investments, and overseas remittances.





How important are the United States and China to us as trading partners? Overall, it would appear that they are equally important, as combined exports and imports with each are both in the neighborhood of 13 percent of our total for all countries. The United States is more important to us as an export market, accounting for 15 percent of our total exports in value terms, against Chinas 10.9 percent. As source of imports, the reverse is true, with our official figures showing less of our imports (10.8 percent) coming from the United States than from China (16.2 percent). The latter figure is likely to be even higher, given the rampant smuggling of goods into the country, particularly from China. Recently it was reported that Chinas data on exports to us are 60 percent higher than our corresponding data on imports from it, indicating the extent of such undocumented imports.





What do we sell to the two countries? Dominating our exports to both (50 percent of our exports to China, and 39 percent to the United States) are electronic products, mostly in the form of intermediate products such as semiconductors and circuit boards. For China, mineral ores are also prominent (14.5 percent), with shiploads of virtual raw earth, mostly nickel ores, being shipped there every week. Rounding up our top five exports to China are chemicals, miscellaneous manufactures and machinery/equipment. For the United States, garments are our second top export (14 percent), followed by coconut oil, miscellaneous manufactures, and ignition wiring sets for motor vehicles. These give us some idea on which industrieshence which types of workersbenefit from our trade with either country, and correspondingly, who would be adversely affected by a cutback in trade, as fallout from possible political conflict. Offhand, it appears that proportionately more workers benefit from our exports to the United States than to China, with labor-intensive manufactures more prominent in our top five exports to the former.





What do we buy from the two countries? Topping our imports from both are electronic products in the form of basic components for further assembly and finished consumer products. These comprise nearly half (48.2 percent) of total imports from the United States against less than a fifth (19.3 percent) from China. Agricultural products in the form of animal feed stuffs, cereals and preparations (including flour), and other food and live animals are prominent imports from the United States, along with industrial machinery and equipment. From China, our other top imports are iron and steel, industrial machinery and equipment, miscellaneous manufactures, and metal products.

As source of foreign direct investments (FDI), the United States is far more important to us than China, accounting for 13 percent of total net FDI inflows in 2015, against Chinas negligible 0.01 percent (less than $1 million). In 2014, only 2 percent of total Chinese investments into Asean reportedly went to the Philippines. Chinese Ambassador Zhao Jianhua is reported to have acknowledged that the Philippines invests more in China than China does in the Philippines. Its most visible investments here are in power, shipping and mining. The Chinese government owns a 40-percent stake in the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines, and is also reported to have acquired a controlling stake in Negros Navigation Corp. operating the 2GO Travel lines.





A recent article in the Journal of Political Risk lists some 25 Chinese mining firms known to have investments in the country as of 2012, albeit not officially recorded. It cites investigative media reports portraying Chinese mining companies to be engaged in improper and less than legal mining operations in the country. On the other hand, US investments in the country have a long history and are much more substantial and varied, spanning the agriculture, industry and services sectors.





As for remittances, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas data report that nearly half (43 percent) comes from the United States, and less than 1 percent from China. It would seem from all this that on purely economic terms, we stand to lose more from antagonizing the Americans than the Chinese. But as weve stated at the outset, its best not to antagonize either. Whether in trade, investments or remittances, we need bothand we need much more.





* * *

cielito.habito@gmail.com




Pakistan-India Peoplesa Forum for Peace and Democracy (PIPFPD)

Press Statement - September 16, 2016

PIPFPD strongly criticizes the unlawful and illegal arrest of Kashmiri human rights activist Khurram Parvez (39) late Thursday night and demands his immediate and unconditional release. The Forum also condemns the Indian governments action at the Delhi airport on Wednesday, harassing Khurram Parvez, detaining him and not allowing him to travel to Geneva to attend the ongoing UN Human Rights Council. J&K police have arrested Khurram from his home in Srinagar.

Khurram, is program coordinator of the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS) and chairperson of the Asian Federation Against involuntary Disappearances (AFAD). The officials at the airport informally told Khurram that they have been instructed not to allow him to leave. In fact, the Immigration officer had even stamped his boarding pass but subsequently disallowed him to board the flight.

Khurramas arrest reveals the brutal face of the Indian government in Kashmir and is part of a pattern of persecuting voices speaking against oppression and human rights violations, which the government wishes to keep under the wraps. The action also reveals that the government does not believe in dialogue and peaceful resolution but in undemocratically crushing Kashmiris and dealing with them through military action and harassing tactics.

Denying Khurram the right to travel is equally shocking. Narendra Modi led Indian government is trying to scuttle travel rights of people who are critical of the NDA government. Earlier in January 2015 Greenpeace activist Priya Pillai was stopped from flying to London. She was to make a presentation on the human rights violations in Mahan, Madhya Pradesh. Subsequently, she challenged the decision in the Delhi High Court and won the case. Delhi High Court criticized the government for exceeding its authority.

Khurram is prevented from and arrested for highlighting human rights violations in Jammu & Kashmir.

PIPFPD is of the opinion that this act clearly indicates the crackdown on the civil society of Kashmir valley. We demand that he should be immediately released and allowed to go to Geneva. India is a democratic country and voices of dissent are very critical to the survival of its democracy.

For further details contact: pipfpd.india@gmail.com | 09869077718
The decision announced Thursday by Jamaica to withdraw its recognition of SADR, self-proclaimed by the Algeria-backed Polisario, exacerbates the diplomatic crisis in which the separatist front is being embroiled.

It is Jamaicas Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade that announced the countrys decision to withdraw its recognition of the pseudo-Sahrawi Republic, 37 years after it recognized that entity during the Cold War era.

Jamaicas decision was announced in an official document handed over to Nasser Bourita, the Moroccan Junior Minister of Foreign Affairs, who is currently on a visit to the Caribbean country.

The document states that Jamaica expresses its sincere hope that its position of neutrality and its continued support to the ongoing UN process will send a strong message that it stands with the international community in its effort to achieve a just and peaceful solution to this protracted regional dispute.

Through this decision, Jamaica has joined the 46 countries that have withdrawn their recognition of SADR, mostly after the initiative that Morocco proposed to the UN in 2007. The initiative provides for granting the Sahara a broad autonomy under Moroccan sovereignty.

This setback is all the harder for the Polisario that Jamaicas decision came two months, almost to the day, after the separatist front was dealt a blow at the African level. Actually, on 18 July, 28 member countries of the African Union (AU) had formally requested the suspension of the SADR from all the activities and bodies of the AU.

The motion requesting the suspension of the self-proclaimed republic had been sent to Idris Deby, President of Chad and acting President of the AU.
Young roster has high hopes for future. Only four seniors suited up.
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Founded in 1979, the Independent Filmmaker Project (IFP) is the largest and oldest not-for-profit organization dedicated to independent film.

Besides their year-round programs and initiatives supporting independent filmmakers, their best known events are the Gotham Awards, a major highlight of the annual film awards season, and IFP Film Week, a series of conferences, panels, screenings, and other activities held in the early fall.

For this year, IFP Film Week - running from September 17-22 - has greatly expanded to include many more public events to be held in and around their newly established home base, The Made in NY Media Center in Dumbo, Brooklyn. These events include many free public screenings, starting with the kick-off outdoor screening on September 17 of the 80's music film classic Krush Groove, and continuing with early looks at upcoming feature films, viewings of new virtual reality work, and cutting-edge visual art installations. These events are accompanied by talks from many filmmakers, writers, performers, and visual artists.

All in all, this will be a packed week of activities that promises to be most enlightening and stimulating. For more information and details, see the summary of IFP Film Week's events below, and visit their website for further details and information. (Some of these events, such as the virtual reality projects, require pre-registration, which you can also do through the website.)

IFPs signature event, IFP Film Week, has expanded this year to include numerous screenings, talks, meet ups, exhibitions, and tours centered on cutting-edge independent content for the big screen, small screen and Internet open to the public.

IFP has always had a reputation industry-wide as a place of discovery, says IFP Executive Director Joana Vicente. Now, with IFP Film Week in Brooklyn, we welcome all New York audiences to come and discover the new ideas, new artists, digital pioneers, and experience all our talented and diverse community has to offer.

Under the leadership of Head of Programming Amy Dotson, produced by Erik Luers, Annie Malarkey and gallery manager Tom Rotenberg, public programs run September 17-22 in and around IFPs headquarters, Made in NY Media Center by IFP in DUMBO, Brooklyn.

IFP Screen Forward Conference kicks off the week, including:

Talks with some of the most interesting, innovative and outspoken storytellers today include Laura Poitras , Oscar-Winning Director (Citizenfour), Ezra Edleman , (Director, OJ: Made in America), Amy Emmerich (CCO Refinery 29), actress and activist Rose McGowan, and creator Issa Rae ( Awkward Black Girl and HBOs upcoming Insecure).



, Oscar-Winning Director (Citizenfour), , (Director, OJ: Made in America), (CCO Refinery 29), actress and activist and creator Awkward Black Girl and HBOs upcoming Insecure). Behind the scenes chats with the cast and creators of :

o Hamiltons America, featuring cast members of Hamilton;

o Cult webseries and upcoming HBO series High Maintenance

o Doc sensation Weiner

o Innovative horror film The Witch

o Hello, My Name is Doris, one of the highest grossing indie films of the year.

o Antonio Campos exciting upcoming film, Christine, staring Rebecca Hall

Discover some of the funniest and most subversive comedians, writers and performers in the city including Catie Lazarus (Employee of the Month), Phoebe Robinson (2 Dope Queens), Ingrid Jungermann (F to the 7 th ), Chris Kelly (Other People) and Chioke Nassor (Late Night with Seth Meyers), and webseries sensations Shugs & Fats .

(Employee of the Month), (2 Dope Queens), (F to the 7 ), (Other People) and (Late Night with Seth Meyers), and webseries sensations . Experience the future with the best VR, AR, and immersive storytelling including work from United Nations VRs Gabo Arora, Felix and Paul, Lance Weiler, Mike Woods and more.



and more. Exploring the intersection of story and tech through:

o Discussions on the rise of short-form documentaries with VICE, Narratively and Great Big Story

o Designing participatory stories with Scatter and multi-sensory experiences with Meta.is

Cutting edge storytelling techniques for social media with Mighty Oak



Meet up at Meet the Decision Makers, the only open-to-the-public program where aspiring industry and creative aspirants can meet directly with leaders from over 40+ top film, television and digital companies including A&E, Amazon Studios, HBO, and more.

Exhibitions & experiences at the Media Center will take place throughout the Week that are open to the public, including:

Phi Centres VR Garden (Daily 10-5)

o Series of the best of North American VR from Canada and the United States, hosted by Montreals innovative Phi Centre.

United Nations VR @ IFP Film Week (Sunday 4-6p)

o Launch of new work by VR pioneer Gabo Arora, including a communal VR viewing experience of his latest work.

The Art of Dying Young (Daily 10-5)

o An Augmented Reality installation by Shawn Peters and producer Barry Cole that examines the lives, local histories and place-making initiatives of the Brooklyn neighborhoods of Bedford Stuyvesant and South Williamsburg told through the lives of two young men who have been memorialized through murals.

Tactile and interactive exhibits by BRDG

o Creative, digital moments in physical spaces and environments, projects will include video environments, motion tracking, tactile AR exhibits and live interactive emulations throughout the IFP Made in NY Media Center.

Digital Projection Mapping at the Archway throughout the week

o Best of LightYear 1.2.3 on the Manhattan Bridge Over and Underpass throughout the week.

IFP also has a long history of discovering new voices and introducing their work to audiences first, well before the whole world knows their names. These IFP rising stars include Lena Dunham (Girls), The Duplass Brothers (Togetherness) Moria Demos & Laura Riccardi (Making a Murderer), Ava DuVernay (Queen Sugar), Derek Cianfrance (The Light Between Oceans), Robert Eggers (The Witch), Ciro Guerrra (Embrace of the Serpent), Barry Jenkins (Moonlight), David Lowery (Petes Dragon ), Dee Rees (Bessie), Denis Villeneuve (Sicaro), Roger Ross Williams (Life, Animated), and Behn Zeitlin (Beasts of the Southern Wild).

Celebrate, meet and discover the next amazing film, television and digital pioneers at free, public screenings and parties including:

On Saturday, September 17, IFP Film Weeks Kick-Off Screening will take place at The Archway. Proceeded by dance party, IFP, Alamo Drafthouse and Rooftop Films will host a free screening of 80s classic Krush Groove. The event is held in conjunction with DUMBO BID.

will take place at The Archway. Proceeded by dance party, IFP, Alamo Drafthouse and Rooftop Films will host a free screening of 80s classic Krush Groove. The event is held in conjunction with DUMBO BID. Tuesday, September 20 is the 12 th annual IFP Film Lab Showcase , held at Brooklyn Bridge Parks Pier 1. Giving audiences a first look at twenty exciting new feature films, before their festival premieres, this outdoor screening features excerpts from the new films from the emerging talent. The Labs are the nations only program that supports diverse feature filmmakers when they need it most: through the completion, marketing and distribution of their first features. The IFP Film Labs are generously supported by the Time Warner Foundation; the screening is held in conjunction with Rooftop Films and Brooklyn Bridge Park Conservancy.

annual , held at Brooklyn Bridge Parks Pier 1. Giving audiences a first look at twenty exciting new feature films, before their festival premieres, this outdoor screening features excerpts from the new films from the emerging talent. The Labs are the nations only program that supports diverse feature filmmakers when they need it most: through the completion, marketing and distribution of their first features. The IFP Film Labs are generously supported by the Time Warner Foundation; the screening is held in conjunction with Rooftop Films and Brooklyn Bridge Park Conservancy. Wednesday, September 21, join the IFPs Future of Filmmaking at BRICs The Stoop , which will feature innovative writers and directors working in film, television, and digital platforms, discussing how they tell stories  and make a living  across multiple platforms. Speakers will include Ingrid Jungerman (F to 7 th ), Chris Kelly (Other People), Jessie Komitor (People of New York), and Chioke Nassor (Late Night with Seth Meyers).

, which will feature innovative writers and directors working in film, television, and digital platforms, discussing how they tell stories  and make a living  across multiple platforms. Speakers will include (F to 7 ), (Other People), (People of New York), and (Late Night with Seth Meyers). Wednesday, September 21, the IFP Screen Forward Lab Showcase at Brooklyn Bridge Parks Pier 1 will give audiences a first look at twenty exciting new television and webseries, before their broadcast and digital premieres. The IFP Screen Forward Labs are generously supported by the Time Warner Foundation. The screening is held in conjunction with Rooftop Films and Brooklyn Bridge Park Conservancy.

Showcase at Brooklyn Bridge Parks Pier 1 will give audiences a first look at twenty exciting new television and webseries, before their broadcast and digital premieres. The IFP Screen Forward Labs are generously supported by the Time Warner Foundation. The screening is held in conjunction with Rooftop Films and Brooklyn Bridge Park Conservancy. On September 22nd, IFP and POV are partnering with Photoville for a free, evening screening and event at the Beer Garden @ Photoville featuring exclusive clips from IFP Lab Alumni and upcoming POV release, From This Day Forward, as well as StoryCorps shorts and more.

For more information on all public programs or to purchase tickets to the IFP Screen Forward Conference, ifpfilmweek.com.
A 25-year-old student at UC Berkeley was arrested Wednesday, following an investigation into a sexual assault that took place earlier this month.

The Daily Californian reports that Sardar Sikandar Wali Zia Khan, a male student who currently lives in on-campus housing, was arrested at 3:24 p.m. Wednesday in the case of a September 4 rape in a UC Berkeley residence hall.

According to KTVU, "Police were told the victim, a 19-year-old student, was allegedly assaulted by a male acquaintance who was a student and a resident of campus housing."

UC Police Department spokesperson Sargeant Sabrina Reich tells the Daily Cal that "Khan is currently facing two felony charges for rape and penetration with a foreign object," and remains in custody at Santa Rita Jail.

A call to UCPD for further details was not returned at publication time, but the Daily Cal reports that "UCPD is not releasing the name of the residence hall where the crime occurred out of respect for the privacy of the people involved in the case."


Looking to see a bunch of naked people that are, well, deceptively naked? Then the Saturday, September 24 Body Art Show & Parade is for you. Coming to the strip of the Embarcadero between the Ferry Building and Pier 1, the festival aims to show painted and modded bodies in all their glory.

"This is an art event exhibiting a wide variety of body decoration," reads the event page. "Our bodies are the art work. This is a 'bare as you dare' event, which means that participants (and spectators) can attend completely naked if they wish. However, since it is a body art event, participants (including nudists) are encouraged to decorate their bodies in some manner."

Just what, exactly, is body art? We touched on the topic in August of last year with a look at the (actually) painted ladies of San Francisco. Artist Trina Merry painted models to seamless blend into their surroundings, and the effect was pretty cool.





Broke Ass Stuart got wind of the forthcoming show/parade, and helpfully informs us that it is both free to observe and free to participate (nice!). And as the organizers point out, you should definitely, at least, show up. "It took more than two years of Federal Court litigation to force the City of San Francisco to issue the permit for this art event," they explain. "In order to keep our rights to freedom of artistic expression, we must make use of them on a regular, public basis. So, on this day, lets show and educate the world through art that skin is a canvas and the human body can be a creative, expressive, work of art."

See you, and lots of confused and delighted tourists, there! The fun starts at 10:00 a.m.

Related: [Semi-NSFW] These Are The Real Painted Ladies Of San Francisco
When London Breed became Board of Supervisors President last year, besting David Campos for the top spot, her election was interpreted as a victory for the board's so-called moderates over its so-called progressives.

But it was also an intriguing political coup: Breed, after all, arrived on the board in 2012 by literally declaring she gave no fucks, specifically as those fucks might regard established political players or protocols. "You think I give a fuck about a Willie Brown at the end of the day, when it comes to my community and the shit that people like Rose Pak and Willie Brown continue to do and try to controls things," Breed declared when a reporter asked if she were beholden to Brown.

"Why do women have to be a pawn for somebody?," she went on  or, rather, off. "Why arent women strong enough to stand on their own two feet and run and be the kind of voice that I mean, look at my record, Willie Brown didnt do that work, I did the work. Willie Brown didnt make those decisions on redevelopment  I made those decisions. Willie Brown didnt wipe my ass when I was a baby  my grandmother took care of me."

Since that declaration, Breed has taken a similar tone on Twitter, once leading SFist to call her "the Amanda Bynes of SF Supervisors." More recently, Breed had some real talk for local progressive political website 48 Hills.

"The official publication of the non-profit San Francisco Progressive Media Company," 48 Hills was launched in 2013 after its editor Tim Redmond was forced out of his long-held position as editor of the San Francisco Bay Guardian when that publication was taken over by the SF Media Company. Funding was pulled from from the Guardian the following year. But in Breed's estimation, 48 Hills is little more than "a bullshit ass blog," a quote that comes from Breed's seemingly private missive to Redmond, which he has since published on said blog.

Breed's words came in response to a previous 48 Hills article commenting on a recent Board of Supervisors meeting. "Sup. London Breed, who in the past few months has moved toward the progressive camp as she faces an election against tenant lawyer (and progressive) Dean Preston," wrote Redmond. "But in this case, she voted on the mayors party line every single time." Under the article's headline, Redmond was even more blunt: "Breed tries to undermine majority and sides with the mayor on a series of 6-5 vote," he wrote, which is some serious spin. That lead to Breed's note:

So, when I vote one way, the way you disagree with, Im the mayors bitch, but when I vote the way you want me to, its because I have a challenger? So if this is true:

In the past four years, on the vast majority of contested votes, Breed has been on the side of the mayors 6-5 majority (until last year, when the majority shifted and a tenant lawyer, Dean Preston, challenged her from the left).

then how does this happen?

http://48hills.org/2016/07/20/big-wins-for-progressives-at-key-board-meeting/ wow Tim, you are really a piece of work! Honesty? you dont even fact check your own bullshit ass blog! As my grandmother used to say Im going to pray for you, cause you got the devil in you"

On Redmond's website, where he is no longer constrained by the oppressive word limits of print journalism, he's written a lengthy response to Breed and a defense of his original piece. To that, Breed's reply  or lack of one  might look like this:
An anonymous voice mailer spurred the evacuation of a Mission District building Thursday, after she made multiple calls threatening to bomb the structure.

The saga actually began on Wednesday, police say, when a person bearing an "unknown female voice...left voice mails" for an undisclosed person or persons threatening to blow up a building on the 100 block of Fair Oaks Street, which is between 22nd and 23rd Streets.

That same caller was back at it as of 9:14 a.m. Thursday, leaving another voice mail threatening to destroy the structure.

This time, according to the San Francisco Police Department, officials "were immediately notified" and police "started the evacuation protocol" in the area to ensure all were safe.

And safe they were, as the voice mailer's threats were apparently empty. According to the SFPD, "a sweep by SFPD bomb dog yielded negative results for a bomb," and everyone was able to return to the area.

As of Friday morning, police say that no suspect information is available in the case, nor have any arrests have been made.
SIOUX CITY | Judy Stanwick noticed something was off with her gait on a Monday in September 2014.

By Wednesday, she could no longer stand.

By Friday, she was paralyzed from the waist down.

Stanwick, 56, was suffering from Guillain-Barre syndrome, a rare and potentially life-threatening condition in which the immune system attacks the nerves causing paralysis.

When Stanwick was hospitalized, she said a male physical therapy assistant was the only one who could lift her to a standing position.

Two years later, the Dakota Dunes woman is using a Sara Plus to walk on a track during out-patient physical therapy at UnityPoint Health-St. Luke's. The powered standing aid, which promotes mobility among patients, is among 80 pieces of new equipment the hospital implemented early this year to safely move patients while lessening the physical strain on nurses, physical therapists and other care employees. The investment was more than $130,000.

Stanwick said she feels secure and confident in the Sara Plus.

"The therapists are young women. I assume it would be dangerous for them to try to get me to walk again because I can't stand yet," she said. "It is the only thing I can use to try and walk."

Musculoskeletal disorders are the main source of injury for health care workers. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, health care workers suffer lower back and shoulder injuries at a rate three times that of construction workers.

National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health standards set the maximum amount of a patient's weight that health care workers should manually lift, push or pull at 35 pounds. Even when lifting a leg, therapists, nurses and nurse aides can exceed that safe lifting load.

"With the larger patients we have to use more of our own muscle strength to help assist them to move. It does make it more taxing on ourselves and puts us at greater risk for injuries," said Heather Rush, a physical therapist at St. Luke's. "It's nice to have the new lift equipment because it takes much more stress off of us."

Over the past two years, Mindy Spenner, a physical therapist and manager of therapy services for the hospital, said she's seen an increase in obese patients. Recently, she said staff had to move a patient who weighed close to 600 pounds.

"It's surprising sometimes at how well somebody that is that weight can move on their own, so we try to let them do as much on their own as much as possible," she said. "That helps us determine what piece of equipment would work best for them."

Although more than two-thirds of American adults are considered overweight or obese, few hospitals have adopted safe patient handling programs. According to a report from Public Citizen, a national nonprofit organization, experts from the Oregon Coalition for Healthcare Ergonomics, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health and Stanford Risk Authority estimate that only 3 to 25 percent of hospitals have such programing.

Faye Tompkins, manager of corporate, employee health and wellness for St. Luke's, said she thinks cost factors into a hospital's willingness to purchase lift equipment, but she said she thinks a lack of statistical data showing that lift equipment is beneficial also plays a role. She said a back injury to one employee could cost $100,000 after surgery and rehab.

"When we first started talking about lift equipment, we had some leaders here that had come from hospitals that purchased lift equipment and it just sat in a closet and nobody ever used it," she said.

St. Luke's debuted its injury management and prevention and cost containment ergonomics program in 2001. In 2006, Tompkins said the hospital started purchasing safe patient handling equipment, buying one or two pieces with grant committee funding.

"We worked that way until last year, when we got a capital budget approved and we made some really nice purchases. We got quite a few pieces from that capital budget," she said.

Staff were trained on the new equipment in early 2016. Erik Nieuwenhuis, a physical therapist and WorkSmart Ergonomics injury prevention specialist and wellness consultant for St. Luke's, said statistics show these lifting tools in combination with good body mechanics, the use of gait belts, and stretching and employee wellness programs are having a big impact on injury reduction.

In 2001, St. Luke's recorded 75 patient care-related Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA)-reportable injuries, while in 2015, the hospital had just 9. Through June, St. Luke's has had only 1 OSHA-reportable musculoskeletal disorder for patient care employees.

Tompkins said a representative from a lift equipment company used to visit the hospital to provide on-site training for employees once every three months. Putting Nieuwenhuis in charge of the lift equipment, she said, is a huge advantage.

"Before we really didn't have enough equipment to have a true, good, formal policy because we didn't have enough equipment on each floor. Now we do in each area," Nieuwenhuis said.

"So many times when I go to different departments now, the equipment's gone. Sometimes it used to be sitting in the storage area, but now it's being used on almost every floor."

Four MaxiMoves replaced older-style Hoyer lifts. Five Sara Pluses, a mechanical sit-to-stand tool, can be used with walking slings to hold patients weighing up to 420 pounds. If a patient's legs give out, Nieuwenhuis said the equipment gives them fall protection.

"They don't fall and hit the ground. They're gonna stay safe; and we don't get hurt. It's a big win-win for both parties in that respect. We never had that before," he said. "We'll be able to safely get people up sooner and quicker."

Also among the lifting equipment are 30 sets of bariatric MaxiSlides, flat sheets with handles for transfers; six bariatric rollboards that slide with patients over 300 pounds; and the Dane WheelChair Mover, which can transport patients weighing up to 550 pounds to different areas of the hospital.

"We've had some staff that have gotten hurt over the years pushing bariatric patients. The wheels have gotten caught or turned and then tweaked a shoulder or tweaked a back. This will prevent these things from happening a lot more," Nieuwenhuis said of the WheelChair Mover.
ST. LOUIS  Evan Wright, 18, started smoking cigarettes and cigars early in high school. He sometimes smoked three cigars a night and began to have serious breathing problems, he said.

A year ago, he started vaping, which delivers nicotine in an appealingly flavored aerosol without all the toxic chemicals that come from burning tobacco. His breathing problems went away.

Every day, I get the urge to go buy a cigar or a pack of cigarettes, but I pull out the vape and inhale the strawberry pina colada, and Im good to go, said Wright, of Des Peres, Missouri.

On the heels of an ordinance that passed last Tuesday banning the sale of both tobacco and vaping products to anyone under the age of 21 in St. Louis County, vaping business owners say they are worried less about their bottom line than about 18- to 21-year-olds no longer having the option to use vaping to quit smoking.

A lot of them are vaping because they quit cigarettes, said Dru Fernandez, who owns Mape Vape in Maplewood, Missouri. I dont know anybody who comes in here that starts vaping because they think its fun. Everybody that comes in here, they tell you a story that they used to smoke.

Fernandez said about 8 percent to 10 percent of his customers were ages 18-21. Hes not worried about the drop in customers when the law goes into effect Dec. 1, he said.

My main concern is the principle of this. A vapor product is not tobacco. You are taking away the option for younger adults to have safer alternatives than combustive tobacco.

Lack of information

The two products are seen the same by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, however. The agency recently extended long-standing restrictions on cigarettes to vaping products, also known as e-cigarettes. Minors were banned from buying the products starting in August.

The move was in response to the growing number of teens vaping. Between 2011 and 2015, e-cigarette use rose from 1.5 percent to 16 percent among high school students, and from 0.6 percent to 5.3 percent among middle school students, federal figures show. That means more than 3 million middle and high school students vaped in 2015.

Whether e-cigarettes are safer than conventional cigarettes or help people quit smoking remains unclear because of the lack of information on the new devices, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

E-cigarettes are battery-operated devices that deliver nicotine and other flavorings in a vapor instead of smoke. Because they deliver nicotine without burning tobacco, they appear as a less toxic alternative to cigarettes.

The deadly health consequences associated with smoking, such as cancer and heart disease, are linked to the inhalation of tar and other chemicals produced by tobacco combustion. The pleasurable, addictive properties are produced by nicotine.

The dangers of nicotine alone are debatable. Some research suggests nicotine may prime the brain to become addicted to other substances, according to the drug abuse institute. A California study suggests teens experimenting with vaping were six times more likely than their peers to transition to tobacco.

The vapor also has been found to contain carcinogens and toxic chemicals such as formaldehyde and acetaldehyde, as well as metal nanoparticles with unknown consequences from repeated exposure.

St. Louis County is among 191 U.S. communities that have chosen to ban the sale of vaping products to anyone under the age 21, despite arguments by shop owners and former smokers that e-cigarettes serve as smoking cessation devices. St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay indicated on Twitter two weeks ago that he would pursue similar legislation for the city.

Other physicians and health groups, such as the American Lung Association and the American Heart Association, also supported the county ordinance.

St. Louis County Councilman Sam Page said the ordinance will dramatically decrease smoking habits, and we will save kids lives.

I feel a lot healthier'

Despite the problems with e-cigarettes, however, major health organizations in England have found that vaping is about 95 percent less hazardous than smoking.

And while federal figures show vaping among teens has increased since 2011, smoking tobacco has decreased: by 4.3 percent among middle school students and by 15.8 percent among high school students.

Nearly nine out of 10 cigarette smokers first tried smoking by the age of 18, according the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Mallory Immethun, 20, of Fenton, Missouri, said she started smoking cigarettes when she was 17. She smoked a pack a day, and her asthma worsened. When she started vaping nearly two years ago, she quit smoking immediately.

It just makes you feel so much better, Immethun said. I feel a lot healthier doing it.

Connor Schwieger, 18, of Maplewood, started smoking cigarettes when he was 14, also exacerbating his asthma. He began vaping about six months ago and kicked his tobacco habit.

I havent used my inhaler since, Schwieger said. Ive been able to play volleyball for three hours. Before I could only play for one.
SIOUX CITY | After the Woodbury County Board of Supervisors nixed the idea of appointing a county-funded task force to study the effects of raising the minimum wage twice, the Morningside College Democrats took it upon themselves to hold a public forum to talk about the importance of the issue in front of a panel.

The forum--dubbed "The Minimum Wage: An Issue Worth Raising"-- was held in the UPS Auditorium on the Morningside campus Thursday.

The panelists-- who supported the idea-- consisted of State Representative Chris Hall, D-Iowa, Sioux City Council Member Rhonda Capron, Woodbury County Supervisor Jackie Smith and Sioux City resident Shiuvaun Reuter.

The panelists started with opening statements on the need for raising the $7.25 minimum wage. And Hall shared a recent study by the nonprofit and nonpartisan Iowa Policy Project that said in Woodbury County, a married couple with two children with child care expenses would each need to earn at least $13.00 an hour to get by.

"Nobody can survive at $7.25," Capron said. "Even if you work two jobs at $7.25, it's not even 15 bucks an hour. I just dont see how they can survive."

The almost 30 people in attendance shared their experiences with the wage now, and an opponent in the crowd gave a history of the failures of minimum wage in different countries and said raising the minimum wage goes against basic economic practices.

But that's why Smith and Capron accepted the invitation.

"I hope to get some input from people that attend and to hear what other people have to say, because I'm not sure what everyone thinks about," Smith, a Democrat, said.

Capron said, "When this whole thing started the county did not even want to review it, and I think that is crazy. We should give the citizens a chance to view their points, and I think we need a panel to hear what their issues are."

In June, Smith raised the issue to the board of supervisors to create an advisory committee to look into whether the county minimum wage should be above the $7.25 per hour state threshold. Board chairman Jeremy Taylor and Supervisor Mark Monson said they were for the forming of a task force, but said it is an issue that should not be looked at with county time and funds. Supervisor Matthew Ung also dissented.

Then in August, a dozen citizens came to a supervisor's meeting advocating for the task force after a United Way study in late June showed 42 percent of Woodbury County families struggle with basic expenses. Again, the supervisors voted against making it an agenda item.

"I think this is the next step," Smith said about holding a forum. "The supervisors encouraged an outside route to go ahead and study it, because they particularly weren't interested... I think it should probably be a state issue, but the state has not done anything and they have not made any moves towards doing anything."

Any movement to bring the issue to a state level has fallen flat in the Republican-controlled House. Smith believes one of the only ways is if the counties start putting pressure on the state by passing local ordinances.

This week, Linn and Wapello counties joined Johnson in ordinances in a countywide raising of the minimum wage. Polk and Lee counties have also taken measures to look at the possibility of raising the $7.25 wage.
SIOUX CITY | Once a Sioux City home is extensively damaged, it can receive a red tag from the city officials, meaning it is too dangerous to be lived in.

Those red-tagged homes can stand in that condition for a long time, creating an eyesore in neighborhoods. But a city housing rehabilitation project is working to get such homes renovated so they meet building codes and are again holding families.

Sioux City officials on Friday will hold a press conference at 1403 Rebecca St., at a home that had been on the red tag list since April 2014. A new owner bought it, then participated in what is known as the Phase 2 Home Investment Partnership Program.

Neighborhood Services Director Jill Wanderscheid said Thursday the Rebecca Street home had been damaged, with holes in the roof, rotted wood and major electrical and plumbing problems.

Wanderscheid said the city has been offering the HIPP housing rehab program since 2015. She said one other person is currently working through the Home Investment Partnership Program, where those who agree to live in the renovated home for 10 years can receive up to a $40,000 forgivable loan.

Griselda Balmaceda bought the home and, after extensive work, received $24,750 from the housing assistance program. It has new tan siding, doors, windows and landscaping.

"They are super excited," Wanderscheid said.

Wanderscheid said the outcome shows the program is a good one to improve the city's housing stock. There are 70 structures on the city's red tag list, encompassing several kinds of structures, not just residential units.

Gary Fester, who lives in the Rebecca Street neighborhood, walked by the renovated house. Fester said the residence had been dropped off into poor condition, so he liked the new look.

"I like it. It looks nice. It makes the neighborhood look better," Fester said.
DES MOINES | Time Management Systems in Sioux City and Tyson Fresh Meats in Storm Lake will receive financial assistance for their expansion projects thanks to action taken Friday by the states economic development board.

The Iowa Economic Development Authority approved $1.2 million in tax credits and refunds for Tyson, which plans to add additional cooler capacity and replace cooling units in an existing facility at its pork processing plant.

The addition will allow Tyson to slaughter more hogs and store more products in coolers in Storm Lake.

Tysons expansion project is expected to cost $30 million and will create eight new positions for the company, which employs more than 2,000 people. Of that amount, nearly $21 million will be spent on new equipment and machinery. Construction is expected to be complete in October of 2017, with machinery and equipment installation complete in February of 2018.

The Tyson award comes from the states High Quality Jobs Program. It is subject to approval by the City of Storm Lake and a local match in the form of a $309,000 TIF rebate.

Tyson is the largest employer in the Buena Vista County seat of 10,600 people.

We are excited, Storm Lake City Manager Jim Patrick said Friday. Its always nice to have a company make an investment in your community. Not only is this an investment, but it is creating high-quality jobs.

Time Management Systems will receive a $75,000 tax credit toward construction of a new, 4,521-square-foot commercial building. The $494,000 project will double the size of the family-owned technology businesss Sioux City campus.

The project is expected to create seven new jobs, six of which must pay at least $18.72 in order for the company to qualify for the tax credit. It is expected to be completed in May.

The City of Sioux City plans to provide a $25,000 property tax abatement for the project.

The Journal's Bret Hayworth and Alex Boisjolie contributed to this story.
STORM LAKE, Iowa | Tyson Fresh Meats is seeking nearly $1.2 million in state incentives for a $30 million project that will allow its Storm Lake pork plant to slaughter more hogs and store more products in coolers.

The proposed project would add cooler capacity as well as replace the units in one of the existing coolers, according to documents filed Thursday with the Iowa Economic Development Authority, or IEDA. The documents did not specific the size of the proposed addition or the expected increase in slaughter capacity.

The expansion would create eight new jobs at the plant, which has around 1,700 workers, making it the largest employer in the Buena Vista County seat of around 11,000.

The IEDA board is scheduled to approve the proposed incentive package for the project at its monthly meeting Friday in Des Moines. The company is seeking tax credits of $1.182 million through the state's High Quality Jobs Program.

The award is subject to approval by the city of Storm Lake of the application and a local match that would include an estimated $309,643 property tax rebate over five years.

The project costs include around $400,000 for site preparation, $900,000 for the new building and $20.6 million for new machinery and equipment. Construction on the building is expected to begin in October 2017, with the installation of machinery and equipment targeted for February 2018, according to the IEDA.

At its meeting Friday, the IEDA board also will consider awarding $75,000 in incentives to help a Sioux City-based technology business expand.

TMS, Inc. Iowa, doing business as Time Management Systems, Inc., plans to construct a 4,521 square-foot commercial building that would double the size of the building it currently rent.

The additional office space would allow the family-owned business to grow. Seven new jobs would be created and 10 positions would be retained.

The $494,484 project would be supported by $75,000 from the state's Targeted Jobs Withholding Tax Credit Program, which is aimed at recruiting and keeping new or expanding employers in border cities like Sioux City.

The City Council has agreed to provide a local match of $25,000 in the form of property tax abatement over five years, according to the IEDA documents.

TMS, which has been in business for more than 30 years, offers one of the leading employee time-tracking, labor tracking and door access security system technologies, according to the documents. The company supports more than 6,000 customers in North America.
BEIJING -- China, Mongolia and Russia will cooperate in seven areas to build a trilateral economic corridor, according to guidelines released this week.

The three neighbors will improve transport facilities by expanding land, air and sea connections, said the guidelines issued by the National Development and Reform Commission.

They plan to renovate ports of entry and overhaul customs procedures for easier clearance.

The three countries vowed closer cooperation in energy and mineral resources, high tech, manufacturing, agriculture and forestry.

They agreed to expand trade at border regions and widen services trade, and eyed more cooperation in education, science and technology, culture, tourism, medical care and intellectual property.

In addition, they promised to strengthen cooperation in environmental protection and push partnerships of local governments and border regions.

The guidelines were signed in June in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, following a meeting of Chinese, Mongolian and Russian leaders.
Companhia Brasileira de Distribuicao engages in the retail of food, clothing, home appliances, electronics, and other products through its chain of supermarkets, specialized stores, and department stores in Brazil. It operates in Brazilian Retail, Grupo Exito, and Other Businesses segments. The company sells non-perishables, beverages, fruits, vegetables, meat, breads, cold cuts, dairy products, cleaning products, disposable products, and personal care products; and home appliances and other non-food products, such as clothing and baby items, shoes and accessories, household articles, books, magazines, CDs and DVDs, stationery, toys, sports and camping gears, furniture, mobile phones, mattresses, pet products, and gardening equipment and tools, as well as electronic products, including personal computers, software, computer accessories, and sound and image systems. It also offers medications and cosmetics at its drugstores; and non-food products at gas stations, as well as rents commercial spaces and e-commerce sales. The company operates its supermarkets under the banners of Pao de Acucar, Extra Supermercado, Mercado Extra, and Compre Bem; hypermarkets under the banner of Extra Hiper; and proximity stores under the banners of Mini Extra, Minuto Pao de Acucar, Pao de Acucar Adega, and Aliados Minimercado; and gas stations and drugstores under the banners of Extra and Pao de Acucar, as well as sells its products through its Websites. As of December 31, 2021, it operated 667 stores, 74 gas stations, and 68 drugstores in 16 Brazilian states and the Federal District, as well as 15 distribution centers and warehouses across Brazil. The company was founded in 1948 and is headquartered in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Companhia Brasileira de Distribuicao operates as a subsidiary of Casino, Guichard-Perrachon S.A.
Duke Energy Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, operates as an energy company in the United States. It operates through three segments: Electric Utilities and Infrastructure, Gas Utilities and Infrastructure, and Commercial Renewables. The Electric Utilities and Infrastructure segment generates, transmits, distributes, and sells electricity in the Carolinas, Florida, and the Midwest; and uses coal, hydroelectric, natural gas, oil, renewable generation, and nuclear fuel to generate electricity. It also engages in the wholesale of electricity to municipalities, electric cooperative utilities, and load-serving entities. This segment serves approximately 8.2 million customers in 6 states in the Southeast and Midwest regions of the United States covering a service territory of approximately 91,000 square miles; and owns approximately 50,259 megawatts (MW) of generation capacity. The Gas Utilities and Infrastructure segment distributes natural gas to residential, commercial, industrial, and power generation natural gas customers; and owns, operates, and invests in pipeline transmission and natural gas storage facilities. It has approximately 1.6 million customers, including 1.1 million customers in North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee, as well as 550,000 customers in southwestern Ohio and northern Kentucky. The Commercial Renewables segment acquires, owns, develops, builds, and operates wind and solar renewable generation projects, including nonregulated renewable energy and energy storage services to utilities, electric cooperatives, municipalities, and corporate customers. It has 23 wind, 178 solar, and 2 battery storage facilities, as well as 71 fuel cell locations with a capacity of 3,554 MW across 22 states. The company was formerly known as Duke Energy Holding Corp. and changed its name to Duke Energy Corporation in April 2005. The company was founded in 1904 and is headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina.
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More and more terms like customer engagement and customer experience are being used in todays business lexicon. And more and more you see them being used interchangeably. On top of that customer service and customer experience are used the same way. And if that werent confusing enough, in many conversations all these phrases are sometimes being used interchangeably with customer relationship management (CRM).

At this years ExCom 2016 event, Paul Greenberg, author of seminal CRM at the Speed of Light series and the upcoming Harvard Press book The Commonwealth of Self-Interest: Customer Engagement, Business Benefit, broke down these terms and how they differ, and how they are related and work together to implement modern customer engagement strategy.

Check out video of Greenbergs presentation here:

Below is an edited transcript of a short conversation with Paul, and embedded below are the audio of our full discussion, and the video of Pauls presentation from ExCom 2016. He starts the discussion by talking about customer experience vs. customer engagement.

Customer Engagement and Customer Experience Arent One in the Same

Paul Greenberg: Theyre different. When you look at customer experience theres actually two ways to looking at. On a broad scale its how a customer feels about a company over time. And again you know its an evolving/changing/shifting kind of feeling  but its a feeling. You cant enable it via technology because you cant enable human feelings. It doesnt work that way.

With that said, in order for a customer to change how they feel over time they have to interact with the company in some fashion. When it comes to customer engagement my definition is the ongoing interaction between company and customer offered by the company, chosen by the customer. Now theres two ways to look at that. One is in order for a customer to be engaged with a company at some level the customer has to want to continuously interact, meaning if its one interaction and they stop, its not engagement its just a singular interaction. They want to have an ongoing relationship and ongoing dialogue or communication between the company and the customer.

But what the customer is expecting in that is a highly personalized interaction; highly personalized communication from the company that has an impact in two ways. One it gives the customer something that they want. And on the other hand the customers themselves recognizes the company knows enough about me to care enough about my cares, knows enough about me to give me something I want. The problem with all of that is that if your company is scaling to a larger scope its not that easy to meet those customer desires because theyre all unique and independent.

So if you have a million customers and a million different requests from those customers the company has to figure out what are the same things that I can offer customers that will satisfy the largest group of those customers, who at the same time will still feel as if they have had an interaction or any independently personalized experience with the company. But at the same time we wouldnt go bankrupt; I offer a basket full of products/services/tools, or what I call consumable experiences, then the customer gets to choose from that array of offerings. And the key there is the company doesnt go bankrupt because theyve chosen the offering theyre going to provide to the customer that make sense for the most part for a group of customers. And is felt by the customer to be individually and personally for them.

Secondly the customer gets to pick which ones they want, which make the customer feel in control of the interaction which is very important. And it gives the company data on their customer to help refine the offerings the next time. So thats customer engagement right.

Small Business Trends: What is CRMs role in customer engagement?

Paul Greenberg: If CRM was what me and you and others really wanted it to be when we first started out we wouldnt be talking about any distinction really; it would have been all those things. We looked at it philosophically and strategically but it ended up being technologies and systems; in other words enablement.

What CRM does for marketing, sales and customer service, when it boils down to it, is that it enables the operational systems that companies are using to increase their chances of closing a deal. More successful marketing, making customer service case management a lot easier when its operational; its come down to that.

It doesnt mean that no components for communication/social are in CRM technologies; the fact is its pretty much standard now where those communications are designed to impact and enable the the effectiveness of customer engagement, which then improves the overall customer experience. CRM, in effect, becomes an operational technological core for engagement, and for ultimately a great customer experience. But its still distinct from it.

Small Business Trends: Esteban Kolsky, customer service expert, said customer service as we know it will be nonexistent by 2025. What do you think?

Paul Greenberg: I think hes right. We are seeing that kind of transition. Think back a few years the first metric everybody used to look at was first call resolution. How quaint is that. What they find out over time, because of the rise of new forms of communication with customers, call resolution was the most expensive form of resolution.

The reality is what were seeing now because of these new communications channels, and more effective processes, is innovative practices and more effective CRM systems. And now as were starting to see the evolution of more effective AI (artificial intelligence) and more effective user-generated successful resolution to customer service cases; and see customers use things like self-service channels in a lot more effective manner.

More and more people will be using self-service as a form of solution, or at least as the first form of resolution. If you get an answer without dealing with another human being by just going online and finding it by utilizing tools, that makes it easy for you because youre looking for the path of least resistance when youre trying to solve a problem or just answer a query.

So Estebans estimation of another eight or so years is probably about right. What hes saying  because we still have my generation (Baby Boomers) continues to retire and step away from things and when Gen Xers and Gen Yers and Gen Zers begin to move forward its just going to become standard operating procedure that they use the means to solve problems by themselves before they use contact a representative.

Its just going to happen.

Listen to the audio here:

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This is part of the One-on-One Interview series with thought leaders. The transcript has been edited for publication. If it's an audio or video interview, click on the embedded player above, or subscribe via iTunes or via Stitcher.
Your reaction to particularly awful days can make or break future success. The better action to take is to remain as calm as possible. Take quiet time to analyze how far you have come. Think about the twists and turns, and what currently has you stopped in your tracks.

Numerous conversations revealed that many almost quit their current endeavors. But one common factor as to why they did not quit helped them to prevail: They enjoy what they do too much! Ironically, it has become their way of life.

Embrace the joy in your life to find true reward.

What to Do When You Are Stuck In a Rut

As uncertainty hits, follow these two suggestions:

Take the time needed to uncover the better route. Convert a negative frame of mind into a positive.

Reframe the Situation

One sales technique referred to as Reframing applies very well in difficult situations. Whether personal or trying to work with a client, the first step is to figure out where the discontent originates. Upon recognizing the misstep, it becomes easier to work together to find the better solution. By asking a series of questions such as, What if the improved path begins to reveal itself.

On the personal side, moving from negative to positive thought is the beginning step for improvement. The change in attitude makes an enormous difference in providing increased opportunity to save the day.

The day that you find you are doubting yourself, take private time to consider the why that is. Most likely, one of your peers will have had a similar experience. Have a conversation about how they dealt with it and ask for recommendations on how to handle. Their insights wont necessarily apply or even matter. Its more about the conversation itself. Just unleashing the dilemma is all it takes to get back to full steam ahead. As others see you meeting negativity and obstacles head on, they come to admire your steadfast personal brand.

Top Performing Habits

Examine the best and the worst in place:

Tweak the best and discard the worst

Revitalize the motivation to move forward

Balance

Some people attempt to work around the clock. In order to perform best, its important to relax and enjoy life, too. Are you taking time off to be with family, friends or to exercise and explore the world around you? The outside interests tend to provide further ideas and motivation to continue moving forward in the journey.

Sales Tips

When negativity hits, stop to examine the origin.

Decide whether changes need to be made.

Should changes be in order, decide whether they are minor or major.

Begin the process by eliminating the no longer needed.

Create a list of what needs to be fixed.

Prioritize the list in order of immediate need.

Add new trends to those venues you wish to maintain.

Continually stay abreast of new trends to be ahead of the curve.

Re-energize yourself and your business by communicating your news.

Talk about the newfound insights with followers and peers to further build business.

Republished by permission. Original here.
Helpful tools like Zoho, MailChimp and XERO are already fairly popular with small businesses. And this week, some of those platforms got even better by announcing new integrations and platforms. You can read about those updates and more in this weeks Small Business Trends news and information roundup.

Small Business Operations

New Zoho Integration with MailChimp Lets You Send Campaigns to Your Contact List

Business applications provider Zoho has announced the integration of its contact management software ContactManager with the email sending platform MailChimp. The aim is to make it easier for small businesses to send email campaigns to their contacts.

XERO Introduces New HQ Platform for Accounting and Bookkeeping Businesses

Xero (NZE:XRO), a Software as a Service (SaaS) firm that develops cloud-based accounting software for small businesses, recently unveiled Xero HQ  a new open practice platform for accountants and bookkeepers that allows you and your staff to plan out work more efficiently and unlock your small business data and display it in a way that is as useful to you as it is to your customers.

Businesses Move Forward With Self-Driving Cars, While Lawmakers Remain Parked (Watch)

Companies like Google and Tesla are moving forward with developing autonomous vehicles. But they might be moving a little too fast for state and local governments. Currently, only nine states and Washington D.C. have laws on the books related to self-driving vehicles.

Palo Alto Software Introduces What If Feature to Forecast Cash Flow

The issue of cash flow is one that many small business owners fail to address until, in many cases, it is too late. According to CBInsights, the post-mortem it conducted of 101 failed startups revealed 29 percent didnt make it because of cash flow related problems.

Economy

Small Business Optimism Declines as Presidential Election Looms

Small business owners are losing optimism and refusing to expand operations in the run up to Novembers high-stakes presidential election. According to researchers at the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB), Americas Index of Small Business Optimism declined two-tenths of a point in August, settling at 94.4 points.

Marketing Tips

Businesses Are Literally Luring In New Customers with Pokemon Go (INFOGRAPHIC)

Its been just over two months since Pokemon Go became a thing. The mobile app has smashed all sorts of download records and there has been rampant speculation whether such a popular app and a budding technology  augmented reality via smartphone  would be good in some way, shape, or form, for businesses.

Video Wars: WeVideo, Apple Innovate While Facebook Lags Behind With Important Tools

When it comes to digital marketing, video is the undisputed king. And although engaging videos are generally more difficult for companies to produce and distribute, social media has totally streamlined the process.

Small Biz Spotlight

Spotlight: Shopswell Hopes to Make Online Shopping More Social

When it comes to online shopping, consumers arent always likely to see the best products and information. Sometimes, its more about which companies pay for visibility than it is about creating a great user experience. Thats where Shopswell comes in. The team aims to improve online shopping through a social platform where shoppers can interact and discover new products.

Small Business Loans

Small Business Lending at Big Banks Bounces Back, Says Biz2Credit

Things are beginning to look up for small businesses again. After seeing a sharp decline in loan approvals from big banks in July, approval rates have bounced back in August 2016. Thats according to the latest Biz2Credit Small Business Lending Index, the monthly analysis of more than 1,000 small business loan applications on Biz2Credit.com.

Social Media

How To Use Instagram Stories for Small Business: A Guide

About a month ago, Instagram introduced Instagram Stories and now, instead of having to choose a few photos for posting, Stories allows you to post a bunch of photos throughout the day. The photos, however, disappear after 24 hours. Does this sound familiar? Thats probably because Stories features remarkable similarities with Snapchat.

20 Things You Should Know About Tumblrs New Live Video

These days, it looks like just about every other social networking site under the sun owns a livestreaming platform.

How One Facebook Photo Is Helping This Ice Cream Seller (Watch)

Fidencio Sanchez has been selling ice cream and popsicles on the streets of Chicago for more than 20 years. But at 89, pushing around a 50-pound cart all day is proving to be a bit of a struggle. Sanchez had been lightening his workload as of late. But an unexpected death in the family forced him to go back to selling popsicles on a daily basis.

Technology Trends

GoDaddys New API Eases Domain Name Redirect to Microsoft, Squarespace, Others

Domain name registrar and hosting company GoDaddy (NYSE:GDDY) just announced a new program designed to make it easier for people to connect their domain name with web services such as websites and email, regardless of where the domain is registered or who hosts the service.

Vivaldi Browser Offers Alternative to Chrome, Firefox, Others

Lets face it, the browsers used today can only be described as functional, leaving much to be desired when it comes to aesthetics and customization. So with that in mind, Jon Stephenson von Tetzchner launched Vivaldi community and the Vivaldi web browser. Vivaldi is a Chromium/Blink engine based web browser, which according to von Tetzchner is for ourselves and for our friends.

New HP Line of Printers Targets Small Businesses and Other Users

The printer copier market is a mature segment that for the most part has been operating without true innovation for quite some time. Additionally, it is service intensive and complicated, which makes the return on investment and total cost of ownership of business-class printers a begrudging expense by organizations for a necessary tool.

XERO Refreshes its Advisor Directory, Brings Accountants and Small Business Clients Closer Together

New Zealand-based small business accounting and bookkeeping software company Xero (NZE:XRO) has announced a refresh to its Advisor Directory, a platform deigned to help small business owners access targeted, industry-specific financial guidance.

Is Sony Xperia XZ a Good Fit for Mobile Entrepreneurs, Even With a Lower Resolution Screen?

One of the features mobile entrepreneurs look for is portability without sacrificing functionality, and this generally means smaller smart phones. But currently the market is trending towards large devices, which makes any new small flagship phone stand out from the crowd, and that is what Sony (NYSE:SNE) has done with the Xperia XZ and X Compact.

Dont Jump in Line to Buy an Apple Car Just Yet (Watch)

If you had your heart set on owning an Apple Car in the future, you may be disappointed. The company is reportedly shutting down Project Titan, its initiative to put together self-driving vehicles. Instead, it seems the company might focus its efforts on creating backend software for self driving vehicles.

Huawei Unveils Nova, Premium Phone Fits Small Business Budget

Unlike some smartphone manufacturers that limit themselves to a couple of segments, Huawei has taken a very different approach, making a phone for everyone. The latest case in point is the Huawei Nova and Nova Plus, two phones with premium features, but without the premium price.

HP Pavilion Wave Is More Affordable PC for the Creative Entrepreneur

First impressions say a lot, and if you are a small design, architecture or creative firm, everything from the color of your office to the furniture and equipment you have chosen says something about you.

Productivity Tool: Listen to Phone Calls Through Your Fingertip?

Remember those slick spy movies where the hero simply pressed a button to make a quick call during a covert mission? The secret agent fantasy is all set to become a reality when Sgnl, a smart strap hits the market soon. Sgnl is currently raising funds on Kickstarter. How Does the Sgnl Smart Strap Work? Whats most fascinating about Sgnl is its simplicity.

Blank Screen Photo via Shutterstock, Screenshot via XERO

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International Relations  September 16, 2016  Ilan Pappe

Ilan Pappe is a historian, socialist activist, professor at the University of Exeter, and supporter of the Campaign for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS). Of Israeli origin, he is a world-renowned scholar on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and has written numerous books on the subject, including The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine and The Idea of Israel: A History of Power and Knowledge . Pappe was interviewed by Alejandra Rios for Left Voice , where this article first appeared.

Alejandra Rios (AR): Youve talked and written about the concept of homeland as justification for destroying the native population. What is the meaning of this concept and what are some examples of its use in other places? In what sense is it applied differently in Palestine than in other countries?

Ilan Pappe (IP): The context is the phenomenon of settler colonialism: the movement of Europeans, because they felt unsafe or endangered, into non-European areas in the Americas, Africa, Australia and Palestine. These people were not only seeking a new home, but also a new homeland. Namely, they had no wish or plan to come back to Europe.

The only problem was that the lands they coveted were already inhabited by other people. In most cases, their solution was the genocide of indigenous people. In two cases, the solution was different: apartheid in South Africa and ethnic cleansing in Palestine.

AR: In your book, The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine , you suggest that the objectives of Israel have remained the same since 1948. Can you elaborate?

IP: As any settler colonial movement, the Zionist movement is motivated by the logic of elimination of the native. In the period after the second World War, elimination is more complex and maybe less inhuman, but still drastic. The desire of the Zionist movement to create both a Jewish state and a democratic one means that there is always a wish to take over as much of Palestine as possible and leave in as few Palestinians as possible.

This is the background for the Israeli ethnic cleansing operation in 1948; an operation that ended with expulsion of nearly a million Palestinians and a Jewish takeover of 80 per cent of the land. However, the ethnic cleansing of 1948 was not a complete project. There was still 20 per cent of the land that Israel did not have and there was a Palestinian minority within Israel. The vision of a purely de-Arabized Palestine was still there, though the means differed.

The means included the imposition of military rule over the Palestinians in Israel and refusing to allow the refugees to return. The space was not enough and the opportunity to enlarge it came in 1967, but then the demographic problem emerged again. This time, the means were apartheid, military occupation and cutting the land into enclaves and Bantustans.

AR: You have described Israeli actions in Gaza as incremental genocide. What is the meaning of this term?

IP: Incremental means that there is no dramatic, massive killing of people of a certain race or nation. However, a strategy like the one Israel has been conducting since 2006 has led to what the UN called the transformation of the Gaza Strip into an uninhabitable place  so this is not just the constant killing of civilians that makes it genocidal, but also the destruction of the infrastructure.

AR: Do you think that Israel is carrying out ethnic cleansing in the West Bank and East Jerusalem on a similar scale as what took place in 1948?

IP: Well, the fact is, just in the Greater Jerusalem areas since 1967, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were transferred in various means  from massive expulsion or by moving their neighbourhood to the West Bank or by not allowing them to return if they left the country. After 1967, ethnic cleansing is more about moving Palestinians into enclaves rather than out of the country.

AR: You argue against a two-state solution on the grounds that it is not viable and instead are in favour of a bi-national state. What are your reasons for coming to this conclusion? How do you think a bi-national state could be achieved and how would it operate?

IP: The two-state solution is not viable for three major reasons. First, it only applies to 20 per cent of Palestine and to less than half of the Palestinian people. You cannot reduce the problem of Palestine in such a way either geographically or demographically.

Second, Israel created such a reality on the ground, in terms of settlement and colonization, that it would be impossible to create a normal Palestinian state, even if one were to accept this solution. The best you can hope for are two Bantustans: one in the West Bank and one in the Gaza Strip. This is not a solution.

Finally, there will be no solution to the conflict without respecting the right of the Palestinian refugees to return and the two-state solution does not respect this right.

AR: What has been the effect of the growing international criticism of Israeli actions against the Palestinian people? How has this affected the peace movement in Israel?

IP: In the last ten years, civil societies around the world had enough of their governments passivity on Palestine. Therefore, they took independent action by supporting the Palestinian civil-right call for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel.

The world governments are still not pressuring Israel to change its policy and therefore it is difficult to expect any change from within. There is no peace camp in Israel. There is now a small group of activists who are encouraged by the BDS movement and are trying to educate Israelis about the human and civil rights violations in the past and present. These groups from within will not survive; it is necessary to put more international pressure on Israel.

AR: What role do academics or intellectuals have in the struggle for the liberation of Palestine?

IP: A very important role. They can tell the story about Palestine that Israel wants to hide from the world. There is enough evidence, and today there are enough scholars using it, to tell the history as it really happened. We will need to deal bravely with this history if we would want to have a genuine process of reconciliation in Israel and Palestine.

AR: How important is the BDS campaign? What do you think it can achieve?

IP: Very important. It has two major roles: first, to send a painful but necessary message to Israel that there is a price tag attached to its continued policy of dispossession and colonization. And secondly, to galvanize world public opinion and activism around a campaign that would not let the Palestine issue be forgotten. 
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.
Lets face it; the Hard Rock Casino is not exactly known as a dining destination. Your options there include snack food chains (Ben & Jerrys, Wetzels Pretzels, Kilwins) or the Hard Rock Cafe, where the best thing on the menu is the apps combo (wings, rings, chicken tenders, spring rolls and bruschetta) which are just there to soak up the alcohol. And the less said about the limited menu available poolside, at The Beach Club (a few apps, salads and a trio of sandwiches) the better. Thats okay, you go to Hard Rock to gamble or see a show, right?

If thats your mind set, you are missing out on one of the finest dining experiences in South Florida. Kuro, the high-end Japanese restaurant at Hard Rock, features contemporary artisanal dishes using locally sourced as well as ingredients imported from Japan. Chef Alex Becker has created a menu featuring bold and complex flavors that are harmonious. As is the trend now, the menu forgoes the usual division of courses and offers tasting portions, designed with sharing in mind. What many restaurateurs hope you wont notice when they offer individually priced tasting portions is how the bill can climb to astronomical heights. However, if you can afford it, the expense is justified at Kuro. Our recent dinner featured one cocktail, two glasses of wine, eight shared dishes and a trio of desserts and the bill was $238.50, and thats before tip!

Unless youre part of the 1 percent, a meal at Kuro is most likely going to be a special occasion place. I can almost guarantee you that, no matter how special, Kuro will match the occasion, if you order judiciously. Start with one of the really cool cocktails. If thats not for you, the restaurant serves craft beers, Japanese whiskeys, shochu, 30 brands of sake and wine from 110 vineyards.

We ordered the edamame salad, but were served a bowl of black edamame dusted with sea salt. It was delicious, but $15 for a bowl of edamame? I was thinking, This is going to be one over-priced evening.

But then, the tuna on crispy rice arrived at our table and it showed me exactly what Kuro is all about. Incredibly high-grade tuna tartare, piled high on a square of light-as-air puffed rice. OMG!

From the tempura section of the menu, we opted for two unusual dishes. Corn is not an ingredient you think of with Asian fare, but kakiage, a sort of giant corn fritter, makes itself at home on this disparate menu. In fact, it was my favorite dish of the night. We also tried the king crab tempura. Unfortunately, this was the least successful dish of the night. The batter was a little thick and heavy and the butter snow (a bit of molecular gastronomy) completely overwhelmed the crab. Surprisingly, I was underwhelmed by the sushi, sashimi and maki rolls. Theres only so much you can do to make these rolls special. Yes, the fish was incredibly fresh, but then all sushi should be.

I was so looking forward to the uni pasta, but a shortage of uni made it unavailable. Just the thought of soba noodles, uni and osetra caviar, was making me salivate. The lobster shiso, which arrived next, more than made up for that disappointment. Perfectly cooked lobster is removed from the shell, cut into bite-sized portions then replaced and plated beautifully. A hint of wasabi flavors the cream sauce that accompanies this dish. Koji Lamb, one of the few meat dishes we tried (carnivores, dont worry, theres plenty of options for you here-the seafood options just appealed to us more) was perfectly medium rare, but the blueberry demi-glace was overly sweet and the meat was a little tough.

Many Japanese places serve up a dish of green tea ice cream or mochi. Kuro rocks desserts! We couldnt choose just two, so we didnt! Three desserts for two people? Why not? And each one was a winner! If you like chocolate, the choco-hazelnut bar is a layered log of goodness, combining a rich mousse, crisp cookie and crunchy nuts! Apple Tobanyaki combines tender slices of apple with rich ice cream and a crumble base that is to die for. But, the star of the dessert menu is the unassumingly named Japanese Doughnuts. Kuros version is more like an Italian zeppole than the ring shaped American version. The dough inside was flaky and light, the outside crispy and coated with sugar and five spice seasoning. Dulce de leche and chocolate dipping sauces added just the right touch.

The massive and beautifully decorated dining room manages to maintain an energetic buzz without becoming overwhelming. Kuro follows the practice of a waiter who takes your order, while other staff (usually called back-waiters or runners) actually deliver the food to your table. Ive never been a fan of this practice because invariably the wrong items are delivered to tables, and that proved to be the case here. It also means that no one person is watching your table, and we had empty, dirty plates sitting on our table for far too long.

If Kuro sounds great, but it is just beyond your budget, stop by for lunch. The menu is at tad limited when compared to dinner, but the noodle, tempura and rice entrees average about $15, and you still get that top level decor, views and food.

Kuro

1 Seminole Way, Fort Lauderdale

954-585-5333

SeminoleHardRockHollywood.com
City and business leaders gathered on a construction site in downtown Fort Lauderdale Friday to celebrate the building of a train station intended to revolutionize travel in South Florida.

There are three milestones in construction, said Bob Moss, Chief Executive Officer of Moss & Associates. First you sign the contract, then you top out and then you finish.

Moss construction company has employed hundreds of people at the Brightline project, said Fort Lauderdale Mayor Jack Seiler.

This will be a economic stimulus for downtown Fort Lauderdale and eventually an economic engine for all of South Florida, said Seiler, who attended Tuesdays topping out ceremony along with district three commissioner Robert McKinzie and Broward County Vice Mayor Barbara Sharief.

Fully funded by private investors, Brightline promises to establish inner city express train service linking Miami, Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach and Orlando. The first yellow colored train is expected to roll off the tracks in the summer of 2017.

Im going to hop on and hop off to go shopping, just like our tourists, said Sharief.

The Fort Lauderdale station, planned and designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP in association with Miami-based Zyscovich architects, is located north of Broward Boulevard, adjacent to the central bus terminal. The 60,000 square foot facility along NW 2nd Avenue is part of McKinzies northwest district that Seiler said is seeing remarkable growth and redevelopment.

In the future, passengers can travel from Orlando to Fort Lauderdale in two and half hours.

We look at it as a two-way street, Seiler said. We want all the people that might go to Disney World for two or three days to say, you know what, weve had a great time at the kids park, lets go down for some adult more mature fun in Fort Lauderdale, Second Street, Las Olas, lets hit the beach, lets hit the Seminole Hard Rock Casino or one of the other casinos here.' So I think theres definitely a opportunity for tourism to benefit here. Were looking for as much economic impact coming in as we see going out.
The Broward Sheriffs Office (BSO) has come a long way since May 3, 1991, when Sheriff Nick Navarro (1985-1993) and his deputies raided the gay Copa night club with his wife and visiting dignitaries in tow.

Navarros successor, Sheriff Ron Cochran (1993-1997), turned the tide in favor of the LGBT community. Sheriff Ken Jenne (1998-2007) met with representatives of GUARD - Gays United to Attack Repression and Discrimination - including this writer. Sheriff Al Lamberti (2007-2013) continued the BSOs outreach to the LGBT community and, though a Republican, won the gratitude of some gay Democrats who voted for him when he ran for re-election in 2012. Even so, Lamberti lost to Democrat Scott Israel, the Police Chief of North Bay Village.

On January 8, 2013, Scott Israel was sworn into office as the sixteenth Sheriff of Broward County. Sheriff Israel is Floridas first Jewish sheriff. Though as devoted to the cause of law and order as any other officer, Sheriff Israel is a bona fide progressive in comparison with some of his north and west Florida colleagues.

According to the BSO web site (sheriff.org, obviously a biased source), Sheriff Israel diversified the department, redirected BSOs mission to focus on reducing violent crime, keeping kids out of jail and addressing the disadvantaged members of our community, including the homeless and mentally ill. Though not without his faults, Sheriff Israels leadership earned him a victory in the August 30 primary election against three other Democrats and makes him the favorite to win a second term in the November 8 general election.

The BSO is more than the Sheriff, of course. It is made up of 5,800 employees, including 3,100 deputies and 600 firefighters. Under Sheriff Israels leadership, the makeup of the BSO more closely resembles the community that it was formed to serve. Though Sheriff Israel has been criticized for hiring his friends and political allies, he remains committed to his pledge to employ the best and the brightest, regardless of race, religion, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation: Surround yourself with lions who share the same mission, as he told Daniel Hicks of the Agenda. Sheriff Israels LGBT appointments include some of our communitys best-known activists, including General Counsel Ron Gunzburger, Deputy General Counsel Patricia Windowmaker and Assistant General Counsel Stephen Muffler. To this list we should add some good friends of our community, such as community advocate Patti Lynn. When BSO Detective David Currie married his husband in 2016 he proudly wore his BSO uniform - with the Sheriffs approval.

Under Sheriff Scott Israel the BSO strengthened its already-existing non-discrimination policy by requiring department vendors on contracts worth more than $100,000 to provide health coverage for their employees same-sex partners and to institute the same kind of workplace diversity policies as the agency they supply.

For LGBT Pride Month 2014, Sheriff Israel issued a proclamation where we recognize and celebrate the amazing impact that lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender individuals have had on our community. ... We now openly embrace the multicultural diversity of our community which makes us a better, stronger and more united Broward. Sheriff Israel and some of his deputies take part in the annual Stonewall Parade on Wilton Drive and BSO representatives regularly attend LGBT community events, such as the Pride Centers weekly Coffee and Conversation.

This year, the American peoples attention is aimed at the upcoming presidential election. However, we should remember that many down ballot races are equally important and, in some cases, even more important. On November 8, Broward Sheriff Scott Israel faces a Republican opponent, retired BSO Sergeant Santiago Vazquez. Unlike 2012, when there were some honest reasons to vote for Sheriff Lamberti, there is no doubt where we stand this year. Vote to re-elect Scott Israel as Sheriff of Broward County.
Authorities in Fort Pierce arrested a 32-year-old man on Wednesday afternoon in connection with a fire deliberately set at a house of worship.

Joseph Schreiber is charged with arson of the Islamic Center of Fort Pierce. Police say two anonymous phone calls, social media postings and surveillance video led them to arrest Schreiber. The accused has a criminal record and faces additional hate crime charges, police say.

Here's an earlier report:

A $10,000 bounty has been placed on the arsonist of a Fort Pierce mosque.

Late Sunday evening, a fire was started at the Islamic Center of Fort Pierce. The fire caused extensive damages, ruined sections of the center and has state and local officials searching for answers.

An arsonist lighting this mosque on fire is not good for anyone, it is not good for the community, it is not good for America, said St. Lucie County Sheriffs Office Major David Thompson, at a press conference on Monday.

The mosque has been on heightened alert when it was revealed earlier to be the place where the Pulse Nightclub mass shooter prayed. Bedar Bakht, a longtime member of the mosque, told NBC affiliate WPTV, threats of violence against the mosque have increased.

Since that Orlando incident, weve had a lot of threats, Bakht told the West Palm Beach television station. Not personal threats, but people passing by cursing us out, giving us the finger.

In a news release Wednesday, the Florida chapter for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) offered a reward of $5,000 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the arsonist. Additionally, the Florida Advisory Committee on Arson Prevention is offering a $5,000 reward.

Surveillance video captured a person, suspected of igniting the fire, approaching the building on motorcycle. In the video, the suspect appears to be carrying paper and a bottle of liquid. St. Lucie County Sheriffs Office is describing the suspect as a white or Hispanic man.

According to CAIR, this was the third arson at a Florida mosque this summer. The incident happened at the beginning of Eid ul-Adha, one of two annual Muslim holidays.
Le Collectif Cheikh Yassine a organise un certain nombre dactivites et de festivites pour les enfants de Gaza sous le theme  La joie des enfants de Gaza pour lAid . Ces activites ont commence le premier jour de lAid et continue jusquau 4eme jour de lAid dans la bande de Gaza.



Plusieurs activites, ont ete organisees parmi lesquelles : des competitions recompensees par des prix, des jeux, des animations et des chants presentes par un groupe ainsi que des distributions de cadeaux et daides financieres.




Dr. Holdren (left), Administrator Bolden (center) and Dr. Michele Gates (right) discuss the ARM mission during a live NASA TV briefing. Behind them is a mockup of robotic capture module for the Asteroid Redirect Mission. Credit: NASA. NASA

Officials from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and NASA held a live Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM) discussion at the space agencys Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.

During the event on Wednesday, Sept. 14, OSTPs Dr. John P. Holdren, NASAs Administrator Charles Bolden and ARM Program Director Dr. Michele Gates, highlighted the missions scientific and technological benefits, how the mission will support NASAs goal of sending humans to Mars in the 2030s, and how ARM will demonstrate technology relevant to defending Earth from potentially hazardous asteroids.
Many people have wished me well and wished and wished me a safe journey. Some people have donated money. I am grateful for the best wishes, and the donations.

In many respects, were all in this together. The plight of Syria and Syrians is entwined with us as well. If the West and its proxies successfully destroy Syria as they did to so many other countries, including Iraq, and Libya, and Afghanistan, then the next country on the list will be Iran and so on.

But the mercenary terrorists are losing. I suspect that now the diplomats are looking for a way to help the US save face and to usher the West diplomatically out the door. I hope this is the case. The carnage in the Middle East, especially after the 911 false flag, is testament to the fact that a unipolar world is too dangerous for humanity.

Author and Anti-war activist Mark Taliano

Listening to diplomats can be confusing though. The Dirty War of aggression against Syria was planned well in advance. The lies and diplomatic scripts were wrapped around the invasion plans once the plans were complete. Intelligence agencies decided well in advance to use so-called Islamic Militants to fight the war. Saudi Arabia, a close ally of the West, is an incubator for these mercenaries, and Israel needs them as well to create their dream of a Greater Israel.

The story of the White/al Qaeda Helmets is particularly brazen. The White Helmets are a creation of Purpose Inc., and they, like all the fake NGOs, are embedded with the terrorists, and serve to advance the terrorist cause of regime change. Yet it is this same group that is vying for a Nobel Peace Prize. If they win their award, it will be further testament to the contamination of the Western mind-set, to the success of fake NGOs, and to the effectiveness of Public Relations perception managers.

All of the different names for terrorist groups are part of the psychological operation. Syrians trying to live their lives refer to them all as Daesch. Syrian writer Afraa Dagher, for instance, calls ISIS fiction. Shes right. It is well-documented that there are not and that there never were moderate terrorists.

Al Qaeda is the designated scape-goat to mislead the Western public, and to serve as a pretext to invade the world in a war on terrorism, which is itself a war for terrorism (since terrorists are the Western assets).

In Syria, the designated enemies are al Qaeda, ISIS etc. when in reality they are the strategic assets. This is well-documented using admissions and documents from Western sources.

It is also well-documented that the West has a long history of creating, using, and supporting un-Islamic Islamic Militants. Al Qaeda were proxies for the West in Afghanistan, in Bosnia, in Libya, in Iraq and now in Syria. The West calls them al Nursra Front in Syria. The West uses these proxies as ground troops with a view to maintaining plausible deniability and distancing themselves from their assets crimes. The West has always claimed that it fights for freedom and democracy, and now for humanitarian reasons  but they are all Big Lies, and they always were. The West is trying to destroy Syria because Syria is deemed to be an impediment to the Wests global hegemony and its projects for parasitical corporate globalization. Public assets, including free education, free public healthcare, and values such as equality, and democracy, are enemies to corporate globalists.

This puts me in a somewhat awkward position in Syria. Canadas unspoken allies are the terrorists  all of them  so informed Syrians who havent read my articles may resent the Canadian flags on my luggage. Terrorists, on the other hand, might welcome the sight of my flags, since the Canadian government supports the terrorists, but I have no intention to befriend terrorists operating in Syria, and every intention to befriend those who oppose the terrorists  the Canadian government doesnt represent my views on this matter.
Secret cables and reports by the U.S., Saudi and Israeli intelligence agencies indicate that the moment Assad rejected the Qatari pipeline, military and intelligence planners quickly arrived at the consensus that fomenting a Sunni uprising in Syria to overthrow the uncooperative Bashar Assad was a feasible path to achieving the shared objective of completing the Qatar/Turkey gas link. In 2009, according to WikiLeaks, soon after Bashar Assad rejected the Qatar pipeline, the CIA began funding opposition groups in Syria.  Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Why the Arabs dont want us in Syria , Politico

The conflict in Syria is not a war in the conventional sense of the word. It is a regime change operation, just like Libya and Iraq were regime change operations.

The main driver of the conflict is the country thats toppled more than 50 sovereign governments since the end of World War 2. (See: Bill Blum here .) Were talking about the United States of course.

Washington is the hands-down regime change champion, no one else even comes close. That being the case, one might assume that the American people would notice the pattern of intervention, see through the propaganda and assign blame accordingly. But that never seems to happen and it probably wont happen here either. No matter how compelling the evidence may be, the brainwashed American people always believe their government is doing the right thing.

But the United States is not doing the right thing in Syria. Arming, training and funding Islamic extremists  that have killed half a million people, displaced 7 million more and turned the country into an uninhabitable wastelands is not the right thing. It is the wrong thing, the immoral thing. And the US is involved in this conflict for all the wrong reasons, the foremost of which is gas. The US wants to install a puppet regime in Damascus so it can secure pipeline corridors in the East, oversee the transport of vital energy reserves from Qatar to the EU, and make sure that those reserves continue to be denominated in US Dollars that are recycled into US Treasuries and US financial assets. This is the basic recipe for maintaining US dominance in the Middle East and for extending Americas imperial grip on global power into the future.

The war in Syria did not begin when the government of Bashar al Assad cracked down on protestors in the spring of 2011. That version of events is obfuscating hogwash. The war began in 2009, when Assad rejected a Qatari plan to transport gas from Qatar to the EU via Syria. As Robert F Kennedy Jr. explains in his excellent article Syria: Another pipeline War:

The $10 billion, 1,500km pipeline through Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria and Turkey.would have linked Qatar directly to European energy markets via distribution terminals in Turkey The Qatar/Turkey pipeline would have given the Sunni Kingdoms of the Persian Gulf decisive domination of world natural gas markets and strengthen Qatar, Americas closest ally in the Arab world. . In 2009, Assad announced that he would refuse to sign the agreement to allow the pipeline to run through Syria to protect the interests of our Russian ally. Assad further enraged the Gulfs Sunni monarchs by endorsing a Russian approved Islamic pipeline running from Irans side of the gas field through Syria and to the ports of Lebanon. The Islamic pipeline would make Shia Iran instead of Sunni Qatar, the principal supplier to the European energy market and dramatically increase Tehrans influence in the Mid-East and the world

Naturally, the Saudis, Qataris, Turks and Americans were furious at Assad, but what could they do? How could they prevent him from choosing his own business partners and using his own sovereign territory to transport gas to market?

What they could do is what any good Mafia Don would do; break a few legs and steal whatever he wanted. In this particular situation, Washington and its scheming allies decided to launch a clandestine proxy-war against Damascus, kill or depose Assad, and make damn sure the western oil giants nabbed the future pipeline contracts and controlled the flow of energy to Europe. That was the plan at least. Heres more from Kennedy:

Secret cables and reports by the U.S., Saudi and Israeli intelligence agencies indicate that the moment Assad rejected the Qatari pipeline, military and intelligence planners quickly arrived at the consensus that fomenting a Sunni uprising in Syria to overthrow the uncooperative Bashar Assad was a feasible path to achieving the shared objective of completing the Qatar/Turkey gas link. In 2009, according to WikiLeaks, soon after Bashar Assad rejected the Qatar pipeline, the CIA began funding opposition groups in Syria.

Repeat: the moment Assad rejected the Qatari pipeline, he signed his own death warrant. That single act was the catalyst for the US aggression that transformed a bustling, five thousand-year old civilization into a desolate Falluja-like moonscape overflowing with homicidal fanatics that were recruited, groomed and deployed by the various allied intelligence agencies.

But whats particularly interesting about this story is that the US attempted a nearly-identical plan 60 years earlier during the Eisenhower administration. Heres another clip from the Kennedy piece:

During the 1950s, President Eisenhower and the Dulles brothers  mounted a clandestine war against Arab Nationalism  which CIA Director Allan Dulles equated with communism  particularly when Arab self-rule threatened oil concessions. They pumped secret American military aid to tyrants in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Iraq and Lebanon favoring puppets with conservative Jihadist ideologies which they regarded as a reliable antidote to Soviet Marxism. The CIA began its active meddling in Syria in 1949  barely a year after the agencys creation. Syrias democratically elected president, Shukri-al-Kuwaiti, hesitated to approve the Trans Arabian Pipeline, an American project intended to connect the oil fields of Saudi Arabia to the ports of Lebanon via Syria. (so) the CIA engineered a coup, replacing al-Kuwaiti with the CIAs handpicked dictator, a convicted swindler named Husni al-Zaim. Al-Zaim barely had time to dissolve parliament and approve the American pipeline before his countrymen deposed him, 14 weeks into his regime.. (CIA agent Rocky) Stone arrived in Damascus in April 1956 with $3 million in Syrian pounds to arm and incite Islamic militants and to bribe Syrian military officers and politicians to overthrow al-Kuwaitis democratically elected secularist regime. But all that CIA money failed to corrupt the Syrian military officers. The soldiers reported the CIAs bribery attempts to the Baathist regime. In response, the Syrian army invaded the American Embassy taking Stone prisoner. Following harsh interrogation, Stone made a televised confession to his roles in the Iranian coup and the CIAs aborted attempt to overthrow Syrias legitimate government.(Then) Syria purged all politicians sympathetic to the U.S. and executed them for treason. (Politico)

See how history is repeating itself? Its like the CIA was too lazy to even write a new script, they just dusted off the old one and hired new actors.

Fortunately, Assad with the help of Iran, Hezbollah and the Russian Airforce has fended off the effort to oust him and install a US-stooge. This should not be taken as a ringing endorsement of Assad as a leader, but of the principal that global security depends on basic protections of national sovereignty, and that the cornerstone of international law has to be a rejection of unprovoked aggression whether the hostilities are executed by ones own military or by armed proxies that are used to achieve the same strategic objectives while invoking plausible deniability. The fact is, there is no difference between Bushs invasion of Iraq and Obamas invasion of Syria. The moral, ethical and legal issues are the same, the only difference is that Obama has been more successful in confusing the American people about what is really going on.

And whats going on is regime change: Assad must go. Thats been the administrations mantra from the get go. Obama and Co are trying to overthrow a democratically-elected secular regime that refuses to bow to Washingtons demands to provide access to pipeline corridors that will further strengthen US dominance in the region. Thats whats really going on behind the ISIS distraction and the Assad is a brutal dictator distraction and the war-weary civilians in Aleppo distraction. Washington doesnt care about any of those things. What Washington cares about is oil, power and money. How can anyone be confused about that by now? Kennedy summed it up like this:

We must recognize the Syrian conflict is a war over control of resources indistinguishable from the myriad clandestine and undeclared oil wars we have been fighting in the Mid-East for 65 years. And only when we see this conflict as a proxy war over a pipeline do events become comprehensible.

That says it all, dont you think?
This is my second post about Moebius, in which I wanted to tell my story how I came to discover him, love his comics and all the things I di...
It's Election season and our editor's mailbox is overflowing. Who do your neighbors support? Read about it here.
Its no surprise that the future isnt bright for polar bears.

The massive predators dependence on Arctic sea ice puts them at extreme risk in a warming world and has earned the animals a threatened designation on the U.S. endangered-species list.

But most studies of polar-bear habitat have focused on ice conditions in discrete regions or at specific times of year. Now, scientists at the University of Washington have completed the first, Arctic-wide analysis of the changes in sea ice that have the greatest impact on the bears  particularly the shift toward an earlier melt and a later freeze.

Across all areas, we found significant trends in earlier springtime breakup and later fall formation of ice, said Kristin Laidre, of the UWs Polar Science Center. Those are trends that are not good for bears.

For the analysis published Wednesday in the journal The Cryosphere, Laidre and UW polar researcher Harry Stern used 35 years of satellite data on sea ice concentrations in all 19 Arctic regions where subpopulations of polar bears live. Between 1979 and 2014, they found that the spring melt occurred about 3.5 weeks earlier on average, while the freeze-up in fall started about 3.5 weeks later.

That means about seven fewer weeks of good ice conditions for bears.

If the trends continue, the bears could lose another six to seven weeks by the middle of this century, Stern said.

Few species are so closely tied to ice as the white bears. Sea ice is the platform from which polar bears hunt for seals, their principal food. They travel via ice, and find mates there.

If the ice forms later or breaks up earlier, you have a reduced time period when bears are out on the ice doing all these critical things, said Laidre, who has spent 16 years studying Arctic mammals and seven years trapping, tracking and monitoring polar bears, most recently in eastern Greenland.

12 inches

The absence of ice in early spring, when females and their cubs emerge from their dens, can be particularly perilous. Those females havent eaten since the previous fall, Laidre said.

Many polar-bear populations live in parts of the Arctic where its normal for ice to melt in summer. Theyre adapted to spending some time on land, where they fast or scavenge for low-nutrient foods, like birds, eggs and animal carcasses.

But if two hungry months are stretched to three because ice is slow to freeze, the animals could be pushed beyond their survival limit, Stern said.

Other bears follow the ice throughout the summer as it melts and retreats toward the North Pole. But even for those animals, pickings are slim because fewer seals live in the deeper water, Laidre explained.

Scientists are documenting impacts of shrinking sea ice on polar bears in some areas, said Eric Regehr, an Alaska-based polar-bear biologist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service who was not involved in the UW analysis.

In the Hudson Bay area of northern Canada, polar bear populations have declined overall, and survival of young bears is lower when sea ice melts earlier. In the Beaufort Sea, which borders Alaska and Canada, loss of sea ice is correlated with thinner bears and lower survival.

In Greenland, where Laidre works, hunters also report thinner bears and more animals spending time on land in the summer.

But in other areas, like the Chuckchi sea off Alaskas northern coast, populations and individual bears still appear to be healthy, Regehr said.

In the here-and-now, loss of ice is having negative effects in some places, but not in others, he said.  And in many places, we just dont know because we dont have good information.

23 inches

Over the long term, the outlook remains grim, Regehr added. Sea-ice loss due to climate change is the number-one threat to polar bears.

The UW analysis, which will be repeated every year, gives biologists a powerful new tool to track the changes in sea ice that have the biggest impact on polar bears, he said. It allows us to compare across the Arctic and identify the area where the changes have been greatest.

Data from the project, which was funded by NASA and the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources, is also being used by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature  the organization that evaluates the status of species worldwide.
Heres something to say cheers to: Now when you open a bottle of Mirror Pond Pale Ale, know the Port of Longview could have had hand in its making.

Longshoremen at the port this week unloaded six 23-ton brewing tanks bound for the popular Deschutes Brewery in Bend, Ore.

Crews used a mobile harbor crane to move the tanks into the ports laydown yard, where the tanks were stored for two days. On Friday, the tanks will be loaded onto special trailers and trucked to Bend, making their final leg on their journey from Port of Antwerp, Belgium.

This operation fully utilized all the cargo handling benefits the Port has to offer, said Laurie Nelson-Cooley, port business development manager, in a prepared statement. Our facilities, equipment and experienced workforce make the Port of Longview an ideal location for handling project cargo such as this.

Each tank measures 52 feet tall and 14 feet wide and holds 30,000 gallons of liquid  enough to make about 320,000 12-ounce bottles of beer.

The tanks were custom-designed for Deschutes Brewery in Germany by Ziemann Group. Each tank is equipped with 10 instruments that allow brewers to control temperature, pressure and other variables. Those are tracked with software to fine tune our process, improving our quality and consistency across all of our brands, a Deschutes company spokesperson said in an email.

The fermenting tanks will used to make the company s primary brands, including Mirror Pond Pale Ale, Black Butte Porter, Fresh Squeezed, Pinedrops IPA, Armory XPA, and Inversion IPA as well as few seasonal brands.

Since its founding in 1988, Deschutes Brewery has been a major leader in the burgeoning craft beer industry. It now ships beer to 28 states and recently announced plans to open its first east coast brewing facility in Roanoke, Va.
After years of planning, the state Department of Ecology Thursday adopted a landmark rule to curb emissions of gases that cause global climate change.

At least four entities in Cowlitz County must invest millions of dollars to comply: Cowlitz Countys Headquarters landfill and Puget Sound Energys Mint Farm generating station in Longview must comply next year. Pulp and paper mills owned by KapStone Paper and Packaging Corp. and Nippon Dyanwave (formerly Weyerhaeuser) must comply by 2020.

We act on climate because the science is clear: carbon pollution is damaging our oceans, its damaging our forests, its damaging our economy, our health and our quality of life, Maia Bellon, director of Department of Ecology, at a Seattle press conference.

Weve witnessed increased risk of wildfires. Weve suffered through drought and weve seen reduced snowpack threaten our water supplies for our fish, for our crops, for our power generation and for our people, she added.

Ecology called it the first-of-its-kind rule in the nation, after the legislature failed to adopt Gov. Inslees proposed cap and trade plan.

Under the new plan, sites emitting more than 100,000 metric tons of greenhouse gases annually must reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 1.7 percent annually until they meet complex reduction targets. As an alternative, companies can purchase credits from other businesses or contribute to projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Some businesses not currently covered by the rule may become subject to it in the future as Ecology as regulations tighten.

The rule could cost Washington businesses $410 million to $6.9 billion over the next 20 years, Ecology estimates. However, the rules would have $9.6 billion in social benefits from improved environmental conditions, the agency said.

But Don Olson, Cowlitz County solid waste manager, said the new rule is like a new tax on waste facilities.

Its a sad day for anybody that pays a garbage bill in the state of Washington because youre going to see your garbage bill go up anywhere from 3 to 7.5 percent annually, Olson said.

Complying with the new rule could cost Cowlitz County $80 million between 2017 and 2035, according to county estimates.

Decaying waste in landfills emit methane gas. The county recently invested $1 million for a new collection system to capture methane and burn it off to convert it to carbon dioxide, a less potent greenhouse gas. Olson said it will be difficult to further reduce methane emissions, so the county may have to buy credits to comply.

Ecology argues there are further reductions waste facilities can make, such as capturing methane and selling it as a product, said Neil Caudill, greenhouse gas reporting specialist.

Chris McCabe, executive director of the Northwest Pulp and Paper Association, also said its too early to comment on the final rules. However, earlier drafts were woefully inadequate for addressing concerns of pulp and paper companies. McCabe said regulations could hit pulp mills with a double whammy: paying to comply with burning natural gas on site and increased costs for electricity rates.

Industries affected by international trade say the rule will put them at an unfair disadvantage against global competitors. In response to those concerns, Ecology revised the draft rule in June to offer more leniency to energy dependent, trade-exposed industries. Those facilities, such as paper mills, aluminum smelters and cement kilns, have three additional years to comply.

All companies and agencies will get credit for investments made in the past to become more energy efficient and reduce greenhouse gas emissionssuch as KapStones biomass energy plant.
A Kelso man was found dead in an early Friday house fire in the Butler Acres neighborhood.

Firefighters found the body Robert Earle Sieglitz, 45, after they were called to a home at 2410 Burcham Street at 2:51 a.m.

Sieglitzs ex-wife, Delilah A. Wolfe, and three dogs escaped the fire.

Responding crews found heavy smoke and flames coming from the rear of the two-story home and called for more help, according to a Cowlitz 2 Fire & Rescue press release.

When Wolfe, who owns the home, told firefighters someone was still inside, firefighters entered the burning structure and found Sieglitz in the basement, where he had been living after he and Wolfe divorced.

Sieglitzs body has been removed by the Cowlitz County Coroners Office.

Wolfe, in her early 40s, said she was awake and waiting for a carpool ride to work when she heard a smoke alarm activate. She silenced the alarm and went downstairs to check on Sieglitz and found heavy smoke in the basement.

She tried to alert him through the wall, but she was overcome by smoke and exited the home, according to Cowlitz 2.

Wolfe said she spoke with Sieglitz shortly before the fire broke out; he then went back to his room, Cowlitz 2 spokesman Bryan Ditterick said.

Wolfe was taken to St. Johns Medical Center for smoke inhalation.

Sieglitz is a known smoker and had cooking equipment in his room, but the cause of the fire remained undetermined by midmorning, Ditterick said.

The home, valued at $162,000, is a total loss, according to fire officials. No other injuries were reported.

Crews from Cowlitz 2 Fire & Rescue, Longview Fire, Cowlitz Fire District 6 from Castle Rock, Kalamas Cowlitz Fire District 5 and Clark County Fire & Rescue in Woodland responded to the fire.
An Indian-origin and American-based scientists from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have bagged the prestigious US awards for his ground-breaking innovations. The India-based scientists Ramesh Raskar, who originally belongs to Nasik has been recompensed with worth $500,000 LemelsonMIT Prize 2016 for his progressive works to enhance lives globally.

On Tuesday, at Cambridge in Massach usetts, Ramesh has been honored with the prestigious LemelsonMIT Prize which worth $500, 000. Alongside him, Dinesh Bharadia, a scientist from Kolhapur, also has packed away another exalted recompense of the Paul Baran Young Scholar Award of the Marconi Society.

Nasik-born Ramesh Raskar aged 46, is the originator of the Camera Culture research group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Media Lab and works as an Associate Professor of Media Arts and Science. He is the co-inventor of radical imaging technology, including Femto-photography, which is the low-cost eye-care solutions for the developing world, and a camera that permits clients to peruse pages of a book without opening the spread. Femto-photography is an ultra-quick imaging framework that can see around corners.

In the event of winning the award, Ramesh said, Everyone has the power to solve problems and through peer-to-peer co-invention and purposeful collaboration, we can solve problems that will impact billions of lives.

On the other hand, Dinesh Bharadia, 28 years old researcher at MIT, has been awarded the esteemed 2016 Marconi Society Paul Baran Young Scholar Award, for his innovation of full duplex radios. The research of Bharadia refuted a long-held assumption that it is unrealistic for a radio to get and transmit on the same recurrence band due to the obstruction that outcomes.

Marconi young scholar award won by Dinesh worth $4,000 (Rs. 2,67,870) which is equal to the amount of the Nobel Prize in science and technology field.
The growth of the web technology has witnessed a significant growth in last few decades, while the entire world has dominated by its phenomena. According to a recently published press release, India is listed to be the second largest market for internet, following China.

A recently released report by the UN Broadband Commission for Sustainable Development has announced top six nations from all around the world that has given the growth of the internet the best accommodation. While China in the list is placed on the crown position, India surpassing the US has acquired the No. 2 rank on the list.

India with 333 million internet users has outdone the United States to become the second biggest Internet market in the world. On the other hand, China with 721 million internet users is leading the lineup. All the six nations, according to the statement accounted for experiencing the most significant growth in the web technology, while 55% of the total global population is still away from the internet.

According to the estimation, around 3.9 billion people are residing far away from the Internet among which total 55% belong to China, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nigeria. Apart from being worlds no. 2 internet market, India also recently has surpassed the US to become the second-largest smartphone market in the globe. India with an anticipated 260 million mobile broadband subscriptions has snatched the rank of second largest smartphone maker in the world.

Among other divisions, South Korea with 98.8% is kept on dominating the top position as worlds highest domestic internet access, while others like Qatar with 96% and the United Arab Emirates with 95% are following it.

During the release of Internet Trends Report 2016 at the Code Conference in California, the leading venture capitalist, and forecaster Mary Meeker reported that the rate of smartphone use and shipment have sluggish in India.
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The world's major central banks, stung by this year's $81-million heist in Bangladesh, have launched a task force to consider setting broad rules to protect the vast network of cross-border banking from cyber attacks, according to two sources with knowledge of the matter. The committee of central banks, part of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) in Basel, Switzerland, set up the task force this summer. It has begun gathering information from members on their protections against fraud, said the sources, who requested anonymity because work had just begun.

The task force could ultimately set cyber security standards around inter-bank transfers that may be adopted globally. The new principles or guidance could cover responsibilities of banks that send and receive money transfers, and networks like SWIFT that transmit payment instructions in correspondent banking. The task force also aims to consider recommending the steps each player should follow if a central bank falls short of protecting its systems from hackers, what role domestic regulators should play, and how to respond if another breach happens, the sources said.

"It's in its formative stages," said one of the sources. "It's what needs to happen ... but it's not a fast process." The other source said a focus of the task force will be identifying where the "breakdowns" are hidden in correspondent banking. The BIS, which oversees the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures (CPMI) that launched the effort, declined to comment. The sources said the attempted theft of nearly $1 billion from Bangladesh Bank's account at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, as well as other cyber attacks that since came to light, helped spur the committee of central banks.

In early February, hackers breached the Bangladesh central bank's systems and peppered the Fed with payment requests via the SWIFT global money-transfer network. Some requests were filled, amounting to $81 million that disappeared mostly into Philippines casinos. A Reuters investigation found the theft happened amid missed warning signs and miscommunication between the New York Fed and Bangladesh Bank.

After months of international finger-pointing, central banks and police investigators now appear to be cooperating to try to recover the funds, find the culprits, and strengthen a banking system found to be vulnerable. The National Bank of Belgium, which directly oversees SWIFT, or the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, has a leading role in the task force, one of the sources said.

Belgium's central bank, the New York Fed and SWIFT each declined to comment. The New York Fed, which is taking part in the task force, said in June it was talking with other central banks about cyber security and the structure of global payments. The task force would have representatives from some of the most influential 25 central banks that make up the BIS payments committee, including the Bank of Japan, the European Central Bank, the People's Bank of China, and the Fed. However it was unclear who was tapped to serve.

The committee, which promotes the safety and efficiency of payment, settlement and related inter-bank financial arrangements, could open a consultation process and seek advice from interested parties as early as this year, one source said. It could take another couple of years before anything is formalised.

Reuters
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China-based internet company Baidu has received a permit to test its self-driving cars in California from the state's Department of Motor Vehicles, as the race to introduce driverless automobiles accelerates. Baidu, which unveiled its autonomous vehicle in China last December and has been steadily increasing its investments and partnerships in the sector, has already tested on Chinese roads and highways.

California is seen as a crucial testing ground for autonomous vehicles due to technological innovations being developed in Silicon Valley, where many car companies and start-ups operate research labs to develop self-driving technology. Baidu said it would begin testing in California "very soon."

"Being able to do road tests will greatly accelerate our progress," Jing Wang, general manager of Baidu's autonomous driving unit, said in a statement. In April, Baidu opened an office in Silicon Valley and said it plans to have over 100 researchers and engineers working there by year's end. With its California DMV permit, Baidu becomes the 15th company to receive approval from the state. Others with the permit include traditional automakers such as Volkswagen and Ford Motor Co, as well as technology firms including Alphabet's Google, and Chinese electric vehicle start-up Faraday Future.

In August, both Baidu and Ford jointly invested $150 million in Velodyne, a Silicon Valley maker of laser-based sensors that are a key building block for self-driving cars. A flurry of well-funded Chinese tech firms, including Alibaba, have poured money and resources into the automotive sector, with many launching new electric car start-ups, some of them based in California. Faraday Future was awarded approval to test its cars in California in June.

Reuters
tech2 News Staff

In the past few years, the way we connect, communicate and lookup for what's happening around in the world has changed. Social media has come to the forefront, and taken the centrestage in our lives. Looking up for something online is no more simply 'Googling it'. Micro-blogging site, Twitter, has always played an exceptional role when it comes to times of uncertainties. During the Munich shooting, we saw how Twitteratti opened their doors (and hearts) to help those in need.

During the most recent unrest in Bangalore, apart from the 15,000 Bangalore policemen to have been deployed to handle miscreants, we also saw them using social media to alert and guide users. The official Bangalore Police Twitter handle @BlrCityPolice ensured prompt replies to the residents of India's IT city.

A report in The Hindu points out, that Bangalore put in place a 14-member social media team that was quick with one-on-one responses in the 48-hour period of unrest and uncertainty that started Monday. They have been dealing with anxious citizens assuring and reassuring them. They have been sending out alerts and emergency contact details, along with asking citizens to not pay heed to rumours.

https://twitter.com/BlrCityPolice/status/776270817248161792

The news report said, citing constable Lokesh. H.M, over 1,000 tweets were sent out and these included responses as well as announcements. Further, the team has been given a room with a television projecting these tweets, as well as computers are available to monitor the tweets. The social media is led by M.G. Nagendra Kumar, Deputy Commissioner, Command Centre, according to the report. However, it's not just Twitter, the team also received queries on WhatsApp and Facebook.

https://twitter.com/BlrCityPolice/status/776300904056139776

https://twitter.com/CoorgRocker/status/776317028395126785

The social media team reportedly gets about 100 queries across social media on an ordinary day, but during the past few days, the queries have increased by manifold, and for obvious reasons, to 5000/day. Reportedly, they received about 4000 WhatsApp queries. Also, the number of followers on social media are also said to have increased.
tech2 News Staff

Google has released the final version of its new Angular 2.0, the JavaScript-based open source web application framework.

"Angular 1 first solved the problem of how to develop for an emerging web. Six years later, the challenges faced by todays application developers, and the sophistication of the devices that applications must support, have both changed immensely. With this release, and its more capable versions of the Router, Forms, and other core APIs, today you can build amazing apps for any platform. If you prefer your own approach, Angular is also modular and flexible, so you can use your favorite third-party library or write your own," the company writes in a blogpost.

Google had first announced Angular in 2010, and then the Angular 2 was unveiled in 2014. Angular 2 was a complete rewrite and not just an update. After a series of previews and beta releases, the company is now officially releasing the final version of Angular 2.0.

Today, app developers have a wider gamut of choices when it comes to Javascript frameworks such as Facebook's React framework, among others. Techcrunch points out, "Facebooks React framework especially has a lot of momentum behind it, though, to be fair, the two projects have slightly different styles (Angular is a far more opinionated framework, for example) and strengths (React Native makes it easy to build native apps, for example). But given that Google doesnt give developers who built applications with Angular 1.x an easy upgrade path, many of them are now looking at which technology to use next."

Angular 2.0 brings in a host of new features such as improved support for browsers, core functionality moved into modules making it easier for third-party libraries, and so on. The team also recommends developers to use TypScript to write apps, offers more guides to help learn Angular 2.0. You can read the details here.
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Indonesia's tax office will investigate Alphabet Inc's Google for suspected unpaid taxes from billions of dollars worth of advertising revenue, a senior finance ministry official said on Thursday. Muhammad Hanif, head of the specials cases branch in the tax office, said Google's refusal to cooperate after it was sent a letter in April requesting to be allowed to examine the company's tax reports had raised suspicions.

He told a news conference that the probe would not be launched until the end of the month at the earliest. PT Google Indonesia, incorporated in 2011, said it was complying with the government. "We continue to cooperate fully with local authorities and pay all applicable taxes," a Google Indonesia spokesman said in an emailed response to questions.

The government had also asked to examine the tax reports of the Indonesian offices of three other U.S. Internet-based companies - Yahoo, Twitter and Facebook. Those three companies have complied, officials said. Yahoo and Google have formed Indonesian limited liability companies, while Twitter and Facebook operate branches of their Asia-Pacific offices in Indonesia.

The government believes these companies owe income and value added tax on billions of dollars of revenue they generate from advertising in Indonesia, the tax office said. Hanif said Google's Indonesian entity was only allocated around 4 percent of the total revenues generated from the country, and it was this amount that was taxed, which he described as too small and "unfair".

The communications ministry had estimated the value of digital advertising in Indonesia at about $800 million last year. The ministry said all of it was untaxed. There was no immediate explanation for the wide discrepancy of the two agencies' estimates for digital advertising revenue. Indonesia is facing a sizeable revenue shortfall this year as the resource-rich country can no longer rely on commodity-related income.

In a separate development, the tax office said it is checking whether Ford Motor Co had avoided paying appropriate taxes, after a local newspaper reported that the U.S. car maker modified imported Everest model vehicles sold in Indonesia to pay a lower tax rate. If the car maker is proven to have caused state losses, it may have to pay back taxes of up to four times the amount it owed, according to Indonesian law.

"We have always strictly complied with all Indonesia government regulations and policy, including all import-related tax and customs requirements, related to each of our Ford vehicles officially marketed and sold in the country," a Ford spokesman said. Ford announced in January it is closing all operations in Southeast Asia's biggest economy, where it held less than a 1 percent market share.

Reuters
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Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd said on Thursday it was collaborating with Intel Corp to develop a wearable technology platform to track the progression of disease in patients with Huntington's, a fatal degenerative disorder. The inherited condition causes the progressive breakdown of nerve cells in the brain, resulting in a gradual decline in motor control, cognition and mental stability.

There are no approved drugs to alter the course of Huntington's, although there are medicines that help with symptoms. Patients typically succumb to the disease within 1525 years of diagnosis. Teva, with Intel, will deploy the technology as part of an ongoing mid-stage Huntington's study, the Israeli company said on Thursday. Patients will use a smartphone and wear a smartwatch equipped with sensing technology that will continuously measure functioning and movement.

The data from the devices will then be wirelessly streamed to a cloud-based platform, developed by Intel, that will translate it, in near real-time, into scores to assess motor symptom severity. The line between pharmaceuticals and technology is blurring as companies join forces to tackle chronic diseases using high-tech devices that combine biology, software and hardware.

Accurate monitoring using wearables is expected to dovetail with a drive to offer so-called value-based healthcare. The aim is to prove that medicines can keep large groups of patients healthy, thereby improving their appeal to cost-conscious insurers. That gives drugmakers a major incentive to offer services that go beyond routine drug prescriptions.

Businesses such as Apple, Samsung Electronics and Alphabet, are all trying to find health-related applications for a new wave of wearable products. Earlier this month, Sanofi and Verily, the life sciences unit of Google parent Alphabet Inc, announced a joint venture combining devices with services to improve diabetes care. In August, GlaxoSmithKline and Verily created a new company focused on fighting diseases by targeting electrical signals in the body, a novel field of medicine called bioelectronics.

Verily is also working on development of a smart contact lens in partnership with Swiss drugmaker Novartis that has an embedded glucose sensor to help monitor diabetes. Sanofi also has a diabetes deal with Alphabet, while Biogen is working with the tech giant to study the progression of multiple sclerosis. Teva, last year, announced it would partner with IBM's Watson Health.

Reuters
tech2 News Staff

Lenovo along with its Moto brand has kicked off a new campaign called 'Skip the Sevens'. Now, there are no brownie points to what the company is trying to convey. It is taking a dig at the big guns  Apple iPhone 7, Samsung Galaxy Note 7 and S7.

The company with its full-page advertisement is directly pointing at Moto Z and Moto Mod and asking Samsung and Apple users to look at where the innovation is rather than at incremental product improvements. Well, that's not all, Lenovo has also put out a video showing the blind brand loyalty by users over choosing innovative products.

Interestingly, Lenovo isn't the first company to do so. We've already seen LeEco and OnePlus tweet out from their official handle to take a dig at the missing headphone jack and how it's nothing novel or rocket science!

https://twitter.com/LeEcoIndia/status/773540995824775168

https://twitter.com/oneplus/status/773590144234377216

Recently, LeEco's ad took a potshot at Apple and ridiculed it for tiny iPhone 7 Plus battery.

Microsoft had also mocked Apple recently, and we wouldn't blame it, for it's the latter's iPad pro advertisement that was targeted. And, these aren't really the first ones to do so. This has been going on for years now. And, as more companies join the smartphone battle, one can expect more of such potshots. Last year we saw Dell, Lenovo and Asus hit back at Apple for its Macbook line.

https://twitter.com/ASUSUSA/status/575729155494404096

And, Samsung was once again leading the pack when it came to mocking arch-rival Apple. We've seen Samsung take a dig at Apple's queues, battery and even had some hilarious 'genius' ads out. And, there is no denying that Samsung has also faced a fair share of mockery.

During Apple-Samsung patent wars back then, Samsung had claimed that Apples marketing chief Phil Schiller went crazy after Samsung launched its Next Big Thing advertising series. The campaign often showed people standing in line to buy the iPhone and took potshots at Apple fans.
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Reliance Jio has sought the industry watchdog's intervention over the three main telecom operators -- Airtel, Vodafone and Idea -- refusing to allow porting of their subscribers to its network, in an alleged disregard to licensing norms. "Reliance Jio Infocomm, vide letters dated September 2, 2016, sent individually to Bharti Airtel, Idea and Vodafone, who are the incumbent dominant operators, informing them that Reliance Jio would be commencing its services from September 5," the company said in its letter.

"In spite of being under legal and contractual obligation to port the numbers after a valid request is made, the incumbent dominant operators have rejected all the requests made for porting between Sep 5 to Sep 12," said the letter to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI). The letter said against 201 total requests made to the three operators -- to Airtel the most, followed by Idea and then Vodafone -- 161 of them have violated the contractual obligations and eight were subject to wrong coding, among other issues.

None were successfully completed, it said, and elaborated upon the portability regulations. IANS sent queries to all the three operators. Vodafone and Idea did not respond. Airtel's spokesperson said in a one-line written response that the company was processing all porting requests as per guidelines. "Please note that these rejections are in addition to the rejection of mobile number portability request of 4,919 corporate mobile numbers issued to employees and members of Reliance Industries Group by Bharti Airtel in August 2016," the Reliance Jio letter said.

"Reliance Jio sincerely requests that the TRAI take serious cognizance of this complaint and intervene by taking strict action against incumbent dominant operators under the relevant provisions of the mobile number portability regulations and the unified licence," it said. The letter comes just as the incumbent operators and Reliance Jio appeared to be in the process of settling their differences over providing enough points of inter-connect for calls from the latter's network to go through to their own subscribers.

IANS

Disclaimer: Reliance Industries owns Network18 which also publishes Firstpost.com (tech2).
tech2 News Staff

The last couple of weeks haven't gone well for Samsung or its Galaxy Note 7 owners, and by now, the whole battery issue that leads to exploding devices, fires and even damaged property has put the company's reputation at stake.

As the reports started flooding in, Samsung was forced to issue a recall of all Galaxy Note 7 devices. The recall will reportedly cost Samsung in excess of $1 billion.

Ever since the company announced the recall, asking consumers to return their devices, there has been some confusion over what, when and how. Samsung "voluntarily" issues a recall, but failing to go through regulatory procedure added to the confusion.

Finally, the US government officially recalled the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 smartphones, but by then there were dozens of reported cases in which batteries exploded or caught fire. Consumers should immediately stop using and power down the recalled Galaxy Note 7 devices purchased before September 15, 2016,  the official notice reads. The report also brings to light the fact that Samsung has received 92 reports of batteries overheating in the US, which includes 26 reports of burns, 55 reports of property damage, including fires in cars and a garage.

Samsung claims to be taking all measures to ensure such incidents don't take place again. A ZDNet report claims that Samsung plans to change the colour of the battery indicators in the newly produced Note 7 devices to help consumers differentiate older devices from newer ones. The battery indicator of the new devices, shown on the homescreen top right corner, will be green, instead of the white seen in faulty units.

A Re/code report cites a Samsung official who claims the recall with begin no later than 21 September. In another report, Samsung is said to be providing the new units of the phablet to local distributors and stores in South Korea starting Monday, 19 September.

Meanwhile, here's a timeline of the events:

2 August, 2016

Samsung launched the Galaxy Note 7 at the high profile Unpacked event. The highlight of the device was the dual curved display, iris scanner and that it was water resistant, including the S Pen.

3 August, 2016

The Samsung Galaxy Note 7 was made available for pre-order in the US.

11 August, 2016

The Galaxy Note 7 was launched in India at Rs 59,900.

19 August, 2016

The device went on sale in the US, both via online and offline channels.

25 August, 2016

The first incident of the Galaxy Note 7 explosion came to light. The device caught fire and exploded while on charging. The incident took place in China.

29 August, 2016

The Galaxy Note 7 was officially launched in China. But, some were disappointed to see only the 4GB variant, while the 6GB variant was given a miss.

2, September, 2016

By now, there were about 35 reported cases. Samsung acknowledged the problem, and announced a recall program. The company blamed the affected batteries. It said to have started conducting a thorough inspection with suppliers to identify possible affected batteries in the market. However, the company said it didnt want to take any chances, and stopped sales of the device to immediate effect. The company also announced that all devices would be replaced. Sales stopped in China.

5 September, 2016

Samsung Electronics Australia advises all customers who use a Galaxy Note 7 smartphone to power down their device, return it to its place of purchase and use an alternative device until a remedy can be provided.

Soon there were reports claiming how its the largest recall in the history.

7 September, 2016

An Australian man was left with burns when his Samsung smartphone exploded as he slept in his hotel room. Tham Hua, from Victoria state who was visiting Western Australia, said his Samsung Galaxy Note 7 exploded in his hotel room, bursting into flames. By now, it was believed that Samsung is recalling and replacing up to 2.5 million Note 7 devices, with nearly $1 billion dollar cost to the company. And, soon there were reports that the device was being banned US flights.

8 September, 2016

Three Australian airlines banned passengers from using or charging Samsung Electronics Galaxy Note 7 smartphones during flights due to concerns over the phones fire-prone batteries. Qantas, its budget unit Jetstar and Virgin Australia said they had not been directed to ban the use of the phone by aviation authorities, but did so as a precaution following Samsungs recall of the phones in 10 markets.

9 September, 2016

The US Consumer Product Safety Commission released an official statement warning users about the defective Galaxy Note 7 Lithium-Ion batteries and how dangerous they can be.

On the same day, Samsung also penned down in a blog post, urging users to power down their Galaxy Note 7 and exchange them as soon as possible. The company said they are expediting replacement devices so that they can be provided through the exchange program as conveniently as possible and in compliance with related regulations. Samsung took to explaining whats causing the issue.

US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) banned the use of galaxy Note 7s in flights. Hours after the announcement, DGCA issued a warning and banned the use of Samsung Galaxy Note 7 on flights.

In light of the recent incidents involving battery incidents with Samsung about its Galaxy Note 7 devices globally, traveling public and airlines are advised not to switch on these mobiles during the flight or stow them in any checked in baggage, issued DGCA order read.

10 September, 2016

Samsung Electronics started urging users of its Galaxy Note 7 phones to turn in their handsets as soon as possible as part of a recall.

11 September, 2016

Another incident, and this time, a 6-year old boy in New York had to be rushed to the hospital as the device exploded in his hands.

12 September, 2016

Reports claimed Samsung Electronics will only use batteries made by Chinas ATL for its replacement devices. The Chinese company is set to become the sole battery supplier for Samsung by shipments for the time being since the company stopped receiving batteries from its main provider and has not found a third supplier. Reportedly, Samsung used to get 70 percent of its batteries from its subsidiary while 30 percent was from ATL for Galaxy Note 7 devices.

Samsung Electronics Co Ltds shares fell to their lowest level in nearly two months after the recall announcement. More airlines across the world banned customers from carrying the devices.

13 September, 2016

Meanwhile, Samsung has planned to push an OTA that will limit Note 7 charging to 60 percent. A South Korean newspaper, carried a Samsung advertisement announcing the software update for any users of the Note 7 who may be disregarding its recall notice and continuing to use the smartphone.

14 September, 2016

In another incident, a car caught fire and the driver alleged that the exploding Samsung Galaxy Note 7 caused for the havoc.

15 September, 2016

US officially recalls Samsung Galaxy Note 7. The replacements are said to begin no later than 21 September. The new units will come with a green battery level to indicate they've been replaced.
Gionee signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Haryana Government to set up its first manufacturing unit in Faridabad, Haryana with an initial investment of INR 500 cr. The manufacturing unit will be set up over an area of around 50 acres in Faridabad and will provide employment to over 28,000 people in the next three years. The capacity of the facility will be close to 30million units and Gionee plans to manufacture around six lakh mobiles per month from this facility and use it as an export hub in future.

The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed by Chairman, Gionee Mobiles, Mr. Liu Lirong and Haryana State Industrial and Infrastructure Development Corporation (HSIIDC) in the presence of Chief Minister Shri ManoharLalKhattar and state industries minister Shri Vipul Goel.

On signing the MoU, Chairman, Gionee Mobiles Mr. Liu Lirong said, India is one of our most important markets, and Gionee has been seeing exponential growth here, which will only increase rapidly as time progresses. Added to it, are factors such as great government policies, availability of skilled manpower and infrastructure support that Haryana provides. Hence we are confident that our investments and efforts are being made in the right direction.

Gioneehad entered the Indian market in 2013 and had already reached a turnover of Rs 3250 cr by end of 2015. The company plans to almost triple its turnover by end of 2016.

Commenting on the development, Mr. Arvind Vohra, Country CEO & MD, Gionee India said, Keeping in line with our Make in India initiatives, we have taken it a step further from having two facilities to setting up our own manufacturing unit in India. This unit will help us achieve the inventory levels required to take Gionee to the next level of growth. It is a dream project for us, and our aim is to not justset-up a factory, but an entire modern township around it, for our employees. We are thankful to the Haryana government for giving us the opportunity to give shape to our endevours.

Gionee has already carved a niche for itself in the Indian smartphone market and has emerged as a serious contender to the top five smartphone players in the Indian mobile handset business. We will continue to bring in innovations in the smartphone category and shape the future of the market.

@Technuter.com News Service
4 RMG workers killed in Tangail road crash

UNB, Dhaka: Four people were killed and 20 others injured when a bus with a group of garment workers on board overturned on the Tangail-Mymensingh Road near Pouli bridge in

Kalihati upazila early Friday.



The deceased were identified as Asma Begum, 40, wife of Firoz,

Mominur Rahman, 40, son of Karim Uddin, Asadul Habib, 15, son of

Abbas Ali, and Ripon, 30, son of Siddik Ali-all hailing from Patgram

upazila in Lalmonirhat district.



Jahangir Alam, Elenga highway traffic sergeant, said the accident

took place around 4:15 am when a Gazipur-bound `Prabhati Banasree

Paribahan` bus carrying a group of garment factory workers skidded

off the road as its driver lost control over the wheels, leaving four

of them killed on the spot and 20 others injured.



They met the accident while going to their workplace in Shafipur

after hiring a bus from Patgram of Lalmonirhat.



The injured were rushed to Tangail Medical College Hospital.
15 lives lost in road accidents

UNB, Dhaka: Fifteen people were killed and 34 others injured in separate road accidents in Brahmanbaria, Tangail and Madaripur districts on Friday.

In Brahmanbaria, Eight people were killed and four others injured in a head-on collision between a bus and a microbus on Dhaka-Sylhet highway at Shosoi in Bijoynagar upazila on Friday.



Seven of the deceased were identified as Abdul Hannan, 58, Darud Miah, 56, Hadiur Rahman, 60, Ali Hossain, 12, Mukib Chowdhury, 65, Matiur Rahman and Sohag, hailed from Moulvibazar district.



Police said the Sylhet-bound bus of Ena Paribahan from Dhaka collided head-on with the microbus coming from the opposite direction, leaving eight passengers of the latter dead on the spot and four others injured.



The injured were rushed to a local hospital, said Humayun Kabir, in-charge of Hatihata highway police camp.



In Tangail, four people were killed and 20 others injured when a bus carrying a group of garment workers overturned on Tangail-Mymensingh Road near Pouli bridge in Kalihati upazila early Friday.



The deceased were identified as Asma Begum, 40, wife of Firoz, Mominur Rahman, 40, son of Karim Uddin, Asadul Habib, 15, son of Abbas Ali, and Ripon, 30, son of Siddik Ali-all hailing from Patgram upazila in Lalmonirhat district.



Jahangir Alam, Elenga highway traffic sergeant, said the accident took place around 4:15 am when the Gazipur-bound Prabhati Banasree Paribahan bus skidded off the road as its driver lost control over the steering, leaving four of them dead on the spot and 20 others injured.



They met the accident while going to their workplace in Shafipur hiring a bus from Patgram of Lalmonirhat.



The injured were rushed to Tangail Medical College Hospital.



In Madaripur, three people were killed and 10 others injured as a bus collided with a human hauler on Dhaka-Barisal highway in Boro Bridge area in Rajoir upazila on Friday.



The deceased were identified as human hauler driver Billah Hossain, 35, Belal Sheikh, 50, a resident of Sanerpar village in the upazila and Salauddin Kazi, 35, son of Moazzem Kazi of Sirkhara village in Sadar upazila.



Sub-inspector of Rajoir police staion Ramjan Hossain said the Dhaka-bound bus collided with the human hauler at noon, leaving Billal and Belal dead on the spot and 11 others injured.



Two critically injured passengers were rushed to Faridpur Medical College Hospital where Moazzem succumbed to his injuries.
Merkel, Hollande seek new EU `roadmap` at summit

French President Francois Hollande welcomes German Chancellor Angela Merkel for a working meeting.

AFP, Paris :

German Chancellor Angela Merkel called Thursday on EU leaders meeting this week without Britain to come up with a "realistic" plan for Europe that reflects the bloc's "concerns, hopes and desires."

Speaking ahead of a meeting with French President Francois Hollande in Paris, Merkel said security and prosperity should take centre stage at Friday's summit in the Slovakian capital Bratislava. Merkel said the current wave of jihadist violence and the mass influx of migrants demanded a common European approach.

"We must protect our external borders and we must provide a common response," she stressed, adding that Europe needed to address citizens' concerns in order to remain "a continent of hope".

Hollande said the summit aimed to agree a "roadmap" for Europe's post-Brexit future, including improved defence capabilities, greater investment in renewable energy and a new push on training and jobs for the continent's legions of jobless youth.

The Bratislava summit is intended to give the EU a new sense of purpose after the existential crisis triggered by Britain's shock referendum decision to quit the bloc.

Meanwhile, European Union leaders gathered in a centuries-old castle in the middle of their fractious continent Friday, hoping to find a sense of common purpose again in the face of the planned departure of Britain and fundamental disagreements over everything from uncontrolled migration to the economy.

The 27 leaders, minus British Prime Minister Theresa May, hope their daylong talks in the Slovak capital will provide the broad outlines of a new "Bratislava roadmap" that should lead to a new-look EU by next spring following the shock British referendum result in June.

Slovak Prime Minister and summit co-host Robert Fico said that "we all want to show unity and we all want to show that this is a unique project and we need to continue."

France and Germany have been the driving nations behind the EU since its inception over half a century ago and they are cooperating intensely to get the EU back on the rails ahead of a summit in the Italian capital next March, which will mark the 60th anniversary of the EU's founding Treaty of Rome.

With divisions rife among the 27 nations even now that Britain is on the way out, German Chancellor Angela Merkel acknowledged the task ahead was massive. "We are in a critical situation," she said.
Indian police arrest prominent Kashmiri rights activist

AP, Srinagar :

Police have arrested a prominent rights activist in India-held Kashmir a day after he was barred from leaving India to travel to Geneva to participate in a session of the United Nations' Human Rights Council, police and family members said Friday.

Police picked up Khurram Parvez from his home in the region's main city Srinagar late Thursday night.

A police officer, speaking on condition of anonymity, gave no details about the possible charges against Parvez. On Wednesday, immigration officials at New Delhi's international airport barred Parvez from boarding a plane to Geneva, even though he had a valid visa and letter of invitation from the UN body.

The arrest comes as the troubled Himalayan region has been hit by some of the most serious anti-India protests in recent years.

Triggered by the killing of a popular rebel leader two months ago, the protests have left more than 80 people dead and thousands wounded, mostly by government forces firing bullets and shotgun pellets to quell the demonstrations.
Snowden not a whistleblower, risked national security: US

The United States said that Edward Snowden is not a whistleblower as he put many lives at risk.

AP, Washington :

A House intelligence committee report issued Thursday condemned Edward Snowden, saying the National Security Agency leaker is not a whistleblower and that the vast majority of the documents he stole were defense secrets that had nothing to do with privacy.

The Republican-led committee released a three-page unclassified summary of its two-year bipartisan examination of how Snowden was able to remove more than 1.5 million classified documents from secure NSA networks, what the documents contained and the damage their removal caused to U.S. national security.

Snowden was an NSA contract employee when he took the documents and leaked them to journalists who revealed massive domestic surveillance programs begun in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. The programs collected the telephone metadata records of millions of Americans and examined emails from overseas. Snowden fled to Hong Kong, then Russia, to avoid prosecution and now wants a presidential pardon as a whistleblower. Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., chairman of the committee, said Snowden betrayed his colleagues and his country.

"He put our service members and the American people at risk after perceived slights by his superiors," Nunes said in a statement. "In light of his long list of exaggerations and outright fabrications detailed in this report, no one should take him at his word. I look forward to his eventual return to the United States, where he will face justice for his damaging crimes."

Snowden insists he has not shared the full cache of 1.5 million classified documents with anyone. However, the report notes that in June, the deputy chairman of the Russian parliament's defense and security committee publicly conceded that "Snowden did share intelligence" with his government.

Ben Wizner, Snowden's attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union, blasted the report, saying it was an attempt to discredit a "genuine American hero."
PATUAKHALI: About 4 kms of dam from Pashurbunia to Bura Jalia in Kalpara Upazila has been breached due to excess flow of water of Ramnabad River recently.
Joint work against money laundering

Economic Reporter :



Bangladesh Intelligence Unit of the central bank, Transfer Processing Cell of the National Board of Revenue and Criminal Investigative Department of Police will work in coordination to stop laundering of money.

The initiative has been taken in response to an advice from the International Monetary Fund, said Bangladesh Bank sources.

IMF and Bangladesh Bank officials recently held a meeting on the matter. IMF said the government would benefit from joint work of the three state-run organisations.

A recent international survey found the increase of money smuggling from Bangladesh and a large sum of the money were laundered under the guise of external trading through banking channels.
Buddhists celebrate Madhu Purnima

Chittagong Bureau :

Buddhists here have celebrated one of the significant festivals Madhu Punrima in the city and elsewhere in the district yesterday with traditional enthusiasm and solemn devotion.

Madhu Purnima, one of the scared festivals is celebrated on the day of the full moon in Bhadra, in commemoration of the service and support rendered by the animals of the Parilyeyo forest, India to Gautam Buddha.

Madhu Purnima announces the greatness of charity. While Buddha was observing his 10th barsabas (seclusion inside the hermitage) or monsoon rites in the Parilyeyo forest, an elephant and a monkey collected alms and gathered fruits for him. They also protected him from ferocious animals.

One day, the monkey brought a beehive, which Buddha accepted. In his joy at the Buddha's acceptance of his gift, the monkey started jumping from tree to tree and suffered a fatal fall. It was the day of the full moon in Bhadra. day was named Madhu Purnima or 'honey full-moon' to commemorate the gift of the monkey. Apart from celebrating the greatness of charity, the day is significant for its role in establishing unity among Buddhists.

The purnima was celebrated in all monasteries, respective offices of the religious organizations and educational institutions through day long programmes.

The day's programmes will herald with hoisting of the national and religious flags atop all monasteries in the dawn and chanting of the sacred verses from the Tripitaka.

Offering of honey , mass prayer, blood donation, sangadana, discussions, meditation course, panchashila, pradip puja are other highlights of the programmes.

In the city, the main religious congregations was held at Nandankanan Buddhist temple, Katalganj Nabapandit Vihar, Purnachar International Buddhists Monastery at Devpahar, Agrabad Mohashahan Moitri Vihar, Sarbajanina Bouddha Vihar at Momin road . In Nandankanon Buddhist temple, the chief priest Dr Ganasree Mohathero will lead the mass congregation.

To mark the day, local dailies brought out some articles while Bangladesh Betar and Bangladesh Television, Chittagong centres would also air special programmes highlighting importance of the festival.

Besides, special prayers seeking continued peace and progress of the nation as well as global peace offered in all monasteries.


Amended service rules shall not be applicable to the detriment of privileges existed at the relevant time

Surendra Kumar :

Sinha CJ

Hasan Foez Siddique J

Mirza Hussain

Haider J

Mohammad Bazlur

Rahman J

Bangladesh Bank, and another ............Appellants

vs

Sukamal Sinha Choudhury and another............. Respondents*

Judgment

February 23rd, 2016

Constitution of Bangladesh, 1972 Article 102(2)

Bank Company Act (XIV of 1991)

Section 45

The authority has every right to amend/ alter the service Rules to suit the need of the time and, as such, there is no illegality in preparing the circular with new terms and conditions but such new terms and conditions prepared by the authority shall not be applicable to the detriment or disadvantage to the privilege that existed at the relevant time when an employee of such appointing authority entered into its service. .. .... (10)

Bangladesh vs Md Azizur Rahaman, 46 DLR (AD) 19; Bakhrabad Gas System Limited vs Al Masud-ar-Noor, 66 DLR (AD) 187 ref.

M Amir-ul-Islam, Senior Advocate, instructed by Mahmuda Begum, Advocate-on-Record-For the Appellrl11ts.

Mahbub Ali, Senior Advocate (with AM Al1linuddi/'I, Senior Advocate) instructed by Chowdhury Md Zahangir, Advocate-on-Record-For the Respondents.

Judgment

Mirza Hussain Haider J : This appeal is directed against the judgment and order dated 2-6-2010, passed by High Court Division in Writ Petition No. 530 of 2009 making the Rule absolute.

2. The present respondent No.1 filed the abovenoted writ petition impugning the Administrative Circular No. 10 dated 30-4-2005 issued by the respondent No. 3 making policy for promotion to the post of General Manager.

3. Facts leading to the filing of this appeal in short are that the respondent No. 1 herein (the writ petitioner) joined Bangladesh Bank as Statistical Officer on 14-2-1979 in the Specialized Department and subsequently was transferred to the General side as Assistant Director. Thereafter, he was promoted to the post of Deputy Director- on 31-8-1987, then to the post of Joint Director on 6-5-1991 and lastly to the post of Deputy General Manager on 9-3-1997. While functioning as such, he performed the functions of the General Manager on several occasions in the absence of the General Manager. It is stated that the Bangladesh Bank formulated criteria for promotion from the post of Class-1 Officers up to the post of Deputy General Manager in the. General side vide Administrative Circular No. 22 dated 26-121979 (Annexure-E ). Since there was no other separate criteria for promotion to the post of General Manager the custom and practice was to promote the senior Deputy General Manager to the said post of General Manager. As such, the writ petitioner became qualified for being considered for promotion to the post of General Manager since 2001 and he was enlisted in the panel for promotion to the said post. In 2003 the authority made a list for promotion in the vacant post of General Manager keeping the writ petitioner at serial No.3. After the senior most person was promoted to the next higher post he became number 2 in the list. In 2004 when the question of giving promotion to five vacant posts of the General Managers came, the respondent No.2 formulated some criteria, in respect of promotion to the post of General Manager at the 269th meeting of its Board of Directors held on 27th April, 2005 and circulated the same by the impugned circular No. 10 dated 30-4-2005, incorporating therein some new terms and conditions to the prejudice of the petitioner. Hence the writ petition was filed which, ultimately, upon hearing the parties, was made absolute by judgment and order dated 2-6-2010 holding that the impugned Circular No. 10, so far it relates to its retrospective effect, is liable to be declared to have been made not under any lawful authority of the Bangladesh Bank Order and, as such, void and as a whole not applicable to the writ petitioner's case'. In the impugned judgment the High Court Division also observed that 'the writ petitioner was eligible for promotion since 2001 and, as such, he is entitled to seniority over his juniors and also entitled to all financial benefits from the date he was first superseded by his Juniors'.

4. Being aggrieved by the said Judgment and order dated 2-6-2010 passed in Writ Petition No. 530 of 2009 the writ respondent No.2 and 3 moved the Appellate Division in Civil Petition for Leave to Appeal No. 58 of 2011 wherein, upon hearing the learned advocate for the leave petitioner, this Division by order dated 12-12-2011 granted leave in the instant appeal to consider:

"1. Whether "the High Court Division erred in law by declaring that "the impugned Circular (Circular No, 10) as far as it relates to its retrospective effect is liable to be declared to have been made not under any lawful authority for the BBO and void and as a whole not applicable to the petitioner's case without at all taking into consideration that Circular No. 10 came into effect on the date of its publication Le 30-4-2005 having no retrospective effect and was made applicable on 29-9-2009 to the present respondent and thus the impugned judgment is based on erroneous view both on question of law and on fact and that it would be illegal on the part of Bangladesh Bank if the writ petitioner was promoted under the so called practice as claimed on exclusive consideration of seniority and without applying the prevalent law at the relevant time since 30-4-2005."

5. And whether "the Circular No. 10 of 2005, a statutory instrument incorporating a merit -cum-seniority based promotion criteria, along with a transparent and objective evaluation process with a clearly defined criteria and marking system in the ACR plus educational qualification and length of service to be taken into account for appointment to the post of GM in Bangladesh Bank having been found by, the High Court Division inapplicable by treating the right to promotion of an employee being a vested right in the old evaluation system and further upholding private interest of employee (allowing an antedated promotion and seniority with financial benefits) is thus violative of established principle of jurisprudence developed by the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court laid down in Bangladesh vs Md Azizur Rahaman 46 DLR (AD) 19 with particular reference to paragraph 29 wherein the principle as laid down in various Indian Supreme Court cases were consolidated i.e. AIR 1986 SC 830; AIR 1987 SC 2348; AIR 1982 SC 917 adopted as part of Bangladesh Jurisprudence in respect of service Promotion Rules as enunciated in the judgment of the Appellate Division in the following terms:- "a new rule was introduced in Gujrat Subordinate Secretariat Services (Seniority) Rules. By the new rule prospect of promotion in future was prejudiced. Yet, it was held no grievance could be made of the new rules if they are made bonafide to meet exigencies of service. In VT Kanzode's case, an Administrative Circular of the Reserve Bank introduced common seniouity and provided for inter- group mobility among different grades of officers of Groups of I, II, III with retrospective effect. The circular was not violative of Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution and the Supreme Court in that connection made the following observations Private interest of employees of public undertaking cannot override public interest and an effort has to be made to harmonize the two considerations. No scheme governing service matter can be full (sic) proof and some sections or the other of employees is bound to feel aggrieved on the score of its expectation being falsified or remaining to be fulfilled" 46 DLR (AD) 19 paragrap-29"

6. Mr M Amirul Islam, the learned senior counsel, appearing on behalf of the appellants submits that the High Court Division has erred

in law in holding that the impugned Circular has retrospective effect and thereby declaring the said circular so, far it relates to retrospective effect, unlawful without taking into consideration that the impugned circular came into effect on the date of its publication i.e. on 30-4-2005 having, no retrospective effect and, as such, the same was made applicable to the writ petitioner. He also submits that since the impugned circular was prevailing several years before the promotion of the writ petitioner to the post of the General Manager the same would have been illegal if the writ petitioner was promoted on the basis of the said so called practice of seniority basis only. He further submits that the impugned circular has been made for the betterment and effective functioning of the authority containing therein the criteria for appointment and promotion to the post of General Manager as such, there is no illegality on the part of the respondents in making the. circular. He also submits that the promotion, posting of an employee is not a vested right and in the instant case, though the writ petitioner was eligible to be considered for promotion under the previous customs and practice but since in the meantime a statutory instrument bearing new criteria for promotion on the basis of meritcum-seniority came into effect the writ petitioner could not be considered for promotion to the post of General Manager, any more, under the previous customs and practice. He further submits that the said circular is not violative of any law or constitution and having no retrospective effect the same was not made applicable to the writ petitioner retrospectively. As such, the finding of the High Court Division that 'the said circular has a retrospective effect and the same has prejudiced the writ petitioner' is erroneous. Hence the impugned judgment and order should be set aside. In support of his submissions Mr Islam relied upon the decisions reported in 46 DLR (AD) 19, AIR 1986 (SC) 1830, AIR 1987 (SC) 2348, and AIR 1982 (SC) 917 and thereby prays for allowing the appeal.

7. On the other hand Mr AM Aminuddin, the learned Advocate appearing on behalf of the respondent (writ petitioner), referring to the decision in the case of Bakhrabad Gas System Limited vs Al Masud-or-Noor, reported in 66 DLR (AD) 187 submits that the authority (appellants) have every right to amend/alter Service Rules to suit the need of the time but not to the detriment or disadvantage to the rights or privileges that existed at the relevant time when an employee of such appointing authority entered into its service. He next submits that an employee shall definitely be entitled to the new service benefits if given or created by the new Rules, but no Rules can be framed or created to his disadvantage or detriment or to the denial of his accrued/vested right. Therefore, the writ petitioner (respondent No. I-herein) is entitled to get promotion as well as all other financial service benefits available under the administrative Circular No. 22 of 1979. He next submits that the respondent No.1 being in the penal of promotion to the post of General Manager since 2001 and he placed in Serial No.2 in 2004 and 2005 under the administrative Circular No. 22 of 1979 but he was dropped out from the said penal by the present appellant upon incorporating the impugned Circular No. 10 of 2005 which seriously affected the Respondent No.1 to the detriment or advantage of his service benefits and prejudiced by the newly incorporate circular. As such, the impugned circular No. 10/2005 is not applicable in respect of the present respondent No.1 rather he is entitled to get promotion under the administrative circular No. 22 of 1979. As such, the High Court Division did not commit any illegality in making the Rule absolute. He submits that it is true that promotion is not a matter of right but he has a right to be considered for promotion which is a condition of his service and Article 133 of the Constitution gives power to the

authority to regulate the appointment, seniority and service condition in respect of the anything relating to the service of the persons in the service of the Republic but it does not prohibit promotion beyond the provision of law i.e. administrative Circular No. 22 of 1979. He submits that the term "Regulate" is not complementary to the term "Prohibition", therefore, none of the provisions of the impugned Circular No. 10 of 2005 is to be read to impose prohibition on the promotion of the present respondent No.1 since a right has already accrued to him under Administrative Circular No. 22 of 1979. Lastly, he submits that the appellant herein, during the pendency of the Rule, gave an undertaking to the Court that 'if the writ petitioner succeeds in the writ petition it would make a supernumery post of General Manager for him and straight way give him promotion as per the order of the Court' and accordingly, while making the Rule absolute the Court observed that 'the writ respondent No.2 is barred by promissory estoppel from resiling from its undertaking and, as such, the said authority is legally obligated to fulfill its undertaking.' Thus he submits that the appellant herein instead of complying its undertaking have taken a different plea in this appeal which he is barred by estoppels.

8. Having heard the learned counsel of both the parties and having perused the materials on record it appears that the issue in this appeal is whether circular No. 10 of 2005 will be applicable to the detriment or disadvantage of the respondent herein in respect of promoting him to the post of General Manager or whether he will be governed by the administrative Circular No. 22 of 1979 which was prevailing at the time of selecting him in Serial No.2 of the list for promotion and thereby promote him to the post of General Manager and whether the decision referred to by Mr M Amirul Islam in 46 DLR (AD) 19 will be applicable or the decision referred to by Mr AM Aminuddin in 66 DLR (AD) 187 will be applicable.

9. Admittedly the present respondent joined the Bangladesh Bank on 12-4-1979 as a Statistical Officer in the Specialized Department of the said bank. Thereafter he was promoted to the post of Deputy Director in 1987 and then to the post of Joint Director in 1991 and lastly Deputy General Manager in 1997. It is also admitted that on various occasions, he performed the duties of the General Manager in the absence of the General Manager. When the respondent No.1 joined the Bangladesh Bank the administrative Circular No. 22 of 1979 (Annexure-E) was in force. It is also admitted that the Respondent No.1 herein was placed in Serial No.2 in the seniority list/panel prepared by, the authority on the basis of seniority cum merit in the year 2004-2005. When the post of General Manager fell vacant, the authority at the time of considering the case of the present respondent No.1, came up with some new criteria in respect of promotion to the post of General Manager at its 269th Board Meeting held on 27-4-2005 and the said decision of the Board of Directors along with new terms and conditions were circulated under the administrative Circular No. 10 dated 30-4-2005. Thereby did not consider the case of the respondent No.1 herein in respect of promoting him to the post of General Manager on the plea that he does not fit in within the ambit of the impugned circular No. 10 of 2005.

(To be continued)

10. The principle laid down in 66 DLR case clearly shows that the authority has every right to amend/ alter the service Rules to suit the need of the time and, as such, there is no illegality in preparing the impugned circular with new terms and conditions but such new terms and conditions prepared by the authority shall not be applicable to the detriment or disadvantage to the privilege that existed at the relevant time when an employee of such appointing authority entered into its service. Here in his case, the present respondent claims that after joining the service of the Bangladesh Bank in 1979 and having been promoted to the next higher post a right has accrued to the respondent herein to be considered for promotion to the post of General Manager as Clause Vr J of Circular No. 22 on 1979 Provides that 'a panel would be prepared once a year based on qualification, standard and length of service as on 31st August each year and would be operative as from the 1st September', that is the panel is to be prepared on seniority cum merit basis.

11. On the other hand Circular No. 10 of 2005 has incorporated the basis for promotion on merit then the seniority without creating any reasonable classification between the prospective promotees in respect of their seniority; meaning the time spent in service has no value and thereby counting the merit only will automatically indulge the junior officers to be promoted to the next higher post without having better experience in service. No matter the new administrative Circular No. 10 of 2005 having the criteria of merit-cum-seniority may be better criterion other than the basis of seniority cum merit but it will not value or justify the service of particular persons in the department. Keeping this in mind the present appellant gave an undertaking to the Court that the respondent No.1 herein would be given promotion to the supernumerary post of General Manager straightway in case he succeeds in the writ petition and as per order of the Court. Bu t now the authority has deviated from its own oath.

12. Under such circumstances we have considered the decisions referred by both the learned counsel. The centre point of the 46 DLR (AD) 19 case is whether the Rules challenged therein are violative of Article 29 of the constitution, which contemplates the right of equal opportunity of the employees in the Republic. The writ petitioners of that case pleaded that by the said Rule their seniority has been violated to such extent that they would be practically debarred from future employment. It was submitted in that case on behalf the writ petitioner, that "seniority is determined by set principles or statuary rules; the order of seniority may also be altered by such rules. Ordinarily alteration of seniority does not curtail the right to future appointment, that is, promotion. Promotion is not a matter of right, it is to be earned by meritorious service which includes efficiency, good conduct, character and integrity, dynamic personality and, above all, sense of value and promotion. Seniority alone is not sufficient for promotion but it is certainly one of the primary requisites for promotion. Though by seniority alone a person cannot earn promotion, he, by virtue of seniority, has a right to be considered for promotion. In the instant cases the impugned Rules did not deprive the writ petitioners of their right to be considered for promotion. At best they may say that their chance for promotion has been reduced to a great extent thereby. Reduction of chance of promotion does not amount to deprivation of the right to equal opportunity for employment. Therefore, in this case, the provision for equal opportunity for employment has not been violated" .

13. The said principle has further been extended in the case of Bakhrabad Gas System Limited vs Al Masud-ar-Noor, reported in 66 DLR (AD) 187 wherein the apex Court held "the appointing authority has every right to amend/ alter the service Rules to suit the need of the time but not to the detriment or disadvantage to the rights or privileges that existed at the relevant time when an employee of such appointing authority entered into its service. To be more explicit, the appointing authority enjoys the power and authority to frame new rules to regulate the service of its employees, but that in no way, can take away the accrued/vested rights of its employees, here the writ-petitioners. We also make it very clear that an employee shall definitely be entitled to the new service benefits if given or created by the new rules, but no rules can be framed to his disadvantage or detriment or to the denial of his accrued/vested right as in the instant case sought to be taken away. The new rules adding new terms and conditions including the one as to the promotion to the next higher posts shall be effective and applicable to the employees, who will be appointed after the coming into effect or force of the same."

14. That being the development in the service law let us see whether the High Court Division has gone beyond that. In this respect on perusal of the impugned judgment and order of the High Court Division one interesting thing has drawn our attention. That is the High Court Division did not declare the administrative Circular No. 10 of 2005 ultra vires rath~r the same having not been given retrospective effect has been declared not wholly applicable in respect of the present respondent's case. This view has been taken considering that if the same is given such effect then the writ petitioner or any person having such qualification to be promoted to the next higher post will be affected because the said Rules has been made to the detriment or disadvantage to the right and privilege that existed at the relevant time i.e. 2001 or 2004 and 2Q05 when the writ petitioner (Respondent herein), was entitled to be promoted, in the post of General Manager.

15. Under the facts and circumstances as stated hereinabove we are of the view that the impugned judgment and order of the High Court Division does not call for any interference by this Division.




Why Soha Ali Khan is so infuriated?

The spectre of religious intolerance, which has captured the imagination of many over the past few months, raised its ugly head once again when actress Soha Ali Khan, the daughter of Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi and Sharmila Tagore, was targeted by a few trolls for her secular beliefs recently.

Soha Ali Khan, who will be next seen playing a Sikh housewife in upcoming dramatic thriller 31st October, recently had a harrowing experience when she was trolled on social media for visiting the Golden Temple in Amritsar and a few days back, her pictures at a Ganpati pandal invited criticism by some people, who felt that she was being disloyal to her religion.


Lisa Ray steps in a new territory

Internationally acclaimed actress, model, TV host, entrepreneur and social activist Lisa Ray will launch her first fragrance September 21st on the UN's International Day of Peace with The 7 Virtues, a Canadian company living the mantra Make Perfume Not War.

Based out of Halifax, Nova Scotia, The 7 Virtues sources natural essential oils from regions impacted by war or strife in an effort to rebuild through the power of scent. In partnership with Lisa Ray, The 7 Virtues introduces Lisa Ray Jasmine of India, inspired by India's rich and diverse culture.

Drawing on the old saying No perfume without Jasmine, Lisa Ray Jasmine of India blends awakening notes of orange blossom, cardamom, ginger, frankincense and myrrh with the exotic Jasmine flower, designed to blend beautifully with any of our fragrances, says Barbara Stegemann, Founder and CEO of The 7 Virtues. Stegemanns winning pitch on CBCs Dragons Den led her to meet her mentor and business partner, W Brett Wilson, Chairman of CANOE Financial.

The inspiration for all our fragrances is to support farmers in nations rebuilding, continues Stegemann. Having helped farmers in Haiti, Afghanistan, the Middle East and Rwanda, we wanted to do our part to contribute to India, realizing it is home to the worlds largest group living in poverty.

Dividing her time between Toronto, Mumbai and Hong Kong, Lisa Ray is no stranger to philanthropy, having been recognized as a Woman of Action by the Israel Cancer.
BTCL`s management must be overhauled

BANGLADESH Telecommunication Company Limited (BTCL) is in default of Tk 1,830 crore to national exchequer since October 2008 when it should have earned huge profit from the monopoly in handling international calls and other businesses in domestic sector. A report in a national daily made the disclosure on Friday making many to wonder how the publicly owned company is deceitfully depriving the government of its share of revenue. Question arises who are controlling the financial management of BTCL, which is by far the largest telecom company in the country and why the government is tolerating the default over the years.

It is very shocking that despite Bangladesh Tele-Regulatory Commission's repeated reminder BTCL did not take any effective step so far to pay the overdue. It is no unknown that a section of ruling party men wielding huge power in the government establishment is holding the company hostage and minting money illegally. It is an open secret that ruling party men have set up local telecom firms and illegally using BTCL frequency to run unauthorized Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) centers facilitating international calls dodging government revenue. Some ministers' indirect involvement even came up in media report in the past in such unauthorized business when there is no effective step to bring it out of this situation.

The BTCL has been set up as a public limited company restructuring Bangladesh Telegraph & Telephone Board in 2008. Bur ever since it has turned into a den of corruption in the hands of dishonest officials who are operating under the shelter of powerful political quarters. As per a TIB report released in 2015 such dishonest quarters are siphoning over Tk 2,000 crore every year when BTCL officials are tampering call records, facilitating illegal logistics, engaging in illegal VoIP business and renting BTCL-owned land to others. The government is losing on an average three cent per call in illegal VoIP business, which is punishable under existing law. But the illegal business is continuing.

Needless to say TeleTalk, another subsidiary of the government has turned into a chronic loss making entity which even failed in recent past to pay the auction fees of 3-G mobile service. Surprisingly it applied to the government to make payment for it. Some ministers also actively lobbied with the Finance Minister to agree to the payment.

It is unbelievable that big public telecom companies will continue to be defaulter over the years to pay the government share of the revenue while vested interest quarters are misusing their service and income; which is not acceptable at all. We must say that the government should take steps to recover money from BTCL and hold its full control on the firm to save the country's financial system from predators' hand.




Drugs taken in open places in broad-day light

Reza Mahmud :

Drug addicts take illegal drugs like morphine and pethidine with injection syringe in the broad-day light and thereby create very ugly scene in many parts of the capital city, but police try to avoid it many a time and transfer responsibility on others.

"We face very embarrassing situation everyday while crossing the Dayaganj level Crossing where the drug users openly commit crime. Our school going children question us about the matter, but we cannot answer them," Sumon Chowdhury, one of the residents of the area, said it.

The drug addicts do it at Babubazar bridge area, Moghbazar level crossing and some other areas.

The guardians of school and college going students of those areas accused the police of shutting the eyes on the drug taking incidents and say that the area is not under their jurisdiction. "It is nothing but to avoid own responsibility," alleged a businessman.

The drug addicts look very ugly, wear dirty clothes and bear wounds in their bodies. The addicts frequently snatch and steal commuters' cash and mobile phone sets near their dens to meet the expenses.

"It is not acceptable. They frequently compel us to give them money by showing us blades. They even cut their own bodies to bleed to frighten us," said, Shabita Rani a resident of Nayabazar area adding that the police could not free the Babu Bazaar bridge area from the anti-social elements. The residents of Moghbazar level crossing areas have raised the same allegations.

When contacted about the Dayaganj den, Mizanur Rahman, the Officer-in-Charge of Gandaria Police Station told The New Nation, the area is not under his police station.

"It is not under Gandaria police station. It is under Shyampur. I will inform the police station about the drug hub," he said.

But Abdur Razzak, the Officer-in-Charge of Shyampur Police Station did not agree with the statement saying Dayaganj is not under his jurisdiction.

"The Shyampur police station's jurisdiction does not exceed the Gandaria railway station. Dayaganj is far from our police station's area," he said.

When contacted, Mezbah ul Islam, the Officer-in-Charge of Tejgaon police station, said, the Moghbazar rail crossing's drug den is totally out of his area.

"It is partially under Tejgaon industrial area police station and partially under Ramna," he said.

But Abdur Rashid, the Officer-in-Charge of Tejgaon industrial area police station, said the drug addicts' den at Mogbazar level crossing is not under his area. "The den is under Ramna and Tejgaon police station," he said.

When contacted, Masudur Rahman, Sub-Inspector and duty officer of Ramna police station, said, all the area of that drug addicts hub is not under Ramna. "The police is trying heart and soul to eliminate drug hubs," he said.

Abul Ahsan, the Officer-in-Charge of Kotwali police station said the east side of the Babu Bazar bridge is under his area. But the West side of the bridge is under Bangshal police station.

He claimed that the efforts of his police station notably decreased the number of addicts in his area.

Besides, Sub-Inspector Rafiqul Hasan, the duty officer of Bangshal police station, said police drove away the addicts several times but they came back soon. "The addicts are loads for police. The addicts need rehabilitations. The media should take step about it," he said.




Assange`s arrest warrant in rape case upheld by Swedish Court

NBC News :

The arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange over a rape accusation will not be dropped, a Swedish appeals court ruled Friday.

Assange, 45, has always maintained extradition from the U.K. to Sweden could lead to him being sent to the U.S. over WikiLeaks' huge dump of secret documents. However, the European warrant was upheld.

"After reviewing the existing investigative material and what the parties have stated, the Court of Appeal finds that Julian

Assange is still suspected on probable cause of rape," the ruling issued by a three-judge panel in Stockholm on Friday said. "The Court of Appeal also shares the assessment of the District Court that there is still a risk that Julian Assange will flee." Per Samuelsson, Assange's Swedish defense lawyer, said he would appeal the decision to the country's Supreme Court. "We are naturally disappointed that Swedish courts yet again choose to ignore Julian Assange's difficult life situation," he told The Associated Press. "They ignore the risk that he will be extradited to the United States." Swedish authorities began investigating Assange in 2010 on allegations of sexual assault and rape against two women. The sexual assault allegation was dropped after time ran out to bring charges last year, but officials said they would continue pursue the rape investigation. Assange denies the allegations. After running through legal options in Britain, the Australian avoided extradition to Sweden by seeking asylum in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in June 2012. Assange still faces arrest in Britain for breaching bail conditions. The statute of limitations for rape is 10 years in Sweden, meaning it would expire in 2020 if prosecutors haven't filed an indictment by then. Earlier this month, chief prosecutor Ingrid Isgren said colleagues working on the Swedish case have had no contact with U.S. authorities. On Wednesday, Swedish prosecutors said an Ecuadorian official would interrogate Assange on their behalf in October at the embassy. Swedish prosecutors maintain they need to question Assange before deciding whether to formally charge him. In late May, a Swedish lower court upheld the arrest warrant for Assange, saying the stay at Ecuador's Embassy did not equal detention. WikiLeaks has been a thorn in the side of governments around the world for years and Assange's time in the Ecuadorian embassy has not halted their work.
Tortured maid gets financial assistance

Chandpur Correspondent :

The minor girl, who was brutally tortured by her employer in Gazipur, received financial aid from Chandpur district administration on Friday.

Mohammed Abdus Sabur Mandal, Deputy Commissioner of Chandpur, handed over Tk 25 thousand to the victim's family in the morning.

Jannatul Ferdous, a domestic maid, was beaten and burned with electric Iron by the employer after she wanted to go her village home.

The nine, year old girl is undergoing treatment at Chandpur Sadar Hospital.

Police have already detained the employer Omar Faruq and one Mustafa Sardar who had given the girl to the employer.

A joint team of Joydebpur and Chandpur police arrested Omar Faruq from Gazipur's West Burulia after a case was filed against him and his wife Moni Begum under the Women and Children Repression Prevention Act for torturing the girl.

Moni Begum, the employer's wife, remains in hiding.
A Dhaka bound bus carrying all garment workers from Kalihati Upazila of Tangail district after celebrating Eid-ul-Azha at their homes was turned turtle leaving five dead and 25 others injured on Friday.
17 killed in road accidents

At least eight passengers were killed and three others injured while a passenger bus collided head-on with a microbus on Dhaka-Sylhet Highway in Brahmanbaria. This photo was taken from Islampur area on Friday.

Staff Reporter :

At least 17 people were killed and 40 others injured in separate road accidents in Brahmanbaria, Tangail and Madaripur districts on Friday, reports our correspondents.

In Brahmanbaria, eight people were killed and five others injured in collision between a bus and microbus on Dhaka-Sylhet highway at Bijoynagar area in the morning.

Of the deceased, seven were identified as Habibur Rahman, his sons Abu Sufian and Md Kamran, their relatives Morshedur Rahman, Ali Hossain, Abdul Hannan and Mokter Mia.

"All the victims were passengers of the microbus. They died on the spot,"

Officer-in-Charge of Bijaynagar Police Station Ali Ershad told The New Nation.

He said police recovered the bodies from the spot. The injured were taken to the district's Health Complex. Later, one of them succumbed to his injuries there.

In Tangail, five people were killed and 25 others injured as a bus turned turtle in Pungli area under Kalihati upazila in the district.

The deceased are Asma Begun, 40, wife of Firoz Mia of Lalmonirhat, Asadul Habib, 15, son of Abbas Ali, Ripon, Shumon 25, and Monirul of Lalmonirhat.

"A Dhaka-bound passenger bus turned turtle when its driver lost his control over the steering in Pungli area around 4:15am on Friday, leaving 25 people injured," Elenga Highway Police Outpost's Sergeant Jahangir Alam told The New Nation.

He said, the injured were taken to Tangail Medical College Hospital's emergency unit where five critically injured people succumbed to their injuries there.

In Madaripur, four people were killed and 15 others injured as a bus hit a three-wheeler, locally known as Mahendra, on Dhaka-Barisal Highway in Rajoir area of Madaripur around 12 noon.

Identities of the deceased could not be known immediately.

Police said, two of them died on the spot and two succumbed to their injuries at Rajoir Upazila Health Complex.
London mayor backs Hillary for US President

Al Arabiya News :

London's first Muslim mayor, Sadiq Khan, voiced support for Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton on Thursday, warning that anti-Muslim views like those espoused by Republican Donald Trump "plays into the hands" of ISIS.

During a stop in Chicago on his first visit to the United States, Khan said he was "a big fan" of Clinton and hoped she would win the presidential election in November. "She's arguably the most experienced candidate to run to be the president," Khan told reporters following a speech to more than 250 academics, diplomats and business people.

"As the father of two daughters, I think the message it sends when the most powerful politician in the world is a woman is phenomenal, and hope she wins," said Khan, who as mayor of London is arguably one the most influential member of his faith in western Europe.

Immediately after taking office in May, Khan tangled with Trump over his proposed ban on allowing Muslim immigrants and refugees into America, deriding his plan as "ignorant." During his roughly 45-minute speech before the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, Khan did not mention Trump by name but attacked the positions the New York developer has staked, such as tightening Muslim immigration into the United States.

"I think to suggest somehow that Muslims aren't welcome in the USA, to suggest somehow that being a Muslim isn't compatible with being western, unintentionally plays into the hands of Da'esh or so-called ISIS," Khan said. Trump has offered an evolving stance on Muslim immigration into the United States since his original December 2015 call for a ban on Muslims entering the country.

Earlier this summer, he voiced support for limiting the ban to only countries with known terrorist links. Last month, he appeared to moderate somewhat on an outright ban by touting the idea of the United States undertaking "extreme vetting" of incoming Muslim immigrants, refugees or visitors.
12 more fishermen abducted from Sundarbans

Khulna Correspondent :

At least 12 more fishermen were abducted from Bhaizora canal and Dudhmukhi areas of Khulna Range's West Forest Division on Thursday night, local fishermen said.

On condition of anonymity, some fishermen told this Correspondent that at about 10.30 pm on Thursday, some fishermen hailing from Koyra of Khulna district went for fishing at Bhaizora. Suddenly, a gang of forest bandits named 'Jahangir Bahini' swooped and beat them mercilessly, looted their

fishes, fuel oil and other valuables, and then abducted at least 12 fishermen.

Mehedi Masud, Zonal Commander of Coast Guard, West Zone told this Correspondent that he heard the news of fishermen abduction and ordered the Coast Guard to rescue the fishermen, who had been abducted so far by this time.

It is noteworthy that on September 9 and 14, about 23 and 20 fishermen were abducted respectively from the Chandpai Range of the Sundarbans' East Division by two forest bandit gangs named Sagor Bahini and Jahangir Bahini. Some of them earned freedom paying ransom.

Lt. M Fariduzzaman Khan, Staff Officer (Operations) of Coast Guard's West Zone said, after getting information, the Coast Guard started operation to rescue the abducted fishermen from the forest robbers. 'Their operations will continue in the areas adjacent to the Sundarbans until success is earned.'

On the other hand, in view of the repeated abduction, fishermen are in fear as to what to do next or to begin starvation, said a fish trader.
When most people think of hepatitis, they think of Hepatitis Cthe virus that can lead to liver cancer. However, there are actually five different types of hepatitis viruses, and each one can cause its own set of symptoms and health problems. So, which hepatitis is the worst?

What is hepatitis and what are the different types of the virus?

Hepatitis is a virus that attacks the liver, and can cause inflammation, scarring, and even liver cancer. There are five different types of hepatitis viruses: A, B, C, D, and E. Each one is different and can cause different symptoms and health problems.

Hepatitis A

Hepatitis A is usually spread through contaminated food or water. The virus can also be spread through contact with an infected person, such as through sexual contact or sharing needles. Hepatitis A does not usually cause long-term liver damage, and most people will recover from the virus within a few months. However, hepatitis A can be deadly in some cases, especially for people with other liver diseases.

Hepatitis B

Hepatitis B is a more serious virus than hepatitis A, and can lead to chronic liver disease, cirrhosis, and liver cancer. The virus is spread through contact with infected blood or body fluids, such as through sexual contact or sharing needles. Hepatitis B is a serious virus, but there are treatments available that can help people manage the virus and live normal, healthy lives.

Hepatitis C

Hepatitis C is the most serious of all the hepatitis viruses, and can lead to chronic liver disease, cirrhosis, and liver cancer. The virus is spread through contact with infected blood, and can also be passed from mother to child during childbirth. There is no cure for hepatitis C, but there are treatments available that can help people manage the virus and live normal, healthy lives.

Hepatitis D

Hepatitis D is a more serious virus than hepatitis B, and can lead to chronic liver disease, cirrhosis, and liver cancer. The virus is spread through contact with infected blood or body fluids, such as through sexual contact or sharing needles. Hepatitis D is a serious virus, but there are treatments available that can help people manage the virus and live normal, healthy lives.

Hepatitis E

Hepatitis E is usually spread through contaminated food or water. The virus can also be spread through contact with an infected person, such as through sexual contact or sharing needles. Hepatitis E does not usually cause long-term liver damage, and most people will recover from the virus within a few months. However, hepatitis E can be deadly in some cases, especially for people with other liver diseases.

What is the treatment for hepatitis and how can you prevent it from spreading?

The treatment for hepatitis varies depending on the type of virus. There is no cure for hepatitis C, but there are treatments available that can help people manage the virus and live normal, healthy lives. For hepatitis B, there is a vaccine that can prevent the virus from spreading, and there are also treatments available to help people manage the virus.

For all types of hepatitis, it is important to practice safe sex and to avoid sharing needles. If you think you may have been exposed to any type of hepatitis virus, it is important to see a doctor right away for testing and treatment.

Herbal supplements can be very effective in supporting normal liver function. Milk thistle, for example, is a well-known herb that has been used for centuries to support liver health. Other herbs that have been traditionally used to support liver function include dandelion, turmeric, and ginger. These herbs can be found in many different forms, such as capsules, teas, and tinctures. Speak with a healthcare professional to find the best herbal supplement for you.

So, which hepatitis is the worst?

Hepatitis C is the most serious of all the hepatitis viruses, and can lead to chronic liver disease, cirrhosis, and liver cancer. The virus is spread through contact with infected blood, and can also be passed from mother to child during childbirth. There is no cure for hepatitis C, but there are treatments available that can help people manage the virus and live normal, healthy lives.

However, all types of hepatitis can be serious and even deadly, so it is important to be aware of the different types of the virus and how they are spread. If you think you may have been exposed to any type of hepatitis virus, it is important to see a doctor right away for testing and treatment.
Toshiba to help Uganda exploit geothermal power

Japanese engineering and technology company Toshiba Corporation has expressed interest in helping Uganda exploit its geothermal energy as the country looks to alternative energy to boost power supply.

The development of Ugandas geothermal energy resources is in line with our energy policy objectives of increasing power generation capacity and diversifying our energy mix in order to achieve least cost, affordable and stable energy supply, Dr. Fred Kabagambe-Kaliisa, Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Development said.

Toyoaki Fujita, Business Development Executive of Toshibas Energy Systems and Solutions Company said, We hope to build a strong partnership with Uganda and to contribute to the development of sustainable power supply there.

Toshibas Energy Systems and Solutions Company is a world leader in geothermal power generation, and I believe that our established expertise can contribute to the geothermal power supply in Uganda, he said.

Kabagambe-Kaliisa said, We are very confident that the Government of Uganda and Toshiba will create a strong Public-Private-Partnership to develop the Geothermal Energy resources.

cooperate in personnel development.

Uganda has rich geothermal potential, equivalent to 500 megawatts.

Currently, about 60 per cent of power generation capacity is from hydroelectric power, and the country has long promoted construction of hydro power plants. Adding geothermal to the mix will contribute to supply stability and the ability to meet rising demand stimulated by high economic growthcurrently increasing at about 10% per a year.

In the African market, Toshiba most recently delivered four geothermal turbines to Kenya that started commercial operation in 2015. The company has also concluded MOUs with geothermal power development companies in Ethiopia in 2014, Tanzania in 2015 and Djibouti in August this year, all covering comprehensive collaboration in the geothermal power generation business.

www.toshiba.com
Flooding that ravaged south Louisiana and damaged homes across the Baton Rouge and Lafayette regions has put a crimp in fall election planning, making it more difficult for voter outreach and tracking when tens of thousands are displaced.

Contingency plans are in the works for where to cast ballots in the nearly 60 precincts that are damaged and unusable for the Nov. 8 election. But the problems for candidates, advocacy groups, pollsters and strategists are more logistically complex.

How do you find the people you want to poll? Where do you send campaign mailers? Do you knock on doors in flood-ravaged neighborhoods? Will people occupied with the bureaucracy and the financial uncertainty of rebuilding care about an election at all?

Secretary of State Tom Schedler, Louisianas chief elections officer, expects the disasters widespread damage could depress voter turnout in an election that will help decide the nations next president, an open U.S. Senate seat, six U.S. House seats and a slew of local races.

People, lets face it, theyre trying to get to work, take kids to school. Theyre trying to get their lives back in order. I would hope this would be a top priority, but lets be real. We know this could be disruptive, Schedler said.

One thing Schedler isnt worried about, though, is whether people will have access to the ballot and a location to cast it.

Miraculously, we did not lose one voting machine, Schedler said, crediting employees who made sure the machines were protected, in some instances even as their own homes were flooding.

About 11 percent of precincts in East Baton Rouge and Ascension parishes are damaged and likely wont be available to use on Election Day, according to Schedlers office. The number in devastated Livingston Parish is higher, close to 20 percent.

Schedler said hes confident parish elections officials have strong backup options that will give people access to the polls with minor disruption. In Livingston Parish, he said, that likely will involve creating a mega-precinct site where people whose usual ballot-casting locations are damaged can go to one central location.

To give people information about voting site changes, the Secretary of States Office intends to send notifications by mail, take out an advertisement in the local newspaper, update its online information and put up signs in Livingston Parish.

Schedlers urging people to early vote and, if necessary, to request a mail ballot from their local registrar of voters office that can be sent to any location a displaced person is staying.

Were trying to make it as painless as possible, he said.

Louisianas dealt with displaced voters before  and in more extensive ways  after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. When New Orleans city elections were held eight months after the storm, displaced voters cast ballots by fax and mail and at satellite polling places in Lake Charles, Shreveport, Baton Rouge and other cities. Evacuees scattered to other states boarded buses and traveled to Louisiana to vote early.

In the aftermath of the mid-August flooding, elections officials arent the only ones who have to devise contingency plans, however. Candidates and groups advocating for or against them also have to draft new voter outreach and grassroots strategies for the most heavily-damaged areas.

When youve got 50,000-plus households where people arent there, it dramatically effects mailings by the campaign, calls to get people to go vote, getting the vote out, doing public opinion polls, said Baton Rouge pollster Bernie Pinsonat. Thats a huge amount of people taken out of the mix.

Pinsonats firm, Southern Media and Opinion Research, delayed statewide polling plans for three weeks because of the flooding. The firm, Pinsonat said, calls at least 30 percent cell phones for its polls, so that can help locate people displaced from their homes.

He said he and his partner are comfortable theyll get accurate statewide polling data, but Pinsonat said someone trying to target Livingston Parish in a campaign will have difficulty.

Thats a heck of a lot of houses where theres nobody there, he said.
Pre-purchase property inspection is a relatively new thing in the United Kingdom. Its not something that most people have heard about, but it has become increasingly popular over the last few years with the rise in property prices and increased demand for high quality homes.

What are the benefits of pre-purchase building inspection? What can you expect to find out when you pay someone else to inspect your home before you buy it? And what should you look for during an inspection?

Many people want to know if theyre buying a house thats been well maintained or if its had any serious problems. If youve found a place on the market that seems attractive, but then discover some issues after moving in, you may not be as excited about buying it as you thought you were.

Its important to do your due diligence when looking at properties. A lot goes into making a property appealing to potential buyers, from the landscaping to the flooring to the kitchen appliances. The same applies when inspecting a property  there are many things that need checking over to make sure everything is running smoothly.

Here are some of the benefits of performing a pre-purchase inspection:

You get to see exactly what will happen to your money

When you go shopping for a new car, youll probably be shown several different models. You might even be shown one that looks like a great value, but doesnt fit around all of the extra features that you want. When it comes time to actually buy the vehicle, however, you wont have seen how your money will be spent on it once you drive it off the showroom floor.

Likewise, when you shop for a new home, you dont really know what youre getting yourself into until you move in. In order to get a feel for whether the home youre considering is what you want, you normally have to spend quite a bit of time inside it. This allows you to learn more about everything that youre going to be spending your hard-earned cash on.

A pre-purchase building inspection gives you much the same kind of experience without having to spend thousands of dollars. Since youre paying for the service, you can expect to see exactly what youre paying for, instead of just seeing a vague idea of what you might end up with.

You find out about potential major repairs

Some buildings are very expensive to maintain, which means that owners often neglect them for the sake of saving money. While youre paying for a building inspection, youre also paying for a professional who knows how to spot signs of trouble and repair work that needs doing.

If you notice that a particular area of your new home needs fixing right away, you can call in an expert to take care of it quickly. If you find that theres something wrong with your boiler, you wont have to wait weeks for a plumber to come over and fix it. Instead, youll have access to a solution immediately.

You can save hundreds of pounds by finding out about potential problems early on

One of the biggest expenses when you first buy a home is the cost of moving in. Many people dont realize this until its too late. Buying a home involves not only paying for the actual house, but also for moving costs, furniture, and other items that have to be moved along with the home.

Having a good idea ahead of time of what youre likely to encounter can help you avoid these kinds of costs. If you know youll need to replace the plumbing system, for example, youll be able to put together a budget for the expense and plan accordingly.

You can protect your investment by finding out if the homes been well cared for

While there are plenty of people who think that houses always look better when theyre newly built, youd be surprised at how well maintained older residences can still look nice. Sometimes, though, those homes need some additional maintenance to keep them looking their best.

This could involve repairs that arent so noticeable or small improvements that you wouldnt consider otherwise. Even worse, some houses have fallen into disrepair without anyone noticing. This is why having a professional perform a building inspection prior to purchasing a home is such a big benefit.

Not only will it give you insight into the state of the property, but it will also give you peace of mind knowing youre not getting taken advantage of. As long as youre aware of the potential pitfalls, youll have less reason to worry about the state of your new home.

You can use information gathered during a building inspection to negotiate a lower price

If youre worried about buying a home because you suspect that it may need extensive renovation work, you may already have a rough idea of how much work youll need to do to bring it up to scratch. That knowledge can come in handy if you decide to buy the home.

You can use all of the details that you gather during a building inspection to present a realistic picture of what the home is worth to prospective buyers. If a potential buyer thinks that the home is worth more than what you paid for it, you can try negotiating a lower price.

You can sell your home faster and for more money

If you decide to list your home on the market soon after buying it, youll need to price it accurately in order to attract buyers. But if youve already done a thorough building inspection, youll know exactly what work is needed and what the current market conditions are.

In other words, youll be able to make a more accurate estimate of the amount of money youve invested in the home and how much its worth. If you find that youre selling your house for close to its full market value, you can use this information to convince the potential buyer that your home is worth the asking price.

Even if youre planning to stay in the home for a while before you decide to sell, the fact that you did a thorough building inspection will give you more confidence when listing it. Prospective buyers will know exactly what theyre paying for.

Your home will hold its value longer

As mentioned earlier, the value of a home depends heavily upon the condition of the building itself. If your home is in bad shape, potential buyers wont be interested in buying it. On the other hand, if youve performed a thorough building inspection and know what sort of repairs are necessary, you can offer your prospective buyer a compelling reason to invest in your property.

When you buy a home, youre essentially agreeing to have it inspected periodically to ensure that it stays in top shape. Not only does this allow you to avoid expensive repairs down the road, but it can also increase the value of your home.

You can make smart decisions about property investments

Buying real estate isnt as simple as just driving a couple of minutes to pick up a house. There are lots of considerations involved, ranging from location to cost. The same is true when youre investing in property.

If you find a house that meets all of your requirements, youll want to make sure that you have a solid understanding of where it stands with regards to the rest of the market. If you havent spent enough time researching the area, you could inadvertently end up with a bad deal.

There are lots of resources available online that can help you determine the overall level of competition in your area. They can also help you figure out if there are any properties that meet your requirements that you didnt know about.

If you own rental property, you can use the information to identify tenants who might cause damage

If you own rental property and youve noticed that certain tenants consistently cause damage, you can use the results of a building inspection to identify them. You can then contact them directly to let them know that youre watching them closely and that you dont appreciate the problem theyre causing.

They might start taking better care of their homes, which would be good news for everyone. It could also be the case that youll find out that theyre responsible for previous damages that werent caught during a previous visit.

You can make smarter decisions about hiring contractors

If youve hired contractors to build or repair your home, you might want to ask them for references. However, unless you perform a thorough building inspection, you might not know exactly what to look for.

For instance, maybe you only checked the roof for leaks or the walls for cracks. You might not have looked underneath the foundation for anything that could cause a future issue. By performing a building inspection, you can ensure that you hire reputable contractors who will be trustworthy with your money.

You can avoid purchasing a home thats in poor condition

Of course, the main benefit of structural inspections perth is that it helps you avoid purchasing a home thats in poor condition. Before you make the decision to buy a home, you should do whatever you can to find out about the state of the building.

You can also ask your realtor about what sorts of inspections are typically recommended. Some agents say that its standard practice to check the heating system, the roof, the electrical wiring, and the floors. Others will tell you that they recommend that you check the entire structure.

Either way, if you choose to hire an inspector, youll find out exactly what needs to be fixed and how much it will cost to do so.

As a result, it can be concluded that a pre-purchase building inspection is highly important for the buyers because it provides transparency regarding the current conditions of the structure. Additionally, the building owner is made aware of any upgrades or repairs that are required, which could lead to a fair deal throughout the purchasing and selling process.
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.
SPRINGFIELD  Three downstate Republican senators are moving up in their partys leadership ranks following state Sen. Matt Murphys resignation.

The Palatine Republicans departure from his position as deputy minority leader led to the promotion of Sen. Dave Luechtefeld of Okawville, who will fill the post until he retires in January at the end of his current term.

Taking Luechtefelds spot as one of four assistant minority leaders will be Sen. Chapin Rose of Mahomet, who moves up from the position of minority whip. That makes room for Sen. Jason Barickman of Bloomington to take Roses former post.

The Illinois Senate Republicans announced the changes Thursday, the day Murhpys resignation became effective. He departed for a job with a lobbying firm.

Dave is a tireless fighter for the needs of Southern Illinois, while also demonstrating his leadership skills and ability to see the state as a whole, Senate Minority Leader Christine Radogno of Lemont said in a prepared statement. Dave and I began our careers as freshman seatmates on the floor of the Illinois Senate. With this appointment, he will end his career as my seatmate.

Luechtefeld expressed gratitude for the appointment.

As Illinois continues to face many difficult challenges in the months ahead, I am hopeful that  I can contribute in a new way in meeting those challenges, he said in a prepared statement.

Luechtefeld wont earn the $20,649 stipend normally associated with the position, according to an announcement from Radognos office.

A statement from Roses office said he plans to use his new position to continue being a voice for Republicans in budget negotiations. He was part of a bipartisan group of lawmakers that negotiated a stopgap budget that Gov. Bruce Rauner signed into law June 30.

Rose noted that Murphy was also a key participant in those discussions.
EAST ST. LOUIS  A woman who conspired with her husband to coerce a distraught 15-year-old girl from Madison into prostitution at truck stops and trailer parks last summer was sentenced Thursday to 20 years in federal prison.

Chief U.S. District Judge Michael J. Reagan told Robin (Lott) Thompson, 25, that her crime was one of the worst he has ever seen.

What you and your husband did was strip an individual of the right to feel secure, control and trust what she did with her own body, Reagan said at a hearing here. He was one of the enablers in your case but I think there were numerous times when you could have said, Enough is enough, and Stop.

In addition to 20 years, Robin Thompson was given 10 years of supervised release and fines.

Thompson and her husband, Marcus D. Thompson, 29, of Park Hills, Missouri, admitted in May that they used the girl for prostitution in at least three states, advertising sex encounters by posting explicit pictures of her on the website Backpage.com.

The victim reported the couple to authorities in July 2015 from Cardinal Glennon Childrens Medical Center in St. Louis, telling police she believed the four other girls enticed into the operation were 12 to 18 years old. She told authorities that one of the girls died in her arms and that they were beaten and threatened with being fed to alligators in a swamp if they tried to escape.

The teen had been missing since June 9. She was walking down a street in Madison when Marcus Thompson approached in a white pickup with the four other girls inside, court documents said.

She had been contemplating suicide that day by jumping off a bridge after arguing with her father over becoming pregnant, Reagan said Thursday.

Federal investigators subpoenaed Backpage.com and found that the Thompsons cellphone was used to place ads in Orlando and Pensacola in Florida, as well as Atlanta, Nashville, Tennessee, and Dallas in June and early July 2015.

As part of an agreement with federal prosecutors, Robin Thompson pleaded guilty of conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of a child by force, fraud or coercion. Her husband pleaded guilty in May to the conspiracy charge and child sex trafficking. At his sentencing hearing set for Sept. 29, Marcus Thompson faces 27 to nearly 34 years in prison.

Robin Thompsons lawyer, Gary Milone, argued for a lighter sentence, saying Robin Thompson had never run afoul of the law before meeting her husband. The lawyer said she had an uphill climb all her life and pointed to her lack of criminal record, and her drug-addicted mother, history of child abuse and methamphetamine addiction.

Milone said she dropped out of high school her junior year, and at the time was ranked 232nd of 239 classmates.

Robin Thompson said Thursday in court, My biggest mistake was not being able to tell people no. She added, I admit I was wrong, but Im not this horrible person everyone makes me out to be.

She told Reagan she didnt know the teen was underage until later on. Reagan said he didnt believe her.

Robin Thompson negotiated prices, arranged meetings at truck stops, booked hotel rooms, provided condoms, kept a ledger of the transactions and threatened to harm the girl if she tried to escape.

The girl told authorities she brought in about $1,000 a day for having sex with men, some of whom took pictures and videos.

Reagan read excerpts of the girl's victim impact letter, in which she described long-term emotional and physical trauma, loneliness and fear of being re-victimized: Its hard to wake up every day and remember the people I had sex with ...  she wrote.
Carbondale City Councilwoman Carolin Harvey and Anna City Councilwoman Martha Anna Webb believe women add a different perspective to city councils and village boards.

I saw a need for involvement, Harvey said.

So she ran for city council. Harvey has served about three and a half years and plans to run for re-election.

Harvey is a Transitional Programs coordinator in the office of the registrar at Southern Illinois University.

I think it gives me a different perspective. Its not just all SIU; its not all the city of Carbondale. We have to work together, Harvey said.

She added that Carbondale Mayor Mike Henry and SIU Chancellor William Colwell are working toward that end and trying to do more things collaboratively.

One of the biggest issues in the city of Carbondale is the impact of lower enrollment numbers at SIU.

I dont think that is unique to Carbondale, but I do think it has a greater impact on Carbondale, Harvey said.

She is also concerned about the attractiveness of the city. The council is trying to beautify the city and make the city more inviting to parents, students, faculty and staff so that not just for SIU but for all the businesses in the area would want to be in Carbondale.

She would like to see power lines in Carbondale buried in the future.

Other concerns that Carbondale council is facing right now is sales taxes.

The sales tax for food and beverages is something we are looking at seriously, Harvey said.

She would like to see more community relations and police and community relations improve.

I will say I think there has been an improvement, but I think there still could be a better relationship here overall, she added.

She said that like everyone else she would love to have lower taxes, but realistically we all know that will not happen.

Carbondale has a lot of low income residents who need housing and a lot of rental houses sitting vacant. Harvey was hoping the council could help broker a deal to sell or rent the empty houses for a lower price.

I guess I just hate to think about people living in the woods or sleeping on park benches when there is a house right down the street from where they are that is vacant, Harvey said. I am disappointed in us.

Women are having their voices heard on city councils throughout the region. Jessica Bradshaw also serves as a councilwoman in Carbondale. Marilyn Ruppel and Sheila Ahlgren serve as aldermen for Herrin City Council and Alma Gomez is on the Cobden Village Board. Murphysboro has Joyce Cottonaro, Barbara Huges and Gloria Campos. Martha Ann Webb has served on Anna City Council for seven years. She was appointed, then elected commissioner.

I had retired and several people suggested I run for council because I care about our town. I want to help it grow and help the people who are in it, Webb said.

Webb retired from Choate Mental Health and Developmental Center in Anna, and she would like to see the facility stay open. Choate has faced threats of closure recently stemming from budget cuts and budget impass in Illinois.

Another issue in Anna is pickup of grass, limbs and leaves. The city used to pick up yard waste, but had to stop.

I hope someday we can pick that up again. Its hard for seniors to get rid of their grass, limbs and leaves, Webb said. Ive always wanted to build a compost facility.

A big concern for the council and residents is what will happen with Anna City Swimming Pool. Webb said it needs replaced.

I would love to see a new swimming pool, she added.

Webb has seen some positive growth in Anna during her time on the city council. The city has a lot of street programs going on now. She said Shawnee College Extension Center and Anna Arts Center provide educational cultural programs for the city.

Two new businesses are opening on South Main Street, Farmers Daughter Boutique and Apple Blossoms.PAWS (Pets Are Worth Saving) recently received $50,000 to build a new facility.

I hope we can see the PAWS building soon, Webb said.

Like Harvey, Webb would like to see the town cleaned up.

If people would clean up in front of their own houses, it would make a big difference in our town, she said.

The next meeting of Carbondale City Council will be at 7 p.m. Tuesday. Anna City Council will meet at 5 p.m. Tuesday.
My old friends Dennis Prager, Bill Bennett and Rush Limbaugh, among many others, seem to have made a transition. It's not enough to vote for Trump. No, even reluctant supporters must now talk themselves into believing that conservative "principles" require a vote for Trump. Like John C. Calhoun, who discovered that slavery was not only not wrong, it was a "positive good," some Republicans are urging that a vote for Trump is a moral imperative. To oppose him is, in Bennett's words, to put vanity and a sense of "moral superiority" above the interests of the country. Rush Limbaugh, who travels in a private plane, condemns anti-Trump intellectuals at tiny, poorly funded think tanks for "(wanting) their paychecks."

To justify support for an emotionally stunted, aspiring authoritarian, Prager et al argue that the country "cannot survive" four years of a Hillary Clinton presidency. Limbaugh warns that this is a "Flight 93" election -- meaning we either storm the cockpit and risk death, or surely die.

Bad analogy. The passengers on Flight 93 were pretty sure they were going to die. The only question was whether to go down fighting and possibly disrupt the terrorists' plans, or to die passively. Those passengers ought to remind us that a lot remains right with America, because the voices crying doom are particularly piercing just now.

There is much decay in America. Government, best represented by an IRS that targets Americans for their political activism and an FBI that declines to hold high officials to the same standards as ordinary ones, is corrupt. Government is also sclerotic and headed for insolvency -- with the approval of both major-party candidates. The courts are making social policy without even a pretense of constitutionality. Race relations are getting worse. The press is dominated by mindless infotainment. Men are dropping out of the labor force. The internet has unleashed the most feral appetites of the human soul -- from child porn to anti-Semitism. Manners are fraying.

So, yes, it may be that we cannot pull out of this dive. Many of these ills are not susceptible to repair by a president. In any case, how can people who until the day before yesterday emphasized the crucial importance of ethics, morality, tradition and honor now argue that Trump is not the antithesis of those virtues?

If you're going to have a cult of personality, at least choose someone worthy. Trump has spent a career in the tabloid zone, and it shows. The amazing thing is that a lifelong teetotaler can sound so drunk. At NBC's "Commander in Chief Forum," for example, Trump repeated his favorite barstool bluster that the United States of America should have "taken the oil" before departing Iraq. Leaving aside for a moment the morality of using the U.S. military to pillage another nation, the "how" of this formulation is a bit murky, since Trump is adamantly opposed to "boots on the ground." We could have left a small force, he airily explained to Matt Lauer. And the Iraqi population would have been fine with that? No danger of an insurrection, to say nothing of sabotage?

Trump again repeated the debunked claim that Mexico is "taking all of our jobs or a big percentage of our jobs" and preened about causing the resignation of a mid-level Mexican government official as proof of his toughness. A truly great nation needn't lord it over minor Mexicans. He later purred about his cordiality with Vladimir Putin, and imagined how delightful the world would be if we could have a better relationship with Russia, which "wants to defeat ISIS as badly as we do." Well, not badly enough actually to fire on them, it seems. Russian jets hit Bashar Assad's opponents square on but left ISIS pretty much unscathed.

Trump claims to have taken an interest in international affairs for "many years," but he apparently missed the part when Barack Obama/Hillary Clinton had the same naive hope about Russia. They called it a "reset." Trump would decry it as a "disaster" even as he slides into the exact same rut. Despite his slogan, Trump is quick to slander America. Asked about the attempted coup in Turkey, he sneered that the U.S. lacks the moral authority to criticize other nations. When presented with Putin's record of killing opponents, he was phlegmatic. "Our country does plenty of killing also." He's long admired dictators he describes as "strong leaders."

Trump's comments on foreign policy come at a time when he's been attempting to impersonate a normal candidate, and some observers have developed blinding amnesia. This Trump is bad enough, but the other one -- the violence-inciting, promiscuously dishonest, bankruptcy-declaring, NATO-dissing, tax return-withholding, alt-right empowering, threat-issuing, America-disparaging Trump -- cannot remain chained for long. That Trump cannot save America. He might do even more damage than she. So spare us the overwrought Flight 93 analogies.
Uganda targets US market with its coffee

In a move meant to increase the visibility of Ugandan coffee to key markets The National Union of Coffee Agribusinesses and Farm Enterprises (Nucafe) is rolling out key campaigns to market the commodity in the United States.

This follows a match-making meeting between Nucafe executive director Joseph Nkandu and US investors in agribusiness value addition, including Chromatic Coffee and Seva Coffee, held in Silicon Valley, California, recently.

Nkandu said though the Government targets to export 20 million bags of coffee by 2020, insufficient marketing of the commodity in key consuming countries like the US could hamper its plan.

Ugandas coffee is not known in key coffee consuming countries like the US. Our coffee is just used as a blend, but we want to change this trend and start having it on the shelves in the US, Nkandu.

The executive director Uganda Coffee Federation, Betty Namwagala, earlier said despite Uganda being one of the leading exporters of coffee in Africa and the 10th producer globally, its brand as a country is not seen anywhere on the global supermarket shelves even when the coffee as regarded of best quality.

Namwagala said there should be a deliberate effort to take Ugandas coffee to the international supermarket, rather than it being used as a blend for redeeming other coffees.

The above partly explains why Ugandas export volumes have stagnated at about 3 million bags for close to 20 years. Uganda last had the highest coffee production in 1996/1997, estimated at 4.2 million bags.

Despite the low volume, coffee exports remain Ugandas biggest foreign exchange earner after tourism and remittances from Ugandans living abroad.

Nucafe was among the 14 social enterprises globally that qualified to take part in the Global Social Benefit Institute of Santa Clara University accelerator programme conducted in the Silicon Valley, California, US.

The accelerator programme prepares innovative social enterprises to scale and prosper by providing quality, in-depth mentoring delivered by Silicon Valley business executives to improve enterprises.

Nucafe is a social enterprise that supports and empowers smallholder coffee farmers who are not in position to individually participate directly in the market place.

It is now expected to send coffee samples to be analysed, after which it will be allowed to sell its processed and branded products to the US.

Uganda is thinking about boosting coffee production and exports and to do that, we need to prepare the market and it must start now.

We have to do things differently, Nkandu said.

Nucafe has embarked on a journey to establish the necessary operational and traceability systems, so as to improve the quality of coffee to meet the required standards in the US market.

The organisation is also working closely with farmers to ensure they harvest good quality coffee beans to guarantee high quality coffee that meets the US standards.

Nkandu also urged the Government to partner with the private sector so as to offer a well-packaged intervention approach across the coffee value chain to increase productivity and be able to meet the 20 million bags of coffee that it targets to export by 2020.

We need a well-packaged approach for farmers to be able to increase coffee yields amid climate change.

The intervention should not only be on seedlings as the Government is doing now; we have to address challenges constraining the coffee crop wholesomely across the entire value chain. You cannot stimulate coffee production by simply supplying seedlings alone, he said.

Namwagala also said though the Government has made efforts to work with the private sector and the farmers in as far as providing seedlings is concerned, there is not much impact reflected in the volumes.

The aBi Trust Coffee Development Offi cer, Teopista Nakkungu, noted that there is need for intervention in the coffee sub-sector to enhance quality, access to improved seeds and agro inputs and markets among others.

The stakeholders in the sub-sector also called for the enactment of a national coffee law to guide coffee production and ensure high quality standards in planting, harvesting, drying and processing the coffee beans.

Nucafe was also awarded the Kenya Entrepreneurship Showcase Impact Medal from the Italian Entrepreneurship for Impact Foundation and Tangaza University, Kenya, last year in recognition of the organisations farmer ownership model innovation.

The model enables farmers to own their coffee along the various stages of the value chain.

Farmers are also trained on how to assume as many roles and responsibilities as possible in the coffee value chain in order to increase their incomes from the value added.

www.nucafe.org
Girl Scouts from the service unit of Orangeburg and Calhoun counties will remember the late Geraldyne Zimmerman with a parade and balloon release.

Zimmerman, known affectionately as Mrs. Z, died April 10, 2011, at the age of 100. Born in 1911, she was one year older than the Girl Scouts.

She had been active with the Girls Scouts since 1951 and started the first Girl Scout troop for African-American girls in Orangeburg. Zimmerman went on to create the Helen Sheffield Girls Club for girls in grades 9-12 in 1963.

Approximately 150 girls from Service Unit 643, which includes Orangeburg and Calhoun counties, will participate in the parade which will begin at 8 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 17, at St. Pauls Episcopal Church at 1170 Watson Street in Orangeburg.

The parade route will turn on Magnolia Street and Goff Avenue before ending at Harmon Park, where a balloon release will be held in honor of Zimmerman.

The Girl Scouts of Eastern South Carolina are sponsoring the inaugural Geraldyne Zimmerman Gala from 6 to 9 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 29, at The Cinema in Orangeburg.

It is a formal, adults-only scholarship fundraiser. Part of the proceeds from the event will go to support the creation of a Geraldyne Zimmerman Scholarship Fund.

Beginning next year, two $2,000 scholarships will be awarded to two graduating members of the GSESC council who have been accepted and enroll at South Carolina State University, Claflin University or Orangeburg-Calhoun Technical College.

Frances Morant, chairperson of the scholarship committee, said the parade and balloon release is a way for the girls to participate in honoring Zimmernan.

It gives us an opportunity to spotlight the girls in the community and show that there are still Girl Scouts working in the Orangeburg area and that we do have a viable troop in the Orangeburg area, Morant said.

She added, We want to show the community that we are still here and growing strong. And it also helps the girls kick off the scholarship event. This is their way of participating in the event as well as promoting healthy lifestyles for girls.

Tickets for the scholarship gala are $75 per person.

For more information, contact Pat Baxley, grants development manager with the GSESC, by phone at 843-669-5174, ext. 3150, or email at patbaxley@girlscoutsesc.org.
T&D Region farmers are receiving almost $8.3 million in state grants to help them following last Octobers floods.

The South Carolina Department of Agriculture announced it is mailing checks for Farm Aid grants on Friday, Sept. 16.

Approaching the anniversary of the flood, I am pleased to report that less than four months have passed from the time this bill became law until farmers will have money in their hands, S.C. Agriculture Commissioner Hugh Weathers said.

He said the department and the S.C. Department of Revenue worked diligently to administer this program effectively and efficiently. Clemson Extension personnel coordinated training sessions that prepared farmers to submit their applications.

On May 24, the S.C. General Assembly approved $40 million in aid to help farms in flood-ravaged communities. Eligible farmers could receive grants covering 20 percent of their verified crop loss up to a $100,000 maximum.

Farmers in Orangeburg County will receive a total $4.4 million, the largest amount going to any single countys farmers.

Calhoun County farmers will receive almost $2.7 million, while Bamberg County farmers will receive more than $1.2 million.

Information gathered from the applications confirmed earlier SCDA estimates of 75 percent crop loss as a result of the flood. Only 37 percent of those losses were covered by crop insurance.

The grant amounts ranged from 88 applicants receiving the maximum award of $100,000 to the smallest grant of $164. The average award was $28,364.

Overall, 1,244 farmers were approved for a total award amount of $35.5 million.

The legislation was well crafted and the grants provide a life-line for farmers, not a bail-out, Weathers said. It has been a challenging and rewarding experience to complete this program so timely to help our farmers.
On Saturday, many people will glance at their calendar and remark that it is Constitution Day  a celebration of the day that the founding fathers signed our Constitution in 1787. But will it resonate just how much significance that document has  even over 200 years after it was signed?

Though old, the Constitution has renewed significance to hundreds of Americans each and every day. Take Raleigh Bruner, the owner of a small moving company in Kentucky. After helping his sister move, he thought that it might be a good way to make a living. He started a moving company, Wildcat Moving, and named it after his alma mater  the University of Kentucky. But Raleigh soon learned that Kentucky law made it illegal to run a moving business if the existing moving companies object.

That law is called a Certificate of Necessity law, but some call it the Competitors Veto. The way the law works is that when an entrepreneur applies for a license to run a moving business, he must notify all existing businesses of the application. The existing businesses can then protest the application for any reason  including the simple reason that they dont want to compete.

A protest subjects the applicant to a government hearing akin to full-blown litigation, where the applicant must prove to a bureaucrat that his business is necessary. Of course, proving that your business is necessary in advance is a nearly impossible feat. The only way to prove that your services are needed is to open your doors and let consumers decide.

Bruner filed a civil rights lawsuit arguing that the law violated his constitutional right to earn a living. A federal judge agreed, and struck down the law. Now that Bruner can operate free of the Competitors Veto, hes turned Wildcat Moving into a thriving business. For Bruner, the Constitution signifies his right to earn a living for himself and his family.

The Constitution is also significant to Lasheika White, an African-American mother whose son is prevented from attending the school of his choice in St. Louis next year  simply because he is black.

The White family formerly lived in St. Louis, where her 9-year-old son, Edmund, attended a charter school. The family recently moved to Maryland Heights, Missouri, and they would like to continue enrolling Edmund in the same school that he has been attending since kindergarten. But Edmund is prohibited from transferring by a policy that allows only non-black students living in the county to transfer to public schools in St. Louis.

The original purpose of the discriminatory policy was to assist desegregation, but the Whites have filed a constitutional lawsuit arguing that prohibiting students from attending the school of their choice  solely because of their race  is unconstitutional. To Lasheika, the Constitution represents her right to be free of irrational discrimination.

The Constitution is also significant to the Murrs, who own two adjacent properties in St. Croix, Wisconsin. The Murrs purchased a waterfront lot in 1960 and built a family cabin on it. They enjoyed their cabin on the river so much that, three years later, they bought a second lot as an investment property. Local law now prevents the Murrs from using or selling their investment lot.

The Murrs filed a constitutional lawsuit seeking compensation for the governments taking of their investment parcel, arguing that they had been denied all economic use of their property. But a Wisconsin court ruled that because the Murrs own the adjacent cabin lot, and they can still use that cabin, they have not been denied all economic use of their property as a whole, and are not entitled to compensation.

In other words, by treating the two separate parcels as one, the court allowed the state to avoid compensating the Murrs when it took their property. The Supreme Court of the United States will hear the Murrs' appeal next term. To the Murrs, the Constitution represents their right to compensation when the government deprives them of use of their property.

All three of these families are represented free of charge by Pacific Legal Foundation, a non-profit legal organization dedicated to protecting constitutional rights. To these people, and to their attorneys, the Constitution isn't just an old document, it's a bulwark against infringements on their rights.

Although its especially important to think about the Constitution today, for many across America, every day the Constitution promises them important individual liberties. Americans would be wise to bear that in mind even after the clock strikes midnight, and its no longer Sept. 17.

Anastasia Boden is an attorney with Pacific Legal Foundation.
Left:Magistrate Zoila Ellis-Browne admitted that the application for recusal was not unexpected. Right:Attorney Kay Bacchus-Baptiste described both matters as highly political.

Attorney Kay Bacchus-Baptiste has lauded Magistrate Zoila Ellis-Browne, for upholding the defences application for her to recuse herself from hearing the criminal matters involving her clients:





Nice Radio proprietor Douglas Dougie De Freitas; New Democratic Party (NDP) Central Leeward Candidate, Benjamin Ben Exeter; and NDP Youth Arm member Shabazah George.





Bacchus-Baptiste made the commendation while speaking to THE VINCENTIAN on Tuesday, shortly after Ellis-Browne made the double recusal at the Calliaqua Magistrates Court, becoming the second magisterial recusal from these matters.





Magistrate Bertie Pompey, who presides at the Kingstown Magistrates Court, was the first Magistrate to have done so, and the matters were transferred to the Calliaqua Magistrates Court, where Ellis-Browne presides.

De Freitas matter was scheduled to be heard last Tuesday, while Exeters was down for hearing on September 26.





However, after making the recusals, Ellis-Browne transferred both matters to the Biabou Magistrates Court where Magistrate Rickie Burnett presides.

The cases will go before Burnett on September 30, at which time, dates are expected to be set for the hearings.





The charges





De Freitas is facing 12 charges of publishing false statements likely to case fear or alarm, or to disturb the public peace.





The charges were laid in connection with statements De Freitas had reportedly made on Nice Radio on December 10, the morning after the results of the December 9, 2015 general elections were declared.

Exeter is charged with unlawful possession of an offensive weapon, to wit, a firearm, at a public meeting outside the House of Assembly: assaulting police Constable Granville De Freitas, causing him actual bodily harm; assaulting Corporal Cuthbert Morris and resisting arrest.





George, who will be tried alongside Exeter, is charged with obstructing Corporal Morris during the execution of his duties, and with having an offensive weapon without lawful excuse, to wit, a zapper.

The charges against Exeter and George stemmed from incidents at an NDP protest outside the House of Assembly, December 29, last year, where members of parliament were taking their oath of office.

Bacchus-Baptiste told THE VINCENTIAN on Tuesday, "I was indeed heartened that she (Ellis-Browne) said she had anticipated the application for her to recuse herself, and that she had done research on the issue.

"I commend her for that. It shows that she wants to make sure that justice would be pure in the eyes of the general public.





The basis for the application





Bacchus-Baptiste described both matters as "highly political, and stressed that Ellis-Brownes decision to recuse herself in the interest of justice and fair play, was commendable.

Ellis-Browne is the wife of Michael "Mike Browne, a former Minister of Government in the ruling Unity Labour Party (ULP) administration.





Bacchus-Baptiste had requested the Magistrates recusal in both matters, stating that the three defendants, as well as a fair section of the general public, are deeply concerned that, "There is apparent bias, or a real possibility of bias, should you (Magistrate) adjudicate of these matters, which are highly political and politicised matters.





Bacchus-Baptistes application was made in a letter to the Magistrate, dated September 9, 2016. She also made oral submissions at the Calliaqua Magistrates Court on Tuesday.

She referred to media reports in relation to comments that were made by Colin John, then Assistant Director of Prosecution (DPP), in response to questions from the media, outside the Kingstown Magistrates Court, minutes after Magistrate Pompey had recused himself from hearing Exeters matter, June 20, 2016. John was the prosecutor in that matter. According to media reports, John had told reporters that if the matter goes before Chief Magistrate Rechanne Browne, the argument can be made that she is the sister of Minister of Health Luke Browne, and if it goes before Ellis-Browne, it could be argued that she is the wife of former Government Minister Michael "Mike Browne.





Bacchus-Baptiste pointed out that, "While previous political association should not disqualify a Magistrate, the public expressions of the Assistant DPP, and the highly charged political environment we live in, make it imperative that the defendants and the general public, feel justice is seen to be done. A fair minded and informed observer in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, may feel that a real possibility exists for bias.





Crown Counsel responds





But Crown Counsel Karim Nelson, in response to Bacchus-Baptistes application, on Tuesday, expressed the view that the point the then Assistant DPP was making when he spoke to the media, was that, "No matter what Magistrate the matter goes before, people would always find something to say.





Nelson opined that a fair-minded and informed observer in St. Vincent and the Grenadines would say, "There is no real possibility of bias.

He also noted that Michael "Mike Browne, has not been a member of parliament for the last five years, and he (Nelson) does not even know what is Mike Brownes current political affiliation.

Nelson concluded, "I think there is no real possibility of bias in this case.

Before recusing herself in both matters, Ellis-Browne admitted that the application for recusal was not totally unexpected, and that she had already done some research on the issue.




Professor Hilary Beckles, Vice Chancellor of UWI, is slated to headline the panel of persons making presentations at the conference.

Garifuna issues take front stage once again with the staging of the third International Garifuna Conference, October 11 and 12 .





The opening ceremony is scheduled for the Kingstown Methodist Church Hall, Monday October 10, at 5:30pm.

David Darkie Williams, president of the Garifuna Heritage Foundation, outlined preparations for the event last Tuesday. He was supported by Deborah Dalrymple, Head of the Open Campus of the University of the West Indies.





Vice Chancellor Of the University of the West Indies (UWI) Professor Hilary Beckles is expected to deliver the feature address at the opening of the Conference, to be held under the theme, Retrieval, inclusion and reparations.





Professor Beckles heads the CARICOM Commission on Reparations for native Genocide and Slavery.

The Conference swings into full gear with a presentation by Professor Guillermo Guevara, Director of the Indigenous Experimental University of Tacau, Venezuela.





Speaking at last Tuesdays briefing, Ambassador of the Republic of Venezuela H.E. Yuri Pimentel described Guevara as a fighter, and is certain that the event will strengthen ties between the citizens of both countries bound by historical experience and "example of struggle and survival despite the most terrible genocide by the British imperialism.





Director of Alliance Francaise, and Anthropologist Vanessa Demirciyan will also be a Conference presenter. She is pursuing a PhD in Garifuna matters, and her contribution is expected to shed more light on the Garifuna story.





Dr Karen Martinez, Dean of the Ecumenical Community College of Dangriga, Belize, will share her experience of the Garifuna existence as reflected from her attachment to that Garifuna settlement.

Also on the panel will be Dominican Anthropologist and Historian Dr Lennox Honeychurch.

Presenters will also be from Canada and Barbados, along with representatives of the Indigenous Retrieval from Greiggs and Sandy Bay and the SVG National Trust.





Dr Desha Osborne, Adjunct Assistant Professor at the Hunter College City University of New York will speak on the topic: Locating nationhood through cultural expression.





Tuesdays focus will be on: Retrieval techniques and tools for research; Experiences in developing relevant educational programmes for indigenous communities; and History of the Garifuna people  Pre-colonial and post-colonial.

On Wednesday, the attention will be on Reparations and indigenous cultural experience and Actions for Indigenous retrieval.





The Garifuna Heritage Foundation is inviting everyone, especially teachers, students at the Community College and secondary schools students to take part in the conference.
The Cybercrime Act No. 26 of 2016, perhaps the most widely debated piece of legislation in recent memory, was passed in this countrys parliament on August 12, 2016.





It received the full support of its architects, the government of the Unity Labour Party, even in the face of intense local, regional and international protests.

The protests were, on all accounts, predicated on the common concern that the Act infringed on the freedom of expression.





Once it received the majority support of the parliament, the next step in the process towards full enactment of the Act/Law lay with the office of the Governor General, which has to give it formal assent, thereby clearing the way for it to be published in the (Government) gazette, so as to adhere to the requirement that it is now a public document.





THE VINCENTIAN was reliably informed that the gazette carrying the Assent "went out on Wednesday.

Reports that the Act had been gazetted earlier could well have been misleading.

The delay between Parliaments approval of the Act and its Assent and gazetting was a cause for concern, and investigations as to what might have occasioned that (delay) throw up an interesting situation.





THE VINCENTIAN became aware, during the course of its investigation, that two separate Assents to this Act  one carrying the name of Susan Dougan OBE, Governor Generals Deputy and dated August 22, 2016, and another in the name of Victor H. Job, Governor Generals Deputy, and also dated August 22, 2016, had surfaced.

The indecision as to which to print and the lack of clear instructions so to do, may just have contributed to the delay.

It is understood that the gazetted Assent is not in the name of Susan Dougan and we are to assume, without actual possession of the relevant gazette, that the Victor Job Assent may be the one that was printed.





Question: When was Victor Job, a retired Methodist Minister sworn in as the Governor General Deputy? Has Susan Dougan relinquished the post of or been replaced as the Governor Generals Deputy? Did she have a problem with the Act or the process leading to Assent? She was the one introduced to the public as the bona fide Deputy, how then does Victor Job suddenly appear to have such authority?





The passage of the Cybercrime Act through Parliament had its fair share of turbulence. It appears that it continues to attract static that leaves a bad taste the mouths of concerned citizens especially.
Local artistes/writers/producers/publishers who turned up on Saturday to collect their first payments from ECCO. SVGs new ECCO Director Jemmot Anthony is pictured standing second from left.

Local performing/ recording artistes, song writers, musicians, publishers, etc., who showed faith in the Eastern Caribbean Collective Organisation for Music Rights (ECCO)  the copyright organisation representing music-related interests in the OECS - have seen their faith morph into benefits.





Last Saturday, September 9, at Frenches House in Kingstown, the local chapter of ECCO paid out the first ever royalties to those locals who had signed on to membership before January 2016.

Some 43 members received their share of a total pay out of some EC$9,700.00.

This payment is not only historic, according to one observer, it is the result of stoic work by a small group of persons, led by ace music teacher and arranger Joffre Venner, who beat the pavement, absorbed the doubts of artistes and producers, and endured, moreso, the ridicule and substantial opposition from users of the works of others, to bring Saturdays eventuality to fruition.





And while only a handful of those eligible for payments were on hand to receive their benefits, the act has already borne fruit in that, according to one person connected to the process, there has since been a drove of inquiries for membership.





One person who received payment commented that he had no doubt that this day would come; that he had the greatest confidence in persons like Joffre Venner, this countrys original Director on the Board of ECCO.

"This is a great day for all of us involved in creating works of art. Like all the big artistes across the world, we deserve to benefit from what we create. I hope those who have not signed on would now do so, he said.

Saturday, though, had its moment of sadness, occasioned when Venner (referred) reminded those present that he, in accordance with ECCOs constitution, could not seek re-election to the Board. Venner had served his allotted three consecutive 2-year terms.

Also departing the Board of Directors under the same condition as Venner, were Mr. McCarthy Marie and Llewellyn Gill, Chairman and Vice Chairman respectively.





Following elections supervised by ECCOs Attorney, Thaddeus Antoine of TM Antoine Partners, the new Board of ECCO reads: Dr. Anderson Reynolds (St. Lucia), Christine Charlemagne (St. Lucia), Claudia Edward-Ladner (St. Lucia), Daryl Bobb (Dominica), Hugh James (St. Lucia), Martin James (St. Lucia), Shala Emmanuel (St. Lucia), Shayne Ross (St. Lucia), Wayne Green (Grenada), Jemmot Anthony (St.Vincent & the Grenadines).

Officers of the Board, including its Chairman, will be elected at a subsequent meeting of the Board, when it will also appoint a Director for Antigua & Barbuda and an interim Director for St. Kitts & Nevis.

The administrative headquarters of ECCO is located in Castries, St. Lucia and its General Manager is Steve Etienne.
Left:Residents also raised concerns about the traffic problems that arose as a result of inadequate parking space. Right:Aqua  the other operation that has raised the ire of residents.





Residents in Arnos Vale are breathing a sigh of relief following the decision made Garth Lance Oliver to comply with the notice from the Physical Planning and Development Board, for him to cease the operation of his food outlet, known as Chill Spot.





"Planning did not close them down, they closed themselves down, one resident told THE VINCENTIAN.

"Do the right thing, that is what we wanted them to do, she continued.

"The residents did it collectively, it wasnt a one man thing.





Notices from Planning





Oliver received notification by way of a letter dated August 31 from the Ministry of Planning, stating that he had been given until tomorrow, September 16, to comply with the order to cease operation.





According to the letter, the Physical Planning Board had found the reasons offered by Oliver as to why he should remain open for business, to be unsatisfactory.





The letter also reminded that he was served notice back in 2014, after it was discovered that he was operating the business without the necessary permission.





It pointed to Olivers non-compliance in the face of being served an enforcement notice and being refused planning permission, by continuing to operate the business, failing thus to comply with the requirements as set out in the enforcement notices, and bringing the business in violation of the Town and Country Planning Act, Cap. 334 of the laws of St Vincent and the Grenadines.





A previous notice had been served in January 2015 as a result of Oliver covering the Rent and Drive parking lot with a roof, without authorization so to do.





An application submitted by Oliver in April 2015 was denied, reasons being: the violation of the required setback from the secondary road; the developments incompatibility with the existing land use in the area; and the reduction of parking space designated to the existing Rent and Drive development as shown on the planning application approved back in 2006.





More sentiments expressed





And the residents are pleased with the decision of the Planning authorities.

"I am extremely happy that they are closing him down, said another resident.

He told THE VINCENTIAN that he was not able to sit in his porch because of the stench that emanated from a nearby drain.





The resident, said that although he does not reside in close proximity to Olivers business, he has been affected at times because of the traffic which builds up in the area when patrons come to purchase food.

He said that he has been living in the area for about five years, three of which he has had to put up with Olivers business.





"It seemed as if the residents had no right, he continued.

"The place is already beginning to become quiet.





Another relieved resident explained that it was a combination of the smoke, cement dust and loud music.









He said that his girlfriend is asthmatic and that he has a two year old child.

Action needed to be taken, he said, because the problem was on-going for over two years.

"The only one who abided was Trotman, but these two? as he pointed in the direction of Chill-Spot and Aqua, a similar business within walking distance of the other.

"Is like them dont care at all, they keep saying that we fighting them down, we dont want them to make a dollar. What we simply telling them is to do something that could ease what we are feeling, but they dont want to do that. Yes they closing down, but they cause that on they own self, he said.





Issue with the Senator





The residents also took issue with Senator Carlos James who went on social media making a call for "the need to compromise and strike a balance in the on-going saga.





In venting her feeling, another resident said that for three years, she was imprisoned in her own home.

"We had to close the door to keep out the smoke; the place it hot  its noise from the night until anytime they feel like closing; and now people talking about compromise?





"We did all that; we called them, we spoke to them; we called the police, health, planning, we went to them (business owners); we called the ministers of government, even the Prime Minister, she said.

The affected residents did everything possible within the law, and now they were all breathing a sigh of relief.

But while the residents are feeling contented with the decision made by the Planning Authorities, there are still some concerns about the other operation  Aqua.





One resident, who lives in close proximity, complained about the music levels, saying that he has had to go over and ask on a number of occasions for some consideration to be maintained, however as the hours roll by, the volume levels increase, he said.





The resident also noted that some people say that such businesses are needed to promote tourism, but he said that the kind of obscenities that are often heard being used by patrons, are not a conducive environment for foreigners.




St. Vincent and the Grenadines has the potential to become a great global destination for vacation travellers.





It has not always been so: For many years, primarily due to lack of access, SVG has been one of the best-kept vacation destination secrets in the Caribbean.





In 2008, following a great deal of planning and location searching, ground was broken by the ULP Government for a new international airport in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, that would usher in opportunities for a billion dollar tourism-vacation industry, as well as unprecedented opportunities for import, export and business development.





While the new and soon to be opened Argyle International Airport is becoming a reality, frustrating delays have precluded international airlines from including our tropical paradise on their flight schedules.





What has happened, however, is that, under the leadership of Jennifer Richardson-Herbert, Communications Officer for the International Airport Development Company Limited, along with St. Vincent Tourism, global media has been giving glowing reports about St. Vincent and the Grenadines to an ever increasing number of tourism operators and vacation travellers.





This huge market-place includes not only the world-wide Vincentian Diaspora, but the affluent, newly retired, or about to retire baby boomers and, right on their heels, an equally large group of millennials who compete to be the first to attend and brag about experiencing new destinations.





It is often said that you only have one opportunity to make a good first impression, and you can be assured that just as they will spread the good news and positive experiences, visitors to our country will be volubly critical of negative experiences. Negative experiences include well documented criticisms from hundreds if not thousands of international travellers who have had to endure unpredictable delays or cancellations of confirmed connecting flights from Barbados, to and from St. Vincent. Much of this criticism is repeatedly directed at LIAT Airlines who have practically a monopoly on inter-island transportation.





In the interim





THE VINCENTIAN, in an exclusive interview with Paul Gravel, Managing Director of SVG Air -Grenadine Airways -ABM Air, learned that because St. Lucia is not on the St Vincent Barbados-St Vincent route, LIAT does not service the Hewanorra International Airport, causing incredible inconvenience to customers who in some cases have had to wait several days for transportation.





Gravel announced that Grenadine Air Alliance now flies daily to both Barbados and St Lucia, the two Gateways to St Vincent from the rest of the world. Until Argyle International opens and Air Canada, American, West Jet, Virgin, Emirates and other international airlines can start daily or weekly services, Grenadine Air Alliance will be there to help Vincentians and other international travellers to make convenient and affordable connections to and from St Vincent in a reasonable period of time.





Grenadine Air Alliance is offering daily flights connecting St. Vincent and the Grenadines, including Bequia, Canouan, and Union Island, with the St. Lucia Hewanorra and Barbados airports, scheduled to meet the arrival and departure of international flights.





They have just added an additional Twin Otter to their fleet, to facilitate the Barbados Route to accommodate visitors wanting to spend just a day either on St. Vincent or in the Grenadines. Early morning flights to the Grenadines allow day passengers, for example, to spend an entire day in St. Vincent, or relax on the Captain Yannis day tour Catamaran. The expanded service will also serve residents of Union or Canouan who wish to travel to St Vincent in the morning and return that same afternoon.





A personal touch





Negative criticisms have repeatedly been reported over not just late or cancelled connecting flights, but from a total absence of personal service available to arriving, stranded or inconvenienced passengers. Gravel stated that Grenadine Air has addressed that problem by having staff persons welcome each of the arriving guests personally as they come off their inbound carriers. They are escorted to the departure lounge, and their luggage is retrieved for them.





Another great advantage for those flying direct from overseas to St. Lucia, is that the Governments of St Lucia and St Vincent and the Grenadines have an agreement allowing arrivals to clear Immigration and Customs in St Lucia. The passengers are then considered to be on a domestic flight from St. Lucia to St. Vincent, eliminating the long line- ups facing LIAT customers when landing at E.T. Joshua Airport from Barbados. They just collect their luggage and walk straight through like they had just flown in from Bequia or Mustique.





While high level meetings between Government and industry personnel are currently being held to resolve current problems, SVG Air -Grenadine Airways may indeed be the travel alternative to LIAT.
The UN Security Council is comprised of five permanent members and ten non-permanent members. Inset: St. Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Dr. Ralph E. Gonsalves confirmed that his government was still pursuing a non-permanent seat on the UN Security Council.

St. Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Dr. Ralph E. Gonsalves says the nation is still pursuing its "ambitious bid for a non-permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council.





"Its still on the agenda, and were pursuing it, Gonsalves told THE VINCENTIAN in an exclusive interview last week Tuesday, while on a brief visit to New York. "Its something thats pretty ambitious.





The Vincentian leader said there is dire need for a Small Island Developing State (SIDS) to sit on the Council "to assist with the articulation of issues, such as climate change.





"Its a matter that were pursuing very, very much, said Gonsalves, adding that the nations pursuit is done through the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) and SIDS DOCK.





AOSIS is a coalition of small island and low-lying coastal countries that share similar development challenges and concerns about the environment, especially their vulnerability to the adverse effects of global climate change. It functions primarily as an ad hoc lobby and negotiating voice for SIDS within the United Nations system.





AOSIS said it has a membership of 44 states and observers, drawn from all oceans and regions of the: Africa, Caribbean, Indian Ocean, Mediterranean, Pacific and South China Sea. Thirty-nine are members of the United Nations, close to 28 percent of developing countries. Together, SIDS communities constitute some five percent of the global population.





SIDS DOCK is an initiative among AOSIS member-countries, providing SIDS with a collective institutional mechanism to assist them to transform their national energy sectors into catalysts for sustainable economic development, and help generate financial resources to address adaptation to climate change.





It is called SIDS DOCK because it is designed as a "DOCKing station, to connect the energy sector in SIDS with the global market for finance, sustainable energy technologies.





SIDS DOCK was launched in December 2010, with four partners: The United Nations Development Program (UNDP), the World Bank, AOSIS and the Government of Denmark, which announced a grant of US$14.5 million in start-up contributions.





On December 8, 2011, the SIDS DOCK Steering Committee designated Belize as the host country for the SIDS DOCK Secretariat.

Gonsalves said he had led the UN when SIDS Dock was launched.

"We worked with the global environmental fund, we worked with several agencies all over the world, he said. "There are big issues. We in the Caribbean need to push to deal with mitigation.

"We have to push for the mitigation (of 2 degrees Celcius above pre-industrial levels), Gonsalves added. "But we have to make sure countries, like us, get the necessary adaptation monies.





The Security Council





Elections for the 2020 non-permanent Security Council seat that St. Vincent and the Grenadines seeks, take place a year earlier, the prime minister said.

Under the UN Charter, the Security Council has primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security.





The Council has 15 members  including five permanent members China, France, Russian Federation, the United Kingdom and the United States - with each having one vote.





The current remaining 10 non-permanent members, elected for two-year terms by the UN General Assembly, with end of term date, are: Angola (2016); Egypt (2017); Japan (2017); Malaysia (2016); New Zealand (2016); Senegal (2017); Spain (2016); Ukraine (2017); Uruguay (2017); (Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela) (2016).

Last month, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sir Louis Straker, told THE VINCENTIAN that, in light of the governments quest to "boost the Mission to the UN, ahead of the countrys application for non-Permanent Membership on the Security Council, personnel at the Mission are being expanded.

Sir Louis said that Sehon Marshall, a former Deputy New York Counsel General, has been appointed Minister Counsellor, and that Marsena Ballantyne, the former aide to the Ambassador to the UN, I. Rhonda King, has been promoted to Minister Counsellor.





The Foreign Affairs Minister also disclosed that another Minister Counsellor will soon be appointed.

"We have to beef up our staff [at the Mission], Straker said. "We have to show that were involved in various organizations of the UN.
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By Azernews





By Rashid Shirinov

Azerbaijan and Lithuania have agreed to further expand their bilateral cooperation in the railway sector during the Baku meeting of the head of Azerbaijan Railways CJSC Javid Gurbanov and the Ambassador of Lithuania to Azerbaijan Valdas Lastauskas.

This was said on September 15 to Trend by the spokesperson of Azerbaijan Railways Nadir Azmammadov.

The sides discussed the prospects of future cooperation between the two countries, including the railway project Viking.

Lithuanian Ambassador highly assessed the large-scale reforms carried out by Azerbaijan Railways, Azmammadov said.

The combined train Viking started to run on the route Ilyichevsk (Ukraine)  Minsk (Belarus)  Draugyste (Lithuania) with a total length of 1,766 kilometers in 2003. Participants of the project are Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, Latvia, and Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey joined later.

In February 2016, Ukraine and Lithuania signed a Memorandum on joining the container train Viking to the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route from Europe to China, passing through Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan.

Later, in May 2016, Azerbaijan signed a Protocol on the participation of Azerbaijan Railways in the project of the international container train Viking.

In the past 10 years, Viking train has traveled 2.3 million kilometers and has transported more than 4.8 million tons of cargo. The project is constantly developing: transportation possibilities are introduced in international forums and other events.
By Azernews





By Nigar Abbasova

The Azerbaijani Finance Ministry has presented its forecast indicators of the state budget and a draft concept of the socio-economic development for 2017 and subsequent three years to the Cabinet of Ministers.

Forecast of the budget is based on oil prices standing at $40 per barrel. Moreover, the country has also prepared two additional scenarios for forecasting the state budget given the price at $35 and $45 per barrel, a source told Trend.

The parameters of the state budget for 2016 were based on oil price at $25 per barrel, which was mainly connected with the decline in oil prices, which in turn sharply reduced the projected revenues of the state and consolidated budgets, as well as devaluation of the national currency and transition to a floating exchange rate.

The transfers of the State Oil Fund of Azerbaijan (SOFAZ) to the state budget are expected to be lower than the indices fixed in 2016. The source, however has not provided any information about precise figures.

Meanwhile, tax revenues from the regions of Azerbaijan amounted to 622.1 million manats ($379.9 million) in 2015, which is by 16.5 times higher than the rate fixed in 2003. Experts say that the growth is a result of the implementation of state programs on socio-economic development of regions. Moreover, specific weight of tax revenues coming from the non-oil sector of regions has also increased by 3.9 percent up to 12.4, which is also considered to be an obvious indicator of development of entrepreneurship in the country.

Head of the organization on the management of territorial tax authorities Elchin Beylarov, said that one of the most successful results of the implementation of state programs is that certain regions of the country form their expenditures at the expense of taxes, not getting any subsidies from the budget. He stressed that one of the main objectives is increasing the number of such regions in the future.

Some 61.6 percent of registered taxpayers accounts for regions of the country, while revenues to the state budget (from regions) amounted to 381.1 million manats ($232.7 million) in January-August 2016.

The public budget revenues for 2016 are expected to reach 16.822 billion manats ($10.273 billion), while the rate of expenditures will amount to 18.495 billion manats ($11.294 billion).

Finance minister Samir Sharifov earlier said that Azerbaijan could neutralize negative effects of the external factors on its economy, underlining that the country succeeded to fulfill all tasks related to the execution of the state budget.

Moreover, the country has recently introduced certain changes in its tax system, which envisages improvement of tax legislation and facilitation of business doing in the country.

The price of a barrel of Azeri Light crude oil stood at $47.13 on September 15. The official exchange rate of the U.S. dollar and euro to Azerbaijani manat was set at 1.6375 manats and 1.8406 manats, respectively, on September 16.
By Azernews





By Nigar Abbasova

Azerbaijan's state energy giant SOCAR held a presentation on the issuance of bonds for the domestic market of the country, on September 16.

SOCARs President Rovnag Abdullayev, addressing the event said that the company is pursuing a new strategy on the strengthening of its positions at the international level and seeks to diversify its financing channels.

Eurobonds have been successfully issued on the domestic market. This is a very important step for diversifying financing channels and creating investment opportunities for the population, he said.

The company will issue USD bonds for Azerbaijani citizens starting September 20. The nominal value of each bond is $1,000, while the total volume of emission is $100 million. The annual bond yield is 5 percent, while interest income is not taxable and will be paid quarterly. The bonds will be sold till October 10, 2016.

Abdullayev said that obligations may be obtained only by Azerbaijani citizens and local companies, mentioning that SOCAR guarantees the liquidity of the issued securities and the possibility of selling them at any time. He also pointed out that foreign individuals and legal entities have a right to buy bonds from their owners on the secondary market.

The sale of bonds will be implemented in "Asan" services ?1 and ?5. Citizens of the country will be able to receive interest yield in International Bank of Azerbaijan (IBA), Kapital Bank, Rabitabank, Xalq Bank. AzFinance, InvestAZ, PASHA Kapital and PSG Kapital will act as market makers (dealer firms that assume the risk of holding a certain number of shares of a particular security in order to facilitate its trading).

Abdullayev emphasized that issuance of bonds will provide for new financial mechanisms for the economy of the country. He said that that issuing of SOCAR bonds in the country wont lead to an increase in the volume of funds attracted from outside, as the funds from selling these securities will be used for diversification of the companys financial portfolio, adding that part of the funds attracted after the issuance of dollar bonds will be used to repay part of the external debt of the company.

Azerbaijani presidential aide on economic reforms Natig Amirov, in turn, said that the government of Azerbaijan is considering the issue of exempting interest income of bonds from taxes for an open-ended period (the interest income is exempt from taxation in the country for a period of three years starting from February 1, 2016). He also said that SOCAR is ready to place its shares on the stock market.

Back in late 2012, SOCAR's head Rovnag Abdullayev voiced plans to issue bonds of the company worth 500 million manats ($299 million) and place them on the Azerbaijani securities market, saying that success of the companys corporate bonds in foreign markets allowed to plan the issue of bonds in the domestic market.
By Azernews





By Laman Ismayilova

Sheki, one of the most ancient settlements and cultural centres of Azerbaijan hosts The Uch Mekan International Theater Festival.

The festival that opens the 144th theatre season in the country will last until September 24.

The magnificent event, which covers such cities as Baku, Sheki, Mingachevir, brings together the theatre troupes from Turkey, Russia, Georgia, Iran, Ukraine and the UAE.

Azerbaijan is represented at the event by the State Academic Drama Theater, State Russian Drama Theater, State Puppet Theater, Shaki State Drama Theater and Ganja State Drama Theater.

During the festival, theatre lovers will be delighted by twelve performances. Eight of them will be staged in Sheki. Another three will be presented in Mingachevir, while the last one will be shown in Baku.

The solemn opening ceremony of the Festival was attended by organizers, TURKSOY representatives, renowned theater and art figures, guests and theater lovers.

Prior to the opening ceremony, the participants in the festival visited Azerbaijans national leader Heydar Aliyevs statute erected in front of the building of Shaki Executive Authority, put flowers and revered his memory.

Then, the event participants viewed the photo-stand depicting theatrical art samples.

The opening ceremony was addressed by the head of Shaki Executive Authority Elkhan Usubov, Azerbaijans deputy minister of culture and tourism Adalet Veliyev, who spoke of the history and development of the Azerbaijani national theater, the first theater and the first opera that was staged in the Muslim East. They stressed that the theatrical art of Azerbaijani people is rooted in the ancient folk festivals and dances.

Then, guests were presented the "Dead" play by great writer Jalil Mammadguluzadeh, the editor of satirical magazine "Molla Nasraddin".

The history of Azerbaijan theater started with spectacles "Vizier of Lankaran khan" and "Hadji Gara", based on plays Mirza Fatali Akhundov in March-April 1873.

These first amateur performances staged by students of real school by initiative of Hasan-bay Zardabi and with the active participation of the Najaf-bay Vezirov and Alekber Adigezalov have become a powerful impetus for the establishment of a national theater.
By Trend





The decision on amendments to the constitution should be made by Azerbaijani people, said the US Ambassador to Azerbaijan Robert Cekuta on September 15.

Changing the constitution is extremely serious thing. This is the basic law of the country, Cekuta told reporters commenting on the upcoming referendum to amend the countrys constitution.

Earlier, President Ilham Aliyev signed an order to hold a referendum Sept. 26 on amending Azerbaijans constitution.

Elsewhere in his comments, the ambassador stressed the necessity of continuing the US-Azerbaijan cooperation in economy and trade.

"The US and Azerbaijan have a lot to work together and we will continue to work together.

Azerbaijani troops are staying in Afganistan as peacekeepers along with us. We are together in fighting terrorism. We very much appreciate what Azerbaijan's example of tolerance means in fighting violent extremism"- ambassador said.

According to Cekuta , U.S. will continue to work on helping the Southern Gas Corridor, that is important for the Europe's energy security.
By Azertac





An Azerbaijani delegation led by Parliament Speaker Ogtay Asadov participated in the meeting of Speakers of parliament of the Council of Europe member states in Strasbourg on September 15.

The delegation included chairman of the parliamentary committee, Head of the Azerbaijani delegation to PACE Samad Seyidov, Chairperson of the PACEs Committee on Migration, Refugees and Displaced Persons Sahiba Gafarova and other officials.

The delegates discussed the issues of the migration and refugee crisis in Europe: role and responsibilities of parliaments, national parliaments and the Council of Europe: together promoting democracy, human rights and the rule of law, and mobilization of parliaments against hate, for inclusive and non-racist societies.

During his visit Asadov met President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe Pedro Agramunt, where the sides spoke about prospects of cooperation, as well as relations between Azerbaijan and the Council of Europe.

The meeting was also attended by chairman of the parliamentary committee, Head of the Azerbaijani delegation to PACE Samad Seyidov, Chairperson of the PACEs Committee on Migration, Refugees and Displaced Persons Sahiba Gafarova.




By Trend





Azerbaijans President Ilham Aliyev met with Moldovas Prime Minister Pavel Filip in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan on September 16.

During the meeting, the parties emphasized the good level of relations between the two countries and expressed satisfaction with the great potential of relations. They pointed to the high level of cooperation between Azerbaijan and Moldova within international organizations.

At the same time, the parties pointed out that both sides are interested in further developing the cooperation. They emphasized the good cooperation in the spheres of economy, trade, transportation, energy, investment making and agriculture.

The parties exchanged views on further intensifying the activities of the intergovernmental commission and paying reciprocal visits for this purpose.
By Azertac





A regular meeting of the CIS Council of Heads of State has kicked off in Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan.





President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev is attending the meeting, which marks the 25th anniversary of the founding of CIS.





Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev welcomed President Ilham Aliyev. The heads of state posed for photographs.





Almazbek Atambayev then welcomed other guests who attend the meeting of the CIS Council of Heads of State. The presidents posed together for photographs.





The CIS Council of Heads of State is now meeting in a limited format.




By Trend





A military unit came under attack in Turkeys Agri province, Milliyet newspaper reported on September 16.

Nine Turkish servicemen were killed as a result of the incident.

Reportedly, the attack was committed by militants of Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) terrorist group.

Large-scale anti-PKK operations have been launched in the province following the attack, said the newspaper.

The conflict between Turkey and the PKK, which demands the creation of an independent Kurdish state, has continued for over 33 years and has claimed more than 40,000 lives.



The UN and the European Union list the PKK as a terrorist organization.
The International Air Transport Association (Iata) announced that the 2016 World Passenger Symposium (WPS) will focus on key initiatives that are transforming the passenger experience.



These include distribution and payments, airport processes, onboard connectivity, and baggage handling.



The conference will open with two high-level speeches. Sir Tim Clark, president of Emirates Airline, will set the stage for the conference in a welcome address. Alexandre de Juniac, Iatas director general and CEO, will follow with keynote remarks focused on meeting customer expectations as demand for air travel grows.



Meetingor even better exceedingcustomer expectations is the key to any successful business. Thats challenging. Expectations continuously evolve to become ever more demanding in detail and personalisation. We also know that travelers want a simpler, more transparent shopping experience, faster and more efficient airport processes and reliable connectivity during all stages of their journey. Speed is of the essence. And many of the enablers lie in making even better use of data and technology, said de Juniac.



The sixth edition of WPS will take place in Dubai from October 18-20 with Emirates as the host airline. More than 700 high-level delegates from across the travel value chain are expected to attend.



Highlights:

 The Leadership Panel, featuring Sir Tim Clark, president of Emirates Airline and Paul Griffiths, CEO, Dubai Airport, will discuss the formula for success and financial sustainability

 Latest 20-Year Passenger Forecast presented by Brian Pearce, Iatas Chief Economist

 The popular CIO Forum will also return for another year, to be joined with an Innovation Day

 Presentation of the results of Iatas Global Passenger Survey

 Presentation of the results of the Iata New Distribution Capability (NDC) Hackathon in Dubai

 The third edition of the Passenger Innovation Awards



Other subjects to be discussed at WPS include: NDC user experience; the One Identity concept for safe, secure and simpler passenger identification; Smart Security; onboard connectivity and new systems for baggage processing. - TradeArabia News Service


Dhofar Global, a leading supplier of hygiene care products in the Middle East, has announced its participation at the 2016 edition of Hotel Show, taking place in Dubai from tomorrow, with plans to display its innovative range of cleaning and hygiene solutions for the hotel industry.



The Hotel Show is an annual event that has consistently drawn the participation of notable companies and key decision-makers within the hospitality industry. We are excited to be part of this event as it provides a valuable networking platform and we are also eager to present our modern and innovative solutions that we believe could greatly enhance the operational efficiency of our clients, said Chandan Singh, CEO, Dhofar Global.



The occupancy rates within the country continues to rise, and this positive trend is set to continue in light of Dubais winning bid to host EXPO 2020. In fact, Dubai alone, is set to have 100,000 hotel rooms by 2020. With the development of new hotels as well as the new and dynamic trends within the hospitality sector, many companies are looking for unique solutions to address the growth in the industry. The Hotel Show, being one of the most highly anticipated hospitality events in the country, provides an ideal venue for Dhofar Global to showcase their versatile solutions and network with hospitality professionals and companies participating at the exhibition, Dhofar has said in a statment.



The Hotel Show Dubai will commence on September 17 and will run till September 19 at the Dubai World Trade Center. - TradeArabia News Service
Small but significant gains may mean there is a light at the end of the tunnel for Wyomings struggling energy sectors, but for counties that depend on industry tax dollars, the downturn in markets can linger long after prices and production begin to rise.

Energy taxes are the fuel that feeds local governments, including schools, emergency services and police departments. But, production taxes are due a year to 18 months after a commodity is drilled or mined. When taxes are done incorrectly, which in Wyoming is par for the course, counties either receive unexpected bills for taxes paid years before, or are met with a windfall of extra cash.

That has two significant consequences in Wyoming. As the state awaits a time when oil prices rise and coal companies dig deep, the tax delay means that county budgets will lag behind any upturn.

Counties establish their valuation every year. Its essentially a countys net worth, and it determines all its budgets, from the coroner to the local school district.

And every year, industry accounts for large percentages of some counties valuation.

In Campbell County, for example, coal production alone is about 60 percent of the total valuation. In neighboring Johnson County, oil and gas production and property account for up to 75 percent of the countys worth.

For the latter, the current bust almost cut its valuation in half, from about $880 million in 2015 to $514 million in 2016.

Campbell, too, has lost millions in valuation, but still remains high. In 2016, the countys total assessed valuation was $5.3 billion, down from $6.2 billion in 2015.

High valuations have influence statewide, as the ups and downs of local tax numbers reflect the ups and downs of state revenue as well. In terms of some areas, like education, high earning counties contribute to a pool of money that guarantees education dollars for poor counties.

But looking at the yearly worth of these counties is not directly tied to that year.

The taxes paid by industry to Campbell County earlier in 2016 were from 2014s coal production.

As the state moves closer to stable markets, local counties will continue to reap their tax dollars 12 to 18 months behind.

That delay is hard enough for counties in a normal year. But it means the pains of Wyomings current downturn will be felt after the markets being to make solid gains.

Its also hard on companies.

Say a bankruptcy occurred today, (the companys) got taxes that were assessed in 2015 that are due in 2016, 2017. Everybody is walking around on egg shells on account of those kind of things, said Mike Madden, R-Buffalo.

Alpha Natural Resources  now Contura Energy  owes Campbell County more than $1 million in delinquent taxes from earlier production years, said Becky Brazelton, county treasurer.

Alpha emerged from bankruptcy July 26.

Contura has yet to alert the county on its intentions to pay the late tax, Brazelton said.

There is one more complication to the tax delay and that is tax corrections, or amendments.

Since March 2015, almost 50,000 amendments have been filed with the Wyoming Department of Revenue to correct tax mistakes on production going back to 2006. Some of these result in extra money owed to counties, and others in money owed back to industry companies.

What that often means is that counties are continually making adjustments. In cases where a company significantly overpaid, the county then must pay that money back, often disrupting their budgeting process as they extract money from the various places it went, from special districts to hospitals.

Wyoming has an unwieldy energy tax structure that contributes too many mistakes made every year, said Pat Meyer, Park County assessor.

Meyer is on a task force commissioned by the Wyoming Legislature to tackle some of the industry tax issues that plague both companies and state and local governments.

When this task force was formed, it was industrys opinion that Wyoming had the most complicated process to value oil and gas, he said.

The task force has looked at establishing an average price per barrel, average transportation costs and similar set figures to reduce the number of mistakes being made, Meyer said.

The work of the task force has been hampered by the downturn, according to Madden, the representative from Buffalo and a member of the group.

Its kind of hard to run a task force where you are dealing with redoing taxes, when you got this financial uncertainty and stress in the whole system, he said. You cant keep peoples mind on it. Its too early to tell how we are going to work on it.

The task force is set to end this year. Madden said he was unsure if it would be extended, but the group has yet to come to firm solution on tax issues.
On a chilly September morning, a few hundred feet off the popular but deteriorating Talapus Lake Trail near Snoqualmie Pass, Jon Nishimura wielded his shovel and a smile.

Few things make him as happy as building and repairing trails.

I just love it, the Mountlake Terrace resident said during one of his more than 500 outings as a Washington Trails Association volunteer. I just feel good about myself when Im able to do something for somebody else. It may not seem like a lot, but it makes a big difference.

It is precisely this sentiment that has made the association one of the most important things to happen to Washington trails in the past half century. Powered by more than 4,400 volunteers, the organization advocates for trails and helps cash-strapped local, state and federal agencies maintain and build trails.

People in our region and our state love the outdoors and want to give back, said Rebecca Lavigne, the associations interim executive director.  Really, no other state has an organization like the WTA.

This month, the group is celebrating its 50th anniversary. Whether they know it or not, most hikers have seen and benefited from the organizations work.

The nonprofit contributes 140,000 hours of volunteer trail work each year. But as some are fond of saying, if they do their job right the trail will look like its been there for 100 years.

Before we became involved we had no idea there were these angels out here on the trails, said Ardeth Gregg, a volunteer whose husband, Joe, is on the groups board of directors. You dont think about it as you hike. Its an amazing blessing that they take care of so many trails.

As much as they have to celebrate this month, association members also realize their next 50 years might be even more challenging.

We just celebrated the National Park Services centennial, and there was a lot of talk about the lack of maintenance, Lavigne said. Its going to take everybody who cares about those places to speak up for them. If our elected officials dont hear from us they (public lands) are at risk for the future. That is our biggest issue.

From magazine to movement

In 1966, guidebook author Louise Marshall started publishing a magazine called Signpost to give people a forum for sharing stories about their hikes and trail conditions.

Fifty years later, the association is still doing this via its website, wta.org, and the magazine, now called Washington Trails. National Park and U.S. Forest Service rangers even use the trail reports from the website to inform visitors.

It didnt take long for the group to become something more substantial than an information source.

Really, I think it was because of the people, Lavigne said. There was a need to band together to protect public lands, and that led to (the WTA) becoming a voice for advocacy and policy work.

In the 1960s, outdoors advocates were clamoring to protect public lands. The Wilderness Act was signed in 1964, but by the end of the decade there were only four wilderness areas in Washington. Today there are 31. The association was among the many groups that lobbied for protecting public lands.

In the 1990s, the association evolved again.

I think the WTA had a tremendous impact because the Forest Service has lost almost all its funding, and they just didnt have enough people to do all the work, said Ed Vervoort, a Seattle resident who has volunteered for the organization for more than a decade.

The idea to organize volunteer work crews came from then-executive director Greg Ball.

He said volunteers can do trail work, and they can do it safely and have fun, Lavigne said. It would build a large group that was invested in trails, and it would build (the WTA into) a bigger and stronger organization.

Watershed moment

On Nov. 6, 2006, the skies opened over Mount Rainier, forever changing the national park and the association.

Eighteen inches of rain fell in 36 hours. An entire campground washed away. The Carbon River Road needed to be closed permanently to vehicle traffic. Trails were rendered impassable. In total, the flooding caused $36 million in damage and closed the park for six months.

Other popular outdoor recreation areas were also impacted by flooding.

A huge amount of people wanted to get outside, and suddenly they couldnt do it anymore, Lavigne said. And agencies didnt have the funding to do it on their own. The WTA was one of a number of nonprofit and private businesses that stepped up to help. We recruited a lot of new volunteers. They saw we were doing important work and wanted to help.

In the decade since the flood, Lavigne said the number of association volunteers has doubled.

A partnership was formed with Mount Rainier National Park during the flood cleanup, and the group has worked in the park ever since.

In July, Mount Rainier volunteer coordinator Kevin Bacher said outside assistance is vital to the park. You take that away, and all of a sudden there is no way we could keep up.

Out of the woods

On Sept. 3, Adam and Conrad Gregg, 15-year-old twins from Sammamish, spent the day helping a crew build a half-mile reroute of the Talapus Lake Trail.

Theyve each participated in more than 12 work parties and, as teens, they sometimes stick out. While most of the other crew members on this morning were two or three times their age, the twins feel at home on the trail.

Its a really good way to be outdoors and do something for the community, because so many people hike around here, Adam Gregg said.

Appealing to youth is a priority for the association. Lavigne says a quarter of its volunteer base comes from youth programs.

We want every child in Washington to have an opportunity to connect with the outdoors, Lavigne said. We know we as an organization cant do that, but we can leverage our expertise to train others who can help reach that goal.

In recent years, the organization has made an effort to do more projects close to population centers. WTA crews have worked on trails in Tacomas Swan Creek Park and Olympias Priest Point Park.

This, Lavigne hopes, will help give trail access to people who might have difficulties traveling to other locations.

We want the outdoors to be relevant 50 years from now, Lavigne said. We know people care, so we want to go where the people are at.
Former Secretary of State Colin Powell may have served in the George W. Bush administration, but he showed little affection for Vice President Dick Cheney and his daughter Liz, whom he called idiots, in a newly released trove of leaked emails.

In separate emails between Powell and Condoleezza Rice, who succeeded him as Secretary of State, Rice said Cheney needs to spend quality time with his grandchildren and let the past go.

The emails, posted on the website DCLeaks.com and first reported by Buzzfeed News late Tuesday, offer insight into the unvarnished opinions of Powell, a retired Army general and statesman. The Cheneys are one of the most prominent political families from Wyoming. Liz Cheney is campaigning to represent Wyoming in the U.S. House.

The email messages run from March 2015 through last month and also illustrate the retired four-star generals thoughts on Donald Trump, whom he called a national disgrace, and his own Republican Party, which he described as crashing and burning.

Powell also laments Hillary Clintons attempt to equate her use of private email at the State Department with his.

The Star-Tribune asked Liz Cheney and longtime Dick Cheney aide Kara Ahern for a response to Powells and Rices comments. They did not reply.

Powell, 79, did not respond Wednesday to a phone message or email seeking comment. He earlier told BuzzFeed that he does not deny the emails authenticity.

In September 2015, the Cheneys published Exceptional: Why the World Needs a Powerful America. The book came up during an email exchange between Powell and Kenneth Duberstein, White House chief of staff under President Ronald Regan, according to BuzzFeed, which obtained a copy of the email.

They are idiots and spent force peddling a book that aint going nowhere, Powell wrote.

See acknowledgement in Cheneys new book, Duberstein wrote in a separate email to Powell. Scary.

Scary and the usual suspects. Will pass without a trace with most Americans, Powell replied, according to BuzzFeed.

In the books two-page acknowledgements section, the Cheneys thanked close family and friends for their support of their book project, including Ahern. Most are Washington conservative insiders, such as Scooter Libby, Bill Kristol and Charles Krauthammer.

DCLeaks.com has been alleged to be an outlet for hackers tied to Russian intelligence groups. The website, which says it intends to expose the misuse of political power, has previously released emails from other Washington political figures.

The release of Powells emails is the latest in a string of leaks that appear intended to influence the 2016 presidential election. The FBI is investigating how thousands of Democratic National Committee emails were hacked and released, an embarrassing breach that Clintons campaign maintains was committed by Russia to benefit Trump.

Powell and Rice criticized Dick Cheneys and Bushs loyalty to former U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, according to Politico.

One day when we both have had too many drinks we can discuss why [President George W. Bush] tolerated him and why Dick, a successful SecDef, was so committed to Don, Politico said Powell sent on Dec. 16.

Cheney was secretary of defense under George H.W. Bush.

Cheney sat for an interview with a Fox News reporter, which became a book released in November, Cheney One on One: A Candid Conversation with Americas Most Controversial Statesman. Politico said the book examined the Iraq War and other controversies during the Bush years.

Rice wrote that Cheney needs to concentrate on quality time with his grandkids and let it go.

Hee, hee, he wont, Powell replied on Nov. 26.

Rice wrote that Cheney should go away already! according to Politico.

In the emails, Powell said he stayed relatively quiet during the rise of Trump, the Republican presidential nominee. To go on and call him an idiot just emboldens him, Powell said.

To a former aide he writes, No need to debate it with you now, but Trump is a national disgrace and an international pariah.

He also criticized Trump for backing the false claim that President Barack Obama was not born in the United States.

All his lies and nonsense just pile up, Powell wrote. I just go back to the unforgivable one. Trying to destroy the President elected by the American people with his fictitious investigation into this source of birth. Absolutely disgraceful.

Trump, in a Twitter post late Wednesday, said, I was never a fan of Colin Powell after his weak understanding of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq = disaster. We can do much better!

Powell also suggests frustration with the state of the nations politics.

We all need to start voting for America and not our parties, Powell writes. Trump is taking on water. He doesnt have a GOP philosophy or even a Conservative philosophy. We need a revolution and it will begin with the GOP crashing and burning up its current form.

Powells leaked messages include his thoughts on Clintons lingering email woes. He criticized Clinton aides for tying him into the controversy over the Democratic nominees use of a private email server while she was secretary of state.

Powell has acknowledged using a private email account with both senior U.S. officials and for back-channel communications with foreign dignitaries. Clinton used a private email server located in the basement of her New York home.

Powell wrote that he had told Clintons minions repeatedly that they are making a mistake trying to drag me in, yet they still try. In another spot, he declared of Clinton that Everything HRC touches she kind of screws up with hubris.

The messages contain comments that reflect that he, too, sought to use private email as a way to avoid creating documents retained by the government. Decrying friggin record rules, Powell wrote that he saw email more like a telephone than a cable machine.

Congressional Democrats have seized on the use of a private email addresses by Powell and Rice as a foil for Republican attacks on Clinton. By suggesting that he didnt view work conducted via private email as a permanent government record, Powell could offer those Democrats additional ammunition.
CHEYENNE  Wyoming drivers may one day get to pick a license plate celebrating Yellowstone National Park for their cars, though there are several things that need to happen before the plate becomes a reality.

Wyoming Department of Transportation Director Bill Panos told Transportation Commission members about the concept Thursday.

However, he stressed that a Yellowstone plate is only in the development stage, and the department is still researching the matter  including the business model needed to make the plate work.

Were very preliminary now, he said. Were just looking at artwork and business models.

In addition, the Legislature would have to pass a law allowing the plate to be produced.

Still, Panos said the department is looking into what the plate would cost to produce and how to make sure those costs are covered.

Other states, including Wyomings neighbors, rake in millions of dollars from specialty license plate fees.

Those fees are often split between the state and a designated organization or agency, something Wyoming also does with its University of Wyoming license plate.

Besides being another option for drivers and benefiting an organization or agency, Panos said the Yellowstone plate would be a piece in solidifying the parks association with the state of Wyoming and vice versa.

That desire to better associate the two at the state level was what got the ball rolling on the Yellowstone plate.

This was about connecting the word Wyoming with Yellowstone, Panos said.

But one problem with specialty plates in Wyoming is simply that there arent a lot of vehicles relative to other states, an issue brought up by commissioner Bruce McCormack.

Wyoming has about 900,000 to 1 million registered vehicles in all, Panos said, therefore limiting the number of potential sales.

But to get around that problem, the department may sell a Yellowstone novelty plate alongside a regular plate.

Novelty plates are license plates the public can order that are not for use on a vehicle.

Selling novelty plates could increase the likelihood the financial math for the Yellowstone plate would work.

Panos said the department usually sells about 2,000 novelty plates each year. He said orders for those novelty plates come in from around the world.

Rick Newton, another commission member, said he would like to see more of the state represented in specialty plates as well.

Im just thinking we should do it for the whole state somehow, he said, versus just Yellowstone in the northwest corner.

Panos said the ultimate goal is to establish a business model that would work for other specialty plates.

He threw out ideas for a Grand Teton National Park plate, a Devils Tower plate and an Equality State-themed plate as examples.

In addition to the standard license plate and University of Wyoming plate, Wyoming also offers several license plates to military members and first-responders and to owners of certain collector vehicles.

Wyoming and California are tied for the third-fewest number of specialty plates available among the states, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Only Nebraska and New Hampshire offer fewer.
URUGUAY

Former Gitmo detainee reportedly out of coma

MONTEVIDEO  A former Guantanamo detainee reportedly has awakened from a coma that resulted from a hunger strike to dramatize his unhappiness about being resettled in Uruguay and his demand to be moved to another country.

Cristian Mirza, the Uruguayan governments liaison with six resettled detainees, said Thursday that Abu Wael Dhiab had come out of the coma at his apartment in Montevideo.

Dr. Julia Galzerano of the Medical Union of Uruguay said Dhiab was extremely dehydrated after 11 days without water but said his vital signs were generally good, despite kidney problems.

TURKEY

Statuette of woman

is 8,000 years old

ISTANBUL  Archaeologists have uncovered a rare stone figurine of a woman dating back 8,000 years at a dig in Turkeys central province of Konya that an expert says is one of only handful of statuettes of the era ever found in one piece.

Stanford University Professor Ian Hodder told The Associated Press in an email that the 7-inch figurine, found at the Catalhoyuk site, is unique because it is carved from stone, unlike most which are made from clay.

Its excellent condition and craftsmanship also set it apart, he said. Such figurines are often thought of as fertility goddesses. However, Hodder cites newer theories that suggest this object represents older women who have achieved status.

CHINA

Journalists assaulted

in crackdown on village

BEIJING  Journalists were attacked and forced out of the fishing village where China has suppressed new protests five years after the village received international attention for demonstrations against land seizures.

Wukan remains under siege two days after police arrested 13 protesters on allegations that they incited violence and arrest. The Chinese government is now staging a broad crackdown on information from the village, refusing to let journalists in and heavily restricting discussion of Wukan on social media networks.

Reporters from two Hong Kong newspapers, the South China Morning Post and the Chinese-language Ming Pao, were assaulted Wednesday night while conducting interviews and later detained for several hours, both newspapers reported.

TANZANIA

Wing flap belongs

to missing airliner

A wing flap that washed ashore on an island off Tanzania has been identified as belonging to missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, Australian officials said Thursday.

The flap was found in June by residents on Pemba Island off the coast of Tanzania, and officials had previously said it was highly likely to have come from the missing Boeing 777. An analysis by experts at the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, which is heading up the search for the plane, subsequently confirmed the part was indeed from the aircraft.

Several pieces of wreckage suspected to have come from the plane have washed ashore on coastlines around the Indian Ocean since the aircraft vanished with 239 people on board during a flight from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to Beijing on March 8, 2014.

INDONESIA

Speedboat explosion kills 2 foreign tourists

BALI  Two foreign tourists were killed and about 20 other people were injured in an explosion Thursday on a speedboat that was ferrying them from the Indonesian tourist island of Bali to neighboring Lombok, police said.

Karangasem district police chief Sugeng Sudarso said the Gili Cat 2 fast boat had about 40 people including crew on board.

He said the dead are an Austrian woman and a woman of European nationality who police initially said was German.
Tucson-based artificial heart maker SynCardia Systems won bankruptcy court approval Friday to sell its assets to a private-equity firm that plans to recapitalize the company.

The asset sale allows SynCardia to emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization as a new company that will continue to provide artificial hearts and further develop the technology.

SynCardia filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on July 1 in Delaware, proposing to sell all of its assets to its senior secured creditor, Sindex SSI Lending LLC, in an effort to save the company.

Sindex, an affiliate of the Philadelphia-based private-equity firm Versa Capital, purchased about $22 million worth of SynCardias senior debt at a steep discount in June.

Sindex bid $19 million of that debt in a so-called credit bid for SynCardia, plus $150,000 in cash, to buy the company.

The so-called stalking horse deal was subject to higher and better offers, but no competing bids were filed by a deadline Tuesday, SynCardia said in court documents.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Mary F. Walrath gave her final approval of the sale to Sindex on Friday. She also approved a motion to change the name of the bankrupt entity to TAH Windown, which will continue as the debtor to wind down assets not included in the sale.

SynCardia, maker of the only artificial heart approved in the U.S., Europe and Canada as a bridge to transplant, has continued to service hospitals and patients and otherwise operate, with debtor financing provided by Sindex.

SynCardia says more than 1,500 of its artificial hearts have been implanted since the company was formed in 2001 with technology from the original Jarvik-7 heart, including nearly 500 since January 2012.

SynCardia officials would not comment on Friday. The company employed about 100 people as of last year.

In a news release in mid-August, the company said that after its emergence from bankruptcy, it would continue work on an improved version of its portable heart driver and complete an FDA-approved clinical study of a smaller, 50cc total artificial heart to fit women and other smaller patients, already approved for use in Europe.

SynCardia also said it planned to proceed with another FDA-approved study to use the companys artificial heart as a long-term destination therapy for patients who are not eligible for transplants.

While SynCardia will live on, it leaves behind millions of dollars in unpaid debts, and shareholders, including many local investors, who will get nothing from the case.

SynCardia in its bankruptcy filing declared total assets of about $17 million against $53.6 million in debt, including $11.6 million in unsecured debt that will go unpaid.

Among the unsecured debts is a $312,500 debt to the former University Medical Center, now part of Banner Health, for an unspecified purchase agreement dating to 2002.

UMCs involvement with SynCardia dates to the 1990s, when it partnered with Utah researchers to pick up development of the artificial-heart technology after failed attempts to commercialize the original Jarvik-7 heart.

University of Arizona officials confirmed the debt would go unpaid but could not verify what SynCardia purchased from UMC.

Versa specializes in buying and recapitalizing troubled companies. Its portfolio of turnaround projects includes retailers the Wet Seal, Avenue Stores and Black Angus Steakhouses and manufacturers Bell and Howell and Polartec.
PHOENIX  State utility regulators voted Thursday to hire legal counsel so one of their own can pursue his subpoena of records of Arizona Public Service and Pinnacle West Capital Corp.

But how far they are willing to let Commissioner Bob Burns go with his legal battle to find out what the utility is spending to influence elections  and how much theyre willing to spend  remains undecided.

Officially, the 4-1 vote has no limit on what would come out of the budget of the Arizona Corporation Commission.

Commissioner Tom Forese had proposed an initial cap of $100,000, with a promise to revisit the issue when that money ran out. Commission Chair Doug Little said that made sense. He did not want a blank check, saying APS has indicated it would take its fight to shield its political donations from commission and public eyes as far as it needs.

I dont think it is prudent or appropriate to simply write a blank check to put us potentially on the hook for legal fees that might extend up to and including a Supreme Court deal, Little said. And he said if Burns lost his legal battle, the state could end up having to pick up the tab for the utilitys attorneys, too.

But Burns argued that any pre-determined figure would effectively tie his hands and assure he would lose the lawsuit, as the states largest utility company and its parent have deep pockets and could simply drag the case on until funding for his own lawyer ran out.

Commissioner Andy Tobin sided with Burns in pushing authorization to hire an attorney without a pre-set cap.

Tobin noted the commission has previously hired outside counsel for individual commissioners.

That includes a $90,000 bill to let Susan Bitter Smith try to fight charges she was holding office illegally, and $130,000 to help Bob Stump stave off efforts by an outside group to get access to the texts from his cell phone.

And in both cases, there was no pre-set cap.

But Tobin said Thursdays vote is not the kind of blank check that Little and Forese oppose. He said if the litigation appears to be going nowhere or a trial judge rules against Burns, the commission can decide at that time to cut its losses.

With that condition, Forese and Little agreed to go along; Stump did not.

The quest for the attorney stems from a subpoena Burns issued to have APS and Pinnacle West provide him with various documents.

Hes particularly interested in learning what they have spent on past political races and whether they are the source of any of the $3.2 million in dark money anonymous donations used by outside groups to help elect Forese and Little.

An attorney for APS questioned Burns authority to seek much of what he wants and refused to turn over some documents.

The company then filed suit in Maricopa County Superior Court asking a judge to quash the subpoena.

A hearing is set for next month.

The commissions own legal staff cannot represent Burns because his interests in getting the documents are at odds with his colleagues, who have questioned both the need for the information as well as the legal authority.
Saguaro Christian Church, 8302 E. Broadway, filled more than 150 backpacks with food for children at Sewell and Bloom elementary schools this week.

The free national Blessings in a Backpack program provides food for children who might go hungry over the weekend. Children receive the backpacks on Friday to take food for the next two days.

This week, the Muslim Community Center of Tucson, 5100 N. Kevy Place, also donated $454.50 to the Community Food Bank of Southern Arizona, funding the purchase of 3,114 pounds of potatoes. They also donated 58 pounds of canned food, said Peter Norback, who works as a liaison between the mosque and the food bank.
AfricaRice is a CGIAR Research Center  part of a global research partnership for a food-secure future. It is also an intergovernmental association of African member countries. For more information visit: www.AfricaRice.org

A propos dAfricaRice

AfricaRice est un Centre de recherche du CGIAR  un partenariat mondial de la recherche agricole pour un futur sans faim. AfricaRice est aussi une association intergouvernementale composee de pays membres africains. Pour plus dinformations, visiter : www.AfricaRice.org
FRIDAY 

Celebrate the moon at Pop-Cycle

If you love the moon, Pop-Cycle's Voyage to the Moon Show is where you need be. There will be snacks, art, a huge paper moon to take photos with, and coloring pages for children. This event is free but you can donate money that goes to Emerge.

When: Friday, Sept. 16, 7 to 9 p.m.

Where: Pop-Cycle Shop, 422 N. 4th Ave.

Cost: Free

Look at the full moon

Tumacacori National Historical Park is hosting Full Moon Night. This is your chance to experience the mission grounds after dark under the full moon. Do it alone with your group or join the optional guided lantern tour at 6:30 p.m.

When: Friday, Sept. 16, 5 to 8:30 p.m.

Where: Tumacacori National Historical Park, 1891 E. Frontage Rd.

Cost: Free for anyone under 16 and $5 for anyone 16 or older

SATURDAY

Do you think Batman is rad?

We do, too. Heroes & Villains is celebrating National Batman Day with a trivia contest, cosplay and giveaways. The trivia contest starts with qualifying rounds at 10:30 a.m., 11:15 a.m. and noon. Winners move on to the final round at 1 p.m. The winner will get what the store calls a "huge Batman prize pack," but everyone will leave with something. The store is giving everyone a free copy of the Batman Rebirth #1 comic book.

Don't be shy. You can go dressed up as Batman or your favorite hero.

When: Saturday, Sept. 17, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Where: Heroes & Villains, 4533 E. Broadway Blvd.

Cost: Free

Go book crazy at Children's Museum Tucson

Love of Literacy is a free event that gets you and your family into the museum to explore (so it's perfect if you've never been), but also gives book lovers a chance to love literacy a little more. There will be a build-a-book workshop, giveaways, story readings and much more.

When: Saturday, Sept. 17, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Where: Children's Museum Tucson, 200 S. 6th Ave.

Cost: Free

Do yoga for free

OM Yoga is hosting a free community yoga class for everyone that needs to stretch more. Get your friends and your mat together for some downward dog action.

Register for the class here.

When: Saturday, Sept. 17, noon to 1 p.m.

Where: OM Yoga Studio, 5961 N. Oracle Rd.

Register for more free articles. Log in Sign up

Cost: Free

Calling all Danny Zuko lovers!

Get your summer crush to come with you to a "Grease" sing along at The Loft Cinema. Go dressed up as your favorite character for a chance to win a prize in their Rockin Rydell Costume Contest. Don't worry about winning, everyone gets a Grease Goodie Bag with admission.

When: Saturday, Sept. 17, 7:30 p.m.

Where: The Loft Cinema, 3233 E. Speedway Blvd.

Cost: Loft members and children 12-and-under pay $8 and everyone else pays $10.

SUNDAY

Ditch the screen

All Day Analog is the perfect opportunity to turn off the electronics and enjoy the finer things in life like letter writing, music and story time.

When: Sunday, Sept. 18, 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.

Where: Exo Roast Co., 403 N. Sixth Ave.

Cost: Free, but bring money if you want beverages

All Day Analog Relax, craft, read, draw or do anything analog, as well as participate in one of the many events.

Get buggy at the Arizona Insect Festival

Put your fear of bugs aside for one day because your kid is going to love seeing and touching bugs of all shapes, sizes and colors. This festival is a must-do.

When: Sunday, Sept. 18, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Where: Third floor of the Student Union Grand Ballroom

Cost: Free

Arizona Insect Festival Learn everything you ever wanted to know about bugs and insects at the Arizona Insect Festival.

Children rock the stage

Kid's Open Mic! is the perfect opportunity for your little performer to show off their hidden talent and shine. And at La Cocina, you can eat while watching the tiny local talent. There will be street tacos and hot dogs for picky eaters and booze for the adults.

Performers must be 13-years-old or younger and can perform alone or with someone else. Sign ups start at 4:20 p.m. on a first-come, first-served basis.

When: Sunday, Sept. 18, 4:30 to 7:30 p.m.

Where: La Cocina Restaurant & Cocina, 201 N. Court Ave.

Cost: Free but the food and drinks will cost you
Help India!

By Twocircles.net Staff Reporter

Srinagar: Two days after Khurram Parvez was stopped from travelling to Geneva, Switzerland for a UN Human Rights session, the prominent human rights defender has now been arrested and detained in Srinagar.

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Parvez, who is the chairperson of Asian Federation Against involuntary Disappearances (AFAD) and Program Coordinator of Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS), has been detained without formal arrest or notifications, and in violation of his rights to information, and legal counsel, said Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society. He has not been provided with any written document, court order or the reasons for his detention, the organisation added.

Khurram Parvez was scheduled to attend the 33rd UN Human Rights Council Session in Geneva to brief UN bodies, including the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and foreign governments on the atrocities committed by Indian state forces in Jammu and Kashmir, particularly over the last two months. Khurram Parvez is presently detained at the Kothi Bagh Police Station in Srinagar.





Image Courtesy- Khurram Parvezs Facebook account



The unlawful detention of Khurram Parvez is a violation of internationally recognized and non-derogable civil and political rights, and Indias own constitutional guarantees. It is a clear indication of reprisal, an attempt to intimidate and restrain Khurram Parvez and his human rights work. In doing so, it seeks to isolate him and silence the critical concerns of Kashmir from being heard by the international community. Unlawful arrests have been consistently used by the Indian state in Jammu and Kashmir to repress all space for dissent. Tellingly, the action on Khurram Parvez closely follows Indias rejection of the UN High Commissioners request for access to Jammu and Kashmir for a UN fact-finding mission, JKCSS said in a release.

PDP faces inner revolt, MP resigns

Tariq Hameed Karra, who became an MP from Central Kashmir in 2014 elections after defeating Dr Farooq Abdullah, resigned from all positions and in his scathing resignation statement he targeted the Mehbooba Mufti government for their attitude towards the recent uprising.

The Central and State Governments policies of unabated genocide in the worst form of inhuman brutality, continued denial mode towards the dangerous ground realities, their insensitive and adhocist approach towards Kashmir issue and for their continued blatant and open policy of dealing with Kashmiris by way of Oppressive, Repressive and Suppressive majors are other reasons for registering my protest, Karra said in his resignation speech.

Karra lashed out at the PDP government for denying the citizens a chance to offer Eid prayers, as shrines and the Grand Mosque were locked. My apprehension that by PDPs facilitation RSS backed BJP would even impose religious ingression stands unfortunately vindicated today. Though I was all along feeling suffocated due to PDPs alliance with RSS backed BJP, my conscience was shaken during the last two months especially, due to PDPs newly acquired avatar during the present upheaval by the treatment meted out in the hands of Central and State Government especially by PDP. My conscience cannot take it any longer. My heart is bleeding and my soul is crying for the people of my homeland. Hence taking a call of my conscience and as a mark of protest on moral grounds against the brutal policies of BJP at center and State Govt.s complete sell-out and surrender before them, I have decided to disassociate myself from the primary membership of Peoples Democratic Party and from the membership of Parliament to which I was elected from Srinagar Parliamentary Constituency in 2014 on PDP ticket, he said.
Help India!

This is a first in a three-part series on how Birsa Ambedkar Phule Students Organisation (BAPSA) has, while effectively countering Savarna politics espoused by the Hindu Savarnas, accepted support and help from Students Islamic Organisation (SIO), the student organisation of Jamaat-e-Islami, an organisation that can be termed casteist, patriarchal and sectarian. Khalid Anis Ansari, Assistant Professor (Sociology) in Glocal Law School, Glocal University (India), explains why this must be questioned too. Why so hard on savarna Left and Hindu Right but so soft on savarna Muslim Right?

A Bahujan Third Space Beyond Left and Right: Really?

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At the outset let me extend my congratulations to BAPSA for the splendid performance in JNUSU elections. In the last few weeks I had tried to follow BAPSAs JNUSU campaign from social media and other sources closely and had extended my unequivocal moral support. The quest for a bahujan third space beyond the left and right in the campus was a radical move and the need of the hour. Also, it was heartening to note that despite all slander campaigns hurled at BAPSA they stood their ground and left a lasting impact on JNUs political sphere. However, despite having high hopes from BAPSA there are some areas of concern and disagreement. I think now it is the right time to air them and enter into a dialogue in a spirit of mutual reflection and introspection.

My preliminary concern is that BAPSA is not consistent enough in its critique of the Right. In other words, BAPSAs closeness to the Muslim Rightas represented by the SIO, the student wing of the Jamaat-e-Islami Hind (JIH)is problematic. As we know Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), which was founded by an Indian born upper-caste Syed, is a global Islamist organisation with a totalitarian-supremacist vision and mission. In terms of organisational structure and processes JIH is not a wee bit different from other Marxist or Hindutva organisations equally informed by a founding totalitarian narrative. JIH is a cadre-based organisation which runs hospitals, newspapers, publishing houses, schools, colleges, madrasas, dawah (proselytising) centers, student and women associations, etc.

There is little space for dissent and all non-conformist voices are usually shown the door. Wild weeds are pruned periodically and purges dont surprise anybody. JIH has a Majlis-e-Shoora (equivalent to a Marxist politburo) which is absolutely dominated by savarna Muslims and without any female representation. The Majlis-e-Shoora does not also have members from other religious communities. In terms of maslaqi (sectarian) orientation JIH is positively disposed towards the Deobandi school of thought and opposed to Barelvi/Shia sects. In short, the charge that JIH is a casteist, patriarchal, sectarian and communal organization may not be at all misplaced.

The JIH, until very recently, did not believe in either democracy or secularism. However, the sedimentation of democratic imagination as a norm pushed them to review their position and JIH launched its own political partyWelfare Party of India (WPI)in 2011. There is nothing novel about this. In the last few decades various leftist and rightist organisations have tweaked their strategies to remain relevant in a complex democratic ethos. This shift has been captured as post-Marxism (Laclau & Mouffe) and post-Islamism (Asef Bayat) by scholars. Overall, I welcome this democratic shift with a few caveats.

Now all the leftist and rightist student organisations (AISF/SFI/AISA/ABVP/SIO) are facing a conceptual/strategic crisis in campuses across India when confronted with the recent ascendance of Ambedkarite, queer or ecology discourses which are at variance with their founding narratives and deeply reminiscent of their own historical omissions and repressions. In the case of caste this crisis is very glaring.

It is a matter of historical record that the Mandal revolution was opposed by the RSS, Jamaat-e-Islami Hind and most shades of Left in India. The present appropriation of Ambedkar and the politics of social justice by the same forcesas expressed in the slogans of Lal Salaam, Neel Salaam or Jai Bheem, Jai Meemwithout a public apology to Bahujans (across religions) is simply a shameless act to say the least.

The SIO-JNU (by their own admission not to be confused with SIO units elsewhere) in an apologia circulated earlier on Facebook and now published by Round Table India have stressed that they are now ready to take the politics of social justice and internal reform seriously.

Let me offer them two issues that they need to work on urgently. One: the Muslim practice of triple talaq as reignited by the case of Shayara Bano recently. On this issue Uniform Civil Code has been a non-starter due to the fear of Hindu Right and most conservative/progressive/liberal/moderate Muslim voices have conceded that the issue be resolved within the domain of All India Personal Law Board through internal reform. But what about the shameless affidavit filed by the AIMPLB in the Supreme Court that advocates that triple talaq prevents men from killing wives or divorce proceedings instead of triple talaq could damage a womans chances of re-marriage if the husband indicts her of loose character in court. SIO-JNU would know very well that the present National President of JIH is also the Founder Member and Vice President All India Muslim Personal Law Board. Has the SIO-JNU (by their own admission not to be confused with SIO units elsewhere) protested outside the JIH headquarters in New Delhi and sought the resignation of their National President? Two: the question of Muslim reservations. Those who have followed the debate may be aware that the pasmanda muslims have consistently objected to the demand of reservations for the entire Muslim community dubbing it as a ploy by the hegemonic high caste Muslims to corner all the benefits. What is the position of SIO-JNU (by their own admission not to be confused with SIO units elsewhere) on this question?

Are they aware of the JIH position? Can they enlighten us on their brand of social justice?

However, having said that I understand and empathize with the predicament of young people battling outmoded institutionalised political discourses in the light of new transformative shifts in the political sphere. In the recent JNU sedition episode a number of ABVP cadres tried to question the party line but had to resign in disgust. Marxian student organisations have a history where creative young political souls had to dissociate in order to conduct their own version of meaningful politics. Some adapt, others exit, and the more persistent ones are kicked out. I would really like the samurais in SIO-JNU (by their own admission not to be confused with SIO units elsewhere) to go all out for justice and reform without meeting a similar fate.

Conceptually speaking, if JIH can outgrow its founding narrative then the left and Hindutva groups can do that as well. Why does BAPSA have hope with SIO and not with SFI/AISA/AISF or ABVP? Afterall, if SIO claims to be speaking for the subaltern Muslims, the left too speaks for the oppressed proletariat and the ABVP speaks for the humiliated Hindus (Yes, I know they are all student organisations and principally speak for the student community!). Apparently BAPSA, being steeped in the Ambedkarite discourse, has objected to left and Hindutva groups because they are dominated by the savarnas. Is not the JIH dominated by savarna muslims? Why this selective love for savarna muslims who are equally guilty for blocking all roads for community reform and empowerment of pasmanda muslims along with savarna Hindus? Why so hard on savarna left and Hindu right but so soft on savarna Muslim Right?
Arkadin and Applicable Join Forces to Bring UCaaS to Large Enterprises

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By Alicia Young

Web Editor By Alicia YoungWeb Editor

Arkadin (News - Alert), an NTT Communications company and provider of Unified Communications and Collaboration services, announced this week that it has acquired Applicable Ltd. Applicable is a provider of Cloud Unified Communications (News - Alert) and enterprise voice services.





Applicable is bound to be a great asset to Arkadin, as it has already proven itself to be successful in building, implementing and managing cloud-based Microsoft Lync and Skype (News - Alert) for Business for large enterprises. Arkadin is striving to expand its global reach and provide UC services to large and global companies, which is where Applicables past successes will come in handy.

The acquisition of Applicable is an important milestone for Arkadin to enable all businesses, from SMBs to the largest enterprises, to harness the full power of Unified Communications for greater workplace productivity, said Olivier de Puymorin, Chairman and CEO of Arkadin International. Our highly complementary portfolios and service strategies, coupled with shared cultural values and an aggressive vision for growth, present a huge opportunity for our global customers and partners to have the benefits of a private and fully managed cloud-based UC solution.

Although Applicable will continue to run its operations independently, the two companies will collaborate when it comes to product development and long-term strategic planning. Both companies will benefit from this pairing, especially Arkadin. It is finally getting the opportunity to strengthen its portfolio of UC solutions and make them available to the Large Enterprise market. This acquisition enhances the existing portfolio thats centered on Arkadin Total Connect, which is a multi-tenant Microsoft (News - Alert) Skype for Business hosted service. The service provides a fully integrated UC ecosystem that has voice-enabled Office 365, audio/web/video conferencing and contact center. Arkadin had a strong base already, and its only going to be improved through this acquisition.

Applicable is excited for the move too, with Applicable Managing Director, Alan Baldwin, saying, We are thrilled to be joining Arkadin and are certain it will benefit all stakeholders, including our talented workforces and current and future customers.

He continued, Our combined resources and shared passion for enabling organizations to collaborate, will successfully deliver integrated Microsoft UC services that meet the essential quality of experience requirements of enterprise customers. Arkadins global telephony and local approach to service, together with Applicables expertise, offer customers a complete UC service.

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Edited by Maurice Nagle
Andrea Tantaros surfaces for the first time since the interview revealing that she too was a victim of Roger Ailes sexual harassment. The TheFox News analyst has remained quiet across her social network sitesfor the last week or so, but Andrea Tantaros surfaced on Tuesday to condemn the injustice about to unfold. In typical Tantarosform, she is letting folks know that she is livid over the event about to take place. Herheart is with people suffering today from the senseless deaths of their loved ones who died trying to capture the 15 terrorists who are about to be released from Guantanamo Bay.

Adding insultto injury

Tantaros is talking about the families who lost loved ones capturing the group of 15 extremely dangerous terrorists who have now been approved for release from Gitmo and in turn putting everyone in harm's way today. On Andrea's Twitter page she posts a blurb from USA Today announcing that the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay will soon cut loose these very dangerousdetainees now that the Obama administration has approved their release.

Deemed 'dangerous'

It was Obama's ownGitmo Review Boardthat stated these terrorists were "deemed too dangerous to transfer," writes Tantaros. So instead of a transfer, they are going to be set free? The Fox News personality posted a collage of the terrorists' mugshots on her Twitter page calling them "theworst of the worst" among the terrorists in the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, facility.

Using all capitol letters for her one word description of what the Obama administration is about to do, Andrea calls this latest approved release "UNJUSTIFIABLE." You would more than likely to be hard pressed finding people who would disagree with her analysis on this move.

An 'unforgivable' action

This is an "unforgivable" action as there are families across the nation who have lost their loved ones in themilitary as they attempted to track and capture these terroristsand take them out of harm's way.

What was this all for if these 15 terroristsare going to be released in the near future and how long will it take before they mastermind or take part in a terrorist event resulting in more loss of life?

Then what? Send out more military troops to recapture these men who were already securely behind bars today?

It is hard to imagine that these men have changed from "too dangerous to transfer" to "release approval."

Andrea's return to Fox News?

Many of Andrea's fans are asking when she will return to Fox News to share these views with the masses? The answer to that question is unknown. According to the Western Journal, since Andrea reportedly broke a confidentiality clause in her contract by giving that interview about Bill Ailes sexually harassing her, there's a chance she'll be let go. With all the problems Fox News is facing today, they'd be foolish to cut Tantaros loose, as she's such a popular on-air personality.

While Andrea hasn't given a reason for revealing the truth to the public, fans wouldn't expect any less of the Fox News personality, who is all about the truth. That is why she is so trusted and people want to see her on the air!
Typhoon lashes China before weakening Updated: 2016-09-16 07:03 (Agencies)

Typhoon Meranti slammed into southeastern China on Thursday with strong winds and lashing rain that cut power to 1.65 million homes.

Media reported one death and one person missing in Fujian province in what has been described as the strongest storm of the year globally.

One person died and 51 were injured in Taiwan, the Central Emergency Operation Center there said, as the typhoon hit the southern part of the island on Wednesday.

The storm, registered as a super typhoon before losing strength after sweeping across southern Taiwan, made landfall in the early hours near Xiamen, capital of Fujian.

Dozens of flights and train services were canceled, State television said, which disrupted travel at the start of the three day Mid-Autumn Festival holiday.

Pictures on State media showed flooded streets, fallen trees and crushed cars in Xiamen as rescuers in boats evacuated people.

About 320,000 homes were without power in Xiamen.

Across the whole of Fujian, 1.65 million homes had no electricity, according to media reports.

Large sections of Xiamen also suffered water supply disruptions and some windows in tall buildings shattered, showering glass onto the ground below, Xinhua News Agency reported.

Xinhua said it was the strongest typhoon to hit that part of the country since the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, and the strongest so far this year anywhere in the world.

Tens of thousands of people had already been evacuated as the storm approached, and fishing boats were called back to port.

Meranti was a Category 5 typhoon, the strongest classification awarded by Tropical Storm Risk storm tracker, before it made landfall on the mainland. It has since been downgraded to Category 2.

Typhoons are common at this time of year, picking up strength as they cross the warmwaters of the Pacific and bringing fierce winds and rain when they hit land.

Meranti will continue to lose strength as it pushes inland and up toward China's commercial capital of Shanghai, but will bring heavy rain.
US to China and back again Updated: 2016-09-16 09:28 By Hong Xiao(China Daily)

They are born in the US to Chinese immigrant parents and sent to China to live with relatives until they are old enough to return to America to attend school. The trauma that both children and parents experience can be life long, Hong Xiao reports from New York.

Children who were "satellite babies" sing, dance and play with toys at the Chinese-American Planning Council in New York City. [Hong Xiao/China Daily]

Lindy Tse can't forget the first night when the couple brought her back to the US from Fujian province at age 4. She cried silently all night because she didn't want to cause them any trouble. She thought they were total strangers. They were her parents.

Tracy Lam still remembers feeling "unknown" when she was brought back to the US from China at the age of 5. She didn't know the two strangers standing in front of her, even though she called them "Mom" and "Dad".

Lindy and Tracy are "satellite babies"children born in the United States to Chinese immigrant parents who worked long hours and couldn't afford child care. So they were sent back to China when they were infants, raised by relatives, typically grandparents, and returned to the US to enroll in school when they were 5 or 6. Some parents of satellite babies also choose to send their children back to China in part to preserve their culture.

It took one year for Tse to speak to her father. "I think it was because we both lost four years that could be important to our relationship," said Tse, now 16.

Lam, 17, said, "Sometimes I still feel a distant connection between me and my parents. I just don't know how to show my emotion to them."

David Chen's parents sent him to China's Fujian province to be raised by his grandparents when he was less than a year old. At the age of 5, Chen's parents brought him back the US to enroll in school in New York City.




Silk Road makes pitch to US tourists Updated: 2016-09-16 22:19 By LIA ZHU in San Francisco(China Daily USA)

China is geared up to attract US tourists to its destinations along the Maritime Silk Road.

A delegation of more than 70 travel professionals from 14 Chinese provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities as well as China Youth Travel Service will visit the US and Canada from Sept 20 to 23 to promote the Maritime Silk Road, a Chinese strategic initiative to increase investment and foster collaboration across the historic Silk Road.

With the theme of Beautiful China  Journey along the Maritime Silk Road, the China National Tourism Administration (CNTA) will launch a series of campaigns, where the Maritime Silk Road-related provinces and cities, including Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Guangdong, will promote their particular tourist attractions and give away free gifts.

Campaigns in Vancouver (Sept 20) and Houston (Sept 22) will be trade events, with a delegation of airlines representatives, tour operators, travel media and government officials.

An event in Miami will be open to the public and feature live performances and videos highlighting tourism destinations. The three-hour event will start at 5 pm on Sept 23 at Miami Dolphin Mall.

This year marks China-US Tourism Year and the Year of Silk Road Tourism. We hope to take advantage of this momentum to promote Chinese tourist resources in the North American market, said Xiaopeng Pan, deputy director of the China National Tourist Office in New York.

From January to April, we had about 720,000 Americans traveling to China; the increase was over 8.3%, the highest in recent five years.

We have received positive feedback from international tourists who traveled in China, said Pan. One of the important reasons is China has achieved rapid growth and its tourism infrastructure and services have also made great improvements.

The challenge now is to learn how to promote Chinas tourist resources in ways that appeal to Americans, she said.

liazhu@chinadailyusa.com
Southwest China says Miao on catwalk Updated: 2016-09-16 22:25 By HONG XIAO in New York(China Daily USA)

Silvia Morimoto, chief of staff of the regional bureau for Asia and the Pacific in the United Nations Development Program, browses the 2016 China Miao Embroidery Charity Exhibition in New York on Thursday. HONG XIAO / CHINA DAILY

Vying for attention amid the thousands of haute couture collections on display during Fashion Week in New York are the embroidered offerings from the remote mountains of Southwest China.

A charity exhibition at Venue 57 in Manhattan, featuring Chinas Miao embroidery, opened in New York on Thursday.

The exhibition was organized by the China Soong Ching Ling Foundation (SCLF), the government of Kaili City in Guizhou province in Southwest China and the fashion magazine Marie Claire.

Miao embroidery is a folk heritage of the Miao ethnic group from Guizhou.

Historical records show that the skillful needlework has been around since the Tang Dynasty (AD 618-907). It was created by Miao women and always passed down from mother to daughter.

Included in Chinas first list of state-level intangible cultural heritages, Miao embroidery is widely regarded as an important component not only of Miao culture but also for Chinese national culture.

The exhibition is divided into two thematic sections: the Classical Creativity section showcases works including Miao formal costumes, accessories and jewelry, as well as reproductions of traditional costumes and other embroidery pieces.

The New Life section exhibits crossover works designed by contemporary international designers with inspiration from traditional Miao handicrafts.

Yet for various reasons, the Miao embroidery tradition has also been in danger of dying out.

In the past 30 years, many exquisite Miao embroidery techniques have rapidly been lost. Many older people in their 60s or 70s are now the last remaining practitioners of a particular style of embroidery, said Deng Li, chief content officer of Marie Claire China and the programs initiator.

In 2011, SCLF and Marie Claire jointly established the SCLF Marie Claire Womens Happiness Fund with the goal of preserving intangible cultural heritage and helping women in ethnic minority regions improve their living standard and social status.

Our aim is, on the one hand, to protect and revive traditional Miao embroidery, and at the same time to encourage the fashion industry to inject modern design into this ancient art form and help Miao embroidery to move with the times and unleash a new energy, Deng added.

Since its launch five years ago, the fund has organized a series of training activities in Miao embroidery techniques and skills with local women.

So far the program has provided support to eight Miao minority villages and benefited more than 600 families, with participating families seeing an annual income increase of between 3,000 to 5,000 yuan ($450-$750).

More than a thousand pieces of embroidery have been produced, and five complete replicas of traditional costumes have been made using classic Miao embroidery methods.

Through cooperation with government organizations, the program combines poverty-alleviation work with the preservation of Miao embroidery.

Silvia Morimoto, chief of staff of the regional bureau for Asia and the Pacific in the United Nations Development Program said that the project aligns with the 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) that the UNDP has been promoting.

Like poverty reduction, gender equality, inequalities reduction  basically, this (project) is very much in line with the SDGs. I really hope they can escalate this project to other minorities, said Morimoto, who attended the show.

Following an exhibition in Paris in 2014, the weeklong 2016 China Miao Embroidery Charity Exhibition in New York is the second appearance for Miao embroidery before an international audience.

xiaohong@chinadailyusa.com
China frees Canadian detained for years Updated: 2016-09-17 00:58 By AGENCIES(China Daily USA)

Kevin Garratt, a Canadian held in China for two years and charged with spying, returned to Canada on Thursday.

The Canadian leader had raised Garratt's case during an official visit to China this month.

"On Thursday, September 15th, Kevin was deported from China and has returned to Canada to be with his family and friends," the family said in a statement requesting privacy.

A Canadian government official said Garratt had been formally sentenced earlier in the week and then released on bail. He flew into the city of Vancouver.

In a statement, Trudeau said he was delighted that Garratt had returned safely.

Garratt and his wife, Julia, were detained in August 2014 near China's border with North Korea. He was charged with spying and stealing state secrets.

Julia, who was not charged, was released on bail and left the country.

A source close to the case, who requested anonymity because of its sensitivity, said Garratt was tried on April 20.

The release came as a surprise, since there were few signs of a breakthrough when Trudeau flew to China. While he was in Beijing, the Garratt family expressed their frustration at the lack of progress.

"We raised this case at the highest levels when we were there. It's just indicative of the mature and healthy relationship we have that we can do so," said the government official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

James Zimmerman, the Beijing-based lawyer for Garratt, said: "The family appreciates the strong, persistent efforts of the Canadian government to secure Kevin's release."

The affair had undermined efforts by both countries to boost economic ties.

A court in the city of Dandong, near the North Korean border, ruled on Garratt's case on Tuesday, China's Foreign Ministry said in a statement emailed to Reuters.

"China is a country ruled by law," the ministry said in the statement.

"China's judiciary handled the case seriously and in accordance with the law, thoroughly ensuring Kevin Garratt's litigation rights and thoroughly respecting and implementing Canada's consular rights."
A growing number of female managers are defying traditional stereotypes and moving abroad to move up corporate ladders or start companies

Zhang Lei works as general manager of China Mobile International UK Ltd. China Daily

Zhang Lei is no stranger to leadership. At 29, the Chinese businesswoman was appointed general manager of Infosto Group's Beijing office, a Finnish online platform for classified information exchanges.

Today, she leads a team of more than a dozen people as general manager of China Mobile International UK Ltd in London.

"I could have chosen to stay in China and have a stable life, but I wanted change and more responsibility," says Zhang.

She's one of a growing number of Chinese women breaking through the so-called glass ceilingthe invisible barrier between men and women in the workplace that prevents many from reaching top jobs.

Zhao Shuo, managing director of Fushi Group, was lured to Europe from her job in Shanghai.

"The driving force for me to go overseas was a colleague who had come from Australia to join our team and she made more money than us," Zhao says. "In 2001, Greenwich University gave me an offer to study for an MBA, and the motivation was to make money and go back to China."

Fast forward 11 years and Zhao now runs her own company in London, helping Chinese families to buy properties in the UK.

"Now, we have clients in Hong Kong, Singapore and the Middle East coming to invest in the UK," she says.

Despite women like Zhang and Zhao climbing the ladder, men still dominate corporate boards and CEO roles, according to the World Bank Group.

Statistics from Grant Thornton show only 24 percent of senior roles are held by women globally, while a third of businesses have no females in management positions.

"In the telecommunications industry, there are many males and few females," says Zhang. "I think it's still a man's world."

She arrived in London in 2007 and was one of five people to set up China Unicom's European office.

She was appointed head of China Mobile''s UK office in 2013 and is now responsible for the company's UK operations, as well as the growth of businesses in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

"A lot of women don't want this because their families won't support them, or encourage them to leave," Zhang says, highlighting a cultural hurdle experienced by a number of Chinese women.

Her husband, who works in satellite telecommunications in China, did not follow her to London, despite having been supportive of her career.

"It's my choice and my husband's choice," she says. "We're both happy in our jobs."

Having now spent nine years in London, Zhang says her job overseas has changed her views on work in many ways.

She cites "my working style, the way we respect each other and the fact that there is no difference between the manager and junior staff, whereas in China they care more about hierarchy."

According to Zhao, who also says she has many Western values, manager roles in China aren't perceived in the same way as they are in the UK.

"In activities that you attend outside of work in China, you need to have guanxi (personal relationships) to socialize with people and you need to drink (wine, beer or white spirits)  I don't think women can handle it."

Unlike Zhang, Zhao's family relocated to London from China.

The businesswoman, who has an 11-year-old daughter, says she likes the challenge of having to balance work and family life.

"Sometimes, you have to go to meetings and events after work and you will miss something, like homework, but it's not that significant," says Zhao.

Monique Villa, CEO of the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of the global news and information provider, says having a job and caring for family is very "doable", and men today are helping more than ever.

The French national, who has transformed the foundation through programs and training aimed at empowering people, particularly women, says the gender gap at work has narrowed considerably.

"For women like me who started working in the '70s as a journalist at Agence France-Presse, you had no women in responsible jobs," she says.

"One of the top leaders of one company came into my office and asked my deputy, who was a man, 'Is it difficult to work under a woman?'" she recalls. "It's a question you would never be able to ask today, but in the '90s it was a question you could ask without people being horrified."
Japan using tensions to advance interests, experts say Updated: 2016-09-17 02:09 By ZHANG YUNBI(China Daily)

Japan is aggravating tensions with China over South China Sea issues to promote its own interests, according to experts who analyzed recent comments by Japan's new Defense Minister Tomomi Inada. On Thursday, Inada said that Tokyo is eying more patrols with the US and joint drills with regional navies.

Inada, speaking at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington, DC-based think tank, said Japan's increased engagement in the area would include capacity building for coastal nations, Reuters reported.

She also said she supports "the US Navy's freedom-of-navigation operations, which go a long way to upholding the rules-based international maritime order".

Su Xiaohui, a researcher on international strategies at the China Institute of International Studies, said Japan's interest in joint patrols mirrors its intention to promote its own interests in the South China Sea. Tokyo has a great deal of interest in conferring with nations in the area, including the Philippines and Vietnam.

"In light of the evolving US policy toward the South China Sea issue in recent years, Tokyo plans to offer more aid as a traditional US ally," Su said.

Su said it is expected that Japan will become more vociferous in the issue in the near future, but "it remains to be seen how much effect the US-Japan joint actions will take".

Foreign Minister Wang Yi told his Japanese counterpart Fumio Kishida in a Wednesday telephone conversation that the China-Japan relationship is "in a critical phase".

It is hoped Japan would do more "things that facilitate the improvement of the bilateral ties and things that facilitate ensuring maritime stability", Wang added.

Lyu Yaodong, an expert on Japanese diplomacy at Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said Japan is seeking to whitewash its wartime role of invader in the region when it intervenes in the South China Sea issue.

"Japan will further expand its military presence in the region without offering tangible action to ease ties with China," Lyu said.
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BINH DUONG  The Viet Nam Singapore Industrial Park Joint Venture Company (VSIP) plans to expand its scale in Binh Duong and Bac Ninh provinces to offer more diverse services to investors.

Kelvin Teo, co- chairman of VSIP Group Management Board, said that two Memoranda of Understanding (MoU) had been signed with local authorities.

These two expansions will potentially add 1,500ha to the current 6,660 ha of the existing seven VSIP projects, he said. Were still studying their feasibilities.

Teo also said that during 20 years operating in Viet Nam, VSIP had attracted US$9 billion investment from more than 630 multi-national companies.

The company has brought more than 174,000 jobs to the industrial service sector, supporting the rise of the countrys middle class.

Factories no longer serve only the domestic market, but also multiple markets. VSIP is therefore exploring innovation hubs for Viet Nam, Teo said. We believe that Viet Nam can embrace greater sophistication expected of foreign factories, but we will need the Governments support in readying the Vietnamese in education and skills development.

Viet Nam  Singapore relations

Singapore has deep economic ties with Viet Nam, with bilateral trade growing steadily, doubling over the past decade to reach $16 billion in 2015.

Singapore is Viet Nams sixth largest trading partner, while Viet Nam is Singapores 11th largest trading partner.

Speaking at the 20th anniversary of VSIP on Wednesday, Deputy Prime Minister Truong Hoa Binh praised the contribution of Singaporean businesses operating in Viet Nam.

Singaporean investors have made a hugely significant contribution to the Vietnamese economy across different provinces, in sectors such as oil exploration, industrial manufacturing, agriculture, forestry and seafood processing, and most notably in the fields of infrastructure, business services and real estate, Binh said.

He said that the Government pledged to continue putting in place policies to stabilise the investment environment, promote the reform of administrative processes for a more efficient approach, streamline the legal system and create favourable conditions for foreign enterprises.

Teo Chee Hean, Singapores Deputy Prime Minister, said that Viet Nam continued to enjoy one of the highest economic growth rates in our region.

Its young population, vibrant workforce and rising middle class are Viet Nams comparative advantages. The Government has also progressively reformed and liberalised the economy, he said.

It has built up a strong network of bilateral and multilateral free trade agreements, and advocated for agreements connecting our region such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership. Such efforts will improve Viet Nams business environment, facilitate investments and open up new opportunities for foreign companies, including those from Singapore. VNS
HA NOI  The total value of the 50 most valuable brands in Viet Nam in 2016 amounts to around US$7.3 billion, an increase from around $5.5 billion last year.

The information was released by Brand Finance at a ceremony to announce the nations top 50 brands in Ha Noi yesterday. This is the lists second year in Viet Nam, a recognition of the development of the countrys leading brand names.

The average growth rate of each brand in the Top 50 is 20 per cent, far exceeding companies from other ASEAN countries, which have flat or negative growth rates.

The total brand value of Viet Nams Top 50 brands increased by 39 per cent over one year, suggesting that Vietnamese firms are gradually catching up with the global trend of investment in branding.

The Top 5 brands retained their positions, making up almost half (47 per cent) of the total brand value of all Top 50 companies.

Vinamilk is the strongest Vietnamese company in brand value and strength, and is the only Vietnamese brand with a AAA-rating in brand strength, despite an 11-per cent decrease in value from last year. Viettel Telecom is the most improved brand in terms of absolute value and for the first time made it into the Top 100 most valued telecom companies worldwide.

The Viet Nam banking and telecommunications industries also showed strong growth.

Three of the banks - VietinBank, Vietcombank and BIDV - made the list this year, BIDV for the first time and VietinBank and Vietcombank both improving their global rankings.

The growth rate of Viet Nams telecommunications industry was even higher. Both Mobifone and Vinaphone achieved improvements in their Brand Finance Telecom 500 2016 ranking.

Speaking at the event, Samir Dixit, Managing Director of Brand Finance Asia Pacific, said this year marked sharp improvements for Vietnamese firms. Several breakthroughs in the ranking showed that Vietnamese firms are becoming increasingly aware of brand value, in particular, and intangible value, in general.

The brand is the single largest intangible and a critical success-driver for both shareholder returns and business returns. If more than 50 per cent of a companys value is in the intangibles, not managing the brand as a strategic business asset isnt a choice but a necessity. Our study clearly shows that brands with strength rating of AAA* are twice as profitable over brands with a rating of A, Dixit said.

Lai Tien Manh, Country Representative of Brand Finance Viet Nam, said several domestic companies have missed opportunities in mergers and acquisitions (M&A) by not taking brand value into account when evaluating deals.

Viet Nam is entering globalisation with an increasing rate, especially due to the impending Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the continuing ASEAN Economic Community (AEC). With these free trade agreements on deck, local businesses should take measurements to prepare for an invasion of international brands. Therefore, branding should be considered as an important part of the preparation, he said.

He also added that there is also a whole new level of M&A activities happening across various fields such as real estate, retail or fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG). The ranking will provide the market an important reference of how much investors should pay for a brand when they want to buy shares or make an M&A agreement.  VNS
HA NOI  Vietnamese businesses which have never exported Siluriformes fish (catfish) products to the United States have been asked to temporarily stop registering exports to that country.

The move follows a message sent to the National Agro, Forestry and Fisheries Quality Assurance Department (NAFIQAD) by the US Department of Agriculture (USDA)s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), reporting a number of regulations relevant to the export of Siluriformes fish to the United States.

FSIS is conducting an evaluation of the Vietnamese food safety control system on Siluriformes fish. Once completed, FSIS will consider adding new businesses to the list of qualified exporters.

According to the United States 2014 Farm Bill, which came into effect in March this year, catfish exports will fall under the regulatory jurisdiction of FSIS and not the US Food and Drug Administration.

Under the bill, Vietnamese tra fish exports and many other Siluriformes fish products have had to struggle with the USDAs final inspection rule.

The final regulation, released by FSIS, will be applied on both locally raised and imported Siluriformes fish.

From March 2016, an 18-month transitional implementation period for both domestic and international producers will begin. Therefore, FSISs regulations will be wholly applied from September 2017.

During the 18-month transitional implementation period, FSIS will only allow those Vietnamese businesses which previously exported Silurifomes fish products to this market.

Director of NAFIQAD Nguyen Nhu Tiep said FSIS required all businesses processing Siluriformes fish products for the United States market, from slaughtering, filleting, freezing to packaging, to have their names included on the list of businesses eligible for export to the North American country, released on the FSIS website.

Tiep said NAFIQAD had sent a proposal asking FSIS to avoid applying this rule for all Vietnamese processing units, instead, making it applicable only for those businesses that were executing the final processing phase before exporting the fish products to the United States. As for the remaining units, NAFIQAD would be in charge of examining and certificating food safety conditions.

While waiting for the FSISs reply, NAFIQAD said processing businesses and exporters should buy Siluriformes fish products from units which had already been included on the eligible list released on the FSIS website.

Viet Nam, currently, has 60 businesses eligible for exporting Siluriformes fish products to the United Stated, mentioned on the FSIS website.

Tra fish export value down

Tra fish export value this year was expected to drop by 4 per cent compared to US$1.6 billion last year due to declining demand, according to the Ministry of Finances National Institute for Finance.

Duong Hoang Lan Chi, the institutes expert, said increased cod fish supplies in the European Union (EU) would affect consumption of tra fish in the world, while some other countries such as China, India and ASEAN nations have encouraged development of catfish production at home to reduce imports.

In addition, she said, Viet Nams tra fish exports to the US has also faced difficulties due to the US catfish inspection programme that came into effect in March 2016 and competition with other white-meat fish products in the US market.

Meanwhile, tra fish processors for export have lacked raw material for processing due to higher cost of breeding at farms, according to experts.

Duong Ngoc Minh, deputy chairman of the Viet Nam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP), said enterprises have developed production of raw material of tra fish but lacked co-operation with farmers. The enterprises have also not been able to forecast demand and supply of the market, resulting in a lack of raw material of tra fish for processing activities.

So far of this year, the raw material has been reduced by 40 per cent against the same period last year and was expected to lack 50 per cent by the first quarter of 2017, he said.

The lack of raw material has pushed up the price of tra fish up from VN18,000-19,300 per kilo to VN20,300-20,800 per kilo in the second quarter of this year, said Lan Chi. But the increased price was still lower than breeding cost at VN22,000-23,000 per kilo.

Therefore, farmers have not been interested in expanding production of tra fish.

Lan Chi expects tra fish sales would not fetch VN23,000 per kilo by the end of the year so the shortage of tra fish for processing would remain until next year and the farmers would not actively expand their investment to tra fish breeding.

To develop production and exports, co-operation between enterprises and farmers should be promoted while quality products should be improved to international standards, she said.

She also proposed developing export markets via international fairs and e-commerce to reduce the cost of accessing export markets. - VNS
HA NOI  Viet Nam may launch its first derivatives market in the first quarter of next year, officials said at a press briefing yesterday.

The fundamental legal framework for trading derivatives has been completed, and stock exchanges will instruct investors and traders about the trading techniques, Ta Thanh Binh, head of Market Development Department at the State Securities Commission (SSC), said.

The fundemental documents to this shift are Decree 42/2015/N-CP, issued in May 2015 by the then Prime Minister on derivatives and derivatives market, and the Circular 11/2016/TT-BTC issued early this year by the Ministry of Finance with guidelines for the implementation of decree.

The development progress of the derivatives market has basically gone according to plan, she said. The development of derivatives market was initially divided into three stages.

In the initial plan, legal framework and market facilitation had to be completed during 2013-15, and the market had to come into effect this year. After four years of implementation, relevant agencies would improve the quality of the market and launch other products as well.

Binh also urged the Ha Noi Stock Exchange (HNX) and the Vietnam Securities Depository (VSD) to develop the implementation plan and settlement mechanisms for the trading of derivatives products.

The SSC will soon complete minor policies regarding the operation of derivatives market, and publishing of trading details and violations, Binh said, adding that the SSC would work with the HNX and VSD to develop regulations on the prices, fees and taxation.

Those papers will be completed soon and published before the market officially operates.

Binh also suggested the HNX and the VSD should work together to test the technical system within this month in order to try it in October and November with market members, including securities firms and investment funds.

In addition, the SSC, the VSD and the HNX should improve the training for investors, traders and securities firms on related issues in derivatives trading, Binh added.

Big events coming in October

The HNX will also host three big events next month, including a CEO summit, which has drawn the participation of 10 local stock exchanges from all ASEAN countries, HNX Deputy Director General Nguyen Thi Hoang Lan said at the meeting yesterday.

At the summit, held between October 6 and 8 in Ha Noi, the HNX will also organise a broker networking event to connect Viet Nams securities firms with those in the ASEAN region. Fifty-five pairs of brokerage firms in ASEAN have set schedule for bilateral meetings.

The third networking programme for securities firms is expected to help brokerage firms in the region exchange their ideas and experiences and to improve co-operation in the securities sector.

During the summit, the HNX will also host the annual meeting for local market members.  VNS
A farmer harvest rice in the Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta.  Photo baodautu.vn

CAN THO  Experts highlighted the development potential of the Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta to Vietnamese and French entrepreneurs yesterday during an investment promotion seminar in Can Tho City.

During the event, representatives of about 30 Vietnamese provinces and cities invited French investment in nearly 60 projects, hoping to raise more than US$7.1 billion in investments.

In the delta alone, Long An Province called for $18.3 million in investments in a food storage centre in the ong Thap Muoi area. Ca Mau Province called for $3.5 billion in investments in Hon Khoai seaport.

Can Tho introduced a hi-tech farming zone project worth $26 million. Con Son tourism complex sought $100 million in investments.

An Giang Province called for investments in a heart hospital and an urban upgrade for a climate change adaptation project.

Truong Quang Hoai Nam, vice vhairman of the Can Tho Peoples Committee, said these were all key projects of the localities.

Nguyen Phuong Lam, deputy director of the Viet Nam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI)s Can Tho branch said the delta is the largest agricultural production region of the country, accounting for more than 40 per cent of agricultural yield nationwide.

Rice and aquacultural products from the region each represented roughly 56 per cent of national yields.

The Mekong Delta region also contributed significantly to some of the countrys value chains with export values exceeding $1 billion, such as rice, tra fish and shrimp exports.

Lam said the Delta, with it population of 17-million-people, was worth investing in because of its proven track record of economic growth and good investment climate with proper infrastructure.

The Mekong Delta is also one of the regions impacted most strongly by climate change, which has opened up significant investment opportunities for foreign businesses.

Nicolas Du Pasquier, chairman of the French Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Viet Nam, said France could share important experience coping with climate change with local provinces and cities.

CIRAD, a French research institute in Viet Nam, has already helped the Delta improve catfish cultivation.

According to VCCI Can Tho, France currently ranks 16th among 116 countries and territories investing in Viet Nam, with 469 projects and a total investment capital of $3.43 billion.

As of September, there are 22 French projects in the Delta, with a combined registered capital of nearly $115 million.

Entrepreneurs from 50 Vietnamese businesses and 20 French companies, plus representatives from the French cities of Brest, Choisy-le-roi, Rennes and Le Grand Perigueux, attended yesterdays seminar.

The seminar was part of the 10th Viet Nam  France co-operation conference which opened Wednesday and ends today.

Deputy Prime Minister Vu uc am told attendees Viet Nam would create more favourable conditions for French businesses to invest in the country.  VNS
HA NOI  Travel firms that organize inbound tours for US nationals are concerned about the recent changes in visa fees.

From August 29 the visa fee has been hiked to US$135 from $25, and Americans can only get a multiple visa unlike earlier when they could get a single-entry visa for $25.

An official said this follows an agreement signed between the Vietnamese and US governments.

Phan Xuan Anh, chairman of the HCM City-based Viet Excursions, said his companys partners in the US might not accept the higher visa fee.

US travellers who come on cruises are charged $5 [for a visa]. But if they return to the US by air, they have to pay $135.

Le Phong Tran, a senior executive at Fiditour, said the fee hike would cause difficulties for travel firms because they signed contracts with their partners based on the earlier fee many months ago.

Tran Thi Viet Huong of Vietravel said the new policy would benefit American businesspeople who visit Viet Nam regularly, but not tourists who do not intend to come to Vietnam more than once in a year.  VNS
HA NOI  The Viet Nam Cai Luong Theatre will attend the China-ASEAN Theatre Festival, performing a cai luong show for the first time, in Nanning, Guangxi, from September 17 to 23.

Vietnamese artists will perform the Cung Phi iem Bich (Concubine iem Bich) cai luong (reformed opera) at the festival.

The organisers are paying attention to the cai luong performance because it is the first time the Vietnamese cai luong is being presented at the festival, director Hoang Quynh Mai said.

At the previous festivals, besides modern drama and puppetry, Vietnamese cheo (popular opera) was presented, she added.

Cai luong is a form of modern folk opera, particularly famous in southern Viet Nam. It is the convergence of southern Vietnamese folk songs, classical music, tuong (traditional opera) and modern spoken drama.

Director Mai has shortened the two-hour performance to 70 minutes and restructured it to make the performance easier for international spectators at the festival to understand.

This act made its debut at a national competition for young theatre directors in 2007. Director Mai was awarded the first prize at the National Competition of Theatrical Talented Young Directors in 2007 for this performance.

A new team has been cast for the festival. Young actress oan Hoa Mai will enact the role of concubine iem Bich.

It is a little bit of pressure for me because iem Bichs role was performed successfully by veteran Thanh Thanh Hien earlier, Hoa Mai said. I have dreamed about enacting the role of iem Bich. I will put my heart and soul into the role.

Concubine iem Bich tells the story of an officer in the court of a 13th century king, Tran Thanh Tong, who gave up his position, office and title to become a monk, named Huyen Quang, and lead a religious life.

Sceptical of his former officers religious devotion, the king sent iem Bich, an imperial concubine and talented artist disguised as a country girl, to the Hoa Yen Pagoda on Yen Tu Mountain to tempt the monk.

Another theatre work, Da Co Hoai Lang (Night Drumbeats for an Absent Husband) will also be staged at the festival by the Viet Nam Cai Luong Theatre. The work was written in 1919 by well-known composer Cao Van Lau, a native of the Mekong Delta province of Bac Lieu.

The song recreates the love, anguish and pride of a young woman watching her husband fight for the country.

I think the festival will be a good opportunity for young actors to share and exchange acting experiences, the director said. We are eager to go to the festival where many artists from Asean countries will gather."

Vietnamese artists from the Viet Nam Tuong Theatre will also present an extract from Ngheu, So, Oc, Hen old tuong (classical opera) at the festival.

In addition, the festival will see Vietnamese traditional water puppetry by the Viet Nam Puppetry Theatre and the drama Sand Castle by the Viet Nam National Drama Theatre.

The festival is considered to be the start of the long-term cooperation and cultural exchange between China and the Asean nations. -- VNS
NA Chairwoman Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan.  VNA/VNS Photo An ang

HA NOI  Law makers yesterday discussed the Governments proposal on further tax reduction and exemption for agricultural land use.

According to the proposal, tax reduction and exemption would be applied not only to farmers but also to other individuals or entities in order to encourage people and businesses to take part in large-scale agricultural production and rural development.

At present, the total tax reduction and exemption for agricultural land use is worth VN7 trillion (US$318 million), the report said.

The lawmakers agreed that the tax exemption was a good policy because farmers incomes were unstable and low.

However, many deputies urged the Government to review agricultural land use, especially forestry farms, by State entities.

NA Vice Chairman o Ba Ty said many farms misused the forest land areas allocated to them, including cases of farm heads illegally transferring the land for personal gain.

The Government should carefully check situation and consider whether to offer tax exemption to such farms, said Ty.

NA Vice Chairwoman Tong Thi Phong and Chairman of the Economic Committee Vu Hong Thanh said sanctions should be applied in cases of agricultural land misuse.

Report on Formosa, East Sea

Viet Nams lawmakers also instructed the Government to report to them on the Formosa steel plants activities to remedy the shortcomings that resulted in a mass fish killing and environmental disaster in April.

The legislatures also asked that the reports, to be presented at the upcoming National Assembly session scheduled to open on October 20, address the Government policy in light of the recent decision by the Hague international tribunal on the East Sea.

NA Chairwoman Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan said the Government must prepare the reports well, as the lawmakers requested.

She said We could not put it off any more. The NA must know all issues affecting to the country.

Speaking at a meeting of the National Assembly Standing Committee (NASC), deputy Phan Xuan Dung, chairman of the NA Science and Environment Committee that has been monitoring the Formosa disaster, said his committee had proposed to the Government and the NA that the company be allowed to resume operation once it complies with its commitments on the treatment of waste.

The chairman of Finance and Budget Committee, Nguyen uc Hai, said the report should discuss how to allocate Formosas compensation money to those affected and the progress of the firms environmental commitment implementation .

Deputy Ha Ngoc Chien, chairman of the NAs Ethnic Affairs Council, said the report was required because this issue was a big concern for voters.

Chien also asked for a report on the East Sea situation after the ruling by the international arbitration on the Philippines petition against China.

Many issues were considered sensitive but they were just reported briefly. I thought this would limit the role of the NA, said Chien.

Both deputies and voters need to know important issues of the country, he added.

- VNS
Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong delivers speech at a working session yesterday with the standing board of the Party Committee of Mekong Deltas Can Tho city.  VNA/VNS Photo Tri Dung

HA NOI  Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong underscored the importance of human and material resources for development during a working session yesterday with the standing board of the Party Committee of Mekong Deltas Can Tho city.

The session mulled over the 10-year implementation of the Politburo (ninth tenure)s Resolution on developing Can Tho during industrialisation and modernisation.

The Party leader asked Can Tho to continue restructuring the economy, renewing the growth model with top priority being given to the service sector while simultaneously developing high-quality industry and high-tech agriculture.

Between now and 2020, the southern city needs to rally all possible resources, seek new momentum for growth to deserve its reputation as a socio-economic hub and a driver of the Mekong Delta regional economy, he said.

He suggested Can Tho take the lead in further upgrading transport infrastructure to strengthen regional connectivity and attract tourists, and improving the business climate by hastening administrative reform.

To that end, workforce training is a must, he stressed, adding that Party members and officials need to abide by the resolution on Party building adopted at the fourth plenum of the 11th National Party Congress.

The Politburo discussed Can Thos development targets and tasks as well as its proposals.

Over the past 10 years, the citys economy has grown an average of 13.98 per cent annually. The gross domestic product per capita amounts to US$3,636 a year while the rate of poor households has been reduced to 1.71 per cent.  VNS
HCM CITY  The HCM City administration has received a proposal from a US-based company to develop a smart transportation system using US$300 million borrowed from investment bank Morgan Stanley.

The project aims to reduce traffic jams, improve transport safety and reduce emissions, according to the company.

During a recent meeting with Tran Vinh Tuyen, vice chairman of the citys Peoples Committee, Shawn Smith, president of US company Vigilant Solutions Inc, suggested that the city use a smart traffic control system with a network of 12,000 fixed and mobile cameras installed around the city.

The funds would also be used to identify vehicle registration number plates to prevent traffic and toll collection violations.

Costs for manpower, technology and a control centre would also be covered under the loan.

The system would link to a national system for number plate registration and collection of fines imposed on traffic violators, Smith said.

San Francisco, which uses the system, has recorded an average of 5,600 cases of traffic violations each day, helping the city collect $2.8 million in fines.

Tuyen said the system, which is in line with HCM Citys goal of becoming a smart city, should first be installed in inner city districts and later in outlying districts.

The city leader asked the company to clarify incentives and sources of capital for the project.

Tuyen suggested that the US company work with city departments and submit a detailed proposal to the municipal government by next month.

The citys Department of Information and Communications was asked to co-operate with other agencies to support the investor in implementation, internet security, contractor selection and financial incentives.

The Department of Transport had previously suggested a smart traffic control model as an effective solution to control traffic congestion, accidents, pollution and urban order.

The department is focusing this year and in 2017 on upgrading the traffic control system to secure smooth connections with the new network in the future.

Can Tho as a smart city in 10 years

The Viet Nam Fatherland Front Committee has called on the Can Tho Party Committee to pass a resolution to develop the city into a smart city in the next 10 years.

Speaking at a seminar held in the Mekong Delta city earlier this week, the committees Chairman, Nguyen Thien Nhan, said the resolution would identify 10 tasks, including developing a common data base for use by the public, businesses and State agencies.

There are 17 sectors for which the data should be developed - population, labour and family, water supply, investment, industry, agriculture, construction and housing, trade, tourism, transport, environment, education and training and human resources development, science and technology, health, social and health insurance and social security - he said.

It would be used to draft the citys smart zoning plan, he said.

The city has to review and upgrade zoning plans once in six months, and by doing this it would have forecasts for its development for the next five years, he said.

It should focus on improving its economic efficiency and developing indexes for provincial competitiveness, labour productivity, water resources, human resources and culture, he said.

Last year Can Tho ranked third behind HCM City and Ha Noi in labour productivity among the countrys five centrally administered cities.

It ranked 14th in the Provincial Competitiveness Index.

But the citys dynamism and competitiveness  two of the most important criteria in a market economy  ranked below the national average.

This year the citys economy has grown at 7.5 per cent, according to its Peoples Committee. VNS




HA NOI  Storm Rai has killed at least five people and left ten others missing over the past few days in central localities, according to the latest report from the National Steering Committee for Disaster Prevention and Control.

Some 26 people were also injured due to falling trees, collapsed houses and landslides after the storm, the fourth to hit Viet Nam this year, made landfall in the central region early this week.

Heavy rains caused flash flood and landslide in Nghe An Provinces Quy Chau District, which borders Nhu Xuan District of Thanh Hoa Province, yesterday, killing two people from Thanh Hoa and one from Nghe An while leaving five others missing. Two people from Quang Binh Province reportedly died. Local authorities of the two provinces have mobilised all their forces to search for the missing people.

The Committee for Disaster Prevention and Control also reported that 90 houses were destroyed, 612 houses were damaged and 53 houses had their roofs blown away.

More than 1,700 houses and 11,655ha of rice were submerged, while thousands of trees had fallen.

In addition, thousands of poultry and cattle had died due to flooding in the localities hit by the storm, while over 1,000ha of aquaculture farmland was damaged. Hundreds of kilometres of national and provincial highways were also damaged and 19 small bridges were destroyed.

Meanwhile, thousands of students in Ha Tinh and Nghe An were kept home from schools due to floods.

The committee has urged authorities of localities in the central region to take measures to deal with the aftermath of the storm.

The central localities have been requested to assess the damage caused by Storm Rai and mobilise forces to help people stabilise their lives. The Steering Committee also asked the provinces to undertake active measures to deal with the effects of Super Typhoon Meranti, which hit Chinas Taiwan yesterday and is forecast to land in Guangdong Province today.

Provinces from Nghe An to Quang Binh have been told to implement measures to deal with the rain and the floods caused by the typhoon and inspect the safety of lakes and dams, especially those under construction on rivers and streams in areas where heavy rainfall is expected.  VNS
HA NOI  Traditional herbal medicines of poor quality dominate the domestic market, a drug control agency top official admitted.

More than 80 per cent of the 60,000 tonnes of herbal medicines consumed in Viet Nam each year are imported, most of them illegally. Head of the Drug Administration of Viet Nam under the Health Ministry, Truong Quoc Cuong, announced this statistic at a conference on drug quality and origin control on Wednesday.

Herbal medicine traders often take advantage of Viet Nams policy of allowing border-area residents to buy cross-border goods in small volumes without making customs declarations.

In some cases, the raw herbal materials are registered to authorised agencies as farming products or materials for producing cosmetics. This allows them to enter the domestic market. But such products often fail to meet the criteria to be imported as herbal materials, Cuong said.

The administration has only granted permission to 14 companies to import a total of 1,400 tonnes of herbal medicines since March, Pham Vu Khanh, head of the Traditional Medicine Administration, said.

"Just 1,400 of 60,000 tonnes of herbal medicines consumed in Viet Nam yearly are imported with clear orgin, Khanh said.

This implies rampant smuggling of herbal medicines. The result is many poor quality medicines which affect public health and medical treatment.

Vice head of the National Institute of Drug Quality Control Nguyen ang Lam said the institute usually samples about 7,000 traditional medicines yearly for testing purposes.

Problems related to quality were found in up to 10 per cent of the samples. In about 1 per cent of the samples tested, concentrations of active elements were too low for therapeutic purposes.

The active ingredients of herbal medicinal preparations are often lost during improper harvesting and processing. Such deficiencies often plague low quality imported herbal medicines.

Lam also urges caution when combining traditional medicines and Western allopathic medicines.

"Quacks mix modern drugs into traditional remedies, expecting to make the medicines work more quickly," Lam said.

Such practices are meant to satisfy users who believe traditional medicines are safer, with fewer side-effects, than new medicines. Those who mix traditional and modern medicines this way want to see faster treatment results.

Allopathic medicines such as paracetamol, corticoid, Glibenclamid, meformin and sidenafil  a drug requiring a prescription and continuing observation for side-effects  have also been detected in traditional herbal medicines.

Using corticoids for extended periods could have serious side-effects, including osteomalacia, oedema, high blood pressure, diabetes, mental disorders and kidney failure. This is just one example of potential harmful side-effects from allopathic medicines.

Traditional medicine requires time to take full effect. This increases the chance of negative side-effects from adding allopathic drugs to herbal medicines.

Nguyen Thi Dung, a retired health officer in Ha Nois Tay Ho District, said Viet Nam had many valuable traditional medicines but her family reluctantly said no to them after learning about the risks of poor quality herbal medicines.

What a pity! Dung said.  VNS
HA NOI  The Ha Noi Police on Thursday said they had decided to prosecute five more people who are part of a ring accused of printing, publishing and trading value-added tax (VAT) invoices.

They are Nguyen Thuy Hang, Phung Thi Dung, Nguyen Thi Trang, o Van Sang and Duong Hoang uc, aged between 23 and 46.

Last month, the police arrested three people, Hoang Le Hang, Vu Kim Oanh, and Nguyen An Tuan, who were part of a ring that used ghost businesses to illegally trade VAT invoices.

Hang, 45, residing in Hai Ba Trung District, headed the 10-person ring, which comprised her relatives and acquaintances.

Her office was based in Yen Cafe on Cam Hoi Street.

Their modus operandi was to buy businesses incurring losses and then modify the business details or they would establish ghost companies operating in different fields, including construction, tourism, services and trade. (These businesses would be used) to sell VAT invoices, according colonel Phung Anh Quang, head of the investigation division.

Hang bought businesses at prices ranging from VN30 to 40 million each, including their stamps and invoices, the police officer said.

She and her accomplices then sold VAT invoices for VN200,000-300,000 (US$8.9-13.4) per one, he added.

The police also seized 36 company stamps, nearly 200 invoice books, several other documents and VN757 million ($33,000) in cash.

Since June 2014, the ring had sold more than 3,000 VAT invoices, worth VN780 billion ($35 million), to 500 companies, under the names of 33 companies.

The illegal trading in VAT invoices caused tax losses of VN78 billion ($3.4 million) to the state budget, the police said.

The police are investigating the case further.  VNS
Last week, Viet Nam News asked our readers how they expect their children to study at school, following a much-discussed letter a father sent to the Ministry of Education and Training responding to the immense pressure placed on his son to thrive. Here are some responses:

Mai Que Nguyen, Vietnamese, Ha Noi

I totally agree with this father. Actually, the majority of parents in Viet Nam still pay too much attention to their childrens marks and performance at schools, which certainly put great pressure on the kids.

I do not expect too much from my sons study results at school. I want him to study depending on his capacity, not my expectation, and at the same time find time to play and develop soft skills. Knowledge only plays a part in the success of my son in the future. What makes me really happy now is to see my son feel happy to go to school each day without bearing any pressure from his parents.

Therefore, I chose a school that does not force my son to study too much. Normarly, it takes only 20-30 minutes for him to do homework after school, and he spends the rest of the time at home entertaining himself or studying what he is really interested in.

I will not force my son to follow what I expect him to be. Of course, my wish for my son would be for him to become a superman in study, or become a top businessman or study at top schools. But those are not his dreams. I just try to find his strength and guide and help him to develop that strength. If he is not good at study, I will instruct him to enter a vocational school. Now I found that my son loves cooking, so I let him cook anytime he likes. Maybe in the future, he will become a good cook, not a businessman as I expected.

Andrew Burden, Canadian, Ha Noi

As an English teacher of many years, I have seen a lot. I try to do a good job each day, but there are many challenges. There is no expat union or association to protect me and promote my rights.

I am exposed to low quality teachers and learning environments. I am almost embarrassed to tell people back home what I do.

In Ha Noi, I was asked by my Vietnamese boss to stop another teacher from driving home drunk. That means he was teaching while drunk! In Sai Gon, I watched a teacher get into an argument at night with a fellow teacher: it seems he wanted to be left alone to take his heroin! In Taiwan, I complained that teachers were hitting students with sticks and rolled up magazinesI got fired.

I taught colours to public school primary students using a black & white photocopied book. Dont get me started on nutrition and the cost of lunches. Let me say, students are not getting value. Why are recess and lunch breaks subjected to ear-splitting loudspeaker announcements?

Now I know why kids ignore me. They are both deaf & dumb. Dumb in the sense that they only study for exams and are not encouraged to think for themselves. That being said, I love my students, teaching and Viet Nam.

To paraphrase Shakespeare, who will help me with this problem?

Pham Nga, Vietnamese, HCM City

Personally speaking, Im on the fathers side. I did read the letter. It touched me; I feel the invisible pressures we are putting on our 10-year-old too.

Sometimes we argue with each other. My husband demands our son to study more, even do extra homework besides the schools to make sure that he is good at certain subjects and doing well like some top classmates.

Its not a wise move, I think. I always encourage my child to spend one hour on studying and three hours playing instead of one- hour play and three-hour study. For me, first and foremost, he must stay physically healthy. Whenever I pick my son at school, I ask him how much fun he had at school. I care more about his joy going to school, not his marks. Of course, I spend some time in the evening to check over the knowledge he learns at school, ensuring that he grasps it.

It is undeniable that practice makes perfect but will one make perfect without a health and strong body? Additionally, whenever possible, I facilitate my child to receive social knowledge through community activities such as giving used books or clothes to underprivileged children.

Children are the future owners of our country and our world, so lets let them shape it in their own way and let them do what they are up for.

Bui Minh Thuy, Vietnamese, Ha Noi

We ourselves had to study too much when we were students, and that made us so exhausted. I still remembered when I was in the10th grade how there were many afternoons I spent crying after coming back from extra after-school classes, finding myself too tired and afraid to study. I joined extra classes four days per week in order to prepare for the university entrance exam two years later. If I failed the exam, my parents would be very disappointed.

Honestly, I still want my son to study well at school but it is not the most important thing. The most important thing is that he could manage to study within his capacity. If he meets any difficulty during the study, I will never scold or create pressure on him. Instead, I will work together with him to address the problem and figure out what should be done and should not be done.  VNS
HA NOI - The fees being charged at toll stations in the mushrooming BOT transportation projects are inconsistent with the capacity of drivers to pay, Deputy Transport Minister Nguyen Nhat said at a conference in Ha Noi yesterday.

The conference, held by State Audit of Viet Nam (SAV), focused on problems arising in Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) projects and the role of the State in their management.

Le Quoc at, deputy chief investigator of Ministry of Planning and Investment, said the boom in the number of BOT transport projects over the past years has helped develop transport infrastructure despite limited State budgets.

However, various levels of fees at different toll stations have raised public concerns, he said.

Many BOT projects were built on key roads so that drivers have no choice but to use them. This is a forceful way of asking residents to use the service, at said.

at also spoke of the density of toll stations, saying 32 of 88 are located less than 70 km from each - closer than the minimum distance regulated by the Transport Ministry.

Many toll booths collect fees based on the number of stations they travel rather than based on travelling distance. In fact, people living close to toll collection stations of BOT projects are the most vulnerable, at said.

Ngo Van Quy, SAV chief auditor, said that SAV and relevant ministries have supervised and assessed BOT projects investment and pointed out shortcomings.

There have yet to be specific criteria to select BOT investment projects. Shortcomings have reduced the investment efficiency of this kind of investment, he said.

The implementation of BOT projects is very important and urgent given limited budget resources, State Auditor General Ho uc Phoc said.

We need to have measures to select projects, manage and improve transparency and accountability to not only improve investment efficiency and harmonise benefits of investors, users and enterprises; but also to help attract capital to develop the national economy, he said.

A representative of the Ministry of Planning and Investment called on the Transport Ministry and localities to study transport infrastructure networks and specify roads which need BOT investment.

Pham Thi Van Anh, a representative of the State Bank of Viet Nam, said the SAV should focus on choosing the right investors and contractors as well as calculating the total value of investment and fee collection management.

At the conference, the SAV announced plans to publicise audit results of BOT transport infrastructure projects at the beginning of next year.

BOT toll station purchase

Binh Duong Building Materials and Construction Company using the provinces own local budget and decided to completely remove it. In an effort to eradicate BOT toll stations that reportedly disturb residents, the Peoples Committee of southern Binh Duong Province made a positive move to spend about VN4-5 billion (US$177,800-222,200) to purchase a toll booth in Thuan An Township fromusing the provinces own local budget and decided to completely remove it.

The provincial Peoples Committee Chairman Tran Thanh Liem said the decision was to expand roads, reduce traffic jam and create conditions for investment attraction.

Transport Deputy Minister Nguyen Nhat praised the provinces move, but said the budget source must be clarified.

The locality must consider other socio-economic tasks that need more investment priority, he told the Vietnam News Agency.

In fact, there are other important tasks that need priority such as poverty reduction and eradication, agriculture and rural areas development, and waste treatment. If these problems have not been solved, it is unacceptable to allocate such a massive amount of money to remove a BOT project, he said. - VNS
HA NOI  Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Tran Hong Ha has requested the Environment General Department and local Peoples Committee to determine the cause of the fish kill-off in central Thanh Hoa Province.

The order came as the media reported massive fish deaths in recent days at Tinh Gia Districts Nghi Son Island Commune.

The minister further asked the department and local officials to invite experts and scientists to take water samples for testing.

They were also requested to check on information about waste sludge from coastal dredging projects in Nghi Son Port which poured into the ocean.

The agencies have to report back to the ministry before September 20, the minister said.

Earlier, nearly 50 tonnes of fish bred in cages, and 300kg of natural fish, were found dead in Nghi Son Island Commune, raising suspicions that the fish were poisoned by toxic waste.

However, the provincial Natural Resources and Environment Department confirmed that the blooming of algae, resulting in the red tide phenomenon, was the main reason behind the massive fish deaths.

On Tuesday, the Fisheries Research Institutes working delegation visited Nghi Son, Tinh Hai and Hai Yen communes in Tinh Gia District to take water samples, Nguyen Van Nguyen, deputy head of the institute, said.

He added that the officials would take water samples every hour along three sites that had reported the fish deaths.

On the same day, the ministrys Environmental Monitoring Centre also took samples of water from cages and from the area near the wastewater discharge system of the Nghi Son Oil Refinery and Petrochemical Complex, where dead fish had also been found.

Also, the deputy head of the Management Board of Nghi Son Economic Zone said the complex had a plan to wash out crude oil pipes.

After receiving the information, the local Department of Natural Resources and Environment and police asked the complex to stop the discharge of wastewater and wait for test results, as well as specific verification from the Environment General Department.

Regarding information about nearly 400 tonnes of waste in the Taiwanese Hung Nghiep Formosa Ha Tinh Steel Corportation, Nghi Son Environment Joint Stock Company has ended its contract with Formosa Ltd Co for handling this waste.

Formosa company has still yet found a unit for shipping and handling its waste, while the amount of waste in the companys warehouse is building up.  VNS
QUANG BINH  Nine people, most being children, were hospitalised after being severely burned when balloons exploded at the Mid-autumn Festival in central Quang Binh Province yesterday.

The victims were playing in front of Tam Toa Church in ong Hoi City when two young men set fire to a strings of balloons so they might give the balloons to the children, causing severe burns to those people standing nearby.

Dr Tran Van Son, deputy head of Viet Nam-Cuba Hospitals Emergency Department, said three children had suffered light injuries and were discharged from the hospital.

The other children were seriously injured and still receiving treatment.  VNS
HA NOI  The Japanese language is being taught at some primary schools in Ha Noi and HCM City, on a trial basis.

An opening ceremony for Japanese language classes at primary schools in Viet Nam was held yesterday at Chu Van An primary school in Ha Noi, with the participation of representatives from the Ministry of Education and Training and the Japanese Embassy in Viet Nam.

In a letter sent to students, Japanese Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to Viet Nam Fukada Hiroshi said language was a foundation for cultural exchanges among countries.

Those students learning Japanese language would contribute to the development of relations between Japan and Viet Nam, he said.

First Secretary and Head of the Japanese Embassys Department of Culture and Information, Anazawa, said Japanese language was taught for students beginning in the third grade, which was quite early, but the younger the students are, the better they can learn.

The program is being carried out on a trial basis at four primary schools during the 2016-2017 academic year, including Nguyen Du, Khuong Thuong and Chu Van An schools in Ha Noi and Viet Nam-Australia school in HCM City.

Japanese language classes are expected to be expanded nationwide for all primary schools in the future.  VNS
ALEPPO - The United Nations has urged Syrias government to allow immediate aid deliveries to hunger-stricken civilians after a fragile ceasefire was extended for 48 hours by Russia and the United States.

In a sign of renewed tensions between the two powers, Moscow on Thursday accused Washington of failing to meet its obligations under the truce deal it brokered with Moscow.

Russias ambassador to the United Nations, Vitaly Churkin, said Moscow wanted a UN Security Council resolution endorsing the deal.

"We are working on it," he told reporters in New York, adding that he thought it should be adopted when the Security Council meets on Syria next Wednesday.

The UN said trucks loaded with aid were for a second day in a buffer zone between Turkey and Syria, voicing hope the supplies could be delivered to besieged rebel-held districts of Aleppo city on Friday.

The ceasefire deal calls for the demilitarisation of the key Castello Road into the city.

Russia said on Thursday that Syrian armed forces were "fulfilling their obligations and have started a gradual withdrawal" from the route, but rebel groups did not appear to be carrying out a simultaneous pullback as agreed.

Rhetorical fog

The United States said the ceasefire was more or less holding, despite breaches by both sides, but expressed concern the UN aid convoys were blocked.

Washington said late Wednesday that US Secretary of State John Kerry and his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov had agreed to prolong the ceasefire which began on Monday.

But hours later Russian military spokesman Igor Konashenkov accused Washington of spinning "rhetorical fog" intended "to hide the fact that it is not fulfilling its part of the obligations".

"As of the third day (of the truce), only the Syrian army is observing the regime of silence," he said. "At the same time, the moderate opposition led by the US is increasing the amount of attacks on residential districts."

US President Barack Obama was due to gather top national security aids on Friday -- including his secretaries of state and defence -- with the shaky ceasefire set to dominate a meeting ostensibly about countering the Islamic State group (IS).

The truce, agreed after US-Russia talks in Geneva last week, is part of the latest bid to end a five-year conflict that has killed more than 300,000 people.

It aims to halt fighting between Syrian President Bashar al-Assads forces and rebels, but excludes jihadists like IS.

Twenty-three civilians including nine children were killed in air strikes on an IS-held town in eastern Deir Ezzor province on Thursday, a monitor said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said it was unclear whose warplanes attacked Al-Mayadin.

Later the Observatory reported "two strikes by unknown airplanes," in rebel-held Talbisseh in central Syria.

According to the monitor, those were "the first strikes on an area where there are no jihadists since the start of the ceasefire".

The UNs Syria envoy Staffan de Mistura said the truce was holding "by and large".

But promised authorisation from Damascus for humanitarian convoys had not yet been received.

"This is something that is required to happen immediately," he said.

Clock ticking

East Aleppo, where around 250,000 civilians are besieged by government forces, is a major concern for humanitarian organisations.

The ceasefire extension "provides us a critical window of opportunity" to assist people there, said David Swanson, a spokesman for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

"That being said, the clock is ticking and time is of the essence."

Forty trucks carrying food for 80,000 people waited at the Turkish border to go to Aleppo about 70 kilometres (44 miles) away, said Swanson.

The Observatory said earlier the army was unwilling to pull back until the opposition forces did.

The east of Aleppo is in desperate need of aid after weeks of heavy fighting, and a government siege that has lasted most of the past two months, with no aid entering since early July.

In west Aleppo, a young boy died from his wounds after being hit by a sniper in the first death in areas covered by the truce since it started, the monitor said.

And a sniper later shot dead another person in the citys rebel-held east, it added.

The deal calls for the truce to be renewed every 48 hours, and for Washington and Moscow to begin unprecedented joint targeting of jihadists like IS and former al-Qaeda affiliate Fateh al-Sham Front if it lasts a week.

The opposition has yet to officially sign on, and hours before the ceasefire began Assad said he was committed to recovering all of Syria.

If the deal holds, it could open the door to new peace talks.  AFP
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WATERLOO  Writers are encouraged to not tell, but to show.

A Waterloo architecture firm is taking that advice.

Struxture Architects in downtown Waterloo showcased improvements to its office at an open house Thursday evening. The improvements include collaborative work space, adjustable desks and green energy initiatives including solar panels and LED lighting. The firm opened its office to the public Thursday for an open house showcasing the improvements.

Were beginning to practice what we preach, said Nick Hildebrandt of Struxture Architects.

The 72 solar panels that cover the roof have been in place for about six months, Hildebrandt said. The panels not only reduce the carbon footprint of the office, but clients considering installing solar panels can see exactly how theyre mounted, the direction they face and see the energy output.

Unless they can see it in process, it can sometimes be difficult to imagine, said Jane Miller of Struxture.

The panels dont quite generate all of the offices electrical needs, but it offsets power consumption by up to 60 percent, said Jesse Lizer of Stuxture architects. The roof wasnt big enough to install enough panels to offset all the energy use.

We would have put more on if we had the space, Lizer said.

The firm will have more data on its year-round energy production at the end of the year, Hildebrandt said.

Well have a better idea on the timeline for payback on a project like that, Hildebrandt said.

On the third floor, the remodeled, open, collaborative office space lets members of the firm work together and share ideas.

A lot of it is to improve the environment we work in, Hildebrandt said. But its definitely the kind of plan we talk about with some of our major clients.

City business leaders, downtown neighbors and former Struxture employees were invited to the event.

Louanne Madsen, who was the office manager at Struxture until she retired in 2007, said she wanted to see the space and former co-workers.

It was a great place to work, Madsen said. I really enjoyed the people.

Madsen was with the company when it relocated to downtown Waterloo in 1999.The collaborative office area seems like a good use of space, she said.

It looks like a great idea that people can work together and toss ideas around, she said.

Conference and meeting rooms are connected for web-based communication that can save clients and the firm travel time and money.

Ambassadors from the Greater Cedar Valley Alliance & Chamber cut a ribbon outside the office marking the completed project. City council members Jerome Amos Jr., Fourth Ward, and Steve Schmitt, at large, represented the city at the event.
Clint Eastwoods Sully is the story of a commercial jet that sustained catastrophic engine failure and yet landed safely in the Hudson River with little more damage than wet clothes and ruined itineraries.

Its focus through this story is the pilot, Captain Chesley Sully Sullenberger, played by Tom Hanks.

Opening hours after the crash (Sully bristles at the term crash, noting it was a forced water landing), the film flashes back to it throughout the next days of Sullys experience. Its a whirlwind  birds ruin his jets engines, hes an instant celebrity, hes deeply disturbed by the experience, hes under investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board for possible ineptitude.

For necessary dramatic purposes, an investigation that took over a year unfolds in a few days. The board is skeptical of Sullys decision to land in the Hudson, with simulations claiming an airport landing was possible. But Sully and his co-pilot Jeff Skiles (Aaron Eckhart) were there, and they know that engine failure gave them just one workable option.

Shot beautifully with melancholy blueish hues, Sully is nonetheless an emotionally upbeat work. The crash sequences are handled with an eye for realism, saving the manufactured drama for the investigation. Dialogue dense with pilot terminology reinforces the authenticity as Sully and his co-pilot have 208 seconds to diagnose engine failure and execute an emergency landing.

Eastwood quietly reveres Sully, as well as the planes crew and New York City first responders. Theres an especially powerful moment when Sully, told that hes the reason everyone survived, shares the credit with everyone who did their jobs. Eastwood and Hanks take material that could have easily been TV movie-level and make it essential big-screen viewing, a warm, culturally relevant American success story.

Its rare that true stories like this  disasters that end with everyone walking away  are told so well. Audiences tend to find a deep connections to real-life tragedy, but theres a place for hope, too, and Eastwood has found it.
WATERLOO  A Waterloo police officer charged in a June road rage incident has pleaded not guilty.

Corbin Allen Payne, 45, entered a written not guilty plea to a charge of misdemeanor assault causing bodily injury on Tuesday. He also waived his right to a speedy trial, and trial has tentatively been set for November.

Payne, a lieutenant with the Waterloo Police Department, was charged in connection with a June 12 incident where he allegedly accused East China Restaurant delivery driver Robert Carlisle Jr. of speeding and cutting off a vehicle he was riding in while off duty.

The confrontation took place in the Kimball Ridge Shopping Center, and Payne allegedly pounded on the delivery drivers vehicle and grabbed Carlisle, at one point holding him by the neck, court records state.

When a passerby yelled at him to leave Carlisle alone and that he would call the police, Payne allegedly responded that he was a police officer, records state. Payne and a woman he was with then drove off, records state.

Carlisle had marks on his neck and body from the incident, according to authorities.

Officers who were called to the scene traced the car to Payne. The case was investigated by the Black Hawk County Sheriffs Office, and Payne told deputies that Carlisle was driving fast and nearly caused a crash and that his wife and he followed Carlisle to the parking lot, court records state.

Payne was placed on administrative leave, and the incident is being reviewed by the police department's internal affairs office.
UPDATE: A news conference is scheduled today on the Safety Services Director Dan Trelka's status.

According to a news release from Waterloo City Hall, the joint press conference to discuss Trelka's status and future community policing will be 2:30 p.m. at City Hall.

EARLIER STORY

WATERLOO --- Director of Safety Services Dan Trelka  who has overseen several missteps by officers over the past few months  has told some of his staff he has been asked to step down.

Neither Trelka nor Mayor Quentin Hart would publicly confirm the report last week but will hold a news conference at 2:30 p.m. in City Hall to discuss the situation and the future of community policing in the city.

News of the removal of the popular chief rippled through the community Friday and Saturday with many people expressing dismay and outrage Trelka is the fall guy for the department.

There were reports on social media a crowd will show up at Mondays Waterloo City Council meeting to protest the decision. The council meets at 5:30 p.m. at City Hall.

According to sources, Trelka, 52, informed a small number of officers that he had been asked to leave, and that there would be no improvement in the department if he remained chief.

The police chief serves at the pleasure of the mayor. Hart, in his first term as mayor, was out of town Friday and declined to comment when reached, saying he would not discuss personnel matters publicly.

In recent weeks the Waterloo Police Department has come under fire over allegations of unfair treatment of black residents.

In July, the city finalized settlements with residents who brought use of force lawsuits and the family of a 13-year-old girl who was thrown to the ground and handcuffed. In August, the department began an internal affairs investigation into recorded remarks a patrol officer made disparaging a black teen killed

in 2013, and in September police disclosed another officer had been disciplined for striking and pulling the hair of a handcuffed black suspect following a chase and crash.

Several Waterloo City Council members contacted Friday said they were unaware of the move, including Steve Schmitt, chairman of the councils public safety committee.

Council member Tom Lind, the committees vice chairman, said he received a phone call relaying a third-hand rumor Friday morning before the news broke.

That was the first I heard about it, and it was just kind of a rumor, Lind said. I dont know if he resigned or got fired.

After the news was out, Lind said he received a phone call from Hart, who told him it was a personnel matter and Hart couldnt talk about it with Lind.

Lind said he was troubled he and Schmitt werent approached for input.

The two of us should have been at least been advised or asked for our opinion about making such a major change, and maybe the whole council should have been asked about it, Lind said.

Council member Pat Morrissey, who like Hart attended a National League of Cities state conference in Des Moines last week, said he knew of no developments regarding Trelka.

In recent weeks, officers have been undergoing diversity training, and last week Trelka said he had been in meetings with the U.S. Department of Justices Community Relations Service.

Trelka was named Waterloos police chief in 2010, and he was appointed to the newly created position of director of public safety in January 2011.

A Wisconsin native, Trelka had served in the U.S. Marines and was a sheriffs deputy in Weld County, Colo., before becoming a police officer in Sturgeon Bay, Wis., in 1992. He became the Sturgeon Bay police chief in 2003 and held that position until he was named Waterloos police chief.

Former Black Hawk County Supervisor and longtime neighborhood anti-crime activist Leon Mosley is one of Trelkas staunchest supporters.

I think he is a great police chief, Mosley said. He has sat in my yard. He has helped us with crime in the community personally. Hes out in the community, and hes doing one heck of a good job. And it really upsets me that somebody asked him to leave. If he wants to leave, thats a whole different story.

The person that has asked him to leave, what has that person done in the community to make it safer and better? Mosley said. Asked if he would feel the same if that person were the mayor, Mosley said, I dont think the mayor would do that. I hope he wouldnt. Theyre not going to find anybody thats going to do a better job than he (Trelka) is doing.

We have two blacks on the police force. Why? said Mosley, who is black. They are begging to get people. They wont come.

Meanwhile social media sites such as the Taking Back Waterloo page filled with comments in support of Trelka. A Facebook page We Support Dan Trelka was also started and had nearly 1,000 likes by Saturday afternoon.

Courier news editor Pat Kinney contributed to this story.
WATERLOO  Voters in Waterloos east side will have an open seat for their Iowa House representative for the first time in 14 years, and they have three choices in the general election to replace retiring Rep. Deborah Berry, D-Waterloo.

Those are the main reasons the Rev. Frantz Whitfield decided to host a debate at Mount Carmel Baptist Church.

This is the first time that we get to have the open forum and debate like this, Whitfield said. I wanted to jump on the train as fast as I could because a lot of people have been voicing concerns about District 62, but they just didnt have the venue and platform to do it.

The hour-long debate, with time for audience questions, will be Saturday at his church, 805 Adams St., beginning at 10 a.m. Republican Todd Obadal and Independent John Patterson will participate; Democrat Ras Smith will not. All of the candidates are from Waterloo.

House District 62 comprises the northern part of Waterloo, Elk Run Heights, Evansdale and Raymond.

Whitfield said he wants the candidates to speak to the sizeable African-American population in the district.

With early voting beginning in about two weeks and the Nov. 8 election just 50 days away  Whitfield wants to give voters an opportunity to meet the candidates.

Smith said in a statement he appreciates the invitation but believes it would be most productive for him to spend Saturday morning meeting with constituents.

Smith said he would participate in two other upcoming forums.

Whitfield said he is frustrated by Smiths absence because he sees the debate as an opportunity to introduce the candidates to more voters. Whitfield did note, however, that each of the candidates has in the past addressed his congregation.

But he said the candidates are mostly unknown to voters in the district.

He said he expects to hear the candidates talk about the important issues in the community, including education, health care costs and gun violence.
WATERLOO  Although the $14 million interchange at County Road C-57 and U.S. Highway 218 between Cedar Falls and Janesville is about two weeks from officially opening, state and county officials gathered to mark completion of a significant portion of work Thursday.

The interchange took years of planning and a full construction season to complete. Safety was the main concern that prompted local officials to petition the Iowa Department of Transportation to consider upgrading the intersection, said Black Hawk County Sheriff Tony Thompson. He said the project represents what was the hard, but right thing to do.

It involved a lot of moving parts, Thompson said, indicating the Canadian National rail line that had to be moved about two miles and extending the overpass.

We tried some easy solutions, Thompson said. This was the hard, right thing.

Thompson said the interchange was needed because, despite deputies trying to slow traffic down, there was too much traffic for the at-grade intersection.

It wasnt speed, he said. It was sheer volume of traffic.

Thompson said 73 crashes occurred at the intersection since he took office.

Traci Berry, director of the Janesville First Responders, said she saw many of those crashes and reminded people traffic stats have people behind them.

They were real lives, she said, adding she hopes relatives of people killed or seriously injured at the intersection take comfort the improvement took place.

Linda Laylin, chair of the Black Hawk County Board of Supervisors, thanked residents along the corridor for their patience and the Iowa DOT for their response to the countys request.

Pete Hjelmstad, field services coordinator for the Iowa DOT, said local officials did their duty as well.

They went to the commission and they showed how important this structure was, Hjelmstad said.

The other U.S. 218 at-grade crossings at Mount Vernon, Bennington and Gresham roads will be closed when the interchange is finished. The project essentially creates an access-controlled expressway between Cedar Falls and Janesville. Not all nearby residents are happy.

Gloria Dayton said the new alignment will cut off her access to the main road and put her on miles of gravel to get to and from her home on Bennington Road.

Im worried about winter, Dayton said. Im worried about fire and EMTs getting to us when necessary.

J.B. Holland Construction Inc. of Decorah was the general contractor on the project.
WATERLOO  The parade of second-graders passing through barns Thursday at the National Cattle Congress Fair were frequently told not to touch the animals.

So when petting was invited by the animals handlers, it caused a lot of excitement among the students.

They swarmed around a plastic swimming pool in one barn to get an up-close look at eight downy chicks. The chicks  seven yellow and one black  scurried across a bed of wood shavings as the children gingerly rubbed their heads or backs with a single finger.

Theyre really fluffy, said Gabe Vogel, a student in Dawn Evens class at Poyner Elementary School.

Along with touching some of the farm animals, second-graders from schools across the Cedar Valley took in the sights, sounds and smells during the Cattle Congress Discovery Youth Program, which continues today. Busloads of children, accompanied by their teachers, toured livestock barns and other exhibits at the fair led by volunteer guides.

What did Evens students think of the animals in the barns? Theyre big, said one girl.

And they poop a lot, added Isabella Nissen, after watching one exhibitor scoop up a pitchfork of manure from a cows stall. She walked through the barns holding her nose.

One exhibitor opened the gate to her mini Hereford heifers stall, holding its halter so the Poyner kids could pet the cow.

Sanal Sabic admitted he had never been that close to a cow, but it wasnt his favorite animal to touch in the barns. I really like how the lamb feeled, said the second-grader.

After leaving the barns, students had other hands-on experiences, including at the rabbit exhibit. But their most exotic chance to get close to a creature was the Live Stingray Encounter in Estel Hall. Students were invited to reach into the tank where the stingrays glided through the water and touch them.

Elijah Yeagher, another one of Evens students, described them as really slimy. Theyre kind of hard in the middle.

Classmate Chloe Schmidt apparently felt a little bit more when she touched one of the stingrays. It was like a shark was biting me, she said.

About 1,800 children were expected to participate in the school tours with their classes. Its been done for several years now, and its getting bigger all the time, said Jim Koch, an NCC facilities manager. Its a good way to teach kids about agriculture, just teach them more about the agricultural side of it.

In conjunction with touring the fairgrounds, students spent time at the Electric Park Ballroom where they ate lunch and went through a series of workshops to learn more about swine, dairy cows, poultry and sheep.

Even starts educating her Poyner students ahead of the fair. We learned about farms  dairy farms, mostly, she said.

After a couple virtual tours of farms, the students outlined their own imaginary farming operations. Even incorporates literacy lessons by having the children write letters to dairy farmers. Some of the farmers, including members of her extended family, respond to the letters.

We look forward to it, its always lots of fun, said Even, of the day at the fair.

The NCC Fair continues through Sunday. Friday is Kids Day, where children 17 and under pay no admission. For more information about the fair, go online to nationalcattlecongress.com.
One veterans organization raises nearly $4 million for a new building.

Another, only 15 to 20 miles away, is struggling to raise just less than $10,000 to pay bills and keep its doors open.

One is having a grand opening in about three weeks. The other is trying to stay open another three months.

Something is wrong with this picture.

The Waverly Area Veterans Post is open for business and plans a grand opening celebration Oct. 8. Its the result of cooperation among various Waverly-area veterans organizations and support from the community, the state and beyond.

In Waterloo, Sullivan Brothers Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 1623, located in the former Jims Lounge building near downtown, held a major fundraiser last week that yielded $5,200. It needs another $4,000 to stay open.

We congratulate the Waverly vets. We hope the Waterloo VFW post stays open. We wish both every success.

Yet the Waverly project demonstrates what the Waterloo veterans posts had an opportunity to do in the 1980s  and didnt. Cooperate.

That may upset some people. But were not telling tales out of school. Everyone knows it. And its not just us saying it.

Take retired U.S. Army Reserve Maj. Gen. Evan Curly Hultman of Waterloo, an old East High School running back whos been carrying the ball for Becker-Chapman American Legion Post 138 over the past year in its challenges in moving to a new location from its longtime home near the KWWL building.

We tried to get it done in Waterloo, and it just fell through, Hultman said in a 2014 interview at the outset of the Waverly project. It met with resistance from national veterans organizations trying to preserve their separate identities.

We paid a big price in the process, Hultman said. Post memberships dwindled as veterans passed away. Buildings deteriorated. Waterloo AMVETS Post 19, eventually sold its building and now meets at Veterans Memorial Hall.

Waverly project proponents enlisted Hultman as honorary fundraising chairman and he helped then get the job done, raising donations ranging from actor Tom Hanks to Gen. Colin Powell, and numerous local donations large and small, in addition to a state Vision Iowa grant.

But it also took cooperation. Following the 2008 flood, and faced with dwindling membership, individuals from Waverly veterans organizations formed their own local WAVP board in 2009. Their success didnt happen overnight. It took seven years of compromise, cooperation and hard work.

That has paid dividends. While the Waterloo VFW raised its $5,200, a single donor wrote a $10,000 check to the Waverly project the same week.

Our donor is a continuing supporter, WAVP board member Hank Bagelmann said. That said, we do wish our comrades at the Waterloo VFW well. Raising $5,200 is a good start. Their challenge, as is ours, is to do everything possible to bring these most recent generations into the organizations.

Theres a lot of truth in that statement. Some now-elderly Vietnam veterans say, when they tried to get involved and take leadership roles with some veterans organizations years ago, they were met with resistance from older World War II and Korea-era veterans. The Vietnam veterans are being careful to avoid that with younger veterans of Iraq, Afghanistan and the 1991 Persian Gulf War. They want to make sure they receive help with post-traumatic stress and other struggles the Nam vets largely had to shoulder alone.

There is precedent for cooperation among Waterloo-area veterans organizations, going back as far as 100 years, when Spanish-American War and Civil War veterans teamed up to make Veterans Memorial Hall a reality. It was built in 1915.

Veterans must reach out across generational, fraternal and city limit lines. Cedar Falls is learning that lesson. While home to the largest AMVETS post in the state, veterans there also have revitalized their Legion and VFW organizations, all of which share members and work closely.

Equally important, nearly all veterans posts arent solely for veterans. All, like the Waterloo VFW post, have public hours and events and all could stand a little more patronage from the general public.

Theres no reason Waterloo cant have vibrant and viable veterans organizations. All they need to do is look to their neighbors for examples. And all the public needs to do is support them with business and donations.

And with the large number of returned veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan, and the alarming rate of suicides among veterans of all eras, these organizations are needed to to engage and serve those younger veterans. Any venue, any post, could play a role in saving a life, keeping a family together or finding a veteran a job and a calling in life.

As weve said before, in this cause, as Gen. Douglas MacArthur once said, there is no substitute for victory.
Q: Is there any place in the area that recycles old paint, roof sealer, etc.?

A: We are not aware of any paint recyclers in the area.

Q: The business section Sept. 4 had an article about Troubled Waters and stated if we want our wells tested to contact our county sanitarian. Who would that be for someone who lives in rural Black Hawk County?

A: Call the Black Hawk County Health Department, 291-2413.

Q: What happened to the old church at the corner of West Second and Wellington? Have the windows blown out? Was there a fire?

A: The property is in disrepair from neglect. The city of Waterloo is preparing to take legal action under Iowa Code Section 657A to get title to the property.

Q: In front of 3602 Kimball is a power box with a barricade that has a broken cover for at least a year. Who would I call to get this repaired?

A: The Waterloo Engineering Department was informed about the damage and determined the box belongs to Windstream. The private utility company has informed the city it would repair the problem soon.

Q: Who is in charge of the pipeline going through Indian territory?

A: The developer of the $3.8 billion Dakota Access pipeline is Dallas-based Energy Transfer Partners, a Fortune 500 company founded in 1995. The 1,172-mile project would carry nearly a half-million barrels of crude oil daily from North Dakotas oil fields through South Dakota and Iowa to an existing pipeline in Patoka, Ill. The Standing Rock Sioux tribe of North Dakota filed a lawsuit challenging the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers decision to grant permits at more than 200 water crossings.

Q: Can you print information about Billy who is on the Today show, such as his full name, how long hes been on the show, etc?

A: Billy Bush joined Today this summer. Formerly host of Access Hollywood and Access Hollywood Live, he got his start in radio.

Q: Is Frankie Avalon still living?

A: Yes; hes now 76.

Q: Do George Burns and Gracie Allen have any living children?

A: Their son, Ronnie, died in 2007. Daughter Sandra Burns Luckman is still alive.

Q: What are the lyrics to Oh, How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning?

A: Here they are:

Ive been a soldier quite a while

And I would like to state

The life is simply wonderful

The Army food is great

I sleep with 97 others in a wooden hut

I love them all

They all love me

Its very lovely but

Oh! How I hate to get up in the morning

Oh! How Id love to remain in bed

For the hardest blow of all

Is to hear the bugler call

Ya gotta get up

Ya gotta get up

Ya gotta get up this morning

Someday Im going to murder the bugler

Someday theyre going to find him dead

Ill amputate his reveille

And step upon it heavily

And spend the rest of my life in bed.
If you have opinions about the subject matter of posts on this blog please share them. Do you have a story about how the system affects you at work school or home, or just in general? This is a place to share it.
By West Kentucky Star Staff Sep. 15, 2016 | 02:28 PM | PADUCAH, KY

The Paducah Police Department has released officer body camera footage of a Sept. 11 incident at a Paducah nightclub, during which an officer was accused of using a racial slur.The body cam footage was released after another video was posted online by someone outside the Brickhouse nightclub. In that video, the person could be heard repeatedly accusing Officer Daniel Kimball of using the slur.Chief Brandon Barnhill has released a statement about the incident, saying Kimball was responding to the club at around 1:30 am after the owner called police to report some patrons smoking marijuana inside. Barnhill said that after making an announcement that he was not going to arrest anyone, Kimball asked patrons who were smoking inside to leave the building. A short time later outside the building, Kimball got into a discussion with an African-American man during which Barnhill says Kimball repeated the man's statement back to him, which included the racial slur.While acknowledging that it was not professional for Kimball to use the word in any context, Barnhill said he is glad that Kimball later apologized to the man and ended the exchange in a friendly way. "We recognized that while the command staff felt that Officer Kimballs approach of repeating the statement that included the slur did not live up to our expectation of professional, we were glad to see that he later explained his intentions to the man, that he apologized and the two ended on a handshake." Barnhill said.Barnhill said the department reached out to African-American leaders in the community to discuss the incident, and after watching the video he feels confident they were in agreement that Kimball did not appear to make the comment in a malicious or racist manner.Barnhill said the incident remains under internal review. Click the link below to watch the full, unedited video.

On the Net:
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Willamette Associate Professor of Law David Friedman commented on the resolution of the Oregon v. Oracle lawsuit in a September 15 Associated Press story.

The lawsuit has been the topic of national news since 2014. Oregon paid software giant Oracle $240 million to create its Cover Oregon health care exchange website  a website the state said never worked or enrolled a single person. That problem resulted in Oregon joining the federal exchange instead in order to comply with the Affordable Care Act.

In the lawsuit, the state sought $6 billion in punitive damages. Oregon Governor Kate Brown announced a settlement September 15 in which the state accepted a package worth $100 million, $25 million of which will be cash to reimburse the states legal fees. Oracle will also contribute $10 million to a state technology education program and offer the state six years of unlimited Oracle software and technical support, a deal that is worth an estimated $60 million.

Most of the money used to initially pay Oracle came from federal funds designated to help states comply with the Affordable Care Act. Friedman said that is likely why the settlement mainly involves non-cash value.

The government would say, Thank you for being our collection agency. Were going to take that back, he said. Thats why this is coming out as credits and things that are a bit to the side of the direct verdict. Oracle has probably convinced them that this is their best shot at collecting the best value.

The settlement ends years of litigation four months before a costly trial would have occurred. Friedman said as Brown runs for a second term, she can now put this fight behind her.

This was going to go on and on forever and ever, he said. A lot of people can claim victory over this.

About David A. Friedman

David A. Friedman is an associate professor of law at Willamette University College of Law, where he teaches commercial law, business law, torts, and consumer trade practices law and his scholarship focuses on behavioral economics, contract theory, advertising law, and public health. Friedman received the Jerry E. Hudson Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2012. His publications have appeared in leading law journals and large-circulation public media.

About Willamette University College of Law

Opened in 1883, Willamette University College of Law is the first law school in the Pacific Northwest. The college has a long tradition at the forefront of legal education and is committed to the advancement of knowledge through excellent teaching, scholarship, mentoring and experience. Leading faculty, thriving externship and clinical law programs, ample practical skills courses, and a proactive career placement office prepare Willamette law students for today's legal job market. According to statistics compiled by the American Bar Association, Willamette ranks first in the Pacific Northwest for job placement for full-time, long-term, JD-preferred/JD-required jobs for the class of 2014 and first in Oregon for the classes of 2012, 2013 and 2014. Located across the street from the state capitol complex and the Oregon Supreme Court in downtown Salem, the college specializes in law and government, law and business, and dispute resolution.
Bee Breeders, an online organisation of architecture competitions, has announced the winners of Iceland Trekking Cabin competition, which were selected from Canada, Sweden and Australia. The winners of the Iceland Trekking Cabins architecture competition successfully tackled a challenging brief, requiring them to create a shelter for trekkers in a vast, dynamic landscape which varies across each location and is defined by topographic contrast and ecological factors. The Iceland Trekking Cabins required participants to create a supple and dextrous structure that would protect against the elements and foster social collectivity.



Bee Breeders' first place winners from Canada were recognised for their clever articulation of the most basic elements of shelter - the roof and wall - to create a fully immersive experience. It featured an expansive roof that allows the textured landscape to permeate through, and gabion walls from local stone that also create an external gathering space.



The success of the second place proposal for the Iceland Trekking Cabins competition from a team in Sweden, lies in its simplicity and strength of parti. With three aligned and evenly spaced concrete cores that contain the circulation, hearth, and bathroom of the cabin, these elements allow for extra shelter beneath the structure to create a public gathering space while solving the difficult problem of maintenance under heavy snow conditions.



The third place winners were a company from Australia called Trias, setting itself apart in the use of cabinetry as a language to create shelter. Through the dimensional unit of the tatami mat, the project creates a modular furniture system that defines the perimeter of the shared central space, creating a gradient between the common dining area and private sleeping cells.

The competition selected 3 winners and 6 Honorable Mentions in the competition.

See the 3 winning projects with short project informations below:

1st prize: Terra Firma by Deagan McDonald, Kelsey Nilsen, Canada

First place is awarded to a project distinguished by its clever articulation of the most basic elements of shelter  the roof and wall  to create a fully immersive experience. The shelter presents itself as an expansive roof, allowing the textured landscape to permeate through. Supporting the roof, gabion walls from local stone rise from the ground, appearing as pre existing relics in the landscape.

Arranged into three distinct volumes, the walls create both interior shelter from the elements and exterior gathering space. Elevated wooden platforms are inserted as needed in the interior, providing reprieve from the elements, leaving the local terrain largely untouched. The weight of the roof and walls celebrate permanence, while the porous quality of the material and spatial sequencing open the project to the transitory nature of the landscape.

Read 1st prize winners interview





2nd prize: Iceland Trekking Cabins by Robin Krasse, Karl Lagerqvist, Mattias Dahlberg, Sweden

The success of the second place proposal for the Iceland Trekking Cabins competition lies in its simplicity and strength of parti. Three aligned and evenly spaced concrete cores contain the circulation, hearth, and bathroom of the cabin and also serve to elevate the structure above the ground.

The light touch of these primitive elements on the fragile ecological landscape serves a triple function: allowing for extra shelter beneath the structure, creating a public gathering space, and solving the difficult problem of maintenance under heavy snow conditions. Materially, these cores are rendered as unapologetically raw concrete, an admission of the manmade substance of the structure in relation to the wild nature it sits upon.

Read 2nd prize winners interview

Exterior plan

Interior plan

Section

3rd prize: HEIMA by Jonathon Donnelly, Jennifer McMaster, Australia

The third place entry for the Iceland trekking cabin proposal sets itself apart in the use of cabinetry as a language to create shelter. Through the dimensional unit of the tatami mat, the project creates a modular furniture system that defines the perimeter of the shared central space, creating a gradient between the common dining area and private sleeping cells.

The furniture units are comprised of lightweight plywood and are a collection of bed, window, entry, and kitchen modules: each cabin unit can be adjusted, reoriented, and scaled to adapt to the uniqueness of the Icelandic landscape. This kit of parts is clad in polycarbonate skin, a material that in its obscuring translucency and reflectivity, mirrors the mercurial atmosphere of the Nordic sky. At night, it functions as a lantern, marking the terrain through the light that spills from its clerestory.

Read 3rd prize winners interview

All images courtesy of Bee Breeders

> via Bee Breeders
Canl Bahis siteleri sektoru son derece onu ack ve farkl ozelliklere sahip bir sektordur. Elbette bahis secenekleri arasnda yuksek kazanc getiren alan kuskusuz canl bahistir. Peki, canl bahis nedir?

Canl Bahis Nedir?

Canl bahis adndan da anlaslacag gibi devam eden musabakaya bahis yapmaktr. Bu bahis musabaka devam ederken de yaplabilir olmasdr. Basta futbol olmak uzere voleybol, tenis, hentbol, basketbol, buz hokeyi ve masa tenisi gibi spor organizasyonlarna canl bahisler yaplabilmektedir. Canl bahis siteleri bu oyunlarn hepsine yuksek oranlara bahis yapmanza imkan tanr. En fazla tercih edilen futbol canl bahisleri diger alanlara gore daha fazla on plandadr. Siteden siteye degisen sartlar ve uygulama esaslar soz konusu olsa da kurallar sabittir.

Canl bahisi populer klan ve heyecan katan en onemli ozellikle musabakann basladg ana dek bahis yapabilmedir. Canl bahis icerisinde yer alan secenekler kazanma sansnz da dogrudan arttrmaktadr. Ilk korneri kim kullanr, ilk tac, gol, sar kart, krmz kart gibi futbol musabakas icerisinde olabilecek hemen hemen her seye bahis yaplabilmektedir. Normal bahisegore de son derece yuksek oranda olmas avantajl yonlerini ortaya koymaktadr. Nitekim dogru secenek ksa surede kazancl ckmanza etki edecektir.

Strateji ve dogru analizle 90 dakika gibi bir surede anaparanzkatlayabilirsiniz. Tabi bunu basarabilmek icin mutlaka musabakaya dair ayrntlar iyi degerlendirmek gerekir. Soz konusu musabakann detaylarn inceleyip, cezal, sakat oyuncu veya performans dusen takm oyunu gibi detaylar bilmek canl bahiste kazanc belirleyen onemli unsurdur. Guvenilir Canl bahis hem heyecanl zaman gecirmeyi hem de musabakalar takip ederken para kazanmay saglamaktadr.

Canl Bahis Nasl Oynanr?

Bahislerinizi guvenilir sitelerden gerceklestirdiginiz zaman herhangi bir sekilde para cekme de sorun yasamazsnz. Guvenilir bahis siteleri tespit edip sonrasnda da uyelik islemlerini tamamlamanz gerekmektedir. Belirlenen uyelik sartlarn yerine getirip hesabnza da paray aktardktan sonra bahis islemlerini sorunsuz yapabilirsiniz. Peki, canl bahis nasl oynanr?

Oncelikle bahis konusunda mutlaka dogru site arastrmas yapmalsnz. Yapacagnz arastrma neticesinde buldugunuz site uzerinden canl bahisislemlerini gerceklestirebilirsiniz. Bunun icin uye olup, hesaba para atp, canl bahis bolumune girmelisiniz. Sonrasnda dahil olmak istediginiz musabakann saatini ogrenip, gerekli analizleri yapmalsnz. Tahminlerinizi belirledikten sonra karsnza ckacak olan bahis sayfasndan istediginiz hamleyi yapmalsnz. Bahis tutarn belirledikten sonra musabaka baslayacaktr.

Canl bahis diger normal bahis esaslarna gore farkllklar icermektedir. Bunlardan en onemlisi musabakann gidisatna gore islem yapabilir olmaktr.Ayrca musabakann 2. Yarsna gore hamle yapp ayr bir bahisin soz konusu olmas da ciddi avantajdr. Dogru hamle ile sizde istediginiz bahisi yapp kazanc elde edebilirsiniz. Nitekim canl olarak yapacagnz bahis icin mac oncesi raporlara gore hareket etmek onemlidir. Cunku takmlarn durumlarn analiz etmek tahmin gucunu arttracaktr. Misal tamnn en iyi oyuncusu sakat ya da kart cezals ise takmn performansnda dusus yasanacaktr. Buna ek olarak takmn deplasman performans ile evinde ki performans ayr olacaktr. Burada da takmn musabakay nerede yaptgna bakmak gerekir. Bu ayrntlar da iyice analiz ettikten sonra bahsinizi yapp kazanmann keyfini yasayabilirsiniz.

Canl Bahis Siteleri

Son derece yuksek getiriye sahip bahis sektoru uzun zamandr faaliyet gostermektedir. Cok ciddi rakamlarn soz konusu oldugu bu sektor zamanla sanal ortamlara donusmustur. Elbette guvenli ve bir o kadar da avantajl olan bu siteler cok yonlu frsatlar sunmaktadrlar. Canl iddaa siteleri gerek yeni uyelere gerekse de hali hazrdaki uyelerine bolca bonus frsatlar vermektedir. Yatracagnz tutara gore belirlenen bonuslar site icerisinde rahat hareket etmenizi de saglayacaktr.

Canl bahis sitelerini kullanmadan once mutlaka guvenli olup olmadgna goz atmalsnz. Zira baz kullanclar guvenli olmayan sitelerden yaptklar islemlerden dolay magdur olmaktadrlar. Nitekim guvenli ve sorunsuz hizmet sunan yurt ds site tercih etmek en dogru secenektir. Sektorde uzun yllar faaliyet gosteren siteleri tercih edebilirsiniz. Bu alanda yer alan yabanc siteler musteri memnuniyetine onem vermektedir. Oncelik site kullanclarn sorunsuz sekilde bahislerini yapabilir olmasn saglamaktr. Bahis sitelerinde amac hem daha fazla kullancya hizmet vermek hem de sektorde emin admlarla ilerlemek onceliklidir. Dogru site tercihi ile sizde canl bahislerinizi sorun yasamadan gerceklestirebilirsiniz. Sizler icin hazrlams oldugumuz canl bahis siteleri listesi su sekildedir;

Mobilbahis Tempobet Bets10 Bahigo 1xbahis Betboo Youwin Superbahis

Sralams oldugumuz bu siteler sektorde basarl islere imza atms sitelerdedir. Canl bahis konusunda beklentileri karslayacak olan bu siteler sizlere kolaylk sunmaktadrlar. Bol bonuslu secenekle de sizlere farkl bahis yonlerini sunacaklardr. Sistemsel etki icerisinde her zaman etkin sonuc alabilmek icin surekli olarak faaliyet icerisindedirler.

Canl Bahis Taktikleri

Bahis sektorunun en fazla dikkat edilmesi gereken hususu dogru taktik ve dogru tahmindir. Elbette dogru tahmini yapabilmek icin analizi cok iyi yapmak gerekir. Canl bahis taktikleri arasnda ilk sra analiz gelmektedir. Analiz yapamadgnz zaman basarl tahminlerde bulunmanz pek de mumkun degildir. Cunku bahiste onemli olan konu musabakann analizini cok iyi yaplmas gerektigidir. Canl bahisin ozelliklerini iyi bilmek ve nasl bir hamle yapacagnz bilmek gerekir. Ozellikle riskli maclarda yaplacak degerlendirmeler cok daha onemlidir.

Canl bahis yapacaklarn takip edecegi degerler takmlarn durumlar ile alakal olmaldr. Performans uzerine kurulu bahis sisteminde takm degerlendirmesine iyi bakmak gerekir. Iki takmn son 5 macta nasl bir sonuc ortaya koyduguna bakarak hareket etmek onemlidir. Ayrca hangi takm evinde daha iyi performans sergiliyor diye de ayrca bakmak gerekir.

Analizlerle alakal puan durumlarna da goz atmak cok onemlidir. Puan degerlendirmesinde oncelikle takmlarn ihtiyaclar ile dogru orantl hareket etmek gerekir. Cunku olusturulan performans takmn da durumunu ortaya koymaktadr. Nitekim istenilen sonucu elde edebilmek icin tum ayrntlar bilmek gerekir. Takm ici duzenden tutunda da takmn son durumuna kadar her ayrnt onemlidir. Iki takmn birbirleri arasnda ki sonuclar da incelemek gerekir. Burada dikkat edilecek detaylarn basnda maclarda kac gol oldugu ve gollerin hangi dakikalarda atldgdr. Cekismeli gecen musabakalarda bazen goller ilk yarda daha fazla olurken baz maclarda da ikinci yarda daha cok gol olmustur. Iki takm arasnda ki maclarda gollerin cogunlugu ilk yarda geliyorsa buna gore bahis yapabilirsiniz.

Canl Bahis Siteleri Bonuslar ve Kampanyalar

Bahis yapanlar veya yapmay dusununler sitelerin sunmus olduklar frsatlar merak etmektedirler. Cunku siteler daha fazla kullancya erismek icin her donem kampanyalar duzenleyerek kullanc odakl hamleler yapmaktadrlar. Canl bahis bonuslar ve kampanyalar oldukca populer olup, siteler bu konuda adeta birbirleri ile yarsmaktadrlar. Birbirinden farkl ozelliklere sahip olan kampanyalar size frsatlar sunmaktadr. Daha cok kazanma ihtimalinizi arttran bu bonuslar daha cesur olmanza da dogrudan etki edecektir. Nitekim bonuslar sitelerin cekiciligini ve avantajlarn arttrmaktadr. En cok kazandran canl bahis siteleri bedava bonuslar ve kampanyalar icin http://www.milano2018.com/canli-bahis-siteleri-2022/ linkinden yardm alabilirsiniz.

Hos geldin bonusu ile baslayan ve sonrasnda para yatrdkca bonus veren cok sayda site bulunmaktadr. Canl bahis bonusu veren siteler yeni uyelere sunduklar frsatlar farkl kampanyalarla mevcut uyelerine de sunmaktadrlar. Hali hazrda siteyi kullananlarn da bonus frsatlarndan yararlanmalar icin donemsel kampanyalar olusturmaktadrlar. Boylece baska sitelere gidisler olmayacag gibi site de daha keyifli zaman gecirmek mumkun klnmaktadr. Bu tur eklentiler yapan sitelerde musteri memnuniyeti daha fazladr.

Bahis siteleri ozellik ve uygulama bakmndan farkllklar bunyelerinde bulundurmaktadrlar. Verilen bonuslarn olusturulmas ve kullanclar aktarlmasnda yatrlan para miktarlar belirleyici olmaktadr. 1.000 TL yatran bir kullanc yuzde 20 bonus frsat olan bir kampanyadan 200 TL bonus kazanabilmektedir. Yatracag tutar 10.000 TL oldugunda bu bonustutar 2.000 TL olabilmektedir. Gerceklesen ve uygulanan esaslar tamamen donemsel olarak yaplan kampanyalarla alakaldr. Iyi Canl bahis siteleri bonuslar ve kampanyalar icin sitelerin vermis oldugu oranlar takip edebilirsiniz.

Canl Bahis Siteleri Para Yatrma

Online Canl bahis yapacaklarn merak ettigi konulardan bir digeri de para yatrma islemleridir. Oldukca onemli olan bu konuda hata yapmamak cok onemlidir. Canl bahis sitelerine para yatrma islemi sanlann aksine son derece basittir. Oldukca basit ve uygulama esas dogru etki olusturan bu yapda sizde islemi rahatca tamamlayabilirsiniz. Para yatrma konusunda su yolu izleyebilirsiniz.

Guvendiginiz ve herhangi bir sekilde aklnzda soru isareti kalmayan bahis sitesine uye olmanz gerekmektedir. Uyelik islemini sorunsuz sekilde tamamladktan sonra para yatrma islemine gecebilirsiniz.

Kullanacagnz siteye uye olduktan sonra karsnza kullanc ad ve sifresini gireceginiz yer gelecektir. Buraya giris yaptktan sonra site icerisine islemlere devam edebilirsiniz.

Sitede yer alan para yatrma sekmesine tklayp sonrasnda karsnza gelen sayfay inceleyebilirsiniz. Para yatrma bolumunde yer alan ksma ne kadar para yatracagnz yazp devam tusuna basmalsnz.

Yatrmak istediginiz tutar girip sonrasnda da devam tusuna bastktan sonra karsnza kart bilgilerinizi gireceginiz sayfa gelecektir. Kredi kart kullanarak para gondermek isteyenlerin tercih ettigi bu sayfa tum bilgiler girilip islem onaylanmaldr.

Canl bahis sitelerine para yatrma islemini gerceklestirmek icin hesaba havale secenegini de kullanabilirsiniz. Site icerisinde musteri hizmetleri ile iletisime gecerek banka hesap numaralarn ogrenebilirsiniz. Belirtilen IBAN numarasna istediginiz tutar havale edebilirsiniz. Havale ederken acklama ksmna yazlacak bilgilere dikkat etmelisiniz.

Kredi kart veya banka havalesi ile gerceklesen para yatrma islemi sonucunda site hesabnzdan bakiyenize bakabilirsiniz. Bakiyenize gore dilediginiz sekilde bahislerinizi gerceklestirebilirsiniz.

Canl Bahis Siteleri Para Cekme

Canl bahiste dogru hamleler ve dogru tahminler sonucunda kazandgnz bedeli geri almak isteyebilirsiniz. Kazanclarnz istediginiz banka hesabnza cekebilmek icin uymanz gereken kurallar soz konusudur. Oncelikle bahis sitelerinden para cekebilmeniz icin uye olurken dogru bilgi paylasmnda bulunmanz gerektigidir. Cunku canl bahis sitelerinden para cekme islemi icin kullanc hesab ile talep edilen banka hesap bilgilerinin ortusmesi gerekir. Yani uye olurken verilen bilgi ile banka hesab kime ait ise o bilgiler ayn olmaldr. Bu uygulama sitenin hem kullancsn hem de kendisini guvene alma politikasdr. Ayrca frsatclarn onune gecerek yeni bir uye olusumunun da onune gecmek amac gutmektedir. Uye olan kisi farkl para cekilme talebi verilen hesap farkl oldugunda para cekme islemi gerceklesmeyecektir.

Bahisleriniz sonucunda kazanc elde edebilir ve bu kazancnz da hakknz olarak almak isteyebilirsiniz. Burada son derece basit uygulama soz konusu olurken siteler aras farkl gorunumler soz konusu olabilir. Fakat yine de tum sitelerde uyenin site icerisinde para cekme bolumune girmesi yeterlidir. Burada cekilecek olan tutarn belirlenmesi ve hesap numarasnn girilmesi ile birlikte islem onay gerekecektir. Para cekme taleplerinde sizden gerekli bilgiler istenmekte ve havale islemi istenilen bilgiler esliginde yurutulmektedir. Dogru bilgi paylasmak sorunsuz para cekebilmeniz en onemli kuraldr. Istenilen bilgiler girildikten sonra site sorumlular gerekli kontrolleri yapp herhangi bir sorun yoksa ksa surede hesabnza gerekli paray aktaracaklardr.

Canl Bahis Sitelerinden Para Cekmek Icin Istenen Belgeler

Bahis sitelerine uye olduktan sonra baz kullanclar para cekme taleplerinin karslanmadg konusunda sikayetlerde bulunmuslardr. Bu sikayetlersektorde uzun zamandr bulunan guvenilir bahis siteleri de yer almaktadr. Fakat sikayetlerin dayanaklarna bakldgnda ise islerin tamamen farkl oldugu gorulmektedir. Yasanan bu durum kullanclarn hatal bilgi girmesi ve uyelik bilgileri ile banka bilgilerinin uyusmamas ile dogru orantldr. Birde canl bahis para cekmek icin istenen belgeler eksik ya da hatal olarak sunulmus olabilir. Ortaya ckan karsklar neticesinde para cekme talebinde bulunan kisi istedigini alamadg icin sikayetci olmaktadr. Oysa ki istenilen bilgiler dogru ve istenilen evraklar eksiksiz sunulsa para cekme islemi sorunsuz olacak.

Sitelerin para cekme konusunda dikkatli hareket etmesi hilelerin ve illegal faaliyetlerin onune gecmek adnadr. Cunku baz kullanclar farkl bilgiler vererek ikinci hesap acabilmektedirler. Bazen de bilincsizce hatal bilgi girilebilmektedir. Hatal islemlerin cozumu konusunda islem yaptgnz sitenin musteri temsilcileri ile gorusebilirsiniz. Talepleriniz dogrultusunda para cekme islemlerinde ki sorunlar giderilecektir. Canl bahis para cekmek icin istenen belgeler listesi su sekildedir;

Kullanc bilgileri ile banka bilgilerini karslastrmak icin kimlik fotokopisi

Banka hesap bilgileri

Ikametgah ve kisiye ait herhangi bir fatura.

Kacak Iddaa

Turkiyede dogrudan bahis yapmak icin resmi kanallar kullanlabilmektedir. Fakat tercih edilen ve oran olarak cok daha fazla frsatlar sunan kacar iddaasiteleri bulunmaktadr. Bu siteler kanunlara aykr sekilde yaplmakta olup, yasal bir dayanag yoktur. Elbette bu sitelerin kurulus merkezi Turkiye olmayp, ds ulkelerdedir ve faaliyetler belirlenen siteler uzerinden yaplmaktadr. Kacak Iddaa oldukca riskli olup, cok dikkatli olunmas gerekir.

Kacak Bahis

Kanunlar cercevesinde istediginiz gibi bahis yapamayabilirsiniz. Bahis yapabilmek icin ya kanuni olarak sorun olmayan ulke dsnda ki kumarhanelere gitmeniz veya kacak bahis sitelerinden islem yapabilirsiniz. Zira bu durum tehlikeli olsa da cok sayda site guvenli sekilde bu alanda hizmet vermektedir. Kacak bahiste oldukca fazla secenek bulunurken yuksek oranda kazanc sunuyor olmas da ragbeti arttryor.

Illegal Bahis

Bahisin bircok alanda yasak oldugu Turkiyede bu alanda cok sayda yabanc merkezli siteler hizmet vermektedir. Illegal bahis sektorunde faaliyet gosteren siteler guvenli hizmet anlays ile kullanclarna frsatlar sunmaktadr. Yurt ds merkezli bu siteler sorunsuz sekilde hizmetlerini surdururken bulunduklar ulkelerde kanunlara uygun sekildedir. Elbette faaliyet noktasnda bulunduklar ulkelerde sorun teskil etmese de Turkiyede faaliyet gostermeleri kanunin yasaklanmstr.

Yasads Bahis

Gerek olusturulan etkenler gerekse de ortaya konulan riskler yasads bahis de oldukca tehlikelidir. Kanunlarn mudahil olduklar bu alanlar da hem kullanclar hem de populer bahis yaptranlar tum riskleri goze almaktadrlar. Fakat yasaklardan uzak sekilde guvenli hizmet sunan siteler de bulunmaktadr. Takipler neticesinde kapatlan sitelerin muhakkak alternatifleri kurularak yollarna devam etmektedirler.

Canl Iddaa Siteleri Nelerdir?

Dunya genelinde kabul gormus cok sayda guvenli hizmet veren populer bahis siteleri bulunmaktadr. Elbette bu siteler dunyann bircok ulkesinde faaliyet gosterse de Turkiyede yasaktr. Sektorde yer alan cok sayda legal iddaa siteleri bulunmaktadr. Herhangi bir kanunsuzlugun olmadg bu sitelerden hzl ve guvenli islem yaplabilmektedir. Tabi bu sitelerde uygulanan oranlar yasal olmayan sitelere gore daha dusuktur. Illegal sitelerin tercih edilme sebeplerinin en onemli etkeni de olusturulan oranlardr. Peki, Iddaa siteleri nelerdir? Faaliyetleri ve uygulama esaslar nelerdir?

Turkiyede faaliyet gosteren yasal iddaa siteleri listesi su sekildedir;

Iddaa

Bilyoner

Tuttur

Birebin

Oley

Nesine

Misli

Iddaa

2004 ylnda hizmet vermeye baslayan Iddaa Spor toto tarafndan kurulmus olup, ilk etapta bayilik seklinde calsmaya baslamstr. Elbette zamanla gelisen teknolojiye ayak uydurarak internet uzerinde de populer bahis severlerin hizmetine sunulmustur. Kuruldugu donemde devletin resmi kurumu olarak faaliyet gosterirken gelinen yeni donemde ozellestirilmistir.

Bilyoner

Turkiyede faaliyetine 2006 ylnda baslayan Bilyoner ilk ozel yasal bahis sitesi olma ozelligine sahiptir. Guvenilir bahis siteleri Turkiyede bunlardr. Ksa surede populer olan site halen faaliyetlerini sorunsuz sekilde surdurmektedir.

Tuttur

Ksa surede adndan bahsettirmeyi basaran Tuttur 2009 ylnda faaliyetlere baslamstr. Guvenilir bahis siteleri arasnda yerini almstr. Gunumuze dek bircok alanda populer bahis yapanlara frsatlar sunarken avantajlar ile de begeni toplamstr.

Birebin

Kullanc odakl calsmalar surdurse de 2011 ylnda sektore giren Birebindiger sitelere gore daha az ragbet gormektedir. Bahis oynamak ise bu sitede oldukca kolaydr. Elbette farkl yaklasmlara sahip olmasndan dolay ilerleyen sureclerde adndan sklkla bahsettirecek gibi gorunuyor.

Oley

2009 ylnda Dogus yayn gruplarnn istiraki olarak kurulmus olup yasal olarak herhangi bir sorunu olmayan sitelerdendir. Bahis siteleri arasnda hzl cks yapms bir sitedir. Oley yapms oldugu yenilikler ile kullanclarn da dikkatini ksa surede cekmeyi basarmstr.

Nesine

Birbirini takip eden surecte Nesine de yine 2006 ylnda hizmet vermeye baslamstr. Yasal bahis siteleri arasnda yerini almay basaran firma ksa surede sevilen ve ragbet goren bir site olmustur.

Misli

2009 ylnda sektore cok hzl giris yapan Misli cok sayda reklam filmi ile on plana ckmay basarmstr. Internet uzerinden hem yasal hem de sorunsuz hizmet veren bahis sitelerinden bir tanesi olmustur.

Canl Bahis Siteleri Kayt ve Uyelik Islemleri

Her zaman populerligini koruyan ve surekli gelisim gosteren canl bahis gun gectikce daha da gucleniyor. Bahis oynamak icin ise sitelere uye olunmas gerekir. Yuksek getirisi ve begeni toplayan faaliyetleri ile cok sayda site bu alanda faaliyet gostermektedir. Elbette sorunsuz sekilde uye olmanz ve faaliyetler gostermeniz de oldukca kolaydr. Canl bahis siteleri kayt ve uyelik islemleri dakikalar icerisinde gerceklestirilecek yapya sahiptir.

Uye olacagnz siteyi belirledikten sonra siteye girmeniz gerekmektedir. Girdiginiz sitenin ana sayfasnda uye ol ya da kayt ol bolumu bulunacaktr. Siteler arasnda degiskenlik gosteren bu alanda temel unsurlar bulunmaktadr. Elbette farkllklar olsa da temelinde benzer bilgiler uye olmak isteyen kisilerden talep edilmektedir.

Uye ol bolumune tkladktan sonra karsnza uyelik bilgi formu ckacaktr. Bu formda sizin kim oldugunuzu ogrenmek ve sitenin guvenligini saglamak adna islemler yaplmaktadr. Uyelik formunda yer alan ad soyad bolumunu eksiksiz ve dogru sekilde doldurmalsnz. Sizden bu formda istenen bilgilerin tamamn girmeniz istenecektir. Istenen bilgiler mutlaka dogru ve eksiksiz sekilde olmaldr. Eksik veya hatal bilgi uyelik islemlerinde sorun teskil edebilir. Yine de yanls bilgi girisine ragmen uyelik islemleri tamamlanabilir. Fakat boyle bir yol izleyenler sonrasnda buyuk skntlarla karslasabilirler. Bu skntlarn basnda da para cekme islemlerinde yasanan sorunlardr.

Uyelik islemleri dikkatli ve ozenle doldurulmas gereken yapdadr. Canl bahis siteleri kayt ve uyelik islemleri gerceklestirilirken verilen bilgiler site yonetimi tarafndan muhafaza edilmektedir. Herhangi bir sekilde 3. Sahslarla paylaslmas gibi bir durum soz konusu degildir. Bu faaliyetleri surduren sitelerin guven unsurlar arasnda bu nokta onceliklidir.

Bahis sitelerine uye olurken hatal bilgi paylasmnda bulunmak size faydadan cok zarar verecektir. Diyelim ki bilgileri hatal girdiniz ve uyelik onayland. Uyelik tamamlandktan sonra siteye para yatrdnz ve kazanc elde ettiniz. Kazancnz sonrasnda hesabnza almak istediginizde karsnza banka bilgileri bolumu gelecektir. Para cekme talebi gerceklestikten sonra site uyelik bilgileri ile banka hesap bilgileri ortusmez ise paranz alamazsnz. Boyle bir durumla karslasmamak adna bu hususa ayrca dikkat etmelisiniz.
Hello Nigeria! is a fresh initiative that is committed to bringing Nigerians and friends of Nigeria together in a dynamic celebration of its rich culture.

WASHINGTON, DC, September 16, 2016 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Entergrate, LLC presents Hello Nigeria, a multi-faceted series anchored by Nigeria's Independence Day, taking place from Thursday September 29th--Sunday October 2nd 2016. The weekend consists of five (5) events designed to celebrate Nigerian people, spark meaningful conversation, and highlight the many contributions of Nigerian culture in order to reimagine the perception of Nigeria and foster interest in the future of the country.



Event Lineup:



Thursday September 29th, 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.--Hello Nigeria presents: A Look Forward, an evening of insightful discussion regarding Nigeria's current socioeconomic environment highlighting opportunities for entrepreneurs and innovators held at the Eighteenth Street Lounge in Washington, DC.



Friday September 30th, 10 p.m. to 3 a.m.--The weekend festivities kick off at The 7th annual official Lagos Party at Bliss Nightclub presented by *FAME *PARTY ADDICTS *NANA*ABSL *FORMAL OR TRADITIONAL ELEGANT ATTIRE PREFERRED



Saturday October 1st, 10 p.m. to close--Hello Nigeria presents: Since 1960!, the official Green Carpet Ball held at the Carnegie Library in Washington, DC. *BLACK TIE OR TRADITIONAL ELEGANT ATTIRE PREFERRED



Sunday October 2nd, All day--A digital gathering for Nigerians facilitated by Hello Nigeria in association with various religious institutions inviting people from around the world to use this opportunity to affirm their faith, reminisce on growing up Nigerian, and express sentiments of peace, prosperity, and positivity for Nigeria.



Sunday October 2nd, 4:30 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.--The official Hello Nigeria Comedy show at the Bowie Center for the Performing Arts featuring the comedy of Kanmi, E-Baby, Prof. B with hilarious veterans Seyi Brown and JEDI to close out the celebratory weekend.



About Entergrate: Entergrate is comprised of five founding members based in the greater DC metro area. Olumide Akintan Jr. is a project manager and structural engineer, Randall Olade is a software developer and entrepreneur, Emmanuel Ogunsalu is a financial consultant, Jacob Korede works with at-risk youth, and Tobore Sefia is a broadcast operator and social innovator. Entergrate LLC was formed in 2016 with the purpose of creating opportunities for advancement and innovation in Africa.



# # #
Foto: TASR - Michal Svitok Foto: TASR - Michal Svitok

Bratislava, September 16 (TASR) - High-quality projects with delays are better than hasty ones with imperfections, said European Commissioner for Regional Policy Corina Cretu in connection with the delay in completing the reconstruction of Bratislava's Old Bridge from European funds.Accompanied by Bratislava mayor Ivo Nesrovnal, Cretu travelled by tram across the newly reconstructed bridge and then also walked along it. "I think that you managed to complete a very sound project," she said during her inspection. She praised the new trams, stating that they can compete with the ones in Strasbourg in terms of design."Infrastructure is a very demanding matter. It takes time, and can't be built overnight. The most important thing is to have a high-quality project and to use the finances in a wise manner," said Cretu, adding that the delay that occurred in the case of the Old Bridge reconstruction is usual in new EU-member states.The reconstruction of the Old Bridge and construction of a tram line over the Danube River to the borough of Petrzalka cost 69 million. Cretu views the Old Bridge as important not only for the 120,000 residents of Petrzalka; she also sees a kind of symbolism regarding the unification of East and West. "While we see many differences and divisions within the European Union, it's very important to point to important symbolic moments these days, as it shows us that we can be united and should be united," stressed Cretu.Nesrovnal thanked Cretu to her personal contribution towards the implementation of the transport project. "We launched tram transport for Petrzalka residents for the first time in 55 years. We view this as a big joint success. It's evidence of the fact that very good things can be done in Bratislava if you do them with heart, energy and with the support of good partners," he said.The European Union provided 85 percent of the finances for the project, while the state covered 10 percent and the city 5 percent. The city had to complete the project by the end of 2015 in order to obtain European funds for it. The reconstruction work on the Old Bridge was completed in mid-December 2015. The bridge was opened to pedestrians and cyclists in May, while the tram service across the bridge to Petrzalka was launched in July.
Peter Mihok. Foto: TASR/Michal Svitok Foto: TASR/Michal Svitok

Zdroj: Teraz.sk , spravodajsky portal tlacovej agentury TASR

Bratislava, September 16 (TASR)  There's a need to return to the EU's original goals, which even after 60 years are still up to date and important for dealing with the prospects of the EU, said Slovak Trade and Industry Chamber (SOPK) director Peter Mihok on Friday.The security of and guarantees for Europe's citizens are being viewed in a ever more sensitive manner than a few years ago. The migration crisis has played a significant role in this. However, it has to be said that many EU-member states have handled the crisis better than the EU itself so far.Frontex, the European Agency for the Management of Operational Cooperation at the External Borders, which was set up in 2004, hasn't even been able to protect the EU's territorial waters in the Mediterranean Sea so far, said Mihok. The EU must tackle problems with smugglers and resolve illegal breaches of the Schengen area.A Europe without conflict and wars is the main factor when it comes to the security of all EU citizens. The main precondition for this is EU-wide cooperation and mutual respect for all players. The EU can't be economically and financially successful if its members don't cooperate with each other, stressed Mihok.stressed Mihok.In the first four decades of the EU project people thought that European integration was a model solution for sustainable development and growth in the quality of life. However, the coming of a new century showed that this needn't be the case in the long term. EU-member states weren't able to keep up with the USA. At the same time it was as though they were unsettled by the changes in China, India, South East Asia and on the Arabian peninsula. The first signs of Europeans living above their means came to light as did a poor structure of education unsuitable for the needs of the labour market.added Mihok.
Bohuslav Sobotka Foto: TASR/AP Foto: TASR/AP

Zdroj: Teraz.sk , spravodajsky portal tlacovej agentury TASR

Bratislava, September 16 (TASR) - The Visegrad Four (V4) countries (the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia) have prepared a joint statement in support of bolstering EU security, providing tighter control of external borders and preserving the Union's Cohesion Policy, the free market and the Schengen zone, said Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka after arriving for the informal EU summit at Bratislava Castle on Friday.said Sobotka.The Czech prime minister isn't worried that the conclusions of the summit might be inadequate due to differences of opinion.he stressed.he added.
J. Hoberman at Artforum:

WHAT EXACTLY IS The Town Hall Affair, an hour-long performance piece the Wooster Group staged this past May as a work-in-progress at the Performing Garage in SoHo? Is it a reconstruction of Chris Hegedus and D. A. Pennebakers 1979 feature Town Bloody Hall, which documented the Dialogue on Womens Liberation presented April 30, 1971, at New Yorks Town Hall by the Theatre for Ideas? Is it a deconstruction? A hall of mirrors? A stroll down memory lane?

Multiple iterations of a narrative (often jumping from medium to medium) tend toward myth. Such has been made of that archetype-populated April evening when Norman Mailer took the stage to defend his masculinist manifesto The Prisoner of Sex, which had just appeared in the March issue of Harpers Magazine, before a panel of four women (three of whom would publish accounts of the event) as well as a packed house.

Originally, Mailer had wanted to debate Kate Millett, author of the literary polemic Sexual Politics (1970) and bete noire of Mailers countercritique of feminism. Millett refused and so Mailer made do with the Australian feminist Germaine Greer, then on a book tour promoting her best-selling feminist analysis The Female Eunuch (1970). The panel was rounded out with Jacqueline Ceballos, president of the New York chapter of now; Village Voice dance critic Jill Johnston, recently out as a lesbian; and New York intellectual dowager Diana Trilling.

more here.
Vivian and Dave said "I do" in the middle of a perfect San Francisco day.







The couple, who met in Taiwan at Dave's wine event, knew that San Francisco was the perfect city to celebrate their love. The morning started with a cable car ride up to Twin Peaks, before the two tied the knot in a beautiful ceremony beneath the towering Stern Grove redwoods. Local foods were on full display: party favors included locally-grown apple butter, dessert was provided by b. patisserie, and wine came courtesy of the groom's own production.









Photography:Jerry Yoon Photographers

Cake:b. patisserie

Dress:Badgley Mischka

Shoes:Betsey Johnson

Equipment Rentals: Classic Party Rentals

Music:Corelli Strings and Viento Band

Catering:Elaine Bell Catering

Tuxedo: Ermenegildo Zegna

Floral Design:Fig & Twine

Lighting:Got Light.

Hair and Makeup:Makeup by Quis

Event Planner:Mango Muse Events

Videographer: Marmalade Sky Films
The audience for Nick Cave's Soundsuits isn't really the audience. To put it another way, people looking at the artist's tall, bright, faceless garments from the outside are part of the audience. But another important audience member is the one wearing a Soundsuit: the person inside.





Although visitors to the new exhibition can't try on the suits, seeing them in person is just as good and not quite as tricky. At the two-year-old Anderson Collection museum at Stanford, the just-opened Nick Cave exhibit features seven Soundsuits and two video installations in the first-floor galleries, as well as one suit that has invaded the permanent collection of abstract-expressionist-era work upstairs.





For those new to Cave's projects, the suits up close are surprising; they seem to ask questions and patiently wait for the viewer to answer. What kind of movements would you make if no one could see you? From the interior of the suits come the sounds that give the figures their collective name. How would you react if you could hear these singular noises, the kind only made by thousands of hand-stitched plastic buttons and a food-wide swirl of copper wire? How about the sound of a metal-flower collection with acrylic-afghan underskirts?





Nick Cave, Soundsuit, 2011. Mixed media including beaded baskets, pipe cleaners, bugle beads, upholstery, metal, and mannequin. (Photo by James Prinz Photography. Courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery New York)

The artist's Soundsuit project was initially a response to "feeling devalued, less than, dismissed" as an African-American man at the time of the acquittal of the Los Angeles Police officers who had, as the whole world saw on video, beaten Rodney King. Cave's first Soundsuit was a kind of safe haven, fully concealing the identity of the wearer at a time when the artist felt profoundly unsafe. The suits still hide, and have the potential to protect, the person inside one of these intricate pieces made from dismissed or cast-off objects such as plastic toys, pipe cleaners, and varicolored faux-fur. But over the years, Cave's project has expanded; it also now focuses on the inspiration of movement, dance, and expression based on what's heard from inside. An Alvin-Ailey-trained dancer, Cave often performs in the Soundsuits alone or with friends and collaborators, as shown in the exhibit's videos, and the suits in motion are riveting. Who's in there?





Nick Cave, Soundsuit, 2011. Mixed media including beaded baskets, pipe cleaners, bugle beads, upholstery, metal, and mannequin. (Photo by James Prinz Photography. Courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York)

Although Cave's work is rooted in response to painfully serious realities, it also shouts with a certain kind of silly joybright colors and absurdism dominate, and there are sock monkeys. The Anderson's show subtly emphasizes the accessibility of Cave's creations to children, with a decorate-your-own Soundsuit shape wall, as well as a "Family Pop-Up: Make Your Own Soundsuit" event on Oct. 15.





Whoever the audience members may be for Nick Cave, after listening to the questions, scrutinizing each suit's custom stockings, and considering the relationship of hiding-place to self-expression, all may come away with a better idea of how to listen to the person inside.





// Runs Sept. 14, 2016Aug. 14, 2017, 314 Lomita Dr. (Palo Alto), anderson.stanford.edu
She's too modest to say so, but we're not: Defne (pronounced like Daphne) Crowe is one cool chick. The Vespa-riding 30-something with a nose for what's next and a closet full of Freda Salvadors is the ideal ambassador for San Francisco's hippest businesses.

Defne Crowe's home vibe mirrors her cool-girl sartorial styleeasy, artistic, and open to possibilities. (Photography by Guru Khalsa)

As founder of the nearly five-year-old Mission-based boutique communications agency Made PR , Crowe, in her words, focuses on "Bay Area businesses that make things." What she doesn't say is that she seems to attract (or perhaps even select) clients with a certain look and cachet: Made's lean yet mighty roster of core clients reads like a who's who of Bay Area It brands: Timbuk2, Blue Bottle Coffee, Goorin Bros. and Three Twins Ice Cream.







Regulars in the SF editorial world have known Defne since the early days; she's one of those likable real girls with a ready smile (and always an enviable pair of shades) who we like to cheer for as we watch her star rise. This past year has been a particularly stellar one for her: She got married (congrats!); bought a "fixer-upper" in Guerneville and invited us all to stay; expanded her team at Made to include five full-timers; scored the Campari account (cheers!); and realized a professional dreamto work with the Detroit-based brand Shinola, upon its entree into the Bay Area.





"I grew up in Michigan, so being able to work with Shinola on its two Bay Area openings (in SF's Jackson Square and Palo Alto) was truly an amazing experience, and an honor," she says.





But having lived in SF for 12 years, it's clear that Crowe's heart is here, and that she herself is the target of her clients' affection. "The common thread among [Made PR's] brands is a certain lifestyle," she explains. "We're talking to discerning people who value quality and craftsmanshippeople who drink Blue Bottle, enjoy a Negroni, and wear Shinola watches and A.P.C. jeans." (ICYMI, Made PR handled the recent opening party for A.P.C.'s new Jackson Square store.)









When it comes to her personal style, Crowe's a "classics with a fun twist" kind of girl. "My go-to outfit consists of high-waisted jeans and a black bodysuit. I change things up with interesting accessories, and pair with heels, Vans, or my Everlane slip-ons." Another key part of her look? Piling her long, lovely waves into a signature messy topknot, known around her office as the "Def-a-do." The fashion and vintage lover also values comfort, and effortless-chic seems to come to her, well, effortlessly.









Shameless Product Placement

"Blue Bottle's single-origin drip; Timbuk2's Femme satchel backpack; Three Twins' Lemon Cookie ice cream; Goorin Bros.' black fedora."





Dream Client

"Heath Ceramics"





Out-of-Towners Tour

"I've got this one down: We walk over to Blue Bottle inside Heath Ceramics, then head to the top of Bernal, and then back to the Mission for lunch at Wise Sons deli."





SF Shopping Spree

"Acrimony, No. 3, Freda Salvador, The Podolls, Afterlife, and Painted Bird."





Home Essential

"This beautiful bear painting by local artist Michael McConnell. I saw it inside the Stable Cafe and treated myself after I won a big client. It's a picture of a bear tied to a stick, and, whenever I look at it, it reminds me not to be tied down to one thing."





Eats + Drinks

"My absolute favorite restaurant is Rich Table, and I'm obsessed with Izakaya Rintaro. Trick Dog for cocktails, and 20 Spot for wine."





Great Escape

"Our Guerneville homewhere I get to do nothing."




Many of Stone's most memorable films have been about real people  including Nixon, W., JFK and The People vs. Larry Flynt. Most of them succeeded because, no matter how Stone felt personally about the main subjects, he still painted intricately rounded portraits of them. Layer by layer, he deconstructed their personalities to help us understand how they ended up the way they did.

Here, oddly, Stone has produced a blandly one-dimensional protagonist. From Frame 1, as we witness him training for Special Forces duty despite two broken legs, Snowden is the very picture of an all-American hero. He is played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt, an excellent actor (breathtaking in Don Jon) who here is asked to do little more than posture bravely in the face of adversity, like Superman with a pocket protector.

Transferring from Special Forces to military intelligence, Snowden quickly discovers that the U.S. government, public assurances to the contrary, is collecting phone and computer data on virtually all its citizens  a violation of the NSA charter, which allows only foreign intelligence-gathering. More unnerving still, he learns, the military has developed software so advanced that just a few well-chosen search terms can tweeze out the most intimate details of anyone's life.

Snowden, a brilliant programmer, engages in this sifting as long as his conscience will allow. But when he realizes that one of his own programs is being used for the monitoring, he decides enough is enough: He downloads incriminating documents onto a tiny memory stick, hides it inside his ever-present Rubik's Cube and  in the film's tensest sequence  smuggles it out of the high-security facility where he works, never to be seen again. Snowden then releases the documents to the press, and the rest is (still-unfolding) history.

Stone, to his credit, does not demonize those behind the information-collection programs. He sees a USA so traumatized by the attacks of 9/11, and a military so blindly driven to prevent their recurrence, that ordinary people consent to relinquish their freedoms for security. Characters willing to make that trade-off get ample screen time to state their case  most eloquently, Rhys Ifans as Snowden's CIA boss. These folks even get to reveal their sometimes mixed feelings, which makes them more intriguing than Snowden, who seems not to have a doubting cell in his cerebellum.
Laws crafted by those elected should do most good for most people

columns


Fertoz Investor Conference Call - Tuesday 20 September

Brisbane, Sep 16, 2016 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Organic phosphate supplier Fertoz Ltd ("Fertoz" or "the Company") ( ASX:FTZ ) is pleased to host a conference call to discuss the Company's strategy with investors.



Incoming Chairman Patrick Avery will update investors and take questions on:



- The development of Fertoz's world-class phosphate resource assets



- The Company's sales and marketing progress and targets



- Fertoz's strategy supporting its goal of delivering cash flow and growth by supplying rock phosphate to the fast-growing North American organic farming market



A brief investor presentation will be made available at the time of the call at http://fertoz.com/investors/presentations.html.



Conference call details:



Time: Tuesday 20 September, 10 30am AEST (8 30am AWST)



Conference ID: 8318 2275



Toll-free dial-in numbers:



Australia - 1800 123 296 (toll-free) / +61 2 8038 5221 (toll)

Canada - 1855 5616 766

US - 1855 293 1544

UK - 0808 234 0757

NZ - 0800 452 782

Singapore - 800 616 2288

Hong Kong - 800 908 865

Japan - 0120 477 087

China - 8008 702 411

India - 1800 3010 6141



For countries not listed, the Australian participant toll number can be used.



To ask a question, participants will need to dial "*1" (star, 1) on their telephone keypad.



About Fertoz Ltd





Fertoz (ASX:FTZ) is an Australian-based phosphate exploration and development company with a range of projects in British Columbia, Canada as well as Queensland and the Northern Territory. The Company is focused on becoming a fertiliser producer as quickly as possible, initially focusing on the Canadian/USA markets.

Fertoz plans to develop its exploration assets in Canada in order to identify any potential Direct Shipping Ore (DSO) projects. It intends to seek joint venture partners to assist in funding the exploration projects in Australia.

Phosphate is a commodity necessary for feeding the world, and Fertoz is ready to capitalise on this growing demand.


Invigor's Condat secures $1m agreement with broadcaster

Sydney, Sep 16, 2016 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Leading big data solutions company Invigor Group Limited ( ASX:IVO ) ("Invigor") is pleased to announce its wholly-owned Berlin-based software solutions business, Condat AG, has signed a framework agreement with ZDF, Germany's largest public broadcaster. The contract has an estimated value of $1 million over the next 4 years, and will provide ZDF with a technology solution allowing the broadcaster to shift to a fully digital, file-based distribution platform.



- Agreement signed with ZDF - Germany's largest public broadcaster



- Second major agreement with ZDF following on from $1.5m contract announced last year



- Latest agreement in growing pipeline of major media contracts in preferred stage



- $1 million total contract value expected over four years



- Follows contracts secured with Ericsson in UK and GVL in Germany



This contract is additional to the $1.5m contract announced with ZDF last year.



Condat supports broadcast media outlets to move their operations to an online distribution model. Condat's smart media engine allows broadcasters to edit, assemble, store and playback its programming, which can substantially reduce production and distribution costs.



Invigor's Chairman and CEO, Mr Gary Cohen, said: "The agreement with ZDF is the latest in a growing pipeline of projects with major media providers in Germany and more broadly in Europe. We are pleased with the increasing revenue growth and profitability of Condat, which continues to grow its footprint as a key European supplier of specialist software solutions.



"With the ongoing move amongst leading broadcasters towards digital delivery of their content via internet-connected devices, Condat's smart media engine and accompanying technology solutions are experiencing strong demand. We see data analytics as a key driver behind supporting broadcasters to deliver personalised on-demand content, and this is complementary to Invigor's data driven solutions being offered in the Australian market."



About Invigor Group Ltd





Invigor Group (ASX:IVO) uses its complementary suite of big data products to source, aggregate, analyse and publish content for the benefit of businesses and consumers.

Today its interconnected data sets enable enterprise clients including retailers, brands, shopping centres and government bodies to identify and better understand competitors, consumers, markets and demographics while providing the consumer with the best value-for-money.

Using its current products and a pipeline of additional offerings Invigor will have the ability to provide an end-to-end solution spanning sales, product management, business intelligence, marketing, advertising, content creation and distribution, while monetising each step of the process.
ACAs library of educational tools help members improve their business practices. ACA also holds the most popular industry conferences and offers credentialing for collectors, attorneys, and more. ACAs Training Zone subscription gives agencies access to almost all of our education for one low cost.
The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board imposed sanctions on three audit firms, along with engagement partners at two of the firms, for violating independence requirements while auditing broker-dealer clients.

Two of the firms and two engagement partners admitted to the violations, a first for the PCAOB.

The three firms were Berkow, Schechter & Company LLP of Stamford, Conn., Roth & Company PC of Des Moines, Iowa, and Jackson, Howell & Associates, PLLC of Cordova, Tenn.

In the case of Berkow Schechter, the firm continued to prepare financial statements and accounting records for a broker-dealer auditing client despite PCAOB warnings. The firm will pay a $15,000 civil penalty and cannot accept new broker-dealer audit clients for one year. The firms founder, Neil H. Berkow, who served as engagement partner for the audits, has been censured by the PCAOB and will pay a $5,000 civil penalty. He has also been barred for one year from association with a PCAOB-registered public accounting firm.

Roth & Company maintained and prepared accounting records and financial statements for a broker-dealer audit client. The firm agreed to pay a $20,000 civil penalty and cannot accept new broker-dealer audit clients for one year. Jerome A. Carlson, a shareholder at the firm who was the engagement partner for the audit, has been censured by the PCAOB and will pay a $10,000 civil penalty. He has also been barred for one year from association with a PCAOB-registered public accounting firm.

Before the enforcement actions, both firms and their engagement partners had received PCAOB inspection findings alerting them that their conduct impaired their independence, but they nevertheless continued to prepare their clients' financial statements. Both firms and partners admitted to the facts, findings and violations in the PCAOBs orders. The orders represent the first instances in which the PCAOB has obtained admissions from auditors who violated independence requirements in their audits of broker-dealers.

However, the third firm, Jackson, Howell & Associates, consented to the PCAOB order without admitting or denying the PCAOB's findings and will pay a $2,500 civil penalty. The firm was accused of maintaining and preparing accounting records and preparing financial statements for a broker-dealer audit client.

It remains central to the mission of the PCAOB to promote high quality and fully independent audits of broker-dealers to protect investors, said PCAOB director of enforcement and investigations Claudius B. Modesti in a statement. These disciplinary orders reflect both the importance of maintaining auditor independence and the consequences to firms and individuals who fail to do so.
The Texas Society of CPAs has chosen Jodi Ann LaFreniere Ray, a former executive at Meeting Professionals International, as its incoming executive director and CEO, starting next January.

At Meeting Professionals International, she was vice president of membership and volunteer experience, overseeing governance and community development for more than 90 chapters and clubs in 24 countries. Before joining MPI, Ray was CEO of chambers of commerce in Connecticut, North Carolina and Texas, in charge of membership, government affairs, economic development and finance.

Ray earned a bachelors degree in psychology from Fairfield University, the Institute for Organization Management (IOM) designation in 1998 and the Certified Chamber Executive (CCE) credential in 2007.

I am looking forward to working with the members, volunteers, chapters and staff at the Texas Society of CPAs and to bringing my experience in membership and volunteer development, strategic leadership and organizational management to this time-honored association, she said in a statement.

TSCPA chairman Kathy Kapka said Ray would be an asset to the associations staff leadership. Jodi Ann was confidently selected by our leadership because she has the experience and expertise to successfully lead TSCPA into our next 100 years, she said.
By Nicholas West

There seems to be a troubling uptick around ethics recently within scientific circles that are focusing on robotics, artificial intelligence, and brain research. I say troubling because embedded within the standard appeals for caution which should appear in science, there also seems to be a tacit admission that things might be quickly spiraling out of control, as we are told of meetings, conventions, and workshops that have the ring of emergency scrambles more than debating society confabs.

Yesterday, Activist Post republished commentary from Harvard which cited a 52-page Stanford study looking into what Artificial Intelligence might look like in the year 2030. That report admits that much of what the general public believes to be science fiction  like pre-crime, for example  is already being implemented or is well on the way to impacting peoples day-to-day lives. We have seen the same call for ethical standards and caution about killer robots when, in fact, robots are already killing and injuring humans. Really all that is left to be considered, presumably, is the degree to which these systems should be permitted to become fully autonomous.

The same dichotomy between properly addressing the role of future technology and uh oh, I think the genie is out of the bottle also appears in the following article from Arizona State University, which some readers might remember was the source of a whistleblower that came to Activist Post some years ago with extreme concern about a secret DARPA program being conducted at Arizona State that aimed to develop a form of remote mind control using the technology of Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation. One of the ways that this technology could become remote-controlled is via the use of neural dust or smart dust that literally would open a two-way connection between brain and computer. You will read more about where that technology stands today in the article below, as well as other forms of implants that are slated for development.

It used to be the case that I would highlight a select few words from university, military, and scientific press releases; this time, the entire article would have to be highlighted, as it runs the full gamut of open admission about what previously has been conspiratorial or sci-fi (there is even mention of geoengineering here).

Lastly, can we really entrust the exact same players who are developing these systems  many for profit and control  to be involved in the formulation of an ethical framework?

If you share a concern that the technology we have developed is beginning to take on a life of its own, please share this information as we try to keep pace and hopefully corral our own creations into the most positive functions possible.

Considering Ethics Now Before Radically New Brain Technologies Get Away From Us

By Andrew Maynard, Arizona State University

Imagine infusing thousands of wireless devices into your brain, and using them to both monitor its activity and directly influence its actions. It sounds like the stuff of science fiction, and for the moment it still is  but possibly not for long.

Brain research is on a roll at the moment. And as it converges with advances in science and technology more broadly, its transforming what we are likely to be able to achieve in the near future.

Spurring the field on is the promise of more effective treatments for debilitating neurological and psychological disorders such as epilepsy, Parkinsons disease and depression. But new brain technologies will increasingly have the potential to alter how someone thinks, feels, behaves and even perceives themselves and others around them  and not necessarily in ways that are within their control or with their consent.

This is where things begin to get ethically uncomfortable.

Because of concerns like these, the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NAS) are cohosting a meeting of experts this week on responsible innovation in brain science.

Where are neurotechnologies now?

Brain research is intimately entwined with advances in the neurotechnologies that not only help us study the brains inner workings, but also transform the ways we can interact with and influence it.

For example, researchers at the University of California Berkeley recently published the first in-animal trials of what they called neural dust  implanted millimeter-sized sensors. They inserted the sensors in the nerves and muscles of rats, showing that these miniature wirelessly powered and connected sensors can monitor neural activity. The long-term aim, though, is to introduce thousands of neural dust particles into human brains.

The UC Berkeley sensors are still relatively large, on par with a coarse piece of sand, and just report on whats happening around them. Yet advances in nanoscale fabrication are likely to enable their further miniaturization. (The researchers estimate they could be made thinner than a human hair.) And in the future, combining them with technologies like optogenetics  using light to stimulate genetically modified neurons  could enable wireless, localized brain interrogation and control.

Used in this way, future generations of neural dust could transform how chronic neurological disorders are managed. They could also enable hardwired brain-computer interfaces (the original motivation behind this research), or even be used to enhance cognitive ability and modify behavior.

Jason Reed/Reuters

In 2013, President Obama launched the multi-year, multi-million dollar U.S. BRAIN Initiative (Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies). The same year, the European Commission launched the Human Brain Project, focusing on advancing brain research, cognitive neuroscience and brain-inspired computing. There are also active brain research initiatives in China, Japan, Korea, Latin America, Israel, Switzerland, Canada and even Cuba.

Together, these represent an emerging and globally coordinated effort to not only better understand how the brain works, but to find new ways of controlling and enhancing it (in particular in disease treatment and prevention); to interface with it; and to build computers and other artificial systems that are inspired by it.

Cutting-edge tech comes with ethical questions

This weeks NAS workshop  organized by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and supported by the National Science Foundation and my home institution of Arizona State University  isnt the first gathering of experts to discuss the ethics of brain technologies. In fact theres already an active international community of experts addressing neuroethics.

Many of these scientific initiatives do have a prominent ethics component. The U.S. BRAIN initiative for example includes a Neuroethics Workgroup, while the E.C. Human Brain Project is using an Ethics Map to guide research and development. These and others are grappling with the formidable challenges of developing future neurotechnologies responsibly.

Its against this backdrop that the NAS workshop sets out to better understand the social and ethical opportunities and challenges emerging from global brain research and neurotechnologies. A goal is to identify ways of ensuring these technologies are developed in ways that are responsive to social needs, desires and concerns. And it comes at a time when brain research is beginning to open up radical new possibilities that were far beyond our grasp just a few years ago.

In 2010, for instance, researchers at MIT demonstrated that Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation, or TMS  a noninvasive neurotechnology  could temporarily alter someones moral judgment. Another noninvasive technique called transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (tDCS) delivers low-level electrical currents to the brain via electrodes on the scalp; its being explored as a treatment for clinical conditions from depression to chronic pain  while already being used in consumer products and by do-it-yourselfers to allegedly self-induce changes in mental state and ability.

Crude as current capabilities using TMS and tDCS are, they are forcing people to think about the responsible development and use of technologies which have the ability to potentially change behavior, personality and thinking ability, at the flick of a switch. And the ethical questions they raise are far from straightforward.

For instance, should students be allowed to take exams while using tDCS? Should teachers be able to use tDCS in the classroom? Should TMS be used to prevent a soldiers moral judgment from interfering with military operations?

These and similar questions grapple with what is already possible. Complex as they are, they pale against the challenges emerging neurotechnologies are likely to raise.

Preparing now for whats to come

As research leads to an increasingly sophisticated and fine-grained understanding of how our brains function, related neurotechnologies are likely to become equally sophisticated. As they do, our abilities to precisely control function, thinking, behavior and personality, will extend far beyond what is currently possible.

To get a sense of the emerging ethical and social challenges such capabilities potentially raise, consider this speculative near-future scenario:

Imagine that in a few years time, the UC Berkeley neural dust has been successfully miniaturized and combined with optogenetics, allowing thousands of micrometer-sized devices to be seeded through someones brain that are capable of monitoring and influencing localized brain functions. Now imagine this network of neural transceivers is wirelessly connected to an external computer, and from there, to the internet.

Such a network  a crude foreshadowing of science fiction author Iain M. Banks neural lace (a concept that has already grabbed the attention of Elon Musk)  would revolutionize the detection and treatment of neurological conditions, potentially improving quality of life for millions of people. It would enable external devices to be controlled through thought, effectively integrating networked brains into the Internet of Things. It could help overcome restricted physical abilities for some people. And it would potentially provide unprecedented levels of cognitive enhancement, by allowing people to interface directly with cloud-based artificial intelligence and other online systems.

Think Apples Siri or Amazons Echo hardwired into your brain, and you begin to get the idea.

Yet this neurotech  which is almost within reach of current technological capabilities  would not be risk-free. These risks could be social  a growing socioeconomic divide perhaps between those who are neuro-enhanced and those who are not. Or they could be related to privacy and autonomy  maybe the ability of employers and law enforcement to monitor, and even alter, thoughts and feelings. The innovation might threaten personal well-being and societal cohesion through (hypothetical) cyber substance abuse, where direct-to-brain code replaces psychoactive substances. It could make users highly vulnerable to neurological cyberattacks.

Of course, predicting and responding to possible future risks is fraught with difficulties, and depends as much on who considers what a risk (and to whom) as it does the capabilities of emerging technologies to do harm. Yet its hard to avoid the likely disruptive potential of near-future neurotechnologies. Thus the urgent need to address  as a society  what we want the future of brain technologies to look like.

Moving forward, the ethical and responsible development of emerging brain technologies will require new thinking, along with considerable investment, in what might go wrong, and how to avoid it. Here, we can learn from thinking about responsible and ethical innovation that has come to light around recombinant DNA, nanotechnology, geoengineering and other cutting-edge areas of science and technology.

To develop future brain technologies both successfully and responsibly, we need to do so in ways that avoid potential pitfalls while not stifling innovation. We need approaches that ensure ordinary people can easily find out how these technologies might affect their lives  and they must have a say in how theyre used.

All this wont necessarily be easy  responsible innovation rarely is. But through initiatives like this weeks NAS workshop and others, we have the opportunity to develop brain technologies that are profoundly beneficial, without getting caught up in an ethical minefield.

Andrew Maynard, Director, Risk Innovation Lab, Arizona State University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Nicholas West writes for ActivistPost.com. This article may be republished in part or in full with author attribution and source link.
At the annual general meeting of The Advertising Club, held in Mumbai today, the members unanimously elected Raj Nayak, CEO, Colors, as its President.

Watch this space for more...
NEW YORK, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Following a meeting in New York this week with AJC and other Jewish organizations, Hungarian State Secretary Levente Magyar claimed that we concurred with his view that U.S. Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power's remarks about anti-Semitism in Hungary at a recent UN Conference were "exaggerated," "intentionally mistranslated sentences" based on "distorted information."

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Ambassador Power correctly described the disturbing developments in Hungary, a country to which we have long attached importance. Anti-Semitism and xenophobia are a serious concern, as has been widely reported. We support Ambassador Power's remarks and share her criticism of the Hungarian state honor awarded to the journalist Zsolt Bayer, a notorious figure known for his anti-Semitic and anti-Roma invective. We have, in fact, shared our outrage at this act directly with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/ajc-statement-on-false-claim-in-hungarian-official-media-300329664.html

SOURCE American Jewish Committee
Fitch Ratings has affirmed Telefonica Moviles Chile S.A.'s (TMCH) Long-Term Foreign and Local Currency Issuer Default Ratings (IDR) at 'BBB+'. Fitch has also affirmed the company's National long-term rating at 'AA(cl)'. The Rating Outlook is Stable. A full list of rating actions follows at the end of this release.

KEY RATING DRIVERS

TMCH's ratings reflect its leading market position in the Chilean mobile telecommunications market, strong brand recognition and network infrastructure, and sound financial profile backed by solid cash flow generation. The ratings also incorporate its linkage to the parent, Telefonica S.A. (TEF) rated 'BBB', and TEF's other Chilean subsidiary, Telefonica Chile S.A. (TCH), also rated 'BBB+'. TCH offers complementary fixed-line telecommunication services and allows TMCH to achieve synergies mainly in terms of integrated business strategy under the common management, brand unity, as well as sales coverage under the common management strategy. The ratings are tempered by the intense competitive landscape amid the industry maturity, and the company's shareholder distribution policy.

Strong Market Position:

TMCH is one of the two dominant mobile operators in Chile, along with Empresa Nacional de Telecomunicationes S.A. (ENTEL), with a 34.3% subscriber market share as of March 2016, estimated by Subsecretaria de Telecomunicaciones (Subtel). Its high capex to bolster network competitiveness bodes well for its growth strategy centered on mobile data, which still has ample room for growth given only 33% of mobile internet penetration of its subscriber base. The company is also estimated to have the largest mobile internet market share of 34%.

The competitive landscape in Chile will remain intense, as other major mobile operators, including the new entrant, WOM, continue to offer aggressive tariff plans to improve market shares. While this would suppress the company's subscriber base growth, especially in the prepaid segment, and profitability, Fitch expects TMCH's market position to remain intact as its solid network competitiveness and service quality, and strong brand recognition will help fend off competition.

Mobile Internet Drives Growth:

Growth in mobile internet and data services should help offset negative impact from ongoing contraction in voice service revenues over the medium term, caused by a high level of competition and the falling subscriber base - mainly the prepaid segment. While the continued loss in prepaid mobile internet user base is negative, with a 32% fall at end-June 2016 compared to a year ago, a solid 15% growth in high-ARPU post-paid data users helped achieve 2.5% mobile internet revenue growth during the same period. TMCH's mobile internet revenues proportion of total sales improved to 37% at end-June 2016 from just 11% in 2012.

Fitch believes that ever-increasing demand for data will continue in Chile over the medium to long term, in line with the global trend. As such, Fitch expects this trend to continue with the data users representing around 45% by end-2018 and the segmental revenue proportion increasing above 45% during the same period, mitigating ongoing voice revenue contraction.

Voice ARPU Erosion:

Revenue contraction in the voice segment is unlikely to be curbed over the medium term as the average revenue per user (ARPU) continues to trend down against the backdrop of high competition and industry maturity, with the high mobile service penetration rates at 127% as of March 2016. Fitch forecasts the erosion in voice revenues will remain steeper than the mobile internet revenues growth at least for the short term, suppressing the company's top line growth in negative territory until 2017. During the first half of 2016, TMCH's revenues fell by almost 5% compared to a year ago. Positively, its EBITDA generation remained relatively stable, only falling by 1% as a result of its cost control efforts, including lower subsidies.

Robust Cash Flow Generation:

TMCH boasts strong and stable cash flow generation which helps the company maintain its solid financial profile in line with the rating level. The company's pre-dividend FCF margin is high, with an average of 9% during 2011-2015, and Fitch expects a similar level of margin to continue over the medium term. Fitch forecasts the company's CFFO generation to consistently be over CLP200 billion annually over the medium term, which should comfortably cover the company's capex needs of around CLP120 billion per year on average during 2016-2018. This provides the company with comfortable headroom to support its shareholder returns, which Fitch expects to be largely covered by its pre-dividend FCF generation.

Stable Financial Profile:

TMCH's financial profile is forecast to remain commensurate with the rating level over the medium term backed by solid cash flow generation. Fitch forecasts the company's net leverage, measured in terms of total adjusted net debt-to-EBITDAR, to remain stable at around 1.2x-1.3x in the short- to medium-term in the absence of any sizable dividends, which is considered moderately low for the rating category. During the latest 12 months (LTM) as of June 30, 2016, TMCH's net leverage was 1.1x, reflecting its net value of hedge derivative instruments, which was in line with the end-2015 level.

KEY ASSUMPTIONS

Fitch's key assumptions within the rating case for TMCH include

--Negative revenue growth in 2016 and 2017;

--EBITDAR margin to remain stable at around 26%-27% over the medium term;

--Capital intensity, measured by capex to sales, to gradually fall toward 12% by 2018;

--Pre-dividend FCF margin to remain stable at around to 10% over the medium term;

--Net leverage to remain modestly above 1.0x over the medium term.

RATING SENSITIVITIES

Negative rating action could be considered in case of material deterioration in the company's key operating and financial metrics due to intense competition, unfavorable regulatory impact, and higher than expected capex and shareholder distributions - all of which combined resulting in negative FCF generation and net leverage increasing to over 2.0x on a sustained basis.

Telefonica Moviles Chile S.A.'s ratings are not directly linked to the ratings of its parent, Telefonica SA (TEF). However, any significant deterioration in the parent's credit profile, to the effect that it results in further rating downgrades or in a material liquidity crunch for the parent, could place pressure on Telefonica Moviles Chile S.A.'s ratings. TEF is currently rated 'BBB'/Outlook Stable.

Conversely, an upgrade of Telefonica Moviles Chile S.A.'s ratings, resulting in more than one notch differential from the parent's 'BBB' rating, would be limited given their strong linkages.

LIQUIDITY

TMCH boasts a sound liquidity profile backed by its large readily available cash position amid robust CFFO generation. As of June 30, 2016, the company's short-term debt amounted to CLP169 billion, which was fully covered by its cash balance of CLP223 billion. The company has good access to capital markets, which further bolsters its financial flexibility and liquidity profile.

Full List of Rating Actions

Fitch affirms TMCH's ratings as follows:

--Long-Term Foreign and Local Currency Issuer Default Rating (IDR) at 'BBB+';

--National long-term rating at 'AA(cl)';

--Local debt issuance programme series No. 589, No. 590, No. 813, and No.814 and series C, D, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, and M bond issuances at 'AA(cl)'.

Additional information is available on www.fitchratings.com.

Applicable Criteria

Corporate Rating Methodology - Including Short-Term Ratings and Parent and Subsidiary Linkage (pub. 17 Aug 2015)

https://www.fitchratings.com/site/re/869362

Additional Disclosures

Dodd-Frank Rating Information Disclosure Form

https://www.fitchratings.com/creditdesk/press_releases/content/ridf_frame.cfm?pr_id=1011836

Solicitation Status

https://www.fitchratings.com/gws/en/disclosure/solicitation?pr_id=1011836

Endorsement Policy

https://www.fitchratings.com/jsp/creditdesk/PolicyRegulation.faces?context=2&detail=31

ALL FITCH CREDIT RATINGS ARE SUBJECT TO CERTAIN LIMITATIONS AND DISCLAIMERS. PLEASE READ THESE LIMITATIONS AND DISCLAIMERS BY FOLLOWING THIS LINK: HTTP://FITCHRATINGS.COM/UNDERSTANDINGCREDITRATINGS. IN ADDITION, RATING DEFINITIONS AND THE TERMS OF USE OF SUCH RATINGS ARE AVAILABLE ON THE AGENCY'S PUBLIC WEBSITE 'WWW.FITCHRATINGS.COM'. PUBLISHED RATINGS, CRITERIA AND METHODOLOGIES ARE AVAILABLE FROM THIS SITE AT ALL TIMES. FITCH'S CODE OF CONDUCT, CONFIDENTIALITY, CONFLICTS OF INTEREST, AFFILIATE FIREWALL, COMPLIANCE AND OTHER RELEVANT POLICIES AND PROCEDURES ARE ALSO AVAILABLE FROM THE 'CODE OF CONDUCT' SECTION OF THIS SITE. FITCH MAY HAVE PROVIDED ANOTHER PERMISSIBLE SERVICE TO THE RATED ENTITY OR ITS RELATED THIRD PARTIES. DETAILS OF THIS SERVICE FOR RATINGS FOR WHICH THE LEAD ANALYST IS BASED IN AN EU-REGISTERED ENTITY CAN BE FOUND ON THE ENTITY SUMMARY PAGE FOR THIS ISSUER ON THE FITCH WEBSITE.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005783/en/

Fitch Ratings

Primary Analyst

Alvin Lim, CFA

Director

+1-312-368-3114

Fitch Ratings, Inc.

70 West Madison Street

Chicago, IL 60602

or

Secondary Analyst

Francisco Mercadal

Associate Director

+56-02-2499-3340

or

Committee Chairperson

Joe Bormann, CFA

Managing Director

+1-312-368-3349

or

Media Relations

Elizabeth Fogerty, New York, +1 212-908-0526

elizabeth.fogerty@fitchratings.com
Japan Makes Its Case for Foreign Direct Investment at an Auspicious Moment

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will offer opening remarks next Monday at an investment seminar addressing current and future business opportunities in Japan for non-Japanese companies.

Presented by the Japan External Trade Organization (JETRO) and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), Investment Opportunities in Japan: Toward the New Asia-Pacific Era will be held at the Grand Ballroom of The Pierre in Midtown Manhattan on Monday, September 19.

Prime Minister Abes address will be followed by presentations from:

Takatoshi Ito, Professor at Columbia Universitys School of International and Public Affairs

Stephen Volk, Vice Chairman of Citi and Chairman of Citis Institutional Clients Group

Akira Kiyota, Group CEO of Japan Exchange Group, Inc.

Hirotoshi Tanaka, President of JETRO New York

Ziad Haider, Special Representative for Commercial and Business Affairs, US State Department

Marco Annunziata, Chief Economist and Executive Director of Global Market Insights at General Electric Company

Kathryn Wengel, Worldwide Vice President of Johnson & Johnson Supply Chain

Yasutomo Suzuki, Mayor of Hamamatsu City

Hirofumi Katase, Vice-Minister for International Affairs of METI

Prime Minster Abe and the other speakers will address a capacity crowd of industry executives interested in learning more about Japans business climate for foreign direct investment. The morning seminar will be followed by a networking lunch.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005771/en/

MSA Partners, LLC

Chris Vickrey, 212-764-4760

Vickrey@msapr.com
TULSA, Okla., Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire-iReach/ -- TULSA, OKLAHOMA - The national optical retailer, Stanton Optical is scheduled to open its first location in the state of Oklahoma. This location is located at 7030 S. Sheridan Avenue, on the corner of South Sheridan Avenue and East 71st Street, and will proudly serve the residents of Tulsa. The grand opening is scheduled for mid-October 2016.Stanton Optical plans to expand by 10 more stores before the end of the year, with the Tulsa, OK location being the 53rd store for the company. This location will provide a wide range of eye care needs, including eye exams, prescription eyeglasses, and contact lenses. With its own dedicated state-of-the-art optical lab, Stanton Optical will be able to provide its customers high quality eyewear in as little as 15 minutes. To celebrate this grand opening, Stanton Optical will offer Tulsa residents the exclusive offer of 2 pairs of eyeglasses for $69, plus a FREE eye exam! Visit the Stanton Optical website to schedule an appointment.

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160915/408499

About Stanton Optical:

Since its inception in 2006, Stanton Optical has become a national leader in the eye health industry by developing an accessible alternative to over-priced eye care services. To circumvent costly markups traditionally associated with national brick-and-mortar stores, Stanton Optical works directly with designer eyewear manufacturers and equips a majority of its stores with optical labs that produce quality prescription eyeglasses in as little as 15 minutes.. That's why many Stanton Optical retail stores feature over 3,000 designer frames for men, women, and children, popular brands of contact lenses like Acuvue, Air Optix, Biomedics, PureVision, SofLens and Proclear, and same-day services.

Media Contact: Daniel Stanton, Stanton Optical, 561-228-4834, rchiaverini@stantonoptical.com

News distributed by PR Newswire iReach: https://ireach.prnewswire.com

SOURCE Stanton Optical
BAYONNE, N.J., Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Indiana Boy" rifle started when Anthony Imperato, President of Henry Repeating Arms learned of a two-year-old boy named Brayden who was born prematurely at 3 pounds, 2 ounces with a serious condition that left his intestines outside of his body. The surgery to remedy this condition led to infections and now most of his organs need to be replaced.

Mr. Imperato immediately offered the family assistance through the Guns for Great Causes branch of Henry Repeating Arms. 33 special edition rifles will be auctioned off and sold across the country to generate funds to help Brayden's family cover the cost of the anti-rejection drugs that are required for a successful transplant operation of this severity.

The theme of the rifle is summed up with the brave warrior mouse and inspirational text found on the buttstock. The book on the stock reads, "And though he is small he is fierce, for love, hope and courage make Brayden a WARRIOR." For nearly 3 years now Brayden has fought to stay alive showing bravery and strength miles beyond his age and size. He has been on a feeding tube for his entire life, and half his time since birth at Riley Children's Hospital in Indianapolis or traveling to and from it.

The American Walnut buttstock is laser-engraved and hand painted with the image of an open, fairytale-style book with the inspirational text for Brayden on the left page and a brave warrior mouse on the right. The book has a brick-red cover, with off-white antique pages. The warrior mouse stares danger in the face as two arrows fly over his head, just as Brayden does when presented with a new challenge due to complications. He is armed with a sword fit for Excalibur in his right hand and a green-colored shield in his left, which is adorned with a stylized "B" for Brayden. Some American leafy-vine scrollwork painted in copper provides a backdrop for the book.

Only 33 of these rifles will be made starting with serial number "BRAYDEN01" and going through "BRAYDEN33." The first rifle is available for auction on Gunbroker.com, item #584484452. The remaining 32 rifles will be sold directly through Henry Repeating Arms for $750. Every cent raised will be donated to Brayden's family to help with the exorbitant costs associated with organ transplants. To order please email teresa@henryrepeating.com with a name, phone number, and home address. Payment can be made by credit card and the rifle will ship to a local Henry dealer. Henry Repeating Arms will recognize everyone who purchased one of these rifles as thanks for participating in this special fundraiser.

For information about the company and its products visit www.henryrifles.com or call 866-200-2354.

About Henry Repeating Arms

Henry Repeating Arms is one of the country's leading rifle manufacturers. Their legendary name dates back to 1860 when Benjamin Tyler Henry invented and patented the first practical repeating rifle during the Civil War. It became known as the "gun you could load on Sunday and shoot all week long." Henry rifles went on to play a significant role in the frontier days of the American West and soon became one of the most legendary, respected and sought after rifles in the history of firearms. President Lincoln's Henry hangs in The Smithsonian and has become a national treasure. The company's manufacturing facilities are in Bayonne, NJ and Rice Lake, WI.

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160916/408778

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160916/408777

To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/serial-number-brayden01-henry-golden-boy-is-first-of-33-rifles-created-to-help-2-year-old-indiana-boy-needing-organ-transplants-300329572.html

SOURCE Henry Repeating Arms
United States Plastic Bag Market 2016 - Analysis And Forecast to 2020 - U.S. is the leader in global imports of plastic bags,...

Research and Markets has announced the addition of the "U.S. Plastic Bag Market - Analysis And Forecast to 2020" report to their offering.

The report provides an in-depth analysis of the U.S. plastic bag market. It presents the latest data of the market size and volume, domestic production, exports and imports, price dynamics and turnover in the industry. In addition, the report contains insightful information about the industry, including industry life cycle, business locations, productivity, employment and many other crucial aspects. The Company Profiles section contains relevant data on the major players in the industry.

The U.S. is the leader in global imports of plastic bags, accounting for an 18% share (based on USD). It was followed by Japan (10%), Germany (7%), and the UK (7%). In 2015, U.S. plastic bag imports totaled 2,698 million USD, which was 143 million USD (6%) higher than the year before. A significant drop in 2009 was followed by robust growth through to 2015, with an average annual increase of +7% from 2010 to 2015. In 2012, U.S. plastic bag imports surpassed their pre-recession level of 2008.

China was the main supplier of plastic bags into the U.S., with a 40% share of total U.S. imports in 2015, based on USD. It was distantly followed by Canada (17%) and Mexico (8%). Imports from China grew by +3.7% per year from 2007 to 2015; however, Mexico was the fastest growing supplier (+12.3% per year), while Canada remained relatively stable. Consequently, China strengthened its position in the U.S. import structure by +1 percentage point from 2007 to 2015, and Mexico gained +4 percentage points. Meanwhile, Canada saw its share reduced by -3 percentage points over the same period.

Product coverage:

Single-web film specialty bags, pouches, and liners

Multiweb film/film combination specialty bags, pouches, and liners

Plastics bag manufacturing

Companies Mentioned

AEP Industries Inc.

Ampac Holdings

Clopay Corporation

Congoleum Corporation

Consolidated Container Holdings

Du Pont Teijin Films U.S. Limited Partnership

Essentra Holdings Corp

Flexcon Company

Formosa Utility Venture

GSE Holding

Hilex Poly Co.

Inteplast Group

Klockner Pentaplast of America

Liqui-Box Corporation

Mastic Home Exteriors

Mitsubishi Polyester Film

Novolex Holdings.

Pliant

Poly-America

Primex Plastics Corporation

Reynolds Presto Products

Rjf International Corporation

Scholle Corporation

Taghleef Industries

Tegrant Corporation

The Bryce Corporation

The Glad Products Company

Toray Plastics (america)

Transilwrap Company

Tredegar Corporation

Tredegar Film Products Corporation

For more information about this report visit http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/mgdc7t/u_s_plastic_bag

Related Topics: Plastic Packaging

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005335/en/

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Laura Wood, Senior Manager

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Waterton, a U.S. real estate investor and operator, today announced it has appointed Mark Jeffery as general manager of the Sheraton Needham Hotel in Needham, Mass. A 30-year veteran of the hospitality industry, Jeffery will be responsible for overall operations of the 247-key hotel, leading a team of 110 on-site associates.

"Marks extensive experience both in the U.S. and overseas made him uniquely qualified to lead the team at the Sheraton Needham, said Patrick Hansen, senior vice president of hospitality operations at Waterton. Over the years, Mark has done it all, from spearheading the launch of new hotels to finding creative ways to further increase the visibility, and profitability, of existing properties that find themselves in a constant state of reinvention in todays highly competitive market.

Jeffery most recently spent five years as general manager of the Boston Newton Marriott, repositioning the property through effective management practices and a strategic budget and capital plan that boosted all major financial performance metrics. He previously served as general manager of the Renaissance Boston at Patriot Place Hotel & Spa, leading the award-winning opening of the hotel in 2009. Prior to that, he held various positions with Marriott International Inc., one of which included auditing hotels in the United Kingdom, dating back to 1999. As senior director of operations for Marriotts Eastern region, his most recent role with the company, he oversaw a portfolio of 43 hotels located between Pennsylvania and Maine, achieving the highest-ever guest satisfaction rating for the area.

Boston is my home and where Ive spent most of my career, so Im excited to be joining a new team in what, for me, is very familiar territory, Jeffery said. In addition to possessing deep knowledge of the local hospitality market, Ive made it a point to familiarize myself with each and every department that contributes to the day-to-day operations of a hotel, allowing me to better understand the needs of each team. This translates to a better overall experience for the customer by improving everything from back-of-house operations to the greeting guests receive when they walk through our front door.

Jeffery holds a bachelors degree in hotel management from the University of Massachusetts Amhersts Isenberg School of Management. Throughout his career, he has earned numerous awards on both a personal and property level, including General Manager of the Year and Hotel Opening of the Year. Outside of his professional responsibilities in the hospitality industry, Jeffery has served on the boards of both the Newton-Needham Regional Chamber of Commerce and Arts & Business Council of Boston.

Located approximately 20 minutes southwest of downtown Boston, the Sheraton Needham Hotel offers 247 guest suites and numerous amenities, including the Sheraton Club Lounge, a fully equipped Link@Sheraton connectivity hub, 24-hour fitness center and indoor pool. For more information, call (781) 444-1110 or visit www.sheratonneedham.com.

About Waterton:

Waterton is a real estate investor and operator with a focus on U.S. multifamily and hospitality properties. Founded in 1995, Waterton executes value-add strategies and manages a national portfolio of multifamily and hospitality properties on behalf of institutional investors, family offices and financial institutions.

Waterton has an expertise in selecting and managing attractive risk-adjusted real estate investments located in major markets around the United States. Since its formation, the company has invested over $5.3 billion in assets. Waterton is privately held by its co-founders and is headquartered in Chicago with regional offices throughout the United States. Currently, Watertons portfolio includes over $4.0 billion in assets, including approximately 20,000 multifamily units and 13 hotels. Visit Watertons new website: www.waterton.com.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005484/en/

For Waterton

Abe Tekippe, (312) 267-4528

atekippe@taylorjohnson.com

or

Kim Manning, (312) 267-4527

kmanning@taylorjohnson.com
WISeKey to establish a Mauritius based center to work on this project with the Mauritius Board of Investment

WISeKey International Holding Ltd (WISeKey)(SIX:WIHN), a leading cybersecurity company, during its participation at the Mauritius Investment Board Blockchain event, announced its intention to establish a BlockChain Centre of Excellence in Mauritius to deploy a Trusted Blockchain as a Service platform, to assist the Mauritius Government to create a Blockchain Ecosystem.

WISeKey will work with experts from industry, government, and academia to address businesses most relevant blockchain developments with practical, standards-based solutions using available blockchain technologies. This dedicated center of excellence will conduct research, rapid pilot prototyping, co-creation of use cases and IP creation on blockchain technology and platforms. The Mauritius BlockChain Centre of Excellence will recommend a National Blockchain Platform to facilitate enterprises to swiftly adopt and on-board blockchain based solutions and services.

The Mauritius Blockchain Center of Excellence will help position the country as a key and active player in the blockchain space. It will provide access to both policy, technical and business expertise around blockchain. WISeKey will be cooperating with local companies participating at the center on building points of view, proof of concepts, policies, educational materials including addressing all the distributed ledger capabilities across different blockchain schemes (public, consortium and private), with industry verticalization and domain specialization (IoT, transactions, messaging, etc.), underpinned by the best underlying technologies from startups, our key partners and from the community.

Carlos Moreira, Founder and CEO WISeKey said: "We strongly believe that the Blockchain Center of Excellence will disrupt business flows and processes across different industries in Mauritius and will position the country as one of the Blockchain Platforms and Hubs."

WISeKey will be localizing in Mauritius at the development of the WISeID Blockchain which is constantly growing as new blocks are added to it with a new set of recordings. Each WISeID node gets a copy of the WISeID Blockchain and gets downloaded automatically upon joining the WISeID network. Through the WISeID BlockChain app users are always in control of their digital identity stored on their mobile, IoT sensor and or computer and is only the user who determines which identification attributes are shared with social media, credit cards, merchant sites etc. never disclosing the Personal Identifiable Information (PII) if not required or necessary. WISeID uses BlockChain as a public, immutable ledger that allows third parties to validate that the original Identity or Attribute certifications provided by a Third Trusted Party has not been changed or misrepresented. Keeping control of Digital Identity is key to protecting users personal data.

The Mauritius Event: The next Blockchain Valley

Organized by Board of Investment (BOI) of Mauritius

The Board of Investment (BOI) is the national investment promotion agency of the Government of Mauritius with the mandate to promote and facilitate investment in the country. It is the first point of contact for investors exploring business opportunities in Mauritius and the region. BOI also assists investors in the growth, nurturing and diversification of their business.

BOI Announcement:

BMPL Ebene Cybercity has today been the scene of a historical landmark in the shaping of our digital economy.

The very first seminar on Blockchain exceeded our expectations with overwhelming appreciation from the audience. More than 200 stakeholders across various sectors, including Banks, Assets Management, Insurance, Tourism, ICT and entrepreneurs from over the world attended the seminar.

As an indication, investments in bitcoin and Blockchain infrastructure have already topped USD 1 billion, and every major bank in the world is increasingly paying attention to this technology.

The seminar saw the participation of renowned international speakers who intervened on diverse themes, namely demystifying Blockchain, developing its ecosystem, its regulatory framework and the potential applications of Blockchain in todays innovation-driven economy.

Mr. Carlos Creus Moreira, Chairman, CEO & Founder of WISeKey made a clear presentation of Blockchain technology. He highlighted the differences between Blockchain and other technologies such as cloud computing, and expanded on the potential in creating revolutionary solutions which do not exist in the marketplace today.

Mr. Sebastien Couture, co-founder of Stratumn, demonstrated how Blockchain builds consensus around multiple institutions, enterprises and individuals working together by eliminating the role of the middleman and improving efficiency while at the same time improving trust between all the parties.

His colleague, Mr. Anuj Das Gupta, Head of Research at Stratumn, elaborated further on the subject by discussing the potential applications of Blockchain, including in KYC systems and Smart cities. He also suggested that Blockchain technology could be used in diverse sectors such as energy and healthcare.

We also had the pleasure of listening to Ms. Primavera de Fillippi, Researcher at Centre National de Recherche Scientifique, who elaborated on the need for a shift in the regulatory mindset, moving from a bureaucracy base, friction and permission (permission-based rules) to one based on accountability, transparency and innovation (information-based rules) in a bid to reconcile the objectives of providing comfort and security to users while ensuring that regulations do not stifle innovation.

Finally, Mr. Larry Christopher Bates, Chief Security Officer and President of Bitland Global, suggested that Mauritius can become the Blockchain Valley through the advent of a cyber-security Hague for international data-houses. He maintained that this will inevitably contribute to economic growth.

Blockchain as a technology is here to stay. The onus remains on us to harness its advantages and leverage them for the benefit of Mauritian businesses, consumers and the Government. In addition, Blockchain KYCs efficiencies and cryptographic protocols deliver stronger security and faster compliance with reduced operating costs.

The seminar has set the scene for this technological revolution. We now have to develop the Blockchain ecosystem, including devising an appropriate regulatory framework, build the local manpower and encourage both public and private sectors to integrate the technology in their structures to trigger a new phase of efficiency led by the growth of their ventures.

A small country, Mauritius has the potential to rapidly implement Blockchain in day-to-day business.

Far from being the end, this is rather the dawn of a new beginning. We will follow up on this seminar with another one in a few months. The objective is to maintain the momentum, attract more global players and position Mauritius as a trusted and secure platform in the region for the deployment of Blockchain technology.

Already, WISeKey and Bitland have indicated that they are considering setting up operations in Mauritius.

This can only bode a bright future for the next Blockchain Valley.

About WISeKey

WISeKey (SIX Swiss Exchange:WIHN) is a leading cybersecurity company and selected as a World Economic Forum Global Growth Company. WISeKey is currently deploying large scale Internet of Things (IoT) digital identity ecosystems and has become a pioneer of the 4th Industrial Revolution movement launched this year at the World Economic Forum in Davos. WISeKeys Swiss based cryptographic Root of Trust (RoT) integrates wearable technology with secure authentication and identification, in both physical and virtual environments, and empowers IoT and wearable devices to become secure transactional devices. The RoT serves as a common trust anchor, which is recognized by the operating system and applications, to ensure the authenticity, confidentiality and integrity of on-line transactions. With the cryptographic RoT embedded on the device, the IoT product manufacturers can use code-signing certificates and a cloud-based signature as a service to secure interactions among objects and between objects and people. WISeKey has patented this process in the USA as it is currently used by many IoT providers.

Disclaimer:

This communication expressly or implicitly contains certain forward-looking statements concerning WISeKey International Holding Ltd and its business. Such statements involve certain known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which could cause the actual results, financial condition, performance or achievements of WISeKey International Holding Ltd to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. WISeKey International Holding Ltd is providing this communication as of this date and does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements contained herein as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

This press release does not constitute an offer to sell, or a solicitation of an offer to buy, any securities, and it does not constitute an offering prospectus within the meaning of article 652a or article 1156 of the Swiss Code of Obligations or a listing prospectus within the meaning of the listing rules of the SIX Swiss Exchange. Investors must rely on their own evaluation of WISeKey and its securities, including the merits and risks involved. Nothing contained herein is, or shall be relied on as, a promise or representation as to the future performance of WISeKey.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005594/en/

WISeKey:

Carlos Moreira, +41-22-594-3000

Founder & CEO

cmoreira@wisekey.com

or

Investor Relations (United States)

The Equity Group, Inc.

Lena Cati, 212-836-9611

lcati@equityny.com
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I never knew that you could smell a thunderstorm  they almost smell like hot asphalt or a spark made from flint and steel.

I inhaled deeply trying to memorize that smell at 5,000 feet above the surface of the ocean in a WC-130J Super Hercules in the middle of Hurricane Hermine. It was my first flight with the Air Force Reserves 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron Hurricane Hunters," and Id looked forward to it for months.

I was especially looking forward to the turbulence, and I wasnt disappointed. Being in the back of a C-130 in the middle of a hurricane was like wearing a blindfold on a roller coaster, but even more exciting. I gripped onto the metal railing of my seat and giggled like a little kid.

Between rides on the turbulence coaster I got out of my seat and pressed my face against the cool glass window attached to a back door to get a better look at the stunning clouds that grew thicker as we approached the storm.

After I'd taken a few dozen pretty cloud pictures I wandered around the plane watching the crew work and listening as best I could through ear plugs and the roar of the propellers so I could learn about how the Hurricane Hunters operate and why their mission is so important.

One thing that makes the 53rd WRS so unique is the fact that they have a special waiver for flying through severe weather. Navigators spend their flight hours monitoring the aircrafts radar, which has a spectrum of colors that indicate different kinds of weather. Green means theres some rain, yellow means theres moderate rain and red typically indicates a thunderstorm-like environment. The hurricane hunters own 10 of the 12 aircraft in the world allowed to fly through red areas, everyone else is required to go around. The other two are P-3 Orions owned by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Hurricane Hunters.

Once the pilots and navigator have reached the storm they then have to find and fly to the eye and begin an alpha pattern which is like drawing a big X in the sky. Something else I didnt know was that the storm environment can begin more than 100 miles away from the eye. Going through the eye wall was the most fun part of the storm to me because it was the most turbulent and once you made it through, the view was breathtaking.

An aerial reconnaissance weather officer collects weather data from plane sensors throughout the storm, but during each pass through the eye, the ARWO collects even more data from a dropsonde. A dropsonde is a long tube that a loadmaster launches from the aircraft, which then falls toward the ocean collecting wind speed and direction, temperature, humidity and pressure, and sending them back to the plane where they are collected, analyzed and relayed to the National Hurricane Center in Miami, Florida to be used in their forecasts.

The importance of the Hurricane Hunter mission can be illustrated in the fact that when we took off from Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi we were headed into Tropical Storm Hermine and before we left the storm it had been upgraded to Hurricane Hermine. Its because of the data that the hurricane hunters collect during these missions that the NHC is able to produce more accurate forecasts.

Seeing Hurricane Hermine from the inside and learning about the 53rd WRS Hurricane Hunters gave me the opportunity to see a major storm from another perspective. But however beautiful and exciting they are from the air, I know that they are also dangerous and destructive from below. Having ridden out Hurricane Issac in 2012, which totaled my car in the aftermath, I now know how important it is to pay attention to the NHC forecasts and heed any warnings that are issued for your area.

As we landed on flight line that was sunny and radiating heat I was thankful for the opportunity to have done something so incredibly unique and watched a crew gather data that would allow the NHC to give people more warning about where a storm will hit and how intense it could be, potentially saving money, resources and lives.
Political season do's and don't's for Reservists

With the presidential election upon us, everyone is encouraged to vote  including those in the military. The Department of Defense has a longstanding policy of encouraging DoD personnel to carry out the obligations of citizenship, according to DoD officials. However, civil servants and military members are held to a high standard and cant endorse any party or candidate while on duty.



Military reservists cant participate in a political gathering in uniform  not on duty, not off duty, and not even after you retire!



Federal employees and military members have an obligation to support elected officials whether or not they voted for them. For this reason, getting a paycheck directly from the federal government limits a persons ability to participate in some aspects of the political process. The points below are taken from public affairs election-year guidance, which derives from Federal Law such as the Hatch Act, DoD, and Air Force instructions.



Dos and donts for reservists



Unlike their active duty counterparts, reservists who are in military status and not in uniform can participate in the democratic process, including running for elected office, speaking at political gatherings, and speaking on a radio or TV program. As civilians, they may advocate for a political candidate, but they cant imply DoD, Air Force, or Reserve endorsement of any party or candidate. However, active duty military members (including reservists in military status) are prohibited from engaging in numerous political activities. That means if youre on orders, you cant attend a presidential rally. If youre not on orders or if youre a DoD civilian, you can. Also, members cannot display large political signs on their vehicle, though they can display a normal-sized political bumper sticker.



To avoid the perception of DoD sponsorship, Reservists in military status (and active duty military) may not participate in partisan political clubs, solicit for a political group or march in a political parade on or off duty. Active duty and Reserve military members are also prohibited from using official authority to influence an election or solicit votes for a candidate or issue.



Of course, no one in the military or civil service can use government resources (like email or computers) or government work time to lobby or solicit votes or money for a candidate. Regarding social media, Reservists not in military status and civilians have common-sense guidelines: dont be unprofessional or threatening.



Dos and donts for federal civilians



Rules governing political activities by government civilians are found in the Hatch Act. Most Hatch-Act restrictions are centered on preventing supervisors from influencing subordinates to participate in or contribute to partisan groups or candidates.



Federal employees cant display political campaign materials in the workplace or express opinions about candidates or issues when on duty. Federal employees may not express opinions directed at the success or failure of a political party or candidate when on duty, in a federal building, or in a federally owned vehicle. DoD civilians who violate the Hatch Act could be suspended or fired.



If youre unsure whether or not a specific political activity is approved, reference AFI 51-902 or call the legal office at (413) 557-3513.


From homeless dropout to Citizen Airman

Of the hundreds of thousands of people who are homeless in the U.S., one Rainier Wing Reservist knows all too well.



It was one of the toughest periods in my life, said Senior Airman Troy Serad, an engineering assistant assigned to the 446th Civil Engineer Squadron. It was the beginning of my 10th grade year of high school and I dropped out. We went from place to place, sometimes staying with different family members. It was a bad time.



While this was a pivotal point in Serads life, this story starts many years earlier.



Born in Texas, Serads parents divorced when he was a toddler. His father moved to New York and his mother packed up his three brothers and him and moved to her home state of Washington.



My mother didnt have many job skills but did what she had to in order to support us, said Serad. She would work odd jobs and then got some training in the medical field. While working in a hospital she was assaulted by a patient and became disabled.



Because of her disability, many years of struggles for Serad and his family began.



When I was 8 years old I remember answering the door and a sheriffs deputy had delivered an eviction notice, said Serad. For whatever reason, I would always receive the notices. I would take the eviction notice to my mom and she would always say that it would be all right. We moved about every six months but somehow my mom always found us another place to live.



Things werent right growing up, he said. We were always dependent on the state, receiving food stamps and low-income housing.



As a result of the hardships Serad faced at home, his schooling suffered as well.



When I was younger, it didnt matter if I went to school or not, said Serad. I was frequently truant from school and my mom would always sign my notes. I was able to get good grades so I could make up whatever I missed.



As the difficulties of life continued for Serad, things went from bad to worse.



When we lost our house, we moved around with different family members or friends, said Serad. We were never out on the street sleeping, but we had to couch surf or stay at other peoples houses. I was not in school. I was around bad role models.



By that time, his older brother Zackery had joined the military.



When I dropped out of school my plan at the time was to get my GED and work for the railroad, said Serad. It was definitely ambitious.



But Serads older brother Zack, a Marine Corps combat veteran, knew he was always destined for more.



I knew he was intelligent when he was very young but I always remember worrying about him, said Zachery Serad. I always tried to make sure I was there for him, from the time I was in high school to fighting in Iraq.



When Zach found out that Serad had quit school he knew he had to do something.



I told him straight up how I felt, said Zack. I knew that his potential would only show through with an education or a lot of luck. Serad boys dont have much luck so education it was.



With some tough love from Zack, Serad stepped back onto the path of success.



My older brother Zack always told me that I would be this very successful person and believed in me, said Serad. I went back to school and the teachers bent over backwards to help me earn enough credits to graduate. I not only graduated with a high school diploma, but also an associates degree.



Thanks to his brother and teachers that believed in him, Serad pushed himself to excel.



Without my English teachers I wouldnt have made it, said Serad. They expected better from me. It always felt great when my work was complemented and rewarded.



After high school, Serad continued with his education and earned his bachelors degree in urban planning from the University of Washington.



Soon after starting a new job at Amtrak, Serad was ready for another great challenge--the Air Force Reserve.



Airman Serad serves as a role model for the self-improvement opportunities available as well as his outstanding focus on high duty performance, said Lt. Col. Andrew Lafrazia, 446th CES commander. His example will hopefully be a catalyst for others to see what education can accomplish.



Being a Citizen Airman has positively impacted Serad.



The Air Force Reserve has been more than I expected, said Serad. If you are not a part of the military you dont know what its like. It rewards good work and promotes from within. There is a lot of value in what we do.



I joined for the education and medical benefits, and to start something new, he said. I also joined because of the pride I have in my brother being a Marine Corps veteran. Lastly, I wanted to prove to myself I could do it.



Sharing his experience as a Reservist to troubled teens is a passion for him.



As an Airman I have been able to influence and enlighten what the military does in a positive way, said Serad. Lately, I have been working with a couple of high school students who are considered to be youth at-risk. I have been encouraging them about the benefits of the military and what it has to offer.



Like his English teachers, his CE leadership expects Serad to Excel.



I wouldn't be surprised to see him take on a significant challenge educationally, such as an advanced degree, or professionally such as a city planner, congressman or entrepreneur, said Lafrazia. Whatever direction he takes, I'm glad to have him in my unit.



Currently Serad is studying for the Law School Admission Test in pursuit of earning a law degree.



Having this background has made me what I am today, said Serad. My dream job would be a senator or congressman; to be a representative of the people. I have this desire to help others.
Air Force leaders release birthday message

Secretary of the Air Force Deborah Lee James, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Dave Goldfein, and Chief Master Sgt. of the Air Force James A. Cody released the following message in honor of the Air Forces 69th birthday:



To the Airmen of the United States Air Force:



On the 69th birthday of our United States Air Force, we salute you - the dedicated Airmen providing unrivaled Airpower for America - as we celebrate the establishment of the United States Air Force as a separate service. We remember our proud heritage and honor those who advocated for an independent Air Force, passing on to us the responsibility for continued innovation and leadership in the air, space, and cyber domains.



Today, our Air Force delivers Global Vigilance, Global Reach, and Global Power with unmatched effectiveness. With tens of thousands of Airmen supporting combatant commanders from deployed locations and many more directly contributing from their home stations, the United States Air Force is absolutely essential to prevailing in every joint fight.



America depends on our remarkable Total Force of Active Duty, Guard, Reserve, and Civilian Airmen who have never failed to answer our Nations call. We thank you and your family for your service, sacrifice, and commitment to the defense of our Nation. Happy 69th birthday United States Air Force!


In a major cause of concern for the Indian authorities, a US-sponsored study has now claimed that the banned CPI-Maoists are the fourth dreaded terrorist outfit in the world after Taliban, Islamic State and Boko Haram.

The world witnessed 11,774 terror attacks in 2015, in which 28,328 people were killed and 35,320 injured. India was the fourth worst-affected country after Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, with 43% of 791 attacks in the country carried out by Naxalites. A total of 289 Indians died in terror strikes.

At least 176 people were killed in about 343 attacks carried out by the CPI (Maoists) across the country, over half of them in Chhattisgarh (21 percent), Manipur (12 percent), Jammu and Kashmir (11 percent) and Jharkhand+ (10 percent).

The number of attacks in Chhattisgarh rose to 167 in 2015 from 76 in 2014, the data found.

Islamic State, on the other hand, launched 931 attacks which left 6,050 people dead. Boko Haram, Nigerias militant Islamic group, carried out 491 attacks killing a total of 5,450 people. Taliban were involved in 1,093 strikes in which 4,512 people lost their lives. Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which rounded off the top five in the list, was involved in 238 strikes, killing 287.

The report said there was great diversity in the perpetrators/terrorist groups involved in attacks in the country, with 45 outfits active across the country. The Naxals alone accounted for 43% of terrorist attacks in India last year. The report said the number of people kidnapped/taken hostage by terrorists and insurgent groups in India almost tripled in 2015, increasing to 862 from 305 in 2014. Of this, Naxals alone kidnapped/took hostage 707 persons last year compared with 163 in 2014. In 2014, there were no attacks in which 50 or more people were kidnapped or taken hostage while in 2015, there were seven such attacks, all of them attributed to Maoists.

However, the data collected by Home Ministry also revealed that as many as 2,162 civilians and 802 security personnel were killed by Naxals between 2010 and 2015.
Edward Snowden, in exile in Moscow after leaking US National Security Agency documents, said Friday he intends to vote in the US presidential election, but did not say which candidate he favors. I will be voting, Snowden said, speaking at a conference in Athens by video link from Moscow.

But as a privacy advocate I think its important for me  that there should never be an obligation for an individual to discuss their vote. And I wont be doing so with mine. He added: What I will say about the candidates is that Im disappointed were not hearing much about the constitution in this election cycle. Were not hearing very much about our rights.

The 33-year-old spoke ahead of the opening of the movie Snowden, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Snowden thanked human rights groups for their campaign to seek a pardon for him from President Barack Obama. Im not actually asking for a pardon myself because I think the whole point of our system and the foundation of our democracy is a system of checks and balances, he said. But  Im incredibly grateful and fortunate to be able to experience the support of the worlds three leading human rights organizations.

A Republican-led bipartisan US House intelligence committee on Thursday released a report calling Snowden a serial exaggerator and fabricator who doesnt fit the profile of a whistle blower. All of the committee members separately sent Obama a letter urging him not to pardon Snowden, who revealed the NSAs collection of millions of Americans phone records. The American Civil Liberties Union, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International are behind the campaign to pardon him.

Kenneth Roth, HRWs executive director, was on the panel of the Athens conference, and described the effort as an uphill battle. What were hoping is that after the election when Obama is in his final months in office at that stage he can begin to do something that are appropriate as a matter of conscience but politically difficult, Roth told the AP.

One of them we would be is to pardon Snowden, he said. Theres been broad recognition that Edward Snowden has done an enormous public service by disclosing the degree to which all of our privacy has been invaded needlessly.
Punjab needs change; the previous and present governments have not made much difference to the state and its peoples development. Now, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is an option and my intuition is that it will be going far in the upcoming assembly elections, though its image is being tarnished every day by the Congress, BJP and SAD. Soon, Punjab is going to witness good governance. I think like Delhi, peoples problem will be solved on priority. Presently, media and other political parties are biased towards AAP. Punjab needs its own voice and they should make an attempt to get it, this time.

There are many local news channels and newspapers in Punjab, hardly addressing local issues. And even the mainstream media is least bothered to gawp into Punjab unless some drastic tragedy happens. Lets start with Punjab Chief Minister Prakash Singh Badal, who held a special meeting with Bandi Singh Sangharsh Committee in the month of May 2015, which leads the struggle initiated by Bapu Surat Singh Khalsa, to sort out the burning issue of Sikh political prisoners. In order to decide over the pending cases against Sikh political prisoners as per law, Badal set up a high power panel comprising additional chief secretary (home), Chief Ministers principal secretary, chief secretary (jails), additional director general (intelligence and jails) and four representatives of Sikh organizations. The committee has been asked to investigate all related cases to guarantee the timely release of Sikh prisoners. It is worth mentioning that the worsening health condition of Bapu Surat Singh who has been on a hunger strike for the past two years for the releasing of Sikh prisoners languishing in various jails of India despite completion of their terms. Badal initiated the meeting with the committee which is an umbrella organization of all Panthik bodies, for dialogue. Intelligence agencies also then recommended the state government to resolve the issue as soon as possible.

This panel was constituted in May 2015, however, after one and half years, no concrete step has been taken to address the issue. Neither government nor media is taking any aggressive step to solve the problem.

Meanwhile, Punjab cabinet had approved an amendment in the Good Conduct Prisoners Act of 1962 in order to simplify the procedure of granting parole to prisoners of states jails. After amending the Act in August 2015, it would be easier to grant parole to prisoners on the basis of their good conduct. However, amendment of the act has no mention about the Sikh political prisoners. The amendment may have come to invent a way to release political prisoners on parole? Punjab Government is reportedly under a lot of pressure due to the hunger strike of Bapu Surat Singh Khalsa, who has been campaigning since January 16, 2015, for the release of political prisoners. There are a number of political prisoners who despite having served their mandatory sentences have not been released. In order to calm down furious Sikh activists, Punjab government pretended to have designed this solution to resolve a long pending issue, but that proved to be an eye wash.

If you remember, very recently the Youth Akali leader Jagtar Singh Bhaini from Sri Anandpur Sahib committed suicide by jumping into the Bhakhra Canal. His moped and footwear were found near the Army Bridge on the Canal. His family had refused to accept that Bhaini could commit suicide. Similarly, police also refrained from declaring it a suicide until the dead body couldnt be recovered. Jagtar Singh was having disagreement with the SGPC member of his constituency and Education Minister cum MLA from Roop Nagar. His difference with SGPC over a piece of land was under trial in Court. He was considered as a right hand of Damdami Taksal Chief Baba Harnam Singh Dhumma. Jagtar Singh Bhaini also had conflict with the BJP leaders of his city. A lot of false cases were framed against him by the Police under political pressure. He was under depression after getting stuck in the mesh of conspiracies chalked out against him. So far, there is no investigation or no conclusion drawn over his death, Jagtars death became open and shut case. Even media have no information on what has happened in this case.

Punjab is suffering with Drugs, Babas and sadhus; people are misguided from all fronts. A recent study by Dr. Ravinder Sandhu of Guru Nanak Dev University shows that the incidence of such crimes in Punjab is nine times the national average. Between 1999 and 2008 the years when Punjab was recovering from the aftermath of terrorism, such crimes registered a staggering 245 per cent increase. Punjab became the state with the highest number of narcotics-related crimes, surpassing Mizoram which earlier held this dubious distinction. Nobody knows how many of the states youngsters are drug addicts. Youth of Punjab has given up everything; they are not in their senses to ask for their own rights.

Forget about politicians and others, even nature is not very much kind to Punjab. This state is undergoing an ecological disaster due to agriculture supported by heavy use of chemicals and pesticides and overuse of ground water. Thousands of acres of crops are burned to make room for next seasons crops, adding to a health crisis. Farmers are committing suicide, they are overburdened with loans and in such crises survival is another challenge. Media is ignoring these issues of Punjab.

The need of the hour is that, the Sikh Panth ( Sikh community) should get together to form a Sikh channel in Punjab that could air news regarding crucial issues as well as delivering justice to sons of the soil. Media houses are busy in PRing Prakash Singh Badal, Sukhbir Badal etc. Badals themselves have lots of stakes in local media houses and publications. Media in Punjab needs to cover all events and should not act like an obedient slave of politicians. They should represent all sect of society with unbiased mindset. Lets hope, one day they will stand for their own voice.

(Any suggestions, comments or dispute with regards to this article send us on feedback@afternoonvoice.com)
Swami Aseemanand, who is the main accused in the 2007 Samjhauta Express blast case, was granted bail on Friday by a special NIA court in Haryanas Panchkula district.

The bail was granted to Assemanand by the National Investigation Agency court on a personal bond of Rs 1 lakh and two surety bonds of Rs 1 lakh each.

The case refers to multiple blasts that had occurred in the Samjhauta Express near Dewana station in Panipat, killing 68 people, mostly from Pakistan.

Not only did it cause the disintegration of improving India-Pakistan relations, it established an indisputable historical narrative  the rise of Hindu terror.

The initial investigation into the matter did not point towards the involvement of Hindu terror in the incident. It is highly probable that the UPA regime had scripted a Hindu terror theory pertaining to the fact that the plot was mentioned in a chamber of discussion where the narrative was invented.

A number of NIA witnesses have turned hostile in the case, including one of the three witnesses presented today before the court.

He was granted bail by the Punjab and Haryana High Court last year. But, he was not furnishing bail bonds to avail bail as he was facing blast cases elsewhere too and was not on bail in those cases.

Aseemanand is now likely to be moved to Rajasthan as the order in the Ajmer blasts case will be out soon.
A suicide bomber blew himself up inside a mosque packed with worshippers for Friday prayers, killing at least 16 people and injuring 35 others in Mohmand Agency in Pakistans restive northwest tribal region.

The attacker blew himself when the prayers was in progress at the mosque in the Anbar tehsil of the agency bordering Afghanistan.

It was a suicide blast, a local official said. At least 16 people were killed in the attack, local media reported, citing officials.

Many people were gathered inside the mosque when a suicide bomber blew himself up, an eyewitness said.

Rescue teams and police rushed to the spot. The bodies and the injured are being shifted to local hospitals for medical treatment.

Injured were also transported to hospitals in Bajaur Agency, Charsadda and Peshawar for treatment.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban routinely targets courts, schools and mosques.

The attack came on a day when Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif vowed to continue the war against militancy and terrorism till elimination of the last terrorist.

During a meeting with Army chief General Raheel Sharif on Friday, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy.

The army had launched operation Zarb-e-Azb in June 2014 to flush out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas.
The Chief Secretary of Maharashtra, Swadheen Kshatriya has honestly paid the rent and electricity charges of the BEST GMs bungalow for the period it was utilised by him for accommodation purpose. Kshatriya had paid Rs 5, 62,780.56 as rent and electricity charges accrued during his stay.

RTI Activist Anil Galgali had sought information from the BEST Administration regarding the usage of the bungalow meant for the GM of BEST. The Public Information Officer and Chief Engineer (Establishment) of the BEST Administration, informed Galgali that, as per directions of the State Government, the bungalow meant for GM was provided to Swadheen Kshatriya for the period 27th June 2006 to 9th May 2010 and 31st January 2011 to 31st March 2015. During his stay, Swadheen Kshatriya paid Rs 3, 95,0 58. 56 towards electricity charges and Rs 1, 68, 722 for rent. On the other hand, Ratnakar Gaikwad had defaulted the payment of utility services during his tenure as Chief Secretary. On the contrary, Swadheen Kshatriya has not misused his position and made payment for the services utilised.
A Swedish appeals court on Friday upheld an arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange over a 2010 rape accusation, rejecting his request to have it lifted.

The court announced in a statement that Assange is still detained in absentia, adding that it shares the assessment of the (lower) district court that Julian Assange is still suspected on probable cause of rape and that there is a risk that he will evade legal proceedings or a penalty.

The 45-year-old Australian has been holed up in the Ecuadoran embassy in London since June 2012, seeking refuge there after exhausting all his legal options in Britain against extradition to Sweden.

Assange has refused to travel to Stockholm for questioning over the rape allegation, which he denies, due to concerns Sweden will extradite him to the United States over WikiLeaks release of 500,000 secret military files on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

This is the eighth time the European arrest warrant has been tested in a Swedish court. All of the rulings have gone against him.

The appeals court said Assanges four-year embassy sequestration is not a deprivation of liberty and shall not be given any importance in its own right in the assessment of proportionality.

The length of his embassy stay and the earlier passivity of police investigators were arguments for setting aside the detention, it noted.

However, the relatively serious offence of which he is suspected means that there is a strong public interest (in) the investigation being able to continue.

At present, continued detention therefore appears to be both effective and necessary so as to be able to move the investigation forward. The reasons for detention therefore still outweigh the intrusion or other detriment that the measure entails for Julian Assange.

Swedish prosecutor Marianne Ny hailed the decision.

The public interest in having the investigation proceed still carries a lot of weight, in our opinion. The court has here shared our opinion that upholding the arrest warrant is in line with principle of proportionality, she said in a statement.
China is willing to join hands with India to implement the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries and properly handle sensitive issues to push forward bilateral ties, State Councillor Yang Jiechi has said.

Yang who met National Security Advisor Ajit Doval in New Delhi on Thursday on the sidelines of the BRICS National Security Advisors meeting said development of bilateral ties between the two countries have maintained good momentum.

China and India pledged on Thursday to further promote cooperation among the BRICS nations and discussed issues such as cyber security, energy security and anti-terrorism, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

This is the first meeting between Doval and Yang after Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping met at Hangzhou on the sidelines of the G20 summit on September 4.

China is willing to join hands with India to implement the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries, deepen mutual political trust, expand pragmatic cooperation and friendly exchanges, and properly handle sensitive issues in order to push forward the development of bilateral ties in the right direction and promote Asias development and prosperity, Yang said.

In his meeting with Xi, Modi said both countries have to be sensitive to strategic interests and promote positive convergences and prevent growth of negative perceptions.

Xi said, China is willing to work with India to maintain their hard-won sound relations and further advance their cooperation. Both the leaders set the direction for the development of bilateral ties for the next phase, Yang said in his meeting with Doval.








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Date: 11 August, 2016.

Place: Salt Lake City, State of Utah, United States.

On 11 August, a very rare event was witnessed by a family in Salt Lake City. According to a report written by one of the members of this family and published on UFO specialised website MUFON.com, a black object was seen hovering above Utahs capital city.

My family and I (myself 37 years of age, sister 24, brother 27 and my two boys 10 and 8) were driving up interstate 15 in Utah, just south of Salt Lake City, the witness wrote. I was the first to notice a black object in the sky which seemed to be about 3 miles away, about 1500 feet off the ground. I made a joke to my boys to look there was a UFO. My sister said: its just a cloud, to which I responded I know, I'm just trying to trick the boys, the anonymous woman related.

She first thought it was just a cloud, but she soon realised that it looked unusually static. I did think it was weird that there was a single black cloud low in the sky and not all that far away, she said. The mother-of-two also added that as they got closer, it looked solid and seemed to have defined edges.

She then decided to grab her mobile phone and take some photos. What she captured astounded her. After taking several pictures and looking through what I took, I looked up and there were now 3 black classic UFO shaped objects. Then two and then one again, she commented.

Finally, the alleged UFO gained speed and disappeared. It then seemed to pick up speed continuing north towards Ogden. Within seconds it was gone, she affirmed.

We all at first were not excited about what we were watching but slowly realized it was no cloud and then when there were three horizontally and evenly spaced apart about 600 yards we became real excited and kids a little scared, she expressed.

On this event, ufologist and writer Scott C Waring, of UFO Sightings Daily, commented: These photos reveal a dark disk over Salt Lake City last month. The disk was seen alone, then with several others, and then alone again. Thats how cloaking devices work. It was seen right after sunset, when the cloaks of the ships are most vulnerable.

Draw your own conclusions

For further information: www.ufosightingsdaily.com/2016/09/fleet-of-ufo-seen-over-salt-lake-city.html

Fleet of UFO seen over Salt Lake City during sunset on Aug 11, 2016, Photos, UFO Sighting News.

Date of sighting: August 11, 2016

Location of sighting: Salt Lake City, Utah, USA

Source: MUFON #78355

These photos reveal a dark disk over Salt Lake City last month. The disk was seen alone, then with several others, and then alone again.

Thats how cloaking devices work. It was seen right after sunset, when the cloaks of the ships are most vulnerable, that is when they saw many. Later, there was just one. Aliens do this for several reasons. One, they want a scout up ahead, that is being watched by humans, so the others wont be seen if their cloak is not working. Two, they want to see, feel the reactions of those who see it, so they know what precautions they must take next to insure they don't frighten humans.

Scott C. Waring

Eyewitness states:

My family and I ( myself 37 years of age, sister 24, brother 27 and my two boys 10 and 8) were driving up interstate 15 in utah just south of salt lake city. I was the first to notice a black object in the sky which seeemed to be about 3 miles away, about 1500 feet off the ground. I made a joke to my boys to look there was a ufo. My sister said its just a cloud to which I responded " I know I'm just trying to trick the boys". I did think it was wierd that there was a single black cloud low in the sky and not all that far away. We watched it for a few minutes still talking about it going back and forth weather it was a cloud because as we got closer so it seemed it seemed more defined edges and solid. I decided to take pictures half thinking I was just taking pictures of a single solid black cloud. The pictures did not turn out well because it was with a cell phone a little past sun set and zoomed to the max. After taking several pics and looking threw what I took I looked up and there were now 3 black classic ufo shape objects. Then two and then one again. I did not see them seperate or come back together if that is infact how there became three and then one. It then seemed to pick up speed continuing north towards ogden. Within seconds it was gone. My brother and I both thought the object was about 500 yards across and about half that tall. We all at first were not excited about what we were watching but slowly realized it was no cloud and then when there were three horizontally and evenly spaced apart about 600yards we became real excited and kids a little scared. I don't know what it was but I know it was unusual. There was never a light on the objects. Just black.








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A family movie night recently turned to a UFO watch night when a family member noticed some strange flying objects in the sky.

My family and I were outside setting up an outdoor movie for the kids just after the sun had gone, the reporting witness stated. I was looking into the south, southwest sky just above the neighbourhood rooftops and saw a red burning light, without a tail.

The object travelled fast across the sky from a south to north direction in the western sky.

Initially I thought it was a meteor or a comet that had come into our atmosphere. There was no tail the speed was quiet fast, approximately 200km/hr. The red, orange light burned or sparkled bright until it went past us and then the light started to burn out.

The light finally burned out and the witness was left watching a dark grey rectangular object flying in the north, northwest sky. Twenty minutes later the same thing happened again on the same sky spot. The size, the level of brightness as well as the traveling speed were all similar to the first one.

This time round my husband who had my phone, caught it on video. We were all thinking it looked like or could be a Chinese lantern, but then figure that a lantern could not travel quickly and definitely not in such a straight and specific line or trajectory.

The third time round was dumfounding for the whole family as they watched in awe and wonder as to what the objects could be and what it all meant.

My husband thought that it may be an F18 fighter jet, with their afterburners on, but I believe we would have heard sound, which there was none, if a fighter jet was flying so low.

The jet theory was discounted as the lights shone in front and not at the back of the object.

The whole experience was crazy for the whole family.

The incident took place on September 3, 2016 between 8.30-9 pm and was reported to MUFON the same day.

Investigations are still ongoing.
WASHINGTON, Sept. 16, 2016  The National Cattlemens Beef Association is looking to have a say in a lawsuit seeking to force disclosure of records that USDA gathered in an audit of the beef checkoff program.

NCBA filed a motion to intervene this week in the case originally brought in 2014 by the Organization for Competitive Markets with the help of attorneys from the Humane Society of the United States.

NCBA said some of the records involve confidential business information and that the lawsuit is an attempt by HSUS to divert attention from beef promotion activities.

The OCM complaint seeks disclosure of agency records from USDAs Office of the Inspector General audit that began in 2011. That program is better known as the beef checkoff, which collects a $1 per head assessment on all live cattle sold in the U.S. to be used for research and promotion purposes.

OCM said it is trying to get to the truth about OIG audit. So far it has been a five year fight to get to the truth, but we are in for the long haul. We are not going to back down until the American cowboy knows the truth, Fred Stokes, an OCM board member, said in a release.

The group says it filed the lawsuit in 2014 because of discrepancies between an independent audit of the beef checkoff and the OIG review. OCM wasnt satisfied with the amount of documents related to the audit that the group received from USDA under a Freedom of Information Act request.

NCBAs relationship with the State Federation of Beef Councils  which occupies half of the seats on the committee that allocates checkoff funds  has long been a source of consternation among NCBA opponents. They claim it gives the group too much say over checkoff policies, specifically the money it distributes.

Those same opponents believe that NCBAs relationship with the checkoff sometimes leads to the use of checkoff funds for illegal purposes, mainly NCBAs lobbying efforts. NCBA maintains that the organization never uses checkoff funds for policy purposes.

But NCBA CEO Kendal Frazier said in a statement that OCM, HSUS and a small handful of cattlemen have chosen a devils pact in an effort to weaken the checkoff, which will in turn, weaken beef demand and our entire industry.

In a court motion filed on Tuesday, NCBA said some of the documents in question contain NCBAs confidential business information.

Joe Maxwell, an OCM member and the senior political director for the Humane Society Legal Fund, feels differently. He told Agri-Pulse that NCBA, the main contractor to the beef checkoff, has had a sweetheart deal for years due to its influence over the Cattlemens Beef Board, which allocates checkoff funds.

Maxwell also made it clear that the sole plaintiff in the case is OCM; HSUS attorneys are working on the case, but he says thats only because OCM lacks the financial wherewithal to fight such a lengthy legal battle. He said HSUS is working the case pro bono.

Not an Agri-Pulse subscriber? Get our Daily Harvest email and Daybreak audio Monday through Friday mornings, a 16-page newsletter on Wednesdays, and access to premium content on our ag and rural policy website. Sign up for your four-week free trial Agri-Pulse subscription.





In an interview with Agri-Pulse, Stokes said that NCBA policies against country-of-origin labeling and changes to the Grain Inspection, Packers and Stockyards Act helped contribute to the price decline in the cattle industry. Hes skeptical of NCBA as an organization, and he says he wants to know how checkoff funds have been used.

If there was no wrongdoing here, why would NCBA be so frantic in trying to protect it? Stokes said. Give us the damn truth. Thats all.

Frazier says that OCM and HSUS may assert that the case is about transparency in the beef checkoff, but he believes the Humane Society is using it to undermine the beef industry.

HSUS intends to put every cattleman and woman in America out of business, Frazier said. By weakening checkoff programs and damaging producer-directed marketing and promotion efforts, they can cause economic harm to our industry and force us out of production agriculture.

We have nothing to hide. We have, and will continue to fully cooperate with all reviews and audits of our contracting activities, he added. However, we will not stand idly by and allow HSUS to kill the checkoff.

#30

For more news, go to www.Agri-Pulse.com
WASHINGTON, Sept. 15, 2016 - The National Pork Producers Council is confident that Congress will brush away pervasive anti-trade sentiments in this election year and approve the Trans-Pacific Partnership in a lame duck vote before a new president takes office.

Some lawmakers may not be ready to publicly announce their support for the 12-nation trade pact, but they will be ready to cast a yes vote once the Nov. 8 election is over, say NPPC leaders who attribute much of the countrys pork revenue to exports.

NPPC members from around the country are in Washington this week and have been lobbying lawmakers hard on their current No. 1 issue  congressional approval of the TPP, a treaty that is expected to help boost sales of pork and other agricultural commodities to countries like Japan and Vietnam.

We want a vote and our producers are (on Capitol Hill) asking for a vote in the lame duck, said Nick Giordano, NPPC vice president and counsel for global government affairs. And Ill tell you, I think the votes are there.

Giordano and other top NPPC officials spoke to reporters today at a luncheon briefing on the groups top issues, which include more resources to prepare for a potential outbreak of food and mouth disease.

Despite the anti-TPP rhetoric that has come from the Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton on the campaign trail, there are plenty of lawmakers who understand just how important the trade deal is to the U.S. economy and specifically to agriculture, the officials said.

Lawmakers know that the TPP will help the U.S. sell a lot more pork, beef, wheat and other farm commodities to millions of consumers in Pacific Rim nations by slashing tariffs and removing non-tariff trade barriers, said NPPC President John Weber.

From the legislative standpoint, they cant ignore it, Weber said. They cant ignore the economic impact of what the (TPP) would do for this countrys economy in the years to come.

Giordano said there are plenty of signs that TPP support is gaining steam in Congress. The fact that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Speaker of the House Paul Ryan have both said they dont expect a vote in the lame duck doesnt mean it wont happen.

Theyre not going to play their hands today, he said of McConnell and Ryan.

Are you tracking trade issues? Follow Agri-Pulse for more in-depth coverage. Sign up for a four-week free trial now.

The American Farm Bureau Federation is also continuing its fight to persuade Congress to approve TPP, and the groups president, Zippy Duvall, told reporters today he was excited to hear that Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said this week that TPP would be approved this year. The Hill newspaper quoted Hatch as saying, I think were going to get it done in lame-duck.

"That's a very positive announcement," Duvall said.

Duvall also touted the results of a poll released by AFBF last month that found half of Americans would be more likely to support TPP if they knew it would provide new markets overseas for U.S. farm products.

NPPCs Giordano said the stakes are extremely high because if Congress doesnt pass TPP this year during a very supportive Obama administration, the next president likely will not make it a priority.

What happens if they dont vote on this in the lame duck? Giordano asked. We all know that the candidates for the presidency are both closed to this  The wheels could come off the cart. It could fall apart.

Giordano waived off speculation that the presidential candidates might not really be against TPP.

Do you want to roll the dice and say that these people dont really mean what theyre saying on the campaign trail? he said. It needs to be done now.

(Steve Davies contributed to this report.)

#30

For more news, go to: www.Agri-Pulse.com
WASHINGTON, Sept. 15, 2016 - The Senate voted 95-3 today to approve a bill that would finance waterway improvement projects in 30 states and improve drinking water delivery systems. The bill also includes a provision exempting some farmers with aboveground fuel storage tanks from EPA requirements to prepare spill control plans.

Sen. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., inserted the storage-tank provision in the 500-plus-page bill in order to give farmers some relief from EPAs Spill, Prevention, Control and Countermeasure requirements. Farms with fuel storage tanks with an individual capacity of 1,000 gallons or less, or an aggregate capacity not exceeding 2,000 gallons would be exempt from the SPCC rules. Containers holding animal feed ingredients would also be exempt.

Speaking on the floor about the provision, Fischer said, Most agricultural producers live miles away from the nearest refueling station; therefore, producers rely upon on-farm fuel storage to supply the fuel they need at the time they need it. This amendment will ensure that producers can maintain that on-farm fuel storage (and) bring some reasonable, measured exemptions to the SPCC rule for small- and medium-sized farms and for livestock producers.

Overall, the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) of 2016 would authorize more than $12 billion for 30 Army Corps of Engineers projects in nearly 20 states. One major one is the Central Everglades Planning Project, which is designed to provide more water storage, treatment and conveyance of water south of Lake Okeechobee, which has suffered this year from a widely publicized outbreak of blue-green algae.

The authorized projects will help grow our economy, protect communities from flooding, increase our global competitiveness, and restore our natural treasures, Sens. James Inhofe, R-Okla., and Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., said in a joint statement . Inhofe chairs the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee and Boxer is the panels ranking Democrat.

This bill also provides critical support and reforms to help small and disadvantaged communities improve access to clean and safe drinking water and to repair aging infrastructure that contributes to lead contamination nationwide, they said, adding that a critical component of the bill is a provision addressing contamination in the water in Flint, Michigan.

The largest single project authorized in the bill is one involving replacing aging locks and dams on the Upper Ohio River at a cost of $2.6 billion. The Corps of Engineers signed off on a study backing the project earlier this week.

Like what you see on the Agri-Pulse website? See even more ag, rural policy and energy news when you sign up for a four-week free trial Agri-Pulse subscription.





In response to the crisis in Flint, the bill also authorizes $300 million over five years for a nationwide grant program to replace lead service lines for drinking water systems.

Inhofe touted the bills establishment of a new cost-sharing program allowing local sponsors of Corps projects to provide funding.

The local sponsors are willing to spend their own money and yet it is not legal for them to do. We correct that, he said on the Senate floor.

Sponsors can either give money to the Corps to carry out the maintenance or get in and start maintaining using their own dollars, Inhofe said. That is something you would think they could do now, but they can't. That is in this bill. That was the major thing the ports were pushing for in this bill.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., also applauded the Senates approval of the legislation, noting that it contains critical drought relief provisions that will improve coordination between the Corps of Engineers and state and local agencies to implement water supply measures at reservoirs.

#30

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Hungary Aims to Help Millions of Persecuted Christians Worldwide Threatened By Extremists

A woman holds a cross during a rally organized by Iraqi Assyrians in Germany denouncing persecution by the Islamic State terror group against Christians living in Iraq, in Berlin, Aug. 17, 2014. ( REUTERS/THOMAS PETER) A new government office aimed at helping the millions of Christians around the world who face persecution has been established in Hungary. "Today, Christianity has become the most persecuted religion, where out of five people killed out of religious reasons, four of them are Christians," Zoltan Balog, the Hungarian Minister for Human Capacities, told Catholic News Agency about the 10 person office within the department. "In 81 countries around the world Christians are persecuted and 200 million Christians live in areas where they are discriminated against. Millions of Christian lives are threatened by followers of radical religious ideologies." Christian persecution has risen in recent years with the growth of terror groups such as Boko Haram in Nigeria, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, and many other extremist factions. Balog explained that the office has deemed it of "utmost importance" to help persecuted Christians, which will involve coordinating humanitarian action. The office will also monitor how Christianity is treated in Europe. "Our interest not only lies in the Middle East but in forms of discrimination and persecution of Christians all over the world," he said. "It is therefore to be expected that we will keep a vigilant eye on the more subtle forms of persecutions within European borders." The report noted that the new department, which is estimated to have a 3 million euro budget, is the first of its kind in any country to deal directly with the persecution of Christians. Tam
September 15, 2016

BAGHDAD  On Sept. 10, commenting on the news that the last batch of Iranian dissidents affiliated with the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (MEK) had left Iraq and were heading to Albania in a deal that the United States mediated and the United Nations supervised, the Iraqi government declared it had "closed the book on the Baathist regime."

The last group of Iranians was composed of 280 dissidents. They had lived in Camp Liberty refugee camp in Baghdad since 2012, after the Iraqi government transferred them from Camp Ashraf in Diyala province, along the Iraq-Iran border, in which they had lived for almost three decades.

On Sept. 12, US Secretary of State John Kerry expressed his happiness about the MEK members' departure from Iraq and escaping the danger that was threatening their lives there, saying, "Their departure concludes a significant American diplomatic initiative that has assured the safety of more than 3,000 MEK members whose lives have been under threat."

Kerry added, "[Camp Liberty] had on many occasions been shelled. There were people killed and injured. And we have been trying to figure out a way forward.  After steady progress over a period of months, I visited Tirana earlier this year and I discussed with the Albanian government how to assist in facilitating the transfer and the resettlement of the last group of MEK members from Camp Liberty.  Im very proud that the United States was able to play a pivotal role in helping to get this job done."

Every now and then, Camp Liberty, which had sheltered MEK members for four years, would be bombed with mortars and rockets by armed groups close to Iran. For instance, Watheq al-Battat, a leader for the armed faction Hezbollah in Iraq who was reportedly killed in 2014, claimed responsibility for carrying out an attack against the camp in 2013, killing seven people and wounding 100 others.

On Sept. 10, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi's media bureau issued a press statement, expressing the prime minister's satisfaction with the departure of the last Iranian dissidents. The government statement read, "The Iraqi government has completely eliminated the presence of the MEK on Iraqi territory and was able to close this file and close the book on the Baathist regime."

A major burden has been lifted off Baghdad's shoulders after 13 years. The MEK, which Iran-affiliated Iraqi parties call the "Khalq hypocrites," was close to Saddam Hussein's regime and had opposed the velayat-e faqih project, which has had strong ties with the Iraqi governments for 13 years.

Iran exerted great pressure on Iraqi authorities to put an end to the MEK in their country, because the group created a source of concern for Iran's presence and projects there. This is why Baghdad breathed a sigh of relief as it bid farewell to the opponents of velayat-e faqih.

Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister for Arab and African Affairs Hossein Jaberi Ansari said Sept. 11, "The hypocrite terrorists  the MEK  had many conspiracies and committed crimes against the Iranian and Iraqi peoples. This is why their departure helps to spread chaos all around the world. On the other hand, the departure of al-Qaeda, which attacked both the Iranian and Iraqi people, was a good thing. They will be brought to justice sooner or later."

Majed Ghammas, the representative of the Lebanese Shiite Supreme Council to Tehran, told Iranian Tasnim news agency that the MEK's departure from Iraq was "humiliating."

Meanwhile, Fatima al-Zarakani, an Iraqi member of parliament for the State of Law Coalition led by Nouri al-Maliki, told Al-Monitor, "The MEK is a terrorist group. They had great cooperation with the Baathist regime to exterminate the Iraqi people. Their departure from Iraq is a major positive step toward getting rid of the Baathist regime's affiliates in the war against Iraqis.  The MEK has played a negative role in Iraq before and after 2003, as well as it has sought to please the Baathist regime and Iraq's enemies through acts that harmed the Iraqi political process."

However, Maryam Rajavi, the president of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, commented on the last Iranian dissidents' transfer from Iraq to Albania and said, "This process is a strategic defeat for the regime in Tehran, where the bells rang marking the start of change [in Iran], attack and crawl operations."

She added, "The conspiracies and schemes to eliminate the MEK were defeated. The velayat-e faqih regime remained, along with its Ministry of Intelligence, its terrorism power and all its spies in Iraq who were hungry for the blood of MEK members, dragging their tails between their legs in shame."

For his part, an Iranian dissident who spent time in Camp Ashraf in Iraq but currently resides in Paris, told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity, "The suffering the MEK members had to endure in Iraq over the past 13 years cannot be described. But we can describe the steadfastness with which we confronted Mullahs' attempts to annihilate us; we were victorious and the dictatorial regime was defeated."

Of course, the MEK's departure from Iraq after they had been present there for 30 years has eliminated the threat posed against the Iranian regime, since the MEK's proximity to Iranian interests in Iraq could not have been easy for Tehran.

After 2013, Iraq's Shiite governments missed the chance to take advantage of both the presence and the departure of MEK members in strengthening their position vis-a-vis neighboring Iran, thereby enhancing Iraq's national interests in the midst of regional rivalries over Iraq.
September 16, 2016

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip  At a market in Gaza, Souad Abu Jarbou filled four large bags with prayer rugs and different gift items, including prayer beads, perfumes, incense, jalabiyas and ihram clothing. It cost her $1,500 to buy the various gifts for the guests expected to visit her family to congratulate her mother for making the hajj on Aug. 27.

My mother decided that we should buy gift items from the local Gaza market, particularly since the various items are less expensive than those in the Saudi market, Abu Jarbou told Al-Monitor. I bought some beads, prayer rugs and prayer clothes for women and children, small oil perfumes and a number of miswak [twigs for cleaning teeth].

Some pilgrims bring their relatives special gifts from Saudi Arabia, such as cell phones, jewelry and Gulf-made abayas. Ibrahim Shurfa, a customer in the market, explained to Al-Monitor, The pilgrims use the money given by family members to get them some clothes and special things, such as loose overgarments, incense and devices like cell phones. He noted that perfumes and incense of the kind in Saudi Arabia are unique and difficult to find in Gaza.

My father-in-law bought traditional gift items for guests who will be congratulating him on the pilgrimage, said Shurfa. The pilgrims' families are buying presents from Gaza to save money and time, since it has become difficult to carry luggage through Egypt from Saudi Arabia to Gaza, given the many Egyptian checkpoints on the way back until the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt.

There are numerous shops selling pilgrimage gift items throughout Gaza. Notable among them are the shops in the old and well-known working-class al-Zawiya market in central Gaza. Emil Zeinos shop, in the middle of the market, is full of pilgrims' family members on shopping sprees.

The prices vary depending on the presents, Mohammed, a salesman at the shop, told Al-Monitor. For instance, the price of a dozen [prayer] beads ranges between 5 to 7 shekels [$1.32-$1.85]. There are fancy prayer rugs, while others are ordinary. The one-piece prayer outfits with a stretch hijab for women are more expensive than the traditional prayer clothes, and their prices vary depending on the fabric. The prayer clothes are sold for $8 in Gaza and $12 in Saudi Arabia

Mohammed further said, The same items sold at the Gazan shops are usually sold in Saudi Arabia, but at cheaper prices. The demand for these items booms during the hajj and umrah pilgrimage seasons. He claimed that the prices in Gaza are convenient for all pilgrims regardless of their social class or financial situation.

The increase in shoppers after the Eid al-Adha, as pilgrims return to Gaza from the hajj, is such that shops stay open late at night and during the third day of the eid, Mohammed said. He described the pilgrimage season as a blessed season, during which business booms.

Maher Tabbaa, director of public relations at the Gaza Chamber of Commerce, told Al-Monitor that hajj pilgrims from Gaza spend an average of $1,500-$2,000 on gift items in Gaza, for a total of nearly $5 million. The number of Gazan pilgrims this year was 2,443, said Hassan al-Saifi, deputy minister for religious endowments.

Saifi also said, Gazan pilgrims are buying gift items from the hajj and umrah gift shops in Gaza, instead of bringing them from Saudi Arabia because they pay 50 Egyptian pounds [$5.60] per kilogram in air freight transport in Egypt and due to the difficult land transport conditions when traveling from Egypt through the Rafah border.

Saifi further remarked, All sorts of gift items are available on the Gazan market. Pilgrims can choose the items that are suitable for their economic situation.

He noted, The profit margin [for shop owners] is acceptable, after the umrah pilgrimage season failed [to be accessible to Palestinians] for the second year in a row, given the ongoing closure of the Rafah border. Most of the products in the stores have been stored in warehouses since last year.

The presentation of hajj gifts remains a pleasant tradition, despite the financial cost.
September 16, 2016

BAGHDAD  Three lists of candidates have been proposed to Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi for the position of minister of defense, held by a Sunni, to replace sacked Minister Khaled al-Obeidi.

The first list is signed by parliament Speaker Salim al-Jabouri and includes Kamel al-Dulaimi, Badr al-Jabouri and Ahmed Abdullah Moussa. The second list was put forth by the Mutahidoun bloc, led by former parliament Speaker Osama al-Nujaifi, and includes Hajem al-Hassani, Salim Dali and Arfan al-Hayali. The third list was submitted by head of the Iraqiya List Iyad Allawi, who nominated five candidates: Hamed al-Matlaq, Raad al-Hamadani, Falah al-Naqib, Faisal al-Shamari and Hachem al-Daraji.

The Iraqi parliament had voted Aug. 25 to withdraw confidence from Obeidi on charges of corruption during the interrogation session conducted by Alia Nassif, a member of parliament for the Reform Front, on Aug. 1. Obeidi, however, appealed the parliament decision Sept. 7 before the judiciary, which could delay the appointment process of a new defense minister for several weeks.

The process of naming a defense minister entails several stages. The names of candidates belonging to Sunni blocs need to be forwarded to Abadi, who might select a name or choose someone else from outside the parliamentary blocs. The parliament is then briefed on the candidates resume and background before making a confidence vote, which requires the support of the parliamentary majority.

Ahmed al-Jarba, a parliamentarian for the Union of Iraqi Forces  comprising all parliamentary Sunni blocs  told Al-Monitor, Sunni blocs have nominated several candidates for the post of defense minister instead of Obeidi. However, Abadi has the last say in this matter. He might also nominate someone from outside the political blocs. The Iraqi parliament has the freedom to vote for the candidate it deems appropriate.

He said, As per the agreement between the parliamentary blocs and Abadi, the post of minister of defense ought to be held by a Sunni, but the candidate is not necessarily affiliated with the Sunni blocs in parliament, as it is no longer an issue of parliamentary quotas.

He added, Previously, the post of the Ministry of Defense was the share of the Mutahidoun bloc led by Nujaifi. Whereas today, all Sunni blocs making up the Union of Iraqi Forces submit a list of names for the post.

According to parliamentarian Khaled al-Assadi, who is close to Abadi, the prime minister is waiting for the Federal Court decision on Obeidis appeal before nominating a new figure for the post.

In a statement to Ayn al-Iraq news agency Sept. 4, Assadi said, We believe that Abadi is waiting for the Federal Court decision on Obeidis appeal before nominating a new candidate. Selecting a new defense minister will take some time and will not be settled in the next few days given the importance of the post.

However, member of parliament Raad al-Dahlaki of the Diyala Is Our Identity coalition, led by Jabouri, told Al-Monitor that it is unlikely Obeidi will reassume his post. We have turned the page on former Minister of Defense Khaled al-Obeidi. We are now in the process of choosing a new minister.

He said, We fear that the disagreements between the blocs over the name of a new candidate would delay the naming of a new defense minister in these pressing times, where the Iraqi army is waging a war against the Islamic State [IS].

Dahlaki added, Sunni blocs have no objection to the nomination of any candidate, even if the suggested names are not part of the Sunni blocs, as long as the candidates are competent and have expertise. We hope that the Shiite coalition would follow in the footsteps of the Union of Iraqi Forces in nominating a new minister for the Ministry of Interior to replace outgoing Minister Mohammed al-Ghabban.

Ghabban, who belongs to the Shiite Badr Organization that is headed by Hadi al-Amari, had resigned July 5 following the bloody explosions in Baghdad. The Badr Organization nominated parliament member Qasim al-Araji for the post.

It does not make sense for the Sunni blocs to give up their [sectarian] quotas in the government and in selecting a new Ministry of Defense, leaving the matter in the hands of the prime minister, while other blocs cling to their ministerial nominees and government quotas, Dahlaki said.

It is likely that the post of minister of defense would remain vacant for a long time for many reasons, particularly since Obeidi has been trying to return to office by appealing the parliament decisions and the investigation findings. In addition, selecting a nominee from the Sunni blocs would prompt other opposing blocs to not vote on granting confidence to the nominee.

Shiite and Kurdish blocs, on the other hand, might have different positions on the candidates. The position of the defense minister is of paramount importance, and there are concerns of politicizing it in light of the ongoing war against IS. Thus, all parties ought to select a competent and professional man for the position with utmost care and vigilance.

It is also likely that some parliamentary blocs opposing Abadi, such as the Reform Front, would throw a wrench in the process of nominating a new minister for political reasons, mainly their wish to select a minister away from sectarian quotas.
September 16, 2016

Knesset member Basel Ghattas of the Balad Party, one of the three factions that form the Joint List of predominantly Arab parties, is not taking back a single word of the harsh comments he wrote about former President Shimon Peres, 93, who is hospitalized in serious condition after suffering a major stroke.

Several hours after it was reported that Israel's ninth president was in intensive care in a medically induced coma and doctors were fighting for his life, Ghattas wrote on his Facebook page, Is Peres' inevitable end coming close? We don't know. He has seven lives. But he is without doubt on his final journey. We must remember that he is one of the pillars of the arrogant, imperialist Zionist enterprise, and of the settler enterprise, along with being one of the most heinous, most brutal and oldest in terms of age and results. He is the one who inflicted the most damage and brought a plethora of disasters to the Palestinian nation and to the Arab world  our blood covers him from head to toe."

In the first interview he has given since the storm erupted over his post, Ghattas told Al-Monitor, I did not wish for his death, but what I wrote is exactly what most Arabs in Israel think. This is how he is perceived in our narrative and memory. Before the collective festival of agony and sadness begins, I wanted to tell people that this man is not the dove of peace he is made out to be. This is the man who engineered Oslo [Accord in 1993], which for me and for most of the Arabs is a disaster.

Ghattas attack on Peres, whose name for many in Israel and around the world is synonymous with peace, caused great consternation among the Arab members of Knesset. Al-Monitor sought comment from the chairman of the Joint List, Knesset member Ayman Odeh, who like the rest of his party colleagues refused to be drawn out. Only Knesset member Aida Touma-Sliman agreed to say that just because she and Ghattas are members of the same Knesset faction does not mean they think alike. When someone is fighting for his life it is customary not to say something that is critical, although [late Prime Minister] Ariel Sharon also came in for criticism [when he was in a prolonged coma] and [former Knesset member] Yossi Beilin also said harsh things about [former Minister] Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, she said. According to Touma-Sliman, the fact that the condemnation emanated from an Arab legislator generated a disproportionate response.

In an interview with Al-Monitor, Ghattas said he understands the accusations about the troubling timing of his words, but doesnt accept them. So far Ive refused to comment in the media. A few short remarks were aired on Channel 2 but recorded without my knowledge. But now Im telling you loud and clear: I am not going back on what I wrote about Peres and I also dont understand why people were surprised. Oslo was one of the ways Peres succeeded in not resolving the conflict and rather in perpetuating the occupation. He did not want a separation into two states because after Oslo he was also responsible for the expansion of the settlements.

The text of the interview follows:

Al-Monitor: If not Peres, who then is a partner for peace, in your opinion? If the Palestinians claim that Israel will not find a better partner for negotiations than Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, one can say along the same lines that the Palestinians will not find a better partner than Shimon Peres. Dont you think so?

Ghattas: When was he even in a position of power?

Al-Monitor: Dont you think youre harming the line taken by the Joint List, led by Chairman Ayman Odeh, who calls for Arab-Jewish coexistence and life side by side?

Ghattas: I did not cause any damage. If  to obtain equality and rights  the Arabs in Israel have to please the Jews or to be "good Arabs," we have already learned that this is not the way. Even when the Arabs voted in the past for Zionist parties, the result was that they suffered more. The way to achieve equality is only through struggle.

Al-Monitor: Youre in the Knesset and you were elected by your constituents to advance the interests of the Arab citizens in the State of Israel. Do you believe that such statements advance the Arab sector?

Ghattas: No one is doing us a favor by allowing us to be in the Knesset, and especially the Zionist left wing is not doing us any favors by allowing us to express ourselves. We have been robbed of our freedom of speech. We receive blow after blow on a daily basis and our margins [of ability to speak freely] are being shrunk. The reason we are in the Knesset is only because of that freedom of expression that we want. Were not interested in being cast as agents who kowtow to the ministers in order to get benefits of some kind.

Al-Monitor: What about the claim that youre causing damage to a whole group of people who want to live peacefully with the Jews?

Ghattas: We are a people devoid of rights, oppressed, whose lands are expropriated and who are shortchanged in budget allocations, and yet somehow we are always to blame. Not those who hold power and hold budgets. This is how we have been turned into the guilty party. If things continue this way, we will come to a decision not to take part in national elections, as we decided in 2002. We in Balad are seriously debating this issue.

Al-Monitor: Do you think the Joint List  with all its internal disagreements  especially involving the scandals generated by Balad, will run in the next elections?

Ghattas: Yes, it will not be easy. I think only idiots would dismantle the Joint List, which has achieved great power.

Al-Monitor: Ayman Odeh did not want to comment on your remarks. Why do you think hes silent?

Ghattas: Take it any way you like.
September 16, 2016

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip  The stages of the local council elections in the Palestinian territories that started July 27 have highlighted a deep-rooted Palestinian internal division at various levels. The division was felt even more sharply when the electoral campaigns started, when slander and insults were exchanged between Fatah and Hamas supporters.

Fatah refused to recognize the legitimacy of the Gaza courts following the disqualification of some of its electoral lists by the courts and the Central Elections Commission, allegedly for not meeting the electoral requirements or violating the law.

The lists that were disqualified are mostly Fatahs, in addition to one independent list. On Sept. 4, the elections commission disqualified five Fatah lists in the West Bank and Gaza Strip after objections were filed against them.

The commission dismissed 154 objections raised against other electoral lists supported by Hamas and by independents in Gaza and the West Bank. The lists in question then had to file challenges before the courts in the West Bank and Gaza in accordance with the Palestinian electoral law. Five additional Fatah lists were disqualified on Sept. 8, while one list was readmitted to the electoral game in the West Bank.

Article 22 of the Palestinian Local Council Elections Law No. 10 of 2005 states, Any person may within three days as of the date of publication of the electoral lists file a written objection to the elections commission, stating the reasons for his objection.

Article 23 stipulates, The commission shall issue its decisions on the submitted objections within three days as of the date of expiry of the time limit for objections, and its decisions may be challenged before the appropriate court, within three days of the date of their issuance.

Article 24 states that the court shall issue its decisions on the challenges submitted to it within three days, and its decisions shall be final.

The Charter of Honor signed by all Palestinian factions ratified these legal provisions. Articles 21 and 22 stress the need to abide by peaceful and legal methods with respect to objections and challenges and their outcomes at all stages of the electoral process, as well as the need to cooperate with the authorities with respect to investigations into these objections, challenges and complaints and to respect the Palestinian courts' decisions regarding the electoral process.

But Fatah refused to resort to the appropriate courts in Gaza to challenge the judicial rulings disqualifying its electoral lists. Amin Maqboul, the secretary-general of Fatah's Revolutionary Council, told Al-Monitor that the judicial system in the Gaza Strip lacks legitimacy and violates Articles 16 and 18 of the Palestinian Judiciary Law No. 15 of 2005, according to which judges shall be appointed and promoted by the president of the Palestinian Authority. He explained that such is not the case in Gaza, where Hamas has been appointing judges since the 2007 split.

Maqboul accused Hamas of seeking to disqualify Fatahs electoral lists through the elections commission and the Gaza courts to foil the electoral process. He noted that Fatah had called on Hamas to withdraw its objections against its lists in return for Fatah renouncing its own objections against Hamas lists, but the deal was refused.

He pointed out that on on Sept. 8, the Supreme Court in Ramallah ordered the temporary halt of the local council elections pending examination of the complaint by the Palestinian Bar Association filed over Gaza's judicial illegitimacy and the exclusion of East Jerusalem.

Hisham Kahil, executive director of the elections commission, also told Al-Monitor, Written agreements were reached with all parties to observe the Palestinian courts' decisions regarding the electoral process. The factions also agreed that the government institutions in Gaza shall oversee the electoral process.

He added, Based on the agreements with the factions, the electoral commission is bound by the decisions issued by the Gaza Strip courts on the challenges against some of the electoral lists," noting that Article 11 of Law No. 10 of 2005 guarantees every citizens right to challenge the electoral lists after their publication.

Salah Abdel Ati, the director of the Palestinian Center for Policy Research and Strategic Studies (Masarat), told Al-Monitor that holding elections will not be easy in light of the internal division and the severe crisis of confidence between Fatah and Hamas. He said, After the factions approval of Law No. 10 of 2005 and the signature of the Charter of Honor regarding the electoral process, and in the light of the clarifications and guarantees provided by the elections commission to both Fatah and Hamas, any renouncement of these guarantees will certainly foil the electoral process.

Abdel Ati added, All parties agreed that these courts shall be the authority to handle challenges regarding the electoral process. Unfortunately, the courts in Gaza, where judges are close to Hamas, and the courts in the West Bank, where the judges are close to Fatah, exploited their powers and issued rulings disqualifying the lists of their respective opponents. This halted the electoral process.

He pointed out that the main problem is more legal than political. The part about objections and challenges against individual candidates and lists in the Local Council Elections Law is not clear. Article 14 of this law specifies that nomination shall take place within electoral lists on the basis of proportional representation and that the candidates list shall be considered closed. This is what led us to this muddle, he said.

Abdel Ati called on the elections commission to amend and clarify the conditions on the disqualification of an electoral list that are set forth in the law, noting that the exclusion of an entire list as a result of the disqualification of one of its members is unfair.

Political analyst Samir Hamattu expressed wonder as to why Fatah renounced the agreements according to which Gazas courts shall be the courts empowered to settle the electoral challenges, the Gaza police shall be responsible for security during the electoral process, and the teachers in Gaza's public schools shall oversee and monitor this process.

He told Al-Monitor, It seems that Fatah was shocked by the large number of challenges filed before the courts against its lists by the lists supported by Hamas. This is why Fatah refused to comply with the law, argued that the courts in Gaza are illegitimate and resorted to the Supreme Court in Ramallah to challenge the legitimacy of Gazas institutions.

Hamattu said he expects the freezing of the electoral process after the issuance of the final ruling of the Supreme Court in Ramallah confirming the illegitimacy of Gazas institutions. This would bring us to square one in the relationship between Fatah and Hamas, he said.

Palestinians are eagerly waiting for Sept. 21 when the Supreme Court will issue its final ruling, and many expect a permanent halt of the electoral process.
September 16, 2016

RAMALLAH, West Bank  In an effort to end the nine-year division between Hamas and Fatah, South African Ambassador to Palestine Ashraf Suleiman will soon meet with groups that have developed initiatives toward that goal.

Suleiman is expected to start talks soon with Patriots to End the Split and Restore National Unity and the Palestinian Center for Policy Research & Strategic Studies (Masarat). He will seek to combine their initiatives with one recently revived by Awad Abdel Fattah, the general secretary of the National Democratic Assembly, along with activists and advocates for the Palestinian cause in South Africa, under the supervision of the Institute of Palestine and South Africa.

On Sept. 7, Abdel Fattah met with Suleiman to discuss the upcoming meeting, the date of which has not yet been set.

South Africa joined the Palestinian reconciliation and national unity efforts by sponsoring a South African initiative two years ago without much traction, but this year the effort has shown promise, as two Palestinian dialogue sessions were held in April and July in Cape Town. The sessions involved representatives of Palestinian factions, intellectuals, media personnel and independent figures.

By integrating the three initiatives, the parties hope to form a popular and intellectual movement powerful enough to end the division by pressuring the parties involved, Abdel Fattah told Al-Monitor.

The South African move is designed to [connect] efforts and coordinate visions between the three initiatives in an attempt to combine them all and form a lobby. These are, namely, our initiative under the auspices of South Africa; the Masarat initiative, which managed to draft clear ideas on how to achieve a practical national program to end the split; and Patriots to End the Split and Restore National Unity, which has been active to bring about a comprehensive vision. This is the task that Suleiman will embark on through his meeting with those in charge of the initiatives," he said.

The three initiatives converge on many ideas," he added.

South Africa will rely on its strong ties with Palestinian factions and the Palestinian Authority. Those ties have been demonstrated on more than one occasion, most recently in April when Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas inaugurated Nelson Mandela Square in Ramallah, where a 20-foot statue of the anti-apartheid leader was erected. Former city of Johannesburg Mayor Parks Tau said during an April 25 press conference that Mandelas statue is a symbol of hope and inspiration for the people of Palestine to realize their freedom.

Masarat Director General Hani al-Masri also emphasized South Africa's friendly relations with the Palestinians and its interest in ending the split. He told Al-Monitor that Masarat is ready to cooperate with all parties seeking to develop a formula to end the division and reshape a national program.

Masarat has integral perceptions on how to end the split and achieve national unity. They were formulated in a national unity document, and we support all efforts to benefit from those perceptions," he said. The document seeks to bridge the gaps and remove the obstacles to the previous agreements. Thus, we viewed that there is need for a full package, not a partial solution to contentious issues to be reached, that all [relevant groups] need to be involved, not only the factions, and that the focus should be placed on developing a national strategy.

Masri said he welcomes the South African efforts and stressed that the Palestinian people need to be able to develop a third popular current to pressure the parties to the crisis.

Hamas and Fatah had several negotiation rounds to resolve their split, which goes back to 2007. During that time, they have signed numerous agreements in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Qatar, which have all failed to bring about a real reconciliation. Most recent among these agreements were the Beach Refugee Camp Agreement on April 23, 2014, and the failed reconciliation meetings in Doha, Qatar, on June 18, 2016.

Taysir al-Zubri, a member of Patriots to End the Split and Restore National Unity, told Al-Monitor, We learned that South Africa has a project to resolve Palestinian differences and is collecting data from all national parties to reach a formula that would be agreed upon by all parties in the Palestinian arena.

He added, We have met with those in charge of the South African initiative [and] our views converged. We focused on how to move political dialogue to the Palestinian street, namely to involve institutions, unions, factions, human rights commissions and citizens to pressure the parties to the split.

His group welcomes all delegations willing to work and coordinate to achieve national unity. He stressed that the organization "will examine all suggested ideas.
September 15, 2016

GAZIANTEP, Turkey  The crucial city of al-Bab finds itself directly in the line of fire of all the forces in Syria competing to control it. Each party is seeking to fortify its military position in the city to grab land as the Islamic State (IS) withdraws.

Our troops will advance toward al-Bab city. This will be our next military target. We want to completely liberate this city," said Ahmed Sultan, deputy commander of the Army of Revolutionaries, an affiliate of the Kurdish-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

"We will not allow the regime to advance, and we will also prevent the Turkey-backed Free Syrian Army [FSA] factions from taking part in the liberation of al-Bab and its countryside," he told Al-Monitor. "These factions are unable to make any progress without Turkey's support. We are able to clear the area of terrorism.

Col. Haitham al-Afisi, the commanding officer of the FSA-affiliated rebel group Brigade 51 and an officer in the Hawar Kilis operation room, sees things differently. The next phase of Operation Euphrates Shield will include "ousting IS members and the separatist SDF troops" from an area south of the border zone that FSA cleared in the first phase.

The first phase was completed Sept. 4 after Turkey-supported FSA factions took over the town of al-Ghandoura and the villages between al-Rai and Jarablus in Syria's far north. That cleared a 98-kilometer (61-mile) stretch of border from Jarablus, east of the Euphrates River, to Azaz to the west, to a depth of 10-15 kilometers (about 5-10 miles). Afisi said the next step will deepen the clear zone to 20-30 kilometers (about 12-18 miles).

Al-Bab is roughly 30 kilometers south of the border.

Afisi said, We want to create a safe zone adjacent to the Turkish border, to lift the injustice of the Syrian people, to allow our fellow citizens and loved ones, who are refugees or displaced, whether abroad or internally, to return to their homes and country.

That won't come easily, however. The SDF, whose military component is the Kurdish Peoples Protection Units (YPG), seeks to link three northern Kurdish provinces  Jazeera, Ein al-Arab/Kobani and Afrin  to the east and west of the Euphrates River. After securing control of Manbij on Aug. 13, the SDF now needs to take over al-Bab and its countryside.

Turkey would like very much to prevent that.

The Turkish-backed forces are certainly heading toward Manbij because the SDF did not give up their positions, but rather reinforced them," Col. Ahmed Othman, commander of Sultan Murad Division, an FSA faction, told Al-Monitor. He said battles are currently underway in the eastern and southern sides of al-Rai toward al-Bab.

But al-Bab's value goes far beyond Turkey's goals. The city, controlled by IS since January 2014, is one of the most important IS strongholds, connecting the group's control areas in the city of Aleppo in the north to the provinces of Raqqa and Deir ez-Zor in the east. Al-Bab is a strategic link in the confrontation areas among the warring parties in Syria, and it seems to swing the balance in the ongoing battles in northern Syria.

Another party keenly interested in al-Bab is, not surprisingly, al-Bab's own military council, which the city established Aug. 15. A military commander of Jabhat al-Akrad, which is part of the council, told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity, The factions affiliated with al-Bab military council are composed of al-Bab citizens; most of them are Arabs and Kurds. The council also includes the Seljuq Brigade, formed of Turkmens from al-Bab and Azaz and its countryside. These factions, whose members hail from this region, have the priority to wage the battle of al-Bab.

Of the fighting in the north and east countrysides of Aleppo and the possibility of the council facing military confrontation, the commander said, Al-Bab military council does not want confrontation with any other faction of the FSA; but battles were waged against us and we will not stand idly by, because we are defending our land and our dignity as Syrians.

As for the SDF's outlook, Farouk Haji Mustafa, the director of Bercav Center for Media and Freedom, told Al-Monitor, The SDF only has two options. Either wage a battle for al-Raqqa  which, although useful, does not give the Kurds any historic gain, but only provides security  or wage an al-Bab battle, which is the most important in my opinion. This battle would give the Kurds a national gain by linking Kobani and Afrin through al-Bab and its countryside, which would connect together the Kurdish regions in northeast Syria.

Mustafa concluded, The east Euphrates area has indisputably become a Kurdish area. It seems that even Turkey is not objecting to this area, while the west Euphrates area has become a disputed area between the Turks and their supporting factions on one hand, and the Kurds and the SDF on the other hand.
September 16, 2016

On Sept. 12, the people of Fernana  a small town located in northwestern Tunisia  gathered at the pumping station that supplies water to Tunis and threatened to cut off the supply to the capital, before security forces intervened and prevented them from doing so. This came in response to the death of Wissem Nasri, a cafe owner who set himself on fire outside the municipality building following a dispute with its general secretary because he could not obtain permission to serve shishas to his clients.

Nasris suicide  reminiscent of Mohamed Bouazizi's in Sidi Bouzid, whose self-immolation marked the beginning of the Tunisian revolution in December 2010  provoked strikes and demonstrations in the city of Fernana. In a TV report aired Sept. 8, a resident of Fernana denounces the marginalization of his town, including the lack of access to water, although the region registers the most rainfall in the country and provides drinking water for most of the northern half of Tunisia.

Since the beginning of July, repeated water cuts in several regions of Tunisia sparked anger and protests among the local population. Water shortages were reported in towns such as Sousse, Nabeul, Sfax, Kef, Siliana, Beja, Sidi Bouzid, Ben Arous, Medenine and Tataouine. Given the increasing number of protests, the Tunisian citizens water observatory, Watchwater, warned against a possible thirst uprising in a statement released Aug. 10.

On July 28, then-Minister of Agriculture, Water Resources and Fisheries Saad Seddik  who was replaced by Samir Bettaieb after a change of government at the end of August  said at a press conference that Tunisia had suffered a rainfall deficit of 28% compared to 2015, and that this had negatively impacted the filling of dams in the north of the country. He also said Tunisians were living below the water poverty line  as defined by the United Nations  which is 1,000 cubic meters (roughly 264,000 gallons) per person, against 460 cubic meters (roughly 121,500 gallons) per person in Tunisia.

Recalling that the right to water is guaranteed by Article 44 of the new Tunisian Constitution, Watchwater asked in its Aug. 10 statement for the hearing of the minister of agriculture and of SONEDE (National Company of Water Exploitation and Distribution) before parliament, insisting on their responsibilities in the management and distribution of water. We call on the representatives of the people  to exercise their right to question the company and the ministry concerned, said the organization. But their request was not accepted.

The observatory has been mapping all water supply-related incidents in Tunisia since March. Since we launched the platform, we have been collecting 739 alerts, Ala Marzougui, the coordinator of Watchwater, told Al-Monitor.

Marzougui comes from Redeyef, a phosphate mining area in southwest Tunisia. He said, In Redeyef, we have been undergoing for long years repeated shortages. The last water cut here was in early September and lasted for four days. But all Tunisian regions suffer from cuts, even in winter. Maybe it has been catching more attention from the media this summer because of the touristic places being affected.

For his part, Larbi Bouguerra, a former professor at Tunis University's faculty of science and the author of the essay "Water under Threat," told Al-Monitor, We all know that rainfall is erratic in the Mediterranean and that there are episodes of five to six years of drought.

He said, Nothing has been done to address the problem. It has not been anticipated. On the other hand, water is wasted in Tunisia. We no longer use the traditional techniques that once existed to collect water, like the rainwater tanks."

Bouguerra insisted, The previous governments under Presidents Habib Bourguiba and Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, favored the coast. They drained all the water from the north of Tunisia to the Sahel region and the tourist cities.

In a series of articles published in 2015 about water and the Arab Spring, Bouguerra wrote, The Tunisian revolution began in the most disadvantaged areas in terms of access to water.

Marzougui added, We can see that the regions most affected by water cuts  such as Gafsa, Jendouba, Kasserine, Sidi Bouzid and Kairouan  also suffer the most marginalization, unemployment, lack of infrastructure and lack of access to health care."

However, on Aug. 12, two weeks after his press conference about drought and the water scarcity most Tunisians experience, Seddik said in a radio interview that the government had decided to give priority to the tourist areas for supply of clean water.

According to the World Resources Institute, Tunisia will be one of the most water-stressed countries in 2040. In 2014, the World Bank described water scarcity as a development challenge for Tunisia, dealing with climate change, urbanization and growing demands from industry and agriculture.

It is true that there exists overexploitation and water pollution, said Habib Ayeb, a Tunisian geographer, researcher and associate professor at the University of Paris 8 who focuses his research on marginalization, water and social change.

He told Al-Monitor, The most important thing is the right to access to water. It is a matter of inequality and injustice. The real problem for me is: Who has the right to access to water and what is the water used for?

In 2013, at the time when the 2014 constitution was drafted, Ayeb was one of those asking for the right to water to be defined as a legally enforceable right, which means the possibility for the people who are not connected to the clean water system to take legal action against the state and to obtain financial compensation, he said. But the proposal wasnt adopted. The right to water is enshrined in the constitution but has not been defined.

While Ayeb insisted he cannot predict the future, he also said, Assuming the revolution was caused by social demands, water could be the reason for a new uprising. The only thing I know is that there is a growing awareness. During the dictatorship, there already were water cuts, but nobody talked about it. And I think that as long as we keep the same water governance model the problem will remain."
September 15, 2016

With US-led operations against the Islamic States strongholds of Raqqa in Syria and Mosul in Iraq looming, Ankara and Washington are engaged in intense talks to determine Turkeys involvement in them.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has indicated that Turkey wants in on both operations, declaring that US President Barack Obama called for Turkish cooperation in Raqqa during their recent meeting at the G-20 summit in Hangzhou, China. Turkish and American suspicions about each others ultimate motives, however, continue to make cooperation difficult.

The US alliance in Syria with the People's Protection Units (YPG), the armed wing of the Democratic Union Party (PYD), remains the main obstacle. Turkey says the Kurdish YPG and PYD are terrorist groups linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).

Meanwhile, Baghdads insistence that Turkish forces in Iraq be withdrawn, a position supported by Washington, remains an obstacle to Turkeys participation in the liberation of Mosul.

Other issues such as the possible extradition from the United States of Fethullah Gulen, the alleged mastermind of the failed coup attempt in Turkey in July and US criticism of undemocratic developments in Turkey after the coup are also causing friction between the two strategic partners and could undermine cooperation in Syria and Iraq.

"Raqqa is one of the issues the United States and Turkey are currently discussing, Erdogan told reporters while flying back from Hangzhou. We need to demonstrate our presence in the region. If not, terrorist groups such as [IS], the PKK and its Syrian offshoot the YPG will fill the vacuum," he said.

The problem for Washington, however, was embedded in these remarks. The United States does not see the PYD or YPG as terrorist groups and says it will continue to work with them against IS in Syria.

US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter warned Turkey at the end of August, after the Turkish army wrested the Syrian town of Jarablus from IS and started moving south against YPG forces, to stay clear of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, largely made up of YPG fighters.

"The United States was very supportive, and is very supportive of [Turkey's] general counter-[IS] activities and everything they did to secure the area between the border and Jarablus and then westward, but not south of Jarablus," Carter told reporters at the Pentagon.

US State Department spokesman John Kirby repeated Washingtons position after the latest US-Russian-brokered cease-fire in Syria came into force. We dont want to see violence or clashes between Turkish forces and Kurdish forces, Kirby said Sept. 12 during his daily news briefing, adding that fighting IS was where the United States wanted energies to be applied.

A Western diplomat in Ankara who wished to remain anonymous due to his sensitive position said Turkish and US expectations regarding Raqqa were ultimately discordant. The Americans suspect that Turkey only wants to join the Raqqa operation to prevent the PYD from gaining a foothold there, the diplomat told Al-Monitor.

Retired Brig. Gen. Naim Baburoglu spelled out Turkeys strong suspicions about US intentions regarding the Kurds in Syria and Iraq. The basic reason why [Washington] gives importance to the PYD is that it wants a Kurdistan in the north that will be under the tutelage of the United States, and which will be a second Israel for it. The US unchanging strategic aim in the Middle East is for a united and independent Kurdistan, Baburoglu argued in his column for Gercek Gundem, an online news outlet.

Burhanettin Duran, the general coordinator for the pro-government Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research in Ankara, says Turkeys aim is to develop a comprehensive approach not to just fight IS, but also to block PKK and PYD aspirations in Iraq and Syria.

Right now, central governments are losing power to sub-state actors and terrorist groups in Syria and Iraq alike. At the same time, [IS'] self-proclaimed caliphate and the armed, PKK-affiliated Syrian [YPG's] pan-Kurdism blurs the border between the two countries, Duran wrote in his column for Sabah.

Despite the risk of overstretching its resources, Turkey believes that the right move is to develop a comprehensive strategy to fight both groups, he added.

Erdogan said in a public address this week that Turkey is also keen to participate in the operation to free Mosul. Lauding the success of the Turkish militarys Operation Euphrates Shield against IS in northern Syria, he said there was a need for a similar action in Iraq. The solution to the Mosul problem passes through lending an ear to Turkeys rational perspective and suggestions, Erdogan said.

Our hope is that the central government in Iraq will see this, he added, thus revealing that differences between Turkey and the Iraqi government persist.

According to Duran, Turkey is objecting to a power grab by the PKK and Shiite militants in Mosul at the expense of local Turkmens and the peshmerga.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi called on all Turkish troops in Iraq to be withdrawn after Turkey deployed troops and tanks in Bashiqa, a town north of Mosul, in December 2015. Ankara says these forces are necessary to fight IS.

Abadi also got backing from Washington. The US does not support military deployments inside Iraq absent the consent of the Iraqi government, Brett McGurk, Washingtons envoy for the US-led anti-IS coalition, tweeted at the time.

In a subsequent phone call, Obama asked Erdogan to take additional steps to de-escalate tensions with Iraq, including removing more troops.

During the Arab League summit in Mauritania in July, Iraqi Foreign Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari said, We have called on the Turkish government many times via diplomats to return their forces to Turkey. He went on to call on Arab countries to apply pressure on Turkey to make it comply with the Iraqi demand.

Ankara has not heeded these calls, but it is not clear how it hopes to join any operation against Mosul under these conditions. Turkeys difficulty with regard to the Syrian Kurds is not restricted to the United States, either.

Although Russia has ostensibly distanced itself military from the YPG, it continues to argue that the Syrian Kurds must take part in negotiations aimed at ending the Syrian crisis. While Ankara welcomed the US-Russian-brokered cease-fire in Syria, Turkish officials are aware that if it holds, current lines on the ground drawn by all the sides in Syria will hold, too.

This means the PYD will remain in places Turkey does not want to see them. Pro-government analysts such as Duran declare that this effect could leave Turkey no choice but to take unilateral military steps against the PYD and YPG, but the odds are against Ankara.

Al-Monitor's Western diplomatic source suggested that Turkey may have overreached with Operation Euphrates Shield. By declaring the aim of this operation to be both IS and the YPG, and moving against YPG positions, Turkey might have painted itself into another corner in Syria, because this seems to have only strengthened US and European resolve to back the Syrian Kurds, the diplomat said.
September 16, 2016

In the aftermath of the July 15 abortive coup attempt, four major purges on July 27, July 30, Sept. 2 and Sept. 7 dismissed thousands of officers and noncommissioned officers from the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK). Since then, speculation has been rife on how these purges have affected the TSKs combat effectiveness and on whether there will be problems filling critical posts.

On Sept. 8, for the first time since the purges, the official website of the chief of staff provided a breakdown on the TSK personnel changes.

According to the figures given, today, about 351,000 personnel are serving in the Turkish army, navy and air force: 206 generals, 29,949 officers, 67,476 noncommissioned officers (NCO), 48,879 specialist soldiers, 15,888 contractual soldiers and 188,611 conscripts. Accordingly, 46% of the TSK are professionals, while 54% are conscripts.

When we compare these numbers with the March 2016 figures, we see a 38% reduction in the number of generals, which then numbered 325 in three branches and an 8% reduction from 32,451 officers. There were no major changes in other ranks.

Dismissals after July 15 have mostly affected brigadier generals and rear admirals. As the TSK maintains a huge pool of colonels, it will not be hard to fill those vacancies. Brigadier generals who were dismissed in August were rapidly replaced. Colonels were quickly promoted and posted to critical brigades in the east and southeast, while others are serving as acting commanders in the western brigades. There were 27 major generals and seven lieutenant generals dismissed and replaced in August. In sum, all dismissed generals have been replaced and there are no shortages.

The officer group most affected by dismissals is the air force combat pilots. The TSK has 321 warplanes, 240 of them F-16s. In March, Turkey's air force, the TAF, had 600 active pilots. After the dismissals of about 280 of them, there are now about 300 combat pilots available. Before July 15, there were nearly two pilots for each warplane. This figure is now down to 0.8.

Meanwhile, investigations into many combat pilots continue, raising the prospect of more dismissals.

How will the TAF meet its pilot needs? There is a three-pronged approach to this critical problem. First, the 15-year compulsory service of combat pilots may be raised to 18 years. There is also a plan to recruit sophomore and junior university students from the departments of industrial engineering, electronics, aeronautics, space sciences and computer sciences to the Air Force Academy and to train them as combat pilots in an accelerated two-year program. Finally, the government has issued a call inviting pilots who have left the service and are now mostly working for civilian airlines to return to the TAF. There are reports that 140 former combat pilots are preparing to return to service.

With these measures, the combat pilot deficit can be overcome within two years. But between now and September 2018, the current crop of combat pilots will be working hard, with much overtime and longer rotations.

Also to be noted are the dismissals of about 30 pilots of the 10th Tanker Squadron based at Incirlik Air Base that provides aerial refueling of combat planes. This will likely affect the aerial refueling capacity of the TAF for the time being.

Another group affected by the dismissals is the army's helicopter pilots. About 20 of them, including assault helicopter pilots, have been dismissed. Their absence means a much heavier workload for the army pilots, who have major tasks in the fight against the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).

Among the dismissals are a disproportionate number of battalion and team commanders in the special forces, from the navys elite Underwater Assault Unit and the TAFs Combat Search and Rescue personnel.

Many special forces battalion commanders and team leaders were arrested and dismissed from service on charges of participating in the coup. Similarly, there are reports of dismissals of a high number of helicopter pilots and other officers and NCOs serving in TAFs elite Search and Rescue teams. The coup attempt cost the elite units of the TSK dearly.

In the army, most of the dismissals are from the Chief of Staff headquarters and Land Forces Command in Ankara and from units in Istanbul. The second army command responsible for combating terror in the southeast, border security with Syria and the current Operation Euphrates Shield has suffered the least. About 20 brigades of the second army command are now operationally active with their new commanders.

In the navy, most of the dismissals are from the command offices in Ankara or personnel serving in rear headquarters. The navy has been the least affected branch.

In light of this information, it is clear that the most affected are the TAF's combat and tanker pilots and then the Special Forces Command, the Land Force's aviation units and finally the navy's headquarters personnel.

Although the TSK appears to be coping with the effects of the dismissals, no one can deny that the special forces units, underwater assault teams and TAF search and rescue teams will need at least a year  for the TAF, a minimum of two  to restore their personnel numbers to pre-July 15 levels.

But sources speaking to Al-Monitor in Ankara note that morale and motivation in the TSK have risen significantly with Operation Euphrates Shield that began Aug. 24. They said they were gratified that so many officers and NCOs cut their leaves short or did not take the leave they were due and volunteered for combat service.

Among the TSK personnel now detained, there are scores who were not involved in the coup attempt. Concluding their investigations could further increase the number of available officers.

In short, the depletion of air combat and helicopter pilots and special forces personnel has adversely affected the combat strength of the TSK, but it is generally felt that the high motivation of the remaining personnel can make up for the numerical decline. It is fortunate that the second army, which is fighting the PKK, maintaining border security with Syria and participating in Euphrates Shield, has been the least affected command. But at the end of the day, the TSK will need at least two years to recover from the losses inflicted by the coup attempt and the consequent purges.
September 16, 2016

Turkey is a country that often boasts of its youthful population, but this advantage may not last long. According to the Turkish Statistics Institute, the countrys elderly  aged 65 and above  numbered 6.5 million in 2015, or 8.2% of the total population, up from 8% in 2014. Globally, elderly people make up 8.5% of the worlds population. So, Turkey is not that young, having an elderly rate close to the global average. Though it could hardly compare with nations such as Monaco, Japan and Germany, where senior citizens make up, respectively, 30.4%, 26.6% and 21.5% of the population, Turkey still ranks 66th among 167 countries in this category.

Only 11.5% of senior citizens participate in the labor force, which clearly demonstrates that the elderly are rarely employed. Shut out from productive life, they are in a sense left to await death, which brings about low spirits along with health problems.

In 2015, 45.6% of Turkeys senior citizens were satisfied with their general health, down from 47.5% the previous year, which is another indication that idle lifestyles are not good for the elderly.

To address the problem and encourage senior citizens to be more active in working and social life, Akdeniz University in the Mediterranean city of Antalya has inaugurated an education program called Renewal University, targeting people over the age of 60. The program, which offers courses in sociology, psychology, biology, technology, chemistry, agriculture, pharmacology, medicine, history, philosophy, maintenance and cooking, takes aim at the cognitive renewal of these students. After launching a trial run with 60 students in May 2015, the university has attracted considerable interest, with enrollment exceeding 300.

Though Turkeys population aged 65 and over is slightly below the global average, the figure for those aged 60 and over is seen as a reason for concern. Ozgur Arun, the head of Akdeniz Universitys gerontology department, sounded the alarm at an international conference two years ago, saying, When the elderly exceed 10% of the population, this indicates that society is aging. In Turkey, people aged over 60 make up 13% of the population. A study of demographic shifts in the past 50 years indicates that the total population has tripled, while the elderly population has grown seven times. The aging process that France completed in 115 years and Switzerland in 85, Turkey will complete in the next 15 years.

Ismail Tufan, the founder of Akdeniz Universitys gerontology department, has been briefing Turkish government officials on the looming problem for the past 16 years. Beyond sounding an alarm, he has done his part in preparing for the new phenomenon: Renewal University is his brainchild.

In remarks to Al-Monitor, Tufan stressed that the initiative aimed to freshen the intellectual, physical and spiritual development of aging people. Our education program targets people aged 60 and over. Along with the learning process, we created also an environment for debate. Learning is a lifelong process. By learning something new, you enhance your intellectual, physical and spiritual development, he said. Our senior citizens will now take more pleasure from living and improve their quality of life. Contributing to a healthier old generation is what we aim for.

Tufan has coined a slogan  Learning is cure and remedy  and is urging universities across Turkey to launch similar programs for senior citizens.

At Renewal University, there are no grades or competition. Learning is the only thing that matters. At the end of the four-year program, senior citizens will be able to return to working life and even serve in executive positions.

Tufan described how a letter he got from a man from the remote eastern province of Ardahan brought him to tears. He wrote that all his life he wanted to be an agricultural engineer, but managed to finish only primary school because of poverty. He told how he reads anything he lays hands on, how he raised three children who became a judge, a lawyer and an engineer, and requested to be enrolled in our school, Tufan said, adding they had received applications from people as old as 82.

Our school is free. We also provide the textbooks, Tufan said, noting that 26 lecturers were involved in the program. We started with 60 students last year and reached 127. There are high school and university graduates among them. The university will open officially this year, and we have received 370 applications so far. We expect the figure to exceed 500 by the start of the education year.

Postgraduate and doctoral programs are also available for the students. In one interesting detail, cooking is a compulsory course in all departments, a decision prompted by the fact that elderly men in particular dont know how to cook. Tufan recalled how an elderly villager he met in eastern Turkey told him, Wrap your wife in cotton wool. I have 12 children and dozens of grandchildren, but since my wife died, Ive stopped having hot meals. Another man rushed to enroll after reading about the cooking course in the newspaper. He was eager to learn to cook vegetable dishes, complaining how he exacerbated his hemorrhoids by frequenting kebab restaurants when his wife went away on long trips.

We want to enhance the creativity of our people by providing them with an opportunity for lifelong learning, and by making sure that this becomes a national policy, Tufan said, adding that the establishment of the gerontology department itself took years of painstaking work.

The academic urged more efforts to develop projects for senior citizens, stressing that the number of Turks aged 60 and over would reach a staggering 30 million by 2050, standing at 11.6 million at present.

The average age of staff at hospitals and nursing homes who care for the elderly in Turkey is between 35 and 45, Tufan said. So, the elderly adopt a lifestyle shaped by the young without questioning it and thus fail to have an active and successful aging process. In this context, Renewal University graduates, using also their own experience, could claim the management of the establishments that cater to their peers.
September 16, 2016

TEHRAN, Iran  Lengthy negotiations between the United States and Russia appear to have finally paid off when they reached a deal on a cease-fire in Syria announced Sept. 10. If the truce  the cessation of all air and ground attacks by all parties for one week  is adhered to by both sides, the United States and Russia plan to subsequently establish a joint implementation center to coordinate intelligence and airstrikes against the Islamic State (IS) and Jabhat al-Nusra.

The interests of Iran, as one of the key players involved in the complex and multi-dimensional conflict in Syria, will certainly be affected by the US-Russian agreement, like those of other actors. Indeed, while Iranian officials have formally welcomed the truce, they have also warned that it should not serve as an opportunity for militants to regroup and transfer fighters and arms.

Al-Monitor spoke with Nasser Hadian, a professor of international relations at Tehran University, about the situation. He said that Iran supports the US-Russian agreement in that it serves humanitarian goals, but the path ahead remains ambiguous. It is only a temporary cease-fire, and it is unlikely that it will lead to lasting peace or the establishment of a new government in Syria.

Touching on how possible US-Russian military cooperation could affect Iranian interests in Syria, Hadian said, If the agreement takes hold, Russia and the United States will form a new military alliance against IS and Jabhat al-Nusra. Fighting these two groups is an Iranian goal too. So if the agreement is implemented, it will not harm Iran's interests. He cautioned, however, Discord might emerge in the next steps.

Given Tehrans growing cooperation with Moscow, it appears that Iran increasingly sees itself as Russia's strategic partner in the Middle East. Take for instance, Iran for the first time since the 1979 Islamic Revolution allowing another country, Russia, to conduct military operations from one of its air bases. Thus, there is therefore also the question of how potential US-Russian military cooperation might impact the Iranian-Russian alliance in Syria.

Mohammad Jamshidi, a professor of international relations and an expert on US foreign policy at Tehran University, told Al-Monitor, I see the alliance between Iran and Russia as strategic, and the various forms of military cooperation between the two countries in recent years confirms this. But the agreement between the United States and Russia is a kind of tactical coordination. The strategic goals of Russia and the United States in Syria are at odds with each other.

Jamshidi added, I believe that Russia did not deal with the United States at the expense of Iran's interests. Actually, the United States always seeks cease-fire agreements when pro-Syrian government forces achieve considerable victories on the battlefield. It uses these kinds of agreements as a tool to buy time in order to regroup armed groups, and Russia knows this.

Nonetheless, Jamshidi does not believe the US-Russian deal can be considered detrimental to either Russia or its allies, including Iran. The interesting point is that Russia, in comparison to the United States, makes strategic use of this agreement, he said. Russia is buying time, too, he added.

The Russians are denying the Obama administration the time needed for taking any decisive decision in Syria, Jamshidi said. I mean it's obvious that the Obama administration will not have anymore time to arm the opposition groups when the cease-fire period ends.

Elahe Koolaie, a professor of international relations at Tehran University and a Russia expert, sees the US-Russian agreement as demonstrating the Russians' ability to advance their goals. There are different overlapping interests and threats in Syria, and all of the involved players should use the opportunity to cooperate with each other, Koolaie told Al-Monitor. The agreement between Russia and the United States has a good possibility of reducing Iran's security threats too.

Iran has stood by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad since the civil war erupted in 2011. It has done so based on the belief that Assads continued rule is tied to Irans regional security interests. One of these interests is maintaining the so-called Axis of Resistance. To achieve this objective, Iran has also for years supported Hezbollah in Lebanon, including paying a financial and political price for doing so. Considering Syria's physical and geopolitical position in regard to Israel, Lebanon, Iraq and Turkey, it has a key role in maintaining the Axis of Resistance. Hence, Irans prioritization of keeping Assad in power. Indeed, Ali Akbar Velayati, the foreign policy adviser to Irans supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has publicly stated that keeping Assad in power is an Iranian red line in Syria.

In this vein, Tehran-based Syria expert Amin Parto told Al-Monitor, Irans interests in Syria will be guaranteed only if Bashar al-Assad maintains his power. The same thing is true about Russia. So, in the short term, and as long as there is no word about political transition, the agreement is aligned with Irans interests, as it presents a good opportunity for pro-Syrian government forces to revitalize themselves. But in the long run, it is at odds with Iran's defined interests because opposition groups and the United States will not accept any arrangement that does not include shifting [away from] the Baathist-Alawite [political] system in Syria.

Al-Monitor also spoke with Alex Vatanka, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute, in Washington. It is high time for Iran to look for ways to soften its support for Assad, he said. Iran's long-held Assad or nothing approach is highly unlikely to win in the end in Syria if a political solution is ever to be found. The Russians know that, the Turks know that, and Iran can keep itself relevant among key external players by recognizing this inevitable fact.

Vatanka further emphasized, In the end, Iran owes Assad nothing. For both moral reasons and for the sake of its long-term geopolitical interests, Tehran needs to show more flexibility. The more this war drags on, the less the likelihood that Syria as one state can be kept together, which Tehran says is its number one priority.

Mindful of Irans stated position on the US-Russian deal, Vatanka added, Iran has no option but to support this latest cease-fire. Any cease-fire that halts the madness of violence in Syria  however limited  must be seized. But this cease-fire alone will not end the war but might be a step that can be built on for a broader peace effort.
Donald Trump Jimmy Fallon

In this image released by NBC, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump appears with host Jimmy Fallon during a taping of "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon," Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in New York. (Andrew Lipovsky/NBC via AP)

Aww-shucks TV personality Jimmy Fallon hosted Donald Trump on "The Tonight Show" to mixed reviews. Many people are saying Fallon should've asked Trump about his unreleased taxes or his birther campaign, instead of playing with the controversial candidate's hair. Others point out that Fallon is a talk show host, not some hard-hitting journalist--what's he supposed to do, denounce Trump on national television? But critics accuse Fallon of fawning over Trump and normalizing his extreme positions. Are you #FinishedWithFallon? Or do you think #FallonWasFine? Scroll down to VOTE!

PERSPECTIVES

The Hollywood Reporter thought that Fallon was overly obsequious (a.k.a. butt-kissing).

After his appearance on 'The Dr. Oz Show,' the Republican candidate smiled his way through 'The Tonight Show' thanks to a cringe-inducingly fawning Jimmy Fallon.

Trump supporters thought it was fabulous.

Loved Trump tonight with Jimmy Fallon. Such a warm man, able to laugh at himself--a wonderful quality. Well done! #FallonTonight  Linda Suhler, PhD (@LindaSuhler) September 16, 2016

Others argued Fallon could've been courteous and still asked some questions. What would Letterman have done?

Was Jimmy Fallon supposed to do a hard-hitting interview? Of course not. Was he supposed to shower a racist with love? No. Not that, either.  Aura Bogado (@aurabogado) September 16, 2016

Many people are saying they are completely finished with Fallon.

Not one serious question on @fallontonight.

I understand Jimmy Fallon is a comedian. But he asked Clinton about her emails & foreign policy.  Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) September 16, 2016

Is the Twitter freakout over Fallon's interview warranted? He interviews all of the candidates, right?

Jimmy Fallon has a topical guest on his show.

He has a few laughs with him.

clearly that means he's racist.  Pyro Bob (@SeraphOfFire) September 16, 2016

Journalist Jon Lovett argues Trump is not like other candidates.

Have Trump on! Keep it light! But to not ask even one question about racism or any of it? What would Carson do? Conan? Letterman? Cavett?  Jon Lovett (@jonlovett) September 16, 2016

If you want to see the normalization of racism, it's the host of the Tonight Show interviewing a racist demagogue without bringing it up.  Jon Lovett (@jonlovett) September 16, 2016

Maybe Jimmy was just being Jimmy. Is it really his job to go after Trump?

Interesting to see many of the media folk who've given Trump a pass for 2 solid years throwing both elbows at Fallon. Cuz where y'all been??  Edana Walker (@RedSaid) September 16, 2016

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The company that owns the pipeline that has leaked more than 250,000 gallons of gasoline into a Shelby County wildlife management area says that the flow of gas from the line has been "greatly diminished" since the leak was discovered Sept. 9.

"The gas actually leaking from the pipeline has been greatly diminished to where we can begin excavation activities later today," David York, a spokesman for Colonial Pipeline, told AL.com Friday afternoon.

Gov. Robert Bentley declared a state of emergency Thursday as fears rose that the service interruption caused by the leak could leave Alabama and other southern states facing shortages of the type of gasoline that is used to fuel vehicles.

York also said that the gasoline leaking from the pipeline at a site in the William R. Ireland Sr. Cahaba River Wildlife Management Area is being fully contained and that it does not pose a threat to the Cahaba River, which is home to many rare and endangered species. He said the gasoline is all flowing into nearby ponds that are keeping it from flowing to the river.

"There is no concern that we will lose containment from what we call Pond Number Two," he explained. "If for some reason we do lose containment on Pond Two, there is also Pond Three and it's got containment built on it, and there's multiple containment areas on Peal Creek, all before it gets to the Cahaba River."

He explained that the three ponds were already in place near the leak as "a result of some mining activity" and that they are being used as containment ponds because they are well-suited to that task. He said that the pond's purpose is to help collect and contain the gas in one place and to help keep it from getting into the water table.

"This [pond] just happened to be there and a downhill gradient from where the leak is located, and it served as a nice area to collect gasoline," he said. "Gasoline floats on water so as far as getting into the groundwater it has to be on the ground for extended periods of time."

He also said that there is little risk that the gasoline could catch on fire, and that authorities are working to ensure that does not happen.

"There's certainly no concern right now because we have Shelby County and Helena fire departments there with us and they are helping us manage the explosive level of the gasoline," he said. "There's some chemicals being put on the gasoline to keep the vapors down and this is all in coordination with the EPA and local emergency responders."
Authorities have now released the name of a man killed early Thursday at an eastern Birmingham apartment complex.

The Jefferson County Coroner's Office identified the victim as George Arthur Crenshaw Jr. He was 23.

The shooting happened just after 4 a.m. in the 6200 block of Crest Green Drive outside of an apartment complex. Crenshaw was found in the parking lot, and pronounced dead on the scene at 4:25 a.m.

Birmingham police have not released any additional information about the slaying. Anyone with information is asked to call detectives at 205-254-1764 or Crime Stoppers at 205-254-7777.
Colonial Pipeline employees and contractors started Friday afternoon digging out a leaking underground pipeline that spilled hundreds of thousands of gallons of gasoline south of Birmingham and shut down a major cog of the country's fuel distribution network, sparking fears of a gas shortage.

The latest update from Colonial Pipeline states that federal, state and company officials have cleared crews to begin the excavation process, which they had not previously been able to do because of the dangerous conditions created by pooled gasoline and fumes.

Colonial Pipeline also raised its estimate of the size of the spill. The company announced last week that the spill leaked around 6,000 barrels of gasoline, which is 252,000 gallons. They now say the leak is likely between 6,000 and 8,000 barrels, which is 336,000 gallons. A barrel is 42 gallons.

The pipeline was shut down Sept. 9, when the leak was confirmed. Colonial says the flow of the leak is greatly diminished, and temporary plugs have been installed on either side of the leak to minimize the impact.

Representatives of Colonial Pipeline and EPA on-scene coordinator Chuck Berry said the gasoline is contained in a mining retention pond and does not pose a threat to the nearby Cahaba River, which contains numerous threatened and endangered species. Berry said the nearest home is about 2.5 miles from the spill and that the gasoline and vapors do not pose a threat to nearby residents.

The repairs are expected to continue over the weekend, with the leaking pipeline potentially returning to service as early as next week. The company's Line 1, which contains the leaking section, normally transports 1.3 million barrels of gasoline each day to distribution centers throughout the Southeast and the East Coast.

Shutting down the pipeline for seven days represents a potential disruption of 9.1 million barrels or 382 million gallons or gas, though Colonial Pipeline and other companies are finding alternate means to transport the gasoline throughout the country.

The governors of Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina have each declared a state of emergency this week allowing truckers to work longer hours to avoid fuel shortages. Some suppliers have begun shipping gasoline by boat from Houston to New York.

Colonial began using its Line 2, which normally ships diesel fuel and other distillate products, to ship gasoline beginning on Thursday to avoid potential disruption. Line 2 now alternates between shipping gasoline and shipping distillates to try to avoid shortages of either product.

Line 1 is flowing from Houston to west Alabama, but stops short of the leak site. Gasoline from Line 2 is transferred back to Line 1 in Atlanta before moving northeast toward New York.

In addition, the company said it is "exploring alternatives, including the construction of a temporary segment of pipeline around the leak site to allow Line 1 to return to service as rapidly and safely as possible."

The cause and exact location of the leak have not been determined, but more information should be available once the pipeline is excavated.
Life in Jerusalem quickly returns to normal after a man is killed by Israeli troops for allegedly trying to carry out a stabbing attempt.

It is remarkable how quickly Jerusalem bounces back to normality after what the Israelis call a terrorist incident.

It was just before 1pm local time when a Jordanian man ran towards the border patrol outside of the ancient Damascus Gate shouting God is Great in Arabic.

The Israeli police say they neutralised the threat. Neutralised  what they mean is they shot the man dead.

A few hours later, everything was back to normal.

I mingled with the tourists after the incident. Judging by the looks on some of their faces upon hearing me report from the scene, they were surprised a man had been killed in this spot just a few hours earlier.

READ MORE: Israeli forces kill three Palestinians, one Jordanian

The stabbing incidents began in October last year when the Israelis restricted Palestinian access to the al-Aqsa Mosque compound, one of the holiest sites in Islam.

Young Palestinian men lashed out in anger. A knife is an easily available and concealed weapon. An almost perfect weapon for a desperate young man.





But its not that simple.

Some Palestinians say that the stabbing incidents are an outright lie. That some young men have been killed by Israeli forces and that no weapon has been found on them.

Human rights groups have also waded in, saying that Israel is using excessive force against the Palestinians.

Nothing is ever clear.

At the scene, a young Palestinian man shows me footage of the aftermath of the Damascus Gate incident.

I ask him whether he saw a knife. Wallah! There was no knife. This was just a crazy man. Why would you kill a crazy man?

By crazy, he means the man suffered a medical condition, and not that he was angry.

We may never know the truth of what his mental condition might have been. But if you charge towards heavily armed police shouting God is Great then I am guessing anger was certainly a part of his psyche.

READ MORE: Family of man killed by Israeli army feels powerless

I take a few minutes after reporting on the attack to take in the scene. The Israeli border patrol eyes our camera crew with a mixture of unease and suspicion. Attempts to speak to them about the incident are met with muted response.

As tourists stream through the gate and into the walled city, I cant help but wonder how normal occupation has become. How even the death of a man hasnt stopped the Old City from continuing on much like it has for thousands of years.

The paving stones of the floor have seen so much blood from so many wars that what is a little more?

As I walk back to the car to return to the office, more news comes in, this time from Hebron in the occupied West Bank.

Another Palestinian shot dead, in what Israeli authorities are calling another stabbing incident. That makes three Palestinians killed in three separate places in the occupied Palestinian Territories, in one day.

The attacks from both sides continue and yet life in Jerusalem goes on, a mans death seemingly just another moment in this ancient walled city.

Follow Imran Khan on Twitter: @ajimran
Even if the agreement is not meant to benefit the regime, it may do so in any case.

One need not espouse the hardline ideology of Syrian rebel group Ahrar al-Sham to agree with its view that the new cessation of hostilities, brokered by Russia and the United States, will only serve to reinforce the [Syrian] regime and surround the revolution militarily.

The days leading up to the truce saw the regime and its allies intensify air strikes and ground offensives, killing scores of civilians and undermining trust, which is vital to maintaining a ceasefire.

This has been their tactic in the run-up to every previous truce. As such, Syrian civilians can be forgiven for dreading the very prospect of a ceasefire, let alone having no hope that it will last.

Just hours before the current one took effect, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad vowed to retake the whole country. He made the same vow while Russia and the US were hammering out the previous cessation of hostilities in February, which collapsed amid repeated regime violations.

Ambiguous ceasefire

This is a clear indication that, to him, such ceasefires are stepping stones to achieving that aim, not to a negotiated political solution.

Indeed, pro-Assad forces continue to besiege rebel-held areas during the current ceasefire.

This tactic, which is a war crime as it entails collective punishment of civilian populations, has proved effective in forcing rebel withdrawals from certain strategic areas.

This is probably why the regime is violating the ceasefire terms by denying aid access to rebel-held eastern Aleppo, and why at the time of writing, no aid had yet been delivered to besieged areas  a recent investigation by The Guardian exposed how the regime controls United Nations aid, and led this month to more than 70 aid groups suspending their cooperation with the UN in Syria.

As with the last truce, there is no indication or hope that the current one will lead to a political breakthrough, even if it does hold  sporadic violations have already been reported.

If the rebels do not or cannot separate, they risk being targeted by the regime, Russia and even the US. As such, the opposition is stuck between a rock and hard place. by

Last week, the regime once again reiterated that Assads position  the crux of the conflict  is not up for discussion.

This position will have only hardened amid recent battlefield gains thanks to Russian air strikes and ground support from Iranian troops, Hezbollah fighters and other foreign Shia militias  all of whom have been reinforced, particularly for the battle over Aleppo.

Meanwhile, Moscow has said that it will continue targeting terrorists, without clarifying which groups it means. There is no consensus about which groups are terrorist, and Russias definition is far broader and more fluid than that of the Syrian oppositions foreign backers.

The Jabhat Fateh al-Sham dimension

As such, Moscow may feel it can continue to have a free hand in its air campaign, particularly since the text of the agreement with the US has not been made public or even made available to rebel groups.

In other words, they are being given an ultimatum to abide by a deal they have not even seen, or risk being targeted.

In that regard, a central demand is that rebel groups separate their forces from those of Jabhat Fateh al-Sham (formerly the al-Nusra Front).

This is being presented as something relatively straightforward and a test of rebel groups sincerity with regard to renouncing terrorism and seeking a negotiated solution to the conflict.

However, this aspect of the agreement presents grave difficulties and dangerous choices for the opposition, and could majorly benefit the regime.

Firstly, it is far easier said than done given how intertwined the rebel positions are, particularly in the face of recent regime gains.

Jabhat Fateh al-Sham played a major role in the recent breaking of the regime siege of eastern Aleppo. This was a major feat that averted that part of the city falling to the regime, which would have been disastrous for the revolution.

OPINION: The ramifications of al-Nusras split from al-Qaeda

A separation of rebel forces from those of Jabhat Fateh al-Sham would leave eastern Aleppo vulnerable to the regime, whose advance was stalled and reversed precisely because rebel forces worked together.

Generally speaking, if the rebels separate, this may entail ceding positions to Jabhat Fateh al-Sham. In the short term this would bolster the jihadist group, the opposite of what the cessation of hostilities intends.

In the longer term, however, US and Russian air strikes against the group  which would be easier to target if other rebels separate from it  would lead to it withdrawing from certain areas. The subsequent void may well be filled by the regime.

Between a rock and hard place

If rebel groups separate from Jabhat Fateh al-Sham and the ceasefire collapses  which it almost certainly will  the overall armed opposition will be more divided, and Jabhat Fateh al-Sham may target those groups.

When it was al-Nusra Front, it did not shy away from attacking other rebels. For example, it forced two western-backed groups to disband altogether.

If the rebels do not or cannot separate, they risk being targeted by the regime, Russia and even the US. As such, the opposition is stuck between a rock and hard place. The regime and its allies do not face that kind of pressure under this cessation of hostilities.

The architects of the agreement are overlooking the extent to which various rebel groups cooperate with Jabhat Faeth al-Sham out of strategic necessity rather than ideological convergence.

With regard to the latter aspect, for example, the Free Syrian Army and Jabhat Fateh al-Sham have nothing in common.

Given all these considerations, even if the agreement is not meant to benefit the regime  which can be hotly disputed, particularly regarding Russian intentions  it may do so in any case.

The irony is that this truce may lead to more war or to pacification, but not to peace.

Sharif Nashashibi is an award-winning journalist and analyst on Arab affairs.

The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial policy.
There's a Good Reason Christians Rarely Take Up Arms in the Middle East

We are accustomed to seeing Christians in the Middle East as always being victims of discrimination and violence. And so they are, and have been for centuries, suffering from laws (even now) which reject their claims to equal citizenship, and from sporadic but frequent and terrifying instances of persecution or mob violence. In recent years sectarian violence has approached such a crescendo that the very existence of Christianity in the region of its birth has been put in doubt. Why don't Christians then take up arms, as some other persecuted groups have done? The Druze of Lebanon, who offend Islamic orthodoxy by their belief in reincarnation and liberal reinterpretation of the Koran, are famously ruthless fighters. The Alawites of Syria proved such effective soldiers that they took over first the country's military and then its government. Leaving aside questions of principle -- the region already has more than enough armed men -- the pragmatic answer is that it usually wouldn't work. Christians are too divided to form any kind of unified political party, let alone a military unit. There are more than 20 different Christian denominations in the region and not since the advent of Islam have they ever come together to act as one. Furthermore, most Christians are urban and many are middle class without military experience and with the option of emigration to the West. Finally, the precedents are so ominous that they would hardly expect anything good to come from putting their heads above the parapet in such an obvious way. Chief among those precedents is that of the Armenian and Assyrian Christians in the early 20th century. Both groups, living under Ottoman rule but accused of covert collaboration with the Ottomans' Russian enemies, were subjected as a consequence to a genocidal campaign of massacre, rape and deportation. In the beautiful town of Mardin, southern Turkey, some years ago I took care to read the inscriptions on the lintels of the local restaurants and hotels; they showed that these had once been the homes of Assyrian Christians. None lives there now. The Assyrians were a tight-knit group, bound together by ethnic as well as religious ties. Survivors who fled to Iraq, then under British rule, hoped that the British would give them some form of autonomy, or even independence. Instead, history would repeat itself. After Iraq was granted independence, clashes between Assyrian and Iraqi soldiers led to a general massacre of Assyrians -- an event which partly inspired the definition of "genocide". Another more recent precedent is the Lebanese Civil War of the 1970s and 1980s between Lebanon's former Christian ruling class and their Muslim opponents, which ultimately led to the country's domination by its neighbour Syria. So what should we make of the existence of Christian militias in Syria, fighting alongside the Kurds to defeat ISIS? Many are composed of Assyrians, the same group that suffered in Iraq. Will it end differently for them this time? There are quite a few of these militias, all of them aimed at fighting ISIS. These groups are doing what most of us would do if we lived in such a lawless place: defending their villages from an enemy that will show them no mercy and brooks no compromise. In doing so, however, they enter a web of tangled moral choices. Such groups need weapons and support. Some find that by aligning with Bashar al-Assad's blood-soaked regime. Others look to the rebel Kurdish forces operating in the country's north-east. So they are unified now by a necessary war against radical Islam; but one day, if the Syrian state and the Kurds come to blows, they will be divided again. Life in the Middle East can often involve rawer, more dangerous choices than we will ever have to make.
The controversial start of the presidential election campaign means the upcoming months are bound to be nasty.

The burkini hysteria of summer 2016 has once again turned France into the laughing stock of the Western, if not of the entire, world.

It took weeks of controversy and the seizing of the countrys highest administrative authority  the Council of the State  to reaffirm the right for women to dress as they please in public space.

Last week, it turned out that former President Nicolas Sarkozy had himself orchestrated everything by pressuring mayors from his political party The Republicans to issue the ban.

As well as showing once again the irresponsible nature of the man, this revelation answers the question who benefits from the crime.

Humiliating a weak minority

Barely nine months before the 2017 presidential election in France, Nicolas Sarkozys move was intended to anchor debate in a clash of identities rather than a clash of concrete and ambitious projects for France.

Not surprisingly, he succeeded in setting the tone for the election without any resistance from his presidential rivals.

By following in the footsteps of Sarkozy, the right and even the left  as represented by Prime Minister Manuel Valls  have implicitly admitted that they agree on the failed neoliberal policies of Francois Hollande, and that there is no turning back from austerity nor going back to the welfare state.

It is admittedly inconceivable for such a trivial issue as a bathing suit worn by a few women to spark a national debate.

Over nine million French people live below the poverty line; yet economics, unemployment, staggering inequalities, institutional failures, a weakening schooling system, the environment, health coverage system deficit and pension funds are all being ignored through systematic 'Islamodiversion' with burkini as the latest illustration. by

This further calls into question the real motives of the protagonists. The French political landscape is by and large dominated by white males above 50, and none of them voiced loud support for female politicians when they complained about sexism in politics or even sexual harassment.

In a country where a woman is raped every 40 minutes, where 200,000 women are victims of domestic violence and where the salary gap between men and women represents a whopping 15 percent on average, such staunch voices supporting womens rights would have been welcome.

Behind the call for womens rights, politicians blew the dog whistle to issue new measures meant to humiliate a weak minority while making political gains.

Exposed

The burkini ban even revealed the underlying threat against French democracy itself. Rather than supporting the Council of the States decision and upholding the rule of law, Manuel Valls declared that the debate must continue  after having supported the ban.

On the other hand  and after orchestrating the controversy  Sarkozy said that the French constitution should be changed in order to allow the burkini ban. Yes, the constitution!

In the meantime, right-wing candidates took the stage in their respective constituencies.

In a cheeky attempt to rewrite history and negate the massacres of millions of people, Sarkozys former Prime Minister Francois Fillon singled out Muslims by indirectly naming them as the sole problematic community in France, and even that France should be proud of its colonial legacy.

Moreover, Alain Juppe, 73, who was Jacques Chiracs prime minister in the 1990s, invoked the idea of a contractual agreement on the principles of secularism between France and Muslims, as if the latter were newly arrived immigrants and had not been established for decades.

OPINION: Burkini ban  New wave of French mission civilisatrice

The sole winner of this kind of one-upmanship is none other than Marine Le Pen, the far-right leader who has remained silent throughout the summer.

She did not need to comment, nor intervene as all the other candidates were doing her job of campaigning solely on identity issues.

The real sufferers

The biggest losers, however, are the French people. More than nine million of them live below the poverty line; yet economics, unemployment, staggering inequalities, institutional failures, a weakening schooling system, the environment, health coverage system deficit and pension funds are all being ignored through systematic Islamodiversion, with burkini as the latest illustration.

French people are being fooled, but they should only blame themselves. For decades they have failed to adopt a shared French identity, and are still battling to impose a dominant one.

Without much resistance, they have given their blessings to the normalisation of racism in public discourse, and many of them are enjoying this state of national neurosis.

OPINION: Reforming Islam or the relationship with Islam?

Nearly seven million voted for Marine Le Pen during the last regional elections, and all polls put her in the top three for the presidential election, even though she brings no concrete policies to the table.

So far, the task for bringing sound debates on socioeconomic issues lies on the shoulders of the social movements against labour reform, which are planning to take to the streets again.

Even though those social movements are fragmented, their mobilisation has a chance to succeed if they radicalise and become more inclusive for all those who took the brunt of austerity  including the banlieue.

As French sociologist Louis Chauvel says, we are witnessing the expiration of a large majority of the political and intellectual sphere who still live in a world that others have seen disappear for 30 years.

Yet, those people are still in charge and still hoping to go on. As long as it is ruled by political midgets, France will never rise again.

The early and violent start of the presidential election campaign means the forthcoming months are bound to be nasty and no one can expect any voice of reason to emerge.

The countrys political system has been shouting that is outdated, but who will hear the call and who will act to change it?

Yasser Louati is a French human rights and civil liberties activist. His work focuses on Islamophobia, national security policies and social justice for minorities.

The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial policy.
Syrian forces and rebels accuse each other of breaking fragile ceasefire, as aid lorries are held up for another day.

Convoys carrying humanitarian aid to Syrias besieged Aleppo city have been held up for yet another day, as fighting between Syrian forces and rebels outside Damascus raised concerns about whether a fragile ceasefire could hold.

The fighting on Friday was described as some of the most serious since the truce came into effect on Monday, with both the government and rebels accusing each other of breaching the US-Russia brokered agreement.





In a sign of rising tensions, Washington told Moscow on Friday that potential military cooperation in Syria would not happen unless it pressured the Syrian government to allow aid into besieged areas.

The US and Russia agreed last week to set up a committee that would enable joint targeting of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) and Jabhat Fateh al-Sham groups in Syria if a ceasefire held for seven days and unfettered humanitarian aid was allowed to flow into the country.

Aid for Aleppo, however, has been stuck on the Turkish border for five days now, with the UN calling on the Syrian government to immediately allow life-saving supplies into the citys rebel-held areas, where about 300,000 people are living under siege.

In a phone call on Friday to his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov, US Secretary of State John Kerry condemned repeated and unacceptable delays of humanitarian aid, according to John Kirby, a State Department spokesman.

OPINION: Ceasefire terms pose major risks for Syrian rebels

Kerry told Lavrov that Washington expects Russia to use its influence on the Assad regime to allow UN humanitarian convoys to reach Aleppo and other areas in need, Kirby said

The two countries back opposite sides in the conflict, with Moscow supporting the government of President Bashar al-Assad and the US supporting a coalition of rebel groups.

Both ISIL and Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, the group formerly known as al-Nusra Front, are excluded from the ceasefire.

The US and Russia agree on the value of extending the cessation of hostilities, despite some continuing violence, Kirby said.

Russia on Friday said that only its ally, the Assad government, was respecting the ceasefire, but nevertheless suggested that the truce be prolonged by a further 72 hours.





The Kremlin also said that it was using its influence to try to ensure the Syrian army fully implemented the ceasefire agreement and that it hoped the US would also use its influence with rebel groups.

Truce violations

Hours-long fighting and shelling erupted in neighborhoods on the edges of Damascus on Friday, with activists and residents calling the clashes the heaviest in the Syrian capital for weeks.

State media said rebels violated the ceasefire by shelling government-held areas in the eastern Damascus neighborhood of Qaboun, wounding three people.

According to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the fighting between government troops and rebels was concentrated in the neighbourhood of Jobar, next to Qaboun, where rebels have had a presence for years.

OPINION: Inside Bashar al-Assads mind

Mazen al-Shami, an opposition activist near Damascus, said government forces tried to storm Jobar but were repelled by opposition fighters.

This is one of the most serious violations of the ceasefire, al-Shami told the Associated Press news agency via Skype.

There are violations, but it has been made very clear by the US and Russia that this was expected, said Al Jazeeras Stefanie Dekker, reporting from Kilis on the Turkish side of the border with Syria.

The levels [of violence] are by no means to call this [ceasefire] off.

Despite the real reduction in violence, continued Dekker, the UN has said it is incredibly frustrated over not being able to obtain the necessary permits from the Syrian government to let aid into Syria.

READ MORE: UN appeals for passage of Aleppo aid

As part of the deal, the strategic Castello Road leading into rebel-held eastern Aleppo was meant to be demilitarised for aid to enter.

The United Nations had hoped that 40 lorries of food would be delivered there as part of the truce.

There seems to be little pullback by both sides [Syrian government and rebels] on that road to allow this aid in, Al Jazeeras Charles Stratford, reporting from Gaziantep on the Turkish border with Syria, said.

Moscow said the Syrian army had begun to withdraw from Castello Road on Friday but was forced to return after its forces came under attack by rebels using small arms fire, Stratford said, quoting Russian officials.

Later on Friday, the UN Security Council cancelled an urgent meeting to discuss the Syria ceasefire deal at the request of the US and Russia, according to diplomats.

The meeting had been called to allow US and Russian envoys to present details of the joint agreement, including the delivery of aid and joint military operations.

Earlier reports had quoted Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin as saying on Thursday that he hoped the council would adopt a resolution endorsing the truce deal at next weeks high-level General Assembly.

In a separate development, air strikes on Friday reportedly killed 23 civilians and wounded 20 others near Deir Az Zor, an eastern town controlled by ISIL. The attacks in al-Mayadin hit a school housing civilians who had fled the violence, according to the Syrian Observatory.

The monitoring group said at least half of those killed were women and children, adding that it was unclear who had carried out the raids.
Progress in Cambodia in reducing deaths from tuberculosis could be short-lived as future funding could be in doubt.

Soth Srey Touchs sister died two months ago from a disease that antibiotics could have treated.

Her sister was 43 years old when she was diagnosed with tuberculosis, but it was just too late.

She was told that she had tuberculosis, but she was already too sick, Srey Touch, a resident of the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh, told Al Jazeera.

TB is treatable with antibiotics, but poor access to healthcare means many in Cambodia are, like Srey Touchs sister, still victims of a preventable death.

Decades of civil war left Cambodias medical infrastructure in tatters and this country of some 15 million people has one of the highest rates of TB worldwide.

But years of effort have resulted in the number of people dying from the disease dropping by 67 percent in Cambodia, Al Jazeeras Wayne Hay, reporting from Phnom Penh, said.

Cambodia still has one of the highest rates of tuberculosis infection in the world, but the statistics are heading in the right direction quickly, he said.

READ MORE: Cambodia  unlicensed to Heal

In Cambodia, the battle against the disease is fought not in hospitals, but in communities across the country where government health workers and NGO volunteers go door to door in the most at-risk neighbourhoods.

Raising awareness about the disease, the health workers make sure that suspected cases are screened and that patients who are being treated take their course of medication each day until they are TB-free.

Accessibility needs to continue to be improved, especially in areas where they live very far from the health centres, said Jacqueline Chen, who works with Operation Asha, an Indian NGO focused on eradicating the disease.

It is in those more remote areas that awarness about TB is not so strong, Chen said.





Thanks to money from aid groups, including the Global Fund, and other donors, the government has worked with NGOs to rebuild and decentralise healthcare, and there are now 1,300 community health centres that provide free TB screening and treatment.

So far the Global Fund  which provides funds to fight Aids, TB and malaria worldwide  has spent more than $40m fighting TB in Cambodia.

But because of Cambodias relative economic success and development, international aid funds are now leaving and going to other, poorer, countries.

Some fear that a reduction in funding to fight the disease will see a return TB levels of the past.

While Cambodia has done a good job so for of combating the disease, there is a concern that without continued funding, much of the good work could be undone, Al Jazeeras Hay said.
A US House of Representatives intelligence committee report has called Edward Snowden, the National Security Agency (NSA) leaker, a serial exaggerator and fabricator who does not fit the profile of a whistleblower.

The Republican-led committee released a three-page unclassified summary of its two-year bipartisan examination on Thursday, which details how Snowden was able to remove the documents from secure NSA networks, what information the documents contained, and the damage their removal caused to US national security.

Adam Schiff, a Democratic member of the House intelligence committee, said the investigation revealed that the vast majority of what Snowden took had nothing to do with American privacy.

The majority of what he took has to do with military secrets and defence secrets, Schiff said in an interview for C-SPANs Newsmakers.

I think thats very much at odds with the narrative that he wants to tell that he is a whistleblower.

In a series of tweets, Snowden, 33, dismissed the House committees report as artlessly distorted and a serious act of bad faith.

Their report is so artlessly distorted that it would be amusing if it weren't such a serious act of bad faith. Let's take examples:  Edward Snowden (@Snowden) September 15, 2016

Snowden was an NSA contract employee when he took the documents and leaked them to journalists who revealed extensive domestic surveillance programmes begun in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.

Snowden fled to Hong Kong, then Russia, to avoid prosecution and now wants a presidential pardon because he says he helped his country by revealing secret domestic surveillance programmes.

The programmes collected the telephone metadata records of millions of Americans and examined emails from overseas.

Snowdens attorney also criticised the House committees report, which was released on the eve of the opening of the film Snowden on Thursday.

Snowdens revelations about the agencys bulk collection of millions of Americans phone records set off a fierce debate that pitted civil libertarians concerned about privacy against more politicians fearful about losing tools to combat terrorism.

Perceived slights

Devin Nunes, chairman of the House intelligence committee, said Snowden betrayed his colleagues and his country.

He put our service members and the American people at risk after perceived slights by his superiors, Nunes said in a statement.

In light of his long list of exaggerations and outright fabrications detailed in this report, no one should take him at his word. I look forward to his eventual return to the United States, where he will face justice for his damaging crimes.

Snowden insists he has not shared the full cache of 1.5 million classified documents with anyone. However, the report notes that in June, the deputy chairman of the Russian parliaments defence and security committee publicly conceded that Snowden did share intelligence with his government.

READ MORE: The world is apparently awash in terror masterminds

Ben Wizner, Snowdens lawyer at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), said the committee report was an attempt to discredit a genuine American hero.

After years of investigation, the committee still cant point to any remotely credible evidence that Snowdens disclosures caused harm, Wizner said.

After "two years of investigation," the government charges I faked a sick day and have a GED? Did they not watch the Guardian interview?  Edward Snowden (@Snowden) September 15, 2016

The committee, on the other hand, called Snowden a disgruntled employee who had frequent conflicts with his managers.

According to the committee, Snowden began mass downloads of classified material two weeks after he was reprimanded for engaging in a spat with NSA managers.

The committee also described Snowden as a serial exaggerator and fabricator.

A close review of Snowdens official employment records and submissions reveals a pattern of intentional lying, the report said.

He claimed to have left Army basic training because of broken legs when in fact he washed out because of shin splints. He claimed to have obtained a high school degree equivalent when in fact he never did.

Army held me for weeks in a special unit for convalescence before separation. I left on crutches. They don't do that for "shin splints."  Edward Snowden (@Snowden) September 15, 2016

The report said Snowden claimed to have worked for the CIA as a senior adviser, when he was a computer technician.

He also doctored his performance evaluations and obtained new positions at NSA by exaggerating his resume and stealing the answers to an employment test, the report said.

Speaking by video link from Moscow, Snowden said on Wednesday that whistleblowing is democracys safeguard of last resort, the one on which we rely when all other checks and balances have failed and the public has no idea whats going on behind closed doors.

He addressed a New York City news conference where advocates from the ACLU, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International announced an online petition drive to urge Obama to pardon Snowden before he leaves office.

The Obama administration has urged Snowden to return to the US and face trial.
Both pro-government forces and Houthis suffer losses as they clash in area overlooking strategic Bab al-Mandab Strait.

Dozens of people have been killed in heavy fighting between Houthi rebels and pro-government forces in Yemens war-torn central city of Taiz.

Sadeq al-Hassani, a spokesman for forces loyal to the countrys exiled President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, said on Thursday that 27 Houthis and 13 pro-government fighters were killed in clashes around Taiz, the AFP news agency reported.

On Wednesday, pro-government officials had reported that five Houthis were killed when loyalists backed by Arab coalition air strikes fought off a rebel assault in Kahbub, a mountainous area overlooking the strategic Bab al-Mandab Strait at the entrance to the Red Sea.





Al Jazeera cannot independently verify the death tolls and the rebels rarely acknowledge their losses.

More than 200,000 civilians have been caught up in the fighting in Taiz, a city between the rebel-held capital of Sanaa and the southern port city of Aden, which has become one of the major front lines in the battle for control of Yemen.

For months, aid agencies have warned of a major humanitarian disaster in the city. There are frequent reports of dire food and water shortages, and of hospitals struggling to function without access to fresh medical supplies.

Yemen has been torn apart by conflict since 2014, when Houthi rebels, allied with troops loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, captured large expanses of the country, including Sanaa.

The Arab coalition, assembled by Saudi Arabia, launched an air campaign against the rebels in March 2015.

Since then, more than 10,000 people have been killed and 2.8 million driven from their homes.

Across the country, at least 14 million people, more than half of the population, are in need of emergency food and life-saving assistance.
Democratic candidate returns to campaign trail as Trump campaign says he believes President Obama was born in the US.

Hillary Clinton is back on the campaign trail and has accused rival Donald Trump of fostering ugliness and bigotry by refusing to acknowledge that President Barack Obama was born in the US.

Taking the stage shortly after Obama on Thursday, Clinton noted at a gala of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute in Washington DC that Trump had declined to acknowledge the outgoing president had been born in the US.

Trump, who helped to fuel the rise of the so-called Birther Movement, told The Washington Post newspaper in an interview that he would answer that question at the right time. I just dont want to answer it yet.

READ MORE: Why Donald Trump might win

He was asked one more time where was President Obama born and he still wouldnt say Hawaii. He still wouldnt say America, Clinton said.

This man wants to be our next president? When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?

The Trump campaign released a statement late on Thursday saying Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.

It also made an accusation that Clinton launched the Birther Movement during her unsuccessful primary run against Obama in 2008.

Clintons appeal

Obama and Clinton made successive appeals to 3,000 Hispanic leaders and supporters on Thursday, pointing to a large turnout of Latino voters as the antidote to Trump.

Both noted the Republicans hard line on immigration, referring to his opposition to a comprehensive overhaul of the system and his pledge to build a wall along the Mexican border.

Obama said that the political seasons discussion of immigration has cut deeper than in years past. Its a little more personal, a little meaner, a little uglier.

He said Latinos need to decide who the real America is and push back against the notion that the nation only includes a few of us.





We cant let that brand of politics win. And if we band together and organise our communities, if we deliver enough votes, then the better angels of our nature will carry the day, Obama said.

The rally marked Clintons first public appearance since Sunday, when she abruptly left a 9/11 memorial service after getting dizzy and dehydrated.

She had been diagnosed with pneumonia on Friday, but the campaign informed the public only after the video of an ill Clinton emerged.

Clinton on Thursday promised again to complete Obamas unsuccessful push to achieve comprehensive immigration reform, including a pathway to citizenship for the estimated 11 million immigrants who are in the country illegally.

She reiterated her intention to release a plan to overhaul the immigration system during her first 100 days in office and expand programmes that have protected some groups of immigrants from deportation, including those who arrived in the US as children and the parents of US citizens and legal permanent residents.

Divisive rhetoric

Pointing to the benefits of a diverse nation, Clinton seized upon Trumps unwillingness to say Obama was born in the US and his past support for the Birther Movement questioning Obamas citizenship.

We need to stand up and repudiate this divisive rhetoric, Clinton said. We need to stop him conclusively in November in an election that sends a message that even he can hear.

While Obama and his potential successor did not appear onstage together, they did chat for about 15 minutes backstage. The event represented a passing of the torch before a key Democratic constituency.

Obama captured 71 percent of Latino voters against Republican Mitt Romney in 2012, a lopsided outcome that Clinton hopes to replicate with about eight weeks remaining before Election Day.

READ MORE: Five things to know if Clinton or Trump were to drop out

Facing tightening polls against Trump, Clinton could find that her ability to garner big margins from Hispanics will be critical in battleground states such as Florida, Nevada and Colorado.

Obama made no mention of Trump by name but alluded to his candidacy, saying if the nation is going to fix the immigration system, then were going to have to push back against bluster and falsehoods and promises of higher walls. We need a comprehensive solution.

Obamas attempt to shield parents from deportation is in limbo after the Supreme Court deadlocked on a decision in a case challenging the presidents authority to expand the deportation protection programme.

Obama is stepping up his campaign activities on behalf of Clinton.
Khurram Parvezs arrest follows Indian officials move to stop him from attending UN rights council session in Geneva.

Police in Indian-administered Kashmir have arrested a prominent human rights activist, a day after he was barred from travelling to Switzerland to participate in a session of the UN Human Rights Council.

Khurram Parvez, the chairman of Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances, was arrested at his home in Srinagar, the capital of Jammu and Kashmir state, late on Thursday, police said.

On Wednesday, immigration officials at New Delhis international airport barred Parvez from boarding a plane to Geneva even though he had a valid visa and letter of invitation from the UN body.

Authorities told [Pervez] that due to orders from the Intelligence Bureau, he cannot travel to Geneva, Parvez Imroz, the president of the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society, said in a statement.

On 64th day of civil uprising, India succeeded in killing 2 more Kashmiris but has failed to kill the demand for FREEDOM.  Khurram Parvez (@KhurramParvez) September 10, 2016

It appears that Khurram Parvez is not being allowed to travel because he has been highlighting violations of human rights.

Parvezs arrest comes as the divided Himalayan region is in the midst of some of most widespread anti-India protests in recent years.

Thousands of people have been protesting against Indian rule in Kashmir almost daily since the killing of a young separatist commander in a gun battle with Indian soldiers on July 8.

IN PICTURES: Pellet guns cause severe eye injuries in Kashmir

Since then, at least 82 people have been killed and more than 11,000 wounded, including more than 100 blinded by pellet injuries.

Kashmir has been divided between India and Pakistan since the two gained independence from British rule in 1947. Both claim the territory in full.

Several separatist groups have for decades fought Indian soldiers  currently numbering around 500,000 deployed in the territory  demanding independence for the region or its merger with Pakistan.

Tens of thousands of people, mostly civilians, have died in the fighting.
Three Palestinians and one Jordanian shot and killed by Israeli troops in separate incidents after alleged attacks.

Three Palestinians and one Jordanian man have been shot and killed by Israeli forces in separate areas across the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem in less than 24 hours.

The first incident on Friday occured at the Damascus Gate entrance to East Jerusalems Old City. Israeli police said the man, who was carrying a Jordanian ID, attempted to stab Israeli soldiers with a knife.

The unidentified man, 28, was shot dead at the scene.

Police said an investigation had been launched as to why he carried out the attack.

OPINION: Israel-Palestine, a way to end the occupation

Al Jazeeras Imran Khan, reporting from Jerusalem, said the man had come in through the Allenby bridge crossing from Jordan on Thursday, according to Israeli police.





The second incident on Friday took place at a bus junction near the Israeli settlement of Kiryat Arba in Hebron. A Palestinian man driving a car with a female passenger allegedly rammed the vehicle into a civilian bus stop, the Israeli military said in a statement.

Forces at the scene fired at the vehicle resulting in the death of one of the assailants while the other was wounded, the army said.

The military added that three Israelis were wounded, one critically.

The Palestinian health ministry identified the killed man as Fares Khadour.

Fridays third incident took place in the Tel Rumeida neighbourhood of Hebron in the occupied West Bank when Israeli forces shot dead a Palestinian man who allegedly attempted to stab a soldier.

OPINION: Israel and Palestine, breaking the cycle of violence

In a separate incident late on Thursday, Israeli forces shot a Palestinian man during a military raid in the village of Beit Ula, in the southern occupied West Bank district of Hebron.

The man, identified as Mohamed al-Sarrahin, died of his wounds later on Thursday.

In the latest wave of increased violence in the occupied Palestinian territories since October 2015, it is estimated that Israeli troops and settlers are responsible for the killing of at least 225 Palestinians, including unarmed demonstrators, bystanders and alleged attackers.

Thirty-five Israelis were also killed in stabbing and shooting incidents carried out by Palestinians.

Palestinians are frustrated by Israels decades-long occupation and with peace talks going nowhere.

There is a lot of concern here between Palestinians and Israelis that if something is not done in terms of a peace process, then these attacks are just going to continue, Al Jazeeras Khan said.
Court rules in the central governments favour that the Futenma airbase be moved to a sparse area in Okinawas north.

A Japanese court has approved plans to relocate a US military base on the island of Okinawa, in a decision likely to anger locals who want to see American military presence removed altogether.

Tokyo wants to move the unpopular Futenma marine airbase from a crowded residential district to a sparsely populated area in the northern part of the island, but the plan has been opposed by many locals, including Okinawan governor Takeshi Onaga.

A judge in the prefectural capital of Naha ruled on Friday in favour of the central government, a court spokesman said, in the first judicial decision over the disputed reclamation.

There is no choice but to go ahead with the landfill in order to reduce the trouble at Futenma, presiding judge Toshiro Tamiya told the court, according to Jiji Press.





The dispute has seen Onaga and Prime Minister Shinzo Abes government file rival lawsuits as local authorities have blocked plans to reclaim land for the relocation  a priority for Tokyo as it seeks to satisfy its ally, the US.

After the verdict, Onaga told local media that he would appeal to the Supreme Court and pledged to do whatever he could to block the relocation.

Tokyo and Washington first proposed moving the airbase in 1996, while insisting it must remain on Okinawa  a strategic island in the East China Sea from where US troops and aircraft can react to potential conflicts throughout Asia.

READ MORE: Voices of Okinawa  Standing against a US military base

The roots of the presence goes back to the end of World War II when Okinawa was the site of a battle between Japan and the US, followed by a 27-year US occupation.

Violent crimes have prompted large-scale protest demonstrations before on Okinawa.

In 1995, tens of thousands rallied following the rape by three American personnel of a 12-year-old girl. The protests prompted Washington to pledge to reduce the US footprint on the fortified island.

Nearly 100,000 people joined a protest in 2010 against the building of the new base off the northern coast.

US officials have also grown increasingly concerned that the behaviour of its troops on the island could jeopardise support among Japanese for the security relationship.

Washington has imposed restrictions, including on off-base alcohol consumption ban after an intoxicated sailor injured two locals while driving this month.
Protesters vent anger against Pena Nieto over his handling of drug violence, corruption and his meeting with Trump.

As Mexico gears up for its Independence Day celebrations, protesters have taken to the streets of the capital to demand the presidents resignation.

Thousands of people gathered in Mexico City on Thursday, demanding that Enrique Pena Nieto resign over his handling of drug violence, corruption and his recent meeting with Republican White House hopeful Donald Trump.

Demonstrators waving blackened flags of Mexico marched across the capital towards the Zocalo Square, where the president traditionally stands on a balcony of the National Palace the night before the holiday to replicate the grito, or shout of independence, made in 1810.

Riot police stood near the Zocalo to block access to protesters, who marched under the rallying cry resign now.

READ MORE: Mexico drug war fuels private security boom

Parents of 43 students missing since September 26, 2014, joined the protest, with people angry at the governments failure to solve the case almost two years after they were abducted by police and allegedly killed by a drug cartel.

Trump has angered Mexicans by demanding that the country pay for a border wall and describing migrants as rapists.

Other protests unfolded elsewhere, with hundreds demonstrating peacefully in the western city of Guadalajara.

But in the southern city of Oaxaca police used tear gas to repel teachers from a radical union opposed to Pena Nietos education reform.





They responded by throwing rocks and launching fireworks at the officers. One person was injured.

Pena Nieto, who took office in December 2012, has seen his approval rating sink to 23 percent in a recent survey by Reforma newspaper.

He has been haunted by older scandals, notably the disappearance of the 43 students.

Pena Nieto has also come under fire over his wifes purchase of a mansion from a government contractor, prompting him to issue a rare apology although the couple denied any wrongdoing.

READ MORE: Donald Trump doubles down on deportation plan

In recent days, Mexican authorities have been investigating a bus drivers allegations that armed men abducted 15 passengers this week in the violence-plagued northern state of Tamaulipas.

An official in the federal attorney generals office, who requested anonymity because he was not authorised to speak publicly, told AFP news agency on Thursday the investigation was opened after multiple media reports and that there was an order to investigate the list of passengers who travelled on the bus.

More than 28,000 people have been reported missing in Mexico in the past decade, including 5,700 in Tamaulipas alone.








UN says most of those fleeing South Sudan are women and children, including survivors of violent attacks.

The number of refugees from South Sudan has passed one million after renewed violence in July forced thousands to flee to neighbouring countries, creating one of the worlds worst humanitarian disasters, according to the United Nations.

South Sudan, the worlds youngest nation, has now joined Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia as countries which have produced more than a million refugees, Leo Dobbs, spokesman for the UN refugee agency, the UNHCR, said on Friday.

This is a very sad milestone, he added.

Most of those fleeing South Sudan are women and children. They include survivors of violent attacks, sexual assault, children that have been separated from their parents or travelled alone, the disabled, the elderly and people in need of urgent medical care, he said.

Number of S.Sudanese #refugees passes 1 million, including almost 200,000 since fresh fighting erupted in July. https://t.co/XFmxQPwMIE  Leo Dobbs (@LDUNHCR) September 16, 2016

About 185,000 people have fled the country since early July, when fierce fighting flared in the capital Juba, between supporters of President Salva Kiir and Riek Machar, then-vice president.

Both civilians and foreigners, including aid workers, were targeted in the July chaos by soldiers who raped women and girls, conducted mock executions and forced people at one hotel compound to watch as they executed a local journalist.

That fighting has shattered hopes for a real breakthrough and triggered new waves of displacement and suffering, Dobbs said. More than 1.6 million people were displaced within the country, he added.

South Sudan gained independence from Sudan in 2011, but civil war erupted two years later when Kiir accused Machar of plotting a coup.

A peace deal reached a year ago under international pressure has been violated repeatedly by fighting, and Machar fled the country in recent weeks.





Refugees and kleptocrats

According the the UN, neighbouring Uganda hosts the largest number of South Sudanese refugees, more than 373,000, and more than 20,000 arrived there just in the past week.

Ethiopia, Kenya, Sudan, Democratic Republic of Congo and Central African Republic also have received tens of thousands of people fleeing.

Many refugees arrive exhausted after days walking in the bush and going without food or water. Many children have lost one or both of their parents, Dobbs said.

South Sudans landmark one million refugees comes in a week that the countrys leaders were accused of amassing a huge fortune at the expense of the state.

The Sentry Group, founded by US actor George Clooney and rights activist John Prendergast, alleged on Monday that President Kiir, Machar and those close to them had looted state coffers, accumulated luxury homes and cars, and enriched themselves and family members through stakes in oil and other business ventures.

In its report, the US-based watchdog said the leaders and their families often live in multimillion-dollar mansions outside the country, stay in five-star hotels, reap the benefits of what appears to be a system of nepotism and shady corporate deals, and drive around in luxury cars.

Responding to the allegations, presidential spokesman Ateny Wek Ateny said they were completely rubbish and legal action would be taken against the Sentry group.

The watchdogs report also implicated international banks, businesses, arms brokers, property companies and lawyers in knowingly or unknowingly facilitating the violent kleptocracy that South Sudan has become.
Here are some reactions to an interview with the Australian Immigration Minister, Peter Dutton, on Talk to Al Jazeera.

Judith Reen, former teacher on Nauru:

It is a distortion to state that Australia is one of the most generous providers of humanitarian places in the world.

As Robin Davies, of the Refugee Council of Australia, states, refugees resettled through the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) make up less than 0.45 percent of the worlds displaced people.

Minister Dutton [Peter, the Australian immigration minister] refers to the 18,000 resettled in Australia through UNHCR, while official figures state 13,750 is Australias base-line intake and a further 12,000 from Syria have been pledged  but after one year only around 3,000 of the additional quota have been resettled.

While it is important to process applications in an orderly fashion, it is also important to recognise the urgency of the worlds largest refugee crisis in history.

Cherry picking data does nothing to help those in immediate and dire need.

If the Australian programme is, as Minister Dutton claimed in his interview, based on permanent resettlement, why then were Temporary Protection Visas (TPVs) re-introduced on October 18, 2013?

TPV holders are Australias second-class refugees and have a three-year visa with no family reunion or travel rights.

TPVs are discriminatory and hinder resettlement. Australia is the only country to grant such visas to those found to be owed protection and, as Dutton himself stated on April 4, 2016, there are now 28,290 people living on temporary protection visas in Australia.

Despite Minister Duttons claims, people arriving by boat and seeking asylum have not broken Australian or international law.

They are not illegal. An overwhelming majority of asylum seekers arriving by boat are found to be refugees, and those on Manus and Nauru are no exception.

Minister Dutton states that they can go home and fails to acknowledge that the very definition of a refugee is someone who cannot go home due to well-founded fear of persecution.

The Rohingya students in my class were stateless, the unaccompanied Hazara boys in my class fled the Taliban and bore the scars, our school captain was a Syrian from Aleppo, the Iraqis were fleeing ISIS. None of them could go home.

If Minister Dutton does not want to see these children any where but a loving home, he will abide by the principle of non-refoulement as enshrined in the Refugee Convention and act now to resettle them in a safe and permanent manner.

The minister states that we spend hundreds of millions of dollars to assist refugees in Indonesia, Regional Processing Centres and on shore. Meanwhile we have spent A$9.6bn on offshore processing alone since 2013.

I can tell you unequivocally that the average Nauruan citizen, and those left in limbo on Nauru and Manus both within and outside of the camp, would not consider themselves assisted by this funding.

They are still living in substandard conditions and still do not have permanent resettlement options.

Like Minister Dutton I too am proud of the way in which Australia humanely resettles the lucky few beneficiaries of Australias humanitarian intake.

I am in fact the daughter of one of the 90,000 who arrived between 1949 and 1950 and were accepted as refugees without a period of inhumane detention.

This was a time in which Australia took record numbers of humanitarian entrants. Since the UNCHRs inception the greatest number of refugees accepted into Australia was the intake of 1980-81 under Malcolm Fraser, which was 22,545.

While Minister Dutton claims we are receiving record numbers of refugees, this number clearly exceeds the actual intake for 2015-16 of 13,750 as well as about 3,000 additional Syrians.

Minister Dutton repeatedly states the need for an orderly migration programme, refusing to acknowledge that fleeing persecution and war does not happen in an orderly fashion.

This is why other countries such as Germany, the UK, Sweden and Canada process asylum-seeker claims in country regardless of mode of arrival.

In 2015 Sweden received 35,800 unaccompanied minors alone. This was five times their quota for 2014. That is how you deal with the facts and respond to a refugee crisis.

I worked with 29 unaccompanied minors who were forced on to planes on Christmas Island and assured that they were privileged to be going to a processing centre where their claims and thus resettlement would be expedited.

They are still there. Other unaccompanied minors who remained on Christmas Island are now settled in Australia. This is an arbitrary, not orderly process.

In response to the Moss Review, three to five Australian Federal Police staff have been stationed on Nauru in a training capacity with an explicit mandate not to be involved in investigations.

The NPF (Nauru Police Force) lacks the training and facilities to properly investigate allegations. There are no forensic tools, for example which can be used to conduct investigations into sexual assault.

During my contract on Nauru there were no police officers trained to manage the clinical and forensic interviewing of children and families in a non-leading and sensitive manner.

There was no child protection framework and no independent oversight of the ad hoc investigations which were conducted.

I would like to respectfully refute Minister Duttons claims that none of the allegations relating to Wilsons guards was investigated by Wilsons.

I refer to one such incident on 3/9/15 in which a female asylum seeker was advised by a Nauruan guard not to press charges against a fellow Nauruan guard who physically assaulted her 14-year-old son.

The incident was dealt with by the Wilsons investigation team which is clearly a conflict of interest.

Wilsons had responsibility for deciding which complaints made within the Regional Processing Centre would be referred to the Nauru Police Force, minimising the number of allegations subject to criminal investigation.

Evidence submitted to the Senate Inquiry into Allegations and Conditions on Nauru, August 2015, stated that those investigations which were passed on to the NPF were frequently misplaced and not pursued.

Those who made such complaints were often subject to threats and harassment by guards within the centre in an effort to coerce them to withdraw their complaints.

As Minister Dutton was intent on discussing only the facts, I would like to make him aware that the well-resourced school he referred to as current was closed by his department in July of 2015.

The building was repurposed as offices for Wilsons training, Immigration and the Nauru Government.

Id also like to address his statement that people sought asylum in Nauru or PNG when the Minister knows full well that asylum seekers were taken there against their will.

Furthermore, if Minister Dutton puts faith in the Nauruan and Papua New Guinea processing of refugees he should be above calling those granted refugee status country shoppers or economic migrants.

It is true that it is difficult to keep emotion out of it but unlike the minister I dont have the luxury of emotional distance. I worked with the victims of this policy for two years.

I wish I could tell him personally that I am not a politically motivated creature. I am a school teacher, horrified at Australias treatment of asylum seekers and refugees on Manus and Nauru.

I do not condone an open border policy, nor do I think that the people detained on Nauru and Manus should necessarily come to Australia.

Those who have been held in limbo on Manus and Nauru for three to four years have accumulated trauma which has left many with even more complex needs.

It is incumbent upon the Australian government to take a bipartisan approach to ensuring that these men, women and children are resettled as soon as possible in a country with the facilities and rule of law to protect and rehabilitate them and allow them to rebuild their lives.

Evan Davis, former teacher on Nauru:

Minister Dutton acknowledges that the imprisonment of asylum seekers and refugees on Nauru is being used as a deterrent. Children are being tortured and traumatised on Nauru so the Australian government can broadcast to the world.

You try to come here by boat and this is what will happen to you.

If the boats have been stopped then it is time to close Nauru.

We dont need to continue to traumatise children on Nauru for the purpose of using them as an example of how poorly you will be treated if you try to come to Australia by boat.

The issue of keeping asylum seekers and refugees on Nauru cannot be justified on any terms. It is cruel and inhumane.

The system is designed to break peoples spirits, to grind them into the ground, to de-humanise people and to deprive them of any dignity.

The children are not attending the school in acceptable numbers and the asylum seekers are not welcome in the new hospital.

The asylum seekers and refugees have not found safety and security in Nauru.

Mr Duttons reference to the school classrooms is completely inaccurate. The classrooms and the teachers Mr Dutton refers to were at the school located in RPC 1.

This school was closed in July 2015 and the teachers are no longer working on Nauru. There are photos taken in 2015 of Nauru college.

The classrooms and toilets are not of a suitable standard. There are no modern facilities.

Mr Dutton is either deliberately misleading the public or he is ignorant of the actual situation on Nauru. I know the truth, I know what has happened and is happening on Nauru  I was a witness.

I am not against the Australias immigration programme; what I am against is the torturing and traumatising of children.

There is no doubt the 2015 Border Force Act had the effect of preventing people from speaking out. This Act has been very successful in preventing people from sharing information.

That is the intent and that is the effect.

I am not trying to subvert a fair or successful immigration process. What I am against is the process of torturing, traumatising and de-humanising children.
At least 23 dead and dozens wounded during Friday prayers in Mohmand tribal district bordering Afghanistan.

A suicide bomber has killed at least 23 people and wounded dozens while they were attending prayers at a mosque in a northwestern Pakistani tribal area, sources tell Al Jazeera.

Fridays bombing occurred in the village of Anbar Tehsil in the Mohmand tribal district bordering Afghanistan where the Pakistani army has been battling the Pakistan Taliban.





The suicide bomber was in a crowded mosque, he shouted Allahu akbar (God is greatest) and then there was a huge blast, Naveed Akbar, deputy administrator of Mohmand Agency, told Reuters news agency.

Akbar added that some fatalities appeared to had been caused when part of the mosque caved in from the force of the blast.

A portion of the mosque and verandah collapsed in the blast and fell on worshippers. We are still retrieving bodies and the injured from the rubble of the mosque, he said.

One of the wounded, 41-year-old Ghulam Khan, said he heard a deafening explosion during the prayers.

I cried for help, but no one came to me  there were other bodies  wounded worshippers, who were reciting verses from Quran and waiting for help, he told the Associated Press news agency.

Khan said local residents and tribal police helped transport the wounded to hospital.

No claim of responsibility

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban in particular routinely attack soft targets such as courts, schools and mosques.

READ MORE: Deadly twin blasts hit court in Pakistan

The army launched an operation in June 2014 in a bid to wipe out armed groups bases in the northwestern tribal areas to bring an end to a violent campaign that has cost thousands of civilian lives since 2004.





Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif condemned the bombing and said the attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the governments resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country.

Security in Pakistan has improved in recent years  the military says terrorist incidents dropped from 128 in 2013 to 74 last year  but major attacks on soft targets are still common.

A bombing of lawyers in the city of Quetta killed 74 people last month, an attack claimed by both the Islamic State Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and Jamaat-ur-Ahrar, a breakaway faction of the Pakistan Taliban.

Jamaat-ur-Ahrar also claimed the Easter Sunday bombing in a park in the eastern city of Lahore that killed 72 people, many of them children.
Judges reject plea by WikiLeaks founder, holed up in Ecuadorian embassy in London, to have 2010 detention order dropped.

A Swedish appeals court has upheld a detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, dismissing the latest attempt by the 45-year-old Australian to make prosecutors drop a rape investigation from 2010.

The decision by the Svea Court of Appeal means that the arrest warrant stands for the 45-year-old computer hacker, who has avoided extradition to Sweden by seeking shelter at the Ecuadorian embassy in London since 2012.





Assange, who denies the rape allegation, has previously challenged the detention order seven times.

He says he fears he will be extradited to the US to face espionage charges if he leaves the embassy.

Swedish authorities have rejected seven previous appeals by Assange to drop the arrest warrant, said Al Jazeeras Nadim Baba, reporting outside the Ecuadorian embassy in London.

The new decision by the Swedish court doesnt change anything because it has already been agreed by Sweden and Ecuador that next month, in fact right here at the embassy, Mr Assange will be questioned by Ecuadorian officials in the presence of Swedish colleagues.

His Swedish defence lawyer, Per Samuelsson, said he would appeal against the decision to the Supreme Court.

We are naturally disappointed that Swedish courts yet again choose to ignore Julian Assanges difficult life situation, Samuelsson told the Associated Press news agency.

They ignore the risk that he will be extradited to the United States.

Swedish prosecutors say they are not in contact with counterparts in the US and that they would also need Britains permission should a third country seek his extradition.

READ MORE: Q&A  Julian Assange on the Panama Papers

Upholding a lower court ruling, the appeals court said Swedish prosecutors are actively trying to move the investigation forward and set up an interrogation of Assange at the embassy.

Acting on behalf of Swedish investigators, an Ecuadorian prosecutor is set to question Assange on October 17.

This means that there is at present no reason to set aside the detention order. Julian Assanges claim to that effect shall therefore be refused, the court said.

It also brushed aside the findings of a United Nations working group which described his stay at the London embassy as arbitrary detention.

The court noted that the panels finding wasnt binding on Swedish courts and that Assanges stay at the embassy is not to be regarded as an unlawful deprivation of liberty.
UF researchers are recruiting about 400 children for a study about youth brain development and health.

The study, called Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development, or ABCD, aims to see how childhood experiences affect social skills, behavior, academic success and health through adolescence and into early adulthood, said Sarah Reaves, UFs research site coordinator. More than 10,000 9- and 10-year-olds nationally will take part in the research.

The National Institutes of Health gave UF a $3.76 million grant for its part of the research, focusing on children in North Central Florida, she said.

Florida International University was the only other school in the state chosen to help conduct the study, she said. The 19 institutions conducting research will try to get elementary schoolers representative of national demographics.

Reaves said UF has the facilities needed to conduct cognitive and mental tests the children will take.

The University of Florida was very poised to have those resources and capabilities to run something this ambitious, she said.

UF professor Sara Jo Nixon said the project will be the first long-term study to follow young children as they age. She wanted UF to help collect data for Florida because its one of the fastest growing states.

Its a landmark study in terms of both its depth and breadth, said Nixon, a coprincipal investigator at the UF Health site.

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A cross-county car chase ended near Gainesville on Tuesday morning with four arrests and more than $3,000 thrown out a window.

Florida Highway Patrol troopers arrested Mark Anthony Rivera, 24, Antwan Laron Belin, 29, Lovy Lovette House, 31, and Marvie Leonugean Alford, 30, after the men led deputies on a chase from Jefferson County, Florida near Tallahassee.

Rivera, Belin and House are from Tampa, and Alford is from Lutz, Florida.

Courtesy of Alachua County Jail. Marvie Leonugean Alford

Courtesy of Alachua County Jail. Mark Anthony Rivera

Courtesy of Alachua County Jail. Lovy Lovette House

Courtesy of Alachua County Jail. Antwan Laron Belin

Highway patrol first started looking for them at about 10 a.m. after deputies said they were chasing the men, who were driving in a silver Chevy Malibu, in Jefferson County. During the chase, one of the men threw $3,100 out of the car.

At about 11 a.m., the car reached speeds of 120 mph on Interstate 75 near Alachua, Florida, cutting off motorists and driving through emergency lanes, according to an arrest report. It is unclear who was driving, because none of the men were sitting in the drivers seat when troopers stopped them.

Troopers chased after the car until spike strips punctured the cars tires and ended the chase. Troopers found credit card numbers and other personal information that did not belong to anyone in the car, according to the report.

Alford and House were arrested on charges of fraud and resisting arrest, among other charges. Belin and Rivera were arrested on charges of fraud and aiding and abetting, among other charges.

All four were taken to the Alachua County Jail where they remain, as of press time, in lieu of a $1.1 million bond for Rivera, a $400,000 bond for Alford, a $300,000 bond for House and a $200,000 bond for Belin.

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@ceostroff

costroff@alligator.org
After more than a year as dean, Laura Ann Rosenbury has changed the face of the UF Levin College of Law.

Since she began, the law school has enrolled not only its most diverse incoming class  with 35.9 percent of incoming students identifying as ethnically diverse  but also the most selective; their average LSAT law school aptitude test score was three points higher than the previous years.

However, not all of her decisions have sat well with students and faculty.

After an essay Rosenbury authored in Spring was published, students of the law school took to social media to express their discontent with her. In the essay, she wrote about a former student and a UF law professor who made sexist comments by referring to her as young and vivacious during a banquet last Fall.

Students on social media argued the dean should have refrained from identifying the student, saying it was unfair for her to identify the two men in a negative light.

Attacking a student as a Dean of one of the graduate programs is a really bad precedent, one commenter posted.

Rosenbury, 46, said she thought that by not including names, she was keeping it confidential.

I thought by declining to use their names, I was doing enough to protect their identity, she said in a phone interview. In hindsight, I would have worked harder to protect the identity of the student and faculty member, she said.

She said she doesnt believe the men meant anything by the comment, but it was something she felt needed to be addressed.

I believe that we first need to identify problems before we begin to solve them, and one way to begin to identify the problem is to talk about them and then to discuss, she said.

Jeffrey L. Harrison, a UF law professor, said although he doesnt agree with using titles that made it easy to identify the student and professor, he said he believes Rosenbury meant no harm.

Shes just not that kind of person, he said. Shes not vindictive.

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Harrison said Rosenbury addressing the comment is proof that women in the legal system still face obstacles. He agrees with her saying that the word vivacious carries negative gender connotations.

I dont think anybody would call a man vivacious, because Ive never heard of it, he said.

Changes that Rosenbury has implemented at the law school, such as balancing classroom sizes and recruiting top students, have been for the better, he said.

But Jim Theriac, a UF law alumnus, said members of the law school have told him theyre afraid of speaking out against the dean.

When I have four to five people telling me its a toxic atmosphere, Im concerned, Theriac said.

Michelle Jacobs, a UF law professor, said the incident was the straw that broke the camels back.

Jacobs said shes noticed some of the law schools community that includes students, faculty and staff feel misrepresented regarding decisions made by the administration.

We do have a segment of the community  I wont comment on how big it is  that do feel disrespected and not listened to, she said.

Incidents like the uproar over the deans essay are the product of events being magnified because of long-running disagreements, Jacobs said.

Its not that change is not needed in our college, she said. Change is needed for any institution to grow, but the process by which the change takes place, I think, is the thing thats driving the feeling of toxicity.

Paul McBride, a third-year UF law student, said the courses during Summer semesters have been reduced, and a lack of communication between students and the administration is leaving him and other students unhappy with the direction of the college.

The 25-year-old said in years past, deans of the college would hold a few town hall meetings, during which students could express their concerns and ask the dean questions. Since Rosenburys term, theres been only one, he said.

We feel like we dont have the ability to voice our concerns anymore, he said. We dont want to feel like were at odds with the administration of our school. Its an unfortunate situation to be in, because were supposed to be on the same team.

If students had been informed of changes before they were implemented, like the elective classes being reduced, or requiring student organizations to host guest speakers at times that didnt conflict with other organizations events, conflict and confusion could have been avoided, he said.

Rosenbury wrote in an email her goal has been to foster a community of collaboration, engagement and civil disagreement. Shes hosted six two-hour office hour sessions with students, as well as eight meetings with student leaders.

I welcome feedback at all times, including about how to improve faculty and student culture, she said.

Moving forward, she wrote in the email that she wants to use data-driven and strategic approaches to continue increasing the profile of the law school.

We are certainly a law school on the rise, and I very much look forward to what the future holds, Rosenbury said.
The night before she was set to leave, Cindy Nellys living room was full of supplies.

A sleeping bag. A suitcase full of prenatal vitamins. An obstetrical kit.

After watching the civil war in Syria unfold over the past six years  and displace millions  the UF alumna felt it was time.

At 6 a.m. Wednesday, Nelly put her life in Gainesville on hold as she boarded an airplane bound for Turkey. Upon landing on the Eastern coast of the country, she began a monthlong medical trip, tending to women and children at more than 20 refugee camps.

It really just calls to me, she said. It feels like I have to go.

  

The trip to Turkey had been weeks in the making.

On Aug. 5, the 46-year-old midwife and advanced nurse practitioner set up a GoFundMe page to funnel donations.

About a month later, the page has raised more than $8,000, which Nelly will use to buy medical supplies, like antibiotics, sutures and bandages, in Turkey.

Within the countrys borders, the money translates to nearly 24,000 Turkish liras.

Nelly said the need for health care in Turkey is palpable.

After the war broke out in Syria and refugees fled violence from their government and foreign fighters, an already overburdened medical system was stretched to its limits, she said.

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Turkey hosts more (Syrian) refugees than any other country in the world right now, she said. And they cannot possibly provide services to all people who need them.

Standing outside their home as Nelly packed, her husband Peter Alcorn said the urge to help is just a part of who Nelly is.

Alcorn seemed calm but admitted feeling nervous that Nelly would be heading to a country recently rocked by a coup attempt and a handful of terror attacks.

Im a little bit nervous, he admitted. Its a little unstable over there right now.

But, he said, what makes him more nervous is Nellys unflinching drive to serve the underserved.

If she doesnt feel like shes being productive in the camps, then she will be the first to sign up to go elsewhere, he said.

As Nellys plane landed in Izmir, Turkey, after a 13-hour flight, four children thought of their mother.

She has twin sons, 22-year-old Abraham and Eziah, a 23-year-old daughter, Hannah, and a 13-year-old son, Cyrus.

Eziah, a student at Florida Gateway College, said Nellys efforts have inspired him to go on his own one day.

Like any other kid, Im nervous for her safety, he said. But I know she is doing something very good that other people cant do.

Cindy Nellys American passport sits atop her table on Tuesday evening while she prepares to leave to Turkey. As a part of other trips, the midwife has visited Kenya, Rwanda and Haiti to provide similar medical services.

  

This is not the first time Nelly has dropped everything to answer a call to service.

After a hurricane ravaged New Orleans in 2005 and an earthquake struck Haiti in 2010, she left home and provided disaster relief.

She has also volunteered at clinics across the world, in countries like Kenya, Gambia, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Colombia.

When friends asked if she was scared to go to Turkey, she answered sternly.

Its really interesting that I get a lot more people asking me if Im scared to go on this mission than have ever asked me about any other international work, Nelly said. Its probably less dangerous than most of the other international work that Ive done.

The preparation for the trip is also different: Turkey already has a solid medical infrastructure, Nelly said, which means that instead of bringing materials, she has been asked to bring money and purchase the majority of supplies there.

The packing isnt as exciting this time, Nelly said. Its not as much stuff as normal  its pretty minimal.

Her personal items are few: A box of Clif Bars, some clothing and two dark-chocolate bars with sea salt and almonds will hold her over.

Nelly hopes the trip will give her the opportunity to speak with refugees and later share their stories and hopefully inspire Gainesville to become more active in the face of tremendous suffering.

If the public becomes more aware of what is happening, then maybe instead of 10 to 20 thousand refugees, we can welcome more in, she said.

Id like to connect with people so they can feel like we are paying attention, that there are those of us here that really do care, Nelly said.

When Nelly returns to Gainesville, she will begin working at UF Health Shands as a midwife. After she returns from overseas, she said she hopes to continue to touch lives.

Nicholas Nourieh, a Syrian-born UF student, said he was happy  and surprised  to see what Nelly had decided to do.

The 20-year-old UF biology senior, who is also a member of the Arab Students Association, said he hopes Nellys work will lift some of the burden from the shoulders of refugees.

These kinds of acts help give hope, he said.

Cindy Nelly fills her bags with about 200 condoms, and dozens of contraceptive pills and pre-natal medications ahead of her monthlong service trip to Turkey. The UF alumna said she felt a calling to help refugees after watching the country implode following a yearslong civil war. It really just calls to me, she said. It feels like I have to go.
Jaliyah Howard, like most first-graders, has a natural affinity for exploring the world.

The 6-year-old learned at an early age how to open locks, including the deadbolt on her front door.

But because Jaliyah is primarily nonverbal, a result of her autism spectrum disorder, her mother, Jovon Howard, always worries about her daughters safety.

When she doesnt respond to her name, thats a frightening thing, even inside your house. Howard said.

However, a new state pilot program, launched by the UF Center for Autism and Related Disabilities, is offering to help keep track of individuals who have autism, which may make them prone to wandering.

Project Leo will provide free wristwatch-style tracking devices to individuals with autism, a disorder that affects one in 68 children in the U.S.

The project was founded after 9-year-old Leo Walker, a boy with autism, drowned in 2014 after wandering from his home.

The UF center is waiting to receive 80 personal transmitters to distribute to individuals and families that are unable to afford their own tracker, said Ann-Marie Orlando, a research assistant professor at the center.

She said the local sheriffs offices in the five counties that the center will serve are waiting on the receivers.

Once both the trackers and the receivers come in, they can be handed out.

The center received $100,000 in-state grants in order to participate in the program, Orlando said.

Florida Atlantic University and the University of South Florida will also be distributing transmitters, she said.

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Families work very hard to keep their children safe, and were trying to help them do that, Orlando said. I think this device will give some parents assurances that theyre not alone, and in case their child does wander, that support is available.

The device can be attached to clothing or worn around the wrist or ankle. It sends transmissions to individuals local sheriffs departments so law enforcement can locate them if they get lost.

UF became involved in the project after Orlando and other members of the center were approached by Florida Rep. Elizabeth Porter to become a distributor site for the transmitters, Orlando said.

Any effort that we can make to help families keep their loved ones safe, were going to work hard to do, she said.

For Jaliyahs parents, news of the program brings reassurance that they can keep track of her even when they cant see her.

When we found out about Project Leo coming out, I said, You know what, this really meets our needs, Jovon Howard said. Were happy families. We just want whats best for our kids.

Residents of the following counties are eligible to receive the transmitter

Alachua

Baker

Columbia

Hamilton

Suwannee

Jaliyah Howard, 6, who has autism, could benefit from Project Leo, a new state pilot program launched by the UF Center for Autism and Related Disabilities. The project would provide free wristwatch-style tracking devices to help keep track of individuals who have autism, which may make them prone to wandering.
Cassidy Meyers grabbed a piece of red chalk to write Lib West needs more plugs on a chalkboard Thursday morning.

Thursday was the last day Impact Party representatives asked students to contribute ideas on how to improve UF for the partys upcoming platform. For the past three days from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., party representatives spoke with students on Turlington Plaza and North Lawn. Representatives at each location recorded hundreds of suggestions, said Impact Party President Janae Moodie.

Weve had some good discussions, she said. So far, everything has been going really smoothly.

Impacts platform should be released early next week, although theres not an official date, Moodie said.

Meyers, a UF zoology sophomore, said she votes in Student Government elections so her voice can be heard.

They make some important decisions, the 19-year-old said.

Other ideas included lowering student fees and decal prices and placing stoplights outside the Reitz Union parking garage.

Outside of the Reitz, 18-year-old Megan Cabana posed for a picture, holding a chalkboard that read more water fountains.

I get really dehydrated when Im walking to class, the UF communication sciences and disorders freshman said.

Before platform-generating, Cabana said she hadnt talked with SG senators since starting college this semester.

I havent actually heard of them until just now, she said. I would want to learn more so I could know what Im voting for, if I voted.

@k_newberg

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knewberg@alligator.org
On Monday, former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom David Cameron announced his resignation as a member of Parliament for the Conservative Party, three months after the Brexit referendum. While he may be remembered for years to come as the man who accidentally caused Britain to leave the European Union, Cameron also leaves a powerful legacy behind  perhaps one that American Republicans can learn from.

Throughout his premiership, Cameron achieved important social reforms. Most notably, he supported the legalization of same-sex marriage in 2013, despite fierce opposition from his own Conservative Party. Additionally, he stood behind legislation curbing police stop-and-search powers and legislation forcing businesses to reveal gender pay gaps. Considering the centuries-old tradition of social conservatism in the party, Cameron achieved a significant feat: He showed the U.K. that the Conservative Party is ready to move on from archaic social issues and that there is more to the Conservative Party than homophobia andxenophobia.

As Alan Duncan noted in his recent Time magazine piece, after becoming prime minister in 2010, Cameron established a stable coalition government with the left-of-center Liberal Democrats. Although the coalition was expected to fail, he enabled a wide range of public sector reform, including the devolution of powers in health, education and local government. Duncan noted that Cameron knew when to compromise in the face of unpopular policies, but he also knew when to stand by principles. This was most evident in Cameron's introduction of same-sex marriage legislation despite backlash from his own Conservative members of Parliament.

Unfortunately, the state of conservatism in the U.S. is much bleaker. Mainstream Republicans stubbornly hold onto these outdated ideals and attempt to represent them as fundamental values of the party. In fact, the 2016 Republican platform considers traditional marriage as the foundation for a free society and pornography as a public health crisis. Not only are these stances deeply out of touch with cultural and social transformations, but as a result, they also alienate important demographics such as women, millennials, minorities and the LGBTQ+ community. Forty years ago, these communities were not politically organized and remained relatively left out in the political consciousness. Writing these communities off today would be absurd, given their increasing activism and mobilization. Yet even today, over a year after its legalization, only three out of 54 Republican senators have come out publically in support of same-sex marriage. Do Republicans truly think this number represents its base?

The same applies to the Hispanic constituency. The desire to stop illegal immigration, justified as it may be, should have never led to a situation of hysteria in which many Hispanics no longer feel comfortable with the Republican party. President George W. Bush's administration at least understood the importance of integrating the Hispanic constituency into the party. The failed Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2007 could have secured the loyalty of a substantial proportion of the Hispanic community for many years to come. Today, that seems unlikely.

What is most unfortunate in all of this is that the Republican Party has more to offer beyond cultural warfare. The party has a strong intellectual tradition that encourages productivity, thoughtful critique of the welfare state and excessive public spending. Likewise, the party has a tradition of strong foreign policy with a grand strategy aimed at protecting the country, its allies and ensuring world stability. For the past several decades, Republicans have been at the forefront of defending democracy, preventing genocide and assuming an international role based on morals.

Whether people agree with these policies, it is evident that nothing has hurt the Republican Party more than cultural wars and failure to adapt to social transformations. Hopefully the Republican Party can come out of its current identity crisis with a new social platform that can adapt to a changing social and political climate. Until then, Republican politicians can learn a thing or two from David Cameron.

Julian Fleischman is a UF political science and telecommunication senior. His column appears on Fridays.
           2005     ..        
Members of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan, established by the Human Rights Council in March this year, concluded its first mission to the east-central African country yesterday after having met with a wide range of actors. During their one-week mission (8 to 15 September), the three Commission members travelled throughout []http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Appa-sourceTheAfric...










English News Saudi crimes haunt Obama as HR chief criticises Alkhalifa abuses

Alwihda Info | Par Bahrain Freedom Movement - 16 Septembre 2016





Two recent developments threaten to cause further strain on the Saudi-US relations. The first is a bill allowing families of 9/11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia in U.S. courts. It passed the House and Senate by a voice vote, and would give families of 9/11 victims the ability to sue Saudi Arabia for involvement in the 9/11 terrorist events in 2001, The House passed the bill last Friday just before the 15th anniversary of the attacks. The Senate had approved the measure in May. Prior to its passage, the White House had indicated that the president would veto the legislation. The second is a joint resolution to block arms deal with the Saudis. Senators from both sides of the aisle introduced the joint resolution on 8th September, hoping to block a large U.S. arms deal with Saudi Arabia. S.J.Res 39 was introduced by Senators Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), Rand Paul (R-Ky.), Al Franken (D-Minn.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah). Explaining their motivation, all four cited the atrocities committed by the U.S.-backed, Saudi-led coalition in Yemen. Murphy warned in a statement that the war in Yemen, funded by the U.S., has become a disaster that is making our country less safe every day. Thousands of civilians are being killed, and terrorist groups inside the country, like al Qaeda and ISIS, are getting stronger, he added. Until the Saudis conduct changes, the U.S. should put a pause on further arms sales. The arms deal they are hoping to block includes $1.15 billion worth of tanks and other military equipment. It was announced by the Pentagon in August.



In his opening speech of the 33rd session of the Human Rights Council, Zeid bin Raad, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights lambasted Alkhalifa regime for its dismal record of human rights. He said: I am concerned by harassment and arrests of human rights defenders and political activists, and legislation which enables revocation of citizenship without due process. He pointed out the bleak record of the Bahraini regime in its treatment of native citizens adding: The past decade has demonstrated repeatedly and with punishing clarity exactly how disastrous the outcomes can be when a Government attempts to smash the voices of its people, instead of serving them. He ended advising the regime to change its policies: The authorities of Bahrain would be well advised to comply with the recommendations of the human rights mechanisms and UPR, and engage more productively with my Office, as well as with this Councils Special Procedures. Sayed Ahmed Alwadaei, Director of Advocacy, the Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy (BIRD) said : Bahrain should take the warnings of the High Commissioner seriously and end the repressive campaign against its people. Its allies, namely the UK and US, must also voice support for the High Commissioners comments at a time when Bahrain has used every opportunity to insult him and his office.



The Alkhalifa kangaroo courts have confirmed a one year prison sentence on Dr Saeed Al Samahiji on charges including insulting a brotherly state and calling for illegal demonstrations. Amnesty International has urged people to; call on the authorities to quash Dr Saeed al-Samahijis conviction and release him immediately and unconditionally as he is a prisoner of conscience, imprisoned solely for peacefully exercising his right to freedom of expression; to call on them to ensure that he is protected from any torture or other ill-treatment and that he receives any medical attention he may require; and to urge them to repeal laws that criminalize the peaceful exercise of the right to freedom of expression, in line with Bahrains obligations under Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.



In the week 5-11th September at least ten native Bahrainis were detained by the Alkhalifa occupiers including one child. There were at least 47 marches in 25 towns and villages, some of which were mercilessly attacked. Four native Bahrainis were sentenced in the period for a total of 52 years for expressing their opinion. Two native Bahrainis have been given life imprisonment for opposing the hereditary dictatorship. Hussain Ali Makki and Mohammad Ali Hubail from Sitra were sentenced after a brief appearance at the tribal court.



A criminal complaint by a Bahraini victim of torture has been made to the Garda (police in Ireland who commenced an investigation headed by Detective Inspector Paul Costello. A separate complaint was rejected by The Dublin District Court yesterday seeking a summons for prosecution of Bahraini Attorney General for his role in the torture of Mr Jaffar Al Hasabi. He had been subjected to beatings, electric shocks and other forms of abuse while in detention in Bahrain in 2010. More cases against Alkhalifa torturers are expected in several countries as the regime has failed to convict a single torturer.



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In Focus: Evolution of an Issue: Tying Debate Turns to Loan Quality

By Barbara A. Rehm

WASHINGTON  Congressional concern over banks coaxing customers to buy multiple products is morphing into a debate over the impact that cut-rate loans are having on credit quality and the broader credit market.

Gone, or nearly so, are allegations that banks are breaking the law when they provide cheap loans to entice a customer to buy more products, particularly investment banking services. Either this "illegal tying" just is not happening, or it is too hard to prove given the complicated law and its long list of exemptions.

But the issue refuses to die, and lawmakers are now questioning whether the industry's moves to boost the profitability of customer relationships is undermining credit quality, artificially holding down the cost of credit, and whether bank competitors are being unfairly disadvantaged.

"The relationship between loans to a corporation that may or may not be subsidized by the promise of future, additional investment banking business  has the potential to alter credit markets, and it certainly can disguise the true cost of credit," Sen. Chuck Schumer said during a Feb. 5 Senate Banking Committee hearing.

"It may also price out many firms that cannot subsidize below-market loans through fees from other businesses."

That's what big pure-play investment banks such as Goldman, Sachs & Co. and Morgan Stanley have been arguing for years: banks are stealing their customers by underpricing loans. Commercial banks, the brokers charge, have an unfair advantage in that they can hold these loans on the books at original cost while brokerages must mark the credits to market every quarter. (Accounting rules figure banks hold loans as long-term assets while brokers do not  a differentiation that has blurred over the years as banks securitize more assets.)

The New York Democrat's comments came during a hearing on William Donaldson's nomination as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission  an agency that had not weighed in on this issue.

But Mr. Donaldson, who founded the brokerage firm Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette Inc., vowed the SEC would investigate, saying "making soft loans to get the more profitable business is an issue that rivals the use of research as the handmaiden of banking."

Making a cheap loan to get a customer's underwriting business has helped commercial banks make inroads on firms such as Goldman Sachs. But gaining market share has come at a cost to credit quality, said Sen. Schumer.

Since enactment of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act in 1999, Sen. Schumer said, "We've seen a lot of writedowns of loans that certainly were made alongside investment banking relationships  I'm thinking specifically of recent experiences of firms that have lost more loan value from recent large-scale bankruptcies than they ever made in investment banking fees."

At the Donaldson hearing, Senate Banking Chairman Richard Shelby, R-Ala., repeated his intention to hold a hearing on tying specifically and more generally on Gramm-Leach-Bliley, the financial reform law that made it easier for banks to offer both credit and securities products.

He may be able to use some ammunition from the General Accounting Office, which is investigating allegations of bank tying at the request of Rep. John D. Dingell. The Michigan Democrat resurrected interest in this topic last July with a letter to Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan and Comptroller of the Currency John D. Hawke Jr.

GAO sources said there is no deadline on their report, which is just now taking shape. But it is clear the investigative arm of Congress will be looking closely at how well the Fed and the OCC are enforcing the anti-tying provisions of the Bank Holding Company Act of 1970. (The agencies investigated this question in 1992 and turned up little; the GAO issued a report in 1997 that also found few instances of illegal tying.)

Federal banking regulators are not convinced there is a problem. They contend examiners are enforcing anti-tying laws, and there is no evidence that banks are underpricing loans to gain investment banking market share. Since banks are not illegally tying products, the regulators argue that there has been no impact on credit quality.

"The agencies have not found that commercial banks are manipulating the pricing of credit to build investment banking market share," Mr. Greenspan and Mr. Hawke wrote in an Aug. 13 letter to Rep. Dingell. "We have not identified illegal tying by banks and thus do not have evidence that such tying activity was a cause of recent losses."

In response to Rep. Dingell's letters, federal bank regulators did agree to review the big banks' internal tying policies, marketing programs, training materials, and internal compliance audits. Last week Mr. Hawke provided an update on that effort: "We haven't found anything that would raise a serious question, but our investigation is still ongoing."

But in a Feb. 6 speech to a group of lawyers, Mr. Hawke questioned the wisdom of deploying examiners to search for tying violations, and suggested aggrieved borrowers or competitors should sue banks.

"There is a question of resources here," he said. "Why not go to court and try to prove your case if you think you've been damaged?"

Mr. Hawke described the row between commercial and investment banks as a "clash of titans" who should be able to defend themselves without the government's help.

Commercial bankers are reluctant to stir this pot, but many say privately that they are not dictating terms to customers  it's the other way around.

Isaac Lustgarten, a partner with Arnold & Porter law firm in New York, echoed the private comments of many bankers.

"There is a legitimate flip-side to this," Mr. Lustgarten said. "Borrowers go to banks and say provide us both services. In return for one-stop shopping, we also want a lower price. They are saying, 'Reward us, the borrower, for coming to you and you alone.' "

Again privately, bank regulators agree with this assessment and few insiders expect any sort of regulatory crackdown. Even if the SEC wants to, sources said it lacks the authority.

"Donaldson doesn't have much he can do about it. He can't regulate those banks," said one lobbyist who counts commercial and investment banks among his clients. "At the end of the day, it's got to be Greenspan or Hawke, and that doesn't seem likely."

Whether the issue gains any traction in Congress may depend on the results of the GAO study.

"I don't think it will become an issue until and unless people begin to document that it is happening, in which case there will have to be some action," Rep. Barney Frank, the ranking Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee, said recently.

Still, Sen. Shelby's hearings into how well Gramm-Leach-Bliley is working could be another avenue for making changes in the ways banks are allowed to market credit products.
Ripple, a provider of distributed ledger settlement technology, announced Thursday it has raised $55 million in Series B funding from several of the world's largest banks.

The latest funding round includes participation from new investors including Standard Chartered, Accenture Ventures, SCB Digital Ventures, the venture arm of Siam Commercial Bank, and SBI Holdings. Ripple has previously received funding from Santander Innoventures, the venture capital unit of the Spanish banking giant, and Google, among others.

Additionally, the company announced that Standard Chartered, National Australia Bank (NAB), Mizuho Financial Group (MHFG), BMO Financial Group, Siam Commercial Bank (SCB) and Shanghai Huarui Bank are now among the global banks that have adopted Ripple to improve their cross-border payments. For example, Shanghai Huarui Bank is working with Ripple on a new commercial cross-border payment service for its retail customers so they can send money internationally in real time and at a lower cost.

"2016 has proven to be the year where the most forward-thinking financial institutions are actually using blockchain technologies for payments and settlement rather than as an experiment," Ripple CEO and co-founder Chris Larsen said in a press release. "The continued growth of the Ripple network represents a major endorsement of our open approach to connecting the world's banks and their customers. Together we are building a modern payments system."
It's the banking equivalent of good sportsmanship.

Speaking at an investor event Thursday, U.S. Bancorp Chief Executive Richard Davis said he has no plans to court Wells Fargo customers who might be put off by the recent account-related scandal at their bank.

In fact, he said, U.S. Bancorp officials have made it clear to its bankers that anyone who targets Wells Fargo customers will be let go.

Business "will come to us if we've earned it," Davis said during a presentation at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in New York.

Wells Fargo agreed to pay about $190 million to settle charges from federal regulators that thousands of bank employees opened phony accounts to meet sales goals and collect bonuses.

As the news began to unfold, Davis said he reminded employees at his Minneapolis company to take the high ground.

"We went out Monday morning and told [bankers] to take no advantage of the Wells circumstance," Davis said.

The comments come as executives at some small banks have described the Wells scandal  and the potential disruption in the marketplace  as an opportunity to poach business away from megabanks.

U.S. Bancorp, which has $438 billion in assets, holds the all-day event for investors every three years.
It could be a few years before Richard Davis, one of the most well-respected leaders in banking, hands over the reins as chief executive of U.S. Bancorp, but he began preparing the industry for that moment this summer.

Normally succession planning involves a blend of whispers, winks and trial balloons  and sometimes an orchestrated horse race  but not in this case. Longtime executive Andy Cecere is Davis' heir apparent, and Davis wanted to make sure the promotion of Cecere to the role of president in January was read that way by everyone.

"We are telegraphing to you that one day  he would succeed me and run the company," Davis said at the Bernstein Strategic Decisions Conference in New York in June.

He reiterated the message on Thursday, when he was asked about his retirement plans during the company's investor day in New York.

"It's not imminent, but by the same token I have other plans in life," Davis said, noting that he has set up a "visible succession opportunity" for Cecere.

The comments confirmed widely held assumptions that Cecere, 55, was next in line, but there are questions about what exactly makes him a good fit in today's world  and how the low-profile executive will fashion a public image in the months ahead.

The transition process at Minneapolis-based U.S. Bancorp is important not only because it involves the leadership of the fifth-largest banking company in the country. It also will be watched closely because many banks including JPMorgan Chase and BB&T have prominent, long-serving CEOs, and the next generation of leaders will have long shadows to step out from and new business challenges to overcome.

Reputations will likely be won or lost on how well bankers generate growth in a sluggish economy and adapt to a high-tech world, observers said.

Cecere, for one, "will have to contend with this slower pace of macroeconomic growth," said Scott Siefers, an analyst with Sandler O'Neill.

Finding new ways to grow may be the "defining issue" for the industry's next generation of big-bank CEOs, said Gerard du Toit, head of banking and financial services in the Americas at Bain & Co.

Challenges Ahead

The transition-related questions are among many long-term issues facing U.S. Bancorp.

Davis, 58, took over as CEO in 2006. He secured his legacy in banking by steering the company through the financial crisis and making big investments that burnished its image in the aftermath. But profits at U.S. Bancorp have been flat recently, rising just 1% in the second quarter from a year earlier, to $1.4 billion. A mixture of low rates and higher costs have been a drag on results.

During its presentation to investors Thursday, U.S. Bancorp lowered a handful of long-term profitability targets  including its three-year goal for return on equity  citing predictions for a flat yield curve.

Meanwhile, the $438 billion-asset company  a giant among regionals, yet significantly smaller than the megabanks  has made innovation a priority, announcing big investments in areas such as faster payments and robo-advisory platforms.

One possible area of growth is acquisitions. While the company is currently prohibited from buying banks under a federal enforcement order to fix anti-money-laundering controls, it has scooped up credit card portfolios in the past year from Auto Club and Fidelity Investments.

During the presentation Thursday, Davis said he would "love to do more traditional bank M&A," sounding more open to the prospect than he has in recent months. U.S. Bancorp was also notably floated as a potential acquirer of the $71 billion-asset Comerica in Dallas, which has reportedly been exploring a sale.

Cecere declined a request for an interview for this article, and the company also declined a separate request to discuss succession planning as the board has not officially announced its plan. Davis, who is also chairman, noted in June that the ultimate decision on the next CEO rests with the full board but that he wanted to be transparent about the company's leanings and to quell any speculation.

Credentials, Contrasts

Several people familiar with Cecere's leadership style say his credentials alone speak to why he's being groomed to take over.

He currently oversees all major business lines, including consumer banking, payments and wealth management.

He has held a long list of executive roles in his three-decade career with the company, including chief financial officer and head of wealth management. He also represents the company on corporate boards and civic organizations.

"He's got the intellect," said John Wiehoff, chief executive of C.H. Robinson, a supply chain management firm in the Twin Cities, who serves with Cecere on a separate corporate board.

Cecere's temperament, however, would be a notable shift from the bravado that's expected from a big-bank CEO.

He has a reputation as a good listener who only speaks when he has something to say. Most describe him as low-key and reserved.

For instance, in accepting a recent alumni award from the Carlson School of Management in Minnesota, he declined to mark the occasion with a customary party and celebratory speech.

Instead, Cecere  who is on the school's board of overseers  requested a small lunch, to which he invited his wife and mother, according Sri Zaheer, dean of the Carlson School.

"He's not really flamboyant," Wiehoff said.

If there are any drawbacks to choosing Cecere, it's that he is not yet a household name.

At all companies, a new CEO can take some getting used to. At U.S. Bancorp, it could take even longer, given Davis' strong reputation.

"This is the classic leadership transition," said Michael DeVaughn, a management professor at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul. "What happens when you transition to a strong charismatic leader to the No. 2 person?"

Davis is known locally as a civic-minded leader who recently helped finance a popular professional football stadium.

In the industry, of course, he is known for his colorful commentary on economic trends. He once dropped a "Star Trek" reference in a talk about cybersecurity without missing a beat.

"That will be a challenge that bleeds into leadership," DeVaughn said. "How will [Cecere] step out?"

DeVaughn drew broad comparisons to the somewhat rocky CEO transition at Apple, when Tim Cook, a previously unknown insider, succeeded founder Steve Jobs.

Whether Cecere may diverge from Davis on strategy won't become clear until he begins to call the shots.

Still, at a time when banks are struggling to maintain their reputations, having someone with Cecere's temperament and skill set could be an asset, DeVaughn said.

In the coming months and years, the industry will be watching to see how Cecere handles the limelight  and if he embraces his role on the public stage.

"Like it or not, at a company of that size, the CEO is always in the spotlight," Siefers said. "There are really only a couple of large banks that are that highly regarded."
Harvard Business School asserts in a study entitled "Problems Unsolved and a Nation Divided" that our weak economy is the result of "political polarization," which has paralyzed Congress and prevented it from taking the steps necessary to improve our competitiveness.

Daily Caller:

The study asserts that the key to understanding how to fix the nations economy is to maintain competitiveness: U.S. competitiveness has been eroding since well before the Great Recession. Americas economic challenges are structural, not cyclical. The weak recovery reflects the erosion of competitiveness, as well as the inability to take the steps necessary to address growing U.S. weaknesses. In other words, the U.S. government hasnt ensured that the American economy is competitive with the rest of the world. The majority of the studys recommendations focus on maintaining a strong tax policy. The agenda should be simplicity and efficiency, it concludes. The high corporate tax rate and a tax on international income create burdens on the U.S. economy that shouldnt be in place, according to the studys authors. Additionally, personal income taxes should also be reformed to include a mandatory minimum tax amount on any income over $1 million a year. Harvard Business School also reports that the carbon tax is essential to restoring the nations economy. Not everyone surveyed in the study agreed with the authors, an unusual phenomenon the authors attributed to partisan dialog that confused the public. Among the general public, many believe that the political system is obstructing economic progress. However, many Americans are unsure, which we attribute to the divisive and partisan dialog on the economy which has confused the public on many issues.

How can the government improve the competitiveness of American business? Outside incentivizing certain investments that increase productivity and repealing a bunch of unnecessary regulations as well as lowering the corprorate tax rate, as recommended in the study, there really isn't much Washington can do.

It is more important to remove roadblocks to growth rather than enact new legislation that would interfere in the economy. But the Harvard study appears to favor a top-down approach  an approach that would have a dubious outcome.

The Obama years have seen a ruinous increase in federal regulations on business that has sapped economic growth, dampened the incentive of companies to hire new workers, and stifled creative enterprise. But there are also other drags on the economy. A crumbling infrastructure damages efficiency. Silly rules on hiring and firing get in the way of employing the best people.

The bottom line is that, as much as possible, government should get out of the way and let the free market work its magic. We'll all be better off in the long run.
Missouri state senator and Black Lives Matter protester Jamilah Nasheed refused to stand along with her fellow legislators to recite the Pledge of Allegiance at the opening of a session of the Missouri senate.

The Muslim convert (she was born Jenise Williams) has been active in the Ferguson riots/protests, and although Ms. Rasheed has supported strict gun control laws, she was found in possession of a loaded firearm when she was arrested in front of the Ferguson city hall in 2014. (Nasheed also refused to take a breathalyzer.)

While there is no law compelling Ms. Rasheed to stand and recite the pledge, one wonders at a public servant (sic) willfully refusing to make a pledge to the country she is ostensibly serving. And one wonders why she is doing this now, when she freely pledged this same allegiance in the past. If she has changed her views and no longer deems America worthy of her allegiance, shouldn't she be removed from her office?

The Missouri legislature can and should at least censure her, if not remove her from office. And since the GOP has a supermajority, it can be done.

Nasheed took an oath before assuming office. According to the Missouri Constitution:

Section 15. Every senator or representative elect, before entering upon the duties of his office, shall take and subscribe the following oath or affirmation: "I do solemnly swear, or affirm, that I will support the Constitution of the United States and of the state of Missouri, and faithfully perform the duties of my office, and that I will not knowingly receive, directly or indirectly, any money or other valuable thing for the performance or nonperformance of any act or duty pertaining to my office, other than the compensation allowed by law." The oath shall be administered in the halls of the respective houses to the members thereof, by a judge of the supreme court or a circuit court, or after the organization by the presiding officer of either house, and shall be filed in the office of the secretary of state. Any senator or representative refusing to take said oath or affirmation shall be deemed to have vacated his office, and any member convicted of having violated his oath or affirmation shall be deemed guilty of perjury, and be forever disqualified from holding any office of trust or profit in this state.

While the Pledge of Allegiance is not the oath of office, her refusal to make it brings into question her support for the Constitution of the United States. As such, it can be argued she has vacated her office.

In a seemingly unrelated story, a Social Security employee in Illinois is being threatened with termination for refusing to watch a training video promoting "sensitivity" to LGBT issues.

David Hall, a 14-year career employee of the Social Security Administration in Chicago, is faced with termination for his refusal  based on religious grounds  to submit himself to what he believes is a violation of his religious beliefs. Mr. Hall worked in I.T. and did not have direct contact with clients or the general public.

So Mr. Hall has an obvious First Amendment right being violated, and the liberals are demanding he be fired, while a state legislator willfully breaks the law and further refuses to even acknowledge her allegiance, and she is untouchable. The hypocrisy is galling.

After all, both are public employees.

The Democrats and the left are completely willing to take down a man who has not sworn such an oath as Ms. Nasheed and do so happily. Until Republicans learn to play hardball in the fashion of their political opponents, they will continue to lose, and America will continue its long, agonizing slide into the abyss.
On September 15, 2016, Donald Trump announced his economic plan to revitalize the economy, which, under Obama, has averaged less than 2% growth. Trump is projecting a rate of growth of 4%, which would create a boom. His plan is to reduce marginal tax rates on individuals and businesses, renegotiate trade deals, and reduce regulations on businesses. He also proposed to allow companies that have funds overseas to bring the money back into the USA, to use in the USA, by paying a lower tax rate.

The plan is similar to Ronald Reagan's, which lowered marginal tax rates and reduced regulations which in turn led to a boom.

The basis of the Reagan and Trump plan is to reduce tax rates to allow individuals and businesses to use the money as they see fit instead of having the government spend the money. Even though the tax rates are lowered, tax revenues increase, as they did under Reagan, because of the increase in economic activity. Democrats always object and mock this as trickle-down economics because they prefer to have the government spend the money instead of individuals and businesses.

While reducing tax rates is important, it is almost as important to reduce the regulations that federal agencies issue daily. Businesses have to comply with these regulations. It takes man-hours in H.R. departments, legal fees, and administrative costs, all of which take away from the essentials of the business such as production, manufacturing, and distribution.

Lydia Wheeler, of the Hill, reported on December 30, 2015:

2015 was a record-setting year for the Federal Register, according to numbers the Competitive Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., released Wednesday. This year's daily publication of the federal government's rules, proposed rules and notices amounted to 81,611 pages as of Wednesday, higher than last year's 77,687 pages and higher than the all-time high of 81,405 pages in 2010  with one day to go in 2015.

The regulations are printed in the Federal Register, also known as the Coder of Federal Regulations (CFR).

An example of the agency regulations is the IRS rule requiring that employers provide health insurance that has birth control and abortion coverage. The IRS has hounded the Little Sisters of the Poor on this issue. So in addition to caring for elderly patients in their homes, the Little Sisters have to spend resources to fight the IRS.

This highlights a major problem with agency regulations: the lack of accountability by the agencies.

Article 1, Section 1 of the Constitution states:

All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and a House of Representatives.

While this is clear, Congress has passed numerous laws and approved such agencies as the EPA, NLRA, Internal Revenue Code, OSHA, Social Security, and Obamacare. Congress gives these agencies the power to issue regulations to administer, interpret, and enforce the laws. For example, the IRS issues numerous regulations on the meaning of income, credits, and deductions. The agencies have also been busy with Obamacare to issue regulations such as those forcing the Little Sisters of the Poor to offer abortion coverage as part of the medical insurance.

This branch of the law is called administrative law, which means the regulations issued by the agencies.

This gives the president enormous power, because the president appoints the Cabinet and the heads of the agencies. But it also removes a check on the actions of the agencies by the voters.

We elect Congress to pass the laws and can vote against congressmen, but we have no vote against the agencies. An agency's regulations can be rejected by a majority vote of Congress, but this rarely happens.

An agency regulation may also be challenged in federal court by an aggrieved party. But the judicial standard to overturn a regulation favors the agency. The standard was stated in Chevron, U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, 467 U.S. 837 (1984), where the U.S. Supreme Court stated a two-step test for whether a court should defer to an administrative agency's statutory interpretation: (1) Did Congress directly address the precise question at issue? And (2) if not, is the administrative agency's answer based on a reasonable construction of the statute?

This puts the burden of proof on the person challenging the regulation, and most regulations are upheld by the courts. But most regulations are not challenged, because it is expensive to litigate.

Thus, Congress has given away to agencies much of its power to legislate. Congress passes a broadly worded statute and tells the agency to fill in the blanks.

As part of reducing the issuance of regulations, President Trump and a Republican Congress should pass a law that shifts the burden of proof to the agencies, to prove that their regulations are reasonable. They should allow mandatory attorney fees to anyone who challenges the regulation and wins.

But more importantly, they should limit the scope of what an agency can rule, and Congress should approve of every regulation issued by an agency. This will involve Congress in the rulemaking activity of the agencies and restore to Congress its constitutional duties and authority.

It is time for Congress and the president to take responsibility for the regulations issued by the agencies.
On a visit to Chicago, London mayor Sadiq Kahn lectured the U.S. on how to welcome immigrants to the U.S. He said integration, not assimilation should be the goal in developing "cohesive communities."

Voice of America:

One of the lessons from around the world is that a laissez faire or hands-off approach to social integration doesn't work. We need rules, institutions and support to enable people to integrate into cohesive communities and for the avoidance of doubt, I don't mean assimilation, I mean integration, and there's a difference, Khan said. People shouldn't have to drop their cultures and traditions when they arrive in our cities and countries.

Note that Khan is presuming to lecture a country that has successfully assimilated 140 million people in the last 170 years. It was done without forcing the newcomers to give up their culture. To this day, we celebrate the cultures of other countries together, as Americans. Pride in one's ethnicity is encouraged. And while there are forces trying to destroy the "melting pot" model, they haven't met with much success...yet.

Perhaps Khan could have given some examples where the assimilation model was a failure and the integration model  think France  was a success.

Frances recent move to ban the burkini and Britains decision to break away from the European Union could be traced back to anti-immigrant sentiments, much like those espoused by Trump, Khan said, and the only way to avoid these ridiculous situations is through social integration. "We need to be sure that minority communities have a sense of belonging, so that they are as resilient as possible to extremism and radicalization. We should create the right conditions for new migrants to fully integrate into their new neighborhoods, providing clear advice on our values and expectations, he said. Khans first official trip to North America as Londons mayor began earlier in the day Thursday when he met with Canadas Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Khan is in the U.S. along with several leaders in Britains tech industry to promote trade between the two countries.

Great Britain "integrates" immigrants by validating every claim the newcomers make regarding the superiority of their culture and way of life to that found in the West. Many Muslims advocate for sharia courts while demanding that grocery stores and other establishments bow to the Islamic way of doing things.

Does this promote "cohesive communities"? Or is it a recipe to create islands of religious and ethnic minorities disconnected from the whole?

In 50 years, when it is likely that most of Western Europe is an Islamic caliphate, the few remaining Europeans will wonder where they went wrong and why the glory of civilization was deliberately trampled to dust by those entrusted with Western civilization's legacy.
For the sake of humor, I often email my friends with a news report followed by a parody of it.

Sometimes it is difficult, however, for readers to accept that the real news item is not itself the actual parody. Here is an example.

According to a report at Fox News, a college student "active in the local Black Lives Matter movement is suddenly all for police patrols in his neighborhood  after he was robbed at gunpoint outside his apartment."

This reminds us of the decades-old truism that a conservative is a liberal who has been mugged. In this case, the mugging was literal. While it is doubtful that the student has now become a Second Amendment right-wing "deplorable" conservative, it is entirely possible that he has finally taken the first baby step toward acknowledging reality  at least that tiny part of it encompassing the fact that policemen are not, it turns out, "hunting down young black men like dogs and murdering them in the street." That is an inexact quote, but close. For another quote, an exact one, see here among others.

The student in the real news, Jerry Ford, Jr., has apparently been living in a bubble up until now, by which I mean he has happily never before been subjected to the grim reality behind the political rhetoric and hopefully never again will be mugged. It must be a horrible experience. To be accosted by a stranger who is clearly posing the credible threat of murder, and then to be deprived of one's valuables, must be a nightmare-inducing trauma.

Another sad part of this is that Ford has seemingly been oblivious, up until now, that for many thousands of American residents, especially those leading "black lives" (that is to say, their own lives), the imminent threat of sudden, deadly violence, but not from policemen, is a constant daily factor. Many people live in such fear of their neighborhood criminals that they carefully schedule their trips to the corner store to avoid the most dangerous hours. In many neighborhoods, even choosing which colors to wear can be a life-or-death decision.

To some extent, the commonsense remedies for this ongoing atrocity are hampered by the myths perpetrated by the Black Lives Matter organization and similar groups. They have made it politically incorrect to so much as mention the term "black-on-black violence." They refer to such terms as racist. To point out that vast numbers of young black men grow up, never having known their fathers  to point that out is offensive. Yet therein lies a major part of the problem. Would I be politically offensive to estimate, without knowing the specifics, that the man who mugged Ford is a young black male raised by a single mother? Would I be offending Ford to suggest that such young men are a vastly greater threat to his life than nearly any policeman in the country? Is that why he is calling for a police presence in his neighborhood?

Hopefully, Jerry Ford will reconsider his racialist views. If not, then he will become a parody of himself.
Eight km to the south of Fethiye city in southwestern Turkey lies the ruins of around five hundred houses belonging to the once thriving community of Livissi, consisting mostly of Greek Orthodox Christians. Livissi, now known as Kayakoy or the Rock Village, was built probably in the 18th century on the site of the ancient city of Lebessus, and is thought to have been the place where the inhabitants of Byzantine Gemiler Island fled to escape the marauding pirates. After a devastating earthquake and fire left Fethiye a wasted land, many moved to Livissi and the town grew. During its heydays, Livissi had a population of 10,000 or 20,000 according to different sources.

Before the First World War, there were many Greek populations living peacefully across the whole of western Turkey. But when War started, these Greeks suddenly found themselves in enemy land and at mercy of the Ottomans. Several hundred thousand Greeks were massacred during the war as part of ethnic cleansing carried out by the Turks. Some fled to Greece. Others were forcibly deported.

Photo credit: Sarah Murray/Flickr

The inhabitants of Livissi were driven out from their homes and marched on foot to another location 220 km away. Many perished, succumbing to hunger and fatigue, during these death marches.

After Turkeys defeat in the War and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the Greeks decided to go land grabbing and invaded Turkey. A full-scale war followed the Greco-Turkish War lasting three years, during which untold number of horrible crimes were committed by both Greeks and Turks against each other mass murders, rapes, butchering, burning down of cities and the usual.

Eventually, a peace treaty was signed in 1923, and both countries came to an agreement to exchange population. Over one million Greek Orthodox Christians living in Turkey were to return to Greece. In a similar fashion, about 500,000 Muslims would have to leave Greek territories and go back to Turkey.

By the time the war ended, Livissi was more or less abandoned. The few remaining families were once again forcibility deported. When the Greeks left, the Muslim deportees from Greece landed on Livissi. However, the Muslims, accustomed to large and fertile fields in their former land, found this hilly and rocky town unfit to live, and abandoned the place in favor of other regions. In 1957, a 7.1 magnitude earthquake delivered Livissi its final blow, destroying most of the towns buildings.

The town of Livissi, now renamed Kayakoy, remains deserted but preserved as a museum and a historical monument. Unfortunately, the Turkish government has been cooking up some terrible plans to turn part of the historic town into a tourist attraction with hotels, shops and other facilities.

Photo credit: Dany Sternfeld/Flickr

Photo credit: Tania & Artur/Flickr

Photo credit: Chris Parfitt/Flickr

Photo credit: Sarah Murray/Flickr

Photo credit: Dennis & Patty/Flickr

Photo credit: Dennis & Patty/Flickr

Photo credit: David Bacon/Flickr

Photo credit: Dennis & Patty/Flickr

Photo credit: Eric Sehr/Flickr

Sources: Wikipedia / BBC / Wikitravel / The Guardian
AT&T has confirmed that it is currently in the process of deploying three-channel carrier aggregation across its LTE-Advanced (or LTE-A) network. In the detail, AT&Ts spokesperson, Steven Schwadron, explained that AT&T is in the process of deploying three-channel carrier aggregation into high-density, high-traffic areas, which implies that Americas second largest carrier is rolling out this LTE-A technology in stages. According to their website, AT&T currently sells 27 LTE-A capable smartphones, which includes flagship smartphones from 2015 and 2016 such as the iPhone 6, iPhone 6S, LG G5, Samsung Galaxy S6 together with a number of pre-owned devices, including the HTC One M8, LG G3 and LG G2. AT&Ts website does not currently differentiate between devices that are capable of either two-channel or three-channel carrier aggregation. In order for customers to benefit from three-channel carrier aggregation not only must they be in an area offering the service but they must also have a compatible device.

To explain three-channel carrier aggregation, this is a networking technique that combines spectrum at three different points in the frequency range in order to increase available bandwidth and so network performance. Weve seen other carriers around the world increasing theoretical download speeds to 300 Mbps through combining three channels, although a more realistic real world download speed is considered to be around 200 Mbps taking into account network conditions and the load on the carrier at the time of use. Steven was unable to provide technical details as to the parts of the spectrum AT&T are combining for their three-channel carrier aggregation, nor the cities or indeed districts where the technology is available.

Weve seen several other American carriers discussing their own use of high performance LTE-A technologies including three-channel carrier aggregation. Sprint have enabled 200 Mbps three-channel carrier aggregation in Chicago and Kansas City, where the fourth largest US carrier has combined three different channels of its capacious 2.5 GHz spectrum. Back in June, T-Mobile US announced they were testing the technology in Dallas and have since started offering the technology. Verizon Wireless has recently started marketing two-channel carrier aggregation and has upped this to three-channels where it has sufficient spectrum, plus they have been talking about other LTE-A technologies such as MIMO (multiple-input, multiple-output).
Americas second largest carrier, AT&T, is benefiting from modernizing its network by improving its profitability. Chief Financial Officer, John Stephens, has been discussing how in the last twelve months the carrier is showing record margins  close to 50% for the last reported quarter. John explains that one of the reasons for these high margins is because AT&T have been improving and modernizing the network to improve efficiency. Two major parts of this have been moving customers off its legacy 2G networks and in using network virtualization technologies. It will be interesting to see how AT&Ts business performs as we enter 2017, especially given that some investment banks believe the industry is to come under increased pressures and that margins will shrink.

AT&Ts plan is to migrate all customers off its old 2G networks so that it can shut down this service and refarm the spectrum for newer, higher capacity networks. A 3G mast using former 2G spectrum can handle many more customers and provide a better quality of service, and 4G LTE networking is even more capacious. This means that AT&Ts network can handle many more customers for a similar level of maintenance, which means better service for customers able to use the newer generation networks. Where AT&T is able to shut down its 2G service  also known as EDGE or sometimes GPRS  it puts this spectrum back into service into either 3G or LTE masts. AT&T has been encouraging customers using the 2G networks to migrate to newer devices that are at least compatible with 3G networks and over the last twelve months, has halved its 2G-only customer base from 12 million to 6 million. In Johns words, most of those or virtually all of those devices are M2M (machine to machine) products, that is, typically older, automated wireless units for remote monitoring systems. Typical examples might be remote environmental or stock level sensors used in warehouses and medical facilities. M2M technology is one of the cornerstones of the Internet-of-Things revolution, whereby we are expecting billions of interconnected devices to join networks  but modern IoT devices using at least 3G or LTE radios.

The other side of AT&Ts network modernization plan involves using network virtualization. Earlier this year, AT&T announced that it was their ambition to see 30% of the network switched across to virtualization technologies and the company remain on track to reach this ambitious target  which is up from 5% this time last year. This means moving more and more of the networks functions away from hardware network switches and replacing with software controlled alternatives. There are many advantages for the carrier in doing this: it reduces the need to send an engineer to a site or location in order to adjust the network, but instead changes can be made from a central location. Controlling the network via software means it is significantly cheaper to design, deploy, evolve and upgrade compared with a traditional hardware box approach.
Are smart assistants just a fad? Google doesnt seem to think so. In fact, the Mountain View-based tech giant has recently detailed its plans for the future of this emerging technology which Google predicts will soon be omnipresent. So, if smart assistants truly do become an irreplaceable part of our future lives, how does Google intend to convince us to use its AI-powered solution and not one that Facebook, Microsoft, or some other tech giant comes up with? The answer is simple: mapping data. A huge amount of geographic data Google has accumulated over the years is precisely something its competitors dont have access to so it makes sense for the company to try to base its future AI assistants on it in order to offer something they cant. According to Google Maps division chief Jen Fitzpatrick, thats exactly what the company decided to do.

In Fitzpatricks own words: Maps is a pretty incredible swiss army knife of a product. In a recent interview with Business Insider, she expressed her strong belief in mapping data as an incredibly important factor of future smart assistants, adding that Google has the upper hand over its competitors because the company is heavily investing in mapping endeavors for almost two decades while the likes of Apple and Tesla just started taking notice of similar projects in the last few years. So, whats Google doing right now after it has collected most of the relevant mapping data on the planet? As Fitzpatrick reveals, the company is currently trying to build the next generation of Maps which will boast the most detailed understanding of the real world thats ever existed. That includes marking landmarks, shops, restaurants, hotels, hospitals, gas stations, and everything else that could be potentially useful to a Maps user. Naturally, this process started a while back but Google is now increasing its efforts to finish it as quickly as possible.

In addition to simply marking points of interest on its maps, Google is also attempting to put a bigger emphasis on past experiences of its users related to specific locations. Fitzpatrick wants a future in which people can ask their smart assistants to recommend them something like a pet-friendly restaurant in Marseille or a tourist-friendly bar in Budapest that plays jazz music. Furthermore, Google is also exploring new avenues in regards to the type of data it collects. Things like natural disasters, taxis, and emergency services are just some of the stuff the company will soon be trying to track or is already tracking to some extent.

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The general is plan is that Googles smart assistants evolve simultaneously with its Maps service by utilizing new sets of data Maps will gradually start having access to in the future. Fitzpatrick described this step as the next chapter of Google Maps. What exactly that chapter will entail remains to be seen but one thing is certain: Google is heavily betting on smart assistants.
Two years after becoming the head of Google Glass, executive Ivy Ross has seemed to of received a sizable promotion at the San Francisco branch of the company. Ross new official title is Vice President of Design and User Experience for Hardware products. In other words, the person who had been originally hired to focus on the design and marketing aspects of the Glass wearable is now doing something similar, but for all of the companys hardware divisions. This information comes directly from Ross LinkedIn page which has been quietly updated in the last few days.

Ross arrived at the Mountain View-based company in May of 2014 with a rich design and marketing background which was obtained in the fashion industry after working for a lot of big brands names, including Calvin Klein, Gap, and Swatch. The general idea back then, was for Ross to come up with solutions to make Glass attractive to the user base that is not typically described as tech-savvy. Its not a huge leap to say that the higher-ups at Google were obviously pleased with her achievements in the Glass division. Namely, despite the initial consumer model of the Glass being discontinued, that apparently had more to do with the fact that the device was expensive and had a short battery life. Speaking from a pure design standpoint, the wearable thats recently been given a second chance as Project Aurora has apparently been at least somewhat successful in the eyes of Googles higher executives. At least, thats what Ross promotion would suggest given how shes now one of the main people responsible for the design of all of Googles hardware.

In any case, it seems the Harvard graduate will continue her work at Google but on a larger scale, trying her best to figure out how to make the companys upcoming smart speaker, Chromecast computers, and other physical products as appealing as they can be to the average consumer. Interestingly enough, when Business Insider reached out to Google about the promotion, company representatives declined to comment. Which if nothing else, could suggest the promotion has not yet been made official.
Ryan Germick controls arguably the most significant billboard of all time, the Google homepage. He is the man, along with his team, behind the Google Doodles, the temporary homepage and logo redesigns that Google use to commemorate past or present events or anniversaries. Initially they were only intended as an internal out of office reminder, but the Doodles have developed over time to often include animations and interactivity and become more frequent. Germick says that he has now started to see Google Doodles everywhere as he imagines how everyday objects could look decorating the homepage as the Google logo. The ideas arent just his though. Google employees around the world are encouraged to submit ideas and suggestions. Germick tries to encourage the kind of boundless creativity that he says is often seen in children but that tends to get lost or restricted as we get older.

The first Google Doodle was displayed in 1998, at the time of the Burning Man festival that year and was designed by Larry Page and Sergey Brin to remind employees that they would be away at the festival. For a while after that the Doodles were designed by external consultants, but brought back in-house at Google in 2000. Google employees working on the Doodles are now known as Doodlers and have expanded from a single employee to a dedicated team working out of Googles Mountain View headquarters and connecting with their global employee base in an attempt to be as diverse and inclusive as possible.

The first interactive Doodle was in 2010, to commemorate the 30th anniversary of Pac-Man. Many have followed since, including an electric guitar, a Rubiks Cube, a Turing Machine and a Doctor Who game. About 400 Doodles have been created so far, planned from as much as 18 months earlier, with about 100 of those being animated. The more complex interactive Doodles usually have a team of engineers working on them.

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The reach and potential influence of the Google Doodle is extraordinary, with a huge worldwide audience. Altering a company logo breaks with all marketing tradition, but Ryan Germick and his team manage to achieve it and incorporate a little fun and education as they do so.
The United States has been enjoying the Lenovo Moto Z for the past few weeks while those in Canada are still waiting. If what a new report out of MobileSyrup is correct  Canadians will be able to purchase the Moto Z and its Moto Mods from October 5. Unfortunately, there are no firm or complete details on which carriers will be selling the Moto Z, although it is expected that both Rogers and Bell will carry the device. It is also expected to come with a no-term price of $900, which does make it much more expensive than the $624 enjoyed by consumers in the US with Verizon.

The new Moto Z measures 153.3 x 75.3 x 5.2 mm which makes it a pretty thin device. In fact, it is so thin that Lenovo did away with the standard 3.5 mm headphone jack. They provide you with an adapter that fits in the USB Type-C port which will then allow you to plug your headphones in. The sound is better, but if you are a headphone user, then you must remember to keep your adapter with you at all times. Even the Moto Z Force model, which can handle a headphone plug is missing it too. Although again, you are provided with an adapter. You may want to consider using a Bluetooth headset, although it is possible that with this trend occurring, headset makers will also sell models with a USB Type-C reversible plug.

Moto Z buyers are getting a 5.5-inch Super AMOLED QHD display with 535 pixels-per-inch. The brains come from the Snapdragon 820 processor, an Adreno 530 GPU, 4GB of DDR4 RAM, and 32GB of the faster UFS expandable memory. The primary camera is 13-megapixels in size with an aperture of f/1.8, with laser autofocus, dual-tone LED flash, and OIS. The front-facing camera (FFC) consists of a 5-megapixel lens, f/2.2, and even a LED flash for great low-light selfies and video chats. It also packs the usual suspects including WiFi, Bluetooth v4.1, GPS NFC, an FM radio, and the USB Type-C port for charging and data transfer. It also has the usual nano-coating to help with water splashes.

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There are currently several Moto Mods out on the market for the Moto Z phones which fit the Moto Z, the Moto Z Force, and the Moto Z Play. The ones that are expected to come to Canada are the Incipio Power Pack for $90 (which will add 2,200 mAh to your 2,600 mAh battery), the JBL SoundBoost for $100 (which attaches two stereo speakers to your Moto Z), the Insta-Share projector for $400 (which will take whatever is on your phone and project it on the wall) and the gem of the group  if you are into photography  the new Hasselblad True Zoom camera with a large Xenon flash and 10X optical zoom which you can just snap on.
Earlier this month, it was reported (then confirmed) that Google had shelved their modular smartphone ambitions in Project Ara. This came as a bit of a surprise, seeing as Google was hoping to put out the first commercial units early next year, and had a slew of partners on board to create modules for the device. Not to mention developers would be getting their units this fall. It also shows that as Alphabet, the company is really beginning to reign in on their outlandish projects and hoping to make something that will actually make money for the company  this is also what has led to many exits among other projects under X, like the Self-Driving Car Project. But back to Ara, this news leads us to wonder, are modular phones still ahead of their time? Are they ever going to take off? Are modular phones ever going to be a viable commercial product?

Google isnt the only one to have tried their hands at a modular smartphone. LG and Lenovo both tried it earlier this year with their own flagships. The LG G5, that was announced at Mobile World Congress in February, was a somewhat modular smartphone. The bottom of the phone could come off, and you could swap out the battery, and also add on a battery grip, or a DAC for better audio (thats about as far as LG went with modularity). Lenovo did a better job, but made it a bit gimmicky. Using connector pins on the back of the Moto Z, you can add Moto Mods onto the back of the device to extend its functionality. One of the Moto Mods would add speakers, another was a Pico Projector, one was an extended battery and the newest was a Hasselblad camera.

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These offerings from LG and Lenovo are commercially available  although the LG G5 is more widely available than the Moto Z line. But they havent done exceedingly well. With Lenovo, they kind of shot themselves in the foot, by giving the devices a timed exclusive with Verizon and keeping the Moto Z Force as a Verizon exclusive forever. Meaning that there would be a much smaller market of people actually wanting to buy the phone. In fact, even now, two months after the Moto Z and Moto Z Force launched at Verizon, the Moto Z is not available in many areas (but it is available or will be soon, in Europe). But many reviewers have stated that Lenovo did the better job when it came to modularity. Not only did the Moto Z look better, but it worked a whole lot better. Allowing users to slap on a Moto Mod onto the back of their device without having to reboot the device. Which actually became a pretty big feature for Moto Mods on the Lenovo Moto Z family of smartphones. This is because with LG, you have to pull out the battery which means you are forced to reboot the phone. Even with Project Ara, you could hot swap items like the camera, without needing to turn off the device then turn it back on.

The modular phone, its a dream that every technology nerd would love to have become a reality. Imagine being able to swap out the camera on your smartphone for something else thats better? Or swapping out the RAM for more RAM, same for the storage? All this without having to buy an entirely new smartphone. That was basically what Google was promising or at least hoping to achieve with Ara  although some of these things wouldnt be swapped out, like the RAM and processor. And thats due to how the phone would be built. Otherwise the phone would be much, much larger than it needed to be. This means you can buy a shell as your smartphone and just basically replace parts every so often, as you need. This includes the battery, youd be able to swap it out instead of needing to plug in your phone. It would definitely cut down on electronic waste, which is starting to become a pretty big problem in countries across the globe. In fact, Japan is going to use e-waste to create the medals for the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, which is a creative way to get rid of all that electronic waste thats sitting around.

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Now the dream isnt dead. Itll likely still happen, but it wont happen in 2016, and probably not 2017 or even 2018. These things take time. While Google (and before being sold to Lenovo, Motorola) has spent a ton of time working on this, it doesnt mean the time was wasted. As Google may license Ara out to other companies to work on the dream of a modular smartphone. The modular smartphone is doomed to fail, for now. It wont always be like this, however. Things like this take time to mature and get better. Its also a case of trial and error. The more things like this are tested, especially in the real world, the more issues that will crop up and companies can work to fix them, before making them widely available. But yes, modular smartphones are a bit ahead of their time. Much like Dell was ahead of the Phablet time with the Dell Streak 5  which when you look back at it, it wouldnt have been a phablet in todays world. Then a year later, Samsung came out with the 5.3-inch Galaxy Note and created the Phablet market and has owned it ever since. When it is a modular smartphones time, whoever does it, is going to likely take the space and own it for the foreseeable future. As Samsung did with the Phablet space in 2011, all the way til 2016 with the Galaxy Note 7.

A commercial version of Ara may never actually happen, now that Google has cancelled its Ara plans. But we will likely see a commercially available modular smartphone before this decade is over with. Now it may not be from Google, or even Lenovo. But there are other companies working on this same exact concept. Including Fairphone, Nexpaq, and Puzzlephone. Although Puzzlephone did recently announce that they are delaying their first units, due to funding slowing down and thus affecting their work. The commercially available version may also be much more limited than what PhoneBloks (the company Motorola bought and turned into Project Ara under X) promised in their opening video announcing the product a few years ago. It may be something a bit closer to full modularity than what Lenovo has currently, but they may be the closest ones to offering a commercially available modular smartphone right now.

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Many are sad that Project Ara is dead, but its not forgotten, and the modular smartphone is far from dead. As smartphone makers search for ways to innovate their smartphones, modularity is likely going to be a pretty big focal point for a lot of manufacturers. As weve already seen in 2016 and will likely see more of in 2017. However, at this point, its pretty obvious that Lenovo has done the best job at providing modularity to their smartphones, and thats without even using the word modular to describe Moto Mods for the Moto Z, Moto Z Force and the Moto Z Play, which is pretty impressive to say the least.
Lets face it. Everyone uses their mobile device to send messages. The only difference is what type of message and what type of messaging app. This everyone does it mentality does mean that messaging apps are available in abundance now and Android device owners are able to choose the messaging app which not only best suits their needs, but also best suits their personality. Whether it be over-the-top apps which come equipped with all the bells and whistles or more subtle and straightforward messaging apps, there is a messaging app waiting for you to try. With so many to choose from there are going to be some which inevitably do not make it on to the list. Such is life when you only have ten positions to fill. Here are our top 10 messaging apps for Android.

Skype

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There is a good chance you are already using Skype for your video calling as it is one of the most widely-used video calling apps available for Android. However, it is also a pretty good messaging app. So if you are not really into downloading more apps than you need and do have Skype installed, then this is a good one to use for your messaging needs. Of course, if you dont have Skype installed, then now would be the time to do so.

WhatsApp

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For those looking for an extremely popular messaging app then look no further than WhatsApp. This one sees tons of features being added on a regular basis and is also one that has recently pushed forward its encryption benefits. So if you are looking for a safe and secure app that many of your friends are likely already using, then WhatsApp is it. This one connects to your phone number and so anyone who is in your contacts already will instantly start to show up.

Facebook Messenger

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WhatsApp is now owned by Facebook. However, that has not stopped Facebook from pushing forward with their own messaging solution, the aptly named Facebook Messenger. If you are big into your Facebook then this is a must have app as it does come with a lot of Facebook integration and features. For instance, with this one you can simply sign in with your Facebook account, which makes setting it up and getting it going really easy.

LINE: Free Calls & Messages

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While LINE might not be an app (or a company) that everyone is familiar with, it is an app which a very large number of Android smartphone owners now use. In fact, this goes for all of the LINE-related apps. This is largely due to LINE being a very well-known and used app company in certain areas of the world, like Asia. Not to mention, this is also a fairly feature-rich app as well, with LINE: Free Calls & Messages offering a ton of additional ways to communicate, including a wealth of stickers and so on. If you are looking to try out a completely different messaging app, then LINE: Free Calls & Messages might be the one to go for.

Viber

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Viber is another app which has gained in popularity of late and with good reason. It offers a very nice and intuitive interface and app overall. Like WhatsApp, this one makes use of your phone number and once connected to your number, is able to pull contacts from your phone for the people you know who are also using the app. So the set up is fairly simply and within no time, you will be good to go with this one.

Telegram

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Telegram is one of those apps which has recently gained quite a lot of media attention, both good and bad. However, the good and bad media attention is due to the same reason  how secure this app is. So if you are after an app which ensures you have an encrypted messaging connection, then few apps will do this better than Telegram.

Signal Private Messenger

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Of course, Telegram is not the only message app out there that places security at its core and if you would prefer to support one which has not gained so much negative press recently, then Signal Private Messenger is definitely one worth checking out. This is another security-focused messaging app, which also comes with a ton of additional features, like voice calling, group messages and so on.

BlackBerry Messenger

BlackBerry Messenger, or more simply, BBM, needs no introduction. In fact, in many ways this is one of the original messaging services and at one point was literally all the rage with people swapping their pins  a great solution to connecting with people without having to hand over your phone number or email. While the operating system that BBM used to breathe off of is slowly fading, the app is not. It has gone through some major redevelopments and improvements and has now been ported over to Android. So if you like the BBM way of messaging and own an Android device, there is only one option  BBM for Android.

Hangouts

Of course, for the Android faithful, there is always Googles own messaging solution, Hangouts. This is another app which has seen multiple transformations and redesigns over time and does provide its users with a great way to keep in touch. All the usual perks you would expect, including the ability to make calls, group messaging and so on are all included. This one also has the added benefit of being available in a desktop form as well. Which means whichever device you are on, your messages and contacts are just a click away.

Google Messenger

Then again, if you are just looking for a very simple text messaging app to use then there is always Googles Messenger app. This is an app which can replace your default text app and brings with it all the design cues you would expect from a Google app. There is not a lot in the way of additional content on offer here, but if you just want to send your texts easily with a nice, clean interface, then Messenger is worth downloading, if you do not already have it installed that is.

Allo

OK, while this is a top 10 list and we have already discussed 10 apps, it seems impossible not to mention Googles other messaging app, Allo. The problem with Allo is that it is not actually available to download yet. This is a brand new messaging app from Google and one which looks to bring a number of features that you dont currently have access to with the likes of Hangouts (or some of the other apps), such as smarter Google Assistant integration, and much much more. While you cannot download the app just yet, you can always register for the app and be one of the first to download it, once it does go live.
It is now official. The Samsung Galaxy Note 7 has been the subject of a lot of media attention over the last few days and weeks due to an issue which is suspected to cause the battery to overheat and/or catch fire. This has led to Samsung asking consumers to return their devices for a replacement, although this asking did not constitute an official recall in the Unites States. That has now changed as following their early announcement to stop using the device, Samsung along with the US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) has today issued a formal recall for the Galaxy Note 7 in the US.

The official recall does not provide much information beyond what is already known but does make it clear that Galaxy Note 7 smartphones purchased before September 15 are being recalled. In line with the number of reports that have come through recently, the CPSC does state that the reason for the recall is due to the Galaxy Note 7 posing a serious burn hazard to consumers. Again, as had already been reported, the CPSC advisory notes that owners of the Galaxy Note 7 should return their smartphone to the wireless carrier or place of purchase. Alternatively they can head over to the Samsung website for further details on how to return the device or call Samsung toll-free on 844-365-6197.

While this formal recall does not change much compared to the current state of affairs (as Samsung had already halted sales of the handset), now it is formal, stock of the smartphone cannot be sold in the US until the issue had been rectified. Of course, this is likely to only be a short outage as Samsung is thought to be working hard and quickly on re-establishing sales channels in the US, as well as elsewhere in the world. Interestingly, the announcement does detail that this recall affects about 1 million devices, which does seem to be a form of confirmation of how many units were sold in the US prior to the sales freeze taking place. Either way, you can find out more about the recall or read the CPSCs announcement on the matter in full, by heading through the source link below.
Xiaomi is one of the largest smartphone manufacturers in the world. This company was founded back in 2010, and theyve managed to become one of the largest Chinese smartphone manufacturers in only a couple of years. That being said, Xiaomi releases quite a few devices a year, and various reports in the past accused the company of pre-installing adware, spyware and all sorts of other malicious software on their devices. Now, the company basically always responds to such accusations and explains the situation, so its not exactly wise to jump to conclusions. Well, weve actually had a similar situation today, read on.

Earlier today, weve stumbled upon a report claiming that Xiaomi can install any app on their devices without you knowing it. This information came from Thijs Broenink, a Computer Science student from Netherlands. He basically figured out that Xiaomis AnalyticsCore.apk constantly runs in the background, and reappears even if you decide to delete it. This app, according to Broenink, checks for updates from Xiaomi every 24 hours, and sends all kinds of information to Xiaomis servers. This app also automatically installs the update from Xiaomis servers, if it finds it there, the updates file is named Analytics.apk. Now, the update will get automatically installed on your device, without your knowledge, which is what makes this quite weird, and what seemingly scared Mr. Broenink.

Well, we didnt want to go ahead of ourselves and write about this until we contact Xiaomi to get an official explanation of what is going on here. The company was kind enough to offer an official response to Mr. Broeninks post, heres what they had to say: AnalyticsCore is a built-in MIUI system component that is used by MIUI components for the purpose of data analysis to help improve user experience, such as MIUI Error Analytics. As a security measure, MIUI checks the signature of the Analytics app during installation or upgrade to ensure that only the APK with the official and correct signature will be installed. Any APK without an official signature will fail to install. As AnalyticsCore is key to ensuring better user experience, it supports a self-upgrade feature. Starting from MIUI V7.3 released in April/May, HTTPS was enabled to further secure data transfer, to prevent any man-in-the-middle attacks.

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Now, according to Xiaomis statement, this app functions more or less as Mr. Broenink described, but in addition to sending usage reports (which are used to improve user experience), the app also pulls updates from the server if theyre available. Now, Xiaomi also said that MIUI (Xiaomis user interface pre-installed on every single one of their devices) check the signature of the AnalyticsCore app before installation in order to make sure that the update is official, otherwise it wont install it. So, all in all, the AnalyticsCore app does support the auto-update feature, though Xiaomi claims that this only improves user experience, nothing else, and it seems like this issue was blown way out of proportion.
Assyrian Bishop: We Denounce Kurdish Curricula and Abuses

Syriac Orthodox Bishop Maurice Amsih. ( AssyriaTV) His excellence the Syriac Orthodox bishop of Gozarto, Syria, Maurice Amsih is visiting Sweden. Assyria TV asked him for an interview to tell about the current situation in Gozarto. Despite the difficulties of the war he is hopeful about a better life for the Assyrians and other inhabitants. He says the solution seems to come soon where Gozarto will return to the control of the Syrian government after Aleppo is taken back. He denounces any Kurdish abuses from the self-proclaimed PYD-rule towards the Assyrians, such as imposing Kurdish curricula in Assyrian schools, confiscating the property of the emigrated or to put the pro-Kurdish Assyrian militia MFS in the front line when Kurdish Asayish is fighting against the Syrian regime. Recently when the clashes in Hassakeh began, he went out to the street and prevented the MFS from shooting alongside the Asayish. The Kurds warned him but he ignored it. In the Assyrian school in Derbesiyeh there are only four Assyrian pupils, but 300 Kurdish. Bishop Amish refused to accept the Kurdish curricula in this school or any other school n Gozarto. He also refused to apply for permission from the Kurdish authority. In such case the school will loose its permission from the state of Syria, he says. As to the attacks and suicide bombs in Qameshly, he is convinced that they are aimed to scare the Assyrians to flee, the same way it happened in the Nineveh Plains. But we will never surrender, he says. This is our ancestral land and we will remain here, he adds. The suicide bomb against the patriarch last May was carried out by a 14 year old mongoloid boy, and the belt probably exploded by remote control. The church is fully behind the unity of Syria and denounces any division of the country, bishop Amsih states.
(ANSA) - Rome, September 16 - Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, who has died aged 95, was a former central banker who was later hailed as "everyone's president" when he served as a highly popular head of State from 1999 to 2006.

The former premier played a key role in Italy adopting the euro and as president made it his mission to revive a patriotic spirit that had been signally lacking in postwar Italy, outside far-right circles.

The statesman was born in the Tuscan port city of Livorno on December 9, 1920.

He graduated in Italian literature in 1941 from the prestigious Scuola Normale in Pisa, where he took a second degree in law after World War Two.

During the war, he served in the Italian army - from 1941 until 1943 - before he joined partisans to fight against Benito Mussolini.

The experience made him a staunch patriot and Europhile.

In 1946, he joined the central bank, where he spent most of his working life - 47 years.

He steadily climbed its ranks until his appointment as governor in 1979.

He served in that position for 14 years, until April 1993, when he was named prime minister in a government of transition until May 1994, when Italy was embroiled in a vast political corruption scandal, the so-called Tangentopoli (bribesville).

A bi-partisan figure, Ciampi steered the country through a difficult institutional and economic transition, becoming the first non-lawmaker to head a government since the Italian Republic was founded.

He was not involved in the 1994 election that launched three-time conservative premier Silvio Berlusconi's career.

However, he served as finance minister in the center-left governments of Romano Prodi (April 1996-October 1998) and Massimo D'Alema (October 1998-May 1999), playing a key role in ensuring that Italy was among the first group of countries to join the single currency.

Surrounded by a team of economists, including the current European Central Bank President Mario Draghi, Ciampi succeeded in cutting Italy's fiscal deficit from 6.7% in 1996 to 2.7% in 1997.

In May 1999, Parliament overwhelmingly elected him tenth president of the republic for a seven-year mandate.

Ciampi's conduct during the war, his prized work as a civil servant and bipartisan standing gave him a credibility and respect he devoted to promoting a sense of patriotism and national unity, urging Italians to take pride in their shared history and symbols, notably the flag.

He loved to use the word "patria" (homeland) in his speeches and often ended them hailing the tri-color Italian flag and Italy: "Viva il tricolore, viva la nostra bandiera, viva l'Italia".

In 2001 he memorably paid tribute to an Italian division of soldiers that rebelled against the Germans and was massacred on the Greek island of Cephalonia during WWII, hailing them as starting the Resistance.

Ciampi's patriotism also informed his neo-Keynesian economic views in which he stressed the importance of all the 'social partners' working together in 'concerted action' on business and incomes policies to spur progress for the whole country.


In Syria 54 killed in last 24 hours says SOHR Despite ceasefire, victims include 34 civilians and 11 children

(ANSAmed) - BEIRUT, SEPTEMBER 16 - The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) said on Friday that 54 people have been killed in the country in the past 24 hours, despite the current week-long ceasefire underway since Monday.



Of the 54 victims, it said 34 were civilians of whom 11 were children, including a baby girl killed by insurgents in southern Syria and a baby boy killed by a government sniper in east Aleppo, in the country's north.



The highest death toll was in Mayadin, in the country's ISIS-controlled east, where SOHR said 27 civilians were killed on Thursday, including nine children, in an airstrike by unidentified military aircraft.



Both sides accuse the other of having broken the ceasefire.



SOHR said that in recent hours there have been government airstrikes and artillery attacks in west-central Syria (Idlib), in central Syria (in the areas of Homs and Hama), inside and outside the capital city of Damascus (in west Ghuta and the Jobar area), and in the country's south (in the regions of Daraa and Quneitra). State news agency SANA reported ceasefire violations by insurgents in Jobar, an area in east Damascus outside of government control.(ANSAmed).




Former president Ciampi dies at 95 Pope, Renzi, Mattarella pay tribute, Salvini says 'traitor'

(By Paul Virgo).



(ANSAmed) - Rome, September 16 - Former Italian president Carlo Azeglio Ciampi died Friday at the age of 95.



Born in Livorno in 1920, Ciampi was head of State from 1999 to 2006. He was popular and widely respected for his ability, intelligence and impartiality.



He also had a stint as premier, from 1993 to 1994, and served for 14 years as the governor of the Bank of Italy, up to 1993.



"The government embraces Signora Franca," Premier Matteo Renzi tweeted, referring to Ciampi's widow. "A thought of gratefulness goes out to a man of the institutions, who served Italy with passion". Pope Francis also paid tribute. "He undertook public responsibilities with gentlemanly discretion and a strong sense of the State," the pontiff wrote in a telegram to Ciampi's widow.



Ciampi died in Rome's Pio XI clinic, where he had been for several days after a deterioration in his health conditions, his doctor Andrea Platania said on Friday. Ciampi, a life Senator, would have turned 96 in December.



Domenico Marchetta, the head of the ex president's office in the Senate, said the funeral will take place in Rome. His body will lie in state at the Senate on Saturday, ANSA sources said. President Sergio Mattarella said "Italians will not forget" Ciampi. "They will continue to appreciate him and to consider him an example of competence, dedication, generosity, and passion," he said, calling Ciampi "a great Italian and a great European".



But the praise was not universal.



Northern League leader Matteo Salvini said that Ciampi was a "traitor" like his successor as head of State, Giorgio Napolitano, and former premiers Romano Prodi and Mario Monti. "Death is always bad news that should be faced with prayer and condolences," said Salvini, who wants Italy to drop the euro, while Ciampi had a big hand in Italy adopting the single currency. "Politically, Ciampi is one of the traitors of Italy and the Italian people, like Napolitano, Prodi and Monti. "He had the disaster that hit 50 million Italians on his conscience, like the others. "Politically speaking, he is one of the accomplices of the sell-off of Italy to the powers-that-be".



Senate Speaker Pietro Grasso hit back, suggesting Salvini was a "vulture". "Any exploitation of his death at a political level can only be described as a vulture-like operation," said Grasso.



(ANSAmed).




BERLIN - European Parliament President Martin Schulz criticised countries of east-central Europe on Friday, the day of the EU Summit in Bratislava, for "having left Germany by itself" to face the continent's current migrant and refugee crisis, in an interview with German daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.



Schulz rejected the accusation made by eastern European governments of Berlin's "moral imperialism", and said that what German Chancellor Angela Merkel has done in terms of migrant policy "was right".



Schulz said eastern European countries have had "military aid and sanctions against Russia when they felt threatened by Moscow" but "they weren't ready to give a hand" when it was time to show solidarity for refugees.



Schulz defined the situation in the EU as "dangerous".
Cupertino, California  Swift Playgrounds, an innovative new iPad app from Apple that makes learning to code easy and fun for everyone, is now available on the App Store. With Swift Playgrounds, real coding concepts are brought to life with an interactive interface that allows students and beginners to explore working with Swift, the easy-to-learn programming language from Apple used by professional developers to create world-class apps.

The Swift Playgrounds app is approachable enough for students with no previous programming experience to begin exploring key coding concepts, but also powerful enough for skilled programmers to experiment and express their creativity using Swift.

Everyone should have the opportunity to learn coding, and we are excited to bring Swift Playgrounds to the next generation of programmers looking for a fun and easy way to explore key coding concepts using real code, said Craig Federighi, Apples senior vice president of Software Engineering. More than 100 schools around the world have already committed to adding Swift Playgrounds to their fall curriculum, and we cant wait to see what students create with it.
YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 16, ARMENPRESS. The Defense Ministry of Nagorno Karabakh informs the Azerbaijani forces made more than 20 ceasefire violations across Nagorno Karabakh-Azerbaijan line of contact.

The Ministrys announcement reads: Overnight September 15-16 the Azerbaijani side violated the ceasefire regime more than 20 times by firing over 225 shots from various caliber weapons at the Armenian positions in Nagorno Karabakh-Azerbaijan line of contact.

The Defense Army forces adhered to the ceasefire regime and continued conducting the reliable protection of the military positions.
YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 16, ARMENPRESS. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the United Kingdom announced on September 16 that it closed its Embassy in Turkey for security reasons, Cumhuriyet reported.

It is already a long time the UK urges its citizens to be cautious and avoid visiting the bordering areas and certain provinces of Turkey.

Earlier it was reported Germany closed its Embassy and diplomatic representations in Turkey due to terror threat.

Not only the diplomatic representations, but also the German schools will be closed in Turkey until September 16. With such measures the German side will try to ensure its citizens security in case of possible terror threat.

Moreover, the German Embassy in Turkey posted a note in Twitter which says the German diplomatic representations will provide limited services, and the admissions will not be at all until September 16.
YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 16, ARMENPRESS. Deputy Foreign Minister of Armenia Robert Harutyunyan says Armenia must be a country connecting the EAEU and Iran.

Currently negotiations are underway over EAEU-Iran free trade agreement, and Armenia must be ready to not only act as a platform between the EAEU and Iran, but also it must try to present the possible investors interests within the framework of the agreement. In other words, we must put an emphasis on such sectors which we think have prospects in terms of making investments in Armenia. This process supposes development of Armenia-Iran bilateral business ties, he said, Armenpress reported.

The Deputy FM said the businessmen of Armenia must know at best the issues of establishing business ties with Iran. He also said works must be done to considerably facilitate the process of transferring the Iranian goods through Armenia.

Especially after the elimination of sanctions the interest of the European, Russian, US and other companies is increasing towards Iran. We must understand how we must work with Iran and develop the relations, he said.

That route through which the Iranian product is being exported is very important. Unfortunately, the transport of the large part of Russia-Iran goods is being carried out through Azerbaijan. Armenia has serious works to do on this issue, the Deputy FM said.
YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 16, ARMENPRESS. 25 years ago the peoples of the Commonwealth of Independent States chose the path of building independent states and today we can document that we have achieved a lot of things despite numerous obstacles and this is to some extent thank to the mechanisms provided by the Commonwealth, Armenpress reports President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan announced in Bishkek at the narrow-format meeting of the heads of the CIS member states.

Our states are in the phase of reinforcing their governance systems. For Armenia, this is the way to ensuring rule of law, improvement of the governance system, economic development, increasing the level of independence of the judicial system, strengthening the civil society and support for free media, President Sargsyan stated.

In the words of the Armenian president, last year a Constitutional referendum, substituting the semi-presidential system of governance into a parliamentary one, was held in Armenia to achieve these goals.

This week for the first time during the 25 years of our independence, a consensus was reached between the parliamentary majority and the opposition with the participation of the civil society over the amendments of the Electoral Code. More transparent mechanisms for the supervision of the electoral processes are applied, and the criminal responsibility for electoral frauds is further toughened, the President said, expressing conviction that all these measures will increase the public trust towards electoral processes, bringing them to conformity with international standards.

A few month later parliamentary elections will be held in our country. The Republic of Armenia will send invitations to all its partners, including to the CIS member states, to participate in the international monitoring mission, Serzh Sargsyan said, adding that a new government is in the stage of formation in Armenia aiming to give a new impetus to the economy and expanding export volumes.
By: Alexander Chipman Koty

With the establishment of the ASEAN Economic Community at the end of 2015, many ASEAN members have witnessed increasing harmonization of economic policies. The removal of trade barriers and increased openness throughout ASEAN is partly a result of the implementation of pre-arranged regional integration and standardization measures, but is also caused by growing competition between ASEAN members themselves to attract foreign investment. Real estate is one area which has been the target of liberalization efforts in many ASEAN member states in recent years, and has subsequently witnessed considerable growth.

Between 2005 and 2014, investments reached US$28.19 billion, largely coming from investors outside the region. Investment in the sector is poised to continue growing at impressive rates in the coming years as restrictions on foreign investors are eased and the regions emergent middle class exercises increased spending power. Emerging markets including Vietnam, Indonesia, and Cambodia have been conducting reforms to make foreign involvement in their real estate markets more accessible, presenting a wide range of opportunities. However, considerable obstacles remain when investing in ASEANs real estate market. Despite an improving investment landscape, many countries continue to have highly restricted land ownership laws, including short land tenures and restrictions on the ability to re-lease and renew land. As much of the region grapples with high urbanization rates and inadequate infrastructure, governments must balance the desire to attract foreign capital with providing their citizens with affordable housing.

RELATED: International Tax Planning Services from Dezan Shira & Associates

Vietnam

On July 1, 2015, Vietnams Housing Law and Law of Real Estate Business came into effect, greatly liberalizing foreigners access to purchasing real estate and making Vietnam one of the most open countries in Southeast Asia to overseas real estate investment. Together, the new laws allow foreign investors to own, sell, and transfer properties. While land is owned by the Vietnamese government, foreigners can hold titles on residential properties for up to 50 years, with the opportunity for a 50 year extension. Further, individuals married to Vietnamese nationals can own for a longer term.

Meanwhile, foreign companies, branches, and representative offices licensed to do business in Vietnam may purchase and sell properties for the length of the period declared on their investment or operation certificate, and developers are permitted to lease houses and buildings. In an effort to protect consumers, developers intending to sell or lease units before construction is finished must receive a guarantee from an authorized bank. Foreign buyers may purchase property that is part of a development, such as an apartment, condominium, or townhouse, but not standalone units. Previously, foreign investors could only rent property for up to a year at a time unless receiving a land use right when operating under a joint venture with a Vietnamese partner, and individuals faced a multitude of restrictions.

The new legislation makes Vietnam an attractive location for foreign investment in real estate, as is evidenced by a study by the Urban Land Institute and PwC that rated Ho Chi Minh City as the fifth best real estate investment prospect in the Asia-Pacific region, trailing only Tokyo, Sydney, Melbourne, and Osaka. In 2014, FDI inflows into real estate was three times 2013 levels and construction five times 2013 levels, making them the second and third largest recipients by sector, behind only manufacturing.

Together, real estate and construction captured US$3.6 billion in FDI during 2014, representing 18 percent of the countrys total. Leading extra-ASEAN investors in 2014 included South Korea, Hong Kong, Japan, while the U.S., EU, and Canada all saw sizable increases in real estate investments in Vietnam.

Indonesia

Indonesia is an alluring market for foreign real estate investment due to its large and youthful population, rapid urbanization rates, and emerging middle class. Within the next 40 years, Indonesias middle class of approximately 45-50 million people is projected to nearly double. The countrys massive population of over 255 million is disproportionately young, with half under the age of 30. The countrys demographics suggest that there will be a huge influx of young first-time buyers entering the property market for the foreseeable future, many of whom will be part of a large middle class. Over half of Indonesias population already reside in urban areas, and the United Nations projects urbanization to reach 75 percent by 2050. Between 2011 and 2013, average prices of residential property increased by about 30 percent annually, and Indonesian real estate stocks also performed impressively during that time period.

For individuals, foreign ownership in lower-end properties is highly restricted, though the high-end luxury market has been liberalized in recent years. A decision in 2015 allowed foreigners to own luxurious apartments, and a later decision permitted foreigners working or investing in Indonesia to own landed houses. Foreigners can purchase a landed house for an initial period of 30 years, with the possibility to extend for 20 years and then an additional 30, for a total length of 80 years. Foreigners can only hold Right to Use (Hak Pakai) titles, and cannot hold Right of Ownership or title to units categorized as modest or very modest. The minimum price for a property to be eligible to be purchased by a foreigner depends on the region, ranging from IDR 5 billion for an apartment in Jakarta to IDR 750 million for an apartment in a less developed region.

Although foreign individuals face considerable restrictions, there are no restrictions on fully owned foreign entities involved in property development and investment from owning property, and can hold Right to Build. Although foreign invested companies are not restricted, the lucrative lower to lower-middle range of the market has a significant government presence. Under the One Million Houses initiative, state-owned developer Perumnas received IDR 1 trillion from the government to meet the goal of constructing ten million new homes between 2015 and 2020.

Cambodia

Though it lacks the size and industrial capacity of Vietnam and Indonesia, Cambodia is a frontier market which has experienced an increase in foreign participation in real estate in recent years. Though foreigners cannot own land in Cambodia, 2010s Foreign Ownership Property Law opened foreign investment in condominiums and strata-titled units. Foreigners are restricted to the upper floors of buildings, limited by certain locations, and cannot comprise over 70 percent of a given building.

According to the consultancy CBRE, the number of condo units in Phnom Penh has risen from just 178 in 2009 to 2,095 in 2014, and projects an additional 9,000 between 2015 and 2018. Property Guru notes that investors have been registering rental returns between five and seven percent per year and annual capital growth of between five and 7.5 percent. However, the rapid growth in units may outpace local demand, as most are unable to meet the costs. Further, there are suspicions that Cambodias real estate sector is being used for money laundering. Chinese developers have been aggressive in the region, and some see Cambodia as a vehicle for Chinese entities to get their money out of China and convert their wealth to US dollars. Despite these concerns, Cambodia has potential to grow thanks to increasing regional integration and consistently strong GDP growth figures.

Observations

The real estate market in ASEAN is undergoing a period of reform, bringing both opportunities and uncertainty. Several countries have eased their restrictions to foreign ownership in recent years, though the breadth of property rights is often unclear. For example, Myanmars draft Condominium Law allows foreigners to own up to 40 percent of a condo building, but does not allow them to manage them. As such, it remains unclear whether owners will be allowed to rent out their properties. Despite liberalization efforts, foreigners still face considerable restrictions throughout the region, and political instability in countries such as Thailand lead to additional uncertainty. Even developed markets like Singapore pose questions. Although the city state is an alluring locale for new office projects as it emerges as a headquarters for companies operating in ASEAN, concerns over affordability and foreign influence have led to restrictive measures controlling foreign participation. Nevertheless, ASEAN is a dynamic and rapidly changing real estate market trending towards liberalization, presenting intriguing opportunities both in the short and long term.



About Us Asia Briefing Ltd. is a subsidiary of Dezan Shira & Associates. Dezan Shira is a specialist foreign direct investment practice, providing corporate establishment, business advisory, tax advisory and compliance, accounting, payroll, due diligence and financial review services to multinationals investing in China, Hong Kong, India, Vietnam, Singapore and the rest of ASEAN. For further information, please email asean@dezshira.com or visit www.dezshira.com. Stay up to date with the latest business and investment trends in Asia by subscribing to our complimentary update service featuring news, commentary and regulatory insight. 

Annual Audit and Compliance in ASEAN

For the first issue of our ASEAN Briefing Magazine, we look at the different audit and compliance regulations of five of the main economies in ASEAN. We firstly focus on the accounting standards, filing processes, and requirements for Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines. We then provide similar information on Singapore, and offer a closer examination of the city-states generous audit exemptions for small-and-medium sized enterprises.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership and its Impact on Asian Markets

The United States backed Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) includes six Asian economies  Australia, Brunei, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam, while Indonesia has expressed a keen willingness to join. However, the agreements potential impact will affect many others, not least of all China. In this issue of Asia Briefing magazine, we examine where the TPP agreement stands right now, look at the potential impact of the participating nations, as well as examine how it will affect Asian economies that have not been included.

An Introduction to Tax Treaties Throughout Asia

In this issue of Asia Briefing Magazine, we take a look at the various types of trade and tax treaties that exist between Asian nations. These include bilateral investment treaties, double tax treaties and free trade agreements  all of which directly affect businesses operating in Asia.
Fr Ibrahim Alsabagh talks to AsiaNews about isolated incidents of violence" that "distress" the civilian population. Such sudden events fuel a climate of "instability and insecurity." A lasting truce" is needed to allow food and aid distribution. The situation in east Aleppo. Christians pray for the citys salvation.

Aleppo (AsiaNews)  This morning, "we were awakened by a rocket that fell near here;" it "hit the Syrian Catholic bishop's residence" in Azizieh, west Aleppo. The building, along with the Cathedral of Our Lady, has "been targeted by rockets and mortar fire for a while" from rebel-held area, said Fr Alsabagh Ibrahim.

Speaking to AsiaNews, northern Syrias main city and current main battleground in Syrias civil war, the 44-year-old Franciscan parish priest at St Francis Latin Church in Aleppo, said that despite three days of truce, "isolated incidents of violence" in both Aleppo and Damascus continue, and this is distressing the civilian population already exhausted by the conflict.

The rocket hit the roof of the bishop's house, the clergyman said, and ended up in an empty guest room. "Neither the bishop nor his vicar were present at the time, and this prevented casualties or injuries. The damages to the building remain."

"Since the beginning of the truce, a relative palpable calm prevails. However, missiles and rockets against homes and churches have broken this apparent normality, the Franciscan explained. They are sudden and maintain a climate of instability and insecurity.

The ceasefire that began with the Islamic festival of Sacrifice (Eid al-Adha) is the latest in a series of diplomatic efforts by Washington and Moscow.

The goal is to contain a five-year conflict that has caused, according to the latest estimates, more than 300,000 deaths (430,000 according to other sources) and millions of refugees, an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe with more than 4.8 million refugees abroad, and 6.5 million internally displaced people.

Aleppo remains the hotspot with at least 250,000 people trapped in the eastern sector. Local sources said the people are in desperate need of fuel, flour, wheat, milk powder and medicines.

Since 13 September, two convoys carrying aid have been waiting at about 40 km west of Aleppo. They are being held up because, among other things, the road leading to the city is controlled by militias affiliated with al Qaeda.

The UN special envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura confirmed that the ceasefire in the country is holding in spite of some "isolated violations." For him, It is particularly regrettable because [] we are losing time.

For Fr Ibrahim, the real goal is to ensure long-term stability and a truce that is truly "sustainable" and not limited to a short period of time. The civilian population is still suffering and continues to pay the price of war."

In many areas of the city, there is no water, and power is on and off in several areas. Finding work is hard, and food and medicine are hard to get. "We need specialised doctors for specific diseases," he added.

School is going to reopen soon and "parents have to wreck their brain to decide whether to send their children to class or not.

No one knows what will happen after the truce. Many fear that violence could break out again, above all those with small children, because the minimal conditions for a normal life do not exist. Many families are still thinking about leaving the city for good, to escape any time and leave everything behind. Meanwhile, principals and teachers in Catholic schools are preparing for the new year, despite the hardships and obstacles."

East Aleppo residents also face difficulties and problems. Speaking to AFP, a male nurse, Rachid (not his real name) described the situation as catastrophic without food and medicine. There is little hope for quick aid delivery.

Still, "It's nice to see children play outside, taking advantage of the truce, but with regard to aid, we are still waiting, said Yasser Hemeish, of the Aleppo City Medical Council.

The suffering of the civilian population has united the residents of east (about 250,000), and west Aleppo (almost 1.2 million), Fr Ibrahim said.

Human dignity must be defended and safeguarded in this context of war. We pray for everyone, for a shared peace. With this intention, we celebrated in the last days the mystery of the exaltation of the Holy Cross, Our Lady of Sorrows and, tomorrow, we shall celebrate the stigmata of St. Francis." (DS)
At least 23 Shi'ite rebels, 13 regular soldiers killed in battle of Taiz. The Houthis conquer a Saudi outpost in the border region of Jizan. Fighting continues in the mountainous Kahbub region, which dominates the entrance to the Red Sea. After losing four soldiers, Qatar sends moe men and means to strengthen its presence on the ground.

Sana'a (AsiaNews / Agencies)  At least 40 people have been killed in intense fighting between Houthi Shia rebels and pro-government forces around the Yemeni city of Taiz, the most important town in the southwest of the country.

Colonel Sadeq al-Hassani, a spokesman of the loyalist forces, confirmed the 13 casualties among their own soldiers; at least 23 dead among the Houthis during the siege attempt launched by Shiite rebels on the city.



In recent days, the Houthis took a military outpost of the Saudis in the border region of Jizan. The militiamen attacked the area with artillery shells, rockets and light weapons, and forced the Saudi soldiers stationed in defense of the bastion.

A second battle is also being waged in the governorate of Taiz, in the mountainous Kahbub; an area of strategic importance, overlooking the Strait of Bab al-Mandab at the entrance of the Red Sea. There have been at least five victims between the Houthis, centered by air raids and artillery strikes unleashed by the Arab coalition soldiers to the Saudi leadership.



Meanwhile, Qatar has sent a thousand soldiers to strengthen the Arab coalition ranks, which in recent times has suffered setbacks on the ground. In addition to troops, Doha has sent 200 armored vehicles and 30 Apache helicopters to the region. The Qatari forces, which in recent hours have seen the loss of four soldiers on the battle ground, are heading to the province of Maareb to join the fighting raging in the area. Qatar also plans to send more troops and resources.



Since January 2015, Yemen has been the scene of a bloody internal conflict pitting the countrys Sunni leaders, backed by Riyadh, against Shia Houthi rebels, close to Iran.

In March 2015, a Saudi-led coalition began air strikes against the rebels in an attempt to free the capital Sana'a and bring back then exiled President Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi. So far the air campaign  criticised by the UN - has killed at least 6,600 people, mostly civilians and many children. At least 2.5 million people have been displaced from their homes.

For Saudi Arabia, the Houthis, allied to forces loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, are supported militarily by Iran, a charge that Tehran rejects.

Extremist groups linked to al Qaeda and jihadist militias linked to Islamic State are active in the country, a fact that has helped escalate violence and terror.
by Mathias Hariyadi

National Conference of catechists held in Makassar (South Sulawesi). Theologians, bishops, priests and laity from 37 dioceses met to discuss the relationship between family, technological innovations and faith transmission for five days.

Jakarta (AsiaNews) - The relationship between faith and the modern technologies and faith transmission from parent to child in an environment where social networks have more and more space in the lives of todays youth.

These were some of the themes which 110 catechists from 37 Indonesian dioceses discussed during the 11th national conference (Ppki XI) entitled: "Faith in the family: the foundation of Indonesian society in flux".

Organized in collaboration with the Indonesian Bishops Conference Catechetical Commission (Komkat KWI), the conference was hosted for five days in Makassar, the capital of southern Sulawesi.

Theologians, bishops, priests and lay catechists have contributed to the work speaking of their own educational experiences. Professor Eko Indrajid, an IT expert, explained that "we are in an era of modern communications, with a number of handy tools." "These - he continued  run the risk of alienating people from each other, because everyone is too busy with their own gadgets and do not take the time to talk to their neighbor."

Four married couples were called to testify about the education of their children in the Catholic faith. Fr. FX Adisusanto, director of the Bishops' Conference Communications Deeartment, told AsiaNews that the theme of the relationship between the Catholic families and new technologies must be "discussed in an urgent manner" among parents, bishops and catechists. The aim is to find new ways to use the new discoveries for the good of society, placing them in modern catechesis.

Some innovative ways of communicating with young people were discussed by the participants in the conference. To promote understanding of the new social environment on the part of the Church, the bishops decided to ask some young priests to study modern technologies, so that they can help in the development of a new ministry.
Fr Abdel-Massih Fahim said that the Israeli government has not yet transferred the funds pledged last year. On the one hand, the Education Ministry praises Christian schools as some of the best in the country; on the other, it constrains their activities. Students are enthusiastic about going back to school. Multiculturalism and religious pluralism are stronger that any obstacles. We are actors, not mere spectators.

Jerusalem (AsiaNews)  Students and teachers have started the new school year "with enthusiasm and participation" even though problems have remained "unresolved" for more than year and affect the lives of Christian schools in Israel, Fr Abdel-Massih Fahim, director of Christian Schools of the Holy Land Custody, told AsiaNews.

"The financial situation is still up in the air and getting worse, the Franciscan priest said. The Ministry has not yet allocated the funds promised in 2015. Still, we want to continue our mission, so we have started school."

Despite old problems, and educational and social challenges, about 33,000 students have gone back to Christian schools. The first bell rang in all 47 institutions, and at least for this year, classes started on time.

Yet, the dispute remains. Last year, Church leaders in the Holy Land postpones by a month the start of the school year in September 2015.

During the 28-day strike, pupils and teachers slammed Israeli discrimination against Christian schools in funding and school fees ceiling. The standoff ended with the government pledging 50 million shekels (US$ 13.3 million) by 31 March 2016. However, the money has not yet been transferred.

Church leaders in the Holy Land and European bishops have been involved in the battle against funding cuts. The issue was discussed last year when Pope Francis and Israeli President Reuven Rivlin met for the first time at the Vatican.

"We have negotiated with the Ministry of Education and the Department of Social Equality, Fr Abdel-Massih Fahim noted, but the matter is still pending. In recent days, they asked us to fill out a form, to be sent by September 20 to receive a portion (25 per cent of) of the funding. We have already taken steps to do this. Now we are waiting to see what happens."

Christian schools have 400 years of history and Church leaders want to keep them open. "We had moments of crisis in the past and we are convinced that we can overcome this, the priest explained.

We want to continue, in spite of the financial crisis, so much so that last year we gave a further discount of 25 per cent to the families."

Ahead of the new year, each school found a way the get the necessary funding but "it is a temporary solution."

"We do not want alms from the government but respect for our rights, Fr Fahim said. Ministry officials have proposed 34% funding but that is not enough. Plus, the law says that the government should foot at least 75% of the costs. The goal is strip us of our autonomy, but we will continue to defend it to the hilt."

The mission of Christian schools is "clear: equal education for all, in a context of dialogue, discussion and exchange between students and teachers. The economic problems with the Israeli authorities do not and should not affect this. Multiculturalism and religious pluralism are the basis of our reality.

The same Education Ministry that has failed to fund Christian schools also acknowledges that they provide an excellent education.

Our schools are among the best in the country, not only nationally but also internationally, the head of Christian schools said. The high demand to register is evidence of this. Of course, we feel bad to say no to some families, but this shows the good work done by our schools."

The new year comes full of challenges, not only economic. "The role of schools, Father Fahim said, is to raise awareness among students helping them keep up with research and rapid change, especially about Middle East. We are actors, not mere spectators. We participate in our students development by teaching them moral values."

Some 33,000 pupils  60 per cent of them Christian and 40 per cent Muslim with a few Jews  attend Christian schools. The staff numbers around 3,000, including Muslims and Jews.

Discrimination is blatant when compared to Ultra-Orthodox schools, which are funded only by the state and are not subject to Education Ministry inspections of their curriculum.
Study Reveals Why Some People Are More Affected By Sad Songs Than Others

Trending News: This Is Why Sad Songs Only Make Some Of Us Sad

Why Is This Important?

Because its empathys fault you go all teary-eyed when sad songs come on the radio.

Long Story Short

In a piece for The Conversation, an expert in music cognition has explained the results of recent research into why sad songs make some people cry while others are unaffected.

Long Story

Does a good love ballad always have you sniffing and fighting back tears however much you try and ignore it? Well, we may finally have a scientific explanation for why.

An article for The Conversation by Tuomas Eerola, professor of music cognition at Durham University, has explained that how we respond to sad songs is down to empathy.

In a study, which was published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology, researchers asked 102 people to listen to the tearjerking "Discovery of the Camp" by Michael Karmen.

Walt Disney Pictures

The piece was briefly featured in the series Band of Brothers, but is obscure enough that participants were unlikely to have a personal backstory to the song  it probably wasnt playing when anyone got dumped.

The subjects were then asked to take a test called the "impersonal reactivity test" which is widely used to measure empathy.

What researchers found was that the participants who were most moved by the music were those who had tested high for empathy and especially for "empathetic concern," which means not only experiencing someone elses pain but also feeling compassion and sympathy.

Walt Disney Pictures

By contrast, those with low empathy ratings didnt feel the songs in the same way.

Eerola suggests that the bittersweet melancholic feeling we get from listening to sad music may come from the body releasing the hormones oxytocin (the pleasure hormone) and prolactin which provide a positive rush as protection from the misery.

At least the next time you find yourself sobbing in the supermarket when Adele comes on, you have a scientific explanation.

Own The Conversation

Ask The Big Question

Is it better to be empathetic even if it means "feeling" sad songs?

Disrupt Your Feed

Empathy really is a double-edged sword; it makes you a nicer person but it also makes you vulnerable to immensely awkward public floods of tears.

Drop This Fact

A recent Dutch study found that men have less empathy than women due to higher levels of testosterone, providing a possible excuse for why men are so bad at reading womens thoughts.
by Michael MataThe Australian government has announced it is reviving long-stalled plans to extend its anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing laws (known as the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006 ) to capture lawyers, accountants, jewelers, and real estate agents involved in illicit activities, said Justice Minister Michael Keenan.The law reforms have been repeatedly shelved since mid-2007 due to opposition from some of the affected sectors, including the legal profession. The first tranche of the AML/CTF Act were put in place in 2006 to compel banks, fund managers, and casinos to report the source of their money flows. However, the anticipated second tranche of reforms, which would cover designated non-financial businesses and professions (DNFBPs), did not materialise.According to Keenan, the government is preparing to release the proposals to the public for consultation. "The first step in this process will be the release of industry consultation papers by the Attorney General's Department, which is expected to happen before the end of the year," he said.The professions captured by the extended laws will be required to conduct risk assessments on their businesses, develop compliance programs, train their staff, as well as report suspicious transactions and any cash payments exceeding $10,000.Lawyers have long opposed the extension of the AML/CTF Act as they fear it would clash with their obligation to respect legal professional privilege.New Zealand is also expediting the second phase of its anti-money laundering regime in response to the Panama Papers leak.
Bucking the trend of expansion by offering services to other markets via virtual technologies, Owen Hodge Lawyers has expanded to the Wollongong and Illawarra region.



The Sydney law firms Wollongong office will specialise primarily in family law with plans to also establish a thriving practice in the B2C market in the Illawarra region.



Human beings are not virtual. Consumers of legal services seek convenience, Rolf Howard, Owen Hodge Lawyers' managing partner, told Australasian Lawyer.



In part that is provided by technology but where it is perceived by the consumer as geographically based then a smart law firm has to respond to that need.



Howard said that delivery of service is not enough because it doesnt necessarily mean a clients needs have been fulfilled.



Many lawyers confuse delivery of the legal service with meeting clients' needs and wants. The former may be integral to the latter but is unlikely to be sufficient of itself, he said.



Being a virtual lawyer may be sufficient to deliver a service but it might not be sufficient to meet the needs and wants of the client. Ultimately it is the latter that differentiates the successful law firm.



The law firms expansion to Wollongong is in response to the regions significant growth in the last five years. Now with a population of over 200,000, Wollongong has become a significant economic and business hub in NSW, it said.



Apart from family law, the law firm sees making inroads in the B2C market in the region with a focus on building relationships with growing mid-tier business clients.



Naturally, Wollongong is a growing commercial centre. It has some long-standing successful law firms who have provided good quality legal services to individuals and commercial clients in that region. However, they have enjoyed that market to themselves, said Howard.



We see ourselves as providing an alternative to many of the mid-tier business clients which exist and are growing up in that region. Establishing ourselves initially in the B2C market is a low risk/cost strategy.



Owen Hodge Lawyers also sees their growth being fuelled by more and more private practitioners particularly those in sole practices seeing benefit in joining the firm.



Many lawyers, and particularly lawyers operating in sole practices, are experiencing the complexity of delivering a high quality service at a sufficient fee level into the market place to provide a return that is commensurate with their skills and experience, the managing partner said.



Howard explained that their work developing their capabilities  particularly their infrastructure and culture  and their efforts to build their brand is expected to pay off especially in attracting talent.



Our recent past growth and anticipated future growth is being fuelled by lawyers joining us to utilise our brand positioning in the marketplace and the systems and resources available to them to service their client bases and grow their practices, he said.


By Robert Merkel, Lecturer in Software Engineering, Monash University

Flickr/Toshiyuki IMAI, CC BY-SA

Downloading security updates for computers and mobile devices is a regular routine for most of us.

But not all such updates are created equal. Apples recent iOS 9.3.5 update (and a related update to parts of OS X) was one of the more significant in recent memory.

The update fixed three security flaws which, used in combination, could give an attacker full control over an iPhone if the phones user clicked on a malicious link.

The discovery of these security flaws brought to light a relatively new, low-profile and ethically questionable business: selling potent hacking tools, and information about security flaws that make them effective, to government agencies and private companies around the world.

Zero-day exploits  a hackers wild card

In the world of information security, a vulnerability is a flaw in an IT system with security implications. A zero-day vulnerability is simply one that is unknown to the developers of an IT system. This means there is no fix available for the it.

An exploit is a computer program that takes advantage of one or more vulnerabilities to make an IT system to do something its administrator didnt intend it to do.

A zero-day exploit is an exploit that uses an zero-day vulnerability. If an zero-day exploit is in the hands of an attacker, there is little a user or system administrator can do to stop them.

Exploits vary greatly in the scope of things they enable an attacker to do to a system. The most potent exploits are root exploits, which give an attacker complete control over the system.



Similarly, exploits vary in the ways that they can be delivered. A remote exploit is one that can be transmitted to the target device over a network.

The most insidious remote exploits happen without any user involvement, but even remote exploits that require tricking a user to click on a link, for instance, are often effective.

Spying on a human rights activist

The vulnerabilities in iOS came to light when an internationally recognised Emirati human rights activist, Ahmed Mansoor, received an odd-looking text message on his iPhone.

Mansoor was sufficiently sceptical to forward the message to security researchers, who investigated the message and discovered the exploit and its origins. Detailed reports are available from the researchers at Citizen Lab and Lookout Security.

The attempted attack against Mansoors iPhone was extremely potent. It used a combination of three zero-day vulnerabilities that were unknown to Apple and would have given the attackers complete control over his iPhone and the data on it.

It was sent to his phone as a text message. Its one weakness was that it required that Mansoor actually click on the malicious link in that message. It is the first known such attack against the iPhone.

NSO Group, spyware exporters extraordinaire

According to Citizen Lab researchers, the software used to target Mansoors iPhone was probably the work of NSO Group, an Israel-based company that is reportedly American-owned.

The Citizen Lab report on the Mansoor case says:

The high cost of iPhone zero-days, the apparent use of NSO Groups government-exclusive Pegasus product, and prior known targeting of Mansoor by the UAE government provide indicators that point to the UAE government as the likely operator behind the targeting.

It says the same NSO Group software was also used to target journalists in Mexico, and had also been used in Kenya.

Israeli newspaper YnetNews reports that the Defense Export Controls Agency (DECA) granted the NSO Group a license to sell its espionage program, Pegasus, to a private company in an Arab state, despite some strong objections.

The news report goes on to say that Foreign Ministry officials stress the NSO Group was not involved in any data breach itself.

The spyware bazaar

NSO Group is but one of a number of companies domiciled in wealthy American-allied democracies offering similar hacking tools to government agencies, including undemocratic governments known for systematic human rights violations.

One such company, Italy-based Hacking Team, was itself hacked in 2014. Its customer list was leaked to media outlets, and included the Sudanese and Saudi Arabian governments.

As well as the trade in complete spyware products, another group of companies trade in information about zero-day vulnerabilities. One company, Zerodium, has even posted a reward list, indicating what it will pay for different zero-day exploits against different software platforms. Apple iOS exploits can fetch up to US$500,000.

Zerodium claims to have purchased a zero-day remote exploit against the iPhone, similar in its effects to the NSO Group hack, in November 2015.

It is unknown whether the vulnerabilities used by the exploit (if it indeed exists) are common to the NSO Group hack, and therefore whether it still works on iOS 9.3.5 and 10.

Zerodiums client list is known only to Zerodium and the governments that permit it to operate. But spyware vendors such as NSO Group need a steady supply of exploits for their tools to remain functional, so they would be plausible customers.

Leaving the rest of us exposed

Police forces and intelligence agencies do have legitimate reasons for wanting to get covert access to IT systems. But the current trade in hacking tools and zero-day vulnerabilities should, in my view, be drastically reined in.

First, Western democracies are far too willing to permit the sale of these tools to undemocratic governments that use them to spy on political opponents.

Second, by stockpiling and exploiting vulnerabilities rather than assisting software developers to fix them, this trade leaves the rest of us unprotected if other parties discover and exploit the same zero-days.

While core government defence and intelligence infrastructure might get its own, secret protection against such attacks, there are a broad range of other targets who are potentially at risk of highly sophisticated attacks, even by state-sponsored hackers, and do not have the benefit of such protection.

Russian state-sponsored hackers, for instance, have been accused of attacking high-profile non-government organisations, such as the organisational wing of the US Democratic Party, and even the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA).

The WADA hack was apparently the result of spearphishing and probably did not involve use of a zero-day exploit. But zero-days could easily be used for similar attacks.

NOBUS for the NSA, but not for the private sector

The US governments own hacking agency, the National Security Agency, reportedly has a Nobody But Us policy that guides a decision whether to reveal vulnerabilities it finds to software developers, or keep them secret for exploitation.

As former NSA director Michael Hayden put it:

If theres a vulnerability here that weakens encryption but you still need four acres of Cray computers in the basement in order to work it you kind of think NOBUS and thats a vulnerability we are not ethically or legally compelled to try to patch  its one that ethically and legally we could try to exploit in order to keep Americans safe from others.

Whether the NSA is actually following the spirit of this stated policy is open to doubt.

But there is no such principle guiding the broader trade in hacking tools between private companies and governments around the world. It appears to be disturbingly close to open slather.

Its time for this to change.

Robert Merkel does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond the academic appointment above.

Originally published in The Conversation.
Australia should be aiming for an immigration programme that strikes a balance between skilled workers and families being reunited, it is claimed.The Federation of Ethnic Communities' Councils of Australia (FECCA) is concerned that more emphasis is being put on attracting skilled workers and that family visas are not regarded as being as important as they should be. In particular it is worried by a new report from the Productivity Commission, the Government's independent research body, that the fee for parent visas should be increased substantially.'We are concerned that the report's recommendations do not adequately recognise the importance of family migration. Overlooking the benefits of family migration may lead to the system being heavily skewed toward skilled migration,' said FECCA chairperson Joe Caputo.He pointed out that while the commission's report is an important contribution to the understanding of the impact of Australia's migration programmes, some recommendations appear 'skewed toward fiscal impacts' and the social and cultural contribution of family stream migration is under-estimated.The Productivity Commission's report recommends that the Australian Government amend arrangements for permanent parent visa applicants including a substantial increase to the fee for parent visas, a narrowing of eligibility to non-contributory parent visas to cases where there are strong compassionate grounds to do so, accompanied by clear published criteria to limit applications for such visas.The report also says that the Government should consider lowering the caps for contributory parent visas and introduce a more flexible temporary parent visa that would provide longer rights of residence, but with requirements, as for other temporary visas, that the parents or sponsoring child would meet the costs of any income or health supports during the period of residence.Indeed, the system seems somewhat against parent visas. According to the Department of Immigration and Border Protection (DIBP) there is approximately a 30-year wait before visa grant consideration for parent (non-contributory) visa applications.There is a delay of up to 50 years for people applying for remaining relative and aged dependent relative visa applications. The associated costs for contributory parent visas are also significantly higher than those for non-contributory visas.'The availability of family reunion is essential for successful settlement, allowing migrants to maintain family ties and connections. Family reunion is also related to core human rights principles around the rights of Australians to live with their family members,' said Caputo.'FECCA is fundamentally opposed to the imposition of a fee for immigration to Australia. Australia's migration intake should be balanced and merit based, not based on the financial means of a potential migrant. A holistic approach should be adopted, looking at the skills and other contributions of migrants,' he added.
MB gets future-ready with warehouse, vehicle preparation centre and retail-training academy.

German luxury carmaker, is betting big on future growth in India. Yet another confirmation of its intent was seen in the inauguration of the largest parts warehouse in the luxury-car industry and the companys largest retail training academy in South Asia, christened Mercedes-Benz Academy, in Chakan, near Pune.

This infrastructure expansion by Mercedes-Benz India is a strong reiteration of the growing relevance of the Indian market and a strategic step towards future readiness to cater to the growth in the sector. The parts warehouse and the Mercedes-Benz Academy were inaugurated by Till Conrad, head-region overseas, Mercedes-Benz Cars at Daimler AG and Roland Folger, managing director and CEO, Mercedes-Benz India.



Speaking on the occasion, Conrad said, India remains one of the bright spots for Mercedes-Benz and this critical expansion of infrastructure. Mercedes-Benz is not only expanding its infrastructure here in India, but also strategically developing the skill-set of its workforce, ready to capitalise the future growth of the luxury industry. We are confident that initiatives like these will make the brand future ready.

Dr Till Conrad, Head - Region Overseas, Mercedes-Benz Cars, and Roland Folger, MD and CEO, Mercedes-Benz India, inaugurating the Vehicle Preparation Centre on September 15.

Roland Folger added, Creating the largest parts warehouse in the luxury car segment equipped with state-of-art technological processes, automations and also inaugurating South Asias biggest Mercedes-Benz Academy are significant accomplishments for Mercedes-Benz India. These initiatives are result of our focused customer orientation that will help create a long-term value to our discerning patrons, giving us a competitive edge in this dynamic market.

Asias largest luxury car parts warehouse

The parts warehouse, which is spread across 16,500 sq. mt., can accommodate up to 44,000 Stock Keeping Units (SKUs), has a multi-tier shelving system (G + 2 Levels) with in rack sprinklers in shelving system at every three metres. There are 10 outbound docks for loading and dispatching the material, and six inbound docks for receiving materials.

The warehouse, which caters to over 50 locations, is equipped with modern material handling equipment like High Level Order Picker (HLOP), Low Level Order Picker (LLOP) and Reach Trucks (RT)) for efficient operations. To drive operational efficiency, there is Spare Parts Automation (SPAN).

Mercedes-Benz Academy

Mercedes-Benzs Retail Training division, which has been engaged in developing, nurturing and mentoring retail manpower for the past two decades, has received a shot in the arm with the Mercedes-Benz Academy. Be it establishing the in-house Mechatronics School, successfully driving the ADAM Course at the Government Polytechnic in Pune, Aurangabad and Government Engineering College Trivandrum, or developing training content creating virtual learning platform for Global Training of Daimler AG, retail training has been the backbone of developing manpower required to support future business growth.

Now, with the Mercedes-Benz Academy, the German carmaker has consolidated its Retail Training division and inaugurated its largest training facility in South Asia. The key objective of this academy will be to pursue the cultivation of knowledge and support retail manpower growth.

Some of the key highlights of the Mercedes-Benz Academy are:

 Training for 225 participants per day at any given time

 Combi-bays: Four large bays that can accommodate two vehicles per bay, two small bays that can accommodate one vehicle per bay

 Host classrooms, aggregate room and an eLab

Vehicle Preparation Centre

The Vehicle Preparation Centre or VPC has been set up to cater to Mercedes-Benz Indias vehicle storing requirement till 2024 and aid the companys vision to deliver Zero Defect Customised Vehicles with Customer Delight.

At VPC, the vehicles are stored, maintained and prepared for dealer dispatches following the stringent VPC guidelines laid down by Daimler. The system is also subjected to process audits, integrated management system (IMS) audits and various inventory audits. All vehicles get stringent checks during takeover from production, periodic maintenance and SVC (Standard Vehicle Check) before they are dispatched to the dealers.

Some key highlights of VPC are:

 Use of a Unique Inventory Management Software which eases the monitoring of the movement of vehicles, their maintenance schedules. This software has features such as Automatic UPN (Unique Parking Number) generation as per model and colour.

 Entry is restricted only to authorised vehicles and drivers through automated boom barriers, digital board displaying parking occupancy status.

 Automated key storage and vending machine for safety and faster retrieval of required key.

 Automated conveyor system for automatic car wash machine which removes human intervention while placing the car in auto car wash.

 State-of-the-art underground exhaust extraction system in the workshop.

 Nine productive bays comprising five scissor lifts and four two-post lifts and a facility to lift Guard vehicles.

 Exclusive storage facility for VPC loose parts, welcome kits for customers.

 A world-class paint booth, paint preparation station for paint repair jobs.

 A supreme car modification centre to carry out value-added jobs like AMG styling, decal kits, specialised car upholstery, specialised paints and other fitments.


Apart from light visual tweaks, the Ghibli gets a more powerful petrol engine; rivals the BMW 5-series and Jaguar XF.

Maserati has revealed its facelifted Ghibli at the Chengdu motor show in China, showing how the car will look before it arrives on roads early next year. As shown by newly released pictures, the BMW 5 Series, Jaguar XF and Mercedes-Benz E-Class rival gets restyled bumpers at both ends and a new front grille.

Little has changed inside because the model was recently updated with a new infotainment system and dashboard design. That said, the 2018 model does gain a raft of new tech to improve performance and luxury.

New for the facelifted Ghibli is Integrated Vehicle Control, which is claimed to enhance the car's dynamic abilities while maintaining the safety net of ESP.

The car also swaps hydraulic power steering for an electric system, which integrates with driver assist technology such as Highway Assist, Lane Keeping Assist and Active Blind Spot Assist. Along with Adaptive Cruise Control and Traffic Sign Recognition, these features come as part of the optional Driver Assistance package.

Like its sibling, the larger Quattroporte, the Ghibli gains GranLusso and GranSport trims (pictured above). The trims will replace the current cars Luxury and Sport trims.

The cars 3.0-litre V6 diesel and petrol powertrains were recently given extra power, but Maserati has ramped up the output of the latter further with an additional 20hp and 30Nm, bringing the figures up to 418hp and 580Nm. The diesel sticks with its 267hp output.



Expect the refreshed Ghibli to come to India sometime late next year.
The Velocette LE was a motorcycle made by Velocette from 1948 to 1970.

The designation LE stood for "little engine". Used by over fifty British Police forces, the police riders became known as "Noddies" because they were required to nod to senior officers, and the LE was nicknamed "the Noddy Bike". Production ended in 1970 when the company ran into financial problems and went into voluntary liquidation.
At least thats what German publication Autobild suggests in an article titled  Ferrari-Neuheiten bis 2019.  In the photo gallery-based story, the publication presents and speculates about the future of the brand up to 2019.In chronological order, the newities are the LaFerrari Aperta (due in 2017), 488 GTB Speciale (2017), all-new California (2017), all-new GTC4 Lusso (2018), Ferrari 488 Speciale Aperta (2018), and a front-engined model that will replace the F12 berlinetta , which is due in calendar year 2019.In the final slide of the article, Autobild tells that the F12 berlinettas next-in-line will be powered by an atmospheric V12. Intriguingly, displacement will continue to be 6.3 liters. Thus, the cited publication suggests that the F140 type V12 mill will keep calm and carry on as a naturally aspirated unit. Speculation aside, this is a doable prospect when you think about it.Reflect on the Ferrari brand in 2016. The lower echelons are powered by F154 3.9-liter twin-turbo V8, while the F12 berlinetta, F12 tdf , GTC4 Lusso, and the LaFerrari hypercar are motivated by the almighty F140 6.3-liter naturally aspirated V12, the most powerful naturally aspirated engine in a road car. This is a balance that allows the Prancing Horse to keep the N/A V12 alive.Another way Ferrari keeps the V12 flame alive is mild hybrid technology. Thanks to an electric motor and a Formula 1-inspired KERS system for short bursts of additional get-up-and-go, the LaFerrari hypercar beggars belief how quick it is. And besides the jaw-dropping go-faster credentials, the Ferrari LaFerrari's mild hybridization also keeps the eco-mentalists happy.My two cents go on the survival of the naturally aspirated Ferrari V12 engine, at least as an "In your face!" directed to Porsche and McLaren.
The mid-engine coupe has managed to go round the Ring in 7:46.70. As for the relevance of the time, this gets the stamp of approval, since it comes from Sport Auto. The German publication is an authority when it comes to real world Green Hell lap times (read: without the otherworldly preparations many carmakers make).In fact, when dropping the 7:42 Nordschleife time of the 911-engined Cayman GT4, we have to mention the same driver, namely Christian Gebhardt, is responsible for this.And since we all love comparos, we'll continue down that path. Even though the 718 seen here comes in PDK form, comparing it to the manual GT4 isn't fair, with the latter's GT Division goodies, such as the 911 GT3 suspension, creating a massive gap between the two.However, since we already listed the times of these mid-engined delights, we'll also mention that the predecessor of the Porscha we're here to discuss, namely the 981 Cayman S , was a 7:55 car (time signed off by Walter Rohrl).It's worth noting that the output premium brought by the variable geometry turbo 2.5-liter flat-four (350 hp and 310 lb-ft/420 Nm vs. 325 hp and 273 lb-ft/370 Nm) has to share its improvement credit with other bits of the 718. And it's enough to mention that the rear wheels and tires are now 0.5 inches wider to understand why.We'll quickly go past the generation gap one decade of car industry evolution makes by mentioning the 718 Cayman S almost ties the Lamborghini Gallardo Superleggera. You know, the one with a freaking V10 delivering 530 hp.More importantly, the mid-engined sportscar is now arguably the fastest four-cylinder car on the infamous German track. Yes, we know we said it's the second fastest in the title, but while the KTM X-Bow might be powered by a two-liter turbo supplied by Audi (the irony), does that toy really qualify as a car in your book?Returning to the boxer machine, it's interesting to see how, even with the PSM (Porsche Stability Management) electronic nanny in its sleep mode, the Cayman S is easy to drive at the limit. Just try to count the number of times the driver gets to adjust his seat belt during the hot lap and you'll understand how cooperative this Porsche is.P.S.: Pay attention to the footage and you'll notice an Ultraviolet Blue 911 GT3 RS PDK sharing the track with the 718 Cayman.
The American company has been chosen through a competitive process to provide Southern Californias Edison Mira Loma substation with a 20 MW/80 MWh solution that will store energy on a large scale.The idea behind the project is to prevent the Los Angeles basin from blackouts during peak hours of energy demand, which tend to appear in the winter and the summer.The state Public Utilities Commission voted an order in 2013 that will oblige California utility suppliers to install 1.3 gigawatts of energy storage capacity by 2020.One gigawatt is the equivalent of 1,000 megawatts, which means that 1,300 megawatts will have to be stored by all of the utility companies in the state of California.According to Tesla , when fully charged, the Powerpack system that will be operational by the end of this year at SoCals Edison Mira Loma substation will hold enough energy to power 2,500 average households for a day, or to charge 1,000 Tesla vehicles.Ironically, Tesla did not specify the battery capacity of those vehicles, or how far they could go with the electrical energy stored in their batteries.The Tesla Powerpack is a solution that is designed for Utility and Business users to collect energy on site. The batteries of the Powerpack will be charged with electricity from the regular grid during off-peak hours.It will then deliver that energy back into the network during high strain moments. The solution has the role of reducing the dependency of natural gas during peak hours of the electrical grid.Tesla reminded everyone of last Octobers rupture of the Aliso Canyon natural gas reservoir, which spilled so much methane gas that 8,000 Californians had to be temporarily displaced.However, that was not the worst part about the rupture, which released 1.6 million pounds of the gas in the atmosphere. Because of the massive spill, the Aliso Canyon leak is considered the worst in US history, and the greenhouse gas emissions caused by it are claimed to outweigh those of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
Photo of Toyota Research Institute CEO Gill Pratt courtesy of Toyota.

Toyota Research Institute is joining forces with the Open Source Robotics Foundation (OSRF) to extend Toyotas research and engineering expertise for autonomous vehicle and future mobility technologies.

The two-year collaboration, which also includes OSRFs newly formed for-profit subsidiary Open Source Robotics Corp., will focus on expanding development of both open source and proprietary tools for Toyotas robotics and automated vehicle research initiatives, according to Toyota.

The move reflects Toyotas ongoing evolution beyond the boundaries of the conventional automotive industry to become a broad-based mobility technology company, Toyota said in a released statement.

Toyota Research Institute is also awarding OSRF a $1 million charitable contribution in support of its mission to advance open source robotics software.

At Toyota, we are creating better ways to move, whether its across the room, across town, or across the country, said Toyota Research Institite CEO Gill Pratt. The Open Source Robotics Corporation team brings unparalleled technical expertise and industry-leading technology platforms, which we intend to embed in the heart of our research programs. TRI also believes that the open source movement can catalyze the development of the robotics industry, and we are excited to help OSRF expand its impact.

OSRF is an independent nonprofit organization that now oversees development of the Robot Operating System, a flexible framework for writing robot software, and Gazebo, a 3D multi-robot simulator.
Car rental in Alaska is feast or famine  during the summer high season, fleets walk the tightrope of near 100% utilization. During the winter, they de-fleet and shelter in place until the thaw.



In this context, companies such as Alaska Auto Rental in Fairbanks can require prepaid guaranteed reservations. We have a strict policy, acknowledges Peter Chapman, general manager.



(The companys policy: Guaranteed reservations require prepayment at the time the reservation is placed and are fully refundable until three days prior to pickup. Cancellations made with less than three days advance notice are non-refundable.)



We are careful to not overbook because we provide a reservation guarantee that we stand behind, Chapman says. Because we don't overbook, it is a business necessity to avoid having a 20% to 30% no-show factor. Our prepaid reservation model effectively mitigates the no-show issue. You can count all of our no-shows in a year on one hand.



Chapman says he has gone out and bought a replacement vehicle on a moments notice when an unexpected accident happened that would otherwise have left the next customer stranded. Thats what it takes to provide the level of service we are committed to, he says.



So when a customer with a reservation calls to cancel it less than 24 hours from pickup and hammers the agent for a refund, what do you do? When this happened recently, Chapmans staff restated the guaranteed reservation policy to the customer and offered the opportunity to talk to Chapman, but they held firm on not providing a refund.



Alaska Auto Rental will waive the policy for legitimate circumstances beyond the renters control, which even includes flight delays or cancellations. The customer admitted he was aware of the policy, but his excuse was He didnt like the weather, Chapman says.



When Chapman got involved, his goal was threefold: Listen to the customers concerns, re-verify that he was aware of the guaranteed reservation policy, and review phone logs and recorded audio to make sure the staff followed protocol, which they did.



If the customer was not properly informed of our policies, wed take responsibility, he says. But because he acknowledged and accepted our policies prior to placing his reservation, the consequence for his decision to change his plans was fully his to bear. He simply didnt like the fact that it was non-refundable and he was trying to negotiate with them.



Chapman held his ground. And then, Nevill S. from Edmonton, Canada made good on his threat of a negative review by dropping this bomb on Yelp:



I would strongly avoid this car rental agency. They lack good spirit and the fairness of doing business. They have bad policies which selfishly cover their interests, and leave the customers totally exposed to factors beyond anyone's control.  Their Fairbanks manager Peter, is very cutthroat, hardheaded, and lacks empathy. It goes on. He posted a similar Google review.



On Yelp, Alaska Auto Rental had nine reviews prior to the negative one and a five-star rating. With this 10th review, the rating dropped to 4.5 stars.



Chapman responded. His first reaction, fortunately, wasnt the final response. The proper method of responding to a review from my experience is to step back, take a breath, and not take it personally, he says. I try to get some external input from someone who is familiar with us but not tied to the specific situation.



In Chapmans response to the bad review (viewable on both the Yelp and Google pages), he reiterated the companys policy in a professional manner. He wrote that he reviewed phone records to ascertain that the staff did follow protocol. He addressed the customers blatant inaccuracies, including the claim that the customer did not receive an emailed reservation confirmation, and that his email follow-ups went answered  the customer not only didnt email the company, but he never provided an email address when he made the reservation, records show.



Having good online reviews is very important to us, but were not going to let somebody use the threat of leaving a negative review to coerce us to do what they want, Chapman says. Im willing to fire a customer over that.



Nonetheless, the review stays and the Yelp score drops, though viewers are hopefully savvy enough to see through these blatant tactics. Subsequent to this exchange, the company received a new five-star review, which mentioned the prepayment policy in a positive way. Chapman responded, which offered a way to clarify the policy for potential customers in a more positive light.



In a corporate structure, sticking up for yourself or your company often gets lost in the fact that your branchs CSI (Customer Service Index) takes a hit regardless if the review is unfair. If CSI is tied to performance, the tendency might be to cave into the unreasonable customers demands.



Alaska Auto Rental isnt beholden to this Catch-22. It isnt the cheapest car rental company in Fairbanks; it wouldnt survive as such. The company has prevailed through exceptional customer service, Chapman says, which delivers word-of-mouth marketing. Without a large advertising budget, online reviews matter.



In this case, Chapman felt the greater issue was the integrity of the company rather than kowtowing to a customer with an agenda to help maintain a positive star rating. Hes right.

Originally posted on Business Fleet
Tesla is involved in yet another car crash that took the life of a 23-year old Chinese man named Gao Yaning. Reports are coming in that Tesla Model S was travelling on a highway when it collided with a street-sweeping vehicle parked on the side of the road.

The family of the victim is now suing the American company for the crash in the grounds that their product - marketed as an auto-pilot vehicle - failed to prevent the accident. As of now, It's still unclear whether or not the auto-pilot feature was engaged when the mishap occurred.

"Because of the damage caused by the collision, the car was physically incapable of transmitting log data to our servers and we therefore have no way of knowing whether or not Autopilot was engaged at the time of the crash," Tesla said in a statement.

Dashcam footage of the accident showed that the Model S did not appear to slow down as it barreled towards the street-sweeper, nor did it attempt to evade the obstacle. Tesla has repeatedly stated that while their vehicle can indeed take over the wheel, the driver is instructed to be aware at all times so they can react to circumstances that might be beyond the car's technology.

The automaker has also reached out to Gao's father - the owner of the Model S - to give them further details of the accident but the man is apparently uncooperative with the company.

This is the third incident involving Tesla in a fatal car crash. One occurred in Florida last May where the accident claimed Joshua Brown, and the other happened recently in Netherlands that took the life of a 53-year old man.

Another recent incident with the Model S in China involved a man named Luo Zhen where his car grazed another vehicle which damaged the left side of its front bumper. Luo admitted that he didn't have his hands on the wheel and was checking his phone at the time.

However, Luo argued that the car was sold to him as a self-driving vehicle. The autopilot feature has been questioned in the past for how it's named which can cause misinterpretation to those buying the vehicle.

Here is the dashcam footage of the incident. It happened around the 35-second mark.
Tesla is yet faced with another hurdle in pushing their products forward. The California-based start-up has been denied to sell their vehicle in Michigan as ruled by the state's secretary of state.

The decision came down on September 7 after the conclusion of a hearing that review the state's initial motion to deny the automaker's request for a license submitted in November 2015. The said application - if green-lighted - would have allowed Tesla to sell electric vehicles in storefronts in the state.

Grounds for the denial isn't in the growing controversy regarding the automaker's auto-pilot feature but is rather based on the company's direct-sales model.

The state's law specifies that "a vehicle manufacturer shall not ... sell any new motor vehicle directly to a retail customer other than through franchised dealers." Though presented with yet another legislative battle, Tesla said in a statement that it has no plans in changing the way they operate.

"Tesla sells its cars directly to consumers all over the world, and seeks to do the same in Michigan," the company wrote in its correspondence with the Secretary of State. "Tesla has never sold its cars through an independent, franchised dealer."

States that has also barred the automaker from selling their products are Texas and Iowa. Gallery locations in Texas allows Tesla to display their electric cars but that's just as far as the state is allowing the company to move forward at the moment.

Tesla will likely take legal actions against states that are barring it from implementing their direct-sales model, according to The Wall Street Journal. Michigan is also likely seen as an integral part of the company's growth given that it's the most populated state without a Tesla store or gallery.

While Tesla is currently unsuccessful in permeating Michigan's market, it has seen recent success in the state of Arizona. The Arizona Department of Transportation has allowed the automaker to practice their direct-sales model after an Arizona judge found that the DOT had wrongfully denied Tesla a new motor vehicle license in May.

The ruling is effective immediately granting the company legal rights to sell their vehicles in the state through its existing gallery in Scottsdale. Tesla is also reportedly working on several more sites at undisclosed locations.
Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel has three wins under his belt. However, the German and his team have been experiencing a drought recently as Ferrari has yet to clinch a win this season.

That drought may very well come to an end in the upcoming race to be held in Singapore this weekend. Vettel is confident that he can recreate his Singapore heroics last year but admitted that Mercedes is still the favored contender.

While Mercedes had a lackluster performance in 2015 for reasons left unexplained by the world champions, it is expected that they will smoke the competition as the team said that last year's issue has already been resolved. There is still doubt in this supposed dominance, though.

Nico Rosberg of Mercedes himself has said that Singapore should be viewed as a Red Bull track. And he might be right. Red Bull has had a driver on the podium every year since 2010 and has traditionally excelled in Singapore.

Apart from Red Bull's mythical mastery on the aerodynamic side, there are other reasons why the team has excelled here year after year. Among their strength is the ability to find that sweet spot on a set-up that's been an integral part of the team's success over the years.

Red Bull is also adept when it comes to good traction and stable braking, and performed better last year compared to Mercedes when it comes to pushing the tyres quicker at the end of Pirelli's scale.

As for Ferrari, the team has entered this season hoping to go head to head against Mercedes. Unfortunately, they are already out of contention having failed at securing a win from the first 14 races, experiencing problems both on and off the track.

But Vettel isn't giving up just yet and believes that the storm to their drought is near the horizon.

"It's true we have not had a great season so far but it hasn't been as bad as some people think. We are critical of ourselves because we have not achieved what we set out to achieve," Vettel said.

"Since last year some people have left and a lot of others have been shuffled around," he added. "When we started off last year it was clear where we wanted to go, we wanted to bring Ferrari back to the top.
Tesla Motors Inc. dismissed Mobileye's statement on the safety of its Autopilot as a result of discontinuing to use the camera supplied by the latter company. In a statement released on Thursday, Tesla accused Mobileye of disparaging its products' safety when it learned that Tesla will start producing its own vision system.

Tesla Bites Back

According to a representative from Tesla once Mobileye gained knowledge that the EV company will start making its own vision system for upcoming Autopilot models, it "attempted to force Tesla to discontinue this development, pay them more and use their products in future hardware."

This response came in the day after Mobileye's Chairman, Amnon Shashua, claimed in a Reuters report that they had broken ties with Tesla because the company has been "pushing the envelope in terms of safety" with the design of its Autopilot. This prompted Tesla to respond that they have been constantly educating drivers to always be prepared to take full control of the vehicle.

Tesla's Autopilot Safety Controversy

Tesla's Autopilot has been facing heavy criticisms after the death of a Tesla driver in Florida on May when a Model S slammed into a tractor while Autopilot was engaged. A few months after, another Tesla driver from China died when it crashed into a cleaning truck.

The Chinese father which was the owner of the Model S sued Tesla in July saying that his son was relying on the Autopilot feature, which was the reason why he was not minding the road when the accident happened. However, Tesla responded that there's no way to learn whether Autopilot was engaged as the car was unable to transmit any logs during the crash.

Issues on the Autopilot led the company to put limits on the design in January. On Sunday, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced that an update would temporarily prevent drivers from using the system if they fail to heed audible and visual warnings to take back full control.
The city of Santa Monica issued eviction notices to two FBOs on the field, just days after one of them, Atlantic Aviation, filed a federal complaint in its fight to remain at the airport. Atlantic, which operates FBOs across the country, charges that the citys efforts to limit fuel sales and other aviation-related activities at KSMO runs against the airports long-term obligation to the FAA to keep the airport operating. American Flyers, which operates flight schools in multiple states, also received a 30-day notice from the city, which is trying to close the airport for development. Atlantics lawyers have asked the FAA in the complaint to take corrective action against the city for obstructing its operations, according to a report in the Santa Monica Lookout. The Citys objectives are now crystal clear: fight the FAA for local control of SMO in the courts and, in the interim, undertake any measure at its disposal to severely curtail or discourage air traffic at SMO, the complaint says.

The FAA has said in the ongoing legal disputes that federal funding obligations require KMSO to stay open until at least 2023. In a recent letter to the city reacting to the City Councils decision to shut down the airport by 2018, the agency said it would take legal action to prevent the restriction of airport operations.But the city has pressed on with plans to close the field in the next couple of years and redevelop the land as a park and business district, vacating airport business spaces and aircraft tiedowns while raising landing fees. As far as the city is concerned, Atlantic no longer fits the needs there. Atlantic Aviation caters to people who can afford to travel by luxurious private jet, Nelson Hernandez, a senior advisor to the city, told the Lookout. Anti-airport activists have long argued that aircraft cause noise, pollution and safety problems for city residents. The Los Angeles Daily News noted in a pro-airport editorial this week that those complaints have been ongoing since the post-war era, when Douglas Aircraft was unable to expand there and moved to Long Beach after building military aircraft at KSMO during World War II. Meanwhile, business jets increased their activity there over the decades, fueling calls to close the airport.
The pilot of the Blue Angels jet that crashed on June 2 in Tennessee was too fast and low when he flew an aerobatic maneuver during practice, the Navy said Thursday. Jeff Kuss, 32, who died in the crash, flew a split S maneuver 300 feet lower than required and had the afterburners on in his F/A 18C Hornet, resulting in a speed that was at least 50 knots too fast, according to a report by the Navy Times. Officials also reported that the clouds were at 3,000 feet, which was a possible factor in Kuss flying the split S too low. Clouds at about 3,000 did not impact the solos ability to fly, but that weather was likely a contributing factor to Capt. Kuss decision to initiate the Split S maneuver below the normal altitude, the head of Naval Air Forces said in a statement. The required speed for the maneuver is 125 to 135 knots, but Kuss was flying at 184 knots, investigators found. When you combine that with afterburners, it resulted in rate of descent that he didnt recognize, a Navy spokeswoman told the Times.

Those errors, along with findings that Kuss had forgotten routine tasks such as turning on his transponder and entering his squawk code, also led officials to believe that fatigue was a factor. Every other squadron in the fleet has the ability to find a substitute pilot to complete the mission or execute an alternative mission, the Navys statement said. However, if one of the Blue Angels pilots is not ready, there are no other pilots who can readily cover their position for a show. The Navy will continue to examine safety policies and flight operations, and the split S maneuver has been removed from the Blue Angels flight routines, the Times reported.
Armenia needs deep and comprehensive reforms and the European Union is ready to assist in their implementation, the head of the EU Delegation in Yerevan, Piotr Switalski, said on Friday.

We agree that Armenia is now at a critical juncture, he told RFE/RLs Armenian service (Azatutyun.am). Armenia is facing big challenges and I think the awareness that Armenia needs deep and comprehensive reforms is very universal.

Switalski pointed to a recent statement by President Serzh Sarkisian that acknowledged the need for major political and economic reforms in the country. We are ready to assist, he said.

But any political force in Armenia, if it wants to conduct reforms and move Armenia further, needs very strong legitimacy, added Switalski. For any political force, there is no better source of legitimacy than elections which are considered by the population as reflecting its will, as free and fair.

The Sarkisian administration has pledged to ensure that Armenias next parliamentary elections due in April 2017 are democratic through a landmark agreement that was signed with three major opposition parties early this week. The agreement commits the Armenian authorities to taking a set of specific measures to prevent serious electoral fraud.

The EU swiftly welcomed that deal. The EU stands ready to assist, also financially, in the implementation of this important agreement, its commissioner for European neighborhood policy, Johannes Hahn, said on Wednesday.

Switalski echoed that assessment, saying that Armenia can really be proudof the election accord and a political dialogue that preceded it. I think that this dialogue between the government coalition and the opposition parties proved that Armenian political culture can be very mature, that Armenian political stakeholders, despite very obvious and very deep differences and disagreements, can sit at one table and in the interests of Armenia can work together to prepare a joint solution, a compromise, he said.

In Switalskis words, the EU support reflects the 28-nation blocs strategic goal in Armenia and the broader region. All we want is a stable, resilient and prosperous Armenia, the diplomat said.
Armenia stands for a peaceful resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict based on reasonable mutual concessions by both warring sides, President Serzh Sarkisian said on Friday.

Sarkisian mentioned the unresolved dispute in his speech at a Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) summit held in Kyrgyzstans capital Bishkek.

We have always made clear our position which is in tune with the position of the co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group: namely, the conflicts resolution through peace negotiations on the basis of international law and norms as well as a reasonable mutual compromise. I stress: mutual compromise, he said.

Sitting next to his Azerbaijani counterpart Ilham Aliyev, Sarkisian stressed at the same time further progress in Armenian-Azerbaijani peace talks is contingent on the implementation of confidence-building measures designed to prevent deadly truce violations. Those include international investigations of such violations and deployment of more OSCE field observers in in the conflict zone.

Sarkisian and Aliyev agreed on such measures, sought by the U.S., Russian and French co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group, when they met in Vienna in May more than a month after the heaviest fighting in and around Karabakh since 1994.

The two leaders signaled further progress after holding follow-up talks hosted by Russian President Vladimir Putin in Saint Petersburg in June. That summit fueled media speculation that Moscow is pressing the conflicting parties to agree to a peace deal based on the co-chairs so-called Madrid Principles. No further Aliyev-Sarkisian meetings have been scheduled since then.

The mediators framework peace accord calls for a gradual return to Azerbaijan of virtually all seven districts around Karabakh that were fully or partly occupied by Karabakh Armenian forces during the 1991-1994 war. In return, Karabakhs predominantly Armenian population would be able to determine the disputed territorys internationally recognized status in a future referendum.

Meeting with Putin in Moscow last month, Sarkisian stressed that international recognition of the Karabakh Armenians right to self-determination must be at the heart of any workable peaceful deal.

By contrast, Aliyev and other Azerbaijani leaders have repeatedly rejected a settlement that would stop short of restoring Bakus control over Karabakh.

As of Friday afternoon, it was not clear whether Sarkisian and Aliyev planned to hold a face-to-face meeting on the sidelines of the Bishkek summit attended by Putin.
16 September 2016 11:42 (UTC+04:00)

By Rashid Shirinov

The appointment of Karen Karapetyan as the Prime Minister of Armenia seems not very encouraging for the Armenian population. Because there is a persistent notion that the country has got into a bog that has no way out, as the Armenian authorities are not just thieves and corrupt, but literally a gang.

For many years, pro-government experts from Armenian make rosy predictions on the country's future. But they never come true, and ordinary citizens think quite the opposite way.

One person is unlikely to change anything, global changes are needed to improve the socio-economic situation of the country, one of Gyumri residents told 1in.am in a survey.

Armenians do not place much hope in Karen Karapetyan. Prime Minister, Ministers, the President - they all work just for themselves. It does not matter if Prime Minister or the President is replaced  we will still have to leave the country for work, another resident complained.

The problem that existed while the previous Prime Minister of Armenia Hovik Abrahamyan held the office, was the lack of political will, that was only enough for creation of legislation, structures, but not for anti-corruption fight. This view was expressed by Varuzhan Hoktanian, head of anti-corruption center Transparency International.

In addition to the lack of political will, Hoktanian stressed the wrong economic model in Armenia, which stood unchanged during the Premiership of Hovik Abrahamyan. That caused other problems dominance of oligopolies, dependence of the judicial system in Armenia and many other.

And the inaction of Armenian government to corruption is quite understandable  sufficient number of Armenian authorities themselves illegally conduct business in the country and corruption fight is not what they need.

So, as Hoktanian noted, Armenian economy sphere is at the bottom, and that swamp will stay a permanent residence for the citizens of that poor country.

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Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov

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16 September 2016 13:25 (UTC+04:00)

By Moha Ennaji

The United Nations World Water Development Report confirms what many already know: hundreds of thousands of people in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA)  especially in Algeria, Jordan, Libya, Morocco, Palestine, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen  have faced the worst water shortages in decades in 2016. This is the last thing the region needs, as it works toward economic growth and diversification.

Multiple factors have contributed to the current situation, including climate change, desertification, water pollution, and misuse of natural resources. Inadequate information, education, and communication exacerbate many of these challenges, as it reinforces a lack of awareness of  much less commitment to  environmentally friendly practices. Add to that inadequate disaster-risk reduction and management by governments  many of which are dealing with other conflicts and crises  and the situation has become truly dire.

Algeria, for example, has been experiencing its worst drought in five decades. With much of the countrys agriculture relying heavily on rainfall, owing to underdeveloped infrastructure, cereal yields are down 40% this year. Despite its vast oil and gas wealth, Algeria has failed to ensure sufficient affordable water resources for its population, not to mention adequate employment opportunities. As a result, the country is now being rocked by popular protests.

Libya has faced even greater instability, wrought by years of internal conflict. The resultant power cuts and fuel scarcity undermined water distribution in the country. Last summer, the UN had to procure some five million liters of water from neighboring countries to meet the countrys needs.

In Jordan, water shortages occur with devastating frequency, particularly in larger cities like Amman. Jordan is estimated to have enough water reserves to support two million people. Yet its population is more than six million, not including the 1.5 million Syrian refugees who currently reside in the country.

In times of shortage, it is the refugees who are likely to be among the first to feel the effects. Water supplies in many refugee camps, in both Jordan and Lebanon, have been cut to a minimum  a decision that affects millions of people who are already enduring scorching temperatures. At Rukban, a refugee camp on Jordans joint border with Syria and Iraq, more than 85,500 residents each receive barely five liters per day for cooking, drinking, and washing.

The situation in Yemen is similarly grim. Racked by sectarian violence and civil war, the country has no functioning government to manage water resources. The capital, Sanaa, could run dry in ten years. And, with half of Yemens population lacking access to clean water, crops are failing and disease is spreading. The UN estimates that 14,000 children under the age of five die of malnutrition and diarrhea each year. Meanwhile, farmers are drilling deeper than ever for water  some wells are 500 meters deep  without any regulation.

Effective government intervention may be a long way off in Yemen, but it is feasible  indeed, imperative  in other MENA countries. For starters, national governments must work to modernize agricultural practices, including by training farmers and introducing more efficient irrigation tools. Reducing farmers dependence on rainfall is essential.

Some countries  namely, Morocco and Jordan  have already taken some important steps in this direction. Moroccos government, in particular, has made substantial efforts to develop its water resources, including through dam-building.

But there is a still a long way to go. Water-distribution efficiency in Morocco remains low  just 60% for irrigation. For a country that has experienced more than 20 droughts in 35 years, that is a serious problem. The good news is that the African Development Bank recently approved a loan of more than 88 million ($98.7 million) to fund a project aimed at improving the quality of water distribution.

This points to a crucial insight: no one country can do it alone. Regional and international cooperation is badly needed. MENA countries must support one another in implementing programs modeled on what has worked elsewhere.

Moreover, additional investment  financed from domestic and international sources  should be allocated to repairing aging water infrastructure, as well as new projects, such as well-designed dams and water reservoirs. And stronger efforts must be made to safeguard existing water resources.

Here, the public has an important role to play. But citizens first must be made aware not only of how to use water more sensibly, but also of how to protect against climate-related disaster risk.

For the private sector and NGOs, upgrading water management in the MENA region presents a major opportunity to invest in water-services delivery and related technology. The regional market for enhanced local sanitation and water-related services is estimated to be worth over $200 billion. Projects aimed at meeting this demand are a smart investment.

But it is up to governments to take the first steps. If they do not take action to preserve water reserves and standardize supply, the most defenseless populations will continue to suffer, a situation that can easily lead to unrest  or worse. Indeed, if nothing is done to address the water challenges facing the MENA region, those challenges may fuel future wars.

At the next meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, to be held in Morocco in November, water should be at the top of the agenda. Given that more than 80% of the national contributions to the fight against climate change from the countries of the global South focus on water challenges, coordinated action by governments and international actors can no longer be postponed.

Copyright: Project Syndicate: Watering the Middle East

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16 September 2016 11:29 (UTC+04:00)

By Rashid Shirinov

Azerbaijan and Lithuania have agreed to further expand their bilateral cooperation in the railway sector during the Baku meeting of the head of Azerbaijan Railways CJSC Javid Gurbanov and the Ambassador of Lithuania to Azerbaijan Valdas Lastauskas.

This was said on September 15 to Trend by the spokesperson of Azerbaijan Railways Nadir Azmammadov.

The sides discussed the prospects of future cooperation between the two countries, including the railway project Viking.

Lithuanian Ambassador highly assessed the large-scale reforms carried out by Azerbaijan Railways, Azmammadov said.

The combined train Viking started to run on the route Ilyichevsk (Ukraine)  Minsk (Belarus)  Draugyste (Lithuania) with a total length of 1,766 kilometers in 2003. Participants of the project are Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, Latvia, and Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey joined later.

In February 2016, Ukraine and Lithuania signed a Memorandum on joining the container train Viking to the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route from Europe to China, passing through Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan.

Later, in May 2016, Azerbaijan signed a Protocol on the participation of Azerbaijan Railways in the project of the international container train Viking.

In the past 10 years, Viking train has traveled 2.3 million kilometers and has transported more than 4.8 million tons of cargo. The project is constantly developing: transportation possibilities are introduced in international forums and other events.

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Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov

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16 September 2016 12:02 (UTC+04:00)

By Laman Ismayilova

Sheki, one of the most ancient settlements and cultural centres of Azerbaijan hosts The Uch Mekan International Theater Festival.

The festival that opens the 144th theatre season in the country will last until September 24.

The magnificent event, which covers such cities as Baku, Sheki, Mingachevir, brings together the theatre troupes from Turkey, Russia, Georgia, Iran, Ukraine and the UAE.

Azerbaijan is represented at the event by the State Academic Drama Theater, State Russian Drama Theater, State Puppet Theater, Shaki State Drama Theater and Ganja State Drama Theater.

During the festival, theatre lovers will be delighted by twelve performances. Eight of them will be staged in Sheki. Another three will be presented in Mingachevir, while the last one will be shown in Baku.

The solemn opening ceremony of the Festival was attended by organizers, TURKSOY representatives, renowned theater and art figures, guests and theater lovers.

Prior to the opening ceremony, the participants in the festival visited Azerbaijans national leader Heydar Aliyevs statute erected in front of the building of Shaki Executive Authority, put flowers and revered his memory.

Then, the event participants viewed the photo-stand depicting theatrical art samples.

The opening ceremony was addressed by the head of Shaki Executive Authority Elkhan Usubov, Azerbaijans deputy minister of culture and tourism Adalet Veliyev, who spoke of the history and development of the Azerbaijani national theater, the first theater and the first opera that was staged in the Muslim East. They stressed that the theatrical art of Azerbaijani people is rooted in the ancient folk festivals and dances.

Then, guests were presented the "Dead" play by great writer Jalil Mammadguluzadeh, the editor of satirical magazine "Molla Nasraddin".

The history of Azerbaijan theater started with spectacles "Vizier of Lankaran khan" and "Hadji Gara", based on plays Mirza Fatali Akhundov in March-April 1873.

These first amateur performances staged by students of real school by initiative of Hasan-bay Zardabi and with the active participation of the Najaf-bay Vezirov and Alekber Adigezalov have become a powerful impetus for the establishment of a national theater.

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Laman Ismayilova is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Lam_Ismayilova

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16 September 2016 12:30 (UTC+04:00)

A film Young Voices, Ancient Song dedicated to refugee children from Azerbaijans Karabakh region was screened on September 14, 2016 in Los Angeles. Directed by Jeffrey Werbock, a renowned devotee of Azerbaijani traditional music, the film tells the story of Azerbaijani refugee children performing Mugham - this most sophisticated form of their national music and continuing the musical traditions, despite the hard refugee life and the injustice of being forced out from their homes and lands.

Hosted by Azerbaijans Consulate General in Los Angeles, the premiere was attended by foreign diplomats, journalists, representatives of governmental and non-governmental organizations, academicians, composers and others.

Taking the floor before the screening, Azerbaijans Consul General in Los Angeles Nasimi Aghayev spoke about the illegal military occupation and ethnic cleansing of Azerbaijans internationally recognized territory by Armenia, which resulted between 1988-94 in the invasion of around 20 percent of Azerbaijans lands and expulsion of over 1 million Azerbaijanis from these occupied lands as well as from Armenia itself. Mentioning that over 400,000 of these people were children, Aghayev noted that many of these children, now grown up, still struggle with the trauma of invasion, ethnic cleansing, deportations and massacres, having had to live in refugee camps for years and losing their childhood forever. The injustice against Azerbaijani civilians continues to this day as they are still not allowed to return to their homes in Karabakh, which remains under the military occupation by Armenia, despite the international condemnation, the Consul General said.

Aghayev expressed his gratitude to Jeffrey Werbock and the European Azerbaijan Society  the sponsor of the film - for telling the untold story of Azerbaijani child refugees.

Then the film was screened. It was received with much interest of the audience. Following the screening, the floor was given to Jeffrey Werbock. Sharing stories from his 45 years of engagement with Azerbaijan and its ancient musical traditions, Werbock said that it all began in here Los Angeles in 1970s when as a young student I came in touch with the Azerbaijani music for the first time. Speaking of the his travels to refugee camps across Azerbaijan in search of young musical talents in 2000 and 2008, Werbock expressed the awe he felt seeing extremely talented young refugee children masterfully performing the complex Mugham music.

Then Werbock played several Mughams on Azerbaijani Tar and Kamancha, which mesmerized the audience and was received with long applauses.

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16 September 2016 11:10 (UTC+04:00)

By Rashid Shirinov

The position of U.S. on the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict has not changed, U.S. Ambassador to Azerbaijan Robert Cekuta said.

We support the activity of OSCE Minsk Group, he told reporters in Baku on September 15.

Cekuta also recalled that last week the U.S. Co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group James Warlick discussed the resolution of the conflict with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

The Ambassador noted that the conflict should be resolved, that settlement should be found, and the sides have to come together for stability and wellbeing of everyone in the region. We continue to work with sides, he added.

Cekuta also addressed the suggested amendments to the constitution of Azerbaijan, noting that the decision should be made by Azerbaijani people.

Changing the constitution is an extremely serious thing. This is the basic law of the country, he told reporters commenting on the upcoming referendum.

President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev has signed a decree on holding a referendum on amendments to the countrys constitution on September 26, 2016. Final results will be announced till October 21.

Robert Cekuta also stressed the necessity of continuing the U.S.-Azerbaijan cooperation in economy and trade, noting that U.S. and Azerbaijan have a lot to work together.

Azerbaijani troops are staying in Afghanistan as peacekeepers along with us. We are together in fighting terrorism. We very much appreciate what Azerbaijans example of tolerance means in fighting violent extremism, the ambassador said.

He further stressed that U.S. will continue to work on helping the Southern Gas Corridor, that is important for the Europe's energy security.

Azerbaijan and Armenia for over two decades have been locked in conflict, which emerged over Armenian territorial claims. Since the 1990s war, Armenian armed forces have occupied over 20 percent of Azerbaijan's internationally recognized territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent regions. The UN Security Council has adopted four resolutions on Armenian withdrawal, but they have not been enforced to this day.

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Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov

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16 September 2016 13:40 (UTC+04:00)

By Rashid Shirinov

Summit of the Non-Alignment Movement will support the solution of the Armenian-Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict within the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan.

The corresponding paragraph on support is included in the draft outcome document of the summit, which takes place in Venezuela, Foreign Ministry of Azerbaijan told Trend on September 16.

The heads of states and governments of member countries of the Non-Alignment Movement have set to work on the 17th regular summit on Margarita island in Venezuela.

Agenda of the summit includes a number of issues that have a direct significance for Azerbaijan.

Decision on the transfer of 2019-2022 presidency at the Non-Alignment Movement to Azerbaijan is expected to be taken at the summit.

It is also planned that the next summit will be held in Azerbaijan in 2019.

Azerbaijani delegation at the summit is led by Azerbaijans Minister of Foreign Affairs Elmar Mammadyarov.

Armenia broke out a lengthy war against Azerbaijan laying territorial claims on its South Caucasus neighbor. Since a war in the early 1990s, Armenian armed forces have occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan's territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven surrounding regions. More than 20,000 Azerbaijanis were killed and over 1 million were displaced as a result of the large-scale hostilities.

Armenia has not yet implemented four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding districts.

Non-Alignment Movement is an international organization uniting 120 countries on the principles of non-participation in military blocs. The movement was formally established by 25 states at the Belgrade Conference in September 1961.

Azerbaijan became a full member of the movement in 2011.

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Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov

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16 September 2016 14:35 (UTC+04:00)

By Rashid Shirinov

Azerbaijans embassy in Iran will express official Bakus position to Tehran regarding the participation of representatives of the unrecognized regime created on Azerbaijans occupied lands in the Olympiad in Tehran.

Hikmet Hajiyev, spokesman for Azerbaijans Foreign Ministry, made the statement in an interview to Trend on September 16.

Tehran hosted the opening of the 48th Armenian Olympiad which was attended by representatives of the unrecognized regime created on Azerbaijani lands occupied by Armenia.

Azerbaijans Foreign Ministry has been informed about the incident and Azerbaijans embassy in Iran will express the position of the Ministry to Irans relevant structures, Hajiyev noted.

I would like to note that Iran has always supported Azerbaijans territorial integrity and sovereignty and advocated for the settlement of the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in accordance with the UN Security Councils resolutions, he added.

Meanwhile, Iranian Ambassador to Azerbaijan Mohsen Pak Ayeen the Olympics held by Armenians living in Iran is an internal event, and it is carried out in deference to the religious minorities.

Iran considers inappropriate to use sport for political purposes, he told Trend on September 16. Iran's position on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict has not changed, and the participation of Iranian officials in this event is a sign of respect for religious minorities.

Pak Ayeen also noted that the organizing committee has invited representatives of Georgia and Armenia as participants to the event, and no other country or region was represented in the Olympics.

Participation of a representative of any country in sportswear with coat of arms or symbols of another side was not agreed with the organizing committee of the event, he added.

Azerbaijan and Armenia fought a lengthy war that ended with the signing of a fragile ceasefire in 1994. Since the war, Armenian armed forces have occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan's territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven surrounding regions. More than 20,000 Azerbaijanis were killed and over 1 million were displaced as a result of the large-scale hostilities.

While the OSCE Minsk Group acted as the only mediator in resolution of the conflict, the occupation of the territory of the sovereign State with its internationally recognized boundaries has been left out of due attention of the international community for years.

Armenia ignores four UN Security Council resolutions on immediate withdrawal from the occupied territory of Azerbaijan, thus keeping tension high in the region.

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Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov

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16 September 2016 18:07 (UTC+04:00)

By Rashid Shirinov

International efforts to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict has still not yielded any results because of the destructive position of Armenia, said the Chairman of Milli Mejlis (Azerbaijani Parliament) Ogtay Asadov on September 16.

He made the remark at the meeting of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) countries-members presidents of parliaments in Strasburg.

Asadov said that attempts to give religious color to the hostile policy conducted by Armenia against Azerbaijan are unfounded.

For nearly 25 years, 20 percent of Azerbaijani territory  Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts  are being occupied and they suffered from ethnic cleansing. More than a million civilians were expelled from their homes in Armenia and the occupied lands of Azerbaijan.

Speaker of Azerbaijan Parliament said that the unresolved conflict poses a threat to peace and stability not only in the South Caucasus region, but in the whole world, and the April events occurred on the front line once again prove it.

Ogtay Asadov informed the meeting participants that another armed provocation of the Armenian Armed Forces and their intensive shelling of the settlements along the front line forced the Azerbaijani Armed Forces to retaliate for the security of civilians.

He stressed that the large-scale military actions led to the deaths of many people and large scale destruction.

Asadov also said that today everyone should understand how dangerous it is to close the eyes to ethnic separatism and militant nationalism, as well as seizure of foreign lands.

I am sure that in this matter, the international community will finally have their say, and the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict will be resolved on the basis of universally recognized norms and principles of international law in the framework of territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, Asadov said.

The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts. More than 20,000 Azerbaijanis were killed and over 1 million were displaced as a result of the large-scale hostilities. The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations.

Armenia still controls fifth part of Azerbaijan's territory and rejects implementing four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding districts.

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Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov

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16 September 2016 10:18 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

Azerbaijans executive authorities and state-financed organizations will suspend the purchase of imported goods (services and works) until January 1, 2018.

This is envisaged in the decree signed by Azerbaijans President Ilham Aliyev Sept. 15, 2016, on additional measures to increase the purchase effectiveness in the activities of executive authorities and state-financed organizations.

The limitation doesnt apply to foreign loans taken under state guarantee, foreign grants, purchase of goods (services and works) needed for protecting the country and state security, medicines and medical products.

In case of necessity to buy imported goods (services and works) in accordance with the contracts signed before the entry into force of this decree, a relevant decision will be made by the Ministry of Economy in agreement with president of Azerbaijan.

Under the decree, jointly with the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Economy has been instructed to inform the president once every three months about the funds spent on the purchase of imported goods (works and services).

Moreover, the Ministry of Economy and the Cabinet of Ministers have been instructed to solve other issues arising from the decree.

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16 September 2016 10:16 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

By U.S. Ambassador to Azerbaijan Robert F. Cekuta

Our long term well-being depends on protecting the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the biodiversity we share. This common natural heritage binds together the United States, Azerbaijan, and countries around the world. As I travel to different parts of Azerbaijan, including most recently to Zangezur National Park in Nakhchivan, and see what is being done to protect the environment, I see parallels to what we are celebrating this year in the United States as we mark the 100th anniversary of establishment of our national parks system.

National parks and protected areas are places where shared values are enshrined for generations to come. Parks all over the world benefit the public and celebrate land and sea and cultural treasures. The richness and biodiversity of Azerbaijans parks are no exception. They are a valuable resource, encompassing diverse ecosystems from the semi-deserts of Shirvan to the deciduous forests in Hirkan; from the beautiful high mountains of Shah Dag to the shores of the Caspian Sea in Samur-Yalama and wetlands in Absheron. Seeing Goygol last fall was like being back in the northeastern United States. Azerbaijans nine national parks, 11 state parks and 24 state reserves are home to a wide variety of wildlife including eagles, gazelles, bears, wolves, deer, and wild boar. Some parks are famous as stops on migratory routes for flamingoes and other birds. The parks embody the diversity Azerbaijanis value and which needs to be protected and fostered in todays world. This is one of the reasons I have greatly enjoyed visiting several of Azerbaijans national parks, including those in Absheron, Altagac, and Shirvan. My wife Anne and I firmly intend to visit all the remaining national parks in the year to come.

In the United States, we are celebrating the centenary of our U.S. National Park Service, which was established August 25, 1916. In 1872, the U.S. Congress established the worlds first national park  Yellowstone  which became the catalyst for a worldwide national park movement as countries adapted the model to suit their own circumstances.

We have found that national parks are vital to protecting biodiversity and marine environments, for combatting wildlife trafficking, preserving cultural heritage, and for mitigating and adapting to climate change. Parks help safeguard our shared environment by providing places for scientific collaboration, community engagement, promotion of healthy lifestyles, and education for our current and future generations. They have proven important as focal points for tourism and economic growth. For example, today more than 20,000 U.S. National Park Service employees care for U.S. National Parks, and each year visitors to U.S. Parks support more than 240,000 jobs in local communities and contribute over $27 billion to the U.S. economy.

I am proud of the role the United States has played in this global movement and see many of the things embodied by our National Park Service with each visit to an Azerbaijani national park. I encourage you to visit Azerbaijans parks and celebrate the great natural beauty that is this countrys rich heritage. Should you have the chance to visit the United States, you can find your national park (http://findyourpark.com)

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16 September 2016 10:29 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

By Elmira Tariverdiyeva

Azerbaijan is a unique example of a country that succeeds to go only its way, even if it is the path of greatest resistance to an outer influence. Attempts of this influence are felt very strongly, especially recently, when almost all of the tidbits of the region are divided between the main global centers of power.

Unfortunately, namely the attempts by international players to establish their own rules in the countries of the region almost tore a lot of countries in the region to pieces, having left them in the chaos of civil war and economic collapse.

We are the witnesses of sad examples of Syria, Iraq and other Middle Eastern countries, which have became victims just because some third countries thought political system of these poor countries was wrong. And now, when the citizens of these countries are killed or driven away from their homes, when children and the elderly are dying, third countries seem to like it all...

Azerbaijan saw numerous examples of how other people's orders and life values can affect the lives of citizens of a country, and today, the Azerbaijani government is doing everything possible so that this doesnt happen to our country.

The speech of Azerbaijans President Ilham Aliyev was dedicated exactly to this.

Some foreign circles have quite a different purpose: to dictate to us, to turn Azerbaijan into a tool, to break Azerbaijani peoples will, and then to use a powerful country like Azerbaijan for their own purposes. This would be a catastrophe for us, said Azerbaijans President Ilham Aliyev addressing a ceremony for opening of a new building of school No. 311 in Sabunchu District, Baku, Sept.15.

The pressure on us is increasing, because we move on our own path, do not bow before anyone, we behave with dignity, protect our national interests, put Azerbaijani peoples interests above everything, and this policy should continue, he said. Today, we have this policy. I pursue this policy and no force can turn me from this path.

One can be sure that those to whom the president addressed heard and correctly understood Bakus message.

It is clear that the policy, which is being conducted by Azerbaijan, the policy of balance and support for friendly, partnership relations with all countries in the region except the aggressor occupying Azerbaijani lands disturb the people who are used to express and promote their interests in any country of the world, using dishonest and inhumane methods.

However, Azerbaijani people saw brilliant examples of the situation when anyone is being influenced from outside and makes hasty actions that harm the country.

Today Azerbaijani people value stability more than far-fetched and extraneous values inculcated by various forces.

So, apparently Azerbaijan is the only oasis of stability in the region. And the main task of Azerbaijani people today is to support and help maintain the policy being conducted by Azerbaijan for many years and leading to prosperity, even if it is the path of greatest resistance.

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16 September 2016 11:56 (UTC+04:00)

An Azerbaijani delegation led by Parliament Speaker Ogtay Asadov participated in the meeting of Speakers of parliament of the Council of Europe member states in Strasbourg on September 15.

The delegation included chairman of the parliamentary committee, Head of the Azerbaijani delegation to PACE Samad Seyidov, Chairperson of the PACEs Committee on Migration, Refugees and Displaced Persons Sahiba Gafarova and other officials.

The delegates discussed the issues of the migration and refugee crisis in Europe: role and responsibilities of parliaments, national parliaments and the Council of Europe: together promoting democracy, human rights and the rule of law, and mobilization of parliaments against hate, for inclusive and non-racist societies.

During his visit Asadov met President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe Pedro Agramunt, where the sides spoke about prospects of cooperation, as well as relations between Azerbaijan and the Council of Europe.

The meeting was also attended by chairman of the parliamentary committee, Head of the Azerbaijani delegation to PACE Samad Seyidov, Chairperson of the PACEs Committee on Migration, Refugees and Displaced Persons Sahiba Gafarova.

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16 September 2016 13:11 (UTC+04:00)

By Amina Nazarli

Mexico's Independence Day was solemnly celebrated in Baku on September 15 by the countrys Embassy in Azerbaijan.

This is the second time that the capital city hosts the event. Mexico had struggled for its independence for 11 years old. Officially, the country's independence was proclaimed on September 29 1821. "Viva Mexico" or "Viva la independencia are shouted amidst the crowds on this day -- the word that Hidalgo, one of the nations leaders during the War of Independence in Mexico, shout to call people to revolt.

Mexico's ambassador to Azerbaijan Rodrigo Labardini, addressed the event, saying that Mexico and Azerbaijan are the main countries in their regions, adding that the states have great tourism potential.

Labardini informed the guests that Mexico is one of the 10 most visited countries in the world. He recalled that the Mexican embassy in Baku currently issues visas and that facilitated the visit to the country.

Touching upon the ties between the two states, the ambassador said that they are developing steadily.

Labardini further said that the second round of political consultations between Mexico and Azerbaijan, in order to promote bilateral relations, is scheduled for the next week.

He added that Azerbaijani businessmen will visit Mexico in November to establish commercial relations.

Azerbaijan and Mexico are the commercial and logistic hubs in their respective regions, according to the diplomat.

Mentioning that both counties have natural links -- they both produce oil and gas, the ambassador emphasized that Azerbaijan and Mexico have close ties not only in this sector. The two sides are also cooperating in education sphere, and a number of Azerbaijani citizens are already studying in Mexico and have a Mexican scholarship, he said.

The trade turnover between the two countries increased by 208 percent to $ 22 million in 2015.

Speaking about the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Labardini noted that Mexico calls for the implementation of the UN resolutions on this issue, which clearly refers to the "sovereignty and territorial integrity of Azerbaijan."

Armenia broke out a lengthy war against Azerbaijan laying territorial claims on its South Caucasus neighbor. Since a war in the early 1990s, Armenian armed forces have occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan's territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven surrounding regions. More than 20,000 Azerbaijanis were killed and over 1 million were displaced as a result of the large-scale hostilities.

Mexico recognized Azerbaijan's independence in 1991 and diplomatic relations between the two countries were established in 1992.

Azerbaijan's Embassy in Mexico opened in 2006. Diplomatic representation of Mexico was established in Azerbaijan in 2014.

Baku attaches great importance to the development of relations with Mexico. Relations are actively developing in all directions, including in culture.

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Amina Nazarli is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @amina_nazarli

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16 September 2016 13:55 (UTC+04:00)

By Amina Nazarli

A number of procedures in connection with the upcoming referendum on additions and amendments to the Azerbaijani Constitution have been accomplished so far.

Deadline for submission of applications to Central Election Commission (CEC) in connection with the observation at the referendum ends on September 16 across the country.



The term to refer to the CEC, regarding the special permission to observe sessions of election commissions before the voting day, also ends on Friday.

As of September 7, the CEC has registered 846 observers for the upcoming referendum, and 37,429 observers on the polling stations.

In addition, the term established for the preparation of ballots for voting in the referendum also ends on the same day.

Meanwhile, the Embassy of Azerbaijan in Uzbekistan said that everything is ready for the referendum.



First Secretary of the Azerbaijani diplomatic mission Leila Orujova said that the Embassy set up polling station, election commission, organized the lists of Azerbaijan citizens, included on the consular register.

September 26, 2016, was set as the date for the referendum on proposed changes to the constitution of Azerbaijan and it was announced as a non-working day across the country.

In a bill recently sent to the Constitutional Court, President Ilham Aliyev proposed amendments to 29 Articles of Azerbaijans current constitution. The changes envisage the extension of the presidential term from five to seven years, the establishment of the first vice-president and vice-president positions in the country as well as the cancel of minimum age limit for presidential candidates, and dissolution of parliament by the president.

The League of Protection of Labor rights, Center for Aid and independent advice "For Civil Society" and, Independent Research Center ELS passed registration to conduct Exit Poll.

Final results of the Referendum will be announced until October 21.

The last time changes to the Constitution were made seven years ago, following Constitutional referendum held in 2009.

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Amina Nazarli is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @amina_nazarli

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16 September 2016 13:36 (UTC+04:00)

By Amina Nazarli

Azerbaijans ancient city of Ganja, with more than 4,000-year history will be a new cultural capital of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).

CIS city of culture is selected for one year period. Currently, the city is Turkmenistan's Dasoguz. Ganja will be announced as a culture city officially on September 16.

Bishkek meeting of the CIS Council of Heads of the States on September 16 will announce Ganja a new cultural city and a relevant action plan will be approved.

The summit, dedicated to the 25th anniversary of the CIS, will summarize the activities of the organization and the defined goals and objectives for the future.

Ganja, the second largest city in Azerbaijan after Baku with about 313,300 residents has many amenities that offer a wide range of cultural activities, drawing both from a rich local dramatic portfolio and an international repertoire.

Located some 375 km away from Baku, the city differ for its ancient architectural monuments.

This year, the city also became the eight European Youth Capital. The title will allow the city for the period of one year to showcase, through a multi-faceted program, its youth-related cultural, social, political and economic life and development.



The region is famous for its nature, namely for majestic Goygol Lake and reserve. A large mountain lake surrounded by the mountains of the Lesser Caucasus was formed as a result of a devastating earthquake that destroyed the mountain Kapaz in the 12th century.

The northeastern foot of the Lesser Caucasus Mountains is a picturesque place which has attracted many people across the centuries. This made the history of the region profound and captivating. Ganja is significant to the politico-economic and cultural life of the country since the earliest times.

The city was also the capital of Azerbaijan, when the country first declared its independence in 1918, thus playing a leading role in the history of the country.

It is one of the science and education centers of Azerbaijan. The city has four public higher education institutions.

Despite numerous cases of destruction during its long existence, Ganja has retained the appearance of a beautiful city with many monuments of architecture. One of the main features of the city is the Juma Mosque - Ganja central mosque.

Among other ancient monuments are bridges, the palace of Sultan Darus, towers, mosques, madrasas, baths, caravanserais and complex of buildings Imamzade.

--

Amina Nazarli is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @amina_nazarli

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16 September 2016 13:43 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

Azerbaijans President Ilham Aliyev met with Moldovas Prime Minister Pavel Filip in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan on September 16.

During the meeting, the parties emphasized the good level of relations between the two countries and expressed satisfaction with the great potential of relations. They pointed to the high level of cooperation between Azerbaijan and Moldova within international organizations.

At the same time, the parties pointed out that both sides are interested in further developing the cooperation. They emphasized the good cooperation in the spheres of economy, trade, transportation, energy, investment making and agriculture.

The parties exchanged views on further intensifying the activities of the intergovernmental commission and paying reciprocal visits for this purpose.

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16 September 2016 18:00 (UTC+04:00)

The crimes committed in Ukraine against Azerbaijanis were resolutely condemned.

The Prosecutor General of the Republic of Azerbaijan Zakir Garalov appealed his Ukrainian counterpart Yuri Lutsenko in connection with the cases of violence against Azerbaijanis taking place recently in this country, the Prosecutor General's Office said.

In his appeal, Garalov resolutely condemned the murder of the native of Khachmaz district Abdullah Abdullayev in Pokrovsk city with stealing of the large sum of money belonging to him, blasting in the same city of two cars belonging to the chairman of the Azerbaijan Association Shahin Baylarov, kidnapping and deliberate murder in Donetsk region of Ilgar Ashurov and taking a large sum money and car belonging to him, murder with special cruelty in the Kherson region of Tabriz of Alakbarov and also other crimes committed against Azerbaijanis. In the appeal, it is also emphasized that these events evoked a wide response among the public, requires fair and objective investigations according to requirements of the criminal procedure legislation and rules of international law.

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16 September 2016 23:11 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

Azerbaijan attaches great importance to CIS membership, said Azerbaijans President Ilham Aliyev during the meeting of the CIS Heads of State in Bishkek on September16.



We believe that the organization has come a long way and withstood the test of time throughout 25 years, said President Aliyev.

Our organization was established as a result of certain historical events and thanks to the wisdom of our peoples and leaders, after 25 years, we have this organization which is of great importance both for the region and world, because the geography of our organization is quite large, added the president.

In a friendly environment, we discuss important issues which concern our countries and our peoples, said President Aliyev. There are many issues which need to be addressed.

I would like to mention Azerbaijans active role in strengthening the cooperation in humanitarian sphere. We attach great importance to this. I believe that the cooperation in humanitarian sphere is the basis of our collaboration. Probably, without this, there wouldnt be that level of trust and understanding which exists today, he added.

Azerbaijan, for its part, within our organization and in general, initiates various international events, said President Aliyev.

A few days later, Baku will host the 5th International Baku Humanitarian Forum under the patronage of Russian and Azerbaijani presidents, he said, adding that this forum has already become a very important international platform to discuss the issues related to humanitarian cooperation.

President Aliyev pointed out that these issues are always in the limelight, especially, in the present, when it can be seen how the humanitarian cooperation issues are sometimes interpreted in various countries.

We see the so-called migrant crisis. We see it, but unfortunately, instead of strengthening the mutual understanding between peoples and enhancing the cooperation in humanitarian sphere, it all goes in reverse: a process of splitting for ethnic, religious principle and grounds goes on. We are very concerned about this, since our organization is also strong for that representatives of peoples with different culture, faith and traditions are in it, said the president.

We are united by a common desire to strengthen the cooperation. I should also inform the colleagues that this year was declared the Year of Multiculturalism in Azerbaijan, he said. Azerbaijan has already been recognized as one of the centers of multiculturalism on a global scale. Baku hosted the 7th Global Forum of the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations this year.

I would also like to emphasize the importance we attach to cooperation in the economic sphere both in bilateral format with member states and in multilateral format, said President Aliyev.

Good prospects are opening up here as well. Despite the level of decline in economic activity in the world, I believe that we will succeed to maintain the tendencies for the development of economic cooperation.

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16 September 2016 14:13 (UTC+04:00)

By Nigar Abbasova

Energy-rich Kazakhstan is planning to increase its oil production to 79.5 million in 2017 with further growth up to 86.5 million tons in 2021. The target is reflected in the socio-economic development outlook of the country for 2017-2021.

The increase is mainly connected with the expansion of production at Tengiz field, which is considered to be one of the largest fields in the world, as well as resumption of production at Kashagan oil and gas field, scheduled for October 23.

Fitch International rating agency forecasted that the country may increase its production by 60 percent reaching the level of 2.7 mbd till 2030. The agency said that main drivers of growth are large projects, which are planned to be implemented in the upstream sector, as well as development of transport infrastructure in the country.

Kazakhstan's three largest oil fields (Kashagan,Tengiz, and Karachaganak) are expected to account for some 75 percent of the total national output in 2025, while the figure standing at 50 percent in 2015.

The output of the country increased twofold from 2001 to 2015.

Moreover, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) has recently raised its forecast of oil supplies from non-member countries in 2017, increasing the volume of expected production in 2017 up to 200,000 (bpd) mostly due to start up of Kazakhstan's Kashagan oilfield.

Commercial production in the amount of 75,000 barrels per day at Kashagan field is expected to be reached in November, 2016.

Kashagan, located in the north of the Caspian Sea, possesses geological reserves standing at 4.8 billion tons of oil. The total oil reserves amount to 38 billion barrels, while some 10 billion of them are recoverable reserves.

The production at the Kashagan field started in September 2013, but was suspended in October, after a gas leak in one of the main pipelines.

Recoverable reserves of Tengiz, which includes Tengiz field and the Korolevskoye field, are estimated between 750 million to 1.1 billion tons of oil. Karachaganaks oil and condensate reserves stand at 1.2 billion tons. Almost 16 percent of oil produced in Kazakhstan is being extracted from this field. Kazakhstan's economy depends heavily on the oil sector, which accounts for an estimated 20 percent of GDP, 50 percent of fiscal revenues, and 60 percent of exports.

The planned volume of output for 2016 is 74 million tons of oil, while oil production hit 79.46 million tons in 2015. Kazakhstans proven oil reserves as of early 2016 stood at 30 billion barrels, according to the BP Statistical Review of World Energy

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Nigar Abbasova is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @nigyar_abbasova

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16 September 2016 19:52 (UTC+04:00)

By Nigar Abbasova

Energy-rich Iran, which is keen to regain its positions and recover its energy sector, hugely affected by the sanctions era, is now seeking to cooperate with major foreign companies.

The OMV group, an integrated international oil and gas company headquartered in Vienna, Austria received 1 million barrels of crude oil from Iran in a spot delivery at the Italian port of Trieste which the energy group will further send to its two refineries in Austria and Romania. The operation became the first delivery of Irans oil to the Austrian company since 2012, when sanctions were imposed on the country.

OMV has been present in Iran since 2001 when it implemented operations at the Mehr exploration basin in the western part of the country, which became the first contract of the company with Iran.

The Austrian Company earlier signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) as it looked to revive its activities in Iran. The deal covered several areas ranging from oil and gas field evaluation to crude oil and petroleum product swaps.

Being the fourth country in the world for the volume of proven oil reserves, Iran was producing over 4 million barrels of oil per day before sanctions were ratcheted up in 2012. The country expanded its cooperation with foreign companies following lifting of sanctions, while production went from 2.8 mbd up to 3.5 mpd.

Two major Italian energy companies earlier signed the long-term contracts with the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) to import Iran's crude oil. Iran will export between 60,000 to 65,000 barrels of oil per day to the Saras SpA refineries, according to the contract.

Mohsen Qamsari, the director for international affairs of NIOC, earlier said that Iran signed agreements for the sale of crude oil with companies from Spain (Repsol) and Greece (Hellenic Petroleum), and negotiations with other major oil companies are underway. Moreover, NIOC is also planning to sign an agreement with the Swiss Vitol energy and commodities company on the sale of oil and gas condensate, Fars agency reported earlier.

Crude oil exports of Iran jumped 15 percent from July to more than 2 million barrels per day (bpd) in August.

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Nigar Abbasova is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @nigyar_abbasova

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16 September 2016 16:11 (UTC+04:00)

By Gunay Hasanova

The Brexit vote is encouraging populist parties in Europe to seek similar referendums for their nations.

I am ready to hold a referendum on leaving the European Union, said French far-right National Front Party leader at the European Parliament- Marie Le Pen.

Give to people the right of being free back. Give them the right of cooperating at the level they want to. Finally, create for people the ability to determine their own destiny and be a democrat, she added.

Previously, Jean-Luc Melenchon, leader of the far-left party Front de Gauche (FG), has also said that France should leave the EU.

Melenchon and Le Pen are both set to stand on Euro-skeptic platforms in the French presidential election in spring 2017.

Earlier, another presidential candidate Bruno Le Maire, a former secretary of state for European affairs, has also called for a referendum on redefining the European project.

More than 60 percent of French people view the EU unfavorable, indicates the Research conducted by the U.S. think tank Pew Research Center.

Frances relationship with Europe has always been paradoxical. On one hand, France has long been a supporter of the idea of a united Europe. Aristide Briand, Jean Monnet, and Robert Schuman were the founding fathers of European integration. On the other hand, France is a country with a long history as a nation-state which is why making its policy dependently on the European Union is a controversial issue.

French Euro-skepticism has been fueled by the economic troubles of the Eurozone crisis and the migrant crisis in Calais and other parts of France.

The National Front has managed to capitalize on general dissatisfaction, fears about immigration and security concerns in the wake of the Paris attacks.

In turn, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said that the European Union is not at best shape.

Obviously, the UKs decision to leave the European Union turned out a strong fact to impact the further developments within the union.

Recently, the European Union announced its intentions to create its own military bloc in order to ensure its internal and external security.

Moreover, Brexit would have a wider political impact on the EU, both by disrupting internal political dynamics and because of the risk of political contagion if the case of leaving the EU encourages disintegrative forces in other member states.

In turn, earlier Germany has warned that France, the Netherlands, Austria, Finland, and Hungary could leave the Union as well.

The European Union is an economic and political partnership involving 28 European countries, which after the Second World War fostered economic co-operation, with the idea that countries which trade together are more likely to avoid going to war with each other.

It has since grown to become a "single market" allowing goods and people to move around, basically as if the member states were one country.

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16 September 2016 12:14 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

Four members of the Islamic State (IS, aka ISIS, ISIL or Daesh) terrorist group have been detained in Turkey, Milliyet newspaper reported on September 16.

Reportedly, the detainees were planning to commit terrorist attacks near foreign diplomatic missions in the country.

The testimony of the detainees revealed that the IS was planning terrorist attacks near German and UK embassies Sept.17.

It was earlier reported that the UK embassy in Ankara will be closed Sept.16 for security reasons.

Previously, Germany closed its diplomatic missions in Turkey.

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16 September 2016 10:46 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

A military unit came under attack in Turkeys Agri province, Milliyet newspaper reported on September 16.

Nine Turkish servicemen were killed as a result of the incident.

Reportedly, the attack was committed by militants of Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) terrorist group.

Large-scale anti-PKK operations have been launched in the province following the attack, said the newspaper.

The conflict between Turkey and the PKK, which demands the creation of an independent Kurdish state, has continued for over 33 years and has claimed more than 40,000 lives.



The UN and the European Union list the PKK as a terrorist organization.

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By Rashid Shirinov

Turkmenistans President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov has dismissed the countrys Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador to Azerbaijan Toyly Komekov.

He has held the office since December 2010. From now on, Komekov will head Turkmenistans State Committee for Tourism and Sport, the website of Turkmen government states.

Under another presidential decree, previous head of Turkmenistans State Committee for Tourism and Sport Kakabai Seidov has been dismissed and appointed as Turkmenistan's Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador to Azerbaijan.

Reportedly, he has been dismissed as Turkmenistan's National Olympic Team did not gain any medal at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio.

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16 September 2016 13:38 (UTC+04:00)

The European Commission has stepped up its funding to improve living conditions for refugees, migrants and asylum seekers in Greece, Azertac reported. New funding worth 115 million will be released to humanitarian organisations operating in the country.

"The European Commission continues to put solidarity into action to better manage the refugee crisis, in close cooperation with the Greek Government. The new funding has the key aim to improve conditions for refugees in Greece, and make a difference ahead of the upcoming winter. Over the past months, we have significantly contributed to restore dignified living conditions through our humanitarian partners. Together, we will continue our work until our job is done", said Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Management Christos Stylianides, who announced the new funding at the Thessaloniki International Fair in Greece together with Greek Alternate Minister for Migration Ioannis Mouzalas.

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16 September 2016 12:57 (UTC+04:00)

By Gunay Hasanova

The meeting of the CIS Council of Foreign Ministers kicked off in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan on September 16.

The meeting is expected to focus on 16 issues related to multilateral cooperation within CIS.

Moreover, the foreign ministers will discuss the practical measures regarding the further expanding the multifaceted cooperation between the CIS countries and exchange views on the relevant international issues.

The ministers will review the draft joint statements of the heads of states on the 25th anniversary of CIS, combating international terrorism, on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the completion of Nuremberg Tribunal and the world drug problem. Further steps to optimize the activities of CIS will be among key issues.

Previously, it was reported that the countries plan to sign some documents on organizational decisions, particularly regarding Russian chairmanship in the CIS in 2017.

The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) was created in December 1991. The CIS united Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Ukraine.

However, in 2008 Georgia withdrew its membership.

The CIS has few supranational powers but aims to be more than a purely symbolic organization, nominally possessing coordinating powers in the realm of trade, finance, lawmaking, and security.

Integration of the countries in the framework of the Commonwealth of Independent States is executed through its coordinating institutions (charter bodies, executive bodies and the bodies of branch cooperation of the CIS).

The Council of the Heads of States is one of the charter bodies.

---

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
16 September 2016 15:00 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

Deputy co-chair of Turkish opposition Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) Alp Altinors has been detained, Aksam newspaper reported on September 16.

Altinors has been detained on charges of conducting propaganda in favor of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) terrorist group.

Moreover, eight HDP members have been detained on similar charges.

The conflict between Turkey and the PKK, which demands the creation of an independent Kurdish state, has continued for over 33 years and has claimed more than 40,000 lives.



The UN and the European Union list the PKK as a terrorist organization.

---

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
16 September 2016 15:56 (UTC+04:00)

By Gunay Hasanova

Leaders of the 27 EU countries without the UK plan to prepare a road map in the spheres of migration, security, and economy at an informal meeting in Bratislava on September 16, which must be ready until the EU summit to be held in March 2017 in Rome.

The upcoming summit was called after the referendum in the UK where the vote of withdrawal from the EU won with a small margin.

The purpose of the meeting is not to discuss the further details of negotiations regarding the UK leaving the EU but to talk about the future of remaining EU countries, RIA Novosti reported.

The political agenda of the day for the upcoming months may be defined at the Bratislava summit, said a source close to the EU leadership.

Since the meeting will be informal, it is not expected to take any specific decisions regarding the different aspects of EU life.

However, the leaders plan to put an honest diagnosis on the situation in EU on the background of the desire of citizens to leave the union faced during the British referendum.

The source says that the diagnosis should be put on what really works in the EU and what not, as well as, what should be improved.

Tusk understands that we cannot isolate ourselves from reality with the optimistic views about the future of the EU. He is convinced that in order to be successful, the EU first needs, to be honest about what it lacks, said the source.

The Head of the European Council Donald Tusk noted that the purpose of the informal meeting in Bratislava and the process that will start there is to return hope and stability to union shaken by many crises.

There are a few political conditions for this. The first is the restoration of confidence, and especially citizens' confidence in the European Union not the trust of countries to each other and EU institutions. The second condition is to demonstrate the ability to regain control of the political processes that undermined that trust, said the source.

Tusk considers that the key political processes where the EU needs to regain control are massive. Such as the uncontrolled influx of migrants for such a long time, growing security threats related to terrorism, as well as, economic and social uncertainty, reports the source.

Tusk noted that the main outcome of the meeting will be the plan of specific actions in various spheres starting from migration and security to the investments that EU countries need to implement until the March summit of EU leaders in Rome.

"We need to adopt formal decisions on the matters mentioned above, as well as on other topics at the next summit of the European Council in October and December," said Tusk in his letter before the summit.

The EU and Russia relations wont be discussed at the summit. A political discussion will be devoted to this question at the summit of 28 EU countries in October.

Recently, German Chancellor Angela Merkel stated that the European Union is in a critical condition, adding that it needs to show its ability to change in practice.

"We are in a critical situation. It is necessary to take actions to show that we can get better on security issues, combating terrorism, defense cooperation, economic growth and the labor market," she said.

Commenting on Bratislava summit, she also stressed that one should not expect to solve all problems during the meeting, adding that they will discuss the Bratislava declaration and find the ways to agree on it.

Moreover, German Chancellor said that the EU Heads of State and Government will discuss the issues of migration and combat the causes of migration crisis on September 16.

"All these will be worked out until the end of the year and we want to make concrete progress until the 60th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome in March 2017, Merkel said.

The European Union is an economic and political partnership involving 28 European countries, which after the Second World War fostered economic co-operation, with the idea that countries which trade together are more likely to avoid going to war with each other.

It has since grown to become a "single market" allowing goods and people to move around, basically as if the member states were one country.

---

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
16 September 2016 17:12 (UTC+04:00)

By Gunay Hasanova

Meeting of Chief of the General Staff of Turkish Armed Forces, Army General Hulusi Akar and his Russian counterpart, Army General Valery Gerasimov contributed to the development of relations in the military sphere, which will affect the further strengthening of cooperation between the two countries, reported Anadolu Agency with the reference to military source on September 16.

The source pointed out that the visit to Turkey on the eve of Gerasimov took place in a positive and constructive way.

The position of the Defense ministries of the Russian Federation and Turkey are strengthening, and Gerasimov's visit created opportunities for further positive development, contributing to the formation of a common position on the processes in the Middle East, said the source.

The Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, Army General Valery Gerasimov paid a working visit to Turkey on September 15.

Prospects of resolving Syrian crisis were discussed at the meeting as well.

Previously, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said that Turkey asked Russia for a military ground support as part of the Shield of the Euphrates operation in Syria.

In turn, Erdogan during the G20 summit said that Turkey and Russia are holding talks to achieve a ceasefire for Syrias Aleppo. The Turkish president emphasized that achieving a ceasefire in Aleppo is one of the most important issues for Turkey and Russia.

Syria has been suffering from an armed conflict since March 2011, which, according to the UN, has so far claimed over 500,000 lives.

Militants from various armed groups are confronting the Syrian government troops. The Islamic State (IS, ISIL, ISIS or Daesh), the YPG and the PYD are the most active terrorist groups in Syria.

---

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsA
16 September 2016 20:13 (UTC+04:00)

The 64th meeting of the Heads of the Council of Customs Services of CIS was held in Minsk.

The event was attended by 11 delegations, including representatives of the State Customs Committee of Belarus, customs services of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova and the Russian Federation, AZERTAC reported.

The Council of Heads of Customs Services is one of the bodies of the CIS cooperation formed in 1993 to coordinate the activities of customs authorities.

The event discussed over 12 issues concerning the draft generic technology cooperation between the customs authorities of the railway administrations of CIS during the customs clearance and control of goods transported by rail, and other issues.

---

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
16 September 2016 18:22 (UTC+04:00)

By Gunay Hasanova

President of Kyrgyzstan Almazbek Atambayev has expressed in a restricted format his satisfaction over all the CIS countries reaching a consensus on the optimization of Commonwealth during the meeting of the Council of CIS Heads of State on September 16, RIA Novosti reported.

There were a lot of controversy about the CIS optimization, but I am glad that all countries could agree on a common point and already prepare documents to operate in an optimized mode, he said.

He noted that the past 25 years since the formation of the CIS is a significant period to determine the progress achieved and indicate plans for the future.

The meeting of the CIS Council of Foreign Ministers was held in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan on September 16.

The ministers reviewed the draft joint statements of the heads of states on the 25th anniversary of CIS, combating international terrorism, on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the completion of Nuremberg Tribunal and the world drug problem. Further steps to optimize the activities of CIS were among key issues.

The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) was created in December 1991. The CIS united Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Ukraine.

However, in 2008 Georgia withdrew its membership.

The CIS has few supranational powers but aims to be more than a purely symbolic organization, nominally possessing coordinating powers in the realm of trade, finance, lawmaking, and security.

Integration of the countries in the framework of the Commonwealth of Independent States is executed through its coordinating institutions (charter bodies, executive bodies and the bodies of branch cooperation of the CIS).

The Council of the Heads of States is one of the charter bodies.

---

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
16 September 2016 16:51 (UTC+04:00)

By Amina Nazarli



Azerbaijan located in the junction of two world civilizations, is a miraculous country with its rich natural resources, and ancient culture, history and people, whose lifestyle presents a unique and harmonious combination of the traditions and ceremonies of many different cultures and civilizations.

The country with rich ancient history has thousands of places to visit, ranging from the capital to the unique villages lost in the clouds. Warm Caspian Sea, sandy beaches and delicious cuisine attract tourists to Azerbaijani resorts day by day.

Tourism has already turn to the priority of Azerbaijans economy, which makes any efforts to improve this field. Azerbaijan takes drastic measures to take tourism to a new level in the country.

Experts claim that good tourism management can provide a strong impetus for the attraction of foreign tourists to any country.

Henceforth, the government will stimulate the tourism industry, through the simplification of the visa regime, providing benefits and privileges in the field of customs duties, taxes and other obligatory payments.

All these issues are reflected in the new draft law On Tourism discussed in the Azerbaijani Parliamentary on September 15.

According to the project, exemptions and privileges will be applied for some tourist and recreational zones.

These preferences will mainly focus on basic infrastructures in recreational areas, and all necessary expenses will be borne by the government. In addition, taxes for such facilities will be simplified.

Moreover, through the relevant funds, companies engaged in tourism infrastructure will be granted preferential loans. Goods, intended for tourism infrastructure, the list of which will be determined by the relevant executive authority, will be exempt from import duties.



In accordance with the draft law, travel agencies are required to create a reserve fund for possible risks. They should inform their customers about the place they have requested. In case of refusal of services, travel agencies should insure the risks for the payment of specified amounts in favor of consumer, or to create a reserve fund in a bank account in the same amount, or provide a bank guarantee in the same amount, or provide another form of guarantee in favor of the consumer.

Under the new project, in case of failure terms of the contract on rendering tourist services, a customer is entitled to demand compensation for material and moral damage caused to him/her in the manner prescribed by law.

Moreover, the draft law also envisages to introduce some restrictions for tourist facilities. For the tourist facilities included in the UNESCO Cultural and Natural Heritage will be under special protection regime. The same law is also applied for the facilities, which are not included in the UNESCOs list, but which are considering unique treasure of cultural and historical heritage of Azerbaijan.

The regime provides limitation of tourist flow to such facilities. This does not concern Bakus Icherisheher and Gala State Historical-Ethnographic Reserve.

--

Amina Nazarli is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @amina_nazarli

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz
Fast food chain McDonalds has opened a pilot standalone cafe in Paris that serves a range including macarons and muffins, but no burgers.

The trial McCafe, in Rue Rambuteau near Les Halles opened at the end of August.

The new cafe serves coffee, croissants, brioches, cupcakes, club sandwiches and bagels, but burgers and fries are absent from the menu.

A spokeswoman for McDonalds in France told British Baker: The experiment has just begun; it is too early to formalise a balance sheet or anticipate deploying this test.

McDonalds launched its McCafe brand in 2003, opening standalone cafes in countries including America and New Zealand.

The McCafe concept came to the UK in 2012, but as a brand within existing McDonalds stores not as a standalone concept.

At the moment, there are still no standalone McCafe outlets in this country, although a range of McCafe coffees and snacks including iced frappes and iced fruit smoothies are sold.

Meanwhile, in the UK, McDonalds is spending 500m on rolling out tablets across its UK restaurants by 2018, giving customers the chance to play games, check Facebook or browse the web while they eat.

The tablets, from Samsung and other providers, are currently in place in 400 sites and conversions are taking place at the rate of one a day, a spokeswoman told British Baker.
Naughty for a reason

BMS World Mission is supporting an initiative to help children with learning difficulties in Lebanon





A child is regularly playing up in the classroom. They cant sit still, they answer back and are disruptive. They are not doing well in their studies and are not achieving anything. The teacher is exasperated with them  they just seem to be a waste of time.



But what if the teacher doesnt realise that the reason the child is being naughty and underachieving is because they have a learning difficulty?



In Lebanon, children who have learning difficulties like ADHD, autism, dyslexia and speech and language impairments are often undiagnosed and can be seen as difficult or naughty students. Very few schools will enrol children with these difficulties and, without assistance, those who are accepted can struggle and fail, and even be asked to leave. These children are often hidden away in their homes, with families unaware or unable to get help for them. These children do not reach their full potential and can miss out on an education. Their future can be bleak.



BMS is addressing this problem by supporting a pilot project led by a partner in Lebanon. Our partner has expertise in working with children with learning differences and has helped many to overcome the challenges they face and to succeed at school. The project is enabling two public schools to become inclusive educational communities.









Teachers are being trained to identify students with learning difficulties at an early stage and be able to provide better teaching for them. This training will enable the teachers not only to respond to the individual needs of students who have learning difficulties, but also to recommend appropriate steps for parents to help their children, including referring them to specialists. Where needed, children with learning difficulties are being assessed by BMS partner, leading to tailored help for each child, with counselling and support for their parents. The aim is for the project to be a model that the Ministry of Education in Lebanon can replicate nationally, potentially impacting thousands of students with learning difficulties across the country.



Through this project, BMS is helping children with learning difficulties in Lebanon get a greater understanding of their condition and is ensuring that they receive the support they need from their school and parents. They will no longer be a waste of time, but they will do well at school and have a chance at a happier, more fulfilled life. Thank you.





BMS is also supporting work with thousands of refugees in Lebanon who have fled from the war in Syria. Help refugees have a brighter future by donating to our Syrias Forgotten Families appeal today or using it in your church soon.

This article first appeared on the website of BMS World Mission and is used with permission

BMS World Mission, 16/09/2016
A Tampa couple woke up Wednesday morning to find their wheelchair-accessible van stolen.

Van belonged to Eric Chapman, who suffers from ALS

Van needed to take Chapman to doctor appointments



Described as 2005 green Chevrolet Uplander, Florida tag EUNN33

Eric Chapman suffers from ALS. He spends most of his days homebound with his wife, Margarita, taking care of him but he tries to stay optimistic.

"I'm a very positive person," Eric Chapman said.

He said another family who had an ALS patient gave him the $10,000 van about four years ago. His wife calls it their "lifeline."

"The door would glide open on its own, the ramp would come down, Eric would just maneuver himself in and I would strap him in as a passenger and that gave him the freedom to feel normal. He had normalcy in that van because he was the passenger and we would just go on our happy way," Margarita Chapman said.

"It was everything to me. It gave me freedom to be in the outside world," Eric Chapman said.

Without the van, Margarita Chapman said she can't drive her husband on errands or take him to doctor appointments.

"We're just praying we get it back in the condition that they took it in," she said.

Eric Chapman said his plan was to pass the van on to another ALS patient when he no longer needs it.

The van is described as a 2005 green Chevrolet Uplander with the Florida tag EUNN33.

It has a wheelchair ramp and rust on the right, rear door.

"They must really be desperate. Who would want to take something from someone who already has so little?," said Margarita Chapman.

Anyone with information is being asked to contact Tampa Police.
PLEASE NOTE!

Due to the March 23, 2020 NM DOH Public Health Order, These Event Listings Are Not Accurate!

All non-essential businesses are closed, public gatherings are prohibited!

(One day some of these events will be rescheduled or will resume, but they are not happening now!)
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With little fanfare or publicity, the Sons of Confederate Veterans raised a flag at their memorial at Martin Luther King Drive in Orange on 9/11, but it wasn't the iconic battle flag, which has polarized the nation for more than a year.

The smallish banner that was raised for the first time at the otherwise-unmarked circular concrete monument features a diagonal red cross with 13 white stars on a blue field. It was flown by the Army of the Trans-Mississippi, the last major Confederate command to surrender.

It's the visual opposite of the Confederate States of America's battle flag, which had a blue cross with white stars on a red background.

That flag was the one taken down to cheers and cries of "Take it Down!" at the South Carolina statehouse in July 2015, a month after the murders of nine black churchgoers, in what authorities said was a racially motivated attack.

The slayings sparked a series of protests about the display of the Confederate battle flag, which in many people's eyes has come to represent slavery.

The Sons of Confederate Veterans is an organization that seeks to honor the soldiers and sailors of the Confederate armed forces who served and those who were killed in battle, according to Marshall Davis, director of publicity for the Sons of Confederate Veterans' Texas Division.

On its website, the group asks its supporters for help.

"The SCV Texas Division's mission is to preserve and protect the history and heritage of the South and it's (sic) Confederate Soldiers.

"But, we need your help. Please consider donating to our cause today. Time is of the essence as we see our flags, our monuments, and our historical sights (sic) attacked on a daily basis by those that have much more funding and influence with local government."

>> See other Confederate monuments in Texas in the gallery above

Orange Mayor Jimmy Sims said the site's existence is legal, but the Sons of Confederate Veterans has not yet complied with the conditions of its permit by providing parking or access for disabled people.

"It's not about a flag," he said. "It's about their operation. They can't ignore their permit. If they do, we'll shut them down."

The memorial is not marked with any signs.

However, there are five "No Parking" signs on 41st Street, a narrow, one-lane asphalt road, and a "No Parking" sign on the Interstate 10 service road on the construction's south side.

Orange Councilwoman Essie Bellfield, an African-American, wonders what the group is trying to prove.

"The Confederate flag is a symbol of what went on. Anyone who is a student of history knows that," she said.

Asked about the less well-known flag flying at the memorial, she said, "I haven't seen it and I don't know if it would offend me or not."

The memorial at North 41st Street and FM 3247, also known as Martin Luther King Drive in honor of the slain civil rights leader, has 13 columns atop a circular concrete platform with three steps leading up to it. Each of the steps near a column shows cracking, and some of the concrete is peeling from the columns.

Davis, of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, said the group prefers not to publicize what it does because it draws detractors, whom the media will focus on instead of its organization.

"Our detractors have in their platform to remove all Confederate symbols," he said.

In South Carolina, after its Legislature passed a bill signed into law by Gov. Nikki Haley, who supported the removal of the Confederate flag from the capitol, the banner was deposited in the Confederate Relic Room at the capitol's Confederate memorial.

On Sunday, the day the SCV's Orange Camp raised the flag, Americans observed Patriot Day, the 15th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.

Patriot Day is distinguished from Patriot's Day, observed the third Monday in April for the American Revolution battles of Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775.

"For Confederate veterans, it (Sept. 11) is Patriot's Day. We think anyone who fought and died were patriots," Davis said.

DWallach@BeaumontEnterprise.com twitter.com/dwallach
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It's no secret that Beaumont doesn't have the most dazzling reputation among Texas cities, but despite a recent study naming the town as one of the least safe for women in the country, there is some silver lining.

Finance website ValuePenguin recently released its ranking of the safest cities for women in America, with Beaumont landing in the bottom 10 of 261 ranked cities.

At No. 255, Beaumont was still nonetheless safer than Houston (No. 260) and Amarillo (No. 257), according to statistics.

With 31 data points from sources such as the FBI, Center for Disease Control and United States Census Bureau, the team at ValuePenguin ranked cities in four categories: crime; public policy and representation; healthcare; and education and wealth.

See ValuePenguin's full ranking of 261 cities here.

Beaumont ranked No. 221 in crime, No. 236 in healthcare and No. 235 in education and health.

However, the city earned the No. 14 spot in public policy and representation. Data from that category included factors such as how many women had paid sick leave and workplace accommodations for pregnant workers.

Researchers gave heavier consideration to crime and healthcare statistics, reasoning that they were better markers of the current state of each city, said Andrew Pentis, associate editor at ValuePenguin. Alternatively, public policy and representation and education and wealth were better indicators of how the safety of a city could improve or falter in the next few years.

The ranking "points to the fact that Beaumont is on its way to being safer for women," Pentis said.

See what other Texas cities were at the bottom of the list, as well as the 15 safest cities in America in the slideshow above.
After an undercover operation, 15 women were arrested in North Dallas last month and eight brothels have been shut down, according to police and media reports.

The women, ranging in age from 48-to-73-years-old, were managers of massage parlors and were apprehended Aug. 26, the Dallas Morning News reported.

Each of the women were charged with aggravated promotion of prostitution, a third-degree felony, which can result in a $10,000 fine or two to 10 years in prison. Of the eights brothels, five of them were located within one-block of each other, the Morning News reported.

RELATED: SAPD: 8 men arrested for soliciting sex from undercover detectives in prostitution sting

Additionally, two of the women were charged with using a facility of interstate commerce in aid of racketeering enterprise, according to a U.S. Department of Justice news release. Connie Su Moser, 63, and Kum Shugars, 67, were arrested and booked into Kaufman County Jail while the other women were taken to Dallas County Jail.

The North Texas Trafficking Taskforce seized $420,000 from Mosers home, about $70,000 from her bank account and her 2015 Lexus, according to the release. Moser was also charged with one count of conspiracy to commit sex trafficking, the release said.

RELATED: Police: Backpage.com ads lead to arrest of 19 in undercover prostitution sting in Central Texas

The Morning News reported that undercover agents visited the parlors leading up to the women's arrest pretending to want a massage. Agents said they were offered sex by the employees of the parlors and would find an excuse, like having an asthma attack, to get out of the parlor.

Agents found the brothels had at least 21 women who are suspected to be victims of sex trafficking.

RELATED: Police: 12 men, 2 women arrested in South Texas prostitution sting

The massage parlors involved were:

Number 1 Spa

Green Spa

Home Town Spa

Dupond Studio

7 Star Spa

Empire Spa

Gold One Spa

The Dallas Doll House

The 15 women arrested are:

Myoungsa Gilliland, 53

Soo Jin Cho, 48

In Sun Lee, 59

Un Hui Kamemoto, 55

Yong Suk Lee, 65

Yon Im Canapp, 58

Un Toner, 55

Jung Ja Hwang, 73

Kwangsun Kang, 72

Sun Williams, 64

Im Gyeong Sook, 53

Suk Chong Freeman, 58

In Cha Kennedy, 54

Connie Su Moser, 63

Kum Shugars, 67

RELATED: 61 arrests made in biggest-ever sex trafficking bust for McLennan County

kbradshaw@express-news.net

Twitter: @kbrad5
A 19-year-old Iowa man who filmed himself molesting a baby girl two years ago plead guilty to engaging in a lascivious act with a child Monday and was given a sentence that could keep the teen out of prison, according to media reports.

Kraigen Grooms, 19, received a 10-year suspended sentence and five years of supervised release after federal agents said he filmed himself raping a 12-month to 18-month-old girl in 2014 and put the footage on an underground pornography website, KTVO reported Tuesday. But an Iowa prosecutor told the Associated Press that Grooms did not actually rape or cause any physical harm to the child.
After being pressured to turnover financial information, Connecticut's Insurance Commissioner Katharine Wade is recusing herself from "any role" in the approval of the Anthem-Cigna merger, the Connecticut Mirror reports.

Here's what you should know.

1. Ms. Wade's lawyer Kimberly Knox said the commissioner had no conflict of interest in the deal  Ms. Wade was a former Cigna employee, and her husband is a current employee  but instead is stepping down because she was "highly politicized" throughout the process.

2. The decision came at a hearing of the Citizen's Ethics Advisory Board which was weighing whether to start a hearing, that would have forced Ms. Wade and her husband to turn over financial documents to determine if they had a conflict of interest in the deal.

3. After her recusal, neither Ms. Wade nor her husband should be required to disclose any financial documents.

4. Ms. Knox said Ms. Wade had turned over all documents sought by Barbara Housen, the board's general counsel.

5. Ms. Knox said the board had no grounds to issue a declaratory ruling because the Insurance Department is no longer reviewing the merger.

6. Ms. Wade has said neither she nor her husband hold any shares of Cigna stock, after she divested in April 2014. Her husband has a "conditional future compensation clause in the form of unvested stock and options."

7. Common Cause and the Connecticut Citizen Action Group are still urging the board to continue its inquiry.

More coding, billing and collections news:

5 things to know on Anthem stock after Zacks Investment downgrades to sell

Uninsured rate hits 9.1% with 4M Americans gaining coverage  5 highlights

Are settlement talks between CMS & payers in the works? 4 takeaways




Both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump's health have come under question causing the presidential candidates to release their medical records. David Scheiner, MD, President Obama's former physician, said objective physicians should examine the presidential candidates, according to ABC News.

Here are five takeaways:

1. Due to personal relationships with candidates, Dr. Scheiner notes objective physicians may be better able to provide an honest assessment of the candidate's health to the public, as opposed to candidates' personal physicians.

2. Dr. Scheiner says although physicians have an ethical obligation to report the assessment, it puts them in a compromising position. He tells ABC News, "I would like to think I have more integrity, that I would have been honest about that. But it is a terrible position to be put in. And because it is such a terrible position I think the whole thing has to change."

3. President Obama was in excellent health so Dr. Scheiner explains he was not placed in such a position.

4. Like many Americans, Dr. Scheiner wants both candidates to release more health information. For instance, he believes Hillary Clinton should undergo a neuro- psychological exam to determine if her 2012 concussion caused more damage than is currently known.

5. He also claims Donald Trump should have X-rays of his feet to confirm he was deferred from the Vietnam War due to bone spurs. Dr. Scheiner also stated Donald Trump should also have a neuro-psychological exam as he believes the Republican candidate may have a personality disorder. Dr. Scheiner told ABC News, "That warrants an evaluation, the kind of statements he makes."

More healthcare news:

Tenet shares jump 4%: 5 notes

Aurora Health Care opens $38M Germantown Health Center, equipped with ASC: 5 takeaways

AmSurg-Envision merger closer to final stages as Hart-Scott-Rodino waiting period expires; Surgery Partners Q2 same-facility revenue jumps 14.9% & more  5 key updates on ASC companies
Fred Davis, MD, president and CMO of ProCare Pain Solutions in Grand Rapids, Mich., discusses the state of independent physician practices and best opportunities in the future.

Q: What are the top three challenges independent physicians face today?

Dr. Fred Davis: Number one is getting paid adequately for what we do; number two is ensuring access to streams of patients and third is learning how to restructure the way we practice as independent specialists. Medicine has become much more subspecialized, focusing on narrow skill sets that are done exquisitely well. However, healthcare is also moving toward a more integrated model of care, and we are actually taking responsibility for the whole patient for a period of time. For example, in the emerging perioperative surgical home, we are not just doing surgery, but also making sure the patient has a preoperative course of preparation and postoperative care so they have optimal outcomes and dont end up back in the hospital.

A lot of specialists, used to being responsible for a narrow scope of care, will have to change the way they are working to integrate with more clinicians and entities that touch the patient over the course of treatment. Payments are being bundled. Working with larger clinically integrated systems requires that specialists embrace other aspects of care. We are looking more at the whole person and process of care. If you are able to work with emerging clinically integrated networks and with chronic disease, there can be a secure stream of patients.

Q: What benefits are there to consolidating into the large independent physician group model?

FD: Its really interesting that so many doctors are becoming employed today, and working for hospitals. However, there are some advantages to the large group model. You are more likely to have a physician leader in the large specialty group than at the hospital.

The management structure of the group is also more likely oriented to your specialty. Large hospital systems have 100 different competing priorities with everything from running the emergency department, and lab to the structural aspects of the hospital, or even owning an insurance company. Voices of the physicians and efficiencies can be lost. But when the primary management focus is for a physician group, you have a more common shared experience behind you. There is a certain bond because you all went through the same training and have sat by the patients bedside, holding their hands as they transitioned in care. This is a shared experience that you dont have when you are dealing with a non-physician administrator.

There is something unique about the physician leader. There is a connectivity there. A certain amount of commonality between the leader and physicians is very helpful.

Finally, its easier to keep up with structural changes in medicine with a large group. The way we gather and transmit information between people and the EHR technology is easier to access with better quality staff and systems in the larger group. You can also do a better job of negotiating contracts and pull from a higher level of expertise on the management side as compared to a small practice.

Q: What will be the characteristics of the most successful independent physicians of the future?

FD: The key is to have a certain degree of flexibility and not get too set in your ways. One of the advantages of an independent group is you are able to pivot more quickly to trends occurring in the marketplace.

Independent physicians need to be able to connect with patients, the public and their peers. The days of being standoffish  someone who is good technically, but not able to relate well with peers or the public  are numbered. Our professional lives are more complicated. You have to have a certain temperament that is more customer focused because so many decisions made in the market place that are consumer-driven. You also have to be willing to advocate on behalf of your patients and your practice with large organizations that are setting policy. You cant just sit back and expect things to happen and then be mad when things dont go your way.

Learn more from Dr. Fred Davis at the 15th Annual Spine, Orthopedic & Pain Management-Driven ASC Conference + The Future of Spine in June 2017! Click here for more information.
In 2013, Willis Eye re-established inpatient care services at its main building and applied for Medicare enrollment as a hospital after years of being classified as an ASC; now, Willis Eye is at odds with CMS over the classification, according to a Philadelphia Business Journal report.

Here are five things to know:

1. Willis Eye relinquished its state ASC license after applying to enroll in Medicare as a hospital. CMS pays higher rates to inpatient hospital services than outpatient ASC services. However, the application was denied because Willis Eyes primary services were outpatient.

2. Willis Eye maintains it is a hospital because it does have inpatient procedures. U.S. Senator Robert P. Casey penned a letter to Medicare in support of Willis Eyes status as a hospital

3. Pennsylvania regulators concluded Willis Eye met the Medicare conditions of being a hospital and recommended certification as a hospital.

4. When Willis Eye operated as an ASC, the facility attempted to partner with Thomas Jefferson University Hospital for inpatient cases at the neighboring neurosciences hospital; the two already partnered with Willis Eye serving as a training site for Thomas Jefferson University medical students. However, the inpatient neuro patient demand at the hospital was too great to accommodate the eye cases.

5. Sen. Caseys letter outlines the unique services Willis Eye provides.
An investigation identified significant security lapses at Western State Hospital in Lakewood, Wash., where two patients with a history of violence escaped in April, according to a report obtained by The Associated Press in response to a public records request.

The investigation revealed staff at Western State  the largest psychiatric hospital in Washington State  performed no routine security inspections. Additionally, 25,000 master keys were unaccounted for, thousands of tools that could be used to open windows had been misplaced and management was unwilling to recognize security lapses in the hospital.

According to the Associated Press, the 2016 report revealed security issues identified by a similar investigation six years prior.

"Just as in its 2010 report, the 2016 team also found that there is a lack of awareness of the foundational role security plays in the operation of a psychiatric hospital," said investigators.

Western State CEO Cheryl Strange said the hospital has made substantial safety improvements since the escapes.

"Western State Hospital remains laser-focused on ensuring safety, security, active treatment, quality care and meeting the requirements set by the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services," said Ms. Strange in a statement relayed by the Associated Press.

On April 6, Mark Alexander Adams, who has been convicted for domestic violence multiple times, and Anthony Garver, who was held on charges for allegedly torturing and killing a woman, escaped. Mr. Adams was apprehended the next day. Mr. Garver made it across the state and was found four days later.

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Alabama Medicaid Agency officials said they will appeal federal auditors' recommendation it reimburse CMS $96.5 million in refunds involving payment miscalculations, reports AL.

The HHS Office of Inspector General published two audits in July that found the state's Medicaid program miscalculated administrative costs by $75.2 million in the period from 2010 to 2012. The audits also claimed the agency miscalculated public expenditures by at least $21.3 million in 2010.

The OIG recommended Medicaid refund CMS $96.5 million. However, Alabama Mediciad officials disagreed with auditors' findings and vowed to contest the recommendation in September.

So far, CMS has not sent demand letters to the state for repayment, according to Alabama's Medicaid program.

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A large reason Texas has the highest rate in the U.S. of residents without healthcare coverage is because the state's two largest cities  Dallas and Houston  are the least insured metropolitan areas in the nation, analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data shows, Vice News reported.

Houston and Dallas claim spots No. 1 and No. 2 on the Census Bureau's ranking of the largest American cities based on the rates of uninsured residents, followed by Miami and San Antonio.

Texas' high uninsured rates are connected to the state's rejection of Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act. With a population of nearly 30 million people, expanding Medicaid in Texas would have a significant positive effect on efforts to increase overall insurance rates in the U.S., according to the report.

However, continuing to reject Medicaid expansion leaves millions of people in the state without health insurance, leading to an increased strain on the state's medical system, according to the report. Many people without insurance either turn to emergency departments for basic care or allow serious chronic conditions to go untreated and get worse.

"The system is unsustainable," Kristie Loescher, a healthcare policy expert at the University of Texas in Austin, told Vice. "You're cutting off a vital aspect of productivity in your communities by having people who are having to deal with illness and things like that without care."
The following healthcare layoffs were reported by Becker's Hospital Review so far in September. They are listed below, beginning with the most recent.

1. Wyoming hospital cuts workforce by nearly 5%: 4 things to know

Mountain View Regional Hospital in Casper, Wyo., laid off 15 employees Monday, representing almost 5 percent of the organization's workforce, reports Casper Star-Tribune. In discussing the layoffs, the surgical specialty hospital cited a decline in surgeries. In addition to the layoffs, some positions at Mountain View were left vacant due to attrition and weren't filled.

2. Dartmouth-Hitchcock to lay off up to 460 employees

Lebanon, N.H.-based Dartmouth-Hitchcock will lay off between 270 and 460 employees by the end of 2016, according to the Concord Monitor. According to a memo to employees, the system is trying to cut costs after closing the fiscal year that ended June 30 with an unexpected $12 million deficit. It is unclear which service areas will be affected by the cuts.

3. Lafayette health system cuts 70 jobs due to patient debts

Lafayette (La.) General Health laid off 70 employees across four hospitals to offset a downturn in revenue, reports The Advertiser. Health system officials attributed the cuts to reduced state and federal funding, low reimbursement rates and a local economic downturn that has harmed patients' ability to afford their high deductibles and medical expenses. The layoffs occurred at Lafayette General Medical Center, Lafayette General Southwest and University Hospitals & Clinics, all in Lafayette, as well as Acadania General in Crowley, La.

4. Syracuse hospital lets go of 9 management, non-union employees

Syracuse, N.Y.-based Crouse Hospital laid off nine management and other non-union employees, The Post-Standard reports. The hospital cut 13 non-union jobs, including some supervisor and director positions, according to Crouse Vice President Bob Allen. One of the non-union positions was unfilled.

5. NC medical transport service shuts down, leaves hundreds out of work

Johnston Ambulance Service in Goldsboro, N.C., closed, as it is unable to continue to operate in its current financial condition, according to a WRAL-TV report. JAS, one of the largest privately held ambulance service in North Carolina, shut down Aug. 31 after more than four decades in business. The closure impacts 400 full and part-time employees.

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Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump said he'd use Medicaid to expand insurance coverage, and supports making birth control available without a prescription, reports Bloomberg.

His comments were made during an hour-long interview on The Doctor Oz Show taped Wednesday. During the interview, Mr. Trump said he backs the use of Medicaid to help provide health coverage for those who can't afford to purchase plans from private health insurers, according to the article.

"We have to help them through the Medicaid system," Mr. Trump told Mehmet Oz, MD, the host of the television show. "People have said that's not the right thing to say. But there is a fairly large percentage who can't afford it."

A spokesman for Mr. Trump's campaign, Jason Miller, clarified the comments in an email to Bloomberg, saying the presidential candidate had not proposed Medicaid expansion.

"Mr. Trump has been consistent on this issue since he announced his campaign  he believes that Medicaid should be used as a safety net for the poor to ensure that nobody in America falls through the cracks," Jason Miller said in the email.

Mr. Trump has been vocal about wanting to repeal the Affordable Care Act, under which many states have expanded Medicaid.

As for birth control, Mr. Trump said some women can't get to a physician's office to get a birth control prescription, and they shouldn't have to, according to the report.

"I would say it should not be done by prescription," Mr. Trump, who is pro-life, said. "You have women who just aren't in a position to get a prescription."

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Striking nurses at Minneapolis-based Allina Health are paid substantially less than the 1,500 nurses recruited to fill in for them, reports Pioneer Press.

Allina nurses, represented by the Minnesota Nurses Association, began their second strike of the summer on Labor Day at five Minnesota hospitals  Abbott Northwestern Hospital and Phillips Eye Institute in Minneapolis, United Hospital in St. Paul, Mercy Hospital in Coon Rapids and Unity Hospital in Fridley. As workers began the open-ended strike, Allina brought in 1,500 replacement nurses.

Huffmaster and HealthSource Global Staffing, two primary staffing agencies, offered the replacements $70.50 to $75 per hour to work at Allina's hospitals, according to the article, which cites the agencies' websites. Additionally, the agencies cover the replacement nurses' accommodations and travel expenses.

The striking nurses, however, are paid between $31.27 and $48.15 an hour, with an average full-time Allina nurse salary of $87,298 a year, before bonuses or overtime, Allina has said, according to Pioneer Press.

Allina could not verify to the publication the exact amount the replacement nurses are being paid, and representatives from the staffing agencies did not respond to the publication's requests for comment.

But David Kanihan, vice president of marketing and communications at Allina, said in an email to Becker's Hospital Review that caring for patients is Allina's top priority. "When the union walked off the job, we still had the responsibility to continue providing care. And that is what we've done. Striking was the union's choice  not ours."

Union spokesman Rick Fuentes told Pioneer Press Wednesday, "The nurses (are) angry at Allina's use of its resources to replace them rather than invest in them."

A key issue in the dispute between Allina and its 4,800 union nurses has been the nurses' health insurance. Allina wanted to eliminate the nurses' four union-backed health plans, which include high premiums but low or no deductibles, and move the nurses to its corporate plans, reports the Star Tribune. Allina has estimated that eliminating the nurses' four union-backed health plans would save the health system $10 million per year.

The latest strike is the second since an initial seven-day strike in June. The June strike cost Allina $20.4 million.
The following insurers made headlines this week. They are listed below, beginning with the most recent.

1. Centene to extend health plans in Arizona's largest counties

Health insurer Centene filed requests with the Arizona Department of Insurance and CMS to offer health plans on Arizona's Affordable Care Act exchange in the state's most populous counties.



2. Southwest General, Anthem BCBS ink bundled payment contract

Southwest General Health Center in Middleburg, Ohio, and Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield of Ohio implemented a bundled payment structure for total joint replacement surgeries.

3. BCBS of Vermont seeks $6.2M from state in unpaid premiums

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Vermont engaged the state in a reconciliation process to procure $6.2 million the insurer said it paid in patient claims and is owed in premiums.

4. Humana launches plan in Wisconsin, shuts out Froedtert, Children's

Health insurer Humana formed a group insurance plan in Wisconsin with four health systems but left out a few large organizations in the narrow network.



5. Michigan insurer to drop 8 plans from ACA exchange

Health insurer Priority Health will drop eight preferred provider organization options from Michigan's Affordable Care Act exchange Jan.1 because of decreased demand for the plans.

6. CareSource to automatically enroll 40k amid payer exits

Health insurer CareSource will absorb about 40,000 displaced policyholders following Aetna, UnitedHealthcare and other insurers' exit of Affordable Care Act exchanges in Indiana and Ohio.

7. Cigna to hire 70 in Pennsylvania

Health insurer Cigna will add 70 customer service jobs at its Moosic, Pa., office in anticipation of an increased demand for healthcare services.

8. ConnectiCare backtracks, stays in ACA exchange

ConnectiCare changed course Tuesday, deciding to remain in the state Affordable Care Act exchange next year and drop its rate appeal.

9. BCBS of Rhode Island partners with Virgin Pulse for wellness platform

Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Rhode Island inked a contract with technology solutions company Virgin Pulse to offer a member wellness program to enhance and maintain healthy habits.

10. New Jersey co-op taken over by state, 6 co-ops remain

Nonprofit insurance co-op Health Republic of New Jersey exited the exchange marketplace, forcing 35,000 policyholders to find new plans in 2017.

11. Aetna CEO responds to US senators' letter

The CEO of Aetna said issues outlined by U.S. senators in a Monday letter about Aetna's Affordable Care Act exchange pullback were "unfounded accusations" and "marketplace reality" is to blame for its public exchange departure.

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Southwest General, Anthem BCBS ink bundled payment contract

BCBS of Vermont seeks $6.2M from state in unpaid premiums
Uninsured individuals in Illinois' Cook County will receive increased healthcare assistance following the county board's Wednesday approval of an ordinance to create a health expansion program, the Chicago Tribune reports.

Here are five things to know about the program.



1. Under the approved ordinance, in 2017 the program will help nearly 40,000 Cook County residents receive primary care physicians in the county's Health and Hospitals System.

2. Next year, the county plans to spend $2 million on the program's initial operations.

3. Uninsured residents making $48,000 per year for a family of four will qualify for the program. Participants cannot be eligible for Medicaid. In 2017, participants will also be limited to individuals enrolled in Cook County Health and Hospitals System's CareLink financial assistance program.

4. Patients can present a membership card to receive care at Chicago-based John H. Stroger, Jr. Hospital, Chicago-based Provident Hospital and more than a dozen clinics, according to the report. Care will be offered at no cost save for co-pays for dental services and prescriptions. Co-pays would not be more than a few dollars.

5. Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle said a third of the county's health system patients are uninsured, accounting for $400 million in uncompensated care last year. Recent U.S. Census data found 900,000 people in Illinois lack health insurance.

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Progressives launch campaign to support public health insurance option

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Brain cancer has replaced leukemia as the most common cancer causing death among children and adolescents, according to a report published Friday by the National Center for Health Statistics, which is part of the CDC.

In 1999, three out of 10 cancer deaths among children and adolescents aged 1 to 19 were due to leukemia (29.7 percent), while about one in four were due to brain cancer (23.7 percent), the report shows. By 2014, these trends reversed and brain cancer overtook leukemia as the most common cause of cancer-related death among this population, accounting for 29.9 percent of total cancer deaths.

Overall, the report showed, the cancer death rate for children and adolescents age 1 to 19 declined 20 percent from 1999 to 2014.

In The Washington Post, Elizabeth Ward, senior vice president for intramural research at the American Cancer Society, attributed the decrease in deaths from leukemia to progress oncologists have made in developing effective chemotherapy treatments and finding the optimum ways to utilize radiation and bone-marrow transplants.

On the contrary, she said in the publication, "brain cancers are generally very hard to treat," partly because surgeons must be cautious not to damage healthy tissue.
Michael Bloomberg, former mayor of New York, is investing in the future health of Americans: Mr. Bloomberg is donating $300 million to Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore to fund efforts targeting opioid addiction, gun violence and other public health issues.

The donation will help establish the Bloomberg American Health Initiative that will focus on five areas of public health: drug addiction, obesity, gun violence, adolescent health and environmental threats.

The donation will support student scholarships, faculty posts and public health research aimed at improving America's life expectancy, according to WSJ, which reports the World Health Organization ranks the U.S. No. 31 in life expectancy. WHO estimates Americans born in 2015 will live an average of 79.3 years. Japan has the longest life expectancy at 83.7 years.

"My country should be leading in life expectancy, and we're way down in the pack," Mr. Bloomberg said, according to WSJ. "We've got to do something about this."

Mr. Bloomberg is a repeat donor to Johns Hopkins: He has donated a total of $1.5 billion to the school, reports WSJ. He graduated from Johns Hopkins University in 1964 with a degree in engineering.

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The International Congress for Joint Reconstruction will hold a direct anterior hip course for orthopedic surgeons at its annual conference.

Here's what you should know.

1. Salt Lake City-based OrthoGrid Systems will demonstrate its HipGrid technology in a direct anterior total hip arthroplasty operation.

2. The device provides a "high level of ease, efficiency and accuracy to orthopaedic surgical procedures."

3. Direct anterior hip arthroplasty is less invasive than the posterior approach. With the drone, surgeons can assess alignment and implant position in real time through the use of fluoroscopy.

4. The effectiveness of the drone has been demonstrated in peer-review and ongoing clinical studies. The studies show "improved acetabular cup angle, leg length and hip offset outcomes," with a decreased average surgery time.

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Patients undergoing total joint replacement surgery in Northeast Ohio can now use a bundled payment model because of a partnership between Southwest General and Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, Crain's Cleveland reports.

Here's are three things to know.

1. Anthem is going to cover the entire spectrum of care for hip and knee replacements.

2. The agreement is covered through the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services' Ohio's State Innovation Model Grant. It is helping hospitals implement value-based care practices.

3. The bundled payment model will increase transparency for Anthem's customers, and will provide the hospital with a more predictable revenue model.

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Physicians and nurse practitioners are in the middle of a decisive "turf war" as a state task force attempts to define the scope of advanced practice registered nurses, The Tennessean reports.

Here's what you should know.

1. Tennessee is attempting to revise its "restrictive" scope of its practice law.

2. Nurses argue they can deliver care equivalent to that of a primary care provider, and that they could help lessen the impact felt by a regional physician shortage.

3. Physicians question if NPs could provide that level of care, and would prefer it stays in their scope.

4. The task force "has devolved into a fight between doctors and nurse practitioners."

5. Primary care doctor John Hale, MD, said, "Reluctantly I say no (we haven't made progress.) We've met twice and we're closer to the beginning than the end."

6. There is a projected shortage of 20,400 primary care providers by 2020.

7. NPs in Tennessee need a supervising physician to practice. That physician is expected to sign at least 20 percent of all patient charts in a month. They are considered primary care physicians, however they don't have full prescriptive authority.

8. Physician groups are concerned that NPs won't provide the same quality of care.

NPs referenced several studies which showed their care was comparable, and at times, their patient interaction was higher.

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Here three surgeons discuss the policy changes they would make to improve the current healthcare industry landscape.

Ask Spine Surgeons is a weekly series of questions posed to spine surgeons around the country about clinical, business and policy issues affecting spine care. We invite all spine surgeon and specialist responses.





Next week's question: What has been the biggest learning moment in your career?





Please send responses to Anuja Vaidya at avaidya@beckershealthcare.com by Wednesday, Sept. 21, at 5 p.m. CST.

Question: What healthcare policy changes would you make if you could?

Ray Oshtory, MD, MBA, Pacific Heights Spine Center, San Francisco: Allow Medicare to collectively bargain drug prices for Medicare Part D benefits. Currently, Medicare sets payment rates for physicians, and other private insurers use Medicare's rates as a benchmark for setting their rates. That is why physician reimbursement rates have not risen over the past two decades, for better or worse.

Similarly, if Medicare were allowed to collectively bargain drug prices, other insurers would surely use Medicare's rates as a benchmark, thereby driving down the cost of pharmaceuticals, and likely eventually implants and devices as well, if a carve out for these products was implemented. That one simple policy change would prevent the prices of pharmaceuticals from skyrocketing, examples of which have been filling the media lately. As a point of reference, Medicare Part D's budget for 2015, which accounts for only outpatient prescription drugs, was equivalent to Medicare Part B's budget for 2015, which accounts for all payments to all doctors for all services, inpatient and outpatient.

Brian R. Gantwerker, MD, The Craniospinal Center of Los Angeles: I would make payers contractually obligated to pay on time. In short, when medical authorization is obtained from a private payer, it is considered a contract for payment. Payers would then not be able to disconnect the authorization and payment process. So, they cannot then ask for the same documents four or five time or make up reasons to not pay, such as the patient was not covered at the time of service, etc., and just write the check.

The other thing would be tort reform. Without a doubt, I thank MACRA will fail as doctors will and should continue to practice defensive medicine. The move toward disincentivizing doctors from "use resources" will not work and doctors will not sacrifice patient well-being or their careers.

Vladimir Sinkov, MD, New Hampshire Orthopaedic Center, Nashua: Medical liability reform  caps on non-economic damages have been shown to work well in reducing frivolous lawsuits in several states. Nationwide adoption of those caps would be a good first step. Healthcare courts, instead of the regular jury trials, would also be helpful. Finally, a great incentive for discouraging the start of a frivolous lawsuit would be having the plaintiff pay defendant's legal fees and lost time out of work if the plaintiff loses.

Additionally, deregulation of the health insurance market, removal of their anti-trust exemption clause and allowing insurance companies to compete across the state lines would encourage true market competition and drive down costs and increase efficiency. This would greatly enhance our ability to deliver timely and excellent care to our patients. And finally, repealing and replacing ObamaCare with a reasonable healthcare reform is the obvious one.
Neurosurgeon Gregory Sherr, MD, is suing HealthEast Care System, CentraCare Health and six affiliated physicians for an alleged "pattern of anti-competitive, tortious and otherwise illegal conduct." Both healthcare systems are based in St. Cloud, Minn.

Here are six things to know:

1. Dr. Sherr brought suit against the two health systems and six physicians in Federal District Court on Sept. 15.

2. Dr. Sherr served as Saint Cloud Hospital's neurosurgery department chair until early 2015. CentraCare wholly owns Saint Cloud Hospital. He resigned from Saint Cloud Hospital and joined Midwest Spine and Brain Institute in Stillwater, Minn.

3. Dr. Sherr and Midwest Spine and Brain Institute opened a neurosurgery clinic within blocks of Saint Cloud Hospital. In addition, Dr. Sherr received privileges at a few HealthEast hospitals.

4. Following these actions, Dr. Sherr alleges six neurosurgeons affiliated with the two health systems colluded to bring unfounded complaints against him in the HealthEast "Peer Review" process. Dr. Sherr argues this occurred because he was a competitive threat to the hospitals' in-house neurosurgeons.

5. The complaint alleges these "baseless complaints" resulted in the HealthEast committee suspending his privileges for violating HealthEast Bylaws. As a result of this suspension, Dr. Sherr alleges his reputation and career were ruined and he had to resign from Midwest Spine and Brain Institute and relocate to Florida.

6. Schaefer Halleen law firm is representing Dr. Sherr in the suit, and commented the case will be "groundbreaking," as they plan to reveal anti-competitive collusion among the neurosurgeons at two large Minnesota health systems.

"My intent was to develop, with MSBI's support, a state-of-the art neurosurgery approach to treating difficult cranial and spine cases. To have this dream destroyed, and to deprive Minnesota citizens of this resource, simply because I was a competitive threat to in-house neurosurgeons, is a tragedy for complex medical care in this state," said Dr. Sherr.
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The new posts were revealed by Communities Minister Paul Givan

Around 280 public sector jobs are being created in Northern Ireland to help deal with credit and child maintenance payments in Britain.

The new posts were revealed by Communities Minister Paul Givan.

His department has secured an additional contract to deliver services to claimants across the water on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions.

The Department for Communities currently employs around 1,400 staff, providing services to claimants on behalf of its Westminster counterpart.

The contract will be worth more than 16m over the next two years.

The new jobs will pay around 19,000 a year, and are mostly expected to be at administrative grade level.

The posts will be in Belfast and Armagh.

"This is great news for Northern Ireland and this additional investment is clear acknowledgement by the Department for Work and Pensions that they value the high quality services currently being provided by our staff," Mr Givan said.

"These posts will all need to be fully operational by April 2017, and I can confirm that they will be shared between sites in Belfast and Armagh.

"I am committed to building on our relationship with the Department for Work and Pensions.

"I will be soon visiting London to meet with their ministers to discuss how we can provide further support."

Some of the posts will be based at the Armagh jobs and benefits office, which the department says will be used for the delivery of "personal independence payments posts as it has the necessary ICT infrastructure and accommodation".

The department says it will be able to "redeploy staff to Armagh from other offices where there are surplus staff following changes introduced by the Welfare Reform Bill".

In April a freeze on recruitment and promotion in the Northern Ireland Civil Service was lifted more than a year after being imposed.

It came as a union representing civil servants said the loss of nearly 3,000 personnel with "thousands of years of expertise" under public service reform had placed the organisation under considerable pressure.

Meanwhile, this week accountancy firm BDO revealed it's creating 43 jobs in Belfast over the next three years, partly funded by almost 218,000 in grants from Invest NI.
An energy expert has warned Northern Ireland consumers could face a hike in bills after Brexit.

Richard Murphy of law firm Pinsent Masons said if negotiations were to leave the UK outside European energy networks, it could push up prices.

"The direction of travel for energy markets has long been towards further integration. This facilitates the efficient transfer of energy from generation points to demand, flattening out peaks and troughs on the system and allowing for smarter trading," he said.

"If Brexit meant that we were to find ourselves moving away from this pan-continental network, we couldn't benefit from those efficiencies and costs would rise. The levels of investment in the infrastructure that has delivered these integrated networks makes it a practical non-starter to divest ourselves from the European system.

"Brexit presents undoubted challenges and uncertainties for the Irish energy market, as recognised by its inclusion the NI Executive's letter to the Prime Minister.

"However, for the sake of businesses and consumers, we must remain focused on the introduction of I-SEM and the necessary supporting infrastructure such as the proposed North-South Interconnector. Brexit cannot disrupt this work."
CGI image of Hinkley Point C, as Theresa May will be petitioned to drop the planned power station and invest in renewable power instead (EDF Energy/PA)

The Chinese firm helping to build the new nuclear power station at Hinkley Point is to submit a design for another site after the Government go-ahead for the 18 billion project.

State-owned CGN said it was now "able to move forward and deliver" nuclear capacity at other UK sites, including Bradwell in Essex and Sizewell in Suffolk.

The plan for Bradwell is to submit a design for UK regulatory approval soon in a process called generic design approval, which could take four years.

The firm will need to get the reactor design and technology approved for use in the UK before building the station, with one third funding from EDF.

The French energy giant is pressing ahead with the 18 billion Hinkley power station after m inisters ended uncertainty by saying they had reached a "new agreement", imposing "significant new safeguards" for future foreign investment in critical infrastructure.

The power station will create 25,000 jobs, hundreds of apprenticeships and deliver 7% of the UK's electricity in 2025.

Greg Clark, Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, said: "Having thoroughly reviewed the proposal for Hinkley Point C, we will introduce a series of measures to enhance security and will ensure Hinkley cannot change hands without the Government's agreement.

"Britain needs to upgrade its supplies of energy and we have always been clear that nuclear is an important part of ensuring our future low-carbon energy security."

Ministers said the agreement "in principle" with EDF means the Government will be able to prevent the sale of the French firm's controlling stake before completion of construction, without the prior notification and agreement of ministers.

The Government said existing legal powers, and the new legal framework, would mean it was able to intervene in the sale of EDF's stake once Hinkley is operational.

"The new legal framework for future foreign investment in British critical infrastructure will mean that after Hinkley, the British Government will take a special share in all future nuclear new-build projects.

"This will ensure that significant stakes cannot be sold without the Government's knowledge or consent.

"The Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) will be directed to require notice from developers or operators of nuclear sites of any change of ownership or part-ownership.

"This will allow the Government to advise or direct the ONR to take action to protect national security as a result of a change in ownership," a statement said.

Justin Bowden, GMB national secretary for energy, said: "Giving the thumbs-up to Hinkley is vital to fill the growing hole in the UK's energy supply needs."

Jean-Bernard Levy, EDF Group chief executive said the decision marked the "relaunch" of nuclear in Europe.

"It demonstrates the UK's desire to lead the fight against climate change through the development of low carbon electricity. This decision demonstrates confidence in the EPR technology and in the world renowned expertise of the French nuclear industry."

Barry Gardiner, shadow energy secretary, said the announcement was "face-saving" by the Government, adding: "They have failed to get a better deal for billpayers, they've caused a crisis in investor confidence in the UK, they've risked offending one of our key future trading partners, and in the end all they have done is to pretend to give themselves powers which they already had."

University College London's Professor Michael Grubb said: "The contract will commit UK energy consumers to pay many tens of billions of pounds over a period of 35 years after first operation - to about 2060.

"For this amount, we could now get about twice as much electricity even from the more expensive renewables like offshore wind energy."

A group opposed to Hinkley, and Greenpeace, delivered a 300,000-name petition to Downing Street calling for the project to be scrapped, shortly after the go-ahead was announced.

John Sauven, Greenpeace executive director, said: "This decision is unlikely to be the grand finale to this summer's political soap opera. There are still huge outstanding financial, legal and technical obstacles that can't be brushed under the carpet."

Horizon, the company behind the proposed Wylfa Newydd nuclear power station on Anglesey, North Wales, said: "New nuclear is vital for the UK's future electricity mix and so today's announcement on Hinkley Point C is good news for the country's security of supply and clean energy needs."

A Downing Street spokesman said that Prime Minister Theresa May spoke by phone with French president Francois Hollande before the announcement was made, while Mr Clark spoke with his counterparts in France and China.

The spokesman said: "We have done a good deal to secure Britain's energy security and supply into the future. We are proceeding on the basis of robust new safeguards that will enhance security at Hinkley.

"We are satisfied it is a good deal. It is worth pointing out that there will be no addition to anyone's bills until Hinkley is constructed and up and running."

Asked whether the Prime Minister was concerned that the new infrastructure safeguards announced by Mr Clark would put off potential foreign investors in future projects, a Downing Street spokesman said: "Not at all. As the Secretary of State said, we are very much a country that is open for business and welcomes international investment into Britain."

The spokesman also dismissed suggestions that the delay in giving the green light to Hinkley was down to Government dithering rather than any substantive change in the terms of the deal.

"Not at all," he said. "As we said some time ago, it was right that we took our time to look at all the component parts of this deal.

"That has been done and the new and robust safeguards put in place for the Hinkley deal and other nuclear deals and national infrastructure projects going forward are materially different from those that existed already and represent a real beefing up of those measures."
Serious negotiations on the UK's exit from the European Union cannot begin until the end of next year, a former senior EU official has warned.

Herman Van Rompuy, the former president of the European Council, said talks on the "hardcore" issues would have to wait until after elections in France and Germany. "Before the German elections and before there is a new German government, no serious negotiations will take place," he told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme.

"You can always start with more technical matters, but the hardcore (issues) - the difficult topics - will be tackled after the constitution of the new German government. That will be in October to November."

Mr van Rompuy added that while there was no desire to "punish" Britain for voting to leave, the UK had "not many friends" among the other member states and that the negotiations would be difficult.

He also warned that maintaining free movement of labour would be a red line if the UK wanted to remain part of the single market. "Any negotiation will be a difficult negotiation," Mr Van Rompuy explained.

"Of course, we want an agreement that represents some sort of mutual benefit.

"There are huge economic interests, but there are also red lines. It is very well known that freedom of movement is one of those red lines.

"It is very difficult for the European Union to do something else vis a vis Britain compared to what we agreed upon with Norway and Switzerland."
Jo Malone has said she regretted a lock-out clause in the sale of her business

Fragrance entrepreneur Jo Malone has not stepped foot in the boutiques bearing her name since stepping aside from the business seven years ago.

Ms Malone, who will address the iFactory Celebration Conference, toasting companies from the border counties in Londonderry tonight, said she regretted a lock-out clause in the 2006 sale of her business to Estee Lauder preventing her working with fragrance for five years.

"I would never do that again. But whatever I do now, I know I can never walk away from the creation of fragrances because it completes me and makes me whole.

"I could never do a lock-out where I was prevented from making things again. That made me unhappy."

The American cosmetics giant first bought into the business in 1999. Malone remained as creative director and chairwoman before stepping aside completely in 2006, a few years after receiving successful treatment for breast cancer.

There are now Jo Malone boutiques in 28 countries, including House of Fraser in Belfast's Victoria Square. But their creator said: "I have never been into a Jo Malone since I left. At the time it was too painful. I couldn't even walk around department stores where there were cosmetics because I could not create any more."

Even the sight of a bottle of scent could trigger her tears because she was banned from fragrance work, she said.

But Ms Malone has since set up a new fragrance business, Jo Loves, with one shop in London  on the site of a delicatessen, where she worked as a teenager.

While factory techniques have changed since she started to work in fragrance the first time round, she said she still creates her scents at her kitchen table.

Ms Malone, who started up in business in 1994, said she was looking forward to speaking to businesses at the iFactory Awards.

"37% of businesses fail in their first year and we need to encourage those people," she said.

She said she wanted to stimulate the "undiluted creativity" of those who would be listening.

Adding that she wanted to remind businesses of their importance to the economy.

"Jobs are not created in Downing Street but within businesses, and businesses are created by entrepreneurs. If one person creates one job in their business, and 100,000 other businesses follow them, that's 100,000 new jobs. If people did that, that's how our economy will pick up."

As to whether she would sell again, she said: "At this moment in time, I wouldn't. And if I ever did, I could never leave the industry again like I did before."

While being barred from fragrance for five years was a deep regret, leaving was the right move at the time, she said. "Somebody said to me, you might have made more money but to me I enjoyed what I did and it was the right place and the right time. I'd just fought cancer. I felt I wouldn't be around forever and I didn't want to be travelling around the world opening stores, but I wanted to have memories of life.

"I made those decisions then based on what I knew at the time. Ten years on I would have approached it very differently but that's life and what it teaches you."
Whisky sales are rising but experts have warned of "challenges" for exporters post-Brexit

The amount of whisky sold overseas has increased for the first time since 2013, but industry bosses have warned the "uncertainties" caused by the Brexit vote will pose "challenges" for exporters.

The equivalent of 533 million bottles were shipped from Scotland in the first six months of 2016, new figures from the Scotch Whisky Association (SWA) revealed.

While that increase of 3.1% represents the first return to growth for whisky exports since 2013, the statistics also showed a small fall in the value of exports.

Sales of whisky around the globe amounted to 1.7 billion between January and June, down by 1% on the same period in 2015.

SWA chief executive David Frost said the figures suggested there had been a "strengthening in global consumer demand".

But he also highlighted the "continued international uncertainty" as he urged the Government to ensure a supportive tax and regulatory regime.

Mr Frost said: " The first half of 2016 was marked by an improving Scotch whisky export performance, suggesting a strengthening in global consumer demand compared to the last couple of years.

"The industry-wide emphasis on craftsmanship and provenance, backed by investment, means that Scotch exports are well-placed to grow in the future, appealing to consumers in both mature and emerging markets."

But he added: " It is clear, however, that the uncertainties of the Brexit vote will create challenges for exporters and we continue to encourage early clarity on the likely shape of the UK's future trading relationship with the EU and other countries.

"We are working closely with our members and government to ensure the industry's trade priorities are well understood, to promote open markets, and to identify opportunities to grow our exports in the future.

"Given the continued international uncertainty, we also look to government to make every effort to put in place a competitive domestic tax and regulatory environment, supporting a key home-grown industry."

While the volume of whisky exported to other countries in the European Union increased by 5% to the equivalent of 208 million bottles in January to June 2016, the value of these fell by 1% to 518 million.

Almost two fifths (39%) of Scotch whisky exports by volume went to the EU, while th e US is still the largest market for whisky exports by value, with sales to the America worth 357.4 million in the period January to June, a rise of 9% from the first half of 2015.

But the largest volume of sales went to France, with exports increasing from the equivalent of 86.5 million bottles in the first six months of 2015 to the equivalent of 90.9 million bottles in the same period this year. The equivalent of 41 million bottles were exported to India after a 41% increase in sales volumes.
Producer Debra Hayward has been with the Bridget Jones franchise from the very beginning, and was part of the team responsible for getting everyone back on board.

Explaining how the new movie's plot came about, she says: "In the first film, Bridget was 32, in the second she was 34, and although Helen (Fielding, Bridget Jones' creator) has written a fantastic book (2013's Mad About The Boy), we all felt there was a gap in the story and that fans would love to know what happened to Bridget in that interim.

"Everybody was definitely tentative," she admits. "It would be so easy to make a poor third film, but we really wanted to do justice to the character. It took a long time to get it right, a lot of thinking and planning and everybody was involved in that, Renee and Colin included.

"There's a humanity in Renee, it sounds a cliche, but there's an everywoman quality. She's so synonymous with that character now, it's quite hard to imagine Bridget in any other way. To have had the benefit of taking a character and following her journey over 15 years, seeing her age, seeing what happens to all her friends. I think that's a real privilege and I hope there is more. I'd love to see what happens with Bridget in her menopause or with older children."

Former Grey's Anatomy star Patrick Dempsey (50) plays Mark Darcy's newest adversary, the rich and charismatic American Jack Quant.

"Prior to coming in for the reading, I was very, very nervous," confesses the Maine-born star. "Then when we did the table read, everybody started talking about their own nerves, and that allowed us all to bond.

"It was nice to be able to watch Colin and Renee work in the rehearsal process. There were things we needed to do to improve the script, and it was nice to enjoy the process again. In television, you can't ask those questions sometimes, you've just got to get on with it. It was nice to take the time and to fall in love with acting again in many ways.

"With Jack, it was important not to have the same tone (as Hugh Grant's Daniel Cleaver). We had to make him an American and stick with that, that's where conflict will be. Shooting in and around London was a lot of fun, and to make the slapstick scenes somewhat believable, even though they are completely absurd. I would have to say those were our favourite scenes together. As for Jack's algorithm for love, I can understand it, but then there's always a little bit of magic that makes it happen that's unexplainable."

Meanwhile, Colin Firth (55) returns to play uptight human rights barrister Mark Darcy for a third time, but faces a new challenge for Bridget's affections.

"I was a bit sceptical about this whole operation, until I saw everybody together again, and seeing Renee on such fantastic form," he says.

"We'd exchanged emails and conversations over the years, about what this version has to look like if we're ever going to do it," reveals the actor. "Just getting as many of the old team back suddenly gave us a confidence boost, and also realising - and this surprised me - that there seemed to be an appetite for the film.

"I knew it was expected I would just slip into the character, and other people may associate me with it, but I don't," Firth adds, of getting back into Darcy-mode. "So I had to have a quick look at those early films to see what Mr Darcy looked like. It's a bit brutal (to see yourself age), but I thought being older was going to be important to ever doing this again."

Has he heard from Grant?

"I haven't heard a peep. I did miss him - until Patrick showed up - but I'm probably inherently superficial because Patrick replaced him very quickly," Firth teases.

"I'm under death sentence by Helen Fielding unfortunately, so I think there may be a limit for my character, but I don't see why they (the films) shouldn't go on forever."

The newest addition to Bridget Jones world is Sarah Solemani (34), who plays our heroine's work colleague and close friend, mucky-mouthed newsreader Miranda.

"I got the call that I was going to play Bridget Jones' best-friend, and I honestly felt like I'd always been her best-friend - loved the films and the books," the actress enthuses. "Miranda likes to put Bridget on Tinder, take her to music festivals and stuff, so to be able to be so naughty and cheeky with Bridget Jones was a dream come true. My screen test was the first time I met Renee. I was so nervous but she was really cool, had the accent down and we just played and tried things. Behind the camera she gave me a thumbs up, which I thought was really nice.

"In one of the scenes, we meet Ed Sheeran. He was just like an actor, really open. He serenaded me for about six hours, and by the end, I was just like, 'I get this Ed Sheeran thing now'.

"As part of our research, we went to the BBC news studios and met Fiona Bruce, who talked us through how it operates. It's so fast-paced how they have to build the news every day, and also they have a real hand in what they are saying. Is Fiona like Miranda? Oh totally. She's having fun on the weekend."

And the film wouldn't be complete without Bridget's mate Shazzer with Sally Phillips (46) returning to the role. Now, though, she's a mum-of-two and forced to curb the swearing.

"I think I went on record saying, 'A third film will never happen', but look, it has, and I think it's better than ever. I think what's so nice is it's a sequel that doesn't feel like a sequel," Phillips adds. "It's really touching to have known these people so long, and all of us turning up with our wrinkled faces. It was really easy to return to Shazzer. I'm a lot closer to her now than I was at the time, weirdly, in that now she's happily married, she's got a couple of out-of-control kids and money worries.

"When we were shooting, there were was paparazzi absolutely everywhere and in the end, the costume department just started using the paparazzi photos as our continuity shots."

As for whether there should be a fourth movie, she adds: "I think it's the right time to leave them, as I can't imagine bettering the film."
Bridgets still writing that diary in the new movie

It's hard to believe there was uproar when it was originally announced Renee Zellweger would play Bridget Jones. Some felt the Texas-born star couldn't possibly embody the quintessential British creation - but now, it's impossible to imagine anyone other than Zellweger in the role.

Her comedic sensibilities and warmth are irresistible, as is her spot-on portrayal of a woman who's tenacious and determined, but not afraid to reveal her flaws and insecurities, as she grapples with conflicting aspirations.

"Bridget is eternally optimistic, self-effacing and finds humour when facing adversity. She's perfectly imperfect, and that's what people relate to in her," says Zellweger, petite in a long-sleeved black top and monochrome skirt, her girlish, gentle Southern drawl belying her 47 years.

It was early in 1995 when Helen Fielding's column, written from the point of view of a London singleton, who guzzled Chardonnay, obsessed over her daily calorie intake and coined phrases such as 'wanton sex goddess', first appeared in a daily newspaper.

The novels, Bridget Jones's Diary and Bridget Jones: The Edge Of Reason, followed in 1996 and 1999, with the respective movie adaptations in 2001, which earned Zellweger an Oscar nomination, and 2004.

There were rumours of a third movie but nothing concrete materialised - until a script, which has been co-written by Fielding, Dan Mazer and Emma Thompson (who also makes an appearance as Bridget's wry doctor), began to take shape and director Sharon Maguire, who helmed the first movie, was drafted in.

Now, 12 years after the last instalment, it's finally time to check in with Bridget on the big screen and see how she's getting on in her early 40s.

But how does Zellweger feel about the fact that more than a decade has passed?

"I love it, because there's more of a story to tell, and the people who fell in love with Bridget Jones in the books, like I did so many years ago, we've all grown up together," reasons the actress, whose breakthrough role was apposite Tom Cruise in 1996 hit Jerry Maguire.

She'd always remained "hopeful" they'd have an opportunity to revisit the beloved character.

"So when I got the script, it was like a treasure, you know?" she says wistfully, clasping her hands together. "I was savouring it, every page, every moment, just being back with these characters again and back in her world. It was such a treat."

That didn't stop Zellweger, who's dating musician Doyle Bramhall II, panicking at the thought of actually bringing Bridget back to life, however.

"It began with terror," she says, her distinctive narrow eyes creasing up with laughter.

"[I thought] 'How do you do this?' How do you not mess it up? How do you show that a person has grown but that she's the same?"

Any concerns she felt were unfounded.

The idiosyncratic walk, the Home Counties vowels, the nervous laughter and endearing awkwardness are all still there.

"I started as I always do, so the process was familiar to me this time," says Zellweger, when asked how she managed to step back into 'Bridget mode'.

"I moved to England, started looking around and listening to the accent to get the basics down, and we went from there."

She even managed to travel incognito on public transport.

"Oh yeah, no problem, on the tube with my Oyster card every day."

There is a marked physical difference this time round, however: Bridget is noticeably slimmer.

"I had to gain a little weight but not as much as before," explains Zellweger, who reportedly gained around 20-30 pounds for the early films.

"Sharon and the producers felt it would be good to see Bridget having achieved one of her goals in life.

"She might not have it together in other areas of her life, but she's making healthy lifestyle choices."

It wouldn't be Bridget Jones without some tumultuous drama for her to overcome, with characteristic gusto.

As it turns out, she didn't enjoy a 'happy ever after' with Mark Darcy, played by Colin Firth (but at least he's not dead, as he is in Fielding's 2013 book, Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy).

Instead, the film opens with Bridget's focus firmly on her career, as a top news producer.

Things get complicated when she spends the night with charismatic American Jack Qwant (Patrick Dempsey), a few days before reuniting with Darcy and, as she puts it, having "similar relations".

Suddenly, Bridget's pregnant, and doesn't know who the father is.

"Colin's like your favourite old jeans," says Zellweger, on reuniting with her dashing long-term co-star. "We've been through so many interesting experiences together and shared so many awkward moments filming, it's so easy when I see him.

"If ever you've seen him in interviews and thought, 'Wow, he seems like a very special person', you're right. And that Patrick Dempsey's no shlub, either," she adds, of the good-looking Grey's Anatomy star, known to fans as 'McDreamy'.

"He brought an interesting new energy and new dynamic to the story. And he was really thorough, figuring out how to be sure that Jack was well-defined as a character, and not just because we need another guy to be a rival for Mark Darcy."

Darcy's previous adversary for Bridget's affections was, of course, the dastardly Daniel Cleaver, played by Hugh Grant, who decided not to return to the franchise.

Did Zellweger miss him?

"Of course," exclaims the actress who won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her role in Cold Mountain back in 2003.

"He's informed so much of Bridget Jones' journey, in terms of who she is and her history and the choices she's making in this latest incarnation, so I felt like he was part of it in some way.

"And very selfishly, I missed him because he's my pal and I love working with him. He's a lot of fun."

The movie not only marks a return to Bridget, but a big-screen comeback for Zellweger following a six-year sabbatical, during which she travelled to Liberia for charity work, spent time with her family and, as she puts it, had "a little bit of normalcy".

But now, following a dazzling display at the film's premiere, the actress can bask in the positive reviews the film's already receiving, and look ahead to new screen projects, including the upcoming drama Same Kind Of Different As Me.

The future's looking bright - but then Zellweger already knows that, because, like Bridget, she's an eternal optimist.

"Hopefulness is something we share," she says.

"It sometimes looks like naivety, but I wouldn't want to be any other way."

Bridget Jones's Baby is at cinemas now
Family ties: Terry with his mother-in-law Joan Watters (centre) on her 100 birthday, wife Frances (left) and all the family

Long struggle: Terry waves from the steps of the plane that brought him home to England after his captivity

Terry Waite, whose best-selling book Taken On Trust was published earlier this month with a new chapter to mark the 25th anniversary of his release from five years' captivity in Beirut, is no stranger to Belfast.

He was married to local woman Frances Watters in St Jude's Church on the Ormeau Road in May 1964. Terry was back here only a couple of weeks ago to visit his mother-in-law Joan Watters, now 105, who is living in a nursing home in south Belfast.

In his book he recalls how he met Frances at the home of Irish friends, and as their romance blossomed they visited her sister in Paris.

"In one week we visited all the main sights... shortly before we left Paris we prepared a picnic lunch and went to sit by the Seine. It was a perfect day, warm with a gentle breeze. As we sat together watching the river flow by I asked Frances to marry me, and she accepted."

He was later to muse: "I can't help but look back on our life together and consider how difficult it must have been for her to live with my unsettled, searching nature.

"She was able to accept me with all my restless vulnerability and show me the real meaning of love. It has taken me over 25 years to learn how to relax in her love. I am still learning."

Waite, who worked in the Middle East as a special envoy for then Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Robert Runcie, was captured by Hezbollah in 1987 and kept for five years, mostly chained and in solitary confinement. He details graphically his experiences of that ordeal in Taken On Trust.

In the book he remembers meeting his wife at RAF Lyneham after his release: "In the haven of my room I sat with Frances and heard of her ordeal. Every member of the family shared the experience of captivity.

"Frances decided that it was her first responsibility to ensure that our children had as normal a life as possible. She drew the curtain.

"The pressures to which she was subjected by certain sections of the media were appalling and it was only after the intervention of the Press Council that she was given some respite. At Lyneham, each member of my immediate family had access to a counsellor and we now recognise how fortunate we were to be surrounded by expert helpers."

Terry has been a regular visitor to Belfast over the years, and recalls a number of memorable engagements in Ireland, north and south.

"I appeared with the Warrington Male Voice Choir in many parts of the island, including St Anne's Cathedral in Belfast," he says.

This was after the Warrington bomb planted by the IRA in March 1993.

The explosion, on a busy shopping afternoon, killed two young boys.

Terry says: "The idea of the concerts by the Warrington choir and my address on each occasion was to help people to share in the power and comfort of music.

"We took our lead from the people in Warrington, who wanted to do something positive, so these concerts were held to help further reconciliation between divided communities."

Waite is very much aware of the improving situation in Northern Ireland.

"The bridge-builders have done a reasonably good job.

"There is not nearly the same degree of violence, and that is a great step forward in a long and complex process, but there is still much to be done. The people of Northern Ireland are resilient and tough, and they have always been willing to keep hope alive.

"I congratulate them for what they have achieved."

Though he has not been involved recently in bridge-building here, Terry remembers some of the high-profile figures who were, including Lord Eames.

He feels, however, that the ordinary people also deserve much credit.

"They did not receive much acclaim at the time, but it is important to remember what was done by the people at ground level.

"They became fed-up with the violence and decided to get on and do something to end it. That is well worth remembering."

Terry believes that people in other troubled areas should be wary about Northern Ireland as the only model of conflict resolution.

"You have to deal with each country as it stands.

"There were elements in the Northern Ireland situation that were similar to others, such as the need for dialogue and mutual respect, and people to apply these to the situation in hand, wherever they are."

He believes that the world has moved into a virtual Third World War.

"This is very different from the First and Second World Wars, but as we know, acts of violence are now taking place all over the world, and we are having to deal with a global war.

"We need to try to understand the roots of the conflict, and why some people are behaving in the way they are. Some members of Isis are psychotic and some may have mental problems.

"Others have allowed their convictions to steer them into a perversion of the teachings of Islam, and to find out why they do this, we need to go way back into history."

Terry is critical of the politicians whom, he says "did not clearly understand the background" of the countries they were dealing with in the Middle East and what they were letting themselves in for.

He adds: "Of course the West has a measure of responsibly for overthrowing Saddam, but in doing so they released forces over which they had no control.

"I am not a supporter of dictatorships, but if you remove a dictator you cannot introduce democracy overnight. It does not work like that. I said that at the time when the invasion of Iraq was being proposed."

Terry underlines the point in the new chapter of his book. "Our politicians seem to have shown a lamentable ignorance of that region and the complex issues that face the people of those and other countries.

"I say politicians deliberately, for I know full well that many diplomats with experience of this region, along with senior military figures, have been opposed to some of the actions that have been taken at the instigation of our political leaders."

Terry believes that Isis is being defeated on the ground. "But it is not totally defeated by any means. The Arab world has got to get its act together, just as the people of Northern Ireland were able to achieve a solution, partly with help from outside.

"The same needs to happen in the Middle East where local people will have to make their own contribution to peace."

Now 77, Terry continues to have a busy life, and he is currently on a whirlwind tour to promote the reissue of his book with the extra chapter.

He and Frances have four grown-up children - one son and three daughters - and they have three grandchildren. Though steeped in Anglicanism for a large part of his life, he now regularly attends Quaker services, and he writes movingly about attending a Friends' meeting-house near Bury St Edmunds.

"In solitary confinement, I was deprived of both books and music. I then realised how important they were to me - I believe that good language, like good music, has the capacity to breathe harmony into the soul.

"Here, in this Quaker place of worship, by contrast, there is no music, nor are there readings or formal prayers. Here, in this simple room, one discovers the music and harmony of silence.

"It is truly healing, and unites all who sit together in a deep and reconciling harmony, a harmony that our poor divided world so desperately seeks."

Terry, a remarkable man by any standards, has no intention of retiring and he plans to return to Belfast in November to promote a new book of narrative and poetry titled Out Of The Silence. This will be published by SPCK.

The reissue of Taken On Trust is well worth-reading and re-reading.

Towards the end of the new chapter he reflects plaintively on his life where he has known more than enough of the suffering and frustration of world conflicts.

He writes: "I do not lose hope... I have frequently said to myself that if only men and women who are hostile to each other could put the past in the past and begin to work for a better future, then we might begin to make some progress."

That is something we could well take to heart in Northern Ireland.

Taken On Trust by Terry Waite, Hodder and Stoughton, 9.99
The Northern Ireland Civil Service voluntary redundancy scheme has ended after almost 3,000 jobs were shed, it has emerged.

Finance Minister Mairtin O Muilleoir confirmed the exit scheme had now closed, and a total of 2,996 staff had left.

Their departures will result in eventual annual savings of 87m, the Sinn Fein minister said in a written Assembly answer.

However, at least one department is experiencing difficulties as a result of the loss of experience and expertise, MLAs have been told.

Problems facing the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs were exacerbated by the decision to move its headquarters 60 miles from Dundonald to Ballykelly.

DUP MLA William Irwin revealed yesterday that around 125 senior staff had left rather than agree to be relocated.

Alliance leader David Ford told a meeting of the DAERA committee there were growing concerns over a loss of environment and veterinary specialists.

DUP Agriculture Minister Michelle McIlveen said that while she had "concerns" over the HQ move, with some staff "resistant to go", the department had also faced challenges over staffing as a result of the voluntary exit scheme.

And she reiterated the view of her Sinn Fein predecessor Michelle O'Neill that staff in other areas of the Civil Service were "keen" to be relocated to Co Londonderry.

The department's head of policy, Louise Warde Hunter, admitted it was facing a major issue over the move to Ballykelly, with the need to retain staff who had particular expertise in the field of agricultural administration.

The consequences of the UK's vote in favour of leaving the EU had added to that challenge, she said.

She added that while colleagues had been left "frustrated", the staffing issue was a matter of "squaring a very, particularly challenging, circle".

"Our priority, especially as a new department, is to keep the wheels on, keep the show going and to ensure that we prioritise even within our priorities," she told the committee.

The relocation to Ballykelly will see approximately 600 posts move - about 20% of the total departmental staff of 3,000.
A former accountant turned brothel keeper has been freed on a six-month suspended jail sentence.

Paul Ervine, from Ballymacash Park in Lisburn, was also fined 2,000 after pleading guilty to a total of seven charges including managing three brothels, controlling a prostitute, having over 3,000 in criminal property, and inciting a woman to become a prostitute.

Unfortunately for the 62-year-old former tax adviser, the woman he was trying to recruit was reporter Patricia Devlin, who secretly recorded him boasting of the thousands of pounds to be made as a call girl.

The report by the former Sunday Life journalist led to a police investigation into his illegal activities.

Ervine later claimed that he thought he was doing nothing illegal, believing he was acting as an agent for the women, and very different from those acting as a pimp or operating a brothel.

In all, Ervine was involved in managing brothels in Belfast's Kitchener Street, Connsbrook Avenue and University Court on dates between January and December 2014.

When initially arrested by police in May 2015, officers also recovered 3,210 in cash, which he accepted was "criminal property".

Yesterday at Antrim Crown Court Judge Gordon Kerr QC told the shamed former accountant that in determining the appropriate sentence the court had to look at the nature of his offending, in particular were any young women being trafficked so that they could be exploited.

However, in his case he was told that the "activities" of the woman he "intentionally controlled" was already an established prostitute.

Nevertheless, said Judge Kerr, Ervine was operating for "pure profit", organising clients and running the brothels.

The judge said that with regard to the current sentencing guidelines, the appropriate sentence was one of six to 12 months, but that given his guilty pleas, co-operation with police and his limited record, the majority for motoring offences, with nothing of a similar nature, he could suspend any custodial sentence.

Judge Kerr said that there was also nothing to suggest that Ervine, who had a good work record, posed a danger to the community, and was assessed as a low risk of reoffending, and that the proper sentence should be one of six months suspended for two years.

However, the judge added that Ervine accepted that the monies recovered by police were from his criminal activity, and he ordered the disposal of the 3,210, and because he had intended to profit from his wrong doing, Ervine would be fined 2,000.
A paranoid schizophrenic who killed his friend after breaking into his house and pursuing him with two knives will serve at least six years' prison for the "truly horrific attack".

Sentencing Ahmed Noor at Belfast Crown Court yesterday, Madam Justice McBride said the fatal stabbing on the city's Botanic Avenue last January was brutal, unprovoked and sustained.

After attacking his friend Mohsin Bhatti - a 29-year-old asylum seeker originally from Pakistan, Noor told police he had "killed the king" and also claimed to be "Allah's assassin.

The defendant denied murder and possessing two offensive weapons, but pleaded guilty to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility.

Madam Justice McBride described Mr Bhatti as vulnerable and said he was a "quiet, gentle, hospitable and friendly man who got on well with others".

Mr Bhatti called 999 from his mobile phone at 5am on January 29 last year and asked for police before screaming.

He was stabbed multiple times and suffered injuries including a wound to the chest that penetrated his heart, six knife wounds to his back and five to his neck - one of which went through his jugular vein.

The court heard that Noor had been smoking cannabis for several hours on the day of the attack, and that voices his head had told him to attack his friend.

The defendant then armed himself with two kitchen knives, before breaking into the victim's house by smashing a window with a fire extinguisher.

Once inside, the two men struggled, before Mr Bhatti fled, chased by Noor, who is originally from Somalia but was living in Agincourt Avenue at the time.

After the fatal attack, he told police it was "the happiest day of his life" and said that he was going to rule the world.

Madam Justice McBridge said the frenzied attack had a massive impact on Mr Bhatti's mother and father, who still live in Pakistan, and his sister, who lives in England.

She added that the killing had resulted in profound anguish and trauma for the victim's relatives, speaking of the "far-reaching consequences for the family of this unprovoked and brutal killing of their vulnerable son and brother".

Madam Justice McBride said that while she accepted that Noor was psychologically unwell at the time of the killing, he was also intoxicated through his cannabis use.

Telling the court that she deemed the defendant to pose a risk to the general public, the judge stressed that Noor's prolific drug use had aggravated his underlying problems.

Madam Justice McBride also spoke of Noor's lack of insight into the crime he had committed, his failure to comply with treatment programmes offered to him and his expressions of joy in the aftermath of the brutal killing of Mr Bhatti.

She additionally branded the killing a "truly horrific, unprovoked, violent and sustained attack."

Noor was handed an indeterminate custodial sentence and was told that he would have to serve a minimum of six years' detention before being considered eligible for release.
The Origin sculpture at Squires Hill in the Cave Hill Country Park, overlooking Belfast

Anann Nic Chormaic, aged 3, illuminates Belfasts newest and highest positioned sculpture for the first time this evening, Friday, 16 September. Picture by Brian Morrison

Belfasts newest and highest positioned sculpture was illuminated for the first time this evening, Friday, 16 September. Picture by Brian Morrison

We have the Balls on the Falls, Nuala with the Hula and now the Drop at the Top or even Napoleon's Tear?

Those are just some of the suggestions for Belfast's newest piece of public art.

Origin - as it is officially titled - is the highest-positioned sculpture in Belfast, overlooking the city from Squire's Hill in Cave Hill Country Park.

At night, it will be illuminated by a soft white glow, the raindrop will appear to float and it will be visible from a number of points across the city.

The 11-metre high structure was funded by Creative Belfast, a partnership between Belfast City Council and the Arts Council of Northern Ireland, which invested 900,000 in seven large-scale projects showcasing the city's cultural heritage.

Origin cost 100,000 to install.

Some have been critical while others have been more welcoming to the newest addition to the city skyline.

But the important matter now is what we all call the structure. Yes it has an official name - but so do Nuala and the Balls, not that many could tell you them.

Beacon of Hope and Sunrise, just to remind you.

On Friday morning we asked the public for their suggestions and many have been offered, some printable, some not.

Among those suggested were Drop at the top, Spill on the Hill, Napoleon's Tear or Belfast's Teardrop. While some others were not so complimentary. Among those suggested - that we can print - were the Farce at the Farset or Drippy McDripface.

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Many have been critical of the amount of money spent on the project.

Writing on the Belfast Telegraph Facebook page, Mark Montgomery said: "I'm looking forward to heading up and seeing it close up.

"A beacon for all those cruise ship tourists to see and a symbol of a slowly changing society. Is it money well spent? A drop in the ocean to the 850million we hand out in housing benefit and job seekers allowance so I think YES."

Roisin McDonough, the chief executive of the Arts Council of Northern Ireland, described Origin as "suitably powerful and inspiring".

"Public money makes things possible that wouldn't otherwise be possible," she said.

"In the hands of artists, a remarkable and defining legacy has been created for Belfast city through this piece of public art.

"Origin gives us a suitably powerful and inspiring statement about the scale and the influence that this river has had on generations of people's lives and livelihoods in Belfast, and I hope that many, many people come to enjoy it."

Tracey McVerry, from Solas Creative, explained how the River Farset inspired the piece. "The importance of the River Farset and the lifeforce which it gives to the people of Belfast is portrayed in the form of a granite ripple at the sculpture's base," she said.

"Everything radiates out from the centre, just as a drop hits the water surface. The ripples represent the linen industry, foundries and the hard-working communities that built and shaped Belfast."

Some 100,000 of National Lottery funding was invested in the design, creation, manufacture and installation of Origin.

Its manufacture used four square meters of toughened Narima glass, 200 meters of stainless steel, 250 kilos of other glass, three tons of steel and two tons of granite.
Families are struggling to afford to bury their dead because of soaring funeral bills, it has been claimed.

The cost of dying in Northern Ireland has more than doubled in the last decade.

The average funeral now costs over 3,000 - a rise of 106% since 2004.

Spending on so-called paupers' funerals, carried out for people who die alone or without relatives able to pay, has also jumped alarmingly in recent years.

It has led to warnings that some families are being left struggling to cope with funeral costs.

DUP MP Gavin Robinson said he knew of some families in his East Belfast constituency who are still saddled with debt nearly two years after burying loved ones.

"I know one woman whose husband died at the end of 2014, and she is still struggling to meet the costs of the funeral," he told the Belfast Telegraph.

"I am also aware of funeral directors who are struggling because they are carrying a significant amount of bad debt, where families are just unable to meet the bills that they have."

On Wednesday Mr Robinson raised his concerns during a debate at Westminster, where he called for more assistance for hard-pressed families.

It came as new figures revealed how the cost of funerals in Northern Ireland has soared.

SunLife's annual Cost Of Dying Report found the average funeral price here is 3,277. The 106% rise since 2004 is one of the biggest anywhere in the UK.

Death-related expenses are increasing much faster than any cost of living bills such as rent, food or utilities. London remains the most expensive place to die, with the average funeral costing 5,529 - 42% above the national average of 3,897.

Researchers found one in 12 people organising a funeral had to cut back or change some of the "send-off" costs they had planned.

This includes cutting back on limousines for immediate family, memorials and flowers.

Some people have even had to sell belongings or take out a loan to cover the cost of a funeral.

Citizens Advice Northern Ireland raised concerns about the support available for bereaved people with limited incomes. It said a Social Fund funeral payment - awarded to help meet essential costs - is inadequate.

The charity noted the average award in 2014/15 was 1,048 - less than a third of the 3,277 average funeral bill.

Pol Callaghan from Citizens Advice Northern Ireland said: "The loss of a loved one is a difficult time for any family.

"Unfortunately, for people on a low income it also brings a heavy financial burden. This compounds the trauma of bereavement with the stress of money worries and added debt.

"The diminished value of the Social Fund funeral payment only covers around one third of funeral costs. This is leaving people in real hardship."

Citizens Advice is calling for a review of the payment.

Mr Robinson said more and more families were struggling to bury their dead.

"The Social Fund is there as the Government's way of stepping in when families are on benefits and can ill-afford the cost of a funeral, and yet it simply does not meet the costs," he added.

"There is a massive deficit, and it is forcing people to organise payday loans and get themselves into huge levels of debt.

"Saddling someone in such desperate circumstances with further debt only compounds the problem."
Greggs has opened its newest store in Northern Ireland.

As revealed by the Belfast Telegraph, the company opened its fourth shop in Belfast's Castle Lane, creating 18 new jobs, on Friday.

Richard Stewart, manager of Greggs on Castle Lane said: Im delighted to help bring another Greggs shop to this high footfall location in Belfasts vibrant city centre.

"The Castle Lane store is in an ideal location both for shoppers and city centre workers and were really looking forward to bringing them a taste of Greggs - from our much-loved savouries, to our Balanced Choice range and our freshly ground coffee  there is something for everyone."

Shop opening times are Monday  Wednesday 07:00  18:00, Thursday 07:00  19:00, Friday and Saturday 07:00  18.00.
A palm print found on a van used in the Kingsmills massacre does not belong to high-profile republican, Colm Murphy.

The Belfast Telegraph can reveal that the Dundalk publican is not the suspect whom the PSNI has matched to the palm print.

Instead, it has been linked to another republican who was questioned by detectives last month.

It was reported in June that the palm print, which had just been matched to a suspect by forensic scientists after 40 years, was that of prominent dissident republican, Colm Murphy.

He was found liable for the Omagh bomb in a civil court three years ago.

A front-page Irish News report stated: "Palm print on Kingsmills getaway van belongs to Colm Murphy."

However, the PSNI has not matched the palm print to 64-year-old Murphy who lives in Ravensdale, Co Louth.

Rather, they are linking it to another suspect from South Armagh whom they questioned in connection with the Kingsmills atrocity last month.

The 59-year-old South Armagh man was arrested on suspicion of murder and attempted murder.

He was released pending a report to the Public Prosecution Service.

The Irish News last night defended its story saying that it had "clear information" linking Colm Murphy to Kingsmills and stating that he had been arrested by police on numerous occasions over the past 30 years.

While it is not disputed that the high-profile republican has for many years been suspected in security circles of involvement in the atrocity - which he denies - the palm-print on the van is not his.

Relatives of the Kingsmills families will today meet detectives in Armagh to discuss the police investigation and the palm print.

IRA victims' campaigner, Willie Frazer, last night said: "All the families want is the truth.

"Jean Lemmon is 93 years of age. Bea Worton is 89. May Quinn is 82. These women have suffered for 40 years and they deserve honest answers.

"We appreciated the police's clarity last week that they had matched the palm print to the South Armagh republican.

"We are hoping for more answers in this meeting with detectives. We want to know why it took so long to match the print," he added.

A barrister for the PSNI said in court last week that police believed the palm print found on the getaway vehicle used in the 1976 massacre of 10 Protestant workers belongs to the South Armagh republican whose name is known to the Belfast Telegraph.

Confirmation of his identity came after a lawyer acting for the families of those killed issued a plea for clarity on his arrest in Belfast Coroner's Court.

Barrister Peter Coll, representing the PSNI, said: "The person arrested is the person that police believe is the palm print."

Mr Coll continued: "I can confirm that on August 5 detectives from the PSNI's legacy investigation branch investigating Kingsmills arrested a 59-year-old man on suspicion of murder and attempted murder.

"He was arrested and questioned on the palm print that there have been some discussions about in the past.

"He was released on August 6 pending a report to the PPS. The matter rests with the PPS at the minute."

A staunch Sinn Fein supporter, the 59-year-old was one of the most senior members of the Provisional IRA's South Armagh Brigade, although he has no public profile outside his own local area.

As one of Thomas 'Slab' Murphy's most trusted operators, he was heavily involved in smuggling.

He comes from a staunchly republican family, and has been jailed for short periods outside Northern Ireland for IRA-related offences.

In response to a Belfast Telegraph query about the Irish News report claiming that the Kingsmills van palm print belonged to Colm Murphy, a spokesman for the newspaper defended the story.

He said: "We had clear information linking Colm Murphy to the investigation into the Kingsmills massacre in our coverage of June 3.

"In a High Court hearing on June 6 over a failed attempt by the Chief Constable to seek an injunction against The Irish News, police made no attempt to dispute the accuracy of our article.

"Mr Murphy has accepted that he was questioned in 1976 over the murders and in his own words has since been arrested by police on '30-plus' occasions.

"A 2011 report by the PSNI's Historical Investigation Team also effectively named Mr Murphy as the chief suspect, although he has consistently denied involvement.

"We note the evidence given to the Kingsmills inquest earlier this month about the arrest of a 59-year-old man said to be connected to a palm print found on a van used in the murders, and we further note that the individual in question was subsequently released without charge," he added.
Alliance MLA Naomi Long has called for all public appointments to be overseen by the Commissioner for Public Appointments (CPA) to combat accusations of cronyism.

It comes after former Deputy Chief Constable Alan McQuillan told the Belfast Telegraph that "a level of cronyism exists in Northern Ireland in which corruption can thrive".

The East Belfast MLA made her call during a briefing yesterday by the commissioner to the Committee for Communities.

Mrs Long added the CPA ought to have statutory powers to step in during appointments processes, similar to their counterpart in England and Wales.

"It is important there is both transparency and public confidence in all public appointments," she said.

"At the moment, the CPA provides oversight and feedback on appointments to public bodies, including on issues of diversity.

"However, some ministerial appointments remain outside that scrutiny. Particularly in light of recent allegations of cronyism, it would make sense to bring all appointments within their remit.

"Only in exceptional circumstances, where ministers can justify it to the CPA, should there be any deviation from that process," she added.

Earlier this week, Mr McQuillan said Northern Ireland does not have "anything like the level of transparency that there is in Britain" as he revealed he would not be seeking any further public appointments.

"My impression is that a culture of cronyism exists in Northern Ireland in which corruption can thrive," he added.

"Northern Ireland is a very small place. Too many jobs are filled by people who simply have the right political connections.

"I have major concerns about how public appointments work here. When an inquiry is set up, the classic response is to appoint 'one of ours and one of yours'. Not the best people for the job, the most acceptable people.

"We need to break away from that, because it damages the reputation of politics entirely."

Mrs Long said the CPA should have statutory powers to intervene in an appointments process if they are concerned about how it is being run or about the range of the pool of applicants "to ensure boards are inclusive and have the right balance of skills to oversee public bodies, which are responsible for the vast majority of public spending here".

"Proper, robust oversight of all appointments is crucial if the whiff of cronyism and corruption is to be addressed to the satisfaction of the public," she said.
Police search for Arlene's body in an area of woodland near Castlederg in 2011

Police searching for missing Arlene Arkinson are examining a new site at a field near Killen, outside Castlederg.

Arlene vanished aged 15 in August 1994 after a night out at a disco across the border in Co Donegal.

She was last seen being driven off down a country road late at night by convicted child killer Robert Howard.

The body of the teenager has never been found, despite extensive police searches over the years since she disappeared.

The field being examined by specialist police teams is about a mile from the road Howard drove her down.

Detective Chief Superintendent Raymond Murray, the head of the PSNI's serious crime branch, said yesterday: "The family of Arlene Arkinson have been advised of this development as a precautionary measure.

"It would be premature to draw any inference from this initial report or the police response to it at this time."

Howard was acquitted of the schoolgirl's murder in 2005 by a jury that was not told about his lengthy criminal history, which included killing teenager Hannah Williams in south London several years earlier.

Earlier this year, an inquest into Arlene's death was told that while he was imprisoned in England, Howard boasted to fellow inmates in the most graphic terms about killing the schoolgirl from Co Tyrone.

The inquest also heard from retired RUC Chief Superintendent Norman Baxter, who said that Howard, the prime suspect, could have been charged with murder years earlier.

He told Belfast Coroner's Court: "She (Arlene) was a forgotten victim and that's quite a terrible thing."

Mr Baxter said he believed the Arkinson family were not seen as a priority for police between 1994 and 2002. The court also heard of the animosity that existed between some police officers and certain members of the Arkinson family, who were perceived as pests and troublemakers.

"I think the Arkinson family were seen as people who had no standing and therefore society did not bother with them and therefore she (Arlene) was not of importance and not a priority," Mr Baxter told the inquest. "I think it is a terrible case that a 15-year-old just vanishes, and after a period of statutory obligation you park it and move on."

The inquest into Arlene's death - which opened in February of this year - has been adjourned since June.

The delay is down to Coroner Brian Sherrard opening communications with An Garda Siochana, seeking testimony about the schoolgirl's disappearance from any witnesses.

The inquest is scheduled to reopen in Belfast next Monday.
Urban Villages will be created in the Bogside, Fountain and Bishop Street in Derry

Five of the most socially deprived areas of Northern Ireland have been selected for a 45m project that will breathe new life into communities blighted by high unemployment.

Urban Villages will be created in the Bogside, Fountain and Bishop Street in Londonderry, as well as across Belfast, including Ardoyne and Greater Ballysillan, Colin, Lower Newtownards Road, Sandy Row, Donegall Pass and the Markets area.

The aim is to improve good relations and develop areas which have suffered economic and social challenges.

Launching the project in the Bogside yesterday, First Minister Arlene Foster said: "The Urban Villages Strategic Frameworks will unlock potential right across government to transform areas which have seen years of decline and deprivation."

Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness explained how the money given by the Executive will help the different areas.

He said: "This 45m of planned capital investment will help to transform the physical environment in these places. It will build capacity for the local community and foster positive community identities."

Jeanette Warke from the Cathredal Youth Club in the Fountain said the residents in the area are already seeing the benefits from the Urban Village scheme.

She said: "For 10 years we had tried to get funding for the play park here but thanks to this project we were able to get a magnificent play facility for the children.

"There is a lot of work to be done in the Fountain, not least with all the derelict and dilapidated houses and I was over the moon to find out that the Cathredal Youth Club will be extended and renovated too."

Community relations between people on either side of the interface between the Fountain and the Bogside have taken giant steps forward in recent years but Donna McCloskey from the Triax Partnership Organisation said this project will expand on that.

She explained: "Being one of the Urban Villages is going to make a huge difference to people on both side of the interface but an important part of it is normalising the flow of people from the Fountain to the Bogside and vice versa."
A new search has taken place for the missing Northern Ireland schoolgirl Arlene Arkinson (Family handout/PA)

Police and forensics officers at farmland in Killen where new searches for Arlene Arkinson are under way

The farmer who sparked the new search for missing schoolgirl Arlene Arkinson has said he found what looked like a shallow grave.

Noel Doherty, who rents the remote piece of land being examined by forensic experts, said it appeared a hole had been dug and then filled with stones.

He said: "I found this thing of stones about six foot long and three foot wide.

"It is like a grave but I don't know if it's a grave.

"There is something peculiar."

A team of specialists from England have spent much of the day looking at the site close to where the schoolgirl was last seen in the company of convicted child killer Robert Howard.

Their work has been focussed on an isolated patch of land at the foot of a small valley close to the village of Killen, Co Tyrone, several miles outside Castlederg.

Mr Doherty, who has lived and farmed in the area all his life, said the community had never forgotten the teenager who vanished 22 years ago.

"I didn't pass no remarks on it when I saw it first," he said. " But I started to think on it that evening.

"I could see where somebody dug out the clay and back filled it with stones. I thought it was peculiar looking so decided to do something about it.

"I phoned the landowner to find out if any animals had been buried in the garden and he checked it out. There were never any animals buried in that garden.

"It would be nice for the Arkinson family if they could find her but, I can't say what it is."

Access to the scene has been sealed off since Tuesday.

A police cordon has been erected at the top of the single narrow track which leads through fields to a secluded derelict stone farmhouse concealed behind a clump of mature trees.

A run-down metal barn is also behind the police tape.

Experts dressed in white forensic suits have spent much of the day inspecting the isolated site, clearing debris such as branches and twigs and placing a number of items into exhibit bags.

Mr Doherty said his disturbing discovery was about 15 metres (50 feet) to the back of the old house.

Arlene, 15, disappeared in August 1994 after a night out across the Irish border in Co Donegal.

She was last seen being driven down Scraghy Road, close to where the new search is being conducted, late at night with paedophile Robert Howard.

It is believed grazing cattle may have eaten away nettles and grass to reveal the suspicious plot.

"It was all overgrown but the animals ate off the overgrowth," said Mr Doherty. "We always grazed that part of the farm with sheep before and the last couple of months we have grazed it with cattle.

"And, that's how it could be seen - the cattle ate off the nettles and grass and I could make out the stones.

"It could be seen easy enough when they ate the overgrowth but I had never seen it before."

The Police Service of Northern Ireland said the Arkinson family have been made aware of the new activities as a "precautionary measure".

Detective Chief Superintendent Raymond Murray said: "It would be premature to draw any inference from this initial report or the police response to it at this time."

Howard was acquitted of Arlene's murder in 2005 by a jury that was not made aware of his lengthy criminal history which included killing another teenager, Hannah Williams, in south London several years earlier.

However, he remained the prime suspect in the unsolved case until his death in an English prison last year.

There have been more th an 40 extensive searches conducted in forested areas, fire dams, reservoirs and remote farmland in Counties Tyrone, Fermanagh and Donegal but so far, Arlene's body has not been recovered.

Howard's flat at Main Street in Castlederg, the home of Donna Quinn - one of the last people to see Arlene alive - and, controversially, a house belonging to Kathleen Arkinson, a sister of the missing schoolgirl, have also been examined as part of the police investigation.

After receiving a tip-off that Arlene's body was buried under a bridge near a bog, a new team of experts and a victim recovery dog spent months scouring the rural hinterland between 2010 and 2012.

But again, searches at 13 sites proved fruitless.

Meanwhile, a long-running inquest into the circumstances of Arlene's disappearance is expected to conclude hearing oral evidence when it resumes in Belfast on Monday.

Kathleen Arkinson has said she will never give up hope of finding her sister's remains.

She said: "It has been very difficult few days. But I am trying not to raise my hopes up.

"It has been so long and there have been so many let-downs.

"The difference this time is it's so close to where Arlene was last seen. We just don't know what to think, to be honest.

"The timing is also unbelievable, in the middle of the inquest.

"We'll never get justice for Arlene, justice has evaded her in every way, but I hope they can find her and we can get some closure."
The death of a homeless man in a Salvation Army night shelter has sparked a call for greater investment in services to prevent similar tragedies in the future. Image posed by model

The death of a homeless man in a Salvation Army night shelter has sparked a call for greater investment in services to prevent similar tragedies in the future.

The man, who died in the charity's Centenary House in Belfast, was named locally as Steven McLaughlin.

It brings to six the total of homeless people who have died in the city this year.

Anti-homelessness campaigner, councillor Paul McCusker, said Mr McLaughlin was well-known to people and organisations working with the homeless in the city.

Mr McCusker said last night: "His death will come as a shock to everyone working with the homeless in Belfast. He was a bit of a character.

"It will affect a lot of people."

The SDLP councillor called for more resources to be made available to help homeless people and those at risk of homelessness.

"The hostels are all full on a daily basis," he said.

"We need more bedspaces."

But he added that while a bed for the night was important, essentially it was just treating a symptom.

"We need more investment in mental health services and addiction services, as well as a preventative programme to help people before they get into the cycle of homelessness and hostel life."

The cause of Mr McLaughlin's death is not known. A post-mortem is to be carried out.

The Salvation Army said last night: "We are deeply saddened by the death of a service user at our night shelter in Belfast on the evening of Tuesday, September 13.

"We commend the night staff on how they handled this very sad event and for the support that they provided to him during his recent stays in the night shelter."
In with new: student accommodation at John Bell House, which opens this weekend

Economy Minister Simon Hamilton with Anthony Best from Lacuna Developments at the official opening of John Bell House

John Bell House - the first proposal for private student accommodation in Belfast.

The first of hundreds of students are set to move into Belfast's 16 million new-look student digs at a landmark building in the city centre this weekend.

The student residents will bring in an estimated 4.4m to the local economy every year, according to the developers, Watkin Jones.

The site of the former Belfast Metropolitan College is the first major private sector student accommodation in Northern Ireland.

Invited guests to the opening of the renamed John Bell House were given a grand tour of the renovated building and some of the 413 student rooms, made up of 291 bedrooms and 121 studios. It also features a management suite and both indoor and outdoor communal areas.

The four-piece Arco String Quartet played classical music in the iconic Great Hall which is now a communal area for the students.

Bold-coloured sofas are dotted throughout the hall next to a social area with board games, books and a TV all under the original windows and interior features of the Grade-two listed building.

Yesterday, a number of students armed with suitcases arrived to 'check in' to what will be their new home for the next academic year.

Some of the high-end 'gold-rated' student rooms will cost up to 660 per month while shared apartments or self-contained studios can cost around 500 per month.

John Bell House, named after the renowned and award-winning physicist who famously corrected Einstein with Bell's Theorem, was formerly known as Belfast Technical Institute where the scientist studied.

The five-storey property was officially opened yesterday by Economy Minister, Simon Hamilton MLA.

The building at College Square East had been vacant since 2011 before the major redevelopment was proposed as a joint venture between local firm Lacuna Developments based in Holywood, and Welsh developers Watkin Jones.

Anthony Best, Director Lacuna Developments, said: "We were the first to introduce the concept of purpose built student accommodation to Belfast. Relative to other university cities of comparable size we identified a lack of quality managed accommodation. Outside of university owned accommodation there was little to no choice for students, other than HMO (Houses in Multiple Occupation) properties."

Glyn Watkin Jones, of Watkin Jones, a ninth generation construction company specialising in private student accommodation added: "John Bell House is the first of three projects by our joint venture that will total 40m construction investment."

The DUP Minister said it provides the "highest standard" of purpose built accommodation.

Mr Hamilton added: "The investment and restoration of John Bell House have returned an iconic building back to the city. With a mix of shared apartments and en-suite rooms, with kitchens and workspaces, there is something for all students."
Family and friends of Gerard McMahon help carry his coffin at the funeral in Belfast yesterday

Family and friends of Gerard McMahon help carry his coffin at the funeral in Belfast yesterday

Family and friends of Gerard McMahon help carry his coffin at the funeral in Belfast yesterday

The family and friends of a man who died after police used CS spray to incapacitate him in Belfast city centre have paid their final respects to him.

Gerard McMahon (36) passed away last Thursday after a "violent incident" on Great Victoria Street in the early hours.

Police were called to the scene after reports that a man had become involved in an altercation with taxi drivers.

According to investigators, Mr McMahon spent more than two-and-a-half hours walking through the centre of the city before arriving at a taxi rank at around 5am.

An officer used CS gas as police struggled with Mr McMahon during an attempt to arrest him.

His condition quickly deteriorated and police administered first aid until an ambulance arrived at the scene.

Paramedics used a defibrillator, but they were unable to save Mr McMahon, who died in hospital. No weapons were recovered from the area.

Requiem Mass for Mr McMahon was held at St Matthew's Church in Bryson Street, where hundreds of friends and relatives gathered to pay their respects, with burial taking place at Roselawn Cemetery.

Mr McMahon, who was from the Short Strand area of the city, was known to his friends as DJ Mako.

His casket was draped with a banner bearing the logo of Space nightclub in Ibiza.

Family and friends paid tribute to him on social media.

Mr McMahon's aunt said that she was "totally heartbroken" and added: "If love could have (saved) you yesterday you would still be here."

Another post said: "You could never have met a nicer person."

His heartbroken parents, Gerard and Ella, called for a "thorough and swift investigation" into his death by the Police Ombudsman.

They said: "Our family are grieving for our son and brother, Gerard, and are calling on the Police Ombudsman's office to carry out a thorough and swift investigation into the circumstances of his death."

Andree Murphy, deputy director of Relatives for Justice, said that the incident raised troubling questions about the PSNI's use of "less-than-lethal" weapons such as Tasers and CS spray.

She added: "The family deserve a prompt and transparent investigation into acceptable policing methods.

"We have had a number of concerns about these technologies since the Patten Report, and there's a lot of competing evidence about the dangers of CS spray and Tasers.

"The legacy of less-than-lethal technologies in Northern Ireland from the Troubles means that we need to be extra vigilant.

"The conversation cannot just have a beginning, middle and end - it needs to be ongoing."

"The onus is now on the Ombudsman to deliver a clear, effective and transparent investigation that garners the confidence of the family."

SDLP councillor Brian Heading, who said he remembered the effects of CS spray from the 1970s, added: "It's a tragedy for the family, and the Police Ombudsman should be looking at the suitability of these devices."

The case has now been turned over to the Ombudsman's office, which has launched an investigation and is appealing for information from the public.
Rugby star Tommy Bowe said his wife Lucy Whitehouse doesn't take his sex symbol status too seriously.

The Ulster player (32) wed former Miss Wales Lucy in 2015 and while Tommy might have previously topped the polls as Ireland's Sexiest Man, he said his long-term love brings him "right back to earth".

"Lucy laughs it all off. She's kind of used to it at this stage and she finds it more slagging material than anything else," the Ireland international told Dublin Live.

"She brings me right back to earth and I don't get away with too much."

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Whatsapp Tommy Bowes wife Lucy keeps his feet on the ground

Lucy, a nurse, relocated from her native Wales to move to Belfast with Bowe, who she first met while he playing with the Ospreys in 2011.

"Marriage didn't change anything between us," he said.

"We have remained the same people.

"And Lucy is from near Cardiff, so she's settled in to Belfast very well because it's very similar," he added.

"People are very friendly up here and she's made lots of friends at work, which is what you have to do when you move away."

The down-to-earth athlete previously said he never considered himself a "heart-throb".

"I was one of the dorky kids," the Monaghan man told the Irish Independent in 2014. "There were other heart-throbs in the school, and a couple of my mates would definitely have fancied themselves ahead of me.

"I think that I always enjoyed female company, and it was a bit of crack to have a little flirting going on with the girls that were in your class."
Frank Cushnahan, who was appointed to Namas advisory committee in 2010

Nama has shrugged off criticism from the Republic of Ireland's most powerful spending watchdog by launching a 3bn (2.5bn) loan sale, it has been revealed.

The State agency pulled the trigger on the massive sale yesterday, just 24 hours after the publication of a highly critical report by the Comptroller & Auditor General (C&AG) into the agency's handling of the controversial Project Eagle sale of Northern Ireland loans.

Last night, a spokesman for Nama confirmed that the so-called Project Gem portfolio of hundreds of property loans had been launched for sale, but said it had been planned for some time.

"This project has been scheduled for some time. We have an important job of work to do and our focus continues to be to secure the maximum return for the taxpayer," the spokesman said.

Meanwhile, the Irish government has bowed to pressure from Opposition TDs for a statutory inquiry into the sale of Nama's Northern Ireland loan book, Project Eagle.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny yesterday accepted the demands for an independent investigation as the fallout from the publication of the C&AG's report continues.

Dublin sources said there is "growing consensus" between Mr Kenny and Opposition leaders as to what approach should be taken to investigate the sale of the property portfolio by the country's bad bank.

However, several issues need to be ironed out, including what sort of individual should head up such a probe.

The C&AG report, which carefully scrutinised the sale, found the taxpayer suffered a potential loss of 190m (223.5m).

The report also questions whether Nama failed to take more action when it learned Frank Cushnahan - who was appointed to Nama's advisory committee in 2010 on the recommendation of the DUP - stood to be paid more than 5m in so-called 'success fees' by one of the bidders.

Amid all the fallout, Nama has categorically rejected many of the report's findings.

The body described the report by Seamus McCarthy as "fundamentally unsound and unstable and cannot be left unchallenged".

The controversy has rocked the Irish government and led to serious questions for Finance Minister Michael Noonan as to whether he acted soon enough.

After repeatedly resisting calls for a independent investigation, Mr Kenny yesterday accepted the demands from Fianna Fail and other parties.

The Fine Gael leader asked his counterparts to submit recommendations by the end of next week as to how a statutory inquiry can work and, in particular, overcome the fact that there are two jurisdictions involved.

Speaking after the meeting, Mr Martin said he believes these challenges can be overcome.

"There's a lot of work that an inquiry can do, in terms of working within the Republic, access to documentation within Nama, Nama personnel," he said.

"Remember in the banking inquiry, which had specific legislation, some of the key personalities involved in the banking world were not interviewed or brought before that inquiry.

"Yet we had an inquiry which shed considerable light on many of the issues pertaining to that, so I think it's equally possible here."

Sinn Fein and some left-wing TDs told Mr Kenny they believe an inquiry should be wider in scope and investigate Nama as a whole.

Pearse Doherty, the party's finance spokesperson, has called for all future sales of Nama to be ceased.
David Mundell said Nicola Sturgeon's warnings of a 'lost decade' after Brexit are becoming 'increasingly alarmist'

The UK Government has warned the SNP to cease its march towards a second independence referendum with Brexit "doom-mongering" and embrace the "opportunities" of leaving the European Union (EU).

Scottish Secretary David Mundell said SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon's warnings of a "lost decade" after Brexit are becoming "increasingly alarmist".

In a speech in Glasgow today, Mr Mundell said Brexit will herald "a phase full of opportunity for Scotland within the UK".

In advance extracts, he called for "a positive and responsible approach from those in positions of responsibility".

He said: "Doom-mongering warnings of a 'lost decade' and 'deep and severe' damage are becoming increasingly alarmist.

"Objective observers might wonder if the aim is to provide bracingly frank analysis or to try and talk up the challenges of Brexit in the hope of making Scottish independence seem less of a risk.

"There is no certainty that countries with their own independence movements to consider, like Spain or Romania, would look favourably on an application from an independent Scotland.

"But even assuming hypothetically that accession were a viable option, an independent Scotland's membership as a new joiner would not be an attractive prospect."

Scotland would need to join the euro, pay more towards the EU budget and open its borders to EU migration, potentially threatening free travel within the UK, he warned.

"From being a strong voice within the third largest member state, Scotland would instead be one of the EU's smallest members," he said.

Mr Mundell said the arguments for Scotland remaining in the United Kingdom are stronger than ever, nearly two years to the day since the referendum in 2014.

"I do not think that the UK's vote to leave the European Union does anything substantial to weaken the argument for the UK," he said.

"It certainly does not make Scottish independence any more attractive, viable or beneficial a prospect than it was in 2014. Indeed quite the reverse."

He added: "The vital Union for Scotland's interests remains the United Kingdom and I believe we are entering a phase full of opportunity for Scotland within the UK.

"First, because of the fundamental strengths of the United Kingdom, which have endured for centuries.

"There are the broad shoulders of the world's fifth-largest economy and the pooling and sharing of resources across its constituent parts.

"It is the UK's fundamental stability, even in the context of Brexit, which makes the case for the Union so compelling."

Michael Russell, minister for UK negotiations on Scotland's place in Europe, said: "David Mundell represents a Tory government which the people of Scotland overwhelmingly did not vote for, trying to sell them an EU referendum result that they overwhelmingly did not vote for - and these comments would be laughable were they not so ridiculous.

"Just a few months ago Mr Mundell, Ruth Davidson and many other Tories warned us of the disastrous consequences of leaving the EU - yet now they try and pretend that the UK offers some sort of stability or certainty for Scotland.

"So, rather than trying to insult the intelligence of the people of Scotland, perhaps Mr Mundell could use his speech today to justify why he thinks they should be dragged out of the EU - given that every single area of Scotland voted to Remain."
The nurse is facing disciplinary action over allegations she concealed her temperature during checks on her return to the UK from Sierra Leone

Ebola nurse Pauline Cafferkey "potentially put the public at risk" through her actions as she returned to the UK with the virus, a misconduct hearing has been told.

A disciplinary panel also heard claims the Scottish medical worker's conduct had "undermined" public trust and confidence in the nursing profession.

The allegations were made by a lawyer for the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) on the first day of the hearing in Edinburgh.

But the nurse's legal team pointed to her "previously unblemished record" and insisted the legal threshold for a finding of misconduct against her has not been met.

Ms Cafferkey, 40, was infected with the virus while working in Sierra Leone in 2014 and returned to the UK at the end of December that year.

Accusations that she acted dishonestly during her return to Heathrow were dropped on Tuesday after after the panel ruled there was no reasonable prospect of them being proved.

She remains accused of allowing an incorrect temperature to be recorded during the screening process at the airport and of leaving the screening area at Heathrow without reporting her true temperature.

The NMC claims that "the mischief in this case is that Ms Cafferkey, realising she had an elevated temperature, allowed an incorrect temperature to be entered on her screening form and left the screening area without disclosing to anyone in authority what her true temperature was".

A high temperature is deemed to be an early sign of an infection.

Speaking to the charges, Anu Thompson, representing the NMC, said there was "no question" Ms Cafferkey had been acting for the public good in providing humanitarian assistance in Sierra Leone.

But she said the group had a responsibility to ensure it did not expose other people to risk.

"In summary, we say that Ms Cafferkey's conduct potentially put the public at risk and her conduct undermined the trust and confidence the public has in the profession."

Describing the potential risk as "significant", she asked the panel to make a finding that the nurse's fitness to practise is impaired "to protect the public and protect the public interest".

Mrs Thompson said there were significant mitigating circumstances in Ms Cafferkey's case, but told the panel: "The fact that she was suffering from the early onset of the virus cannot absolve her of all responsibility for her conduct, nor can it remove her understanding or knowledge of the disease."

Ms Cafferkey was in attendance at the hearing but did not address the panel during the session.

Joyce Cullen, representing Ms Cafferkey, told the hearing the nurse had been in the hands of medical professionals during the screening process and had not been acting in a professional capacity at the time.

The charge against her "simply does not meet the legal test for serious professional misconduct", the lawyer argued.

She told the panel that, in going to Sierra Leone, Ms Cafferkey, from Cambuslang near Glasgow, had strengthened the reputation of the profession.

Ms Cullen pointed to the fact that, at the time of the screening, Ms Cafferkey was exhausted after completing a 22-hour journey to London.

She was "very likely to be substantially impaired" as a result of exhaustion and the early effects of the Ebola virus, the panel was told.

Ms Cullen referred to Ms Cafferkey's "previously unblemished record" as a registered nurse and said the incident at the centre of the allegations was "very short-lived".

Public confidence would also be undermined by a finding of impairment, Ms Cullen argued.

"In my submission there is no basis for a finding that her fitness to practise is impaired," she told the hearing.

Earlier, the session heard that Ms Cafferkey was among a group of doctors and nurses returning to Heathrow after a six-week deployment to Sierra Leone.

In agreed evidence put before the panel, it was said that screening staff from Public Health England (PHE) at the airport "were not properly prepared to receive so many travellers from at risk countries" and this resulted in the area being described by some of those present as "busy, disorganised and even chaotic".

The hearing was told that a doctor took Ms Cafferkey's temperature and found it to be up to 38.3C (100F).

"Dr 1 says that Registrant A (someone else in the group) stated at this point that she would record the temperature as 37.2 degrees on Ms Cafferkey's screening form and then they would 'get out of here and sort it out'," the evidence states.

The nurse was cleared for onward travel, arrived in Glasgow late in the evening and awoke feeling "very unwell" the following day, December 29 2014. She was diagnosed with Ebola the same day and spent almost a month being treated in an isolation unit at London's Royal Free Hospital.

The volunteer recovered, but had two further admissions to hospital - one with a relapse of the Ebola virus and the other with chronic meningitis.

The hearing continues on Wednesday.
A watchdog has dismissed claims that one of Fusilier Lee Rigby's killers was mistreated after he was arrested in Kenya.

A Government-ordered report also found Michael Adebolajo was "definitely not" subject to an intelligence services plot.

Fusilier Rigby was murdered by Adebolajo and Michael Adebowale in London in 2013.

Adebolajo was sentenced to a whole-life prison term and Adebowale was sentenced to life, with a minimum of 45 years.

In a 2014 report, the Parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee said the killing could not have been prevented.

But it raised concerns about the response to Adebolajo's arrest in Kenya in 2010 and allegations of mistreatment, sparking a report by Intelligence Services Commissioner Sir Mark Waller, that was published yesterday.

It concluded that Adebolajo was not the victim of a conspiracy, torture or mistreatment.

The commissioner wrote: "I found that Mr Adebolajo was most definitely not the subject of an intelligence services conspiracy and that his allegations of mistreatment at the hands of the Kenyan authorities were probably untrue."

Adebolajo flew from the UK to Kenya in October 2010. He was arrested a month later in a remote village just over 40 miles from the border with Somalia, before being returned to Britain.

UK intelligence services were not aware of or involved in the arrest, Sir Mark's report found.

It added that the response of MI5 and MI6 to the arrest and detention of Adebolajo in Kenya was "generally good".

But it raised concerns about the effectiveness of MI6's engagement with the committee's inquiry and Sir Mark's review.

However, the commissioner added: "I would stress I do not think (the intelligence services) sought to obstruct or mislead either investigation."

In a written statement confirming the publication of Sir Mark's report, Prime Minister Theresa May said: "I welcome the fact that he has firmly rejected any suggestion of a conspiracy by the security and intelligence agencies in Mr Adebolajo's detention."
A former Manchester United steward has been jailed for life for the IS-inspired murder of an imam.

Mohammed Syeedy, 21, was consumed by hatred of Jalal Uddin, 71, because he practised a form of Islamic healing in Rochdale's Bangladeshi community which the terror group consider "black magic".

Syeedy acted as getaway driver for another man, Mohammed Kadir, 24, who bludgeoned Mr Uddin to death in a children's play area on the early evening of February 18, Manchester Crown Court heard.

Kadir fled the UK three days after the killing and it is thought he may now be in Syria.

Syeedy held his hands to his face in shock after the foreman delivered the verdict after about four hours of jury deliberations.

He later shook his head several times with his face covered as he sat down.

High Court judge Sir David Maddison handed him a life sentence, with a minimum term of 24 years.

The judge said Mr Uddin was a "gentle, well-respected man" who was attacked and "brutally" killed because he practised Ruqya faith healing.

He told Syeedy: "You and your co-offender saw the practice as a form of black magic that could not be tolerated within Islam."

Defenceless Mr Uddin was dealt at least five savage blows from behind with a hammer, shortly after he entered the park in South Street, Rochdale.

The swift and ferocious attack smashed his skull and drove a piece of bone into his brain.

Their victim was targeted after it was discovered he was providing "taweez", in which he made amulets to bring good fortune to the wearer.

Syeedy was involved in months-long surveillance of Mr Uddin and along with Kadir stalked their prey after he left the Jalalia Mosque to go to a friend's house for an evening meal

The Crown said Syeedy was a "knowing participant" in the murder, and his claim that he had no idea what IS supporter and ex-John Lewis call centre worker Kadir planned and then carried out, was "absurd".

The judge concluded Syeedy was aware Mr Uddin would be seriously injured "as to disable him permanently to prevent him practising Ruqya, through taweez, ever again".

And he said he was satisfied Syeedy had run into his home in Ramsay Street, Rochdale, to grab the murder weapon in a "carefully planned" plot.

Sir David told the defendant: "So slick was this operation that only some 90 seconds passed between the killer getting out of the car, approaching Jalal Uddin, killing him, and then proceeding to the other side of the park, where you picked him up.

"The evidence in this case, to my view, established that you have an interest in jihad, in the sense of armed violent struggle by extremists.

"It is quite plain that you have a strong dislike of the use of taweez."

The judge said there was "no significant" evidence to be certain that he was an active supporter of IS.

In fixing the length of sentence, he said: "I take in to account you were not the actual killer, but it seems to me you were an obviously integral part to the commission of this offence, and it could not have been committed without your involvement."

In a victim personal statement read to the court, one of Mr Uddin's seven children said "the pain and void that has been left with his death has been unbearable".

Saleh al-Arif said his father was "a distinguished Islamic scholar" who had moved to the UK in 2002 to help provide for his family back home.

He began teaching the Koran to children in east London, before moving to Birmingham and then to Rochdale where he became an imam at the Jalalia Mosque.

He said: "He was a devout pacifist and shared love to all he came across. I cannot begin to understand why anyone would want to murder him."

Describing his visit to Oldham mortuary to see his father's body, he said: "I was denied the most basic right, to kiss my father's face, because of this cowardly and horrific attack."

In a statement issued by police, his family added: "Weeks prior to his murder, Jalal had intended to return to Bangladesh and be reunited with his wife, children and grandchildren, whom he had not seen for some 15 years, in which time he had dedicated his life to selflessly serving his family, trying to make ends meet.

"Although Jalal was a Muslim who peacefully practised his faith, he had a love and respect for all religions, cultures and creeds, and the fact that he was murdered by someone inspired by Isil shows the true nature and barbarity of this organisation and those who serve it."

Although Kadir, formerly of Chamber Road, Oldham, remains at large, police did not issue a photograph of him.
Tim Farron will tell Lib Dem delegates that Nigel Farage remains the real focus of power in Ukip

Lib Dem leader Tim Farron has insisted critics need to respect his views as a Christian.

Mr Farron said he did not understand why some people found his continued refusal to say whether he believes gay sex is sinful a concern.

Asked if he understood why critics are irked by his repeated reluctance to clarify his stance, Mr Farron told the Press Association: "I think it's a peculiar one.

"No, is the honest answer, because I think people look at my liberalism, my desire to support people's rights to make whatever choices they want, and I kind of also expect in the same way people - maybe it's a naive expectation - to respect my beliefs as a Christian.

"And obviously that means a whole range of things about how I then choose to live my life. It also means that I don't go around pointing the finger at anybody else.

"I don't go making pronouncements on theological matters. And I think as someone who is a liberal, everybody has the right to marry who they want to marry, love who they want to love, and that's the position we take."

After a Lib Dem conference consultative meeting overwhelmingly backed decriminalising sex work, Mr Farron said he would support such a move if the evidence endorsed it.

"You have got to be guided by the evidence, whatever it might be. And if the evidence points in that direction, then that's where we should go, but it's important we should have this consultative session," Mr Farron said.

The Lib Dem leader also warned about the rise of extremism in Labour and the Tories.

"They are both being wagged by an extremist tail," he said.
Chinese branches of Wal-Mart have been forced to recall batches of donkey meat after it was found to contain fox.

The US company has apologised and said it would reimburse shoppers in China who bought the Five Spice donkey product, which tests showed contained the DNA of other animals.

According to local news reports, the problem was first brought to the attention of food standards officials when a customer, identified only by his surname Wang, found the so-called donkey meat looked, smelled and tasted strange.

He sent the product to a testing institute, and the Shandong Food and Drug Administration later announced that it contained fox meat.

Wal-Mart said it has launched an investigation into the incident, adding that the manager at a suppliers factory had already been detained.

We are deeply sorry for this whole affair, said Wal-Mart's China president and CEO, Greg Foran. It is a deep lesson that we need to continue to increase investment in supplier management.

Shaun Rein, the Shanghai-based managing director of China Market Research (CMR) Group, told Reuters: This is another hit on Wal-Mart's brand, meaning wealthy shoppers will start to lose the trust they had before.

Donkey meat is popular in China, though makes up a tiny proportion of all meat products consumed. Fox meat, on the other hand, is cheap because of its distinctive smell and the fact that eating it could pose serious health risks, a breeder told the Yangcheng Evening News.

Wal-Mart, which is the largest supermarket chain in the world and has more than 400 stores across China, has been hit with a number of scandals in the far east in recent years.

In 2011, the China government fined Wal-Mart, along with Carrefour, a combined 9.5 million yuan (950,000) for manipulating product prices. That same year the US retailer was also fined in China for selling duck meat past its expiry date.
Smoke billows from one of the towers of the World Trade Center and flames as debris explodes from the second tower, in this Sept. 11, 2001

A columnist for a state-run newspaper in Egypt has suggested the US invented Isis and set up the 9/11 attacks to justify its military interventions in the Middle East.

Is it possible to believe the official version, from the US government, of the events of 11 September 2001? wrote journalist Noha Al-Sharnoubi in Al-Ahram, a major national Egyptian newspaper owned by the government.

Ms Al-Sharnoubi said the World Trade Centre and Pentagon attacks could have been premeditated to "justify the war on terror in her column, published on 23 August.

She also cast doubt over the veracity of the actions of the so-called Islamic State, alleging the extremist group could have been made up to trick the world and validate US foreign policy.

According to an English translation by the Middle East Media Research Institute (Memri), Ms Al-Sharnoubi wrote: Is it a coincidence that the commanders of the September 11 attack trained at American flight schools?

Is it conceivable that four hijacked planes flew around so freely, penetrated US airspace and hit the towers of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon one by one, with an interval of 15 minutes and 30 minutes between the attacks," she added.

"All this took place without the Americans targeting the planes and downing them, despite all their intelligence, satellites and radars?

Or was the whole thing planned [in advance] in order to justify the war on terror, the [first] episode of which [later] began in Iraq?

Ms Al-Sharnoubi also questioned the contents of Isis propaganda videos, suggesting the militant group could be another story that was prepared in advance [by the West] to justify the devastation, partitioning and occupation of Middle Eastern countries.

Does it make sense that most Isis members are foreigners [i.e., Western nationals], unless ISIS is another story that was prepared in advance [by the West] to justify the devastation, partitioning and occupation [of countries] that is taking place and will continue to take place in the Middle East? she wrote, according to Memri.

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Those who are murdered and [then] accused of perpetrating terror attacks in the West  are they the real culprits?

"[Perhaps Western] intelligence elements are behind the attacks and the bombings, and later Muslim citizens are arrested and killed and simply accused of perpetrating [the attacks] in order to justify what is happening in the Arab countries in the name of the war on terror, and in order to justify the plan to persecute the Muslims in the U.S. and Europe and expel them? Have we really been deceived, and continue to be deceived, to such an extent?!

Egypt is listed as number 159 out of 180 countries in Reporters Without Borderss 2016 World Press Freedom Index.

According to the report, journalists are obliged on national security grounds to report only the official version of terrorist attacks under an anti-terrorism law passed in 2015.
Donald Trump has admitted during an interview that he is overweight for his height.

The US presidential candidate told Fox and Friends that he was 6ft 3ins and 16.8 stone.

While admitting that he would like to lose weight, he insisted his health and cholesterol levels were good. "If they were bad, I would say, 'Let's sort of skip this, right?", Mr Trump said.

The Republican candidate (70) also claimed that when he looked in the mirror, he saw a considerably younger man. "I see a person that's 35," he explained.

His admission came as the campaign focuses on the health of candidates after Mr Trump's Democratic rival Hillary Clinton was diagnosed with pneumonia.
A detective from Ireland has suffered serious injuries after he was struck in the head by a man with an 11-inch meat cleaver in New York.

Off-duty NYPD officer Brian O'Donnell, from Co Offaly, suffered a six-inch gash from his temple to his jaw when he attempted to tackle Akram Joudeh during the 5pm attack on Wednesday.

Joudeh from the borough of Queens in New York City, was shot 18 times after he launched the savage attack.

Joudeh, who has a long criminal history, was initially stopped by police near Penn Station, in the middle of Manhattan, as he tried to remove a wheel clamp from his illegally-parked car.

Jimmy ONeill, the new NYPD police chief  who only takes over officially on Friday from the retiring Bill Bratton  said that Joudeh then ran through the streets around Macy's department store in the middle of rush hour.

Officers joined in the pursuit, and one uniformed sergeant deployed a stun gun to no effect.

Joudeh pulled out an 11-inch cleaver from his waistband and began running toward Sixth Avenue, officials said.

Det O'Donnell attempted to intervene but was struck across the face.

The dad, who lives in Long Island, was taken to Bellevue Hospital, where he's listed in serious condition, officials said.

Mr Bratton and Bill de Blasio, the mayor of New York, visited him in hospital and said he was in good spirits.

A spokesman for the NYPD told Independent.ie that Detective O'Donnell was "stable".

Det O'Donnell moved to the US from Co Offaly 16 years ago and he previously worked with the US navy. He signed up to the New York Police Department and friend say he was four years from retirement.

A bystander, Jonathan Schneier, said when he left work to get coffee he saw a balding man holding a meat cleaver, surrounded by a small group of officers yelling at him to drop the knife. One officer had a Taser out. Others had handguns.

"I give credit to the police officers. They gave him many opportunities," Mr Schneier said.

He said the man with the knife "did not look very stable."

The man turned and ran, Mr Schneier said. He ran one city block and then jumped on top of a NYPD car.

After Det O'Donnell was struck three uniformed NYPD officers then fired a total 18 times at Joudeh, striking him several times.

Two other officers were taken to the hospital with non-life threatening injuries from the encounter, although it was unclear how they were injured.

Joudeh was described as being in a critical but stable condition. He has 15 prior arrests, including one on August 27, after he was found carrying knives near a synagogue.

His last known address was in Queens, though police say he may have been living in his car.

The incident caused gridlock in central Manhattan, with streets shut and the FBI sending agents from the Joint Terrorism Task Force to the scene as a precaution.

Detective O'Donnell has two sisters living in Dublin, a sister living in New York and a brother who runs a bar in Las Vegas.

He is a massive GAA and Nw York Yankees fan and his family has strong GAA connections.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been in the Ecuadorian Embassy for four years

A Swedish appeals court has upheld a detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

Mr Assange is wanted by prosecutors in a rape investigation stemming from his visit to Sweden in 2010.

The decision made by the Svea Court of Appeal on Friday means the arrest warrant stands for the 45-year-old Australian, who has avoided extradition to Sweden by taking shelter in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since 2012.

Mr Assange denies the rape allegation and has challenged the detention order several times.

It is unclear whether he will make an appeal against the decision to the Supreme Court.

Upholding a lower court ruling, the appeals court said Swedish prosecutors are actively trying to move the investigation forward and set up an interrogation of Mr Assange at the embassy.

Acting on behalf of Swedish investigators, an Ecuadorian prosecutor is set to question Mr Assange on 17 October.

"This means that there is at present no reason to set aside the detention order. Julian Assange's claim to that effect shall therefore be refused," the court said.
The Prince of Wales attends the New Zealand Somme Commemorations at the Caterpillar Valley Commonwealth War Graves Commission Cemetery in Longueval, France

The Prince of Wales attends the New Zealand Somme Commemorations at the Caterpillar Valley Commonwealth War Graves Commission Cemetery in Longueval, France

The Prince of Wales spoke of his hope for a "future free from conflict" as he paid tribute to the New Zealand troops killed at the Somme during a ceremony in France.

Charles, the Field Marshal of the New Zealand Army, spoke during a service at the Caterpillar Valley Commonwealth War Graves Commission cemetery in Longueval.

The prince, dressed in a New Zealand Army Field Marshal uniform, said: "It is hard to imagine that a century ago this was an infernal which my predecessor as Prince of Wales, my great-uncle Edward, described as 'the nearest approach to hell imaginable'."
The United Nations faces "a problem" in shipping humanitarian aid into Syria, its envoy for the country has said.

Staffan de Mistura put the blame squarely on a lack of authorisation from Bashar Assad's government that has even disappointed the Syrian president's key backer: Russia.

Mr de Mistura said a US-Russia brokered cease-fire deal agreed last week has largely reduced the violence since it came into effect on Monday, but the humanitarian aid flows that were expected to follow have not materialised.

He said 40 aid trucks are ready to move and the UN would prioritise the embattled, rebel-held eastern areas of the northern city of Aleppo.

The Syrian government has not provided the "facilitation letters" or permits needed to allow the start of the convoys, Mr de Mistura said.

He said the government had agreed on September 6 - before the cease-fire deal was signed - to allow aid into five areas, but the authorsation has not come.

Aside from the reducing the bloodshed, the "second dividend" of the US-Russia deal is humanitarian access.

"That is what makes a difference for the people apart from seeing no more bombs or mortar shelling taking place," Mr de Mistura said, speaking in Geneva.

"On that one, we have a problem," he added. "It is particularly regrettable ... These are days which we should have used for convoys to move with the permits to go because there is no fighting."

"The Russian Federation is agreeing with us," he said.

Earlier, activists said the ceasefire was still holding despite some violations.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said government forces and opposition fighters were ready to withdraw from the Castello road, a main artery into Aleppo, to hand it over to Russian troops.

It said government forces will not start pulling out until the rebels begin to do the same.

AP

Syrian opposition activists have said an airstrike on the eastern town of Mayadeen, held by the Islamic State group, has killed at least four people and wounded dozens.

That casualty toll is according to Deir el-Zour 24, an activist collective. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the airstrike killed seven people.

Mayadeen is in the eastern province of Deir el-Zour, near the Iraqi border. IS is not included in the US-Russia brokered truce and t he US-led coalition, Russia and the Syrian government have been carrying out air raids against the extremist group.

AP

Jan Egeland, the top humanitarian aid official in Mr de Mistura's office, said the "good news" from the cessation of hostilities was that the bloodshed has dropped and "attacks on schools, attacks on hospitals have stopped".

The "bad news", he said, was a lack of a green light for UN trucks to cross front lines.

"Our appeal is the following - it's a simple one," Mr Egeland said. "Can well-fed, grown men please stop putting political, bureaucratic and procedural roadblocks for brave humanitarian workers who are willing and able to go to serve women, children, wounded civilians in besieged and crossfire areas?"

"If they do that, we're willing and able to go to all these places in the next few days - and we are very hopeful that we will indeed be able to do so," he added.

Aleppo has been the centre of fighting over past months and Syrian government forces and their allies launched a wide offensive earlier this month, capturing several areas south of the city and putting eastern rebel-held areas under siege.

Over 2,000 people were killed in 40 days of fighting in Aleppo until the ceasefire went into effect. The dead include 700 civilians, among them 160 children, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. .

"No aid has arrived in Aleppo. The regime is refusing to allow aid into Aleppo," said Aleppo-based activist Baraa al-Halaby.

Syria's state news agency Sana said opposition fighters opened fire at a location along the Castello road that was being prepared for Syrian Arab Red Crescent representatives. The report said two people guarding the location were wounded.

Sana also reported violations of the cease-fire in the north-west villages of Foua, saying sniper fire by insurgents wounded a Syrian boy there. It also said three shells were fired at the government-held southern village of Hadar.

The opposition reported 29 violations by government forces, including shelling, air raids and heavy machine gunfire.

Meanwhile, in the eastern province of Deir el-Zour, clashes and shelling over the past 24 hours between government forces and the Islamic State group in the provincial capital, also called Deir el-Zour, killed at least three people, including a child, according to activists and state media.

AP

Russia wants the UN Security Council to endorse the Syrian ceasefire agreement that it brokered together with the United States.

Russian ambassador Vitaly Churkin said he hopes the Security Council will adopt a resolution endorsing the agreement at next week's high-level General Assembly meeting, which draws leaders from around the globe.

He said: "I think we need to adopt it on the 21st" - a reference to the summit-level Security Council meeting on Syria.

AP
I'm not surprised that Dr Caroline Gannon, one of only two paediatric pathologists in Northern Ireland, has resigned. When you have to advise a couple to bring their dead baby home in a cooler box, following an abortion in England, it's easy to see how that could make your job seem impossible.

I empathise with Dr Gannon and the family involved. There is something obscene and inhumane about being forced to transport the remains of a much-wanted baby in an ice-packed picnic bag, because of the barbarity of our current laws, which refuse support to people in this hellish situation. When will we, like Dr Gannon, say enough is enough?

As the BBC reported, the couple had been told that their baby had a fatal foetal abnormality. Since it is illegal in Northern Ireland for an abortion to be carried out on these grounds, they had to go to England for the termination. Understandably, they wanted a post-mortem examination to find out more about the diagnosis. But it is difficult to arrange post-mortems in these circumstances in England, so they had to bring the baby back in the boot of their car, on the overnight ferry. Other couples, finding themselves in the same horrible bind, have had to use parcel carriers to ship the remains.

Dr Gannon said that recent developments in abortion law in Northern Ireland made her position untenable.

As it appears that the majority of political opinion here is opposed to abortion, there seems little prospect of legislative change.

Moreover, the Attorney General has made several well-documented interventions in Northern Ireland abortion law. In November 2012, he offered to assist the Justice Committee at Stormont in an investigation into the Marie Stopes clinic in Belfast. In November 2015, he appealed a High Court judgement which ruled that Northern Ireland's almost total ban on abortion was in breach of human rights law. And in February 2016, he questioned whether a proposal to allow abortion in cases of fatal foetal abnormalities - one of several amendments to the Justice Bill - was compatible with international human rights law.

What struck me most about Dr Gannon's words was that she said her own code of ethics was being compromised by the legal constraints on her job.

She told the BBC: "I just cannot work in this particular system. I find it very difficult and I cannot reconcile the legal system I am having to operate under with my own personal ethical beliefs."

This is also important in a wider sense, because ethics, or morality, is too often seen as the sole preserve of anti-abortion campaigners, who use faith and doctrine as the foundation for their arguments against reproductive choice.

But these people do not have the monopoly on morality. They do not own ethics; they are not the only ones with principles.

Our personal moral code - essentially, our conscience, which helps us decide for ourselves what is right and what is wrong - is an entirely individual thing. And Dr Gannon found that it went against her conscience to deny distressed couples the information, support and choice she believed they were entitled to, which is why she resigned.

In her powerful new book, The Moral Case for Abortion, Ann Furedi argues that abortion is not a necessary evil, something to feel guilty about, or be ashamed of, or to apologise for. Or indeed to be criminalised for. Furedi is the chief executive of the British Pregnancy Advisory Service, which is the UK's leading abortion care charity. She insists that abortion can be a morally good choice: a rational, responsible decision which affirms a woman's status as a thinking, acting, autonomous human being.

Furedi wants those of us who are in favour of a woman's right to choose to put pragmatic arguments to one side and make a determined assault on the high moral ground, which for too long has been entirely occupied by the anti-abortion lobby.

She says - and I agree with her - that abortion should be a private matter for a woman's conscience.

To deny a woman that choice is a denial of her moral agency, her freedom to choose the path she wants her life to take.

It is ironic that opponents of abortion wish to portray Northern Ireland, with its brutal, antiquated laws, as a place of moral purity, while England - operating under the 1967 Abortion Act - is considered morally degenerate.

But what is so morally pure about denying a woman the termination that she needs?

What is so deeply principled about forcing a grieving couple to bring their dead baby home in a picnic bag?
Sometimes, I suspect, the ability of human beings to fool themselves with their own words over the Middle East is greater than the folly of war. One leads to another.

I was crossing the Atlantic when the international crimes against humanity took place on 11 September 2001; my plane turned round over the ocean, shedding tons of fuel, before heading back to the safety of Europe. Safety then, of course.

Not now. Before I landed, the third-rate politicians who would lead hundreds of thousands of Arabs  and, comparatively, a few of us  to our deaths in the Middle East had conned us all with their cliches.

The first of these mischievous remarks was that the attacks of 9/11 had changed the world forever. Politicians said it, newspaper editorials echoed it, populations repeated this dumb expression by the million. For if we really believed in the democracy, values and freedoms of the West which we suddenly rediscovered, it was our duty to ensure that the murderers of 9/11 did not change our societies. Not now  nor ever.

But there was another expression, which I missed at the time. The US was going to launch, we were told, a world war against terror. Its not the word terror that I failed to spot, a word whose generic, racist use became briefly pardonable after the attacks in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania, and then more disgusting than ever when it was re-used by Bush, Putin and any tin-pot dictator from the Middle East to Far East Asia to further their policies of brutality across the globe.

No, it was the use of the phrase world war which I didnt notice.

There were plenty of 9/11 parallels with Pearl Harbour  numerically understandable for that day in 1941, but preposterous in comparison to the mass slaughter of souls which it added to the Armageddon Hitler had already unleashed.

No, the real comparison should have been the Great War of 1914-18, which destroyed the European order in a bloodbath which no-one predicted and which led, after 9/11 in our own age to an international outcry against the Wests propensity to bomb and bomb and bomb the Middle East.

The parallels, of course, are not exact. But 15 years after the event, I can see that our response to 9/11 had much more in common with August 1914 than September 1939  or December 1941, if we are going to recall Americas entry into the Second World War.

In 1914, Europe had lived in a secure world, based upon a balance of power, its populations enriched by the industrialisation  and therefore modernisation  of transport, health, culture, science, even political understanding. The pre-war old world still contained the seedlings of revolution.

But no-one worked out two terrible explosive products within this mutual security pact. When one of these modern balances broke down  even over something so piffling as the killing of an archduke in Sarajevo  the rest would automatically collapse.

So certain were we of our European security arrangements, that we had no way of preventing a simple disaster when someone blew a fuse in the system. This proved that, far from modernisation, we were still in the age of imperial war.

The second development which we did not  or refused to  take account of, was that the one product of modernisation which would not fail us was war. The machine gun, the trench mortar, long-range artillery and air warfare would indeed change the world forever.

We may still dispute Britains need to stand with France  a Brexit from the Entente Cordiale might have changed all that if a referendum had been held just over a hundred years ago  but we can scarcely dispute the unique fury with which we responded to Germanys attack on Belgium and France.

Cries of Hun barbarism  or Boch brutality  as the Germans stormed into Flanders, supposedly bayonetting babies and crucifying nuns on farm doors, form an immediate parallel to Islamist terror and whoever is not with us is against us. Oddly, there is another parallel: the 1914 Germans did indeed commit atrocities in Flanders (though not to the extent our propaganda would claim), just as the Islamists of bin Laden had committed atrocities before 2001.

The larger historical mirror shows two populations a hundred years apart setting off to war, with declarations of unity and patriotism and a strong hint of national superiority, without the slightest suggestion that the future may be on the side of mass death rather than mass victory. Self-righteousness, however justified, usually leads to the cemetery. Here, perhaps, we should not look back to the First World War, but to the immediate aftermath of 9/11.

Read more

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For while Europe knew the facts that preceded August 1914, certain truths were kept from ourselves fifteen years ago. We could ask who had committed these crimes against humanity (19 men calling themselves Muslims) or how (box-cutters, airliners, tall buildings), but anyone who asked why (these included myself) were excoriated as terror lovers, friends of terrorists, etc.

Any abuse could be uttered to prevent us asking why all the killers were Arabs, whether there was therefore a problem in the Middle East, how had such rage been kindled in a part of the world which had been ruled by our armies and then our pet dictators for the past century  since the end of the First World War, in fact. The identity of the 19 men  15 of whom were Saudis, as was Osama bin Laden  was morphed into the expression Arabs, as if the Sunni Muslim, Wahabi nature of the murderers had nothing to do with their country of nationality.

Thus, too, the final government report on 9/11 crucially excluded the 28 pages  in fact, 29 pages  of evidence about Saudi Arabias connections to the hijackers.

The pages were jealously guarded, for security reasons, of course, until this year, when  blow me down  they were released with a few censored passages (or redacated as our pusillanimous journalists called them) and revealed only what we have known for a long time: that the Saudis had been funding groups who encouraged the killers.

Read more

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The security label, however, was deadly serious. For if the Saudi identity of the whole operation had been acknowledged from the start, how could the US and the country led by a prime minister whose name I find it difficult to utter, have claimed so imperiously that Saddam Husseins Iraq  not Saudi Arabia  was behind the destruction of the Twin Towers.

The very proposal to go to war in Iraq would have been highly questionable if we had absorbed the information contained in the censored passage of the 9/11 report. That  and that alone  was why the report was so important. It was tampered with so that we would attack Iraq and leave our Saudi allies in peace.

No wonder the Muslim response on this fifteenth anniversary of 9/11 has been so indifferent. Iran and Lebanon were among the first nations to offer their condolences in 2001.

But I am struck by the words of a Pakistani doctor a few days ago. Its a non-event, she said, when they see the damage the Americans have done in the Arab-Muslim countries, the 11 September is the last of their worries  and not because they support terrorism.

Exactly. And just as the Great War led to the Second, so the world war against al-Qaeda led, via Iraq, to the war against the apocalyptic Isis  the extraordinary word of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff. We did try to stop history. Brits marched against Blairs murderous attack on Iraq before it began. But off we went. Forget Afghanistan  a good war, hadnt we defeated the Taliban?  and lets head for Baghdad for part two of the Great War.

It was folksy stuff. Secluded far from Washington after 9/11, George W Bush demanded to return to the White House. He asked after his wife and two daughters. Assured that they were safe, he asked: And Barney? Barney was the family dog. And from that moment, we all were.
Namas failure to investigate its former adviser, Frank Cushnahan, is one of the more troubling aspects of the Project Eagle controversy.

The damning report by the Republic's Comptroller & Auditor General (C&AG) Seamus McCarthy on the loan sale does not speculate to any great degree about Namas motivation for deciding not to take steps to get to the bottom of things.

However, it does bring into the public domain documents that indicate the agency was seriously concerned its reputation would be damaged if details of Mr Cushnahans activities became public.

Namas board was informed on March 11, 2014 that a potential issue had arisen during discussions with investment firm Pimco, which had been pursuing a deal to buy the portfolio since the previous April.

During a conference call, a lawyer for Pimco told Nama representatives about a success fee arrangement the firm proposed paying in the event of a successful bid.

The Pimco lawyer said this involved three parties  New York law firm Brown Rudnick, Belfast solicitors Tughans and Mr Cushnahan, a former member of Namas Northern Ireland Advisory Committee (NIAC).

They were to split a fee of either 15m (17.6m) or 16m (18.8m). There are varying accounts of the figure.

It is clear the news set alarm bells ringing at the board meeting. Minutes show it was noted that Mr Cushnahan, who quit the NIAC the previous November, had never disclosed any conflict of interest while in office.

The board noted external NIAC members such as Mr Cushnahan did not have access to sensitive confidential information about debtors.

However, there was a recognition that he would be knowledgeable about Namas strategy in Northern Ireland.

Nama also knew Mr Cushnahan had business links with at least seven Nama debtors, who together owed the agency almost 1bn (1.18bn). The board felt his involvement with Pimco raised a significant reputational risk to Nama.

The minutes show the board discussed whether Pimcos bid, at this stage, was fatally flawed.

Two days later, the board was informed that Pimco felt obligated to withdraw.

Given the level of concern evidenced in the minutes, it seems strange that Nama did not pursue Mr Cushnahan for an explanation.

Nama chairman Frank Daly said this week that there was little point in pursuing him at the time as the Pimco deal was dead.

However, the C&AG was troubled by this line of thinking. He found Nama should have sought advice or written to Mr Cushnahan to seek an explanation. Mr McCarthy also found that Nama never briefed Lazard, the advisory firm conducting the sale on its behalf.

Had Lazard been told, it could have assessed whether the entire sales process had been compromised. Instead, knowledge appears to have been confined to the Nama board and a small number of senior executives.

The proposed fee arrangement only became public when it was disclosed by Mr Daly at the Dail Public Accounts Committee in July last year after police began investigating corruption claims.

Pimcos withdrawal left Nama with two bidders, Cerberus and Fortress, with Cerberus eventually submitting the winning bid.

Nama received an assurance from Cerberus that no one connected to Nama would receive a fee in respect of the deal, but again it seems Nama failed to ask enough questions.

The agency only discovered as the deal was going through that Cerberus had agreed to pay fees to Brown Rudnick and Tughans, the firms who had worked alongside Mr Cushnahan on the Pimco deal. Around 7.5m (8.8m) subsequently paid to Tughans ended up being diverted by its managing partner, Ian Coulter, to an account in the Isle of Man.

The UKs National Crime Agency is investigating who was destined to benefit from the cash. In a secret recording broadcast by the BBC, Mr Cushnahan said 6m (7m) of it was for him.

If Namas inaction after it learned of the links between Pimco and Mr Cushnahan was motivated by a desire to ensure damaging information did not become public, it is a strategy that has failed spectacularly. The damage its board was so worried about has only been exacerbated by its failure to act on that information.
An Indian farmer carries paddy seedlings for planting rice in his field in Raha, a village in the northeastern Indian state of Assam, Aug. 10, 2016.

Updated at 2:24 p.m. ET on 2016-09-16

Rice farmer Niranjan Deka said he was helpless as an army of pests destroyed a years worth of work within hours.

My paddy crops were ready to harvest, but are all finished now. Those worms devastated more than an acre of my farmland in less than 24 hours. And all I could do was stand by and watch, Deka, a resident of the northeastern Indian state of Assam, told BenarNews.

He and other farmers across Assam, one of Indias biggest rice producing states, are staring at difficult times ahead because of an infestation by caterpillars that swarm paddies.

Locally known as shur puk, the species of caterpillar also known as armyworms, has wiped out about 87,000 acres of paddy fields in 22 districts of Assam during the past four days, affecting nearly 100,000 farmers, according to the states Agriculture Department.

The infestation has caused an unprecedented agricultural crisis in the state, Assam Agriculture Minister Atul Bora said.

In just a few days the problem has taken an epidemic proportion. It appears now [that] we are facing one of the biggest pest attacks the state has ever witnessed, he told BenarNews.

Prevalent across South Asia, armyworms usually emerge after monsoonal floodwaters recede. Several weeks ago, devastating floods from monsoonal rains inundated parts of Assam and nearby Bangladesh, another big rice producer.

Bora said he had already briefed leaders of Indias ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in New Delhi and sought their help to tackle the menace.

Impossible to control

The last time a major infestation hit the state was in 1967, but the damage was not as widespread, according to experts. They warned that there was little anyone could do to stop the destruction.

Rice-swarming caterpillars are considered one of the most dangerous pests. Fields attacked by them resemble fields grazed by cattle. These armyworms should be eliminated as soon as they appear near any farmland. But now that these worms have entered the paddy fields, it is near impossible to control them, Kabindra Borkotoky, a Guwahati-based agriculture expert, told BenarNews.

Marginal farmers with small land holdings are the worst affected by the pest attack, he said.

After the recent floods in Assam that damaged standing crops valued at more than 1.93 billion rupees (U.S. $28.7 million), small farmers somehow managed to transplant paddy, which was due to harvest in October, Borkotoky said.

But now, these farmers, who have no savings, are left with nothing and are staring at possible starvation in the absence of any government help, he added.

Praying for supernatural intervention

And while the state government waits anxiously for New Delhi to help, troubled farmers across the region are resorting to lighting prayer lamps and holding religious rituals in their fields in hopes of a supernatural intervention that might save their crops.

I cant wait around and see my family starve to death. Only God can help us now. Otherwise, Im afraid committing suicide will be the only option left, Palash Bora, a farmer from Golaghat district, told BenarNews.

More than 70 percent of Indias 1.25 billion people depends on agriculture for a living. Failed crops, due to drought, flooding or infestation, leads thousands of farmers to commit suicide annually.

According to the latest figures from the National Crime Records Bureau, more than 5,600 farmers took their own lives across India in 2014. Bankruptcy and the inability to repay debt in the absence of concrete government support are the most common reasons for why farmers kill themselves, the bureau found.

Its been four days since the damage started and it is continuing at an alarming pace. But the government has yet to announce any concrete measures to help the farmers. Time is running out and I fear if the government does not intervene immediately, the farmers will have to pay a heavy price, Akhil Gogoi, a peasant leader in Assam, told BenarNews.

An earlier version gave wrong information about the monetary value of crops lost in Assam through recent floods.
Updated at 11:30 a.m. ET on 2016-09-16

Malaysias King granted a rare audience Thursday to former Malaysian Premier Mahathir Mohamad to discuss public calls for the removal of Prime Minister Najib Razak, who is embroiled in a corruption scandal, according to Mahathirs son and aides.

King Abdul Halim met Mahathir for more than an hour at his palace in the northern Malaysian state of Kedah as the ex-premier submitted to him a Peoples Declaration endorsed by more than 1 million Malaysians calling on Najib to quit over his alleged involvement in the looting of billions of dollars in state funds, Mukhriz Mahathir told BenarNews.

Najib has flatly rejected the corruption charges, linked to the debt-laden state fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) and deposits into his private accounts worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

I can confirm the meeting was held at 4:45 p.m. today (Thursday) in the palace, Mukhriz said. We honestly thought its going to be a short meeting, probably 30 minutes, but it lasted one hour and 15 minutes.

Now that we have submitted the declaration, at least we can now tell the people that we have done our part, said Mukhriz, who was the chief minister of Kedah state before Najibs loyalists forced him out of power earlier this year.

...[T]he ball is no longer in our court. The appeal made by 1.4 million Malaysian signatories have now been passed to the King, Mukhriz said of the four-eyed meeting between Mahathir and King Abdul Halim, 89, who has been the long serving sultan of Kedah.

Former Premier Mahathir Mohamad signs the guest book at the Istana Anak Bukit in Alor Setar, Kedah before meeting the Malaysian King on evening, Sept. 15, 2016 [Courtesy of Khairuddin Abu Hassan]

Malaysias nine sultans take turns to become the countrys constitutional monarch under a unique rotational system introduced toward the end of British colonial rule in the 1950s.

Malay Muslims 60 percent of population

Their roles are largely ceremonial, and the power to govern Malaysia resides with parliament and the prime minister. But the traditional rulers are regarded as the supreme upholder of the Malay tradition and the symbolic head of Islam. Malay Muslims comprise some 60 percent of multi-racial Malaysias 26 million people.

Last year, in rare comments, the rulers had called for a swift, transparent investigation into the troubled state-fund 1MDB, saying the governments failure to give convincing answers on the scandal may have resulted in a crisis of confidence.

Mukhriz said he did not know the details of the discussions between Mahathir and the King in Anak Bukit, the royal town of Kedah.

Sufi Yusuf, special officer to Mahathir, and the formers leaders lawyer, Mohamad Haniff Khatri, also confirmed the one-on-one talks.

Dr. Mahathir received an audience with the Yang di-Pertuan Agong [King] this evening and submitted the Peoples Declaration and [discussed] matters pertaining to the declaration, Sufi told BenarNews.

I cant divulge other details, he said. He [Mahathir] went to the meeting without being accompanied by anyone.

The Kings principal private secretary, Syed Unan Mashri Syed Abdullah, when contacted by BenarNews couldnt confirm the meeting, saying he was away performing his pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia.

The mainstream Malaysian media did not carry any reports on Thursday about Mahathirs talks with the King.

While rejecting the corruption charges, Najib has launched a crackdown on dissent and assumed sweeping security powers that some critics say threaten human rights and democracy and could be used to disallow protests.

Najib dismisses declaration

The Peoples Declaration was put up for signatures online and on paper after Mahathir and nearly 60 other opposition leaders as well as civil society leaders launched it in March in a rare show of solidarity.

Aside from calling for the removal of Najib through legal, non-violent means, the declaration, which has gathered 1.4 million signatures as at July, sought the repeal of laws that violate fundamental rights, and the restoration of institutions whose integrity has allegedly been undermined, such as the police, the central bank and Malaysias anti-corruption body.

Najibs government has dismissed the declaration, saying the move by Mahathir and his allies demonstrated the depth of their political opportunism and desperation.

There is an existing mechanism to change the government and prime minister. Its called a general election. And it is the only mechanism that is lawful, democratic, and fulfils the peoples will, a government statement had said.

Early this year, Mahathir had quit the ruling party, the United Malays National Organization (UMNO), saying he could no longer stay in a party dedicated to supporting the scandal-plagued Najib.
Members of Sarawak for Sarawakians protest in Kuching, calling for the state government to push for autonomy, Sept. 16, 2016.

During Fridays 53rd anniversary of Sabah and Sarawak joining Malaysia, some residents of both Borneo island states protested for greater autonomy.

While Prime Minister Najib officiated over Malaysia Day festivities in Sarawak, some 100 protesters in its capital, Kuching, called for autonomy for the state.

The national government has left Sarawak behind and not fully honored the Malaysia Agreement of 1963, by which the resource-rich and underdeveloped region gained its freedom from British rule and joined the Malaysian federation, said Peter John Jaban, the founder of Sarawak for Sarawakians.

It is like a bad marriage, where the wife is abused over and over again. Despite all that, we still celebrate the wedding anniversary. That is how many of us feel today, Jaban told BenarNews.

The movement he heads has been pushing for the state to secede from Malaysia.

Elsewhere on Friday, Najib was in Bintulu, about 600 km (372 miles) from Kuching, to preside over this years festivities marking Sarawak and Sabahs merger with Malaysia.

Najib told celebrants Friday night that he wished to see people in both states enjoying a similar standard of life to those in peninsular Malaysia, The Star newspaper reported. There are many things to be proud of in the nation made up of peninsular Malaysia, Sabah and Sarawak, he said.

Meanwhile in Sabah, Chief Minister Musa Aman said in his Malaysia Day message that Sabahans should not allow themselves to be swayed by those sowing disunity between the state and peninsular Malaysia.

We must not succumb to their plan, he said.

BN maintains control

The Barisan Nasional coalition, which heads the Malaysian government and has ruled over East Malaysia for decades, maintained control of Sarawak in May when it captured 72 of 82 seats in the states legislative assembly elections. Chief Minister Adenan Satem won his first electoral bid as an incumbent.

Adenan succeeded Abdul Taib Mahmud two years ago when Taib became governor of Sarawak, despite allegations of corruption over his 33 years as chief minister. Additionally, an Australian senate committee is investigating money-laundering allegations against Taibs family over multi-million dollar real estate deals and assets in Australia.

Since Adenans victory, Najib has been met with calls for Sarawak to receive higher royalties for Sarawaks oil and gas resources. Adenan describes ongoing talks with the federal government as positive.

In his electoral campaign, Adenan called on voters to give him a bigger mandate so he could speak up to Kuala Lumpur to regain powers lost since Sarawak joined Malaysia.

In the Malaysia Agreement we signed, all kinds of powers were given to Sarawak, but now the federal government just takes and takes and takes, Adenan was quoted as saying during the campaign. I want those powers back as it was in 1963.

Public holiday declared in 2010

Najib declared Malaysia Day an official public holiday in 2010 after parliament a year earlier debated the exact date of Malaysias independence.

The Federation of Malaya gained independence from Britain on Aug. 31, 1957. Sarawak and Sabah along with Singapore joined the federation to form Malaysia in 1963  but the federation expelled Singapore two years later.

Plans to officially declare the country of Malaysia on Aug. 31, 1963, had to be postponed to Sept. 16 because of opposition from neighbors Indonesia and Philippines.

Sarawak Deputy Chief Minister James Jemut Masing said all Malaysians must honor and respect Sept. 16 as the true date when Malaysia as a nation was conceived.

It is important and significant and to be taught in schools so that younger generations know their history, he said.
We all know that Jonah was the prophet who tried to run from Gods call. But do you know the reason he tried to run? Jonah was afraid that if he preached repentance to the people of Nineveh, who were Israels arch enemies, God would forgive them.

In other words, Jonah had a problem with the goodness of God.

He would have been much happier if God simply wiped out the people of Nineveh rather than had mercy on them, and he actually complained about this at the end of the book.

But as shocking as it is to see the wickedness of Jonahs heart, many of us are just like him. I call it the Jonah Syndrome, and in times past, it has affected me too.

Let me explain exactly what I mean.

We see from 2 Kings 14:25 that Jonah had no problem prophesying that the Lord would expand the borders of Israel, but when it came to going to Nineveh, the capital of Assyria, to warn the people that destruction was coming, he looked for a way out, knowing that the Lord was a merciful God and that if the Ninevites repented, God would forgive them.

Did Jonah care about his personal reputation, not wanting to look bad if the prophesied judgment didnt come to pass? That could definitely be part of it. But what we do know is that he had a real problem with the mercy of God.

The Scriptures state that after the people repented in sackcloth and ashes, When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that he had said he would do to them, and he did not do it (Jonah 3:10).

And how did Jonah react? This was the greatest response to any message preached in human history, the greatest altar call ever given (to put it in contemporary terms).

Did Jonah rejoice? Not one bit. In fact, the Word says, But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry (Jonah 4:1).

How remarkable! Jonah was terribly upset that God had mercy on more than 120,000 people.

And he prayed to the LORD and said, O LORD, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country? That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster. Therefore now, O LORD, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live. And the LORD said, Do you do well to be angry? (Jonah 4:2-4)

But it gets worse. God caused a plant to shelter Jonah from the heat, but then it died quickly, and the prophet got even angrier.

The Lord said to him, You pity the plant, for which you did not labor, nor did you make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle? (Jonah 4:10-11)

You might say, Well, Jonahs attitude was miserable, but certainly none of us have attitudes that bad.

Are you sure?

Have you ever gone through a church split and found yourself upset because God still blessed the people on the other side (of course, the wrong side from your perspective)?

Have you ever been hurt by a ministry and grumbled when the Lord continued to bless them and even work miracles for them?

Have you ever been glad (rather than grieved) to see a colleague fall, as if this vindicated you? (If a brother or sisters failure is your success, you do not have the heart of the Lord.)

These are all symptoms of the Jonah Syndrome, and the sooner we recognize them, the sooner we can repent and ask the Lord for a transformation of heart.

A number of years ago, I was involved in a very difficult split, one which brought pain and confusion to many people, as much as we all tried to avoid it. Yet God sustained both of the entities involved, to our mutual surprise.

Lord, how can you bless those people when they treated us so poorly? we thought to ourselves.

God, surely you wont sustain them when they are so wrong in this matter! those on the other side thought to themselves.

Yet the Lord blessed and sustained us both while we struggled to find common ground in order to reconcile.

The key that unlocked the door for reconciliation was the recognition that God was for both entities involved in the split, since He cared for both equally, loved the sheep involved in both groups equally, and wanted to bless all of us equally. (Its also important to realize that none of us are ever perfectly righteous, whichever side we are on.)

I remember well the night of reconciliation and the hugs and tears and laughs and renewed fellowship, and I remember well how we smiled at one another and said, I bet you were surprised to see how the Lord came through for us and sustained us!

Yes, both sides were surprised to see that the Lord was for both of us....

Lets remember the Lords words in the Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard, where he rebukes those who had a problem with the owners goodness, asking, Are you envious because I am generous? (Matthew 20:15)

And lets remember the words of Jacob (James), that judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment! (James 2:13)

As we have received mercy, let us show mercy, never forgetting there are not different camps or sides in the Body of Christeven if we use those terms descriptivelybut just one family with one Father, and He desires to do good to all his children.

Can we share his heart?

Content provided by OnePlace.com.




First up, Joe Biden is thinking about dropping tariffs against China. But theres a spy in prison this morning that helps us understand why he shouldnt. Ill explain.





Your second brief, If youre looking for a good paying job, you might consider being a CEO for a health insurance company. One executive made $142M dollars last year. Let's talk about that.





And as always, Im keeping an eye out for developing stories. Put this one on your radar. Mexican cartels are grooming American kids online and paying them cash to traffic illegals or run drugs across the border. Ill share details.





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Tumusiime Rhoda Peace, AUC Commissioner for Rural Economy and Agriculture, this week joined Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta and president of Rwanda, Paul Kagame, at a presidential panel on transforming African agriculture, during the official opening ceremony of the Alliance for a Green Revolution Forum 2016, in Nairobi, Republic of Kenya.

Image by 123RF

The panelists discussed ways to transform agriculture in Africa and covered a myriad of topics including technology advancement for farmers, empowering women and youth, private sector engagement and participation in agriculture, and building capacity for all stakeholders in the agriculture value chain, among others.

Kenyatta called on African leaders to urgently address the challenges hindering agriculture advancement, to fight food insecurity and create employment. "Let us streamline our national plans and strategies and align them to the AU Malabo Declaration and have specific timelines to achieve the set goals," he said.

Kenyatta further called for a greater push for accountability by creating a continental agricultural performance scorecard.

He also committed USD 200million over the next five years to support the Kenyan agricultural sector. "Today, I commit to set aside $200 million to benefit especially 150,000 young farmers and entrepreneurs to access markets, adopt mechanization; improve agriculture value addition and agro-processing in the country."

Kagame said African countries should view the agriculture sector not only as a sector in their economies but as the backbone of their economies and agent for transformation, emphasising that it is cardinal to enhance the involvement of the entire value chain, especially the private sector.

We need to move from what we know needs to be done to doing something we need to just go ahead and do it.

Citing the Comprehensive Africa AgricultureDevelopment Program (CAADP), the AU 2014 Malabo Declaration and Africas Agenda 2063, Peace said the AUC empowers countries to have credible plans to transform agriculture and to ensure that commitments and decisions made by AU leaders are actualised.

Peace strongly emphasised however, that for decisions and commitments to be implemented, there is need for active involvement by the African leadership, country ownership of projects and structured designs that adhere to specific country needs.

Implementation is at country level, and leadership is key, she said. Countries where the leadership has been involved in implementation of CAADP and Malabo are doing better in transformation of agriculture.

The panel discussion and subsequent official opening of the AGRF 2016 was also attended by Tanzania's former president Jakaya Kikwete, former Nigerian president Olusegun Obasanjo, and AGRA president, Dr Agnes Kalibata.

The AGRF 2016, under the theme, seize the moment has brought African leaders together to advance policies and secure investments that will ensure a better life for millions of Africas farmers and families.
An Al Jazeera documentary that tells the tale of how advocacy groups got it wrong by pushing through a law on conflict minerals - which has virtually brought the legitimate trade in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to its knees - is up for an Emmy Award.

Despite being home to $24trn worth of untapped mineral reserves, the DRC remains one of the least developed countries in the world. Conflicted: The Fight over Congos Minerals investigates the impact of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Acts Section 1502, added in 2010, which requires publicly traded companies to track whether their products contain so-called conflict minerals from the DRC.

As part of Al Jazeeras Fault Lines series, journalist, Anjali Kamat, travels to the eastern hills of the country, where tantalum, tungsten and tin are mined by hand before making their way into electronic devices across the world.

She discovers that after the law was passed, the mineral trade in eastern Congo came to a standstill, as buyers took their business elsewhere.

We are working now at 20% of our normal capacity, says John Kanyoni, managing director of Metachem Sarl. [We've lost] a lot of money... Those who did that feeling that they helped Congo, they didn't help Congo at all. It harmed thousands and thousands of Congolese.

After finding evidence of fraud and smuggling, Fault Lines questions why advocacy groups that campaigned for Section 1502 claim it has been a success, and if some of biggest brands in the tech industry should really be claiming to be sourcing conflict-free and taking credit for reducing violence in the DRC.

Congolese journalist, Caleb Kabanda, worked on the documentary as Fault Lines fixer, while another local journalist and photographer, Pascal Bashombana, helped with research, pre-production and translation. Kenyan, Franklyn Odhiambo, also contributed to the translation and transcription.

The episode is competing in the Outstanding Business and Economic Reporting in a News Magazine category, and is one of five Fault Lines episodes nominated and one of 10 nominations for Al Jazeera.

The 37thth Annual News and Documentary Emmy Awards are being held in New York on 21 September 2016.
Now in its 4year, the Medic East Africa exhibition continues to enjoy the support of the major healthcare federations and associations across the region.

These include the Kenya Medical Association, Association of Kenya Medical Laboratory Scientific Officers, Association of Medical Engineering of Kenya, Kenya Healthcare Federation, East Africa Healthcare Federation, Association of Private Health Facilities in Tanzania, as well as the Healthcare Federations of Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi.

Medic East Africa has quickly become one of the most important healthcare trade shows on the African continent, stimulating trade and bilateral talks with the key players in the industry, says Simon Page, managing director, Informa Life Sciences Exhibitions, the company organising the event.

Medic East Africa will also host four Kenya Medical Association CPD-accredited clinical and non-clinical events under the theme Healthcare For All  which address the latest challenges and best practices in healthcare. The flagship is the Healthcare Management conference, along with new clinical congresses on surgery, anaesthesia and medical laboratory.

Affirming his organisations on-going support for Medic East Africa, Dr Amit Thakker, chairman of Kenya Healthcare Federation says: "Medic East Africa continues to facilitate trade and promote medical education in order to improve healthcare within the region. It's the perfect opportunity to learn from best practices in business and healthcare delivery."

Medic East Africa 2016 is free-to-attend for professionals from across the healthcare spectrum including dealers and distributors, medical manufactures, general practitioners, doctors, surgeons, hospital managers, nursing staff, as well as all other medical professions and those involved in the delivery of healthcare in the region.

It takes place at the Oshwal Centre in Nairobi, Kenya, on 27-29 September 2016, and features 250 exhibitors from 20 countries. The event is a B2B stage for healthcare professionals designed to stimulate trade and interaction with key government associations, C-level management from hospitals and dealers and distributors from the East Africa region.
The South African Fashion Week (SAFW) will showcase the autumn/winter 2017 collections from 20 to 24 September at The Park, situated at Hyde Park Corner.

The partnership between the SAFW and Hyde Park Corner officially began in April 2016 where the spring/summer 2016 collections were showcased.

SAFW Women

The carefully curated designer schedule for autumn/winter 2017 includes a diverse lineup of top names as well as an exciting array of newcomers:

1. African Style Story

2. Atelier Dajee

3. Clive Rundle

4. Colleen Eitzen

5. Erre

6. Gert-Johan Coetzee

7. Greerkyle

8. Heart & Heritage

9. JJ Schoeman

10. Judith Atelier

11. Keys Fashion

12. Mantsho

13. Non-European

14. Rip n Sew

15. Rubicon

16. Sober

17. Somerset Jane

18. Sun Goddess

19. TNiche

20. Morphe

21. Yadah Exclusive Designs

22. Vintage Zionist

23. Kottin & Twille

24. Black Coffee

25. Guillotine

26. Lunar

SAFW Men

This year SAFW is in its 19th year. Since its founding, SAFW has shown menswear designers as part of its collections where they were mostly bespoke and made to order. For the past five years the event has focused on developing menswear collections. Although the designers can still only supply small quantities, we are confident that there are designers ready to sell quality garments to selected menswear boutiques, deliver on time and at the right price points.

Menswear labels showing this season are:

1. Afrikanswiss

2. Ephymol

3. Esnoko

4. Floyd Avenue

5. Leaf Letlhare

6. House of St Luke

7. Non-European

8. Palse

9. Presidential

10. Rip n Sew

11. Rogue

12. Roman Handt

13. Tovch

14. Tailor Me

15. Zamaswazi

SAFW Sunglass Hut new talent search

Good design alone is not enough to turn a brilliant student into a brilliant young designer, who then plays a role in the creative fashion design space. It takes hard work combined with the correct marketing platform, social media savvy, correct timing, master manufacturing, the right clientele, celebrities and personal marketability for a designer to be seen by the media and other key players. They need to be pushed into the limelight where they are recognised, talked about and given opportunities to fast track their businesses.

In the opening show of SAFW AW17, ten of the brightest emerging Design Stars, sponsored by Sunglass Hut, will be given an opportunity to introduce their collections to the market  they are:

1. Odon

2. Lavina

3. Mieke

4. HerRitual

5. Nu | base

6. Lumin

7. Etsa

8. Sheila-Madge Designs

9. Siyathokoza

10. Aya Velase

SAFW Trade Event

In driving our vision for a thriving designer-lead local fashion industry, the SAFW Trade Event will once again host over 50 exhibitors under one roof. This valuable platform will connect designers with media and buyers from 26-27 September 2016.

The bricks and mortar retail space, in particular, large shopping centres, remain the principal marketing channel where an estimated 95% of all purchases are still done offline. SAFW, in collaboration with Hyde Park Corner, will give designers access to this market cost-effectively by hosting this four-day, high powered event where designers will sell directly to discerning fashion followers.

Entrance is free for this shopping experience which takes place from 28 September to 1 October during regular trading hours in the Centre Court at Hyde Park Corner.
Wholesale trade sales rose 1.2% year on year in July, following a revised 1.7% increase in June, Statistics SA said on Thursday.

Compared with June, wholesale trade sales increased 2.3% in July, after falling 1.4% in June and rising 2.3% in May.

Wholesale trade is a constituent of the third-largest sector of the economy, along with retail trade, motor trade, and catering and accommodation.

Retail sales growth on Wednesday slowed more than expected, to just 0.8% year on year.

After a shock 1.2% contraction in the first quarter, the economy grew 3.3% in the second quarter - but economists have questioned whether that can be sustained.

Mining and manufacturing production data released last week bolstered that view. The mining sector posted its 11 straight month of year-on-year contraction, with the pace of the fall in output picking up to 5.4%.

Manufacturing production increased, but barely, and at a much slower pace than expected, coming in at 0.4% year on year.
Woolworths has issued a product safety recall on the Country Road Indigo Elephant crew top, saying it is not satisfied with the quality of the garment.

The retailer said concerns lay with the press studs on the garment during routine safety tests, but that to date Woolworths had not received any customer complaints.

"The safety of our customers is our priority. We have therefore, as a cautionary measure, taken the decision to voluntarily remove the garment from our stores," it said.

The recall only applies to the Country Road Elephant Crew, ages 0-24 months, colour indigo, style number 60197318.

Woolworth said 19 units had been sold in SA and that all existing stock of the product had been removed from its stores. It asked customers who had purchased the product to return it to either a Country Road or Woolworths store for a full refund.

"We know that South Africans trust Country Road for quality and we would like to apologise to our customers for any inconvenience caused," it said.

Woolworths fullyear results released in August showed that Country Roads comparable store sales were 3.9% lower on the prior year.

This came despite promotional activity and a reduction in prices. Gross profit margins declined 1.5% to 59.4% for the Country Road group, while store costs rose 8.5% due to the increase in trading space.

In 2014, Woolworths acquired the full shareholding of Country Road, and bought David Jones for A$2.15bn (about R23.6bn).
A dividend yield of 12.5% and the presumption that the board of Lewis Stores would find other ways to prop up its revenue could explain why the company's share price showed little reaction to the hard-hitting ruling issued by the National Consumer Tribunal on Wednesday.

On Thursday, Lewiss share price closed just 2.33% weaker at R41.52 after the company issued a Sens statement at lunchtime informing shareholders of the tribunals ruling. But, with the tribunal considering a second referral against Lewis, shareholder sentiment may buckle.

In its first substantial ruling against a listed company, the tribunal found this week that the National Credit Regulators investigation and complaint against Lewis was valid.

The complaint, which related to the sales of insurance against loss of employment and disability, had been referred to the tribunal in July 2015.

Lewis challenged the validity of the referral throughout the process, causing the hearing to be delayed until 28 July.

The tribunal ordered an independent audit of all of the credit agreements entered into by Lewis since 2007 to determine how many pensioners or self-employed consumers were sold loss-of-employment insurance and how many pensioners were sold disability insurance.

The furniture retailer must reimburse such customers with any premiums and interest charged on their accounts. Customers who no longer have open accounts with Lewis are to be traced and reimbursed.

The independent audit, to be paid for by Lewis, has to be completed within 120 days and the audit report is to be given to the National Credit Regulator within 150 days.

On Thursday, Lewis reminded shareholders that its own investigation had found that about 44,000 customers had been sold the insurance involving R67m.

Jacqueline Boucher, the manager of investigations and enforcement at the credit regulator, said on Thursday the regulator was aware of Lewiss investigation, but that it needed an independent audit. She also noted the audit would include the sale of disability insurance to pensioners.

Industry sources said the mechanics of the independent investigation would be daunting as the auditors had to mine huge volumes of information.

Retail analyst Syd Vianello said as long as investors believed Lewis would maintain its generous dividend payments the Lewis share price would probably hold where it was. Lewis and other credit retailers would look to other sources of income if the regulators banned income-generating activity that contravened regulations, he said.

"As in any business, companies are looking to earn a certain level of income, whether its from insurance premiums, club membership or extended warranties, if one component is put under pressure they will look to another," said Vianello.

Lewis is one of the last big furniture retailers to still sell on credit. "Most are shifting to a cash model," said Vianello, as the cost of providing 36 months of unsecured credit was steep.

Lewiss problems with the tribunal look set to continue for at least several months. The tribunal has just closed pleadings on a second referral by the credit regulator, which relates to Lewis charging customers for extended warranties and club fees. A hearing date has not yet been set for that referral.
Food service company Compass Group, with operations in 50 countries and serving around four billion meals a year, have announced that it will source only cage-free eggs for its global liquid and shell egg supply chain by 2025.

Humane Society International and The Humane Society of the United States have worked with Compass Group around the globe for several years on this and other animal welfare issues, securing cage-free policies for the companys US and Mexico operations.

Chetana Mirle, director of HSI Farm Animals, said: By adopting a worldwide commitment to only source cage-free eggs, Compass Group will improve the lives of millions of animals each year. The cage-free egg movement has clearly become one of global significance, and we look forward to working with more companies on similar policies.

In its statement, Nicki Crayfourd, director of group health, safety and environment at Compass Group PLC, commented, Improving the welfare of farm animals is a key focus for our business and we've supported the sourcing of cage-free eggs since 2009. This commitment marks the next step in our journey and we look forward to continuing to work with partners such as Compassion in World Farming, Humane Society International and The Humane League who provide invaluable support and guidance.

Egg-laying hens are often confined for their whole lives in wire battery cages so small and crowded with other birds that the animals cannot even fully stretch their wings. The use of conventional battery cages for laying hens is banned or being phased out under laws or regulations throughout the EU, five US states, New Zealand and Bhutan. The majority of states in India, which is the worlds third-largest egg producer, have declared that the use of battery cages violates the countrys animal welfare legislation, and the country is debating a national ban.

The announcement follows a similar commitment made recently by Sodexo, the worlds second largest food service provider, to also switch to a 100 percent cage-free egg supply chain for their global operations. Compass Group joins a growing number of companies that have committed to cage-free egg policies worldwide including Alsea, Unilever, Grupo Bimbo and Nestle. In South Africa, Woolworths has adopted a cage-free egg policy, and cage-free and free-range eggs can also be found at Pick and Pay, Checkers, and Spar.
With the aim of empowering women and to recognise the role they play in food security, job creation, and economic growth, the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF) in partnership with Total South Africa recently hosted the 16th Annual DAFF Female Entrepreneur of the Year Awards under the theme "Reaffirming the commitment towards women empowerment in the agriculture, forestry, and fisheries sector." We spoke to Nyameka Makonya, head of strategy at Total South Africa about Total SA's stake in female entrepreneurship and the importance of this programme that awards women who have challenged the status quo.

Nyameka Makonya

Total South Africa has supported and sponsored the awards since its inception. What is Totals stake in female entrepreneurs in this sector? Why support it?

Nyameka Makonya: Total South Africa has four focus areas on CSI and one of them is social development. Under this pillar, we seek to encourage and support women, young females and the disabled. FEA is a perfect vehicle in which we are able to address these identified groups and partnering with DAFF was a strategic move as they have access to these groups in a more organised manner as well as resources to reach the farmers.

What did the programme look for in participating female entrepreneurs?

Makonya: We looked for dedication, selflessness, professionalism, as well as development. Once a person is dedicated and selfless in their project they stay with it longer despite the challenges and the results that become evident. Some categories require that certain documentation should be available e.g. proof of registration, proper bookkeeping, etc. All this proof shows professionalism and the willingness to grow from a small farmer to a big business, it is vital that our entrepreneurs keep up with the requirements and standards of running a business. And finally, the importance of entrepreneurs is not only to open businesses for themselves but to develop others and create employment, particularly in the current economic climate.

Tell us more about the winners? What set these women apart?

Makonya: The winners were awarded in the following categories:

 Best Female Worker in the Sector is Lindelwa Elizabeth Mabuya from Western Cape

 Best Subsistence Producer in the Sector is Nthabiseng Kgobokoe from North West

 Top Entrepreneur in the Sector: Smallholder is Makhosazana Sambo from Mpumalanga

 Top Entrepreneur in the Sector: Processing is Mabel, Cynthia Mothlale from Northern Cape

 Top Entrepreneur in the Sector: Commercial is Caroline De Villiers from Western Cape

 Top Entrepreneur in the Sector: Export Markets is Vanecia Janse from Eastern Cape

The competition first takes place at a provincial level, thereafter the provincial winners of different levels compete at National level. The National winners have already proved their worth at the provincial and competed amongst the best. Some of them have entered more than once  they may not succeed at first but they never give up. They learn from their mistakes, pick themselves up and move along. Others have been in farming for more than 10 years, they do it out of passion - the recognition becomes part of the bigger story. These have been the lessons for us.

The theme of this years awards was Reaffirming the commitment towards women empowerment in the agriculture, forestry, and fisheries sector. Why has this become increasingly important and how will awards such as this further support and encourage the equal participation of women in the industry?

Makonya: The main aim of the awards is to honour the efforts and contribution of women, young females and women with disabilities for the role they continue to play in food security, poverty alleviation, job creation and economic growth within the sector. We want to acknowledge these women for entering into a territory that was not only white but male dominated as well. Acknowledging people, particularly from disadvantaged backgrounds for their contribution is important, what these women are doing is addressing some of the challenges that South Africa is battling with.

Why is it important to attract, empower and celebrate young female farmers in particular?

Makonya: For a long time farming has been a taboo for women, let alone young females. We want to encourage them because there is a lot that can be done in this sector. We also want to demystify the thinking that it is for the uneducated and poor, this is a growing sector with a lot of possibilities. It is only fair that young females are given an opportunity equal to others to showcase their skills and abilities.

What do the awards mean for its recipients? How will it change their situation and the situation of other female farmers who are challenging the status quo?

Makonya: It means a change in the way they have been doing things, all winners receive prize money as well as other benefits. This enables them to buy more equipment, seeds, go for courses or any anything that may improve their working life for the better.
Elanco Animal Health has made scientific and structural advancements toward enhancing responsible antibiotic use and bringing new alternatives to decrease the need for shared-class antibiotics in livestock.

In an update tracking progress of its Eight-Point Antibiotic Stewardship Plan unveiled last year, Elanco announced the following actions:

 Completing label change submissions to remove growth promotion from shared-class antibiotics globally and to require veterinary oversight where infrastructure exists

 Created two new research teams and invested 90 percent of annual food animal research budget to deliver new alternatives

 Eight new candidates moving into Elancos product development pipeline

 $2 million innovation incentive support against five livestock diseases

 Launched or expanded geographic availability of four antibiotic alternatives including vaccines, enzymes, and a protein, and gained approval for two new animal-only antibiotics.

 Creation of nutritional health business to protect animal health using the latest science to improve microbiome

Elanco is committed to bringing greater clarity to issues around antibiotic stewardship and shaping science-based recommendations on responsible use, animal welfare, and the long-term sustainability of the food system," said Jeff Simmons, president, Elanco Animal Health. We have a responsibility to the health and welfare of animals, to treat the ones that get sick while safeguarding antibiotics for future generations through responsible use.

Bacteria resistance is an evolving science, and we must continue to better understand the drivers. Of the 18 organisms identified by the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as antibiotic resistance threats, just two of them were directly related to animal use of antibiotics. Human, animal, and environmental sectors all have a role to play in protecting antibiotics for the long-term. The Elanco Eight-Point Antibiotic Stewardship Plan promotes responsible antibiotic use, decreasing the need for shared-class antibiotics and brings treatment alternatives to livestock producers to keep animals healthy while decreasing the need for shared-class antibiotics.

Among the scientific advances realized:

 Nearly 50 new development ideas have been brought forward for assessment, with eight new candidates moving into Elancos research and development pipeline and 21 additional candidates completing proof-of-concept studies over the next year.

 Research efforts focused on the greatest areas of unmet need for livestock producers where shared-class antibiotics are the only option today.

In 2016, Elanco also launched two animal-only antibiotics for intestinal diseases in pigs and poultry, as well as a completely new non-antibiotic alternative to reduce mastitis in dairy cows, the greatest use of shared-class antibiotics in the dairy industry today. These new products give livestock producers alternatives to protect animal health and welfare without impacting antibiotic treatment outcomes for people.

Elanco is also progressing on a number of other efforts to increase responsible use, including:

 Completed 75 label change submissions to remove growth promotion claims around the world. This includes full compliance with US FDA Guidance 213 in advance of the end-of-year deadline.

 An additional 18 label change submissions will be completed in Latin America by end-of-year.

 Completed submission of 67 labels for shared class molecules to move products from over-the-counter to be under veterinary oversight in the United States, Canada, and Brazil - the countries where over-the-counter use remains and veterinary infrastructure exists.

New commitments

To continue progress made over the past year, Elanco is sustaining its commitment to finding alternatives to antibiotics, said Aaron Schacht, vice president of Elanco Research and Development. Through our internal and external innovation efforts, we are poised to deliver a pipeline with a mix of preventatives and treatments that could help reduce the use of shared-class antibiotics.

By 2020, Elanco aims to deliver a total of 25 viable antibiotic alternative development projects that address critical unmet challenges in livestock production via alternatives to shared-class antibiotics. We believe we can provide solutions that address five of these disease challenges in a fundamentally new way by 2020.

Grand challenge

Elanco will incentivize new innovation from many sources, including internal development, external partnerships, and open source innovation.

The Elanco Advancing Antibiotics Alternatives Grand Challenge, in partnership with InnoCentive, will offer more than $2 million in support and incentives to find new innovation ideas for five of the most challenging livestock diseases that rely on shared-class antibiotics today, including:

 Liver abscesses in beef cattle

 Necrotic enteritis in poultry

 Coccidiosis in poultry

 Lawsonia in pigs

 Strep suis in pigs

The first challenges are now open for response and can be found here.

New nutritional health business unit

Finally, Elanco is creating a nutritional health business to protect and improve animal health using the latest science to improve gastrointestinal health and the microbiome. Early disease prevention with non-medicated feed additives, like enzymes, prebiotics, and probiotics, can improve microbiome health, helping protect from disease even before clinical signs develop thus lessening the need for antibiotics. In addition to Elancos current product in this space, the new business is anticipated to deliver two new non-antibiotic products to customers annually between 2017 and 2020.

Prevention 360: aggregating information, interventions, and innovations

To help prevent diseases and aid early disease detection, Elanco is also introducing Prevention 360 to aggregate the many sources of production, health, and post-harvest data. Prevention 360 will help more effectively identify early indicators of disease, develop alternative production practices and provide product solutions.
The Competition Commission on Wednesday, 14 September 2016, said it was still studying the remedies set down by the Competition Tribunal in the precedent-setting predatory pricing case against Media24.

The commission, which asked for much tougher remedies, is entitled to appeal against the tribunal's rulings.

During the tribunal's hearing into the remedies, the commission sought an interdict against Media24 preventing it from publishing a further title in the Goldfields area for six years.

It also called for Media24 to sponsor a new rival in the area at a cost of R10m. The R10m was to be administered by the Media Diversity Development Agency for three years.

Media24 said it was taking advice from its legal team. "This has been a complex matter and is the first time a contravention of this nature has been prosecuted by the competition authorities." The group's Anika Ebrahim said the company would publish the remedy's terms and explanation in two newspapers by 26 September, as required by the tribunal.

The tribunal rejected the commission's suggested remedies. It also rejected Media24's proposal to spend less than R1m training "would-be journalists" in a bid to remedy the effect of its predatory pricing on media competition in the Goldfields area near Welkom.

In its recently released order, the tribunal described Media24's proposed remedy as "remarkably meagre" and instead ruled that the media group provides 90-day credit facilities for the printing and distribution needs of current and new entrants to the market. This is the first time in its 17-year history the tribunal has set down a remedy for predatory pricing.

The credit facilities are to cover the cost of printing and distribution for any community newspaper in the Goldfields' market. The credit will be provided by printing company Paarl Coldset and door-to-door distributor OnTheDot, which are associates of Media24. The credit facility must be available for three years.

The unusual terms of the tribunal's remedy reflect the unusual circumstances surrounding the case. In September 2015, in the first ruling of its kind, the tribunal found that Media24 used predatory pricing to drive an independent community newspaper out of business.

The case involved a battle for dominance in the Welkom market and Media24's actions were judged to have resulted in the permanent removal of a vibrant independent competitor, Gold Net News (GNN).

In its ruling a year ago, the tribunal said Media24 had used one of its two Welkom-based community newspapers, Forum, as a "fighting brand" to ensure GNN could not survive. Forum charged advertising rates that were below its costs and for a lengthy period operated at a loss. Ten months after GNN was finally forced to close, Forum also closed leaving Media24's second paper, Vista, in a dominant position. This allowed Vista to raise its advertising rates.

Media24 is the first company to be found guilty of predatory pricing in terms of the Competition Act. In an earlier case of predation brought by Nationwide Airways against SAA, no final ruling was made.

The tribunal could not levy a fine against Media24 because the charge of predatory pricing was in terms of section 8(c) of the Competition Act, for which no first-time fines can be levied.

Tribunal member Yasmin Carrim said the market continued to be uncompetitive and it was clear that major challenges for current and potential rivals to Media24 were the expense of printing and distribution.

Source: Business Day via I-Net Bridge
Cabinet has approved the publication of the National Liquor Amendment Bill of 2016 for wider public consultation, Minister in the Presidency for Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation, Jeff Radebe, said on Thursday, 15 September 2016.

Briefing media following Cabinets fortnightly meeting, Minister Radebe said the bill amends the National Liquor Act of 2003.

This was approved together with the final National Liquor Policy which addresses challenges hampering the effectiveness of the Act and facilitated the drafting of the bill, he told reporters.

The bill addresses the socio economic impact of liquor, the slow pace of transformation, standardisation of key aspects of regulation and improved regulatory collaboration. The bill also addresses the eradication of manufacturing and trading of illegal and illicit alcohol, as well as challenges regarding regulatory capacity within the National Liquor Authority.

The intervention also focuses on reducing socio-economic harms and other costs of liquor abuse, restructuring the liquor industry and enhancing cooperation between all spheres of government.

Minister Radebe added that it is aligned with the National Development Plan (NDP) priorities of ensuring effective governance, social protection and employment creation.

It will among others prevent illegal trading, enhance education and awareness programmes and assist in enhanced programmes on rehabilitating those who are addicted, explained Minister Radebe.

National Gambling Amendment Bill

Cabinet also approved the draft National Gambling Amendment Bill for wider public comment. The bill addresses issues hampering the effectiveness of the National Gambling Act of 2004.

The bill aims to ensure that cooperative governance and oversight functions are improved and that regulatory certainty and negative effects of gambling are drastically reduced.

It will focus on enhancing existing gambling activities and no new gambling activities will be introduced. The bill will ensure that vulnerable groups such as minors and problem gamblers are protected and will be able to access assistance from organisations such as the National Gambling Regulator, Minister Radebe told media.

The bill is aligned with priorities of the NDP with a view to ensure effective governance, social protection, employment creation, recreation and leisure.
According to Kevin Jacobs, broker/owner of RE/MAX Premier, over the last six months there has been a notable increase in the demand for property in the Cape Town's Southern Suburbs.

While many areas throughout the country have seen a slow-down in buyer activity, the Southern Suburbs have bucked trends with demand on the increase. Demand for investment property has been particularly strong, especially sectional title units located in Kenilworth, Claremont, Newlands and Rondebosch. This is mainly due to the fact that properties within these areas offer good yields, as they are centrally located and sought-after among students and younger generation home buyers, says Jacobs.

He adds that another reason why the Southern Suburbs have seen an increase in buyer activity is that there are a number of new developments that have recently become available. We have seen a trend of investors purchasing freestanding homes that are situated on larger stands with the view of developing the property into smaller sectional title scheme units.

Freestanding family homes

It is not only the sectional title units that are selling well. According to Jacobs, there has also been an increase in the number of buyers wanting to purchase larger residential freestanding family homes. He notes that homes that are correctly priced between the R5m and R7m mark are selling relatively quickly. Homes priced correctly below R3m are highly sought-after, often selling within days of being listed on the market.

According to Jacobs, while local buyers still make up the majority of consumers purchasing property in the Southern Suburbs, there has been a marked increase in the number of buyers who are relocating from Johannesburg, Durban and Port Elizabeth.

Buyers are drawn to the Southern Suburbs because of large array of excellent amenities on offer, such as good schools, universities, hospitals, shopping centres and businesses. Many people are looking to relocate the area because it is centrally located and has easy access to both Cape Towns CBD and the Southern Peninsula. Southern Suburbs residents can easily commute into the centre of town for business or hit the beach on the weekends  nothing is too far, says Jacobs. Rondebosch East has seen an increase in demand among the Muslim community who are looking for property close to the local mosques. A trend among the community is to purchase properties that are redeveloped into multi-storey luxury homes."

Negative impact of overpricing

Jacobs says that the only properties in the Southern Suburbs that are not selling well are those that are perceived to be overpriced. Listing a property at the correct price cannot be overemphasised. A trend that we have seen is that these specific properties are listed with more than three agencies, the agent commission is usually low and the properties sometimes take up to six months or more to sell, and normally at prices that are substantially less than original asking. In some severe cases, the property can sell for less than its actual value, which is mainly due to buyers and agents developing a negative perception about the property over a period of time, says Jacobs.

Adrian Goslett, regional director and CEO of RE/MAX of Southern Africa, says that when a property has been on the market for some time it gets a negative stigma attached to it, the seller appears desperate to sell with the perception being that there is something wrong with the property.

Correctly-priced homes are selling and selling well in the Southern Suburbs. Homeowners who are looking to sell their property will be able to take advantage of the upward tick of buyer activity in the area, provided they list their home at fair-market value, Jacobs concludes.
Opened in 1979, Sun City has become one of South Africa's best-known resorts over the years. The complex is in the final stages of a revamp to the tune of more than R1-billion to grow its popularity further still and entrench its positions as a top lifestyle destination.

Since it was first built, Sun City has been recognised as the destination that provides something for everyone  from luxury travellers to fun-seeking families, couples looking for a romantic getaway or adrenalin-seekers looking for the very best adventure.

Cabanas revitalised

Continuing that tradition is the revitalisation of the Cabanas hotel which, after its upgrade, now offers a trendy, modern island-style atmosphere for all guests to enjoy.

Ntebi Mathope, Colin Jonkers, Claudia Henkel

Says Mike Van Vuuren, resort general manager of Sun City: The Cabanas hotel offers a fantastic mix of accommodation and services. Its in a perfect setting for guests near the Sun City Waterworld Lake, ensuring they have a base from which to explore the resort.

Valley of Waves upgraded

Part of the extensive upgrade is the Valley of Waves, known as one of the greatest water parks in Africa and very popular with Cabanas guests.

A complete transformation of the Valley of Waves includes the addition of two new slides, Nobels Descent and Ovango. The food and beverage offering at the Valley of Waves has also been reinvigorated to ensure a fun foodie beachside experience. Guests now have the choice of two new food outlets to choose from, The Brew Monkey and Food Factory.

The Brew Monkey is a gastro pub with a rustic microbrewery feel that overlooks the wave pool, and Food Factory is a fast food outlet offering a selection of freshly prepared meals.

Said Van Vuuren: We invite people to come and experience the changes for themselves. Take a slide down the Nobles Descent and enjoy a burger on the beach with friends and family and end your day around the fire pits at Cabanas. There is something for everyone and were really excited about creating lasting memories for with guests."
Joint chairperson of cash-strapped Skywise Airlines, Javed Malik, is a frontrunner to fill the position of CEO of Mango Airlines, South African Airways' low-cost subsidiary. This is the first time that Mango has had to find a new CEO since it was founded in 2006, following the resignation of its longtime head, Nico Bezuidenhout.

Bezuidenhout effectively resigned from the position at the end of July to head up Fastjet, the London-listed low-cost carrier that focuses on Africa. He has twice been the acting CEO of SAA and clashed repeatedly with SAA chairwoman Dudu Myeni, who is a close friend of President Jacob Zuma.

Last month, Business Day reported that Myeni was lobbying to place former Business Unity SA CE Jerry Vilakazi as CEO at Mango, as a precursor to him becoming the next CEO of SAA. However, Vilakazi denied this.

Newcomer and low-cost airline Skywise was launched in February last year but was grounded by Airports Company SA in December for failure to pay R4m in airport fees relating to the landing, take-off, and parking of aircraft and related service charges. The cash-strapped company has made a number of attempts to secure funding to pay off its debts and fund its operations.

In December, the Financial Services Board shot down Skywise 's attempt at a crowd-funding scheme, when it set up a website on which it offered 1,500 shares at R100,000 each and gave potential investors three days to buy in without first viewing the airline's share prospectus - a contravention of the Companies Act.

On Wednesday, Skywise said in a statement that it was in the final stages of a shareholder deal with a new investor, a promoter of new commercial aircraft.

Mango board chair Rashid Wally said no offer had been made to Malik for the position of CEO. He said he had met with Malik a few times to get to know him. The process of appointing a new permanent CEO could take three to six months and would still require Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan's approval. "It is a challenge filling the position of CEO. It is easier to fill in other industries but there is a scarcity of aviation experience," he said.

Malik would not say if he had received an offer from Mango. However, he said he had resigned from Skywise to pursue "much more challenging roles in the industry".

"If I were to be approached by Mango, it would be an honour. And I would be the first to take the process of transformation further."

Source: Business Day
According to the head of the South African Civil Aviation Authority (SACAA), Poppy Khoza, the threats facing civil aviation security have changed dramatically over recent years and require collaboration among role-players in order to remain a yard ahead of those behind terror attacks. Khoza was addressing delegates attending the inaugural annual aviation security event.

Hiljon via pixabay

The challenge in countering aviation security in recent years is that perpetrators have become more sophisticated in their approach and this has necessitated a refined approach from aviation security specialists. Terror tactics have evolved and we cannot rely on old methods to counter new and emerging threats. We ought to collaborate, coordinate and communicate to better equip ourselves to save the lives of many innocent people, Khoza said at the start of the two-day seminar.

Being mindful of emerging trends and threats

Khoza, who is also the chairperson of the International Civil Aviation Organisations (ICAO) Aviation Security Panel, said that those responsible for aviation security should be mindful of the emerging trends relating to terror attacks, which now include, among others, cyber and insider threat.

The aviation security fraternity cannot overlook the implications of the theft of information and intelligence, which could find its way into the hands of those who would want to cause mayhem. The more we try to innovate, the higher the risks we attract. This means that risk assessment ought to be continuous and mitigated appropriately as those with ill intentions are watching every move to identify gaps they can exploit.

Khoza also said that whilst the increase in passenger numbers is good for economic growth, there are others that regard it as an ideal target for terror attacks. We have noted an increase in security incidents in the latter part of 2015, notably the Brussels Airport and the Ataturk Airport in Istanbul. The bigger the airport or aircraft capacity, the higher the risk. Our infrastructure and technological innovation must always be designed with this reality in mind, as a mass target is the aim for terrorists.

Non-aviation activities at airports a weakness

With this in mind, security experts acknowledge that airports are a hype of activity and have in most instances evolved into bigger shopping malls with a runway. This means that there are a lot of non-aviation activities, key among them being the retail business. This means that non-aviation employees are not selected and screened as carefully as travellers and those who work in the aviation industry. Terror syndicates are gradually moving in to take advantage of this weakness. Moreover, we no longer have a single description of who the terrorist is, it can be anyone including the employees we trust, explained Khoza.

Other areas of concern

Other presenters, which include local and international experts, delved into other areas of concern including the risk posed by remotely piloted aircraft systems, commonly known as drones. Landside security is another topic that stimulated dialogue during the seminar. The dialogue also focused on new and emerging threats in civil aviation security and countermeasures that should be implemented such as behaviour detection and the profile of the terrorist.

The SACAA continuously reviews security measures at South African airports to ensure that they meet both local and international legislative requirements.

Similarly, the country, through the SACAA, gets intermittently audited by reputable international organisations on many and varied aspects of civil aviation administration, which among others, include security systems. All the audits to date have indicated that South Africa is compliant with global prescripts and have in a few instances exceeded requirements.

Whilst South Africas security systems and procedures continue to be endorsed as world-class, we can never afford to be complacent and must, therefore, use gatherings such as this to remind ourselves of our joined responsibility to safeguard the lives of those that are involved in air travel. After all, no country or operator is immune to possible security breaches or can claim to have a 100% fool-proof security system, Khoza asserted.
Over 200 people attended Meltwater's Outside Insight event held in Johannesburg, which shared insights on modern industry best practices for brands and agencies involved in online marketing. One of the key insights was that growth occurs when digital marketers humanise the brand.

 Kasto via 123RF

The event focused on how South Africas top businesses have disrupted outdated best practices by exploring how companies could apply a growth hacking mindset towards their marketing strategies. Growth hacking, initially a phrase that emerged from a tech start-up community, relies on innovative and inexpensive tactics to drive client acquisition and engagement.

Brett StClair (Barclays Africa), Jeanine Ferreira (Vodacom), MJ Khan (Sasol) and Jarred Cinman (NATIVE VML), exchanged knowledge on how brands and agencies could be more innovative, and more importantly, effective, when it comes to online marketing.

Humanise brands

According to MJ Khan, Sasols group online manager, content has very little value if it doesnt address where the audience is right now. The reason a product or service resonates with an audience is because it was right for them at that point in their life.

Brands need to ask themselves, how can we address the needs of peoples issues right now, instead of the generic spray and pray approach, explains Khan. He emphasises the need for content to be about the audience and not about the brand in the digital age. Meltwaters own Johannesburg managing director, Matthew Barclay, also reiterated the point by touching on how smart media contact database software could allow companies to growth hack their digital influence by communicating highly specific messaging to industry relevant influencers and journalists.

Khan also touched on the importance of instant messaging and referenced the popularity of WhatsApp. He used the example of Sasols Bursary Programme campaign last year, whereby they dedicated a WhatsApp number and a community manager for the specific channel. They went from 30,000 applications to 52,000 applications just by using the WhatsApp platform alone. Students just want to ask questions, they dont want to call or engage face-to-face and we tapped into this, says Khan.

Brett StClair, head of Digital Products at Barclays Africa, shared in this sentiment by stressing key partnerships that have relevant platforms for your brands audience. His advice is to find the right partner so that you can develop a win-win and win  the third win being a happy customer.

How does one, growth-hack

StClair also went on to share that growth-hacking starts with really understanding who your customer is; encouraging marketers to embrace failure on the journey to discovering how best to interact with their customers:

Youve got to try things so that you can fail and then try again. Weve tried campaigns based on our own assumptions of what our customers wanted and we failed. When growth-hacking, be sure that you are either proving or disproving assumptions so that you have a good understanding of what you are promoting. Its important to listen to what your audience wants. Growth hacking is about taking advantage of your early adopter, someone who is willing to try your product and give you feedback. StClair used the example of dogfooding which refers to companies using their own staff to try and test products or services.

Jeanine Ferreira, digital marketing portfolio manager for Vodacom, showcased the companys recent NXT LVL campaign as an example of how to secure wide-scale buy-in from the youth market, with specific emphasis on young women. She had advocated that in order to maximise campaign success, brands should:

Make sure your campaign instructions are clear and form part of the overall campaign



Combine online and offline for maximum effect



No brand is an island  enlist the help of subject matter experts to grow your reach and engagement



Find the balance between love and money  there needs to be a visible link between your brand campaigns and sales conversations.



Put your money where your mouth is and follow through with your campaign commitments

Panel Discussion: Digital faux pas, transformation and trends

On the topic of where brands are missing the mark on digital, Meltwaters EMEA marketing director, Heidi Myers, went on to explain that the most common mistake shes identified in the digital space concerns a lack of consideration for organisational goals and ROI when committing to marketing activities.

Brett StClair added that marketers tend to throw away campaign data. We think its great that our campaign trended, but we dont delve into the data behind it to understand what went wrong. This underpinned the necessity of using a media intelligence platform to capture data and analyse conversations that are taking place online.

Jarred Cinman - NATIVE VMLs managing director - went on to explain, A big challenge in the digital industry in South Africa is that we are still untransformed. The marketers in this country are mostly white people who are talking to a market they dont understand and because of this we are seeing a lot of badly worded content that is completely out of touch with the audience. It all comes down to authenticity, people are looking to make a connection, to feel moved or touched by something, and they will then amplify the message for you.

When tasked with identifying future trends across South Africas digital landscape, the panellists had forecast:
Today sees the release of ISO's latest album, 'Polydimension'. I got in touch with vocalist Richard Brokensha to find out about the band's sixth studio release as well as his thoughts on the SA music scene.

What was the recording process like for Polydimension?

We recorded the album live together in one room over two days. It was a really fun process and we got to spend a lot of time together working as well as enjoying each others company.

If this album could be described as a meal, what would it be?

Gourmet buffet :)

Any particularly favourite songs off the new album?

Personally I love Evolution and State of Blue.

How do you conceptualise your live shows?

We work from the concept of the album, so we try and tie in our look as well as our production to work alongside the look of the album. We also spend a lot of time on the set list and how it flows in order to capture the vibe of what we are trying to conceptually deliver.

How has your sound changed with the replacement of drummer Marko Benini to Nick Mc Creadie?

They are both great drummers, so we still managed to retain our progressive element on the drums. Nic is an awesome musician and he really adds his own special flavour to the overall sound. There is a new element in the sound now and I am really enjoying the grooves he comes up with.

Where will you be touring the new album?

All across beautiful South Africa and hopefully we will head to Europe again soon.

What are your thoughts on the local music scene?

We have a mix of such amazing musicians in this country and I am really proud to be a South African and see how our scene competes on a global stage. We really do have the talent and with a bit more infrastructure to showcase this, I think our industry can only flourish.

Which local acts are currently getting you excited?

Acadamie

Whats next?

We will be performing our brand new music to the fans and getting out there on the stages. We will see from there how they respond. We will just be creating new music and ideas as well as developing our band in the coming months with our awesome team.

Polydimension is available for purchase on iTunes

Images by Sean Brand

isoband.net
Monica Luscay Kyzer (29), a Kimberley-born female technician at Maserati South Africa, could be deemed a diamond among the rough in more ways than one.

She followed a traditional educational path up to Grade 10, following the passing of her mom, after which a decision was made to be home schooled. This resulted in an opportunity to enrol at a technical school and in her fourth year (N4 level) she was offered an internship with Mercedes Benz Daimler.

Career motivation

Testament to her career choice was the unquestionable advice from her mother: Know the car that you are driving, so that one day if you ever break down while on your own, you will know what to do. It played a fundamental role in her decision to pursue a career in the motor industry.

Kyzer currently holds the position of service advisor at Maserati South Africa at their dealership in Cape Town, a position that allows her to be completely immersed in her passion for luxury performance cars.

What mostly excites Kyzer about her role at Maserati is that while the motoring industry is traditionally male dominated, she is in fact the only female technician working on the Maserati brand in South Africa in a service advisory capacity. While that might mean that she is treated as one of the guys, this grease monkey is proud that she is actually not just one of the guys. What makes her different is that she is female and that makes her stand out.

If client service is your strength, then this will be a rewarding job because I definitely feel a sense of job satisfaction being directly involved with developing and growing client relationships, she says.

Although shy, Kyzer considers her best attributes to be: honesty, kindness, determination and loyalty. This, coupled with the unfailing support of her parents is what has ultimately contributed to her success.

Words of wisdom

Kyzers advice to young women who are interested in pursuing a career in the motoring industry: Don't be afraid to go for something which is your passion in life. The motoring industry can be a great opportunity to achieve your dream career. Even when you feel like giving up, make sure you get up and continue. Its like running a race, either you do it alone, or someone turns around, picks you up and runs with you to the finish line.

She also says that young women should be determined and motivated, have great communication skills and be willing to be a team player. The minimum requirements for a job of this nature would include a Matric certificate, good language skills, mathematics as a subject and any other technical qualification.

Her attitude towards a days work: No challenge you face is too big or too small, take it as it comes and try to resolve it as efficiently and smoothly as possible.

In her spare time, Kyzer enjoys taking walks on the beach, long-distance drives, listening to music, hiking and, above all, spending time with her family.

Source: Maserati South Africa
The Southern African Freelancers' Association (SAFREA) has announced its solidarity with its media alliance partner, the Association of Freelance Journalists Kenya (AFJK), and other Kenyan institutions as they petition against unwarranted harassment of media professionals. The 3 September death of journalist Joseph Masha served as the catalyst for the petition.

 rawpixel via 123RF

According to media reports, Masha's was one of five mysterious journalist deaths in the past year.

Fair and balanced reporting is the hallmark of good journalistic practice, and our colleagues across the continent must be given the opportunity to do their jobs without having to fear for their safety or their lives, says SAFREA chair Laura Rawden.

On 9 September, Nairobi-based journalists marched in protest against what they called mysterious killings and harassment of local journalists. Amongst such incidents they named the alleged poisoning of Masha, a journalist with the Kilifi-based Standard Newspaper, following his meeting with a local politician.

Various agencies and actors of the government, and in some cases citizens, have taken it upon themselves to normalise, justify and rationalise harassment, stalking, physical abuse, online bashing, physical assaults, and in some cases attempted assassinations of journalists on the basis of unfavourable reporting, the journalists said in a petition they brought to the country's Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), Keriako Tobiko.

SAFREA is shocked and saddened to hear of these alleged incidents. The news serves to drive even stronger commitment to its new partnership with AFJK to form the Alliance of African Media Associations (AAMA), an initiative that acts to support the rights, skills and general recognition of media practitioners in Africa.

By working together, it is our hope that we can strengthen the media industry and encourage support and protection for the journalists working in it, says Rawden.

As Kenya approaches its 2017 national elections, SAFREA joins calls from Kenyas journalism fraternity for national government to protect media professionals and encourage fair reporting as stated in the Kenyan Constitution.
The Master Builders Association of the Western Cape (MBAWC) recently held its annual general meeting at which John Matthews, president of the organisation, discussed construction activity and projects within the province. Two of its apprentices were also awarded at the AGM.

It would appear that much of the worlds economy, including South Africa, has taken on a holding pattern and this is further portrayed in the countrys GDP growth figures. However, Cape Town seems to have escaped the downturn and construction activity here continues to boost the local economy, said Matthews.

He elaborated on the state of the building industry in the province, saying: We continue to see high levels of activity in and around the Cape Town CBD, the V&A Waterfront as well as the Atlantic Seaboard. These activities certainly indicate the level of confidence that investors still have in the future of our city.

He added that both the Western Cape Government and the City of Cape Town have continued to award significant numbers of projects in the areas of health, education and housing. We are fortunate to have these two spheres of government that operate in a relatively efficient manner and also abide by the principles of good corporate governance, thus making a significant contribution to our local construction industry. I trust that this will continue now that the local government elections are done and the status quo in Cape Town, with regards to political leadership, has been re-affirmed.

Matthews concluded by saying: Although most of our members and the contracting fraternity at large seem to have reasonable order books and sufficient projects on hand, this remains a very competitive industry with tight tendering and low margins remaining the order of the day. Our industry seems to be fixed in a low margin mind-set and one wonders what sort of volumes of work would be required to raise profit margins to a level that would adequately compensate contractors and subcontractors for the risks that they expose themselves to in their daily business operations.

Apprentices awarded

At the AGM, awards were bestowed upon two apprentices who have shown particular promise as future master builders in the organisations apprenticeship programme. Abduragmaan Lamara from Mitchells Plain was awarded the Buckland Apprentice of the Year Award, while the Rob Johnson Award for Young Apprentice Carpenter of the Year went to Quee-yam Daniels from Kensington.

Lamara, who joined the MBAWCs apprenticeship programme in 2014, has completed all of his theoretical and practical training whilst doing his in-service site training with GVK-Siya Zama. His supervisors have praised his eagerness to learn and his sharp focus on the task at hand. His positivity in the workplace and can-do attitude when faced with difficulties were also highlighted. The youngster is currently awaiting his trade test.

Daniels, who also joined the programme in 2014, completed his in-house training at GVK-Siya Zama too. His good work ethic and willingness to make himself available as a source of support to all on the job site have set him aside as a young hopeful to watch. He too is awaiting his trade test.

This year marked the second year that the Rob Johnson Award has been given and the 11th for the Buckland Award.
THE manufacture and procurement of set-top boxes, which will be required when digital migration occurs, has been halted pending the conclusion of the legal battle over the nonencryption of the converters, Parliament heard on Thursday.

The move will further delay migration from analogue to digital broadcasting, which is required to free up broadband spectrum and boost connectivity.

The Universal Services and Access Agency of SA (Usaasa), which is implementing the digital migration process, addressed a joint meeting of the portfolio committee on communications and telecommunications and postal service.

The agency said it had decided to "err on the side of caution" and suspend the manufacture and procurement of new set-top boxes until the Constitutional Court has ruled on the validity of an alteration to the Broadcasting Digital Migration Policy, which states that statesubsidised set-top boxes should not be capable of encrypting broadcasting signals.

The alteration was introduced by Communications Minister Faith Muthambi and was contested by e.tv, which won its case in the Supreme Court of Appeal in May.

However, Muthambi, who also addressed the committee, told the MPs the migration process would continue with the boxes that are already available, despite the Usaasa decision.

Muthambi accused the Usaasa board of "doing things without engaging the ministry". The Supreme Court of Appeal had not interdicted the rollout of the digital migration process, she said.

SA already lags much of Africa on digital migration and missed last year's International Telecommunications Union deadline of mid-June to switch its signal to digital.

The ANC has been divided over the matter, with the national general council backing encryption and Muthambi opposing it.

E.tv says the state-subsidised set-top boxes should support encryption, and its ability to encrypt future broadcasts is "essential to its business plans".

Muthambi and private broadcaster M-Net have launched a Constitutional Court appeal against the appeal court's finding. The case is set to be heard in February next year.

Muthambi told MPs the department had solid grounds to challenge the ruling and encryption would be tantamount to subsiding e.tv.

Last year, Usaasa announced a list of bidders that each won a piece of the multimillion-rand set-top box tender.

However, Usaasa board member Lungelwa Shandu said it would not be prudent to continue with buying set-top boxes because of the pending Constitutional Court hearing.

The agency would, however, continue to distribute set-top boxes already manufactured.

"We have made a decision to suspend the further manufacturing or placement of orders of the set-top boxes... as we might be found to have embarked on a process that is wasteful and fruitless. However, we are open to engagements to find a lasting solution which is legally defensible," said Shandu.

Mmamoloko Kubayi, chairwoman of the portfolio committee on telecommunications and postal services, said the delays in the digital migration process were affecting the entire telecommunications sector as it awaited the spectrum.

National Association of Manufacturers in Electronic Components secretary-general Adil Nchabeleng said the association supported Usaasa's decision.

"We applaud the decision irrespective of its impact on manufacturers. It's responsible because we do not know what the Constitutional Court ruling will say... but we do hope the minister will withdraw her court challenge to allow digital migration to be concluded soon."

Source: Business Day
Urban Brew Studios would like to congratulate their chief content officer, Markus Davies, who was selected as an International Emmy Awards juror this year. Davies who was invited by Academy Member Leopold Hoesch to join the Academy of Arts and Television as a full time member in 2014, was also a juror in the semi-final round of the Emmy Awards last year.

In June this year he travelled to Cologne, Germany to participate on the panel judging "Current Affairs and News. Davies says it was a great honour to be invited as a juror for the second time, Being able to be in a position to judge some of the worlds best content is always a fantastic honour, but it comes with real gravitas and responsibility. The process is tough, and the Academy demands of you a fair and just evaluation: remember, the Emmy is a very serious award. Thousands of filmmakers around the world aim to be recognised by this award.

Davies says that the category of Current Affairs is very close to his heart, having produced a documentary called Battle Ground Afghanistan in 2012. This doccie was itself nominated by National Geographic to contend for a Prime Time US Emmy in the category Current Affairs.

Urban Brews CEO Trish Taylor says, Markus who has been involved in the film and television industry since 1996, has extensive experience in film making and this honour is well-deserved and comes as no surprise to us. Markus, who is a producer and director, is also an active participant in the Global broadcasting business with a finger on the pulse in the industry and as such we believe a compelling Emmy Awards juror.




The Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) has recommended training for police and other security forces that is focused on protecting the safety of journalists, as part of efforts to prevent violent extremism (PVE) and countering violent extremism (CVE).

Image by 123RF

The MFWA also called for accountability, particularly prosecutions, for crimes against journalists in order to enable journalists to feel safe about reporting on sensitive topics, including violent extremism.

These recommendations were part of the MFWA's submission to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in line with the UN organ's compilation of best practices and lessons on how upholding human rights can contribute to PVE and CVE.

The submission expressed great concern that police and other security forces regularly violate the right to freedom of expression, especially press freedom rights. The persistence of crimes against journalists, impunity and acts of censorship preventseven precludesthe media from performing its duty as a provider of information.

For example, in Nigeria last year, the military attacked the media for reporting on the role of international assistance in Nigeria's CVE strategy against Boko Haram. The attack led to widespread self-censorship among the media with regard to reportage on the anti-Boko Haram war.

The MFWA made five major recommendations to the OHCHR:

PVE and CVE strategists should understand the promotion of freedom of expression, including press freedom, as more than just a tool of PVE and CVE programming and efforts.

Police and other security forces must receive human rights training, particularly on the need to respect and protect freedom of expression, including press freedom, and the safety of journalists.

States should take steps to end impunity for crimes against journalists and the media generally. The lack of accountability, particularly prosecutions, for crimes against journalists creates a culture of impunity, facilitates future attacks and pushes journalists to self-censor on a range of topics, including violent extremism.

States should build the capacity of journalists and the media to report on issues related to violent extremism, which entails creating an enabling environment for the media to perform its functions.

The media must behave with increased professionalism, which will facilitate its ability to support and educate the public on PVE and CVE programming and efforts.

Click here for the full submission by the MFWA. OHCHR's Compilation Report is a collection of best practices on how to combat violent extremism as part of the UN High Commissioner's Action Plan on the issue.

Source: mfwa.org.
'Conflicted: The Fight Over Congo's Minerals' is nominated for an Emmy Award for 'Outstanding Business and Economic Reporting in a News Magazine'. It's one of five 'Fault Lines' episodes nominated and one of 10 nominations for Al Jazeera.

Conflicted

Despite being home to $24 trillion worth of untapped mineral reserves, the Democratic Republic of Congo remains one of the least developed countries in the world. Conflicted: The Fight Over Congos Minerals investigates the impact of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Acts Section 1502, added in 2010, which requires publicly traded companies to track whether their products contain conflict minerals from the DRC.



Fault Lines Anjali Kamat travels to the eastern hills of the country, where tantalum, tungsten and tin are mined by hand before making their way into electronic devices across the world. She discovers that after the law was passed, the mineral trade in eastern Congo came to a standstill, as buyers took their business elsewhere.

We are working now at 20% of our normal capacity, says John Kanyoni, managing director of Metachem Sarl. [We've lost] a lot of money... Those who did that feeling that they helped Congo, they didn't help Congo at all. It harmed thousands and thousands of Congolese.

After finding evidence of fraud and smuggling, Fault Lines questions why advocacy groups who campaigned for Section 1502 claim it has been a success, and if some of biggest brands in the tech industry should really be claiming to be sourcing conflict-free and taking credit for reducing violence in the DRC.

Congolese journalist Caleb Kabanda worked on the documentary as Fault Lines fixer, while another local journalist and photographer, Pascal Bashombana, helped with research, pre-production and translation. Kenyan Franklyn Odhiambo also contributed to the translation and transcription.

The 37th Annual News and Documentary Emmy Awards are being held in New York next Wednesday, 21 September 2016.

We live in a world run through with fault lines and Al Jazeera's Fault Lines takes you beyond the headlines, holding the powerful to account across the U.S. and the Americas. The acclaimed series has won Emmy, International Emmy, and Peabody Awards.
From Begging On Streets To Studying At Cambridge Life oi-Syeda Farah

Have you ever heard of stories of young children who spent their childhood begging, but later became the richest people, as their destiny changed? Though there are many cases of poor people making it big, there are a few that will really touch your heart.

Here, in this article, we are about to share the story of a beggar who made it big and he apparently studied in Cambridge and was all set to travel to Italy.

Find out about the guy who has been working really hard and trying to make his own identity known to the world.

Check out the story of Jayavel from the streets of Chennai, India, who became an inspiration for people around the world, especially when you have nothing except your willingness to change your own destiny. Read on to know more...

His Dad Became A Miser... Jayavel's family had to migrate from Nellore, in the 80s. This was due to a failed crop season. This was the time the fate of his entire family changed. They Chose Begging As A Living... The family had a tough time to find a living and hence started begging on the streets of Chennai. They slept on pavements, and when it rained during the nights, they would take protection near shop pavements, until the policemen chased them away. His Earnings Were Taken Away By His Mother... Due to the sad state of the family, the mother had turned to an alcoholic addict and all of Jayavel's earnings were taken away from him for her personal expenses. This led Jayavel to have less money for his own expenses. He Met Uma Muthuraman  His Saviour! Uma Muthuraman was doing a project on the lives of street kids in Chennai, when she came across Jayavel. She instantly decided to help him and took him under her NGO "Suyam Charitable Trust". There Started His New Story... With the funding he got from the NGO, he got proper education and he completed his 12th grade with good marks. This prompted some donors to provide him a free loan amount for his higher grades. He Then Went On To Clear The Cambridge University's Entrance Exam! After that, he cleared the Cambridge University's entrance examination and got a seat in Glyndwr University, Wales, United Kingdom. He took up the 'Performance Car Enhancement Technology Engineering' course to study. This course deals with enhancing the performance of race cars. And, his mother still lives on streets...
Menstrual Taboos According To Various Religions In India Life oi-Staff

Menstrual taboo is a social taboo primarily concerned with menstruation of a female. Menstruation is recognised as a social taboo in India, where a menstruating woman is considered to be tainted.

In most of the societies and religions, menstruation and in general a menstruating woman is considered ritually unclean.

Also Read: Shocking Religious Traditions In India

Different religions and cultures view menstruation in different ways, but still it is one among the stigmas of the Indian society.

Here, we mention to you about menstrual taboos according to various religions in India. Have a look and find out how these taboos are observed across different religions.

1. Hinduism According to the Hindu religion, a menstruating woman is considered to be unclean and is given a set of rules to follow. A Hindu menstruating woman is not allowed to enter kitchen (having a pooja room) and temples. She is prohibited from talking loudly, wearing flowers or touching a person. Yes, these rituals are still followed! A menstruating woman is considered as forbidden in the society who is not even allowed to return to her family until her period ends. 2. Islam A menstruating woman is excused from performing any ritual or religious activities during this period. Any kind of physical relationship is strictly prohibited under the Islam religion. A menstruating woman is allowed to be present during the festive season; however, she is exempted from prayers. 3. Christianity On the perception of uncleanness, Christianity considers a menstruating woman as unclean. Others think that this law should be discarded, as Jesus allowed himself to be touched by a menstruating woman to cure him. 4. Sikhism According to Sikhism, a menstruating woman is considered as clean as a man is. Guru Nanak, the founder of Sikhism, rebuked the tradition of treating women as impure while menstruating. A menstruating woman is not considered as unclean, in fact she is allowed to offer prayers during this period and do Seva as well. Sikhism makes it clear with the message that a menstruating woman is pure, as it is known that the menstrual cycle is a natural process given by God. 5. Judaism According to Judaism, anyone who touches a menstruating woman would be unclean until he takes a bath. Having physical intercourse during such a time is strictly prohibited in Judaism, and anyone going against it would be strictly punished. 6. Special Law In Kashmir The Kashmiri's have their own taboos and beliefs when it comes to menstruation. According to the state law, a menstruating woman is not considered as an untouchable. In fact, she is taken care by the whole family. According to Kashmiris, they believe that serving a menstruating woman will help them to get some blessings from god.
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BEIJING (PTI): China on Thursday night successfully launched its second experimental space lab as part of an ambitious programme by the Communist giant to build a manned space station by 2022, the time when US-led International Space Station expected to go out of service.



The Tiangong-2 space lab was successfully launched from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in northwestern China's Gobi desert.



"It was text book launch. It reached the designated orbit in about 10 minutes," an official in-charge of the mission announced over the state-run TV which telecast the launch live.



"The mission is complete success and the space lab reached its designated orbit," the official said.



China's manned space program has now entered a new phase of application and development," Wu Ping, deputy director of China's manned space engineering office, said.



In a cloud of brown smoke, Tiangong-2 roared into the air underneath a mid-autumn full moon from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on the back of a Long March-2F rocket, trailing a vast volume of flame, the official Xinhua news agency reported.



China's ambitious space programme aims for a manned space station by 2022. China's space station is expected to be sent into orbit just as the US-led International Space Station goes out of service -- making China potentially the only country with a permanent space presence.



The 8.6-tonne space lab will manoeuvre itself into an orbit about 380 kms above the Earth for initial on-orbit tests.



It will transfer to a slightly higher orbit at about 393 kilometers above the Earths surface by next month before a manned space ship called Shenzhou-11 would ferry two astronauts into space to dock with the lab.



The two astronauts will work in Tiangong-2 for 30 days including manual and automatic docking before reentering the Earths atmosphere.



In April 2017, China's first cargo ship Tianzhou-1, which literally means "heavenly vessel," will also be sent into orbit to dock with the space lab and provide it with fuel and other supplies.



China, which conducted its first manned space mission in 2003 also plans to launch its Mars mission in 2020 to catch up with India, the US, Russia and the EU to reach the red planet.



As it launched the second space station, China on Wednesday announced that its first space lab Tiangong-1 is expected to fall into the Earth's atmosphere in the latter half of 2017.



Tiangong-1 was launched in September, 2011 and ended its data service in March this year, when it had "comprehensively fulfilled its historical mission," Wu Ping, deputy director of the manned space engineering office told media on Wednesday.



The space lab is currently intact and orbiting at an average height of 370 kilometers, she said.



It was in service for four and a half years, two and a half years longer than its designed life, and had docked with Shenzhou-8, Shenzhou-9 and Shenzhou-10 spacecraft and undertaken a series of tasks, making important contributions to China's manned space cause, Wu said.



"Based on our calculation and analysis, most parts of the space lab will burn up during falling," she said, adding that it was unlikely to affect aviation activities or cause damage to the ground.



China has always highly valued the management of space debris, conducting research and tests on space debris mitigation and cleaning, Wu said.



Now, China will continue to monitor Tiangong-1 and strengthen early warning for possible collision with objects.



If necessary, China will release a forecast of its falling and report it internationally, Wu said.



China will begin building a space station that is more economically efficient and uses more data than the current International Space Station (ISS), starting from next year, chief engineer of China's manned space programme Zhou Jianping said.



"Once the space lab mission comes to an end, China will start building our own space station," he told state-run Xinhua news agency, adding that China will launch a core module of the space station around 2018.



China's space station will consist of three parts, weighing over 60 tonnes, said Zhou, adding that it will be smaller than the ISS and be able to dock with two manned spacecraft and one cargo spacecraft at most.



Zhou said the station is designed to house a maximum of six astronauts.



"After the building of the space station, manned space flight will become normal, which means China will send at least six astronauts in two groups to space each year," he added.



Zhu Zongpeng, chief designer of China's space lab system, said construction of the space station will be completed by around 2020 and it will enter into service around 2022, with an initial designed life of at least 10 years.



Astronauts could soon be stationed in orbit for missions that last more than one year, Zhu said.



China has been actively developing a three-step manned space programme.



The first step, to send an astronaut into space and return safely, was fulfilled by Yang Liwei in the Shenzhou-5 mission in 2003.



The second step was developing advanced space flight techniques and technologies including extra-vehicular activity and orbital docking.



This phase also includes the launch of two space laboratories - effectively mini space-stations that can be manned on a temporary basis.



The next step will be to assemble and operate a permanent manned space station.


New faculty arrive on Brandeis campus

A total of 19 new faculty members and visiting professors have been welcomed to the Brandeis campus this fall.



The College of Arts and Science has introduced 17 faculty members, including two visiting professors, and the Brandeis International Business School welcomed two faculty members, one being a visiting professor.

The knowledge, teaching expertise and research these new faculty bring will enrich our campus and beyond, Provost Lisa Lynch said. I encourage everyone in the Brandeis community to extend a warm welcome to this group of accomplished teachers and scholars.

Here is a look at the newest members of the Brandeis faculty:

College of Arts and Sciences

African and Afro-American Studies

Salah Hassan (Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania, 1988), Madeleine Haas Russell Visiting Professor in African and Afro-American Studies in 2016-17, and Professor in African and Afro-American Studies and Fine Arts starting in 2017-18. Professor Hassan is also the Goldwin Smith Professor of African and African Diaspora Art History and Visual Culture in the Africana Studies and Research Center and in the Department of History of Art and Visual Studies at Cornell University. Professor Hassan is also a curator and art critic. Prior to his appointment at Cornell, he served on the faculty at the State University of New York at Buffalo, the University of Pennsylvania, and the College of Fine and Applied Art in Khartoum, Sudan. Professor Hassan is founder and editor of NKA: Journal of Contemporary African Art.

Carina E. Ray (Ph.D., Cornell University, 2007), Associate Professor of African and Afro- American Studies. Since receiving her Ph.D., Professor Ray has served as Assistant Professor and Associate Professor at Fordham University. She is recognized as an important young scholar in African history and African diaspora studies with an impressive publication record. Her research interests include her book, Crossing the Color Line: Race, Sex, and the Contested Politics of Colonialism in Ghana, was published last year by Ohio University Press, and she has begun work on her second book, Somatic Blackness: A History of the Body and Race- making in Ghana.

Biology

Amy Si-Ying Lee (Ph.D., Harvard University, 2012), Assistant Professor of Biology.

Dr. Lees research focuses on a process called translation, which is fundamental to the production of proteins, one of the building blocks of cells. Her interdisciplinary approach combines bioinformatics, biochemistry and mechanistic experiments, and has implications for several aspects of biology including the study of cancer. Upon completion of her Ph.D. from the Program of Virology in the Division of Medical Sciences at Harvard, Dr. Lee moved to the University of California at Berkeley, to pursue postdoctoral training. She has been awarded graduate research fellowships from the Department of Defense and the National Science Foundation, and a postdoctoral fellowship from the American Cancer Society.

Classical Studies

Joel Christensen (Ph.D., New York University, 2007), Associate Professor of Classical Studies. Dr. Christensens research interests span Greek Epic and Archaic poetry, rhetoric and literary theory, linguistics, and myth. He has a number of publications forthcoming, including a second book, Homers Thebes: Epic Rivalries and the Appropriation of Mythical Pasts, which is co-authored with Elton Barker of the Open University, UK. Another book project, currently in progress, is tentatively entitled Many- Minded Man: The Odyssey, Psychology and the Therapy of Epic. A Brandeis alumnus, Dr. Christensen returns to Brandeis after several years at the University of Texas at San Antonio. His courses this fall include Leadership in Ancient Greece and Rome and Greek Prose Authors.

Economics

Tymon Soczynski (Ph.D., Warsaw School of Economics, 2014), Assistant Professor of Economics. Since receiving his Ph.D., Professor Soczynski has served as Assistant Professor at the Warsaw School of Economics. His research interests include microeconometrics and applied microeconomics, with particular emphasis on program evaluation, and economic history.

Shameel Ahmad (Ph.D., Yale University, 2016), Florence Levy Kay Fellow in Economic History with the rank of Lecturer. Dr. Ahmad received his Ph.D. this year with a dissertation titled, Demography and Development in Colonial India. Dr. Ahmad is an economic historian with interests in the fields of demography, development, and international trade.

English/Comparative Literature and Culture

Jennifer Reed (Ph.D., University of Virginia, 2015), Florence Levy Kay Fellow in Eighteenth-Century Studies, and Lecturer. Dr. Reed holds a B.A. in English from the University of Cambridge and an M.Sc., also in English, from the University of Edinburgh. Her dissertation, Mapping Sympathy: Sensibility, Stigma, and Space in the Long Eighteenth Century, examines the relationship between sympathy and stigma from Richard Steele to James Boswell. Her research has been supported by a Digital Humanities Fellowship from the University of Virginias Scholars Lab, and by a Visiting Graduate Student Fellowship at Yales Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. In 2013, her teaching was recognized by an Outstanding Graduate Teaching Assistant Award from the University of Virginias Teaching Resource Center.

English/Creative Writing

Rebecca M. Frank (Ph.D., University of Cincinnati, 2012), Jacob Ziskind Poet-in- Residence. Dr. Frank holds an M.F.A. from Emerson College. She is the author of two collections of poems: Little Murders Everywhere, a finalist for the 2013 Kate Tufts Discovery Award and The Spokes of Venus, which was published in February 2016 by Carnegie Mellon University Press. Her work has involved interdisciplinary and multi- media collaborations with a filmmaker for an adaptation of a poem for Motionpoems and with composers on digital music and art song. Dr. Frank comes to Brandeis from the University of Southern Mississippi where she was assistant professor of creative writing and literature at the Center for Writers for four years.

Mathematics

An Huang (Ph.D., University of California at Berkeley, 2011), Assistant Professor of Mathematics. Dr. Huangs research focuses on two main areas: the problem of computing period integrals in algebraic geometry via D-module techniques; and discovering unexpected connections between graph theory, number theory, and topology. Following completion of his PhD, Dr. Huang moved to Harvard University where he was a postdoctoral fellow for three years, and where he was appointed a research associate in 2014.

Konstantin Matveev (Ph.D., Harvard University, 2016), Instructor in Mathematics.

Dr. Matveevs research interests include probability, mathematical physics, interacting particle systems, algebraic combinatorics, and symmetric functions. Upon graduating from the University of Toronto, he moved to Harvard University for his doctoral studies, where he received his PhD in May. Dr. Matveev is the recipient of a Postgraduate Scholarship-Doctoral Award from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC).

Omer Offen (Ph.D., Columbia University, 2002), Visiting Associate Professor of Mathematics. Dr. Offens research interests include automorphic forms, representation theory, and trace formula. Since completing his doctorate at Columbia University, he has held postdoctoral fellowships at academic institutions in France (the Institut des Hautes Etudes Scientifiques), in Germany (the Max-Planck-Institut fur Mathematik, and Humboldt-Universitat zu Berlin) and in Israel (at the Weizmann Institute of Science). In 2008, Dr. Offen was appointed assistant professor at Technion-Israel Institute of Technology where he was promoted to associate professor in 2013.

Music

Karen Desmond (Ph.D., New York University, 2009), Assistant Professor of Music. Professor Desmonds research focuses on the intellectual and aesthetic experience of music in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Her monograph, Ars nova in Music and Medieval Thought: Making it New, 1300-1350 (under contract with Cambridge University Press), explores the cultural and intellectual contexts that saw the emergence of new music-theoretical currents in fourteenth-century France.

Andrea Segar (D.M.A. State University of New York at Stony Brook, 2013). Andrea Segar joins the Lydian String Quartet as first violinist and Associate Professor of the Practice. Professor Segar enjoys a varied career as a soloist, chamber musician, and teacher. Her competition awards include first prizes in the Washington International String Competition and the American String Teachers Association National Solo Competition.

Near Eastern and Judaic Studies

Laura Jockusch (Ph.D., New York University, 2007), Albert Abramson Assistant Professor of Holocaust Studies. Dr. Jockusch undertook her academic training in Jewish studies programs at universities in Germany, the United States, and Israel. Her research centers on the Holocaust and the postwar period, focusing on the social, cultural, political, and legal histories of Holocaust survivors from a transnational and comparative perspective. Her first book, Collect and Record! Jewish Holocaust Documentation in Early Postwar Europe (Oxford University Press, 2012), was winner of the 2012 National Jewish Book Award for the Holocaust category, and of the 2013 Sybil Halpern Milton Book Prize. For the past four years, Dr. Jockusch was a postdoctoral fellow at the Martin Buber Society of Fellows at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where she was working on her second book, Beyond Vengeance: Jewish Conceptions of Retributive Justice after the Holocaust.

Jacqueline Vayntrub (Ph.D., University of Chicago, 2015), Assistant Professor of Biblical Studies. Dr. Vayntrubs research centers on the philological and historical-critical study of the Hebrew Bible from within its ancient Near Eastern context. Following completion of her Ph.D., she took an appointment as a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University. Her first book, The Limits of Biblical Poetry, considers definitions of biblical poetry in successive generations, from Jewish medieval scholarship to the present. It applies insights from Classics, folklore studies, narratology, and speech-art theory, and thereby aims to advance a new approach to the study of biblical poetry.

Psychology

Hannah Snyder (Ph.D., University of Colorado at Boulder, 2012), Assistant Professor of Psychology. Since receiving her Ph.D., Professor Snyder has served as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Denver. Professor Snyders research investigates executive function (the cognitive processes that allow control of thoughts and behaviors), and how it is affected by and affects mental health across development, with a focus on adolescence and young adulthood.

Sociology

Gowri Vijayakumar (Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley, 2016), Assistant Professor of Sociology. Professor Vijayakumar received her Ph.D. this year with a dissertation titled, Viral Politics: Sex Worker Activism and HIV/AIDS Programs from Bangalore to Nairobi. Her research interests include gender, sexuality, sex work, development, labor, feminist theory, HIV/AIDS, South Asia, and Sub-Saharan Africa.

International Business School

Anna Scherbina (Ph.D., Northwestern University, 2003), Visiting Associate Professor of Finance. Prior to joining Brandeis, Professor Scherbina worked at the University of California, Davis and Harvard Business School. Her primary area of research is behavioral finance and asset pricing, covering a variety of topics, such as: why seemingly sophisticated mutual fund managers may hold on to stocks with poor prospects; how investor disagreement about firm values affects future stock returns; and what happened to real estate prices during the Great Depression. She is now working on documenting how personal attributes (such as gender, age, and education) influence mutual fund managers career outcomes. She is teaching Investments and Introduction to Finance in the fall semester.

Yang Sun (Ph.D., MIT, 2014), Assistant Professor of Finance. Dr. Sun joins Brandeis after working as an Assistant Professor at the University of Hong Kong for two years. Her primary research interests have a two-fold focus. Her research on household finance studies the behavior of consumers in financial product markets, and how frictions in such behavior affect the outcome of the financial sector. Her research on corporate finance examines issues in corporate governance and payout policy. In her first year at Brandeis, she is teaching a graduate course in Corporate Finance in the spring semester.

Faculty arriving in fall 2017

Sebastian Kadener (PhD, The University of Buenos Aires, 2002), Visiting Associate Professor of Biology

Max Mishler (PhD, New York University, 2016), Assistant Professor of History
Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 16/09/2016 (2235 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

In 2013, CBC Radio 3 teamed up with a bunch of B.C. breweries to do a Canadian band beer project. Some great B.C. bands were involved with the project, including D.O.A for D.O.Ale and Said the Whale for Said the Ale.

This past weekend, the Summer Lights Music Festival took place at the Keystone Centre grounds and Said the Whale was one of the main performers, alongside Joel Plaskett and many amazing Manitoban musicians.

(P.S. Cheers to the organizers and the City of Brandon for putting on such an amazing festival!)

Submitted Fernie Brewings What the Huck ale is available at Liquor Marts throughout the province.

Well, CBC Radio 3 host Grant Lawrence promised me samples of the Canadian band beers, including Said the Ale, but it never happened. Instead, Grant (grandson of Onanoles late Johnnie Lawrence) showed up with a bottle of What the Huck ale by Fernie Brewing out of Fernie, B.C. While I was hoping for one of the CBC collaboration beers, whenever someone brings me a beer from somewhere Im not going to be visiting any time soon, its always a plus.

Now Fernies What the Huck is available in Manitoba at Liquor Marts throughout the province. Not only that, my ol classmate from Brandon University poli-sci days, Jordan, now works at Fernie Brewing as head of shipping/receiving, as well as the occasional beer packager and brewer.

When I have a link back to the brewery, I want to try even more of their beers.

What the Huck pours a rich golden ale with a light copper hue, a moderate amount of carbonation and a light amount of white head thats only at the edge of the glassware.

The aroma gives off a rich, caramel maltiness thats reminiscent of a typical Canadian macro amber ale. Theres a light pine hop bite in the aroma and a very sweet, berry fragrance from the huckleberries, which reminds one of a raspberry/cranberry jam medley, somewhat sweet yet somewhat tart.

For the flavour, What the Huck starts out as your typical Canadian pale golden ale, barley-focused and giving off a light grain flavour with a bit of lemongrass in the background.

But then its followed by a hit of the huckleberry  which sure doesnt make an impact at first but then hits hard, giving off a bit of a tart cranberry-like juiciness followed by a grassy hop bitterness.

The mouthfeel is reminiscent of apple juice as its not giving off any carbonated vibes and the aftertaste is a light tart fruitiness (cranberry) with a hint of metallic bitterness.

I was comparing notes with the batch I had back in 2013 and in many ways its quite different  the 2013 batch was full of berries and had a very carbonated mouthfeel. However, when it comes to small craft breweries, recipes change over the years and vary batch by batch.

I find that Fernie is a solid craft brewery for those who are scared to try anything new, but rarely attempts to appeal to beer snobs and geeks. This beer is no exception. Its a solid light fruit wheat ale that would mainly appeal to people looking to try something different from Bud without getting too experimental.

If youre looking for a light fruity ale with a hint of tartiness yet isnt bitter on the hops, What the Huck is a great alternative to Labatt 50 or Pilsner in the sweet malty beer department.

Packing five per cent ABV, What the Huck is available at Liquor Marts in Brandon (Corral Centre, 10th and Victoria), Dauphin, Minnedosa, Roblin and Virden for $3.03 per 473 ml can.

new and fabulous offerings

In Brandon, there are a few great beer releases this week, including Torques Red Line IPA and Witty Belgian at the 10th and Victoria Liquor Mart (limited availability), and two beers from one of my June biercation breweries, Brasserie Dunham  Berliner Melon Weisse and Rustique Saison.

And for the Mortal Kombat fans, there are three imperial ales by Sound Brewing out of the States  Scorpion Imperial Stout, Raiden Imperial Saison and Sub-Zero Imperial IPA.
Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 16/09/2016 (2235 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

I was in the south end Liquor Mart a couple of weeks ago to pick up some wine the fab folks there had set aside for me. I walked in the familiar doors, past the familiar tasting counter, and immediately noticed a very unfamiliar piece of equipment.

Whats that? I asked product consultant Kevin Kotyk, who was, as usual, offering wine samples to eager patrons.

Its a WineStation, he said with a smile.

<t-3>Id never seen anything

like it. Eight bottles sat in the two compartments of the WineStation  four whites (well, truthfully, two whites, a rose and a light red) on one side and four reds on the other.<t-5>

How long have you had it? I queried.

Oh, since  April? he suggested, not entirely sure himself. Quite a while, anyway.

I cant believe I havent been here in that long! I said apologetically.

I really felt like an idiot. I usually make the rounds of the three main Liquor Marts in town frequently, but I guess I havent been as diligent as I thought.

Anyway, I quizzed Kotyk about the device, and its really quite a remarkable machine. The temperature can be set independently for each side  the compartment containing the whites was dialed in at 8 C, while the red side was holding at 17 C.

A tank of inert gas connects to the WineStation and a rubber gasket keeps the seal intact so no oxygen can get through (over time, even just a day or two, exposure to oxygen makes wine go off or go bad) and the gas pushes the wine out and fills up the empty space in the bottle.

The company that makes the device, Winegate, says its product can keep wine tasting fresh (if one can use that word for a product thats aged) for 60 days. Kotyk said Liquor Mart South has kept bottles for a month, and the wine was still showing very nicely at that point, which is truly impressive.

The South End store is the only Liquor Mart in Brandon to have a WineStation  Kotyk said theres also one in Steinbach and another half-dozen or so in Winnipeg.

The machine can be programmed for five, 10 or 15 millilitres, but can also be programmed for ounces, too, which makes it ideal for restaurants.

It is neat, Kotyk said. Everyones been excited to see it. The most common comments are, When did you get it? and I need one of those at home!

Because it has room for eight bottles, its great for showing how wines compare to each other  sweet to dry wines and that sort of thing. Its a really great service for our customers.

I couldnt agree more! And as an added bonus, four of the five wines I tried from my first visit to the WineStation knocked my socks off! (The WineStation was fully loaded that day, but Id had, liked and written about the Conundrum rose before, and the others were a Riesling-Gewurztraminer, which is sweeter than I like, and the other a Sauvignon Blanc, which is not usually my favourite.)

Anyway, the Pfeiffer Gamay from Australia is a light red wine that can be served chilled (and it was)  it boasts aromas and tastes of strawberry and cherry with a clean, dry finish. A really lovely beverage, this would pair nicely with chicken and salmon, according to Kotyk. This Gamay sells for $20.12.

Tenuta Frescobaldi Di Castiglioni ($21.99) from Italy, is an Old World delight, featuring black fruits and strawberries accented by touches of cocoa, espresso, tobacco and vanilla. Smooth and surprisingly full-bodied, I very much enjoyed this wine.

The Trivento Golden Reserve line of wines from Argentina, which includes a Chardonnay and a Malbec, both of which Ive tried and very much liked, also contains a Cabernet Sauvignon, which I sampled through the WineStation. And I thought it was great. Made from 100 per cent Cabernet Sauvignon grapes, this is a complex, decadent wine with rich and juicy red fruit with a delightfully smooth texture that turns to a subtle minty chocolate on the finish. All the Trivento Golden Reserve products at the Liquor Marts sell for $19.99 and are well worth the price.

Ive yet to try a J. Lohr product I didnt absolutely love, and the J. Lohr Los Osos Merlot is no exception. Ill be happy if our dollar increases in value so these wonderful wines will drop in cost again, but they really are something special.

<t-4>The Merlot, from Paso Robles, Calif., has hearty aromas and flavours of raspberries, red currants and blackberry, although for me, the raspberry definitely was the most pronounced of the three. Smooth and rich, with

enough tannin to make it interesting and give it backbone without making it chalky, this is a beautiful Merlot that unfortunately is $26.56 a bottle.

I thoroughly enjoyed all these wines, and with or without the WineStation, theyd still be fabulous. But drop by the south end Liquor Mart to see and sample from this impressive appliance. Those dedicated wine fans, especially those who might be remodelling or building homes, might find its something they want to incorporate in their designs.

Now if I could just find a place for one in my house 
Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 16/09/2016 (2235 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

An open letter to Brandon-Souris Conservative MP Larry Maguire:

Since seeing the news of the impending closure of the lumber plant, Tolko Industries, in The Pas and the effect that this will have in northern communities, there has been speculation that to be viable, their casino will need to relocate to an area of more affluence, Brandon or Winnipeg.

This news seemed to coincide with the debate for an urban reserve in Brandon.

Its very easy to extrapolate that an urban reserve would very quickly open discussion about its economic viability, and a casino, we know, would be front and centre in that debate.

Recently, there have been several Brandon Sun editorials that are leaning heavily in favour of such an outcome, without another plebiscite even!

Yesterday I read in the Sun editorial a report that seems to indicate that the powers that be are using some common-sense thinking about the viability of another casino in the southern half of the province.

As alluded to in the editorial, the commissioned independent report cautioned against further investments in Manitoba that has one of the most penetrated gaming markets in North America.

It was also recently reported that Sand Hills Casino is losing money hand over fist and is having trouble making its mortgage payments, let alone make a profit for the supporting reserves in Manitoba.

To bring another casino that is in financial trouble into the Westman area would just mean that both would probably fall into receivership (unless, perish the thought, it has government subsidy).

Mr. Maguire, I have not heard anything from your office that would help put this casino debate to rest.

Please assure the Brandon and Westman taxpayers that we need to put this matter to rest, dead and buried. Please.

Abe Funk

Brandon
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The war in Syria has gone on for many years, but it seems the world has forgotten about the people of Syrias suffering!

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Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 16/09/2016 (2235 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

One of the most important details to understand about the terrorists behind the Islamic State in the Middle East is that they  unlike so many other terrorist organizations  have become masters of social media.

Harken back to the earlier days of this gruesome group, and you will recall several videos of a man with his head covered in black, routinely severing the bodies of white European and North American victims from their heads.

By posting them online, they found a unique and cheap way to spread fear and hatred of Muslims, and to recruit new jihadists to their cause from the ranks of socially disaffected youth in our western cultures who are looking for ways to act out their aggressions.

James Fergusson, director of the University of Manitobas Centre for Defence and Security Studies, told the Winnipeg Free Press that its more common for young people to be targeted as potential radicalized homegrown terrorists because they tend to be more idealistic and easily influenced.

They have very little experience. They can be easily persuaded under peer pressure  and this would be peer pressure through the Internet. They may feel, for a variety of reasons, disaffected or alienated in society, and they look to identify with someone else, he said.

According to a report by Charlie Winter in 2015, titled Documenting the Virtual Caliphate, ISIS puts out huge volumes of propaganda every day  from videos and photos to pamphlets and full-length documentaries  on several social media platforms.

Disseminating an average of 38.2 unique propaganda events a day from all corners of the Islamic State caliphate, this is an exceptionally sophisticated information operation campaign, the success of which lies in the twin pillars of quantity and quality, Winter wrote.

The quantity, quality and variation of Islamic State propaganda in just one month far outweighs the quantity, quality and variation of any attempts, state or non-state, to challenge the group. All current efforts must be scaled up to achieve meaningful progress in this war.

And clearly that hateful message reaches right around the world and into our own backyards.

Just this week, a Westman teen admitted in a Winnipeg courtroom to promoting terrorism for the Islamic State. As the Free Press reported, the 17-year-old boy pleaded guilty to counselling to commit an indictable offence for the benefit of, at the direction of, or in association with a terrorist group, namely Islamic State.

The Sun has previously reported that authorities seized notebooks and computer equipment from the youths home, and that the case against him was based on a tip to authorities and had been investigated for some time.

<t-1>Unfortunately, its still unknown at this point whether there was any specific plan for the boy  then 16 at the time of the offence  to travel overseas to fight for ISIS, or a plan to harm any Canadian authorities. A local Crown attorney also previously confirmed that the boy had visited

the Brandon Islamic Centre in an effort to convert to Islam.

Until more is known about the circumstances surrounding this particular case, conjecture does us little good. But there have been other cases of Manitobans falling prey to this radical group. Islamic State sympathizer Aaron Driver, 24, was killed during an August police raid in Strathroy, Ont., carried out by investigators who suspected Driver had planned a suicide bomb attack on an unnamed Canadian city.

What then are parents supposed to do? Parents already fear for their kids futures when it comes to peer pressure to do drugs, smoke or start drinking  not to mention youthful mischief that could eventually lead our kids into handcuffs and a visit with a presiding judge. The teenage years are laden with potential landmines that no parent wants to have to deal with.

And now we can add terrorist recruitment to the list. Lovely.

Yet the best way to counter this rush of radical Islamic propaganda, according to White, is for western powers to fight fire with fire, so to speak. The need for an alternative narrative on social media and not a counter narrative to Islam should be the Wests most important takeaway from that report. Its not useful to say that ISIS and radical Islam is evil, but rather we should be providing an alternative for disaffected youth, and reaching out to them to find better channels for their talents and energies.

And that comes right back to helping our kids make better choices, period. We dont need to blame ISIS for the problems our kids face, nor do we need to hyperventilate over the trumped-up potential for our kids to start bombing city hall because some radical wing nut told them to do so.

Teach them right from wrong, educate them about the dangers posed by certain groups in social media, show them love and compassion, and give them a fighting chance to succeed at life. And perhaps, most importantly, as adults we need to lead by example, showing tolerance and acceptance in the face of bigotry and fear. That will do more to kill recruitment drives than anything else.
The list of finalists for the inaugural DatSci Awards 2016 have been announced today.

Each of the 21 finalists are recognised for their enormous contribution to the field of Data Science and technology under six award categories - Data Scientist of the Year, Student of the Year, Team of the Year for Academic Research, Multinational of the Year, Company of the year: Indigenous Irish and Start-up of the Year.

In a conscious effort to give back to the Data Science community, all proceeds from the event will contribute towards a scholarship for a Masters programme in Data Science/Business Analytics commencing academic year 2017/2018. Details on the application process will be released after the awards.

The awards, in association with Next Generation and the National Centre for Applied Data Analytics Research (CeADAR) will take place on September 22 in the Aviva Stadium and will recognise emerging talent within the data science community, progressively thinking organisations as well as data scientists within Ireland.

The ceremony also hopes to address the potential for Ireland to become the European Data Science Hub.

Speaking about the DatSci Awards, Linda Davis, CEO and founder of Next Generation said: Ireland is at the forefront of Data Analytics and it is key that we celebrate all the exciting and potential world changing projects that are happening right here.

It is really exciting to see what possibilities the use of data analytics can bring to our health, our food, our medicines and our everyday consumer products. I look forward to seeing Ireland evolve as a European hub for data analytics.

These awards intend to pay it forward. We want to inspire and support the next generation of Irish based data scientists too. Its an exciting time and it is important to support the future stars of Irish data science too.

Data Scientist of the Year (Sponsored by Optum, part of the UnitedHealth Group, Title Sponsor)

 Dave Sheehan, AIB

 Aoife DArcy, The Analytics Store

 Maciej Dabroswki, Altocloud

 Vincent Lonij, IBM

Student of the Year (Sponsored by Deutsche Bank)

 Cian Gallagher, Griffith College Dublin

 Sebastien Ruder, NUI Galway

 Mark OConnell, NUI Maynooth

 Kevin Brosnan, University of Limerick

Team of the Year for Academic Research (Sponsored by Dun & Bradstreet)

 CeADAR

 ICHEC

 Insight Galway

Multinational Company of the Year Award (Sponsored by Accenture Digital)

 Pramerica

 CarTrawler

Indigenous Irish Company of the Year: (Sponsored by Pegasus)

 Eir

 Core Media

 Corvil

Best Start-up of the Year (Sponsored by CarTrawler)

 Connectors Marketplace

 Kinesis Health Technologies

 Orreco

 VIDiRO

 AYLIEN
First time buyers in Dublin need to earn more than 100,000 to get onto the property ladder according to new figures.

A new report compiled for the Irish Sun shows a single person looking to buy a home in South County Dublin would need to be on a wage of 133,000 a year.
Northern Ireland's deputy first minister has said there is no reason why anyone - on either side of the border - would not co-operate with a Commission of Investigation into NAMA.

Martin McGuinness has said everyone should support the goal of getting to the bottom of how the sale of the Northern loans was handled.
The Minster for Transport has said we need to take collective responsibility if we are going to reverse the number of deaths on our roads.

Shane Ross is launching a new campaign to support European Day Without A Road Death, next Wednesday, September 21.
Taoiseach Enda Kenny will stress Ireland's "red line" stance on neutrality to other EU leaders today during a key post-Brexit vote meeting focussing on the refugee crisis and growing talk of an EU army, by Fiachra O Cionnaith, Political Reporter in Bratislava.

The Fine Gael leader re-iterated Ireland's position this morning, despite French president Francois Hollande and European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker both urging increased combined defences from potential terrorist attacks.

Speaking as he arrived in Bratislava, Slovakia, for the crucial meeting on future plans for the EU in light of the Brexit vote, Mr Kenny said Ireland will continue to "contribute" to addressing the issue.

However, he twice said this country has a "red line" position on neutrality which cannot be ignored.

"Ireland has always contributed, taking into account the red line issues we have in terms of neutrality, to European co-operation and we will continue to do so taking those factors into account," he said.

The EU heads of state meeting is part of a series of behind-closed-doors talks between EU members in recent months in order to address a range of issues affecting the future of Europe caused in part by June's Brexit vote.

However, while the economy, job growth and the continuing refugee crisis in the Mediterranean are among the issues to be discussed, suggestions of a future EU army are likely to dominate proceedings.

Speaking on his way into the meeting this morning, French president Francois Hollande said EU member states must accept that Europe needs to be able to defend itself from attacks and not rely on help from the US.

"There is no continent, there is no union if there is no defence of our values and interests. France is making a major effort in terms of European defence, but she cant do it alone," he said.

While the comment was contradicted by Lithuanian president Dalia Grybauskaite, who said she never heard somebody is proposing to create a European army, it mirrors recent suggestions by European Commission president Jean Claude Juncker.

In his annual address to the European Parliament on Wednesday, Mr Juncker said he is in favour of a plan to set up a 100,000-strong volunteer European youth corps to help with defence and security measures - a remark one Strasbourg official said underlines the political bloc's current "existential crisis".
The EU must take a "brutally honest" assessment of its problems, according to the president of the European Council.

Donald Tusk (pictured) has been speaking as EU leaders gather in Slovakia - without the UK - to discuss the future direction of the union.
A former Manchester United steward has been jailed for life for the murder of an imam in the UK.

Mohammed Syeedy, 21, was consumed by hatred of Jalal Uddin, 71, because he practised a form of Islamic healing in Rochdale's Bangladeshi community which the terror group consider "black magic".

Syeedy acted as getaway driver for another man, Mohammed Kadir, 24, who bludgeoned Mr Uddin to death in a children's play area on the early evening of February 18, Manchester Crown Court heard.

Kadir fled the UK three days after the killing and it is thought he may now be in Syria.

Syeedy held his hands to his face in shock after the foreman delivered the verdict after about four hours of jury deliberations.

He later shook his head several times with his face covered as he sat down.

High Court judge David Maddison handed him a life sentence, with a minimum term of 24 years.

The judge said Mr Uddin was a "gentle, well-respected man" who was attacked and "brutally" killed because he practised Ruqya faith healing.

Jalal Uddin

He told Syeedy: "You and your co-offender saw the practice as a form of black magic that could not be tolerated within Islam."

Defenceless Mr Uddin was dealt at least five savage blows from behind with a hammer, shortly after he entered the park in South Street, Rochdale.

The swift and ferocious attack smashed his skull and drove a piece of bone into his brain.

Their victim was targeted after it was discovered he was providing "taweez", in which he made amulets to bring good fortune to the wearer.

Syeedy was involved in months-long surveillance of Mr Uddin and along with Kadir stalked their prey after he left the Jalalia Mosque to go to a friend's house for an evening meal

The Crown said Syeedy was a "knowing participant" in the murder, and his claim that he had no idea what IS supporter and ex-John Lewis call centre worker Kadir planned and then carried out, was "absurd".

The judge concluded Syeedy was aware Mr Uddin would be seriously injured "as to disable him permanently to prevent him practising Ruqya, through taweez, ever again".

And he said he was satisfied Syeedy had run into his home in Ramsay Street, Rochdale, to grab the murder weapon in a "carefully planned" plot.

Judge Maddison told the defendant: "So slick was this operation that only some 90 seconds passed between the killer getting out of the car, approaching Jalal Uddin, killing him, and then proceeding to the other side of the park, where you picked him up.

"The evidence in this case, to my view, established that you have an interest in jihad, in the sense of armed violent struggle by extremists.

"It is quite plain that you have a strong dislike of the use of taweez."

The judge said there was "no significant" evidence to be certain that he was an active supporter of IS.

In fixing the length of sentence, he said: "I take in to account you were not the actual killer, but it seems to me you were an obviously integral part to the commission of this offence, and it could not have been committed without your involvement."

In a victim personal statement read to the court, one of Mr Uddin's seven children said "the pain and void that has been left with his death has been unbearable".

Saleh al-Arif said his father was "a distinguished Islamic scholar" who had moved to the UK in 2002 to help provide for his family back home.

He began teaching the Koran to children in east London, before moving to Birmingham and then to Rochdale where he became an imam at the Jalalia Mosque.

He said: "He was a devout pacifist and shared love to all he came across. I cannot begin to understand why anyone would want to murder him."

Describing his visit to Oldham mortuary to see his father's body, he said: "I was denied the most basic right, to kiss my father's face, because of this cowardly and horrific attack."

In a statement issued by police, his family added: "Weeks prior to his murder, Jalal had intended to return to Bangladesh and be reunited with his wife, children and grandchildren, whom he had not seen for some 15 years, in which time he had dedicated his life to selflessly serving his family, trying to make ends meet.

"Although Jalal was a Muslim who peacefully practised his faith, he had a love and respect for all religions, cultures and creeds, and the fact that he was murdered by someone inspired by Isil shows the true nature and barbarity of this organisation and those who serve it."

Although Kadir, formerly of Chamber Road, Oldham, remains at large, police did not issue a photograph of him.
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Consumers wondering whether A2 protein-only milk can make them "feel better" may have to wait until November 2017 for some insight, when a court battle between ASX-listed The a2 Milk Company and Japanese beverage giant Lion Group will be heard.



The legal stoush began in June, when a2 Milk disputed Lion's use of the term "A2 Protein" on labelling for Lion's PURA and Dairy Farmers products.

Milk products produced by a2 Milk come from dairy cows that produce only the A2 type of beta-casein protein. That is unlike regular cow's milks, such as that used in PURA and Dairy Farmers, which contain both A1 and A2.

The marketing and product proposition behind a2 Milk is based on a long-running claim that its A2 protein-only product reduces digestive discomfort, and causes consumers to "feel better."
The Turnbull government will introduce a tax treaty between Australia and Israel to improve business relations between the two countries.

The treaty is linked to the government's plan to boost innovation in Australia as well as its push to further trade between the two countries as Israel's technology sector booms.

Treasurer Scott Morrison announced the tax treaty on Friday at the Australia Israel Chamber of Commerce luncheon.

"The government has now formally commenced negotiations with Israel on a tax treaty that will improve trade and investment by removing tax barriers for business which I'm hopeful will be included in the first half of next year," he said.
The organised crime taskforce noted that many of those arrests attributed to bikie gangs are in fact not related. Spreading across Australia In 2015 Victoria enacted new laws to deal with bikie gangs. South Australia has introduced laws heavily based on Queenslands existing model, despite their lack of success. New South Wales already has consorting laws it uses to police bikie gangs. The NSW Ombudsman has conducted two reviews on the use of this legislation  one in 2014 and another in 2016. Both found shortcomings in the way police were using the legislation. The 2016 review recommended the use of the consorting laws be focused only on serious or organised crime, and prohibited from being used to tackle minor or nuisance offending.

The proposed Queensland law does not necessarily focus on consorting for the purpose of criminal activity. It says:  the persons association with the other person need not have a purpose related to criminal activity. This would seem at odds with the governments claims that the laws:  would enable law enforcement agencies to tackle all forms of serious organised crime  by focusing on peoples criminal activity, rather than a focus on any individual group. Queenslands new laws draw heavily on the NSW consorting laws. They include several provisions, including consorting offences, a ban on clubhouses, anti-fortification requirements, and public safety orders.

Perhaps most controversially they ban the wearing of gang colours in public. Until now colours had only been banned in licensed venues in some states. The previous Queensland state government rejected such a move. Then-premier Campbell Newman said: We dont go after people because of the clothes they wear, the tattoo they may have, the way their wear their hair. We go after the people who break the law, who are a threat to society. But banning colours is now seen as a way to combat organised crime. Police already have the tools they need

The QPS and other Australian law-enforcement agencies already had powerful legislative tools to combat criminal organisations prior to enacting consorting-specific legislation. Queenslands Criminal Organisations Act provides for making declarations and control orders for preventing and disrupting the activities of organisations involved in serious criminal activity, and of their members, former members, prospective members and associates. Ironically, this legislation was introduced by the then-Labor government in 2009, and was opposed by the LNP opposition both before and after its introduction. Its criticisms included: This bill is a repugnant attack on the rights and liberties of individuals. The QPS has made only one application under it to have an organised declared a criminal organisation: the Gold Coast chapter of the Finks bikie gang. The application and the legislation successfully withstood a High Court challenge.

At the time, QPS Assistant Commissioner Mike Condon said: Where there is sufficient evidence we will take action. Despite this in 2014, the QPS withdrew is application regarding the Finks. The reasons for withdrawal were suppressed. And no other evidence has ever been presented to make an application against any other gang in Queensland. What will the proposed laws achieve? It may well be difficult for the minority Labor government in Queensland to have these laws passed. Minor parties and independents have expressed concern with them.

This reflects to some degree a state of policy paralysis the government finds itself in. It has insufficient numbers in parliament to pass legislation without crossbench support. The devil is in the detail. The government says even if the new laws are passed, the existing laws will remain in place for two years  possibly until after the next state election. This will allow the government to claim it did something about the unpopular existing laws, but that by bringing in its own laws it is also tough on crime. In any case, like those that preceded them, these proposed laws may just end up being window-dressing. Existing offences and investigative powers are more than sufficient to deal with the threat of organised crime and criminal elements in the bikies. Loading
Julio Gonzalez, a jilted lover whose arson revenge at the unlicensed Happy Land Nightclub in the Bronx in 1990 claimed 87 lives, making him the nation's worst single mass murderer at the time, died on Tuesday at a hospital in Plattsburgh, N.Y., where he had been taken from prison. He was 61.

The cause was apparently a heart attack, prison officials said.

Unemployed Cuban refugee Julio Gonzalez was arrested soon after the fire.

Mr Gonzalez had been at the Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, N.Y., where he was serving 87 concurrent sentences of 25 years to life in prison after being convicted of starting the fire, which swept through the club early on Sunday, March 25, 1990.

At the time, the club, on the second floor of a run-down building on Southern Boulevard in the East Tremont neighbourhood, was crowded, mostly with Honduran immigrants celebrating Carnival. Only six people escaped.
Senator Michaelia Cash hugs Senator Pauline Hanson after her first speech to the Senate in September. Credit:Andrew Meares A useless distinction anyway, as it turns out, because Hanson would like them all banned from migrating to Australia. The only thing different about Hanson's second maiden speech was her decision to pick on a younger, hotter minority group. Asians and Aborigines are so '90s. They've been replaced by Muslims, whose numbers and influence Hanson grossly exaggerated to make her point, which (I think) was that they are a threat to everyone. Julian Leeser delivers his first speech at Parliament House on Wednesday. Credit:Andrew Meares Hanson styles herself as an outsider and great pelter of truth bombs upon the walls of the Establishment.

In fact, she is an intellectually lazy pest who could not be more of a politician had she spent her early years branch-stacking for one of the major parties. She attacks welfare recipients despite having spent much of the past 20 years grasping at public funding, or living off it, as she has relentlessly sought public office. Hanson's second maiden speech was unsurprising in content and tone, but this time is different, because she arrives in Canberra with a posse of three other senators, a large chunk of the balance of power and the goodwill of the political establishment. Former prime minister Tony Abbott, who, back in the '90s, helped raise a fighting fund to help jail her, was recently filmed for a video making amends with Hanson. He knows he needs her constituency if he is to make a comeback. In an interview on 7.30 on Wednesday night, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop was very careful in her words, noting that Hanson had won half a million votes. Behold the spectacle of senators lining up to embrace her after she finished her speech on Wednesday. West Australian Liberal Michaelia Cash practically went in for a snuggle. Derryn Hinch went in for a kiss.

Hanson is a disrupter and, to quote Abbott, a wrecker. The real damage will be done by the politicians who pander to her. Not long after Hanson spoke on Wednesday, the newly-elected Member for Berowra, Liberal Julian Leeser, gave his maiden speech in the other chamber, and he made it count. He used his public podium to tell the very personal story of his father's suicide when Leeser was a "self-absorbed 20-year-old", as he described himself. Leeser is the grandson of a Jewish refugee, a class of people who were often told to go back to where they came from. His mother, he said, constantly reminded him and his brother of their good fortune to be growing up in a free country. She realised, Leeser said, the "historical peculiarity" of being "both Jewish and free".

Leeser is a constitution freak and young fogey. For his 10th birthday he asked for a copy of the Constitution, and since then he has used his intellectual gifts to study it and protect it. He was a strong advocate for the "No" case during John Howard's 1999 referendum on the republic, because he believes constitutional monarchy is the best available political system. In 2009 he helped see off a campaign to bring about an Australian Bill of Rights, and more recently he advised Abbott on the best way to achieve constitutional recognition of Indigenous people, while preserving the integrity of the constitution, and crucially, how to convince fellow conservatives constitutional recognition is a good idea. Now he's been elected to Parliament, Leeser's great interest is federalism and how to address the tension between the states, who deliver more services but have few revenue raising measures; and the federal government, which (he says) is bad at delivering services and collects too much tax. Loading Leeser was 20 when Hanson gave her first maiden speech, the same age he was when his dad killed himself and his world change irrevocably. In the intervening years he has evolved into a man who will probably make a considerable dent on the policy-making of the country.
Instagram has always welcomed late adopters with open arms.

Take the Hemsworths brothers' entry to the Insta game in 2015, or the arrival of a post-breakup Tom Hiddleston to the app last month: each heartthrob joined the app, was immediately located by their thousands of adoring (read: teenage, female) fans and went on to guarantee themselves hundreds of thousands of likes on a selfie, no questions asked.

Orlando Bloom is a latecomer to going public on Instagram. Credit:Getty

However, when Orlando Bloom made the decision to expose his Insta-self to the masses, he decided that, rather than starting a new public account, he would just switch his previously private feed to public.

Posting a picture of a handwritten note reading, "I caved...", Bloom opened his Instagram of just over a year to the masses. (Ex Miranda Kerr came in with the fourth comment on the post, writing, "Nice one!".)
In a quiet street on Brisbane's southside, inside a non-descript garage, a young man is being repeatedly beaten.

Nearby residents are blissfully unaware of what is going on inside as a traffic controller down the street towards a picturesque park steadies the infrequent flow of cars along the street.

Brisbane plays a starring role in Australia Day, directed by Kriv Stenders. Pictured is Miah Madden running across the William Jolly Bridge. Credit:Vince Valitutti

It's important the men conducting the beating aren't disturbed by traffic noise as the sensitive microphones being held above them will pick up the sound and the take will need to be reshot.

The men are actors and those holding the microphone are among the hundreds of crew members engaged to work on Australia Day, a new film from Hoodlum being shot around Brisbane throughout September.
How do you get more from your Generation Z employee; the 20-year-old that is addicted to their mobile phone, rarely talks to anyone over 30, but will dominate Queensland's future workforce?

That is one key to Queensland's innovation.

Meet Generation Z: (From left) Zac McSwiney, Elle Ramirez, Molly Rea, Dane Moltzen and Bronte McInnes. Credit:Anthony Johnson

Generation Z - born from 1996 onwards - is quieter than Generation X or Generation Y and tends to sit back, one of Queensland's leading teaching strategists said.

"Attract their curiosity," Central Queensland University's Professor Margee Hume told a roomful of business owners, public servants, and education providers on Friday morning.
Police are searching for a man who crashed his car trying to evade police in Brisbane's west.

A man was driving a green sedan along High Street in Toowong when police attempted to pull him over about 12pm.

Queensland police are searching for a man last seen in Toowong. Credit:Glenn Hunt

The man refused and drove off, crashing through a stop sign and into a barrier.

He then jumped out of the car and ran from the scene on foot.
In the world of start-ups, marketplaces are the pot of gold that never seem to end.

Also known as platform companies, the likes of Fodoora and GoCatch might be household names, but there are thousands of smaller ones in Australia shifting the landscape in their respective industries.

Detch Singh, co-founder of Hypetap.

These include the likes of Sydney-based companies LawPath (legal services) and Expert 360, a global marketplace for consulting talent.

The highly-scalable business models are beloved by investors.
Samsung has an exploding phone problem, and it isn't just the Galaxy Note7.

So claims a California man in a lawsuit filed in federal court in New Jersey last week. Daniel Ramirez says a Galaxy S7 Edge badly burned his right leg when it burst into flames in late May.

Ramirez, who was working a construction job in Akron, Ohio, says he "heard a whistling and screeching sound and noticed his (right-front) pocket vibrating and moving around, as well as thick smoke ascending from his pocket," according to the 19-page suit. Ramirez said he suffered second- and third-degree burns to his right upper leg and right thumb and index finger when the handset ignited his pants and "melted" them to his leg.

Ramirez is seeking more than $US15,000 ($20,000) in compensatory and punitive damages.
The wife of a suspected Chinese-Australian money launderer who allegedly turned over more than $850 million at Crown Casino has failed in her bid to access a Californian luxury home held under proceeds of crime laws.

High-stakes gambler Dan Bai Shun Jin is under investigation by the Internal Revenue Service in the United States and Australian Federal Police over suspicions he was involved in large-scale illegal money laundering at casinos in Australia, the US, Macau and Singapore.

The home in California.

His wife, Hongjie Ma, recently applied to the Victorian Supreme Court to lift a restraining order on a multimillion dollar property in Fremont, California but was unsuccessful, as the court agreed that the purchase could have been made with laundered funds.

The house was seized along with three other properties in 2013 as part of the investigation into what has been described by law enforcement as "astronomical" levels of gambling by Mr Jin.
The river is likely to reach its major flood level of 3.6 metres on Saturday evening. Charlton residents at a public meeting. Credit:Joe Armao The Avoca River in Charlton is expected to peak at 7.5 metres, also overnight Friday or on Saturday. For towns along the Great Ocean Road - including popular holiday destinations Lorne, Apollo Bay, Wye River and Separation Creek - the floods are another blow from Mother Nature. Premier Daniel Andrews and SES David Pollard inspect flooding at Charlton. Credit:Joe Armao

The area suffered heavy losses after bushfire ravaged the area in December. A deep crack has developed in the side of a hill above the famed tourist drive near Paddy's Path - a walking track between the towns Wye River and Separation Creek - putting 600 cubic metres of earth at risk of being lost in a major landslide. The farmer's submerged ute in Wallacedale. Federal Liberal MP Sarah Henderson said she was concerned the landslides would deter holidaymakers. "My concern is people will not come down to the Great Ocean Road," she said. "I am concerned about the impact it will have on the local economy."

The member for Corangamite, which includes the beachside towns, urged Victorians not to cancel their plans. She called upon the Andrews government to match the federal government's $25 million in funding for the repair and maintenance of the tourist drive. "We are seeing some very significant damage that's been caused to the road in the last 48 hours and I'm very concerned that it's more serious than first thought," Ms Henderson said. The coastal road is closed between Eastern View and Lorne, and Lorne and Skenes Creek. Lorne can still be accessed via Winchelsea and Deans Marsh, and people can still reach the Twelve Apostles via Colac and Camperdown.

SES spokeswoman Terri Russell said Lorne was open for business. She said food and drink would be delivered to communities isolated by the landslides and road closures. Further north in the state, a slow-moving tide of water is flowing down from the Grampians and heading towards north-west Victoria after nearly 200 millimetres of rain was dumped on the mountains. The water is rolling down creeks and rivers over the already-saturated plains of the Wimmera region.

Heavy rain forecast for early next week is adding to the concerns of residents and emergency services. No homes were affected on Thursday night in Charlton, about 240 kilometres north-west of Melbourne, as the Avoca River held steady at about 7.3 metres. The river is expected to peak about 11pm on Friday or early Saturday morning. Donald Road resident Stewart Smyth, whose home was inundated with a metre of water in the 2011 floods, said it had been a long night, but there was no damage to his property this time.

"You packed everything up and took things away and it turned out ..." he trailed off. "But best to do that than be sorry later on. "I suppose everybody's on edge from the last time, because we lost everything last time." Another resident, Christian Coughlin, agreed the town was on edge, but said the near miss would help calm nerves. "As soon as we got a big rain everyone started panicking a little bit, which is expected," he said.

"I think this is really going to help the town come back to knowing that it will flood, but it's not always going to be as bad as it was then." There is also rising tide of emotion in Charlton about Saturday's local grand final match. Charlton's Navy Blues have lost the last three grand finals and are hoping to break the losing streak when they take on Wycheproof-Narraport at St Arnaud. Players are confident they will be able to make the 40-kilometre trip to the ground, despite the floods. "I think from what we've heard down here, all roads will be open come Saturday morning as planned," local player Michael told radio station 3AW.

The Richardson River in nearby Donald had reached 3.48 metres at 6am on Friday and was still rising. While some rivers have already peaked, there are still some waiting to peak through the weekend and into next week. "Our concern is that the rivers and the ground are already quite saturated," SES spokeswoman Terri Russell said. Rivers around Horsham, at the foot of the Grampians, are expected to peak on Sunday. CFA controller Trevor Ebbels said the town was waiting on tenterhooks.
Their long held desire to meet this long lost other side of the family has now come - but in a way none of them ever expected.

Keen to honour their Pop's military service during the funeral, Nicole's sister Tammy posted on the Facebook page of Perth Beer Economy asking for a bugle player to attend and play The Ode and Last Post.

"Then we got told that Pop's blood grand-daughter Amanda was up flicking through the computer because she couldn't sleep and went on the Perth Beer Economy page and saw Tammy's post, saw the last name Wells and that was the same as her father's and thought maybe it was her long lost grandfather, who she didn't know but knew of, and she got in touch," Ms Mason said.

From there it was a flood of memories and tears as Mr Well's descendents got meet each other for the first time.

"We've got all of the missing pieces and they've got all of these missing pieces and it's all just coming together. I was apprehensive at first, a bit cautious, but when we met them all that just faded. They're great people, really down to earth, we fell like we are related. And the son we've met looks just like him - there's no mistaking the ears, they're a trademark!" Ms Mason said.
You could say that you need a small gold mine to buy a plane ticket to the heart of WA's mining rich country.

The sky-high airfares to regional WA have been a hot topic for many years, and now the Pilbara Regional Council are calling for a state government inquiry into the pricey flights from Perth to the Pilbara.

Pilbara locals are fighting for cheaper plane seats. Credit:guvendemir

Pilbara Regional Council CEO Tony Friday wants the local residents to pay subsidised airfares, and is hopeful the state government will consider developing a regional travel support package.

"It's not about airlines taking profits, it's a misguided tax incentive that has rigged the system against local residents," Mr Friday said.
The mining executives would accept me sauntering around the mines looking like I just graduated from clown school, with my cowboy shirt and man bun comically jutting out of my ill-fitting hard hat. But I have no doubt I would have been buried in a shallow grave "beyond the black stump" if I infected an army of workers with the "runs". When I wasn't acquainting myself with every toilet in the North West I looked on with genuine awe and wonderment at the modern-day engineering marvels constructed for the mining industry in the Pilbara. I have never been to a mine site. The closest I've come to a "mine" was when my booze-loving Irish father would lay down the bottle for a few days and pick up a shovel and dig a massive pit to bury all the rubbish he collected.

The mining structures in the North West are monuments to the wonders of engineering. The kilometres of twisted and distorted metal and steel at the Roy Hill mine looked like they were spawned from the mind of gothic artist HR Giger (Think Alien movies). It is evocative, powerful and alluring. The towering, cathedral-like structures at the Woodside-operated North West Shelf project and the Yara Pilbara fertilising plant are architectural and engineering triumphs. Who would have thought underneath the layers of red dirt, there could be such breathtaking beauty?

Flying over the Pilbara in an aging twin-propeller plane (that I had the sneaking suspicion fought in the Battle of Britain), you get to witness the phenomenal contrasting colours of the region. The ranges have been carved with intricate and exquisite arteries and veins after thousands of years of rain and wind. And the rich vibrant earth looks like an ocean of Neapolitan ice cream. (Well, the chocolate parts because, let's be honest,you only eat the chocolate). As the plane violently wobbled across the emptiness I was confronted with the prospect of never being found, even if I survived a crash. While I wasn't chuffed about the idea of drinking my urine to stay alive, I embraced the thought of slowly eating my way through a dozen verbose fellow journalists to get some peace and quiet.

Sadly though, when you get to the towns of the North West, the economic havoc caused by the mining boom bust is evident for all to see. As you drive into Karratha the housing developments have just stopped. It's as if a child got half-way through a drawing and simply wandered off bored. And the half-empty high-rise Pelago apartments in the middle of the town jut up like an odd monument to the Barnett government's failed investment in the area. The WA government bought 50 apartments in late 2012 at the cost of $30 million to cope with the swelling population in the town and to combat the sky-rocketing rents. But the plans to house health workers in the units fell through and now the government struggles to rent them out.

This is a scene from ET - not Brendan Foster's Pilbara trip. But at times it felt like this... In the end our bus driver summed up the flagging fortunes of Karratha better than any economic analysts could. He said a mate bought a house at the height of the boom for almost $1 million, but flogged it off recently for less than half of that. When people were flooding into the town in 2012 looking for work, rents were a whopping $2500 a week. Now you would be lucky to get $500 for a home.

While once-thriving mining communities are slowly withering and dying, they are still "home" to thousands of fly-in, fly-out workers. And while being trapped in a donga for one night wasn't exactly reminiscent of Russian writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's harrowing time in a gulag, I got a momentary glimpse into the challengers faced by FIFO workers. Unfortunately the media tour never made it to the Goldfields as our chartered plane sprung a fuel leak. But I'm told the Chamber of Minerals and Energy is planning a day trip to Kalgoorlie further down the track. If I get the chance to see one of the world's biggest open mines in Kal, I'll embrace the trip with gusto and giddy joy.
Sweden's court of appeal has upheld an arrest warrant for Julian Assange.

It refused appeals by Assange to set aside a detention order, and to hold a hearing in which he can present his defence against accusations of rape.

Suitcases being loaded into a truck outside the Ecuador's London embassy on Friday. Credit:Nick Miller

However Assange's legal team say they will appeal the decision.

"The Court of Appeal finds that Julian Assange is still suspected on probable cause of rape in Engkoping on 17 August 2010," the court found in a judgment published on Friday.
Australian Federal Police have caught up with an Australian man who skipped bail and fled to Thailand in 2011 after being charged in connection with his involvement in a drug syndicate.

Thai police arrested 58-year-old Robert Gordon Pollybank Gee at a bar on the resort island of Phuket in a joint operation with the AFP.

From South Australia, Gee was allegedly the ring leader of an Australia-wide drug network.

Gee has been listed among Australia's most wanted on charges of narcotics and conspiracy and is expected to face extradition to Australia.

Police launched a national appeal for information on Gee and other fugitives in August.
Peshawar: At least 22 people were killed in the bombing of a mosque in the western Pakistani tribal region of Mohmand on Friday, officials said.

The explosion occurred during Friday afternoon prayers in Pai Khan, a remote village in the mountainous Ambar subdistrict of Mohmand, a deputy administrator in the region, Naveed Akbar, said by telephone.

Friday's bombing was the latest in a series of attacks in Pakistan. This was was treated after a roadside attack in Quetta on Tuesday. Credit:Archad Butt/AP

Mr Akbar said that at least 20 more people had been hurt, with seven of the most critically wounded being airlifted to Peshawar, the capital of nearby Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province.

The attack was claimed by Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a splinter group of the Pakistani Taliban, saying it was targeting local residents who supported the government.
Beijing: Journalists have been attacked and forced out of a fishing village where China has suppressed protests five years after the village received international attention for demonstrations against land seizures.

Wukan remains under siege two days after police arrested 13 protesters in an early-morning raid on allegations that they incited violence and arrest.

Villagers protest in Wukan village in 2011. Credit:AP

The southern fishing village was thrust into international prominence five years ago for winning the right to elect its own leaders.

The Chinese government is now staging a broad crackdown on information about the village, refusing to let journalists in and heavily restricting discussion of Wukan on social media networks.
Florence: Days after meeting Australian ministers, British Foreign Minister Boris Johnson says a European Union naval force deployed in the Mediterranean should turn back migrant boats after they leave Libya and prevent them from reaching Italy.

Italy is on the frontline of Europe's migrant crisis, taking in more than 400,000 refugees over the past three years, many of them saved from rickety boats pushed out to sea by people smugglers based in north Africa.

Italian officers rescue a woman from a crowded wooden boat carrying more than seven hundred migrants, during a rescue operation in the Mediterranean, off Libya last month. Credit:AP

The European Union launched Operation Sophia in 2015 in response to the crisis, with a mandate to disrupt the people trafficking networks and destroy smugglers' boats.

Mr Johnson said part of the mission's work was to return boats back to shore after they had put to sea.
Ohio: Officials in Columbus, Ohio, appealed for calm, patience and investigative help on Thursday, hours after a white police officer fatally shot a 13-year-old African-American boy who had apparently brandished a firearm that was later determined to be a BB gun.

Speaking at a news conference, the mayor, the police chief and other officials offered few details about what led to the death Wednesday night of the teenager, Tyree King. They cautioned that the investigation, which will be presented to a grand jury, will not be quick. So far, they said, they do not know of any video recording of the incident.

In this frame from video, police work at the scene of a shooting in Columbus, Ohio, where a boy with a BB gun was killed. Credit:AP

"Any loss of life is tragic, but the loss of a young person is particularly difficult," Mayor Andrew J. Ginther said. "Investigations take time, and I ask for everyone's patience during this difficult time."

According to police, officers responded to a report of an armed robbery in the Olde Towne East neighbourhood in central Columbus, and saw three males who matched the suspects' descriptions. Two fled and officers chased them into an alley, where Tyree pulled what appeared to be a gun from his waistband, police said, and an officer shot him multiple times.
Obesity is responsible for the deaths of over three million people a year worldwide due to its associated diseases such as diabetes, cancer and cardiovascular disease.

However, a subset of obese individuals seems to be protected from such diseases. Understanding the underlying protective mechanisms in the lower risk individuals could help design novel therapeutic strategies targeting those at higher risk of disease.

An international collaboration, funded by Qatar National Research Fund (QNRF), between the University of Bristol and Anti-Doping Laboratory Qatar (ADLQ) has revealed that fat stem cells in healthy obese individuals can store fat more efficiently than those with increased risk of diabetes. Efficient fat storage protects against fat deposition on internal organs such as liver, kidneys and heart leading to increased risk of diabetes.

Dr Wael Kafienah, from the University of Bristols School of Cellular and Molecular Medicine, explained: The existence of obese individuals with lower risk of diabetes has received great interest in the past few years, as they may hold the clue to understanding and possibly treating obesity-associated diabetes. Our clinical data confirmed the previously-reported variability in obesity-associated pathology. Here, we have shown that the group with healthy fat stem cells had lower cholesterol and a better liver function.

Dr Mohamed Elrayess, from ADLQ, said: In this study we have shown that the impaired ability of fat stem cells to store excess fat was partially due to increased levels of the inflammatory marker interleukin-6 in the blood. Indeed, when fat stem cells isolated from healthy obese individuals were exposed to interleukin-6 in the laboratory, they behaved like those obtained from individuals with risk of diabetes. [FIGURE].

This study has shed light for the first time on the importance of fat stem cells in the context of diabetes. The collaboration between the two institutions will explore ways to improve the efficiency of fat stem cells in pre-diabetic obese patients, thereby reducing their risk of developing diabetes.

Paper

'Interleukin-6 induces impairment in human subcutaneous adipogenesis in obesity-associated insulin resistance' by Almuraikhy S, Kafienah W, Bashah M, Diboun I, Jaganjac M, Al-Khelaifi F, Abdesselem H, Mazloum NA, Alsayrafi M, Mohamed-Ali V, Elrayess MA in Diabetologia. 2016 Jun 24. [Epub ahead of print]
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And the Employee of the Year award goes to

A medical office worker spotted a fire in a Newkirk Avenue building that fire marshals missed after a blaze on Sept. 13. Firefighters responded to a conflagration at the Newkirk Medical Plaza between Rugby and Marlborough roads at around 11 pm and thought they put it out by 11:30 pm, officials said. Marshals inspected the structure, then let employees in to scope out the damage  but thats when one of the desk jockeys one-upped New Yorks Bravest and spotted a flame still burning in the ceiling, a building manager said.

One of the employees, the office staff who was with us, noticed in the ceiling, heard crackling sounds and noticed open flames, so the fire marshal commanded all us to leave to evacuate and called the fire department back, said Yehuda Miller. If not for that walk-through that we did, the fire marshal said its a very good chance  because there were no working smoke detectors anymore  by the time that would have been detected, the flames would have been so big the entire block would have been burnt down.

A department spokesman called Millers account hearsay and said the agency is still investigating.

But Miller does not blame the department or firefighters  six of whom were hospitalized for minor injuries while battling the inferno  for the oversight.

At this point right now, when I just watched six firefighters who had minor injuries fighting the blaze, I only want to thank the FDNY for their work and their self-sacrifice and the amazing job they do, he said.

Smoke eaters quelled the fire for good by 5 am, a department spokesman said.

And police cuffed a guy for allegedly setting the blaze  cops say the firebug broke in around 11 pm and lit the place up.

Miller called the cops after the offices high-tech, cellphone-video security system sensed the prowler, he said.

We have an alarm system and we got notified on my iPhone that there was activity going on at the building, Miller said. I see this guy walking around in the building who clearly shouldnt have been there. I called the police  and I saw him going up this hallway and then I see him going to the rear going out the back door. They sent the officers right to the back and they caught him at the door.

The plaza houses an occupational and physical therapy office, primary care center, orthopedic office, and an obstetrics and gynecology office  all damaged by the flames, which took 106 firefighters to extinguish, a fire department spokesman said.

But the womens health office was scorched worst, and Miller believes that may have been part of the suspects motive, he said.

The section for womens health was the one damaged the most and it appears as though that was the target, Miller said. Everyone in the building has to relocate. The whole building is not workable. Its absolutely horrible.

Police charged the man with burglary, arson, reckless endangerment, and criminal trespass, officials said.
Campus News

Quanxi Jia rejoins UB to boost material science efforts

By CORY NEALON

Quanxi Jia, a world-renowned scholar and UB alumnus, has rejoined his alma mater to help build the universitys materials science programs.

Jia, who returns to UB after a decorated 23-year career at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, has been named the Empire Innovation Professor and National Grid Professor of Materials Research in the Department of Materials Design and Innovation (MDI). He also will serve as scientific director at UBs New York State Center of Excellence in Materials Informatics (CMI).

Jias appointment was announced by Liesl Folks, dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences; Robin Schulze, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences; Krishna Rajan, Erich Bloch Endowed Chair of MDI; and Mark T. Swihart, executive director at CMI.

Materials science is a critical element to many industries, ranging from aerospace and medical devices to renewable energy and consumer electronics. We are delighted that Quanxi Jia, an internationally recognized expert with an exemplary record of research and service, has joined UB in this strategically important role. He will boost UBs position as a premier public research university and enhance important regional and national initiatives that will help Buffalo grow as a hub for advanced manufacturing, Folks, Schulze, Rajan and Swihart say in a joint statement.

A collaboration between the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and the College of Arts of Sciences, MDI builds upon UBs existing faculty expertise in computer science, physics, chemistry, mechanical engineering, environmental engineering, electrical engineering, biomedical engineering, and chemical and biological engineering.

The department trains future materials scientists and engineers, with an emphasis on the use of advanced computational tools, in conjunction with bench science, to reduce the cost and time it takes to discover and commercialize new materials that are critical to the economic security of the region, nation and world.

CMI is one of two New York State Centers of Excellence at UB. The center advocates for the universitys technology-based economic development programs and cultivates industry collaboration, while further growing UBs expertise and reputation in the fast-moving field of materials informatics, including discovery and commercialization of innovative new materials.

The goals of MDI and CMI match those of the White Houses Materials Genome Initiative and its Big Data Research and Development Initiative, and state initiatives  such as the Western New York Regional Economic Development Council  that work to boost economic development in Buffalo and beyond.

Prior to joining UB, Jia was director of the Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies, a U.S. Department of Energy nanoscale science research center operated jointly by Los Alamos National Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratories.

His research areas include the synthesis and study of structure-property relationships of nanostructured materials, multifunctional materials and thin films; the development of innovative deposition techniques for the growth of electronic materials; and the development and fabrication of novel solid-state microelectronic and electro-optic devices.

Jia received bachelors and masters degrees in electrical engineering from Xian Jiaotong University, China, and a PhD in the same field from UB in 1991.

He has authored or co-authored more than 450 peer-reviewed journal articles, delivered more than 100 invited lectures and holds 48 U.S. patents. He serves as co-editor-in-chief of Materials Research Letters and sits on the editorial board of several academic and professional journals.

Among his many awards and honors are two prestigious R&D 100 awards, the 2005 Asian-American Engineer of the Year Award and the Federal Laboratory Consortium for Technology Transfer Awards for Excellence in Technology Transfer. He is an elected fellow of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, Materials Research Society, American Physical Society, American Ceramic Society and American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Burnham-On-Seas MP James Heappey has explained why he believes the Prime Minister is right to have given the 18bn Hinkley Point C project the go-ahead this week.

The MP spoke out after Thursdays announcement that Europes biggest construction project will go ahead with a number of security caveats to control ownership.

Im delighted that  with a couple of caveats  the Prime Minister has decided to give Hinkley the nod, he says.

The Prime Minister was absolutely right to look again at the Hinkley deal and sensible in setting the caveats she has to control ownership. However, the decision could not wait any longer.

Nuclear power stations are expensive things but they produce huge amounts of reliable, low carbon energy, free from the price fluctuations of the global gas market and the unreliability of the weather. For an economy the size of ours, that always on base load is inescapably essential.

However, those who are saying there are other ways of generating that energy are not entirely wrong. Im writing this from the west coast of the United States, where the Energy and Climate Change Select Committee are currently meeting with some of the policy makers and companies that are most enthusiastically embracing the renewables-plus-storage future.

Yesterday morning we were at Tesla, and after that we were at Nest. The vision they have is compelling, and with Elon Musk backing one and Google the other I have no doubt theyll succeed. Yet theyll be the first to admit that theyre only just getting going.

Our current nuclear fleet generates about a third of our electricity and in around a decades time, we have to switch it off.

No matter how successfully we encourage greater energy efficiency or the growth of demand management technologies (and we must keenly encourage both), we will still need to replace that generations capacity, because our wider plans for the decarbonisation of heating and transport will massively increase the electricity load placed on the UK system.

I have every confidence that the ministerial team at BEIS are as enthused as I am about the decentralised, digitised, and dynamic energy system of the future. And it is perfectly possible that this sort of system could be ready to act as base load by the time Hinkley gets switched on.

On the other hand, it might not be. The Government has to make a decision that makes sure the lights are still on in a decades time.

Moreover, we cannot be lazy and compare the cost of Hinkley to the current UK wholesale price of electricity. Nobody can build any sort of generation system for that.

Gas fired power station developers might currently want a strike price of around 75 per MW/hr but that is with gas prices as low as they are at the moment. It certainly wouldnt take much of a hike in gas prices to get up to the price of Hinkley.

On top of that, it is important to note that replacing the current nuclear fleet with gas would run a cart and horses through our international commitment to decarbonise.

Our ambition should be to build this fleet of new nuclear power stations so that we continue to draw a third of our energy from that always on base load. Beyond that we should pursue as much renewable generation as we can manage, and we should aggressively promote the UK as a place to develop storage technologies.

There is a huge industrial opportunity in doing so. Well need some combined cycle gas turbine power stations to balance out the intermittency of renewables until that storage capacity is in place but once the gas has gone, well have a reliable and completely clean source of energy that can meet the growing needs of our low carbon economy.

We are going to switch off our coal fired power stations by the end of the decade and the current nukes must be switched off within the decade that follows. Replacement capacity that is utterly reliable must be commissioned urgently to plug the gap that will be left.

No matter how expensive Hinkley might seem, the cost of turning to standby generation or peaking plants when there is insufficient power to meet our needs will be significantly higher because the lights cannot be allowed to go out.
Mobile apps and iPads are the new tools of medical representatives as pharmaceutical in India are taking the digital route for product promotion.
City-gas distribution company Ltd (MGL) is now betting on a new market beyond Mumbai with its Raigad gas distribution project, where it plans to invest Rs 50 to 100 crore annually in five years time.
To tap the opportunities in Indian retail and e-commerce businesses, Pune-based retail startup is building its one-stop shop platform that enables mid-to-large retailers/brands to drive higher sales both via offline and online channels. The tech company is also in the process of making simple products for small sellers across the country at an affordable price.
A mega planned by Odisha has caught the attention of some of the top notch players in renewable energy business. SB Energy (formerly SBG Cleantech), a joint venture between Japan's SoftBank Group, Bharti Enterprises and Taiwan-based Foxconn Technology Group and homegrown conglomerate Shapoorji Pallonji are among major players keen to invest in the park.

Others queued up for investments are Azure Power, Panchvaktra Holdings, Orange Renewable and SkyPower Global.
Cash and carry major is looking at expanding operations in Uttar Pradesh by launching new stores in important towns in near future.
The environment ministers of nations on Friday announced setting up of a joint working group, institutionalising their mutual cooperation on green issues.

The ministers, who met in South Goa during the two-day meeting, also agreed on a memorandum of understanding (MoU).

"We have finalised the MoU and have reached on some conclusions which are necessary for the future in light of UNFCCC and the Paris agreement," Union Environment Minister Anil Dave told reporters.

" has a major role in the global area, particularly (for) air quality, water management, waste management. These are the areas where we had some agreement.

"We agreed with each other. Technology transfer is one of them, because technology and finance are the major issues if you want to mitigate the objects, goals," Dave said.

He said the heads of the states will meet again during the summit in Goa and will discuss the matter.

Dave said countries which are advanced in specific technologies will try and transfer that technology to others.

"There is a proposal from China that in April next year, technocrats and those who have specialised command on the subject will meet in Beijing," he added.

Dave said the BRICS countries have "hundred per cent agreement of all the parties on the issues related to environment."



The Minister termed climate change as a "serious concern".

"Sudden remedies for climate change are not possible. In the longer run, we see unpredictable changes in atmosphere, especially in the behaviour of the sea, crop patters," Dave said.

"I am happy to inform you that we have agreed that each and every water body or each and every river of the country must be preserved properly so that safe, clean drinking water should be available to the entire society," he said.
The bandh called for by the Opposition parties and traders in Tamil Nadu, demanding Cauvery river water and to lodge protest against attacks on Tamils and their property in Karnataka, received a mix response.





DMK leaders Stalin and his sister Kanimozhi courted arrest even as police stepped in to prevent them from stopping trains and staging road blocks in Chennai.


Greaves Cotton, one of India's largest diesel auto engine manufacturers, shared inputs with the Delhi police, which led to raids on two shops in New Delhi selling spurious parts branded as 'Greaves' .
As Nepal undergoes a political transition, India on Friday pitched for implementing the country's Constitution by accommodating aspirations of all sections and assured it of all possible support amid China's efforts to gain ground in the Himalayan nation.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi held an "extensive and productive dialogue" with his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal popularly known as Prachanda after which the two sides inked three pacts including one on India extending $150 million for Nepal's post earthquake reconstruction.

It is Prachanda's first visit to India after becoming Prime Minister for the second time. KP Sharma Oli quit the top post in July following fresh political turmoil due to protest of Madheshi community against the new Constitution.

The two countries also decided to continue cooperation in areas of defence and security.

In a statement to media following the talks, Modi said India hoped Nepal will be successful in implementing the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating aspirations of all sections of its diverse society.

"As immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability and economic prosperity (Shanti, Sthirta aur Samrudhi) of Nepal is our shared objective," the Prime Minister said in the presence of Prachanda.

On his part, the Nepalese Prime Minister said his country has nothing but "goodwill" for India and that destinies of both the countries are "interlinked".

The Prime Minister said India has been privileged to be Nepal's partner at "every step" of the country development journey and economic progress. "Our friendship is time-tested & unique. We share our burden during difficult times, just as we celebrate each other's achievements."

Modi said both sides have agreed to focus on "close monitoring" and time bound completion of all development projects being implemented by India in Nepal. He said speedy and successful implementation of ongoing hydropower projects will be ensured.

Showering praise on Prachanda for his efforts to bring stability to Nepal, Modi said, "I am confident that under your leadership Nepal will be successful in implementing the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating aspirations of all sections of the diverse society."

"I conveyed to Prachanda that India stands ready and prepared to strengthen the development partnership with Nepal and we will do so as per priorities of people and government of Nepal," Modi said.

About the political transformation in Nepal, Prachanda said his government was making sincere efforts in taking every section of the society onboard while implementing the provisions of the Constitution.

"I shared with Modiji that promulgation of the Constitution last year by the popularly elected Constituent assembly was a historic achievement for people of Nepal. You are aware that my government has made serious efforts to bring everyone on board as we enter the phase of implementation of the Constitution," he said.
Nepal's Prime Minister was on Friday morning accorded a ceremonial welcome at the forecourts of the Rashtrapati Bhawan here in the presence of his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi.

Prime Minister Dahal, who is on a four-day visit to India, is scheduled to hold talks with President Pranab Mukherjee and Prime Minister Modi in the latter part of the day.

The visiting dignitary arrived in New Delhi on Thursday.

On his arrival, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj met the Nepalese Prime Minister.

External Affairs Ministry said that India will take this opportunity to understand the developmental priorities of the new Nepalese Prime Minister.

He will also visit Nathpa Jhakri Hydropower Project in Himachal Pradesh tomorrow.

This is Dahal's first foreign bilateral visit after he assumed office last month.

The visit will provide an opportunity for both the sides to discuss issues of mutual interest and seek ways to strengthen the age-old friendly ties.
The (NPPA) has revised the ceiling price of 18 more drugs, soon after the last round of changes. The latest move will mean reduction in price of up to 23 per cent for the 18 drugs.
PricewaterhouseCoopers Pvt. Ltd, in consortium with Airport Planners and Design Consulting Pvt. Ltd, and SPA Legal has been roped in by the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor Development Corporation (DMICDC) as transaction advisors for the greenfield airport in Gujarat.

As transaction advisors, the consortium is tasked with analysing and evaluating various plans, including the Detailed Project Report (DPR) prepared by Airports Authority of India (AAI), suggesting a suitable mode of implementation.
Tariq Hameed Karra, a senior and founding member of the ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP) in Kashmir, elected to the Lok Sabha from Srinagar in 2014, has quit his party and membership of Parliament, in protest at what has taken place in his state. Edited excerpts of a talk with Sanjay Jog:



What prompted your decision?



The call of my conscience. The PDP went against the basic principles on which the party was floated, the premise of being a facilitator for India-Pak relations, between the (separatist) Hurriyat Conference and the Government of India, on getting The Armed Forces (Jammu and Kashmir) Special Powers Act, 1990, repealed, the Public Safety Act dropped. Also, to facilitate return of our Pandit (Hindu) brothers and to save people from excesses, oppression and other brutalities.
The central government has moved a transfer petition related to the cases where pharmaceutical companies have filed against ban of FDCs or . Through the petition, the government has sought withdrawal of the pleas pending before high courts of Delhi, Kerala, Karnataka and Madras, so that these can be taken up by the Supreme Court.
In what seems to be a more favourable stance being taken towards the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs), Union Minister for Human Resources Development Prakash Javadekar on Friday said that the government desired more autonomy for the premier B-schools while commenting on the pending Bill.

"The government desires for IIMs and higher education institutions to get more autonomy and be able to compete in the market based on their quality and grow accordingly. We also have to see that all sections of the society get justice," Javadekar told mediapersons during his visit to the Ahmedabad campus on Friday. Javadekar, however, did not comment further on the status of the draft Bill or on the impending selection of a new chairman at IIM-A.
The Maharashtra Cabinet on Friday gave its approval for the demerger of Ratnagiri Gas & Power Pvt Ltd (RGPPL) into Ratnagiri Power Company and Ratnagiri LNG Company. The liquefied natural gas company will re-gasify imported LNG and pool with domestically available gas during the low-demand season.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and visiting Nepalese PM Pushpa Kamala Dahal Prachanda on Friday took pains to convey that India- ties were on the mend following the recent stress in the bilateral relations between the two neighbours.
The government is looking towards small and medium enterprises (SMEs) for revival of exports, Commerce and Industry Minister Nirmala Sitharaman told the Economic Times newspaper in an interview.
In the first high-level meeting since the Centre approved the Rs 27,000 crore trans-shipment port at Enayam, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa assured Union Minister of State for Road Transport, Highways and Shipping, Pon. Radhakrishnan, that her government would extend all the support to the project.

Local villagers have been opposing the project stating that the proposed port will accelerate the erosion of their beach and threaten their livelihood. Those in favour of the project call the opposition politically motivated
Residents of Pune may finally heave a sigh of relief as their traffic woes may finally be getting solved. World Bank and Asian Infrastructure Investment (AII) Bank have sanctioned an amount of Rs 6,325.50 crore for the construction of Rail project.

"The State Government had created a committee to look into solving the public transport issues of the city. On the recommendation of the committee the Maharashtra Government had sent proposal to the Centre. The Ministry of Urban Development and the Finance Ministry worked together to get this loan sanctioned. The loan was sanctioned for Pune on September 14, 2016," said Girish Bapat, Pune Guardian Minister.
In a setback to India, the World Trade Organization (WTO)s appellate body upheld the rulings of a panel which stated the Indian governments power purchase agreements with solar firms were inconsistent with international norms.

The appellate body (of the WTO) upheld each of these panel conclusions appealed by India, the stated.

The US had, in 2014, filed the complaint before the global trade body alleging discrimination against American firms.

The US Trade Representative (USTR) Michael Froman said the appellate body had issued a report in favour of the Obama administrations challenge to Indias domestic content requirements (DCR) under its National Solar Mission (NSM). Since India enacted these requirements in 2011, which requires solar power developers to use Indian-manufactured cells and modules, American solar exports to India have fallen by more than 90 per cent, he said.

This report is a clear victory for American solar manufacturers and workers, and another step forward in the fight against climate change, Froman added.

The Obama administration, he said, strongly supports rapid deployment of solar energy worldwide, including in India. Local content requirements are not only contrary to rules, but actually undermine our efforts to promote clean energy by requiring the use of more expensive and less efficient equipment, making it more difficult for clean energy sources to be cost-competitive, he alleged.

US-based National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) welcomed WTOs rejection of Indias appeal and urged the Indian government to move quickly to dismantle its discriminatory DCR that have blocked access for US solar cell modules.

As each and every previous ruling in this case has shown, Indias DCR are a clear violation of core WTO rules and today (Friday)s victory will give an important boost to US manufacturing, NAM said. This decision also demonstrates why the strong rules-based WTO system and trade agreements with binding and strong enforcement rules are critical to open markets and eliminate unfair barriers overseas.





THE SETTING SUN WTOs appellate body upheld the rulings which stated the Indian governments power purchase agreements with solar firms were inconsistent with international norms

The US had filed the complaint before the global trade body, in 2014, alleging discrimination against American firms

In February 2016, the WTO panel found in favour of the US in a dispute challenging Indias localisation rules discriminating

The case assumes significance as India recently dragged the US to the WTO over Americas DCR and subsidies provided by eight states in the renewable energy sector

Earlier in February this year, USTR said the WTO panel found Indias localisation rules discriminating against imported solar cells and modules under Indias NSM.

The WTO appellate body rejected all of Indias defensive arguments, USTR said. In particular, it upheld the panels finding that Indias DCR measures are not justified under the government procurement derogation of Article III:8(a) of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade 1994, because the Indian government does not itself procure solar cells or modules under the NSM, USTR said.

The case assumes significance as India recently dragged the US to the WTO over Americas DCR and subsidies provided by eight states in the renewable energy sector.
The Regulatory and Development Authority of India (Irdai) is expected to give the final approval to foreign companies to set up a branch in India.Speaking on the sidelines of an summit organised by Assocham, Irdai chairman T S Vijayan said that by January 2017, the body expects the final approval (R3) licence to be given out to the global reinsurers' India branches.We are speeding up the process and expect that some of the players will be able to begin branch operations in January 2017, he said.These players, including Swiss Re and Munich Re, have already received the initial approval or R1 licence. In the next Irdai authority meeting in October, Vijayan said that the second phase of R2 approval will be coming in for discussion. After this, these firms will be required to bring in the requisite capital to set up a branch.The sector will see the first initial public offering (IPO) of shares of the sector. Private player ICICI Prudential Life Insurance's IPO will open on Monday."The first IPO will be a pioneer in the sector. If the response is good, it will generate interest in the sector," Vijayan said.On the discussion paper on listing of insurance companies based on the number of years in business, Vijayan said that some ompanies are not in favour of it, while some are neutral. "So, we are evaluating whether to bring it as a regulation or not. The aim is that this should increase governance and disclosures for companies," Vijayan said. Overall, growth in new business is slowly coming back said insurers.Speaking during the event, S K Roy, chairman, Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC), said that for August, the entity has seen a 92 per cent growth in new business premium.

Going forward, the regulator said that thrust should be on technology-based services. He said that they will enable selling through electronic offices. Similarly, he said that agents should also move from selling to an assisted buying model.


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(IOB) has received shareholders' approval to raise Rs 1,551 crore from the Government of India.

At an EGM called by the Bank on Thursday, the shareholders approved allotment of upto 55,57,14,797 shares to the Government, which in turn will infuse Rs 1,551 crore on preferential basis.

The central government has recently announced an allocation of Rs 3,101 crore into the bank by way of preferential allotment of equity, which is struggling with high non-performing assets (NPA). Almost 50 per cent of this amount, Rs 1,551 crore, is marked for immediate infusion, which would help the Bank to keep its capital adequacy ratio within the limits.

State-run Indian Overseas Bank, has reported a net loss of Rs 1,451 crore ($217 million) with a further rise in its sour assets, for the first quarter of this fiscal year.

Bad loans as a percentage of total loans rose to 20.48% as of end-June from 17.4% three months earlier, according to a regulatory filing of the Bank.

Provisions, including for bad loans, more than tripled from a year earlier to Rs 2,138 crore in the three months to June 30.

The total income saw a decline of 12% to Rs 5,868 crore during the quarter as against Rs 6,672 crore recorded during the corresponding quarter of previous year.

The Capital Adequacy Ratio in Basel III is at 9.47%. The bank said that the government of India has allocated Rs 3,101 crore by way of preferential allotment of equity and 50 per cent of this amount, Rs 1,551 crore, is marked for immediate infusion. With the fund infusion, the Capital Adequacy Ratio of the bank will be above the regulatory minimum of 9.625 per cent, it added. After the capital infusion, it would be at 10.37 per cent.
In view of rising non-performing assets (NPAs) in the corporate sector, State Bank of India (SBI) has moved towards a projected-cash-flow financing from the earlier practice of balance-sheet financing.
British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said he favoured turning migrant vessels back towards Libya as a "deterrent" measure that would take the immigration heat off Italy.

"We are determined in the UK to help Italy. We recognise this is a European problem," Johnson told a joint press conference with Italian counterpart Paolo Gentiloni in Florence.

Johnson noted that British vessels HMS Diamond and HMS Enterprise were participating in the Rome-based EU military taskforce dubbed Operation Sophia, launched in 2015 with the aim of neutralising refugee smuggling routes in the Mediterranean.

Johnson said Operation Sophia was designed "to help turn back some of these boats ... And I think personally they should be turned back as close to the shore as possible, so they don't reach the Italian mainland and they are more of a deterrent effect" to other vessels bent on heading for Italy from north Africa.

"I think I'm right in saying we turned back 200,000 migrants, sorry saved, saved 200,000 migrants, so I do think it's the right approach," insisted Johnson without specifying which migrants he was referring to.

HMS Enterprise was involved in a rescue operation to save 750 migrants off Libya today, the Italian coastguard said.

Italy is right in the front line for migrants seeking a new life in Europe having since 2014 seen some 450,000 people reach its shores.

According to Italy's interior ministry, nearly 128,400 migrants have arrived via the Mediterranean since the start of the year, a five per cent jump over the same period last year.

Many board rickety, makeshift boats in the hopes of reaching the Italian island of Lampedusa some 300 kilometres away.

UN envoy Martin Kobler said in an interview published today that some 235,000 are ready to make the dangerous crossing from Libya to Italy.

"We have on our lists 235,000 migrants who are just waiting for a good opportunity to depart for Italy, and they will do it," Kobler told Italian daily La Stampa.

The Operation Sophia ships can only board traffickers' vessels if they enter waters, which they never do, and are often end up on rescue missions for migrants trying to make their way towards the Italian coast.

The EU force cannot enter Libyan territorial waters without a formal request by the UN-backed Government of National Accord which is trying to extend its shaky authority from Tripoli to the rest of the country.

Gentiloni reiterated the issue was a problem for Europe as a whole and not just Italy and would be addressed at tomorrow's EU summit in Bratislava.
Apple fans from Sydney to Shanghai, the first customers worldwide to snap the new iPhone 7 off the shelves, cheered as they left stores on Friday brandishing their purchases, flanked by applauding sales staff.

But underneath the usual fanfare, the crowds of enthusiasts and overnight campers were smaller than in past years. Some customers complained after the larger version and models with the new jet-black color sold out.

In part, online pre-ordering has made queues unnecessary for all but diehard fans, and in Chinese stores only those who had ordered in advance were queuing to collect. Yet in markets like China, online interest in the new phone has also been muted compared to past launches, as cheaper local brands amp up their features, design and marketing.

Wu Ting, a 28-year-old from Nanjing, was surprised to find herself first in line at a downtown Apple store in Shanghai on Friday, a holiday in China.

I found last year that there were crowds of people, but this year almost no-one. I came an hour early thinking Id have to wait a long time before getting seen, Wu said.

Sales in China will be the acid test for Apples year ahead: The success of the iPhone 6 in China drove sales last year, while the slower-burn 6S contributed to Apples first global revenue drop in over a decade earlier this year.

Chatter about the iPhone 7 launch on Chinese microblog Weibo has been far more muted than when the iPhone 6 debuted in 2014. An index of searches on Baidu Inc, Chinas most popular search engine, shows the new phone lagging both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 5.

Apples Greater China sales dropped by a third in April-June, albeit after more than doubling a year earlier, while its market share has fallen to around 7.8 per cent, placing it fifth behind local rivals Huawei, OPPO and Vivo.

Apple has been slower to adapt, consumers and analysts say: the new iPhone has few major changes to win over fickle shoppers and the firms marketing has been generic.

From Steve Jobs to Tim Cook, Apple has never had any marketing strategy tailor-made for China, said Zhou Zhanggui, a Beijing-based strategic consultant.

Apple risks losing out more if it does not better cater to local demands in its marketing as well as product design. In Beijings fashionable Sanlitun shopping district, several people who had already grabbed new iPhone 7s were hawking them for a markup just outside a flagship store.

But Apple has not lost its shine for all customers.

Marcus Barsoum, a 16-year-old who described himself as a diehard Apple fan, spent two nights camped outside the Sydney store. By the morning, some 200 people were gathered in light rain to be the first customers globally to own iPhone 7s.

Weary but elated, Barsoum charged into the store at 8 am to the cheers of Apple staff. He emerged with a matte black iPhone 7, although he had wanted a larger 7 plus in jet black.

It feels great to be the first in the world to have the iPhone 7, he said. It was 100 per cent worth it.
Tackling the toughest issues of Britain's exit from the European Union should not happen before the end of 2017, former European Council president Herman Van Rompuy said.

The UK voted its way out of the EU in a June referendum but the official divorce proceedings cannot begin until Britain starts procedures, through triggering Article 50 of the EU's Lisbon Treaty.

Prime Minister Theresa May has said she will not begin the formal process before 2017, while Van Rompuy yesterday said negotiations on the toughest issues will have to wait until after elections in France and Germany.

"Before the German elections and before there is a new German government, no serious negotiations will take place," Van Rompuy told the BBC Radio 4 "Today" programme.

"You can always start with more technical matters but the hard core -- the difficult topics -- will be tackled after the constitution of the new German government. That will be October-November," he added.

The French election will be completed in April or May next year.

The most challenging issues on the negotiating table will likely be how Britain can achieve its aim of restricting migration from the EU, while maintaining access to the single market.

Van Rompuy, a former Belgian prime minister, said the EU would seek a deal of mutual benefit but "red lines" would stand on key areas.

"There are huge economic interests but there are also red lines. It is very well known that freedom of movement is one of those red lines," he said.

The former EU chief said that while the bloc did not feel it had to "punish" the UK, it would not want to encourage any of the remaining member states to leave.

Van Rompuy's comments came on the eve of a summit of the remaining 27 EU member states in the Slovakian capital Bratislava. The meeting is aimed at creating a roadmap for the bloc without Britain.
Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton has accused Donald Trump of fostering ugliness and bigotry by refusing to acknowledge President Barack Obama was born in the US and asked Americans to reject the bluster and bigotry of her Republican rival in November's election.

"This man wants to be our next president? When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?" Clinton asked in her address to the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute Gala here last night.

She was referring to a latest interview of Trump in which he was unwilling to say that Obama was born in the US.

The Trump Campaign in a late night statement said that "he believes Obama was born in the US."

In her remarks, Clinton alleged that Trump is running the most divisive campaigns of the lifetimes.

"His message is you should be afraid  afraid of people whose race or ethnicity is different, or whose religious faith is different, or who were born in a different country. There's no innuendo or dog whistles anymore. It's all right out there in the open now. So we've got to come back twice as strong and twice as clear," she said.

She also said that Muslims and Latinos remain targets of Trump's divisive campaign as he promises to deport 16 million people living and working in the US.

Clinton said she has a different vision: she will introduce comprehensive immigration reform in her first 100 days and work to build an economy that works for everyone, not just those at the top.

She paid tribute to the Latino community's contributions to America and said, "You're not intruders. You're our neighbours, our colleagues, our friends, our families. You make our nation stronger, smarter, more creative. And I want you to know that I see you and I am with you, and time and again."

Clinton said she intends to close her campaign the way she began her career  fighting for kids and families.

"That's been the cause of my life. It will be the passion of my presidency. So tonight I want to mention two things I'll do in the first 100 days of my administration to help families in every corner of America," she said.

Clinton said a comprehensive immigration reform will not only be the right thing to do, but it will add $700 billion to US economy and enable America to be what it's always been - a place where people from around the world can come to reunite with family, start new businesses, pursue their dreams, apply their talents to American growth and innovation.

Trump has tried to reset himself and his campaign many times, she alleged.

"This is the best he can do. This is who he is. And so we need to decide who we are. If we just sigh and shake our heads and accept this, then what does that tell our kids about who we are? We need to stand up and repudiate this divisive rhetoric. We need to stop him conclusively in November in an election that sends a message that even he can hear," she said.

"Parents and teachers are already worried about what they're calling the 'Trump Effect'. Bullying and harassment are on the rise in our schools, especially targeting students of colour, Muslims and immigrants," she alleged.
Hillary Clinton returned to the campaign fray in a tightening race against Republican Donald Trump, who released new details of his physical fitness in response to the health scare that sidelined his rival.

Seeking to turn the page after her poorly handled bout with pneumonia, Clinton was headed to North Carolina and then the US capital Washington as she resumed the White House race after a three-day convalescence.

"Welcome back to 'Stronger Together,'" the Democratic nominee quipped cheerily to reporters on board her campaign plane.

Asked how she was feeling, the 68-year-old former secretary of state replied: "I am doing great, thank you so much!"

Clinton was taken ill Sunday during a 9/11 memorial ceremony in New York where she was seen stumbling limp-legged into her vehicle, an episode that raised tough questions about her campaign's transparency.

With the candidates' health suddenly at the forefront of the campaign, Clinton looked to head off further scrutiny by releasing new medical records yesterday indicating that she was "fit to serve" as president.

The disclosure came as the media-savvy Trump, 70, teased new health data of his own during the taping of a medical chat show, before publishing it today in full.

The one-page letter from his long-time doctor lists various lab results, including for cholesterol, blood pressure and liver and thyroid function  all deemed to be within the normal range.

While Trump is shown to be overweight, with a body mass index of 29.5, his doctor Harold Bornstein declared the Republican nominee to be "in excellent physical health."

Trump had made a point of refraining from harsh attacks on his convalescent rival  but the candidates were quick to resume their jousting.

Team Trump included a veiled jab at Clinton in a statement accompanying his health update: "We are pleased to disclose all of the test results which show that Mr Trump is in excellent health, and has the stamina to endure  uninterrupted  the rigours of a punishing and unprecedented presidential campaign."

While addressing the Economic Club of New York, Trump slammed the policies of Clinton and President Barack Obama as having doubled the national debt as he promised his presidency would bring about "an American economic revival."

Clinton, meanwhile, slammed the brash billionaire, who has repeatedly praised Russian President Vladimir Putin, for his "alarming closeness with the Kremlin."

"Donald Trump has run a deplorable campaign," she told the Tom Joyner radio show.
Several Russians living in cast their votes from the state in the election to their country's Lower House of Parliament, Duma.

The voting was held on Thursday at a temporary polling booth in Porvorim village of Goa, about 5 kms from here, in the office owned by Vikram Varma, legal counsel of the Russian Consulate in Mumbai.

The number of votes polled was not disclosed by the officials.

The elections are being held for 450 seats of Duma.

The voting in Russia is scheduled on September 18, but in the voting was held earlier as the ballot boxes are to be transferred to Mumbai and sent to Russia.

"The entire process went on peacefully. Two representatives from the Russian Consulate at Mumbai had arrived in Goa," Varma said.

Sergey Lunev, Head of the Mumbai branch of the Russian Trade Representation, and Vice Consul Alexey Strukov were deputed as election officers, he said.

The arrangements were overseen by Consul General Alexey Zhiltsov.

With the tourism season still a few weeks away, not too many Russians were in Goa, and the turnout was moderate but peaceful, Varma said.

"Most of the Russians were thrilled that they were able to cast their vote while in Goa," he said.

This is the second time that Russia allowed voting from a venue outside a Consulate or the Embassy in India.

The first such polling was witnessed in on December 4, 2011, when nearly 300 Russian voters cast vote, Varma said.

Goa is a popular holiday destination for Russians with 65,000 to 70,000 visitors from the country arriving in the last tourist season.
WikiLeaks whistleblower and former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor hit back on Friday at a House Intelligence Committee report that described him as a "disgruntled employee" and not a "principled whistleblower".

Snowden mocked the committee's findings on Twitter, challenging several points.

"The claim I "doctored performance evaluations?" This one is amazing: I reported an XSS (hacking) vulnerability in CIA annual review system," Snowden said.

A summary of the 36-page two-year report, said Snowden "was a disgruntled employee who had frequent conflicts with his managers and was reprimanded just two weeks before he began illegally downloading classified documents".

The report said Snowden "doctored his performance evaluations" and exaggerated his resume to obtain "new positions at the NSA".

"He took advantage of its access as network administrator to search hard drives on his colleagues' computers," it stated.

According to Snowden, he "could go on".

"Bottom line: after 'two years of investigation', the American people deserve better. This report diminishes the committee," he said in his concluding tweet.

The report released on September 15, came as Snowden supporters have launched a major push to have him pardoned before US President Barack Obama leaves office, and as Hollywood film "Snowden" hits theatres in the US.

" is no hero  he's a traitor who wilfully betrayed his colleagues and his country," The Telegraph UK quoted Devin Nunes, the Intelligence Committee chairman, as saying.

White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest told the media on September 12 that Snowden is "charged with serious crimes, and it's the policy of the [Obama] administration that Snowden should return to the US and face those charges", ABC news reported.

Snowden on September 13, laid out his case for presidential pardon stating that though his actions were against the law, they changed the nation for the better.
The US Department of Justice is asking to pay $14 billion to settle an investigation into its selling of mortgage-backed securities, Germany's flagship lender said on Friday.

The claim against Deutsche, which is likely to be negotiated in several months of talks, far outstrips the bank's and investors' expectations for such costs.

While it is yet to become clear what the final payment will be, if it were to be as high as $14 billion, this would be a severe strain for Deutsche's fragile finances and would likely further rock investor confidence in the bank.

The bank's US-listed shares fell 8 per cent in after-hours trading.

" has no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited. The negotiations are only just beginning. The bank expects that they will lead to an outcome similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts", said in a statement on Friday.

The Department of Justice declined to comment.

The Wall Street Journal earlier reported the department's demands.

The Department of Justice has taken a tough stance in settlement negotiations with other banks, requesting sums higher than the eventual fine.

In 2014, it asked Citigroup to pay $12 billion to resolve an investigation into the sale of shoddy mortgage-backed securities, sources said. The fine eventually came in at $7 billion.

In a similar case, rival Goldman Sachs agreed in April to pay $5.06 billion to settle claims that it misled mortgage bond investors during the financial crisis.

That settlement included a $2.39 billion civil penalty, $1.8 billion in other relief, including funds for homeowners whose mortgages exceed the value of their property, and an $875 million payment to resolve claims by cooperative and home loan banks among others.

Deutsche Bank's settlement will comprise a different list of recipients, a source close to the matter said, adding that the lender had already settled some claims three years ago.

In late 2013, Deutsche Bank agreed to pay $1.9 billion to settle claims that it defrauded US government-controlled Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, America's biggest providers of housing finance, into buying $14.2 billion in mortgage-backed securities before the 2008 financial crisis.

A $14 billion fine, or even half that sum, would still rank among one of the largest paid by banks to US authorities in recent years. In 2013, JPMorgan Chase & Co agreed to pay $13 billion to settle allegations by the US authorities that it overstated the quality of mortgages it was selling to investors in the run-up to the 2008-2009 financial crisis. In 2014, Bank of America Corp. agreed to pay $16.7 billion in penalties to settle similar charges.

Deutsche Bank has not said what it has set aside in anticipation of a settlement over the sale and packaging of resident mortgage-backed securities before 2008. Its overall legal provisions stood at 5.5 billion euros at the end of the second quarter.

Deutsche was once one of Europe's most successful players on Wall Street. Like many of its peers, it has since faced a slew of lawsuits that often trace back to the boom years before the crash. Its litigation bill since 2012 has already hit more than 12 billion euros.

Claims filed by individuals, companies and regulators against Deutsche, outlined in the bank's 2015 annual report, relate to mis-selling of subprime loans and manipulation of foreign exchange rates or gold and silver prices. Other lawsuits are for the rigging of borrowing benchmarks Libor and Euribor, used to set the price of mortgages and derivatives.

In July, Chief Executive John Cryan said he hoped to close the four largest remaining litigation cases this year.

These are the mortgages and FX cases, an investigation into suspicious equities trades in Russia and allegations of money laundering.
has rallied 12% to Rs 127 on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) in intra-day trade after Reliance Mutual Fund (MF) bought more than 4% stake in the electric utilities company for Rs 44 crore through open market.
Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain, who today met Union Health Minister J.P. Nadda, requested the Centre to allot 10 percent beds in government hospitals for fever, chikungunya and dengue cases besides setting up a 24-ghour fever centers to address the grievances of the patients coming from far places.

Jain told the media that that all government hospitals in Delhi including AIIMS, Safdarjung and Ram Manohar Lohia (RML) have almost 10,000 beds.

"I requested that in all government hospitals, 10 percent of beds should be reserved for fever, chikungunya and dengue cases and they have accepted the same," Jain said.

"In Delhi, the Central Government has a lot of capacity and if they give 10 percent beds also then also the total increase would be more than thousand beds," he added.

Jain also requested the Central Government to open clinics at local level so as to save time of the patients, who come from far places just for check-ups.

Jain said, "Yesterday the AIIMS released its data, which revealed that 80 percent being treated at the AIIMS from chikungunya and dengue after September 1 are out station patients."

Stating that more than 15,000 extra beds are available in the government hospitals of Delhi, Jain said, "After an increase in 10 percent beds, thousand additional beds will be available from today."

Nadda on his part asked the Delhi Health Minister for the case history of the total number of deaths that have been reported so far, be it in any private hospital or government hospital along with details.

"It will be analysed and the report for the same will be sent to us so that we can analyse as to why all this happened," he added.

The Delhi Health Minister had earlier said that there was no need to panic, adding the AAP Government is ready to provide help at all cost.

"But one should get admitted only if the doctor advises them to do so and not because they are scared," he said.

Chikungunya and dengue continue to wreak havoc in Delhi with the number of deaths from the two vector-borne diseases reportedly climbing to 30 so far.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
With the reported Chikungunya death toll climbing to 12 in the capital, Health Minister Satyendra Jain on Friday rejected complaints of vector borne disease patients about the shortage of beds in Delhi hospitals and claimed that atleast 1,500 beds are still unoccupied.

"At least 1,500 beds are vacant at hospitals under Delhi government, it will be very wrong to say that patients are denied bed. We have also ordered for five MRI machines and ten CT scan machine," he added.

"The data that was release by AIIMS it showed that there were deaths due to dengue. Not everyone who have died due to dengue are from Delhi, there are many from neighbouring states too, we need to segregate data," he added.

Responding to opposition criticising AAP-led Delhi government over Chikungunya death toll, Jain said if people want to do politics they can do but Politics can wait.

"Because right now, everyone should help us in fogging. I urge everyone to co-operate with State government to deal with situation," he added.

After facing flak from several quarters, AAP government suddenly became active on Wednesday with two of its ministers, Satyendra Jain and Water Minister Kapil Mishra doing rounds in the city.

Jain visited several hospitals on Thursday to take stock of the situation.

Meanwhile, Union Health Minister J. P. Nadda spoke to the Health Ministers of Haryana and Uttar Pradesh regarding the dengue and chikungunya cases.

In a tweet, Nadda said, "community participation is important to stop mosquito breeding which is responsible for these diseases."

He said, he will also meet Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain today on the issue.

The Delhi government is likely to submit a detailed report to the Union Health Ministry on the chikungunya deaths in the capital.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
In the wake of the ongoing unrest in the valley post the killing of Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani on July 8, Jammu and Kashmir Panthers Party chief Bhim Singh on Friday demanded that the incumbent Mehbooba Mufti-led government should be asked to step down and Governor's rule must be imposed in the state.

Expressing grave concern over the deteriorating law and order situation in the valley, Singh said, "This is not an internal crisis, it is an external crisis and a crisis because Jammu and Kashmir is part of India and Pakistan has full interference in the activities of Jammu and Kashmir."

The Jammu and Kashmir Panthers Party also used the occasion to take potshots at Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government at the Centre, saying none of the present leaders understand the situation there.

"When Mufti Sahab, the then chief minister, passed away on 7th January, the situation of Jammu and Kashmir went out of imagination of the Indian leaders. They could not understand the situation there and are still not able to understand the same," said Singh.

"No other national leader after Nehru or Gandhi could understand this. I have been saying this since three months that there is only one way out, which is Governor's rule," he added.

Singh further said that he would be meeting President Pranab Mukherjee later in the day during which he would urge him to impose Governor's rule in the state.

"Jammu and Kashmir has its own Constitution. The Indian Constitution does not apply to us and it's such a tragedy. So, there is only one way. Even today, I am going to meet the President and I will just say one thing that let there be Governor's rule in Jammu and Kashmir. There cannot be President's rule till six months," said Singh.

"The incumbent government should be asked to step down. The assembly has become a liability not just for the taxpayers, but also for the nation's security," he added.

Earlier on Thursday, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) leader Tariq Karra resigned from the party in protest against the "ongoing civilian killings" in the valley.

Holding the PDP-BJP alliance responsible for the present state of affairs in the valley, 61-year-old leader Karra alleged that the PDP has collaborated with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)-governed BJP to facilitate and implement the Hindutva agenda in the only Muslim majority state.

The Kashmir Valley is witnessing unrest since the last 70 days. Over 80 people have been killed and thousands injured in clashes with the security forces.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
With the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) all set to probe Rajdev Ranjan's murder case, the slain journalist's wife Asha on Friday expressed hope that they would now get justice.

The CBI, which registered a case in connection with the murder case yesterday, has taken over the probe from the Bihar Police.

Asha thanked the Centre for ordering a CBI probe into the case.

"Till the time the CBI does not comes to me for investigation, till then I cannot say anything," she told ANI.

"I have been fighting for a CBI probe since the very beginning as somewhere I have trust in the CBI investigation. And I believe that if the CBI investigates this case then I will definitely get justice," she added.

Asha, a contractual teacher in a government-run school in Siwan, had earlier this month met Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh and urged him for speedy investigation into the case by the CBI, as delay could lead to tampering of whatever evidence is left.

The case has come into limelight again after a photograph appeared in the media showing murder suspects Mohammad Kaif and Mohammad Javed with Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) strongman Mohammed Shahabuddin after his release from jail.

Kaif, however, later rubbished all accusations against him and said that he has no involvement in Rajdev's murder case.

Kaif told ANI that he had very close and good relations with the journalist, adding that he was at his sister's residence for the post funereal ceremony at the time he was killed as she died two days before his murder.

Speaking on the accusation levelled against him by Rajdev's wife, he said, "Rajdev's wife doesn't know me that well. The people have said wrong things about me to Rajdev's wife.

Rajdev, who worked for Hindustan, was shot dead at a busy fruit market in Bihar's Siwan town on May 13. The Bihar Government had recommended the CBI probe into the case on May 16.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Karnataka Water Resources Minister M.B. Patil on Friday asserted that the statewide shutdown called by various trade organisations and farmer associations in Tamil Nadu should be peaceful and added that it is the state's government's responsibility to ensure safety and security of people.

"Supreme Court is right, we have to control the bandhs and the respective states should ensure safety of the citizens, whether it is Kannadigas or tamilians. It's the law of the land, it's our duty and we are doing it. The bandh in Tamil Nadu has to be peaceful," Patil said.

Patil added that Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has written to Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa appealing to ensure safety of Kannadigas during the protest in Friday.

The Supreme Court yesterday expressed its dismay over people taking the law into their own hands, and insisted that the state authorities take immediate preventive action.

The top court has also asked the counsels of both states to go through the petition and file their responses by September 20.

Situation pacified in Bengaluru, a day of after uneasy calm prevailed in the city, following large-scale violence over Cauvery water sharing row with Tamil Nadu.

Curfew, imposed late on Monday night, was lifted in 16 police station limits of the city on Wednesday.

However, prohibitory orders are still in place.

All political parties, except the ruling AIADMK, have extended support to the bandh.

State transport corporation buses, suburban trains and cab services will keep the traffic flowing, ensuring commuters get to work.

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The Congress Party on Friday took a jibe at the Samajwadi party over the reports of the ongoing rift within the family, saying the damage has been done and it is too late to fix things now.

Congress leader Ali Anwar said that looking at the inching polls in the politically crucial state of Uttar Pradesh, it seems difficult for the Samajwadi Party to resolve the ongoing spat.

"Now it is difficult to repair the rift in the Samajwadi Party, as there is very less time left for the UP polls. Now the party will have to bear the brunt," Anwar told ANI.

Newly-appointed Samajwadi Party (SP) Uttar Pradesh chief Shivpal Singh Yadav resigned from the state cabinet as well as from all the posts of party held by him.

Shivpal tendered his resignation to Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav after meeting his elder brother party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav in the state capital.

However, Akhilesh did not accept his uncle's resignation.

Mulayam, earlier in the day, had summoned Shivpal, who is at loggerheads with Akhilesh, and held closed door meeting with him to defuse the situation.

Shivpal later met Akhilesh at his official residence, but the meeting lasted only 15 minutes.

Earlier on September 13, Akhilesh stripped Shivpal of key ministerial portfolios, hours after Mulayam replaced him with his uncle as the party's state unit chief.

Earlier in the day, party national general secretary Ramgopal had met the Chief Minister and claimed that "Akhilesh is not angry with anyone and the decision of Neta ji (Mulayam) is final in the party."

He said that "differences" had arisen due to some "misunderstanding" even as he made a veiled attack on Rajya Sabha MP Amar Singh.

Earlier, Shivpal Yadav had reportedly announced the party's first list of 142 candidates for the 2017 polls.

Disagreements between Akhilesh and his uncle have been reported on several occasions, including on the choice of official to be appointed as the state's chief secretary after Alok Ranjan's term ended, and the postponement of Qaumi Ekta Dal's merger with Samajwadi Party.
Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav on Friday attempted to pacify his younger brother Shivpal Yadav and son Akhilesh Yadav, saying there is no rift and there cannot be any fight within his party which is like his "family" till he is alive.

Speaking a day after Shivpal stepped down from all party posts and the state government, Mulayam said, "The Samajwadi Party is a family. There won't be any fight in the family till I am alive. There is no fight between Shivpal and Akhilesh. There are no differences within the party. There is no fight between Ramgopal Yadav, Akhilesh and Shivpal."

"Every father and son has friction on one or other issue. There is no rift. But there is fault of our people as well who spoke to the media," he added.

The Samajwadi Party strongman urged his party workers to come together and work in unison as the elections time is approaching.

"It is elections time. We should all come together and work," he said.

He also said that the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister would go and meet Shivpal at his residence.

"Akhilesh will go and meet Shivpal at his residence. Akhilesh humaari baat taalega? Akhilesh humaari baat nahin taal sakte. (Will Akhilesh ignore what I am saying? He can never deny what I say)," he said.

The crisis in Uttar Pradesh's ruling party deepened on Friday with supporters of Shivpal and Akhilesh shouting slogans outside the Samajwadi Party office in Lucknow. Sources said Mulayam rejected Shivpal's resignation from party posts after meeting his brother on Friday.

Mulayam held a meeting at his residence to thrash out a solution on the ongoing power struggle between his son and Akhilesh and his younger brother Shivpal.

Shivpal earlier in the day urged his supporters to work towards strengthening the party.

Shivpal, who held a clutch of important departments, quit the government as well as his position as chief of Samajwadi Party's state unit yesterday.

However, the Chief Minister rejected Shivpal's resignation from the cabinet.

The development came after a day after the Samajwadi Party boss and the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister held separate meetings with Shivpal.

Earlier on September 13, Akhilesh stripped Shivpal of key ministerial portfolios, hours after Mulayam replaced him with his uncle as the party's state unit chief.

Samajwadi Party general secretary Ramgopal Yadav had after meeting the Chief Minister yesterday claimed that the latter is not angry with anyone, adding Mulayam's decision is final in the party.

He said that "differences" had arisen due to some "misunderstanding" even as he made a veiled attack on Rajya Sabha MP Amar Singh.

Earlier, Shivpal had reportedly announced the party's first list of 142 candidates for the 2017 assembly polls.

Disagreements between Akhilesh and his uncle have been reported on several occasions, including on the choice of official to be appointed as the state's chief secretary after Alok Ranjan's term ended and the postponement of Qaumi Ekta Dal's merger with Samajwadi Party.

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In what may be seen as a fresh political crisis arising in Arunachal Pradesh, 42 Congress MLAs, including Chief Minister Pema Khandu, today resigned from the party.

It is reported that all these MLAs will be joining the Peoples Party of Arunachal (PPA), formed by erstwhile chief minister late Kalikho Pul.

This is the second time in seven months that the PPA has been gifted a government in the frontier state.

In the 60-member House with an effective strength of 58, the Congress had the support of 47 MLAs, including two Independents, while Opposition BJP has 11 members.

Khandu was sworn-in as the ninth Arunachal Chief Minister on 17 July.

In a dramatic turnaround in this land-locked state on July 16, Congress replaced Nabam Tuki by choosing Khandu as the new Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader, who staked claim to power on the basis of support of 45 party MLAs along with two Independents.

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India on Friday conveyed to Nepal that it must implement its Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating aspirations of all sections of society.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi was briefed in detail by his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal on all the developments that have been taking place in his country in terms of constitution and political processes.

Dahal conveyed that his government is in process to bring all sections of Nepal onboard for constitution.

"Our position was very clearly articulated and we hope that Nepal implement constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating aspirations of all sections of society," Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar said in a press briefing.

Three crucial agreements were signed today in which focus of talks was on improving connectivity , bringing economy of Nepal back on track and expedite the reconstruction process post earthquake last years.

Also, India is building 50000 houses and has agreed to increase its commitment from 2 lakh to 3 lakh rupees per house.

India has also extended Line of Credit of 750 million.

Lauding Dahal's efforts to bring stability to Nepal, the Prime Minister said, "I am confident that under your leadership, Nepal will be successful in implementing the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating aspirations of all sections of the diverse society.

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Asserting that "terrorism is the biggest enemy of human rights and it threatens the contemporary architecture of stability, based on respect for sovereignty," India has urged the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) to set up a 'Working Group on Terrorism'.

Speaking at the 17th NAM Summit, Minister of State for External Affairs M J Akbar said, "Terrorism is the biggest enemy of human rights. The subjugation of terrorists is, therefore, protection of human rights. Terrorism threatens the contemporary architecture of stability, based on respect for sovereignty. We must not be so naive as to believe that terrorists do not have a political objective. They are anti-national in a fundamental sense: for they do not believe in the concept of a nation state."

"Today, terrorist bandit groups like Daesh, Hizbul Mujahideen, Jaish-e-Muhammad, Boko Haram, Al Shabaab and so many others of their ilk, want to establish empires of destruction bolstered by false ideology that perverts the faith they claim to represent," he added.

Asserting that terrorism is the biggest obstacle to development at a time when the poor are insisting, the Minister said that poor should not be made to wait long for prosperity.

"The first rights on economic growth must belong to those who need development most, and they must get it now, not tomorrow," he said.

He also urged the fellow nations to accept a specific route map towards our common horizon of peace and prosperity.

"We must ensure that existing United Nations structures as part of the Global Counter Terrorism Strategy function in a non-partisan and professional manner, above political expediency. This NAM summit must be as unambiguous on terrorism as it was once about apartheid and colonialism," he said.

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The Supreme Court on Friday commuted the death penalty of a convict in a rape and murder case of a seven-year-old girl that took place in 2011 in Jabalpur district of Madhya Pradesh.

The apex court said the case does not fall in the rarest of rare category and clarified that the convict will not be released before 25 years behind bars.

Earlier in February 2013, a local court in Jabalpur awarded death sentence to the accused.

Terming the case as 'rarest of rare', Additional District Judge Chandresh Khare awarded capital punishment to Pancham Lodhi on the basis of evidence submitted by prosecution.

As per the prosecution, Pancham Lodhi of Sunachar village in Jabalpur district lured the minor girl to his house and raped her on May 12, 2011.

When the girl raised an alarm, he strangulated her and later dumped her body on a loft inside his house

A case under Sections 302 (murder), 363 (kidnapping), 366, 376 (rape) and 201 of the IPC was registered against him and submitted for trial after the probe.

The death sentence was upheld by the Madhya Pradesh High Court.

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Speaking on the AAP- MCD blame game in the capital over deaths, the Janata Dal (United) on Friday said that confusion persists in Delhi because Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has no powers to execute even normal functions.

In a blistering attack, JD(U) leader Ajay Alok said there is no government in Delhi, as its Chief Minister does not even has the authority to buy a pen, and the tussle between LG and AAP government is making this difficult for the people off Delhi.

"In Delhi there is no government. In a government where the Chief Minister does not even have the power to buy a pen, where a chief minister cannot make transfers what kind of government is that," said Alok.

"The High Court has given all power to LG there; this is why there is so much confusion in Delhi. No officers listens to the Chief Minister. The Delhi government does not exist," he added.

Alok further extending support to the AAP government said that the Supreme Court should interfere in the matter for the betterment of residents of the capital.

"The Supreme Court should immediately interfere in this matter. All powers are with LG, who is in America. The people of Delhi just have god to look up to," said Alok.

The tussle between the Aam Admi Party and the BJP-dominated Municipal Corporation of Delhi got murkier after the death toll from the mosquito-borne disease reached to five in the capital.

While Keriwal-led Delhi government said lack of preventive measures by the cooperation is the reason behind spike in cases of , the MCD accused CM of providing no assistance in tackling the issue.
Mulayam Singh Yadav will today chair a parliamentary board meeting of the Samajwadi Party (SP) in Lucknow to put an end to the fight between his son Akhilesh Yadav and brother Shivpal Singh Yadav.

Yesterday night, newly-appointed Samajwadi Party (SP) Uttar Pradesh chief Shivpal resigned from the state cabinet as well as from all the posts of party held by him.

Shivpal tendered his resignation to Akhilesh Yadav after meeting his elder brother and party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav in the state capital.

However, the Chief Minister did not accept his resignation.

Mulayam yesteday summoned Shivpal, who is at loggerheads with Akhilesh, and held closed door meeting with him to defuse the situation.

Shivpal later met Akhilesh at his official residence, but the meeting lasted only 15 minutes.

Earlier on September 13, Akhilesh stripped Shivpal of key ministerial portfolios, hours after Mulayam replaced him with his uncle as the party's state unit chief.

Shivpal, the younger brother of Mulayam Singh Yadav, could be seen completely powerless as Akhilesh kept the PWD portfolio with himself, while Avdhesh Prasad had been given the charge of Irrigation and Flood Control department and Balram Yadav, the additional charge of Revenue and many other departments, currently being held by Shivpal thus, bringing down the number of ministries held by him from ten to just two.

Earlier in the day, party general secretary Ramgopal had met the Chief Minister and claimed that "Akhilesh is not angry with anyone and the decision of Neta ji (Mulayam) is final in the party."

He said that "differences" had arisen due to some "misunderstanding" even as he made a veiled attack on Rajya Sabha MP Amar Singh.

Earlier on Wednesday, speaking at a function in Lucknow, Akhilesh, who chose the day to tweet about the start of his poll campaign on October 3, said "outsiders" were interfering in the affairs of the family and the party.

Earlier, Shivpal Yadav had reportedly announced the party's first list of 142 candidates for the 2017 polls.

Disagreements between Akhilesh and his uncle have been reported on several occasions, including on the choice of official to be appointed as the state's chief secretary after Alok Ranjan's term ended, and the postponement of Qaumi Ekta Dal's merger with Samajwadi Party.

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Nepal's Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal, who is on a four-day visit to India, will today hold talks with President Pranab Mukherjee and Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

He will also be accorded a ceremonial reception at the Rashtrapati Bhavan this morning. The visiting dignitary arrived in New Delhi on Thursday.

On his arrival, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj met the Nepalese Prime Minister.

External Affairs Ministry said that India will take this opportunity to understand the developmental priorities of the new Nepalese Prime Minister.

He will also visit Nathpa Jhakri Hydropower Project in Himachal Pradesh on Saturday.

This is Dahal's first foreign bilateral visit after he assumed office last month.

The visit will provide an opportunity for both the sides to discuss issues of mutual interest and seek ways to strengthen the age-old friendly ties.
Asserting that India's friendship with Nepal is time-tested and unique, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday said peace, stability, and eco prosperity of Kathmandu is New Delhi's shared objective.

"We share our burden during difficult times, just as we celebrate each other's achievements. As immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability, and eco prosperity of Nepal is our shared objective," he said in a joint statement with his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal.

Prime Minister Modi lauded his counterpart for strengthening the democratic institutions in Nepal.

"We wish you every success. India stands ready and prepared to strengthen development partnership with Nepal. We will do so as per the priorities of the people and government of Nepal," he added.

The Prime Minister said continued cooperation in the field of defence and security agencies between both countries is important to guard open borders.

"Our security interests are inter-linked. We agreed that securing our societies is essential for achieving shared objectives of development and growth," he added.

The Prime Minister further said both countries have also agreed to focus on close monitoring and time bound completion of all development projects.

"We agreed to push for speedy and successful implementation of the ongoing hydropower project and development and operationalisation of transmission lines. We have agreed to showcase our shared Buddhist heritage and focus on the development of Ayurveda and other traditional systems of medicine," he said.

Prime Minister Modi expressed confidence that the discussion between both countries would further cement the centuries old relationship and write a new and glorious chapter of friendship.

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Chief Minister Nitish Kumar-led Bihar Government on Friday filed an appeal in the Supreme Court, challenging the Patna High Court's order granting bail to gangster-turned politician .

Earlier, senior advocate Prashant Bhushan also filed a petition in the top court for the cancellation of bail granted to Shahabuddin, who walked out of the Bhagalpur jail last week. Siwan native Chandrakeshwar Prasad's also filed a petition in the apex court seeking cancellation of Shahabuddin's bail.

The court will hear Prasad's plea on September 19.

Shahabuddin, who had been in jail for more than 10 years in connection with multiple cases, was granted bail by the Patna High Court on September 7 in connection with the murder of a man who witnessed the killing of two brothers in Siwan.

Shahabuddin's release from jail evoked widespread criticism of the grand alliance in the state with the opposition accusing the government of paving way for his release by not opposing the bail strongly in the court.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had yesterday demanded the immediate arrest of Shahabuddin and accused the former Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) parliamentarian of being the main conspirator in the murder of journalist Rajdeo Ranjan.

Senior BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi said that sharpshooter Mohammad Kaif is one of the accused in the murder of Ranjan and is the close aide of Shahabuddin. He demanded that that the former parliamentarian should be removed from the party.

However, Nitish Kumar has said that law will take its own course in Shahabuddin's case.

"I only want to say that law will take its own course," Kumar said when asked about Shahabuddin.

When asked about comments of some RJD leaders, including that of Shahabuddin, questioning his leadership, he said he does not pay attention to these.

Meanwhile, RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav has said that the controversy over Shahabuddin getting bail has been created by the BJP and the media and the matter should be decided only by the courts.

Shahabuddin had also downplayed the NDA's demand slapping Crime Control Act against him and put the ball in Nitish Kumar's court while asserting that if the process is initiated then it would be an administrative decision.

"I will do what I have to do. I have always been the way I want. Whatever the government wants to do...can do...what can I comment on that? The grounds for initiating CCA will be prepared and then imposed. According to me, there should not be any grounds for anything but the decision will be taken on what the government says," Shahabuddin told ANI.

"It's not about ego or pride. I don't have any regrets because I think a lot before speaking. I might seem to be angry when I speak. If I can't smile then how can I pretend? I have always spoken the truth," he added.
Asserting that Pakistan's struggle with terrorism will not come to an end until it makes a decisive shift in its policy of tolerance towards externally-focused groups, the US said that there can be no peace in the region until these cross-border attacks are stopped.

The statements were made by US Special Representative for and Afghanistan, Richard Olson before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, adding US President Barack Obama's administration had also conveyed this message to the Pakistani government, reports Dawn.

Olson, also emphasised the need for a constructive relationship between Afghanistan and Pakistan, which he said was essential for bringing peace and stability to the region.

Prior to his current position, he was the US ambassador in Islamabad.

Noting that relations between and Afghanistan experienced a "significant improvement" when Afghan President Ashraf Ghani came to power, he said they "peaked and troughed" over the past year in part due to critical issues, including refugees, border management, and counterterrorism.

He also underlined encouraging signs of progress in recent months between the two countries, stating that after a meeting in June between Afghan and Pakistani foreign policy chiefs, both sides agreed to coordinate at senior and tactical levels on border management issues.

Kabul also provided Islamabad with evidence that prompted the military to conduct combing operations in a few key areas along the border, in the wake of the deadly August 24 attack at the American University of Afghanistan in Kabul.

Olson said that the Pakistani military had made progress in shutting down terrorist safe havens through Operation Zarb-i-Azb, adding Islamabad had also worked with the United States to decimate core Al-Qaeda.

Meanwhile, the US diplomat told the Senate committee that Pakistan's leaders had assured Washington of their intention to do so.

He also emphasized that the US would also continue to support the India-Afghanistan relationship, including through the revival of a US-India-Afghanistan trilateral talks.
Baloch Republican Party founder on Friday clarified that he has not made a formal request to India for asylum, but added that if does get the opportunity in the future, he would certainly consider it.

"Our people in Balochistan and Afghanistan are in a very difficult situation. Very few of them are able to come to Europe, rest are living there only. So, we want that the Indian Government should open there doors for them and provide them access, including myself. Right now, I'm here (Switzerland), but I face problem regarding my travel. So, if I get an option to be in India, I will definitely go there," Bugti told ANI.

He said that the request would be made formally after discussing the issue within the party on September 19.

"Till now, we haven't sought any asylum officially. On 19th of September, we have a central committee meeting of the BRP where we will finally decide on this and then make the process formal," he said.

On being asked about why he is seeking asylum in India, Bugti said, "India is our neighboring country. In Europe, even if a government or the immigration department knows the problem, the people don't. But in India, the people know about our problems, we will have their support. We share the same culture. We will be closer to our people and our people can easily seek asylum there, and it is easier for them to reach there with their families."

Responding to how he views the campaign that has started after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's remarks on Balochistan on August 15 during his Independence Day speech, Bugti said that it has helped to highlight the issue.

"It is very positive. We have always been trying to highlight the Balochistan issue nationally and internationally. But when Indian Prime Minister Modi Sahib talked about it, it got more highlighted and the public there knows about it now. Earlier nobody there (India) knew what is happening in Balochistan and people are talking about it now. Things are going in a good direction now," he said.

He added that India's intervention is important for the cause of Balochistan and that raising the issue in the United Nations will help get the attention of the Western countries.

"It is very important. When Narendra Modi sahib talked about it, neighbouring countries like Afghanistan and Bangladesh supported his statement. Similarly, when Indian Government will raise the issue in the UN then the western countries will think on it more seriously and will review their policies regarding Pakistan," said Bugti.

"The ground reality in Pakistan is exactly what we have been telling to the media. After Modi's statement they have intensified the operations. And now they are abducting children and women especially in Dera Bugti and Turbat. More than 100 people have gone missing since the incident. It is there (Pakistan) anger that why we welcomed India's remarks and thanked them," he said.

Baloch activists and leaders have continuously maintained that Pakistan is involved in the genocide of the Baloch people and that human rights violations are rampant in the region there..
The Afghan Army on Friday said that over 20 villages were cleared of Taliban in a military operation conducted by security forces in Qala-e-Zal district in Kunduz province.

The Afghan army's Pamir 20 Division in a statement on said that the center of the district was also cleared of militants and with several Taliban fighters killed and wounded in the operation.

"All the villages around the district were cleared of militants and were searched. This process will continue. We have established army and police bases in the district and the security forces will take their next steps from here," the Tolo News quoted Brigadier General Adam Khyan Matin, commander of the first Regiment of Pamir 20 Division as saying.

The security forces also recovered a number of weapons in the operation.

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People will undergo a major envy-moment after watching Anupam Kher's recent Twitter update.

The 61-year-old actor, who had his movie 'The Headhunter's Calling' premiered at the ongoing Toronto Film Festival, shared a snap from the event with co-actor Gerard Butler.

The two seemed to be overwhelmed with the response their upcoming American drama garnered, post its premiere.

Taking to social media, Kher posted a collage of snaps from the premiere and captioned it, "TheHeadhuntersCalling gala premiere at #Tiff16, Toronto #GreatAudienceResponse #GerardButler #DrSingh."

Kher will be seen portraying the role of an Indian-American pediatric oncologist Dr. Singh in the movie.

Based on a family drama, the movie is helmed by Mark Williams and written by Bill Dubuque.

Along with the Bollywood actor and Butler, the film also features Willem Dafoe, Alfred Molina, Alison Brie, and Gretchen Mo.

On a related note, Kher also tweeted a picture with Hollywood actore Woody Harrelsonn from the festival and captioned it, "It was such a joy and pleasure to meet one of my favourite actors @WoodyHarrelsonn last night at #TIFF16.

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Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is set to raise the issue of 'human right violations' in Jammu and Kashmir in the 71st Session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York later this month.

"The Prime Minister will specifically focus on the current situation particularly the continuing grave violations of human rights by India in Jammu and Kashmir. He will call upon the international community and the United Nations to live up to their promise of the right to self-determination of the people of Jammu and Kashmir in accordance with the relevant UN Security Council resolutions," a statement by Pakistan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.

Sharif will also participate in the High-Level Meeting of the General Assembly to address Large Movements of Refugees and Migrants (19 September) and the Leaders' Summit on Refugees convened by President Obama (20 September).

"Pakistan will avail of these high level meetings to highlight its tremendous contribution to the cause of refugees as the host of the world's largest protracted refugee situation, and urge the international community to devote adequate political attention and support for the voluntary repatriation of Afghan refugees from Pakistan and their sustainable reintegration in Afghanistan," the statement said.

On the sidelines of the UNGA, Prime Minister Sharif will hold bilateral meetings with a number of leaders, including the UN Secretary-General and is also likely to interact with business leaders and select members of the media.

Asserting that Pakistan is a great advocate of multilateralism and the United Nations to promote collective responses to the multifaceted challenges of global peace, security and development, the statement added that Islamabad would continue its constructive role and engagement at the UN with a view to protecting and promoting our national interests.

"Including on core issues such as Jammu & Kashmir, reform of the Security Council, counter-terrorism, human rights, peacekeeping, and a host of development and other matters," the statement said.

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With Pakistan still struggling to become a polio free country, its Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province faces the challenge of how to counter militant attacks on vaccinators.

The militants had last week killed union council polio eradication committee head Dr Zakaullah Khan in Peshawar, sending a message that they are around, reports the Dawn.

This message has only terrified vaccinators to stay away from administering Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV).

Pakistan and Afghanistan, are the last two polio-endemic countries in the world, facing militants, with the first forced to stopp vaccination in Swat in 2007, followed by in North and South Waziristan agencies in 2012. Due to this at least 160 children have been left crippled for life.

The Swat valley recorded the most nationwide polio cases in 2009 after a ban was imposed by the outlawed Pakistan Tehreek-i-Taliban chief, Maulvi Fazalullah.

Reports suggest that Waziristan suffered immensely when 150,000 children remained unimmunised for two years and the situation only improved when the army began their action.

No polio cases has been recorded in Swat for five years now and the number of such cases in Waziristan has dropped to two.

And the authorities in Federally Administered Tribal Areas argue that the children got infected in Afghanistan where they had migrated due to the military campaign against Taliban militants.

The children are said to have stayed in the area under the influence of militants loyal to Fazalullah, a known opponent of oral polio vaccine.

The officials associated with the anti-polio campaign are of the opinion that they cannot afford to abandon the efforts and lose the gains they have obtained in the prolonged fight against polio.

An official said that Dr Zakaullah stood undeterred despite killing and injuring of his several anti-polio colleagues in targeted militant attacks.

Another official highlighted the efforts of the vaccinators and said that despite meagre wages, vaccinators played instrumental part in containing the crippling disease in KP and Fata.

The Taliban had assassinated several of their colleagues in the provinces.

Despite the proposal was under consideration to give vaccinators more money, it never got approval.

The official said that the militants have so far killed 41 anti-polio workers and injured 40, including women, and policemen deployed to protect door-to-door vaccination campaign but the efforts have not been halted.

As a result of the army's operation, militants are said to have been targeting vaccinators not only in Peshawar but also in Charsadda, Swabi and Mardan to block the global polio eradication campaigns.

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Union Minister for Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution took a critical review of the supply side of pulses here with representatives of pulses importers, senior official of relative ministries and enforcement agencies.

There was a silent acceptance by the representatives from various associations of pulses trade that the unprecedented price of pulses last year was due to speculation and hoarding. The availability of pulses by September-end last year and this year is almost equal taking domestic production and imports.

Paswan remarked that given the net deficit scenario in the demand-supply of pulses in the country, there is a need for the importers of pulses to be more transparent in their operations. There is a need for Government and the traders to work closely so that the traders get to know the realistic gap in the supplies of various pulses. This would enable the traders for planning imports in advance.

The representatives from IGPA assured the Government for providing the data regarding imports in advance. A decision was taken for meeting on a monthly basis between the Government and traders.

Paswan told the traders that for augmenting the supplies, Government has also entered into G2G long term contracts with other countries. One such MoU has been recently executed between India and Mozambique. He explained that the role of Government of India is that of a facilitator. In fact this move of Government has opened a window for the private traders to expand their operations to foreign lands with more surety and stability. The traders were requested to extend all support for successful execution of G2G contracts. African countries like South Africa, Tanzania have shown interest in entering into G2G contracts.

The traders pointed out that there is a need for exchanging the production estimates of Agriculture Ministry and that of the traders. The Government estimates and trade estimates need to be compared and more correct figures be arrived at.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has paid tribute to social reformer Sree Narayana Guru on his Jayanti.

"I bow to the venerable Swami Sree Narayana Guru on his Jayanti. His noble thoughts, teachings & fight against injustice always inspire", the Prime Minister said.

Sree Narayana Guru was a social reformer from Kerala who led a reform movement against casteism and promoted new values of spiritual freedom and social equality.

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In a move signalling to bring some calm in the recent turbulence in the Samajwadi Party, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Friday announced that his uncle would get back all his previous ministerial portfolios.

He also announced that sacked minister Gayatri Prajapati will be inducted into the cabinet as well.

The development is bound to bring some normalcy to SP after the party was hit by a crisis when senior Cabinet minister resigned from the ministry and also quit the post of Uttar Pradesh Samajwadi Party chief.

Before quitting, Shivpal first met his elder brother and party chief Mulayam and then met Akhilesh.

According to reports, the Chief Minister then offered him an olive branch by restoring all his key portfolios and allowing him to remain the state chief.

Speaking to ANI here after meeting Mulayam, Shivpal said, "I have spoken to Netaji and put my views in front of him. All is well now and we are united again. All his orders have almost been implemented. Starting tomorrow all will be back to the old ways."

Akhilesh had earlier divested Shivpal of all important ministerial portfolios including PWD, irrigation, cooperative, flood control and revenue and handed him the social welfare department.

Prior to it, Shivpal had replaced him as its new chief in Uttar Pradesh on the instructions of Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav.

The development came hours after Akhilesh shunted out state chief secretary Deepak Singhal, considered close to Shivpal and replaced him with Rahul Bhatnagar.

Disagreements between Akhilesh and his uncle have been reported on several occasions, including on the choice of official to appointed as the state's chief secretary after Alok Ranjan's term ended and the postponement of Quami Ekta Dal's merger with the Samajwadi Party.

The move comes at a time when the state is gearing up for assembly elections which is scheduled to take place next year.
Shivpal Singh Yadav, who yesterday resigned from all posts of the Uttar Pradesh Government held by him and the Samajwadi Party (SP), on Friday urged his supporters to work towards strengthening the party.

Scores of Shivpal's supporters gathered outside his official residence at Kalidas Marg here this morning and raised slogans in his support.

The supporters also demanded the ouster of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav and senior Samajwadi Party leader Ram Gopal Yadav.

"Restore Shivpal's honours.return all departments to him---return the SP state presidentship," the supporters chanted.

However, Shivpal asked his supporters to work towards strengthening the party and stand united in support of Mulayam Singh Yadav.

"We've to work towards strengthening the party, I urge you all to go to the party office where Netaji will be coming. We all stand by Netaji (Mulayam Singh Yadav). 'Unka sandesh humare liye adesh hai.' (His message is a command for us)," he told his supporters.

Shivpal, who held a clutch of important departments, quit the government as well as his position as chief of Samajwadi Party's state unit yesterday.

However, the Chief Minister rejected Shivpal's resignation from the cabinet.

The development came after a day after the Samajwadi Party boss and the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister held separate meetings with Shivpal.

Earlier on September 13, Akhilesh stripped Shivpal of key ministerial portfolios, hours after Mulayam replaced him with his uncle as the party's state unit chief.

Samajwadi Party general secretary Ramgopal had after meeting the Chief Minister yesterday claimed that the latter is not angry with anyone, adding Mulayam's decision is final in the party.

He said that "differences" had arisen due to some "misunderstanding" even as he made a veiled attack on Rajya Sabha MP Amar Singh.

Earlier, Shivpal had reportedly announced the party's first list of 142 candidates for the 2017 assembly polls.

Disagreements between Akhilesh and his uncle have been reported on several occasions, including on the choice of official to be appointed as the state's chief secretary after Alok Ranjan's term ended and the postponement of Qaumi Ekta Dal's merger with Samajwadi Party.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Unleashing a belligerent attack on Pakistan for brewing terrorism, Afghanistan President during his recent visit to New Delhi said that Islamabad's policy of differentiating between 'good terrorists' and 'bad terrorists' is not right, adding that terrorism will bite the Asian neighbour probably like a snake.

Hitting out at those using religion to justify terrorist acts, Ghani asserted that Islam does not condone terrorism.

"Terrorism will bite probably like a snake. States need to have a common perspective," he warned. Ghani also said the threat of terrorism is not a passing threat, and that terrorist organisations change very rapidly, even if their objectives remain the same," Ghani said as reported by World Press.

"A tiny minority cannot be allowed to hijack a civilisation and a religion. There is no terrorism in the past 160 years except for adherence, practitioners from every civilisation that we take. So, there is no reason to demonise a certain civilisation. But on the other hand, members of that community have an obligation to speak truth to violence," Ghani said.



It is unacceptable to speak in the name of Islam. Islam does not allow for terrorism. Terrorism must be condemned and we must stand together to contain it. Extremism cannot be permitted a platform. This is denial of everything that we stand for, and everything that civilisation has stood for," he added.

Ghani's made these remarks while addressing 'Fifth Wave of Political Violence and Global Terrorism' at the Institute of Defence Studies and Analysis.

Ghani further slammed Pakistan for a ribbing, given the recent strain in tensions over Pakistan-based support for Taliban operating in Afghanistan.

"There is war in Pakistan which the media doesn't speak about. There are 207,000 Pakistani forces in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan. This violence needs coverage and understanding, and needs to be stopped," he said.

"Making a distinction between good and bad terrorism is an approach that is enormously short sighted. Those who think they can manipulate the psychology of this phenomenon or affect the pathology are mistaken. Afghanistan does not allow terrorists to launch attacks from its soil, despite the fact that it is under attack," he added.
The United States has asserted that that the nation faces continued challenges to its interests in Afghanistan, while reiterating frustration over Pakistan's role in harboring terrorists from the Haqqani network aiding the Taliban in its fight to regain control of Afghanistan.

During a hearing on U.S. policy in Afghanistan, U.S. Senator Bob Corker, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, stressed on the ongoing security and development challenges facing the country as the U.S. and other international partners prepare for an Afghanistan aid conference in Brussels next month, a statement said.

Corker further expressed continued support for postponing a faster drawdown of the U.S. security presence this year and additional counterterrorism assistance for Afghan forces amid increasing violence by extremists groups.

"I was really glad to see President Obama commit to 8,400 troops going forward. I would've liked for [that decision] to have occurred earlier, but it seems like we've been able to continue to have the support of our allies in the region.I appreciate, certainly, the additional authorities that have been given to our military there to counter Al-Qaeda and to work more closely with the Afghan troops themselves," he said.

Hitting out at Pakistan for playing an active role in harboring terrorists from the Haqqani network, one of the most violent groups aiding the Taliban in its fight to regain control of Afghanistan, Corker asserted that Islamabad continues to be a tremendously duplicitous partner in this.

"Certainly they are working against our interests [in Afghanistan] through helping support.the Haqqani network. They are the greatest threat to American soldiers there and certainly the greatest threat to the Afghan military and civilians," he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The US has maintained that it would encourage Afghan President Ashraf Ghani's move of asking Pakistan to include India in the transit trade agreement for stronger trade relations between all the countries of the region.

Speaking at the daily press briefing, Deputy Spokesperson of the U.S. State Department, Mark C. Toner said, "I would just say, speaking broadly, that we would support stronger trade relations within the region. And we've long said that it's a priority for the United States at least, but it should be a priority for the countries in the region to all work more cooperatively and constructively together. And a trade agreement would be part of that."

On being asked by a reporter what was his position on Afghanistan asking India's inclusion in the transit trade agreement it has with Pakistan, Toner replied, "I think we would encourage, as I said, stronger trade relations between all the countries of the region."

The Afghanistan-Pakistan Transit Trade Agreement (APTTA) is a bilateral trade agreement between Islamabad and Kabul. It has been renegotiated several times.

The treaty was signed in 1950 which gave Afghanistan the right to import duty-free goods through Karachi.

Meanwhile, on also being about Afghanistan stand that if India is not included, it would deny Pakistan the right to transit its goods to Central Asia through Afghanistan, Toner said, "I'm not going to weigh in on the negotiations between - bilateral negotiation between Afghanistan and Pakistan."

He was of the opinion that Afghanistan has rights to make its own decisions with regard to who it decides to allow trade relations with.

"Afghanistan is a sovereign country and it has its own rights - it has rights to make its own decisions with regard to who it decides to allow trade relations with. But broadly speaking, again, it's in the interests of the region, it's been a consistent goal of ours strategically to promote stronger relations between all the countries," he added.

The APTTA treaty also allows Afghanistan to access to the dry port of Lahore, and also access to a land route up to the Wagah border with India.

However, it does not allow India to use the land route to export goods to Afghanistan either.

With Prime Minister Narendra Modi announcing one billion USD aid to Kabul, Toner said that the US supports India's generosity and focus on Afghanistan and willingness to help Afghanistan become a stronger and independent country.

"The fact that India is willing to invest in that future we view as a very positive sign and we appreciate India's effort," he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
cases have reached an alarming proportion in West Bengal with highest number of deaths in the country so far.

With 56 persons affected with in Darjeeling district, out of which 11 persons are from the Darjeeling Hills, Siliguri Municipal Corporation (SMC) will go for an intensive awareness campaign on dengue.

Darjeeling district chief medical officer of Asit Biswas told ANI that the number of dengue cases is higher in the district compared to last year.

"There were 56 dengue positive cases reported till September 14 in Darjeeling, of which 33 from Siliguri Municipal Corporation. Of 56 cases, 23 have travel history from South Bengal. We're taking all necessary measures to deal with this," he said.

"We will start door-to-door survey to get proper information on dengue cases and will also conduct meet with SMC and other officers," he added.

Meanwhile, Siliguri mayor Asok Bhattacharya said most dengue cases are from West Bengal, with Kolkata and South Bengal being the most-hit areas.

"We don't have complacency, but have instructed all staff, employees and workers so that they can do the needful. We have also asked counsellors to organise health camps and health awareness programmes," he added.

West Bengal is followed by Odisha and Kerala.

According to reports, there have been 60 Dengue deaths with 27,879 dengue cases reported from different states and union territories in the country so far this year.
Hinduja Foundries tumbled 18.3% to Rs 35.95 at 14:53 IST on BSE, with the stock extending Thursday's slump triggered by the boards of the company and Ashok Leyland approving the merger of the company with the latter.

Shares of Ashok Leyland were down 1.29% at Rs 80.50.

Meanwhile, the S&P BSE Sensex was up 225.65 points or 0.79% at 28,638.54.

On BSE, so far 3.04 lakh shares were traded in the counter of Hinduja Foundries, compared with average daily volume of 5,422 shares in the past one quarter. The stock hit a high of Rs 41.60 and a low of Rs 35.20 so far during the day. The stock had hit a 52-week low of Rs 27.30 on 12 February 2016. The stock had hit a 52-week high of Rs 65 on 7 July 2016. The stock had underperformed the market over the past one month till 15 September 2016, sliding 17.6% compared with 0.93% rise in the Sensex. The scrip had also underperformed the market in past one quarter, declining 23.34% as against Sensex's 6.31% rise.

The small-cap company has equity capital of Rs 207.05 crore. Face value per share is Rs 10.

Shares of Hinduja Foundries tumbled by the maximum permissible level of 20% to settle at Rs 44 yesterday, 15 September 2016, after the board of directors of the company and Ashok Leyland approved a proposal for the merger of Hinduja Foundries with Ashok Leyland. As per the terms of the merger proposal, shareholders holding 100 shares in Hinduja Foundries will get 40 shares of Ashok Leyland. One thousand 2008 series global depository receipts (GDRs) of Hinduja Foundries will get 133 shares of Ashok Leyland. One 2006 series GDRs of Hinduja Foundries will get 4,800 shares of Ashok Leyland. The appointed date for the proposed transaction is 1 October 2016. Vinod Dasari, CEO and Managing Director of Ashok Leyland said that the amalgamation will result in operational efficiencies and help realize cost synergies.

The transaction is subject to various regulatory approvals and approval of shareholders of both the companies.

Hinduja Foundries reported net loss of Rs 36.58 crore in Q1 June 2016 compared with net loss of Rs 98.52 crore in Q1 June 2015. Net sales rose 10.2% to Rs 166.24 crore in Q1 June 2016 over Q1 June 2015.

Hinduja Foundries is one of the India's leading foundry group with the capacity to produce cylinder block and head ranging from 25 kilograms (kgs) to 500 kgs. From castings for automobiles and tractors to industrial engines, construction equipment and power generation equipment, Hinduja Foundries meets the stringent requirement of diverse segments. It even caters to the exceptionally high standards of defence applications.

Ashok Leyland is one of the leading manufacturers of medium and heavy commercial vehicles in India.

Both, Ashok Leyland and Hinduja Foundries are a part of Hinduja Group.

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On 19 September 2016

Hindustan Foods will hold a meeting of the Board of Directors of the Company on 19 September 2016 to consider the proposal of Fund raising through Preferential lssue of equity shares of Rs. 10/- (face value) each, in accordance with the provisions of Companies Act, 2013, and SEBI (lssue of Capital and Disclosure Requirements) Regulations, 2009, as amended and subject to approval of the shareholders of the Company and other necessary approvals, if any, and to consider other matters.

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Nava Bharat Ventures rose 2.76% to Rs 122.85 at 10:36 IST on BSE after Reliance Mutual Fund bought 39.70 lakh shares of the company at an average price of Rs 112 per share in a bulk deal on the NSE yesterday, 15 September 2016.

Meanwhile, the S&P BSE Sensex was up 346.88 points or 1.22% at 28,759.77.

On BSE, so far 2.16 lakh shares were traded in the counter as against average daily volume of 1.13 lakh shares in the past one quarter. The stock hit a high of Rs 127.80 and a low of Rs 121.35 so far during the day. The stock had hit a 52-week high of Rs 134.80 on 22 July 2016. The stock had hit a 52-week low of Rs 64 on 12 February 2016. The stock had outperformed the market over the past one month till 15 September 2016, advancing 4.7% compared with 0.93% rise in the Sensex. The scrip had also outperformed the market in past one quarter, gaining 9.85% as against Sensex's 6.31% rise.

The small-cap company has equity capital of Rs 35.72 crore. Face value per share is Rs 2.

HC Mauritius sold 40 lakh shares at an average price of Rs 112.01 per share in this deal.

On a consolidated basis, Nava Bharat Ventures' net profit fell 32.1% to Rs 29.21 crore on 9.3% decline in net sales to Rs 313.72 crore in Q1 June 2016 over Q1 June 2015.

Nava Bharat Ventures operates in the business verticals of power generation, mining, ferro alloys and agri-business with multi-national operations spread over India, South East Asia and Africa.

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Polyplex Corporation rose 4.17% to Rs 299.50 at 12:20 IST on BSE after the company said that it has completed acquisition of entire equity stake in its step down subsidiary.

The announcement was made after market hours yesterday, 15 September 2016.

Meanwhile, the BSE Sensex was up 327.95 points, or 1.15%, to 28,740.84.

High volumes were witnessed on the counter. On BSE, so far 9,943 shares were traded in the counter, compared with an average volume of 4,072 shares in the past one quarter. The stock hit a high of Rs 300 and a low of Rs 290 so far during the day. The stock hit a 52-week high of Rs 315 on 12 August 2016. The stock hit a 52-week low of Rs 195.90 on 6 April 2016. The stock had underperformed the market over the past one month till 15 September 2016, falling 1.69% compared with 0.93% rise in the Sensex. The scrip had also underperformed the market in past one quarter, gaining 3.45% as against Sensex's 6.31% rise.

The small-cap company has an equity capital of Rs 31.98 crore. Face value per share is Rs 10.

Polyplex Corporation said that post acquisition of entire equity stake in its step down subsidiary namely, Peninsula Beverages and Foods Company, it has become direct wholly owned subsidiary of the company. On 12 August 2016, the board of directors of Polyplex Corporation had approved the proposal for acquisition of entire equity stake in its step down wholly owned non-material subsidiary company, Peninsula Beverages and Foods Company from company's wholly owned subsidiary, namely Polyplex (Asia) Pte Limited, Singapore. Peninsula Beverages & Foods Company engages in the wholesale trading of food and beverage products.

Polyplex Corporation's net profit rose 2050.7% to Rs 16.13 crore on 3.6% decline in net sales to Rs 233.67 crore in Q1 June 2016 over Q1 June 2015.

Polyplex Corporation is among the world's largest manufacturers of thin polyethylene terephthalate (PET) film. The company runs integrated manufacturing and distribution operations in six countries viz. India, Thailand, Turkey, USA, China and Netherlands.

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Western Libyan militias freed 15 people kidnapped almost a year ago by the Libyan branch of the Islamic State (IS).

Mohamad al-Gasri, official spokesman for the militia alliance seeking to recover Sirte, told Efe news agency that the freed hostages consisted of nine Libyans, three Koreans, two Indians and a Palestinian.

They were kidnapped by the IS when the group took district 3, the only area left in the hands of IS.

Al-Gasri also reported that a Libyan militant was killed and three were wounded when a device exploded in the neighbourhood, which is believed to be home to 200 jihadists.

This alliance of militias, led by the militia of Misrata city, launched in late August the final assault on the port city of Sirte, occupied by the IS since February 2015.

--IANS

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The air cargo markets deceleration this year had a greater impact on third-quarter cargo revenues at American Airlines than its primary rivals, Delta and United Airlines. But the best revenue quarter in company history and a $483 million profit painted a positive financial picture that could be replicated in the final quarter thanks to resilient []
Maharashtra's Tribal Welfare Minister Vishnu Savra faced the ire of tribals in Palghar whose children have perished due to .

When he visited a tribal hamlet in Khoch village in the worst-hit Mokhada sub-district on Thursday evening, angry locals confronted the minister and demanded answers.

Some infuriated tribals asked him, "600 children have died here (in 2016) what have you done for us?"

"So what? The government is doing its work, implementing schemes.....," Savra retorted, as some of the enraged villagers virtually asked him to 'get out'.

One grieving young tribal woman, whose two-year-old son died due to severe late August, accosted the minister at the doorstep of her hut, "Where were you so long.. My son died 15 days ago and you come now? You want to click pictures? We don't want to meet you. No need to come here."

Other villagers also joined the chorus and said there was no need for the minister to come, and Savra arrogantly shot back, "If you don't want me to come, then I won't."

Savra's comments were dubbed as insensitive by the Congress, Nationalist Congress Party and even ruling alliance partner Shiv Sena, with several leaders including Leader of Opposition (Congress) Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil, demanding his resignation or dismissal from the cabinet.

Later, Savra alleged that some activists of Shramjeevi Sanghatana, a local organisation, were instigating the tribals and that his comments were being "twisted out of context," even as videos of the encounter went viral on the social media.

The locals expressed their anger that though claims are made of huge funds being allocated for their welfare, they received no funds and had to even 'beg' for money to treat the child of the young tribal woman.

The child's condition suddenly worsened last month and he was rushed to a Nashik government hospital, but succumbed due to suspected symptoms.

Stung by the villagers' aggressive attitude, the BJP leader who is also Guardian Minister for the district, beat a hasty retreat along with his motorcade from the village.

Governor C V Rao had directed three ministers  Minister for Women and Child Development Pankaja Munde, Tribal Welfare Minister Vishnu Savra and Minister for Public Health Deepak Sawant  to take urgent remedial steps to tackle malnutrition not only in Palghar but in other parts of the state also.
The Aadhaar number will be treated as provident fund number for coal mine workers in the country, an official said on Friday.

It was decided at a meeting attended by Directors (personnel) of all subsidiaries of Coal India Limited (CIL), Coal Mines Provident Fund Organisation (CMPFO) Commissioner B.K. Panda and heads of regional offices of CMPFO in coastal town Puri on Friday.

"Aadhaar number would be treated as Coal Mines Provident Fund number in future. We have targeted to execute it from December 25, 2016," said L.N. Mishra, Director (personnel) of Mahanadi Coalfields Ltd (MCL).

He said it would benefit all employees, especially the contractual workers, who have been engaged under several contractors.

He said any employee can access the CMPFO website through his or her Aadhaar number and get details of PF, pension and status of application and address all queries.

The collection of master data from live members and contract workers would be completed soon.

CMPFO is also planning to provide status of claim, PF balance, pension payment through SMS services from December 25, the Good Governance Day.

IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
All the portfolios withdrawn from senior Samajwadi Party leader Shivpal Singh Yadav earlier this week were given back to him on Friday, after days of a bitter power struggle between him and his nephew and Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav.

The Chief Minister's Office late on Friday tweeted that all the departments like Public Works Department (PWD), Irrigation, Cooperative and Revenue were once again back with Shivpal Singh Yadav.

In another tweet, it also announced that former mining minister Gayatri Prajapati was also being brought back in the cabinet.

The two developments came after SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav announced these measures before party workers. Following the resignation of Shivpal Yadav from all party posts and from the state government, the ruling party had plunged into a grave crisis on Thursday night.

Mulayam Singh finally mediated in the ongoing war of supremacy within the party and asked Akhilesh Yadav to roll back his decisions against Shivpal Yadav and Prajapati. With this, while curtains seem to have finally come down on the four-day-old drama but informed sources say the coldness between the "chacha-bhatija" still continues.

"The patch up is superficial. The egos of the two are set to clash again as Shivpal has won this round and the chief minister who was adamant on not retreating back from his actions has had to do so, thereby diminishing his hold and authority on the government," a senior party leader said.
With the Peoples Democratic Party's Srinagar MP Tariq Hameed Karra quitting the party as well as his Lok Sabha seat, the countdown may well have begun for the PDP-BJP alliance in Jammu and .

The coming together of the PDP-BJP in February last year was like an inter-community, inter-caste and inter-religious marriage which was not exactly fawned upon by the elders and hardliners on either side, but compulsions of realpolitik and an element of romantic optimism solemnised a union of opposites amidst much hype and fanfare.

Eighteen months later, the marriage is on the rocks and heading for a messy divorce. Both sides no longer seem to be making any effort to keep the spark alive in the relationship. They appear resigned to fate, going through the motions, quite like a couple -- thoroughly bored and disgusted with each other -- staying in the same house but sleeping in different rooms.

And just as in a classic break-up situation, both the BJP and the PDP seem to be waiting for the right moment that will ensure they get the maximum mileage and sympathy while exiting the relationship. And the other side, maximum flak.

But there appears little time left now for such structured finesse and timing. The resignation of PDP MP Karra has the potential to trigger a chain of events which will gather its own momentum, causing the BJP-PDP alliance to implode.

Karra's emotive statements equating the alliance government with the Nazi regime and accusing Prime Minister Modi of pushing an agenda of intolerance and Hinduisation, will have an impact on the PDP cadre. By exhorting fellow PDP lawmakers to follow his example he has made chief minister Mehbooba Mufti's already difficult position more precarious.

Mehbooba Mufti has nobody but herself to blame for this situation. After her father's death she vacillated too long and tried too hard to get a good bargain. In the end, all that posturing yielded little for her. Only her goodwill -- both with her cadre as well as the BJP -- suffered. And the vacuum of over two months after Mufti saheb's passing away and the public dilly-dallying and bargaining robbed the PDP-BJP alliance of whatever little lustre and allure it had during her father's tenure.

Now Mehbooba is getting marginalised on both fronts. Delhi views her as a weak leader and a not fully trustworthy ally. Her supporters in the valley see her as someone who has deserted them and the cause of for power. For her political survival, Mehbooba has little choice but to walk out of this alliance.

She may just be waiting for the right time to exit. Any big event, incident and tragedy can offer her that opportunity.

For the BJP too, the romance and optimism of last year looks like a flashback from an old black-and-white era film. The party had forged the alliance viewing it as an historic opportunity to make inroads in the valley. In hindsight, the idea itself was not based on ground realities. Across the valley people had voted with one purpose in mind: to the keep BJP out.

But the experiment still had a chance till Mufti Mohammad Sayeed was the Chief Minister who was so much more politically savvy than Mehbooba.

A quick aside here.

It's remarkable how the older generation leaders have behaved with such maturity in . From a Delhi perspective, Omar Abdullah has been too short-sighted these past couple of months, stoking separatist sentiment in the valley by his provocative statements.

His stand may have gained Omar some brownie points vis-a-vis Mehbooba (who was no different when Omar was in the saddle) but his trust quotient in Delhi has gone down several notches. It would have been so much wiser on Omar's part if he had learnt a few lessons from his father.

For all the colour and controversy in his personal life, Dr Farooq Abdullah was always so much more mature and restrained when doing politics in and on Kashmir.

Coming back to the BJP and the Centre, they seem to be running out of options. The situation in the valley is slippery and shows no signs of improvement. Sticking on with Mehbooba and the PDP is bringing diminishing returns with each passing day.

In this scenario, the option of imposing Governor's Rule is increasingly being discussed in Delhi with the government weighing the pros and cons of such a move. Those favouring Governor's Rule have many arguments, but weather seems to be one factor weighing on the minds of Centre.

With winter and snowfall approaching, there are some who argue that cross-border infiltration and support to separatists will come down in the next few months, giving Delhi an extra few months to make up its mind. And give a final chance to the PDP-BJP alliance to retrieve the situation.

The question, keeping in mind the present situation in the valley, is: Does Delhi have the luxury of time on its side?

(Sanjeev Srivastava is founder-editor of EditPlatter.com and former India Editor of BBC. The views expressed are personal. He can be contacted at sanjeevs59@hotmail.com)

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Actress Anupama Kumar, who is making a comeback to Telugu filmdom after seven years, will play a business tycoon in an upcoming yet-untitled Gopichand-starrer.

She was last seen in the 2009 Telugu film "Aa Okkadu".

"It's a very interesting role. I play a business tycoon, and will be required to undergo complete makeover," Anupama, popular for her work in Tamil films such as "Neer Paravai", "Vallinam" and "Meagamann", told IANS.

In the film, she will be paired with Sachin Khedekar, and she's looking forward to work with the National Award-winning actor.

"I've worked with him in an advertisement. Having always been in awe of his performance, I'm quite excited to be sharing screen space with him," she said.

To be directed by Sampath Nandi, the project will be predominantly shot in Bangkok.

The film also stars Hansika Motwani, Catherine Tresa and Prakash Raj.

--IANS

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The Indian army apprehended eight hardcore cades of the insurgent group Karbi People Liberation Tiger (KPLT) in a series of "multi directional and synchronised operations" since Thursday night in Assam's West Karbi Anglong district, an official statement said.

The militants rounded up including Sunder Dera, alias Rijak Dera, commander-in-chief of a KPLT faction, a defence ministry release said on Friday.

A large cache of arms, ammunition and incriminating documents were also recovered during the operation.

Based on specific intelligence inputs, the army and police launched simultaneous and multiple operations in West Karbi Anglong district on Thursday night, the statement said. During the confrontation with the armed terrorists, the troops "exercised maximum restraint and used minimum force' to ensure there was no collateral damage", it said.

The apprehended terrorists also include an area commander and vice chairman of the group who were instrumental in coordinating extortion, kidnapping and recruitment of new cadres.

Four rifles including one AK-47 rifle, grenades, live ammunition, extortion notices & receipts were recovered from the terrorists.

"KPLT, which is in a state of disarray due to the recent successful operations by security forces has suffered a crippling blow. The elimination of two hard-core KPLT cadres and apprehension of 14 cadres in the past one month has left the outfit leaderless and completely disorganized," the release said.

--IANS

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Amid speculation that Baloch leader Brahumdagh Bugti may seek asylum in India, his party will meet in Geneva on September 18 and 19 to take a decision on the issue.

Baloch Republican Party (BRP) spokesman Sher Mohammad Bugti, who is in Geneva, told IANS over telephone that the Central Committee will discuss many issues including those pertaining to Balochs outside Balochistan.

"In the meeting we will also take a decision on how and when to apply for asylum," Sher Mohammad Bugti told IANS.

He said he was not aware of reports that BRP leader Brahumdagh Bugti may seek asylum in India. "Till now he has not applied officially for asylum in India," he said.

Brahumdagh Bugti is the grandson of Baloch nationalist leader Akbar Bugti, who died in a military operation in Balochistan in 2006.

Earlier, Brahumdagh Bugti told CNN News 18 that people of Balochistan were living in "very terrible conditions" and that the Baloch issue got more attention after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi referred to the rights abuses there.

"After Modi's speech (on India's Independence Day) people have started talking about Balochistan," Brahumdagh Bugti said.

--IANS

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As Karnataka continues its legal battle over the Cauvery, the states capital -- almost entirely dependent on the river -- wastes half the water it receives, according to an IndiaSpend analysis of water-use data.

The only Indian city that wastes water at a greater rate is Kolkata. And the situation in Bengaluru will only worsen.

Every Bangalorean -- 8.5 million people live in India's third-most populous city -- should get 150 litres of water per day. But what she gets is 65 litres, the equivalent of four flushes of a toilet. Water is supplied, on average, thrice a week.

Over the next nine years, the city's water demand is predicted to be three times more than supply.

Its population density 13 times higher than Karnataka's average, Bengaluru consumes 50 per cent of Cauvery water reserved for domestic use in Karnataka. As much as 49 per cent of this water supplied is what is called "non-revenue water" or "unaccounted for water" -- i.e., water lost in distribution -- according to the Bengaluru Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) data.

"Inequitable supply to different parts of the city -- ranging from one-third to three times the average per capita daily supply -- makes this worse," Krishna Raj, associate professor at the Institute for Social and Economic Change (ISEC), Bengaluru, and author of a 2013 paper on the city's water supply system, told IndiaSpend.

Bengaluru's water loss is the second-highest among Indian metros: Kolkata leads at 50 per cent. The wastage figure for Mumbai is 18 per cent, New Delhi, 26 per cent and Chennai, 20 per cent. Across the world, cities lose only about 15 to 20 per cent of their supply, said the ISEC study, which pegged Bengaluru's losses at 48 per cent three years ago.

Former BWSSB chairman, T.M. Vijaybhaskar, admitted to a loss of about 46 per cent water at a conference in February 2016. "Of 1,400 MLD (million litres per day) of water pumped to the city, 600 MLD goes to waste," he said.

The ISEC paper attributed the wastage to two types of distributional losses: First, damages and leakages in the water supply system and, second, unauthorised water connections.

"Water leakages largely take place at distribution mains, service pipes and stand posts and together account for 88.5 per cent of water spillover, the rest being low leakages at main valve, meter joint stop valve, ferrule, air valve and others," the paper said. "This huge loss is directly attributed to the water seepage at various stages of supply."

Of the 270 thousand million cubic ft (TMC) of Cauvery water allotted to Karnataka by the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal, Raj estimated that, roughly, about 80 per cent is used for agriculture and industry (down from over 90 per cent in 2007). This leaves about 20 per cent for rural and urban domestic use, of which Bengaluru records the highest demand.

The city receives about 19 TMC of Cauvery water. Recently, the Karnataka State Urban Development Department provisionally raised supply by an additional 10 TMC to meet the needs of 110 villages added to the metropolitan area in 2007. A formal proposal to raise the city's water supply to 30 TMC from the Cauvery basin has been forwarded to the central government.

Sourced from a distance of 100 km, up to a height of 540 m, the BWSSB spends nearly 60 per cent of its budget in pumping water to the Bengaluru metropolitan region. With groundwater reserves overexploited and polluted, and its other two ageing reservoirs -- the 120-year-old Heseraghatta and 83-year-old Thippegondanahalli of Cauvery's Arkavathi tributary -- unreliable, Bengaluru is almost entirely dependent on the disputed river.

The large water losses, which ISEC has recorded for the last five years at least, offset any efforts to augment water supply through various stages of Cauvery river water supply projects. Thus, efforts to enhance per capita water availability to 150 litres per capita per day (LPCD) to meet World Health Organisation (WHO) and Central Public Health and Environmental Organisation (CPEEHO) standards remain unfulfilled.

"After Stage IV Phase II of the Cauvery Water Supply Scheme (CWSS) was commissioned recently, Bengaluru now receives 1,350 MLD of water daily," said Raj. "For the city's population of 8.5 million (Census 2011), this quantity officially raises per capita water availability to 158.82 litres, which is more than sufficient to meet the WHO and CPEEHO standards."

If unaddressed, the situation is only likely to worsen. In nine years, the city's demand (currently 1,575 MLD) is estimated to rise by 71 per cent, while the supply (currently 1,350 MLD) will rise only by a third, thereby tripling the demand-supply gap, according to the ISEC study of water demand and availability.

By 2031, Bengaluru's water supply will reach its optimum level (2,070 MLD) and stay there while the city's water demands rise further in the decades thereafter, widening the shortfall progressively, showed BWSSB data.

"Whenever the demand for water exceeds supply, urban water utilities quickly design water supply strategies, giving little importance to demand control or management. Failure of water supply authorities to incorporate demand-side factors in their policies leads to 'system-collapse' or 'institutional failure'," the 2013 paper said.

"As per the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal award, Karnataka receives lesser water per sq km -- 1 TMC of water is distributed over 134 sq km here, whereas in Tamil Nadu, it is supplied to 116 sq km," Raj said. "Add to this, there is inefficiency and inequity in Bengaluru's supply which must be addressed."

(In arrangement with IndiaSpend.org, a data-driven, non-profit, public interest journalism platform, with whom Alison Saldanha is an assistant editor. The views expressed are those of IndiaSpend. Feedback at respond@indiaspend.org)with IndiaSpend)

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
With Prime Minister Narendra Modi set for a two-day visit to Gujarat from Friday evening, the ruling BJP leadership is busy promoting a mobile app to enable supporters to connect with him to wish him on his birthday on September 17.

The ruling party aims to rope in at least five lakh people to upload the app.

The aggressive promotion of the app comes in the backdrop of a flop BJP programme in Surat recently when Patel youngsters disrupted a show of strength in the presence of party president Amit Shah amid the simmering Patidar and Dalit agitations.

With leaders of both the agitations -- Hardik Patel of the Patidars and Jignesh Mewani of the Dalits -- in their twenties, the task of promoting the mobile app has been assigned to the state Bharatiya Janata Party's youth wing.

A special booth has been set up at the state BJP headquarters 'Shree Kamalam' on the outskirts of state capital Gandhinagar.

Party sources said trained volunteers will also meet youngsters in different educational institutes and encourage them to connect with Modi.

Modi, who will stay at his home on his 66th birthday, is visiting the state for the second time in less than a month.

Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani has said that the app will be a great opportunity for the people to connect and greet the Prime Minister through the 'Narendra Modi App' on his birthday.

Modi is slated to reach Ahmedabad after 9 p.m. on Friday and will be greeted at the airport by hundreds of party workers.

His convoy will then drive to Raj Bhavan where he is to make a night halt. The Prime Minister will visit his nonagenarian mother Hira Ba on Saturday in Gandhinagar to seek her blessings.

Afterwards, Modi is expected to return to the Raj Bhavan and hold a meeting with state BJP functionaries, including the Chief Minister, ministers and important office-bearers.

The Prime Minister will leave for Limkheda in the tribal district of Dahod to inaugurate the government's water and irrigation schemes entailing an expenditure of Rs 1,755 crore. Here, he will also address a huge tribal rally.

Thereafter, Modi will fly to south Gujarat's Navsari town to address 'Samajik Adhikarita Shibir' for specially abled children. He will then leave for Surat and fly back to Delhi by an Indian Air Force aircraft.

Sources in the Gujarat Administrative Department (GAD) said that Modi will use road routes from Ahmedabad to Gandhinagar on Friday and to reach his brother's house on Saturday morning.

For Limkheda in central Gujarat and Navsari functions, the Prime Minister will travel by a helicopter, said an official source.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A youth who had attempted self-immolation here in protest against Karnataka's attitude towards sharing of Cauvery river water with Tamil Nadu succumbed to burn injuries here on Friday, the NTK party said in a statement here.

The youth, identified as Vignesh, was a member of the Naam Tamizhar Katchi (NTK) party founded by film director S. Seeman.

The NTK party statement said Vignesh died on Friday and his body will be kept at the party office here for people to pay their last respects.

The body will be transported to Vignesh's native place -- Mannargudi town -- and the final rites will be held there on Saturday.

The self-immolation bid happened on Thursday when the party was holding a rally here in support of Tamil Nadu's claims over Cauvery river water.

Suddenly Vignesh poured kerosene on himself and lit the match. Though the blaze was doused quickly, he suffered severe burn injuries and was taken to a government hospital for treatment.

--IANS

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The Congress suffered a major blow after it lost the Arunachal Pradesh government again on Friday when Chief Minister Pema Khandu and all its MLAs but one defected to the Peoples' Party of Arunachal (PPA), a BJP ally.

Two independents, supporting the Khandu government, also joined the PPA -- a member of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led anti-Congress grouping of North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA).

The Congress had 44 legislators in the house of 60. Forty-three have defected and the only MLA to remain is former Chief Minister Nabam Tuki.

Khandu told reporters that he had informed Speaker Wangki Lowang that "we are merging the Congress with the PPA". The merger was decided at a Congress Legislature Party (CLP) meeting held on Friday morning.

PPA chairperson Kameng Ringu said the Congress MLAs joining his party was something waiting to happen. "It is a homecoming after a temporary exile," Ringu told IANS.

After the mass exodus of Congress MLAs, the PPA now has a strength of 45 legislators. Besides, there are 11 BJP MLAs.

The Congress accused the BJP of a "foul play" and committing a "fraud on democracy".

"The PPA is an illegitimate child of the BJP's diabolical design to decimate democracy," Congress spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala said in New Delhi.

Surjewala alleged that the defection was orchestrated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP President Amit Shah who he said rode to power on the promise of cooperative federalism.

The BJP denied it had anything to do with the political development.

"If elected MLAs don't want to stay with the Congress, what can others do?" asked Union Minister and BJP MP from Arunachal Kiren Rijiju.

BJP state chief Tapir Gao told IANS that the exodus of the MLAs had vindicated its stand that "the Congress high command is totally neglecting its legislators".

Pasang Dorjee Sona, a confidant of Chief Minister Khandu, said there would be no swearing ceremony "since it was only a change of party affiliation".

Asked if the PPA would also rope in the BJP in the new government, Sona said it was up to them "to decide whether to be part of the PPA government".

Some of the defectors told IANS that the change was brought about in the interest of the state.

Techi Khaso, who represents Itanagar, said it made sense to join an ally of the centrally ruling BJP because it "will serve the agenda of development more rather than having two different parties (ruling) in the centre and state".

Jomde Kena, another MLA, said the state was suffering from a financial deadlock because of the Congress-BJP rift. "States cannot run that way. If by changing sides, we can uplift the state, then what's wrong in that."

Kaling Moyong, a BJP MLA, said Arunachal Pradesh with limited resources cannot prosper if different parties were in power at the center and in the state.

This is the second time in over nine months that the sensitive border state has suffered a major political crisis.

In a controversial move, then Governor J.P. Rajkhowa last year advanced the assembly session from January 14 to December 16. The move triggered political unrest and finally led to the declaration of President's Rule on January 26 after the fall of the Tuki-led Congress government.

The Tuki government collapsed after Congress rebels led by Kalikho Pul joined hands with the BJP and voted it out in a special session of the assembly.

Pul took over as Chief Minister in February with BJP's support. But a Supreme Court order ousted his government and reinstated Congress rule.

To stem the rebellion, the Congress replaced Tuki and made Khandu the Chief Minister. Pul was found dead on August 9, weeks after he was forced to resign following the Supreme Court order.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The Congress on Friday staged a protest in all 70 constituencies of the national capital to observe "Bhagoda Divas" over the absence of AAP ministers following the outbreak of chikungunya and dengue.

The protest against Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, his ministers and Lt. Governor Najeeb Jung, for being out of the city was led by Delhi Congress unit chief Ajay Maken.

He accused the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leaders of staying away from the city at a time of crisis.

Slamming Kejriwal, Maken alleged: "While the people of the city are facing an epidemic like situation, Kejriwal was busy in campaigning for his party in Punjab."

"Instead of looking after the situation here, he went to Bengaluru for his treatment," he alleged.

The Congress leader also attacked Jung, who was in the US and Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia for holidaying in Finland.

The Congress leader also slammed one of the mayors of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) who is on a foreign trip.

The Congress leader also urged Kejriwal and other ministers of the Delhi government to immediately come back and hold an all-party meeting over the vector-borne diseases chikungunya and dengue, which have claimed at least 32 lives in the last few days.

--IANS

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BJP President Amit Shah on Friday blamed Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav for rising atrocities on Dalits in Uttar Pradesh.

Speaking at a rally here to denounce remarks by UP minister Mohd Azam Khan on B.R. Ambedkar, Shah said it was sad that Dalits were being victimized in the country's largest state.

"Samajwadi Party workers are grabbing land of poor Dalits and have let loose a reign of terror on them," he said and also accused Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati of having exploited the Dalits for electoral gains.

Without taking any name, he hinted that the SP government was being run at the directions of Azam Khan who was mouthing obscenities at everyone and had now insulted even the architect of the Indian Constitution.

State Bharatiya Janata Party chief Keshav Maurya said his party would continue with the agitation against Azam Khan till a case was registered against him for the use of objectionable language against the Dalit icon.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The Ozone Cell of the Environment Ministry here celebrated International Ozone Day on Friday by awarding young schoolchildren for participating and winning in painting, poster-making and slogan writing competitions organised by the ministry.

The International Day for the Preservation of the Ozone Layer is celebrated every year on September 16 to commemorate the day when several nations signed the Montreal Protocol, agreeing on the substances that deplete the ozone layer from the atmosphere and trying to banish them.

On this occasion, the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change released a report 'The Montreal Protocol: India's Success Story', detailing the Indian endeavours in phasing out harmful CFC (Chlorofluorocarbons), used in electrical appliances.

"CFC has been replaced by HFC (Hydrocflourocarbon) completely. We have stopped using harmful gases... according to estimates we will have completely done away with HCFCs (Hydrochloroflourocarbon, an alternative of CFC) too, by the year 2025," said Ajay Mathur, Director-General, TERI (The Energy and Research Institute), who was present at the event as a chief guest.

"HFCs are good in that they don't contribute to ozone depletion, but they emit greenhouse gases, causing an increase in global warming. This increase will have a global impact, including India where floods and droughts will become more frequent, according to experts," he added.

CFC, HCFC and HFC are all compounds of gases used in refrigerants, coolants, solvents, contact lenses and foam industry among others -- the former two contain chlorine and flourine, two chemicals which are the major cause of ozone depletion, while HFC, though causing no harm to the ozone layer, contributes to global warming.

Mathur told IANS that there were other chemical compounds which are better alternatives to HFCs and HCFCs.

"The representatives of Indian government will discuss the possibilities of better, less polluting alternatives to what are available now during the meeting on Montreal Protocol in Kigali, Rwanda, next month. There are two chemicals so far, HFO (Hydrofluoroolefin) and propane, which have proven to be better replacements of other three," he told IANS.

He also praised corporates for doing their bit in restoring ozone levels in the atmosphere.

"The multilateral fund which our country has received has been very efficiently used, which was mostly spent on technology building. Our corporates too have used the funds very competently, adding 40 per cent from their pocket, of the total spent in technology building... Godrej has just started using propane as refrigerant... which is more ozone-friendly," he told IANS.

The event was also attended by M.K. Singh, Joint Secretary in the Environment Ministry.

--IANS

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The Delhi High Court on Friday issued notice to the Centre on a public suit seeking to declare as unconstitutional certain provisions of the Representation of Peoples Act that allow a convicted person to contest elections six years after their conviction.

A division bench of Chief Justice G. Rohini and Sangita Dhingra Sehgal sought a response from the Ministry of Law and Justice as well as the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs on the plea filed by advocate Ashwini Upadhyay contending that convicted people should be barred for their lifetime from contesting elections.

The petitioner said sections eight and nine of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 should be declared unconstitutional as they restrict disqualification period to only six years.

The disqualification rule for convicted persons cannot be applied differently on the executive, the judiciary and the legislature, the suit said.

"Hence section eight and nine of the Part-II, Chapter-III (disqualification for member ship of parliament and state legislature) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 is violative of the fundamental rights, unconstitutional and inconsistent with Article 13 and 14 of the Constitution of India," the plea stated.

In the executive and judiciary, when one is convicted for any criminal offence, he or she is suspended automatically and their services are terminated for lifetime.

However, this rule is applied differently in case of a convicted person in a legislature, said the plea.

Even after conviction and undergoing sentence, one can form a political party, become the office bearer of a political party, contest the election, and become member of legislature after expiry of six years from the date of their conviction, Upadhyay said.

The petition questioned why should not there be a lifetime ban on convicted person on contesting elections, forming a political party and becoming office bearer of a political party.

The petition sought direction to set minimum educational qualification and maximum age limit for contesting candidates.

"Direct the law ministry to implement the Election Commission's Proposed Electoral Reform and Law Commission Report No-244 and 255, which is necessary for de-criminalisation and de-communalisation of politics," the petition stated.

Certain immediate measures need to be taken feasibly to mark the first successful step towards an attempt to cleansing the electoral system, it said.

The Representation of the People Act has not provided for any proper guidelines in the form of minimum educational qualifications, good character and conduct, the petition said.

--IANS

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India and Nepal held bilateral talks after Prime Minister Narendra Modi met his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal "Prachanda" here on Friday.

"Reviewing the full spectrum of #IndiaNepal relations. Both PMs lead delegation level talks at Hyderabad House," External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup tweeted.

some agreements are expected to be signed following the talks.

Prachanda arrived here on Thursday on a four-day visit to India.

The new Maoist-led government in Nepal assumed power early last month after the ouster of K.P. Sharma Oli as Prime Minister.

Earlier on Friday, Prachanda was accorded a ceremonial welcome at the Rashtrapati Bhavan here.

Following this, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj called on him at the Rashtrapati Bhavan here.

Apart from Sushma Swaraj, Prachanda is scheduled to meet Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Minister of State for Power Piyush Goyal later in the day before calling on President Pranab Mukherjee.

He will also attend a joint business event organised by Assocham in the evening.

In an interview with state broadcaster Doordarshan, Prachanda said that the Nepal-India relationship was a unique one and that his visit was aimed at building "trust and confidence" between the two sides.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Prime Minister on Friday said India and Nepal have a "time tested" and unique friendship and their security interests are inter-linked.

"Our friendship is time-tested and unique. We share our burden during difficult times, just as we celebrate each other's achievements. As immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability and economic prosperity of Nepal is our shared objective," Prime Minister Modi said, in his media statement after holding talks with visiting Nepalese Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal "Prachanda" here.

Modi also commended Prachanda's role in "strengthening democratic institutions in Nepal".

"Our security interests are inter-linked. We agreed that securing our societies is essential for achieving shared objectives of development and growth. India stands ready and prepared to strengthen development partnership with Nepal. We will do so according to the priorities of the people and government of Nepal," he said.

Modi also said that continued cooperation between the defence and security agencies is important to guard the open borders between the two countries that provide opportunities for interaction to their people.

Prachanda meanwhile said Nepal is eager to learn from India's "success story", and his government is focused on the agenda of development.

The two leaders earlier held bilateral talks and signed a series of agreements at Hyderabad House.

Prachanda arrived here on Thursday on a four-day visit to India.

The new Maoist-led government in Nepal assumed power last month after the ouster of K P Sharma Oli as Prime Minister.

Earlier on Friday, Prachanda was accorded a ceremonial welcome at the Rashtrapati Bhavan here.

External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj called on him at the Rashtrapati Bhavan.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Minister of State for Power Piyush Goyal are also slated to meet the Nepal Prime Minister later in the day.

Prachanda is to also meet President Pranab Mukherjee.

In the evening, he will attend a joint business event organised by Assocham.

In an interview with state broadcaster Doordarshan, Prachanda said that Nepal-India ties are unique and that his visit was aimed at building "trust and confidence" between the two sides.

Ties between both neighbours had soured during the 10-month rule of K P Sharma Oli, with Kathmandu showing a marked pro-Beijing tilt.

India is hoping to bring ties back on track with the visit of Prachanda, who has chosen New Delhi for his first foreign outing after taking over.

China's President Xi Jinping is expected to visit Kathmandu in October, while Indian President Pranab Mukherjee is visiting in early November.
The Islamic State arrested seven women in northeast Syria on suspicion of spying for the US-led coalition and publicly flogged them, local news site ARA News reported on Friday.

The women were flogged before a large crowd in the IS stronghold of Raqqa after being held for allegedly leaking security information on the group's movements in the city to the US-led coalition, the report said.

The women were among more than 10 people arrested by Islamic State's al-Hisbah police force during raids on several houses in Raqqa, ARA News said.

"Among those arrested were seven women who were flogged in front of hundreds of people in central Raqqa on Thursday evening," media activist Aiman al-Issawi was quoted as telling ARA News.

"The Sharia Court accused them of cooperating with the US-led coalition and rival groups," he added.

"At least four other civilians were detained by IS militants but the group has not yet revealed what their charges were," al-Issawi said.

The Islamic State has recently arrested and beheaded dozens of civilians who allegedly collaborated with coalition forces against IS, according to ARA News.

--IANS/AKI

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A 20-year-old undergraduate at a city college died when the auto rickshaw she was travelling in crashed into a speeding bus at a busy Kolkata crossing on Friday, police said.

The girl, a B. Com first year student of Jaipuria college, was declared dead at the state-run R.G. Kar Medical College and Hospital where she was rushed after the accident at the Gauribari crossing early in the day.

Police said the auto driver lost control and hit the bus resulting in the accident.

Four other passengers and the driver were also injured and are being treated at the hospital.

--IANS

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Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrived here on Friday evening to a warm welcome on a two-day visit on the occasion of his 66th birthday on Saturday.

Modi, who flew down by an Indian Air Force aircraft, was received at the Ahmedabad airport by Governor O.P. Kohli, Chief Minister Vijay Rupani, all state ministers and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders.

Scores of BJP volunteers and people thronged the airport to cheer him.

Modi thanked everyone from a podium at a brief function and recalled the September 16 evening of last year when he had similarly landed here for his birthday.

The Prime Minister will make a night halt at the Raj Bhawan in Gandhinagar and seek the blessings of his mother Hira Ba on his birthday on Saturday.

After that, he will fly to the tribal district of Limkheda to inaugurate water and irrigation schemes worth over Rs 1,700 crore.

Modi will also address a public rally at Limkheda before leaving for Navsari in south Gujarat where he will address Samajik Adhikarita Shibir (workshop) for disabled children.

The Prime Minister would leave for Surat on his way to New Delhi on Saturday evening.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Gabina VOA is designed to be an infotainment youth radio show broadcasting to Ethiopia and Eritrea in the Amharic language. The show brings varied perspectives on issues concerning young people in the Horn of Africa region. Gabina in the Amharic language is a front row taxi ridesymbolic of the shows content as a fun ride that takes audiences from point A to point B. Gabina VOAs main goal is Enlightening young people, introducing them to cutting-edge technological innovations, exposing them to new processes and ideas so they can be productive, informed and self-governing citizens.
NewsDistill, a Hyderabad-based news aggregator app, on Friday said it has raised $1,00,000 seed fund from noted investors and technology leaders for examsion and product development to meet growing demand and is likely to raise an equal amount in a couple of months.

The investors include Narasimhan Ganesh, Senior Director, Box.com, Ramana Thumu, Vice President, eBay, and Sudhir Mallem of Uber.

Launched in 2015, NewsDistill aggregates news sourced from various Indian newspapers, television channels, RSS feeds, custom feeds and social in eight major Indian languages besides English, a company release said.

The news is presented through innovative algorithms to the user through a rich user interface application.

"There is a huge demand for personalised news feed on mobile apps especially for those who wish to spend quality time reading similar news from various channels through multiple languages and quick filters," said NewsDistill founder Narasimha Reddy.

"NewsDistill is embarking upon expansion and product development to meet the demand. The current round of investment will be used towards product development and talent aquisition. Our short vision is to become the top news aggregator in India in the next few months," he said.

NewsDistill has recently upgraded its product features by adding world's first personalised "newsplayer" that auto-reads news on the mobile for the reader.

It has also introduced patented robotic voice besides working on creating hyper-local filters to keep the user connected to their neighbourhood always.

NewsDistill is co-founded by Narasimha Reddy, an engineering graduate from Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University Hyderabad (JNTU) who had earlier worked with Yahoo, LinkedIn and Bhaskar Reddy, an aeronautical engineer.

NewsDistill is easy to operate and integrates more than 30 unique features. It is currently available on Android and web platform.

Currently NewsDistill is generating 50 plus million page views per month and aiming to reach 130 plus million page views by the end of November 2016. Around 19-20 minutes is the average daily user engagement time.

--IANS

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The Union Water Resources Ministry on Friday signed an MoU with the Agriculture Ministry to promote organic farming on the banks of the river Ganga.

As per the MoU, villagers residing in 1,657 villages along the river, starting from Uttarakhand to West Bengal, will be encouraged to adopt organic farming.

As per the agreement under the 'Namami Gange' project, each gram panchayat will be treated as a cluster under the Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY) and will be provided training on Integrated Nutrient Management and micro-irrigation techniques by the Agriculture Ministry, an official source said.

Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti and Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh attended the MoU signing event.

"Signing of this MoU will ensure effective and efficient implementation of various projects of 'Namami Gange' in coordination with the Agriculture Ministry," Uma Bharti said.

"I hope the Agriculture Ministry will play a major role in the success of 'Namami Gange' programme," she added.

The agreement also says that all related information will be provided through mobile applications and awareness will be spread about the side-effects of using chemicals, fertilisers and insecticides in farming.

Radha Mohan Singh said in order to train farmers in organic farming, the government plans to launch 'Deen Dayal Unnat Krishi Shiksha Abhiyan' on September 25, marking the birth centenary of Jan Sangh ideologue Deen Dayal Upadhyaya.

"We want to train 15,000 farmers in organic farming in 2016 across the country through Indian Council of Agricultural Research. The government wants to ensure that there is a drop in input costs, while the income of farmers goes up," Singh said.

The progress of the implementation of this the will be monitored by a steering committee consisting of the nodal officers from each ministry. The committee will meet periodically, sources said.

Minister of State for Water Resources Sanjeev Balyan and senior officials attended the programme.

--IANS

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Socialite Paris Hilton gave $100 to a homeless man who wanted pizza and sex.

The 35-year-old business woman was celebrating her Bella magazine cover at New York Fashion Week on Tuesday when she handed the money to a homeless man outside a French bistro, reports femalefirst.co.uk.

"He asked her for $100 as she left the party. She gave the man a crisp Benjamin Franklin," a witness told the New York Post newspaper's page six column.

Witnesses also told the publication that the man, whose name is not known, had been asking people for the money all night, telling them it was to pay for pizza and sex.

Hilton is quite a people's person it seems. She recently shared that she runs all her social media accounts herself.

"Yes I do own my social media, definitely. I think it's important to talk to my fans myself. I do have a team member to help me post things I want, but I mostly Snapchat, tweet and post on Instagram myself.

I love how social media means I can connect with my fans more personally and show them my life and hear their stories," Hilton said.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Amid tight security, pro-Kannada activists, farmers and traders continued peaceful protests on Friday in Bengaluru, Mandya and Mysuru against Karnataka releasing Cauvery river water to Tamil Nadu.

Defying prohibitory orders, about 100 members of the Kannada Okkuta (federation) staged a protest march from Town Hall to Mysore Bank circle and demonstrated at Freedom Park in Bengaluru urging the state government to stop releasing the river water to the neighbouring state.

Police, however, took the protesters, including federation president Vatal Nagaraj, Kannada Rakshane Vedike convener Praveen Shetty and Karnataka Film Chamber of Commerce president Sa Ra Govindu into custody and whisked away from the venue.

The prohibitory orders, imposed on September 12 after violence broke out in parts of the city and extended to September 25, prevent assembling of more than five persons in public places to maintain law and order and prevent any untoward incidents.

Hundreds of farmers and traders also staged protests at Mandya, Srirangapatna and Mysuru and criticised the state government for failing to protect their interests.

In view of the shutdown in Tamil Nadu, security was stepped up in the city and the four districts across the river basin, especially in the border areas where Tamil-speaking people live to ensure their safety and security of their property.

Inter-state bus services to and from Tamil Nadu remained suspended. Transport vehicles, including trucks were stranded on both sides of the border.

"We have deployed enough security at all the 16 entry points on state and national highways from where people and vehicles pass through to and from Tamil Nadu," start Inspector General of Police (central) Seemanth Kumar Singh told reporters at Attibele in the city's southern part.

--IANS

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Film: "Raaz Reboot"; Director: Vikram Bhatt; Cast: Emraan Hashmi, Kriti Kharbanda, Gaurav Arora, Madhu Anand Chandhock ;Rating: *1/2

At the very onset of the narration, we are informed by a voiceover, "Secrets are the enemy of love".

Narrated in a non-linear manner, the film delves into the secrets of the miseries of a young couple, Mr & Mrs Khanna.

It is January 1, 2016. Rehaan and Shaina return to Romania after a few years of their marriage. Apparently they lived there when they were unmarried. But when Rehaan got an offer as a Venture Capitalist for the East European Finance Company, Shaina was insistent that he take up the job. Rehaan was reluctant, since he had a secret to hide.

On the very first day, while unpacking her luggage, Shaina experiences paranormal activities. Rehaan refuses to believe her. A month later, while on a business trip, Rehaan receives a frantic call from Shaina requesting for help. She is found holed up in a telephone booth in a rural area. Apparently, she had gone there to visit a clairvoyant. And thence, the narrative juggles back and forth as to what plagues them and what leads her to the clairvoyant.

With all the trappings of the horror genre, this fourth edition of the "Raaz" franchise offers nothing exciting. Even after exploiting picturesque Romania, this unimaginatively crafted script with a flimsy plot, narrated in a deadpan manner with ridiculous scares, is unconvincing and tedious to watch.

The performances of the cast too are perfunctory. Gaurav Arora and Kriti Karbanda are un-relatable as the couple Rehaan and Shaina. Their characters lack the chemistry and their ordeal, panic and grief all seem forced. Nevertheless, Kriti shows promise.

Apart from the oomph factor, her transformation into a feral woman with frenzied energy, is worth a mention.

Emraan Hashmi as Aditya, Shaina's past and the antagonist of the tale, walks through his performance.

The rest of the cast which include Amar and Shreya - the couple's friends, Trilok - the blind psychometrist, the clairvoyant and the priest, have their moments of on screen glory.

The music, along with the background score, too is passable.

With moderate production values, the film is well-mounted. Manoj Soni's cinematography is worth a mention. He captures the scenic locales in all their glory. And his frames seamlessly merge with the computer generated effects.

Overall, "Raaz Reboot" is mediocre fare and may appeal only to fans of the "Raaz" franchise.

--IANS

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(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The Supreme Court on Friday stayed a National Green Tribunal (NGT) order mandating environmental clearance for all Metro and other rail projects prior to their launch.

A bench of Chief Justice T.S. Thakur and Justice A.M. Khanwilkar stayed the May 31 order of the NGT after Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi told the court that it was coming in the way of various projects, including Metro, and the East-West and North-South dedicated freight corridors.

The apex court order came on a petition by the Dedicated Freight Corridors Corporation of India (DFCCI).

Addressing the bench, Attorney General Rohatgi said: "The Metro's city projects are spreading to over a dozen cities. Places are being dug up for expansion. We are trying to remedy pollution by inviting people to travel in metro. Our main purpose is development and sustainable development."

He said that seeking environment clearances for metro rail projects was ridiculous as metro operations help in reducing pollution.

Saying that the metro projects do not require prior environment clearance, Rohatgi referred to a clarification by the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests saying that metro rail projects require no environment clearances.

The May 31 order by the NGT had come on a plea that had contended that Noida Metro Rail constructions fell under Schedule 8(b) of Environment Impact Assessment Notification, 2006. Though the NGT order was in respect of the NOIDA metro project but its shadows were cast on other projects as well.

--IANS

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Sri Lanka on Friday affirmed its belief in the UN system and the human rights mechanisms and said these were in the best interest of the country's people.

Sri Lanka will look up to the UN for advice and views, and also expertise and technical assistance that will benefit the country in terms of capacity building and strengthening of local institutions, Xinhua news agency cited a government spokesman as saying.

Permanent Representative of Sri Lanka to the UN in Geneva Ravinatha P. Aryasinha said that following an invitation extended in December 2015 to all UN Special Procedures Mandate Holders to visit the island country, a number of Special Rapporteurs regarding the country's priorities have already undertaken visits representing a broad range of mandates.

Aryasinha also said that Sri Lanka will present its fifth periodic report under the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CAT) on November 15-16.

Sri Lanka receives invaluable assistance through the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's Peacebuilding Fund to implement some of the important steps in the areas of transitional justice, reconciliation, good governance, and resettlement and durable solutions, he said.

The country faced a 30-year civil conflict between government troops and Tamil Tiger rebels which ended in May 2009 with the defeat of the rebels.

Thousands of people have been listed as missing in the final stages of the war and the families have continuously called for an international probe.

Addressing a gathering in Colombo during his two-day visit earlier this month, Ban said Sri Lanka is still in the early stages of regaining its rightful position in the region and the international community.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A Swedish appeals court on Friday decided to maintain the arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange over a rape accusation.

Swedish authorities began investigating Assange in 2010 on allegations of sexual assault and rape against two women. The sexual assault allegation was dropped after time ran out to bring charges last year, but officials said they would continue to pursue the rape investigation. Assange denies the allegations.

His defence team requested the warrant be annulled in February after a United Nations report concluded that the order for his arrest was arbitrary, Efe news agency reported.

"After reviewing the existing investigative material and what the parties have stated, the Court of Appeal finds that Julian Assange is still suspected on probable cause of rape," NBC news cited the ruling issued by a three-judge panel in Stockholm.

The ruling, which can be disputed before the country's Supreme Court, also stated that active measures are being taken to interrogate Assange, referring to Ecuador and Sweden's deal to have him interrogated by an Ecuadorian prosecutor on October 17.

Two years ago, an attempt to annul the arrest warrant, also failed.

Assange has been taking refuge in the Ecuador embassy in London since 2012 after a long trial ruled in favour of him being extradited to Sweden.

His intention is to avoid being deported, as he could then be sent to the United States, where he would have to face a military trial for leaking American security documents on Wikileaks.

--IANS

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Two Indo-American scientists from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have been conferred with prestigious awards for their path-breaking inventions.

Nasik-born Ramesh Raskar, an imaging scientist and inventor at MIT, has been awarded the $500,000 Lemelson-MIT Prize 2016, it was announced at Cambridge, in Massachusetts, on Tuesday.

Dinesh Bharadia, researcher at MIT, won the Paul Baran Young Scholar Award of the US-based Marconi Society.

Raskar, 46, is the co-inventor of radical imaging solutions including femto-photography -- an ultra-fast imaging system that can see around corners -- low-cost eye-care solutions for the developing world, and a camera that allows users to read pages of a book without opening the cover.

"We are thrilled to honour Ramesh Raskar, whose breakthrough research is impacting how we see the world," said Dorothy Lemelson, chair of the Lemelson Foundation, in a statement.

The technology, currently in development for commercialisation, uses ultrafast imaging to capture light at 1 trillion frames per second, allowing the camera to create slow motion videos of light in motion.

"Ramesh's femto-photography work not only has the potential to transform industries ranging from internal medicine to transportation safety, it is also helping to inspire a new generation of inventors to tackle the biggest problems of our time," Lemelson added.

"Everyone has the power to solve problems and through peer-to-peer co-invention and purposeful collaboration, we can solve problems that will impact billions of lives," observed Raskar, who is also Associate Professor at MIT.

He plans to use a portion of the Lemelson-MIT Prize money to launch a new effort using peer-to-peer invention platforms that offer new approaches for helping young people in multiple countries to co-invent in a collaborative way, the statement read.

A doctorate from Stanford University in April 2015 and a graduate in electrical engineering from Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur, Bharadia, 28, who hails from Ichalkarnji in Maharashtra's Kolhapur district, has been awarded for his contribution to radio waves.

"Bharadia has been chosen for the 2016 Paul Baran Young Scholar Award for his contribution to send and receive radio (wireless) signals, including mobile telephony and data on the same channel (wave)," the Marconi Society said in a statement.

"Bharadia's research disproved a long-held assumption that it is not possible for a radio to receive and transmit on the same frequency band because of the resulting interference," the statement said.

The Marconi young scholar award includes $4,000 (Rs. 2,67,870) prize and expenses to attend its annual awards event.

He will receive the award at a ceremony in Mountain View, California, on November 2.

Bharadia's technology can be used in India to build relays which can listen to signals from a cellular tower, transmit them instantly and extend the range across the country.

It also has the potential for multiple applications such as building novel wireless imaging that can enable driverless cars ride in severe weather conditions and help blind people to navigate indoors.

According to his Stanford PhD guide Sachin Katti, Bharadia's work enables a host of new applications, from low-power Internet of Things (IoT) connectivity to motion tracking.

Explaining his work, Bharadia explained that when two persons are shouting at each other same time through telephony, neither can hear as they are using the same frequency.

"The noise in your ears (interference) from your shouting prevents you from hearing the other person. That's why radios use two different frequencies to transmit and receive simultaneously," he said.

The shouting analogy shows that the interference is stronger than the signal the radio is trying to receive and the resulting interference depends on the environment and its reflectors, changing in real-time as people move around.

"Bharadia has demonstrated that systems can overcome all such obstacles by inventing new formulas that could in real-time model the non-linear, time-varying self-interference cancellation circuits, said the statement.

Stanford University emeritus professor Arogyaswami Paulraj said Bharadia's work in full duplex radio technology had helped advances in the domain by multiple research groups worldwide, including one group at IIT-Madras.

"Practical use of full duplex in mobile radios may not be far off," Paulraj told IANS in an e-mail from California.

Co-incidentally, Paulraj was winner of the 2014 Marconi Prize in honour of his pioneering work in developing wireless technology to transmit and receive data at high speed. The 4G mobile phones used for voice, data and video and WiFi routers operate on Multiple-Input-Multiple Output (MIMO) technology pioneered by Paulraj.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Ahead of the US- trilateral talks in New York later this month and in the wake of Afghan President Ashraf Ghani's recently concluded visit to New Delhi, Washington has praised India's "generosity and focus" in helping Afghanistan become a stronger nation.

"We obviously support India's generosity and focus on Afghanistan and willingness to help Afghanistan become a stronger, independent nation with stronger economic growth, as well as build capacity to defend itself and provide for the security of its people," US State Department Deputy Spokesperson Mark Toner said in the daily press briefing here on Thursday.

"The fact that India is willing to invest in that future, we view as a very positive sign and we appreciate India's effort," Toner said.

Following the US-India Strategic and Commercial Dialogue in August, US Secretary of State John Kerry said the US, India and Afghanistan would hold a trilateral meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly session in September in which New Delhi's investments in major Afghan infrastructure projects would be discussed.

"I want to thank India for the important contribution that it has been making to the efforts in Afghanistan," Kerry said during a joint press interaction following the Dialogue on August 30.

During Ghani's visit to New Delhi on Wednesday, India had pledged $1 billion for the support and development of "a unified, sovereign, democratic, peaceful, stable and prosperous Afghanistan".

Ghani and Prime Minister Narendra Modi also reaffirmed their resolve to counter terrorism and strengthen security and defence cooperation as envisaged in the Strategic Partnership Agreement.

Without naming Pakistan, both the leaders had expressed grave concern over state sponsors of terrorism in the region.

Asked about India's inclusion in the transit agreement between Afghanistan and Pakistan, Toner said: "I would just say, speaking broadly, that we would support stronger trade relations within the region. And we've long said that it's a priority for the US at least, but it should be a priority for the countries in the region to all work cooperatively and constructively together."

Superseding an earlier deal, the Afghanistan-Pakistan Transit Trade Agreement was brokered by then US Special Representative to Afghanistan Richard Holbrooke in 2010.

Following Wednesday's talks between Ghani and Modi, Indian Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar said India was ready to deliver 1.7 lakh tonne of wheat to Afghanistan but there were transit problems.

He said that a transit request was made to Pakistan but there was no reply from Islamabad.
I was born in 1956 in Madison, Tennessee, while my parents were attending Madison College. I grew up along the Front Range in Colorado, attending schools in Longmont, Brighton, Boulder and Loveland, Colorado. Two years after graduating from Campion Academy, I married my sweetheart, Regina. We lived in Loveland, Colorado for six years before moving to Mena in western Arkansas.





I love the people of Mena and the friendly easy going way of life here. I have owned and operated my own business since moving to Mena. I enjoy the natural beauty of western Arkansas and being out of doors.




Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister on Friday acknowledged that he had felt "bad" over his removal as state party president and said he would abide by every decision of Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav.

"I felt bad and you saw its effect," said to a question on his removal as the party's state unit chief.

was speaking at India TV's Chunav Manch conclave in Lucknow.

After being replaced by uncle Shivpal Singh Yadav as state party chief, Akhilesh in turn divested Shivpal of plum portfolios in the state cabinet.

Akhilesh said he will accept every decision of his father, Mulayam Singh Yadav, and clearly hinted that Gayatri Prajapati, who was sacked as minister by him earlier this week, would be reinstated in the ministry.

"It is my responsibility as a son to accept Netaji's decision. I accept Netaji's decision to bring Gayatri Prajapati back into cabinet," he said.

The Chief Minister also said there is no fight within the family.

"It is election time. We should all come together and work. There is no fight between Ramgopal Yadav, Akhilesh and Shivpal," he said.
Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Friday said he would do everything he can to protect the interests of the state and its people on the Mahanadi water issue.

"I assure each one of you that I will put my best efforts forward and leave no stone unturned in the fight for the rights of the people of our state," said Patnaik before leaving for New Delhi for a tripartite meeting on Saturday on the issue with his Chhattigarh counterpart Raman Singh and Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharati.

He said he is going to New Delhi with a lot of hope.

"I am going with a lot of hope that the Central Government will listen to the voice of Odisha and do justice to the people of our state on this sensitive Mahanadi issue," he said.

Patnaik also thanked the various people's organisations, who came forward to give their suggestions.

In last three days, he held discussions with several organisations and political parties on the issue.

"It was heartening to know that many of them had done detailed research and had come up with well thought-out suggestions. I would also like to thank the various political parties and their leaders who come forward with valuable suggestions in the larger interest of the state and its people," he added.

The Chief Minister was seen off by BJD leaders and thousands of supporters, who gathered along the road to the airport and waved placards and banners wishing him the best.

Meanwhile, a preparatory meeting was held at the state secretariat chaired by Chief Secretary A.P. Padhi.

On the other hand, Odisha Congress on Friday released a white paper on Mahanadi project issue.

State Congress unit president Prasad Harichandan wished the Chief Minister success for the tripartite meeting.

"I wish the Chief Minister all success in the tripartite meeting. I hope that the meeting would resolve the Mahanadi water issue," said Harichandan, stressing that the interests of Odisha must be protected.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
India and close neighbour Nepal sought to re-script their ties and dispel the unease of the past few months, as new Nepalese Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal 'Prachanda' held talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi who described the bilateral relationship as "time-tested and unique".

Both sides inked three agreements, including one on a credit line of $750 million from India to Nepal, and decided to speed up infrastructure and hydropower projects in the Himalayan nation.

"Our friendship is time-tested and unique. As immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability and economic prosperity of Nepal is our shared objective," Modi said, in his media statement after holding talks with Prachanda.

The Nepalese Prime Minister, who arrived here on Thursday on a four-day visit, has chosen India for his first overseas tour -- lending significance to the ties. During his last stint as Prime Minister (2008 to 2009), the Maoist leader had chosen to visit northern neighbour China, which has been trying hard to stamp its presence in Kathmandu.

Modi, while commending Prachanda's role in "strengthening democratic institutions in Nepal", remarked on the strategic nature of the relations, saying the security interests of both countries are inter-linked.

"India stands ready and prepared to strengthen development partnership with Nepal. We will do so as per the priorities of the people and government of Nepal," he said.

Modi said that continued cooperation between their defence and security agencies is important to guard the open borders.

Prachanda, who took over last month after the China-friendly K.P. Oli government lost support, said Nepal is determined to forge an enduring partnership with India for its own development and prosperity.

He said he had exchanged views with Modi on taking concrete steps to elevate ties with India to new heights in all spheres.

"We exchanged views on our respective 'neighbourhood first' policies and agreed that this common orientation in our policies should lead to a greater and mutually beneficial partnership for 21st century based on trust and open dialogue," Prachanda said.

While stressing Nepal's friendly ties with India, Prachanda said he expressed the view that trust and confidence were the pre-requisites of strong and sustainable friendly relations.

And to ensure this, "we should respect each other's sensitivities and concerns in a spirit of good neighbourliness".

Among the agreements inked was one on an Indian credit line of $750 million to Nepal for post-earthquake reconstruction. This is over and above the $1 billion aid that India announced following the devastating earthquake in the Himalayan nation in April last year that claimed over 8,000 lives.

The two sides also signed a memorandum of agreement (MoU) for project management consultancy services for upgrade and improvement of road infrastructure in Terai area of Nepal.

Another agreement was signed on the first amendatory dollar credit line for post-earthquake reconstruction projects in Nepal.

Foreign Secretary S. Jaishankar described Prachanda's visit as "very productive" and "warm".

He said that talks focused on hydropower projects, including the Pancheswar project on rive Mahakali in Nepal.

Air connectivity, goods and power trade figured in the talks.

Tourism came up for discussion and the two sides explored the possibility of joint promotion of the Buddhist circuit.

Prachanda briefed the Indian side about the new Nepalese Constitution and the political processes in Nepal.

"He conveyed that the government is in the process of bringing all sections of Nepal on board for the constitution," Jaishankar said

Ties between both sides had soured last year after the promulgation of the new Constitution in September, which Madhesi and Janjati people living in the Terai region, bordering India, said ignored their rights. A five-month-long border blockade by the Madhesis, which Kathmandu blamed on India, starved Nepal of essential fuel and other supplies from India and saw bilateral ties nosedive sharply.

The Maoist-led government of Prachanda assumed power last month after the ouster of K.P. Sharma Oli as Prime Minister.

India is hoping to bring back the shine in ties with Prachanda at the helm.

Earlier on Friday, Prachanda was accorded a ceremonial welcome at the Rashtrapati Bhavan here.

Following this, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj called on him at the Rashtrapati Bhavan.

In the afternoon, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Minister of State for Power Piyush Goyal also called on the Nepal Prime Minister before he made a call on President Pranab Mukherjee

China's President Xi Jinping is expected to visit Kathmandu in October, while Indian President Mukherjee is visiting in early November.

--IANS

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In a shocker for Congress, all but one of its MLAs, including Chief Minister Pema Khandu, on Friday joined the People's Party of and the party faces the prospect of losing its government.

Sources said Khandu, who two months ago became chief minister in a development that restored the Congress government, along with 43 Congress MLAs joined the PPA and virtually converted it into a PPA government.

The only MLA who has stayed with the Congress is Nabam Tuki, who was replaced as Chief Minister when the Congress, in an effort to control the rebellion in its ranks replaced him with Khandu in July.

It remains to be seen whether the PPA will align with BJP, which has 11 MLAs in the House.

In the Assembly of 60, Congress had 47 MLAs, BJP 11 and two independent. Status of two Congress MLAs are yet to be decided as they put in their papers before the recent series of political developments that led to first Tuki government falling in January 2016, imposition of President's rule and installation of the late Kalikho Pul government for a short span.

Pul, a Congress MLA and had committed suicide last month, was forced to resign in July following a Supreme Court judgement.
It took the political deftness of (SP) supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav to broker peace in the first family of Uttar Pradesh. The ruling party, which is gearing up for the 2017 Assembly polls, looked imminently heading towards a vertical split owing to emerging disputes between Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav and his uncle (Mulayams brother) Shivpal Singh Yadav.
Stunned by the en masse defection of its government in Arunachal Pradesh, the Congress on Friday blamed Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) chief Amit Shah for the "con" job.
Two boys died due to dengue in Anantapuramu in Andhra Pradesh today, prompting authorities to take corrective steps to improve sanitation standards in the city.

A municipal sanitation official was suspended and the municipal health officer issued a charge memo after Information and Public Relations Minister P R Reddy chaired a high-level meeting to fix the responsibility.

The Minister ordered the civic authorities to immediately control stray pigs.

S Md Junaid and S Idris, studying in class V and VII, suffered from fever and were referred to a local hospital in Anantapuramu last Sunday.

Later, they were taken to a hospital in Bengaluru where they were diagnosed with dengue. The boys were then shifted to a children's speciality hospital in Bengaluru, but succumbed to the disease, their father Sikander said.

Reddy visited their family and offered condolences. He offered Rs 40,000 as immediate relief to the family, a government job to a family member and a pucca house, a statement from his office said.

Meanwhile, state Health Minister Kamineni Srinivas said mobile medical teams were dispatched to tribal areas in Rampachodavaram in East Godavari district to check the spread of dengue and malaria.

Social and Tribal Welfare Minister Ravela Kishore Babu visited the area hospital in Rampachodavaram and consoled those undergoing treatment for fever.

Babu asked the hospital superintendent to ensure effective medicare to all tribals.

Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu held a teleconference with District Collectors and directed them to take all steps to prevent the spread of deadly fevers like dengue.

"The medical and health, panchayat raj, municipal and rural water supply departments should work in close coordination and ensure proper sanitation is maintained in urban and rural areas to contain spread of viral diseases," Chandrababu said.

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Two Ludhiana Municipality sanitation workers died today after inhaling poisonous gas while cleaning a sewage drain at Niankari Mohalla in Millergunj locality, police said.

Mehar Singh (40) and Sonu (25) died of asphyxiation while cleaning a choked drain. They were declared brought dead by doctors at a hospital here, they said.

President of Ludhiana Municipal Corporation Karmchari Dal Laxman Dravid said, "We have demanded compensation and registration of a criminal case against officials concerned.

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Altogether five United Liberation Front of Asom-Independent insurgents were arrested from three places of Sonitpur district in Assam, a senior police officer said here today.

The three extremists were arrested from a night bus here last night when they were travelling towars Myanmar for training there after joining ULFA-I, said Additional Superintendent of Police, Sonitpur, Fakrul Islam.

The three were identified as Kishor Deka, Harisinga, Jayanta Deka and Pranab Deka were instructed to join the ULFA-I camp in Myanmar, Islam said.

Meanwhile, the police also arrested another youth Anjan Deka, who joined ULFA-I, he said adding, a joint operation by the police from Sonitpur and Tinsukia districts nabbed another ULFA-I cadre Anil Borah alias Raju from Tinsukia.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The AAP today alleged involvement of BJP and RSS in the assault on three persons, including a madrasa teacher, by suspected cow vigilantes in the city and raised the issue with the National Commission for Minorities.

The party said the incident, which took place on September 14 in Kanjhawla area of outer Delhi, laid bare the "hollowness" of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's appeal against any such act and proved that it was a "mere rhetoric".

Kirari MLA Rituraj Govind wrote to the National Commission for Minorities stating that the accused, who brutally thrashed the victims, had identified themselves as "gau rakshaks".

A few elements were deliberately trying to give the incident a communal angle, he said.

"The Muslim community is extremely angry over the incident and a climate of tension is prevailing in the area...Since staging these incidents are impossible without the political patronage of BJP and RSS, they should also be acted against as per Prime Minister Narendra Modi's appeal," he wrote.

AAP Delhi Convenor Dilip Pandey said the hooligans going around with weapons and thrashing people on the pretext of "gau rakshha" were only getting emboldened with time which, he said, was "ominous" for the country.

"PM Modi had famously said shoot me if you want. Was that drama? It has turned out to be another 'jumla'," Pandey said.

Three persons, including a minor, were allegedly thrashed by a group of men when they were going to dispose of animal entrails and hide after Bakra Eid in Kanjhawla area.

Referring to the alleged gangrape of two girls, including a minor, in Aman Vihar, Govind said the area has earned the dubious distinction of being the "most unsafe" in the absence of a robust law and order machinery.

"There is one police station for a population of five lakh. And instead of augmenting security, the Centre which controls the police is busy arresting AAP legislators," he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
An AIIMS doctor allegedly committed suicide by injecting herself with some poisonous substance at her flat in IP Extension in east Delhi even as the police today said they were probing dowry angle.

30-year-old Dr Ritu Bangoti, who worked at Anesthesia department of AIIMS, took the extreme step at her flat in Kurmanchal Apartment yesterday evening, they said.

The victim's family members, meanwhile, have accused her in-laws of harassing her for dowry.

"The statement of the girl's family has been recorded in front of the SDM and inquest proceedings are on. We have added the charges of 304(B)(dowry death)," said DCP (East) Rishi Pal Singh.

Ritu did not leave behind any suicide note but police is investigating the matter by questioning her family members and neighbours.

The deceased's husband, Brajesh, who is a pilot, was questioned for several hours, police said, adding the postmortem report is awaited, police said.

The deceased used to stay with her in-laws. When she did not come out of her room for a long time, family members broke open the door and found her body, he said.

The police was informed about the death of the doctor by her brother who had made a PCR call.

Ritu was allegedly having strained relations with her husband. Neighbours told the police that the couple had frequent fights over domestic issues.

The girl's family members alleged that her in-laws used to demand dowry which constantly worried Ritu, said the officer.

The reason behind the death of the doctor and the nature of substance she allegedly injected herself with were under investigation, police said.

Ritu got married three years back and had a two-year-old daughter.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Air strikes and clashes tested a fragile ceasefire in Syria today as civilians waited for aid and the UN Security Council was to discuss whether to endorse the US-Russian truce.

The accord has been billed as the "last chance" to end the five-year war but it has been marred by a lack of aid deliveries, sporadic violence and friction between Moscow and Washington.

Russia, a key backer of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, said it was ready to extend the truce set to expire later today by 72 hours, despite accusing the United States and rebels of not fulfilling the deal.

"We are prepared to extend the cessation of hostilities for a further 72 hours," senior Russian officer Viktor Poznikhir said.

UN Security Council members were to meet at 2130 GMT for closed-door consultations, diplomats said, after Russia's envoy to the United Nations said Moscow wanted a UN resolution to endorse the deal.

Today, two children were among three civilians killed in air strikes on the rebel-held town of Khan Sheikhun in the northwest province of Idlib, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Khan Sheikhun, like most of the surrounding province, is controlled by an alliance of rebels, hardline Islamists and jihadists such as the Fateh al-Sham Front, formerly Al-Qaeda's Syrian affiliate.

Under the truce deal, which took effect late Monday, fighting is to halt across the country except where jihadists are present.

Experts say the deal will be particularly difficult to implement in areas where Fateh al-Sham has formed strong alliances with local rebels.

Earlier today, a barrage of rocket fire and shelling could be heard coming from the rebel-held east Damascus district of Jobar, an AFP correspondent said.

Both the Islamist faction Faylaq al-Sham and Fateh al-Sham are thought to be present there.

"The Syrian army is blocking an attack by armed groups that tried to enter the capital's east via Jobar... Leading to intense clashes and rocket fire," a military source told AFP.

State television called the incident a violation of the ceasefire.

The United Nations has described the truce as a "critical window of opportunity" to deliver aid to rebel-held eastern districts of Aleppo city, where around 250,000 civilians are under siege.

The UN had hoped that 40 trucks of food -- enough to feed 80,000 people for one month -- could be delivered to east Aleppo as soon as possible.

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In yet another ATM fraud in Kerala, two persons including an NRI, have lost over Rs one lakh, with the money being withdrawn from their accounts through different ATMs in the city.

The NRI Arvind, who is presently in the Gulf, told police that Rs 52,000 had been withdrawn from his Axis bank account at Pattom here early today.

Police said they have asked him to forward an email complaint to the Police commissioner after which a case will be registered.

He informed them over phone that the money had been withdrawn through five transactions. The withdrawal was from different ATMs in the city, police said.

Arvind told TV channels that he had been to Kerala a month ago and had withdrawn some amount from the account.

However, he was surprised when he got messages early this morning for withdrawal of Rs 52,000 from this account.

In the other incident, one Vineeth said he had lost Rs 49,000 from his Canara Bank account yesterday through 11 transactions.

A case has been registered in this regard, police said.

Last month, a Romanian national was arrested from Mumbai in connection with a hi-tech ATM fraud in which several people had lost money here. Police had then said three Romanians were involved in the racket.

CCTV recordings showed the trio had installed an electronic device inside an ATM kiosk of a public sector bank at Vellayambalam here, using which they had later withdrawn money from the accounts of different persons.

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The Danish-Norwegian eurodance group Aqua will be reuniting for the 20th anniversary of their popular song "Barbie Girl".

The band will hold a reunion tour in their home country Denmark in 2017, reported Aceshowbiz.

"Barbie Girl" topped the charts worldwide and became a number-one hit for three weeks in the U.K. And Australia in 1997.

The band was formed in 1989 by vocalists Lene Nystrom and Rene Dif, keyboardist Soren Rasted and guitarist Claus Norreen.

The group shot to fame in 1997 with "Barbie Girl" and its follow-up album "Aquarium", which included songs "Roses Are Red", "My Oh My" and "Doctor Jones".

Aqua went their separate ways in 2001 after releasing their second album "Aquarius".

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Bharatiya Bhasha Suraksha Manch (BBSM) today announced it will contest the 2017 Goa Assembly polls in alliance with "like-minded parties", including Shiv Sena.

"We appeal all the like-minded parties to join hands and form a grand alliance with BBSM. Parties like Shiv Sena and Goa Praja Party have already shown willingness to join hands with us. We will be working with them," BBSM convener Subhash Velingkar, head of a breakaway faction of RSS, said.

The core committee of BBSM met for the first time today after RSS relieved Velingkar of his post as the chief of RSS's Goa unit. The committee decided to go ahead with the plan of contesting the Goa polls by forming a political outfit, he told reporters.

BBSM has already offered the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party to form an alliance and the latter will have to respond by September 30, he said.

On October 2, formal announcement of the political party will be made, said Velingkar.

"On October 2, we will tell people for whom to vote," he said, adding that BBSM would target 35 out of 40 constituencies in the state.

BBSM has been demanding that mother-tongue (Konkani or Marathi) be declared the language of instruction in elementary education in Goa, and the government should withdraw grants to English medium schools.

It fell out with BJP, the ruling party, and RSS over this issue.

Velingkar said BBSM will launch a more aggressive agitation in the days to come.

"We will be having meetings across Goa and will reach out to every village," he said.

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Belgian authorities today detained two people for questioning following anti-terror raids in the capital Brussels and southeastern Belgium, the federal prosecutor's office said.

Police searched two homes in the Haren and Schaarbeek districts of Brussels and another in the city of Liege in the French-speaking Wallonia region, the office said in a statement.

"Two persons were arrested and will be interrogated by the investigators," it said, adding a judge will decide later whether or not to detain the pair further.

A judge specialising in terrorism cases ordered the raids "in connection with an ongoing federal investigation into the activities of a terrorist group," the statement said without elaborating.

However, the Belgian television station RTBF said the two arrested are a 28-year-old man and his female companion.

The man has been active in a chat group on the encrypted Telegram app where he "apparently indicated he was preparing to carry out an attack," RTBF reported without naming its sources.

The suspect had in the past been linked to criminal but not terrorist activities, it added.

The authorities were now trying to determine if there are links between the recently arrested users of Telegram in France and the man detained in Belgium on Friday, RTBF reported.

On Wednesday, a teenager was arrested in a dawn raid on his home in northeastern Paris during an investigation into the network of French extremist Rachid Kassim, with whom he had allegedly been in touch on Telegram about carrying out a terrorist act.

Belgium has been on high alert since several homegrown jihadists allegedly planned and took part in the November 13 gun and bombing attacks in Paris that left 130 people dead and wounded hundreds of others.

Jihadists linked to the Paris cell then allegedly carried out the March 22 suicide bombings in Brussels that killed 32 people at the main airport and a metro station near the EU headquarters.

Both sets of attacks were claimed by the Islamic State group.

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Government may introduce a Bill in Parliament to "drastically prune" the number of permissions required to be obtained for shooting films.

Union Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs and Minority Affairs Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said the Bill "could be brought about either in the forthcoming winter session or else latest by the Budget session of the Parliament", a release issued by PHD Chamber of Commerce said.

Naqvi said the Government was conscious of the fact that producers and film makers are subjected to obtaining host of clearances from the Centre as well as states before being getting the permission to shoot at a particular location in the country.

"This delays their schedule of timely deliveries of their production as well subjects them to lots of inconveniences. Therefore, the government is going to take corrective measures to sort out this problem through a proper legislation," Naqvi said.

The remarks of the Minister came after filmmakers Prakash Jha and Madhur Bhandarkar requested the Government to drastically reduce the list of permissions for film shootings, currently numbering close to 35 from various agencies.

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Government bonds (G-Secs) firmed up following sustained demand from corporates and banks, and the interbank call money rates also turned higher due to rising demand from borrowing banks amid tight liquidity situation in the banking system.

The 7.59 per cent government security maturing in 2026 rose to Rs 103.62 as compared to Rs 103.51 previously, while its yield was down to 7.05 per cent from 7.07 per cent.

The 7.59 per cent government security maturing in 2029 surged to Rs 103.78 from Rs 103.67, while its yield inched down to 7.13 per cent from 7.14 per cent.

The 7.61 per cent government security maturing in 2030 gained to Rs 104.69 from Rs 104.60. While, its yield softened to 7.07 per cent from 7.08 per cent.

The 7.88 per cent government security maturing in 2030, the 7.68 per cent government security maturing in 2023 and the 7.35 per cent government security maturing in 2024 were also quoted higher at Rs 106.26, Rs 103.64 and Rs 101.77, respectively.

The overnight call money rates also finished higher at 6.55 per cent from Thursday's close of 6.45 per cent. It resumed at yesterday's level of 6.45 per cent and moved in a range of 6.55 per cent and 6.40 per cent.

The 3-days call money rates ended 6.55 per cent. It moved in a range of 6.60 per cent and 6.40 per cent.

Meanwhile, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), under the Liquidity Adjustment Facility (LAF), purchased securities worth Rs 142.23 billion in 38-bids at the 3-days repo auction at a fixed rate of 6.50 per cent as on today, while it sold securities worth Rs 82.17 billion from 26-bids at the overnight reverse repo auction at a fixed rate of 6.00 per cent as on September 15.

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Canada will send more than 450 troops to Latvia from around May 2017 as part of NATO's efforts to reinforce its presence in the Baltics in the face of a resurgent Russia.

The Western defence alliance had in July endorsed the deployment of four battalions of around 1,000 troops each in Poland and the Baltic states, the largest reinforcement of its eastern flank since the Cold War.

Senior Canadian military commander General Jonathan H. Vance confirmed late Thursday that 455 troops would be deployed, wrapping up a two-day inspection of the Adazi military base just outside Latvia's capital Riga.

"I think that the soldiers will start to arrive next spring, around May, and we plan to be fully deployed by early autumn," Vance told reporters.

"At the moment I cannot say what other forces will come too, but the result will be a substantial battle group of about 1,000 soldiers, who will complement the Latvian army."



Canada will lead the multi-national battalion in Latvia, while Britain will lead a battalion in Estonia, Germany in Lithuania and the US in Poland.

Military representatives from Canada, Italy, Poland, Slovenia and Spain arrived to inspect Latvian facilities earlier this month. While these are expected to contribute the remainder of the battalion, no final decision on the composition of the force has been made.

Fears that Russia could attempt an attack in the Baltics -- NATO members since 2004 -- surged after Moscow's 2014 annexation of Crimea from Ukraine.

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A Canadian citizen who was detained in China for two years over accusations of spying has been freed and has returned to Canada.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau yesterday said he was delighted Kevin Garratt is back in Canada with his family. His return comes just over a week after Trudeau visited China in a bid to improve relations.

Garratt had been indicted by prosecutors in Dandong, a city on the North Korean border where he and his wife ran a popular coffee shop and conducted Christian aid work for North Koreans. He and his wife Julia were arrested in August 2014 by the state security bureau. His wife was later released on bail.

China's official Xinhua Agency had reported that authorities found evidence that implicated Garratt in accepting tasks from Canadian espionage agencies to gather intelligence in China.

Trudeau said his government had made the case a priority at the highest levels. The release also comes a week before Chinese Premier Li Keqiang is to visit Canada for talks with Trudeau.

Simeon Garratt, the couple's son, has said his parents ran a coffee shop and did Christian aid work for North Koreans and there must have been a mistake. The couple had worked with North Star Aid, whose website said the British Columbia-registered charity seeks to help North Koreans primarily through providing humanitarian aid. Simeon Garratt has said his parents made no secret of their faith but did not flaunt it in China, where proselytising is against the law. He has said they worked on getting school supplies, cooking oil and food into North Korea.

The coffee shop, Peter's Coffee House, is located within sight of the Friendship Bridge linking China to North Korea. It was known for its North American cuisine and attracted a mix of tourists, students and locals.

The accusations against the couple came about a week after Canada accused a China-sponsored hacker of infiltrating Canada's National Research Council, the country's top research and development organisation. China's Foreign Ministry had expressed strong displeasure over the allegation, urging Canada to withdraw the "groundless" accusation.

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A cattle merchant was robbed of Rs 20 lakh by motorcycle-borne persons at Meerpur village, about 25 km from here, police said today.

According to SP (Rural) Pankaj Pandey, the merchant, Akram, was on his way to a cattle fair at Etmadpur of Agra with a bag containing Rs 20 lakh for purchasing cattle.

He was intercepted in an alley of the village by six bandits riding on two motorcycles, who snatched the bag from him at gunpoint.

A case has been registered in this regard and police is combing the area, the SP said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Punjab Congress leader Amarinder Singh today said caution should be exercised while dealing with the Sutlej Yamuna Link (SYL) canal issue, citing the violence in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu over the Cauvery dispute.

He said Supreme Court judges must take into consideration the "ground reality" before pronouncing a verdict on the issue as "a lot had changed on the ground".

At the same time, he said come what may, he will not allow "an extra drop" of water to flow out of Punjab as it could render at least 10 lakh acres of land in the Malwa region "barren".

Addressing a conference around 45 kms from here, Amarinder blamed Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal for the "SYL mess", alleging that the latter's role dated back to 1978 when he was the chief minister and wanted to please his "friend" and then Haryana Chief Minister Devi Lal.

Lashing out at the Badals and state minister Bikram Majithia, he said the moment the dates of the 2017 state Assembly polls are announced and the Model Code of Conduct comes into force, the Badals will need to "run for cover".

"The people will not let them enter their villages," he said, adding, "That is the reason they are seeking extra security for themselves from the Centre."



Amarinder accused the Badals of "destroying Punjab beyond redemption" and cautioned the people against their "divisive policies". "He (Parkash Singh Badal) is a master in polarising the people," he alleged.

Amarinder also claimed that the alleged desecration of the Guru Granth Sahib at Bebal Kalan, followed by such incidents involving the Quran and the Gita and attacks on Sant Dhadrianwale and an RSS leader at Jalandhar, were all aimed at "creating fear in the mind of and polarising the people".

He alleged that the Badals "had done it earlier and were doing it again".

Later, replying to a question at a press conference regarding AAP's Punjab convenor Gurpreet Ghuggi comparing Arvind Kejriwal with the 10th Sikh Guru and saying the Panj Pyaras were also outsiders, Amarinder said he deserved to be "punished" for this "blasphemy".

He said AAP leaders were behaving in a "senseless" manner and they had "no respect for public sentiments".

Replying to another question on Haryana's objection against using 'Mohali' with the name of the international airport near Chandigarh, Amarinder said it (the airport) should be named after Shaheed Bhagat Singh as had already been agreed upon by both the states, adding that the Union Civil Aviation Ministry should clarify on the issue.

Speaking on the occasion, Congress' Punjab in-charge Asha Kumari accused the Akalis of "destroying" the state.

She said only the Congress party under Amarinder's leadership can "redeem" Punjab from the "mess" the Akalis have put it in.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Karnataka unit of BJP on Friday said Prime Minister Narendra Modi's intervention in the raging with Tamil Nadu was not possible at this juncture and termed the demand by the Congress government in the state as "petty politicking".

It was an attempt by the state government to divert people's attention from its "failure" on the matter, state BJP President B S Yeddyurappa charged.

"At this juncture, Prime Minister cannot intervene...We have to try to get justice through courts,"he told reporters here.

He said: "During the the all-party meeting, MohanKataraki (senior counsel) had very clearly, in the presence of the Chief Minister and other Congress leaders, said it was not possible for the Prime Minister or the central government to intervene as the issue is before the Supreme Court."

Flagging the "extreme unrest" in Karnataka over the release of Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah had on September 9 dashed off a missive requesting Modi to call forth with "on a few hours notice" a meeting of Chief Ministers of the two states to end the impasse.

After violent protest in the city following the apex court's amended order directing Karnataka to release 12,000 cusecs of water daily to Tamil Nadu till September 20, Siddramaih had on Tuesday sought for an immediate appointment with the Prime Minister, a response to which is still awaited.

Yeddyurappa said BJP was of the "considered view" that repeated demand for Prime Minister's intervention in this dispute is "politically motivated" and termed it as a devious attempt to divert the attention of people from the "abject failure" of the state government.

"Instead of indulging in petty politicking, I demand the state government to concentrate in fine-tuning its legal battle...Maintain law and order," he said.

Lashing out at the state government for offering to release 10,000 cusecs to Tamil Nadu, Yeddyurappa alleged that the government raised the issue of law and order while presenting its case before the court, instead of furnishing the facts relating to water level at reservoirs in both the states.

Apart from Congress and JD(S), several pro-Kannada and farmer groups, who are at the forefront of Cauvery agitation, are seeking the Prime Minister's intervention to resolve the issue. Several political parties in Tamil Nadu have also asked for the Prime Minister to intervene.
A dawn-to-dusk bandh called by several farmers and traders bodies over the raging Cauvery dispute began today across Tamil Nadu amid tight security with Opposition parties, including the DMK, supporting it.

As those who had given the bandh call have said a series of protests, including "road and rail roko", will be held, thousands of police personnel have been deployed across the state to maintain law and order.

Police said tight vigil was being maintained and no attempts to mar public peace or disruption of free movement of transportation  on road or rail  would be allowed.

Several local grocery shops, which usually open by daybreak, remained shut in view of the protests.

State transport corporation-run buses besides trains are being operated as usual though autos, taxis and commercial freight operators remained off the roads.

The bandh has been called in protest against the violence targeting Tamils in Karnataka and also to seek Cauvery water for the state.

Barring the ruling AIADMK, its allies and trade unions affiliated, all other Opposition parties, including the DMK, Tamil Nadu Congress, DMDK, MDMK, Left parties and the PMK, are supporting the bandh.

Thousands of police personnel, including armed reserve forces, have been deployed in Tamil Nadu and in Chennai over 15,000 policemen are on duty.

Protection was being provided for Karnataka-related business establishments, schools, institutions and areas where Kannada speaking people live, including Krishnagiri district.
The Centre today warned Kerala and Tamil Nadu that foodgrains for distribution to above poverty line (APL) families would be provided at a higher rate to the states if they fail to implement the National Food Security Act (NFSA) at the earliest.

Other 34 NFSA implementing states and Union Territories have been asked to address gaps in the list of beneficiaries, computerisation of PDS operation, Aadhar linkage with ration cards and grievance redressal mechanism.

NFSA, passed by the Parliament in September 2013 during UPA regime, aims to abolish the APL and below poverty line (BPL) criteria and uniformly provides 5 kg of wheat or rice to all beneficiaries every month at subsidised rate of Rs 1-3 per per kg.

"Kerala and Tamil Nadu are the only two states left where the NFSA has not been implemented yet. Despite being developed states, I don't understand why they are not doing it," Food Minister Ram Vilas Paswan said addressing a two-day national conference on PDS reforms.

The Kerala government had earlier said it would implement the NFSA from November but now the state is planning to do it from December. "Kerala says it does not have necessary infrastructure. I don't understand if a developed state like Kerala says like this," he said.

"If the two states do not implement, we will take stringent action. One option we have is to supply APL foodgrains to them at a higher rate or we completely stop the allocation. Let them buy foodgrains for APL families at the support price," he warned.

Asking the states to speed up reforms in public distribution system (PDS) to curb leakage of foodgrains, Paswan said there could be problems in putting up necessary infrastructure for effective roll out of NFSA but those issues need to be sorted by both the Centre and states.

While the ration cards have been digitised 100 per cent in the country, states are slow in seeding them with Aadhar card, which would help in eliminating bogus beneficiaries, he said, and urged the states to fasten the process.

For instance in Madhya Pradesh, details about ration cards



are visible on the portal but BPL category is also shown, while in most states the details are not updated in a proper format.

Urging the states to address gaps for achieving full computerisation of PDS, Paswan said 24.28 crore ration cards have been digitised in the country, of which only 65 per cent are seeded with Aadhaar numbers.

No initiative has been taken on Aadhaar seeding in Bihar, Manipur, Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Nagaland, he noted.

In case of online foodgrains allocation, the minister said though 28 states/UTs have implemented, there are some issues like no clear bifurcation of NFSA and state specific schemes.

In automation of supply-chain management, Paswan said 15 states/UTs are yet to implement but 18 States/UTs that are implementing have not done it properly.

SMS registration facility is not available for getting alerts for events like stock released from state godowns, stock delivery at fair price shops etc. Monthly summary report is not available for SMSs sent to beneficiary, he added.

On automation of fair price shops (FPSs), the minister said that only 1.42 lakh shops have installed ePoS machines out of 5.28 lakh in 20 states/UTs.

About 13 states/UTs such as Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Goa, Himachal Pradesh, J&K, Kerala, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Punjab and West Bengal -- have not made much progress in last one year, he said.

The minister also asked states to ensure redressal mechanism is put in place to address NFSA related grievances.

The government provides Rs 1.30 lakh crore food subsidy. At present, 71 crore beneficiaries are covered under the NFSA against the target of 85 crores, he added.
Senior Congress leader Prithviraj Chavan today accused the NCP of having "back-stabbed" his party by withdrawing its support from the Maharashtra government ahead of the 2014 state Assembly polls.

His comments came after senior NCP leader Praful Patel had recently accused the Congress of pulling his party down even as it "sank" itself by wrongfully charging it with involvement in scandals.

"The NCP back-stabbed the Congress by withdrawing its support from the Maharashtra government ahead of the 2014 state Assembly polls," Chavan told reporters here.

He also refuted Patel's contention that he had ordered a probe against the NCP leaders in the Rs 70,000 crore irrigation scam.

"It was late Maharashtra Home minister R R Patil, who had given the permission to conduct an inquiry into the alleged Rs 70,000 irrigation scam," Chavan said.

"Even I was shocked by reading reports of the (then) government's approval to conduct a probe into the (alleged) irrigation scam. I did not even know about the decision which was taken by R R Patil," he said.

The Congress leader claimed that Patil had given the approvals to conduct a probe through the Anti Corruption Bureau against NCP leaders Ajit Pawar and Sunil Tatkare on September 20, 2014, a day before the Assembly was to dissolve.

"I am not sure whether R R Patil had held discussions about it with any of his party leaders before taking such a big decision. This could be a result of internal politics," Chavan claimed.

He termed the allegations levelled against him by Patel as "baseless."



"It was mentioned in 2011 economic survey report that despite spending Rs 70,000 crore over irrigation schemes, only 0.5 per cent land came under irrigation. My stand behind publishing white paper on irrigation was only to find out the mistakes and loopholes in planning that could be restored in future planning," he said.

Chavan, who is an MLA, added that a white paper does not necessitate an inquiry against the concerned department or the minister.

"If that was my motive, I would have chosen to hand over the issue to the ACB instead of announcing to publish a white paper," he added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The number of fatalities due to complications has risen to 13 in the national capital, even as the Centre on Saturday sought a detailed report from the Delhi government on deaths due to it and dengue, including medical history of the deceased.

Gulab Chand Gupta (70), from Lajpat Nagar in south Delhi, died on September 12, a family member said.

"He was admitted at Pushpawati Singhania Research Institute (PSRI) in south Delhi on September 7 and succumbed to complications on September 12. His medical report says he died of acute febrile illness with septic shock and multi-organ failure," his son-in-law Santosh Mangal said.

This season, 12 deaths have been reported till Friday, including five each at Apollo Hospital and Sir Ganga Ram Hospital (SGRH), while one death each at AIIMS and Hindu Rao Hospital.

and dengue have claimed at least 31 lives and affected nearly 3,000 people in Delhi. 18 people have died of dengue which has affected over 1,100 people in the city.

"We have asked for a detailed report on the deaths due to the vector-borne diseases in the city. Also, we have sought medical history of the deceased, whether they had any co-morbid conditions," Union Minister J P Nadda said on the sidelines of a symposium here on liver transplant.

"Many of the patients diagnosed in Delhi are coming from the NCR region and so fever clinics could also be set up there. We are resolving this matter with Haryana and other governments in the NCR," he said.

Earlier in the day, Nadda met Delhi Minister Satyendra Jain to discuss the situation and assured all support to the city government, while asserting that no patient is being turned away without treatment and there is no shortage of doctors and drugs.

"It was discussed that reporting of all the vector-borne diseases should be done on a priority basis from every hospital, nursing home, laboratory to the government agencies concerned without failure which is imperative for monitoring the situation and for appropriate preventive measures including fogging of the region concerned," a Delhi government statement said.

The government has also asked private hospitals not to release data on vector-borne disease cases "directly to the press", which may "create panic".

In the wake of chikungunya outbreak, the Delhi government has initiated the process for declaring chikungunya as a notifiable and dangerous disease.

Doctors say that chikungunya is not a life-threatening disease in general, but in rare cases leads to complications that prove fatal, especially in children and old persons.
Pushing hard to overcome the Congressional opposition to the passage of the ambitious Trans -Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement during his tenure, the US President Barack Obama today warned that China is trying hard to create its own trading regime in Asia.

"Right now, China is pushing hard to create their own trading regime out in Asia. And I promise you that China is not going to be setting up a bunch of rules that are going to be to the advantage of American companies and American businesses," Obama said.

"If we are not in there and making sure that fair trade is established in the Asia market we're going to be cut out," Obama told reporters at the White House during a bipartisan meeting with leaders on TPP.

"I know that the politics these days tends to look at trade as something that is negative. But if you talk to the farmers and the ranchers and the manufacturers and the service industries that are dependent on us selling American exports around the world, they will tell you we've got to get this done," he argued.

Obama said TPP is a high-standard trade agreement that makes other countries lower their tariff barriers so that there aren't taxes on US goods that are sold there, that gets other countries to raise their labour standards so they're not undercutting US workers.

"After a lot of negotiations, we've got what is the most progressive, effective trade deal that we've ever seen. And this bipartisan group made up of business leaders, mayors, governors, Republicans, Democrats, national security leaders and military leaders -- the reason they're here is because they know this is important for our economy and they know that this is important for our national security and our standing in the world," he said.

Speaking to White House reporters after the meeting, the Republican Governor from Ohio, John Kasich, argued that TPP is in the best interest of Americans and it is important for the economy of the country and its workers.

He said the two nations who are opposing TPP most vociferously were Russia and China.

The White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said the Congress is the real stumbling block in the passage of the TPP by the US.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The Dalai Lama's call for talks with the Islamic State terror group to end the violence has evoked strong criticism from Chinese media which said the "shocking" suggestion provides a good chance for the monk's supporters in the West to see his "true colours".

"The Dalai Lama's recent terrorist-sympathising remarks have again shocked the world, and provided for those in the West who used to exchange backing him for selfish political gains a chance to see the monk's true colours," a commentary in state-run Xinhua agency said.

While traveling in France, the Tibetan spiritual leader had mooted talks with Islamic State extremists, saying talks are "the only way" to end bloodshed in Syria and Iraq.

"It is not the first time the monk has made such a highly controversial remark, which has been savagely criticised in Europe and the wider world," the commentary said.

"His call for Europe to take in refugees without conditions has also irritated many in the continent, who blame him for being purely hypocritical and totally devoid of common sense. That provides a good enough reason for Paris to shun him," it said.

"Although the Dalai Lama has for long claimed to have abandoned politics and only focus on protecting the Tibetan culture, language and ecology, he devoted his visit to France to mainly spreading his political ideas in a bid to maintain influence," it said.

"It is worth noting that the Dalai Lama, who has been living in India for decades, has never uttered one word about the rampant poverty in that country. On the contrary, he has often caused division and trouble in the Himalayan region and helped stunt economic and social development there," it said.

"Moreover, despite his repeated denial, the Dalai Lama has been trying to split Tibet from China," it said.

The Dalai Lama fled his homeland in Tibet in 1959 after an abortive uprising against Communist rule and has since been based in Dharamshala where the Tibetan governemnt-in-exile is located.

China views the 81-year-old Nobel peace laureate as a separatist seeking Tibet's independence from the Chinese mainland.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Climate change is responsible for reduction in the volume of Himalayan glaciers, Union Minister Anil Dave said today, while adding that countries located around the mountain ranges cannot be held responsible for the phenomenon.

India and China discussed the crucial issue of rapid melting of snow on the Himalayan mountain ranges during a summit of Environment ministers of BRICS countries here.

"Climate change is a big issue and its impact is something which we feel and observe. Each and everyone has a clear understanding that there is something wrong going on the globe," the Minister of State for Environment, Forest and Climate Change said.

He was briefing reporters about deliberations at the two-day long meeting of Environment ministers of BRICS countries that took place in South Goa.

"About 30-40 years back, those who had been to Himalayan ranges would say there were 'him ki chadar' but now 'baraf ka roomal bhi nahi hai' (earlier people used to say there was a blanket of snow in the Himalayas, but now there is not even a handkerchief of snow). Snow at the mountain peaks is melting at a rapid pace," Dave said.

"It is not that countries which are surrounding the mountain ranges are responsible for it; it is the effect of the climate change globally.

The Environment Minister said, "We discussed all these things (problems faced by Himalaya), particularly with China. These are the two countries (India and China) on either side of the mountain ranges."



Dave said China or any other country cannot be blamed for the current state of Himalayan ranges.

"We all are concerned, they (China) are also concerned." Blaming each other is not going to help," he added.

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Nearly 5,000 people, including eminent citizens and students from the city, and about 3,000 Naval personnel are likely to join hands for a coastal cleanup drive here tomorrow.

The 31st 'International Coastal Cleanup Day' will be observed worldwide tomorrow with the pledge "fighting for trash-free seas".

The event will kickstart at Kursura Museum Ramakrishna beach in the city tomorrow morning.

Flag Officer Commanding-in Chief, Eastern Naval Command, Vice-Admiral H C S Bisht will formally inaugurate the event, according to a Navy release here.

The event, which is being observed for the fifth time in succession, will see a joint cleanup drive by Eastern Naval Command, Indian Coast Guard along with prominent clubs/ organisation of Visakhapatnam.

The students from Navy Children School will take up the cleanup drive, starting from Ramakrishna beach to Park Hotel, including Tenneti Park, Yerada, Rushikonda and Kalinga beaches.

The coastal cleanup campaign has gained importance in Visakhapatnam since last few years due to infrastructural development and exponential rise in industrialisation which has directly affected the environment and surroundings.

These major advances have a direct impact on surrounding areas and also the adjoining sea region due to major dumping of sewage and industrial waste.

As a result of this ever growing industrialisation, the pollution level at the sea has gone up alarmingly in recent years, the release added.

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Colombia's president is asking forgiveness for the state's role in the killings of leftist activists in the 1980s.

Some 3,000 activists belonging to the Patriotic Union were slain by paramilitary death squads sometimes in collaboration with state security forces after the political party was set up in the 1980s during peace talks with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia.

President Juan Manuel Santos said yesterday that the party's "extermination" should have never taken place. He called on Colombians to respect the political movement that will be formed with the FARC's signing of a peace deal with the government.

Santos said FARC leaders' trust of the state to protect them is a sign the tragedy is unlikely to repeat itself.

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Expressing frustration over the current law and order situation in Cuttack, particularly over the conduct of some police officers, Congress today submitted a memorandum to Odisha DGP seeking judicial inquiry into the alleged unholy nexus between police inspectors and fraudsters.

A Congress delegation, led by the party's Cuttack city



Chief Md Moqim and accompanied by PCC vice-president Suresh Mohapatra, met the DGP and urged him to keep five senior police inspectors off duty till inquiries against them are over.

It also demanded stringent and exemplary punishment against the erring police inspectors.

Twin City police commissioner Y B Khurania had on Thursday announced that Cuttack DCP Sanjib Arora would investigate into the allegations that the police inspectors were protecting the fraudsters.

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The Congress today lost its government in Arunachal Pradesh when 43 of its MLAs led by Chief Minister Pema Khandu defected wholesale and merged with the People's Party of Arunachal, just two months after it had regained power.

Khandu, who had replaced Nabam Tuki following a dissident campaign in July, paraded 42 MLAs before Assembly Speaker Tenzing Norbu Thongdok, who accepted their joining the PPA, Assembly sources said.

The merger would be notified in the Assembly bulletin, formalising the political development that leaves Congress with governments only in Manipur, Meghalaya and Mizoram in the northeast.

The dramatic development in Arunachal Pradesh brought back memories of the famous 'aya ram, gaya ram' episode involving Bhajan Lal who was heading a Janata Party government in Haryana and defected lock, stock, and barrel with all the party MLAs to the Congress after Indira Gandhi came back to power in 1980.

Tuki was the only Congress MLA who did not join PPA, a constituent of the North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA) which was formed on May 24 in Guwahati.

Khandu on July 16 had become the chief minister after months of political turmoil that unseated Tuki, who himself was reinstated as chief minister by the apex court only two days before.

In a House of 60, the Congress had 44 MLAs with one seat falling vacant after former chief minister Kalikho Pul committed suicide on August 9, while the BJP has 11 members including two Independents.

The status of two Congress MLAs is yet to be decided as they put in their papers before the recent series of political developments that led to first Tuki government falling in January this year, imposition of President's rule and installation of the late Kalikho Pul government on February 19 for a short span.

Pul was forced to resign in July 13 following a Supreme Court judgement. On March 3 last, Pul along with 29 Congress MLAs joined the PPA.

PPA CWC chairman Kameng Ringu termed the development as a "homecoming" after a short temporary self exile of the party.

Asked for the reasons behind the development, Deputy



Chief Minister Chowna Mein said that for a resource-starved state like Arunachal, it is necessary to be with a bigger party to get more development funds from the Centre.

However, Tuki, who was out of the station, could not be contacted for his comments.

The PPA had ruled the state for a brief period from March 3 to July 13 this year under late Pul. Earlier the PPA had formed the government in 1979 when Tomo Riba was the chief minister.

Riba, who took oath on September 18, 1979, ruled the state for 46 days before being deposed on November 3, the same year.

Meanwhile, state BJP President Tapir Gao, while welcoming Khandu's move, stated that the decision should have been taken earlier.

"We are happy that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's dream of a 'Congress-mukt Bharat' is becoming a reality now," Gao said.

While blaming the Congress high command for the mess in the party, Gao said party president Sonia Gandhi and Vice President Rahul Gandhi should have taken care of this.

Asked about the possibility of PPA MLAs merging with the BJP, Gao said the party's door was open.
Congress activists today observed 'Bhagoda Divas' in the national capital, protesting against the alleged absence of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and his ministers from Delhi which is currently reeling under chikungunya and dengue outbreak.

Leading the protests which were held in all the 70 Assembly constituencies of the national capital, Delhi Congress President Ajay Maken attacked Kejriwal and Lt Governor Najeeb Jung for being out of the city instead of helping people at a time of crisis.

"It is extremely unfortunate that while Delhiites are facing an epidemic-like situation, the Chief Minister was campaigning in Punjab and later went to Bangalore. Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia is holidaying in Finland and even the Lt Governor was in the United States. One of the BJP mayors is also on a foreign jaunt," Maken said.

The party also issued a "charge-sheet" on the "failures" of the AAP government in Delhi and BJP-ruled MCDs in providing help to the people suffering from the mosquito-borne diseases.

Maken demanded that Kejriwal and Sisodia should return to Delhi and call an all-party meeting to fight the diseases.

He also urged the central government to immediately deploy doctors and paramedical staff of army and paramilitary forces at Delhi hospitals and dispensaries, and provide free check up and treatment facilities to people suffering from these diseases.

Kejriwal had recently undergone a throat surgery in Bengaluru to cure his persistent cough.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A House intelligence committee report issued condemned Edward Snowden, saying the National Security Agency leaker is not a whistleblower and that the vast majority of the documents he stole were defense secrets that had nothing to do with privacy.

The Republican-led committee released a three-page unclassified summary of its two-year bipartisan examination of how Snowden was able to remove more than 1.5 million classified documents from secure NSA networks, what the documents contained and the damage their removal caused to US national security.

Snowden was an NSA contract employee when he took the documents and leaked them to journalists who revealed massive domestic surveillance programs begun in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.

The programs collected the telephone metadata records of millions of Americans and examined emails from overseas. Snowden fled to Hong Kong, then Russia, to avoid prosecution and now wants a presidential pardon as a whistleblower.

Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., chairman of the committee, said Snowden betrayed his colleagues and his country. "He put our service members and the American people at risk after perceived slights by his superiors," Nunes said in a statement.

"In light of his long list of exaggerations and outright fabrications detailed in this report, no one should take him at his word. I look forward to his eventual return to the United States, where he will face justice for his damaging crimes."

Snowden insists he has not shared the full cache of 1.5 million classified documents with anyone. However, the report notes that in June, the deputy chairman of the Russian parliament's defense and security committee publicly conceded that "Snowden did share intelligence" with his government.

Ben Wizner, Snowden's attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union, blasted the report, saying it was an attempt to discredit a "genuine American hero."

"After years of investigation, the committee still can't point to any remotely credible evidence that Snowden's disclosures caused harm," Wizner said. "In a more candid moment, the NSA's former deputy director, who was directly involved in the government's investigation, explicitly said he didn't believe Snowden had cooperated with either China or Russia."

Snowden's revelations about the agency's bulk collection of millions of Americans' phone records set off a fierce debate that pit civil libertarians concerned about privacy against more hawkish lawmakers fearful about losing tools to combat terrorism.
A Delhi Police constable was injured critically when a speeding vehicle hit a barricade he was manning at Jia Sarai in south Delhi in the wee hours of today.

Constable Vikas sustained injuries in his head and left leg as he tried to stop the vehicle.

Police said the incident took place around 3.40 AM when Vikas and assistant sub-inspector Mange Ram were manning the picket at Jia Sarai.

A speeding Swift Dzire car rammed into the barricade, injuring Vikas.

A case under Section 307 (attempt to murder) of the IPC has been registered at Vasant Vihar police station and the accused driver, Ashok, has been arrested. The car has been seized, police said.

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An advocate today claimed that AAP MLA Sandeep Kumar, arrested on rape charges, was beaten up in prison, but the sacked minister's wife denied the allegation saying it was a "political conspiracy" as the lawyer had not been appointed by him.

Hours after Special Judge Poonam Chaudhry issued notice to jail superintendent on the plea of lawyer A P Singh, Kumar's wife Ritu and his advocate Pradeep Rana rejected the allegations at a press conference. Kumar is in judicial custody in Tihar Jail till September 23.

The court asked the jail superintendent to respond by September 20 to Singh's plea which sought direction to install CCTV cameras in jail and videograph the appearance of the MLA before the court, alleging there was threat to his life.

While the petition did not mention anything about the assault, Singh orally said he had met the legislator in jail and was told that he was beaten up and tortured there.

Speaking at a press conference in the evening, the legislator's wife Ritu said she had met her husband in jail this morning and the allegation that he was assaulted was wrong and claimed that there was a "political conspiracy" behind it.

She also said that neither she, nor Kumar had appointed Singh as his lawyer.

Advocate Rana, who accompanied Ritu, said the application by the other lawyer had been filed in the court without a 'vakalatnama' and when Kumar's wife met him in jail, the MLA had confirmed that he had not signed any other 'vakalatnama' and that he was fine and there was no assault on him.

"Pass an order for separate jail van, install CCTV cameras in jail and videography at the time of appearance before the court and safety, security in jail from threat to life on behalf of applicant Sandeep Kumar, in the interest of justice for fair, speedy and impartial trial...," the plea filed by Singh said.

Kumar was arrested on September 3 after a woman had approached Sultanpuri police station in North Delhi complaining of sexual harassment against the former Social Welfare and Women and Child Development minister, following which a case was filed. The woman had figured in an objectionable video with him.

(Reopens LGD17)



Kumar has been booked under sections 376 (rape), 328 (causing hurt by means of poison with intent to commit an offence) of IPC, under section 67A (punishment for publishing or transmitting of material containing sexually explicit act) of IT Act and Section 7 (public servant taking gratification for an official act) of Prevention of Corruption Act.

In her complaint, the woman has alleged that about 11 months ago, she was raped by Kumar when she had gone to his office in Outer Delhi's Sultanpuri area seeking help to obtain a ration card.

Kumar was removed from AAP government on August 31 by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal after the CD surfaced.

The MLA from Sultanpur Majra had surrendered before the investigators at the office of DCP (Outer) in Pitampura, where his statement was recorded.

Soon after the controversy, the MLA had defended himself, saying he has been targeted.
Union Minister of State for Environment Anil Dave today assured the fishermen and tourism community in Goa to work out a solution for vexed Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) issue.

"The fishermen have been living on the coast for centuries. CRZ has been an issue of concern for them," Dave said.

He was talking to reporters on the sidelines of a summit of environment ministers of BRICS nations held in South Goa, which concluded today.

"Tourism is another subject, which needs to be addressed in the coastal belt. We are looking at all aspects of the CRZ issue. I am sure that shortly we will do something, so that they (fishermen and tourism) will have ease of doing business," the minister said.

Dave yesterday held talks with Goa Environment Minister Rajendra Arlekar on various issues, including the CRZ.

The Union Minister had also visited recently-launched sewage treatment plant at Saligao near Panaji, which is supposed to treat the garbage from the coastal belt.

Dave said such plants with automatic technology are need of the hour and more such units need to be set up in the state.

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Chikungunya is likely to be soon declared a notifiable and dangerous disease as the Delhi government today initiated the process for it in the wake of an outbreak of the vector-borne disease in the city.

Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain has issued a notice, saying the step would ensure proper monitoring of the situation and requisite remedial action.

The then unified Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) had declared dengue as a notifiable disease after the 1996 outbreak, during which 10,252 cases and 423 deaths were reported.

"In light of the prevailing chikungunya outbreak, it is hereby directed that the issue of notifying chikungunya as dangerous/notifiable disease under the relevant sections of the municipal corporations/local bodies acts and rules be immediately taken up with the local bodies concerned for the issuance of such notification," the notice says.

Medical Health Officer of SDMC P K Hazarika said local bodies have power to declare a disease as notifiable.

"We have received the notice and maybe by tomorrow we would declare it as notifiable. Last time the MCD had declared dengue as a notifiable disease after the 1996 outbreak," he told PTI.

A notifiable disease implies hospitals, clinics and nursing homes have to report its cases to the government for proper monitoring. Chikungunya is generally considered as non-fatal.

Hazarika said chickenpox, smallpox, cholera and tuberculosis fall under the category of dangerous diseases.

The government notice said, "This is to be done on priority to ensure that every hospital, nursing home, laboratory, shall furnish the data of chikungunya patients to the concerned government agencies without failure, which is imperative for monitoring the situation and to take requisite remedial action."



In a separate notice issued by Jain, the Delhi government also announced that in the event of chikungunya outbreak "mohalla clinics, polyclinics and dispensaries shall remain open on all days, including Sundays and gazetted holidays during their working hours till October 30".

The health minister said the issue of reporting of the number of cases was raised during the review meeting held on September 14. It was then decided to declare it notifiable.

"The protocol is that when a vector-borne disease case is reported in a household, then the civic bodies send staff to fog the area within a certain radius of that household. And, if proper reporting of cases is not there, then proper fogging cannot be done.

"Hence, it was decided in the meeting to get chikungunya declared as notifiable as so many cases are being reported in Delhi," Jain told reporters.

12 people have died due to complications triggered by chikungunya in Delhi this season while over 1,700 people have been affected by it.

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Any name that goes with Mugabe is a household name, at least in Zimbabwe and most of the Southern African countries. Grace is one of those bearing the popular last name as the former First Lady of Zimbabwe. An entrepreneur and politician, Grace Mugabe is most recognized as the widow of the late Zimbabwean President, Robert Mugabe. As her husband led the Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (Zanu-PF), Grace served as the Secretary of the partys Womens League and was a strong force in the politics of the country.

For someone who came very close to becoming the leader of the Southern African nation, Grace seems to have disappeared from the limelight since the removal of her husband from office and his death that followed, leaving many to wonder what she has been up to. People have also wondered about the kind of upbringing the former first lady had while growing up.

Grace Mugabe Came From A Humble Background

Grace was born on July 23, 1965, in Benoni, Johannesburg, South Africa. Before her marriages, she was named Grace Ntombizodwa Marufu. Born to immigrant parents as the fourth of five children in the family, Grace moved with her mother Idah Marufu to Chivhu, a small town in Mashonaland East province of Zimbabwe, then called Rhodesia.

Looking at the height she has attained in life, it is difficult to imagine there was a time when life was hard for the former First Lady. According to various reports which have been authenticated, Grace had quite a rough upbringing. She was not born with a silver spoon and grew without her father who remained in South Africa to work and support his family.

Grace had a history of hawking when she was young. Thankfully, she was able to continue her education. She had her primary education in Chivhu and thereafter, schooled at Kriste Mambo Secondary School located in Manicaland.

She Was Married When Her Love Story With Robert Began

Grace Mugabe did a secretarial course which helped her secure a job at the presidents office in 1980. What followed was not what anyone saw coming. Working as the secretary to late Robert Mugabe paved the way for a romantic relationship to develop between them. This marked the beginning of her rise to fame and subsequent political journey.

Grace was once married to Stanley Goreraza, a Zimbabwean air force pilot. They had a son named Russell Goreraza. He was born in 1984 and they lived quite a happy and contented life as a family until Mugabe came into the picture.

Perhaps it is not just a stereotype that dictators have a history of coveting peoples wives. Though not everyone would agree that Robert Mugabe was a dictator but there was no doubt he stole Gorerazas wife. Mugabe and Grace reportedly had an affair while both were married to their spouses.

Inside Grace Mugabes Marriage To The Late President

After they have been together for a great deal of time, Grace and Mugabe decided to formalize their affair and got married in 1996. The marriage ceremony took place in Mugabes rural home of Zvimba at Kutama College after Graces husband Stanley Goreraza was officially posted away in China to serve the military.

At the same time, Mugabe was married to Sally Mugabe. It was a few years after her death that Grace and Mugabe got married. Sally died on the 27th of January 1992 from kidney failure. So, it was after the death of Mugabes first wife that Grace legally became a Mugabe. Back then, she was almost certain she would not have any business with politics. But things changed as time went on.

She Is A Mother Of Four

It is not hard to find that Grace Mugabe is a mother of four kids. She had her first child with Stanley Goreraza whom she got married to when she was only 19 and divorced in 1996.

The rest are her children with Mugabe. Robert also had a son named Michael Nhamodzenyika Mugabe with his first wife. He was born on the 27th of September 1963 and died a few years later in 1966.

Meet Grace Mugabes Children

1. Russell Goreraza

Russell Goreraza was born sometime in 1984, a year after Grace got married for the first time. Like the rest of the Mugabes, he has been in the spotlight for a number of wrong reasons, ranging from culpable homicide to grabbing mines, houses, and for his wayward and extravagant lifestyle. He was once married to a lady identified as Gladys Chiedza Chiwaya. They had a child together before they parted in 2014.

2. Nyepudzayi Bona Mugabe

The only daughter of the late Zimbabwean president, Grace and Robert had Bona on the 18th of April 1988. Now described as a businesswoman, Bona is not a stranger to the controversies that have trailed the family. She was deported from Australia where she was studying in 2008 by the government of the country because of what was perceived as human rights abuse in Zimbabwe. The following year, her bodyguards were accused of assaulting reporters in Hong Kong where she completed her studies. Bona got married to Simba Chikore and is now a mother of two.

3. Robert Peter Mugabe Jr.

Born on the 4th of February 1992, Mugabe Junior is the first son of Grace and the late president. He was also born before Grace formalized her relationship with Robert. He studied Architecture at the University of Johannesburg in South Africa and has a huge interest in basketball; he has even represented the Zimbabwe National Basketball team in various competitions. Peter has contributed to the many controversies surrounding the Mugabe family.

4. Chatunga Bellarmine Mugabe

The last of Grace Mugabes kids, Chatunga, was born in 1997. There have been various reports of him doing drugs, engaging in reckless spending, and splashing money on women. He is famed as a troublesome child of the Mugabe family.

The Political Power Grace Wielded in Zimbabwe

Prior to her husbands forceful removal as the President of Zimbabwe after ruling for over 3 decades, Grace Mugabe became a force to reckon with in Zimbabwean politics. She had even taken steps and called shots that the ruling party finds interfering. Her political tussle with Joyce Mujuru, a former Vice-President of Zimbabwe, will not be forgotten in Zimbabwes political history.

The former Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa was believed to have been fired by Mugabe so that she could be in line for president. Many predicted that she would succeed Mugabe as her political presence and activities could not be mistaken for what it clearly pointed to. In the late months of 2017, Grace made a shocking divorce threat to her husband during his bid to negotiate with the armed forces.

Along with the political power she wielded, there were numerous reports of abuse; human rights abuse, and the abuse of the national treasury. For instance, She has featured in a controversial report in which she physically assaulted a journalist with her bodyguard.

She earned the name Gucci Grace for her lavish lifestyle. While she was still the first lady, she spent $120,000 on just one shopping trip to Paris and was rumoured to have withdrawn approximately $8 million from Zimbabwes Central Bank for personal use in 2004.

How Grace and Her Children Have Been Coping Since Mugabes Death

Among other hidden wealth, Grace Mugabe owns a business called Gushungo Holdings. The former first family owns about 10 farms through Gushungo Holdings (Pvt) Ltd. So, their lavish lifestyle might have been tamed but there is no doubt that they are not in financial distress.

Following the power tussle between the late President Robert Mugabe and the military force, which led to his forceful removal from office through a bloodless military coup which brought to an end his 37-year grip on power, Grace Mugabe reportedly fled to Windhoek, the capital of Namibia with her children.

Although there is no clear report about Grace Mugabes whereabouts, it is believed that she still lives in Zimbabwe as the Mugabe family was granted immunity for any crimes that they might have committed while in office. The family was also allowed to retain all its assets.
Increasing digitalisation, which reflects a transformation from marketing skills based on bags and brochures, and gender diversity are new catalysts for the pharmaceutical industry, according to speakers at a summit on human resources (HR) here.

"Marketing teams and sales forces in pharmaceutical industry are increasingly deploying advanced analytics to understand prescribing behaviour and potential patient profiles; reflecting the transformation from bags and brochures to digitalisation.

"Pharmaceutical companies are valuing non-traditional skill sets," OPPI President and Sanofi India Managing Director Shailesh Ayyangar said at the annual HR summit today.

Organisation of Pharmaceutical Producers of India's (OPPI) summit deliberated on HR imperatives for sales force management.

"The important catalyst for change is this era of digitalisation, which has changed the way our customers (physicians) and patients source information.

"Multiple digital channels, including virtual reality, that can allow viewers to walk a mile in the shoes of someone living with dementia, for instance, are increasing the relevance of our contribution beyond our medicines and vaccines," Ayyangar said.

Young professionals from industries such as retail, telecom and other emerging sectors are more drawn to work in an industry that is transforming. Hence, it (pharma sector) is a great place to build careers while also contributing to humanity, he added.

T K Srirang, Group Head-Human Resources, ICICI Bank, in his address said, "The world is nebulous and changing. With the young nation of India becoming one of the fastest-growing economies, we are setting foot into a digital world.

"Automation is now a critical part of business models across sectors. There is an urgent need to invest in capacity and skilling of the workforce to adapt to the changes of tomorrow."



The summit also discussed the role of diversity.

Pharmaceutical firm are quietly metamorphosing from being male-dominated to developing a more inclusive culture with appreciation for better gender balance, Ayyangar said.

N S Rajan, Group Chief Human Resources Officer, Tata Group, said "in today's changing world we need to redefine processes and as HR professionals, we aim to reorient thinking, policies and structures."



Kanchana TK, Director General, OPPI, said, "any new HR intervention requires a clear strategic direction and strong focus from senior leadership. We see this happening right now in our industry.

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Hitting out at the separatists for bringing business and education to halt in Kashmir, Education Minister Naeem Akhtar today questioned whether they want to leave behind the community of illiterates by such acts.

"We have appealed to all, including separatists what kind of society will you want to leave behind," he said, adding, "Will you leave behind the community of illiterates?"



Taking a dig at separatists for issuingshutdown calenders, he said, "opening schools is not my job alone but also that of teachers who should come to schools and open schools and it is also the job of society to ensure it".

He was replying to a question as to when the schools will reopen and children will go back to schools in Kashmir.

"Look at rural areas and villages. Schools are in local areas... Teachers are from the same area so are the students as well. Every village has more than eight schools.

"Why don't they reopen the schools and that is the job of that community to reopen schools and the people should come out to help us in restoring the school education in the state," he said.

"We have appealed in the past and we are appealing this time too. Whatever you want to do, please do not do it with the children and schools. You cannot achieve anything if you stop children for going to schools," the Minister said.

Asked about Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh's statement that schools should reopen withing one week, he said "that you can ask him. We have appealed to all, including separatists what kind ofsociety will you want to leave behind."



Asked about the issuance of shutdown calendars by the separatists, he said "government is fully operational in Kashmir. Whatever the work of government is, it is being done.

"Whether it is ration, water supply or electric supply and also fruit work, it is going on and transport is also running wherever there is need to transport the fruit outside. Supplies are coming from outside including Jammu."



He said the separatists are targeting two things -- Education and business.

"As far as Jammu and Kashmir is concern, currently we have a lot of trouble in Kashmir. But apart from the political aspect of it, the human resource development, the failure on that front, is one of the reasons of current and past troubles," Akhtar said.

"As all of you know that Kashmir is known outside India more for its social fabric than the place it is -- that fabric was produced by our forefathers centuries back. We have to strengthen it," he added.

On the current situation, he said "does anyone kill their own people for fun. There is an environment of turmoil and there has also been loss of life and we are very worried, sad and sad. It is a painful situation but the situation has been imposed on us".

The minister said, "Our jawans and our police have shown utmost restrain. You can see that how many of them have been injured in two and half months period.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Mainly dry weather conditions prevailed in the north today even as a fresh spell of rain occurred in Bihar and West Bengal, which have been battling floods.

The weatherman has warned of "extremely heavy rains" in Konkan and Goa. Heavy rains are likely in Gujarat and Maharashtra tomorrow.

Delhi had a hot day, recording the maximum temperature at 36 degrees Celsius. The minimum temperature in the city settled at 26 degrees Celsius and humidity levels oscillated between 40 and 87 per cent.

The other three metropolitan cities of Kolkata, Chennai and Mumbai recorded the maximum temperature at 35, 33.5 and 26.2 degrees Celsius respectively.

Heavy rains pounded a few places in north Bengal. Cooch Behar got 146 mm of rain, while Jalpaiguri gauged 43.8 mm of precipitation.

The weatherman said more rains are likely in several parts of the state tomorrow.

Light to moderate rainfall was reported from a few places in northwest and northeast of Bihar. Very light to light rainfall occurred at one or two places in rest of the state barring the south central region where weather remained mainly dry.

Patna received 25.6 mm of rainfall. Bhagalpur gauged 4.1 mm, while Purnea got 5.4 mm of rain. Purnea was also the hottest place in the state at 35.7 degrees Celsius.

Humidity levels soared after the rains, adding to people's discomfort.

Dry weather conditions prevailed in Punjab and Haryana. The mercury in the two states settled near normal levels.

The Union Territory of Chandigarh had a warm day at 34 degrees Celsius, while Hisar in Haryana was the hottest place in the two states at 37.3 degrees.

Many parts of Uttar Pradesh also witnessed a fresh spell rain. The MeT office has predicted scattered rains tomorrow.

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The Election Commission today refused to entertain fresh allegations in a petition seeking disqualification of 21 AAP MLAs for allegedly holding office of profit even as it rejected the plea of the lawmakers not to take cognisance of the so-called second application filed in the case.

It also fixed September 23 as the next date of hearing. On August 29, it had reserved its order on the plea of AAP MLAs to reject the so-called second petition.

The Commission, in its order said, "the contents of paras...Make some extraneous/additional allegations and insinuations. Accordingly, these paragraphs...Are directed to be struck off from the reply dated December 28, 20l5 (the so-called second petition) of the petitioner."



In other words, the Commission refused to expand the scope of the original petition by not agreeing to include "additional allegations" filed through the second petition.

The first petition was filed by advocate Prashant Patel before the President on June 19, 2015 seeking disqualification of the 21 AAP lawmakers for allegedly holding office of profit. He had filed additional documents as sought by the EC. But AAP had claimed that additional documents in effect were a second petition which should not be entertained.

But at the same time, the Commission also rejected the plea of the MLAs that the so-called second petition by Patel was not maintainable as it was not sent to the President like the first petition but filed before the poll body.

"None of the learned counsel for the respondents have raised any specific objection that even paras 1 and 2 of the petitioner's reply dated December 28, 2015 can also not be looked into by the Commission. These two paras are mere reiteration of the question raised by the petitioner in his original petition.

"In the Commission's view, there also cannot be any valid objection to the contents of paras...As all these paragraphs relate to the question raised by the petitioner in his original petition," the Commission said in its 18-page order.

(Reopens DES44)



In earlier hearings, the AAP legislators, whose



appointment as parliamentary secretaries is under challenge, had said the EC should consider only the first petition filed by Patel, who moved the plea before the poll body on which the President had sought opinion of the Commission.

They said the Commission cannot consider the second set of documents filed by Patel after the President had already sought opinion on the first petition.

They insisted the second set of documents were not maintainable. Patel, however, argued that the second set was "not a fresh petition but a response to details sought by the EC".

On July 27, the commission had rejected pleas of Congress, BJP and Delhi government to implead them as parties to the petition in the alleged office-of-profit case.

The EC issued notices to the AAP legislators in June after the petition was filed before it by Patel.

The MLAs responded to the notices, saying there was no "pecuniary benefit" associated with the post and it comes without any remuneration or power.

They had also sought personal hearings before the EC.

Delhi's AAP government had appointed 21 parliamentary secretaries to assist its ministers.

Subsequently, the city government sought to amend the Delhi Members of Legislative Assembly (Removal of Disqualification) Act, 1997, so as to exempt parliamentary secretaries from disqualification provisions in 'office of profit' cases.

However, the President refused to give his assent to the Bill.
Newly-nominated Rajya Sabha MP and academician Narendra Jadhav today embarked on a country-wide yatra to propagate the thoughts of social reformer B R Ambedkar on establishing an egalitarian society.

Jadhav's "Ambedkar Vichar Yatra" comes at a time when the Centre and all the states are celebrating 125th birth anniversary year of the Dalit icon and chief architect of the Constitution.

"I am delighted to announce that from today, I am launching 'Ambedkar Vichar Yatra' during which I would be visiting at least 7-8 states.

"I would be delivering 125 lectures marking 125th birth anniversary of Babasaheb, highlighting his contributions in development of the nation, mainly to students in colleges and universities," he said here.

"I would try to end the yatra in Mumbai, where I would share my experiences and thoughts with the people and press," the 63-year-old economist said.

Jadhav said his yatra would be completely "apolitical" and focus only on social issues raised by Ambedkar, who strove for an egalitarian society.

"I plan to end my yatra on October 14," said the Dalit scholar, who has written 21 books on Ambedkar.

He said, "PR department of BMC (Mumbai's civic body) has done an exemplary job by coming out with a coffee table book on Dr B R Ambedkar in Marathi. But this needs to be translated in English also to enhance its reach."



The former Vice-Chancellor of Pune University said the demolition of Ambedkar Bhavan in Dadar here in June was an "unpardonable mistake".

Replying to a query, he said, "There is no need to bring amendment in the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. All provisions have been meticulously incorporated to protect Dalits. And if these provisions are being misused, recourse is available in the Act itself.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
German Chancellor Angela Merkel warned today that the EU faces a "critical situation", as European leaders sought to plot the bloc's post-Brexit future at a summit without Britain.

The 27 leaders -- minus British Prime Minister Theresa May -- gathered at Bratislava's towering castle overlooking the River Danube, determined to respond to the challenges of mass migration, security, globalisation and a stuttering economy.

The aim was to thrash out a "roadmap" of reforms during talks in the Slovak capital's towering hilltop castle, and a boat trip down the Danube.

Merkel said the bloc simply had to improve but her influence as leader of the EU's biggest economy has been undermined by her unpopular decision to open Germany's doors last year to nearly a million refugees.

"We are in a critical situation. We have to show with our actions that we can get better," Merkel said as she arrived at the special summit.

French President Francois Hollande, the other half of the EU's "power couple" with Merkel, was equally blunt.

"We face either break-up, weakening -- or we choose the opposite, together giving Europe a purpose," said Hollande, who has made common cause with Berlin on boosting EU defence cooperation.

EU President Donald Tusk had warned on the eve of the summit that leaders must "have a sober and brutally honest assessment of the situation."



The leaders want to launch a "Bratislava Process" of reforms at this summit, to be further discussed in Malta early next year and then agreed in Rome in March 2017 to mark the 60th anniversary of the founding of the EU.

An EU official said the initial discussions had been "honest, without recriminations" while Tusk had submitted his "roadmap" in the afternoon session.

European Commission head Jean-Claude Juncker had meanwhile submitted his version yesterday but there were no major differences and it "mirrored" what was being discussed, the official said.

Greeted by soldiers in bright blue uniforms and ceremonial plumes, the leaders held a first round of talks in the castle then lunched on a river cruise on a German-flagged boat down the Danube to informally discuss Brexit.

The 27 leaders have insisted there will be no formal Brexit talks until Britain triggers the two-year divorce process and says what it wants.

Maltese Premier Joseph Muscat quipped in a tweet: "Bratislava summit was so far a straightforward discussion of options for EU to move ahead. We are all on the same boat, literally."



Boosting defence cooperation is a key issue for the leaders who hope it will give them something to rally around after deadly terror attacks in France and Belgium.

Juncker earlier this week proposed an EU defence headquarters and a common defence force, both ideas that Britain had previously nixed because they might overlap with NATO.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Terming the Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party as "anti-Punjab", Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal on Friday said even the shadow of these parties was bad for the state.

Addressing a political gathering on the occasion of the Chapaar fair, the chief minister said both these parties were inimical to the interests of the state and its people.

He alleged that these parties don't have any sympathy for the people of and were hostile to the interests of the state and cautioned the people against the "nefarious designs" of these parties.

The CM said the upcoming Assembly polls would be "decisive as it would make or break the future of Punjab" and the fight was between SAD and "enemies of the state" like AAP and Congress.

If "pro-people force" like the SAD-BJP alliance was voted to power again, the state's development would get a major fillip, he said, adding if anti- forces, like Congress and AAP, get a chance the situation would turn for the worse.

Badal asked the people to be cautious during the election as they would have to choose between enemies and friends of the state.

The Congress has "irrelevantly meddled" in the social, political, economic and even religious affairs of the state, he alleged.

He said the erstwhile Congress governments at the Centre had "deliberately denied" the state its capital Chandigarh and even its legitimate share in river waters.

"No sincere Punjabi can ever forgive the Congress for its sins like Operation Blue Star and killing of innocents in 1984 anti-Sikh carnage," he alleged.

"The Congress is perpetrator of a deep rooted conspiracy to deprive the state of its waters, by constructing the Sutlej Yamuna Link (SYL) canal. This canal was aimed at ruining the state by snatching its only available natural resource," he claimed.

Coming down heavily on AAP, the CM said, "The affidavit submitted by the Arvind Kejriwal government in Supreme Court on the SYL issue has exposed AAP's anti- mindset."

"Kejriwal hails from Haryana, so he is naturally inclined towards his native state. The anti-Punjab stand taken by his government in the apex court has proved it," he stated.

Describing AAP a "house of cards", he said it was likely to collapse before the state Assembly polls.

"AAP's leadership neither has character nor ideology. Their sole motive is to come in power and plunder the state," he alleged.
The three organisers of a publicity stunt featuring fake jihadist attackers who sparked panic during the Cannes Film Festival were fined 2,500 euros (USD 2,800) today.

Six men wearing combat dress and masks swept up to the luxury Eden Roc hotel in a high-powered dinghy that was flying a black flag made to look like the one used by the Islamic State (IS) group.

The production team also hired a helicopter to fly low overhead as the dinghy approached the Cap d'Antibes on the French Riviera.

"They came in on a dinghy, dressed in black to film themselves as if it was an invasion by Daesh and they really scared people who were swimming in the sea," prosecutor Thierry Bonifay told a court in Grasse near Cannes, using the Arabic name for IS.

The organisers of the stunt were prosecuted for "aggravated violence".

Four other people, who were actors taking part in the stunt, were cleared.

The team making the commercial for a website had no official permission, according to a report in Nice Matin newspaper.

IS claimed responsibility for coordinated attacks on Paris in November last year in which 130 people were killed.

The group also claimed one of its followers drove the truck that killed 86 people on the Nice seafront, along the south coast from Cannes, on July 14.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Federeal Bank today launched its Skill Academy in the city, the second in the country after Kochi.

The academy will initially provide an in-demand CNC Machine Operator course in milling and turning, which will be certified by city-based CoIndia, cluster development project backed by both the Centre and State government, with major industries in the area, the Bank Chief General Manager and Head, Network II, D Sampath told reporters on the sidelines of the launch.

The initiative will facilitate underprivileged students to successfully complete the 3-month course that make them employable for opportunitites both in India and Abroad, Sampath said.

Stating that the initiative was part of the Bank's Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), he said that 120 students will be trained in the first batch, which would be scaled up in the near future, considering the demand.

When asked about the funding, Sampath said that with infrastructure and lab facilities, the bank will incur an investment of Rs one crore in the first year.

Students of 18-25 years of age, who have passed plus 2, ITI/polytechnic/ Degree or Engineering drop out and whose annual family income does not exceed Rs two lakh, can apply for the course, he said.

The Kochi academy has already trained 90 persons, who are already placed and another 90 are undergoing training, Chairman of SB Global Education Centre, Balachandran, the implementing partner for thuis project, said adding that the Bank will open such an academy in Bihar, location for which is being identified.

CoIndia president, Mahendra Ramadass inaugurated the academy.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Luc Adolphe Tiao, the last prime minister of former Burkinabe president Blaise Compaore, has been detained and charged with murder over unrest that saw the latter unseated in 2014, the supreme court prosecutor general said today.

Compaore lost power after 27 years following a popular uprising in October 2014 against his attempts to change the constitution to remain in office and last year the country's transitional council indicted him and senior members of his government on charges of high treason.

The supreme court prosecutor told AFP Tiao had been detained and charged as part of its mandate to investigate the "popular insurrection" which accompanied the collapse of the Compaore regime.

"Former prime minister Luc Adolphe Tiao has been placed in detention and was taken to a prison facility at Ouagadougou this morning," chief prosecutor Armand Ouedraogo told AFP.

"He has been charged with murder, beating and deliberate wounding and complicity" in violence in connection with military attempts to put down the uprising, which cost 33 lives according to an official toll.

Ouagadougou prosecutor Maiza Sereme last week decried the "difficulties" encountered in pursuing the case against Tiao and former regime leaders citing a lack of "cooperation" from state authorities.

Tiao spent a year-and-a-half in exile in Ivory Coast but returned voluntarily to Burkina Faso last weekend after questioning of several members of his former cabinet who remain in the country



Several sources have told AFP that former journalist Tiao is accused of having signed an order for the army to use force in putting down the popular uprising.

"Everybody knows it was him who gave authorisation to fire on demonstrators," said Ouedraogo, who added he could not say if other ministers in the government Tiao headed would also be detained.

In total, police have questioned 16 ministers from the Tiao government in connection with the killings linked to the anti-Compaore demonstrations at the end of 2014.

The remainder are in exile and some have found employment with international organisations abroad.

Following the suppression of the unrest, Amnesty International released a report on the anti-Compaore demonstration accusing the presidential security unit (RSP) of being behind the violence. The RSP was dissolved following last year's abortive coup.

Compaore is currently in exile in Ivory Coast and the transitional council has also accused him of high treason and of abusing the constitution in seeking to stay in power.

He is the subject of an international arrest warrant in connection with the murder of former president Thomas Sankara, killed in the 1987 coup which brought Compaore to power.

Not least because it does not extradite to countries retaining the death penalty, there seems little chance that Ivory Coast will expel Compaore, who has taken Ivorian citizenship and who is a long-time ally of Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
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Is Milo Yiannopoulos Gay? His Husband and Net Worth Milo Yiannopoulos is a popular writer, journalist, polemicist, public speaker, and political commentator who is also known as the founder of The Kernel, an online blog. He has been said to be among the list of 100 weird and influential people in the United Kingdom. He appeared on this list as a result of personal beliefs and ...

Does Ryan Seacrest Have A Wife Or Girlfriend, What Is His Net Worth? From radio to television, Ryan Seacrest is a household name and a force to be reckoned with in showbiz. The radio personality, television host, and producer is best recognized as the host of the popular TV talent search contest American Idol. Heres how the media personality who always knew what his lifes ambition was and diligently pursued ...

Is Anderson Cooper Gay, Who is The Boyfriend or Husband? For many, the thought of becoming a millionaire by writing and talking about other people appears unachievable but this is the reality of the prominent American journalist Anderson Cooper who gathered millions of dollars for conducting accurate political analysis and other vital reports on TV. He is the main anchor of the CNN news show Anderson ...

Is David Muir Gay or Does He Have A Wife, What Is His Salary? David Muir is an Emmy Award-winning journalist who works for the ABC broadcast-television network and anchors the ABC World News Tonight with David Muir program while also co-anchoring the magazine program 20/20. The Ithaca College graduate, whose show has become the most-watched newscast in America, has covered stories from all across America and the world; reporting ...

Joel Osteen  Divorce Rumors, Net Worth & Family Members Joel Osteen is an American Televangelist, Senior Pastor of Lakewood Church based in Houston, Texas, a husband and a father of two. He is an author of many books, seven of which are New York Times Best Sellers and his televised sermons capture more than 7 million viewers per week and 20 million every month ...

Who Is Todd Chrisley? What To Know About His Children, Gay Rumors & Net Worth Premiered on the USA network in 2014, Chrisley Knows Best is one of the most watched family reality TV shows in the U.S. The series which is currently in its sixth season is centered around U.S real estate mogul Todd Chrisley and his family. The show reveals Todd the patriarch of the Chrisley family as a strict dad who rules ...

Who Is Shannon Bream Of Fox News? Her Husband, Children & Net Worth Shannon Bream who hosts the iconic primetime program started her journalism career in the late 1990s debuting as the evening and late-night news reporter for the CBS affiliate, WBTV. The beauty from America currently works for the Fox News Channel and she is best known for anchoring the primetime program. She also hosts Americas News ...

Is Troye Sivan Gay, Who Is His Boyfriend and What Is His Net Worth? Troye Sivan is an Australian singer and songwriter best known for songs like Happy Little Pill, Youth, Heaven (with Betty Who) and The Boyfriend Tag (with Tyler Oakley) which have all garnered him different awards and ranked on the Billboard Charts. Sivan, who was born in South Africa but now resides in the United States, is ...

Did iDubbbz Have Cancer, Is He Gay and Who Is His Girlfriend Now? iDubbbz is one YouTuber who has made a career out of courting controversy. Renowned for his absurdist channels and comedy video series, the Los Angeles based personality is the owner of two channels, iDubbzTV, and iDubbzTV2, as well as the brains behind comedy video series such as Content Cop, Kickstarter Crap, Gaming News Crap, and ...

Inside Greg Gutfelds Love Story With Wife Elena Moussa and Why Fans Thought He Was Gay Greg Gutfeld is a seasoned American television producer whose career in the media industry has spanned over a decade. He is a man of many talents who makes extra income through comedy, journalism, and editorial works. Gutfeld regularly appears on Fox News Channel as a panellist and co-host of the political talk show The Five ...

Works That Made Bo Burnham A Household Name and How Much He Is Worth Now One of YouTubes first viral stars and the worlds most exciting young comedian, Bo Burnham, has always amazed critics and comedy aficionados alike. Often regarded as the Justin Bieber of comedy, thanks to his fresh looks, floppy blond hair and hoodies, he has a multi-faceted career bigger than many comedians twice his age. It wouldnt ...

Is Louie Anderson Gay And What Is His Net Worth? Louie Anderson has one of the most abstract faces in the industry and equally knows how to use it to his advantage. He is not only a stand-up comedian but also an actor and television host who is known for his distinctive comic wits. Some of his notable projects include Family Feud, where he was ...

Is Don Lemon of CNN Gay, Who is His Partner and What Is His Salary? Don Lemon has risen to become one of the most recognizable faces on CNN over the past few years. The fiery journalist, who anchors CNN Tonight with Don Lemon, is liked and somewhat disliked for his strong and candid opinions on a variety of matters that do not just include politics but also race, significantly, matters that ...

Is Rachel Maddow Gay, Who is the Wife and How Much Does She Earn in Salary? Rachel Maddow is an award-winning American journalist, political commentator, and television news anchor. She is best known for hosting the popular nightly TV show The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC. Prior to this, she hosted a talk radio program on Air America Radio from 2005 to 2010. As of now, the TV sensation co-anchors MSNBCs ...

Demystifying Pokimane  Her Real Name, Ethnicity & Boyfriend Like most social media celebrities in this digital era, Pokimane Thicc is one of those stars who took advantage of the internet to make a name for herself. Given the unlimited potentials which the social media space offers, many people have been instantly propelled to fame just by posting creative online contents. Not only has ...

A Breakdown of Kris Jenners Net Worth, Sources Of Income and Relationships Over The Years Standing outside and looking in, Kris Jenner looks like the oil that greases the wheels of the entire Kardashian/Jenner machine. She has been dubbed a momager and rightfully so because she seems to have had a part to play in the trajectory of each and every one of her daughters individually and the Kardashian brand ...

Pursuits That Brought Liza Koshys Fame To its Zenith and Her Love Life Since David Dobrik Liza Koshy is an American actress who has leveraged YouTube as a platform to promote her comedy while also serving as a television host on occasions. She is talented and funny and has gathered a lot of fans from around the world. Koshy started on Vine in high school and was able to get millions of ...

Alex Aiono Biography  Inside The Life Of The American Singer Not everyone who started from the streets has attained the heights where Alex Aiono is currently. His story could be referred to as the perfect definition of rising from Grass to Grace. He came into the limelight after he started out as a YouTuber, singer, and producer. One fascinating thing about the young YouTuber is ...

Virginia Vallejo Biography And Her Love Story With Pablo Escobar Virginia Vallejo can be referred to as one of the oldest whistleblowers in history after her involvement with Pablo Escobar which made her famous. Over the years, many questions have been raised about her relationship with the drug lord and why she endangered her life to be with him despite his notorious acts. The death ...

Princess Love Bio  Ethnicity, Real Name & Parents For many people, Princess Love is simply Ray Js wife but there is so much more to this feisty lady than meets the eye. She is a star in her own right and has many feathers on her cap. Princess Love is a reality TV star, a model, video vixen, and fashion designer. She and her ...

Who is Papa Franku Also Known As Filthy Frank or Joji, Where is He Now? The social media as we all know today has given people the opportunity to be creative and innovative and at the same time, make something of themselves. YouTube is one of the known social platforms we have today that makes it possible for people to express their God-given talents and post videos they created to ...

Who Is Molly Qerim, How Did She Become a Famous Sports Anchor and Who Is Her Husband? Molly Qerim is an American sports anchor popularly known for moderating First Take, a highly rated sports talk show, on ESPN. Prior to joining ESPN, Qerim hosted Fantasy Live and NFL AM on NFL Network. It is quite obvious that the widely acclaimed television personality is in a class of her own when it comes ...

Safiya Nygaard  Height, Parents & Net Worth Safiya Nygaard is an American YouTuber, writer, content producer, and director who is popular for posting makeup, beauty and fashion videos on YouTube. Her videos regularly top at least one million views, thanks to her lively character as well as her willingness to experiment with outrageous outfits and different beauty products. Here are the things to ...

The Rigors of Sunlen Serfatys Career Journey Until CNN and Fun Facts About Her Personal Life CNN correspondent, Sunlen Serfaty is an Emmy Award-winning journalist known for covering a broad range of breaking news stories, national news, and Washington politics. She has been able to garner widespread recognition for herself which even goes beyond the sphere of her work. Her profile also increased with the extensive work she did in covering ...

Demystifying Jazz Jennings Real Name, Boyfriend & Family Of One The Youngest Transgenders Jazz Jennings is an unusual personality who became famous as a transgender activist and was recorded as the youngest documented public figure to be seen as transgender. She is also a YouTube personality and spokesmodel for brands, her fans, and other transgenders. She fought for acceptance in her high school with her super supportive family for over ...

Inside Fred Armisens Life  Ethnicity, Romantic Relationships and Gay Rumors Fred Armisen is an award-winning American comedian, he is also a writer, an actor as well as a musician. He was a cast member of the legendary comedy show, Saturday Night Live for 13 years and also one of the brains behind the successful satirical show Portlandia. Find out more about this incredibly talented guy ...

Ed and Lorraine Warren Biography: Cases, Kids, and Family Life Have you ever woken up with fear you could not explain, or felt a strange presence that made the hair at your nape rise or even experienced strange occurrences around you? Well, these were some of the promptings that made the well-known paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren delve into trying to explain the ideas ...

Truth About Tony Romos Wife, Kids and Life Since His NFL Retirement Tony Romo grew from the field as a quarterback to the screens as an American Football Analyst. He was a quarterback for the Dallas Cowboys in the richest football league in the world (NFL) before retiring. As a junior, he was honored as an All-Ohio Conference Member, an Ohio Valley Conference Player of the Year and ...

Who is Brittany Venti, The Controversial Game Streamer and YouTuber? In recent times, many people live stream themselves playing video games. This has become a popular pastime on the internet and many highly skilled gamers have become internet celebrities through this means. However, some of them rather than becoming renowned for their gaming skills and great commentary, have become controversial and infamous. A good example ...

Rob Dyrdeks Family: His Kids And Relationship With Wife Bryiana Noelle Flores A multi-talented star and an elite pro skateboarder, Rob Dyrdeks success story began at a remarkably young age. Yet another proof that schooling doesnt always correlate with success, Rob has established himself not just as a phenomenal sportsman but also as a successful entrepreneur. Besides perfecting his skill as a natural talent on the board, ...

xChocobars  Biography and Everything You Should Know About Her Having distinguished herself and recorded massive successes in an industry notably dominated by men, it is very safe to say that Xchocobars deserves all the attention and cash she makes from her career. A household name on Twitch (a smart live streaming video platform), the online-gamer is popularly known for streaming classic games such as Stardew ...

Everything To Know About Mary Padian, Her Boyfriend and Net Worth Mary Padian is a famous American television reality personality best known for her involvements on the Reality show Storage Wars. She also has her own shop called Mary finds where she displays her antique collections. Since her childhood, Padian has been a creative learner. At the time, she used to create new items out of reusable ones and ...

Betsy Woodruffs Family Life: Is She Married or Related To Bob Woodruff? An old name in the world of journalism, Betsy Woodruff has warmed her way into the hearts of many with her impressive talents. Through hard work, Woodruff has carved a niche for herself in a very competitive field. Betsy has strong family and work values and is also an advocate for equal opportunities for everyone ...

Matpat (Matthew Patrick)  Wife, Height & Net Worth As far as internet business is concerned, Matpat remains one of the most dynamic and seasoned figures. He boasts a wealth of experience that has helped him in growing his business from one level of greatness to another. Like most successful people, MatPat started out small but today, he makes millions of dollars from his ...

Facts About Ricegum  His Girlfriend, Real Name & Net Worth Ricegum is an online gamer and YouTube sensation who ditched college; took advantage of the digital era, and made a name for himself on the internet. Though he began as a gaming YouTuber, Ricegum soon gained recognition as a controversial internet star following his many diss tracks. Here is everything you need to know about the youngster ...

Joy Taylor Once Married MLBs Richard Giannotti  Inside Look At Her Love Life and Family The erosion of the sexist idea that women have no business in sports broadcasting created a host of women celebrities who attained fame outside of modeling and acting. One of them, Joy Taylor, a radio personality and TV host for Fox Sports 1, has been in the industry since 2009, becoming one of the most ...

What To Know About Conan OBriens Wife, Kids & Family Today The name Conan OBrien is one that jumps right at you almost immediately you start talking about the most popular television hosts in the USA and this is no surprise because the man behind that name has risen to become one of the most admired men in the business. Known for hosting the late-night talk ...

David Letterman  Net Worth, Wife & Son In all of American, one man whose face has been seen frequently by late night TV talk show lovers is none but David Letterman. The comedian and TV show veteran has been hosting late night talk shows for more than three decades. His Late Night with David Letterman show began on February 1st, 1982 aired ...

Demystifying Sssniperwolfs Family Background And The Boyfriends Shes Had Since she launched her eponymously named channel in 2013, Sssniperwolf has been on the rise when it comes to video game influencers. She is one of the biggest names in the online gaming subgenre of YouTube videos. Real name Lia Shelesh, she started with Call of Duty: Black Ops II but has diversified with other ...

Lester Holt  Wife, Family & Net Worth Lester Holt is a multiple award-winning journalist, newscaster, reporter, and actor who has worked for notable media houses like WCBS TV, CBS, MSNBC and among others. His remarkable feat in journalism has endeared him to the hearts of many and earned him some awards and recognitions. Read on to get acquainted with his biography, ethnicity, ...

What Is Louis C.K. Doing Now, Where Are His Family And How Much Is His Net Worth? It is not easy to make it in comedy. It takes more than a funny bone and the ability to elicit a few giggles from a listening audience. For all the complexities that go into making a successful career in comedy, Louis C.K, the Washington D.C-born comedian, did it. For years, he was at the ...

The Progression of Hoda Kotbs Career, Her Ancestry and Family Life Hoda Kotb gained fame as a television host and news anchor for NBC. She anchors the shows signature show Today, and it has been an excellent vehicle for her skills in front of a camera. Kotb has won several awards, including Daytime Emmys and Peabody Awards. Simply put, she is one of the most successful ...

Jerry Seinfelds Family: All About The Amazing Comedians Wife and Kids Apparently one of the highly important entertainers in America, Jerry Seinfeld is a man of many talents. A very funny man, he is considered to be one of the most successful comedians in the USA who has been in the business as a professional rib-cracker for more than 40 years. As an actor, he has ...

The Rigors Of Sarah Silvermans Rise To Prominence And Rundown Of The Men She Has Dated A comedian, writer, and actress, Sarah Silvermans art and craft is as unique as you would ever find. Her poignant use of comedy to discuss social issues such as race, sexism, politics, and religion has gained her an impressive following. As unorthodox as her style is, so is her life experiences. She previously suffered from epiglottitis ...

Who Is Hannibal Buress, Does He Have A Wife or Girlfriend & Why Was He Arrested? Making people laugh when they are tense or not in the mood is a tough order and to ply the trade, it must indeed take some guts and expertise, this is what the humor maker, Hannibal Buress has been able to achieve and sustain after his inital teething process. The African-American is a screen writer, stand-up ...

The Success of John Mulaneys Career Efforts Since His Work On Saturday Night Live and Facts About His Wife John Mulaney had been working as a professional comedian for years before Saturday Night Live changed his status for life and like many who are now his fans, you probably did not know of him then. However, that changed when he joined the sketch comedy show in 2008. Since then, he has been one of ...

Jeff Dunham  Wife, Children and Net Worth Ventriloquism is a very subtle method of making an inanimate object (like a puppet, doll or dummy) appear to be saying words which are actually coming from the person (holding the inanimate object). In effect, the individual throws his/her voice to the puppet and can even appear to be having a conversation with it. Not ...

Ellen DeGeneres  Net Worth, Wife  Portia de Rossi & Parents Ellen DeGeneres is an American female standup comedian who has proven that whatever a man can do, a woman can also do. Since her journey as a standup comedian started in 1981, she has held swirl as one of the finest comedians America and the world at large has seen. She is often referred to ...

Revisiting Joan Rivers Death  The Daughter, Husband & Net Worth She Left Behind Joan Rivers was a renowned American comedian, TV host, writer, and actress. Her brand of comedy consisted of scathing one-liners and no individual or topic is spared. She hosted her own talk shows in the 80s and 90s and was a pioneer for women in stand up comedy. She was the first woman to host a late night ...

The Struggles of Margaret Chos Childhood, How It Influenced Her Career Growth and Love Life Margaret Cho is best described as a comic star who knows how to maneuver everything related to life into a rib-cracking joke. She is also known to criticize every social and political problem, especially those involving race and sexuality. Apart from her talents as a comic actress, she does amazingly well as a singer and ...

Where Is Eric Bolling Today? Who Is His Son & What Is His Net Worth? Eric Bolling who was once a notable figure on Fox News, is an American TV personality, an author, and versatile Journalist. As a political and financial analyst/commentator, he anchored discussions bothering on finance for Fox Business Channel. Here is everything there is to know about his career, family, and allegations that led to his exit ...

Who Is Chelsea Handler and Does She Have A Husband or Boyfriend? Chelsea Handler is one of Americas top female comedians. She is also an actress, writer, television host, producer, and activist. She is known to be very outspoken even with things that are very personal. In separate interviews with The New York Times, Handler revealed that she had an abortion twice when she was 16. She has authored five books ...

How Did Laura Lee Achieve Fame, How Much is She Worth and Who is Her Husband? Laura Lee is a popular American YouTuber, make-up artist and beauty blogger. From posting videos of her makeup routines on Instagram, Lee has transformed into a beauty influencer and a YouTube sensation. Today, her YouTube Channel has over 630 million views and 4.5 million subscribers. Asides having millions of followers across all social media platforms, ...

Madison Gesiotto Bio  Ethnicity, Parents & Measurements Madison Gesiotto is no ordinary woman; although she excelled in quite a number of pageants and competitions while she was in school, it is her views on politics and issues in America that has made her name known to most people. She possesses beauty and intelligence in a seemingly equal measure and has been able ...

Who Is Lil Tay? Parents, Brother, Sister, Age, Net Worth, Ethnicity Child stardom is nothing new in the entertainment world. With the advent of social media, we have seen more stars made from the internet than ever before, and Lil Tay is one of them. Her uploaded rap videos trademark is cursing, swearing, cash-throwing, and use of obscene languages. Her fame went wild after she dropped ...

What To Know About Tig Notaros Wife, Kids and Family Today Tig Notaro is an American stand-up comic star, writer, actress, and radio analyst. Since she started her career in 2001, she has become one of Americas best comedians, particularly when it comes to observational comedy. One prominent aspect of her routine involves her family, which includes a wife and two children. Interestingly, Tig Notaro is part ...

Who Is Chantel Jeffries? What To Know About Her Age, Ethnicity & Net Worth Chantel Jeffries is a lady of many talents. Beyond being celebrated as a DJ, she has fared well as a model, an actress, musician, and as an artist. She first rose to fame on Instagram where she has a large following. However, in recent times, she has hit the spotlight for her rumored relationships with some ...

Is Ellen DeGeneres Married, Who Is The Brother  Vance DeGeneres and Family Members? Ellen DeGeneres is one of a kind celebrity in todays world as she has used her wealth for the greater good for many people. She has served a host of famous awards shows like the Grammy, Primetime Emmy and Academy Awards. Moreso, she is probably one of the most decorated entertainment personalities around the world and ...

Carli Bybel Bio  Height, Boyfriend & Net Worth Video blogging is now on the rise and YouTube is the place where most of it happens. If you are a lady who cares about her looks or a guy who likes to help his woman out with her looks, then one person whose name rings a bell when it comes to giving beauty tips ...

Who Is Lexy Panterra? What To Know About Her Ethnicity, Boyfriend & Net Worth Lexy Panterra is one of the YouTube personalities whose breakout came through the Twerk dance videos she posted on her social media handles and YouTube which has so far generated over 13 million views for her. From there on, she created her LexTwerkOut workout program in 2014. She is sure very talented as she as moved ...

Who Is AnneMunition? What Is Her Ethnicity & Does She Have A Girlfriend or Boyfriend? AnneMunition is a professional gamer and content creator of American origin. She is one of the most sought-after streamers on Twitch  a popular online platform for watching and streaming videos, especially video games. AnneMunition has almost half a million followers on Twitch and her channel has accumulated at least 13 million views. Her favorite games ...

Norm MacDonald  Former Wife, Son & Net Worth Recently, 59-year-old former Saturday Night Live stand-up comic Norm MacDonald caused a not-so-funny stir when he expressed his personal opinion about the #MeToo movement speaking in defense of Louis CK and Roseanne Barr. Following the backlash of his actions, he is diligently doing damage control for his questionable opinion by posting a public apology on ...

Inside Iliza Shlesingers Life With Husband and How Much She is Worth Now Witty, spontaneous, and truly humorous, Iliza Shlesinger is an American comedian who is clearly proving that the stereotypical claim that women are not really funny is not only incredibly wrong but completely outrageous. Having been in the game for more than 10 years, Shlesinger has grown bigger with each step, stunning fans with her incredible ...

Who Is Nessa Diab? Details of her Parents, Ethnicity & Relationship With Colin Kaepernick Nessa Diab has gained more fame as the girlfriend of different footballers than in her career. She is currently with the popular National Football League (NFL) player, Colin Kaepernick, and has stood by his side during his most trying times. Also known for her mononym, Nessa, she recently engaged in a tweet battle with the ...

Samantha Bee  Inside the Life of Full Frontal Comedian and Presenter We have over the decades seen various brands of humor and personalities who have walked the ropes. One of the formidable forces in the world of comedy is no other than the iconic Samantha Bee of the Daily Show who now runs her own television show on TBS channel. She is a Canadian-American political commentator, ...

What Happened To Jessica Williamss Boyfriend And Which Are Her Best Works? Jessica Williams is a woman who has a lot of feathers in her cap  and keeps acquiring more. The former senior political correspondent of the comic Daily Show, who is also a comedian and actress whose recent movie appearance include starring as a playwright just recovering from a recent split with her boyfriend, Damon, and ...

Who is Nicole Byer? Here are 5 Facts You Need To Know About The Comedian Nicole Byer, an American comedian, actress, and writer, made a name for herself after she played supporting roles on MTVs prank show Ladylike and the reality show Girl Code. The latter was a series that featured comedians who analyzed in minute details, all the issues that young women deal with daily, from period to dating, to weird friendship dynamics and questions about sex. Currently, ...

A Closer Look At Bart Kwans Ethnicity, Height & Personal Life Bart Kwan is one of few Asians who is known for being successful in the comic industry at an international level. His fame broke out after the YouTube channel which he created with his close pal Joe Jo garnered up massive followings. The talented duo has been running the channel since 2007 and their success ...

Heres How VanossGaming Achieved Fame Online, His Worth and Other Facts About The Gamer For many years, the decision to drop out of college to pursue an online career was considered to be foolish and self-destructive by conventional wisdom. It was no different when Evan Fong, popularly known as VanossGaming, dropped out of college to pursue a YouTube career. However, that radical move paid off, and he stands shoulder to ...

Desi Perkins  Ethnicity, Net Worth & Husband YouTube is littered with videos of makeup tutorials by different people but if you are interested in learning how to do your makeup like a pro, there is just one person on that platform who you must follow. She is none other than Desi Perkins! She is a popular make-up artist, Instagram star, and vlogger. Desi, ...

The Phases of Casey Neistats Pursuits and His Love Story With Candice Pool YouTuber, vlogger, filmmaker, and creator extraordinaire; these are just a few hats that Casey Neistat wears and the story of how he got here is incredible. A native of Connecticut, Neistat started out by making refreshingly-authentic short films and videos that featured content that was based on everyday life and called attention to serious issues. He ...

Connor Franta  Inside The Life of American YouTuber YouTube has produced a lot of young celebrities in modern times and Connor Franta happens to be one of them. Apart from being a YouTuber, the young American is also an entrepreneur, entertainer, and writer. His journey to fame began almost a decade ago when he started a self-named YouTube channel where he uploads content ranging ...

Rhett and Link  Bio, Who are Their Wives, Net Worth and Family Facts Rhett and Link refer to an American comedy duo who are very popular on YouTube. They are known for their comic songs, viral commercials, skits and the daily show, Good Mythical Morning. Good Mythical Morning is the most watched daily show online, averaging 100 million views in a month. The show has featured guests such ...

A Walk Through The Maze of Ryan Higas Career Pursuits And Relationship With Arden Cho Ryan Higa is not only celebrated as a YouTube star, but he is also famed for appearing on television screens as an actor and comedian. Nigahiga, his Youtube channel, has gathered over 20 million subscribers and billions of views with his different comic acts, short films, and music videos uploads. With the rise in his career, ...

What to Know About The Shows That Made Craig Ferguson a Star and His Family Ties Rising to the top of your profession can sometimes be a hard and difficult process. It requires days and nights of working consistently hard to be better than what you were yesterday. It requires not giving up when all of your experiences seem to be pushing you to quit. It is because of these challenges ...

David Dobrik Married Liza Koshy for One Month  Inside His Family and Relationships David Dobrik is a YouTube sensation who has garnered fame not just for his vlogs but his love life too. Given his career as a YouTuber, his channel is one place where he shares his romantic escapades. With a cute boyish look like his, this Slovakian young man is definitely a good catch, and not ...

Merrell Twins Bio  Ethnicity, Parents & Boyfriend One of the beautiful things about modern life is social media. As rudimentary as it might seem, it could turn out to be the greatest thing that would be invented in the next 50 years because of its impact on human life. Very few tools have revolutionized human behavior and culture as much as social ...

Who Is Bunny Meyer, Is She Married & What Is Her Net Worth? Bunny Meyer is a YouTube celebrity who has amassed over 8.8 million subscribers with 1.5 million viewers on her channel. She is popularly known as Grav3yardgirl and is one of the highest-paid YouTubers in the world. She initially started out as a fashion designer and later chose the path of a YouTuber. Grav3yardgirl has used her knowledge on fashion, makeup, ...

Ninja  Inside The Life of The American YouTuber and Internet Personality Ninja is a talented video game player known for his mastery of Fortnite and other seemingly difficult games he plays with ease. The video gamer made a career out of what is ordinarily the hobby of many people and has since then amassed a huge online following. Find out about him here, including the controversies that ...

What Is Eva Gutowskis True Sexuality and How Did She Rise So Fast As an Influencer? Ever since Eva Gutowski joined YouTube in 2011, it has been an interesting journey for her, moving from one milestone to the other. Backed by an army of young women and teenage girl fans known as Evanators, she has risen to become one of the most-talked-about personalities in the digital stratosphere. She has also leveraged ...

Emma Chamberlain Biography  Age, Height & Net Worth Before now, people in the entertainment industry could only achieve popularity after many years of dedication and hard work but since social media came into the scene, massive success and overnight popularity became possible. That is the story of Emma Chamberlain who encountered fame as a fifteen-year-old. Emma is one of the many young people who became ...

Anna Akana  Ethnicity, Boyfriend & Net Worth There is a new crop of YouTubers known by their different contents with a very strong uniqueness that stands every one of them out, some upload video games, some fashion while some others have comedy video contents to showcase on their channels. Anna Akana has used her platform to showcase her comedy contents to the ...

Revealing Truths About Lilly Singhs Ethnic Background, Family and Her Relationship With Yousef Erakat Lilly Singh is an Indian-Canadian YouTube personality, actress, and comedian also known as Superwoman. She kicked off her YouTube career in 2010 with the launch of her channel IISuperwomanII and followed it up with a vlog channel in 2011. This paved the way for her fame and success which led to a world tour. The ...

Who Is Andrea Constand, Is She Married and What Is Her Connection With Bill Cosby? Many people got sexually molested but could not voice out due to the stigma victims suffer and what will become of them thereafter. Very few of the victims danm every consequence to seek justice and bring the perpetrator to the book, like Andrea Constand. She never got any media buzz, not until her friend cum molester; ...

Who Is Lazarbeam (Lannan Eacott)? Here Are Facts You Need To Know Lannan Eacott became a person of interest after his YouTube channel, LazarBeam pulled him to the limelight. Initially, he started with uploads of Madden Challenge videos before deciding to build his own channel in January 2015. Within the space of three years, his YouTube channel had gathered over 7 million loyal subscribers. Today, he has not ...

Puzzling Facts About Wengies YouTube Success and More About Her Fiance Among the many YouTubers who have succeeded in winning the hearts of millions of people is Wengie. She is a Chinese-Australian YouTube personality, vlogger, singer, and voice actress. Wengie is famous for a lot of things, from her simple life hacks, DIYs, craft ideas to fun experiments, tricks and pranks. Her content portfolio also includes hair tutorials, diet & fitness tips, lookbooks, ...

Is Jeffree Star A Billionaire and How Much Does He Make On YouTube? If looks can be deceptive then theres no other person who proves this maxim better than Jeffree Star. A quick look at Stars pictures would likely leave you wondering whether or not to tag him a male or female. But who says being controversial has to be a curse? For Star, his looks have caught ...

The Place of Rosanna Pansinos Career Hats In Her Rise To Fame and Facts About Her Personal Life There are a few phrases that could summarize Rosanna Pansinos rise to fame. None of them can do it better than the famous axiom, no knowledge is lost. Her popularity YouTube comes out of her foray into other professions, specifically acting. Although acting now occupies one of the major professional hats in Rosannas resume, it was ...

Muselk (Elliott Watkins) Biography  Age, Girlfriend and Net Worth The new and best in-thing in terms of career is video gaming and we have over time seen young men and women make massive income from an activity that was purportedly designed to serve as a hobby or a relaxation activity. One of such individuals is the Australian-born YouTube Celebrity and Twitch streamer, Muselk, whose ...

PopularMMOs Biography: 5 Interesting Facts You Need To Know We have over the years seen social media millionaires, especially on the YouTube social platform. These celebrities cum millionaires have made names for themselves after carving out niches on the internet, and a typical example of one of such exciting media personality on the YouTube is American Minecraft gamer and YouTube star, PopularMMOs whose channel ...

Jason Nash Once Married Marney Hochman  What To Know About His Ex-Wife and Kids The now-defunct video-sharing app Vine was the path that led Jason Nash to fame. With it, he built an audience of over two million followers, which he parlayed into a significant YouTube career. That move has seen him become one of the most popular personalities on the internet, with the cash income to go with ...

Where Does Dantdm Live? What Do We Know About His Net Worth, Wife and Brother? Most parents buy video games for their kids to occupy their time leisure, while other parents frown at their kids when they play video games. Despite the disparity, every parent would be proud of their child if he/she eventually turns a celebrity or millionaire through playing video games like Dantdm. Biography of Dantdm Dantdm was born Daniel ...

LaurDIY  Biography: 5 Facts You Need To Know About The YouTuber LaurDIY is the YouTube channel of Lauren Riihimaki which she created on December 1, 2011, when she was still a college undergrad with the sole aim of giving Do It Yourself (DIY) as well as practical fashion and beauty tips to her followers. She has used the channel to establish herself as a YouTube personality ...

Lachlan Ross Power  Bio And Family Life Of Australian The YouTube Star It is amazing the varied sources of income that the internet has made possible in this day and age. Internet fame can get its holder a whole lot of monetary and social benefits, but it must be noted that it does not come easy or cheap. For those who desire fame, content is the sacrifice ...

Alfie Deyes  Bio and Net Worth: Everything You Need To Know Alfie Deyes is one internet personality you definitely would like to know about. He boasts of over 10 million subscribers on three of his YouTube channels and has three bestseller books to his name. He is probably the most renowned young personality on YouTube today and his vlogging empire continues to grow by the day. ...

Colleen Ballingers Love Story With Husband Erik Stocklin and How Much She Is Worth Now Colleen Ballinger is an American comedian and YouTuber who is a very funny, adventurous, and highly talented woman. She is also an actress, singer, and writer. Collen is widely known for her work on YouTube where she posts content on her channel, Miranda Sings. The comedian has gained many subscribers over the years and has ...

Who Are The Dude Perfect Members and How Much Are They Worth? Entertainment in the 21st century can be digested in many forms and with platforms like YouTube, the creators and purveyors of entertainment have been democratized. Today, one of the most popular platforms to exhibit ones creative talents is YouTube, even though there are other platforms like Twitter, Facebook, who suffer in comparison to YouTube because ...

Who Is Rudy Mancuso, What Is His Earning Power and What Do We Know About His Girlfriend? Rudy Mancuso started his internet journey on Vine. He would later transition to YouTube where he solidified his place among the internets most beloved comedic creators. He is now regarded as one of the renowned internet personalities in the world, with a presence in mainstream TV and film projects like Comedy Centrals Drunk History and ...

Vsauce (Michael Stevens) Biography and Net Worth: All You Need To Know The advent of YouTube and the internet as a whole revolutionized how human beings consume information. With each passing year, the percentage of learning that is done in a traditional classroom decrease as a seismic shift to internet-based learning happens in our education industry. From open courses online to YouTube classes and videos, there are ...

How did Jake Paul Make His YouTube Big Break and Who is His Wife? One of the most interesting Social Media personalities of the 21st century is the young and popular Jake Paul whose elder brother is the famed Vine star, Logan Paul. Jake has utilized the power of the internet to bring himself to the limelight with a channel named JakePaulProductions that has amassed up to six billion ...

5 Facts You Need To Know About Reaction Time (Tal Fishman)  The American YouTuber Before 2015, the leading meaning of reaction time was the amount of time it takes to respond to a stimulus, until Tal Fishman started his channel, Reaction Time on YouTube and the dominant meaning changed. Today, a google search of Reaction Time would deliver Tal Fishmans videos and YouTube channel link with a few physics ...

Grace Helbig  Net Worth, Boyfriend and Family Life of The YouTuber Grace Helbig is an American internet personality, comedian, actress, and writer. She became popular due to her daily vlog series, DailyGrace, which ran on My Damn Channel from 2008 to 2013. Helbig is also popular for her own indie series on YouTube, ItsGrace, which she launched in 2014. Her vlogs which feature random stuff such as ...

Mark Wiens Bio  Ethnicity, Wife and Parents Food is a great way to connect with people. We all love to eat, if not for the pleasure of food, the satisfaction of quenching hunger, and the very process of providing and sharing that food is part of the strongest bonds that bind humanity together. Maybe it is our historical connection to food, where ...

Is Filthy Frank Dead, What Happened To Him and How Much Is He Worth? As George Kusunoki Miller, he was a nobody. However, as Filthy Frank, George was one of the most famous internet personalities on the planet. The Filthy Frank Show, a sketch series on his YouTube channel, TVFilthyFrank, was one of the platforms most influential creations. He is the reason a crazy dance song, Harlem Shake, made it ...

CaptainSparklez Bio  Net Worth, House and Cars of The Famous YouTuber Sometimes, what society wants from its citizens is quite different from what the citizens want for themselves. This is evident in the life and career of video blogger and American YouTube personality, Jordan Maron famous for his YouTube channel CaptainSparklez. He dropped out of school after discovering his talent in playing an online game called Minecraft. ...

Who is Simply Nailogical (Cristine Rotenberg)? Here are Facts You Must Know Canadian Youtube personality, Simply Nailogical (Cristine Rotenberg) originally started out polishing and designing nails even before it became a trendy culture in the social media. Simply Nailogica started out her showbiz career in her early days as a child actress, acting in commercials for game and toy companies. Aside from acting, she is blogger, vlogger, specializing ...

5 Interesting Facts You Need To Know About Huda Beauty In the world of entrepreneurship, it is interesting when an individual has a mentor who he/she looks up to, this yield more productivity on the part of the individual. The iconic and rich American beautician and makeup artist Huda Kattan nicknamed Heida is the founder of the Huda Beauty blog which is number one Instagram beauty blog ...

Is Dino MasterChef Gay? Details About His Ethnicity, Girlfriend, Where He Is Now Food, for the better part of the early years of human life, was nothing more than what we needed for survival. There was no artistry or curation to the method of cooking. The scarcity of food left no room for artistic expression until we figured out agriculture and we could make as much as we ...

Who Is Gabbie Hanna And How Did She Become Famous? As the world shifts to digital media and depends more and more on streaming services for its news and entertainment content, YouTubers have become one of the leading creators in the new media world. Their understanding of the online audience: how to create, maintain, and increase followers, are all handy skills that have primed them ...

Jacksepticeye  Height, Girlfriend & Net Worth Jacksepticeye is a YouTuber and actor who gained popularity with a series of gaming videos he uploads on his channel to the delight of millions of his subscribers. He is Known primarily for his comic video game series titled Lets Play and his vlogs. His channel was formerly ranked 46th in the list of most subscribed ...

Chris Heria Personal Details: About His Wife, Height & Ethnicity Background In this generation, keeping fit has become one of the major criteria for being hale and hearty. In fact, most occupations these days are majorly concerned with ones body mass, weight and looks. Unlike the past where most people have to register in a gym to keep fit, social media has made it quite easy ...

Everything You Need To Know About Game Grumps Gaming is becoming incredibly popular on YouTube these days with game vloggers make millions of dollars out of them yearly. One of the most popular up-coming gaming YouTube channels is Game Grumps. The Lets Play series was created in 2012 and celebrated its fifth anniversary on July 18th, 2017. In six years of its existence, the ...

Daithi De Nogla Biography, Girlfriend and Net Worth YouTube has created an avenue for many to make wealth and become famous from the comfort of their homes while having fun. Many have built a career out of the platform, uploading numerous videos that have earned them the admiration of viewers across the globe. For Daithi De Nogla, he is loved for his humorous commentary on ...

Does Phoebe Robinson Have A Boyfriend or Husband and What Do We Know About Her Family? Phoebe Robinson is a New York-based comedian, writer, and actress. She is best known as the co-creator and co-host of the WNYC Studios podcast 2 Dope Queens. Just like some other female comedians, she never had any original plans of becoming a stand-up comedian even though, according to her, she took a class on a whim at Carolines on Broadway. After ...

Who Are Lex and Alana from Listed Sisters? What Is Their Ethnicity & Is the Show Cancelled? America is a country built on diversity. Everywhere you look all over the country, a countless number of immigrants or children of immigrants have become an integral part of the fabric of the country. From entertainment to business, immigrants are creating a niche for themselves and climbing to the summit of their respective professions. One ...

Riveting Facts About Danielle Lombard And What She Is Best Known For The American entertainment industry is one that provides many avenues for aspiring hopefuls to express their talents and become famous. From films to television shows and game shows, there is no shortage of ways for men and women who desire fame to pursue and earn it in the United States of America. Another tested medium ...

Unearthing New Details About The YouTube Success And Personal Life of Alex Burriss of Wassabi Productions Wildly hilarious and truly audacious, Alex Wassabi is an American YouTuber who has become a very popular face on the video-sharing platform after having garnered millions of subscribers over the years by keeping people glued to his channel with his witty parody video releases. If you have always loved parody videos, there is every chance ...

Everything You Need To Know About H2O Delirious H2O Delirious whose full birth name is reported to be Jonathan Gormon Dennis has successfully kept himself mystified by hiding his face behind the masks leaving his loyal fans speculating who he really is for many years. The American YouTube star is easily identified by the Jason Mask Style with make-up which he wears on his ...

Who Is HolaSoyGerman and What Happened To Him? German Garmendia has certainly seen it all when it comes to internet success. His channels, HolaSoyGerman and JuegaGerman are in the top twenty most subscribed channel on YouTube. The Chilean YouTuber found a way to tap into one of the worlds greatest inventions and make a living from it. He has been able to build ...

Who Are Glenn Becks Family, What Is His Net Worth And What Happened To Him? The American political commentary space is filled with different personalities. A few of them, through their rhetoric, charisma, and resources have been able to build a large following of men and women who listen to them for insight and direction for various political and social issues in the United States. For Conservatives, the story is ...

Following Charissa Thompsons Rise Through The Ranks Of Sports Casting and All About Her Boyfriend Superstar TV host and sportscaster, Charissa Thompson, has been hailed as one of the highest-profile women journalists in America, and the reason is there for all to see. She has worked for popular establishments such as Versus, Yahoo! Sports, ESPN, GSN, and Big Ten Network. She currently hosts the popular pre-game show, Fox NFL Kickoff, ...

Is Chris Kattan Gay or Does He Have A Wife? What Is His Net Worth? Chris Kattan is a popular American comedian and actor. He has appeared in several comic movies and TV series such as The Middle, A Night at the Roxbury and Bunnicula. Kattan is, however, most popular for his six-year stint as a cast member of Saturday Night Live. During his time on the legendary show, he ...

Everything You Should Know About the Rise of Insta Star Claire Abbott and Why She Gave It All Up A lot of young Americans have shot into the limelight for uploading different kinds of videos on YouTube. Some of these young stars include Connor Franta, Desi Perkins, Emma Chamberlain, the Dolan Twins (Ethan and Grayson), and Claire Abbott. The latter became a social media celebrity for uploading sexy bikini pictures of herself on social media. Apart from ...

5 Facts You Need To Know About The YouTube Channel  h3h3Productions H3h3Productions is a YouTube channel that specializes on Comic responses or reactions of other contents or trendy stories. The celebrity couple that created the channel has over time racked up sizable views for their commentaries and contents. Even though they had their own fair share of copyright cases, thankfully they scored an unprecedented victory in all ...

Lilypichu Bio  Height, Brother and Love Story With Albert SleightlyMusical Chang Like most popular internet celebrities, Lilypichu is one of those Twitch streamers who spend their lives on camera. From daydreaming about the possibility of becoming a full-time professional streamer, she grew to live out her dreams on the popular live streaming platform where people play games, make crafts, and showcase their day-to-day activities. Given the rise of ...

KSI  What To Know About His Girlfriend, Brother  Deji Olatunji & Net Worth Assuredly, when Internet inventors Vint Cerf and Bob Khan created the technological masterpiece, they probably did not know how massive the creation will be harnessed by many for different purposes including as a platform for earning money through content creation. One of such person who smiles to the bank regularly today for spending time creating ...

The Interesting Progression and Highlights of Carrie Keagans Career as a Host and Actress Carrie Keagan has garnered huge fame through her various stints on television. She is not just your regular TV host but one with a difference. Keagan has hosted several high profile events and TV shows, including VH1s Big Morning Buzz Live and Fox News Channels Red Eye with Greg Gutfeld. However, not many know she ...

The Gist On Elise Jordans Marriages And Her Rise To Prominence Political commentaries tend to be boring when it is handled by someone who does not have a knack for it. However, when you see the likes of Elise Jordan run the same commentary, you will have a lot of reasons to look forward to watching her again as the journalist is well-versed in the field ...

What Is Timmy Thick Best Known For and How Successful Is The Star? Thanks to the internet, many people whose talents would have ordinarily gone unnoticed have become famous. A very good example of this modern-day internet celebrity is Timmy Thick, an American social media star. He became popular on Instagram due to his penchant for posting raunchy pictures of himself. He also often posted videos of himself ...

What Does Heather Storm Do For a Living and Who Is She Dating? Reality Television is a great way to make a name for oneself as well as amass a fortune. Heather Storm can attest to this as she is one of those who have made a name and earned a lot from reality TV. She made her name appearing on shows like Car Fanatics, Awesome Autos, and, ...

Matt Carriker Biography  Net Worth, Wife & Height Unlike your regular veterinary doctor next door, Matt Carriker chose to spice up his noble profession with the unusual. Though he is known to many as a medical practitioner, Carriker is better renowned as a YouTube star and an animal lover. Having recorded huge successes on his various YouTube channels, the vet doctors name and ...

Jillian Mele of Fox News Career Achievements, Husband & Measurements There are quite a good number of presenters on radio and television who listeners and viewers may never wish to miss any of their shows because of their sensational golden voice, beauty or the special way or artistry they anchor their shows. Jillian Mele is one of such. She has been at the top of ...

Who is Gillian Turner of Fox News? Her Fiance or Husband and Net Worth Gillian Turner is well-known as a news correspondent for Fox News Channel but before she became a TV personality, she built an intimidating resume working for different institutions, including the American government. She served in different capacities at the White House National Security Council during the administration of former US Presidents  George W. Bush and Barack Obama. ...

Gloria Govan Bio  Age, Ethnicity & Height Even as Gloria Govan is famous as an American actress, author, a TV host, and reality television star, shes more popular as the wife of the former NBA player, Matt Barnes. She became known after appearing on the Florida version of the reality television series, Basketball Wives and later, Basketball Wives: LA  after Matt was traded to the Los Angeles Lakers. Sadly, ...

Michael Fishmans Interesting Start as an Actor and Why He Divorced His Wife of Many Years When one door closes, another one opens. As silly as that axiom may seem, it is the story of the resurgence of Michael Fishman, who plays D.J Conner on the popular show, Roseanne. Having played the character for several years as a child actor into his teenage years; when the show originally ended, Michael did ...

Who Is October Gonzalez  Tony Gonzalezs Wife? All You Need To Know October Gonzalez is a popular American TV host and media personality. Additionally, she is also a model. Gonzalez has hosted several TV shows such as Beat Shazam, Entertainment Tonight, and Rachel Ray. She has also featured in several reality TV shows. Gonzalezs fame is not just due to her profession but also because of her ...

Who Is Tony Berlin  Harris Faulkners Husband: His Children and Family Facts Tony Berlin is a popular American media guru. He has variously worked as a reporter, anchor, and producer for some of the biggest TV networks in America. They include CNN, CBS, NBC, and ABC (where he hosted the popular Good Morning America). Berlin has now diversified into public relations and owns his own PR firm. ...

The Progression of Gianna Tobonis Journalism Career and Details About Her Marriage to Kyle Buckley Gianna Toboni may not be your ideal newscaster but her unusual reporting is what made her a household name. The American journalist is renowned for her hard-hitting and authentic reportage. A motivator and activist for total press freedom, Gianna loves to explore pervasive cultural issues. Not only does this unique and ambitious journalist call for all ...

Dog The Bounty Hunters Family Including Details of His Late Wife and Kids Popularly known as Dog, a name which he got from the television series, Dog The Bounty Hunter, Duane Chapman, an American bounty hunter, and one-time bail bondsman, went from being convicted for a felony to being a reality TV star. He was brought to the limelight following the capture of the convicted criminal, Andrew Luster in 2003 and this eventually made ...

Vicky Karayiannis, Chris Cornells Wifes Bio, Children and Family The world of showbiz is made up of different people who serve different roles, and function in a variety of capacities, and one of the most important people are those in the background. Publicists are undoubtedly one of these background people yet they are vital to the life and fame of most of our favorite ...

Joe Rogan Has A Step-Daughter and 2 Other Kids With Wife Jessica Ditzel  Meet His Family Joe Rogan is a popular American stand-up comedian and TV host. His journey to stardom began in the late 80s and has seen him host several shows, the most popular is the game show titled Fear Factor. The exciting show dares contestants to face some of their greatest fears and embark on challenging stunts. The ...

Josh Gates and Wife Hallie Gnatovich Have 2 Kids But Who Has the Higher Net Worth? Best known for his explorations and adventures, Josh Gates, is a television presenter with a voracious appetite for seeing the world and the beauties in it. Some of that beauty, however, is in his home, in the form of two children he shares with his wife, Hallie Gnatovich. Not excluded is their marriage which has lasted ...

Holly Sonders Wiki, Plastic Surgery & Why She Divorced Her Husband  Erik Kuselias After trying everything within her capacity to have a low key wedding, Holly Sonders was drawn to the public because of her husbands controversy at his workplace. Well, the two are rumored to be divorced but the article below will give more light on how true these rumors are. Meanwhile, Holly Sonders is yet to ...

Nadeska Alexis Bio  Age, Boyfriend & Net Worth Journalism is one diverse profession that allows the practitioners to choose their area of specialty, build a career on it by reporting the truth and facts which in the long run will distinguish them as deserving commendation and recognition among their peers. Some choose to specialize in political journalism, while to others it is sports ...

Media Platforms Charlamagne Tha God Has Explored and All The Controversies He Has Courted Charlamagne Tha God is an American on-air personality, radio presenter, and more recently, author. He is popularly known as a co-host on New York radios nationally syndicated show, The Breakfast Club, a program he has been hosting alongside DJ Envy and Angela Yee since 2010. However, his early years had no connection to his current career ...

A Look At Jimmy Fallons Net Worth and Family Including His Wife & Kids Sometimes, a childs passion for something is a pointer to what he/she would become in the future. As a child, Jimmy Fallon was literally obsessed with watching the late-night comedy program, Saturday Night Live (SNL). Then, his parents would tape the clean parts for him to watch and later, he and his sister would re-enact sketches from the ...

Kay Adams Biography  Does The Sportscaster Have A Husband or Boyfriend? When you hear the phrase sports enthusiast, women are hardly the first group that comes to mind. Well, thats changing pretty fast. Especially with the rise of female sports analysts and broadcasters like Kay Adams who is famed for knowing more about sports than most men do. And why not, shes paid handsomely for it ...

Ben Shapiros Family  Meet His Wife, Kids and Sister Who is Popular for the Wrong Reasons A multi-talented man, Ben Shapiro is a man of controversial nature, an attribute that has made him an unusual public figure. An intellectual whose career path was clearly defined even before he became a man, the Jewish conservative commentator has always had his way with words. He became popular by sharing his critical and often ...

QVC Shawn Killinger Bio  Husband, Net Worth & Facts To Know Shawn Killinger is a prominent TV personality who has worked her way to the top. Though not initially a journalist by training, she defied the odds and today has established herself as a household name, as well as, worked alongside some industry legends. More than just being a reporter, newscaster, and anchor, heres all you ...

Liv Lo  Dissecting the Ethnicity, Parents and Personal Life of Henry Goldings Wife While many are aware that Liv Lo is the better half to Crazy Rich Asians star Henry Golding, only a few understand why his beautiful wife appears increasingly endearing to fans. A former model turned TV personality, and fitness star, Liv has an impressive resume which when combined with that of her statuesque spouse is considered a perfect ...

Stpeach Age, Husband and Other Facts About The Twitch Streamer Lisa Vannatta, famously known by her online alias, STPeach is a Canadian video game streamer cum vlogger who has garnered fame through her appearances on different video-sharing/social networking platforms such as Youtube, Instagram, Twitch, Reddit, and Twitter. The beautiful lady got her career to a start in August 2015 when she joined the live streaming video platform, Twitch. She rose to ...

Insights into Seth Meyers Wife, Family and What His Net Worth Is Celebrities are mostly remembered and known for the work they do. For Seth Meyers, his career as a comedian, writer, actor, TV host, and producer is his biggest identifier. He was on Saturday Night Live SNL show as a head writer and cast member for more than ten years during which he built a reputation ...

Who Is Jessica Gadsden  Age, Net Worth & All About Charlamagne tha Gods Wife Jessica Gadsden is an American fitness coach as well as a personal trainer. She is better known as the spouse of popular American media personality, Charlamagne Tha God. Charlamange Tha God is a well-known TV and radio personality in the U.S. He has featured in several shows (both on the radio and TV) and is ...

Who Is Collins Tuohy  Michael Ohers sister ? Her Wedding, Husband & Net Worth Collins Tuohy is an American entrepreneur, philanthropist, blogger, and social media personality. She is also better known as the adoptive sister of NFL player, Michael Oher, whose life story inspired the Hollywood blockbuster The Blind Side. The Blind Side tells the true life story of Oher who grew up in an impoverished background consisting of a ...

Eye-Popping Facts About The Personal Life And Career Success Of Sportscaster Heidi Watney Heidi Watney is a media personality who has created a niche for herself as a sportscaster. Starting out as a radio presenter, the brilliant young lady has gone on to work for several prominent sports networks, and currently, she is with the MLB. The sportscaster is also known to have been an avid sports lady right ...

Marty Lagina Bio  Siblings (Martina and Rick Lagina), Net Worth and Wife Marty Lagina is an American engineer and businessman who has risen to fame as a reality TV star. This is thanks to his involvement in the adventure TV series, The Curse of Oak Island. The Curse of Oak Island is a long-running TV series which airs on the history channel. The show aims to solve ...

Is Jordan Schlansky Just A Character or a Real Life Person and What Does He Do? The world of late-night television is an interesting one. Shows during that time are geared towards giving viewers comedic relief from a long day at work through interviews and comedy sketches. The often charismatic host of this show requires the balancing talent of a producer whose primary job is to deliver great episodes. It is ...

Heres How Wealthy Jimmy Kimmel Is From All The Phases of His Career, Marriages and Sons Health Jimmy Kimmel is a renowned late-night talk show host known for his charm, wit, and the A-list guests he features on his show. As the host of Jimmy Kimmel Live! On ABC, Jimmy has been serving comedy to television viewers for years which played a pivotal role in launching him into mainstream fame and enabled ...

Natasha Bertrand Biography  Is She Married? Who Is the Husband & What Is Her Age? Natasha Bertrand is not just a young prominent journalist but a first-rate investigative reporter. With her natural beauty and smile, Natashas sharp, insightful political commentary also makes her a thorough reporter. Her sound political perspective and coverage in the country have made her a force to be reckoned with in the profession. Renowned for her ...

What Happened to Shane Kilcher? His Injury Update, Net Worth and More Shane Kilcher is well-known thanks to the Discovery Channel series Alaska: The Last Frontier. It is a show that documents the daily lives of the extended Kilcher family, people who live without plumbing or modern heating. The episodes follow their routines as they rely on hunting and farming for their nutritional needs as well as ...

Is Stephanie Gosk Gay or Lesbian, Who is the Wife or Partner  Jenna Wolfe? In August 2013, NBCs Today viewers were greeted with two shocking news. Today weekend anchor, Jenna Wolfe, announced that she was as a lesbian, introducing her partner as NBC News correspondent Stephanie Gosk, and said the two are expecting their first child. A long time has passed since then and certainly, a lot of things ...

Nikki Mudarris  Bio and Net Worth: 5 Interesting Facts You Need to Know Nikki Mudarris, also known as Miss Nikki Baby, is a reality television star, model and fashionista. Shes best known for VH1s reality TV series Love & Hip-Hop: Hollywood. Her entrepreneurial skills enable her to create and run a successful lingerie line Nude by Nikki. Not only that, but Nikki has also successfully run the Las ...

5 Interesting Things You Need To Know About Kelly Nash Ever heard of the lady who gained national prominence for taking a selfie with a dangerous ball just a few inches away from hitting her? Its no other person than Kelly Nash, an American sports broadcaster currently working as host of The Rundown show which airs on MLB Network every weekday at 2 pm ET. ...

Understanding The Height of Fame John Oliver Achieved With The Daily Show and How He Met His Wife Without knowledge of who he is and his exemplary career, John Oliver cuts an unassuming figure of a regular man but he is one of the most influential personalities in America, especially on television. Since he began his career in 1998, he has been a loud and unapologetic agent of change, using his wit and ...

Why Did Big Chief Leave Street Outlaws, Where Is He Now And Why Did He Divorce His Wife? Justin Shearer, otherwise known by his professional name Big Chief is a famous street racer and television personality. He is famously known for being one of the main characters on the racing reality television series, Street Outlaws. Justin, who had been a significant part of the show since its premiere in 2013, appeared in a ...

Who is Josina Anderson of ESPN? Her Husband and Family Facts There has been a gradual paradigm shift in the world of sports which has today produced the likes of Serena Williams, Naomi Osaka, and other female athletes that are pulling great feats in different sporting fields. Their achievements have also been followed by the emergence of female sports journalists such as Jillian Mele, Eboni Williams, ...

Is Brittany Wagner Married, Who Is The Husband, How Old Is She? Brittany Wagner has been an inspiration to a lot of sports youngster. She has won the hearts of many athletic students with her role as a life coach and an academic counselor. She is well groomed in her career and has worked over a decade for The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and The National ...

Tati Westbrook Bio  Age, Husband & Net Worth With five videos dished out every week, alongside running her own brand, beauty guru, and YouTube superstar Tati Westbrook has proved to the world that theres utterly no impossibility or limit to whatever one is passionate about. Tati is best known for being the owner and manager of the worlds most-viewed beauty and lifestyle YouTube channel, ...

Cathy Areus Long Road to Becoming a Freelance Journalist and What to Know About Her Kids An American freelance journalist, news analyst, and author, Cathy Areu has built a lasting reputation for herself on cable television. Popular for her skillful and sassy presentation of professional views on varying topics including cultural and feminist issues, Cathy is an inspiration to many women across the globe. In addition to being a journalist, she ...

Tucker Carlsons Love Story With Wife Susan Andrews, their Children and Net Worth Today On the TV screens, Tucker Carlson is that fiery fellow who passionately dishes out his conservative and often controversial views on issues of national importance. Such brazenness has fetched him many enemies, especially on the left-wing, but it has also helped him cement a reputation as one of the foremost broadcast journalists in America. His ...

Paige Wyatts Net Worth, Boyfriend and Where She Is Now Paige Wyatt became popular after the Wyatt family began running the reality television show, American Guns. The Wyatt family comprises Rich Wyatt (father), Renee Wyatt (mother), Paige and Kurt Wyatt (children). Rich Wyatt originally ran a gun shop, the Gunsmoke Guns in Wheat Ridge, Colorado which is outside of Denver. The business which he ran together ...

The Progression of Howard Sterns Career As A Media Personality And Why He Divorced His First Wife Howard Stern is a legendary American radio host, who has also done some notable work as an actor, producer, author, as well as photographer. The radio personality achieved worldwide fame as a result of his self-titled radio program, The Howard Stern Show. As a professional radio personality, he has worked in different radio stations. Since 2006, ...

Lisa Joyners Biography  Ethnicity, Net Worth and Other Key Facts Lisa Joyner is an American Journalist, TV talk show host, and actress. Some of her well-known works are her correspondences for the Los Angeles based TV KCBS, inFANity show, Find My Family Show including her film and television appearances in Brimstone, American Sweetheart, The Bold and The Beautiful among others. Lisas passion for reconnecting people with their biological families ...

Amanda Balionis Rise Through the Ranks of Sportscasting and the Identity of Her Boyfriend Amanda Balionis is an American sportscaster currently working as a golf broadcaster for CBS Sports. Among so many of her works in the field of sports reporting, Amandas PGA Tour coverage seems to be the most popular so far. She covered the Super Bowl working with CBS Sports social media team in Atlanta, where she ...

Dissecting Charles Paynes Sexual Allegations, Its After Effects and More About His Wife Charles Payne had a respectable career as an analyst on Wall Street before he made the transition to television and became a contributor and later a host on Fox. In that time, his expertise has come under scrutiny, and he has been at the center of at least one major controversy. The major controversy in question ...

Erik Asla And Tryra Banks Split: Everything You Need To Know Tyra Banks and Erik Asla have called it quits! The couple, who began dating in 2013 and have a son named York Banks Asla, has decided to end what everybody taught was the perfect relationship. Neither person has come out to give a reason for the breakup, but what is obvious right now is that ...

What to Note About Dr Terry Dubrows Qualifications, TV Works and Marriage to Heather Kent In the realm of people that we expect to see regularly on our screens, medical doctors are closer to the bottom of the list. Aside from the fact that their work has little correlation with TV, they are presumably too busy to pursue life as TV personalities. Yet, a few of them have usurped this ...

Jessica Goch  Bio: 5 Things You Didnt Know About Ninjas Wife Jessica Goch is the Schofield-born American Social Media Influencer who has worked as a model but is now better known as a host and interviewer of prominent Electronic sports celebrities at popular gaming events/tournaments. The screen queen also serves as the manager of her famous husband Ninja aka Tyler Blevins whose exploits on Twitch and Fortnite has ...

CNNs Chris Cuomo Biography  Wife, Family & Net worth Chris Cuomo needs no elaborate introduction as he has starred graced many prominent Television cable networks and his voice has been heard through acknowledged radio shows. He is a television journalist and Lawyer who has previously worked for ABC News as Chief law and justice correspondent as well as a co-anchor on 20/20. If you still ...

Neil deGrasse Tyson  Family, Religion & Net Worth Neil deGrasse Tyson is a distinguished American astrophysicist and author who has been able to achieve so much after falling in love with astronomy at the age of 9. He has since attended and become an alumnus of prestigious universities such as Harvard, Princeton, and Columbia, and also recorded numerous achievements in his field of ...

Is Simon Cowell Gay? Does He Have A Wife or Girlfriend and Why is He Famous? Simon Cowell is a well-known talent show judge, TV producer, entrepreneur and one of the most popular TV personalities that Britain has ever produced. In conjunction with his company, Syco, Cowell is the brain behind hugely successful talent hunt shows such as The X-Factor UK, The X-Factor US, Britains Got Talent, Americas Got Talent and ...

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A 19-year-old boy allegedly shot a young girl dead before attempting suicide by turning the gun on himself near Ponda town in Goa, police said today.

Nikhil Kumar, hailing from Jharkhand and currently living in Loutolim village, shot Sujata Naik (19) dead and then tried to commit suicide by shooting himself in the stomach last evening at the deceased's home in Madkai village, Ponda police said.

The boy entered the girl's house where some female family members, including her mother, were present. The girl's father was not in the house at the time of the incident.

Kumar was carrying a revolver owned by his father, who works as a security guard in a private company.

After shooting the girl twice, once in her chest, the boy then turned the gun on to himself and pulled the trigger in his abdomen, police said.

The girl was pursuing a graduate course from a government college at Khandola, about 20 km from Ponda town.

The boy is admitted to Goa Medical College and Hospital near here, police said, adding that they are yet to ascertain the motive behind the killing.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Leading furniture solutions brand Interio (GI) has embarked on a rapid expansion plan to tap tier II and III cities and semi-urban townships.

As part of the plan, GI would open around 300 stores across the country this fiscal to increase footprint by 22 per cent, Brijesh Verma, National Head of Operations and Business Development, said here on Friday.

Inaugurating its third store, the flagship retail outlet "Steel Craft" in the Industrial township of Adityapur, about 2 km from here, in adjoining Seraikela-Kharswan district, Verma said 30 per cent of the proposed stores has already been opened.

The launching of the store in Adityapur was the 100th such outlet in Bihar and Jharkhand region, he said claiming GI has been focusing in eastern region as it contributed 32 per cent of the brand's overall business revenue, the largest in the country.

The company plans to increase business revenue in the region to 40 per cent in the current financial year, he said.

"We are planning to tap the rural market, which is emerging with increasing purchasing power of the rural masses, by introducing new products before the festival season," he said, while referring to new almirah and sofa products such as Millennium Pro, Slim Line and Modules Sofa.

Keeping in view its expansion plan, Verma said the company was also upgrading existing plants, including in Vikroli, Mumbai, where the company has installed robots to produce best quality products.

Besides, GI has also set up a plant in Haridwar and Shirwal near Pune, he said, adding the company has invested around Rs 12 crore in the Haridwar plant, where the company produces 500 mattresses daily.
A photograph showing a Sub Engineer, posted with a rural civic body in Panna district in Madhya Pradesh, being carried across a flooded nullah by a villager on his back has gone viral on social media.

Sub Engineer Arvind Tripathi, who works at Pawai Janpad Panchayat, had posted the picture on Facebook. The incident had taken place two days back.

The picture showed Tripathi being carried across Mahad nullah in Pawai locality, around 10 kms from the district headquarters, by a villager on his back.

Tripathi, who is seen wearing a brown-coloured shirt and white trousers, was on his way to meet villagers to urge them to construct toilets as part of the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan. Under the drive, government staffers offer flowers to villagers and appeal them to build toilets at their places.

When contacted, Tripathi told PTI that he regretted his act of riding on the back of the villager as well as uploading the picture on the social networking site.

Panna Collector J P Irene Cynthia said she was not aware of the development. "I will check it," she said when contacted.

Last month, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan had drawn flak and ridicule for a photograph which showed him being lifted by security personnel to cross a swollen nullah at Panna district to meet the flood-hit people.

Chouhan's picture, which appeared in newspapers, was issued by the State Public Relations department after his visit to the rain-ravaged district. However, it was later withdrawn.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Bills passed by Uttar Pradesh Legislature to facilitate continuation of former chief ministers in government accommodation for life got the governor's assent today.

Uttar Pradesh Governor Ram Naik gave his assent to the Uttar Pradesh State Legislature (Members' Emoluments and Pension) (Amendment) Bill, 2016 and Uttar Pradesh Ministers (Salaries, Allowances and Miscellaneous Provisions)(Amendment) Bill, 2016, and two other bills, a Raj Bhawan release said.

The two bills provide for allotting government accommodation to ex-chief ministers for lifetime and a steep hike in salaries and allowances of sitting MLAs.

The state government had brought the Uttar Pradesh Ministers (Salaries, Allowances and Miscellaneous Provisions)(Amendment) Bill, 2016 to legalise the stay of former chief ministers after the Supreme Court ordered all former chief ministers to vacate their government-allotted bungalows in Lucknow in August.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
In a decision which would help students, Delhi High Court today rejected a plea of some foreign publishing houses against the sale of photocopies of their textbooks, saying copyright in literary works does not confer "absolute ownership" to the authors.

Justice Rajiv Sahai Endlaw also lifted a ban on a photocopy shop located at the Delhi University campus from selling photocopies of chapters from textbooks of some international publishers to the students.

"Copyright, specially in literary works, is thus not an inevitable, divine, or natural right that confers on authors the absolute ownership of their creations. It is designed rather to stimulate activity and progress in the arts for the intellectual enrichment of the public.

"Copyright is intended to increase and not to impede the harvest of knowledge. It is intended to motivate the creative activity of authors and inventors in order to benefit the public," the court said.

The court said the action of making a master photocopy of relevant portions of the books of these publishers "does not constitute infringement of copyright under the Copyright Act".

"If the facility of photocopying were not to be available, they would instead of sitting in the comforts of their respective homes and reading from the photocopies would be spending long hours in the library and making notes thereof.

"When modern technology is available for comfort, it would be unfair to say that the students should not avail thereof and continue to study as in ancient era. No law can be interpreted so as to result in any regression of evolvement of the human being for the better," it observed.

In 2012, a group of publishers, including Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press (UK), Cambridge University Press India Pvt Ltd, Taylor and Francis Group (UK) and Taylor and Francis Books India Pvt Ltd, had moved court alleging that Rameshwari Photocopy Service in DU was infringing their copyright over the text books.

Reacting to the judgement, the publishers in a joint statement said, "it is unfortunate that the court's decision today could undermine the availability of original content for the benefit of students and teachers."



"We brought this case to protect authors, publishers and students from the potential effects on the Indian academic and educational book market caused by the widespread creation and distribution of unlicensed course packs by a copy shop operating from within the premises of the University, where a legitimate and affordable licensing scheme is already in place," the statement said.

In its interim order in October 2012, the court had



restrained Rameshwari Photocopy from "making or selling course packs and also reproducing the plaintiff's publication or substantial portion by compiling the same either in a book form or in the form of a course pack till the final disposal of the said application" till the final disposal of the plea.

Thereafter, the students had moved the court against the interim order seeking lifting of the ban to ensure their welfare and preparation for the upcoming examinations. Their plea was rejected by the court.

The global publishing giants had claimed that the photocopy kiosk violated their copyright and, "at the instance of DU", was causing huge financial losses as students had stopped buying their text books.

The court, however, in its 94-page judgement, also said that nearly all students of the university carry cell phones and most of them have inbuilt cameras which enable them to click photographs of each page of a book and take printouts after connecting the phone to a printer. "The same would again qualify as fair use and which cannot be stopped," it said.

It junked the petitioners' claim observing that "once such an action is held to be not offending any provisions of the Copyright Act, merely because the photocopies are done not by the person desirous thereof himself but with the assistance of another human being, would not make the act offending".

"It matters not whether such person is an employee of the Delhi University or the university avails the services of a contractor. The position of the defendant no.1 (Rameshwari) in the present case is found to be that of a contractor to whom university has outsourced its work of providing photocopying service for its students...," it added.

The judge further observed that the case had cropped up as DU was itself supplying the photocopies instead of issuing the book, which may be sought by a large number of students for a limited period or limited hours.

"It cannot be lost sight of that we are a country with a bulging population and where the pressure on all public resources and facilities is far beyond that in any other country or jurisdiction. While it may be possible for a student in a class of say 10 or 20 students to have the book issued from the library for a month and to laboriously take notes therefrom, the same is unworkable where the number of students run into hundreds if not thousands," the court said.

"According to me, what is permissible for a small number of students cannot be viewed differently, merely because the number of students is larger. Merely because instead of say 10 or 20 copies being made by students individually or by the librarian employed by the university, 100 or 1000 copies are being made, the same would not convert, what was not an infringement into an infringement," the judge said.
Concerned over wildlife deaths in road accidents at the Kaziranga National Park, the National Green Tribunal has asked Assam government to provide the exact number of animal casualties so far due to traffic movement on the National Highway-37 that passes through the home of the famous one-horned rhinos.

A bench headed by NGT Chairperson Justice Swatanter Kumar also directed the Sarbananda Sonowal government to apprise it of the progress made in installation of sensor-operated automated traffic barriers to prevent these deaths.

It directed the state government and the Director of the Kaziranga National Park to inform it on "how how many animals have died because of vehicular movement along the highway."



"The counsel appearing for State shall produce original records before us to show what steps in terms of the previous orders of the tribunal have been taken for installation of sensor barriers for preventing animal conflict.

"They will also show how many vehicles with interceptor speed sensors have been installed and deployed mainly in Kaziranga National Park and how many challans were effected from the date of directions till today. Let all information with original record be placed before the Tribunal on September 30," the bench said.

On the issue of detailed project report (DPR) on measures to curb growing wildlife deaths, the NGT said the document should be prepared in consultation with Wildlife Institute of India, Dehradun.

The tribunal's direction came during a hearing on a plea filed by environmentalist Rohit Choudhury opposing the expansion of NH-37 which passes from Jakhalabandha to Bokakhat through the Kaziranga Park.

On the last date of hearing, Road Transport and Highways Ministry had told the bench that DPR prepared by the state government had been approved.

The NGT had ordered demolition of roadside shops and eateries along the animal corridors near Kaziranga, among a slew of directions in the wake of increasing wildlife casualties due to vehicular movement on the adjacent highway.

Gauhati High Court, however, had stayed the order on demolishing shops and dhabas located within 100 metres of National Highway 37.

The green panel had also asked the Assam government to ensure fixation of sensor-operated automatic barriers at the animal corridors and ascertain whether speed-check cameras were in working condition or not.

The tribunal had earlier directed the Assam government to expeditiously prepare the DPR and summoned its top officials to inform it about compliance of its earlier orders on the issue.

It had also directed the Union Ministry to take clear instructions as to whether or not it proposed to issue any draft notification in regard to Kaziranga Eco Sensitive Zone.
Electric equipment manufacturer HPL Electric and Power will raise Rs 361 crore through initial public offer (IPO), which will be mainly used to meet its working capital requirements and retire part of its debt.

The issue, with a price band of Rs 175-202 per equity share, will be open from September 22-26.

"We plan to utilise the proceeds of the issue to fund working capital requirements and for repayment of loans in this fiscal. We will also utilise the proceeds for other general corporate purposes," company's Joint Managing Director Gautam Seth told reporters here today.

The company, which is engaged in manufacturing of metering solutions, switch gears, lighting equipment and wires and cables, has a net debt of Rs 560 crore.

"Out of the total funds raised, Rs 130 crore could be used to retire part of the debt while Rs 180 crore will be utilised to meet working capital requirements," he said, adding the company will focus on brand image building and increase its visibility across the country.

The issue is being managed by SBI Capital Markets, ICICI Securities and IDFC Bank.

The equity shares will be listed on BSE and NSE.

In fiscal 2015-16, the company had reported gross revenues of Rs 1,350 crore, which also includes income from its subsidiary Himachal Energy.

"The various initiatives taken by the government including promoting use of LED lightings, UDAY scheme, rural electrification, housing for all, smart cities, smart metering, among others is a very positive move and we see this as a huge opportunity for growth across all our four verticals," Seth added.

The company has six manufacturing units in northern India including two at Gurgaon, one each at Kundli, Gharaunda and Sonepat, all in Haryana and one at Jabli in Himachal Pradesh.

HPL has a manufacturing capacity of 9 million units in the metering solutions, 26 million units in the lighting segment, 17 million units in switchgear and 194 million meters of cables and wires.

The company, which is mainly focused on domestic market, is also planning to expand its presence in the Middle East, African countries, SAARC nations as well as in South East Asian countries.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
India has emerged as one of the world's fastest growing import markets with value up 28 per cent to 43 million pounds.

The Association (SWA) released the amount of sold overseas increased for the first time since 2013, largely thanks to India for registering a massive jump in shipment value.

India has established itself as the third-biggest export market for Scotch at 41 million bottles, marking a 41 per cent increase in sales volumes, after France (90.9 million bottles) and the US (53.1 million bottles).

"The growth of exports to India stood out, with value up 28 per cent to 43 million pounds," the SWA said.

The industry body also called on urgent action from the UK government to help realise the full potential of the Indian market.

"The full potential of the Indian market would only be delivered through liberalisation of the exorbitant 150 per cent basic customs duty. We urge the UK government to prioritise discussions with India as it develops its post-Brexit pirorities," it added.

Diageo, a leading UK-headquartered distilling company, recently took over Indian liquor baron Vijay Mallya's United Spirits distribution network in India, which is being linked to the sale of 12 million more bottles than last year.

Most of that was in bulk, for bottling in India, or blending with Indian whiskies.

However, India also registered a marked rise, by more than half, in the amount of single malt whisky shipped to India, adding up to more than 700,000 bottles.

Scotch, a patent of the Scotland, overall had the equivalent of 533 million bottles shipped from the UK in the first six months of 2016, marking a 3.1 per cent increase.

SWA attributes this to an "industry-wide emphasis on craftsmanship and provenance, backed by investment".

However, Scotch makers are concerned about the impact Britain's vote to leave the European Union (EU) could have on the whisky.

"The first half of 2016 was marked by an improving Scotch whisky export performance, suggesting a strengthening in global consumer demand compared to the last couple of years... It is clear, however, that the uncertainties of the Brexit vote will create challenges for exporters and we continue to encourage early clarity on the likely shape of the UK's future trading relationship with the EU and other countries," said David Frost, chief executive of SWA.

Scotchis a specific term used for whisky made from malted barley through a legally defined process, originating in Scotland.

Any bottlers outside Scotland who want to use Scotch whisky as a constituent in a local spirit must first apply for the verification process.

Earlier this year, India had ruled against the use of the term "Scotch" and "Scotland" byIndianspirits firms.
India need not worry about the planned Russia-Pakistan joint military exercises as these drills will not be carried out in disputed areas, a senior Russian diplomat said today.

Russia thinks India should not be concerned about upcoming Russia-Pakistan joint military exercises, the Russian Foreign Ministry's director of the Second Asian Department Zamir Kabulov said.

The joint military exercises, dubbed as 'Friendship-2016', are tactical drills which will be held from September 24 to October 7 in the Army High Altitude School in northern Pakistan's Rattu and at a special forces training center in Cherat area.

The exercises aim to strengthen and develop cooperation between the two former Cold War rivals' armed forces.

"We were informed by the Russian Defense Ministry that these exercises will not be carried out in (disputed) areas, and a place was chosen that has nothing to do with this. Hence there is no reason for India to worry about it," Kabulov was quoted as saying Russia's state-run Sputnik agency.

Kabulov said Moscow had informed New Delhi of the regions where the exercises with Pakistan were planned to take place.

Around 200 military personnel from the two sides would take part in the joint military exercises.

The move comes amidst increasing defence ties between Moscow and Islamabad as the latter was also thinking to buy advanced Russian warplanes.

The joint military drill is seen as another step in growing military-to-military cooperation, indicating a steady growth in bilateral relationship between the two countries, whose ties had been marred by Cold War rivalry for decades.

Islamabad is eager to improve its ties with Moscow to diversify its options in the event of any stalemate in ties with Washington.

After securing a deal of MI-35 helicopters, Pakistan is also exploring options to buy Su-35 fighter jets from Russia, Pakistani media reported recently.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
India and Nepal today committed that they will "not allow" their territory to be used against each other and also agreed to set up an oversight mechanism to review the progress of economic and development projects on regular basis.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal earlier held talks on several areas of partnership between the two countries.

In a joint statement issued by the two sides later, they gave various details related to strengthening of ties.

"They stressed the need to ensure that the open border, which has facilitated economic interaction and movement of people and goods on both sides of the border and has been a unique feature of India-Nepal bilateral ties, is not allowed to be misused by unscrupulous elements posing security threats to either side," it said.

The Nepali side also reiterated its support for India's candidature for permanent membership of the UN Security Council.

"Both sides also agreed to set up an oversight mechanism comprising senior officials from the Indian Embassy in Kathmandu and the Government of Nepal, which will review progress together with respective project implementing agencies/developers of ongoing economic and development projects on a regular basis, and take necessary steps to expedite their implementation," it said.

The Prime Minister of Nepal shared with his Indian counterpart the efforts made by the present government to take all sections of Nepali society on board for effective implementation of the constitution.

"The Prime Minister of Nepal thanked the government and people of India for their goodwill, support and solidarity in Nepal's peace process," it said, adding, "Both sides agreed to hold the next session of the India-Nepal Joint Commission in 2016."



The two Prime Ministers stressed on the need for early development of infrastructure at integrated check posts (ICPs) to facilitate smooth and faster movement of people and goods.

"They noted with satisfaction the progress in construction of ICPs at Raxaul and Jogbani, and agreed that work on the Raxaul-Birgunj ICP project will be expedited with the objective of completing it by December," the joint statement said.

The two Prime Ministers reviewed the progress made in implementation of the two ongoing India-Nepal cross-border rail-link projects and agreed that both sides will take further measures necessary for expeditious completion of both the projects.

Both sides agreed that steps will be initiated to facilitate development of three other agreed cross-border rail-link projects so that the land acquisition can commence on the Nepali side.

"The two Prime Ministers directed the officials to



expedite the construction of sub-station at Dhalkebar so that the Muzaffarpur-Dhalkebar transmission line can be operated at its full capacity as planned," the joint statement said.

"The two Prime Ministers expressed satisfaction that both countries are engaged in preparation of a Master Plan for cross-border interconnection for the period until 2035 and Action Plan on power trade until 2025," it said.

The two sides also reviewed progress of other major hydro-power projects, Pancheshwar, Upper Karnali and Arun-III, and noted that various issues be addressed expeditiously to implement the projects in a time-bound manner so that their benefits start accruing to people at the earliest.

"It was decided to expedite finalisation of the Detailed Project Report of the Pancheshwar multi-purpose project. It was agreed that both sides will continue to take measures to operationalise the Power Trade Agreement signed in 2014.

"Both sides agreed to discuss all water resources cooperation related matters such as inundation and flood management, irrigation matters and other major projects, at the next meeting of the Joint Committee on Water Resources at Secretary level, to be convened at an early date," it said.

Modi and Dahal welcomed the signing of MOU for building Raxaul-Amlekhgunj petroleum pipeline in August 2015 and directed that construction work be undertaken expeditiously.

"Both the Prime Ministers expressed satisfaction at the utilisation of the two Lines of Credit of USD 100 million and USD 250 million for development of roads and power infrastructure in Nepal," it said.

They welcomed the allocation of USD 200 million for irrigation projects, and USD 330 million for development of roads and Mahakali bridge from the Line of Credit of USD 550 million.

The Nepal Prime Minister extended an invitation to his counterpart to pay an official visit to Nepal which Modi accepted. The date will be finalised through diplomatic channels, it said.

"The two Prime Ministers expressed satisfaction at the performance of the Indian Joint Ventures in Nepal and emphasised the need for channelising more Indian investments into Nepal according to its development priorities," it said.

"The two Prime Ministers welcomed the commencement of work for construction of a dharmashala at Pashupatinath area. The MOU between the Pashupati Area Development Trust and the Archaeological Survey of India for reconstruction and renovation of the monuments at the Pashupatinath Area will be finalised expeditiously," the statement said.

The two sides stressed on the need for "taking forward the cooperation" in the fields of tourism and ayurvedic system of healthcare.

In this regard, both sides will take steps to fully implement the MOUs on cooperation in traditional medicine and on tourism cooperation, including development of tourism in the form of Buddhist and Hindu pilgrim circuits.
As Nepal undergoes a political transition, today pitched for implementing the country's Constitution by accommodating aspirations of all sections and assured it of all possible support amid China's efforts to gain ground in the Himalayan nation.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi held an "extensive and productive dialogue" with his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal popularly known as Prachanda after which the two sides inked three pacts including one on extending $750 million for Nepal's post earthquake reconstruction.

It is Prachanda's first visit to after becoming Prime Minister for the second time. K P Sharma Oli quit the top post in July following fresh political turmoil due to protest of Madheshi community against the new Constitution.

The two countries also decided to continue cooperation in areas of defence and security.

In a statement to media following the talks, Modi said India hoped Nepal will be successful in implementing the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating aspirations of all sections of its diverse society.

"As immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability and economic prosperity (Shanti, Sthirta aur Samrudhi) of Nepal is our shared objective," the Prime Minister said in the presence of Prachanda.

On his part, the Nepalese Prime Minister said his country has nothing but "goodwill" for India and that destinies of both the countries are "interlinked".

The Prime Minister said India has been privileged to be Nepal's partner at "every step" of the country development journey and economic progress. "Our friendship is time-tested & unique. We share our burden during difficult times, just as we celebrate each other's achievements."

Modi said both sides have agreed to focus on "close monitoring" and time bound completion of all development projects being implemented by India in Nepal. He said speedy and successful implementation of ongoing hydropower projects will be ensured.

Showering praise on Prachanda for his efforts to bring stability to Nepal, Modi said, "I am confident that under your leadership Nepal will be successful in implementing the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating aspirations of all sections of the diverse society."

"I conveyed to Prachanda that India stands ready and prepared to strengthen the development partnership with Nepal and we will do so as per priorities of people and government of Nepal," Modi said.

About the political transformation in Nepal, Prachanda said his government was making sincere efforts in taking every section of the society onboard while implementing the provisions of the Constitution.

"I shared with Modiji that promulgation of the Constitution last year by the popularly elected Constituent assembly was a historic achievement for people of Nepal. You are aware that my government has made serious efforts to bring everyone on board as we enter the phase of implementation of the Constitution," he said.

In his remarks, Modi said security interests of Nepal and

India are inter-linked and both sides agreed that "securing our societies is essential for achieving shared objectives of development and growth".

He said continued cooperation between defence and security agencies of the two countries is important to guard the "open borders" that provide opportunities for interaction to the people.

India has a close relationship with Nepal but off late, China has been trying to have some influence over Kathmandu. Oli had tried to forge a deeper cooperation with China. Nepal had signed a transport and transit treaty with China during Oli's tenure as PM.

In the talks, the Indian side clearly conveyed to Nepal that it was ready and prepared to strengthen development partnership with Nepal.

India is Nepal's biggest trade partner and both the sides also decided to further expand trade and investment.

Prachanda, who arrived here yesterday on a four-day visit, was earlier given a ceremonial welcome at the forecourt of Rashtrapati Bhavan. He is staying at the Rastrapati Bhavan as a state guest.

Nepal has been facing political crisis since the adoption of a new Constitution in September last year. Madhesis, mostly of Indian-origin, have been opposing the new statute as they fear it would marginalise them by dividing the country into seven provinces.

Nearly five-month-long Madhesi protests led to the closure of key trading points with India triggering shortage of essential supplies in the land-locked country.

The blockade of trade points with India ended in February after more than 50 people were killed in clashes with police. Nepal had blamed India for the Madhesi crisis, a charge rejected by New Delhi.

Modi said Prachanda has been a "catalytic force" of peace in Nepal saying he has personally played a role in strengthening democratic institutions.

Prachanda also invited Modi and President Pranab Mukherjee to visit Nepal soon.
India has emerged as one of the world's fastest growing import markets for Scotch whisky with the value of exports surging 28 per cent to 43 million pounds, a trade body said today while seeking urgent help from the UK government to bring down India's "exorbitant" 150 per cent customs duty on liquor.

The Scotch Whisky Association (SWA) revealed the amount of Scotch whisky sold overseas increased for the first time since 2013, largely thanks to India registering a massive jump in shipment value.

India has established itself as the third-biggest export market for Scotch at 41 million bottles, marking a 41 per cent increase in sales volumes, after France (90.9 million bottles) and the US (53.1 million bottles).

"The growth of exports to India stood out, with value up 28 per cent to 43 million pounds," the SWA said.

The industry body also called on urgent action from the UK government to help realise the full potential of the Indian market.

"The full potential of the Indian market would only be delivered through liberalisation of the exorbitant 150 per cent basic customs duty. We urge the UK government to prioritise discussions with India as it develops its post-Brexit pirorities," it added.

Diageo, a leading UK-headquartered distilling company, recently took over Indian liquor baron Vijay Mallya's United Spirits distribution network in India, which is being linked to the sale of 12 million more bottles than last year.

Most of that was in bulk, for bottling in India, or blending with Indian whiskies.

However, India also registered a marked rise, by more than half, in the amount of single malt whisky shipped to India, adding up to more than 700,000 bottles.

Scotch, a patent of the Scotland, overall had the equivalent of 533 million bottles shipped from the UK in the first six months of 2016, marking a 3.1 per cent increase.

SWA attributes this to an "industry-wide emphasis on craftsmanship and provenance, backed by investment".

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
It was an attempt by a CSIR laboratory to make wine from tea in order to avoid wasting over-grown tea leaves, but the technology is now in demand in Mozambique where it will be replicated using local tea leaves.

The Institute of Himalayan Bio-resource Technology (IHBT), a laboratory of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), has recently signed a MoU with a company from Mozambique under which the technology will be transferred to the company.

"The company, which is owned by a person of an Indian origin, will make wine from tea found locally. Our scientists will go to the African nation to set up machines," IHBT Director Sanjay Kumar said.

Improving tea production in Kangra region of Himachal Pradesh and value addition to tea are the focus areas of IHBT.

The tea produced in the Himalayan state is also known as Kangra tea. Like the Darjeeling tea, Kangra tea is also famous whole leaf orthodox tea available in the country.

"Tea is a very labour intensive crop. The tender apical bud and subtending two leaves are picked at the right stage by trained pluckers and processed in the factories to give the famous Kangra tea," Kumar said.

He said, during the recent years, tea plantations are faced with labour shortage due to which there is delay in plucking of tea shoots, thereby hampering the quality of the leaves.

This delay of two-three days in plucking produces less succulent overgrown tea shoots severely affecting the processing of orthodox black teas, thus, lowering the tea quality and severely affects the economy of the tea plantations, he said.

"To overcome the problem of un-remunerative low grade made teas, the Institute has come up with value addition of these teas by processing them into tea wines," Kumar said.

He said the institute has further made wines using tea with local fruits/berries having health benefiting properties.

"In our technology portfolio we have tea wines (from only tea) and tea herbal wines (tea with local fruits). The wines take a little more than a year for processing. The wines can be made sweet or dry on demand. The alcohol content can also be varied," Kumar said.

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Stepping up its offencive against Pakistan on the Balochistan issue at the UN Human Rights Council, India today said Pakistan is a nation that practises terrorism on its own people and the sufferings of the people of Balochistan are a telling testimony in this regard.

Exercising its right of reply, India, raising the Balochistan issue second time in three days at the UNHRC, said the irony of a nation that has established a well-earned reputation of being the global epicentre of terrorism holding forth on human rights.

"It surely is the height of hypocrisy for a Government that preaches, practises, encourages and nurtures terrorism to venture into the subject of human rights," India said.

In the last two decades, the most wanted terrorists of the world have found succour and sustenance in Pakistan. This tradition unfortunately continues even today, not surprising when its Government employs terrorism as an instrument of state policy, India said.

The current disturbances in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir have their origins in the death in police action of a self-proclaimed terrorist commander of Hizbul Mujahideen with links to the 'deep state' across the border, it added.

India also said it has seen continuous flow of terrorists



trained and armed by our neighbour and convincing proof that they have been tasked with creating incidents that would lead to casualties in the civilian population.

"There cannot be a more cynical policy that targets the very people for whom such deep concern is professed... The pervasive practice of terrorism is not targeting India alone. Many of our neighbours have suffered as grievously from cross-border terrorism and interference in their internal affairs," it said.

Pakistan keeps referring to UN Security Council Resolutions on Jammu and Kashmir. However, it very conveniently forgets its own obligation under these resolutions to first vacate the illegal occupation of Pakistan Occupied Kashmir.

"It was stated that Jammu and Kashmir is under foreign occupation. Yes, a part of it is, and the occupier in question is Pakistan," India said.

Asserting that the foremost challenge to stability in Kashmir is the scourge of terrorism, which receives sustenance from Pakistan and the territories under Pakistan's control, it said Pakistan's attempt, seeking to mask its activities as though an outcome of domestic discontent, carries no credibility with the world.

India said that concrete evidence about cross-border



encouragement and support for the protests in Kashmir has been handed over to Pakistan. But, "instead of working with a sense of purpose to address this issue, Pakistan resorts to short- sighted tactics to divert attention, as we have once again seen today".

India has a robust institutional framework in place to ensure adherence to rule of law and respect for fundamental rights of the people. It includes independent judiciary, National Human Rights Commission, vibrant civil society and free and vocal media, it said.

The people of Jammu and Kashmir have chosen and reaffirmed their destiny repeatedly through India's well-established democratic processes. Free, fair and open elections are regularly held there at all levels. Pakistan, on the other hand, has witnessed continuous degradation and weakening of its institutions.

Pakistan-occupied Kashmir is administered by a 'deep state' and has become an epicenter of terrorism.

Pakistan's human rights record in Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir and Balochistan is deplorable. It has had no hesitation in using air power and artillery against its own people, not once but repeatedly over the years, India said, adding that it is high time for Pakistan to do some deep introspection.

"We would once again urge Pakistan to focus its energies on improving human rights situation and dismantling the terrorism infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir. This would go a long way in bringing peace and stability to the region and beyond," India added.
A senior Islamic State operative, considered the terror group's information minister, was killed in a coalition airstrike in Syria, the Pentagon said today, a week after another raid eliminated a top ISIS leader.

Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said that Dr Wa'il, also known as Wa'il Adil Hasan Salman al-Fayad, has been killed in a precision airstrike near the ISIS stronghold of Raqqah in Syria.

"On September 7, coalition forces conducted a precision strike near Raqqah, Syria, that targeted and killed Dr Wa'il, one of ISIS's most senior leaders," Cook said.

Wai'l operated as the minister of Information for the terror organisation and was a prominent member of its Senior Shura Council - ISIS's leadership group, he said.

Wa'il oversaw ISIS's production of terrorist propaganda videos showing torture and executions.

He was a close associate of Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, the ISIS spokesman and leader for plotting and inspiring external terror attacks, he said.

Al-Adnani was successfully struck and killed by coalition forces on August 30, he added.

"The removal of ISIS's senior leaders degrades its ability to retain territory, and its ability to plan, finance, and direct attacks inside and outside of the region.

"We will continue to work with our coalition partners to build momentum in the campaign to deal ISIS a lasting defeat," Cook said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Israeli troops shot dead a Palestinian man as he tried to evade arrest during a roundup in the occupied West Bank, the Israeli military said.

The Palestinian health ministry identified the dead man as Mohammed Saraheen, 30, and Palestinian security officials said Israeli troops shot him during a raid on his home in the village of Beit Ula, near Hebron yesterday.

"During an arrest operation in Beit Ula, security forces apprehended one suspect while another attempted to flee the building," an army spokeswoman told AFP.

"During the pursuit a force opened fire, resulting in the suspect's death."



She could not immediately say who the suspects were or why they were wanted.

Violence since October has killed 224 Palestinians, 34 Israelis, two Americans, one Eritrean and a Sudanese.

Israeli forces say most of the Palestinians killed were carrying out knife, gun or car-ramming attacks.

Others were shot dead during protests and clashes, while some were killed in Israeli air strikes in the Gaza Strip.

The Hebron area, where Palestinians, Jewish settlers and soldiers live in close proximity, is a frequent scene of clashes.

Last month the UN said it was "gravely concerned" about the killing of a Palestinian refugee on August 16 during an Israeli military incursion into the Fawwar refugee camp near the southern West Bank city.

"A reportedly unarmed 19-year old Palestine refugee from Fawwar camp was killed after being shot in the chest by live ammunition rounds reportedly fired by an Israeli sniper stationed approximately 100 metres away," the UN agency for Palestinian refugees said.

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Italian beauty brand Kiko Milano has forayed into the Indian market and is looking to have over 45 stores in the next three years.

Percassi Group-company, which has partnered with DLF Brands for its retail expansion, is also aiming to harness the potential of online medium to boost sales here.

"In the first year, we will have 4 stores and then will open 20 stores each in next two years," Percassi Group International Director Mark Koprowski told PTI.

As part of its strategy, the company would focus first on the to eight developed metro markets and then later go to tier II places.

"We would also go online. We are yet exploring with our partner DLF as how to go on this," he added.

However, the company did not shared the investment details for its Indian operations.

Kiko Milano, which today opened its first store in DLF Mall of India at Noida, is positioning its range of products as affordable for the middle class segment, which is growing very rapidly.

"We have done an extensive study of the India market before entering here. Our price would be competing with the local players one side but would also offer professional products which would be slightly above that," Koprowski added.

Kiko Milano's products would be from "masstige" segment, which are mass-produced, relatively inexpensive goods and are marketed as luxurious or prestigious, he added.

"More and more women from the Indian middle class are working and this would be our target customer," Koprowski said.

According to him, the present Indian beauty market is estimated to be around USD 1 billion and is growing with an compound annual growth of around 18 per cent.

"This would become double in the next three years. It would have good opportunity for us with right price points," he said.

Kiko Milano has over 850 stores in 17 countries and an online presence in 35 nations.

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Five meritorious students of the famed 'Super 30' academy of mathematician Anand Kumar have been selected for a tour of Japan to know more about science and technology.

"This academy for talented underprivileged students is well known in Japan and this is the reason we have decided to fully sponsor the visit of the five meritorious students of Super 30," Yoji Nishikawa, a senior official of Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST) said after handing over invitation letter to the five selected students.

The five students from the academy have been selected for a special one-week programme in November this year during which they would visit some top educational institutions of Japan and also attend a lecture of Nobel Prize winner Shirakawa, Nishikawa said.

Elaborating further, the Japanese official said under the special programme from November 6-13, the shortlisted students would visit Tokyo University and also interact with students of Super Science High School of that country.

He said they would also be lectured by 2000 Nobel Prize winner in Chemistry, Shirakawa among others.

Last year, Tokyo University had announced its decision to provide full scholarship to two students of Super 30 for higher studies in the famed university every year.

Mathematician Anand Kumar said that the five students have been selected through a screening test for the Japanese educational trip.

Super 30 academy run by Anand Kumar since 2002 in Patna has facilitated selection of more than 350 students hailing from underprivileged section of the society in IITs.

The five selected students Ujjwal Priyank, Aman Nasim, Subham Raj, Aditya Prakash and Sidhant Mohan expressed excitment going to Japan where they would learn more about science and technology.

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Every Friday at the start of the Jewish Sabbath Porto's imposing synagogue positively buzzes with the sound of chatter -- not just in Portuguese but also in English, French and Spanish.

It's in this unexpectedly animated atmosphere that the Jewish community in northern Portugal, wiped out in the 15th century, is currently undergoing a rebirth, welcoming Jews who feel threatened in Europe and elsewhere -- some coming from as far as India.

"Anti-semitism is growing in Europe but Porto seems to be a safe haven. It's good to be a Jew here," said Sam Elijah, who heads a community that numbered only 20 four years ago.

It has since increased to 200 made up of no less than 21 different nationalities.

Now, the community -- which is orthodox but is open to all Jews -- does not hesitate to advertise the attractions of the city abroad and anticipates a big boost in numbers in coming years, in particular from France and Turkey.

The Zekris, a family of four, who did not want to give their full names, took the plunge in August 2015. They are among 50 French Jews already settled in Porto, Portugal's second city and the largest in the country's north.

After living in Israel, the family moved to Toulouse in France to "support the community after the terrorist attacks of March 2012".

The jihadist Mohamed Merah had just murdered three children and a teacher at a Jewish school in the southwestern city.

"We experienced anti-semitism," said Mr Zekri, adding that it was also the reason for the family's move to Portugal.

On this Friday in September, the family is working hard to prepare the Sabbath, during which Jewish tradition forbids work, driving or the use of electricity.

The cooking is done in advance, the timers set to turn off the lights at the exact hour.... "It's always a bit of a rush, but afterwards it's total rest," adds Mr Zekri.

"Here I stroll carefree in a kippah (a small Jewish skullcap) and quite often people stop me and tell me 'We love Jews'," he said.

"I have never heard this kind of talk elsewhere, in France or in Europe," added the father-of-two, who is studying dental medicine.

At the end of September, the first family from Turkey is due to arrive thanks to a new law, which came into force in 2015 offering Sephardi Jews Portuguese nationality by way of reparation for the expulsions and persecution suffered by their ancestors at the end of the 15th century.

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PDP today termed as "back- stabbing" the resignation by its senior leader and MP Tariq Hamid Karra and insisted that it will not have much impact on the ruling party.

Senior party leader Naeem Akhtar criticised Karra's decision announced yesterday, saying he took the step at a time when there was a need to strengthen the hands of Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti and the administration.

"He has back-stabbed the party at a time when there was a need to strengthen the government and the Chief Minister," Akhtar, Education Minister and government spokesman, told PTI over phone.

He said Karra, who quit complaining about government's handling of the ongoing unrest and PDP's alliance with BJP, had been elected on "our agenda and our ticket" and hence should not have taken such a step in such a situation.

Interestingly, Karra resigned from PDP and Lok Sabha days after separatist Hurriyat issued an appeal to mainstream politicians to quit their parties and posts and join the ongoing agitation against the killing of Hizbul Mujahideen militant commander Burhan Wani.

Significantly, like the Hurriyat, he also appealed to the "conscience" of other party leaders to follow his footstpes.

Asked whether Karra's decision could have been influenced by that appeal of the separatists, Akhtar said, "it is for him (Karra) to say."



At the same time, Akhtar insisted that Karra's decision will not have much impact on the party "but it will have impact on the situation", which he refused to explain.

Attacking his former colleague, Akhtar said Karra was a member of the Lok Sabha for about two-and-a-half years but never articulated the sentiments of people of the Valley in the House for which he had got the mandate.

"He never spoke there. He never raised issues like delay in disbursement of relief for 2014 floods (by the central government). If he were bound by principles, he should have waited for the situation in Kashmir to normalise before resigning," the government spokesman said.

In Jammu, Akhtar told reporters that the party is intact as it is an ideology and an agenda under a leadership.

"The parties are like platforms and people keep coming and going. You must remember when NC entered into alliance with BJP and their one MP (Saifuddin Soz) had also resigned and left the party. This has been happening in the past," he said.

He was replying to a question whether Karra's resignation was setback to PDP.

"The party is above leaders and is very much intact," he said while replying to a question about reports that five law makers are resigning from PDP and following Tariq Karra.

(Reopen DEL53)



Commenting on contention of NC and Congress that PDP has been weakened following Karra's resignation, Akhtar said "(chief of separatist women group Dukhtaran-e-Millat) Asiya Andrabi is also saying the same. Andrabi has also welcomed his resignation. (Another separatist leader) Shabir Shah has also welcomed it."



Asked about loss to PDP following the resignation, the senior PDP leader said "there is no loss. The party is intact. There is no need to spread rumours."



To another question about Karra's statement that the government has failed to implement Agenda of Alliance, he said "both the parties are committed to implementation of Agenda of Alliance. It is thefoundation stone of our alliance."



Akhtar further said "the aim of the alliance of North pole and South is to have permanent peace in the state and hold talks with all the stakeholders to ensure development and restoration of the democratic stage in the state. We are committed to it."



He said Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Rajnath Singh have always been saying so.

On Karra's remark about civilian killings, Akhtar said "does anyone kill their own people for fun. There is a environment of turmoil and there has alsobeen loss of life and we are very worried, sad and sad.
A Central government appointed Committee on Friday came down heavily on the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government in Delhi, saying it has been splurging exchequer's money on advertisements projecting the Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and his party in violation of the Supreme Court guidelines and asked the ruling party to reimburse it.

The three-member committee, headed by former Chief Election Commissioner B B Tandon, had been constituted by the I&B ministry on directions of the Supreme Court to address issues related to Content Regulation in Government Advertising.

The committee had received a complaint from Congress leader Ajay Maken accusing the government in Delhi of splurging public money on advertisements.

In its order issued on Friday, the Committee came to the conclusion that the Government of Delhi has violated guidelines issued by the Hon'ble Supreme Court of India in six of the nine areas listed by the complainant.

The violations include outstation advertisements, false/misleading advertisements, advertisements for self- glorification and to target political opponents, advertisements against media, advertisements mentioning the party in power by name and also advertisements issued on incidents occurring in other states.

In its order, the panel which also comprised adman Piyush Pandey and journalist Rajat Sharma, has said that the should be made to reimburse the expenditure since the violation of the Supreme Court order of May 13, 2015, has taken place.

The assessment of the expenditure should be made by the Delhi government, it said.

The panel has directed the Delhi Government to assess expenditure incurred by it in issuing advertisements outside the territory of Delhi on the occasion of various anniversaries (except those tender or appointment advertisements which are outside the purview of the Supreme Court laid guidelines in a judgement delivered in May 2015).

It has also directed that the Delhi government assess expenditure on those advertisements or advertorials in which the name of the is mentioned, which publicized the views of the chief minister on incidents that took place in other States, and advertisements which targeted the opposition.

"The Committee further directs the Government of NCT of Delhi to get the entire expenditure so incurred on the above mentioned category of advertisements reimbursed to the State exchequer from the Aam Admi Party," the order of the Committee on Content Regulation of government advertisements has held.

The panel issued notice to the GNCT of Delhi on August 17 and then on 24the August, 2016 seeking its response after which the Kejriwal led government submitted its comments on August 33.

In its order, the panel felt that a state government should not advertise outside its boundaries, but it should be for attracting investment, business, talent etc and the advertisements should be designed accordingly for the purpose and released for the specific target group.

It added that if some chief ministers think that they are very special and their policies are relevant to the entire country, in such cases their political parties should bear the expenditure of such publicity and not the Government.

The panel also upheld the charge of false and misleading advertisements against the AAP government.

In two allegations in this regard  augmentation of bus fleet in the capital and Rs 350 crore saved in construction of elevated corridor  the panel has asked the Delhi government to verify the facts and take appropriate action.

On Maken's complaint related to large-scale ads on anniversary of party in power, the panel did not indict the Delhi government. Since the SC guidelines permit issue of advertisements highlighting completion of a fixed period of government's tenure like anniversaries, the Committee does not find any merit in the allegation, the panel said.

It also did not find merit in the complaint against the AAP government regarding publication of advertisements in the form of newspaper reports has violated the guidelines.
Bangladeshi fashion designer Bibi Russell, who is on a mission to reinvent khadi, feels that the fabric which was once the icon of the Indian Swadeshi movement in the 1920s is also the fabric of the future.

Having given a makeover to the Rajasthan government's textile division with her label Rajasthali by Bibi Rusell, the former international model will be showcasing her latest collection at the seventh season of the India Runway Week that begins here today.

"Khadi is the ultimate fabric there is, it is the fabric of future. Only it needs the design element to be dynamic like the times and trends. That's what I have attempted to do," she says.

Russell's idea of reinventing khadi involves contemporizing it in a way that would make it wearable for the current generation while retaining the traditional processes of production.

She says, "Reinventing is respecting the age-old technique and modernizing it to not only fit but flourish in current times. To gain knowledge from the absolute grassroots and figuring out how an intervention can be done without interfering."



Every piece in her collection is made out of the handspun and hand-woven fabric that has been diversified by art and design intervention to be made more suitable in the modern context.

The textiles of Rajasthan are among the major sources of her inspiration for the collection which she says will be "100 per cent Rajasthani."



"Each and every thread used in the collection is from Rajasthan. So I would say that the collection is Rajasthan incorporated.

"And the craftspeople of Rajasthan are very close to my heart. They are so talented and deserve to have their work put out for the larger market. That's what I'm trying to do through art and design intervention, redefine the market for Khadi," she says.

Russell, who was awarded with the Designer for Development



(1999) by the UNESCO, says that fashion is not just the clothes one wears but an entire cuture.

"Human dignity is a principle that lies at the heart of my work. It is about the freedom each of us has to express ourselves, to voice our dreams and share our aspirations. No society can flourish without culture, and no development can be sustainable without it."



The collection which promises a mix of both traditional and modern, will have simple, ready-to-wear designs in vibrant colours.

"Tradition is something I deeply respect everywhere I go and something I never leave out of my collections. A little modernization to appeal to the younger generation is needed to diversify the market for Khadi," she says.

She explains how khadi's versatility particularly in its thickness, coarseness and weight, the fabric can be used "to improve current fashion trends by bringing the organic factor in."



"But people don't know about this, that is why there is greater need for creating awareness (about Khadi)," she says.
A grand spiritual gathering that happens once in 12 years and is referred to as the "Kumbh Mela of the Himalayas" has begun in Ladakh's biggest monastery, Hemis, to commemorate the millennial birth anniversary of the scholar saint Naropa.

The month-long mega congregation, also known as Naropa festival, started with spiritual leader Gyalwang Drukpa's grand welcome. Drukpa is the spiritual head of the Buddhist Drukpa Lineage based in the Himalayas.

Revered as the reincarnation of Naropa, Drukpa leader donned the six bone secret ornaments of the scholar-saint at the Naro palace to grant the Grand Chakrasamvara Empowerment.

Discussing the importance of the six ornaments which includes crown, earrings, necklace, seralkha, bangle and anklet, the chairperson of the organising committee, Thuksey Rinpoche said, "It represents the inner spirituality developed qualities.

"This week-long festivity stands strong and firm on the two main concrete pillars of His Holiness' message, vision and goal of eco-friendly way of living, gender equality and woman empowerment," Rinpoche added.

A series of book releases, published by the Hemis Monastery, were also conducted by Drupka leader with Jammu and Kashmir's governor N N Vohra, who was the chief guest for the programme.

Praising Gyalwang Drukpa's for his humanitarian initiatives, the J&K governor said, "This is particularly an important occasion not only because we are celebrating Naropa festival but also because His Holiness is here today. He holds a particular important position in the lineage of Naropa.

"I feel privileged to meet him... He came here all the way by cycle after travelling 2,500 kms for two months. I would like to congratulate him."



Gyalwang Drukpa emphasised on educating people about the importance of eco-friendly way of living and nature.

"We really have to work and push ourselves for the benefits of all the beings and also towards the non-violence movement," he said, adding without nature humanity will not survive.

The programme was followed by the cultural performances of the dance groups from Nepal and Bhutan.

Drukpa Kung Fu Nuns also displayed their drum beating skills and Dharma dance.

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Incorporating laughter into a physical activity programme may improve older adult's mental health, aerobic endurance and confidence in their ability to exercise, according to a new study.

In the study, led by researchers from Georgia State University in the US, older adults residing in four assisted-living facilities participated in a moderate-intensity group exercise programme called LaughActive.

LaughActive incorporates playful simulated laughter into a strength, balance and flexibility workout.

In simulated laughter exercises, participants initially choose to laugh and go through the motions of laughing. The exercises facilitate eye contact and playful behaviours with other participants, which generally transition the laughter from simulated to genuine.

Simulated laughter techniques are based on knowledge that the body cannot distinguish between genuine laughter that might result from humour and laughter that is self-initiated as bodily exercise.

Both forms of laughter elicit health benefits, researchers said.

For six weeks, study participants attended two 45-minute physical activity sessions per week that included eight to 10 laughter exercises lasting 30 to 60 seconds each.

A laughter exercise was typically incorporated into the workout routine after every two to four strength, balance and flexibility exercises.

Because laughter is scientifically demonstrated to strengthen and relax muscles, the laughter exercises often involved physicality in the muscles being worked in strength, balance and flexibility exercises to prepare the body for exercise and help it recover.

The study found significant improvements among participants in mental health, aerobic endurance and outcome expectations for exercise (for example, perceived benefit of exercise participation), based on assessments completed by the participants.

When surveyed about their satisfaction with the programme, 96.2 per cent found laughter to be an enjoyable addition to a traditional exercise programme, 88.9 per cent said laughter helped make exercise more accessible and 88.9 per cent reported the programme enhanced their motivation to participate in other exercise classes or activities.

"The combination of laughter and exercise may influence older adults to begin exercising and to stick with the programme," said lead author Celeste Greene from Georgia State's Gerontology Institute.

"We want to help older adults have a positive experience with exercise, so we developed a physical activity programme that specifically targets exercise enjoyment through laughter," added Greene.

The study appeared in The Gerontologist journal.

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Lt Governor Najeeb Jung today asked Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, who is currently in Finland on a study tour, to return to Delhi immediately in the wake of sudden spurt in dengue and chikungunya cases in the national capital.

"The deputy CM has been asked to come back to Delhi immediately as the city is witnessing spurt in dengue and chikungunya cases," a top source said.

Sisodia, who also hold the education portfolio,along with his officers are in Finland to study the education system of that country.

Source said, besides Sisodia, all officers including Education Secretary have been directed to return to Delhi immediately.

Earlier in the day, Congress activists observed 'Bhagoda Divas' in Delhi to protest against the alleged absence of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Sisodia and other ministers from the national capital which is at present reeling under chikungunya and dengue outbreak.

Refuting the allegation of the Opposition that he is "holidaying" in Finland, Sisodia said it was not a "sin" to study the schooling system of other countries to fix the problems in Delhi's education system.

He said he had worked hard to improve the education system in the national capital and he was in Finland to see what more needs to be done.

"Learning from across the world is not a sin. It's a sin to defame an educational tour as a 'holiday'. I'm in Finland. We need to learn a lot from their education system, the best in the world (sic)," he said in a series of tweets.

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Sadiq Khan is using his first trip to the US since becoming London's first Muslim mayor to criticize Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.

The Chicago Tribune reports Khan said yesterday evening that Trump was representing the views of "extremists" when he said mainstream Muslims can't have Western values.

Khan says he's a "big fan" of Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton who should be "infusing, energizing people to vote" for her.

Khan talked to reporters after speaking at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, where he focused on social integration.

The London mayor plans to tour the city today with Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel. The two are expected to stroll along the Chicago Riverwalk, visit a digital startup community and dine at the Art Institute of Chicago.

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Senior Trinamool Congress leader and Saradha scam accused Madan Mitra today visited the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) office at CGO complex in Salt Lake as per the court's directive to appear before the investigating officer once every week.

Mitra, however, could not meet the CBI investigating officer (IO) because the latter was away in New Delhi, and left the office after waiting for an hour and returned to the hotel in Bhowanipore, where he has put up.

Earlier, Mitra moved to the Sessions Court with a plea to allow him to travel to Salt Lake to meet the CBI IO.

As per one of the conditions against which Mitra was granted bail by the Sessions Court on September 9, the TMC leader was not supposed to move out of Bhowanipore jurisdiction.

"The court allowed Mitra to leave Bhowanipore jurisdiction and go to the CBI office any day once a week." Mitra's counsel Niladri Bhattacharya told PTI.

Mitra submitted a letter to other officials to mark his presence at the CBI office, he said.

The court which had granted bail to Mitra, after he spent over 21 months in prison in connection with the chit fund scam, had also directed him to surrender his passport to the CBI.

The investigating agency has filed a petition before the Calcutta High Court seeking cancellation of Mitra's bail.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis today said that by 2017, every district in the state will have a 'regional development plan'.

"We are in the process of finalising the development plan for Pune city and within two months it will be approved," said Fadnavis, speaking at a meeting of CREDAI National and Presidents' Conclave here.

CREDAI is a federation of associations of real estate developers.

Besides Mumbai, Pune and other big cities, by 2017 every district in the state would have its own regional development plan, the Chief Minister said.

"Maharashtra will be the first state to have such a plan for each of its districts and our government has already started working on such 11 plans already," he said.

Fadnavis also said delays in approving the development plans was a "criminal waste of time, energy and resources".

When his government came to power, several DPs were pending for approval, he said.

"After assuming the office, we fast-tracked the process of approval and have approved nearly 70 DPs in last two years," he said, adding that inordinate delay in approving DPs leads to unauthorised constructions.

There was a need to simplify policies and expedite the decision making, Fadnavis added.

Talking about the Real Estate Regulatory Act, he said that Maharashtra would be the first state to finalise the rules and guidelines under the legislation.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
In November 1968, the Mitsukoshi Department Store in Kobe found itself at the center of a major controversy.2 At the beginning of the month, it had joined with Mitsukoshi stores in Osaka and Tokyo in exhibiting and offering for sale reproductions of a selection of historical maps as part of a special event to mark the centenary of the Meiji Restoration. The idea was to give interested members of the public a chance to imagine, through the maps, what different areas of the country had been like at the time of the Restorationat that moment, in other words, when Japan as a whole stood at the threshold of modernity.

Of the one hundred or so historical maps made available for purchase during the special two-week event, two, in particular, were to become the focus of criticism and protest. The maps in question, which formed a complementary set, depicted the area around Kobe in the immediate wake of the Restoration, and were, no doubt, featured prominently when the exhibit first opened at the local Mitsukoshi branch.

Looking at them now, some 50 years later, it is not difficult to understand how it was that the maps came to be included in the special sale. The treaty port at Kobe had, after all, been opened for foreign residence and trade just as the events of the Restoration were unfolding in 1868, and the two maps, originally printed on wood blocks in five attractive colors, capture much of interest about that moment. This is particularly true of the first map (Map 1 (1)), which depicts the area between the Minato and Ikuta rivers, where the new foreign concession (kyoryuchi) was established.

Map 1 (1): Hyogo-ken gomenkyo kaiko Kobe no zu (1868). Reproduced with permission of the University of British Columbia (George H. Beans Collection). English labels added by the author.

To the right hand side of the map we see the foreign concession ringed by the consulates of the various treaty powers, while at the left hand side, in a large red box, stands the Hyogo Prefectural Court (Hyogo-ken saibansho)the seat of Japanese governmental authority in the surrounding area. In between these two centers of power we see the busy harbor, thronging with an array of Western and Japanese ships, the streets of the main Japanese town and, in the background, the famous peaks of the Rokko mountain range. On closer inspection we also begin to notice other things: The Ikuta Shrine, for example, linked to the foreign concession by a road lined with blossoming cherries, as well as various facilities established to serve the newly arrived population of white men including, most prominently, the Fukuhara-cho brothel district and a special Christian cemetery.3 The second of the two controversial maps (not shown here) depicted the area to the West of the Minato riverthe other side, in other words, of the Hyogo Prefectural Courtand although there is less evidence of the new foreign presence, it too is of considerable interest for what it reveals about the state of the old port town of Hyogo at the dawn of the Meiji era.

What made the two maps controversial in 1968, however, was that in addition to identifying the ordinary peasant communities in the area surrounding the treaty port, each of them also showed the location of a community of Tokugawa period outcastes marked with the words eta mura (= eta village)a label which, in terms of its emotive power and historical resonances, might well be compared to the words nigger town in English.

When this became known to representatives of local community organizations, including the Kobe branch of the Buraku Liberation League (BLL), a national group formed to fight discrimination against those believed to be descendants of Tokugawa period outcastes, they quickly moved to protest the Mitsukoshi decision to display and sell these discriminatory old maps (sabetsu no kochizu), describing it as utterly lacking in common sense (amari ni mo hijoshiki sugiru). The sale of such maps, the BLL bluntly stated, contributes to the spread of discrimination.4

For local activists and community representatives, the timing of the Mitsukoshi event undoubtedly contributed to a general sense of anger and frustration. As newspaper reports at the time of the controversy hastened to remind readers, it had been just a few short years after the Restoration, in 1871, that the new Meiji government issued its so-called emancipation decree (kaihorei) for Tokugawa period outcastes, formally granting them the same legal status as members of the commoner population, and ending official use of the old derogatory names.5 Needless to say, much had happened in the ensuing century, including, most famously, the establishment in 1922 of the Zenkoku Suiheisha, or National Levellers Society, organized by members of former outcaste communities from around the country to fight for dignity, self-respect, and basic rights.6 By that time these communities were widely referred to as tokushu buraku, or special villages, itself a term with pejorative connotations, which was later replaced by a range of other designations such as villages awaiting emancipation (mikaiho buraku), villages subject to discrimination (hisabetsu buraku), or in abbreviated form simply as buraku (= villages), with the rest implied.

Whatever they were called, however, the reality was that even in the 1960s, life in these communities was still characterized by segregation, deprivation and poverty.7 For all the shifts in official nomenclature, moreover, the old Tokugawa period word, eta, which literally means much filth, continued to be used in everyday speech and social interactions as an insult and provocation. From the point of view of the BLL and its allies, then, the Mitsukoshi decision to display and sell maps describing local communities with this word, as part of a commemoration of the same historical moment in which they had first been promised emancipation, constituted clear evidence of the ongoing insensitivity and, indeed, cluelessness of the company. Although it was never publicly mentioned in 1968, the sense of frustration may have been further compounded by the fact that it was precisely the community identified in the first map of Kobe, which was said to have inspired a Tosa samurai named Oe Taku (1847-1921) to lodge the petition that, for much of the 20th century, was credited with having led the Meiji government to issue the 1871 emancipation edict in the first place.8 This undertanding has now been thoroughly debunked. For many at the time, however, this was the place from which the states promise of emancipation had first issued, and yet one hundred years later it was still being represented with the same hateful language.

In terms of timing, it surely also mattered that the late 1960s in Japan, as in so many parts of the world, were a period of growing concern with social justice issues. Buraku activists, in particular, had good reason to feel that they finally stood on the threshold of significant change. In 1965, a special advisory council (Dowa taisaku shingikai) established by the government at the beginning of the decade, had issued a landmark report declaring the discrimination faced by Japans Buraku residents to be a national problem (kokumin-teki na kadai), the eradication of which was a state responsibility (kuni no sekimu de aru). This had opened the way to a period of cooperation between the national government and groups such as the BLL, which eventually culminated in the 1969 Law on Special Measures for Dowa [= harmonization] Projects. In the decades that followed, this law was to significantly reshape the Buraku issue and its place in Japanese society by ensuring that large amounts of government funding were channeled into projects earmarked for the improvement of basic living conditions in communities around the country, which were now officially described using yet another nameharmonization districts (dowa chiku).9

At the end of 1968, then, as details of this major new legislation were being finalised, a great deal of attention had come to focus on the Buraku problem. The issue was taken up in a high profile television documentary shown on the national broadcaster, NHK, in December of that year, and newspaper articles drew comparisons to the black power movement and the struggle for civil rights in the United States at the time.10 From late in 1967, moreover, the BLL had led a campaign to protest the way that another kind of historical source material, family records compiled in the early Meiji period (the so-called jinshin koseki), were being used to perpetuate discrimination. In response, in early 1968 the government had moved to prevent members of the public from accessing all such family records, and indeed, they remain off-limits to this day.11

Against this background, it is little wonder that Buraku groups felt empowered to speak out about the way in which their communities were being represented in historical maps. Nor is it surprising that Mitsukoshi, for its part, was quick to try and resolve the situation. On the one hand, the store management sought to explain its decision by stating that the maps had been left in the form [in which they had originally been published in the 1860s] so as to ensure that the [reproductions] would be useful as historical and scholarly research material.12 On the other hand, however, they were also quick to announce that the decision to put the maps on sale, was a major error, which showed disregard for human rights. In addition to putting an immediate stop to the sale, the store promised to make efforts to promptly buy back [all copies of] the discriminatory old maps that we have sold. As if to underline the general criticism made by the BLL, the deputy store manager was also quoted as saying, We did a general check of the maps before putting them on sale, but had not noticed the problematic term (mondai no hyogen) [i.e. the word eta]. Although it was done unwittingly, it is truly regrettable that our actions have served to further aggravate [the problem of] discrimination.

With this the initial controversy was put to rest, but the Kobe Mitsukoshi incident was to have repercussions that continued to be felt for decades. In its wake, and that of a number of similar incidents that followed, publishers, museums and other organizations in Japan were to become increasingly cautious in their handling of historical maps.13 It soon became common practice to erase language that might be used to identify outcaste communities when republishing or exhibiting historical maps and institutions of all kinds also began to limit open public access to original maps that contained such information. The concern behind this general shift, it should be emphasized, was not just with the use of derogatory or offensive terms, but also the possibility that old maps might be used to out the residents of particular neighborhoods as the descendants of outcastes, thereby re-inscribing old patterns of discrimination and exclusion with regard to employment, marriage, housing and so on. Japans Burakumin, after all, much like Dalits in India, are physically indistinguishable from the majority population, so local knowledge and consciousness of where they live has long been seen to form a significant part of the problem. Maps, it was feared, might serve to perpetuate discrimination by keeping such consciousness alive or, even worse, helping to rekindle it. For many, the seriousness of such concerns was underlined in the mid-1970s, when it was revealed that an unscrupulous private detective had compiled a list of Buraku districts around the country and offered it for sale to companies, so they could use it to investigate the backgrounds of potential employees and ensure that residents of these districts were not hired.14 Needless to say, apprehension about this and other forms of discrimination has not disappeared and, indeed, the advent of online services, such as Google Earth, has recently served to fuel a new wave of debate about the possible misuse and abuse of historical maps.15 The issue remains a highly sensitive one.16

At the same time, however, it is also clear that in recent decades there has been another major shift in thinking about the problems posed by historical maps and how best to address them. While acknowledging the ongoing need for sensitivity to community concerns and potential misuse by malicious individuals, groups such as the BLL now openly criticize the practices of altering and suppressing historical maps that show outcaste communities or refer to them with pejorative terms. In response to an incident in 1990, for example, in which an institution in Niigata removed a map from an exhibit because it contained potentially offensive language, the BLL issued a statement saying that, rather than hiding such maps, it is more desirable [for them] to be displayed together with a proper explanation [of the relevant issues]. Similarly, in 1994, responding to another incident in Niigata, the BLL commented that, to simply cover things up will not solve anything. Instead, we must enlighten [people] about the history of discrimination embedded in the word eta. Another important step came in 2001, when the Osaka Human Rights Museum (Liberty Osaka), with the support of the national BLL and many of its regional branches, hosted a special exhibition of historical maps depicting outcaste communities.17 Two years later, in October 2003, when the national BLL issued a general statement outlining its current position on the publication and exhibition of historical maps, it not only reaffirmed its opposition to the erasure and covering up of historical terms, but even went so far as to describe the demands it had made of Mitsukoshi in the 1960s to buy back maps and stop sales of any further copies, as a clearly mistaken (akiraka ni ayamatta) approach.18

While some may be tempted to see this change simply as marking a return to common sense practice after a period of politically correct censorship, it is surely important to recognize the significant changes in societal context that have occurred since 1968. The 1969 Special Measures Law, which was allowed to expire in 2002, has not been without its critics, but there can be little doubt that during the decades of general economic growth and prosperity that followed its enactment many of the most obvious forms of inequality that had previously plagued, and marked, Buraku communities came to be addressed, and general sensitivity to the issue of discrimination has also grown. This is certainly not to suggest that all aspects of the problem have been adequately resolved, or that the possibility of discrimination has been permanently consigned to the past. As recent work by scholars such as Timothy Amos and Joseph Hankins suggests, however, the issues have clearly become more nuanced and complex in recent decades.19 In particular, as some of the most obvious markers of Buraku difference have been eroded, groups such as the BLL have become increasingly concerned with questions of how to foster a positive sense of community identity, and promote awareness of the history out of which the movement first arose. It is, in large part, against this background that the recent shift in attitudes to the question of historical maps should be understood. As the BLLs 2003 statement puts it, Rather than shrinking before a phantasm of possible discrimination (sabetsu sareru kanosei to iu genei), let us boldly step forward to expand and deepen the possibilities for opposing discrimination. In other words, rather than altering or covering up maps for fear they might be misused, it is better to make responsible use of them to discuss, explore and promote understanding of the problem and its ongoing implications.20

There is, of course, no question that historical maps are potentially useful, not only for understanding the conditions in which members of oucaste communities lived, but also the ways in which such communities formed an integral part of the larger society, and, indeed, of the ways that outcaste geographies could sometimes play a critical role in shaping other aspects of social development and change. As an example of this let us turn, finally, to a brief consideration of another map from the Kobe area in the years immediately following the Meiji Restoration.

Map 2: Settsu no kuni Yatabe gun Ujino mura sotai ezu (1870). Reproduced with permission of the Kobe City Museum. English labels added by the author.

The map (Map 2) shows the lands of a village called Ujino in 1870, the third year of the Meiji era.21 In the top right-hand corner the seals of the headman and three other village officials have been affixed to the map to attest that its remarkably detailed record of local land use is accurate. The village lands have been divided up into a total of 420 plots, each of which has been numbered and marked with the name of an individual owner. Colors have also been used to indicate different kinds of land-use: Rice paddies are shown in light blue, other fields in yellow, and newly reclaimed paddy land (shinden) in off-white. The Uji River, which formed the villages Western border, is shown in blue. Irrigation ponds are marked in a darker blue, embankments in brown, and roads in red. The large blank space at the top of the map represents a hilly area too steep for cultivation, while another area left blank at the lower left indicates land controlled by a neighboring village. Ujino itself, which is to say the houses of village residents, is shown close to the middle of the map, marked in orange. Two red torii gates, one at the base of the uncultivated hills, and another at the North Western corner of Ujino, indicate the presence of local shrines; a Buddhist temple can also be seen near the heart of the main settlement. At the Western-edge of the map, however, we see a second Buddhist temple, in the middle of an area marked in purple. The map key indicates only that this area was known as Furonodani: This so-called branch village, within the territorial limits of Ujino, was, in fact, the same outcaste community marked on the 1868 map at the center of the Mitsukoshi controversy.

One immediate indicator of the disadvantages faced by Furonodanis residents is its location on the banks of the Uji River, which made it prone to flooding. It is also instructive to note how small it is in comparison with the main peasant village of Ujino. From the records of a local census we know that in 1871 there were some 1093 people living in this tiny space. In Ujino, by contrast, an area perhaps three or four times as large, the total population, including servants, was around 400. The overall pattern of inequality is also clear from a consideration of landownership. The compilers of the map used a special prefix to indicate the names of outcaste landowners, and from this we can confirm that residents of Furonodani were mainly limited to farming a narrow strip of land around the edge of the community. In one area, just to the North of Furonodani, and immediately adjacent to the village graveyard, we see a particularly dense concentration of plots, too small to be properly mapped. The compilers here have simply listed the names of the outcaste owners.

With access to land so limited, it is hardly surprising that, according to the 1871 census, only a small number of Furonodani households listed farming as their primary occupation. As was true of many outcaste communities, some residents of Furonodani were responsible throughout the Tokugawa period for collecting the carcasses of dead animals (particularly cattle) from surrounding peasant communities. This helped ensure a strong connection to various kinds of leather work, but a wide variety of other occupational groups (day laborers, hair dressers, flower sellers etc) were represented too. The map also makes it clear that, in contrast to the lands controlled by Ujino peasants, only a very small portion of the land cultivated by Furonodani residents was used to grow rice. This may have been because Furonodani, like many outcaste communities, was exempt from the payment of annual rice taxes. Instead, its residents (together with those of another nearby outcaste community) had been required to perform special duties (yaku) in the old port town of Hyogo: cleaning the area around the towns administrative headquarters, clearing away the bodies of sick travellers and beggars found dead in the town streets, and helping with the administration of judicial punishments (displaying and guarding the severed heads of executed criminals etc.) This long-standing connection to the management of poor, diseased and criminal bodies, helps explain one other striking aspect of the 1870 map of Ujino: the presence of both a Western-style hospital (dai byoin) and a workhouse (tokeijo).

As already noted above, in preparation for the opening of the new treaty port in 1868, Japanese officials had overseen the construction of a variety of new institutions in the area. Both the new hospital and the workhouse that appear on the 1870 Ujino village map are also marked on the 1868 Kobe map discussed above.

Map 1 (2): Hyogo-ken gomenkyo kaiko Kobe no zu (1868). With locations of hospital, workhouse, checkpoint and jailhouse shown.

Looking back at the 1868 map (see Map 1 (2)), moreover, we see that a checkpoint (bansho) was also built on the edge of Ujino village, and that a new jailhouse (royashiki) had been established across the Uji river from Furonodani. A few years later Kobes first modern prison would also be built nearby. It is, of course, possible that other factors helped to shape the concentration of these particular institutions in this small area. Given the nature of the duties that had been performed by Furonodanis residents under the old regime, however, there seems little doubt that this clustering was linked to an older geography of social inequality and hierarchy. From the very outset, then, Japanese modernity was being inflected and shaped by the legacies of the old status order, and, as we have seen above, it would take more than a century before the underlying issues would begin to be addressed by the broader society.
Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik today vowed to fight for the rights of the people at the tripartite meeting scheduled to be held in New Delhi tomorrow on the Mahanadi water issue.

During his visit to Delhi, the Chief Minister would meet his Chhattisgarh counterpart Raman Singh at the meeting convened by Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti.

Patnaik, who was given a ceremonial send off at the airport by ruling BJD ministers, MPs, MLAs and party workers, said Mahanadi was the lifeline for crores of people living in 15 districts of the state and he would strongly fight for the rights of the people.

"I assure each one of you I will put my best efforts forward and leave no stone unturned in the fight for the people of our state," Patnaik said.

"I am going with a lot of hope that the Centre will listen to the voice of Odisha and do justice to the people of our state on the sensitive Mahanadi issue," he said, adding his government had already lodged protest against neighbouring Chhattisgarh's act of constructing projects on the upstream of river Mahanadi.

The Chief Minister, who met the members from the public and political parties for three days, thanked those who came forward with valuable suggestions in the larger interest of the state.

"I am extremely grateful to our people who have come from all over the state to voice their concern and give their suggestions on this very important issue," he said.

Stating that he would like to personally thank everyone who came and met him, Patnaik said "I also express my deepest gratitude to the four and half crore people of our state who are concerned about this issue and continue to support me for the interest of the state.

Earlier in the day, Patnaik continued to listen to the



people for the third consecutive day over the Mahanadi water dispute and met as many as 28 organisations and discussed the water sharing dispute with them.

Meanwhile, Chief Secretary A P Padhi presided over a high-level meeting and discussed on the state government's stand on the tripartite meeting.

Besides Patnaik, Chief Secretary Padhi and Water Resource secretary P K Jena would attend the meeting tomorrow in New Delhi.

Patnaik had sent a BJD fact finding team to Chhattisgarh for an on-the-spot verification of the projects undertaken by that state on the Mahanadi river last month.

In its bid to resolve the dispute between the two states, the Centre had convened a joint meeting in New Delhi on July 29, which was attended by Chief Secretaries of both Odisha and Chhattisgarh.

However, there was no outcome of the meeting forcing Uma Bharti to convene another meeting between the two Chief Ministers of Odisha and Chhattisgarh on September 17.
Alleging discrepancies in the new electoral list prepared by the Election Commission, Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee today asked the party leaders and elected representatives to compare it with the old list.

Banerjee, at the meeting of party's decision making committee, asked the party leaders to prepare themselves for the Panchayat elections slated in 2018 in the state.

"Mamata Banerjee said that the list has been prepared without consulting political parties. She has asked the public representatives and leaders to compare the old voter list with the new voter list," a senior party leader, who was present in the meeting, said.

The senior party leader said that there was no similarity in the master roll and the revised roll prepared by the Election Commission.

"We feel that there is a discrepancy and the BJP is behind it," he alleged.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Mauritius, the island nation that accounts for the second-largest FDI, has sought a line of credit and more investments from India as it gets ready for implementation of the revised tax treaty from April 2017.

Mauritian Minister of Finance and Economic Development Pravind Kumar Jugnauth on Thursday met Finance Minister Arun Jaitley to discuss economic ties between the two countries and avenues to deepen co-operation.

"Now that the tax treaty is revised, is seeking a package in the form of line of credit and more investments from India to boost its economy and generate employment," an official told PTI.

Following the decade-long negotiations, India in May reworked its tax agreement with to introduce a levy to prevent investors using the island nation as a shelter to avoid taxes.

The 1983 Double Taxation Avoidance Convention (DTAC), which helped channelise a third of the India's foreign direct investment in the past 15 years, was revised on May 10 to impose short-term capital gains tax at half the rate during the two-year transition from April 1, 2017.

The levy is currently at 15 per cent. The full rate will kick in from April 1, 2019.

This is the first visit of Mauritian Finance Minister after the revised treaty was signed between the two countries.

The official said after the revised DTAC kicks in, lesser number of companies are likely to route their funds into India using the Indian Ocean island nation and some could shut shop as well.

The LoC as well as strengthening of ties is a political call to be taken at the highest level, he said.

"It is a call to be taken on how well we want to manage our neighbours. One of the deciding factors will be China's growing influence in the region, particularly among the nations that were considered friendly to India," the official added.

India and had been in negotiations about revising the three-decade-old tax treaty since 2006 to check misuse by some investors.

More than a third of the $278 billion India has received in foreign direct investment in the past 15 years came via Mauritius.

The two nations in 1983 had signed the treaty seeking to eliminate double taxation of income and capital gains to encourage mutual trade and investment.

Mauritius, which has 43 double taxation treaties with different nations that allow companies registered in the two countries to pay taxes in only one, is seeking to reinvent itself as an investment destination and a financial services hub.
Stepping deeper into the political fray, Michelle Obama today warned young voters against being "tired or turned off" in the 2016 election. She urged them to rally behind Hillary Clinton, "particularly given the alternative."



Mrs. Obama is emerging as one of Clinton's most effective advocates, especially with voters who backed President Barack Obama but are less enthusiastic about his potential Democratic successor. The Clinton team's biggest challenge regarding Mrs. Obama is getting the reluctant campaigner to commit to more events.

Today's rally in Virginia was Mrs. Obama's first solo campaign event for Clinton and comes nearly two months after her star turn at the Democratic convention. Speaking to mostly students at George Mason University, she repeatedly jabbed Trump without mentioning him by name, declaring that being president "isn't anything like reality TV."



The first lady pointedly called out those who continue to question the president's citizenship "up to this very day." Drawing on a frequently quoted line from her convention speech, Mrs. Obama said her husband had responded to those questions by "''going high when they go low."



Hours earlier, Trump stated for the first time that the president was born in the United States, though he did not apologize for devoting years to promoting false allegations that Obama was not an American citizen.

Beyond her ability to take on Trump with a smile, Mrs. Obama's real value to Clinton is her wild popularity with Democratic voters, particularly young people and blacks.

She vouched repeatedly for Clinton's resume and character, urging voters motivated by her husband's history-making campaigns to feel the same way about the first woman nominated for president by a major U.S. Party.

"When I hear folks saying that they don't feel inspired in this election, well let me tell you, I disagree- I am inspired," Mrs. Obama said.

Clinton aides want Mrs. Obama in battleground states as much as possible between now and Election Day. Today's rally in northern Virginia, less than an hour drive from the White House, is the only event she's publicly committed to, though the Clinton campaign expects her to make additional appearances.

Jennifer Palmieri, Clinton's communications director and a former Obama adviser, called the first lady "an advocate without peer."



"There is no other surrogate with the reach, credibility and respect she has," Palmieri said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The recent revision of minimum wages for the agri and non-agri sector workers would benefit 70 lakh people, Labour Minister said on Friday.

"For the first time, minimum wages have been simultaneously revised for agricultural and non-agricultural sectors. This will benefit 70 lakh workers," he said at the Vishwakarma Rashtriya Puraskar and National Safety Awards function held here.

The Labour Ministry, quoting Dattatreya, added that the government has also revised the minimum wages for unskilled non-farm workers upwards by 42 per cent to Rs 350 per day.

"We have also increased bonus from Rs 3,500 to Rs 7,000 or minimum wages whichever is higher. Eligibility ceiling for bonus has been raised from Rs 10,000 to Rs 21,000. This will benefit 65 lakh workers," the Minister said.

Besides, the minimum pension has been fixed at Rs 1,000 in EPS-95 in perpetuity, which will benefit 20 lakh pensioners, Dattatreya added.

He was referring to Labour Ministry amending the Employees Pension Scheme (EPS) 1995, to provide the entitlement of minimum monthly pension of Rs 1,000 in perpetuity.

Congratulating the award winners, the Minister said that they should become leading lights in promotion of safety in their respective organisations for years to come.

"I would like to impress upon them that they should work with the same vigour, dedication and commitment as well as contribute in an exemplary manner to the overall industrial and economic development of India such that it clinches a significant space among the industrialised nations," he added.

Industrial peace and harmony can be achieved only when the goals of employment and employability are in tune with the targets of industrial development and growth, he said.

Dattatreya said that his ministry is focusing on safety, health and welfare of the Indian workforce and will strive towards making India a better workplace for all.

"It is the need of the hour that industries develop and implement preventive safety and health culture in their organisations to ensure global standards in conformance with the National Policy on Safety, Health and Environment at workplaces," he said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi was accorded a grand reception here tonight as he landed at the airport ahead of his 66th birthday tomorrow.

This is the PM's third visit in recent times to Gujarat, where Assembly elections are due next year.

Governor O P Kohli, the entire Gujarat cabinet including the Chief Minister Vijay Rupani, state BJP leaders including the newly-appointed president Jitu Vaghani and hundreds of party workers welcomed Modi at the airport.

After his grand reception, Modi thanked Gujarat BJP leaders and party workers and drove to the Raj Bhavan in Gandhinagar where he will spend the night. Some of the party workers seemed disappointed as Modi did not address them.

Tomorrow, Modi will first go to Gandhinagar to seek the blessings of his mother Hiraba and meet other family members, Gujarat BJP spokesperson Bharat Pandya told PTI. Modi's mother lives with his younger brother Pankaj Modi in Gandhinagar.

Later, he would go to the tribal district of Dahod to inaugurate various irrigations projects.

Dahod collector Lalit Padaliya said the inauguration ceremony will be held at Limkheda town, around 25 km from the city, and the PM will also address a rally there.

"The Prime Minister will inaugurate Kadana-Hafeshwar irrigation project," Padaliya said.

Later in the afternoon he would go to Navsari where he is scheduled to take part in a function where aid would be distributed to the differently-abled persons.

"In Navsari, PM will distribute kits and aid to 'divyang' citizens. He will also address a large gathering near Navsari town," Pandya said.

BJP is facing a challenge in Gujarat ahead of next year's polls in the aftermath of Patel quota agitation and the protests of Dalit community after the Una atrocity incident.

Last month Modi visited his home state twice -- to condole the death of Sawminarayan sect's leader Pramukhswami Maharaj and later to inaugurate an irrigation scheme in Saruashtra region.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Issues related to universal healthcare and achieving its targets with partnership with the private sector will be discussed by speakers at a lecture series organised here tomorrow.

Union Health Minister J P Nadda and noted heart surgeon Naresh Trehan will be key speakers on the topic of "Universal Healthcare: Forging Partnership with the Private Sector" organised under the aegis of second national Y N Singh Memorial Lecture series.

The series was started by the Y N Singh Memorial Foundation.

Besides Nadda and Trehan, Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Assembly Speaker Sitashran Sharma, Chhattisgarh Health and Family Welfare Minister Ajay Chandrakar, his MP counterpart Rustam Singh, MP Congress President, Arun Yadav and Chhattisgarh Leader of Opposition T S Singh Deo, among others would be present on the occasion, Foundation Chairman Aseem Singh told reporters today.

"Providing health facilities to all, especially in a diverse country like India which has varied socio-economic dimensions, is a major challenge before the country," he said.

Keeping in mind that challenge, the Foundation has organised this year's lecture on the topic of health and invited Nadda and Trehan to share their experience on the issue, he said.

Last year, the Founation had organised a lecture on internal security which was addressed by Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh and Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh.

The lecture series is organised in the memory of late Y N Singh, who had done a commendable job in the field of cooperatives and for farmers during his stint with public sector fertiliser companies like IFFCO and KRIBHCO.

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Pakistan has scuttled an India-sponsored proposal of setting up a working group on counter-terrorism during the deliberations at the senior official-level 17th summit of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) in Margarita Island, Venezuala.

According to top government sources, as NAM diplomats strove to set up a working group on terrorism to coordinate their positions in fora, Pakistani representative Tasneem Aslam alone spoke against it and opposed the consensus that had built around the proposal which had the support of a very large number of NAM delegations.

"Despite being isolated, Pakistan continued with its objections to stall the proposal emphasising that there could not be a consensus on terrorism," the sources said.

The proposal by India, whose ministerial delegation is led by Minister of State for External Affairs M J Akbar, gathered a lot of steam following the minister's strong pitch against terrorism at the ministerial segment.

Interestingly, there was no meeting so far between Akbar and Pakistan's adviser to the prime minister on foreign affairs Sartaj Aziz who is also in the conference.

"The Indian proposal aimed to foster greater cooperation between NAM states who are the biggest victims of terrorism as 20 NAM states from all parts of the globe spoke strongly in support with Pakistan being the sole country opposing the broadly supported initiative," sources said.

Aslam said it may be too onerous for small countries to have to participate in another working group as they have staffing issues and also why a working group only for terrorism and not for other issues.

Whereas the attempt was that when terrorism issues are on UN agenda the working group would make statements on behalf of the NAM.

"It would negotiate together as a bloc. It would try and have common positions among NAM members on new terrorism- related issues. In effect it would be a useful platform for NAM members to cooperate together and enhance their negotiating position. That is the purpose of the proposal," sources said.

Now it is to be seen whether the proposal will be part of the final statement to be prepared for the summit which is going to conclude on Sunday.
Taking a serious note of the attack on Muslim youths allegedly by cow vigilantes in Kanjhawala area of outer Delhi, the National Commission for Minorities (NCM) has asked police to submit a report on the incident at the earliest.

"The Commission has taken an extremely serious view of the attack on Muslim youths by cow vigilantes in Delhi. It has written to the Commissioner of Police (Alok Kumar Verma) to submit the report at the earliest," NCM member Praveen Davar said.

Davar urged the government to facilitate medical treatment of those injured in the assault and demanded that those responsible "should not get away with it".

"We will wait for the report and take it up during our meeting next week. The Commission can make further remarks only after discussing it. Meanwhile, the government can ensure that the victims get medical treatment," Davar added.

Three persons, including a minor, were thrashed by a group of men when they were going to allegedly dispose of animal entrails and hide of animals sacrificed on the occasion of Bakra Eid at around 8 PM on Wednesday.

The police have arrested four persons, while it has launched a hunt to nab other attackers.

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North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA) convenor Himanta Biswa Sarma today claimed the NDA has formed a government in Arunachal Pradesh with 43 of the 44 Congress MLAs there joining the regional outfit PPA, thereby rejecting Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi's leadership.

Assam minister and BJP leader Sarma at a press meet here, said, "As the PPA is a part of NEDA, which is a constituent of the (BJP-led) NDA, an NDA government is in Arunachal Pradesh from today. Arunachal is free from Congress."



"With this development, stability should come to Arunachal Pradesh and bring the entire North East under the development umbrella of the NDA government," he said.

On the eleven BJP MLAs extending support to the Pema Khandu government, Sarma said, "PPA is a part of NEDA and obviously it is morally obligatory to extend outside support. Khandu called me and desired PPA be called a part of NEDA."



"We welcome the development in Arunachal Pradesh as it will strengthen one of our member party, PPA. Khandu is inducted into NEDA and is now one of its Chief Ministers," he said.

Asked what message was sent after today's situation in Arunachal to the Congress president and vice president, Sarma, a former Congress dissident, said, "The message is very clear ... People do not want the leadership of Rahul Gandhi. The Arunachal Pradesh development proves that."



"Today 43 MLAs including the Speaker, resigned from the Congress and merged with the People's Party of Arunachal Pradesh (PPA) and all, except Nabam Tuki, presented themselves before the Governor," Sarma said.

He claimed "BJP as a party, was not consulted by the MLAs and it was not in the loop. I informed the BJP leadership and our national president this evening about the development after Arunachal Chief Minister Pema Khandu informed me at 4 PM and I verified with their Assembly bulletin. Our national president has not reacted."



"Only at 9 AM I was told by Khandu that something will take place today, but I was not aware about its magnitude. After the Supreme Court order, Khandu was reluctant to go back to the Congress," the NEDA convenor said.

It is the second time this year that the Congress has been hit hard by rebellion in Arunachal Pradesh where Pema Khandu had two months ago become Chief Minister in a development that restored the Congress government.

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YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 15, ARMENPRESS. Vice President of the National Assembly of Armenia Eduard Sharmazanov assesses the consensus reached on September 13 on the amendments of the Electoral Code between the authorities and the opposition as historical.

After the Executive Body meeting of the Republican Party, Sharmazanov stated that the mentioned cooperation shows that the authorities of Armenia are most interested in holding the 2017 parliamentary elections within the frames of the law.

We agreed to the compromise in order to ensure maximally high public trust towards the results of the elections, Armenpress reports the National Assembly Vice President said.

He also added that the gentleman-style agreement between the authorities and the opposition resulted in oppositionist figures to be satisfied at least by the changes in the Electoral Code.
Noting that most laboratories accredited with the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas did not have requisite facility to test petrol and diesel for adulteration, the National Green Tribunal has directed IIT Madras to determine the quantum of impurity in these fuels.

A bench headed by NGT Chairperson Justice Swatanter Kumar, which had directed the Ministry to inspect petrol pumps in Delhi-NCR, also directed authorities to conduct qualitative analysis of fuel samples from the government laboratories without going into the percentage of adulteration.

"The report of pilot project taken up by the IIT Madras for examining and analysing the quantitative adulteration of Naphtha and Kerosene in petrol/diesel, should be submitted to the Tribunal before the next date of hearing positively. Let the concerned and IIT Madras be informed of this direction.

"In addition to the samples so far collected from the outlets and/or from the vehicles, the authority should collect at least 50 samples from NCR including Gurgaon, NOIDA, Bahadurgarh, Alwar and others," the bench also comprising Justice Raghuvendra S Rathore said.

The tribunal directed the Ministry to place the analysis report of fuels before October 20, the next date of hearing.

Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta appeared on behalf of the Ministry of Petroleum and three oil marketing companies.

The Tribunal was hearing a plea filed by Delhi resident Cherub Singla seeking directions to inspect the fuel quality at petrol pumps across the country especially in cities facing acute air pollution.

Advocate Avneesh Arputham, appearing for the petitioner, said as none of the accredited labs in India had the ability to test the magnitude of adulteration in fuel, the pilot project of IIT Madras was very important.

The Ministry had earlier informed NGT that out of 20 labs, response from 17 labs (including IIT Delhi, IIT Madras and IIT Mumbai) was received and except for IIT Madras, all laboratories expressed inability to detect percentage of content of naphtha and kerosene in case of adulteration of petrol and diesel as they were not equipped with the requisite testing facilities.

Last year, the NGT had constituted a committee comprising officials from the Central Pollution Control Board, Ministry of Petroleum and state pollution control boards to conduct joint inspection at 10 petrol pumps in Delhi-NCR and analyse fuel samples after a plea claimed that adulterated fuel was a major cause of air pollution in the capital.

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The noise pollution level on the day of Ganesh idol immersion in Mumbai and adjoining regions have came down as compared to the preceding years, a senior Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB) official said.

"The noise level in Mumbai was 81 decibel on the immersion day of 2015, which declined to 75.3 decibel yesterday," MPCB joint director V M Motghare told PTI.

The high pitch music played during the immersion rally of the Ganesh festival for last some years, leads to noise pollution, which apparently causes hearing disabilities.

The efforts of state police and the MPCB have led to the decline in noise pollution, the official said.

Noise pollution had reached to its worst level of 106 decibel during 2013, the MPCB annual report said.

MPCB on Friday released figures of key locations such as Bandra, Andheri, Girgaum and Pune.

Noise level at Girgaum declined from 101.8 decibel to 74.6 decibel. Andheri recorded 76 decibel as against 83.2 last year.

Thane city recorded a decline, from 89.4 decibel last year to 78.9 decibel on Thursday.

Pune has recorded a sharp fall in noise levels, down to 86 decibels this time as against 106.1 decibel last year, Motghare said.

MPCB recorded noise pollution levels on five days during the festival, at 158 locations in the state.
He has over the years carried the image of a 'serial kisser' and actor Emraan Hashmi says the audience does find it difficult to disassociate him with that tag.

The actor, who shot to fame with his breakthrough role in "Murder" in 2004, is no mood to run away from the image.

"I am not running away from that image (serial kisser). But may be audience is finding it difficult to disassociate myself from that. They can't believe when we say it is a family film with my presence. It definitely is a problem," he told PTI.

"Once you have that stamp of serial kisser, you can waiver a little bit, experiment with different characters, but there is something that people love you for," he added.

Emraan feels of all the characters he has played, the one with shades of grey have always stood out and made a place in audiences heart.

"It is not just the kisses. It is the irreverential, immoral characters that I've played. The love-able negative characters which have grey shades, they are endearing. So that's what they associate with me."



The 37-year-old star is aware that kisses in his films are talked about and he can never shy away from that.

Emraan, however, also feels people talk about it even if there aren't any kissing scenes in his film.

"I can never run away from that and now I choose not to. If it has to be there, it should be. I do it and get done with it. Because even if it is not there, there is a conversation about the kiss. So there is no running away from the kiss, I've realised that."



His latest movie "Raaz Reboot" releases today.

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prices fell in Asia on Friday as the prospects of higher output from Libya and Nigeria further fuelled oversupply concerns, cutting short a nascent rebound.

Both contracts rose yesterday on news that 6,000 barrels of gasoline had leaked from the Colonial pipeline that carries fuel from the Gulf Coast to the eastern United States.

The leak, however, was not enough to overshadow expectations that Libya and Nigeria are due to ramp up production.

At around 0350 GMT, US benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) fell 25 cents to $43.66 and Brent dipped 26 cents to $46.33. WTI is down 4.8 per cent over the week while Brent has lost 3.5 per cent.

Libya's National Corporation said this week it would double production within four weeks after it was handed control of crucial ports that had been seized by forces loyal to the country's rival administration.

At the same time, Nigeria  Africa's biggest crude producer  appears set to also increase its exports, traders said.

A persistent crude supply glut has hammered prices for more than two years as rival producers maintain high output levels in their fight for market share.

A meeting later this month in Algeria between Russia and the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries is expected to touch on price stability but analysts remain doubtful a deal can be reached to freeze or cut output.

Halley said that in the absence of comments ahead of that meeting "the street turns to the only real game in town  the (Federal Reserve policy board) rate decision" next week.
army chief General Raheel Sharif on Friday called on the Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif ahead of the premier's visit to the US where he will address the UN General Assembly and is expected to rake up the Kashmir issue.

Sharif is likely to deliver a speech at the UN General Assembly session on September 21. Sharif on Friday met Hurriyat leaders from Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) and assured them that he would emphatically highlight the Kashmir issue at the UN General Assembly next week.

During the meeting with Raheel, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy till the elimination of last terrorist.

"Vowing to continue the war against militancy and terrorism, the prime minister expressed his satisfaction over the security situation in the country," PM House said in a statement after Raheel called on Sharif.

The premier and the army chief discussed internal as well as regional security, it said.
Following the arrest of a Pakistani doctor for allegedly raping a patient inside the ICU of Apollo Hospital, at least a dozen other Pakistani doctors, holding long term visas and work permits, have resigned.

Reports in local media suggested that they were asked to put in the papers following the rape complaint last week against Dr Rajesh Chauhan, a Pak national.

"All doctors of Pakistani nationality have resigned. I can not comment further, as other matters are sub-judice," said the spokesperson of Apollo Hospital, Sandip Joshi.

The hospital, located in Bhat village of Gandhinagar district, is around 10 km from Ahmedabad city.

On September 8, Gandhinagar police arrested Dr Chauhan and a ward boy named Chandrakant Vankar for allegedly raping a 19-year-old girl who was being treated for dengue.

Investigation revealed that Dr Chauhan had flouted his visa conditions by accepting a job outside Ahmedabad city.

Gandhinagar superintendent of police Verendra Singh said police will seek information from the hospital about other Pakistani doctors on its staff too.

"Chauhan was not supposed to work outside Ahmedabad, but he accepted job in that hospital. Now as the issue has come up, we will seek information from hospital to find out (other) such doctors," said Singh.

The special branch of Ahmedabad city police would also look into the matter.

"As per the rules, a person who has been granted work permit along with Long Term Visa (LTV) must live and work within the geographical limits mentioned in the permit. We will probe the issue in detail after we get a report on Dr Chauhan from Gandhinagar police," said the joint commissioner of police, special branch, R V Jotangiya.

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A magistrate's court here today remanded Virendra Tawde arrested in the CPI leader Govind Pansare murder case, in judicial custody.

The special investigation team of Kolhapur police had taken Tawde in custody on September 3.

He was produced before the magistrate U B Kalpagar after his police custody ended. As police did not demand further custody, the court remanded him in judicial custody for 14 days.

He would now be transferred to Yerawada jail in Pune.

Tawde, a member of the conservative Hindu organisation Sanatan Sanstha, was first arrested by CBI in the Narendra Dabholkar murder case. On September 3, Kolhapur police took his custody for the probe in the Pansare murder case.

Police had carried out searches at Sanatan Sanstha's 'ashram' at Panvel near Mumbai and claimed to have found some drugs which could affect the nervous system.

According to police, Vinay Pawar, an absconding accused who CBI has said was the shooter in the Dabholkar murder case, was a suspect in this case too.

Police have already arrested Sameer Gaikwad, a Sanatan Sanstha 'disciple', in the Pansare case.

Pansare, a CPI leader and rationalist, and his wife were shot while on morning walk in Kolhapur on February 16, 2015. He died four days later while his wife survived.

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Megastar Amitabh Bachchan says he feels embarrassed when he goes abroad and people there call India, the land of rapes.

The actor, who is essaying the role of a lawyer in his latest release "Pink," said Indians should work together to make the country a first world nation.

"It's very embarrassing when we visit abroad and people there say, 'You are from India, the land of rapes'. I want that to go. I don't like it when people call us a third world country or developing country.

"We all must work to make India a first world nation, a developed country," Bachchan said at a press conference of the film.

The "Piku" star said each part of the country should be safe for women.

"We should not say that Mumbai is safer than Delhi or vice versa. We are a country and women should be safe in every part. If an incident occurs in Delhi the whole nation feels bad and gets worried. The issue is about the whole nation or universal."



Produced by Shoojit Sircar and directed by Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury, "Pink" also stars Taapsee Pannu, Kriti Kulhari, Angad Bedi, Andrea Tariang and Piyush Mishra.

One of the most prominent scenes in the movie has Bachchan asking Taapsee's character if she is a virgin or not?



Asked about the discrimination girls face about their sexuality, Bachchan said, "If girls are asked about their virginity, then boys should also be questioned. There should be no discrimination.

"If a girl is asked there is always a question mark, as if it is something very wrong, but when it comes to boys, there is an exclamation mark denoting that they have done something great."



The veteran actor believes that the issue raised in the film has been a talking point for many years.

"What the film is saying has been a point of discussion for the longest time in our society. We all think about it and the makers have presented it in the form of cinema. We make our films depending on the changes and developments in the society. And the topic raised in the film is already a part of discussion in society," he said.

Bachchan has some hard-hitting dialogues in the film and he is proud of the way the writers worked on his lines.

"I am really proud to be a part of the film. And every dialogue I have said in the film, if asked to say off camera I will say the same words without even thinking once. I mean them.

Bachchan said for him, his kids --Abhishek and Shweta --



are equal and rather than mending the behaviour of girls it is important for the family to teach their boys to respect women.

"I have always treated my son and daughter equally. And whatever little I have managed to achieve in my life... I will divide it equally between them when I leave.

"I always believe that to bring change in the society, it is important to change the upbringing. Boys should be taught to respect women. The letter I wrote was in respect of the film so it was for girls. I think now it's Jaya's turn to write a letter to boys."



While shooting for the film the whole cast including Bachchan went through an emotional turmoil. The actor revealed that there came a time when he could not hold himself and had to leave the set.

"There were moments in the film when we all broke down. I am 74 and I am not shy to say that I felt emotional during the filming. There was a sequence when I just couldn't control my tears and had to leave the set as I didn't want to cry in front of three young ladies.

"No one of us have used glycerin to cry. When you are performing something which you believe in strongly, the emotions come automatically," he said.
The Supreme Court today asked the Centre to apprise it of steps taken to enforce its 1991 directions including making 'Environment Science' a compulsory subject in college and school curricula.

"You (University Grants Commission and Human Resources Development Ministry) take instruction on it. We will hear it again on September 23," a bench comprising Chief Justice T S Thakur and Justice A M Khanwilkar said.

The bench was hearing an interim plea of environmentalist M C Mehta alleging that the directions passed in 1991 on his PIL have not been complied with letter and spirit.

The court initially asked Mehta whether it could entertain an interim plea in an already decided and disposed of PIL.

Later, the bench asked Additional Solicitor General P S Patwalia, appearing for the Centre, to apprise it on what steps could be taken to ensure that the curricula include 'Environment Science' as compulsory subject.

During the hearing, the law officer, representing the Centre, said state boards, responsible for deciding school curriculum, functioned under the state administrations and hence cannot be forced by it to do the needful.

In the 1991 verdict, a bench headed by then Chief Justice Rangnath Misra had said "the UGC will take appropriate steps immediately to give effect to what we have said, i.E., requiring the Universities to prescribe a course on environment. They would consider the feasibility of making this a compulsory subject at every level in college education.

"So far as education up to college level is concerned, we would require every state Government and every Education Board connected with education up to matriculation or even intermediate colleges to immediately take steps to enforce compulsory education on environment in a graded way. This should be so done that in the next academic year, there would be compliance of this requirement."



Besides making 'Environment Science' a compulsory subject, it had then passed a slew of directions including an order to "cinema halls, touring cinemas and video parlours to exhibit free of cost at least two slides/messages on environment in each show undertaken by them".

Disposing of the PIL in 1991, the bench had asked the



Centre to issue appropriate directions to state governments and Union Territories to "invariably enforce as a condition of license of all cinema hails, touring cinemas and video parlours" to show slides on environment free of cost.

"The Ministry of Environment should within two months from now come out with appropriate slide material which would be brief ... To efficiently carry the message home on various aspects of environment and pollution."



It had said that the materials to be shown by exhibitors, would be given to the District Collectors, the licensing authorities for the cinema exhibition halls, for compliance.

"Failure to comply with our order should be treated as a ground for cancellation of the licence by the appropriate authorities. The material for the slides should be such that it would at once be impressive, striking and leave as impact on every one who sees the slide," it had said then.

The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting should start without delay producing information films of short duration on various aspects of environment and pollution bringing out the benefits for society on the environment being protected and the hazards involved in the environment being polluted, it had said.

It had asked the then Attorney General to have a dialogue with the Ministry as to the manner the All India Radio and Doordarshan could assist this process of education.

"We accept on principle that through the medium of education awareness of the environment and its problems related to pollution should be taught as a compulsory subject," the apex court had said.

Environmentalist Mehta, in his fresh plea, alleged that the directions have not been complied with in letter and spirit even after the lapse of so many years.
Police today recovered 15 to 20 live bombs stacked in two bags and about 7 sharp weapons from a CPI-M party office in Benachitty market area of the steel town today.

Police said several sharp weapons were also recovered during the raid which was launched following a tip off.

The bombs were later defused, the police said adding none was detained or arrested in connection with the incident so far.

CPI-M zonal secretary Pankaj Roy Sarkar ruled out the party's involvement in the storing of bombs and weapons in its office and said it was a conspiracy to defame the party.

Prabhat Chatterje, local INTTUC leader said efforts were on by the leftist party to create fear in the minds of the people.

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YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 16, ARMENPRESS. The Coordination Council of Armenian organizations of France expressed concern over the changes made in the Article 38 of the Equality and Citizenship Law which has been adopted by the Special Committee of the Upper House (Senate) of the French Parliament.

The Article 38 is directed towards the condemnation of denial of crimes against humanity and genocides, Nouvelles d'Armenie reported.

According to the changes adopted by the Committee, the necessity of legislation to be adopted against the denial is questioned.

This step also created dissatisfaction among a number of French legislators since the provisions of the Article 38 were adopted unanimously by the French Parliament.

The Coordination Council of Armenian organizations of France recalled that the European Court of Human Rights accepted the possibility of adopting anti-denial legislation over Perincek v. Switzerland case if that denial provokes hatred and violence.

More in-depth legal works are necessary for this legislation which must be carried out by the Government that has initiated this legislation. The Senate cannot go to compromise and be subjected to pressures by the Turkish Government that is controlled by nationalists and anti-democratic forces. The Coordination Council of Armenian organizations of France calls on the Senate to restore this legislation in the atmosphere of consensus which existed in the National Assembly, the statement says.
Former Israeli president Shimon Peres remained stable today morning three days after a major stroke, a spokesman for the 93-year-old said, after the Pope and Donald Trump offered their best wishes.

Israelis have been watching closely since their elder statesman and last remaining founding father was hospitalised on Tuesday feeling unwell and then suffered a stroke and internal bleeding.

His condition has improved since, but he remained sedated on Friday morning.

"There is no change at the moment," a spokesman for Peres said.

"His condition is obviously still serious but at the moment he is stable."



Doctors are hoping it will be possible to take Peres out of sedation in the coming days, though they are monitoring his condition hourly.

Yesterday his personal physician and son-in-law Rafi Walden told AFP that during times when they had taken him out of sedation, he had been able to squeeze his hand.

He has not been able to speak due to being intubated, Walden said.

Peres has held nearly every major office in Israel, serving twice as prime minister. He was president, a mostly ceremonial role, from 2007 to 2014.

He won the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize jointly with prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat for his role in negotiating the Oslo Accords, which envisioned an independent Palestinian state.

The former hawk turned dove is widely respected both in Israel and abroad, regularly meeting world leaders and celebrities.

Pope Francis wrote to Peres yesterday saying he had "prayed for strength for the family and for a full recovery."



The letter said the Pope held a special prayer for Peres alongside Rabbi Abraham Skorka of Argentina.

Peres and the Pope last met two months ago when Peres visited the Vatican, while in 2014 they made a joint prayer for peace alongside Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.

US Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump also wrote to wish Peres a "swift recovery."



"You are among the last of a generation of leaders who fought for the right of the Jewish people to shape their own destiny," Trump wrote.

Trump's Democrat rival Hillary Clinton, former British prime minister Tony Blair and Russian President Vladimir Putin have also inquired about his condition.

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Integrated milk and dairy product company Prabhat Dairy has received its first export order for its cheddar cheese to Iraq.

The order is placed by a leading brand in Iraq, the company said in a release issued here today.

Prabhat Dairy has India's third largest cheese manufacturing plant at Shrirampur, Maharashtra, which commissioned last year.

A few months ago, it had exported their first order of sweetened condensed milk to a leading ice cream brand in Dubai, said the release.

Prabhat Dairy had already supplied its other products like ghee, skimmed milk powder and whole milk powder to countries like Mauritius, Nigeria, Malaysia, Algeria among others.

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President Pranab Mukherjee will be on a four-day visit to Uttarakhand from September 27 during which he will go to Kedarnath to pay obeisance at the Himalayan shrine along with his family and take part in the Ganga Arti at Haridwar.

Mukherjee will be received at the Jollygrant airport by Governor K K Paul, Chief Minister Harish Rawat, Chief Secretary Shatrughna Singh and DGP M A Ganpati on September 27, an official release said.

A announcement was made after a meeting chaired by the Chief Secretary to review the preparations of the presidential visit.

The President will inaugurate the renovated Ashiyana building in the city on September 27 where he will also stay during his four-day visit concluding on September 30.

He will leave for Kedarnath on September 28, where he along with his family members, will visit the Himalayan temple to offer prayers and return to Dehdradun in the afternoon.

He will also visit Haridwar on September 29 and take part in the Ganga Aarti before returning to Dehradun.

He will leave for Delhi on September 30.

The President had to return to Delhi without paying obeisance at the Himalayan shrine in June this year as his chopper had failed to land due to bad weather.

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Clearing the decks for their divorce, Malayalam film director S Priyadarshan and his actor-wife Y Lissy today appeared before a family court here and signed all papers required for the legal separation.

It is expected that a formal order granting decree of divorce to the couple, married for 24 years, would be issued by the principal family court here onSeptember 20.

They appeared before the family court and signed all the papers that are required for the divorce.

Soon after the family court proceedings, Lissy issued a statement saying "My marriage with Mr Priyadarshan officially ended today. We both have signed the final papers at the HonourableFamily Court here in Chennai today."



"This has been a real ordeal. In recent times all celebrity divorces, from Hrithik and Sussane to Dilip and Manju to most recently Amala and Vijay all have been mutually agreed divorces.I am sure it also must have been painful to those couples but whatever differences they may have had, they all decided to respect each other.

"Ours was the only exception where it was often fierce and uncivilized battle on and off the courts until a compromise was reached at thehonourable High Court in Chennai. Perhaps the ugliness of our divorce proceedings says all about the kind of marriage we have had," Lissy said.

Stating that she felt relieved now, the actor thanked lawyers, friends and well wishers for their unconditional support and prayers.

Several cases were filed by the couple in connection with divorce, domestic violence and harassment, besides division of properties and most of them were settled because of the mediation and initiative that was carried out by Justice K K Sasidharan of Madras High Court when the cases came up before him in February last.

A compromise memo was then filed before the high court by the couple stating that they will peruse divorce by mutual consent and withdraw all pending cases and allegations in the family court against each other.

It also provided for division of properties among the two.

Priyadarshan and Lissy have a daughter and a son, who are settled abroad.

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Britain's Princess Anne, daughter of Queen Elizabeth II, has a "bad chest infection" and has cancelled a visit to Botswana and Mozambique at the end of this month, royal officials said today.

The comes a week after Buckingham Palace first announced shortly after her return from the Rio Olympics that Anne, 66, was sick and would not attend scheduled engagements.

She has spent this week resting after being treated in hospital in Aberdeen, northeast Scotland, on September 9, where she was admitted from the queen's Balmoral residence in the Scottish Highlands.

"The princess royal is still recovering from a bad chest infection. (Her) working programme for next week has therefore been scaled back, with a number of engagements cancelled," a Buckingham Palace statement said.

"As a precaution, on the advice of doctors, the princess will not undertake the planned visit to Botswana and Mozambique at the end of the month."



She was due to attend Botswana's 50th anniversary celebrations from September 28 to 30.

Another of the queen's children, Prince Andrew, will now attend instead.

Anne's recent engagements include spending time at the Rio Olympics as a member of the International Olympic Committee.

The princess is 12th in line to the British throne and is known for her love of horses and busy schedule of engagements -- the most of any member of the royal family last year.

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Rahul Gandhi today accused the Uttar Pradesh government of failure to lend support to improve situation in the Bundelkhand region, which has been battling continuous drought.

"The requirement in Bundelkhand is different and it needs to be addressed differently," he said at a 'khat sabha' here.

Rahul recalled that the Congress-led UPA government had given a special package to the area, but the SP government in Uttar Pradesh did not lend support to improve the situation in the region.

The Congress vice president was speaking in course of his 'Deoria to Dilli kisan yatra' in Bundelkhand region, which has been facing continuous drought.

Attacking the Narendra Modi-led Central government on the much-debated Land Acquisition Act, the Congress leader said the UPA government had brought the bill on land acquisition by talking to all stakeholders, which was in the interest of farmers.

"But Modi had tried to make it (the bill) ineffective to help those who are responsible for committing maximum corruption in the country," he said.

"When we were in the government, we talked about roads and education...," Rahul said, adding that though BJP and other parties raised questions on the issue of loan waiver of farmers, the UPA government went ahead in announcing Rs 60,000 crore package to provide relief to the farming community by waiving loans of small and marginal farmers.

During his visit here ahead of the 2017 Uttar Pradesh Assembly election, Rahul met family members of freedom fighter Vishweshwar Bajpai in Badausa and had lunch with them.

The Congress vice president also offered prayers at the Kamtanath temple before embarking on the Kisan Yatra.

(Reopens DEL 29)



The Congress Vice President accused the Prime Minister of ruling by creating fear in the minds of people and said he was pitting religions and castes against each other.

"There is no need to fear anything. It is a country of lions," Rahul said, adding that the Congress party's ideology is fearlessness.

He urged his party workers to take the message of fearlessness, religious amity and development to the masses in poll-bound Uttarakhand.

Claiming that the Congress stood for the national flag, Rahul said 15,000 Congress workers had laid down their lives to uphold the national flag.

He described his party as the one which has fought for the country's independence and said working for Congress meant working for the national flag.

Attacking BJP's ideological parent RSS, Rahul alleged it had not unfurled the national flag at its headquarters in Nagpur for 52 years.

RSS should be asked why it did not do so, the Congress Vice President said, adding that the saffron outfit had "no respect" for the national flag.

Asking Modi to show the same urgency in the implementation of One Rank One Pension (OROP) which he had displayed in imposition of demonetisation, Rahul said ex-servicemen were still protesting at the Jantar Mantar in Delhi.

"If demonetisation can be done in a minute, OROP too can be implemented in a minute," he said.

Rahul also demanded a green bonus for Uttarakhand in recognition of its contribution to environment conservation.
The Defence Ministry has cleared Reliance Defence and Engineering Ltd (RDEL) -- known as Pipavav before Anil Ambani took over -- for defence projects after a financial and technical capability of the company's shipyard was carried out in detail.

However, another private player ABG Shipyard did not make the cut, a move that assume significance as Defence Ministry gets set to open the bids for Rs 20,000-crore project of making Landing Platform Dock (LPDs), defence sources said.

The two yards, which had been shortlisted along with L&T for a navy order for four LPDs, had faced corporate debt restructuring and changes in management.

The move prompted the Defence Ministry in October last year to order for a "capacity assessment" report.

While L&T had tied up with Spain's Navantia for the contract, Pipavav had an agreement with French shipbuilder DCNS and ABG is tied up with US company Alion.

Sources said the financial records of both the yards were taken along with report from the principal banking lenders.

Also, the new cash flow injected into the yard by Reliance Infrastructure Ltd was also discussed in detail.

Following this, the Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) in its last meeting has cleared the capacity assessment of RDEL, defence sources said.

In March last year, Reliance Infrastructure together with its wholly-owned subsidiary Reliance Defence Systems Pvt Ltd, had agreed to acquire from the Promoters of Pipavav Defence approximately 18 per cent shareholding in the company at a price of Rs 63 per share, aggregating Rs 819 crore.

This was followed by an open offer. Post open offer, Reliance Infra now owns almost 35 per cent in the company.

Later on Pipavav Defence also announced its plans to exit the corporate debt restructuring (CDR) package as it would lead to improved financial flexibility and increased business opportunities for P-DOC.

Pipavav Defence has since been renamed as Reliance Defence and Engineering Ltd (RDEL).

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Actress Renee Zellweger went back to school during her four-year hiatus from Hollywood.

The "Bridget Jones's Baby" star said she took some college classes during her break from acting in 2010, reported Female First.

"I went back to school to study something that I'm fascinated with, as a pedestrian, plebeian observer, and I just wanted to see if I had an aptitude with it, so I went and took some classes in college.

"It was great, I got to know my classmates really well. We had lots of fantastic conversations, and I had to study, and that was really interesting, because I wasn't sure if my brain was gonna hold that information at this stage in my life!" Zellweger said.

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A report on removing the 25 Mw cap for hydro power projects to treat it as renewable would be put out soon for public consultation.

"India's capacity could touch 225 Gw by 2022 if hydroelectricity is added to the renewable category as is being done the world over," Goyal told PTI after his visit to the city and Limkheda in Dohad yesterday.

"It is only in India where hydro projects below 25 Mw are considered renewable and those above are considered non-renewable. I had asked officials to look into removing this distinction," he said.

The report is almost complete and will soon be put out for public consultation, he said.

The minister visited Limkheda for reviewing arrangements for the visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi tomorrow for launching several tribal welfare schemes, including providing drinking water facilities.

During his visit to Vadodara, Goyal met officials of the state government and Gujarat Urja Vidyut Nigam which along with Union Power Ministry will host the international Switch conference on energy sector here from October 6 to 10.

A comprehensive policy to promote hydropower generation is likely to be announced soon with viability gap funding for projects, compulsory hydropower purchase obligations for distribution companies and a set of good practices that states have to follow.

The idea is to address factors that drive hydropower costs up way above those of other sources of power and give policy support in its market development.

The ministry will also expand the scope of power distribution companies' renewable power purchase obligations to include hydropower from projects with a capacity greater than 25 Mw. At present, only power from those with less than 25 Mw is considered renewable.

Goyal had earlier said that the new hydropower policy will be comprehensive.

"It will explore the possibility of providing to hydroelectric projects beyond 25 Mw the benefits that are at present available to renewable energy," he said.
Logistics solutions provider Rivigo today announced adding 100 more cities for faster delivery of cargo using truck driver's relay mechanism.

"Rivigo today announced a significant expansion of its part-truck load capability - Rivigo Zoom by adding more than 100 cities to its pan India coverage. With the expansion, Rivigo services can now be availed of in most state capitals, major cities and industrial centres," the company said in a statement.

It said combining technology and a unique driver's relay mechanism, Rivigo provides precision deliveries at 50-70 per cent lesser transit times compared to conventional trucking companies.

The expansion coincides with the company acquiring 1,200 trucks from Ashok Leyland to take its fleet size to 2,700 by the year end.

"We are confident that these improved transit times, and the broader network will enable significant enhancement in our customers' market share through higher customer delight and zero lost orders in the upcoming festival season," Deepak Garg, Founder and CEO Rivigo said.

The company said it is specifically targeting to meet the forthcoming festival demand.

"Festival demand is expected to be buoyant this year after a good monsoon and higher salaries and pensions with the implementation of the Seventh Central Pay Commission recommendations. Significant demand growth is likely to be driven by tier-II and tier-III cities," Garg added.

Rivigo is a technology-enabled logistics company with more than 1,500 trucks, approximately 2,000 drivers and more than 50 strategically located pit stops across over 150 distinct routes.

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YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 16, ARMENPRESS. The process of establishing Armenia-Iran free trade zone will probably be transferred to any private company, Deputy Minister of Economy Hovhannes Hovhannisyan said stating that this option prevails among the proposed three options.

The topic of free economic zone has been raised and become a subject of discussions, but this is still not a stage of practical steps. An exhibition of Armenian products is going to be held in Iran soon: we are planning to negotiate on that issue during our visit. We must use that process, he said, Armenpress reported.

He expects signing of new agreements between the businessmen of Iran and Armenia from the exhibition of Armenian goods and services which will be held in Iran on October 5-8.

We have certain results over exporting the Armenian services to the Iranian market, for instance, ggtaxi, Ucom. We hope this exhibition will contribute to the signing of new agreements and the realization of other Armenian goods, services in the Iranian market, he said.
Top security experts from the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries will meet in New Delhi for two days next week to strengthen the anti-terrorism mechanism for South Asia.

The second meeting of the high level Group of eminent experts from countries will be held on September 22 and 23, an official statement said.

The aim of the meeting is to strengthen anti-terror mechanism, it said.

The first such meeting was held in New Delhi in February 2012.

The agenda of the meeting includes functioning of Terrorist Offences Monitoring Desk and the SAARC Drug Offences Monitoring Desk, countering terrorism and strengthening anti-terrorism mechanisms in SAARC, intelligence sharing and police cooperation, human resource development and relationship building, combating corruption and cyber crimes, among others.
The State Bank of India



branch at Kajora colliery area near here was today looted of several lakhs of rupees this afternoon.

Police said five-to six armed men entered the bank at around three pm posing as customers.

They brandished revolvers at the bank staff and customers and forced them to a corner before taking away the money from the cash counter and the vault.

The looters then decamped with the money, the police said adding none was injured in the incident.

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Former Supreme Court judge on Friday said that the apex court had "grievously erred by law" in the Soumya rape and murder case in which the death sentence of the accused Govindacahamy was commuted.

In a Facebook post, he said: "The Supreme Court has grievously erred by law by not holding Govindachamy guilty of murder."

The Supreme Court had on Thursday quashed Govindachamy's death penalty, but upheld life imprisonment for raping 23-year-old Soumya on February 1, 2011.

The death penalty had been imposed by a fast track court in Thrissur, which was later upheld by the Kerala High Court.

The apex court had on Thursday found that there was no intention on the part of the accused to kill the victim.

It held that since it has not been proved that the accused had intention to kill, he cannot be held guilty of murder.

"What the court has overlooked is that Section 300 IPC, which defines murder, has 4 parts and only the first part requires intention to kill," Katju said.

"If any of the other 3 parts are established, it will be murder even if there was no inention to kill," the former Press Council Chairman stated.

Katju said it was "regrettable" that the court has not read Section 300 carefully.

"The judgement needs to be reviewed in an open court hearing," he said.
The Supreme Court today stayed an order of the Bombay High Court allowing deemed universities to conduct admissions to medical courses.

The apex court stayed the August 30 order of the high court till September 19 and listed the matter before the Constitution bench where similar matters are pending.

A bench of justices Shiva Kirti Singh and R Banumathi, while passing the interim order, said prima facie the high court should not have stayed the orders of the Centre and the Maharashtra government.

"Prima facie, we are of the view that the High Court should not have stayed the orders issued by the State of Maharashtra and the Union of India dated August 20, 2016 and August 9, 2016 respectively. Hence the impugned order passed by the Bombay High Court is stayed till the next date of hearing.

"We direct both the parties to maintain status quo prevailing as on date. List these matters on Monday i.E. September, 19, 2016 ... Before the Constitution Bench where similar matters are pending," the bench said.

While issuing notice on the appeal filed by Maharashtra government challenging the high court order, the bench said, "we have considered the broader contour of the controversy and the orders by which this court permitted centralised examination through NEET and also the judgment of the Constitution Bench..."



The high court had on August 30 stayed the Maharashtra government's decision mandating centralised counselling for the students who appeared for the National Eligibility Entrance Test (NEET) this year for medical and dental courses.

It had allowed the deemed universities in Maharashtra to hold their own counselling sessions for the admissions.

Private deemed universities running medical and dental colleges, had moved the HC against a government resolution(GR) which provides for centralised counselling for admissions.

The HC had stayed the mandatory common counselling, but made it clear that the deemed universities shall admit students strictly on the basis of the ranking in NEET.

The state government had contended that centralised admissions process makes it easier for students as they do not have to apply separately to each college.

There are around 1,600 medical seats in deemed universities in Maharashtra.

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The Supreme Court on Friday stayed the operation of a Green Tribunal (NGT) order asking Indian Railways and Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) to seek environmental clearances for their projects.

A bench comprising Justices T S Thakur and A M Khanwilkar prima facie agreed to the submission of Delhi Metro and Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India (DFCCIL) that the order of the Tribunal was erroneous and if they were forced to seek clearances from the Ministry of Environment and Forest, their projects will get delayed.

Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for the government firms, said there was a notification to this effect and Railways and DMRC are not required to seek environmental clearances for their projects like dedicated freight corridors.

On April 28, this year, MoEF and DMRC had informed the NGT that Metro Rail projects are not required to seek environmental clearance (EC).

The Environment Ministry had told NGT that railway and Metro Rail projects were not within the purview of the 2006 Environmental Impact Assessment Notification and therefore prior EC was not required.

Earlier, the Green Tribunal had held that the Indian Railways and the DMRC would have to secure environmental clearance from MoEF for their projects.
A senior Pakistani police official was today suspended for using undue force during the arrest of a senior MQM functionary and leader of opposition in the Sindh assembly here.

Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah ordered an inquiry into the episode and suspended SSP Rao Anwar and DIG East Kamran Fazal after the dramatic arrest of senior Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) leader Khawaja Izharul Hasan from his residence.

In visuals shown on all television channels, SSP Rao was seen forcibly handcuffing the opposition leader and dragging him away to the police van despite pleas from his family members including women and senior MQM leader Farooq Sattar.

The visuals caused an uproar with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif calling up Sindh Chief Minister Shah to find out what had caused the incident.

The Sindh CM immediately issued orders for the suspension of SSP Rao, a top anti-terror official, who is accused of having close links with the leadership of Pakistan People's Party (PPP) and its former President Asif Zardari.

But Anwar, who has remained in the also for his numerous encounters and gunning down of suspected militants on the outskirts of Karachi, was defiant in the face of his suspension.

"I have arrested Khawaja Izhar under proper law and regulations. He was arrested for his involvement in the May 12 incidents and there were other MQM leaders involved as well," Anwar told the media.

"I have been suspended unjustifiably as this is not the way the law works. I have done nothing wrong," he said.

The senior police official who in the past has also got into trouble with his open accusations against MQM leaders of ordering target killings warned that if action was not taken against MQM there would be more bloodshed in Karachi.

The opposition leader was later transferred from the custody of Anwar at Malir police station and taken to the central police headquarters from where he was eventually released in the evening.

The MQM, Karachi's biggest political party, is facing a crackdown after its former self-exiled leader Altaf Hussain in London delivered an anti-Pakistan speech and asked his workers to launch attack on media.

Dozens of MQM offices have been sealed as part of a campaign against encroachment of government's land.

Farooq Sattar who was pushed around as well despite just recovering from a road accident with his arm in a sling later told media that suspension of SSP Rao was not enough and the MQM wanted to know who was running the provincial affairs, the Sindh government or Zardari in Dubai.

"Rao Anwar must be sacked from his job. We will accept nothing less or hold protests," he added.

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Progesterone, a female sex hormone, found in most forms of hormone-based birth control pills, appears to stave off the worst effects of influenza infection and help damaged lung cells to heal more quickly, suggests a new study.

In mouse studies, researchers from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, in the US, suggest that sex hormones have an effect far beyond the reproductive system and that progesterone may one day be a viable flu treatment for women.

The World Health Organisation reports that more than 100 million young adult women around the world are on progesterone-based contraception. And women of reproductive age are twice as likely as men to suffer from complications related to the influenza virus.

"Despite the staggering number of women who take this kind of birth control, very few studies are out there that evaluate the impact of contraceptives on how the body responds to infections beyond sexually transmitted diseases," said lead author Sabra L. Klein, associate professor in the Bloomberg School.

"Understanding the role that progesterone appears to play in repairing lung cells could really be important for women's health. When women go on birth control, they don't generally think about the health implications beyond stopping ovulation, and it's important to consider them," she added.

For their research, Klein and her colleagues placed progesterone implants in female mice and left other mice, also female, without. The mice were then infected with influenza A virus. Both sets of mice became ill, but those with implants had less pulmonary inflammation and better lung function and saw the damage to their lung cells repaired more quickly.

The researchers found that progesterone was protective against the more serious effects of the flu by increasing the production of a protein called amphiregulin by the cells lining the lungs. When the researchers bred mice that were depleted of amphiregulin, the protective effects of progesterone disappeared as well.

Klein said she was not surprised that progesterone lessened the inflammation and damage associated with the flu. What she did not expect was to find that progesterone also helped induce repair.

Klein said there is no scientific data to date showing whether progesterone in humans has any relationship to flu severity, since no researchers have asked those questions.

The mice in the original study were given actual progesterone and not a synthetic form of the hormone, which is what is in contraception. More recently, as part of their ongoing research, Klein and her team gave synthetic progesterone to mice and found a similar effect.

The findings appears in the journal PLOS Pathogens.

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Heavily-armed Shabaab fighters seized control of a Somali town near the Kenyan border today after an attack on an army base that left several soldiers dead, local officials and residents said.

At least a dozen people, most of them soldiers, were killed in the fighting that began in late afternoon and lasted more than an hour in the town of Elwak.

Defeated Somali troops retreated towards the border some three kilometres away, leaving the jihadists in control, the sources said.

"There was heavy fighting in Elwak this afternoon. Shabaab militants attacked the military base of the Somali national army in the suburbs," said Somali military official Abdukadir Elmi. "We don't have the details yet but there were casualties".

Witnesses said fighting lasted into the evening when the militants took full control of the town.

"Shabaab fighters took control of Elwak town after storming the military base," said resident Omar Adan.

"More than 10 soldiers were killed in the fighting including the commander of the camp".

He said Shabaab fighters entered the town disguised as Kenyan soldiers and riding in military vehicles they had captured from the Kenyan army.

A statement on the jihadists' Andalus radio telegram account claimed control of the town and said dozens of troops had been killed.

The Shabaab, which quit the capital five years ago, continue to launch attacks against government, military, civilian and foreign targets in its fight to overthrow the internationally-backed government.

The group is expected to try and violently disrupt elections due to be held in September and October.

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Six officials have been punished in China for failing to provide poverty allowance to a rural mother who murdered her four children before committing suicide last month due to acute poverty, an incident that brought bad press for the Communist nation.

Yang Gailan, 28, of Agushan village, Gansu Province, axed her son and three daughters, aged between three and six, to death before drinking pesticides and killing herself on August 26.

Her husband Li drank poison and killed himself eight days later.

The murders exposed grave problems in the work of local officials, the Kangle county government said in a statement.

Several officials bear inescapable responsibilities, it said.

Chen Guangjian, deputy township head, and two village level officials Li Jinjun and Wei Gonghui, were suggested to be removed from office.

Ma Yongzhong, vice head of the Kangle county, was given a warning by the Party, with two township officials, Bai Zhongming and Lyu Qiang, given a more severe warning, state- run Xinhua agency reported.

Inequality in China has long been a concern.

The Gini coefficient, a widely used measurement of inequality, stood at 0.469 in 2014.

The World Bank considers a coefficient above 0.40 to represent a severe wealth gap.

China which says over 600 million people have been lifted out ofpovertyin the last three decades acknowledges that over 70 million people still lived below thepovertyline in rural areas and ramped up efforts to start housing construction to relocate poor people to more prosperous areas.

The incident was widely reported in the international media, bringing bad publicity for China.

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YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 16, ARMENPRESS. Discussions are expected to be held over the Nagorno Karabakh conflict settlement ways on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, US Ambassador to Azerbaijan Robert Cekuta said, the Azerbaijani APA news agency reported.

The US attaches importance to this conflict settlement. We think the conflicting sides must hold meetings and work towards that path for the sake of the establishment of stability, peace and prosperity in the region, Cekuta said.

He also said the US stance on the Nagorno Karabakh issue remains unchanged. Cekuta added that the US is working with other Minsk Group Co-Chairing countries over this issue.
Sri Lanka's proposed Truth Seeking Commission, a Reparations Office and a Judicial Mechanism will be decided by mid-October after the Consultation Task Force on Reconciliation hands over its report, a top diplomat has said.

Sri Lanka's Permanent Representative to the UN Ravinatha Aryasinha informed the ongoing UN Human Rights Council sessions in Geneva that wide-ranging consultations are being carried out by the 11-member task force for this purpose.

"In all these processes, the government and government institutions work closely and in consultation with the UN system and the OHCHR as well as other international experts," the ambassador said yesterday.

"We are also working closely with ICRC, especially in the area of dealing with the missing, including the technicalities of the establishment of the Office on Missing Persons, the training and capacity building requirements as well as obtaining expertise and sharing experiences of other countries that have similar mechanisms," Aryasinha said.

Sri Lanka has to respond to the UN Human Rights council resolution adopted in 2014 which called for an independent investigation into alleged war crimes blamed on both the government troops and the LTTE during the country's civil war.

The UN has estimated that 40,000 people died, many of them civilians, during Sri Lanka's civil war that lasted nearly three decades.

At last October's sessions in Geneva, the UN Human Rights Council had adopted a resolution co-sponsored by Sri Lanka which called for an international investigation with foreign judges prosecutors and investigators.

Aryasinha said that his government has already taken steps to implement the recommendations of the UN group of disappearances which visited the island nation last year.

"We believe that engagement with the UN system and the Human Rights Mechanisms is in the best interest of the people of our country, to obtain advice and views, and also expertise and technical assistance that will benefit us in terms of capacity building and ensuring the strengthening of our own local institutions," the Lankan envoy added.

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Kerala government is exploring all legal options, including filing a curative petition, in the Supreme Court in the sensational rape and murder case of Soumya, a top law officer said today.

A day after apex court dropped the murder charge against the accused, state Advocate General C P Sudhakara Prasad said all legal options, including filing a curative petition, were being considered to ensure maximum punishment to Govindachamy, who raped the 23-year old sales representative after pushing her down from a train in 2011.

"Steps are being taken in this direction," he told reporters here.

He, however, said a final decision would be taken only after consulting with the people concerned.

In its 22-page verdict, the apex court had discharged Govindachamy under section 302 (murder) of IPC, in which the maximum sentence is capital punishment, saying there was no intention on his part to kill the victim but only to sexually assault her by keeping her in a supine position.

The bench comprising justices Ranjan Gogoi, P C Pant and U U Lalit, however, upheld trial court verdict awarding life imprisonment to Govindachamy for raping the 23-year-old sales representative.

The verdict had come as shock for the victim's family which dubbed it as "heart breaking" and expressed anguish over the "failure" of the state prosecutor to "properly" present the case in apex court.

Political parties in the state have attacked the LDF government accusing it of not properly presenting the case in the Supreme Court.

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Rajinikanth's daughter Soundarya Rajinikanth has been co-opted as a member of the Animal Welfare Board of India besides being appointed as its Ambassador to the film fraternity.

"Animal Welfare Board of India is delighted to announce Soundarya Rajinikanth has accepted our invitation to be a co-opted Member of Board and in addition, to serve as a Member of its Performing Animals Sub Committee (PASC)", AWBI Vice-Chairman S Chinny Krishna said in a statement.

"Coming from a family deeply involved in film industry, her special expertise in computer graphics and animation, her presence on the PASC will help the Board to a very great extent", he said.

Soundarya would serve as the Ambassador of AWBI to the film fraternity besides protecting the welfare of animals used in films, he said.

Chennai-headquartered Animal Welfare of Board of India is a statutory advisory body on Animal Welfare Laws under the Ministry of Environment and Forests.

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City-based SpeedJet Aviation has joined hands with Gulf Aviation Academy (GAA) of Bahrain to train pilots, cabin crew and other airline personnel as their demand in the domestic market was on the rise.

As part of the tie-up, SpeedJet Aviation, which offers training courses for cockpit and cabin crew and ground handling personnel, plans to churn out around 600 pilots by 2019, SpeedJet Aviation director Dharamraj Shukla told PTI.

Last year, SpeedJet Aviation trained over 100 pilots for various type of aircraft including Airbus A320, Boeing 737 and Embraer E170/190, besides churning out than 150 cabin crew, Shulka said.

The academy's range of training programmes includes pre-pilot training (12-15 months), type rating, cabin crew and ground handling.

Under the partnership with GAA, which is a part of Bahrain Mumtalakat Holding Company, the investment arm of the Bahrain government, the Mumbai-headquartered academy would be sending its students, enrolled for pilot and cabin crew courses, for training sessions at GAA's state-of-the-art facility in the Gulf country, Shukla said.

"The aviation industry is on a high-growth trajectory with India likely to become the third-largest aviation market by 2020.

"As of now, Indian airlines are reporting increased profitability; low-cost carriers have placed heavy orders for new aircraft. All these factors combined will lead to a sharp spike in demand for trained aviation personnel," Shukla said.

Domestic aviation market has been posting more than 20 per cent growth for over a year on account of low fuel prices and low airfares.

The Sydney-based aviation think-tank Centre for Pacific Aviation (CAPA), in its recent report, has projected that there could be further orders for 250-300 aircraft in the pipeline from SpiceJet, Vistara and Premier Airways, in addition to the huge orders already placed by carriers like IndiGo, Jet Airways and GoAir.

The tie-up offers Indian students a competitive advantage in the aviation industry that is at par with international norms, according to SpeedJet Aviation.

This move is a first-of-its-kind for GAA in the Asian market to offer a comprehensive range of structured training programmes for all aviation personnel including pilots, cabin crew, engineers and ground staff, it said.

India being one of the largest and fastest growing air travel market provides great opportunities for individuals to pursue a career in the aviation sector, GAA's Chief Executive Officer Dhaffer Al Abbasi said.

"Our state-of-the-art course equipment enables us to offer a comprehensive and modern aviation training infrastructure, besides the students also get access to various training facilities around the world through our global affiliates," he said.

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Gliding stealthily through the ocean depths, attack submarines quietly shadow their quarry, ready to strike with torpedoes or missiles.

Somewhat neglected after the Cold War, they are now making a serious comeback around the world.

Militaries in Asia, Russia and the United States are aggressively stepping up the development, acquisition and deployment of the undersea craft.

That's because they have realized that even the best surface vessels and warplanes are vulnerable to anti-ship or anti-aircraft missiles, says Bryan Clark of Washington's Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, an independent think-tank.

"So they are shifting to more undersea capabilities to do some of the offensive operations that they want to carry out," he said.

Nowhere is the trend more marked than in Asia, prompted by China's rapidly expanding military might.

Beijing has established a range of maritime defense capabilities and highly sophisticated anti-aircraft systems that prevent enemy vessels from nearing its coast.

China has also worked hard to build a fleet of attack submarines, and now boasts 50 diesel and five nuclear attack subs.

Australia signed a contract this year to buy 12 submarines, non-nuclear versions of the French Barracuda attack vessel.

Vietnam has taken delivery of the fifth of six submarines it bought from Russia. Japan is expected to increase its fleet from 18 to 22 diesel subs by 2018. And India, Indonesia and Malaysia are all developing their own underwater capabilities.

The US Navy is paying close attention -- and looking at its own fleet.

Admiral Harry Harris, who heads the Pacific Command, has warned about China's military buildup in the South China Sea, saying the United States needs more attack subs in the region.

And General Philip Breedlove, former head of the US European Command, sounded similar warnings about Russia's renewed attention to submarines under President Vladimir Putin.

In addition to providing a key military capability, submarines also act as intelligence gatherers, compiling data on enemy fleets and even monitoring what's happening on land.

The United States uses its undersea craft to monitor North Korea, China and Russia, experts say.

During wartime, submarines can cripple entire enemy fleets, while those equipped with cruise missiles can lurk off coasts and attack targets on land.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A suicide bomber blew himself up inside a mosque packed with worshippers for Friday prayers, killing at least 16 people and injuring 35 others in Mohmand Agency in Pakistan's restive northwest tribal region.

The attacker blew himself when the prayers was in progress at the mosque in the Anbar tehsil of the agency bordering Afghanistan.

"It was a suicide blast," a local official said.

At least 16 people were killed in the attack, local media reported, citing officials.

"Many people were gathered inside the mosque when a suicide bomber blew himself up," an eyewitness said.

Rescue teams and police rushed to the spot. The bodies and the injured are being shifted to local hospitals for medical treatment.

Injured were also transported to hospitals in Bajaur Agency, Charsadda and Peshawar for treatment.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban routinely targets courts, schools and mosques.

The attack came on a day when Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif vowed to continue the war against militancy and terrorism till elimination of the last terrorist.

During a meeting with Army chief General Raheel Sharif today, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy.

The army had launched operation 'Zarb-e-Azb' in June 2014 to flush out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
At least 23 people were killed and 29 others injured when a suicide bomber shouting 'Allahu Akbar' blew himself up inside a mosque packed with worshippers for Friday prayers in Mohmand Agency in Pakistan's restive northwest tribal region.

The attacker blew himself when the prayers were in progress at the mosque in the Anbar tehsil of the agency bordering Afghanistan.

"A suicide bomber was in the mosque. He shouted 'Allahu Akbar' and blew himself up," Assistant Political Agent Naveed Akbar told reporters.

He said that Friday prayers were being offered around 2 PM when the powerful blast took place.

At least 23 people were killed in the attack and 29 others injured, Pakistani media reported, citing officials.

"Many people were gathered inside the mosque when a suicide bomber blew himself up," an eyewitness said.

Rescue teams and police rushed to the spot. The bodies and the injured are being shifted to local hospitals for medical treatment.

Injured were also taken to hospitals in Bajaur Agency, Charsadda and Peshawar for treatment.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban routinely targets courts, schools and mosques.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has expressed his grief over the loss of lives in the blast.

The attack came on a day when Sharif vowed to continue the war against militancy and terrorism till elimination of the last terrorist.

During a meeting with Army chief General Raheel Sharif today, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy.

The army had launched operation 'Zarb-e-Azb' in June 2014 to flush out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Pakistan's support base in the US is fast dwindling as American lawmakers are unhappy over Islamabad's reluctance to take action against some terror groups and its continuance of providing safe havens to them, a group of Indian parliamentarians has said.

"One thing came across very clearly from across the spectrum that they (Americans) are very unhappy with Pakistan. They are very concerned about...Americans lives at stake (in Afghanistan), the kind of promises that have been broken," Baijayant Jay Panda of the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) told reporters.

Panda, who is leading a seven-member delegation of Parliamentarians as part of Indo-US Forum of Parliamentarians (IUFP) organised by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industries (FICCI), said the sense he and his colleagues got from these meetings that the support for Pakistan in the US has come down considerably in the last few years.

As a result, Panda said there is greater sensitivity and recognition of India's constructive and developmental role in Afghanistan.

"This was not the case earlier. We can see that some of the (American) attitude (towards India's role in Afghanistan) is changing. They are much happier today about continuing and increasing India's investment in Afghanistan. The Americans used to be sensitive to Pakistan pressure until a year or two ago," he said.

"The world knows the cross border terrorism that we face....This is connected to the Kashmir issue. In some of the discussions the issue came up about the violence of Kashmir and the concern, but it was the overall general concern about the rise of violence which we ourselves are concerned. We are tackling it," he said.

Other members of the delegation are Anurag Thakur and Harish Chandra Meena from the BJP, Neeraj Shekhar from Samajwadi Party, Jayadev Galla from Telugu Desam Party and Rajeev Satav and Sushmita Dev from Indian National Congress.

During their stay here, the Indian MPs have had a series of meetings with top American lawmakers, officials of Obama Administration and top think-tanks.

Bilateral relationship between India and the US has transformed completely in the last decade and a half, he said, adding that it has bipartisan support in both the countries.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Observing that 'Surya Namaskar' is just a form of exercise good for the body, the Bombay High Court on Friday declined to grant an interim stay on a resolution by Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) making the yoga and sun salutation mandatory in the civic schools in the metropolis.

The court made the observation on a PIL challenging the August 23 resolution adopted by the Shiv Sena and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) controlled BMC, which sparked protest from the opposition parties dubbing it as part of the move to saffronise education.

The petitioner, Masood Ansari, a social worker, had sought a stay on the civic body resolution holding that it violated fundamental rights and is malafide and bad in law.

He said children attending the BMC-run schools mostly belong to poorer sections of society and come from all religions, castes and communities.

A Division Bench of Chief Justice Manjula Chellur and Justice M S Sonak observed that people should not look at it just by the name 'Surya Namaskar'.

"Don't go by the name...It is just a form of exercise which is good for the body," Justice Chellur said.

The HC, while posting the petition for further hearing after two weeks, declined to grant an interim stay on implementation of the resolution.

Anjali Awasthi, counsel for the petitioner, argued that minor students cannot be expected to perform 'Surya Namaskar', which is a combination of 12 'asanas', daily.

To this, the HC said it would consider this argument at a later stage and would call for a report to ascertain if the sun salutation exercise can be performed by minors.

BMC last month had adopted the proposal moved by the BJP corporator Samita Kamble to make the mandatory in over 1,200 municipal schools.

The resolution was backed by the ruling Shiv Sena, but triggered sharp reaction from the Congress and other opposition parties even as the BJP defended the move saying that religious motives should not be infused into the decision.
A Swedish appeals court will today decide whether to maintain an arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder over a 2010 rape accusation which he fears could lead to his extradition to the US.

Assange has always refused to travel to Stockholm for questioning over the allegation, which he denies, due to concerns Sweden will extradite him to the United States over WikiLeaks' release of 500,000 secret military files on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Today's hearing will be the eighth time the European arrest warrant has been tested in a Swedish court, with all seven previous rulings having gone against him.

The 45-year-old Australian sought refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy in London in June 2012 after exhausting all his legal options in Britain against extradition to Sweden.

The hearing comes a day after WikiLeaks released medical records claiming Assange's mental health was at risk if he remained confined in the embassy.

"Mr Assange's mental health is highly likely to deteriorate over time if he remains in his current situation.... It is urgent that his current circumstances are resolved as quickly as possible," said a report published by the organisation on Twitter.

The 27-page medical report accompanied by supporting documents is attributed to an unnamed "trauma and psychosocial expert" in London and dated December 11, 2015.

Assange's lawyers have urged Sweden to respect a non-binding legal opinion by the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, which on February 5 ruled that his confinement in the Ecuadorian embassy amounted to arbitrary detention by Sweden and Britain.

A Stockholm district court, however, rejected the finding, ruling that "Julian Assange's stay in the embassy should not be considered a detention".

It said the arrest warrant against him needed to be maintained because "there is still a risk that he will abscond or evade justice".

The appeals court will announce its decision at 11 AM (local time).

Ecuador announced earlier this week that Assange had agreed to answer questions from Swedish investigators at the embassy from October 17.

The Swedish Prosecution Agency had asked that their own investigators be allowed to interrogate Assange in person, but Quito denied that request.

Instead, the Swedish prosecutors will provide their questions in writing and an Ecuadorian prosecutor will conduct the questioning.

Swedish prosecutor Ingrid Isgren and police investigator Cecilia Redell will however be allowed to be present.

The Swedish prosecution agency has defended itself against criticism that it has let the case drag on since 2010 without any progress.
YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 16, ARMENPRESS. The Council session of the Heads of CIS member states has been kicked off in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan on September 16.

President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan is taking part in the session, press service of the Presidential administration told Armenpress.

The session is chaired by President of Kyrgyzstan Almazbek Atambayev.

During the sessions the Heads of States will discuss the mutual cooperation of the CIS member states on political, economic, humanitarian, security provision sectors, more than a dozen issues related to combating new challenges and threats. Thereafter, documents signing ceremony will take place.

Chairman of the CIS Executive Committee Sergey Lebedev will summarize the session results at the meeting with the media.

It is expected the Presidents will sign the statement of the Heads of CIS states on the occasion of the CIS 25th anniversary. The document will summarize the results of the 25 years of the CIS activity, as well as will outline the prospects of expanding and deepening the further cooperation.
A Swedish appeals court on Friday upheld an arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder over a 2010 rape accusation, rejecting his request to have it lifted.

The court announced in a statement that Assange "is still detained in absentia", adding that it "shares the assessment of the (lower) district court that is still suspected on probable cause of rape... And that there is a risk that he will evade legal proceedings or a penalty.
Employers around the world are concerned about finding and retaining skilled talent with 34 per cent of employers in India saying talent shortage is a concern, while for China the figure stood at 47 per cent.

According to PNB MetLife Employee Benefit Trends Study 2016, at least one-third of employers in six countries surveyed across developed and developing markets feared being impacted by a talent shortage.

While 34 per cent of Indian employers believe that talent shortages are a cause of concern, 40 per cent employers each in Poland, the UK and the UAE also hold the same view. In China, 47 per cent employers think likewise, while as high as 56 per cent of Russian employers believe so.

"In some countries, part of this fear stemmed from unemployment rates being near all-time lows, like in Russia and Poland," the report said.

Historically, companies have long focused on salaries and lure of bonuses to attract and retain employees, but instead of just salary, a total rewards packages are an important factor to attract and retain employees, says the report.

Around 88 per cent of all Indian employers surveyed said they provided benefit offerings to attract away from competitors. A larger percentage of MNCs said they offer benefits such as health, life and accidental insurance and financial planning.

"As demand for employee benefits grows, we'll see more and more local companies implementing total rewards packages to win the talent war over the coming years," the report said.

Increasingly, voluntary and wellness benefits, as well as retirement and financial planning options, are becoming more sought after and "must-have" parts of total rewards package.

"At a time where finding and attracting skilled talent is increasingly difficult, offering higher salaries and bonuses may not be the answer. Those who take a total rewards approach - by providing a wide range of voluntary benefit options and financial planning and wellness programs - will create an environment that demonstrates care and makes a positive impact," the report said.

It further added that will be better off financially and physically and have a stronger relationship with their employers, resulting in greater retention, loyalty and increased productivity.
: A high-level business delegation today visited the Sri City Special Economic Zone to get a lowdown on the facilities available at the site.

Led by Industrial Estate Authority of Thailand Governor, Verapong Chaiperm, along with Deputy Consul General, Pornpimol Sugandhavanija, visited the SEZ located at nearby Tada.

Welcoming the team, Sri City SEZ Managing Director Ravindra Sannareddy said, "Interaction of this kind will improve the Thai-India business ties. I am confident that the visit would pave the way for Thai businessmen to invest in Sri City".

Chairperm appreciated the initiatives taken by Sri City and extended his invitation to the SEZ to be part of the Industrial Development Corporation Network.

The delegation was here for conducting a detailed study on the infrastructure and ambience available in Sri City, a press release said.

The team was given a briefing on the infrastructure available at the site and the delegation was taken around the campus, the release said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
DMK leaders M K Stalin and Kanimozhi were among several leaders detained on Friday while staging protests in support of a shutdown called in Tamil Nadu over the as the dawn to dusk bandh called by farmers, traders and supported by the opposition over the issue evoked a mixed response in the state.

Meanwhile, a youth who had set himself on fire over the Cauvery issue on Thursday, succumbed to injuries, police said.

The activist belonging to Naam Tamizhar Katchi had suffered over 90 per cent burns and died this morning.

"We were giving him all possible treatment. However, he suffered a cardiac arrest and despite our best efforts, he could not be revived," a senior hospital official told PTI.

Several establishments remained shut in Coimbatore, Tirupur and Nilgiris districts, affecting normal life, in response to the bandh call.

About 20,000 small and medium scale units in and around the city and over 30,000 garment factories in the textile hub of Tirupur also extended support to the bandh and downed shutters, according to reports.

In Chennai, DMK treasurer Stalin led a rally from Rajarathinam stadium to Egmore Railway station. He then squatted in front of the railway terminal along with hundreds of party workers after his attempt to stage a rail roko was foiled by police, who detained him along with his protesters.

DMK Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi, who staged a road roko on arterial Anna Salai along with DMK supporters, was later detained by police in a marriage hall. She has sought convening of an all-party meeting over the Cauvery issue.

In Coimbatore, senior leaders of various political parties, including DMK and MDMK and farmers associations were arrested while trying to stage rail roko near railway stations and road blockade.

The bandh did not affect functioning of state and central government offices in Tamil Nadu, which remained open.

While state transport corporation-run buses besides trains are operating as usual, some autorickshaws, taxis and commercial freight operators stayed off the roads.

Farmers' leader P R Pandian also took part in protests with farmers of various organisations.

VCK Chief Thol Thirumavalavan, who staged a rail roko with his supporters by blocking a North India bound express train, was detained by police near Basin Bridge here.

Meanwhile, DMDK leaders and party workers led by party leader Premalatha Vijaykanth, went on a fast at the party headquarters in the state capital. They held aloft placards and raised slogans against the Centre and Tamil Nadu and Karnataka governments.

They condemned the violence against Tamils in Karnataka and sought protection for them.

In Tiruchirapalli, MDMK supremo Vaiko courted arrest while trying to block trains.

Large-scale demonstrations were on in Thanjavur and the Cauvery delta region by VCK, MDMK and Left parties.

The bandh has been called to protest the violence targeting Tamils in Karnataka and also to seek Cauvery water for the state.

Barring the ruling AIADMK, its allies and trade unions affiliated to it, all other opposition parties, including DMK, Tamil Nadu Congress, DMDK, MDMK, Left parties and PMK, are supporting the bandh.

Thousands of police personnel, including armed reserve have been deployed in Tamil Nadu and in Chennai alone, over 15,000 police personnel are on duty.

Protection is being provided for Karnataka related business establishments, schools, institutions and areas where Kannada speaking people live, including Krishnagiri district.
Telangana Rashtra Samiti MP Kalvakuntla Kavitha today met Yoga Guru Baba Ramdev in Delhi seeking his support to Prime Minister Narendra Modi for setting up a Turmeric Board.

The TRS leader, who represents Nizamabad Lok Sabha seat in Telangana, met Baba Ramdev and requested for letter of support to Prime Minister and active intervention for the setting up of Turmeric Board for the welfare of turmeric farmers and also for the provision of a Minimum Support Price (MSP) to be given to turmeric crop.

"I have already met the Prime Minister twice in the last two years apart from Chief Ministers of Maharashtra and Kerala for their support toward this initiative," Kavitha said in a letter addressed to Baba Ramdev, a copy of which was released to media here.

"India accounts for about 80 per cent of world's turmeric production with about 1.5 lakh hectares under cultivation, with Telangana occupying almost 40 per cent of area coverage and 63 per cent in production share in which my constitutency of Nizamabad has one of the largest trading centres in the country," she said.

The separation of turmeric from other spices and creating a separate board to significantly improve the prospects of this crop is imperative, she said.

Kavitha also urged Baba Ramdev to consider setting up of a spice plant under the initiative of Patanjali group in Nizamabad to procure turmeric directly from the farmers and also other spices that are predominantly available in South India not only for consumption and sale in India, but also targetting the export market.

She assured all possible support and assistance from Telangana government to see the first Patanjali unit in South India to be established at Nizamabad and also invited him to visit Nizamabad.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Two girls drowned in a river and another went missing in Purnia district of Bihar today, a police officer said.

The incident took place at Parsa village when the girls were returning to their home at Raghuvansh Nagar village after collecting fodder for cattle, Sub-Divisional Police Officer (SDPO) S A Fakhri said.

While the bodies of two girls, identified as Sanowar Khatun (13) and Shakeela Khatun (14), were recovered by NDRF with help of local people, the body of another girl Pulia Khatun (14) has not been recovered as yet.

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Britain's parliamentary standards watchdog has opened an inquiry into the country's longest- serving Indian-origin MP Keith Vaz after he was embroiled in a sex scandal over allegations that he hired two male prostitutes and made references to drugs.

The 59-year-old Labour politician has since resigned as chair of the influential House of Commons Home Affairs Select Committee.

In an updated list of inquiries unveiled yesterday, the Leicester East MP has been named by the UK's Parliamentary Standards Commissioner as among those under investigation.

However, commissioner Kathryn Hudson has suspended the inquiry until Scotland Yard confirms its own assessment on whether a police investigation will be initiated against Vaz.

"Keith Vaz MP - Alleged breach of paragraphs 10 and 16 of the Code of Conduct (suspended pending outcome of police assessment)," reads the official announcement of the inquiry.

Under the relevant paragraphs of the code, the commissioner will look into whether Vaz breached the section which states: "Members shall base their conduct on a consideration of the public interest, avoid conflict between personal interest and the public interest and resolve any conflict between the two, at once, and in favour of the public interest."



It will also assess if he was in breach of the section requiring members to "never undertake any action which would cause significant damage to the reputation and integrity of the House of Commons as a whole, or of its members generally".

The Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards' probe will determine whether Vaz was guilty of a conflict of interest as he headed up a Home Affairs Select Committee review into prostitution laws while allegedly engaging the services of male escorts.

The inquiry comes after allegations published in the 'Sunday Mirror' earlier this month claimed the married, father of two had met two male escorts from eastern Europe at his north London flat last month.

The high-profile politician is also alleged to have told the escorts to bring the party drug known as "poppers" and is also quoted as discussing the possibility of paying for cocaine at a future meeting, but added that he would not take the drug himself.

The parliamentary probe was triggered by Conservative party MP Andrew Bridgen, who had reported Vaz to the commissioner.

In turn, it emerged today that Vaz has also reported Bridgen to the same watchdog - accusing him of breaching its Code of Conduct.

In letters seen by the 'Daily Mirror', Vaz highlights a section of the rules that says the commissioner cannot probe matters relating to MPs' conduct "in their purely private and personal lives".

Vaz, born to Goan parents in Aden, Yemen, had made a public apology to his family after the newspaper reports appeared and his wife has since told the media that she has forgiven him and that he is "not a bad person".

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The UK has signed an agreement with Nepal to provide 85 million pounds for reforms in the health sector to help women, children, poor and the marginalised sections of the country.

The UK aid support will help improve the health of women, children, the poor and the marginalised in Nepal, according to a statement by the UK Embassy here.

The support includes restoring health services in areas affected by the last year's twin earthquakes, building on similar support offered post-earthquake, and improving the quality and governance of health services nationwide.

The UK will provide 85 million pound over 4.5 years (Jul 2016 - Dec 2020) to support the delivery of Nepal government's Nepal Health Sector Strategy 2015-2020.

Under the agreement, 57 million Pound will be as Financial Aid to the Department of Health and 28 million pound as technical assistance. Of the 85 million Pound, 20 million will support the retrofitting and rehabilitation of hospitals in earthquake-hit and at-risk areas.

Department for International Development (DFID) Nepal's strategy of combining financial aid and evidenced- based policy dialogue, with strong technical support on a focused set of health and governance issues has been instrumental in supporting the Nepal government to deliver impressive improvements in health outcomes, particularly among women and children.

"Health is an area of success in Nepal. The Ministry of Health has made huge gains especially in child and maternal mortality and we are proud to have been supporting the Ministry for the last 17 years as it did this," said Gail Marzetti, Head of DFID Nepal.

"Investing in health contributes to a reduction in poverty and ensures that people are better able to benefit from economic growth," the statement said.

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A Dhaka-bound Jet Airways plane, with 135 passengers and crew onboard, was forced to returned to IGI airport here today to offload the baggage of a passenger who failed to show up at the boarding gate.

According to sources, a passenger, Foysol Islam, was travelling from London to Dhaka via Delhi but failed to board the Jet Airways flight (9W-272) from Delhi to Dhaka.

Another passenger Pie Islam was also travelling in same flight but the ground staff by mistake offloaded the registered baggage of Pie Islam instead of Foysol, after he was declared "no show" at the boarding gates, they said.

As per safety and security rules, no airlines are allowed to carry any baggage if its owner is not travelling on the plane.

When the anomaly, came to notice of the airline, the pilot of the aircraft was asked to return to the IGI airport, they said.

When the aircraft returned, the registered baggage of Pie Islam was reloaded while that of Foysol was offloaded from the flight and it was cleared to fly to Dhaka, they added.

Confirming that the flight had to turn back to IGI to offload an unclaimed baggage, Jet Airways said, the flight came back to offload the baggage of a passenger, who was not able to make the flight connection in time.

"Jet Airways flight 9W-272 from Delhi to Dhaka did an air turn back at Delhi, to offload baggage of a guest who was not able to make the flight connection in time," airline spokesperson said in a statement.

As safety of the guests and crew airline's utmost priority, Jet Airways regrets any inconvenience caused to its 135 guests onboard the Boeing 737 aircraft, the spokesperson added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
More than two years after an 11-storey under-construction building collapsed near here killing 61 workers, the second block of the project would be demolished before the month end, authorities today informed the Madras High Court.

The counsel for the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority (CMDA) made the submission before the bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice R Mahadevan during hearing on a PIL filed by DMK treasurer M K Stalin seeking a CBI probe into the June 28, 2014 collapse of the first phase of the multi-storey building and also the demolition of the second phase of the project.

Stalin expressed doubt about the safety of the second phase of the 11-storey building near the collapsed building in the suburban Moulivakkam.

Compensation for the people who had booked flats in the collapsed building have not paid compensation till date, the court was told.

The Supreme Court had in May upheld the Kancheepuram Collector's order to demolish the 11-storey structure.

The developers, the district administration and the CMDA are working on "safe" demolition of the building and to recover the cost from the developer, the counsel for the CMDA informed the court and gave the assurance that the building will be demolished by September 30.

The bench accepted the submission and adjourned the case to November 4for further hearing.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 16, ARMENPRESS. Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday that Russia had not annexed Crimea and that Kievs actions had been the root cause behind Crimeas reunification with Russia, Armenpress reports, citing TASS.

Russia did not annex that territory, Putin said in a reply to the Ukrainian ambassador at the CIS summit in Bishkek.

"Russia did not annex anything. Whatever happened with Crimea is the result of unlawful actions of certain political forces in Ukraine who had brought the situation to a state coup," the Russian head of state said.

Putin recalled that Crimea had reunified with Russia at the will of the people who inhabited that territory. "These actions are fully compliant with the international law and the United Nations Charter and relevant decisions of the United Nations courts on similar issues, which the United Nations used to have in its international practice," the president stressed.

Ukrainian Ambassador to Kyrgyzstan Nikolay Doroshenko, who represents his country at the CIS summit in Bishkek, objected two items on the agenda. He spoke against Russias CIS presidency in view of the fact that Russia had breached international laws and had annexed part of Ukraines territory.

"On behalf of Ukraine I have two remarks concerning the agenda, in particular, item three regarding the hand-over of presidency to Russia," he said. "Russia violated international law and annexed part of Ukrainian territory and currently it is contributing to the armed conflict in the east of Ukraine, so for that reason the Ukrainian side finds Russias presidency unacceptable."

Putin said that Ukraine has not ratified the Charter of the Commonwealth of Independent States and it is unable to propose any amendments to its activities and procedures.

"As is known, Ukraine has deplorably neither signed nor ratified the CIS Charter and for that reason it can hardly lay claim to the right to make proposals regarding the organizations procedures," Putin said.
The US today claimed victory over India at the WTO wherein it had challenged the local content requirement in solar panels by the Indian government.

The US Trade Representative (USTR) Michael Froman said the World Trade Organisation (WTO) Appellate Body has issued a report finding in favour of the Obama Administration's challenge to India's "domestic content requirements" under its National Solar Mission.

Since India enacted these requirements in 2011, which requires solar power developers to use Indian-manufactured cells and modules, American solar exports to India have fallen by more than 90 per cent, he said.

The Appellate Body affirmed an earlier WTO panel report agreeing with the US that India's domestic content "requirements discriminated against" American-made and other imported solar products, in breach of international trade rules.

The decisive finding rejected all of India's defensive arguments, USTR said.

"This report is a clear victory for American solar manufacturers and workers, and another step forward in the fight against climate change," Froman said.

The Obama administration, he said, strongly support rapid deployment of solar energy worldwide, including in India.

"But local content requirements are not only contrary to WTO rules, but actually undermine our efforts to promote clean energy by requiring the use of more expensive and less efficient equipment, making it more difficult for clean energy sources to be cost-competitive," Froman alleged.

The National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) in a statement welcomed WTO's rejection of India's appeal and urged the Indian government to move quickly to dismantle its discriminatory domestic content requirements that have blocked access for US solar cell modules.

"As each and every previous ruling in this case has shown, India's domestic content requirements are a clear violation of core WTO rules and today's victory will give an important boost to US manufacturing," NAM said.

"This decision also demonstrates why the strong rules- based WTO system and trade agreements with binding and strong enforcement rules are critical to open markets and eliminate unfair barriers overseas," it said.

Earlier in February this year, USTR said the WTO panel found in favour of the US in a dispute challenging India's "localization" rules discriminating against imported solar cells and modules under India's National Solar Mission.

(Reopens FGN 33)



The WTO panel agreed that India's domestic content requirements discriminate against US solar cells and modules by requiring solar power developers to use Indian-manufactured cells and modules, in breach of international trade rules, it said.

"The WTO Appellate Body rejected all of India's defensive arguments," USTR said.

In particular, the Appellate Body upheld the Panel's finding that India's DCR measures are not justified under the government procurement derogation of Article III:8(a) of the GATT 1994 because the Indian government does not itself procure solar cells or modules under the NSM, it said.

The Appellate Body upheld the Panel's finding that India's DCR measures could not be justified under Article XX(j) of the GATT 1994, because the Indian government had failed to establish that solar cells and modules were "in short supply" in India, it added.

The Appellate Body also upheld the Panel's finding that India's DCR measures are not justified under Article XX(d) of the GATT 1994, because India failed to demonstrate that its DCR measures are in fact "measures to secure compliance with laws or regulations which are not inconsistent with the provisions of [the GATT 1994]," USTR said.
In more trouble for textile manufacturer Welspun India and its US subsidiaries, two class action lawsuits have been filed against the company here alleging it perpetrated "widespread fraud" for years by using inferior and less expensive cottons in its bedsheets and towels and marketing them as premium Egyptian cotton.

The lawsuit has been filed in the US District Court in the Southern District of New York by Meghan Abbott, a North Carolina resident who purchased bed linens by Welspun from retail store Target.

A second lawsuit has been filed in a St Louis federal court. Both lawsuits are claiming minimum damages of USD 5 million each.

The lawsuit alleges "widespread fraud perpetrated by one of the world's largest textile makers" Welspun India and its US subsidiaries.

"For years, Welspun has sold and marketed bed linens as made from Egyptian cotton, which commands a premium in the market because it is perceived as higher quality," the lawsuit alleges.

"In fact, Welspun uses inferior and less expensive cottons in many of its Egyptian cotton bed linens. As a result, consumers who have purchased Welspun bed linens have overpaid for an inferior product. This action seeks full recompense for Welspun consumers as well as punitive damages for the egregious conduct," it said.

Citing a corporate presentation by Welspun that claimed "Your comfort is our commitment", the lawsuit said Welspun's commitment is to its own profits rather than the consumer.

It said due to the false misrepresentation that 100 per cent Egyptian cotton was used in its products, "plaintiff and class members were injured. Specifically, they paid a premium for '100 per cent Egyptian Cotton' bed linens but received bed linens that were not '100 per cent Egyptian Cotton'".

The lawsuit demands an order temporarily and permanently enjoining Welspun from continuing the "unlawful, deceptive, fraudulent, and unfair business practices" seeking costs, restitution, damages, including statutory and punitive damages.

Last month US retail giant Target terminated its relationship with Welspun India after an extensive investigation found that Welspun had substituted another type of non-Egyptian cotton when producing bed linens between August 2014 and July 2016 and had marketed them as premium cotton.

Joining Target, US retail behemoth Walmart said it too was pulling the supplier's Egyptian-cotton sheets over concerns that the products' origins may be mislabeled.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The United States today designated French jihadist recruiter Omar Diaby a "global terrorist" subject to US economic sanctions, the State Department said.

The 40-year-old Al-Nusra Front militant, who also uses the name Omar Omsen, became notorious last year for faking his own death in order to leave Syria for surgery.

According to the designation, Diaby leads a group of 50 French volunteers who traveled to Syria and signed up with the Al-Nusra Front, Al-Qaeda's franchise in the region.

Nusra says it broke with Al-Qaeda in July and has rebranded itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham.

"Although assumed killed in August 2015, Diaby re-emerged in May 2016, claiming his death was a ploy to allow him to travel to Turkey for an operation," the designation said.

"Diaby came to the attention of French intelligence due to his involvement with a French extremist group and his online propaganda video series," it added.

"Diaby's videos have been credited as the chief reason behind why so many French nationals have joined militant groups in Syria and Iraq."



Diaby's parents reported him dead last year but in May he surfaced again, giving an interview by Skype to France 2 television to explain he had traveled for surgery.

France 2 also broadcast footage of a training camp in western Syria housing around 30 young French jihadists, many of them from Diaby's home region near Nice.

While Diaby had not then been directly linked to attacks in France, he has expressed approval for the January 2015 shootings at the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo.

"I wish I'd been chosen to do that," he told France 2.

And Diaby -- or "Emir Omar Omsen" -- has been in the crosshairs of French intelligence for some time.

He was a member of Forsane Alizza, a small Islamist group that was broken up in 2012 by the French government for fomenting extremism among young French Muslims.

Diaby, a Frenchman of Senegalese descent, was known at first for producing radical propaganda videos but he is said to have traveled to Syria in 2013.

His hometown of Nice was the victim of a jihadist attack in July this year, when 86 people were killed as an attacker drove a truck into a Bastille Day crowd.

Diaby is known to recruit in the Nice area and intelligence agencies have long feared that militants returning from Syria will bring the war with them.

French police sources have also told AFP that Diaby's name came up in March as officers in Paris investigated a suspect arrested for "planning violent acts."



Now that Diaby is a "Specially Designated Global Terrorist" under US law, American firms and individuals are barred from associating or doing business with him.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A police jawan was killed and four others including three security personnels were injured when an SUV in the convoy of Delhi Labour Minister Gopal Rai overturned in Chhattisgarh's Kanker district this afternoon.

The AAP leader's vehicle was not involved in the accident and he was safe, said a senior police officer.

The mishap took place under Korar police station area on Kanker-Bhanupratappur road when Rai was heading for Bhanupratappur for a party programme.

A police jawan identified as Dinesh Dhruv died in the accident while three other policemen and the driver of the SUV were injured.

As per the preliminary information, driver of the SUV lost control of the vehicle near Korar following which it overturned, skidded off the road and rolled into adjoining field, leaving all the five men inside injured.

The Minister and his associates took the injured to Bhanupratappur. "Dhruv succumbed to his injuries while being taken to Raipur from Bhanupratppur for the treatment," the police officer said.

The driver of SUV who also sustained serious injuries was being shifted to Raipur while other three were taken to Kanker district headquarters.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Actress-author Joan Collins has revealed that she turned down a role in "Hollyoaks" which is now being played by Linda Gray.

Gray, who played Sue Ellen Ewing on "Dallas", had confirmed the casting last month.

But now Collins, 83, says TV bosses at Channel 4 in the UK came to her first, reported Contactmusic.

"I was just asked to be in Hollyoaks but I'm not doing it. You know who is doing it? Linda Gray," she said.

Collins said she was too busy for "Hollyoaks", thanks to a new British stage show and an upcoming movie project, adding, "I wouldn't have the time for anything else.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The Union Water Resources Ministry today signed an MoU with the Agriculture Ministry, to encourage farmers of over 5,000 villages along the Ganga to take up organic farming, which will help curb pollution caused by chemical fertiliser-laden runoff in the river.

Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti and Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh attended the MoU signing event.

As per the MoU, the Agriculture Ministry will develop organic farming in over 5,000 villages along the Ganga with each Gram Panchayat representing a cluster under Paramaparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana.

It also will provide training on Integrated Nutrient Management and micro-irrigation techniques. The government aims to promote organic farming through various means like awareness programmes, self-help groups, providing information through mobile apps.

"Signing of this MoU will ensure effective and efficient implementation of various projects of Namami Gange in coordination with the Agriculture Ministry," Bharti said at the event.

Informing that Namami Gange is a "multi-disciplinary" programme, she said its success depends largely on the participation of other ministries, state governments and local communities.

"I hope the Agriculture Ministry will play a major role in the success of Namami Gange programme," Bharti said. On his part, Singh assured help for successful implementation of the programme.

Meanwhile, the agriculture minister said to train farmers in organic farming, the government plans to launch Deen Dayal Unnat Krishi Shiksha Abhiyan on September 25, marking the birth centenary of BJP ideologue Deen Dayal Upadhyaya.

"We want to train 15,000 farmers in organic farming this year across the country through Indian Council of Agricultural Research...There should be drop in input costs, while the income of farmers goes up," he added.

As per the MoU, the government will also encourage livelihood opportunities and natural farming, based on animal husbandry. It will remain in effect for three years and thereafter can be extended on mutual agreement between the two parties, the release added.

The achievement and progress of the implementation of this MoU will be monitored by a steering committee consisting of the nodal officers from each ministry. The committee will meet once in three months or whenever necessary.

Minister of State for Water Resources Sanjeev Balyan, secretary to the ministry Shashi Shekhar and its special secretary Amarjit Singh also attended the programme.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Rafael Nadal's decision to opt out of the opening match remained shrouded in mystery with Captain Conchita Martinez and Feliciano Lopez coming up with completely different versions.

While it was communicated to media minutes before the match that Nadal wont be able to play due to a stomach bug, Lopez said at the press conference that the 14-time Grand Slam champion had a wrist issue.

Later after the second singles, Conchita addressed the media and contradicted Lopez by saying that he indeed had a stomach bug.

"He had a stomach ache after lunch. He was not feeling too well and we didn't want to risk it. He is being taken care of by the doctor and it all depends on how he recovers. We will work with the doctor and only tomorrow we will know if he will be playing the doubles," Martinez told reporters.

After being pressed by media again, she said: "It was definitely stomach bug. Wrist has been an issue but it has been progressing well."



Earlier after the opening match, Lopez said that Nadal is still recovering from a wrist injury and was not completely sure of playing in the first match and that the team was aware of this development for the last week.

"We knew during the week that I might play the tie instead of Rafa as he was not 100 per cent sure if he will be up to for the tie. We spoke last night about it and till the last moment he was not 100 per cent sure. So I had an idea so it wasn't bothering me," said Lopez, who turned up in place of Nadal and defeated Ramkumar Ramanathan 6-4 6-4 3-6 6-1 to give Spain 1-0 lead over India in World Group play-off.

"Rafa has been struggling with his wrist for last 2-3 months, he didn't want to take risk. We talked with the captain and decided it was the right decision that I should play. There is a good chance that he might play tomorow either with Marc or with me. We are confident that he will play this weekend.

"Rafa is okay, nothing serious. He didn't have any stomach upset. He was playing in the US Open with the same wrist issue. It is getting better and better but still it is sometimes painful. We still have 2 days of competition. So he might play one of these days," he added.

The hype around Davis Cup tie between India and Spain reached a crescendo after Nadal was named in the squad and a 4000-capacity crowd had turned up at the R K KHanna stadium to watch the legend in action but the last moment pull out left the fans disappointed here today.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A woman militant of the outlawed People Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak (PREPAK) has been arrested by Imphal West district police from her residence at Tera Loukrakpam Leikai.

The 30-year-old woman was arrested last evening in the presence of women police, said a release issued by Manipur police today.

Investigation revealed that she had extorted a huge amount of money by serving demand letters to general people, businessmen, educational institutions for raising PREPAK funds, the release added.

A case has been registered at Lamphel police station and probe is on, the release added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A 20-year-old youth was killed and another injured when they were allegedly attacked by a group of men in Bhilwara district leading to tension in the area with Hindu groups calling for a bandh today.

Vishal and his friend Raju were attacked by a group of local men last night in Kotwali police station area, police said.

Bajrang Dal and other Hindu organisations have called for a bandh today following the incident.

As a precautionary measure, internet services have been banned in the area, police said.

Additional Collector Anandli Lal Vaishnav said the Hindu groups have called for a bandh and efforts are on to pacify them.

We are on the lookout of the accused and investigation has been initiated, Bhilwara SP Pradeep Mohan Sharma said adding an old enmity may have led to the incident.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
About 50 companies from Armenia will participate in Armenia Expo 2016 in Tehran, said the acting Minister of Economy of Armenia Artsvik Minasyan to the NEWS.am.

September 16, 2016, 09:28 Minasyan: 50 companies from Armenia participate in Armenia Expo 2016

STEPANAKERT, SEPTEMBER 16, ARTSAKHPRESS: The Armenian companies that had displayed an interest to participate represent various sectors, for example industry or services.

The exhibition, first of all, is a possibility to introduce the industry of Armenia. There is also an agreement with the Iranian side to organize a similar exhibition in Armenia. "We, on our part, will organize meetings for the Iranian businessman with our economic entities," he said.
NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said on Friday that if the economy recovers, banks may be able to "deprovision" some of the non-performing assets that are weighing on their balance sheets and curbing their ability to expand lending.

Jaitley, addressing a conference after meeting top bankers in New Delhi, also said he hoped banks would "gear up" to the point where they would be able to transmit cuts in policy rates by the Reserve Bank of India.

(Reporting by Douglas Busvine; Editing by Malini Menon)

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
By Gabriela Baczynska and Robin Emmott

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Union's commissioner for industry will propose later this month that EU states issue joint bonds to expand the European defence industry, as part of the response to Britain's decision to leave the bloc.

Greater EU cooperation on defence has been frequently proposed but never materialised. The individual EU countries jealously guard their national defence industries, and Britain in particular opposed such proposals.

With Britain's decision to quit the EU, ideas for creating - and paying for - closer security and defence ties are re-emerging. Among them is a joint, permanent command headquarters for EU civilian and military missions.

"Our defence budgets are shrinking ... If you look at Russia increasing its defence budget by 97 percent and China by 160 percent, while the EU's has fallen 9 percent, it is really frightening," Industry Commissioner Elzbieta Bienkowska said in an interview.

"We are considering pooling national budgets to fund common defence projects and issuing joint EU bonds," she said, adding she would present the proposal to 27 EU defence ministers on September 27 in Bratislava, when they meet without Britain.

"Britain never expressed support, there was always resistance. But with Brexit we found interest, we have the momentum. The mood is quite different," Bienkowska told on Friday.

Bienkowska, who is in charge of the industrial part of the EU's new defence and security strategy, wants to create a European Defence Fund that could finance development of technology that the 27 states agreed they all need.

She said the funding could initially come from a new line in the existing European Fund for Strategic Investment (EFSI) specifically for development of defence projects.

The EFSI was set up last year as a three-year scheme to finance infrastructure, energy, research and development in the EU. It works by leveraging 15 times its own 21 billion euros with private investor money. Brussels wants to increase the fund and extend it, although member states have yet to endorse that.

Bienkowska said EFSI could start funding defence projects next year but did not have a date for joint defence bonds. Germany has in the past opposed issuing common EU debt.

FINANCING

The European Commission has already proposed assigning 90 million euros in 2017-2020 for joint defence research, an idea awaiting approval by EU states and lawmakers.

Bienkowska hopes her proposals will help develop joint EU defence capabilities to make it less reliant on imported technology.

Ideas include developing a European drone, cyber defence or maritime surveillance technology. She wants to offer more VAT exemptions for joint EU defence programmes but opposes allowing deducting new defence spending from national debt, as some countries have proposed.

Italy has called for financial incentives for both technology development and joint purchases, proposing scrapping sales taxes for purchases and allowing deduction of some defence spending from national deficit calculations.

France and Germany, however, said in a recent joint proposal that any fiscal measures to build up a common defence market should not distort competition.

In addition, the European Investment Bank, a key source of funding for EFSI, has so far refused to invest in defence projects. Bienkowska hopes to change that.

"It's not only about using momentum of Brexit. It is about global challenges, technological shifts and the different threats we face ... There is growing awareness that some common idea of defence is really needed," Bienkowska said.

(Writing by Gabriela Baczynska, editing by Larry King)

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
By Manoj Kumar

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Finance Minister Arun Jaitley pushed back on Friday against calls to increase the allocation of funds to recapitalise state banks saddled with the bulk of the banking sector's $120 billion in sour loans.

Instead, he held out the prospect that a revival in the fortunes of borrowers would enable banks to "deprovision" some of the non-performing assets (NPAs) weighing on their balance sheets and make it possible for them to expand lending.

"Obviously banks would prefer more funds for recapitalisation but there are budgetary constraints," Jaitley told a conference after meeting senior state bankers in New Delhi.

Jaitley has earmarked 700 billion rupees ($10.5 billion) in bank capital injections from budgets covering a four-year period ending March 2019.

As part of that plan, New Delhi injected 250 billion rupees into the banks in the last fiscal year, and has announced another 229 billion rupees in the current year.

However, ratings agency Fitch estimates that $90 billion in capital will be needed for Indian banks to meet Basel III banking rules due to be fully implemented by March 2019. Fitch says 11 Indian banks may fail to meet those norms.

"The NPA situation is certainly not either static or permanent, because a very large bulk of it is provisioning," Jaitley said.

"Therefore, the moment that you see the revival of a sector, a lot of the provisioning itself would get deprovisioned, and the account itself would get upgraded." Jaitley had earlier said that the government stands "solidly" behind the banks.

A senior government official, who declined to be named, said after the briefing that the government disagreed with Fitch's analysis and estimated that the banks would need far less support over time.

Jaitley also said steps had been taken in two industrial sectors with the worst bad loan problems - infrastructure and steel - and added that "at some stage this problem could start to see a reversal".

(Writing by Douglas Busvine; Editing by Devidutta Tripathy and Richard Borsuk)

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
By Ankur Banerjee

(Reuters) - Samsung Electronics Co Ltd <005930.KS> formally recalled 1 million Galaxy Note 7 smartphones sold in the United States, replacing or refunding the flagship phones, whose susceptibility to catching fire has damaged the image of the Korean powerhouse.

Samsung received 92 reports of batteries overheating in the United States, including 26 reports of burns and 55 cases of property damage, the company said as it announced the recall in cooperation with the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC).

The recall is a costly setback for Samsung, which was counting on Galaxy Note 7 to bolster sales as rivals such as Apple Inc launch new devices. The scale of the recall is unprecedented for Samsung, the world's largest smartphone maker.

Samsung said on Thursday that new Note 7 replacement devices will be available at most retail locations in the United States no later than Sept. 21.

Earlier this month, Samsung said it would recall all Note 7 smartphones equipped with batteries it found to be fire-prone and halted their sales in 10 markets, denting a revival of the firm's mobile business.

While recalls in the smartphone industry do happen, including for rival Apple Inc , the nature of the problem for the Note 7 is a serious blow to Samsung's reputation, analysts have said.

The CPSC said on Thursday that consumers should immediately power down and stop using the recalled Galaxy Note 7 devices.

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration has asked airline passengers to switch off and unplug the recalled Note 7s during flights.

Some 2.5 million of the premium devices worldwide need to be recalled, Samsung said. Some analysts say the recall could cost Samsung nearly $5 billion in lost revenue this year.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Seated in a little green nook at the Pullman Hotel on a warm September morning, sipping cappuccinos, Rajeev Samant and I flip over the usual conversation starters: maniacal Gurgaon traffic, favourite brand of coffee, recent travels and so on. I ask what brings him to New Delhi from the expansive stretches of Sula Vineyards in Nashik. "The delWine awards," says Samant, CEO of the Indian wine brand.
New Delhi, Sep 15 (PTI) Reliance Jio has slammed incumbent operators Bharti Airtel, Idea Cellular and Vodafone for allegedly refusing to help their mobile phone users port or switch to the new operator.

In a letter to TRAI Chairman R S Sharma, Reliance Jio said Bharti Airtel Ltd, Idea Cellular Ltd and Vodafone India Ltd are perpetrating "illegal and perverse actions" by refusing to enable the porting of mobile number connections.

"Considering that this is a clear and deliberate breach of the license conditions, TRAI must direct incumbent dominant operators to comply with their license terms and obligations ... failing which it should recommend cancellation of the respective licenses at the earliest," Jio wrote.

The three firms did not offer any immediate comment on the story.

"It is important to note that this is being done in blatant disregard to license terms and their obligations under the Telecommunication Mobile Number Portability Regulations, 2009 and TRAI directions," Reliance Jio wrote on September 14.

Jio said it has been certified as Mobile Number Portability (MNP) compliant by the Telecom Enforcement, Resource and Monitoring Cells of all service area and in this month it wrote to incumbents about commencing services.

"Inspite of being under legal and contractual obligation to port the numbers after a valid request is made, the incumbent dominant operators have rejected all the requests made for porting between September 9 and September 12," it said giving data of port requests rejected.

ALSO READ: Next set of smart cities to be announced next week: M Venkaiah Naidu



It said the rejections were in addition to "the rejection of MNP request of 4,919 corporate mobile numbers issued to employees and members of Reliance Industries Group by Bharti Airtel in August 2016. This was inspite of a confirmation from Bharti Airtel that there were no outstanding dues and that the MNP process could be completed."

Reliance had last month asked all its employees to shun rival mobile phone operators and shift to Jio.

"Almost all of these rejections have been made on the baseless and unsubstantiated ground of 'violation of contractual obligation'. The incumbent dominant operators have not even bothered to elaborate the contractual obligations that have been violated," it said.

The "baseless and unsubstantiated" ground of violation of contractual obligation was being raised to unnecessarily harass customers and prevent them from availing the services of Jio, the company said.

Jio asked TRAI to take serious cognizance of its complaint and intervene by taking strict action against the incumbent operators under the relevant provisions.

ALSO READ: iPhone 7 on sale in 28 countries; jet black out of stock
Come October and online buyers will be glued to the websites and apps of leading ecommerce firms Flipkart, Amazon and Snapdeal.

It will be a buyers' delight during the festive season with the companies offering deep discounts to lure buyers and raise volumes. We take a look at how the festive sales may pan out for the big three e-commerce players .

Amazon India



The US-based electronic commerce and cloud computing company's India arm is expected to hold the festive season sales from October 1 to October 5, 2016, according to media reports. The company is expected to spend Rs 125-130 crore in marketing and advertising budget.

Earlier, the retailer had advanced its sale schedule from October 15.

For sale event in India, Amazon is following its US strategy where it aggressively spends during Christmas. The US parent sale held its sale event between 8-12 September.

On the funding front, Amazon seems to have gathered momentum with its founder and CEO Jeff Bezos committing $3 billion in June 2016 for its Indian operations.

The major portion of its expenditure announced in June 2016 is expected to be spent on the festive season sale.

In 2014, the firm had invested $2 billion in India opertions.

Flipkart

Indian ecommerce firm Flipkart's 'Big Billion Day Sale' will be back in first week of October. The sale will most likely launch on October 3. This time too, Flipkart may offer huge discounts on app only.

It is also expected to come up with a "buy-now-pay-later" scheme and is said to be in talks with lenders to arrange pre-approved loans for consumers. This move will give Flipkart a big edge over its competitors Amazon and Snapdeal.

To ensure better and timely service to its millions of customers, the firm is likely to organise its 'Big Billion Day sale' in installments throughout the month of October.

Reports say Flipkart plans to raise its stock of products in order to efficiently deal with a sudden increased demand for goods during the sale period.

The firm's Re 1 offer, launched during the first big-billion day sale, is expected to be back this year.

The retailer is also likely to come up with exclusive tie-ups with brands and offers like EMIs (equated monthly installments), which will make products more affordable to a larger audience of customers.



Snapdeal

Ahead of the festive season sales, another major retailer Snapdeal plans to create 10,000 temporary jobs at the company between September 15 to November 15, with the positions mostly being in logistics to ensure smooth deliveries.

The firm has invested Rs 200 crore in rebranding activities and also unveiled a new logo as the e-commerce major focuses on wooing the next 100 million potential online shoppers. Snapdeal has done away with its blue and red logo, replacing it with a Vermello (red)-coloured box.

The excitement for the festive season sales has just begun and it will be worth watching how the Big Three will handle the mammoth demand for the discounted products.
Supreme Court on Friday extended the parole of Sahara chief Subrata Roy till September 23, granted to him in May on humanitarian grounds after his mother passed away.

The parole continued later to enable him arrange money to refund his investors.

The decision to extend the relief was taken by a bench headed by Chief Justice T S Thakur in-chamber as his parole was to end today.

The regular special bench of CJI and Justices A R Dave and A K Sikri was not available.

Sahara's lawyer Keshav Mohan said that a draft of Rs 353 crore has been deposited in the SEBI-Sahara account.

The bench extended the relief to 68-year-old Roy till September 23, the next date of hearing.

The apex court on September 2 had asked the Sahara Group to come clean by disclosing its sources from where it had raised Rs 25,000 crore and paid its investors in cash, observing that it is "difficult to digest" as such a huge amount "cannot fall from the heavens."

It had earlier extended Roy's parole on August 3 till today with a condition that he has to deposit to Rs 300 crore with SEBI.

The apex court had granted parole to Roy on May 6 for four weeks on humanitarian ground following the death of his mother Chhabi Roy in Lucknow after prolonged illness.

Besides Roy, the court had also granted parole to a jailed Sahara director, Ashok Roy Choudhary.

It had said they were free to meet prospective buyers of properties and move within the country under police escort.

Roy has been lodged in Tihar jail since March 4, 2014 on the orders of the apex court in relation with a long running dispute with market regulator SEBI.
October 30, 2022 15:10

We cannot be forced to give up the right to self-determination by pressure and other mechanisms. Head of the "Free Fatherland-CMD" faction of the Armenian National Assembly

The developments of the last months regarding the Nagrno-Karabakh conflict and the negotiation process have caused certain concerns, because they do not reflect and take into account the right of nations to self-determination.
Normal life in Tamil Nadu was affected on Friday due to a general strike called by different groups representing farmers, traders, transporters and others over the Cauvery water issue.

Road and rail services, especially, took a hit with autos, taxis and commercial freight operators remaining off the roads.

State transport corporation-run buses and trains were operating as usual, according to reports.

DMK & VCK party workers' 'Rail Roko' protest against #CauveryIssue in Hosur, Tamil Nadu. pic.twitter.com/4EAg0jr8r5 - ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

Opposition parties, including the DMK, joined the protests. The party's leader MK Stalin was arrested while attempting to stop trains, while his sister staged a road block in Chennai.

Thousands of police personnel were deployed across the state to maintain law and order.

Police said tight vigil was being maintained and no attempts to mar public peace or disruption of free movement of transportation - on road or rail - would be allowed.

Several local grocery shops, which usually open by daybreak, remained shut in view of the protests.

The bandh has been called in protest against the violence targeting Tamils in Karnataka and also to seek Cauvery water for the state.

Barring the ruling AIADMK, its allies and trade unions affiliated, all other Opposition parties, including the DMK, Tamil Nadu Congress, DMDK, MDMK, Left parties and the PMK, are supporting the bandh.

Chennai: DMK workers stage protest over #Cauvery water dispute row, DMK leader Kanimozhi also present pic.twitter.com/8B4qNYE2Fh - ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

Thousands of police personnel, including armed reserve forces, have been deployed in Tamil Nadu and in Chennai over 15,000 policemen are on duty.

Protection was being provided for Karnataka-related business establishments, schools, institutions and areas where Kannada speaking people live, including Krishnagiri district.

(With inputs from agencies)
Last week, India's fifth-largest private sector bank, YES Bank, abruptly put on hold its ambitious plan to raise $1 billion, citing extreme volatility in the share price. The bank was targeting a higher price of Rs 1,410 per share. The day it took the decision to suspend the offering, the share price plunged to Rs 1,330 per share from its previous day closing of Rs 1,405. The stock was on the rise in the run-up to the issue, rising from Rs 1,221 per share in early August to Rs 1,440 per share on September 6, two days before the issue opening. While the market regulator, Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) is looking into the various aspects from pricing to deferment, the bank has to now strategise its next move. The capital has to be raised for meeting the bank's growth requirement.

Take a look why the bank needs capital:

Boosting Capital Adequacy Ratio

Banks are required to keep aside a portion of capital before lending to any corporate or retail customers. There is a constant infusion of capital needed for a growing bank like YES Bank. For example, the bank grew its advances by a whopping 30 per cent to Rs 98,209 crore in 2015/16. This robust growth continues in the first quarter of 2016/17 with 33 per cent growth in advances at Rs 1,05,942 crore. At a time when credit growth in the banking industry is at 10 per cent, YES Bank is growing almost three times the industry growth. The billion-dollar issue was expected to boost the tier-1 or core capital from 10 per cent-plus to 15 per cent. Similarly, the total capital adequacy ratio was supposed to move from 15.1 per cent to close to 20 per cent. Clearly, the bank was building a capital buffer to support its growth requirement for the nest 3-4 years.



The Large Bank Phase

YES Bank is in its third phase of growth, which it calls the large bank phase. In a little over a decade, the bank has amassed huge growth in its balance sheet. Today, at a balance sheet size of Rs 1,65,263 crore, this mid-sized bank is bigger than public sector banks like United Bank of India, State Bank of Patiala, Dena Bank, and State Bank of Bikaner and Jaipur.

Retail Expansion

YES Bank started as a corporate bank offering lending as well as advisory services to corporate clients. The bank also made a big foray into knowledge and renewable sectors. Currently, the bank has entered the retail banking journey to get into more diversified business segments. In fact, retail is the only segment that is growing today - corporates faced with higher debt and lower capacity utilisation are not borrowing from the bank. YES Bank's retail portfolio is just 10 per cent of its advances. There is huge scope for growth by expanding the branches as well as product mix. It has already increased its branch network from 631 to 900-plus in the past 18 months. This number will further move up in the next 3-4 years. Similarly, the bank has launched its credit card and also got an approval to start the mutual fund business.

Competition and peer pressure

The competition is all set to come from new models of banking - payments banks and small finance banks. Similarly, Kotak Mahindra Bank, which got the licence along with YES Bank in the mid 2000 period, has taken a big stride by acquiring ING Vysya Bank, which has a huge network in the South of India. This acquisition, apart from balance sheet size, gives a huge network of branches, products and clients to Kotak. While Yes Bank is not looking at inorganic growth, the bank has only organic route to expand.

Asset Quality Pressure

The provisioning for stressed assets also takes away capital. In fact, after the asset quality review by RBI, there are many banks that are under pressure. While YES Bank's NPAs are very low, they are also on the rise, which require provisioning from capital.


Uttar Pradesh authorities have blown the lid off an ATM card syndicate that swiped lakhs of rupees from dozens of people with the help of bank officials and technology.

The Special Task Force says the gang misused a loophole in the phone banking system, bypassing all security norms.

According to officials, with their technique the cheats did not need to steal an ATM card and PIN, or block the mobile number of a person to siphon money from his bank account. In fact, banks would deliver original debit or credit cards into their hands while the clients remained oblivious.

The incident comes against the backdrop of mounting cyber crimes in India as technology penetrates deeper into even the most intractable corners. As per Reserve Bank of India (RBI) data, 11,997 cases related to ATM, credit and debit cards as well as net banking frauds were reported by banks in 2015-16.

ALSO READ: RBI to shortly issue Rs 20 notes with governor Urjit Patel signature





The modus operandi of the gang kicked off with the leak of client information from the bank. "We have discovered the role of bank officials, who used to take screenshots of bank account holders information," said UP STF's additional superintendent Triveni Singh. "It has name of account holder, address, mother's name, date of birth, account balance and mobile number. These details are sufficient for the gang to target anyone. Screenshots of potential targets were leaked by bank officials to gang members through WhatsApp." One of the cheats then called up a bank call centre as a customer and choose the option of updating a debit card.

"Here is the flaw in the system. If the caller does not enter the ATM PIN despite being asked twice then, to forward the call to a customer care executive, the system will ask the person to enter a nine-digit reference number. The system accepts any random nine-digit number. As soon nine numbers are typed, the call gets connected to a customer care executive who asks for basic details, which have already been supplied by bank executives to the gang," Singh explained.

After providing the account holder's details, the imposter would request an upgrade for the debit card, which as per norms is done based on the balance in the account. The customer care executive then clears the application.

To get the new card and PIN, the gang followed the same process and a member would call up the bank's customer care department after a few days, complaining that he had not received his card.

"After asking for some personal information, the customer care executive provided details of the courier company assigned to deliver the card and PIN," the officer said. "The cheat then called up the delivery firm and expressed urgency to collect the card. As the imposter had all the details handy, the courier man delivered the card to the person at the desired location."

The syndicate, which now had a new card and PIN, would go to any cash machine and change the linked mobile number so the customer would not get any alert messages on transactions "When a request to change mobile number is placed, the ATM machines ask for the old number, which the gang already has. So, a member inserts a number which does not exist. Now they make transactions without getting tracked," said the officer.

The gang's mastermind was arrested in UP's Kanpur city on Wednesday and was identified as Dhiraj Nigam. He earlier worked with a debit card selling company in Delhi and knew minute details of the banking system, police said. About half a dozen victims have come forward so far with losses amounting to Rs 20-24 lakh. More cases are expected to emerge. "We have also zeroed in on a call center executive who was passing the information to the gang and will be arrested soon," Singh said.

(In association with Mail Today Bureau)
India's daily oil imports from Iran in August surged to their highest in at least 15 years as the OPEC producer boosted its shipments to recoup market share ceded to rivals Saudi Arabia and Iraq under pressure from economic sanctions.

India received about 576,000 barrels per day (bpd) of Iranian oil in August, up about 10 percent from July, according to trade sources and ship arrival data compiled by Thomson Reuters Supply Chain & Commodities Research.

The August imports from Iran are likely a record although reliable data is available only back to 2001.

Iran used to be country's second-biggest oil supplier - a position now held by Iraq - before sanctions aimed at Tehran's nuclear programme began undercutting its petroleum trade.

The sanctions were lifted in January, and in August, Iran's crude exports, excluding condensate, rose to near pre-sanctions levels at 2.11 million bpd, with loadings headed for India surpassing those for China, Tehran's top oil client.

India's oil imports from Iran last month were nearly triple the 199,000 bpd taken in August a year ago, according to the tanker arrival data.

In April-August, the first five months of India's current fiscal year, Iran's share in its overall imports surged to 10.7 percent, its highest since 2010/11.

India's Iran oil purchases rose nearly 70 percent to 451,000 bpd over those five months from about 266,000 bpd in the same period a year ago, the data showed.

India's oil imports from Iran are set to surge to a seven-year high in the year that began April 1, with the nation's state-owned and private refiners together buying at least 400,000 bpd on average.

In the first eight months of 2016, India's oil imports from Tehran rose 84 percent to about 395,000 bpd, the data showed, in comparison with 214,000 bpd a year ago.

Private refiner, Essar Oil, was the top Indian client of Iran in August, followed by Indian Oil Corp and Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd.
Telecom operator Vodafone India has decided to increase inter-connection capacity with Reliance Jio's network by three times but the new player said the number of ports promised to be released is substantially lower than what it actually needs.

"Following guidance from Trai and clarifications from Jio regarding its commercial launch, Vodafone India has decided to increase the points of inter-connect (POIs) between the two operators by thrice and accordingly, increase the capacity to connect," Vodafone India said in a statement.

Vodafone is the third incumbent operator, after Idea Cellular and Airtel, that has agreed to increase inter-connection points for Reliance Jio, after Telecom Regulatory Authority of India intervened in the matter.

RJIL, however, countered the claim and said, "The quantum of POIs (Point of Interconnection) proposed to be released by Vodafone as per its press release is substantially less than the requirement estimated based on transparent workings shared with Vodafone."

ALSO READ: RBI to shortly issue Rs 20 notes with governor Urjit Patel signature





The Mukesh Ambani led firm said that it has been writing regularly to Vodafone regarding its requirement for interconnection capacity over the last few months highlighting the urgency of the requirement and the impact on quality of service parameters.

"The situation has deteriorated significantly in the last few weeks, with over 80 calls failing out of every 100 call attempts. In the last 10 days alone, over 15 crore RJIL calls have failed on the Vodafone network," RJIL said

It said that no action was taken by Vodafone in the last several weeks, resulting in non-compliance of Trai regulation on quality of service which mandates that POI congestion should not affect more than 1 call in every 200 calls made.

"Vodafone India has always provided points of inter-connect (PoIs) to other operators for all their fair, reasonable and legitimate requirements and will continue to do so," Vodafone said.

"Vodafone is hopeful that all issues it has raised with Trai and Jio will be duly considered and resolved at the earliest."

Inter-connection is required to enable mobile users to make calls to customers of other telecom networks. A mobile operator levies inter-connection usage charge for each incoming call it gets from a subscriber of another network.

Incumbent carriers have been demanding higher inter-connection charges compared with 14 paise they get for each incoming mobile call on their networks.

RJIL, which commercially launched its services on September 5, has accused the existing players of not releasing sufficient inter-connection ports which it feels is leading to call drops.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India has indicated that it will take strong action against telecom operators found responsible for poor quality of service.

RJIL has alleged that over 22 crore calls have failed on the Airtel network while 52 crore have failed cumulatively on the networks of the three incumbent operators -- Airtel, Vodafone and Idea in about last 10 days.
General Electric Co said it will receive $1.9 billion for a contract to supply steam turbines, generators and other equipment to the Hinkley Point C project, the United Kingdom's first new nuclear power plant in decades.

By approving Hinkley Point on Thursday, the UK government cleared the way for GE to begin building two 1,770-megawatt Arabelle steam turbines and generators capable of powering six million homes and supplying about 7 percent of the UK's power generation needs for 60 years, GE said. They will replace older coal-fired plants, GE said.

The government of British Prime Minister Theresa May approved the controversial 24 billion (18.17 billion pounds)project on Thursday, after putting it on hold in July.

GE had already been doing early engineering work on the project to build one of the largest nuclear plants in the world.

The U.S. industrial company acquired the contract and capability when it purchased the power assets of France's Alstom last year. Alstom won the competition a few years ago, GE said.

The UK decision "confirms our technology leadership and it also confirms that it was not such a bad decision to buy Alstom," Andreas Lusch, chief executive officer of steam power systems at GE Power, said in an interview on Thursday.

New nuclear projects are slowly recovering after a steep drop following the 2011 Fukushima accident in Japan. GE is also bidding on nuclear competitions in Finland, South Africa, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, India and China, Lusch said.

"We are involved in all of those projects in the tendering phase," he said.

The UK government's agreement to move ahead with Hinkley Point also established a new UK investment policy aimed at giving the country greater control when foreign states are involved in buying stakes in "critical infrastructure" in the future.

The project, being built by French state-controlled utility company EDF, includes an $8 billion investment from Chinese state-backed firm China General Nuclear Power Corporation .

EDF said it had agreed with the UK government that it would not sell its controlling stake in the project, raising concern among some analysts about EDF's risk profile. (Reuters)



Source: www.businessworld.ie
Minister Sean Canney, Minister of State with special responsibility for the Office of Public Works and Flood Relief today received the Dutch Peer Review Report on Irish Flood Risk Management from Mr. Paul Schellekens, Dutch Ambassador to Ireland.

In a bid to reduce further impact of flooding, nationwide, the Irish Government have commissioned the peer review from their Dutch counterparts.

The peer review had two main objectives; the bench-marking of Irish national flood-risk management (FRM) policy when compared with international best practice and to indicate key areas that can inform future legislation, policy and resource allocation.

The report cost 90,000, half of the costs were met by the Dutch Government through its DRR programme.

Minister Canney said I am delighted to receive this report from Ambassador Schellekens today. This is a very valuable and comprehensive piece of work that was conducted independently by Dutch experts in the field of flood risk management.

The Report has reviewed Irish Flood Risk Management, benchmarked it with international best practice, and provides strategic direction for the future of flood risk management in Ireland which will inform the Catchment Assessment and Management Programme (CFRAM). It also acts as confirmation of the process undertaken to date. He added.

Source: www.businessworld.ie

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The transport union SIPTU last night served notice on Dublin Bus for additional strikes through September and October.

The dispute at the transport company is in relation to Dublin Bus drivers' pay and conditions of employment.

The new strike dates are in addition to strikes last week, strikes this week and the 48-hour work stoppage already scheduled for next week on Friday 23rd and Saturday 24th September.

In September a new round of stoppages will now take place on Tuesday 27th and Wednesday 28th.

In October, strikes will take place on Saturday 1st, Wednesday 5th, Friday 7th, Monday 10th, Wednesday 12th, Friday 14th, Tuesday 18th, Wednesday 19th, Monday 24th, Wednesday 26th and Saturday 29th.

SIPTU Transport, Energy, Aviation and Construction Division Organiser, Owen Reidy, said: Despite the fact that we are currently in the third day of strike action resulting from this dispute, it would seem that the management of Dublin Bus and the Department of Transport have little interest in resolving the outstanding issues.

SIPTU Organiser, John Murphy, said: It is not acceptable to ask workers to comply with three comprehensive restructurings of Dublin Bus, which have resulted in the company returning to profitability, for little appreciable reward. What is even less acceptable is that rather than some of these profits being redistributed to a workforce that has not had a pay rise in eight years the National Transport Authority simply takes 2 million from revenues.

Dublin Bus commented on the new stoppages in a statement on their website last night; This industrial action is unnecessary and unjustified and will continue to cause significant disruption to our customers and trade in Dublin city. To date, this industrial action has cost the company in excess of 4 million and continues to impact the financial stability of the company. We will now assess the full implications of todays announcement.

In a statement last night from the Department of Transport, on behalf of Minister Ross, the government made it clear that there would be no governmental intervention; Minister Ross greatly regrets the grave inconvenience caused to the travelling public by this ongoing dispute. He is acutely aware of calls for him to directly intervene but must reiterate that as any Ministerial intervention could be interpreted as a commitment to open the State chequebook, it would be inappropriate for him to do so. He again calls on Management and the Unions to engage with each other immediately.

Source: www.businessworld.ie

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ISME, the Irish Small and Medium Enterprises Association, released its latest Quarterly Bank Watch Survey today.

The Association found that delays and refusal rates, of businesses accesing credit, is placing constraints on business and restricting growth.

The survey shows that 38% of respondents had required additional or new bank facilities in the last 3 months, compared with 42% in the previous quarter.

However, 36% of companies who applied for funding in the last three months were refused credit by their banks, a marginal increase on the 35% rate, seen in the previous quarter.



ISME CEO, Mark Fielding commenting on the results of this quarter's survey, said, "We are disappointed to see the bailed-out banks slip back into their old ways of the 'long no'. The substantial increase in the length of time it is taking to get approval on a loan demonstrates a complacent and lazy attitude from bankers. The delay in decision time has increased from 7 to 8.5 weeks and is a cause of concern and totally unsatisfactory, as it has major implications for businesses."



ISME has today called on the Government to investigate the increasing delays in decisions by the rescued banks and ensure reliable reporting from the rescued banks, through the Department of Finance and Central Bank.

Source: www.businessworld.ie
Samsung Electronics Co Ltd formally recalled 1 million Galaxy Note 7 smartphones sold in the United States, replacing or refunding the flagship phones, whose susceptibility to catching fire has damaged the image of the Korean company.

Samsung received 92 reports of batteries overheating in the United States, including 26 reports of burns and 55 cases of property damage, the company said as it announced the recall in cooperation with the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC).

The recall is a costly setback for Samsung, which was counting on Galaxy Note 7 to bolster sales as rivals such as Apple Inc launch new devices. The scale of the recall is unprecedented for Samsung, the world's largest smartphone maker.

Samsung said on Thursday that new Note 7 replacement devices will be available at most retail locations in the United States no later than Sept. 21.

Earlier this month, Samsung said it would recall all Note 7 smartphones equipped with batteries it found to be fire-prone and halted their sales in 10 markets, denting a revival of the firm's mobile business.

CPSC chairman Elliot Kaye on a call with reporters said that companies should not try to do a recall alone.

"That in my mind anybody who thinks that a company going out on its own is going to provide the best recall for that company, and more importantly for the consumer, needs to have more than their phone checked," he said.

While recalls in the smartphone industry do happen, including for rival Apple Inc, the nature of the problem for the Note 7 is a serious blow to Samsung's reputation, analysts have said.

The CPSC said on Thursday that consumers should immediately power down and stop using the recalled Galaxy Note 7 devices.

Some 2.5 million of the premium devices worldwide need to be recalled, Samsung said. Some analysts say the recall could cost Samsung nearly $5 billion in lost revenue this year.

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration said Thursday that air travelers must keep the recalled phones off and unplugged during flights, formalizing a recommendation it had made last week to passengers. (Reuters)



Source: www.businessworld.ie

About Us
Nagorno-Karabakh Republic National Assembly Chairman Ashot Ghoulyan received European Friends of Armenia NGO (EuFoA) newly appointed Director Diogo Pinto, and EuFoA Secretary General Hovhannes Grigoryan.

September 16, 2016, 12:57 Ashot Ghoulyan received European Friends of Armenia NGO newly appointed Director

STEPANAKERT, SEPTEMBER 16, ARTSAKHPRESS: First, the Parliament speaker congratulated Pinto on assuming his new position, the NKR NA informed, expressing hope that cooperation with this organization will continue, and it will be possible to increase the effectiveness of the respective projects.

The organization is a special connecting link with Europe, noted Ghoulyan. Especially in the case of Artsakh, when Azerbaijan attempts in every way to isolate us from all political processes.

Diogo Pinto, for his part, stated that the objective of his first visit is to get familiarized, whereupon the future plan for cooperation will be presented. He added that their task will be to interpret, for the European society, the signals of the position of Artsakh.

We will be working with a renewed team, new ideas, stressed the EuFoA director. And if we get your support, Im sure we will succeed.

The NKR NA chairman, in turn, assured that all necessary steps will be taken to expand and deepen the joint work.
The world's major central banks, stung by this year's $81-million heist in Bangladesh, have launched a task force to consider setting broad rules to protect the vast network of cross-border banking from cyber attacks, according to two sources with knowledge of the matter.

The committee of central banks, part of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) in Basel, Switzerland, set up the task force this summer. It has begun gathering information from members on their protections against fraud, said the sources, who requested anonymity because work had just begun.

The task force could ultimately set cyber security standards around inter-bank transfers that may be adopted globally. The new principles or guidance could cover responsibilities of banks that send and receive money transfers, and networks like SWIFT that transmit payment instructions in correspondent banking.

The task force also aims to consider recommending the steps each player should follow if a central bank falls short of protecting its systems from hackers, what role domestic regulators should play, and how to respond if another breach happens, the sources said.

"It's in its formative stages," said one of the sources. "It's what needs to happen ... but it's not a fast process." The other source said a focus of the task force will be identifying where the "breakdowns" are hidden in correspondent banking.

The BIS, which oversees the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures (CPMI) that launched the effort, declined to comment.

The sources said the attempted theft of nearly $1 billion from Bangladesh Bank's account at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, as well as other cyber attacks that since came to light, helped spur the committee of central banks.

In early February, hackers breached the Bangladesh central bank's systems and peppered the Fed with payment requests via the SWIFT global money-transfer network. Some requests were filled, amounting to $81 million that disappeared mostly into Philippines casinos. A Reuters investigation found the theft happened amid missed warning signs and miscommunication between the New York Fed and Bangladesh Bank.

After months of international finger-pointing, central banks and police investigators now appear to be cooperating to try to recover the funds, find the culprits, and strengthen a banking system found to be vulnerable.

"It just shows the vulnerabilities and, with the Bangladesh example, how a lot of money can be redirected in a very short amount of time," U.S. Senator Gary Peters, a Democrat who has urged the Group of 20 to prioritize cyber crime, said in a recent interview.

The National Bank of Belgium, which directly oversees SWIFT, has a leading role in the task force, one of the sources said.

The New York Fed, which handles some $80 billion in global money transfers each day and which is also taking part in the task force, said in June it was talking with other central banks about cyber security and the structure of global payments.

Belgium's central bank, the New York Fed and SWIFT, which stands for the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, each declined to comment.

The task force would have representatives from some of the most influential 25 central banks that make up the BIS payments committee, including the Bank of Japan, the European Central Bank, the People's Bank of China, and the Fed. However it was unclear who was tapped to serve.

The committee, which does not include Bangladesh Bank, promotes the safety and efficiency of bank-to-bank payments and settlements. It could open consultations with outside entities as early as this year, said one of the sources, adding it could take another couple of years before anything is formalized. (Reuters)

Source: www.businessworld.ie

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FILE PHOTO

As hallmarks of Utahs agricultural heritage, the states agricultural industry conducts an annual search for family-owned farms and ranches which have maintained production in the same family through 100 years.

At Tuesdays meeting of the Cache County Council, six local agricultural families were honored with Utah Century Farms and Ranch designation. Representatives of these families were introduced by Cache County Extension Agricultural Agent Clark Israelsen, who said 70 Cache County farms actually qualified for designation which he sees as very important.

Agriculture in Cache Valley generates $185 million new dollars every year, Israelsen told the council. Thats not just being shifted from point A to point B. Thats new wealth. Its new out of the ground every year. That is pretty profound, its significant. Its a benefit to all of us to have these farms productive, and active and successful.

This year the Century Farm Award winners came from northwest Logan, Paradise, Wellsville, Mendon and two from Amalga. Israelsen said he hopes to live 31 more years so his own little farm in Young Ward can become a Century Farm.
Newly-appointed State Superintendent Sydnee Dickson will be in Cache County all day Friday, September 16, visiting schools and meeting with legislators and educators. According to a press release, this is the first of several visits she is making around the state as part of a Listening Tour meant to facilitate open discussions about public education issues.

Dr. Dickson, who was <a href=http://schoolboard.utah.gov/news/sydnee-dickson-selected-as-utahs-state-superintendent target=_blank>appointed state superintendent</a> by the Utah State Board of Education in June, is a graduate of Utah State Universitys Emma Eccles Jones College of Education and Human Services. As an Aggie, she is excited to spend some time in the area.

Dr. Dickson will first visit InTech Collegiate High School at 1787 Research Park Way in Logan at 10 a.m. Then, at 11 a.m., she will visit Ellis Elementary School at 348 West 300 North in Logan and have lunch with the students.

At 1 p.m. Dr. Dickson will conclude her visit to Cache County with a tour of Cache County School Districts newest high school, Ridgeline, located at 180 North 300 West in Millville.
US ambassador to Azerbaijan Robert Cekuta was unaware of the statement by Ambassador James Warlick, US Co-Chair of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) Minsk Group, with respect to the supply of weapons from the US to Armenia and Azerbaijan.

September 16, 2016, 16:58 US ambassador to Azerbaijan is unaware of Warlick statement

STEPANAKERT, SEPTEMBER 16, ARTSAKHPRESS: Responding to an Azerbaijani journalists query on Warlicks statement regarding the provision of a limited amount of defensive weaponry to Armenia and Azerbaijan, Cekuta noted that he is not familiar with this statement by the OSCE Minsk Group US co-chair.

He added, however, that the US cooperation with Azerbaijan refers to making the Azerbaijani army in line with the NATO forces.

James Warlick had told Interfax news agency that the US supplies limited amount of defensive weapons to both Armenia and Azerbaijan. He had added, however, that the US Congress has a legalized mandate with respect to Azerbaijan, and that this mandate does not permit the US to supply weapons that can be used in the Karabakh conflict, for offensive purposes.
Can the Bratislava Summit mend the European Union?

Published on September 16, 2016

Story by euro topics

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The leaders of the EU member states met today in Bratislava to discuss how the European Union should deal with the problem of refugees and Brexit. In the run-up to the meeting Donald Tusk called for "a sober and brutally honest assessment of the situation. Europe's press reacted with a mix of hope and scepticism.

Politicians are finally listening to Europeans - Kristeligt Dagblad, Denmark

Kristeligt Dagblad hopes very much that the representatives of the member states and the EU will roll up their sleeves and get to work on overcoming their differences in Bratislava: "Everything points to the EU elite having understood the problems. In many key areas the EU is to be strengthened but at the same time have less influence in others. Although many politicians have succumbed to the trend of expressing Euroscepticism or opposition, the Union needs all the political and public support it can get. A Europe in which countries don't work together is unimaginable. There is no alternative to precisely this European Union. We should be glad that the politicians are now listening to the peoples of Europe." (16/09/2016)

The EU needs good will most of all - Sydsvenskan, Sweden

Sydsvenskan suspects it won't be easy to reconcile the various interests within the EU: "Metres of shelves containing treaties, directives and regulations govern cooperation in the EU. But what good are rules and agreements if no one follows them? Cooperation in the EU can't be brought about with rules. It must be based on good will and the readiness to put the common good above conflicting national interests. Without such good will the EU simply can't function. Is there enough of it present to break the spiral of dissatisfaction with the EU? The answer could lie in Bratislava." (16/09/2016)

Take foot off the integration pedal - Dennik N, Slovakia

Whenever the EU runs into problems further integration is automatically presented as the solution, says Dennik N, calling for a new approach: "If your car has a problem with the engine, the fuel line, the ignition, the gearbox or the brakes because it was put together too quickly and with faulty parts, it doesn't help to step on the gas pedal even harder. The only thing to do is stop and get the car repaired and the faulty components replaced. The summit in Bratislava and the coming months will show whether the EU leaders can overcome their profound tendency to react to any integration problem with more integration. But judging by EU Commission chief Juncker's recent speech there is little hope of this. He has recognised the problems but only sees strengthening Brussels as the solution. To stick with the car metaphor, with such drivers the car will fall apart long before it reaches its destination." (16/09/2016)

Exclusion of the British is unacceptable - The Times, UK

The decision not to invite the UK to the summit is proof that Jean-Claude Juncker wants to punish the country for its Brexit vote, the Times complains: "The divorce papers have not yet been served. Britain is still an equal member of the EU and its Prime Minister should be present... The intentions of Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the European Commission, have become all too clear. He wants to erect a cordon sanitaire between Britain and the remaining members. In his annual state of the union address yesterday, Mr Juncker declared that he 'respected but regretted' Britains decision to leave. His actions betray little sense of regret. He will not be satisfied until Britain is punished and given pariah status."

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30 Countries, 300 Media Outlets, 1 Press Review. The euro|topics press review presents the issues affecting Europe and reflects the continent's diverse opinions, ideas and moods.

Story by euro topics
On 16 September President Bako Sahakyan attended the exhibition of Honored Artist of the Republic of Armenia Karen Grigorian devoted to the 25th anniversary of the NKR proclamation, Central Information Department of the Office of the Artsakh Republic President stated.

September 16, 2016, 17:29 Bako Sahakyan attended exhibition of Honored Artist of the Republic of Armenia Karen Grigorian

STEPANAKERT, SEPTEMBER 16, ARTSAKHPRESS: The Head of the State highlighted holding such events underlining the creation of lasting values relating to crucial historical events.

Primate of the Artsakh Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church Archbishop Pargev Martirosyan and other officials were present at the event.
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO The Dr. M.L. Garza-Gonzalez Charter School was celebrated for reaching a 20-year milestone. The campus was recognized by the Texas State Board of Education Friday in Austin.

SHARE CONTRIBUTED PHOTO Dr. M.L. Garza-Gonzalez Charter School superintendent Maria Luisa Garza (left) and Ruben Cortez, Jr. District 2 State Board of Education member pose for a picture Friday after the campus was recognized by the Texas State Board of Education in Austin.

By Beatriz Alvarado of the Caller-Times

The Dr. M.L. Garza-Gonzalez Charter School was celebrated for reaching a 20-year milestone.

The campus was recognized Friday by the Texas State Board of Education in Austin. School officials attended the 20th anniversary celebration of the Charter School Network. The State Board of Education recognized the first generation charter schools that are still operating under TEA.

"We celebrated that we're still alive, so to speak," charter district superintendent Maria Luisa Garza said. "Several others (charter schools) throughout the state don't exist anymore."

The Garza-Gonzalez Charter School is an affiliate of the National Council of La Raza and began as an alternative school for at-risk youth. In 1980, the school became the educational branch of the grass roots organization, the Gulf Coast Council of La Raza, a news release states.

The council was founded by Maria Luisa Garza and her husband, Ricardo Gonzalez and since its inception has operated educational and social services for troubled youth and their families, the release states. In 1993, the school, then named the Academy of Transitional Studies, got accreditation from the Southern Association of Colleges and School and began accepting students from the community that had been removed from their school campus due to disciplinary reasons. It also was the only adolescent shelter for abused and neglected youth in the community, the release states.

In 1996, the school applied for and was awarded charter school status. It was built in 2002 and officially opened a more than 60,000-square-foot campus at 4129 Greenwood Drive. About 100 students enrolled last year, 90 percent of whom are classified as economically disadvantaged.

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By Natalia Contreras of the Caller-Times

Francisco Gallegos, 20, walked to the center of a stage and encouraged other students to join him in a grito contest Thursday.

He requested background music, and when a familiar accordion tune by a Ramon Ayala song played, he took a deep breath before shouting a grito himself.

Gallegos, a political science and social work major, was an organizer of the Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi Hispanic Heritage Month kick off and one of about 300 students who attended the celebration at the University Center.

This was the first time Gallegos joined the Islander Cultural Alliance to organize the celebration.

"I always wanted to learn more about different cultures and people," Gallegos said. "Growing up I was very in tune with my own culture, Mexican culture. Being part of this allows me to teach others about my culture and I get to learn from my roots, embrace them and be proud of them."

The celebration featured live music by N'Rumba Corpus Christi, food, featured speakers, Aztec traditional dances by Ehekal Rapalotzin dance group and the grito contest.

The university first put together the celebration in 2010, event coordinators and assistant professor of English Andrea Montalvo-Hamid said.

Since then, the turnout has increased and lineup of events has changed and become more interactive.

"We are in South Texas, we have a large Latino population and we are a Hispanic serving institution," Montalvo-Hamid said. "It's important to not only acknowledge that but celebrate it. There are so many Spanish-speaking countries and we need to celebrate those cultures and share them with everyone."

Tia Mullins, 21, said she has learned a lot from Hispanic cultures and her own, Pacific Islander culture after becoming involved with the Islander Cultural Alliance.

"This group celebrates so many different cultures and it brings them closer to the students," Mullins said. "I am Filipino and Guamanian and it just makes me feel good to be in an inclusive community and to be a part of that environment."

Twitter: @CallerNatalia

Coming up

Here's some area events:

Sept. 16: The Corpus Christi Hispanic Chamber of Commerce will host its 16 de Septiembre Festival & Mercado from 5-9 p.m. at the Congressman Solomon P. Ortiz International Center, 402 Harbor Drive. Cost: Free. Information: 361-887-7408.

The YWCA will host its annual Diez y Seis Forum  a Celebration of Hispanic Culture at 11:30 a.m. Friday, Sept. 16, at Dos Comales, 227 N. Water St. Registration required. Cost: $5. Information: www.ywcacc.org

Sept. 17: Ballet Folklorico Viva Mexico's 18th annual show with guest performers Mixteco Ballet Folklorico and Mariachi Aguila will be at 6:30 p.m. at the Miller High School Auditorium. Silent auction opens at 5:30 p.m. Cost: Free. Information: 361-994-8274, www.balletfolkloricovivamexico.org.

Sept. 21: Hector P. Garcia State Holiday Celebration at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi will host a discussion with guest speaker Dr. Ignacio Garcia from 2-3 p.m. in the University Center, Anchor Ballroom B.

Sept. 23: Del Mar College Viking Book Club will discuss "How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents" by Julia Alvarez at 1:30 p.m. in room 402, White Library, Del Mar College East, Naples off Kosar at Staples Street. Free. Information: 361-698-2385 or benitaflores@delmar.edu.

Sept. 27: Hispanic Health Fair at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi will be from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. in the Dugan Gym.

Sept. 27: Del Mar College lecture by James Klein, associate professor of history and Renato Ramirez, chair of the Social Sciences Department and professor of political science, "Addressing the Forgotten Dead: New Research on Violence Against the Mexican and Mexican-American Populations of the United States" will be at 1 p.m. in room 514, White Library, Del Mar College East, Naples off Kosar at Staples Street. Free. Information: 361-698-1218 or eflores@delmar.edu.

Sept. 28: Latin Dance Night will be from 5:30-7 p.m. in the Hector P. Garcia Plaza at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi.

Oct. 4: South Texas Colonia Initiative (STCI) Presentation by Lionel and Juanita Lopez will be from 6-7 p.m. on the 2nd floor of the Mary and Jeff Bell Library Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi.

Oct. 12: Del Mar College lecture "Making Tacos in Space: Jose Jimenez and the Evolutionary History of Hispanics in American Spaceflight, 1958-Present" will be at 1 p.m. in room 514, White Library, Del Mar College East, Naples at Kosar off Staples Street. Free. Information: 361-698-1218 or eflores@delmar.edu.
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers this week revoked the permit for the Lydia Ann Channel barge mooring facility and ordered the owners to remove it.

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By David Sikes of the Caller-Times

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has revoked its permission for a Lydia Ann Channel barge mooring facility to continue and ordered the owners to remove about 80 mooring structures along 8,000 feet of the channel near Port Aransas.

The company has 30 days to submit a safe plan for the removal of its facility. This is only the Corps second permit revocation since 2011, according to Sandra Arnold, public affairs chief for the Corps of Engineers Galveston District.

This decision comes nearly six month after a group called Friends of the Lydia Ann Channel convinced a federal judge there were enough oversights, missing details or misinformation in the permitting process to warrant a trial and full re-evaluation of the project, which was already underway. The group had earlier filed a lawsuit, citing a violation of the Endangered Species Act, partially because of the proximity of wintering endangered whooping cranes.

"We consider this to be a significant victory to protect the Lydia Ann Channel's irreplaceable resources," wrote attorney David Smith, representing the friends group. "However, we are troubled that the fleet appears to be continuing to operate on these unpermitted structures. We remain cautiously optimistic, and look forward to working with the Corps and the court to ensure that the industrial barge fleeting operations are brought to a halt, all unpermitted mooring dolphins and other structures are removed, and the area is fully restored."

Following a public outcry, the Corps of Engineers in April suspended its original 2015 letter of permission for the project, which triggered an evaluation, while allowing the company to continue its operation of temporarily storing barges along the east side of the Lydia Ann Channel. In March, Senior U.S. District Judge Janis Graham Jack ordered a full re-evaluation of the project and of the federal process that ultimately permitted the company to build it. A trial involving the lawsuit is still set for February 2017.

Whether there will be a trial depends upon what transpires at the facility in the near future, Smith suggested. At this point there has been no settlement among all the parties yet and no judgment in the lawsuit, he added.

Court documents filed this week indicate the corps has determined the project's purpose and need as stated by Lydia Ann Moorings LLC does not accurately describe the scope of the operation or address the underlying need for it.

Before construction began and again this week, a company representative said the enterprise addressed complaints of barges being pushed against San Jose Island near the channel while awaiting passage into the port. The company installed fewer mooring structures than were proposed between 75 and 12 feet from the island at a depth of 12 feet, the spokesman said in April.

Attorneys for the friends group dispute the environmental harm addressed by the project's original premise and believe the prescribed depth or mooring dolphins was not maintained throughout the facility. The group also suggested what was proposed to the Corps as a simple short-term storage facility is now a long-term mooring operation and refueling station, resulting in an environmental hazard, the scope of which was not addressed in the permit.

So the group circulated a petition, declaring the Corps failed to comply with the Endangered Species Act and did not conduct proper environmental impact studies. They claim the permitting process was hurried and should have allowed for public input.

Judge Jack agreed, in part, saying the corps was cavalier regarding the environmentally sensitive area involved and that it appeared few independent determinations of potential harm were requested or conducted by the Corps.

Twitter: @DavidOutdoors
Krista M. Torralva/ Caller-Times Judges, clerks and court staff discuss handling more than 5,000 cases by the Aug. 1, 2017 deadline.

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By Krista M. Torralva of the Caller-Times

After saving Nueces County from losing thousands more dollars in grant funding, court officials are looking to the more than 5,000 cases that need to be resolved by Aug. 1, 2017.

County officials this month learned the county lost more than $140,000 in grant money and were at risk of losing thousands more because the courts hadn't cleared the percentage of cases required by the governor's office to receive grants.

Judges, clerks, lawyers and other court staff rushed to get in compliance by the Oct. 1 extended deadline the governor's office granted the county.

On Thursday, County Judge Loyd Neal hosted a roundtable meeting to figure out what went wrong, discuss how to prevent the issue again and turn the focus to the next load of cases that need to be cleared.

"We all have a stake in this and you all have indicated to me you want to fix this," Neal said. "This is how you solve problems in county government. You sit around a table and you figure out what's wrong and you work together to figure it out."

District Clerk Anne Lorentzen apologized for the hundreds of cases that weren't properly classified between 2010-2014. A reporting issue carried over from the previous administration was the main problem, she and Chief Deputy Lilia Gutirerez said they learned. Lorentzen defended her office and said they've devised plans to prevent a repeat of the problem.

"As soon as it came to us, we got on the ball," Lorentzen said. "We have a plan. We already know ahead of time what we need to do because we discuss everything."

Most of the problem cases were what is called "failures to appear." In those cases, the defendant didn't appear to court on the scheduled date and an arrest warrant may have been issued. Those types of cases should be categorized as cleared, but about 350 were not, Lorentzen said. Other problem cases were duplicate bookings in the Nueces County Jail.

But looking ahead, the majority of cases needing resolutions are in the hands of the district attorney's office, several judges and clerks said.

Outgoing District Attorney Mark Skurka was not in the meeting but his First Assistant prosecutor and former elected District Attorney Carlos Valdez attended. A new district attorney will be in the office come January. The candidates are Republican James Gardner, who used to be in the office, and career criminal defense lawyer Mark Gonzalez, the Democrat who defeated Skurka in the primary.

County Court at Law No. 4 Mark Woerner suggested the system is backlogged with weak cases that either can't be proven or don't have cooperating witnesses.

"When you file a case that does not have a cooperating, complaining witness it's going to get dismissed. It won't happen immediately ... but eventually it does get dismissed," Woerner said. "Don't file cases that can't be proven to begin with and that would cut down a lot of it."

In 2015, 2,281 misdemeanor cases were dismissed and 3,213 ended in convictions, according to statistics from the District Clerk's office.

The new district attorney will either have to dismiss cases or work hurriedly to get the cases moving through the system, which could have an impact on the already crowded jail, County Court at Law No. 1 Judge Robert Vargas said.

Twitter: @CallerKMT
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO

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By Beatriz Alvarado of the Caller-Times

Police released surveillance footage of a vehicle after a 16-year-old girl reported a man masturbating in his Jeep as he drove by Calallen High School.

The girl told police she saw the man about 3:30 p.m. last Friday near the school. She reported the incident to police Tuesday, according to a police news release.

The Jeep was last seen traveling east on Northwest Boulevard, or Farm-to-Market Road 624. The Jeep was a tan or beige Cherokee and did not have any noticeable aftermarket upgrades, the release states. A long PVC pipe was seen stretching from the front to the back seat.

The man is described to be about 30 years old with light brown skin, about 215 pounds, black hair that was styled as a short fade, and a short, well kept beard.

No tattoos, piercing or scars were reported to police.

Those who would like to provide information may call Crime Stoppers at 361-888-8477 or submit information online at www.888TIPS.com. Tipsters can remain anonymous.

Twitter: @CallerBetty
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO The students from Naval Air Station Kingsville's Child Youth Center after-school program created "Celebrate Life" posters for the Spinz snack bar on base.

SHARE CONTRIBUTED PHOTO The students from Naval Air Station Kingsville's Child Youth Center after-school program created "Celebrate Life" posters for the Spinz snack bar on base. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO The students from Naval Air Station Kingsville's Child Youth Center after-school program created "Celebrate Life" posters for the Spinz snack bar on base.

By Julie Garcia of the Caller-Times

To promote suicide awareness, Kingsville area children got creative.

The students from Naval Air Station Kingsville's Child Youth Center after-school program created "Celebrate Life" posters for the Spinz snack bar on the base, said Rod Hafemeister, assistant public affairs officer.

The base wants to spread effective ways to deal with depression or problems that may lead to suicide. Among them are developing effective coping and problem solving skills, flexibility in thinking, access to helpful resources, healthy relationships and lifestyle, and a sense of belonging to a certain group and spiritual support.

The posters will remain on display through September as part of Suicide Awareness Month, Hafemeister said.

Twitter: @Caller_Jules
GABE HERNANDEZ/CALLER-TIMES Justice Greg Perkes of the 13th Court of Appeals (left) and appeals judge Kevin Yeary of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals enter during Red Mass on Thursday.

SHARE GABE HERNANDEZ/CALLER-TIMES San Patricio County Judge Terry Simpson (left) hands over offerings to Bishop Michael Mulvey during Red Mass Thursday. GABE HERNANDEZ/CALLER-TIMES Judge Kevin Yeary of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals talks during Red Mass Thursday. GABE HERNANDEZ/CALLER-TIMES Justice of the Peace Robert Gonzalez (left) helps Justice of the Peace Abel Suniga (center) with his robe as he talks to Thelma Rodriguez, another judge, during Red Mass on Thursday. GABE HERNANDEZ/CALLER-TIMES Justice of the Peace Thelma Rodriguez does the peace sign to judges during Red Mass.

By Krista M. Torralva of the Caller-Times

When judicial leaders must execute justice and mercy in the wake of public opinion, Bishop Michael Mulvey encourages them to pray.

The bishop of the Diocese of Corpus Christi prayed over lawyers and other elected officials Thursday during Red Mass, a legal tradition dating back to the 13th century in Europe that marks the beginning of a judicial year. The Catholic church celebrates and prays for the judiciary during the liturgy.

Mulvey expressed gratitude for lawyers and officials who work with abused children and relationships where there is domestic abuse and called those crimes a "plague."

"It's not an easy task to enter in the private lives of people, families, but when lives are at risk, society must intervene to protect the most vulnerable among us," Mulvey said.

The service, held just blocks from the Nueces County Courthouse at Corpus Christi Cathedral, brought together about 250 lawyers and elected officials, along with their families and supporters. Several legal organizations paraded red banners during the event.

Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Judge Kevin Yeary gave the keynote address. Yeary said he hopes his message serves as a reminder to share the God-given gifts lawyers have with others and to do so while maintaining a consistent prayer life.

"A lot of times, when we get down to the heat of battle in the courtroom or in a struggle ... sometimes it's easy to forget what's really important and that can cause us to sometimes get cross with one another or hold grudges and that's not what we're here for," Yeary said before Mass. "We're here to sort things out in the way ... that is consistent with what our creator wants us to be doing and with what the people who we are electing to write the laws intend for us."

Mulvey encouraged lawyers to pray for wisdom, courage and right judgment.

Twitter: @CallerKMT
STEPANAKERT, SEPTEMBER 16, ARTSAKHPRESS-ARMENPRESS: President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan is taking part in the session, press service of the Presidential administration stated.

The session is chaired by President of Kyrgyzstan Almazbek Atambayev.

During the sessions the Heads of States will discuss the mutual cooperation of the CIS member states on political, economic, humanitarian, security provision sectors, more than a dozen issues related to combating new challenges and threats. Thereafter, documents signing ceremony will take place.

Chairman of the CIS Executive Committee Sergey Lebedev will summarize the session results at the meeting with the media.

It is expected the Presidents will sign the statement of the Heads of CIS states on the occasion of the CIS 25th anniversary. The document will summarize the results of the 25 years of the CIS activity, as well as will outline the prospects of expanding and deepening the further cooperation.
CALLER-TIMES ARCHIVE Capt. Daniel Valdez (top) from the Corpus Christi Fire Department inspecting the fire truck with the help of engineer Andy Barboza last year at Fire Station #2 in Corpus Christi.

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By Fares Sabawi of the Caller-Times

Teams of 10 will gather to play tug-of-war on Oct. 8, but not against each other  against a fire truck.

Corpus Christi's fire department and police department are hosting the Third Annual Fire Truck Pull to benefit Special Olympics Texas.

The team that pulls a fire truck over a line in the shortest time wins. But the fire truck fights back, with the driver putting it in reverse occasionally.

"The key to having a good pull is teamwork and timing," Fire Chief Robert Rocha said.

Proceeds benefit Special Olympians in South Texas.

"We have 1,200 athletes in this region that we support," Police Chief Mike Markle said.

Police Lt. Henry Mangum, who helps organize Special Olympics Texas fund raisers, said he's passionate about supporting the athletes.

"We have officers going to meet a segment of society we don't see every day," Mangum said. "You go to (a Special Olympics event) and see what you're working for, and it's unbelievably heartwarming."

Rivalries will also be renewed Oct. 8. For the past two years, firefighters have come out on top in the fire truck pull. Mangum said the police team is going to come away with the win this year.

"Our guys are studying it and watching YouTube videos on it," he said. "They're taking a scientific approach to it."

Firefighters, on the other hand, won't give up the title easily.

"We enjoy our friendly rivalry with the police department," Rocha said. "But we're not going to lose."

Each team must have 10 participants and pay a $300 fee per team to participate. To register, contact Alice Fulton-Garza at agarza@sotx.org or call 361-857-5679.

Twitter: @Caller_Fares

if you go

What: Fire Truck Pull

Where: American Bank Center, 1901 N. Shoreline Blvd.

When: Oct. 8. Registration begins at 9 a.m., first pull scheduled for 10:15 a.m.

Cost: $300 per team

Information: Call 361-857-5679 or visit www.sotx.org/firetruckpull
John Walsh will be the featured speaker June 24.

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By Julie Garcia of the Caller-Times

PORT ARANSAS  Nearly two years after adopting an ordinance banning single-use plastic bags, Port Aransas has suspended it.

In a 5-1 vote Thursday, the Port Aransas City Council decided to suspended the ordinance, pending a state Supreme Court decision on the legality of plastic bag bans. Councilwoman Joan Holt voted no.

The beachy tourist town shaped the ordinance language on Laredo's ordinance, which was brought to court by the Laredo Downtown Merchants Association. Brownsville has a similar ordinance.

"It hurts me in the worst possible way to suspend this, but I know we have a responsibility to keep the city out of expensive lawsuits," said Councilwoman Beverly Bolner.

The ordinance prohibited stores within the city limits from giving customers single-use plastic bags at checkout. It was enacted in January. Bags used for seafood, bait or to prevent contamination from raw food were the exceptions.

The ordinance was citizen-driven, and city leaders have noticed a difference in the environment this year.

"I like the fact that our city is clean. It has had an effect," said Mayor Charles Bujan. "But it has been ruled illegal. We cannot afford such a disaster."

The state's Fourth Court of Appeals struck down Laredo's ban on Aug. 17. According to the court records, the 2-1 decision concluded it went against the state's health and safety code, which prohibits or restricts the sale or use of a container or package in regards to solid waste management. Plastic bags are considered containers.

City attorney Michael Morris suggested a suspension of the local ordinance, pending the Supreme Court's decision.

"It's not binding on other cities and Port Aransas, but it will have an effect," Morris said. "It may encourage one or more merchants to use the bags and challenge Port Aransas to enforce the law, and they could go further and sue Port Aransas saying its unlawful."

Mark Winton, owner of Winton's Island Candy, said the ordinance hasn't worked for his store. He sells primarily chocolate and gummy candy.

"I use a lot of brown paper bags, but everything I sell goes in your mouth," Winton said. "Chocolate is expensive. It's a luxury, and people come here on vacation and want to have a good time. They don't want their candy to melt."

Council members did not forget why the ordinance was enacted before voting. Wildlife, especially marine animals, were a major reason why the idea was brought forth.

Rae Mooney, a Port Aransas resident, did not agree with the suspension. She said Corpus Christi and Houston are considering similar bans.

Corpus Christi's Island Strategic Action Committee recently proposed a ban on plastic bags which is being reviewed by city officials.

Twitter: @Caller_Jules
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO The Veterans Band of Corpus Christi received a donation of nearly $1,500 from Celanese, a Bishop-based plant.

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By Julie Garcia of the Caller-Times

After a few years of the Veterans Band of Corpus Christi playing its annual employee luncheon, a Bishop refinery decided to pay the group back.

Celanese Chemicals, a Bishop-based plant, donated nearly $1,500 to the nonprofit band of military veterans in a presentation Wednesday. The band was included in the company's annual employee fundraiser that raises money for a number of veterans nonprofit organizations and charities.

Band director Ram Chavez said they play the company's luncheon every summer and never asks for donations, and he feels very fortunate they were included this year.

The money will go toward buying gas cards to cover expenses when the band travels to different performances. They keep a busy schedule, Chavez said.

"We've gotten higher visibility because of our trip to Hawaii," Chavez said of the band's performance at a decommissioning ceremony for the USS City of Corpus Christi on May 30 in Pearl Harbor.

In June, the organization celebrated its 30th anniversary and has performed about 6,500 events.

Twitter: @Caller_Jules
060216-KJ-Jacksonville, Fla.  Walmart is not only rolling back prices, they are rolling out new and revamped produce and bakery departments that are meant to offer more selection and a more thought out design to move shoppers through the areas easier. One of the stores trying this new concept is a store in Jacksonville, Florida where shoppers find wider isles in the produce section, as well as, and expanded organics are and more selections of fruits and vegetables.(Kelly Jordan, USA TODAY) [Via MerlinFTP Drop]

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By Julie Garcia of the Caller-Times

A remodeled Walmart Supercenter invites the community to see what's new.

The store, located at 3829 U.S. Highway 77 in Calallen, will have a grand reopening celebration Saturday from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Sunday from noon to 4 p.m. that will include family activities and free food samples.

The store has a remodeled fresh produce area, expanded bakery and pharmacy area, according to a news release. Fresh doughnuts and bread will be added at the bakery, and a full range of medicines and immunization services will be available at the pharmacy.

There will be a ribbon-cutting at 9 a.m. Sept. 23.

Twitter: @Caller_Jules
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In 1983, girls across the world chanted "Ride, Sally Ride," as Dr. Sally Ride made history as the first American woman to fly in space.

It was a seminal moment for women in the sciences. Many, at the time, predicted Dr. Ride's breaking the "highest glass ceiling" as she exited the earth's atmosphere would inspire more young women and quickly close the gender gap in the sciences.

But a little more than 30 years later, women are still under-represented in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. Dr. Ride's flight did inspire a generation of women to pursue careers in the sciences, but it also left more work to be done. That is why she made it her life mission to help inspire young girls to go into the sciences before her passing in 2012.

It is a mission and a passion that we share at Girls Inc. of San Antonio. For more than a decade, we have worked to help girls in our community be strong, smart, and bold, building on the example set by pioneers like Sally Ride and celebrating a new generation of women in science including today's astronauts.

The issue is not about curiosity in the subject matter, but also confidence in the skills needed to do the work. For girls, building self-assurance in their abilities in STEM areas early in their education is key because given the right tools, support and guidance, we know girls can change the world. But even today, too many girls don't have the role models and mentors needed to cultivate and validate their interest in STEM fields.

That is why women, who make up 47 percent of the American workforce, only make up 39 percent of chemists and material scientists. And they are only 17 percent of industrial engineers, 8 percent of electrical engineers, and 7 percent of mechanical engineers.

In higher education, the gap isn't as stark but it still exists. Last year, for the first time ever, women in America were more likely than men to have a bachelor's degree. But in the physical sciences and mathematics, women only made up 42 percent of the graduating students in 2014. They were only 20 percent of the students who earned engineering degrees. And only 18 percent of students who graduated with a computer science degree.

Developing and inspiring skills for the next century must begin early. Girls in early childhood and elementary school show the same interest and aptitude for math and science as boys. But study after study shows that the STEM breakdown starts in middle and high school. Part of the problem seems to be a lack of mentors and role models that results in insufficient encouragement for girls pursuing STEM activities.

Fortunately, this is something we can definitely change. Since 2009, Girls, Inc. of San Antonio has partnered with Boeing to help girls bring out their "inner STEM" selves and pursue science and math-based education and careers. The company, which is celebrating its 100th birthday this year, provides funding for our girl-focused STEM programs and shares its people power through employees who volunteer as mentors for our up and coming STEM students.

The company helped us launch our annual Girls, Inc. Science Festival and our STEM Saturday programs, which foster girls' interest in STEM fields through hands-on activities and meeting and interacting with women who have already broken thorough in STEM fields. Boeing's investment in STEM activities where girls ask questions, get dirty, and solve problems will develop girls' enthusiasm for and skills in STEM. Last year, the company provided seed funding for Eureka!, our program that helps engage young women in STEM starting in the eighth grade and continuing through high school. This program helps ensure these girls have continued support and mentorship as they grow up. Supporting girls to be strong, smart, and bold today will lead to a larger percentage of successful women in the STEM fields of tomorrow.

As a technology leader that is built on engineering and scientific expertise, Boeing knows that we cannot afford as a nation to leave any vital resource untapped  especially the vast well of young female talent who have traditionally been left out.

As Dr. Ride showed, it takes more than just inspiration to help close the long-standing gap for women in the sciences. It takes hard work, sustained encouragement, and help from forward-looking private sector partners like Boeing to make progress.
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Plans to build 123 new apartments at the railway station risk the area becoming the Costa del Cambridge amid claims their design is appalling and is not in character with existing buildings.

The concern emerged this week after residents were invited to a public exhibition to have their say on proposals for two blocks of the CB1 developments Devonshire Quarter.

Residents expressed shock at the overbearing height of the new B2 and F2 blocks, with concerns also raised about the proposals implications for road safety, congestion and green space.

However, developers Brookgate defended its proposals and said it would provide a fitting setting for people accessing Cambridge station from the north.

Resident Dunecan Massey, 36, said he was pleased to see the area being developed as a whole but was concerned the focus was more on cars and buses rather than pedestrians and cyclists.

He said: I cant see provision for footfall to and from the town centre, in particular crossing Station Road which has been already subject to a petition and also how to cross the northern access road.

What I get a sense of here is bouncing out of an extremely crowded interchange where the natural thing is to jump in a taxi. I cant see a vision of how people are encouraged to walk.

I know people are chancing it on the northern Road. Its not safe.

Mr Massey added he felt the area was becoming over-developed, with a design that risked giving the area an unappealing Costa del Cambridge feel.

He said: Its appalling, it doesnt reflect that local architecture at all. We dont think the quality of the buildings will make it last  its going to look very tired in 10 years.

As well as new apartments, Brookgates proposals for the two blocks include ancillary retail, basement parking and a new 207-space multi-storey car park for Network Rail.

A Devonshire Road resident, who did not want to be named, said the apartments looked frighteningly like the Marque and questioned whether they would benefit the citys key workers.

She told the News: Theres a scramble to build more and build high. Its a golden opportunity to do something with exciting architecture and I dont think its exciting.

It desperately needed redevelopment but this is cramming as much in as humanly possible and thats different. I could swallow it better if it was going to benefit key workers but its not.

The F2 and B2 blocks have outline approval under Brookgates wider master plan for CB1 and the next stage would involve the developers submitting a detailed planning application.

However, one resident questioned how much people could take away from the plans and said she felt the consultation process sometimes felt like lip service.

Brookgate stressed it was keen to listen to residents concerns and that it would be picking up on the need for a pedestrian crossing, as well as having on-going discussions about design.

A spokesman added: Blocks B2 and F2 will create a boulevard within which cyclists, motorists and pedestrians will access the station and car park.

It will be a shared surface public space designed by the same landscape architect that has worked throughout CB1.

Phase 1 of the new Station Square will shortly be open to the public and operational for taxis, drop off/pick up and disabled parking, which is the next substantial part of the public facilities being provided by Brookgate at the CB1 development.

The short term traffic management experienced during its construction will be relieved once Phase 1 of the new Station Square is open.

They added the new multi-storey car park had a modern, well-designed and attractive design and that it would be a significant improvement over the previously consented multi-storey car park.
| BY Ricki Green |

Following a three-way competitive pitch, Orchard has been appointed the digital agency of record across PPG Architectural Coatings brands in Australia and New Zealand. Incumbent on the account was The Farm.

PPG Architectural Coatings is a subsidiary of PPG Industries, a leading global supplier of paints and coatings. The company manufactures brands such as Taubmans, White Knight, PPG Paints and Bristol.

Orchard will take on the responsibility of bringing PPGs brands to life online and use digital to drive inspiration, brand preference and experience pre store visits. Its first task will be to overhaul and establish solid digital foundations and information management processes, allowing PPG to deliver customer-centric digital brand experiences.

Says Nadine Miller-Vachon, marketing director, PPG Architectural Coatings, Australia & New Zealand: This is an exciting time for our company as we partner with Orchard to help us grow within the digital space. Orchard not only demonstrated that they understood our brands and the brief but also put forward some very innovative ideas on how we could achieve differentiation within the digital space. We now have the opportunity to continue to drive awareness for our brands and further focus on our consumers growing needs.
| BY Ricki Green |

The system of self-regulated advertising in Australia is highly successful, but this message can sometimes be lost when governments propose new laws about what and how we can advertise.

Our industry is strongly committed to the system of self-regulation. This month advertising self-regulation training seminars will be held in Brisbane, Melbourne, Perth and Sydney. Presentations from the Advertising Standards Bureau (ASB), the Outdoor Media Association (OMA), the Australian Association of National Advertisers (AANA) and The Communications Council will refresh members on the system of self-regulation and ensure they are up to date on all the Codes and how to comply.

Please find details for all upcoming seminars here.

The industry is responsive to community concerns and is proud to have adopted the AANA Wagering Advertising & Marketing Code in July of this year. These seminars will cover the new Code to ensure that advertisers and marketers develop and maintain a high sense of social responsibility in advertising and marketing wagering products in Australia.

Training will also cover the Alcohol Beverages Advertising Code (ABAC) as the industry understands the importance of ensuring all alcohol advertising complies with community standards.

The seminars will use extensive case studies and recent ASB decisions to review the implications of non-compliance.

The Codes covered will include the following:

 AANA Code of Ethics

 AANA Food and Beverages Code

 AANA Advertising & Marketing to Children

 AANA Gaming and Wagering Code

 OMA Code of Ethics

 Alcohol Beverages Advertising Code (ABAC)

Pressures from vocal consumer groups are concerning for industry as we continue to find ways to market effectively and responsibly across increasingly diverse and fragmented target audiences. These training seminars will allow participants to develop a better understanding of current community standards, the implications of code breaches, and ways to manage expectations in the regulatory environment.

Says Tony Hale, CEO of The Communications Council: At the heart of the advertising industry is the self-regulatory system that has proven to successfully move with community standards. These seminars are essential for our members in general, and in particular, account management and production teams. These industry seminars are not to be missed.

Says Charmaine Moldrich, CEO, the OMA: Australias system of self-regulation works, and it works well. We at the OMA are committed to ensuring members only display advertising that aligns with community standards. This training is a vital part of educating our members as to what those standards are.
"The whole thing is ghoulish, too, but I felt it had drama and pressed for some reflection on art and war. People get into messes; war is the worst of them, and evil, but love and art  which we think of positively  are vain (hopes) and not immaculate."
The Ngambri man was invoking allodial title - described as a common law native title - to claim the land on behalf of his people. He said the land, on a charitable lease, can't be sold to recover a debt.
"I'm at a loss to understand how they can possibly justify crippling one of our most significant national cultural institutions to save a buck, while they are prepared to spend $175 million on a marriage equality plebiscite when they should just do their job and make the decision in the parliament," he said.
Johan Dennelind, who was appointed CEO to help clear up the scandal, admitted wrongdoings and unethical behaviour in a conference call this morning.

Telia Companys board learned of the scale of the proposed fine last night and reacted this morning after an overnight board meeting.

The proposal covers  as far as we understand  all existing investigations. It is a very high amount.

The companys chairman, Marie Ehrling, shared Dennelinds view of the scale of the fine. Our initial reaction to the proposal is that the amount is very high. We will now have to analyse the information and decide on how to proceed with the ongoing discussions with the authorities, she said in a prepared statement.

But she also admitted that the company  previously called TeliaSonera  had been wrong. I have said on many occasions in the past that Telia Companys entry into Uzbekistan was done in an unethical and wrongful way and we are prepared to take full responsibility. We are cooperating fully with the authorities to bring clarity to the matter.

General counsel Jonas Bengtsson said that Telia has been cooperating with Swedish, Dutch and US authorities. The new board, appointed at the 2013 annual general meeting, determined to change the company fundamentally, he said, and decided to cooperate with all investigating authorities.

The US Securities and Exchange Commission and the US Department of Justice started investigating in early 2014, followed by the Dutch authorities. Telia was not questioning their jurisdiction over the matter, said Bengtsson. Telia has cooperated with these authorities. It is an extensive cooperation.

Telia is hoping that the proposed fine will be an end to the matter. The proposal as far as we understand it covers all interests the authorities have in Telia Companys activities, he said.

Dennelind was unclear on how the level of the fine was set. We have just received the information and have to analyse it, he said. But he added that the company hasnt had an expectation of the level in advance. We simply state it is a big number.

Telia Company announced earlier in 2016 that it intends to dispose of all its central Asian interests, though Dennelind said he understands that there is no investigation into investments outside Uzbekistan.

Earlier this month Telia sold its 60% stake in Tajikistan operator Tcell for $39 million to the Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development, which owns the other 40%.

The Uzbekistan scandal dates back to what was then TeliaSoneras acquisition of Uzbekistan operator Coscom  later rebranded as Ucell  in July 2007. TeliaSonera did not conduct a sufficiently in-depth analysis into the identity of our local partner in Uzbekistan before we invested in the country or into how this partner came to own the assets that were later obtained by TeliaSonera, said then CEO Lars Nyberg in his 2013 resignation statement.

A report by Swedish Television in September 2012 alleged that TeliaSonera paid $320 million for its Uzbekistan licences through Gayane Avakyan, an Uzbek woman in her late 20s described as having close ties to Gulnara Karimova, the daughter of Islam Karimov, who had been president of Uzbekistan since 1991. Karimov died on 2 September 2016.

After the allegations emerged, TeliaSonera commissioned a Swedish law firm, Mannheimer Swartling, to investigate. The company also fired Per-Arne Blomquist, the CFO, and three other senior executives after it received Mannheimer Swartlings report.

Uzbekistan has not been a good investment for other foreign telecoms companies. In February 2016 VimpelCom agreed to pay $835 million in settlement fees to US and Dutch authorities after admitting it paid huge bribes to enter the Uzbekistan telecoms market. Telenor this week started to sell its stake in VimpelCom.

In August 2016 Russias MTS left the Uzbekistan market after selling its 50.1% stake in Universal Mobile Systems to the state for an undisclosed amount. Four years earlier the Uzbekistan government confiscated MTSs assets in the country and arrested executives.

This morning Dennelind told financial analysts that the fine would not affect Telia Companys dividend policy.
Prime minister Andrew Holness made the announcement in a statement to Jamaicas House of Representatives this week, following complaints that the identity of the people behind Caricel was a mystery.

Caricel plans to build a 4G-only network. It is believed to be planning to spend $50 million to build the network in the capital, Jamaica.

Caricel, owned by Symbiote Investments, calls itself Jamaicas first pure data service company. It adds: Caricel will this year launch an IP multi-service, multimedia communications network, providing products and services to residential, business and government entities.

The company says it is owned by a consortium of Jamaican businessmen with a passion for telecommunications and a genuine interest in empowering their fellow countrymen. But it does not name the people involved.

The award of the licence has met with some controversy in Jamaica, as Symbiote Investments has an existing carrier and service provider licence and was accused of using unauthorised spectrum. A government department, the Office of the Contractor General, had recommended that the mobile licence should not be issued and that the licences previously granted be revoked.

But Prime Minister Holness disagreed. He told the house: Non-issuance of the spectrum licence, in the circumstances, would be tantamount to a revocation of the grant of said licence and would be in violation of the principles of natural justice.

The previous government approved the 15-year mobile licence in February 2016, on payment of about $20 million.

The main work for my Cabinet was to determine whether the conditions set by the former Cabinet were met, but we did more than that. We carefully considered the matter and took into account the legal advice of the attorney general, Holness said.

However he added that the attorney general has recommended a number of areas for legislative and other actions. These, he said, include placing a duty on non-natural persons (that is, companies) applying for telecommunications licences should provide all required and relevant information about their shareholders, directors and other officers.

Caricel does not list its directors and senior staff on its website, simply listing that it has a board chairman, board of directors, chief executive officer, senior vice president marketing and commercial operations, company secretary, chief technical officer and chief financial officer, without giving names.

However, according to LinkedIn, the CEO of Symbiote Investments/Caricel is Lowell Lawrence. Three years ago he was director of a company called Newgen Technologies, which accused the incumbent fixed and mobile operator, Lime  the then trading name for what is now Flow, and then owned by Cable & Wireless Communications  of abusing its dominant position.

Lime and Newgen settled the $13 million lawsuit without disclosing details.

Based on the nature of the thing, I am not at liberty to get into any detail. The most I can say to you is that the matter was settled in a mutually beneficial way, Lawrence told the Caribbean Business Report at the time.

Newgen was offering wholesale international termination services, according to the Jamaica Observer. According to another Jamaica publication, the Gleaner, Newgen merged with Index Communications Network, trading as Gotel, to operate under the Symbiote Investments brand.
A former 40 year Atheist analyzes Atheism, without resorting to theism, deism, or fantasy.

***

If You Don't Value Truth, Then What DO You Value?

***

If we say that the sane can be coaxed and persuaded to rationality, and we say that rationality presupposes logic, then what can we say of those who actively reject logic?

***

Atheists have an obligation to give reasons in the form of logic and evidence for rejecting Theist theories.
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AUBURN  Auburn Community Hospital formally unveiled a new MRI scanner Tuesday that hospital officials describe as one of the best in the region.

The magnetic resonance imaging system has been added to the hospital's radiology department. In operating the technology, ACH has partnered with radiologists from the University of Rochester Medical Center.

The $3.2 million scanner was funded with a grant from the Auburn Community Hospital Foundation, according to Scott Berlucchi, ACH's president and chief executive officer.

Berlucchi was joined by other hospital executives, staffers and other invtied guests in ACH's lower level Tuesday for a ribbon-cutting ceremony to celebrate the new technology. Attendees also included state Assemblyman Gary Finch and students with the hospital's New Visions program.

The event marked a significant change for hospital services as ACH did not have its own MRI system inside the hospital. Rather, hospital staff used a third-party freestanding MRI. The scanner was housed in the back of a tractor trailer parked at the hospital parking lot.

The new MRI system was installed after about three months of renovations to ACH's lower level, said Chief Medical Officer Dr. John Riccio, which saw the area gutted before lead-lining the concrete walls.

"We now have a state-of-the-art investment here that's already exceeding our financial expectations and it's already doing more for the area patients than we thought it would six months in," Riccio said Tuesday. "This is a really major step forward."

The lower level of ACH now features four zones classifying the imaging department, with the fourth zone established for the MRI machine itself.

The wing was designed for comfort, said Dr. Ken Munro, ACH's director of imaging services. For example, patients entering the MRI machine are treated to an LED overlay of cherry blossoms on the ceiling.

Due to the nature of magnetic resonance imaging, however, certain zones bear restrictions on metal objects  including implants  an individual can have on their person. The hospital's model is a Siemens Magnetom Verio, which hospital officials said produces the highest quality images of any MRI program in the region.

Most community hospitals use a smaller 1.5-Tesla magnet with their MRI systems, said Dr. David Waldman, chair of the University of Rochester's radiology department. With ACH's 3-Tesla model, Waldman said the images radiologists get are "fabulous" quality.

Other area hospitals have taken notice as ACH has provided its imaging services to institutions from as far as Syracuse and Rochester, Berlucchi said.

"We're very proud of that because they're basically calling Auburn to get their scan done," Munro said.

Berlucchi said ACH deserves nothing but "the very, very best the region has to offer" after partnering with the University of Rochester for radiology services.

When Berlucchi started as CEO in 2007, he said ACH did not have any sort of imaging system on its premises. Since then, Berlucchi said he committed himself to improvements.

"A far cry from 10 years ago," he said of the current system. "No magnet or being in the parking lot, to the region coming here."
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.

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Higher Education Financial Agency (HEFA) is to be set up by the government to encourage research in institutes like IITs, IIMs and other higher education institutes. The fund of up to 20,000 crores can be given to these institutes to build up research oriented infrastructure which can meet up to the international standards.

In the Union cabinet meeting, chaired by the Prime minister Narendra Modi, the proposal to set HEFA was cleared by the cabinet. HEFA would be jointly promoted by an identified promoter and HRD ministry with an authorized capital of 2,000 crores.

In a statement released by HRD ministry, it is said, "The HEFA would also mobilize Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) funds from PSUs and corporates, which would be in turn released for promoting research and innovation in these institutions on grant basis."

It adds, "HEFA would finance the civil and lab infrastructure projects through a 10-year loan. The principal portion of the loan will be repaid through internal accruals (earned through fee, researches, etc.) of the institutions."

HEFA would be formed as a special purpose vehicle (SPV) within a PSU bank or a government owned NBFC. It would be the promoter of HEFA. It would be set up under Companies Act. It will be registered under RBI as Non-Banking Finance Company (NBFC).

All centrally aided institutes for higher education will be added as the member of HEFA. It will be consisting of a board of five members and five institutions. The members of Board will be selected on a rotational basis.

The prime motive of HEFA would be to obtain fund from market and add them up with CSR funds and donations. These funds will be used to build up world class infrastructure in IITs, IIMs, NITs and central universities.

The initial government contribution will be 1,000 crores and 1,000 crores will be given by the five corporate donors. The debt funding of 10,000 crores can be raised by the body. The institutions can credit money from HEFA within a prescribed limit. Government is also planning to give target based bonuses and penalties to the institutions.
New Delhi, September, 16, 2016: NIIT.tv - a disruptive innovation by NIIT, has won the prestigious award for 'Educational Technology, at the Indo-American Education Summit 2016. The award is a recognition of NIIT.tv's effort to make quality skill-based training available to every digitally connected Indian anytime, anywhere using a cutting-edge technology platform.

Organized by the Indus Foundation, an association dedicated to the promotion of higher education in India, the Indo-American Education Summit recognizes the achievements of some of the finest universities, colleges and institutions by presenting Awards for Educational Excellence annually. The Summit 2016 had sessions on collaborative research programs, joint/dual degree programs, twinning & transfer programs, faculty & student exchange programs, study abroad in India programs, distance education programs, vocational education programs, and other academic partnerships.

NIIT.tv is an internet TV portal that can be accessed on a computer, tablet or smartphone anytime, anywhere. It is a democratic digital learning initiative, backed by NIIT's strong Educational Technology framework, that was launched in October last year with an aim to bring high quality training from its classrooms to every digitally connected learner, for free, at any time, place and language of their choice. The platform has received an overwhelming response with a total of 469,145 registered users from 160 Countries.

Speaking on occasion Udai Singh, Head, New Business Initiatives, NIIT Ltd said, "This award is an acknowledgment of our commitment to offer job-focused skills training to the large under-skilled population of India, with an aim to create a globally competitive workforce for the emerging Indian economy. I wholeheartedly thank Indo-American Education Summit for this encouragement and recognition."

Since its launch in October 2015, NIIT.tv beta program has progressed well. Based on feedback from learners and the growth of courses, the course catalogue has been enhanced, an intuitive learning dashboard has been introduced, and the proven cloud courseware system from NIIT's Cloud Campus has been integrated into NIIT.tv. Also the NIIT.tv Android app is now available on the Google Play Store for free download. A course configurator has also been created to enable independent authors & subject matter experts to offer their courses on NIIT.tv.

Over the last 35 years NIIT has contributed extensively to the IT sector by training 35 million people in IT and other disciplines. As a socially responsible corporate citizen, NIIT with the launch of NIIT.tv is now committing to extend that experience and expertise to service the needs of India in many other sectors, across the entire social spectrum. With over 200 people working on education-technology, NIIT is a leading EdTech company in the country actively involved in offering technologically advanced learning products and services to its customers.

About NIIT

Established in 1981, NIIT Limited, a global leader in Skills and Talent Development, offers multi-disciplinary learning management and training delivery solutions to corporations, institutions, and individuals in over 40 countries. NIIT has three main lines of business across the globe- Corporate Learning Group, Skills and Careers Group, and School Learning Group.

NIIT's Corporate Learning Group (CLG) offers Managed Training Services (MTS) to market-leading companies in North America, Europe, Asia, and Oceania. The comprehensive suite of Managed Training Services includes custom Curriculum Design and Content Development, Learning Administration, Learning Delivery, Strategic Sourcing, Learning Technology, and Advisory Services.

With a team of some of the world's finest learning professionals, NIIT is dedicated to helping customers increase the business value of learning and development (L&D). Built on the sound principles of 'Running Training like a Business', NIIT's Managed Training Services and best-in-class training processes enable customers to align business goals with L&D, reduce costs, realise measurable value, benefit from rock-solid operations, and increase business impact.

NIIT's Skills and Careers Group (SNC) delivers a diverse range of learning and talent development programs to millions of individual and corporate learners in areas including Banking, Finance & Insurance, Retail Sales Enablement, Management Education, Multi-Sectoral Vocational Skills, Digital Media Marketing, and programs in digital transformation technologies. These programs are delivered through a hybrid combination of the 'Cloud Campus' online platform, satellite-based 'Synchronous Learning Technology' and a physical network of hundreds of learning centers in India, China, and select markets in Asia & Africa. The flagship multi-disciplinary course offerings include the industry-endorsed GNIIT - Digital Transformation program and a set of DigiNxt Programs for students from different streams, apart from a wide range of specialist short duration programs.

To further strengthen its SNC portfolio in India, NIIT has tied up with industry majors like ICICI Bank for NIIT Institute of Finance Banking Insurance& Training Limited, IFBI; leading business schools in India for NIIT Imperia; Genpact for NIIT Uniqua; and a joint venture with NSDC for NIIT YuvaJyoti Limited. Besides this, for the China market, NIIT has tied up with governments and software parks in Guian, Chongqing, Wuxi, Suzhou, Changzhou, Zhangjiagang, Haikou and Dafeng, for state-of-the-art public-private partnership centres.

NIIT has introduced - StackRouteTM, an initiative to produce the world's best full stack programmers. StackRouteTM aims to create multi-skilled, and multi-disciplinary programmers who can become key members of high-performance teams in top notch product engineering companies, start-ups, and IT firms. Further the company has also launched NIIT.tv - a digital learning initiative that brings skilling from NIIT classrooms to every digitally connected Indian, for free, at any time and place of their choice. A disruptive innovation by NIIT for the education space. NIIT.tv will deliver for the very first time, skill-based live courses as well as on-demand courses to the masses, through the digital medium.

As NIIT's wholly owned subsidiary for its K-12 school learning initiative - MindChampion Learning Systems Limited, is providing technology based learning to around 2,000 private schools across India, reaching out to more than a million students. The futuristic NIIT nGuru range of learning solutions for schools comprises Interactive Classrooms with digital content, technology-driven Math Lab, IT Wizard programs and Quick School - an Education Resource Planning software.

As the Most Trusted Training Brand in India for 4th year in a row (Brand Trust Report, 2016), NIIT's learning and talent development solutions, continue to receive widespread recognition globally. NIIT has been named among the Top 20 Training Outsourcing Companies for the past nine consecutive years by Training Industry, Inc. USA. Further, leading Indian ICT journal Dataquest has conferred upon NIIT the 'Top Training Company' award successively for the past 20 years, since the inception of this category. NIIT has also been featured as the 'Most Respected Education Company'- 2016 by leading financial magazine, Business World.
Sept. 16, 1936

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Sept. 16, 1961

Communist police strengthened the wall between East and West Berlin during the night. Extra barriers went up at four of the seven open crossing points.

It was apparent the East German regime was trying to prevent further breakthroughs by desperate escapees. At least five trucks have crashed through barriers to get to freedom in West Berlin since the wall went up Aug. 13.

Sept. 16, 2006

Citing the potential of asbestos exposure in Cayuga County facilities, county Sheriff Rob Outhouse says he will take precautions before sending his inmate work crews to work on projects downtown. But contrary to some reports, Outhouse said, he has not stopped allowing the work crews to complete projects for the county.

This week Outhouse denied a request from the county for a sheriff's office inmate work crew to move furniture at a downtown facility. The location of the project was in a place the department was concerned about, Outhouse said. Outhouse requested an environmental survey to be conducted before workers completed the project.

Sept. 16, 2011

A Seneca Falls woman who won a GMC Denali pickup truck worth approximately $55,000 gave the truck to her father Friday during a ceremony in Auburn. Kim Clingerman found out she was one of 10 winners selected out of 3.5 million contestants in June who participated in OnStar's "Push OnStar" sweepstakes.

Clingerman, who serves with the Air Force National Guard and was deployed when she found out about the win, said the news caught her by surprise. Clingerman received the keys to the pickup truck during an award ceremony at the Summit Chevrolet, Buick, GMC dealership in Sennett Friday and immediately gave the keys to her father, Richard Clingerman. The elder Clingerman said he intends to keep the gift, which was given to him for his 50th birthday.
AUBURN  The city of Auburn will use a set budgeted amount to help pay for quality control to Owasco Lake, transitioning away from a investment method seen by some as unreliable.

The Auburn City Council voted Thursday to commit $125,000 annually into the Owasco Lake Watershed Inspection Program, which is responsible for monitoring the lake for quality issues. The $125,000 will be broken into quarterly payments.

As the largest entity that draws drinking water from Owasco Lake, Auburn's contribution makes up a majority of the inspection program's budget. In the past, the city contributed amounts through the water rate at 6.3 cents per 100 cubic feet of usage.

However, lower rates of consumption in recent times have impacted the watershed program's budget, said Comptroller Laura Wills. The inspection program, she said, does not have any outside revenue sources.

The change will not have any impact on taxpayers, according to the comptroller. Wills said the $125,000 line item was budgeted in the city water fund and was thereby considered when formulating a new citywide water rate, which was finalized by council in August.

Auburn and Owasco are the only two municipalities that directly support the inspection program's budget, officials said. Owasco's investment method is based on usage.

Councilor Debby McCormick said when the usage rates would fall short for the watershed program, the results would affect programming and restrict cash flow.

"It's just not reliable. You don't know what's coming down the pipe," said Councilor Debby McCormick. "I think it's going to help. It's just one less thing to worry about."

'Worth every dime': Police presence to return to Auburn schools Students and parents can again expect an active police presence in Auburn schools this comin

In other news

Auburn officials voted to finalize an agreement with the city school district to continue the school resource officer program over the next five years.

Four officers with the Auburn Police Department are tasked to patrol the schools within the district as part of the program, including extracurricular activities and events. The city and school district shared the program costs associated with salaries in the past, but the new contract calls for the district to take 100 percent of the cost burden in the last year of the deal.

Under the agreement, program contributions from the Auburn Enlarged City will scale over each year of the contract. For the first year, the district will cover $250,000 of the $355,000 cost.

Though the city is just finalizing the agreement, SROs have been in place since the first day of school. City Corporation Counsel John Rossi said the Auburn school board will meet next on Sept. 22 when members will likely approve the contract as well.
Syracuse Mayor Stephanie Miner has a simple explanation for the driving force behind the construction of the Interstate 81 viaduct in her city and the Arterial in Auburn.

"They were designing for cars, not people," she said in an interview.

Both projects  the elevated portion of I-81 and the Arterial that stretches through Auburn  were born out of urban renewal, a policy that sought to revitalize cities throughout the country.

AUBURN AND SYRACUSE

The lasting impact of urban renewal can be felt in both cities. Before the Arterial and the I-81 viaduct, there were neighborhoods with businesses and homes. These structures were torn down to build the highways.

Urban renewal, revisited A series examining the impact of Auburn's urban renewal initiatives, including the Arterial:

In Syracuse, a neighborhood made up of mostly African American residents was cleared for the elevated highway.

"You have a whole bunch of decisions which ended up tearing communities apart and then making communities distrust their government in order to build infrastructure that served machines, not people," Miner said.

For Auburn Mayor Michael Quill, discussing urban renewal goes beyond the policy. It brings back memories of downtown Auburn pre-Arterial.

Quill was serving in the Marine Corps from 1968 to 1972. During that time, several buildings were demolished and work on the Arterial began. While he was away, he didn't realize the changes being made in his hometown.

He returned home and started with the Auburn Fire Department in November 1973. The Arterial wasn't completed yet, but the transformation was evident.

More than four decades later, Quill wonders if constructing the Arterial was a good decision for the city.

"Do I miss some of the old buildings? Absolutely," Quill said. "Has it been better for the city of Auburn? I don't really believe that it has been as helpful as it hoped."

There are obvious differences between the Arterial and I-81. I-81 is an elevated highway as it passes through central New York's largest city. The Arterial that runs through Auburn is a flat roadway. You can easily turn off the Arterial onto side streets. Exits are available on I-81, but getting to your preferred destination may take additional travel.

That is, of course, if motorists are interested in what Auburn and Syracuse have to offer.

One reason for the construction of the I-81 viaduct and the Arterial, after all, is to make it easier for vehicles passing through both cities.

"Everyone coming from the east to the west  they just travel through the city and boom, they're gone," Quill said.

Miner added that there's a policy lesson to take away from the motivation for why the two highways were constructed.

"I think you start by saying we need to be mindful of what we're doing," she said. "We're trying to create stronger communities for people. What's going to help communities of people grow economically and culturally and socially? And then make policies consistent with that rather than thinking about how can we move people from point A to point B as quickly as possible."

Auburn and Syracuse have been changed by the presence of the highways.

In Syracuse, I-81 splits the city in half. Miner referred to some areas near the viaduct as "dead zones." She said the highway cut off the downtown area from University Hill  two of the city's most vibrant neighborhoods.

Auburn's situation is similar. In some cases, the Arterial splits entire streets. What was one neighborhood before is now two  or more  areas with a different environment. Businesses thrive in some of these areas. In others, the same success is hard to find.

While Quill has his criticisms of the Arterial, he doesn't question the city leadership and other officials who pushed for its construction at the time.

"I'd love to be in the minds of all the individuals who were involved at the time," he said. "I know they did it in the best interests of Auburn. It wouldn't be fair for myself to second-guess what their thoughts, what their intentions were. But I am, to a point, disappointed with the Arterial as to what it's done to our downtown. I'd rather go back to the old way that it was."

CANANDAIGUA

Not all upstate cities approached urban renewal the same way.

When you talk about urban renewal in Canandaigua, it's less about transportation infrastructure and more about building improvements.

Canandaigua Mayor Ellen Polimeni said the city's approach emphasized preserving structures that were vacant and in need of repairs.

"We had a lot of space above the commercial areas in those historic buildings and urban renewal really focused on making those habitable with residential housing units," Polimeni said. "We had a lot of apartments that developed, but also some office space that developed."

The apartments in the historic buildings are still there today. Polimeni said the units are being renovated and the city is seeking grants to help property owners make facade and structural improvements.

Perhaps the biggest development related to urban renewal was the creation of Canandaigua's business improvement district. The policy, Polimeni said, helped start the discussion about the city launching a business improvement district.

"You gotta have the buy in and one thing that a business improvement district is it gets buy in," Polimeni said.

She added, "We have some vacancies, but they're on top of it. They're always out recruiting and looking. And then event-wise, they bring a lot of people into town for various events."

Polimeni knows Canandaigua had a different urban renewal strategy than other cities. That might explain why she has a much more positive view of the policy than her counterparts in Auburn and Syracuse.

"We didn't do what a lot of different communities did," she said. "We didn't tear down and we didn't tear down buildings. We built up. We tried to establish our sense of place. We wanted to be noted for our history. We built on that foundation  historic preservation. We put in a historic preservation ordinance and it's still adhered to."

THE FUTURE

Within the next few years, the neighborhoods torn down for the I-81 project decades ago may, in some way, return.

Federal, state and local officials are planning for the future of the I-81 viaduct. The elevated highway reaches the end of its useful life in 2017, which means it must be either rebuilt or replaced.

"We're now getting at a point of time where we can start to undo some of the damage that was done, at least to the topography," Miner said. "People's sense of whether the government listens to them or works for them is another deeper seeded issue. But I think if you start with a premise that you should design for people, not machines, we will make better decisions."

One of the proposals to replace the viaduct is a boulevard. A tunnel has also been mentioned. Rebuilding the elevated highway is another option.

The state Department of Transportation is currently reviewing which option is best for I-81, Syracuse and the entire region.

The Arterial, however, likely isn't going anywhere.

Quill said it would be interesting to hear from Auburn residents on what they think of the Arterial. But he doesn't believe the Arterial will be removed, at least in the next couple of decades.
Following its arrival in Europe and North America, the Bugatti Chiron has now landed in South-East Asia, where it will be displayed to customers during exclusive private appointments.



The worlds most powerful production hypercar, which uses an 8.0-liter quad-turbo W16 engine that develops 1,500 PS (1,479 HP) and 1,600 Nm (1,180 pound-feet) of torque, will make a brief appearance at the Singapore F1 Grand Prix, this weekend, and then it will be on display at the brands local showroom, which has been renewed.

With the presentation of the Chiron here in Singapore, Bugatti is honouring the special importance of the South-East Asia region for the brand, said the automakers Member of the Board of Bugatti Automobiles S.A.S. for Sales, Marketing and Customers Service, Stefan Brungs. Here, people show fantastic levels of appreciation and passion for groundbreaking performance and exclusive brilliance as well as enthusiasm for the Chiron.

With its ability to cover the 0 to 100 km/h (62 mph) sprint in just 2.5 seconds and to go from naught to 200 km/h (124 mph) in 6.5 seconds, on the way to a top speed of 420 km/h (260 mph), the Bugatti Chiron has been chosen by more than 200 wealthy customers by now, who had to pay the sticker price of $2.7 million. The company will produce just 500 examples of the powerful machine and the waiting is said to extend beyond three years.

PHOTO GALLERY
The Michigan Secretary of State will uphold a decision for the state to deny a dealer license to Tesla Motors.



The state made an initial motion to deny the electric automakers request for a dealer license in November 2015 and ultimately, it was denied because of Teslas direct-sales model. If it was approved, Elon Musks firm would have been able to sell vehicles through storefronts in Michigan, reports Automotive News.

Laws in place in Michigan since 1981 require all carmakers to sell vehicles to customers through franchised dealers. Unlike most companies, Tesla sells directly to its customers and offers the ability for new cars to be purchased through its website.

Tesla cant sell vehicles in Texas or Iowa either, due to similar laws.

In good news for Tesla, it was granted a license to sell directly to customers in the state of Arizona. This decision came after the firm was previously denied a license in May.

PHOTO GALLERY
If youre a rev head not satisfied with the selection of car emojis offered by Apple, then today is your lucky day.



For iOS 10, a new app dubbed Automoji has just landed on the App Store that includes 52 emojis of the most iconic Porsche models of all time.

Created by Kevin McCauley, the emoji pack includes depictions of all of the German automakers most famous road cars as well as all of its vehicles to have claimed an overall race victory at the Le Mans 24 Hours.

Among our personal favorites are the Porsche 917K, 919 Hybrid and the insane 911 GT1. Some of the best road cars include the 911 GT3 RS 4.0, 918 Spyder, Carrera GT and 959.

Priced at $0.99 over at iTunes, the emoji pack is probably the closest many of us will ever get to owning something Porsche related.

PHOTO GALLERY
Tractor manufacturing is a domain that benefited not only from Lamborghinis expertise, but from Porsches too, which began constructing prototypes of the farm-aimed vehicles prior to WW2.



The earliest batches were powered by petrol engines, but later ones turned to diesel power and used two-, three- and four-cylinder air-cooled engines, with outputs ranging between 14 and 55 horses.

Things were looking good for Dr. Ferdinand Porsches tractor manufacturing business, but at the end of the war, he was banned from producing such vehicles, as only firms that had been making tractors prior to and during the war were permitted to continue.

Porsche was then forced to license the designs to other manufacturers, and papers were eventually signed with Germanys Allgaier GmbH and Austrias Hofherr Schrantz. In 1954, Mannesmann AG diversified its business into tractor manufacturing by buying the rights to Porsches engine and Allgaiers tractor design, setting up Porsche-Diesel Motorenbau GmbH.

Two years later, Mannesmann opened a production facility in Friedrichshafen-Manzell, at an old Zeppelin factory, where assembly of four models began: the 14 HP Junior, 25 HP Standard, 38 HP Super and 50 HP Master. Between 1956 and 1963, Porsche-Diesel Motorenbau produced more than 125,000 tractors, many of which were aimed at other markets.

This particular 308 Super was put together in 1959 and it was discovered at a farm near Dublin, Ireland, in 2014, where it sat on a field for several years. It was then taken to a vintage tractor expert, who returned it to its former glory in a proper restoration process, during which it received a red and cream finish and had its four-stroke, 2,466cc 3-cylinder, air-cooled diesel engine properly serviced.

Responsible for selling it at an estimated 10,000-15,000 ($13,270-$19,905) is SilverstoneAuctions, which says that the Porsche tractor was never registered for the road, but since it comes with the correct chassis plate, registration should not be a problem. It will go under the hammer on October 15, at The Porsche Sale 2016, at The Wing, Silverstone Circuit, in Northamptonshire.

PHOTO GALLERY
Photo: Contributed

Volunteers can find an outlet for their good deeds at Kelowna's 19th annual Okanagan Volunteer Opportunities Fair this Saturday.

The free family event will showcase more than 70 local non-profit organizations who are seeking volunteers.

It gets underway at 10 a.m. at Parkinson Recreation Centre.

Students can explore options for volunteer service hours, and potential volunteers can find out what local organizations are doing around the Central Okanagan.

I enjoy hearing all of the stories from the organizations and their volunteers, says Dawn Wilkinson of Kelowna Community Resources. Last year, I met volunteers who had found opportunities at the volunteer fair a few years previous and were then staffing the booth for the organizations that had originally recruited them.

In preparation for Canadas 150th anniversary, volunteer centres across the nation are putting up the challenge to donate 150 hours of volunteering over the course of the next year.

Kelowna Rotaract will be serving lunch for $5, with proceeds going to its local and international projects.
Photo: The Canadian Press A Kermode bear, better know as the Spirit Bear is seen fishing in the Riordan River on Gribbell Island in the Great Bear Rainforest.

A vast tract of land about half the size of Stanley Park within British Columbia's prized Great Bear Rainforest has been donated to the Nature Conservancy of Canada.

The four parcels of private waterfront land on British Columbia's Central Coast include 185 hectares of ecologically significant old-growth forests and estuaries.

The Conservancy says the area supports some of the most dense populations of black and grizzly bears in the province, along with the white kermode or spirit bear.

The newly conserved parcels are part of the world's largest coastal temperate rainforest and include the Gullchucks Estuary, Spider Island, and the Geldala and Kiidiis shores that sit opposite of Rivers Inlet.

On Monday, Premier Christy Clark also announced the Great Bear Rainforest will be endorsed under the Queen's Commonwealth Canopy initiative aimed to conserve forests around the globe.

Already, 85 per cent of the Great Bear Rainforest's 6.4 million hectares are conserved, while the remaining area is used for logging.
While much of the focus this year is on the presidential election, there is a competitive congressional race in central New York.

U.S. Rep. John Katko, a Republican, is running for re-election in the 24th Congressional District. His opponent is Colleen Deacon, a Democrat who previously worked as U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand's top aide in the region.

The 24th Congressional District is comprised of Cayuga, Onondaga and Wayne counties, plus the western portion of Oswego County.

Our question for readers: If the election were held today, who would you vote for: Deacon or Katko?

Cast your vote in our poll and comment on the race below.
Photo: Twitter - VPD

During a two-day inspection sweep on commercial vehicles, Vancouver Police found only 22 of 214 units checked had no violations.

The VPD's Commercial Vehicle Unit, RCMP and provincial Commercial Vehicle Safety Enforcement officers joined forces for the road-safety blitz.

The inspections took place at multiple locations across the city and will continue Friday, said Staff Sgt. Brian Montague.

On Wednesday, only seven of 119 vehicles checked had no violations.

On Day 2, the results were slightly better, with 15 out of 95 units violation-free.

In total, 127 of those violations were considered minor, but 65 resulted in commercial vehicles being taken off the road for serious safety defects.
Photo: Getty Images

It probably wasn't the vision of urban planners when the concept of being thrifty, green, and trendy was first talked about.

The equivalent of $1,000 per square foot for a tiny home might seem little shocking. But read this week's headlines, and you will see that this is actually happening.



To make matters worse, planning and government jurisdictions are giving incentives to developers of tiny homes in a multitude of ways, so is it just the tiny home trend a rip-off?



Yes and then again, no. We have had tiny homes for years.



Let's be honest, this is nothing new. My first home, a caravan in the U.K., was about 164 square feet and cost me $1,200, about $13 a square foot.

I know it was a long time ago, but that was a great start for a young kid.



Then, together with my wife, I got into bricks and mortar. We purchased a 400 square foot home for $50,000. We were so excited, for a similar price again (per square foot) ,we got in to a real house.

Sure, the living room was smaller than my current bathroom, but we were as excited as heck.



In Canada, if you grew up in urban areas or The Prairies, you are probably used to living in small spaces also.



We got greedy



Then, life changed. Material possessions became ultimately important. Bragging rights morphed to how many square feet you owned, then, whether you had stainless appliances or granite counters.

What was once the finishings of the world's millionaires became common place, and, in fact, even demanded by ordinary citizens.



Then, we had a global financial crisis, in large part caused by our own greed.



Tiny houses are re-born



Suddenly, there is a boom in tiny houses. No, not a boom, a veritable explosion, a media frenzy.

Everyone was talking about something that had been around forever as if it were the newest, coolest option.

I recall in Canmore auctioning off a subdivision of tiny lots for tiny houses way back in 1998. It was perfect.

Did other municipalities look at it as a success? Nope. In fact, I have not seen another development use a zero lot line concept (a shared lot line) to build smaller houses on smaller lots.

Why? Because municipalities and citizens probably think it is ugly. It is OK over there, but not in my back yard.



TV hype



The TV Industry started to popularize tiny homes with spun-out dreams of romantic, tiny homes parked in glamorous locations, giving the owners a dream lifestyle.



But we didnt just build tiny homes. We built designer, tiny homes. Throw caution and budget to the wind; we were willing to pay for the coolest gadgets, the cutest designs and multi-storey tiny homes (An oxymoron if ever there was one!)



Enter the marketers



Never skipping a beat, the smart marketers moved into town, convincing the municipalities that they were going to solve the world's problems (one of which people think is housing affordability) and, badda-boom-badda-bing, we look at the results and gasp.



Lets grow up - just for a second



Now, we see advertisements in Kelowna for $1,600 per month rentals for a 300 square foot apartment.

That is equivalent to a mortgage of close to a $400,000 or to put it another way, the cost per square foot if you paid $400,000 for that same unit would be $1,300.



Do we have a problem? Sure, perhaps there should have been some strings attached to those enticing developer incentives.

The problem we have is probably more to do with stupid people if anyone takes up that offer to rent something a little larger than a sandbox for $1,600 a month.



So let's not be too concerned. We can, of course, advertise anything for rent or for sale, but on the other side of the deal, there has to be a willing buyer.

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.
Photo: Malahat Fire

A Vancouver Island man accused in a fatal collision that killed an RCMP officer is being sued over another crash.

Kenneth Jacob Fenton is facing a lawsuit over claims he drove drunk and crashed a pickup one month after the April collision that killed Const. Sarah Beckett.

Hes being sued by Megan Ashe, his passenger.

Ashe claims Fenton lost control of the vehicle and hit a large rock, causing the truck to roll.

She alleges Fenton drove at an excessive rate of speed, failed to apply the brakes in time and was impaired by alcohol, drugs and fatigue.

Ashe claims numerous injuries and says she continues to suffer from headaches, dizziness and psychological trauma.

She's seeking unspecified damages for pain, suffering and loss of enjoyment of life.

Fenton faces five charges in the Langford crash that killed Beckett, including impaired driving causing death.

He is not in police custody and is scheduled to make his first court appearance on Sept. 29.

 with files from CTV Vancouver
Photo: Twitter

Officials with Fisheries and Oceans and Parks Canada will patrol the coastline of Prince Edward Island for the next few days after a stranding of five dolphins there Thursday.

After tourists reported a mother and a young Atlantic white-sided dolphin stranded in Savage Harbour, officials began looking for more.

Andrew Reid of the Marine Animal Response Society says other stranded dolphins were spotted in Rustico and Covehead, and a dead one was found at the Rustico causeway.

Reid said the dolphins in Savage Harbour and Rustico were moved to deeper water Thursday, and Fisheries officers were planning check the one in Covehead Friday  which was swimming in shallow waters.

He said the live dolphins appeared fairly healthy and it's unclear why they got themselves stranded, but it's not uncommon in the Maritimes.

Reid said Atlantic white-sided dolphins can reach 10 feet in length and 500 pounds.
Photo: CTV

Police chased a pickup across Metro Vancouver Thursday night before it was abandoned.

Now, they're searching for the driver after the pursuit led police from Surrey to Lougheed Highway in Burnaby.

The truck was being driven in a dangerous manner, so police followed from a distance and from above, with an RCMP helicopter.

The chase began when the truck failed to stop for a police cruiser and ended about 1 a.m..

Heavily armed police and members of B.C.s anti-gang task force swooped down on the area and seized the vehicle.

 with files from CTV Vancouver
Photo: drakeofficial.com

Don't get duped if you want to see Drake.

Vancouver Police are warning anyone still looking for tickets to this weekend's concerts at Rogers Arena stands a good chance of getting ripped off.

The VPD warns that last-minute ads on Craigslist are often posted by scammers.

"There is a good chance you will find yourself standing outside the event, unable to get in, and out-of-pocket for the money you spent," said Sgt. Brian Montague.

Police get reports of ticket fraud at almost every event in Vancouver, he added.

But there's no way to know they're not legitimate until you get to the show.

Both Saturday and Sunday's Drake concerts are officially sold out.

Floor tickets are being advertised for as much as $800 on Craigslist.
Photo: The Canadian Press

The lawyer for a man found guilty of second-degree murder in the deaths of an Alberta couple says he has filed notice he will appeal his client's conviction.

Brian Beresh says the appeal focuses on what he calls a major error in the ruling and is seeking to have former Summerland resident Travis Vader acquitted or a new trial ordered.

Beresh says Justice Denny Thomas relied on a section of the Criminal Code that has been declared unconstitutional and made other errors involving the interpretation of evidence.

He says nothing will happen with the appeal until Vader is sentenced in Court of Queen's Bench, which could run well into the fall.

Alberta's Justice Department has declined comment on the case, which has been in and out of court since 2012.

The family of seniors Lyle and Marie McCann, who were killed in July 2010 while driving to British Columbia for a camping trip, was not available for comment.
Photo: Air Miles

The company that runs the Air Miles loyalty rewards program is the target of a proposed class-action lawsuit.

A statement of claim filed with the Court of Queen's Bench this week alleges LoyaltyOne Co. made unfair and unilateral changes to the program's terms and conditions.

Air Miles racked up before December 31, 2011 are set to expire at the end of this year and miles collected after that are to expire five years after they are earned.

The proposed suit, which has not been certified, claims users were not given adequate notice of the changes and that the company has made it difficult for miles to be redeemed before their expiry.

Air Miles are earned by shopping at participating retails and are meant to be exchanged for flights and other rewards.

The plaintiff in the case is a Red Deer, Alta., man who had been saving up miles for a dream vacation to the South Pacific that he otherwise could not afford.
Photo: The Canadian Press

Karen Barzilay recently found herself in a bind when she was unexpectedly called into work while her nanny was out of the country.

With no one available to care for her three young daughters, the 40-year-old television producer  like any desperate, tech-savvy parent  turned to social media and posted her dilemma on Facebook.

That's when her neighbours told her about BookJane, a mobile app they created to help Torontonians find caregivers on demand.

Within hours, Barzilay was able to narrow down her search to three candidates with the qualifications she was looking for: someone who was active, who had children of their own and was comfortable cooking a few family meals.

"I was in a predicament when I went to the app. I was a little apprehensive. It's a nerve-wracking, meeting someone and saying, 'Here are the kids and I'm going to work now,'" she said.

But she was reassured after seeing "Jane" with her children, who were kept busy throughout the week with bike rides, park visits and baking banana bread.

BookJane founder and chief executive, Curtis Khan, describes the app as the Uber for babysitters and elderly caregivers.

"People are ready. Uber has paved the way. Airbnb has paved the way," said Khan, a former marketing executive. "They're looking more and more to technology."

Since launching in July, Khan says BookJane now has a database of 2,000 caregivers and 500 clients in Greater Toronto, including individuals, childcare centres and hospitals.

Users can find a caregiver for their children or elderly parents within a few clicks and book for as little as one hour or for the day  at a rate of $21 an hour for a childcare provider and $25 an hour for a personal support worker for a senior.

Payments are made directly through the app with a credit card, with BookJane taking $4.20 to $5 an hour for making the connection.

The app lets users chat online with prospective hires and track their movements while on the job in real-time.

Khan said listed caregivers have to pass stringent qualifications including an extensive in-person interview, a police check, a vulnerable sector check, provide references, be certified in CPR and First Aid, and either hold designations in early childhood education or personal support work. The approval process, on average, takes about two weeks.

BookJane also provides liability insurance of up to $5 million, and hires can be filtered through various parameters including years of experience and languages spoken. Users and caregivers are also given a rating following a job.

Khan said the idea for the app came to him and his wife, a private daycare provider, when they ran into obstacles hiring a temporary worker to care for an ill parent.

"The sandwich generation have parents who are aging, and they have kids who are younger," he said. "They're managing each one. It's not the easiest time."

Apps such as BookJane are cropping up as an alternative to traditional hiring methods, such as online classified sites like Kijiji and Craigslist and traditional nanny agencies.

Elize Shirdel created the app DateNight in 2014 as a way to link parents with babysitters in their neighbourhoods.

"A lot of parents use the app for date nights, for after-school care, to run to IKEA to buy a sofa, or to look at houses," said Shirdel, a mother of two boys.

DateNight, which is currently in Toronto and Ottawa, has a directory of more than 400 pre-screened babysitters, many of whom are high school and university students.

Babysitters are booked for a minimum of two hours, and paid between $10 to $17 an hour, with the app taking a 10 per cent cut for administrative costs.
Photo: Twitter

The country's biggest civil service union says talks with the federal government aimed at reaching a collective agreement for some 90,000 public servants have gone nowhere.

Now, the Public Service Alliance of Canada is contemplating next steps that could result in job actions affecting everything from issuing passports to child tax benefits.

Negotiators returned to the bargaining table this week for the first time in nearly three months after the Treasury Board of Canada, which bargains on behalf of the government, signalled it was not prepared to back away from proposed changes to sick leave for federal employees.

PSAC national president Robyn Benson says the government refused to budge from an earlier wage increase offer of 0.5 per cent in each of three years.

And she says government negotiators didn't discuss sick leave at all, other than to float what she described as a vague reference to the issue at one of the bargaining tables.

Treasury Board negotiators have been holding firm on a proposal to replace the existing sick leave system with a new short-term disability plan, but PSAC has said the proposal would force workers to choose between a pay cheque and going to work sick.
" " Motorists travel across the Forth Bridge over the Firth of Forth River in Edinburgh, Scotland. See more car safety pictures. Jeff J Mitchell/ Getty Images

Fog is one of those driving hazards you kind of forget about until it sneaks up on you. It's like a weird relative that lives on the opposite side of the country that you completely forget about until a family reunion. But once fog arrives, you have to deal with it. After all, no one gets "fog days" from their boss allowing a stranded employee to stay home from work. So what do you? Well, you use your common sense and tackle that fog head on.

If you're one of those people who likes to talk about how well you can drive based on the area of the country your from, now's the time to start bragging. Things like, "You call this fog?" may be heard coming out of your mouth. But even if you're not accustomed to fog, you probably have a few ideas of how you should drive in it. But are they correct?

Advertisement

Common sense may tell you to do one thing in the fog. The only problem is some of that common sense may be more parts common and less parts sense. So take a look at our 5 completely wrong ways to drive in the fog and test your fog-driving knowledge. Or confirm that you are, indeed, the best fog driver this side of the Mississippi (whichever side you're on).
Photo: CTV

The federal government has stepped in at the last minute to temporarily stop the deportation of a Quebec man to Italy based on a 20-year-old conviction.

Michele Torre was at Montreal's Pierre Elliott Trudeau airport awaiting an early evening flight when word of a ministerial reprieve came down late today.

His daughter, Nellie Torre, says she received word from her local MP that a ministerial reprieve had been granted for three weeks to review the case.

Torre, 64 was convicted in 1996 in a cocaine importation conspiracy linked to the Mafia and served part of a nearly nine-year sentence.

He only found out about an expulsion order based largely on that conviction when attempting to secure Canadian citizenship a few years ago.

The married father of three has been a permanent resident since arriving in Canada in 1967.

Earlier Friday, a Federal Court judge rejected a request for a stay.

His family had been seeking a federal reprieve on humanitarian grounds.
Photo: The Canadian Press

Canada is challenging the world to step up and pledge money to fight AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Friday on the first day of an international donor conference in Montreal.

Delegates from around the world are in the city for two days hoping to raise $13 billion U.S. to replenish the Global Fund, which was set up to pool money to fight the three major infectious diseases.

Trudeau, who is hosting the event, said Canada has already promised more than $800 million for the 2017-19 funding period and he called on countries to "pledge with compassion, pledge with ambition."

"We must lead by example," he told delegates during his opening remarks. "And we must work together. Because when we do, we show the world what can be accomplished when we unite in common purpose."

The conference includes UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, rock star Bono and billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates.

David Morley, president and CEO of Unicef Canada said the Global Fund centralizes resources, cuts down on administrative costs and makes it easier for organizations such as his to transfer funds to governments in need of help.

Additionally, the Global Fund buys drugs in bulk, he said, which makes them cheaper and more accessible.

Morley said Canada should play a leadership role in asking wealthy countries to contribute more money to the cause.

"Canada can go to other rich countries like Sweden and Germany and say 'we're stepping up; you step up,' " he said.
Photo: The Canadian Press

A defence lawyer says the parents of a diabetic boy who died of starvation and lack of treatment are guilty of manslaughter for their "well-meaning but ineffective care."

Emil Radita, 59, and his wife, Rodica, 54, have pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder in 15-year-old Alexandru's death.

The Raditas didn't intend to kill their son, Andrea Serink said Friday in her rebuttal to the Crown's case.

"The culpability lies in that his care did not meet the appropriate legal standard. We're saying where they're culpable is that they didn't provide him with the level of care that he needed," said Serink, who represents Rodica Radita. "The Raditas are guilty of manslaughter, not murder."

Alexandru weighed just 37 pounds when he died in 2013.

"You have to have something more to say than you are beyond a reasonable doubt convinced that they really appreciated the significance of how dire his medical condition was," Serink told the judge hearing the case.

"I agree with you that these facts need to be viewed dispassionately but  manslaughter or murder  it's the death of a young boy, so the passion of the court is engaged at each level," said Justice Karen Horner.

Serink said there was insulin in the home, even though some of it may have expired, and there's no evidence the couple denied their son medical care.

She said the Crown has failed to prove that the Raditas planned Alexandru's death.

"There was no diary seized from the accused's home that explained their state of mind, or the plan, or other things that would assist in terms of the Crown theory. There's just a complete absence of evidence."

Crown prosecutor Susan Pepper said that any reasonable person would have known lack of treatment would have fatal consequences for Alexandru.

"Really the question is was there an intention to withhold care ... leading to certain consequences that they would expect to have occur? That's the intention," Pepper said in her final remarks Friday. "The motive as to why they did it ... that is a separate issue."
Photo: Jeopardy

On the popular American quiz show "Jeopardy," the answer might read: These people can compete once again.

The question: Who are Canadian contestants?

"Jeopardy" host Alex Trebek, who was born in Ontario, says in a news release that he's pleased Canadians will be allowed to apply for the show once again.

Privacy laws had prohibited Canucks from the online test site, but Trebek says he looks forward to seeing more of his fellow citizens on the show soon.

The issue came to light when Benn Millman of Port Moody, B.C., was on "Jeopardy" last season.

He noted at the time that he might be one of the final Canadians to participate unless the show changed its rules.

Registration for online contestant testing opened Monday for the show's 33rd season in syndication.

Note to readers: This is a corrected story. An earlier version misspelled Trebek's last name. This version also clarifies the wording around how this issue came to light.
" " October 1945: An obsolete Junkers JU 88 transport plane with a Focke-Wulf FW 190 fighter on top, at a display of British and German aircraft at the Royal Aircraft Establishment in Farnborough, England. Take a look at our animation of how the sleeve valve engine works. Fox Photos/ Getty Images

During World War II, engineers within the Nazi regime devised some of the best and most-advanced aerial weaponry of the era. One German fighter plane, the Focke-Wulf Fw 190, for a time outperformed anything the Allies could put in the air.

Fortunately for the Allies, engineering on their side eventually swung the air superiority pendulum to their advantage. A rugged, unconventional engine that many people today have probably never even heard of helped to neutralize the Fw 190 and the rest of the Luftwaffe. In its own way, an engine helped propel the Allies to victory [source: Rickard].

Advertisement

The sleeve-valve engine, which has been used on both automobiles and airplanes, powered speedy British fighters such as the Hawker Typhoon and Hawker Tempest. With their brute horsepower, they helped the Allies control the skies, provide air support for ground forces and eventually win the war.

But what exactly is a sleeve-valve engine, and what's with the funny name? And why don't we see or hear much about them today?

The engine gets its name from the thin-walled, metal sleeve that slides up and down within each cylinder during the combustion process. Typically, holes in the sleeve and in the cylinder containing it line up at predictable intervals to expel exhaust gases and suck in fresh air.

Despite its honorable armed services record, the complex sleeve valve setup lost out to what we use in internal combustion engines today, tappet valves. In airplanes, of course, piston-driven powerplants of all types largely gave way to jet engines.

But hold on -- don't dismiss the sleeve valve as a useless historical relic just yet.

At least one company is seeking to bring the venerable sleeve valve engine back into action, but with a few modern twists.

In the next few pages, we'll take a look at just what makes the sleeve-valve engine turn. We'll also examine why it fell out of favor, along with the reasons it's being called up now, more than a century after its invention, to serve in a different kind of "fight."
A report released Sept. 12 gave some Catholic leaders in the field of interfaith dialogue reason to redouble their efforts when it comes to building connections between the Catholic and Muslim communities.

Danger and Dialogue: American Catholic Public Opinion and Portrayals of Islam was released by the Bridge Initiative, a research project on Islamophobia in the public square based in Georgetown Universitys Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding.

Among its key findings were that one in five Catholics believe Islam and Catholicism have no similarities and that more than twice as many Catholics  30 percent  have an unfavorable impression of Muslims as the 14 percent that have a favorable view of Muslims.

The survey of U.S. Catholics also found that Catholics are less likely than the general population to say they know someone who is Muslim personally. Those who do have connections with Muslims, either through a personal relationship, joint community service project or interfaith dialogue are far more likely to have a positive view of Muslims.

In a way, that is good news to Father Thomas Baima, vicar for interreligious and ecumenical affairs for the Archdiocese of Chicago.

This is exactly my experience, Baima said. If you want to know about another religion, you need to talk to people from that religion. It is most important not to talk about people but to talk to people.

But Baima, who has been active in interreligious dialogue for over 35 years, did not expect the lack of understanding among Catholics about their own church teaching.

What surprised me most was how the general Catholic population has still not received the teaching of the Second Vatican Council even 50 years after the event, Baima said. It reinforces how critical it is for priests and deacons and catechists to present Vatican II at every opportunity.

Nostra Aetate, the Vatican II Declaration on Non-Christian Religions, speaks particularly of the high regard in which the church holds Muslims.

Baima said he was also surprised by the second section of the report on how consumption of Catholic media affected views of Muslims. The report showed that Catholics who consume Catholic media are somewhat more likely to have an unfavorable view of Muslims, perhaps because Catholic media outlets tend to focus on the persecution of Christians in the Middle East.

To those Catholic media outlets, I would say that every pope since John XXIII has called for respect for Muslims as a people and a respect for Islam as a religion, he said. Those same six popes have all affirmed that we all worship the same one God, the God of Abraham, and esteem the virtues taught by Middle Eastern monotheism.

Baima and Rita George-Tvrtkovic, an associate professor of theology at Benedictine University in Lisle and a former staff member at the Archdiocese of Chicagos Office for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, both said they would like to see more work breaking down the results by age, education and geographic area. Large urban dioceses, like Chicago, have larger Muslim populations and Catholics there might have more familiarity with Muslims, they said.

You simply cant duck interreligious dialogue in Chicago, Baima said. Its living on your street and going to school with your kids. Its in the water, as it were.

But George-Tvrtkovic cautioned that living near Muslims wont automatically solve questions of perception.

Its not enough to know a Muslim if you dont engage them in conversation, she said.

Still, she said she sees that happening in parishes all the time. While her academic specialty is medieval Muslim-Christian relations, she is a frequent speaker at parishes and schools on modern interfaith dialogue, and she was scheduled to give a presentation on Muslim-Christian dialogue to the youth group at St. Clement Parish on Sept. 11.

Ive given thousands of talks, and I always bring copies of Nostra Aetate, she said. They go like hotcakes.

Baima said the thing that gave him hope was the reach of diocesan newspapers, which are seen by more Catholics than any other form of Catholic media mentioned.

It shows the importance of diocesan teaching in terms of educating the Catholic population, Baima said.

Baima also pointed to items that showed Catholics are not as ignorant as a first glance at the report might make them appear. A majority of Catholics were able to identify prayer and fasting as important components of Muslim spiritual life.

The other encouraging sign he saw was the Francis effect, in which people who got their news from media which most frequently mentioned Pope Francis were more likely to have a positive view of Islam and Muslims.

I think the pope would be gratified to know that, Baima said.

Baima was in Rome in 2015 for an interfaith meeting of Catholic and Buddhists.

Pope Francis said quite directly at that meeting that the path forward is a path of fraternity and service, Baima said, which mirrors the findings of the survey that those who share fellowship and service with Muslims tend to have better views of them. This is the way we bring the Francis effect down to the grass roots.
Pakistan: Dewan Cement denies Anhui Conch interest

16 September 2016

China's Anhui Cement Co Ltd is reported by Pakistan's local media to have set its eyes on Dewan Cement Ltd (DCL) as it seeks business opportunities in Pakistan. While DCL shares have been trading heavily as a result in the past few months, DCL has denied rumours of a takeover.

DCL Director, Haroon Iqbal, and Company Secretary, Muhammad Hanif German, said in response to a Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSE) query whether any Chinese company is buying a substantial stake in the company, "Chinese companies have been exploring invest opportunities in various sectors of Pakistans economy. In our case also, some Chinese investors informally touched base with us, but neither any proposal was floated for our consideration, nor were there any expressions of interest."



DCL has a cement and clinker capacity of 2.89Mta and 2.76Mta, respectively with a market share of six per cent. The company operates two production facilities  one in southern Pakistan, near Karachi at Deh Dhando, Dhabeji, Sindh and the other in northern Pakistan, near Kamilpur Hattar Industrial Estate, district Hattar Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.



Financial standing in 9MFY16 and 3QFY16

DCL's 9M performance ending March 2016 showed an upward trend in the top and bottom lines. Net sales grew by 11 per cent in YoY growth between 9MFY16 and 9MFY15, while after tax profit grew by 19 per cent. However, higher operational costs led to a fall in gross margins from 15 per cent in 9MFY15 to 13 per cent in 9MFY16. Quarterly margins were equally disappointing: 14 per cent in 3QFY16 against 16 per cent in 3QFY15.



DCL is in the process of commissioning a 6MW waste heat recovery plant for its Karachi plant and may also be working on adding captive power generation plant and alternate fuel energies, although no formal announcements have been made as to the timeline of these plants.

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(TNS)  CHEYENNE, Wyo.  Digital education is officially a priority in Wyoming.The state Department of Education on Tuesday announced that it is launching a statewide Future Ready Initiative, through Future Ready Schools, a project of the Alliance for Excellent Education in Washington, D.C.Laurel Ballard, the department's student and teacher resources team supervisor, said, "One of the major commitments that we make is that we will put together a strategic plan around digital learning. By joining this, what it's going to allow us to do is provide us access to resources and professional development at the state level, as well as at the district level."She said those resources will help teachers develop online courses, help school districts integrate technology into classrooms, and help teachers use the technology to personalize students' educational experiences."It's going to assist with meeting those educational needs. Everybody has something that may be a little bit different that they need," Ballard said.The program is set up around seven key areas:* Curriculum, instruction and assessment* Use of space and time* Robust infrastructure* Data and privacy* Community partnerships* Personalized professional learning* Budget and resourcesBallard said these areas will be used as a framework for the digital learning strategic plan that the state will use for the next five years.Kari Eakins, communications director for the Department of Education, said nine of the state's 48 school districts have signed on to the initiative. She noted that it isn't mandatory.Those nine districts are in Big Horn, Fremont, Sublette, Teton, Uinta and Weston counties.Teachers and administrators in those districts will have access to the Future Ready Schools Hub, which is where they can access all the additional training and resources, Ballard said."The districts that have taken the pledge, a lot of them use a lot of personalized instruction or blended learning, where they use resources online. You have a wide variety of skills in a classroom. Districts are starting to move so they can really be able to simultaneously be able to meet the needs of high-end achievers, as well as students that may be struggling," she said.Those districts also use technology to better engage students, she said. "Instead of reading about World War II, there are resources out there that really let them play with what it was like."Eakins said even rural districts will not have problems incorporating more technology into classrooms because of Gov. Matt Mead's Unified Network that provided high-speed internet to every district across the state.She added that they've already seen technology used well in both small and large school districts across the state."Access to technology has become less of an issue in Wyoming. How to utilize it well is the bigger issue," Eakins said.The Wyoming Department of Education also is working on a plan to expand distance learning across the state. That plan is based in virtual education. Ballard said she expects that plan to be released in October."The benefits received from (digital learning) are important, and we need to spend some time and effort focusing on it," she said.
Frightened domestic violence victim or cold-blooded murderer?

Thats what the jury will have to decide in the murder trial that began this week for Susan Joy Jacobson, who gave birth just days after the Coconino County Sheriffs Office arrested her for shooting her common-law husband to death in their Doney Park home.

Jacobson, 44, is charged with one count of first-degree murder domestic violence and one count of tampering with physical evidence in the death of Marvin Neal James, 54, on Feb. 25, 2015. The couple lived together in a house off Blue Ridge Drive, had a 3-year-old son in common and their second child was due to be born the next week.

The defendant, Susan Jacobson, murdered Marvin James because she felt that he did not deserve to be the father of their children, said prosecutor Ammon Barker during opening statements in Coconino County Superior Court Thursday.

Defense attorney Bruce Griffen disagreed. During opening statements, he painted Jacobson as a domestic violence victim who killed James to protect herself and her unborn child.

The reality here is that Marvin James is not the victim, Griffen said. The reality here is that Susan Jacobson is the victim.

Both sides agree James died in his bed from a single gunshot wound to the head from his .22 caliber revolver late on the night of Feb. 25, 2016. Jacobson admitted she pulled the trigger. Afterward, she wrapped the body in garbage bags, a blanket and a tarp and attempted to clean up the blood. She later threw away the soiled bedding and buried the gun.

The Sheriffs Office learned about James death after Jacobson turned herself in at the Law Enforcement Administration Facility in Flagstaff Feb. 27, 2015, which was more than 24 hours after the mans death.

When deputies responded to the home, they saw James body through the bedroom window. The body had been moved from the bed onto a series of adjacent items of furniture that formed a ramp to the window. It was still wrapped in garbage bags, a blanket and a tarp.

She tried to move the body outside the window to dispose of it but she couldnt so she left the body there for days while she thought up her next move, Barker said.

The Coconino County Medical Examiner is expected to testify that part of the innermost bag around James head was found stuck inside his mouth, indicating that he was still gasping for his final breaths for an unknown amount of time.

Jacobson also directed deputies to the buried gun. In her interviews with the Sheriffs Office, she insisted she had shot James in self-defense after he threatened her and kicked her in the stomach.

Disagreements over how to raise their son had been a source of conflict from the beginning, Barker said. He described Jacobson as a hovering, protective and even possessive mother. Barker said Jacobson would not leave the relationship because she did not want to share custody of their son.

He said Jacobson was so obsessed with having full custody of her children that she decided to shoot James while he was sleeping.

She knew that there was no way she was going to get full custody of those kids, Barker said, at least, not as long as Marvin was alive.

Griffen told the jury their troubles did start after their son was born in 2011, but not because Jacobson was a hovering mom.

Griffen said there would be evidence showing James subjected Jacobson to worsening verbal, physical, mental, emotional and sexual abuse. He also said he would present evidence that she tried to get help from law enforcement, counselors and social service agencies, but she could never leave.

A lot of this case is about why you cant leave sometimes even though you should have, Griffen said. The great Catch-22, perhaps, of domestic violence is that you know you need to leave, but if you leave, youll make it worse.

In this case, he said, James threatened to take their 3-year-old son to Mexico if Jacobson crossed him. According to Griffen, on Feb. 25, 2015, James was furious that Jacobson had borrowed her stepfathers truck. He said James woke Jacobson in the middle of the night raging about the truck.

Jacobson told investigators James kicked her abdomen, though the blow was cushioned by a pillow she had in front of her stomach. Griffen said James threatened to kill her.

She makes a split-second decision, Griffen said. Her words were, It was a race for the gun (in the dresser).

She rushed back to the bed and took one shot in the dark.

Griffen said Jacobsons attempts to clean the crime scene were to keep her son from seeing his fathers body, not proof that she was trying to hide James death from law enforcement or that she shot him with murderous intent.

He drove home the point by calling Jacobson to the stand in front of the jury. He described the petite and quiet woman as hard-working but timid, passive and non-violent.

I present to you the person least likely to hurt anyone, Griffen said. He later added, unless she is faced with death and faced with the death of her unborn child.

Testimony will resume this morning. The trial is expected to take up to four weeks.
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WASHINGTON -- The chairman of the Hualapai Tribe told a Senate committee Wednesday that a proposed 70-mile, $173 million water project would lay the groundwork for expansion of Grand Canyon West and increased tourism in the state.

Damon Clarke told the Senate Indian Affairs Committee that the Hualapai Tribe Water Rights Settlement Act of 2016 will also preserve the tribes dwindling source of groundwater by allocating 4,000 acre-feet of Colorado River water per year to the tribe.

The nearest groundwater to Grand Canyon West is 35 miles away, and that supply is barely adequate for current operations, and completely inadequate for growth, Clarke said. With additional water, the tribe could take advantage of the potential for further development that would provide additional jobs for tribal members and non-Indians, as well as revenues for our tribal government.

But the Interior Department expressed significant concerns at Wednesdays hearing about the cost of the project and the relatively small amount of water to be delivered under the project. In prepared testimony for the hearing, acting Assistant Secretary Larry Roberts said the true cost of the project could be even higher than anticipated.

We believe the cost to construct a 70-mile pipeline from the Colorado River  will be significantly higher than the amount authorized, Roberts statement said.

The department also raised concerns that language in the bill could generate substantial litigation.

Roberts statement said the department supports efforts to settle water-rights claims and looks to reach a fair and final settlement  that we can fully support.

But Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Arizona, said the legislation provides significant but fair benefits to the tribe, while ensuring that communities outside the region are not shortchanged on their water needs.

It (the Colorado River) provides roughly 40 percent of our water supply, Flake said. And because of the priority the tribes claim, theres a possibility that future development and other water rights could displace current water users in Arizona.

Flake, who introduced the bill last week with fellow Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain, said the agreement would also bring essential tourism revenue to the state by boosting business at the tribe-owned Grand Canyon West, which he said currently has about 1 million visitors a year.

Without access to additional, reliable water supplies, we are unable to realize its full potential, which includes a residential community of Grand Canyon West for the tribal members who work there, Flake said.

Under the 92-page bill, the Hualapai would get 4,000 acre-feet of water per year for use at Grand Canyon West and the tribes main residential community in Peach Springs. It would allocate $134.5 million in federal funds to build the project and put $39 million in trust  $32 million in a tribal trust and $7 million to Interior  for maintenance and technical assistance from the department.

Peach Springs, home to most of the tribes members, is a two-hour, dirt-road drive from the Grand Canyon West, a tribally maintained section of the canyon that is best known for the Grand Canyon Skywalk, a glass-bottomed walkway extending from the canyon rim to a point 4,000 feet above the river below.
Chino, CA (91710)

Today

Some clouds this morning will give way to generally sunny skies for the afternoon. High around 85F. ENE winds shifting to W at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Clear to partly cloudy. Low 54F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph.
Its hard not to notice the Babbitts and their extended family in Flagstaff  from the five founding brothers have come an estimated 500 relatives, many of whom remain here.

But it was somewhat surprising to see Babbitt Ranches pop up in the same story about a rare, tiny cactus that now grows only in Coconino and Mohave counties.

The Fickeisen plains cactus, about as big as a thumbnail, was recently listed as federally endangered, causing more than 17,000 acres in the two counties to be designated as critical habitat.

Heat, drought, rodents and grazing cattle were named as the culprits, with special protections put into place.

Everywhere, that is, except Babbitt Ranches northeast of Flagstaff. There, all 20,000 acres either owned or managed by the Babbitts were exempt  the Fickeisen cactus, it seems, is thriving.

As reported last week, the good health of the Fickeisen is related to the health of the grasslands on the ranch. The Babbitts employ rotational grazing that prevents overuse of any single allotment while promoting plant diversity and soil aeration.

But the Babbitts went further when they learned the Fickeisen was endangered. They relied on surveys of the cactus dating back to 2006 by a retired U.S. Forest Service biologist to devise a special protection and management plan for the Fickeisen. Where the cacti were spotted, the cattle were moved away in the summer, when the plant is in its flowering mode.

Billy Cordasco, a great-grandson of C.J. Babbitt and president of Babbitt Ranches, told the Daily Sun that managing for a sustainable cactus population is just part of the ranching companys commitment to healthy ecosystems, wildlife habitats and biological diversity. In all, there are more than 350 different species of plants and animals on the ranch, hardly the biological desert that many critics say ranching causes.

Such ranching practices will become even more important in the face of climate change that, in the desert Southwest, is likely to produce hotter, drier conditions. Federal agencies that allocate grazing permits could do worse than roll some of the Babbitts best practices into new lease agreements  they will make range-fed beef more palatable to those conservationists committed to healthier grasslands in the Southwest.

And speaking of the Babbitts and Billy Cordasco, that was his late wife, Fon, who was so fondly remembered by Flagstaff runners at this years Imogene Pass Run in Colorado. Fon, who died earlier this year of cancer, served as an unofficial organizer, cheerleader and den mother to the hundreds of local runners who enter the race each year -- the largest single delegation from any city. She had run the race for 20 years, each year convincing more or her local running friends to join her on the trek north. Its a part of the Babbitt legacy in Flagstaff that just keeps growing, too.
PHOENIX -- The state's jobless rate is finally ticking down again after four straight months of gains.

New figures Thursday show a seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for August of 5.8 percent. That's down two-tenths of a point from July, a figure that matched the August 2015 rate.

But it's not because the economy is necessarily growing.

In fact, the private sector lost 1,500 jobs between July and August. That compares with the typical month-over-month gain for this time of year of 16,100.

Government did add 31,100 jobs. But virtually all of those are in public education, representing staffers in universities, community colleges and public schools who were in jobs like cafeteria workers and janitors where they are technically unemployed for the summer even though they expected to be hired back when the new school year began last month.

The unemployment picture is even more complex than that.

Arizona's jobless rate is based on a household survey. Respondents are asked if they are working and, if not, are they looking for work.

Doug Walls, research administrator for the Arizona Office of Economic Opportunity, said last month's survey showed that fewer people were looking. So they're not part of the labor force and they don't count as "unemployed,'' allowing the jobless rate to drop.

Walls said it's "nothing to be concerned about,'' saying the labor force size can fluctuate from month to month.

But the August figure is still fourth-tenths of a point higher than where it was in April.

The state's manufacturing sector showed continued weakness, with year-over-year employment now down by 400. The big loser in this category included firms that make computers and electronic parts.

Walls said at least part of this comes down to automation: Companies are able to produce as much with fewer people.

He said this isn't just an Arizona phenomenon, with the United States losing 14,000 manufacturing jobs last month.

Overall, the survey of employers -- separate from the household report -- showed year-over-year job growth of 2.7 percent. While far from the state's historic trends, Walls described that as "steady and moderate growth.''

He also said it is in line with predictions his agency made late last year that the number of people working in Arizona in the first half of 2016 would increase by 2.84 percent.
A recent Quinnipiac University poll asked likely voters the following question: Do you think that Gary Johnson, the Libertarian candidate for president, should be included in the presidential debates this year, or not? In response, 62 percent answered yes.

Given how unhappy voters are with the two major party candidates, that should come as no surprise. Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are easily the two most unpopular presidential nominees the broken two-party system has ever put forward, and voters are increasingly frustrated and anxious to find a viable alternative.

For many, former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson is that alternative. Of course, Im biased  Im his campaign manager. But consider that Johnsons poll numbers are in the double digits in 42 states. The more voters hear from Johnson, the more they seem to like him. Thats why, as the Quinnipiac poll shows, nearly two-thirds of them want to see him share the stage with Trump and Clinton.

Youd think the Commission on Presidential Debates would pay attention. Instead, the commission has decided that no candidate can participate in the debates unless he or she crosses a 15 percent average polling threshold. Thats highly problematic.

For starters, the commission draws that average from five national polls conducted by traditional media that often restrict themselves to head-to-head match-ups between Trump and Clinton. How is Johnson supposed to break through the 15 percent barrier when his name isnt an option?

Its also worth asking whether these polls are entirely reliable, given that the polling industry is struggling to accommodate new communications technology. In years past, almost all polling was conducted by calling landlines, which have gone the way of the dinosaur. Pollsters are scrambling to incorporate cellphones into the mix, but even that approach ignores the fact that young people spend less time on the phone than they do online. Polls conducted online show more support for Johnson than polls conducted over the phone.

Incidentally, Johnson does particularly well among millennial voters, who are both more likely to be independent of a political party and less likely to own a landline.

Despite all these obstacles, Johnsons support continues to grow. He has broken through the 15 percent ceiling in 15 states. In four states, hes within 4 percentage points to 6 percentage points of second place.

Besides, thanks to the electoral college, our national election is really a series of 50 state contests. A national poll is therefore essentially worthless when it comes to predicting the winner in November. The next president has to get to the magic number of 270 electoral votes, and Johnson is the only candidate, other than Trump and Clinton, who will be on the ballot in all 50 states. That fact alone ought to persuade the debate commission to include Johnson.

There is also precedent to consider. In 1992, H. Ross Perot polled well through early summer when matched up against then-President George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. After he temporarily dropped out of the race, his numbers plummeted, and by the time he got back in he was only at 7 percent to 9 percent in national polls. (Thats lower than Johnson by most accounts.) Nevertheless, he was invited to participate in the debates, and he went on to win 18.9 percent of the popular vote. If voters had not been given the opportunity to see him go head-to-head with the standard-bearers of the obsolete two-party system, he would never have gone so far.

Shouldnt Johnson get the same chance?

Americans want to make an informed choice, and the debates are the best opportunity they have to learn about those seeking the White House. Voters believe that more information is always better than less  and so do political leaders. Former presidential candidate Mitt Romney, former Govs. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California and Mitch Daniels of Indiana and newspapers including the Chicago Tribune, the Boston Herald and the Richmond Times-Dispatch have all called on the debate commission to let Johnson and his running mate, Bill Weld, into the debates.

The commission, a private tax-exempt organization, has the opportunity to do the right thing. If its going to use polls to decide whos in and whos out, perhaps it should give some weight to the 62 percent of Americans who want Johnson on that stage.



ABOUT THE WRITER

Ron Nielson is national manager of the Johnson-Weld campaign. He wrote this for the Los Angeles Times.
To the editor

Hillary Clinton is not only healthy but she is also trustworthy. She developed pneumonia last week when her cough did not improve on its own over a five-day period. She saw a doctor and was diagnosed with s CT scan on September 9, 2016. She worsened on September 11, 2016, when she attended a memorial ceremony. We then learned soon thereafter she had pneumonia.

Sorry Ms. Carlson ("Clinton can fix health but not voter trust," Guest column, 9/14/16), you are wrong condemning her for not letting you know immediately. It was not a coverup but an acute illness from which she will recover.

The trust deficit Carlson describes is with her own reporting. She lacks the medical knowledge or the integrity to understand the diagnosis. A moderate case of pneumonia can be treated with antibiotics by mouth. Rest can facilitate the recovery but Secretary of State Clinton is running for the presidency of our country. She is determined to win as the alternative is unthinkable.

I trust Hillary Clinton to be the President. I trust her to continue our economic improvement. I trust her to increase the number of people in our country with medical insurance. I trust her to be Commander in Chief. I trust her with my vote.

I don't trust Margaret Carlson from the Bloomberg Review and her biased guest column.

GREGORY JARRIN, MD

Winslow
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When the New Horizons spacecraft approached Pluto in July 2015, many astronomers largely expected that a peek at Pluto's largest moon Charon would be uneventful. Unexpectedly, scientists found that Charon possessed a giant red cap on its north pole unlike anything else seen in the solar system to date. Now, researchers may have discovered how Charon got this dark spot: fumes from Pluto painted the moon's surface.

Charon is by far the biggest of Pluto's five known moons. At roughly 1,200 kilometers wide, Charon is nearly half the diameter of Pluto, making it the largest moon in the solar system compared to its host.

NASA's New Horizons discovered that Charon had a huge dark red cap on its north pole. If Charon were Earth, the red cap would probably cover a large portion of the northern hemisphere, extending south from the North Pole to at least 50 degrees north latitude, or roughly as far as the U.S.-Canada border or the English Channel. Hints of the cap could appear about as far south as Mexico City or the Red Sea, said study lead author Will Grundy, a planetary scientist at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona.

"This is the only case known so far in the solar system where we've found a satellite or an atmosphere-less body with polar colorations on it of the strong nature that we see on Charon," said research astronomer Larry Trafton at the University of Texas at Austin who did not take part in this study. "It was pretty much a surprise -- we expected Charon to be a blander object than it turned out to be."

Similar colors on Pluto's surface are probably due to organic molecules known as tholins, named after the ancient Greek word for sepia ink. These compounds arise from chemical reactions between methane and nitrogen. "They are chemically the same stuff as the smog that used to fill Los Angeles basin -- they have an orange tint to them," Grundy said.

Scientists previously speculated that methane and nitrogen escaping from Pluto's atmosphere got trapped by Charon's weak gravity, frozen at its cold poles, and slowly converted to tholins over time. However, until now, there were no rigorous models supporting this scenario.

To solve the mystery, Grundy and his colleagues first modeled how much gas might escape Pluto. Methane and nitrogen currently escape from Pluto at rates of 1.3 kilograms and 4 grams per second, respectively, as estimated from New Horizons data. Methane is the lighter molecule, so it is the main one escaping.

New Horizons scientists estimated that Charon intercepts about 2.5 percent of these molecules. The scientists developed models of Charon's surface temperatures that suggest Charon's winter pole -- the pole facing away from the sun -- would get cold enough for nitrogen ice to grow there at a rate of about 0.2 microns per decade, and for a layer of methane ice roughly 0.3 microns thick to accumulate at each pole of Charon during winter. (Pluto's year is 248 Earth years long, and its winter lasts more than a century.)

The researchers' calculations suggested that solar ultraviolet light striking Charon would convert material from Pluto into tholins. When Charon's winter poles reemerge into the sunlight, the nitrogen and methane ice would rapidly disappear, but the heavier, less volatile tholins would remain behind, with about 30 centimeters accumulating at Charon's poles over a billion Earth years.

"The calculations in the paper are simple back-of-the-envelope ones," Grundy said. "For every one of them, the numbers seem to add up. That doesn't prove anything, but this idea has seemed to survive the tests we've thrown at it so far."

The model suggests that Charon's south pole should also possess a red cap. Although Charon's south pole is currently in winter night, images of that moon's southern hemisphere lit by "Pluto-shine" -- that is, the scant amount of sunlight reflecting off Pluto -- that Grundy and his colleagues analyzed reveal that there is evidence of darkening toward the south pole, suggesting a red cap there as well. "I think it's interesting that each new place we look we find new phenomena," Grundy said.

Planetary scientist Bob Johnson at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, who did not take part in this research, said these findings join increasing discoveries of the transfer of materials between bodies in the solar system, such as between Jupiter's moons Io and Europa, and from Saturn's moon Enceladus to other Saturnian moons.

"It will also be interesting to see if similar features show up in other outer solar system bodies, like on Eris's satellite Dysnomia, or the recently discovered satellite of Makemake," Grundy said.

Future research should develop more detailed models of Pluto and Charon to rigorously test this scenario further and "make more detailed predictions about how the red stuff ought to be distributed," Grundy said.

The scientists detailed their findings online Sept. 14 in the journal Nature.
High-performance epoxy resin adhesives from renewable green starting materials A series of epoxy resins has been synthesised by a team of chemists from Germany, who used renewable starting materials for a more environmentally friendly approach than conventional methods. The resulting epoxy resins have highly desirable mechanical properties, such as high stiffness, tha ... more

Electrospun polymer fibres better than non-woven polymer fibres at mopping up oil from oil spills Electrospun polystyrene shell/polyurethane core fibres made by scientists in China have absorption capacities 2-3 times higher than reported for non-woven polypropylene fibres (widely used to clean up oil spills). Electrospun fibres are an ideal candidate for soaking up oil, as their struct ... more
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It took $66 billion  the largest all-cash transaction in history  for German biotech giant Bayer to win control over Monsanto, the global seed market leader. The takeover creates a very unique  and to some, very unsettling  kind of corporate beast, one tasked with feeding billions as temperatures rise and farmlands shrink.

If the merger goes through  and that's a very big if, given that both EU and American regulators are likely to carefully scrutinize the deal  the new firm would corner more than a quarter of the world market for seeds and pesticides. In the United States, it would control some 58 percent of cottonseed sales. According to Vox, the new company would be the largest agribusiness in the world, selling 29 percent of the world's seeds and 24 percent of its pesticides.

That puts one firm in a pole position to influence, and potentially control, how the world feeds itself. Regulators are likely to investigate whether the merged company will be too big and able to squeeze farmers and shoppers at the price register. And it comes as the rest of the agribusiness industry is also consolidating, in part to counteract slumping commodity prices due to the economic slowdown in China, which trickles down and forces farmers to spend less on supplies.

The specter of greater market power for firms that make the seeds that many poor farmers need to buy each spring before planting is sparking panic in the developing world.

"It will lead to concentration of power and will result in market distraction. This is the third such merger of seed majors in recent times. This will leave only three players in the global market and will have a cascading impact on Indian agriculture," N. Prabhakara Rao, President of the National Seed Association of India, told the Hindu newspaper.

But the merger could be the future of the industry. Low food prices have left smaller firms unable to innovate, forcing more consolidation of resources.

Monsanto isn't immune to these pressures. The company for years relied on profits from the weed-killer known as Roundup, which went hand-in-hand with crops resistant to the product, called Roundup Ready crops. But weeds in the United States are developing a resistance and the company, based in Missouri, is scrambling to find a better product. Monsanto even tried to buy rival Syngenta but the latter's CEO Michael Mack said the $45 billion bid fell "woefully short."

And the Bayer-Monsanto marriage is just the latest in a string of combinations in the industry. Dow Chemical and Dupont agreed to combine their crop science divisions last year; the deal still hasn't been approved by regulators. U.S. regulators signed off on a deal for China National Chemical Corporation to buy Swiss seed company Syngenta for $43 billion. Just last week, Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan and Agrium merged in Canada.

These mergers are fueled by the need for increased research and development budgets. Agribusinesses are trying to develop crops that are resistant to climate change as temperatures around the world grow hotter and rainfall grows more erratic. They're also going to have to feed a lot more people; by 2050, projections show there will be 9 billion people living on the earth. This means there is going to be less area to farm.

To others, these kinds of merger are just excuses to corner the market.

"The attempted takeover of Monsanto by Bayer is a threat to all Americans. These mergers boost the profits of huge corporations and leave Americans paying even higher prices," Sen. Bernie Sanders said in a statement. "Not only should this merger be blocked, but the Department of Justice should reopen its investigation of Monsanto's monopoly over the seed and chemical market."

Whether the Bayer-Monsanto deal will succeed remains to be seen. It could be especially difficult in Europe, where the use of genetically modified seeds  Monsanto's bread and butter  is widely frowned upon.

"We expect significant antitrust and political hurdles and assign 50 percent probability of deal completion," Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. analysts Jeremy Redenius said in a research note.
Geneva Mayor Kevin Burns speaks outside of a former Dominick's grocery store that is now is for lease Monday, Sept. 12, 2016, in Geneva, Ill. Burns said he would like to see the space filled, but that Albertson's, Jewel-Osco's parent company, doesn't want to lease the space to another grocery store. (Erin Hooley/Chicago Tribune) (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune/Chicago Tribune)

For going on three years, the former grocery store in downtown Schaumburg has been shuttered.

The Dominick's name is barely visible now, the windows are coated with a fine layer of grime and a chunk of the facade appears to be missing, exposing wooden beams.

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Last July, Tony's Finer Foods bought the shopping center with plans to open a store in the vacant Dominick's. But before the deal closed, Jewel-Osco's parent company, Albertsons, extended its lease on the store for another five years, through May 2021.

Now Tony's is Albertsons landlord, and neither has immediate plans to open a grocery store there.

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Expand Autoplay Image 1 of 5 A sign advertises that a building which used to house a Dominick's grocery store is for lease on Sept. 12, 2016, in Glen Ellyn. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)

"It upset a lot of our residents, as well as business owners. It was extremely frustrating," said Matt Frank, Schaumburg's economic development manager, of the plot twist.

When Dominick's went out of business in December 2013, it added 72 empty stores to the Chicago area's retail landscape. The most desirable ones were snatched up by chains like Jewel-Osco, Mariano's and Whole Foods Market. Last year, Albertsons acquired Safeway, Dominick's parent company, giving it control of most remaining Dominick's leases and property in the area.

At least 18 suburbs are still trying to turn the lights back on in the darkened stores. As time drags on, the prolonged vacancies create pockets of blight in once-thriving retail areas, hurting town coffers, hindering other businesses and inconveniencing residents. Some officials blame Albertsons, saying the company is paying rent on dark buildings to block out Jewel-Osco competitors.

Mike Withers, Jewel-Osco president, adamantly denies the company is keeping the stores vacant to thwart competition.

"Absolutely not," Withers said. "Our goal is to get someone in these boxes. We don't want dark stores. ... It's extremely important to us that we keep communities vibrant."

While Albertsons' corporate real estate team makes decisions on the vacant stores, Withers has input, and in some cases he has tried to quell the rising angst in some suburbs, say some suburban officials.

A sign advertises that a building which used to house a Dominick's grocery store is for lease on Sept. 12, 2016, in Glen Ellyn. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)

Withers declined to discuss dealings with specific stores in detail but said the lease extension in Schaumburg was a show of interest. "Yes, we had interest in doing something there and continue to like that real estate. From my perspective, it does have value," Withers said.

But current economic pressures in the grocery industry, particularly in Chicago's hypercompetitive market, make it difficult to open more locations in the vacant stores at this point, Withers added. So for now, Albertsons is listing the 66,000-square-foot Schaumburg store for sublease.

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Schaumburg officials still would like to see a grocery store in the Town Square Shopping Center, which sits between a park and the bustling Schaumburg Township District Library.

"The challenge is trying to get the two parties together to find the right user for the space," Frank said.

State Farm, which makes real estate investments in addition to selling insurance, sold the shopping center to Tony's but wasn't aware Albertsons exercised the option to extend the lease until after the deal closed, said Missy Dundov, a State Farm spokeswoman.

A Tony's Finer Foods representative did not return requests for comment.

Expand Autoplay Image 1 of 12 A box of chocolate mousse is all that remains on an endcap. (Scott Strazzante, Chicago Tribune)

A similar situation is unfolding in west suburban Geneva, where Albertsons recently extended its lease for another five years on an empty former Dominick's in the busy Randall Road corridor, said Geneva Mayor Kevin Burns.

"Despite our best efforts at negotiating a mutually beneficial deal, Albertsons continues to pay in excess of $1 million a year to keep the store dark," Burns said.

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Burns wants to see the space filled by a grocery retailer, both to meet the need for that part of town and to generate sales tax revenue. But while there's been "strong" interest from other chains in the 72,000-square-foot store, Albertsons' lease includes language that prohibits potential competitors from coming into the space, Burns said.

"Despite our frustrations and deep disappointment, we don't hold the cards in that location. Albertsons holds all the aces and all the kings," he said.

Mary Frances Trucco, Jewel-Osco spokeswoman, wouldn't say whether the company's lease in Geneva prevented other grocery stores from operating there. Geneva was also not included on a list of 18 vacant former Dominick's stores leased by Albertsons that Jewel-Osco provided to the Tribune. Trucco wouldn't say why not.

"The Albertsons corporate real estate team is working with the landlord in Geneva," Trucco said in an emailed statement.

Albertsons has been "extending dark store leases" to keep out competition, a tactic that's "objectionable, but not unusual" in the Chicago area's extremely competitive grocery industry, said Andrew Witherell, a commercial real estate broker who consulted with Mariano's on its expansion into 11 former Dominick's stores.

"It's clear that some retailers have been turned away as a result of (Albertsons) exercising its options," Witherell said.

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One point that both Witherell and Jewel-Osco's Withers agree upon: The best former Dominick's locations already have been taken. "The stores remaining are at lesser value. We went after the best of them," Withers said.

As examples, Jewel-Osco recently opened a store in an empty former Dominick's in Bensenville and expects to open its second Mundelein store in November.

Withers said Albertsons is willing to sublease to other grocery chains but emphasized that retailers have to be "creditworthy."

Some arrangements haven't worked out. In Northbrook, Arlington Heights and Elk Grove Village, Albertsons subleased the vacant stores to Joe Caputo & Sons, a family-owned grocer, after it acquired those leases in the Safeway acquisition. Caputo & Sons closed those stores after falling deep into debt to a produce wholesaler, so they're once again empty.

Elk Grove Village Mayor Craig Johnson had grown frustrated after hearing from a "half dozen" grocery retailers in the spring who said they were interested in the empty space but were being ignored by Albertsons.

More recently, Johnson said he's talked with Withers and is more optimistic about the dialogue moving forward.

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"To his credit, (Withers) wants to work with Elk Grove Village, the owner of the property and any potential grocery store retailers," Johnson said.

The mayor added: "We just don't want to be held hostage."

Buffalo Grove officials don't want that either. In May, the village board voted to amend the zoning code to prohibit so-called negative use restrictions on property that allow retailers to prevent competitors from moving into empty stores. Chris Stilling, community development director, said it was a "proactive" measure not directly aimed at Albertsons.

Last month, Buffalo Grove officials also considered issuing citations to Albertsons, which allowed the condition of its vacant Dominick's store on Lake Cook Road to deteriorate, Stilling said. But in recent weeks, Albertsons has made improvements at the site, such as restriping the parking lot and landscaping, he said.

"I think it will come down to the bottom line and I believe (Albertsons) will eventually want to recoup some of these costs," Stilling said.

Other towns have banded together to attract retailers. Last year, nine western suburbs launched a joint effort, "One Call/10 Stores," to try to fill some 700,000 square feet of former Dominick's space. Most of those stores, however, remain empty.

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"It's had a huge impact," said Tony Fradin, economic development coordinator for Bartlett, of the village's empty store. "It's limited choice for our residents."

But Fradin also acknowledged there hasn't been much interest from grocery retailers in taking the space. Village officials are open to considering other nonretail uses for the space, he said.

This much appears certain: Some of the 72 former Dominick's stores will never be grocery stores again. A few have already been repurposed as furniture or thrift stores.

Are the remaining former Dominick's stores more of an opportunity or a burden for Albertsons?

"I would say there is the possibility of future opportunity and many of the closed stores are certainly burdens," Withers said.

gtrotter@chicagotribune.com

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Twitter @GregTrotterTrib
The intimate drama "Max Rose" feels like little more than a modest television movie. But it's a respectable way for comedian Jerry Lewis, now 90 years old, to make what may be his valedictory performance.

Max (Lewis) is a one-time jazz pianist mourning the death of Eva (Claire Bloom, seen in flashback), his wife of 65 years. He has a strained relationship with his son, Chris (Kevin Pollak), but is doted on by his granddaughter, Annie (Kerry Bishe). After going through his wife's belongings, the widower is stunned to find a makeup compact inscribed to Eva from Ben, dated in 1959  when she was presumably happily married.

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Lewis's last major role was in the 1995 comedy "Funny Bones," but despite nods to his famous musical lip-sync routine in "The Errand Boy" and attempts by Annie to perform slapstick, "Max Rose" is a somber drama about aging and fidelity. The actor is in fine dramatic form, his once rubber-faced mugging replaced by an aged melancholy. When Max's son places him in a nursing home, Max's loneliness and frustration seem perfectly real. "You're not indestructible. And it's a disappointment," one of his friends at the nursing home says, neatly summing up the film's sentiment.

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Writer-director Daniel Noah is primarily known as a producer of such art house films as the Iranian vampire movie "A Girl Walks Alone at Night." "Max Rose" seems to come from someplace personal, but its pain feels dialed down a notch to make it easier to digest. Still, the movie gains resonance from its look at what may be the final years of a movie legend.

"Max Rose"  2.5 stars

No MPAA rating

Running time: 1:23

Opens: Friday

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Expand Autoplay Image 1 of 122 Sophie Turner as Jean Grey, anger management student, in "Dark Phoenix." The film, the latest in the "X-Men" franchise, costars James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender and Jessica Chastain. Read the review. (Twentieth Century Fox)
The cultural touchstone born Marguerite Ann Johnson and known widely as Maya Angelou wrote seven autobiographies and two cookbooks, in addition to everything else she wrote, directed, delivered to the world. She changed and expanded a lot of minds, simply on the strength of her 1969 memoir "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings." It seems faintly absurd to confine her full-to-bursting life story to a single two-hour documentary, even a good one, which this one is.

"Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise" is absorbing and effective in its chosen form. Even if you know something of Angelou through various aspects of her creative life, directors Bob Hercules and Rita Coburn Whack are bound to surprise you with a choice detail or two. Their film opens a two-week run at the Gene Siskel Film Center this weekend, and will air on the PBS "American Masters" series a little further down the line.

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A fellow writer, Nikki Giovanni, says early in the documentary of Angelou: Hers was "a life lived on stage." That stage was vast, full of crisscrossing setbacks and triumphs. Made over a four-year period, featuring interview footage filmed not long before Angelou's final curtain in 2014, "And Still I Rise" lets its subject guide her own story, while still making room for others interviewees, from Hillary and Bill Clinton (Angelou wrote and delivered the January 1993 presidential inaugural poem, the first since Robert Frost's for Kennedy) to Cicely Tyson and Alfre Woodard.

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The discards of a fractious marriage, preteen Angelou and her brother were sent by train from LA to Stamps, Ark., in the depths of the Depression with name tags on their arms. "I declared my mother dead," Angelou recalls, "so I wouldn't have to long for her." Prosperous extended family in Stamps raised the children; when Angelou's mother, newly single, relocated from LA to St. Louis, the children reunited with her. At age 7, Angelou was raped by her mother's boyfriend, a hollowing-out that defined her being without confining it, as she wrote about in "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings."

Her marriages, her nightclub career in San Francisco (she was the "Queen of Calypso"), her political activism (she knew Martin Luther King and Malcolm X), her affinity and deep friendship with James Baldwin: It's all glanced upon here. Touring in an early '50s revival of "Porgy and Bess," where she was a featured dancer, she met Baldwin in Paris. Years later, she was cast in a landmark off-Broadway production of Jean Genet's "The Blacks," with a stunner of a cast including James Earl Jones, Godfrey Cambridge, Cicely Tyson, Louis Gossett Jr. and Roscoe Lee Browne. Some things, including sex work, she did for money; some things for passion. We hear in the film from her eloquent son, Guy Johnson, and from Jules Feiffer, whose then-wife, Judy (also on camera), found Angelou's dinner-party stories of her life to be eminently memoir-worthy. A call to Random House ensued, and "Caged Bird" was the result.

"I've always been a patsy for men who could think," Angelou says, explaining her stimulating, flawed relationships. The movie's a little dodgy on some of the particulars, and certain aspects of "And Still I Rise" are routine or worse. The dramatic re-enactment segments, routine; the dull, rolling wash of a musical score by Stephen James Taylor, worse. But the film's subject triumphs, in the end. Her literal voice was unforgettable, a glorious, aching instrument of communication. And, really, Angelou's literary voice was no different.

Co-directors Hercules and Whack, along with cinematographer Keith Walker, will introduce and discuss the 8:15 p.m. Friday and 5:15 p.m. Saturday screenings. Whack will also introduce the 5:15 p.m. Sunday and 8:15 p.m. Monday screenings.

mjphillips@chicagotribune.com

Twitter @phillipstribune

"Maya Angelou: And I Still Rise"  3 stars

No MPAA rating

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Running time: 1:54

Opens: Friday through Sept. 29 at the Gene Siskel Film Center, 164 N. State St.; www.siskelfilmcenter.org.

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Expand Autoplay Image 1 of 122 Sophie Turner as Jean Grey, anger management student, in "Dark Phoenix." The film, the latest in the "X-Men" franchise, costars James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender and Jessica Chastain. Read the review. (Twentieth Century Fox)
Listeners long have savored the music of Chicago guitarist Bobby Broom, but his work never has sounded more intimate than it did Thursday night at the Jazz Showcase.

Leading a trio that reveled in understatement, Broom performed as if leading a session in his living room, the rest of us invited to eavesdrop. Even Broom's spoken introductions were delivered at something just above a whisper, the musician in every way encouraging his audience to lean in a bit to fully perceive what was happening.

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Like many jazz musicians of boomer vintage, Broom has nurtured a love of pop hits from the 1960s and '70s, and he indulged it on this occasion, in most appealing ways.

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He opened the evening with the Johnny Nash hit "I Can See Clearly Now," swaying it gently in three-quarter time with bassist Dennis Carroll and drummer Greg Artry. In effect, three strands of softly stated melody intertwined, Broom's characteristically sleek guitar lines dovetailing with Carroll's delicate lyricism on bass and Artry's beautifully etched phrases on drums.

Broom recorded the tune on his "Stand!" album of 2001, which also featured "The Letter," another oldie that music lovers of a certain age will recall from the Box Tops' hit recording. The trio referenced the driving energy of the original without succumbing to it, keeping the tempo moving but the ensemble sound light and transparent.

Here Broom turned in the most substantial solo of the evening's first set, sending "The Letter" to places the Box Tops surely never envisioned. Playing rhythms against the beat, producing jagged and angular phrases and in other ways thoroughly transforming the piece, Broom offered an object lesson in what an inventive jazz musician can do with a familiar song.

But Broom's collaborators also contributed significantly, bassist Carroll venturing so far afield harmonically as to leave the original tune something of a distant memory. And drummer Artry, who's perhaps best known for the power and ferocity of his work, showed a degree of restraint and economy listeners have not often heard from him. Ditto his brushwork elsewhere in the set, Artry revealing a different side of his art.

Some of the set's most warmly expressive playing occurred in another historic piece, "The Tennessee Waltz," which Broom recorded on his "My Shining Hour" album two years ago. His extended opening solo  with its expansively rolled chords and thoroughly nonmetered rhythm  amounted to a kind of narrative soliloquy, Broom telling a story in sweet melody and folkloric ornaments. When Carroll and Artry joined the fray, they reimagined "The Tennessee Waltz" in blues-soul terms, Artry's drums churning restlessly underneath it all.

There was some edgier fare here, too, in the form of Broom's sinewy tone and fast-flying lines in Kenny Burrell's "No Hype Blues," which gave drummer Artry a chance to play his biggest solo of the set. But even here, he maintained the scaled-down aesthetic of the entire performance, rendering every stroke and attack with pristine clarity.

Broom and friends turned up the dial and the tempo in Lee Morgan's "Speedball," but this finale was the exception in an otherwise mostly introspective performance.

Considering all the noise in our world, the muted approach had a power all its own.

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Howard Reich is a Tribune critic.

hreich@chicagotribune.com

Twitter @howardreich

When: 8 and 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday; 4, 8 and 10 p.m. Sunday

Where: Jazz Showcase, 806 S. Plymouth Court

Tickets: $20-$35; 312-360-0234 or www.jazzshowcase.com

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Expand Autoplay Image 1 of 122 Sophie Turner as Jean Grey, anger management student, in "Dark Phoenix." The film, the latest in the "X-Men" franchise, costars James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender and Jessica Chastain. Read the review. (Twentieth Century Fox)
The Trump International Hotel looms over the Las Vegas Strip. Donald Trump is counting on strong voter enthusiasm to overcome Hillary Clinton's organizational edge in Nevada. (Los Angeles Times)

Reporting from Las Vegas  The nerve center of Nevada's Democratic Party was abuzz with activity, like a dorm room full of grown-ups cramming for the Big Exam.

Dozens of campaign workers, arrayed around a hodgepodge of old furniture, tapped at their laptop computers and murmured into cell phones, a cardboard cut-out of Hillary Clinton standing sentry in the midst of the well-worn office suite.

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A few miles away, in a sleek industrial park, Donald Trump's recently opened headquarters sat shiny and new and largely empty on a recent midday afternoon.

A riot of red, white and blue campaign signs, several arranged to form a big "T," overlooked tidy rows of vacant tables and unfilled chairs, like advertisements in a showroom awaiting its first customers.

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Nevada is the presidential campaign's westernmost battleground and one of the most competitive states in the country, with polls suggesting a hair's breadth between Trump and Clinton.

It is also a proving ground for two vastly different approaches to winning the White House.

Here, as elsewhere, Clinton is relying on the grind-it-out mechanics of intensive organization, marrying computer algorithms and data-driven metrics to the old-fashioned practice of door-knocking, phone-banking and targeted messaging.

Her campaign is bolstered by one of the most formidable state parties in the country  built in the service of Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid  a confederation of powerful labor unions and layers of free-spending Democratic interest groups. Guiding the effort is a group of campaign veterans practiced at scratching out tough victories in closely fought contests.

Trump, for the most part, has Trump.

It is almost as though Trump has stolen a line from Hollywood's 'Field of Dreams' and turned it on its head: Dont build it, and they will come anyway.

The Nevada Republican Party is in shambles. The GOP nominee has been shunned by the state party establishment, including popular two-term Gov. Brian Sandoval, and spurned by Nevada's best and most experienced Republican strategists.

Trump's turnout operation, to the degree it exists, is piggybacked on the efforts of the national party and allies working in the state's neck-and-neck U.S. Senate race and two House races in the Las Vegas area.

It is almost as though Trump, who mocks political convention, has stolen a line from Hollywood's "Field of Dreams" and turned it on its head: Don't build it, and they will come anyway.

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"We have an absolutely unreal amount of enthusiasm," said Charles Munoz, a California transplant and Trump's Nevada state director, who is running his first political campaign.

He predicted an overwhelming turnout of angry and frustrated voters  the kind who don't need prodding to the polls  that will shock people and turn Nevada from Democratic blue to Republican red for the first time since George W. Bush narrowly won the state in 2004.

"You know that term 'the silent majority?'" Munoz said. "There's a lot of that."

Clinton's organizational advantage here is not unusual. A survey by PBS' "NewsHour" of the 15 most competitive states  Florida, Ohio, and North Carolina among them  found the Democrat with more than three times the number of field offices as Trump, who is also being vastly outspent on the television airwaves.

The disparity is unlike any in presidential politics since at least 1972, when President Nixon outspent Democrat George McGovern 2-to-1 on the way to a 49-state landslide. (Clinton, though, has nothing like the consistently massive lead that Nixon enjoyed in polls.)

Trump is convinced his way  big rallies, a provocative Twitter feed, an unending stream of controversial remarks that command hours of free TV time  is the winning way. Data-driven campaigning, he has said, is "overrated."

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He need look no further than Nevada to make his case.

Rivals Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz both commanded superior organizations heading into the state's February caucuses. Trump not only crushed the two senators, he won more votes than all four Republican candidates running in 2012 combined.

Once a GOP stronghold, Nevada has been on the leading edge of political transformation in the Mountain West, as a large and growing Latino population gathers strength and boosts Democrats' presidential prospects. Clinton figured to be a heavy favorite, given her family's political history in the state  her husband, Bill, carried it twice  President Obama's consecutive victories and the assets Reid and his allies placed at her disposal.

Hillary Clinton's campaign is relying on the grind-it-out mechanics of intensive organization married to the latest in data-driven technology. (Brendan Smialowski / AFP/Getty Images )

But Nevada still possesses a strong and stubborn anti-Washington streak, which has played to Trump's considerable advantage. In some places, Clinton's long and impressive resume  first lady, U.S. senator, secretary of State  may be seen as top-notch training for the presidency.

"In this state that amounts to, 'Oh, good, we're going to have more of the D.C. crowd running the show,'" said Billy Vassiliadis, a longtime Democratic strategist and Clinton supporter.

Nevada's demographics  the state has one of the country's highest percentages of people without college degrees, a core Trump constituency  also helps the Republican nominee.

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Few things, however, have done more to set the terms of the presidential contest than the continued overhang of the Great Recession, which devastated Nevada like nowhere else. The state suffered the highest unemployment in the country and for months led the nation in home foreclosures and personal bankruptcies.

By objective measures, the state has bounced back smartly. Nevada is now one of the country's leaders in job growth, having recovered nearly all the positions lost during the epic downturn. Employment in the Las Vegas area is at an all-time high, and the state's construction industry, which flat-lined for several years, is growing at a brisk pace.

But those indices fail to measure the psychological toll, said Elliott Parker, who teaches economics at the University of Nevada in Reno, or the fact many Nevadans, although back to work, are making less money than they once did or living in homes still worth less than their outstanding mortgages.

"Things are better, but compared to what?" Parker asked. "Certainly not compared to the kind of growth we were seeing before the Great Recession."

Clinton's biggest advantage is a 6-percentage-point edge in Democratic registration and the way Trump has deeply antagonized the party's base of women, black and Latino voters. Their robust support is vital, which makes the Democratic get-out-the-vote operation key: In 2014, when turnout hit a record low, Republicans won every statewide office and seized control of the Legislature for the first time since the 1920s.

"It's the task of Democrats to make sure that they are driving, cajoling, urging those key voter groups to the polls," Vassiliadis said. "If they don't, she loses."

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Last week, Democrats opened state field office No. 14 in a strip mall in Henderson, just outside Las Vegas. More than 100 people crammed into the space between Supercuts and a Rubio's fish taco restaurant, and 50 or more spilled onto the concrete patio in 100-degree heat.

Candidates for Congress and the Legislature mocked Trump, his hyperbolic rhetoric and regard for Russian President Vladimir Putin, and they invoked Clinton's slogan "Stronger Together." A Clinton staffer led the crowd in a chant of "battle born, battle tested," riffing on Nevada's state motto.

Five campaign workers then circulated through the crowd, clipboard in hand, signing up volunteers to staff phone banks, walk precincts and hit the streets to register voters.

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Health care providers and insurers don't agree on whether women should go through counseling with a genetic conselor before genetic testing for breast cancer. (Fotolia / TNS)

Health care providers and insurers agree that it's in everyone's best interest to refer women for genetic testing if their family history of breast or ovarian cancer puts them at higher risk. What they don't agree on is what should happen before testing, specifically whether women need to be advised by a certified genetic counselor or someone with similar training before the test is ordered. On the one hand, obstetrician-gynecologists say that counseling patients about hereditary cancers of the breast, ovaries, uterus and other reproductive organs is part of their normal routine, as is counseling pregnant patients about prenatal genetic testing. As licensed physicians, they are considered competent to provide this type of care.

"This is what we do," said Dr. Mark DeFrancesco, the immediate past president of the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, noting that most physicians have been taking family histories since medical school. "There are simple-to-understand criteria for who should be considered for genetic testing, and it usually has to do with whether you or someone in your family has had cancer."

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DeFrancesco recalled a patient whose mother, grandmother and maternal aunt all had breast cancer, but the insurer required she see a genetic counselor before testing would be approved. In such cases, "it will take a few extra weeks to get tested, and she might decide not to bother," he said. DeFrancesco said genetic counselors have an important role to play after testing has been done to help patients who test positive for a genetic mutation understand the results.

In a statement released last December, the physicians group said it opposed such a restriction and warned that it limits patients' access to care. Insurers sometimes take a different view, although their rules vary. Two national insurers, UnitedHealthcare and Cigna, require women to receive counseling by a certified genetic counselor or other professional trained in cancer genetics before they will approve coverage for tests that look for mutations in two genes, BRCA1 and BRCA2, that increase the risk for breast, ovarian and other cancers.

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UnitedHealthcare began requiring genetic counseling for BRCA tests in January. The insurer allows physicians to do the counseling themselves if they attest they're qualified to do so, said Dr. Lee Newcomer, senior vice president for oncology and genetics.

Cigna made counseling a requirement in 2013 for BRCA and colorectal hereditary cancers and a heart condition called Long-QT. In July, the company expanded the list to include all hereditary cancers. Cigna generally requires physicians to get additional training in cancer genetics in order to meet its counseling requirement, said Dr. Jeffrey Hankoff, Cigna's medical officer for clinical performance and quality.

BRCA mutations increase a woman's risk of developing breast cancer by age 70 by between 45 and 65 percent. They account for 5 to 10 percent of all breast cancers. BRCA mutations raise women's risk of ovarian and other cancers as well. There are other known genetic mutations that also increase a woman's risk for breast and ovarian cancers, but they are less commonly tested for.

The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, an independent panel of medical experts, recommends that women with a family history of breast, ovarian, fallopian tube or peritoneal cancer be screened to determine if they're at increased risk for BRCA mutations and referred for genetic counseling and testing, if indicated.

Under the health law, women with insurance aren't responsible for paying anything out of pocket for the testing and counseling recommended by the task force if it's performed by in-network providers.

The health law coverage requirement didn't drive Cigna's BRCA genetic counseling decision, said Hankoff.

"We had concerns that people were having testing ordered that didn't appear to need it and probably didn't understand it," Hankoff said. In addition, "Too often the wrong tests were being ordered."

For example, a woman whose sister has been diagnosed with breast cancer and tested positive for a specific mutation doesn't need a genetic test that looks for all hereditary breast cancer mutations, Hankoff said. She only needs to be tested for the specific mutation that her sister has.

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Genetic counselors, meanwhile, try to walk a middle line in the debate. To become certified, people complete a master's degree program that encompasses both classroom study and clinical training in genetics, ethics and the psychosocial aspects of helping families through diagnosis and the decision-making process, among other things. Certification by the American Board of Genetic Counseling is typically required in order to practice.

"There are a lot of complexities with genetic testing," said Mary Freivogel, president-elect of the National Society of Genetic Counselors, who practices in the Denver area. "A lot of [OB-GYNs] don't have the time or interest to do this well."

With the number of genetic tests growing by leaps and bounds, meeting the demand for counseling can be a challenge, experts agree.

Physicians don't necessarily get it right. For one thing, they often aren't great at taking family histories, neglecting to gather information about the men in a family, for example, or factoring in close relatives who died at a young age, said Robert Smith, a cancer epidemiologist who is vice president for cancer screening at the American Cancer Society.

"Not everybody has a set of family members that allow for the elevated risk to be obvious," Smith said. "There's a lot to be said for having a specialist do it."

Please visit khn.org/columnists to send comments or ideas for future topics for the Insuring Your Health column.

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(c)2016 Kaiser Health News Visit Kaiser Health News at www.khn.org Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

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Is state Sen. Kwame Raoul  sitting in the state Senate seat once held by President Barack Obama  thinking about running for mayor of Chicago?

Yes.

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"Naturally, in any profession, somebody aspires for a promotion, right?" Raoul said on my "The Chicago Way" podcast. "So you'll have a lot of people who won't close the door."

You're not closing your door?

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"Absolutely not," said Raoul in an extended interview where we talked about a possible run for mayor, or for governor, and his belief that his boyhood friend, the former U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, won't run for governor.

Mostly, Raoul wanted to focus on crafting new sentencing guidelines for gun crimes that target felons who are at the root of Chicago's violence epidemic.

Sometimes I call him "The Kwaminator" because he has the experience and a natural charisma. Years ago, at the Union League Club, I predicted The Kwaminator would be mayor someday.

Raoul agreed that although Mayor Rahm Emanuel has been damaged, the mayor still has ample time to try and repair his political standing in Chicago. But there will be a challenge, Raoul said.

"I don't think he'll get a free pass," Raoul said. "I think there will be challenges. He suffered some reputation damages as a result of things that happened during his tenure, so it leaves an opening for somebody who is well prepared to put forth a viable challenge.

"And that will likely happen. Who that is? I don't know. But that person, given the pragmatics of politics, would have to have the capacity to raise a lot of money to get their message through. It would be naive to think you can just do a grass-roots campaign to take on something like that whether or not Rahm runs."

The mayor is talking as if he's running for re-election. He can't very well say he's not running. That would trigger political jackals and hyenas and his mayoral skin would be stripped bare. But clearly, Raoul is positioning himself for 2019 just in case. And he isn't alone.

There are others in the mix of serious possible candidates. These include Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart, who has a high profile and a public persona as a decent fellow. And reform Ald. Scott Waguespack, 32nd, should be considered. Waguespack was one of the few who had a true spine to publicly stand up to the corruption in Richard Daley's City Hall when Daley was Boss Daley and spending the city into ruin.

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A likely possibility is City Treasurer Kurt Summers, the former chief of staff of Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle. Summers is now being informally guided by Emanuel's top money guy, Michael Sacks. He is chairman and CEO of Grosvenor Capital Management, is considered to be one of Emanuel's closest advisers and is also known as "Mayor" Sacks.

But it all depends on Rahm. Yes, Rahm has been weakened by events, some of his own making, like his disastrous handling of the Laquan McDonald video. Emanuel suppressed that video until after his re-election and then settled the case with the family for $5 million. It showed the black teenager being shot to death 16 times by a white Chicago police officer. If that video had been released during the campaign, Rahm would have lost support of black voters and would have lost the mayoralty to Cook County Board Commissioner Jesus "Chuy" Garcia.

Following the McDonald fiasco came a city crime wave that seems to have no end, with 3,000 shootings already and more than 500 homicides so far this year, and the Police Department demoralized, on the defensive  "fetal" as Emanuel said  seemingly unwilling to engage and make street stops.

I'm told the mayor's upcoming crime policy speech will address these issues, with a focus on more police and mentoring young African-American boys considered most at risk in the hopes of guiding them away from violence.

But will that be enough to begin Rahm's political rehabilitation with black voters who, according to polls, have rejected him?

"Rahm took a pretty big hit in the Laquan McDonald situation," Raoul said on "The Chicago Way." "And I agree, you can't say that you're not going to run because that renders you a lame-duck mayor and renders you ineffective. At the same time, that happened early in his term. He's got a lot of runway left to reverse some of the things he took a hit on. Whatever you may feel about him one way or another, you certainly can't count him out."

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Raoul said that his focus right now isn't a political promotion, but legislation sought by Chicago police Superintendent Eddie Johnson to increase jail time for felons who illegally carry guns in the city. Raoul wants to target those repeat offenders, but also wants policy to reduce the number of nonviolent offenders held in the state prisons.

But politics is politics, and he said that anyone who wanted to challenge Rahm  or wants to run if Emanuel doesn't seek re-election  would need millions. He doesn't talk to Michael Sacks every other day. And he says he's not thinking about it all that much.

"I'm not giving that thought now, right now," he said. "We have the gun violence problem in Chicago and that's my focus."

Twitter @John_Kass

There's a new episode of "The Chicago Way" with John Kass and Jeff Carlin. Guests include state Sen. Kwame Raoul, Shaun 'From Elmwood Park' Thompson and Tribune reporter William Lee. Listen here: wgnplus.com/category/thechicagoway/
The Lake County Veterans Service Office, offering local veterans help and relief for 30 years, has an identity problem.

"No one knows we're here," said Ray Guiden, a service officer with the office.

Tucked in the back corner on the third floor of the Lake County Government Center, the Veterans Service Office's door is open to all veterans.

"We provide a service for all veterans of Lake County," Guiden said.

The office works with veterans to determine their eligibility for benefits; completes forms for the VA; and helps families of deceased veterans with benefits and claims. Guiden said if his department can't help someone, he can point that person to another agency.

"I don't think people fully realize it's there," said Lake County Councilman Jamal Washington, D-Merrillville, who is also a U.S. Army veteran.

Washington said when he left the army he was confused and didn't get a lot of information of what to do next.

"This is your center point," Washington said.

Despite the department's work, it operates on a minimal budget with limited staffing.

The office runs on $65,906 budget  one of the smallest departments in Lake County  and asked the County Council recently to consider a 3 percent increase for 2017.

Additionally, the council tentatively added $12,000 to the department's budget for an extra part-time person in the 2017 budget.

The office has two full-time service officers, Guiden said, but serves the second largest veterans population in Indiana. Compensation and benefits paid out to Lake County veterans totaled $71,735 in fiscal year 2015, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs.

In Porter County, the veterans office has four service officers and a $99,773 budget. Porter County had 13,331 veterans living there in fiscal year 2015  the seventh largest veterans population in the state.

Guiden estimated the department will handle a base of 1,500 appointments a year. He said the part-time position has processed more than 500 burial cases so far in 2016.

"Certainly, I would like to have more resources," Guiden said, but doesn't think it's the right time to ask for a lot more funding.

Washington said the department has a huge role in the county and should get some investment.

"I think we need to do a better job promoting that," Washington said.

Washington said one way to make the department more visible could be partnering with area recruiting stations so people enlisting can get started in the service and then know what to do at the end.

"We can give them a whole package deal," Washington said.

Given the work the department already does, Washington said the county can invest in the department and make it a resource for Lake County veterans. Washington said he'd like to see the department bring on some more people who can work on re-entry programs and job placement services for veterans.

"I think it'd be a better all in one department," Washington said.

Guiden said the department has made a lot of improvements during the last few years, including moving into a larger and more accommodating office and doing a better job interacting with the veterans who go into the office.

"We tried to make it a little more personal and take interest in their cases," Guiden said.

Guiden, who is also the service officer for American Legion District 1 of Northwest Indiana, said the office is not a Department of Veterans Affairs office, but instead a place where veterans can get help with filing claims and other paperwork with the federal agency.

"The system is not easy to navigate," said Jason Gootee, a Lake County veterans service officer, and the VA has more than 500 forms for different programs and benefits.

The process for getting people enrolled in benefits or filing claims isn't simple, Guiden said.

"It's just not a cut and dry thing," Guiden said, and people can't just sign up and get a check.

"We're always navigating that minefield of federal bureaucracy," Guiden said.

To process a case takes more than filling out forms, Gootee said, and it can involve researching similar claims and their outcomes and the history of the individuals.

"There's a lot of work that goes into previously before sitting down with the veterans," Gootee said.

"It's a pretty busy schedule," Guiden said.

Gootee said the staff can become default social workers and mental health and medical counselors for people who come into the office.

"It's not just paperwork," Gootee said.

The job extends beyond the hours Guiden and Gootee log in the office.

Gootee said he goes to a support group at Southlake Methodist that starts at 6 p.m. after he's logged a full day at the office. He said if he's out at an event or walking around, people come up to him and want to talk.

Guiden said the staff isn't on call 24 hours a day but when they're out in the public eye, they're going to answer someone's question.

"There's always somebody out there who has a question," Guiden said.

clyons@post-trib.com

Twitter: @craigalyons
Valerie Jean Percy, 21, was found beaten and stabbed to death in her bed on Sept. 18, 1966, at her family's mansion in Kenilworth. The killing remains unsolved 50 years later. (Kasondra Van Treeck / Chicago Tribune) (Chicago Tribune)

Fifty years later, it remains one of Illinois' best-known and most mysterious unsolved killings.

Valerie Jean Percy, 21, was found beaten and stabbed to death in her bed Sept. 18, 1966, in her family's Kenilworth mansion. It was the first homicide in the history of the North Shore suburb.

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Percy was the daughter of Chicago-area business executive and then-Republican U.S. Senate candidate Charles "Chuck" Percy. She had just graduated from Cornell University and came home to work on her father's election campaign.

The Percy family on a bicycle outing in 1964. From left, Mark, Gail, Roger, Valerie, Sharon, Loraine and Charles. (Chicago Tribune archive photo )

It was early on a Sunday morning, and the Percy family was asleep in its lakefront home when Valerie's stepmother, Loraine, "was awakened by the sound of someone moaning, and I got up to see what was the matter."

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Realizing the sound was coming from Valerie's room, Loraine Percy opened the door and saw a man bending over the blood-soaked bed and shining his flashlight on Valerie's body. As the stepmother gasped in surprise, the intruder swung around and aimed the flashlight at her eyes, blinding her. She ran back into her bedroom, woke her husband and pressed a burglar alarm.

Before Charles Percy could reach his daughter's room, the killer fled down the stairs and out of the house. Loraine Percy was able to give police only a vague description of the man: dark-haired, about 5-foot-8 and 160 pounds, and wearing a checkered shirt.

Though the intruder was heard running away, and neighbors were awoken by the Percy home's alarm, there were no witnesses to his escape, and searches proved fruitless.

The Chicago Tribune front page from Sept. 18, 1966.

From the start of their investigation, police were puzzled over what the motive might be because the intruder took no money or valuables from her room, and the position of the body did not indicate she had awakened and caught someone in the act of ransacking the room. From all appearances, Percy had been beaten about the head as she lay asleep and then stabbed. She was not sexually assaulted.

Sharon Percy, far left, twin sister of Valerie, embraces her aunt Diana Guyer as Sharon's younger sister, Gail, walks past a police officer outside the Percy home in Kenilworth on Sept. 19, 1966. (Chicago Tribune historical photo)

In the first few years after the killing, investigators talked to thousands of people and tracked leads across America.

One focus of their investigation was a cross-country burglary gang traced to Colorado, Illinois, Louisiana, Pennsylvania and Texas.

Harold James Evans, from left, Francis LeRoy Hohimer and Frederick J. Malchow were part of a burglary gang that was investigated in connection with the Valerie Percy slaying. Evans and Hohimer told investigators that Malchow was the killer, but their claims were never proved. (FBI)

In the years after the Percy slaying, one jailed member of the group, Harold James Evans, told investigators that another member, Frederick J. "Freddie" Malchow, had bragged that he killed Percy. The convicted leader of the gang, Francis Leroy Hohimer, also implicated Malchow as the killer.

But Malchow already was dead by that time. FBI agents had interviewed him in a Pennsylvania jail where he was awaiting trial for rape and robbery in a home invasion in that state. Malchow denied any involvement with the Percy killing. In 1967 he broke out of jail and fell to his death from a railroad trestle as police moved in.

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"To this day I am convinced that Freddie Malchow was the killer and that he acted alone," Robert Lamb, the last full-time investigator in the Percy homicide, told the Tribune in 1991. Lamb noted that investigators were able to place Malchow in Chicago at the time of the slaying through an airplane baggage ticket.

A Chicago Tribune story from Sept. 14, 1972.

Charles Percy briefly suspended his campaign for the Senate after his daughter's death, but he resumed the race and defeated Democratic Sen. Paul Douglas in the 1966 election. Percy represented Illinois for nearly 20 years and headed the powerful Foreign Relations Committee. He died in September 2011 at 91.

Sen. Charles Percy with then-Vice President Gerald Ford at the Republican Midwest Leadership Conference in March 1974 at the Hyatt Regency O'Hare in Chicago. (Chicago Tribune historical photo)

The Percy's former home was demolished in 2010 to make room for a new residence. When the Tribune contacted Sharon Percy Rockefeller and asked her to share some memories of growing up there with her twin sister and other family members, the unsolved slaying was still fresh in her mind. "It was the happiest of times and the saddest of times," she said of life at the house.

In recent years, new details related to the killing have come to light. The Tribune reported in June 2011 that a Percy neighbor who was the first doctor to examine the victim wrote a detailed account that he never showed to police.

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Dr. Robert Hohf rushed to the house after getting an early-morning phone call from Charles Percy. Hohf, a surgeon at Evanston Hospital, wrote that he "dashed" upstairs and, stepping into Valerie's bedroom, "I saw immediately the figure of a badly battered girl, obviously dead."

Percy neighbor Dr. Robert Hohf was summoned to the family's home and was the first doctor to see the body of Valerie Percy and declare her dead. (handout)

Hohf was never interviewed by police and was not invited to the inquest for the slaying. After his handwritten report became known five years ago, authorities said it is valuable as a witness account but does not differ substantially from the original police reports and timeline of events.

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This week, just days before the 50th anniversary of the Percy killing, Kenilworth officials released a document they say shows that police are still investigating the case. The document states that multiple people have confessed to the slaying, but detectives have disproved the claims by checking them against confidential information about the crime.

Kenilworth issued the document at the request of a Cook County judge who is handling a dispute between the village and a New York attorney who thinks the massive files from the Percy investigation should be made public.

The judge is scheduled to decide next month whether to order the release of some or all of the 20,000-page case file that includes witness statements, crime scene photos, tips and investigative reports.

Meantime, the slaying of Valerie Percy remains a mystery entering its sixth decade.

Valerie Percy in August 1964, two years before her death. (Chicago Tribune historical photo)

Text from Chicago Tribune stories.
A Chicago police officer has been indicted on federal civil rights charges for shooting into a car full of teenagers, marking the first time federal authorities have brought charges against one of the city's officers for a shooting in the last 15 years.

Officer Marco Proano, 41, was captured on video shooting repeatedly into the car as it backed away from him on the South Side in December 2013, wounding two teens inside.

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In an indictment announced Friday, Proano was charged with two counts of deprivation of rights under the color of law alleging he used unreasonable force. He is free on his own recognizance and due to make his first appearance in federal court Thursday, court records show.

The incident was the second controversial shooting of Proano's 10-year career with the department. In July 2011 he shot 19-year-old Niko Husband to death at close range. A Cook County jury found the shooting unjustified, awarding his mother $3.5 million in damages, but a judge overturned the verdict.

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Proano's indictment marks a rare move for federal authorities. A recent Chicago Tribune investigation found that Chicago police had shot 702 people  killing 215  in the last 15 years, yet no officers had been charged by federal authorities in any of those cases.

The charges come amid continuing political upheaval in Chicago over police shootings and the rarity of city officials or prosecutors seeking to punish police for alleged abuses. Mayor Rahm Emanuel continues to roll out proposed changes to the Police Department and its oversight systems spurred by the political crisis that followed the release in late November of video of white Officer Jason Van Dyke shooting black teenager Laquan McDonald 16 times.

The city's police disciplinary authorities have long been reluctant to rule police unjustified in shootings, but since the scandal erupted, the city's Independent Police Review Authority has ruled a spate of shootings unjustified. Indeed, on Friday, IPRA spokeswoman Mia Sissac said the agency had ruled Proano's 2013 shooting unjustified.

IPRA's recommendation has been forwarded to the Police Department, Sissac said. The department has yet to announce any proposed disciplinary action against Proano, who has been on paid desk duty since shortly after the December 2013 shooting. He is paid $81,588 a year, according to city payroll records.

Proano could not be reached for comment, and his attorney, Daniel Herbert, declined to comment.

The video of the shooting of the teens in 2013 was first aired last year by The Chicago Reporter after it said it obtained the footage from former Cook County Judge Andrew Berman, who heard a criminal case involving one of the teens. The publication said the judge, who retired before the story was published, called the officer's actions the most disturbing he'd seen in his legal career.

The Tribune reported in June 2015 that the shooting was the subject of a criminal investigation by the FBI and the U.S. attorney's office.

According to a lawsuit filed by the mothers of three of the teens, several teenagers were riding in a car that was stopped by two officers near 95th and LaSalle streets when one passenger fled.

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In footage taken by a camera in a squad car, Proano can be seen walking quickly toward the teens' car with his gun pointed sideways at them in his left hand. He then backed away briefly as the car reversed away from the officer. Proano then raised his gun with both hands and opened fire, the video showed.

The suit alleged that Proano fired more than a dozen shots.

One teen was shot in the shoulder and grazed on his forehead and cheek, according to the lawsuit. Another teen was shot in his left hip and right heel. A third teen was taken to the ground by one of the officers, causing an injury to his right eye, the suit alleged.

According to a statement from the Police Department released at the time, the car's driver ran off and someone else jumped in the driver's seat and put the car in reverse. The officer then opened fire, the statement said.

Former FOP spokesman Pat Camden, meanwhile, said officers stopped the car because they thought it was stolen. He said the driver reversed toward officers who were approaching it and then drove forward, dragging the passenger in the back seat. An officer "worried about the safety of the individual trying to get out of the car" then opened fire, Camden said.

The city agreed to settle the lawsuit over the shooting for $360,000.

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The mother of Niko Husband  the teen fatally shot by Proano  also sued, and jurors in Cook County court found in 2015 that the officer had used unjustified force. The jury awarded her $3.5 million, but the judge negated the verdict because of a contradictory answer jurors gave on a written question. The judge's ruling is being appealed.

That incident unfolded on a night in July 2011 as police responded to a call of an armed man and encountered dozens of people at an underground dance party near 80th Street and Ashland Avenue. Husband came out of the building, according to court records, and appeared to be struggling with a young woman.

Proano testified that he and two other police grabbed Husband by the arms and tried to free the girl. As they wrestled with him, Proano said, he felt a gun in Husband's waistband. The officer said he tried to grab the weapon from Husband but was afraid it would go off.

After another officer tried unsuccessfully to deploy a Taser, Proano fired three times. A Police Department statement that night said Husband had reached for his gun and pointed it at the officers, prompting Proano to shoot Husband in fear of his life.

An autopsy report showed the first two shots came from about 2 feet away, but the third was a "contact" wound, indicating that Proano had pressed his gun directly against Husband's chest. The trajectory of that bullet suggested that Husband was already on the ground when it was fired.

The young woman he was with before the shooting was a friend, and she testified that while she did yell, "Get off of me!" as he had his hands on her, she was actually talking to one of the officers.

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The attorney representing Husband's family, Donald Shapiro, argued at trial that the gun had been planted by officers. He said it had only one bullet in it, making it implausible that Husband was trying to aim it at three burly police officers who were wrestling with him.

Proano was not only cleared by IPRA but also awarded a department commendation for valor, records show.

Proano was the subject of nine complaints during a four-year period ending in mid-December 2014, police records show. He was never disciplined for any of the complaints, which included allegations of illegal searches and excessive force.

jgorner@chicagotribune.com

dhinkel@chicagotribune.com

Twitter @JeremyGorner

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Twitter @dhinkel
Chicago State University board of trustees approved the resignation of President Thomas Calhoun Jr. during board meeting in Chicago on Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. (Zbigniew Bzdak/Chicago Tribune). (Zbigniew Bzdak/Chicago Tribune/Chicago Tribune)

Chicago State University President Thomas Calhoun Jr., who lasted just nine months in the job, will receive $600,000 as part of a separation agreement approved Friday.

Without explanation and before an irate and vocal crowd, trustees voted 6-1 to accept Calhoun's resignation and pay him double his annual salary to leave immediately. Students, faculty and staff blasted the decision to part ways with Calhoun, who was popular on campus though apparently not with the trustees. Student trustee Paris Griffin voted against the measure.

Trustees appointed Cecil Lucy, the university's vice president for administration and finance, as interim president as people in the crowd turned their backs toward the board and chanted, "Shame! Shame!"

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Chicago State University student Michael Weigand criticizes trustees following their vote to accept the resignation of President Thomas Calhoun Jr. on Sept. 16, 2016. (Chicago Tribune)

Calhoun did not attend the board meeting and declined to discuss his departure when reached by the Tribune, but in a statement he encouraged students to stay positive amid the challenges.

Calhoun's abrupt departure  and sizable severance  comes at a troubling time for the Far South Side public university. The cash-strapped school has laid off about 40 percent of its employees this year, and its accreditation is at risk because of the financial strife. Student enrollment has been declining for years.

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Board Chairman Anthony Young said little about Calhoun's departure Friday, making only a brief statement that Calhoun and trustees "decided that it was in the best interest of both the university and Dr. Calhoun for us to separate." Young stopped to speak with two reporters, but then walked away before he could be asked any questions.

Calhoun's five-year employment contract, scheduled to run through 2020, provided for various scenarios under which the board could remove Calhoun without cause, including with him accepting two years of salary to leave immediately.

Under the separation agreement, Calhoun will get half the severance payment this year and half next year. Both sides agreed not to sue or "make disparaging remarks" about each other, Young said. The university did not provide a copy of the agreement.

Expand Autoplay Image 1 of 14 Teacher Kelly Harris addresses the board as Chicago State University board accepted the resignation of Thomas Calhoun, president of the Chicago State University after voting him out during meeting in Chicago on Sept. 16, 2016. (Zbigniew Bzdak / Chicago Tribune)

The other board members who voted for the deal were Nikki Zollar, James Joyce, Spencer Leak Sr., Horace Smith and Marshall Hatch Sr.

Sen. Donne Trotter , a Chicago Democrat whose district includes Chicago State, said trustees wanted a change because Calhoun was not the right fit.

"He came in the middle of a full-scale war going on," Trotter said, referring primarily to the state's financial challenges. "I believe that the board just didn't feel that he was the guy to direct them to clearer skies. Calhoun was not the right general for this phase of the operation."

Gov. Bruce Rauner said earlier this week he was concerned about tax dollars going to severance payments.

"We don't have that many taxpayer resources to go around," he said. "Taxpayers are supporters of that institution. And you hate to see a lot of money going out for not productive uses. The money should be in the classroom with the students and the teachers."

Throughout the Chicago State meeting, students and faculty heckled the board members.

When Hatch said he appreciated Calhoun's service, one member of the audience shouted: "If you all had any shame, you would all resign."

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"He's the only one who could fix us!" yelled another person, referring to Calhoun.

Leak criticized the crowd for their repeated interruptions, his words taking a religious tone.

A standing-room-only crowd shouts down the Chicago State University board of trustees as it approves the resignation of President Thomas Calhoun Jr. on Sept. 16, 2016. (Dawn Rhodes, Chicago Tribune) (Dawn Rhodes, Chicago Tribune/Chicago Tribune)

"I believe we should acknowledge God and ask God to guide us from this point on," Leak said. "If we acknowledge God, this meeting will not be as contentious as it has been."

But the rancor continued during public comments. Trustees sat mostly expressionless as students called for their resignation and demanded Calhoun be reinstated.

"What I've been seeing in this board meeting has been shocking and a little bit disgusting," said student Andre Fredericks. "I'm looking at the student representative giving you the voice of the students and it's continuously being drowned out by those who are supposedly for the students."

Fredericks, like others, also took aim at the size of Calhoun's severance.

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"There are a bunch of different things on campus that need your attention," he said. "But yet, there was money to buy out President Calhoun's contract. The board of trustees has lost the trust of the faculty, the staff, the administration and most importantly, the students."

Earlier this week, as it became apparent that Calhoun was on his way out, more than 100 faculty members signed a letter urging trustees to back the president and keep him in office.

"To do otherwise would continue the turmoil we have experienced since February and likely expose the still vulnerable university to additional harm," the letter stated. "We have the right president at the right time. We share with you the desire to see this university flourish."

The soft-spoken Calhoun, previously an administrator at the University of North Alabama, was hired in October and started at Chicago State in January with much optimism.

But Calhoun's supporters contend the new president never was given an opportunity to lead.

In February, the board created a four-person management committee, which oversaw all hirings, layoffs and other personnel-related decisions. No employment changes could be made without a majority vote of the committee, which included Calhoun, Lucy, Provost Angela Henderson and Renee Mitchell, human resources vice president.

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The unusual arrangement meant Calhoun did not have sole control over employment matters. Trustees were scheduled to formally disband the committee at Friday's meeting, but the matter never was called for a vote.

Calhoun's departure continues a tumultuous year for the school.

With a heavy reliance on state funding, the institution struggled during the budget gridlock of the past year that kept public dollars from flowing to the state's colleges and universities. Chicago State, which primarily serves minority and low-income students, typically receives 30 percent of its budget from Springfield.

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Chicago State declared a state of financial emergency in February, just weeks after Calhoun took office, and mass layoffs followed.

Academic programs have been slashed and services reduced. The library's hours have been shortened to 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., weekdays only.

Rauner said this week that his administration will consider appointing new trustees to the board. Four trustees' terms are up in January.

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"We're going to do a thoughtful process to try to find highly qualified individuals to serve on that board," Rauner said. "Chicago State is a very important institution. We'd like to see them do well. I would like to be very supportive of them. But in the past, for many years, they've had management problems and they've had significant financial difficulties. And I'd like to see them better run."

Chicago Tribune's Kim Geiger contributed.

Chicago State University President Thomas Calhoun Jr. announces actions the university will take relating to the state budget crisis in Chicago on Feb. 26, 2016. (Jose M. Osorio / Chicago Tribune)

drhodes@chicagotribune.com

Twitter @rhodes_dawn
Chicago police executing a search warrant above a day care center in the Fernwood neighborhood Thursday evening recovered a gun, about 50 rounds of ammunition and more than $9,000 worth of drugs.

At about 6 p.m., members of a Morgan Park Police District tactical team executed the warrant above a day care center in the 500 block of West 103rd Street, according to police.

They found a 9mm pistol, more than 50 rounds of ammunition, and about $1,050. In addition, 375 grams of cannabis and 63 grams of raw rock cocaine were recovered, a combined value of more than $9,000.

One person is in custody, and charges are pending.
Melissa Calusinski, former day care worker convicted of the murder of a toddler, listens to testimony during her appeal hearing at the Babcox Justice Center in Waukegan on Aug. 18, 2016. (Stacey Wescott / Chicago Tribune)

Melissa Calusinski was back in a Lake County courtroom Friday as a hearing resumed to determine if her murder conviction in the death of a toddler will be overturned.

Five years after the Carpentersville woman was found guilty of fatally injuring the boy at a day care center where she worked, the judge who sentenced her to 31 years in prison agreed to hear what her lawyers say is new evidence that should clear her.

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Prosecutors dispute the existence of new evidence and have argued against a new trial for Calusinski in the death of 16-month-old Benjamin Kingan, of Deerfield.

Calusinski, 29, confessed to slamming Benjamin's head to the ground while working at the Lincolnshire center in 2009. But her attorneys have long contended she was coerced.

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The crux of the case that has attracted national attention now is whether Benjamin died of a skull fracture caused by Calusinski, as a jury concluded in 2011, or whether he died of a previous head injury, as her attorneys argue. They say the pathologists who conducted the initial autopsy of Benjamin missed evidence that he had a prior injury and say X-rays found in the Lake County coroner's office since Calusinski's conviction support that claim.

Benjamin Kingan in an undated family photo. Day care worker Melissa Calusinski was sentenced to 31 years in prison for the death of Kingan. (Family photo)

Calusinski's high-profile defense attorney, Kathleen Zellner, contended Calusinski was disadvantaged at her trial because her lawyers didn't have access to these X-rays.

"Garbage in, garbage out. The defense was getting garbage," Zellner said. "At a bare minimum, she has to have a new trial."

Prosecutors counter that the X-rays are not new  just a digitally lightened version of X-rays provided before the trial  and that a prior injury, if it did exist, doesn't exclude the possibility that Calusinski caused his death with a new injury. But their discovery led in part to Lake County Coroner Thomas Rudd's decision last year to reclassify Benjamin's death from homicide to undetermined.

On Friday, a private software developer testified for Calusinski that the X-rays provided to the defense were virtually useless because of their lack of clarity.

This prompted Calusinski's father, Paul, to call during a break in testimony for a federal investigation into what he called a "cover-up" of evidence in the case.

But prosecutors pointed out in earlier testimony that they received the same difficult-to-read version of the X-rays as the defense attorneys and had sought help from the coroner's office before the trial in making them more legible. The state also has noted that the defense attorneys had access to the same lightening tool as prosecutors did.

Prosecutors also have noted that jurors at Calusinski's trial heard testimony from a defense witness who said he believed the boy died of a previous injury, but those jurors still chose to convict Calusinski.

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"These aren't new X-rays," Assistant State's Attorney Jason Humke said, later adding that it was important to look at the whole case and the numerous experts who agreed that Benjamin died of recent head trauma.

Among those who are backing the defense's conclusion  that Benjamin died not by Calusinski's hand but by a previous head injury  is Dr. Nancy Jones, former Cook County chief medical examiner, who consulted on the case early on but did not examine the remains, and reviewed the case again at Rudd's request. A new sworn statement by Jones was entered into the record Friday.

In her report to Rudd, Jones wrote that she was in "complete agreement" with him that Benjamin had a previous injury that was missed by examiners and that could have re-bled, causing his death.

She also stated that Calusinski's video statement to investigators was "entirely inconsistent" with Benjamin's injuries, because she said she held the boy's face away from her when she hit his head on the floor, but the injuries were near the back of his head.

Jones resigned as chief medical examiner for Cook County in 2012, amid claims that the office was mismanaged and criticism from employees that bodies were stacking up in the morgue's cooler. She now works on her own as a consulting forensic pathologist.

Testimony at the trial indicated that Benjamin had a habit of throwing himself backward while seated and hitting his head on the floor behind him when he was angry. But his behavior did not alarm the day care staff, and his pediatrician, Dr. Daniel Lum, described it as "pretty common" and never knew of a child seriously injuring himself from the habit.

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Prosecutors re-emphasized that point Friday, saying children often bump their heads, but such a habit would not have caused a fatal injury.

They also noted that the pathologist who examined Benjamin, while later acknowledging he missed an older injury, said it didn't change his opinion that the boy died of blunt trauma.

In a court filing, prosecutors also argued that the trial jury already considered conflicting expert testimony about the cause of Benjamin's death.

"The jury was instructed consistent with the law in Illinois that defendant's acts need not be the sole and immediate cause of death," prosecutors wrote. "The jury only had to find that defendant's actions contributed to Ben's death."

Lake County Judge Daniel Shanes said he will announce his ruling on Sept. 23.

rmccoppin@chicagotribune.com

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Timothy Echols, 57, a Fort Wayne man who went missing Sept. 1, 2016, on the South Side. (Police photo)

Police are asking for help finding a Fort Wayne man who went missing two weeks ago in the city's Avalon Park neighborhood.

Timothy Echols, 57, was last seen Sept. 1 leaving a relative's house in the 1100 block of East 83rd Street. He left the relative's home to take the Metra train downtown and has not been heard from since, police said.

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Echols has medical issues and is in need of medication, police said.

He is described as black with a light complexion, black hair and brown eyes. He is 6 feet tall and weighs about 225 pounds, police said.

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Anyone with information on his whereabouts should contact the Area South Special Victims Section at 312-747-8274.
A South Shore man has been charged with attempted murder and multiple other felonies in a shooting that wounded a retired Chicago police deputy chief early Wednesday, according to a police news release.

Keith Vaughns, 21, approached Fred Coffey, 72, in the 2400 block of East 82nd Street about 9:30 a.m. Wednesday, according to the release. Vaughns pulled a gun from his backpack and told Coffey to give me everything you got," police said.

He then fired one round at Coffey, a retired deputy police chief, who was shot in the shoulder.

Coffey returned fire, hitting Vaughns in his left inner thigh.

Vaughns fled in a silver Toyota, but he later was taken into custody and treated at Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn. His condition was stabilized.

Vaughns, of the 7800 block of South Oglesby Avenue, was charged with attempted murder, attempted armed robbery, aggravated battery, unlawful use of a weapon and violating parole.
After a string of South Side fires were set within blocks of each other, a mans body was found in a garage in the 2100 block of West 21st Street. The fires dotted the Heart of Chicago neighborhood early on Sept. 16, 2016. (Jose M. Osorio / Chicago Tribune) (Jose M. Osorio / Chicago Tribune/Chicago Tribune)

A man was killed and about two dozen people were driven from their home in a string of fires set within blocks of each other in the Heart of Chicago neighborhood early Friday, police and fire officials said.



At least seven separate fires were reported around 3 a.m., apparently set in alley trash cans that spread to garages and at least one home in the West Side neighborhood, according to officials.

The scene of a fatal garage fire in the 2100 block of West 21st Street on Sept. 16, 2016. (Jose M. Osorio / Chicago Tribune)





"The whole alley was red," said Jessica Ocampo, standing a few houses down from a fire in the 2200 block of South Blue Island Avenue.

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The fatal fire was in the 2100 block of West 21st Street, where a man was found dead inside a garage. Police were conducting a death investigation, and police refused to release any other details.



A few blocks away, in the 2200 block of South Blue Island Avenue, about two dozen people were displaced from their home after a fire in a residential building. No injuries were reported.

Chicago police help investigate a fatal arson in the 2100 block of West 21st Street, where a body was found in a garage early on Sept. 16, 2016. (Jose M. Osorio / Chicago Tribune)





The other fires were reported in the surrounding blocks, including in nearby garages in the 1700 block of West 21st Street, the 2100 block of South Wood Street and the 1800 block of West 21st. Nobody was reported injured or displaced in those fires.



Ocampo said she was lying down when she heard what she thought was a pipe bursting. She heard sparks and then felt the heat from the fire. Fearing it would spread to her backyard, Ocampo called her uncle, who stores his vehicles at their home.

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Crews respond to a fire in the 2200 block of South Blue Island Avenue early on Sept. 16, 2016. At least eight people were displaced after a fire started about 3 a.m. Friday. (Megan Crepeau / Chicago Tribune)





Ocampo's mother, Sandra Ocampo, said she was woken up by a noise that sounded like fireworks. She thought it was part of a celebration for Mexican Independence Day until she got out of bed and saw police in the neighborhood.

As she watched firefighters, she was amazed. "How many engines are here?" she said. "My God."



She has lived in the neighborhood since the 1970s and remembers when vehicles would sometimes be set on fire in the alleys. She thought that was the case early Friday until she saw the apartment building down the street on fire.
Vincent Smart, from left, and Dontelle Mohead were two of the six inmates Chicago businessman and former mayoral candidate Willie Wilson, at podium, bailed out of jail Sept. 15, 2016. (Phil Velasquez / Chicago Tribune)

Dontelle Mohead, 28, was one of six people bailed out of jail Thursday by former mayoral candidate Willie Wilson as part of his Good Samaritan Bond Pilot Project.

Taking photos with clergy, politicians and Wilson near the Leighton Criminal Court Building, Mohead grinned and exclaimed: "I feel like a celebrity!"

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Mohead, who was being held on a charge of financial identity theft, said he didn't believe it was real when he was told Wednesday afternoon that he would be getting out of jail. Wilson bonded him out for $500.

The project, funded by Wilson, will help inmates charged with misdemeanors who can't afford to post bail.

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"When I was running for president, I was talking about prison reform so I decided, look, stop talking, go in your pocket and help," said Wilson, adding that he hoped to set an example.

Wilson announced in June 2015 that he would run for president as a Democrat but failed to secure the nomination. He emphasized that his project was not about politics but "about human lives."

Marcellus Blackwell Sr. broke into a smile Thursday when he talked about seeing his children for the first time since he'd been incarcerated two weeks ago for a misdemeanor charge of street gang contact by a parolee. He was also bonded out for $500.

"You really don't get opportunities like this, especially in Chicago with all the crime and the misjudgments of character, so when they gave me a chance, I really didn't know what to do," Blackwell said. "I couldn't sleep all night, I was just so happy."

Wilson originally planned to commit $15,000 but promised Thursday to put $50,000 toward bailing out inmates through 2017. Wilson said he was provided a list of potential beneficiaries by the Cook County sheriff's office and plans to have diverse recipients because the project was not "a black thing" but "a human thing." He hopes to bail out up to 5,000 people by 2017.

The Cook County Jail has 344 detainees who need $1,000 or less to be released. Of that, 188 people, or 55 percent, are charged with misdemeanors, according to Cara Smith, chief policy officer for the sheriff's office.

"We were delighted to work with Dr. Wilson, and the individuals that have been released will receive services and support through the sheriff's supportive release program where we will do our best to ensure their success in the community and their compliance with future court dates," Smith said.

Sharlyn Grace, criminal justice policy fellow at Chicago Appleseed Fund for Justice and co-founder of Chicago Community Bond Fund, praised Wilson for bailing out the inmates. However, she said she believes that wider scale policy changes also need to be implemented. The Chicago Appleseed Fund for Justice is a social impact research and advocacy organization focused on court reform, and the Chicago Community Bond Fund is a nonprofit organization that posts bonds for those who cannot.

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"The private charity model is no substitute for the systemic reform that we need," Grace said. "(Pretrial detainees) are not posing a threat and they're there simply because they cannot pay that money. That situation needs to be remedied and that is going to require policy change."

Clergy and politicians attended the news conference, lauding Wilson's project as an "antiviolence initiative" and encouraging people to join in.

Wilson said he hopes the beneficiaries of the project will take advantage of this "second chance" and commit to programs that will have a positive affect on their lives, such as going to local churches for support and guidance.

But some of the inmates have had previous brushes with the law, committing misdemeanors and felonies.

Blackwell was charged with felonies in the past, including burglary and aggravated battery of a peace officer.

Vincent Smart, another beneficiary who was bonded out for $500 after being charged with retail theft, also has had past felonies, including burglary and retail theft.

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Wilson said the future was "out of (his) hands" and he entrusts them to God.

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The other inmates included:

Kevin Nesbit, who was bonded out for $500 after being charged with criminal trespass to vehicles.

John Quesada, who was bonded out for $350 after being charged with retail theft.

Russell Miller, who was bonded out for $500 after being charged with criminal trespass to vehicles.

The total amount of their bonds was $2,850. Wilson also gave $200 to each person for food and necessities, bringing his contribution to $4,050 Thursday.

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gwong@chicagotribune.com

Twitter @GraceWong630
With the Chicago Teachers Union mulling a possible walkout as early as next month, another school contract fight is unfolding outside the spotlight that could result in a strike at one of the city's largest charter school networks.

Educators at the UNO Charter School Network, a chain of campuses that's enrolled about 8,000 students and was once run by the clout-heavy United Neighborhood Organization, are careful to say they're not sure if they'll schedule a strike authorization vote, much less a walkout. But United Educators of UCSN leaders have scheduled what a bargaining team's spokeswoman described as an informational meeting.

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"It's all about the members, the members have to decide," said Erica Stewart, who helped organize the charter's union and teaches fifth grade at the network's Cisneros campus in the Brighton Park neighborhood.

"None of us want to strike, nobody wants to put the families through that," Stewart said. "But when management is not really giving us a chance, or listening to us or treating us with respect, then it's something that might be considered."

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The unionized charter teachers aren't part of the CTU. They're represented by the Chicago Alliance of Charter Teachers and Staff, a branch of the American Federation of Teachers. Teachers at each unionized charter network operate under separate contracts negotiated with each school operator.

The roughly 400 UNO charter teachers are fighting in entirely different legal territory from the one that sets rules for how and when the CTU's teachers can strike. But that hasn't deterred the CTU from giving some significant help to their charter brothers and sisters.

Robert Bloch, the CTU's attorney and one of its top negotiators, is at the bargaining table for UCSN's teachers. A CTU field representative has helped UCSN teachers organize, as part of a 2015 deal with the teachers union representing several of Chicago's publicly-funded but independently-operated charter networks.

The charter teachers' demands align with the CTU, including calls for pay raises and preserving a practice where the school system pays the bulk of teachers' pension contributions.

"With only weeks to go before the contract expires, the parties have very significant differences and there's no indication yet that they'll be able to bridge those questions," Bloch said.

For the CTU, a walkout would upend a conventional notion that charters can operate outside the influence of organized labor.

"The basic story is that the charter schools are now coming within the rubric of regular public education and they're finally getting organized," Bloch said. "To me, that's a sea change in the way that they're going to be operating. That they're going to have to account for the collective voice of their staff."

Andrew Broy, head of the Illinois Network of Charter Schools, cried foul about CTU's involvement. He calls it a conflict of interest because CTU has tried to negotiate a limit with CPS on the number of charter schools that could open.

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"It's no secret that the Chicago Teachers Union is gladly anti-charter, now they're at the bargaining table negotiating against charter school management," Broy said. "It's a way to undermine the charter movement, no doubt about it."

The charter school network is working through a divorce with UNO, after matters including a contracting scandal and trouble with the Securities and Exchange Commission ousted former CEO Juan Rangel.

The school network did not respond to a request to interview Chief Executive Officer Richard Rodriguez. But the organization emailed families Friday to say the school network would continue to negotiate with its union and intended to "provide a reasonable compensation package  to our teachers and all of our staff."

jjperez@tribpub.com

Twitter @PerezJr
Then-state Rep. Ron Sandack participates in a legislative hearing on the Neighborhood Recovery Initiative at the Bilandic Building in Chicago on Oct. 9, 2014. (Phil Velasquez / Chicago Tribune)

SPRINGFIELD  When a top ally of Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner abruptly resigned this summer blaming fraudulent social media accounts and politics getting "too ugly," there was much head-scratching, eyebrow-raising and theorizing among the Capitol crowd.

Then-state Rep. Ron Sandack was a firebrand on the House floor unafraid to tear into what he perceived as shortcomings of Democratic leadership and Speaker Michael Madigan, so the departure was unexpected.

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Those wondering what the heck happened got some answers Friday, courtesy of a police report and mea culpa statement from Sandack himself: He left amid an extortion scam in which he twice wired money to the Philippines after engaging in "inappropriate online conversations" with a woman who contacted him on Facebook.

The fake social media accounts popped up after Sandack accepted a friend request and exchanged several messages on Facebook with an unknown woman, who later demanded money.

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"This past July, I was the target of an international crime ring focusing on high-profile individuals luring them to engage in inappropriate online conversations with the intent of extortion," Sandack said in a statement released Friday. "I took their bait and fell for it hook, line and sinker."

Sandack's disclosure came roughly an hour after Downers Grove police released a redacted report about the case after ending an investigation into the matter this week. Police said no charges were forthcoming because the offender is in the Philippines, where the case has been referred to local authorities.

According to the police report, Sandack said the scam began on July 7 after he received a friend request from an unknown woman on Facebook. They exchanged a few messages, but Sandack did not hear from her again until July 12, when they messaged for about three hours that afternoon. Toward the end of that conversation, Sandack indicated he was using his computer at work in St. Charles, where he is a partner in a law firm.

Shortly after, the woman called him on Skype. Sandack told police the woman was in her early 20s with long black hair and her appearance did not match the photos attached to the Skype and Facebook accounts. The next morning, she sent a message making an unspecified demand, which resulted in Sandack wiring money to the Philippines via Western Union later that day.

The specific demand, and the amount of money Sandack sent, were redacted from the report that Downers Grove police released Friday in response to an earlier public records request. On July 14, Sandack was contacted again with demands for more money.

The lawmaker told police he initially ignored the request until he was alerted that several fraudulent social media profiles were created in his name, at which point he contacted Facebook to shut down the pages. He again sent an unknown amount of money, this time via MoneyGram, before walking into the Police Department to file a report later that evening.

Sandack temporarily turned over a laptop to police, saying he needed it for court the following day. He also provided screen shots of conversations with the woman, exchanges that were also blacked out in the report.

Sandack announced his resignation from office on July 24, saying "cybersecurity issues" made him re-evaluate continued public service. The next day, he told the Tribune that he stepped down because politics is getting "too ugly." Asked then if any compromising information was accessed before he deleted his social media accounts, Sandack said "no."

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On Friday, Sandack said the matter was not related to his position and the laptop was not state property.

"Poor decisions on my part enabled me to be a victim and, as a responsible citizen, I reported it and have been working with the police throughout their investigation," Sandack said. "I'm human. I made a mistake for which I am remorseful and ashamed, especially because I have hurt my family, and there is no greater self-inflicted wound than that."

Sandack is married and has two children. Before joining the General Assembly, he served as mayor of Downers Grove. The six-year lawmaker was an outspoken defender of the governor, serving as Rauner's floor leader where he was well-known for his passionate debates with Democrats across the aisle.

He often continued those arguments online through his Facebook and Twitter accounts, and even appeared in a segment on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show," where he said Democrats were to blame for Illinois' budget impasse.

Sandack first joined the Legislature in 2010 when he was appointed to fill the Senate seat of Dan Cronin, who stepped down to serve as DuPage County Board chairman. Sandack moved to the House in 2013 and was up for re-election Nov. 8 against Democratic attorney Greg Hose, also of Downers Grove.

David Olsen, a Downers Grove Republican and College of DuPage board member, has since been appointed to fill Sandack's seat in the Illinois House and take his spot on the ballot.

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A Rauner spokesman declined to comment Friday. The governor has declined to weigh in on Sandack's departure  a sharp contrast to the kind words he offered former Sen. Matt Murphy, another top ally who recently announced his resignation to join a public affairs firm.

Sandack is not the first DuPage County politician to become embroiled in controversy over inappropriate online activity. In 2013, the former police chief of Villa Park lost his bid to become mayor after he acknowledged that photos that surfaced on an Internet sex site, of a man staring into a webcam and of exposed genitals, were of him, prompting the candidate to apologize to his family and supporters.

mcgarcia@chicagotribune.com

jmahr@chicagotribune.com
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, attends a press conference with French President Francois Hollande, after the EU summit in Bratislava Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. The EU summit, without the participation of the United Kingdom, kicked off the discussion on the future of EU following Brexit. (Ronald Zak / AP)

With policy splits among European Union countries putting their bloc under existential threat, national leaders agreed Friday on a six-month time table to come up with solutions for the multiple crises hobbling their union. But they delivered few concrete commitments on ways to bridge the deep differences.

While not on the agenda, Britain's decision to leave the EU hung over the meeting, reinforced by the absence of British Prime Minister Theresa May. But the 27 leaders attending talks in the Slovak capital had plenty of other divisive issues to discuss: Migration, a common European defense policy, worrying unemployment and the anemic state of the economy

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In the end, the leaders committed to have a clear roadmap of the way ahead and some practical results when they meet in late March to mark the 60th anniversary of the EU founding Treaty of Rome in the Italian capital.

"Europe can, must move forward, as long as it has clear priorities: protection, security, prosperity and the future of the youth," said French President Francois Hollande in a joint news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

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Merkel called the current situation in the EU "critical," not only because Britain voted in June to leave the EU, the first ever member to do so.

She noted the migration crisis and economic problems that have fed growing disenchantment with the EU among many member states. Still, she said there was a common willingness to bounce back beyond the many issues that divide and even anger individual EU nations.

EU Council President Donald Tusk agreed, saying the mood in the EU now was "sober but not defeatist."

Still, comments by some leaders as they left the meeting suggested hard work ahead.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, the staunchest opponent of liberal EU migration policies, again blamed Germany for refusing to set limits on migrant arrivals under Merkel. Unless Berlin caps arrivals, he said, the flood will continue "because everyone sees ... that there is a place in Europe where the good life can be achieved, where they are welcomed and where their needs are taken care of."

Orban said Hungary should be praised instead of criticized for erecting a razor-wire barrier at its southern borders. "Our job is to stop at the Hungarian border the negative consequences of the suction effect of German domestic politics," he said.

The refugee emergency has been particularly divisive and Orban has been one of the most abrasive voices as he makes common cause with other countries to the East  Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Poland  to oppose solutions coming out of EU headquarters in Brussels.

At the end of a "difficult day" of consultations, Orban said the good news is that all 27 remaining EU members said they would stay in the union and work together to improve it. But he complained that the current "self-defeating and naive" migration policies would remain.

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Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, whose country holds the EU's rotating presidency, frankly acknowledged the divisions. "There are different views, different ideas," he said. "We need to be more concrete in the future."

Still, some of Orban's allies noted recent give by Brussels on the notion of mandatory refugee resettlement.

"It is of great importance that we are leaving today with a new political agenda that will open the process of EU reforms," Poland's Prime Minister Beata Szydlo said. "We are opening the process of reforming Europe."

Others also noted some progress in discussions on how to heighten security and defense cooperation, secure external borders and get Europe's unemployed youth back to work.

EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said a decision was taken to award 108 million euros ($121 million) in emergency funding to Bulgaria for border management at one of the most porous borders, with Turkey  a decision praised by Orban. Other EU nations committed extra equipment and personnel.

Added urgency for EU reform comes from planned elections in France and Germany next year where far-right and populist parties are seeking to exploit uncertainty generated by Britain's decision to become the first country to walk out of the EU.

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Hollande is trailing in the polls ahead of next May's French presidential elections. His far-right opponent from the National Front, Marine Le Pen, has already said she will call for an in-out referendum on EU membership if she wins.

Europe's weak economy also hampers EU efforts to make common cause. Greece remains in the zone of EU nations using the euro after its third international bailout. But it is still struggling to deliver on its promises to creditors. How to deal with the euro's problems remains divisive  on one side are pro-austerity countries led by Germany, on the other, more social-minded governments.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, whose country has been at the center of the region's debt crisis and seen the arrival of hundreds of thousands of migrants, mostly from Turkey, over the last year, said things cannot continue as they are.

"What Europe should not do is to continue sleepwalking in the wrong direction," he said.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, whose country was one of the EU's founders, insisted internal quarrels were not new.

"When we started with six nations, they were there too," he said. "We have to make sure we can fix them."

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Hillary Clinton on Thursday accused rival Donald Trump of fostering ugliness and bigotry by refusing to acknowledge President Barack Obama was born in the United States, and urged Hispanic leaders to stoke a large voter turnout in November's election.

Taking the stage shortly after Obama, Clinton noted at a gala of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute that Trump had declined to acknowledge the outgoing president had been born in the United States. Trump, who helped fuel the rise of the so-called "birther movement," told The Washington Post in an interview that he would "answer that question at the right time. I just don't want to answer it yet."

"He was asked one more time where was President Obama born and he still wouldn't say Hawaii. He still wouldn't say America," Clinton said. "This man wants to be our next president? When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?"

Clinton's comments came as Trump refused to say that Obama was born in Hawaii during a new interview with The Washington Post's Robert Costa, despite his campaign aides' suggestion that he had abandoned his "birtherism."

"I'll answer that question at the right time," Trump said. "I just don't want to answer it yet."

The Trump campaign released a statement late Thursday saying Trump "believes that President Obama was born in the United States." It also made an unsubstantiated accusation that Clinton launched the birther movement during her unsuccessful primary run against Obama in 2008.

Obama and Clinton made successive appeals to 3,000 Hispanic leaders and supporters, pointing to a large turnout of Latino voters as the antidote to Trump. Both noted the Republican's hard-line position on immigration, referencing his opposition to a comprehensive overhaul of the system and his vows to build a wall along the Mexican border.

Obama said the political season's discussion of immigration "has cut deeper than in years past. It's a little more personal, a little meaner, a little uglier." He said Latinos need to "decide who the real America is" and push back against the notion that the nation "only includes a few of us."

"We can't let that brand of politics win. And if we band together and organize our communities, if we deliver enough votes, then the better angels of our nature will carry the day," Obama said.

Clinton vowed again to complete Obama's unsuccessful push to achieve comprehensive immigration reform, including a pathway to citizenship for the estimated 11 million immigrants who are in the country illegally. She reiterated her intention to release a plan to overhaul the immigration system during her first 100 days in office and expand programs that have protected some groups of immigrants from deportation, including those who arrived in the U.S. as children and the parents of U.S. citizens and legal permanent residents.

Pointing to the benefits of a diverse nation, Clinton seized upon Trump's unwillingness to say Obama was born in the United States and his past support for the "birther" movement questioning Obama's citizenship.

"We need to stand up and repudiate this divisive rhetoric," Clinton said. "We need to stop him conclusively in November in an election that sends a message that even he can hear."

While the president and his potential successor did not appear onstage together, they did chat for about 15 minutes backstage. The event represented a passing of the torch before a key Democratic constituency.

Obama captured 71 percent of Latino voters against Republican Mitt Romney in 2012, a lopsided outcome that Clinton hopes to replicate with about eight weeks remaining before Election Day. Facing tightening polls against Trump, Clinton's ability to garner big margins from Hispanics could be critical in battleground states such as Florida, Nevada and Colorado.

The president made no mention of Trump by name but alluded to his candidacy, saying if the nation is going to fix the immigration system, "then we're going to have to push back against bluster and falsehoods and promises of higher walls. We need a comprehensive solution."

Obama's attempt to shield parents from deportation is in limbo after the Supreme Court deadlocked on a decision in a case challenging the president's authority to expand the deportation protection program.

The president is ramping up his campaign activities on behalf of Clinton. Obama headlined his first solo event for his former secretary of state earlier this week in Philadelphia, and will appear alongside her at a dinner for the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation on Saturday.

The Associated Press and Washington Post contributed to this report.


In 2000, Sandra Isenstein was part of a delegation to St. Petersburg, Russia, to rededicate the ORT school there. (Family photo / Handout)

Sandra Isenstein was a North Shore stay-at-home mom with four children in 1953 when she joined Women's American ORT, now known as ORT America.

Founded in Russia in 1880 to teach employable skills to impoverished Jews, ORT America (ORT being an acronym for Organization for Rehabilitation through Training) is today a volunteer organization of schools, institutes and programs in 37 countries.

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The nonprofit group also promotes international human rights, women's issues and works with more than 300,000 students annually.

"It was a way to feel like an adult, not just a mother," Isenstein told the Tribune in 1995. "It was stimulating to be with my peers."

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Isenstein, 88, who was a member of ORT America for more than four decades and went on to serve as its national president, died of natural causes on Sept. 1 in a hospice care facility in Boston, her family said. She and her husband moved from their home in Highland Park to Edgartown, Mass., several years ago, her family said.

"Sandy was a visionary, who clearly saw how the world was changing and was very instrumental in helping our organization adapt to those changes," said Linda Kirschbaum, who recently stepped down as president of ORT America. "She was extremely intelligent, always curious and very organized  and it showed."

Born Sandra Meitus on Chicago's North Side, Isenstein's father was a Russian immigrant. After graduating from Senn High School, she earned a bachelor's degree in journalism from Stanford University.

In 1950, she married Marvin Isenstein. The couple lived in Evanston for a short time before settling in Highland Park, where they raised their family.

Looking for an activity that was challenging and stimulating, Isenstein joined ORT America. She became president of the Midwest district, before serving as national president from 1991 to 1995.

She led overseas delegations to ORT schools and programs in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, France, Iran, Israel, Italy, Morocco, Peru, Russia and Uruguay.

During her tenure as national president, Isenstein established the President's Young Leadership Council, made up of 12 career women from across the United States, aimed at increasing development of young leadership.

"That means that a young person doesn't feel like she has to spend her whole lifetime working her way up, and that way we hope we're getting the best and brightest people," she told the Tribune in 1995.

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In 2000, Isenstein was part of a delegation to St. Petersburg, Russia, to rededicate the ORT school there. She was a delegate to several World ORT congresses, an officer of the World ORT Union and a member of the American ORT board of directors.

"My grandmother respected people who voiced their opinions  whether or not they aligned with her own," said her granddaughter Libby Isenstein. "And what I learned from her about asserting myself has definitely helped me be more successful in my career and otherwise."

Isenstein also is survived by her husband; three sons, Mark, Burton and Joel; a daughter, Betsy; and nine other grandchildren.

Services were held.

Joan Giangrasse Kates is a freelance reporter.
Jeffrey Leef is a Republican and a political novice who decided to challenge Chicago's Democratic machine by running for Congress. He had no expectation of defeating incumbent Rep. Danny Davis, whose 7th district hasn't elected a Republican in 70 years. This was an idealistic pursuit by a citizen in defense of the endangered two-party system in Cook County.

Besides, what could possibly go wrong?

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The answer, recounted to us by Leef, comes with much rueful chuckling because wow did he learn a lot about the bare-knuckle nature of Illinois politics and the sorry imbalance between the Democratic and Republican parties in Chicago. Oh, he also learned what it feels like to be the surprise focus of a federal court case, because that's where Leef's quixotic campaign landed. His little experiment in democracy was in danger of getting crushed like a bug, and that just wasn't right. It seemed  un-American.

"Every citizen has the right to run for elected office," he says.

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Leef's story, a version of "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" set in the opaque world of Chicago ward bosses, started March 15, primary Election Day. Pulling a Republican ballot to vote for John Kasich for president, Leef was disheartened to see so many uncontested races, including a blank space where there should have been a GOP challenger or two seeking the nomination to run against Davis. Leef, a University of Chicago radiologist from River Forest, decided to do his part. He'd run for the House seat.

Because Leef would be entering the race after the primary, the process required getting nominated by party committeemen. The Chicago GOP was on board, so Leef showed up at the scheduled meeting feeling excited and patriotic. He thought more people should do this! But the scene that unfolded was like nothing in a civics textbook. There was a lot of angst in the crowd. Then yelling. It was ugly. Leef was witnessing what will go down in the annals of Chicago political history as the Great Committeemen Scandal of 2016.

The background: Committeemen are elected officials, but local Republican leaders failed to recruit enough trusted members to run, leaving many wards open to unfamiliar candidates and potential shenanigans. Worried that Democratic operatives could infiltrate their ranks by running as Republicans, the Chicago GOP amended its bylaws just before Election Day to rule as ineligible committeemen who voted in Democratic primaries the preceding eight years. They gave 13 newly elected committeemen the boot. But some of the newcomers showed up at the meeting anyway, causing the ruckus.

Leef got the nomination, and later secured enough signatures to get on the ballot. But before he could put up lawn signs or receive a single donation, an ousted committeeman filed an objection to his candidacy with the state Board of Elections. All Leef wanted was to get his campaign rolling, but now he was caught in the crossfire of bizarre allegations of dirty tricks and the existence of what came to be known as the case of donkeys in elephants' clothing.

When the Chicago Board of Elections took up the case, it seemed inclined to defer to the ousted committeemen. Leef was dumbfounded. He was about to get kicked off the ballot by people who claimed to be Republicans. "Why would they try to stop a guy from running against a Democrat who usually runs unopposed? It makes no sense."

Suspicious minds can postulate: A lot of unseemly things happen in Illinois politics. The ousted committeemen could have been real Republicans. Or they could have been infiltrators. Knocking a little guy such as Leef off the ballot would allow Democrats to focus resources on other contests. Committeemen act as election judges, so there was another motivation for Democrats to sneak across party lines. What a shameful situation, thought Leef, yet this was the very reason he chose to get involved: to protect the institution of two-party politics. "We've come to the spot in Illinois where it doesn't matter if you are Republican or Democrat  you can't run for office unless you've been anointed by the Chicago machine," he says.

Chicago Republicans, stunned by the election board's position, sued in federal court. They argued in part that the First Amendment's guarantee of freedom of association gives Republicans the right to decide who's eligible to be a committeeman. The case moved forward quickly, but Leef's campaign still was held in limbo all summer.

The decision, rendered by Judge Milton Shadur, on Sept. 14, provided a fitting climax to this little drama. He sided with the Republicans, saving the humble candidate's place on the ballot. Jeffrey Leef will run for Congress after all.

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With so little time before Election Day, Leef knows his campaign can go only so far. But he also knows he beat the odds by getting past his Democratic foes and staying on the ballot. So really, he's already won. "You have to look for small victories," he tells us.

Score one for democracy in Cook County too.

Join the discussion on Twitter @Trib_Ed_Board and on Facebook.
Members of the Chicago Police Department stand outside the entrance to police headquarters as protesters lay on the ground chanting Friday, August 5, 2016, in Chicago. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)

A question to Chicago aldermen, re police accountability reforms: Do you get that this is your job?

Less than two weeks before a City Council vote, Mayor Rahm Emanuel's plan to overhaul the police oversight system is still taking shape. City Hall is working to address what we agree are serious deficiencies in Emanuel's proposed ordinance.

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But the City Council is the legislative body here. Why are you behaving as if your role is to simply vote up or down on the mayor's plan?

Where is your plan?

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We've said before that the mayor's ordinance is a good start. The Independent Police Review Authority, which almost never finds cause to discipline a police officer, would be gone. It would be replaced by the Civilian Office of Police Accountability, or COPA. The new agency would investigate a broader scope of complaints against officers and would recommend policy changes based on patterns it identified in those investigations.

The ordinance also would create a deputy inspector general to audit the Police Department and its oversight system.

That all looks nice on paper. But these good intentions will cost money. The mayor's ordinance doesn't address funding for COPA. It doesn't mention adding money to the city inspector general's budget to cover the costs of a deputy to oversee the police.

COPA will be charged with handling thousands more cases than IPRA. To do its job, it doesn't just need more money  it needs a guarantee that City Hall and the City Council can't take that money away.

The fatal flaw in Chicago's police oversight system has been its lack of independence. That was starkly obvious as City Hall struggled to contain the damage over the police shooting of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald. Emails obtained by reporters showed former IPRA chief Scott Ando triangulated constantly with Emanuel's Law Department and communications staff. Ando knew who was boss. If you doubt that he was right, remember that he's gone.

So no, you don't fix IPRA by calling it COPA and giving it more responsibilities. You wall it off from City Hall. You give it a fixed minimum budget. You let it hire its own attorneys  not just because the Law Department has a track record for meddling, but because city attorneys could be called upon to defend cops who are being investigated by COPA when they're sued in civil court. That's a serious conflict of interest.

At Tuesday's hearing before the Public Safety Committee, some of you challenged the mayor's top attorney, Stephen Patton, about these unresolved issues. He promised to get back to you.

These are important questions. They are also old questions. They have been asked and answered by others already.

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Emanuel's Police Accountability Task Force, whose work supposedly is the foundation for these reforms, recommended that IPRA's successor have a guaranteed budget of not less than 1 percent of the Police Department's budget.

Way back in April, Ald. Leslie Hairston, 5th, sponsored an ordinance that put the figure at 1.5 percent, and Ald. Jason Ervin, 28th, filed a measure that would set minimum funding for a police inspector general at 1 percent of the police budget.

There's a lot more to those measures, but neither of them ever got any traction.

Perhaps, aldermen, you could dust off those plans and discuss them while you're waiting for the mayor to flesh out his own. Hairston and Ervin filed a joint substitute ordinance Monday. It deserves to be part of the discussion, too.

Has anyone asked the council's independent Office of Financial Analysis for input?

What have you been doing?

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Yes, we know: You were hosting public hearings. Baby-sitting them, really. The overwhelming majority of citizens who spoke at those hearings were there to plead for more community control over policing and oversight. Much, much more.

They were neatly side-stepped by Emanuel's plan to deal first with the new oversight structure and later with the role of a community board.

So who exactly were those people talking to, aldermen? Where is the evidence that these critical reforms are being shaped by their input  or by yours?

If you want an ordinance that assures the police watchdogs will operate independently of City Hall, you should be doing more than sitting back waiting for City Hall to finish that ordinance.

Join the discussion on Twitter @Trib_Ed_Board and on Facebook.
A rapid review in case middle school was a long time ago: The Bill of Rights  the first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution  protects every American from unwarranted government intrusions and enshrines citizens' rights to speak and worship freely. The document, written by James Madison, distilled and displayed principles of a society liberated from tyranny. These rights flowed not vaguely to a society or individually to a monarch's favorites but to all Americans, regardless of station or circumstance.

The Tribune's agenda today isn't an exercise in constitutional history. Rather, it's a look through a comparable prism of principle at what all of us owe young Americans. As a new academic year launches and uncertainty roils Illinois' largest school district, we set out to explore the rights of Chicago's children  of America's children  to a high-quality education at public expense. And, whether you're a current student or a former one, we invite your help.

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Madison's Bill of Rights does not speak about children. It says not a word about a child's right to learn. About her right to great teachers. To safe, high-performing schools.

With no such amendment ratified in 1791 or in the two-plus centuries since, we think the nation's schoolchildren merit their own Bill of Rights  a declaration of what every child who crosses a public classroom threshold deserves.

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In our three-year New Plan of Chicago series, we've urged a dozen innovations to help this metropolis thrive. To create jobs, streamline government, curb crime and help struggling citizens gain the skills and education they need to succeed.

But none of that happens without the key driver: excellent schools for children.

What's true for Chicago's 652 schools and nearly 400,000 students is true in Atlanta, in Yakima, Wash., everywhere: When teachers, parents and administrators set high expectations and deliver a robust education, students succeed in life.

That's our preamble. Now, to the specifics of our Schoolchild's Bill of Rights:

1. High quality teachers for all students. One way to guarantee the best guides, instructors, in every classroom: Pay for performance. Teachers who catapult their students' academic success should expect fat bonuses in their paychecks. Teachers who don't should expect to find other work. Making this happen means unraveling policies that cement underperforming teachers in classrooms because of seniority, tenure, irrational labor contract protections or other protocols that assign more value to adults' career endurance than to children's educational needs.

2. School choice for all families. Districts shall make no laws and brook no proposals that squelch the expansion of high-quality charter schools. Charters that falter should be shuttered. Schools excel academically, or they go out of business. The public education industry should view ethnic, parochial or other private schools not as threats but as alternatives that enrich and diversify a community's educational offerings.

3. Even more choice than that. We believe students in failing schools should be able to choose state-funded vouchers to attend private schools. We believe states should allocate some educational funding into ESAs, Education Savings Accounts, that help parents pay tuition and other expenses in public or private schools. And that companies should be eligible for credits if they direct part of their state taxes to nonprofits that provide student scholarships.

4. The best chance to graduate. That means schools should exploit Big Data systems that drive results. For instance: Chicago Public Schools freshmen now are tracked to make sure they don't fall behind academically. Those who need extra help thus are identified and ostensibly receive it promptly. The result is record, and rising, CPS graduation rates. More of that formalized intervention, please, throughout Illinois and nationally. And while first-year success is especially vital, many students similarly struggle as academic demands increase in subsequent years. Catching those students, too, before they fall, or fail, out of school should be routine nationally. It isn't.

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5. No interruptions to the school year. Chicago teachers are girding for a strike if their contract demands aren't met. In many states, teachers can negotiate aggressively over a contract but cannot strike. Strikes harm students. Why not independent arbitration  or some other way  to fairly settle teacher-management disputes? Put another way: Why should students pay when adults can't agree?

6. Parents who get  and stay  involved. Some districts allow parents to take over failing schools via so-called "trigger laws": That is, parents can change the administration of an underperforming public school. Other districts coax parents via personal appeals, parental "report cards" and online tools that help them track their children's progress. The University of Chicago, for instance, is set to unveil a powerful new online tool that will help parents and teachers boost kids "to and through" college. The intimate involvement of parents plainly separates many successful school communities of all types from schools where almost all of the burden falls on professional educators. No matter how much America improves what occurs within its schools, it will never be enough: No school district can substitute for parents who won't turn off the TV, stow the cellphone and read to their children or help them with homework.

7. Farewell to yesteryear's schools and protocols. Follow the money  by the billions: American public education is an enormous real estate venture where, too often, students and employees share structures that are the wrong size or shape for functional education in the 21st century. Illinois public officials in particular have chronically caved to demands that they not close underpopulated schools or consolidate small districts or shrink the number of middle-management educrats. The sheer number of districts (and lavishly paid superintendents and assistant superintendents and ...) should shrink to meet today's needs, not yesterday's conveniences. And individual schools should be combined or reconfigured so that limited resources can serve the student populations they have  not the ones they used to have. In Chicago, that means more schools that empty out as neighborhood residents relocate will have to close. And soon. Schools don't exist in perpetuity; they exist to serve students. And student populations aren't static.

Schools exist to serve students. Those five words are the philosophical foundation of our Schoolchild's Bill of Rights. Turning these aspirations into realities would re-energize schools that serve some students well but churn out others who aren't prepared to build their futures.

To help us improve or expand on this document, see the accompanying request for your proposed amendments.
See the winner here.

Blog Extras:

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"C'mon in, the lyin's fine."

Kurt Gubitz, Chicago



"I am glad it is a tuck and not a layout."

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Carter Greene, Lincolnwood

"LOOK OUT!!!....Here comes Rahm's water TAX!!!"

Forrest C. Shields

"Rhinosplashy "

Jason Gansauer, Michigan City, IN

"Now we're both on the endangered list!"

Clare Frances Newell, Chicago

"Well, Rahm and my alderman will be happy. More water to fill my pool, more taxes to fill their pension debt."

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Laura Otto, Mt. Prospect

"There's plenty of room in the budget pool, Rahm. Just add more water. "

M. H. Noland, Willowbrook

"Oops! I forgot about the city's new water tax!"

Tom Pawela, Geneva:

"Just what we need: a third-party entering the election."

Brent Hoffmann, Chicago

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"Splish splash, here's a new water tax!"

Gary Katz, Long Grove

"Hey Joe Six Pack, you're about to get hosed !!"

Sally Hunt, Palos Heights:

Cannonball Splash Tax, Cha-Ching!

Pat Trunda, Cary
The Homestead National Monument of America Education Center welcomed individuals from a variety of countries throughout the globe for its second naturalization ceremony of the year on Friday.

Twice a year, the newly approved United States citizens gather at the Homestead to receive their certificates as prominent figures in Nebraska welcomed them as Americans.

This is not an easy thing to achieve, said U.S. District Judge John M. Gerrard, who was keynote speaker for the event. It takes time, money, perseverance and patience. To hand these certificates out is one of the most enjoyable aspects of being a judge. I hope that you will preserve your heritage and culture, for America is blessed with a variety of cultures that help enrich our own.

The ceremony was highlighted with music from Judy Anderson, special messages from U.S. Senators and Congressmen and remarks from Homestead Superintendant Mark Engler.

The Homestead was one of the first National Parks to partner with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services for Naturalization Ceremonies and since then, it has become common at national parks throughout the country, said Ken Zarybnicky, Supervisor with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCI) in Omaha. It is just a natural fit because of how embedded in this countrys culture national parks are.

The Homestead hosts two Naturalization Ceremonies a year and Park Ranger Susan Cook estimates that this was the parks 20th in the past decade.

To be approved for citizenship, an individual must be cleared and eligible, interview with a member of the USCI, and pass a test of 10 questions. Those looking to apply are given 100 possible test questions and 10 are chosen at random. To pass, the individual must answer six correctly.

There were over 20 individuals that were approved for citizenship at Fridays ceremony and while their home countries may have been different, each one is now a citizen of the United States.

I am very happy to be an American, said Birhanu Bedane from Ethiopia. Im working here in Nebraska and have a very good life."

Bedane has lived in America for five years and works at a farm in Crete. After the ceremony, all the new citizens were given the opportunity to register for the upcoming election, which he was very excited to be a part of.

Everyone has a dream to be an American and I am enjoying being in America, said Abdirashid Salan from Somali. I am much happier to be part of this great country.

The ceremony coincided with Constitution Day in America, which celebrates the adoption of the Constitution and those who have become U.S. citizens.
The first Chinese Film Festival in Italy kicked off in Milan on Thursday, with a top selection of movies, and a series of forums to address the evolution of China's film industry.

The festival will run at the Space Odeon Cinema in Milan until Sept. 18, while related events will also take place in Venice, Rome, Florence, and Turin, according to the organizers.

Some 40 films will overall premiere during the gala, and the selection would include the best of Chinese movies released in recent years.

Milan was chosen as host-city not only for his reputation as economic and financial capital of the country, but indeed because here lives the largest, and oldest Chinese community of Italy.

"The festival aims at providing a cultural bridge between the 'new citizens' and their 'hosts' through the universal language of cinema," the organizers said.

As such, it would offer a chance of dialogue and discussion to all those who love cinema, arts, and visual language, among both Italians and Chinese.

The event also took inspiration from Italy's long tradition in cinema.

"Besides being the 'cradle' of the Renaissance, Italy also gave birth to one of the most prestigious film festivals in modern times," the organizers added.

"The Venice Film Festival, which was established in 1932, is now one of the most relevant at European and global level. It is our role model and ultimate goal in the future," the organizers added.

Some 20 professionals and experts will contribute to the festival side-events in order to address the developments of China's film market, which is expected to become the world's largest in about two years.

This rapid evolution will be discussed through different perspectives, such as the Chinese market's growth in terms of production and distribution, and the current increase in the number of theatres in China.

Chinese contemporary movies will also be analysed in terms of contents, as a way to convey the social, cultural and economic evolution of China's society to the Italian audience.

The selected movies would compete in three different sections, including a main movie competition and a documentary section.

Prominent cinema professionals from both China and Italy will constitute the Festival's jury, including Chinese director and Berlinale Silver Bear Jury Grand Prix winner Wang Xiaoshuai, Italian Academy-Award winner production designer, art director, and costume designer Dante Ferretti, and Italian cinema journalist Maria Pia Fusco.

Along with the best movie award, and best documentary award, the jury will confer a prize to the best director, best screenwriter, best actor and actress in competition.
A leading Chinese nuclear power company, China General Nuclear Power (CGN), welcomed the British government's approval of the Hinkley Point C power plant Thursday.

"We are delighted that the British government has decided to proceed with the project. We will continue to work with our strategic partner French EDF to develop nuclear power projects at Hinkley Point, Sizewell and Bradwell, and provide safe, reliable and sustainable low-carbon energy for the U.K.," CGN's spokesman Huang Xiaofei told Xinhua

The U.K. government said it had confirmed the Hinkley Point C nuclear power plant will go ahead following a new agreement with the French company EDF.

With total investment of 18 billion British pounds, Hinkley Point C will be the first nuclear power plant in the U.K. for more than 20 years. It will provide 7 percent of electricity for the country.

According to an agreement between the Chinese and French company, a CGN-led Chinese consortium holds a one-third stake in the project.

The regulatory approval by the British government is a historic step and a stepping stone for Chinese nuclear companies to gain market access to developed economies.

Two months ago, the British government surprisingly halted the project and called for a review of the program. CGN said in July that it respected the British government's decision, and they have been fully committed to providing safe and reliable energy for Britain.

"CGN is very glad and fully capable of providing technical support and contributing its experience to the Hinkley Point project," said He Yu, company chairman.

Chinese nuclear companies will also greatly benefit from cooperating with partners with advanced technology and valuable experience, he said.

"There is great market potential for nuclear power in the global market," said Yang Maochun, deputy director of international cooperation at CGN.

There is global demand for over 200 nuclear power stations, he said.

CGN is the world's fifth largest nuclear power provider in terms of operating capacity. It has cooperated with EDF for over three decades, the company said. h According to an agreement between CGN and EDF, the Bradwell project plans to use the Hualong One design, China's third-generation nuclear reactor design, after the technology passes British regulatory inspections.

Two power projects using the technology started construction in eastern Fujian Province and southern Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region last year.

Several countries, including Thailand, Indonesia, Kenya, South Africa, Turkey and Kazakhstan, have shown interest in the Hualong One design, CGN said.

"Every step we make in nuclear program in Britain will have an exemplary effect. Emerging markets will further cement their confidence in the Hualong One design," Huang said.
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French President Francois Hollande(R) welcomes German Chancellor Angela Merkel at Elysee Palace in Paris, France on Sept. 15, 2016. French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Thursday pressed European partners to set an agenda of reforms to overcome difficulties that Brexit has triggered. (Xinhua/Theo Duval)

French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Thursday pressed European partners to set an agenda of reforms to overcome difficulties that Brexit has triggered.

"What we want is to face the causes which had led UK leave. What we must have in mind is to give to the Europeans a clear view of what will be their future," Hollande said in a joint press meeting with Merkel.

With that aim, the French president called for a roadmap of reforms at the informal EU summit whose "first priority is security ... our border security, our security against external threats."

On the eve of the EU gathering in Bratislava, Merkel, on her visit to Paris, expressed "a real willingness to move forward."

"It is now about applying an agenda for Bratislava that makes clear we are determined to react together to the weaknesses, to the tasks we face," she added.

On Friday, European leaders will meet in the Slovak capital, the first meeting since Britain quit the European Union. They will discuss ways to better handle immigrants flows, boost growth and create more jobs for youth.
Athens, Greece has been named Athens, Greece has been named

World Book Capital 2018

"for the quality of its activities, supported by the entire book industry" by UNESCO director general Irina Bokova on the recommendation of an advisory committee, which includes representatives of the International Publishers Associations, the International Federation of Library Associations & Institutions and UNESCO. The city was also lauded for its "cultural infrastructure and its expertise in organizing international events."

Cities designated as UNESCO World Book Capital promote books and reading, as well as organize activities over the year starting April 23 with the celebration of World Book and Copyright Day. The purpose of 2018's initiative is "to make books and reading accessible to the whole population, including to migrants and refugees."

This year's World Book Capital is Wroclaw, Poland, and next year's will be Conakry, Guinea.

via Shelf Awareness
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A police officer responding to a robbery report killed a 13-year-old black boy with a BB gun later Wednesday in Columbus, the capital city of Ohio, police said on Thursday.

According to Columbus police's statement, Bryan Mason, a police officer who shot and killed a man in 2012, was investigating a report of an armed robbery of 10 U.S. dollars Wednesday night when Tyre King, a 13-year-old black boy, pulled a BB gun from his waistband. The police officer fired and the boy pronounced dead in hospital after the shooting.

Andrew Ginther, Mayor of Columbus, said "there is something wrong in this country, and it is bringing its epidemic to our city streets," regarding the death of the boy a "call to action for our entire community."

There has been no evidence that Tyre King is related to the robbery.

The family of the boy called for a fair and independent investigation into his death.

Columbus police said on their Facebook account that the officer involved did not have a body cam when shooting the boy, which may make the investigation difficult.

People gathered on Thursday near the scene of the shooting, some of them carrying signs calling for justice for Tyre, according to a report by the Associated Press.

The public is comparing Tyre's death to the fatal shooting of a 12-year-old black boy in 2014 in the state while Columbus police rejected the comparison, saying that "the only thing similar in nature is the age, race and outcome."

Agence France-Presse said citing officials that Tyre's death "marked the 13th police-involved shooting in Columbus so far this year, five of which have resulted in deaths of suspects and another that killed an officer."

The black boy's death was preceded by several police-involved fatal shootings across the United States this year. These shootings put the use of force by police into question and some of them have prompted protests against racial discrimination and obsession with guns.

On Aug. 13, a confrontation between police and protestors turned violent in Milwaukee in the north central U.S. state of Wisconsin, after a police officer shot and killed an armed 23-year-old man.

On July 17, three gunmen killed three police officers and wounded several others in a shooting incident in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. One gunman was shot dead by the police, and the other two are still on the run.

On July 7, a 25-year-old sniper named Micah Johnson ambushed and killed five police officers and wounded seven others and two civilians in downtown Dallas, Texas. He was shot dead by the police.

On July 5, two black men were shot dead by police in Louisiana and Minnesota, which sparked angry protests by African Americans across the nation against police brutality and racial discrimination.

On March 27, a native American woman was killed by an Arizona police officer. The shooting has prompted protests by native American activists.
Mr OBrien is an established New Zealand poet and artist and the 2015-16 Stout Memorial Fellow. This lecture draws on a chapter from a book he has been working on during his fellowship, titled which analyses the way paintings and poems can speak to, for, and of a place. In 2012 Mr OBrien was awarded the Prime Minister's Award for Literary Achievement (Non-fiction). The same year he received a Laureate Award from the Arts Foundation of New Zealand. In the New Year's Honours, 2013-14, he was awarded a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to the arts.
An employee works on ballerina Cendrillon shoes at the production workshop in the Repetto factory in Saint-Medard d'Excideuil, southwestern France. [Photo/Agencies]

The expansion of ballet studios in China is encouraging French ballet clothes manufacturers to introduce their premium designs to a booming market with the help of local distributors.

Former professional ballet dancer Christophe Ridet recalls that his ballet wear company Wear Moi first started with the purchase of a sewing machine in Hong Kong in 1991, while he was on tour there with his wife.

When the French dancer retired a year later he decided to put the sewing machine to good use, to create customized ballet and musical-related clothes for his wife and other professional dancers.

Nowadays, Wear Moi is present in more than 50 countries, having entered the Chinese mainland market in April 2014 with the help of local distributor Weimo Ballet.

The French brand, which is expanding fast in China through an online store, is seeing that leotards remain the most popular product in their mainland customer's shopping baskets.

Additionally, the company notes that its light grey ballet clothes are a hot-selling item in the country as Asian women believe that it enhances their hair and skin tone.

This year, the company forecasts a healthy 30-40 percent increase in revenues.

"The increase in sales is not just a reflection of more people practicing ballet, it also shows that more ballet dancers are spending a higher amount of money on premium clothes," explained Christophe Ridet, founder of Wear Moi. "It is still a very promising market".

For Wear Moi, the adoption of ballet as an alternative workout and the fact that an increasing numbers of ballet studios in China are opting to use imported brands for their uniforms, are helping to drive sales up.

Emma Wang, director of the Beijing-based Morning Star Ballet studio, notes that the market for ballet clothes has changed dramatically in the last few years thanks to the addition of new foreign brands.

"When I was a professional dancer 20 years ago, it was really hard to find ballet wear in China," she said.

"Our school or the ballet company had to provide the clothes for us. We could only buy our own clothes if we traveled abroad. Now professional and amateur dancers have plenty of options to choose from," Wang added.

French pret-a-porter company Repetto entered the Chinese market in November 2014 with the inauguration of its first shop in Shanghai helped by Swire Resources, its exclusive distributor in the country.

Repetto now has six stores in China, is distributed in Shanghai, Beijing and Chengdu and has signed partnership agreements with ballet schools in these cities to promote its brand.

Looking ahead, the company plans to expand the number of stores to meet the growing demand for ballet clothing in the country.

"The first Repetto outlet store opened in Shanghai Village near Disneyland", noted Clara Chan, a representative of Swire Resources. "We are actively investigating good and suitable locations for potential new Repetto stores."

Although Repetto sells a wide a range of products in China, including dance wear and conventional city bags and shoes, the French brand's timeless Cendrillon ballerina pointe shoes remain its most popular item in stores in the mainland.

Additionally Repetto notes that other ballet clothes, such as mousseline skirts and leg-warmers, are also popular among adult women in China.

"We do see the potential demand for affordable luxury products and ballet products", explained Chan. "Consumers know more international brands and are also seeking more unique and personalized shopping experiences."

This year revenues generated by Repetto's dance products, including ballet wear and pointe shoes, have been growing at more than 60 percent in China compared to last year.

And the company is optimistic about the future, as more women in China are learning ballet for either artistic reasons or to lose weight and correct posture.
A girl receives a doctor's review in a hospital in Chengdu, Sichuan province, before going through a cosmetic surgery. [Photo/China Daily]

The scale of the cosmetic surgery sector is surging in China, with more and more movie stars and young consumers having the procedures. More internet startups and O2O platforms have started to join the sector.

The output value of the sector reached 535 billion yuan ($81 billion) in 2014 and is expected to top 1 trillion yuan in 2019, with an annual growth rate of 15 percent, according to a report by Industrial Securities this year.

Still, privately-owned agencies dominate the market, and it has been difficult for them to become strong household names or brands. Unknown institutes have to compete for customers by spending big money, usually 60 to 70 percent of their profits, on advertising.

"Internet platforms emerged as a new way for cosmetic surgery institutes to attract customers, as traditional advertisers and the search engine Baidu Inc are costing them too much," said Lou Jun, vice president of China-focused venture capital funds IDG Capital Partners, news portal jiemian.com reported.

Lou last year led the investment in mdl.com, an online community and e-commerce platform for people to learn and share cosmetic surgery related information.

"Such an online-to-offline platform about cosmetic surgery will help the industry to cut its advertisement and promotion out of Baidu.com. This is like what Dianping.com, China's biggest online food service rating website and a key information provider, did with the catering business," Lou said.

In China, over 80 percent of cosmetic surgery consumers are women, and those aged between 18 and 30 account for over 60 percent of the total, according to an industry report.

The O2O model, despite a rather small business unit in the cosmetic surgery industry, is seeing some front runners in terms of their funding sizes and overall rankings. SoYoung.com, gmei.com, yuemei.com and mdl.com are the top four O2O platforms in the market.

They all developed in similar ways. First, they established communities for users to share experiences and doctors to give professional advice, then they launched O2O e-commerce services. The difference between the rivals did not show up until recently, when they went through rounds of financing.

SoYoung.com was the first to finish the series C round of funding. It started by hiring a huge number of Chinese students studying in South Korea to translate South Koreans' diaries that documented their personal experiences of having plastic surgeries.

Tan Xingjiong, deputy director of the internet branch at the Chinese Association of Plastics and Aesthetics, said: "The biggest challenge of the cosmetic surgery sector is gaining the trust of consumers. After all, it is a sector with certain risks and slow growth. The O2O platforms need a long time to obtain consumers' trust."
Chinese local brands are outperforming western brands, but Chinese women's appetite for South Korean beauty products continues, according to an industry report.

According to a report on Facial Skincare released by Mintel Group Ltd this month, domestic companies including Pehchaolin Daily Chemical Co Ltd and Shanghai Shangmei Cosmetics Ltd saw significant gains in market share. Intensive investment in mass marketing and distribution channels has helped both companies grow rapidly in the short term. Booming e-commerce has also helped both companies to acquire more users without opening physical stores during the last five years.

More importantly, consumers have realized local brands are better value for money than most of the international brands. Mintel has tracked the product usage in 2015 and 2016.

Facial cleanser remains the most used product among both women and men. Facial masks have replaced moisturizers and have become the second most used product after cleanser. Chinese women's appetite for K-beauty continues.

Some 33 percent said South Korean brands are their most often purchased brands, which rank the highest amongst all listed countries of origin. Chinese women are enthusiastic fans of cosmetics endorsed by South Korean celebrities, particularly those popular with young audiences aged 20-24. They are tempted to buy skincare brands used by leading actors in South Korean TV dramas. Chinese women have established a distinctive association of brands from different countries.

As a result, their purchase motivations are driven by these distinctive perceptions. The facial skincare market was worth more than 91 billion yuan ($13.7 billion) by the end of 2015, a year-on-year growth of 11.5 percent. The robust growth of domestic brands as well as brands from South Korea has expanded the market size further.

Looking ahead, the market will continue to see strong growth supported by the demand for the anti-aging and antipollution products.
A staffer checks a fiber-optic cable at Latamfiberhome Plant in Duran, Guayas province, Ecuador, on Aug 26, 2016. [Photo/Xinhua]

MEXICO CITY - Many more Latin Americans are plugged into the Internet than ever before, according to a study released this week by a United Nations agency.

Between 2010 and 2015, the percentage of Latin American households connected to the Internet nearly doubled, to 43.4 percent, the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) reported earlier this week.

That matters immensely to the digitalization of the economy of Latin America, a region that is still struggling to develop, and that can no longer rely on its abundance of natural resources to drive growth, especially at a time when the price of raw materials on the international market is notably low.

"We cannot wait for commodities prices to rise again," the director of ECLAC's Production, Productivity and Management Division, Mario Cimoli, told a regional technology conference held in San Jose, Costa Rica on Monday and Tuesday.

"It is necessary for countries to increase their productivity, and that can only be achieved by digitalizing the economy and productive business activities," added Cimoli.

As one of Latin America's leading trade partners, China has been helping the region do just that through both private- and public-sector ventures.

China's leader in telecommunications, Huawei, has been providing solutions to regional telecom services for 18 years, and also offers training and scholarships to Latin America's next generation of techies.

E-commerce giant Alibaba has expanded to the region, making life easier for connected consumers, and web behemoth Baidu is launching a support and mentoring scheme for Brazilian tech startups as it continues to drive its expansion strategy in the country.

Less than a month ago, China's ambassador to Ecuador, Wang Yulin, was on hand to help inaugurate the country's first fiber optics factory, built in the coastal province of Guayas with Chinese cooperation.

The new plant is part of Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa's push to expand Internet access by laying down more fiber optic cables. His government has already connected 32.8 percent of all households by laying down 66,000 kilometers of cables.

The plant, named Latamfiberhome, is the result of a joint venture by Ecuador's Holding Telconet and China's Fiberhome Technologies.

"With the infrastructure ready, we only need to begin using the plan to set up the brilliant future which awaits us," said Holding Telconet's Executive President Tomislav Topic.

"Starting from today, we will be able to export fiber-optic cables made in Ecuador, with Ecuadorian talent and manpower as well as Chinese technology," said Ecuador's Vice President Jorge Glas.

The plant is projected to manufacture 1 million kilometers of fiber-optic cable a year once it is fully operational in 2019.

Ecuador, which currently imports cables worth around 15 million U.S. dollars a year, estimates that it will export cables worth 20 million dollars a year. This joint venture will provide the telecommunications services and high technology to be needed by Latin America.

Baidu, China's web giant, "is launching a support and mentoring scheme for Brazilian tech startups ... to identify salable ventures in the country," Brazil-based technology reporter Angelica Mari wrote Monday in ZDNet.

Through the program, Baidu aimed to give startups a boost with its "experience, traffic, and connections within Brazil and internationally," wrote Mari.

What's in it for Baidu? A "10 percent stake in the capital of the companies selected in the program," she said.

Global telecommunications technology and equipment provider Huawei, which has 18 years of experience in the Latin American market, has helped regional telecom operators expand their businesses as it has grown its own.

The company has been working closely with top local telecom operators like VIVO and TIM in Brazil, Claro in Peru, Movistar in Mexico and Tigo in Paraguay to provide consumers with customized terminals and favorable mobile service packages.

Helping lower prices has been key to expanding Internet access, according to ECLAC's report.

"In terms of affordability, while in 2010 the cost of contracting a fixed broadband service of 1Mbps (megabits per second) represented about 18 percent of average monthly income, by early 2016 that figure had fallen to 2 percent. Affordability also increased significantly for users of prepaid data packages. In several countries, these packages lasting 30 days cost less than 2 percent of income," the UN agency said.

In Colombia, Huawei provides customized telecommunications technology service to main local mobile telecom carriers; in Brazil, six out of seven 4G mobile networks were constructed by the company.

Huawei has also begun to partner with local universities and governments to promote research and innovation.

In 2014, Huawei provided two cloud computing systems to facilitate education development in northern Brazil, offering platforms for online teaching and information sharing.

In a meeting this July with Argentinean President Mauricio Macri, Huawei's chairwoman, Sun Yafang, said her company was considering more investments in the country and is planning to open a Training Center.

The center would initially aim to train some 500 employees, local partners and industry collaborators, and potentially expand into a research and development facility for Latin America, similar to the ones Huawei has in Germany, Sweden, Britain, France, Italy, Russia, India and China.

Huawei famously runs "Seeds for the Future," an educational program that has provided college students around the world, including in Latin America, with scholarships to study information and communications technology.

ECLAC's report, titled "The State of Broadband in Latin America and the Caribbean 2016," was presented at the Conference on Science, Innovation and Information and Communications Technologies, held Sept 12 and Sept 13 in San Jose.
Nearly 112, Dong Jimin joined the Chinese resistance soon after the September 18th Incident in 1931. [Photo by ZOU HONG/CHINA DAILY]

Editor's note: Almost 85 years ago, the Japanese army engineered the September 18th Incident near Shenyang, Liaoning province, and launched an invasion of Northeast China. This was followed by a full-scale invasion, triggering the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression (1937-45). Three veterans of the war, with a combined age of more than 300 years, spoke to our reporter and recounted what it was like to take up arms against the invaders.

Zhang Daqian has had a remarkable life, not the least in its longevity. He is a carpenter who experienced the horrors of war, survived, and now, at more than a century old, the 102-year-old reflects on a life rich in experience beyond the imagination of many.

Working with wood, he said, required a calculated approach, be it shaving or crafting the piece, being careful not to waste any and knowing when to stop. "But none of these 'calculations' compare to the one I made decades ago, on the battlefield in Shanxi, in northern China," he said.

That was in 1943, six years into China's War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression (1937-45). Zhang, an artillerist, in fact the only artillery specialist in his squad in China's Nationalist Army, found himself face to face with an enemy soldier.

"This may sound surreal today, but it was just him and me. We were separated by about 100 metersboth armies had been dispersed by all the fighting, I suppose. I had a gun, with one bullet left. And from where I stood, behind some low earthworks, I could clearly see that he was also holding a gun."

Zhang had to think quicklyhis life depended on it.

"We stared at each other for a few seconds. Then I told myself, 'Don't panic. He has only one bullet.' How did I know? Because if he had two, he would have shot me," he said. "I took off my military cap, put it on a stick, which I thrust skyward."

The Japanese soldier, probably too nervous to see and think clearly, fired. The bullet hit the cap. "I guess he thought the cap was me. It took him two seconds to realize his mistake," Zhang said. "And off he fled. I didn't fire."

These days, with both his wife and only son having passed away, Zhang is living a quiet, if not lonely, existence in Pingdingshan, Henan province. Still agile, he cooks for himself, something unthinkable for most people his age. From time to time, his nephew, Zhao Jianguo, visits. "My uncle doesn't even remember the number of times bombs and shells exploded near him," Zhao said.

Zhao told of one particular moment when his uncle's life hung in the balance.

Zhang and his squad were overwhelmed by the enemy, Zhao said.

"When the fighting ended, a team of Japanese soldiers came to inspect the battleground. My uncle, too feeble to run, hid himself under the body of a fellow Chinese soldier," he said. "He was lying there, immobile. Then all of a sudden, a bayonet went through the dead body on top before stabbing my uncle in his right leg."

The pain was overwhelming, but Zhang remained still and did not utter a sound. The Japanese soldiers left, sure in their minds that all the Chinese soldiers had been killed. Later, under cover of darkness, Zhang fled into the mountains and tried to stop the bleeding with his limited knowledge of Chinese herbal medicine. He survived and later rejoined the army.

But then his luck ran out. He was captured by the Japanese in Shanxi province and thrown into a labor camp in Hebei province about 200 kilometers away.

"My uncle had been a carpenter before joining the army. So the Japanese asked him to make wooden barrels. But this type of carpentry he had little idea about," Zhao said, adding that his uncle never mentions those days, as they are too painful to discuss.

The only story the old man has shared with his nephew involved a failed escape attempt. "A small group of interneesabout 15 peoplebuilt an underground tunnel that was about four meters long and led directly from the camp yard to the outside," Zhao said. "It took them four entire months since they were only able to work during the change of guards that took place a few times a day."

On the eve of their planned escape, they were betrayed.

"The traitor must have been among us," said Zhang, who saw three of his fellow internees beaten to death during interrogation.

For movie buffs with a keen interest in World War II history, the horror of such interrogation could be glimpsed through the 2013 British-Australian war film The Railway Man, starring Colin Firth as Eric Lomax, a real-life British officer captured by the Japanese in Singapore during WWII and tortured at a POW camp for building a radio receiver from spare parts.

World of darkness

At age 95, Song Yupu has also lived a life that, at times, saw him exposed to inhumane treatment.

Joining the army in 1941, Song was captured during a battle in the summer of 1942, when his 800-member regiment was rounded up by 5,000 Japanese in Shandong province, eastern China. "About 200 Chinese soldiers died by the end of the fighting. The rest of us were captured," Song recalled. "I was put into a truck with about 40 other people, heading for a place unknown."

At around midnight, the truck stopped. "It was dark, and we waited until the next morning, only to be driven into another world of darkness where we would remain for all our waking hours for the next few years."

That was the underground world of the iron mines, deep in the mountains of Northeast China's Jilin province, occupied by Japan since 1931.

"Every morning, we were driven into the tunnels before dawn, and were only able to return long after sundown to our living quarters, where 30 men slept on the floor in one room," Song said.

Cave-ins happened quite often, according to Song. And when illness struck, many of those overworked, malnourished young men, mostly in their early 20s, were too weak to survive. "Once so robust, they broke like chopsticks," Song said. "Of all the people in that truck, only three eventually went out of the mountain alive."

Song was one of them. And he did so by fleeing the deathtrap two years ahead of Japan's defeat in WWII. "I tried twicethe first time was just a few months after my arrival at the mine. I ran into the mountains with a couple of fellow captives, before realizing that all roads down the steep slope had been blocked by the Japanese," he said. "When night came and the bitter cold set in, we were left with two choices: to die in the wild or to return to the camp. We chose the second."

Fortunately for them, the man who was directly in charge of all the captives was a Chinese who harbored secret sympathies for the young men, so the punishment handed out was not as severe as it might have been.

Song decided to make another escape attempt two years later, in 1943. "As laborers, we were allowed to write to our families. So I wrote a letter to my parents back in Shandong asking whether they knew anybody from our village who had moved to Jilin in the previous years. It turned out that there was one," he said.

Song's parents wrote back, telling their son the exact address of his fellow villager in Jilin. Song immediately wrote to that man, notifying him of his coming. "I made no mentioning of my life at the labor camp. And he assumed that I was a traveling businessman," Song said. "Then one day, I fledat that point, I knew my surroundings well enough that no turning back was necessary."

For two days solid Song walked until he stood right before the door of his savior, 100 km from the camp site. "I told him everything. He let me rest for a few days before getting me a pass through his connections," Song said. "Then I took a train that took me to my parents."

Japan officially surrendered to China on Sept 9, 1945. Song, who had experienced too much to stay in his little village in Shandong, came to Beijing the following year. He became prop manager of the newly-founded Peking Opera Company, where he worked until retirement.

For the past 70 years, he has been living in his small courtyard home just a few minutes' walk away from Tian'anmen Square, the symbolic heart of the country. He has problems with his legs and he can barely walk. "I believe the origin of the pain lies in the days spent digging iron ore in the dark, damp tunnels," he said.

However, Song said the scene that had seared the most indelible impression on his mind was not one of suffering, but one of loss.

"I still remember the way our captain fell during our last battle, in the blinding sunlight of the day. He was hit by a bullet," Song said. "We were merely two meters from each other. In fact, I had never been that close to him before that pointphysically and mentally."

In times of war, questions of life and death can be almost academic. Death can arrive at any time and no plans can be made for life beyond the battlefield. Death is not something to be scared of, but something to be accepted, said Dong Jimin, who, incredibly in December this year will turn 112.

"Death was just an integral part of life that could come at any time, with or without an emphatic note," he said.

Lives cut short

Dong joined the Chinese resistance soon after the September 18th Incident. That day in 1931, Japanese military personnel detonated a small quantity of dynamite close to a railway line owned by Japan. The explosion was so weak that it failed to destroy the track and a train passed over it just minutes later. But the Imperial Japanese Army accused the Chinese of causing the blast and responded with a full invasion that led to the occupation of Northeast China, then known as Manchuria.

Decades later, on Sept 3 last year, when China held a grand military parade to commemorate the end of WWII, Dong watched the live TV broadcast at home. His son, Dong Xiwu, will never forget what happened next.

"When the vehicle carrying veteran soldiers came into view, my father propped himself up on the back of a chair and saluted."

For Song, every ceremony serves as a reminder of lives cut short in an instant and of young men never allowed to age.

"A young man, my fellow inmate at the labor camp, once talked to me about his plans to run away," Song recalled. The man died in the mine after part of it collapsed. "He said to me, 'I have to get out of hereI'm engaged'," Song said.




Quan Deyuan recounts bringing 36 Japanese war criminals to trial to students at the Military Tribunal Site for Japanese War Criminals in Shenyang, Liaoning province. [Photo by LIU CE/CHINA DAILY]

It is easy to find reminders of war in Shenyang, capital of Liaoning province. The Military Tribunal Site for Japanese War Criminals in the downtown area is one of them. The city was occupied by the Japanese army during World War II.

"The September 18th Incident was the beginning of the Japanese invasion of China, and the military trial in Shenyang was a part of the process of ending the aggression. The Chinese War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression (1937-45) began in Shenyang, and also ended in the city," said Wang Jianxue, chairman of the September 18th Incident Study Research Institute.

In 1956, the government set up the tribunal site to bring 36 Japanese war criminals from World War II to trial. All 36 criminals pleaded guilty, including Suzuki Keiku, lieutenant general and commander of the 117th Division of the Japanese army, and Rokusashi Takebe, chief of general affairs of "Manchukuo".

"All the criminals pleaded guilty in the face of overwhelming evidence. And they never expected that Chinese people would be able to return good for evil because none of them were sentenced to death. Some of them even knelt down in court to apologize to their Chinese victims," Quan Deyuan recalled. Now, 84, Quan was the assistant judge at the trial.

After graduation from law school at Peking University in 1954, Quan became a law teacher in Liaoning. He was selected to take court records because he was a law major and could speak Japanese.

"All the procedures of an international court were followed. According to international practice, lawyers should wear dark suits, white shirts and leather shoes. But this was in 1956, no one in China wore clothes like that, so they drew a great deal of attention when they were walking down the street."

Quan remembered clearly that on the first day of the trial on July 1, the chief judge announced to the defendants: "During the process of the trial, you can ask questions to the witnesses. You can defend yourself. Also, you have the right of a final statement."

The most unforgettable thing for Quan was the witness testimony. "A woman, whose 4-year-old daughter and mother-in-law were killed, even tried to pounce on the Japanese criminal. According to witnesses, the Japanese used numerous horrible ways to kill innocent civilians. It brought tears to my eyes in court," he said.

That's also the reason that Quan and many people couldn't understand the light sentence Japanese criminals received at that time. The war criminals were sentenced to prison terms ranging from eight to 20 years.

"However, my supervisor reminded me that these criminals used to be ordinary people. It was the Japanese government that was ultimately responsible for the war. Forgiving them was more meaningful than killing them. They could serve as envoys of friendship between the two countries in the future," Quan recalled.

"Time has proved he was right."
BEIJING -- Typhoon Meranti has left seven people dead and another nine missing in eastern China's Fujian Province, the local government announced Friday.

Meranti, the largest typhoon this year, made landfall in Xiamen at 3:05 am Thursday, with a maximum 15-grade wind force bringing extraordinary rainstorms.

By 7 am Friday, the typhoon had forced 331,000 in Fujian to relocate. The typhoon also destroyed 1,600 houses, damaged 22,200 hectares of crops and inflicted direct economic losses of 1.7 billion yuan ($249 million).

The Ministry of Civil Affairs and the National Commission for Disaster Reduction has dispatched work teams to assess the damage and help with rescue work. Local authorities were also required to carry out immediate emergency aid and relief.

Fujian provincial government has so far allocated 60 million yuan in living relief for affected people.
The ongoing China-Russia naval exercise in the South China Sea should not be taken out of context by other countries since it is a regular annual drill and does not target a third party, a senior Chinese navy officer said on Friday.

"Some people and countries are pointing fingers at this (joint drill), and I think they harbor malicious purpose with too much imagination, which is not necessary at all," said Rear Admiral Yu Manjiang, vice-commander of the Nanhai Fleet who is commanding the joint exercise.

It's natural that the drill takes place in the South China Sea because the two countries have already held joint exercise in other Chinese waters including the country's North Sea and East Sea region.

The drill, "Joint Sea-2016", is being held in the eastern waters of Zhanjiang, the southernmost city of Guangdong province, where the Nanhai Fleet under the People's Liberation Army Navy is headquartered.

The annual China-Russia joint naval exercise is the fifth of its kind between the two sides since 2012. Last year, the drill was conducted in two phases: in the Mediterranean in May and then in the Peter the Great Gulf, the waters off the Clerk Cape, and the Sea of Japan in late August.

The joint exercise has "significant political meanings and military value", which is going to deepen pragmatic cooperation between the two countries' military authorities, Yu said.

The joint drill completed its first phase of land training on Thursday and has entered the second phase of maritime operation.

Ten Chinese Navy ships - destroyers, frigates, landing ships, supply ships and submarines - are participating in the drill, as well as 11 fixed-wing aircraft, eight helicopters, 160 marines and amphibious armored equipment.

The Russia's big anti-submarine ships Admiral Tributs and Admiral Vinogradov, the big amphibious ship Peresvet, the sea towboat Alatau, and the tanker Pechenga are attending the drill.

The drill will highlight real combat, digitization and standardization to promote naval cooperation.

During the drill, the two naval forces will undertake defense, rescue, and anti-submarine operations, in addition to joint-island seizing missions and other activities.
Premier to demonstrate China's increased diplomatic clout at UN, speak with executives in New York, start a new chapter in relations with Canada, and make a first of its kind visit to Cuba

China Daily

More details have emerged on Premier Li Keqiang's upcoming debut at the UN General Assembly, a trip that will include Li meeting his Canadian counterpart and becoming the first Chinese premier to visit Cuba in more than half a century.

The whirlwind of activities will take place in an 11-day journey that starts on Sunday.

The premier is expected to expound on Beijing's viewpoints regarding the international order, development and global governance at the annual general debate of the UN session, kick off a meeting between Chinese and Canadian premiers that is set to become a regular event, and most likely meet with legendary Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro, according to diplomats and analysts.

While attending the 71st session of the UN General Assembly between Sunday and Wednesday, Li is expected to tell the world how China has delivered on the promises President Xi Jinping made at last year's session, Yang Xiyu, a researcher at the China Institute of International Studies, said on Friday.

At the UN Sustainable Development Summit last September, Xi said China would establish an assistance fund for South-South cooperation, with an initial pledge of $2 billion to support developing countries. Xi also announced China's decision to establish a 10-year, $1 billion China-UN peace and development fund to support the UN's work at last year's UN session.

During the annual UN session this year, China will release a country report on implementing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development  the first country to release such a report. It follows the action plan formulated at the recent G20 meeting in Hangzhou for implementing the agenda, which is a blueprint for ending poverty and hunger, promoting equality and protecting environment for the years leading up to 2030, according to Yang.

"The presence of Chinese president and premier at the consecutive UN sessions indicate China attaches great importance to the UN and supports the organization in playing its role," Yang said.

During his stay in New York, the premier is expected to attend the general debate, and chair a symposium on the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and China's ways of doing that.

He is expected to announce "pragmatic moves" in support of the work of the UN and in addressing global challenges such as terrorism, refugee crises and infectious diseases, Vice-Foreign Minister Li Baodong said this week.

Also on the agenda is a meeting to be hosted by the Economic Club of New York, a nonprofit membership organization with members drawn from the top executive levels of business, industry and finance.

"This public diplomacy arrangement indicates the premier wants to have close contact and direct conversations with people in business, finance and industry circles," Yang said.

The premier will then fly to Canada for a flurry of activities, including meeting Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Ottawa, and attending an economic and trade forum in Montreal, according to sources with the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

In their meeting in Beijing around half a month ago, the two premiers announced the two countries would launch an annual dialogue between both heads of government to boost bilateral relations and exchanges of views on international affairs.

"Li's visit will mark the official start of the dialogue mechanism, which indicates the two countries are well on the way to a more mature and stable relationship," Yang said.

While Li's visit to Canada was the first by a Chinese premier in 13 years, he would be the first Chinese premier ever to visit Cuba since Beijing and Havana established formal relations in 1960.

Liu Xiuqin, Chinese ambassador to the Caribbean country between 2010 and 2012, said Chinese presidents have all visited Cuba since 1993, each at least once, but none of its premiers has visited the island nation.

Premier Li's historic visit would result in enhanced political relations, and ramped-up cooperation in trade, she said.

Asked if Fidel Castro would meet Li, Liu said she believed that the former Cuban leader would surely meet the Chinese premier as long as his health permits.

Xu Shicheng, a senior researcher of Latin American studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, also predicted the meeting would happen.

Xu said that building on the traditional relations of the two countries, Premier Li's visit would lend a strong boost to bilateral trade.

The two-way trade between the two countries has remained about $2 billion in recent years, which Xu said doesn't match the momentum of their good relations.
They are born in the US to Chinese immigrant parents and sent to China to live with relatives until they are old enough to return to America to attend school. The trauma that both children and parents experience can be life long, Hong Xiao reports from New York.

Lindy Tse can't forget the first night when the couple brought her back to the US from Fujian province at age 4. She cried silently all night because she didn't want to cause them any trouble. She thought they were total strangers. They were her parents.

Tracy Lam still remembers feeling "unknown" when she was brought back to the US from China at the age of 5. She didn't know the two strangers standing in front of her, even though she called them "Mom" and "Dad".

Lindy and Tracy are "satellite babies" - children born in the United States to Chinese immigrant parents who worked long hours and couldn't afford child care. So they were sent back to China when they were infants, raised by relatives, typically grandparents, and returned to the US to enroll in school when they were 5 or 6. Some parents of satellite babies also choose to send their children back to China in part to preserve their culture.

It took one year for Tse to speak to her father. "I think it was because we both lost four years that could be important to our relationship," said Tse, now 16.

Lam, 17, said, "Sometimes I still feel a distant connection between me and my parents. I just don't know how to show my emotion to them."

David Chen's parents sent him to China's Fujian province to be raised by his grandparents when he was less than a year old. At the age of 5, Chen's parents brought him back the US to enroll in school in New York City.

'Suicidal thoughts'

Chen said the separation from his grandparents, the difficulties of learning English and a bully at school made him have suicidal thoughts in the third grade.

"I definitely had emotions bottled up. I kept everything inside," said Chen, now 24 and a medical student at Touro College in Middletown, New York.

When Chen lived with his parents, they worked 14 hours a day spread out at several restaurants, often seven days a week.

He said he didn't display his feelings or thoughts to them: "I didn't know who they were. They were strangers to me. I was pretty distant with them."

The term "satellite babies" was coined by Dr Yvonne Bohr, a clinical psychologist, and researchers at York University in Ontario, Canada, who have studied such separations since 2006.

"Babies are often sent away just around the time when they have just developed a strong attachment to their biological parents and as a result they may experience distress during[this] separation," Bohr told CBS News. "When they return, the parents in turn may expect the child to be very happy to be home, often not understanding that for that child this isn't home anymore."

In 2016, film director Jenny Schweitzer's nine minute long documentary Satellite Baby focused on the trauma that the children experienced after being shuttled between two worlds.

Lois Lee was featured in the film. She is the director of the Chinese-American Planning Council, a non-profit in the New York City borough of Queens, that provides childcare services and helps satellite babies adjust.

During her 45 years at the council, Lee has been working with immigrant families and helping thousands of children, including Tse and Lam (not their real names).

Working parents

Lee said most parents of satellite babies in New York work double-digit hours every day of the week and can't afford early child care, which averages $14,144 per year in the city.

"These young couples work long hours at jobs like restaurants, nail salons, grocery stores, dry cleaners and hotels, doing jobs that no one wants, and yet they can't get child care services for their families to keep the children here," she said.

Lee said a reunion can be difficult for both parents and child after the long-term separation they have experienced.

"They didn't see their child's first steps. They didn't hear them when they first learned how to talk. They lost five years bonding with their child," she said.

Even after they live together, the parents can't combine taking care of their child and working long hours for a better future for the family, Lee said.

"The parents still work till 9 o'clock; they even work in Connecticut, in New Jersey. They come home late, and the children have to eat dinner by themselves with prepared food," she said. "The children will wonder, 'Why did you bring me back here? You don't want to spend any time with me."'

She said the children feel guilty because their parents can't take care of them, and now they feel they are a burden to their family.

Lee said she doesn't expect the parents to create a family atmosphere like American families do by eating dinner together or carrying out a full set of bed time routines, but at least, they should talk to their children and try to understand each other. "They (children) need to know their parents love them and want to talk to them," Lee said.

For more than 50 years, CPC has been offering a free program for children from pre-K to fifth grade whose parents have a tight working schedule. She said 70 percent of the children now at CPC are Chinese Americans, and 70 percent of those children are satellite babies.

CPC is open from after school to 6 pm every school day and on holidays when public schools close. The staff helps children with homework, takes them to the beach, to a park, to movies - what parents normally would do but don't have time to do.

"We are like their substitute parents," Lee said.

To help solve problems in parent-child communications, CPC also has a class for parents to teach them how to communicate better with their children and how to discipline them.

Lee said the children show more understanding of their situation "because we talk to them".

"We try to help them embrace their identity, appreciate how hard their parents work, appreciate that their parents did not want to give them but they had no choice," she said

And now that they have you back, they are still sacrificing, which doesn't mean they don't love you."

Chen said that being a satellite baby has put a strain on his relationship with his parents, but that it also has made him more independent.

"It made me understand why my parents did what they did when I was younger, in terms of working hard and sending me to China as a satellite baby," he said.

Lois Lee (left), the director of the Chinese-American Planning Council, which helpschildren of Chinese-American immigrants adjust to life in America.Hong Xiao / China Daily David Chen's parents sent him to Fujian province to be raised by his grandparents when he was a baby. He returned to the US at age 5. Provided To China Daily

Children who were satellite babies sing, dance and play with toys at the Chinese-American Planning Council in New York City.Photos By Hong Xiao / China Daily

(China Daily 09/16/2016 page6)
Offering some human context around that fraught question, Tupuna Awa looks at the people and politics of the Waikato River. Marama Muru-Lanning introduces us to the way Maori of the region, the Crown and Mighty River Power have talked about water, ownership, stakeholders, guardianship and the river. Those conversations culminated in 2009 with a Deed of Settlement signed by Waikato-Tainui and the Crown that established a new co-governance structure for the Waikato River. By examining debates over water, Muru-Lanning provides a powerful lens into modern iwi politics and contests for power between Maori and the State.
An employee works on ballerina Cendrillon shoes at the production workshop in the Repetto factory in Saint-Medard d'Excideuil, southwestern France.[Photo/Agencies]

The expansion of ballet studios in China is encouraging French ballet clothes manufacturers to introduce their premium designs to a booming market with the help of local distributors.

Former professional ballet dancer Christophe Ridet recalls that his ballet wear company Wear Moi first started with the purchase of a sewing machine in Hong Kong in 1991, while he was on tour there with his wife.

When the French dancer retired a year later he decided to put the sewing machine to good use, to create customized ballet and musical-related clothes for his wife and other professional dancers.

Nowadays, Wear Moi is present in more than 50 countries, having entered the Chinese mainland market in April 2014 with the help of local distributor Weimo Ballet.

The French brand, which is expanding fast in China through an online store, is seeing that leotards remain the most popular product in their mainland customer's shopping baskets.

Additionally, the company notes that its light grey ballet clothes are a hot-selling item in the country as Asian women believe that it enhances their hair and skin tone.

This year, the company forecasts a healthy 30-40 percent increase in revenues.

"The increase in sales is not just a reflection of more people practicing ballet, it also shows that more ballet dancers are spending a higher amount of money on premium clothes," explained Christophe Ridet, founder of Wear Moi. "It is still a very promising market".

For Wear Moi, the adoption of ballet as an alternative workout and the fact that an increasing numbers of ballet studios in China are opting to use imported brands for their uniforms, are helping to drive sales up.

Emma Wang, director of the Beijing-based Morning Star Ballet studio, notes that the market for ballet clothes has changed dramatically in the last few years thanks to the addition of new foreign brands.
Myanmar's State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi meets with U.S. President Barack Obama at the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C., September 14, 2016. [Photo/Agencies]

WASHINGTON - US President Barack Obama on Wednesday announced his intent to restore trade benefits to Myanmar, saying Washington is ready to lift sanctions on the Asian country.

In a letter to Congress, Obama said he intended to reinstate preferential treatment for Myanmar under the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program, a preferential tariff system.

The move came as Obama hosted Myanmar State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi at the White House on Wednesday. The Myanmar leader is visiting the United States for the first time since her party won a sweeping victory in the general election last year.

After their bilateral meeting, Obama told reporters the United States is ready to lift sanctions on Myanmar.

"The United States is now prepared to lift sanctions that we have imposed on Burma for quite some time," said Obama, who later added that the move would come "soon."

"It is the right thing to do in order to ensure that the people of Burma see rewards from a new way of doing business and a new government," Obama said.

According to a joint statement by the United States and Myanmar, the United States will terminate the national emergency with respect to Myanmar and will revoke the executive order-based framework of the Myanmar sanctions program.

The move represents Washington's recognition of "the progress toward democratic transition that Myanmar has achieved, including through the election of a civilian-led government," the joint statement said.

Hailing the "remarkable" progress Myanmar has made, Obama said Suu Kyi is in a position to "begin shaping a remarkable social and political transformation and economic transformation" in the country.

"We have reached a point where, as President Obama said, people did not expect us to reach five years ago, although we were quite confident that we'd get there," Suu Kyi said. "But now we have to go ahead."

She also acknowledged that "there's so much that has to be done in our country," adding that the most important thing is national reconciliation and peace.

In May, the United States lifted some of the sanctions on Myanmar to show support for the country's political reforms and economic growth and to facilitate trade between the two sides.

The move eased restrictions on Myanmar's financial institutions, allowed certain transactions related to U.S. individuals living in the country, and removed seven state-owned enterprises and three state-owned banks from the U.S. blacklist.
BEIJING -- A police officer responding to a robbery report killed a 13-year-old black boy with a BB gun later Wednesday in Columbus, the capital city of Ohio, police said on Thursday.

According to Columbus police's statement, Bryan Mason, a police officer who shot and killed a man in 2012, was investigating a report of an armed robbery of $10 Wednesday night when Tyre King, a 13-year-old black boy, pulled a BB gun from his waistband. The police officer fired and the boy pronounced dead in hospital after the shooting.

Andrew Ginther, Mayor of Columbus, said "there is something wrong in this country, and it is bringing its epidemic to our city streets," regarding the death of the boy a "call to action for our entire community."

There has been no evidence that Tyre King is related to the robbery.

The family of the boy called for a fair and independent investigation into his death.

Columbus police said on their Facebook account that the officer involved did not have a body cam when shooting the boy, which may make the investigation difficult.

People gathered on Thursday near the scene of the shooting, some of them carrying signs calling for justice for Tyre, according to a report by the Associated Press.

The public is comparing Tyre's death to the fatal shooting of a 12-year-old black boy in 2014 in the state while Columbus police rejected the comparison, saying that "the only thing similar in nature is the age, race and outcome."

Agence France-Presse said citing officials that Tyre's death "marked the 13th police-involved shooting in Columbus so far this year, five of which have resulted in deaths of suspects and another that killed an officer."

The black boy's death was preceded by several police-involved fatal shootings across the United States this year. These shootings put the use of force by police into question and some of them have prompted protests against racial discrimination and obsession with guns.

On Aug 13, a confrontation between police and protestors turned violent in Milwaukee in the north central US state of Wisconsin, after a police officer shot and killed an armed 23-year-old man.

On July 17, three gunmen killed three police officers and wounded several others in a shooting incident in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. One gunman was shot dead by the police, and the other two are still on the run.

On July 7, a 25-year-old sniper named Micah Johnson ambushed and killed five police officers and wounded seven others and two civilians in downtown Dallas, Texas. He was shot dead by the police.

On July 5, two black men were shot dead by police in Louisiana and Minnesota, which sparked angry protests by African Americans across the nation against police brutality and racial discrimination.

On March 27, a native American woman was killed by an Arizona police officer. The shooting has prompted protests by native American activists.
After fears in recent years that London was losing its luster as a capital city in the fashion world, following an exodus of brands that went to show their products in the rival cities of New York and Paris, the British capital is back on the map.

Worries started when Alexander McQueen moved its show from London to Paris in 2002. Stella McCartney, daughter of British music legend Paul McCartney, also shows her eponymous brand in the French capital.

And an unwritten consensus started to form: Ambitious designers seeking international recognition had to go to New York, Milan, or Paris.

Even the timing of London's fashion week, awkwardly squeezed between those held in New York and Paris, did not help the British capital.

But, despite the concerns, London has defied skeptics and, rather than fading in significance, cemented its status and, to some extent, edged out the other three.

This year London's autumn catwalk shows start on Friday.

In addition to traditional stalwarts, such as Burberry, London's fashion scene has bounced back because it has become a magnet for young and original designers who want to unsettle the industry's hierarchy.

Left: Robert Wun's Spring/Summer 2017 collection. Right: Robert Wun in his studio. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

Among them is 25-year-old Robert Wun, who, like so many London-based fledging designers, defies preconceptions.

Sporting a casual black T-shirt and jeans with long, curly bob, Wun looks like a London version of Alexander Wang.

One might assume he too would take his inspiration from street styles in the way 32-year-old Wang built his brand as the ambassador of America's young and sporty chic.

But when Wun speaks, his received pronunciation and out-of-the-box ideas jolt you into realizing he is not, and does not want to be, anyone else.

Asked whether he is street-style savvy, his beaming expression dims and is followed by a clear-cut "no".

"Trends are not what I care about," he says.

Instead, he questions the obsession with "being trendy", saying it stops people from understanding the true value of clothes  the stories behind them.

"In the end, if it's just about a piece of clothing, it devalues this industry," he says.

So, where does he get his ideas? Perhaps, from locations, as is the case with Dolce & Gabbana's love letter to Italy's picturesque and culturally unique Sicily.

The last answer you might expect is National Geographic but, in declaring his admiration for "the amazing beauty of nature", his collection last season featured sea-wave-style ruffle sleeves, and the new collection for Spring/Summer 2017 comes from his observation of mantis and orchid.

"I just want to tell my own stories through design," he says.

And, while his clothes tell a story, his life story is worth telling too.

Born to a Mongolian father and Tibetan mother in Britain, Wun's background is diverse, even for a city like London that is known for its diversity.

He moved to Hong Kong as a toddler and returned to the UK at 16 to attend boarding school and then college. He speaks English, Mandarin and Cantonese fluently.

After graduating from the London College of Fashion in 2012, he launched his brand one year later.

"London is a good place for fashion-loving young people like me, without any background, to start up," he said.

Constantly travelling between London and Hong Kong, he appreciates London's welcoming environment.

"If a designer is a seed, it needs good soil."

Three years after starting his brand, Wun is still a one-man design team. None of his co-workers have a full contract because they all work part-time.

But he is not alone.

For two seasons he worked with On|Off, a company, like others in London, including TopShop-sponsored NewGen, that promotes young talent and helps present their collections in designer showrooms before making runway shows.

Tomorrow's Talent show is held in London on September 15, a day before London Fashion Week kicks off. [Photo by Jiang Shan/China Daily]

Some of these new designers made it onto the runway at the Tomorrow's Talent show on Thursday, one day before London fashion week officially began.

Reality is harsh for start-up designers, but hope roots in London that they can become the next Christopher Kane.
In light of continued developments, primarily since 2008, there exists in these United States a Legal System which operates on a proved Two Tiered approach to justice rendered, which primarily benefits Democratic Elites and Woke Ideological Virtue Signalers, representing their co-dependent wards, to the expressed exclusion of normal hardworking American citizens: What is your suggestion in remedying this widespread injustice and, if not corrected, its existential outcome for our Constitutional Republic?

Complete overhaul of the Department of Justice and their enforcers - the FBI - to reflect a far more honest justice system to keep patriots remaining calm.

Disband the FBI, and request that congress investigate all unethical and non patriotic practices to partially right the wrongs of a distrusted and politically weaponized "Department of Justice."
(Photo : Getty Images) The Subaru corporate logo is seen at the International Car Show (salon des voitures) at Heysel, in Brussels, Belgium.

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Japanese automaker Subaru will call back 13,336 imported vehicles in China next year because of defective airbags that may pose safety hazards to its passengers.



The recall is scheduled to start on January 16 next year, according to the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection, and Quarantine. It would affect Legacy cars manufactured between February 2, 2004, and May 18, 2009; Outback vehicles made from January 28, 2004, to May 21, 2009; and Tribeca cars manufactured between June 22, 2006, and June 17, 2011.



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When the defective airbags of the affected units inflate, it may cause damage to the gas generators inside causing flying debris and posing safety risks to passengers, according to Xinhua News Agency.



The defective airbags will be replaced free of charge.



While most car makers are competing on making electric vehicles, Subaru does not feel like going with the trend, saying all-electric car models will not become a trend until the decade ends, Car Scoops reported.



"While we haven't pushed for it, by the end of this decade it's one of the things we have to look at increasing. But there's no electric car that's going to pop out in the next couple of years," Nick Senior, managing director of Subaru Australia, said.



However, Subaru is expecting a reasonable sale percentage by 2025, saying: "but we are seeing a transformation in many areas, some of this is a bit slower at the moment, but there is no doubt in 2025 a percentage of our sales are going to be from electrics, hybrids, whatever you want to speculate. So I imagine from here through to 2025 you're going to see a bit of a change."



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TagsSubaru, car recall, Recall, legacy, Outback, Tribeca
China's First Island Chain.

(Photo : PLAAF) PLAAF Su-30MKK being refueled during Sept. 12, 2016 patrol.



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Their latest long-range aerial patrol of the Western Pacific took aircraft from the People's Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) over the Bashi Channel separating the Philippines from Taiwan and again past the "First Island Chain."



Described as a "routine combat simulation drill," this patrol on Sept. 12 consisted of Sukhoi Su-30MKK two-seat, long-range strike fighters; Xian H-6K long-range strategic bombers and unidentified aerial refueling tankers, probably Xian H-6Us. The patrol might have consisted of five to eight aircraft.



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The fleet conducted reconnaissance and early warning, sea surface cruising and inflight refueling. The PLAAF said this patrol and the others that preceded them are normal, annual, planned exercises to raise its ability to defend Chinese sovereignty and security.



"This is common practice for the air forces of coastal states, and a normal need for developing China's defense. The Chinese air force will normalize this kind of exercises beyond the 'First Island Chain' according to international laws and regulations," said Shen Jinke, PLAAF spokesperson.



The patrol sent a renewed message China can now pierce the First Island Chain at will.



The First Island Chain refers to the first chain of major archipelagos out from the East Asian continental mainland coast. It consists of the Kuril Islands, the Japanese archipelago, Japan's Ryukyu Islands, Taiwan, northern Philippines and Borneo.



It extends from the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia in the north to the Malay Peninsula in the south.



China views the First Island Chain as the area it must secure so it can disable U.S. bases in the Philippines, U.S. aircraft and U.S. Navy aircraft carrier groups.



Securing the First Island Chain will allow China to launch a pre-emptive attack against the Americans. China's First Island Chain Doctrine aims to seal off the Yellow Sea, the South China Sea and East China Sea inside an arc running from the Aleutians in the north to Borneo in the south.



The stormy and wind lashed Bashi Channel is a waterway between Y'Ami Island, the northenmost Philippine island, and Orchid Island, Taiwan's southernmost island. It's a part of the Luzon Strait in the Pacific Ocean.



The Bashi Channel is also an important passage for military operations. Both Taiwan and the Philippines dispute the ownership of the waters because it lies within each of their 200 nautical mile exclusive economic zone.



The PLAAF said it will organize regular patrols that fly past the First Island Chain.



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TagsPeople's Liberation Army Air Force, PLAAF, Bashi Channel, First Island Chain, Sukhoi Su-30MKK, Xian H-6K long-range strategic bombers
(Photo : GettyImages/KoichiKamoshida) China has criticized a recent security deal between Japan and India, describing it as "disgraceful."

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China has expressed its concern over Japan's decision to sell search and rescue aircraft to India at a low cost. Japan and India have agreed to the sale of $1.6 billion worth of Shinmaywa US-2+ search and rescue aircraft. The sale would be made at a reduced rate to strengthen security ties between the countries.



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According to India Times, China considers the collaboration to be "disgraceful" if it is designed to exert pressure on Beijing over the South China Sea dispute. China's foreign ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said that China does not object to normal state-to-state cooperation including in defense.



Xinhua reported that Japan is likely to lower the prices of the aircraft as much as possible to boost its security and defense ties with India. The deal may also push India to become more engaged in the South China issue. Referring to a report indicating such motives, Hua said that if the report is true, then the purpose of the cooperation between India and Japan may not be deemed righteous.



Earlier talks between Japan and India over the sale of 12 aircraft collapsed due to technology transfer and pricing issues. However, Japan's offer to negotiate prices is said to have revived the discussion. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Model is expected to visit Japan later this year.



India has welcomed Japan's offer. Both countries signed an agreement related to the defense technology transfer in 2014. Both nations are planning to pep up their maritime security measures in the South China Sea and the Indian Ocean.



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Tagschina, India, Japan, South China Sea, Indian Ocean, Shinmaywa US-2+
(Photo : GettyImages/LintaoZheng) China's Premier Li Keqiang is set to make a trip to Cuba, Canada, and then to New York to attend a UN general assembly.

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Chinese Premier Li Keqiang has been invited by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to attend the 71st session of the United Nations General Assembly. Li would also be visiting Cuba and Canada. China's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said the trip would last from Sept. 18 to 28.



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China's Vice Foreign Minister Li Baodong said that the premier is expected to talk about China's position on international order and global governance while addressing the general debate at the UN General Assembly session. He is also likely to hold talks with various foreign state leaders during his stay in New York.



Premier Li would also visit Canada, which would be a first by a Chinese premier in 13 years. The visit is expected to strengthen bilateral ties between the two countries. Li has been invited by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.



Premier Li would visit Cuba as well on the invitation of the President of the Cuban Council of State and Council of Ministers Raul Castro Ruz. Xinhua reported that Cuba is the first country in the Caribbean and Latin America to have diplomatic ties with China. This would be the first visit by a Chinese premier to Cuba since the establishment of diplomatic ties between the two countries 56 years ago.



Li and Raul are expected to sign cooperation documents in several areas including technology, economy, and industry. They would also discuss various measures to strengthen the cooperation and friendship between the two countries.



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TagsLi Baodong, china, Canada, Ban Ki Moon, Raul Castro, Justin Trudeau
(Photo : YouTube Screenshot) The Tiangong-2 at Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center.

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China has successfully launched its second space station--Tiangong--to space on Thursday.



The space lab blasted off into the sky on board a Long March 2F at 10:04 a.m. (ET) on Thursday from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the Gobi Desert, China Central Television reported.



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According to Wu Ping, deputy director of China's manned space engineering office, the 9.5-ton space lab would settle into an orbit about 380 kilometers above Earth for preliminary orbit tests as soon as it reaches space. Then, Tiangong-2 would transfer to a bit higher orbit at around 393 kilometers above the Earth, where the future Chinese space station will be operating, Xinhua reported.



The Tiangong-2, which means "Heavenly Palace," would be utilized for testing space technology and conducting medical and space experiments, Time reported. It will also be used for "testing systems and processes for mid-term stays and refueling," according to the New York Times.



The launch comes five years after China launched its first satellite, the Tiangong-1, in September 2011.



"Tiangong is a precursor test bed of capabilities; building toward the large space station has always been the culminating goal of the Shenzhou program," Joan Johnson-Freese, a professor at the US Naval War College, told CNN.



Next month, the Shenzhou 11 spaceship will take two astronauts to the station to conduct research for a month related to biology, psychology, and medicine, according to BBC.



China plans to create a manned space station by 2022 as well as land a rover on Mars by 2020.







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(Photo : Getty Images) Philippine Foreign Affairs Secretary Perfecto Yasay Jr. has said that the country's conflict with China over territories in the South China Sea is just a "small portion" of the entire Sino-Philippine relations.

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Despite their opposing positions in the disputed South China Sea, the Philippines would continue pushing for formal talks with China to settle the territorial conflict peacefully and thrash out other common interests that are crucial to Sino-Philippine relations.



Philippine foreign secretary Perfecto Yasay Jr. told an audience in Washington, D.C. on Friday that despite the differences between Beijing and Manila over the disputed strategic waterway, the Duterte government would continue to explore opportunities to mend ties with Beijing.



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Yasay said that although there is a conflict between Beijing and Manila over the disputed sea, the dispute is only a "small portion" of the entire diplomatic relations between both nations.



Sino-Philippine relations



Yasay said talks with China on Sino-Philippine relations should proceed formally as the two nations explore their ties and interests on various important matters such as "trade, investment, cultural exchanges, infrastructure and people-to-people contact."



"That area of the disputed territory in the South China Sea is a small portion of our relationship. We would like to continue engaging everyone including China and our neighbors in pursuing other interests that include trade, investment, infrastructure development, cultural exchanges, people-to-people contact," he said.



The foreign secretary said he hoped that there would be countless opportunities for both sides to engage in formal talks to peacefully settle their conflict over the disputed maritime territory.



Special envoy



Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte had sent Manila's special envoy, Fidel Ramos, to Hong Kong to "break the ice" with top Chinese officials in August to pave the way for formal talks to commence in Beijing.



Duterte said Chinese and Philippine officials have started laying the groundwork for the talks, which he expected to begin before the end of the year.



The Philippines had earlier indicated that it would only engage in formal talks with China on the basis of the Permanent Court of Arbitration's (PCA) ruling, which China's massive claims in the South China Sea.



July 12 ruling



China's President Xi Jinping, for his part, has emphasized that Beijing would not accept any talks, actions, and future propositions by any state that would be based on the PCA's ruling.



The Philippines ties with China turned sour under former President Benigno Aquino III. Manila has been making efforts in repair its damaged relationship with the Asian giant.



On July 12, the Hague-based PCA ruled that there is no legal basis for China's "historic claims" to territories in the South China Sea under its nine-dash line.



The court said Beijing had violated international law and the rights of the Philippines to explore its resources within its exclusive economic zone.



Beijing did not participate in the legal proceedings and dismissed the court's ruling as "illegal" and "null and void."



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TagsSino-Philippine relations, Foreign Secretary Perfecto Yasay Jr, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, Chinese President Xi jinping, arbitral court, Philippines, china
(Photo : Getty images) Typhoon Meranti hindered transportation in parts of China as it made landfall on Thursday.

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Chinese government officials have confirmed that Typhoon Meranti has killed at least 10 people and left at least six people missing as it cooled on Friday.



Seven of the confirmed casualties were reportedly from Fujian, and three were from Zhejiang.



Initial efforts to get information about the fatalities were prevented by the heavy rains. Information only started flowing after the heavy storm cooled down.



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Families that had fled from the rain could be seen returning to what was left of their homes after the rains.



Chinese meteorological authorities say the Typhoon Meranti is the strongest to have ever hit the China coast since 1949.



The storm caused damages worth millions with the transport sector being greatly affected by the whole massacre.



The rain caused a massive blackout in Fujian with over 1.5 million homes staying in the dark during the whole incident.



Airlines canceled flights and railway transportation was suspended during the storm. Ferry services between Xiamen and Kinmen Island were also suspended.



China Meteorological Administration said that though the Typhoon Meranti had weakened, heavy rains should be expected.



A video posted online showed that Typhoon Malakas is fast approaching Taiwan. It is expected to hit the Island on Saturday.



In Taiwan, the Typhoon Meranti also killed one person and injured 38 others.



Typhoons are a common occurence at this time of year in the Pacific region.



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Tagschina, Taiwan, typhoon, Typhoon Meranti, Typhoon Malakas
(Photo : CCTV) Lauch of Tiangong-2 on 15 September 2016.

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Yesterday's successful launch of the Tiangong-2 space lab will see China a "new phase" in its space program that will culminate with the building of its first space station, Tianhe-1, starting 2018.



Tiangong-2 was the payload of a Long March-2F rocket launched from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China. Beijing declared the launch a success 20 minutes after blast-off.



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The space lab will maneuver into an orbit 380 kilometers above Earth for initial in-orbit tests. It will then ascend to its permanent orbit some 390 kilometers above Earth's surface.



This October, the Shenzhou-11 manned spacecraft will carry two Chinese astronauts into space to dock with Tiangong-2. The male astronauts will work in the lab for 30 days before returning to Earth.



In April 2017, China's first space cargo ship, Tianzhou-1 carrying fuel and other supplies, will dock with Tiangong-2. The astronauts will carry out experiments related to aerospace medicine, space physics and biology, such as quantum key distribution, atomic space clocks and solar storm research.



They will also conduct a space-Earth quantum key distribution and a laser communications experiment to facilitate space-to-ground quantum communication.



Then there's POLAR, a collaboration between Swiss, Polish and Chinese institutions to study gamma ray bursts, which are the most energetic events in the universe.



Tiangong-2, originally built as a back-up to Tiangong-1, has a length of 14 meters and a diameter of 3.4 meters. It weighs 8,500 kilograms.



The new station has a larger payload capacity, allowing improved living conditions for its crew of three astronauts. The crew will be able to survive for 20 days without resupply.



Tiangong-2 will also be equipped with a new robotic arm. it will be accompanied by a small Banxing-2 satellite for technology demonstrations.



Banxing-2 (the word means Companion Satellite) is a small technology development satellite that will capture images of the new station in orbit. Its predecessor, Banxing-1, accomplished the same mission for the Shenzhou 7 in September 2008.



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TagsLauch of Tiangong-2, 15 September 2016., china, Tianhe-1, Tianzhou-1, Banxing-2
BALTIMORE  Attorneys for Adnan Syed have a simple response to prosecutors efforts to block his new trial: If the case against the Serial podcast subject is strong, try it again.

Give Syed a fair trial and let a jury decide, lead attorney C. Justin Brown said Thursday. My client has spent more than 17 years in prison based on an unconstitutional conviction for a crime he did not commit. The last thing this case needs right now is more delay.

A Baltimore judge earlier this year vacated Syeds murder conviction in the 1999 death of his Woodlawn High School classmate and ex-girlfriend Hae Min Lee and ordered a new trial.

Prosecutors say Syed was convicted on overwhelming evidence. They are pursuing an appeal of the ruling.

Syed was serving a life sentence. Serial and its spinoffs probed questions about the case, and Syed was given the opportunity to convince Judge Martin Welch that his original defense attorney was wrong to not call an alibi witness to testify at his 2000 trial.

That witness testified at a hearing in February, and Syeds defense team also raised questions about cellphone records used to tie Syed to the area where Lees body was found.

Welch ruled in July that it was in the interest of justice that Syed receive a new trial. He said the decision was based on the questions over cell phone records.

Since that ruling, prosecutors have argued in court filings that Welch should not have allowed Syeds attorneys to present arguments over the cellphone records at the February hearing.

In a response filed Thursday, Syeds attorneys rejected the claim.

The state must put forward a strong contention that the experienced Circuit Court judge assigned to this case on remand abused his discretion in reopening Syeds postconviction proceedings, they wrote. The Circuit Court did no such thing.

Syed remains jailed and charged with murder pending the outcome of the appeal, which his attorneys said could take years to resolve. Brown has enlisted an additional team of defense attorneys, who helped put together the response filed Thursday.

At the February hearing, Brown said Syeds original defense attorney should have raised a disclaimer that was sent by AT&T with Syeds cellphone records in court. The disclaimer, which appeared on a fax cover sheet, said location data from certain calls was not reliable.

The technician who testified at Syeds 2000 trial did not appear at the February hearing, but said in an affidavit that the cover sheet caused him to have concerns about his original testimony.

Prosecutors used the phone records in 2000 to bolster testimony from the states star witness, Syeds alleged accomplice Jay Wilds, and an FBI expert testified this year that the records were reliable and accurate.

The Circuit Court properly found that the AT&T disclaimer, on its own, significantly undermines the States prized cell phone location evidence, creating a substantial possibility that the result of the trial was fundamentally unreliable, Syeds attorneys wrote in the filing Thursday.

In a separate filing, the defense also rejected new claims from two former classmates of alibi witness Asia McClain.

The former classmates came forward after the judge ordered a new trial and told the Attorney Generals Office that 17 years ago McClain told them that she would lie to help Syed avoid trouble. McClain has denied the claims.

What the State seeks to do is no different than a defendant losing at trial and then requesting a new trial because he has now found a witness who would testify that the States critical witness lied, they wrote.

It is too late for that.

Syeds attorneys say he deserves a new trial, with capable counsel.

If the State wishes to present the nuanced factual arguments it makes in its lengthy application, it can retry the case, just as the Circuit Court ordered, they wrote.
(Photo : US Navy) The guided-missile destroyer USS Mustin (DDG 89) with Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force destroyer JS Kirisame (DD 104) in the South China, 2015.

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Japan will move more towards confronting China in the South China Sea rather than in the East China Sea closer to home by announcing its navy will conduct more patrols in the disputed sea with the U.S. Navy and the navies of its regional allies.



Minister of Defense Tomomi Inada said Japan will increase its military presence in the South China Sea by launching a series of what it termed "training patrols" to support the U.S. and its Asian allies, especially Vietnam and the Philippines.



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The patrols will be similar in nature to the "Freedom-of-Navigation" operations regularly conducted in the South China Sea by U.S. Navy warships. China has refused to ratchet down tensions despite losing an arbitration case to the Philippines last July 12.



These training patrols planned by the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force will also see the participation of warships from the Republic of Korea Navy, said Inada during a talk at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington D.C.



CSIS is an American think tank that conducts policy studies and strategic analyses of political, economic and security issues throughout the world.



Japan will conduct bilateral and multilateral exercises with regional navies such as the Vietnam People's Navy and the Philippine Navy despite confusing signals emanating from Manila because of the erratic foreign policy of volatile Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte. It will also engage in capacity building with these countries.



Inada said Japan remains concerned about China's refusal to abandon its claim to own most of the South China Sea. She also pointed out Japan's dispute with China over Japan's Senkaku islands in the East China Sea.



The Permanent Court of Arbitration's ruling in the South China Sea case filed by the Philippines concluded China has no legal basis to claim historic rights within the nine-dash line in the South China Sea. It also said China violated Philippine sovereignty by seizing three reefs within the Philippines' exclusive economic zone.



Inada said that if the world condoned China's attempts to change the rule of law and allowed "rule bending" to succeed, the "consequences could become global."



"In this context, I strongly support the U.S. Navy's freedom-of-navigation operations, which go a long way to upholding the rules-based international maritime order," she said.



"Japan, for its part, will increase its engagement in the South China Sea through, for example, Maritime Self-Defense Force joint training cruises with the U.S. Navy and bilateral and multilateral exercises with regional navies," she said.



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TagsJapan, South China Sea, East China Sea, Tomomi Inada, Freedom of Navigation, training patrols, Vietnam People's Navy, Philippine Navy, Permanent Court of Arbitration
NORTH OF THE STANDING ROCK SIOUX RESERVATION  Wood smoke swirled past Dan Four Thunders as he sipped coffee outside the main kitchen at the Camp of the Sacred Stones.

This is Siouxbucks, he said, smiling. And this is our star barista over here. Coffee, tea  he does it all.

The barista, 68-year-old Allen Coomsta Matt, had no time to stop and chat as he quickstepped from fire to fire, tending pots of coffee. Matt, whos from the Flathead Reservation in Montana, had rolled into camp the day before and set up his teepee in the wind and rain.

The next morning, he joined the ranks of volunteers who, for months, have been doing the daily work of accommodating the thousands of American Indians and others camped out to protest the planned crossing of the Dakota Access Pipeline under the Missouri River less than a mile north of the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation.

Along with a steady drip of coffee, the expansive camp near Cannon Ball has multiple kitchens, a school for kids, a check-in tent for news media, a prayer space, corrals for horses, pits for compost, dumpsters for trash, rows of port-a-potties and tents full of donated food.

Nonstop meals

Nantinki Young, who goes by Tink, has been the camps head chef for about four weeks. The camp initially had just one kitchen, but to meet demand, about six other satellite kitchens sprung up, said Young, who lives on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota.

Her day usually starts at 7 a.m. and doesnt end until midnight. She said the joy of feeding people keeps her going.

Were here to protect the water, Young said, alluding to protesters concerns about the risk the pipeline poses to Standing Rocks source of drinking water. Without water, you have no life, and food goes right in hand-in-hand with that.

Meatloaf was on the lunch menu Friday, Sept. 9, and campers formed a queue leading to the central kitchen. We go from breakfast right into lunch and right into dinner, so theres no in-between, Young said. As we serve, we start getting the next meal started.

The kitchens use a combination of wood and propane to cook meals. A refrigerated semitrailer keeps food fresh  part of an effort to ensure the operation is sanitary, Young said.

These are all our relatives, she said. We dont want to get anybody sick.

With food preparation comes compost. Justin Banks knows this.

The 29-year-old from Arizonas Hopi Reservation and two helpers were assigned the daylong task of digging up prairie soil to create a six-foot deep pit for kitchen slop. Asked what his job description is, Banks said, Whatever the matriarch tells us to do.

Whos the matriarch?

I dont know, he said. Theres a lot of them.

Winter plans

Maybe not the matriarch but definitely a volunteer, 64-year-old Mamie Lookstwice left her home on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota and came to the camp a month ago. Since then, shes been staffing the supply tent and sorting through donated tarps, baby food, baby wipes and other necessities of camp life.

We get a lot of donations, and they go out to the people out there, the retiree said, holding a turquoise coffee mug and wearing a Water Protector button. We try to meet their needs as much as we can.

Last week, the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe lost its court battle in Washington, D.C., with the judge denying its request for an emergency injunction to halt construction of the $3.8 billion crude oil pipeline. But federal authorities put the project on hold until the tribes concerns can be further addressed.

Pipeline opponents saw this as a victory, but they said theyll continue taking a stand at the campsite while legal matters play out, including the tribes appeal of the judges decision. However, what the camp will look like once the cold and snow of a North Dakota winter arrive is unknown.

Some are planning for the winter, said Joseph Smith of Standing Rocks land management program. We just dont know yet whos going to be here.

Smith, who was busy assembling a standup patio heater donated by the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, said his tribe is making arrangements for firewood, warm tents and other supplies to help campers last through the winter.

In the meantime, theyre dealing with the rain and wind of late summer. We tell everybody, Tie your tent down, Smith said.

Camp school

Blaze Starkey, a teacher at the camps school, said cloudbursts once had the potential to cancel classes, which were all held outside until recently. Now that the school has four large tents, including a teepee, rain isnt an issue, he said.

Starkey is one of six teachers at the school, which has about 30 students, ages 6 to 13. Theyre part of the whole reason why were even trying to stop this pipeline, he said of the kids. A camp without children would honestly be like a camp without life.

With such a large gathering of tribes from around the country, Starkey said, the camp itself is a learning experience for his students who, along with math, reading and writing, receive lessons from musicians, elders and other speakers. Starkey, a member of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, is responsible for teaching the Lakota language.

To keep parents out of legal trouble, he said, the school fulfills requirements for home or public schooling in the students home states. We just want to make sure that while theyre here, they have, like, a really high quality education.

Starkey, who lives in Wakpala, S.D., on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, said he arrived at the camp a few days after it first started in April, and occasionally, he makes the hourlong drive home to do laundry.

The 31-year-old said the school plans to stay open this winter and that theres talk of building classroom structures with more insulation. In the past, you know, we lived in teepees in these winters for a long, long time, he said. If you know how to set up a teepee, theyre actually very warm.

On Friday afternoon, Matt the coffee-maker went to his teepee to escape the elements. He sat on his cot, took off his boots and reflected on why he was there.

The cause for me is peace and prayer, he said. We dont want violence. Thats not what we came here for.
COMMENTARY: What every Christian should consider in a national election 16 September, 2016 by Dr. Mac Brunson , |

EDITOR'S NOTE: Just months before America's presidential election, a number of pastors have expressed their opinion on voting. Christian Examiner will share their views through the publication of columns, news articles and feature stories.

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (Christian Examiner) -- September 11 has become a significant date in American history. That date did not become noteworthy just in 2001, because it actually has a deeper history for Americans.

As a nation, we stand at a crossroads. This election requires every citizen to be alert, informed, and prepared to vote. We have not seen an election this important in more than 100 years  perhaps not since the election of Abraham Lincoln.

On September 11, 1814, America was under attack. No one ever imagined that 17,000 British troops would be on the outskirts of the city of Baltimore. Off the coast were nearly 30 British ships of war. The British navy maneuvered 16 of those ships to within striking distance of Fort McHenry. Those naval vessels began a 24-hour barrage on the American forces stationed in Fort McHenry. The plan was to send the British navy up the western branch of the Patapsco River, bomb the city, and make it possible for British troops to take Baltimore.

Two weeks earlier, the British had taken Washington D.C. and burned a great portion of the city. President Madison and most of the populace of Washington had fled the city as the British put the capital to the torch. Dolly Madison was perhaps the last to leave Washington. She secured a number of national treasures, including Gilbert Stuart's full-length painting of George Washington, before she left the city. As she departed, the British were right on her heels.

When the British left Washington, they headed to Baltimore but were unable to take the city. The citizens, at their own personal expense and sacrifice, sunk their own boats in the mouth of the western branch of the river to make it impassable to the great British warships.

There were the founding fathers that gave up their life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness to fight for future generations to have the very things that they sacrificed. There were those who gave their all at places like Antietam, Sharpsburg, Gettysburg, Petersburg, Normandy, Utah Beach, Pork Chop Hill, Da Nang, Fallujah, Sadr City, Baghdad, and of course, Kabul.

As a nation, we stand at a crossroads. This election requires every citizen to be alert, informed, and prepared to vote. We have not seen an election this important in more than 100 years  perhaps not since the election of Abraham Lincoln. Beyond voting, though, there is something else we desperately need to do: Pray.

In the heart of Psalm 122, David calls on the nation to pray for the city of Jerusalem. This passage has some very clear millennial overtones, but David calls on a nation to pray for the capital city, which in a sense represents the nation itself.

The phrase "pray for the peace of Jerusalem" is well known and is basically all we know of this Psalm. But consider what God is asking the people to pray for:

Psalm 122:6 "May they prosper who love you"

Pray for the economy of the nation. Psalm 122:7 "Peace be within your walls"

Pray for the safety of the nation and for homeland security. Psalm 122:7b "Prosperity within your palaces"

Pray for the state of the nation's political life. Psalm 122:8 "For the sake of my brothers and my friends"

Pray for the populace (that is us).

It is interesting that in Jeremiah 29:7 God tells the Hebrews to pray for the city in which they are exiles:

"And seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf ..."

God was telling them to pray for the city of Babylon.

As the people of God, we have an obligation to the nation in a time of crisis.

WE HAVE AN OBLIGATION TO REMEMBER ACCURATELY OUR HISTORY

Contained in this idea to pray for the peace of Jerusalem is a recollection of their history. The earliest account we have of Jerusalem is in Genesis 14:18 where we are told that Melchizedek, King of Salem, came to meet Abraham. Salem is an abbreviated form of the noun, Jerusalem, which essentially means peace. However, Jerusalem had known anything but peace. In fact, the city had been under siege more than three dozen times:

Shishak  King of Egypt

Rezin  King of Syria

Pekah  King of Israel

Sennacherib  King of Assyria

Pharaoh Necho  King of Egypt

Nebuchadnezzar  King of Babylon (3 times)

Ptolemy Soter  King of Egypt

Antiochus the Great

Antiochus Epiphanes

Pompey  The Roman General

Vespasian and Titus  Roman Generals

Muslims

Crusaders

Britain wrested it from the Turks

Israelis wrested it from the Jordanians

We are told in Ezekiel 38-39 that a confederation of nations will move down against Israel, and ultimately, the entire world will turn on the nation of Israel in a battle that we know as the battle of Armageddon. It has been anything but a city of peace and yet David says to pray for the peace of Jerusalem.

Most likely this Psalm was written by good King Hezekiah and was used when he restored the temple and called the divided nation to come together and worship the true God. Many from the northern tribes would have sung this song of ascent when they came to participate in worship in the temple for the first time in centuries. The people of God are called on repeatedly to remember their history.

Several years ago before the national election, I was interviewed by the BBC. They were interested in knowing about faith and country and what the two had to do with each other. I reminded them that when the Pilgrims, the Puritans, and the others who would not stay in a state-sponsored church left England, they came to the new country under a charter from James I. The charter that the Pilgrims had at Plymouth Rock stated:

We, according to our princely inclination, favoring much their worthy disposition, in hope thereby to advance the enlargement of Christian religion, to the Glory of God Almighty.1

King Charles signed the Carolinas Charter in 1622 and stated that the settlement was for the "propagation of the gospel."2 I shared with the BBC that it was far more than just religious freedom; it was for the purpose of propagating the Gospel of Jesus Christ. That is our history as a nation.

In my first church out of seminary, we lived fifty minutes from Colonial Williamsburg. My family would go there often. We would stand in the House of Burgess and think about those who sat, stood, and spoke in that very room. In May of 1765, Patrick Henry took the dreaded Stamp Act, turned it over, and wrote these words on that document:

This brought on the war which finally separated the two countries and gave independence to ours. Whether this will prove a blessing or a curse will depend upon the use our people make of the blessings, which a gracious God hath bestowed on us.

If they are wise, they will be great and happy. If they are of a contrary character, they will be miserable.

Righteousness alone can exalt them as a nation. Reader! Whoever thou art, remember this, and in thy sphere practice virtue thyself, and encourage it in others.3

That is our history. That is what we were founded upon and we must not forget. In fact, now more than ever, we desperately need a lesson in our own nation's history.

We will elect the 45th president of the United States, and I wonder... do we have a clue what we are doing? John Jay, the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court said this about elections:

Providence has given to our people the choice of rulers, and it is the duty, as well as the privilege and interest of our Christian nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers.4

The Office of the President of the United States is established in Article 2 of the Constitution. According to that document, the President must be a natural born citizen, at least 35 years of age, and a resident of the U.S. for at least 14 years. He must win the majority of the Electoral College (which we saw in the 2000 election is pretty critical). He serves a four-year term and can serve no more than two terms plus two years of an unexpired term.

The President may be impeached, which simply means he can be brought to trial. Think about that statement in light of other world leaders and dictators. He is impeached by a majority of the House and tried by the Senate where a conviction must be by two-thirds majority. He serves as head of the Executive Branch. Under that leadership falls the following:

The Office of Management and Budget

Federal Procurement and Policy

Council on Economic Advisors

National Security Council (including the CIA)

Domestic Policy Staff

U.S. Trade Representative

Council on Environmental Quality

Council on Wage Price Stability

Office of Science and Technology Policy

Homeland Security

Beyond that the President has a Cabinet that includes the Vice President and the heads of 15 executive departments:

Department of State

Department of the Treasury

Department of Defense

Department of Justice

Department of the Interior

Department of Agriculture

Department of Labor

Department of Commerce

Department of Health and Human Services

Department of Education

Department of Housing and Urban Development

Department of Transportation

Department of Energy

Department of Veterans Affairs

Department of Homeland Security

There are seven categories that fall under the role of President:

Chief of State

Chief Executive (Appoint federal officials, Supreme Court Justices, members of the Cabinet, Federal District Judges, Heads of Agencies, and U.S. Attorneys)

Chief Diplomat (Appoints Ambassadors, makes treaties with 2/3 vote of Senate).

Commander in Chief (Act in emergencies without consent of Congress, use armed forces in combat, and enforce federal law, treaties, and federal court buildings

Legislative Leader (suggests to Congress legislation, signs bills, and retains veto power)

Chief of Party

Guardian of the Economy

It behooves us to stop and think, to pray, and to make a sober decision when it comes to electing the next President.

George Washington said:

It is impossible to rightly govern the world without God and the Bible.5

Solomon writes in Proverbs 14:34 and he says:

Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.

Andrew Jackson said:

That book, Sir, (the Bible) is the rock upon which our republic rests.6

If we do not have knowledge of our past, we will stumble around looking for our future.

WE HAVE AN OBLIGATION OF RECOGNITION OF THE DEEPER ISSUES

For the Psalmist, the real issue was the worship of God and putting the things of God first. This has been called an envelope Psalm, because it begins and ends with a word about worship. The Psalmist listed several things about which his generation should be concerned.

There are four issues that should concern every one of us who is a believer and citizen of this country:

1. THE ATTACK ON THE FAMILY

There has been a real fight in this nation over the issue of homosexuality and marriage. For more than fifty years, gay activists have intentionally sought to make their lifestyle and behavior normal in the eyes of mainstream America. With the Obergefell v. Hodges case, the Supreme Court fundamentally changed 6000 years of human history. Their fundamentally flawed decision was announced to the nation on June 26, 2015, which also happened to coincide with the 9th day of Tammuz of the Jewish calendar. The 9th of Tammuz was the day of mourning for the ancient Jews because it was the day that the Babylonians destroyed the Temple of God in Jerusalem. The ramification for Americans will be the same as for the ancient Jews. It will become an unofficial day of mourning.

We have watched the gay agenda gain practically everything they set out to obtain. It began with sitcoms that made us laugh at the gay lifestyle. Hollywood made the gay lifestyle seem delightful, funny, and entertaining. They never showed the dark side, with the multiple partners, the immense hurt, shame, pain and dysfunction, along with the family devastation that accompanies homosexuality.

There has been a frantic search for the "gay gene." It has not been found, but that does not keep the press from discussing it as if it is fact. It is the same way they handle evolution. Thus, it is accepted without existing.

What no one in the mainstream media will tell you is that the genes that make up the body and those genes that influence behavior are different. Jones and Yarhouse write:

We are used to thinking of genes as causing us to have things like brown eyes or wavy hair and choice has little to do with such characteristics. But behavioral genetics has produced abundant evidence of genetic influences that clearly do not render human choice irrelevant.7

The future of the family and what is taught to your five-year-old is at stake. It is time for Christians to come out of their closet and take a stand.

2. ABORTION AND THE SANCTITY OF HUMAN LIFE

In a recent interview with KIRO Radio's Jason Rantz, Terry O'Neill, President of the National Organization for Women (NOW), made clear the state of pro-abortion rejection of modern science. O'Neill was asked whether she would still promote abortion, even if science conclusively proved that life begins at conception.

"I don't care. Of course, I would support abortion," replied O'Neill.

This is more than law and medicine. The issue goes to the very heart of who we are as a people.

No one argues when life begins anymore because advances in medical science tell us that life begins at conception. If that is so, every abortion in this country is murder, except for the rare, rare case that the life of the mother is in jeopardy. Certainly, taking a baby from a botched abortion and laying it on a table until it dies constitutes not just murder, but a monstrous act that makes the bizarre experiments of the Nazis look like an act of Christian charity. (See also Kermit Gosnell and his house of horrors.)

The other side of this issue is what abortion does to the mother, the woman who undergoes such a procedure. No one, especially Planned Parenthood, discusses the depression, guilt, or the sense of being broken and incomplete that many women experience. An estimated 43% of all women will have at least one abortion by the time they are 45 years old and no one discusses with them the psychological implications of an abortion. These women go through life angry and bitter and burdened with a sense of loss, a psychological numbing, depression, anxiety, and a host of other related issues. The very ones who push abortion are the ones who say you have no right to grieve. Sadly, though, we in the church have made it impossible for these hurting women to grieve and be ministered to.

3. STEM CELL RESEARCH AND THE SACREDNESS OF ALL LIFE

As advances in science have confirmed that stem cells can come from many sources other than embryos, this subject is not as hotly debated. However, getting the media to acknowledge that evangelicals were right on this is impossible.

Many have accused Christians of not wanting to find cures and solutions to many of the greatest medical issues of our day. The truth is that we want to be like Christ who went from village to village healing every disease and sickness. We are told that He went about doing good. That is our model. We simply believe we can honor life, hold it sacred, and still do good.

4. THE ASSAULT ON CHRISTIANITY

Perhaps the greatest crime of all in our society is intolerance. However, there is one exception: it is politically correct and socially acceptable to be anti-Christian in America today.

In Redlands, California you will see masking tape over part of the city seal on police cars and other city vehicles. The crosses on the badges of firemen have been drilled out and the cross in the city seal on official documents has been covered up with magic marker. That is where we are as a country. The ACLU, along with many other segments of society, have now determined that any vestige of Christianity has to go.

I want you to stop and think about these things as we prepare to vote in a national election. The family is under assault and the church is under attack in America. Does that give you a good perspective of where we are headed?

Watch carefully the language being used today by political candidates. We often hear about Freedom of Worship, but not about Freedom of Religion, which is guaranteed to us in the Bill of Rights. Freedom of Worship is a phrase that implies you are free to worship God inside your church building, but not to bring it out into the public square. We were guaranteed by the framers of the Constitution a Freedom of Religion, which means I am free to believe and practice my faith in the market place.

Personally, I do not think either party has the answer. In fact, I am convinced that nothing short of a miracle of God is going to turn this nation around. We are in a time of crisis that is beyond Democrats and Republicans.

You say, "But Preacher...a miracle, do those really happen?"

On August 24, 1814, the British under General Ross marched on Washington D.C., defeated the capital forces, and began to burn the city. At 10:30 pm, they entered the White House and began looting. General Ross himself stole the personal love letters that President Madison had sent to his wife, Dolly. They then put the White House to the torch. The city burned that night to the degree that the glow of the fire could be seen fifty miles away. Madison sat on a horse in Virginia and watched the glow of the fires burn the city of Washington. Many thought that America was on the brink of collapse.

The next day, August 25, the British were still burning the city, the Naval Yard, and the Library of Congress. But that afternoon the most unusual thing occurred. A hurricane hit Washington. It dumped so much rain that the fires were extinguished. The winds were so strong that the British army was routed. Then, a tornado ripped right through the center of the city killing more British soldiers than the American forces. One British account states that the winds literally picked up British cannons and threw them yards away.

The next day, the decimated British army retreated from Washington. It was as if the hand of God came down and spared the young nation.

He can do it again.

-------------------

Tim LaHaye, The Bible's Influence on American History (San Diego: Master Books, 1976), 7. Ibid., 9. William J. Federer, America's God and Country: Encyclopedia of Quotations (St. Louis: AmeriSearch, 2000), 289. Ibid., 318. Ibid., 660. Ibid., 311. Stanton L. Jones, and Mark A. Yarhouse, Homosexuality: The Use of Scientific Research in the Church's Moral Debate (Downers Grove: Inter Varsity Press, 2000), 48.

------------------

This article was published at www.fbcjax.com and is used with permission
Two ecumenical Christian organizations have criticized Israel for its occupation of Gaza, and also called on the U.S. to cease its practice of arming Israelis.

ChristianToday.com reports that the World Council of Churches (WCC) and The National Council of Churches of Christ, USA (NCC) recently met together in Arlington, VA to discuss the situation in Israel.

"More than 60 representatives of churches and church-related organizations from around the world gathered because we hear the cries of all who are yearning for peace and justice in the land we call Holy," a statement from the groups said.

The two groups, which represent over 545 million Christians, condemned Israels control of Palestinian territory and called on the U.S. to cease interfering in the conflict.

"[K]eeping an entire population under occupation and even in a closed area, such as Gaza, in prison-like conditions is a grave and unsustainable situation, the statement continued. "We are also well aware that Israel is the occupying force and has commanding power over the people of Palestine and, thus, bears special responsibility for taking the initiative."

The statement went on to criticize the U.S., calling on the country to "cease its practice of arming various state and non-state actors in the Middle East and, in particular, to reconsider its proposed $38 billion military aid package to Israel, for the last thing needed at this time is more weapons," and "end the current wave of legislative efforts to penalize the use of non-violent economic measures to influence policy in Israel."

The pro-Israel Anti-Defamation League called the statement disappointing, yet sadly predictable.

The American Jewish Community also accused the two Christian groups of having a long history of anti-Israel bias.

Publication date: September 16, 2016
As Europes leaders (minus the UK) meet in the Slovakian capital, Bratislava, the voice of the Eastern bloc* leaders is being heard more, even if its not always comfortable listening for Brussels Eurocrats.

This week, Hungary, which has during the past year come under pressure for its handling of Europes mass migration crisis, has become the first government to open an office specifically to address the persecution of Christians in the Middle East and Europe.

"Today, Christianity has become the most persecuted religion, where out of five people killed [for] religious reasons, four of them are Christians," Catholic News Agency (CNA) quoted Hungarys Minister for Human Capacities, Zoltan Balog, as saying. "In 81 countries around the world, Christians are persecuted, and 200 million Christians live in areas where they are discriminated against. Millions of Christian lives are threatened by followers of radical religious ideologies."

The move sets a precedent on the international stage. It comes after Hungarys right-wing conservative Prime Minister, Victor Orban, drew criticism in the EU by saying Europe should focus on helping Christians, before helping millions of "Islamic people" coming into Europe.

"If we really want to help, we should help where the real problem is We should first help the Christian people before Islamic people," Orban said.

Orbans government has campaigned against an EU plan to spread some of the burden of the influx of migrants and refugees by requiring member states to accept quotas: hes called a referendum on 2 October at which voters are expected overwhelmingly to back the government and reject any future quotas.

A political war

The launch of a government office directly concerned with Christian suffering comes at a time when Europe is divided between what Orban calls an "EU elite" and those, like him, who want to hold on to Europes Christian roots.

"The political war based on the topic of migration is a great opportunity for both parties. For the [EU elite], it is a great chance to destroy the Europe that is based on the conception of Christianity and nationality; to completely alter the ethnic-based foundations of the EU," Orban said. "[The elite] know that Muslims will never vote for a party with Christian roots, so with the huge volume of Muslims, the conservative parties will be crowded out of power. But this war is also a great opportunity for the supporters of the nation states with Christian roots."

Since Germany in 2015 signalled its "open-door" policy (equally driven by Christian teaching) to refugees fleeing warzones in Syria, close to 1.5 million people have arrived in Germany to seek asylum. Many travelled through "the Balkan route", though Hungary has now erected a fence on its southern borders with Serbia and Croatia.

Christian refugees

Hungarys new office will have a starting budget of US$3.35 million. Minister Balog said it is of the "utmost importance" to help persecuted Christians, to raise international awareness of their "untenable situation" and to coordinate humanitarian efforts.

In Iraq, a Christian population estimated at more than a million before the 2003 war  and considerably more prior to that  today stands at less than 300,000. Many displaced from Iraqs Nineveh Plains after the 2014 Islamic State offensive currently seek a permanent home in the West.

In Syria, a similar situation has developed since the countrys civil war started five years ago. Other countries in the region have seen a haemorrhaging of indigenous Christianity with the resurgence of Islam as a political ideology since the last century.

Iraq ranks second on Open Doors 2016 World Watch List, a list of 50 countries where Christians come under the most pressure, while Syria is fifth. In almost 40 of the 50 countries, Islam either predominates or Islamist non-state actors (e.g. militias) are at work.

The Hungarian government will spend the coming weeks working out the exact duties of the new department, thoughit will have a primarily humanitarian focus, said Eduard von Habsburg, the Hungarian ambassador to the Holy See.

The decision to launch the new department came after PM Orban and Minister Balog travelled to Rome in August to meet Pope Francis.

Part of the reason for going public now with the initiative is to set an example for other European nations.

"Somehow the idea of defending Christians has acquired a bad taste in Europe, as if it means excluding other people," von Habsburg said, and the Hungarian initiative is intended to show it doesnt have to be that way, Catholic news sources reported.

Contacts in Rome

Orban and Balog, respectively a Protestant layman and a Calvinist pastor, were the only non-Catholic members of the group whom Pope Francis received in a private audience in August.

Von Habsburg said that government officials interactions with leading European churchmen, such as Cardinal Christoph Schonborn of Vienna, Austria, and with the patriarchs of the Middle East, also contributed to the decision to form the agency.

Meanwhile, Balog confirmed that he and Orban had met with Christian leaders from the Middle East in Rome. Among the participants were Syriac Patriarch Ignatius Joseph III Younan of Antioch, Maronite Patriarch Bechara Boutros Rai of Antioch, Melkite Archbishop Jean-Clement Jeanbart of Aleppo, Patriarch Ignatius Aphrem II of the Syriac Orthodox Church, and Bishop Gabriel of the Coptic Orthodox Church, CNA reported.

"Our interest not only lies in the Middle East but in forms of discrimination and persecution of Christians all over the world," Balog said. "It is therefore to be expected that we will keep a vigilant eye on the more subtle forms of persecutions (sic) within European borders."

*The Visegrad group of Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Poland.

Courtesy: World Watch Monitor

Publication date: September 16, 2016
Students at Dallas Theological Seminary (DTS) will now require students to take sexual abuse awareness training to complete their ministry degree programs. The new regulation was announced by the seminary earlier this month.

DTS is offering the course in collaboration with MinistrySafe.

The complete course by MinistrySafe will be offered by the college from spring of 2017, which will provide over 40 hours of training on preventive protocols in unique ministry settings. A shorter entry-level certification course is available this fall as well.

"There are some issues that a seminary just can't prepare you for and that you have to learn on the job once you're out in ministry," wrote Dr. Mark Bailey, president of DTS. "With this issue, if you're learning 'on the job,' something terrible has most likely already happened. We don't want our students and the children who are served by their ministries to experience that. That's why we're pleased to partner with MinistrySafe -- to equip our students to protect those who are most vulnerable."

Decades of sexual abuses by Catholic clergy all over the world were documented publicly, which led many Catholic and Protestant seminaries to offer their own internal trainings to prevent the sexual abuse of children.

"Listening to their statistics and stories, I realized how big a problem abuse can be and that there are procedures that churches and ministries need to be doing to protect our kids," Mark Yarbrough, DTS' vice president for academic affairs, told the Christian Post.

"The need for these guidelines are part of the new reality of 21st century ministry, and students need to have them before they enter ministry."

DTS will also provide this course online for the alumni free of charge, so that they could use it in the churches and ministries.

"An exciting aspect of this partnership is getting these resources into the hands of DTS alumni who serve all over the world in ministry positions," Kimberlee Norris, a sexual abuse trial attorney with MinistrySafe was quoted as saying in the DTS press release. "DTS has such broad influence among thriving ministries everywhere; equipping these ministries with effective resources is truly a privilege."

MinistrySafe was started by a team of husband and wife Gregory Love and Kimberlee Norris to provide solutions to the risk of child abuse in churches and affiliated organizations.

"Every program providing services to children desires to foster a safe, exciting environment where learning and enrichment can occur. When an effective Safety System is put into place, staff members and volunteers can focus on their core purpose, knowing precautions have been taken to prevent abuse and protect children in their care," the MinistrySafe website reads, while also providing a link for 5-Part Safety System designed by it.
Hungary announced on September 6 the creation of a new government department to help persecuted Christians around the world.

Protecting Christian communities around the world is an important criteria for the Government and the goal is to help families living in these communities," Minister of National Economy Mihaly Varga said, according Hungarian news agency MTI.

The creation of the new office follows Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orbans meeting in Rome in August with Pope Francis and other church leaders from the Middle East.

Eduard von Habsburg, the Hungarian ambassador to the Holy See, said that the new department was conceived out of several years of the Hungarian government quietly helping Christians in the Middle East, by securing visas for persecuted Christians and other persecuted minorities, the National Catholic Register reports.

The government also helped to build a Christian school in Erbil, Iraq. Habsburg said: "[Following] the philosophy that the best way [for the government] to give them a chance is to help them to stay at home, in their countries and to find help there... to help them have the chance of receiving help on the spot, according to Christian Times.

According to Crux, a Catholic news station, Habsburg hopes that other European nations will follow in Hungarys example.

Hungary considers itself Christian, and is interested in the situation of Christians all around the world. It wants to extend a helping hand, Habsburg said.

The department will be under the Hungarian Ministry for Human Capacities and will be headed by former deputy ambassador to Italy Tamas Torok.

"Today, Christianity has become the most persecuted religion, where out of five people killed [for] religious reasons, four of them are Christians," Minister for Human Capacities Zoltan Balog said, according to the Catholic News Agency (CNA). "In 81 countries around the world, Christians are persecuted, and 200 million Christians live in areas where they are discriminated against. Millions of Christian lives are threatened by followers of radical religious ideologies."

Already, $1.13 million USD has been given to the department of the $3.35 million that will be allocated to gather and analyze information on persecuted Christians as well as fund government officials visits to areas where Christians are being persecuted.
This week, Hungary, which has during the past year come under pressure for its handling of Europes mass migration crisis, has become the first government to open an office specifically to address the persecution of Christians in the Middle East and Europe.

Today, Christianity has become the most persecuted religion, where out of five people killed [for] religious reasons, four of them are Christians, Catholic News Agency (CNA) quoted Hungarys Minister for Human Resources, Zoltan Balog, as saying. In 81 countries around the world, Christians are persecuted, and 200 million Christians live in areas where they are discriminated against. Millions of Christian lives are threatened by followers of radical religious ideologies.

[Editors note: Canadas attempt at an office of international religious freedom, modeled on the American version, shut down after only three years.]

The move sets a precedent on the international stage. It comes after ...

1
Judicial Watch: New State Department Documents Reveal Top Agency Officials Raised Questions about Clinton Emails in Early August 2013 'Finally, John, you mentioned yesterday requests for Secretary Clinton's emails; may I get copies.'  Margaret Grafeld, Deputy Assistant Secretary, Global Information Services to John Hackett, Deputy Director, Office of Information Programs and Services, August 7, 2013



Documents Reveal that in Early August 2013, State had 17 Freedom of Information Requests relating to requests for Clinton correspondence



Contact: Jill Farrell, Judicial Watch, 202-646-5172



WASHINGTON, Sept. 16, 2016 /Christian Newswire/ -- Judicial Watch today released 113 pages of new State Department documents, revealing that in early August 2013, top State Department officials raised questions about former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's emails and the number of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests seeking information about them.



According to the newly obtained emails, in August 2013, State Department officials were aware of 17 FOIA requests relating to requests for Clinton correspondence, including four that "specifically mention Emails or Email accounts." Despite the large number of FOIA requests and growing concern among top agency officials, the State Department did not formally request that the former secretary of state produce the emails on the clintonemail.com server until October 2014.



Included among the 17 FOIA requests was a Judicial Watch lawsuit seeking records pertaining to possible conflicts of interest between the actions taken by Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State and Bill Clinton's activities. The lawsuit produced 276 pages of internal State Department records revealing that within two days of the deadly terrorist attack on Benghazi, Mohamed Yusuf al-Magariaf, the president of Libya's National Congress, asked to participate in a Clinton Global Initiative function and "meet President Clinton." The records also show Hillary Clinton's staff coordinated with the Clinton Foundation's staff to have her thank Clinton Global Initiative project sponsors for their "commitments" during a Foundation speech on September 25, 2009. The lawsuit (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Dept. of State (No. 1:13-cv-00772)) was filed on May 28, 2013.



In a 2014 joint expose with the Washington Examiner Judicial Watch's Chief Investigative Reporter Micah Morrison reported: [F]ormer President Clinton gave 215 speeches and earned $48 million while his wife presided over U.S. foreign policy, raising questions about whether the Clintons fulfilled ethics agreements related to the Clinton Foundation during Hillary Clinton's tenure as secretary of state.



According to documents obtained by Judicial Watch and released  in an ongoing Freedom of Information Act case, State Department officials charged with reviewing Bill Clinton's proposed speeches did not object to a single one. MORE: www.judicialwatch.org/press-room/press-releases/judicial-watch-new-state-department-documents-reveal-top-agency-officials-raised-questions-clinton-emails-early-august-2013

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U.S. Commission on Civil Rights Chairman Attacks Religious Freedom

Contact: Liberty Counsel Action, 407-875-1989, Media@LCAction.org

WASHINGTON, Sept. 16, 2016 /Christian Newswire/ -- The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights (USCCR) report, "Peaceful Coexistence: Reconciling Nondiscrimination Principles with Civil Liberties," is a shocking example of the war against religious freedom in America. "The Commission's report is a shameful anti-American and anti-God document that trashes religious freedom," said Mat Staver, Founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel.

Martin Castro, named USCCR chairman by President Obama in 2011, said that the words "religious freedom" and "religious liberty" have become merely code words for intolerance, Christian supremacy, racism, sexism, homophobia, Islamophobia and therefore must yield before LGBT anti-discrimination laws. Regarding sexual orientation and gender identity, this report also does not support those people who hold to their religious belief of traditional marriage as they provide services such as marriage licenses, photography, cake decorating or flower arranging.

The focus of the "Peaceful Coexistence" report states that granting religious exemptions to nondiscrimination laws "significantly infringes" on the civil rights of those claiming civil rights protections on the basis of "race, color, national origin, sex, disability status, sexual orientation and gender identity." The report calls for laws that eliminate exemptions or accommodation for religious convictions. Two members of the Commission dissented from the report.

"Chairman Castro is out of touch with reality and with our Constitution," said Mat Staver, Founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel. "He and the other members of the Commission who agree with him want to throw out the First Amendment and trash religious freedom whenever faith and practice collides with an intolerant LGBT agenda. The report is a declaration of war against religious freedom. George Washington said anyone who works against the twin pillars of religion and morality cannot be called a 'Patriot.' This report is un-American," said Staver.

Liberty Counsel is an international nonprofit, litigation, education, and policy organization dedicated to advancing religious freedom, the sanctity of life, and the family since 1989, by providing pro bono assistance and representation on these and related topics.
A woman who was reported taken at gunpoint has been found safe, but the suspect has not been located by law enforcement and remains armed and dangerous, according to an email from the state Justice Department sent at around 7 p.m.

At about 4:10 p.m. on Thursday, the state Justice Department had issued a missing and endangered person advisory for DonnaLynn Russell. The 27-year-old reportedly was taken at gunpoint by Derek Big Man, 26, at 2:30 p.m. Thursday in Billings, according to the press release.

Big Man is 5 feet 10 inches, weighs 177 pounds and has black hair and brown eyes, according to the release.

Anyone with information is asked to call the Billings Police Department at 406-657-8460.

According to the Montana Department of Corrections online database, Big Man has a criminal history including a 2010 sentence out of Yellowstone County for assault with a weapon and criminal possession of dangerous drugs. Both offenses took place on Dec. 15, 2009, according to the database. Big Mans sentence expired on Jan. 5, 2013, according to the database.

More recently, Big Man was convicted in Big Horn County in 2015 for misdemeanor escape, criminal mischief and obstructing a peace officer or public servant, according to Big Horn County Attorney Jay Harris. Those three crimes carried six-month sentences. All but the escape sentence were suspended, according to an email from Harris.

In October 2015, Big Man signed a two-year deferred prosecution agreement for felony attempted theft. All offenses occurred on or about April 25, 2015 in Hardin, according to an email from Harris.

Big Mans sentences were suspended and the deferred prosecution agreement was reached on the grounds that Big Man acquire no future criminal charges and receive substance abuse treatment, according to an email from Harris.

If the agreement and sentence suspensions are revoked, Big Man could face 10 years in prison, according to the email from Harris
home World 'Islamic conquest of Europe' warning issued by Austrian cardinal

An Austrian cardinal who is considered to be a frontrunner for the papacy warned against an "Islamic conquest of Europe" during a speech given in Vienna last Sunday.

The speech was made by Cardinal Christoph SchAnborn on the 333rd anniversary of the Battle of Vienna in 1683 when the Ottoman Empire was defeated.

SchAnborn suggested at the Holy Name of Mary church festival that many Muslims want to see the end of Europe. He reportedly stated, "Will there be an Islamic conquest of Europe? Many Muslims want that and say: Europe is at its end."

He then reportedly prayed, "God have mercy on Europe and on thy people, who are in danger of forfeiting our Christian heritage."

He claimed that the invasion is already being felt "not only economically, but above all, in human and religious matters."

The Austrian government appears to be working to prevent the said Islamic conquest. Parliament recently passed a law that would ban foreign financial sources for Muslim organizations and require imams to speak German. The law aims to curb the influence of foreign Muslim nations and organizations.

Last April, the parliament also passed a law restricting the right of asylum which allowed border authorities to reject asylum seekers.

SchAnborn is a conservative who was once considered as a viable candidate for the papacy before the election of Pope Francis. He has been called the "Sorcerer's Apprentice" while he was a student of Pope Benedict XVI.

Last month, American Cardinal Raymond Burke also shared his own opinion about Islam. He held a teleconference wherein he stated that Muslims and Christians do not worship the same god.

"I don't believe it's true that we're all worshipping the same God, because the God of Islam is a governor," Burke said. "In other words, fundamentally Islam is, Sharia is their law, and that law, which comes from Allah, must dominate every man eventually," he added.
home World Christian converts forced to hide their faith in Turkey refugee camps, ministry leader reports

A ministry director based in Turkish camps said that although some refugees are opening up to Christianity they still face many challenges. Refugees who convert to Christianity in Turkey are left with no choice but to keep their new faith a secret from others to avoid being treated like "infidels."

"We have earned the trust of refugees, they just are very pleased to welcome us to their tents," the director said in an interview with Christian Post. He noted that non-Muslims are not usually well-received but the refugees living in difficult conditions are glad for their help.

The ministry director said that he has witnessed more than 120 conversions in the past two years. He and the other ministry workers reported seeing changes in the way the refugees perceive Jesus.

"In Turkey, Muslims say the words, Hazreti Isa to express that Jesus was a prophet - they have in mind the meaning, 'Prophet Jesus,'" he told Christian Aid Mission.

"But now the refugees are saying 'Jesus Christ' like us, instead of Prophet Jesus. Praise God that seeds are beginning to take root. In every tent, when we talk about Jesus, we are seeing this change when we translate. They say and use these words more often," the director continued.

His ministry provides medicine, vitamins and clean water to 3,500 refugees in unofficial camps in southern Turkey. The aid group also gives sugar, wheat, rice, oil and milk formula to the widows at the camp.

Ministry workers are trying to disseminate Arabic Bibles in the camp. Bible-based coloring books are also being handed out to children.

The ministry director said that the failed coup attempt in Turkey last July has taken away the attention from the refugee crisis which meant that the ministry has to work much harder to help the displaced Syrians.

Last Thursday, the European Union granted 348 million euros to the U.N. World Food Program for Syrian refugees in Turkey. The money was part of a three billion euro fund that the E.U. promised to Turkey for taking in refugees that are originally bound for other parts of Europe.
home Faith Christian persecution documentary premieres in Washington DC

"Our Last Stand," a film documenting the persecution of Christians in Syria and Iraq, premiered on the last day of the National Advocacy Convention in Washington D.C. on Friday. Producer and director Jordan Allott partnered with In Defense of Christians (IDC) to shed light on the situation of Christians in the war-torn regions of the Middle East.

Helma Adde, a Syrian American school teacher, went to Syria and Iraq to speak face to face with victims of ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria). She time in the refugee camps where Christians are staying and met with the militias who are fighting to liberate villages from ISIS. Adde also paid a visit to her parent's hometown of Quarmishli in Northern Syria.

All of Adde's insights and experiences were documented by Allot.

Allott met Adde through her father, Fr. Gabriel Adde, who is a Syrian Orthodox priest. Fr. Adde once appeared with Allott on FOX News to discuss Christian persecution in these areas. Allott had already traveled to the Middle East prior to making the film.

"There's a need to convey to American Christians, especially, what Christians in the Middle East face and the important role they've played historically," Allott said to the National Catholic Register. "I was looking for a subject for the film and knew Helma would be the ideal bridge between her community in Iraq and Syria and an American audience," he added.

The film does not propose a specific solution to the crisis in the Middle East but Allott wanted to use the film as a tool for outreach and awareness.

"Politicians need to hear about it to make it a priority," Allott said. "This film allows people outside the community to be involved," he continued.

Allott noted that most of the refugees he had met do not want to leave Syria or Iraq. "Maybe our focus should be on stabilizing these places so they can stay," Adde said.

"Our Last Stand" also premiered in New York last month. It won "Best Feature Documentary" and "Best Director" at the independent film festival Revolution Me.

The next screening of the film will be on Saturday, Sept. 17, at the Saratoga Springs Film Festival in New York.
home US Churches shouldn't host events contrary to its principles, says Gary Johnson

Libertarian Party presidential candidate Gary Johnson said he supports religious freedom and he maintained that churches or synagogues should not host events that are contrary to its religious principles.

"As a member of a synagogue, I don't have to host a Christian reception in my synagogue. That's your church. That's your religion. You should be able to practice that unabated," Johnson explained in an interview with The Brody File.

To cite an example, the former governor of New Mexico insisted that Christian bakers have to sell their cakes even if it will be eaten at a gay wedding but he said that they don't have to decorate it.

"In the case of the bakers, the bakers have to sell the cake but the baker doesn't have to decorate the cake. That's the First Amendment that comes to play. You don't have to decorate the cake but you are in business so you got to sell that cake," he said.

Johnson deviates from the views of other Libertarians. TV host John Stossel wrote a column on World Net Daily arguing that the government should not prohibit businesses from refusing service to anyone.

"Every private business should be allowed to refuse service to whomever they want. Outlawing all discrimination perpetuates hatred by driving it underground," Stossel wrote.

Stossel asserted that Johnson is still better than the two leading candidates despite disagreeing with him about the issue about Christian bakers.

The former governor gained notoriety last week when an MSNBC host asked him what he would do about Aleppo if he was elected, to which he responded, "What is Aleppo?" Johnson later admitted that he "blanked" and thought that Aleppo was an acronym.

He recently purchased a full-page advertisement on the New York Times asking to be included in the debates. Johnson will be able to join the debates if he scores at least15 percent in the polls. The Libertarian candidate scored 11 percent in a NBC/SurveyMonkey poll conducted between Sept. 5 and Sept. 11.
home US Franklin Graham fires back at Hillary Clinton: I'm not deplorable to God

Famed American evangelist Franklin Graham went on social media to respond to Hillary Clinton's "basketful of deplorables" remark and said that God does not see him as deplorable.

"I'm not 'a deplorable' to God, even though I might be in the eyes of Hillary Clinton. What about you?" Graham wrote on Facebook.

Clinton remarked during a fundraiser last Friday that half of Trump's supporters belong to a "basketful of deplorables." She went on to describe them as "racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, [and] Islamophobic." Clinton apologized the next day and stated that generalizing the "half" was wrong.

Graham noted in his post that all sin is deplorable to God. He quoted John 3:16 and stated that God cannot tolerate sin.

"So much so that when Jesus carried our sins to the cross, God had to turn His back and could not even look on Him. Jesus died for our sins, took our sins to the grave, and rose again triumphantly to life on the third day," Graham said.

"If we confess our sins, repent, and believe on Him as our Savior, our deplorable sins are washed away and we can have a right standing before God," he added.

Earlier this week, Graham also criticized Clinton's running mate Tim Kaine for suggesting that the Catholic Church will reverse its position on gay marriage.

Graham has not endorsed a candidate so far but he urged Christians to vote in the coming elections. He also told them to encourage their family and friends to register and be informed about the candidates.

During his visit to Louisiana, the evangelist has said that he has no faith in either the Republican and Democratic parties. He was one of the pastors who attended Donald Trump's closed door meeting with 900 pastors in New York but he insisted that his presence was not an endorsement of Trump.

The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association published a special election 2016 edition of Decision magazine. The special issue compares the different platforms of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.
home US Hillary Clinton back on campaign trail; Donald Trump up in polls

Hillary Clinton got back on the campaign trail on Thursday after taking three days off for pneumonia, and the Democratic presidential candidate faced a more challenging political landscape, with Republican rival Donald Trump rising in opinion polls.

Senior Clinton aides said they always expected the race to the Nov. 8 election to be close. But it was clear from a raft of new polls that Trump had halted a summer swoon after taking steps to give a less freewheeling, more polished performance on the stump.

Clinton, 68, appeared in good health on a visit to her campaign plane's press cabin while flying to Greensboro, North Carolina, for a rally where she sought to refocus her campaign on the plight of the working class - which has turned out to be a potent theme for Trump.

Leaving the stage to the tune of James Brown's "I feel good," Clinton told reporters she kept her pneumonia diagnosis last Friday quiet, telling only senior staff, because she thought she would be able to "power through" the illness and keep campaigning.

"From my perspective, I thought I was going to be fine and I thought that there was no reason to make a big fuss about it," she said.

On Sunday, Clinton nearly collapsed while leaving a ceremony marking the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in New York.

Her illness coincided with a mini-surge by Trump, who has drawn even or taken a slight lead in national polls. Polls in battleground states where the race is likely to be decided showed Trump now leading in Iowa, Ohio, Florida and Nevada, and tied in North Carolina.

Following her appearance in North Carolina, Clinton was scheduled to appear at a Washington dinner.

Clinton's campaign chairman, John Podesta, said the candidate and her aides expected the contest to be close.

"We always expected the race to tighten up, we still feel like we're in a strong position with organizational advantage in Florida and Ohio," Podesta told reporters on Thursday. "They call these states battlegrounds for a reason."

In a speech at the New York Economic Club, Trump stuck to his script, avoiding the more improvisational style that has produced a cornucopia of controversies.

Trump pushed a package of tax cuts he said would help power the U.S. economy to an annual growth rate of 3.5 percent.

The New York businessman said his goal would be 4 percent growth, a target originally championed by Republican primary rival Jeb Bush. Trump said the growth would generate 25 million new jobs.

His economic package resurrected a decades-old debate on whether tax cuts can generate sustainable growth. But the overarching impression left by his speech was one of Trump talking about substantive issues and avoiding the frivolous.

Bob Shrum, a Democratic strategist who managed 2004 candidate John Kerry's unsuccessful campaign, said Clinton remained the favourite to win the White House, with demographic changes favouring her over Trump, who is heavily reliant on white voters.

What has hurt Clinton, Shrum said, is not the time taken off from the campaign trail but rather her decision to keep her diagnosis secret until forced to disclose it - which reinforced a perception among voters that she has a penchant for secrecy.

"Fairly or unfairly, what this was taken as was more evidence that she was not transparent and that's what hurts her," Shrum said. "She been far more transparent than Trump but she hasn't gotten any credit for it."

Democrats have sought to pressure Trump to release his tax returns, but the Republican has said he will not release them until a federal government audit has been completed. Clinton has released her tax records.

With the candidates' health in the spotlight, Trump, 70, on Thursday released details of a recent physical examination, a day after Clinton released specifics on her medical condition.

Trump's campaign said the results of his physical showed the fast-food fan has normal cholesterol with the help of a statin drug, weighs 236 pounds (107 kg) and has normal blood pressure.

In a not-so-subtle slap at Clinton, the Trump campaign said his medical report showed he "has the stamina to endure a uninterrupted a the rigours of a punishing and unprecedented presidential campaign and, more importantly, the singularly demanding job of president of the United States."

Trump also appeared on the "Dr. Oz Show" to discuss his health in an interview with host Mehmet Oz, a surgeon.

Top Clinton aide Jennifer Palmieri said "one upside" of Clinton's unplanned break was the chance to "sharpen the final argument Clinton will present to voters in these closing weeks."

"Our campaign readily admits that running against a candidate as controversial as Donald Trump means it is harder to be heard on what you aspire for the country's future, and it is incumbent on us to work harder," Palmieri said in a statement.

Trump backers on Capitol Hill said they were heartened by the tightening race after a call on Thursday morning with his campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway, who mapped out what the campaign was doing. She promised a more policy-driven approach from Trump in the race's final stretch.

"The poll numbers are just looking phenomenal as you move away from registered voters to likely voters," Republican U.S. Representative Blake Farenthold of Texas said.
home World Hungry Swazis take part in Islamic celebration of Eid al-Adha against the advice of Christian leaders

Swazis took part in the celebration of the Eid Al-Adha on Tuesday despite objections from their Christian leaders. The Swazis lined up at the Ezulwini Islamic Centre at the invitation of Muslims who promised to give away free packets of meat.

Bishop Simon Hlatjwako, president of the League of Churches, claimed that those who participated in the festival and ate the free meat are not true Christians.

"True Christians should not dare set foot at the Muslim slaughtering ceremony," said Hlatjwako to The Times of Swaziland. "Personally, I would not even bother myself; I do not care about their meat and ceremonies. Muslims worship their own god and as Christians, we do not go along with their god," he added.

Bishop Steven Masilela, president of the Conference of Churches, stated that Christians who are considered as the body of Christ are not allowed to eat everything.

The Islamic Centre gave away at least 300 parcels of meat. About 200 people left empty-handed because there was not enough food to go around for everybody. Luqman Asooka, the imam of the Islamic Centre, asked them to come back the next day.

"This is not a show-off, we are following the Islamic teaching, which say if we have something good, we have to share it with the needy," Asooka told the Swazi Observer.

"We felt like we had extra meat and instead of throwing it away, we saw it right to share with the need, we shared with everyone, even some government officials," he continued.

Eid al-Adha or Feast of the Sacrifice, commemorates the day when God commanded Abraham to sacrifice an animal instead of his son. Saudi Arabia declared Sept. 12 as the start of the festival, which usually lasts four days.

According to the CIA factbook, about 10 percent of Swazis are Muslims. 40 percent are identified as Zionist, which is said to be a blend of Christianity and indigenous religions. 20 percent are Catholics while the remaining 30 percent are Anglican, Baha'i, Methodist, Jewish and Mormon.
home World Sudanese authorities arrest Christian school teachers

Sudanese police and officials of the National Intelligence and Security Services stormed a Christian school in Madani to arrest its principal and 12 teachers last week. The school employees were accused of supporting the rebel group Sudan People's Liberation Army-North.

The accused denied the charges against them. Headmaster Samuel Suliman and the 12 teachers spent eight hours in jail before they were released on bail. Suliman said the police had a letter requesting the State Ministry of Social Welfare to turn over the Evangelical Basic School to the government.

"Over the past days, we have experienced difficult times in the school," Suliman told Morning Star News.

More than 1,000 students aged 3 to 18 attend the school which is affiliated with the Sudan Presbyterian Evangelical Church.

Since 2012, the area has witnessed the expulsion of Christians and the bulldozing of churches. In April 2013, the Sudanese Minister of Guidance and Endowments declared that the agency will not be granting new licenses for new churches because of the population decrease in South Sudan.

Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir has imposed a strict form of sharia which resulted in the discrimination of Christians and the Nuba people. In 1999, Sudan was flagged as a "country of particular concern" by the U.S. State Department.

Earlier this week, Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) and other international NGOs called on the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) to take action against human rights abuses in Sudan.

"We urge the Permanent Representatives of Members and Observer States at the United Nations Human Rights Council to take serious action in response to the deplorable human rights situation in Sudan," said Mervyn Thomas, chief executive of CSW.

Thomas noted that the reports of severe violations are valid reasons for the UNHRC to appoint a Special Rapporteur, an independent expert specializing in issues related to human rights.

"The targeting of civilians in South Kordofan, Blue Nile and Darfur, the restrictions on civil and political rights, including on freedom of religion or belief, and the harassment of civil society, and human rights defenders are deeply concerning," Thomas said. "We call on the Council to adopt a resolution that addresses the realities on the ground," he added.
Anti-gay pastor Steven Anderson banned from UK

It's emerged that a fundamentalist American pastor has been banned from the UK.

Steven Anderson was due to be travelling through London en route to South Africa and Botswana. Christian Today had already reported that Anderson had been banned from South Africa over his anti-gay comments. Now it has emerged he has also been banned from the UK.

He has made a litany of offensive remarks, including suggesting that the people killed by a gunman in a gay nightclub in Orlando earlier this year were "paedophiles".

Anderson claims that as he was about to board a flight, he was told that he had been banned from changing flights in London and so he had to find another route to Botswana (where he said, "We're gonna say whatever we want, we're gonna do whatever we want").

In typically offensive style, he released a video, describing South Africa as, "The rape capital of the world... one of the most dangerous, wicked places in the entire world."

A Home Office spokesperson confirmed the pastor has been banned from the UK. He said, "The Home Secretary has the power to exclude an individual if she considers that his or her presence in the UK is not conducive to the public good or if their exclusion is justified on public policy grounds... Coming here is a privilege that we refuse to extend to those who seek to subvert our shared values."

Anderson, whose church is not affiliated with any denomination, has a long history of offensive remarks and he has promoted Holocaust denial.
Australia: Anglican bishop backs same-sex marriage ahead of possible referendum

An Anglican bishop in Australia has come out in favour of same-sex marriage ahead of a possible referendum on the issue next February.

Ballarat's bishop Garry Weatherill, who opposes the referendum, told the ABC that he supported "marriage equality".

Bishop Weatherill said: "The local position of this particular bishop is for marriage equality. The Bible teaches marriage is for man and woman, that is pretty clear and that is our standard position. But it is saying marriage is good for people and society, and I think whether or not we approve of same gender relationships, we want people to be in strong, monogamous and sustainable relationships that give harmony to their lives and to the community."

His comments come after Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull this week introduced legislation into the Lower House for a plebiscite on same-sex marriage to be held on February 11.

The Labor opposition is expected to attempt to block the bill.

The bishop has spoken out against the plebiscite, arguing that Parliament should decide on such matters and that it is "almost inevitable" that hate speech will rise in the event of a national vote.

"It is the issue of respect that concerns me about the plebiscite. It is about the distress it could cause in the community, particularly among young, gay or sexually confused young people," he said. "The Government has quite sensibly tried to say there will be equal amounts of money for both sides of the argument, but who knows where other money will come from."
A former Columbus Police sergeant has filed suit against the town of Columbus and the Columbus Police Department accusing them of violating his civil rights by firing him from the department in 2015.

Paul Caraway was accused of exposing himself to a police dispatcher in a government building in 2015.

Caraway names Columbus Mayor Gary Woltermann and Columbus Police Chief William Pronovost in the complaint filed in the Billings Division of U.S. District Court on Sept. 8.

In it, Caraway claims Woltermann and Pronovost did not follow procedures in terminating him after a complaint of sexual harassment against him.

Pronovost suspended Caraway on Nov. 6, 2015, after a city employee filed a sexual harassment complaint against Caraway, according to the lawsuit.

Caraway filed a grievance appeal of his suspension with Woltermann, who denied the appeal on Nov. 20, 2015, according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit, which cites media reports, states Pronovost released untrue information regarding harassment complaints against Caraway.

Caraway also calls the woman who reported him an "instigator" who was "lacking in credibility," in the complaint.

By not providing Caraway with a post-termination evidence hearing, the mayor and the chief deprived Caraway of his right to procedural due process, according to the lawsuit. Caraway was also deprived a chance to clear his name, according to the filing.

Because of Pronovost's and Woltermann's actions, Caraway suffered humiliation, mental and emotional distress, loss of self-esteem and loss of his professional reputation, according to the complaint.

Caraway is seeking lost wages and benefits, general damages and legal expenses.

Neither the city nor the police department had responded to the complaint as of Thursday.

Caraway's attorney is Michael J. San Souci, of Bozeman.
Cardinal denies attacking Muslims after warning of 'Islamic conquest of Europe'

A senior Austrian Cardinal has denied attacking the Muslim faith after reports that he had warned against an "Islamic conquest of Europe".

The office of Cardinal Christoph Schonborn, the Archbishop of Vienna, said in a statement that his homily on September 11 had been "misinterpreted on social media as an attack against Muslims and even as directed against the refugees".

He had said in a speech to mark the 333rd anniversary of the Battle of Vienna: "Will there be a third Islamic attempt to conquer Europe? Many Muslims think this and wish this and say that Europe is at its end."

The Cardinal reportedly went on to pray: "God have mercy on Europe and on thy people, who are in danger of forfeiting our Christian heritage". He added that this was already being felt "not only economically, but above all, in human and religious matters".

However, his office insists that he was "not championing a sort of defensive battle, defending Christian values against Islam".

The Cardinal has offered a clarification: "Europe's Christian legacy is in danger, because we Europeans have squandered it. That has absolutely nothing to do with Islam nor with the refugees. It is clear that many Islamists would like to take advantage of our weakness, but they are not responsible for it. We are."

He continued: "One must not take my homily to be a call to defend ourselves against the refugees, this was not at all my intention. The opportunity for a Christian renewal of Europe lies in our hands: if we look at and come to Christ, spread his gospel and deal with our fellow men, strangers included, as he has taught us, in love and responsibility."

Cardinal Schonborn, 71, is a conservative who has been referred to as the "spiritual son" of his one-time mentor, Pope Benedict XVI.

The comments came as a new study in the US found that only 14 per cent of Catholics have a favourable view of Muslims.
Christian groups slam Israel over Gaza 'prison', call on US to cut military aid

Two leading Christian groups have strongly criticised Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory, demanded the Jewish state end the "prison-like conditions" in Gaza and called on the US to cancel its military aid budget to its Middle Eastern ally.

In a joint statement following a "consultation on the Holy Land" this week, the World Council of Churches (WCC) and The National Council of Churches of Christ, USA (NCC) ecumenical groups that represent over 545 million Christians combined, said that "keeping an entire population under occupation and even in a closed area, such as Gaza, in prison-like conditions is a grave and unsustainable situation." It added: "We are also well aware that Israel is the occupying force and has commanding power over the people of Palestine and, thus, bears special responsibility for taking the initiative."

The statement called on the US to "cease its practice of arming various state and non-state actors in the Middle East and, in particular, to reconsider its proposed $38 billion military aid package to Israel, for the last thing needed at this time is more weapons," and "end the current wave of legislative efforts to penalize the use of non-violent economic measures to influence policy in Israel."

The statement said: "No people should be denied their rights and, certainly, no people should be denied their rights for generations. The unresolved conflict in Israel and Palestine is primarily about justice, and until the requirement of justice is met, peace cannot be established. As Israel's occupation of East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Gaza nears the 50-year mark, generations have been suffering under this reality."

The church groups sounded a pessimistic note on the prospects of a two-state solution. "The possibilities of a viable two-state solution, for which we have long advocated, are more elusive and, seemingly, more unrealistic than ever," their joint statement said.

The two umbrella organisations met in Arlington, Virginia from September 12-14, 2016. "More than 60 representatives of churches and church-related organizations from around the world gathered because we hear the cries of all who are yearning for peace and justice in the land we call Holy," the statement said.

The statement was signed by Rev Olav Fykse-Tveit, general secretary of the WCC, and Jim Winkler, the president and general secretary of the NCC.

The pro-Israel Anti-Defamation League called the statement "disappointing, yet sadly predictable." It said: "The WCC and NCC preference to blame only Israel for the Arab-Israeli conflict  and for the failure to achieve a two-state solution  is wrong on the facts and detached from the realities in the region," according to a statement Thursday by Jonathan Greenblatt, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, and Rabbi David Fox Sandmel, its director of interfaith affairs.

The American Jewish Committee accused the two Christian groups of having "a long history of anti-Israel bias." It said: "What could have been a powerful plea for peacemaking turned reflexively to a familiar and factually feeble denunciation of Israel from two groups with a long history of anti-Israel bias...These two church bodies claim to seek justice, but uniformly blame Israel exclusively for Palestinian suffering, while utterly failing to hold Palestinians to account for incitement and violence against Israel."

The World Council of Churches is made up of 348 member groups representing some 500 million people, while the The National Council of Churches of Christ, USA, has 38 member groups representing some 45 million Christians.
Churches burned and members threatened with violence: The reality of being a Christian in Cuba

Amid an escalating crackdown on churches in Cuba, a prominent pastor and religious freedom activist has warned that "the threat of physical violence... comes with the territory of being a Christian" in the Caribbean island.

Rev Mario Felix Lleonart Barroso, who has left Cuba after being targeted by authorities, told International Christian Concern (ICC) that the Cuban government closely monitors religious groups.

The Office of Religious Affairs (ORA) is "supposed to mediate and act as a bridge between churches, people, and the government," he said.

"But if you've lived in Cuba or know anything about the way things are from the inside, you know the ORA is nothing more than an arm of the state established to suppress the religious liberties and rights of Cuban citizens. It's just another one of the government's ways to have eyes and ears everywhere."

The constitution guarantees religious freedom in Cuba, but UK-based Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) has warned that the government's treatment of religious groups has significantly deteriorated in the last year. The organisation has accused authorities of targeting church properties "to tighten its control over the activities and membership of religious groups and thus eliminate the potential for any social unrest."

Between January and July 2016, CSW recorded 1,606 violations of religious freedom including the demolition and confiscation of church buildings, the destruction of church property and arbitrary detention.

Religious leaders have also had their personal belongings confiscated, and more than 1,000 churches are still considered 'illegal' and are under threat of future confiscation.

Barroso said the closure of churches and the eviction of members is "bad enough", but warned that there is also "the problem of destroying or even burning things inside the building; not to mention, the threat of physical violence that comes with the territory of being a Christian in Cuba".

He was arrested in March, just hours before US President Barack Obama arrived in Cuba for an official state visit. His wife was placed under house arrest and locked inside their home with the couple's two young daughters.

"It was one of those moment that you never forget," Barroso told ICC. "Knowing that your daughter is watching something like that is a painful experience. It's hard for a young mind to understand that expressing your beliefs and your opinion can land you in a jail call.

"You think to yourself: standing up for what is right could end up being the end of my life."

Despite the troubles, however, Barroso told ICC he remains hopeful about the future of the Church in Cuba.

"The reason the government sometimes tries to silence the Church or to close down church buildings is because it is worried about how many people are turning away from the state and looking to God (and the Church) for answers and for hope," he said.
Donald Trump admits Barack Obama was born in the US

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has confirmed that he believes that President Barack Obama was born in the United States.

"President Barak Obama was born in the United States period. Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again," he said at a campaign event at the Trump International Hotel in Washington today.

Trump has been blamed for fuelling the so-called "birther" controversy.

Today he attempted to blame Hillary Clinton for starting the controversy and tried to take credit for ending it.

He has suggested in the past that Obama was born outside the US, which would have made him ineligible for the country's highest office. Obama released his birth certificate in 2011 in an attempt to quell the speculation.

Earlier, the Mayor of London Sadiq Khan accused Trump of playing into the hands of Islamic State.

Khan, who is Muslim, speaking at a press conference in Montreal, said: "Donald Trump said that Muslims from around the world  I'm paraphrasing  would not be welcome into the United States of America.

"Not only does that show a lack of understanding and awareness of the great country that is the USA and its history and legacy, it's also inadvertently playing into the hands of Daesh and so-called ISIS because it implies it's not possible to be a Western liberal and mainstream Muslim.

"I think it's important that the USA maintains her role as a beacon for tolerance, respect and diversity.

"I think it's important for those of us who are foreigners to stay out of the US elections. I hope the best candidate wins and I hope she does win with a stomping majority."

Trump has said in the past that if he did go ahead and ban Muslims, he would make an exception for Khan.
Evangelicals in Egypt head to US in support of President Sisi's UN visit

A delegation from the Evangelical Church in Egypt left Cairo yesterday to head to the US in support of President Abdel-Fattah Sisi ahead of his visit to attend next week's United Nations (UN) General Assembly.

The state-owned MENA news agency reported an official statement from the Evangelical Church that said the delegation's visit, which reportedly comes in coordination with evangelical churches in the US, is an expression of support for the Egyptian state from the Church.

The Church, which has around 250,000 members, said that it coordinated the visit to "support Egypt at such a critical stage in the history of the region."

The Church requested that next Sunday be devoted to prayer for the "success of the visit" and support for Egpyt.

Sisi is set to attend the UN General Assembly next week. On 21 September, he will also attend the UN Security Council summit on Syria to discuss migrants and refugees, as well as an African leaders' meeting on climate change.

The show of support comes amid growing tensions between the Government and Coptic Christians. Yesterday, Christian Today reported that Human Rights Watch (HRW) is warning that the Government in Egypt is signalling that Christians can be attacked "with impunity" because of a new law that discriminates against the religious minority.

The new law, published byAl-Youm al-Sabaa, allows local authorities to forbid new church buildings and requires any new churches that are built to be "commensurate with" the number of Christians in the area. It is also feared that the law's security provisions effectively sanction mob decisions against Christians.

Christian Today reported in August that the new law was being heavily criticised by the Coptic Christian community.

Now HRW has warned that the law discriminates against the increasingly-beleagured Christian minority in Egypt.

There have been a number of recent incidents of mob attacks against Christians that have left one person dead, several injured, and properties destroyed.

Most Christians in Egypt are Coptic Orthodox and they are believed to make up between six and ten per cent of the 93 million population.
Foodbank harvest appeal: 'Parents are going without food so their children don't starve.'

The Bible speaks a lot about poverty, helping the poor, seeing a need and meeting that need.

Foodbanks are increasingly offering a way to practise that teaching.

"What foodbanks have done is given the Church a way it can reach out with that message, the good news, in a very practical way," says Paul Pickhaver, director of Kingston Foodbank at New Malden Baptist Church, Surrey.

He was speaking as a new appeal is launched for food for more than 420 foodbanks across the UK, but also for cash to keep them up and running.

In its Combined Harvest appeal, the Trussell Trust Foodbank Network is calling for both types of donations for the first time.

This will help foodbanks make the challenging shift from autumn to winter, when they will see a significant rise in the need for help.

In the last year alone, more than 1.1 million three-day emergency food supplies were provided to local people in crisis by the foodbank. Of these, more than 400,000 went to children.

Pickhaver said: "The foodbank here in Kingston exists to provide food for local people who are in crisis, for whatever reason."

Reasons for needing help can be loss of a job, getting a job and coming of benefits but having to wait for wages to kick in, or even malnutrition, where people are not getting enough of the right kinds of food.

"Affordability and living costs in a place like Kingston is a real challenge."

He added: "The most important thing you can give to support a foodbank is food."

But this year, money is also needed, to help with running costs such as transport and insurance.

Kingston has in addition also set up a "fuel bank" initiative, funded by npower, which is now being rolled out to the rest of the country, where they give people vouchers for gas and electricity bills. They've helped hundreds of families. "So not only are we giving them food, we are giving them means to heat that food," Pickhaver said.

And while often based in churches, of course foodbanks do not just help Christians. The food comes from people of all faiths and none, and likewise anyone is given help regardless of religion or ethnic background.

Ron, 43, from, Kingston, explained that he has mental health issues and drink problems. He lost his job just before Christmas and became dependent on benefits.

"The money doesn't stretch as far as it should. So these places are really handy," he said.

Without the foodbank, he would have to borrow money for food, and then pay that back. "It can be just a vicious circle," added Ron. He is hoping to return to work soon and is looking at training for a new job.

Jason, 49, says he "went off the path" as a young man but things are better now and his family is happy. He simply does not have enough money to buy the food he needs to live. But besides the food, he likes going to the foodbank "to be around nice people."

Foodbank network director Adrian Curtis said: "During previous years we've been incredibly humbled by the level of support people across the UK have given foodbanks at harvest time.

"Thank you to everyone who has donated food, time or money; your compassion and support means that people in your community unable to afford food after being hit by something like redundancy, illness or a delayed benefit payment, have had somewhere to turn."

He added: "Food donations are really important to our foodbank network, but foodbanks also have lots of costs you might not immediately think of: as independent charities they have to cover insurance and utilities; many will have to rent storage space for their food and pay to run a foodbank van; and an increasing number are running additional projects, such as budget cookery courses, that offer wider preventative support to help people avoid reaching the point where they need a foodbank referral."

Winter is the busiest time of year for foodbanks, when people faced with higher gas and electric costs in the cold weather can face having to choose between turning on the heating or putting food on the table. Local food donation drop off points can be found via this map
'Hawaii Five O' season 7 spoilers: Scott Caan won't be in 150th episode; Adam and Kono to have a baby?

While many shows mark their milestones with all of their original cast members intact, this is sadly not going to be the case for Hawaii Five-O's 150th episode.

According to a report by Movie News Guide, scheduling conflicts have rendered Scott Caan  who plays Danny Williams  unable to join the team for Episode 150. Executive Producer Peter Lenkov confirmed the news over Twitter. "Unfortunately he's not in 150," he said.

Along with his taping schedule for Hawaii Five-O, Caan is also involved in the 9/11 drama "Two for One" opposite Jason Biggs and Erika Christensen, which is currently in its post-production phase. This is also the reason why he will be appearing in a reduced number of episodes this season.

In a separate interview with TV Guide, Lenkov hinted that there will be major developments in the relationship of Adam (Ian Anthony Dale) and Kono (Grace Park), which may come in the form of starting a family.

"I like to believe they're going to be thinking about starting a family and about just trying to move on from all the bad in their life. It brings them closer together, knowing that everything's fleeting, and I think they're looking at their relationship in a different way," he said.

Meanwhile, as the synopsis of the premiere for season 7 has been released, it seems that the team is not showing any hints of slowing down, even after McGarrett's (Alex O'Loughlin) close call last season.

"Five-0 must work with rogue MI-6 agent Harry Langford (guest star Chris Vance) to find a terrorist planning to cause nuclear reactors across Europe to meltdown. Also, McGarrett and Danny ask retired FBI profiler Alicia Brown (guest star Claire Forlani) to help them find their serial killer vigilante," the synopsis read.

Meanwhile, the show's season 7 premiere on CBS has also been pushed back to Sept. 30, after it was initially announced for Sept. 23, reported Carter Matt.
Just too hard? 10 Old Testament passages your pastor's never preached on

The whole Bible is the word of God. All Christians would agree with that, but probably most would say that parts of it are more useful than others. We struggle with those long genealogies, for instance, and we can't always see the point of all those Old Testament laws  though we believe they have a point.

Some Church traditions lay down programmes of preaching for their ministers through a weekly 'lectionary' that gives them the passage for the week. It takes them through a good chunk of the Bible, usually over a three or four-year period. Others stress the value of 'consecutive exposition', where a whole book of the Bible is expounded verse by verse or chapter by chapter. That way, the argument runs, you can't miss anything out even if you wanted to.

But are there bits of the Bible that we just don't hear preached on at all? Here are 10 Old Testament passages your pastor has almost certainly avoided, either because they're too gory, too shocking or just too hard to make anything of.

1. Genesis 19: 30-37

It's the story of how Lot was made drunk by his two daughters so they could have sex with him and bear children (who turned out to be the ancestors of Israel's deadly enemies, the Ammonites and the Moabites). It's all rather sordid and horrible. There are lessons in it about consequences and family dysfunction, but it's not an appealing story.

2. Genesis 30: 25-43

Jacob wants to go his own way from his father-in-law Laban, but needs to build up his resources first. He asks for all the spotted and striped sheep and goats, and Laban agrees. He gets the flocks to mate in front of fresh-cut branches in which he's cut stripes, and their offspring all turn out to be striped too. It's just one of those stories we struggle to find anything to say about.

3. Numbers 22:21-41

This is about Balaam's donkey. The prophet is asked to curse Israel on behalf of the Moabites, but as he's on his way an angel with a drawn sword standsin front of him, visible to the animal but not to Balaam. Understandably, the creature stops; less understandably, it complains to Balaam when he beats it. There are certainly things to learn from it, but it just seems too weird.

4. Judges 19: 1-30

This is one of the most brutal and terrible stories in the Bible. A man and his concubine stayed in the town of Gibeah overnight. A crowd gathered wanting to have sex with the man; he sends them his concubine instead and they rape her to death. He chops up her body and sends the pieces to the rest of the Israelites so they can see what's been done.

In the end, this turns out to be a story of God's justice. But it's strong meat  too strong for most churches.

5. 1 Samuel 27: 1-12

David is the greatest king and hero of the Old Testament. Before he became king, he spent time with the Philistines, sheltering from Saul. He still raided Philistine territory, though, and to keep the Philistine king from becoming aware of his depredations he killed everyone in the villages he targeted: "He did not leave a man or woman alive" (verse 11); we have to assume he killed the children too. It's a long way from the image of David we like to portray, and very hard to preach on.

6. 2 Kings 2: 23-25

The prophet Elisha appears to have been follicly challenged. He's walking along when some boys make fun of him; two bears come out of a wood and maul them, which seems a bit extreme. What's going on here? Perhaps it's about respect for elders, or perhaps he was tonsured like a monk as a sign of his office. Either way, it's a challenging preach.

7. 2 Kings 6: 1-7

Another Elisha story. One of his band of prophets drops an axe into the river and is upset because it was borrowed. Elisha throws a stick into the water and the axe-head floats to the surface. It's one of several Elisha miracles that just seem odd  a bit too domestic, perhaps. There is a lesson there when you read them all together  his actions are symbolic prayers, acting out what he wants to happen  but on the whole, these stories are ones preachers avoid.

8. Psalm 137: 8-9

These are the verses that speak of God's blessings on the one who "seizes your infants and dashes them against the rocks". And the Psalm starts so well, with that lovely lament for Jerusalem: "By the waters of Babylon we sat down and wept..." The last verses are hardly ever read in public worship; they seem sub-Christian. But they should be: they're a deeply honest acknowledgment of the desire for revenge. Until we acknowledge anger, we can't deal with it.

9. Ezekiel 23: 1-49

A remarkably graphic, no-holds barred allegory of Israel and Judah, characterising them as two adulterous sisters. Some of these verses are Not Safe For Work and would bring blushes to the faces of most congregations.

10. Daniel 6: 24

Who doesn't enjoy the story of Daniel and the Lions' Den? It has a happy ending, with Daniel rescued alive against all the odds. But it's a rare preacher who will go on to talk about how the story actually finishes  his accusers, with their wives and children, torn to pieces and devoured in his place. That's not the version we tell in Sunday school. Sin, though, has consequences  not just for ourselves, but for others.

There are some parts of the Bible we find it really hard to fathom, and so we're likely to leave them alone. But never forget what Mark Twain wrote: "It ain't the parts of the Bible that I can't understand that bother me, it's the parts that I do understand."

Mark Woods is the author of Does the Bible really say that? Challenging our assumptions in the light of Scripture (Lion, 8.99). Follow him on Twitter: @RevMarkWoods
Nigel Farage calls on the Archbishop of Canterbury to step down

Outgoing UKIP leader Nigel Farage has called on the Archbishop of Canterbury to resign.

He accused Archbishop Justin Welby of failing to stand up for Britain's "Christian culture".

"It's a great shame isn't it that the head of our established Church is not prepared to stand up for our Christian culture in this country. He's somebody that should go too."

He was speaking to Sky News before delivering his valedictory speech as UKIP leader.

Farage, who has shared a platform with US Republican nominee Donald Trump, also criticised Douglas Carswell, UKIP's only remaining MP, who left the Conservatives to join the party.

He said: "I don't know why he joined. Genuinely, I don't know why he joined. He doesn't seem to support anything we stand for - it's very odd."

Farage was at the UKIP conference in Bournemouth where a new leader is being elected.

He was criticising Welby in response to comments made by the Archbishop earlier this year.

The Archbishop of Canterbury was answering questions on migration and asylum seekers at a House of Commons selected committee when he criticised Farage as "inexcusable" and accused him of "legitimising racism".

He was also strongly critical of Trump, saying he agreed with Pope Francis who had said "anyone who only builds walls and not bridges is not a Christian". On banning Muslims from entering the United States, Welby said: "It is certainly not a Christian thing to do, nor is it a rational thing to do. It does not respect the dignity of the human being."
Montana farmers are nervously watching the purchase of agricultural giant Monsanto by German pharmaceutical and farm chemical company Bayer.

Bayers planned $57 billion purchase of Monsanto was announced Wednesday. Bayer would also buy $9 billion in Monsanto debt. As the companies described the deal as a good for the next generation of innovation for agriculture, farmers worried the lack of competition might hurt more than help, especially after the merger of Dow Chemical and DuPont.

I think if you looked at one of them by itself, it wouldnt be that bad, John Youngberg of Montana Farm Bureau Federation said of the mergers. But now were looking at two of them if this goes through.

Montana farm acres are populated by products from all four companies. Montana Farm Bureau member Ken Johnson, of Conrad, noted in a statement Wednesday that the mergers could result in higher cost for seeds, herbicide and fertilizer because of reduced competition.

In addition to Monsanto-Bayer, and Dow-DuPont, seed and chemical company Syngenta is being purchased for $43 billion by the China National Chemical Corporation.

Youngberg said theres also concern about research. Farmers have benefited from a race between companies trying to develop better products. Theres concern that research will be consolidated and fewer research paths will be tested.

The Farm Bureau is asking the U.S. government to scrutinize the latest deal carefully.

U.S. Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., the Senates only farmer said the merger between Bayer and Monsanto couldnt be worse for Montana farmers.

Corporate consolidation in the agriculture market is the single greatest threat to family farmers and our rural way of life. This latest proposed mega-merger stands as a high water mark for agribusiness in its quest to dominate the seed market, and family farms will pay the price, Tester said in a statement about the sale.

Tester called on the Justice Department to reject the sale.
'Our confidence is in God,' says minister father of Brit facing extradition to US

A Baptist minister whose son is to be extradited to the United States on hacking charges has spoken of his "confidence" in the justice of God.

A judge ruled today that Lauri Love, 31, who has been an activist with the Occupy movement and who suffers from Asperger's, was arrested in 2013 and charged with hacking US military and Nasa computer networks.

He is alleged to have stolen data from the Federal Reserve, the Department of Defense, NASA and the FBI.

Authorities in the US want him to stand trial in their country, where he could face a sentence of up to 99 years.

District judge Nina Tempia, sitting at Westminster magistrates court, ruled today that he can be extradited to face three trials on the hacking charges.

In effect this means that she is sending his case up to the Secretary of State.

Tempia said the charges are "extremely serious". She acknowledged his mental health issues but was satisfied his needs would met in the US.

Love, from Stradishall in Suffolk, is the son of Rev Alexander Love, a Baptist minister from Scotland who is currently a prison chaplain at HM Prison Highpoint North. His mother also works at the prison.

The minister told Sky News he was very upset by the decision to extradite his son.

"I've been alive for a long time and all my life I've always believed that to be born in these islands was to win the lottery of life, that in our society there was decency and fairness, that our laws were just.

"I don't criticise the judge. She has passed judgement on a law that is flawed. This is not right, that my son can be taken away. It is my belief that it is not fair or just that a boy who's got mental health issues can be taken away from his family who are his support network, merely to satisfy the desire of the Americans to exact what I feel is vengeance on him. This is wrong."

He said that the decision might still be reversed on appeal.

"Our confidence is not just in the legal system. Our confidence is in God. Though I would say one thing. We've had a big discussion about who can come into this country. Let's have a discussion about who can be taken out of it and why they should be taken out."
Pastor Kong Hee says that despite a challenging year, Jesus was real in his life

City Harvest Church founding Pastor Kong Hee posted a status on Facebook saying that it has been a challenging year, but Jesus was real for him and his family.

In the Facebook post, the 51-year-old pastor, who has been sentenced to jail for manipulating millions of dollars in church finances to fund the music career of his wife Ho Yeow Sun, shared how Jesus had been so real for him and his family. The post also shows photos and videos of the pastor and the ministry of CHC.

"This is my personal Year-in-Review. It has been a challenging one but Jesus has been so real to me and my family every step of the way." the post of Pastor Hee reads. "Thank you for loving us and always praying for us. We love Jesus and all of you... Happy New Year!"

This is my personal Year-in-Review. It has been a challenging one but Jesus has been so real to me and my family every... Posted by Kong Hee on Thursday, 31 December 2015

Pastor Hee was found guilty for channeling $35.9 million in church funds into a company called Xtron, which handles the music career of Sun. The guilty party contested claiming that the company was an activity deemed as outreach to non-Christians. However, evidence proves that there was misappropriation of funds on the part of CHC staff, and that the act was considered criminal in nature.

According to The Straits Times, The Singaporean pastor along with five other staff have been sentenced to prison with sentences lasting from 21 months to eight years. Hee will receive the lengthiest sentence of eight years, which starts this January.

Other staff members of CHC who were involved in the malpractice of organization funds are CHC fund manager Chew Eng Han, who was given a six-year sentence; deputy senior pastor Tan Ye Peng, who got five years and six months; and ex-finance manager Serina Wee, who got five years; and Ex-CHC finance committee member John Lam and former finance manager Sharon Tan, who each got 21 months.

City Harvest Church is a Singaporean Christian church that was started by Hee back in 1989. The congregation now has over 15 weekly worship services and has over 17,000 members in attendance.
Samsung Galaxy A8 (2016) release date, specs rumors: New leaked renders hint possible launch in the near future

Leaked renders and specs of the 2016 edition for the Samsung Galaxy A8 suggest that the variant is ready for launch.

The latest leaks have already found their way to benchmarking website AnTuTu. According to GSM Arena, The AnTuTu listing is the latest leaked specs for the new iteration and consolidates previous leaks from other websites like Geekbench and GFXBench.

While Samsung has yet to provide confirmation on the 2016 Samsung Galaxy A8, industry observers agree that the supposed leaked specs may have some truth to them, given that the specs remain consistent. If the purported specs become official, then the 2016 Samsung Galaxy A8 will launch with the same, 5.7-inch display from last year's edition, and will sport full HD resolution. Other purported specs include an Exynos 7420 chipset paired with 3 GB of RAM, 64 GB of onboard storage, and although a late 2016 release, will still come out with Android Marshmallow 6.0.1 right out of the box. However, given that the 2016 edition will be a recent release, it is expected that Samsung will update the new Galaxy A8 to use the Android Nougat sometime next year.

Meanwhile, although the leaked specs indicate an 8-MP main camera and a 5-MP selfie shooter, it is more likely that Samsung will retain the same 16-MP setup from last year's variant.

Aside from the specs, supposed press renders have also made their way online, giving weight to speculations that Samsung will officially announce the 2016 Galaxy A8 soon. In addition, reports have also mentioned that the device has already gone through different certifications prior to its approaching release, among them FCC and Bluetooth SIG.

Although Samsung remains silent on supposed details, a new edition for the Galaxy A8  originally launched last year  is certainly possible. Reports have already surfaced that the South Korea-based tech giant is already readying 2017 editions for some of the iterations in the lineup, notably the Galaxy A3, Galaxy A5, and Galaxy A7.
Teen Christian boy 'murdered' and hung from a tree in Pakistan

A 14-year-old Christian boy has been murdered and his dead body hung in a tree in Faisalabad, according to a charity helping Christians persecuted in Pakistan.

Zeeshan Masih was visiting his uncle's cattle farm and went out to buy a soft drink.

He did not return home, and was later found hanging from the branch of a tree near his uncle's pastures.

His death was registered by police as natural, despite medical evidence showing sexual assault. The British Pakistani Christian Association (BPCA) said his assailants were two local but unidentified Muslim men.

One police officer claimed the boy died of a heart attack induced by drinking a soft drink after eating fruit.

After pressure from the BPCA, a local church and a local bishop, the police have now agreed to register an incident after a DNA report is received in about a month.

Kanwal Amar, lead reporter for the BPCA, said: "This family are deeply traumatised. They have lost a son to an extremely heinous crime and the chance for them to get justice is limited. The manner in which police officers have attempted to camouflage this crime has hurt and angered them. They are calling for an independent inquiry into the handling of their son's death."

Wilson Chowdhry, chairman of the BPCA, said: "The brutal nature of the crimes inflicted on Christians in Pakistan is the product of their vulnerability and the warped minds that breed in the nation.

"The levels of rape, sodomy and murder in Pakistan are reaching unprecedented levels. Christians and other minorities are a natural target as they are disenfranchised by the country's laws and statutes, which confer second-class citizenship upon them.

"In the main Christians are poor, illiterate and hold a pariah status culminating in an ineffectual response from statutory authorities when help is needed, who deem them worthless. No amount of laws can ever change a deeply entrenched community mindset that believes Christians are anathema  so crimes like this will continue and justice will fail time after time."

BPCA has offered to pay for the funeral and is raising funds for the family to have a legal advisor to press for a full murder investigation. The BPCA has also set up a petition to stop child abduction and organ trafficking.
Why are young evangelicals seeking out traditional worship?

I was maybe 13 or 14 and in a Religious Studies class. At my (Church of England) state school, church attendance was compulsory to be admitted. In the class we were asked to draw a picture of our church. It was the prelude to a discussion about our different churches, the buildings, the worship style and our experience of them.

While many people in the class had already stopped attending church once they'd got a place at the school, some still were regular worshippers. They mostly drew church buildings that looked nothing like what I drew.

They sketched out a classic 'churchy' looking building. There were spires and old stone structures, surrounded by graveyards - generally places that looked like churches. I sketched out a 1960s concrete and glass structure. At the time, the church we attended was meeting in a Further Education College so that was the building I drew. I was secretly feeling pretty pleased with myself. As the discussion in the class moved forward and some others described the worship in their services as boring, I was able proudly to proclaim that we had electric guitars, and doughnuts before the service (meeting as we called it).

This small incident was a microcosm of the relationship I had to tradition when I was growing up. I saw it as pretty irrelevant to the practice of faith. What could those old, cold buildings possibly have to offer? By extension, what could the kind of Christianity that happened in these places ever offer me? In my mind it was stale, repetitive and irrelevant to the late 20th Century world in which I was growing up.

Fast forward to 2016 and while I haven't lost my love for electric guitars in worship (and I'm always happy to be offered a doughnut) I realise that my youthful view was far too reductive. The tradition of the Church, liturgy, the creeds, apostolic succession, the Eucharist and much more all play an important role in my expression of faith. It seems many others are on a similar journey  especially younger people.

Across the US and the UK there is a movement of younger people from an evangelical background who are reconnecting with the heritage and tradition of the Church.

This takes many forms, but it caught my eye this week that the Prayer Book Society  a group dedicated to promoting the Book of Common Prayer  is proclaiming a "National resurgence" in its use. The Book, which forms the basis of Anglican liturgy and theology was first written in the mid 16th Century and revised in 1662. Although some parishes have continued to use it since then, many have moved away from it, either using Common Worship  the more contemporary liturgical style, or doing away with liturgical worship altogether.

However, the Society now says that many younger people are expressing an interest in the Prayer Book. "Many young people... are coming across The Book of Common Prayer for the first time," said spokeperson John Service. "They are struck by the beauty and relevance of the language which has inspired writers like Shakespeare as well as churchgoers down the ages."

24-year-old Fergus Butler-Gallie who's training to be an Anglican priest says he's noticed a pattern with younger people who are keen to have more substantive expressions of worship. "The words... found in The Book of Common Prayer satisfy that hunger as they rediscover past patterns of worship and understand their significance," he said.

It isn't just the Prayer Book, though. Younger people seem to be rediscovering more traditional, liturgical expressions of worship across the board.

Rev Erik Parker has blogged about the phenomenon of being a 'high church millenial'  in the Lutheran tradition. Rachel Held Evans has written a book about her journey from evangelicalism to Episcopalianism. It isn't just Protestant denominations either. Some young evangelicals are becoming Roman Catholics, with one writer suggesting, "college [is] a ripe breeding ground for interest in Roman Catholicism. Among the traits of the Catholic Church that attract... students - and indeed many young evangelicals at large - are its history, emphasis on liturgy, and tradition of intellectualism."

Indeed, there seems to be a thirst for Orthodox Christian faith as well. The most popular piece I've ever written for Christian Today was about the Jesus Prayer  an ancient prayer of the Orthodox Church.

Lambeth Palace, the home of the Archbishop of Canterbury, itself now plays host to a community of young people from around the world, who live under a rule of regular prayer, meditation and worship.

This trend towards tradition may tell us many things. The sociological, historical and political factors in all of this can't be ignored, but there isn't space to examine them here  in fact whole doctorates could be written on the phenomenon. One thing is for sure though  embracing a more traditional, liturgical style of worship doesn't mean abandoning more informal, evangelical practices.

The old can (and probably should) be held in positive tension with the new. If we as believers and our churches were open to embracing a broader range of styles, it would surely deepen our spiritual experience.

Pastor Brian Zahnd describes his journey as a charismatic evangelical like this: "As far as I was concerned, most Catholics, Orthodox, Anglicans, and mainline Protestants needed to 'get saved'  which is to say, they needed to become my 'style' of Christian... [But now] This much I'm sure of: Orthodox mystery, Catholic beauty, Anglican liturgy, Protestant audacity, Evangelical energy, Charismatic reality  I need it all!"

So what does the future hold? It's hard to say, but the search for tradition and structure alongside the energy and dynamism of evangelicalism is a potent mix. Some churches are investigating a 'cross-tradition' approach which seeks to blend these different elements. In an article entitled, 'Why Millennials Long for Liturgy', Gracy Olmstead writes, "The millennial generation is seeking a holistic, honest, yet mysterious truth... Protestant churches that want to preserve their youth membership may have to develop a greater openness toward the treasures of the past. One thing seems certain: this 'sacramental yearning' will not go away."

Follow Andy Walton on Twitter @waltonandy
With just one bullet, British sniper kills top ISIS executioner, 3 other jihadists, saving lives of 12 hostages about to be murdered

There's no magic in this bullet, but it saved 12 innocent liveseight men and four women.

The single shot triggered an explosion that killed a top Islamic State (ISIS) executioner and three other jihadists, who were recording what was supposed to be another routine mass killing for the group's propaganda video, the Daily Mail reports.

The bullet reportedly came from a Barett .50-caliber rifle fired by a British Special Air Service (SAS) sniper who was posted nearly a mile away from the execution site near Raqqa, Syria.

The SAS shooter fired the shot just seconds before the executioner was set to burn the hostages alive using a flamethrower.

The bullet struck the fuel tank strapped on the back of the ISIS executioner, triggering an explosion that instantaneously killed him and his three fellow jihadists.

The unidentified executioner was a notorious ISIS militant who had been on a U.S. "kill list" for several months, according to the Daily Star. Reports said he and several other militants had been traveling around ISIS-held compounds in Syria killing civilians accused of being spies.

After receiving a tip on the executioner's location, British special forces tracked him to a town near Raqqa.

"The SAS team moved into an overwatch position above a village where they were told the execution was going to take place. Up to 12 civilians were going to be murderedeight men and four women. They were suspected of being spies," a source told the Daily Star.

The source said none of the hostages were actually spies and that the ISIS militants knew that. Nevertheless, they decided to execute them "to instil fear into the local population," he added.

The SAS sharpshooter waited first for the executioner to finish his rambling speech over a loud hailer condemning the hostages. When he was about to set them on fire, the sniper let loose a single round from his rifle.

The shot hits the bull's eye, triggering a blast that reportedly killed all four ISIS militants at the scene. The hostages were presumably rescued following the botched execution.

SAS sharpshooters have been in action in Syria for quite some time. In May, British sniper killed an ISIS commander in Syria while he was teaching child soldiers how to decapitate enemies. Last December, an SAS sniper used only three bullets to take out five ISIS fighters in Iraq, according to the Daily Caller.
Miracle Mattress will reopen "as soon as possible" with new employees and training after sparking national outrage with its advertisement for a 9/11-themed "Twin Tower Sale" during the 15th anniversary of the attacks, the San Antonio company said Thursday.

The ad prompted a deluge of social media outrage and international media coverage last week after the company posted a video to its Facebook page showing manager Cherise Bonanno and two employees proposing to honor the deadliest attack on American soil by selling mattresses of all sizes at twin bed prices. In the video, Bonanno knocks the two employees into two towers of stacked mattresses, toppling them as the three screamed. Bonanno closes the video by saying in a somber tone, We will never forget.
Having lost state Sen. Robyn Driscoll to the Yellowstone County Commission, Yellowstone County Democrats will meet Wednesday to replace the legislator.

Democrat Kelly McCarthy said the party will hold a special nominating convention Sept. 21 to fill the roughly 100 remaining days of Driscoll's four-year Montana Senate term.

Barring an unlikely special session, the Legislature won't meet until after Driscoll's term expires. Her replacement is likely to just represent Driscoll's south central Billings constituents in title only for the remainder of the year.

Driscoll was selected in August to replace Bill Kennedy on the Yellowstone County Commission. Kennedy now works for the Montana State University Billings Foundation.

Driscoll couldn't legally accept the county office and stay in the Legislature, or seek re-election to the state post.

Driscoll was replaced last month on the 2016 ballot by Jen Gross.

State law lets political parties to nominate three people to replace a party member elected to public office, though the final decision is made by county commissioners.

Almost anyone 21 or older who has been a Montana resident for a year and a Yellowstone County resident for six months can be nominated by Democrats to replace Driscoll. Current office holders cant apply.

The nominating convention is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at Teamsters Hall, 437 Kuhlman Drive, Billings. Candidates will get five minutes to make their case to replace Driscoll.

The Yellowstone County Commission hasn't scheduled a date for filling Driscoll's legislative seat.
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A Houston man grabbed a prime spot outside Apple's Highland Village store Thursday, taking a chance that the new iPhone 7 will be available in store after pre-orders left some models sold out before Friday's launch.

Shehzaan Bandukia, 26, was first in line at the Westheimer Road store, pacing in the Texas heat and talking on the phone to friends buying tents for an all-night stakeout in the upscale River Oaks shopping area. The recent University of Houston graduate has camped on the sidewalk before every new iPhone launch, he said, and he expects the usual crowd to join him.

"There is going to be a lot of people here," he said.

For years, hardcore Apple fans have made a sport of waiting to buy the company's latest technology. But this year, the odds of getting the iPhone 7 off the shelf are substantially lower for those who chose to spend hours or days on the street instead of pre-ordering it.

Apple on Thursday said it had sold out of the the iPhone 7 in shiny jet black, the newest color, as well as the iPhone 7 Plus in all colors. The company said in a statement that "limited quantities" of silver, gold, rose gold and matte black iPhone 7s would be available at retail stores for walk-in purchases.

RELATED: Fire risk prompts official recall of 1M Samsung phones

Bandukia, who has his sights set on a jet black phone, said the news made him nervous. Now unemployed, he planned to skip a job fair Friday in favor of snagging a new phone.

"I don't want to waste my time if there's really not going to be any available," he said.

Apple didn't have information about the number of phones it would distribute to its Houston-area stores for walk-in purchases.

"We sincerely appreciate our customers' patience as we work hard to get the new iPhone into the hands of everyone who wants one as quickly as possible," Apple said in a statement.

Demand for the new phone exceeded expectations in the wake of its unveiling Sept. 7. The latest device has a better camera, longer battery life, better processing power, water-resistant functionality, and most notably, no audio jack.

In July, Apple reported that iPhone sales had fallen for the second consecutive quarter from the same period a year earlier, leaving some asking if the new iPhone would entice consumers enough to boost results. After the latest product reveal, analysts polled by FactSet did not revise their 2017 earnings-per-share estimates, which averaged $8.86.

That might change as iPhone sales continue. On Thursday, Credit Suisse analyst Kulbinder Garcha improved the firm's outlook for iPhone 7 sales and Apple earnings per share in light of data from phone carriers and other information, according to StreetInsider.

Bandukia, who has been saving for the phone since February, said he thinks the new features are innovative. But he is even more excited about the launch of the iPhone 8 next year, when Apple is expected to debut a major redesign for the device's 10th anniversary.
A new report found that many organizations do not believe their cybersecurity is fully effective despite a heightened focus on preventing such digital attacks, according to the BRG Cybersecurity Preparedness Benchmarking Report led by a Houston team of researchers.

The report's key findings include:

45 percent of respondents reported that they need to improve security awareness and training.

Current employees were the likely source of 45 percent of data breach incidents, followed by 22 percent of incidents caused by hackers and 13 percent by former employees.

Infections from viruses or malicious software accounted for 39 percent of all data breaches, followed by system failures or data corruption accounting for 35 percent of breaches.

63 percent of respondents ensured that contracts included provisions for cybersecurity and 41 percent obtained the right to audit the provider's security, but only 23 percent actually tested the cybersecurity of their external service providers and vendors.

90 percent of respondents do not have a cybersecurity strategy for the Internet of Things, and 86 percent do not have a strategy for Big Data.

65 percent of respondents reported having a formal cyber incident response plan, and 60 percent incorporated regulatory and government notification protocols for breaches. However, when asked if their organization was well equipped to handle a cyber breach, 51 percent of respondents were neutral or disagreed.

54 percent of respondents reported that they expected an increase in their 2016 cybersecurity

budget. However, 48 percent of respondents reported they were neutral or disagreed

when asked if leadership allocated adequate budget for cybersecurity efforts.
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Crime Stoppers of Houston on Friday released a list of 10 fugitives wanted by the Houston Police Department.

Of the 10, three are wanted on charges of aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon. Two are wanted on charges of assault that caused bodily injury to a family member, while one is wanted on a charge of endangering a child.

Each person on the list had an active arrest warrant as of Wednesday. Do not try to apprehend these accused felons.

READ MORE: Fugitives sought by Montgomery County Crime Stoppers (Sept. 16)

Anyone with information about these suspects should contact Crime Stoppers anonymously at 713-222-TIPS (8477). Tipsters may be eligible for a reward.

Click through above to see the fugitive's mugshots, charges and last known locations.
A Georgia man admitted buying luxury homes, an office building and high-end vehicles with the millions he embezzled from his former employer, a Houston-based construction company, the U.S. Attorney's Office announced Thursday.

Daniel Nathan West, 50, could spend 20 years in prison for stealing more than $3 million from Airis International Holdings, which constructs airport facilities for the aviation industry.
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While the actual fighting with weapons ended more than 150 years ago, it almost appears as if the Civil War is still going on.

Only now, instead of bullets, the fight is over names associated with the War Between the States and whether - and where - they might be appropriate.

The latest volley comes in Houston, where Mayor Sylvester Turner is renewing a push to rename Dowling Street, a prominent thoroughfare in a predominantly black part of the city and a road that leads to Emancipation Park.

READ MORE: Emancipation Park designated as historic landmark

For the record, Dowling Street is named for Richard Dowling, who served as a lieutenant in the Confederate Army and led Texas troops. He also was a businessman in Houston after the war.

Emancipation Park, a historic landmark, came into being about five years after the shooting ended, when it was purchased and named to honor the freeing of the slaves.

The civil war over the Civil War took off after a South Carolina man linked to neo-Confederate ideologies walked into a Charleston, S.C., church and proceeded to gun down eight people in June 2015. Since then, that state has taken down the Confederate battle flag from the state capitol, and cities across the country have changed street names and moved monuments.

READ MORE: Big plans for Emancipation Park

It hasn't always been easy. The city of New Orleans is fighting a lawsuit in its effort to remove several Confederate monuments, and protesters this week pledged to use ropes and chains to pull down a statue of President Andrew Jackson standing in the city's iconic Jackson Square in the French Quarter.

What's happening in Houston, though, is much more peaceful and leaves the heavy lifting to city officials.

In this case, Turner wants the authority to change street names without seeking the approval of the street's residents. That would allow him to unilaterally give Dowling Street a new name.

READ MORE: Houston schools with Confederate names

Prior attempts to rename the road haven't gone far.

Fans of the late radio DJ and Houston hip-hop champion Anthony "Zin" Mills floated a petition earlier this year to rename part of the street for him. And, in 2015, state Rep. Garnet Coleman, D-Houston, waged a crusade to change the name.

Other Confederate names in Houston have gone by the wayside, with the Houston Independent School District dropping eight such labels from schools earlier this year.

READ MORE: HISD drops Confederate names from eight schools

But, Dowling Street has hung on.

Can it beat back another move to rename the street, much like the real Dowling's troops held off a Union offensive at Sabine Pass?

The future of Turner's push will determine what becomes of the past.
When it comes to mythical creatures, the internet seems to live by the "X-Files" motto, "I want to believe."

This week, it was a Bigfoot sighting in Michigan's Upper Peninsula that got people wanting to believe in the unbelievable.

READ MORE: Sasquatch hunters near Houston say they were attacked by Bigfoot

Crypto Sightings, a website dedicated to sightings of mythical beasts, posted a photo of a hairy creature seen in a trail camera on Sept. 4 with the headline "Bigfoot Picture from Upper Peninsula of Michigan."

The photo made the rounds at different internet outlets, including USA Today, with everyone wondering if it could be the elusive creature.

By Monday, Crypto Sightings confirmed that the creature was indeed a bear.

READ MORE: A company that searches for Bigfoot is trying to raise $15 million

"The skeptics have gotten this one right and the search for Bigfoot will have to continue as we log this one as a simple misidentification," Crypto Sightings wrote.

Although this Bigfoot sighting turned out to be a bear, don't expect the hunt for the elusive, ape- and human-like creature to die off anytime soon.

There's a group in Oregon that plans on venturing into the Canadian wilderness to hunt for Bigfoot. One Bigfoot hunting company was - - very briefly - - valued at $10 billion.

With Halloween right around the corner, there's a good chance you'll read a couple more reports about Bigfoot sightings in the near future.
A random act of kindness was caught on tape at a Kingwood-area Starbucks, then posted to Instagram by user egbertowillies.

The video above shows a Starbucks employee carrying a large umbrella, the ones meant to go on the outdoor patio area, and using it to shield a customer from the rain.
A federal judge sentenced a Billings woman to 10 years in prison Friday for her role in a meth distribution ring that reached the Crow and Northern Cheyenne reservations.

Hope Margie Rathbun, 38, had previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine and possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime.

Her sentence reflected the mandatory minimum of five years on each count. As part of a plea agreement, prosecutors dropped an additional count of conspiracy to distribute and two counts of possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine.

The hearing took place in U.S. District Court in Billings before Judge Susan P. Watters.

Evidence from a Nov. 14, 2013, search was suppressed during the court process because a judge ruled that law enforcement lacked probable cause to serve an arrest warrant at that home.

Police had entered with an arrest warrant for a man who was at the house. Rathbun was also there and gave statements to law enforcement regarding drugs after authorities entered the home.

The suppression of that evidence contributed to the dismissal of the other counts.

An investigation by a drug task force linked Rathbun to more than 60 grams of meth, according to court documents and comments by Watters on Friday. Federal prosecutor Lori Suek said Rathbun was an active participant in the meth distribution operation.

Multiple searches were carried out at Rathbun's home during 2013 and 2014. One of the searches turned up two ounces of meth, $7,000 in cash and a Ruger .762 rifle, which she used to "protect her drugs," court documents state.

Prior to hearing her sentence, Rathbun read a statement to the court. She spoke about the "harsh reality" of her actions and the effect on her family, some of whom sat in the courtroom gallery.

"I let my addictions take control of my life in every area and aspect," she said.

Rathbun received a recommendation to serve her sentence at a facility in Fort Worth, Texas, which includes substance abuse treatment programs. Following her prison sentence, she will have five years of supervised release.
ZooMontana executive director Jeff Ewelt chased a golden eagle with a fractured wing about a mile and a half before he captured it in April.

Ewelt and the eagle returned to the same field near Acton on Thursday, where the female once again set off running. This time however, after a brief pause, the predatory bird spread her wings and soared up to her former nest.

The site of the bird in a branch so near its old home caused Montana Raptor Conservation Center rehab director Becky Kean to choke up. Workers at the raptor center see a lot of sadness, but they see a lot of miracles as well, Kean said.

The golden eagle is one of the largest raptors in North America, with wings that can span up to seven feet. It is considered one of the fastest-moving animals on earth, surpassing its cousin, the bald eagle, in both size and speed. Five countries have designated the golden eagle as their national animal: Albania, Austria, Germany, Mexico and Kazakhstan.

The animal is named for its light brown, almost blond-colored head and neck, blending into the dark brown feathers that cover the rest of its body. It prefers open plains and cliff areas and favors the Western United States over the more populated Eastern United States.

Like most raptors, golden eagles are monogamous, remaining with the same mate for years and sometimes for life.

Melanie Richard witnessed this partnership when she spotted the fallen eagle in April. Richard would take a gravel road on the way to walk her dogs. She had noticed the nest in a tree near the road. In the spring, Richard spotted the smaller female eagle standing in the field, her mate soaring above.

Keeping an eye on the eagles circling partner, Richard approached the bird, expecting it to fly away when she got too close. When it remained grounded, Richard saw something was wrong with one of its wings.

Richard, a 20-year volunteer animal handler at ZooMontana, called Ewelt. The next day, Ewelt chased the bird through the rain, succeeding in a haphazard rescue.

By the time I caught up to her, I was tired, she was tired, Ewelt said. It was a wild goose  well, eagle  chase.

Recovery

Ewelt sent the bird up to the raptor center in Bozeman. The female was one of 20 injured eagles the conservation center has taken in this year, Kean said. The center could not determine how the eagle fractured its wing, though the majority of injuries the center sees are caused by humans, she said.

Of the estimated 6,000 golden eagle deaths each year, more than half were linked to humans, according to a study published in 2016 by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Division of Migratory Bird Management. The birds are shot, electrocuted, poisoned, hit by cars and trapped. About 2 percent were killed from lead poisoning.

While bald eagle population continues to grow, with close to 140,000 in North America, the golden eagle population dwindles. About 40,000 golden eagles are in North America, according to U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Division of Migratory Bird Management.

In 1978, golden eagles were included in the Bald Eagle Protection Act.

Federally, the birds are not considered endangered, though New Hampshire and New York have included it on state endangered lists.

Of the birds the raptor center rescues, about 35 to 45 percent are later reintroduced to the wild  a pretty good number, Kean said.

The center never gave up hope on the female eagle rescued in Acton, Kean said. For months after the team took the eagle in, the eagle refused to fly, hopping around the center. Then one day, the bird began to fly laps around her enclosure.

I just watched her and thought, this girl is going to be released, Kean said.

The bird did not need to return to Acton to be reintroduced to nature, Kean said. The migratory eagle might have returned even without the miles Kean drove to bring her back. But releasing the bird with the people who rescued it made the return extra special.

Richard was "tickled" to be included in the eagle's return. She opened the cage at the eagles release.

ZooMontana is always looking for volunteers who can drive rescued birds from the zoo to the raptor center in Bozeman. The center is about to break ground on an educational center, where people can learn more about raptors and their habitats.
Montana State University Billings will have a new baccalaureate nursing program next fall after the proposal was approved Thursday.

The Montana University System Board of Regents cast an affirmative vote for the proposal on the final day of its meeting, which was held at City College this week. The regents approved university budgets and projects for institutions across the state.

Called the RN to BSN Completion Program, its designed for students who complete the associate degree in nursing at City College to transition toward a Bachelor of Science in nursing through MSUB.

Politicians and industry representatives spoke this week in favor of the proposal.

By quickly vetting and approving this program, the Montana Board of Regents will be helping to ensure today that our students are prepared for our highest-demand jobs in the future, Lt. Gov. Mike Cooney said Thursday.

The program is a 49-credit course that students will take online in three semesters. It was developed with City College through Montana Health Creating Access to Rural Education, a 2014 grant program from the U.S. Department of Labor.

The online format is in part designed to serve students outside Billings, particularly in eastern Montana. It allows for clinical components to be completed at health care facilities in any community under guidance from the American Association of Colleges of Nursing, according to MSUB.

The regents vote represents a significant step for MSUB as it looks to expand its course offerings with emphasis on the College of Allied Health Professions. The tangible goal toward that end is the construction of the Yellowstone Science and Allied Health Building, for which the MSUB Foundation is fundraising.

MSUB has dealt with falling enrollment and budget cuts, and program expansion is part of the universitys focus on student retention. With a large health care sector and the most populous urban center, MSUB Chancellor Mark Nook said that the Billings university is a logical place to expand at that educational level.

With the major health care facilities here, weve got to be a player, Nook said.

That view was underscored by the states projection of a labor shortage in the health care sector. Gov. Steve Bullock met in Billings with officials in May to discuss the issue. At the time, it was estimated that there will be an annual demand for 1,300 additional jobs in the industry.

On Thursday, Cooney used the figure 1,100 new jobs each year through 2024. He said that health care is the largest job sector in the state.

I do not visit any health care facility that does not tell me they have an incredible need for these positions, he said.

Nook said the university will begin putting together the program. A big piece of that will be the hiring of a nursing director. MSUB allotted $80,000 for the hire in its 2017 budget, which was approved by the regents on Thursday.

City College graduates about 40 students each year from its associate degree nursing program. The first bachelors class is expected to start next fall.
It's deja vu all over litigation again for the citizens of Billings.

A District Court judge ruled in favor of Billings police officers who sued eight years ago, claiming that they had been shorted because the city didnt calculate wages as required by their collective bargaining agreement. Only Ernie Watters and 26 other BPD officers were named in the lawsuit, but District Judge Brenda R. Gilbert of Park County approved the case as a class action that involves 143 officers, most of whom are now retired, like Watters. Gilbert got the case because all Yellowstone County judges recused themselves; they all worked with the lead plaintiffs wife, Susan Watters, then a state district judge, now a U.S. district judge.

The crux of the dispute is how the city of Billings calculated each officers longevity pay, which is a small addition to compensation based on how long the officer has been with BPD. The amounts were relatively small on each paycheck, but over years, with 143 officers, the underpayment added up to $932,960, according to calculations by an accountant hired by the officers. The judge ordered the city to pay that amount, noting that the city did not provide its own calculations. The amount owed each officer ranges from less than $20 to more than $31,000.

The total judgment against the city is about $2.7 million, including the underpayment, plus $778,000 in legal and attorney fees and a penalty of just over $1 million. That doesn't includes the city's expense for representation by a private law firm.

Gilbert assessed the penalty under Montana law because the city has a record of underpaying employees, as evidenced by the Billings firefighters lawsuit that resulted in a judgment of more than $5 million against the city in 2007. The firefighter lawsuit didnt involve longevity issues. Two years later, attorneys who won the firefighters lawsuit filed the police lawsuit.

The city paid the firefighter judgment by borrowing from a city fund, reducing planned Fire Department staffing and repaying the loan over 10 years.

The citizens of Billings have seen over the past couple of years that our Police Department has been seriously understaffed and is just this year getting up to barely adequate staffing. So heres our top-priority message to City Administrator Tina Volek and the City Council: Dont reduce BPD staff, dont put another freeze on hiring, dont reduce the force. Public safety must be our No. 1 priority.

The city has public safety fund reserves; use that money to pay the judgment.

Secondly, the City Council must decide, in consultation with its employed and privately contracted attorneys, whether to appeal this decision to the Montana Supreme Court. Frustrating as it is to be saddled with a judgment that no one on this council could have avoided, the council must be clear-eyed in its decision. This case has been litigated for eight years. Gilberts Sept. 8 order indicates that the city should have been expecting a ruling in favor of the officers. Only the amounts may have been in doubt. An appeal would increase taxpayers' costs for the city's outside counsel.

The firefighter judgment was upheld unanimously by the Supreme Court. Yes, this is a different case, but can citizens expect a different result in an employment contract lawsuit that has been litigated for so many years? When the key evidence is the written contract?

Nine years ago, a Gazette opinion expressed exasperation that firefighter contract wording so evident to a district judge and seven Supreme Court justices had eluded the citys legal team. Apparently, that hasnt changed.

After a closed Monday night meeting for discussion of this lawsuit, Mayor Tom Hanel told a Gazette reporter that the appeal decision will be rendered in a future public meeting. Thats the way the council needs to handle this issue: in public.
CHEYENNE, Wyo.  A resident of a senior citizen apartment complex who shot three people, killing one before he killed himself, wrote a letter expressing concern about poker games in a common room, police said Thursday.

Cheyenne Police Department spokesman Dan Long called it a "letter of discontent" but did not provide more details about what Larry Rosenberg, 77, wrote before he opened fire at Heritage Court Apartments.

Detectives have not made conclusions about Rosenberg's motive but were looking into "longstanding animosity" between Rosenberg and the three victims before the shooting Wednesday in Wyoming's state capital, Long said.

The victim who died was identified Thursday as 45-year-old Matthew Wilson, a complex employee.

Building residents Gregory Gilbert, 65, and Larry Warwick, 74, were identified by Long as the victims who were wounded and taken to Cheyenne Regional Medical Center.

Gilbert was in critical condition Thursday, said hospital spokeswoman Kathy Baker. Warwick was no longer listed in the hospital's directory of patients but Baker said she could not provide additional details.

Gilbert was one of the organizers of the poker games held three times a week that bothered some residents, said Mary Eastman, a resident who described Rosenberg as a friendly man who went with her to yard sales. Long said he could not immediately confirm that Gilbert had organized the games.

Rosenberg gave Eastman the letter on Wednesday before the shootings, just as she was leaving to go shopping, she said. She returned to find the complex had turned into a crime scene. She opened the letter later and gave it to police.

Rosenberg shot Wilson and Gilbert next to each other outside the complex and shot Warwick inside it, Long said.

He then fled on a bicycle and shot himself with a handgun as officers approached him about a mile away, Long said.

Rosenberg also had a rifle and "past contacts" with police but Long said he was unable to provide details about previous police interaction with him.

Detectives on Thursday were conducting additional interviews with apartment complex residents, Long said.

On Thursday, the common room where the poker games were held was empty, with country music playing at low volume.

Two flower bouquets had been placed on grass under an aspen tree near the spot where the two victims were shot outside the complex.

The apartment complex advertises online that it has 34 one-bedroom affordable units for households including at least one person 62 or older.

Telephone messages left seeking comment with the owner of the complex, Accessible Space Inc. of St. Paul, Minn., were not returned.
Two kitchen workers who sustained life threatening grease burns in an incident at a Church's Fried Chicken in Livingston are suing the restaurant for $150 million, their attorney said Friday.

The women, a mother of three and a teenager, were "horrifically, permanently injured" on Aug. 1 when the kitchen floor collapsed, said their attorney Benny Agosto, Jr. They're suing for gross negligence, saying it was an accident that could easily have been avoided through common sense repair work.
GALVESTON  A Galveston County judge on Thursday sentenced a man to 90 years in prison for sexually assaulting a 5-year-old child, according to county prosecutors.

Visiting District Judge Lisa Burkhalter sentenced Donald Alvin Owens, 57, to two consecutive terms of 45 years in prison for each of two counts of aggravated sexual assault of a child younger than 6, the district attorney's office said in a news release.

Testimony revealed that Owens was a family friend who abused the child, whose sex was not disclosed, for two or three years. The abuse ended only after the family moved out of state.

The abuse was reported to La Marque police after the child reconnected with extended family following the move, according to testimony.

The jury took about an hour to find Owens guilty after a two-day trial. Owens elected to have his punishment determined by a judge rather than a jury.

Owens refused to take responsibility for the abuse, but "did say that he knows the victim has been 'scarred for life,'" prosecutors said in the news release.

Prosecutor Kacey Launius asked the judge to impose a sentence that would make sure the victim would never worry that Owens would hurt anyone else again.

Owens is not eligible for parole and must serve the entire 90-year sentence.
A 26-year-old woman was caught trying to smuggle more than 2 pounds of heroin, valued at $70,000, into Houston at George Bush Intercontinental Airport, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

The young woman was returning home Sept. 4 from Guatemala City, Guatemala, and had the heroin hidden in the linings of her carry-on backpack, camera bag and luggage. She was immediately arrested and turned over to the Houston Police Department.
A man died and another was injured early Friday morning in a fiery crash when a wrong-way driver slammed head-on into a car on Texas 225 in southeast Houston, forcing officials to shut down the freeway in both directions for hours.

The two-vehicle wreck happened about 2:30 a.m. on the eastbound La Porte Freeway near Allen Genoa, said Sgt. James Roque of he Houston Police Department.
Former President George W. Bush on Thursday visited the first school in Texas to bear his name, the new George W. Bush Elementary School in St. Paul, a Dallas suburb.

After the VIP entourage toured the building to visit classes in session, all the pupils gathered in the auditorium for an inauguration ceremony. During the event, a smiling President Bush was serenaded by the students with an adorable tune about accepting diversity.
LARAMIE  University of Wyoming President Laurie Nichols says that she's confident the institution will emerge from its financial woes stronger and more focused.

In delivering her first state of the university speech Thursday to faculty, staff and students, Nichols noted various accomplishments at the college for the last year, such as faculty awards, the opening of new buildings and work with the state's community colleges.

"It shows you that things are alive and well at the University of Wyoming," she said.

But Nichols said Thursday that the future of the university depends on relying less on the state Legislature for funding. She said UW must increase its enrollment and review its tuition and fees, which she said are among the lowest in the nation.

Nichols started the job in May just as the state's only public, four-year university was beginning the process of accounting for the loss of $35 million in state aid because of a decline in state energy revenue. In addition, the university must reallocate an additional $6 million from within its budget for utilities and improvements to its accounting system for a total budget hit of $41 million. Nichols declared a financial emergency.

The university has since identified about $19 million in cuts in the current 2017 fiscal year and a special committee is working to find another $15 million in savings in the 2018 fiscal year.

Many of the budget cuts have been accomplished by eliminating vacant positions, asking faculty to do more classroom instruction, offering early retirement incentives and trimming benefit expenses.

Nichols is scheduled to present a plan in November to the UW Board of Trustees that details the new budget cuts she and the committee has identified.
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Two men arrested at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport on Monday bring a different meaning to "Mile High Club."

Kobie Howard, 38, and Nicolas Marriot, 25, were arrested after police found 22 pounds of marijuana in a suitcase.

READ MORE: Texas officers seize $6 million worth of marijuana plants

According to news station KEYE TV, an Austin police officer and his K-9 partner, Emma, were doing a routine inspection when the dog got a whiff of the marijuana. It was wafting from a gray bag on an inbound flight from Sacramento, Calif. Police waited to see who would pick it up at the bag claiming area, the news station reported.

News station KXAN reported that Marriot took the bag and made his way toward the exit with Howard. When confronted by police, Marriot said he came from Dallas and had no idea why the K-9 targeted his bag. He declined to give officers consent to search his bag, according to KXAN.

Police obtained a search warrant and found 22 pounds of marijuana in Marriot's bags.

READ MORE: Jay Z declares drug war an 'epic fail' in short film

Police said they believesd the men were working together. Each was charged with third-degree felony possession of marijuana.

Police told KXAN they believed the marijuana was brought in bulk to sell to college students.

Bail for Marriot was set at $25,000 and $50,000 for Howard.
Authorities are searching for six members of a Texas A&M fraternity after drugs were discovered at a frat house party where a student was found unresponsive and later died at the hospital.

The warrants for the six range from possession of marijuana to manufacture and delivery of a controlled substance. They are the result of an investigation after officers were called to a party about 4:40 a.m. Aug. 20 at the Sigma Nu fraternity house at 550 Fraternity Row, according to the College Station Police Department.
Houston supporters of Gary Johnson again rallied for the Libertarian Party presidential candidate, despite his long-shot odds of winning the White House.

On Thursday, a few people held up a giant pro-Johnson sign on the Rosemont Pedestrian Bridge, over Memorial Drive.
AUSTIN  House Speaker Joe Straus said Thursday he would work with the Texas Education Agency to address concerns about a monitoring system that has led school districts to keep thousands of children with disabilities out of special education.

"Students who need special education should not be kept out of it," Straus said in a Facebook post, which indicated his office had delivered the same message to Education Commissioner Mike Morath. "The House appreciates the Commissioner's attention to this issue and will work with him to address these concerns," added Straus (R-San Antonio)

INVESTIGATION: How Texas keeps tens of thousands of kids out of special ed

The Houston Chronicle reported Sunday that the TEA set an 8.5 percent target for special education enrollments in 2004 and has since then required districts that serve more children to file "corrective action" plans for curtailing special education services. Over the past 12 years, the percentage of Texas students receiving special ed has dropped from nearly 12 percent to exactly 8.5 percent, the lowest rate of any state in America. Houston and Dallas, the state's two largest school systems, are even lower, at 7.4 percent and 6.9 percent, respectively.

The Chronicle also found that TEA officials arbitrarily established the 8.5 percent standard in the face of a $1 billion budget cut without the benefit of any research on its impact or on how deeply to reduce special education. The national average for students receiving special education is about 13 percent.

HUGE DECLINE: Special ed enrollment dropped 40% in Straus' district

Several lawmakers, officials, teachers and advocates have expressed outrage at the target, saying it has deprived tens of thousands of disabled children an adequate education. The Texas Education Agency has denied depriving any students of proper instruction and defended the monitoring system but promised to conduct a "detailed review" of its impact.

In his statement, Straus said the monitoring system was "designed to prevent schools from identifying students for special education when it isn't necessary." However, he stressed "the importance of providing services to all students who need them while continuing to make sure that students are not improperly identified for special education."

Straus's legislative district is in the North East ISD, which serves northeastern San Antonio and is the second largest district in Texas' second largest city. Its special ed enrollment has dropped from 15.3 percent in 2004 to 9.2 percent today, a 40% decline that is the biggest among Texas' largest school districts.

The largest, Northside Independent School District, in northwestern part of San Antonio, has had a decline in its special ed enrollment from 14.7 percent in 2004 to 11.1 percent.

The third largest is San Antonio ISD, which serves the center of the city. Its special ed enrollment has declined from 12.7 percent to 10.2 percent.

ANGER: State's special ed guidelines called 'a travesty'

Since the 8.5 target was implemented, special ed enrollments have declined in 96 percent of Texas' 1,200 school districts.

The Chronicle investigation, which included a survey of all 50 states, an examination of thousands of pages of records and over 300 interviews with parents, educators and officials, did not identify any evidence of significant over-identification of students in special ed. The percentage receiving Texas has never exceeded the national average.

Numerous state and national experts have expressed surprise at the fact that special education enrollment have long been below the national average and are now the lowest in the nation by far, given the state's high rate of poverty, premature births, lack of medical care and other risk factors that increase the need for special education. Today, among the the nation's 100 largest school districts, there are only 10 that serve fewer than 8.5 percent of their students in special education. All 10 in Texas. The Houston and Dallas school districts serve just 7.4 percent and 6.9 percent of students, respectively. By comparison, about 19 percent of students in New York City receive special ed services.
AUSTIN  Republican presidential nominee Donald Trumps trip to Houston on Saturday no longer includes an event open to the public and the news media.

According to his campaign website, Trump is scheduled to attend The Remembrance Projects 1 p.m. luncheon at the Omni Houston at Westside. The Houston-based nonprofit advocates for families whose relatives were killed by undocumented immigrants, per its website.
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President Barack Obama has long since released his birth certificate. Members of Donald Trump's campaign and family acknowledge the obvious - that Obama was born in Hawaii.

But, Trump himself seems unable to let go of the debunked conspiracy theory that Obama was born outside the United States.

It's a theory that didn't originate with Trump, but he's certainly been the most well known and prominent proponent of the theory, even after Obama produced his full birth certificate showing he was born in Hawaii in 1961.

READ MORE: The many conspiracy theories that Donald Trump has pushed

The theories about Obama's birth started with his presidential run in 2008. Far right-wing Republicans and even some backers of Democratic rival Hillary Clinton floated the idea that Obama wasn't born in the 50th state, but rather in Kenya, the native country of his father.

The various theories all have a common thread: That Obama's Hawaii's birth certificate is a fraud, that people at the hospital where he was born were either lying or paid off and that Obama was constitutionally ineligible to be president.

U.S. Sen. John McCain, an Arizona Republican, flatly rejected the theory during his failed run for the presidency in 2008.

READ MORE: Trump: Cruz's Canadian birth certificate could be 'very precarious' for GOP

Trump stepped into the birther fray in 2011, when he first floated the idea of a presidential run. During an interview on "Good Morning America," Trump said he was "a little skeptical" about Obama's birthplace.

Trump repeated the allegations about Obama and his place of birth on talk shows, in interviews and on Twitter again and again. Trump even talked of sending investigators to Hawaii to look into Obama's past and to find out if the birth certificate was real.

There's no evidence of any investigation on Trump's part. And, if he did actually send investigators to Hawaii, the search went about as well as O.J. Simpson's quest for Nicole Brown Simpson's "real killers."

READ MORE: Perry 'doesn't know' if he's seen Obama's birth certificate

That is, if it took place, no one can prove it. And, if it turned anything up, no one knows about it.

After Obama released his long-form birth certificate on April 27, 2011, Trump took credit.

"I am really honored and I am really proud, that I was able to do something that nobody else could do," Trump said.

READ MORE: Trump birther attack dogs Cruz across Iowa

While Trump has promoted a variety of conspiracy theories - Ted Cruz's father and JFK's assassination, Muslims cheering the 9/11 attacks in New Jersey were two of the most prominent - he wouldn't let the Obama's-birth issue go.

After launching his presidential bid in 2015, Trump returned to the issue. Throughout the campaign, Trump has questioned Obama's place of birth, usually when opinion polls showing the president's popularity increasing.

And, Trump has declined to release his own birth certificate, health records, tax returns and college transcripts, despite making those demands on Obama and others.

READ MORE: Ron Paul wants to see Donald Trump's birth certificate

As recently as Thursday, Trump told The Washington Post he wouldn't address where Obama was born or whether he believes the president is a Hawaii native. Trump's running mate, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, and his campaign operatives have been rapidly trying to reverse those statements.

Just hours after Trump's comments, the campaign issued a statement blaming the rumors on Clinton and saying Trump believes Obama was born in the United States. Trump came out Friday morning and said "Obama was born in the U.S., period."

But Trump being Trump, he has a hard time sticking to the campaign's script. And, what he says Friday about Obama's birthplace may not be what he says next week, or even on Saturday.
OMAHA, Neb.  Bankers say weak farm income continues to weigh down the economy in rural parts of 10 Plains and Western states.

The overall rural economic index for the region remained in negative territory and declined to 37.3 in September from August's 41.1.

Survey officials say any score below 50 on any of the survey's indexes suggests a decline in that area.

Creighton University economist Ernie Goss says farm income is expected to decline 12 percent over last year. That is limiting spending by farmers and hurting the economy in rural areas.

Bankers from Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming were surveyed.

Goss says the number of farm loan defaults hasn't increased significantly over the past year, but more loans are being restructured.
-- Straus: disabled students must get special ed, by the Chronicles Brian Rosenthal

Students who need special education should not be kept out of it, Straus said in a Facebook post, which indicated his office had delivered the same message to Education Commissioner Mike Morath. The House appreciates the Commissioner's attention to this issue and will work with him to address these concerns, added Straus.

>> Parents rebuke lawmakers for cutting Medicaid money for therapy, Austin American-Statesman

-- Sandra Blands mother says $1.9 million lawsuit settlement is victory for moms, by the Chronicles Gabrielle Banks and St. John Barned-Smith

The tentative settlement reached late Wednesday calls for improved training for state troopers and substantive reforms in Waller County and in rural jails across the state. I believe this is going to be a rippling effect across the country, Geneva Reed-Veal said Thursday. I'm hopeful there won't be any more unlawful arrests. I'm hopeful with this spotlight and this settlement that others don't have to receive a call from 1,000 miles away that their child is on the way to the morgue.

Reed-Veal, of Chicago, has been outspoken about police abuse and jail reform since her daughter died in what was ruled a suicide at the jail. Under terms of the proposed settlement, the county would pay $1.8 million and the DPS would pay $100,000, according to San Antonio attorney Tom Rhodes, one of three lawyers who represented Reed-Veal in the suit.

-- Watch this space  Reed-Veal also wants state lawmakers to push for legislation in Bland's name to require similar changes in other rural jails, a move that state Rep. Garnet Coleman, D-Houston, said Thursday he would file for the upcoming legislative session. Coleman said the Sandra Bland Act would address issues raised by the Bland case, including so-called pretextual traffic stops conducted to hold defendants on other issues, measures to divert people with mental illness from being jailed and allowing for expanded use of personal recognizance bonds for low-level offenses.

-- Talking about #txlege, heres what Gov. Abbott said about cutting taxes and increasing funding next year, per the Statesmans Sean Walsh: Theres some challenges coming up in the next session. Obviously because of the price of oil, were dealing with a little bit tighter budget, and so we just need to be responsible budget-wise. That said, we know there are many concerns among many people across the state that must be addressed.  We still want to work on cutting the (business franchise) margins tax even more. We need to find ways that we can reduce property taxes, about which weve heard plenty of complaints.

 Abbott also said that some programs will need more money, such as higher education, the early education initiative he began last legislative session and challenges in the foster care system that are completely unacceptable.

>> White House enlists Houston businessman in refugee battle, Houston Chronicle

-- ICYMI: Trumps lead in Texas remains in single digits, new poll finds

Me in the Chronicle on the Texas Lyceum 2016 poll: This year's poll throws into sharp relief Clinton and Trump's particular strengths and weaknesses. For example, Trump was an overwhelming favorite among likely voters when asked which candidate can do a better job of changing the culture in Washington, D.C., garnering 58 percent to Clinton's 29 percent; 13 percent said they did not know.

Meanwhile, Clinton edged out the Republican nominee when it came to foreign policy, an area where she long has criticized Trump as unfit to be commander in chief, particularly citing his affinity for Russian President Vladimir Putin. Respondents also said she was the better candidate on education and the environment.

>> Recent presidential polls spark an unusual discussion in Texas, The Texas Tribune

>> Abbot says hes fully behind Trump, hopes for double-digit win here, The Texas Tribune

-- School choice fight turns to education savings account, by Quorum Reports Kimberly Reeves. ($) The debate over vouchers is just warming up as a new option for school choice  education savings accounts  is on track for introduction next session. School choice was one of three interim charges at the Senate Education Committee on Wednesday. And, as the day was stacked, public comments were pushed to the end of the day. The real firepower likely will be unveiled next week in Houston, when Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick will be the headline speaker at the Texas Conservative Coalitions policy summit on educational choice. Thats John Colyandros group.

>> Council OKs $67 million flood recovery plan, Houston Chronicle

CAPITOL DAYBOOK - no meetings

SPEED READ

Appeals court rules against Deuell in lawsuit brought by Texas Right to Life, San Antonio Express-News

Ted Poe on fight against Leukemia, The Texas Tribune

Dallas chief leaving earlier for unspecified 'opportunities, Houston Chronicle

Arizona's 1st female governor, Rose Mofford, dies at 94, Houston Chronicle

Deloitte says 16 weeks of paid family leave is 'good for business', Houston Chronicle

Tomlinson: Dont seal border, give Americans a raise, Houston Chronicle

Dallas district to test water for lead at schools, Austin American-Statesman

Army dismisses Texas brigade leader for multiple violations, AP

Soldier accused of killing transgender woman in West Texas, Austin-American Statesman

The Texas Miracle #22: Dancing with the Snark (and Rick Perry), Texas Observer

Greg Abbott says if Texas were a country, its economy would rank 10th in world, Politifact

Pipeline protestors say companys suit should be dismissed, AP

Snowden says hell vote in US presidential election, AP

RACE TO THE WHITE HOUSE

-- Clinton rips Trump on 'birtherism' before Hispanic group , per the APs Ken Thomas: Obama and Clinton made successive appeals to 3,000 Hispanic leaders and supporters, pointing to a large turnout of Latino voters as the antidote to Trump. Both noted the Republican's hard-line position on immigration, referencing his opposition to a comprehensive overhaul of the system and his vows to build a wall along the Mexican border.

>> Paul Ryan: Trump should release his taxes, CNN

-- Clinton Moves to Fix Millennial Problem With Assist From Sanders: Hillary Clinton has a millennial voter problem, and she's working to address it with help from progressive icons Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, who are slated to campaign for her this weekend in Ohio. The Democratic nominee is under-performing with younger voters who are generally a stronghold for her party, because of a huge trust deficit. Although surveys indicate they strongly prefer her to Republican Donald Trump, substantial numbers say they'll vote for a third-party candidate or stay home on Election Day. (Bloomberg)

-- Must-read from NYTs Jonathan Martin and Amy Chozick:  Hillary Clinton and her Democratic allies, unnerved by the tightening presidential race, are making a major push to dissuade disaffected voters from backing third-party candidates, and pouring more energy into Rust Belt states, where Donald J. Trump is gaining ground.

With Mrs. Clinton enduring one of the rockiest stretches of her second bid for the presidency, her campaign and affiliated Democratic groups are shifting their focus to those voters, many of them millennials, who recoil at Mr. Trump, her Republican opponent, but now favor the Libertarian nominee, Gary Johnson, or the Green Party candidate, Jill Stein. While still optimistic that the race will turn decisively back in Mrs. Clintons favor after the debates, leading Democrats have been alarmed by the drift of young voters toward the third-party candidates.
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.
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Its been 15 years since 9/11/01, another day of infamy that left a deep gash in the psyche of the world.

I was working in Washington, D.C., when the plane hit the Pentagon. My partner and I were in the Longworth House Office Building visiting with Rep. Barbara Cubin from Wyoming about Medicare. We had just come from a breakfast meeting with our peers from around the country; we boarded a cab around 8:45 that morning. En route I remember mentioning how long the lines were for the morning tour of the White House. We started in Cubin's office and while waiting the television showed the first plane slamming into the World Trade Center.

Shortly thereafter we were escorted to a committee hearing room where we saw the second plane slam into the next tower. We finished our business and proceeded to our next appointment but that was interrupted when the Secret Service rushed him off to some secret spot. As he went by he said, Well boys, it doesnt look like well be meeting today, they just hit the Pentagon.

The disbelief that such a thing could happen was interrupted by the chaos of evacuating Capitol Hill. At first it seemed like hundreds of people headed for the door, then thousands, which quickly turned to tens and then hundreds of thousands of evacuees.

The sidewalks were smothered with pedestrian traffic all heading in different directions. The crowd was surreal and quiet, sirens dominated the air, and the morning sun lit up the Capitol dome like a beacon. I turned to my partner and said,We gotta get out of here, thats a target." The next instant two huge concussions came up the mall.

People spread out on the sidewalk, some shrieked, some just cried out, and the rest of us just kept moving as fast as we could. Turned out the booms came from the Happy Hooligans hitting the afterburners on their F-16s, breaking the sound barrier on their way to intercept Flight 93.

My partner and I made it to his hotel and since no phones were working we set a time and place wed meet. My hotel was about 3 miles away so I just found a mass of people heading my way and went along with the flow of shoulder-to-shoulder people. There were a few times when the flow of people was halted to allow emergency vehicles to get by. I safely arrived at my hotel.

By this time the landlines were back when my boss called: Ive got a car, meet me out front, grab your bag, and dont check out. I hesitated but there was no quibble in his voice when he said, Ulmer, this is not a choice thing, get ... down to the lobby! Next thing I know it took three hours to make the 3 miles to my partners hotel and anytime we found a sign that said "west" we followed it for the next 24 hours.

It was the ride home that I remember most. I was the lone Democrat in the car and all four of us had served in the Legislature together so we had a lot of respect for each other. I remember the three others angrily saying we need to nuke them, etc., while I wondered what freedoms we Americans would give up to preserve our security.

Then Congress passed the Homeland Security Act and here I am today hoping we dont have to give up any more of our rights to pursue life, liberty and happiness in whatever ways we desire. The last 15 years have left us all longing for peace. It is my deepest prayer that this longing will be granted someday.
Immersed as we are with another presidential political campaign, mudslinging and name-calling assail us everyday, so if the TV is on, the only thing you can do is send the little kids from the room. Looking back on a few of our previous campaigns, I cant quite remember the Truman-Dewey contest in 1948 when The Chicago Daily Tribune on Nov. 3 carried the very mistaken headline proclaiming Dewey Defeats Truman. Truman, the winner, wore a big smile as he displayed the paper for an historic photo-op and then went on to conduct an impactful presidency.

The war hero Dwight Eisenhower squared off against Adlai Stevenson in 1952 and won with 55 percent of the vote. Eisenhowers experience with transportation difficulties on European battlefields and witnessing the efficiency of the German Autobahn highway system led him to promote the four-lane interstate system to Congress, which passed the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956.

This election also gave us the first glimpse of Ikes vice president running mate Richard Nixon, who gained unfavorable attention by accepting some gifts, which raised a few eyebrows. The Republican hierarchy considered dumping him, but he appeared on a career-saving national television spot that was viewed by the largest television audience to that time. He stated he would not return the gift of a dog named Checkers because his daughters had adopted it. He survived the uproar.

Elections passed into history: Kennedy-Nixon, LBJ-Goldwater, Nixon-Humphrey, Nixon-McGovern, Carter-Ford, and on to the present day, but it is the Carter presidency where Ill pause. The label of a failed presidency hangs over Jimmy Carters four years in office, but a certain relationship developed at the time that begs a second look.

John Waynes stature as a movie hero was firmly established. He was also a staunch conservative Republican who was not afraid to voice his political opinions at the highest level. Pit his views against those of the liberal Democrat Carter, and a conflict arises. There was something admirable in the way they conducted themselves in their opposition to each other. After Carters election, the usual celebratory events took place, and President Carter chose to invite the Duke to one, an invitation he accepted.

Years later, Waynes daughter, Marisa, reflected on the event and remembered saying, But hes a Democrat. Her father answered, Hes my president now. Im an American and I support him. Maybe I disagree with his politics but the people elected him, and I respect him for that.

Patrick Wayne, one of his sons, said not so long ago, Im sure he would be disappointed in todays political scene. The biggest part of politics today seems about smearing opponents instead of articulating their differences and projecting your opinions in a positive way.

One incident shows John Wayne was unafraid to defy his conservative political affiliation. The Panama Canal Treaty came up for adoption after Carter negotiated it and met strong conservative opposition. Wayne supported it, saying, I have studied the treaty, and I support it based on my belief that America looks always to the future. Here he butted heads with the likes of Strom Thurmond, Jesse Helms and a newcomer desiring the presidency for himself, Ronald Reagan.

Reagan attacked the agreement, thinking it would hand over our rights for use of the canal. Wayne responded in blunt terms. Now I have taken your statement and I will show you point by (expletive) point in the treaty where you are misinforming people.

After Wayne died, his family asked Carter in 2012 to write the foreword to a book titled John Wayne: The Genuine Article. Upon Carters election to office, he told of receiving a very simple yet meaningful note from Wayne: Congratulations sir from one of the loyal opposition. His many communications from Wayne were always respectful and heartfelt. Before Waynes death, Carter signed into law a bill ordering a gold medal be struck in Waynes honor out of gratitude for his innumerable contributions to our nation and even visited Wayne on his deathbed. As he said, Wayne frequently disagreed with him, didnt even vote for him, yet he still considered him a supporter.

Carter concluded, We need more of that kind of interaction in our dialogue today. We need more John Waynes.

If anyone thinks 2016s is the worst campaign ever, the election of 1828 rates at the top of the list. It featured a rematch between incumbent President John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson, the winner of the Electoral College in the election of 1824. It featured attacks on both of their wives. Unending accusations of adultery and bigamy took their toll on Jacksons wife. who, shortly after her husbands election, sickened and died, only a few days before they were to head to Washington and take office.
Health, fitness and fun are the focus of the fifth annual Beefin' It Up; Fuel for the Finish run/walk Oct. 1 south of Mandan.

The North Dakota CattleWomen, its sponsor, plans to donate part of the proceeds to the Make-A-Wish foundation of North Dakota.

Details about the day's 5K run/walk, 10K run, kids run for ages 10 and younger, virtual run and registration can be found at www.facebook.com/BeefinItUpFuelForTheFinish.

Race-day registration is set for 8-9:15 a.m. at The Post, on the west side of Highway 1806 2 miles south of Mandan. The first run will begin at approximately at 9:30 a.m. There will be a scavenger hunt and coloring pages to occupy youngsters whose parents are participating in the run/walk.

The 5K/10K route will follow paved trails and roads from The Post along the Missouri River into Fort Lincoln State Park.
With each terrorist attackfrom Fort Hood, to Brussels, to Paris, to San Bernardino, to Orlandothe Obama administration and the press provoke moral confusion by calling it a tragedy. Tragedy in the classical sense means that mysterious, divine forces stronger than we are ultimately determine our fate. That is to say, tragedy means unavoidable fate, like that which befell Oedipus. One cant fight fate. To act against it is foolishness. But a calamity traceable to preventable human actions is not tragedy.

By calling terrorist attacks tragedies, Obama implies that citizens should accept terrorism as though it were compelled by the universe. The president has even said that tragedies simply occur. As such, we should be stoic in our anger, while full of pity for the victims, just as one pities Oedipus for his predetermined suffering. Believing that we suffer tragedies because of fate disarms us. It drives citizens deeper into their private, apolitical lives, suggesting that neither willfulness nor anger can adequately address suffering. Describing political and religious violence as tragic is in some sense a denial that such attacks are planned and executed by our enemies. This kind of rhetoric allows us to overlook that righteous anger must occasionally be mobilized in defense of our democratic systemand that it is a system worth defending.

The administration and the media also use the word evolve to describe our enemiesas in, the terrorist threat continues to evolve. This makes it sound as if a mysterious force compels jihadis, rather than premeditated motive or design. Just as we are compelled to suffer tragedies, our enemies are compelled to evolve. If that is really the cause of terrorists actions, shouldnt we pity them for the manner in which evolutions force deforms them? Surely one cant fight an enemy that one pities. Or shall we say that evolution is bad because it fosters terrorism?

This evasive language is based in our desire to evade unpleasant truths: namely, that war is sometimes necessary. Our most effective response to terror, and to hatred, is compassion, its unity, and its love, said Attorney General Loretta Lynch in the aftermath of the terrorist attack on an Orlando, Florida, gay nightclub. For Lynch, fighting terrorism consists in standing together in commitment, in solidarity, and in equality. Her words read like satire.

Pretending that love and compassion can domesticate hatred and ambition promotes magical thinkingthe belief that force is unnecessary, for example. Flattered and confused by such rhetoric, citizens may come to disbelieve an adversarys stated ambitions. They become blind to world-transforming desires, like Hitlers, or ISISs desire for a caliphate.

A sensible public vocabulary should strike the opposite tone, showing how formidable our enemies are, rather than implying that they are pitiable entities without mind or will. It should teach citizens to despise the barbarism behind terrorist attacks, a sentiment which would affirm our own civility. We can do this by publicly exposing the terrorists ambitions and plans. War is not caused by fate or evolution, in other words, but by will and designamong other things.

The public is sometimes animated by contrary impulses. We live in hopes of both perfect prosperity and perfect security, often without being able either to see or stomach the things necessary to bring them about. Good public education attempts to minimize, rather than exacerbate, such tendencies. We shouldnt seek to make citizens more private, more self-loathing, and gentler. Rather, we should aim to make citizens more sensiblewhich is to say, more disposed to prudent action, and likelier to believe in action and victory than in tragedy and fate.

Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images
Achizitie de Servicii Tehnice de creare a plantatiilor forestiere de protectie din cadrul primariei Andrusul de Jos si a primariei Vadul lui Isac, r. Cahul
On the evening of October 29, 2004just a few days before Americans went to the polls in that years presidential electionthe Qatari-owned broadcaster Al Jazeera aired segments from a videotape of Osama bin Laden. In the film, bin Laden addressed the American people and condemned US involvement in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It was widely speculated that the videos release was timed to influence how Americans would vote.

The events of September 11, 2001, had already ensured that national security would play a central role during the 2004 election. Although the US had not seen a successful attack on home soil since 9/11, the abuses at Abu Ghraib, revealed a year earlier, were fresh in the minds of American voters, and the specter of Al Qaeda terrorism loomed over the 2004 primaries and presidential campaign.

Terrorist attacks exert pressure on both the mediawhich must quickly report on the incidents while providing accuracy, context, and analysisand politicians, who are bound to enact new laws and security measures. In our hyper-connected world, the media seeks to act as a filter and narrator of each act of horror, holding those in power responsible where they are perceived to have failed. Governments see it as their duty to respond with new agencies and legislation in an effort to better protect citizens. Failings occur when politicians and the media use public vulnerability to appear decisive or further a political agenda, or to sensationalize in a quest for audience share.

The 2004 presidential election shows that the lack of a serious public debate about the legitimacy of the War on Terror served the interest of an incumbent but unpopular president. This happened despite misgivings over how the conflict in Iraq was being prosecuted. Twelve years later, Trump is also attempting to use the fear of terrorism, specifically ISIS, as a motivating tool for voters worried about security.

Terrorismand the responses it garnershas never placed such extraordinary pressures on both democracies and the media, which finds itself acting as both filter and participant in the face of such violence. That is especially true in an era when social media platforms have become a dominant new source of information for audience and journalist alike, and sometimes even for the assailants themselves.

Those years deepened the trauma for everyone. There were administrators and bureaucrats who were concerned in that they didnt want another attack to happen. We were already traumatized by Guantanamo Bay. So we accepted the erosion of our rights as citizens.

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The medias coverage of politically motivated attacks, however, has often amplified fears over terrorism instead of analyzing or questioning them. During the 2004 election, parts of the media did not devote enough time to examining individual and important policy differences between incumbent President George W. Bush and John Kerry.

Security and terrorism were the predominant issues throughout the 2004 election cycle. For both media and politicians, these were manifest in two distinct forms: fears of another attack like 9/11 and unease over the war in Iraq. Both President Bush and his Democratic challenger Kerry pledged to make America safer. The election focused on persuading voters that each candidate had the most suitable traits and the experience necessary to accomplish this goal.

A clear pattern emerged: Voters threw their support behind Bush in light of his hard line on terrorism against a backdrop of external threats. One examination of terror warnings issued by the US government between February 1 and May 9, 2004, shows statistical evidence that warnings led to an increase in support for Bush. In one mathematical model, each terror warning from the previous week corresponded to a 2.75-point increase in the percentage of Americans expressing approval for Bush. The warnings even had a similar effect on voter evaluation of Bushs handling of the economy.

The election cycle was marked by a renewal of media interest in the so-called War on Terror. In the days after the events of 9/11, CNN called the ongoing crisis Americas New War, and MSNBC described it as America on Alert. Fox News, which had already seen considerable gains in its audience share since 9/11, was the first to adopt War on Terror, picking up the phrase from the Bush administration.

Issued just four days before polls opened, bin Ladens video was intended to hold up other recent events, like the 2004 train bombings in Madrid and violence in Iraq, as warnings of what might happen in America. The video immediately raised awareness of Bushs signature campaign issue: the threat posed to America by terrorism, especially on home soil. Overnight, terrorism command centers throughout America were put on high alert. An initial poll from Newsweek magazine claimed that Bush jumped to a six-point lead as a result of public reaction to bin Ladens message.

Coverage of the video differed across the media. The New York Times analyzed the speech. The Washington Post additionally provided a full transcript of the message. Fox News, meanwhile, reminded viewers of Al Qaedas role in the September 11, 2001, attacks with a more emotional Bin Laden Claims Responsibility for 9/11.

The race became a one-issue election about security, said Sarah Oates, Professor and Senior Scholar at the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland. In that sense, the election of 2004 stands very much alone. Say what you will about Americans, we are a practical people in that most of our elections are about economics. There was a sense that people were being manipulated into constantly thinking about security.

A backdrop of terror warnings and coverage of the bin Laden speech, continued Oates, persuaded many voters to be more sympathetic to Bushs harder line, despite warnings from some critics that they were accepting the move from an open liberal democracy to a more securitized state. I think those years deepened the trauma for everyone. There were administrators and bureaucrats who were concerned in that they didnt want another attack to happen. We were already traumatized by Guantanamo Bay. So we accepted the erosion of our rights as citizens.

Trumps aggressive nature has had a profound effect on the pace of news coverage. Media organizations have seen the 24-hour news cycle turn into a minute-by-minute sprint. News isnt dependent on editors or experts as filters. It exists in the full glare of millions of social media accounts broadcasting on the nations mobile devices.

In a 2006 report, Oates examines a sample of news during the campaignfrom ABCs World News Tonight with Peter Jennings, CBSs Evening News with Dan Rather, and NBCs The Nightly News with Tom Brokawand finds that 43 percent of all news stories were related to the election, while 22 percent addressed terrorism. After Iraq, terrorism was the most often mentioned subject.

Oatess study, Comparing the Politics of Fear: The Role of Television News in Election Campaigns in Russia, the United States and Britain, also shows that despite the frequent appearance of terrorism in news stories, TV channels failed to explain the difference in the candidates policy proposals. While Bush and Kerry often mentioned terrorism, they held opposing views on a number of issues like the death penalty, abortion, tax cuts, healthcare, and job creation. The same study also reveals that in several instances, Bush criticized his opponent for being too soft and lacking a coherent security plan. Kerry usually responded with a pledge to not waver and hunt down the terrorists wherever they are.

The tenor of the press coverage in 2004 during the campaign was heavily influenced by the administrations implied message that if you werent supporting their approach, you verged on being unpatriotic, said Philip Seib, co-author of Global Terrorism and New Media: The Post-al Qaeda Generation and a professor of journalism, public diplomacy, and international relations at the University of Southern Californias Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. That period from 2001 to 2004 is marked by the tone taken by Fox News. I think that helped foster the idea of patriotic news coverage.

Jennifer Merolla, author of Democracy at Risk: How Terrorist Threats Affect the Public, said there was a concerted effort to put terrorism at the center of the 2004 campaign. Terrorism was the one issue which was a salient factor for voters. Id describe it as pointing to the pack of wolves in the forest. Anything dealing with national security is a challenge for Democrats. We are seeing the same thing in 2016, where Trump is both assertive and bombastic on security.

Yet the medias laser-like focus on terrorism caused it to overlook other key issues. In one notable instance, the press spent the better part of a month analyzing the errors contained in a CBS 60 Minutes Wednesday report, broadcast in September 2004, that charged Bush received favorable treatment from the Texas Air National Guard. The investigation centered around memos from 1972 and 1973, suspected to be inauthentic. While host Dan Rather apologized for the report and CBS defended the story for 10 days, coverage lasted weeks. That time could likely have been used more relevantly, in many voters minds, to cover the policies of the campaigns in their closing months.

The same media dissonance is on display during the current election. After terrorist attacks like Nice and Paris, Donald Trump has repeatedly criticized President Obama for being weak in fighting ISIS. Using little more than a Twitter account, Trump has received, according to The New York Times, the equivalent of $1.9 billion in free television coverage. He has spent only $10 million on paid advertising and received 62 percent off all coverage during the Republican race.

TV stations have, for the most part, reacted to Trumps social media statements with opinionated discussion panels and polls. The candidates evolving ban on all Muslims entering the US is a strong case in point. From Times Donald Trump Pushes for Muslim Ban After Orlando Shooting to the Vox explainer, Donald Trumps new Muslim ban plan is just as scary as the old one, each iteration of the policy has been given its due analysis. The consequence of this has been to formalize terrorism as a key election issue as well as to stigmatize a vulnerable American minority.

The medias focus on terrorism is not warranted by the facts. While future incidents of terrorism remain likely, other forms of violence kill more Americans each year. According to figures from the Justice Department and the Council on Foreign Affairs, 11,385 people died in firearm incidents on average annually in the US between 2001 and 2011. In the same period, an average of 517 people were killed annually in terrorism-related incidents. Putting aside the terrorism-related deaths of 2001, the annual average drops to 31.

But Trumps tactic of creating a media response to his warning of terror attacks has proved largely successful. While his more outlandish accusationsthat President Obama created ISIS, for examplehave been widely dismissed and mocked, they have still dominated news cycles and forced terrorism to the top of the news agenda.

Trumps campaign benefits from this in terms of forcing the election to be fought on territory it deems favorablejust as the Bush campaign did in 2004. A recent Pew Research Center survey showed if voters were moderating a 100-minute debate between Trump and Hillary Clinton across 10 issues, they would allocate 15 minutes to hearing the candidates plans for keeping the US safe. Economic growth, health care, the budget deficit, and immigration all polled behind terrorism.

I am worried that a major attack in the election would benefit Donald Trump, said Brigitte Nacos, a journalist, author, and adjunct professor of political science at Columbia University. There are already about 40 percent of the public who consistently believe that Trump can cure all of the problems the US has. He [says] at nearly all his appearances that he has a plan to wipe out ISIS. Torture for him is not enough. He says he is going to wipe out the ISIS people and kill their families. In the larger picture, Clinton might be more willing to get involved in foreign wars. But Trump tells his crowd that ISIS is a Clinton creation.

My research finds two vital differences between media coverage of terrorism during the 2004 and 2016 presidential races. Most obviously, the widespread use of digital journalism and social media has quickly attached human narratives to recent hate crimes like Orlando or terror attacks such as Nice and Paris. Hashtags such as #MuslimsAreNotTerrorists and #NotInMyName have highlighted human stories with long online contrails, which have proved effective in correcting both erroneous reporting and Islamophobia. Much coverage was given to the Union of Muslims of the Alpes-Maritimes findings that a third of the people killed in Nice were Muslim.

While terrorism poses few direct challenges to the existence of a modern state, it does raise serious questions about how new security laws are written in their aftermath, the political atmosphere that allows them swift passage, and their effects on our civil liberties.

More significantly, the American media has also had to adapt to the major challenges of real-time coverage of the presidential race. Fact-checking websites such as PolitiFact and FactCheck, as well as instant fact-checking departments at newspapers like The Washington Post, have all had an impact on the election process. Studies have also highlighted their success: More than eight in 10 Americans having a favorable view of fact checking.

As an unconventional Republican candidate, Trumps aggressive nature has had a profound effect on the pace of news coverage. Media organizations have seen the 24-hour news cycle turn into a minute-by-minute sprint. News isnt dependent on editors or experts as filters. It exists in the full glare of millions of social media accounts broadcasting on the nations mobile devices.

The intense and often spectacular nature of terrorism can render it difficult to make sense of each incident beyond the immediate horror of the event. The pace and shocking violence of attacks on civilian targets, and their consequences for human liberties, provide valuable lessons in how both new and established media react. Each example demonstrates how different responses from politicians can shape both the minds of the electorate and a subsequent election.

As many of the experts I interviewed note, the aftershocks of terrorism are felt for years in both established and emerging democracies. While terrorism poses few direct challenges to the existence of a modern state, it does raise serious questions about how new security laws are written in their aftermath, the political atmosphere that allows them swift passage, and their effects on our civil liberties.

Media, politicians, and social platforms will all have to adapt to new challenges in the years ahead. Platforms like Facebook and Twitterwhich, in the hands of victims and perpetrators of terrorism, can bypass traditional mediawill continue to face scrutiny over accuracy, neutrality, and user intent. Politicians and journalists will continue to have their decisions tested by how they respond to terrorism, and they must encourage discussion of how terrorism can manipulate the political process. The first priority of governments and the media should be to protect the traditions and objectives of democracy while informing the public.

This article is adapted from a Tow report by the same author. It is part of a series on journalism and terrorism that is the product of a partnership between the Tow Center for Digital Journalism and Democracy Fund Voice.

Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today

Burhan Wazir is an award-winning journalist and a former Head of Opinion at Al Jazeera English. He has been living in the Middle East since 2008. He has previously worked at The Observer and The Times of London, and was part of the core management team which launched The National newspaper in the United Arab Emirates in 2008, where he was Weekend Editor.
Uber riders in Pittsburgh can get a glimpse of the future by summoning a car capable of handling most of the tasks of driving on its own.

Starting Wednesday morning, a fleet of self-driving Ford Fusions will pick up Uber riders who opted to participate in a test program. While the vehicles are loaded with features that allow them to navigate on their own, an Uber engineer will sit in the drivers seat and seize control if things go awry.

Ubers test program is the latest move in an increasingly heated race between tech companies in Silicon Valley and traditional automakers to perfect fully driverless cars for regular people. Competitors such as Volvo and Google have invested hundreds of millions of dollars and logged millions of miles test driving autonomous vehicles, but Uber is the first company in the U.S. to make self-driving cars available to the general public.

That pilot really pushes the ball forward for us, said Raffi Krikorian, Director of Uber Advanced Technologies Center (ATC) in Pittsburgh, the companys main facility for testing self-driving vehicles. We think it can help with congestion, we think it can make transportation cheaper and more accessible for the vast majority of people.

Removing the cost of the driver is one way to make rides more affordable. But that prospect didnt sit well with some Uber customers.

It scares me not to have a driver there with an Uber, said Claudia Tyler, a health executive standing near the entrance of an office in downtown Pittsburgh.

A reporter from The Associated Press tried out the service Monday. The ride through downtown Pittsburgh and over some bridges went smoothly, with the car waiting for oncoming traffic before making a turn and at one point stopping for a vehicle that was backing into a parking space. Parking, however, was a task the human driver had to perform.

Approaches to driverless technology differ. Google, a unit of Alphabet, and Ford Motor Co. want to perfect the fully driverless car  no steering wheel, no pedals  before letting the public climb in for a ride. Others are adding autonomous features in phases, while relying on the driver to take over in certain circumstances.

Many experts predict that it will be years, if not decades, before the public is being driven around in fleets of fully driverless vehicles under any condition.

Because vehicles are driving at seventy miles per hour on the highway, if something goes wrong, things could go wrong very bad, very quickly, said Carnegie Mellon engineering Professor Raj Rajkumar. This technology needs to be ultra-reliable before we can take the human out of the driving equation.

NuTonomy, a spinoff from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, got the jump on Uber globally three weeks ago when it began picking up passengers in self-driving taxis in Singapore. The company said Tuesday that its six taxis  with backup drivers  havent had any accidents since the service launched.

The Uber vehicles are equipped with everything from seven traffic-light detecting cameras to a radar system that detects different weather conditions to 20 spinning lasers that generates a continuous, 360 degree 3-D map of the surrounding environment.

During the demonstration for reporters two engineers were seated in front  one ready to take control in case the car encountered a situation it couldnt handle, the other monitoring the cars 3D map and scribbling notes on how to improve the cars software. The engineers must undergo a week of safety orientation or more to drive the cars, with additional training as the vehicles continue to be refined.

Pittsburgh is a particularly good place to experiment, they said, because the city is a research hub of self-driving cars and has notoriously bad driving conditions, including snowstorms, rolling hills and a tangled network of aging roads and bridges. Uber executives are watching to see how the cars handle these challenges before saying when fully driverless vehicles will be ready to hit the roads.

We actually think of Pittsburgh as the double black diamond of driving, Krikorian said. If we can really tackle Pittsburgh, that we have a better chance of tackling most other cities around the world.

Pennsylvania also lacks stringent testing regulations at the moment, unlike other driverless car-testing venues such as California. The Uber trial is perfectly legal under current state law, Pennsylvania officials said.

Theres no requirement that you be touching the steering wheel, said Kurt J. Myers, deputy secretary at the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation. But there is a requirement that you are a licensed driver and that you are in the drivers seat.

A task force commissioned by the state is expected to make policy recommendations in November.

Uber officials hope the initial trial will teach them how to ease public fears of adopting the bleeding-edge technology.

The Pittsburgh pilot is our opportunity for real world testing, so that we can learn more about what makes riders feel safe and comfortable, said Uber product manager Emily Bartel.

Ubers Silicon Valley roots means it tends to pivot quickly and plan, experiment, and adjust direction within weeks, in contrast to longtime carmakers like General Motors or Toyota who have yearlong timelines when bringing out new features, Rajkumar and Uber officials said. When the drivers are removed from front seats, the cars will likely be restricted to driving in specific locations under good conditions at first.

Id probably give them a little bit and let them work their kinks out, Patrick Holland, a Philadelphia-area student, said right before getting into a human-driven Uber. But I think a product thats well tested and its proven to work and safe  I think thats where were heading, and I think Ill eventually find myself in a driverless vehicle.

(Dee-Ann Durbin in Detroit contributed to this report.)

Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
A utility responsible for a massive gas leak that drove thousands of families from their Los Angeles homes pleaded no contest to a criminal charge Tuesday as part of a $4 million settlement with prosecutors.

The deal requires Southern California Gas Co. to adopt an expensive leak-monitoring system at its Aliso Canyon facility that goes beyond federal and state requirements, Los Angeles County District Attorney Jackie Lacey said.

The protections put in place by this agreement create a safer facility for its employees, the environment and the surrounding communities, Lacey said in a statement.

The company pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor count of failing to immediately report the gas leak to state officials when it was discovered Oct. 23. Prosecutors said the utility waited three days before notifying the state Office of Emergency Services.

The well that wasnt plugged until February led more than 8,000 families to move out of their homes in the Porter Ranch area of the San Fernando Valley. Many complained of headaches, nosebleeds and nausea during the event that scientists said was the largest known release of climate-changing methane in U.S. history.

The settlement includes the maximum fine of $75,000, plus a penalty of $232,000.

The brunt of the figure, though, comes from the installation and maintenance of an infrared leak-detection system. The district attorney said that is expected to cost more than $1 million to install and more than $2 million to staff and monitor with six full-time employees over the next three years.

SoCalGas issued a statement saying the settlement was another important step in our efforts to put the leak behind us and to win back the trust of the community.
Daughters of the American Revolution gathered at the Greenwood Cemetery in Spokane, Wash., to honor a charter member of the Mandan chapter who was North Dakota Regent from 1938 to 1940.

Jessie D. Ricker Shinner attended the DAR Continental Congress in Washington, D.C., in April 1940. On the train ride home, she became ill. Once home, she entered the Mandan Hospital to have surgery. She suffered a heart attack after surgery, dying at the age of 56. Services were held at First Presbyterian Church, Mandan.

North Dakota DAR laid a new tombstone honoring her dedication to DAR. Shinner also had served as state registrar, state recording secretary and state vice regent. She was the 10th state regent.

The tombstone dedication was sponsored by the Washington DAR, Julie Pittman, state regent. Sons of the Revolution Color Guard presented a musket salute, folding of the American flag and flag presentation to North Dakota DAR members. Fife and drums accompanied the singing of "Amazing Grace." A reception followed.

Local dignitaries attending were the first vice president general, Beverly Jensen, and the honorary state regent, Nancy Legerski.
'Michael Gamble & the Rhythm Serenaders' Prove Swing is Still the Thing, Organic [REVIEW]

Bassist/Bandleader Michael Gamble swings hard with his Rhythm Serenaders. (Photo : courtesy Organic )

Swing's the thing! Before the grandiose joyousness of solid 1930s swing music got overtaken by bebop in the 1940s and rock'n'roll in the 1950s, swing was, indeed, the thing. Such progenitors as Benny Goodman, Duke Ellington, Artie Shaw and Count Basie toured the country with their orchestras until it just got too damn expensive to travel with such a retinue and they all died out like dinosaurs. Although swing dancing made a 1980s comeback, it didn't permeate the culture. Nowadays, though, such bands as Svetlana & The Delancey Five and Vince Giordano & the Nighthawks party like its 1939. The self-titled debut by Michael Gamble and the Rhythm Serenaders (Organic) now ties it all up in a pretty package.Turn back the clock!

Taking from the songbooks of Irving Berlin ("He Ain't Got Rhythm"), Cootie Williams ("Slidin' and Glidin'"), Charlie Christian ("Seven Come Eleven"), Lionel Hampton ("Pick A Rib"), Mary Lou Williams ("A Mellow Bit of Rhythm"), Ben Webster ("Woke Up Clipped"), Roy "Little Jazz" Eldridge ("Scottie"), Jerome Kern ("Smoke Gets In Your Eyes") and 10 more, bassist Gamble and drummer Josh Collazo sure do serenade. And they have two clarinets, two saxophones, two guitars, two trumpets, two trombones, two pianos, and two vocalists to fit into their ark.

This is dance music. Back in the day, the dance was the Lindy Hop, named after the hop across the Atlantic by Charles "Lucky Lindy" Lindbergh. Now there's swing dancing competitions and social events all over the country. Gamble runs one of the biggest ones in his Asheville, North Carolina home town. It's a five-day festival called Lindy Focus.

The great thing about these songs is that they're action-packed movers, bluesers and ballads recorded on state-of-the-art equipment using modern engineering techniques proving, once again, that swing is still the thing.

 2016 The Classical Art, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.

TagsMichael Gamble, REVIEW, Organic Records, Svetlana & The Delancey Five
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Akron Roundtable's Thursday speaker, artist and urban planner Theaster Gates, has directed innovative renovation of unused spaces and community service activities in Chicago neighborhoods since 2005.

AKRON, Ohio - Artists need to be entrepreneurs, said Theaster Gates Jr., featured speaker at the Akron Roundtable Thursday.

Gates, the founder and artistic director of Rebuild Foundation in Chicago, is an artist, urban planner and Wall Street Journal 2012 Innovator of the Year. He has directed innovative renovation of unused spaces and community service activities in Chicago neighborhoods since 2005.

He spoke in poetry with guys singing and playing the flute throughout his speech.

"We create organizations out of a deep need to do something," Gates said. "Deep, passive, creational platforms that allow for new things to emerge. We want to see our cities be better. We want to build schools for young people. We need foundations and administration. Administration without love is boring. Love without administration is reckless."

Theaster Gates' address drew a standing ovation at Thursday's Akron Roundtable luncheon at Quaker Station. (Shane Wynn for Knight Foundation)

Gates spoke of what it means to be an artist and an entrepreneur.

"It starts with being able to make a way out of no way or at last see a way," he said. "Love allows us sight; administration allows us capacity. Sight and capacity equals forward motion."

His foundation works to rebuild the cultural foundations of underinvested neighborhoods and spur culture-based, artist-led and neighborhood-driven community revitalization.

Gates' Akron appearance was sponsored by the Knight Foundation. He won a standing ovation from the sold-out crowd.

Gates' vision resonates with many Akron community leaders, as the city and local groups work to revitalize underserved neighborhoods through art, culture and reinvestment projects.

For 40 years, Akron Roundtable has provided a community forum, bringing speakers to Akron to inform and educate attendees on topics important locally and globally.

Here's the line-up for the rest of the year:

Oct. 3

Special 40th Anniversary Celebration Dinner

John S. Knight Center - 6 p.m.

Patrick Carney, Black Keys

David Giffels, Author

Sponsored by Huntington

Oct. 20

Quaker Station - noon

EJ Dionne

Syndicated Columnist, The Washington Post

Sponsored by Akron Rubber Ducks

Nov. 17

Quaker Station - noon

David Baker

Executive Director, Pro Football Hall of Fame

Sponsored by Welty Building Company

Dec. 08

Quaker Station - noon

Steve Steinour

CEO, Huntington Bancshares Incorporated

Sponsored by Huntington Private Bank

Purchase seats for upcoming Roundtable events here.
Matt Contessa 1994.jpeg

Akron's former Deputy Mayor of Labor Relations Matt Contessa, who died Tuesday at 83, successfully negotiated 39 contracts with the city's labor unions during 16 years of service, the longest term held in that post.

AKRON, Ohio - Akron's former Deputy Mayor of Labor Relations Matt Contessa died Tuesday after a short illness. The North Hill native was 83.

Contessa was invited to serve as deputy mayor in 1984 under Akron Mayor Tom Sawyer. According to his obituary, he successfully negotiated 39 contracts with the city's labor unions during 16 years of service, the longest tenure in that post.

He worked at B.F. Goodrich and was active in the United Rubber Workers Local 5, elected as divisional chairman in 1968 and president in 1974. As director of pension and insurance for the URW International Union, Contessa led the B. F. Goodrich master contract talks for the URW that set the pattern for industry-wide contracts, his obituary stated.

In a statement, Akron Mayor Dan Horrigan said Contessa was a true friend for 25 years who helped him choose a career in elected service.

"Matt Contessa was a devoted man who served the city of Akron and United Workers' Union with distinction," Horrigan stated "His loyalties to friends, along with his due diligence regarding fair treatment for all, were the themes of his life's work. These principles were obvious throughout his tenure as Deputy Mayor for Labor Relations. He was passionate about all issues affecting the working people of this community and maintained transparency at all times."

According to his obituary, Contessa was active in the Summit County Democratic Party, serving on the party's executive committee, assisting local candidates, and serving on campaign committees for Dick Celeste, Walter Mondale and Jimmy Carter at the Local 5 offices.

Locally, Contessa served on the boards of the Akron Metro Transit Authority, Tri-County Employee Assistance Program and the local United Cerebral Palsy organization.

Visiting hours will be Friday from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Hennessy-Bagnoli-Moore funeral home located at 936 N. Main St. in Akron. A burial service will be Saturday at 10 a.m. at St. Anthony Catholic Church located at 83 Mosser Place in Akron.
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Cleveland police Chief Calvin Williams speaks to those who attended a roundtable discussion for the department's new use-of-force policy Thursday.

(Eric Heisig/cleveland.com)

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- A roundtable discussion held Thursday with residents, Cleveland police and the team monitoring the city's settlement with the U.S. Justice Department showed that all sides may need to make a few tweaks to a proposed use-of-force policy before finalizing it.

The proposed policy would make several key changes to the department's current use-of-force policy. Most importantly, it seeks to better define when it is "objectively reasonable" -- a legal standard that means an average officer would have made the same decision -- for an officer to use force.

It also says officers must make every effort to de-escalate a situation before using force.

The several dozen at Thursday's meeting offered a variety of suggestions. Monitoring team head Matthew Barge said the policy is not finalized and will likely undergo changes in the coming weeks.

The new policy is mandated through the city's settlement with the Justice Department, known as a consent decree, over police use of force. It is scheduled to be enacted by the end of the year.

Thursday's event at the Jerry Sue Thornton Center at Cuyahoga Community College was set up so that small groups could discuss the policy and then provide feedback on anything missing from the proposal.

The monitoring team also is accepting feedback on the proposed policy on its website. Another discussion event is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Tuesday at Urban Community School, 4909 Lorain Ave.

Here are a few takeaways from the meeting:

A couple of tweaks

After the groups heard about the policy, they were tasked with making recommendations on how it could be improved.

The suggestions ranged from trying to ensure that officers were compassionate to taking into consideration medical conditions and whether a person understands the officer before deciding whether to use force.

A few themes arose, though. Several groups said officers should be required to communicate as much as possible with a person in an attempt to de-escalate.

At one table, Dan Carravallah, a third-year law student at Case Western Reserve University, said the policy should say that officers should be required to announce themselves.

When deputy Cleveland Police Chief Joellen O'Neill asked Carravallah whether wearing a uniform, like she was, was enough, Carravallah said that more information is always preferable.

"My feeling is that communication, more information ... is safer for more individuals in that situation," Carravallah said.

Keisha Matthews, a second-year law student at CWRU who was at the same table, talked about the need to address how force can and cannot be used on children.

Those at another table suggested that better measures should be in place to ensure that officers who commit wrongdoing are disciplined.

Answering questions

During Thursday's meeting, Barge laid out the proposed policy and how officers would be held accountable. He, along with Assistant U.S. Attorney Michelle Heyer and city attorney Gary Singletary, also answered questions on the policy and how it would affect residents.

"The use of force is never mandated. It's always situational," Singletary said

Barge said the citizen complaint investigation process, which was criticized in a monitor's report in July and was a discussion topic Thursday, will be addressed after the use-of-force policy and training are complete.

Chief on the goodwill tour

Police Chief Calvin Williams attended the meeting and participated in a discussion group. Like his visibility during the Republican National Convention and at meetings prior to Thursday, Williams continues to try to meet as many people as possible to try to spread a better message about Cleveland police.

His brief remarks at the end of the meeting echoed those efforts. He, along with others, stressed that community feedback and involvement is important so that actual reform takes place.

He also invited those in the crowd to ride along with a patrol officer to see what goes into the day of a cop.

"Take a ride along with us and see how it really is out there," Williams said.

If you would like to comment on this story, please visit Thursday's crime and courts comments section.
Brenna Gerhardt invites people to change the way they look at the world, one illuminating thought at a time.

She directs the North Dakota Humanities Council, which will host a gathering of some of the nations influential thinkers and writers in a daylong event celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Pulitzer Prize Foundation.

It will be held Sept. 24 at Legacy High School in Bismarck and includes presentations by historians and journalists, Pulitzer Prize winners and finalists, and a Benjamin Franklin impersonator to encourage reflection on the role of a free press and pivotal historical events.

This is a world-class event with people you would normally have to fly out of North Dakota to hear, and were bringing them here, Gerhardt said.

This Pulitzer Prize Edition, part of the councils ongoing GameChanger Ideas Festival, is supported by a grant from the Pulitzer Prize Foundation, which provided a roster of available speakers. Gerhardt said the North Dakota Humanities Council chose speakers whose work focuses on current issues, including Americas nuclear arms program, the legacy of racism, immigration, the history of indigenous people, and the accountability and abuse of power.

Though coffee will be served earlier, the day officially begins at 9:40 a.m. with ongoing presentations and concludes at 5:30 p.m. with a reception and book signings. Tickets are $75 for general admission, $50 for military and spouses and $30 for students.

Mike Jacobs, former editor of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Grand Forks Herald, will provide a welcome. Besides the regular sessions, participants may register for intimate coffee and conversation sessions during the day. Lunch will be available on-site from local food trucks.

Eric Schlosser is a 2014 Pulitzer finalist in history for his study Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident and the Illusion of Safety. His research looked at management of the countrys nuclear arsenal and examined the countrys proximity to aging and temperamental weapons and whether the risk of human error could trigger a cataclysm. Attorney Murray Sagsveen, a former brigadier general and senior judge advocate for the Army National Guard, will interview Schlosser.

Elizabeth Fenn is the 2015 Pulitzer winner in history for Encounters at the Heart of the World: A History of the Mandan People. Fenns work takes new discoveries in archaeology, anthropology, geology, climatology, epidemiology and nutritional science, and offers an original perspective on early American history as seen through the Mandan tribes on the upper Missouri River. She will engage in a question-and-answer session following her presentation.

Humanities scholar Greg Smith will impersonate Benjamin Franklin, talking about the founding father's life and the differences between the colonial press and modern-day access to news. Participants will be invited to ask questions about Franklins influence on the American press.

Sonia Nazario is a 2003 Pulitzer winner in feature writing for Enriques Journey, a six-part series following Latin American children as they followed risky and sometimes deadly paths to reunite with their working parents in the United States. This journey, Nazario found, causes the children to face hunger, illness, gangs and corrupt law enforcement.

Her 2006 book on the same theme explores the sometimes negative emotions of migrant workers and their reunited children, and calls for more investigation into immigration law and the motivation behind these journeys. She will be interviewed by Michelle Roberts, originally from Hazen, and award-winning investigative reporter.

Jacqueline Jones is a 2014 Pulitzer finalist in history for A Dreadful Deceit: The Myth of Race from the Colonial Era to Obamas Administration, the result of her career-long research into the understanding of race. She argues that it is a social invention that politically and economically aids the powerful and harms Americas national identify. She will ask participants to wonder where the justification of privilege leaves modern America. She will be interviewed by Mark Trahant, a 1989 Pulitzer finalist for national reporting on a federal Indian policy. He is a professor at the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks.

Seymour Hersh, a 1970 Pulitzer winner in international reporting, is known for breaking stories, including the My Lai massacre in South Vietnam and the Abu Ghraib prison. Drawing on a lifetime of reporting the ins and outs of American foreign policy, cover-ups and international developments, Hersh will take participants into a world where Americas official foreign policy meets political power in other parts of the world. He will be interviewed by Jacobs and conduct a question-and-answer session afterward.

Find more information about each presenter, along with more event details and ticket information, at www.gamechangernd.com/pulitzer.html.
A federal judge threw out a restraining order that barred the Standing Rock tribal chairman and several other pipeline protesters from "unlawfully interfering" with construction.

U.S. District Judge Daniel Hovland wrote Friday the order no longer served a "legitimate purpose," because cases are being prosecuted locally and additional federal sanctions are not warranted.

A temporary restraining order against Standing Rock Tribal Chairman Dave Archambault II, council member Dana Yellow Fat and five other protesters was issued in mid-August after Dakota Access LLC filed a lawsuit against them. The company argued the order was necessary to stop the protesters from interfering with construction, threatening the safety of workers and ultimately costing the company business.

The order barred the protests from "unlawfully interfering in any way with the plaintiff and its representatives' access and construction of the pipeline."

The judge's action comes a day after Tim Purdon, attorney for Archambault and Yellow Fat, asked the judge to dissolve the order.

Purdon argued it was too broad and caused a chilling effect on the protesters' ability to speak and demonstrate freely.

"The temporary restraining order in this case is nothing more than an 'obey-the-law' injunction," Purdon wrote, citing cases that have struck down similar orders. "For the majority of protesters who are not First Amendment scholars, the precise line between conduct that is protected by the First Amendment and that which risks violating the temporary restraining order is not clear."

Though Hovland nixed the order, he was blatantly critical of the protests.

"To suggest that all of the protest activities to date have been 'peaceful' and 'lawful' defies common sense and reality," he wrote, mentioning incidents of vandalism, trespass and verbal taunts toward law enforcement. "Nearly every day, the citizens of North Dakota are inundated with images of 'peaceful' protesters engaging in mindless and senseless criminal mayhem."

Nearly 70 people have been arrested on protest-related allegations, including seven on felony charges.

Hovland linked some of the recent crime to "troublesome 'peaceful protesters'" from out-of-state, who he wrote have "hidden agendas vastly different and far removed from the legitimate interests of Native Americans of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe who are actually impacted by the pipeline project."

On Thursday, Purdon, on behalf of Archambault and Yellow Fat, also asked Hovland to dismiss the suit against the protesters. He argued the company lost the foundation of its case when the federal government announced last week it would not authorize construction under the river at this time.

"Dakota Access' claims, through its complaint, that it has the legal right to construct the pipeline are now false," he wrote.

A call and email to Dakota Access and a call to its attorney for comment on the suit were not returned Friday.

A hearing on the restraining order scheduled for Tuesday has been canceled. The judge has not ruled on the motion to dismiss the case.
Currently being served at Viscous Coffee in Adelaide, Australia, a large serving of Asskicker promises to keep those brave enough to drink it awake for between 12 to 18 hours. The brew is so strong that its creator, Viscous Coffee owner Steve Benington, has sourced a health warning for the drink from a local GP.

Feeling drowsy? Then maybe you need an "Asskicker," a coffee containing roughly 80 times the caffeine found in one espresso shot.

The potent drink comprises of four espresso shots, eight 48-hour brewed cold drip ice cubes, and 120 ml of 10-day brewed cold drip. According to Benington, who spoke to the Australian newspaper the Advertiser, the caffeine content of each cold drip ice cube is equivalent to slightly more than two shots of espresso.

The Asskicker was first created for an emergency nurse working night shifts. "She consumed her drink over two days and it kept her up for almost three days  I toned it down a little after that and the Asskicker was born," explained Benington in the Advertiser. He added that he creates personalized blends for other customers.

Research sent to CNBC by Jonny Forsyth, Mintel's global drinks analyst, validates the Asskicker's recent viral popularity. He explained: "Our need for visceral, intense experiences has increased due to the cluttered, saturated world we live in. In this new environment, brands associated with strong sensations will attract consumer attention and devotion."

The Asskicker boasts five grams of caffeine in total, compared to a single espresso and standard filter coffee containing roughly 60mg and 150mg respectively, depending on how they are brewed.

Benington advises in the Advertiser that the large coffee is to be consumed gradually over three to four hours, which provides twelve to eighteen hours "sustained up-time."

Professor Kausik Ray, consultant cardiologist at Imperial College London, described caffeine as "the world's most commonly used recreational drug." He told CNBC via e-mail that the substance can cause an increase in heart rate, or palpitations in some individuals, whilst other effects also include anxiety, difficulty sleeping and tremors. Caffeine lovers may also experience withdrawal symptoms.

"The new (product) is very concentrated so it could in theory exacerbate all of the above," he said.

Forsyth's drinks research revealed that "demand for (intense) experiences is particularly strong for millennials." He acknowledged that, counterintuitively, millennials have spearheaded the popularity of drinks which boost energy levels, rather than older consumers. Forsythe notes that this "creat[es] opportunities for brands to introduce products customizedas either low or high caffeine for specific occasions."

Follow CNBC International on Twitter and Facebook.


Chinese gambling mecca Macau has finally roared back, and Jim Cramer is ready to gamble on casino stocks.

After years of growth, Macau suddenly took a nosedive in 2014 when the Chinese government cracked down on corruption, which brought a halt to soft briberies like Macau junkets, which were lucrative for casinos.

From their peaks in 2014 to lows in the beginning of 2016, Las Vegas Sands lost 60 percent of its value, MGM Resorts lost 43 percent and Wynn Resorts shed nearly 80 percent. MGM did not fall as much as the others because it had substantially less Macau exposure.

However, declines finally slowed in Macau this year, and many casino stocks have been on fire. For investors who believe that the industry has finally bottomed, Cramer says not to wait around.

"If you were waiting around for a green light to tell you if was safe to buy, you passed up some enormous gains," the "Mad Money" host said.
North Korea's Foreign Minister said on Thursday the country was ready to launch another attack against the "provocations" of the United States, whose bombers this week flew over South Korea in a show of solidarity with its ally after Pyongyang's latest nuclear test.

North Korea set off its most powerful nuclear blast to date this month, saying it had mastered the ability to mount a warhead on a ballistic missile and ratcheting up a threat that its rivals and the United Nations have been powerless to contain.

Two U.S. B-1 bombers flew over South Korea on Tuesday, drawing condemnation from the North.

"The people of Korea are ready to stage another attack against the provocations of the United States," said Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho during a speech at a meeting of the Non-Aligned Movement countries in Venezuela that was translated into Spanish.


U.S. regulators could learn a thing or two about pragmatic policies from their Chinese counterparts, according to one of the world's leading private equity executives.

David Bonderman, chairman and founding partner of TPG, told delegates at the annual Milken Asia Summit in Singapore that, based on his interactions, regulators in China made more sense than their peers in the U.S.

"They are more qualified, went to better schools," Bonderman said, alluding to Chinese regulators.

"Politics has been the worst in the U.S. and that's even before Donald Trump." Bonderman, who has been a big donor for the Democrats, added.

The storied investor has spoken on political matters before. In 2014, he said governments should stop legislating against Uber, according to Reuters, while in an interview with the Financial Times in 2008, Bonderman observed that his then 15-year old daughter could run the country better than then-U.S. President George W. Bush.
Dan Tardif | LWA | Getty Images

It may be time to give your life insurance coverage a checkup. Mistakes that financial advisors see clients make with life insurance was a common theme at the FPA Be conference in Baltimore this week.

"Insurance planning really shouldn't get started until there's been some financial planning," certified financial planner John Ryan told attendees at a Thursday seminar on insurance mistakes.

Here are three missteps that can be easily avoided or fixed:



1. Not having enough insurance

Among parents with young kids, 37 percent don't have life insurance, according to a 2015 Bankrate report. Of those who do have insurance, half have less than $100,000 in coverage. Not having enough insurance is a common misstep, said Ryan, who is an independent insurance broker and the founder of Ryan Insurance Strategy Consultants in Greenwood Village, Colorado. But it's an easy one to fix, and can be inexpensive thanks to low term policy rates.

Conduct a thorough analysis of your life insurance needs to make sure you have enough to cover funeral expenses and replace your income for the family, as well as cover debts like the mortgage.

"With the [term] rates today, there's really no reason not to round up," he said.



2. Not reviewing your medical records

It's smart for consumers to request a copy of their medical record from their primary care physician before applying for life insurance, certified financial planner Carolyn McClanahan told attendees during a Thursday session on health planning. McClanahan, a physician, is also the director of financial planning for Life Planning Partners in Jacksonville, Florida. Insurers will get those records, too, and use your medical history to gauge risk and determine rates, she said. There may be potentially costly mistakes in the record that should be fixed. (McClanahan said she recently found such an error on her records, ahead of applying for a new policy.)

3. Focusing on avoiding estate taxes
Amancio Ortega Xurxo Lobato | Getty Images

Warren Buffett and Bill Gates are household names, but one of the men battling them for the top spot on the global billionaires list may have escaped your attention. A self-made retail magnate who launched the Spanish brand Zara, Amancio Ortega briefly overtook the Microsoft founder last week to become the richest man in the world. Shares of Ortega's retail conglomerate have fluctuated since, but in any event, the Spanish retail magnate's reserve is a more interesting way to approach him than whether he is No. 1, 2 or 3 among the world's richest. Buffett is a public relations and media master; Gates puts out lists of his favorite books to read on business. The Spanish billionaire, on the other hand, has shied away from the media for years while amassing a personal net worth of more than $77 billion (as of Thursday). His empire is built on a foundation of 7,000 stores in nearly 100 countries across brands like Zara, Massimo Dutti and Pull&Bear, which amassed $20 billion in revenue in the last fiscal year for Inditex, the retail conglomerate Ortega founded. Aspiring entrepreneurs can try to divine some of Ortega's operating principles and the secrets to his success from past profiles, an authorized biography written by a friend and the occasional interview he has given.

Here are five lessons from the press-shy $77 billion man to get you started.

Lesson 1: Speed is everything. When Ortega founded Zara in 1975, he upended the retail world with an aggressive schedule meant to get new clothes on the rack faster than anyone else in the market. Dubbed "fast fashion," Ortega's strategy was to refresh the stock in Zara stores twice a week and receive orders within 48 hours, according to a CNBC report. This speed has become a hallmark of Ortega's business and a sore point for his competitors. While a dress modeled during Fashion Week can take months to arrive in a department store, a similar design can be found in Zara just a few weeks later, Business Insider noted. Lesson 2: Obsess over what your customers want. "The customer has always driven the business model," Ortega wrote in Inditex's 2009 annual report. He has consistently stuck by that motto. In the 2010 annual report, the last before Ortega stepped down from his position as chairman, he wrote, "The customer must continue to be our main centre of attention, both in the creation of our fashion collections and in the design of our shops, of our logistical system and of any other activity."

Ortega's fashion acumen comes from observing what people are wearing and listening to what they want. He doesn't base his inventory on fashion shows, Fortune reported in 2013. The company tracks bloggers and listens to customers instead. This allows it to be malleable, always adjusting to the current season's trends.

In this regard, Ortega is in good billionaire company, sharing an obsession with Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos, who has said tech companies obsess over competitors when they should be focusing on customers. In the 2015 Amazon letter to shareholders, Bezos wrote: "Many companies describe themselves as customer-focused, but few walk the walk. Most big technology companies are competitor-focused. They see what others are doing, and then work to follow fast." Lesson 3: Control the supply chain. While other fashion firms have their clothes made in China due to the cheap labor costs, Inditex sources most of its products from Spain, Portugal and Morocco, The Economist reported in 2012. Ortega's designs are cut from materials finished and treated in his mills and then sewn by a network of local shops. This shortened supply chain allows the company to react quickly to new trends. That way, stores stock what customers are actually buying and are not left with unwanted inventory. Lesson 4: Stay true to your roots. Ortega's life is a true rags-to-riches tale. Born to a father who worked on a railway and a mother who was a housemaid, Ortega left school at the age of 14 to start making money. He was shamed by a shopkeeper who refused his mother credit to buy groceries for the family, his friend and biographer Covadonga O'Shea told an audience in 2012, when the English version of her book, "The Man From Zara," was released.

watch now



Ortega has stayed true to his humble beginnings. He has never had an office, according to The Telegraph. He sits at a desk at Inditex's headquarters in his hometown of La Coruna, talking to the factory's designers, fabric experts and buyers.

"He loves working around all his employees," O'Shea said. Even at 80 years old, Ortega goes to the office most days. He never tires of working and hearing new ideas.
Wall Street is getting increasingly bullish on Amazon , with two firms raising their price targets on the e-commerce giant to $1,000 or more. Investors should buy the internet retailer's shares on the prospect of better automation efficiencies from artificial intelligence, according to Evercore ISI, which reiterated its buy rating. "[Amazon is in an unique position] to apply automation to drive audience conversion while similarly applying it to warehousing and delivery," analyst Ken Sena wrote in a note to clients Friday. "This stands to drive not only greater overall customer satisfaction through shorter delivery times, narrower delivery windows and lower overall delivery costs, but operating margin expansion for Amazon as well," he said. Sena raised his Amazon price target to $1,015 from $930, representing 32 percent upside from Thursday's close. RBC Capital's Mark Mahaney reiterated his outperform rating on Amazon and raised his price target to $1,000 from $840 Thursday. There are now three price targets for Amazon at $1,000 or higher out of 43 ratings, according to FactSet. Due to the better cost efficiencies from automation, Sena forecasts Amazon's fulfillment services will used in 80 percent of the company's third-party marketplace business by 2021 versus his 65 percent previous estimate. Moreover, fulfillment and shipping costs will trend lower and lead to an improvement of 1.5 percentage points in profit margin over the next five years. "Studies we have collected show automation savings to the tune of ~10-25% (or in the case of autonomous delivery, if you want to think a little further ahead, up to 80% per unit). And as this trend unfolds, we believe larger addressable markets, both categorically (i.e. food, where we peg the [total addressable market] at > $500bn) and geographically in markets such as India will increasingly open," he said.  CNBC's Michael Bloom contributed to this story.

Jeff Bezos Getty Images
The banks have had a tough week as bad news slams the sector, compounded by analyst downgrades of their stocks.

The SPDR S&P Bank ETF ended the week down 2.1 percent. Frankfurt-listed shares of Deutsche Bank fell more than 9 percent on Friday, while U.S.-traded shares of Wells Fargo and Citigroup closed down about 1.5 percent and 1.4 percent, respectively.

Equity research firm AlphaValue has changed its opinion on Deutsche to "sell" after the bank confirmed that the Justice Department made an opening claim position of $14 billion to settle a number of investigations related to mortgage securities and related activity between 2005 and 2007. Although Deutsche may eventually settle at a much lower figure, AlphaValue said it reduced its earnings forecasts for Deutsche since the bank's litigation provisions are currently at 5.5 billion euros, or about $6.14 billion.

Deutsche said in a statement that it "has no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited" and that "negotiations are only beginning." It expects the eventual figure to be "similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts."

Atlantic Equities downgraded Wells Fargo to "underweight" and cut its price target to $44 from $51 on Friday. Although the bank was recently fined $185 million by regulators for setting up 2 million accounts without customer authorization, Atlantic said the fine "is not material." The firm's concern is that Wells Fargo that the news "will be disruptive" and "poses a huge reputational risk." Atlantic said that the bank may lose "its premium rating" as the story plays out.

It was also reported that federal prosecutors are investigating Wells Fargo.
Brand authenticity is something successful entrepreneurs are able to create, and big corporations are increasingly being forced to buy from them, said the co-founders of CAVU Ventures Partners.

"You can't outsource authenticity. Entrepreneurs are really good at ... creating these brands that have heart and soul," CAVU's Clayton Christopher told CNBC's "Squawk Box" in an interview on Friday. "That's what big companies are starved for."

"It's much less risky for these big companies to buy small brands that have proven some level of success," he added.

Christopher, an entrepreneur turned venture capitalist, certainly speaks from experience.

He founded Sweet Leaf Tea in 1998 with $12,000 and a recipe from his grandmother. Nestle, after an initial investment of $15.6 million in 2009, bought Sweet Leaf outright two years later.

Deep Eddy Vodka, co-founded by Christopher in 2009, sold for nearly $400 million to Heaven Hill distilleries about six years later.

After raising $150 million, CAVU Ventures started at the beginning of this year, with a concentration on consumer food and beverage companies. Their investments include Bai drinks, Chef's Cut jerky, and Austin Eastciders.

CAVU stands for Ceiling And Visibility Unlimited, an aeronautical term meaning great flying weather.

"My lovely wife came up with that. She's pretty creative," Christopher said, adding it's an aspirational mantra for the company.
A big Wall Street technology firm is being sued after allegedly falling for a run-of-the-mill email scam and wiring client funds to hackers.



SS&C Technologies , a $6 billion market capitalization company that bills itself as "the most comprehensive powerhouse of software technology in the financial services industry," was duped by China-based hackers who sent sloppy emails to company staffers in order to trick them into releasing client money, according to a complaint.

And that, now, has taken Tillage Commodities Fund offline temporarily. The investor has suspended business operations after nearly $6 million of its funds reportedly were fleeced, via SS&C, this March, according to a lawsuit. The complaint from Tillage, a commodities investor, alleges SS&C Technologies, its fund administrator, ignored its own protocol, resulting in the lost funds.
September marks the start of China's peak travel season but traditional hotspot Taiwan is not feeling the love, amid a political stalemate between Beijing and Taipei.

On Monday, about 10,000 Taiwanese tourism workers took to the streets, calling on the government to improve the situation, just ahead of a key period for the industry: the Mid-Autumn Festival long weekend in China, which started Thursday, and the week-long National Day holiday that starts on October 1.

The Taiwan Tourism Bureau said the number of Chinese visitors who came to the country as part of a tour group fell 8 percent from January to July, even as total overseas visitor numbers grew 7.9 percent from a year ago to 6.3 million. In contrast, the number of individual travelers from the mainland rose 14 percent from January to July.

The fall in group traveler numbers was particularly significant for Taiwan because holidaymakers in tour groups tended to spend more days at different places in Taiwan.

"Even if the number of tourists from South Korea increase by 100 percent, it could still not make up for 5 or 10 percent decrease in the number of tourists from the Chinese mainland," said Taiwan's Travel Agent Association spokesperson Ringo Lee said at the protest.

Numbers from Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council backed up the picture of a broad slump, showing there were 15 percent fewer visitors from mainland China in July alone, while overall Chinese visitor number growth from January to July was just 0.5 percent higher than the same period a year ago.

The slide in mainland visitor came on the back of the cooling relationship between Beijing and Taipei, caused by Taiwan's election of pro-independence campaigner Tsai Ing-wen as president in January.
A New Jersey couple on Friday filed a class-action lawsuit against Costco Wholesale and several of its stores, claiming the membership-only warehouse giant has been illegally overcharging them  and potentially hundreds of thousands of other customers  by charging sales tax on toilet tissue purchases in violation of state law.

Don't you know you're not supposed to squeeze the Charmin toilet paper  or charge sales tax on it?

Toilet tissue sold for household use is exempt from New Jersey's 7 percent sales tax.

But the couple, Jacqueline Taufield and Robert Arnold, said that they were charged the tax when they purchased Charmin toilet tissue on July 26, 2015, from a Costco in Wayne, New Jersey, and then again when they picked up some more Charmin in a Costco in Hackensack five days later.

The suit said that when the Leonia couple complained to Costco management after realizing they had been charged sale tax improperly, "they refused to issue a rebate to them."

The couple's lawyer, Rosemarie Arnold, said, "Rather than refund [Robert's] money, they told him, 'Well, if you believe that, you have to mail your receipt to the corporate headquarters along with a letter and tell the corporate headquarters how you were improperly charged tax.'"



The couple was "annoyed and angry" about the charge, and that response, said Arnold, who is not related to Robert.

"The obvious solution is to say, 'You're absolutely right ... we made a mistake, here's your money back,' " the lawyer said.

The suit says that Costco "despite being aware of the illegality of their actions... continues to cheat their customers, causing them to incur monetary damages when they purchase toilet tissue."

The claim, filed in Bergen County Superior Court, alleges violation of the New Jersey Consumer Fraud Act, breach of contract, unjust enrichment, negligence, violation of the state's "Truth-in-Consumer Contract," and fraud.

A Costco spokeswoman, when asked for comment on the suit, said, "Unfortunately, we are not able to provide a response at this time."
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has opened a new line of investigation into why ExxonMobil has declined to write down the value of its assets following a two-year oil price rout, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

The probe of Exxon's accounting practices comes as Schneiderman's office is already looking into whether the oil giant's past research into climate change, which did not become public until recently, could impact its business and shareholders.

Exxon declined to comment to the Journal about the investigation, but told the newspaper it follows all rules and regulations. In the past, Exxon has said the company is conservative in its assessments of new assets and requires executives to make sure projects remain viable in low-price environments, according to the Journal.

"We don't do write-downs," CEO Rex Tillerson told trade publication Energy Intelligence last year. "We are not going to bail you out by writing it down. That is the message to our organization."

Among the top 40 largest publicly traded oil and gas companies, Exxon is the only only that has not written down its assets in the last 10 years, the Journal said, citing S&P Global Market Intelligence data.

Energy companies write down the value of their reserves when commodity-price declines make it uneconomical to extract oil and gas from those reserves. They are therefore unable to bring that product to market and profit from it.

Exxon, the world's largest publicly traded integrated oil company, has previously faced questions about its approach to writing down assets during a 2013 Securities and Exchange Committee inquiry following a drop in natural gas prices, as well as in a 2004 class action lawsuit following Exxon's merger with Mobil Corp., the Journal reported.

Read the Journal's full story here.
A sign outside the 21st Century Fox headquarters in New York.

21st Century Fox accused Netflix of illegally hiring two of its executives in a lawsuit filed Friday, Deadline reports.

Fox alleges that Netflix has been conducting a "brazen campaign to unlawfully target, recruit, and poach valuable Fox executives by illegally inducing them to break their employment contracts with Fox to work at Netflix," Deadline said. The suit was filed in California Superior Court.

The two executives in question, now-former VP of Promotions Marco Waltenberg and now-former VP of Creative Tara Flynn, were both under contract when they left for Netflix, according to the publication.

Both were hired earlier this year. They now work in the streaming giant's promotions and drama programming development department.

The suit argues that "Netflix is defiantly flouting the law by soliciting and inducing employees to break their contracts," a Fox spokesperson told Deadline. "We intend to seek all available remedies to enforce our rights and hold Netflix accountable for its wrongful behavior."

A Netflix spokesperson told CNBC the company intends to defend the lawsuit vigorously.

"We believe Fox's use of fixed-term employment contracts in this manner are enforceable," the spokesperson said. "We believe in employee mobility and will fight for the right to hire great colleagues no matter where they work."

Read the full report on Deadline.
The start-up scene is booming in France, the deputy minister for innovation and digital affairs told CNBC, as the country pushes to attract more tech entrepreneurs from across Europe -- including the U.K..

Following the U.K.'s Brexit decision, several European countries are trying to attract more tech companies and start-ups from London. In July, for instance, a billboard was spotted on the streets of the U.K. capital urging start-ups to move to Berlin.

French deputy minister Axelle Lemaire is also keen for start-ups to consider setting up in her country. She spoke to CNBC's Julia Chatterley about the opportunities for young entrepreneurs looking to start a business in France.

"The amount of investment from VC funds is really on the rise," she added. "What I'm here to say is, come and have a real look at the reality of the innovation eco-system in France."
We screen students for vision, hearing and spinal problems. Why not for depression?

The Montana Suicide Mortality Review Team, composed of Montana health care professionals and other citizens, has recommended that all students be screened for depression beginning at age 11. That recommendation is consistent with what the U.S. Prevention Services Task Force advised recently.

What we envision is making parents aware, giving parents information and suggestions on where to go for follow up, said Karl Rosston, statewide suicide prevention coordinator. We want to give parents information so they can make decisions.

Shocking as it may be to think that children as young as 11 are seriously depressed, Montana statistics argue for detection of this disease at an early age. Since 2014, at least two Montana 11-year-olds have taken their own lives, one child in Billings, one in Great Falls. Several 12-, 13- and 14-year-olds have killed themselves in the same period.

Not all who suffer depression will kill themselves or even attempt self-harm. But the majority of people who die by suicide had undiagnosed, untreated or ineffectively treated mental illnesses. Depression is the illness most often connected with suicide.

The review team was created by a 2013 law that aims to reduce the rate of suicide in Montana, which is the highest of any state  double the national average.

The Montana team made other recommendations for a multi-level approach for all elementary and secondary students, including:

 Teaching resiliency and coping skills starting in grades 1 and 2.

 Training school counselors in suicide prevention.

 Training all middle and high school students in a Question, Refer Persuade, a simple, evidenced-based method of asking a few questions to help their peers stay safe.

 Requiring each school district to develop protocols to respond to students identified as being at high risk.

Among the 27 Montana youth who died by suicide between Jan. 1, 2014, and March 1, 2016, 21 were white, five were American Indian and one was Asian. Seven were 17 years old, 20 were younger. Eighty-one percent were boys.

The Montana Youth Risk Behavior Survey, a confidential survey conducted every other year in Montana middle and high schools, has shown an increasing trend toward serious depression among our youth. In 2015, the most recent survey:

 Nearly 30 percent of Montana students said they had felt sad or hopeless for more than two weeks in a row in the past year and had stopped doing some of their normal activities.

 Nearly 9 percent reported attempting suicide.

Students with disabilities were more likely than any other student group to answer yes to those questions. The second highest rate of risk was among students in alternative schools, followed by American Indians living in urban areas and American Indians living on reservations. All those groups had higher risks than the general student population, according to the YRBS.

Montana cannot ignore depression and suicide. The student screening recommendations are new, but the screenings arent. Family doctors and mental health professionals have used depression screenings (often a series of questions) for many years.

The Montana Suicide Prevention Review Team has asked that lawmakers consider mandating some type of depression screening for middle and high school students. Such a law is justified for protecting adolescent health  and life. But local school boards dont have to wait for lawmakers to act next year. In consultation with their community and health care professionals, school trustees can and should establish depression screening programs.

We urge Montana school leaders not to wait for the next student suicide. Step up now to help parents learn about depression, treatment and recovery.

 Billings (Mont.) Gazette
Case IH Magnum Autonomous Tractor in field with a planter implement. Source: CNH Industrial/Case IH

Within the next decade, farming as we know it is expected to be revolutionized by the use of self-driving tractors and robots that can perform time-consuming tasks now done by humans.

Sales of major farm machinery have been in a continued slump amid weak prices for key crops such as corn and soybeans, but the ever-present need to control farm costs and increase output will eventually drive farmers to adopt autonomous technologies.

"They (farmers) are a pretty cautious bunch, which is understandable," said Kraig Schulz, co-founder and CEO of Autonomous Tractor Corp., a small private company based in Minnesota that is developing AutoDrive technology for tractors. Its technology is aimed at turning existing tractors into semi-autonomous machines.

Experts say the first wave of autonomous tech in ag will go primarily to higher-value crops, such as tree nuts, vineyards and fresh produce. Also, some suggest that the big tractors could be replaced with self-propelled autonomous implements, such as sprayers in row crops, orchards and vineyards or with other robotic equipment for other specific tasks on the farm.

All told, Goldman Sachs predicts farm technologies could become a $240 billion market opportunity for ag suppliers, with smaller driverless tractors a $45 billion market on its own. Tens of billions could be spent on advanced tech for major farm uses such as precision fertilizer, planting, spraying and irrigation, Goldman predicts.

Rising costs for farm labor and falling costs for self-driving technology also will provide further catalysts for the shift.

On Monday, California Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law a bill giving farm workers in the state  the nation's largest agricultural producer  historic overtime pay.

"This is going to have a serious effect on farming out in California," said Schulz, who expects rising labor costs to be an opportunity for autonomous and even semi-autonomous equipment to replace some of the human labor needed in farming.

"Rising labor costs would certainly be a positive for adoption of automated processes," said Jerry Revich, an analyst at Goldman Sachs.

Self-driving tech prices falling

At the same time, the progress in self-driving technology for automobiles  including both object detection capabilities using multicamera systems, radar and lidar technology  could help speed up and lower the cost of developing autonomous farm machinery.

"Some of the new sensors that help you autonomously park your car, parallel park, backup sensors, cameras and things like that  all that stuff  the cost has come way down on it and it's allowed us to leverage it more in our machines," said Matt Rushing, a vice president in charge of precision ag and advanced technology for AGCO.

The content and technology to move to driverless cars cost about $2,700 per vehicle, according to Goldman Sachs. In agriculture, autonomous driving equipment would require technology where there is a slightly higher complexity, but "not disproportionately higher," Revich said. "We're watching the sensor and technology prices really move down," said Rob Zemenchik, global product marketing manager for Case IH's precision farming unit, Advanced Farming Systems. Europe's CNH Industrial , known for its Case IH tractor brand, unveiled an autonomous concept tractor last month in Iowa at the Farm Progress Show, one of the world's largest farm shows. CNH's autonomous tractor could presumably work unmanned around the clock and uses GPS and sensor technology. The grower could remotely monitor and control the machine using a device such as a tablet. CNH's concept tractor does maintain the driver cab so the operator can perform tasks not presently suited to automation, such as commuting between fields or going through suburban or rural community roads to reach a farm.

"We're focusing on perfecting the off-road parts of the solution and we're very comfortable with our progress to date," said Zemenchik. CNH's autonomous tractor could come to market as early as 2020.

Deere and AGCO , two rival farm machinery manufacturers, have similar technologies.

A Deere spokesman said the farm equipment giant does not have a driverless tractor on the market, although the company has done some work on driverless technology in orchards.

Deere's strategy has been generally to develop ag technologies internally, although it recently tried to buy Monsanto 's Precision Planting, but the Justice Department blocked that deal.

Swarms of farming robots

watch now

The autonomous driving trend isn't limited to large farm machinery. There's also interest in smaller tractors and ag robots, and some see them working in groups of five or more in a swarm-like action.

One lure for the smaller machines is they would be lighter and reduce soil compaction, a problem today with heavy tractor machinery and one that can reduce crop yields.

According to Goldman Sachs, a fleet of smaller automated tractors could lift farmer revenue by more than 10 percent and reduce farm labor costs. It also suggests that precision ag technology used today is already saving growers money and increasing yields.

Globally, Goldman estimates that advances in ag technology  including such things as autonomous ag vehicles, farm robots, drones, as well as precision in planting, fertilizing and irrigation  could result in farm yields potentially rising by more than 70 percent by the year 2050.

"You'll start to see more and more autonomous vehicles, especially smaller vehicles in farming, replacing some of the manual work that we would have seen being done by humans," said Rushing, the AGCO executive.

Indeed, AGCO has a concept that would give small mobile, cloud-controlled units the capability to perform various tasks in farming. The technology from AGCO's Fendt subsidiary "is focused on eliminating not only the cost and inefficiencies of an operator, but also the cost of the tractor and the planter tool bar as well," according to the company.

AGCO expects a fleet of field robots could also be offered as a service by dealers to farmers since they could presumably be put on a trailer and delivered. If that happens, the Duluth, Georgia-based company said it could reduce the capital costs for the farmer since they wouldn't need to make a big equipment purchase.

See & Spray machine from Blue River Technology that can identify plants and weeds to spray chemicals for crop protection. Source: Blue River Technology
General Electric said it will receive $1.9 billion for a contract to supply steam turbines, generators and other equipment to the Hinkley Point C project, the United Kingdom's first new nuclear power plant in decades.

By approving Hinkley Point on Thursday, the U.K. government cleared the way for GE to begin building two 1,770-megawatt Arabelle steam turbines and generators capable of powering six million homes and supplying about 7 percent of the U.K.'s power generation needs for 60 years, GE said. They will replace older coal-fired plants, GE said.

The government of British Prime Minister Theresa May approved the controversial 24 billion (18.17 billion pounds) project on Thursday, after putting it on hold in July.

GE had already been doing early engineering work on the project to build one of the largest nuclear plants in the world.

The U.S. industrial company acquired the contract and capability when it purchased the power assets of France's Alstom last year. Alstom won the competition a few years ago, GE said.
If Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump is relying on younger voters to carry them over the finish line in this election, they'd better look elsewhere.

The stark truth is starting to appear in several polls: The latest New York Times/CBS News poll showed that a whopping 36 percent of voters under 30 planned to vote for a third-party candidate such as Gary Johnson or Jill Stein.

However, the implications are very different for Trump and Clinton. For Trump, the lack of support from young people simply signals a missed opportunity. For Clinton, not getting their support or seeing a significant portion of it migrate to Johnson or Stein in crucial states like Michigan and Pennsylvania could be a death blow.



Right now, Johnson and Stein are collectively polling above the 10 percent level among all voters in the Real Clear Politics average of all polls. That may not be enough for either of them to be included in the debates, but it's an historically stunning level at this stage in the election cycle. Consider that Ralph Nader had less than 3 percent of the vote in just one state in 2000, and that was enough to tip the election to George W. Bush. Imagine what a double-digit collective third-party percentage could do in this contest. Third-party candidates have only crossed the double-digit threshold twice in the last 50 years.

You can't really blame Clinton or Trump for this. Traditionally, voters aged 18-25 have been the weakest group as far as turnout. The Democrats got spoiled by the super surge in younger voters who turned out in 2008 to vote for Barack Obama. In some states, it appears those younger voters made a key difference. Their turnout dropped off a bit in 2012, but it was still historically higher than usual. Now, a large number of younger voters aren't making it through the pollsters' "likely voter" screens.

Younger voters are much more likely to be idealistic and back candidates that conventional wisdom tells them cannot win. The enormous support for Bernie Sanders earlier this year stood out as a prime example of that. Clinton did try to gain their interest with her proposal for debt-free college tuition much earlier this summer. But for some reason, her campaign flat out stopped talking about that proposal almost as quickly as it rolled it out. Trump has tried to make the case that his trade policies will help younger workers, but that never really got off the ground among millennials who seemed much more likely to view those policies as nativist.

And then there's one more thing: Remember just how old these leading candidates are. Trump is 70 and Clinton turns 69 in October  and that's REALLY OLD as far as 18-25 year olds are concerned. I know, it didn't hurt the 74-year-old Sanders with younger voters but here's the difference: He campaigned on issues that were uniquely focused on things important to young voters. Trump and Clinton can't make that kind of an issues pivot with about 50 days to go before Election Day.

Here's another reason why this is more devastating for Clinton. On the flip side, older voters tend to have strong, unflappable turnout at the polls. According to the Census Bureau's take on the 2012 election, voters in their 50s and 60s beat 18-25 year olds and even voters in the 40s by at least 20 percentage points in most comparisons.

And guess who older voters are most likely to vote for in this election? Trump. He has double-digit leads among voters over 45, according to recent polls.
The debate surrounding the U.K. government's decision to give the green light to the 18 billion ($23.81 billion) Hinkley Point C nuclear project rages on.



The joint project, financed by France and China, has proved controversial in some quarters. Critics have raised concerns over the fixed price of 92.50 per megawatt hour of electricity for 35 years once the plant begins generating as well as potential risks to the U.K.'s security, given that foreign firms will have a stake in crucial U.K. energy infrastructure.

"It seems to be a very problematic deal: there are quicker, faster, cheaper more reliable ways of moving forward," Paul Dorfman, honorary senior research fellow at University College London's Energy Institute, told CNBC on Friday. "The deal itself seems to be deeply problematical and the reactor seems to be a failing reactor," Dorfman added.

On Thursday, Greg Clark, the U.K.'s secretary of state for business, energy and industrial strategy, said that a series of measures would be introduced to enhance security and ensure the Hinkley project would not be able to change hands without the government agreeing.

"Britain needs to upgrade its supplies of energy, and we have always been clear that nuclear is an important part of ensuring our future low-carbon energy security," Clark added.

Dorfman, however, remained skeptical: "It looks like a very poor piece of policymaking which will unfortunately lock us into a 35-year contract  an unheard-of 35-year contract  index-linked, at four times the price it was mooted," he said.

"We at the Institute estimate that means that hardworking U.K. taxpayers and electricity consumers will be putting 1 billion per year into the deep pockets of the French and Chinese corporations," he added.

CNBC's Holly Ellyatt contributed to this report
The U.K.'s green light to construct a nuclear power plant at Hinkley Point has positive repercussions industry wide, according to one expert.

The move is "definitely very good news for the whole nuclear industry," said Kirill Komarov, first deputy CEO of Rosatom, the Russian state nuclear energy company. Komarov was pleased that the British government was ready to support both the development of nuclear energy and its scheme to fix prices long term.

The joint project, financed by France and China, has proved controversial in some quarters. Critics have raised concerns over the fixed price of 92.50 ($121) per megawatt hour of electricity for 35 years once the plant begins functioning, as well as potential risks to the U.K.'s security, given that foreign firms will have a stake in crucial U.K. energy infrastructure.

Komarov expressed "slight concern" that the future price of electricity was higher than necessary. He said that nuclear energy is often blamed for high costs, which is bad for the industry's image.

When asked who the winners of the Hinkley Point deal were, Komarov acknowledged that this "depends how (the parties involved) structure these relations, not just in the process of financing but in the process of construction."

"China, I have no doubt, is interested not just to finance the story, but to construct significant parts of equipment on the territory of China and supply it to the United Kingdom," he said.
The action taken against Wells Fargo for opening unauthorized accounts is a "political gift" to regulators, analyst Edward Mills said Friday.

That's because it will likely accelerate bank compensation rules and additional enforcement actions those regulators want to make.

"This is a different political reality in D.C., where best interest of the consumer has to be to be the driving force, and you have to really look at incentives. Gone are the days of the trips to Hawaii. Gone are the days of being able to sell whatever you want in terms of financial products," the FBR Capital Markets senior financial policy analyst told CNBC's "Power Lunch."

Wells Fargo was recently fined for creating accounts for customers across multiple product lines without telling them, in order to meet sales goals. All told, the bank agreed to pay $185 million in penalties and $5 million to customers. Over the course of five years, 5,300 employees were also fired.

The bank is now under investigation by the House Financial Services Committee and CEO John Stumpf has also been called to testify before the Senate Banking Committee on Tuesday. Federal prosecutors are also reportedly investigating the bank.

Mills said Stumpf has to take personal responsibility when he appears before both committees and do something like separating the chairman and CEO roles or taking no bonus. He thinks Stumpf also needs to say which executive has been fired or penalized for what happened.

"If he tries to make this about rogue employees, which has been part of the initial response, that is not going to work, because ultimately what the senators are going to try to make this about is either it was a toxic culture or it is too big to manage," he said.

On Tuesday, Stumpf told CNBC's "Mad Money" he holds himself accountable, but does not plan to resign.

"I think the best thing I could do right now is lead this company, and lead this company forward," he said.



 CNBC's Abigail Stevenson contributed to this report.


Huffington Post will launch its 17th edition in South Africa in November, the media company announced on Friday.

"Africa is an important place in the world, but I would say that the advertising and media markets would characterize it in the emerging phase, and not quite robust," Huffington Post CEO Jared Grusd said to CNBC. "For us, that's not what's driving us. What's driving us is the opportunity to do something really important around the world."

HuffPost South Africa will be in partnership with top South African media company Media24. Even without a dedicated publication in South Africa, Huffington Post gets 750,000 monthly unique users from the country.

Though the U.S. edition is a still a major focus, more than 50 percent of Huffington Post's traffic comes from overseas, according to the company. In June 2016, it had 173 million unique global visitors and 74 million unique monthly visitors in the U.S., according to comScore. Currently, the company has more than 300 editors in 20 countries outside the U.S. International expansion will continue, Grusd said.

The South African edition was personal for Grusd because he was born there. Grusd said the number of internet users in the country is expected to grow to 34.5 million by 2018, and mobile phone users to 41.5 million. Digital video is expected to grow by more than 29 percent, as well.

Grusd, who has been CEO of Huffington Post since August 2015, is in a unique position to continue the brand since co-founder and editor-in-chief Ariana Huffington stepped down in August. Huffington left her media company to focus on a new venture called Thrive Global, a health and wellness advisory start-up. She will start there in November. Grusd formerly held executive positions at Spotify and Huffington Post parent company AOL .

For the most part, Huffington Post will continue along the same media plan he's followed since he took over the CEO post last year, Grusd said. Part of the plan has been an emphasis on helping transition Huffington Post, as audiences consume more mobile and video media.

"We've been focusing on how do we continue to expand our audiences," Grusd said. "As we know there's been giant secular shifts in terms of the media landscape from PC to mobile, from just text-based for videos. I think the opportunities for publishers have never been greater, but are remarkably different today than have been three or five years ago."

Huffington Post in its DNA is a "marriage between a media company and a technology company," giving it the ability to experiment with new formats, Grusd said. Video remains a priority for the company, he added.

For example, AOL acquired augmented reality and virtual reality production company RYOT in April. The outlet is partnering with Huffington Post to create more experimental types of films for its core properties.

"They're really on the frontier in terms of pushing the innovation on how to tell the story," he said. "We're really excited about VR and AR as experiences that deeply resonate."

The company is also emphasizing social video. It is the number 1 publisher on Facebook , according to Newswhip. Grusd said its actively experimenting with Facebook Live, even though it ended its 24-hour HuffPost Live livestream in January.

"It's not just about content," Grusd said. "We do believe in journalism. That is the heart and soul of the company, but how we express that journalism that's where the fun can happen."

Update: This story was updated to reflect Huffington stepped down in August, and will be starting at Thrive in November.
David Ganek is a man on a mission, a hedge funder who believes he was wronged by an overzealous prosecutor who raided his offices in 2010 and charged the co-founder of his firm with insider trading. The charges were reversed in 2014, but in Ganek's mind the harm was irreversible. Since then, he's been on a quest for redemption. An in-depth profile from Institutional Investor explains Ganek's motivation and details his long odyssey. This is an excerpt; the complete post can be found here.

The news spread like wildfire across trading floors in New York, Boston and Connecticut: The Federal Bureau of Investigation had raided four hedge fund firms looking for evidence associated with suspected insider trading.

The date was November 22, 2010; the firms in question were Barai Capital Management, Diamondback Capital Management, Level Global Investors and Loch Capital Management. Within months all four had closed, after experiencing significant redemptions from investors as a result of the raids, while the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, Preet Bharara, proceeded with his insider trading investigation across the hedge fund industry. In 2012, Bharara filed charges against 12 individuals from the four targeted firms. But one man was never charged: David Ganek.

While the founder and principal of New York-based Level Global was named in the affidavit submitted to a judge by the FBI in support of the 2010 search warrant, neither he nor his firm  which had $4 billion in assets and was worth approximately $400 million at the time it was raised  were ever charged with a crime. Now Ganek is pushing back.
With fewer Americans out of work, there is more money in shoppers' wallets this holiday season, but a tighter labor market isn't an all-around win for the industry.

As retailers from Toys R Us to Target kick off their seasonal recruiting efforts, they're competing for a smaller pool of candidates.

Macy's on Tuesday said it would host its first national hiring day at its nameplate, Bloomingdale's and Backstage stores. The company is looking to hire 83,000 seasonal employees, roughly flat with last year, with an additional 3,000 of those workers staffing its fulfillment centers. Those 15,000 employees would equate to roughly 18 percent of its seasonal workforce.

Macy's announcement follows similar decisions from other retailers, who are stepping up their hiring efforts amid a tighter job market. Target, which is adding 77,500 temporary workers in its stores and fulfillment centers, will for the first time hold a nationwide hiring event across all of its stores over one weekend.

Toys R Us, which last year hosted regional events, will also launch its first nationwide recruiting efforts. They will take place at its shops and distribution centers on Oct. 10 and Nov. 11.

"It's definitely been a more competitive marketplace," spokeswoman Alyssa Peera said.

The U.S. unemployment rate fell to 4.9 percent in August, down from 5.1 percent a year prior. The retail trade has accounted for a chunk of hiring over the past 12 months, with some 15,968,000 people working in the industry. That's up nearly 2 percent from a year ago.

At the same time, preliminary government data show that slightly more retail jobs were unfilled in July than a year earlier.

"The same group of [retailers] that were fighting over people last year will be fighting over people this year. And there's a few less people to fight over and a few more positions to fill," said Steve Osburn, a director at the Kurt Salmon consulting firm who specializes in the supply chain.

Along with a series of minimum wage hikes at the company and state level, that dynamic has raised the price of hiring help. The average hourly pay for employees working in the retail trade ticked 2 percent higher in August, to $17.92, according to preliminary data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

It's only going to get more expensive for retailers who want to attract the best workers, said Tyler Owen, a senior director at JDA Software who specializes in workforce management.

Already, Toys R Us has said it will introduce new incentives this year, including pay increases in competitive markets, additional discounts, and after-hours parties and recognition for employees.

The Federal Reserve's Beige Book recently noted modest retail sales gains in Boston, Cleveland and San Francisco, which would indicate those cities are more competitive markets, said Barry Asin, president of Staffing Industry Analysts.

"The price of labor is just going to continue to skyrocket," JDA's Owen said.

Overall, retailers are expected to hire 738,800 seasonal workers for the winter holidays, according to a forecast from outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. That would be flat with last year.

But as online shopping continues to account for a larger piece of the pie, retailers will need to beef up staffing levels at their off-site distribution centers and in their stores' back offices.

Like Macy's, both Toys R Us and Target are putting a greater emphasis on these types of roles. Though Toys R Us would not provide a specific figure, Target has said it will hire 7,500 temporary workers to fill openings at distribution centers. That's up from 6,500 last year.

Yet despite their traditionally higher pay, Owen predicts warehouse roles will be some of the toughest to fill. That's because those opportunities typically aren't top of mind for job seekers, he said.

Working in a warehouse tends to be more labor-intensive than customer-facing roles, which can make those jobs appealing. What's more, fulfillment centers are often built in rural areas where land is cheap, but there are fewer residents, Osburn said.

Last season, retailers had pronounced difficulty filling warehouse gigs in areas including central Ohio, Memphis, Tennessee, and Louisville, Kentucky, Osburn said. This year, he predicts retailers will need to boost employment in these centers by roughly 20 percent, to match the industry's growth.



"More and more, people are finding other ways to make money," Asin said. "Everything from Uber drivers to working for sites like Upwork or Freelancer or TaskRabbit, even Airbnb are ways for people to supplement their income."

As retailers scale their in-store fulfillment services, it's crucial they hire more people for their click-and-collect and ship-from-store departments. Using bricks-and-mortar shops to fill orders was a pain point for the industry last season, according to a survey by JDA. Roughly 50 percent of respondents who elected to pick up their own order had some sort of issue with the process, whether their item wasn't available or they had to wait for an extended period of time.

Although retailers are placing a greater emphasis on this area for the holidays, Osburn anticipates consumers will encounter similar issues. Getting their stores in shape will be especially challenging for retailers in the final days before Christmas, as the first day of Hanukkah falls on Dec. 24.

Meanwhile, because Christmas is on a Sunday, the final cutoff for shoppers to order online gifts for home delivery will occur earlier. That will likely cause more consumers to collect their orders in store, Owen said.

"Those two overlaying demand curves are going to be right on top of each other," he said. "It's going to make it that much more difficult."

Yet while some temporary workers are expected to see a lift in their hourly wages this year, Owen noted that it will be measured. Many retailers still view labor as an expense, as opposed to a potential differentiator for their brand.

"They don't want to pay any more than they would have to," Owen said. "It's a matter of giving just enough to protect the brand ... without breaking the bank."

Osburn stressed that retailers shouldn't rely on pay alone to attract workers. Otherwise, when a competitor down the road lifts their hourly wage by 50 cents, employees won't hesitate to break their loyalty. Retailers should also consider offering flexible work schedules, child care services or opportunities for bonuses, he said.

"Those are the type of things that tend to be successful," Osburn said.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel's party is set for further losses in regional elections in the capital Berlin on Sunday, with the right-wing populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party expected to make gains.

Support for Merkel and her conservative Christian Democrat Union (CDU) party has been hit by her open-door migrant policy, with a record number of people moving to Germany in 2015, according to official statistics.

This is expected to tell in Sunday's elections, which come after the CDU was knocked into third place by the AfD in regional elections in the region of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern earlier this month.

Voting in Berlin started at 7 a.m. London time Sunday and polling stations will close at 5 p.m. London time, according to Reuters. Public broadcasters will publish exit polls shortly afterwards.
Tragically, the events of Sept. 3 near Cannon Ball suggest it is time to investigate the relationship of our public officials with the company building the Dakota Access Pipeline. Often when something looks and smells fishy, it is.

We need to know why the pipeline route was moved to the reservation border where the river is wide and there isn't any oil spill equipment. We need to know why officials have repeatedly made demonstrably false statements about the protests, and whether they are harassing people at roadblocks because of ethnicity. We need to know if our officials knew of the intent of the oil pipeline company to demolish cultural artifacts and to use mace and dogs on the protectors. We need to know why charges for spray-painting on a plow blade have been made before charges for assault and evidence tampering.

We will need all of the records (minutes, recordings, phone calls, email, video, photos, paperwork) from the pipeline company, the governors office, the minerals department, the Morton County Sheriffs Department, and others evaluated and all witnesses questioned immediately. An appearance of collusion has presented itself, and we cannot tolerate even the appearance of such activity let alone its reality.

In our society we must have public officials who do their jobs according to the bounds of the constitution, legally and in the open, for the benefit of all citizens. Regretfully, this does not seem to be the case today.

Teddy Roosevelt said that when we give in to corruption we ourselves are in the wrong. Let's demand a thorough FBI investigation right now to make sure there has been no corruption in North Dakota, and lets have the laws apply evenly to everyone in our state.
German lender Deutsche Bank sounded an optimistic tone Friday, despite its shares suffering their worst day since late June following the news of a proposed $14 billion settlement by the U.S. Justice Department.



Jorg Eigendorf, head of communications and senior group director at Deutsche Bank, said that the bank had a "comfortable cushion" after the DOJ suggested that the bank pay $14 billion to settle a number of investigations related to mortgage securities. Reports state that investigations refer to the way it sold these securities before the financial crash of 2008.



Eigendorf said that it was a very high number but was confident that "we'll be able to negotiate this number down." Analysts have speculated that the bank might not have enough of a buffer even if the proposed settlement was halved.

"We didn't want this number to leak out ... We want these negotiations to be confidential" he told CNBC Friday.



He added that the bank was not concerned and there was "no reason to be worried right now." Shares slid nearly 8 percent in Friday's session after news of the suggested settlement.



Deutsche Bank said in a statement Friday that it "has no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited." The bank emphasized that negotiations have just started and that it expects the outcome to be "similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts."



The company previously thought that a settlement between $2 billion and $3 billion would be fair, as it had already paid $1.9 billion in 2013 to resolve similar claims, the Wall Street Journal said. Other banks have recently paid smaller fines to settle similar violations, according to reports.
Surrounded by military veterans, US Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump says US President Barack Obama was born in the United States, during a campaign event at the Trump International Hotel, September 16, 2016 in Washington, DC

But the birther issue will not go away for Trump, who offered no words of apology or explanation for spending the better part of a decade poisoning the American electorate with a racist conspiracy theory meant to de-legitimize the nation's first black president.

"Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it," Trump said, clinging to the thoroughly debunked false history of the birther movement. " President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period."

And he did it in a throwaway line at the end of a military veterans event and hotel PR stunt that he tricked cable TV networks into covering live in nearly its entirety. And he did it with a lie.

Donald Trump on Friday finally gave up his half-decade quest to prove that President Barack Obama was not born in the United States and thus not eligible to serve as president.

Trump did not let the issue go after Obama released his long-form birth certificate in 2011 (despite plenty of previously available evidence that he was born in Hawaii). He suggested the birth certificate was fake and encouraged efforts to prove it was fake. "Birtherism" ignited Trump's shocking political ascendance. Most of Trump's supporters now believe Obama is a Muslim not born in this country.

This is among the reasons that Trump's numbers among African-Americans are the worst in political history. It also among the reasons that Trump, despite recent tightening in the polls, is still not likely to win. It is true that Trump has cut Hillary Clinton's lead in the RealClearPolitics national average to just 1.5 percent and drawn even or slightly ahead in key swing states including Florida and Ohio. But keep in mind this happened during Clinton's worst stretch of the campaign in which she nearly collapsed at a 9/11 memorial service and failed to disclose her pneumonia diagnosis for nearly three days.

Presumably, Clinton will begin to perform better on the campaign trail  she has in the last couple of days  and she will have three opportunities in the debates to remind people who already don't think Trump is qualified to be president that voting for him would be a tremendous risk. The latest Quinnipiac poll out this week found that 62 percent of Americans believe Clinton is qualified while 61 percent believe Trump is not.

And remember that even if Trump wins Florida, Ohio, North Carolina and one electoral vote in Maine  along with all the safe red states he would have just 266 of the 270 electoral votes he needs. He would then need to win Michigan, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Colorado or Virginia. He trails in all those states.

And in the GOP primaries, Trump got away with having little or no organization. Winning a national election is a very different endeavor. Obama outperformed his poll numbers in 2012 in large part because he turned out a very diverse electorate in key swing states including Florida, Ohio and Colorado. Clinton has a vastly superior ground game and Trump's birtherism is likely to drive his nonwhite numbers even lower.

And Clinton is not likely to let Trump forget his birther history. She ripped into him on Friday before an African-American audience in D.C. "We know who Donald is. For five years, he has led the birther movement to de-legitimize our first black president," she said. "His campaign was founded on this outrageous lie. There is no erasing it in history."

Clinton then demanded an apology. "Barack Obama was born in America, plain and simple. And Donald Trump owes him and the American people an apology," she said.

Trump will never apologize. He is physically incapable of doing so. And Clinton will skewer him with it and the debates. And the remaining wavering suburban and highly educated Republicans who are now flirting with Trump will be reminded where he came from and what he believes.

Ben White is Politico's chief economic correspondent and a CNBC contributor. He also authors the daily tip sheet Politico Morning Money [politico.com/morningmoney]. Follow him on Twitter @morningmoneyben.


After years of insisting that President Barack Obama was born outside the United States, Donald Trump finally reversed himself Friday.

"President Barack Obama was born in the United States. Period," the GOP presidential candidate said in nationally televised comments. "And now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again."

Trump made the acknowledgement at the end of a more than 30 minute event in which he promoted his new Washington hotel and received endorsements from military veterans.

Critics had called his years-long "birther" campaign racially charged.

Trump has previously refused to publicly concede that Obama was born in the United States, despite the president's release of his birth certificate showing he was born in Hawaii. Just Wednesday, during an interview with The Washington Post, Trump refused to say Obama was born in the U.S.



Critics like Democratic presidential rival Hillary Clinton have bashed Trump's years-long campaign against Obama as an attempt to de-legitimize the country's first African-American president. Trump's claims had fueled doubts about his ability to court minority voters, who overwhelmingly have backed Clinton in recent polls.



Despite his statement Friday, Trump did not apologize for stirring the controversy, and Clinton blasted him on Twitter.

Clinton tweet

Obama told reporters on Friday that he was "shocked" the issue even resurfaced, but added: "I was pretty confident about where I was born."



A Clinton campaign spokesman on Friday called Trump's comments "disgraceful," saying "it was appalling to watch Trump appoint himself the judge of whether the President of the United States is American."

Trump, like his campaign on Thursday, falsely blamed Clinton for starting the so-called "birther" movement in her 2008 presidential primary against Obama. Supporters of Clinton made those claims, but there is no evidence of Clinton or her campaign questioning Obama's birthplace.

Trump also claimed he "finished" the birther theory. His campaign said he did so by compelling Obama to release his birth certificate in 2011.

In tweets since 2011, Trump had suggested he still doubted Obama's birth certificate, even suggesting hackers should find more information about the president.

Tweet

Tweet

 CNBC's Katie Little contributed to this report.
Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D., on Thursday condemned threats posted on YouTube by Anonymous Agents that target state officials, law enforcement, workers and pipeline company executives.

The videos, featuring a computer-generated voice and a Guy Fawkes mask, threaten harm or the release of personal information.

Heitkamp said she reached out to the Department of Justice to authenticate the threats, determine where theyre coming from and how legitimate they are.

Threats of violence cloaked in anonymity never have and never will have any place in North Dakota, she said in a statement.

One message is directed at Gov. Jack Dalrymple, criticizing his decision to activate the North Dakota National Guard. Jeff Zent, spokesman for the governor, said the office forwards threats to law enforcement.

The YouTube videos, as well as other threats made through social media, are under investigation by the Morton County Sheriffs Department and other agencies that are assisting, said department spokeswoman Donnell Preskey.

Theres a lot of intimidation being directed at our law enforcement, she said. We take all of these threats seriously.

Cody Hall, a spokesman for the Red Warrior Camp, which is demonstrating against the pipeline, said the online messages from Anonymous Agents are not affiliated with the camp.

We dont know anything about Anonymous, he said. Theyre a separate entity.

Hall said he continues to receive calls and emails from people around the country who are unhappy with how law enforcement is treating the pipeline opponents.

Morton Countys actions of racial injustice have only fueled more people to show up, he said. We wont leave. We come from this land. We are protecting this land.

Also on Thursday, North Dakotas congressional delegation joined the governor in calling on the U.S. Justice Department to provide law enforcement resources to keep the peace during the ongoing demonstrations.

In a conference call with the Department of Justice, Department of Interior and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the delegation and the governor asked for both federal funding and additional law enforcement personnel.

Since the administration created this problem, it has the obligation to fix it, said Rep. Kevin Cramer, R-N.D., referring to the federal agencies decision to temporarily pause pipeline construction north of the Standing Rock Sioux reservation. Its long past time to restore order.

Assistant Attorney General William Baer committed to responding to the request by today.

In addition, the North Dakota leaders asked the federal agencies for a clear and timely resolution to the Dakota Access Pipeline project.

If the administration wants to review the process for consulting tribes on public infrastructure projects, it should do so prospectively, not retroactively, said Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D.
SeongJoon Cho | Bloomberg | Getty Images

At a time when venture capitalists are scratching and clawing for cash returns, a surprising but welcome guest has come to the party: Unilever . Two months after acquiring Dollar Shave Club for about $1 billion, Unilever is reportedly in talks to buy Jessica Alba's Honest Co. for a similar amount. Like Dollar Shave, Honest is a popular consumer brand that's taken advantage of modern internet marketing and distribution tools to compete with industry giants. The Wall Street Journal, citing a person familiar with the matter, reported Thursday night that talks between Unilever and Honest are at an early stage and that Honest "hasn't ruled out going for an initial public offering instead." A Unilever spokesperson declined to comment, and a representative from Honest didn't respond to a request for comment. While not providing the level of gains that VCs generate from massive Facebook and Google acquisitions or from blockbuster IPOs, Unilever is at least offering some healthy liquidity to investors and proving venture-backed start-ups can succeed in penetrating markets outside of technology. The dealmaking is particularly good news for investors in consumer packaged goods, where big acquirers have yet to materialize. In retail, Wal-Mart recently shelled out $3.3 billion for Jet.com and Nordstrom previously purchased HauteLook and Trunk Club, but there's been virtually no activity in the market for packaged foods, beverages and household goods.

watch now

"Unilever is stepping up now and becoming potentially that innovative leader that looks at acquisitions of these new companies as a strategy for growing, modernizing the brand and taking products to new demographics," said Josh Goldman, a partner at Norwest Venture Partners and an investor in e-commerce companies including Casper, ModCloth and Gilt Groupe. "They've got a line of VCs lining up to talk to them now."

Honest is based in Santa Monica, California, just a few miles from Dollar Shave. Alba, who starred in films including "Little Fockers" and "Fantastic Four," started the company in 2011, and has gained traction through online sales of diapers, organic baby formula, laundry detergent and dish soap. Headquartered more than 5,000 miles away in London, Unilever is the world's fourth-largest fast-moving consumer goods company, according to OC&C Strategy Consultants. The top three are Nestle , Procter & Gamble and PepsiCo . As Unilever expands its brand, don't expect it to be entirely friendly to start-ups and Silicon Valley. In 2014, the maker of Hellmann's mayonnaise sued start-up food company Hampton Creek, claiming that its Just Mayo product was engaging in false advertising because it wasn't real mayonnaise. Hellmann's later dropped the suit, but turned around earlier this year and introduced competitive eggless products. Of course, San Francisco-based Hampton Creek now has bigger problems, after Bloomberg reported last month that the company bought its own products from stores across the country. The U.S. Justice Department subsequently opened a criminal probe into whether the company committed fraud.

Unilever shares
Investor and CEO Marcus Lemonis didn't shy away from the tough question: Does Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf need to resign over the bank's recent phantom account scandal?



"Yeah, I mean, I think in any business where there's activity that is just flat out wrong, somebody's got to go, and it starts from the top," Lemonis said on CNBC's "Power Lunch" on Friday.



Wells Fargo has been accused of creating roughly 2 million phantom accounts without customers' knowledge, in order to meet company sales targets, as the Wall Street Journal first reported.

The bank has agreed to pay $185 million in penalties and $5 million to customers and has separately fired 5,300 people over the scandal. The House Committee will call Stumpf to testify as part of the investigation.
Wells Fargo's troubles in Washington are deepening.



The House of Representatives Financial Services Committee is seeking interviews with several bank executives in the wake of revelations that the bank employed thousands of staffers who created fake accounts in order to meet performance goals.

Committee chairman and Texas Republican Jeb Hensarling is seeking records pertaining to allegations of fraud by Wells Fargo employees, according to a letter sent to the bank's general counsel on Friday.

That letter seeks transcribed interviews with CFO John Shrewsberry, COO and president Timothy Sloan, chief risk officer Michael Loughlin and Carrie Tolstedt, the executive who oversaw the bank unit responsible for fake accounts, and who departed the bank with a pay package worth nearly $100 million.

The House Financial Services Committee is also seeking Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf to testify at its hearing, which will be scheduled for later in September.
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The European Union's top officials have denied a rift after they gave conflicting visions over how the bloc should combat euroskepticism and the risk of a break-up. On the eve of an EU summit in Bratislava on Friday, European Council President Donald Tusk said that he and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker were like "one fist" and that was "no problem" between them  despite the two leaders offering diverging views of whether there should be, in Juncker's view, "more Europe" and "more unity" or, as Tusk said, an honest look at the direction the EU is taking and the danger of alienating its citizens further. In Juncker's annual "State of the Union" address on Wednesday, he said that European integration had to come before the interests of national states amid a tide of "galloping populism." Europe is facing increasing euroskepticism among its citizens and member states increasingly critical of the leaning towards more political integration and a "supranational" EU.



EU Commission President Jean Claude Juncker (L) and EU Council President Donald Tusk. JOHN THYS/AFP/Getty Images

Meanwhile, on the eve of an EU summit in Bratislava on Friday, which is being attended by 27 EU leaders  apart from U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May  Donald Tusk told reporters that leaders could not start discussions with "this kind of blissful conviction that nothing is wrong and everything is ok." He insisted that he and Juncker's visions for Europe were the same, however. "I'm absolutely sure that we have the same vision because what we need first of all in Europe today is good cooperation, solidarity and this political will to cooperate among member states. But at the same time we need very effective institutions and believe me, me and Jean-Claude Juncker we are like one fist." Discussions in Bratislava are not specifically about Brexit or the exit process (which has yet to formally begin) but will focus on the future of the EU in the wake of the U.K.'s vote to leave, the root causes of dissatisfaction and fragmentation between member states over controversial issues like the migration crisis. Tusk told reporters that complacency over the future of the EU was not an option. "I'm absolutely sure that, after Bratislava, we have to assure our citizens that we have learned the lesson from Brexit," Tusk said. Follow CNBC International on Twitter and Facebook.



United Front

EU leaders and ministers were determined to put on a united front as the arrived in Bratislava, for the summit. Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven told CNBC that the Brexit vote was regrettable and was "a loss for the whole EU but we have to work from that and show that we can unite."

He said that Juncker's call for a "stronger" EU was correct and said the bloc needed to coordinate on security. Austrian Chancellor Christian Kern told CNBC as he arrived at the summit that it was "time to achieve some progress on the real issues (facing Europe) which are migration, security and social welfare and I'm quite optimistic that we'll have good progress today," he said.

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Pricing of the Proof 2016-W American Eagle silver dollar, which pays tribute to the coin's 30th anniversary with a special edge device, was the focus of the week's top post on CoinWorld.com.

Its time to catch up on the week that was in numismatic insights and news.

Coin World is looking back at its five most-read stories of the week.

Click the links to read the stories. Here they are, in reverse order:

5. What happened to all those spilled Lincoln cent planchets?: A tractor-trailer hauling millions of copper-plated zinc planchets bound for the Philadelphia Mint struck a concrete median barrier on I-95 near New Castle, Del., Sept. 8.

4. Who gets to keep the SS Central America treasure recovered in 2014?: The full fair market value of the treasure recovered in 2014 from the 1857 wreckage of the SS Central America has been awarded by a federal judge in Virginia.

3. With so many grades and so much inconsistency in grading, what is a collector to do?: "For my money, I would rather have a beautiful MS-63 coin than an ugly MS-65 one," writes Q. David Bowers.

2. The 2016-W Walking Liberty gold half dollars are in production: Only Coin World has exclusive images of one of the coins from early production.

1. What will the Proof 2016 American Eagle silver dollar cost collectors?: The U.S. Mint issued initial prices, subject to change, for a crop of remaining 2016 numismatic products.

Connect with Coin World:
Sept. 16, 2016

 An astronaut on board the International Space Station debuted a colorful flight suit on Friday (Sept. 16) as part of an effort to raise awareness about childhood cancer and the benefits of pairing art with medicine.



NASA flight engineer Kate Rubins revealed "COURAGE," a hand-painted flight suit created by the pediatric patients recovering at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. The unique garment was produced by "The Space Suit Art Project," a collaboration between MD Anderson, NASA Johnson Space Center and ILC Dover, a company that develops NASA spacesuits.



"This project has really inspired me," said Rubins during a live video conversation with MD Anderson pediatric cancer patients and representatives of The Space Suit Art Project on Friday. "It was an amazing opportunity to get a chance to paint with you guys. I remember this suit when it was just a blank canvas and all of you guys painted on it."



Before she launched to the station in July, Rubins joined former-astronaut-turned-artist Nicole Stott and other NASA representatives who lent their time and artistic talents to create "COURAGE" and mentor the young cancer patients at MD Anderson.







Astronaut Kate Rubins assists MD Anderson Cancer Center young patients as they discover the healing aspects of art by helping to create the "COURAGE" flight suit in May 2016. (NASA)

"We here are all experiencing our first real art exhibit on the space station," Stott told Rubins from Mission Control.



Born out of the hospital's Arts in Medicine Program, which helps patients cope with cancer treatment through art, The Space Suit Art Project inspired the leaders within NASA's space station program to support the effort with help from astronauts, scientists and engineers. The agency provided the patterns for the suits and collaborated with ILC Dover to assemble the garments.



"COURAGE" was delivered to the space station on July 20 on SpaceX's ninth Dragon cargo spacecraft to supply the orbiting laboratory.



"When we were unpacking all the cargo, I said let us look out for this spacesuit. This is so important and all of these kids have made some beautiful art," said Rubins.



In addition to "COURAGE," which was created by having cancer patients paint their designs directly onto the flight suit's fabric, The Space Suit Art Project has also produced wearable, replica spacesuits based on the equipment worn by astronauts outside the space station.







The Space Suit Art Project's first replica space suit, "HOPE," seen at The Museum of Fine Arts in Houston. (The Space Suit Art Project)

The project's first spacesuit, named "HOPE," was stitched together from more than 600 painted art pieces created by patients, families and staff at MD Anderson. It is intended to represent the hope patients and families have as they go through treatment.



The creation a second replica spacesuit is now underway as an international collaboration with children's hospitals around the world. "UNITY" will symbolize the global issues surrounding childhood cancers, with a goal to unite others, help spread awareness about childhood cancers and offer hope and courage to cancer patients around the globe.



Stott and Ian Cion, the director of MD Anderson's Arts in Medicine program, embarked Aug. 31 on a 12-day journey to pediatric cancer centers in Cologne, Germany; Moscow, Russia and Tokyo, Japan to provide young patients with a chance to contribute to the "UNITY" spacesuit.



Stott and Cion were in Houston on Friday to be in Mission Control for the live event with Rubins on the space station.



"COURAGE," which was painted by MD Anderson patients  many of whom were in isolation during their treatment, is meant to demonstrate the courage it takes to be isolated from family and friends during long periods of time.







Astronaut Kate Rubins participates in a call with pediatric cancer patients while wearing the "COURAGE" flight suit. (NASA TV)

According to MD Anderson, research shows that creative arts therapy can benefit patients' mental and behavioral health. The hospital uses art activities, like The Space Suit Art Project to give patients a sense of control and purpose, make them more comfortable in the hospital environment and help build a sense of community among patients and families.



"I can tell you that wonderful healing things are coming from these art projects with the people working them," said Stott. "I know for myself, like Kate said, the inspiration that comes from this is 'gi-normous,' in the words of my son."



"As September is childhood cancer awareness month, this couldn't have happened at a better time," she said.



On average, one in 285 children in the U.S. are diagnosed with cancer before the age of 20.



"COURAGE," once returned to Earth, is scheduled to go on display at Space Center Houston, the visitor center for NASA's Johnson Space Center, in January 2017.
WASHINGTON  Senators John Hoeven and Heidi Heitkamp, Congressman Kevin Cramer and Gov. Jack Dalrymple today called on the U.S. Justice Department to provide law enforcement resources to ensure public safety during ongoing demonstrations in North Dakota.

Since the administration created this problem, it has the obligation to fix it, Cramer said. Its long past time to restore order.

Moments after a federal court judge ruled Sept. 9 to allow work on the Dakota Access Pipeline to continue, three federal agencies stepped in to halt construction just north of the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation.

The Departments of the Army Corps of Engineers, Justice and Interior issued a statement that they need to determine whether any of their previous decisions regarding the construction and its compliance with the National Environmental Policy Act and other laws should be reconsidered.

"After careful consideration, the court has decided that the project can proceed. Now everyone needs to follow the law," Hoeven said. "If the administration wants to review the process for consulting tribes on public infrastructure projects, it should do so prospectively, not retroactively.

In a conference call with officials from the Department of Justice, Interior and the Army Corps of engineers, the delegation and governor asked for:

 Immediate additional federal law enforcement officers to assist local law enforcement in their efforts to keep the peace.

 Federal funding to cover the cost of additional policing. The state has already spent $1.8 million to date and estimates it will spend approximately $125,000 a week based on current circumstances.

 A clear and timely resolution on the Dakota Access Pipeline project, apart from any review of the current process for consulting with tribes in the future.

Whats most important here is public safety, which is why were asking the federal government to help provide resources to help our state and local law enforcement officers keep everyone in our tribes, our families and our communities safe, Heitkamp said.

The delegation and governor also sent a letter Wednesday to the Justice Department, Department of the Interior and Army Corps of Engineers calling for a timely resolution of the issue and requesting a meeting with the agencies, the tribal leader and the company to reach an agreement.

With its decision on Friday to delay the pipeline project, the federal government shares in the responsibility of making sure that peace and order are maintained, Gov. Jack Dalrymple said.
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Family starts over after losing home, pets in Wooldridge fire

The McComb family called Wooldridge home before losing everything material to wildfire. What hurt the most was the loss of their pet dog Olaf.
Three agencies are investigating whether a North Dakota angel fund ran afoul of state law when it sought investors for real estate projects, a potential violation that lawmakers say underscores the need for major reforms to the angel fund program that rewards investors with lucrative tax credits.

The Minot-based Legendary Angel Fund is the biggest of the states 22 angel funds, with 89 investors who invested nearly $4.8 million and reaped more than $2.1 million in tax credits between January 2014 when the fund was certified and Dec. 22, 2015, the end of the last reporting period.

One of the contacts listed on Legendarys website, Todd Berning, is a developer behind the proposed $12 million Sheyenne Plaza project in downtown West Fargo and the planned $14.5 million Homewood Suites hotel next to the Cambria Hotel and Suites in West Fargo.

The Legislature tweaked state law in 2013 to prohibit angel funds from investing in real estate projects because lawmakers said that wasnt the original intent. Any angel fund that was certified by the state Department of Commerce before Jan. 1, 2013, and had invested in real estate or a real estate holding company wasnt eligible for recertification.

Documents that lawmakers copied from Legendarys website advertised investment opportunities in the Homewood Suites, a strip mall in Grand Forks and an affordable housing development in New Rockford.

Its a clear violation, Rep. Mike Nathe, R-Bismarck, said during a meeting Tuesday, Sept. 13, of the Legislatures interim Political Subdivision Taxation Committee, which has been evaluating tax incentives.

Attorney Kyle Pender of Montgomery Goff & Bullis in Fargo, which represents the fund, said via email Thursday that Legendary representatives were traveling and unavailable for comment.

Without consent from our client, all I can tell you is that Legendary Investments, LLC has been in contact with representatives from the ND Commerce Department and is confident that its investments have all been made in accordance with the angel fund statute, he wrote.

Had our suspicions

Lawmakers created the angel fund investment tax credit in 2007 as a way to encourage investment in venture capital needed to support high-risk startup businesses.

Those who invest in a certified angel fund can claim a dollar-for-dollar state income tax credit equal to 45 percent of the investment, up to a maximum credit of $45,000 a year with a lifetime cap of $500,000.

The state Department of Commerce certified Legendary Investments LLC as an angel fund in May 2014 for the three-year period starting Jan. 1, 2014.

Nathe said he received a tip from a concerned citizen in June that the Legendary fund was soliciting investments for real estate projects, and prospectus sheets printed from the funds website appeared to confirm it.

We all had our suspicions, he said during Tuesdays committee meeting at the Capitol. So we have some hard proof here that this is going on.

Agencies investigating

However, its not that clear-cut because under state law, an angel fund doesnt have to report which companies it invests in or the amounts of those investments. Only the companys name and principal place of business must be reported.

Legendary Investments LLC has reported three investments to date: iconHD LLC, Proof Artisan Distillers LLC and Packet Digital, all North Dakota companies.

Paul Lucy, director of economic development and finance at the Commerce Department, said theyre trying to determine whether the Legendary Angel Fund invested in real estate. The initial response from fund representatives wasnt sufficient, Lucy said, so were in the process of attempting to gather some additional information.

Tax Commissioner Ryan Rauschenberger said while it appears on the surface that the angel fund was investing in real estate, the structure of the fund and how money flowed to real estate projects  for example, as a loan or bridge financing versus an equity investment  will determine the legality.

We are doing due diligence, he said.

If state officials find the law was violated, Legendary would lose its angel fund certification. But beyond that, the angel fund law has no penalty provisions, and Rauschenberger said it would be the investors  not the fund managers  who would be on the hook if the state determines the tax credits werent allowed and must be paid back.

Theres really nothing we can do to that angel fund. Thats a pass-through entity, he said.

Securities Commissioner Karen Tyler was attending an out-of-state conference Wednesday and Thursday and could not be reached for comment. Nathe said the Securities Department is looking into the matter.

Blatant lie or semantics?

Lawmakers were particularly critical of the Homewood Suites prospectus dated Nov. 20, which stated that Legendary Investments LLC has created an equity investment series with its Angel Fund to invest in the West Fargo property.

This series is a direct equity investment, as the hotel property qualifies as primary sector as defined by the state of ND being that it is attached to the new Cambria convention center, it stated.

However, Lucy said the Commerce Department hasnt certified either the hotel or convention center as a primary sector business, nor did we give anyone any indication that it was going to be.

Sen. Dwight Cook, R-Mandan, said thats why the Securities Department needs to look into it.

Theyre luring money from an investor with a blatant lie, are they not? he said.

It might be semantics, Lucy said, noting the prospectus didnt actually state they were certified as primary sector.

Revisions recommended

Nathe noted that committee members took some heat during the primary election season for being critical of angel funds, with some suggesting political motivations because many Republican legislators had endorsed Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem and his opponent for the GOP nomination, Fargo businessman Doug Burgum, had been involved with angel funds.

Nathe said he didnt want to paint all angel funds with the same brush.

But like any other industry, the 10 percent makes it bad for the other 90 percent, he said.

In July, the committee forwarded a draft bill that would eliminate the angel fund tax credit and expand the states seed capital investment tax credit, which has more stringent reporting requirements and wouldnt allow tax credits to be claimed on investments in out-of-state companies.

These are funds that are taking away from the general fund, so its a burden on everyone as taxpayers of the state of North Dakota, so we have to make sure that theyre going the right way, said the committees chairman, Rep. Jason Dockter, R-Bismarck.

A separate bill draft that would keep the angel fund program but add stricter certification and reporting requirements is still under consideration.

Rep. Alisa Mitskog, D-Wahpeton, said Legendary is definitely a bad player that needs to go away, but she noted the Southern Valley Angel Fund LLC has done great work growing ComDel Innovation in her district.

We cant judge all angel funds by the one bad egg here, she said.

Badlands connection investigated

The documents presented to the committee this week were no longer available Thursday through Legendarys website at www.legendaryfund.com, which lists Berning, Pender and Blake Nybakken as contacts. Berning and Nybakken did not return messages seeking comment.

However, the documents were still online at badlandsfund.com, a similar-looking website with a page dedicated to the Legendary Angel Fund, complete with renderings of four Recent Angel Fund Projects, including the two proposed West Fargo projects and Park South Apartments in Minot.

The Secretary of States Office has no Badlands Fund in its business records but does have a Badlands Angel Fund LLC, with Montgomery Goff & Bullis listed as its registered agent and address.

Justin Dever, co-deputy commissioner of the Commerce Department, said Badlands is not a certified angel fund and hasnt applied for certification. Rauschenberger said the state is looking into the relationship between Legendary and Badlands.
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Local professionals chose their favorite business and professional services, products, healthcare, dining and more. Find out who their top picks are.
September 13, 2016 -- Rick Wagers, chief financial officer and senior executive vice president for Regional One Health, poses for a portrait at the hospital on Tuesday. Regional One intends to replace most workers who accepted an offer of early retirement. (Yalonda M. James/The Commercial Appeal)

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By Kevin McKenzie of The Commercial Appeal

Regional One Health has posted its first loss since 2010 and is cutting costs, but also considering how to replace aging county-owned facilities and investing in "growth products" to bolster its revenues.

The belt-tightening, including a call for voluntary retirements that netted 85 workers, comes despite the fact that Regional One has just begun to feel the pinch of reduced federal and state subsidies to be phased in under the federal Affordable Care Act.

This budget year is when Regional One will start to feel Affordable Care Act reductions  about $6 million worth  in subsidies for treating uninsured patients, said Rick Wagers, the system's chief financial officer. Medicaid expansion dollars were supposed to help replace the dwindling subsidies under the health reform law, but Tennessee's Republican-controlled Legislature has declined the federal expansion offer.

In a recent interview, Wagers was candid about the performance and strategies of the system that operates the Regional Medical Center, home to the region's trauma center. Regional One recently planted an East Memphis campus as it navigates competition and reforms reshaping the nation's hospital industry.

Within two or three years, he said, Regional One may approach Shelby County government about replacing buildings on its Memphis Medical District campus that are nearly twice as old as the national average. The county owns the facilities, which the system leases for $1 a year.

With basically no debt and positive cash flow to invest as needed, Regional One isn't calling on county government for more than the $27 million already provided for its safety-net hospital. That's even though the county about five or six years ago offered an additional $10 million that the health system took for two years, then passed on as school and other needs mounted for county government.

"In essence we need some of our buildings replaced and so we're kind of saving ourselves for the bigger ask, if you will, when we're ready to do that," he said.

Shelby County Mayor Mark Luttrell said that he and Regional One CEO Dr. Reginald Coopwood stay in touch, have discussions about Regional One's operational and capital needs, and that the county's obligation is to keep the Regional Medical Center open.

"We're well aware that at some point they're going to need some investment in capital construction," Luttrell said. "We'll sit down and listen to their proposal and see what we can do."

Realizing last year that Regional One was heading for a larger than forecast loss, executives focused on becoming more efficient, reducing costs and investing in revenue-producing initiatives to enter the new budget year, Wagers said.

Regional One finished its 2016 budget year on June 30 with a bottom-line loss of about $11.7 million  its first red-ink year since Wagers and Coopwood arrived in 2010.

With net operating revenue of about $321 million and total operating expenses of about $437 million, the operating loss was $116 million for the year. The net loss dropped to $11.7 million once government support of about $100 million, investment and other income were added.

A voluntary retirement offer this summer is projected to produce savings of about $2 million a year, but cost savings wasn't the only goal, said Wagers, 65, who retired as chief financial officer at Vanderbilt University Medical Center before joining Coopwood's executive team.

Executives plan to inject some new blood into the organization's workforce of about 3,000 people, he said. Regional One had workers as old as 84. The 85 employees who accepted the offer had to be at least 59 1/2.

"With long-tenured staff, typically they are usually at the upper end of the pay scale, and/or you may have some that could have retired on the job, if you will," Wagers said.

"We'll be able to hopefully rehire, and again, in a majority of those positions at a rate that is less than what we had been paying and hopefully as good and rejuvenated people as we can find," he said.

Registered nurses, in short supply, were excluded from the offer.

Higher than expected costs pressured last year's budget, Wagers said.

He provided the example of a single patient, a welder who was burned over about 95 percent of his body and treated at the Firefighters Burn Center.

Regional One paid more than $1 million for skin and blood products and the average cost of his care would have topped about $1.7 million, Wagers said.

Workers' compensation was expected to pay, but didn't. TennCare was then going to provide about $200,000, but after Wagers appealed, raised that to $960,000, he said.

With centers of excellence in trauma, burn, high-risk births and neonatal intensive care at the Regional Medical Center, the system had a lot of unanticipated costs and high-severity cases, he said.

The east campus offering a variety services in a leased, renovated office building at Bill Morris and Kirby parkways, is an example of an investment in additional revenue sources for the system, Wagers said.

So far, an extended care hospital developed within Turner Tower on the main campus, for patients on ventilators or requiring longer-term care, is the best performing "growth product," he said.

"What we've done is try to invest in activities that are profitable to help underwrite the basic mission of the institution, which is the support of the one Downtown and all comers that come into that institution," Wagers said.
Cameron Hollingsworth in a family photo

By Daniel Connolly of The Commercial Appeal

Cameron Hollingsworth, a 10-year-old boy injured in the deadly fire on Severson Avenue, has died, said Anne Glankler, a spokeswoman for LeBonheur Children's Hospital.

His death brings to 10 the number of people killed in the fire early Monday morning, which fire officials called the deadliest in the area since the 1920s.

His father Ernest Jett Jr. said earlier this week that the boy was on life support and that doctors planned to remove organs for donation before allowing him to pass away.

He said the family opted for organ donation so "we can stop another family from going through what my family is going through."

The hospital spokeswoman said Cameron died Wednesday evening.

Also dead as a result of the fire were Cameron's six brothers and sisters: Angel Mitchell, 17; Ernest Jett III, 9; Diamond Jett, 8; Alonzo Ward, 7; Kierra Jett, 5, and Precious Rose Jett, 2 or 3.

Three adults also died in the fire: the children's grandmother Eloise Futrell, 61, their father's girlfriend Lakesha Ward, 27, and family friend Carol Collier, 56.
Flanked by Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland (left) Interim MPD Director Michael Rallings talks during a July 11 press conference at City Hall about a Black Lives Matter protest in Memphis. (Jim Weber/The Commercial Appeal)

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By Ryan Poe of The Commercial Appeal

Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland's administration will present an ordinance Tuesday allowing Police Director Michael Rallings  and others under the DROP  to delay retirement and serve the rest of Strickland's first term.

All employees who entered the Deferred Retirement Option Program (DROP) and are set to retire between Oct. 1, 2016 and Oct. 31, 2019  including Rallings, who is set to retire in April 2018  can freeze their participation in the program for up to two years.

While the proposed ordinance would include all of those eligible for the freeze, Strickland's administration acknowledges the amendment is directed at retaining the police director through the mayor's current term that ends at the end of 2019.

Strickland declined to speak in detail about the DROP freeze  the second in two years  before Tuesday's council committee discussion, but a city spokesperson said Rallings has committed to remain through 2019, when Strickland's first term expires.

The City Council's personnel committee is scheduled to discuss the ordinance at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday in City Hall. The council could vote on the ordinance as early as Nov. 1 if it follows the regular process to approve an ordinance.

The city's actuary looked at two options for retaining Rallings past his DROP date, but eventually settled on the DROP freeze because it was "more financially advantageous both for the city and Director Rallings," according to the spokesperson.
SHARE July 4, 1991 - Mary Parker raises her fist in celebration as she cheers speaker Jesse Jackson to the podium during the dedication ceremony for the National Civil Rights Museum. An array of celebrities from television, film and the 1960s civil right era attended the festivities. (Michael McMullan/The Commercial Appeal files) July 4, 1991 - Jesse Jackson (left) and Joseph Lowery look out on the crowd as they await the ceremony to start at the dedication of the National Civil Rights Museum. (Michael McMullan/The Commercial Appeal files) Related Coverage Room 306: History Lives Here: National Civil Rights Museum marks 25th anniversary

By Lisa Jennings, The Commercial Appeal

Originally published July 5, 1991  At the National Civil Rights Museum Thursday, retired teacher Elnora Farwell remembered a day when policemen refused to let her black students play in Overton Park.

She tried to explain at the time, which was more than 25 years ago, that it was the law. But the children didn't understand, she said.

Standing in a crowd waiting for the opening ceremony of the new museum at the Lorraine Hotel, Mrs. Farwell said she's still trying to explain to children what Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s life and work meant to the world after his assassination in 1968: freedom.

She said she hopes the museum will help.

''It's a continual thing,'' she said. ''We've got to make sure every child knows what Martin Luther King was about.''

Climbing up on a chair in the heat of late morning to watch the ceremony, Mrs. Farwell, 71, and her daughter, Joyce Johnson, 53, reminisced about King's fatal visit to Memphis.

The two women had marched in the rally for the sanitation workers that erupted into a riot on Beale Street.

They remembered the cloud of police Mace that burned their eyes.

They also remembered hearing King's last speech and feeling a peculiar foreshadowing of disaster.

''I was so frightened that night, there were so many strange people, both black and white. It was like they were firecrackers waiting to be popped,'' Mrs. Farwell said.

Friday's crowd was hot as a firecracker, too. Museum officials tried to admit visitors slowly, to allow people to enjoy the exhibits.

But the increasingly hot and irritated crowd pushing at the door insisted on entering at a faster rate.

Vera and George Clark managed to get inside but found it was too crowded to stop and read the narrative with each exhibit.

Walking through the art gallery lined with pictures of the events that led up to King's assassination, Mrs. Clark said, ''My husband and I went to school every day sitting on the back of buses. Back then, I never thought the day would come when something like this would happen.''

They walked through the empty auditorium where films about the civil rights movement eventually will be shown.

On the way upstairs to the room where King stayed before he was killed, the Clarks, both 64, stopped to watch Jesse Jackson, actor Morgan Freeman and museum president D'Army Bailey walk by.

''Oh, that's what I came here for,'' Mrs. Clark said.

King's former room was re-created with a written explanation of the events on the day of the shooting. But museum volunteers rushed visitors through, and there was no time to read the display.

The Clarks said they were most impressed by a sculpted scene of the sanitation workers wearing the famous ''I AM a man'' placards and being threatened by National Guardsmen with bayonets on their rifles.

But there was evidence aplenty that the museum is not yet complete. The soldiers' rifles still had padding covering the bayonet points.

After the tour, which took about 15 minutes, the Clarks wrote their names on a wall that served as a giant guest book.

''It was powerful,'' Clark said. ''But I'll have to come back.''
SHARE Gloria Steinem

Gloria Steinem addresses 75th anniversary celebration

By Jody Callahan of The Commercial Appeal

At a dinner Thursday night celebrating its 75th anniversary, the Memphis branch of Planned Parenthood announced a $12 million fundraising campaign to further its causes in the area.

So far, $9.8 million of that total has already been raised in gifts and pledges, Planned Parenthood Greater Memphis Region officials said.

The announcement was made at the 2016 James Award celebration at the Hilton Memphis, which featured about 600 people at $275 a head. Noted feminist and author Gloria Steinem spoke at the event, which named local NAACP official Johnnie Turner as the recipient of this year's James Award.

"Tonight we recommit ourselves to another 75 years of building a strong, informed, empowered community of activists who stand up and speak out when our rights are threatened," said Ashley Coffield, head of the Memphis branch. "A new era of Planned Parenthood in Memphis starts now."

The money will be used in four ways, officials said:

Care ($4.5 million), meaning expanded and enhanced patient services that will include a second health center to complement the existing facility on Poplar Avenue. Officials wouldn't disclose much about the second location, citing security reasons."We are not going anywhere," said Robert Cox, co-chairman of the fundraising campaign committee.

Education, $750,000.

Advocacy, $750,000.

Sustainability ($6 million), meaning keeping the group's mission alive "for future generations."

The highlight of the night for many, though, was the 20-minute talk by Steinem, founder of Ms. magazine and the author of numerous books.

"Nothing but nothing is more important than ensuring our fundamental right to reproductive freedom," she said, beginning her talk. "The principle that government power stops at our skin."

While praising Planned Parenthood's mission, Steinem also touched on feminism, racism, gay rights and even global warming during her talk.

"It is true in this country that race and sex are intertwined," she said. "It is not possible to be a feminist without also being anti-racist."

She also recounted some experiences from her past, including meeting with women on trips to Africa as well as an interview with Fannie Lou Hamer, a black woman from Mississippi who was sterilized without her consent by a doctor while having surgery to remove a tumor.

"What could be more clear about the brutality of controlling women's bodies as the means of reproduction?" Steinem said.

But all of it circled back to the same cause: women's rights, particularly reproductive freedoms.

"I am here to say to you that there is no cause on earth more important," she said.
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By Jennifer Pignolet of The Commercial Appeal

Shelby County Schools may seek outside help in developing best practices for the approval and revocation of charter schools.

The board's academic performance committee will recommend to the full board an agreement with the National Association of Charter School Authorizers to consult with the district. The item is up for discussion at Tuesday's work session and a vote would come the following week.

The recommendation comes only a few months after the school district revoked four charter schools but received harsh criticism from both the charter community and the State Board of Education over a lack of clear processes for dealing with charter schools.

"With the most recent revocations, we certainly heard this board's concerns about processes," the district's director of planning and accountability Bill White told the academic performance committee Thursday.

Board member Chris Caldwell said the consulting work will complement the work being done by a separate committee, comprised of board and district officials and charter school representatives, to create a Charter Compact that will deal with similar issues of process.

But Caldwell said the compact is broad, and the national consultants will focus on training the school board and the staff on procedures for authorizing and revoking charters.

The consulting work will cost $152,000 but will be paid for by The Hyde Family Foundations, according to the district.

Board members said they support bringing in the consultants, especially because the district won't be paying for it.

Board member Miska Clay-Bibbs called it "an opportunity to give us a road map to be successful."

Caldwell also noted the board has final approval on all decisions, and that the charter consultants would be there to advise.

White said the association is the expert on charter schools and best practices with those who authorize charters. The group has previous experience in Tennessee consulting with the state board.

"The State Board of Education has worked closely with NACSA to ensure a high bar for our authorizing practices," the board's executive director, Sara Heyburn, said in an email. She added it is "encouraging" to see SCS consider the same partnership.

According to the association's website, "The mission of the National Association of Charter School Authorizers is to achieve the establishment and operation of quality charter schools through responsible oversight in the public interest."
Last year, hybrid cloud was a priority for many enterprises, although with a certain amount of confusion about what it involved. This year, those ambitious plans are showing up as an approach to hybrid cloud that relies on platform as a service (PaaS) to take full advantage of cloud models.

The enterprise view of hybrid cloud is becoming clearer and more sophisticated than simply using cloud alongside existing on-premises IT, says Adam Warby CEO of managed services provider Avanade (a Microsoft/Accenture joint venture). The way Ive seen it evolve is that people have been getting more focused on hybrid IT than on hybrid cloud, and thats relevant because most people are having to deal with managing legacy and existing applications while trying to reinvent what they're doing as a business . What we're seeing now are different workloads that really do need the ability to work seamlessly between on-premises and in-public cloud.

As an example, Warby points to the way you can run SAP workloads, including Business Suite and SAP HANA, on Azure and integrate services like Fieldglass, SuccessFactors and Concur with Office 365. SAP was a key workload for Avanade client Rio Tinto, who are moving their entire IT as a service into the cloud, Warby says. Its important we have that kind of flexibility. I think pubic cloud will be the dominant workload over time, but the ability to do close to the processor, high volume transactions close to the data is still going to be important.
U.S. lawmakers are trying to stifle any hope that National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden will receive a pardon. On Thursday, the House intelligence committee sent a letter to President Obama urging him to treat Snowden as a criminal.

Mr. Snowden is not a patriot. He is not a whistleblower, the letter said.

The letter was sent amid calls from tech leaders and liberal activists for Obama to pardon Snowden. The campaign, supported by Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak and celebrities including actor Daniel Radcliffe, argues that Snowden sparked an important debate about government mass surveillance.

It is clear that Americas democracy has benefited from Snowdens actions, activists said in an open letter from the group PardonSnowden.org.

Members of the House intelligence committee disagree. On Thursday, the committee released a four-page summary of a two-year investigation into Snowden that said he damaged U.S. national security.

The vast majority of the documents he stole have nothing to do with programs impacting individual privacy interests, the committee said in its summary. They instead pertain to military, defense and intelligence programs of great interest to Americas adversaries.

Russia, China, Iran and terrorists could access the information that Snowden released to do ill against the U.S., the summary said.

Even by a conservative estimate, the U.S. Govemment has spent hundreds of millions of dollars, and will eventually spend billions, to attempt to mitigate the damage Snowden caused, it said.

The committee didn't release the full report to the public because it includes classified information. The investigation delved into Snowdens background and how he was able to obtain 1.5 million documents from the NSA.

It goes on to claim that Snowden is a serial exaggerator and fabricator, citing past instances where the committee alleges he lied about his resume and credentials. Investigators did not interview Snowden or his NSA co-workers and supervisor directly. Instead, it relied on interviews with U.S. intelligence officials.

The committee has unanimously voted to adopt the investigative report on Snowden.

Earlier this week, Snowden made his own pitch on why he should be pardoned in an interview with the Guardian newspaper. "If not for these revelations we would be worse off," he said. "Yes, there are laws on the books that say one thing, but perhaps this is why the pardon power exists -- for the exceptions."
A U.K. judge has ruled in favor of extraditing a British man to the U.S. on charges of hacking government computers, despite fears he may commit suicide.

Lauri Love, 31, has been fighting his extradition for allegedly stealing data from U.S. government agencies, including the Department of Defense and NASA.

On Friday, a Westminster Magistrates court ruled that Love can be safely extradited to the U.S. to face trial, even though he has Asperger Syndrome and a history of depression.

I send this case to the secretary of state for her decision as to whether or not Mr. Love should be extradited, Judge Nina Tempia said in the ruling.

The Courage Foundation, which is running Love's defense fund, said his legal team will appeal the ruling.

The U.S. charged Love with the hacking offenses back in 2013. Love is facing a maximum sentence of 99 years if convicted.

He is accused of conducting the cyberattacks for more than a year starting in October 2012 and stealing confidential data on government employees, including Social Security numbers and credit card details.

To gain access to government databases, he allegedly pulled off his hack with SQL injection attacks and exploited vulnerabilities in Adobe Coldfusion, a web application development platform.

An unnamed source who had access to chat rooms used by Love later revealed the hacks to U.S. investigators. Love is facing extradition requests from three U.S. court districts.

Fridays ruling in the U.K. found that although Love is a suicide risk, the U.S. has measures in place to ensure his safe transfer to the country.

His defense fund, however, claims that Love will be unfairly treated in the U.S. and that he will be served with a prison sentence that goes too far.

Love's hacking has been related to his activism, the defense fund said. He allegedly breached the U.S. government computers as part of OpLastResort, an online protest in response to the death of Aaron Swartz, who committed suicide while under U.S. investigation for possible computer crimes.
by Melita Dina Silva-Ribeiro

KUWAIT, SEP 16, 2016: The Salmiya Parish Youth (SPY) of Saint Therese of Child Jesus Church, Kuwait organised 'Gospel Rock' on September 12, for music lovers in Kuwait. The event was held at Don Bosco and the parishioners from the other three parishes in Kuwait - Holy Family Cathedral, Our Lady of Arabia and Saint Daniel Comboni - were also invited.

There were 26 performances comprising of Choirs, Bands and Solo Performances singing in different languages - English, Hindi, Malayalam, Tagalog and Polish.

The hymns were accompanied by talented musicians on different musical instruments. There was an acapella performance too.

The participants included children and adults of various ages. Vivian Sequeira, a member of the Angel choir - that participated at the Gospel rock - said, "It was fun and inspiring to see others, including children doing something we all love together."

The event also saw a unique staging by a few pilgrims who attended the World Youth Day (WYD) 2016 in Poland. They tried to create the ambience of the WYD and were seen waving flags of different countries as they sang two WYD theme songs  Abba Ojcze (1991) and Blogoslawieni Milosierni (2016) in English and Polish.

Maddona David, an organiser of the event said, "The SPY has always outdid themselves and I am so glad to be part of such a team vibrantly working for God's Glory."

Finally , each participant received a 'Certificate of Participation' as a token of appreciation for the time and effort they had put in.

The Salmiya Parish Youth is animated by Father Lionel Braganza and youth animator, Gaspar Baptista. The core group meets every Tuesday with Father Braganza and Baptista, while the entire youth group meets every alternate week.
Gilford resident and grandmother Mary Keohan made her decision to vote for Donald Trump last week. And she doesnt think of herself as a deplorable, thank you very much.

In fact, she wore a hat with a taped-on note card reading Adorable deplorable.

Keohans hat was just one response to a statement made by Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton last week.

Speaking at a Manhattan campaign fundraiser, Clinton told her audience, To just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trumps supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. 

As attendees laughed, Clinton added, The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic  you name it.

One pilot survey appears to support at least some of Clintons claim. The National Science Foundation American National Election Studies 2016 survey conducted in January measured various voters feeling temperature toward certain groups, with 0 being very cold or unfavorable and 100 being very warm or favorable.

A Western Political Science Association analysis of the data shows Trump supporters felt coldest toward Muslims, transgender people and feminists, ranging from the mid-20s to high 30s. On the contrary, Trump supporters temperature was close to 75 for both whites and police.

But Keohan, like numerous other Donald Trump supporters attending the Republican presidential candidates rally at Laconia Middle school Thursday, didnt agree with Clintons sentiment. They challenged it  verbally, with note cards on hats or in T-shirt form.

She doesnt know me, said Jake Fallas, a 29-year-old Hampton resident who, along with his 23-year-old wife, Kati, wore shirts reading Deplorable 1 and Deplorable 2.

Keohan, who is a registered independent, said, I dont like to be put into any basket. She wondered aloud how Clinton could hole so many American citizens into a category  Thursdays Real Clear Politics averages show 40.9 percent of likely voters support Trump, and 42 percent support Clinton.

Keohan added of the presidential candidates, If they dont respect the marginalized, theyre not going to be a good leader. You have to treat each person with dignity.

Any claimed prejudice referenced by Clinton, Keohan said, is always inappropriate. She didnt believe Trump supporters expressed those sentiments, and if anyone at a rally did within her vicinity, Keohan said, I would get security.

Security wasnt visibly needed at Thursdays rally. While officers at past events have removed multiple protesters, those in the Laconia Middle School gymnasium were enthusiastic but relatively calm during Trumps focused policy speech.

None of the racial and ethnic slurs recorded at various Trump rallies and compiled in an August New York Times video were audible Thursday night.

The crowd did voice where its priorities are. A few scattered supporters cheered when Trump promised to support and work with Hispanic and African-American communities.

At the next phrase  and we should take care of our veterans  the room erupted.

Last month, the Pew Research Center conducted a survey of voter views. When respondents were asked to comment on increased racial and ethnic diversity in America, 16 percent of Trump voters said it made the country a worse place to live. Only 2 percent of Clinton voters agreed.

By contrast, 72 percent of Clinton voters said more diversity makes the U.S. a better place to live, and 40 percent of Trump supporters agreed.

Retired Candia couple and new Trump supporters Carol and Tony Gagnon acknowledged the existence of prejudice in some of their candidates backers. But not in half of them  which would amount to tens of millions of Americans.

I think theres a very small percentage, Tony said. Youre going to get that in any group. To deny that isnt honest.

A Reuters survey would suggest that percentage is larger at least where religion is concerned. Conducted in June and July, the survey shows 58 percent of Trump supporters  versus 24 percent of Clinton supporters  have a somewhat unfavorable or very unfavorable opinion of Islam.

Trump has suggested many times during his campaign a ban of all foreign-born Muslims entering the United States as a national security measure, though he did not mention this plan Thursday.

In North Conway nurse Joanne Darrahs eyes, Trump supporters arent hateful towards Muslims, but real about the state of the world today.

Decked out in red, white, and blue as she waited outside Thursday, Darrah said, The vast majority of Trump supporters . . . are hard-working decent Americans. To say a secure border doesnt mean a Trump supporter is anti-Islam.

She continued that shes never seen hateful rhetoric at New Hampshire Trump rallies. On TV, Ive seen so-called plants, Darrah said.

She added, I have relatives from Syria. My family is the United Nations.

Couple Ernie and Shelley Coates and their 13-year-old son Gage of Belmont said they were tired of being labeled for whom they chose as their candidate.

Were not racist and were not going to label anybody that way, Shelley said. Its not all white rednecks that like (Trump). I think a lot of people are tired of the same old thing and are looking for something new.
Cllr Neil Clarke is Chairman of the District Councils Network and Mark Pawsey is the MP for Rugby and the Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group for District Councils.

As Parliamentarians return to Westminster for a few short weeks before the party conference season, the ramifications of the Brexit vote still dominate the political horizon.

During the EU Referendum the entire political class was told, in no unclear terms, that the fruits of economic growth have to be balanced more fairly across the country.

In response, Theresa May has set in motion the framework for a national industrial strategy  a task to which she has appointed former communities and local government secretary Greg Clark to oversee.

As Paul Goodman noted in a recent column outlining the housebuilding challenges facing the new Communities and Local Government Secretary Sajid Javid, at the 2015 General Election we Conservatives campaigned on a manifesto of security in the broadest sense.

This must include housing and economic growth, as both are vital to central and local government uniting for their success nationwide.

Failure to provide quality housing in sufficient numbers and at affordable prices risks locking a generation out of home-ownership. Unless local economies outside London and the South East are given the power to unleash their full growth potential, we will be unable to create a strong, fair and balanced society.

There is an urgent desire to deliver on this national agenda. As chairmen of the All Party Parliamentary Group for District Councils and the District Councils Network, we are acutely aware that national revival requires local action. We have to act locally in order to grow globally.

If we learned anything from Brexit, it is that we ignore local identity and what matters most to local communities at our peril. Those who voted Brexit did not, in all likelihood, want to see Whitehall step up to fill the void left by the EU. Nor did they want another unaccountable and distant form of local government structure imposed on them top down.

Englands 201 district councils, who serve nearly 22 million residents and cover two-thirds of the country, are in the forefront for driving housing and growth across huge swathes of non-metropolitan England. As strategic housing authorities, they have the local knowledge so vital to understanding where the most appropriate and sustainable areas for development are located in their areas. They are also the bodies most capable of unlocking stalled sites, granting a higher proportion of planning permissions in less time than any other types of local authority. District Councils approve 90 per cent of planning applications compared to 70 per cent of London boroughs and do so in less time than the capitals councils and Unitary Authorities.

As trusted custodians of locality, close to their business community, District Councils are strong, local leaders. They commonly act as catalysts for collaboration to deliver place-based growth schemes, employment and skills services for their areas. Let us appreciate the contribution they make.
Iain Dale is Presenter of LBC Drive, Managing Director of Biteback Publishing, a columnist and broadcaster and a former Conservative Parliamentary candidate.

Brits dont quit. Thats the quote that came back to bite David Cameron on the arse this week, after he announced his departure from the Commons. His decision makes me sad, since I have always taken the view that ex-Prime Ministers should continue to play a role in our national life. We should be able to draw on their experience and wisdom, and the ideal forum to do that in is Parliament.

Unfortunately, however, the media has now become the chosen forum of former Ministers in which to contribute to debate. I understand Cameron when he says that whatever he said as a backbench MP would be a distraction  but its a pretty weak reason to quit Parliament.

You only become a distraction if you allow yourself to, and comment on everything. Jim Callaghan hung around for seven years after he quit the Labour leadership. He chose his interventions carefully. I dont remember John Major becoming a distraction in the 1997-2001 Parliament.

Indeed, Major should be David Camerons role model in how to behave in his post-Parliament life. He only says something when he has something to say. And because of that, we all take notice of it on the rare occasions he emerges onto The Andrew Marr Show.

         

Next week, Im starting the LBC Middle East Process. Yes, really. On my radio show Ill be hosting an hour-long debate between the Israeli Ambassador to London Mark Regev, and the Palestinian Ambassador, Manuel Hassassian.Ive interviewed them separately before, and I hope that we can have at least a partial meeting of minds.

Clearly, there will be huge differences between them, but in my experience they are both reasonable men who have the ability to see a different point of view from their own. Whatever the outcome, I think I can assure you an hour of gripping radio.

         

The fuss about the state of Hillary Clintons health has been something to behold. The conspiracy theorists claim shes got everything from Parkinsons disease to dementia or both.

If she had, it would undoubtedly be in the public interest for it to be revealed, and no doubt that shes have to step down. But unless I am missing something, she is suffering from a mild dose of pneumonia. By the time you read this column, she should be back on the campaign trail.

Would she be getting this kind of scrutiny if she were a man? Actually, I think she probably would. Americans are obsessed about the health of their leaders. For example, if youre of my vintage, youll remember the furore when Jimmy Carter, then President, collapsed while out on a jog. As the first presidential debate approaches (its only ten days away), Hillarys performance will be examined like never before.

         

My company, Biteback, is publishing a book this week by someone youve probably never heard of a Turkish newspaper editor called Can Dundar.

We Are Arrested is the dramatic story of the repression of press freedom in Turkey, and how he was treated at the hands of the Turkish state. Hes had to flee the country for his own safety, and is the most famous journalist on the list of 109 Wanted Turkish writers.

If anyone now seriously believes that Turkey is now anything other than a semi-fascist state, they want their heads read. And quite why the EU is still entertaining the idea of Turkish membership is beyond a rather sick joke.

         

So according to Jean Claude Juncker, the EU should now create an EU defence fund and a headquarters for a common military force. Yet another prediction made by Leave supporters (and denied by Remainers) which has come true.

         

Imagine youre on a ten hour-long flight to Montreal. Youre the Mayor of London. Journalists are on the plane with you. Its your first big foreign trip. Youre offered an upgrade from economy. What do you do?

Why, you refuse it of course! Well, thats what Sadiq Khan did on Wednesday. My question is this: why on earth should we expect the Mayor of London to travel economy? Soon well be expecting the Prime Minister to travel cattle class just to prove her hairshirt credentials. Ridiculous.

        

So the Leader of the Scottish Conservatives is the most popular political leader in Scotland, according to a new poll. And in other most unlikely headlines of the week, Owen Smith to storm to victory over Jeremy Corbyn in Labours leadership election. Which one of those two do you think is true, and which one is made up?
Tomorrow is Constitution Day, a holiday celebrated in America every year on September 17, the anniversary of the day the framers signed the document. Here are five facts you should know about the U.S. Constitution:

1. The Constitution contains 4,543 words, including the signatures and has four sheets, 28-3/4 inches by 23-5/8 inches each. It contains 7,591 words including the 27 amendments. It is the oldest and shortest written Constitution of any major government in the world.

2. Thomas Jefferson did not sign the Constitution. He was in France during the Convention, where he served as the U.S. minister. John Adams, who at the time was serving as the U.S. minister to Great Britain during the Constitutional Convention, also did not attend the signing. The only men who both became presidents and signed the Constitution were George Washington and James Madison.

3. There was a proposal at the Constitutional Convention to limit the standing army for the country to 5,000 men. George Washington sarcastically agreed with this proposal as long as a stipulation was added that no invading army could number more than 3,000 troops.



4. The Constitutions iconic opening line was not included in early drafts of the document. The preamble originally started with individual states listed from north to south: We the people of the States of New Hampshire, Massachusetts et al. The five-person Committee of Style is considered to have been responsible for composing much of the final text, including the revised preamble.

5. More than 11,000 amendments have been introduced in Congress. There were no amendments added to the Constitution from 1804 to 1865. This was the longest period in American history in which there were no changes to our Constitution. (The first to come after that period was at the end of the Civil War the Thirteenth amendment, which abolished slavery.) Overall, the Constitution has only been changed by amendment seventeen times since 1791.
 The Washington Post and Baltimore Sun Highlight U.S. Trade Mission to Israel | Main | UPDATED: Anti-Anti-Israel News 

September 12, 2016

USA Today Image Blurs Reality on Israeli Counterterror Raids



A photograph in USA Todays Aug. 17, 2016 World In Brief? section showed two Palestinian children peering through a broken glass window but was accompanied by misleading text.

The image, credited to AFP photographer Hazem Bader, appeared under the headline Through the eyes of children.? A description underneath the photo read:

Palestinian children peer through a window at Israeli soldiers conducted searches Tuesday in the al-Fawwar refugee camp south of Hebron. Twenty-five Palestinians were wounded in clashes with Israeli soldiers, Red Crescent medics said.?

Yet, the caption does not tell readers what Israeli soldiers were searching for. As The Times of Israel reported, Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) were conducting an overnight operation to uncover weaponry? in the al-Fawwar refugee camp (Palestinian teen said killed in clashes with IDF troops in West Bank,? Aug. 16, 2016).

While conducting their mission, IDF soldiers were assaulted by dozens of Palestinians [who] hurled IEDs (improvised explosive devices), blocks and rocks? at them. In response, the IDF used riot dispersal measures and fired .22 caliber bullets toward the main instigators,? according to an Israeli military spokesperson.

Confirming their suspicions, two improvised handguns? were found at the camp along with other weapons and ammunition.? Perhaps this is unsurprising. According to The Times of Israel:

The army closed off the Fawar camp for 26 days last month after a gunman belonging to a Hamas terror cell fired on a car carrying an Israeli family on a nearby West Bank road, causing the vehicle to crash.?

As a result of that attack, in which Rabbi Miki Mark was murdered and his wife and two children injured, the IDF has been clamping down on Palestinian workshops manufacturing arms in the West Bank [Judea and Samaria],? The Times of Israel noted.

However, none of this crucial context was provided to USA Today readers.

That it was omitted is perhaps not surprising when one considers the photographer.

As CAMERA has noted, photos taken by Bader have been propagandistic in nature. For example, one 2012 image, carried by the Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and MSNBC, among others, purported to show an injured Palestinian construction worker? as he screamed in pain after an Israeli army driver drove a trailer hooked to a tractor over his legs.?

Yet, as CAMERAs Israel Director, Tamar Sternthal, pointed out in a Feb. 7, 2012 Canadian Jewish News Op-Ed:

After checking Palestinian, international and Israeli sources, it appears that the injured worker, Mahmoud Abu Qbeita, was, in fact, not actually injured. Moreover, there is no evidence that he was even run over. The Palestinian Center for Human Rights and the United Nations, both of which provide comprehensive reports about West Bank casualties, made no mention of the alleged injury (AFP Shows Lack of Transparency?).?

Baders own personal website, as a CAMERA snapshot pointed out, featured a picture of the photographer smiling alongside Yasser Arafat, the now-deceased head of the Fatah and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) (Canadian Jews News: AFP Flunks on Transparency,? Feb. 9, 2012).

Posted by SD at September 12, 2016 03:54 PM

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LX(R) rendering.jpg

A computer rendering of the LX(R), the U.S. Navy's newest amphibious warship. Ingalls Shipbuilding received a $19.1 design acceleration contract Thursday, bringing the total amount of contract work to be performed by Ingalls on the LX(R) program to more than $32 million.

(Ingalls Shipbuilding)

PASCAGOULA, Mississippi -- After announcing earlier this week a $21.4 million contract to overhaul the USS Ramage, Ingalls Shipbuilding announced Thursday afternoon receipt of a $19.1 million contract modification to accelerate design work on the U.S. Navy's newest amphibious warship the LX(R).

Coupled with contracts announced last month, Ingalls has now received new contracts totaling nearly $140 million since August -- $32.8 million of which is tied to design work for the LX(R) program.

Ingalls was selected in June to perform the bulk of the design work for the LX(R) as part of a contract to build the LHA 8, another amphibious assault ship.

"This acceleration contract is extremely important for a shipbuilding program that is extremely important to this nation," said Ingalls president Brian Cuccias. "The LX(R) program will continue a stable, hot production line of talented shipbuilders and a robust supplier base across this country.

"The competitive value that Ingalls brings to design and build these affordable, capable and survivable warships is essential to meet the missions of our Navy-Marine Corps team."

The LX(R) will replace the Navy's Harpers Ferry- and Whidbey Island-class dock landing ships and will use the same hull as the San Antonio (LPD 17) class.

Ingalls has delivered 10 of the LPD 17 ships to the Navy, is currently building the 11th, Portland (LPD 27), and has received more than $258 million in advance procurement funding for the 12th, Fort Lauderdale (LPD 28).
Leonardo da Vinci illustrated the concept of contact lenses in 1508. More than 300 years later in 1823 British astronomer Sir John Herschel conceptualized a practical lens design. In 1996 the one-day disposable soft lenses were introduced.

In his drawings submitted with the application for a patent in 1903, Johann Frederic Volle of Scranton (now Pascagoula) showed a vast knowledge of how a contact lens would be shaped and improve vision. His design remarkably resembles contemporary lenses.

Probably one of Jackson County's best kept secrets occurred on March 3, 1903 when Johann Frederic Volle, a German-born tinsmith living in Scranton (now Pascagoula), obtained the first patent for contact lenses in the United States.

Two years later before he could manufacture or market his patented idea, Volle died.

In 1985, Jonny Scott, a "Mississippi Press" reporter told the story of Volle, who was born in Wurtenburg, Germany around 1841.

More than 100 years later in 1983, Dr. Henry Knoll, a scientist with Bausch and Lomb of New York discovered Volle's patent in an old optometry book, "Contact Lenses," published in 1942, and thought to be one of the first books published about contact lenses.

Dr. Knoll told Scott that Volle apparently did not even realize that what he had patented would one day be called contact lenses.

Lin Jacobson, described in the 1985 article as the last descendant of the Volle family, told Scott he had no knowledge of how Volle may have acquired his knowledge of contact lenses. In his patent, Volle noted that he has "invented new and useful improvements in eyeglasses ... My invention relates to frameless eye lenses or glasses, the object being to provide an eye lens or glass which require no frame or attaching means, but will be supported in position upon the eyeball by contact therewith of the eyelids," Volle wrote in his patent.

His drawings showed a vast knowledge of how a contact lens would be shaped and improve vision. He also mentioned that depending on the requirements of the user the lens "will have more or less magnifying power or will be arranged to compensate for astigmatism."

Dr. Knoll pointed out the flaw in Volle's design was that the tissue of the eye could not tolerate glass being placed against the cornea. And the hooks he devised would have been extremely uncomfortable. Once plastics were invented, modern lenses could be made that allowed oxygen to reach the eye and let it breathe.

The question remains as to how Volle came up with the idea of a contact lens. Dr. Knoll said the first papers dealing with contacts were published in Europe in 1888 and he doubted Volle would have had access to these. Da Vinci's description of what might have been a contact lens and Herschel's description of a lens in the 1827 Encyclopedia may have been available to him.

Little is known of Volle's life. The 1900 census showed that he had a sister, Johanna Fredricka (Volle) Lindinger who lived here with seven of her eight children. She operated a boarding house on the corner of Krebs Avenue and Pascagoula Street which was commonly referred to as the Lindinger House, according to Scott's article.

Volle's obituary was published on March 17, 1905, and noted he suffered a paralytic stroke. He is buried in Pascagoula's Greenwood Cemetery.
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California will be the first state to create a guide to teaching classes on ethnic studies, after Gov. Jerry Brown signed AB2016 , a law that requires the state to create, review, and adopt a model curriculum by the end of 2019.

The new law had a long and convoluted journey through the states legislative process: California Assembly member Luis Alejo, a Democrat, who introduced the bill, first worked on the topic as a legislative aide more than 14 years ago. A similar bill was passed by the states assembly last year but was not signed by Gov. Brown.

More than two dozen California schools and districts are already offering ethnic studies courses. And a group of researchers at Stanford University found that ethnic studies courses were associated with improved academic outcomes and attendance for students in San Francisco.

But the teaching of ethnic studies remains controversial, and just what content should be included in the courses is equally political. Even as California is embracing the subject, ethnic studies courses are still banned in Arizona , where legislators were concerned that the class encouraged Latino students to resent white people. And in Texas, the states call for a textbook on Mexican-American studies yielded a textbook that critics are calling racist.

The California law does not require high schools to offer the class. Once the model curriculum is finished, schools will be encouraged to offer an ethnic studies course as an elective.

Most ethnic studies classes are created by individual teachers or districts. Some cover one particular groups history or stories say, Mexican-American historywhile others cover multiple groups. Many are interdisciplinary, including literature, music, science and culture as well as history.

Advocates argued that creating a model template will help guide teachers and districts and ensure that classes are substantive and effective.

We did it! Si, se puede! Si, se pudo!! wrote Jose Lara, the coordinating committee member of the Ethnic Studies Now! Coalition, in an email to supporters announcing the bill signing.

Lara wrote that the law will help students learn and think critically about diverse histories, cultures, and sciences. The coalition will continue to advocate for school districts to adopt ethnic studies and examine the curricula that is being used in schools.

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Learning about science, technology, engineering, and math is increasingly importantbut right now, too many Americans dont have equitable access to great STEM education.

That means that in the next decade, researchers, policymakers, and educators should focus on broadening access to STEM education so that there are lifelong opportunities, connections between professionals and schools, models for different genders and racial groups, interdisciplinary approaches, and educational activities that involve play and taking risks.

Thats the argument set out in a new report released yesterday by the American Institutes for Research and the U.S. Department of Education .

The report, STEM 2026: A Vision for Innovation in STEM Education , is based on conversations with 30 researchers, school district leaders, and other experts in STEM education. The report was based on the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency, or DARPA, approach , in which experts meet in workshops to develop a bold vision and goals for the future that will guide researchers and policymakers.

In the reports 2026 vision, STEM education around the country would have six main traits:



Communities of practice, in which educators and professionals share tools and resources;

Learning activities that encourage students to play and take risks;

Interdisciplinary projects that call on students to use several disciplines to solve problems;

Flexible learning spaces, so students are engaging in the natural world or technical labs as well as in traditional classrooms;

Performance assessments that are innovative and accessible; and

Messaging around STEM that shows diverse people participating in STEM fields and activities.

The 2026 vision also includes technology companies creating programs that could increase diversity and inclusiveness.

In a blog post about the research , Courtney Tanenbaum, the principal researcher behind the report, discusses some of the disparities in access to STEM that observers are so concerned about. Many fewer girls, Hispanic, and black students take computer science classes; and more than 10 percent of high schools dont offer a full slate of science and math courses.

But in the report and blog post, Tanenbaum also highlights interactive science programs, such as National Geographics Bioblitz , a software program that might increase access to or engagement in the sciences, intelligent tutoring programs , and schools like the Linked Learning programs in California that focus on career and technical education, as evidence that the solutions may not be too far off.

President Obama has been focused on STEM education for much of his tenure: He introduced the White House Science Fair , has pushed for recruiting more great STEM teachers , and has mentioned STEM in several State of the Union addresses.

Its less clear whether the federal focus on STEM will continue until 2026. Presidential contender Hillary Clinton has said that computer science and STEM would be educational priorities in her administration; Donald Trump has been less specific about STEM .

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Here it comes again: the argument that Advanced Placement credits can help students save money by helping them get through college more quickly. This week brings a new round of think-tank opinionating on the idea (more about that in a second).

But is it true?

Lets go right to the source: the College Board, which administers the AP program. Jason Manoharan, the College Boards vice president of AP strategy and program management, told a gathering of education writers earlier this year that APs key value is in providing challenging courses to high school students. By and large, he said, AP students dont graduate from college early, so its false to cast it as a money-saving thing.

AP wasnt always cast as a money-saving thing. Its been more about offering high school students a challengeand yes, perhaps some creditsthan about speeding their journey through college. Only more recently, as college costs and student debt have soared, has AP been portrayed as a way to minimize hefty tuition costs.

The idea of AP as money-saver is explored in a new paper by Paul Weinstein, Jr., of the Progressive Policy Institute . He studied the AP-acceptance policies of the top colleges and universities, found them too restrictive, and argues that institutions should be required to grant credit for scores of 3 or higher as a way of helping students manage college costs by finishing in three years. (His numbers differ a bit from the ones we reported in a 2014 story about how colleges restrict AP credit , but the basic idea is same.)

In a response to Weinstein, Nate Malkus of the American Enterprise Institute argues that most institutions accept at least some AP credits, so forcing the rest to do so wont make a huge impact, and could actually give an unfair edge to privileged students.

But that leaves the dangling question of whether getting AP credits really speeds students time-to-degree. And research hasnt universally backed up the idea.

A 2010 collection of studies about AP , for instance, includes one from Texas that concluded that AP students graduated no sooner than those who didnt take AP, unless they had accrued enough credits to enter college as sophomores.

Theres a solid base of research about the benefits of scoring a 3 or higher on AP exams, including a greater likelihood of getting good grades in college.

But the College Boards own research has shown that the benefits dont really extend to speeding through college. Students who score 3 or higher are more likely to finish college on time (in four years instead of taking longer) than students who dont. Even those who take an examregardless of how they scoreare more likely to finish in four years . Thats great, of course, but its not exactly a picture of AP students zipping through college in three years, as some might like to imagine.

College Board spokesman Zach Goldberg said in an email that AP students have the potential to save time and money through placement and credit-granting policies. AP gives students the opportunity, in some cases, to graduate college earlybut our research indicates that many AP students dont actually choose to graduate early. Often, students use the credit they earn for AP as a chance to take other courses.

Its nothing new to question whether AP can live up to the hype that some heap onto it. A decade ago, scholars were warning the public not to inflate APs benefits as President George W. Bush was asking the program to play a big role in addressing the nations weakness in math and science. (Lots of folks are hyping dual-enrollment programs as a way students can speed through college , too, even though many students run into trouble with that dream when their colleges wont accept their credits.)

Photo: Peyton Stearns, left, and Maggie Squyer work together during an Advanced Placement Environmental Science Class at Lincoln High School in Sioux Falls, S.D. Jay Pickthorn/The Argus Leader via AP
New federal guidance on using research to improve schools suggests that its not enough to find a study that supports a programdistrict leaders and researchers alike have to think more about who really benefits from an intervention and how.

If states and districts take up the guidance released this morning, it could deeply change how researchers and educators work together for education studies and could significantly broaden the array of students and schools who get studied. Experts also warn that without significant supports and training, it could be a high bar for most districts to reach.

First, a brief recap: The Every Student Succeeds Ac t gives states and districts much more room to be creative when it comes to school improvement than the narrow range of options available under the No Child Left Behind Act, but they must give evidence that their proposed interventions are likely to work. The law provides tiers of evidence, from strong (experimental trials) to moderate (quasi-experimental) to promising studies that dont meet the higher standards of rigor but still statistically control for differences between the students using an intervention and those in a control group. In areas aside from school turnaround where there just is no rigorous research, states and districts can test an intervention while conducting their own study.

The U.S. Department of Educations new guidance, released on Friday morning, is intended to flesh out that tiered system of evidence. Its not legally binding in the way regulations are, but it encourages state, district, and school leaders to do more than just check a box for finding a good study that supports their chosen intervention. (For more on the likely accountability impact of the guidance, check out my colleague Alyson Kleins coverage at Politics K-12 .)

For example, to show strong evidence, the guidance calls for at least one randomized controlled trial that meets the standards of the federal What Works Clearinghouse or is of otherwise equal quality. That study has to show statistically significant benefits for the students on a relevant outcome, without being overshadowed by negative findings on other high-quality studies, and it has to be performed using a large, multisite sample that includes similar children and settings where leaders hope to use the interventions.

Moderate evidence calls for the same standards, but for quasi-experimental studies. The guidance does not call for large or multisite studies for promising evidence, but it does tell education leaders to avoid programs with very mixed results on studies and make sure the results are relevant to what the school wants to improve.

Providing More Context for Education Findings

Lets stop and break that down a little, because it could spur a lot more nuance in education research. To meet the strongest level of evidence for a program in this guidance, its not enough to a have a big, well-implemented randomized controlled trial. You have to make sure that you are measuring the thing that actually needs to change.

For example, a school with a high absenteeism problem may look at a program found to improve school climate. A closer look could reveal students report feeling more connected to school, but no change in the actual number of students who miss school. That could mean the district should look at another climate program, or use the program in coordination with other programs designed to address other potential reasons students miss school, and then study the programs effects.

What weve learned in the last eight years is really thinking about whats the data were trying to collectnot just for compliance, which we were really good at, but about what we are trying to prove, said Sonal Shah Beeck, the director of the Center for Social Innovation and Impact at Georgetown University, during a White House symposium Thursday on using social sciences in policy .

Who Improves in School Improvement?

Moreover, the guidance suggests that school improvement research needs to be studying the kind of children and schools that match the places where the intervention actually will be used. Critics have pointed out for years that there are an awful lot of studies that use middle-income white students from around college towns, and an awful lot that focus on poor minority students in urban schools. Those can be very high-quality studies, but the narrower populations are one reason it can be hard to scale a successful program for poor urban black students to an equally poor suburban school with high numbers of Vietnamese English-learners.

Just as one size doesnt fit all when it comes to clothes or education initiatives, one study doesnt fit all district and school contexts, said Ash Vasudeva, the vice president for strategic initiatives at the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, who was pleased with the new guidance. When educators examine the quality of research, they should be looking at whether the studies were conducted with populations that reflect their own.

The Institute of Education Sciences provided support for a more contextual approach earlier this week, with a new What Works Clearinghouse that allows users to find research based on specific types of students, like English-learners, or school locations, like rural or urban schools.

Cycle of Improvement

The guidance also calls for states, districts, and schools to use research as part of an ongoing cycle of improving their own practice. As the chart below shows, the Education Department suggests an improvement science approach, in which districts build evaluation into planning and implementing interventions, and then use their results to improve the programs or change them going forward.

Its a great climate right now for an academic to be generating quality research about what policies work, said Ben Castleman, an assistant professor of education and public policy at the University of Virginia, at the White House symposium. As we continue to innovate, we need to rigorously evaluate whether these strategies work before we put a lot of money in.

But at the symposium, Georgetown Universitys Shah Beeck also warned that there must be more outreach and support from the research community itself to help districts and schools think about and use evidence in education differently.

We have to train people on how to do this in communities that are not next to the University of Texas or the University of Oklahoma, but they are in communities where there are a lot of problems, she said. We need to make sure when we do evidence-based policy we arent leaving out large swaths of communities who dont have access to [big university researchers]. We need to think about this tension that exists.

Chart Source: U.S. Education Department

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Yesterday, the organizers of XQ: The Super School Project announced the ten winners of its competition to reimagine the American high school. Each winner took home $10 million to help turn its design into reality.

I think the idea is appealing. I wholly agree with the premise that high school needs to be rethought, and that the work is best done by educators and entrepreneurs in real schools and communities, not by politicos, bureaucrats, well-fed consultants, or us self-impressed think tank types.

I also like that the project is helmed by the talented, dynamic Russlynn Ali. While I had differences with Russ about some big decisions made during her tenure running the U.S. Department of Eds Office of Civil Rights, I think shes razor-sharp and well-suited to lead this effort.

So far, so good. But I start to get nervous when I see this whole goofy super schools stuff, and got more so yesterday when I saw the fanboy enthusiasm with which self-professed education reform outlets greeted the announcement.

The promise of the super schools themselves probably depends on how one feels about various educational tropes. For instance, Furr High School in Texas, which happened to be the first listed on the XQ site, promises:

Furr High School will activate learning through a project- and place-based model grounded in the rigors of environmental and nutritional sciences. This large public high school will transform its culture with restorative justice, connect the dots between students and community, and combine Socratic seminars, university and business partnerships, and wrap-around services. Students and teachers will pair with their university counterparts to become green ambassadors in important environmental-sustainability research projects.

For one thing, theres enough jargon there to choke a horse. For another, these paper promises are, at best, an unreliable guide to what happens in practice. Thats the problem with these design competitions in educationits a lot easier to say things than to do them.

Will the Furr design work? Is it even an especially good idea? Well see. It kind of points to the problem of this kind of contest, especially when there seems to be so much checking of predictable right-answer boxes (e.g. restorative justice, university partnerships, wrap-around services, green ambassadors). I dont know how the judging for XQ went down, but long experience leads me to suspect that there were code words and projects that made it to the top of the pileespecially since instructional merit turns out to be brutally hard to judge from a paper proposal.

And thats all fine, as far as it goesespecially if these things were billed as interesting attempts and not as super schools. After all, its worth keeping in mind that this is hardly the first time something like this has been attempted. The results have generally been mixed, though that can get lost because so few school reformers seem inclined to consider the lessons of even relatively recent history.

For instance, perhaps the most notable school redesign competition got its start a quarter-century ago in 1991, when a bunch of CEOs responded to President George H.W. Bushs 1991 proposal for model schools by launching the New American Schools Development Corporation (NASDC, later shortened to New American Schools, or NAS). As historian Jeff Mirel recounted in the pages of Education Next, it was:

A privately funded, nonprofit organization devoted to supporting the design and dissemination of whole school reform models. NASDCs founders envisioned a complete overhaul of American education stimulated by the spread of these innovative designs. As one put it, school reformers who hoped to receive NASDC grants had to cast aside their old notions about schooling-to start with a clean sheet of paper, and be bold and creative in their thinking, and to give us ideas that address comprehensive, systemic change for all students for whole schools.

The results? The effort wound up celebrating familiar ideas which had been gussied up in new jargon. It was dominated by the usual suspects. It gave rise to school models shaped by faddish enthusiasms. The major AIR evaluation found that 21 of 24 models showed no significant impact on learning, and the RAND study of results in scale-up jurisdictions revealed equally uninspiring outcomes. It came to an inglorious end after more than a decade and is now another name on the list of largely forgotten disappointments.

As Mirel concluded back in 2002, At its inception New American Schools held the promise of being an extremely exciting research-and-development initiative in education. It would sponsor the creation of innovative designs, pilot test them in a select group of schools, and decide whether they were effective enough to warrant wide dissemination. And then it ultimately turned into something else.

I think thats right. If XQ can avoid those same missteps, temper the enthusiasm of its well-wishers, resist the faddish impulses that always plague these exercises, and avoid the temptation to be defensive about the endeavors it has now touted as socially-just super schools, this could be a terrific contribution to school improvement. But putting things that way should make clear why I think the jury is so clearly still out.
Surveying The Server Scene

Dell made gains while Hewlett Packard Enterprise saw steep year-over-year declines but retained its position atop the revenue mountain in the global server market in the second quarter, according to research firm Gartner.

Worldwide server revenue declined nearly 1 percent year over year in the second quarter, but shipments grew 2 percent over the same time as x86 servers continue to gain traction in the market, Gartner said.

Dell capitalized on the strength of the x86 market, moving into the top spot in server shipments for the quarter, displacing HPE. HPE, despite declines in both revenue and shipments, held its position as the top server vendor by revenue for the quarter. Cisco Systems' revenue results were flat year over year. IBM, which sold its x86 business to Lenovo in late 2014, claimed a 9 percent revenue market share.

Still, while the battle between Dell and HPE rages, Chinese manufacturers Lenovo, Huawei and Inspur made significant shipment gains in the quarter. Click through to see five key stats from Gartner's second-quarter worldwide server report.
Christians in Cuba are facing increasing persecution, according to a pastor and religious freedom activist.

ChristianToday.com reports that Christians in Cuba are experiencing escalated threats due to their faith.

Rev. Mario Felix Lleonart Barroso stated that "the threat of physical violence... comes with the territory of being a Christian in Cuba.

Although Cubas constitution guarantees religious freedom, this hasnt deterred the government from targeting Christians.

From January 2016 to July 2016 there were 1,606 recorded violations of religious freedom in the country. These violations included destruction of churches, church property, and arbitrary arrests of Christians.

Barroso said Christians face "the problem of destroying or even burning things inside the building; not to mention, the threat of physical violence that comes with the territory of being a Christian in Cuba.

Despite the threats, however, Barroso remains hopeful for Christians in Cuba.

"The reason the government sometimes tries to silence the Church or to close down church buildings is because it is worried about how many people are turning away from the state and looking to God (and the Church) for answers and for hope," he said.

Publication date: September 16, 2016
ST. JOSEPH, Minn.  After losing the MIAC home opener against St. Thomas on Wednesday, the College of Saint Benedict volleyball team playsin the Wartburg Tournament in Waverly, Iowa. CSB will take on Luther College on Friday, Sept. 16 at 5 p.m. On Saturday the Blazers face Buena Vista University at 10 a.m. and Wartburg College at 2 p.m.The Norse are 6-4 heading into Friday's matchup. Jamie Sindlinger leads the team with 87 kills, followed by Anna Larson with 85. Sam Sixta leads the team with 251 assists on the year. Taylor Gaide leads the team with 161 digs.The Beavers are 7-3 heading into Saturdays matchup. Last year Buena Vista lost 3-1 to the Blazers in the Wartburg Tournament. Maddie Bardole (105 kills) and Jade Schaap (100 kills) lead the attack, while Ashely Pelton (146 assists) sets them up. Six Beavers have recorded at least 50 digs total this season.The Knights are 4-3 heading into Saturday's matchup. Last year Wartburg lost 3-1 to the Blazers in the Wartburg Tournament, but turned around to beat CSB 3-2 in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. Aryn Jones leads Wartburg with 72 kills and 22 blocks. Maria Brown has 123 assists, and Kathryn Nasby has 115 digs this season.leads the Blazers with 302 assists and is second in the MIAC. Pekarek is second in the MIAC with 9.15 assists per set.(104 kills) and(89 kills) lead the Blazers on attack. First yearleads the team with 148 digs.After CSB went 2-2 last weekend and lost their first MIAC game Wednesday, Saint Benedict looks to gather momentum in Iowa this weekend. The Blazers fared well in last years Wartburg Tournament winning all three games, and hope to do the same this year. This marks the last weekend of tournaments before CSB jumps into conference play, and Saint Benedict is looking for some momentum as it heads into the heart of the MIAC season.
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In the latest battle between New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and the states teachers union, the governor has asked the states highest court to use a landmark 1985 decision to upend teacher- tenure protections in 31 low-income school districts around the state .

Asserting that despite $100 billion in additional state aid, little progress has been made in those districts, the administration is asking the court to release the state from a previously ordered school-funding formula and let the Commissioner of Education override state teacher-tenure protections and collective negotiation agreements to increase teacher effectiveness in the 31 districts.

In 1985, the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled in the case of Abbott v. Burke that the quality of the education that kids in the states poorest districts were receiving violated the state constitutions guarantee of a thorough and efficient system of education for all New Jersey children. The state was eventually forced to adopt a school-aid formula that alleviated that funding gaps between the states rich and poor districts.

In a court filing on Thursday that has some echoes of Californias Vergara case , the Christie administration asserted that those additional funds had done little to improve the state of public education in the states poorest communities and that changes to teacher policies were needed to improve those districts.

"[A]lthough the State has provided nearly $100 Billion in State funding to the SDA Districts since 1985, there has not been sufficient improvement in student performance, the administration argued .

The administration goes on to assert that the states Tenure Act and provisions of collective bargaining agreements effectively limit the Districts freedom to provide the students with the most qualified teachers, to introduce new programs or to increase total teacher/student contact hours, which would be in the best interest of the school children.

In a statement responding to the court filing, the president of the states teachers union, the New Jersey Education Association, called the move a frivolous legal challenge by Christie to distract from the upcoming trials surrounding the Bridgegate scandal.

He knows his legal argument does not hold water, said NJEA president Wendell Steinhauer. He tried this strategy before in a 2010 challenge to the Abbott decision and it was rejected by the court. This is not a legal strategy. Its a political ploy.

The move comes after a particularly tumultuous time in the relationship between the governors office and the teachers union. The governor has spent much of the summer pursuing a new funding formula that would equalize state aid to districts. Union leaders and Democrats have complained that the plan would likely lead to school closures and teacher layoffs in poor districts, reported The Record.

At a press conference last week, Christie, long known for his antagonistic relationship with educators, likened the union to the Corleones , the fictional Mafia family from the movie, The Godfather.
STRATFORD  Federal environmental officials and local officials jointly announced this week a comprehensive plan is ready to clean up the century-old legacy of the Raybestos Co., which sold and gave away thousands of cubic yards of soil tainted with asbestos and a cocktail of other harmful and cancer-causing chemicals.

The final plan is the latest chapter of a cleanup saga that dates back to 1979, when officials first began to seek a solution to the Raymark waste problem. Raybestos was known as Raybestos-Manhattan, Raymark, and Raytech over the years, among other corporate names.

Most officials said the deal was about as good as could have been expected, although some people in town wanted Town Hall to hold out for a complete removal of all of the Raymark material. Town Hall officials note that some years back, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was reluctant to remove any of the tainted soil.

The town of Stratford will see more economic growth as a result. Importantly, EPA must continue to work with town officials and residents in the implementation of the plan, said U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., when the decision was announced.

The plan calls for the tainted soil, present in dozens of sites, to be brought to the former Raybestos Brakettes softball field on Frog Pond Lane. From there, more than half of it  the most toxic soil  will be sent out-of-state to an approved disposal site. The remainder will be capped over.

"Having the EPA invest $95 million in environmental clean-up activities in Stratford will allow the town to address its future with the confidence that residents are protected from past corporate pollution, said Beth Daponte, Town Council chairwoman. While the clean-up process will be very difficult for the town, the end result will be a better Stratford going forward."

Mayor John Harkins agreed.

This record of decision announced today by the EPA will finally rid Stratford of its toxic Raymark legacy, which has threatened the public health and stunted economic growth in our town for decades, the mayor said.

Officials say that the actual movement of soil will not begin until the fall of 2017.

More detailed strategies will have to be worked out for how best to transport the contaminated soil, including the hiring of local contractors to help out with the project, coordination with police and other authorities, and so forth.

Every property has its own challenges, plus, well have to prepare the softball field site, said Jim Murphy, the EPAs team leader for community involvement. This cleanup will be challenging because of all the small sites well be dealing with. But, once we start moving, it will be accomplished in a straightforward manner  well try to inconvenience people as little as possible.

He said that work wouldnt take place in the evenings. And we will be meeting with people and with town officials as much as possible to listen to their concerns as much as possible, he said. When we were cleaning up the Raybestos factory site, we were putting in 20-hour days, which was problematic for many people in town  there wont be a repeat of that.

That site, where East Main Street meets the Barnum Avenue Cutoff, is where The Home Depot, Walmart and Shop-Rite now stand - officially known as the Stratford Crossing shopping center. Its been capped over with a thick layer of asphalt, and monitoring wells were installed to keep track of any subterranean movement of the toxic material.

The factory there, which had been in decline for years, was shuttered for good in 1989.

Murphy said that the most toxic material  more than half of the total waste that will be excavated  will be transported to a certified disposal site out-of-state.

Some people ask Why dont you move all of the soil out-of-town, he said. But we are spending taxpayer dollars to do this, and well be entirely in compliance when its completed.

Officials say that this phase of the project will cost about $97 million.

Earlier parts of the Raymark cleanup included the old factory site as well as the playing field for Wooster Middle School on Lincoln Street, both of which were completed in the 1990s.

In all, 100,000 cubic yards of soil will have to be moved

jburgeson@ctpost.com
President of Mongolia takes an interest in deepening bonds with Cuba

Submitted by: Juana

Havana

Personalities

Politics and Government

09 / 16 / 2016



The interest in deepening relations between Cuba and Mongolia was expressed by the President of that Asian nation, Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj, who arrived in Cuba on Wednesday night on an official visit.

Upon his arrival to the island, the head of state assured the press that for a long tie the two peoples have had bonds of friendship and expressed his confidence that his stay in Cuba will open new possibilities to expand bilateral cooperation.

The Mongolian head of state was received by Cuban Deputy Foreign Minister Rogelio Sierra upon his arrival at Terminal three of Havanas Jose Marti International Airport.

During his stay until Sunday, the Mongolian President will hold official talks with Army General Raul Castro, President of the Cuban councils of State and Ministers, and will carry out other activities.

For 56 years now, Cuba and the Asian nation have had uninterrupted relations, characterized by friendship and cooperation between the two countries. (acn)
High School Vandalism Charges

There are innocent high school pranks, and then there are outright acts of vandalism. And the line between the two can be nearly invisible. Ten Arkansas teenagers allegedly crossed that line and then some by spray painting, super gluing, and etching a rival team's beloved panther mascot statue.

So what kinds of charges, and punishments, could these kids be facing? (And could their parents be in trouble, too?) Here's a look.

Juveniles

Nine of the ten arrestees were under the age of 18 and, according to Little Rock's KATV, are still awaiting charges from the Saline County Juvenile Authorities and the Saline County Prosecuting Attorney's Office. They may have dodged the proverbial bullet, since juvenile court punishments are generally limited to fines or community service rather than jail or prison. Juveniles can also petition to have their court record sealed, and sometimes destroyed, under certain circumstances.

Adults

One of the ten accused vandals is 18, and was charged with criminal mischief, a catchall crime that often includes vandalism. Criminal mischief in the first degree in Arkansas occurs when a person "purposely and without legal justification destroys or causes damage to [the] Property of another," and is a Class C felony if it causes $500 worth of damage or more. Unfortunately for this young man, the damage to the school's panther statue was estimated to be $4,000, meaning he could be looking at 3-10 years in prison and up to $10,000 in fines.

Parents

Speaking of the damages, when a child or juvenile is convicted of vandalism his parents could be on the hook for restitution. Restitution can be ordered in addition to any criminal fines and court costs, all of which parents could be liable for if the child can't pay. Parents could also face a civil suit from vandalism victims, as they are generally liable for their children's behavior, but there's no indication the school in this case is interested in filing a lawsuit.

Criminal charges are no joke -- if you've been charged with a crime you should contact an experienced criminal defense attorney as soon as possible.

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Small Businesses Hoping for a Delay of New Overtime Rules

Last summer, the Obama administration announced plans to expand overtime pay benefits for workers to cover employees earning up to $47,000. This summer, the Labor Department announced the new overtime rule is official, and they would go into effect on December 1. But that still might not be enough time for some small businesses to be ready, argues the National Federation of Independent Business.

The NFIB contends that small businesses "can't just flip a switch and be in compliance," and is asking for a delay in implementing the rule until June 1 of 2017. But they don't sound likely to get it.

Not Ready for Overtime

Despite nearly two years of warning, the NFIB says that large corporations with "lawyers, accountants and human resources specialists" who are familiar with legal federal notices "may prove able to cope with the new (rule) in a 25 week window of time ... But the department cannot reasonably expect America's small businesses to match them."

The new rule is expected to expand overtime coverage to an additional 4.2 million workers, and the NFIB estimates that could impact about 2.5 million small businesses. "In many cases, small businesses must reorganize their work forces and implement new systems for tracking hours, record keeping, and reporting," NFIB president Juanita Duggan told USAToday.

Deadline Looming

Despite the protests of the nation's leading small business trade group, the Labor Department doesn't look like it will budge on the December 1 deadline for implementation. "America's workers have waited long enough for a fair days pay for a long days work," said David Weil, administrator of the department's wage and hour division in a statement. Weil also noted that the start date "is a sufficient amount of time (more than six months) for employers to adjust to the new salary level," and that the 190 days small businesses have been given to comply is "more than three times what's legally required."

If you're having trouble bringing your small business into compliance with the new overtime rules, or need legal guidance on compliance, you can contact an experienced employment attorney in your area.

Related Resources:
Orchestra's executive director promotes Family Concert in Somerset

The Johnstown Symphony Orchestra and Johnstown Concert Ballet will perform "Peter and the Wolf" on November 13 at the Somerset High School Auditorium.
Check it out: Fun things to do this weekend in Lake County

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Nearly 30 military and civilian officials from seven KNU brigades attended the training in in Lay Kay Kaw Myothit in Myawaddy Township, Karen State, said Pado Saw Aung Win Shwe, the head of the KNUs Foreign Affairs Department.

He said: The KNU has been accused of still using child soldiers, we are on a blacklist. Awareness trainings such as this one are being held so that we can get removed from the blacklist. After they have made investigations they will remove us from the blacklist.

UNICEF, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), and the Hpa-an and Mawlamyine Save the Children branches cooperated for the two-day awareness-training programme, which raised awareness of childrens rights and how to prevent the recruitment of child soldiers.

An official from the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), the military branch of the KNU, said: We dont take child soldiers, I only learnt that we were on the blacklist at the training. However, we have learnt more about childrens rights.

According to an announcement released by the United Nations Information Centre in Rangoon on 12 March the Burma Army and seven ethnic armed organisations (EAOs) are still recruiting children to be soldiers.

The seven EAOs accused of still recruiting child soldiers are: the KNLA under the KNU, the Democratic Karen Benevolent Army (DKBA), the Kachin Independence Army (KIA), KNU/KNLA (Peace Council), the Karenni Army, the Shan State Army  South (SSA-S), and the United Wa State Army (UWSA).

The KNU has denied that it recruits and uses child soldiers and says that it has rules and regulations against the recruitment of children as soldiers.

Reporting by SPhan Shaung for KIC News

Translated by Thida Linn

Edited in English by Mark Inkey for BNI
Located in Taunggyi District, close to the popular resort of Inle Lake, Yawnghwe Palace, known locally as Yawnghwe Haw, was the residence of Sao Shwe Thaike, an ethnic Shan prince who became the first president of the Union of Burma in 1948 on the day that the country gained independence from Britain. He was deposed and arrested when Gen. Ne Win seized power in 1962, and he died in prison soon after.

Sao Haymar Htaike is a daughter of Sao Shwe Thaike. She spoke to Shan Herald recently about her hopes of getting custody of the palace back in her familys hands, and her expectations for the newly elected government led by the National League for Democracy (NLD).

Question: The government says it will transform your familys former residence, Yawnghwe Palace, into a marketplace. What are your thoughts on this?

Answer: This is simply not right. In Burma, there are so many heritage places, such as Bagan. So why does the government want only Yawnghwe Palace to be converted into a marketplace? I would speculate that they want to destroy our history. They want to eliminate our valuable sites. In doing so, people in the future will never know who built the palace. It will all gradually disappear. Who is responsible if our history disappears? Because of the 21st Century Panglong Conference, people are now talking about peace. But in fact, a peaceful mind is what should be important to us. If we, the family, see our palace being used as a market, how can we be at peace?

Q: Assuming that the government knows that Yawnghwe Palace is a Shan State heritage site, but they insist on using the compound as a marketplace, what would be your message to them?

A: I strong oppose the plan. They say they wish to enhance our heritage and culture, but then why would they create such a market in the palace grounds? Why dont they do the same at Bagan or Mandalay Palace? Why only on a Shan heritage site?

I am so worried about this. I am afraid the palace will be erased just as Kengtung Palace was. Nowadays, the new generation knows nothing about Kengtung Palace.

Q: Have you written to the government, addressing the matter?

A: Yes, I have. On July 28, I sent a letter to the Ministry of Hotels and Tourism. I stated that I strong opposed their plans to create a market in the compound. I also sent letters to the Presidents Office, the State Counselors Office, the Ministry of Culture and Religion, the Shan State government, the Shan State Ethnic Burman minister and the Ethnic Intha minister.

Despite this, during a parliament session on September 7, the minister of hotels and tourism stated that they would create a marketplace. This means they disrespect my fathers family.

Q: If the government insists on pursuing the project, what will you do?

A: This would not be a rightful way of governance. Good governance must be based on listening to peoples voices. I am a citizen of this country. They should discuss the issue with citizens. But what they are doing is flexing their own muscles. This is not right. If they insist on doing this, people will react against them in the next election.

Q: The minister of hotels and tourism has said that they had a plan to discuss the issue with local people, and work with experts in order to stay neutral. What are your thoughts on this?

A: Right now, I am just an ordinary person, not a sao pha [feudal lord]. But nonetheless, why did they not talk to us? This palace belonged to us. I lived there when I was a child; therefore I am the rightful owner. They said they would ask for local participation. But they didnt even engage with the family.

The government tried to explain to the public that they had a good relationship with the family of the sao pha, but that is a lie. We totally disagree with them. Because of this, the issue has now grown into a huge problem.

Actually, our country faces problems with building peace and consolidating the NCA [Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement]. So why do they insist on focusing on the Yawnghwe Palace? I really do not understand, and I want to help solve the problem through peaceful means.

Q: As a member of a royal family, can you explain to us your lifestyle and experiences during your time in the palace?

A: Yawnghwe Palace was built during the time of my grandfather and father. We, the family, lived there and we love it. In fact, I can say this about all the people of Yawnghwe town, not just my family members. It is very important to all of us.

We had some lovely traditions at Yawnghwe Palace. During my fathers reign, there was a dharma exam every month, and monks from across Shan State were invited to come and stay as a place for relaxation. At the time, the local residents would gather at the palace to offer food to the monks. It was an enjoyable and remarkable occasion.

Another event was during Buddhist Lent [October or November] when we held a ceremony at Inle Lake, and paid respects to the elderly. This event was held both inside and outside the palace. However, all such activities stopped after 1962.

I am now 72 years old. The only thing I can do to keep our culture and tradition alive is by writing about it. I love the palace. I have good memories there. So, now I am writing some history about the palace.

Q: You said that you sent letters to the government. What is the current status?

A: In July 2013, the central government put the palace under the control of the Shan State government. Regarding the properties that were seized by the government, many people demanded they be given back to the rightful owners. On July 23, 2013, my mother Sao Mya Win, then aged 94, who was the wife of Sao Shwe Thaike, sent a letter to President Thein Sein and the Shan State chief minister to request the return of the palace. But she received no response. My mother passed away in 2014. In July 2015, I wrote to the Shan State government, and then again after a new government was elected [in November 2015]. But still no response.

Q: So what do you expect from the government now?

A: I expect that the government will give the palace back to us.

Q: If you get the palace back, what will you do with it?

A: We have studied the details of the U Thant museum in Yangon [Rangoon]. But first, we will discuss the matter with the Shan State government, the Culture and Tradition Department, and with local people and monks.

The palace grounds cover about seven acres. We would build a playground and a study center for youths. This center would be free of charge.

Q: And if you cannot get it back, what do you plan to do?

A: I will continue campaigning and demanding until I get the palace back. And I will oppose any project that eliminates our culture and traditions. I will protect our valuable heritage. I will also start discussions with our Shan leaders.

Q: You and the minister of hotels and tourism know each other, so why did he not talk with you about this matter?

A: I also want to ask him about this. We have known each other about 14-15 years. I do not understand why he is behaving like this. Even though we cannot meet in person, he can talk to me by telephone. Neither has U Nay Myo, the representative of Yawnghwe Township, spoken to me about it. What they are doing is disrespectful to me.
For decades it has been one of the most shameful failures of British politicians: their inability to provide the country with a long-term energy strategy to prevent 1970s-style black-outs.

So given how fragile and ageing our infrastructure is, the Prime Minister may have had no option but to approve the new nuclear power station at Hinkley Point if only to make sure the lights stay on.

But at what cost! The deal for the plant is already 30billion, producing some of the most expensive electricity in the world. There are also disturbing doubts about the design, with two reactors in Normandy and Finland massively over budget, behind schedule and beset by appalling technical problems.

Given how fragile and ageing our infrastructure is, the Prime Minister may have had no option but to approve the new nuclear power station at Hinkley Point if only to make sure the lights stay on

But the most worrying aspect of this deal was the way George Osborne jumped into bed with Beijing, ignoring security concerns about a totalitarian regime with a long history of industrial spying.

By calling in the deal, Theresa May showed an admirable reluctance to kowtow to the Chinese. In giving it the go-ahead, she has insisted that in future Britain will retain a golden share in projects like Hinkley, to stop them being sold to foreigners. Her move is long overdue.

Having resolved Hinkley, is it now too much to hope we might stop handing control of our energy supply to foreigners, and build our own power plants?

By calling in the deal, Theresa May showed an admirable reluctance to kowtow to the Chinese

No Orgreave inquiry

On June 18, 1984, 6,000 police officers clashed with 5,000 miners hell-bent on shutting down the coking plant at Orgreave, near Sheffield, in some of the worst violence seen during the entire miners strike.

Since then, the Battle of Orgreave has become a Leftist cause celebre, with growing demands for a public inquiry.

Yesterday we learned Home Secretary Amber Rudd is regrettably considering giving in to this bien pensant clamour. But what would an inquiry reveal that we dont already know about police using cavalry charges, baton attacks and snatch squads?

On June 18, 1984, 6,000 police officers clashed with 5,000 miners hell-bent on shutting down the coking plant at Orgreave, near Sheffield, in some of the worst violence seen during the entire miners strike

Also well-documented is that officers were pelted with bricks and broken glass.

Yes, miners were disgracefully fitted up  but civil claims against South Yorkshire Police were settled 25 years ago.

As bitter experience shows us, a public inquiry would take years and inevitably turn into a lucrative payday for lawyers. More worryingly, it is impossible to recreate the terrible tensions of 1984.

Yes, miners were disgracefully fitted up  but civil claims against South Yorkshire Police were settled 25 years ago

Arthur Scargill (pictured being arrested on the picket line at Orgreave) , a ruthless Marxist demagogue, wanted nothing less than the overthrow of an elected government

Arthur Scargill, a ruthless Marxist demagogue, wanted nothing less than the overthrow of an elected government. He had no mandate from the union ballot box, and terrible acts of intimidation were committed against miners who carried on working. An innocent taxi driver carrying a scab to work was killed by a slab of concrete dropped from a bridge.

The truth is that, at the time, this country was an economic basket case. By taking on and defeating Scargill and the rabid militant unions, Mrs Thatcher triggered an economic miracle that transformed the lives of millions of Britons.

The BBC, to which every TV-watching household is legally required to hand 145.50 every year, will have its books opened up to the National Audit Office.

This is not, as the corporation has ludicrously claimed, an attack on its independence, but the kind of necessary scrutiny which this wasteful and bloated broadcaster has avoided for too long.
Heres an idea. The next time youre stuck in an interminable queue at the airport, just vault the barrier, brush aside the security guards and run headlong to your gate.

If your plane isnt there yet, barge open the emergency exit, set off the alarms, and make for the middle of the runway.

Settle down, take a long slug from the bottle of mineral water they didnt have time to confiscate and make yourself comfortable.

How far do you think youd get? If you managed to evade the screening staff, the sniffer dogs and the posse of dopey birds from the perfume counter hosing you down with Chanel No 5, youd be rugby-tackled by a goon in a hi-viz jacket before you passed Costa Coffee.

Queues are a nightmare at airports, but if you try to vault the barrier security will chase you down and armed police could even get involved (file picture)

In the unlikely event of you reaching the emergency exit, youd be surrounded by armed police, bundled to the ground and pegged out like Gulliver.

If you tried to resist, youd be Tasered to within an inch of your life as a basis for negotiation.

Next stop would be a prison cell, followed by interrogation, an intimate body search and a court appearance the following morning.

I dont know what the exact charge would be, but theyd think of something suitably draconian.

Endangering aircraft, perhaps, or maybe a breach of anti-terrorism legislation, carrying a maximum penalty of 25 years in jail.

You wouldnt be able to complain that you werent warned. The airports are plastered with notices advising that anyone refusing to co-operate with, or behaving aggressively towards, staff will be arrested and prosecuted.

Talk back in a disrespectful fashion to someone informing you that your miniature toiletries are in a non-regulation plastic bag, or chucking your childs half-empty bottle of Pepsi in a dustbin, and you can expect to be hauled off in unceremonious fashion.

But 'middle class layabouts' brought London City Airport to a standstill with a protest, pictured,

If you have caused a major security alert  and what doesnt constitute a major security alert these days?  you can expect a heavy fine and a possible custodial sentence, especially if the judge has got out of the wrong side of bed that morning or has just had his holiday screwed up because of a bomb scare at Nice airport.

It would serve you right, too. After all, as the authorities are constantly reminding us, our safety is their number one priority.

You cant expect to cause a full-scale security alert at an international airport and get away with it.

Well, not unless youre a double-barrel-named, middle-class layabout and you bring Londons City Airport to a standstill.

They werent acting out of frustration at the mindless, routine aggravation we are all subjected to when we travel by plane, you understand.

Nine defendants, pictured during the protest, were each let off with a conditional discharge and ordered to pay 95 court costs

They chained themselves to the runway, after crossing the River Thames in rubber dinghies and scaling perimeter fences, because they wanted to draw attention to racist climate change and the Black Lives Matter movement.

So thats all right, then.

The fact that these spoilt imbeciles were all white is almost academic.

If they hadnt claimed to be from Black Lives Matter, theyd have justified their sabotage on the grounds that they were protesting about Brexit, or the migrant crisis, or the lack of designated transgendered toilet facilities on jumbo jets.

The police response was pathetic. Instead of turning a fire-hose on them, sending for bolt-cutters and a bulldozer, they let them stay put for six hours while negotiators attempted to talk the protesters into giving themselves up.

They even handed out bottles of water to prevent the poor lambs becoming dehydrated.

Meanwhile, 9,000 paying passengers trying to go about their lawful business were cooped up in the terminal.

The cost in terms of lost connections, cancelled business meetings, disrupted holidays and  who knows?  missed funerals, weddings and family reunions is incalculable.

What right had these selfish sons and daughters of privilege, subsidised by rich parents and the mug British taxpayer, to cause human anguish on such a scale?

This week these chinless chimps turned up at court to answer charges of aggravated trespass and what a bunch they were.

They could have stepped straight out of the society pages of Tatler, if they hadnt chosen a life of agitprop as opposed to aristocratic decadence.

All of them, however, displayed a typically aristocratic disdain towards the misery they caused the lower orders caught up in their vindictive act of disruption.

Cast your eyes down the roll-call of these self-proclaimed Black Lives Matter activists. You couldnt make them up. Theyre a bunch of Sloaney dilettantes.

Take, for example, 25-year-old Natalie Geraldine Twistleton-Wykeham-Fiennes, a regular on the climate change protest circuit and cousin of actor Ralph. Never mind double-barrelled, shes triple-barrelled.

Treble surnames all round!

Like the rest of her compadres in crime, she doesnt seem to have done a proper days work in her life.

Nat still lives at her parents 2 million pad just off Clapham Common and claims to make a living babysitting.

Would you let her babysit your kids? Shed probably chain herself to the cot because you were using non-recyclable disposable nappies.

Esme Waldron is described as an expert on lesbian culture. Of course she is. You dont get many Esmes working on the fish counter in Lidl.

Alex Etchart  who works in youth empowerment, has a degree in ethnomusicology and directed The Sex Workers Opera  is the son of a Uruguayan father who claims to be living in political exile in the UK.

In which case, his old man might have told him to display a little more gratitude towards his adopted country.

Pity we cant put young Alex on the first plane to Montevideo  once weve cleared the runway, of course.

Sam Lund-Harket is an environmental officer at university, whatever that is. Deborah Francis-Grayson, is 31 years old yet she is still doing a media and communications PhD.

Richard Littlejohn bemoans the state of the legal system for giving the Black Lives Matter protesters a 'slap on the wrist'

That should come in handy when the post-Brexit export drive gets into full swing.

Half of them are full-time students, at an age when most people are going out to work, paying taxes, mortgages and raising a family.

So was it too much to hope that when they turned up in court they would be given a rude awakening?

Sadly, yes.

Instead of handing down exemplary sentences, Judge Elizabeth Roscoe didnt even fine them.

They were let off with conditional discharges, told to pay court costs of 95 each and ordered not to do it again.

No wonder the nine defendants were hugging each other and laughing their heads off outside the court afterwards.

What an insult to the thousands of people who had their lives disrupted by this ridiculous juvenile demonstration.

Goodness knows how much their puerile protest cost in terms of lost business, but Im guessing it runs at the very least into hundreds of thousands of pounds.

What was Judge Roscoe thinking? Did she take pity on them because shes from a comparable social background? We may never know.

And what kind of a deterrent is a conditional discharge? What does it say about the courts attitude to airport security, 15 years after 9/11.

Dont forget that this self-indulgent rabble staged a military-style operation, using rubber dinghies and chains to breach a supposedly heavily guarded area.

OK, so they didnt bring any planes down, but they stopped plenty taking off.

Meanwhile, Howard and Hilda from Hemel Hempstead  on their way to visit the grandchildren in Glasgow  can be strip-searched at security and threatened with arrest if they resist.

But a bunch of privileged public school wastrels can invade a runway and bring an international airport to a complete standstill  not just with impunity, but with a police escort.

And then be let off with less than the proverbial slap on the wrist by a super-lenient judge.
A mother has revealed how she was drinking and partying up until weeks before she gave birth  because she had no idea she was pregnant.

Rosie Yearling, 25, from Colchester, Essex, thought she was suffering from stress when she started experiencing excruciating pains across her stomach.

The now mother-of-one to daughter Bella - who weighed 7lbs 8oz - said she had a flat tummy up until that point and had been having regular periods so had no indication that she was expecting.

Rosie Yearling, 25, from Colchester, Essex, pictured with daughter Bella, thought she was suffering from stress when she started experiencing excruciating pains across her stomach

Rosie Yearling, 25, pictured at five months pregnant, was still drinking and partying - not knowing she was pregnant

Just four weeks before going into hospital, size 10 Rosie thought she was just hungover from two nights boozing when she started to feel nauseous after a friend's hen do.

She had taken a full-length selfie in a slinky black dress before going out and was feeling confident when she hit the town with 14 friends in Nottingham.

She said: 'I'd felt like I'd put a bit of weight on a few months before but I'd reduced my portions and started eating healthier, and the cut of this dress boosted my confidence again.'

Rosie said her stomach had 'gone hard and had started swelling' when the pains started and by that point she was in labour - pictured

Less than a month before she gave birth, Rosie took a full-length selfie of herself in her new black dress on a night out in Nottingham

However, during the night out, Rosie said nausea swept over her and she only just managed to make it to a cubicle in time.

She said: 'I must have been being sick for a long time, as some of the other girls came looking for me. I was freshening myself up when they found me.'

She had been drinking the night before and joked to her friends: 'I'm not used to two heavy nights out in a row.'

Taking it easy for the rest of the night, Rosie then felt awful again the next day, but she put it down to drinking too much.

However, over the next few weeks, Rosie struggled at work as a call centre supervisor.

She started suffering back ache and feeling sick at work, but her mother said it was probably down to the stress of working six days a week.

Pictured with Bella and her boyfriend Connor, Rosie said when their daughter was born: ' As he sat holding her and they looked into each other's eyes I realised I had his support and I knew we'd be fine'

Pictured on the hen do, Rosie said she was sick after drinking but just put it down to a hangover from the day before

One night, Rosie went to bed but was woken up in the middle of the night 'with excruciating pain ripping through my stomach' and she yelled out for her mother.

'Crippled over and crying, I wondered if this was down to stress too', she said.

As her mother got ready to take her to the hospital, her dad took her to one side and said: 'You look pregnant.'

Rosie said: 'I couldn't take in what he was saying.

'How could I be pregnant? Me and my boyfriend Connor, 23, had always been careful, and I hadn't had any symptoms.

'My stomach had gone hard and had started swelling since the pain had started - but it wasn't very big.'

Rosie said she was tired at work but believed it was because she was working six-day weeks

Rosie's father said for her to text her boyfriend and she typed: ' I'm going to A&E. I'm in severe pain but just to let you know my dad thinks I'm pregnant.'

She said: 'It was about 2am so I wasn't expecting to hear from him for a while and spent the journey trying to figure out what else could be causing the pain besides a baby.

'At hospital the staff agreed I might be expecting. I was beside myself.

'I didn't even know if this pain meant I was suffering a miscarriage.'

They sent Rosie to the early stages pregnancy department for a scan, where she was told by a nurse: 'You're full-term,' the nurse told her after struggling with the scan equipment.

'You're in labour - you're going to have this baby now.'

I was running through all the times I'd been out drinking over the last nine months with no idea of the life growing inside me

As her contractions worsened, Rosie's stomach grew bigger.

The midwife told her that the baby must have been laying very far back during the pregnancy.

She spent 26 hours in labour and kept yelling and crying to her mother: 'I can't do this - I don't want this baby!'

Rosie, who had a 26-hour labour, admits being terrified - and says having a baby at 24 wasn't part of her plan.

She said: 'I was also running through all the times I'd been out drinking over the last nine months with no idea of the life growing inside me.'

She added: 'When our daughter was born I was still in shock. As they handed me the tiny 7lbs 8oz I couldn't make sense of the fact she was mine.

Bella, pictured, weighed 7lbs 8oz and Rosie says: 'I couldn't make sense of the fact she was mine'

'But then they handed her to Connor and I experienced the weirdest feeling.

'As he sat holding her and they looked into each other's eyes I realised I had his support and I knew we'd be fine.

'I was exhausted but there was no doubt in my mind we'd be okay and we'd just get on with it and do it together. And I knew he felt the same.'

Rosie was kept in for a few days as they ran various tests on the baby - who they called Bella.

The baby was fine but Rosie said: 'That didn't stop me feeling a huge amount of guilt about the lifestyle I'd led while she'd been secretly growing inside me.

'Bella is a year old now and Connor and I have really settled into our unexpected roles as parents.

'I'm still living at home while we look for our own place and mum and dad been so supportive, as have Connor's family.

'We're very lucky.'

Rosie admits: 'This is definitely not the way I planned living my 20s but now Bella's here I wouldn't have it any other way.'
Always elegant: Samantha Cameron

Out there in the land of privilege, in the velvety shadows where the rich gather to compare yachts and notes, there are a great number of women who feel they must justify their existence.

They dont have to work, they dont even know how to work, but they work anyway. Sort of.

Doing those charity thingies is no longer enough  even though few of them were actually manning the taps in a hospital sluice room or spending a day a week at a hospice.

Attending fund-raising balls in a nice dress was about the height of it, but now they need more validation. They need a vocation, they need to show off their skills.

So they do things like design jewellery or perhaps a bikini range; they become interior designers; they launch a line of extortionately priced knickers or maybe even some childrens clothes.

Real designers, the ones who have trained and practised their craft for years must grind their teeth, but there is no shortage of no-talent poor little rich girls or idle actresses trading on their connections for the greater good of themselves.

Their inspiration and goddess is Marie-Chantal, Crown Princess of Greece, whose eponymous international childrens wear brand is a roaring success, even it if does sell angel-wing onesies for babies at 53.

Elsewhere, Prince Harrys former love Chelsy Davy has just launched a safari-themed jewellery collection; Camilla Fayed, daughter of one-time Harrods boss Mohamed, has opened a vegan restaurant in West London, while Petra, daughter of F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone, had a handbag range and sister Tamara launched a haircare line that featured a 30 hairspray and was supposedly a window into the often untouchable world of elite elegance.

Gingerly stepping into this world is Samantha Cameron, who is reputedly eyeing up a career as a fashion mogul, with plans to launch a clothes range in her post-Downing Street life. SamCam has always seemed like a very nice woman  but why on earth does she think she can become a dress designer overnight?

Perhaps the wife of the former prime minister is thinking that if Victoria Beckham can do it, then anyone can  and perhaps she is right. Victoria couldnt sew up a hole in her tights and had absolutely no experience of tailoring except for wearing it, but somehow she has become the toast of the fashion world, selling dresses  but not very many of them  that retail at more than 2,000.

I like some of her simpler designs but many of the outfits from her latest collection, just shown in New York, were hideous. They looked look like they were put together by a five-year-old after running amok in a curtain shop with a pair of blunt scissors.

Still, Victoria is remarkable. She is a pop star who couldnt sing, a dancer who couldnt dance and a designer who cannot stitch  I have nothing but admiration for her success in handpainting a fashion empire with such a limited palette of talent.

So where does that leave SamCam? Well, she did go to art school (thats something!) and at least she has retail experience, with her former role as creative director at the luxury goods firm, Smythson. Also, it might be in the blood. Her mother, Annabel Astor, has founded two successful emporia, first in fashion and jewellery, latterly with the phenomenally successful Oka furniture chain.

But perhaps what is most important of all is that Mrs Cameron spent six years as a prime ministers wife. During that time, every outfit she wore, whether on or off duty, was subject to immense scrutiny.

That must really focus the mind when it comes to getting dressed in the morning, whether for the school run or meeting the Obamas. That must really make a woman understand what works and what to avoid.

And I have to say, Samantha Cameron really did this country proud. Unlike a million political wives I could mention, she was always elegant, coiffed, poised and polished.

Her taste runs to sophisticated modern classics with a twist; the kind of sombre colours, low-key separates and chic accessories that look particularly wonderful on a leaders wife.

Perhaps the wife of the former prime minister is thinking that if Victoria Beckham can do it, then anyone can  and perhaps she is right

She also understood the power of a great dress, she liked a skinny belt, it wasnt just her black pillbox hat on Remembrance Day that made her seem like a contemporary kind of Jackie Kennedy.

Yes, there was the occasional fashion misstep  that ghastly milkmaid dress, those awful deckchair stripes  but one only has to think of pixie-booted Cherie Blair, the Home Counties drear of Norma Major or perma-crumpled Sarah Brown to realise how much we are in her debt. For a brief shining moment, she made us look good on the international stage  and I for one am terribly grateful.

And yet  just because you are a high-profile woman with a strong sense of style, must it follow that you feel obliged to inflict it on everyone else? SamCams fashion forward looks and fondness for half-mast tailored trousers might play well in Notting Hill, but will the rest of the country be interested enough in her off-beam style to actually buy it?

Only time will tell. However, if anyone can do it, Sam can.

I don't want warm wine at Waitrose

Waitrose want to open wine bars and cafes in stores in a bid to shore up profits at parent company John Lewis. What a hideous idea.

Im already fed up with all those people mooching around and getting in everyones way when they come in for their free coffees. If Waitrose want to sell more items, they would be helping themselves and their customers if they put more staff at the tills. Thats all we want. Not some lukewarm glass of sauv blanc at the veg stall, thanks all the same.

How my heart bleeds for beautiful Berry

The Oscar-winning actress Halle Berry has said she was discriminated against at the beginning of her Hollywood career

Sob story of the week. Brace yourselves for the most crushing piece of news since Bambis mother got k*lled in the forest.

The Oscar-winning actress Halle Berry has complained that she was discriminated against at the beginning of her Hollywood career.

Halle had to beg for her roles because  hankies at the ready  she was deemed too beautiful.

In 1991 when she auditioned for Jungle Fever, director Spike Lee wanted the former beauty queen to play the glamorous wife, but she wanted to be the drug addict.

Deep down, I am the crack whore, she whined, but relented enough to climb into an orange bikini to play glamorous Bond girl Jinx (above) in Die Another Day a few years later.

Still, you cant say she hasnt struggled. It reminds me of the time I interviewed Peter OToole in 2000, when he had just criticised the principal of a drama school for believing that the more attractive pupils had it made in the acting world. Of course they did. They still do.

No. I say, have mercy on the pretty, said the then 68-year-old OToole, who of course had been devastatingly handsome in his youth.

Yet even that had its drawbacks. I used to get called Bubbles, because I had lovely curly hair, he said.

Thats why I am starting a charity called Pity The Pretty, a support group for handsome and gorgeous thesps who are trying to come to terms with their extravagant good looks.

Send your donations by the 12th of Never to: The End of The Rainbow, Pigs-Might-Fly Street, Cloud Cuckoo Land. Thank you.

Transport For London are trialling a campaign offering the elderly and infirm the chance to wear a large lapel badge that reads: Please Offer Me A Seat.

I admire the sentiment, even if it does Londoners and visitors to their city a great disservice. I travel on buses or tubes in the capital every day, where seat offering is a commonplace occurrence and a great credit to all.

And who wants to go around wearing such a demeaning badge? No oldies of my acquaintance, thats for sure.

Sindy's lost her sparkle - what a dull dolly

Hasbro, the makers of Sindy, have released a 21st-century version of the iconic doll but  uh oh  what is this? Slim, sporty teenage Sindy has been replaced with a pancaked-face pre-pubescent with the kind of stupefied expression that suggests she belongs to a cult.

She dresses in comfy separates and flat shoes, which, say makers, will make her more realistic and relevant. To whom? To a little girl who dreams of working on a checkout and demolishing a lifetimes supply of chips and chocolates? Shes just so dull and torpid.

Im glad that the unrealistic body image of dolls is being addressed, but surely with these dullard dollies they are going too far in the other direction?

Hasbro, the makers of Sindy, have released a 21st-century version of the iconic doll but  uh oh  what is this? Slim, sporty teenage Sindy has been replaced with a pancaked-face pre-pubescent with the kind of stupefied expression that suggests she belongs to a cult

It is particularly galling, considering it was Hasbro who turned Sindy into a turbo-chested playgirl in the first place. Sindy was launched in this country by Pedigree in 1963  and she is very dear to my heart, because I used to have one. A brunette, with a duffle coat and jeans and a really sweet little face.

Back then, Sindy was a scaled down version of a sensible size ten figure (33-24-34 to be precise). She was exciting and fuelled the imaginations of little girls  not least of all because Sindy had jobs. A life that opened up a world of endless possibilities.

She was a nurse, with a lovely swirling cape. She skied. She joined the Pony Club. She had a duffle bag and went travelling.

She drove her own car, wore tweeds in the country and went skating, complete with darling little red skirt and striped sweater, and a matching bobble hat, of course.

When Hasbro bought Sindy in 1986, they turned her into a pneumatic, glassy- eyed voluptuary with a gnat-span waist, just like the hugely successful Barbie.

They even remodelled her lovely face to make her look more American, but to no avail.

Sindy could never compete with Barbie, and sank into a slow decline.

Now shes back, remodelled as a plain-faced tubster so that no little girl who is not perfect will feel bad about herself.

So what, you might think. Its only a dolly. Yet sometimes I feel that the politically correct, imagination-muffling constraints that adults impose upon children are to their detriment, not their advantage.

Toys should be enjoyable and aspirational. And this sad Sindy is far from that.

When it comes to advantages in life, Tara Palmer-Tomkinson got the full set. Breeding, looks, wealth, intelligence  hey, throw some royal connections into the mix and you have the kind of gilt-edged pedigree that can take you anywhere. Only it didnt quite work out like that.

Unlike her older sister Santa, the best-selling novelist who married historian Simon Sebag-Montefiore, had two children and a happy family life, Tara took a few wrong turns. At her lowest ebb, the former It-Girl had a 400-a-day cocaine habit and although she longs to be married, her Mr Right is still missing in action. Now she claims that a lot of her former boyfriends sponged off her and were only interested in her money.

My initials may be TPT but they could probably be ATM, said the 44-year-old this week.

That is really sad  but who let it happen? Tara did. No one else. As the writer Nora Ephron said: above all else, be the heroine of your life, not the victim.

Hilaria Baldwin, the wife of actor Alec, has just given birth to the couples third child. When she was still in hospital, she tweeted a photograph of her post-birth body in bra and pants. I want to promote healthy self-esteem, she said. Well, she sure wants to promote something herself. Rampant narcissism masquerading as altruism  its the illness of the age.
Collaboration comes after TDE joined forces with Hailey Baldwin

The bags are made with Italian leather and are monogrammed on purchase

The pieces were shown on the runway at New York Fashion Week

The brands worked together on a three-piece bag collection

Australian label The Daily Edited has collaborated with US label TOME

The Daily Edited is fast establishing itself as an international brand.

The Australian leather goods label has made its debut on the runway at New York Fashion Week in a collaboration with US label TOME.

The brands worked together on a three-piece Italian leather collection that features The Daily Edited's signature monogramming.

Going global: Australian label The Daily Edited has debuted on the runway at New York Fashion Week in a collaboration with the US label TOME

Luxury leather: The three-piece collection includes TDE's signature tote bag (pictured) complete with TOME stitching

This is the first time TOME, which is a womenswear line based in New York, has delved in to producing bags.

The collection includes two tote bags and one pouch, which are made with Italian Saffiano leather.

The pieces were shown on the runway at New York Fashion Week as part of TOME's Spring Summer 2017 collection.

Label love: The collection is made with luxurious Italian Saffiano leather and is monogrammed on purchase

Making a statement: The pieces were shown on NYFW runway as part of TOME's Spring Summer 2017 collection

Chic clutch: The pieces are available in black, burgundy, stone and mist-grey hues

The pieces will be available in black, burgundy, stone and mist-grey hues.

In an interview with Vogue, TOME designers Ryan Lobo and Ramon Martin said the bags incorporated signature elements from each label.

The Daily Edited essential tote bag has been given a TOME makeover by including the label's stitching from their karate pants on the handle.

'As an every woman brand our collaboration with The Daily Edited makes us more accessible to a wider audience,' TOME told Vogue.

Model influence: The collaboration came after The Daily Edited partnered with model Hailey Baldwin on a collection

So chic: Hailey helped design her own capsule collection for the label which included a backpack, clutch and passport holder

The collaboration comes after The Daily Edited collaborated with 19-year-old model Hailey Baldwin on a capsule collection #theHAILEYedited.

The collaboration saw the blonde beauty, who is the niece of actor Alec Baldwin, release a personalised leather backpack, clutch and passport holder through the label.
Kaitlyn, now 20 months, was born healthy at 2.5 kilograms in spite of it all

While initially the doctors thought her baby wouldn't survive, she did

However, her amniotic sac miraculously re-sealed; rarely seen by doctors

The mum of one's waters broke at just 23 weeks, in the middle of the night

When Tiffany Ahlers's waters broke in the middle of the night at just 23 weeks pregnant, the doctors and expectant mum feared the worst.

However, after 12 weeks of drama and a quite miraculous turn of events, the mum-to-be from South Australia delivered her baby girl, Kaitlyn, into the world - healthy and happy at 2.5 kilograms.

'The doctors were left scratching their heads at what happened,' Ms Ahlers told Daily Mail Australia.

'They joked about my magic uterus!,' she added.

Miracle: Tiffany Ahlers (pictured), from South Australia, had a very dramatic birth - her waters broke at just 23 weeks, before her amniotic sac miraculously re-sealed and she had her baby

According to Ms Ahlers, part of her always expected her pregnancy to be somewhat difficult.

She told Daily Mail Australia that because she has something called a 'double cervix', she expected there to be some small issues before she gave birth.

At first, I thought it was blood from my operation, but then the idea crossed my mind: 'What if it was my waters breaking?'

However, after the doctors made the decision to place a stitch into her rapidly-shortening cervix, things went drastically downhill, and quickly:

'I woke in the middle of the night after the day I'd had my cervix stitched up, and felt this big gush,' she told Daily Mail Australia.

'At first, I thought it was blood from my operation, but then the idea crossed my mind: "What if it was my waters breaking?".

'I got up to the bathroom to check, found that it was and rang my nurse's bell immediately.'

Difficult: Ms Ahlers' problems started when she had her cervix stitched up - that night, at three in the morning, she felt this huge gush - which was her waters breaking

Not happening: The doctors prepared the mum to be for the fact that her baby was coming, and that the chance of her baby's survival (pictured) would be small

In fact, Ms Ahlers was experiencing PPROM - Preterm premature rupture of membranes - which is basically the name given to mums whose waters break before they hit 37 weeks.

She was quickly surrounded by doctors in the hospital, who told her she wasn't allowed to move her head - instead, Ms Ahlers 'lay there totally still with my legs in the air' as professionals rushed to her aid:

'The doctors prepared me for the fact that my baby was coming, and would be here within the week. At that stage, the chance of survival was only about 17 per cent,' she said.

Unusual: However, Ms Ahlers' amniotic sac re-sealed, which is extremely unusual - the parents to be (pictured) then set themselves various goals for the upcoming baby birth

The now mum of one said that she felt as though she was 'in shock' as the days in that first week passed in the hospital:

My partner and I have lost three babies in the past, and I was determined not to lose another

'I was totally petrified,' she said.

'The doctor told me that in all his time he had only heard of one person whose amniotic sac had re-sealed, but I had this tiny glimmer of hope as I had read about some women who had experienced it on the Internet.

'My partner and I have lost three babies in the past, and I was determined not to lose another.

'The doctors were asking all sorts of questions about whether we'd like to resuscitate the baby when it came along, and I just thought: "I'm not losing this baby. If he or she had any quality of life, we would do everything we can."'

Slow and steady: As the weeks passed, the baby's chance of survival increased, and when Ms Ahlers hit 29 weeks, she was allowed to go home in order to have a baby shower

And then, after three days in which Ms Ahlers continued to lose amniotic fluids, the leaking suddenly stopped.

As well as this, after an ultrasound, it was confirmed that Tiffany Ahlers had re-sealed; an extreme rarity hardly seen by doctors.

'From that point on, it was all about the little goals,' she said.

'Getting past 24 weeks was a big one, and then each week was a goal for my baby's survival.'

Healthy: When her baby, Kaitlyn (pictured), was born, she was healthy and weighed 2.5 kilograms - the baby is now thriving

PRETERM PREMATURE RUPTURE OF MEMBRANES (PPROM) - WHAT IS IT? * The condition known as PROM occurs when the membraned sac holding your baby and the amniotic fluid breaks open before you're actually in labour. * PPROM is even more serious, as this is a condition in which the membrane rupture occurs before 37 weeks. * PPROM occurs in less than three per cent of pregnancies, and the symptoms are a leaking or gushing of fluids from the vagina. *The major risk of PPROM is a premature birth, which carries its own risks for your baby. Advertisement

At around 29 weeks, Ms Ahlers was allowed to go home for her baby shower, which she said is the moment when she finally let herself think that her as-yet-unborn child might live:

'We bought some furniture and started decorating the bedroom at home,' she remembered.

And before long, at 34 weeks, Ms Ahlers started bleeding - an indication that the stitch was breaking from the weight of her baby:

'Once I had the stitch removed, I lasted about six days,' she said.

'Kaitlyn came out screaming after my Caesarean, but she was healthy at 2.5 kilograms. It was all a bit unreal to me. My baby was really here.'

Struggling: In spite of the miraculous birth, Ms Ahlers says that sometimes she still struggles with the fact that she was so lucky, and Kaitlyn survived

Day-to-day difficulties: She said: 'It's hard. You're pretty much given a possible death sentence for your child and then you don't get it,' and has signs of PTSD

In spite of the fact that she says she is a bit of a softie at heart, Ms Ahlers said that the sheer shock of what happened to her before Kaitlyn was born stopped her from crying during her own birth:

I still struggle with it today. Why was I so lucky?, I often think

'I sob my eyes out during One Born Every Minute, but I didn't cry at the birth of my own baby. I think I was in too much shock,' she said.

According to the mum of one, the magnitude of what happened to her didn't hit until three days later, when she said she was 'inconsolable' with a potent mix of happiness and grief:

'I still struggle with it today,' she told Daily Mail Australia.

'Why was I so lucky?, I often think. I have seen professionals, and still have signs of PTSD. It's as if I'm grieving as though Kaitlyn never did arrive sometimes.

'It's hard. You're pretty much given a possible death sentence for your child and then you don't get it.
She's known for her sensible high street buys from old reliables such as Reiss and L.K.Bennett.

But today the Duchess of Cambridge, 34, opted for a more edgy choice of designer as she stepped out in a blue polka dot dress by New York-based Altuzarra.

It was the first Kate has worn the Paris-born designer, whose edgy creations are beloved of Kim Kardashian, Rihanna and A-listers such as Jennifer Lawrence.

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The Duchess of Cambridge today stepped out in New York-based designer Altuzarra for the first time, wearing a 1,700 polka dot dress to an engagement in Harlow, Essex

For today's visit to the Stewards Academy in Harlow, Essex Kate teamed the multi-coloured polka dot print blue dress with her trusty nude court shoes.

Although the midi dress fell below her knee daring side slits showed off a flash of Kate's toned thighs as she made her way into the venue.

But overall the 1728.35 Aimee dress is a rather more demure creation than some of the designer's other outfits.

Kim Kardashian is a big fan of the brand and has worn Altuzarra's figure hugging designs on several occasions.

Jennifer Lawrence at CinemaCon 2016 at Caesars Palace, Las Vegas wearing Altuzarra's current season Phineas asymmetric skirt

Kim Kardashian at the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund Show and Tea at Chateau Marmont LA in October 2015, wearing Altuzarra's 2,000 Paneled Velvet Metallic Devore Slit Midi Skirt

Reality star KIm has been a fan of the brand for years, wearing one of Altuzarra's early creations to the 2009 Hollywood Style Awards in LA

At the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund Show and Tea at Chateau Marmont LA in October 2015, Kim - who was pregnant with her son Saint - wore a 2,000 Altuzarra skirt.

The high slit on the paneled velvet skirt gave the body confident mother-of-two the opportunity to show off her bronzed pins.

Reality star Kim has long been an aficionado and stepped out in a white ruched dress by Altuzarra for the 2009 Hollywood Style Awards - just one year after the brand was launched.

Rihanna in an Altuzarra skirt and shirt at the Roc Nation Pre-GRAMMY Brunch in LA in January 2014

Rihanna with Kim Kardashian at the Roc Nation Pre-Grammy brunch in LA in 2015. The Bajan singer is wearing head-to-toe Altuzarra, straight off the catwalk

Rihanna is also a big fan, wearing the 369Chika striped silk-twill shirt and 335 striped skirt to a Roc Nation Pre-GRAMMY Brunch in LA in 2014.

The following year, she wore Altuzarra's Jacopo cardigan, Campanile bra top and Balthazar skirt - taking her outfit straight from the catwalk.

Meanwhile, Jennifer Lawrence has also walked the red carpet in Altuzarra on more than one occasion.

Most recently, she wore the brand's current season 1,460 Phineas asymmetric paisley-print silk midi skirt for an appearance at ComicCon2016 in April.

Joseph Altuzarra launched his brand in 2008, aimed at making the 'sophisticated modern woman feel seductive, strong, and confident.'

The former ballet dancer, 33, honed his craft at Marc Jacobs and Proenza Schoule in New York, before returning to Paris to become first assistant to Riccardo Tisci at Givenchy.

The daring side slits in Kate's Altuzarra dress showed off her toned thighs as she made her way to the Stewards Academy in Harlow, Essex this morning

Kate has branched out lately and is shunning her old high street favourites. Here she wears a 1,700 dress by high end designer Altuzarra

Kate's choice of designer for today's engagement appears to indicate a new boldness to her fashion sense.

She often plays it safe in designs from the high street, and when she does go high end it's usually British brands such as Alexander McQueen or Jenny Packham.
Keira Knightley clearly had no idea what she was getting into when she dished about wearing wigs to keep her hair from getting damaged during filming.

The 31-year-old actress revealed that she started to receive products for female-pattern baldness after she told InStyle UK in August that she has been wearing wigs for the past five years because her hair was starting to fall out from coloring it too much.

And while mother-of-one simply meant that she was wearing wigs on set, some outlets reported that she relied on them in her everyday life, prompting her to receive what she told New York Magazine was a 'big box of things for female baldness'.

Huh? Keira Knightley admitted that she was confused when people started sending her products for female-pattern baldness after she revealed that she wore wigs

Clearing it up: The 31-year-old, who is pictured in her film The Duchess, explained that she only wears wigs on set after a recent interview led people to think she relied on them daily

Keira, who doesn't have any personal social media accounts, admitted she had 'no idea what that was about'.

When New York magazine writer Katie Van Syckle reminded Keira during her interview that she recently discussed wearing wigs with InStyle UK, she reiterated: 'For films. I do wear wigs for films.'

Keira went on to thank the writer for clearing up the confusion for her.

'I cant tell you how many boxes of hair loss stuff  and there are many on the market  I have at home,' she said. 'And I was like, Wait, does someone know something that I dont? Am I like bald? Thanks for clearing that up. I was so confused!'

Misconstrued: Keira had said that she started wearing wigs five years ago because the constant dying and styling was causing her hair to fall out. She is pictured in Anna Karenina

Perfect pair: Keira showed off her long, chestnut-colored locks while posing on the red carpet with her husband James Righton earlier this month at the Chanel's Fine Jewelry Dinner

However, Keira did credit wigs for saving her hair while filming because 'it does tend to fall out' when it is being done 'everyday' and dyed a 'million different colors'.

The Imitation Game star, who gave birth to her daughter Edie in 2015, noted that her hair is thicker than ever since her pregnancy.

'I have got ten times more of it,' she said.

Ironically, the actress thought her hair was actually going to fall out when she was carrying Edie, and she admitted that she mentally prepared herself for what she would do if that common pregnancy side effect happened to her.

Better than ever! The actress, who gave birth to her daughter Edie in 2015, insists that she has 'ten times' more hair since her pregnancy. She is pictured at the 2015 Academy Awards

Updo: Keira pulled her hair up and showed off her eye-catching dress at the Culture Chanel exhibition held at International Modern Art Gallery Ca Pesaro in Venice on Thursday

'I was sort of thinking, "Okay, Ill keep it long and when and if it falls out, Ill cut it off and that will be cool because then I could have a bob,"' she explained. 'I am waiting for that to happen, but fortunately it hasnt yet.'

Keira, who wearing her chestnut-colored hair past her shoulders these days, even told the writer that she can 'give it a tug' if she wanted, while offering her stock of hair loss products to anyone who needs them.

And while she has been wearing her hair in loose waves as of late, Keir opted to pull it up and show off the bedazzled collar on her Chanel dress on Thursday.
Normally, mothers spend those precious early months after giving birth simply luxuriating in getting to know their new baby. The curl of their little fingers. The softness of their skin.

Very few, surely, find themselves drawing up shortlists of foreign orphanages to care for their little one, planning for the moment they may have to leave her alone in a country miles from home.

This, however, is no everyday birth.

Four months ago, Michele Newmans daughter, Lily, was born in Mumbai, India, to a young local woman  not a friend or a relative, but a stranger  whose womb she had rented to carry her child. This surrogacy service cost Michele and her husband Chris some 19,000.

Michele and Chris Newmans daughter, Lily, was born in Mumbai, India, to a young local woman  not a friend or a relative, but a stranger  whose womb they had rented to carry her child for 19,000

Very few, surely, find themselves drawing up shortlists of foreign orphanages to care for their little one, planning for the moment they may have to leave her alone in a country miles from home. This, however, is no everyday birth

Today, thanks to a delay in processing Lilys passport application in Britain, Michele and her husband Chris are stuck in their cramped rental apartment in Mumbai with their daughter

Drama enough, one might imagine. But there was another twist in the Newmans tale.

Today, thanks to a delay in processing Lilys passport application in Britain, Michele and her husband Chris are stuck in their cramped rental apartment in Mumbai with their daughter.

Worse still, they face being sent home to England without her, when their medical visa runs out in the first week of October.

With no friends or family in the country and their elderly parents unable to fly out, Michele and Chris have had to come to terms with the terrifying prospect of leaving Lily in an orphanage while they fly 4,500 miles back to England and wait.

Worse still, they face being sent home to England without her, when their medical visa runs out in the first week of October

With no friends or family in the country and their elderly parents unable to fly out, Michele and Chris have had to come to terms with the terrifying prospect of leaving Lily in an orphanage while they fly 4,500 miles back to England and wait

The toll it has taken on the couple, both in their 40s and from Epsom in Surrey, is all too apparent. Michele, usually a confident HR boss, today is heartbroken, constantly on the verge of tears.

Meanwhile Chris, who works in the media, is unable to sleep more than three hours a night because of the stress. Its the final blow in what has been a gruelling quest, one which has utterly consumed the couple for almost a decade.

Indeed, the ecstasy of the moment of Lilys birth the most mind-blowing experience, says Michele  seems far away.

The ecstasy of the moment of Lilys birth the most mind-blowing experience, says Michele  seems far away

Born by Caesarean section on May 18, Lily was conceived from an embryo made up of her fathers sperm and an egg from an anonymous donor  Michele has a condition which means her ovaries stopped producing eggs earlier than normal  which was then implanted into the 25-year-old Indian womans womb

Michele says she became so attached to their surrogate, a divorced market stall worker, who has her own seven-year-old daughter, that it felt like she was part of our family

Born by Caesarean section on May 18, Lily was conceived from an embryo made up of her fathers sperm and an egg from an anonymous donor  Michele has a condition which means her ovaries stopped producing eggs earlier than normal  which was then implanted into the 25-year-old Indian womans womb.

Michele says she became so attached to their surrogate, a divorced market stall worker, who has her own seven-year-old daughter, that it felt like she was part of our family. That might seem weird, but she was helping us so much we had a real emotional link.

Despite Micheles feelings of gratitude, such fertility tourism remains controversial. Many oppose an industry which, at best, has rather questionable ethics and, at worse, has been proved to be exploitative of the Indian women whose bodies are used to make enormous profits.

We knew there was a lot of noise about these homes where surrogates are forced into carrying peoples babies, chained to their beds for nine months

There are thought to be about 1,000 rent-a-womb clinics in India, whose customers are mainly white westerners, and many institutions have been lambasted for their practices.

Some women, it is said, are pressured by their husbands into becoming surrogates, as theyre so keen to get their hands on the cash. There have also been tales of women being forced to give up children against their will, and of women being locked up for nine months by clinic owners while carrying valuable babies.

Even the better-run clinics, such as the one used by Michele and Chris, have attracted criticism for facilitating what is, effectively, the hiring of poverty stricken womens bodies to foreigners with large cheque books.

Indeed, for all the happiness these births bring desperate couples, theres no escaping the fact that surrogacy is big business  and its wombs that are up for sale.

Michele and Chris are only the second British couple ever to publicly admit to paying an Indian surrogate to carry their baby since the practice was legalised there in 2002.

Despite Micheles feelings of gratitude, such fertility tourism remains controversial. Many oppose an industry which, at best, has rather questionable ethics and, at worse, has been proved to be exploitative of the Indian women whose bodies are used to make enormous profits

Though there are around 1,000 surrogate births in India to UK couples every year (as well as 1,000 more from Americans, Australians and Europeans), most choose to keep the circumstances of their babys birth a secret from all but close family.

The only other couple to go public with their story  Octavia and Dominic Orchard from Oxfordshire, who made headlines in 2012  provoked outrage over their description of the arrangement as a business transaction carried out through a baby factory.

So how does the baby business work in practice? Agencies usually commission surrogates on behalf of couples for a large price  and it was to such an organisation that Michele and Chris agreed a fee with the young woman in return for her carrying their child.

While they insist the clinic they used was no baby factory, they admit not knowing how much of their final bill of 19,000 went to the surrogate.

To my horror, I discovered my eggs had stopped developing. I walked home from the surgery on my own and tears were pouring down my face. First I felt angry  why me? Then I felt guilt, that I wouldnt be able to give Chris children

One of the reasons we chose the agency was because its reputable, Michele says. We did lots of research beforehand. We spoke to other couples who used it. We visited the hospital where surrogates give birth.

Obviously one of our main questions was about the surrogate, how she is treated, where she lives. We met her and made sure we understood her reasons for doing this. She had been a surrogate before. She wanted to do this to put her daughter through education.

She doesnt have a lot. With this money, she can pay for her daughters school and live a nicer life.

But for all their altruistic urges, it is clear much has changed since the Newmans first visited India 15 months ago. During this period, the scandal surrounding commercial surrogacy built to such a level that, last October, the Indian government moved to stop foreign couples paying surrogates, as part of a proposed Bill to outlaw rent-a-womb clinics and only permit unpaid surrogacy between family members. It makes little Lily one of the last babies to be born under the old lucrative system.

Ministers said they were acting to stop exploitation  doctors had warned surrogates were risking not only their emotional but physical health  but it was certainly also to quell the outcry in response to those making a good living from this booming, 690 million-a-year industry.

While Michele says she understands the reasons for the ban, she and Chris, whose surrogate was already pregnant by then, admit theyre relieved they slipped through the net.

She and Chris met through friends in 2006 and moved in together a year later (though they didnt marry until 2011). They started trying for children in 2008, and after several months of failing to conceive, Michele went to the doctor for tests

We knew there was a lot of noise about these homes where surrogates are forced into carrying peoples babies, chained to their beds for nine months, she says.

But theres no way we would have done anything like that.

In the background, Lily begins to cry, loud heart-wrenching wails. Distracted, Michele breaks off mid-sentence to soothe her.

Motherhood has been a long time coming. She refuses to reveal her exact age, conscious no doubt of what some critics might say about older women wanting children, but admits shes been trying for babies since her late 30s, at least eight years ago.

There were tears in all our eyes when she held Lily. I wanted to thank her for doing this wonderful thing, but I could barely speak because I was blubbing

Whatever you might think of the path shes taken, one thing is clear: sheer desperation fuelled her to go halfway around the world to pay a stranger to give birth to her child.

Im divorced  this is my second marriage, and it took me a long time to get over my first, Michele says.

Thats why I was looking at starting a family later. It wasnt that I was career-focused or chose to wait; that was just the way my life went.

She and Chris met through friends in 2006 and moved in together a year later (though they didnt marry until 2011). They started trying for children in 2008, and after several months of failing to conceive, Michele went to the doctor for tests.

To my horror, I discovered my eggs had stopped developing, she says. I walked home from the surgery on my own and tears were pouring down my face.

First I felt angry  why me? Then I felt guilt, that I wouldnt be able to give Chris children.

Almost immediately, the couple started looking into in vitro fertilisation (IVF), whereby Chriss sperm could be fertilised in a laboratory by an egg from a donor and implanted into Micheles womb.

Over a painful five years, from 2008 to 2012, during which Michele miscarried twins at 11 weeks, the Newmans tried several rounds of IVF. They spent a staggering 40,000, emptying their joint savings and pushing themselves to the brink of emotional collapse

Waiting for a donor egg in Britain can be a lengthy process, so the couple made enquiries further afield, and, on a doctors recommendation, settled on Institut Marques, an IVF facility in Spain.

A lot of students there are willing to donate eggs to help pay college fees, Michele says.

Over a painful five years, from 2008 to 2012, during which Michele miscarried twins at 11 weeks, the Newmans tried several rounds of IVF.

They spent a staggering 40,000, emptying their joint savings and pushing themselves to the brink of emotional collapse.

We realised we couldnt keep going with the heartache, admits Michele. We couldnt afford to, either. But when do you stop? How do you say no when your dream is this baby? They briefly looked into adoption, signing up with the council, and got as far as a visit from a social worker, before deciding it wasnt for them.

By now both in their 40s, time was running out. If they still wanted a child, surrogacy was their last chance  meaning that while Michele wouldnt have a biological link to the baby, at least Chris would.

Commercial surrogacy is illegal in the UK, though parents can make informal arrangements with a willing friend or relative, as long as they dont pay them.

Im an only child  I dont have a sister or another family member who could do this for me, says Michele. This was the only way.

They spent a staggering 40,000, emptying their joint savings and pushing themselves to the brink of emotional collapse (pictured, their daughter Lily)

Having spent so much already, many of the most popular destinations for fertility tourism  such as the U.S., where couples pay as much as 100,000 for a surrogate  were out of their reach. Instead, they chose India, where the average cost of surrogacy is 15,000 to 20,000 (of which the surrogate gets between 3,000 and 6,000, a huge sum in a country where the average monthly wage is 160).

Last February, they travelled to Mumbai to meet their doctors at Surrogacy India, a clinic that boasts delivery of over 300 healthy babies. The experience, Michele admits, was odd  perhaps as far removed from Mother Nature as its possible to be.

Their medical background was examined and Chris donated sperm. A translator was on standby to help the couple through the process, as it was highly unlikely the surrogate would speak English. They selected the egg donor and surrogate from the agencys database.

You dont get the womens personal information but you do get a record of their medical history, how many children they have and things like eye colour and skin colour so you can choose, Michele says.

Like most Western couples, they chose an anonymous Caucasian egg donor from an unspecified country  an option that costs up to 2,000 more than an Indian donor  and started scrimping to meet the bill.

Tragically, their first surrogate  of a similar age and background to the second  miscarried twins at a few months.

The Newmans surrogate signed a contract promising to give up all parental rights when Lily was born, but Michele says she and Lily would happily visit again while theyre still in Mumbai

Having spoken to Lilys surrogate on Skype, the online video messenger, they met her for the first time before the birth  and then made the unusual decision to bring Lily to see her when she was a month old

Doctors advised them to choose another woman from the database. Her pregnancy took straight away. Finally, after all this time and money and utter devastation, we would have a baby of our own, says Michele. We were so frightened it would go wrong again, so we only told immediate family  our parents and Chriss brothers.

Everyone was supportive. But it took our parents a while to understand. They were afraid, wondering what would happen if the woman didnt want to give up the baby.

Michele insists this wasnt something that ever crossed her mind. One can sense she was so desperately focused on the end game  holding that precious baby in her arms  she forced herself not to think of what might go wrong.

And there was much. Stories abound of surrogates who mourn the loss of their baby, of others who are forced into abortions by family.

However, the clinic chosen by Michele and Chris only recruits women between 21 and 35 with children of their own, and supports them with vitamins, nutritional advice and classes such as yoga.

We wanted to make sure she was cared for, says Michele. We paid for her to stay in a private hospital when she had minor complications. We paid for her mother to take time off work to look after her.

Having spoken to Lilys surrogate on Skype, the online video messenger, they met her for the first time before the birth  and then made the unusual decision to bring Lily to see her when she was a month old.

Babies are normally whisked away after birth without the surrogate being allowed to see them, says Michele.

Having spoken to Lilys surrogate on Skype, the online video messenger, they met her for the first time before the birth  and then made the unusual decision to bring Lily to see her when she was a month old

Babies are normally whisked away after birth without the surrogate being allowed to see them, says Michele

The Newmans surrogate signed a contract promising to give up all parental rights when Lily was born, but Michele says she and Lily would happily visit again while theyre still in Mumbai

We met at the agency; we didnt know if she would want us in her home. Shed had a Caesarean so she was sore, and she doesnt speak English so we needed a translator.

How, one wonders, could any translator convey the complex emotions of such a bittersweet moment?

A mum is all Ive ever wanted to be. After every failure, every disappointment, I wouldnt let it go. And Lily was worth fighting for

Michele says: It was a beautiful time. There were tears in all our eyes when she held Lily. I wanted to thank her for doing this wonderful thing, but I could barely speak because I was blubbing.

The Newmans surrogate signed a contract promising to give up all parental rights when Lily was born, but Michele says she and Lily would happily visit again while theyre still in Mumbai.

Theres nothing to suggest Lily isnt the Newmans biological child: a sweet little poppet, she has her fathers eyes and shock of dark hair, and alabaster skin like Micheles. No wonder her parents are besotted.

Having drawn attention to Lilys passport hold-up, the Newmans are hopeful that cogs are in motion to help them return to Britain within weeks.

Michele, meanwhile, finally has the baby she yearned for in her arms.

Even if the rules hadnt changed in India, she says, they wouldnt be able to afford a second surrogacy.

In an ideal world, had we done this years back, we would give Lily a sibling, she says. But I dont think, financially, we could do it again.

And to anyone who disagrees with the way theyve brought Lily into the world, Michele is fiercely unapologetic.

A mum is all Ive ever wanted to be, she says.

After every failure, every disappointment, I wouldnt let it go. And Lily was worth fighting for.
The baobab has long been appreciated in Africa for its many health properties, but since the Duchess of Cambridge was pictured drinking a smoothie containing the fruit on her visit to the Eden Project, it has been catapulted into the limelight.

The 200million-year-old African fruit of the baobab tree has six times the vitamin C of an orange, is a rich source of fibre and has more antioxidants than any other fruit.

No wonder it's been found to promotes healthy digestion, boost energy, increase immunity and promote collagen for healthy skin and hair.

Scroll down for video

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge knocked back a baobab smoothie on their September 2 visit to the Eden Project in Cornwall

And it's not only your health it can benefit, but the well-being of those in Africa too.

'The rise in popularity of baobab has the potential to create sustainable income for 10 million households who farm the fruit in rural Africa,' explains a spokesperson for Aduna, an Africa-inspired health and beauty brand and social business.

The superfood's healthy properties and ethos has also attracted many celebrity fans.

Eddie Redmayne requested it on the set of the new Harry Potter prequel film Magical Beasts and Where to Find Them, Kirsten Dunst uses it to boost her skin, hair and nails from within, according to her manicurist and Jude Law feeds it to his kid.

Florence Welch likes to take it and Zoella has vlogged about it.

But thankfully, you don't need to trek all the way to Africa - or to Cornwall's Eden project - to experience the benefits.

Baobab comes in powder form at many health shops and can be incorporated into everything from porridge to curries to add zing and healthy boost. Here Aduna share their top recipes.

Baobab and banana ice cream combines the fruit blended with powder and agave syrup

Baobab and Banana Ice Cream

Ingredients: 1 tbsp Aduna Baobab Superfruit Powder; 2 bananas, sliced and frozen for at least 2 hours; 2 tbsp pure maple/agave syrup

This delicious ice cream takes less than 5 minutes to make and requires just 3 simple ingredients. Packed with energising vitamin C and free from refined sugar, its healthy enough to have for breakfast!

Topping ideas: fresh fruit, nuts, cacao nibs, coconut.

Method: Add the bananas, baobab and syrup to a high-powered blender and blend until smooth. Sprinkle with your favourite toppings and serve immediately.

Baobab Flapjacks

These flapjacks are the perfect nutrition-packed snack for on-the-go. As they are nut-free, they are a delicious addition to your kids lunch box.

Flapjacks containing baobab, almond butter and cashews pack a nutritional punch

Ingredients: 2 tbsp baobab powder; 2 cups medjool dates; 2 cups water; 1 cup almond butterp; 3 cups oats; 1 cup cashews; 1 cup sunflower seeds

Preheat the oven to 160C. Add the dates and water to a saucepan, bring to the boil and simmer until soft.

Add the water, baobab and dates to your food processor and blend until a smooth syrup. Pour into a mixing bowl with the almond butter.

In the same food processor, add all the dry ingredients - oats, cashews and sunflower seeds. Pulse until finely chopped - you don't want it to turn into a flour, and you don't want it to be too crunchy  a happy medium!

Add the dry mix to the bowl with the date and almond butter mixture. Stir well with a wooden spoon until mixed.

Spoon onto a baking tray, lined with parchment paper. You want the mixture to be around 1 inch high. Place in the preheated oven and cook for around 20 minutes.

Adding a spoonful of baobab into your morning porridge can help ward off the dreaded cold. This baobab and raspberry version is a fruity twist on a classic.

Baobab & Raspberry Porridge

Ingredients (serves 2): 1 heaped tablespoon baobab powder; 3 cups almond milk/oat/ brown rice milk; 3/4 cup oats; 2 tbsp almond butter; 1/2 punnet raspberries; 1 banana sliced (optional)

Other toppings: A handful of granola, goji berries, cacao nibs or pomegranate seeds.

Start by putting the almond milk, almond butter and cinnamon in a pan and placing over high heat.

After about two minutes, test the temperature. When its hot but not boiling move it on to medium heat and add the oats and raspberries.

Keep on stirring, you may at this point need to bring the temperature of the heat even lower, as you dont want the porridge to overheat and boil.

Add the baobab and stir occasionally for 8 minutes. Then add the rest of the ingredients, stir well, pour into bowls and top!

Packed with antioxidants, this baobab, blueberry & cashew smoothie makes an incredible breakfast or afternoon pick-me-up.

Baobab, Blueberry & Cashew Cream Smoothie

Ingredients: 2 tsp baobab powder; 1/4 cup cashew nuts; 1 banana (preferably frozen); 1 cup blueberries; 1 cup oat/almond/brown rice milk; 1 medjool date

Add everything to a blender and blend until smooth.

If your blender isn't very powerful, you may need to soak the cashews for a few hours before blending to ensure the smoothie is velvety smooth.

Red Lentil, Spinach & Baobab Curry

This warming red lentil, spinach & baobab curry is quick to make and super-healthy

Ingredients: 2 tbsp baobab powder; 1 tbsp coconut oil; 1 small onion; 3 cloves of garlic, diced; 2ins ginger, minced; 1 red chilli, peeled and minced; 1 tbsp curry powder (use your favourite blend); 1 tsp salt; 1 cup red lentils, rinsed well; 1 can (400g) chopped tomatoes; 3 cups water; 250g/8oz new potatoes, halved OR quartered if large; couple of large handfuls of spinach

To serve (optional): yoghurt (non-dairy if desired), fresh coriander, chopped wholegrain flatbread

Heat the oil in a large pan over medium heat. Add the onion and cook for 6-8 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Add the garlic, ginger and chilli and cook for a further couple of minutes. Add the curry powder, salt and red lentils and stir to coat well.

Add the tomatoes, water and new potatoes and bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover the pan and simmer for approximately 30 minutes, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking. When cooked, the potatoes should be fork tender.

Remove from the heat and stir in the baobab powder and the spinach. The residual heat will wilt the leaves.

Serve with a sprinkle of fresh coriander, a dollop of yoghurt and flatbread on the side.

Vegan Baobab and Banana Pancakes

Naturally Sassy shared their recipe for these vegan banana and baobab pancakes

Ingredients: 1 tbsp Baobab powder; 1 banana; 1/3 cup brown rice flour; 1 cup oats; 1 -1 1/2 cups oat/almond milk; 2-3 medjool dates; 1/2 cup blueberries

Add the oats to a blender, grinder or food processor and process until it resembles flour. Set to one side.

Add the dates and milk to the blender and blend until the date pieces have been completely pulverised.

Break up the banana into smaller pieces and add to the blender along with the baobab and brown rice flour.

Blend until the mix is thick and smooth. Then stir in the blueberries.

Add a little coconut oil to a large frying pan over medium heat and pour approx. 1/3 cup of the batter at a time onto the pan. Use a spatula to spread into circles.

Leave to cook for approx. 2 minutes before carefully flipping and cooking for a further minute or two.

Repeat until all the batter has been used up. Serve warm with your favourite toppings.
Fifteen years ago Graham Smith of Liverpool had a bowel operation. The internal nylon stitches in his abdomen caused him pain. "For 15 years I have been hunched over and leaning to the left," he told The BBC. In 2011, Smith, a specialist engineer, told his hospital that he could actually see the stitches as "a small lump of nylon protruding from my abdomen." Eventually the hospital agreed to remove the stitches, but it cancelled the operation twice. Frustrated, Smith decided to design his own titanium operating tools and he performed the surgery on himself.

From The Telegraph:

"I didn't make the decision lightly  I was desperate, but I had to take control of it and I was not prepared to sit and die on a waiting list. "I'm a specialist engineer. I do jobs people can't do, but I'm not a surgeon so don't try this at at home. "There was a bit of blood and it stung a bit but I was confident in what I was doing."

A spokesman for the Royal College of Surgeons told The Telegraph that DIY surgery was not advisable.
Statins are taken by about six million people in the UK. File image

Patients who take statins were plunged deeper into confusion last night after the countrys two leading medical journals went to war over the safety of the drug.

The row was triggered by a major review in The Lancet last week that concluded the pills are safe and their benefits far outweigh any harm.

It was the biggest ever review into their use, but now the rival journal The BMJ has cast doubt on the assertions by claiming adverse side effects are far more common than the study implied.

It also urged the chief medical officer Dame Sally Davies to intervene by launching an independent inquiry.

Health campaigners said most patients would be left utterly confused and would not have the vaguest idea what to believe.

Statins are the most commonly prescribed medication on the NHS, with around six million patients taking them to prevent heart attacks and strokes.

Professor Rory Collins, lead author of the Lancet review undertaken by a team of Oxford researchers, concluded the pills were so beneficial that six million more adults should be taking them.

The Lancets editor, Richard Horton, also launched a strong attack on research published in The BMJ that had warned of the possible side effects of the pills.

The Lancet said research showed benefits outweighed the harm but a rival medical journal, the BMJ, now disputes this and said the adverse effects had been downplayed

He said two studies that had appeared in the journal in 2013 resulted in 200,000 patients stopping their statins, potentially harming their health.

But last night The BMJ defended this research and questioned The Lancets claims that the pills are safe and effective.

TRUMP REVEALS HE TAKES THEM Donald Trump revealed yesterday that he takes statins to control his cholesterol. The Republican presidential candidate released medical data along with Democrat rival Hillary Clinton as their health took centre stage. Mr Trump's health assessment revealed that - at 6ft 3in and 236lb - the 70-year-old is overweight on the BMI scale. His team declared him to be 'in excellent health' in a dig as Mrs Clinton, 68, who returned to the campaign trail yesterday after collapsing at a 9/11 service this week. Advertisement

Writing for the journal, Dr Richard Lehman, a retired GP and Oxford University academic, said muscle pain and fatigue were prevalent and recurrent in many patients on statins. And Professor Harlan Krumholz, a cardiologist at Yale University in the US, said many scientists still had persistent concerns. Also writing for the journal, he added there was a lack of good evidence for the pills benefits in elderly patients.

Fiona Godlee, The BMJs editor, has written to Dame Sally urging her to launch an inquiry into statins. She said an independent review of their safety and effectiveness remains an essential next step if this increasingly bitter and unproductive dispute is to be resolved.

The Department of Health said Dame Sally had only just received the letter and had not yet decided whether to carry out a review.

Health experts urged the two journals to resolve their differences so they could work together to uncover the truth about statins. Tam Fry, of the National Obesity Forum, said: I find it unbelievable that the medical establishment should be at loggerheads over whether they are worthwhile or not.

Poor Joe Public doesnt have the vaguest idea about who to believe. It is essential that someone in authority declares one way or the other what the truth is on statins. Until that day we are going to have people putting themselves at risk.

This week Donald Trump, left, the Republican presidential candidate said he takes statins, as part of health data he released when his rival, Hillary Clinton, above right, collapsed at a 9/11 memorial

Statins lower levels of bad cholesterol in the blood and prevent the build-up of fatty deposits in blood vessels, reducing a patients risk of a heart attack or stroke.

But they can cause unpleasant and potentially fatal side effects including muscle pain, tiredness, type two diabetes and blood clots in the brain. Some scientists and doctors say drug firms producing statins have downplayed these harms and exaggerated their benefits.

Concerns have also been raised that many of the academics promoting their benefits are being funded by the pills manufacturers. These include Professor Collins and the two other academics involved in last weeks review, whose past research had been paid for by drug firms making statins.

The BMJ, formerly known as the British Medical Journal, was first published in 1840 and has 122,000 subscribers.

The Lancet, first published in 1823, has fewer than 20,000 subscribers but is considered to have more influence among academics.

The authors of last weeks review calculated that out of 10,000 patients taking statins, only 10 to 20 a year would suffer side effects. In the same 10,000, they would prevent 1,000 heart attacks or strokes.
A lumbar puncture revealed he did have meningitis and

A horrified mother said her four-week-old son was just 'minutes from death' after doctors failed to spot he was suffering with meningitis - and dismissed it as a cold.

Alison Grocock - who works for the controversial NHS 111 helpline - rushed her son John to hospital after he kept falling asleep before becoming completely unresponsive.

She said she 'knew something was wrong' when John later gave a high-pitched cry - which can be a warning sign of meningitis in babies.

Baby John Grocock was just four weeks old when he started displaying symptoms of meningitis, such as falling asleep and a high-pitched cry

But, despite immediately making her concerns known to staff at the emergency department, Mrs Grocock and husband Simon, said they waited hours for him to be seen.

The parents, from North Anston, South Yorkshire, said staff at Bassetlaw Hospital, Worksop, told them their son was 'fine and to take him home' in November last year.

But they refused to listen and insisted it was something more sinister before tests revealed he actually had meningitis and septicaemia.

'I was later told if I had taken John home, he would have died shortly afterwards. He was minutes from death,' she said.

'I am so glad I trusted my instinct. One doctor told me John probably had a cold, but I knew there was more to it than that - something was seriously wrong,' she said.

'I refused to take John home and was sent to the children's ward for him to be checked out.'

Now 11 months old, John is recovering after spending time in hospital with the deadly infection

Mrs Grocock and John, now 11 months, said she refused to leave hospital until she had a second opinion

He was taken for an emergency lumbar puncture and further tests confirmed he had meningitis and septicaemia.

Now 11 months old, he is making a full recovery, and a fundraiser will be held as part of his first birthday celebrations.

All funds raised going to Meningitis Now, a charity that has helped Mrs Grocock through the experience.

Kate Carville, head of nursing and emergency care at Bassetlaw Hospitals Trust, said: 'I want to apologise to Mrs Grocock for the issue she raised about the care provided to her son John.

'We have met with Mrs Grocock to discuss her concerns.

'We have also implemented some changes as a result of her experiences.'
A new Uber-style service offering patients a private same-day appointment with an NHS GP is to be rolled out nationally.

Doctaly allows patients to skip queues to see a doctor by allowing them to pay for medical care seven days a week.

It charges patients between 39.99 and 49.99 for an appointment during office hours, enabling patients to skip queues to see a doctor.

The cost rises to 69.99 for appointments out of hours, such as before 9am and after 6pm on weekdays and during the weekend

But critics say the service will create a two-tier health system, and is a step closer towards privatising the NHS.

Doctaly allows patients to skip queues to see a doctor by allowing them to pay for medical care seven days a week

The service has been piloted in north London at 10 practices in Barnet and Enfield - with 50 GPs currently signed up.

The service is similar to Uber in that it does not employ GPs itself but matches willing doctors working in their own surgeries with patients who can pay.

But it has proven so successful its founders now plan to roll it out, with national coverage expected by 2018.

Patients log on to the Doctaly website to book an appointment with an NHS GP at a time and location that is convenient to them.

They cannot see their own GP or one registered at their practice, but they can choose another doctor working nearby.

Consultations are for 15 minutes - around five minutes longer than a standard NHS one.

It charges patients between 40 and 50 for an appointment during office hours, enabling patients to skip queues to see a doctor. The cost rises to 70 for appointments out of hours

Founder Ben Teichman told Pulse magazine the service was not about queue-jumping and could stop patients unnecessarily going to A&E.

He said: 'Doctaly is essentially a hybrid service between the NHS and existing private practice making private appointments more affordable, thereby opening them up to a wider audience.

'It is not about queue-jumping. Quite the opposite in fact.

'It should help drive queues down in surgeries and also take traffic away from A&E.

'An A&E appointment can cost the NHS 150 and if access wasn't an issue, many of these patients could have been successfully treated by a GP.'

This sort of service is the slippery slope towards privatisation of the NHS. Dr Jackie Applebee, member of the British Medical Association's GP committee

He added the service was a 'lucrative and convenient alternative' for GPs who may want a few appointment if they have spare time.

Users have access to a number of private medical services including women's health, child health, men's health, private medicals, sexual health screening and private STD testing.

Dr Jackie Applebee, who sits on the British Medical Association's (BMA) GPs committee, said Doctaly was 'very worrying' and would 'further destabilise general practice'.

She told Pulse: 'This sort of service is the slippery slope towards privatisation of the NHS.

'This is not the answer to the crisis in general practice.

'I acknowledge that access is a problem, but the fault for this lies at the door of the Government who have dis-invested in general practice for years so that we now have an unprecedented workforce crisis.

The service is similar to Uber in that it does not employ GPs itself but matches willing doctors working in their own surgeries with patients who can pay

'It introduces the principle of topping up NHS services with purchased services if one has the disposal income.

'If the more affluent begin to do this in significant numbers it is only a small step to an insurance-based health service.'

Dr Richard Vautrey, deputy chairman of the same committee, said: 'Patients want and deserve a properly-funded NHS GP service, based on the registered list, so they can get appropriate timely access to their local GP.

'While patients can access and pay for private GPs or consultants, the risk is a more fragmented service.'
To his patients, Dr Charles Runels is a miracle-worker.

Better known as 'Dr O', he helps women reach orgasm with a treatment that involves injecting a woman's own blood into her clitoris to heighten feeling.

He first attempted the treatment when his lover demanded that he inject blood into her clitoris as a Valentine's Day gift after she had watched him inject his own penis with blood for about a year.

The result was such a tremendous success that he decided to try it on his patients.

Now, seven years later more than 20,000 have had the procedure done and Dr Runels claims to have an 85 percent success rate.

And although the medical community dismiss his techniques as freakery, his clients - ranging from victims of genital mutilation to women with post-birth damage - insist he has changed their lives.

The O-shot machine: This is the centrifuge, which is used to isolating the platelet rich plasma from blood. The doctor takes blood from a woman's arm, puts it in this machine, then - using a tiny needle - they inject the PRP product in the clitoris and the G-Spot to 'heighten orgasms'

The injection is offered by a few surgical practices in the US. One of them is the V-Spot Medi-spa in New York - run by Cindy Barshop (pictured), of the Real House Wives Of New York City

Dr Charles Runels (pictured) says his work is aimed at empowering women. More than 20,000 women have had the procedure he pioneered which involves having blood injected into the clitoris to heighten feeling and achieve orgasm

Operating from a nondescript clinic in the conservative town of Fairhope in Alabama, Dr Runels first draws blood from a patient's arm. He then uses a centrifuge to separate the platelets into a platelet-rich plasma (PRP).

That is put in a syringe, and inserted into the patient's clitoris.The whole thing lasts about 20 minutes.

The idea is that the procedure stimulates cell growth. When you have a cut, stem cells are attracted to the area and become activated to grow new tissue that includes collagen, fatty tissue and blood vessels. As well as supposedly clearing inflammation, the increased blood flow increases sensitivity in the area.

The injection, which can only be performed by Dr Runels or one of the 500 practitioners he has trained since it was patented in 2011, costs upwards of $1,200 per shot.

More than 50 million women struggle to achieve an orgasm, according to research by the American Medical Association and according to Dr Runels and co-creator Dr Samuel Wood, this procedure is the only sure-fire female equivalent of a little blue pill.

It is not Dr Runels' first moment in the spotlight. The idea of PRP shots hit headlines in 2013 when Kobe Bryant got some at different parts of his body to fix injuries.

Soon after, Kim Kardashian posted a picture on Instagram of her face covered in blood after a 'vampire face lift' - by Dr Runels. And more recently, the so-called 'vampire breast lift' has also become a viral trend.

All of those procedures follow the same principle as the O-shot.

Dr Runels' 'vampire face lift' follows the same principal as the O-shot. The procedure made headlines in 2013 when Kim Kardashian posted the photo on Instagram after getting it done

In a recent interview with the Guardian, Dr Runels revealed he had been injecting his own penis for maximized sensitivity for about a year, and one day his lover said she wanted the same. After seeing her heightened sensitivity and stronger orgasms - 'very strong, ejaculatory orgasms', he said - he decided to try the procedure on other patients.

He is adamant that his work is aimed at empowering women. A patient who spoke with the Guardian's Kathleen Hale described how she was raped at 13, then repeatedly raped throughout a 10-year marriage, and was so physically scarred that she only felt pain.

But after a visit to Dr O her injuries faded and 'her incontinence went away'.

Reflecting on that patient's case, Dr Runels told Hale: 'Thats my revenge [against rapists]  to say "Eff you" and give women their flower back.'

That is just one case in thousands. Of the 20,000 women treated, Dr Runels says 85 percent are happy with the results.

But medical professionals are still irate about the lack of testing and FDA approval.

Dr Runels funded a $95,000 study at George Washington University to try the procedure on nine women.

The study focused on the effect injected PRP would have on a kind of vaginal eczema (vulvar lichen sclerosus), which is a common form of scarring on rape and FGM victims, as well as women post-birth. It can also occur naturally.

The research, published in the Journal of Lower Genital Tract Disease, found PRP did reduce inflammation.

However, doctors and OB/GYNs have dismissed the results as thin since it only involved nine women and the findings were based on testimonial feedback.

And many question why Dr Runels hasn't sought FDA approval for the procedure.

PUTTING IT TO THE TEST

The injection is offered by a few surgical practices in the US.

One of them is the V-Spot Medi-spa in New York - which is run by Cindy Barshop, a former star of the Real House Wives Of New York City.

In fact, Elite Daily reporter Emily McCombs recently went to test the procedure at Barshop's Upper East Side 'vagina spa'.

By the third week, I started feeling much more sensation during sex Elite Daily reporter Emily McCombs, who got the O-shot

Dr Carolyn DeLucia, the gynaecologist who treated Ms McCombs, told her: 'The procedure is mostly about returning function.

'It's about being comfortable in our everyday lives and intimacy is an important part of that.'

Ms McCombs said after taking some blood from her arm Dr DeLucia, applied topical cream to numb her clitoris and vagina area.

'I didn't feel anything except her fingers inside my vagina when she did the G-shot injection, which just felt like a regular gynecological exam', she wrote.

After the procedure, which took just over 20 minutes, Ms McCombs noted that she felt more sensitivity during with her fiance.
A DEADLY THAW by Sarah Ward

A DEADLY THAW

by Sarah Ward

(Faber 12.99)

A year after Lenas release from an 11-year prison sentence for killing her husband Andrew Fisher, his body is found shot to death in a disused mortuary.

So who was the man Lena suffocated in her bedroom in 2004, and why did she lie about his identity?

But Lena doesnt hang around to answer the question. She flees from the home she shares with her sister Kat, only communicating with her by sending strange gifts relating to their shared past via a mystery hooded teenager.

Bampton Police in Derbyshire (the same crew who appeared in Wards debut novel, In Bitter Chill) have their work cut out, but gradually they make links between the missing Lena and an old friend of hers who has just committed suicide. Wards main theme, which she warms to in the second half of the book, is rape, and how its victims used to be treated by the police.

This sits uneasily beside a convoluted plot which, unfortunately, rarely rings true.

UNDERTOW by Elizabeth Heathcote

UNDERTOW

by Elizabeth Heathcote

(Quercus 12.99)

When journalist Carmen marries Tom, a London lawyer, she thinks she can be happy even though Tom has baggage in the form of a perfect ex-wife, Laura, their three children and a mystery ex-girlfriend, Zena, for whom he left his family.

Zena, she knows, was stunningly beautiful, and tragically drowned in the sea near Toms holiday cottage. Carmen is sure that Tom has moved on emotionally, but she is unprepared for local gossip that suggests Tom was responsible for Zenas death.

Once the seeds of distrust are sown in Carmens mind, she embarks on her own investigation of events, leading to an unexpected conclusion.

I didnt find this as heart-pounding as the publisher suggests it is, but its an engaging enough read, if a little clunky in parts.

THE DEVIL'S WORK

by Mark Edwards

(Thomas & Mercer 8.99)

After time out to have her daughter, Sophie Greenwood is delighted to have landed her dream job with Jackdaw Books, a childrens publisher headed by the mysterious Franklin Bird.

But within days, the workplace turns toxic and, thanks to a series of disturbing events, Sophie becomes convinced that her ambitious young assistant Cassie is out to get her.

Cleverly interwoven with flashbacks to Sophies university days  when she was best friends with the damaged but fascinating Jasmine Bird, Franklins granddaughter, and dating louche boyfriend Liam  it becomes apparent that the past might have some bearing on the present.

As Sophies life gradually falls apart both at work and at home, she becomes increasingly concerned about the fate of her predecessor, Miranda, and sets out on a course of action with fatal consequences.
Sex determination tests are illegal but centers are still used to identify female foetuses often perceived as being undesirable

With the Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao campaign gaining traction and the government promising strict action against sex determination, a gang in Haryana have sunk to a new low in their effort to carry out the illegal act.

The gang were caught performing sex determination tests at what was made to look like a humble cowshed.

Police, along with the health department officials, raided a cowshed at Gagsina village in Karnal district on Wednesday.

Police arrested a gang performing sex determination tests in a cowshed

The police seized an ultrasound machine and other equipment from a room next to the cowshed.

Four people, including cowshed owner Balkaar and midwife Santara, were arrested.

Two people, including a doctor and a middle-man Vinod, however, managed to flee.

Four people, including cowshed owner Balkaar and midwife Santara, were arrested. (Image for representation only)

According to the police, the gang would first ask the client to come to an undisclosed location, and from there she would be taken to the cowshed in Gagsina.

As part of its ongoing drive against ultrasound centres, the Haryana health department decided to send a dummy client to Vinod.

A deal was struck for Rs 22,000 and Vinod took the woman to Gagsina.

The team of police and health officials followed Vinod and caught the gang red-handed.

The police seized ultrasounds machine and other equipment from the cowshed. (Image for representation only)

In the 2011 Census, Haryana recorded the countrys worst sex ratio at 822 females for every 1000 males.

According to the states health department, the figure has since improved and now stands at 844.
The RK Studios have maintained the tradition of celebrating Ganpati Utsav for decades and this year was no different.

Bollywood's most prominent Kapoor clan, including late Raj Kapoor's three sons- Randhir, Rishi and Rajiv Kapoor along with the young and dashing Ranbir Kapoor, took to the streets of Mumbai to celebrate the festival amid a maddening crowd.

The procession began at around 1.30 pm on Thursday (September 15) from RK Studios in Chembur culminating at Shivaji Park where the idol of Lord Ganesha was immersed later in the evening.

Randhir (left), Rishi (centre) and Rajiv Kapoor (right) along with Ranbir Kapoor (centre) took to the streets of Mumbai

This year immersion festivities marked Ranbirs longest ever procession in history.

The actor along with other members of his family covered a distance of about 4 kms despite heavy rainfall.

RK Studios famously celebrates Ganesh puja and the entire Kapoor family participates

Thousands of fans gathered just to catch a glimpse of their 'Rockstar' hero.

There was immense chaos, colour and deafening noise yet Ranbir maintained his cool and kept walking calmly.

Walking close to his father Rishi, Ranbir oozed oodles of charm even in his casual avatar wearing a black sweatshirt with a hoodie, dark blue jeans and black and white striped loafers.

Randhir Kapoor reportedly got missed with a reporter who wanted his bytes

In between, he also tried his hand at playing the traditional manjeera.

He even caught hold of an orange manjeera and played it till the end of the proceedings.

Ranbir Kapoor caught hold of an orange manjeera while walking in the rain

The beginning of the festivities did see the elder Kapoor brothers i.e Randhir and Rishi get into a brief altercation with some sections of the media, however Lord Ganesha and the occasion soon took prominence.
Uttar Pradesh authorities have blown the lid off an ATM card syndicate that stole lakhs of rupees from dozens of people with the help of bank officials and specially-developed technology.

The Special Task Force says the gang mused a loop-hole in the phone banking system, bypassing all security norms.

According to officials, with their technique the cheats did not need to steal an ATM card and PIN, or block the mobile number of a person to siphon money from their bank account.

Uttar Pradesh authorities have blown the lid off an ATM card syndicate that stole money from dozens of people with the help of bank officials and specially-developed technology

In fact, banks would deliver original debit or credit cards into their hands while the clients remained oblivious.

The incident comes against the backdrop of mounting cyber crime in India as technology penetrates deeper into even the most intractable corners.

As per Reserve Bank of India (RBI) data, 11,997 cases related to ATM, credit and debit cards as well as internet banking frauds were reported by banks in 2015-16.

The incident comes against the backdrop of mounting cyber crimes in India as technology penetrates deeper into even the most intractable corners

The modus operandi of the gang kicks-off with the leak of client information from the bank.

We have discovered the role of bank officials, who used to take screenshots of bank account holders information, said UP STFs additional superintendent Triveni Singh.

It has name of account holder, address, mothers name, date of birth, account balance and mobile number.

"These details are sufficient for the gang to target anyone. Screenshots of potential targets were leaked by bank officials to gang members through WhatsApp.

One of the cheats then called up a bank call-centre as a customer and choose the option of updating a debit card.

Here is the flaw in the system. If the caller does not enter the ATM PIN despite being asked twice then, to forward the call to a customer care executive, the system will ask the person to enter a nine-digit reference number.

"The system accepts any random nine-digit number. As soon nine numbers are typed, the call gets connected to a customer care executive who asks for basic details, which have already been supplied by bank executives to the gang, Singh explained.

Finance Capital: As India becomes more technologically advanced, the exposure to cyber crime increases (pictured - Mumbai)

After providing the account holders details, the imposter would request an upgrade for the debit card, which as per norms is done based on the balance in the account.

The customer care executive then clears the application.

To get the new card and PIN, the gang followed the same process and a member would call up the banks customer care department after a few days, complaining that he had not received his card.

After asking for some personal information, the customer care executive provided details of the courier company assigned to deliver the card and PIN, the officer said.

The cheat then called up the delivery firm and expressed urgency to collect the card. As the imposter had all the details handy, the courier man delivered the card to the person at the desired location.

The syndicate, which now had a new card and PIN, would go to any cash machine and change the linked mobile number so the customer would not get any alert messages on transactions.

About half a dozen victims have come forward so far with losses amounting to Rs 20-24 lakh. More cases are expected to emerge

When a request to change mobile number is placed, the ATM machines ask for the old number, which the gang already has. So, a member inserts a number which does not exist. Now they make transactions without getting tracked, said the officer.

The gangs mastermind was arrested in UPs Kanpur city on Wednesday and was identified as Dhiraj Nigam. He earlier worked with a debit card selling company in Delhi and knew minute details of the banking system, police said.

About half a dozen victims have come forward so far with losses amounting to Rs 20-24 lakh. More cases are expected to emerge.
Policeman in the Vaishali district of Bihar have been photographed dragging a dead body hundreds of metres after tying a rope around the cadaver's neck.

In the absence of an ambulance, the policemen were spotted taking out the dead body from river Ganga using rope.

The photographs exposed the appalling insensitivity of the policemen, who had reached the spot two hours after they were informed about a body floating in the river.

In the absence of ambulance, the police tied a rope around the dead body's neck and allegedly dragged the body for a few 100m from the river bank up to their vehicle

On Wednesday, the villagers in Vaishali district spotted a dead body floating in the river Ganga.

The police team arrived at the scene without any support team of ambulance or aid workers.

The onlookers were reportedly shocked when they tried to take out the body from the river.

In the absence of proper equipment to take out the dead body, the policemen tied a rope around the deceaseds neck and dragged the body for a few hundred metres from the river bank up to the spot where their vehicle was parked.

Villagers watched as they dragged the dead body. Soon, the footage and photographs showing callous attitude of the police started to spread online.

Vaishali villagers had informed the police after they a body floating in the river

By the time the news reached the top officers, there was an outrage among the villagers over poor treatment of the body.

Later, two policemen were suspended for the insensitivity shown in handling the dead man.

This is the second incident where Vaishali police has been seen ill-treating the dead.

A few years ago, in the same district, the police department had taken action against top police officers in Vaishali, who had reportedly thrown the dead bodies of ten people in the river.

These ten men were lynched by a mob in the village.

According to NDTV, the police officers had claimed that the bodies were cremated, but, it was found out that the bodies were thrown into a river.

Last month, images of a man in Odisha walking with the body of his wife on his shoulder shocked the nation.

The man, Dana Majhi was denied a vehicle to take his wife's body to their village for cremation.

Denied a hearse, he started his journey back home on foot with his daughter wailing and walking along side.
A Madrasa teacher and a tempo driver were stripped and beaten with rods by a mob of suspected 'Cow Vigilantes' in outer Delhi on Wednesday night.

The victims - Mardasa teacher Hafiz Abdul Khalid and tempo driver Ali Hassan - said they were going to dispose of the animals sacrificed for Bakrid along with a student helper when they were attacked by some vigilantes in Kanjhawala area.

They said they had received prior permission for the sacrifice from the local police.

The victims - Mardasa teacher Hafiz Abdul Khalid (pictured) and tempo driver Ali Hassan - said they were going to dispose of the animals sacrificed for Bakrid when they were attacked by some vigilantes in Kanjhawala area

The two men have sustained multiple injuries and are currently recuperating in a private hospital.

According the police, Khalid and the student were going to dispose the carcass in a tempo along with the driver, when they were stopped near Mundka Road at Rani Khera village by two vehicles.

Madarsas general secretary Qari Mohamma Lukman said in his complaint: The unidentified men were armed with rod and sticks and opened an attack on them. They were pulled out of the car and were brutally beaten".

The student somehow managed to flee from the spot as he was not wearing scull-cap and did not have a beard.

He came to me and told me about the incident following which I informed the police, Lukman said.

Bulls and cows are displayed at a cattle market ahead of the Eid al-Adha festival

Locals found the two men lying naked with a pool of blood around their bodies.

The victims were taken to Sanjay Gandhi Hospital from where they have been shifted to a private hospital in outer Delhi.

The families of the victims said they were being targeted.

The attackers blamed them for slaughtering a cow. But the fact is that we were granted permissions by the DCP, ACP and SHO for sacrificing animals, said a local.

A police officer said that they have registered a case under section 308 (attempt to commit culpable homicide) of the Indian Penal Code.

Sources also claimed that police are questioning four people for the assault, but no arrests have yet been confirmed.

Lukman alleged that in the past too, some locals have tried to disrupt madarsas activities.

The victims said they were going to dispose of the waste of animals sacrificed for Bakrid along with a student when they were attacked

We suspect involvement of few locals and have informed police about them. We guess that one of them called up gau rakshaks, who followed the madarsa people and attacked them at an isolated place, Lukman added.

The Madarsa is located in Block-Z of Aman Vihar, which is about four kilometres away from the scene of attack.

Around 25 children from UP, Bihar and West Bengal study in the Madarsa.
Wikileaks has tweeted an offer for founder Julian Assange to leave the Ecuadorean embassy where he has been a political asylum seeker since 2012, and turn himself in for a US jail sentence, if President Obama grants clemency Chelsea Manning, who is serving a 35-year sentence for providing documents to Wikileaks while serving in the US Army.

The Swedish government wants to question Assange as part of a rape investigation, and can't seem to do so at the Ecuadorean embassy, seemingly needing Assange to travel to Sweden (whence he fears he will be extradited to the USA for a secret trial under the Espionage Act).





Assange's legal team has released documents stating that his health is declining as a result of his long confinement in the embassy.



It's not clear whether US authorities are taking Assange's offer seriously. When reached by CNN, the Justice Department said it was not aware of any deal offered by Assange. As The Daily Dot notes, Obama has the power to commute Manning's sentences, and has granted 575 commutations during his presidency. Rights groups including the ACLU, Amnesty International, and Human Rights Watch also called on the president this week to pardon Edward Snowden, the former NSA contractor who leaked troves of documents detailing US surveillance practices.



Julian Assange says he'll turn himself in if Obama pardons Chelsea Manning

[Amar Toor/The Verge]
A massive intelligence operation is being launched in Kashmir to identify and weed-out the hidden leadership masterminding unrest in the valley.

The focus of the mission is to zero-in on the leaders and those funding the agitation.

With the army having launched 'Operation Calm Down' in South Kashmir the main focus of the intelligence operation is to isolate the ideologues and the trouble makers, sources said.

The focus of the mission is to zero in on the leaders and those funding the agitations

"This is a multi-pronged strategy. At one level, the access of funds to trouble makers has to be choked.

"Simultaneously, efforts are being made to ensure the contact between ideologues, handlers and the mischief maker is curtailed especially in rural areas, top sources told India Today.

Preparations were underway to create unrest. Separatist leaders in early June had begun travelling to South Kashmir and plans were underway to create unrest.

A Kashmiri throws back a tear gas canister at Indian security personnel during a protest after Eid al-Adha prayers in Srinagar

Who was Burhan Wani? Burhan Muzaffar Wani, popularly known as Burhan Wani, was a commander of the Azad Kashmir-based Hizbul Mujahideen. He was popular among the Kashmiris due to his activity on social media and posted many photos and videos against Indian rule in Kashmir. Born in Dadsara village, Burhan was the son of a Muzaffar Wani, a school principal and Maimoona Muzaffar, who gives Quran lessons in her village. Burhan fled from his home on 16 October 2010 and became a militant at the age of 15. He was killed in an encounter with the Indian security forces on 8 July 2016, which triggered widespread protests in the Kashmir valley. The protests following Burhan Wani death led to killing of more than 70 people while over 7,000 civilians and more than 4,000 security personnel were injured, which was believed to be the worst in the Valley. Burhan is considered a 'martyr' who laid his life for Kashmir's independence. Advertisement

"Rowdy elements at Mohalla level were identified and local leadership made initial payments. The false narrative of victim-hood circulated, soon after the killing which led to a spiral of violence, said an official.

With an initial go-slow against protesters and stone-pelters, the hidden leadership was further emboldened and spread itself wider, officials said.

Information flow was not directly through the Hurriyat leadership, but also from other channels across the Pir Panjal.

The Jammu and Kashmir Police (JKP) now have details concerning the key leaders of the agitation and their methods.

With the army having moved in to South Kashmir  the State police and the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) will be further strengthened and emboldened to move deeper into villages to curtail the operations of the anti-national elements.

Tral, the home of Hizbul Mujahideen terrorist Burhan Wani whose killing in an anti-terror operation led to the current cycle of unrest, is being strengthened by the forces in the phase-I of the operation to reclaim the territory.

The army and the police together had brought peace into the valley, in the past several years.

"It was then that several army camps were removed on orders of the state government in a bid to reduce armys footprint in civilian areas.

"That weakened the grid. Now the army is dominating the terrain," says Lt Gen (retd) Ata Hasnain, former Chinar Corps Commander.

Pakistan's Hafiz Saeed, leader of a Pakistani religious group addresses an Indian rally to condemn the killings of Indian Kashmiris

The presence of Army in Tral or Shopian, Kulgam or pockets of Anantnag- will send out a signal to the militants as well as the secret leadership of the current agitation.

The army will dominate these areas while the police and CRPF will manage the crowd.

The State government will provide relief as a part of the multi-pronged strategy.

There is a multi-agency operation currently underway to stabilize the valley. The National Investigation Agency (NIA) is probing Naeem Gilani, son of Pro Pakistan Hawk Syed Ali Shah Geelani.

"The Income Tax Department is probing not only SAS Geelani, but several other Hurriyat leaders.

"Several fake and shell companies are also under the scanner. The police is in control in urban areas and gradually moving back into rural areas too, sources added.

NIA tracks assets and bogus firms of J&K separatists

By India Today

Naeem Geelani, son of Syed Ali Shah Geelani, is likely to be called for questioning by senior officials for his suspected involvement in suspicious transfer of funds.

Intelligence agencies have found that Hurriyat leaders run eight trading companies to receive funds from Pakistan.

Huge amounts of cash were invested in benami (unaccounted) properties, intelligence sources said.

Syed Ali Shah Geelanis son Naeem is likely to be called for questioning by senior officials for his suspected involvement in hawala funds transfer

Intelligence agencies have also dug out the details of internet calls between separatist Hurriyat leaders and their Pakistani handlers as they joined forces in Kashmir.

The call details, intelligence sources said, establish links between the Hurriyat hawks and their handlers from across the border.

According to intelligence agencies funds from Pakistan reached the Kashmir Valley via Delhi.

Hurriyat leaders collected 'Azadi funds' worth crores of rupees sent by Hizbul Mujahideen chief Syed Salahuddin to fuel unrest in the Valley.

Earlier, India Today reported that Lashkar-e-Toiba chief Hafiz Saeed and Hizbul chief Salahuddin had joined hands to raise funds for fomenting trouble in the valley after the killing of Hizbul commander Burhan Wani.

Saeed and Salahuddin were collecting donations from across Pakistan to fund the troublemakers in the Valley.

As per intelligence sources, Syed Ali Shah Geelani and his wing of Hurriyat Conference along with ten district heads of the outfit are under the scanner for their links with their Pakistani handlers and their suspected role in fueling unrest in the state.

Funds raised in Pakistan and PoK are known to have reached the Valley through hawala via Delhi.

The funds were transferred from Pakistan to Delhi and from Delhi to Kashmir and again from Kashmir to Delhi.

PDP MP resigns from the party and Lok Sabha

Tariq Karra accused PDP of working with RSS

Senior PDP leader Tariq Karra announced his resignation from the party and Parliament on Thursday, accusing the PDP of being a collaborator with the RSS.

Elected to the Lok Sabha in 2014, Karra was a close aide of the late CM Mufti Mohammed Sayeed and was one of the founding members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

He had always opposed the idea of a PDP-BJP alliance and made his dissent known earlier also.

Every single day, Kashmiris are being butchered, fathers carrying coffins of their sons, hundreds being blinded and thousands being injuredKashmiri blood is being spilled on walls, lanes and drains of the valley, Karra said at a press conference.

He added:For the first time in the history of Kashmir, people were not allowed to offer Eid prayers. My apprehension that the PDPs facilitated RSS backed BJP will impose religious ingression stands vindicated today.
Two girls, aged 17 and 18, out on a walk with their boyfriends at a park in outer Delhis Aman Vihar area were allegedly gang raped by five youths on Wednesday evening.

The assailants also thrashed the victims boyfriends before tying them to a tree in the park.

They dragged the girls to some nearby bushes and took turns to rape them.

Two girls, aged 17 and 18, out on a walk with their boyfriends at a park in outer Delhis Aman Vihar area were allegedly gang raped by five youths on Wednesday evening

On Thursday, the police arrested four of the suspects based on the description provided by the girls and their boyfriends.

Police said some of the youths have claimed to be minors and their age has to be verified.

One of them is pursuing a BA through correspondence whereas the other four are school drop-outs.

The girls belong to the Kirari area and are factory workers.

One of the couples was cosying up when the accused youths approached the two couples and demanded that the girls should oblige them sexually, said a senior police officer.

When the couples objected to their demands, the five youths allegedly began assaulting the girls boyfriends with sticks, threatening to get them arrested, said the police.

A case was subsequently registered under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO) at Aman Vihar police station.

Subsequent raids led to four of the suspects being captured.

The accused have allegedly confessed to the crime and have revealed the name of their fifth accomplice who is still absconding.

Reacting to the incident, Congress leader from the area, Pratyush Kant, called for increased police presence.
so that they could 'become doctors'

Dana Majhi told reporters that the money would be spent on his daughters'

Dana Majhi drew worldwide sympathy when he was forced to carry his wifes body wrapped in sheets and on shoulder for 13km, while his heartbroken teenage daughter followed by his side.

Majhi was filmed as he headed towards his home from the hospital in Bhawanipatna town, Odisha.

Mr Majhis 42-year-old wife died from tuberculosis but hospital staff insisted that he move the body and that he couldn't afford a private ambulance, so he resorted to carrying her body himself.

Scroll down for video...

Dana Majhi drew worldwide sympathy when he was forced to carry his wifes body on his shoulders for 13km, while his heartbroken teenage daughter followed by his side

However, the widower was once again in the media limelight on Thursday after he received a cheque of Rs 8.87 lakh donated by the King of Bahrain.

I am relieved as a father now. My daughters will get free education, Majhi said in Oriya, at an event held in Delhi for presentation of the cheque.

I want one of my daughters to be a doctor so that she can serve our village. I would be happy if my other daughters could join the police force or any other prestigious government service.

Visibly shaken at the media attention, Majhi recalled how he was emotionally shaken when his wife passed away.

Dana Majhi received a cheque of Rs 8.87 lakh donated by the King of Bahrain (pictured)

I pleaded several times but no one was ready to give me a hearing. I was not provided a hearing by the Kalahandi hospital authorities because I could not afford it, Majhi said.

Clad in a wrinkled shirt and dhoti, Majhi said he had no other option but to carry the body on his shoulders.

Dana Majhi told reporters that the money would be spent on his daughters' education so that they could 'become doctors'

The farmer with a marginal income of less than Rs 2,000 a month was facilitated with financial assistance in the form of donations and government schemes.

Bhubaneswar-based school for tribal children, Kalinga Institute of Social Science (KISS) promised to admit three of Majhis daughters - Chandini, 13, Sobei, 7, and Pramila, 4, - along with funding his travel expenses.

I am going back to Odisha today. I need to take my flight back home, he said.

His travel to the capital was supported by KISS founder and social worker Achyuta Samanta who had forwarded his case to the King of Bahrain.
Last week, North Korea conducted its fifth underground nuclear test - and second this year - shrugging off threats of deeper sanctions from the United States and the United Nations in the process.

The test demonstrated a nuclear warhead that has been standardised to be able to be mounted on its ballistic missiles, the North Korean regime proclaimed in a statement.

The South Korean government also confirmed the test after recording an unnatural tremor originating from Punggye-ri, where the North has conducted four previous tests.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un (centre) talking with scientists and technicians involved in research of nuclear weapons at an undisclosed location. (File picture)

The latest test was the countrys largest to date, sparking worries that Pyongyang is making real progress in its efforts to build a functional nuclear warhead.

Estimates of the explosive yield of the latest blast have varied.

South Koreas military said it was about 10 kilotonnes, enough to make it the Norths strongest nuclear test ever.

Other experts say initial indications suggest 20 kilotonnes or more.

Assessment

The pace and tenor of North Korean ballistic missile and nuclear tests have undergone a significant shift this year.

Since February, North Korea has fired off more than 30 ballistic missiles with a range of at least 200 km, more than the number fired previously by the country, ever.

North Korean officials gather for foundation anniversary of North Korea

These more extensive tests should allow the North to convert its missile force from a strategic threat/showcase to an operational force that seriously jeopardises all of its neighbours, including China.

Assessment by South Korean and US intelligence is that the North is always ready for an additional nuclear test, South Korean Defence Ministry spokesman Moon Sang-gyun suggested earlier this week.

Last weeks nuclear test have reinforced fears in Washington and across Asia that Pyongyangs military advances could soon outpace the missile defence systems the United States and its regional allies have built up over the last decade.

Kim Jong-Un (centre) inspecting the fire drill of ballistic rockets by Hwasong artillery units of the KPA Strategic Force

There is a growing sense that Washington and its Asian allies could be in danger of falling behind as North Korea builds longer range and increasingly reliable missiles that expand its potential reach and threaten to overwhelm expensive and untested missile-defence systems.

Following last weeks tests, US President Barack Obama pledged to unleash a new round of sanctions on Pyongyang, but decades of economic punishments have done nothing to stop the North so far, and it is highly unlikely that more sanctions will make much of a difference.

Nuclear weapons today seem to be the sole survival strategy of the North Korean regime and so no amount of sanctions is likely to dent that calculus.

The North has also been angered by a US and South Korean plan to install an anti-missile defence system in the South and by the allies massive annual joint military exercises, which are still taking place.

The US has flown two supersonic B-1 Lancer strategic bombers over South Korea in a show of force, just days after North Korea carried out its fifth nuclear test.

B-1 bombers are capable of carrying nuclear missiles and bombs that are able to destroy even underground bunkers.

As has happened in the past, the international community has reacted with predictable outrage.

China said it was firmly opposed to the test, while Japan protested adamantly and the US president Barack Obama warned of serious consequences.

Kim Jong-Un celebrates as he inspects a test-fire of strategic submarine-launched ballistic missile

South Korea has taken an unusually harsh tone. Seoul has a plan to annihilate the North Korean capital if it shows any signs of mounting a nuclear attack.

There has been rising criticism within South Korea of the government as its attempts to isolate the North have failed to deter leader Kim Jong-uns nuclear ambitions.

Sanctions

Though the US says it is considering its own sanctions, in addition to any imposed by the UN Security Council, Japan and South Korea, Pyongyang response has been to laugh it all off.

It seems to have learnt from its earlier shenanigans that nothing of significance will happen.

After the fourth test in January, China agreed to impose tougher UN sanctions.

Further and even tougher sanctions are still possible, like blocking the export of fuel oil to North Korea.

But Chinas bottom line is that it does not want the collapse of the regime in Pyongyang if that leads to a chaotic power vacuum, possibly filled by the US and its allies.

Beijing also remains worried about the prospect of a unified Korean peninsula which will bring Washington right to its doorsteps.

Deterrent

As a result, the threat of further sanctions is hardly a deterrent to the regime of Kim Jong Un, as his military is thought to have a small standing stock of nuclear weapons, with some estimates placing the national inventory around 15-20 weapons.

Sanctions will not affect this stockpile, or the Norths ability to test.

It has also been suggested that as Kim Jong-un continues to consolidate his power, South Korea and the United States should expect that provocations will continue to be a part of North Koreas strategy.

Asia is passing through a turbulent phase with multiple crises brewing in different parts of the region.

At its foundation, these crises are about the changing global balance of power with Chinas rise and its strident assertion of its interests and concerns about Americas ability to manage this power transition.

Even in the case of North Korea, China has laid the blame at Americas doorsteps by suggesting that the cause and crux of the Korean nuclear issue rest with the US rather than China. The core of the issue is the conflict between the DPRK and the US.

The growing geopolitical rivalry between the US and China is manifesting itself in any lack of effective action against Pyongyang.

This will have grave implications for the future of global politics.
Sir Paul Marshall donated 3,250 towards Michael Gove's Tory leadership campaign

Groovy hedge Fund tycoon and devout Brexiteer Sir Paul Marshall donated 3,250 towards Michael Gove's unsuccessful Tory leadership campaign, according to the latest register of interests.

Gingernut Marshall, worth 465million, has hitherto been a big donor to the Lib Dems.

He once worked for late leader Charlie Kennedy. Perhaps he considers them a lost cause under weirdo Tim Farron, and who could blame him?

The saga over Tata Steel's pension fund (deficit: 485million) must be deeply distressing for the group's flamboyant Ivy League-educated ex-chairman, Ratan Tata.

Although retired since 2012, he was group chairman when it took control of the threatened Port Talbot steelworks in 2007.

Wealthy Ratan, 78, was awarded an honorary knighthood in 2014 by Gordon Brown. Unlike Sir Philip Green, there is no suggestion the honour should be removed.

Yesterday marked eight years since Lehman Brothers collapsed. Whither its odious chief executive, Dick Fuld? Once a fixture on Manhattan's social scene, Fuld, 70, is now a Fred Goodwin-style pariah.

Conde Nast voted him 'worst CEO of all time'. In the brilliant 2011 flick, Margin Call, Jeremy Irons used Fuld as inspiration for his character John Tuld, a nefarious bank boss who lays off half his firm while insouciantly polishing off a bottle of Castello di Monsanto chianti.

UBS analyst Patrick Hummel emailed clients this week pleading with them to vote for his team in an investment survey.

As an incentive, he asks them to identify from which vehicle an attached horn sound comes.

For each correct answer, the Swiss bank will donate 10 to charity. Several days later, another email: 'We got very few right answers.

It would result in an embarrassingly low donation for a good cause. So, 50 for a right answer, and we've made it multiple choice' Easier to just write a cheque?

Clever cloggs ex-Bank of England economist-turned Labour MP Rachel Reeves, 37, has been dawdling on the backbenches ever since Jeremy Corbyn's salty mob took over.
Sympathy: John Cryan the British boss of Deutsche Bank

You have to feel some sympathy for John Cryan the British boss of Deutsche Bank. When he took the helm of the German lender in July 2015 he found it loaded with bad loans and all manner of regulatory disputes.

Now Deutsche has been targeted by the US Justice Department (DoJ) for penalties of $14bn (10.5bn) over its sales of mortgage-backed securities.

The scale of the potential penalty is far beyond the money set aside in the banks accounts, and happens to be the same number as the 14bn (12.5bn) levy that the European Commission is seeking to impose on Apple over its Irish tax avoidance.

Deutsche trusts that the DoJ penalty is just a first draft and can be negotiated down.

If it really thinks that it should perhaps talk to BNP Paribas and Standard Chartered, both of which felt they were in with a fighting chance of defying US justice, but failed miserably.

It is a little hard to feel any schadenfreude about Deutsche Banks problems, even though Britain is on its way out of the EU.

The 72 per cent state-owned Royal Bank of Scotland and publicly quoted Barclays still have to settle their differences with the US over mortgage-backed securities. Neither British bank has put aside sufficient sums to cover industrial scale fines of the kind faced by Deutsche.

No one should underestimate the enthusiasm of the US authorities for making banks pay big and in full. JP Morgan Chase was fined $13bn for much the same offences, Citigroup $7bn and Goldman Sachs $5.6bn.

And Goldman dumped most of its mortgage securities before the financial crisis hit eight years ago when Lehman Brothers imploded.

The implications of the DoJ campaign for RBS and Barclays should not be underestimated. The two banks may be far better capitalised than at the time of the financial crisis, but penalties on this scale could punch a huge hole in their balance sheets and require new capital raisings. Barclays would need to speed up asset sales and might even have to sacrifice the dividend. So it is no small wonder that both shares tanked in latest trading, dragging down the FTSE 100.

Fining banks is all very well, except it is not the bankers, who caused the mess, but shareholders and taxpayers who suffer. US Senator Elizabeth Warren, who helped set up the US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau post the financial crisis, is outraged that nine senior financiers  including Stan ONeal of Merrill Lynch, and Robert Rubin and Chuck Prince of Citigroup  have never been prosecuted. All have been accused by regulators of giving false evidence and misleading credit agencies and the authorities.

A senior UK banker once told me that bad behaviour at banks would not be resolved until co-workers, customers and the public saw top executives carted off to chokey in handcuffs. That still has not happened.

Choosing Kim

World Bank president Jim Yong Kim has been a different kind of leader at the global development lender, focusing on pet issues such as health policy, climate change and responses to the global refugee crisis.

Along the way he has failed to win the wholehearted support of the Banks notoriously rebellious staff, stuffed with PhDs, or respected outsiders such as the banks former chief economist Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz. Despite the critics, and a declared desire by the executive board for an open selection process, Kim is marching speedily to re-appointment this week.

President Obama  who renominated Kim  seeks to make sure that whoever is elected his successor in November, the Bank remains in safe Democrat hands. Curiously Britains new, harder-nosed Secretary of State for International Development Priti Patel was quick to endorse Obamas choice, despite her harsh assessment of how aid money is spent. Britain, as the biggest contributor to the Banks poverty fighting arm the International Development Association (IDA), and with a magnificent aid budget of 12bn, could have made a different choice.

It looks as if Kim will be reappointed without challenge. He may well be the right person, but Patel needs to explain why she put a tick against his name so quickly and why other candidates, from the developing countries, were not considered. After all, Obama wont be around much longer to repay any political favours  as if he would, anyway.

Brexit notes

You may never have heard of Skepta, who has just won the Mercury prize, or his Grime music that comes from North Londons estates.

More familiar will be the last two Beatles, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, on the red carpet in London this week for a movie launch. But what all these artists and other talented souls have in common is they are part of creative Britain which last year notched up an 11bn surplus on trade with the rest of the world.
Chief executive David Potts, who has now been in charge for more than a year, has been attempting to revive the retailer's fortunes

Morrisons has notched up a third straight quarter of sales growth as the supermarket continues its turnaround under chief executive David Potts.

Britain's fourth biggest supermarket chain said like-for-like sales grew 2 per cent in the second quarter.

While over the six months to July 31, its pretax profits increased by 13.5 per cent to 143million as sales rose 1.4 per cent.

Morrisons' chairman Andrew Higginson said: 'The new team has made a real difference and delivered further good progress across the board in the first half.

'Prices are lower, customers are being served better and quality is improving.'

Under Mr Potts - who joined in March 2015 - the supermarket group has been cutting costs as well as looking for new commercial deals.

Morrisons this year inked a new deal with online grocer Ocado and signed a landmark agreement with US internet giant Amazon to supply fresh food to its customers.

Mr Potts said he is planning more improvements: 'We are pleased with positive like-for-like sales and underlying profit growth in the first half. Our priorities are unchanged. We have made improvements to the shopping trip for customers and we plan to do more.'

The solid results saw Morrisons shares top the FTSE 100 leader board in morning trading, up 7 per cent or 12.8p at 206.4p, with rivals Tesco and Sainsbury's also benefitting - ahead 4.3p to 166.0p and 3.9p to 239.0p respectively.

James Grzinic, analyst at broker Jefferies International, said: 'We had pretty hefty expectations for Morrisons interims, and they were beaten across the board.

'Progress in laying the foundations has been strong in recent months given agreements with Timpson, Amazon and Ocado. We expect more news to emerge on this in the months to come.'

But results were less impressive at high-end supermarket Waitrose - part of the employee-owned John Lewis Partnership - which today posted a drop in like-for-like sales.

Waitrose saw its sales fall by 1 per cent in the six months to July 30 as the stores group said it was having to respond to 'deep structural changes in the retail market'.

John Lewis chairman Sir Charlie Mayfield added that Waitrose would combat the changes by slowing down its new store openings and instead focusing on improving the stores that it already has.

As a result, John Lewis said it has written down property assets it no longer plans to develop for Waitrose at a cost of 25million.

The property writedowns caused overall first half pretax profits at the John Lewis Partnership to drop by 74.6 per cent to 56.9million. Excluding the charge, the group's pretax profits fell 14.7 per cent to 81.9million.

Cutting back: John Lewis said it had decided to prioritise sprucing up existing Waitrose stores rather than opening new ones

John Lewis said its commitment to competitive pricing, increasing pay and investment also held back profits in the six months to July 30.

Mr Mayfield continued: 'We have grown gross sales and market share across both Waitrose and John Lewis, but our profits are down.

'This reflects market conditions and, in particular, steps we are taking to adapt the partnership for the future. These are not as a consequence of the EU referendum result, which has had little quantifiable impact on sales so far.

'Instead there are far-reaching changes taking place in society, in retail and in the workplace, that have much greater implications.'
Icon: David Beckham in the new H&M advert

Fashion chain H&M has unveiled a new commercial featuring David Beckham as its tries to fight off a slowdown in sales.

The worlds second-biggest clothing retailer, which collaborates with Beckham on a collection, said sales in August rose 7 per cent, which fell short of the 13 per cent forecasts analysts were expecting.

The Swedish firm, which makes most of its sales in Europe, said the month got off to a strong start but sales were hit in the second half of August by hot weather in most of its markets.

It said net sales in the past three months totalled 4.4billion.

The commercial throws Beckham together with US comedian Kevin Hart to promote H&Ms Modern Essentials clothes selected by the former England star.

It is the second advert they have filmed together.

Beckham said: I loved shooting the first campaign with Kevin for H&M so much. We just had to do a sequel.
One of Britain's biggest car makers is planning an export boom outside Europe after Brexit as it seeks to boost profits from the US and Canada.

Honda announced the plan to reduce its dependence on the Continent as it unveiled its new five-door Civic family hatchback  the 10th generation of this popular model  with its Swindon factory as the global production hub.

The new strategy means the proportion of Honda cars exported from the UK to the world beyond Europe will soar four-fold, from just 10 per cent to 40 per cent of production.

Expansion drive: Honda is planning an export boom outside Europe after Brexit as it seeks to boost profits from the US and Canada

In a ringing endorsement of the UK economy post-Brexit, the Japanese boss of Honda in Europe says the car maker is firmly committed to building its vehicles in Britain and exporting them to the wider world.

Katsushi Inoue, Honda Europe's president and chief operating officer, said: 'The launch of this new model is very significant for the European region, not just because of the improvements made in the product, but also what it means for this factory here in the UK.

'The strategy of transforming Swindon into a global production hub was our plan regardless of Brexit.

'It was the plan before the vote in June and it remains our plan after the Brexit vote. There's no change.'

Honda is investing 200million to build the new Civic in Swindon, taking its total investment to 2.2billion as 'part of a long-term vision for the plant in Honda's global operations'.

Mr Inoue promised a 'clear and sustainable future role' for the factory as it broadens its export markets and horizons beyond Europe towards other growing areas, such as North America, Australia and South Africa.

A new Civic will come off the line at Swindon every 69 seconds, with about 800 vehicles produced per day  nearly half of which will go to America as part of the new post-Brexit export blitz.

Swindon, which manufactured its first engine in 1989 and first car three years later, also builds the Civic Type-R and Tourer.

Its CR-V off-roader will be phased out by 2018 as Civic production cranks up.

Honda has taken on 600 more employees to build the new hatchback, taking the total workforce to about 3,600.

Currently 40 per cent of cars built there are sold in the UK, 50 per cent exported to Europe and 10 per cent to the rest of the world. Now it forecasts that 20 per cent will be sold in the UK, 40 per cent exported to the Continent and 40 per cent to the rest of the world, mainly North America.

Honda announced the plan to reduce its dependence on the Continent with its Swindon factory as the global production hub

Mr Inoue said: 'We have a clear role in our global production network for this facility and we remain committed to our sales and manufacturing operations in the UK.

'In recent years, Swindon has produced cars for the UK market and for export to mainland Europe.

'It will now become the global production hub for the Civic hatchback, producing cars for the UK and Europe, but also for export to North America.

'The first units set sail for the US just four weeks ago and will be on sale there just before the end of the month.'

Full production for the UK and European markets will start in February with cars hitting showroom floors in spring. Pre-production cars are now being built for testing.

An aerial view of the sprawling Honda Swindon plant

The upbeat comments of the Honda boss are in sharp contrast to the Japanese government, which had warned that some of the nation's manufacturers may switch their operations from the UK to Europe as a result of Brexit.

Honda also stressed that being outside the EU did not create any technical issues on car specifications  it exports to 70 markets and already manages 548 variants.

Swindon plant director Jason Smith, who has worked at the factory for 25 years, said: 'We've been chosen as the global hub to build the new Civic for the world.

'There's a real buzz at the factory. It's the first time in a decade we've exported a car to North America. It's exciting times for us. We take real pride in what we do.

'The US is a fantastic, untapped opportunity. Currently almost all of our production is for the UK and Europe.
A new era of British industry was heralded in last night as ministers effectively spelled an end to vital firms being sold to foreign buyers.

The Government yesterday approved the building of an 18billion nuclear plant at Hinkley Point in Somerset, but promised to use fresh powers to block developer EDF from selling its share in future.

And ministers vowed to retain a stake in other crucial companies and building projects to ensure that they also are not flogged to the highest bidder.

Pledge: Ministers vowed to retain a stake in crucial British companies and building projects to ensure that they also are not flogged to the highest bidder

This is similar to the Golden Share that the UK has in Rolls-Royce and defence firm BAE Systems, which prevents them from being sold.

And it will stop embarrassing scandals such as when America stepped in  on the grounds of its national security in the wake of 9/11  when P&O's UK ports were sold to Dubai Ports World in 2006.

Although the Government would not reveal which other projects it could assert its influence over to stop a sale, it is thought major infrastructure projects in the pipeline could be affected.

This could include the HS2 high-speed rail link and its sister scheme HS3, which would run across the trans-Pennines.

Crossrail 2, which would run north to south in London, and a new runway in the south of England may also be considered. Also on the agenda could be another nuclear power plant at Bradwell in Essex.

This facility has already been a source of controversy as under the Hinkley agreement the UK said China could build a reactor using its own technology, with one-third owned by EDF.

Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Secretary Greg Clark said it would 'remedy the weaknesses' of the regime for foreign ownership of the country's critical infrastructure.

Under the arrangement for Hinkley, the Government in principle has the power to ensure EDF does not sell all its stake to the Chinese.

The project had been put on hold in July by the Prime Minister over security concerns about Chinese involvement.

The Golden Share decision was given the backing of Vincent de Rivaz, chief executive of EDF Energy.

He said it made sense for the Government to have a special share in future projects and added that while selling the EDF stake was not on the agenda, he agreed the UK should have the final say.

'The solution makes a lot of sense and we have a lot of sympathy for the process which has been carried out,' he added. 'It is a great day for Britain, for customers and for industry.'

The final approval of Hinkley is a major boost to a number of UK companies involved.

More than 1.3billion of contracts have been handed out, many to firms such as Kier, Balfour Beatty and Laing O'Rourke, which will be involved in site development. Construction group Kier already has 350 people working on the Hinkley site creating road networks and excavating 5.6m cubic metres of earth.

Chief executive Haydn Mursell said the decision marked a 'major step' in the UK's energy renaissance, but that it also underscored the intention to work on future projects.


The storied Walt Disney Family Museum hosts Imagineer Kim Irvine, former Disney lead Twitter writer Ed Squair, and Winchester Mystery House manager Walter Magnuson in a panel on Oct 15, discussing the origins of the Disneyland Haunted Mansion, a subject near and dear to my heart.

Walt Disney first announced his plans to add a haunted house-style attraction to Disneyland in 1958, but the Haunted Mansion didn't open until a full eleven years later. It is believed to be the last attraction Walt had a hand in before his death in 1966. But, what happened in between conception and the Mansion's opening in 1969? Take a look at the evolution of the attraction under Walt's tutelage from a scare-a-minute walk-through to the creepy but comical Doom Buggy ride we all know and love. Join Imagineer Kim Irvine, Walt Disney Company alum Ed Squair, and Winchester Mystery House General Manager Walter Magnuson for a discussion on Walt's influence on this adored attraction and the three scripts developed by his original "Illusioneers": Ken Anderson, Marc Davis and X. Atencio.
What a turnaround weve seen at Premier African Minerals, led by the doughty George Roach.

The shares, which had taken a bit of a biffing amid teething problems at its Zimbabwe tungsten project, have risen phoenix-like (well, 42 per cent) in the last week.

The reason? The company has talked about possibly spinning out as a separate entity its Zulu lithium project, which is also in Zimbabwe.

Future: Billionaire Elon Musk has created a buzz with his plans for a $5billion Tesla Gigafactory in the desert of Nevada that will eventually churn out 500,000 lithium ion batteries a year

Lithium is the hot space to be in at the moment. Billionaire Elon Musk has created a buzz with his plans for a $5billion Tesla Gigafactory in the desert of Nevada that will eventually churn out 500,000 of lithium ion batteries a year.

The giant plant is also expected to suck in all of North Americas supplies of the metal. So new projects that help sate growing world demand are always well received.

Advising Premier African on how to get the most out of the Zulu asset is none other than David Lenigas. A Marmite figure in the City, he is an arch-promoter who has significant experience in the lithium field garnered with Rare Earth Minerals and Bacanora.

Turning to the wider market, there has been a kind of back to school feel to the AIM market this week with trading volumes steadily increasing from the late summer lull.

That said, the FTSE AIM All Share was almost static. There was more life in the FTSE AIM 100 which fared better, advancing almost 1 per cent.

Both outperformed the index of blue chip shares, which was finishing the week around 0.8 per cent lower.

Sticking with the risers, there was a lot of speculative interest in Wishbone Gold, which has risen 50 per cent in the past five trading days, and Cluff Natural Resources, which topped the weekly risers list.

The latter, run by the natural resource sector veteran, Algy Cluff, has advanced 340 per cent in a month after announcing a significant North Sea resource upgrade.

Kibo Mining has also enjoyed a decent run, adding 35 per cent. On Friday it inked an outline deal with US industrial giant GE, which would see the pair develop the Mbeya coal-to-power project in Tanzania.

Kibo is the gift that keeps on giving having advanced 174 per cent over the last six months.

One to keep an eye on is Redx Pharma, which seems to be gaining some traction with investors.

It is developing the next-generation Porcupine inhibitor, a potential breakthrough in treating cancer, and its work is being noticed by some of the industry movers and shakers.

Looking at the losers, it has been another awful week for Xcite Energy, which tumbled 67 per cent in that time and has lost almost 90 per cent of its value over the last year.

Gloom: It has been another awful week for Xcite Energy, which tumbled 67 per cent

Precipitating the movement was a likely punitive debt-for-equity swap that will dilute existing shareholders to the point of being the most minor, or minority owners.

It is not the first fallen star of the oil exploration sector to tread this path.

Gulf Keystone Petroleum, which took its legion of investors to the moon before burning up on re-entry, is undergoing a $500million refinancing that will cede control of the business to the banks.

However GKP appears to be in a slightly better place at the end of this week, as it managed to land a separate $25million fundraiser which seemingly received strong support from shareholders.

For Xcite, whose shares were up strongly last week, any prospect of a generous settlement has been well and truly stubbed out.
Five years on from Britain's 'ill conceived' military intervention to dispose of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, ordinary people in Libya say life was better under the despot than the anarchy and threat of ISIS in the country today.

Crippled by power black-outs, a five-fold increase in the cost of food, salaries unpaid for months and the threat of terror, citizens who took up arms against Gaddafi now say their quality of life was better under the feared dictator.

They claim his execution has led to a power vacuum that has created 'six million little Gaddafis' and they no longer feel safe to leave their homes after dark.

Bleak: Libyans who hated Muammar Gaddafi say life was better under him. Chronic cash shortages, sky high food prices and the rise of ISIS mean people say the country is on its knees. Pictured: In Tripoli people queue at an atm for money

Riots: Many Libyans say that the tyrant's execution has created a power vacuum and nbow there are 'six million little Gaddafis' in the country. Pictured: Libyan women shop in in a market in the capital, Tripoli

Divided: Tebu Mohammed told MailOnline: 'Libya died with Gaddafi. We are not a nation anymore, we have become just warring groups of tribes.' Pictured: Colonel Gaddafi

Amid the chaos and lack of security, 8,000 African migrants a day cross the border into Libya and live along its coastline waiting to cross the Mediterranean to Europe.

'I joined the revolution in the first days and fought against Gaddafi,' former revolutionary fighter Mohammed, 31, told MailOnline, from the southern city of Murzuq.

'Before 2011 I hated Gaddafi more than anyone. But now, life is much, much harder, and I have become his biggest fan.'

Taxi driver Mahmoud added: 'Before Libya was much better.'

Oil worker Haroun, 41, said: 'Getting rid of Gaddafi was clearly a mistake because we weren't ready for democracy and we needed support from the international community, which just wasn't there.'

Activist Fadiel added: 'It should be better than Gaddafi's time now but, because of the chaos and everyone fighting each other, it's just a mess.'

It should be better than Gaddafi's time now but, because of the chaos and everyone fighting each other, it's just a mess. Fadiel, activist

Their comments echo the findings of influential British politicians who have condemned former Prime Minister David Cameron's 'chaotic' 2011 intervention in Libya.

In a devastating verdict, the House of Commons foreign affairs committee this week savaged former prime minister David Cameron's judgement in rushing to war - and said the intervention was based on 'erroneous assumptions'.

An international coalition led by Britain and France launched strikes against Gaddafi's forces in March 2011 after the regime threatened to attack the rebel-held city of Benghazi.

Cameron claimed the intervention was necessary to prevent a massacre of civilians, but the new report says that, despite appalling human rights abuses over 40 years, Gaddafi had no record of large-scale attacks on Libyan civilians.

However the cross-party committee accused the Conservative of ignoring military chiefs and a lack of reliable intelligence to pursue an 'opportunistic policy of regime change' in Libya.

It says Cameron gave little thought to how Libya would fare following the removal of dictator Gaddafi, setting the scene for the country's descent into chaos.

Chaos: Amid the mayhem, security on Libya's borders has lapsed, making them porous to 8,000 African migrants crossing the border daily and heading to Europe. Pictured: A rebel fighter prepares to tow a government vehicle hit by a NATO airstrike near Brega in 2011

Fears: Military action has led to the rise of Islamic extremism, which Gaddafi's intelligence services previously oppressed. Pictured: Forces loyal to Libya's government in Sirte

Smuggling: Masses of migrants congregate on the country's vast Mediterranean coastline waiting for boats to take them to Europe, leaving them vulnerable to extremists and traffickers. Pictured: Libyan coastguard pulls a boat carrying illegal African migrants in Tripoli

Libyans today confirmed to the politicians' findings to MailOnline as they have described their daily battles to survive.

Ordinary people now face daily electricity cuts of up to nine hours, a serious cash crisis, which prevents them from accessing their salaries and sky high prices for essential goods, and shortages of medical supplies.

Widespread corruption has also prompted the black-market rate for foreign currency to triple against the increasingly worthless Libyan dinar.

Nuri, 34, a businessman from Tripoli added: 'It's not so much about being pro-Gaddafi because he was a crazy leader who was actually quite embarrassing internationally.

'It's just that people's lives are so difficult now compared to under Gaddafi.'

The situation is so bad some Libyans, previously among the richest people in the Arab world, are considering fleeing the country on migrant boats to start a new life in Europe.

Medical student Salem, 26, from Tripoli, said; 'We thought things would be better after the revolution, but they just keep getting worse and worse.

'Far more people have been killed since 2011 than during the revolution or under 42 years of Gaddafi's rule combined.

'We never had these problems under Gaddafi.

'There was always money and electricity and, although people did not have large salaries, everything was cheap, so life was simple.

'Some of my friends have even taken the boat to Europe with the migrants because they feel there is no future for them here.

Oil worker Haroun, 41, said: 'Getting rid of Gaddafi was a mistake because we weren't ready for democracy. We needed support from the international community, which wasn't there.' Pictured: An African immigrant outside a well stocked shop in Tripoli

Condemnation: Those living in Libya echo the views of British MPs who criticised former Prime Minister David Cameron's 'ill conceived' military action to remove feared tyrant Gaddafi. Pictured: Goods outside a shop in Tripoli

'I would like to escape this mess and study abroad but I have been waiting a year for a new passport and, even when I do get one, it will be hard to get a visa because all the embassies left in 2014.

'So now I feel like a prisoner in my own country. And I have started to hate my own country.'

An ex-pat British housewife, who moved to Libya with her Libyan husband 20 years ago, says it is no longer safe to go out at night.

Sara, 50, a mother-of-one, told MailOnline: 'I used to walk home alone at midnight with no fear.

'But now I don't like to go outside alone after dark. I don't feel safe.'

As well as a lack of security the very fabric of Libyan society has broken down with provinces, towns and tribes retreating into themselves.

'Libya died with Gaddafi,' Tebu Mohammed told MailOnline.

'We are not a nation anymore, we have become just warring groups of tribes, towns and cities.

'Before, there was just one Gaddafi but now we have six million little Gaddafis.'

Successive post-revolutionary governments, parliaments and leaders have all failed to provide ordinary Libyans with basic security, let alone address their daily struggles.

'We have had seven governments since 2011 and what have they achieved?' asked Mahmoud. 'The only thing we can see is new dustbins because one of the early governments installed these new large bins across Tripoli. We still point to them and laugh, saying it's the only achievement of the revolution.'

With two rival governments, a democratically-elected one now operating beyond its mandate in eastern Libya, and the UN-backed Government of National Accord (GNA) in Tripoli, some say Libya is already on the verge of partition. 'The country is already divided. We have two governments, two parliaments, two Central banks and two National Oil Companies,' said former Libyan diplomat Abdusalem, 48.

'The so-called revolution was lies, all lies. We Libyans did not even know what the word revolution meant. We had been sheltered under Qaddafi for 42 years. It was not Libya's revolution, it was NATO's revolution because they wanted to get rid of Gaddafi.'

Judgement: In a devastating verdict, the House of Commons foreign affairs committee savaged Cameron's judgement in rushing to war. Pictured: Rebel soldiers fighting Colonel Gaddafi fire a Katyusha rocket at the frontline in 2011 near Ras Lanuf, Libya

Defence: Cameron claimed intervention was needed to prevent a massacre of civilians, but the new report says that Gaddafi had no record of large-scale attacks on Libyans. Pictured: Gaddafi's vehicles explode after coalition air strikes between Benghazi and Ajdabiyah

Riots have broken out at banks as people are forced to queue for hours in the stifling heat at banks to withdraw a restricted amount of money  equivalent to 219 or $290 - due to an extreme shortage of cash.

Many ATM cashpoint machines have not worked for months. Bank security guards shot and killed three people in a bank queue in May this year.

Banks have refused to issue businesses letters of credit for imports and shipping company insurers have classified Libya as a war zone, sending the price of basic goods through the roof. And food subsidies have been cut.

The price of basic goods including imports have gone through the roof as shipping company insurers have classified Libya as a war zone. And food subsidies have been cut.

Fadiel, from Ras Lanuf, told MailOnline: '[Under the Gaddafi regime] you could buy 20 loaves with one dinar but now you can only buy five, and they are smaller.

Cooking oil was subsidised under Gaddafi and cost 1.75 dinar per 1 litre but because of shortages, some businessmen buy it from warehouses and resell it for 5LYD. Bread and oil are the most basic commodities.'

He added: 'Hospitals are running out of basic medicines, for epilepsy and diabetes, and people are now buying them from private pharmacies at double their previous prices.

'And we are struggling to get our children vaccinated because of shortages, particularly in rural areas.'

As their dreams of a prosperous post-Gaddafi Libya lay in the dust most people say now they only want peace.

One said: 'I cannot see how there will be peace in this country for another ten years, but peace and stability is all that ordinary Libyans want.'

Meanwhile the United Nations special envoy to Libya has warned that there are some 235,000 migrants on the country's shore's preparing to make the dangerous Mediterranean Sea crossing to Italy.

In a stark warning at the escalation of Europe's migrant crisis UN envoy Martin Kobler said: 'We have on our lists 235,000 migrants who are just waiting for a good opportunity to depart for Italy, and they will do it.'

In an interview with Italy's La Stampa newspaper Kobler called for greater international intervention to restore security in Libya.

Opportunism: However the cross-party committee accused the Conservative of ignoring military chiefs and a lack of reliable intelligence to pursue an 'opportunistic policy of regime change' in Libya. Pictured: Cameron leaving his home in London on Wednesday

Tyrant: It says Cameron gave little thought to how Libya would fare following the removal of dictator Gaddafi (pictured), setting the scene for the country's descent into chaos.

The German diplomat said: 'Reinforcing security is the most important issue at the moment. If we have a strong and unified army... then the dangers of terrorism and human trafficking will cease.'

Some 128,400 migrants have arrived in Italy via the Mediterranean so far in 2016, representing a five per cent increase from 2015.
Actor Mark Wahlberg has ended his bid for a pardon for assaults he committed as a teenager in Massachusetts.

In 1988, a 16-year-old Wahlberg hit Thanh Lam in the head with a stick while trying to steal alcohol and punched Hoa Trinh in the face while trying to avoid police.

Wahlberg said he was high at the time and served about 45 days in jail.

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Actor Mark Wahlberg (pictured during the Toronto Film Festival on Tuesday) has ended his bid for a pardon for assaults he committed as a teenager in Massachusetts

He apologized and said he has dedicated himself to becoming a better person so he could be a role model and raised millions of dollars for charity.

His 2014 pardon application to the Governor of Massachusetts was met with sharp criticism.

Wahlberg did not respond to a letter asking if he wished to keep his petition open, so the matter has been closed, Massachusetts Parole Board spokesman Felix Browne said on Thursday.

'The Parole Board did not receive a response from Mr Wahlberg or a legal representative,' Browne said.

'The lack of response was effectively considered a withdrawal of the petition.'

Wahlberg as rapper Marky Mark in 1991, three years after he hit a Vietnamese man in the head with a stick while trying to steal alcohol and punched another in the face while trying to avoid police

Wahlberg, now 45, told reporters at the Toronto Film Festival this week that he regrets asking for the pardon.

'If I could've done it over again I would never have focused on that or applied,' Wahlberg said, according to The Boston Globe.

'I didn't need that. I spent 28 years righting the wrong. I didn't need a piece of paper to acknowledge it.

'I was kind of pushed into doing it. I certainly didn't need to or want to relive that stuff over again.'

However, he is grateful that the process allowed him to meet and apologize to one of his victims.

'Some good did come out of it,' he said.

Trinh previously told Mail Online he had no idea the man who attacked him in 1988 later became one of Hollywood's biggest names.

Hoa Trinh was assaulted by actor Mark Wahlberg in 1988. He told Mail Online until in 2014 he had no idea he was attacked by a celebrity

Trinh was grabbed by Wahlberg, who as fleeing another assault, then punched in the eye at the scene above

Trinh, a Vietnam war veteran who fought in the anti-Communist South Vietnamese Army alongside US forces, spoke for the first time to Mail Online about the brutal attack in a 2014 interview.

He dismissed reports the attack was so severe it left him blinded in one eye, revealing he had already lost his left eye after being injured during a grenade explosion during the Vietnam war.

Trinh, who changed his name to Johnny from Hoa after he emigrated to the US, also had said at the the time he would be willing to support Wahlberg's plea for a pardon.

He told Mail Online: 'He was young and reckless but I forgive him now.'

Walhberg, who grew up in the Dorchester section of Boston, started out as rapper Marky Mark and went on to star in movies such as Boogie Nights, The Departed, The Fighter and Ted.
A House intelligence committee report issued on Thursday condemned Edward Snowden, saying the National Security Agency leaker is not a whistleblower and accused him of leaking secrets that 'caused tremendous damage' to U.S. security.

The report also indicated that the vast majority of the documents he stole were defense secrets that had nothing to do with privacy.

The Republican-led committee released a three-page unclassified summary of its two-year bipartisan examination of how Snowden was able to remove more than 1.5 million classified documents from secure NSA networks, what the documents contained and the damage their removal caused to U.S. national security.

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A scathing House intelligence committee report issued on Thursday condemned Edward Snowden (pictured), saying the National Security Agency leaker is not a whistleblower and accused him of leaking secrets that 'caused tremendous damage' to U.S. security

The National Security Agency campus in Fort Meade, Maryland shown above. Snowden, 33, was an NSA contract employee when he took the documents and leaked them to journalists

The committee said while the 'full scope' of damage caused by Snowden's disclosures remains unknown, a review of materials he allegedly compromised 'makes clear that he handed over secrets that protect American troops overseas and secrets that provide vital defenses against terrorists and nation-states.'

Snowden, 33, was an NSA contract employee when he took the documents and leaked them to journalists who revealed massive domestic surveillance programs begun in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.

The programs collected the telephone metadata records of millions of Americans and examined emails from overseas.

Snowden fled to Hong Kong, then Russia, to avoid prosecution and now wants a presidential pardon as a whistleblower.

Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., chairman of the committee, said Snowden betrayed his colleagues and his country.

'He put our service members and the American people at risk after perceived slights by his superiors,' Nunes said in a statement.

'In light of his long list of exaggerations and outright fabrications detailed in this report, no one should take him at his word.

'I look forward to his eventual return to the United States, where he will face justice for his damaging crimes.'

Snowden's revelations about the agency's bulk collection of millions of Americans' phone records set off a fierce debate that pit civil libertarians concerned about privacy against more hawkish lawmakers fearful about losing tools to combat terrorism.

Democrats and libertarian-leaning Republicans pushed through a re-authorization of the USA Patriot Act last year that ended the program.

There was little evidence that the phone records or other surveillance programs Snowden revealed ever thwarted an attack.

Snowden is seeking a presidential pardon because he says he helped his country by revealing secret domestic surveillance programs.

Separately, all members of the committee sent a bipartisan letter to President Barack Obama urging him not to pardon Snowden.

Dinah PoKempner, left, general council for Human Rights Watch, listens as Edward Snowden speaks on a television screen via video link from Moscow during a news conference on Wednesday to call upon President Barack Obama to pardon Snowden before he leaves office

'The vast majority of what he took has nothing to do with American privacy,' said Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the ranking Democrat on the House intelligence committee.

'The majority of what he took has to do with military secrets and defense secrets,' Schiff said in an interview Thursday for C-SPAN's Newsmakers.

'I think that's very much at odds with the narrative that he wants to tell that he is a whistleblower.'

The Obama administration has urged Snowden to return to the U.S. and face trial.

Justice Department spokesman Marc Raimondi has said 'there is no question his actions have inflicted serious harms on our national security.'

Snowden was a 'disgruntled employee who had frequent conflicts with his managers,' according to the committee report.

Publicly revealing classified information does not qualify someone as a whistleblower, the report said.

Demonstrators hold placards supporting former US intelligence analyst Edward Snowden during a protest against government surveillance in 2013 in Washington, DC

The committee 'found no evidence that Snowden took any official effort to express concerns about U.S. intelligence activities to any oversight officials within the U.S. government, despite numerous avenues for him to do so.'

Snowden began mass downloads of classified material two weeks after he was reprimanded for engaging in a spat with NSA managers, according to the committee.

The committee also described Snowden as a 'serial exaggerator and fabricator.'

'A close review of Snowden's official employment records and submissions reveals a pattern of intentional lying,' the report said.

'He claimed to have left Army basic training because of broken legs when in fact he washed out because of shin splints.

'He claimed to have obtained a high school degree equivalent when in fact he never did. '

Snowden also claimed to have worked for the CIA as a senior adviser, when he was a computer technician, the report said.

'He also doctored his performance evaluations and obtained new positions at NSA by exaggerating his resume and stealing the answers to an employment test,' the report said.

Actress Melissa Leo and actors Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Tom Wilkinson and Ewen MacAskill are pictured in a scene from Oliver Stone's film Snowden, which opens on Friday

Speaking by video link from Moscow, Snowden said on Wednesday that whistleblowing 'is democracy's safeguard of last resort, the one on which we rely when all other checks and balances have failed and the public has no idea what's going on behind closed doors.'

The 33-year-old addressed a New York City news conference where advocates from the American Civil Liberties Union, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International announced an online petition drive to urge Obama to pardon Snowden before he leaves office.

The supporters called Snowden a hero for exposing the extent of government surveillance by giving thousands of classified documents to journalists.

Snowden insists he has not shared the full cache of 1.5 million classified documents with anyone.

However, the report notes that in June, the deputy chairman of the Russian parliament's defense and security committee publicly conceded that 'Snowden did share intelligence' with his government.
Rodney King's daughter was just seven when her father was beaten bloody by officers from the Los Angeles Police Department, sparking race riots that left 55 people dead.

But now in an extraordinary moment of reconciliation, 32-year-old Lora King joined a dozen LAPD cops on Thursday, hugging many of them, in an effort to 'build bridges' with the police.

She was there to join them in a talk to young people who have had their own run-ins with officers.

Rodney King's daughter Lora King (centre), 32, stands shoulder-to-shoulder with a group of Los Angeles Police Officers on Thursday in a meeting to 'build bridges' with the police

Ms King, pictured embracing Los Angeles Police Capt. Ruby Flores, was there to join them in a talk to young people who have had their own run-ins with officers

Her message was that it is more important to build bridges with officers than to stand against them, she said.

'That's actually what my dad stood for, so I'm following in his footsteps. He had no hatred in his heart for police,' King said ahead of her talk with about 50 young adults with the Los Angeles Conservation Corps.

King now works an administrative assistant at an accounting firm and is a mother to daughter Jailyn.

She said she has had her own negative interactions with police.

Despite that and her father's beating, she said a whole police department cannot be judged by the actions of a few.

'It is hard to trust,' she said. 'But it's not going to get anything resolved by hating.'

More than anything, officers need to listen to the community, and the community needs to keep an open mind, she said.

Rodney King died at the age of 47 after he accidentally drowned in 2012.

King's name became known around the world after he was savagely beaten by LAPD officers following a high-speed car chase prompted by his refusal to pull over on March 3, 1991 (pictured)

King now works an administrative assistant at an accounting firm and is a mother to daughter Jailyn. Pictured, Capt. Ruby Flores speaking during the meeting

King's name became known around the world after he was savagely beaten by LAPD officers following a high-speed car chase prompted by his refusal to pull over on March 3, 1991.

The attack was secretly videotaped by a bystander George Holliday, who passed the tape on to a TV station.

King was hit more than 50 times with batons and shocked with a stun gun.

He claimed as the officers beat him, they yelled, 'We are going to kill you, n*****', but officers denied this.

King almost died after the attack and only survived after five hours of surgery.

But it was the aftermath of the beating that made it one of the most notorious incidents in US history.

Four officers Theodore Briseno, Laurence Powell, Timothy Wind and Sgt. Stacey Koon were brought to trial in 1992.

The court case had been moved to the predominantly white suburb of Simi Valley, California and on April 29, and no member of the jury was black.

King was hit more than 50 times with batons and shocked with a stun gun. Pictured, Lora King speaking to a group of young people

The 1992 riots that followed lasted three days and left 55 people dead, more than 2,000 injured and swaths of Los Angeles on fire. Pictured, Ms King and Los Angeles Police Officer Rashad Sharif (left)

Three of the officers was were acquitted while a mistrial was declared for the fourth.

His beating was also the touchstone for one of the most destructive race riots in the nation's history.

The 1992 riots lasted three days and left 55 people dead, more than 2,000 injured and swaths of Los Angeles on fire.

At the height of the violence, King pleaded on television: 'Can we all get along?'

Stacey Koon and Laurence Powell were later convicted of federal civil rights violations and served 30 months in prison.

Lora King said her father's beating was an eye-opener at the time, 'but it's like everyone dozed off again.'

Concern over police tactics has been mounting in recent years in the wake of a number of deaths of unarmed black men at the hands of officers across the country.

Police have increasingly become targets themselves, most notably when a sniper killed five officers in Dallas in July.

King sat next to LAPD officers as they spoke with young adults about interacting with police, discussing what they can do to help diffuse situations and how police can improve.

Rodney King (pictured in April 2012) died at the age of 47 after he accidentally drowned

Lovis Bell, 23, talks about his own experience with the Los Angeles Police Department at a meeting in downtown Los Angeles Thursday

Outnumbered by rioters, LA Police drew back from the riots which many believe contributed to the count of 55 people dead, more than 2,000 injured

Lovis Bell was among them. The 23-year-old landscaper first learned of Rodney King's beating when he was 14.

Bell was slammed up against a gate by police, leaving scars on his chest, which he believes was racially motivated.

But Bell said Lora King's message was powerful and struck a chord.

'I'm still mad, but there's no point,' he said. 'There's no room for hate inside my heart.'

Senior Lead Officer Rashad Sharif was still a rookie with LAPD when King was beaten and was in the thick of the riots the following year.

He said Lora King's willingness to join the department to reach out to young people shows just how much LAPD has evolved in the past 25 years.

'That's a lot of courage to come here and be like, "That's the same uniform that put my dad in the hospital,"' Sharif said. 'Having her here is like full circle ... I just wish I could have met her dad to say, "Hey, I'm sorry, too."'
Four months after the crash, the 28-year-old has turned himself in and his mugshot shows horrific burns,his n

A drunk driver who suffered terrible burns in a fiery crash which killed three his three passengers, has turned himself.

Terrell 'Russ' Barclay's shocking mugshot shows the 28-year-old wearing bandages and a neck brace, with horrific burn scars covering his face.

Burns were also visible on his arms and neck as he shuffled into court, with the help of a walker, to appear before District Judge Patricia Broscius on Wednesday on charges of causing death while driving under the influence.

Barclay had been more than double the legal alcohol limit when he lost control of his car which smashed into a row of parked vehicles before bursting into flames, in the early hours of May 6 in Lehigh Valley, New York.

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Terrell 'Russ' Barclay's shocking mugshot shows the 28-year-old covered in bandages, wearing a neck brace, and with severe burns to his face

Barclay had been more than double the legal alcohol limit when he lost control of his car which smashed into a row of parked vehicles before bursting into flames,

His passengers Ashlee Mosher, 29, Amanda Martin, 26, and 28-year-old Joshua Edwards were all killed in the crash while Barclay was seriously injured after he caught on fire in the blaze, The Morning Call reports.

A police officer estimated the car was going 100 mph moments before the wreck.

The suspect was able to run from the car and when emergency services arrived at the scene.

Barclay was taken to Lehigh Valley Hospital where he spent the next two months in a medically induced coma before being transferred to an Easton rehabilitation center.

Video Courtesy WFMZ

Barclay, pictured before the crash, was able to run from fiery crash but had to be put into a medically induced coma for two months following the smash

The 28-year-old, left and right before the crash, has appeared before District Judge Patricia Broscius on Wednesday on charges of causing death while driving under the influence

But he left the center before police had the chance to charge him earlier this month.

After turning himself in, he has been charged with homicide by vehicle while under the influence, accidents involving death with a suspended license, drunken driving, illegal possession of a firearm by a felon and other offenses.

Freemansburg police officer Jeff Farneski had been travelling on Freemnansburg Avenue when the car sped past 'at a significant high rate of speed and driving erratic,' he said.

The cop gave chase and as he turned the road he saw Barclay's rented 2015 Chrysler 200 sedan crash.

By the time he reached the scene, both the car and a pick up truck it crashed into were on fire.

Barclay was screaming in pain and rolling around on the floor as he desperately tried to extinguish the flames on himself.

Another police officer Mark Demetrovic tried to check the car for others but said he couldn't see anything in the intense inferno.

Passengers Ashlee Mosher, 29, (left and right) Amanda Martin, 26, and 28-year-old Joshua Edwards were all killed in the crash

Police found a bag of marijuana on Barclay and a stolen gun was recovered from near the car.

Barclay was also found to have traces of marijuana's active ingredient THC in his blood and an alcohol-blood level of 0.19 - more than double the legal limit.

He had been driving without a license at the time of the crash after it was suspended following a separate DUI.

Authorities traced the .40-caliber Taurus Millennium to an April 20 theft in Plainfield Township.

Jacob Csilinko, charged with stealing the weapon, told the police he'd sold the weapon to Barclay for $100 at the Scottish Inn in Hanover Township, Lehigh County.

Barclay's passengers were also traced to the hotel room - which Martin had rented - where police later seized drugs and cellphones.

All four passengers and driver appeared to know each other and Mosher, a mother-of-four who worked at the Dunkin' Donuts, was friends with Barclay on Facebook.

Friends described Mosher as an excellent mother who would do anything for her children.
A local council has come under fire for refusing to acknowledge Aboriginal people as the traditional owners of the land, because it's 'divisive' and too politically correct.

The Hills Shire Council, which covers much of Sydney's western suburbs, has refused to adopt the practice of performing an 'acknowledgement of country' at its meetings, despite being specifically asked to do so by local elders.

Councillors were asked by the Darug people to update the code for their regular meetings to include the basic acknowledgement.

The Hills Shire Council has rejected a decision to acknowledge traditional Aboriginal owners of the land with a statement at each council meeting. The majority of councillors said it was too 'divisive', despite larger 'Welcome to Country' ceremonies (pictured) being common

However the proposal was rejected on Tuesday night by a majority of councillors despite it being common place at most other councils, the Sydney Morning Herald reports.

Seven Liberal councillors on the 11 member council rejected the motion to introduce a simple sentence saying that 'Council acknowledges that this meeting is being held on the traditional lands of the Darug people'.

Hills Shire Councillor Mike Thomas (pictured) defended the decision to reject performing an 'acknowledgement of country' ceremony

Defending their decision, councillor Mike Thomas said he had been 'troubled' by the proposal.

'I'm unconvinced by the argument for it. I'm told it's inclusive but to say it's inclusive is to say they're being left out at the moment,' Cr Thomas told Daily Mail Australia.

'When it's the opposite were talking about one culture based on race  that troubles me.

'We don't tolerate divisions on race, religion or gender.

'We're a very intelligent council. Three of the councillors have doctorates, most have a graduate or post-graduate degree - we're all very intelligent people, at least on the Liberal side.'

Cr Thomas said the council's decision had the 'overwhelming support of the community'.

'Acknowledgement of Country' are common at both state and federal level (pictured). The New South Wales government says an 'Acknowledgement of Country ceremony should be undertaken' as a minimum

However Darug elder Ros Fogg said both she and the Darug people had been 'very disappointed' by the decision.

'This is a really big issue of recognition,' Ms Fogg said.

'If we can't recognise there are still Darug people living on Darug country, that's a shame.'
Justin Corbett had been charged with first-degree murder in the 2012 death of Evan Dudley

A mother is outraged and feels justice was 'absolutely not served' after a former airman received probation on Thursday for his involvement in the death of her toddler son who was left in his care while she was deployed overseas.

Justin Corbett, who had been charged with first-degree murder in the 2012 death of Evan Dudley, was convicted in July on the lesser charge of criminally negligent homicide in Delaware.

On Thursday, a judge at the Kent County Courthouse in Dover suspended a maximum eight-year prison sentence for 31 days time served and probation, citing Corbett's lack of a criminal background and his exemplary military record.

The toddler died after suffering serious injuries, including head trauma, from falling down a flight of stairs while in Corbett's care.

Prosecutors, along with the victim's mother, Nicole Dudley, had asked the judge to sentence Corbett to eight years behind bars.

She said that her son's life was stolen from her and that she is now 'faced with a life of nevers.'

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Corbett (pictured walking into court Thursday) was convicted in July on the lesser charge of criminally negligent homicide. A judge suspended a maximum eight-year prison sentence, citing his lack of a criminal background and his exemplary military record

Prosecutors, along with the victim's mother, Nicole Dudley (pictured Thursday outside of court), had asked the judge to sentence Corbett to eight years behind bars for the death of her son, Evan

The toddler (pictured above with his mother) died after suffering serious injuries, including head trauma, from falling down a flight of stairs while in Corbett's care

'Someone took my son Evan from me, and it was you,' Dudley told the courtroom while looking at Corbett. 'Today, I ask for the maximum sentence.'

Corbett spoke directly towards Dudley while addressing the court on Thursday, apologizing for what happened to her son, still claiming it was an accident.

'Nikki, I can't ever start to understand the pain you feel,' he said.

'I will bear the burden of this tragedy my whole life.

'I am truly aware of the pain this accident and I have caused you, and for that, I am truly sorry.'

The heartbroken mother is shocked that Corbett is now a free man after she thinks he killed her son.

Speaking to The News Journal after Corbett received probation, Dudley said that justice was 'absolutely not served.'

While addressing Corbett in court, Dudley (pictured above with her son) said that her son's life was stolen from her and that she is now 'faced with a life of nevers'

'You have a man who killed Evan who is walking free. The evidence speaks for itself,' Dudley said.

'I've been in that house and have seen those stairs. It's just not possible.'

While not his main career, Corbett and his wife, Aubrey, would occasionally watch the boy for his mother, also a Dover Air Force Base airman, as she was deployed in Qatar.

The arrangement was part of a family-care plan approved by the Air Force.

However, in the afternoon of November 3, 2012, Corbett, who was assigned to Dover Air Force Base, called 911 from his base housing home and told dispatchers the boy had fallen down a flight of carpeted stairs and was unresponsive.

Evan was initially rushed to Kent General Hospital where he was assessed and then transferred to Alfred I. duPont Hospital for Children in critical condition with head injuries and multiple bruises on his body, authorities said.

Addressing Corbett, Dudley (pictured above with Evan) said: 'Someone took my son Evan from me, and it was you.' Evan was left in Corbett's care while she served overseas in Qatar with the Air Force

He died four days later due to the injuries, which included a detached retina, excessive swelling and bleeding in his brain and numerous bruises on his head.

His mom, who had flown back from Qatar, was by his side in his hospital bed when the life support was switched off.

The state Medical Examiner ruled the death a homicide by blunt force trauma.

Corbett continued to maintain that the toddler accidentally fell down the set of stairs after being left alone briefly with another child.

But a lengthy state police investigation ensued, including an Attorney General's Office review. Then the case was sent to a child abuse expert and pediatric pathologist for review because certain injuries were noted during the boy's autopsy.

Both experts agreed Evan was a homicide victim, authorities said.

Several people described Evan to investigators as being 'healthy and normal' up until the day he went to visit the Corbett family that day, according to court documents.
A cyclist has suffered life threatening injuries to his hands and legs when he was hit and helplessly dragged for up to 15 metres underneath a large SUV before paramedics rushed him to hospital.

The man in his 50s was believed to be riding along the footpath on Stafford Road when a Mitsubishi SUV exiting its driveway struck the man at around 6.15pm in Gordon Park Brisbane's northside on Thursday.

The cyclist was then dragged between 10-15m and was trapped under the weight of the large SUV, according to police.

Cyclist believed to be riding on footpath was struck and dragged up to 15m under the SUV (Stock Image)

The man was rushed to Brisbane and Women's Hospital with life threatening injuries at around 6.47pm (Stock Image)

The man was trapped for a 'period of time' under the SUV and was rushed to Royal Brisbane and Women's Hospital with life threatening injuries.

Police and ambulance services were called at around 6.20pm and the ambulance service left just after 6.45pm. Police stayed till just after 8pm.

QAS units attended the scene and the Forensic Crash Unit are investigating the collision.

The 26-year-old male driver of the SUV was not physically injured.
A Queensland father who raped his teenage daughter up to four times a week over a two-year period told her 'not to tell her mother otherwise he would be put in jail'.

The 42-year-old, from Ipswich, was jailed for five years on Wednesday after he pleaded guilty to 46 sexual offences, including 25 counts of incest, The Queensland Times reported.

'It was a significant breach of trust by a father to his daughter,' Crown prosecutor Clare Kelly told the Ipswich District Court.

A Queensland father has been jailed for raping his teenage daughter over a two-year period

The abuse, which occurred while the girl was aged 13 to 15, ranged from simulated sexual intercourse to grinding, the court heard.

Ms Kelly said the man warned his daughter not to tell her mother otherwise he would go to jail.

The Queensland Times reported the offending came to light after the victim told her boyfriend and her mother became aware.

The girl's mother told the court in a victim impact statement that the teenager is still struggling to come to terms with the abuse and it had caused significant distress for the family.

Stephen Kissick, the man's lawyer, said his client was sorry and deeply remorseful.

The man suffered with alcoholism at the time, Mr Kissick said.

He was charged with multiple counts of rape, attempted rape, incest with a child under 16 and one count of maintaining a sexual relationship with a child under 16.

Judge Greg Koppenol sentenced the man to five years' imprisonment with a non-parole period of 20 months.
Lou Cabron writes, "Tommy Chong has a funny monologue about his 2003 arrest. When federal agents bang on his door and ask if he has any drugs, he says 'Of course I do! I'm Tommy Chong!' But that's just his way of making a point  that they didn't have a warrant for drugs. Their warrant allowed them to search for glass pipes. (Yes, they actually had a warrant to search for glass.)



"Chong wants his record expunged, in light of the fact that pot itself is now legal in many states. And if his petition gets more than 100,000 signatures, the White House is

required by law to officially respond to it."

"I think it has a very good chance because Obama has admitted to smoking pot," Chong tells THR. It also helps that Obama has issued 562 commutations during his presidency, hundreds of which have been for low-level drug offenses. Chong says his case could not be more low-level. "I was a celebrity bust," Chong tells THR. "[Authorities] basically entrapped me and my company by asking that we ship bongs across state lines. So when we did make a sale, they immediately arrested me and charged me with using the post office to sell illegal paraphernalia."

Pardon Tommy Chong

[Tommy Chong/White House]



Tommy Chong Seeks Obama's Pardon for Drug Paraphernalia Conviction

[Ryan Parker/Hollywood Reporter]
Up to 75,000 refugees are stranded in no-man's land between Jordan and Syria and have received no aid for months, a leading human rights group has warned.

They are trapped in a desert encampment known as 'the berm' with disease spreading and food supplies quickly running out having been barred from entering Jordan, according to Amnesty.

It says humanitarian assistance stopped completely when Jordanian authorities sealed off the Rukban and Hadalat border crossings after a deadly attack killed seven border guards on 21 June.

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Up to 75,000 refugees are stranded in no-man's land between Jordan and Syria and have received no aid for months, a leading human rights group has warned. Aerial pictures show the sprawling camp

Aerial photos show how the camp, near the Rukban and Hadalat border, has grown since December 2015

Since then, only one delivery of food aid was made in early August to more than 75,000 people stranded there, Amnesty International added.

Pictures show how the encampment has expanded in a matter of months while separate images show makeshift grave sites and burial mounds from those who have died there.

Aid agencies are barred by the Jordanian authorities from accessing the no man's land area and were forced to drop supplies over the sandy ridge (berm) using cranes, Amnesty has claimed.

Syria's neighbours, including Jordan which is hosting 650,000 refugees, have taken in the vast majority of people fleeing the conflict, severely straining their resources.

Abu Mohamed, who has been living in the informal camp at Rukban for five months said the situation there has sharply deteriorated since the 21 June attack.

He told Amnesty International: 'The humanitarian situation is very bad, the situation of children in particular is very bad. We have drinking water but hardly any food or milk [it] is awful.

The encampment has expanded in a matter of months and separate images (above) show makeshift grave sites and burial mounds from those who have died there

'Many people have died They distributed just rice and lentils and a kilo of dried dates, but that was all for a whole month, they gave us nothing but that. The mood among the people in Rukban is below zero.'

Local activists say poor hygiene, sanitation conditions and limited access to clean water are reported to have led to an outbreak of hepatitis, which is believed to be the leading cause of child deaths in Rukban.

Aid workers have also reported at least nine childbirth-related deaths since 21 June.

Amnesty says Jordanian authorities have repeatedly cited security concerns as their reason for closing the border, halting humanitarian operations at the berm.

Jordan's Minister of State for Media Affairs Mohammed al-Momani told the organisation that the area around the berm is 'becoming a Daesh enclave' - essentially controlled by the terror group.

He also called on the UN and international community to do their fair share for the refugees at the berm.

Jordan has previously welcomed refugees from Syria through its borders and carried out rigorous screening and registration processes prior to allowing their entry into the country.

The UN is reportedly negotiating plans with the Jordanian authorities to shift humanitarian aid distribution points just over a mile into the no-man's land area, away from the Jordanian border creating a buffer zone, to allow humanitarian operations to resume.

An aerial view shows a different refugee camp near the Jordanian city of Mafraq

Syria's neighbours, including Jordan which is hosting 650,000 refugees, have taken in the vast majority of people fleeing the conflict, severely straining their resources

It comes as a study suggested that the proportion of refugees and migrants arriving in Europe by hidden routes is on the rise.

Researchers estimate that 330,000 people will reach the continent this year by sea through 'overt' channels, normally across the Mediterranean.

This is a sharp fall compared to last year, but a report from think tank, the Overseas Development Institute, said these arrivals are only part of the picture.

The paper suggests that while fewer people will arrive this year on well-known routes, in many cases refugees and migrants may be taking alternative 'covert' routes.

It said the projected number of new asylum applications is still very high, at 890,000 by the end of 2016, adding: 'This large discrepancy between new arrivals and new asylum applications suggests that there are many people whose journeys to Europe we know little about.'

These refugees and migrants travel to Europe through a variety of 'covert' channels and means which can include travelling by plane using false documents, concealed in vehicles or by over-staying visas, according to the study.

A study suggested that the proportion of refugees and migrants arriving in Europe by hidden routes is on the rise. Migrants rescued from sea on the island of Kos, Greece

It calculated that at least 1.7 billion euro (1.4 billion) has been spent on internal deterrent measures including border controls since 2014, while go vernments have also committed 15.3 billion euro (13 billion) outside Europe on bilateral agreements and trust funds to increase economic opportunities at home or in neighbouring countries in an attempt to deter refugees and migrants from setting off on their journeys.

While effective individual national border controls have reduced the number of new, overt arrivals, they have not stopped the large movement of people to Europe, the report said.

Author Marta Foresti said: ' While on the surface, the number of people arriving in Europe has fallen, the rate of those taking hidden routes to Europe has not been affected and is likely to increase.

'These covert routes can be more dangerous and make it harder for governments to monitor migration and design effective responses.'
Kevin Garratt (left) was detained in 2014 along with his wife, Julia Dawn (right), who was later released on bail

A Canadian man arrested in China two years ago on charges of spying and stealing state secrets has been freed and is back home in Canada, his family said on Thursday.

Kevin Garratt was detained in 2014 along with his wife, Julia Dawn, who was later released on bail, in the northeastern Chinese city of Dandong, on the border with North Korea.

On Thursday, a bearded Mr Garratt arrived in Vancouver and embraced his waiting family.

The Garratt family also released a photo of the former detainee hugging his wife after he returned to Vancouver.

Before their arrests, Garratt and his wife, both Christians, had run a coffee shop in Dandong and were active in helping send humanitarian aid to impoverished North Korea.

Garratt was deported from China on Thursday after a court in Dandong ruled on his case on Tuesday, his family said in a statement.

'Kevin... has returned to Canada to be with his family and friends,' the statement said.

'The Garratt family thanks everyone for their thoughts and prayers, and also thanks the many individuals who worked to secure Kevin's release.'

The family asked for respect of its privacy 'in this time of transition,' saying it would release more information in the coming weeks.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau welcomed Garratt home, praising his family's 'grace and resilience,' especially that of Kevin and his wife.

'We are delighted that Kevin Garratt has returned safely to Canada and is with his family once more,' Trudeau said in a statement.

Before their arrests, Garratt and his wife (centre), both Christians, had run a coffee shop in Dandong and were active in helping send humanitarian aid to impoverished North Korea. Pictured with their son Peter and daughter Hannah Garratt

'The government of Canada has been seized of this case at the highest levels,' he added.

'We want to thank consular officials who work behind the scenes every day in support of Canadians abroad.'

The detention had raised tensions between the two countries.

The Garratts were arrested a week after Canada accused China of hacking, prompting accusations that Beijing was investigating them in retaliation.

A number of Christian organizations - especially South Korean - in Dandong are actively assisting North Korean refugees who have illegally crossed the border.

In late August, Trudeau said he had 'highlighted' Garratt's case in meetings with Chinese leaders during a state visit to China.

However, he stressed the aim of the visit was to establish a 'strong, stable relationship and ongoing dialogue' with Beijing.

Following his trip, Trudeau said that the 'hot and cold' nature of relations between the two sides was over and that ties had been 'revitalized.'

Garratt's release comes less than a week before Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang is set to visit Ottawa.

Canada's second-largest trade partner after the United States, China has strongly pushed Canada to join the China-backed Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. Canada said in August it would apply.

The couple moved to China in 1984 and ran a coffee shop in Dandong just across the border from North Korea

The United States and Japan - the world's largest and third-largest economies, respectively - have declined to join.

China's foreign ministry said the Intermediate People's Court in Dandong had ruled on Garratt's case on Tuesday.

'China is a country ruled by law,' it said in a statement, adding that Chinese judicial organs had handled the case 'according to law' and had guaranteed Garratt's legal rights.

In April last year a US geologist jailed in China for more than seven years after being convicted of trading in Chinese state secrets was released and deported to the US.

The 50-year-old, naturalized US citizen was released from a Beijing prison and was sent directly to the airport by Chinese officials for a commercial flight.

Last June a British businessman was granted an early release from prison in China.
There's increasing evidence to show that trees are able to communicate with each other. More than that, trees can learn.

If that's true  and my experience as a forester convinces me it is  then they must be able to store and transmit information.

And scientists are beginning to ask: is it possible that trees possess intelligence, and memories, and emotions? So, to cut to the quick, do trees have brains?

It sounds incredible, but when you discover how trees talk to each other, feel pain, nurture each other, even care for their close relatives and organise themselves into communities, it's hard to be sceptical.

There's increasing evidence to show that trees are able to communicate with each other

I didn't always feel this way. In fact, when I began as a civil servant with the German forestry commission in the Eighties, I knew next to nothing about the hidden life of trees.

It was my job to look at hundreds of spruces, beeches, oaks and pines every day, to assess their readiness for the lumber mill and their market value.

About 20 years ago, while organising survival training and log cabin breaks for tourists, I began to rediscover the love of nature I'd had as a six-year-old.

Next, I noticed that visitors were enchanted by crooked, gnarled trees  ones that I would have dismissed because of their low commercial value.

Forester Peter Wohlleben believes trees must be able to store and transmit information

I began to pay attention to more than just the quality of the trunks. I noticed bizarre roots, strangely intertwined branches, mossy cushions on bark . . . all kinds of wonders. Including, unbelievably, evidence of tree friendships.

In the forest that I manage (near the village of Hummel, east of the Belgian border), I stumbled on a ring of mossy stones, arranged in a circle about five feet across. They were an unusual shape, gently curved with hollowed-out areas.

Scratching at the moss with a knife, I discovered a layer of bark  these were pieces of wood, not stone. But they were hard as rock, and at first I couldn't understand why they were not decomposing, until I tried to move one . . . and discovered it was rooted into the ground, still alive.

What I'd found was the remains of a tree stump, the vestiges of an ancient forest giant. The moss-covered 'stones' had grown where the outer ring had been, and the interior had long rotted away completely. This tree must have been felled at least 400 years ago, perhaps much more, but it was not completely dead.

HOW TREES DRINK 200 GALLONS IN A STORM During a heavy storm, a mature deciduous tree can 'drink' a couple of hundred gallons of water, which is funnelled to its roots. This water is stored in the surrounding soil, to help the tree through future dry spells. Trees think ahead. A single tree contains millions of calories in the form of sugar, cellulose, lignin (which helps to make the structure 'woody') and other carbohydrates. But to insects and birds, a tree isn't so much a grocery store as a guarded warehouse, because the food is surrounded by a thick protective wall of bark. Trees think about security. Every day in summer, trees release about 29 tons of oxygen into the air per square mile of forest. A person breathes in nearly two pounds of oxygen each day, so that's the daily requirement for tens of thousands of people. Trees don't care about us  but we should care about them. Advertisement

It had no leaves, however. Without leaves, a tree cannot absorb nourishment from the sunlight.

Living cells must have food in the form of sugar, and they must breathe. The roots of the stump ought to have suffocated and starved to death long ago.

One possible answer existed. The other beeches around the stump had been pumping sugar into it for centuries to keep it alive, through their tangled roots.

Most individual trees of the same species growing in the same copse or stand will be connected through their root systems. It appears that helping neighbours in times of need is the rule, which leads to the conclusion that forests are super-organisms, much like ant colonies.

But the support they give each other is not random. Research by Professor Massimo Maffei at the University of Turin shows trees can distinguish the roots of their own species from other plants, and even pick out their own relations from other trees. Some are so tightly connected at the roots that they even die together, like a devoted married couple.

Diseased or hungry individuals can be identified, supported and nourished until they recover.

When the thick silver-grey beeches in my forest behave like this, they remind me of a herd of elephants. Like the herd, they look after their own, helping the sick and the weak back onto their feet.

And as those mossy wooden 'stones' revealed, they are even reluctant, like elephants, to abandon their dead. Of course, this cannot be done for every stump. Most rot and disappear within a couple of hundred years  which is not very long for a tree. But a few are maintained on life support for centuries. It appears to be the closeness of connection, or even affection, that determines how helpful the other trees will be.

It seems many species do this. I have observed oak, fir and spruce stumps as well as beeches that have survived long after the tree was felled. But it's not just silent support that trees offer each other.

Dr Suzanne Simard of the University of British Columbia in Vancouver has discovered that they can also send warnings using chemical signals and electrical impulses through the fungal networks that stretch under the soil between sets of roots  networks known as the 'wood wide web'.

These fungi operate like fibre-optic internet cables. Their thin filaments penetrate the earth, weaving through it in almost unbelievable density. One teaspoon of forest soil contains many miles of these tendrils.

Over centuries, if left undisturbed, a single fungus can cover many square miles and create a network throughout an entire forest. Through these links, trees can send signals about insects, drought and other dangers.

News bulletins are transmitted by chemical compounds and also by electricity, travelling at an inch every three seconds.

In comparison with the lightning impulses in mammal bodies, that is extremely slow. But there are species, such as jellyfish and worms, whose nervous systems conduct impulses at similar speeds.

Scientists are beginning to ask whether it is possible that trees possess intelligence

This might help to explain how swarms of insect pests are able to identify trees becoming weak. It's conceivable that some caterpillars and beetles tune in to the warnings flowing from tree to tree, then test which individuals are failing to pass on the message, by taking a bite of their leaves or bark.

A tree's silence might indicate that it is cut off from the fungal network, perhaps because it has lost its ability to communicate, and so is unable to prepare for attack or call for help. So not only do trees talk, insects eavesdrop.

Communication between trees and insects isn't all about defence and illness. There are also the feelgood messages, the perfumed invitations issued by sweet smelling blossom.

These lovely scents are not to please us but to attract bees, which come for the sugar-rich nectar and take away a dusting of pollen, to fertilise other trees.

And it's not just the smells: blossoms are vivid, gaudy splashes of colour. So trees are using displays of erotic perfume and dazzling adornment for sexual purposes  just like many animals and birds.

There's one more way that animals communicate, through sound. I was dubious at first that trees could deliberately make noises, but the latest scientific research is persuading me otherwise.

Dr Monica Gagliano from the University of Western Australia has been monitoring roots with highly sensitive apparatus, and believes they crackle at a frequency of 220 hertz, which the human ear hears as a low A note.

When this note was played back to seedlings, their roots tilted towards the sound. It appears they could hear it, and were responding.

You might wonder, if trees can talk to each other in so many ways, what they have to discuss.

Among beech trees, at any rate, the conversation might be about when to feed the deer.

Deer are extremely partial to beechnuts, which help them put on a protective layer of fat for winter.

The nuts contain up to 50 per cent oil and starch, making them more nutritious than any other food source. And trees make a lot of them  every beech produces at least 30,000 nuts in a year. It has to, because the odds of a beechnut growing into an adult tree are nearly two million to one. Do the maths: a beech isn't sexually mature until it's between 80 and 150 years old, depending on how much light it gets while growing.

Assuming it lives to be 400, it will fruit at least 60 times and produce a total of about 1.8m nuts . . . the minimum number it needs to be sure of spawning one new tree.

But why produce nuts only 60 times in 400 years? Why not every year? The answer is that the trees don't want to overfeed the deer, because big, hungry herds will strip the forest bare.

No sapling will stand a chance if the deer population explodes.

So the trees must co-operate, to ensure that they all withhold their nuts for several years at a time, and then simultaneously come into fruit together. The deer will have a feast, it's true, but the herds won't be able to rely on an annual bounty. Early human farmers spotted this

thousands of years ago. Like the deer, wild pigs gorge on beechnuts, too. Their bodies adapt so their birth rate triples, because they're getting enough nutrition for big litters of piglets. When the nuts arrive and the boars get fat, it's known as a 'mast' year.

The farmers would release their domestic pigs into forests during mast years.

The porkers gobbled the beech nuts, piled on plenty of meat, and had lots of chubby piglets. Then the farmers would round them up, and there'd be pork on the table throughout winter.

If you think that needs clever communication, think about how umbrella thorn acacias on the African savannah defend themselves against giraffes.

When they start picking at foliage, the acacias begin pumping foul-tasting toxins into the leaves to deter them. It happens in minutes, which for a tree is instantaneous. The giraffes get the message and move on.

But they don't go to the next acacia. They wander at least 100 yards before trying their luck again. The reason is astonishing. As they come under attack, the acacias give off a warning gas called ethylene that signals a crisis to neighbouring trees.

That triggers other acacias to dump toxins into their own leaves, as a defensive measure.

And the giraffes have learned that when one tree tastes bad, others in the vicinity will, too.

The exception is when the wind picks up and only trees downwind detect the ethylene in the air, and react. Giraffes know it too, and head upwind.

Elms and pines use a different tactic. When an insect eats a leaf, electrical signals travel from the damaged area to the roots  just as human tissue sends pain signals along the nervous system.

It takes at least an hour for the roots to react and unleash the defences, by flowing bitter compounds into the leaf to send the attacker packing. But something even more amazing is also happening: the tree identifies the attacker by its saliva. Armed with this, the tree releases phero-mones to summon specific predators, to prey on the insects. For example, elms and pines call on parasitic wasps that lay their eggs inside leaf-eating caterpillars, condemning them to slow, painful deaths. Trees are prepared to wait for revenge.

The main reason humans cannot perceive how clever and complex they are is because we exist in such short time scales by comparison. There's a tree in Sweden for instance, a spruce, that is more than 9,500 years old. That's 115 times longer than the average human lifespan.

A tree's childhood lasts ten times as long as ours. Activities that take us moments  waking up or stretching our limbs, can last months for a tree.

It's hardly surprising that most of us see trees as practically inanimate, nothing more than objects. But the truth is very different. They are just as intensely alive as we are . . . and for much, much longer.
BBC executives will no longer be able to walk away with six-figure golden goodbyes under a new blitz on fat cat pay-offs.

The Corporation has agreed that nobody who is sacked or quits would be able to pocket no more than 95,000  finally bringing it in line with the rest of the public sector.

The so-called golden-goodbyes have been under attack since George Entwistle, the former BBC director-general, received a bumper 450,000 pay-off in 2012 after just 54 days in the job.

Golden-goodbyes have been under attack since George Entwistle, the former BBC director-general, received a bumper 450,000 pay-off in 2012 after just 54 days in the job

The crackdown emerged on the day when the new Culture Secretary, Karen Bradley, published plans for the latest BBC Royal Charter. It includes:

Forcing the BBC to name the more than 100 stars who earn more than 150,000-a-year

Putting the National Audit Office in charge of scrutinising the BBCs accounts

A contest to become the chairman of the new BBC Board

Some of the measures triggered howls of protest from the BBC  in particular the requirement to name stars earning 150,000 a year.

Under David Camerons Government, the bar had been set at 450,000.

The Corporation will also be made to throw open its books to the NAO, the spending watchdog which scrutinises the Governments accounts.

For years the corporations finances have been dealt with by the BBC Trust and a commercial auditor, most recently Ernst and Young.

But the NAO  which has a reputation for being fiercely critical of Whitehall waste - will now have root and branch oversight on spending, including the BBC s long exempt commercial arm.

The move to include the BBC Worldwide department - which is responsible for CBeebies and BBC America, as well as selling programmes such as Strictly Come Dancing abroad  is understood to have been fiercely resisted by BBC executives.

The new plans were published after it emerged this week that the BBC had lost the Great British Bake Off to Channel 4

But ministers ruled that no BBC activity should be hidden from public view.

Mrs Bradley also confirmed the chairman of the new BBC Board - which takes over from the trust from next April - would be chosen by open competition.

Previously, Mr Cameron had handed the job to the current chairman of the Trust, Rona Fairhead, in a behind-closed-doors deal.

Earlier this week, Theresa May ripped up the deal and told Ms Fairhead she would have to reapply for her own job. She quit in protest.

In a sign of the tensions between the BBC and the Government, Ms Fairhead yesterday condemned the shake-up, saying that it was not in the long-term interests of licence fee payers.

Earlier this week, Theresa May told Rona Fairhead (pictured) she would have to reapply for her own job. She quit in protest

But Mrs Bradley said that, by driving down costs, the BBC would have more money to spend on programmes such as Great British Bake off  which it this week lost to Channel 4 in a bidding war.

She said: Licence fee payers have a right to know where their money goes. By making the BBC more transparent it will help deliver savings that can then be invested in even more great programmes.

MPs from other parties also told the BBCs managers to stop moaning.

The SNPs John Nicolson said: The danger for the BBC is that it will be forced to reveal the salaries of many of its more mediocre but overpaid employees, and that there may be some national teeth-gnashing as a result, when people discover exactly what goes on behind closed doors.

The BBC agreed to lower the cap on controversial golden goodbyes handed to senior executives, which last year cost the corporation 10m.

The payments offered managers in redundancy packages at both the BBC and Channel 4 are currently capped at 150,000 a year.

Mrs Bradley said the new BBC board would be made up of 14 members - nine of which would be appointed by the BBC, plus five which would be public appointments. Originally, the Government had wanted to make more appointments, including a vice chairman, but backed down amid complaints from the BBC about its editorial independence.

Ex-chancellor George Osborne legislated to cap public sector pay-offs, including those given to NHS staff and Town hall bosses, immediately after the 2015 General Election. It was part of the Tory Party manifesto.

According to the Treasury, 1,838 public sector employees received payouts worth more than 100,000 in 2013  which Mr Osborne said was unacceptable. The changes became law in May of this year  but the BBC had an exemption
News At Ten presenter Tom Bradby claims he and his wife Claudia will have 'to spend the rest of our lives with the curtains shut' if a property development opposite their 1million home is given the go-ahead.

Bradby  who is a friend of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge  has called the plan to build six new homes in the picture-postcard village of Houghton, Hampshire, an 'absolute abomination'.

He said one of the houses would be built 'directly opposite our bedroom', adding: 'One of the slight complications of living in a converted bungalow is that all the windows in the upstairs bedrooms are at above knee height.'

News At Ten presenter Tom Bradby and his wife Claudia have complained about a housing development opposite their home in Houghton, Hampshire

The traffic associated from the new property would mean 'headlights beaming straight in'.

The 49-year-old broadcaster, who presented ITV's coverage of the EU referendum, said in a letter to Test Valley Borough Council's director of planning, Paul Jackson: 'I am sorry to be a bit late in commenting on this, but I have been somewhat distracted by the complete meltdown in our political system.'

Describing the development site, Kents Orchard, as an 'important open rural space', Bradby says of the development: 'Passing it would be tantamount to saying you can build whatever you like wherever you like, even in the heart of rural England.'

He adds: 'It would be a quite staggering turn of events. It would certainly permanently damage what everyone acknowledges is an important conservation area.'

Bradby  who is a friend of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge  has called the plan to build six new homes in the picture-postcard village of Houghton, Hampshire, an 'abomination'

He said one of the houses would be built 'directly opposite our bedroom'

Tom and Claudia, who insisted this year that 'we don't see ourselves as a power couple', bought the house for 655,000 in 2003. They also own a flat in London.

Bradby warned he and other local objectors would try to refer the controversy to the Government. 'We have been advised that we should try to call this decision into the Secretary of State if this were to go through,' said the former political editor.

'We would certainly seek to do so because a core principle is at stake, not just for us but for conservation areas generally. I think we would probably succeed.'

However, his protests don't seem to have held much sway with the council. A report to the next meeting of its planning committee recommended the scheme be given the green light.

Thieves steal late wife's ring from grieving Hunter Davies

A bitter blow for Hunter Davies, who is still mourning his beloved wife, Georgy Girl writer Margaret Forster, who died in February aged 77.

Thieves broke into his London home and stole the wedding ring that Forster wore for more than 50 years.

When she passed away at the Marie Curie Hospice in Hampstead, a nurse gently took her ring and gave it to me, explains Beatles biographer Davies.

Author Hunter Davies is appealing for help after thieves broke into his home and stole a wedding ring that was worn by his late wife, Georgy Girl writer Margaret Forster (pictured)

Ive kept it safe next to my bed since, and Im particularly upset that it was taken.

Before we got married, Margaret would wear a pretend wedding ring wed bought from Woolworths.

'We would use it so we could go and stay the night together in a pub wed visit in Rye. After we got married, Margaret bought a new, proper wedding ring. It is irreplaceable.
Andreas Schleicher said the UK government was dramatically overplaying the capacity for grammar schools to drive up standards

A German education chief has hit out at Theresa Mays policy on grammar schools, saying only wealthy pupils are likely to benefit.

Andreas Schleicher, of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, said the UK government was dramatically overplaying the capacity for grammar schools to drive up academic standards and improve social mobility.

But his comments sparked criticism among campaigners  who pointed out that the OECDs own data has shown that the current system is failing pupils.

It comes less than a week after Mrs May unveiled the plans to open more grammar schools, pledging an injection of 50million to dramatically expand selective schooling in England.

Mr Schleicher is the head of education and skills at the intergovernmental forum, which aims to promote social and economic well-being around the world.

Yesterday he cast doubt on the grammar scheme, warning that focusing on grammars and selection was not the way to raise standards. He added that countries such as Germany and Switzerland, where selection is widely used, were not more likely to produce high-achieving students.

The Paris-based chief said there should instead be more investment for more schools that are more demanding and more rigorous.

Mr Schleicher said: I can see the case for introducing more meritocracy in the UK school system. I think the brightest students dont always get the opportunities they deserve.

But what happens in most European systems is that academic selection becomes social selection. Schools are very good at selecting students by their social background, but theyre not very good at selecting students by their academic potential.

He added: The fact that too many students fall through the cracks in too many schools is a far bigger problem than not having enough schools which are selective. The issue lies within schools, not between schools.

But Chris McGovern of the Campaign for Real Education, which has long lobbied for grammar schools, said the OECDs own data shows that the current comprehensive system has failed too many pupils.

It comes less than a week after Mrs May unveiled the plans to open more grammar schools, pledging an injection of 50million to dramatically expand selective schooling in England

Tests taken by 15-year-olds across the world show Britain is falling behind other nations despite the billions invested in education by successive governments.

The OECD-run PISA tests  the Programme for International Student Assessment  are based on maths, science and reading tests taken by more than 500,000 secondary school pupils in around 65 countries.

In the most recent results, published in December 2013, the UK failed to make the top 20 in all three core subjects. Mr McGovern said: Schleichers problem is that he thinks you can change the British comprehensive system. Its a pipe dream.

The curriculum is dumbed down, the teaching is dumbed down and the public exam system is dumbed down.

All of this has been the consequence of 50 years of a comprehensive system that fails too many children. It is a dead horse and we need to stop flogging it. It has caused us to be bottom of the OECD league table for social mobility but top for illiteracy.
The boat is currently moored in Scotland and is a popular tourist attraction

It served as the Queen's private yacht for 43 years from 1954 to 1997

Plans being discussed to recommission vessel 20 years after retirement

Royal Yacht Britannia could be used to conduct UK trade deals post Brexit

The Queens private yacht could be turned into a floating embassy to help increase trade around the world in the wake of Brexit.

It is understood Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson is considering returning the Royal Yacht Britannia to the waves as a great symbol of global Britain.

The ship, which entered service in 1954 and was decommissioned in 1997, previously hosted trade talks in the early 90s that reportedly brought in billions of pounds to the economy.

The Royal Yacht Britannia, pictured, could be turned into a 'floating embassy' under new plans

Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, pictured, is reportedly considering using the boat to conduct trade deals around the world post-Brexit

Conservative MP Jake Berry will call for a debate in Parliament on the plan next month and according to The Sun he has already spoken to Mr Johnson about it.

A source close to the Foreign Secretary told the paper: Boris is certainly intrigued by the idea Jake has floated. Britannia is a great symbol of global Britain.

Mr Berry added: In her latter years Britannia is estimated to have brought in 3 billion of commercial trade deals between 1991 and 1995.

During those profitable years, she hosted business figures from across the globe for sea days  on board trade talks.

Mr Berry said a 500million was secured on behalf of the City of London aboard Britannia in 1980 while she was in the Bay of Naples, and added business leaders would be unable to resist the opportunity to discuss proposals aboard the exclusive yacht.

Since her retirement, Britannia has been moored in the Port of Leith in Edinburgh and has served as a tourist attraction.

The steam-propelled yacht spent 43 years in the service of the Royal Family and sailed more than one million nautical miles around the world.

The Queen and Prince Philip, pictured aboard Britannia, used the vessel as their private yacht between 1954 and 1997

During its 43-year service she travelled more than one million nautical miles around the globe

The ship is cared for by charity the Royal Yacht Britannia Trust and attracts around 300,000 visitors each year.

It is understood the plans to recommission her would be funded by private donations and not the taxpayers.

The Mail previously campaigned for the creation of a new royal yacht to mark the Queens Diamond Jubilee in 2012, with then prime minister David Cameron backing the 60million idea.
This video appears to show the moment a Syrian rebel blows himself and his fellow freedom fighters up by taking a selfie with a phone connected to a bomb.

The footage, which has not been verified, shows members of the Free Syrian Army gathering around a camera.

The eight men are seen sitting in front of a rebel flag as they sing into a microphone, with two rifles propped up in front of them.

This video appears to show the moment a Syrian rebel (left, holding phone) blows himself and his fellow freedom fighters up by taking a selfie with a phone connected to a bomb

The 30-second clip shows one of the men picking up a phone and holding it up to take a picture of him and the other rebels.

A clicking noise can be heard moments before a sudden blast rocks the room, with flames and smoke obscuring the camera's view.

When the dust clears, the camera has been blown backwards onto the floor and is pointing towards a ceiling fan.

The rebels can be heard shouting 'Allahu Akbar' - meaning 'God is great' - as they jump over the camera to help their comrades.

A clicking noise can be heard moments before a sudden blast rocks the room, with flames and smoke obscuring the camera's view

When the dust clears, the camera has been blown backwards onto the floor and is pointing towards a ceiling fan

The fact that the camera was not destroyed and that the other men in the room appear uninjured suggest the bomb may have been smaller than others seen used by rebels and ISIS in Syria.

It is not known if anyone was injured or killed in the blast.

The Free Syrian Army is allied with the coalition of western nations - including the US, UK and France - in the fight against ISIS.
A grammar school has been slammed for handing out a homophobic maths question which stated God intended people to be straight.

The practice test paper was distributed to dozens of students at The Royal Grammar School, High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire.

It has sparked outrage among pupils, parents and gay rights activists.

The maths question said: If in a town, 70 per cent of the men are married to 90 per cent of the women (and each marriage is between one man and one woman, as God intended when he made humans male and female), what percentage of the adult population are married?

A photograph of the question was shared on social media where it was condemned.

The question asked people to consider a town where marriage was only conducted 'as God intended'

A maths question on the paper asked people to work out the percentage of married couples in a town where men were only married to women 'as God intended'. (File photo)

PinkNews, a website which champions the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) movement, said: A student at the school told PinkNews that several people had been shocked to see the homophobic question.

Another student on the Reddit social media site said that the questions on the paper were drawn up by a now-retired teacher who is a caricature of conservative Christianity, through the school is officially secular.

Headteacher Philip Wayne has apologised for the offence caused at the school which boasts former pupils including Transport Secretary Chris Grayling and comedian Jimmy Carr.

He said the question was set as part of an additional test for higher-level maths students by a former full-time teacher who retired a long time ago.

The former member of staff had continued to volunteer at the school and recently handed out the paper before the question was spotted by some students.

Mr Wayne told the Huffington Post UK: The first few boys  there were about 30 or 40 boys who came to pick up the tests  they noticed the question concerned and they reported it to staff in the maths department, so it was very quickly withdrawn by the department.

The volunteer will not be returning to the school.

All staff are expected to abide by personal and professional standards of conduct, whether they are on the payroll or not.

Mr Wayne said that pupils of any age at the school, that educates 11 to 18-year-olds, could collect the practice tests.

But due to the degree of difficulty, older students and more able mathematicians are likely to have picked it up.

He added: I am sorry on behalf of the whole school community of governors, staff and boys for any offence that this has caused.

Mr Wayne, headteacher of the Royal Grammar School, above, apologised for the question's appearance on the practice paper

LGBT rights charity Stonewall praised the school for dealing with the material quickly, but stressed the importance of tackling discrimination within schools.

A spokesman said: Its encouraging to see that this incident was dealt with as soon as it was raised, but demonstrates how important it is for staff to be equipped to prevent and tackle LGBT discrimination in all of its forms.
A brewery worker with terminal cancer was allegedly assaulted by a union representative at a picket line while he was on his way to work, CCTV footage shows.

Rob Frewen, 51, was pushed to the ground and sat on following a heated exchange allegedly with an unnamed Electrical Trades Union (ETU) organiser outside the Carlton & United Breweries' (CUB) Abbotsford plant in Melbourne during the early hours of Thursday morning.

The attack follows months of dispute at the brewery after the beer giant's decision to cut a maintenance contract that left 55 people out of work.

CCTV footage captured the moment Rob Frewen, 51, was pushed to the ground and sat on outside the Carlton & United Breweries' Abbotsford plant during the early hours of Thursday morning

The brewery's head, Gary Woodburn told Daily Mail Australia that the people involved at the picket knew about Mr Frewen's medical condition and had been encouraged to lay off him.

'Focusing on work takes his mind off his condition.'

Mr Woodburn added that the brewery and its workers had received death threats, threats to family members and staff since the decision to end the maintenance contract.

'We've been shocked at the escalation of the anti-social and unlawful behaviour that's been happening since June,'

'Rob is really open about his condition, he's a real inspiration about how he's faced it.

'I spoke to him shortly after it (the assault) happened and he was really shaken. He wasn't too badly injured physically but we made sure he got checked out,' he said.

He added that Mr Frewen, who has returned to work, is on anti-seizure pills and any impact to head can seriously hurt him.

The attacker, whom Mr Woodburn claims is 'a younger man', then holds Mr Frewen down and sits on him, stopping when a car drives into view

Mr Woodburn says about 15 people from the ETU and the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union have been picketing outside the brewery on a daily basis after CUB changed contractors

The footage shows someone appearing to grab the 51-year-old and push him into the road at 5.30am on Thursday.

The attacker, whom Mr Woodburn claims is 'a younger man', then holds Mr Frewen down and sits on him.

The assault ends as a car drives into view.

Victoria police say they have identified a man who they plan to question over the incident 'at a later date'.

'A man was pushed to the ground following a verbal altercation,' a police spokeswoman said.

'The man did not sustain any injuries.'

The attack follows months of dispute at the brewery after the beer giant's decision to cut a maintenance contract that left 55 people out of work

Mr Woodburn said the workers at the brewery were shocked and appalled at the assault, but it didn't come as a total surprise

Mr Woodburn says about 15 people from the ETU and the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union have been picketing outside the brewery on a daily basis after CUB changed contractors.

Large scaffolding has been erected outside the brewery, forcing motorists to drive on the other side of the road and Mr Woodburn says open fires have been set under wooden structures.

'We support lawful picketing but we expect it to be within the law of the land and that doesn't seem to be the case here,' the brewery head said.

Mr Woodburn said the workers at the brewery were shocked and appalled at the assault, but it didn't come as a total surprise.

'Local police have been helpful but their hands are tied,' he said.

'We're concerned that it's going to take something big before action is taken.'
As many as 20,000 US prisoners are going into their second week on strike against forced labor and inhumane prison conditions, though the US prison system has locked down the centers of the strike, denied all conduits for information, and put the leadership into solitary confinement.



The strike commemorates the anniversary of the Attica Prison Uprising, and though it's hard to know exactly what's going on inside  thanks to the control exerted by America's jailers  the news that's trickled out is both inspiring and worrying.



Retaliation against strikers is also hard to track, but outside advocates said that several leaders were put in isolation and denied communication privileges, making it even harder for information to come out. In one instance, at the Ohio State Penitentiary, Siddique Hasan, a well-known prison activist sentenced to death for his role in a 1993 prison uprising, was accused of plotting to "blow up buildings" on September 9. Hasan, an organizer with the Free Ohio Movement, was confined to isolation and denied access to the phone for nearly a month before the strike  a deliberate effort to prevent him from communicating with the outside about it, supporters said. "What people have to realize is that these men and women inside prison  they expected to be retaliated against, but they sacrificed," said Pastor Kenneth Glasgow, a former prisoner and a supporter of the Free Alabama Movement, the prisoner-led group that first called for the nationwide strike. "People on the outside are not understanding they are being bamboozled," he added, expressing disappointment that the strike hadn't garnered more attention. "A lot of people are not realizing the value in what's going on, they don't realize that it's slavery, that slavery still exists."

THE LARGEST PRISON STRIKE IN U.S. HISTORY ENTERS ITS SECOND WEEK

[Alice Speri/The Intercept]

(Image: It's Going Down)
A soldier is accused of killing a transgender woman near his base in West Texas, and the FBI is investigating whether it was a hate crime.

Police arrested 21-year-old Anthony Michael Bowden on Tuesday and charged him with murder.

The FBI civil rights squad is working with police in El Paso to determine whether the slaying of 36-year-old Erykah Tijerina on August 8 was a hate crime.

A soldier is accused of killing a transgender woman near his base in West Texas, and the FBI is investigating whether it was a hate crime. Police arrested Anthony Michael Bowden (left) on Tuesday and charged him with the murder of Erykah Tijerina (right)

Police say several pieces of forensic evidence led investigators to Bowden, according to the El Paso Times.

The case remains under investigation.

Bowden is based at Fort Bliss, but it is not currently known what his role there is. The soldier is in jail on a $750,000 bond.

Tijerina was found dead with 'obvious signs of foul play' at the Rio Grande Apartments near Fox Plaza.

'We are looking into that (hate crime) aspect. The El Paso Police Department is clearly the lead on the homicide investigation,' Keith A. Byers, assistant special agent in charge of the FBI in El Paso, told the El Paso Times.

'The priority is to apprehend the person or the persons responsible and to make sure that we attain justice for the victim.'

Tijerina (pictured) was found dead with 'obvious signs of foul play' at the Rio Grande Apartments near Fox Plaza.

No information about Bowden's assignment at Fort Bliss (pictured) in El Paso was immediately available

The FBI defines a hate crime as a 'criminal offense against a person or property motivated in whole or in part by an offender's bias against a race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender, or gender identity.'

Family and friends of the victim held a memorial in her honor at Carolina Park in the Lower Valley in August.

Her sisters and friends said they fear the slaying was a hate crime, according to the El Paso Times.
Hillary Clinton says she has 'sympathy' for Colin Powell and won't be commenting on his leaked emails.

In several, the former secretary of state disparaged Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton. One read, 'Everything HRC touches, she kind of screws up with hubris.'

The Democratic White House hopeful wouldn't retaliate against Powell today, though.

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Hillary Clinton says she has 'sympathy' for Colin Powell and won't be commenting on his leaked emails

'I have a great deal of respect for Colin Powell, and I have a lot of sympathy for anyone whose emails become public. Im not going to start discussing someone elses private emails,' she said on Tom Joyner's radio show.

Adding, 'Ive already spent a lot of time talking about my own, as you know.'

CNN's Don Lemon, who had also called into the show, broached the topic of Powell's hacked emails in the Wednesday pre-tape that aired this morning.

Lemon asked her how she would answer him and critics who believe that she's constantly fumbling the ball 'whether its your emails, or disclosing your health issues, or even pointing out [Donald] Trumps flypaper-like ability to attract the racially insensitive or deplorables.'

Clinton declined to comment on Powell's emails and instead shifted the conversation to Russia's intensified hacks on U.S. political figures and her opponent's 'alarming closeness with the Kremlin,' which she said is 'deeply concerning.'

She said what's 'really important about the emails is the chilling fact...that the Russians are continuing to attempt to interfere in our election.'

Dinging her White House rival, she said, 'Theres a lot that Trump should answer for because these attempts by Russia to interfere in the election are ones that go right hand-in-hand with his closeness to the Kremlin, his flattery of Putin.

'So Im going to keep raising the alarm about Russian influence, and that, of course, raises questions about who Trump actually does business with.'

Clinton rebuffed a second attempt from Lemon to get her to respond to Powell's comment about her 'hubris' and began talking about how transparent she's been.

The former secretary of state said she's 'worked very, very hard' to be transparent.

And not just in comparison to her Trump, 'but really, in a comparison to anybody whos run.'

'The medical information Ive put out... meets and exceeds the standard that other presidential candidates, including President Obama and Mitt Romney and others, have met,' she stated.

Her tax returns for the last 40 years are also public, Clinton said.

'So I think that the real questions need to be directed toward Donald Trump and his failure to even meet the most minimalistic standards that we expect of someone being the nominee of one of our two major parties.'

While Hillary enjoyed her last day of bed rest, Bill Clinton was happy to step in and sub for the Democratic presidential candidate on the campaign trail on Wednesday

Clinton was spotted taking selfies with a number of young admirers as he stopped for a caffeine break at Alfred Coffee in West Hollywood

The crowd of Los Angelenos were clearly shocked to see the former president outside

Women were lining up to take pictures with Clinton, and he was more than happy to oblige

Powell also made comments about Bill Clinton's past marital infidelities.

He told a close friend in a July 2014 email that he did not want to vote for Hillary in the 2016 election, seemingly citing Bill as a factor.

'I would rather not have to vote for her, although she is a friend I respect,' he wrote.

'A 70-year person with a long track record, unbridled ambition, greedy, not transformational, with a husband still di**ing bimbos at home (according to the NYP),' Powell wrote to wealthy private equity investor Jeffrey Leeds.

That email was in response to one Leeds wrote which contained some comments saying how former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani thought Clinton would win the election.

' They don't think Hillary is stoppable. Every one is beatable,' wrote Leeds, who also said that he managed to get Giuliani to admit that 'the President is a decent man.'

Clinton later subbed in for Hillary at the College of Southern Nevada in Las Vegas

The pictures of Clinton and his admirers come as comments about his past marital infidelities were discovered in leaked emails written by Collin Powell (pictured together in 1993)

Shock: In that same exchange, his friend Jeffrey Leeds said Rudy Giuliani thought President Obama was a 'decent' man and that Hillary would win in 2016 (above)

The emails also reveal that Powell was urged to run for president by Eric Shinseki - the former Secretary of Veterans Affairs under President Obama.

COLIN POWELL ON REFUSING TO RUN FOR PRESIDENT C'mon Ric. I would be 80 upon my first months in office. Yes, every day someone kindly mentions it that I should have. I didn't want to and nothing has changed. And I can't carry the burden of the GOP. They left me years ago. He then added: 'We have got to stop thinking that a superman or superwoman could come save us as President. Until we super people start fixing things a President won't help. Toss out Congress incumbents that do nothing, fix taxes, fix the infrastructure, get super rich money out of the system, eliminate Gerrymandering, etc. And none of this is presidential. Advertisement

'I'm sure good friends and associates from past political campaigns have asked, and I hope you have seriously considered entering your name into the campaign for President. I'm not [a member of the Republican party], but I worry at what is happening to your proud and distinguished Party,' wrote Shineski.

'I do hope for the sake of the Republican Party and our country that there is time for you to consider a late entry into the run for the White House. We'd all be well served.'

Powell responded to this by writing: 'C'mon Ric. I would be 80 upon my first months in office. Yes, every day someone kindly mentions it that I should have. I didn't want to and nothing has changed. And I can't carry the burden of the GOP. They left me years ago.'

He then added: 'We have got to stop thinking that a superman or superwoman could come save us as President. Until we super people start fixing things a President won't help.

'Toss out Congress incumbents that do nothing, fix taxes, fix the infrastructure, get super rich money out of the system, eliminate Gerrymandering, etc. And none of this is presidential.'

Better times: 'I told you about the gig I lost at a University because she so overcharged them they came under heat and couldn't any fees for awhile. I should send her a bill,' wrote Powell about Clinton in an email to a friend (pair above in 2014)

Not a fan: Powell also had less than kind things to say about retired General Michael Flynn, Trump's closest military adviser (Powell's email exchange with his son above)

Other emails show Powell being incredibly critical of Republican nominee Donald Trump, calling him a 'national disgrace' and an 'international pariah' whose anti-Obama birther movement was 'racist.'

'Yup, the whole birther movement was racist,' wrote Powell to journalist and former aide Emily Miller earlier this year.

POWELL'S COMMENTS ON TRUMP IN LEAKED EMAILS -'Yup, the whole birther movement was racist. That's what the 99% believe. When Trump couldn't keep that up he said he also wanted to see if [President Obama's] certificate noted that he was a Muslim.' -'If Donald were to somehow win, by the end of the first week in office he'd be saying 'What the hell did I get myself into?' ' -'You guys are playing his game, you are his oxygen. He outraged us again today with his comments on Paris no-go for police districts. I will watch and pick the timing, not respond to the latest outrage.' -'To go on and call him an idiot just emboldens him.' -'Trump has no sense of shame' -'National disgrace' -'International pariah' Advertisement

'That's what the 99% believe. When Trump couldn't keep that up he said he also wanted to see if the certificate noted that he was a Muslim.'

He then added: 'As I have said before, 'What if he was?' Muslims are born as Americans everyday.'

Powell also complained about the media's coverage of Trump in an email late last year.

'You guys are playing his game, you are his oxygen,' he told CNN anchor Fareed Zakaria in December 2015.

'He outraged us again today with his comments on Paris no-go for police districts. I will watch and pick the timing, not respond to the latest outrage.'

And in July of last year, Powell despaired about Trump handing out Senator Lindsay Graham's personal phone number, saying 'Trump has no sense of shame.'

He also said to former New Jersey governor Christine Todd Whitman about Trump: 'NYC finance guys hate him, wouldn't lend him money. He cheats and then sues.'

Powell also had less than kind things to say about retired General Michael Flynn, Trump's closest military adviser.

'Flynn got fired as head of DIA. His replacement is a black Marine 3-star. I asked him why Flynn got fired. Abusive with staff, didn't listen, worked against policy, bad management, etc. He has been and was right-wing nutty every since. I watched about five minutes on line of his [RNC speech] and switched off,' wrote Powell in an email to his son.

He also sent a clip of Trump supporter and New Hampshire state representative Al Baldasaro speaking to a friend, writing: 'In case you missed this nut.'

Not great: Major political donor Jeffrey Leeds told Powell in an email last March that Hillary Clinton 'HATES' President Obama (above at the Democratic National Convention in July)

Revelations: Leeds also claimed that the Clintons refer to President Obama as 'that man'

Meanwhile, Leeds told Powell that Clinton 'HATES' President Obama in emails between the two men that were first obtained by The Intercept.

POWELL EMAIL TO LEEDS IN AUGUST 2015 Agree, press has started asking Peggy and me about our use. We have answered 3 IG questionaire [sic] and are clean. A newsie asked today to interview me on my use. Told them to read my book, Chapter on 'Brainware.' They are going to d**k up the legitimate and necessary use of emails with friggin record rules. I saw email more like a telephone than a cable machine. As long as the stuff is unclassified. I had some secure State.gov machine. Everything HRC touches she kind of screws up with hubris. I told you about the gig I lost at a University because she so overcharged them they came under heat and couldn't any fees for awhile. I should send her a bill. Trump conceivable take it to the convention. He appeals to the worst angels of the GOP nature and poor white folks. Just finished a book by a guy named Llosa about loss of culture. It was reviewed in the WSJ last week. Culture is going and with it the ties that bind. An increasing theme in my speeches-----celebrification of our society..FOX got the highest ratings ever after the debate so Ailes makes friends again with Trump and sends Megyn Kelly off to get over her period. Hey, noting personal, just business. Advertisement

Jeffrey Leeds wrote to Powell in one email which was first posted on Twitter by Lee Fang that all Clinton wants is to win the upcoming election, and that she might not win in the end.

He then went on to say: 'It's the one prize she wants. She has everything else. And she HATES the President ('that man' as the Clintons call him) kicked her a** in 2008. She can't believe it or accept it.'

In another March 2015 email exchange between the two the men talk about Clinton's health, with Leeds stating that Rhode Island Senator Sheldon Whitehouse informed him that 'she could barely climb the podium steps' when the two gave a speech at the same event a few months prior.

DailyMail.com has reached out to both Leeds and Whitehouse for comment.

Leeds also wrote to Powell about other problems he believed Clinton would be facing in the upcoming election.

'No one likes her and the criminal thing ain't over,' wrote Leeds.

'I don't think the president would weep if she found herself in real legal trouble. She'll pummel his legacy if she gets a chance and he knows it.'

That message was sent with a forwarded email from Politico declaring that Bernie Sanders had won Maine in the primary election.

In the email where the men were discussing her health, Powell also said about Clinton: 'On HD TV she doesn't look good. She is working herself to death.'

He then goes on to tell Leeds that the two were at the same home in San Francisco and he 'ducked her so we didn't turn loose another email story by being seen together.'

In an email exchange Powell had with another former Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, her called Benghazi a 'stupid witch hunt.'

Powell wrote: 'Basic fault falls on a courageous ambassador who thoughts [sic] Libyans now love me and I am ok in this very vulnerable place.'

He then added in the email, which was seen by Buzzfeed: 'But blame also rests on his leaders and supports [sic] back here. Pat Kennedy, Intel community, DS and yes HRC.'

JEFFREY LEEDS EMAIL TO POWELL ABOUT CLINTON I think Hillary can't believe she might not make it. It's the one prize she wants. She has everything else. And she HATES the President ('that man' as the Clintons call him) kicked her a** in 2008. She can't believe it or accept it. Advertisement

Rice responded by saying: 'Completely agree. Let me know when you're in town and we'll have that glass of wine (or two).'

Powell and Rice also spoke about what kind of President Trump would be, with Powell writing in a June 2016 email: 'If Donald were to somehow win, by the end of the first week in office he'd be saying 'What the hell did I get myself into?''

Rice responded by saying: 'I think his attention span may be waning because national campaigning is a lot harder than just showing up at rallies.'

In other emails seen by The Daily Caller multiple people seem to suggest in exchanges with Powell that he plans on endorsing Clinton for president.

Christie Whitman, the former New Jersey governor who has already endorsed Clinton over Trump despite being a Republican, wrote to Powell in late July: 'Have you endorsed her yet?'

Powell responded by writing: 'Nope.'

He later added: 'You'll recall that in 2008 and 2012 I waited until early fall.'

In another exchange, Powell's friend Harlan Ullman responded to a story the former Secretary of State sent out about Trump's negative remarks about the Khan family by saying: 'W hen are you going to throw the knock out blow?'

Powell responded to this by saying: 'I try not to bother someone who is beating himself and the GOP up. And please, don't start bugging me like every newsie and getter in town.

'I and when I do it will be known.'

Smart choice: It was Senator Sheldon Whitehouse who allegedly told Leeds that Clinton had trouble scaling the stairs at a 2015 event (Whitehouse and Clinton above in 2008)

Pen pals: The men also discussed Clinton's health in a March 2015 email (above)

Powell was not happy however when Clinton and her 'mafia' tried to drag him into what he referred to as 'emailgate.'

POWELL ON CLINTON AND TRUMP IN AUGUST 2016 It could have been so easy for her just tell what she did, a 'Full Monte.' Last night several folks came up to me to say 'She threw you under the bus.' I replied 'don't be silly, she is under the bus.' The FBI guys loved me and so did the IG types. But conversation turned to: 'Clintons always trying to use you.' Most folks up here detest Trump and won't vote for him, but dislike her intensely at the same time. Ah, well the country will decide. The NYT piece yesterday on emails was fine and balanced. I worked with the reporter. I found out from her about the book coming out. No alert from State or HRC team. Same with WP reporter. He gave me info that had been leaked to them. Trump just looks stupid trying to appeal to blacks and Latinos. Advertisement

In a series of emails he asks Cheryl Mills, who has worked with both Bill and Hillary, to make sure his name is not brought up when members of the Clinton team speak about her email scandal.

He continues to write her as his name continues to come up, and finally threatens in one email from August 19 that was seen by The Daily Caller to 'send an even tougher counterattack from a Trump media friend.'

Powell complained about becoming a scapegoat for the Clinton campaign to a confidante one week later in an email that was seen by The Intercept.

'HRC could have killed this two years ago by merely telling everyone honestly what she had done and not tie me to it,' wrote Powell.

'I told her staff three times not to try that gambit. I had to throw a mini tantrum at a Hampton's party to get their attention. She keeps tripping into these 'character' minefields.'

He also wrote the entire situation was 'dumb,' saying: 'She should have done a 'Full Monty' at the beginning. I warned her staff three times over the past two years not to try to connect it to me. I am not sure HRC even knew or understood what was going on in the basement.'

Not fans: Both Powell and fellow former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice agreed that Benghazi was a 'witch hunt' (Powell and Rice above at the 2005 inauguration)

In an email to Leeds, Powell wrote about the scandal: 'They are going to dick up the legitimate and necessary use of emails with friggin record rules. I saw email more like a telephone than a cable machine.'

He added: 'Everything HRC touches she kind of screws up with hubris.'

POWELL ON GENERAL FLYNN, TRUMP'S MILITARY ADVISER Flynn got fired as head of DIA. His replacement is a black Marine 3-star. I asked him why Flynn got fired. Abusive with staff, didn't listen, worked against policy, bad management, etc. He has been and was right-wing nutty every since. I watched about five minutes on line of his [RNC speech] and switched off. Advertisement

Powell went on to lament losing out on a job to Clinton, writing: 'I told you about the gig I lost at a University because she so overcharged them they came under heat and couldn't any fees for awhile. I should send her a bill.'

And to close things off in that email Powell, back in August 2015, stated that he could very see Trump becoming the Republican nominee for president.

'Trump conceivable take it to the convention.He appeals to the worst angels of the GOP nature and poor white folks,' wrote Powell.

To prove his point, Powell talked about the newfound relationship between Trump and former Fox News CEO Roger Ailes.

'FOX got the highest ratings ever after the debate so Ailes makes friends again with Trump and sends Megyn Kelly off to get over her period. Hey, noting [sic] personal, just business.'

Much better times: They are idiots and a spent force peddling a book that ain't going nowhere,' said Powell about Dick Cheney and his daughter Liz (pair above in 2000)

An email Chuck Ross posted on Twitter also seems to suggest that Powell is not a huge fan of Dick Cheney, and refuses to appear with him on Meet the Press.

POWELL ON DICK AND LIZ CHENEY IN SEPTEMBER 2015 MTP told us yesterday morning they were going to put the Cheneys on with me. Chuck [Todd] had apparently seen them somewhere and offered it. I said that was there call but it would be without me. Panic at NBC. They pushed them off a couple weeks. I don't know why CBS gave them that much time. They are idiots and a spent force peddling a book that ain't going nowhere. Advertisement

He wrote in a 2015 email: 'MTP told us yesterday morning they were going to put the Cheneys on with me. Chuck [Todd] had apparently seen them somewhere and offered it. I said that was there call but it would be without me. Panic at NBC. They pushed them off a couple weeks.

The former vice president and his daughter Liz were promoting their book Exceptional: Why the World Needs a Powerful America at the time, and had been given a lengthy interview earlier that week on CBS This Morning.

Powell wrote about that appearance: 'I don't know why CBS gave them that much time. They are idiots and a spent force peddling a book that ain't going nowhere.'

He and Conoleezza Rice also went after Donald Rumsfeld in an email seen by Politico, with Powell writing: 'One day when we both have had too many drinks we can discuss why [President George W. Bush] tolerated [Rumsfeld] and why Dick [Cheney], a successful Sec Def, was so committed to Don.'
The mistress of a millionaire who was killed by his wife, has spoken out about the verdict that sent the widow to prison for only two years.

Bonnie Contreras, who calls herself the former girlfriend of slain CEO Bill Hall Junior, told KENS 5 that she doesn't agree with the sentencing of Hall's wife, Frances Hall, but says: 'But I'm okay with it.'

'I can't hate anybody or judge anybody out of the sentencing that [Frances Hall] got,' she said.

Bonnie Contreras (pictured), who calls herself the former girlfriend of slain CEO Bill Hall Junior, who was killed by his wife, said she doesn't agree with the sentencing of Frances Hall, but adds: 'But I'm okay with it'. Contreras said she forgives Hall for killing her lover

A jury convicted Frances Hall (pictured), 53, of murder in the 2013 death of her estranged husband on Tuesday. The San Antonio woman could have been sentenced up to life in prison for the collision between her Cadillac SUV and his Harley as she chased him in a jealous rage

A jury convicted Frances Hall, 53, of murder in the 2013 death of her estranged husband on Tuesday.

The San Antonio woman could have been sentenced up to life in prison for the collision between her Cadillac SUV and his Harley as she chased him down in a jealous rage.

However, the Bexar County jury concluded that the woman's 'sudden passion' was a mitigating factor in her guilt in the death of trucking company owner Bill Hall.

Her attorneys argued the wreck was an accident.

She also got a two-year prison sentence for aggravated assault for hitting a vehicle driven by her husband's alleged mistress, Contreras, in the same pursuit.

Frances Hall (left) also got a two-year prison sentence for aggravated assault for hitting a vehicle driven by her husband's alleged mistress, Contreras, in the same pursuit

As the sentencing verdict came down on Tuesday, Contreras sat in the court room surrounded by authorities for protection. She said she and Hall (pictured) were in love and even talked about children

As the sentencing verdict came down on Tuesday, Contreras sat in the court room surrounded by authorities for protection.

'I was his girlfriend. I was his love,' Contreras said about Bill Hall Jr.

'I was his everything. He couldn't wait to start having children. He couldn't wait to get married,' she told KENS 5.

Contreras told the station that on the day Hall was hit and killed, they had been preparing for an eventful weekend.

'We had gone to the Harley Davidson store to buy clothes and whatnot for our bike ride that weekend.'

Contreras also told the station that Hall's family knew about the love affair way before the crash.

Contreras said she still loves Bill Hall (pictured) and will never regret time spent with him, adding that 'I forgive this woman'

'When I first met Bill, months later I asked him if he was married and he told me, "Yes, but I'm going through a separation. I'm gonna get a divorce,"' Contreras said.

She said that she still loves Bill Hall and will never regret time spent with him.

'If I had the chance to talk to Frances face to face, I would tell her, "I forgive you."'

'I forgive this woman.
Local MP Ian Liddell-Grainger (pictured) voiced his excitement that the Hinkley Point nuclear plant deal was back on

Amid gossip about Chinese spies  plus a Labour claim that this was the most expensive single object in history  the Government yesterday confirmed that the Hinkley Point nuclear plant deal with the Chinese and French had been revived.

The plant was originally waved through by David Cameron and galloping Sinophile George Osborne but Theresa Mays people went cool.

Or was it our intelligence chiefs who demanded a rethink, not wishing communist Peking to set up a cell in the back streets of Bridgwater?

Your average Chinese agent might not quickly master the burr of Somerset yokels but Mrs May is probably right to be suspicious.

There was a big turnout of ministers for the Commons statement. Business Secretary Greg Clark (manner like smooth peanut butter) got to stand at the despatch box but senior colleagues in attendance included, unusually, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Philip Hammond. His previous post? Foreign Secretary.

That may be significant. Did the two-month delay to Hinkley allow Mr Hammond, conscious of Foreign Office concerns, to make things more acceptable to MI6?

Local MP Ian Liddell-Grainger, one of Westminsters more excitable fellows, boomed his happiness that the deal was back on.

Mr Clark thanked him for his patience. Patience! Liddell-Grainger is about as patient as a honking, pillaging Visigoth. Mr Clark was in his own way perhaps saying to Liddell-Grainer: There, Ian, you need not have screamed quite so many rude words down the telephone to me in recent weeks.

Hinkley Point nuclear plant was originally waved through by David Cameron (left) and George Osborne (right)

Diana Johnson (Lab, Hull N) was surely on to something when she asked if there had been a failure, in the initial deal, to look adequately at national security issues. The swingeing cost remains unaltered, alas. Zac Goldsmith (Con, Richmond Park) pointed out that the electricity generated by Hinkley will be the most expensive ever. He said that over the years we would effectively be giving the French builders of Hinkley a 30billion subsidy.

Mr Clark thought that fair value in exchange for stability of energy supplies. If that is his attitude to public spending we must hope he never again becomes a Treasury minister.

The Commons day had two other watchable events. First was a public apology by Justin Tomlinson (Con, Swindon N) for leaking a Commons report on credit regulation to, er, Wonga. Classy company, Justin! MPs so often give brazenly insincere apologies to the Commons that it was unusual to hear Mr Tomlinsons evident nerves. His voice kept cracking and wobbling.

It was almost surprising he did not burst into tears. Mr Tomlinson is either a brilliant actor or he was genuinely shaken by the threat of a two-day suspension from the House.

And then came a statement on the BBC by the new Culture Secretary, Karen Bradley, who announced that the plug had been pulled on the BBC Trusts chairman, Rona Fairhead.

Given that the same Trust vaporised an innocent little Radio 4 programme I made on the Met Office  the numpties on the Trusts editorial standards committee held that I was insufficiently worshipful towards groupthink on global warming  I find it hard to grieve the passing of Rona the Groaner.

She managed to be both a lightweight and a bore. That might do for bank non-executive directors but you need a bit more bottom in a BBC grandee.

Culture Secretary Karen Bradley announced that the plug had been pulled on the BBC Trusts chairman, Rona Fairhead (pictured)

No doubt the System will secure her an undeserved berth in the House of Lords.

Mrs Bradley had lifted her own game. Her delivery, previously on the blurty side, was yesterday so grave and grand, she could have been the Queen at the State Opening of Parliament.

The more she said she was grateful to Rona Fairhead, the more one gained the impression Rona had been shot at dawn.

Some media types rejoiced when the last Culture Secretary, John Whittingdale, left office.
Given his particular line of work, professional stuntman Eddie Braun knows about danger - and he plans for the worst.

That's why he paid bills several months in advance.

He set up emergency cash reserves to take care of his family and engaged in an emotional talk with his teenage son about looking out for his mom and three sisters.

Braun's simply putting things in place before he buckles into his steam-powered rocket cycle this weekend and flips the switch to launch him over the Snake River Canyon in Idaho, stretching 0.25 miles wide.

He's replicating the jump that could have cost his boyhood idol, Evel Knievel, his life four decades ago.

Stuntman Eddie Braun answers questions during a news conference on Wednesday in Twin Falls, Idaho, about his upcoming attempt to jump the Snake River Canyon in a steam-powered replica of Evel Knievel's rocket

A view of the new jump site from across the Snake River Canyon near Twin Falls, Idaho, that Braun will attempt is shown above

This weekend, Braun will replicate the jump that could have cost his boyhood idol, Evel Knievel, his life four decades ago. Braun pictured on September 8, 1974 during his Snake River Canyon jump

'I tied up loose ends, as I would for any life-or-death type stunt coming up,' Braun, a longtime Hollywood stuntman, said.

He will launch sometime between noon Mountain time on Friday and 7pm on Saturday, depending on wind conditions.

'The last thing I want burden my family with on top of the shock of me being...'

He took a deep breath.

'I feel very optimistic about this jump,' the 54-year-old Braun continued.

'I wouldn't be doing this if I thought it couldn't be done.'

As a tribute to Knievel, Braun named his rocket 'Evel Spirit.'

It's identical to the model Knievel used for his failed canyon attempt on September 8, 1974, when he walked away with only minor injuries.

Braun pictured during Wednesday's news conference. His endeavor is more than three years in the making and cost him around $1.5 million out of his own pocket

Braun sits in the cockpit of The Evel Spirit, a steam-powered rocket, surrounded by, from left, rocket designer Scott Traux, stunt vehicle engineer Craig Adams, stunt vehicle supervisor Mick Van Moorsel and attorney Paul Arrington, at the team's shop in Twin Falls

Braun will launch over the Snake River Canyon in Idaho sometime between noon Mountain time Friday and 7pm on Saturday, depending on wind conditions

Braun wants to prove Knievel could've made it had his parachute not prematurely deployed.

His endeavor is more than three years in the making and cost him around $1.5 million out of his own pocket, with corporate sponsors hard to line up.

He's drawn the interest of ABC's Good Morning America, which will air an interview with him on Friday morning.

Only fitting since Knievel's launch was shown on ABC's Wide World of Sports.

'This is about the kid Evel inspired and about the Evel spirit,' said Braun, who will launch from a spot about five miles away from Knievel's site just outside of Twin Falls, Idaho.

Along for the journey are two sons yearning to fulfill the legacies of their dads: Kelly Knievel, who was present the day of the crash, and rocket designer Scott Truax, whose father constructed the original 'X2 Skycycle' for Knievel.

During the Snake River Canyon attempt, wearing his patriotic jumpsuit, Knievel (left) was the epitome of cool and calm. But soon after takeoff (right) his parachute deployed and halted the rocket's momentum, causing the attempt to fail

In this July 31, 1974, file photo, a parachute opens behind the rocket-powered Sky Cycle X-2, containing American motorcycle stuntman Evel Knievel, as he attempts to jump the Snake River Canyon, Idaho

This September 6, 1974,photo shows the ramp used when Kneivel tried to jump the Snake River Canyon in Twin Falls, Idaho

Scott followed his dad's blueprints down to the last bolt, except with one deviation - updating the parachute system.

Braun's rocket will reach a top speed of 400 mph in about three seconds and an altitude of 3,000 feet before the engine cuts off and the parachute deploys.

Braun said he expects to soar about 1,500 feet - or 0.28 miles - over the canyon.

For the last few months, they've conducted various tests on the rocket.

First and foremost, a static fire test in which they welded the rocket to the ground to make sure it was generating the kind of power they needed to soar so far.

'Passed with flying colors,' Braun said.

The parachute test was a different story.

'Shredded it,' Braun recounted.

They feel they've addressed the issues. But it's a guess.

'We just don't know,' Braun said.

'We know what Evel's problem was - his parachute coming out early.

'What we don't want with mine is it coming out too late. Therein lies the secret - what is that magic formula?

'Because up to the point of me climbing in it, there's no real test that can be done.'

Watching Braun's attempt closely will be Michael Hughes (pictured), a self-taught rocket scientist in Apple Valley, California

On October 18, Hughes will attempt to rocket over the ghost town of Amboy, California, once a familiar spot along Route 66. His rocket and launch pad in Canyon, Texas shown above

Watching Braun's attempt closely will be Michael Hughes, a self-taught rocket scientist in Apple Valley, California.

He almost teamed up with Braun a few years ago. But Hughes wanted to build rockets on his own.

On October 18, Hughes will attempt to rocket over the ghost town of Amboy, California, once a familiar spot along Route 66.

The 60-year-old Hughes is unique in that his launch pad also doubles as a motor home.

He successfully completed a jump on January 30, 2014, in Winkelman, Arizona, but hurt his left and ribs on the fall back to earth because his parachute shredded.

Of course, he's hoping for the best for Braun. But the parachute design concerns him.

THE LEGENDARY EVEL KNIEVEL'S DAREDEVIL STUNTS ACROSS THE YEARS * Motorcycle jump over the fountains at Caesars Palace in 1967. The jump failed after the bike unexpectedly decelerate, causing him to crash. He suffered a crushed pelvis and femur, fractures to his hip, wrist and both ankles and a concussion that left him in a coma for 29 days during his hospital stay. * Motorcycle jump over thirteen buses at Wembley Stadium in London in May 1975 in front of 90,000 people. He crashed and broke his pelvis and back and told the audience: 'Ladies and gentlemen of this wonderful country, I've got to tell you that you are the last people in the world who will ever see me jump. Because I will never, ever, ever jump again. I'm through.' Motorcycle jump over thirteen buses at Wembley Stadium in May 1975 in front of 90,000 people * His 'retirement was short lived' and in October 1975, Knievel successfully jumped 14 greyhound buses at Kings Island theme park in Ohio. Although he landed on top of the 14 bus, he still held the record for the most successful jumps in history. It was his longest successful jump at 133 feet. Knievel successfully jumped 14 greyhound buses at Kings Island theme park in Ohio in 1975 * In 1977, Knievel attempted to jump a 90-foot tank filled with sharks in 1977. But during rehearsal he crashed on landing ramp into a cameraman. He broke his own arms but also feared he had done permanent damage to the eyesight of the cameraman, who received treatment but in fact escaped without permanent injury. Knievel in hospital after his failed attempt to jump a 90-foot tank filled with sharks in 1977 Advertisement

'If his rocket ever starts tumbling, which Knievel's did, it will land and not be a happy ending for him,' explained Hughes, a limo driver in his spare time.

'You can get rolled up in the parachute.'

Braun tried not to make a big deal of the jump to his family, but he did have a serious conversation with his son.

Braun told him that should anything go wrong, the son would one day walk his sisters down the aisle at their weddings.
The rail company that has brought months of misery to commuters has been shortlisted for three 'passengers matter' awards.

Southern is still in the middle of a crippling union dispute which has seen up to a third of trains a day cancelled.

The company is embroiled in the long-running disagreement with the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) over plans to change the role of guards on its trains.

But, the Association of Community Rail (ACORP) Awards says it will celebrate the operator's hard work and community dedication, as finalists in three categories which includes 'Passengers Matter'.

Southern Railway is also up for gongs for 'Involving Young People' and 'Involving Diverse Groups'.

Victoria station, above, is one of the major stations affected by ongoing strikes. Southern has now been nominated for several awards despite the delays and hundreds of cancelled trains

Passengers have been left furious in recent months, as the operator cancelled around 341 trains a day since July, and have been left battling against numerous days of strike action, which included a five-day walkout in August.

Govia Thameslink Railway, which operates the company, cancelled one in every 20 trains (5 per cent) last year, earning the company the worst cancellation record of any train operator over the past six years.

Phil Carrington, a Southern commuter from Brighton, East Sussex, said: 'If they had any sense they would have said they did not want to be shortlisted.

'Regardless of the merits of the award, you would have thought they would realise this is a PR disaster waiting to happen and avoided it like the plague.'

The RMT has been on strike several times over claims safety will be compromised if Southern makes its planned changes to guards

Passengers using Southern services have been affected by ongoing strikes as the company battles its union members over the future of guards on its trains

Another disgruntled passenger, Lucy Ashton, also from Brighton, added: 'Maybe they should ask the people who use their trains what they think.'

The awards celebrate unsung heroes and heroines of the community rail world, alongside the hard work and dedication of community projects.

Southern said that since last August it has revamped and reinvigorated the process for adopting stations across its wide network, to form station partnerships, 'having a huge impact on our communities'.

Andy Harrowell, community investment manager at Southern, said: 'We are focused on putting our stations at the heart of the communities they serve.

'Together with Southern Community Rail Partnership (SCRP), we have really been able to make a difference to local communities.

'Southern and SCRP are committed to encouraging use of the railway, especially in young people.'

The statement came the morning after a protest at Lewes Station, in East Sussex, over the level of service and its effect on commuters getting home.

Charles Horton, CEO of Govia Thameslink, which runs Southern Rail, speaks to customers at Victoria Station, London, during a 'meet the manager' event in June this year

MP for Hove, East Sussex, Peter Kyle has also revealed that rail bosses from both Southern Railway and Network Rail are unable to work out who is responsible for delays amid 'dysfunction' on the network.

Labour MP Mr Kyle said the dispute was discovered yesterday at a cross-party group he set up and co-chairs to try and solve the problems.

He said: 'When you look at all the delays on the Southern track at the moment, we know that a third of them are caused by Southern.

'We also knowthat a third are caused by Network Rail, but what we did not know is that there a third of those delays for which there is no explanation.

'This is because Southern and Network Rail cannot agree or identify the cause of the delay.'

The operator was accused of having the 'worst train service in Britain' last year, after it was announced that the 07.29 Brighton to London Victoria service had failed to arrive on time for any of its 240 journeys in 2014.
Donald Trump's fondest wish came true Thursday, as he conducted nearly an entire campaign rally without his hated national media in tow.

He called it 'really good news'.

Trump publicly mocked his own traveling press corps for showing up late, a turn of events that his own campaign staff caused.

'I have really good news for you,' Trump told about 1,000 people in a New Hampshire middle school gymnasium. 'I just heard that the press is stuck on their airplane.'

'They can't get here. I love it! So they're trying to get here now. They're gonna be about 30 minutes late.'

'They called us and said, "Could you wait?" he claimed. 'I said absolutely not. Let's get going, right? Let's get going, New Hampshire!'

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump landed a heavy punch on the national press corps Thursday, holding nearly an entire campaign rally before they could arrive

Trump (pictured on his jet in March) had already landed in New Hampshire while reporters were on an airplane tarmac at New Jersey's Teterboro airport

Trump's private gold-trimmed Boeing 757 was waiting for him at New York City's la Guardia airport but the press charter plane (pictured) was at New Jersey's Teterboro airport

The crowd, accustomed to hearing about his near-daily sparring matches with reporters, roared with approval.

While Trump, the Republican nominee for president whose contentious relationship with journalists has become the stuff of legend, started the event, the traveling press was still on an airplane tarmac at the end of a charter flight.

Miles away, they watched it unfold on their smartphones. Local New Hampshire media and a few regional reporters who didn't depend on the campaign for transportation, were more fortunate.

Trump himself ran late, beginning a 7.30pm rally just after 8pm.

But he has been far later in the past, on a few occasions making his fans wait for more than 90 minutes.

In recent days Trump has blasted political journalists, typically as a group, for being 'dishonest', 'lying' and 'horrible people'.

He complains frequently that America's mass media, enamored with Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, is committed to denying him a fair shake.

Trump mocked the press corps for arriving late, although it was his own campaign that caused the situation

While Trump started the event, the traveling press was still on an airplane tarmac at the end of a charter flight

On a few occasions, Trump has made his fans wait for more than 90 minutes

Eric Trump, the Republican nominee's middle son, spoke briefly in New Hampshire, but reporters and TV network producers only knew it from watching YouTube on their iPhones

Reporters who follow him from state to state have become accustomed to seeing audience members at campaign events hurling insults in the direction of the 'press pen,' a barricaded area no journalist is permitted to leave.

Reporters arrived Thursday night 22 minutes into Trump's presentation, an unusually short show that ended eight minutes later.

In between, Secret Service spent valuable minutes inspecting briefcases, camera gear and laptops, as the agency does before every Trump event.

But unlike other campaign rallies, the group of more than two dozen journalists could only hear the billionaire's voice, muffled, through an open side door.

The problems started in mid-afternoon, following a taping of 'The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon'.

The problems and confusion surrounding Trump's jet and the one carrying reporters started following a taping of 'The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon' (pictured)

Reports blasted Trump for mocking them for their late arrival despite the fact he and his team were to blame

Trump's private jet, a gold-trimmed Boeing 757, was waiting for him at New York City's la Guardia airport, but the press charter plane, a cozier regional jet, was at New Jersey's Teterboro airport.

Before reporters could take off, they had to wait for the 'pool'  a rotating subset of the press corp who see Trump up-close and were permitted inside the building where the 'Tonight Show' was taped  to make it to New Jersey.

By the time their 40 minute flight took off, Trump had already landed.

The Trump campaign organizes charter flights for news outlets, charging the organizations equal shares of the cost for each flight.

Typical bills for airfare, charter buses and baggage handling can approach $15,000 per week, per person.

Compounding Thursday's problem is that Trump, unlike Democrat Hillary Clinton, does not fly on the same aircraft as the reporters who cover him.

Hillary Clinton's campaign is 'together' with reporters as of last week, with the Democratic nominee flying on the same plane as her press corps and ensuring they're never left behind

Hillary came under fire for calling Trump supporters 'deplorable' (pictured, a Trump supporter wearing a 'deplorable' label on the back of his top)

Clinton began observing that convention only last week. Trump, whose luxurious flagship 'Trump Force One' plane is outftted in ivory leather and gold-plated seat belt buckles, isn't expected to ride in a more ordinary private jet.

Trump also owns a smaller Citation X jet which he takes on journeys to airports with short runways. That plane, too, is outfitted in a style befitting a billionaire.

His traveling press corps will begin using a Boeing 737 jet next week, a plane with enough room for the candidate, his senior staff and a Secret Service detail.

It's the same model aircraft Clinton is using.

But two campaign sources told DailyMail.com that the real estate tycoon doesn't want to leave his personal ride at home.

Instead, Trump said last week that he would on occasion allow daily pool reporters to fly on his plane.

That, however, has happened only once.

Unlike Democrat Hillary Clinton (pictured), Trump does not fly on the same aircraft as the reporters who cover him

His traveling press corps will begin using a Boeing 737 jet next week, the same model Clinton (pictured) is using

It wasn't an option on Thursday, even though the pool  made of print and wire service reporters, videographers and photographers  could have gone with the candidate instead of riding to a more distant New Jersey airport.

That would have allowed the rest of the press corps to make it to the Granite State long before the Republican nominee.
In an earlier statement, the network said they stood behind Sepulveda

Logo TV did not respond to allegations they were aware of his seedy past

One suitor said they all underwent weeks of rigorous background checks

Contestants on the Bachelor-style show are furious and accuse the network of covering up Sepulveda's past

Logo TV has been accused of knowingly covering up the fact that the star of its brand new gay dating show had worked as an escort and had a sex tape.

Several contestants on Finding Prince Charming insisted there is 'no way' the network wasn't aware of Robert Sepulveda Jr.'s hidden past.

The suitors had to go through weeks of 'rigorous background checks' before the show began filming, one told TheWrap, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

A spokesperson for Logo told DailyMail.com: 'As we've repeatedly stated, we stand behind Robert 100 percent. We are frankly baffled why one reporter continues to employ untruths to disparage Logo, Robert and the show.'

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Logo TV has been accused of knowingly covering up the fact that the leading man on its gay dating show had worked as an escort and had a sex tape

'It doesn't matter what you've done in your past': Robert Sepulveda Jr. has defended his days as an escort

'I don't believe the network was blindsided. I don't think anyone believes that,' another contestant added.

Rumors about Sepulveda's days as an escort had been swirling ever since he was announced as the new 'Gay Bachelor' on the dating show.

A sex tape of the 33-year-old interior designer also surfaced on numerous pornographic sites. Sepulveda has since claimed an ex-boyfriend posted a private video without his permission.

Last month, he defended his seedy past saying he had worked as an escort to pay for college.

Several contestants on Finding Prince Charming insisted there is 'no way' the network wasn't aware of Robert Sepulveda Jr.'s hidden past (pictured on the first episode)

Rumors about Sepulveda's days as an escort had been swirling ever since he was announced as the new 'Gay Bachelor' on the dating show (pictured contests leap in the pool during the first episode)

Contestants are furious they were not told about Prince Charming's past before the show

'Well, everyone is worthy of love,' the 33-year-old told Us Weekly. 'It doesn't matter what you've done in your past, escorting or anything else. The past is the past. I was young and it helped through college.'

A show contestant said he had confronted Logo TV after recognizing Sepulveda from the pornographic video.

'As soon as I left the house and got my phone back I googled 'Robert Sepulveda' and the words 'sex tape' and there it was,' he said. 'Didn't even need to scroll down.'

The 13 suitors in the show had their phones confiscated during filming.

He added that he was furious that the show had hired a former male prostitute without telling them.

'If I wanted to date a hooker, I'd hire one,' he told TheWrap. 'I'm beyond livid.'

Another contestant alleged that the network just 'wanted to churn up some drama to get attention.'

The Logo have not responded to reporter's requests for comment about the allegations.

'I was young': Robert explained that he worked as an escort to help pay for college

But after news broke that Sepulveda used to be a prostitute, they issued a statement which read: 'We are aware of Robert's past and fully support him as he moves forward in his search for love on 'Finding Prince Charming.''

A source told TheWrap the network followed carried out a standard vetting process with Sepulveda but 'nothing came up during the background check.'

Sepulveda previously said that he believes that a real Prince Charming 'is someone who has life experience in all aspects of life, that isn't afraid of someone with HIV or someone who doesn't care what you've done in your past.'

Robert spoke out after several reports emerged alleging that he worked as a male escort on the now-defunct RentBoy website in Florida in 2006.

'The past is the past,' he told The Huffington Post, 'I was young and it helped through college,' he said. 'But what I want people to focus on is who I am today as an entrepreneur, as an activist.

'I started a non-profit and, you know, focusing on the show. That's really what I want people to focus on.'

He added: 'The show allowed me as well to close a lot of chapters in my life that I felt a lot of guilt around, a lot of shame and a lot of things I thought I couldn't share and express.'

'It doesn't matter to me': Robert and the show's host Lance Bass (pictured at the VMAs last week) recently confirmed that one of the contestants is HIV-positive

The show sees the Atlanta-based interior designer search for love as 13 gorgeous men vie for his heart.

The series is being presented by Lance Bass and while it is not a spin-off of the Bachelor, it sees the hopefuls live in a Los Angeles mansion while competing for Robert's affections in the same manner.

Meanwhile, Robert and Lance recently confirmed to People Now that one of the contestants on the show is HIV-positive, and that this will feature as a major plot point.

For me, it's like, 'Is someone HIV-positive not worthy of love?'' Robert said. 'That's really the question, and it doesn't matter to me. Prince Charming would be accepting of anyone, and that's how I am.'
A mother charged with murdering her two-year-old daughter before fleeing the scene and leaving the lifeless body in a bathtub was allegedly found by police sitting on the side of the road reading a Bible.

Police arrested the 27-year-old woman last weekend in Katoomba, west of Sydney, and some 90 kilometres away from her home in the Sydney suburb of Miller.

They allege that after drowning her child in the bath she jumped in her car and left her home, coming to the attention of police only after crashing twice on her journey.

When officers found the woman she was allegedly slumped next to her vehicle reading the Bible, the Sydney Morning Herald reports.

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A mother (pictured) charged with murdering her two-year-old daughter was found by police sitting on the side of the road reading a bible after fleeing the scene

The woman was charged with the murder of her two-year-old daughter (pictured) left her lying dead in the bathtub of their Sydney housing commission home for up to three days, police allege

Investigators allege the girl's mother murdered her daughter sometime between 6am on Saturday and 12.30pm on Tuesday (pictured is the house's backyard)

The mother was charged with the murder of her daughter, 2, who is believed to have been dead at their housing commission home in Sydney's south-west (pictured) for several days

The woman was then taken to a Blue Mountains hospital where she remained for two days before the horror that had occurred at her home was discovered.

Posts discovered on social media will likely lead to questions being asked about whether the woman was fit to be looking after her daughter.

The series of rants on Facebook indicate to somewhat of a troubled history in relationships and with the Department of Family and Community Services.

'You took away my motherhood, you take away my freedom, so now I say enough's enough and still you need a reason,' she wrote.

'Keep fighting your demons no matter, don't give up, learn from your mistakes, and keep walking forward one step at a time,' the mother wrote in another post.

The woman appeared to have experienced a number of relationship struggles judging by social media posts

It is also believed she had somewhat of a troubled history with the Department of Family and Community Services

The mother (pictured) appeared in Penrith Local Court briefly by video link on Wednesday morning after being charged with murder on Tuesday night

Forensic investigators were seen entering the property shortly after the girl's body was found on Tuesday afternoon

The mother appeared in Penrith Local Court briefly by video link on Wednesday morning after being charged with murder on Tuesday night.

She was dressed in prison greens, had orange highlights in her hair and did not say anything. She did not apply for bail and will appear in court later this year.

Court documents show the woman was arrested at 7.30pm on Tuesday night and charged at Katoomba Police Station in the Blue Mountains.

Her daughter's body was discovered about midday on Tuesday at the woman's housing commission home in Miller, south-west Sydney.

Investigators allege the girl's mother murdered her daughter sometime between 6am on Saturday and 12.30pm on Tuesday.

The mother accused of murdering her baby girl often sat out the front of her Housing Commission home smoking and wore revealing clothes, a neighbour said.

Residents of Miller - the western Sydney suburb where the woman lived with her daughter and a man believed to be her partner - were shellshocked on Wednesday at the death of the little girl who was 'always happy'.

One neighbour said if he had known of any problems with the baby he would have raised her himself.

'I wish she gave it to me,' he told Daily Mail Australia.

The neighbour, who asked not to be identified, described the mother as a private person and 'very, very quiet'.

He rarely saw her outside except for when she would smoke out the front. Before he had not seen her around for a week.

He saw a man at the front of the house drinking a beer on Friday.

'Fly high angel RIP': A teddy bear with a pink sunflower and a handwritten message was placed by a tree outside the family's home

The mother was involved in a car accident on the way through the Blue Mountains on Sunday

Officers made the grim discovery upon entering the housing commission home (pictured)

A man in his 40s would visit the home every fortnight and help around the house, including fixing the washing machine. It's understood the family had only been in the home for about a year.

Police had taped off the suburban street on Wednesday, with a large van parked out the front and two officers standing guard. Police were called to the Miller home about midday on Tuesday after a friend reported concerns for the young girl's welfare.

The friend was on the phone to police when she made the grim discovery at the housing commission home.

The street was cordoned off by police on Wednesday

Police investigations into the two-year-old girl's death are continuing

The girl's 27-year-old mother had been treated in hospital after she was involved in a car accident in the Blue Mountains on Sunday.

Neighbour Pat Ingram said she hadn't seen the girl since last Wednesday and said a woman had earlier knocked on her door to check if Pat had seen the girl.

'Someone knocked on our door, asked if we had seen the little girl. She said she was concerned for the child's welfare. She asked if I had a ladder,' Ms Ingram told Daily Telegraph.

'I told her if she was really concerned, she should ring the police.'

'A report will be prepared for the coroner and a post mortem will officially determine how the child died,' the spokesperson told Daily Mail Australia.

A child's trampoline can be seen in the backyard of the state-owned home, which is now cordoned off by police tape.

A child's trampoline can be seen in the backyard of the state-owned home

A shocked neighbour (pictured) spoke to media outside of her house on Wednesday afternoon

The specialist investigators wore full blue suits to ensure they did not compromise evidence inside the crime scene

A child's trampoline can be seen in the backyard of the state-owned home, which is now cordoned off by police tape
Donald Trump said Friday that the President of the United States was born in America, not Kenya, ending years of 'birther' conspiracies and claiming that he 'ended' them by successfully challenging Obama to produce his birth certificate in 2011.

'Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy,' Trump said in the ballroom of his gleaming new hotel in Washington. 'I finished it. I finished it. You know what I mean.'

'President Barack Obama was born in the United States. Period. Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again.'

Trump spoke for three minutes after 24 minutes of remarks from military generals, admirals and Medal of Honor recipients who had gathered to endorse him.

Although a campaign aide had promised at 11:00 p.m. Thursday that the late-Friday-morning event would be a 'press conference,' Trump did not take any questions.

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Admission: Trump said Friday that he believes Barack Obama was born in the US. But he insisted the 'birther' rumor started with Hillary Clinton in 2008 and 'i finished it'

Blasted: Trump's admission came after Clinton blasted him Wednesday for an interview in The Washington Post that day in which he skirted around admitting Obama was born in Hawaii

Reporters yelled to him from the back of the ballroom, which was set up to put more than 15 yards of space between the press and his podium.

'Why won't you take questions?' DailyMail.com shouted. 'Why did it take you so long to say this?'

Trump smiled, stared ahead, and never acknowledged the crush of media, although nearly half the press corps stood on chairs so the Republican presidential nominee could see them.

After the event Trump led a small contingent of family and friends through a tour of his new hotel. A videographer and photographer from the press pool accompanied them, but print and TV reporters who might have asked him questions were physically blocked from coming along.

Trolled: Trump buried his birther comment at the end of an event to announce a new slate of military endorsements, forcing cable networks to broadcast the entire event

His brief and belated statement about the president's place of birth was good enough for supporter Bob Livingston, who was House speaker-designate before he resigned from Congress and became a major player in D.C.'s influence industry.

'I thought he got a point across,' Livingston told DailyMail.com.

'You couldnt get any more definitive. That ought to be the end of this issue.'

Minutes later, with few remaining in the room other than reporters, the blue backdrop that stood behind Trump's podium came crashing to the ground, bringing all but one of the standing flags down along with it.

Only a lone American flag stood amid the wreck.

Hillary Clinton's campaign, too, declared Trump's performance a shambles.

'Trump's actions today were disgraceful,' her campaign manager Robby Mook said in a statement.

'After five years of pushing a racist conspiracy theory into the mainstream, it was appalling to watch Trump appoint himself the judge of whether the President of the United States is American.

'This sickening display shows more than ever why Donald Trump is totally unfit be president.

Shocked, not really: President Obama joked on Friday that he was 'pretty confident about where I was born'

As the issue came to a head on Friday, President Obama was asked about it during a brief press availability in the oval Office before a meeting about the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal.

He said he had 'no reaction and I'm shocked that a question like that has come up at a time when we have so many other things to do. Well, I'm not that shocked actually. It's fairly typical.'

'We got other things to attend to. I was pretty confident about where I was born. I think most people were as well. My hope would be the presidential election reflects more serious issues than that.'

Trump's senior communications adviser declared Thursday evening that the billionaire believes Obama was born in America, more than five years after Trump first raised doubts about the President's country of origin.

But Friday's statement in front of TV cameras was the first time Trump himself had said so.

'In 2011, Mr Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate,' Trump's senior communications adviser, Jason Miller, said in a statement Thursday night.

It concluded: 'Having successfully obtained President Obamas birth certificate when others could not, Mr Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.'

However, the statement added: 'Mr Trump did a great service to the President and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised.'

Clinton shoved back on Friday, saying Trump owes the president and the public an apology for stoking birther fires as long as he did.

'Donald's advisers have the temerity to say he's doing the country a service by pushing these lies. No he isn't.'

After Trump's speech Clinton's camp when on a tweeting spree. The candidate stood by her assertion that he needs to apologize

Trump is feeding into 'bigotry and bias that lurks in our country' with his presidential campaign, the Democratic nominee said.

'Barack Obama was born in the United States, plain and and simple,' she stated. 'And Donald owes him and the American people an apology.'

However, Obama's spokesman said later in the day, 'I don't think the president much cares.'

Trump has blamed Clinton for creating the long-discredited rumors about Obama's citizenship for some time, which he himself first supported in March 2011.

In September last year he tweeted: 'Just remember, the birther movement was started by Hillary Clinton in 2008. She was all in!'

Ted Cruz had made a similar remark three months earlier.

'All in': Trump made this tweet, which blamed Clinton for the birther movement, in September last year. Ted Cruz had made a similar remark a few months earlier

However, while the birther movement began in the Clinton-Obama Democratic primary battle of 2008, there is no evidence the rumors actually came from Clinton herself, according to Factcheck.org.

They started in an anonymous email circulated by Clinton supporters including some aides; Clinton herself never publicly agreed with them.

The Republican candidate's admission that Obama was born in the USA came after he was lambasted Thursday night by Hillary Clinton for refusing to back down from birtherism.

'This man wants to be our next president? When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?' she asked.

Earlier in the day, The Washington Post printed an article in which Trump refused to respond affirmatively to a question about Obama being born in Hawaii.

'Ill answer that question at the right time,' he reportedly said. 'I just dont want to answer it yet.'

Rumor: Clinton supporters did start the rumor during the 2008 Democratic primaries, but she never supported it, nor was she linked to it. She later supported Obama after conceding

Clinton latched onto the statement while speaking to attendees of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute's gala in Washington, DC.

She blew up her opponent for standing by his belief that Obama was born in Kenya.

She told the audience Trump launched his presidential campaign with a 'racist lie about Mexican immigrants' when he said they were rapists and criminals.

'And every time we think he's hit rock bottom, he sinks even lower.'

Now he's terrorizing a minister in Flint, Michigan, she said, for asking him not to deliver a partisan political speech from her pulpit.

Support: Trump had supported the birther movement since March 2011 (pictured: A female Obama supporter objecting to a sign commissioned by a Colorado businessman, in 2009)

In the Post interview, Clinton said, 'He did again. He was asked one more time where was President Obama born. And he still wouldn't stay Hawaii. He still wouldn't say America.'

Trump has 'tried to reset himself and his campaign many times,' said the Democratic presidential candidate. 'This is the best that he can do, this is who he is.'

'So we need to decide who we are. If we just sigh and shake our head and accept this, then what does it tell our kids about who we are?'

Obama spoke at the event before Clinton. The article dropped right as he was arriving, limiting his ability to react to it in his own address.

He said of Trump at the event, 'If were truly going to fix this broken system, then we're going to have to push back against bluster and falsehoods and promises of higher walls.'

Truth: Obama eventually released his birth certificate in 2011. Trump says he forced Obama's hand but ultimately did him a favor

This election feels a 'little more personal,' Obama said. 'It's a little meaner, a little uglier.'

'And folks are betting that if they can drive us far enough apart, and if they can put down enough of us because of where we come from or what we look like or what religion we practice, then that may pay off at the polls.'

'But I'm telling you that's a bet theyre going to lose,' he said.
The family of a woman who was stabbed to death by her refugee husband broke down and wailed in court on Friday after the offender was jailed for at least five years for manslaughter.

Solomon Hailu Jenbare, 52, who was tortured in his native Ethiopia and suffers from depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, was acquitted of murdering 25-year-old Wubanchi Asfaw in November 2014, but found guilty of her manslaughter.

Her distraught mother and friends sobbed and yelled out in the NSW Supreme Court after Justice Lucy McCallum jailed him for nine years with a non-parole period of five years.

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Relatives of Wubanchi Asfaw were distraught at NSW Supreme Court on Friday

Ms Asfaw's husband Solomon Hailu Jenbare (pictured) was sentenced to nine years' jail over her death

Jenbare will be eligible for parole in April 2019 with time already already served, The ABC reported.

'In my opinion I thought he would be life in prison, that's what I was thinking. Five year, three year, that's a joke,' Meskeren Tesfaye, a supporter, told The ABC outside court.

Justice Lucy McCallum told the court that the woman must have died in immense pain but she believe Jenbare was remorseful.

Ms Asfaw, who was killed by Jenbare in 2014, break down outside court

A relative of Wubanchi Asfaw carries her picture. The 25-year-old was stabbed to death

Ms Asfaw's distraught mother and friends broke down after Jenbare was acquitted of murder
Robert 'Baja Bob' Gordon, 68, strangled his wife Sharon then shot himself, police said

The father of former NASCAR driver Robby Gordon strangled his wife then shot himself in their Southern California home, police said on Thursday.

The deaths of legendary off-road racer Robert 'Baja Bob' Gordon, 68, and Sharon Gordon, 57, were an apparent murder-suicide, Orange police Lt. Fred Lopez said a day after the bodies were found.

The Orange County Coroner's Office has described Robert Gordon's death being consistent with a self-inflicted gunshot wound, and his wife's death being the result of strangulation, according to TMZ.

No further details on the motive or circumstances were released.

The couple were the father and stepmother of ex-NASCAR star Robby Gordon, who fought back tears and expressed disbelief on Thursday outside the home on a Southern California hillside where he grew up and developed his love of racing.

The bodies were found on Wednesday around 5pm inside the upscale Orange Park Acres home located in Orange, which is about 30 miles away from downtown Los Angeles.

A rifle was found at the scene, officials said on Thursday. It was reportedly being tested to determine if it was the weapon used in the murder-suicide.

'This is devastating,' Robby said on Thursday while fighting back tears.

'He taught so many, and I want everyone to know what a good man he was.

'I'm so sad and I can't believe it.'

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Former NASCAR driver Robby Gordon said he's 'devastated' after the bodies of his father and his wife, Sharon Gordon, 57, were found Wednesday. They are pictured together above

Robby (pictured above Thursday) expressed his utter disbelief and shock at their deaths while standing outside of the home that he bought in 1989 and where the couple lived together

Robby said: 'This is devastating. He taught so many, and I want everyone to know what a good man he was. I'm so sad and I can't believe it.' He is pictured above right with family friend Steve Nichols on Thursday

He added that he would speak about the deaths again once authorities conclude their investigation.

He also thanked the auto and horse racing communities for their support and prayers.

'The truth will come out, what went down here,' he said.

Robby said his father missed a doctor's appointment on Wednesday when he and other family members became worried.

He asked his father's best friend, Jay Hooker, to check on the couple at the home, who discovered the bodies and called police.

Police Lt. Fred Lopez said autopsies were pending as part of the ongoing investigation.

Robert (left) and Sharon lived in the house that Robby (right) bought in 1989 that's located in an upscale neighborhood in Orange, California

Robby said his father missed a doctor's appointment Wednesday and that's when he and other family members became worried. Above the home is pictured

Robby asked his father's best friend, Jay Hooker, to check on the couple at the home and that's who discovered the bodies and called police. Above an unidentified woman breaks down in tears near the home

Robby shared that his father instilled in him a passion for motorsports and competition.

He currently races in an off-road series he created in 2013 called Speed Energy Formula Off-Road, following the path of his father.

'He taught me at a young age that 1 horsepower wasn't going to be enough - go do something different,' Gordon recalled his father saying.

'And I was fortunate enough to do something different.'

Sharon is the stepmother to Robby, and his two sisters - Beccy Gordon Hunter-Reay and Robyn Gordon.

Jill Dombroske, a neighbor, told The Associated Press that the couple were longtime residents in the quiet neighborhood where large homes sit on expansive hillside properties and many people own horses.

'I feel very sad,' she said. 'Everyone here will be very sad.'

Another neighbor, Greg Saunders, said everyone in the area knew the family.

Police Lt. Fred Lopez said autopsies were pending as part of the ongoing investigation. Robby also said Thursday that 'the truth will come out' about what happened. Above people in the neighborhood gather

Jill Dombroske, a neighbor, said: 'I feel very sad. Everyone here will be very sad.' She is pictured above walking in front of the home where the crime happened with her house

He said Robert had a horse feed business and would regularly drop hay off at neighbors' homes.

Residents in the upscale neighborhood also shared stories about the couple's friendly ways  swapping jokes with neighbors, gifting tickets to racing events and delivering feed personally to local equestrians.

'I can still see them walking hand in hand, walking their dogs down the street,' John Reina, who lives across the street, said.

'To kind of wrap your head around this tragedy is very hard to do.'

Residents were out on Thursday morning walking and riding horses on dirt trails that run along the winding hillside roads.

The Gordon family is known for racing, as Huntley Gordon, Robert's father and Robby's great-grandfather, raced Indy cars in the early 1900s.

Robert started racing in motorsports in the 1970s, his daughters, Beccy and Robyn, also raced as Robby has more than a dozen NASCAR wins.

He was a class champion five times in the Baja 1000, which is a difficult race that goes through the desert terrain in Baja, California.

Robert's former wife, Marlene, pre-ran the Baja 500 while being seven months pregnant with Beccy.

The Gordon family is known for racing, as Huntley Gordon (pictured above in the car), Robert's father and Robby's great-grandfather, raced Indy cars in the early 1900s

Robert started racing in motorsports in the 1970s. He is pictured above left in competing in a motorsports competition

Robyn became the first woman to win the overall title at the Baja 1000 as she shared driving duties with her father and brother in 1990.

Beccy is married to IndyCar Series driver Ryan Hunter-Reay, who won the Indianapolis 500 in 2014.

In addition, Beccy has also raced professionally and was a swimsuit model for brands like Roxy, Quiksilver.

She also became the youngest member on the U.S. women's national softball team, inducting the sport into the 1992 Olympics that were held in Barcelona, Spain.

According to his Facebook page, Beccy just gave birth to the couple's third son on Wednesday.

Robby has previously raced in CART, IndyCar, Trans-Am, IMSA, IROC and Dakar Rally.

Beccy is married to IndyCar Series driver Ryan Hunter-Reay, who won the Indianapolis 500 in 2014. The couple is pictured above with two of their sons as she just gave birth to a third boy on Wednesday

Robby has previously raced in CART, IndyCar, Trans-Am, IMSA, IROC and Dakar Rally. He is pictured above during a practice run for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series in 2012

Known for his aggressive style, he earned three wins in parts of 19 seasons in what is now the NASCAR Sprint Cup.

He was a full-time driver early last decade and finished a career-high 16th in the points standings in 2003 driving for Richard Childress Racing.

Robby last raced in the Sprint Cup in 2012.

In addition, Robby is one of only four drivers, joining John Andretti, Tony Stewart and Kurt Busch, to compete in the Indianapolis 500 and NASCAR Coca-Cola 600 on the same day.

He nearly won the 1999 Indy 500 before running out of fuel in the closing laps.

In 2013 he founded the Speed Energy Formula Off-Road series and recently began racing in it.

The 47-year-old's off-road racing team, Stadium Super Trucks, is scheduled to run this weekend in Costa Mesa.

He said on Thursday he is not backing out of the event because of business commitments.

'And to switch from what happened to a business mode really stinks,' Robby said.

Members of the motorsports community took to social media to offer their support to the family over the shocking deaths of Robert and Sharon.

American professional stock car racing driver and champion team owner Dale Earnhardt Jr. tweeted: 'Praying for friends @RobbyGordon @BeccyGordon and the Gordon family during this difficult time. Hope they find strength and support.'
Liberal National MP George Christensen has called for restrictions on migrants from countries with a high prevalence of violent extremism and radicalism.

The Queensland backbencher claimed many immigrants who have arrived in recent years did not share Australian values during a fiery speech in Parliament on Thursday.

His controversial calls comes just a day after outspoken One Nation leader Pauline Hanson advocated for Muslims to be banned from entering the country.

The politician warned against the rise of 'Islamism' and claimed he was concerned by 'those who are willing to commit violence in the name of that ideology'.

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Liberal National MP George Christensen (pictured) has called for restrictions on migrants from countries with a high prevalence of violent extremism and radicalism

His controversial calls comes just a day after outspoken One Nation leader Pauline Hanson (pictured) advocated for Muslims to be banned from entering the country

'We should consider some tighter controls on borders, such as restricting immigration from countries where there is a high prevalence of violent extremism and radicalism,' Mr Christensen said.

'Many immigrants entering this country in recent years do not share our Australian values. Their views are widespread in the countries from which they come.'

He asked the House of Representatives whether migrants were 'diametrically opposed to the values that helped shape our nation and that underpin our society and our culture'.

'Why did they choose to come to Australia in the first place?' he questioned.

'There are other countries that they would find less offensive, countries where they could enjoy a similar level of oppression and violence to which they are accustomed, which they obviously want.

'It is not necessary to travel half way around the world to come to Australia and demand that Australians change their culture, their society and their laws to match those of their former homeland.'

The politician claimed he was concerned by 'those who are willing to commit violence in the name of that ideology'

However, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull (pictured) has hit back at calls from Mr Christensen to tighten immigration from extremism-riddled nations

However, Malcolm Turnbull has hit back at calls from Mr Christensen to tighten immigration from extremism-riddled nations.

'Our immigration policy is non-discriminatory,' the prime minister told Neil Mitchell on 3AW on Friday.

While there should be concerns about terrorism, that kind of policy would also mean rejecting its victims, Mr Turnbull said.

'We are taking a substantial number, some thousands ... from the Syrian conflict zone - these are people from oppressed minorities, these are people who have been victims of terrorism.'

Mr Turnbull cautioned against demonising the Muslim community, saying they were the most valuable tool for intelligence agencies in fighting terrorism.

'Tagging all Muslims with the crimes of a few is fundamentally wrong and also counter productive,' he said.

It's in the nation's interest to reaffirm Australia's position as the most successful multicultural society in the world.
Bank said it had 'no intention' to settle 'anywhere near the number cited'

The claim against Deutsche was much bigger than had been expected

US government said banks misled investors about the quality of their loans

Deutsche Bank has been asked to pay $14bn by US Justice Department

Deutsche Bank has been ordered to pay $14billion to settle a claim with the US Department of Justice over mortgage deals - but the financial giant has said the figure is far too high.

The German bank is among many financial institutions probed over dealings in shoddy mortgages in the lead-up to the 2008 financial crash.

The US government accused the banks of misleading investors about the quality of their loans.

The claim against Deutsche, which is likely to be the subject of negotiations for several months, was much bigger than expected.

The claim against Deutsche, which is likely to be the subject of negotiations for several months, was much bigger than expected

Following the announcement, the bank's shares tumbled nearly 7 per cent.

Deutsche has seen profits fall amid a difficult business climate and restructuring under new boss John Cryan, which has seen thousands of employees lose their jobs.

The Frankfurt-based lender confirmed the proposed settlement by the Justice Department.

In a statement, it said: 'Deutsche Bank has no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited. The negotiations are only just beginning.

'The bank expects that they will lead to an outcome similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts.

Deutsche has seen profits fall amid a difficult business climate and restructuring under new boss John Cryan (pictured), which has seen thousands of employees lose their jobs

Deutsche Bank is among many financial institutions investigated over the sale of mortgage-backed securities

SALE OF MORTGAGES THAT LED TO FINANCIAL CRASH US mortgage-backed securities were the investment products that sparked the global financial crisis in 2008. Each security or bond was linked to pools of US mortgage loans, many of which were classified as sub-prime - mortgages awarded to high-risk and low-wage homeowers. The poor quality of the loans led to huge losses for investors, kicking off the recession that began in late 2007 as the housing market collapsed and investors suffered billions in losses. When many of those homebuyers defaulted on their mortgages as the US property bubble burst, it turned the linked securities into bad debt. This caused billion-dollar losses at banks, who were forced to write down the value of their investments. Advertisement

Deutsche Bank is among many financial institutions investigated over the sale of mortgage-backed securities, the investment products that sparked the global financial crisis in 2008.

At the current figure, the fine facing Deutsche is one of the largest penalties handed out by US authorities.

The Justice Department had wanted $12billion from Citigroup in 2014 - but they settled on $7billion.

Earlier this year, the Justice Department announced a roughly $5billion settlement with Goldman Sachs over the sale of mortgage-backed securities.

JP Morgan Chase was fined $13billion, while the Bank of America paid $16.7billion to settle similar charges.

The sums paid by the banks are intended to offer financial relief to some homeowners. They have not included criminal sanctions or penalties.

Deutsche was once one of Europe's most successful players on Wall Street.

But it has faced a string of lawsuits that often date back to the boom years before the crash. Its litigation bill since 2012 already stands at more than 12billion.

The news comes days after the EU antagonized US politicians by ordering Apple to pay 13billion of back taxes in Ireland.
Donald Trump's famous hair was wildly mussed up when he appeared on Jimmy Fallon's The Tonight Show on Thursday.

The talk-show host closed his segment with Trump by asking if he could do one silly thing with him since he could be president the next time he appears on the show.

'I'm not liking the sound of this,' Trump said before Fallon asked if he could mess his hair up.

The audience roared as the Republican nominee pondered the bizarre request but he ultimately agreed.

'The answer is yes, but... I hope the people of New Hampshire... will understand,' Trump said, noting he would be there later tonight and did not want his coiffure out of place.

But Fallon certainly sent Trump's locks flying out of control in every direction.

Donald Trump's famous hair was wildly mussed up when he appeared on Jimmy Fallon's The Tonight Show on Thursday

Fallon sent Trump's locks flying out of control in every direction. And while Trump is known for being sensitive about his hair, he smiled throughout the hilarious ordeal

And while Trump is known for being sensitive about his hair, he smiled throughout the hilarious ordeal.

Afterwards, he tried to push his hair back in place, but it largely resisted.

Back in 2011, Trump shared his in-depth routine for what it takes to get his head of hair to look the way it does.

He told Rolling Stone he lathers his hair in Head and Shoulders in the shower and then lets it air dry which usually takes about an hour.

While it's drying he said he spends his time reading newspapers.

'I then comb my hair. Yes, I do use a comb,' he said. 'Do I comb it forward? No, I don't comb it forward.'

He added: 'I actually don't have a bad hairline. When you think about it, it's not bad.

'I mean, I get a lot of credit for comb-overs. But it's not really a comb-over.

'It's sort of a little bit forward and back. I've combed it the same way for years. Same thing, every time.'

Trump appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on Thursday

Thursday's hair ordeal came hours after it was reported that Trump's campaign said he has finally admitted President Barack Obama was born in America, more than five years after first raising doubts about his country of origin.

'In 2011, Mr Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate,' Trump's senior communications adviser, Jason Miller, said in a statement.

It concluded: 'Having successfully obtained President Obamas birth certificate when others could not, Mr Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.'

However, the statement added: 'Mr Trump did a great service to the President and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised.'

During the Tonight Show, Trump repeated his comments that he does not want a moderator at the debates and complained that critics of Today show host Matt Lauer are 'trying to game the system.'

'Donald, this is getting real,' Fallon said of the race for the White House.

'It's getting real,' Trump replied.

'Do you still want to do it? There's time,' Fallon joked.

During Thursday's show, Trump repeated his comments that he does not want a moderator at the debates

Trump went on to say the presidential campaign has been 'fun, amazing,' and that 'it's been an honor for me.'

When asked what he would say to children who wanted to grow up to be president he replied: 'You want to help people,' noting there are 'tremendous problems.'

'If you want to help people there's no better position to do it from than the presidency.'

Fallon asked Trump if he had always wanted to be president with Trump saying he 'really never did,' noting if he had he 'probably wouldn't have done as many shows.'

The billionaire businessman then went on to describe his run for president as 'grueling but at the same time very satisfying,' adding his background in business has helped him.

Speaking about the primaries, he said he 'spent less money and did better.'

'That's what we want to do for the country, spend less money and do better,' he said.

When asked about changes since the primaries, Trump noted 'the press has become more and more vicious.'

According to recent polls, Trump and his Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton are tied in the race for the White House, with both candidates receiving 42 per cent among likely voters in a four-way split.

When asked if he watches the polls Trump said, 'Oh I love the polls.'

The billionaire businessman described his run for president as 'grueling but at the same time very satisfying,' adding his background in business has helped him

'If I'm losing or lagging I never mention it, only when I'm winning,' he said.

As the interview continued, Fallon told Trump his name for the 'Trump-Vladimir Putin bromance' is 'Vlump.'

Last week, Trump praised Russian President Vladimir Putin's 'strong control' over Russia and said he was 'far more' of a leader than President Obama.

However, Trump noted the media makes it out like Putin is his 'best friend' but said that is not the case, adding 'I don't even know him.'

'I don't know him,' Trump told Fallon.

'I know nothing about him. If we got along with Russia, not a bad thing. I don't have any feelings about him.'

'They make it like he's my best friend. I don't even know him,' he added.

As the November 8 election is only months away, the first presidential debate is scheduled for September 26.

According to recent polls, Trump and his Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton (;pictured) are tied in the race for the White House, with both candidates receiving 42 per cent among likely voters in a four-way split. When asked if he watches the polls Trump said, 'Oh I love the polls'

Trump said he will 'certainly prepare' for the debate and said he loved the primary experience and looks forward to it.

However, he said it will be 'very tough' for Lester Holt, one of four moderators selected for this years presidential debates.

'I think Matt Lauer did a tremendous job. People saying he wasn't as tough [on Trump as Hillary],' he said.

'He was very tough on me, he was tough on her.'

'I think it's unfair,' he added. 'They are trying to game the system.'

Trump earlier this week said he would like to have a debate with Clinton without moderators.

He believes the moderators would be biased and help Clinton because they wouldn't want to suffer the same fate as Lauer, who took a load of criticism for throwing too many softball questions at Trump during a recent NBC News 'Commander-in-Chief Forum.'

He said having a debate without moderators like Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas in 1858 would be 'fascinating.'

Trump again made comments that he would like a debate without moderators. He said having a debate without moderators like Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas would be 'fascinating'

He also suggested that there is 'a lot of outside pressure being placed on Lester,' who is moderating the first presidential debate, saying he is 'going to hammer me.'

'I think that's not the right thing to do,' he said.

When asked about offering up apologies, Trump said 'I don't love apologizing.'

'I'm not thrilled about apologizing, but I'll apologize if I'm wrong,' he said before Fallon asked him if he liked to play the board game 'Sorry.'

'I like Monopoly better,' he said.

Following news about Clinton being sick with pneumonia, Fallon mentioned Trump 'handled that very well.'

When asked if he has gotten sick Trump replied: 'Is this wood or formica?' he asked Fallon of his desk, before fake knocking on it and saying he had not gotten sick.

He noted he has avoided getting ill by not 'thinking about it,' and said despite his 'very grueling schedule,' he so far is 'staying strong.'

As for his penchant for fast food, Trump said he enjoys it noting that with Wendy's and KFC or the like 'at least you know what you're getting.'

He said if he went to some unknown place: 'If they don't like me I don't know.. I'm better off with fast food.'

Trump went on to speak lovingly about his childhood, marveling at the fact that the 2,000-square-foot home he grew up in as a child in Queens, New York is now for sale.

Trump also complained during the segment that critics of Today show host Matt Lauer (pictured) are 'trying to game the system'

'I had a really good childhood. That's sad to look at that, I want to buy it,' he said.

He also spoke of how his parents were strict but loving.

During a game the pair played when they pretended Trump was taking a job interview for president, Trump was asked questions such as how his coworkers would describe him and to describe some of his hobbies.

He said coworkers would describe him as 'somebody who never gives up,' and noted he does not 'have any time' for hobbies.

When asked why he wants to leave his current job, Trump told Fallon: 'I'm sort of looking to make a lot less money.'

'What will you do if you don't get this position?' Fallon asked.

'More than anything I want to take over the Tonight Show.'
Said he was inspired by rave culture, 80s London fashion and Harajuku girls - black culture was not mentioned

Stylist Guido Palau said he didn't consider the look cultural appropriation but said he takes inspiration from every culture

Others criticized the designer for including only two people of color

brand of cultural appropriation after the

It was a fashion show that got everyone talking.

Unfortunately, it wasn't the clothes that made the headlines at Marc Jacob's New York Fashion Week show.

It was the designer's controversial decision to use a cast of predominately white models - which included Kendall Jenner and Gigi Hadid - with huge multicolored wool dreadlocks.

Marc Jacobs has come under fire for 'cultural appropriation'. Pictured is Bella Hadid as she models dreadlocks and a see-through lace dress

Many people online have blasted Marc Jacobs for the move, accusing the brand of cultural appropriation.

'Dreadlocks are part of black culture, something you have no business trying to sell or appropriate. Do better,' wrote Twitter user Maia.

Others questioned why there were so few black models in the show.

'Dreadlocks and yet no black models. Smh,' wrote one user. Another tweeted: 'Y'all made your models wear dreadlocks but only use two black models? Bye.'

Marc Jacobs say the look was inspired by rave culture, London 1980s fashion and and Harajuku girls - black culture was not mentioned.

Many people online have blasted Marc Jacobs for the move, accusing the brand of cultural appropriation

But some furious Tweeters claimed that white people should be banned from wearing dreadlocks altogether.

Olivia wrote: 'W hy does Marc Jacobs think it's okay to put dreadlocks on white people?'

Chris Coon added: 'Dreadlocks look better on blacks, give it up white people.'

Dreadlocks are apparent in many different cultures, from the ancient Greeks and Egyptians, to right through to modern day India, Africa and white counterculture.

But in America, it is most closely linked to black culture and is sometimes used as a symbol of black pride.

So it is strange that the designer chose to use so few African American models in this season's show.

The process: Yahoo Beauty revealed the artist behind the rainbow wigs is Jena Counts of Dreadlocks by Jena; here Gigi is getting her wig on

Wigged out: Kendall Jenner and Gigi Hadid looked thrilled with their out-there outfits and bizarre wigs as they posed backstage at the Marc Jacobs show in NYC on Thursday

Stylist Guido Palau said he didn't consider the look cultural appropriation but said he takes inspiration from every culture.

'Style comes from clashing things. It's always been there  if you're creative, if you make food, music, and fashion, whatever, you're inspired by everything,' he told The Cut after the show.

'It's not homogeneous. Different cultures mix all the time. You see it on the street. People don't dress head-to-toe in just one way.'

He said that Marc Jacobs would often take something 'street' and 'raw' and transform it into something ' much more sophisticated and fashionable.'

'Dreadlocks are part of black culture, something you have no business trying to sell or appropriate. Do better,' one Twitter user wrote

Palau said that had to find the right hair to create the high styles 'inspired by transgender director Lana Wachowski,' the trans director behind films such as The Matrix who appeared in Fall 2016 ad campaign, the site reported.

That is when he found Jena Counts of Dreadlocks by Jena - the artist behind the rainbow wigs, Yahoo Beauty reports.

She has been 'dying wool hair extensions in the small town of Palataka, Fla., for about one year.'

It was added the 'self-taught pro' learned her technique online and has made 200 to 300 different shades since starting. 'It comes in a roping and you cut it and roll it/ You can wash them with sulfate-free shampoo to keep the colors.'

She sells her custom rainbow-colored creations on Etsy for up to $155 a set.

After the much-talked-about show, some of the models were seen exiting the ballroom.

All the heels: Other models in the same sky-high platforms and unusual wigs that appeared on the blue carpet

Kendall Jenner and Gigi Hadid had joined the cast of Marc Jacobs models wearing the pastel colored dreadlocks.

The models seemed to love the look as they laughed backstage. Bella Hadid made a more serious expression as she modeled a see-through top. Other models at the show were Karlie Kloss, Irina Shayk, Jourdan Dunn and Adriana Lima.

Demi Lovato, Malin Akerman, Christina Ricci, Carla Gugino and Courtney Love were in the audience.

The overall look of the show was pastels colors meets Ziggy Stardust.

Kendall, 20, looked pensive as she made her way down the runway in a wigs with blue and purple as well as an army green color. Her coat was metallic gunmetal grey with a black studded belt.

Some furious Tweeters claimed that white people should be banned from wearing dreadlocks altogether




A former Penthouse Pet has been sentenced to a minimum six-and-a-half years in jail for helping smuggle the drug ice into Australia concealed in bath products.

A Sydney District Court judge found Simone Farrow, 41, played a principal role in helping to smuggle methamphetamine into the country over a seven-and-a-half-month period before her arrest in October 2009.

Farrow was given an overall sentence of 11 years, and with time served she will be eligible for parole in February 2019.

Former Penthouse Pet Simone Farrow, 41, has been sentenced to a minimum six-and-a-half years in jail for helping smuggle the drug ice into Australia concealed in bath products

Farrow was arrested in 2009 on the Gold Coast before being extradited to Sydney.

Prosecutors said she controlled the drug ring while pursuing a career in the United States under the name Simone Starr.

She pleaded guilty to importing a marketable quantity of a border controlled drug, but denied being the leader of the smuggling racket.

In April 2015, she broke down in court while detailing her former drug addiction and suicide attempt.

She told the court her mother told her it was okay to be a prostitute when she was a teenager.

In April 2015, she broke down in court while detailing her former drug addiction and suicide attempt

Prosecutors said she controlled the drug ring while pursuing a career in the United States under the name Simone Starr
An Ohio woman is now suing the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office after she was pepper-sprayed while being restrained in an isolation cell.

Amber Swink, who was 24 years old at the time, was pepper-sprayed by then Montgomery County Sheriff's Office Sgt Judith Sealey, while at the Montgomery County Jail, a civil rights suit alleges, according to the Daytona Daily News.

Sealey has since been promoted to captain because of political reasons, the suit alleges.

Amber Swink (pictured), who was 24 years old at the time, was pepper-sprayed by then Montgomery County Sheriff's Office Sgt Judith Sealey, while at the Montgomery County Jail, a civil rights suit alleges

The video shows Swink being restrained as an officer walked up to her and sprayed her in the face. The officer then gets even closer to her face and continued to pepper spray her

The suit also mentions other allegations that accuse the department of policy violations and a cover-up.

But Sheriff Phil Plummer has denied those allegations and did not defend Sealey's actions against Swink, the Daily News reported.

The lawsuit claims that the video, which was taken in November 2015, shows excessive force 'that amounted to torture'.

The video shows Swink being restrained as an officer walked up to her and sprayed her in the face.

The officer then gets even closer to her face and continued to pepper spray her.

Swink, who is now 25, had been pepper-sprayed once by Sealey, who at the time was the highest-ranking officer at the jail, before being placed into a restraint in an isolation cell, according to the suit obtained by the Daily News.

Police reported that Swink was taken to jail because she was heavily intoxicated and acting belligerently. During the video, Swink appears to pass out after being pepper-sprayed and a medic (right) performed sternum rubs until she regained consciousness

Swink told The Washington Post: 'It felt like somebody just crushed up fresh peppers and made me use them as face cream.'

In the video, Swink appears to cough before she passes out.

A medic performed sternum rubs until Swink regained consciousness, according to the Daily News.

The suit alleges that Judith Sealey (pictured) was promoted to captain as part of a 'back door' deal made after racist text messages were sent by the force's former captain and another detective

Police reported that Swink was taken to jail because she was heavily intoxicated and acting belligerently.

She was sentenced to community control after being convicted of assault on a police officer for breaking the officer's glasses, the Daily News reported.

Plummer said Wednesday that he saw the video and that Sealey's actions were a violation of policy, adding that she 'was dealt with'.

According to a report, Swink had been yelling and screaming, which is why Sealey pepper-sprayed her.

Plummer said Sealey was given a 'letter of caution,' which would remain in her file for six months.

He told the newspaper that Sealey is 'top-notch' and that there was no way she would be terminated.

The complaint said 'several private meetings were held' to determine how to conceal the incident and that information should be 'intentionally destroyed,' the Daily News reported.

The suit alleges that Sealey was promoted as part of a 'back door' deal made after racist text messages were sent by the former captain and another detective.

It says the deal was made to promote Sealey because of pressure from Dayton Unit NAACP President Derrick Foward.
Her remains were not recovered until 18 months after she disappeared

Ms Sinclair's body was found in a shallow grave in the Northern Territory

A man who killed his partner and dumped her body in a shallow grave in the Northern Territory has been sentenced to life in jail.

Danny Deacon, 45, was found guilty last week of murdering Carlie Sinclair, his partner of ten years, on or about June 18, 2013.

He claimed he was provoked on the night of the murder and feared Ms Sinclair was going to leave him, separating him from their then two-year-old son, The ABC reported.

Danny Deacon, 45, has been sentenced to a non-parole period of 21 years and six months for murdering his partner Carlie Sinclair

Deacon claimed he feared Ms Sinclair (left) was going to leave him, separating him from their then two-year-old son

At the Supreme Court in Darwin on Friday, Justice Peter Barr called Deacon's evidence 'untrustworthy' and 'self serving' and sentenced him to life with a non-parole period of 21 years and six months, NT News reported.

'There was no loss of self control on your part. Everything you did on that evening was planned and prepared for,' Justice Barr said.

Deacon pleaded not guilty to murdering Ms Sinclair, who was found in a pre-dug grave 18 months after she went missing.

But evidence presented in court, including a video of Deacon confessing to killing the 35-year-old, was enough to return a majority guilty verdict.

Deacon put Ms Sinclair in the boot of her Rav 4 after killing her and drove to Berry Springs, where she was buried.

Ms Sinclair was found in a pre-dug grave in Berry Springs 18 months after she went missing
Mr Callaway was the only suspect and did not give evidence in court

The family of murdered Melbourne grandmother Brenda Goudge have been left devastated again after they heard the prime suspect could not be held responsible for the horrific murder of the 61-year-old grandmother.

The five-year search for justice came to a crossroads on Friday when a Victorian Coroner decided there was not enough evidence to charge former policeman Paul Callaway with the gruesome murder of Mrs Goudge at her Wantirna home in Melbourne on July 8, 2011.

The inquest heard police believe former policeman Paul Callaway deliberately contaminated evidence and lied to homicide investigators about his movements the morning Mrs Goudge's body was found suffocated to death.

The family members of Mrs Goudge had to hold back tears as they were left angry and devastated a 'broken system' had failed to find and bring a murderer to justice.

Police are still searching for the murderer of Brenda Goudge who was found dead in July 2011

Paul Callaway (Right) was the only suspect in the five-year search for Mrs Goudge's murderer

'Blind Freddy could have sat through that inquest and known who did this,' son Adam Goudge said.

'Somebody has got away with murder.'

Mr Callaway was the only suspect in the case and is opposed to giving evidence in court in case of incriminating himself, which infuriated family members calling him 'gutless'.

'What I think is terribly unfair is we all took the stand and he was omitted...not to have to speak and its wrong,' Mrs Goudge's sister Sue McCormack said.

The court heard police believed the only suspect Paul Callaway (Left) contaminated evidence

'The reason given he didn't take the stand is it might incriminate him. I think they should have to take the stand.

'He didn't even come today. That's how gutless he is.'

Coroner Caitlin English told the Victorian Court while they did not have enough evidence today to conclude Mr Callaway was involved in the murder, he was not excluded from the investigation.

The family members of Mrs Goudge are devastated and said, 'Our justice system is broken'

'The evidence does not allow me to conclude that Mr Callaway was involved in the death of Mrs Goudge,' said Coroner Caitlin English, the Herald Sun reported.

'Having said that, there is no evidence that positively excludes Mr Callaway as a person who may have been involved.'

Mrs Goudge, 61, was discovered more than five-years-ago in her backyard pool after she failed to show up to work at Jay Dee Auto Cables where she is a business partner.

Mrs Goudge, 61, was discovered around five-years-ago in her backyard pool at Wantirna home

Her daughter and employee Rebecca Goudge and business partner Mr Callaway were concerned and went looking for her entering the Wantirna home through the opened back door.

The horrific scene then began to unfold before her daughter's eyes as they found blood on her bed and found bloodstained pillows by the pool that led them to her body in the pool.

Mr Callaway pulled her body out of the water and both of them called police.

A forensic pathologist concluded she had suffered blunt force trauma to the head and died of asphyxiation through a doona or pillow after a struggle had taken place.

Coroner English said it's likely Mrs Goudge knew her attacker as there were no sign of forced entry.

Mr Callaway's alibi came under scrutiny when he originally told police he was having breakfast at home the morning of the murder, only to later claim he was viewing a property and had breakfast at a fast-food outlet.

A $1 million reward still remains for anyone with evidence leading to an arrest or conviction

The court heard Mr Callaway and Mrs Goudge argued, 'just like an old married couple,' during their business partnership since 2007. The court also heard staff had left the business due to her behavior towards them.

Police said Mr Callaway financially benefited from his business partner's death.

She said Mr Callaway seemed to have 'engaged in deceptive behaviour in what he told police'.
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Britain has woken up to flash flooding, thunder and lightning as stormy weather lashes much of the country  dumping almost half a month's rain in a few hours and bringing an abrupt end to the September heatwave.

Roads and properties have been hit by severe flooding in parts of central London, Hampshire, Oxfordshire, Surrey, Hertfordshire and Greater London after a band of torrential rain moved in from the Channel overnight.

Dramatic pictures show cars submerged in floodwater, Tube stations flooded and lightning bolts over the capital.

And it may be a miserable journey home after a rainy day in the capital as flooding threatens to give commuters a disappointing start to the weekend.

Delays of up to an hour are affecting trains from London Euston to Milton Keynes after a landslide derailed a train between Watford Junction and Kings Langley, causing major disruption and scores of cancellations for travellers trying to get from London Euston to the Midlands and the North.

Hundreds of passengers were trapped on the two stricken trains for more than four hours this morning.

The delays are expected to last until the end of the day.

Up to two ft of flood water at Didcot Parkway and Newbury stations in Oxfordshire caused travel chaos. The deluge flooded the underpass at Didcot, meaning only one platform could be used.

Lines at Newbury were submerged by the water preventing services from stopping until one platform operated a reduced service in the afternoon.

The bad weather could continue into Saturday, compounding affected areas further, the environment agency warned.

Water submerged stretches of motorway including on the M4 and M25, where two lorries crashed at around 5.20am.

It was hoped the anticlockwise carriageway of the M25 and the M4 at junction eight would be fully open 'before tonight's peak period, unless weather conditions change again,' said a Highways England spokeswoman.

Trains from Paddington and Euston are delayed and passengers trying to catch flights from Heathrow have allegedly been told not to try to get to the airport today, but that their tickets would be valid tomorrow.

The stormy conditions bring a sudden end to the record-breaking heatwave in Britain which saw temperatures climb to 30C again yesterday - making it the third successive September day that temperatures soared that high.

The mercury plummeted by more than 10C overnight as forecasters issued a string of severe weather warnings.

Commuters are now facing transport chaos after the flash flooding caused problems on the nation's roads - including on the M25, M4 and M40 - as well as on the rail network where 'several incidents' are causing delays.

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Fancy a swim: Dramatic pictures from Didcot railway station in Oxfordshire show the ticket barriers and stairwells submerged in murky floodwater after it engulfed the main concourse. One Twitter user warned others to 'abandon' the station

A rather wet morning commute: One person stood outside a rather flooded Didcot Parkway railway station in Oxfordshire today before learning that trains were cancelled or not stopping at the station due to the flash flooding which hit overnight

Wading through the water: One man was forced to walk through deep floodwater as he arrived at the Spar shop at Didcot Parkway railway station in Oxfordshire this morning following flash flooding overnight which saw half a month's rain fall

Where did summer go? Cars are pictured wading through deep floodwater on the M25 in London early this morning (left) while Maidenhead High Street in Berkshire remained underwater overnight as the drains failed to cope with the rainwater

A bad day on the trains: Euston station in London is packed with commuters after a derailment caused by a landslide near Watford caused London Midland and Virgin train services to be either cancelled or delayed at rush-hour this morning

What to do? Commuters were left questioning how they would get to their destination after train services in and out of London Euston (pictured) were heavily disrupted this morning following the derailment of a train caused by a landslide

Delayed, delayed and... delayed: There was disruption to all trains out of London Euston this morning (pictured) after the derailment near Watford. A landslip on the line caused a train to come off the tracks - forcing dozens of cancellations

Nightmare: A train derailed on the Milton Keynes to London Euston line this morning after hitting a landslip near Watford (pictured). The train came off the tracks before being given a 'glancing blow' by an oncoming train shortly after 6am. Workers can be seen assessing the track following the landslip this morning (left), while the train is seen derailed in the tunnel (right)

A landslide and a derailment: This image on the left shows the damage to the London Midlands train after it derailed and hit another train following a landslip near Watford. Passengers still remained trapped on the stricken train this morning (right)

Crikey! This dramatic photograph shows lightning bolts striking over Godalming in Surrey in the early hours of this morning

Out with a bang: There were dramatic thunderstorms in much of southern England overnight including in Surrey (pictured)

Stormy scene: This graphic from Met Desk shows the extent of the rainfall over southern England at around 1.30am overnight

Four people - two drivers and two passengers, one of whom was pregnant - suffered minor injuries in the crash, which saw the 6.19am service from Milton Keynes derail after hitting the landslide just north of Watford Junction.

Another train travelling in the opposite direction 'gave a glancing blow' to the derailed train, Network Rail said.

It left the two London Midland trains 'leaning against one another' as emergency crews desperately worked to evacuate the some 400 passengers stuck on board.

Around 100,000 could be in line for a refund after the dramatic incident on the early morning service.

Any passenger delayed between 30 minutes and one hour on a London Midlands route is eligible to claim 50 per cent of a single ticket or 35 per cent of a return ticket and a proportion of a season ticket.

Virgin Trains automatically refund anyone who booked through their website if they are delayed by more than 30 minutes.

The train operators will not be footing the bill, however.

Owen Johns, spokesman for Network Rail, said: 'Network Rail pays compensation to train operators when delays are caused by infrastructure issues, including weather, landslips, signalling problems and people under trains.

'Although this delay was not caused by Network Rail, anything caused by the weather is a Network Rail issue. We cover delay repayment for anything not caused by the train operators themselves.

'The train companies pay delayed passengers compensation directly but yes, the money comes from us, we pay them back.

'As Network Rail is an external government body, the money does come from the taxpayer.'

Jake Steers, who was on board the first train at the time of the landslide, described his relief that they were inside the tunnel at the time - or 'there would have been casualties'.

FLASH FLOODING CHAOS The following roads and rail services are disrupted by the flash flooding this morning: ROADS M4 - A34 junction with Newbury M40 - Entire Thames Valley area M25 - Greater London TRAINS Milton Keynes Central and London Euston - Major disruption and 60-minute delays due to a derailed train at Watford Junction Woking to London Waterloo - Delays of 30 minutes due to flooding Reading to London Paddington - Lightning has damaged equipment in Slough, causing delays Didcot Parkway, Oxford - Trains not stopping due to flooding Dorchester to Bournemouth - Delays until 11am due to flood damage Stansted Airport to Cambridge and London Liverpool Street to Stratford - Lightning strike to signalling system is causing severe disruption. Abellio Greater Anglia advises people not to travel Advertisement

He said: 'We were going through the tunnel, when the first carriage derailed and it all shuddered and the train shook violently.

'I didn't see the landslide as we were in the tunnel, then we crashed into the oncoming train slightly.

'I couldn't see the landslide just felt it hit us. It's quite worrying as I have been doing that commute for two and a half years. It would have a lot worse had we not been in the tunnel - there would have been casualties had they been going full speed.'

Both of the London Midland trains involved in the incident are 'still in situ', Network Rail said. Workers are assessing the best way to remove them from the tracks.

The passengers were allowed to get off the stricken trains at around 11am - four hours after the initial derailment and collision - and were ferried back to the nearby Kings Langley station in Hertfordshire on a Virgin train which was drafted in to help.

Speaking before they were rescued, passengers told of the their ordeal.

Chris Robertson said: 'Everyone is fine but we are in a tunnel with limited signal. Don't catch a train to Euston today, the line is shut.

'We hit a landslide and derailed clipping an oncoming train. Emergency services have arrived to get us off but are assessing what to do first.'

A Network Rail spokesman said: 'Both trains are still in situ and the rescue train is on route.

'The service that clipped the London Midlands train which derailed was travelling in the opposite direction.'

The incident is causing major delays to services in and out of London Euston with most journeys cancelled and those that are going ahead suffering delays of at least 60 minutes.

Martin Frobisher, route managing director for Network Rail, confirmed the 6.19am train hit a landslip caused by torrential rain, resulting in it leaving the tracks a few miles north of Watford. The train remained upright, he added.

'Engineers are on site and train services are now running through the area but it will be some time before a normal timetable resumes,' he said.

London Midland tweeted: 'Due to derailment this morning, there will be delays and cancellations. Ticket acceptance in place on other train operating companies.'

A spokesman added: 'The 06.19 service from Milton Keynes to Euston derailed just after 7am this morning at a tunnel near Watford Junction.

'It's at the busiest stretch of mixed railway in Europe and we are expecting delays and disruption until at least midday, but possibly longer. It affects London Midlands trains, Virgin and Southern. Services to the midlands, north west and Scotland will be affected.'

There goes the summer: Londoners were forced to change their sunhats for umbrellas as rain hit the capital this afternoon

Not quite the weather for sightseeing: Tourists donned protective waterproof ponchos as they took in the London sights

So much rain: This is a flooded underpass in the town centre of Maidenhead, Berkshire this lunchtime following the downpour

Flooded: The underpass in Maidenhead twon centre in Berkshire was full of floodwater today after the drains failed to cope

This Met Desk graphic shows rain across the country overnight prompting the Environment Agency to issue a string of alerts

Warnings: The Environment Agency has issued a string of flood alerts for much of London and the wider area in the South

Initially, all four lines of the West Cost main line were closed at the scene, but two were reopened at around 8am.

Mr Frobisher added: 'Our priority is to fully reopen the railway as soon as it is safe to do so. A full investigation into what happened will take place.'

Pictures on social media also show severely waterlogged rail stations and roads, including Didcot Parkway, Newbury and Chieveley stations across Oxfordshire - which is causing further misery for rail passengers.

Water can be seen rising up stairwells and partly submerging ticket barriers at Didcot Parkway station.

Turnpike Lane and Manor House stations on the London Underground's Piccadilly line were closed early this morning but re-opened by around 6.30am, Transport for London (TfL) said.

Meanwhile, on the rail network, South West Trains said 'several incidents are disrupting' the network.

A spokesman said: 'A lightning strike has caused substantial damage to certain elements of our signalling equipment on the line which runs between Ascot and Guildford via Aldershot.

'Train services running through these stations may be delayed or revised. Disruption is expected until the end of the day.'

Flooding has also damaged equipment connected to a level crossing between Dorchester and Bournemouth, meaning they have to be manually controlled, with problems and delays set to go on until around 11am.

Rain, rain, go away: Raincoats and umbrellas were the order of the day in London as heavy rain lashed the capital this morning

Where has summer gone? Commuters were forced to dig out their umbrellas this morning as heavy rain lashed the capital

Trying to ease the flooding: Council workers were seen unblocking drains e after downpours in Godalming, Surrey overnight

Roadside flooding: Water is building up on roads across London and Surrey (Godalming, pictured) after heavy rain today

What a show: Lightning tore across the sky over the iconic Tyne Bridge and Swing Bridge on Newcastle Quayside last night

Light up, light up: Lightning bolts are seen striking over Newcastle last night as thunderstorms ripped across the country

A different kind of light show: Lightning over Godalming in Surrey in the early hours as the storm sweeps across the UK

A 'large amount of infrastructure' at Woking has also been damaged by the water - with disruption and delays expected until the end of the day.

Train services are also severely disrupted between Stansted Airport, Cambridge, London Liverpool Street and Stratford.

A severely reduced service will run between Hertford East and London Liverpool Street after a lightning strike hit signalling equipment. Abellio Greater Anglia is now advising passengers not to travel.

A spokesman said: 'Due to the severity of the disruption [we] are advising you not to travel between Cambridge / Hertford East / Stansted Airport London Liverpool Street / Stratford. Your ticket will be valid on this route tomorrow.'

There is also disruption on the London Waterloo to Woking route, due to flooding, and on the Reading to London Paddington line after lightning strikes damaged signalling equipment.

Thames Valley Police said there was also disruption on roads with congestion on the M4 at the A34 junction with Newbury and on the M40 throughout the Thames Valley area.

Shocking video footage also shows a 'river of water' running down the M25 after it was hit by flash flooding. Cars can be seen driving through the foot-deep floodwater after it engulfed the motorway at J21a near Watford.

This Morning TV presenter Philip Schofield was among those who took to Twitter to comment on the loud thunder overnight

Lighting up the nighttime sky: One Twitter user uploaded this dramatic photo of lightning over Windsor at 3.45am overnight

The storm up north: Twitter users shared these photographs of lightning bolts in the sky above Sheffield during the night

Cars submerged as summer draws to an end: The centre of Ruislip Manor, London, was flooded yesterday evening as up to 40mm of rain fell in just an hour during heavy downpours in parts of the UK, which forecasters warn will continue today

Many residents took to Twitter during the night to complain about being kept awake by the stormy conditions  which swept in after yet another day of balmy temperatures in the capital.

TV presenter Philip Schofield was among those awoken by the loud thunderstorm. He wrote: 'Holy CR*P!!! Thunder nearly blew us out of bed!!', alongside a series of 'laughing and thunderbolt emojis'.

Twitter user, Jay Virdee, said: Windsor at 3:45am #thunderstorms #lightning' before sharing a series of lightning bolt pictures. Another added: 'Crazy crazy storm outside right now. It sounds like the end of the world. Never heard anything like it.'

The weather front has sent temperatures tumbling ahead of the weekend, just days after parts of the country baked in 34C (93F) heat. Temperatures already dropped by 10C overnight and are expected to stay around 18C today.

A yellow warning of rain remains in place for much of England during today, rising to amber along a narrow corridor west of London where 'exceptionally heavy, thundery rain' accompanied by hail is expected.

The Environment Agency has also issued a series of flood warnings.

Surrey Fire and Rescue Service said it had been called to reports of a house struck by lightning near Woking, while crews worked to pump water out of flooded premises across the county.

Energy provider SSE said 1,273 homes across Basingstoke, Newbury, Reading and Bournemouth were left without power as a result of lightning.

Fire chiefs advised motorists to avoid driving through flooded roads and turn around as pictures emerged of Maidenhead High Street resembling a swimming pool.

It's raining, it's pouring: Commuters were forced to shield themselves with umbrellas as heavy rain hit Waterloo, London

At least we're dry! Two youngsters managed to keep out of the rain in their double buggy in Wimbledon, south west London

Hello autumn: Commuters across the capital - from Wimbledon (left) to Waterloo Bridge (right) were drenched at rush-hour

Flooding: The Met Office has put a string of severe weather warnings in place and warned some areas could see flash flooding (pictured, Ruislip, London) as the hard ground - after a scorching week - cannot instantly absorb the rain

The end of summer: Up to 40mm of rain fell in a single hour yesterday (pictured, west London) and as much as 40mm is due later today in some areas, which is equivalent to the average monthly rainfall in September of 60-70mm, the Met Office said

Weather warnings: The Met Office has issued yellow-graded weather warnings for much of the country today, and the more sever amber-graded for London (left). Right: This graphic shows some of the lightning strikes over the UK during the night

TRAIN DERAILS AND IS 'HIT BY ANOTHER' AFTER LANDSLIP CAUSES RAIL CHAOS Hundreds of passengers were trapped on a derailed train for more than four hours today after it hit a landslide and derailed  before colliding with another train. Four people  two drivers and two passengers, one of whom is pregnant  were injured when the London Midland train was hit by a landslip and derailed just north of Watford Junction at around 7am. Network Rail said the 6.19am service from Milton Keynes to London Euston came off the tracks and was given a 'glancing blow' by an oncoming train in a 'slow tunnel'. It left the two London Midland trains 'leaning against one another' as emergency crews desperately worked to evacuate the some 400 passengers stuck on board. Landslide: The train derailed just after it entered this tunnel near Watford when part of the nearby bank crashed down onto the track. Network Rail workers are seen at the track assessing the site this morning - as it remains closed to commuters Aftermath: One of the two London Midland trains involved in the incident near Watford this morning. The train was hit by a landslide and derailed, before being struck by another train Rail workers were seen passing bottles of waters to the stricken commuters, many of whom told of their terrifying ordeal at being involved in the derailment. Jake Steers, who was on board the first train at the time of the landslide, described his relief that they were inside the tunnel at the time - or 'there would have been casualties'. He said: 'We were going through the tunnel, when the first carriage derailed and it all shuddered and the train shook violently. 'I didn't see the landslide as we were in the tunnel, then we crashed into the oncoming train slightly. 'I couldn't see the landslide just felt it hit us. It's quite worrying as I have been doing that commute for two-and-a-half years. It would have a lot worse had we not been in the tunnel - there would have been casualties had they been going full speed.' Both of the London Midland trains involved in the incident are 'still in situ', Network Rail said. Workers are assessing the best way to remove them from the tracks. The passengers were allowed to get off the stricken trains at around 11am - four hours after the initial derailment and collision - and were ferried back to the nearby Kings Langley station in Hertfordshire on a Virgin train which was drafted in to help. Workers at the scene of the collision between the two trains just north of Watford junction Martin Frobisher, route managing director for Network Rail, said a train hit a landslip caused by torrential rain, resulting in a small section of the train leaving the tracks a few miles north of Watford. Pictured: The landslip on the track this morning Chris Robertson said: 'Everyone is fine but we are in a tunnel with limited signal. Don't catch a train to Euston today, the line is shut. 'We hit a landslide and derailed clipping an oncoming train. Emergency services have arrived to get us off but are assessing what to do first.' A Network Rail spokesman said: 'Both trains are still in situ and the rescue train is on route. 'The service that clipped the London Midlands train which derailed was travelling in the opposite direction.' The incident is causing major delays to services in and out of London Euston with most journeys cancelled and those that are going ahead suffering delays of at least 60 minutes. Martin Frobisher, route managing director for Network Rail, confirmed the 6.19am train hit a landslip caused by torrential rain, resulting in it leaving the tracks a few miles north of Watford. The train remained upright, he added. 'Engineers are on site and train services are now running through the area but it will be some time before a normal timetable resumes,' he said. Initially, all four lines of the West Cost main line were closed at the scene, but two were reopened at around 8am. Mr Frobisher added: 'Our priority is to fully reopen the railway as soon as it is safe to do so. A full investigation into what happened will take place.' Emergency crews and ambulances were pictured at the scene of the incident. Advertisement

Met Office meteorologist Martin Combe said 1.3inches (32.8mm) of rain had fallen in just three hours in Farnborough, Hampshire - half the 2.75inches (70mm) average for September.

He said: 'The storms are quite slow moving so it means the amounts are starting to build up over time, so we may get higher figures and localised flooding.

'The showers and thunderstorms are going to carry on for quite some time moving slowly north and eastwards, remaining around London through the morning and all afternoon in East Anglia.

'They will eventually clear off to the east, but it will be cool behind them. While it won't be any colder than average it is going to feel a lot cooler than it has been.'

Away from the storms, today will be a relatively cool and fresh day for the rest of the country with some sunshine.

London is expected to see a high of 21C (70F), Cardiff 18C (64F) and Manchester, Glasgow and Belfast 17C (63F).

Saturday and Sunday are expected to be similarly fresh, although a weather front will bring rain for Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales on Sunday.
Bill Clinton shrugged off Hillary's pneumonia diagnosis on Thursday night's edition of 'The Daily Show,' adding that her famous collapse didn't 'worry' him.

'Big deal, she had pneumonia - people get get it all the time!' he chuckled to host Trevor Noah, adding that he wasn't afraid when he saw her collapse on Sunday because he knew '90 per cent of the time people are just dehydrated'

'I didn't worry too much about it,' he explained, 'and sure enough the doctor examined her and that's what she said.'

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Guest: Bill Clinton was Trevor Noah's guest on Thursday's edition of 'The Daily Show,' where he shrugged off concern over Hillary's pneumonia diagnosis, saying 'people get it all the time'

Not afraid: He said he wasn't afraid when Hillary collapsed on Sunday, because he guessed she was just dehydrated, and 'sure enough the doctor examined her and that's what he said

Tonight! President @billclinton discusses the merits of experience vs being an outsider in a presidential candidate. pic.twitter.com/ygwrWcIvJb  The Daily Show (@TheDailyShow) September 16, 2016

'But (the doctor) also said you have pneumonia, and it used to be called, when I was young, "walking pneumonia," but sometimes you can't walk any more and you gotta rest, and that's what she did,' he added.

Much of his time on the show, however, was spent talking about the fearsome contest between Clinton and Trump, characterized by Noah as 'an outsider - a man who doesn't believe in logic and ideas.'

Clinton said that America is in a stronger position now than it has been in the past.

However, he added, that could all change if the public chooses what he characterized as Trump's politics of hatred and fear over his wife's own campaign in November.

Former President @billclinton weighs in on the harmonious lovefest known as the 2016 presidential race. pic.twitter.com/8IstR3TolG  The Daily Show (@TheDailyShow) September 16, 2016

'Played': Clinton, who grew up on a farm in rural Arkansas, said 'his people' were being played by politicians who tell them 'everybody's our enemy' and 'divide or demean or demonize'

If he were 25 again, Clinton said, and he were given the chance to spend the next 30 years in any country, he would choose America 'because we're in a better position.

'But if we give in to this "lowest common denominator, everybody's our enemy, tell me something bad or I don't wanna know, let's divide or demean or demonize," we could blow it all... That's why the election's so important.'

It was a serious monologue, although he did take the time to quip that being 25 again is 'like "Make America Great Again," - I'd like to be, but I wouldn't vote for anybody who promised to make me 25!'

Clinton, who grew up in rural Arkansas, also said that 'his people' were 'being played now because their incomes are down.'

'Look, I am a product of what is supposed to be Hillary's opponent's base,' he said, 'the non-college-educated, small-town and rural white working class.

'I'll probably be the last president ever to live on a small farm with no indoor plumbing,' he joked. 'It's good politics, it's a terrible experience.

'But I know how fragile it is, and I watched unscrupulous politicians play my people from the time I was a boy: All the racism that was inspired by the integration of Little Rock Central High School in Arkansas.

'Everybody looking for somebody else to blame: "Surely to God there's a way we can be just a little bit more angry than we are now, just a little bit more divided?"'

Answers: Clinton said the solution was to provide solutions 'that constitute answers, not anger, empowerment, not resentment'

He commended 'his people' - Scots-Irish Protestants - for making up a large proportion of the military and for being community minded.

But he bemoaned the fact that 'there are two counties in West Virginia where the number-one source of income is a disability check.'

And he fretted that 'this is the first drug epidemic in my lifetime where the addiction rates are highest in small town and rural America.'

The solution, he said, was to provide solutions 'that constitute answers, not anger, empowerment, not resentment.'

He also explained that he was reorganizing the Clinton Global Initiative, which brings together philanthropy groups, to distance it from him and his wife, so that if she becomes President she cannot be accused of corruption.

Fun: The talk ended on a fun note as Noah gave Clinton the gift of balloons - a reference to the end of the DNC, when he was clearly delighted by a series of balloons dropped on his head

It was a pretty serious business throughout, but Noah ended on a light note.

'I did think about what gift I could give you for coming to the show,' Noah said. 'I did notice that there is one thing that makes you smile, so I would like to give you the gift of balloons.'

And that's when a cluster of red, white and blue balloons fell on Clinton's head - just like at the Democratic National Convention.

'Yay!' cheered Clinton, holding one of the orbs aloft, before adding: 'When I saw the film on the end of the convention... I thought: "You know, I really am in my second childhood."'
Levi Shirley was killed by a landmine in Syria, where he had traveled to fight against ISIS

Three young men who died fighting ISIS in Syria after joining a Kurdish guerilla group will return to military-style honors today.

The caskets of Levi Shirley, 24, Jordan MacTaggart, 22, and William Savage, 27, arrived on Wednesday at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport after a complicated journey without ceremony.

Shirley and MacTaggart will arrive today by train in Denver, while Savage was being transported to North Carolina, where his father lives.

Their families will each be presented with a flag flown over the US Capitol, said congressman Ed Perlmutter, a Denver-area Democrat who helped coordinate the transfer of the bodies.

'Though they did not fight as members of our armed forces, they are Americans and as Americans we have a responsibility to bring these young men home and to give the families relief and closure,' Perlmutter said in a statement.

The men died separately in combat after joining the People's Protection Units  the main Kurdish guerrilla group battling ISIS in Syria.

Robert MacTaggart (left) and William Savage (right) were both killed while fighting against ISIS in Manbij, Syria, last month

Shirley, of Arvada, Colorado, was killed by a land mine July 14.

MacTaggart, of Castle Rock, Colorado, died on August 3 while fighting in a squad that included two Americans and a Swede in Manbij, Syria.

Savage, of St Mary's County, Maryland, also died in Manbij on August 10.

Efforts to bring the men home stalled because of Turkey's tense relationship with the Kurds and the US after a failed coup in July.

Though they did not fight as members of our armed forces, they are Americans and as Americans we have a responsibility to bring these young men home and to give the families relief and closure Ed Perlmutter

The remains of Keith Broomfield of Massachusetts, believed to be the first American to die alongside Kurds fighting ISIS, had been returned to the US through Turkey last year.

But Kurdish groups determined it would be too dangerous to repatriate the bodies of Shirley, MacTaggart and Savage through Turkey and instead shipped them hundreds of miles east to Iraq.

The bodies were then flown to Amman, Jordan, and on to Chicago.

Shirley's mother, Susan Shirley, said she worked with the State Department to bring her son's body home and her friends contacted Perlmutter to help navigate the frustrating terrain.

He enlisted aid from contacts at the White House.

'It took extraordinary measures by many people to get these men from Syria to the US, especially given the ever-changing and dangerous geopolitical dynamics in the Middle East,' Perlmutter said.

'It seems we are in the final stages of this long and sad situation.'

Susan Shirley said her son was in Syria 'as an American to protect Americans'.

But unlike fallen members of the armed forces, the young men had no military escorts to accompany their caskets and no 21-gun salute.

Still, Susan Shirley said she appreciated the homecoming for her son and extended her condolences to families that lost military members in action.

'You can do all the pomp and circumstance you want, but those families aren't getting their sons back, either,' Shirley said.

Veterans groups said they had no problems with the honors planned for the three men.

'They went to fight for the right side,' said Joe Davis, spokesman for the national Veterans of Foreign Wars.
A French court has sentenced five men over a violent clash that broke out in Corsica when a tourist started taking pictures of women in burkinis on the beach (file picture)

A French court has sentenced five men over a violent clash that broke out in Corsica when a tourist started taking pictures of women in burkinis on the beach.

More than 100 police were called to the beach in Sisco, when a mass brawl broke out between locals and families of North African origin from another part of the Mediterranean island.

Five people were injured in the violence on August 13 and there were reports at the time that harpoons were thrown during chaotic scenes.

The incident prompted the mayor of the village to ban the Islamic burkini swimsuit initially thought to have been at the centre of the row.

Hundreds of people gathered outside the court in Bastia on Thursday to support two local men who faced charges over the incident alongside three brothers of Moroccan origin.

Mustapha Benhaddou was sentenced to two years in prison for armed violence, while his brothers Abdelillah and Jamal both received suspended sentences of six months.

Villagers Lucien Straboni and Pierre Baldi were handed suspended sentences of one year and eight months respectively.

Protesters clash with riot police as locals vent their anger over the burkini row in Corsica last month

Pictured, angry crowds protest on the streets of Bastia after the violent incident in Sisco

Of the brothers only Mustapha was present in court, the others telling their lawyers they feared for their safety following several anti-Islam demonstrations and attacks on the island.

'There are fractures in French and Corsican society, but those are not what we are dealing with in this case, which concerns a simpler, seedier problem,' prosecutor Nicolas Bessone told the court.

The clashes came amid heightened tension in France after a string of attacks claimed by the Islamic State group, including the July 14 massacre in the southern city of Nice when a Tunisian ploughed a truck into crowds celebrating Bastille Day, killing 86 people.

Harpoons were said to have been thrown in a beach brawl that broke out after a tourist was seen taking pictures of women wearing burkinis on this beach in Corsica

In Corsica last December, angry protesters vandalised a Muslim prayer hall and trashed copies of the Koran after an assault on firefighters that was blamed on local youths of Arab origin.

Sisco is one of around 30 French towns that have moved to ban the burkini, though the country's top administrative court has suspended the move in most cases.

But the Council of State allowed Sisco to keep its burkini ban, saying it was justified on public order grounds - even though prosecutors ruled out any connection between the beach brawl and the full-body swimsuit.

Sisco's mayor Ange-Pierre Vivoni described the court's ruling as 'a relief for me and local people'.
Hundreds of Apple fans came from far and wide to camp outside stores for up to two days to be the first in the world to buy the iPhone 7.

But perhaps the most dedicated was Attapon 'Tom' Thaphaengphan who spent $800 travelling from Bangkok, Thailand, to Sydney for the launch on Friday.

The 30-year-old braved rain, cold and construction noise after marking out a spot in line at Apple's flagship Sydney store on George St at 2pm on Thursday.

Scroll down for video

Attapon 'Tom' Thaphaengphan spent $800 travelling from Bangkok, Thailand, to Sydney for the iPhone 7 launch on Friday

He documented his trip on Facebook since arriving in Australia on Monday and taking the opportunity to see a few friends and visit the Opera House.

Before officially joining the line, Mr Thaphaengphan produced a video for Thai iPhone news website iPhoneMod, where he works back home.

In the Thai-language video he appeared to discuss the new phone, Sydney launch, and the line of people waiting outside - including shots from inside and outside the George St store.

Though he was not there as early as some super fans who began their vigil on Wednesday morning, he still had a good spot in line.

The 30-year-old braved the rain, cold and construction noise in order to get the iPhone 7

He marked out a spot in line at Apple's flagship Sydney store on George St at 2pm on Thursday

Crucially, he was one of few people who managed to snap up a limited number of pre-orders for the popular iPhone 7 Plus model that sold out before the doors even opened at 8am on Friday.

'Countdown 19 hours before opening buying an iPhone 7,' Mr Thaphaengphan wrote next to a snap of him sitting in a deck chair outside the store on Thursday afternoon.

He then spent a cold and wet night outside holding down his spot, dressed in just a hoodie and dark jacket, remarking to his friends back home that he should have brought more than two layers.

The social butterfly did manage to duck out and grab Korean barbecue for dinner with two friends before heading back to the line.

At another point he was able to sneak out to a nearby McDonald's to recharge his phone, buying a hot chocolate so he could stay until his battery was full.

Mr Thaphaengphan was part of a 200-strong line to be the first to get their hands on the new device on Friday morning

Though he was not there as early as some super fans who began their vigil on Wednesday morning, he still had a good spot in line

He documented his trip on Facebook since arriving in Australia on Monday

The next morning Mr Thaphaengphan shared one of his friend's umbrellas to keep dry in the early morning rain while he waiting for the store to finally open.

Once he acquired the shiny new iPhone 7 Plus Gold he celebrated with a coffee to warm up, writing 'after 19 hours waiting, now iPhone 7 is here!'

Mr Thaphaengphan was part of a 200-strong line to be the first to get their hands on the new device on Friday morning.

Others pitched tents and rolled out sleeping bags for an uncomfortable night's sleep.

Apple tried to keep the crowds happy by charging mobile phones and providing 24-hour free wi-fi.

Once in store, customers will be able to buy the iPhone 7 for $1079 or the iPhone 7 plus for $1279.

Prices will increase in line with the new models of 32GB, 128GB and 256GB storage.

Others pitched tents and rolled out sleeping bags for an uncomfortable night's sleep
But he was ordered to serve it by way of an intensive corrections order

On Friday he was sentenced to two years in jail for the 2014 incident

A truck driver will walk free after he slammed into a car and killed a young woman because he was admiring the view out his window.

Bree Stanford, 19, died after Steven Barnett ploughed his truck into the back of her friend's black Mazda that had broken down in his lane, SMH reported.

Barnett took his eyes off the road momentarily to admire the scenic view as he crossed the M1 Pacific Motorway over the Hawkesbury River Bridge at Mooney Mooney in May 2014.

Scroll down for video

A young woman died after truck driver Steven Barnett ploughed into the back of her friend's black Mazda that had broken down in his lane

Bree Stanford, 19, died after her friend's Mazda was crushed while she was sitting in the passenger seat and her friend checked out the overheated car

Truck driver Steven Barnett (right) arrives at the Downing Centre District Court in Sydney in May 2016 where he was found guilty of dangerous driving occasioning death

Ms Stanford's friend, a P-plater, was driving the pair from Terrigal to Sydney, when they stopped the overheated car. There was no breakdown lane.

Her friend got out of the car to check the engine and escaped unharmed, but Ms Stanford could not exit the vehicle in time.

The vehicle was caught under the truck's prime mover when Barnett ploughed into their car, which travelled together for 105 metres along the motorway.

Barnett cried and embraced his lawyer at the Sydney Downing Centre District Court on Friday as Judge Dina Yehia ordered his two-year prison sentence to be served as an intensive corrections order.

The truck driver was found guilty of dangerous driving occasioning death earlier in 2016.

Ms Stanford, from Panania in Sydney's south-west, was a journalism student who loved to travel

Barnett wept on the side of the road after ploughing into a P-plater's car after he momentarily took his eyes off the road to admire the view

Judge Yehia said while Barnett's 'momentary inattention' resulted in a 'catastrophic consequence', he acknowledged that the driver had not been speeding, driving erratically or micro-sleeping.

But the judge said the tragedy had a 'profound' emotional and psychological impact on Ms Stanford's family.

The court also heard that the Albury truck driver and father-of-two was a well-regarded and experienced truck driver who suffered from symptoms consistent with PTSD after the crash.

Barnett (left) left court on Friday after the judge handed down a two-year prison sentence to be served as an intensive corrections order

He told a psychologist that he was 'torn apart' by the impact his actions have had on Ms Stanford's family.

Judge Yehia said he was satisfied with the offender's remorse and contrition.

If Barnett is suited for an intensive corrections order, he will ordered to complete mandatory community service, and will be subjected to conditions such as electronic monitoring, drug and alcohol testing and curfews.

Ms Stanford was a journalism student from Panania in Sydney's south-west.
A tiger has appeared to growl at his handler to get out of their brand new pool at the launch of a new enclosure.

The Tiger Island Park at Dreamworld on the Gold Coast has open its doors to their tigers on Friday after a $7 million dollar redevelopment to the popular enclosure.

Photos from the park's opening celebration show the tigers checking out their new space and jumping into their new pool.

Scroll down for video

A tiger (pictured) growls at one of the handlers who's jumped inside their new pool at the Tiger Island Park at Dreamworld

The park was designed by celebrity landscaper Jamie Durie, who is also an ambassador for the Dreamworld Wildlife Foundation

They were joined in the enclosure with a few handlers, with brave enough to jump in the pool with them.

The park's landscape designer Jamie Durie, who is also a said a video message at the celebration that he and his team enjoyed working on the project.

It will be home to seven adult cats and five little kittens.

Mr Durie added that he hopes more awareness will be made about tiger conservation for the endangered species.

The opening was also attended by Queensland tourism minister Kate Jones and Gold Coast deputy mayor Donna Gates.

Tiger conservation advocates took to Facebook to praise Dreamworld for their contribution to the protection of the endangered species

Visitors will be able to visit the park and see the tigers in their new home when it opens on Sunday, September 18

Tiger conservation advocates on Facebook have praised the wildlife park for the new park.

One woman wrote: 'thank you with all my heart Dreamworld for your contribution to the welfare of the most majestic and amazing creature that walks this earth!!!!' [sic]

Another said: 'just in time for summer.... they will love it on a stinking hot day... awesome job guys.' [sic]
Could Channel 4 presenters Davina McCall and Clare Balding be the new dream team to replace Mel and Sue on The Great British Bake Off (GBBO) as it moves to Channel 4.

Could Davina McCall (left) or Clare Badling (right) be part of The Great British Bake Off on Channel 4

This weeks episode, which was the fourth episode in the shows final series on BBC, saw an extra half a million viewers since the shock announcement on Monday that it was moving to Channel 4.

Love Productions agreed a 25million-a-year three-year deal with Channel 4, after the BBC allegedly fell 10m short in its offer, causing controversy not only with the shows fans but also with presenters Mel Giedroyc, 48, and Sue Perkins, 46, who quit the show.

STATEMENT FROM MEL AND SUE Double act Mel (left) and Sue (right) quit following the shock announcement but it has not yet been confirmed who will present with many suggestions being made 'We were very shocked and saddened to learn yesterday evening that Bake Off will be moving from its home. We made no secret of our desire for the show to remain where it was. 'The BBC nurtured the show from its infancy and helped give it its distinctive warmth and charm, growing it from an audience of two million to nearly 15 at its peak. 'Weve had the most amazing time on Bake Off, and have loved seeing it rise and rise like a pair of yeasted Latvian baps. 'Were not going with the dough. We wish all the future bakers every success.' Advertisement

But there are now rumours the two could be replaced by the popular Channel 4 girls Davina McCall and Clare Balding.

Following Mel and Sue's double act on GBBO it has not yet been confirmed whether the new Channel 4 show will have one or two presenters.

Alexander Armstrong teased GBBO fans yesterday alluding to an 'exciting' announcement being made today

GBBO fans were also alluded to a tweet from comedian, actor and Pointless presenter Alexander Armstrong who suggested there was going to be a big announcement today, which many assumed would relate to the show.

On his Twitter yesterday he said: A very special announcement happening tomorrow.

A very special announcement happening tomorrow. Heres a little clue: https://t.co/QH8zlWEsk1 pic.twitter.com/wIRFw9qoFl Alexander Armstrong (@XanderArmstrong) September 15, 2016

Other names Channel 4 bosses may be considering include Sarah Millican, who successfully filled in for Jo Brand on an episode of Bake Offs spin-off show, An Extra Slice, last year, and Miles Jupp, the posh but popular host of Radio 4s News Quiz.

As well as GBBO moving to Channel 4 so will all of its spin-off shows including programmes like Junior Bake Off and Bake Off: Extra Slice.

A source told The Sun: They lose all of the great shows around it too. Junior Bake Off gets good figures for a CBBC show, and Creme de la Creme pulled in an impressive 4.4m in its first episode in March.

Other names Channel 4 bosses may be considering are comedian Sarah Millican (left) or current Bake Off: Extra Slice presenter Jo Brand (right)

It does leave a big hole in their programming across several channels, not just BBC1.

Bake Off judge Paul Hollywood was seen going out on his bike from his home in Wingham, Kent, yesterday, as it is yet to be confirmed whether tense negotiations has kept Mr Hollywood, 50, and fellow judge Mary Berry, 81, on the show as it moves channels.

Paul Hollywood out on his motorbike near his home in Wingham, Kent, on Thursday

Judges Paul Hollywood (right) and Mary Berry (left) are yet to confirm whether they will move with the show

Neither of them are yet to comment on the changes, but will the show really be as successful without them?
George Osborne has insisted his political career is not over as he sniped at Theresa May over grammar schools and her handling of the Hinkley Point decision.

The former chancellor, who was brutally sacked by Mrs May when she became Prime Minister in July, warned her against focusing on the minority of children who would benefit from selection.

He dismissed the safeguards put in place by Mrs May before she signed off the controversial nuclear power plant project, saying they did not add 'any extra protection'.

George Osborne, left, is launching a Northern Powerhouse think-tank to push through his pet project from his time in government

He also pointedly said that Mrs May was only the 'best candidate who had put themselves forward' for the top job - and said he would 'not necessarily' be a thorn in her side.

The intervention came as Mr Osborne launched a new think-tank to push for his pet 'Northern Powerhouse' project. He said the group would be working in partnership with former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg to develop devolution.

HOW GEORGE FLEXED HIS MUSCLES... GRAMMAR SCHOOLS We should be focusing on where 80 per cent of the children go in a selective system. The real focus of education reform remains the academy programme. HINKLEY POINT I dont think anything has fundamentally changed from the deal we put together in government just a few months ago. NORTHERN POWERHOUSE There was a little bit of a wobble when we had the new administration about whether they were still committed to the concept of the Northern Powerhouse. THERESA MAY Mr Osborne said he had backed Mrs May for the leadership because she was the best person for the job of the candidates who put themselves forward. BREXIT I definitely didnt get right my judgment of the national mood. The forecasts were made in good faith. The truth is, you look internationally at independent forecasts of the UK, they are all predicting a significant slowdown. HIS FUTURE I will be championing the things Ive always cared about, which is, Where is the voice of the liberal mainstream majority in this country? Advertisement

Mr Osborne admitted he had totally misjudged the mood of the country during the EU referendum campaign, when he infuriated many Tories with his Project Fear efforts to prevent Brexit.

'I definitely didn't get right my judgement of the national mood,' he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

In the wake of David Cameron's decision to quit as MP for Witney earlier this week, Mr Osborne was asked whether he was tempted to leave the House of Commons to seek money-making opportunities like a book about his time in office.

He replied: 'I don't want to write my memoirs because I don't know how the story ends, and I want to hang around and find out.'

Mr Osborne told Today: 'Politics is a tough business, but I think one of the things I'm coming to understand is that you can push and fight for your ideas from different places inside the House of Commons chamber, either as an opposition or as a Government backbench MP.'

Mr Osborne said he wanted to be a 'voice for the liberal mainstream of the country'.

'I will want to draw attention to the and causes I care about,' he said. 'By staying in I can bring attention to the issues I care about.

'I will be championing the things I care about. Where is the voice of the liberal mainstream majority of this country?'

Mr Osborne was quizzed about his views on the grammar school expansion being pursued by Mrs May.

He stressed that new PMs should bring 'new ideas' - but said the political debate should be focused on 80 per cent of children who do not benefit from selection.

'I support the goals Theresa May has set out but I always think that 80 per cent of the discussion surrounding education is about where 20 per cent of the children will go, when in fact we should be focusing on the 80 per cent of children,' he said.

Mr Osborne, pictured at the launch in Manchester today, said he would not be writing his memoirs because he did not know how they ended

The former chancellor was flanked by Manchester City Council leader Sir Richard Leese, left, and Mayor of Liverpool Joe Anderson, next to Mr Osborne, among others

'The great transformation has been the academy and free school programme and if you look at whats been achieved in London, which was in the worst situation 30 years ago and now is the best, you can see whats been achieved.

Im not against grammar schools opening where they are wanted but I think the real focus remains the academy programme transforming the state schools that most children in this country go to.'

Mr Osborne said he was 'pleased' that the Hinkley project had been given the green light by Mrs May - after she dramatically paused the deal with China and France for a review in July.

He said 'nothing substantial' had been changed about the scheme due to the review, and also played down the importance of the government demanding a 'golden share' in infrastructure projects in future.

Mr Osborne said the advice ministers received in 2013 was that the idea would 'not add any protection'.

Theresa May (centre) held a reception for London Fashion week in Downing Street last night

'You cant run a plant without the consent of the government so it didnt seem necessary to have an additional share. Maybe the advice has changed but Im not in the government anymore, he added.

Mr Osborne was asked about claims by Liberal Democrat former Cabinet minister Ed Davey that he and Mrs May had not got on well.

'Genuinely not true. Ive worked with Theresa for 20 years in opposition and in government,' Mr Osborne said.

'In a cabinet, that included people such as Ed Davies, she was one of the grown-ups.'

But Mr Osborne also damned the PM with faint praise by saying only that she the 'best of the candidates' to stand for the top job.
Success for the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) in a Berlin city vote on Sunday would be seen around the world as the rebirth of the Nazis, the mayor of the German capital has warned.

The right-wing AfD has gained support as voters become increasingly uneasy with Chancellor Angela Merkel's open-door refugee policy, which saw about one million migrants arrive in Germany last year.

Latest polls show the AfD is set to get 14 percent in the weekend vote in Berlin, which is historically a left-wing stronghold.

Mayor Michael Mueller of the centre-left Social Democrats said a win for the 'Islamophobic' AfD would undo Berlin's long struggle against neo-Nazi groups, like the one pictured here mourning soldiers at an anniversary of the Battle of the Seelow Heights

The right-wing populist Alternative for Germany (AfD), which is polling at up to 14 percent, has left the capital's left-leaning party reeling ahead of the city government vote on Sunday, worrying Mayor Mueller (pictured)

The forecast prompted Mayor Michael Mueller, a Social Democrat (SPD), to take to social media in an attempt to sway floating voters - which is predicted at 41 percent - to the left.

'Careful, Berlin,' he wrote on Facebook.

'It would be seen around the world as a sign of the return of the right-wing and the Nazis in Germany.

'Berlin is not any old city - Berlin is the city that transformed itself from the capital of Hitler's Nazi Germany into a beacon of freedom, tolerance, diversity and social cohesion,' he said.

The AfD has gained support in poor areas of the city's former communist east and are expected to gain representation in the senate.

The party's top candidate for Berlin, Georg Pazderski, hit back saying Mueller was branding 'hundreds of thousands of voters' as Nazis with rhetoric that could incite violence against AfD members.

Should the predictions materialise, it would heap even more pressure on German Chancellor Angela Merkel

Should the predictions materialise, it would heap even more pressure on German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

The AfD won a shock 20.8 percent in an election in the eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern two weeks ago, meaning the party is now represented in nine of Germany's 16 state assemblies.

In Berlin, the centre left SPD is currently polling 23 percent, the CDU 18 percent, the Greens 15 percent and the hard-left Die Linke party 14.5 percent.

Political pundits are forecasting a coalition of the SPD, the Greens and Die Linke to run the city for the next five years.

Currently the city is ruled in a coalition of the SPD and the CDU.

Any strong AfD showing in Sunday's election will be another warning shot to Merkel of the dangers that lie ahead for her in the general election in the autumn of next year.

The AfD has made massive inroads into her traditional voter base because of her open door policy on immigration.

Bloody clashes in the eastern city of Bautzen on Wednesday between neo-Nazis and migrants illustrate that her pleas for integration and tolerance are falling on increasingly deaf ears.

When migrants started arriving in large numbers about a year ago, some were met with applause, cheers and gifts, but the mood has since shifted due to concerns about integration and attacks by asylum seekers on civilians this summer.

On Wednesday, locals and asylum seekers clashed in the eastern town of Bautzen.

About 80 young people, mainly Germans described by police as being right-wingers, chanted that the town belonged to Germans as 20 asylum seekers stood opposite them.

The groups threw bottles and wooden slats at each other.




Courier got trapped inside his Loomis security van on first day in a new job

A courier got trapped in the back of his own van and required four police cars and six officers to get him out - on his first day in a new job.

Crowds gathered to laugh at the poor courier's predicament as his mishap set off deafening attack warning sirens from the Loomis security van outside the Sainsbury's Local in Deansgate, Manchester.

A passerby was prompted to call 999 as the siren wailed 'security vehicle under attack, please call the police' but six officers tried and failed to free the driver.

A passerby was prompted to call 999 as the siren wailed 'security vehicle under attack, please call the police' but six officers tried and failed to free the driver (pictured)

Video footage from a passerby shows a colleague of the man, who arrived a whole hour later, trying to use an emergency key to free the prisoner.

Eye witness Jasmine Andersson, 24, from Manchester, said: 'I felt so sorry for him.

'Everyone has that embarrassing incident on the first day of work, but you don't really expect for it to happen in front of a crowd of people with a siren blaring out at 60 decibels. But he was sweet and unassuming.

'I spoke to the man who was standing around who made the 999 call. He said that some people had been just there laughing at it and he made the call because the message had said to do.

'Police officers had arrived at the scene by 3.10pm. There were six of them. They tried the doors first but the siren would just keep getting louder and they couldn't get in.

Pedestrians express their disbelief after the courier, reportedly on his first day in his new job, banged on the van doors pleading for help

'Then they made up a sort of knocking system to see if the man inside was okay. Eventually they got one knock from inside, so they knew he was just trapped.

'They were just shouting at the van, "Knock once for you are trapped but you're okay, knock twice for something else happened".'

As the saga progressed and it became evident the police could not break the courier out of the van, Loomis was contacted to send back up.

The red-faced captive was unleashed from the van to meet a round of applause from pedestrians.

Jasmine said: 'When he got out of the van he answered the police's questions and then quickly darted back into the van with his colleague.

'As he went by I just asked if he was okay, and he said, "Just really embarrassed".

Eye witness Joshua Steele, 24, said: 'What I found so funny about the whole thing was when the police established their knocking system. They just seemed utterly perplexed about what to do.

Crowds gathered to laugh at the poor courier's predicament outside the Sainsbury's Local in Deansgate, Manchester (pictured)

'At first when one of them tried the door, the rest of them just stood back, and then when one officer came up with the idea of knocking. As he did it they stood back, almost like they revered him.

'Then, the officer when up to his boss, and said, "sir, I've established that the man is safe and well and that he is trapped inside".

'They were just completely confounded.'

A Greater Manchester Police spokesperson said: 'We received a call at 2.55pm out to an alarm sounding in a vehicle on Deansgate. Officers attended the scene. There was nothing criminal reported about the incident.'

A Loomis spokesperson said: 'Delivering cash in the UK is a complex business utilising ever-evolving technologies. On this occasion the crew were caught out by new technology that they were unable to override from inside the vehicle.
Fugitive Edward Snowden, in exile in Moscow after leaking National Security Agency documents, said he will vote in the US presidential election, but did not say which candidate he prefers.

'I will be voting,' Snowden said today, speaking at a conference in Athens by video link from Moscow.

'But as a privacy advocate I think it's important for me... that there should never be an obligation for an individual to discuss their vote. And I won't be doing so with mine.'

Fugitive Edward Snowden, in exile in Moscow after leaking National Security Agency documents, said he will vote in the US presidential election

'I will be voting,' Snowden said today, speaking at a conference in Athens by video link from Moscow

He added: 'What I will say about the candidates is that I'm disappointed we're not hearing much about the constitution in this election cycle. We're not hearing very much about our rights.'

According to a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, Snowden would still be eligible to vote because he has not yet been convicted of a crime.

'There's no legal basis whatsoever for depriving Edward Snowden of the right to vote. He's been convicted of no crime, much less one that would strip him of his civil rights,' leading US attorney Ben Wizner told The Daily Dot.

In Hawaii, Snowden's last permanent place of residency in the US, only convicts serving time in prison are denied the right to vote.

In 2012, Snowden donated money to the campaign of Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul, but said he voted for a third party candidate in the 2008 general election.

Both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have been harshly critical of the former CIA contractor.

According to a lawyer for the ACLU, Snowden would still be eligible to vote. Pictured, Steven Erlanger, London Bureau Chief for the International New York Times (left) and Kenneth Roth, Executive Director of Human Rights Watch (center)

In Hawaii, Snowden's last permanent place of residency in the US, only convicts serving time in prison are denied the right to vote

One candidate Snowden may be considering is Green party nominee Jill Stein.

In a column for The Guardian, the physician wrote: 'If elected president I will immediately pardon Edward Snowden'.

Snowden thanked human rights groups for their campaign to seek a pardon for him from President Barack Obama.

'I'm not actually asking for a pardon myself because I think the whole point of our system and the foundation of our democracy is a system of checks and balances,' he said.

'But... I'm incredibly grateful and fortunate to be able to experience the support of the world's three leading human rights organizations.'

A Republican-led bipartisan US House intelligence committee on Thursday released a report calling Snowden a 'serial exaggerator and fabricator' who does not fit the profile of a whistleblower.

All of the committee members separately sent Obama a letter urging him not to pardon Snowden, who revealed the NSA's collection of millions' of Americans phone records.

The report also indicated that the vast majority of the documents he stole were defense secrets that had nothing to do with privacy.

In 2012, Snowden donated money to the campaign of Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul, but said he voted for a third party candidate in the general election

Both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have been harshly critical of the former CIA contractor

The committee said while the 'full scope' of damage caused by Snowden's disclosures remains unknown, a review of materials he allegedly compromised 'makes clear that he handed over secrets that protect American troops overseas and secrets that provide vital defenses against terrorists and nation-states.'

Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., chairman of the committee, said Snowden betrayed his colleagues and his country.

'He put our service members and the American people at risk after perceived slights by his superiors,' Nunes said in a statement.

The American Civil Liberties Union, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International are behind the campaign to pardon him.

Kenneth Roth, HRW's executive director, was on the panel of the Athens conference, and described the effort as 'an uphill battle.'

'What we're hoping is that after the election when Obama is in his final months in office  at that stage he can begin to do something that are appropriate as a matter of conscience but politically difficult,' Roth said.

'There's been broad recognition that Edward Snowden has done an enormous public service by disclosing the degree to which all of our privacy has been invaded needlessly.'

The 33-year-old spoke ahead of the opening of the movie 'Snowden,' starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt.
Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has dismissed Heathrow expansion as a 'fantasy' destined for the 'dustbin'.

The outspoken remarks came after the ex-mayor of London was excluded from the key Cabinet committee that will decide on airport expansion.

They could be a sign that Mr Johnson fears Theresa May is getting ready to approve a new runway at Heathrow.

Boris Johnson, pictured on a visit to Italy yesterday, has renewed his attack on the idea of expanding Heathrow airport

Mr Johnson warned that the taxpayer would foot the bill for the inevitable failure of Heathrow expansion.

'As I've advocated for many years Heathrow expansion is the wrong choice, and if it is chosen it simply won't get built,' he said.

'The massive costs and enormous risks mean it's undeliverable, and the taxpayer will be saddled with the bill for failure.

'While we are finding this out our international competitors will be further extending their competitive advantage over us. We need to consign this Heathrow fantasy to the dustbin. We need a better solution,' Mr Johnson told the Daily Telegraph.

It is understood that Mr Johnson will still contribute to the debate due to his eight years' experience as London mayor and as the MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip, near Heathrow.

The long-awaited decision on whether to expand Heathrow or Gatwick is politically highly sensitive for the Prime Minister due to divisions within the Tory ranks.

Mr Johnson campaigned against Heathrow expansion while he was mayor, and Putney MP and Education Secretary Justine Greening is also opposed.

Although, as Foreign Secretary, Mr Johnson does not hold a direct interest in airport expansion as part of his job, the decision will affect his brief in terms of Britain's links with the rest of the world, as a new runway could open up new destinations for direct flights.

A Downing Street spokeswoman said: 'We will confirm membership of the Cabinet committee in due course.'

The previous Cabinet committee on airport expansion, set up by David Cameron, included the then-chancellor, business secretary, transport secretary, environment secretary, Scottish secretary, communities secretary, energy secretary, chief whip and fixer Oliver Letwin.

It emerged last week that ministers may be given a free vote on the issue.

Theresa May, pictured centre at a Downing Street reception for London Fashion Week last night, represents a constituency that is near Heathrow

An internal Government paper filmed by a passenger on the London Underground discusses the 'potential waiving of collective responsibility' ahead of the forthcoming decision on airport capacity.

In July last year the Davies Commission recommended the building of a third runway at Heathrow, but the Department for Transport announced that further investigation into noise, pollution and compensation would be carried out before a decision is made.

Mr Cameron was expected to indicate which project would get the go-ahead after the EU referendum, but his resignation following the victory for the Brexit campaign meant the decision was left for his successor, Mrs May.

A group of political and business leaders have written to the Prime Minister urging her not to give the go-ahead for a third runway at Heathrow.

Expansion at the London hub would 're-forge its monopoly' in the UK, the 29 signatories said in their letter to Mrs May.

The group, which includes the chief executive at Birmingham Airport, Paul Kehoe, and a number of West Midlands MPs, pleaded with Mrs May to ensure the decision on extra runway capacity does not damage the region.
Lina Alvarez who lives in the province of Lugo, in north western Spain already has two sons but is now carrying her third child.

A 62-year-old Spanish doctor has announced she is eight months pregnant saying she feels like a woman half her age.

Lina Alvarez who lives in the province of Lugo, in north western Spain already has two sons but is now carrying her third child.

Ms Alvarez says she started menopause 20 years ago, but after undergoing fertility treatment, she is now expecting a baby girl.

The infant, who has already been named Lina and is said to be developing well, already weighing 4.4lbs.

And Ms Alvarez told local media: 'I feel like a woman in her 30s. To feel better than this is impossible.'

Her oldest child is now aged 27 but was left disabled after a medical error left him injured during her pregnancy.

Her son's condition was caused when a gynaecologist damaged her son's head during a routine test, which also led to the breakdown of her marriage.

He requires constant care and she is her son's primary carer. She also has another son aged 10, who was born when she was 52.

Ms Alvarez added: 'I am very happy because I am living now my reward for so much suffering. It is a miracle.

'It was a life of tears. For years I cried every day because I could not face my son's disease. He had to be in hospital twice a week.'

But despite her pregnancy sparking a heated debate in Spain, the mother-to-be says she shrugs off any criticism.

She added: 'I always wanted to be a mother again, but most medical experts said no.

Despite her pregnancy sparking a heated debate in Spain, the mother-to-be says she shrugs off any criticism

'However, some years ago I met a gynaecologist who agreed to help me if the tests were OK and they were positive so he planted an embryo.

'They said there was only a six per cent chance of success, but I got pregnant with a baby girl.

'Everything is going perfectly. I feel like I'm having a second chance and the pregnancy has made me feel younger and stronger.

'When she will be 30, I will be 90. I will be a grandmother as well as a mother and so what, the fact is that my daughter will have been brought up.
A furious boyfriend hurled the entire contents of his flat - including a sofa and a washing machine - out of the window after his girlfriend told him she was leaving him.

Shocked bystanders saw the 23-year-old, who has not been named, chucking clothes, furniture and other household appliances out of the eighth floor apartment in Chelyabinsk, central Russia.

It is understood that his girlfriend had ended their relationship after becoming fed up of his jealous behaviour.

A furious boyfriend hurled the entire contents of his flat - including a sofa and a washing machine - out of the window in Chelyabinsk, central Russia, after his girlfriend told him she was leaving him

Mother Yuliya Khakimova, who filmed the incident, said: 'I just took my son out of nursery school. We were on our way home when we heard a huge crash behind our backs.

'I turned around and saw a piece of a sofa had landed behind us. It was thrown out of the window on the eight floor. '

In the footage, an onlooker can be heard shouting to the man in Russian: 'What a moron! Have you lost your mind?!'

He replies: 'No! They all are sl*ts! Believe me...They all are sl*ts!'

Another person can be heard heard saying: 'I hope he is not going to throw his girlfriend as well.'

Luckily nothing is thrown out of the window as a mother walks past with her child.

Furniture and other household items were thrown down onto the ground below the eighth-floor apartment

When the man throws an ironing board out the window, one of the bystanders shouts: 'Ironing board! Throw the iron!'

The man reportedly only stopped throwing things from the flat when police arrived at the scene.

A police spokesman said: 'The police detained the 23-year-old man. He explained that he had been arguing with his girlfriend. The man was drunk at the time.'

The man was not fined but told to clear away the debris left on the street.
Ex-Met officer Pere Daobry is pictured leaving Colchester Magistrates' Court where he was convicted of assaulting his wife but spared jail because he rang the police after

A former Metropolitan Police firearms officer who strangled his wife until she passed out escaped a prison sentence - because he had the 'decency' to call 999.

Pere Daobry, who worked for the Met protecting VIPs - and now guards a member of the UAE royal family - set upon Sarah Jay, a former Essex Police sergeant, after the pair had been arguing.

When she declared that she no longer loved him, muscle-bound Daobry, 44, launched into a minute-long assault on Mrs Jay in the bedroom, using both hands to strangle her until she was unconscious.

Colchester Magistrates' Court heard how the ex-officer, who worked for the Met for 12 years, then rang the police and confessed to the 999 call handler: 'I want to report an assault and I am the perpetrator. I have assaulted my wife.'

When asked by the operator if his wife needed an ambulance, the dad-of-four responded: 'Yeah, I tried to strangle her.'

Daobry was married to Mrs Jay, 42, for two years before the attack on December 27 last year. He later denied the assault but was found guilty after a trial.

During the trial, Daobry claimed to have used a police-approved choke hold to stop Mrs Jay from taking an overdose of prescribed tablets at their home in the pretty Essex village of Thorpe-le-Soken.

But magistrates rejected his evidence 'entirely' and found him guilty of assault.

The offence was serious enough that he could have been jailed but he was yesterday handed a 12-week suspended prison sentence.

Left - Daobry with his wife Sarah Jay, a former Essex Police officer, in a picture taken last year when she took the force to an employment tribunal. Right, his LinkedIn profile picture - he says he is now working for the UAE royal family as a bodyguard

Explaining why the sentencing was suspended, Alix Mason, chair of the bench at Colchester Magistrates' Court, said: 'This was a very unpleasant assault on Mrs Jay and she was clearly terrified. There is no credit for an early guilty plea. Having said that, we do take note you have no previous convictions and you had the decency to ring 999.'

The defendant was also ordered to carry out 200 hours of unpaid work and handed a year-long restraining order. He must pay a total of 1,665, including 930 in compensation to Mrs Jay and 620 in court costs.

At the trial earlier this year, the court heard how the pair's relationship soured about six months before the incident with Daobry leaving to live in Australia after he lost his job as an undercover firearms officer with the Met.

According to Daobry's LinkedIn profile, his job at the London police force involved work in close protection and diplomatic protection.

Diplomatic protection at the Met can involve guarding government ministers as well as embassies, consulates and diplomats.

In Sydney he provided protection to a 'high net worth individual'.

After his stint in Australia, the court heard, he arrived back in England in early December 2015 and returned to stay at the marital home.

Mrs Jay told the court: 'When he came back, I didn't recognise him as being the same person. I told him I didn't love him and I did not recognise him as the person I married.'

She said he got angry and began shouting, and came towards her as she was on a bed  she tried to get away.

'He grabbed me and I don't know if I was pushed or I fell, but the next thing I remember I was on my back between the bed and the wall. My feet were in the air and I was being held by my throat.

'I was struggling to breathe.'

Sarah Jay, a former Essex Police sergeant, was left with head and neck injuries when her muscle-bound husband held her by the throat in an assualt at their home in Essex

When asked by the prosecutor when the attack came to an end, Mrs Jay said: 'I don't know.

'The next thing I remember I was waking up. I was lying on my back with my feet in the air.'

When she awoke, Daobry was sitting on the bed and told Mrs Jay: 'I am phoning the police.'

The court heard that Mrs Jay, who now works as a personal trainer, suffered scratches and pain to her neck, scratches on her back and swelling on her forehead.

According to Daobry's LinkedIn profile he has been working as a close protection officer to a 'high net worth' member of the UAE Royal Family since January 2016. He has previously worked in a similar role for the Saudi royal family.
A North Korean defector has told how he was forced to eat snakes and the bark from trees to live after his family fell foul of the country's crazed leader.

Sungju Lee faced a daily struggle to survive and ended up becoming a 'teenage gangster' who lived on the streets from the age of 12 after being abandoned by his parents.

Brainwashed into believing Britain and other western countries were 'evil', the teenager lived in constant fear of being executed or sent to a detention camp where almost everyone died from starvation.

Sungju Lee (pictured, centre) is seen here with former Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper (right) and former MP Barry Devolin (left), who now works in South Korea

He managed to escape a life of violence and misery after his father paid people smugglers to transport him to South Korea where he was able to begin a new life away from the oppressive regime of dictator Kim Jung Il.

That new life away from the most oppressive regime in the world has led to Lee studying at a Warwick University and writing a biography called 'Every Falling Star' which vividly describes his life of poverty and degradation in North Korea.

As a country with sealed borders, and limited contact with the outside world, few people are ever able to escape.

Lee, 29, puts his escape down to a 'miracle meeting' with his grandfather and his determination to survive at all costs.

While his teens years were spent in abject poverty as a street kid his early life was one of luxury compared with how most of the population lived.

Unlike millions of other North Koreans, Lee was born into a wealthy military family who enjoyed privileges most of the population could only dream of. His father was part of the military guard attached to serving the country's leader Kim Jong Il.

'Everything was provided for and we had a very good life compared to so many,' Lee told Daily Mail Online.

When he was 12 Sungju was abandoned in North Korea and was forced to fend for himself

Sungju Lee talks about his book on the YouTube page Abrams Books

'We had a foreign car, a BMW, and a house that was provided by the state. I got to eat ice cream and had candy. At weekends we would go out into the country. Life was very good. There was always plenty of food and we were happy.'

At school he was taught from an early age that the US was on the brink of invading the country. Brainwashed into believing America and South Korea wanted to destroy the country he grew up with a deep suspicion of the West.

'We were always told America wanted to attack us, and that was the reason we had such a big army. We had to defend our country.

'There was no internet, mobile phones or TV stations so no one knew what was really going on. Everyone just accepted what we were told and no one raised any questions.'

When Lee was 10 years old he said his father made what he calls a 'political mistake' leading to a catastrophic change in the family circumstances.

'We were living in the capital Pyongyang and my father came home and said we were leaving,' said Lee.

'I was too young to understand, but he had been banished from the capital. 'On the train journey out of the capital I was shocked to see all these people begging.

'They were starving and begging for food. I had no idea. I was so shocked I asked my father if we were still in North Korea. This was not what I was used to seeing. 'We had been taught that ours was the best country in the world. It was paradise, but here were all these people begging.'

The Lee family fled to the north east region of North Korea where famine and poverty were rife. With no income and living in a shabby house that leaked when it rained the family struggled to survive.

'My father went to get a job in a factory but it was closed and deserted as there was no electricity.

'We had no income and my father would go off into the woods to look for food. We ate whatever he brought home. It might be pine tree bark or snakes that were turned into a stew.

'We ate anything to stay alive and everyday was hard. Insects, squirrels and vegetation from the forest. Anything that prevented us from starving to death. 'We would eat insects, squirrels and snakes.

Sungju Lee has written a book about his extraordinary experiences

The first time I had snake stew it was awful, but it was the only protein that I got. There were always lots of roots that my father would get from the forest. I was young and just ate what I was give,' he said.

After a year in the town of Gyeong-seong his father left telling his son and wife that he would be gone for seven days. Lee would later learn his father had made his way across the land border to China and later settled in South Korea.

When his father failed to return his mother told him she was going to visit an aunt who had some food - but Lee never saw or heard from her again.

Abandoned at the age of the 12, and with no home or means of support, Lee had to look out for himself, begging on the streets for scraps of food.

'There wasn't lot of food but I'd beg for scraps. Bits of rice, anything not to starve to death. So many people died of starvation and the Government did nothing to help' Lee told how he would watch as children his age starved to death on the streets such was the desperation for food.

So many of the population were on the brink of starvation that they did nothing to help. 'In the morning we would see bodies of children. I would think they were asleep, but they had died. There was no food. It was only scraps, and we often had to fight for those.'

'Some of the merchants would get the children to fight each other for what scraps they had left and take enjoyment from that. If you could not fight for food then you would die.

'The streets were full of people just sitting or lying down and starving to death. Once they had died their bodies would be removed. 'There were no jobs so people had no income to buy food. They had to find it themselves from the fields and land around the town.

Lee said during his four years on the streets he only encountered 'miserable' looking people. 'No one was happy. We were all hungry, but you did not complain to the Government. 'We had been told that children were the kings' of the nation. Of course we would ask ourselves why we were starving, but you did not say anything to the Government. They controlled everything.'

'No one was happy but they believed what the Government was telling them. We were always told North Korea was a paradise and so no one complained because they knew what would happen to them. It wasn't long before Lee met up with other teens who had been orphaned or abandoned by their parents and formed a street gang.

'There were seven of us and we stuck together,' he said. 'Each day would be spent begging for food, or stealing. We would mostly pick pocket people but as there were seven of us we would use our fists. 'I knew martial arts and used that to help me steal. I had to do anything to eat. We would steal from shops and markets.

'The first time I stole it was hard, the second a bit easier and by the fifth time it was a job. That was how I lived Lee said he never once had a full stomach while he was on the streets and part of a gang. Merchants would set up stalls at the station as that was the busiest place in the town.

They would sell food to the travellers and we would wait to pick up the scraps. Any food that was dropped on the floor or left over. Lee said he and the gang would only stay in a town for about two months before shop owners recognised their faces and called police.

They were continually on the lookout for police as an arrest meant being sent to a detention camp that the street thieves called 'the tomb'. 'If you went to the tomb you rarely got out alive.

Kids who were sent there died of malnutrition. Once I was sent there after being caught stealing and it was awful. 'The children there were so weak from starvation that they couldn't move from their bed. They would just foul where they lay. The place stank and I hated.'

Lee said his gang would have to fight was constantly involved with 'turf wars' with other gangs. 'If we went into a new town the gang there would try to stop us. We would fight. If we lost, we left but if we won then we stayed. 'We were a tough gang. Only gangs could survive. If you were an individual then there was no chance as the gangs ruled the street.'

Sungju Lee's book, written with the help of American journalist Susan McClelland, came out in Britain this week

Barely in his teens, Lee had no one to turn to. The Government insisted that living in North Korea was paradise. Those who criticised the regime disappeared or were sent into the furthest reaches of the country where they starved to death. Thousands were sent to labour camps where they were effectively worked to death.

Between 1994-1998 as many as 300,000 people starved to death after famine blighted the country which was branded part of the 'axis of evil' by President George W Bush.

Lee said he was resigned to a life as a street thief until a chance encounter at the railway station in Gyeong-seong where he slept rough each night. While looking for someone to steal from, Lee was approached by an elderly man.

'He told me he knew me and asked me to come home with him. I agreed, but only if the other gang members could come with me,' he said. 'We were planning to steal everything he had, but once I was in his house I saw a photo on the wall. It was the wedding photograph of my father and mother and the man told me he was my grandfather. 'Looking back it was a miracle that we met each other.' Lee later learned that his grandfather had been told by North Korean officials that his daughter had been relocated to Gyeong-seong and for the past four years had searched for them, looking round the railway station every Sunday in the hope of finding her.

When his grandfather asked him to stay and help him in his farm looking after goats Lee seized the opportunity. 'I was glad to leave my life on the street behind. I was so grateful to my grandfather and he gave me a chance.'

Eight months after moving in Lee said a stranger appeared at the farm with a letter from his father. The letter said: 'Son, I'm living in China. I really miss you. Come to China with your mother'.

Human traffickers helped Lee make the perilous crossing into China in October 2002, dodging border guards who are trained to shoot on sight. He then flew to South Korea where he had an emotional reunion with his father.

'I was just speechless with shock and so happy to see him,' said Lee. 'I never thought I would see him again and we hugged each other for a long time' Lee cannot name his father as he still has family members still living in North Korea which is now ruled with an iron fist by Kim Jong-un. Family members face being arrested and punished for having any links to defectors.

He doesn't know if his mother is alive or dead having never heard from her after she walked out saying she was going to get food. Living in South Korea, Lee was able to resume his school studies and at the age of 22 graduated from high school.

He discovered that South Korea doesn't want to start war with his country and the US were not planning to invade. 'All my life I had been told that we had to have a big army because of the threat from America. We were told America had invaded South Korea and were waiting to attack us,' he said.

'No one questioned why America wanted to attack and we were told it was because they had lost the Korean War and wanted revenge.' Not surprisingly living in Seoul, the capital of South Korea, was a mind blowing experience compared to what he had witnessed growing up. 'There were so many cars and people were so friendly,' he said. Lee also discovered mobile phones, television and movies were readily available with no one watching his every move.

Last year Lee won a scholarship to study for a Masters degree at Warwick University in International Relations and Security.

With American journalist Susan McClelland he also wrote a book about his experiences called 'Every Falling Star' which was published in the UK this week.

It is the first ever book by a defector aimed at young adults and Lee hopes he had been able to describe to people what life is like for the ordinary person within the closed nation. Lee hopes that one day his country will be unified and said the Kim Jong-un is gradually losing his iron grip on the country.

Although the internet is banned and only the privileged few have mobile phones news from outside the country's borders is steadily filtering in. In the past year the 32 year old supreme leader of North Korea has carried out several high profile executions of family members and those serving him having accused them of treason. He has used increasingly bizarre and violent methods to dispatch of those who have failed him.

One minister was executed by flame thrower while another was killed by having a anti aircraft gun fired at his body. Tension between the North and South is at its highest for years after a series of nuclear tests carried out by King Jong-un.

South Korea has threatened to obliterate Pyongyang if the North launches any ballistic missiles. The US commander in South Korea, Gen. Vincent K. Brooks, has called the North's nuclear test 'a dangerous escalation' and 'an unacceptable threat.' Lee believes that he will see North and South Korea unified in his lifetime. 'It will happen because Kim Jong-un is losing his power and more people are becoming aware that the outside world does not want to wage war.'
Violent clashes between refugees and locals have broken out in Greece - as the number of migrants arriving from Turkey has doubled to 1,000 in just one week.

On Chios, local residents were sprayed with tear gas by police after hundreds marched through the main square demanding the removal of the island's huge refugee camp.

On Lesbos, migrants have lead two demonstrations through the capital Mytilene demanding the right to leave the island and travel to mainland Greece having been stranded there for months.

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Clashes: Violence between refugees and locals have broken out in Greece - as the number of migrants arriving from Turkey has doubled to 1,000 in just one week. Pictured: Greek police use tear gas against residents in Chios during protest against the island's Souda migrant camp

Protests: On Chios, Far right supporters fought with asylum seekers after crowds marched through the main square demanding the closure of the controversial refugee camp

Raids: Local residents clashed with police on Wednesday night as crowds gathered demanding the closure of the sprawling Souda camp in Chios, home to almost 2,000

Some 13,000 migrants are living in over-crowded refugee camps on the Aegean islands  many on Chios and Lesbos.

Dozens of Golden Dawn supporters twice tried to invade the sprawling Souda camp in Chios, home to almost 2,000 refugees, on Wednesday night.

Angry migrants responded pelting police and demonstrators with stones and chanting; 'let us free, we want to go to Athens'.

Riot police had to use tear gas to break up the Far-right demonstration and to keep the war parties apart.

Lesbos mayor Spiros Galinos says the conditions inside the camps such as Kara Tepe on the island opened in 2015 are 'particularly worrying and dangerous'.

He told MailOnline: 'We witnessed extensive fights inside the first reception centre in Moria, with dozens of injured immigrants.'

Residents inside the camp say the conditions are unbearable.

Yiunnis Sateh, 22, from Morocco said: 'There is no room to sleep, not enough food for all and not enough water to take a shower.'

Lesbos residents say they cannot continue to support such large numbers of migrants.

Nikos Trakellis, president of Moria village that is home to the Moria refugee camp, said: 'A single village cannot bear the burden of the whole island's refugee issue with 5,000 restrained and frustrated people who are protesting all the time.

'The residents here cannot stand it anymore. How will the villagers work at their fields in the winter when these fields are cramped with immigrants. And crime is rising again.'

'The image that prevails around the world that Lesbos suffers from tremendous immigrant incidents today does not reflect reality,' said Vangelis Mirsinias, president of the Lesbos Chamber of Commerce. 'Mytilene is very neat and clean, and the beaches had been cleaned.'

Packed: Some 13,000 migrants are living in over-crowded refugee camps on the Aegean islands  many on Chios and Lesbos. Pictured: Syrian boy, four, washed by his mother at Souda

Cramped conditions: Lesbos mayor Spiros Galinos says conditions inside the camps are 'particularly worrying and dangerous'. Pictured: A Syrian woman at Souda on Chios, Greece

Mr Galinos told MailOnline: 'We witnessed extensive fights inside the first reception centre in Moria, with dozens of injured immigrants.'

Tourist numbers have plummeted by two-thirds in Greece with holidaymakers staying away after being put off by pictures of migrants on the beach next to sun loungers over the last two years.

Tourism chief Nikos Molvalis added: 'The beaches are pristine and dozens of volunteer actions had been done in spring in order to clean our shores.

'And let's not forget that in the past years [Lesbos town of] Molyvos stood next to refugees when the refugee crisis was not on the news.'

Just 16,745 holidaymakers visited Lesbos during the four-month tourist season this year, down 65 per cent down on the 47,479 who came in 2015.

Meanwhile the number of Syrians and others fleeing Turkey for Greece is growing rapidly once again as an agreement reached months ago to curb the flood of refugees into Europe seems to be on the verge of collapse.

Over 1,000 migrants from Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq arrived in Greece last week - double the previous week, according to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees.

This is a huge rise from the trickle of new asylum seekers arriving after the deal struck between Brussels and Ankara in March this year, although well short of the 1,700 daily arrivals at the height of the crisis.

'This agreement is only paper,' Syrian Mohammad Ibrahim, 44, from Aleppo, told the New York Times in Bodrum, Turkey.

'In practice they aren't sending us back to Turkey like they said they would. So it is time to go. We are waiting to leave with 40 other people. God willing, we will arrive safely.'

Turkey agreed to the controversial deal to accept migrants arriving in Greece were expected to be sent back to Turkey if they did not apply for asylum, or if their asylum requests were refused.

They also strongly enforced their border controls to prevent further migration. In return Ankara was promised a three billion Euro aid package and visa-free travel to the EU.

The EU promised to operate a fast-track asylum process in large 'hot-spot' refugee camps on the Greek islands and accept two Syrian refugees from Turkish camps for each Syrian deported to Turkey. Migrants already in Greece were supposed to be offered sanctuary in countries across the EU.

The agreement was intended to halt the huge exodus of people from the Middle East, Asia and Africa who were arriving on the Greek islands last year to claim asylum.

Over one million had used this route to reach Europe.

Migrants who were not from Syria or Iraq were widely viewed as trying to exploit the wars in these countries to seek a better life in Europe.

But only 500 migrants have been returned from Greece to Turkey under the deal. A further 4,200 have returned to their home countries voluntarily.

Meanwhile some 13,000 have been stuck on the Aegean islands since March waiting for their applications for asylum to be heard  the majority on Chios and Lesbos.

Another 56,000 who had reached Greece ahead of the deal and the closure of the so-called Balkan route to northern Europe are stuck on the mainland.

EU states have failed to honour the agreement to take in refugees from Greece.

The Turkish government's brutal crackdown on opposition following the failed coup in July has caused EU leaders to stall on their offer of visa-free travel ahead of the October deadline.

There are fears Turkey will pull out of the deal completely if the EU fails to honour their visa-free travel demand.

The break-down in the EU-Turkey agreement has spurred a new wave of migrants to set sail from Turkish beaches for the Greek islands.

Meanwhile refugees have told of their frustration at being prevented from leaving the Aegean camps for the mainline and other parts of Europe.

Eritrean refugee Gabi Dula, 25, has been waiting for five months in Lesbos for her asylum request to be examined.

She said: 'People from Eritrea have been recognised by the EU as refugees. But the committee here hasn't even interviewed us.

'We have our babies here and our families are waiting for us in Europe.'

Eritrean Sakan Bali, 20, added: 'Eritrea has been at war with Ethiopia for years. The state obliges us to be soldiers and fight after 18 years old.

'But we don't want war. We want peace and education.'

Yezidi refugee Teo Ban, 28, from northern Iraq, has been living at Lesbos' Kara Tepe camp for many months with his wife Dera and their children.

Describing his flight from the Sinjar mountain massacre he said: 'I lived in the mountains for nine days. I saw children dying at the mountain because they had no food or water.'

Among the refugees are also economic migrants seeking a better life in Europe.

Tourist numbers have plummeted by two-thirds in Greece with holidaymakers being put off by pictures of migrants on the beach next to sun loungers over the last two years

Over 1,000 migrants from Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq arrived in Greece last week - double the previous week, according to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees. Many of them end up in Souda refugee camp on the island of Chios (pictured)

Mehdi Ahman, 31, from Morocco, said: 'If you are not from a well-known family you don't get a good job. I sold cleaning products to survive but I have studied. I can't live in the streets I will go wherever there is job.'

Mehdi, who reached Lesbos in April, added: 'My trip by the boat was a nightmare. The smugglers left us in a forest in Turkey and we had been waiting for three days for the boat to come.
Tension between the two groups in which the 750,000 asylum seekers make 1.8 per cent of the population

A pitched battle involving a mob of 100 neo-Nazis brawling with 20 asylum seekers was the result of Angela Merkel's open door policy to more than a million migrants, Germans say.

People living in Bautzen, east Germany, claim the Chancellor's decision to accept 750,000 asylum seekers has changed their town so that they no longer recognise it.

German police say Wednesday night's confrontation, in which bottles and fists were thrown, was building for weeks and was inevitable.

Police union leader Rainer Wendt also told MailOnline he fears this week's missiles and violence will be repeated across the country.

Tension: The pitched battle where 100 neo-Nazis brawled with 20 asylum seekers in the east German town of Bautzen was a result of Angela Merkel's open door policy, Germans in the town say. Pictured: Lisa Mersiowsky says she hates the Nazi thugs who fought with migrants

Brawl: Shocking pictures showed the thugs fighting with migrants in the town where asylum seekers make up just 1.8 per cent of the population. Pictured: Eteri Makhishvili, 26, is an immigrant from Georgia living in Bautzen

Trouble: Police say the fight on Wednesday had been brewing for some time and that they expect further violence to be repeated across Germany. Pictured: Actor Michelle Bray said she had been abused by people who have said: 'N***** run home!'

Anger: People like Roberto Simant blame Merkel for throwing Germany's doors open to more than a million foreigners and says he only has sympathy with the locals involved in this week's violence. He told MailOnline: 'The town's changed so much. It is all Angela Merkel's fault.'

Mr Wendt said: 'Young migrants and Far right groups are confronting each other more and more. That's what led to the mass fight in Bautzen. When you bring radicals into the scene the conflict escalates ever wider. I don't see this as a regional problem - it is one we have to get out of.'

Bautzen has for long become a magnet for the anti-immigration extremists.

Police have been called to the Kornmarkt, a small square that leads into the old town pedestrian area, 70 times in the past five months to separate thugs and migrants.

The town has changed so much I no longer recognise parts of it. And it is all Angela Merkel's fault. It's easy for her to make pronouncements in Berlin. She doesn't live here and among the people who do do not like it. Roberto Simant, 30

Yet Mrs Merkel continues to insist that Germany can absorb over a million foreigners while retaining its national character.

But her view is not shared in Bautzen where 750 asylum seekers, 1.8 percent of the town's population, are perceived as menacing and threatening.

One of those opposed to them is Roberto Simant, 30, a building supplier, who said he has 'sympathy' only for the locals involved in Wednesday's violence.

He said: 'I was born in this town and I am saddened to see what it has become. Some of these refugees are worse than animals. They harass local girls, try to grab them and feel them up.

'The 17-year-old daughter of a friend of mine was punched to the ground by some of them when they tried to have sex with her. They beat her to the ground.

'The town has changed so much I no longer recognise parts of it. And it is all Angela Merkel's fault. It is easy for her to make pronouncements in Berlin but she doesn't live here and among the people who do do not like it.'

Violence: Police have been called out 70 times in just five months to separate clashes between migrants and thugs. But Charmaine Dominick said: 'This is a lovely town. It is such a shame what has happened to it. I can't understand it.'

Julia Klar, 21, a journalism student, added: 'The fear I have is not from asylum seekers but the Far right. They are a stain on our country. It is sad that it has come to this - fighting in my town.'

Silko Grafe, 32, who was born in Bautzen, told MailOnline that part of the problem is the new arrivals often come from Islamic countries where alcohol is banned. In Germany they drink, become intoxicated and react to abuse and insults from the Far right

Germany chancellor Mrs Merkel continues to insist the country can absorb over a million foreigners while retaining its national character. But her view is not shared in Bautzen where 750 asylum seekers are perceived as menacing

The anti-migrant feeling in Bautzen is not the welcoming culture that Mrs Merkel urged her countrymen to embrace when the borders were first opened. It has led to fear of the situation by those living there

Pensioner Hannah Fannar, 80, who was born in Bautzen, said she has watched the town alter over the years - adding: 'My town has changed, and not for the better. I hear all these terrible stories about refugees. There are more of them coming every day.

'I know that local people don't like them. I feel afraid on the streets sometimes. When will they all go home?'

My town has changed, and not for the better. I hear all these terrible stories about refugees. There are more of them coming every day. Hannah Fannar, 80

This is not the welcoming culture that Mrs Merkel urged her countrymen to embrace when the borders were first opened. It has led to fear and loathing in Bautzen.

Michelle Bray, 29, an actor who moved to Bautzen a year ago from the western city of Aachen.

The daughter of a Greek-German mother and an African-American father, she has been subjected to racial abuse.

But she said: 'I think this is a really great town.'

Michelle was at the Kornmarkt on Friday to paint a banner supporting the new arrivals.

She added: 'Locals say it has changed - well, so do I. And that is because of the Far right. I have been insulted on the streets, people calling to me, 'N***** run home!' How do you think that makes me feel? My mum is terribly worried.

'I won't go out at night now without friends. I don't feel safe.

'I have to emphasise that most of the people here are good. They are kind. But among them are these racists, these haters. It makes me sad.'

Eteri Makhishvili, 26, is an immigrant from Georgia living in Bautzen.

The young mother told MailOnline: 'Personally I have not had any trouble but there is tension. Asylum seekers are stigmatised and in turn they become resentful.

'Fear creates fear. There is an atmosphere here. Heavy drinking on both sides doesn't help. I don't know what the solution is.'

Alcohol is playing an increasing part in unrest between the new arrivals and locals, according to police.

Young Muslim men, many of them unaccompanied, have arrived from Islamic countries with alcohol bans.

But in Germany they are free to drink and are not used to it. Last Friday, five days before Wednesday's clash, hordes of tattooed neo-Nazis stood opposite youngsters from Morocco, Syria, Algeria and Afghanistan.

The foreigners, emboldened by drink, retaliated, according to locals, in an incident which ended in scuffles.

Five days later it ended with locals chasing them through Bautzen's streets, shouting: 'Get out of our Nazi district!' and 'F****** foreigners!'

Police say the asylum seekers are bored with nothing to do and began the trouble on Wednesday with drink-fuelled insults towards the Far right.

'They're often p***ed,' said Silko Grafe, 32, who was born in Bautzen.

He went on: 'The character of the town is changing, through them and through the Far right, who come here to protest against them.

Battles: Refugees and neo-Nazis battled it out in Bautzen, east Germany, on Wednesday night with police fighting to save migrants, who were outnumbered by five to one

Protests: Rallies have been held against the 750,000 asylum seekers, who are living in the town. Crowds this week gathered in front of the City Museum

Casualties: A man identifying himself as Mehdi (right), from Morocco, was hurt in the attack on Wednesday and says he received a cut on the arm that required bandages

'I have heard terrible stories of the refugees, the young guys, insulting women, grabbing them, feeling them up. You can't do that. Word gets around and tempers fray.

'Of course all people are different and I dare say that there are many good people among them. But fighting doesn't solve anything.

Mr Grafe added: 'I blame Angela Merkel for all this. She should come to a place like Bautzen and ask what real people feel, not her advisers.

'I don't know who to vote for in the general election next year. But it won't be her.'

Charmaine Dominick, 50, from South Africa, is visiting her daughter, Natasha, who lives in Bautzen and runs their family computer repair company.

Charmaine said: 'Really, this is a lovely town and it is such a shame what has happened to it. I can't understand it.

'There aren't many refugees. I have never known them to be anything other than polite and friendly.

'The neo-Nazis have seized on to this and tried to demonize them. It is so unfair and I hope that common sense eventually prevails.'

Lisa Mersiowsky, 21, from Bautzen, who studies bio technology, said: 'I hate these Nazi thugs. They damage the town and they hurt people. I don't care who started what, who threw the first punch.

'The fact is that these people need our help. I have never been afraid of asylum seekers, but I would certainly be afraid of meeting a neo-Nazi on the street.'

Julia Klar, 21, a journalism student, agreed, saying: 'The fear I have is not from asylum seekers but the Far right. They are a stain on our country and it is sad that it has come to this, fighting in my town.'

On Friday not a single asylum seeker could be found in Bautzen.

In an attempt to stem clashes, refugees have been confined to their quarters and forbidden from going out after 7pm. Pictured: The violence in which the neo-Nazis chanted 'Bautzen for the Germans' and fought with fists and bottles

On Friday not a single asylum seeker could be seen in Bautzen. Many were thought to be hiding in their accommodation, which was guarded by police on Wednesday night (pictured) following the fight

Heavily tattooed men sporting leather jerkins patterned with iron cross motifs lurked menacingly on the square where 48 hours earlier the brawl broke out.

The refugees were confined to their quarters where they are forbidden to venture out after 7pm - a measure aimed at defusing tensions until a permanent solution to their presence can be found.
Horrific pictures have emerged showing the body of an endangered brown bear who was reportedly shot dead in Spain.

A group of tourists came across the corpse of the 16 stone creature last week as they visited a nature reserve in the northern Spanish region of Asturias.

And experts believe that the animal was killed with what they think was a single gun shot to the chest.

Horrific pictures have emerged showing the body of an endangered brown bear who was reportedly shot dead in Spain in the region of Asturias

Now Spanish police have launched an investigation to find who could be responsbible for the bear's death.

Animal rights experts say the bear could have been shot by poachers, who are also known to shoot lynxes, wolves and endangered eagles in Spain.

Luis Suarez, head of biodiversity at WWF-Spain said: 'It is outrageous that endangered species are still being shot dead in the 21st century.

'Bears, lynxes, wolves or endangered eagles are shot by poachers in Spain, a grim example of all that still needs to be done to protect Europe's nature.'

The population of wild brown bears in Spain fell to just 80 after the animals were allowed to be legally hunted up until the 1960s.

Animal rights experts say the bear could have been shot by poachers after it was found to have a gun shot wound to the chest

Since then, conservation work has seen those numbers swell to 280 and the Asturias region and Cantabrian is now considered a stronghold for the endangered animal.

A group dedicated to protecting wild bears, the Fundacion Oso Pardo (Brown Bear Foundation), has been launched and illegal hunters now face up to two years in prison.

The bears are omnivores, eating anything from berries and nuts to sheep and calves.

According to the World Wildlife Fund, they play a necessary role in keeping other animal populations in check while also helping seed dispersal with their droppings.
Dramatic video has emerged of the moment a female protester stormed the stage after a Tim Kaine rally and grabbed the microphone from the vice presidential candidate's podium.

The Virginia Senator, speaking in New Hampshire yesterday, can be heard saying: 'Thank you so much for having me here to Exeter - let's go win this thing. Appreciate it.'

A woman, holding a Stronger Together sign, then walks towards the candidate and grabs the microphone.

Dramatic video has emerged of the moment a female protester stormed the stage after a Tim Kaine rally

The Virginia Senator, speaking in New Hampshire yesterday, can be heard saying: 'Thank you so much for having me here to Exeter - let's go win this thing. Appreciate it'

The candidate appears to acknowledge the woman before shaking hands with members of the audience.

The protester had access to the high-profile politician for more than 10 seconds before he walked off stage.

The woman, who has not yet been identified, was eventually escorted off the stage.

Although the microphone was cut off, in another clip posted to social media the protester appears to be shouting: 'Senator Kaine, will you formally apologize to Native Americans on behalf of this nation?'

A woman, holding a Stronger Together sign, walks towards the candidate and grabs the microphone

The protester had access to the high-profile politician for more than 10 seconds before he walked off stage

The woman (pictured), who has not yet been identified, was eventually escorted off the stage

Jennifer Crumpton, from WMUR9, wrote on Twitter: 'Protestor escorted out of Kaine rally in Exeter. 349 others screaming support'.

This is not the first time a protester has attempted to storm the stage in the 2016 campaign.

In August, Secret Service agents tackled and arrested an animal rights activist who tried to rush the stage during a Hillary Clinton rally in Des Moines, Iowa.

In March, four secret service agents surrounded Donald Trump after a protester tried to storm his podium at the end of a campaign rally in Vandalia, Ohio.

Earlier this week a British man who grabbed a police officer's gun at a Trump rally in June pleaded guilty to federal charges that could see him jailed for two years.

Although the microphone was cut off, in another clip posted to social media the protester appears to be shouting: 'Senator Kaine, will you formally apologize to Native Americans on behalf of this nation?'

During the Exeter rally, Tim Kaine suggested that Donald Trump's view of America is elitist

Kaine frequently blasted the book, claiming it does not strike the positive tone of Stronger Together, which he co-authored with running mate Hillary Clinton

Michael Sandford pleaded guilty to being an illegal alien in possession of a firearm and disrupting an official function, which could have carried a 20-year sentence if he was convicted at trial.

'I tried to take a gun from a policeman to shoot someone with, and I'm pleading guilty,' Sandford told the judge at the US District Court in Las Vegas.

During the Exeter rally, Tim Kaine suggested that Donald Trump's view of America is elitist.

Addressing a Democratic organizing event on Thursday, the Democratic vice presidential nominee referred to Trump's 2015 book Crippled America.

Kaine frequently blasted the book, claiming it does not strike the positive tone of Stronger Together, which he co-authored with running mate Hillary Clinton.

Kaine described Trump as out-of-touch, saying the billionaire businessman's philosophy is 'a view out of the penthouse of a tall tower.'

He continued: 'I do not recognize this picture of our country. This is not who we are.'
Alan Barnes (pictured) moved into a new home with the money raised for him by Katie Cutler after he was mugged

Disabled mugging victim Alan Barnes has offered just 10 to an indebted woman who raised hundreds of thousands of pounds for him.

The 68-year-old moved into a new home with the money raised for him by Katie Cutler after he was mugged.

Now she is embroiled in a cash crisis over a 6,687 public relations bill from an agency which says it helped her achieve 'blanket coverage' of her cause.

But despite receiving nearly 330,000 in donations from well-wishers after her fundraising campaign, Mr Barnes says he will help her with just a small amount as he does not wish to 'show off'.

He also believes he should not use money given in charity to him to pay off the debt.

The news sparked a furious reaction online from trolls who launched a tirade of abuse at Mr Barnes.

But Ms Cutler has urged people not to criticise the pensioner over his decision, saying: 'The money raised was Alan's and that money was for him - it should stay with him. He can do what he wants with it.'

Mr Barnes was left with a broken collarbone when he was pushed over while putting his bins out in Low Fell, Gateshead, last year.

Money began to pour in for the 4ft 6in Christian after beautician Ms Cutler set up an online fundraising page on the Go Fund Me website.

Katie Cutler (left) raised 330,000 for Alan Barnes. She's now being chased over a 7,000 PR bill relating to the fundraiser, and he has offered to donate 10 to help her

Within three weeks she had raised 330,000 for Mr Barnes, who bought a house.

After her charitable endeavour, Ms Cutler, also from Gateshead, had announced plans to launch The Katie Cutler Foundation to help raise money for others.

But now she is being threatened with bailiffs after being landed with a 6,687 PR bill.

Claire Barber, of Alnwick, Northumberland, offered to help raise the profile of that cause for 550 a day through public relations.

But because Ms Cutler donated the money raised to Mr Barnes and other good causes, she says she does not have the cash which Ms Barber is now claiming in a county court order.

Mr Barnes, who has put his Gateshead house up for sale, suggested the bill could be paid by fundraisers.

He said: 'I would suggest that someone sets up a small fund to raise money to pay for Katie's PR.

'It's not a big amount and I think a lot of people would actually like to do that for Katie. I'm quite happy to put just a small donation in because I don't want to show off.'

When asked how much he was willing to donate, Alan said: 'A small amount to me is 10 or something.'

He added: 'It's easy for people to say 'he's got a lot of money, cough up' but you got to look into all the alternatives.

'It might seem hard but if I start handing it out, other people might ask for money. It was given to me on the understanding that I use it for myself.

'A lot of people just want it to stay with me.'

His stance sparked criticism on social media - prompting Ms Cutler to leap to his defence, saying: 'I do not think Alan should have to pay anything.'

She added: 'A lot of people think he should have paid that bill because things in that relate to him.

'If you go out for a meal, the richest person does not have to foot the bill. I feel strongly about this.

'The money raised was Alan's and that money was for him - it should stay with him. He can do what he wants with it.

'And he does not deserve this abuse. He is a vulnerable adult - I have been brought up around vulnerable adults - and the abuse is not nice.'

Mr Barnes, who says he has not seen Ms Cutler for over a year, plans to live off the money she raised for him.

He says he will make a donation to charity when he dies from any leftover cash.

The pensioner has not seen Ms Cutler in more than a year - she helped him buy a new house

Ms Barber, CEO of Claire Barber PR, said in a statement: 'Katie Cutler employed Claire Barber PR to handle her PR in March 2015.

'We worked together for four months achieving blanket bespoke PR coverage across almost every national newspaper, multiple TV news channels across the North East and UK including Sky, ITN, ITV, the BBC and Channel 4, Radio 2 and an exclusive negotiated interview on ITV This Morning that took a considerable amount of time to set up. Also hundreds of emails, calls and planning.

'It was an enormous amount of work with phenomenal success. Katie made two payments in June 2015, then proceeded to write all over social media her shock at getting our bill (which was agreed prior to any work undertaken).

'At this point we offered her a payment plan, but she wouldn't respond to anything. As a small family business with an impeccable reputation and after over a year and still no payment, we had no choice but to go to the small claims court.'

'Katie didn't respond with any defence to the small claims court either other than acknowledgement of papers. We are a small, hard working company and we are simply not able to carry this debt.

'We are incredibly shocked with the way Katie has belittled our hard work and devotion to the four-month project that Katie commissioned us for.'

In the months after the mugging, Mr Barnes got a 'calling from God' to move to the Shetland Islands.

But he decided to stay put and is now looking for another home in the Gateshead area.
A major seaside attraction in Brighton broke down when it became unbalanced because drinkers rushed to the bar.

The 46.2 million new British Airways i360 attraction was hired for a private party last Thursday. It allows guests to travel up 531ft and enjoy aerial views of the East Sussex city.

But when 180 party-goers, including a heavily pregnant woman, gathered to get refreshments at the bar the sensors became over sensitive causing the ride to grind to a halt for more than two hours.

Attraction: The i360 broke down last week when it became imbalanced because drinkers rushed to the bar

Inside: Visitors expecting to go on the i360 attraction had a long wait in store when it broke down on Sunday

Bosses behind British Airways i360 tweeted on Wednesday when the attraction opened

Chairman of the attraction, David Marks, claimed the vertical cable car went into 'safe mode' because the sensors detected a greater strain on one set of cables than the other. The error meant guests were left in mid-air without proper toilet facilities.

Mr Marks said: 'The British Airways i360 pod is designed for passengers to move freely around so that they can enjoy the panoramic views.

'A group of passengers moved from the north to the south side of the pod because that's where bar is and because the tolerance levels were too tightly set in the control system, this triggered the pod's safety mode.

'The tolerance levels have now been adjusted to the correct level of sensitivity.'

It was the first time the 15 per person ride broke down since opening in August.

On Sunday, one of the pod's sensors for its docking station at ground level failed causing it to close for two days.

Around 130 passenger were trapped for two hours after the pod went into safety mode again.

Technical problems: The 46.2million innovation in Brighton has broken down twice in just a matter of days

Impressive sight: The 360 degree viewing tower has a curved-glass pod offering views of up to 26 miles of Sussex coastline

Two hours later another fault meant even more visitors were stuck inside the pod.

The attraction finally reopened to the public on Wednesday.

After the technical glitch Mr Marks said: 'Investigations reveal that the load and balance system settings were too low, which meant the system was over-sensitive.

'When the pod was near full capacity this triggered the default safety mode and the brakes were automatically applied.'

'To mitigate this, we operated to a lower capacity until we were able to adjust the settings and upgrade the software.'

'On Sunday September 11, one of the sensors around the pod docking stations at boarding level gave a false reading to the control system, which again put the pod into safety mode by activating the brakes.

'All the sensors have now been checked and adjusted where required, and will be monitored regularly.'
Trenor expected to plead guilty at next hearing at Cambridge crown court

He admitted during interviews that his job couldn't support his 'addiction'

The 28-year-old stole the cash over year-long period to fund his gambling

Martin Trenor, 28, has been charged with theft of 254,000 and fraud by abusing his position as a manager

A manager of a Marks and Spencer store stole over 250,000 from his employer to feed his gambling habit, a court heard.

Martin Trenor, 28, has been charged with theft of 254,000 and fraud by abusing his position as a manager between March 19, 2015 and March 21, 2016.

He entered no plea at Cambridge Magistrates Court on Friday and his case has been sent directly to the crown.

Paul Brown, prosecuting, said the starting term for such a crime is in excess of three years and therefore Trenor's sentencing needs to be dealt with at a later date.

Mr Brown said: 'The position we as the prosecution say are these matters are not suitable to be dealt with at magistrates court.

'The background is he was employed as a manager for the Marks and Spencer Simply Food at Cambridge railway station, he also had responsibilities for two other outlets.

'His role was he was in charge of banking the cash three times a week.

'He made admissions in his interviews he had a gambling addiction and couldn't support his lifestyle on his wages.

'He's taken money on a daily basis, and has been gambling online.'

The court heard how Trenor was also responsible for Upper Crust and Delice de France at Cambridge railway station.

Trenor (shown left) entered no plea at Cambridge Magistrates Court (right) on Friday and his case has been sent directly to the crown

Trenor, of Cottenham, Cambridgeshire, appeared in a black suit and tie at the short hearing and is next due to appear at Cambridge Crown Court on October 14.

Judge Caroline Jackson heard Trenor didn't enter a guilty plea at the hearing due to an error with the wording of the charges.

But his solicitor, James Dignan, said Trenor will plead guilty to the charges at his next appearance.

Mr Dignan added: 'You may not consider it it important but if those problems could be resolved by today then he would be pleading guilty today.

'There will be guilty pleas in due course.'
Part of building, including its veranda, collapsed crushing people below

More than 35 worshippers in packed mosque were also injured in blast

At least 25 people have been killed after a suicide bomber shouting 'Allahu Akbar' attacked a mosque in Pakistan during Friday prayers.

More than 35 worshippers were injured when a huge blast destroyed the building, in the Mohmand tribal area of the country's north west, bordering Afghanistan.

According to eyewitnesses, the mosque was packed with people during Friday prayers and the attacker shouted 'Allahu Akbar' before detonating an explosive vest.

Part of the building, including its veranda collapsed in the blast, crushing worshipers below and bodies are still being hauled out of the rubble, officials said.

At least 25 people have been killed after a suicide bomber shouting 'Allahu Akbar' attacked a mosque in Pakistan during Friday prayers (file picture)

'The suicide bomber was in crowded mosque, he shouted 'Allahu Akbar', and then there was a huge blast,' Naveed Akbar, deputy administrator of Mohmand agency, told reporters.

Local tribal elder Haji Subhanullah Mohmand said the attack may have been carried out by Islamist militants seeking revenge after local tribesmen gathered a volunteer force and killed one and captured another insurgent.

'It seems to have enraged the militants and they got their revenge by carrying out a suicide attack in a mosque today,' Mohmand said.

Pakistan's frontier regions, which are deeply conservative and hard to access due to rough terrain, have long been the sanctuary of fighters from al Qaeda, the Taliban and other militant groups.

In 2014 the army launched a major operation in other parts of FATA including North and South Waziristan against insurgents who routinely attacked government officials and civilians.

Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif condemned the bombing and said the 'attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the government's resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country.'

Security in Pakistan has improved in recent years - the military says 'terrorist incidents' dropped from 128 in 2013 to 74 last year - but Islamist extremists continue to stage major attacks.

A bombing of lawyers in the city of Quetta killed 74 people last month, an attack claimed by both the Islamic State and Jamaat-ur-Ahrar, a breakaway faction of the Pakistani Taliban.

Jamaat-ur-Ahrar also claimed the Easter Sunday bombing in a park in the eastern city of Lahore that killed 72 people, many of them children.

Most of the myriad militant groups that stage attacks inside Pakistan seek to overthrow the government to establish an Islamic theocracy and impose a stricter interpretation of the religion than is practised in much of the country.
Angela Merkel is refusing to let EU leaders describe the migrant situation as 'chaos' - instead insisting they refer to 'uncontrolled flows'.

In their first meeting without Britain, the leaders of the 27 countries that will remain after Brexit are meeting at Bratislava Castle in Slovakia to consider how the Brussels club can survive.

At the end of the meeting, they were due to present a joint statement promising to tighten borders controls so as 'never to allow a return to the chaos last year'.

However, Mrs Merkel - who has been heavily criticised over her decision to open Germany's doors to more than a million migrants last year - insisted the word 'chaos' was deleted.

Instead the leaders will refer to 'uncontrolled flows', an EU source told the Mail.

Hungarian PM Viktor Orban, Mrs Merkel and Austrian chancellor Christian Kern were deep in conversation before the formal talks even began

Angela Merkel, pictured boarding a boat as the leaders took a cruise on the Danube, is said to have refused to allow the joint statement to refer to the migrant situation as 'chaos'

The leaders were having their discussions at the Bratislava Castle in Slovakia

Arriving this morning, Mrs Merkel set out a laundry list of areas in which progress had to be made - including counter-terrorism, collective defence and creating jobs.

'We are in a critical situation. We have to show with our actions that we can get better,' she said.

Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico said the leaders 'all want to show unity' but warned that it would not be easy.

'After Brexit and the risks connected with Brexit, it is absolutely necessary to me to be very honest,' he said.

The EU's leaders took a luxury pleasure cruise on the River Danube.

But low river levels on the famed waterway meant Slovak authorities had to cancel a visit to a museum by the 27 leaders that was meant to be the highlight.

Instead the premiers were left to cruise aimlessly up and down the Danube during a two-hour working lunch.

'Due to the extremely low water level of the Danube River, we won't be able to take a short break at the Danubiana (art museum),' Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico told journalists.

'Instead, the ship will turn around there, and we'll continue by sailing back to Bratislava.'

It is the first time EU leaders have gathered without Britain in attendance after the referendum

Mrs Merkel appeared to be struggling to be seen as the leaders lined up for the group photograph before the talks

The German chancellor, who is only around 5ft4, had been placed in the second row behind EU commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker

The Dutch-founded Danubiana Meulensteen Art Museum is in Cunovo, close to the border between Slovakia, Austria, and Hungary.

Donald Tusk, the European Council president, will urge the premiers to refocus on practical actions such as tightening border security and curbing migration rather than 'grand visions' of creating an EU superstate.

Mr Tusk, who chairs meeting of EU leaders, will relay a message from Theresa May, who has been excluded from the talks.

However, the discussions will be dedicated to working out how the bloc will continue without Britain rather than on agreeing their Brexit negotiation tactics.

The Eu leaders took a trip down the Danube during the summit - but had to cut the jaunt short because water levels were too low

Mr Tusk, a former prime minister of Poland, will ask the leaders to come up with an honest assessment of what is wrong with the EU and will strike a note of caution over plans drawn up by European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker for an EU army.

A senior EU official said: 'Tusk himself believes that cooperation should be as much as possible concentrated on practical things. Too much discussion on grand visions that do not materialise can at this stage be counter-productive.

'It should be about concrete cooperation of member states in the area of defence and not to replace Nato but to supplement the cooperation of many of our member states in Nato.'

A leaked draft of what the leaders are set to agree revealed they will admit that many people in Europe 'are concerned by a perceived lack of control and fears related to migration and terrorism'.

Angela Merkel said the EU is in a 'critical situation' as she arrived for the summit today

French president Francois Hollande and EU commission president Jean-Claude Juncker are also attending the gathering in Bratislava

They will promise to curb the migrant influx by sending guards to strengthen Bulgaria's border with Turkey and step up deportations of people not entitled to asylum.

In a session aimed at 'building a common diagnosis' on what is wrong with the EU, Mr Tusk will tell the leaders they 'cannot simply shout down the reality with optimistic messages about the future'

'To succeed we have to be honest about the shortcomings to lay the grand for hope,' he will say.

The UK was missing from the line-up of flags at Bratislava Castle, where the EU summit is taking place

An EU source said: 'Do we want to address real issues or hide behind nice words? We cannot avoid honest discussion in Bratislava.

'The diagnosis debate among the leaders has to be frank and open, even if it will not always be very nice. But I hope it will be polite.'

Mr Tusk's reality check is in sharp contrast to Mr Juncker, who on Wednesday gave a long-winded and rambling speech setting out his dream of an EU army.
Hundreds of passengers were trapped on a derailed train for more than four hours today after it hit a landslide and derailed  before colliding with another train.

Four people  two drivers and two passengers, one of whom is pregnant  were injured when the London Midland train was hit by a landslip and derailed just north of Watford Junction at around 7am.

Network Rail said the 6.19am service from Milton Keynes to London Euston came off the tracks and was given a 'glancing blow' by an oncoming train in a 'slow tunnel'.

It left the two London Midland trains 'leaning against one another' as emergency crews desperately worked to evacuate the some 400 passengers stuck on board.

Four people  two drivers and two passengers, one of whom is pregnant  were injured when the London Midland train from Milton Keynes hit a landslip and derailed just north of Watford Junction. Pictured: The front of the damaged London Midland train following the collision

Aftermath: One of the two London Midland trains involved in the incident near Watford this morning. The train was hit by a landslide and derailed, before being struck by another train

Passengers were trapped on the stricken train more than four hours after the incident. They are pictured above - with a paramedic seen onboard - following the derailment at 7am today

Emergency service workers are seen on the train as they assess the damage to a carriage

My view for the past 2 & a half hours  pic.twitter.com/pmUPn5Uf3m  Benedict Jnr. (@JnrBenedict) September 16, 2016

Rail workers were seen passing bottles of waters to the stricken commuters, many of whom told of their terrifying ordeal at being involved in the derailment.

Jake Steers, who was on board the first train at the time of the landslide, described his relief that they were inside the tunnel at the time - or 'there would have been casualties'.

HOW DRAMA UNFOLDED - 6.19am London Midlands train service is hit by a landslide just north of Watford junction at 7.01am - Impact of landslide causes train to derail as it enters a 'slow tunnel' - During derailment, the train is struck by an oncoming London Midland train - Both trains grind to a halt and are left 'leaning against one another' - More than 400 passengers were left trapped on the trains and received medical attention and bottles of water - A spare Virgin train was sent to the site and all of the passengers were evacuated from the stricken trains - They were taken by the Virgin train back to Kings Langley station in Hertfordshire by 11.30am - The two crashed trains remain 'in situ' and Network Rail says workers are still 'assessing the damage' Advertisement

He said: 'We were going through the tunnel, when the first carriage derailed and it all shuddered and the train shook violently.

'I didn't see the landslide as we were in the tunnel, then we crashed into the oncoming train slightly.

'I couldn't see the landslide just felt it hit us. It's quite worrying as I have been doing that commute for two-and-a-half years. It would have a lot worse had we not been in the tunnel - there would have been casualties had they been going full speed.'

Both of the London Midland trains involved in the incident are 'still in situ', Network Rail said. Workers are assessing the best way to remove them from the tracks.

The passengers were allowed to get off the stricken trains at around 11am - four hours after the initial derailment and collision - and were ferried back to the nearby Kings Langley station in Hertfordshire on a Virgin train which was drafted in to help.

Workers at the scene of the collision between the two trains just north of Watford junction

The train derailed on the Milton Keynes to London Euston line this morning after hitting a landslip near Watford (pictured). The train came off the tracks before being given a 'glancing blow' by an oncoming train shortly after 6am. Workers can be seen assessing the track

Four people were injured when the train derailed after being hit by a landslip (pictured above)

The train is seen derailed in the tunnel (top right) after being hit by the landslip (forefront)

Speaking before they were rescued, passengers told of the their ordeal.

Chris Robertson said: 'Everyone is fine but we are in a tunnel with limited signal. Don't catch a train to Euston today, the line is shut.

'We hit a landslide and derailed clipping an oncoming train. Emergency services have arrived to get us off but are assessing what to do first.'

A Network Rail spokesman said: 'Both trains are still in situ and the rescue train is on route.

'The service that clipped the London Midlands train which derailed was travelling in the opposite direction.'

The incident is causing major delays to services in and out of London Euston with most journeys cancelled and those that are going ahead suffering delays of at least 60 minutes.

Martin Frobisher, route managing director for Network Rail, confirmed the 6.19am train hit a landslip caused by torrential rain, resulting in it leaving the tracks a few miles north of Watford. The train remained upright, he added.

'Engineers are on site and train services are now running through the area but it will be some time before a normal timetable resumes,' he said.

Rescue workers boarded the train before treating four passengers for 'minor injuries' today

A replacement train - operated by Virgin - was sent to the scene and it has since taken the evacuated trapped passengers to Kings Langley station, where it was met by paramedics

Paramedics checked on the passengers as they arrived back at Kings Langley station today

Passengers are pictured disembarking the Virgin train which was sent to collect them from the crash scene just north of Watford junction. This train was used as a shuttle to take them back

Initially, all four lines of the West Cost main line were closed at the scene, but two were reopened at around 8am.

Mr Frobisher added: 'Our priority is to fully reopen the railway as soon as it is safe to do so. A full investigation into what happened will take place.'

Emergency crews and ambulances were pictured at the scene of the incident.

A Hertfordshire Fire Service spokesman said: 'Four people were treated for minor injuries and around 400 passengers are on board.

'We were called 7.30am. Engine units of one train was off the rails and was leaning against the other trains.

'Our crews provided first aid to four people with minor injuries. Two drivers, one pregnant woman and another complaining of neck pain.

'The ambulance service are on the scene.

'Around 400 people are being evacuated onto a rescue train.

'The train line remains blocked by two trains.'

Radio reporter Sarah Lowther, who was on the derailed train, said two trains were 'kissing each other' in a tunnel.

She spoke of a 'Dunkirk spirit' on board as passengers helped one another, but said she was 'worried' about the driver, who had a bad back after the crash.

A Network Rail worker is seen carrying bottles of water to take to the trapped commuters

Network Rail workers wheeled bottles of water towards the stricken train for passengers

This image shows the extent of the landslid - with debris covering much of the railway track

Speaking to Morning Money radio, she said: 'The trees were taken down from the side of the rail line last year. Trees have roots, roots hold the mud ... The mud had nothing to cling on to.

'It was the first time I've actually flown on a train; when we came off the tracks I assumed the brace position.

'Everyone is looking after each other with water and sugar but we're worried about our driver.'

A pregnant woman was on board and emergency services were trying to remove her from the train, she added.

Ms Lowther got on the train at 6.47am at Berkhamsted, which was hit by an 'oncoming' train at 7.01am.

British Transport Police said officers were working with fire and ambulance services at the scene.

Francis Thomas from London Midland told BBC Radio 4's Today programme the driver of the train 'reported hitting something' which caused the train to derail.

Paramedics are seen walking towards the train to treat the four passengers who were injured

The train derailed just after it entered this tunnel near Watford when part of the nearby bank crashed down onto the track. Network Rail workers are seen at the track assessing the site

Martin Frobisher, route managing director for Network Rail, said a train hit a landslip caused by torrential rain, resulting in a small section of the train leaving the tracks north of Watford

'This is the busiest piece of railway that carries freight and passengers in the whole of Europe, it affects anything that goes to the West Midlands, to the North West and Scotland - all train services have been affected this morning, it will take quite a long time to get the service recovered,' he added.

'We have got extra staff on site assisting those passengers (on the train) and that is our focus - to look after those passengers, make sure they are all right and get them to their final destinations.'

Mr Thomas said trains go in and out of London Euston every 90 seconds, and that he expects 'there will be disruption until lunchtime, and possibly longer'.

London Midland tweeted: 'Due to derailment this morning, there will be delays and cancellations. Ticket acceptance in place on other train operating companies.'

A spokesman added: 'The 06.19 service from Milton Keynes to Euston derailed just after 7am this morning at a tunnel near Watford Junction.

'It's at the busiest stretch of mixed railway in Europe and we are expecting delays and disruption until at least midday, but possibly longer. It affects London Midlands trains, Virgin and Southern. Services to the midlands, north west and Scotland will be affected.'

Euston station in London is packed with commuters after the derailment caused London Midland and Virgin train services to be either cancelled or delayed at rush-hour this morning

There is disruption to all trains out of London Euston this morning (pictured) after the derailment near Watford. A landslip on the line caused a train to come off the tracks
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A whisky warehouse worker has excited Nessie hunters after photographing something mysterious in Loch Ness - but it appears to be just three seals.

Ian Bremner, 58, was driving around the Highlands in search of red deer - but stumbled across what he claims could be the world's most famous monster swimming in calm waters.

His photographs show what appears to be a dark beast with a long winding body bobbing on the surface on Saturday between the villages of Dores and Inverfarigaig.

Some friends have said the beast's head could be a seal and his picture captures the extraordinary moment three of them were playing together in the water.

But he said: 'I suppose it could be seals - but I'm not so sure. The more I think about it, the more I think it could be Nessie.'

Split: Ian Bremner has said he believes he has photographed Nessie to the excitement of other enthusiasts - other say this shows seals swimming in the surf

Evidence: The whisky warehouse worker says he was looking for red deer nearby when he captured the photos - he says that the more he looks the more he thinks it is Nessie

But Mr Bremner said he is sure it is Nessie and shows a two-metre long silver creature swimming away from the lens with its head bobbing away and a tail flapping a metre away, preparing to swim further on.

He said: 'It's a part of the world that always makes you second guess what you're seeing.

'When you're up there you're constantly looking in the water to see if you can spot anything in there.

'This is the first time I've ever seen Nessie in the loch. It would be amazing if I was the first one to find her.

'I'm normally a bit of a sceptic when it comes to Nessie and I think it's just something for the tourists but I'm starting to think there is something out there.

'When I saw it on my screen I said 'what the hell is that?'

'If you're fishing there it's the sort of place where you can get a tingle up your spine and second guess what you're seeing.

'You start seeing things even when you know fine there's nothing there.'

The most famous claimed sightings is a photograph taken in 1934 by Colonel Robert Kenneth Wilson. However, it was later exposed as a hoax by one of the participants, Chris Spurling, who, on his deathbed, revealed that the pictures were staged

He says that the photographs match the common description of Nessie being a long serpent creature which stretches as far back as 1933.

The image he took closely resembles some of the clearest and most notable examples of the creature.

Encounters from 1933 tell of a 10ft long limbless creature crossing the road leaving behind a slimy trail of undergrowth.

And in 2001 a pair of fishermen spotted a dark 6ft long blob stickingThere have been five other reported sightings of the monster this year which, including Ian's latest, is the highest number since 2002.

Some of Ian's friends think his picture actually shows three seals playing in the water.

Over the years there have been 1081 recorded sightings of the Loch Ness Monster lurking in the water.

The monster and the tourists who come to look for it are thought to be worth around 30million to the Highland economy.
A distraught wife in India will be scarred for life after her husband of eight years allegedly cut off her nose because her family couldnt afford a marriage dowry.

Kamlesh Rathore, 25, from Shahjahanpur, in Uttar Pradesh, northern India, said her husband, Sanjeev Rathore, 27, had been demanding a dowry of Rs 50,000 (550) ever since they got married.

A dowry is part of Indian custom and is either cash, jewellery or land that the bride's family gives to the groom as a condition of any marriage.

A distraught wife in India will be scarred for life after her husband of eight years allegedly cut off her nose because her family couldnt afford a marriage dowry

Kamlesh Rathore, 25, from Shahjahanpur, in Uttar Pradesh, northern India, said her husband, Sanjeev Rathore, 27, had been demanding a dowry of Rs 50,000 (550) ever since they got married

Kamlesh said: He harassed me every day for the dowry. He was constantly demanding Rs 50,000.

'I repeatedly told him that my father is very poor and he cannot afford such an amount but he did not listen and used to threaten me that hell chop off my nose.

He has beaten me for years.

'Hes used belts, slippers, sticks and has always tortured me.

'He used to accuse me of working as a prostitute and threaten to sell me. He was always drunk.

'During our eight years of marriage he was very harsh with me.

On September 14, Kamlesh was cooking dinner when Sanjeev started shouting and demanding money again.

She said that suddenly, from behind, her in-laws grabbed her and held her down while her husband allegedly chopped off her nose.

They all grabbed me tightly. I could not move.

'And then out of nowhere I saw a knife and he chopped off my nose, Kamlesh recalled.

Kamlesh, who has a six-year-old daughter, said her husband and in-laws fled as soon as they chopped off her nose.

His last words were: Youll now be like this forever.

On September 14, Kamlesh was cooking dinner when Sanjeev started shouting and demanding money again. She said that suddenly, from behind, her in-laws grabbed her and held her down while her husband allegedly chopped off her nose

People outside the residence of Kamlesh Rathore, 25, after her husband Sanjeev Rathore, 27, chopped off her nose with a knife over the dowry, in the Shahjahanpur district of Uttar Pradesh, India

Kamlesh quickly called her parents who lived nearby and they rushed her to the nearest medical centre.

She was still bleeding heavily when she arrived at the primary health centre, in Shahjahanpur, where doctors were only able to dress the wound.

They could not re-attach the nose as Sanjeev had taken it with him.

Kamleshs older brother, Sachin, 26, said the family cannot afford any future surgery for Kamlesh to fix her nose.

My sisters husband has been very cruel. He has given her a terrible life and now this.

'He even took her nose and gifted it to the gods at his temple. Hes a sick man.

Superintendent Manoj Kumar, at Khutar police station, in Shahjhanpur, said the husband and family are on the run

Superintendent Manoj Kumar, at Khutar police station, in Shahjhanpur, said the husband and family are on the run.

He said: An FIR (First Information Report) is registered.

'This is a dowry case and the family were demanding money.

'Were still chasing the husband, mother-in-law, father-in-law, sister and brother-in-law.
Apple customers have been left furious after not receiving their pre-ordered iPhones - despite ordering them weeks ago to get them on the release date today.

'Unprecedented demand' for the new iPhone 7 and 7 Plus has led to a 'global shortage of stock'  leaving major UK networks and retailers including Vodafone, EE, O2, BT, Three Mobile and Carphone Warehouse without enough phones to send to people.

Some outraged customers say they could now be forced to wait until Christmas before they get their phones - and are paying up to 80 a month for nothing.

Social media has been awash with memes, GIFs and graphics from people angry their phones haven't arrived in time

Furious customers took to Twitter to express their outrage at being forced to wait even longer for their new phones

Mobile giants including EE, Three, Vodafone and O2 have been forced to apologise to their customers, blaming a 'supplier problem'.

EE said UK retailers had only been sent a limited number of stock - despite the devices being the most hotly-anticipated gadget of 2016.

EE told customers by text last night that they will now have to wait to get their phones

And some customers were only told last night they will now have to wait weeks to get their phones.

One Twitter user wrote to O2: 'Zero communication, shockingly poor service.'

Another told Vodafone, 'Day one of hating you', while one user raged: 'Apple you are a joke'.

People have also criticised 'bad customer service', telling both Apple and their network providers they should be 'ashamed'.

Others have called for refunds and compensation after being forced to pay for mobile phone contracts on phones they do not yet have.

One tweet read: 'Found out by contacting Vodafone myself that I will NOT receive my iPhone 7 today. Zero communication, shockingly poor service. Not happy.'

Another said: 'I was told my iPhone would arrive today - no delivery, no message so it hasn't even been dispatched! What's going on?!'

Yesterday, Apple revealed it had sold out of initial supplies of all iPhone 7 Plus devices and the new jet black model of the smaller iPhone 7, due to customer pre-orders.

Furious customers on social media asked what the point of pre-ordering a phone was if it was not going to arrive in time

Analysts were divided over the cause of the shortages, with some saying the handset was more popular than expected, while others suggested the tech giant may be deliberately limiting supply or could be experiencing supply problems.

'Apple clearly controls supply tightly,' said Matthew Kanterman, an analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence.

'They're possibly keeping supply artificially low, or at least lower than demand, so as to avoid having the oversupply of previous years.'

'Unprecedented demand' for the new iPhone 7 and 7 Plus has led to a 'global shortage of stock'

'Shame on you': Angry customers have today criticised both Apple and their mobile phone networks for being a 'joke'

An EE spokesperson said: 'We have seen unprecedented demand for the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus.

'There is widely reported global shortage of stock, and like all UK retailers we have been sent limited initial numbers of these devices, but as a trusted partner of Apple we are receiving regular deliveries to help us keep up with demand.'

EE added: 'We are prioritising fulfilling pre-orders, but there will be limited stocks of available colour and size variants in EE stores.

'We are working around the clock to get handsets into the hands of our customers as quickly as is possible.'

Many customers are asking for refunds and pointing out they are paying up to 79.99 a month - for nothing

Scores of shoppers queued outside the store in Shanghai, China, patiently waiting to get their hands on the latest model which they had pre-ordered - successfully

An O2 spokesperson said there was a 'market-wide delay' in receiving iPhone stock this year.

'This means that while most of our customers who pre-ordered will receive their new iPhone today, some will experience a short delay in receiving it.

'We've contacted them to explain we've held their place in the pre-order queue and will get it to them as soon as possible.

'We are sorry for the disappointment this has caused our customers.'

Hong Kong: Customers lucky enough to get their phones queu outside the Apple store in the Causeway Bay district in Hong Kong

London: Apple's store at Covent Garden told customers that supply shortages mean they will not be able to buy any iPhones

A Vodafone spokesman added: 'We expect the majority of our customers to receive their pre-order within the timeframes we indicated on our website when they placed the order. For many, that will be from today and across the weekend.

'However, Apple has confirmed to Vodafone and other operators that customers who have pre-ordered some variants of the device  particularly the iPhone 7 Plus and the jet black iPhone 7  may experience delays to their delivery.
A Philadelphia pastor's wife pulled out a gun and shot an armed man who was trying to rob her and her family, police say.

Pastor Robert Cook, his wife Stephanie and their 12-year-old son were returning to their home in the Frankford neighborhood around 11pm from a concert when they were approached by a man armed with a weapon Thursday night.

'I turned around and there was a shotgun in my face,' the 48-year-old pastor said.

Police say a struggle began when the man demanded the pastor's wallet and hit the pastor on the head with the butt of what appeared to be a rifle, but later turned out to be a nail gun modified to look like a firearm.

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Pastor Robert Cook (left), his wife Stephanie (right) and their 12-year-old son were returning to their home when they were approached by a man armed with a weapon Thursday night

Police say a struggle began when the man demanded the pastor's wallet and hit the pastor on the head with the butt of what appeared to be a rifle, but later turned out to be a nail gun modified to look like a firearm (scene above)

Robert said he heard his 38-year-old wife telling the suspect to drop the weapon while their son was afraid to move and stood still.

'I was afraid he was going to kill my husband and son,' Stephanie told Philly.com. 'I was hoping he would drop the gun.'

That's when the concerned wife and mother pulled out her licensed gun and shot the man in the leg.

Robert, who is the pastor at the Saint James Lutheran Church which is nearby their home, told WPVI-TV 'everything was like lightning for a minute.'

'This is the first time I actually thought I'd die,' he said.

Robert (pictured above showing bruise after being hit in the head) said he heard his wife telling the suspect to drop the weapon while their son was afraid to move and stood still

Robert, who is the pastor at the Saint James Lutheran Church (above) which is nearby their home, said 'everything was like lightning for a minute.'

'I didn't want him to die as crazy as that sounds,' Stephanie told the newspaper. 'I just wanted him to drop the gun.'

The suspect, a 66-year-old man, then ran bleeding from the scene as Robert took his wife's gun and gave chase.

Philadelphia Police Chief Inspector Scott Small said: 'The suspect was able to make an unusual escape by jumping on running boards of a moving vehicle that happened to be traveling east.'

The injured man was eventually tracked down by cops who arrested him.

He was treated in custody with his leg wound at the Aria-Frankford Hospital and is in stable condition.

Robert said: 'When we got our guns we were like we got them, but we hope we never have to use them...If it comes down to my family or him, and it's him, I'm sorry.'

Robert suffered a bruise to the head. His wife and son were not harmed in the incident.

Police recovered a weapon from the scene and have not released the identity of the suspect, as the incident remains under investigation.

They also have not said what charges the suspect will face.

The couple said that they forgive the suspect for trying to steal from them.
Drug firms will soon be barred from raising the prices of common drugs needed by the NHS as Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt announces plans to close the loophole.

Some businesses have been accused of hiking the price of common drugs up by over 12,00 per cent, helping them rake in more than 200million a year.

The companies have been allowed to charge 'extortionate' prices by simply dropping the brand name and using a generic name instead, allowing them to legally bypass the NHS' pricing cap rules.

Britain's Secretary of State for Health Jeremy Hunt arriving at 10 Downing Street for a cabinet meeting, in London, on Tuesday

According to The Times, Mr Hunt, has now tabled laws to prevent these dramatic price changes.

The proposed legislation, known as the Health Service Medical Supplies (Costs) Bill, is expected to pass by next spring.

As reported in June this year in one case two millionaire brothers nicknamed Britain's 'Bollygarchs' were accused of being part of a group of businesses hiking up prices on drugs.

Vijay and Bhikhu Patel, who started out with a single Essex pharmacy and are now worth 675million.

In the firing line: Millionaire brothers Bhikhu, left with wife Shashi, and Vijay Patel, right with wife Smita, have been accused of using a loophole in the NHS pricing structure to hike up the cost of drugs

Starting out: This undated image is believed to show Vijay, far left, and Bhikhu, far right, pictured with their sister Manjula and parents Chhotabhai and Shahtaben

Vijay and Bhikhu Patel have been among Britain's richest Asians for years having amassed hundreds of millions from their pharmaceutical businesses.

They live in two of Essex's finest mansions, but the brothers came to the UK from Kenya as teenagers in 1967, arriving with little more than the clothes they came in.

But when both men were contacted by the MailOnline, but neither responded.

Overall The Times investigation found that since 2011, 32 medicines have risen in price by at least 1,000 per cent - a bill of 262million and enough to pay for an extra 7,000 junior doctors a year.

SOME OF THE 32 DRUGS THAT HAVE HAD PRICES HIKED; 10mg tablets of steroid Hydrocortisone - up by 12,500 per cent from 70p in 2008 to 85 in 2016. 50mg of anti-anxiety drug doxepin up from 5.72 to 154 a packet since 2011. Cyclizine 30mg tablets, used to treat nausea, up from 9.57 to 353.06 a packet. Advertisement

But concerns have been raised that if the Health Service Medical Supplies (Costs) Bill was passed commercially sensitive data would be shared.

As drafted the law would enable the government to share information on profitability with a wide range of health officials and government bodies, including Revenue and Customs and the Competitions and Markets Authority. The regulator can impose multi-million pound fines if it concludes that a company has abused a dominant market position.

A Department of Health spokesman previously said: 'No pharmaceutical company should be exploiting the NHS.

'The Competition and Markets Authority is already investigating a potential abuse of generics pricing, and as part of a public consultation we have asked for views on government powers to limit the prices of generic medicines where there is no competitive market.'
Donald Trump Jr. insisted Friday morning that a remark he made about journalists 'warming up the gas chamber' for an imaginary Republican Hillary Clinton was entirely about media bias  and had nothing to do with Jews or Nazis.

'I didn't say anything about the Holocaust,' the younger Trump said on 'Good Morning America.'

'I was talking about media bias. I was talking about, if you're a conservative, it's essentially capital punishment.'

Donald Trump Jr. insisted on Friday that he never meant to invoke Nazi imagery when he said reporters would be 'warming up the gas chamber' for Hillary Clinton if she were in the GOP

'I was talking about media bias,' Trump Jr. said  not the Holocaust

He had said Wednesday on a Philadelphia radio show that reporters have 'built up' Clinton and 'let her slide ... on every lie, on every DNC game trying to get Bernie Sanders out of the thing.'

'I mean, if Republicans were doing that, they'd be warming up the gas chamber right now. It's a very different system  there's nothing fair about it.'

Trump Jr. insisted on Friday that CNN anchor Jake Tapper backed him up, which he had.

'Even Jake Tapper from CNN said: "Listen, Donald Trump Jr. put out the same thing"  he played the clip yesterday on his Twitter account  I said the same thing two weeks ago about the media bias, and I used the term "electric chair".'

'It was a poor choice of words, perhaps. But in no way, shape or form was I ever even remotely talking about the Holocaust.'

The CNN moment came in June, actually, but Trump Jr. did make a similar comment about one-sided media coverage in June, condemning Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook for suggesting an email leak from the Democratic National Committee was designed by Russian agents to help Trump win the presidency.

'If a Republican did that they would be calling for people to bring out the electric chair,' he told CNN at the time.

Trump Jr. dropped 'gas chamber' into a political discussion on Wednesday  referring to a form of capital punishment  but a media feeding frenzy ensued as the remark was seen as anti-semitic

Don Jr. (right) is the Republican presidential nominee's eldest son

Donald Trump Sr., the Republican nominee for president, routinely calls the corps of reporters who follow him from rally to rally 'the most dishonest people in the world' for picking his every word apart while giving Clinton only cursory attention.

On Thursday night in New Hampshire he gloated and gushed when his staff's poor planning got his own plane to a campaign rally a half-hour before the traveling press, giving him the opportunity to start the event without them.

The 'gas chamber' comment immediately brought condemnation from liberal politicians and pundits, and at least one Jewish advocacy group.

The killing devices are used for capital-punishment executions in five U.S. states, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, but only 11 criminals have met their fate that way since 1976.

The German Third Reich used the devices far more routinely during the 1940s, however, killing six million Jews and many other persecuted minorities before incinerating their bodies.

The Trump campaign leapt to defend Don Jr. on Thursday, blaming reporters for stirring the pot.

Trump Jr. and his father are both frequent critics of reporters for giving Hillary Clinton the kid-glove treatment

'The liberal, dishonest media is so quick to attack one of the Trumps that they never let the truth get in the way of a good smear,' Trump senior communications adviser Jason Miller said in a statement.

'Don Jr. was clearly referring to capital punishment to make the case that the media continues to take words out of context in order to serve as the propaganda arm of the Hillary Clinton campaign  something that's only gotten worse as Trump's poll numbers have improved.'

Don Jr. has ample personal connections to the Jewish community.

His wedding party when he married wife Vanessa included several Jewish bridesmaids and groomsmen. And his sister Ivanka converted to Orthodox Judaism before marrying real estate investor Jared Kushner.

The Anti-Defamation League on Thursday called on Trump Jr. to retract his statement.

'Trivialization of the Holocaust and gas chambers is NEVER okay,' the Jewish advocacy group proclaimed on Twitter.

'We hope you understand the sensitivity and hurt of making Holocaust jokes,' the group added in another tweet. 'We hope you retract."

The radio interview, reported widely on Thursday, marks the second time in three months that a Trump has been accused of antisemitism.

In early July his campaign tweeted an image criticizing Clinton for being 'crooked' and tainted by special-interest money. It included an attention-grabbing starburst graphic reading: 'Most corrupt candidate ever!'

The starburst had six points, leading some to assume it represented a Star of David  a universal symbol of Israel and Judaism.

Trump defended himself on Twitter, saying it more closely resembled a sheriff's badge  and again taking a swipe at political journalists.

'Dishonest media is trying their absolute best to depict a star in a tweet as the Star of David rather than a Sheriff's Star, or plain star!' he complained.

The graphic originated with an anonymous Twitter account that was later deleted.

The user had described himself as a 'comedian' who would 'probably offend you if you are Liberal, Politically Correct, Feminist, Democrat or Piers Morgan.'

The Anti-Defamation League, a prominent Jewish advocacy group, turned up the heat on Don Jr. by asking him to retract his comment

The presidential campaign's social media manager who published the 'star' tweet, Daniel Scavino, is married to a Jewish woman.

Trump later tweeted another image with a six-pointed star to make a point. This time the shape appeared on the cover of a book of Disney stickers featuring characters from the hit animated movie 'Frozen.'
John McDonnell has been embroiled in an extraordinary spat with former minister Anna Soubry over claims female politicians are being 'terrorised' by left-wing activists.

The Tory branded the shadow chancellor a 'nasty piece of work' as she said that one Jewish Labour MP was living in a safe house due to abuse from left-wing activists.

Mr McDonnell was also involved in furious clashes with former Downing Street spin doctor Alastair Campbell, whom he branded 'nauseating'.

The tempestuous scenes came as the trio appeared on the BBC's Question Time programme last night. There were even suggestions that the two Labour figures nearly came to blows after the filming.

Shadow chancellor John McDonnell, left, was branded a 'nasty piece of work' by Tory former minister Anna Soubry on Question Time

Mrs Soubry said one Jewish Labour MP was living in a safe house following abuse from left-wing activists

Some of the most ferocious exchanges came as Mrs Soubry took him to task for trying to deny that he was a Marxist.

The Broxtowe MP pointed out that there was a video on YouTube where he described himself as a Marxist.

And she went on: 'I tell you something else Mr McDonnell, you are a very nasty piece of work.

'There are colleagues of mine in House of Commons, Labour MPs, who are at the point of being terrorised by McDonnell and his cronies.

'There are women MPs who suffer day in, day out from misogynist, unpleasant, sexist abuse on Twitter, Facebook - from people who are apparently within their own party.

'There is a Jewish Labour MP - a woman - who is living in a safe house because of the level of anti-Semitism she has to bear.'

Ms Soubry said some MPs were 'so frightened, humiliated, almost terrorised by Mr McDonnell and his gang they will leave politics'.

Turning to McDonnell she told him: 'You sir can stop it.'

But Mr McDonnell dismissed Mrs Soubry's 'abuse' of him as 'outrageous'.

He said the Labour leadership had made clear it condemned any abuse of MPs.

Mr McDonnell was also involved in bruising clashes with former Downing Street spin doctor Alastair Campbell, pictured right

But Mr McDonnell branded Mr Campbell, a key figure in Tony Blair's three general election victories, 'nauseating'

'We are not accepting this smear campaign that is going on from the Tories and others as well,' Mr McDonnell said.

Tempers boiled over again when Mr Campbell - a key figure in Tony Blair's three general election victories - warned that veteran left-wingers Mr McDonnell and Jeremy Corbyn were leading the party to 'disaster'.

Mr McDonnell interrupted to say: 'It's nauseating because you are the one, above all else, who actually created the environment where no one believed a word a politician said.

'You lost us five million votes in that process and set us up to fail. The reason Jeremy was elected is because people want some honesty back in politics again.'

Mr Campbell responded: 'Oh my God.'

Earlier Mr Campbell had conceded that there were 'issues' from the Blair years that had been damaging to Labour - including the Iraq War and tuition fees.

But the two Labour figures soon lost patience with each other.

Mr Campbell accused Mr McDonnell and his allies of 'destroying' the party.

'And what's more, I actually worry you don't even care,' he added.

At one point Mr Campbell lamented about being unable to keep the discussion civil.

'I came on here tonight to be as nice to you as I possibly can,' he said.

Mr McDonnell broke in: 'The feeling is mutual.'

Mr Campbell said he feared Mr McDonnell and Jeremy Corbyn were leading the party to 'disaster' during the bitter exchanges

Host David Dimbleby struggled to control the heated discussion on the show, which was filmed in Salisbury last night
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The winners of renovation show The Block - former AFL player Darren Jolly and his wife Deanne have listed their newly renovated Melbourne home on the market, which was demolished without permission.

The couple hope to sell the property for more than $2.6 million after they spent about $1 million over a year to transform the 1920s California bungalow into a contemporary four-bedroom house, the Herald Sun reported.

But Jolly and his wife were reportedly fined $4,000, which they deny, and placed on a two-year good behaviour bond after completely demolishing their heritage-protected house without the City of Boroondara's permission.

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The front facade of the heritage listed 1926 home was demolished by The Block stars without a permit

The couple hope to sell the property for more than $2.6 million after they spent about $1 million over a year to transform the 1920s California bungalow into a contemporary four-bedroom house

The winners of renovation show The Block - former AFL player Darren Jolly and his wife Deanne (pictured together) - faced fines for bulldozing a heritage-protected house without permission

The pair purchased the rundown property for $1.395 million last June.

They were ordered to rebuild the early 20th-century Melbourne home with the same detail as the original, which John Luppino, the director of city planning at the City of Boroondara, said they had satisfactorily achieved.

The couple had permission to demolish 95 per cent of the building, but when they discovered the extensive rot and termite damage within the structures of the house, proceeded to demolish the whole thing.

This included the front facade of the heritage site, which was not part of the council permit.

Residents of the Oswin Street Heritage Precinct were angered by the destruction and did not believe their renovations reflected the original 1920s and 1930s housing style.

'It's got the California bungalow facade ... but it's a fake, bottom line,' resident and Kew Historical Society member Debbie McColl-Davis told the Herald Sun.

But real estate agent Paul Richards of Bekdon Richards in Hawthorn said the house needed rebuilding as it was in such a weak state.

'It's tasteful, the facade fits in with the streetscape  it's got the original roof, windows and door, all fully restored of course.'

The refurbished property features three large bedrooms with porcelain pendant lights, built-in wardrobes, ensuites, a large living room with bespoke shelving, a powder room, and bathrooms with marble tilework.

It also features an alfresco desk where a huge gum tree stands above the solar-heated pool. The kitchen features a Calacatta marble island bench and European oak flooring.

The 14 Irymple Ave property in Kew will go under the hammer on October 8.

The couple were ordered to 'pay costs' and were given a two-year good behaviour bond for breaching their planning permit

The couple wrote a letter to the council to explain their actions, but did not have permission when they demolished the front of the house

The front facade of the house was rebuilt with original materials, such as these diamond leadlight windows

The once traditional California bungalow was transformed into a modern house with a solar-heated pool

The refurbished property features three large bedrooms with porcelain pendant lights, one bedroom opening into the backyard area

Jolly (left) defended the decision to demolish the 'rotten' and 'termite-infested' home which he described as a 'b***** mess'

Darren and Deanne Jolly and their two daughters. The celebrity couple have come under fire for bulldozing a heritage-protected house in Melbourne's eastern suburbs

The large and cosy living room space has a built-in fireplace and opens into the outdoor alfresco area

The bathrooms have ducted heating and air-conditioning plus underfloor heating

The house boasts earthy, minimalist and contemporary elements with white and timber accents

The study features a built-in desk and bench window seat to create a welcoming workspace

The main bathroom features a freestanding stone bathtub which serves the three large bedrooms

The luxury of the ensuite with its dual vanity basins and dual rain style shower heads

It is matched by a deep his n hers walk-in robe which is reached via a short corridor featuring a shoe rack wall

The kitchen features a massive Calacatta marble island bench lit by handmade ceramic pendant lights

The kitchen boasts a top shelf Miele appliances including 2 pyrolytic ovens, induction cooktop, steam cooker and integrated dishwasher and coffee machine, all complemented by a butlers pantry with Vintec wine fridge

The house has 100% wool carpets and 100% linen curtains, engineered European Oak flooring, bespoke made handles, plantation shutters on the windows
In 1999, Kenneth Boss was one of four police officers who shot and killed an unarmed black immigrant who was holding a wallet that was mistaken for a gun in the Bronx.

Now, he is being honored as one of New York City's top cops for bravely rescuing stranded boaters in Jamaica Bay earlier this year.

According to the New York Post, Boss was announced as one of eight recipients of the 'Sergeant of the Year' award handed out annually by his union, the Sergeants Benevolent Association.

Boss shot five of the 41 bullets that were fired at 22-year-old street vendor Amadou Diallo 16 years ago as they were patrolling the streets just after midnight in the Soundview section of the Bronx.

Kenneth Boss (right) was one of four officers who shot and killed Guinean immigrant Amadou Diallo (left) after they mistook a black wallet he was holding for a gun

According to the New York Daily News, Boss remains the only officer from the Diallo tragedy to remain on the force.

Sean Carroll, who initially shouted to his colleagues that Diallo had a gun, leading to the barrage of bullets, retired from policing in 2005.

The other two officers, Richard Murphy and Edward McMellon, joined the Fire Department of New York.

All four officers were acquitted of second-degree murder.

The four plain-clothes police officers approached Diallo after mistaking him for a rapist who was thought to be armed.

Sean Carroll (top left), Richard Murphy (top right), Edward McMellon (bottom right), and Boss were acquitted after a jury agreed that the shooting was not intentional. Pictured at the time

After they identified themselves, Diallo ran towards his apartment building, where visibility was poor because the porch light was not working.

He pulled out his wallet but the cops thought it was a gun and opened fire on the innocent man.

A total of 41 shots were fired, with 19 hitting Diallo, killing him almost instantly.

All four of the officers were acquitted of second-degree murder after a jury found that they were within their rights to shoot him dead with the information they had at the time.

The case caused uproar across America at the time as critics accused the NYPD of racial profiling and targeting black men.

Diallo's mother, Kadiatou Diallo (left), seen here with Rev. Al Sharpton (right) during a demonstration, says that she is 'at peace' and would one day be willing to meet with Boss

Boss was consigned to desk duty and denied permission to carry a gun until 2012, when the department finally relented after lengthy battles in state and federal court.

Last year, he was promoted to sergeant after passing the required promotion test.

This past May, Boss, who was transferred to the NYPD Aviation Unit, rappelled down a rope from a helicopter as it hovered over two stranded boaters in Jamaica Bay.

'Two police helicopters arrived, but were not able to land,' SBA President Ed Mullins told a luncheon announcing the awards.

'Sgt. Boss, who besides being a police officer had served our country as a United States Marine reservist in Iraq, rappelled from the helicopter, attached the couple to a hoist, and delivered them to safety.'

Diallo's mother, Kadiatou Diallo, told the Daily News that she was at peace with the tragic loss of her son  so much so that she would not rule out one day meeting Boss face to face.

'I don't know how or when, but I think it will come,' she told the Daily News.

'I'm at peace. He is out there doing something as a police officer. This is good.'

The grief-stricken mother said she would tell the sergeant what kind of person her son was.

'The first thing I would do is talk to him about who Amadou was,' she said.

'If he ever met him, he would have known there was no way Amadou could ever harm him or anyone else.'

'For the rest of his life, whatever else [Boss] does, he'll be remembered as one of the officers involved with Amadou,' she said.

'I pray for healing. I wish for him to move on in a constructive way, to do good, and that is what he is doing.'

Mullins praised Diallo as 'kind' and lamented that Boss 'has been put under a spotlight for many, many years.'

'Unlike every other American, he was tried and acquitted, and in this country, when that happens you are set to go free,' Mullins said. 'He's never really been set to go free.
Republican Donald Trump is planning a dramatic statement on the candidate's views on whether President Obama was born in the United States.

'You watch my statement,' Trump told Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo in a phone interview Friday morning.

The candidate has a press conference planned for 10 am at his new Trump International hotel in D.C., a renovated historic property that opened for business this week that the Trump Organization is promoting.

'We have to keep the suspense going,' he teased, before adding, 'I think you'll be happy.'

The candidate hyped his event in a tweet Friday morning. 'I am now going to the brand new Trump International, Hotel D.C. for a major statement,' he wrote.

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Admission: Trump's team say he admitted after five years Wednesday that he believes Barack Obama was born in the US. But he said the birth rumor started with Hillary Clinton in 2008

THE WHOLE WORLD IS WATCHING: Trump plans to speak about the president's birth at his newly opened hotel on Pennsylvania Ave. in Washington

Trump hinted Thursday that he would have more to say on the hot topic, which continues to trail him years after he relentlessly pursued Obama on the topic, only to keep raising suspicions after the president released his long-form birth certificate at the White House in 2011.

'I'll answer that question at the right time,' he told the Washington Post in an interview..

In a turnaround, Trump's team said Thursday he has finally admitted that Barack Obama was born in America, more than five years after first raising doubts about the President's country of origin.

'In 2011, Mr Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate,' Trump's senior communications adviser, Jason Miller, said in a statement Wednesday night.

It concluded: 'Having successfully obtained President Obama's birth certificate when others could not, Mr Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.'

However, the statement added: 'Mr Trump did a great service to the President and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised.'

'We have to keep the suspense going,' Trump said Friday morning in advance of a media event where he was expected once again to speak about the president's birth

Blasted: Trump's admission came after Clinton blasted him Wednesday for an interview in The Washington Post that day in which he skirted around admitting Obama was born in Hawaii

Republican National Committee spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters Friday at Trump's event that he had seen Trumps latest comments about a birther announcement, but said, Im not going to get ahead of him on an event.

Asked why Trump was talking about Obamas birth at Fridays event, Spicer replied, Because he had an event. I think part of it was he had a captive audience that wasnt just one network.'

Spicer gave a good review at first glance of Trumps new hotel property, which the candidate touted in a tweet Friday morning, and which was the setting for the dramatic reveal.

It looks phenomenal. I had an event here back in the 90s. It was pretty run down and dilapidated Its pretty spectacular, he said.

'All in': Trump made this tweet, which blamed Clinton for the birther movement, in September last year. Ted Cruz had made a similar remark a few months earlier

Trump appeared at his new Trump International hotel in Washington the day after appearing on the 'Tonight Show' with Jimmy Fallon on NBC, where the candidate let the host muss up his hair

Trump has blamed Clinton for creating the long-discredited rumors about Obama's citizenship for some time, which he himself first supported in March 2011.

In September last year he tweeted: 'Just remember, the birther movement was started by Hillary Clinton in 2008. She was all in!'

Ted Cruz had made a similar remark three months earlier.

However, while the birther movement began during the Clinton-Obama Democratic primary battle of 2008, there is no evidence the rumors actually came from Clinton, according toFactcheck.org.

They started in an anonymous email circulated by Clinton supporters; Clinton herself never publicly agreed with them.

The Republican candidate's admission that Obama was born in the USA came after he was lambasted tonight by Hillary Clinton for refusing to back down from birtherism.

'This man wants to be our next President? When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?' she asked.

Earlier in the day, The Washington Post printed an article in which Trump refused to respond affirmatively to a question about Obama being born in Hawaii.

'I'll answer that question at the right time,' he reportedly said. 'I just don't want to answer it yet.'

Rumor: Clinton supporters did circulate the rumor during the 2008 Democratic primaries, but she never supported it, nor was she linked to it. She later supported Obama after conceding

Clinton latched onto the statement while speaking to attendees of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute's gala in Washington, DC.

She blew up he opponent for standing by his belief that Obama was born in Kenya.

She told the audience Trump launched his presidential campaign with a 'racist lie about Mexican immigrants' when he said they were rapists and criminals.

'And every time we think he's hit rock bottom, he sinks even lower.'

Now he's terrorizing a minister in Flint, Michigan, she said, for asking him not to deliver a partisan political speech from her pulpit.

Support: Trump had supported the birther movement since March 2011 (pictured: A female Obama supporter objecting to a sign commissioned by a Colorado businessman, in 2009)

In the Post interview, Clinton said, 'he did again. He was asked one more time where was President Obama born. And he still wouldn't stay Hawaii. He still wouldn't say America.'

Trump has 'tried to reset himself and his campaign many times,' said the Democratic presidential candidate. 'This is the best that he can do, this is who he is.'

'So we need to decide who we are. If we just sigh and shake our head and accept this, then what does it tell our kids about who we are?'
A couple who were married 59 years died last month holding hands in their shared hospital room.

Don and Margaret Livengood, ages 84 and 80, charmed the workers at Carolinas Healthcare NorthEast, so someone pulled strings to let the ailing husband and wife share their last days together in the same room.

Nurses positioned the couple's beds to face each other, so that they were holding hands as Margaret passed just before 8am on August 19.

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Margaret and Don Livengood, 80 and 84, died just hours apart on August 19. Doctors pulled strings so that the ailing husband and wife could be in the same room in their last days

The couple were holding hands when Margaret died just before 8am. Her husband died a few hours later, at 5.19pm

That afternoon at 5.19pm, her husband followed her in death, telling his children and grandchildren before he died that he was looking forward to joining his wife in heaven.

'When we get to heaven, we can walk in together, just like we're getting married again. Another honeymoon,' Don said, according to his daughter Pattie Livengood Beaver, who spoke with People.

Beaver and her husband moved in with her parents last year, when both became sick. Her father had pulmonary fibrosis and bilateral pneumonia when he died, while her mother was diagnosed with cancer in May and had several other serious health issues.

The couple both grew up in Rowan County, North Carolina and met while working at the same company. They were married on Margaret's birthday on June 15, 1957

Don could barely breathe at the end of his life, but his wife assured him that the air would be better in heaven.

The couple spent the better part of last year in and out of the hospital, and their daughter says that whenever one was left behind at home they were sad.

When Don was hospitalized, his wife would sit with him each day from 4am to 8pm or 9pm.

Beaver says she drove her parents to the hospital to be admitted together on August 8, not knowing it would be the last time.

Family members believe the couple held out so that their grandson Brandon, his wife Jerrica and their two children could make it for one last visit. The family is stationed in Italy and nearly missed a connection from Detroit to Charlotte, but were allowed to go through the pilot's security line and made the flight. They arrived at the hospital just 12 hours before Margaret died.

Don and Margaret both grew up in Rowan County, North Carolina, and met while working at the Stanback Company, which makes headache powders and chapstick.

Don joined the company after a stint in the Navy, while Margaret was hired as a secretary.

'According to Daddy, he saw this pretty new little secretary, and he told the other guys, "I'm going to date her,"' Beaver said, according to the Salisbury Post.

The aunt who raised Margaret didn't make that easy. The couple's first dates had to take place in church and Don had to join the church before the two could get married.

But that was no trouble for the couple who instilled the same Christian devotion in their children.

The couple were married on Margaret's birthday, June 15, in 1957.

Speaking about the picture of her parents holding hands in their final moments, Beaver said: 'It was normal for them to be holding hands, their love was so precious. But it was the sweetest, most precious thing you can imagine to see them holding hands in the hospital.'

Even the doctors and nurses who cared for the couple were moved to tears, their son David Livengood said.
A British alleged superhacker should be extradited to the United States to face trial where he could be jailed for 99 years, a judge ruled today.

Asperger's sufferer Lauri Love, 31, allegedly hacked huge amounts of data from US agencies including the Federal Reserve, Nasa and the FBI between 2012 and 2013.

British judge Nina Tempia today agreed with the American authorities and ruled the 31-year-old, who lives with his parents near Newmarket in Suffolk, should face a cyber-hacking trial in America.

Mr Love, who will appeal to the High Court, said after today's judgment: 'If you have come for justice then you have missed it'.

His father Reverend Alexander Love added: 'It is not fair or just that a boy with mental health issues is taken away from his family and support network to the US. It is wrong. Our confidence is not in the legal system but in God'.

His case is 'almost identical' to that of fellow hacker Gary McKinnon, whose extradition was blocked by then Home Secretary Theresa May in 2012.

Extradition: Asperger's sufferer Lauri Love, 31, pictured after the judgment, faces trial in America on hacking charges carrying 99 years in jail - unless he wins an appeal

Angry: His father Rev Alexander Love says that Britain should not bow to the will of America, who he says are out to punish his son

Protest: Supporters of Lauri Love bring traffic to a standstill outside Westminster Magistrates' Court in London

Message: :Protesters were singing, playing music and chanting 'no love for the US gov' as time is running out for Mr Love

Mr Love stood in the dock at Westminster Magistrates' Court, wearing a purple sash as a belt, as district judge Nina Tempia ruled he can be extradited to the US, where he could face the possibility of three separate trials in different jurisdictions.

'I'm going to extradite Mr Love but what I mean by that is I'm going to send his case to the Secretary of State,' Judge Tempia told the hearing.

He said that he fears she will grant the request. I cant contemplate the prospect of being extradited to the US because I cant see my life beyond that, he added.

Mr Love faces a possible 99-year prison sentence if convicted in America - but has the right to appeal against his extradition.

There were gasps in the court room as Mr Love was read the ruling, which followed a case hearing in June at Westminster Magistrates' Court.

WHAT NEXT FOR 'SUPERHACKER' LAURI LOVE? Struggle: Lauri Love's family fear he will kill himself if sent to America to face trial without the support of his family Lauri Love will have to mount a fresh High Court challenge to stop his extradition to the US. After today's ruling Home Secretary Amber Rudd will be asked to agree or block the US extradition request. If she agrees to the request he must go to America Mr Love's legal team can go to the High Court seeking a judicial review of the home secretary's decision not to block his transfer. The Home Secretary has 14 days to respond before a judge considers it. If he or she sides with Mr Love then he is likely to stay in the UK. If he loses, a final appeal to the Supreme Court could be lodged before only a direct intervention from the Home Secretary could save him. In 2012 fellow hacker Gary McKinnon had his extradition was blocked by then Home Secretary Theresa May in 2012. Advertisement

He was told he had 14 days to appeal the decision.

The 31-year-old embraced friends and family, who appeared shocked and angry by the decision.

'If you have come for justice then you have missed it,' Mr Love told a crowd of press in the courtroom afterwards.

Mr Love, who suffers from anxiety and depression, also said that he was surprised Mr McKinnons case had not set a legal precedent.

There couldnt be a closer test case. Garys case is replicated here, he added.

The public clearly had concerns about the extradition treaty with the US following his case and the Mail campaign, which is why things were supposed to have changed.

His father damned the laws that could see his son sent to America.

Reverend Alexander Love, a prison chaplain, said he often feared he would find his son, who has been deemed a high suicide risk by medical experts, dead when he returned home.

He said: 'I am obviously very upset. I always believed that to be here [in the UK] was to have won the lottery and I thought our laws were just.

'The judge has made a judgement on a law that is flawed. It is not right that my son has been taken away. It is not fair or just that a boy with mental health issues is taken away from his family and support network to the US.

'It is wrong and I hope the high court will be able to make that case. Our confidence is not in the legal system but in God.

'We have had a big discussion about who should be let into this country, but we need to have one about who should be taken out'.

Defiant: Mr Love, who will appeal to the High Court, raised his arm in the air as he said he had not got justice

Protest: Outside Westminster Magistrate's Court, supporters wearing stickers and hold banners blocked the road, bringing traffic to a standstill.

Mr Love's solicitor, Karen Todner, confirmed that they would be appealing against the result.

She said: 'This is not the end of the road, we are going to lodge an appeal, we are still hopeful the appeal will be successful in the High Court.'

Outside Westminster Magistrate's Court, supporters blocked the road, bringing traffic to a standstill.

Playing music and dancing, they chanted 'no love for the US gov', while angry commuters beeped their horns and gestured at them to move.

WHAT IS ASPERGER'S? Asperger syndrome is a lifelong developmental disability that affects how people perceive the world and interact with others. People with Asperger syndrome see, hear and feel the world differently to other people. If you have Asperger syndrome, you have it for life  it is not an illness or disease and cannot be 'cured'. Often people feel that Asperger syndrome is a fundamental aspect of their identity. Autism is a spectrum condition. All autistic people share certain difficulties, but being autistic will affect them in different ways. Some people with Asperger syndrome also have mental health issues or other conditions, meaning people need different levels and types of support. People with Asperger syndrome are of average or above average intelligence. They do not usually have the learning disabilities that many autistic people have, but they may have specific learning difficulties. They have fewer problems with speech but may still have difficulties with understanding and processing language. Source: The National Autistic Society Advertisement

They were eventually moved on by police.

Judge Tempia said Mr Love's rights under article eight of the European Convention on Human Rights - the right to a private and family life - were 'clearly engaged'.

But she added: 'In balancing the factors for and against extradition I am satisfied that the very strong counter-balancing factors required to find extradition would be disproportionate are not found in this case.'

She said Mr Love faces 'extremely serious charges for offences of computer hacking' and while she acknowledged his physical and mental health issues, she was 'satisfied' his needs would met by US authorities.

She added: 'I am satisfied Mr Love's extradition would be compatible with his convention rights and I send this case to the Secretary of State for her decision as to whether or not Mr Love should be extradited.'

Outside court Mr Love's solicitor Karen Todner said they were 'extremely disappointed' with the decision.

'Most of this judgment is about the defence case, the prosecution didn't actually call any evidence,' she told a huge pack of reporters.

'This is not the end of the road, we are going to lodge an appeal, we are still hopeful the appeal will be successful in the High Court.'

Ahead of Friday's hearing, Mr Love said he held little hope of justice if he was extradited, and suggested a jail term in the US could cause his health to deteriorate and would lead to a mental breakdown or suicide.

He and his family want him to face justice in the UK rather than the US, which he said 'coerces' people into pleading guilty to get reduced sentences.

Warning: Janis Sharp, the mother of Gary McKinnon (pictured together), who was saved from extradition by Theresa May, warned that Mr Love would not survive in the US justice system

Gary McKinnon's mother Janis Sharp warned yesterday that the hacker would not survive life in the US justice system.

'He has Asperger's, is nervous, scared and suicidal and is in a really bad way,' she said.

'I am worried he will be extradited and end up in an American prison, which doesn't have the same standards as jails in Britain.

Upset: Lauri Love's mother Sirkka-Liisa Love and sister Natasha, outside Westminster Magistrates' Court, London, where a judge ruled that Lauri, who is accused of hacking into US Government computers, can be extradited

'If this happens, I worry that he won't survive as American jails are terrible places. I just hope that Gary didn't go through all of this for nothing.'

Speaking about Mr Love, who has Finnish and British dual nationality, she said: 'He's very intelligent but he is also naive, innocent and vulnerable.

'He is terrified at the prospect of going to America, but he's also hopeful that the courts will do the right thing. It is ridiculous to extradite him with no evidence.'

Mr Love, who is studying electrical engineering at Suffolk university, has spent the past three years in legal limbo, waiting to learn his fate.

Speaking to the Mail, the vicar's son, from Newmarket, Suffolk, said he was 'apprehensive but optimistic' about today's judgment.

'I've been having weird dreams and trouble getting to sleep,' he said. 'I've not been getting openly stressed, but it comes out in my eczema.

'I feel more for my parents. They're at an age when they should have a quieter life but I'm hoping that after the judgment things will be easier for them.

'U.S. prisons are not good for people with mental health problems. If I am sent to an American jail, I don't see anything positive happening after that.

'It'll be reasserting British sovereignty if I am not extradited and it's important that our courts are sovereign.'

Mr Love faces 12 counts of hacking between October 2012 and October 2013 across the states of New York, New Jersey and Virginia, and could face trials in three separate states in the U.S.

Sarah Harrison, director of the Courage Foundation, which runs Mr Loves defence fund and support campaign, said: Frankly, if the forum bar cant help Lauri Love, its very difficult to understand how it could ever help anyone.

This is not something we should stand for.

Mr Loves solicitor Karen Todner confirmed they would be appealing the decision.

How vulnerable British 'hacker' deemed a suicide risk could be condemned to life in a US jail

Lauri Love could spend decades in prison if he is extradited and convicted of hacking into US Government computers, his lawyers have said

Lauri Love could spend decades in prison if he is extradited and convicted of hacking into US Government computers, his lawyers have said.

The 31-year-old has spoken of his fears about extradition, saying he holds little hope for justice in the US, and suggested a jail term there could cause his health to deteriorate and would lead to a mental breakdown or suicide.

Mr Love, from Suffolk and who has Asperger Syndrome, had hoped his case would set a 'positive' precedent, allowing him to be tried at home in the UK.

Speaking ahead of the extradition ruling, Mr Love told the Press Association: 'I don't think that any humane person would send someone to the US prison system, especially someone who is not from America and has never been there.

'If this precedent prevents that from happening again I think that's a very positive statement.'

Tor Ekeland, Mr Love's US lawyer and an expert in hacking cases, said he feared the American justice system would 'destroy his life'.

That life has been a complicated one. Mr Love's parents recognised his remarkable intelligence from a young age, the prison chaplain and his wife dazzled by their son's brilliance.

But the Reverend Alexander Love admitted that his exceptional mind blinded them to his problems, which became pronounced in his teenage years when the family moved home.

Frightened: Mr Love may need the Government to intervene in his case if he is avoid being forced over to America

Mr Love developed mental health issues while at school, losing all his hair through stress, and retreated into a world of computers.

While his parents saw how clever and bright he was, he told them he felt his life was pointless.

Mr Love tried to move to Finland, his mother's native country, but came back after a few months 'a mess, very down, feeling like a failure'.

A move to university in Nottingham ended in the second term after a physical and mental breakdown which saw his skin conditions worsen and the development of bronchial infections.

In 2006 he was treated for psychotic episodes and anxiety. He tried to go to university in Glasgow but had to be brought home in the second year after suffering from shingles, the tonsillitis disease quinsy, and scarlet fever.

During his hearing at Westminster Magistrates' Court in June Mr Love spoke of the 'despondency' his undiagnosed health problems brought him as a child, saying 'there wouldn't be a year in my life where I wouldn't have an episode' of depression.

'We are all invested in making a better world for each other. Sometimes that involves confrontational situations with people in power.' Lauri Love on his 'hacktivism'

But he said he was 'unwilling to burden others' with his problems.

His physical issues were all too apparent as he scratched uncontrollably at his eczema while he gave evidence from the witness stand during the case.

And his mental acuity was obvious as he listened intently to legal arguments from the court dock, interjecting on points of law or at times when he felt there was a moral point to be made, all the while crafting an intricate geometric globe from pieces of card and wearing a red origami rose in his lapel he had made earlier.

Perhaps most telling was when he became choked up and held back tears as he told the court how he launched into hacktivism following the 2013 death of 'wunderkind' Aaron Swartz, an internet pioneer who hanged himself after being accused by US authorities of wire fraud when he set up a system to download academic journals at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Mr Love explained: 'We are all invested in making a better world for each other. Sometimes that involves confrontational situations with people in power.'

Today Mr Love works in 'ethical hacking' and advises organisations on cyber-security through the organisation My Hacker House, helping teach youngsters online skills, and studies electrical engineering at the University Campus Suffolk.

He told the court that he wants to 'be in a position that the talents I have are most effectively applied to making this world a better place'.

Mr Love's lawyers said they intend to appeal the extradition ruling.

How the Mail fought to keep Gary safe

Gary McKinnon (pictured) also faced extradition to the US but was spared after an extraordinary campaign led by the Daily Mail

Gary McKinnon also faced extradition to the US but was spared after an extraordinary campaign led by the Daily Mail.

The Affront to British Justice series generated huge support from readers, politicians and celebrities, including Sting and Julie Christie.

Mr McKinnon, now 50, believed the US government was hiding information about UFOs that could lead to the production of clean and free energy, and that he had a moral duty to expose it.

In March 2002, he was arrested at his North London flat by police acting on allegations from the US that he had immobilised hundreds of defence computers, interrupted the supply of vital munitions to American warships in the Atlantic, and caused 500,000 worth of damage. After a 2006 ruling by magistrates that he should be sent to the US, the House of Lords backed the decision in 2008, and the European Court of Human Rights gave its approval in August of that year.

However, that same summer Mr McKinnon was diagnosed with Aspergers, which can spark obsessive behaviour in sufferers, as well as a lack of appreciation of the consequences of their actions. Experts also argued he would be vulnerable to suicide.
For those wishing to feel closer to world leaders, tableware used by some of the world's heads of state have gone onsale at 10,000 per set.

The tableware has gone on display in Hangzhou, where the summit was held and those wishing to feel like a world leader can purchase their very own set of the patterned porcelain for 88,000 yuan (10,062).

Many people on China's social media site have criticised the price of the goods saying it's too steep. Some joked if the leaders' saliva would come as a gift.

Works of art: The porcelain sets were made by a state-run factory in Pudong, Shanghai

Art work: The tableware was designed with the summit's location near West Lake in mind

The G20 summit took place in Hangzhou, China, from September 4-5.

Chinese President Xi Jinping and his wife Peng Liyuan held a banquet at Hangzhou's Xizi Hotel on September 4 to welcome the foreign heads of delegation attending the summit.

The tableware on display was used during the banquet, according to Chinese media.

The porcelain was made with the theme 'Greenish Mountains and Waters' in mind and was inspired by Hangzhou's famous West Lake.

They were made of high-class bone China and designed by a company in Shanghai and created in a state factory.

According to Sina, the design of the cups and mugs were based on lotus flowers and seeds found at the West Lake.

There are 88 pieces in the set.

Important meeting: Some of the world's heads of state attended the summit in Hangzhou

Many world leaders attended: Prime Minister Theresa May attended the summit

Despite their meaning and previous users, people online have been complaining about the cost of the porcelain sets, reports Apple Daily.

One user commented: 'Does the saliva of leaders come as a gift?'

While another said: 'Foreign leaders just used them a few times in two days. It costs so much for a set of tablewares.'

And one user wrote: 'Many Nouveau Riche would place orders.

At the banquet, the heads of state were treated to dishes such as Sweet and sour mandarin fish and orange-flavoured crab meat, reports Decanter China.

Changyu, China's largest wine company was also on offer during the banquet.

World leaders such as US President Barack Obama, British Prime Minister Theresa May, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau attended this year's G20 summit in China.

Chinese President Xi Jinping attends the summit at West Lake in Hangzhou, China
The accused kidnapper who has led police to the bodies of three women in Ashland and nearby Mansfield, Ohio threatened to kill his own daughter in what he described as a 'grand finale.'

Shawn Grate, 40, is due to appear in court this afternoon. He was arrested on Tuesday after police received a 911 call from a woman who reported that she had been kidnapped by him and was being held, in fear for her life.

Officers who rescued the alleged victim from the house in Ashland found the bodies of two women in it and an adjoining property.

Grate then directed law enforcement to a burnt out property some 40 minutes away in Mansfield where he claimed to have killed another woman and from which a female body has been recovered.

The 40-year-old was held on $1 million bond when he appeared in court in Ashland charged with the murder of two women and the kidnapping of a third, ABC6 reported. The third body was found in another court's jurisdiction.

The second victim at the initial crime scene was named as Elizabeth Griffith, 29, who had been missing in Ashland since August 16, when she was last seen in a Walmart in the town.

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Led away: Shawn Grate in Ashland Police custody after he led officers to the bodies of three women in Ashland and in Mansfield. He has confessed to one murder already, prosecutors say

In custody: The alleged kidnapper is now facing investigation over the three bodies. One has been identified as a woman who went missing on September 8

'Crazy': The family of Shawn Grate's ex-wife say he walked out on her and their baby six days after she gave birth and had been a 'monster'.

Shawn Grate was arrested this week and is being investigated about kidnapping and suspected murders

Burned out: This is the property in Mansfield, Ohio, which Grate took police too. Behind it they found another body

Examination: Police have sealed off the area around where the third body was found

Crime scene: This is the ravine behind the house which Grate told police he had burned down

Victim: Elizabeth Griffith, 29, was named by prosecutors as the second of the women found in Ashland

Court documents seen by DailyMail.com lay bare the brutal threats made by Shawn Grate, 40, following his 2012 divorce from wife of one year, mother of his four-year-old daughter, Amber Bowman, 33.

As a result Bowman made a police report and was forced to take out a domestic violence civil protection order against her abusive ex spouse, described last night by a family member as 'a monster'.

Bowman was granted the order  preventing Grate from coming within 500 feet of his ex and their child  in April 2013, one month after she applied for it.

In it the court heard how Grate had made his first threats in a text message sent to his ex in January 2013, following their divorce that had been finalized in December 2012.

In that text he stated that he was, 'preparing for a grand finale.' According to court records Ms Bowman did not take his threats seriously at the time as he 'calmed down and they were able to work out a visitation schedule for their child.'

But that arrangement quickly broke down as Grate did not own a car and, irate, his threats escalated in March 2013.

Grate called his ex-wife at her place of work and told her, 'If I can't see my daughter then no one will,' a statement she took as a clear threat to both her and her little girl.

During that phone conversation Grate demanded that she give him money to 'help him get back on his feet.'

When she refused he told her, 'I will put your family's names into a hat and start taking care of it myself.'

Bowman, 'believed that [Grate] would carry out these threats because he sounded extremely angry, and she was not sure what he was capable of in that state of mind.'

A relative of Grate's ex-wife, 33-year-old Amber Bowman, has told DailyMail.com that they witnessed Grate going 'crazy' on several occasions and shared their belief that Amber, who has a young daughter by Grate, was lucky to escape with her life.

The relative said: 'It could have been her. We're just so thankful that she and her daughter are both safe.

'God has had His hand on us. We pray for those poor women and their families.'

They continued: 'He's a monster. He went crazy on us on several occasions. But you try to see the good in everyone and we loved him.

'It's hard to say that now but we did and you always think it's going to be different.'

It is four years since Amber divorced Grate after just one year of marriage.

In 2013, the year after their marriage legally ended, she reported him to police after he made a series of threatening telephone calls demanding financial assistance in the wake of their split.

Court order: The documents in which Grate's threats against his own daughter were revealed

The terms of the divorce did not grant him any visitation rights to their daughter.

According to the family member: 'He left when their daughter was just six days old. He was a deadbeat dad.

'We're glad he's not in his little girl's life but still, how do you tell a child that their father is accused of something like this? That he could be capable of this? We've just been in tears all day. It's so shocking, so painful.'

Amber released a statement Thursday expressing her deep sorrow and requesting privacy for the sake of her child.

She stated: 'I have been estranged from my ex husband for four years, and he is not part of our lives. My prayers are with the families who lost their loved ones to these horrific acts.'

Her mother, Sharilyn Bascom, 52, declined to comment when approached by Daily Mail Online other than to say that she and her family were 'heartbroken'.

Reading from a prepared statement Bascom said: 'We are sorry and saddened to hear about the recent deaths in our community.

'Monster': Shawn Grate's ex-wife's family told DailyMail.com that he walked out on her just six days after the birth of their daughter

Evicted: Grate had been living at this property in Mansfield, Ohio, but was thrown out in June. He was arrested on Tuesday after the 911 call

Stacey Stanley (pictured) was last seen on September 8, with a flat tire at a gas station in Ashland, Ohio. Her body was later found at a house a few blocks away

The house (pictured, left) in Ashland, Ohio, was supposed to be uninhabited at the time but Grate, who was homeless, is believed to have been squatting there. Two bodies were found there and another elsewhere

'Shawn Grate has been estranged from our family for four years and we have no contact with him. Our thoughts are with the victims' families and friends.'

Grate had initially been expected in court Thursday but his appearance was postponed.

He was arrested after a dramatic 911 call. The woman whose 911 call led to the grisly discoveries whispered to a dispatcher she was afraid of waking her captor.

'I've been abducted. Please hurry,' she said.

Police said officers following up the 911 call found Grate and the woman in a derelict house as well as the remains of two other people.

Chief David Marcelli confirmed one of the bodies at the home was that of Stacey Stanley, who had been reported missing from her home in Greenwich, Huron County.

Grate then pointed investigators to a third person's remains at a property near Mansfield in neighboring Richland county. He claimed to have killed her in a fire.

Stanley's sister Jeana had told the Mansfield News Journal she had been missing since September 8 and claimed the police had not taken her disappearance seriously.

She was last seen at an Ashland gas station when she got a flat tire. That was only a few blocks from the house where her body was found.

A 911 call has been released in which the woman can be heard whispering to the dispatcher. Eventually police can be heard to arrive and arrest a man, while rescuing her

Shawn Grate, who is now in custody, has a long rap sheet for burglarizing properties. He was arrested at this house on Tuesday

The house has been cordoned off with yellow police tape, and two bouquets of sunflowers were placed in front with a teddy bear and a cross with Stanley's name and the message: 'You are loved by many.'

Her son Kurtis Stanley said: 'She'd give anybody anything. She's a very kind-hearted woman.'

He said she had retired early due to health problems.

Barbara Balsizer, who works at the laundromat opposite the house where the bodies were found, said she had not seen any lights on at the house or noticed anything suspicious.

'If I had seen anything out of the ordinary, I would've called the police,' she said.

Bruce Wilkinson, pastor and director of Pump House Ministries, which owns the home and one next to it, said they had been vacant since March and were being renovated.

Last sighting: Police had released pictures of the last known location of Elizabeth Griffith in a supermarket near her home

He said they were padlocked and checked weekly.

The coroner has not determined Stacey Stanley's cause of death, police said.

Neighbors of Griffth had previously suggested there was a link between her disappearance and his arrest.

Elizabeth Boals told WKYC of Cleveland that she had been yelled at by a man living in the house where the two bodies were found and that Griffith, her friend, had had 'negative interactions' with the man.

Richland County prosecutor Bambi Couch Page told the Mansfield News Journal Grate had confessed to killing a woman in June and then setting fire to her house.

The woman who made the 911 call she had been tied up but partly freed herself in a bedroom to make the call while her captor was asleep in the room.

The woman said the man had a stun gun and she was afraid if she woke him he would catch her. She said she had known him about six weeks.
Mohammed Syeedy has been convicted of murdering an imam who he and friend believed practised 'black magic'

A British ISIS supporter has been jailed for life for stalking and murdering an imam who had his head caved in with a hammer.

Mohammed Syeedy, 21, was consumed by hatred of Jalal Uddin, 71, because he practised a form of Islamic healing in Rochdale's Bangladeshi community which the terror group consider 'black magic'.

Former Manchester United steward Syeedy acted as getaway driver for another man, Mohammed Kadir, 24, who bludgeoned Mr Uddin to death in a children's play area on the early evening of February 18.

Syeedy was today handed a life sentence and ordered to serve a minimum of 24 years.

Kadir fled the UK three days after the killing and it is thought he may now be in Syria.

The pair developed a hatred of Mr Uddin because he used a form of healing involving amulets, known as taweez, which are said to bring good fortune.

They stalked Mr Uddin for six months and called him 'Voldemort',the evil wizard in Harry Potter, because they saw his faith healing as 'black magic', the trial heard.

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British ISIS supporter Syeedy (left) was found guilty of stalking and murdering Imam Jalal Uddin (right) who had his head caved in with a hammer

Evidence: Photographs show Syeedy posting with a flag of the Shahada - the Muslim profession of faith - draped over road signs in Rochdale (shown above)

Their intention turned to murder after they saw a photograph of the former imam  who they regarded as a 'magician' - with Rochdale MP Simon Danczuk at the end of last year.

Mr Uddin, who was 71 at the time of his death, was bludgeoned in a park in Rochdale, Greater Manchester, in a horrific attack with a hammer because they believed that he was practicing 'black magic' and needed to be 'punished'.

The jury of six men and six women today found the defendant guilty of murder after four hours of deliberations.

Jailing Syeedy today, judge Sir David Maddison told him: 'You and your co accused considered [taweez] to be a form of black magic that could not be tolerated in Islam.

'You were involved in a number of plots. The first plot was to get Jalal Uddin deported, the second was to report him to the mosque committee. The final plot was either kill him or to cause extremely serious harm to him.

The judge added: 'It seems to me this was a case of two members of the Muslim faith killing another member of the Muslim faith solely because they disagreed with a particular act undertaken by that person.'

Syeedy held his hands to his face in shock after the foreman delivered the verdict after about four hours of jury deliberations.

He later shook his head several times with his face covered as he sat down.

The jury was shown footage gathered by Mr Uddin's killers as they stalked him for months

As part of his defence, Syeedy claimed that he had been personally affected by the acts of ISIS, after the death of taxi driver Alan Henning who was his older brother's good friend, branding them as 'disgusting' in his evidence.

He also travelled as part of an aid convoy, Rochdale to Syria, in 2013, where the defence suppose that he was radicalised.

The pair were said to have sympathised with the ISIS ideology that Taweez are 'black magic' and the magicians practicing it should be killed.

They and their associates carried out secret surveillance to establish where Mr Uddin was living and in August 2015 raided the mosque where he kept his books of 'spells' and other precious religious materials.

On September 6 'covertly-recorded' footage of Mr Uddin was sent to Syeedy's phone, and showed the victim, wearing a white head scarf, walking past the window.

Syeedy and Kadir initially plotted to report Mr Uddin to immigration authorities in the hope he would be deported back to Bangladesh for overstaying his visa.

A photograph found on Mohammed Hussain Syeedy's mobile phone shows him posing with a flag in Rochdale and performing what prosecutors claim is an 'ISIS-salute' alongside a friend

This evidence picture from the trial of Mohammed Hussain Syeedy, shows the taweez - containing Islamic prayers, which Mr Uddin wore when he died

He was supported by members of the community, moving from property to property in fear for being discovered by the immigration authorities.

However the plan to get Mr Uddin deported was cast aside after he was pictured with Rochdale MP Simon Danczuk, leading them to believe that deportation would be difficult.

A WhatsApp message sent to Syeedy's phone along with the photograph of the victim with the MP read: 'Oh c**p Voldemort never gonna be busted by immigration now'.

Believing that getting Mr Uddin deported would be difficult, the pair plotted to kill him. On February 18 this year, the pair met up and travelled to the Jalalia Mosque where they saw Mr Uddin.

They then stalked him to a property on South Street in Syeedy's black Astra, with the lights turned off so Mr Uddin wouldn't recognise them.

Manchester Crown Court heard how Syeedy travelled in a convoy to Syria in December 2013, shortly after his elder brother left with Alan Henning, 47, pictured, on a similar mission

Just after 8.30pm Mr Uddin left the property, and entered a park further up the road. Syeedy dropped Kadir off, and the pair were separated for less than two minutes before Kadir was back in his car.

The prosecution say that this was to allow Kadir to 'attack at speed'. Mr Uddin suffered severe head injuries, with his dentures being broken in half inside his mouth and having the imprint of a hammer head on his forehead.

Syeedy, who pleaded not guilty to both murder and manslaughter, denies the fact that he is an ISIS supporter, despite extremist material being found on his mobile phone.

Among these were photographs of Syeedy and his associates raising index figure salutes, which are said to signify an allegiance to ISIS, it is claimed.

Kadir travelled to Instanbul after the killing and is believed to had fled to Syria three days after killing Mr Uddin.

Crime scene: Mr Uddin was found with severe fractures to his skull administered with a hammer as he walked past a children's play area near Rochdale town centre

Brutal: Syeedy is said to have driven the getaway car while his friend Kadir struck the fatal blows to kill and also 'humiliate' the Muslim scholar, it was said

He has a history of posting ISIS-related material online. In February 2015, he updated his profile picture on a social network with an image containing a quote about armies carrying black flags.

He also posted a photograph of a lounge with a television in the background showing an image of an ISIS flag.

He also posted an English-language nasheed produced by ISIS with the chorus: "We are the soldiers that fight in the day and the night."

The family of the victim have paid tribute to the peace-loving grandfather and hit out at the 'barbarity' of ISIS

The family of Jalal Uddin have hit out at the 'barbarity' of ISIS

The family of victim Jalal Uddin have paid tribute to him as a man who had 'love and respect for all religions' and 'peacefully practised his faith'.

Mr Jalal, the father of five sons and two daughters, came to the UK from Bangladesh in 2002 to teach the Quran in East London before moving north to Rochdale.

Although Uddin was widely praised as having made a positive contribution to the community in Rochdale, he was in Britain illegally by the time of his death, and that had been his status for many years.

It is understood he has not seen his wife, children or grandchildren in the period since he left, but was planning to return when he was killed.

His family described the time since the killed as a 'difficult and arduous journey' for them.

In a statement released through police, the family said: 'Although Jalal was a Muslim who peacefully practised his faith, he had a love and respect for all religions, cultures and creeds, and the fact that he was murdered by someone inspired by ISIL shows the true nature and barbarity of this organisation and those who serve it.

'Jalal's widow has lost a best friend, and one of his son's, who last saw his father when he was 5 years old, and who led his funeral did not even see Jalal's face due to the horrific facial injuries he sustained.

'Our family has now been left empty. Jalal was the greatest man in our lives; his smile will never be replaced.

'We take comfort from the fact that the evidence acknowledges that Jalal was a greatly respected man, a caring and loving soul.

'We hope that with all the information which has come out in court, and from within the wider community of Rochdale, it is clear to all that Jalal did not deserve what he was subjected to.

The family said of Syeedy: 'He has shown no remorse or sympathy towards Jalal or his family, as indicative of his attitude and demeanour throughout the last four weeks.'
The Royal Navy's 6 billion fleet of Type 45 destroyers is spending more time berthed in UK military ports than on active duty defending the nation, official figures have revealed.

The six vessels notched up a staggering 1,515 days in our harbours in the year between April 2015 and 2016 - and four of the state-of-the-art ships were stationary for more than 300 days each.

The figures, obtained through a Freedom of Information request, have angered a former head of the Royal Navy, who has called for urgent action by Theresa May to resolve the problem.

Harbour: Type 45 destroyers HMS Dragon, left, and HMS Diamond which can been seen docked up in Portsmouth earlier this year

The Ministry of Defence has insisted the fleet was not 'sitting idle' and was meeting 'operational tasks'.

The MoD also dismissed accusations the ships were at port to save money.

However Admiral Lord Alan West, the former First Sea Lord, was not convinced and said more needed to be done to improve the situation.

He said: 'We desperately need to get the destroyers out and doing their job.

'We are using Royal Fleet Auxiliary and offshore protection vessels to do jobs that historically would have been done with frigates or destroyers.'

Many of the vessels have faced significant periods of maintenance and refit, with one - HMS Dauntless - now being relegated to a 1bn 'training ship'.

The fleet were also encountering engine problems in the Gulf, and improvements are being made.

Lord West added: 'It seems to me that because we have so few ships that the "get-well package" for the destroyers needs to be implemented with absolute full speed to get them fully available for operations.'

Prize ship: The Royal Navy's 6 billion fleet of Type 45 destroyers is spending more time berthed in UK military ports than on active duty

The ship which has spent the longest time in a UK port between April 2015 and 2016 is HMS Dragon, which was based at Portsmouth Naval Base for a total of 330 days - but this came after a nine-month deployment.

HMS Daring - which sailed from Portsmouth on a nine-month mission this month which will see her joining the fight against ISIS - spent 319 days in the UK.

And after completing a five-month tour in May of last year, HMS Dauntless spent seven months in refit and has not left Britain since, now operating as an engineering training vessel.

HMS Diamond, which deployed to the Mediterranean this month, also spent more than 300 days in the UK.

It was in maintenance and refit before spending two months from May to July this year on operational sea training and further maintenance.

HMS Duncan and Defender spent the least amount of time in the UK, with 125 days and 132 respectively, after having both recently returned from nine-month missions.

The revelations come as the navy faces an engineer recruitment crisis, delays in the replacement programme for the aging Type 23 frigate fleet and issues with the Type 45s' unreliable engine system.

Lord West denied claims the heavily-armed air defence fleet was 'stagnating' in UK ports, but said the Navy was faced with a critical shortage of manpower and cash that urgently needed to be addressed.

He said: 'There is clearly a real problem over money in the Navy - there's not enough of it.

Port: Type 45 destroyer HMS Diamond docked up in Portsmouth earlier this year

'There is a shortage of money and the government has got to come clean about it.

'We need to get cracking and do the repair work that is needed.'

Maritime expert Lieutenant Commander Mike Critchley, now retired, said the figures show the situation with the destroyer fleet had worsened, adding the 'desperate shortage' of engineers was compounding the issue.

Lt Cmdr Critchley, of Gosport, said: 'This has been going on forever.. .it's just getting worse as the days tick by.

'If we had more engineers in the Navy we could have these ships out at sea.

'But you can't just click your fingers. This is a long-term issue that needs a lot of planning.'

A MoD spokeswoman said: 'We are meeting all of our operational tasks and our destroyers are not sitting idle.

'Ships operate out of ports while they go through high-intensity preparations for operations and while they conduct crucial defence engagement.'

We desperately need to get the destroyers out and doing their job Admiral Lord Alan West

The MoD said its target of having 60 per cent of the destroyer fleet at sea would be met with the latest round of missions.

A five-year overview of the destroyers' capacity to be at sea would be a fairer assessment, the MoD added.

Penny Mordaunt, Portsmouth North MP and former armed forces minister, said she expected to see the destroyers out at sea more in the coming years.

'The situation has improved considerably over the last year, latterly with only one ship in at a time for maintenance,' she said.

'Some ships in harbour have been doing training alongside, and we want to see as many out on ops as possible.

'The improvements have come with better management of spare parts and an improving manning situation.

'Resolving the problems of the Type 45 engine and propulsion systems has also assisted greatly.'

The Navy's Type 45s, also known as the D or Daring class, are an advanced class of six guided missile destroyers built - at a cost of around 1bn each.

The class is primarily designed for anti-aircraft and anti-missile warfare, and the first to be built - HMS Daring - was commissioned in 2009.

They replaced the Type 42 destroyers that had served during the Falklands War, with the last of their class being decommissioned in 2013.

During an attack a single Type 45 could simultaneously track, engage and destroy more targets than five Type 42 destroyers operating together.

On the launch of HMS Daring, the Royal Navy proclaimed it was the world's best air-defence ship.
Dramatic CCTV footage shows members of the public stopping a suspected carjacking by rushing to the aid of an elderly man in South Africa.

At the start of the scene two male suspects approach the man and throw him out of his car on Monty Naicker Road in Durban.

But as they push him down onto the tarmac a woman loading the boot of her car nearby rushes to the man's defence.

Two suspected carjackers approach an elderly man and drag him out of his vehicle

She is swiftly joined by a crowd of angry witnesses who pounce on the offenders.

Motorists jump out their cars and passing pedestrians rush in to beat the two men.

One of them is then reportedly 'smashed to a pulp' as his friend escapes.

Eyewitness Rivaaj Ramdas recorded the scene and shared the video on Facebook, posting a photo of one of the alleged attackers lying on the street with his face covered in blood, reports Times Live in South Africa.

Ramdas said: 'I'm so glad that for once the community stood up and fought back as can be seen in the video. One of the animals escaped... the other was smashed to a pulp. May he die and Rest in P*** (sic)!'

Stunned witnesses quickly react and storm towards the alleged attackers to beat them back

One of the men is reportedly 'smashed to a pulp' as his friend escapes in Durban, South Africa

South African Police Service spokesperson Lieutenant-Colonel Shooz Magudulela said Durban Central Police were not aware of the incident.

Meanwhile Ramdas' post has gone viral with over 4000 shares.

Commenter Phumlile Chiliza said: 'Well done community of Durban. This must be done daily.'

While another wrote: 'Mob Justice - are you Joking - they got what they deserved - a Peoples Hiding. If the cops can't serve and protect then the people have to take it upon themselves (sic).'
Donald Trump owes the President Barack Obama and the public an apology for the birther movement, Hillary Clinton said today, blasting the Republican in a speech to black women.

'Just yesterday Trump again refused to say with his own words that the president was born in the United States,' she said. 'Now Donald's advisers have the temerity to say he's doing the country a service by pushing these lies.'

Clinton declared: 'No he isn't.'

Trump is feeding into 'bigotry and bias that lurks in our country' with his presidential campaign, the Democrat said.

'Barack Obama was born in the United States, plain and and simple,' she stated. 'And Donald owes him and the American people an apology.'

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Donald Trump owes the President Barack Obama and the public an apology for the birther movement, Hillary Clinton said today, blasting the Republican in a speech to black women

Admission: Trump's team say he admitted after five years Thursday that he believes Barack Obama was born in the US. But he said the birth rumor started with Hillary Clinton in 2008

Trump is feeding into 'bigotry and bias that lurks in our country' with his presidential campaign, the Democrat said

Trump tried to move on from the controversy later in the day. The Republican presidential candidate said he does believe Obama was born in the U.S. - and took credit for getting the president to release his birth records.

He did not apologize for questioning the veracity of the president's claim in the first place. The president's spokesman said he doesn't think Obama 'much cares' for one anyway.

Clinton wouldn't back down on Friday afternoon from her assertion that Trump needs to say he's sorry, though. She said his actions can't be 'undone' nor can his origin story in a string of tweets.

'Trump has spent years peddling a racist conspiracy aimed at undermining the first African American president. He can't just take it back,' she stated.

The White House candidate had admitted Thursday, through a spokesman, that Obama was born in America, more than five years after first raising doubts about the President's country of origin.

'In 2011, Mr. Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate,' Trump's senior communications adviser, Jason Miller, said in a statement Thursday night.

It concluded: 'Having successfully obtained President Obamas birth certificate when others could not, Mr Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.'

However, the statement also said, 'Mr Trump did a great service to the President and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised.'

Trump has blamed Clinton for creating the long-discredited rumors about Obama's citizenship for some time, which he himself first supported in March 2011.

In September last year he tweeted: 'Just remember, the birther movement was started by Hillary Clinton in 2008. She was all in!'

Ted Cruz had made a similar remark three months earlier.

After Trump's speech Clinton went on a Twitter spree. She said he still needs to apologize and his past birther comments can be 'undone'

While the birther movement began in the Clinton-Obama Democratic primary battle of 2008, there is no evidence the rumors actually came from Clinton, according to Factcheck.org.

They started in an anonymous email circulated by Clinton supporters; Clinton herself never publicly agreed with them.

The Republican candidate's admission that Obama was born in the USA came after he was lambasted on Thursday evening by Hillary Clinton for refusing to back down from birtherism.

'This man wants to be our next President? When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?' she asked.

Earlier in the day, The Washington Post printed an article in which Trump refused to respond affirmatively to a question about Obama being born in Hawaii.

'Ill answer that question at the right time,' he reportedly said. 'I just dont want to answer it yet.'

'All in': Trump made this tweet, which blamed Clinton for the birther movement, in September last year. Ted Cruz had made a similar remark a few months earlier

Rumor: Clinton supporters did start the rumor during the 2008 Democratic primaries, but she never supported it, nor was she linked to it. She later supported Obama after conceding

Clinton latched onto the statement while speaking to attendees of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute's gala in Washington, D.C.

She blew up her opponent for standing by his belief that Obama was born in Kenya.

She told the audience Trump launched his presidential campaign with a 'racist lie about Mexican immigrants' when he said they were rapists and criminals.

'And every time we think he's hit rock bottom, he sinks even lower.'

Now he's terrorizing a minister in Flint, Michigan, she said, for asking him not to deliver a partisan political speech from her pulpit.

Blasted: Trump's campaign said he did the country a 'great service' by demanding Obama's birth certificate. Clinton said Friday that's not true and he should apologize

Support: Trump had supported the birther movement since March 2011 (pictured: A female Obama supporter objecting to a sign commissioned by a Colorado businessman, in 2009)

In the Post interview, Clinton said, 'He did again. He was asked one more time where was President Obama born. And he still wouldn't stay Hawaii. He still wouldn't say America.'

Trump has 'tried to reset himself and his campaign many times,' said the Democratic presidential candidate. 'This is the best that he can do, this is who he is.'

'So we need to decide who we are. If we just sigh and shake our head and accept this, then what does it tell our kids about who we are?'

Obama spoke at the event before Clinton. The article dropped right as he was arriving, limiting his ability to react to it in his own address.

He said of Trump at the event, 'If were truly going to fix this broken system, then we're going to have to push back against bluster and falsehoods and promises of higher walls.'

This election feels a 'little more personal,' Obama said. 'It's a little meaner, a little uglier.'

'And folks are betting that if they can drive us far enough apart, and if they can put down enough of us because of where we come from or what we look like or what religion we practice, then that may pay off at the polls.'

'But I'm telling you that's a bet theyre going to lose,' he said.

It's true that their 'ugliness and anger and vitriol' may 'carry the day in the short term,' he conceded. But if opposing forces 'ban together,' Obama said, they can deliver enough votes to ensure 'the better angels of our nature' are victorious.

Clinton said Friday that country is coming upon a 'pivotal moment.'

'I do believe that every election is important. But this one feels different, doesnt it?' she said, to affirmation from her audience. 'Thats because it is. The next 53 days will shape the next 50 years. The future of our children and grandchildren hangs in the balance.'

Reciting black poet Maya Angelou's assertion that 'when someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time,' Clinton earned a standing ovation from women at gathering, many of whom chimed in to help her complete the famous saying.

'And we know who Donald is. For five years, he has led the birther movement to de-legitimize our first black president. His campaign was founded on this outrageous lie. There is no erasing it in history,' Clinton said.

She contended once again that 'there is no new Donald Trump' no matter how many times he tries to reinvent himself. 'There never will be.'

'Donald Trump looks at Barack Obama after eight years and still doesnt see him as an American,' she said. 'Think about how dangerous this is. Imagine a person in the Oval Office who traffics in conspiracy theories and refuses to let them go  no matter what the facts are.'

Trump 'distorts the truth to fit a very narrow view of the world,' she said, and believes anyone who doesn't look like him or agree with him 'must not be a real American.'

'Donald Trump is unfit to be President of the United States. We cannot become insensitive to what he says and what he stirs up. We just cant accept this. Weve got to stand up to it. If we dont, it wont stop,' Clinton proclaimed.
Paul Hanson's One Nation party has hired an economist who previously worked for Donald Trump.

The announcement was made on Friday night during a community forum event in Rockhampton where Ms Hanson was speaking, reported the ABC.

The economist is said to have previously worked on Mr Trump's US presidential election campaign.

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Paul Hanson's (pictured) One Nation party has claimed to have hired an economist who previously worked for Donald Trump

Ms Hanson's (centre) chief-of-staff James Ashby (right) made the announcement on Friday night during a community forum in Rockhampton, Queensland

Ms Hanson's chief-of-staff James Ashby shared the news while Ms Hanson was answering a question from the audience about the economy.

'We have just hired - and they've just landed in the country yesterday [Thursday] - one of the world's leading economists, who has worked for Donald Trump,' Mr Ashby said.

'That's pretty exciting. We need to build credibility on the economic front, so that's why we've hired somebody with that credibility.'

The announcement comes in the wake of Ms Hanson's controversial maiden Senate speech on Wednesday, that echoed her 1996 appearance.

The economist hired by the One Nation party reportedly worked for Donald Trump (pictured) during his US presidential election campaign

In her speech she said Australia 'was in danger of being swamped by Muslims' echoing her 1996 speech where she said the country 'was in danger of being swamped by Asians'.

At the community event in Rockhampton on Friday night, which had more than 200 attendees, Ms Hanson stood firmly by her comments.
Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid lashed out at Donald Trump as a 'con artist' after the Republican presidential nominee suggested the lawmaker resume exercising with the equipment that left him blind in one eye last year.

'Donald Trump can make fun of the injury that crushed the side of my face and took the sight in my right eye all he wants  I've dealt with tougher opponents than him,' the Nevada senator said in a statement Friday.

'I may not be able to see out of my right eye, but with my good eye, I can see that Trump is a man who inherited his money and spent his entire life pretending like he earned it.'

Reid fell and broke several ribs and facial bones last year, when an exercise band snapped during a workout. He recently indicated that the accident was more serious than he initially disclosed.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid punched back at Donald Trump Friday, saying 'I've dealt with tougher opponents than him,' after Trump made fun of his injury during a recent interview

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump mocked the Senate Democratic leader, saying, 'Harry Reid? I think he should go back and start working out again with his rubber work-out pieces'

Trump slapped at Reid after Reid made a crack about his weight, which was revealed this week to be 237 pounds

Reid, a former boxer, suffered broken bones and damaged his eye during a New Years workout in 2015

Reid got a black eye eye after falling during a run in 2011

In an interview with The Washington Post, Trump was dismissive of Reid, saying, 'Harry Reid? I think he should go back and start working out again with his rubber work-out pieces.'

The Republican bristled after being told Reid had said earlier this week that Trump is 'not slim and trim.'

In his statement, Reid also criticized congressional Republicans for their 'blind obedience' to Trump and unwillingness to examine his business practices or press further for the release of his tax returns.
Prospective students at Swarthmore College are no longer allowed to tour a freshmen dorm, because marijuana in the air is giving parents a 'contact high'.

Student tour guides at the tiny private liberal arts college in Pennsylvania said they were told during fall training that the Willets Hall is now completely off limits.

The building, which houses a quarter of the freshmen class, is described as one of the 'livelier' dorms on campus and an 'excellent place to meet incoming students'.

But the admissions office has always 'discouraged' campus tour guides from showing Willets to prospective students and parents, according to The Daily Gazette.

Prospective students at Swarthmore College are no longer allowed to tour freshmen dorm Willets Hall (pictured) because marijuana in the air is giving parents a 'contact high'

That may be because the building is regarded as the 'loudest, rowdiest and most social dorm on campus', according to student-created website Swat History.

'(This is) due in no small part to the large number of freshmen assigned to live there each year,' the description continues.

The website adds that Willets Hall has a 'reputation for bad smells and drunk inhabitants (which is only partially deserved)'.

And this year the guides were told the hall was completely out of bounds after a number of parents complained of getting a 'contact high' while visiting the building.

Sophomore Jordan Reyes said it was Tara Eames, the associate director for admissions communications, that implemented the recent change and revealed why during training.

But Eames has claimed it is time constraints, and not the waft of weed floating in the air, that is the real reason behind the restriction.

The building, which houses a quarter of the freshmen class, is described as one of the 'livelier' dorms on campus and an 'excellent place to meet incoming students' on the school's website

'Dwell, Parrish, and Wharton [Halls] are close enough to the rest of the tour route to complete the tour on time,' she told the school's paper.

'While (Willets) would extend the tour beyond the time that is promised to our visitors.'

The decision has angered a number of tour guides, who said Willets Hall was an essential part of many students' freshmen year experience.

'Over a quarter of the first-year class now lives in Willets every year, so what are we saying if we can't show prospective students the dorm with the highest population of first years?' one guide wrote in an email to the school's paper.

Sophomore Nathalie Baer-Chan said she was said she would no longer be able to show prospective students her dorm room.

'It really means a lot to the students to get to see it,' she said.

'But I do understand the risks that come with bringing prospective families to unpredictable environments like that.'

Fellow tour guide Natalie Flores was at the same meeting as Reyes and confirmed that the so-called 'contact high' was the reason given for the Willets ban.

Flores said she didn't believe the 'smell of marijuana' was a legitimate reason to cut the dorm from the campus tour.

Though a number of tour guides said the reason was made explicit during a training session, the college (pictured in a file photo) claims the Hall was taken out due to time constraints

'(Willets Hall) is a crucial part of the college tour that we are lucky enough to give and parents are lucky enough to receive,' she told the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Flores said she had never received complaints from parents during tours in the hall.

'A lot of alums think it is the most hilarious thing in the world that they have banned Willets from tours,' she added.

Jim Bock, the school's vice president and dean of admissions, reiterated Eames' claim that the hall was only taken out of the tour because of time constraints.

'We have tried to streamline the route,' he said. 'Even though this is a small school there is a lot to see.'

Bock said there were some general grievances about Willets' smell over the years, but that he has received any direct complaints.

'It is the reality,' he added, 'of what college is like.'
offences date from between June 2014 to August 2016

A woman accused of robbing more than $10,000 worth of luxury items from high-end stores has been refused bail.

Fiona Helena Carstairs, pleaded not guilty to six counts of stealing designer goods from six different boutiques between June 2014 to August 2016.

She stole allegedly stole $10,030 worth of luxury goods from stores across Sydney, The Daily Telegraph reported.

Fiona Helena Carstairs, 56, pleaded not guilty to six counts of stealing luxury goods from designer boutiques in Sydney

Magistrate Margaret Quinn refused a bail application saying that Carstairs was likely to re-offend

Carstairs was arrested by police in August following investigations from thefts in two Paddington stores.

The priciest item she allegedly stole was a gold Christian Dior necklace valued at $3500.

Other items she allegedly stole included black Saint Laurent Dress worth $1395 from a Paddington shop and a French Napoleon jewelry box from a Double Bay store valued at $800.

Another luxury good she allegedly stole was a grey Prada bag with a silver chain priced at $1940 from Prada on Pitt Street.

Magistrate Quinn said that CCTV footage from the stores that she allegedly stole from, obtained by police, was strong evidence

Carstairs allegedly stole a black Saint Laurent dress worth $1395 from Parlour X in Paddington

She also allegedly stole a Prada bag valued at $1940 from the Pitt St Mall store in Sydney

Magistrate Margaret Quinn said the CCTV footage of the defendant in the stores and obtained by the police was strong.

She dismissed a bail application noting that Carstairs was likely to re-offend.
Electoral Commission considering name change for the McMillan district

But it has now emerged he slaughtered

Angus McMillan is to have his name wiped from the founding father's of Australia after his horrible past has been revealed

A Scottish explorer credited as one of the founding fathers of Australia is set to have his name wiped from the map after his bloody past came to light.

Angus McMillan, born on Skye in 1810, has been celebrated with plaques, cairns and even comic strips after founding the harbour that went on to be Port Albert in south Australia.

As a tribute to his pioneering spirit the countrys most southerly electoral district - McMillan - was named after him.

But now it has come to light that he massacred Aboriginal communities to the brink of extinction in a bid to seize more land for his fellow Scottish sheep farmers.

His most notorious massacre occurred in 1843, when he led the slaughter of between 80 and 200 aboriginal men, women and children as revenge for the death of a single white settler.

Australian electoral authorities are now reviewing the wards name after activists have expressed outrage that it is named after a man known as the 'Butcher of Gippsland'.

Evan Ekin-Smith of the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) has said a name change will be considered at the earliest opportunity.

Australian electoral authorities are now reviewing the the countrys most southerly electoral district - McMillan - as activists have expressed outrage that it is named after the 'Butcher of Gippsland'

McMillan (centre) slaughtered between 80 and 200 aboriginal men, women and children for their land for Scottish farmers with his biggest massacre in 1843

He also said that AEC guidelines clearly indicate that naming a district after a man known for mass murder is not appropriate.

A spokesman from AEC added: 'Divisions should be named after deceased Australians who have rendered outstanding service to their country.'

Russell Broadbent, the Liberal MP who represents McMillan, has been at the front of the drive to rename the district.

He expressed hope that constituents would come forward to make their opinions known on the renaming.

He said: 'The renaming of an electorate resides with the AEC, which welcomes submissions from the general public on the matter.'

It has even been suggested the state be renamed in favour of the Gunaikurnai people

Pauline Durnin, a community campaigner, commented: 'I think we need to recall that when this constituency was named in 1940, Aboriginals were not included as citizens of Australia, nor had the right to vote.

'I would like to see the McMillan electorate renamed in favour of the Gunaikurnai people.'

The Gunaikurnai are the indigenous people who have lived in the district for some 20,000 years.

Edinburgh-based writer Cal Flyn, who discovered that McMillan was her great-great-great uncle in 2011, also welcomed the move.

Ms Flyn - who has written a book about her ancestor and his legacy - said: 'It seems the wheels of progress turn slowly, but Im glad to hear that the concern of Gippslands Aboriginal community are finally being heard.

'Changing a name cannot change the past, but it is a symbol perhaps that the wilful blindness shown towards the darker seams of colonial history is coming to an end.'

Ms Flyn - who travelled to Australia to research her book Thicker than Water - discovered that on McMillans arrival in 1840 there were 2,000 Aboriginals in the area. By 1857 only 96 remained.

Professor Ted Cowan - a historian at the University of Glasgow - described McMillans actions as a 'scar' on the reputation of Scots in Australia.

Despite the revelation a community centre in Sale, Victoria, still honours McMillan

In spite of his diminishing reputation, McMillan is still celebrated in some areas.

A community centre in Sale, Victoria, honours him with a sculpture featuring a thistle - representing his Scottish roots - and a saddlebag containing human skulls, which he kept as grim trophies of his exploits.
Business / Companies

by Staff reporter

Liquid Telecomms has rolled out 10 600 kilometres of fibre across Zimbabwe since inception as the fibre company works towards consolidating its position as the leading internet serves provider in the country.According to media reports, the fibre company which is part of the Econet Group has also rolled out 25 000 kilometres of fibre across Africa.It supplies fibre optic, satellite and international carrier services to Africa's largest mobile network operators, ISPs and businesses of all sizes. Liquid Telecoms also provides payment solutions to financial institutions and retailers, as well as data storage and communication solutions to businesses across Africa.Liquid Telecomms chief commercial officer Martin Mushambadope said the company has over the years rolled out exciting products for the market. Liquid Telecom was the first in Zimbabwe to introduce Fibre To The Home, connecting households across the country onto its high-speed fibre network.
EU leaders met without Britain to chart a course for the future today - only to find their own journey plans scuppered by a lack of water in the River Danube.

Low river levels on the famed waterway meant Slovak authorities had to cancel a visit by the 27 leaders to a museum in the capital Bratislava.

The visit was supposed to be the highlight of a special river cruise on a luxury ship.

But instead the continent's top politicians were left to cruise aimlessly up and down the Danube during a two-hour working lunch to discuss relations with Britain once it jumps ship from the European Union.

EU leaders met without Britain to chart a course for the future today - only to find their own journey plans scuppered by a lack of water in the River Danube

Angela Merkel was among the European leaders who took part in the bizarre two-hour cruise today

French president Francois Hollande was also taking part in the summit in Bratislava today

'Due to the extremely low water level of the Danube River, we won't be able to take a short break at the Danubiana (art museum),' Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico told journalists.

'Instead, the ship will turn around there, and we'll continue by sailing back to Bratislava.'

The Dutch-founded Danubiana Meulensteen Art Museum is in Cunovo, close to the border between Slovakia, Austria, and Hungary.

But the leaders couldn't feel too blue as they were lucky to get their Danube cruise at all, after water levels rose overnight, officials said.

'Today from 7am local time cruising was restored on the Bratislava part of Danube,' Pavel Machava, of the Slovak Water Management Enterprise, told AFP.

Slovak authorities have rented the Regina Danubia vessel, built in 1992 and described as a 'floating festive and congress hall on the Danube', for the working lunch.

Low river levels on the famed waterway meant Slovak authorities had to cancel a visit by the 27 leaders to a museum in the capital Bratislava

The visit was supposed to be the highlight of a special river cruise on a luxury 230ft long and 33ft wide ship

It is 230ft long and 33ft wide with a capacity of 400 passengers.

However the EU leaders on board the Regina Danubia will be the only ones lucky enough to be on the river on Friday afternoon - apart from a flotilla of Slovak military frogmen in rubber dinghies.

'Because of the Bratislava Summit, no ships will be allowed to sail between noon and 5pm Friday' for security reasons, Petr Pavlasek, head of the Inland Waterway Transport Division of the Slovak Transport Authority, told AFP.

Slovakia's Foreign Minister Miroslav Lajcak said the main topic of lunch would be relations with Britain after its vote to leave the EU.

The continent's top politicians were left to cruise aimlessly up and down the Danube during a two-hour working lunch to discuss relations with Britain once it jumps ship from the European Union

Special police teams speed in a boats as they secure the cruise ship with the EU leaders on the River Danube today

'Brexit is not the dominant theme of the summit, that is why we will talk about it on the ship during lunch,' Lajcak told reporters.

Premier Fico said the leaders would be served Slovak wine, adding: 'That's important for me because Slovak white wine is of world quality, and we'll be able to present ourselves in this manner.'

The rest of the summit is taking place at centuries-old Bratislava castle, perched on a hilltop overlooking the Danube.
Police in North Carolina are searching for the person responsible for a cruel attack against a stray puppy.

A puppy was found on a rural stretch of road in Madison County on Wednesday, with an arrow piercing through it's neck.

Madison County Animal Control rescued the puppy and then rushed her to Appalachian Animal Hospital where she immediately went into surgery to extract the arrow.

Luckily, the arrow missed all of her vital organs. The surgery was a success and the five- or six-month-old puppy is now expected to make a full recovery.

Her rescuers have named her Grace, because of her good luck.

WARNING: GRAPHIC IMAGES - Scroll down for video

A five- to six-month-old puppy was found shot with an arrow on a rural stretch of road in Madison County, North Carolina on Wednesday

The dog was rescued by Animal Control and immediately taken into surgery. She is now expected to make a fully recovery

Animal Control workers have named the dog Grace, for her good luck. She is currently recuperating with a foster family

'We were all in the office when we were loading her in the truck and we were trying to come up with a name real quick,' Angela Davis the director of Madison County Animal Services, told ABC News. 'Several of us said, "It is by the grace of God that she is even alive," so Grace stuck.'

While Grace recuperates with a foster family, police are searching for the person responsible for hitting the poor mixed-breed puppy. Animal Control says they still aren't sure whether the incident was an accident or intentional.

Tracy Lineberger has lived along the road where the puppy was found for more than 10 years and says that several hunters are in the area. However, he doesn't think that it could be an accident.

Police are looking for the person or persons responsible for abusing the dog

A person who lives on the road says there are many hunters in the area, but he doesn't think the incident could have been an accident

'What's the likelihood of an animal walking out and you're trying to bow practice? I mean, literally, it takes a reaction of pulling your bow back and focusing on that to aim,' Lineberger told WLOS. 'To me, that was purposely done.'

Since the dog is a stray, Animal Services set up a crowdfunding page to raise money to pay for the puppy's surgery.

The response from the community was immediate, and they quickly raised the $1,000 needed for the surgery. Davis says they are now refunding people their money.

Several members of the community have also offered to adopt the dog, once she is healthy enough to leave her foster family.
A scorned wife who caused a huge security alert at Geneva Airport by phoning in a hoox bomb threat has been fined 70,000 to cover the cost of the police operation.

The woman, from Annency in France made the fake threat in July in order to destroy her love rival's holiday, as she was due to fly from the airport.

And after already being sentenced to three months in prison for the hoax, Geneva Police have now handed her a bill for 90,000 Swiss francs for wasting officers' time.

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Police officers set up roadblocks and conducted checks on cars at the entrance of Geneva's airport

Head of Geneva police Francois Waridel told Swiss newspaper Le Matin that the amount corresponded to the cost of paying 145 police officers at 100 Swiss francs an hour as well as the cost of meals, drinks and two police dogs.

It also covers the 880 hours of work between the evening of July 26 when she made the threat and the following afternoon, he added.

At an earlier court hearing, a prosecutor explained how the 41-year-old married mother-of-four, was trying to get revenge on her husband and his mistress, so called in the threat.

Police then heightened security and treated the anonymous call as a serious threat in the wake of several ISIS terror attacks in Europe, including the one in Nice where 85 people died.

In the call, she told she told a Swiss customs a woman would be carrying a bomb in the French sector of the airport, which straddles the Switzerland-France border.

Swiss authorities traced the phone number to the alpine town of Annecy , around 28 miles from Geneva, where French police officers raided an address under powers granted to them by the current state of emergency.

A prosecutor said the woman admitted to making a bomb threat to get revenge on her husband and his lover

Passengers faced long tailbacks on approach roads and frustrating delays in getting to the terminal

The woman was then arrested and brought before the courts in Switzerland.

She said she had been married for 22 years and knew the woman would be travelling through Geneva airport where she was en route to Turkey with her lover and two children.

The woman added that she only wanted to get revenge on her rival and 'hadnt calculated the consequences' of her actions.

However, before police tracked down the woman they had no idea the threat against Geneva Airport was a hoax.

Most entrances to the airport were closed, there were patrols by officers armed with machine guns and police set up roadblocks on approach roads to check people's papers, causing long tailbacks and delays.

Once passengers arrived at the terminal they underwent an additional identity checks by police

Once they arrived at the terminal passengers were allowed to enter through only a few doors where heavily-armed police again checked their passports or other identity documents.

Security was also heightened on the French side of the border.

France is on high alert and remains under a state of emergency after a series of Islamist militant attacks, including the killing of a Catholic priest during a church service and a truck attack that killed 84 people in Nice.
They were written while he was in jail between May 2012 and June 2015

was caught writing stories on Madeleine McCann and William Tyrrell

A convicted paedophile has pleaded guilty to writing sexually explicit stories about missing children Madeleine McCann and William Tyrrell.

Sonny Day, 60, had his case heard on Friday in the Supreme Court of Tasmania.

Day pleaded guilty to producing child exploitation material, reported the ABC.

Paedophile Sonny Day, 60, has pleaded guilty to writing sexually explicit stories about missing children Madeleine McCann (right) and William Tyrrell (left)

He was caught writing about the sexual activity of young children on the walls of his prison cell, under a desk in the prison and on paper.

The stories were reportedly titled: 'What happened to William Tyrrell?' and 'What happened to Madeleine McCann?'

The Supreme Court in Hobart heard the stories were written between May 2012 and June 2015 while he was in prison.

Day was convicted of accessing, transmitting and possessing child pornography in 2014 and was also jailed for similar offences in 2011.

He will appear in court next Friday for sentencing.
Drunk intruder allegedly broke into a Melbourne home in July at 3.20am

A drunk man is accused of breaking into a home and entering a 21-year-old woman's bed giving her hickeys as her partner lay beside her.

The couple's 17-month-old daughter was also reportedly in the room when Lang Kouth allegedly broke into the Melbourne home on July 24 at 3.20am, reported Herald Sun.

Mr Kouth was also vigorously rubbing himself on the woman and only ran out of the house when his victim screamed waking her partner, a court heard.

A drunk man allegedly broke into a Melbourne home, entered a 21-year-old woman's bed and began to assault her as her partner lay unaware next to her (stock photo)

'The accused began kissing and biting [the victim] on the lips, neck and face quite aggressively, he was also rubbing himself up against [her] in a sexual way,' Victoria Police detective Senior Constable Luke Smith told the Melbourne Magistrates' Court.

'(The woman) then reached behind and felt the accused's hair, realising that the person kissing, biting and rubbing her was not her partner ... she opened her eyes and screamed in horror. The victim was terrified and felt sick that someone was in her room, in her bed touching her.'

Mr Kouth's lawyer also explained the bruising on the woman 'originated from hickeys', a court heard.

Lang Kouth broke into the home at 3.20am and caused the woman to have bruising after he gave her hickeys, Melbourne Magistrates' Court (pictured) heard

After Mr Kouth escaped he allegedly stole the couple's vehicle before being caught by police driving 40km/h in an 80km/h zone.

Mr Kouth then allegedly led police on a chase before he slammed into a tree reaching speeds of up to 160km.

Although he allegedly attempted to escape on foot following the accident, he was caught.

Mr Kouth was charged with 10 offences, including sexual assault and car theft.

A psychological report on Mr Kouth is being conducted for his bail application on October 3.
Police searching for a missing 16-year-old girl are now looking for her younger brother and believe they may have been abducted.

Camelia Lupu, 16, was last seen leaving her home address in Stalybridge at around 4.05pm Wednesday last week.

Noevelle Lupu, 13, her brother, has also been reported missing and was last seen at 10.30am on Wednesday this week in Kimberley Street in Oldham.

Camelia Lupu (pictured with her brother Noevelle), 16, was last seen leaving her home address in Stalybridge at around 4.05pm Wednesday last week

Police searching for a missing 16-year-old girl are now looking for her younger brother and believe they may have been abducted

It is believed the pair are with 19-year-old Marius Savin who is wanted on suspicion of their abduction.

Camelia is described as having olive skin, about 5ft tall, of slim build with long black hair and may speak with a Romanian accent.

She was last seen wearing a black leather jacket, black jeans, navy blue trainers with pink trim, a black t-shirt with white writing and a very red lipstick.

Noevelle is described as Romanian, also around 5ft tall with short dark hair.

There was a possible sighting of Camelia in Aldi carpark in Stalybridge at around 4.15pm on September 7, however it is believed that they may now be in the south of England. All port harbours have been made aware.

It is believed the pair are with 19-year-old Marius Savin (pictured) who is wanted on suspicion of their abduction

Sgt Lindsey Curry from Greater Manchester Police said: 'Concerns are rising from Camelia and Noevelle, as we believe they could be being taken out of the country.

'Marius Savin does not have their welfare at heart and we are extremely concerned for their safety.'
Alleged fraudster and self-proclaimed 'Pharma Bro' Martin Shkreli has been hit with a $2.5 million lawsuit for failing to pay a doctor who provided consulting services for one of his healthcare companies.

In documents exclusively seen by DailyMail.com, Shkreli is being pursued for the cash in a suit filed Wednesday by one Dr. Thomas P. Koestler over services he provided to Shkreli's company Retrophin.

Shkreli shot to notoriety after his pharmaceutical company Turing bought antiparasitic drug Daraprin then jacked up the price by 5,556 per cent to $750 per pill.

His unapologetic stance over the move earned him the title of the most hated man in America.

But Shkreli was hauled into court in December last year after he was alleged to have committed securities fraud.

Martin Shkreli, currently facing charges for fraud, is being hit with yet another lawsuit from a doctor who says he has not paid him for consulting services

Dr Thomas P. Koestler, left, says Shkreli owes him $2.5 million

It is alleged he illegally used stock from the biotechnology firm Retrophin Inc. to pay off debts related to his struggling hedge fund and repay angry investors.

He is being charged with seven counts of fraud for running what United States Attorney Robert L. Capers, of the Eastern District of New York, has called a Ponzi scheme.

Police claim he took $11million from Retrophin to pay back victims in an alleged scam.

Koestler - a PhD in Medicine and Pathology - is now set to add to those woes with his lawsuit, filed at the district court in south New York. He says he was supposed to receive shares in Retrophin in return for his services but that Shkreli never transferred them.

In August an arbitrator ruled that Koestler should receive 155,000 Retrophin shares at $15 each, worth a total of $2.3 million - plus interest and expenses.

But Shkreli has still not paid up.

Shkreli was hauled into court last year and is being charged with seven counts of fraud for running what prosecutors have called a Ponzi scheme

On Sunday Shkreli filmed himself in Manhattan trolling Hillary Clinton after she nearly collapsed at a 9/11 ceremony, shouting at her to drop out of the election and voicing his support for her rival Donald Trump

The alleged fraudster was released on a $5 million bond in December regarding the securities fraud charges, ahead of a 2017 court date for him and his co-defendant Evan Greebel, a former lawyer for Retrophin.

Shkreli founded Retrophin in 2011 and headed the company until 2014.

He found time to pay Hillary Clinton an unsolicited visit at her daughter Chelsea's Manhattan apartment on Sunday, after the candidate was rushed away from a 9/11 memorial service. It was later revealed she had pneumonia.
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David Donald Hoppenjan, a pastor and father of five, was arrested in an undercover sting targeting child predators

A 52-year-old pastor is among the 22 people arrested during an undercover sting targeting child predators.

David Donald Hoppenjan was arrested during 'Operation Undertow' after he agreed to oral sex with an undercover officer posing as a 14-year-old boy online, WEARTV reported.

Those arrested, ranging in age from 18 to 71, traveled from as far as Alabama and Mississippi to a designated location in Pensacola, Florida, with the expectations of underage sex.

Several agencies worked together from September 7 to 11, posing as both teenage boys and girls under fake online profiles.

Warrants for their arrests were issued once the men initiated conversations with investigators, and the suspects were taken into custody after they arrived at a designated location set up by the police.

Hoppenjan, a father of five, worked at the First United Methodist Church in Pace, Florida, and volunteered at schools and organizations like the YMCA and Habitat for Humanity, according to the Washington Post.

He was arrested on charges of obscene communication and traveling to meet after using computer to lure child, WEARTV reported.

A spokesperson at the church told the local news channel he is no longer employed as a pastor in a statement that read: 'As a church, we take any allegation of clergy misconduct very seriously.

'The United Methodist Church requires clergy to live by the highest ethical and moral standards...The safety of all children in our communities is a priority.'

His information has since been deleted from the church's website, but the Washington Post reported he wrote about recently returning from a mission trip to Guatemala.

Those arrested, ranging in age from 18 to 71, (pictured) traveled from as far as Alabama and Mississippi to meet investigators posing as underage boys and girls in Pensacola, Florida

Bradly Davis Jones, 46, was arrested with a glass smoking pipe and a bag of methamphetamine.

In the arrangements to meet a 14-year-old girl, Jones wrote: 'I'm the only one who could potentially do anything illegal, but I'm not ashamed of anything I do, and I'm willing to suffer any consequences I deserve,' WXIA reported.

Jones has been charged with traveling to meet after using a computer to lure a child, possession of a controlled substance without a prescription and possession of drug equipment.

Calvin Pearson, 31, and David Oloms, 24, were found with a luggage full of 'sex equipment' after they they arrived at the location together, hoping to have sex with a 14-year-old girl.

Other suspects from Florida included Claudio Mistri, 56, Devin Gilchris, 21, Adelardo Gonzales, 51, Grayson Blanton, 18, Jackson Silliman, 21.

Alfred Foster, 71, Jose Ramirez-Magos, 51, were last known to have addresses in Alabama, while Erik Huber, 29, is thought to have traveled from Mississippi.

Frank Rhobotham, 68, Darius Lambert, 33, Alex Johnson, 19, Charles Phillips, 53, Mison Johnson, 22, Alexander Croyle, 22, John Staples, 24, Jeff Harrison, 26, Justin Hill, 28, Christopher Foster, were also arrested in the sting.

State Attorney Bill Eddins says that depending on the charges, those arrested could face sentences between five years and life.

Pensacola Mayor Ashton Hayward weighed in, saying: 'As a father, I am at ease knowing our law enforcement personnel are successful in dealing with this issue.

'If these were real children in real conditions, these children would never be the same again, and it affects their entire life.'
A drunk plane passenger has been accused of biting a police officer after refusing to get off an Easyjet flight to Ibiza.

Police were called to London Southend Airport to escort Conor Crosby, 24, from Laindon, Essex, off the flight he was trying to board despite being told he was too intoxicated.

Two officers were assaulted and one required hospital treatment after receiving a bite to his hand.

Crosby, a scaffolder, was charged with endangering an aircraft and assaulting two police officers following the incident on Wednesday.

Passengers boarding Easyjet plane: Conor Crosby, 24, from Laindon, Essex, has been charged with endangering an aircraft and assaulting two police officers after he is accused of refusing to leave an Easyjet flight to Ibiza after he appeared drunk and lit a cigarette close to the plane while passengers were boarding

He was bailed to appear at Southend Magistrates Court on Friday, September 30.

The charges come after the incident where officers were called to the aircraft shortly after 7pm following reports from the crew that a man was refusing to leave.

The 24-year-old appeared to be drunk and had lit a cigarette close to the plane as passengers were boarding.

An Essex Police spokesman said: A man has been arrested following an incident at Southend Airport where a police officer was assaulted.

Officers were called to the airport shortly after 7pm after a request from officers based at the airport.

They had been asked to remove a man from an Easyjet aircraft bound for Ibiza who the crew said was too intoxicated to fly.

Southend Airport: An Essex police spokesman confirmed one of the officers went to hospital for treatment

The man refused, there was an incident on the aircraft steps and a police officer was bitten. He was detained and then arrested for assaulting a police officer.

The police officer went to hospital for treatment. The aircraft was allowed to leave, but diverted via Stansted to refuel.

A spokesman for EasyJet confirmed that flight EZY87447 from Southend to Ibiza was met by police before departure due to a passenger behaving disruptively.

The spokesman added: EasyJets cabin crew are trained to assess and evaluate all situations and to act quickly and appropriately to ensure that the safety of the flight and other passengers is not compromised at any time.

Whilst such incidents are rare we take them very seriously, do not tolerate abusive or threatening behaviour on board and always push for prosecution. We would like to apologise for any inconvenience caused.
The son of a Greek digger driver being linked to the death of British toddler Ben Needham on the Greek island of Kos 25 years ago said today: 'My father wouldn't hurt an ant, let alone a child.'

Valantis Barkas said his father Konstantinos, known as Dino, was only being connected the child's disappearance now because he was dead and could not defend himself.

A new witness has claimed that Ben was accidentally killed by Mr Barkas when the boy strayed onto a building site where the digger driver was working.

Today Ben's mother Kerry said she now truly fears her son is dead after 25 years believing he was still alive.

Valantis Barkas said his father Konstantinos, known as Dino, was only being connected the child's disappearance now because he was dead and could not defend himself

Today Ben's mother Kerry said she now truly fears her son is dead after 25 years believing he was still alive

The Greek digger driver Mr Barkas (pictured), who died of cancer last year, has been linked to Ben's Needham's death. A friend told police Mr Barkas may have killed him accidentally

South Yorkshire Police - who have not ruled out murder - have spoken to the new witness and are taking his account seriously. They are now preparing to carry out a fresh dig

Speaking exclusively to MailOnline, Valantis Barkas said his father had done all he could to help police with their inquiries when the 21-month-old went missing in 1991.

Mr Barkas had been using a JCB digger at a farmhouse close to where Ben had vanished while being looked after by his grandparents.

An unnamed 'friend' of Mr Barkas has recently came forward to police to say the Greek Digger driver, who died of stomach cancer last year, may have killed the boy accidentally.

South Yorkshire Police - who have not ruled out murder - have spoken to the witness and are taking his account seriously.

They are now preparing to carry out a fresh dig in the hope of recovering Ben's body and have told his mother Kerry to prepare for the worst.

Mr Barkas' son told MailOnline: 'My father wouldn't harm an ant, let alone a little child.

'My father has testified at the police about what he was doing at the time Ben went missing.

'He stayed there until late at night when the investigations started in order to help out if needed.

'He even gave DNA sample when asked by the authorities. He helped out the police authorities all those years, even though he was not well.

Miss Needham said she could not forgive the witness who could have saved her decades of hell: 'I'm living this nightmare - but it could have been ended 25 years ago'

Ben vanished on July 24, 1991, when Miss Needham, who was 19 at the time, left him with her parents Eddie and Christine Needham while she worked at a local hotel

Ben wandered off at around 2.30pm but police were not contacted for at least three hours because the grandparents thought he must be with Kerry's 17-year-old brother Stephen

'They shouldn't accuse him of anything, especially now that he can not defend himself.'

'I cannot understand why they bring up something that has been cleared so many years ago.'

Valantis, who was a young boy at the time, said he also recalled his father telling the police that he noticed a car full of gypsies passing from the area at a high speed around the time Ben went missing.

As detectives prepare for the dig 'within weeks', Miss Needham said she could not forgive the witness who could have saved her decades of hell.

She said: 'He could have ended this 25 years ago. I could have grieved, had my daughter. You never forget your child but at least I would have known where he was. I could have done something with my life.

'Instead I've had a life on hold without being able to do anything or focus on anything. I'm living this nightmare - but it could have been ended 25 years ago. Perhaps I could have forgiven that person back then. But now, no'.

South Yorkshire Police, who are carrying out a new 1 million inquiry to solve the mystery, say they think Ben is dead

Ben vanished when Miss Needham, who was 19 at the time, left him with her parents Eddie and Christine Needham  who had emigrated to Kos  while she worked at a local hotel

South Yorkshire Police carried out extensive searches on the island in 2012 but found nothing

She added: 'This new witness that's come forward. It is obviously a man from Kos. He's known our family. He's seen me on the TV. He's seen my family on the TV for 25 years. Of course I'm angry. He could have ended this 25 years ago'.

South Yorkshire Police, who are carrying out a new 1 million inquiry to solve the mystery, carried out extensive searches on the island in 2012 but found nothing.

Another Kos resident, Giannis Pampos, said he had offered to help police find bones four years ago.

Mr Pampos, a dowser, said he was looking for the Italian's WW2 mass graves on the island in October 2012 when he accidentally ran into the British Police.

He offered to help but got no response, so searched the area after they had left and got an indication of bones.

'Why did the British Police not ask me to point out the exact spot where I found the indication about the bones, so they could dig using all those sophisticated machines they have available?

'What would it harm if they dug in one more place apart from those they had already dug?'

Giannis Pampos, a dowser, said he had offered to help police find bones four years ago, and had searched the area and found 'indication of bones'

Detectives are planning the new excavations on the island 'within weeks' to find Ben's remains

'I'm petrified,' said Miss Needham. 'I think the police believe they will find Ben's bones. I think he's dead. They will be bringing specialist people from the UK to search for his remains.'

Mr Barkas previously came forward in 2012 to tell police he may have accidentally covered the child in rubble while digging near a farmhouse on the island. But the new witness allegedly claims that Mr Barkas hit him first.

Miss Needham, 43, said she was scared of dying 'from shock and heartbreak' should she receive news of the worst possible outcome.

She said: 'They [police] said a new witness had come forward and told them there were two areas of land that building waste had been dumped at by Mr Barkas which had not been searched.'

But a detailed examination of land near the farmhouse by a specialist police search team found nothing.

'I was absolutely shell-shocked and just sat there numb,' Miss Needham told the Daily Mirror. 'The last dig found nothing so we were convinced Ben was still out there somewhere.'

Miss Needham added: 'What they had to tell me was the last thing they would have ever wanted to. They think my Ben could be dead and buried. They are no longer looking for a missing person. How do I cope with that?

'My mother's instinct has always told me he was alive. What if I've been wrong all this time?

'I'm petrified. I think the police believe they will find Ben's bones. I think he's dead. They will be bringing specialist people from the UK to search for his remains.'

The youngster vanished on July 24, 1991, when Miss Needham, who was 19 at the time, left him with her parents Eddie and Christine Needham who had emigrated to Kos  while she worked at a local hotel.

Detectives are understood to be investigating whether Mr Barkas knew he had killed the boy and whether there was a 'conspiracy' among his friends to protect him

Miss Needham, who also has a daughter, Leighanna, 22, praised the officers involved in the search for her son, describing their efforts to find Ben as 'heroic' and 'truly incredible'

Ben wandered off at around 2.30pm but police were not contacted for at least three hours because the grandparents thought he must have gone with Kerry's 17-year-old brother Stephen.

Miss Needham, who also has a daughter, Leighanna, 22, praised the officers involved in the search for her son, describing their efforts to find Ben as 'heroic' and 'truly incredible'.

Detectives are understood to be investigating whether Mr Barkas knew he had killed the boy and whether there was a 'conspiracy' among his friends to protect him.

Officers have previously excavated land on the island near the farmhouse after the Home Office backed a search that included sniffer dogs and bone specialists.

The operation was prompted on information from Greek Police that Ben may be dead, but no trace of him was ever found.

Officers are not ruling out suspicious circumstances and it is understood soil samples have been taken and drones have been used to photograph the site.

The unnamed witness is believed to have told police he saw Mr Barkas 'sweating and shaking' after coming back from a police station the day after the disappearance.

As previously reported, officers received more than 100 calls regarding the investigation earlier this year after Ben's case appeared on a Greek missing person television programme.

And in May last year, Ben's mother, sister and grandmother travelled to Greece with South Yorkshire Police detectives to make a direct appeal on a Greek television show about missing people.

South Yorkshire Police said officers would be travelling back to Kos in the coming weeks 'to follow up new lines of inquiry' which have emerged following a direct Greek media appeal in May.

Detective Superintendent Matt Fenwick leading the investigation said there would be planned operational activity at two locations on the island identified 'as areas of interest'

Detective Superintendent Matt Fenwick leading the investigation said: 'There will be planned operational activity at two locations on the island that have been identified as areas of interest to the investigation.

'We continue to keep an open mind and have updated Ben's family about certain lines of inquiry we're currently exploring.
News / Education

by Prof Jonathan Moyo

ADDRESS BY THE GUEST OF HONOUR, THE MINISTER OF HIGHER AND TERTIARY EDUCATION, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT ON "REENGINEERING THE CURRICULUM FOR A SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY-ORIENTED SOCIETY" HONOURABLE PROFESSOR JONATHAN MOYO (MP) AT JOSHUA MQABUKO NKOMO POLYTECHNIC



15 SEPTEMBER 2016

SALUTATIONS

- Director of Ceremonies: Mrs. C Muswela- The Principal of Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo Polytechnic: Dr. N. Moyo- The Minister of Rural Development Promotion & Preservation Of National Culture and Heritage & the Acting Minister of State for Provincial Affairs Matebeleland South  Hon Cde A Ncube- The Acting Principal Director Academic Affairs: Mr. J. T. Dewah- The Pro Vice Chancellor of the University of Zimbabwe: Prof P Mashiri- The UZ Coordinator Mr O Mavundutse- The Acting Director Tertiary Education Programmes: Mrs. S. D. Zivanayi and other Head Office officials here present- Chairperson of the Polytechnic Management Advisory Council Ms S Nyathi- Principals from Sister Institutions here presentI recognise representatives of tertiary institutions who are here and in particular the following principals who are here today;Eng. T. Mudondo  Harare PolytechnicDr F Dube  Mkoba Teachers CollegeMr W Chandiwana  Gweru PolytechnicMr E M Gumpo  Hillside Teachers CollegeMrs M Moyo  Madziwa Teachers CollegeMrs P Watema  Mutare PolytechnicMr Muwandi  Mutare Teachers CollegeMr E Musara  Masvingo PolytechnicMr R Mavunga  Kushinga Phikelela PolytechnicMr G. M Mabasa  Bulawayo PolytechnicMrs E Dekune  Danhiko Industrial Training CollegeMr Mutambudzi  Masvingo Teachers CollegeMr W Tunduwani  Msasa Industrial Training CollegeMrs R Nyarugwe  Nyadire Teachers CollegeMr J Banda  Westgate Industrial Training CollegeMrs K. K Chipato  Morgenster Teachers CollegeMr Chitsama  Bondolfi Teachers College- Members of The Polytechnic Management Advisory Council- Captains of Industry and Commerce- Acting Provincial Administration for Matebeleland South Mr Peter Moyo- Provincial Heads of Departments- Heads of Schools- Councillors- All Invited Guests- The College Academic and Administration Staff- Parents and Guardians, Spouses, relatives and friends of Graduating Students.- Ladies Gentlemen- Comrades and Friends- Lastly in a special way, GraduandsGood morning everyone.It is a pleasure for me to have this opportunity to be part of J M Nkomo Polytechnics 40th teacher education which has the 42nd and 43rd intakes and 13th technical education graduation ceremonies where 1,120 teachers and 257 technicians are graduating under the theme: "Re engineering the curriculum for a science and technology oriented society".I'm happy on this joyous day to be at Big Josh which has big dreams, big programs that train big students in big numbers J M Nkomo Polytechnic was established in 1981 and started as Gwanda Zintec College. Since then the institution has produced 12,351 teachers out of whom 5,039 (41%) are male and 7,312 female (59%). This number includes 1,120 teachers graduating today, 813 in the General Course and 307 in ECD. In technical and vocational education, the institution has over the years produced 2,321 graduates.Engineering courses have contributed 261 (11%); Information Technology 114 (4%); Applied Sciences 698 (32%) and Commerce and other disciplines 1,248 (53%). As is the case inmost Polytechnics, this means that the majority of graduates have been in Commerce at the expense of STEM. The same trend is shown in this year's 257 technicians graduating today in technical education, that is, Engineering disciplines have 32 graduands (13%); Applied Sciences 97 graduands (38%); Information Technology 10 (4%) while Commerce and other disciplines have 118 graduands (46%). As previously announced, the Ministry is proposing to do away with the dual programme structure that combines technical and vocational education on the one hand with the teachers training programmes on the other. Evidence from this college as well as from Belvedere Technical College and Gweru Polytechnic has proven this arrangement to be unworkable. In the circumstance, the expectation is that J M Nkomo Polytechnic will develop and concentrate on its teachers education programme while a home will be found elsewhere in Matabeleland South province for the technical programme under a fully-fledged Polytechnic.Director of Ceremonies, it is notable that the highest qualification currently offered by teachers colleges in the country is a Diploma. Withthe expansion of universities in the country whose number is now 18 and set to be 21 by the end of the year, teachers colleges have an opportunity to consolidate their diploma experience and to upgrade that experience to degree level. This transformation is in the interest of the teaching profession and in line with the new Primary and Secondary School Curriculum to be implemented from January 2017; and the Ministry's STEM Initiative to foster Zimbabwe's industrialisation and modernisation. In order to facilitate the proposed transformation of teachers colleges, the Ministry has set up a Foundation Committee to look into the process, structure, content, staffing and resource requirements of the transformation.The Steering Committee Members are:Prof Chipo Dyanda - Chairperson, Former Pro Vice Chancellor, at the University of ZimbabweDr Artwell Mamvuto - Chairman, Department of TeacherEducation, University of ZimbabweDr Florence Dube - Principal Mkoba Teachers CollegeDr Nomathemba Ndiweni - Pro Vice Chancellor Lupane StateUniversityDr Evelyn Garwe - Deputy CEO ZIMCHEMrs. Rosemary Nyarugwe - Principal Nyadire Teachers CollegeMr. Jason Muwandi - Principal Mutare Teachers CollegeThe main Term of Reference for the Foundation Committee is to examine and advise Government on the desirability and feasibility of transforming the country's teachers colleges into degree awarding institutions and to propose an appropriate structure and requirements of the transformation taking into account various possibilities including:i. Retention of schemes of association with the University of Zimbabwe but open up arrangements to include other universities that have departments or faculties of education whether existing or proposed.ii. Enabling the colleges to offer degrees as stand-alone institutions capable of offering at least four degree specialisations.iii. Enabling colleges to become colleges of education.iv. Establishing a national university of education with each of the teachers colleges becoming a campus and one of them with requisite infrastructure becoming the main campus of the university.v. Enabling the Church run teachers colleges, to enter into new schemes of association with their corresponding Church related universities; or even become faculties or colleges of these institutions. vi. Any other possible scheme of arrangement that may be deemed necessary by the Committee. Director of Ceremonies, as the Teachers Colleges prepare to become degree awarding institutions, they must start now to get rid of the scourge of unending allegations of corrupt practices on their admissions. The Ministry continues to receive disturbing reports whose import is that admission procedures of some teachers colleges have been compromised through corrupt practices. Something needs to be done urgently to stop the rot and it will be done. Teachers colleges need qualified lecturers to lecture qualified students enrolled in a transparent and unimpeachable manner To graduands, well done to all of you on your success. Well done to your Principal and her teaching and non-teaching team for helping you realise your milestone. Well done to your parents and guardians who are present here to witness this great moment in the lives of their sons and daughters. Well done to your spouses, relatives and friends who have made this graduation day memorable for you. Best wishes to all of you in your professional journey ahead. I'm sure as big josh prepares to transform into a degree awarding institution, you will be back here sooner than might be obvious Congratulations! Makorokoto! Amhlophe, Matjena, Matsveu.I thank you.
The encrypted messaging account of a jihadist, believed to be a 'key instigator' of hundreds of ISIS recruits, has been cracked by French intelligence, according to reports.

Extremist Rachid Kassim, 29, originally from a town north of Lyon, runs a 'public jihadist channel' on Telegram, a secure messaging app, where he offers guidance on how to carry out attacks in private chats.

He is suspected of ordering or inciting the killing of a police couple in their home in June and the murder of an elderly priest in a Normandy church in July, police sources said.

The encrypted messaging account of jihadist Rachid Kassim (above), believed to be a 'key instigator' of hundreds of ISIS recruits, has been cracked by French intelligence, according to reports

Kassim (left with the knife), 29, originally from a town north of Lyon, runs a 'public jihadist channel' on Telegram, a secure messaging app, where he offers guidance on how to carry out attacks in private chats

The deciphering of the former child carer's account, on which he has 317 followers, has led to dozens of arrests, the Daily Telegraph reported - among them, ten teenagers in a month.

French counterterrorism police arrested a 15-year old boy, said to have links to Kassim, on Wednesday following two recent thwarted attacks, marking the third such arrest of a 15-year-old in a week.

A security official said the suspect was arrested in northeastern Paris and turned 15 only a few days ago.

In a separate case, a 15-year-old was arrested last Thursday on suspicion he was about to carry out a knife attack, a judicial official said on Wednesday. Yet another 15-year-old was arrested Saturday on suspicion of planning something similar.

The two officials were not authorised to speak publicly about the cases and demanded to remain anonymous.

Propagandist Kassim has emerged as the link among at least four plots to attack France since June - including an all-female gang arrested over a car packed with explosives (pictured) left close to Notre Dame cathedral

Video captured the moment a woman was detained after the discovery of a car packed with gas canisters left in central Paris

It was unclear if the three boys knew each other, in real life or online. However, officials are investigating if a potential link could be Kassim, who they say is a French Islamic State member tied to at least four plots to attack France since June.

The boy arrested on Wednesday has links to Kassim, according to the security official, while the judicial official said investigators were trying to verify whether the boys arrested Saturday and Thursday also had links to the jihadi.

The boy arrested on Thursday in Rueil-Malmaison, west of Paris, was handed a preliminary charge three days later of criminal terrorist association, the judicial official said.

Kassim is suspected of ordering or inciting the killing of a police couple in their home in June and the murder of elderly priest Jacques Hamel (pictured) in a Normandy church in July, police sources said

Investigators were also trying to verify whether he had links to Adel Kermiche, one of two young men who slit the throat of a priest as he said Mass in a church in Normandy in June.

Kassim's precise role is under investigation, but he is believed to have become a key instigator who directs recruits in encrypted forums on how and where to carry out the Islamic State group's call for European Muslims to strike at home.

He left France in 2012, and travelled to Egypt with his wife and child.

Most recently, he was believed to be in contact with a 19-year-old in an unprecedented cell of French women who failed in their attempts to detonate a car bomb near Notre Dame Cathedral and kill police.

Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said that Wednesday's arrest was part of French authorities' efforts to target people vulnerable to 'calls to carry out killings, led by a certain number of actors in Syria.'

But he didn't elaborate on any direct links between the boy and the IS group.

The extremist group 'uses encrypted means to encourage increasingly young' individuals, he said, citing the messaging application Telegram.

France is currently in 'an exceptional level of mobilisation' following two failed attacks in six days, he added.

The country has been in a state of emergency since the Paris attacks last November that killed 130 people.

Despite more than 10,000 security forces in the streets, there have been three attacks this year, including a Bastille Day truck attack in Nice that killed 86.

Young teenage suspects are confounding even communities where they live.
Bobby King (pictured), a former army soldier suffering from dementia, is in jail after shooting his wife and daughter in their family home

A former army soldier suffering from dementia is in jail after shooting his wife and daughter in their family home.

Bobby King, 79, from North Carolina shot his 84-year-old wife, Dorothy, and their daughter, Cynthia, 55, on Thursday morning in the Spring Lake home, police chief Troy McDuffie said.

King called 911 after the shooting about 8:45am and admitted to what he had done, then waited in the house until police and paramedics arrived.

Both women died a short time later at a nearby hospital. Cynthia recently moved in with her parents to help take care of her father.

Police seized a 9mm handgun from the house, which it is believed was the weapon used during the shooting, according to ABC11 .

Family members gathering at the home said King served in the Army, but had been in declining mental health in recent years.

But his granddaughter said she still loved her grandfather despite his health battles.

'Although he suffered from depression and mental illness and dementia, he will always be remembered to me as a very good grandfather,' Karen Evans said.

Dementia is a brain disorder that can alter personalities and cause delusions and paranoia, according to the Alzheimer's Association website.

Bobby King's 84-year-old wife, Dorothy, was shot in their family home on Thursday. She died in hospital

Cynthia (pictured), 55, recently moved in with her parents to help take care of her father in their North Carolina home

The association recommends removing or disabling guns from homes of dementia patients because the disease can alter their perception of reality, like making them think a family member or caregiver is really an intruder.

Spring Lake officers had been called to King's home in July, after Dorothy said her husband was threatening her after accusing her of stealing his property, McDuffie said.

King is being held without bond at the Cumberland County Detention Center.
A Colorado family got an unwelcome early morning surprise this week when SWAT officers broke down their front door and windows looking for methamphetamine.

But the officers are now apologizing after they realized the only thing to be found inside the Clifton home was an innocent couple and their five children.

Authorities said an informant unknowingly gave them outdated information, providing a home address that their suspect had since moved away from.

SWAT members quickly realized there was no methamphetamine to be found on Wednesday when they raided the house at 5am and found the children, aged three to 12 years old.

Colorado authorities are apologizing after they broke down the windows and door of a Clifton home (pictured) looking for meth, but only found an innocent family with five children

'We are deeply regretful of the experience to which this family was subjected,' Grand Junction police and the Mesa County Sheriffs Office said in a joint statement.

'We have met with the family, including the children, to explain in detail how such a mistake was made.

Authorities are replacing the broken windows and repairing the family's front door, according to the Denver Post.

They will also have new carpet installed in the home because of concerns about broken glass.

The Grand Junction police said it is still determining how much the repairs will cost, according to spokeswoman Heidi Davidson.

Authorities said the informant, a woman, gave Grand Junction police detailed information about how much methamphetamine she believed was in the home.

She also disclosed where she thought the drugs were located and said firearms were also in the house.

Authorities then put the address under surveillance until a judge signed a search warrant early Wednesday morning.

The family had been living at the address for about a year, according to KJCT 8.

Davidson said officers do not believe the informant was lying about the suspects and that the investigation is ongoing.

'We don't have any information at this time that the information was made up or fabricated,' she said.

'The name we were given was associated with the address. It just wasn't current.'

One neighbor of the family said they found the mistake to be shocking.

Authorities said an informant unknowingly gave them outdated information, providing a home address (pictured) that their suspect had moved away from a year ago

'You want to know why some people don't like cops? Because they don't get their facts straight all the time,' Chelsea Caudill told CBS 4.

'They assume that certain things are true and then they go for it and it bites them in the butt.'

Fellow neighbor Joey Slaughenhaupt said he saw the SWAT team 'all armored up' and pointing AK47s at the window.

Slaughenhaupt added that he worries how the incident will affect the couple's children in the long run.

'I can only imagine being a kid, I wouldn't sleep for awhile,' he told KJCT 8.

'It's just bad for the kids in general. I don't know how you make that up.'

Grand Junction Police Chief John Camper said his officers and deputies are 'extremely committed to accuracy'.

'No one wants to make a mistake like that,' he added.

Authorities added that they were 'so grateful that no one was hurt' during the mistaken raid.

'It should have been vetted better,' Davidson said. 'We should have done a better job from the beginning.'

The family said they are still in shock over the incident, but are happy officers are replacing their front door and broken windows.
Arthur Johnson has spent the last 37 years in solitary confinement

A 64-year-old inmate has been locked away in solitary confinement for the last 37 years - a punishment his lawyer says in cruel and unusual.

Arthur Johnson spends 23 hours a day in a 7-by-10-foot cell, and other than the contact with prison staff, he has not touched another person since Jimmy Carter was president.

Attorney Bret Grote filed a lawsuit on Johnson's behalf, claiming the inmate's punishment violated his civil rights and has been doled out 'with no reasonable justification'.

Johnson was convicted by a jury in 1973 for a fatal gang fight in Philadelphia that killed Jerome Wakefield three years before.

But Johnson - a grade school dropout found to have an intellectual disability - has maintained his innocence, testifying that officers beat him until he signed a typed confession.

Despite the lack of evidence tying him to the crime, Johnson was sentenced to life in prison at the age of 18.

A 1975 attempt to challenge the conviction was unsuccessful, and four years later, Johnson was involved in an alleged escape attempt in 1979.

No one was hurt at the state correctional institute in Pittsburgh, but a prison guard was tied up and locked in a cell.

Not long after, Johnson began what is now one of the longest sentences of solitary confinement in US history.

'Beyond the necessary contact with prison staff, I have not touched another human since 1979,' Johnson said in the federal lawsuit filed by Grote in May against the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections secretary John Wetzel and other DOC officials.

Johnson has never received a written explanation of why he landed in solitary, and has not been presented with 'a clear rationale or the means with which to reduce or end it', Dr Craig Haney wrote in the lawsuit filed by Grote.

Johnson has been shuffled around, and was recently transferred to the SCI Coal Township in Pennsylvania where he spends 23 hours a day in a 7-by-10-foot cell

Other than the one hour he is allowed to exercise in a closed yard five times a week, Johnson spends 23 hours of most days in his cell, where a light is constantly shining.

He is allowed to take three, 10-minute showers a week, and any trips outside the cell are punctuated by strip searches.

Johnson also suffers from insomnia and 'crippling anxiety, memory loss, loss of empathy, inability to concentrate, and depression,' according to the lawsuit.

His attorney Grote, along with his own prison guards, have agreed Johnson has been well behaved.

He received just one disciplinary infraction in the past 20 years for taking a multivitamin pill handed out by a prison nurse back to his cell, the Daily Beast reported.

But he was still added to the Restricted Release List in 2009 for inmates who 'pose a threat to the secure operation of the facility', 30 years after his attempted escape.

'This is kind of business as usual and part of the cover-your-ass mentality thats common in a correctional bureaucracy,' Grote told The Daily Beast.

Grote hopes the lawsuit, which is expected to reach a ruling on a preliminary injunction in the near future, will allow Johnson to be integrated back into the prison's general population.

'No court is going to take away the right of prison officials to use solitary confinement for a period of days or even months,' Grote told the Daily Beast.
A cruel boyfriend who forced his girlfriend to walk the streets naked on a winter's day after she had been messaging other men has had his charges upgraded.

Jason Melo, 24, from the Bronx, faces up to seven years in prison for his cruel stunt on January 17.

The 22-year-old victim claimed Melo choked and punched her in front of their two-month-old daughter before making her strip off and walk around their block.

He was arraigned on coercion, assault and related charges in Manhattan Supreme Court.

Melo, 24, from the Bronx, faces up to seven years in prison for his cruel stunt on January 17

Melo was arraigned on coercion, assault and related charges in Manhattan Supreme Court

He denied the charges but claimed he made her walk around the street with only a white towel around her as he thought she was sending naked pictures of herself to other men.

The woman said she had been afraid and hiding out in her apartment since the incident.

In a previous hearing he said: 'I was wrong to do what I did, sending her out naked, I apologize. If I could turn back time I wouldn't do it.'

The harrowing video first came to light when footage emerged online of a woman being forced to walk through the streets naked while a man, speaking Spanish, hurls abuse at her.

In the video Melo can be heard shouting at his girlfriend in Spanish calling her a 'w****' and a 'b****' while accusing her of texting other men

Melo told her: 'Take off your towel! Co-operate b***h. Show what you are, so pretty and so great. She's a tart. Let's go. Let's go. Say hi to the camera and say why you're doing this.

'Take off your towel and pay the price for the shame I feel after telling you how pretty you were and that I wanted to start a family with you, but it the meantime you were talking to seven other men.'

The woman retorted: 'But not to have sex with them.'

He then ripped the towel from her, leaving her completely naked in the street, apart from a pair of boots.

The woman, who is initially wearing a towel, is then stripped and made to walk around in the street while trying desperately to cover herself with the dust jacket from a motorcycle (right)

On his Instagram page, Melo is pictured drinking champagne, in expensive restaurants and smoking cigars

As she tried to hide between parked cars, he continued to hurl insults at her.

She then tried to cover her modesty with the protective sheet from a motorbike.

He sent around the degrading footage 'to multiple individuals' before it went viral on the internet.

Melo then later released a bizarre video which showed him handing himself over to police.

Melo pleaded not guilty to the indictment through a Spanish interpreter.
British forces could be equipped with tiny insect-inspired drones and a laser weapon which could bring down enemy missiles in mid-air.

The science fiction style kit is being developed with a new Ministry of Defence innovation fund worth 800million over the next decade.

Defence Secretary Michael Fallon said the fund would encourage hi-tech firms to develop new 'disruptive capabilities' for the armed forces.

Insect-inspired devices like the Skeeter - which has flapping wings like a dragonfly - are being developed by the military

He announced that the MoD is finalising a 30 million deal for a 'laser-directed energy weapon'.

The Ministry of Defence said the programme was intended to demonstrate how the technology can be exploited by the military in future.

MBDA, which is based in Stevenage, Herts, will assess how the system can be used to acquire and track targets in varying weather conditions over both land and sea, with sufficient precision to enable 'safe and effective engagement'.

The MoD said that it could be used alongside existing weapons systems - or replace them entirely - with 'significant benefits' for UK forces, such as protecting ships from missile attack or soldiers from enemy mortars. A prototype is expected to be delivered by 2019.

Tiny insect-inspired drones that can collect intelligence are also being developed. The 'Skeeter' devices have flapping wings inspired by the biology of a dragonfly.

Sir Michael said that whereas in the past the MoD would have developed such systems itself, it will increasingly look to the private sector - particularly small and medium enterprises - in future.

Defence Secretary Michael Fallon was shown some of the futuristic kit as he launched the government's new innovation fund today

'It's a way of 'pump-priming' industry and directing investment to focus on the capability of the future,' he said.

'All sophisticated western militaries are having to respond to technological change. In the past, when the MoD needed to respond to challenges presented to us, we did. So this is not business as usual.

'We must fundamentally change how we go about our business blending innovation, imagination, ingenuity and entrepreneurship, in pursuit of maintaining a military advantage in the future.'
Three men were killed while carrying out separate attacks on Israelis today, shattering weeks of calm in Israel and the occupied West Bank.

The attacks came only hours after UN chief Ban Ki-moon said a two-state solution to the region's problems was 'further than ever' from becoming reality.

The day of violence began when a man with a Jordanian passport, Saeed Amro, 28, tried to stab police officers near the Damascus Gate in Jerusalem's Old City and was gunned down by a policewoman.

The first attacker was gunned down after stabbing police officers at the Damascus Gate in East Jerusalem. His body is pictured, covered by a white sheet

Two Palestinians then rammed a car into a bus stop near the Kiryat Arba settlement in the West Bank, wounding three Israeli civilians.

Israeli troops fired a burst of gunfire into the car, killing one of the assailants, Firas Khadour, and wounding the other, a woman believed to be his wife, Raghad.

In the third attack, a Palestinian was killed after stabbing an Israeli soldier in Hebron, a Palestinian city which continues a heavy and controversial Israeli security presence.

Israeli security forces at the Kiryat Arba settlement where Palestinian militants rammed a car into a bus stop

The Israeli Defence Force said: 'An assailant arrived at a junction near Hebron armed with a knife and stabbed a soldier'.

Today's incidents came shortly after midday Muslim prayers on the first Friday after the weeklong Eid al-Adha holiday and shattered a relative lull in violence - with no attacks in three weeks

Since October 227 Palestinians, 34 Israelis, two Americans, one Eritrean and a Sudanese man have been killed Israel and the Palestinian territories.

Israeli security forces gather around the body of a Palestinian man who was shot dead after stabbing a soldier at Tal Rumaida in the West Bank city of Hebron

Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967.

International powers have criticised its continued settlement expansion in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, with more than 500,000 Israelis now living in communities the international community considers illegal.
An Iowa teen girl going blind and deaf due to a rare, incurable genetic disorder is living out her visual bucket list traveling the world before she is no longer able to see it.

Alexis Myers, 15, was born with normal vision and hearing, but now she has lost a lot of her hearing and is slowly going blind due to Autosomal Dominant Optic Atrophy.

Her current vision without glasses is 20/600 and with glasses it's 20/50.

The teen's family and her doctors were unsure of how fast her senses would deteriorate, but she decided she wanted to see as much of the world as possible while still having her vision.

She created a GoFundMe campaign page to raise money towards traveling at the start of the summer.

Alexis Myers, an Iowa teen girl going blind and deaf due to a rare, incurable genetic disorder, is living out her dreams traveling the world before she is no longer able to see it

Myers, 15, was born with normal vision and hearing, but now she has lost a lot of her hearing and is slowly going blind due to Autosomal Dominant Optic Atrophy

Her family and her doctors were unsure of how fast her senses would deteriorate, but she decided to act fast and wanted to see as much of the world as possible

Myers has raised over $12,000 towards her $20,000 goal and has used some of the money to go abroad over the summer.

Myers, who sells jewelry, banana bread and homemade dog toys at the local farmers market, has received help in completing her dream from people and companies all over the world.

Allegiant Airlines gave the teen and her family a set of 30 flight vouchers worth about $200 each totaling $6,000 in value,, the Des Moines Register reported.

Stefanie Michaels, a travel expert, contacted Myers to help plan a trip to Iceland so the teen can see the Northern Lights in the coming months.

Myers has raised over $12,000 towards her $20,000 goal and has used some of the money to go abroad over the summer

Myers, who sells jewelry, banana bread and homemade dog toys at the local farmers market, has received help in completing her dream from people and companies all over the world

The GoFundMe fundraising campaign has helped the Myers travel to France in July where she posed in pictures in front of the famed Eiffel Tower, visit the Louvre, see Notre Dame, the Pont de Grenelle Statue of Liberty, the Arc de Triomphe and much more.

She's also been able to visit the U.K. where she saw the Tower of London, Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, ride the London Eye, tour Salisbury Cathedral and visit Stone Henge.

The teen also visited Germany, as well as several other cities in the U.S., including Chicago where she enjoyed a deep dish pizza.

John Myers, her father, told the Register that he could see 'more of a mature spurt kick in' with her behavior over the course of the summer.

The teen has visited France, the U.K. and Germany, as well as several other cities in the U.S., including Chicago where she enjoyed a deep dish pizza (above)

Since returning from Europe, Myers is now experiencing numbness in her toes and fingers. Doctors are trying to figure out how it relates to her atrophy

He added that she also brought back some culinary ideas she picked up while in Europe.

'She told us that we eat our bratwurst wrong, that you're not supposed to have a bun on your brat,' he shared.

But that's not all she came back from Germany with. Myers is now experiencing numbness in her toes and fingers, as doctors are trying to figure out how it relates to her atrophy.

She has a visit with her opt ophthalmologist in Iowa City at the end of the month, according to the newspaper.

Prior to losing her hearing, Myers had two cochlear implant surgeries as her family struggled for years in trying to figure out exactly what was happening to her

Prior to losing her hearing, Myers had two cochlear implant surgeries as her family struggled for years in trying to figure out exactly what was happening to her.

The disease was detected in the girl from Manson, Iowa after dozens of doctor visits around the Midwest combined with genetic testing on her maternal grandmother that found it was passed down to the teen through her family's genes.

It is believed to be the most common hereditary optic neuropathy, according to American Academy of Ophthalmology.

The disorder only affects about 1 in 50,000 people, as people with it have progressive vision loss that typically starts within the first decade of life, according to the U.S. National Library of Medicine.
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Hardcore Apple fans across the country have finally gotten their hands on the iPhone 7 after it was released on Friday morning.

Many who camped out in New York City, Washington DC, Miami, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and countless other cities across the U.S. risked going home empty handed after it emerged all stocks of the iPhone 7 Plus had been sold, as well as the standard 7 model in a jet black color.

But that didn't stop Jaime Gonzalez and crowds of other people from waiting outside the tech giant's flagship Manhattan store on 5th Avenue.

Gonzalez said he had been in line for three weeks - meaning he was camped out before the phones had even been announced, ABC News reports.

But all those hours seemed worth it for the New York truck driver, who was all smiles as he celebrated with Apple staff members outside the store with his new phone in hand on Friday.

Photos taken outside the store appeared to show the excitement was all too much for one Apple devotee, who was pictured laying face down on the concrete after taking a tumble.

Velvet ropes were wheeled out to keep crowds under control in Los Angeles, where dozens were seen outside a store at the Grove.

There were similar scenes at other Apple stores around the world, with crowds seen in Sydney, Shanghai, Tokyo, London and Hong Kong.

Anticipation had been building for the phone's release since it was announced by Apple CEO Tim Cook last week.

However, some fans had been critical of the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus, which are the first models to ditch the headphone jack.

Crowds appeared to be down on those seen in previous years around the world.

The iPhone 7 starts at $649 and the iPhone 7 Plus has an opening price-tag of $769.

Hardcore Apple fans across the country have finally gotten their hands on the iPhone 7 after it was released on Friday morning

One customer fell down outside the Apple store in Manhattan before he was able to get inside and buy the sought-after new phone

Jaime Gonzalez holds his two new phones in the air after waiting in line for three weeks in New York to get his hands on them

An Apple employee (standing on the left) offers customers pastries and coffee while they wait in line for the release of the Apple iPhone 7 and the latest Apple Watches at the Apple Store at the Grove in Los Angeles

A pair of Russian students, Karina Kraeva and Sergei Alekseev, wait at the front of the line in folding chairs for the new iPhone and Apple Watches to be released in Los Angeles

A flood of customers stroll through the doors at the Apple store in the Grove, Los Angeles, after lining up for the new iPhone and Apple Watch

One customer talks on his phone and appears to take a selfie while waiting in line for the new iPhone in Los Angeles on Friday

Once customers got inside Apple's New York store, they still faced a winding line in order to fork over their cash for a new phone

While waiting in a line to buy a new smartphone, a crowd of people are seen with their current smartphones in hand in Los Angeles

Customers check out the new Apple iPhone 7 at the Apple Store at the Grove in Los Angeles on Friday, September 16

A customer takes a look of the new Apple Watch inside the tech company's flagship store in New York on Friday morning moments after the new gadgets were released

Customers wait in line for the release of the Apple iPhone 7 and the latest Apple Watches at the the Grove in Los Angeles

IPHONE 7 AT A GLANCE New gloss black and black colours Faster A10 processor iPhone 7 plus now has a wide angle and a telephoto lens New Retina HD display is 25 per cent brighter Now water and dustproof Home button has force feedback Stereo speakers at top and bottom with double the volume of previous version New wireless AirPod headphones available as an extra No headphone socket - but adapter and lightning EarPods will be in every box Boosted battery life Apple claims could add 2 hours Advertisement

A happy customer walks past a trio of Apple store workers after buying the new phone on Friday morning in New York

One customer is seen recording the chaotic scenes outside the Apple store in New York on his iPhone - complete with a Brooklyn Bridge case

Customers high five as they begin to head inside the Apple store in New York to pay for their new phones on Friday morning

Customers are seen from below walking into the Apple store in New York. Some people lined up for hours and even days to get the new iPhone

Sydney: The first shoppers in the queue enter Apple's flagship store in Sydney, Australia on Friday morning

London: Apple's store at Covent Garden told customers that supply shortages mean they will not be able to buy any iPhones - and the other flagship on Regent Street is closed for refurbishment

Shanghai: Scores of shoppers queued outside the store in Shanghai, China, patiently waiting to get their hands on the latest model

New York: These dedicated iPhone fans camped overnight outside the Apple store on Fifth Avenue

Hamburg: Customers queued in the morning sunshine outside the Apple store in Hamburg, Germany

Paul Du Buf, 49, from Croydon, was in great spirits after being the first in line to get his iPhone 7 at the Covent Garden Apple Store in London

Washington DC: Batu Adamis - who travelled from Turkey - rests on his luggage outside the Apple store waiting to buy the new Apple iPhone 7 in Washington, DC

People set up makeshift beds and took along luggage, fold-up chairs and food to get them through the night in Berlin

Hong Kong: Customers queue up outside the Apple store in the Causeway Bay district in Hong Kong, China, early on Friday

Tokyo: Customers were welcomed with a high-five from Apple store staff members at the Omotesando shopping district in Japan on Friday morning

Cardiff: Coel Walters-Parry, 19, and another eager customer celebrate being among the first to receive the iPhone 7 in Wales after queuing through the night

Apple fans lining up in the rain for days, like Bishoy Behman, 17 (left), and Marcus Barsoum, 16, (center) who were first in line, have finally grabbed the iPhone 7 in Sydney

Despite the rain, a queue of Apple fans formed in the early hours today at the Covent Garden, London, branch of the Apple store

Longing: Apple fans wait to get inside the store and buy the iPhone 7 in Sydney, despite the controversy over new devices no longer having a headphone jack

Some dedicated Apple fans even brought along a pillow with an image of Steve Jobs printed on it
Even Jeremy Corbyn came under fire as Traingate had a resurgence

A landslide this morning has caused delays all day and 100,000 people could be entitled to compensation paid by the taxpayer

Great Western advised passengers to try their journey tomorrow instead

Commuters have been asked to try to make their journeys tomorrow instead of getting home for the weekend tonight as rail companies try to reinstate the usual timetable after a day of delays.

Great Western Railway tweeted: 'There is a limited train service in and out of Paddington, we advise customers to travel tomorrow if you can for long distance journeys'.

Those who did make it onto a train this evening were lucky to get a seat with even footballing hero Gary Neville 'doing a Corbyn' and sitting on the train floor.

He apparently gave up his seat for an elderly gentleman, according to a fellow commuter on the packed train.

He was heading to the Chelsea to cover the match, which he made in time.

Gary Neville posted this selfie on Instagram this evening with the caption 'Doing my Jeremy Corbyn selfie!' as he headed to the Chelsea Liverpool match

Gary was spotted by a fellow commuter as he sat on the floor and was overheard to have given up his seat to an older man

The footballing legend then spotted the tweet and explained 'this train was full!'

Dan Pope posted this image of commuters packed in like sardines on the 5.15pm service from Paddington to Carmarthen

The jokes at the expense of the Labour leader kept coming, as Robert Brown stood on a service on which he had a seat

One commuter claimed he had heard a similar message about the service to London Heathrow, being told not to travel today but to use his ticket tomorrow when it would still be valid.

Delays of 60 minutes were affecting services from Paddington after an electrical fault. Residual delays after the fault was fixed are expected to continue this evening.

A landslide on an early morning commuter train from Milton Keynes to Euston will cause delays for the rest of the day on London Midland, Southern, Virgin Trains, operating from the central London station.

There was also an opportunity, in the midst of chaos, to remind fellow commuters of Traingate, and the Labour leader's misfired attack on Virgin Trains when he claimed he could not get a seat on one of their services.

Plenty of people tweeted that Jeremy Corbyn should have been on their train, which made his look deserted.

Some were forced to stand despite booking seats as trains became too crowded to attempt to sit and find their allocated seat.

CJ Joiner tweeted that advice to use his ticket to Heathrow from Paddington tomorrow instead of today was the 'stupidest thing' he had ever read

According to Great Western, it's best to make your journey tomorrow, rather than try to get back to your destination today

When commuters finally got on trains, they were crammed in, as Jonathan Saville found out when he left Paddington this evening

Chris Baynes tweeted this picture of a busker calmly playing to crowds as chaos ensued in Paddington

Chris Baynes told the MailOnline that the crowding was so bad, police were having to guard the doors of trains as people attempted to board.

The severe delays have been caused by extreme weather conditions and a landslide on a London Midlands service from Milton Keynes to Euston this morning.

His journey to Leominster from Paddington may have to be completed via Wales as delays continue.

Half a month's worth of rain fell in a few hours causing widespread transport delays across southern England.

Up to 2ft of flood water at Didcot Parkway and Newbury stations in Oxfordshire caused travel chaos. The deluge flooded the underpass at Didcot, meaning only one platform could be used.

Lines at Newbury were submerged by the water preventing services from stopping until one platform operated a reduced service in the afternoon.

The bad weather could continue into Saturday, compounding affected areas further, the environment agency warned.

Olly Smith captured the chaos as hundreds of people tried to get out of central London on services from Paddington this afternoon, which were delayed by approximately 60 minutes

Ben Cubbon got to the station only to find there was no information about train services on the very blank boards

Twitter user 'DogDays' posted an image of the carnage as passengers piled on board, and said they were being told to 'make room', a seemingly impossible task

Andy Sant said there were 'all shades of carnage' at Paddington, where one board asked passengers to enquire about every service expected to leave the station that afternoon

Great Western were able to find the fault and fix it, but there were delays while it was fixed, which are expected for the rest of the evening

More than 100,000 people could claim millions of pounds in compensation after a train derailed heading into Euston - and the taxpayer will foot the bill.

The London Midlands operated 6.19am service travelling from Milton Keynes to Euston derailed a few miles north of Watford Junction just before rush hour on Friday morning.

The service was travelling through the slow tunnel when it hit a landslip caused by torrential rain and then clipped another London Midlands train coming in the opposite direction.

The problems have affected train services out west too, and people are stranded in Reading station this evening

One passenger tweeted the scenes of crowding at Reading, where the delays in London are having a knock on effect

More than 100,000 passengers are likely to have been delayed throughout the day just on London Midland trains, with thousands more using Virgin Train's services on routes to Birmingham and Manchester which suffered a one third reduction in operations.

Any passenger delayed between 30 minutes and one hour on a London Midlands route is eligible to claim 50 per cent of a single ticket or 35 per cent of a return ticket and a proportion of a season ticket.

Virgin Trains automatically refund anyone who booked through their website if they are delayed by more than 30 minutes.

The train operators will not be footing the bill, however.

The Daily Mail's own Quentin Letts has been comparing the conditions to a cattle truck as he headed west to Bristol this afternoon

The blackout on the matrix boards caused misery for commuters stranded as they tried to head home for the weekend

One passenger spotted that a pet dog may have been a poor victim in the scrum, as one was stepped on as passengers battled through Paddington

Passengers are warning one another to avoid certain stations, as Louisa Booth told people not to bother to journey to Euston

Blocked line affected Southern Rail too, who were also later affected by a train on the line between Sutton and Epsom

Network Rail said London Midlands and Virgin Trains will initially pay passengers the compensation money, but that the companies will then be reimbursed by the publicly-funded body.

Owen Johns, spokesman for Network Rail, said: 'Network Rail pays compensation to train operators when delays are caused by infrastructure issues, including weather, landslips, signalling problems and people under trains.

'Although this delay was not caused by Network Rail, anything caused by the weather is a Network Rail issue. We cover delay repayment for anything not caused by the train operators themselves.

'The train companies pay delayed passengers compensation directly but yes, the money comes from us, we pay them back.

'As Network Rail is an external government body, the money does come from the taxpayer.'
News / National

by Staff reporter

Squabbles pitting the National Prosecuting Authority's top hierarchy have taken a nasty turn with national director of public prosecutions Mrs Florence Ziyambi seeking private prosecution for the institution's director of administration on allegations of indecent assault and assault.According to media reports, Ziyambi the second in charge at the NPA last year filed indecent assault and assault charges against Colonel Solomon Siziba, a military officer seconded to the NPA as head of administration.Police investigated the criminal case and compiled a docket. However, suspended Prosecutor-General Johannes Tomana reportedly declined prosecution. Mr Tomana's decision did not go down well with civilian prosecutors, causing major divisions in the unit.Ziyambi alleges that Col Siziba manhandled her and in the process indecently assaulted her. A police report was made but Tomana declined to prosecute Siziba.
Jacobs said he was originally inspired by the hair of transgender director Lana Wachowski, who also starred in his spring/summer 2016 campaign

Marc Jacobs has defended the use of dreadlocks in his New York Fashion Week Show, claiming he doesn't see 'color or race' but only 'people'.

Jacobs came under fire after he cast predominantly white models, including Kendall Jenner and Gigi Hadid, and had them sport huge multicolored wool dreadlocks.

But the designer said the disapproval is 'nonsense', asking his detractors why they don't 'criticize women of color for straightening their hair'.

'I respect and am inspired by people and how they look,' he continued in a comment on one of his Instagram pictures of the show.

Marc Jacobs has defended the use of dreadlocks in his New York Fashion Week Show, claiming he doesn't see 'color or race' but only 'people'

The designer said the disapproval is 'nonsense', asking his detractors on Instagram (pictured) why they don't 'criticize women of color for straightening their hair'.

'I don't see color or race - I see people. I'm sorry to read that so many people are so narrow minded...Love is the answer.'

'Appreciation of all and inspiration from anywhere is a beautiful thing. Think about it.'

Jacobs' response only brought a new flood of criticism, specifically in regards to his comment about women of color choosing to straighten their hair.

Marc Jacobs said something incredibly ignorant, commented one user on Instagram.

People of color who straighten their hair are ASSIMILATING to the white dominant culture because were never allowed to wear our natural hair in schools and jobs.

Until girls here can wear their Afrocs and locs to school without being kicked out (use Google, learn something) stop saying hair is hair and other nonsense quotes.

If youre all about stopping negativity listen to us who are offended!

Another woman of color noted that she had natural straight hair and asked Jacobs if this meant she wasnt appreciating my culture.

Most black womens natural hair isnt good enough for the corporate or business world so we must stripped and cut down our natural hair for chemically straightened hair, she continued.

Jacobs came under fire after he cast predominantly white models, including Kendall Jenner and Bella Hadid (pictured), and had them sport huge multicolored wool dreadlocks

Jacobs' response only brought a new flood of criticism, specifically in regards to his comment about women of color choosing to straighten their hair

Learn more about cultural appropriation before you try to give a listen on it.

Another Instagram user pleaded with Jacobs to remember that racism and cultural appropriation do exist.

Another Instagram user pleaded with Jacobs (pictured Thursday) to remember that racism and cultural appropriation do exist

By having these conversations, in a respectful manner of course, we can turn this situation into a positive learning experience, they added.

Many took to Twitter on Thursday night to blast Jacobs after pictures of his show, which occurred on the final night of New York Fashion Week, made their way online.

'Dreadlocks are part of black culture, something you have no business trying to sell or appropriate. Do better,' wrote Twitter user Maia.

Others questioned why there were so few black models in the show.

'Y'all made your models wear dreadlocks but only use two black models? Bye,' one user wrote.

You shouldve just used women of color instead of white people, one Instagram user wrote.

Another agreed, saying it wouldve been a great way to be more inclusive and have an amazing show with an otherwise-amazing aesthetic.

Marc Jacobs say the look was inspired by rave culture, London 1980s fashion and Harajuku girls.

Many people online blasted Jacobs for the move on Thursday after photos of the show were released, accusing the brand of cultural appropriation

Jacobs has said that the look was first inspired by transgender Matrix director Lana Wachowski, who also starred in his spring/summer 2016 campaign.

But some furious Tweeters claimed that white people should be banned from wearing dreadlocks altogether.

Olivia wrote: 'W hy does Marc Jacobs think it's okay to put dreadlocks on white people?'

Chris Coon added: 'Dreadlocks look better on blacks, give it up white people.'

Dreadlocks are apparent in many different cultures, from the ancient Greeks and Egyptians, to right through to modern day India, Africa and white counterculture.

But in America, it is most closely linked to black culture and is sometimes used as a symbol of black pride.

Jacobs has said that the look was first inspired by transgender Matrix director Lana Wachowski, who also starred in his spring/summer 2016 campaign (pictured is Gigi Hadid)

The designer said his collection was also inspired by rave culture, London 1980s fashion and Harajuku girls

Stylist Guido Palau said he didn't consider the look cultural appropriation but said he takes inspiration from every culture.

'Style comes from clashing things. It's always been there  if you're creative, if you make food, music, and fashion, whatever, you're inspired by everything,' he told The Cut after the show.

'It's not homogeneous. Different cultures mix all the time. You see it on the street. People don't dress head-to-toe in just one way.'

He said that Jacobs would often take something 'street' and 'raw' and transform it into something ' much more sophisticated and fashionable.'

'Dreadlocks are part of black culture, something you have no business trying to sell or appropriate. Do better,' one Twitter user wrote

Palau said that he had to find the right hair to create the high styles inspired by Wachowski, who often wears her hair in short hot pink dreads.

That is when he found Jena Counts of Dreadlocks by Jena - the artist behind the rainbow wigs, Yahoo Beauty reports.

She has been dying wool hair extensions in her small town of Palataka, Florida for about one year.

The 'self-taught pro' learned her technique online and has made 200 to 300 different shades since starting.

'It comes in a roping and you cut it and roll it,' she told the site. 'You can wash them with sulfate-free shampoo to keep the colors.'

Jena sells her custom rainbow-colored creations on Etsy for up to $155 a set.

After the much-talked-about show, some of the models were seen exiting the ballroom.

Stylist Guido Palau said he didn't consider the look cultural appropriation but said he takes inspiration from every culture

Kendall Jenner and Gigi Hadid had joined the cast of Marc Jacobs models wearing the pastel colored dreadlocks.

The models seemed to love the look as they laughed backstage. Bella Hadid made a more serious expression as she modeled a see-through top. Other models at the show were Karlie Kloss, Irina Shayk, Jourdan Dunn and Adriana Lima.
A father and son who made a staggering 3.4million selling dangerous teeth-whitening products have both been jailed for 18 months.

John Hargreaves, 69, and his son Matthew, 44, sold the unsafe beauty treatments - which contained 110 times the legal limit of hydrogen peroxide - at shows and shopping centres across the UK.

The pair, from Knutsford, Cheshire, sold the goods for eight years - giving unhappy customers and Trading Standards' officials the slip by folding one company before starting another with a new name and address.

Judge Philip Harris-Jenkins told a court that the family's business - which also saw 71-year-old mother Jean pitch in - was 'sophisticated and highly organised'.

John Hargreaves (left), 69, and his son Matthew (right), 44, sold the unsafe beauty treatments for eight years

Matthew Hargreaves (right, sat down) and his father made 3.4million selling the products

He said: 'You duped the public into purchasing unsafe teeth-whitening products and placed them at risk of serious harm.

'You placed personal greed before public safety.'

Merthyr Crown Court heard that Hargreaves senior had previously been cautioned in 2007 after sales of 'too strong' teeth-whitening gel at the Royal Cornwall Show prompted a deluge of complaints.

However, the company director ignored the warning from the authorities and they continued to advertise the product - insisting to customers that it was safe.

Prosecutor Mark Wyeth QC said their business proved extremely lucrative, and saw the defendants enjoy a lavish lifestyle - living in a large Cheshire house and owning seven luxury vehicles, including a Range Rover.

However, when complaints started to mount up, Mr Wyeth said the defendants used a number of tactics to try to 'evade Trading Standards and unhappy customers' by starting up new companies.

He added: 'Fifty four various addresses were used as prophylactic against complaints.

'They not only defrauded the general public but also the authorities, without any regard for people's safety.'

The court heard that one woman, named only as Mrs Hague, suffered chemical burns to her mouth and gums from the Hargreaves' teeth-whitening product.

The pair were caught following an operation by Powys County Council's trading standards, with undercover officials buying products from the Hargreaves' stall at the Royal Welsh Show in 2013.

Officers found that as well as numerous false claims about the gel, which included 'used by leading dentists across Europe', it also contained 11 per cent hydrogen peroxide.

Cosmetic product regulations allow sales of products containing up to 0.1 per cent hydrogen peroxide, and anything higher than 6 per cent is classed as being potentially dangerous to health.

But the pair were eventually caught and John (pictured) was led into a security van after admitting participating in a fraudulent business

His son Matthew (pictured) was also jailed for 18 months and led into a security van for admitting the same offence

Powys council's Operation Gleam later expanded to include 10 other local authorities who had tried to catch the two men.

They pleaded guilty to participating in a fraudulent business, an offence under the 2006 Fraud Act.

They were each handed 18-month immediate custodial sentences and banned from becoming company directors for 10 years.

The court heard that Mrs Hargreaves also played a part in the family business, albeit in a more administrative role.

She pleaded guilty to the less serious charge of engaging in unfair commercial practice, and was handed a six-month sentence suspended for two years and banned from being a company director for five years.

After sentence was passed she broke down in tears as her husband and son were taken into custody.

WHAT IS HYDROGEN PEROXIDE? Hydrogen peroxide is a chemical compound and is typically a colourless liquid. Many health experts have warned that it should only be used on the skin, and not ingested. Experts claim that that the compound contains too much oxygen for the blood - which can cause potential issues. Medical Daily reports that when the skin absorbs hydrogen peroxide, it can reduce a cell - called fibroblasts - which clean and repair damaged tissues. Meanwhile, drinking hydrogen peroxide can cause chemical burns in the oesophagus and consuming the 35 per cent solution can even result in death, according to the American Cancer Society. Advertisement

Powys council's cabinet member for trading standards John Powell welcomed the outcome.

He said: 'We cannot have unsafe products being brought into Powys, which could harm our citizens or visitors, particularly as the Royal Welsh Show is our premier event.

'This result also vindicates our decision to embark on a nationwide investigation, demonstrating the excellent skills that our trading standards team possess.'

Clive Jones, the council's professional lead for trading standards and community safety, also praised the officers in the case after they took more than 90 statements and collected 6,000 exhibits.

He added: 'We will be working with the General Dental Council (GDC) on future campaigns as this was one of the largest cases ever taken and we need to ensure that such sharp practices are stamped out.'

Katie Spears, of the GDC, said: 'The GDC continue to work hard to proactively spread the message that tooth whitening is the practice of dentistry and that only registered dental professionals can legally and safely provide such treatment.

'We are particularly proud of the collaborative approach taken here with Powys trading standards to promote patient safety.
Hillary Clinton's healthy lead over Donald Trump among younger voters has been disintegrating, with some younger voters switching over to libertarian Gary Johnson in critical swing states.

To counter the drop-off, the Clinton camp is sending its top surrogates to college campuses around the country. First Lady Michelle Obama campaigns for Clinton at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia today.

First lady Michelle Obama campaigned at the George Mason University college campus in Virginia on Friday, while Clinton's running mate Tim Kaine campaigned at the University of Michigan Ann Arbor Michigan earlier in the week.

Clinton's poll drop among the group has been precipitous, and amounts for some of Trump's gains on her.

'Elections arent just about who votes but who doesnt vote. And that is especially true for young people like all of you,' the first lady told a cheering crowd in Fairfax, Virginia Friday.

Clinton's running mate, Tim Kaine, campaigned this week at the University of Michigan. The campaign is trying to head off a drop in support among millenials

Bernie Sanders, 75, is older than Clinton, but he has been vouching for the 68 year old Clinton among younger millenial voters, who have been abandoning Clinton in recent polls

Her lead among those 35 and under fell from 24 points late last month to just 5 points in the latest Quinnipiac University poll.

In a Fox News poll, her lead dropped from 27 points to 9 points among the same group, the Wall Street Journal noted.'

The Quinnipiac poll had Clinton beatin Libertarian Party candidate Gary Johnson by just two percentage points among those 18 to 34 years old, 31 to 29 per cent. Green Party candidate Jill Stein was at 15 and Donald Trump was at 26.

The loss of support brought Clinton's lead over Trump in a four-way race down to two points, 41 to 39, compared to 48 to 35 in a hypothetical two-way race.

A Thursday New York Times poll also has Clinton's support dropping with Johnson and Stein in the race.

'I would just simply say to the millennials, to anybody else: Look at the issues ... stay focused on the issues of relevance to your life,' Sanders said on MSNBC Friday

Clinton's lead among those 35 and under fell from 24 points late last month to just 5 points in the latest Quinnipiac University poll

First lady Michelle Obama campaigns for Clinton at a college in northern Virginia Friday as the campaign tries to stem its slide among millenials

Clinton has been losing millenial voters to Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson

The led Trump by 46 to 44 percent. But with Johnson and Stein included, the two main candidates were tied at 42 per cent.

Clinton is 68 and Trump is 70. Those she is sending out on the trail for her, including the first lady, defeated opponent Senator Bernie Sanders, and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, have strong appeal among younger voters.

Clintons lead among millenials has also been dropping in battleground states, including Colorado and Michigan.

Bernie Sanders plugged Clinton among the young on MSNBC Friday, before holding a rally in New York for congressional candidate Zephyr Teachout.

'I would just simply say to the millennials, to anybody else: Look at the issues ... stay focused on the issues of relevance to your life,' he said.
Heroin grandma Rhonda Pasek was high on heroin cut with deadly elephant tranquilizer when she was found passed out in her boyfriends car, with her helpless four-year-old grandson looking on, police believe.

Now Pasek, 50  who was sentenced to 180 days in jail on Thursday  is likely to face more charges when tests on the drug found in the vehicle are complete.

Based on its pink color, we believe it was carfentanil, Police Chief John Lane of East Liverpool, Ohio, told DailyMail.com exclusively. That is an elephant tranquilizer.

We could be wrong and we wont know until tests are complete, but that is what we believe.

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This September 7 photo of Rhonda Pasek and her boyfriend Jim Acord unconscious in their car shocked the nation. The photo, taken by the East Liverpool Police department, showed Pasek's 4-year-old grandson waiting patiently in the back seat. Police Chief John Lane has defended his decision to show the boy's face

Rhonda Pasek, 50, appeared in court on Thursday on charges of child endangerment

Carfentanil-cut heroin has been sweeping the country (pictured from a separate raid in August). The drug is 100-times stronger than fentanyl, which has been the main ingredient mixed in until recently and is so powerful that veterinarians typically wear face shields and gloves. Even one drop splattered into a person's eye or nose could be fatal

Pasek and her 47-year-old boyfriend Jim Acord are now both in Columbiana County Jail in Lisbon, Ohio, after pleading guilty to child endangerment charges.

Acord is serving two consecutive 180-day sentences as he also pleaded guilty to driving while impaired.

They were both pictured unconscious in the front of Acords Ford Explorer last week by East Liverpool Police, in a photograph that has stunned the nation.

Pasek, now inmate number 19247, had only been given custody of the little boy six weeks earlier.

She is feeling very remorseful. I speak to her every day and she knows she messed up, friend Gene Kuhn told DailyMail.com.

A judge has now given custody of the boy to his great aunt and uncle, Lori and Terry Lane, both 54, in South Carolina. A hearing on a more permanent future will be held on September 26.

The four-year-old boy was seen looking cheerful in his relatives' company in exclusive photos for DailyMail.com on Friday.

The little boy, who has become the face of the heartlands heroin epidemic, has started a new life with his great aunt and uncle in South Carolina, exclusive photos for DailyMail.com showed Friday

Pasek and Acord in their mug shots. Both are now in Columbiana County Jail in Lisbon, Ohio

More than 300 people from all across America have asked about the possibility of adopting the little boy, East Liverpools safety-services director Brian Allen told the towns Morning Journal.

Pasek and Acord got the maximum sentence under Ohio law, Lane said.

Carfentanil-cut heroin has been sweeping the country. The drug is 100-times stronger than fentanyl, which has been the main ingredient mixed in until recently.

The drug is so powerful that veterinarians typically wear face shields, gloves and other protective gear  just a little bit short of a hazmat suit  when preparing the medicine to sedate animals.

Even one drop splattered into a person's eye or nose could be fatal, Dr. Rob Hilsenroth, executive director of the American Association of Zoo Veterinarians told the Associated Press last month.

Drug-sniffing dogs have been known to die when coming into contact with carfentanil.

Its all about the money, police chief Lane told DailyMail.com. Thats what it always is in these cases.

Lane made the decision to release the pictures without blurring the boys face, along with Allen and town mayor Ryan Stovall.

The little boy's mother, Reva McCullough, 25, says she wants her boy back. She now works at Tiffany's Dolls, a 'gentleman's club' in the Youngstown suburb of North Lima, Ohio, where she dances under the name Mercedes. She says she no longer abuses crack cocaine or marijuana

All three say they have no regrets despite coming under heavy fire from people who worry about the boys future.

In 10 years time, no-one will recognize him as the kid in the picture, Lane said. Because of that picture he got exactly what was needed. He is now in a much better place.

The people who have given such a negative response just have no clue, he added. Our officers see this sort of thing every day.

Lane said pedophiles are now specifically targeting drug-addicted families who cannot look after their children properly, making the youngsters easy prey.

Releasing this picture has gotten people talking about the issue and realizing just how serious it is, he added. Drugs are about the entire family, not just the addict.

That boy looked like that the entire time our officers were there, it wasnt just for the picture. You would think he would be crying at what he was seeing, but he had clearly seen it so many times before.

A dart loaded with carfentanil and a cocktail of other drugs in preparation for tranquilizing a moose in this file photo from 2013

Even Ohio Governor John Kasich is getting involved. He was due to speak to East Liverpool officials on Friday to see how the state can help.

The child in the picture is the oldest of three boys born to stripper Reva McCullough. The oldest two are the offspring of Paseks 25-year-old son Devon Pasek, while the father of the third is another man.

In an exclusive interview Tuesday inside Tiffanys Dolls gentlemens club in North Lima, Ohio, where she dances under the name Mercedes, McCullough, 25, said she bawled for four days straight, when she saw the photograph.

I want my boy back, she added, after DailyMail.com told her her son had been sent to South Carolina.

Ive made a lot of bad decisions in my life, said McCullough, who admitted abusing both crack cocaine and marijuana  but not heroin.

I just went wild when I was 18, she said, adding that she is now completely off drugs.

Reva McCullough, 25, said she wants her four-year-old son back after he was placed in the care of a great aunt in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina

McCullough gave an exclusive interview to DailyMail.com on Tuesday inside Tiffanys Dolls gentlemens club in North Lima, Ohio, where she dances under the name Mercedes

The picture of McCulloughs son put a human face on the scourge of heroin that has attacked Americas heartland for years. In the five days that followed, East Liverpool, a town of 11,000 people, saw seven more overdoses and one death from heroin. And thats just what we know about through 911 calls, said city service-safety director Brian Allen.

In the same time period, a bad batch of heroin killed eight people and hospitalized dozens more in Akron.

In the picture, the boy is seen staring blankly as Rhonda Pasek, sits slumped and unconscious, a bra strap hanging down her arm. Acord, is also slumbering in the drivers seat with his head back and mouth open.

The pair both live some 15 miles from East Liverpool, in New Manchester, West Virginia. Acord told police that he was taking Pasek to the hospital in East Liverpool shortly after 3 p.m. on September 7.

But he was spotted driving erratically by off-duty cop, Kevin Thompson, who pulled him over after he stopped behind a school bus.

Acords head was bobbing back and forth, his speech was unintelligible, Thompson wrote in his report. I also noted pin point pupils.

Acord then attempted to drive off and Thompson reached into the SUV and took the keys. The driver eventually went completely unconscious. Rhonda Pasek was completely unconscious and turning blue, wrote Thompson.

According to court papers obtained by DailyMail.com, the boy was in the care of his octogenarian great grandparents, Dick and Barbara McCullough, almost from the start.

They signed affidavits in December 2012, four months after his birth, saying their granddaughter was using illicit and illegal drug (sic) and specifically crack cocain (sic). They said they found tinfoil with burnt residue on it in her purse.

They claimed the boys father is involved in narcotics trafficking, although he has never been charged.

When asked in the strip club if Devon Pasek is a drug dealer, Reva McCullough smiled and said I have no idea about his profession.

Attempts to reach Devon Pasek were unsuccessful. An October 2012 report in the Morning Journal said Pasek was patted down by cops during a drug bust and officers reportedly found a hard object in his pants pocket that turned out to be a large sum of money wrapped in rubber bands.

(T)he conduct of these parents is erratic at best and is certainly unreliable, Dick and Barbara McCullough wrote, saying their granddaughter and her boyfriend are not providing appropriate care as would be in the best interest of the child.

The McCulloughs  who live in East Liverpool just a quarter mile from where Pasek and Acord were arrested  were given full custody of the boy despite their advanced age. Barbara McCullough, 84, told Fox News the child was a happy little boy.

Pasek was heard cursing under her breath when she came face-to-face with the local and national media that was waiting for her in East Liverpool Municipal Court

Acord's home in New Manchester, West Virginia

In November, 2013, Reva and Devon applied for custody of their son, saying she has a stable and happy home life to offer the child and she and Pasek could offer a good environment within which to raise a child. They later withdrew their application.

By August, 2014, Barbara and Dick McCullough began to worry about their ability to look after the growing boy. According to one report, they found they did not have the strength to lift the boy out of his crib.

At the current time, while great-grandparents are physically and emotionally able to provide for the minor child, they are concerned about their ability to do so into the future due to their ages of 82 and 83 years old, they said.

They asked that custody be transferred to their daughter and son-in-law, Lori and Terry Lane, in South Carolina.

But Rhonda Pasek objected and asked that she be given custody saying she is financially, mentally and emotionally able to look after him.

The case dragged on until June 2015 when Pasek was given partial custody, but within months she was asking for the McCulloughs to be held in contempt of court for refusing to hand the boy over at one point sending the minor child out of state with unknown relatives.

Eventually, Pasek was granted full custody on July 25, a little over six weeks before she was found unconscious.

Judge Thomas Baronzzi acknowledged in his decision that the McCulloughs were critical of the lifestyle of Rhonda Pasek, adding: They indicate their belief that she continues to struggle with the abuse of alcohol.

But the judge said there was no evidence that either her drinking or her diagnosed bipolar condition affected her ability to care for the boy.

Baronzzi specifically ordered that Devon Pasek should be kept away from his son due to his ongoing involvement with drug abuse or drug sales.

After Rhonda Paseks arrest, a judge in West Virginia agreed he should go to live with Gene Kuhn in New Manchester.

But at the same time in Ohio, Judge Baronzzi was giving custody to Terry and Lori Lane in South Carolina.

Kuhn had custody of the boy just for the weekend, during which time he bought him a puppy and two new pairs of shoes and took him to church.

On Monday he sent him to Head Start School, only to be told later in the day that the child had been removed after the two judges had agreed that Ohio laws should apply.

Kuhn said he was looking after the boy only until he could be reunited with his younger brother  who lives with Rhonda Paseks sister in Dover, Delaware.
London's first Muslim Mayor has been paying a visit to Chicago's Jewish Mayor this week, as he sought to reassure Americans that the British capital is open for business after the European Union referendum vote.

Sadiq Khan, who took up office in City Hall in May, met Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel who signed a technology deal with the London Mayor.

'One of the reasons I'm here is to reassure friends in America, businesses, students, tourists, innovators, investors that London is open,' Mr Khan said.

London Mayor Sadiq Khan visits the Green Mill jazz club in Chicago with Rahm Emanuel, the city's Mayor

While London is open, Chicago is a city in crisis - racked with debt, unemployment and known as America's murder capital.

Chicago, in Illinois, is the third largest city in the USA, but it has a high rate of unemployment, crime and ranks highly for political corruptness.

The Democrat party has controlled City Hall for 90 years, and has incurred a 15 billion ($20 billion) bill in pensions payments thanks to generous schemes with unions, according to The Week.

Chicago has a 6.6 per cent rate of unemployment, the highest in any metropolitan area in the USA with more than one million residents.

In London, the unemployment rate is currently 7.5 per cent, higher than the national average.

Chicago also has high crime rates. In the year to date nearly 500 people have been shot and killed in the city, and 2,596 have been shot and injured.

The former police chief of the city said the rate of convictions is low because of a 'no snitch' mantra on the streets.

Comparatively, there were 118 murders in London in 2015.

Mr Khan said he was in America to tell its people that London was a city that is open after the European Union referendum vote in June

Chicago has high rates of unemployment, crime and its city hall is regularly described as one of the most corrupt, with the same party in power for 90 years

Police also face scrutiny for their handling of gun crime and gang violence. A long suppressed video from 2014 showed a white officer shooting a black teenager who was armed with a knife 16 times, with 14 of those bullets fired as the teen laid on the ground.

The Mayor of London tweeted during his visit to the Illinois city, and made comparisons between it and the British capital. He said the riverside walk could be inspiration for a project in Barking, and pledged he would work with Chicago, as leaders should build bridges not walls.

Mr Khan said during his visit to Chicago that London is demanding a seat at the table when the British government begins formally negotiating its exit from the EU, and will ensure the deal is a 'good one.'

London's first Muslim mayor, the son of a bus driver, came with another message for America, telling reporters that Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump was playing 'into the hands of extremists' with his hostile rhetoric toward Muslims.

But Mr Khan and his delegation of London-based entrepreneurs were primarily focused on trying to ease concerns over a British exit from the EU during their five-day trip to Montreal, Chicago and New York. Uncertainty over whether Britain will continue to have access to the EU's single, market has left financial experts worried about a big hit to the country's business sector.

Mr Emanuel signed a technology-partnership agreement with Mr Khan on Friday and said he wouldn't have done so if he had doubts about London's future status as a global city.

Mr Khan, left, told people he felt Donald Trump, the Republican presidential candidate, was playing into the hands of ISIS

The two men took a boat tour of the Chicago River, cruising past skyscrapers including one bearing Mr Trump's name in 20-foot tall letters.

Mr Emanuel showed off the city's new Riverwalk, a pedestrian and recreational path lined with cafes and businesses. They dropped in on a discussion about entrepreneurship at a Chicago tech hub known as 1871.

Mr Emanuel, who is Jewish, also planned to take Mr Khan to his synagogue.

'You have in Chicago a mayor of Jewish faith,' Mr Khan said. 'We have in London a mayor of Islamic faith. I think that message - our friendship - is a message that is bigger than the Brexit vote.'

Mr Khan used the trip to draw comparisons with the cities both electing Mayors of faith - one Jewish and one Islamic. He said the message was bigger than Brexit

Mr Emanuel signed a technology-partnership agreement with Mr Khan on Friday and said he wouldn't have done so if he had doubts about London's future status as a global city

On Thursday, Mr Khan delivered a speech at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs on the importance of social integration in diverse cities, saying a failure to do so makes it easier for 'terrorists to radicalize our young people.' Afterwards, he told reporters that Mr Trump plays to extremists.

'We shouldn't inadvertently play into the hands of extremists who say it's not possible to be somebody who is a mainstream Muslim and hold Western liberal values,' Mr Khan said.

During his five day trip across the Atlantic, Mr Khan will also visit New York and Montreal.
A video shows US commandos fleeing a town as American-backed Syrian rebels hurled a barrage of insults and abuse at them.

Footage captured a chanting crowd of fighters from the Free Syrian Army (FSA) surrounding US troops in the town of al-Rai near the Turkish border.

One rebel was heard yelling that Americans wanted to 'wage a crusader war' against Syria - showing the intricate web of alliances in the war-torn country, where many of America's allies are fighting each other.

Footage captured a chanting crowd of fighters from the Free Syrian Army (FSA) surrounding US troops in the town of al-Rai near the Turkish border

The clip is thought to be the first documentation of American special forces working alongside Turkish fighters against ISIS.

It shows crowds of rebels yelling anti-American slurs as they surround a line of trucks carrying US fighters.

'Christians and Americans have no place among us,' shouts one man, as the trucks drive away. 'They want to wage a crusader war to occupy Syria.'

Another rebel yells: 'The collaborators of America are dogs and pigs. They wage a crusader war against Syria and Islam. '

The US commandos are not in their traditional gear, but are identified by their round helmets and American weapons.

The confrontation took place in al-Rai - which was captured by Turkish-backed Syrian rebel groups from ISIS.

It shows the tensions within Syria, where US-backed rebel groups still feel opposed to American actions. It is not known if the conflict was a spontaneous confrontation or ordered by senior FSA figures.

One rebel was heard yelling that Americans wanted to 'wage a crusader war' against Syria - showing the intricate web of alliances in the war-torn country, where many of America's allies are fighting each other

The clip is thought to be the first documentation of American special forces working alongside Turkish fighters against ISIS

Senior fellow at the Middle East Institute Charles Lister, said the incident was triggered when FSA rebels accused the Americans of supporting Kurdish militia fighters - the People's Protection Units (YPG).

'Heated tempers and YPG relations aside, this was a big mistake by FSA. But it does go to show the diplomacy now required to make it work,' he told The Telegraph.

Turkey, which launched a military incursion into Syria in late August, has been backing the FSA.

Turkey is opposed to the YPG and its FSA delegates have fought with Kurdish fighters - even though they are both US allies fighting against ISIS

It comes as Turkey said on Friday that a ground operation could force out Islamic State extremists from their de facto capital of Raqa in Syria if it was supported by coalition air forces.

Speculation has grown of a possible joint Turkey-US operation to seize Raqa and possibly IS-held Mosul in northern Iraq after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan revealed he had discussed the issue with US counterpart Barack Obama at the G20 in China.

'If coalition forces give air support and our special forces take part, it is possible to be successful in clearing Daesh (IS) from Raqa and Mosul,' Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said at a joint press conference with NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg.

The confrontation took place in al-Rai - which was captured by Turkish-backed Syrian rebel groups from ISIS.

The NATO secretary general was one of the top Western officials to visit Turkey in the wake of the July 15 attempted coup aimed at bringing down the Turkish government.

Cavusoglu referred to the capture of the border town of Jarabulus in northern Syria last month as an example of how a ground operation could remove jihadists.

Pro-Ankara Syrian opposition fighters - the FSA - captured the town in just a day with Turkish support and are now pushing deeper into Syria.

'After the successful operation in Jarabulus, it was an example of how the Free Syrian Army could do certain things' with international support, he added.

The minister did not say from where the air support could come for a Raqa operation but Turkey hosts US warplanes at its Incirlik base.

Ankara launched its most ambitious military operation in Syria on August 24 against ISIS as well as a Syrian Kurdish militia linked to its own separatist rebels who launch attacks in Turkey.
Chipotle says its top marketing executive is back on the job, after being placed on leave this summer as a result of drug possession charges.

The burrito chain says Mark Crumpacker's return was announced internally last week, on September 8.

Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. announced June 30 that it placed Crumpacker on leave after a news report that he was one of the customers named in a New York cocaine ring indictment.

Chipotle says its top marketing executive, Mark Crumpacker, is back on the job, after being placed on leave during the summer of 2016 as a result of drug possession charges, pictured earlier in September

The burrito chain says Mark Crumpacker's return was announced internally September 8

Crumpacker is Chipotle's chief creative and development officer and had been in charge of the company's efforts to win back customers after an E. coli outbreak sent sales plunging

The 53-year-old executive turned himself to face cocaine possession charges on July 5.

Crumpacker is Chipotle's chief creative and development officer and had been in charge of the Denver company's efforts to win back customers after an E. coli outbreak last year sent sales plunging.

The businessman asked for cocaine to be delivered 13 times to his $2.5million apartment on West 13th Street near Union Square, and spent $3,000 according to the district attorney.

He was one of 18 New Yorkers who were caught up in a massive drugs sting earlier this summer.

Crumpacker has been accused of getting cocaine delivered to his apartment 13 times at his apartment in this building near Union Square in New York City

He crossed his arms as he made his way into court last week alongside his attorney Gerald Lefcourt (left)

The Manhattan District Attorney's office says Crumpacker's case is still open, with a court date for October 18.

Chris Arnold, a Chipotle spokesman, says the company conducted a review and is comfortable that 'none of the things Mark is alleged to have done occurred on business time.' He said Crumpacker also went through drug rehabilitation.

'We are a better company with him than without him,' Arnold said.

When the Chipotle executive appeared in court last week, he looked particularly glum as he tried to hide behind his sunglasses.

The judge then threatened him with prison time and mocked him with a series of food puns.

After adjourning the case for six weeks, Judge McLaughlin told Crumpacker he wanted to give him 'food for thought' and 'something to chew on'.

Crumpacker (pictured right, last week) was placed on administrative leave in July after he was named on a list of alleged drug buyers accused of using a livery service to get cocaine

The 53-year-old appeared in court last week hiding behind his sunglasses and surrounded by his legal team for his first hearing in the case

Crumpacker made just shy of $4.3million in total compensation in 2015 in his role as CMO at the Mexican fast food chain, receiving roughly $45,000 for housing expenses and over $30,000 for a company car.

Judge Edward McLaughlin said to Crumpacker and his lawyer in July: I don't want someone who is a purported bigshot to think they should be treated differently.'

Crumpacker was named Chipotle's first Chief Marketing Officer in January 2009, and according to his LinkedIn page he oversees all of the company's marketing functions including advertising, design, events, public relations, social media, and research.

In 2013, Crumpacker was named Chipotle's Chief Development Officer and now leads the company's real estate, design, construction and facilities functions worldwide.

Mark Crumpacker, Chipotle's former Chief Marketing Officer looked glum as he returned to court facing charges he had cocaine delivered 13 times to his $2.5million New York apartment

Prior to joining Chipotle, he was the founder, CEO and Creative Director at Sequence, a San Francisco-based branding and interactive agency.

The salaries of Chipotles top executives were hit earlier this year thanks to a damaging E. Coli outbreak linked to its restaurants.

Co-CEOs Steve Ells and Monty Moran had their pay cut in half in 2015. Ells pay dropped to $13.8m in 2015, down from $28.9 million; while Morans pay dropped to $13.6 million from $28.1 million. They were awarded no stock.

Crumpacker's salary also took a 20 percent hit in 2015 from one year prior.
One of them left Friday with her 10-year-old daughter who was bullied

Three women have been hired; will go live in tiny village of Whycocomagh

Promised a job, two acres of land and a nature and community-focused life

Urged potential employees from Canada to apply in ad posted this summer

A Canadian store located in a remote village promised a job, land and a whole new lifestyle to those willing to relocate.

The posting, shared this summer, attracted thousands of applicants who dreamed of a change of pace.

Among them was Sonja Andersen and her 10-year-old daughter Ava. The little girl was bullied for years at school, to the point of having anxiety attacks upon arriving at that school.

Sonja was one of three women picked by the store as their new hires. The mother-daughter duo, of West Vancouver, British Columbia, began their drive Friday to relocate across the country, more than 3,700 miles away.

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The Farmer's Daughter Country Market (pictured), a bakery and food store in the tiny village of Whycocomagh on Cape Breton island, Canada, offered potential hires a job and a new life

The store offered Canadian citizens the possibility to relocate to Cape Breton (left) on the easternmost end of Nova Scotia. Mortgage broker Sonja Andersen (right) got the job

The Farmer's Daughter Country Market, a bakery and food store, is located in the tiny village of Whycocomagh on Cape Breton island.

Cape Breton itself is at the easternmost end of Nova Scotia. It has about 100,000 residents. Whycocomagh has around 800.

After running out of potential hires, the Farmer's Daughter Country Market put out a plea on Facebook urging other Canadian citizens to relocate to the island and take up a new job at the store.

We are an established business in the heart of Cape Breton, rich in jobs, land, and potential, but no people,' the message, shared in August, read.

The store, which is typically busy between May and December, wanted environmentally conscious employees who wanted to start a new life focused on community and nature.

'If you take pride in being friendly, helpful, and positive and have skills in the food industry or customer service, then you are who we are looking for,' the post continued.

Owners Heather Coulombe (left) and Sandee MacLean (right), who are sisters, will keep sifting through the applications they received and plan to hire more workers

The job comes with two acres of land in Cape Breton (the region is pictured). Sonja wanted to relocate there with her 10-year-old daughter Ava for a change of lifestyle

The Farmer's Daughter Country Market (the store's fudge stand is pictured) received more than 3,500 applications and has picked three new employees so far

The ad didn't specify a salary but admitted the store couldn't offer 'big money' as wages in small Cape Breton businesses were 'not high'.

But it did offer two acres of land for the new hires to set up their home immediately. If the employees are still working for the Farmer's Daughter Country Market in five years, the land will officially become theirs.

There is no house on the land and the chosen applicants will have to set up their home themselves.

Owners Heather Coulombe and Sandee MacLean, who are sisters, received more than 3,500 applications.

They couldn't hire foreign workers due to work permit restrictions, but dozens of Facebook users from around the world expressed their interest regardless.

The two sisters have picked three women to join their team but plan to hire more people in the future.

'Don't worry - we are not done yet,' they told CTV News.

They plan to add three to four more employees to the store in the spring and will continue to sift through applications in the meantime.

Heather and Sandee announced least week that they had hired their first three new employees.

Kerry Walkins, Trish Tait and Sonja Andersen are all expected to move to Whycocomagh within the next couple of weeks.

Sonja and her 10-year-year-old daughter Ava began a long road trip Friday. Sonja, a mortgage broker in West Vancouver, applied to work at the Farmer's Daughter Country Market after struggling financially and mentally.

Three or four more people will get to move to Cape Breton (the region is pictured) in the spring as the Farmer's Daughter Country Market hires more employees

Sonja hopes she and Ava can be happy in Cape Breton (pictured). The little girl suffered years of bullying in school and her mother struggled financially

Ava suffered through five years of bullying at school, Sonja said on a Go Fund Me page.

The little girl had found herself friendless and had anxiety attacks when she had to go to school.

Sonja, even though she worked as a mortgage broker, struggled to make ends meet as a single parent.

Both were looking forward to start their new life, Sonja wrote.

When Sonja found out she had gotten the job, Ava put her head between her legs and started crying, the mother told CBC.

Sonja and Ava have never been to Cape Breton - in fact, they have never traveled beyond Alberta.

But Sonja is looking forward to meeting the people of Nova Scotia, whom she heard are the friendliest people on Earth.

In a year, she hopes she and her daughter will have a slower lifestyle and will have made new friends.

'We want to be sitting there, on our porch, smiling and saying we're happy,' Sonja said.
Can there be a lovelier sight than that of a small child hugging an adored pet?

Five-year-old Tara Adams snuggles in so far she practically disappears into the mass of hair.

The object of her affections, her beloved Solas, doesnt seem remotely bothered to be used as a pillow or to have tiny hands holding his face as she delivers a flood of kisses. Indeed he snuffles her hair too. Where child ends and cow begins, it is hard to tell.

Best friends: Tara Adams, five, loves to cuddle her pal Solas the Highland Cow

Solas, one of twins, was rejected by his mother after he was born, and had to be hand-raised. And Tara, whose father Ian is the stockman on owner Grace Nobles farm near Banchory, Aberdeenshire, came along to lend a hand

Yes, cow. For Solas is a Highland Cow  or, more accurately a bull calf, all of four months old  and this little love-fest is going on in the middle of a field.

Much as we humans love the Highland Cow (the shaggy-fringed breed, often to be found on postcards and biscuit tins) even in the cattle breeding world, few strive to get this close, or develop this sort of relationship.

But when Solas, one of twins, was rejected by his mother after he was born, he had to be hand-raised.

And Tara, whose father Ian is the stockman on owner Grace Nobles farm near Banchory, Aberdeenshire, came along to lend a hand.

As soon as she cradled the tiny creature and encouraged him to feed from a bottle (tiny is a relative term here; even at birth Solas weighed 32 kilos), she was smitten. They became inseparable.

When Tara jumps to her feet, yelling, Cmon wee man, Solas follows, albeit in a more lumbering fashion. Taras other passion is dancing, and she likes to try out her latest moves with him

Theres a tussle and a battle of wills as she tries to get him to drink from his bottle. Normally, calves will drink milk until they are about six months old; Solas  being headstrong  has decided it is already time to move on to grass

It was love at first sight, says her dad. From that moment, she couldnt wait to get over to feed him, groom him, or just sit with him.

Grace, who has an 80-strong herd, says shes never seen anything quite like it. In this world, lots of children get involved  and at all the agricultural shows there are special childrens sections. But Ive never seen a child this young develop such an affinity. Shes a natural with him.

Even before she started primary school (which she did last week), Tara was taking part in the host of cattle shows that are held over the summer in these parts.

Her mum Mary got her her own obligatory white show coat, miles too big, and Tara led her new charge around the ring, carefully steering, positioning and guiding him, as she had been shown how to do by her dad (who himself has a prize heifer).

It was love at first sight... she couldnt wait to get over to feed him, groom him, or just sit with him Tara's father, Ian

Of course, she and Solas stole the show  and now have the rosettes to prove it. As Tara brandishes them aloft, she chides Solas for being too keen to take his share of the glory. He always tries to eat them, she says.

Pity poor Crumble, then, Taras official pet. A rabbit, Crumble was, once, the softest, snuggliest (her word) creature imaginable. Now, its a tough call as to which one she prefers. I like both of them, she says, diplomatically.

Spending the afternoon with the littlest cowgirl in Britain is like stepping into a real-life Disney film. The adult Highland cattle in this field might have an unfortunate air of Donald Trump about them (there is a fine line between that comb-over looking majestic and it seeming simply daft), but Solas, the dinky version, is just cartoon cute.

As is Tara, who strides round the field in her yellow wellies, constantly hitching up her jeans and rolling her eyes when Solas is too slow to do whatever she wants him to do.

What an entertaining double-act this pair make. If they went on Britains Got Talent theyd bring the house down.

Even before she started primary school (which she did last week), Tara was taking part in the host of cattle shows that are held over the summer in these parts

When Tara jumps to her feet, yelling, Cmon wee man, Solas follows, albeit in a more lumbering fashion. Taras other passion is dancing, and she likes to try out her latest moves with him.

At one point he stands on her toe. Theres a tussle and a battle of wills as she tries to get him to drink from his bottle. Normally, calves will drink milk until they are about six months old; Solas  being headstrong  has decided it is already time to move on to grass.

Then its grooming time. Out comes the brush and Tara actually sits on top of Solas as she goes to town on that fringe. She tells me that she hasnt decided what she wants to be when she grows up, but maybe a farmer in the day, and a hairdresser at night.

Despite the preening this is still a working farm and danger is never far away. Shes never in the field on her own, explains Grace, when I query the issue of having a small child in the presence of such big horns.

Solas is still small for his age. Grace says this means hes never going to make a champion bull or be used for breeding.

So what future awaits him? When hes about 30 months, hell be off to the slaughterhouse, says Grace. What?! Oh Tara knows. Shes always known. She knows farms, and she accepts this is the way it is. Besides, by the time that happens, there will be other calves who need her.
Class sizes in British primary schools are among the largest in the developed world, fuelled by rising immigration and a baby boom.

The average teaching group has 26 pupils  beaten only by China, Japan, Israel and Chile, an influential global study has revealed.

This surpasses the size of classes in countries including Mexico, Turkey, the US, Australia, Latvia and Korea.

The findings from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development come amid rising immigration and a baby boom that began more than a decade ago.

The average teaching group in British primary schools now stands at 26, higher than the European Union average of 20. File photo

Primary class sizes in the UK state sector are the fifth highest out of 33 countries, according to data published by the OECD. They exceed the European Union average of 20 and the OECD average of 21.

China comes top with an average class size of 37, followed by Chile (29), Israel (28) and Japan with 27.

The OECD pointed out an anomaly in the UK education system, which sees the average size of state lower secondary classes at just 20. This is below the OECD average of 23 for this sector, and smaller than in UK primaries.

Andreas Schleicher, of the OECD, said that in most other countries, it would be the other way around.

Speaking at the launch of the organisations Education at a Glance report, he said: You ask yourself who needs really small classes, its the small kids. Thats where the impact of the smaller class can be more of a difference. In the UK, who gets the smaller classes, are the older kids.

The OECD research also shows the gulf between class sizes in state primary and private schools in Britain is wider than in any other nation. In UK prep schools, pupils are taught in groups of just 14.

The rise comes amid a baby boom which began more than a decade ago. File photo

Professor Alan Smithers, of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at Buckingham University, said the population is growing rapidly, driven in part by the large families that many immigrants are having.

A Department for Education spokesman said: Despite an increase in the number of children attending primary schools this year, the average primary class size remains stable and within legal limits.

The findings come as the DfE yesterday announced the creation of more than 80,000 pupil places at 77 free schools after a further 56 free schools opened this month.

Education Secretary Justine Greening said: The next wave of free schools means more options for parents so they can choose a place that really works for their childs talents and needs.
News / National

by Staff reporter

Disgruntled members of the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans Association have warned Zanu-PF against interfering with its structures vowing to defend themselves by any means.The association's spokesperson Douglas Mahiya said ex-freedom fighters purged from Zanu-PF and gathered to the effect that the ruling party's G40 faction was meddling in structures in various provinces in a bid to destabilise it.The out of favour former combatants said they are on a mission to democratise the country as they continue from here e left after liberating the country and that they will soon call for an all stakeholder conference.
The negotiations next year would pave the way for Britain to leave by 2019

Donald Tusk claims PM Theresa May said she trigger Article 50 by 2017

Theresa May has not told EU Council president Donald Tusk she plans to trigger Article 50 in January or February - despite claims to EU leaders she had done.

Mr Tusk claimed in a meeting with the remaining 27 states that Mrs May had revealed her planned timetable to begin the formal process of Brexit in January of February.

But Downing Street moved to cool speculation about a new year Brexit today by insisting such a timetable was merely an 'interpretation' of Mrs May's remarks to Mr Tusk.

European Council president Donald Tusk (pictured) revealed the timetable for Brexit at a meeting in Bratislava of the leaders of the 27 countries that will remain EU members

Police boats surrounded the cruise ship that the EU leaders were on as it went along the Danube river in Bratislava, Slovakia

Invoking Article 50 will trigger a two year negotiation on the terms of Brexit and doing so early in 2017 would pave the way for Britain to be out of the EU by early 2019.

EU leaders are meeting without Britain for the first time in Bratislava and have made clear there will be no concessions on free movement of people in return for keeping Britain inside the single market after Brexit.

But a Downing Street source said Mrs May did not specifically mention January or February at the meeting and that Mr Tusk's comments were an interpretation of their conversation.

The PM 'recognises the need to deliver on the public verdict without delay', the source added.

Yesterday, at the end of the day of talks in the Slovak capital, Mr Tusk stressed that they would 'protect the interests of the 27, not the leaving country' in negotiations.

'I hope we will be effective and maybe even stronger than before the British referendum,' he added.

European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker said he could not 'see any possibility of compromising' on the issue of not allowing Britain to restrict immigration from the EU if it wants to retain membership of the single market.

The meeting was supposed to be a show of unity, but it ended in farce with Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi breaking ranks to admit behind closed doors that the leaders were at loggerheads over how to move forward without Britain.

'I can't give joint press conference with Merkel and Hollande as I won't follow a script to make people believe we all agree,' he said.

Mrs May and Mr Tusk met for talks at Downing Street last week and discussed when Britain might trigger exit from the EU

Mr Tusk said Theresa May, who was not at the summit, had informed him of her desire to start the exit process in the new year

Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico, left, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, right, alight after taking a boat down the Danube river

Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban rebuked the other leaders whom he said had failed to change their 'self-destructive and naive' immigration policies.

He said that without Germany imposing a firm ceiling on the number of immigrants it is willing to take in, a 'suction effect' would continue to draw masses to Europe. 'Something must happen in that respect,' he said.

Mr Orban led a charge of those leaders wanting Brexit to be a turning point, with Brussels forced to hand back some powers to member states.

Mr Tusk, who chaired the meeting, said: 'It was a sad moment for Europe when the British people decided to leave.
A student at a Canadian college has been accused of using 'hate language' on campus by wearing a pro-Donald Trump hat.

The classic red 'Make America Great Again' hats - the slogan for the billionaire's presidential campaign - have become a point of contention for many in the lead-up to the election, and the situation at Mount Royal University in Calgary was no different.

Captured on video, the male student, Matt Linder, was approached by another student, Zoe Slusar, and told to remove the hat, which she described was a symbol of hate.

'You're not allowed to share hate language at a university,' Slusar shouted.

Speaking out: This Mount Royal University student, Zoe Slusar, confronted another student who was wearing a 'Make America Great Again' hat and demanded he remove it

Making a statement: Matt Linder was wearing the controversial cap on campus

Slusar continued: 'Make America Great Again means make America all for white people, no immigrants, no people of different sexual orientations.'

'You've got to take the hat off or I am going to write the president of the University. It's not allowed. It's hate language on campus.'

In the video, Linder is seen shaking his head and disagreeing with Slusar. He repeats numerous times that, despite what Slusar is saying, Trump is not against immigrants, but illegal immigrants, Heatstreet reported.

The clip has gone viral this week, fueling a debate as to whether Linder was allowed to wear the hat on a college campus.

The footage finishes with another student, a male, grabbing the hat from Linder's head and walking away.

Controversial cap: , Republican presidential candidate and business mogul Donald Trump speaks at his campaign pep rally in Ladd Peebles Stadium in Mobile, Alabama, in August

At the end of the video this student grabs the hat off Linder's head and takes it

Slusar posted this message to her Facebook after the video of her was posted online

Following the incident, and as the video spread, Slusar took to Facebook to say she is 'saddened' at the way people have reacted to what she did.

'Wearing a hat in support of a movement grown on the seeds of racism, bigotry and exclusion of diversity (sexual and cultural) could make some people afraid,' she wrote.

'People came out of the woodwork around us to support the hat, and after insulting me, they began filming my 'crazy' behavior at asking him to not wear the hat on campus.'

The Incident occurred at Mount Royal University in Calgary, Canada, this week

However, Slusar stands by her choice to confront Linder.

'I do want to state that I stand by my belief that every space, but especially university spaces, should be made to make everyone feel SAFE,' she wrote.

Melanie Rogers, a spokeswoman for Mount Royal University, would not specifically comment on the incident when contacted by the Calgary Herald.
The shockingly easy way that migrants can exploit shoddy border controls to slip into Britain undetected is exposed today by the Mail.

We have proved that terrorists, criminals and illegals can enter this country undercover with no security checks.

I sailed across the English Channel on a small inflatable boat from France without anyone stopping me, asking for my passport, or showing any sign of noticing when I landed on the Kent coast.

Together with a Mail photographer, I made the 31-mile journey to Dover from the French port of Gravelines, which lies between Calais and Dunkirk, the two busy towns where countless migrants wait to cross the Channel and get into Britain illegally.

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Bound for France: Together with a Mail photographer, I made the 31-mile journey to Dover from the French port of Gravelines

Into the shipping lanes, yet still unchallenged: Near the French coast, a vessel belonging to the French coastguard fleet ignored us

Tying up in Gravelines: We did not alert the officials to our arrival. And, as we left the inflatable moored up, there was nobody around who might have asked us where we had come from

Our findings about the UKs scandalously poor border controls come just days after six suspected illegal migrants jumped off a private yacht on the Suffolk coast and disappeared.

This coincided with a chilling report by an influential think-tank, the Adam Smith Institute, which warned that Britain is being left exposed to a terrorist attack by its failure to check thousands of people arriving from abroad.

Police and Border Force officials are still searching for the six people who went on the run from the village of Bawdsey, near Felixstowe, amid fears that people-smuggling gangs are operating with impunity as a result of bad border security on Britains coastline.

Time to go home, and still no port official on duty: We were told by sailors we met in Gravelines that we would not be asked if we were going to the UK because this was of no interest to the French

Landing opportunities: As we got near Dover, we passed miles of deserted beaches. If it had not been for the difficult weather, we would easily have landed on one of them

No inspection: Although told where to berth and giving the name, type and size of the boat, the Dover official did not query if we had come from abroad or ask our nationalities. Crucially, too, there were no checks on the boat for possible stowaways

They believe such international gangs are making millions of pounds by sailing small boats, carrying migrants, into the UK. National Crime Agency investigators say they land in quiet ports, beaches and inlets, as well as using the shortest Channel crossing-point from Calais into Dover.

Last month, a migrant group trying to reach the Kent coast in a small vessel was rescued from a sandbank. It was the eighth rescue of migrants by Border Force officers from seas off the Kent and Sussex coast since March.

To find out how easy it is to slip unchallenged into Britain by sea, I hired a skipper and a RIB (rigid inflatable boat) with an outboard motor from a maritime firm near Rye to take us from the Kent coast to France  and then, crucially, to make the return journey.

We used a credit card to pay for three days use of the boat, as well as giving a 1,000 damage-deposit.

We were not required to say where we planned to sail or if we would take the craft out of British waters. But our skipper was asked to show his up-to-date seafaring qualifications.

From Rye, we sailed to Dover to fill the RIB with fuel for the journey. Entering the harbour early on a Thursday morning, we headed for the visitors quay and tied up beside the Dover lifeboat, whose crew waved to us.

We bought enough fuel for the round-trip at a petrol station and carried it back to the boat.

The cost of 200 for the petrol would pose no problem for well-paid people-traffickers.

When we left the harbour an hour later, we used a radio to tell Dover Port officials that we were departing. An official asked us what direction we were taking and we said we planned to have a bit of fun out there and sail around the coast but that we had no ultimate destination in mind.

We were not asked by the port official if we were heading outside the UK and we did not divulge the fact that France was our destination.

As we set off, the waves were high and the weather was breaking fast. Onwards we went, towards the busy shipping lane running through the Channel.

Once in the shipping lane, we were surrounded by half a dozen cargo ships and a stationary fishing boat. The skipper explained that under maritime rules we were not allowed to cross the bows of the cargo vessels or make them change route by getting anywhere near them.

It meant we had to change course several times as the seas became rougher.

We then spotted HMS Tyne, a Royal Navy warship on operational duties off the South Coast which recently escorted two Russian vessels lurking in the Channel out of British waters. It was to the right, on the horizon.

Her crew, with sophisticated radar, must have seen us, too, yet they did nothing to stop us  although, it must be said, the warships responsibilities do not include checking boats such as ours.

Nearer the French coast, a vessel belonging to the French coastguard fleet also ignored us.

We were not asked by the Dover Port official if we were heading outside the UK and we did not divulge the fact that France was our destination

We had expected to get a radio message from its crew asking us for information about why we had left British territorial waters. But there was none.

It wasnt long before we were getting close to the shoreline.

We sped past Calais, where thousands of migrants have gathered to get to the UK, and could clearly see the towns magnificent Gothic-style town hall tower. At last, Gravelines came into view and we sailed up a man-made canal, which leads to the ports inland marina, and berthed at the side of it.

We did not alert the officials to our arrival. And, as we left the RIB moored up, there was nobody around who might have asked us where we had come from. We disembarked and went into the town for a coffee and then to find a hotel room for the night.

It was only later that our skipper approached the marina to request a safe berth for the boat overnight. The staff did not, however, ask where we had arrived from. Nor were we asked to show our passports or any other form of identity.

The next morning was our chance to test border security on the English coastline and we prepared for our return journey to Dover.

The three of us  our skipper, Mail photographer Andy Kelvin and I  left Gravelines at 6 am (7 am French time). Again, there was no port official on duty to ask about our movements. Indeed, we were told by sailors we met in Gravelines that we would not be asked if we were going to the UK because this was of no interest to the French.

And so, watched by early-morning walkers and cyclists, we roared back into the busy shipping lanes of the Channel.

Workers at a fish-packing factory and a French sailor tending his yacht on the quayside smiled at us as we went.

Rescued: Eighteen Albanians were on this inflatable that was sinking off Dymchurch in May

Bad weather had hit the Channel and our bows were lifted up and down by the waves. Once again, we re-routed to avoid the huge cargo vessels which dwarfed us.

The radio crackled occasionally and we stiffened, thinking we were about to be asked by coastguards on both sides of the Channel where we were going and why. Yet, every time, it was simply the maritime authorities broadcasting a weather warning to shipping.

Once again, we sailed within sight of HMS Tyne. There was no sign of the fleet of coastguard cutters which the French authorities say patrol their coast to stop migrants in dinghies and traffickers boats heading for the UK.

Just 35 minutes after leaving Gravelines, we could see the White Cliffs of Dover shimmering enticingly under the early morning sun in the distance.

As we got near Dover, we passed miles of deserted beaches. If it had not been for the difficult weather, we would easily have landed on one of them. As it was, we decided to sail to Dover itself. We reached the harbour walls, waiting as a ferry from France headed in before us.

We were told by sailors we met in Gravelines that we would not be asked if we were going to the UK because this was of no interest to the French

At this point, the skipper asked the port authority by radio about the best way to enter the harbour to find a berth for the boat overnight.

Again, there appeared to be a glaring lack of security. Although told where to berth and giving the name, type and size of the boat, the Dover official did not query if we had come from abroad or ask our nationalities.

This meant we were able to clamber freely off the RIB and walk into Dover town for a hearty breakfast. It was just after ten in the morning. Crucially, too, there were no checks on the boat for possible stowaways  even though, with piles of waterproofs and luggage on deck, we could easily have been hiding migrants.

Most worryingly, we never saw sight nor sound of a border official on either of our visits to Dover over two days. If we had landed on a deserted Kent or Sussex beach, we would certainly have expected there to be less chance of being challenged by immigration officials.

But in the busy port of Dover, we  perhaps naively  presumed our identities would have been checked. No wonder people-traffickers have been quick to exploit weak security controls along Britains coast. And certainly, there is no shortage of customers for them.

The French government says endless streams of migrants arrive on the countrys northern coast each day, where they congregate with 15,000 others already living in shanty camps there.

Most are hoping to get to England, where the ease of getting jobs on the black market, access to welfare benefits and free public services make them believe the UK is an El Dorado.

Over recent months, several people-smugglers have been caught bringing migrants from France illegally. Eighteen Albanians (including a woman and two children) were rescued by lifeboats from a sinking inflatable off Dymchurch, near Dover, early one morning in May. A dinghy, linked to the stricken inflatable, was found abandoned on the villages beach soon afterwards.

Two British men were later jailed, although their lawyer said they were only the hired boatmen in what appeared to be a sophisticated trafficking ring.

The same month, another 17 Albanian migrants were found in a catamaran at Chichester Marina in West Sussex, and, a few weeks earlier, two Iranians were found floating in an ill-equipped dinghy in the sea near Dover.

Our findings about the lack of border controls confirm what MPs said last month in a Home Affairs Select Committee report, which was critical of the UK and the EUs response to the migration crisis.

They complained that the number of Navy vessels available to patrol Britains coast is worryingly low and that the UK Border Force was clearly under-resourced, with a fleet of only five. The authorities suspect the people-smuggling gangs routinely use the route we took to clandestinely slip illegals into the UK.

This week, French charities reported that the so-called Jungle camp in Calais has become a slum for arrivals from the Horn of Africa  where they have joined thousands from Afghanistan, most of whom have relatives who have already made it across to England.

As security on UK-bound lorries, ferries and trains at Calais is tightened, the trafficking gangsters are turning to new  and more imaginative  methods of spiriting migrants secretly across the sea.

The gangs current rate for the crossing by boat is 12,000 per migrant  which means that our RIB, which could carry at least eight passengers at a squeeze, could have given a trafficker a 96,000 pay-day.

Above all, our investigation has exposed the shocking weaknesses of both the British and French border controls and reveals the immense challenge faced by our over-run Border Force, which has been left under-resourced by successive governments.

Hard-pressed border officials are responsible for screening around 225 million people travelling to the UK each year  policing all entry-points from major airports to areas of uninhabited coastline  but without sufficient manpower or the up-to-date screening equipment required.

We may not have been undercover migrants, criminals or terrorists, but we were able to sail into one of Englands busiest ports with impunity.

Unsurprisingly, many migrants know they have a good chance of success if they pay large sums to illegal trafficking gangs for a place on a boat like ours.

Certainly, our Channel crossing to the UK in broad daylight  and the failure by those meant to guard our shores to question us  makes a mockery of politicians promises to secure our sea borders.

And while this coastal front door to Britain remains wide open, it is certain that more unchecked migrants will get here.
Princess Anne has cancelled a trip to Africa on medical advice as she struggles to recover from a chest infection, Buckingham Palace revealed yesterday.

The Queens daughter had been due to fly to Botswana and Mozambique, but her brother Prince Andrew will go instead.

Anne, 66, had been resting privately at Balmoral this week on doctors orders after her engagements were cancelled.

Princess Anne (pictured) has been resting up at Balmoral this week on doctors' orders

Her spokesman revealed that she was briefly admitted to hospital for tests on September 9 and told to take things easy for a few days.

But it seems that the princess  known for being one of the hardest working royals, conducting more than 500 engagement a year  is recovering more slowly than had been anticipated.

A Buckingham Palace spokesman said: The Princess Royal is still recovering from a bad chest infection. HRHs working programme for next week has therefore been scaled back, with a number of engagements cancelled.

As a precaution, on the advice of doctors, the princess will not undertake the planned visit to Botswana and Mozambique at the end of the month. The Duke of York will now undertake this visit.

However, grandmother-of-three Anne will continue to carry out visits in the UK, going to Great Yarmouth in Norfolk on Wednesday.

The following day she is due in London and four days later in Wales.

The princess has returned home to Gatcombe Park in Gloucestershire to recover.

Yesterday she was seen out supporting her daughter Zara at the nearby Whatley Manor Horse Trials.

Princess Anne will be replaced by Prince Andrew (pictured) on the trip to Botswana and Mozambique

She walked around the event unaided, but did look uncharacteristically wan. And despite the mild weather, she wore four layers of clothing including a wax jacket, plus a tweed flat cap.

Anne was treated at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary on September 9 before being discharged and returning to Balmoral, where she was holidaying with the Queen and Prince Philip.

At the start of the month she joined her parents and Prince Charles at the Braemar Highland Games, which are held a short distance from the Royal Familys summer retreat in Aberdeenshire.

She also recently spent time in Brazil at the Olympic Games as a member of the International Olympic Committee.

She had been pictured with Team GB athletes before the opening ceremony of the Rio de Janeiro Games.

Ordinarily the princess has the same attitude to illness as her father who, when asked about his health, once barked: Do I look bloody ill?

A source told the Mail that the princess had a streaming cold when on official engagements in Russia earlier in the month but had soldiered through.
A Kansas State University student who posted a Snapchat that showed her wearing a black mud mask with a racial slur in the caption is no longer with the school.

The picture, which shows Paige Shoemaker and her friend Sadie Meier wearing L'Oreal Clay facial masks, was captioned: 'Feels good to finally be a n****r'.

Shoemaker said she would have been a senior at KSU this year, but was informed by administrators this week that she was no longer a student after the Snapchat debacle.

The Snap got the attention of the Twitterverse on Thursday after it was posted by a KSU student named Desmund, who identified Shoemaker as the original sender.

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Paige Shoemaker (pictured right with friend Sadie Meier) said she was kicked out of Kansas State U after sending this snapchat, which shows her wearing clay mask and using a racial slur

The Snap got the attention of the Twitterverse on Thursday after it was posted by a KSU student named Desmund, who identified Shoemaker as the original sender of the picture

'Welcome to Kansas State University. Where breakfast in the morning is some K-State Family with a side of racism,' read the post, which was retweeted more than 15,000 times in one day.

A screengrab of the Snapchat was also posted on the official Facebook page of Kansas State University, where it continued to spread like wildfire.

Shoemaker publicly apologized for the picture in a post on her Facebook on Thursday, but claimed that her and Meier were not wearing blackface.

'We clearly understand that what was said and done was completely disrespectful,' she wrote.

'I did want to inform everyone that it was NOT "black face" (sic), but it was a L'Oreal clay facial masks.'

'We never intended for the picture to offend anyone. We had only meant for it to be taken in a funny way, but we clearly understand that what we said should never be joked around about.'

'People shouldn't joke around about such a serious topic like this because it feeds into racism,' she continued.

'Ask anyone who knows us, we are the most accepting and least racist people. We know that we will ride up and learn from this mistake.'

Shoemaker publicly apologized for the picture in a post on her Facebook on Thursday, but claimed that her and Meier were not wearing blackface

Shoemaker also said she believed the picture was a 'joke' among her inner circle of friends that has since been taken 'way out of proportion'

'We will battle everyone for the right to make things right, because we know what we did was wrong.'

Shoemaker also said she believed the picture was a 'joke' that had been taken 'way out of proportion'.

'I mean, not that this is a good thing, that word just happens in our friend group,' she told KSNT.

'We know everyone is like calm. We're a big family. That word doesn't offend anyone in our group.'

'And when I sent it out to my friends, I knew that it wouldn't offend anyone. We did it for our friends as more of a joke.'

Shoemaker's apology hardly quelled critics on Facebook and Twitter, as others denounced those who defended her actions as being part of the problem.

'I guess it was just a coincidence the mask was black and you decided to say "feels good to finally be a n***a"', one Facebook user wrote.

If youre one of the people who think Paige Shoemaker isnt racist for her post then youre just as big of a problem as she is,' one user on Twitter wrote.

One KSU student tweeted at Shoemaker: Delete your account, pack your things and never come back to Kansas State University.

The tweet even caught the attention of actress Gabrielle Union, who posted a link to a story about the Snapchat with the simple caption: 'No no no no no'.

Angela Roberts, who said she previously attended a summer medical program with Shoemaker at University of MissouriKansas City, said she had 'completely lost respect' for the former student.

Shoemaker's apology hardly quelled critics on Facebook and Twitter, as others denounced those who defended her actions as being part of the problem

'I'm sorry, but unless you have stepped into the shoes of an African America, then you wouldn't understand & that explains why this is seemingly "nothing" to a lot of you guys,' she wrote.

'I'm speaking from experience. I've had a lot, I mean A LOT of mean, demolishing, and uncalled for comments made to me and about me Bc of the color of my skin.'

'Whether she is a racist or not, you should NEVER, make a public "joke" diminishing another culture, especially on a sensitive topic,' Roberts continued.

'What she did was wrong, and I have completely lost respect for her as a Former UMKC scholar student and I definitely would NOT want to have her as a doctor.'

KSU and organizations affiliated with Shoemaker were quick to respond to the controversy.

Shoemaker's former sorority, Zeta Tau Alpha, issued a statement, noting that she had been 'expelled' from their organization in the spring of 2015.

'Her words and actions certainly do not reflect the values and principles of Zeta Tau Alpha,' a spokeswoman told Complex.

Zeila Wiley, the interim associate provost for diversity, and Pat Bosco, the school's vice president for student life and dean of students, also released statements.

Wiley wrote in her letter that Shoemaker was 'not currently enrolled at the university' and noted that Meier was 'not associated with it' in anyway.

KSU and organizations affiliated with Shoemaker were quick to respond to the controversy

The administrator said that the Campus Climate Response Team, which includes the Office of Diversity and Office of Student Life, met immediately after the photo was brought to the school's attention.

'This racially offensive photo with a derogatory message has upset the K-State family and is not in concert with our principles of community,' she wrote.

'Such messages on social media are harmful to all.'

Bosco wrote in his letter that he became aware 'one of our students' posted a 'racially offensive photo...and used one of the most derogatory words in the English language'.

'This photo has students, faculty, staff and other members of the K-State family upset,' he continued.

'It rightly should, as there is no place for racism at our university, regardless of what the intentions may have been.'

'K-State prides itself on being one family, no matter your race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation or abilities. All members of the K-State family deserve to be treated with dignity and respect.'
Pope Francis donned surgical scrubs and a mask to cradle premature babies in a surprise visit to a Rome hospital.

Francis seemed enchanted by the 12 tiny babies squirming, sleeping and crying in the neonatology unit of San Giovanni hospital, where he left a papal medal in each crib.

The Argentine pontiff held the newborns in his arms and later greeted new parents at the maternity ward and nursery upstairs.

Pope Francis donned surgical scrubs and a mask to cradle premature babies in a surprise visit at a neonatology unit of San Giovanni hospital in Rome

Francis seemed enchanted by the twelve tiny babies squirming, sleeping and crying, and left a papal medal in each crib

He cradled newborn Emiliano, asking 'Is he eating well?' and inquired about other babies.

Five of the babies, including a pair of twins, were in intensive care and were intubated.

Pictures showed the Pontiff shaking hands with some of the parents, as staff gathered round and snapped photos on their phones.

Each month of his Holy Year of Mercy, Francis spends one Friday afternoon outside the Vatican performing an act of mercy.

The Vatican said he wanted to send a message about respecting life at all stages, from its start to natural death.

The Argentine pontiff reached out his finger to place in the hand of one of the newborns

Five of the babies, including a pair of twins, were in intensive care and were intubated

'The Pope, who was greeted with astonishment by the staff, put on a face mask and underwent all the necessary hygiene precautions for the aseptic environment,' the statement said.

The Pontiff later went across the city to visit the 'Villa Speranza' hospice which cares for 30 terminally ill patients.

The two visits continue his monthly series of unannounced trips.

'Days after canonising Mother Teresa a 'who gave great service in favour of life,' the Argentinian pontiff wanted to visit 'two very symbolic buildings,' the Vatican statement said.

He cradled newborn Emiliano, asking 'Is he eating well?' and inquired about other babies
A woman who had to have an emergency caesarean was given a county court judgment for overstaying in a car park while she was in hospital.

Sarah Jones, 32, went to Macclesfield District General Hospital for repeated check-ups after passing the due date for her second child.

When she was ten days overdue, doctors could not hear a heartbeat so urgently took her to the operating theatre to save the baby.

Her daughter Valentina was delivered safely and hospital staff told Miss Jones and partner Robert not to worry about their car. But parking contractors ParkingEye sent a ticket anyway for overstaying.

She then had her credit rating ruined after the firm had a CCJ passed without her knowledge at an address she had not lived at for five years. Miss Jones is one of more than 60,000 issued CCJs by ParkingEye in the past three years.

The firm manages hospital car parks across Britain, despite a Government pledge two years ago to crack down on parking cowboys at NHS sites.

Other victims: Sue and Antony Evans couldn't get a mortgage because of a CCJ which was on Antony's file which he didn't know about, just as Miss Jones had her rating ruined by a CCJ she couldn't defend

Miss Jones contacted the Mail after we revealed banks, utility firms and parking cowboys are obtaining hundreds of thousands of CCJs every year over alleged debts as small as 1p. More than eight in ten are uncontested, with firms sending claims to old addresses.

Theresa May has now ordered an investigation and pledged to root out abuse of the CCJ system.

Miss Jones, a designer from Knutsford, Cheshire, faced a battle through the courts with ParkingEye. She and her partner had visited the hospital a number of times after her due date and paid to park.

She said: I was told they could not find my babys heartbeat and they had to do a C-section and put me to sleep.

It was horrendously stressful. It all happened so fast. Obviously the last thing on my mind was the car. But this year, the couple, who also have five-year-old daughter, Tatiana, found she had a CCJ when they tried to move house. They were rejected because of a black mark on her credit file  a CCJ from ParkingEye for 167.

Year of hell: Teaching assistant, Sarah Becker was blocked from getting a mortgage because of a 1 parking fine

The court had recorded the ticket as being issued on the date Miss Joness daughter was born. But ParkingEye insists it was for a few days earlier, when she had another appointment.

Miss Jones said: ParkingEye showed no compassion. They were not bothered about what happened to me.

I rang the hospital and said, how can you let this happen? I was so upset. They completely wiped their hands of it. The car has only ever been registered to my current address. The car wasnt even made when I lived at the other address. There was no excuse.

Miss Jones was advised by an estate agent to pay but refused out of principle. It took a year of battling through the courts and 255 in costs to have the CCJ removed. The case was thrown out in July.

We lost the house and this caused so much stress whilst I was on maternity leave, Miss Jones said.

East Cheshire NHS Trust, which runs the hospital, started using ParkingEye to manage its car parking in January 2015  after guidance from Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt had called for hospitals to use parking systems where drivers pay when they leave.

The guidance made clear NHS trusts were responsible for the actions of contractors and parking firms should not be incentivised to give out charge notices. Under its deal with ParkingEye, the trust takes money from tickets bought, but ParkingEye profits from handing out fines.

Campaigner Dave Hotchin has heard from about 100 drivers targeted at the hospital, including a mother whose baby was brought in with breathing difficulties. This is making peoples lives a misery, he said.

The Department of Health said patients should not have to face the added stress of unfair parking charges.

East Cheshire NHS Trust claims it was not aware Miss Jones had received a CCJ.

Mortgage refused: Media consultant James Smith was turned down because of a CCJ he knew nothing about. Miss Jones' had a CCJ against her at an address she hadn't lived at for five years

PARKING FIRM BOSS POCKETS 50,000 A WEEK The fat cat in charge of ParkingEye earns 51,000 per week. Andy Parker, 47, was paid 2.68million last year as chief executive of outsourcing giant Capita, which owns the firm. The deal came as ParkingEye had thousands of CCJs taken out against motorists for alleged parking debts. Capita runs more than 100 businesses, bringing in revenue of 4.6billion a year  with more than 2billion in public sector contracts such as collecting TV licence payments. Mr Parker, who lives with his wife and two sons in a 2million home in Loxley, Warwickshire, was promoted in March 2014, four months after the firm bought ParkingEye for 23.9million. Since the purchase, the parking firm appears to have become much more vigorous, increasing claims against drivers. In 2014/15 it made the fifth-most claims, with at least 16,011, and last year was fourth with 22,714 claims. Mr Parkers earnings last year were made up of a 550,000 base salary, a bonus of 550,000 and a long-term incentive plan of shares worth 1.5million for the year. Capita said his salary was among the lowest for CEOs of similar-sized FTSE firms. Advertisement

ParkingEye claims it sent Miss Jones four letters at her current address. But she did not receive them. The firm then had the CCJ issued to her old address.

A spokesman said: ParkingEye does everything it can to secure the correct details when contacting motorists.

Court action is always a final resort and we actively encourage people who receive a parking charge to appeal if they consider that there are extenuating circumstances.
Nathalie Dauriac-Stoebe (pictured) claims shares worth 15m were taken from her

A French wine heiress locked in a court battle with City tycoon John Caudwell says two more women have come forward to back her case.

Nathalie Dauriac-Stoebe was a protege of the Phones 4u founder, but claims that shares worth 15million were taken from her.

She says the billionaire 'concocted' false allegations that she fiddled her expenses to justify sacking her from a wealth management firm which she fronted. He denies her claims.

Now Mrs Dauriac-Stoebe, 38, says two other businesswomen have stepped forward to say a similar thing happened to them. It means Mr Caudwell faces the prospect of a showdown with the three women lining up against him in the bitterly-fought case.

Tracy Gehlan, 48, was an executive at Mr Caudwell's health and fitness chain Jatomi, which runs gyms in several countries. She was employed as a group chief executive in April 2015, but London's High Court heard she was sacked in February this year, four days before her 200,000 bonus was due.

Mr Caudwell told her he 'always sets the bonuses high but then finds a way to fire the employee before he has to pay it', according to her witness statement.

She said an investigation into her expenses was launched 'to find some evidence' to justify her firing.

John Caudwell (pictured) faces the prospect of a showdown with three women lining up against him in the bitterly-fought case

Suzette Burger, a marketing executive at Jatomi, allegedly suffered the same fate.

Mrs Gehlan, from Alloa in Scotland, said: 'Following the comments made by Mr Caudwell in relation to his strategy of firing employees before bonuses were paid, Miss Burger and I highly suspected that we would be removed from the company [before] our own contractual bonuses  200,000 for me and 75,000 euros for Miss Burger  had to be paid.'

She added: 'We were in no doubt that Mr Caudwell was trying to find some evidence of expenses fraud as a way to terminate our employment.'

Mr Caudwell, who denies all the allegations, yesterday branded Mrs Dauriac-Stoebe's application to introduce the other two women to her case as a 'misguided attempt to generate publicity'. His spokesman said: 'The amendments are irrelevant and relate to two individuals who have nothing at all to do with Signia Wealth or these proceedings.'

Mrs Dauriac-Stoebe, who was a senior partner at the Queen's bank Coutts by the age of 26, set up wealth management firm Signia with Mr Caudwell in 2009.

As chief executive she was paid 200,000 a year, with a 300,000 annual bonus. She owned 49 per cent of the firm, and Mr Caudwell 51 per cent, both through offshore trusts.

Tracy Gehlan (pictured) was employed as a group chief executive in April 2015, but London's High Court heard she was sacked in February this year

Suzette Burger (pictured) allegedly suffered the same fate as Mrs Gehlan and has also come forward

But when the partnership turned sour, she claims he made up false allegations about her misusing expenses worth 33,000, to justify sacking her and taking back her shares worth 15million. She denies telling her assistants to fiddle her expenses, which she claims were all justified.

Her visits to Mr Caudwell's yacht in the Seychelles, south of France and Caribbean were all part of her job, she said. And she claimed she twice needed to hire a private chef at her 7.5million Hampstead home to entertain wealthy clients.

In July 2013, the mother-of-two also claimed money to go to a wine tasting event at her father's chateau in Bordeaux, to which many of Signia's key clients had been invited.
Searchers have found the body of an 18-year-old Maryland man accused of fatally stabbing his 10-year-old stepsister and wounding his 13-year-old stepbrother, authorities said.

The body of Andres Rafael Quintana Garcia was found at about 11am on Friday in an area with trees and brush near the family's Glen Burnie home, where Monday's attack occurred, Anne Arundel County Police spokesman Lt Ryan Frashure said by telephone and in a news release.

Law enforcement officials had been searching for Garcia after they obtained an arrest warrant for him, but could not find him for days.

At this time, police said preliminary information indicates Garcia had been dead for some time and took his own life, according to WBAL-TV.

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Police said they have found the body of Andres Rafael Quintana Garcia (left), 18, of Maryland, who was wanted in the fatal stabbing of his 10-year-old stepsister, Ruby Ramirez (right)

Garcia pulled a knife and stabbed two family members, ages 10 and 13, at their home in Maryland (pictured following the attack) on Monday, police said

The body has been taken to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner to determine the cause and manner of death, Frashure said.

'Officers that have been searching for Garcia have several mixed emotions,' Frashure told the Capital Gazette by email on Friday.

'While it is tragic that this young man took his own life, they are hoping that the family can begin the healing process.'

His younger siblings were stabbed on Monday when a family dispute escalated, according to Frashure.

The girl, identified on Friday as Ruby Ramirez, died and her brother, who has not been identified, was released from a hospital on Thursday, he said.

An autopsy on Ramirez found the cause of death was multiple stab and cut wounds indicating homicide, according to WBAL-TV.

Law enforcement officials had been searching for Garcia after they obtained an arrest warrant for him, but could not find him for days

At this time, police said preliminary information indicates Garcia had been dead for some time and took his own life

Investigators said the children were at home, without their parents, when an argument with the suspect turned violent, CBS Baltimore reported.

Garcia allegedly pulled a knife and stabbed the two family members.

Neighbors at the time heard screaming and doors slamming.

'My first instinct was that it was two kids playing, and then something kept telling me that this sounded more stressful,' neighbor Rhonda Hill told CBS.

First responders found the victims at about 7.42pm at the home on the 6400 block of Roots Drive in Glen Burnie.

Both victims were treated at the scene and transported to nearby hospitals, and Garcia fled the scene and disappeared.

On Thursday, a candlelight vigil was held for Ramirez and family and friends left flowers, candles and stuffed animals on their door step (pictured)

'Ever since the assault, we believed that he was in this area because he simply didn't have a lot of resources,' Frashure said on Friday.

'Evidence pointed right after the assault (that) he left the house very quickly, he didn't pack a bag, there was no indication that he grabbed clothing, nothing like that, he had no cellphone.

'So we had his passport. He had only been in this area for approximately six months.

'He came from the northern Virginia area, moved up here with family, so we believe that his resources here were limited.'

Ramirez was a fifth grader at Hilltop Elementary School and had just enrolled in county schools last month, according to Anne Arundel County Public Schools spokeswoman Maneka Monk.

Monk told the Capital Gazette by email on Friday that it had been a 'tough week' for the school.

'No school community wants to face losing one of its youngest members,' Monk said.

'Students and staff are coping the best they can by leaning on each other and coming closer together as a community.'

On Thursday, a candlelight vigil was held for Ramirez.

Prior to Friday's discovery of Garcia's body, he had been facing charges of murder, assault and reckless endangerment.
A Florida man who fired a gun at George Zimmerman's truck during a road-rage confrontation has been convicted of attempted second-degree murder.

Jurors also found 37-year-old Matthew Apperson guilty Friday of shooting into a vehicle and aggravated assault with a firearm.

He faces sentencing on October 17.

Florida man, Matthew Apperson (pictured) who fired a gun at George Zimmerman's truck during a road-rage confrontation has been convicted of attempted second-degree murder

The trial opened Tuesday in the Seminole County Courthouse. During the trial, Zimmerman told the jury: 'I heard a bang and my ears started ringing'

But prosecutor Stewart Stone told jurors that Zimmerman's vehicle had tinted windows, which were rolled up during the confrontation

Apperson testified that he acted in self-defense last year.

He said he fired at Zimmerman during the confrontation because Zimmerman flashed a gun.

But prosecutor Stewart Stone told jurors that Zimmerman's vehicle had tinted windows, which were rolled up during the confrontation.

Apperson's attorney, Michael LaFay, attacked Zimmerman's credibility, calling him a liar.

The trial opened Tuesday in the Seminole County Courthouse.

During the trial, Zimmerman told the jury: 'I heard a bang and my ears started ringing.'

The incident on May 11, 2015 was not the first encounter between Apperson and Zimmerman.

Apperson alleged in September 2014 that Zimmerman threatened him in a road-rage encounter, but did not press charges at the time.

The incident (pictured) on May 11, 2015 was not the first encounter between Apperson and Zimmerman. Apperson alleged in September 2014 that Zimmerman threatened him in a road-rage encounter, but did not press charges at the time

Apperson (pictured walking into the court room) testified that he acted in self-defense last year. He said he fired at Zimmerman during the confrontation because Zimmerman flashed a gun

During the later exchange, Zimmerman testified that Apperson asked whether he remembered him and said he didn't press charges earlier 'because I wanted to kill you myself'.

Zimmerman was acquitted three years ago in the fatal shooting of unarmed black teen, Trayvon Martin, during an altercation.

On the day the 17-year-old was fatally shot, he and his father were visiting his father's fiancee and her son at her town home in Sanford, Florida.

The 2012 case sparked protests and a national debate about race relations in America.

And the 2013 acquittal of Zimmerman on the charge of murdering Martin, inspired a Facebook posting that included the phrase 'black lives matter', which later became the name of the Black Lives Matter movement.

Zimmerman called members of the Black Lives Matter movement 'terrorists' during a bizarre outburst while testifying against Apperson.

Zimmerman was acquitted three years ago in the fatal shooting of unarmed black teen, Trayvon Martin, during an altercation

The Black Lives Matter movement was brought up in court by Apperson's attorney LaFay.

LaFay noted that Zimmerman called Apperson a 'BLM sympathizer' in a post he made to auction the gun he used to kill 17-year-old Travyon Martin in 2012.

But on Wednesday Zimmerman denied that he ever associated Apperson with the BLM movement.

LaFay than asked it was correct to state that the BLM movement began in part after Zimmerman was acquitted of charges in Martin's death, a decision that sparked protests throughout the country.

Zimmerman replied that he didn't believe BLM was a movement at all.
News / National

by Staff reporter

PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe's wife Dr Grace Mugabe yesterday donated school uniforms and shoes to 500 schoolchildren in Chivi South, bringing to 2 500 the number of vulnerable primary and secondary school pupils in the constituency who have benefited from her benevolence over the past few months.According to media reports, the donation by the Dr Mugabe was supported by Chivi Rural District Council chair Councillor Killer Zivhu who also donated four tonnes of maize-meal to the elderly, orphans and schoolchildren to mitigate crippling food shortages in the arid district.Speaking at the handover of the donation, Chivi South, Clr Zivhu paid tribute to the First Family for their readiness to always assist the people of Chivi South.Clr Zivhu said Zimbabweans were supposed to continue rallying behind Dr Mugabe because of her relentless desire to improve the welfare of vulnerable members of the society in Zimbabwe.Among the schoolchildren who received uniforms and shoes donated by the First Lady were pupils from Zunga Primary and Neruvanga Secondary School in Chivi South.
The debate over whether women should fight on the frontline for the British Army has taken a surprising new twist after it emerged a female is already able to do so.

Chloe Allen, 24, has made history after becoming the first woman allowed to fight in combat roles as an infantryman.

The transgender soldier currently serves as a Guardsman in the 1st Battalion, Scots Guards, and signed up to the force in 2012 as a man called Ben.

The announcement comes just two months after former Prime Minister David Cameron said women should be allowed to fight on the frontline.

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Chloe Allen, 24, (pictured) has become the first woman to be able to fight on the frontline for the British Army

The announcement comes just two months after former Prime Minister David Cameron (pictured) said women should be allowed to fight on the frontline

The Army's decision to let Ms Allen remain in her unit means she will carry on driving a 28-tonne Mastiff armoured truck and continue as a Rifleman. And her role in the Scots Guards also means she conducts ceremonial duties and takes part at Trooping the Colour

The rules regarding whether women can do so changed in July - and Ms Allen is officially the first female to be able to do so, reports The Sun.

Ms Allen, from Cumbria, was first spotted wearing women's clothes by a colleague just as she was about to guard a royal palace.

She was patrolling high-profile residencies in London while she was on deployment and after being seen by a fellow serviceman, she was petrified about telling her regiment.

But she revealed that the whole battalion has been 'brilliant' after hearing her news.

She told the newspaper: 'It's a great honour to make history. I'm just looked at as a normal person.'

Ms Allen, who wears silver earrings and has long polished nails, has now started hormone therapy and is relieved she told her colleagues.

She said that she was 'living a lie' while serving as Mr Allen and revealed that she started cross-dressing aged eight.

Ms Allen added: 'The whole sort of worry that I had, I shouldn't have even worried. The entire battalion's been brilliant.

'If it hadn't happened I'd still be living a lie now.'

Ms Allen, who is based in Aldershot, Hampshire, told her boss that she wanted to serve as a woman one year after she opened up to her family.

And after completing all of the paperwork with the Army, she will still serve as an infantryman and will continue to wear the same uniform.

Ms Allen, from Cumbria, was spotted wearing women's clothes by a colleague as she was just about to guard a royal palace (pictured, Buckingham Palace)

The Army's decision to let Ms Allen remain in her unit means she will carry on driving a 28-tonne Mastiff armoured truck and continue as a Rifleman.

And her role in the Scots Guards also means she conducts ceremonial duties and takes part at Trooping the Colour.

After the new rules were introduced, it was thought it would not be until 2018 when a woman would be able to fight on the frontline.

The revelation makes Ms Allen the first and only female infantry soldier in the British Army since it began more than 850 years ago.

General Sir James Everard, Commander of the Field Army, said he was 'delighted' to have the Army's first female serving as an infantryman.

He also applauded Ms Allen's 'courage' for being a 'trendsetter' and added that the British Army is proving to be an 'inclusive organisation'.

In July, Mr Cameron announced that female soldiers would be allowed to fight on the frontline.

Ministers carried out a consultation on lifting the ban, and the head of the Army, General Sir Nick Carter, recommended the move.

Mr Cameron said in July: 'I agree with his advice and have accepted his recommendation. I have asked that this is implemented as soon as possible.

'It is vital that our armed forces are world-class and reflect the society we live in. Lifting this ban is a major step.
A female panda cub has been named 'Peanut' in China.

The tiny bear met the public for the first time yesterday - 10 weeks after she was born at the Shanghai Wild Animal Park, reported the People's Daily Online.

The name 'Peanut', or 'Hua Sheng' in Chinese, was chosen after winning a poll organised by the park and participated by around 50,000 people.

Un-bear-ably cute: A baby panda has been named 'Peanut' by a wild animal park in Shanghai

Hello, nice to meet you: The two-month old animal is the first panda to be born in Shanghai

According to the park, they chose the name 'Hua Sheng' because it means 'to take root, to grow and to breed'.

Peanut is the first panda to be born in Shanghai.

The cub is the child of 20-year-old panda Guo Guo, who gave birth to her on July 9.

Cao Liang, the deputy director of the Shanghai Wild Animal Park, said the baby panda is in 'great health'.

Mr Cao told local reporters: 'She weighs 3,285 grams (116 ounces) now. When she was born, she only weighed 151 grams (5.3 grams).

Peanut had also grown from 14.3 centimetres (5.6 inches) to 52 centimetres (20 inches) in length, according to Mr Cao.

I love you, mum: Peanut is the child of 20-year-old panda Guo Guo, who gave birth to her on July 9. The pair were pictured together on September 9

Important moment: The panda turned two months old on September 9 and a handful of lucky visitors had met her ahead of the public debut

Strong girl: Peanut measures 116 ounces in weight and 20 inches in length. She is in great health, according to the zoo

Mr Cao also said Peanut could open her eyes, but she was not able to crawl yet.

Pictures released by Chinese media show Peanut snuggling up to her mother and getting measured during her debut.

Visitors scrambled to take pictures of the fluffy animal, whose black-and-white coat was just thick enough to cover the pink skin.

An expert from Chengdu-based Panda Foundation told MailOnline that a newborn panda's weight is one-thousandth of its mother's.

A panda is born with pink skin and white fur. Black fur starts to grow when the cub reaches one week old.
China has launched its second experimental space station.

The successful launch is a sign of the growing sophistication of the country's military-backed space program, that intends to send a mission to Mars in the coming years.

The Tiangong 2 was carried into space on Thursday night on a Long March 7 rocket from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on the edge of the Gobi Desert in northern China.

China has launched its second experimental space station. The successful launch is a sign of the growing sophistication of the country's military-backed space program, that intends to send a mission to Mars in the coming years

TIANGONG 2: THE MISSION Tiangong 2 lifted off on a Long March rocket just after 10 PM local time (1400 GMT) yesterday from the remote launch site in Jiuquan, in the Gobi desert. The Shenzhou 11 spacecraft, which will carry two astronauts and dock with Tiangong 2, will be launched sometime next month. The astronauts expect to remain in Tiangong 2 for about a month, testing systems and processes for mid-term stays in space and refuelling, and conduct medical and other experiments. Advertisement

Plans call for the launch next month of the Shenzhou 11 spaceship with two astronauts to dock with the station and remain on board for a month.

The station, whose name means 'Heavenly Palace,' is considered a stepping stone to a mission to Mars by the end of the decade.

China's first space station, Tiangong 1, was launched in September 2011 and officially went out of service earlier this year, after having docked with three visiting spacecraft.

China insists its space programme is for peaceful purposes, but the US Defense Department has highlighted its increasing space capabilities, saying it was pursuing activities aimed to prevent adversaries from using space-based assets in a crisis.

Administrators suggest a manned landing on the moon may also be in the program's future. China could start building its space station starting as early as next year, Xinhua quoted Zhou Jianping, chief engineer of the manned spaceflight programme, as saying

Tiangong 2, lifted off on a Long March rocket just after 10 PM local time (1400 GMT) yesterday from the remote launch site in Jiuquan, in the Gobi desert. The Shenzhou 11 spacecraft, which will carry two astronauts and dock with Tiangong 2, will be launched some time next month

China conducted its first crewed space mission in 2003, becoming only the third country after Russia and the US to do so, and has since staged a spacewalk and landed its Yutu rover on the moon

CHINA'S SPACE STATION China could start building its space station starting as early as next year, Xinhua quoted Zhou Jianping, chief engineer of the manned spaceflight programme, as saying. 'Once the lab mission comes to an end, China will start building our own space station,' Zhou was quoted as saying. The station would be more economically efficient than the International Space Station and use 'more data', he said. China will launch a 'core module' for the station some time around 2018, a senior official said in April, part of a plan for a permanent manned space station in service around 2022. China was prevented from participating in the International Space Station, mainly due to US concerns over the security risks of involving the increasingly assertive Chinese military in the multinational effort. Advertisement

In a manned space mission in 2013, three Chinese astronauts spent 15 days in orbit and docked with the Tiangong 1.

Its successor, Tiangong 2, lifted off on a Long March rocket just after 10 PM local time (1400 GMT) yesterday from the remote launch site in Jiuquan, in the Gobi desert.

The Shenzhou 11 spacecraft, which will carry two astronauts and dock with Tiangong 2, will be launched some time next month.

The astronauts expect to remain in Tiangong 2 for about a month, testing systems and processes for mid-term stays in space and refuelling, and conduct medical and other experiments.

China conducted its first crewed space mission in 2003, becoming only the third country after Russia and the US to do so, and has since staged a spacewalk and landed its Yutu rover on the moon.

Administrators suggest a manned landing on the moon may also be in the program's future.

China could start building its space station starting as early as next year, Xinhua quoted Zhou Jianping, chief engineer of the manned spaceflight programme, as saying.

China will launch a 'core module' for the station some time around 2018, a senior official said in April, part of a plan for a permanent manned space station in service around 2022

China insists its space programme is for peaceful purposes, but the US Defense Department has highlighted its increasing space capabilities, saying it was pursuing activities aimed to prevent adversaries from using space-based assets in a crisis

China is also developing the Long March 5 heavier-lift rocket needed to launch other components of the Tiangong 2

'Once the lab mission comes to an end, China will start building our own space station,' Zhou was quoted as saying.

The station would be more economically efficient than the International Space Station and use 'more data', he said.

China will launch a 'core module' for the station some time around 2018, a senior official said in April, part of a plan for a permanent manned space station in service around 2022.

China was prevented from participating in the International Space Station, mainly due to US concerns over the security risks of involving the increasingly assertive Chinese military in the multinational effort.

A source of enormous national pride, China's space program plans a total of 20 missions this year at a time when the US and other countries' programs are seeking new roles.

China is also developing the Long March 5 heavier-lift rocket needed to launch other components of the Tiangong 2 and other massive payloads.

The country plans to land a rover on Mars by 2020, attempting to recreate the success of the US Viking 1 mission that landed a rover on the planet four decades ago.

China has been working to develop its space programme for military, commercial and scientific purposes, but is still playing catch-up to established space powers the US and Russia.
The findings could be used in future to help prevent violent crimes

The way people walk can provide clues about their personality, claims a new study.

Using motion capture technology, researchers found that movements reveal certain personality traits, such as aggression, agreeableness and extroversion.

The technology is widely used in film to capture the movements of an actor, which are then translated to an animated character on screen.

The way people walk can provide clues about their personality, claims a new study. Using motion capture technology, researchers found that movements revealed certain personality traits, such as aggression, agreeableness and extroversion

WHAT YOUR WALK REVEALS Aggressive - exaggerated movement of both the upper and lower body or 'swagger' Agreeable and/or extroverted - linked with increased pelvis movement alone or 'hip sway'.

Creative and/or conscientious - Less overall movement in a walk (little swagger and little sway) Advertisement

The study, carried out by researchers at the University of Portsmouth, found that the exaggerated movement of both the upper and lower body indicated aggression.

Lead researcher Liam Satchell said: 'When walking, the body naturally rotates a little; as an individual steps forward with their left foot, the left side of the pelvis will move forward with the leg, the left shoulder will move back and the right shoulder forward to maintain balance.

'An aggressive walk is one where this rotation is exaggerated.'

The study also found that personality traits that help with social skills - such as agreeableness and extroversion - were particularly evident in people with increased pelvis movement alone, or 'hip sway'.

The researchers were surprised to find evidence of personality traits not typically related to social skills in the form of 'openness to experience' or creativity and conscientiousness.

'Less overall movement in a walk (so little swagger and little sway in a walk) could predict how creative someone is and how well organised they are,' Mr Satchell told MailOnline.

The study assessed the personalities of 29 participants using a standard personality test called the 'big five'.

This enabled them to identify personality traits including openness, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness and neuroticism.

Participants were also asked to complete a questionnaire that measured their levels of aggression.

Motion capture technology was used to record how they walked on a treadmill at their natural speed. In this image ;ead researcher Liam Satchell talks to a participant

Motion capture technology was then used to record how they walked on a treadmill at their natural speed.

The researchers analysed thorax - the area between the neck and the abdomen - and pelvis movements, as well as speed of gait.

While people may be aware that there is a relationship between swagger and psychology, this is the first research to provide empirical evidence that links aggression with the way people walk, say the researchers.

'We know of no other examples of research where gait has been shown to correlate with self-reported measures of personality and suggest that more research should be conducted between automatic movement and personality,' said Mr Satchell.

REVEALED: THREE TYPES OF PEDESTRIAN A separate study from the Technical University of Munich paired up 20 strangers and asked them to walk towards each other without colliding and without speaking. The volunteers also filled in personality questionnaires and were measured and weighed. From this, the researchers pinpointed three different types of pedestrian. Bumbler - Most people fall into this category. Scientists found 50 per cent can't make up their mind, and vary their strategy when walking in crowds. Barger - Around 25 per cent of people like to pass first, making the other person stand to one side. The person who passes first isnt as rude as they may initially appear. It seems they do tend to adjust their path  just not enough to avoid a collision. Polite - Another 25 per cent prefer to step aside. Interestingly, physical factors such as age, height and gender seemed to have no bearing on pavement etiquette. Advertisement

It is hoped that being able to identify a possible relationship between a person's walk and their intention to engage in aggression could be used as a crime prevention strategy.

'If CCTV observers could be trained to recognise the aggressive walk demonstrated in this research, their ability to recognise impending crimes could be improved further,' said Mr Satchell.

The researchers are keen to carry out additional studies and have called more members of the public to get involved.

The study is published in the Journal of Nonverbal Behaviour.
goddess or an older woman with high status

it is fully intact and made of stone, not clay

Archaeologists have uncovered a rare stone figurine of a woman at a dig in Turkey's central province of Konya.

The woman, with her sagging breasts and belly, is thought to represent either a fertility 'mother goddess' or an older woman who has achieved high status.

An expert says the figurine, dating back 8,000 years, is one of only handful of statuettes of the era ever found in one piece.

Archaeologists have uncovered a rare stone figurine of a woman at a dig in Turkey's central province of Konya. The woman, with her sagging breasts and belly, is thought to represent either a fertility 'mother goddess' or an older women who have achieved high status

THE SITE OF CATALHOYUK Catalhoyuk is one of the most important archaeological sites in the world. Established around 7,000 BC, it was home to 5,000 people living in mud brick and plaster houses. Their buildings were crammed so tightly together, the inhabitants clambered over the roofs and used ladders to get into their homes. The town dwellers were early farmers who had domesticated a handful of plants and kept wild cattle for meat and milk. Cattle horns were incorporated into the walls of their homes. The town contains the oldest murals - paintings on plastered walls. Unlike later towns, there is no obvious hierarchy - no homes for priests or leaders, no temples and no public spaces. The dead were buried in spaces under homes, rather than in cemeteries. Some researchers believe it was an equalitarian society. The town survived for around 2,000 years. It is not known what happened to its inhabitants, but they may have been killed by invaders or driven away by the loss of nearby farmland. Advertisement

By 2009, nearly 2,000 figurines had been unearthed at the site in Catalhoyuk, Turkey.

Made by Neolithic farmers thousands of years before the creation of the pyramids or Stonehenge, the figurines tend to depict tiny cattle, crude sheep and curvaceous people.

But Stanford University Professor Ian Hodder told the Associated Press this one is unique because it is carved from stone, unlike most which are made from clay.

Its excellent condition and craftsmanship also set it apart, he said.

The 7-inch (17-cm) figurine weighs in at 2.2 pounds (one kilogram).

Experts think they could be representatives of animals the people were dealing with.

They may also have been teaching aides.

But unlike others found in garbage pits, Professor Hodder said this figurine was found beneath a platform along with a piece of dark rock called obsidian, which suggests it may have been placed there as part of some fertility ritual.

In the 1960s, some researchers claimed the more rotund figures were of a mysterious large breasted and big bellied 'mother goddess', prompting a feminist tourism industry that thrives today.

However, Professor Hodder cites newer theories that suggest this object represents older women who have achieved status.

'The new figurine certainly suggests such an interpretation with its sagging breasts and belly,' he said.

By 2009, nearly 2,000 figurines had been unearthed at the site in Catalhoyuk, Turkey. Made by Neolithic farmers thousands of years before the creation of the pyramids or Stonehenge, the figurines tend to depict tiny cattle, crude sheep and flabby people (pictured)

Catalhoyuk is in Turkey's central province of Konya (map pictured). The town dwellers were early farmers who had domesticated a handful of plants and kept wild cattle for meat and milk

Established around 7,000 BC, Catalhoyuk was home to 5,000 people living in mud brick and plaster houses. Their buildings were crammed so tightly together, the inhabitants clambered over the roofs and used ladders to get into their homes. Artist's impression pictured

A UNESCO World Heritage site, Catalhoyuk is one of the earliest cities uncovered and dates back nearly 9,000 years.

Catalhoyuk is one of the most important archaeological sites in the world.

Established around 7,000 BC, it was home to 5,000 people living in mud brick and plaster houses.

Their buildings were crammed so tightly together, the inhabitants clambered over the roofs and used ladders to get into their homes.

The town dwellers were early farmers who had domesticated a handful of plants and kept wild cattle for meat and milk.

Cattle horns were incorporated into the walls of their homes.

The town contains the oldest murals - paintings on plastered walls. Unlike later towns, there is no obvious hierarchy - no homes for priests or leaders, no temples and no public spaces.

The dead were buried in spaces under homes, rather than in cemeteries.

Some researchers believe it was an equalitarian society.

The town survived for around 2,000 years. It is not known what happened to its inhabitants, but they may have been killed by invaders or driven away by the loss of nearby farmland.

A UNESCO World Heritage site, Catalhoyuk is one of the earliest cities uncovered and dates back nearly 9,000 years. It is one of the most important archaeological sites in the world. Pictured is the site in 2013
Arctic sea ice this summer shrank to its second lowest level since scientists started to monitor it by satellite, with scientists saying it is another ominous signal of global warming.

The National Snow and Ice Data Center in Colorado said the sea ice reached its summer low point on Saturday, extending 1.6 million square miles (4.14 million square kilometers).

That's behind only the mark set in 2012, 1.31 million square miles (3.39 million square kilometers).

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This image provided by the National Snow & Ice Data Center shows Arctic Sea ice. Arctic sea ice this summer shrank to its second lowest level since scientists started to monitor it by satellite (National Snow & Ice Data Center via AP)

Center director Mark Serreze said this year's level technically was 3,800 square miles (10,000 square kilometers) less than 2007, but that's so close the two years are essentially tied.

Even though this year didn't set a record, 'we have reinforced the overall downward trend. There is no evidence of recovery here,' Serreze said.

'We've always known that the Arctic is going to be the early warning system for climate change. What we've seen this year is reinforcing that.'

This year's minimum level is nearly 1 million square miles (2.56 million square kilometers) smaller than the 1979 to 2000 average. That's the size of Alaska and Texas combined.

'It's a tremendous loss that we're looking at here,' Serreze said.

It was an unusual year for sea ice in the Arctic, Serreze said.

In the winter, levels were among their lowest ever for the cold season, but then there were more storms than usual over the Arctic during the summer.

GREENLAND'S MELTING ICE SHEETS Data from the ESA's CryoSat satellite has allowed researchers to create the most detailed picture yet of Greenland's melting ice. In just the last few years, the region has lost roughly one trillion tonnes of ice, causing sea-levels to rise at an alarming rate. This corresponds to a 0.75 mm contribution to global sea-level rise each year  about twice the average of the preceding two decades. The data also revealed large variations in the amount of ice loss from year to year. In 2012 when summer temperatures were at a record high, Greenland experienced the highest losses. The researchers say this indicates that the region is sensitive to sudden changes in the environment. Using the CryoSat data, the researchers found widespread ice loss at lower elevations, especially on the western edge. Advertisement

Those storms normally keep the Arctic cloudy and cooler, but that didn't keep the sea ice from melting this year, he said.

'Summer weather patterns don't matter as much as they used to, so we're kind of entering a new regime,' Serreze said.

Serreze said he wouldn't be surprised if the Arctic was essentially ice free in the summer by 2030, something that will affect international security.

'The trend is clear and ominous,' National Center for Atmospheric Research senior scientist Kevin Trenberth said in an email.

The National Snow and Ice Data Center in Colorado said the sea ice reached its summer low point on Saturday, extending 1.6 million square miles (4.14 million square kilometers). A stock image is pictured

'This is indeed why the polar bear is a poster child for human-induced climate change, but the effects are not just in the Arctic.'

One recent theory divides climate scientists: Melting sea ice in the Arctic may change the jet stream and weather further south, especially in winter.

'What happens in the Arctic doesn't stay in the Arctic,' Pennsylvania State University climate scientist Michael Mann said.
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Deep below the waters off the coast of Hawaii's Big Island, lies Cook seamount - a mysterious 13,000-foot extinct volcano.

Until now, the volcano has been something that no human has ever laid eyes on, and details of the life it hosts have long remained a mystery.

Now for the first time, a three-man submarine has visited the volcano to examine its geological features and has discovered that Cook seamount has a rich variety of marine life.

A submarine has visited an extinct Hawaiian volcano to examine its geological features. It discovered that Cook seamount has a rich variety of marine life. Within minutes of the vessel's arrival at the summit, life began to appear  a starfish clinging to a rock, joined shortly after by eels, sharks (pictured), chimaera (also known as 'ghost sharks')

WHAT IS A SEAMOUNT? Seamounts are either active or dormant volcanoes that rise dramatically from the bottom of the ocean and never reach the surface. They are hot-spots for marine life because they carry nutrient-rich water upward from the sea floor. Seamounts are believed to cover about 18 million square miles of the planet. Advertisement

Researchers from the University of Hawaii and the nonprofit group Conservation International travelled to the underwater volcano on board the Pisces V vessel.

They spotted such wonders as a rare type of octopus with big fins that look like Dumbo's ears, and a potentially new species of violet-hued coral they dubbed Purple Haze.

Conservation International hopes to study 50 seamounts, or undersea volcanoes, over the next five years.

'We don't know anything about the ocean floor,' said Peter Seligmann, chairman, CEO and co-founder of Conservation International.

'What we know is that each one of those seamounts is a refuge for new species, but we don't know what they are.

'We don't know how they've evolved. We don't know what lessons they have for us.'

During the dive,the only sounds were radio communications from the surface, the hum of an air scrubber that removes carbon monoxide from the passenger chamber, and the voices of the crew.

Researchers from the University of Hawaii and the nonprofit group Conservation International travelled to the underwater volcano on board the Pisces V vessel

The researchers spotted several unusual species, including a coral with a bright violet hue, and an octopus that resembled Dumbo

The thick, hot tropical air inside the steel sphere became cooler and drier as the submarine descended.

'We don't know what we're going to find,' said Conservation International's Greg Stone, a marine biologist on board.

'There will always be the unexpected when you go into the deep ocean.'

Halfway to the volcano's summit, which is 3,000 feet below the surface of the Pacific, no sunlight penetrated.

The Pisces V submersible sits on the deck of a research vessel during an expedition to previously unexplored seamounts off the coast of Hawaii's Big Island

Cook Seamount, which is home to a range of mysterious life, is located 100 miles southwest of Hawaii's Big Island

The only light that could be seen from the submarine's windows was the bluish glow of the vessel's own bright lights.

Occasionally, bioluminescent creatures drifted past in the darkness.

Seamounts are either active or dormant volcanoes that rise dramatically from the bottom of the ocean and never reach the surface.

They are hotspots for marine life because they carry nutrient-rich water upward from the sea floor.

The Pisces V vessel took three researchers, including Terry Kerby (picture), 3,000 feet below the surface to take a look at life around the Cook seamount

Halfway to the volcano's summit, which is 3,000 feet below the surface of the Pacific, no sunlight penetrated. The only light that could be seen from the submarine's windows was the bluish glow of the vessel's own bright lights

Seamounts are believed to cover about 18 million square miles of the planet.

Cook, situated over 100 miles southwest of Hawaii's Big Island, is part of a group of undersea volcanoes known as the Geologist Seamounts that are about 80 million years old and could hold many new animal species, as well as elements such as nickel and cobalt that mining companies could extract.

'My goal today is to ... find out what's living on them, find out how they support ocean life, what their effect is from ocean currents and essentially what drives the ocean, what makes the ocean what it is,' Mr Stone said.

As hot vents shot out volcanic gases around them, the team released bait in the water and a seven foot shark appeared in front of the submarine

A three-man submarine has visited the volcano. Cook, situated over 100 miles southwest of Hawaii's Big Island, is part of a group of undersea volcanoes known as the Geologist Seamounts that are about 80 million years old

'Seamounts are a key part of that, and something which humanity knows very little about.'

Within minutes of the vessel's arrival at the summit, life began to appear  a starfish clinging to a rock, joined shortly after by eels, sharks, chimaera (also known as 'ghost sharks'), shrimp, crabs and two rare Dumbo octopuses.

One of the octopuses changed colour from white to pink to reddish brown as it swam by.

Various types of coral were found around the Cook seamount, including this blue variety, which almost resembles a feather duster

A six-foot eel swims toward the Pisces V submersible at the summit of the Cook seamount during a dive off the coast of Hawaii's Big Island

Several types of deep-sea corals were found along the seamount's cliffs, including a vibrant purple one.

'I need to go home, look through the literature ... and also go and run some genetic analyses,' said Sonia Rowley, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Hawaii who is taking part in the project.

'But as this is a new seamount ... that no one had dived on before, it won't be any surprise to me whether this is going to be a new species.'

Pilot Terry Kerby made sure to keep a detailed log of the diverse creatures found around the seamount to help researchers understand whether they are new species

After the researchers returned to the surface, they carefully logged coral samples taken from the deep ocean seamounts

Two other seamounts were studied over three days of expeditions - McCall, home to a large number of small deep-sea sharks, and Lo'ihi, an active volcano.

Lo'ihi has been extensively surveyed by manned submersibles over the past 30 years.

The past few times the researchers were there, they saw a large Pacific sleeper shark lurking about the volcano's crater.

Coral samples taken from deep ocean seamounts sit in a lab aboard a University of Hawaii research vessel for further analysis

Dolphins swam next to the transport boat on the surface of the water, 3,000 feet above the Cook seamount

As hot vents shot out volcanic gases around them, the team released bait in the water and the seven foot shark appeared in front of the submarine.

The team also saw six foot eels and a number of new geological formations around the crater.

Scientists say Lo'ihi is likely to someday become the newest island in the Hawaii chain as volcanic activity pushes the summit upward.
Study debunks theory that self-driving cars will make people more productive, as many would still want to keep their eyes on the road

Some 23 per cent of Brits and Americans would not go in driverless car

People hoping that the driverless cars of the future will give them more free time while travelling may be in for a disappointment.

Increased productivity is one of the expected benefits of self-driving cars, but a new study claims that they will have little impact.

The study showed that nearly nearly 36 percent of Americans say they would be so apprehensive using a driverless vehicle that they would only watch the road.

Meanwhile UK drivers were even more cautious at 44 per cent.

The average vehicle trip is only around 19 minutes long which doesn't give enough time for any sustained productive activity, say the researchers. Ford is one of the major auto firms currently working a self-driving car (pictured)

'Currently, in the US, the average occupant of a light-duty vehicle spends about an hour a day travelingtime that could potentially be put to more productive use,' said Michael Sivak, research professor at the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute.

'Indeed, increased productivity is one of the expected benefits of self-driving vehicles.'

The average vehicle trip is only around 19 minutes long which doesn't give enough time for any sustained productive activity, said researchers Michael Sivak and Brandon Schoettle.

But people remain cautious about give over full control.

The researchers quizzed 3,255 people in the US, UK, Australia, China, India and Japan over what they would use the extra time in a driverless car for and whether they would use a self-driving car at all.

IN A SELF-DRIVING VEHICLE, WHAT WOULD YOU USE THE EXTRA TIME DOING? Response US UK Australia China India Japan I would not ride in a self-driving vehicle 23.0 23.0 21.2 3.1 7.8 33.0 Watch the road even though I would not be driving 35.5 44.0 43.4 36.1 30.7 33.2 Read 10.8 7.6 6.5 10.5 10.2 5.6 Text or talk friends/family 9.8 5.5 7.9 20.8 15.0 7.4 Sleep 6.8 7.2 7.1 10.8 4.7 12.6 Watch films/TV 6.0 4.2 5.7 11.3 12.3 6.2 Work 4.8 4.9 5.1 5.4 16.3 0.7 Play games 2.0 1.9 2.0 1.3 2.1 1.2 Other 1.4 1.7 1.0 0.7 0.8 0.2

Some 23 per cent of both US and UK participants say they would not ride in self-driving vehicles at all.

Among those who said they would take advantage of the extra time, about 11 per cent of Americans would read, compared to just 7.6 per cent of Brits.

The study also raises concerns over the effectiveness of current restraint systems nontraditional positions - such as facing backward or lying down - being considered for self-driving vehicles.

Google is one of the main contenders when it comes to developing a self-driving car. The company has previously revealed plans for its cars to be able to predict what drivers are going to do next and drive more slowly around children

The researchers warn that untethered objects such as laptops could become dangerous projectiles in the event of a crash.

Earlier this week, cab-hailing firm Uber introduced a fleet of self-driving Ford Fusions to the streets of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, as part of a test program.

While the vehicles are loaded with features that allow them to navigate on their own, an Uber engineer will sit in the driver's seat and seize control if things go awry.

Some experts have suggested that traffic jams could be consigned to history with the arrival of self-driving cars.
Studies of billionaires also found they tend to be highly intelligent as kids

Children with more of these variants are likely to go to university

They account for around one per cent of the population and much of their success has been put down to dedication and perseverance.

But new studies are now challenging the notion that extremely intelligent children earn their achievements through hard work.

Instead, they suggest that they may have a genetic advantage from birth, and that success is built on this early head-start.

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Johns Hopkins University in Maryland runs a talent programme for adolescents who scored in the top one per cent in maths and English. Alumni include Mark Zuckerburg (pictured). Recent studies that such extremely intelligent people are born smart rather than work to be there

WHAT ARE THE HUMAN INTELLIGENCE GENES? Two clusters of genes have been found that are directly linked to human intelligence. Called M1 and M3, these 'gene networks' appear to determine how smart a person is by controlling their memory, attention, processing speed and reasoning. Crucially, scientists have also discovered that these two networks - which each contain hundreds of genes - are likely to be under the control of master regulator switches. Researchers from Imperial College London are now keen to identify these switches and explore whether it might be feasible to manipulate them. The research is at a very early stage, but the scientists would ultimately like to investigate whether it is possible to use this knowledge of gene networks to boost cognitive function. The investigators analysed thousands of genes expressed in the human brain, and then combined these results with genetic information from healthy people who had undergone IQ tests. Remarkably, they found that some of the same genes that influence human intelligence in healthy people were also the same genes that cause impaired cognitive ability and epilepsy when mutated. Advertisement

In the US, there are several universities that look out for early talent and have been tracking where high-achieving children end up.

Their results show that those who succeed have an early cognitive advantage.

Johns Hopkins University in Maryland runs a talent programme which is open to adolescents who scored in the top one per cent in maths and English.

Notable alumni include Mark Zuckerburg, founder of Facebook, and Lady Gaga.

While many of the children on this programme have gone on to achieve great things, Jonathan Wai, a psychologist in the Talent Identification Programme at Duke University in North Carolina, wanted to test whether childhood aptitude was a guide to success in general.

He looked at five subsets of the US elite  federal judges, billionaires, Fortune 500 chief executives and members of the Senate and House of Representatives.

He found that in each subset, those in the top one per cent of ability were over-represented.

While you these people could have pushy parents, or have attended top schools, Mr Wai argues that environment factors alone cannot account for success.

In another study, Robert Plomin, a professor of genetics at King's College London looked at exam scores, alongside 'polygenic scores'  a mark based on the presence or absence of 20,000 common DNA variants across many different genes.

In the study, high polygenic scores -a mark based on the presence or absence of 20,000 common DNA variants across many different genes - were associated with top grades and a strong chance of continued education

Each of these variants has a tiny effect on its own but together they explain 10 per cent of the variation in children's educational attainment at the age of 16.

Professsor Plomin told the Financial Times: 'Polygenic scores could be used to give us information about whether a child may develop learning problems later on, and these details could guide additional support that is tailored to a child's individual needs.'

His results showed that high polygenic scores were associated with top grades and a strong chance of continued education.

The researchers added: 'This makes a real difference for life chances.'
Archaeologists were scouring the site prior to a new housing development

Researchers believe kiln was used when building Palace of Beaulieu

A mysterious hole in the ground could be the 500-year-old kiln of a fearsome Tudor king famed for his lavish banquets.

Archaeologists believe they have unearthed the kiln used in the construction of King Henry VIII's Palace of Beaulieu.

Researchers were given the go-ahead for the excavation before work begins on a new housing development in the area.

Excavation at the Beaulieu development in Chelmsford, Essex where Archaeologists believe they have unearthed the oven of King Henry VIII

The ancient oven was reportedly by Oxford Archaeology East which, along with engineering firm AECOM, was given permission by developers Countryside and L&Q to carry out a programme of archaeological evaluation in advance of development.

This season's dig at the Beaulieu development in Chelmsford, Essex, began at the end of August, while the ongoing excavation has been going on for the past three years.

The kiln was uncovered on Tuesday, with initial estimates stating that it dates back to either the 16th or 18th century.

'The kiln itself would have been used to produce lime (calcium oxide) for use in mortar, concrete and plaster by burning limestone, or in this case chalk', confirmed developer Countryside in a joint statement with its co-developer L&Q and Oxford Archaeology East. which carried out the dig.

'The date of the kiln suggests that it may relate to the construction or later development of Henry VIII's Palace of Beaulieu, which is now known as New Hall.'

New Hall School is an independent boarding school.

Archaeologists believe they have unearthed the oven of King Henry VIII, the fearsome Tudor king known for his love of food

Researchers were given the go-ahead for the excavation before work begins on a new housing development in the area

Chelmsford Museum manager Nick Wickenden said: 'The county council are aware of this. They are keeping tabs on the situation and are currently excavating the site. They had to apply for planning permission to do so'.

Mr Wickenden told MailOnline that the museum would receive any portable finds from the dig.

'However, a structure the size of oven would most likely be left in place and covered over', said Mr Wickenden.

It is understood that the excavation at the Beaulieu development in Chelmsford, Essex, began during the first weekend of September

Henry VIII built one of his first palaces nearby the excavation site (pictured). It is now the site of New Hall School, an independent boarding school

A map showing the location of New Hall School, which now uses the site of Henry VIII's Palace of Beaulieu, near Chelmsford in Essex

The firm developing the land would be under no requirement to protect the Tudor oven unless it was scheduled as an ancient monument by authorities, which is unlikely in this case, said Mr Wickenden.

The site where the oven was found is closed off to the public for health and safety reasons.

'Further scientific dating and analysis of the structure will help to provide a more precise date for the kiln and aid our understanding of how it fits into the story of Beaulieu,' confirmed Countryside in a joint statement.

In February 2009 Channel 4's Time Team visited New Hall to film a documentary called Henry's Lost Palaces.

King Henry VIII reigned from 1509 until 1547 and was known for his love of rich food and for his six wives.
News / National

by Staff reporter

THE Grace Mugabe initiated programme to equip the Zanu-PF's women league provincial executive members with leadership skills, kicked off in Bulawayo yesterday.According to the Chronicle, the programme is aimed at equipping members with leadership and administrative skills in preparation for the forthcoming 2018 harmonised elections.Women's League Provincial Executive Council members from Matabeleland South, North and Bulawayo yesterday attended a leadership workshop which was held at the Bulawayo Polytechnic. The Matabeleland South induction workshop was held at Esigodini while Lupane Hall hosted the Matabeleland North province workshop on Wednesday.Speaking at the workshop, deputy secretary for women affairs Eunice Nomthandazo Moyo, who is also the Bulawayo Provincial Affairs Minister said the women's league was the vanguard of the party, which was expected to support and sustain it.Moyo added that it was important to empower women so that they can work with the people at the grassroots level, growing the party and mapping the way forward as they approach the 2018 elections.
Finding a partner to settle down with is often portrayed as a way to find happiness.

But a new study has shown this is not necessarily the case - for women at least.

Once ladies hit 60, those who have never been married are as happy as those who have got a ring on it.

But for men and women under 60, married people are generally happier than others.

Once ladies hit 60, those who have never been married are as happy as those who are married. these women have found paths to happiness through their careers, friends or family, the researchers said

DOES MARRIAGE MAKE YOU HAPPY? Finding a partner to settle down with is often portrayed as a way to find happiness, but a new study has shown this is not necessarily the case - for women at least. The new study found married people tend to be happiest, and those who are divorced, widowed or divorced are less happy. But this changes for women once they reach 60, who are just as happy with their life whether they are married or if they never took the plunge. While widowed and divorced people tended to be less happy than married people, widows and divorcees are at pretty much the same happiness levels as one another. Advertisement

The researchers, from Bowling Green State University in Ohio, surveyed 51,000 US adults.

They found married people tend to be happiest, and those who are divorced, widowed or divorced are less happy.

But this changes for women once they reach 60.

'Married people are happier than others, but there are plenty of exceptions to that,' study co-researcher Gary Ralph Lee, a professor emeritus of sociology at Bowling Green State University in Ohio told Live Science.

Once women reach this milestone, those who are married and those who have never been married are equally happy, the study found.

The survey did not reveal why older women comprise one of these exceptions, but it could be that these women have found paths to happiness through their careers, friends or family, Professor Lee said.

This was not reflected in older men who never married, however.

'The never-married, older men are, in general, significantly less happy than the married men and generally not distinguishable from the divorced and widowed [men],' Professor Lee said.

Professor Lee presented the research at the American Sociological Association's annual meeting, which took place this year in Seattle in August.

The study has yet to be published in a peer-reviewed journal.

The new study found married people tend to be happiest, and those who are divorced, widowed or divorced are less happy. But this changes for women once they reach 60, who are just as happy with their life whether they are married or if they never took the plunge

Professor Lee, along with colleague Krista Payne, did not look into why older women are just as happy if they never marry, but it could be related to their careers, friends or family.

THE ROBOT THAT COULD SAVE YOUR MARRIAGE For many, expressing their true feelings in words can be a bit of a struggle. But a new chatbot could soon take on the task of whispering sweet nothings to your wife or husband for you. LoveBot will automatically send messages to designated contacts telling them how much you love and appreciate them. It will even ask them how their day is going to show how much you care. The software was developed by Guru Ranganathan at the 2016 TechCrunch Disrupt SF Hackathon in San Francisco, California. It can also send motivational messages or if you want to come across as a bit more relaxed, it even has a casual mode. The system will send links to videos, pictures and articles that it thinks convey the right message. Advertisement

The researchers used data gathered over 38 years from the General Social Survey, an ongoing nationally representative survey conducted by researchers at the University of Chicago.

Participants were asked to rank their happiness, choosing between 'very happy', 'pretty happy' and 'not too happy'.

Because widowed and divorced people are often older, on average, than married people, the researchers did a separate analysis for people age 60 and older.

While widowed and divorced people tended to be less happy than married people were, widows and divorcees were at pretty much the same happiness levels as one another.

'In some years, the divorced were a little better off than the widowed, and in other years that was reversed,' Professor Lee said

'The overall message is that being formerly married, whether it's [due to] divorce or widowhood, is associated with lower levels of happiness.'
They are some of the densest objects in our universe, providing the gravitational glue that holds entire galaxies together.

But supermassive black holes are also hungry monsters, pulling apart stars that get too close and consuming them.

Now astronomers have detected new signals that are the echoes of stars being torn apart by these enormous black holes.

Astronomers have detected the echoes that are released by dust surrounding supermassive black holes after they devour stars that stray too close. The illustration above shows a stream of material from a star as it is torn apart by a supermassive black hole

Astronomers call these destructive events 'stellar tidal disruption' and they create flares that light up the surroundings with huge amounts of energy.

WHAT ARE SUPERMASSIVE BLACK HOLES Supermassive black holes are incredibly dense areas in the centre of galaxies with masses that can be billions of times that of the sun. They act as intense sources of gravity which hoover up dust and gas around them. Their intense gravitational pull is thought to be what stars in galaxies orbit around. How they are formed is still poorly understood. Astronomers believe they may form when a large cloud of gas up to 100,000 times biggger than the sun, collapses into a black hole. Many of these black hole seeds then merge to form much larger supermassive black holes. Alternatively, a supermassive black hole seed could come from a giant star, about 100 times the sun's mass, that ultimately forms into a black hole after it runs out of fuel and collapses. Advertisement

Data from Nasa's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer has now revealed how the surrounding dust can absorb energy from these stellar tidal disruption flares and re-emit them like echoes.

It has allowed scientists to measure the energy emitted by such events much more precisely than ever before.

The findings could help astronomers gain new insights into the size of supermassive black holes and how they shape their surroundings.

Dr Sjoert van Velze, an astronomer at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, who was the lead author of a new study finding three of these events, said: 'This is the first time we have clearly seen the infrared light echoes from multiple tidal disruption events.

His study, which is published in the Astrophysical Journal, looked at five possible tidal disruption events and was able to see the light echo effect in three of them.

A separate study, led by Dr Ning Jiang from the University of Science and Technology in China, has also found a fourth potential light echo.

The findings could help astronomers make new estimates of the dust that encircles supermassive black holes at the centre of distant galaxies.

This can give crucial information about the size of the black hole and the processes it is driving at the centre of a galaxy.

As stars are pulled into supermassive black holes they become stretched and elongated in a process called spaghettification.

Flares produced by stars as they are devoured by supermassive black holes vaporises the surrounding dust, creating a disk shaped 'shell' of dust further away from the black hole (illustrated)

Flares produced as the stars are destroyed are made from high energy ultraviolet and X-ray radiation which destroy dust in the immediate vicinity around a black hole.

Dust that survives the blasts create a disk shaped 'shell' around black holes. This dusty shell is heated by flares but then releases this energy as infrared radiation.

'The black hole has destroyed everything between itself and this dust shell,' Dr van Velzen said. 'It's as though the black hole has cleaned its room by throwing flames.'

Supermassive black holes are dense areas that lie at the heart of all known galaxies and provide the gravitational glue that holds them together. They produce intense jets of gas that form perpendicular to the main disk (artist's impression pictured)

In the new studies, the astronomers were able to use a technique called photo-reverberation to learn details about the dust emitting the light.

They measured the delay between the original flare and the subsequent infrared light, allowing them to determine the distance between the black hole and the dust.

'Our study confirms that the dust is there, and that we can use it to determine how much energy was generated in the destruction of the star,' added Dr Varoujan Gorjian, an astronomer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, and co-author of the paper led by Dr van Velzen.
are more diverse than others

Looking around at the natural world, have you ever wondered why some groups of organisms contain huge numbers of species while others are seemingly barren?

Take insects as an example, animals which evolved around 480 million years ago.

There are perhaps 6 million species living in all manner of environments, and occupying an incredible diversity of niches.

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Have you ever wondered why some groups of organisms contain huge numbers of species while others are seemingly barren? For example, there are over 2,400 species of praying mantis (pictured) and the earliest mantis fossils are about 135 million years old

PATTERNS OF DIVERSITY Plants have had a species production rate more than twice that of animals, while complex organisms (multicellular eukaryotes) have produced new species at a rate almost 10 times that of simpler one (protists and prokaryotes). Sex seems to have been a major catalyst for increasing the rate at which new species formed, perhaps explaining its success as an evolutionary strategy. Among the vertebrates, a terrestrial lifestyle seems to explain greater species diversity. While simply living in a marine versus non-marine habitat might be the major reason for high species number in some major invertebrate groups, like molluscs. With insects, adopting herbivory was probably the key to explaining high rates of new species forming in the past and their remarkably diversity today. Advertisement

Surprisingly though, they have never truly adapted to the marine environment.

Contrast this with Methanopyri, in the Kingdom Archaea, for which there is only a single species (Methanopyrus kandleri) which evolved close to 4 billion years ago.

This remarkable bacterium was found living on the edge of a smoker under extreme conditions: 81-110 degrees celcius, high carbon dioxide concentration and at a depth of 2,000 metres in the Gulf of California.

Just why some groups contain large numbers of species while others dont has long puzzled biologists.

One of the main explanations has been geological age - older groups of organisms are more diverse because they have simply had more time to accumulate greater numbers of species.

Yet, the fact remains that some comparatively young groups of species are remarkably diverse; and conversely, some like the Methanopyri are very ancient but species poor.

A new study by Joshua Scholl and John Wiens published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B has taken a fresh look at this age old problem.

They looked for the first time ever at the rates at which new species were formed across the entire Tree of Life, rather than just a subset of organisms as has been the focus until now.

They found some remarkable and fascinating patterns that shed new light on the question of diversity and its possible causes.

Over the course of lifes history, plants have had a species production rate more than twice that of animals, while complex organisms (multicellular eukaryotes) have produced new species at a rate almost 10 times that of simpler one (protists and prokaryotes).

One explanation for more diversity is that older groups of organisms a had more time to accumulate greater numbers of species. However, the Methanopyri (pictured) is only a single species which evolved close to 4 billion years ago

THE COMPLEX EVOLUTION OF MAN 55 million years ago - First primitive primates evolve 11.6 million years ago - Pliobates cataloniae, and ancestor of 'large apes' and 'lesser apes' discovered 8 million years ago - First gorillas evolve. Later, chimp and human lineages diverge 5.5 million years ago - Ardipithecus, early 'proto-human' shares traits with chimps and gorillas 4 million years ago - Australopithecines appeared. They had brains no larger than a chimpanzee's 3.9 million years ago - Australopithicus afarenis first appear in Africa 3.5 million years ago - The new species, Australopithecus deyiremeda is thought to have appeared in Afar, Ethiopia 3.5 million years ago - Kenyanthropus platyops is thought to have lived in Kenya 3.2 million years ago - The Australopithicus afarenis known as Lucy lived in Afar, Ethiopia 2.8 million years ago - The first of the Homo family appears 800,000 years ago - Early humans control fire and create hearths. 400,000 years ago - Neanderthals first begin to appear and spread across Europe and Asia 200,000 years ago - Homo sapiens - modern humans - appear in Africa 40,0000 years ago - Modern humans reach Europe Advertisement

The work could also help explain another long held mystery: why did sexual reproduction evolve?

Sex seems to have been a major catalyst for increasing the rate at which new species formed, perhaps explaining its success as an evolutionary strategy.

Among the vertebrates, a terrestrial lifestyle seems to explain greater species diversity.

While simply living in a marine versus non-marine habitat might be the major reason for high species number in some major invertebrate groups, like molluscs.

Back to insects, adopting herbivory was probably the key to explaining high rates of new species forming in the past and their remarkably diversity today.

Its striking that we find ourselves alone, especially when we contrast this with the remarkable diversity of hominins seen in the past. Might this tell us something about humans today, and perhaps even where we might be headed as a species

All of this made me pause and reflect on our own group of species, the two-footed apes, or hominins, and our incongruous existence today.

Its striking that we find ourselves alone, especially when we contrast this with the remarkable diversity of hominins seen in the past.

Might this tell us something about humans today, and perhaps even where we might be headed as a species?

Our broader biological group, the Order Primates, contains the lemurs, lorises, tarsiers, monkeys and apes.

HUMAN ACTIVITIES ARE CAUSING NEW SPECIES TO EVOLVE Humans are causing the rapid evolution and making new species of plants and animals emerge, according to a new study. The study, led by the University of Copenhagen, outlined many examples of the process of man-made speciation, where human activities lead to the development of a new species. One example of such animal is the 'London Underground Mosquito'. As the common house mosquito adapted to the environment of the underground railway system in London, it established a subterranean population. The London Underground mosquito can no longer interbreed with its above ground counterpart and is effectively thought to be a new species. The process can take place by accident, through the emergence of new ecosystems like urban environments, or through the domestication of animals and crops. Unnatural selection caused by hunting can lead to new traits emerging in animals, which can eventually lead to new species. The deliberate or accidental relocation of species can lead to hybridization with other species. This has meant more new plant species in Europe have appeared than are documented to have become extinct. Advertisement

There are around 350 species of living primates in a group that evolved perhaps 80 million years ago.

Today, were quite a diverse lot, with primates representing somewhere around 5 per cent of the total number of mammal species.

In total, there must have been many thousands of primate species over the course of that time, nearly all of which have gone extinct.

Extinction is the norm in evolution, with estimates of around 99 per cent of all life having disappeared.

Same probably also for primates.

Tragically, half of all living primate species are threatened with extinction, and all of our close Great Ape cousins - the orangutans, gorillas and chimpanzees - are regarded as endangered or critically endangered by the IUCN.

Just 40 thousand years ago we humans shared the planet with several closely related hominins: like the Neanderthals, Denisovans, perhaps the Red Deer Cave people, and even archaic species in Africa. So, why are there still so many monkeys, but only one bipedal ape

By far the most diverse primates are the monkeys, particularly the Old World monkeys, naturally inhabiting Africa and Asia.

They essentially evolved as a group about the same times as we hominins did, in Africa after 10 million years ago.

And some monkey species evolved over just the last couple of hundred thousand years, like Homo sapiens did, while others evolved several million years ago, just like some of our extinct relatives such as Homo erectus which existed from around 2 million to perhaps 50 thousand years ago.

But unlike the monkeys though, today were alone.

The sole surviving bipedal ape.

ARE WE EVOLVING INTO A NEW TYPE OF HUMAN? By 2050, a completely new type of human will evolve as a result of radical new technology, behaviour, and natural selection. This is according to Cadell Last, a researcher at the Global Brain Institute, who claims mankind is undergoing a major 'evolutionary transition'. In less than four decades, Mr Last claims we will live longer, have children in old age and rely on artificial intelligence to do mundane tasks. This shift is so significant, he claims, it is comparable to the change from monkeys to apes, and apes to humans. 'Your 80 or 100 is going to be so radically different than your grandparents,' Mr Last says, who believe we will spend much of our time living in virtual reality. Some evolutionary scientists believe this age could be as high as 120 by 2050. Mr Last claims humans will also demonstrate delayed sexual maturation, according to a report by Christina Sterbenz in Business Insider. It suggests that as brain sizes increase, organisms need more energy and time to reach their full potential, and so reproduce less. Instead of living fast and dying young, Mr Last believes humans will live slow and die old. The change is already happening. Today, the average age at which a woman in Britain has her first baby has been rising steadily stands at 29.8. In the US, just one per cent of first children were born to women over the age of 35 in 1970. By 2012, that figure rose to 15 per cent. Advertisement

Yet, there are probably many more species of Old World monkeys now than at any time in the past.

Why have we gone the opposite way of the monkeys?

Species poor, not species rich?

Just 40 thousand years ago we humans shared the planet with several closely related hominins: like the Neanderthals, Denisovans, perhaps the Red Deer Cave people, and even archaic species in Africa.

It was kind of like an episode of Star Trek, with humans, Klingons, Vulcans, Cardassians, Ferengi and Bajorans all coexisting.

Keeping each other in check ecologically, competing for resources, occasionally even mating with each other.

So, why are there still so many monkeys, but only one bipedal ape?

Um, no idea, actually.

Its no exaggeration to say this is the greatest mystery of human origins, and one of the most important conundrums of science today.

What we do know though is that we humans belong to a highly extinction prone group of primates.

Weve gone from a total of at least 30 species - with, I predict, many more yet to be discovered - to one.

And in just 10 or 20 thousand years.

SCIENTISTS DISCOVER A NEW HUMAN ANCESTOR Scientists have discovered a new species of small ape last year that may have been the last common ancestor to humans, chimpanzees and gibbons. Named Pliobates cataloniae, the species existed around 14 million years ago, before the evolutionary split between 'large apes' and 'lesser apes'. The discovery fills a gap in the fossil record, and suggests that root of the entire ape family tree evolved from a far smaller creature than previously believed. Pliobates cataloniae was found to have features of both groups, suggesting it was one of our last common ancestors. The partial skeleton that led to the announcement was discovered during the construction of a landfill in Barcelona, Abocador de Can Mata. It was made up of 70 fossils dated to 11.6 million years ago. The remains were so fragmentary that researchers relied on a virtual reconstruction based on high-resolution computed-tomography. Using the computer images, scientists discovered the fossils belonged to an adult female that weighed between 4kg and 5kg (9lbs and 11lbs). This made the species similar in size to a gibbon. Nicknamed Laia - after the patron of Barcelona - her skull and some parts of her postcranial skeleton were similar to living gibbons. But her arm anatomy, specifically the wrist bones and the joint between the humerus and radius, had the basic design of living hominoids. This suggests she moved through the forest canopy by climbing and suspending below branches. Based on microscopic marks on her teeth, researchers believe Laia consumed soft fruits. Advertisement

From a world in which there must have been half a dozen or more bipedal apes coexisting at any one time - across the 8 million years of our evolution - to just us; solo.

The question we need to ask ourselves today is, which kind of species are we?

Are we in it for the long haul, or will be disappear in the blink of an eye of evolutionary time as well?

I must confess that Im an optimist; in the face of some incredible global scale environmental threats, mostly of our own doing, Im not on the side of the extinction of Homo sapiens.

But I do think future generations are in for a pretty rough ride, and will look back on today and ask the question, why didnt you (we) act sooner to lessen our impact on the planet?

The answer might be difficult to face, especially if we eventually find out that the real reason were alone today, the sole bipedal ape, is of our own making; that Homo sapiens was as Homo sapiens is.
T-Mobile has urged customers using the iPhone 6, 6 Plus and SE to refrain from downloading Apples biggest release ever after devices lost service once iOS 10 was installed.

The firm informed users via Twitter that the three devices were affected after the software release.

A temporary fix of restarting the phone every time it loses connection was the only solution given at the time, but Apple has since resolved the issue and created steps to restore service for those affected.

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T-Mobile urged costumers using the iPhone 6, 6 Plus and SE to refrain from downloading Apples biggest release ever on Thursday. The firm informed members on Twitter that the three devices have been found to lose connection to the network once iOS 10 was installed

A HISTORY OF PROBLEMS This is not the first time that an Apple software update has encountered problems. In 2011, when users tried to update to iOS 5, many received multiple error messages. The iOS 9.3.2 released in May this year was supposed to prevent bugs, but instead added a larger one for some iPad Pro customers. Many of the unfortunate users received an 'Error 56' message that prompted them to plug the device into iTunes, but this was not found to reverse the glitch. Advertisement

Attn @TMobile iPhone 5SE, 6 and 6+ customers, T-Mobile CTO Neville Ray shared on Twitter.

Apple is working to fix an iOS problem w/i 48hrs.

Dont upgrade to iOS 10 until we advise.

T-Mobile kept their word and Apple has released an easy way to restore connections within less than 48 hours, reports Gizmodo.

'Nothing else to add at this point, but John Legere and our brand have tweeted/posted for customers, and weve updated QA here with customer guidance,' a T-Mobile spokersperson told DailyMail in an email regarding the problem some of its customers are having with Apple's iOS 10.

'We also started contacting customers who had already updated to iOS 10 to tell them how to fix the issue.'

This glitch is the second one to surface since Apple released its iOS 10 on September 7.

However, many users experienced more serious problems, including bricked iPhones and iPads.

Millions of users flocked to social media shortly after the release to share images of their devices that were rendered temporarily unusable by the upgrade.

This glitch appeared after customers downloaded iOS 10 wirelessly - but the firm says the problem is fixed and it is now safe to install the software.

T-Mobile CTO Neville Ray warned T-Mobile customers via Twitter about the glitch users with certain iPhone variants are experiencing after installing iOS 10

T-Mobile kept their word and Apple has released an easy way to restore connections within less than 48 hours. However, the firm has yet to make a statement regarding what caused the problem

'We experienced a brief issue with the software update process, affecting a small number of users during the first hour of availability,' an Apple spokesperson told DailyMail.com in an email.

'The problem was quickly resolved and we apologize to those customers. Anyone who was affected should connect to iTunes to complete the update or contact AppleCare for help.'

Apple has also shared instructions for those unlucky users, which should turn the 'brick' back into a working iPhone.

Millions of users flocked to social media shortly after Apple's 'biggest release ever' to share images of their devices that were rendered temporarily unusable by the upgrade.

The firm says customers should begin by putting their device in recovery mode and set it up just like they did when it came out of the box.

It is also important that you are using the latest version of iTunes.

'Connect your device to your computer and open iTunes,' Apple explains.

'If you don't have a computer, borrow one from a friend or go to an Apple Retail Store or Apple Authorized Service Provider for help.'

Apple has also shared instructions for those unlucky users that have shared their complaints on Twitter about their bricked devices. The firm says customers need to begin by putting their device in recovery mode and set it up just like you did when it came out of the box

Connect to iTunes and when you see the options 'Restore' and 'Update', choose' Update'. If it 15 minutes has passed and your device still displays the recovery mode screen, Apple says you will need to repeat all of the steps and choose 'Restore' instead of 'Update'

DID THE GLITCH GET YOUR DEVICE? HERE'S HOW TO FIX IT After the iOS 10 release yesterday, some users complained that it rendered their phones unusable. However, Apple says the glitch has been fixed and has provided its unlucky users with instructions to restore their 'bricked' devices: 1) Make sure you have the most recent version of iTunes 2) Connect your device to a computer and restart your device by pressing and holding both the Sleep/Wake button and Home button for at least 10 seconds 3) Do not release until recovery mode is displayed on the screen 4) Next, iTunes should present you with the option to 'Restore' or 'Update' - choose 'Update' 5) If 15 minutes has passed and your device still displays the recovery mode screen, you will need to repeat all of the steps and choose 'Restore' instead of 'Update' 6) After the update or restore is complete, simply set up your device Advertisement

When you have located a computer, simply restart the device by pressing and holding both the Sleep/Wake buttons and Home button for at least 10 seconds.

Apple states that users should hold the buttons simultaneously, 'and don't release when you see the Apple logo'  keep holding until recovery mode is displayed on the screen.

When you see the option to 'Restore' or 'Update', choose' Update' and iTunes should then kick in and attempt to reinstall iOS 'without erasing your data'.

Half way through the #iOS10 update while learning it could brick your phone... pic.twitter.com/XNVBImVJzU  Instant Regret (@IRGame) September 13, 2016

Many iPhone users could not wait to download the new iOS 10 update yesterday, but a new glitch made a 'small number' wish they had after finding the update rendered their phone unusable. However, Apple shares instructions that should restore the devices

iOS 10 - KEY FEATURES Messages - New multimedia features such as stickers and a predictive emoji keyboard - Handwritten notes that animate at the other end - Invisible Ink lets users send secret messages iMessage App Store - Mini apps will include stickers and gifs and payment apps that can be used without leaving the conversation Maps - Updated design - Ability to quickly search for services such as petrol stations - Reminder on where you parked Memories - A new Memories feature will help users to rediscover old photos, similar to Facebook's On This Day - New software will automatically create Memory Movies slideshows Siri - Now available to third-party developers Options to delete Apple apps - Apps such as Stocks or Watch can now be removed from the device Advertisement

If 15 minutes has passed and your device still displays the recovery mode screen, Apple says you will need to repeat all of the steps and choose 'Restore' instead of 'Update'.

After the update or restore is complete, simply set up your device.

Apple's iOS 10 is only designed to work on relatively recent models, so owners must have an iPhone 5 or newer to download the update.

The update also won't work on the oldest iPads - iOS 10 users must have an iPad 4th generation, iPad Air, iPad mini 2, iPad Pro 9.7-inch or any subsequent models for the update to work.

The new software will also work on the iPod touch 6th generation, but not on any older iPod models.

This is not the first time that an Apple software update has encountered problems.

The iOS 9.3.2 released in May was supposed to prevent bugs, but instead added a larger one for some iPad Pro customers.

Many of the unfortunate users received an 'Error 56' message that prompted them to plug the device into iTunes, but this was not found to reverse the glitch.

Having been first revealed at Apple's developer conference in June, iOS 10 sees more artificial intelligence implanted into the software, with the Photos app now better able to identify and show you photos in your library based on time, location, people and even the items in them.

Many users took to Twitter to express their concerns with the update, including Danny Angove, who tweeted 'Loving the new "forcing my iPhone into recovery mode" feature of #iOS10. Great job, Apple'

iOS 10 has several new features, including an updated design to the Maps app (left), and new multimedia features such as stickers and a predictive emoji keyboard in the Messages app

The iOS keyboard has been given a similar intelligence boost, Apple says, and is now able to better understand context as you type, including showing you a snapshot of your calendar as you discuss making plans with contacts.

The firm's Apple Music has also been redesigned as part of the update, having been criticised for being confusing when it launched last year.
If youngsters were once merely tolerated on holidays at sea, theyre now embraced with open arms. In the last decade, liners have upped the child-friendly ante in a bid to woo a whole new generation - and keep their purse-holding parents happy. With fun-filled pursuits including zip-lining over the galley, dining with a favourite movie character or singing up a karaoke storm. Theres never been a better time to be a kid at sea.

BRILLIANT FOR BABIES AND TOTS

Italian company MSC takes looking after the bambini seriously and has a partnership with baby brand Chicco to ensure bundles of joy want for nothing on board; theres even a dedicated chef to whizz up portions of pureed perfection.

FAMILY FAVOURITE: Babies on the move can compete in the mini Olympics, or spend time with Dorebaby, MSCs cute mascot.

PARENTS WILL LOVE: The 0-6 months laundry service, which is entirely unfazed by explosive nappies, and promises to restore baby-grows to dazzling white condition.

BOOK IT: Seven nights on the MSC Meraviglia leaving from Messina, Sicily and calling at stops including Barcelona and Genoa, costs from 649pp based on late June 2017 departures. Children under two sail for free, (msccruises.co.uk, 0203 426 3010). Fly to Sicily with easyJet from 257pp (easyjet.com, 0330 365 5000).

Sponsored link: Book an all inclusive cruise with Royal Caribbean Book one all inclusive cruise fare and get one half price on selected 2017 sailings from the UK and Europe. Enjoy our refreshing new Deluxe Drinks Package including cocktails, plus 25% off the cruise fare for the 3rd and 4th guests. Book by 8 Nov 2016 at royalcaribbean.co.uk/mail, or call 0844 493 2053. Calls cost 7p per minute plus your phone companys access charge. Terms and conditions apply. Advertisement

Teeny travellers aged from six months to three years can enroll in the Guppies club on Norwegian Cruise Lines fleet. NCLs Escape, new last year, is the most baby-friendly and will entertain little ones while mum and dad take a breather.

FAMILY FAVOURITE: Who doesnt like the sound of messy play? Tinies are encouraged to splish, splash and wallow in everything from water to sand.

PARENTS WILL LOVE: Take a literal chill in the on-board Snow Room, which simulates Arctic temperatures to boost blood circulation and promote energy (which parents need).

BOOK IT: An eight-night Caribbean round trip from Miami on Norwegian Escape on August 6th 2017 accommodating up to four people costs from 4637. (Ncl.com, 0333 241 2319). American Airlines flights to Miami cost from 752pp (americanairlines.co.uk, 0844 369 9899).

Parents can enjoy dinner in peace with the Cunard's night nursery

Cunards signature Transatlantic voyage is a popular choice for families wishing to visit Uncle Sam without the nerve-shredding experiences associated with international airports. And the Queen Mary 2 caters particularly well for the uber young crowd.

FAMILY FAVOURITE: Cunards night nursery; where babies aged from 6 months to 23 months can snooze soundly under the watchful eye of professional childminders.

PARENTS WILL LOVE: Dinner in peace. The swish book-ahead Verandah restaurant promises contemporary French cuisine in chic surrounds.

BOOK IT: Sail west from Southampton to New York for seven nights on 21st July 2017 from 1,979pp. Children pay full fare, (Cunard.co.uk, 0843 374 2224).

FUN FOR THE YOUNG (Ages three to twelve)

With lashings of theme park magic transported onto its four-fleet Art Deco-inspired ships, Disney takes a huge share of the family cruise pie. Children between the ages of three and twelve are particularly well catered for with the Oceaneers Club focusing on animated fun while the Oceaneers Lab channels energy through learning.

FAMILY FAVOURITE: Kids can unearth their inner crime-fighter with Captain America at the MARVELs Avengers Academy.

PARENTS WILL LOVE: Make for Quiet Cove; an adults-only area on all four ships. Kick back with a pina colada and momentarily forget you have children.

BOOK IT: Thomas Cook has nine-night Disney Magic sailings from Barcelona including flights from London Gatwick for 999pp based on four sharing a cabin. Prices are based on departures on September 7th 2017, (Thomascook.com, 0800 169 4557).

Everything from drawing to pizza- making and treasure hunts happens at the kids clubs

Traditionally the preserve of more mature passengers, Fred Olsen recently announced the arrival of a new kids club, Little Skippers, on all four of its liners during the summer months.

FAMILY FAVOURITE: Mini-buccaneers can get stuck into treasure hunts, pizza making and swimming classes - and theres even a daily mock-tail to quench thirsts.

PARENTS WILL LOVE: The sound of silence in the Atlantis Spa; algae body wrap, anyone?

BOOK IT: An eight-night cruise to Norway, with stops including Eidfjord, Skjoden and Bergen, on Braemer costs from 1,599pp for adults and 479.50 for children, (fredolsencruises.com, 0800 0355 242).

Many cruises offer an array of clubs and activities for children of all ages

Royal Caribbeans creative and energetic childrens clubs have long been the envy of other liners. The Aquanauts, Explorers and Voyagers clubs promise lashings of fun for three age groups between three and 11 years.

FAMILY FAVOURITE: Grown-ups can join in the fun too; family adventures include scavenger hunts and shipbuilding regattas.

PARENTS WILL LOVE: Punish yourself at a Beach Bootcamp class or perk up your smile with a tooth-whitening session from the medi-spa menu.

BOOK IT: Sail from New Jersey to the Caribbean via Bermuda on Anthem of the Seas. Prices start from 4,418 per family of four for a nine-night cruise, (royalcaribbean.co.uk, 0844 493 4005). Flights to New York from 448pp with British Airways, (Ba.com, 0344 493 0787).

Sponsored link: Book an all inclusive cruise with Royal Caribbean Book one all inclusive cruise fare and get one half price on selected 2017 sailings from the UK and Europe. Enjoy our refreshing new Deluxe Drinks Package including cocktails, plus 25% off the cruise fare for the 3rd and 4th guests. Book by 8 Nov 2016 at royalcaribbean.co.uk/mail, or call 0844 493 2053. Calls cost 7p per minute plus your phone companys access charge. Terms and conditions apply. Advertisement

Pyjama parties, pizza making and video game tournaments are all in the offing on Princess cruises - with the Pelicans club for ages three to seven and Shockwaves designed for pre-teens up to 12.

FAMILY FAVOURITE: Young foodies can shadow the ships chefs in the galley as part of a Junior Chef session, and then join a kids-only dinner

PARENTS WILL LOVE: Dinner a deux at the The Salty Dog gastro pub on the Crown Princess, where plates include the award-winning Ernesto burger.

BOOK IT: A six-port, 14-day trip from Fort Lauderdale to Southampton costs from 599pp for adults and 300 for children based on four sharing a cabin, departures on April 8th 2017, (princess.com, 0333 258 7334). One-way flights to Fort Lauderdale cost from 469pp with Norwegian Airlines (Norwegian.com, 0330 828 0854).

TERRIFIC FOR TEENS

They are arguably the hardest age range to please, but P&O Cruises fend off potential cabin fever (and teenage grumps) with aplomb. Their high-octane H20 activity programme is available on Aurora, Azura, Britannia, Oceana and Ventura. Its mission? To keep 13 to 17 year olds happy.

FAMILY FAVOURITE: A rock school offers drummers the chance to thrash out some serious noise - without bothering sunbathers.

PARENTS WILL LOVE: The well thought-out cabin design, where nifty pull-down beds create extra bunks for children without compromising on space.

BOOK IT: A seven-night cruise from Split in Croatia on August 3rd 2017 includes stops at Venice and Dubrovnik and costs from 4,490 per family including flights from the UK (pocruises.com, 0843 374 0111).

Say goodbye to surly or sulky teen behaviour by picking a cruise with teen-friendly activities

Even the surliest teen is likely to approve of teen-cave Hide Out, which features on board Thomsons latest all-mod-cons liner, the TUI Discovery.

FAMILY FAVOURITE: The Hide Out is the closest thing under 18s will get to proper clubbing; theres a karaoke booth, DJ and dance floor just for them.

PARENTS WILL LOVE: The chance to slink, Kate Winslet-style, down a semi-circular staircase into 47 Degrees, Deck 4s glamorous dining room.

BOOK IT: A Cosmopolitan Classics seven-night cruise from Palma visits Capri, Nice and Messina departing 22nd July 2017. Prices start from 3,955 for a family of four including flights, (Thomson.co.uk/cruise, 0203 451 2682).

All of Carnivals ships are home to Club 02, for 12 to 17-year-olds. Theres a different themed party every night - perfect for offspring who want a little holiday independence and some parent-free fun.

FAMILY FAVOURITE: Sort out your strut and make like an A-lister at the teens-only Red Carpet Party.

PARENTS WILL LOVE: Climb into a hammock at the grown-ups only Serenity area of the Carnival fleet, or try thalassotherapy at the Cloud 9 spa.
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He's only 16 - yet his photographs look like they were taken by a seasoned professional.

Jannik Obenhoff has snapped mountainous scenery featuring snow-capped peaks, crystal-clear lakes and misty hills - and his images have an ethereal beauty that will make you catch your breath.

Many were taken by Obenhoff in Germany and Austria, but there are also snippets from the mountains of Italy.

It's impossible not to feel wanderlust when looking at the stunning landscapes like the one above, captured by 16-year-old photographer Jannik Obenhoff

Many of these pictures were taken by the Munich-based photographer in Germany and Austria. Above, Obersee Lake

Obenhoff started taking photographs, using just an iPad, when he was 13. He has since moved on to using a DSLR camera

Many of his images shared on Instagram give no locations. Above, a lake-side property that Obenhoff called his 'dreamhouse'

Obenhoff told MailOnline Travel: 'I picked nature photography as my main theme because I really like the German landscape and the Alps, which are near where I live.'

He added: 'My favorite place to photograph are the Alps.'

It's the Stubai Alps region that have caught his eye in particular.

While his focus has so far been Germany and Austria, he hopes to visit Iceland, Canada, Greenland and China in the future.

Almost all of his photographs feature mountains or lakes. Above, the picturesque landscape near Hohenschwangau Castle

Every single one of Obenhoff's pictures gets thousands of likes on Instagram. Above, Toblacher See, a popular camping spot in the Dolomites

While his focus has so far been Germany and Austria, he hopes to visit Iceland, Canada, Greenland and China in the future

The Munich-based photographer started taking photographs, using just an iPad, when he was 13.

He would then post these images on Instagram, where he quickly gained a big following.

Today, he takes photographs with a DSLR camera and has already amassed more than 329,000 followers on Instagram.

Although he's still at school, the aspiring landscape photographer is already earning money through sponsorships on his page.

Most of Obenhoff's images feature outdoor locations but their subjects also include a winter sunset in a rural village (left) and a swan afloat on Lake Kochel

Above, a photograph that Obenhoff took while walking on Austria's longest swing bridge, the Holzgau Suspension Bridge

People rarely feature in Obenhoff's photographs but occasionally his followers get little snippets of him and his friends

This little group of trees is actually one of the eight islands on Lake Eibsee in Germany. It's called Ludwigsinsel

Obenhoff told MailOnline Travel: 'I picked nature photography as my main theme because I really like the German landscape and the Alps, which are near where I live'

Although he's still at school, the aspiring landscape photographer is already earning money through sponsorships on his Instagram page

Above, the snow-capped peaks of the Dolomites reflected in the calm waters of Lake Durrensee in South Tyrol, Italy

Left, the alpine village of Hallstatt in Austria pictured in winter and right, a misty dawn in the mountains
Notable entrants came from United Arab Emirates and Brussels Airlines

More than half a million flight attendants submitted their alluring selfies

Blogger 'The Fly' Guy amassed snaps from crew in 49

S ince the very first days of commercial air travel, good-looking staff have been an important sell when it comes to competing carriers.

And as these photos prove, there are plenty of genetically blessed crew members to go around.

With that in mind, one blogger and first class flight attendant who calls himself 'A Fly Guy' has rounded up a selection of the 'sexiest' cabin crew members across the world.

This American air hostess for United Airlines certainly has the lush blonde hair look down pat

Jay, born in North Carolina but based in Dubai, encourages fellow air hosts and hostesses to submit their selfies to his website with the hashtag '#crewfies'.

He claims he has amassed photos from more than half a million crew members.

In what must have been quite a lengthy process, Jay has compiled a list of the top 60 photos from staff in 49 countries worldwide, working across almost every airline.

Of these, MailOnline Travel has selected 30 of them for you to judge yourself. In no particular order, gaze away.

Not strictly a selfie, but this Spanish crew member for Privilege Style definitely makes the cut

Two for the price of one in the case of these delicate-featured United Arab Emirates beauties

Crew from Brussels Airlines, with an almost criminally good-looking male fronting the shot

A doe-eyed flight attendant for KLM Royal Dutch Airlines based in The Netherlands

An Israeli contender who works for El Al airline with vivid green eyes, looking dapper in a tie

A cabin crew member for Thai Airways, capable of melting hearts with her winning smile

A flight attendant for Norwegian Air Shuttle, Scandinavia, will delight fans of the scruffy beard

In striking red and with impossibly long eyelashes, this Russian air hostess works for Aeroflot

Two impeccably groomed Qantas crew members with bright pink scarves, are sure to turn heads

This gaggle of AirAsia India staff all appear to be well-practised in the art of the group selfie

The coiffed hair and generous pout on this EgyptAir attendant is sure to have won him fans

A Greek Aegean Airlines air hostess with a coy pose and cheekbones that could cut glass

A pair of blue-uniformed staff members for Saudi Arabia sail easily into the top 60 contestants

A flight attendant for Iranian airline Qeshm Air, one of more than half a million submissions

Five AirAsia Philippines flight attendants showcase their curled hair and very radiant smiles

With gleaming bright eyes and white teeth, this British Airways air hostess is clearly stunning

This rose-touting Avianca Brazil crew member sure has pulled out all the stops on this one

Decked out in very colourful matching uniforms, a grinning group of Malaysia Airlines staff

Who wouldn't want to share a flight with this truly enchanting South African Airways smile?

Brilliant blue eyes and a slick of unusual purple lipstick for this Etihad Airways air hostess

This pair of Albanian crew members look like twins, and not just because of their uniforms

Is this Azul Brazilian Airlines flight attendant the possessor of the straightest nose in existence?

Once again, bright lipstick paired with a pretty face, on this Polish Enter Air staff member

This Caribbean air hostess for LIAT has bolstered her look with a fetching technicolour scarf

There are doll-like features and flawless make-up on this flight attendant for Safi Airways, Afghanistan

A team of undeniably good-looking crew members in maroon for German Wings airline

Behold the dimples, wide eyes and a cute ski-slope nose on this Vietnam Airlines flight attendant

Could it be Movember? Either way these Italians from Blue Panorama Airlines are sizzling
unable to avoid collision but no one was hurt in the incident

A plane was forced to make an emergency landing after a massive vulture smashed into its nose at 5,000ft.

Shocking images from the ground show the horrific aftermath of the bird strike and the vulture's dead body smeared across the front of the plane.

The Lufthansa aircraft was also damaged in the collision and was struck with such force a large dent was left in its nose.

Shocking images show the body of a huge vulture embedded in the nose of an A320

The Lufthansa aircraft was struck with such force at 5,000ft that a large dent was left in the nose

The A320 had set off from Munich and was about to land at Palma airport, on the Spanish island of Mallorca, at midday on Thursday when the collision happened.

The bird was reportedly a black vulture with a wingspan of nine feet.

Shocking images show the vulture smashed into the metal of the aircraft with a smear of blood around it.

Its claws stick outwards in a gruesome death pose.

The perished vulture is grimly juxtapositioned next to Lufthansa's logo of a soaring crane bird.

The captain of the aircraft reportedly had no chance of avoiding the collision but fortunately the crash with the vulture, a protected species, only affected the nose of the plane and did not cause depressurisation.

The A320 had set off from Munich and was about to land at the airport near the city of Palma, in the Balearic Islands, at midday when the collision happened

The captain of the aircraft reportedly had no chance of avoiding the collision but fortunately the crash did not cause depressurisation

Grim images show the vulture in a death pose, with its claws sticking out over the edge of the fuselage

The incident was reported to the control tower of Palmas international airport of Son Sant Joan and the Airbus landed without further problems - despite the bird being so big it was embedded in the planes fuselage.

As a result of the collision the return flight to Bavaria was cancelled and passengers were put on other flights.

Lufthansa confirmed the incident in a statement to MailOnline Travel, saying the flight 'suffered a bird strike while approaching the airport of Palma de Mallorca'.

It added: 'Due to the damage, the aircraft needed to remain on Thursday in Palma and was been checked by our technicians. The return flight had to be cancelled and passengers have been rebooked on alternative services.'
But they had all successfully passed simulator and technical exams

A third of shortlisted candidates applying to be pilots with India's leading airline have failed the test which analyses their psychological health, since December 2015.

These applicants to Air India had all previously successfully cleared the simulator and technical exams before failing the psychometric test.

Air India sources have revealed that 130 of the 413 candidates had not passed this crucial test which was introduced by the airline in December.

Figures show 75 out of 165 pilots who passed the technical exam failed in the December psychometric test while 55 out of 248 who succeeded in the simulator tests did not clear the psychological health test

The exam was introduced after the co-pilot of a Germanwings flight crashed his plane into the Swiss Alps in March 2015, killing all 150 on board.

Evidence shows Andreas Lubitz, 27 locked the captain out of the cockpit of the flight from Barcelona to Duesseldorf, triggered the automatic descent mechanism and deliberately steered the plane into a remote mountainside.

An investigation into the incident showed he had been suffering from psychological issues for several years and was plagued by depression and suicidal thoughts.

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) - the Indian governmental regulatory body for civil aviation - ordered regular monitoring of pilot's mental health last year based on recommendations of a committee headed by joint director general Lalit Gupta.

However it is unclear whether candidates rejected by Air India went on to find employment with other private carriers.

The exam was introduced after the co-pilot of a Germanwings flight crashed his plane into the Swiss Alps in March 2015, killing all 150 on board. Pictured is a memorial to the victims

'If a candidate is declared unfit in the psychiatric evaluation by one airline, can he be considered fit for any other flying position? Shouldn't the results be shared with the DGCA and other airlines?' an aviation expert asked in the Hindustan Times, which revealed the statistics.

Figures show 75 out of 165 pilots who passed the technical exam failed in the December psychometric test while 55 out of 248 who succeeded in the simulator tests did not clear the psychological health test.

Psychometric tests - normally carried out on a single computer programme - include ability tests and personality tests and are a measure of general intelligence, attainment, aptitude, personality, attitudes, interests, values and motivators.

They assess candidates against the job requirements in terms of knowledge, skills, experience and personality.

Psychometric tests - normally carried out on a single computer programme - include ability tests and personality tests and are a measure of general intelligence, attainment, aptitude, personality, attitudes, interests, values and motivators

In May 2015, the Hindustan Times reported that in March of the same year, 36 of 160 shortlisted candidates who appeared for pilot interviews had also failed in the 'psychological assessment'.

Such appraisals are conducted by a panel including a psychologist from the Indian Air Force.

'AI gives high priority to safety of operations. There cannot be any compromise on entry standards,' an Air India spokesperson told the Indian newspaper.
It's called the stick shaker  an 'attention-getter' for pilots to tell them that their aircraft is about to stall.

And it's a warning that one serving airline captain received as he flew over north Africa in a fully laden Boeing 747 a few years ago.

The cause, he says, was extreme turbulence, which had pushed the aircraft to below its minimum speed, despite the engines being on full power.

He's re-living the dramatic incident with MailOnline Travel in a chat about turbulence he is keen to have in a bid to help ease passengers' nerves about the phenomenon.

Scroll down for videos

A serving airline captain has revealed all to MailOnline Travel about turbulence

He explains why we're so scared of it, how pilots manouevre around it and what they do when it stalls their plane.

The UK-based pilot, speaking anonymously, explains that there are two types of turbulence - one that can be spotted, and another, more unnerving variety.

He says: 'There's turbulence associated with precipitation, be it rain or snow, and we can identify that on a weather radar that we have on the aircraft.

'So we can always avoid that type of turbulence. Unless we need to come in to land in that sort of turbulence, in which case it's a judgement call about whether the turbulence is within safe limits. If it is, we'll commit to an approach and have a go. If it's not within safe limits we'll divert to another airfield, where it is safe, or hold off until such time as it is safe to land.

'The sort of turbulence that people often get anxious about is clear air turbulence, which is often what happens at high altitude. And that's associated with the intercontinental jet streams that circle the globe. And where these jet streams collide, obviously is determined by weather patterns. And when they collide it creates ripples in the air. And that's what clear air turbulence is.

'It's quite easily predictable in terms of where it might be on a given day, and weather forecasters are really good at forecasting it, such that pilots can avoid the worst areas of it, but we can't see it on radar, so we tend to rely on other aircraft reporting it, such that we can either avoid it, or put the seat belt signs on.'

This lurking, unseen turbulence, is why it's always a good idea to belt up on an aircraft.

He continues: 'Because we have a lot of people now who fly an awful lot, sometimes they're a bit casual about whether they should return to their seats and put their seatbelts on, and people think it's a bit of a drag, but there will be that one time in a hundred when it suddenly becomes really important to be in your seat.'

Pilots advise keeping your seatbelt fastened at all times in case of clear air turbulence

It's at this point that the captain decides to recount his terrifying turbulence-over-Africa story.

He says: 'I had a situation going over north Africa in a 747 about 10 years ago where it went from as calm and smooth as we are now, in MailOnline's offices, to a minute later we had the seatbelt signs on and we needed people in their seats. And a minute after that we made a PA announcement to say we needed cabin crew back in their seats and a minute after that the wind had swung round enough that the stall warning went off on the aeroplane because the wind had shifted so quickly that we'd actually gone below our minimum speed.

'So we had a stall warning and what's called a stick-shaker, which is the attention-getter for pilots to say a stall is imminent.

'So we're in a fully laden 747, with all four engines at full power, and we still couldn't maintain altitude. So, while that event is unusual, it is possible for things like that to happen. And the last thing you need, in that situation, is to think that people are still running around in the back.

'So that's why we always take the conservative side of things, and put the seatbelt signs on early, just in case things evolve into a situation that whilst it's not dangerous, it's certainly not ideal to have people running around because the aircraft did move around quite significantly in that event.

'It only lasted about three or four minutes and after that it was fine.'

The pilot explains that he came out of the stall by pointing the plane downwards.

He says: 'You push the nose forward, keep the power on, let the aircraft accelerate. Aircraft like flying, they don't like falling out of the sky, and you've got to try pretty hard to make them do that. So, just push the nose forward, accelerate the aeroplane, and we return to our assigned altitude.

'For two to three minutes it was exciting, it was proper flying, the autopilot wasn't coping very well with it, so you take the autopilot out with a little push button on the control column and you go back to basic flying skills that keep the aircraft safe. That's why we're there.

'That's why there's always two of us on the flight deck and why we take the business of flight safety very seriously. And part of that is putting the seatbelt signs on.'

The captain experienced turbulence so severe over Africa in a 747 that it stalled the aircraft

HOW DO PILOTS DEAL WITH TURBULENCE? The serving airline captain reveals four methods for dealing with turbulence: 1. Grin and bear it - the aircraft is more than capable of withstanding the loads associated with turbulence (although severe turbulence can be quite uncomfortable and best avoided for passenger comfort). 2. Try flying higher (if aircraft performance allows it) or lower (although this burns more fuel and might make things worse). 3. Fly at the aircraft turbulence penetration speed - generally a little slower than normal cruising speed 4. Turn to avoid the area of turbulence if its localised (such as near a thunderstorm). Advertisement

It turns out that even though they work for rival carriers, pilots are very good about radioing each other with turbulence news.

The pilot says: 'There's no favouritism or protocol. So if an Air France aeroplane is in some turbulence and it's got a rival aeroplane behind it, they'll let us know. There's a good deal of respect between pilot communities worldwide because that's how we keep aviation as safe as it possibly can be.'

The pilot believes that a fear of turbulence  and flying in general  is down to a feeling of a lack of control.

He says: 'We live in a 24/7 environment where you can do anything you want, anytime you want, with whoever you want. And then you get to the airport, they make you check your bag in, if it's too big you get told off, you get to security and you have to take your shoes off, you have to take your belt off, give up your laptop, you can't take any toothpaste because it might be a bomb.

'All that stuff happens and it just reminds people that they're not in control anymore. You then get told where you're going to sit, you get told when you can sit down and stand up, and that strips away lots of layers of this illusory layers of control that people have.

'People think they can do whatever they want whenever they like and aviation takes that away.

'And often the reaction that goes with that is not a brilliant one. And that's the reason people get anxious, I think.'

'But a lot of this stuff isn't always rational. We talk a lot in aviation training about the high road and the low road now.

Before the airframe gives way, your head will have come off

'So you've got the hypothalamus, where all the brainy stuff happens and the low road where, which is effectively the inner-chimp. So, if I go to pick something up and it's hot I don't say "oh, that's hot, I'll take my hand away". The inner chimp does it for me. The low road does it immediately. And what you have to do as a pilot is you have to separate the low-road startle factor where the chimp wants to run and hide, or wants to try and batter the controls, with the high road "ok, I'm going to let my training take over now, let's be calm, take a deep breath and analyse what's going on".

'And having to do that is not always easy. But as a pilot you become trained to do that. You become good at doing that. As a passenger, sometimes, the chimp starts to drive behaviour and you see that all the time with air rage or with people just becoming irrational about turbulence.

'I read a really good quote the other day from Mike Tyson, about a plan, fight plans. He said "everybody's got a plan, until they get punched in the face". And I think turbulence is a bit like that, in so much as a passenger might be able to rationalise it when they're on the ground and say "I know it's fine, I know that it's safe, I know that the pilots are great at it".

'But put them in an aeroplane in the middle of the night and start bouncing it up and down and suddenly the Mike Tyson punched in the face thing happens and they succumb to their irrational fear.

'Sometimes the calming voice of the pilot will help with that. And sometimes it just won't help at all.'

The pilot reassures passengers that they should not feel embarrassed about their flying fears.

He says: 'Anyone concerned with air turbulence should not feel embarrassed about it. I think maybe 10 or 20 per cent of passengers have a genuine fear of turbulence in a way that is not rational.

'Because in terms of what it might do to you, yes it's unpleasant, nobody likes being bounced up and down like that, or very few people do, but it's not unsafe.'

So what can turbulence do to the airframe?

He says: 'Nothing. Before the airframe gives way, your head will have come off. By the time airframe breaks up you'll be dead anyway.'

He reveals that pilots basically have four options for dealing with turbulence.

He says: 'You can grin and bear it - the aircraft is more than capable of withstanding the loads associated with turbulence - although severe turbulence can be quite uncomfortable and best avoided for passenger comfort. You can try flying higher - if aircraft performance allows it - or lower - although this burns more fuel and might make things worse.

'You can fly at the aircraft turbulence penetration speed - generally a little slower than normal cruising speed or turn to avoid the area of turbulence if its localised, such as near a thunderstorm.'
News / National

by Ndou Paul

Movement for Democratic Change President Tsvangirai will at 11am today (Friday, 16 September 2016) visit 'pro democracy' activists incarcerated at Chikurubi Maximum Prison.This comes after the European Union (EU) ordered government to urgently and unconditionally release all its political prisoners and create a conducive atmosphere for dialogue with its citizens to avoid pushing the country into a state of anarchy.In a joint motion for a resolution in the EU Parliament in Brussels, Belgium, presented on Wednesday, the parliamentarians said it was premature to lift restrictive measures imposed on President Robert Mugabe's regime over its poor human rights record.The bloc also condemned Mugabe's recent attack on the judiciary.
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These stunning images represent some of the world's most dramatic weather events.

All finalists in the Weather Photographer of the Year 2016 competition - a brand new contest judged by The Royal Meteorological Society and The Royal Photographic Society - certainly put the UK's thunderstorms this week down a few notches.

More than 800 photographs were submitted earlier this year, with winners across various categories announced last weekend at the Royal Meteorological Society's Amateur Meteorologists' Conference in Reading.

Overall Weather Photographer of the Year 2016 was awarded to Tim Moxon for Tornado on Show. Mr Moxon said this was 'one of the most photogenic tornadoes of the year', snapped near the town of Wray, Colorado.

In first place for the over 16s category was Ben Cherry's Sprite Lightning photograph. Judge Michael Pritchard praised him for 'making the most of circumstance and having the serendipity to capture a very rare form of lightning'.

In the under 16s, James Bailey scooped the top prize for his image Hailstorm and Rainbow over the Seas of Covehithe. And as for the public's favourite, more than 2,500 voters handed the accolade to Paul Kingston's Storms Cumbria image.

Overall Winner: An apocalyptic tornado near the town of Wray, Colorado, taken by Tim Moxon. He said: 'We were among a number of people, including those you see in the shot, nervously enjoying the epic display nature put on for us'

First Place in Over 16s: Ben Cherry, who took this in Punta Banco, Costa Rica, says 'I set up the frame to include the pulsing storm and the milky way as I liked the contrast - then this sprite strike illuminated the sky and my jaw dropped'

Froth: In the under 16s, James Bailey scooped the top prize for his image Hailstorm and Rainbow over the Seas of Covehithe

Public's Favourite: Paul Kingston's Storms Cumbria. He said: 'The image I captured shows the inner harbour wall at Whitehaven, Cumbria, being hit by a monstrous wave, dwarfing the surrounding man-made structures'

Battle: A clash between two storm cells in New Mexico in June 2014, each with its own rotating updraft, taken by Camelia Czuchnicki, who remarked 'it's the rarity of such scenes that keep drawing me back to the US Plains each year'

Nebraska storm: Stephen Lansdell's Mama Factory - the photographer and self-described 'storm chaser' said 'this was so beautiful taking on many forms during its life and ending with one of the most spectacular shows I have ever witnessed'

UFO over Caucasus: This image was taken by Dmitry Demin from the cable car to Mount Cheget Kabardino-Balkaria, Russia

Goldfish of the sky: According to photographer Alan Tough 'in early February 2016, unusually cold Arctic stratospheric air reached down as far as the UK, which triggered sightings of these rare and beautiful Polar Stratospheric Clouds'

Nick of time: Paul Andrew, who took this dramatic photo at California's Mono Lake, said 'over the space of about 90 minutes I photographed the unfolding scene, only just making it back to the safety of the car as the heavens opened'

Paula Davies says of her delicate feathery image, which was taken from a car windscreen in North Yorkshire: 'I was attracted by the colours resulting from the low early morning sun'

Another image from Camelia Czuchnicki, who explains: 'This low precipitation supercell formed late in the day over Broken Bow in Nebraska in May 2013 - a stunning spectacle which we photographed for over an hour'

The Guanabura oil tanker being hit by lightning, taken by Graham Newman. He says: 'Shortly after taking the shot, the lightning cell closed on my position on the beach and I grabbed up my equipment and ran for my life'

Shrouded peak: Stephen Burt's Matterhorn Banner Cloud, taken in Switzerland on May 26, 2014, from the Gornergrat glacier

Ice sculpture on Plynlimon: Unbelievably, this hill resides in Northern Ceredigion, Mid Wales. Photographer Allan Macdougall comments: 'This stile and wire fence became a thing of beauty with the glowing translucent fluting of the ice'

Photographer Mat Robinson reveals: 'This was between Tadcaster and York, away from the A64, with the sweep of the road acting as a perfect guide for the eye towards the centre of the storm'

Apparition: Steve M Smith took this photo in North Wales. He says: 'On the hills we were shrouded until late morning when a clear way emerged along the ridge towards Foel Fras in the Carneddau'

Mat Robinson says of his shot: 'I live in Sheffield and each year I challenge myself to be the first Peak District photographer to catch the new snow - this was the third successful attempt'
It's annoying enough when you get someone's automatic out-of-office reply.

First, you can't reach them, and second, they've swanned off on holiday and you are probably stuck at work.

But now Qantas airlines has upped the ante with a service that allows smug travellers to link their out-of-office response to their Instagram accounts, and thus flaunt their exotic snapshots.

Qantas airlines has upped the ante with a service that allows smug travellers to link their out-of-office response to their Instagram accounts, and thus flaunt their exotic snapshots

It's as simple as heading to their site, connecting your Instagram account with your email address and providing your destination and travel dates.

Next time your poor deprived colleagues get your out-of-office, an array of your holiday snaps will fire back to their inbox.

The service, launched today, allows you to select the images you do - or perhaps more importantly do not - want to be used, by tagging designated photos with #qantasoutofoffice.

It's as simple as heading to their site, connecting your Instagram account with your email address and providing your destination and travel dates

Next time your poor deprived colleagues get your out-of-office, an array of your holiday snaps will fire back to their inbox

Qantas Group Executive Brand, Marketing & Corporate Affairs, Olivia Wirth, said, diplomatically, that the airline hoped this would inspire more colleagues, friends and family to travel the world.

'The traditional out of office message can be both generic and impersonal in nature and from our research, sixty percent of employees say they appreciate receiving something more creative,' she said.
A Tale of Two Cities, Royal & Derngate, Northampton

Rating:

Odd to think that 225 years ago it was the French who led the way in liberating Europe from oppression whereas today it is we British who have ignited revolution.

Charles Dickenss A Tale Of Two Cities contrasts Paris and London in 1790. The latter is calm, peaceful, a place where justice prevails. Paris is in turmoil, the guillotine blade dropping on aristocrats necks with a husky rhythm.

Dickenss great doppelganger yarn, with its depictions of the lynch mob in the nascent French republic, has been turned into a fine evenings theatre by adapter Mike Poulton and director James Dacre.

Lookalikes: Jacob Ifan and Joseph Timms as Charles Darnay and Sydney Carton

In addition to period costumes, gorgeous tableaux, an eloquent script and strong acting you have the rattling tale of barrister Sydney Carton falling in love with the wife of Cartons lookalike, an expat Frenchman called Charles Darnay.

Carton tells this Lucie (deliciously dimpled Shanaya Rafaat) he would do anything to make her happy. What? Would he even sacrifice his life in order to save her husband Darnay from the sans-culottes?

This is not the first time this adaptation has been seen. After a brief run at Northamptons Royal & Derngate it goes on tour  Oxford next week, then Richmond, Bradford, Blackpool and five other cities. Here is wholesome storytelling, staged with flair.

Jacob Ifan and Joseph Timms are well matched as Darnay and Carton. Miss Rafaat is tidily swoonsome, Patrick Romer is perfect as her old father and Michael Garner provides solid support as the familys banker friend, Lorry.

Use of local volunteers makes for a large cast, helping scenes of bloodthirsty clamour in Paris. There were so many of them on Tuesday night, they reduced the curtain call to a fine old scrum.

A Tale Of Two Cities was pushed down my gullet as an eight-year-old and I do not recall the narrative moving as entertainingly as it does here.
She left Neighbours well over a decade ago, after her character's presumably fatal car accident.

But Madeleine West is set to return to the long-running soap, reprising her role as Dione 'Dee' Bliss, years after she famously drove off a cliff on her wedding day to Toadie' (Ryan Moloney).

In 2003, viewers watched in shock as the couple's car plunged into the ocean during a tragic accident while they were on their way to their honeymoon.

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Back from the dead? Madeleine West is set to return to Neighbours, while reprising her role as Dione 'Dee' Bliss, years after she famously drove off a cliff on her wedding day to Toadie' (Ryan Moloney)

Madeline, 36, recently explained why she agreed to return.

'Neighbours has become like part of our Australian heritage,' she told News Corp.

'I've always found it lovely when someone from the audience approaches me and feels like they know me through Dee.

'That's when you know you've done your job in breathing life into a character that allowed people to suspend their disbelief for half an hour a day, five days a week.

What could it be? The show teased an upcoming announcement on Instagram on Thursday

Back in the day: Dee and Toadie played on-screen lovers on the long-running soap

Tragedy: Their car tragically plunged off a cliff as they embarked on their honeymoon

While viewers assumed Dee had died as her body was never recovered, producers never confirmed whether she actually survived or died.

While the mother-of-six did not elaborate on story lines or in which capacity Dee will return, she is set to appear on the Channel Ten soap in December.

During her four years as Dee on Neighbours, Madeleine was nominated for the 'Most Popular New Female Talent' Logie Award.

Blast from the past: Madeleine is pictured filming alongside Daniel MacPherson, who played Joel Samuels on the show

She went on to expand her career while starring on shows like Underbelly, City Homicide and Winners & Losers.

Since leaving the show, Madeleine has maintained friendships with former costars Carla Bonner (Steph), Kym Valentine (Libby) and Jackie Woodburne (Susan).

She has been in a relationship with restaurateur Shannon Bennett since 2005 and the couple share six children, 10-year-old Phoenix, eight-year-old Hendrix, six-year-old Xascha and four-year-old Xanthe.

Looking good! Madeleine has been in a relationship with restaurateur Shannon Bennett since 2005 and the couple share six children, 10-year-old Phoenix, eight-year-old Hendrix, six-year-old Xascha and four-year-old Xanthe
She was left absolutely heartbroken when she was dumped by Richie Strahan for mother-of-one Alex Nation on Thursday night's episode of The Bachelor.

But Australia's new sweetheart Nikki Gogan showed she had no hard feeling towards the mother-of-one when the two blonde finalists enjoyed cocktails together at a Sydney bar, on Wednesday.

The pair were giggling and cuddling up to one another after flying in from their hometowns to watch the finale.

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No hard feelings: The blonde beauties were all smiles as they enjoyed cocktails at a Sydney bar on Wednesday

Nikki, who was shattered when Richie chose Alex on the cliff-hanger episode, showed no signs of heartache as she cuddled up to her series rival.

The reality stars cut chic figures, Nikki opting for a floral strapless top and Alex a pitch black one-piece.

The pair appeared to be wearing light makeup as they let their long blonde locks fall over their slender shoulders.

All smiles: The pair were giggling and cuddling up to one another after flying in from their hometowns to watch the finale

The blonde bombshells were in hysterics as they FaceTime called Alex's five-year-old son Elijah ahead of the show's finale.

Meanwhile, Richie's decision to chose Alex as his leading lady on Thursday night's explosive finale broke the hearts of thousands of Nikki fans across the country.

Speaking to Kyle and Jackie O on KIIS FM radio on Friday morning, Alex described the blonde bombshell as a 'gorgeous girl'.

Frenemies: The blonde bombshells were in hysterics as they FaceTime called Alex's five-year-old son Elijah ahead of the show's finale.

'At the end of the day this was Richie's journey to find who he was going to fall in love with,' the 24-year-old said.

'And it's completely understandable that people fell in love with Nikki as well - how could you not, she's a gorgeous girl.'

Richie also admitted it was tough to say goodbye to the fan-favourite.

'I had a massive decision to make but I just followed my heart,' the ropes technician confessed.

'I love you, Alex': Richie confessed his love on Thursday night's finale before they shared a passionate kiss

'That's all you can really ask when you go down this kind of path.'

The Bachelor star revealed his feelings for the 25-year-old single mother in Thursday's episode, telling Nikki they had no future together.

He told Alex: 'Coming down on this adventure, Alex, I was told to follow my heart. And following my heart has led me to you.

'I love you, Alex,' Richie confessed before they shared a passionate kiss. 'Alex, you are the woman I want to spend the rest of my life with.'

No future: Richie had to let Nikki down gently in a heart-breaking and tearful final rose ceremony

Heartbreak: Richie dumped Nikki and said the pair had no future together

Just moments earlier, Richie had to let Nikki down gently in a heart-breaking and tearful final rose ceremony.

'Coming down on this adventure, my family gave me some advice. And that advice was to follow my heart.

'And, Nikki, I really hope you understand... but my heart is with Alex.'

Nikki was clearly devastated but offered a dignified response.

'I've had a great time. I had a lot of fun. Thank you for everything,' the 28-year-old said.
Alice Cooper has revealed that Johnny Depp 'shrugged off' his bitter divorce battle with Amber Heard and didn't seem bothered by it.

The actor went out on tour with Cooper and Joe Perry as The Hollywood Vampires just as the drama started to play out.

But, Cooper told TMZ, Depp, 53, appeared completely unfazed by the circumstances in which his 15-month marriage unraveled.

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'Never talked about it': Alice Cooper told TMZ Thursday that Johnny Depp was in 'such a good mode' during their Hollywood Vampires tour despite his divorce drama with Amber Heard

'We never heard about it on tour. We never talked about it, not once,' he said. 'I've never seen him in such a good mood though.'

TMZ caught up with the School's Out rocker as he arrived at LAX for a brief stop on his way home to Phoenix, Arizona.

The 68-year-old musician insisted that the band never talked about what was going on in Depp's private life

Depp, 53, never talked about the end of his 15-month marriage or the domestic violence claims against him, according to Cooper, 68. They're seen on stage in Coney Island in July

'He let it go': Cooper, who formed the supergroup with Depp and Aerosmith's Joe Perry in 2015, said the Hollywood star focused on the band and the music during their summer tour

'He let it just go off his back,' Cooper explained. 'He's a guitar player in the band and that's all he wanted.'

'And that's kind of what we wanted,' he added. 'We didn't really want all the chaos from Hollywood.'

Cooper debuted Hollywood Vampires in 2015 with Depp and Perry helping form the 'supergroup.'

First love: Depp has been playing the guitar since he was a teen and originally wanted to be a rock star before finding fame as an actor on 21 Jump Street in 1987

Depp has been playing the guitar since his teen years and originally set out to forge a career as a musician, before subsequently finding fame as an actor with TV's 21 Jump Street in 1987.

He married Heard, his Rum Diary co-star, in Ferbuary 2015 following his split from longtime love Vanessa Paradis, with whom he has two children Lily-Rose and Jack.

Heard filed for divorce in May, appearing in court in Los Angeles with a bruised face to seek a temporary restraining order against the Hollywood star whom she accused of abuse.

The former spouses reached a settlement on August 16 in which the restraining order was dismissed and Heard received $7 million, which she then donated to charity.
They recently enjoyed an idyllic holiday to Barcelona together.

And it seems Megan McKenna and Pete Wicks are more loved-up than ever on Thursday night after spending some quality time away.

Leaving Tattu Restaurant in Manchester, the TOWIE beauty, 23, and her tattooed hunk, 26, looked blissfully happy as they wandered to their car hand-in-hand, before indulging in a quick smooch on the backseat.

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The look of love! Megan Mckenna, 23, and her boyfriend Pete Wicks, 26, looked blissfully happy as they left Tattu Restaurant in Manchester on Thursday

Pucker up! The TOWIE stars walked hand-in-hand to their car before indulging in a romantic smooch on the back seat

The brunette beauty couldn't stop herself from smiling as she headed home from the Chinese restaurant hand-in-hand with her man.

The TOWIE beauty looked effortlessly cool as she embarked on their low-key date night, dressed in a chic studded leather jacket emblazoned with cartoon embroidery.

Pairing the jacket with a pair of super skinny high-shine jeans, the Essex lass showed off her incredibly slender legs for all to see.

Happy: The brunette beauty couldn't stop herself from smiling as she headed home from the Chinese restaurant with her man

Adding casual leather trainers and a snakeskin clutch, Megan injected a hint of glamour into her dressed-down look.

Meanwhile her tattooed hunk Pete showed off his many inkings in an extremely tight-fitting bright white T-shirt.

He paired the top with equally skinny jeans and a quirky flat cap, combining casual and cool in one ensemble.

Effortless style: The TOWIE beauty looked effortlessly cool as she embarked on their low-key date night, dressed in a chic studded leather jacket emblazoned with cartoon embroidery

The pair laughed together and remained very tactile as they chatted on their way out from the Asian eatery.

Clambering into their taxi to make for home together the couple then enjoyed a cheeky kiss in the back of the car like old-school lovers, putting on a display just as loved-up as when they first got together.

The pair, who have been together since Megan joined the ITVBe show in March, have recently returned from an intimate holiday to Barcelona.

More loved-up than ever: The pair laughed together as they chatted on their way out from the Asian eatery

Enjoying some quality time away, the couple took to their Instagram pages to share their sweet antics in the sun with fans.

Last week , Megan posted a photo of her and her man enjoying their final extravagant dinner of lobster, smiling with two large glasses of wine in hand.

The post was certainly more tame than Megan's previous update, in which she and her other half had run a bath.

Perfect fit: Tattooed hunk Pete showed off his many inkings in an extremely tight-fitting bright white T-shirt

Hold me: Megan and Pete were very tactile as they couldn't help but hold on to each other on their way home

Going completely naked, Megan covered her modesty with her arms wrapped around her legs but Pete used girlfriend's body to cover his intimate areas.

Megan and Pete no doubt needed some alone time away from Essex drama, after Pete embarked on a fight with Megan's new frenemy Courtney Green at V Festival last month.

With the argument occurring amidst the gathering audience for David Guetta's set, a fellow festival-goer told The Sun: 'It looked really intense.

Still in holiday spirit: The pair, who have been together since Megan joined the ITVBe show in March, have recently returned from an intimate holiday to Barcelona

Cheers! Enjoying some quality time, the couple took to their Instagram pages to share their sweet antics in the sun, including their final dinner of lobster

'Pete was really going in at her and defending his girlfriend Megan while she partied with the rest of the gang and left them to it.

'They had a really long stand-off and seemed to finally settle their differences after a good hour or so.'

Pete was reportedly defending Megan over her clash with Chloe Meadows, who had betrayed his girlfriend by spending time with her enemies Lydia Bright and Chloe Lewis, and accusing her of sleeping with the latter's ex-boyfriend Jake Hall.
Bridget Jones's Baby (15)

Verdict: Just about delivers

Rating:

Unless youve been travelling in Mongolia, youll know by now that Bridget Jones is back  well past her 40th birthday, but still agonising, although less over calorie intake than who might be the father of her unborn child.

Come to think of it, maybe the news has reached Mongolia. The Great Neurotics return has certainly been treated like an event of global significance. First Brexit, now Bridget.

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Labour pains: Renee Zellweger as Bridget with Colin Firth and Patrick Dempsey

In fairness, I enjoyed seeing her back on the big screen more than I thought I would; writers Helen Fielding, Dan Mazer and Emma Thompson have done a decent job of dragging Bridget into middle age.

Renee Zellweger invests her with as much likeability as ever, but hasnt bothered to pile on the pounds this time, which seems to have left some fans feeling betrayed.

Certainly, this is not the woman who lamented in the last film, 2004s Bridget Jones: The Edge Of Reason, that I will always be a little bit fat and, demolishing ice cream by the bucket-load, relished her relationship with two men simultaneously, namely Ben and Jerry.

No, this time her increasingly round belly is about another pair of men: her old flame Mark Darcy (Colin Firth) and a dishy American matchmaking- website mogul, Jack Qwant (Patrick Dempsey).

As a consequence of using her biodegradable condoms, which are well past their sell-by date, one of them has got her pregnant during a one-night-stand. But which?

The film starts by establishing how things have moved on for Bridget in the 12 years since we last met her. Shes 43 and still living in the same flat. She and Mark have long since split up, while the other big love of her life, slimey Daniel Cleaver (formerly played by Hugh Grant, who reportedly declined a role this time round), appears to be dead.

Dragged into middle age: Renee Zellweger invests her with as much likeability as ever

So Bridget is single again, which is not so unlikely. On the other hand, she has also become a TV news producer, which is broadly as improbable as learning that Indiana Jones (definitely no relation) has moved on from the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull to become a lollipop man. TV news producers need to be paragons of efficiency and snappy decision-making, which Bridget very much isnt.

But then, thats where the comedy lies, and the job also yields a new best friend in the form of news presenter Miranda (Sarah Solemani).

Who's the daddy? Renee Zellweger and Patrick Dempsey

Miranda makes it her mission to find Bridget a mate, and takes her to a music festival, which is where she falls for Jack  literally, to start with, which of course is inevitable, since she is still the worlds most hapless woman. However, she then bumps into Mark at a christening, and bump is soon the operative word, with Emma Thompson playing the obstetrician in that very brisk, bossy ET way of hers.

The films biggest laughs all spring from the pregnancy, and the uncertainty about who is the father.

I thought my 23-year-old daughter was going to need treatment herself during a beautifully choreographed piece of slapstick, when Bridget goes into labour and both men carry her to the hospital.

But with the exception of that scene and one or two others, I couldnt shake off a slight sense that Bridget, rather like those condoms, might be past her sell-by date.

Fieldings literary creation was so perfectly in tune with her times, and remained so when the first film came out in 2001.

But the times have changed and Bridget hasnt really kept pace. I dont hold with anything thats been written about the supposed surgical interference in 47-year-old Zellwegers looks. She looks fabulous to me. But maybe thats part of the problem: would Bridget in 2016 really be looking like a sleek movie star?

Perhaps it doesnt matter. Its just fiction, after all. But the original Bridget Jones spoke to a generation of women and this one doesnt.

Significantly, the one-liner that tickled me most at last weeks glitzy world premiere didnt come from the film at all, but from the director, Sharon Maguire, who walked on stage in her clingy frock and admitted: I can barely breathe. Im wearing three pairs of Spanx.

Hunt For The Wilderpeople (12A)

Verdict: Slightly forced whimsy

Rating:

Taika Waititi's film has been rapturously received in his native New Zealand, and its easy enough to see why.

It is whimsically charming and it showcases the countrys extraordinary beauty, while also poking affectionate, self-deprecating fun at Kiwi provincialism. But I didnt fall in love with it, as plenty have. For me, the whimsy felt a little strained, and Im sorry to say the film dragged.

Whimsically charming: Julian Dennison and Sam Neill in Wilderpeople

In ten chapters, it tells the story of Ricky Baker (Julian Dennison), a troubled, overweight boy abandoned by his mother, for whom social services can find no home until the mumsy Bella (Rima Te Wiata) volunteers to have him at the remote house she shares with her grumpy husband Hector (Sam Neill).

Following a sudden death  and a daft eulogy by a comedy clergyman straight out of the Rowan Atkinson school of goofs (a cameo by director Waititi himself)  Ricky goes on the run rather than submit himself yet again to the clutches of social services.

He and Hector head into the Bush, evading all attempts to capture them for months on end and, of course, doing some gradual odd-couple bonding.
He revealed his heart was with Alex Nation as he dumped runner-up Nikki Gogan on The Bachelor's finale on Thursday night.

But one of Richie Strahan's closest friends and radio presenter Sam Frost questioned the 32-year-old's deicison to 'bring Nikki along all the way to the finale knowing she was so in love'.

The former Bachelorette star quizzed her friend during Friday's Rove & Sam Show on 2DayFM, asking: 'Did you ever think, "You know what maybe I should let her go a little bit earlier to save her from that heartbreak?"'

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Questioning: Sam Frost asked Richie Strahan why he didn't choose to send Nikki Gogan home earlier to 'save her from that heartbreak'

The rope technician cited pressures of reality TV as he defended his decision to keep Nikki around despite knowing quite early on where his heart lay.

'Y ou can't just go to the producers and say, "Yeh guys, I know who it is, wrap this up," it just doesn't work like that,' he told Sam and Rove McManus.

Richie also explained he had less visibility of Nikki's true feelings for him as what viewers got to see.

Reality bites: Richie explained he couldn't tell The Bachelor's producers to 'wrap it up' despite knowing early on who he would choose

Heartbreak: On Thursday's finale, Richie held Nikki's hand as he broke the bad news and told her his heart was with Alex

Referring to the blonde beauty's chats to camera away from Richie, he said: 'When you watch it back and you see those [vox pops] of Nikki saying those things, they're the kind of conversations I'm not privy to, so there's a lot of things I do miss there.'

'I was in this position where I did build a really beautiful relationship with Nikki but I was definitely falling for Alex,' the Bachelor went on.

During the tense finale, Richie held Nikki's hands as he told her his family gave him the advice to 'follow my heart'.

Heartbroken: Richie explained on radio that he wasn't 'privy' to the heartfelt confessions of love that Nikki had with the camera when he wasn't around

'And, Nikki, I really hope you understand...but my heart is with Alex,' he said.

Outraged by the reality hunk's decision, Sam took to Twitter to express her disgust.

'NOOOOOOOOOO,' the 27-year-old tweeted, adding multiple crying and broken-heart Emojis.

Showing she had her heart set on Nikki as the winner, Sam added: 'Nicki I will marry you!!! I seriously can't believe it. My heart broke for her poor girl (sic).'

Shocked: Former Bachelorette Sam was genuinely shocked and upset while watching Richie make his decision during the finale




Gemma Arterton says she regrets not having been more discriminating in her choice of film roles in the past

Gemma Arterton says she regrets not having been more discriminating in her choice of film roles in the past.

The British actress is riding high after the success at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) of the fabulous British movie Their Finest, in which she and co-stars Sam Claflin and Bill Nighy do some of their best screen work.

But Gemma admitted that she has appeared in some projects that, deep down, werent really to her taste.

She was naming no names. But she may have had the Hollywood blockbuster The Prince Of Persia, which she made with Jake Gyllenhaal, in mind.

Sometimes Ive not put my foot down, she said. Ive been like: Oh, thank you so much for the work! Id better do it. Rather than: No, I dont want to do that. 

She described her taste in films as quite subversive, and said her agents had started to understand, now, she would rather star in something smaller, but glorious, such as the World War II romantic drama Their Finest, or the French film Orpheline (known here as Orphan), or The Girl With All The Gifts, in which she appears alongside Glenn Close. They have also been shown at the TIFF.

In two weeks time, she will star in Escape, about a young woman going through a crisis  which also marks her first foray into producing, with financial backing from distributor Lorton.

She developed the improvisational feature with director Dominic Savage, and it will be shot in Gravesend, her home town. Gemma will play a mother of two who abandons her husband and young children.

No one makes films about women who want to run away, Arterton noted, as she sipped coffee at a restaurant in Toronto.

Her good friend Dominic Cooper will play the husband.

She was naming no names. But she may have had the Hollywood blockbuster The Prince Of Persia, which she made with Jake Gyllenhaal (pictured), in mind

Gemma says her agents had started to understand, now, she would rather star in something smaller, but glorious, such as the World War II romantic drama Their Finest (pictured)

Guy Garvey, of rock group Elbow, has agreed to write the films score. She met him through Rachael Stirling, her co-star on Their Finest (Garvey and Stirling are married).

Following Escape, Arterton will fill the title role of George Bernard Shaws Saint Joan for director Josie Rourke at the Donmar.

She also has other projects planned with Stephen Woolley, one of the key producers on Their Finest. Plus, theres talk of her appearing with Romola Garai in Vita And Virginia: a film based on Eileen Atkins play about Vita Sackville West and Virginia Woolf, though its early days for that project.

In the meantime, Their Finest will screen at the BFI London Film Festival next month.

Aaron Taylor-Johnson plays a mean, psychopathic hillbilly (who uses an open loo on the porch of his shack, but thats another story) in Nocturnal Animals, the second feature film to be directed by ultra-designer Tom Ford. Taylor-Johnson certainly gives the movie its energy, along with Michael Shannon as a sharp-eyed country cop.

Martin Kemp, the Spandau Ballet rocker-turned-actor, has been cast as Sam Phillips, the undisputed granddaddy of rock n roll and the man who discovered Elvis Presley in Memphis, in Million Dollar Quartet when it plays the South Bank Centre over the Christmas season, from December 17 until January 2.
News / National

by Stephen Jakes

MAGISTRATE Vongai Muchuchuti on Friday 16 September 2016 released Ishmael Kauzani who was arrested and charged with public violence in connection with the demonstration against police brutality which took place last month on $50 bail.Ishmael who is being represented by ZLHR board member Andrew Makoni was ordered to surrender his passport, report to the Harare Central Police Stations Law and order section every Monday and Friday and not interfere with State witnesses as part of his bail conditions.However, Petros Sokole and others as well as Bulawayo MDC-T youth secretary Kunashe Muchemwa who were arrested and charged with public violence over the National Electoral Reform Agenda (NERA) and Police Brutality demonstrations respectively; will have to endure another weekend behind bars after the High Court once again postponed their bail appeal hearing to 20 September 2016.The High Court also postponed to Monday 19 September 2016, the bail hearing of Tinotenda Mhungu and others who were also arrested and charged with public violence over demonstrations last month.They are being represented by ZLHR lawyers Jeremiah Bamu and Trust Maanda.
She's best known for being a reality star on Bravos' Real Housewives Of Beverly Hills.

But on Wednesday, Lisa Vanderpump used her celebrity to appeal to U.S. lawmakers to formally condemn China's annual Yulin Dog Meat Festival.

'The beauty of this cause is that it is universal. It transcends party lines, state borders and political stances,' she told a congressional hearing in Washington, D.C. 'It doesnt matter if youre a Republican or a Democrat; our cause should be everyones cause.'

Her pet cause: Lisa Vanderpump went to Washington, D.C. on Wednesday to to appeal to lawmakers to pass HR 752 that formally condemns the Yulin Dog Meat Festival in China

In May, Congressman Alcee Hastings, a democrat from Florida, introduced House Resolution 752 calling for lawmakers to condemn the festival and urge China to end the dog meat trade.

Wednesday's event was designed to increase bipartisan support for the resolution that could then lead to a vote on the House floor.

'As a country, we are judged by our actions and our beliefs. If we turn our heads and do nothing, we are condoning that this Festival continues,' Vanderpump told the audience of lawmakers, lobbyists and media.

'By not doing anything, we are silently giving Yulin our blessing. We, as people, should not stand passive while watching this barbaric practice continue.'

The reality star and restaurateur has been working with Florida Congressman Alcee Hastings to urge China to end the dog meat trade. They're pictured on Capitol Hill with one of her pups

'It must stop': During the presentation to members of Congress, lobbyists and media, the group showed some of the horrors of the dog meat trade that they described as 'barbaric'

She was joined at the event by Hastings and other animal rights activists including John Sessa, the executive director of the Vanderpump Dog Foundation.

Sessa explained that the point of the resolution is to bring pressure to bear on Chinese officials to enact changes that would protect dogs.

Speaking to DailyMail.com ahead of the hearing, Sessa said: 'There's no real governing body for animal rights. A vote would show that we are, as the United States of America, against the Yulin Dog Meat Festival, and we can't condone this any longer.'

Bringing pressure to bear: John Sessa, executive director of the Vanderpump Dog Foundation, said the goal was to persuade China to enact changes to protect dogs. He's pictured in December 2015 with a dog rescued from Yulin

During the past season of RHOBH, Vanderpump has used the show as a platform for her crusade against Yulin.

In fact, she revealed earlier this year, the willingness of the show's producers to allow her to publicize her dog rights agenda was one of the reasons she decided to remain part of Real Housewives Of Beverly Hills.
She is said to have recently split from Wilmer Valderrama, although she denies that they were romantically involved.

And Minka Kelly was making the most of being single with a night out in Los Angeles on Thursday.

The 36-year-old showed her red carpet style in a polka dot frock at the special screening for a new show on Discovery Impact called Huntwatch.

Good cause: Minka Kelly attends special screening for a new show on Discovery Impact called Huntwatch on Thursday in LA

Discovery Impact is the Discovery Channel's new environmental documentary series.

Minka's blue dress fell just above her ankles and had a V cut mesh right in the centre of her bust, allowing her to flash some cleavage.

The Friday Night Lights actress showed off her perfectly manicured red nails and black toe-nails as she accessorized with a pair of chic black sandals.

Minka styled her ombre brunette locks in a side part as she went for a wavy, natural style.

Subtle but sexy: Minka's blue dress fell just above her ankles and had a V cut mesh right in the centre of her bust

Her make-up was on point as she opted for a thick black eye-liner, a dash of mascara and a nude lip.

Minka's outing comes after reports that she has called it quits with Wilmer after one month of dating.

However she insisted they were never together to begin with, telling Power 106's J Cruz and Krystal Bee: 'He's a good friend to me. And it's funny - he's not my ex. We are good friends, and we always have been. We're not exes!'

Looking beautiful: Glee actress Heather Morris was also in attendance

Glee actress Heather Morris was also in attendance at the event on Thursday.

The blonde beauty wore a long sleeved peach dress with a high split and matching belt that cinched at the waist.

She tied her hair up into a ponytail as she let a few strands fall down to shape her face.

The stunner accessorized with a pair of standout gold sandals and a matching clutch as she posed up a storm on the red carpet.

Perfection: The blonde beauty wore a long sleeved peach dress with a high split and matching belt that cinched at the waist

Huntwatch is a new series narrated by Deadpool actor Ryan Reynolds and produced by the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW).

It follows the 50 year history of Canada's commercial harp seal hunt.

The show will air Thursday, September 22 at 10 p.m. ET.
She had just walked the red carpet in a distinctive black gown.

And it's clear Rooney Mara is a big fan of the look.

The 31-year-old was effortlessly chic in a classic black dress for the premiere of The Secret Scripture at the Toronto International Film Festival on Thursday.

Chic and classy! Rooney Mara was effortlessly chic in a classy black dress for the premiere of The Secret Scripture at the Toronto International Film Festival on Thursday

The sleeveless dress had cut-outs at the waist as to draw attention to her slender belly while tied off at the center with a pretty bow.

The dress had a layered peplum skirt while dropping just above her black heels.

Rooney's hair was slicked back away from her face into a super chic bun as her face transfixed audience members with just a scrap of makeup.

A coat of mascara, pink blush, and glossy lips topped the look off.

Picture perfect! The sleeveless dress had cut-outs at the waist as to show off her slender belly while tied off at the center with a pretty bow

Say cheese! Mara was joined on the red carpet by her The Secret Scripture co-star Vanessa Redgrave and director Jim Sheridan

Rooney was joined on the red carpet by her Secret Scripture co-star Vanessa Redgrave and director Jim Sheridan.

Rooney stars as a woman who journals about her time at a mental hospital in The Secret Scripture.

The film is a film adaptation of the book by Sebastian Barry, which chronicles a 100-year-old woman during her 50 years as a patient at the institution.

Coming soon: The Secret Scripture will be released in the U.S. this year

What a riot! Redgrave appeared to have tickled Jim's funny bone

Rooney and Vanessa play the same woman in varying stages of her life.

The Secret Scripture will be released in the U.S. this year.

It's been a busy week at the Toronto International Film Festival for Rooney, who has also attended premieres for her movies Lion and Una.

Strike a pose! The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo star flashed a bright smile as she posed beside Jim and Fran Sheridan
She was left heartbroken and sobbing after being dumped on Thursday's Bachelor finale.

And as viewers rally behind jilted reality star Nikki Gogan, with the hopes that will try to find love on TV again as the next Bachelorette, the Perth real estate agent revealed that she's not interested in signing up for the Channel Ten dating show.

She said the pain of Richie Strahan ditching her for Alex Nation is still 'too raw.'

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Not interested: Nikki Gogan revealed on Friday that she is not interested in becoming the next Bachelorette because the pain of Richie Strahan dumping her for Alex Nation is still 'too raw'

'... No way. Not at this moment. It's too raw,' she said during an appearance on Studio 10 on Friday.

'I feel like I'm not in the right head or heart space to be able to truly answer that question.

She added: 'And on top of that, I know that's a year from now and I feel like if I focused so far ahead that I might not be open to finding my person before then.

Viewers of the hit show watched fan favourite Nikki, 28, breakdown in tears after being rejected by rope access technician Richie, 31, who opted to instead pick single mum Alex, 24, as the winner.

Supporting each other: Nikki appeared on Studio 10 alongside other Bachelor rejects, Olena Khamula, Rachael Gouvigno, Faith WIlliams

Too soon: '... No way. Not at this moment. It's too raw,' Nikki said of becoming the next Bachelorette after she was dumped by Richie Strahan for single mum Alex Nation during the show's finale on Thursday

Shortly after the finale aired, fans took to social media urging network Ten to cast Nikki as the star of season two.

On Twitter, the hashtag #NikkiforBachelorette2017 began to trend.

'Now that I've had time to cool down I'm ok with this. Nikki can do so much better than Richie #nikkiforbachelorette2017,' one user wrote.

Standing strong: Nikki became a fan favourite on the hit Channel Ten dating show

Rallying behind Nikki: Viewers took to Twitter to support Nikki after the finale aired and the hashtag #NikkiforBachelorette2017 began to trend

'What the heck Richie #NikkiforBachelorette2017,' another tweet read.

In addition to ruling out The Bachelortte, Nikki revealed that she has been completely put off dating.

'I am off dating. I am no where near being ready to date again,' she told The Daily Telegraph.

Shattered: Heartbroken Nikki is struggling to come to terms with the loss of Richie, revealing to The Daily Telegraph that she's not ready to date yet

Since being rejected by Richie, the blonde beauty has returned to her normal everyday life as a real estate agent.

Speaking with Mamamia in the lead-up to the finale, she shared that she has no hard feelings towards Alex.

'[Alex and I] will just have this unique bond that no one else could possibly understand.

'This will forever hold us together. I love her to bits and no matter what, I want her to be happy.

'I'm sure she would say the same'.
She was left devastated when Richie Strahan chose Alex Nation in the dramatic Bachelor finale.

And Nikki Gogan could soon be visiting the Northern Territory to take her mind off her broken heart, by going fishing.

The 28-year-old real estate agent from Western Australia has been invited to the Territory's annual fishing challenge, and with the Top End boasting the highest male to female ratio in Australia, the blonde bombshell could find herself catching a fish on dry land.

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Devastated: Nikki Gogan was left heartbroken when Richie Strahan chose Alex Nation in the dramatic Bachelor finale on Thursday however she was recently invited to the Northern Territory's annual fishing challenge in a bid to take her mind off of things

'It's ladies' choice up here in the NT,' Tourism NT's Suzanne Morgan said.

'The old saying that there's plenty of fish in the sea is definitely true up north.'

'Since things might not have gone according to plan for Nikki on The Bachelor, we genuinely want to invite her to have better luck in the NT.'

'My heart is with Alex': Richie let Nikki down gently in a tearful final rose ceremony

Richie let Nikki down gently in a heart-breaking and tearful final rose ceremony in Thursday's finale.

'Coming down on this adventure, my family gave me some advice. And that advice was to follow my heart,' the ropes technician told the blonde beauty.

'And, Nikki, I really hope you understand... but my heart is with Alex.'

Nikki was clearly devastated but offered a dignified response.

Plenty of fish: The 28-year-old has not yet responded to the invitation to Northern Territory's annual fishing challenge

'I had a lot of fun': Nikki thanked Richie after he told her his heart was with Alex

'I've had a great time. I had a lot of fun. Thank you for everything,' the 28-year-old said.

Season two of the Northern Territory Million Dollar Fish challenge kicks off in October and could see one lucky angler snare a $1million prize.

One hundred barramundi have been tagged with $10,000 and one with a whopping $1million.
Modern Family actress Sarah Hyland showcased her newly bright blonde hair as she walked the red carpet at a pre-Emmys party in West Hollywood Thursday night.

The natural brunette, 25, has had her bobbed locks lightened ahead of Sunday's big awards show and paired her golden locks with a shiny silver mini dress.

Meanwhile, her co-star Ariel Winter, 18, flashed some cleavage in a lace black bra under a black dress slashed to the hip.

Flashing the flesh: Modern Family co-stars Sarah Hyland and Ariel Winter attended a pre-Emmys party in West Hollywood Thursday night in show-stopping outfits

Hyland's sleeveless number fell to mid-thigh and featured a gathered hem.

She paired it with matching strappy sandals and silvery shimmer around her eyes.

Her shoulder-length hair was slightly waved and she added a dash of dark pink lip color.

Winter, 18, showcased her curvy figure in the black dress that had a plunging neckline that revealed her lingerie-clad bosom.

Shiny star: Hyland, 25, paired her newly blonde wavy bob with a slinky metalic silver mini dress that had a gathered hem and a pair of matching strappy sandals with stiletto heels

Dared to bare: Winter, 18, showcased her curvy figure in black dress with a plunging neckline that revealed her lace black bra and some cleavage

Leggy look: The teen actress also showed off her legs in the number that had an asymmetrical hem and was slashed to the hip on one side

Had company: Winter was joined on the carpet with her on-screen brother actor Nolan Gould, 17, who was dapper in a shiny suit and a paisley patterned shirt

The teen actress also showed off her legs in the number that had an asymmetrical hem and was slashed to the hip on one side.

She was joined on the carpet by her on-screen brother actor Nolan Gould, 17, who had on a shiny suit paired with a paisley patterned shirt.

Also at the bash was Pitch Perfect 2 star and director Elizabeth Banks.

Stylish: Actress and director Elizabeth Banks showed up at the Audi-sponsored bash in a navy blue sleeveless jumpsuit with a black bra top embellished with beading and navy pumps

Reunited: Banks, 42, happily posed for photos with her former Scrubs co-star Zach Braff, 41, who was dapper in a black suit and white open-necked shirt

Opted for solid colors: Actress Constance Zimmer, 45, paired an off-the-shoulder white crop top and skinny black pants with teal pumps

The 42-year-old donned a navy blue sleeveless jumpsuit with a low-cut neckline and a black bra bodice embellished with beading. She added matching navy pumps.

The actress happily posed for photos with Zach Braff, whose love interest she played on the final season of TV hit Scrubs.

The actor, 41, wore a stylish black suit with a white open-necked shirt and brown brogues.

Peek-a-boo look: Covert Affairs star Piper Perabo, 39, wore a funky semi-sheer black Mikael D dress with a lace bodice and wide asymmetrical skirt

Showed off her toned physique: Actress Emily Osment, 24 opted for black pantsuit with wide legs and a halter top, while Draya Michelle (R) wore a tight black dress

Actor and Mr. Robot star Rami Malek, 35, paired skinny black jeans with a buttoned-up white shirt and a black jacket

House Of Cards actress Constance Zimmer, 45, opted for an off-the-shoulder white cropped top with flounce sleeves.

She paired it with skinny black pants and a pair of teal pointed toe pumps.

Covert Affairs star Piper Perabo, 39, wore a funky semi-sheer black Mikael D dress with a lace bodice and wide asymmetrical skirt.

Hanging together: Ray Oscar winner Jamie Foxx joined actress Tasha Smith at the party. Smith was lovely in a patterned frock with a drop waist and full sleeves

Friends: The Tyler Perry stalwart also posed for pictures with Mary J. Blige who rocked an off-the-shoulder striped top and black pants with a statement leather belt

She's a Mr. Robot fan!: Sarah posed for a photo with Rami as they chatted inside the venue

Confident: Ariel turned every head as she posed for the cameras in her skimpy ensemble

Meanwhile, actress Emily Osment, 24 opted for black pantsuit with wide legs and a halter top.

Mr. Robot's Rami Malek showed up for the bash in skinny black jeans and a buttoned up white collar shirt.

He added a black jacket and brown shoes.

Low-key: Sofia Richie didn't walk the red carpet, but was spotted inside the event

Party pals: The 18-year-old was chatting to 1 OAK co-owner Darren Dzienciol (C) and EMM Group's Mark Birnbaum

Expectant: Pregnant Fear The Walking Dead star Michelle Ang, 32, showcased her baby bump in a glittery wraparound black dress

Also there was Hollywood star Jamie Foxx, 48, and actress Tasha Smith, 45, who was lovely in a patterned frock with a drop waist and full sleeves.

And while she didn't pose on the red carpet, Sofia Richie was spotted inside the A-list bash.

The 68th Annual Primetime Emmys will be held Sunday at the Microsoft Theater in downtown Los Angeles and the televised show will air live on ABC.

Showing some skin: Ashley Madekwe (L) took the plunge in a mint dress and Emm Kuo clutch, while Mallory Jansen wore red lace

Coupling up: Carrie Preston posed with husband of almost 20 years Michael Emerson
Her outfits have been getting skimpier by the day as she shows off her impressive 70lbs weight loss.

And Kim Kardashian left absolutely nothing to the imagination on Thursday as she stripped completely naked for some selfies.

The 35-year-old insisted she was just showing off her spray tan in the raunchy Snapchat photos which she shared from her Miami hotel room.

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Naked ambition: Kim Kardashian shared nude photos to Snapchat on Thursday evening

Kim used just her arms to protect her modesty while posing nude.

While her curvy figure was on full display, she covered her face with her phone in the images.

The mother-of-two also shared a video to Snapchat, in which she told her fans: 'I just did a midnight spray tan you guys. Tanorexic.'

Earlier in the evening Kim and husband Kanye West had enjoyed dinner with Kourtney and Khloe Kardashian.

Totally innocent: The reality star insisted she was simply showing off her spray tan

'Tanorexic': Kim posed in her Miami hotel room with just her arms protecting her modesty

The family have been filming for Keeping Up With The Kardashians during their time in Miami.

Kim famously made headlines back in March when she shared a naked photo to Instagram and Twitter.

The reality star fired back after she was criticised for her actions by stars including Chloe Moretz and Bette Midler.

'hey @BetteMidler I know it's past your bedtime but if you're still up and reading this send nudes #justkidding,' Kim wrote to the 70-year-old.

Hands on husband! Kanye West reached for his wife Kim's cleavage as she adjusted the neckline of her tank top while heading to dinner at Prime One Twelve in Miami on Thursday

Dare to bare: The mother-of-two left little to the imagination in her racy lingerie-style top

Va va voom! Kardashian turned heads as she made her grand entrance to the Miami restaurant

Konfident: The 35-year-old's outfits have been getting skimpier by the day as she shows off her impressive 70lbs weight loss

She then added: 'hey @BetteMidler I really didn't want to bring up how you sent me a gift awhile back trying to be a fake friend then come at me #dejavu'.

Kim later hit out at 19-year-old Moretz, writing: 'let's all welcome to twitter, since no one knows who she is. your nylon cover is cute boo'.

She also bragged about how much money she's made, sharing: 'sorry I'm late to the party guys I was busy cashing my 80 million video game check & transferring 53 million into our joint account'.

Date night: Kim had enjoyed dinner with husband Kanye and her sisters Kourtney and Khloe

'Feeling better': The reality star told fans she is back to health after falling ill earlier this week

Busting out: The reality star, 35, could barely contain her ample bosom in the very low-cut bra cups of her lingerie one-piece

No stranger to nudes: The mother-of-two made headlines in March when she shared this selfie

Earlier that day Midler tweeted: 'Kim Kardashian tweeted a nude selfie today. If Kim wants us to see a part of her we've never seen, she's gonna have to swallow the camera.'

Meanwhile Chloe had shared: 'I truly hope you realize how important setting goals are for young women, teaching them we have so much more to offer than our bodies.'

While Kim received plenty of backlash for her naked photo, she was supported by stars including Emily Ratajkowski, Ariel Winter, and of course her famous siblings.

Back to work: On Thursday, Kourtney Kardashian and Jonathan Cheban were spotting shooting scenes for Keeping Up With the Kardashians in Miami

It's a family affair: Kim and her sister Khloe were also seen on location for the shoot

The talk: The trio chatted away on a balcony as a dilligent cameraman stood nearby

Ready for their close-ups: The cameraman caught their every word as their chat progressed

Adjustment: Mother-of-two Kim was seen adjusting her bust as filming pressed on

Black and white: Khloe and Kim opted to wear contrasting ensembles for their day of shooting

Shady lady: Brunette beauty Kim looked stylish in a pair of fashionable oversized sunglasses

Tough call? At one point, she was seen engaging in an intense exchange on her phone

Pearly whites: She was soon back to her smiley self, showing off her pearly white teeth

No sweat! Kourtney wowed as she stepped out in a sleeveless olive sweater dress

Sign of the times: As Kim pulled up, she was approached by an autograph seeking fan

Fan favourite: She chatted away with the lucky male during their light-hearted exchange
'Gay Bachelor' Robert Sepulveda Jr. shared his first kiss on Thursday's episode of Finding Prince Charming as tensions rose in the contestants' house.

Chad packed his bags and threatened to quit the show after Eric accused him of hitting on him following the black tie ceremony in last week's premiere episode.

'Are you out of your f***ing mind?' a furious Chad asked Eric. 'Do you think I'm attracted to you? Is that what you think?'

First kiss: Robert Sepulveda Jr shared his first kiss on Thursday's episode of Finding Prince Charming

'No, but that happened. I didn't dream it,' Eric told him.

'Your story is false,' Chad said. 'I never, ever came on to you. You don't exist to me. Bye.'

Eric opened up about his uncomfortable feelings towards Chad as the remaining 10 men prepared for a group date at the beach with Robert.

During a discussion about first impressions, Chad told Eric: 'I thought you were hiding something evil' before brushing it off as a misconception.

Taken back: Jasen had his black tie taken back by Robert and was sent home

Making up? Eric and Chad half hugged after confessing their skepticism for each other at the start of the show

Eric also confessed to Chad that 'sometimes I feel uncomfortable around you'.

Addressing the camera, Eric continued: 'The night after elimination I was alone in the kitchen and Chad comes into the room and all of a sudden he had his hands in his pants.

'It's a little too overly sexual and that's the moment when I started feeling the most uncomfortable around Chad,' Eric said.

Felt uncomfortable: A side confessional featured Eric claiming that Chad came into the kitchen with his hands in his pants

As the contestants walked onto the sand for their group date, they came face to face with Robert frolicking in the sea in a snug pair of swim shorts.

'I'm excited to see Robert in a swimsuit again and I'm also thinking thank god I haven't eaten since 1997,' Justin said.

Danique added: 'Robert is beautiful. He's beautiful. I'm looking forward to getting to know Robert a little bit more, but I'm not excited about being vultures and trying to pull him aside.'

On the beach: Robert was waiting on the beach with host Lance Bass

The group date was barely underway when Eric opened up to Robert about his issues in the house, which prompted the bachelor to confront Chad and ask whether he was being mean to his fellow contestants.

'I can't believe people are talking about me to Robert,' Chad told the camera. 'Maybe some people think this is a game and maybe some people are playing dirty.'

While Eric brought up his feelings about Chad, Dillon admitted he was wary of Sam.

Mean guy: Chad was confronted by Robert after hearing that he was being mean in the house

'I don't care for Sam,' he told Robert. 'Sam is a bully and I don't feel like he's here for the right reasons. I don't think he's a bad person but I also don't want there to be this discomfort in the house.'

Robert said: 'It's important for my future partner to get on with everybody.'

After their concerns had been aired, the men split into two teams for a volleyball match while Robert observed their sporting prowess from the umpire's chair.

Beach volleyball: The guys played a game of beach volleyball to win extra time with Robert

Winning team: The Robettes spent extra time with Robert on the beach

After beating The Nice Guys 21-13, the Robettes were rewarded with the chance to spend some extra time with the handsome bachelor and Robert chose Justin for his one-on-one date.

When all the men returned to the house, Chad pulled Eric aside and told him 'we have a canary in the house'.

Furious at Eric's claims that he had put his hands down his pants and invited him to the pool room last week, he told the other contestants: 'I don't want to be here anymore.'

Canary hunter: Chad went looking for the canary in the house

Face to face: Eric stuck to his story that Chad hit on him

Non existent: Chad told Eric that he no longer existed to him

Packing his bags, he said: 'I felt so outcasted. I felt like the room was spinning. I just want to leave the house. I want to go home.'

After some of the other contestants told him he should stay, he relented: 'My gut is telling me to leave but my heart is telling me to stay. I would like to give Robert another chance.'

He added: 'Robert's an amazing person so I have to stay at the house.'

Time to go: Chad packed his bags and declared that he was leaving

He's back: The guys talked Chad down and he decided to stay

The house, however, was further divided when Sam told the winning volleyball team he did not feel comfortable around them as a group.

A stunned Robby told the camera: 'When I think of Sam I think of a really sweet, soft cuddly bear but then he snaps.'

Harmony was restored, however, when Justin  who was given the power to pick a fellow contestant to enjoy a date with Robert  chose Jasen.

Not comfortable: Sam told the Robettes that he wasn't comfortable with them as a group

Getting ready for his own date, Justin said: 'I don't have any strategy going into this date, but I can make lemonade out of p***. I can talk about anything and let Robert know who I am.'

Justin and Robert spent the afternoon designing their own custom fragrance at a perfumery before sharing a kiss  Robert's first kiss on Finding Prince Charming.

'Our lips connected and it was magic,' Justin swooned.

Date time: Justin was excited about his upcoming date with Robert

Perfume making: Robert and Justin made a cologne together

Making out: Justin scored the first kiss from Robert on the show

Jasen and Robert's date took place at a salt spa, where the pair enjoyed a couple's massage before spending time in a salt room.

It did not take long for Robert to ask Jasen about Chad and Jasen let slip that he had packed his bags and almost quit the show the previous night.

'If he had his bags packed already, I think that tells me a lot about how he feels about our status,' Robert said.

Spa date: Jasen and Robert went on a spa date together

Chemistry talk: Robert and Jasen talked about the importance of chemistry in a relationship

After a tense black tie affair, Chad and Jasen then found themselves in the bottom two and at risk of being sent home.

'I hear you packed your bags last night,' Robert told Chad. 'If you don't want to be here you can go home.'

Chad explained: 'The reason I packed my bags was because I felt very overwhelmed with one person, maybe two in the house. I felt ganged up and bullied.'

The explanation: Chad explained to Robert why he packed his bags

It was Jasen, however, who lost his tie  and his place in the house  after Robert told him he did not feel any chemistry between them.

'Today at the spa it was amazing, we had a great time, but it also opened my eyes to the fact that I don't think you and I have chemistry and for that reason I'm going to have to ask for my tie back,' Robert said.

While a tearful Chad hugged Robert after learning he was safe for another week, Jasen said: 'What makes me most upset is that Robert said we didn't have chemistry because I thought we had a connection.

'I honestly have no idea what happened. Just like the name of our volleyball team, nice guys don't always win.'
They had a whirlwind romance on The Bachelor.

But Richie Strahan and Alex Nation's reality may be a far cry from the chocolate baths and picnics they enjoyed while on the show.

With the first challenge being the long distance between their home cities of Perth and Melbourne, the 32-year-old hunk is also faced with the reality of committing to the 25-year-old blonde's son Elijah, whom he has yet to meet.

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Back to reality: With The Bachelor now over, will Richie Strahan's relationship with mother-of-one Alex Nation stand the test of time in the real world?

During the final episode, Richie's mother Kate was shocked to hear that Alex had a son and quizzed the pair on whether they've considered the responsibilities and challenges that they might face.

Taking the mother-of-one aside, Kate asked: 'How in-depth have you explained to Richard the responsibility that you're asking him to take on?'

Alex assured Kate that she's made it clear to Richie that he'd be a 'role model' for Elijah rather than his father figure.

Romance: The couple enjoyed the luxuries of extravagant dates throughout the series

Future plans: While the pair have fallen in love, Richie's mother Kate had concerns about the pair's lack of discussion around Alex's son during the finale

Not entirely satisfied with the aspiring model's explanation, Richie's mother continued to grill the finalist: 'What about the nitty gritty? Richie sees life as we get up in the morning, we go to work, we have fun.

'Have you explained to him that there's going to be times when Elijah puts on a tantrum?'

Pointing out that her son lives in Perth while Alex and her family are interstate, Kate added: 'There's going to be a lot of compromising on Richie's behalf, but there's not a lot of compromise on Alex's half.'

Real life: The blonde beauty has told Richie she's hesitant to uproot her son Elijah from his life and school in Melbourne

On Wednesday's episode, Alex discussed possible living arrangements with Richie should they end up together.

'Could you see yourself living in Melbourne?' she asked.

Remaining vague with his answer, Richie said he'd be open to an interstate move.

Alex hit back with her opinion on moving her life and young son away from their Melbourne home to Richie's Perth hometown.

'Not in any kind of rush': Alex told Mamamia Richie has yet to meet her son and that their relationship will only start in 'the real world'

'When I think about, like, how we were trying to make this relationship work, I don't want to pull the little guy out of school and get him moving around all these different places,' admitted Alex.

Despite filming for the show finishing over three months ago in May, the mother-of-one has yet to introduce her beau to her son.

'That will come but we're not in any kind of rush,' she told Mamamia.

'I don't think there is any reason to rush into something like that. Even though the show has finished and ended, that relationship would only be starting out in the real world.'
Elizabeth Banks brought some glitz and glam to a pre-Emmys party in West Hollywood on Thursday.

The 42-year-old sported a dark blue navy jumpsuit which was topped off with a fitted black tank top featuring jewels in various shades of blue.

Elizabeth's fitted frock clung to her toned waist as it fanned at the front as she posed up a storm at the Audi pre-awards show party.

Sparkle and shine! Elizabeth Banks brought some glitz and glam to a pre-Emmys party in West Hollywood on Thursday

The Pitch Perfect star's sexy frock was topped off with a pair of black heels as she dressed up the number with dangling earrings.

Her blonde hair was slicked back into an ultra edgy yet chic 'do which drew attention to her radiant and transfixing features.

The star had on ample mascara as to show off her light eyes while candyfloss pink lipstick and blush rounded off the effect.

Meanwhile, Elizabeth earlier in the summer spoke of the harsh truth of ageism in Hollywood, revealing that she has been turned down for roles for being 'too old'.

Added extras: The star's sexy frock was topped off with a pair of black heels as she dressed up the number with dangling earrings

In a video or the UK edition of Glamour, the multi-talented celebrity explains: 'I screen-tested for the role of Mary Jane Watson in the first Spider-Man movie, opposite Tobey Maguire.

'Tobey and I are basically the same age - and I was told I was too old to play her.'

But while Elizabeth accepts she will be judged on her age, she doesn't intend to retire any time soon.

Radiant: The star had on ample mascara as to show off her light eyes while candyfloss pink lipstick and blush rounded off the effect

Look who's here! Zach Braff joined Banks for a snap in front of a sleek car

'I was like, 'Oh, OK, that's what I've signed up for'.

'What I'm grateful for now is longevity. I was never a flavour of the month. I feel very comfortable that I will be working in this industry for a while.'

Meanwhile Elizabeth has recently been filming for next year's Power Rangers movie, in which she will portray Rita Repulsa, and is also reprising the role of Gail in Pitch Perfect 3.

The mother-of-two initially signed on to direct the film, but pulled out of directing in order to spend more time with her family.
News / National

by Thobekile Zhou

A Cabinet minister linked to a Zanu PF G40 faction has said Finance minister Patrick Chinamasa's massive civil servants jot cuts proposals are meant to incite people to rebel against Government.Last week, Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa warned that government risk not paying workers at some point.He proposed a massive 25 000 job cut which would have reduced the workforce to 273 000 by the end of 2017 and bonus freeze for two year.However, in a dramatic u-turn Information, Media and Broadcasting Services Minister Christopher Mushohwe said Cabinet on July 12 rejected such drastic proposal.According to the Zimbabwe Independent, a minister associated with G40 said Chinamasa's plan was "a sinister package of snake oil proposals meant to incite people to rise against the government.""Before coming up with such recommendations, Chinamasa should have come up with better options which include early retirements rather than retrenching."He should have explored ways of ensuring there is a soft landing for those retrenched rather than throwing them onto the streets to join protestors. This is an attempt to fuel anti-government riots," the unnamed minister is quoted saying.
It is said to be a mistake to gild the lily.

However all rules have their exceptions, as glammed up Lily James proved at the premiere of The Exception in Canada on Thursday night.

The English rose stole the show as she traversed the red carpet in a stylish dress at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Cinderella goes to the ball: Lily James stole the show at the premiere of The Exception in Canada on Thursday

The 27-year-old Cinderella beauty looked effortlessly elegant as she posed up a storm in the elegant gown, which flashed just the merest glimpse of ankle.

Downton Abbey favourite Lily, who looked flawless thanks to a sterling makeup job, completed her look with a pair of tan coloured stilettos.

She was joined on the red carpet by her famously temperamental co-star Christopher Plummer, who kept his temper in check as he cuddled up to the starlet for the cameras.

The drama picture tells the story of a German soldier who works to discover if a spy has been planted to infiltrate the home of Kaiser Wilhelm in Holland at the start of the Second World War.

Woman of mystery: She enigmatically stared into the distance as she posed

Fine filly: The silver screen thoroughbred looked fantastic from every angle

The Sound Of Music to his ears: Christopher Plummer was only too happy to pose with his nubile co-star

Unfortunately for his mission, as he tries to ascertain if the Dutch is involved he ends up falling for a young Dutch Jewish woman.

The movie also features Jai Courtney, who plays Captain Stefan Brandt, and was directed by noted Broadway theatre director David Leveaux.

The British film, which was originally titled The Kaiser's Last Kiss, has yet to get a firm release date.

A Plummer role: Christopher plays Kaiser Wilhelm II in the forthcoming film

Who needs a leading man? Lily held hands with Christopher while Jai Courtney stood next to director David Leveaux
She spent Wednesday meeting with members of the U.S. Congress drumming up support for a formal condemnation of China's Yulin Dpg Meat Festival.

But on Thursday it was back to the day-to-day routine of a Hollywood celebrity for Lisa Vanderpump.

The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star was spotted checking out dresses ahead of the Emmys awards show and accompanying round of parties this weekend.

On home turf again: Real Housewives star Lisa Vanderpump was spotted back in Beverly Hills on Thursday after a brief trip to Washington, D.C.

The 56-year-old was chauffeured around town by her devoted husband Ken Todd in their white convertible Rolls Royce.

Lisa stepped out in a sleeveless black jumpsuit with wide legs and a lace peek-a-boo panel at the bust.

She kept covered up in a wide-brimmed straw hat with black band and a pair of very large statement sunglasses.

Needs a frock: Lisa, 56, was seen checking out stylish dresses ahead of Sunday's Emmy Awards and accompanying parties tha will be held in LA

Awards ready? She was seen trying on a full-length white gown while still wearing her wide-brimmed straw hat

No need for a dressing room: The reality star chose to try on the dress on the shop floor putting it on over her black jumpsuit

The reality star and restaurateur was seen trying on dresses over the top of her jumpsuit on the shop floor.

She picked out a strapless white gown with purple flower patterns and then a full-length white strapless dress with a small train.

Meanwhile, patient Ken looked on holding one of the couple's beloved pet pooches on his lap.

Devoted spouse: She was accompanied by her husband Ken Todd who waited patiently with one of the couple's beloved pet dogs on his lap

Running errands: Ken did the driving chauffeuring his wife around town in their white Rolls Royce convertible

Best foot forward; Lisa looked utterly stylish in the wide-legged pantsuit that had peek-a-boo lace detailing at the bust and waist

Just 24 hours earlier, the pair had been in Washington, D.C. where Lisa spoke out as part of a congressional hearing on House Resolution 752 that calls for a formal condemnation by the U.S. of China's dog meat trade.

Wednesday's event was designed to increase bipartisan support for the resolution introduced in May by Florida Congressman Alcee Hastings in the hopes it would lead to a vote on the House floor.

'As a country, we are judged by our actions and our beliefs. If we turn our heads and do nothing, we are condoning that this Festival continues,' Vanderpump told the audience of lawmakers, lobbyists and media.

'By not doing anything, we are silently giving Yulin our blessing. We, as people, should not stand passive while watching this barbaric practice continue.'

She was joined at the event by Hastings and other animal rights activists including John Sessa, the executive director of the Vanderpump Dog Foundation.

Her pet cause: Lisa wasback home after traveling to Washington, D.C. where she appealed to lawmakers on Wednesday to on Wednesday to pass HR 752 that formally condemns the Yulin Dog Meat Festival in China
She had a big business meeting to attend to.

So of course Tori Spelling made sure she was armed with her lucky charm for the occasion.

The 43-year-old was spotted leaving her meeting in Los Angeles on Thursday, clad in the bright green dress that she referred to as 'lucky' on Instagram.

Her lucky charm! Tori Spelling was spotted leaving a meeting in Los Angeles on Thursday, clad in the bright green dress that she referred to as 'lucky' on Instagram

Tori was hard to miss that day.

The former 90210 star teamed her patterned and vibrant green frock with a slick of hot red lipstick.

She wore her light blonde hair down sleek and straight while touching up her complexion with a brush of pink blush.

The actress had a leather purse slung over her shoulder as she quenched her thirsty with a can of ginger ale.

Hard to miss! The star teamed her patterned and vibrant green frock with a slick of hot red lipstick

Tori rejoiced in her successful business meeting that same day on Instagram, teasing a new project in the works in the caption of a selfie she took from inside her car.

'This is the look of a happy girl meets a fierce businesswoman!', Tori wrote.

'Had an exciting meeting today... stay tuned. #luckyvintagegreendress #frontangle #momwarrior #createwhatyouwant.'

Gorgeous in green: She wore her light blonde hair down sleek and straight while touching up her complexion with a brush of pink blush

This comes after it had been reported that the federal government has slapped Tori and her husband Dean McDermott with a tax lien for a hefty $707, 487.30 in unpaid taxes.

And the 43-year-old and her 49-year-old husband are likely have an even greater debt as the figure only accounts for unpaid taxes accrued in 2014.

Earlier in August the couple were hit with another tax lien, this time from the state of California.

'Had an exciting meeting today': Spelling rejoiced in her successful business meeting that same day on Instagram, teasing a new project in the works in the caption of a selfie she took from inside her car

The lien, which was also for unpaid taxes from 2014, was set to cost the celebrity couple $259, 108.23.

Meanwhile, the combined tax liens are not the only fees the family-of-six are struggling with these days, as back in January American Express sued Tori for failing to make payments on her $37, 981.97 credit card bill.

It was reported that the reality star had attempted to make a payment back in June of last year, for $1, 070, but it had bounced.

The company is demanding that Tori pay the delinquent balance in full, including the accrued interest.
She regularly turns up the heat, posing in a number of teeny tiny bikinis.

But Skye Wheatley, 23, decided to take things a step further, posing suggestively with her shirtless boyfriend Cameron McCristal in a Bali hotel on Friday.

The former Big Brother star also revealed on Instagram the couple set up a tripod in their bedroom, before she swiftly deleted the comments.

Feeling frisky? Former Big Brother star Skye Wheatley posed suggestively with her shirtless boyfriend Cameron McCristal in a Bali hotel room on Friday

In the risque photo, Skye gently strokes her partner as she displays her pert behind in a pair of skimpy lace knickers.

With her bronzed limbs on display, the busty blonde was seen getting up close and personal to her lucky boyfriend.

Fans were quick to voice their opinions, with only positive comments such as 'cutest couple' and 'that booty' left un-deleted.

Not shy! The former reality star has been keeping her social media followers up to date with her adventures in Bali, uploading poolside snaps that flaunt her surgically enhanced breasts

The former reality star has been keeping her social media followers up to date with her adventures in Bali, uploading poolside snaps that flaunt her surgically enhanced breasts.

One image saw Skye dressed in an orange two-piece swimsuit, which highlighted her slender sun-kissed frame.

As she wrapped one arm around her tattooed beau, Skye clutched onto a beverage and playfully stuck out her tongue.

Her best angles: Moments earlier, Skye posted another bikini-clad image of herself posing knee-deep in the resort's pool

'Can't wait to fly this dimple butt to Bali'! Before travelling overseas, Skye shared a throwback holiday snap of herself in a black bikini

Earlier, Skye posted another bikini-clad photo of herself climbing out of the resort's pool.

Before travelling to Bali, Skye shared a throwback holiday snap of herself in a black bikini.

She wrote in the caption: 'Cant wait to fly this dimple butt to Bali woohooo two more sleeps'.

Still going strong: She also shared a steamy image of herself and Cameron kissing at the beach
She became the oldest Bond girl in history when she took the role of Lucia Sciarra in Spectre last year.

And Monica Bellucci showcased her ageless beauty once again as she attended Glamour 'n Soul opening at Museo Maxxi in Rome, Italy, on Thursday night.

The actress, 51, displayed her flawless looks and envy-inducing curves as she slipped into a striking sheer tiered gown.

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Graceful: Monica Bellucci showcased her ageless beauty once again as she attended Glamour 'n Soul opening at Museo Maxxi in Rome, Italy, on Thursday night

Featuring panels of mauve, cream and peach, the colour-clashing number was cinched at the waist with a large patent belt to emphasise the Italian bombshell's hourglass figure to perfection.

The strategically placed sheer lace panels gave a glimpse of Monica's black bra as she worked her magic in front of the cameras at the event.

Adding height to her frame with a pair of towering black patent platform wedges, the brunette looked incredible for her moment in the spotlight.

Monica wore her raven locks in bouncy curls and accentuated her classically striking features with heavy eyeliner and a slick of pale pink lipstick.

Timeless: The actress, 51, displayed her flawless looks and envy-inducing curves as she slipped into a striking sheer tiered gown

Striking: The colour-clashing number was cinched at the waist with a large patent belt to emphasise the Italian bombshell's hourglass figure to perfection

The actress was joined by distinguished guests Valeria Golino and Roberto Ciccutto at The Maxxi, a national museum of contemporary art and architecture in Rome.

It's been a busy few weeks, with the actress promoting her latest movie On The Milky Road during the 73rd Venice Film Festival earlier this month.

Monica recently revealed her beauty advice to the Telegraph newspaper, admitting she doesn't like the gym and enjoys treating herself to cakes, pasta, wine and cigarettes.

Monica explained: 'Im not someone who wakes up at 6am to go to the gym.

Every inch a Bond girl: Adding height to her frame with a pair of towering black patent platform wedges, the brunette looked incredible for her moment in the spotlight

'Because the truth is that I like cakes and pasta, the odd glass of wine and a very occasional cigarette.'

In conclusion, the brunette added: 'My advice is: eat well, drink well, have good sex  and laugh a lot. The rest comes all on its own.

Monica was married to French actor Vincent Cassel for 14 years before announcing their separation in 2013.

The couple share two daughters, Deva, 12, and Leonie, six.
She announced she's expecting her first child last week.

And Bond girl Lea Seydoux, 31, looked positively glowing as she attended the French premiere of her new film Its Only the End of the World on Thursday in Paris.

Looking radiant alongside her co-stars, the blonde beauty stole the show with her blossoming baby bump in an eye-catching red ensemble that accentuated her growing bundle of joy.

Glowing: Bond girl Lea Seydoux, 31, looked positively glowing as she attended the Paris premiere of her new film Its Only the End of the World on Thursday with her co-stars

Whispering with her Oscar winning co-star Marion Cotillard, the actress stunned as she posed in the ballerina length number that featured an elbow length sleeve and ruffle detail placed around her waist and shoulder.

Adding some extra inches to her petite frame, the film star teetered on the red carpet in a fashion forward metallic pointed stiletto as she simply accessorised her look with a statement diamond earring and ring.

The French stunner opted to keep to a strict red colour theme as she worked a vivid shade of lipstick which perfectly matched her stylish ensemble and manicure.

Radiant: Whispering with her Oscar winning co-star Marion Cotillard, the actress stunned as she posed in the ballerina length number

Keeping to her Parisian roots, Lea styled her chin length golden locks into a slick soft curl as she opted to work a deep side parting for the event.

Despite being notoriously tight-lipped about her personal life, Lea revealed she was expecting her first child by posing on the red carpet with her bump at the Toronto International Film Festival last week.

Lea was in Toronto to attend the premiere for her much applauded Cannes Grand Prix-winning film Its Only the End of the World.

Chic: The film star posed alongside her co-star Gaspard Ulliel, Marion, and director of the movie Xavier Dolan

Exciting news: Despite being notoriously tight-lipped about her personal life, Lea revealed she was expecting her first child last week

Meanwhile, Marion Cotillard made a statement at Thursday's cinematic event in her over-sized white leather dress which boasted gold button detailing and daring side splits.

Displaying her toned pins, the Macbeth star donned a fashion forward shoe - which featured a gold block heel as it laced up around her slender ankles.

Posing with the film's director, Xavier Dolan, Marion worked a deep side parting as she slicked her locks into chic chignon.

Style statement: Marion made a statement at the cinematic event in her oversized white leather dress which boasted gold button detailing and daring side splits

Sweet: Posing with the film's director, Xavier Dolan, Marion worked a deep side parting as she slicked her locks into chic chignon

The fashion darling ramped up her beauty look with a swipe of burgundy hued lipstick as she went for a bronze shadow all over her eye.

As well as promoting her new film, Marion is currently busy filming another new flick - Assassin's Creed alongside Michael Fassbender.

The French native will play Sophia Rikkin in the computer adaptation - which will hit theatres December 21.
She is known for hosting Love Island.

And Caroline Flack looked as though she had her own girl crush on Thursday, as she fan-girled over Hailey Baldwin at a London Fashion Week bash.

Gushing over the 19-year-old American star who was hosting Stradivarius' The Event Paper exclusive cocktail party on Oxford Street, the 36-year-old British presenter appeared to be on a mission to make a new best friend.

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New BBFs? Caroline Flack looked as though she had her own girl crush on Thursday, as she fan-girled over Hailey Baldwin at a London Fashion Week bash

Clad in a silk green lingerie-inspired slip, Caroline appeared very animated as she waved her hands and chatted excitedly to the blond bombshell.

Hailey engaged in the lively conversation, appeared just as entertained as her new pal.

At one point she raised her hand, perhaps referring to their substantial height difference.

The statuesque star then posed alongside the brunette beauty, as Caroline continued her tactile display.

Friendly: Gushing over the 19-year-old American star who was hosting Stradivarius' The Event Paper exclusive cocktail party on Oxford Street, the 36-year-old British presenter appeared to be on a mission to make a new best friend

Later Caroline took to Instagram to share a picture of the duo at the event, writing: 'Thank you @stradivarius for having us tonight ... #stradivariuslondon #theeventpaper @haileybaldwin'.

Meanwhile Hailey, who boasts over 7m followers, shared a solo snap as she enjoyed the bash, writing: 'Thanks for having me tonight @stradivarius #StradivariusLondon #theeventpaper'.

The daughter of actor Alec Baldwin looked stylish in a tight navy T-shirt and wide legged trousers.

New crew: Clad in a silk green lingerie-inspired slip, Caroline appeared very animated as she waved her hands and chatted excitedly to the blond bombshell

You can sit with us: Hailey engaged in the lively conversation, appeared just as entertained as her new pal

Completing her ensemble with a black choker and killer heels, she looked every inch a star in the making.

Meanwhile Caroline appeared to have not a care in the world after she was recently forced to deny drug use as fans mistook a pen in an Instagram snap for a rolled up note.

As Caroline posted the photograph on Instagram, one beady-eyed user penned: 'Rolled up note there, Caroline. and a card.' before she swiftly hit back: 'Its a childs crayon lol.'

Besties-to-be: The statuesque star then posed alongside the brunette beauty, as Caroline continued her tactile display

Earlier this year, Caroline spoke to Your Fitness magazine about her body overhaul and staying in shape. She revealed she decided to shape up for herself and her own health.

'I'd hate to think I did this for anyone else. The truth is I did this for me to make myself feel the very best I could and this is the way I decided to do it.

'I don't like to weigh myself. But it was never really about losing weight,' the TV star reveals.

Sharing the moment: Later Caroline took to Instagram to post a picture of the duo at the event, writing: 'Thank you @stradivarius for having us tonight ... #stradivariuslondon #theeventpaper @haileybaldwin'

The key to her new look is cutting out all sugar, with Caroline adding: 'I'm consuming more calories now than ever before, they're just the right calories.

'I'm always starving in the morning so I eat a lot for breakfast it's usually scrambled or poached eggs, bacon, avocado, mushrooms or sometimes even steak.

'What made the biggest difference to how I looked and felt was cutting out all sugar.'

'I work out three times a week and used to feel really intimidated entering the free weights area but now I feel comfortable. I've been lifting heavy weights for 14 weeks and I haven't become any bigger.'
They're the Bachelor stars who failed to make a lasting impression on Richie Strahan.

But Noni Janur and Kirralee 'Kiki' Morris looked perfectly happy as they enjoyed a night out at Sydney's Bondi Beach on Friday.

The busty BFFs flaunted their curves in barely-there attire following a champagne lunch with co-stars Faith Williams and Rachael Gouvignon.

The girls are out! The Bachelor stars Noni Janur (R) and Kirralee 'Kiki' Morris (L) flaunted their busty curves during a night out at Sydney's Bondi Beach on Friday

'Baby girlllll @kikimorris,' Noni captioned the shot, which saw them dining at popular burger jaunt Milky Lane.

Keen to impress in the style stakes, the Bachelor stars opted for skimpy attire that accentuated their slim physiques.

Noni, 25, sported a body-con frock which drew attention to her ample assets with a strategically placed cut-out design.

Reality reunion: Just hours earlier, the girls enjoyed a boozy lunch at Bondi's The Bucket List, with fellow contestants Faith Williams (far left) and Rachael Gouvignon (far right)

Allowing her long locks to fall in loose waves over one shoulder, she complemented her bronzed complexion with a neutral make-up palette.

Meanwhile Kiki, 28, highlighted her taut torso in a midriff-style off-the-shoulder top by Australian brand Camilla.

Teaming the vibrant number with a skintight white skirt, the topless model accessorised with a pair of thigh-high boots.

Making friends: Sydney make-up artist Olena Khamula (L) and intruder Stephanie Dixon (R) have been seen enjoying several nights out on the town

Kiki went for a more glamorous look featuring of kohl-rimmed eyes, lashings of mascara and a touch of bronzer.

Just hours earlier, the girls enjoyed a boozy lunch at Bondi's The Bucket List, with fellow contestants Faith Williams, 26, and Rachael Gouvignon, 31.

'Champagne lunch with my bachie babes,' Noni captioned the reality star reunion.

Unlikely friends: Keira Maguire (R), 29, enjoyed a shopping trip and Melbourne night out with rose-eating Sasha Zhuravlyova (L), 31

Despite being booted off the popular dating series, many of the female contestants have kept up appearances on the social circuit.

Keira Maguire, 29, recently enjoyed a shopping trip and Melbourne night out with Sasha Zhuravlyova, 31.

Sydney make-up artist Olena Khamula, 23, and Stephanie Dixon, 25, have also been seen enjoying several nights out on the town.

Meanwhile, Megan Marx, 27, and Tiffany Scanlon, 29, are even rumoured to be dating.
Fans are used to seeing him strut down the runway in skin-baring swimwear.

But Kris Smith, 38, took the term 'provocative' to a whole new level on Friday night when he shared an Instagram photo of himself posing naked in bed with his package barely covered by a bed sheet.

The Myer ambassador positioned the camera strategically so as to beckon his 62,000 followers viewers to gaze upon his crotch.

Get a grip! On Friday night, model Kris Smith shared an Instagram photo of himself posing naked in bed with his package barely covered by a bed sheet

In the caption, the father-of-one simply wrote: 'Night all' alongside the sleeping face emoji.

Fans immediately commented on Kris' risque display, with one fan writing: 'This is starting to get R rated'.

One follower was rather disapproving, asking: 'Why??? Why? Having to fish out attention shows poor character.'

Put it away, Kris! Several fans commented on Kris' risque display, but some did not approve

Another wrote: 'Just amazes me why people post photos of themselves like this do u crave attention @krissmith13 cos its just weird'.

Curiously, Kris appeared to have a change of heart about the snap, deleting it from his Instagram less than an hour after it was posted.

This comes days after he arrived back from a whirlwind trip to the US where he and girlfriend Maddy King attended the Burning Man music festival.

Living the dream: This comes days after Kris arrived back from a whirlwind trip to the US with girlfriend Maddy King. Pictured together in August

'Dancing in the dust': The couple attended the Burning Man music festival

During the trip, Kris shared a photo of himself wearing in a black top hat and purple blazer, adding the caption: 'Dancing in the dust at the madness that is burning man'.

He also shared a snap of himself posing shirtless in gold leggings as he stared off into the desolate expanse of Black Rock Desert, Nevada.

'Burning Man You did not disappoint, we danced in the dust, laughed, cried and I even wore sparkly tights, but we had the best time ever,' he wrote.
Sharon Stone sure knows how to pull off a look.

The 58-year-old Hollywood goddess managed to appear as stunning as ever in a head-to-toe black outfit when she hit the weSPARK Comedy Night at the Skirball Center in Los Angeles on Thursday evening.

This comes after she appeared on the cover of Closer Weekly where her near-death experience was covered. She said she saw a bright white light after suffering from a subarachnoid brain hemorrhage in 2001. 'I feel that I did die,' said the Basic Instinct star.

One tall drink of water: Sharon Stone looked lovely in black leather slacks at the weSPARK Comedy Night at the Skirball Center in Los Angeles on Thursday

She gets it right: The Golden Globe nominee hit all the right notes in her black top and matching jacket with a feathered finish

She added: 'This kind of giant vortex of white light was upon me and - poof! I sort of took off into this glorious, bright-white light.'

The Golden Globe nominee hit all the right notes in her cropped black leather slacks with a black top, matching jacket with a feathered finish, strappy black heels and a pair of brown-tinted siunglasses.

The leggy wonder wore her blonde locks brushed to the side and had on shiny lip gloss. A light blue pedicure hinted at her playful side.

Fresh: The leggy wonder wore her blonde locks brushed to the side and had on shiny lip gloss

She likes her shades: The movie star wore brown-tinted sunglasses as well

In her own words: The Casino actress made this week's cover of Closer

Stone's death experience happened when she was living in San Francisco with journalist husband Phil Bronstein (they split in 2003) and already had the films Total Recall, Basic Instinct, Sliver, Intersection, The Specialist, Casino and Sphere under her belt.

When the hemorrhage took place in September 2001 Stone thought she was having a stroke and waited three days until she went to the hospital.

The incident caused her to take a break from acting as she learned how to talk and walk properly again. 'It almost feels like my entire DNA changed,' she has said.

While in the white light she said she met up with her late friends.

Long and lean: The actress is seen here in June 2001, just three months before she nearly died

'I started to see and be met by some of my friends... people who were very, very dear to me [who had died]. I had a real journey with this that took me to places both here and beyond.'

Stone added: 'But it was very fast - whoosh! Suddenly, I was back. I was in my body.'

The mother-of-three said: 'It affected my life so profoundly that it will never be the same.'

Her story: 'I started to see and be met by some of my friends... people who were very, very dear to me [who had died]. I had a real journey with this that took me to places both here and beyond,' she said; here she is seen with her three sons

And she said there have been benefits.

'I get not to be afraid of dying and I get to tell other people that it's a fabulous thing and death is a gift.

'When death comes to you, as it will, it's a glorious and beautiful thing. I had an incredible sense of well-being and a sense that it's just so near. Death - it's very near and very safe. It's not a far away or scary thing.'

Her super film: The blonde bombshell rocketed to stardom alongside Michael Douglas in the 1992 thriller Basic Instinct

The Quick And The Dead star also said she has a 'big destiny' and is not alone in this universe.

'I feel that God kept me around for a reason,' said The Muse star.

Stone's next film is The Masterpiece, which is directed by James Franco.

The pinup recently traveled to Martha's Vineyard where she picked up the Film Society Global Citizen Award for her philanthropic efforts at the 11th annual Marthas Vineyard International Film Festival. Before that she in Amsterdam with her brother-in-law.

She has three sons: Roan, 16, Laird, 11, and Quinn, 10.
News / Regional

by Stephen Jakes

As tension escalate between Matobo villagers and the Arda who partners with the Trek Petroleum in a farming project where some villagers are being evicted from the homes to pave way for the expansion of the farming area, government is reported to have deployed soldiers amid fears that villagers were planing to stage a protests against the move.Sources form the area said the angry villagers had planned a demonstration to go and tender a petition to the farming project officials arguing that the evictions were disadvantaging them and complaining that the project does not benefit locals but many outsiders were employed at it."The villagers had planned to demonstrate over the evictions today (Thursday) but they are now afraid after the government deployed soldiers and the police in the area. These soldiers are intimidating people," said a villager.
Cindy Crawford normally is seen on the red carpet posing fiercely like a female Derek Zoolander.

But on Wednesday evening the 50-year-old model gave all that Blue Steel pouting a break as she took to the podium at the Fifth Star Awards at Millennium Park in Chicago.

The Vogue favorite was on hand to present an award to her old foe turned friend, fashion photographer Victor Skrebneski.

A new look: Cindy Crawford laughed at the Fifth Star Awards at Millennium Park in Chicago on Wednesday

For her pal: The Vogue favorite was on hand to present an award to her old foe turned friend, fashion photographer Victor Skrebneski

Blue Steel: Crawford normally is seen on the red carpet posing fiercely like a female Derek Zoolander; here she is seen on September 8 in NYC

The pinup looked pretty in a blue halter pantsuit that showed off her yoga-toned arms.

The wife of Rande Gerber had her highlighted hair in soft curls that caressed her shoulders/ Gold hoop earrings added a Jenny From The Block feel.

It's a nice change for Cindy to be presenting an award to Skrebneski because for years they were not talking.

Stylish: The pinup looked pretty in a blue halter pantsuit that showed off her yoga-toned arms

Sexy: The wife of Rande Gerber had her highlighted hair in soft curls that caressed her shoulders/ Gold hoop earrings added a Jenny From The Block feel

From foe to friend: It's a nice change for Cindy to be presenting an award to Skrebneski because for years they were not talking

The man who gave her a hard time: Victor, seen here in 2013, told Cindy she was not easy to photograph, which is difficult to comprehend given her stunning features

That photographer, who is now 86, refused to work with Crawford after she ditched one of his shoots in the 1980s.

At the time he was Chicago's most famous advertising photographer who worked for Estee Lauder and Chanel. He also has carved out a niche with his black-and-white celebrity portraits of actresses such as Sharon Stone.

Victor helped Cindy - who grew up in DeKalb and briefly attended Northwestern University - in her early years. They met when she was 17.

They have a past: That photographer, who is now 86, refused to work with Crawford after she ditched one of his shoots in the 1980s

He helped her out: Victor helped Cindy - who grew up in DeKalb and briefly attended Northwestern University - in her early years. They met when she was 17

'He knows exactly what he wants. It's hard to describe exactly how I feel about him, except I know I respect him as much as I've ever respected anyone,' Crawford, then 19, told the Chicago Tribune in a 1985 story.

But when Cindy skipped out on a catalog shoot with Victor because she landed a job in Egypt that lasted 10 days, he cut her off.

'I had been scared to rock the boat but had hoped that the studio would be gracious and let me go. Instead, I was told that if I didn't do the catalogue shoot, Victor would never work with me again. Ever,' Crawford wrote in her 2015 book Becoming.

She ticked him off: But when Cindy skipped out on a catalog shoot with Victor because she landed a job in Egypt that lasted 10 days, he cut her off

A long, frosty break for these two: They didn't talk for 15 years but are now on good terms

'Victor also told me that I didn't have an easy face to photograph and that he was the only photographer who knew how to make me look good. To this day, sometimes on set I still have to fight the thought that I don't have an easy face to photograph.'

They didn't talk for 15 years.

But then he asked her to shoot a poster for the Chicago International Film Festival and they became friends again.

The new Cindy! The star's mini me daughter Kaia is already a star in the modeling world; here they are seen last week

The star told the Chicago Tribune last week: 'I think sometimes we forget -Midwesterners and Chicagoans - how much talent we have right in our own city. It's great to celebrate it and I'm happy to be back and be part of that.'

She added: 'Now we have a real friendship, an equal friendship, that kind of full circle moment for me. To be able to give him this award just feels great.'
They got married in a lavish ceremony in Babington House, Somerset, in 2012.

And despite one of the busiest guys in television, James Corden, 37, made sure to take some time out for his wife Julia Carey on Thursday.

Packing on the PDA outside Craig's in West Hollywood, the CBS host was enthralled by his lady love as they shared a passionate kiss.

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Loved-up: James Corden, 37, was sure to take some time out for his wife Julia Carey as they packed on the PDA outside Craig's in West Hollywood on Thursday night

Wearing an adorable teddy bear cardigan, the Tony Award-winning actor channelled off-duty chic in a black tee as he wrapped his arm around his partner.

Continuing his laid-back look, The Late Late Show presenter slipped into dark washed denims as he exited the famed eatery in a pair of black leather sliders with white sole.

Boasting a healthy glow, James styled his hair away from his face with a smidgen of product as he highlighted his jawline with his tidy stubble.

Looking more loved-up than ever, James' wife Julia looked radiant as she looked chic in a pair of stone washed denims that clung to her toned pins.

Romance: Wearing an adorable teddy bear cardigan, the Tony-winning actor channelled off-duty chic in a black tee as he wrapped his arm around his partner

Boasting a frayed hem, the blonde beauty paired her jeans with a black tee as she layered her look with a stylish long black knit cardigan.

Injecting height into her frame, Julia strutted her stuff in a pointed nude stiletto which featured studded strap detail that encased her foot.

The pair - who are parents son Max, four, and daughter Carey, 23 months - seemed to enjoy their night off from the kids.

Becoming a huge hit in America with his his hosting gig, James previously told Ross King during a segment on the Lorraine show that his incredible success is down to his wife Julia.

Cute couple: James and Julia (pictured at the Tony Awards in New York in June) tied the knot in 2012 and are parents to two children

He said: 'All credit to my wife, who agreed to move when our daughter [Carey] was five weeks old and our son [Max] was three.

'It was a massive undertaking. I work so hard in the week and then at the weekend, you click your fingers and it's like you are in the South Of France.

'Luckily it's our life for the foreseeable future or until I get sacked.'

James said that sometimes, when he's in the studio about to film, he can't quite believe how far he has come.

He said: 'You do think, "Where am I? What the hell am I doing?"'
Since last Sunday, Alessandra Ambrosio has been in the Maldives for a photo shoot.

And this Friday, the model turned up the heat on Villingili Island, posting an Instagram photo of herself enjoying the beach in a string bikini that bared the better part of her sculpted derriere.

Only the day before, she'd posted a video of herself in a similarly skimpy swimsuit, wriggling her largely exposed buttocks for the camera.

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Bared on the beach: On Friday, while on a photo shoot in the Maldives, Alessandra Ambrosio uploaded an Instagram snapshot of her in a bikini that largely exposed her behind

In the Friday snapshot, she walked away from the photographer, her back covered only by her voluminous mane and the tiny string of her two-piece's top.

The other piece had a multicoloured leafy pattern. The Victoria's Secret Angel's vertiginous legs were in splendid form as she strode across the sand.

'Treasure island,' she captioned the photo, throwing in a few emojis before adding: '#Maldives.'

When you got it: On Thursday, she'd posted a video of herself on the same Villingili Island beach wearing a similarly skimpy bikini

'Working my A** off !!': The 35-year-old jiggled her behind as Rihanna's song Work played

On Thursday, once again on the beach outside her digs at Shangri-La's Villingili Resort & Spa, the 35-year-old donned a turquoise bikini for her video.

A network of straps wound their way across her back, all meeting in a tangle at its centre. As on Friday, the bottom bit of her swimsuit flashed quite a bit of backside, which this time had a good deal of sand stuck to it.

Rihanna's song Work played in the background as Ambrosio jiggled. The camera panned up her back until viewers could see her turning her head slightly, revealing a smile.

'Life is a BEACH': The mother of two posted a stunning bikini photo of herself from the same beach on Monday, the day after she arrived

'Working my A** off !!' she quipped in her caption.

The Erechim native's sustained a steady stream of Instagram posts since her arrival in the Maldives on Sunday, which she'd heralded with a photo from Ibrahim Nasir International Airport in Male.

Standing by her luggage in sweats, a white T-shirt and a denim jacket tied about her waist, she posed with a large sign reading: 'WELCOME TO MALDIVES,' against a blue background that faded to white.

The night of her arrival: An Instagram post from Sunday showed the Victoria's Secret Angel silhouetted by the sea as the sun set behind her

Another photo saw her silhouetted as waves advanced toward her feet and the sun set behind her. Arcing her back, the model reached upward, emphasising how tall and svelte she is.

'Paradise .... Let the journey begins,' she exulted in her caption.

The next day, she posted a breathtaking photo of herself lounging on the beach in a bikini splashed with a multicoloured pattern.

The mother of two's hair was drenched, and she held her head up with one hand, stretching her body to showcase her astonishingly flat midriff and showstopping legs.
It's a busy time in London for the English capital's fashionista's and Pixie Geldof was hard at work on Friday evening.

The 25-year-old socialite and musician attended multiple London Fashion Week shows, where she checked out the Spring Summer 2017 style.

Pixie sat in the front row at Ashley Williams, where she was joined by a host of famous friends and her boyfriend George Barnett.

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Fashionista: Pixie Geldof kicked off London Fashion Week on Friday by taking her place in the front row at Ashley Williams

Pixie and drummer George have been dating for over four years and the couple put on a sweet display as they attended the show.

The pair were spotted deep in conversation on the FROW, smiling at each other as they shared a joke.

Fashionable friends: Pixie caught up with her close pal Alexa Chung at the fashion event

Last year Pixie was forced to deny engagement rumours after she was spotted rocking a huge diamond ring at the Ashley Williams 2015 show and the ring was still in place on Friday.

The starlet opted for minimal make-up and wore her hair in a messy topknot as she showed off her cool and casual style.

Sweet: Pixie and her drummer George Barnett have been dating for over four years and the couple put on a sweet display as they attended the show

Daring to bare: Pixie flashed a glimpse of toned tummy in a cropped casual top and wide-legged trousers

Pixie opted for a cropped sleeveless T-shirt, which she paired with wide-legged pinstripe trousers and gold sandals.

The star and her friends Adwoa Aboah, Mary Charteris, Alexa Chung and Clara Paget all went backstage to wish the designer Ashley Williams well after her presentation.

But this wasn't Pixie's only show of the day, the starlet also made time to stop by the Shrimps presentation.

FROW! Pixie was joined on the front row by Mary Charteris, Clara Paget, George Barnett, Alexa Chung, Naomi Shimada and Aimee Phillips

Catching up: Pixie and Alexa managed to fit in a chat before the presentation started

Opposite reactions: While Alexa looked enthralled, Pixie was caught scrolling through her phone

Showing their support: The gal pals went backstage to congratulate the designer Ashley Williams

Unlike many other stars, she chose to wear the same outfit to both shows, but added a leather jacket for the second presentation.

Meanwhile, Pixie has followed in the footsteps of her famous father to launch a music career and, during the summer, she appeared to have taken inspiration from her late sister Peaches as she sang about the suffering of a loved one.

Showcasing her impressive musical ability in song Twin Things, she sang: 'Wish Id known you like my own skin, so I could feel the hurt you were in. Wish we had that twin thing.'

Posing up a storm: After goofing around, the group put their best pouts on for the camera

Celebrate: The group celebrated the collection by their close pal at London Fashion Week

The socialite has rarely passed comment on her sister's death publicly, though it looks like her music could be a way for the model to express her heartache.

The third daughter of Bob Geldof and the late Paula Yates also unveiled two new songs on May 31, Stay Strong and Escape Route, both of which have been praised by listeners on social media.

'Pixie geldof has actually killed me out of nowhere who said she could release an album im now emotionally broken,' one admirer wrote on Twitter.

Joking around: Adwoa Aboah, Mary, Alexa, Ashley, Clara and Pixie were in high spirits backstage

Pixie Geldof's new song is actually #Lit,' another enthused.

'Pixie geldof's new tracks are great i hope the album is filled w stuff just as good as that,' one listener gushed.

Both tracks have accumulated over 12,000 listens between them on YouTube at the time of writing.

Opening up about the loss of her older sister, she said: 'You wake up and you are smacked with it every day for the rest of your life.'

Moving on: Pixie later stopped by Shrimps SS17 Presentation featuring Converse, at Christie's

Peaches tragically died of a heroin overdose in April 2014, aged just 25.

Pixie isn't the first person to pay tribute to Peaches in song, as her widower Thomas Cohen has written a number of tracks inspired by the mother of his two children, Astala, four, and Phaedra, three.

'You couldn't make it through. Time to say goodbye. Holding onto each other and sing to one another. Everyone knows the house feels so cold. Just to say goodbye,' he sings in Bloom Forever.

Slight change: She added a leather jacket to her look but otherwise kept the same outfit

Another of his songs includes the lyrics: 'Sleeping alone, it's hard to go on in our country home, where we belong. Sing to me one last time.'

Speaking about the inspiration behind the new album, Pixie is quoted by OK! magazine as saying: 'I'm Yours represents every single human I've ever loved in my life.

'Songs of love in every form, platonically, family, in romance. I'm a part of these people's lives and I'm theirs in any capacity they need me.'
Emma Bunton has reportedly joined The X Factor.

While her Spice Girls co-star recently filled in for judge Nicole Scherzinger at auditions and has been asked by Simon Cowell to assist him at Judges' Houses, the music mogul is also believed to have called on Emma for help.

According to the Radio Times, Emma joined Mel and Simon in Malibu, Los Angeles on Friday to help them whittle down the hopeful in the Girls category ahead of the live shows.

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Guest judge? Emma Bunton has reportedly been signed up by Simon Cowell to take part in this year's X Factor Judges' Houses

MailOnline has contacted reps for X Factor and Emma for comment.

While Emma has yet to confirm her involvement on The X Factor this year, she is currently in Los Angeles.

She updated her Instagram account on Friday to share a picture of herself drinking some bubbles provided by Mel and wrote: "Can't sleep #L.A #champagnefrommelb."

If Emma has joined the show this year she won't have any trouble fitting in as she took part in the Judges' Houses segment in 2014.

Close pals: Mel has joined Simon for Judges' Houses in Los Angeles, after filling in for Nicole Scherzinger earlier this year

Getting her pal involved: Mel B has already agreed to take part in the show and was no doubt thrilled to have Emma signed up

Back then Emma joined Mel B at the Occidental Grand Xcaret Resort in Mexico, where she helped her bandmate cut down the Boys category.

And the pair made time for some fun in the sun, aided by tequila.

Emma said: "It was incredible. I don't like to be away from my children for too long so I was there for 72 hours.

Girl Power: Emma and Mel pictured with their bandmates Victoria Beckham, Geri Halliwell and Mel C in 1997

"It was amazing to be with Mel it was great fun, we had a little bit of tequila when we were there, it was really good."
She is known for her bright and bold fashion choices.

And Ashley James pulled out all the stops on Friday night, as she headed to the Paul Costelloe SS17 presentation at London Fashion Week in a quirky candy-coloured ensemble.

The 29-year-old blonde caught the attention of everyone at the Marylebone event in a vintage tulle D&G shirt, which she layered on top of a black bralet covered with beads and gems.

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Sweet thing! Ashley James, 29, caught the attention of all at the Paul Costelloe SS17 LFW presentation on Friday in a vintage tulle D&G shirt, revealing a gemmed bralet underneath

Showing off her unique sense of style, the blonde managed to look incredibly glamorous in the unusual textured shirt by Open for Vintage, reminiscent of a ballerina's tutu.

The shirt featured rips and bows all over which were fastened by silver gems, and tied in vintage style at the bottom to reveal her taut, toned abs.

The sheer material amped up the sex appeal of the look by revealing a raunchy black bralet adorned with candy-coloured beads and gems underneath, displaying her famously ample bust to all.

Ballet beauty: Showing off her unique sense of style, the blonde managed to look incredibly glamorous in the unusual textured shirt by Open for Vintage, reminiscent of a tutu

Wanting to keep the focus on her statement top, the former Made in Chelsea star kept things simple down below with Mom style blue jeans, further enhancing the look's retro vibe.

However she did add a pair of metallic fuschia platform heels and a slick of magenta lipstick to complete her playful, colourful look.

The London beauty's flawless makeup by Secret Spa and glowing complexion was clear for all to see as she posed on the FROW, leaving her hair in a simple but classic straight style.

Raunchy: The sheer material amped up the sex appeal by revealing a black bralet adorned with candy-coloured gems underneath, displaying her famously ample bust to all

The fashionable blonde looked comfortable at the show as she perched beside DJ and close pal Charlotte De Carle, dressed in baroque-inspired burgundy crochet top.

Ashley headed to the SS17 showcase by designer Paul Costelloe, one of the most established names in British fashion.

Making it clear he has been part of the industry for a long time, the Dublin-born designer's show featured classically chic white and cream colours, and involved soft, feminine dresses paired with boxy jackets and sporty accessories.

Vintage: Wanting to keep the focus on her statement top, the star kept things simple down below with Mom style blue jeans, further enhancing the retro vibe

Gal pals: The fashionable blonde looked comfortable as she perched beside DJ and close pal Charlotte De Carle (middle), dressed in baroque-inspired burgundy crochet top

Talking earlier this year about his inspirations during the design process, Paul revealed it is foreign places that spark his fashionable flair.

He told the Creative Industry Hub: 'I travel constantly. I reinvent myself and my collections every season and the inspiration always comes from a different source.'

Going to the fabric fairs and trade shows shows me what colours and materials are coming in.'

Vixen: Made in Chelsea co-star Nicola Hughes also attended the event, opting for a vampy black floor-length gown

Alongside Ashley were a whole host of her Made in Chelsea co-stars - heading to the Fashion Week festivities after being famed for their sleek and sophisticated styles.

Nicola Hughes followed Ashley to the show - opting for a very different but equally as glamorous ensemble.

The reality star embodied her inner vampiress in a high-shine black floor length gown, which she matched with sultry smoky eye make-up.

Show-stopping: The shimmering frock featured a saucy thigh-high split at the front to flash plenty of her slender legs, and a bold, winding ruffle up the right shoulder

The shimmering frock featured a saucy thigh-high split at the front to flash plenty of her slender legs, and a bold, winding ruffle up the right shoulder.

Cutting low at the neck, the star sexily allured to her cleavage in the dress, sweeping her hair into a chic and glamorous chignon to leave her chest and neck bare.

She finished her look with a pair of simple grey pointed court shoes, to keep the focus on her daring dress.

Tiffany Watson also headed to the event in all-black, arriving in a trendy crop top and trousers combo to enhance her incredibly petite waist.

Toned Tiff! Tiffany Watson also arrived at the event in black, opting for a crop top and trouser combo that enhanced her enviably petite waist

The trousers were printed with regal metallic gold and purple florals and elongated her already enviably leggy frame as they remained tailored to the floor.

Adding a more casual element to retain her youthful and trendy style, the sister of Lucy Watson paired the strides with a simple black spaghetti strap crop top, which tied at the side.

The blonde accessorised with a matching gold choker and patent black bag, detailed with a chain strap.

The classics: Paul's SS17 collection featured a cream and white colour scheme, and consisted of soft, feminine dresses mixed with boxy blazers and accessories

Embellished: The blonde accessorised with a matching gold choker and patent black bag, detailed with a chain strap

Woman in black: Adding a more casual element to retain her youthful and trendy style, Tiff paired the strides with a simple black spaghetti strap crop top, which tied at the side

Georgia Toffolo also joined her E4 co-stars at the event, hitting the catwalk in a funky woolen dress, complete with a yellow tartan skirt.

The Made in Chelsea stars are all undoubtedly swarming the catwalks of Fashion Week in their stomping ground of London, as they enjoy time off from filming their E4 reality show, which does not debut on screens until October.

Paul's show was something of a star-studded affair, attended by a whole host of other British celebs.

The Only Way Is Latex: Lauren Pope made a daring arrival in a skin-tight pink skirt and graphic tee

Former TOWIE star Lauren Pope made a statement in her unusual outfit of a pale pink latex skirt and graphic cropped tee.

The skin-tight skirt clung to her womanly curves flatteringly while the top, emblazoned with a cartoon skull, racily laced up at the bust to hint at her cleavage.

Not without her trademark Essex style, Lauren finished her look with a pair of glamorous snakeskin heels and perfectly bronzed make-up.

Katie Piper also hit the front row in a chic scarlet knitted co-ord and patent black court shoes.

Daring: The skin-tight skirt clung to her womanly curves flatteringly while the top, emblazoned with a cartoon skull, racily laced up at the bust to hint at her cleavage

Scot-chic: Georgia Toffolo also joined her E4 co-stars at the event, hitting the catwalk in a funky woolen dress, complete with a yellow tartan skirt

Red hot! Katie Piper also hit the front row in a chic scarlet knitted co-ord and patent black court shoes

Classy lady: Katie added classic black pointed court shoes and a leather handbag to her chic look

Pairing with a simple black handbag and keeping her hair smooth and straight, Katie exuded simplicity and class as she headed into the swanky venue.

One fifth of girlband The Saturdays Una Foden was also present, with her hunky rugby player hubby Ben by her side.

The couple, who have been happily married for four years, cut very refined figures as they stood arm-in-arm - with Una cinching in her striking bardot dress with a chunky buckled leather belt.

Ben matched his stylish wife in a dapper navy checked suit blazer, layered on top of a crisp white shirt which he left open at the collar.

Cut-above couple: Una and Ben Foden cut very refined figures as they stood arm-in-arm - with Una in a striking bardot dress and Ben in a dapper navy suit blazer
She's a successful model so it's not surprising Winnie Harlow is in London for fashion week.

The 22-year-old star was one of the guests at the Shrimps SS17 Presentation dinner featuring Converse at Christie's on Friday but she opted for comfort as she dressed down for the occasion.

Skipping heels in favour of trainers, Winnie wore a pair of white skinny jeans, which she paired with a silver top and a bomber jacket.

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Keeping it casual: Winnie Harlow opted for dressed down look as she attended the Shrimps SS17 Presentation dinner featuring Converse at Christie's on Friday

She wore her dark hair loose over her shoulders and spent some time catching up with the label's designer Hannah Weiland.

Winnie's outing comes amid conflicting reports about her relationship with Formula 1 ace Lewis Hamilton.

Well it is a Converse event: Winnie opted for appropriate footwear for the bash at London Fashion Week

Showing her support: Winnie spent some time catching up with the label's designer Hannah Weiland

According to The Sun Winnie - who suffers from skin condition vitiligo - struck up a bond with Lewis in July but their relationship has recently 'stepped up a notch'.

A source close to the couple told the paper: 'Lewis and Winnie have known each other for a while and partied together in New York last year.

'However, things have stepped up a notch recently.'

Famous faces: Winnie was joined by model turned presenter Alexa Chung, who was event hopping

A quick catch up: Alexa made sure she stopped by to chat with the designer as she enjoyed a hectic start to LFW

'They didnt want to fuel any suspicion at the GQ awards in London so agreed to stay apart from each other and avoided getting pictured together.'

'Its nothing serious at the moment and Lewis is just playing the field, but he really likes Winnie.'

However, a spokesperson has since insisted the couple are not romantically involved, telling MailOnline: 'Lewis and Winnie are just friends.'

Posing up a storm: Alexa and her close pal Nick Grimshaw decided to take their turn on the display area, where the models showed off the new collection

Catching up: Nick, who was casual in trainers, and Alexa also caught up with Laura Jackson

Giving him some pointers? Alexa started off her career as a model so would have been able to pass on some hints to Nick

Whatever the status of her relationship with Lewis, Winnie appeared to be in high spirits at Friday's bash as she kicked off her fashion week experience.

Winnie was not the only star at the presentation dinner, close pals Nick Grimshaw and Alexa Chung were spotted goofing around as they checked out the new season's offerings.

The pair posed up a storm on the display area, where they pulled a number of goofy faces as they shared a laugh.

It's showtime: The pair were in extremely high spirits as they entered the presentation area

Ladies in leather: Pixie Geldof and Lady Mary Charteris both showed up in stylish leather jackets

Alexa was having a busy evening as she also attended the Ashley Williams SS17 showcase, where she sat in the front row.

She showed off her enviable model physique and style in a figure-hugging leather skirt and edgy jumper and paired the look with black heels.

Nick was more casual in trainers, dark trousers, a shirt and leather jacket and was barely recognisable without his signature quiff.

Different styles: Adwoa Aboah kept it casual in trainers and tracksuit bottoms while Pixie opted for heels and pinstripe trousers

Repping the brand: Adwoa and Clara Paget showed off their Converse footwear at the Shrimps SS17 Presentation dinner featuring Converse

The brunette has only just touched down from New York Fashion Week, where she attended numerous high profile shows including Proenza, Noon by Noor and the exclusive Chanel, Vogue magazine and Harper's Bazaar parties.

The fashionable stint sees the presenter enjoy a few exciting nights off, as she prepares to launch her own clothing range called Alexachung in May 2017.

The collection, which she is working on with a team of six designers, is the result of years of tried-and-tested trend setting.

Variety: While all of the models wore Converse, the looks presented were extremely different

Take a bow: The models gathered together after a successful showing at LFW

Close pal Pixie Geldof also headed to the Shrimps event after attending the Ashley Williams show alongside her hunky boyfriend George Barnett.

The star flashed her enviably taut tum in a black cropped graphic tee as she accompanied her friend to the show.

The British model paired the crop with a pair of high-waisted striped culottes, trendily cutting off above the ankle.

Sweeping her hair up into a chic top knot but leaving her fringe loose, Pixie showcased her striking model features and glowing skin for all to see.

A new experience: There was no typical front row as the guests milled around to see the looks

Time to relax: The guests then enjoyed the Presentation Dinner after the show, including Winnie who enjoyed a bite to eat with a friend after the night of fashion

After the presentation's festivities the guests then headed to the Presentation dinner featuring Converse at Christie's afterwards.

The stars all looked in good spirits as they enjoyed a bite to eat after the night of fashion with Nick Grimshaw cosying up to close pal Aimee Phillips, and Winnie catching up with a friend.

Meanwhile Alexa let her hair down even more as she fooled around with designer Hannah Weiland at the bash.

The pair were spotted giggling together as they played around with the decorative shells on the tables.

Catching up: Nick Grimshaw cosied up to close pal Aimee Phillips at the star-studded dinner

Having a ball: Meanwhile Alexa let her hair down even more as she fooled around with designer Hannah Weiland (R) at the bash
She is better known for her drunken antics, having risen to fame on the party-packed series Geordie Shore.

But Charlotte Crosby looked the picture of elegance on Friday night, as she headed to the SS17 Rocky Star catwalk show at London Fashion Week.

The reality star, 26, cut a far more refined figure in a silk playsuit and chic thigh-high leather boots as she posed up a storm at the Freemasons Hall in London.

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Dream in green: Charlotte Crosby, 26, looked the picture of elegance on Friday night, as she headed to the SS17 Rocky Star catwalk show at LFW in a silk playsuit

The Geordie Lass flashed her seemingly endless pins in the super short playsuit, which cut racily high up her thigh.

The khaki ensemble was of a soft silk, which fell delicately around her petite frame, and featured an edgy caged panel across the chest.

Sporting a high neck, the one-piece remained sophisticated despite its micro mini length as Charlotte mingled with the fashion elite at the presentation.

Leggy lady: The Geordie Lass flashed her seemingly endless pins in the super short playsuit, which cut racily high up her thigh

Sophisticated: Sporting a high neck, the one-piece remained classy despite its micro mini length as Charlotte mingled with the fashion elite at the presentation

Charlotte paired the classy outfit however with a pair of sexy thigh-high black leather boots, which served to accentuate her enviably slender legs.

The star finished her look with a host of glamorous accessories - adding a tan belt to emphasise her womanly waist, and a playful handbag emblazoned with the word 'No!' in a cartoon speech bubble.

Sweeping her hair back loosely so a few strands framed her face and adding a slick of bronze eyeshadow, the Celebs Go Dating looked effortlessly glamorous as she headed to the show.

Effortless: Charlotte swept her hair back loosely so a few strands framed her face and added a slick of bronze eyeshadow

Charlotte looked classy and chic as she posed for cameras outside the venue - a far cry from her last public appearance.

On Sunday the reality star reveal her derriere to all on a night out in Newcastle after one of her old friends cheekily pulled up her dress as they embraced.

However stylish Charlotte is set to make several appearances across London Fashion Week 2016, having recently released a clothing collection of her own for In The Style last month.

Fierce: Charlotte paired the classy outfit however with a pair of sexy thigh-high black leather boots, which served to accentuate her enviably slender legs

Playful: The star accessorised with a fun handbag emblazoned with the word 'No!' in a cartoon speech bubble

She told MailOnline of her new range: 'I think this collection is the most fashion forward range that Ive done and Ive gone out of my comfort zone on different shapes and styles.'

'As its a move on from summer Ive gone for a darker colour palette with some neutral tones so that its really easy to wear.'

While Charlotte names the likes of 'effortlessly stylish Kendall Jenner and Gigi Hadid' as her style inspiration, she's thrilled to see anyone and everyone wearing her designs.

She's a natural: The Celebs Go Dating looked effortlessly glamorous as she took her seat on the elite FROW

It's all the rage: Nicola Hughes also opted for the playsuit and boot theme as she took her place on the FROW

'When I was at V Festival this weekend I kept seeing people wearing pieces from my range and I got way too excited and was running up to them to get selfies and snap chats with them!' she gushed.

Charlotte was not the only reality babe to head to the Rocky Star catwalk however - being joined by the likes of Made in Chelsea's Nicola Hughes and Kimberley Garner, as well as Love Island's Olivia Buckland.

Nicola Hughes also opted for the playsuit and boot theme as she took her place on the FROW.

Exotic: Nicola covered up her one-piece with an oversized sleeveless kimono that bound tightly around her waist

Sultry: The star looked sexy as she flashed both her legs and cleavage for the cameras in the barely-there under layer of her outfit

The Irish beauty flashed her tanned and toned pins and a saucy hint of cleavage in the tiny, low-cut one-piece - which she then covered up with an oversized sleeveless kimono which bound around her waist.

Completing her look with a pair of tan suede heeled boots, which stretched to her upper thigh, the blonde looked fierce as she played up to the cameras.

Kimberley Garner added a splash of colour as she put her best foot forward in a vibrant turquoise mini dress.

Stealing the spotlight: Kimberley Garner added a splash of colour as she put her best foot forward in a vibrant turquoise mini dress

Centre stage: The frock featured a quirky but striking design of mismatched florals and tribal suns against the bold blue hue

The former Made in Chelsea star looked show-stopping in the bardot blue mini dress, revealing her gorgeous golden tan from recent holiday to St Tropez, France.

The frock featured a quirky but striking design of mismatched florals and tribal suns against the bold blue hue.

Adding a touch of glamour to her fun look, Kimberley accessorised with an oxblood clutch bag and matching buckled ankle boots.

The clan were also joined by Love Island glamour puss Olivia Buckland, who made a big statement in her gold velour shift dress.

Golden girl: Love Island glamour puss Olivia Buckland made a big statement in a gold velour shift dress

Work it: Not without her trademark attitude, the ITV2 reality star added a sassy black choker and a pair of punky lace-up boot heels to give her look an edge

The loose-fitting frocks skimmed her petite frame, keeping her comfortable but cool as she posed nonchalantly with her hands in her pockets.

Not without her trademark attitude, the ITV2 reality star added a sassy black choker and a pair of punky lace-up boot heels to give her look an edge.

The guests' bold looks matched that of the standout Rocky Star collection they were there to see.

The SS17 range by the designer, who draws on Bollywood and Indian culture in his clothing, was incredibly intricate - featuring applique floral designs and elaborate, delicate headpieces.

Intricate: The SS17 range by the designer, who draws on Bollywood in his clothing, featured applique floral designs and elaborate, delicate headpieces

Calm and collected: Actress Lily Frazer showed off her striking short hair and glowing skin in a funky printed skater dress with a collar

Mixed vibes: Emmerdale actress Natalie Anderson looked lovely in a satin midi (L) while singer Hatty Keane went for the bolder option of a mesh flared jumpsuit (R)
Sunday night TV has never been sexier, with ITV depicting young Queen Victoria smouldering at Prime Minister Lord Melbourne, and Poldarks pecs back on BBC1.

However, sharp-eyed viewers have spotted blunders in Poldark, with historians also commenting that mistakes have been made.

Victoria, too, has been called to account for some glaring historical inaccuracies.

Here, ANNABEL VENNING adds up the anachronisms...

VICTORIA

Dancing to a tune not yet written: At her 1838 Coronation ball, Queen Victoria dances to a Strauss tune written in 1874

HATE AT FIRST SIGHT?

The Victoria and Albert love-affair is given the Mills & Boon treatment: the young Queen is portrayed as loathing her future husband at first, irritated by everything he does.

On the contrary, says Professor Jane Ridley of the University of Buckingham: Victoria fell madly in love at first sight.

She wrote Albert is beautiful in her diary. He was much less excited, though. But the royal pair never came close to calling their union off, unlike the nonsense weve seen on screen.

LOVE TRIANGLE THAT WASNT

The drama makes much of the rival romance between Victoria and Lord Melbourne (Rufus Sewell)  but critics say that though the young queen adored her Prime Minister, she saw him as a father figure.

Her diary in this period is uncensored, so we know exactly what happened in those first three years of her reign, explains Professor Ridley. She didnt fancy Melbourne.

However, A.N. Wilson, author of Victoria: A Life and who has acted as a historical advisor on the series, counters: Although the romance is heightened, its absolutely true. They really loved one another.

SLIMMED-DOWN STARS

The young Victoria was not as plump as shed later become, but she was not nearly as daintily pretty as actress Jenna Coleman, as many have pointed out.

And Rufus Sewell, 48, is far sexier than the real Lord Melbourne. However, most viewers are salivating about Sewell  and, says A.N. Wilson, Melbourne may have been portly and pushing 60 but he was handsome.

Too good-looking by far: Rufus Sewell and the real Melbourne (right)

AUF WIEDERSEHEN, MAAM

As the last Hanoverian monarch, Victoria spoke with a German accent. If Jenna Coleman has a twang, its that of her native Blackpool, not Berlin.

AN EYEBROW RAISER

Colemans dark, shaped brows are more like the Scouse brows of modern WAGS. The real Victoria had paler, thinner brows, as was the fashion at the time.

COOKS NIGHT OFF?

The Buckingham Palace kitchens look bereft of staff. Professor Ridley says they would have been bustling  and smelly, as they were built over a sewer.

DONT CALL RENTOKIL

There is no historical evidence that a plague of rats infested the Palace  or that the Queen screamed in horror. Nor that tallow candles, introduced in a cost-cutting drive, ever dripped onto guests at a ball, as they do on screen to the embarrassment of Victorias courtiers.

Dazzling: Jenna Coleman outshine the real young Victoria

OLD MAIDS VIRTUE

Raffish palace chef Mr Francatelli reveals that Queens dresser Marianne Skerrett hid a sordid secret: she had once worked at Ma Fletchers Nunnery, a brothel. The real Miss Skerrett was of impeccable background.

A MODERN MELODY

The Queen is shown dancing at the 1838 Coronation ball to Johann Strauss IIs Fledermaus-Quadrille. Peter Kemp, Hon. Life President of the Johann Strauss Society, complained to the Radio Times that: It wasnt written for a further 36 years!

CARDBOARD CITY

Some viewers have criticised the city scenes of Victorian London, created by Computer Generated Imagery (CGI), as looking unrealistic and like cardboard.

Very modern brows: Victoria actually had thin eyebrows

LINGERING LONGER

Lady Flora Hastings, a courtier detested by Victoria, is shown on her deathbed as the Coronation takes place in June 1838. She actually died in July 1839.

And Sir John Conroys scheming to become Victorias personal secretary was at its height before Victoria became Queen, when he tried to force her, while she was ill with typhoid, to sign a document making him private secretary.

Its annoying when they mess with the chronology, says Professor Ridley. But its great that its got people interested in Victoria.

A PALACE BREAK-IN

several episodes in Victorias early reign have not been included: two male intruders were found in the Palace, and she was forced to share a bedroom with her mother until she became sovereign  a set-up ripe for dramatic tension.

There are so many extraordinary true events in Victorias life that would have made good storylines, rather than inventing things, comments Professor Ridley.

POLDARK

TOO SEXY FOR HIS SHIRT

Chaps NEVER took his shirt off: No undressing for Ross (Adrian Turner)

Hero Ross Poldarks naked torso has sent women viewers pulses racing. But shirts were like underwear in the 18th century.

Taking off your shirt was equivalent to going naked, says historian Hallie Rubenhold.

Men always kept their shirts on  even during sex.

HATS OFF TO THEM ALL

Going out hat-less would have unthinkable. Men and women wore hats or caps whenever they went out, notes Rubenhold. But hats arent sexy, so Demelza, Poldark and co are often without one.

A WASTE OF PAPER

Printer's error: Cornwall had no printers then

The dastardly George Warleggan prints thousands of pamphlets to blacken Rosss name, but as Dr Joseph Crawford, of Exeter University, points out, there were no printers in Cornwall then  and most people were illiterate, so our villain was wasting his time.

THE WRONG DOG

Pug dogs were popular in Georgian England, but looked nothing like the creature carried by heiress Caroline Penvenen. It has the modern squashed-up face that is the result of years of in-breeding. An 18th-century pug would have had a much more pronounced snout  like a modern-day Jack Russell.

NOT SO SECRET VOTERS

In a local parliamentary election, the gentlemen of Cornwall cast their votes by posting them into a ballot box. But ballot boxes were not used until the following century.

In Poldarks day, men (women did not yet have the suffrage) had to cast their votes openly. And Caroline Penvenen would not have campaigned alongside the male candidates  the sight of a woman canvassing would have gone against all contemporary social mores.

FORTUNE FAUX PAS

Fearsome Poldark matriarch Aunt Agatha would not have told fortunes with Tarot cards  people then used ordinary playing cards for that.

Pug ugly? Not in the 1790s: Caroline Penvenen (Gabrielle Wilde) and her pet dog

TOOTHLESS TEMPTRESS

Rosss maid-turned-wife Demelza, a poor miners daughter, would have been rather shorter and with fewer teeth than played by the glamorous Eleanor Tomlinson.

Most poor people in Cornwall suffered from childhood malnutrition which caused lost teeth and stunted grown  and many of them were scarred by smallpox, says Dr Crawford.

THATS ALARMING!

A burglar alarm was visible on an 18th-century building in the first series, while viewers spotted a plastic bottle on the beach at the end of last Sundays episode.

COVER UP, LADIES

Some of the womens low-cut dresses would have been far too racy for 1790s Cornwall.

Whats more, the turquoise satin dress Demelza wears in series one fastens at the back, whereas 18th-century dresses were front-fastening.

At the time, too, only young girls wore their hair long  not women of mature age.

Over the top cleavage: An upfront Elizabeth (Helda Reed)

THE STAFF PROBLEM

Since their servants Jud and Prudie left, Ross and Demelza had to manage without paid help. In reality, two people could not run a house of that size.

Chopping wood, making fires, boiling water for cooking and washing, cleaning and caring for the horses would have been impossible. There would have been no time for anything else  even sex.

Everyone had servants, except the very poor, says Dr Crawford. Manual labour was completely taboo for someone of Poldarks class.

A burglar alarm? An alarm was visible on an 18th-century building in the first series, while viewers spotted a plastic bottle on the beach at the end of last Sundays episode

ROSS DOESNT CUT IT

Rosss scything technique was criticised. Then, scenes in which he chopped wood in the middle of a field were labelled unrealistic. Wood would be hewn in a shed  rather than yards from the house.

A viewer also disapproved of Poldarks technique when he is chiselling in his tin mine: Anyone who has ever used these tools would know not to wrap the left thumb round the chisel where it can be easily (and painfully) struck by the hammer.

I was always taught to keep the thumb out of harms way alongside the index finger, round the back of the chisel. Any self-respecting tin or copper miner would have known that  as would the owner if he was working in the mine.

A PREGNANT PAUSE
Australian Survivor host Jonathan LaPaglia cut a casual figure as he spent some time with loved ones in Los Angeles recently.

The 47-year-old actor and presenter was spotted taking a stroll through Brentwood Country Mart with his wife Ursula Brooks and daughter Tilly and opted for a relaxed ensemble.

Jonathan was seen wearing a dark-coloured T-shirt which revealed his bulging biceps and defined pecs.

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Family day out: Jonathan LaPaglia was recently spotted taking a stroll through Brentwood Country Mart in LA with his wife Ursula Brooks and daughter Tilly

He teamed the top with a pair of light blue shorts.

Showing his penchant for accessorising, the dark-haired Love child actor wore a pair of Nike running shoes, a silver wristwatch and a pair of cool sunglasses.

Meanwhile it looks like the family's attire was very much colour coordinated for the outing.

Ursula was seen wearing a breezy blue dress.

Bold in blue: It looks like the family's attire was very much colour coordinated for the outing

Finishing well above the knees, the casual chic number showcased a generous glimpse of her trim pins.

She completed her look with a pair of black sandals, sassy shades and a matching cross-over handbag.

Young Tilly wore a long-sleeved blue blouse and light shorts, while clutching onto a white shopping bag, presumably storing some recent purchases.

Jonathan has been on Australian screens over the past few weeks, hosting Australian Survivor on Channel Ten.

He is also well known to fans for playing Dr Patrick McNaughton in Channel Nine drama Love Child.
News / Regional

by Staff reporter

THE GOVERNMENT has been called by Beitbridge residents to start allocating part of the proceeds of revenue collected at the border post towards funding capital projects in the town.They told the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Finance and Economic Development on Wednesday that the town was not receiving anything from the national budget despite playing a critical role in facilitating international trade.According to media reports, the Beitbridge town secretary, Mr Loud Ramakgapola, said most of their infrastructure and other amenities were affected by the large volume of both cargo and human traffic which passed through the town daily.Mr Ramakgapola said it was important for the Government to allocate a quota to the town which would be used to fund the rehabilitation and expansion of key infrastructure around the area.He said Beitbridge was the face of the country for those people entering from South Africa adding that it was very critical to spruce up its image with funds coming from Treasury.
US judge denies request to delay Trump University trial

A US federal judge denied a request for a five-week delay by Donald Trump's attorneys in a trial over whether the Republican presidential candidate's now-defunct Trump University had fleeced customers.

Lead Trump attorney Daniel Petrocelli had asked that the trial - set for November 28 in San Diego - be moved to January 2, as it interfered with another case he is handling.

An attorney representing the plaintiffs opposed the request, arguing that the trial date had been set months ago so as not to conflict with the November 8 presidential election or the end-of-year holidays.

File picture shows Donald Trump at a press conference announcing the establishment of Trump University in May, 2005 in New York City Thos Robinson (Getty/Getty Images/AFP/File)

The two class-action lawsuits against the billionaire businessman claim that Trump University students were tricked with aggressive marketing that amounted to fraud.

The suits say students paid as much as $35,000 to enroll, believing they would make it big in real estate and would be taught by experts hand-picked by Trump.

Trump's lawyers say many students have given the program a thumbs up and those who failed to succeed had nothing but themselves to blame.
IMF prods Mozambique to allow audit of secret loan companies

IMF chief Christine Lagarde pressed Mozambique's President Filipe Nyusi to allow an independent international audit of companies involved in a loan scandal that forced an IMF and World Bank aid cutoff.

Meeting at International Monetary Fund headquarters in Washington, Lagarde told Nyusi the country needed "more decisive efforts to improve transparency" after the government was shown to have hidden off-budget some $1.4 billion in debt, according to IMF spokesman Gerry Rice.

Those efforts would specifically include "an international and independent audit of the companies that were funded under the loans disclosed in April 2016," according to Rice.

IMF chief Christine Lagarde told Mozambique President Filipe Nyusi the country needed to improve transparency after the government was shown to have hidden off-budget some $1.4bn in debt Jim Watson (AFP/File)

The IMF and World Bank suspended aid to Mozambique in April after news surfaced that the impoverished country had spent $40 million on a new aircraft for the president and had hidden the $1.4 billion in borrowing.

In May, a group of 14 donors including Britain, Canada, the European Union, France and the African Development Bank also cut off aid to Mozambique, which is heavily dependent on foreign support.

The unreported borrowing included financing support for two companies, ProIndicus and Mozambique Asset Management, and bilateral credit from another country.

Mozambique has said that most of the money was to fund maritime security and shipyards.

According to Rice, Nyusi indicated to Lagarde that he would support the audit.

"The managing director welcomed that the president indicated the Government of Mozambique's willingness to work with the IMF on the terms-of-reference for this process -- to be initiated by the office of the attorney general -- and to implement it," he said in a statement.
Typhoon Meranti leaves 16 dead or missing in China

Typhoon Meranti has left at least 16 people dead or missing in China and an ancient bridge destroyed as it wreaked havoc on the country's eastern coast, the government said on Friday.

The storm, described by the official Xinhua news agency as the world's strongest typhoon this year and the worst to hit Fujian province since records began in 1949, had killed seven people by Friday morning, the civil affairs ministry said in a statement.

Another nine people were missing and more than 330,000 residents had been relocated, it added.

Residents gather to clean up a flooded street in Xiamen, China's eastern Fujian province after Typhoon Meranti made landfall on September 15, 2016 - (AFP)

The typhoon, which had earlier skirted the southern tip of Taiwan, made landfall in Xiamen early Thursday packing winds of around 170 kilometres per hour (105 miles per hour) and bringing downpours across the province, said the statement.

Flooding destroyed an 871-year-old bridge that was a protected heritage site in Yongchun county, Xinhua reported Friday.

At one point more than 3.2 million homes had their electricity cut off and water supplies for many communities in Xiamen were disrupted, it added.
Philippine 'hitman' charge sparks Duterte probe calls

The Philippines faced calls Friday to investigate its firebrand president after a self-confessed hitman alleged Rodrigo Duterte ordered a thousand opponents and suspected criminals murdered when he was a city mayor.

Edgar Matobato told a Senate inquiry on Thursday that he and a group of policemen killed some 1,000 people in Davao city on Duterte's orders from 1988-2013, with the politician himself shooting dead one of the victims.

"These are serious allegations and we take them seriously, we look into them," said US State Department deputy spokesperson Mark Toner.

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte (C) is accused of ordering the deaths of around 1,000 people in Davao city from 1988-2013 Roslan Rahman (AFP/File)

The allegations surfaced as the Senate investigated alleged extra-judicial killings in an ongoing anti-drug crackdown that has led to more than 3,000 deaths in Duterte's first 72 days in office.

Critics say the alleged killings in Davao, where Duterte was mayor for more than 20 years, established a pattern that has spread nationwide under the new presidency.

The testimony of self-confessed hitman Edgar Matobato sheds light on "the similarity of the strategy adopted by the (Davao Death Squad) and that of the vigilantes that now roam the whole country," Senator Leila de Lima, leading the inquiry, said in a statement.

US-based watchdog Human Rights Watch urged Manila to let United Nations investigators probe the hitman's claims.

"President Duterte can't be expected to investigate himself, so it is crucial that the United Nations is called in to lead such an effort," the monitor's Asia director Brad Adams said.

Sitting Philippine presidents are immune from criminal prosecution during their single, six-year term.

However, the constitution provides for their impeachment and removal from office for "culpable violation of the constitution, treason, bribery, graft and corruption, other high crimes, or betrayal of public trust".

In 2001, president and populist ex-movie star Joseph Estrada was removed from office in a military-backed popular revolt, though an impeachment trial against him on graft charges was inconclusive.

During his election campaign at the start of the year, Duterte variously admitted and denied involvement in the death squads.

He has so far ignored the latest allegations but Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre branded them as "lies and fabrications".

- 'Killings haven't stopped' -

Another Duterte ally, Senator Alan Cayetano, alleged Thursday that the inquiry was part of an opposition "Plan B" to unseat the president -- a charge de Lima rejected.

However, she later suggested it may be time to "revisit" the presidential immunity doctrine.

"Otherwise there will be no solution but impeachment, people power, things like that," she told reporters Thursday, asking: "What if we had elected a mass murderer, serial killer or rapist?"

Wilnor Papa, a campaign officer for the Manila office of Amnesty International, said rampant killings were the outcome of the failure of previous governments to bring criminal charges against Duterte.

"We are now seeing riding-in-tandem (motorcycle-borne assassins) like those that prowled the Davao streets in the late 1990s. The targets are not only drug syndicates. Even purse snatchers use them and they can target basically anyone," he told AFP.

House of Representatives member Edcel Lagman urged Duterte Friday to name an independent fact-finding commission made up of retired judges to "determine the identities of the principals and perpetrators as well as of the victims".

Catholic priest Amado Picardal, a critic from Davao, said the city assassins killed 1,424 people between 1998 and 2015, mostly in slums with the victims including 132 children and two journalists.

Most victims were either involved in illegal drugs or petty crimes. All were unarmed, did not fight back and were "shot in cold blood", he wrote in the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines online newsletter.

"The killings have not stopped," he said.

The fate of the former death squad member Matobato was meanwhile uncertain on Friday as the Senate president, Duterte ally Aquilino Pimentel, refused to take him into protective custody.

There's "no (sign) that his life or safety is threatened," Pimentel told AFP.

More than 2,000 people have died violent deaths since Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte took office in June and implemented plans to eradicate drugs Noel Celis (AFP/File)
iPhone launch generates crowds, queues worldwide

Apple's global iPhone launch Friday was marked by excitement and frustration as fans queued to find scarce models of the coveted smartphone.

Scenes in Apple stores around the world on Friday were reminiscent of days before online ordering became a norm and people camped out for days to be first to get hands on the California company's iPhone 7 and 7 Plus.

Enthusiasm was peppered with disappointment due to shortages of the large-screen iPhone 7 Plus and a jet-black iPhone 7, but it was unclear if the shortages were the result of strong demand or limited supply.

A Chinese couple test the new iPhone 7 during its launch at an Apple store in Shanghai on September 16, 2016 Johannes Eisele (AFP)

"These initial sales will be governed by supply, not demand," Apple said in a released statement which noted that the company would not provide launch weekend sales figures.

Investors evidently weren't certain of what to make of the launch as well, with Apple shares down about a half-percent to $114.92 at the close of trading on the Nasdaq exchange.

BTIG research said in a note to investors that, despite a lack of lines, analysts there expected iPhone sales in the final quarter of this year to grow 3.6 percent to 77.5 million.

At the Apple Store in the Georgetown district of the US capital Washington, dozens of consumers were still waiting in line hours after the store opening to get the new handsets.

"I tried to order it online, but I would have had to wait five to six weeks, so standing in queue was the only option," said Naval Chopra, who was visiting from India at the time of the launch and joined the waiting group at 5:30 am for an iPhone 7.

"If you're an Apple fan, there is something special about getting the new phone on the launch day."

- 'Essential part of life' -

Washington resident Isaac Combs said he had being hoping to get the large-screen iPhone 7 Plus but learned on arrival they were sold out. Still, he opted for the iPhone 7, despite the smaller display.

The iPhone, Combs said, "is an essential part of life, it's something I use every day."

Apple sold of out the larger models quickly and had limited availability of the iPhone 7, with the new jet-black color especially scarce.

The devices chart a new path for the tech giant by eliminating headphone jacks, a move seen as setting a trend for a wireless future.

Apple is seeking to regain momentum and set new trends for the industry, but it remains to be seen if it can generate the same enthusiasm that surrounded previous versions of the iPhone.

While the company has touted total iPhone sales of one billion, the number sold in the quarter ending June 25 fell 15 percent from a year earlier, highlighting concerns over growth for the key profit driver.

Growth has become challenging with many mobile phone markets saturated and Chinese firms including Huawei increasingly popular.

Apple also faces stiff competition from traditional rival Samsung, although the South Korean giant is currently on the back foot after being forced into a massive recall because of exploding batteries of its flagship Galaxy Note 7.

Analyst Michael Walkley at Canaccord Genuity said his brokerage group's surveys suggest the new handsets will boost Apple's fortunes.

"With the iPhone 7 off to a strong start, we anticipate improving replacement sales versus the 6S and a return to iPhone unit growth," he said in a research note.

- Tight control on supply -

Analysts were divided over the cause of the shortages, with some saying the handset was more popular than expected, while others suggested the tech titan may be deliberately limiting supply or could be experiencing supply problems.

"Apple clearly controls supply tightly," said Matthew Kanterman, an analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence.

"They're possibly keeping supply artificially low, or at least lower than demand, so as to avoid having the oversupply of previous years."

As Asia woke up, consumers in Sydney who had camped out in the rain were among the first in the world to get their hands on the new phones -- though others were left bitterly disappointed.

Bishoy Behman, 17, had been sitting outside the Apple store since Wednesday morning but said he and others in the queue found out on Thursday that some models were already sold out.

"I really wouldn't have lined up if I had known that," he told AFP. "For them to have not allocated some stock is ridiculous."

In Hong Kong, some customers were seen near the Apple store in the Causeway Bay shopping district, reselling new phones at a profit.

In mainland China, a key market for Apple, scenes were energetic as crowds of customers tested out the new handsets.

Apple faces a complicated picture in China, where it ranked only fourth in the Asian giant's smartphone market in the first half of this year, facing strong competition from low-cost manufacturers.

A ten years chart of Apple shares and the iPhone evolution - (AFP Graphic)

The first recipients of the new iPhone 7 leave the Apple flagship store in Sydney on 16 September, 2016 William West (AFP)

Customers check out the new iPhone 7 at an Apple store in Shanghai, on September 16, 2016 Johannes Eisele (AFP)

Customers queue in front of an Apple store in Amsterdam on September 16, 2016, for the opening sale launch of the new iPhone 7 Lex van Lieshout (ANP/AFP)
Indian police arrest Kashmiri activist

Indian police said Friday they have arrested a prominent Kashmiri activist who was this week prevented from travelling to Geneva, where he had been due to brief UN officials on the strife-torn region.

Khurram Pervez was arrested late Thursday after returning to his home in Srinagar, which has been roiled for months by violent protests over the killing of a young militant by Indian soldiers.

Police superintendent Faisal Qayoom confirmed his arrest but did not say what the charges were.

More than 80 people have been killed in Indian-administered Kashmir since a militant leader's death on July 8 Tauseef Mustafa (AFP/File)

"We are looking into it. For the moment we've taken him into custody," he said.

Pervez's wife Samina told AFP police had come to the family home late on Thursday to arrest him. He can be held for up to six months without charge under India's Public Safety Act.

More than 80 people have been killed in Indian-administered Kashmir since the militant leader's death on July 8, in one of the deadliest bouts of violence since a full-blown armed rebellion was at its peak in the 1990s.

Most have died in clashes between protesters and police and paramilitaries who have fired tear gas and pellet guns at demonstrators.

Authorities this week banned prayers to mark the Eid festival at the main mosque in Srinagar, capital of India's only Muslim-majority state.

Internet and mobile networks have also been cut off in a bid to prevent a repeat of the protests.

Pervez, coordinator of the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS), was scheduled to brief a UN Human Rights Council session on the situation, but immigration officials blocked him from boarding his flight at Delhi's main airport.

Both India and neighbouring Pakistan lay claim to the whole of the Himalayan territory, which has been divided between the two since they separated seven decades ago.
Food aid for Aleppo still stuck on Syria border

Food aid for desperate civilians in eastern Aleppo remained stuck on the Syrian border on Friday, the fourth morning of a fragile internationally-brokered truce in the war-ravaged country.

An AFP correspondent said no movement could be seen on the rubble-strewn Castello Road, the main route for humanitarian assistance in to divided Aleppo.

The UN had hoped that forty trucks of food -- enough to feed 80,000 people for one month -- could be delivered to besieged rebel-held eastern parts of Aleppo as soon as possible.

The UN had hoped forty trucks of food, enough to feed 80,000 people for one month, could be delivered to besieged rebel-held eastern parts of Aleppo as soon as possible George Ourfalian (AFP/File)

On Friday morning, the trucks were still waiting at the border with Turkey, said David Swanson, a spokesman for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

"The challenge we continue to face -- and this is the very sad reality -- is ensuring all parties to the conflict, and those with influence over them, are in agreement," he told AFP.

An estimated 250,000 people still live in east Aleppo.

Under the US-Russia truce deal, the Castello Road leading into those neighbourhoods would be demilitarised and aid convoys would enter from Turkey.

Russia on Thursday said government forces had begun to withdraw from the area and accused rebel fighters of failing to pull back as agreed.

"As humanitarians this is immensely frustrating. We're here, we're on the ground and we're ready to move... The world is watching," Swanson said.

The ceasefire deal calls for the truce to be renewed every 48 hours, and for Washington and Moscow to begin unprecedented joint targeting of jihadists if it lasts a week.

The cessation of hostilities appears to be largely holding across the country, though Syria's mainstream opposition has yet to formally sign on.
Iran's Rouhani heads for Venezuela, Cuba

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani set off Friday for a tour of Venezuela and Cuba before heading to New York for next week's UN General Assembly, official media reported.

Rouhani will take part in a summit of Non-Aligned Movement countries and hold separate talks with Venezuelan counterpart Nicolas Maduro, the IRNA news agency said.

The 120-nation group was founded more than 50 years ago to represent countries resentful of being squeezed in the power-struggle between the United States and the Soviet Union.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani left for Venezuela for a summit of Non-Aligned Movement countries and separate talks with counterpart Nicolas Maduro HO (IRANIAN PRESIDENCY/AFP/File)

Rouhani's trip comes amid a global oil glut that has seen prices fall dramatically in recent years.

Venezuela has the world's largest oil reserves and has been hit hard by the price slump.

Iran -- which has nearly doubled oil and gas exports in the past year -- has so far resisted pressure from fellow members of the OPEC oil cartel to back a production freeze.

Speaking to journalists before leaving Tehran, Rouhani described Cuba as a "friendly and revolutionary country" and said he would meet President Raul Castro, and his brother and revolutionary leader, Fidel.

"For us, peace and non-interference in domestic affairs of other countries, their national sovereignty, consultation and coordination on issues of the developing and entire world are important," Rouhani said.

World leaders will convene in New York starting Monday for the 71st UN General Assembly, with the global refugee crisis and the Syria war likely to top the agenda.

Iran is a key backer of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, and is currently engaged in a war of words with regional rival Saudi Arabia.
Myanmar soldiers jailed for killing villagers

Seven Myanmar soldiers have been sentenced to jail for killing villagers during an interrogation, the military said, a rare ruling in the former junta-run country where the army has long operated with impunity.

The army controlled Myanmar for half a century in a brutal reign rife with rights abuses, including allegations of torture, rape and recruiting child soldiers.

Although it has loosened its grip since ceding power to a quasi-civilian government in 2011, the army seldom admits to misconduct among its troops.

Although it has rolled back its powers since handing over power to a quasi-civilian government in 2011, Myanmar's army seldom admits to misconduct among its troops Voja M. (AFP/File)

The sentencing handed out by a military court on Thursday suggests the Tatmadaw, as it is known, is looking to revamp its image as the country hurtles toward democracy and opens up to the West.

"Seven Myanmar army soldiers are sentenced to five years for killing local people in Mong Yaw village in Lashio township, Shan State," the military said in statement on Facebook.

"They all have to be sentenced to five years with hard labour in country side prison," it added.

The five villagers were killed in June after skirmishes between ethnic rebels and soldiers around Mong Yaw in northeastern Shan State -- one of many regions riven by decades-long insurgencies.

Locals accused the officers of murder after their bodies were found buried in shallow graves several days later.

The military said that four of the jailed were officers.

The country's new civilian leader, democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi, has made ending the ethnic warfare a top priority since her party took power in March following landmark polls.

But bringing peace to the country's borderlands will ultimately depend on the military, a powerful player that still controls key government bodies.

On Wednesday, US President Barack Obama vowed to lift decades-old sanctions, imposed when the former military junta was in power, during a visit by Suu Kyi to the White House.

While details are still unclear, the move will likely scrap the blacklist that bars Americans from doing business with more than 100 military leaders, their companies and so-called cronies.

Activists have condemned the move however, saying it removes a key lever for applying pressure on the army.

Last year the deaths of two ethnic Kachin teachers triggered public outrage, as activists accused soldiers of raping and murdering the pair in the village where they worked in Shan State.

No one has yet been charged with the killings.
Opinion / Letters

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Hello! My name is Linda Gabriel. I am a Theatre Maker, Spoken Word Artist and Activist from Harare, Zimbabwe. I am applying for a master's degree in Gender Studies at the University of Oslo.The program starts in August 2017. Tuition is free for international students. However during the application period students are required to have their own funds for living expenses. The amount set by the University is NOK 103 950 (11 000). My Goal of 12 000 is based on this amount plus travel expenses.As an activist, I have been using the stage to tell untold stories, issues of gender based violence, sexuality, forced child marriages, and sex work, taking my art beyond the stage and into the world.This Masters degree will be my key to accessing communities that foster social cohesion, peace and reduction of poverty in the context of cultural diversity, freedom of expression, gender equality and improved human rights. Investing in my educational goals is investing in the future of these communities. After my studies, I will return to Zimbabwe to work with more young women in my community.As someone with a BA in Applied Drama and Theatre from University of Witswatersrand Johannesburg, who is a working artist, it can be difficult to get organizations to hire me for outreach programs.My goal is to be more involved on the grassroots level in community development, women and girl child empowerment, educational programs, and policy making, with organizations aiding girls and women in remote areas, marginalized and minority communities 11 000 - Living Expenses ( http://www.uio.no/english/studies/admission/financing-requirements.html)  90 - Visa Application 110 - Travel Insurance 800 - Air Ticket (Zimbabwe to Norway)Your donations will be greatly appreciated and I hope you share my story.'It takes a village to raise a child' - African Proverb
Peres condition stable after stroke: doctor

Former Israeli president and Nobel laureate Shimon Peres remained stable Saturday, four days after a major stroke, his doctor said.

The 93-year-old remained sedated and on a respirator after suffering a stroke and internal bleeding on Tuesday, Peres's personal physician and son-in-law Rafi Walden told AFP.

His condition has improved since, however it is still described as serious but stable.

Former Israeli president Shimon Peres is widely respected both in Israel and abroad Etienne Laurent (Pool/AFP/File)

Israeli public radio said early Saturday that Peres "had a quiet night" in the hospital near Tel Aviv where he is being treated but his life remained in danger.

Israeli President Reuven Rivlin visited his predecessor and spoke to his relatives at the hospital on Saturday evening but did not discuss his medical condition with reporters.

"We pray for the improvement of Shimon's condition and send our support to his family and the medical staff," Rivlin said.

"There's no greater fighter than Shimon Peres -- if it depends on him he will win."

Peres has held nearly every major office in Israel, serving twice as prime minister. He was president, a mostly ceremonial role, from 2007 to 2014.

He won the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize jointly with prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat for his role in negotiating the Oslo Accords, which envisioned an independent Palestinian state.

The former hawk turned dove is widely respected both in Israel and abroad, regularly meeting world leaders and celebrities.

Pope Francis wrote to Peres on Thursday saying he had "prayed for strength for the family and for a full recovery".

The letter said the Pope held a special prayer for Peres alongside Rabbi Abraham Skorka of Argentina.

Peres and the Pope last met two months ago when Peres visited the Vatican, while in 2014 they made a joint prayer for peace alongside Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.

US Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump also wrote to wish Peres a "swift recovery".

"You are among the last of a generation of leaders who fought for the right of the Jewish people to shape their own destiny," Trump wrote.

Trump's Democrat rival Hillary Clinton, former British prime minister Tony Blair and Russian President Vladimir Putin have also enquired about his condition.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told the Security Council Thursday he was hoping for a "swift and full recovery", calling Peres "tireless in seeking peace between Israelis and Palestinians".
Fierce shelling, clashes in east of Syria capital

Fierce fighting and clashes between regime forces and rebels rocked the eastern edge of Syria's capital on Friday, an AFP correspondent and military source said, despite a fragile truce across the country.

"The Syrian army is blocking an attack by armed groups that tried to enter the capital's east via Jobar... leading to intense clashes and rocket fire," a military source told AFP.

A barrage of rocket fire and shelling could be heard coming from the Jobar district, a rebel-held eastern suburb of Damascus.

A Syrian boy sits amid the rubble in Jobar, a rebel-held district on the eastern outskirts of Damascus Amer Almohibany (AFP/File)

The district has been a battleground for more than two years and nearly all of its pre-war population has fled.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group also reported the clashes and said more than 21 shells and rockets hit parts of Jobar.

Two shells also hit the Bab al-Sharqi neighbourhood of Damascus but did not result in any casualties, the Observatory said.

Rami Abdel Rahman, who heads the Britain-based monitor, said both Islamist faction Faylaq al-Sham and the Fateh al-Sham Front -- formerly Al-Qaeda's Syrian affiliate -- were present in Jobar.

He did not have immediate information on casualties.

Under the truce deal negotiated by Moscow and Washington, which came into force on Monday evening, fighting is to halt across the country except in areas where jihadists are present.
Vietnam investigating new fish deaths

Vietnam is investigating new mass fish deaths along its central coast, an official said Friday, months after a major steel plant was blamed for a toxic leak that wiped out tonnes of marine life in the fishing hub.

Public anger has mounted in Vietnam since dead fish started washing ashore in April after the Taiwanese steel firm Formosa discharged contaminated waste into the ocean, causing the worst ecological disaster in decades.

Formosa was eventually slapped with a $500 million fine following weeks of rare protests in the authoritarian country.

Dead fish started washing ashore in Vietnam in April after a Taiwanese steel firm released contaminated waste into the ocean

The government is now looking into new reports that boats were seen dumping sludge into waters off of Thanh Hoa province south of Hanoi, where some 50 tonnes of dead fish washed ashore earlier this month.

Officials initially blamed the deaths on blooming red algae.

"An investigation into the cause of the fish deaths is being carried out by experts from the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources," Cao Thanh Tho, head of aquaculture in the provincial Agriculture and Rural Development department, told AFP.

The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment said it was analysing waste samples "to determine if there is any link with the fish deaths", with results expected by September 20.

Meanwhile, dead fish, including large carps, also started showing up along the Thu Bon River in central Quang Nam province this week, with state-run Thanh Nien newspaper reporting residents saying the waterway has turned black in recent days.

A Quang Nam official told AFP an investigation was under way.
China eyes year-long stays for space station astronauts

China could send astronauts to its space station for more than a year at a time once it goes operational in 2022, a senior project designer told state media.

The country's second space lab, the Tiangong-2 -- or Heavenly Palace-2 -- blasted off Thursday night from the Gobi desert and is expected to operate for at least two years, the latest stage of the Asia's giant's ambitious space programme.

Construction on a space station will start in as early as 2017 and take around three years, before it enters into service in 2022, the official Xinhua news agency reported, citing Zhu Zongpeng, chief designer of the space lab system.

China's Tiangong 2 space lab is launched on a Long March-2F rocket from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the Gobi desert, on September 15, 2016

Astronauts could be stationed in orbit for missions that last for more than one year in the facility, which has an initial designed life of at least 10 years, Zhu said, according to the report.

The longest single stay in space by a human so far is 437 days by Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov.

The Chinese space station will weigh over 60 tonnes -- much smaller than the 420-tonne International Space Station -- and consist of a core module attached to two space labs, Xinhua said.

It will normally accommodate three astronauts at a time but has a maximum capacity of six, it added.

China is pouring billions into its space programme and working to catch up with the US and Europe.

Beijing sees its military-run space programme as symbolising the country's progress and a marker of its rising global stature.

The nation's first lunar rover was launched in late 2013, and while it was beset by mechanical troubles it far outlived its expected lifespan, finally shutting down only last month.

The Tiangong-2 will have two astronauts transported to it to conduct research projects related to in-orbit equipment repairs, aerospace medicine, space physics and biology, atomic space clocks and solar storm research during a 30-day stay, Xinhua said.

But for the most part China has so far replicated activities that the US and the former Soviet Union pioneered decades ago.

As well as building a space station, it intends to eventually put one of its citizens on the surface of the moon.
South Sudan refugees soar past one million mark

The number of refugees from South Sudan has passed the one million mark after a renewed bout of fierce fighting in July sent nearly 200,000 people fleeing the war-scarred nation, the UN said Friday.

The latest United Nations refugee agency figures see the world's youngest nation join the ranks of Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia, where conflict similarly has driven massive numbers fleeing to safety across national borders.

The large majority of South Sudanese refugees registered since it won its independence in 2011 have fled since the outbreak of a particularly brutal civil war in December 2013.

A woman and child pictured at a make-shift camp in the Amuru District of Uganda, which borders war-torn South Sudan, on July 16, 2016 Isaac Kasamani (AFP/File)

Tens of thousands of people have died and more than 2.5 million been driven from their homes.

Countless villages have been burnt to the ground, almost half the population relies on food assistance to survive, and human rights organisations say government and rebel forces have frequently used rape as a weapon of war.

"The number of South Sudanese refugees sheltering in neighbouring countries has this week passed the one million mark," UNHCR said in a statement.

Another 1.61 million people are displaced inside the country, it said.

"Five years after independence, this is a very sad milestone," spokesman Leo Dobbs told reporters in Geneva.

Neighbouring Uganda, which already shelters 375,000 South Sudanese, warned it was running out of resources and asked for support.

"The international community ... must act very fast to end this violence," Disaster and Refugees Minister Musa Ecweru told AFP. "We have maintained an open door policy ... but the resources we have cannot cope with the surging numbers."

"We appeal to donors to step up funding," he added.

Hopes of ending the three-year conflict rose in April when former rebel leader Riek Machar returned to Juba to take up the job of vice-president in a national unity government headed by President Salva Kiir.

- No end in sight -

But fierce clashes erupted in Juba on July 8 between Kiir's guards and troops loyal to Machar, who is currently in Khartoum receiving medical treatment.

Since then, more than 185,000 people have fled, most of them women and children, according to the UNHCR.

"They include survivors of violent attacks, sexual assault, children (who) have been separated from their parents ... and people in need of urgent medical care," the UN agency said.

On September 4, the South Sudanese government first reluctantly agreed to the deployment of a 4,000-strong UN protection force to beef up the UN's peacekeeping mission of 12,000 troops.

But then it asked to re-negotiate the size of the force, irritating the international community.

On Thursday the United States threatened to push for an arms embargo against the Juba government should it block the formation of the force.

Meanwhile several civil society activists who met with a UN Security Council team last week have fled a government crackdown.

The UNHCR said refugees arriving in neighbouring countries were reporting heavy fighting across the southern Greater Equatoria region, where armed groups were killing civilians, sexually assaulting women and girls and recruiting young boys.

"Many refugees arrive exhausted after days walking in the bush and going without food or water," UNHCR said.

Most of those recently uprooted have crossed into Uganda, which counts 143,164 recent arrivals, bringing the total number of South Sudanese refugees in the country to nearly 375,000.

And there is no end in sight: over the past week alone, more than 20,000 new arrivals were registered in Uganda.

A surge of people has meanwhile also entered western Ethiopia's Gambella region in the past week, while others have headed to Kenya, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Central African Republic.

"These countries have commendably kept their doors open to the new arrivals," UNHCR said.

South Sudan: the refugee crisis Philippe Mouche (AFP)
Gabon under internet blackout as it awaits key poll ruling

An internet curfew and social media blackout has sparked outrage and wreaked havoc on businesses in oil-rich Gabon, as citizens keenly await a pivotal ruling challenging President Ali Bongo's contested re-election.

"We are losing a lot of money," fumed Steeve Ndong, who oversees the website of a mobile telephone company.

"The figures of the page I look after are in the red. We are now down to 600 hits a day against between 6,000 and 10,000 normally," he said.

Days of riots in Gabon's capital of Libreville followed the August 31 announcement handing incumbent Ali Bongo a narrow victory Marco Longari (AFP/File)

"It has lasted for 15 days," added Raoul, a doctor in the seaside capital Libreville, adding "(and) we speak of democracy."

Internet connections were partially restored on Thursday between six in the morning until 8 at night and then cut off later. Social media such as Twitter, Facebook and WhatsApp remain blocked.

Gabon, which has been ruled by the Bongo family for nearly 50 years, has been wracked by violent protests after the sitting president was declared the winner of the August 27 polls.

Bongo's rival Jean Ping, a veteran diplomat, took his challenge of the result -- which gave Bongo a winning margin of a mere 6,000 votes -- to the country's top court.

Riots broke out following the August 31 announcement of the results, the National Assembly was torched and there were attacks on Ping's headquarters. Bongo meanwhile claimed that Ping had instigated the violence.

Ping has asked for a recount in the ruling family's stronghold of Haut-Ogooue province, where Bongo won more than 95 percent of votes on a reported turnout of more than 99 percent.

Ping says more than 50 people were killed in post-electoral violence, but the interior ministry says the toll was three dead.

Meanwhile, anxious Gabonese awaiting news of the Constitutional Court's decision on Ping's appeal now only have recourse to the country's tightly-controlled state media and television.

"To know what's really happening we have to wait for the evening news on international TV channels," said a student who identified herself as only Marie.

- 'We are all victims' -

Another young woman, Laure, said she had "anticipated" the crackdown and installed a virtual private network or VPN on her smartphone to avoid "censorship."

"We have access to Facebook," said the 23-year-old Ping supporter.

Communications Minister Alain-Claude Bilie-By-Nze told AFP that the erratic services were due to "disruptions" in the network and nothing more.

"We are all victims," he said. "Like everybody else, we too cannot work normally and we hope that the links will be re-established quickly," he said.

But this line fails to convince many.

"The government is trying to make us believe that business is back to normal but that's rubbish," exclaimed Paul, who works in a Libreville bank.

Shops and businesses, shuttered for days after the post-poll violence broke out, have re-opened but close well before normal hours.

Parents are also worried about the new school term, which begins at the start of October.

In the incredibly tangled web that makes up Gabon's political elite, the Constitutional Court is headed by Marie-Madeleine Mborantsuo, a former beauty queen whose affair with the leader's father produced two children.

For over 20 years the glamorous 61-year-old has headed the nine-member Constitutional Court and many question her impartiality.

The African Union on Friday said it was putting together a high-level legal team to send to Gabon "as soon as possible" to help ensure the court delivers a fair and transparent ruling.

"We wish to guarantee proper transparency as well as the credibility and legitimacy of Jean Ping's challenge," the spokesman for the AU Commission, Jacob Enoh Eben, told AFP.

"Consultations are under way to establish this team of jurists, experts in French administrative law," in coordination with the Gabon Constitutional Court, he said.

The AU was seeking "former Supreme Court chiefs and university professors."

France, Gabon's former colonial ruler, has called for a fair ruling with Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault underscoring the need "to examine the objections transparently and impartially."

Breakdown of Gabon's presidential election results Alain BOMMENEL, Paz PIZARRO (AFP)
Suicide bomber kills 28 at mosque in NW Pakistan: official

A Taliban suicide bomber killed at least 28 people and wounded dozens more as they attended Friday prayers at a mosque in a northwestern Pakistani tribal area, officials said.

The bombing took place in the village of Butmaina in the Mohmand tribal district bordering Afghanistan where the army has been fighting against Taliban militants.

"At least 28 people have been killed and 30 others wounded," deputy chief of the Mohmand tribal district administration Naveed Akbar told AFP.

Paramedics treat an injured blast victim at a hospital in Bajaur Agency, near the Afghan border in northwest Pakistan on September 16, 2016, following a suicide bombing at a mosque Anwarullah Khan (AFP)

The bomber came in as Friday prayers were in progress and blew himself up in the main hall, he said.

The victims include four children, aged 10 or younger, who were killed in the attack, he said, adding that a curfew has been imposed in the area.

Another local government official confirmed the information.

Shireen Zada, a resident who had prayed at another mosque nearby, said he heard the blast as he was walking home.

"I rushed to the spot and when I went inside the hall there was blood and human remains everywhere and people crying out," he told AFP.

"I brought my pick-up truck, loaded three wounded and drove them to the hospital in Khar," he said, referring to the nearest town.

-- 'Cowardly attack' --

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif condemned the bombing, saying the government would remain steadfast in their fight against extremists.

"The cowardly attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the government's resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country," read a statement from Sharif's office.

Taliban faction Jamaat-ul-Ahrar (JuA) claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it was carried out to avenge the deaths of 13 of its members and arrests of others by a local vigilante force in 2009.

Since 2007 the government has encouraged vigilante forces comprising tribesmen -- locally known as peace committees -- to defend their villages against the Taliban.

"Today our suicide bomber has attacked the so-called peace lashkar (vigilante force) in Mohmand agency's Anbar district," the group's spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan said in an email to reporters.

"We warn all the lashkar members of Anbar and supporters of military to quit opposition to Islam and Jihad and refrain from enmity with Mujahedin (holy warriors) otherwise our war is being extended," Ehsan said.

On September 2, at least 14 people were killed and more than 50 wounded after a suicide bomber attacked a court in the Pakistani city of Mardan in an assault targeting Pakistan's legal community that was claimed by the JuA.

The group has also said it was behind an attack on lawyers in southwest Quetta, which killed 73 people on August 8, as well as the Lahore Easter bombing that killed 75 in Pakistan's deadliest attack this year.

Pakistan's deadliest ever attack occurred in Peshawar in December 2014, when Taliban militants stormed a school killing more than 150 people, mostly children.

The army launched an operation in June 2014 in a bid to wipe out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas and so bring an end to the bloody insurgency that has cost thousands of civilian lives since 2004.

As a result security in the country has since improved. Scattered attacks still take place, but they are fewer and of a lesser intensity than in previous years.

According to data from the South Asia Terrorism Portal, 457 civilians and 182 members of the security forces were killed in Pakistan from January 1 to September 11, putting 2016 on course for fewer casualties than 2015.

Last year, the country recorded its lowest number of killings since 2007, when the Pakistani Taliban was formed.

Map of Pakistan locating village of Butmaina where suicide bomber struck in mosque Friday AFP (AFP)
Zimbabwe protesters challenge fresh police ban in capital

Anti-government activists in Zimbabwe vowed Friday to challenge a police order barring protests in the capital Harare, on the eve of mass demonstrations planned across the country against veteran ruler President Robert Mugabe.

A coalition of opposition parties under the banner of the National Electoral Reform Agenda (NERA) is demanding reform ahead of the 2018 vote, including free access to the voters' roll.

The month-long protest ban was instituted Friday, just over a week after an earlier order was overturned by the courts.

A street vendor flees with his goods as Zimbabwe opposition supporters clash with police in Harare on August 26, 2016 Wilfred Kajese (AFP/File)

NERA spokesman Douglas Mwonzora said the opposition parties would challenge the ban in the high court.

"This is a typical comedy of errors where the state has fallen into the very same legal trap it fell into last time," he told AFP.

"A similar order was challenged before a competent court which declared it invalid and nothing is to be gained by issuing the same order again."

Mugabe has vowed a crackdown on dissent and blasted judges for "reckless" rulings allowing previous demonstrations.

Promise Mkwananzi, spokesman for the protest group Tajamuka, said they would march on Saturday, despite the police order.

"The constitution and the high court allow for peaceful demonstrations," he told AFP.

"The police are promoting lawlessness in the country by banning peaceful demonstrations."

Mugabe's ZANU-PF party won the last general elections in 2013, which were marred by electoral fraud.

Opposition to the ageing leader's 36-year reign has grown in recent months with a surge of public demonstrations, triggered by an economic crisis that has left banks short of cash and the government struggling to pay its workers.

Two weeks ago, police detained scores of people including activists and bystanders following violent protests in the capital.
Ben Hornberger: one of Trump's army of volunteers

Benjamin Hornberger is only 22 but not too young for a little grandiloquence. The 2016 presidential election, he says, is "really do or die."

The tireless volunteer who is canvassing for Republican candidate Donald Trump is one of millions hoping to sweep the New York billionaire into the White House.

White, male and lacking a university diploma, he typifies Trump backers who are often less interested in the candidate's economic ideas than his promise to "Make America Great Again."

Ben Hornberger a former Marine and volunteer for Donald Trump, has knocked on at least 6,000 doors since he started campaigning for the billionaire businessman in April 2016 Dominick Reuter (AFP)

Those voters -- many of whom will head to the polls for the first time in 2016 because until now, they were not all that politically inclined -- hope that Trump can ward off what they believe is a US decline, a downward spiral in lockstep with their own marginalization in a swiftly changing society.

"It's not the same as it was back when my dad was a kid," Hornberger said. "Quite frankly, it's gone to hell, and we need somebody to step up and say, enough is enough."

In the past, his working class family would have been a typical target for Democrats -- his father works at a manufacturing plant producing glass for vehicles and his mother is self-employed. His Italian-American grandfather was a railway worker, and the other was a mason and volunteer firefighter.

Hornberger volunteered for Democratic President Barack Obama's 2008 campaign, but after high school joined the Marines for three years, when his political views began to change.

When he got out in February, he found himself suddenly seduced by Trump.

The candidate "went straight to the throat and said this is the way it is and it needs to stop. And I liked that, being a military veteran," Hornberger said, walking down a quiet street lined with wooden houses in Altoona, Pennsylvania.

Armed with a packet of pamphlets, the young volunteer uses a Republican party app on his iPhone to determine which doors to knock on as he traipses through the town of 45,000 residents nestled in the state's center.

- 'So far behind' -

Although the majority of inhabitants here are conservative, few say they'll actually turn out to vote.

Moving from neighborhood to neighborhood in his enormous red pick-up truck decorated with both a Trump and an American flag, Hornberger has knocked on at least 6,000 doors since April.

From Monday through Wednesday, he works at a call center, an ideal job for a polite and smiling young man.

On Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, he stops by the Republican office to discuss his plans with the local party official in charge of canvassing operations. Hornberger spends at least 15 hours pounding the pavement for Trump each week.

He has the same ideological flexibility as the brash real estate mogul: He's against abortion but for gay marriage. And both like free trade but believe the United States "gets the short end of the stick" in trade agreements.

Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton draws only contempt from Hornberger, who says she represents elites and the status quo.

"For everybody to say America is great is not true," he says. "We're so far behind in so many categories. The only category that we lead is militarily."

Hornberger has a tattoo on his chest saying "Only God can judge me," but he also believes in a secular savior.

"Everybody around the world, whether you like it or not," he says, "is whispering the name Donald Trump."

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump is campaigning heavily in the Rust Belt states of Ohio and Pennsylvania as he seeks to attract working class voters who are captivated by his promise to "Make America Great Again" Mandel Ngan (AFP)

Ben Hornberger believes the United States is a business, and should be run by a businessman such as Donald Trump Dominick Reuter (AFP)
Britain's Princess Anne scraps Africa trip due to illness

Britain's Princess Anne, daughter of Queen Elizabeth II, has a "bad chest infection" and has cancelled a visit to Botswana and Mozambique at the end of this month, royal officials said Friday.

The news comes a week after Buckingham Palace first announced shortly after her return from the Rio Olympics that Anne, 66, was sick and would not attend scheduled engagements.

She has spent this week resting after being treated in hospital in Aberdeen, northeast Scotland, on September 9, where she was admitted from the queen's Balmoral residence in the Scottish Highlands.

Britain's Princess Anne was due to attend Botswana's 50th anniversary celebrations from September 28-30 Dominic Lipinski (Pool/AFP)

"The princess royal is still recovering from a bad chest infection. (Her) working programme for next week has therefore been scaled back, with a number of engagements cancelled," a Buckingham Palace statement said.

"As a precaution, on the advice of doctors, the princess will not undertake the planned visit to Botswana and Mozambique at the end of the month."

She was due to attend Botswana's 50th anniversary celebrations from September 28 to 30.

Another of the queen's children, Prince Andrew, will now attend instead.

Anne's recent engagements include spending time at the Rio Olympics as a member of the International Olympic Committee.
Soldiers replace tourists in Aleppo's battered Old City

Instead of colourful, handmade caps for sale to Syrians and foreign tourists, Zakaria Mosuli -- the last tailor in Aleppo's battered Old City -- now sews military headwear almost exclusively for soldiers.

More than five years of war have turned Aleppo's historic city centre, a UNESCO-listed World Heritage site home to an imposing citadel, into a makeshift military barracks.

Syrian shoppers and foreign backpackers have been replaced by war-weary troops, and colourful souvenir stands have given way to checkpoints dividing the ancient market into rebel- and government-held zones.

Syrian government soldiers walk through the entrance to the Khan al-Wazir market in Aleppo on September 16, 2016 Youssef Karwashan (AFP)

"I am the only tailor left in Aleppo's old city," says Mosuli in his modest shop in a regime-controlled street of the district.

He snips carefully from camouflaged military-style fabric at his shop, one of a handful in the souk that are still open.

"In the past, I used to sew colourful hats for children and women and young people," he says.

"But today, my speciality is making army-style caps, as this whole neighbourhood has become a military zone and Syrian army soldiers are everywhere."

Violence broke out in Aleppo in mid-2012, more than a year after anti-government protests first erupted across Syria.

The 13-kilometre (8-mile) ancient market -- the largest souk in the world -- became a front line.

Its streets are littered with rubble and walls are scarred by years of gunfire, rockets and mortar rounds.

- 'People have all left' -

Zakaria says he and his family refused to leave and do not regret their decision.

He brings in fabric from a government-held district into Old Aleppo, crossing several checkpoints and dodging shelling and snipers along the way.

"I have loyal customers who come from inside Aleppo, but most of my customers these days are soldiers and officers."

Pointing to two small birds that swooped into his apartment, Zakaria says: "These are my only friends. The people have all left."

Of the 200 families that once lived in the Old City, just 15 remain.

Most shops were shuttered long ago with metal gates painted in the tricolour Syrian government flag.

Other storefronts are charred black from car bombs and shelling, and many have had their windows blown in by rocket attacks.

When an AFP correspondent visited the market, soldiers were strolling through the ruined streets.

A US-Russia truce deal has seen guns fall silent in large parts of Syria, including Aleppo.

Mohammed Zakaria, a 65-year-old barber in the souk, has been wounded three times by shelling and rocket attacks on the old city.

But he says work is good as long as soldiers are still around.

"This area was especially a tourist area. My customers were all tourists or Syrians from other provinces," the hairdresser says.

"But today, as this district has turned into a military barracks, my customers are all soldiers and officers," he tells AFP.

- 'I want to die here' -

In Bab al-Faraj, a neighbourhood adjacent to the ancient souk, Yehya Qoteish stands next to a vegetable stall stocked with tomatoes, aubergines, peppers and watermelon.

"There are a lot of displaced people who fled here because the rents are very low. People have taken to living in abandoned hotels," he says.

"My customers are displaced people and soldiers," the 57-year-old says.

Further along in Khan al-Wazir, near the citadel, a pro-regime fighter carrying a baby and followed by his wife trudges home among the rubble.

Elsewhere in the Old City, 66-year-old Sarkis still sits outside his storefront every day -- even though he hasn't had a customer in years.

He learned about photography and camera equipment from his brother, and stayed in the Old City to keep their shop running, despite the increasingly dire situation.

"I got used to seeing dozens of tourists in my shop, but today, there are only soldiers who pass by just to check in on me, not to be photographed."

Sarkis says he could not bear to leave the neighbourhood where he was born and raised: "These few metres (yards) around my shop are my life, not just my livelihood."

His children visit him every week, begging him to leave the ravaged district, but Sarkis refuses.

"I was born here. I want to die here."

Still, Sarkis says, he wishes that just a single customer would come by to ask about photographic equipment or even just a camera battery.

"I'd give it to him for free!"

Zakaria Mosuli, the last tailor in Aleppo's battered Old City, sews military headwear at his shop Youssef Karwashan (AFP)

The damaged Khan al-Wazir market in Aleppo's historic city centre Youssef Karwashan (AFP)

Barber Mohammed Zakaria, 65, in his shop in Aleppo Youssef Karwashan (AFP)

The damaged interior of Khan al-Wazir market in the government-held area of Syrian city Aleppo Youssef Karwashan (AFP)
US declares French jihadist Diaby 'global terrorist'

The United States on Friday designated French jihadist recruiter Omar Diaby a "global terrorist" subject to US economic sanctions, the State Department said.

The 40-year-old Al-Nusra Front militant, who also uses the name Omar Omsen, became notorious last year for faking his own death in order to leave Syria for surgery.

According to the designation, Diaby leads a group of 50 French volunteers who traveled to Syria and signed up with the Al-Nusra Front, Al-Qaeda's franchise in the region.

French jihadist recruiter Omar Diaby leads a group of 50 volunteers who traveled to Syria to fight for the Al-Nusra Front Bulent Kilic (AFP)

Nusra says it broke with Al-Qaeda in July and has rebranded itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham.

"Although assumed killed in August 2015, Diaby re-emerged in May 2016, claiming his death was a ploy to allow him to travel to Turkey for an operation," the designation said.

"Diaby came to the attention of French intelligence due to his involvement with a French extremist group and his online propaganda video series," it added.

"Diaby's videos have been credited as the chief reason behind why so many French nationals have joined militant groups in Syria and Iraq."

Diaby's parents reported him dead last year but in May he surfaced again, giving an interview by Skype to France 2 television to explain he had traveled for surgery.

France 2 also broadcast footage of a training camp in western Syria housing around 30 young French jihadists, many of them from Diaby's home region near Nice.

While Diaby had not then been directly linked to attacks in France, he has expressed approval for the January 2015 shootings at the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo.

"I wish I'd been chosen to do that," he told France 2.

And Diaby -- or "Emir Omar Omsen" -- has been in the crosshairs of French intelligence for some time.

He was a member of Forsane Alizza, a small Islamist group that was broken up in 2012 by the French government for fomenting extremism among young French Muslims.

- Radical propaganda -

Diaby, a Frenchman of Senegalese descent, was known at first for producing radical propaganda videos but he is said to have traveled to Syria in 2013.

His hometown of Nice was the victim of a jihadist attack in July this year, when 86 people were killed as an attacker drove a truck into a Bastille Day crowd.

Diaby is known to recruit in the Nice area and intelligence agencies have long feared that militants returning from Syria will bring the war with them.

French police sources have also told AFP that Diaby's name came up in March as officers in Paris investigated a suspect arrested for "planning violent acts."
Nigerian man who named dog 'Buhari' asks court to dismiss case

A Nigerian man whose pet dog shares the same name as Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday asked the court to dismiss criminal charges against him.

In a statement sent by his lawyer, the owner of 'Buhari' the dog Joachim Iroko said he had a "legal right" to name his pet whatever he wanted.

"The name is not exclusive to the president, Buhari can just be a name given to any living creature just for identity," Iroko's lawyer Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa told AFP.

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari Dan Kitwood (Pool/AFP/File)

Iroko appeared in court in Ota in the southwest state of Ogun in August after being charged with "conduct likely to cause breach of peace" after naming his dog Buhari, Adegboruwa said.

He was due back in court on Monday, September 19.

Police allege, however, that Iroko wrote the name Buhari on the sides of his dog to antagonise his neighbour, whose father's name is Buhari.

"The man was not arrested for naming the dog Buhari but the conduct surrounding the attitude or the actions of the man," Ogun state police spokesman Muyiwa Adejobi told AFP.

"The man has been having issues with one of his neighbours whose father's name is Buhari, it has nothing to do with the president."

Iroko denies the claims, with Adegboruwa saying that the animal was usually chained near his warehouse to deter thieves.

Adegboruwa says that the four-legged Buhari, a chocolate-brown coloured dog, has now gone missing.

"We are all looking for the dog," Adegboruwa said, "maybe it is with the police, we still don't know".
US vows no cooperation with Russia until Syria aid flows

The United States said Friday it will not set up a planned joint US-Russian military coordination cell in Syria until regime forces there allow aid into besieged cities.

US Secretary of State John Kerry called Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and condemned "repeated and unacceptable delays of humanitarian aid," a spokesman said.

A ceasefire was declared in Syria's five-year-old civil war on Monday, two days after Kerry and Lavrov signed a deal in Geneva to pressure both sides to hold their fire.

UN fears a potential humanitarian disaster in Aleppo with more than 200,000 people trapped inside the besieged Syrian city Youssef Karwashan (AFP)

Under the pact, Russia was to restrain Bashar al-Assad's regime while Washington leans on the rebel groups opposing him, and both sides agree violence has reduced.

If the truce lasts seven days and humanitarian access is granted, Russia and the United States are to work together to target the extremist Islamic State and Al-Nusra front.

But some clashes have continued, and the United Nations has been unable to send supplies to starving civilians in areas like the besieged northern city of Aleppo.

Russia on Friday complained that only its ally, the Assad regime, is respecting the ceasefire, but nevertheless suggested that it be prolonged by a further 72 hours.

Washington, however, seems to be running short of patience.

Kerry told Lavrov that Washington "expects Russia to use its influence on the Assad regime to allow UN humanitarian convoys to reach Aleppo and other areas in need.
16 DR Congo opposition activists arrested: UN

At least 16 DR Congo opposition activists have been detained in Kinshasa after meeting to discuss how to stop President Joseph Kabila illegally prolonging his stay in power, the UN said Friday.

"At least 16 people were arrested between yesterday and this morning after a meeting on respect for constitution and handover of power," Jose-Maria Aranaz, of the UN's human rights office in DR Congo, told AFP.

Rights group Amnesty International had on Thursday accused authorities in mineral-rich DR Congo of "systematic repression" of those seeking Kabila's departure when his third term runs out on December 20.

Protests erupted in the Democratic Republic of Congo after a ruling that Kabila, who took power after his father's assassination, could remain in office in a caretaker capacity beyond the end of his mandate Junior Kannah (AFP/File)

Government spokesman Lambert Mende said he was surprised by the accusations, adding that authorities had freed several political prisoners in August.

Kabila, who has ruled DR Congo since 2001, is banned under the constitution from running again -- but he has given no sign of intending to give up his job in December.

No elections have been announced and it would be practically impossible to organise a poll in the time left before his mandate runs out.

Protests erupted after the Constitutional Court ruled in May that Kabila, who took power after his father's assassination, could remain in office in a caretaker capacity beyond the end of the mandate.

Authorities have been in talks with a minority opposition group this month to discuss ways out of the political crisis that has gripped DR Congo since Kabila's disputed re-election in 2011.

But the main opposition party led by political veteran Etienne Tshisekedi is refusing to take part, saying the talks are a distraction designed to illegally prolong Kabila's stay in power.
US special forces deploy to Syria to back Turkey

Dozens of US Special Operations commandos have been deployed to northern Syria to help Turkey and "vetted" Syrian rebels fight the Islamic State group, the Pentagon confirmed Friday.

But as footage emerged of the rebels hurling insults and threats at the American special operators, US officials were forced to play down reports that the troops did not receive a warm welcome to the frontline.

Last month, Ankara launched an offensive into northern Syria dubbed "Euphrates Shield," ostensibly designed to cut a major IS group supply line but also to counter the advance of US-backed a Kurdish militia.

At the request of the government of Turkey, US special operations forces are accompanying Turkish and vetted Syrian opposition forces as they continue to clear territory from ISIL Delil Souleiman (AFP/File)

US forces are working alongside the Syrian Kurds of the YPG in the fight against the Islamic State, but Turkey regards the group as terrorists and allies of the PKK separatist group fighting within its own borders.

In Syria, Turkey prefers to work with Arab and Turkmen fighters such as those of the Free Syrian Army (FSA), which is opposed to Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad's regime but has also clashed with the Kurds in the past.

Pentagon spokesman Jeff Davis told reporters that US commandos, at Turkey's request, had joined the Turkish military and "vetted Syrian opposition forces" fighting the Islamic State group near Jarabulus and Al Rai.

But footage widely shared online by Syrian groups and experts appears to show US commandos in Al Rai insulted by FSA fighters, who call them "pigs" and "infidels" in Arabic, demanding they leave Syria.

A US defense official admitted there had been a "misunderstanding," but insisted the troops were still deployed and that the matter had been cleared up.

"There's been no violence, no one is hurt and we are still there," the official said. "I have no report of a hostile or violent action."

The special forces contingent includes several dozen troops, he added.

America's top general, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Joseph Dunford, met with his Turkish counterpart General Hulusi Akar on the sidelines of a NATO chiefs of staff meeting in Croatia on Friday to discuss the anti-IS group fight.

His assistant, Captain Gregory Hicks, said the generals met "to advance discussions on the way forward in the fight against ISIL, and recommitted to the close military-to-military and strategic relationship the US has with Turkey."

Meanwhile, in another incident underlining the four-way tensions between Kurds, Turks, Americans and Syrian Arabs on the battlefield, Kurdish YPG fighters again flew US flags near Syria's border with Turkey.

An AFP photographer saw the stars and stripes flying over a YPG base in Tal Abyad. The use of US flags is seen as a provocation by some in Turkey and the Pentagon repeated its request for them to be taken down.

"We would call on our partner forces not to fly the American flag on their own," Cook said. "I would imagine that that would be communicated if indeed that's taken place in this instance."

There was some good news for the coalition, however.
Coalition strike kills IS 'minister of information': Pentagon

A coalition air strike in Syria has killed a senior Islamic State operative considered the group's information minister, a week after another raid eliminated a top IS strategist, the Pentagon said Friday.

Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said that Wa'il Adil Hasan Salman al-Fayad, also known as "Dr. Wa'il", was killed in a precision strike on September 7 near Raqa, the Syrian city that is the de facto capital of the Islamic State jihadist group.

"Wa'il oversaw ISIL's production of terrorist propaganda videos showing torture and executions," Cook said, describing him as "one of ISIL's most senior leaders" and a close associate of Abu Mohamed al-Adnani, the IS group spokesman killed on August 30.

A member of the Islamic state militant group parades in a street in the northern rebel-held Syrian city of Raqa - (Welayat Raqa/AFP/File)

US officials "will continue to work with our coalition partners to build momentum" in the campaign to deal the IS group "a lasting defeat," he added.

The IS group is also referred to as ISIL and Daesh.

The announcement comes as air strikes and clashes are testing a fragile ceasefire in Syria.

Under the deal, Moscow must pressure Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Washington must work with Syrian rebels to silence their guns.

If the truce, which began on Monday, lasts seven days and humanitarian access is granted, Russia and the United States are to work together to target jihadists, including the IS group and former Al-Qaeda affiliate Fateh al-Sham Front.

Russia said that although only Moscow and the Syrian regime were fulfilling the truce deal, it was ready to extend the agreement by 72 hours.
US flags flown by Kurdish group in northern Syria: AFP

The American flag was flown at a Syrian Kurdish base in northern Syria close to the Turkish border on Friday, a photographer working for AFP said, a day after the US urged against doing so.

In Tal Abyad, the stars and stripes -- flown by the People's Protection Units (YPG) militia -- could be seen from the Turkish border town of Akcakale in the southeastern Sanliurfa province.

Tal Abyad in Raqa province was captured from IS by the YPG in June 2015.

A US flag is flown at the People's Protection Units (YPG) position in the Syrian city of Tal-Abyad, on September 16, 2016

Ankara regards the militia and the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) as the Syrian branch of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) which has waged a 32-year insurgency inside Turkey.

But the YPG has become a key partner of the US-led coalition fighting Islamic State (IS) extremists as part of the Kurdish-Arab Syrian Democratic Forces, much to the chagrin of Washington's NATO ally Ankara.

Turkish media said that US flags had been flown by the Kurdish fighters on Thursday but Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said he was not aware of the reports.

He repeated the US' opposition during a press briefing on Thursday, quoted on the US defence department's website.

"We would call on our partner forces not to fly the American flag on their own. I would imagine that that would be communicated if indeed that's taken place in this instance."

The flags' presence comes two weeks after Kurdish fighters displayed the US flag north of the city of Manbij liberated from IS in August, Turkey's state-run Anadolu news agency said.
Israel readies for 1,500 rockets a day in next war

Israel's army estimates that thousands of rockets could slam into the Jewish state in any future conflagration, military sources said Friday ahead of a nationwide civil defence drill.

"Total war on several fronts, destruction of essential equipment and infrastructure and heavy rocket bombardment" all form part of the scenario for the exercise, which runs from Sunday until September 21, the army said.

The drill is based on projections of the army's Home Front Command, which estimates 1,500 rockets crashing into the country each day, military sources said in a briefing to Israeli reporters, local media reported.

Palestinian militants from the Al-Quds Brigades, the armed wing of the Islamic Jihad movement, sit on a pick-up truck mounted with rockets during a rally in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on July 28, 2016 Said Khatib (AFP/File)

The projectiles could be launched simultaneously by Lebanon's Shiite militia Hezbollah across Israel's northern border and to a far lesser extent from Hamas-ruled Gaza in the south.

Hamas is said to have been left seriously weakened after a 2014 Gaza war against Israel, but it still holds thousands of rockets, according to a military official.

Hezbollah has at least 100,000 and probably more, said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Only around one in 100 rockets is likely to hit a building, military sources say, with the rest falling on open ground or being intercepted by Israel's Iron Dome missile defence system.

They say 95 percent of rockets fired will likely carry a light payload and have a range of less than 40 kilometres (25 miles), but Hezbollah can hit densely-populated central Israel with dozens of rockets each day.

The Home Front Command, tasked with leading and coordinating civil defence, regularly publishes maps showing the maximum time, by location, that Israelis have to take shelter after air raid sirens sound.

In Tel Aviv, Israel's seaside commercial and leisure capital, the time to scramble to safety has been reassessed from 90 seconds at present to 60 in the next conflict.

After a 2006 war with Hezbollah, an official inquiry criticised authorities for lack of preparedness and organisation in civil defence procedures.

During that conflict, the Shiite militia rained about 4,000 rockets on Israel and sent a million civilians into shelters, many of them dilapidated and cramped.
Clinton poll lead vanishes in race's final stretch

Hillary Clinton's lead in the US presidential race against Donald Trump is evaporating with just over 50 days to go until election day, as she stirs ever less enthusiasm in her own camp.

The Democrat's average lead since late August is just 1.8 points at the national level, a drop of four points in two weeks, and in several key states where the November election is likely to be decided, Trump is ahead.

In Ohio the Manhattan mogul now leads the former secretary of state by 46 to 41 percent, and in Florida by 47 to 44 percent, although this falls within the margin of error, according to a CNN-ORC survey.

Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton attends the Black Women's Agenda 39th Annual Symposium on September 16, 2016 in Washington, DC Brendan Smialowski (AFP)

Clinton tried to project an air of calm as she jumped back on the campaign trail after a three-day enforced break due to pneumonia, saying she always said the race would be close.

But in a sign of jitters, her campaign announced that her former rival Bernie Sanders, who is popular among young people, and progressive senator Elizabeth Warren would campaign for Clinton this weekend in Ohio.

Meanwhile Trump declared: "We've had an incredible month. There is a great enthusiasm."

It is not the first time the two candidates have been neck and neck. It happened briefly in May, before Trump lost ground.

But with the election less than two months away, Clinton enjoys ever less popularity among Democrats. Only 38 percent say they are very enthusiastic about her candidacy, down from 47 percent in August, according to a New York Times/CBS poll.

Trump's supporters appear much more fired-up: 55 percent say they are very keen to vote, against just 36 percent in the Clinton camp.

So for the Democrats, getting people out on November 8 will be key.

FiveThirtyEight, a website that analyzes polls, historical and economic data, says Clinton still has a 60.1 percent chance of winning, compared to 39.8 percent for Trump.

Back on August 8, Clinton's chances stood much higher at 79.5 percent, compared to 20.5 percent for the Republican.

But since early last month Trump has overhauled his campaign team, tried to become more disciplined and less attack-oriented in his public appearances and has stopped insulting people. His new campaign chief, Kellyanne Conway, appears on television often to plug Trump.

- Crucial first debate -

"Trump had a couple of good weeks beginning with his success in Mexico" early this month, said Robert Shapiro, a political scientist at Columbia University in New York.

Shapiro added that Trump has been "rallying his base of support, saying more about policy issues, foreign policy, the economy, and... his proposal in terms of maternity leave and child care.

"The bar for evaluating him is not very high, but in that context he has been doing better in terms of campaigning and trying to look a little bit more presidential."

For Clinton things have not been going so well.

She has been dogged for months by the controversy over her use of a private email server while serving as secretary of state and by attacks from her opponents against the Clinton Foundation.

Clinton has also taken heat for saying many Trump supporters belong in a "basket of deplorables."

Shapiro said Clinton did not handle her bout of pneumonia well, either. The campaign's delay of two days in telling the public she was sick boosted a widespread perception that Clinton is not transparent.

Democrats have reason to worry -- but Clinton still has many ways to win the electoral college.

The presidential election is effectively the sum of 50 state elections, with each candidate gunning for a majority of 538 electoral votes divided among the states, all but two of which award all their votes to one candidate.

To reach 270 votes, Trump needs to carry a number of battleground states -- Ohio and Florida but also Iowa, Virginia, New Hampshire, and North Carolina. But he must also lock in all the traditionally Republican states, several of which look as if they might snub his candidacy.

With Clinton dropping in the polls however, the looming first presidential debate on September 26 is not necessarily good news for her.

"Historically in these first debates, the incumbent president or the leading candidate tends to do less well on the first debate than the challenger," said Shapiro.

"And in this case, the expectations and the bar for Trump may be so low that he'll be evaluated differently than she will. The bar is higher for her than for Trump," he added.

Trump supporters hold t-shirts refering to a comment made by Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton ahead of a campaign event by Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump in Washington, DC on September 16, 2016 Mandel Ngan (AFP)
Eritrea must reveal fate of detained officials, reporters: UN expert

A United Nations expert on Friday called on Eritrea's government to urgently reveal the fate of around two dozen senior government officials and journalists arrested 15 years ago.

The group of senior cabinet ministers, members of parliament and independent journalists, including a Swedish national, were seized in a draconian purge on September 18, 2001 and the days that followed.

The government of Eritrea's authoritarian leader Issaias Afeworki has said those arrested were a threat to national security, and have never disclosed their whereabouts or state of health.

The government of Eritrea's leader Issaias Afeworki (pictured) has said those arrested in a 2001 purge were a threat to national security, and has never disclosed their whereabouts or health condition Peter Busomoke (AFP/File)

"Those arrested have been detained incommunicado and in solitary confinement," said Sheila Keetharuth, the UN special rapporteur on the human rights situation in Eritrea.

"Even family members have never been allowed to have any contact whatsoever with them," she said in a statement issued ahead of the 15th anniversary of the arrests.

They are all still being held in secret locations, although media reports indicate several may have died after being held for years in horrendous conditions.

Among those seized was Swedish-Eritrean journalist and author Dawit Isaak.

Despite efforts by Sweden, the EU and others to ensure his release or at least receive assurances that he is still alive, the diabetic journalist has been held incommunicado since then, accused of spying but never charged or sentenced.

Those arrested 15 years ago are not the only victims of rights abuses in Eritrea.

Keetharuth warned that "the 2001 clampdown set in motion a chain of egregious, widespread and systematic human rights violations that continues to this very day".

She listed arbitrary arrests, incommunicado detention, disappearances and torture among the continuing abuses.
Former Burkina PM charged with murder: prosecutor

Luc Adolphe Tiao, the last prime minister of former Burkinabe president Blaise Compaore, has been detained and charged with murder over unrest that saw the latter unseated in 2014, the supreme court prosecutor general said Friday.

Compaore lost power after 27 years following a popular uprising in October 2014 against his attempts to change the constitution to remain in office and last year the country's transitional council indicted him and senior members of his government on charges of high treason.

The supreme court prosecutor told AFP Tiao had been detained and charged as part of its mandate to investigate the "popular insurrection" which accompanied the collapse of the Compaore regime.

Former PM Luc Adolphe Tiao (pictured) spent a year-and-a-half in exile in Ivory Coast but returned to Burkina Faso last weekend after questioning of members of his former cabinet who remain in the country Ahmed Ouoba (AFP/File)

"Former prime minister Luc Adolphe Tiao has been placed in detention and was taken to a prison facility at Ouagadougou this morning," chief prosecutor Armand Ouedraogo told AFP.

"He has been charged with murder, beating and deliberate wounding and complicity" in violence in connection with military attempts to put down the uprising, which cost 33 lives according to an official toll.

Ouagadougou prosecutor Maiza Sereme last week decried the "difficulties" encountered in pursuing the case against Tiao and former regime leaders citing a lack of "cooperation" from state authorities.

Tiao spent a year-and-a-half in exile in Ivory Coast but returned voluntarily to Burkina Faso last weekend after questioning of several members of his former cabinet who remain in the country

Several sources have told AFP that former journalist Tiao is accused of having signed an order for the army to use force in putting down the popular uprising.

"Everybody knows it was him who gave authorisation to fire on demonstrators," said Ouedraogo, who added he could not say if other ministers in the government Tiao headed would also be detained.

In total, police have questioned 16 ministers from the Tiao government in connection with the killings linked to the anti-Compaore demonstrations at the end of 2014.

The remainder are in exile and some have found employment with international organisations abroad.

Following the suppression of the unrest, Amnesty International released a report on the anti-Compaore demonstration accusing the presidential security unit (RSP) of being behind the violence. The RSP was dissolved following last year's abortive coup.

Compaore is currently in exile in Ivory Coast and the transitional council has also accused him of high treason and of abusing the constitution in seeking to stay in power.

He is the subject of an international arrest warrant in connection with the murder of former president Thomas Sankara, killed in the 1987 coup which brought Compaore to power.
Somali town back in government hands after Shabaab attack

Somali government troops backed by African peacekeepers have retaken control of a town close to the Kenyan border hours after its seizure by heavily-armed Shabaab jihadists, officials and witnesses said.

Somali government forces and AMISOM peacekeepers took full control of Elwak this morning, the violent elements have fled before the forces reached them,,Elwak Commissioner Ibrahim Guled told reporters.

He said six Somali soldiers had been killed when Shabaab fighters attacked the town on Friday. We have inflicted heavy casualties on them," he added.

Witnesses say Shabaab fighters entered Elwak disguised as Kenyan soldiers and riding in military vehicles they had captured from the Kenyan army Mohamed Abdiwahab (AFP/File)

A local resident reached by phone told AFP that the assailants pulled out after midnight after looting the military camp. "They have taken everything they found in the camp including three vehicles," said Omar Abdukadir.

Sources said at least 12 people were killed during the clashes late Friday between Somali forces and the Shabaab militants who were disguised as Kenyan soldiers and riding in military vehicles captured from the Kenyan army.

In January, the Al-Qaeda aligned jihadist group razed a base run by the Kenyan contingent of AMISOM -- the African Union Mission in Somalia -- in El-Alde in the south, seizing arms and large quantities of munitions.

It was their third assault in months on an AMISOM base.

The Shabaab, which was forced out of the capital five years ago, continues to launch attacks against government, military, civilian and foreign targets in its fight to overthrow the internationally-backed government in Mogadishu.
American troops have been arriving by the hundreds at an air base 40 miles south of Mosul to lend support to Iraqi soldiers' efforts to liberate the city from ISIS, which is has occupied for more than two years.

Qayyarah air base was recaptured from ISIS by Iraqi soldiers with the backing of US airstrikes in July. The latest indications are that an offensive could begin next month.

U.S. forced will be providing logistics, supplies and support, but it brings American personnel closer than ever to the frontline in the war against ISIS.

Scroll down for video

Jihadists seized the Iraqi city of Mosul in 2014 and it is now their last major stronghold in the war-stricken country (file photo)

Pentagon press secretary Peter Cook told reporters on Thursday that 'the secretary of defense has made clear that our forces in Iraq are in harm's way. Everyone who is serving there is in a dangerous situation.'

Mosul is now the last bastion of ISIS in Iraq. The authorities in Baghdad say the liberation of the city will spell the end of IS on Iraqi soil.

The air base is expected to be rebuilt to allow US and coalition aircraft to operate there. The strip will provide a staging area and enable the striking of suspected IS chemical weapons facilities nearby.

The United States deployed an additional 400 troops to Iraq earlier this month.

Flyers have been dropped in the area in order to alert local residents that an onslaught by coalition forces is due to begin imminently (Above, Supporters of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr chant slogans against corruption as they wave national flags in Baghdad)

Allied forces have been carrying out 'shaping operations' around the northern city,

Jihadists seized the city in 2014 and it is now their last major stronghold in Iraq.

'When the Iraqi Security Force is ready to move on in their operations to get after Mosul, we'll be prepared to support that and the airfield will be ready,' Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Harrigian told reporters Tuesday at the Pentagon.

'This is a partnered effort. This is something we're working from both the land component perspective with the Iraqis and clearly ensuring that, as we begin to put some of our airplanes in there in the future, that it's got the capabilities that we need,' Harrigan added.

The assault could begin as early as October and Iraqi security forces are already alerting locals living in the area by dropping thousands of leaflets warning citizens of the oncoming offensive.

'Protect yourself, don't be human shields for the enemy, leave the town immediately,' a leaflet shown by the Iraqi military to CNN said.

There are 3,000 to 4,500 ISIS fighters in Mosul, according to Operation Inherent Resolve spokesman Col. John Dorrian.

Hundreds of U.S. troops have been arriving at an air base 40 miles south of Mosul, Iraq's second city, in preparation for an offensive some time in October (file photo)

'There is still a tough fight ahead against an adaptive enemy that will try to challenge us as we hone in on Mosul,' Harrigian, the commander of US air forces in the Middle East, said.

US President Barack Obama will meet his Iraqi counterpart at the United Nations next week, US officials said Friday.

Top Obama aide Ben Rhodes said Obama would meet Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi on the margins of the UN General Assembly on Monday.

'The two leaders will have a chance to check in on the counter-ISIL campaign,' said Rhodes, using another acronym for the Islamic State group. 'Also the campaign to liberate Mosul.'

The meeting between Obama and Abadi is also likely to offer support for the Iraqi leader, who faces growing internal challenges.
Brain cancer now leading childhood cancer killer

NEW YORK (AP)  Brain cancer is now the deadliest childhood cancer in the U.S., now ahead of leukemia, a result of improved leukemia treatment and a frustrating lack of progress on brain cancer.

Government statisticians reported the change in rankings Friday, drawing from a review of 15 years of death certificates.

"I think most people, when they think of childhood cancer, think of leukemia," said Sally Curtin of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "This is kind of a changing of the guard."

Cancer is the fourth leading cause of death for children overall, accounting for about 1 in 10 childhood deaths in 2014. About a quarter these cancer deaths, or 534, were due to brain cancer. There were 445 leukemia deaths.

Accidental injuries remained the leading cause of death for those under 19, followed by suicide and murder, according to the report.

There are still more new cases of leukemia each year than new cases of brain cancer, but it no longer accounts for the most deaths. That's due to advances in leukemia treatment over the past few decades and because leukemia is easier than brain cancer to treat, experts said.

"Some types of leukemia that a generation ago were almost universally fatal are now almost universally treatable," said Curtin, a statistician who worked on the report.

But the rate of death from brain cancer for children has held at about the same level for at least 15 years, according to the CDC report.

The trends are similar for adults, too, according to the American Cancer Society.

Leukemia is a type of cancer that affects the blood. That makes it easier for doctors to get to it and fight it with treatments like chemotherapy.

The brain is protected by a barrier which helps keeps many dangerous chemicals  including many cancer drugs  from getting to brain tissue or brain tumors. Surgery is difficult and sometimes impossible, depending on where the tumor is located in the brain. Radiation treatment can damage the development of a child's brain.

"There's survival, and then there's survival at a price," said Dr. Katherine Warren, an expert in pediatric brain tumor research at the National Cancer Institute.

Another factor is that scientists have only recently begun to understand that pediatric brain cancers may be biologically different from adult versions, and could require different approaches to treatment.

In 2014, the brain cancer death rate was about 0.7 per 100,000 children ages 1 through 19. The leukemia death rate was about 0.6. The overall pediatric cancer death rate dropped by about a fifth between 1999 and 2014, the CDC reported, helped by the reduction in leukemia deaths.

___

Online:
Woman, teenager go missing in Kansas City area 9 years apart

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP)  A Missouri man considered a person of interest in his ex-girlfriend's 2007 disappearance remains in jail after being charged with burning another missing woman's SUV.

Kylr Yust made his first court appearance on the felony knowingly burning charge Thursday. He's accused of torching 21-year-old Jessica Runions' small sport utility vehicle. The suburban Kansas City woman went missing last week. A judge entered a not guilty plea on Yust's behalf.

Police say Yust is a person of interest in his teenage ex-girlfriend's 2007 disappearance. Kara Kopetsky was last seen at her high school south of Kansas City.

This undated photo provided by the Kansas City, Mo., Police Department shows Kylr Yust. Yust was returned to Kansas City on Wednesday Sept. 14, 2016 from from Benton County to face a charge that he knowingly burned 21-year-old Jessica Runions' vehicle. The woman from the Kansas City suburb of Raymore was last seen leaving a party Thursday night. Police say Yust is also a person of interest in the 2007 disappearance of Kara Kopetsky. (Kansas City, Mo. Police Department via AP

Here's a look at the cases and the investigation:

___

THE LATEST CASE

Yust hasn't been charged in Runions' disappearance and police haven't said whether he knows her. The woman from the Kansas City suburb of Raymore was last seen leaving a party on Sept. 8, and her SUV was found burned and abandoned two days later in Kansas City. Yust was arrested the next day. Police say they are treating it as a suspicious missing-person case.

___

OTHER VICTIMS

Court records show 17-year-old Kopetsky filed for a protection order on April 30, 2007, alleging Yust kidnapped, restrained, choked, stalked and threatened to cut her throat during their nine-month relationship. A judge granted Kopetsky's request and scheduled a hearing for May 10, 2007, but Kopetsky went missing six days before that.

Police in Belton, where Kopetsky was last seen, say Yust is a person of interest in the case, but he hasn't been charged in the disappearance.

Yust spent time in jail for assaulting his pregnant then-girlfriend in 2011. The woman, who was 18 at the time of the incident, later won a protection order. She told authorities a drunken Yust choked her, threatened to kill her and told her he had "killed people before, even ex-girlfriends out of sheer jealousy."

___

THE SUSPECT

Yust turned 28 on Wednesday. His father, Ken Yust, told The Associated Press he was heartbroken about his son's "crappy decisions," saying his behavior toward women has left "nothing but shame on this end."

Kylr Yust, who is on parole in a drug case, has said he started drinking alcohol at 11, first used cocaine at 14 and tried heroin by the time he was 16, according to The Kansas City Star, which cited court records.

Yust commented about Runions to a TV reporter Wednesday when he was about to be returned to Kansas City from the jail in Benton County, where he was arrested over the weekend. "I have no idea, sir," he told the KSHB reporter who asked what happened to Runions.

When asked if he killed Runions, Yust replied: "Did you?"

As he was placed into a police car, Yust said, "Hi, Mom."

___

WHAT'S NEXT

The judge on Thursday ordered an evaluation to see if Yust is eligible for a public defender and scheduled his next court appearance for Sept. 29.

Investigators continue to look into the disappearances of Runions and Kopetsky.

Court records show investigators took two 9 mm bullets, clothing, Yust's hair samples and other items from a home in Benton County, southeast of Kansas City, where Yust spent time. A shirt and other items were seized from his grandfather's Kansas City-area home, according to media reports.
Mexico march seeks president's resignation

MEXICO CITY (AP)  A social media campaign drew hundreds to a march demanding President Enrique Pena Nieto's resignation as Mexico prepared for its annual independence celebration.

The turnout Thursday was small for a march in a city of 20 million residents, mostly drawing young people. But its timing reinforced the country's dissatisfaction with Pena Nieto.

The president suffers from abysmal approval ratings that risk plunging even more after last month's widely ridiculed meeting with U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump. His party in June lost gubernatorial elections in four states it had never lost before.

Protestors carry a banner reading in Spanish: "Resign" during a march calling for the resignation of Mexico's President Enrique Pena Nieto in Mexico City, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Mexico will mark the 206th anniversary of its independence from Spain on Friday with a massive military parade presided over by the president. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

A heavy police presence prevented the marchers who grew to several thousand from reaching the Zocalo, the city's central square where thousands of others had gathered for the annual independence eve ceremony. The crowd eventually began to disperse peacefully.

Pena Nieto was marking the national celebration with the traditional shout of independence in the Zocalo later Thursday night.

Activist Ignacio Del Valle was among the protesters.

"We have nothing to celebrate," Del Valle said. "On the contrary, the motive of our presence in this protest of dissatisfaction is just this: to repudiate Pena Nieto."

A masked woman holds up a sign that reads in Spanish "The assassins are in Los Pinos," referring to the presidential residence, during a march demanding the resignation of Mexico's President Enrique Pena Nieto in Mexico City, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, one day before the country's independence day. (AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo)

People march along Reforma Avenue demanding the resignation of Mexico's President Enrique Pena Nieto in Mexico City, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, one day before the country's independence day. (AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo)
Clinton rips Trump on 'birtherism' before Hispanic group

WASHINGTON (AP)  Hillary Clinton on Thursday accused rival Donald Trump of fostering ugliness and bigotry by refusing to acknowledge President Barack Obama was born in the United States, and urged Hispanic leaders to stoke a large voter turnout in November's election.

Taking the stage shortly after Obama, Clinton noted at a gala of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute that Trump had declined to acknowledge the outgoing president had been born in the United States. Trump, who helped fuel the rise of the so-called "birther movement," told The Washington Post in an interview that he would "answer that question at the right time. I just don't want to answer it yet."

"He was asked one more time where was President Obama born and he still wouldn't say Hawaii. He still wouldn't say America," Clinton said. "This man wants to be our next president? When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?"

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton pauses while speaking at the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute's 39th Annual Gala Dinner at the Washington Convention Center, in Washington, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Clinton returned to the campaign trail after a bout of pneumonia that sidelined her for three days and revived questions about both Donald Trump's and her openness regarding their health. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

The Trump campaign released a statement late Thursday saying Trump "believes that President Obama was born in the United States." It also made an unsubstantiated accusation that Clinton launched the birther movement during her unsuccessful primary run against Obama in 2008.

Obama and Clinton made successive appeals to 3,000 Hispanic leaders and supporters, pointing to a large turnout of Latino voters as the antidote to Trump. Both noted the Republican's hard-line position on immigration, referencing his opposition to a comprehensive overhaul of the system and his vows to build a wall along the Mexican border.

Obama said the political season's discussion of immigration "has cut deeper than in years past. It's a little more personal, a little meaner, a little uglier." He said Latinos need to "decide who the real America is" and push back against the notion that the nation "only includes a few of us."

"We can't let that brand of politics win. And if we band together and organize our communities, if we deliver enough votes, then the better angels of our nature will carry the day," Obama said.

Clinton vowed again to complete Obama's unsuccessful push to achieve comprehensive immigration reform, including a pathway to citizenship for the estimated 11 million immigrants who are in the country illegally. She reiterated her intention to release a plan to overhaul the immigration system during her first 100 days in office and expand programs that have protected some groups of immigrants from deportation, including those who arrived in the U.S. as children and the parents of U.S. citizens and legal permanent residents.

Pointing to the benefits of a diverse nation, Clinton seized upon Trump's unwillingness to say Obama was born in the United States and his past support for the "birther" movement questioning Obama's citizenship.

"We need to stand up and repudiate this divisive rhetoric," Clinton said. "We need to stop him conclusively in November in an election that sends a message that even he can hear."

While the president and his potential successor did not appear onstage together, they did chat for about 15 minutes backstage. The event represented a passing of the torch before a key Democratic constituency.

Obama captured 71 percent of Latino voters against Republican Mitt Romney in 2012, a lopsided outcome that Clinton hopes to replicate with about eight weeks remaining before Election Day. Facing tightening polls against Trump, Clinton's ability to garner big margins from Hispanics could be critical in battleground states such as Florida, Nevada and Colorado.

The president made no mention of Trump by name but alluded to his candidacy, saying if the nation is going to fix the immigration system, "then we're going to have to push back against bluster and falsehoods and promises of higher walls. We need a comprehensive solution."

Obama's attempt to shield parents from deportation is in limbo after the Supreme Court deadlocked on a decision in a case challenging the president's authority to expand the deportation protection program.

The president is ramping up his campaign activities on behalf of Clinton. Obama headlined his first solo event for his former secretary of state earlier this week in Philadelphia, and will appear alongside her at a dinner for the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation on Saturday.

__

Associated Press writer Kevin Freking contributed to this report.

__

Follow Ken Thomas on Twitter at @kthomasDC

Members of the audience listen as Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton speaks at the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute's 39th Annual Gala Dinner, in Washington, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Clinton returned to the campaign trail after a bout of pneumonia that sidelined her for three days and revived questions about both Donald Trump's and her openness regarding their health. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

President Barack Obama waves to the crowd after his speech at 39th Annual Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute Public Policy Conference and awards gala, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Washington.( AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
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Tribal flags, horses, tents, hand-built shelters and teepees dominate one of the biggest, newest communities in North Dakota, where Native Americans and eco-activists have camped for five months in a bid to block a new $4billion oil pipeline.

The sprawling gathering has a new school for dozens of children and an organized system to deliver water and meals to the hundreds, sometimes thousands, of people from tribes across North America who have joined the Standing Rock Sioux in their legal fight against the Dakota Access pipeline.

'This is better than where most people came from,' said 34-year-old Vandee Kahlsa.

The Santa Fe, New Mexico, resident, who is Osage and Cherokee, has been at the camp for more than a month.

Native Americans and eco-activists have camped for five months in a bid to block a new $4billion pipeline. Pictured, volunteers toss logs at an oil pipeline protest encampment near the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in southern North Dakota

The sprawling gathering has a new school for dozens of children and an increasingly organized system to deliver water and meals. Pictured, Melaine Stoneman and her 5-year-old son, Wigmuke, pose for a photo at the camp

She joins Standing Rock Sioux members who have been here since April, people from other tribes and non-tribal members from as far away as Asia and Europe who have vowed to stay as long as it takes to block the four-state, $3.8billion pipeline.

Though the Dallas-based pipeline company says it intends to finish the project, protesters have some hope: three federal agencies are reviewing their construction-permitting process, temporarily blocking work on a small section not too far from the encampment site and asking Energy Transfer Partners to temporarily stop work on a 40-mile span.

There have been concerns for years among the leaders of North Dakota's five American Indian reservations about 'the increasing number of environmental incidents' in western North Dakota's oil patch and protests over this pipeline have been raging ever since it was announced in 2014.

'I'm pretty sure by winter there will be some buildings up,' said Jonathon Edwards, 36, a member of the Standing Rock tribe who lives in South Dakota and has been here since April 1, when snow was on the ground.

He added: 'People who came here came here to stay.'

The encampment has averaged about 4,000 people recently, he estimated - making it larger than nearly all of North Dakota's 357 towns.

It has been called the largest gathering of Native Americans in a century, and the first time all seven bands of Sioux have come together since General George Custer's ill-fated 1876 expedition at the Battle of Little Big Horn.

Though the Dallas, Texas-based pipeline company Energy Transfer Partners says it intends to finish the project. Pictured, Dewey Plenty Chief picks up trash at a pipeline protest encampment

Tribal officials say donated food and clothing has come from around the world to support those opposing the $3.8 billion Dakota Access pipeline

Andrew Dennis, 42, called the encampment 'creative chaos' that somehow seems to work. The California man arrived last week with supplies and food to donate.

Anchoring the camp is the Defenders of Water School, which uses two old army tents and a teepee as classrooms.

Melaine Stoneman, a Lakota Sioux from the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, said it has been a unique learning experience for her five-year-old son, Wigmuke, which means rainbow in English.

Teacher Teresa Dzieglewicz said classes have averaged about 45 students in recent days. The 32-year-old St Louis resident planned to be at the encampment for a few days, but has since put her graduate school studies at Southern Illinois University on hold.

'I'm lucky and honored to be part of this,' said Dzieglewicz, who taught elementary-school children for three years, including on reservations in South Dakota.

The encampment is on US Army Corps of Engineers land, but some believe rightful ownership belongs to the Standing Rock Sioux, who had made their home there for centuries and whose adjacent 2.3million-acre reservation straddles the North and South Dakota border.

The encampment has averaged about 4,000 people recently, he estimated - only 25 of North Dakota's 357 towns have more than 2,000 people. Pictured, piles of donated clothes for people protesting the construction

The encampment is on US Army Corps of Engineers land, but some believe rightful ownership belongs to the Standing Rock Sioux. Pictured, paramedic Jonathon Edwards fills out forms for medical supplies

'The atmosphere feels like a celebration of cultural reawakening,' said JR American Horse, a military veteran who lives on the reservation.

He said: 'This is a good thing that people have come together.'

He and his tribal brethren help with trash pickup and water-hauling. The camp produces several tons of trash weekly and uses several hundred gallons of water daily.

'We keep busy,' Dewey Plenty Chief, 49, said.

Nearby, mountains of food, clothing and other supplies are stacked on pallets, donations that have been shipped in from around the world, said Ron Martel, a volunteer who lives on the Standing Rock Reservation.

Volunteers like Lois Bull, a member of North Dakota's oil-rich Three Affiliated Tribes, cook for the encampment's residents.

Environmental activists protesting federal oil and gas lease sales on public lands in the Department of the Interior front lobby in Washington

There have been concerns for years among the leaders of North Dakota's five American Indian reservations about 'the increasing number of environmental incidents' in western North Dakota's oil patch and protests over this pipeline have been raging ever since it was announced in 2014

'I wanted to do something to help out and this is that something,' the retired 50-year-old from Grand Forks said while rolling breakfast burritos.

Moose meat from Maine, salmon from southeast Alaska and bison tongue harvested from a herd in the Dakotas was on the menu, said Judah Horowitz, a 27-year-old real estate project manager from Brooklyn, New York, who has been here for the past several days.

'In New York, people think water comes from bottles and meat comes wrapped in plastic,' he said.

Edwards, the Standing Rock tribe member who's been there since April serves another important function: he is a paramedic, treating everything from kids' skinned knees to respiratory problems for older protesters. Several other health care professionals have volunteered in the past few months, too.

He worries about the onset of winter and hopes more permanent structures can be built, though it's unclear where those structures would be located.

But most of all, Edwards said, this gathering will be remembered as a historic event that brought indigenous and water protection issues to the forefront.
Strange brews: Making beer with Boston river water

BOSTON (AP)  Who wants to drink that dirty water?

Some of New England's leading breweries will compete Oct. 1 to see who can turn the questionable water of Boston's Charles River into the tastiest suds.

Six area breweries have signed on for the first ever "Brew the Charles" challenge, a highlight of HUBweek, a weeklong Boston-area festival celebrating innovation in art, science and technology.

A glass of Castle Island Brewing Company "Chuck" beer, a dry hopped cream ale, rests on a rock along the bank of the Charles River, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Cambridge, Mass. Leading New England breweries are competing to see who can turn the questionable water of Boston's Charles River into the tastiest suds. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

Nadav Efraty, CEO of Desalitech, a Massachusetts water treatment company that's sponsoring the competition, hopes it helps spotlight the importance of water conservation and water-saving technologies.

"We're having fun here, but at the end of the day, we want to educate the public and decisionmakers," he said. "We're all efficient with our energy because we know it has environmental and financial costs. We need to think exactly the same way about water."

The river, which winds through 23 Massachusetts communities before ending in Boston Harbor, has come a long way since it gained notoriety in "Dirty Water," the Standells' 1960s hit and one of Boston's adopted theme songs.

Upgrades to wastewater treatment plants over the decades since, now prevent raw sewage from being dumped directly into the river, and environmental regulators have cracked down on improper sewer connections.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency gave the Charles a B+ for meeting water quality standards for almost all boating and some swimming in its most recent annual report card.

There's even a movement to build a permanent swimming facility in the river. A portion of the proceeds from "Brew the Charles" will go toward that effort.

Desalitech pulled about 4,000 gallons of water from the river and treated it in one of its reverse osmosis systems.

The water arrived last month at Boston Beer Co. (the makers of Samuel Adams), Cape Ann Brewing Co., Castle Island Brewing Co., Harpoon Brewery, Idle Hands Craft Ales and Ipswich Ale Brewery.

Jennifer Glanville, the brewer at Sam Adams, said it is brewing a German "helles" lager that she believes will "showcase" the water's unique character. They're calling it "80 Miles of Helles," after the 80-mile length of the Charles River.

Adam Romanow, founder of Castle Island Brewing, said his team went with a dry hopped cream ale in hopes that it will also "let the water shine through." The Norwood, Massachusetts brewery is calling their concoction "Chuck."

"With this style, there's not much to hide behind," Romanow explained. "It's a traditionally lighter, lower-alcohol, classic American style that has been around for eons but generally gets a bad rep despite being absolutely amazing - kind of like the Charles itself."

Alexandra Ash, a spokeswoman for the Charles River Watershed Association, which has worked for decades to improve the river's health, applauded the spirit of the competition but cautioned that it's still not always safe to swim in the Charles, let alone drink from it untreated.

The association this month found high levels of cyanobacteria, a blue-green algae that can irritate the ears, nose and throat and sicken those who drink or swim in it.

"We still have a bit more work to do until that's a possibility," Ash said of drinking river water. "But what's cool about this competition is that it shows off another great aspect of greater Boston  our local water innovation and expertise."

Brewers at Sam Adams and Castle Island Brewing report the Desalitech-treated water was high quality. They used it as they would have any other water source  no additional steps or special treatments needed.

"We've had tons of people ask us if it's safe to drink, if it will make them glow and so on," Romanow said. "But I enjoyed one and I'm not glowing. So I think it's safe to say that not only can you drink this beer, but you're going to want to."

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Follow Philip Marcelo at twitter.com/philmarcelo. His work can be found at http://bigstory.ap.org/journalist/philip-marcelo

Master brewer Bob Cannon, of the Samuel Adams Boston Brewery, pours a pitcher of their "80-Miles of Helles" beer, which is made using water from Boston's Charles River, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Boston. Leading New England breweries are competing to see who can turn the questionable water of Boston's Charles River into the tastiest suds. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

Master brewer Bob Cannon, of the Samuel Adams Boston Brewery, smells the aroma of their "80-Miles of Helles" beer, which is made using water from Boston's Charles River, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Boston. Leading New England breweries are competing to see who can turn the questionable water of Boston's Charles River into the tastiest suds. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

Cans of Castle Island Brewing Company's "Chuck" cream ale are stacked in a cooler at the brewery, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Norwood, Mass. Chuck is made with water from Boston's Charles River. Leading New England breweries are competing to see who can turn the questionable water of Boston's Charles River into the tastiest suds. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

Head brewer Matt Deluca, of the Castle Island Brewing Company, pours a glass of "Chuck", a cream ale made using water from Boston's Charles River, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Norwood, Mass. Leading New England breweries are competing to see who can turn the questionable water of Boston's Charles River into the tastiest suds. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)
NYPD's champion of "broken windows" policing theory retires

NEW YORK (AP)  William Bratton, the police commissioner who led departments in Boston, Los Angeles and New York and saw his crime fighting strategies copied across the nation, ended his unparalleled law enforcement career with a ceremonial send-off Friday in the city that was the setting of his biggest triumph.

Commanders lined up in formation outside of New York Police Department headquarters to bid farewell to the 68-year-old Bratton as he left the building for the last time as commissioner.

Applause mixed with anti-Bratton slogans shouted by protesters behind barricades amid the sound of bagpipes.

New York Police Department Commissioner William Bratton shake hands as he acknowledged the applause of officers and commanders in dress blue uniforms during a ceremony, as he left police headquarters on his last day on the job, Friday Sept. 16, 2016, in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)

Bratton's departure three years into his second stint as commissioner was well timed. Violent crime in New York remains near a modern-day low. Yet, debate is likely to continue indefinitely over how much credit Bratton should get for the city's transformation from the bloody mess it was in the 1980s and early 1990s.

Friday's ceremony came just a week after Bratton fiercely defended the legitimacy of his signature "broken windows" policing strategy  an idea, first proposed by social scientists James Wilson and George Kelling, that you can deter violent crimes by cracking down on lesser types of lawlessness, like graffiti or turnstile jumping.

Bratton earned wide acclaim for his assaults on so-called quality-of-life crimes and for mining crime data to deploy his forces more effectively.

New York's homicide rate had already begun to drop in the two years before he became commissioner in 1994, but during his 27-month tenure it plummeted. Between 1993 and 1995 killings fell by 40 percent, erasing two decades of climbing murder rates.

Homicides fell another 35 percent in the two years after Bratton left the department, forced out by Republican Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.

In more recent years, though, some criminologists have concluded that the impact of broken windows on violent crime is minimal.

In March, the independent inspector general for the New York Police Department issued a report concluding that focusing on offenses like urinating in public and riding bikes on sidewalks had no influence on felony crime rates. It also accused the 36,000-officer department, the nation's largest, of unfairly singling out communities of color for quality-of-life enforcement at a time when Democratic Mayor Bill de Blasio has emphasized protecting civil rights.

Bratton pushed back last week with characteristic aplomb, saying the report was the work of "amateurs" and had "no value at all."

There is no consensus today about what caused New York's turnaround in the 1990s or what caused similar, dramatic improvements in violent crime rates in many other U.S. cities at the same time.

"The idea that the NYPD has a huge impact on crime was always a very dubious claim," said Eugene O'Donnell, professor of police studies at John Jay College of Criminal Justice.

After leaving New York the first time, Bratton worked in the private sector, then took over a scandal-scarred Los Angeles Police Department in 2002.

There, he presided over a decline in violent crime and an easing of some tensions between the department and black and Hispanic communities. He left Los Angeles in 2009 with high approval ratings.

After returning to lead the NYPD again in 2014, Bratton saw perhaps the biggest crisis of his tenure: the death of an unarmed black man, Eric Garner, at the hands of a white police officer trying to arrest him for the minor crime of selling loose cigarettes.

The death sparked angry protests.

It also fueled a backlash in some quarters against the broken windows enforcement policy.

That outcry, though, hasn't caused city leaders to back away from the tactics, or the man, often credited with leading New York out of the darkness.

"The same strategy that helped make us the safest big city in America," de Blasio said recently, "is still making us the safest big city in America."

___

Associated Press writer Verena Dobnik contributed to this report.

FILE - In this Nov. 25, 2015 file photo, New York City Police Commissioner William Bratton listens during a news conference detailing preparations for the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, in New York. Bratton, will step down on Friday Sept 16, 2016, as New York City's police commissioner. (AP Photo/Frank Franklin II, File)

FILE - In this Nov. 21, 1991 file photo William Bratton, as chief of the New York Transit Police, talks to a homeless man in New York, Nov. 21, 1991, on a routine tour of the New York City subway system, three years before moving up to the posItion of police commissioner. Bratton, who steps down on Friday, Sept 16, 2016, was perhaps best known as a fierce advocate of the "broken windows" approach to policing, which he insisted drove down the city's crime rate to historic lows. It's a claim that his critics say is open to dispute. (AP Photo/Betsy Herzog, File)

FILE - In this Dec. 21, 2014 file photo, NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton, second from left, is flanked NYPD Chief of Department James O'Neill, left, and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, at a Mass for two slain officers at St. Patrick's Cathedral, in New York. Bratton, will step down on Friday, Sept 16, 2016, as New York City's police commissioner and O'Neill will take his place. (AP Photo/John Minchillo, File)

FILE - In this Aug. 2, 2016 file photo, New York City Police Department Chief of Department James O'Neill, right, is joined by Commissioner William Bratton during a news conference, in New York's City Hall. Bratton is leaving the nation's largest police force on Friday Sept 16, 2016, and O'Neill will take his place. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer, File)

FILE - In this April 30, 1994, file photo New York City Police Commissioner William Bratton, left, makes an appeal for calm in the Staten Island borough of New York as Mayor Rudolph Giuliani looks on, after the death of 22-year-old Ernest Sayon, who died while in police custody. Giuliani appointed Bratton as commissioner, for his first time in the job, in 1994. Bratton steps down from his second appointment in the job, on Friday, Sept 16, 2016. (AP Photo/Al Levine, File)

FILE - In this May 9, 1994 file photo, Police Commissioner William Bratton speaks at a news conference in New York the year he became head of the NYPD for the first time. Bratton, will step down on Friday Sept 16, 2016, as New York City's police commissioner. (AP Photo/Luc Novovitch, File)

Hundreds of officers and commanders in dress blue uniforms applauded and saluted New York Police Department Commissioner William Bratton, as he walked with his wife Rikki Klieman in a ceremony on his last day on the job, Friday Sept. 16, 2016, at police headquarters in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)

New York Police Department Commissioner William Bratton, center, accompanied by his wife Rikki Klieman, shake hands and acknowledged the applause of officers and commanders in dress blue uniforms during a ceremony, as he left police headquarters on his last day on the job, Friday Sept. 16, 2016, in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)

New York Police Department Commissioner William Bratton, foreground, looks as his wife Rikki Klieman and Mayor Bill de Blasio embrace during a ceremony as he Bratton left police headquarters on his last day on the job, Friday Sept. 16, 2016, in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)

New York Police Department Commissioner William Bratton , center, and his wife Rikki Klieman, receive flowers as they board a 1930's police vehicle, during a ceremony marking his last day on the job, as he left police headquarters, Friday Sept. 16, 2016, in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)

New York Police Department Commissioner William Bratton, left, accompanied by his wife Rikki Klieman, is applauded by officers and commanders in dress blue uniforms during a ceremony, as he left police headquarters on his last day on the job, Friday Sept. 16, 2016, in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)

Incoming New York Police Department Commissioner James O'Neill listen as he is questioned by reporters following a send-off ceremony for his predecessor William Bratton, Friday Sept. 16, 2016, at police headquarters in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)

Mayor Bill de Blasio, left, confers with incoming New York Police Department Commissioner O'Neill during a ceremony marking the last day of outgoing police Commissioner William Bratton, Friday Sept. 16, 2016, at police headquarters in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)

Incoming New York Police Department Commissioner James O'Neill, center, address reporters following a send-off ceremony for his predecessor William Bratton, Friday Sept. 16, 2016, at police headquarters in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)
Fishermen upset over creation of Atlantic's first monument

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP)  Fishermen in New England say President Barack Obama needlessly dealt a big blow to their industry when he created the Atlantic Ocean's first marine national monument and circumvented the existing process for protecting fisheries.

The new Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument consists of nearly 5,000 square miles of underwater canyons and mountains off the New England coast. The designation will close the area to commercial fishermen, who go there primarily for lobster, red crab, squid, whiting, butterfish, swordfish and tuna.

After Thursday's announcement, fishermen pondered their next move: sue, lobby Congress to change the plan or relocate. It's hard to move, they said, because other fishermen would likely already be fishing where they would want to go.

FILE - This undated file photo released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration made during the Northeast U.S. Canyons Expedition 2013, shows corals on Mytilus Seamount off the coast of New England in the North Atlantic Ocean. President Barack Obama will establish Sept. 15, 2016, the first national marine monument in the Atlantic. The move is designed to permanently protect nearly 5,000 square miles of underwater canyons and mountains off the coast of New England. White House officials say the designation will ban commercial fishing, mining and drilling, though a 7-year exception will occur for the lobster and red crab industries. The designation of the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument marks the 27th time Obama has acted to create or expand a national monument. (NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research via AP, File)

They said the designation process wasn't transparent and the administration should have let the New England Fishery Management Council, which is charged with regulating the region's fisheries, finish working on the coral protection measures it's considering.

"There seems to be a huge misconception that there are limitless areas where displaced fishermen can go," said Grant Moore, president of the Atlantic Offshore Lobstermen's Association. "Basically with the stroke of a pen, President Obama put fishermen and their crews out of work and harmed all the shore-side businesses that support the fishing industry."

The lobstermen's association and other fishermen wanted the White House to allow fishing in depths of up to 450 meters (1,476 feet), so they could still go there but still protect deep-sea corals. Annually, about 800,000 pounds (362,877 kilograms) of lobster are caught near the canyons, according to the lobstermen's association.

White House officials said the administration listened to industry's concerns and made the monument smaller, with a seven-year transition period for the lobster and red crab industries.

Industry advocate Robert Vanasse said it's clear the plan will lead to a decrease in supply and raises prices. It's difficult to gauge the economic impact this early, added Vanasse, executive director of Saving Seafood.

A lobsterman in Newport, Rhode Island, wants Congress to act. One of Bill Palombo's three boats catches lobster exclusively in the monument area. If nothing changes within seven years, Palombo said, "I guess you just go out of business."

"What can you do?" he said. "That's why we're so upset."

Palombo and others questioned why, if the area is considered pristine and fishermen have been going there for decades, can't fishing continue?

The designation was widely praised by environmentalists as a way to sustain important species and reduce the toll of climate change.

Priscilla Brooks, of the Conservation Law Foundation, said it's a "very small area" compared to what's currently open to fishing. She said the White House struck a balance so there would be a "soft landing" for the industry, with seven years to phase out fishing.

"The fishing activities taking place in the monument aren't compatible with the protection of vulnerable marine life," she said.

Brad Sewell, of the Natural Resources Defense Council, said fishing gear has been seen on top of coral and has entangled marine mammals. He worries these problems will worsen over time as fishing gear reaches deeper.

"You want to protect an area like this is when it's relatively pristine," he said. "The time to do it is now, not wait until the damage is done."

Affected fishermen formed the Southern Georges Bank Fishing Coalition on Wednesday to oppose the monument. Coalition attorney Drew Minkiewicz said the president doesn't have the authority to use the American Antiquities Act to declare a marine monument far offshore and Congress granted the right to protect these areas to the federally mandated fisheries councils that manage them.

"For people who live and work on the water, this is terrifying," he said. "This is the government using eminent domain on your workplace."

Minkiewicz wouldn't say whether the coalition plans to sue.

The New England Fishery Management Council said it needs to reassess its management strategy given the new developments. Mary Beth Tooley, a council member from Maine, said the public process used by the council "is the way it should be done" and she's disappointed it was circumvented.

Eric Reid, general manager of a seafood processing facility in Rhode Island, knows more than 20 boats that fish in the area covered by the monument.

"If they can't get fish, I'm not in the processing business," said Reid, of Seafreeze Shoreside Inc.
Police arrest rights activist in Indian-controlled Kashmir

SRINAGAR, India (AP)  Police have arrested a prominent rights activist in Indian-controlled Kashmir a day after he was barred from leaving India to travel to Geneva to participate in a session of the United Nations' Human Rights Council, police and family members said Friday.

Police picked up Khurram Parvez from his home in the region's main city Srinagar late Thursday night.

A police officer, speaking on condition of anonymity because of department policy, said Parvez was arrested to prevent him from "causing a breach of peace." He did not elaborate.

On Wednesday, immigration officials at New Delhi's international airport barred Parvez from boarding a plane to Geneva, even though he had a valid visa and letter of invitation from the U.N. body.

His arrest comes as the troubled Himalayan region has been hit by some of the most serious anti-India protests in recent years.

Triggered by the killing of a popular rebel leader two months ago, the protests have left more than 80 people killed and thousands wounded, mostly by government forces firing bullets and shotgun pellets to quell the demonstrations.

Parvez and his organization, the Coalition of Civil Society, were the first to report and draw attention to thousands of mass graves in remote parts of Kashmir and to demand that the government investigate them to make clear who the dead were and how they were killed.

His organization also has written scathing reports about brutality involving some of the hundreds of thousands of Indian troops in the region and highlighted widespread powers granted to troops which led to a culture of impunity and widespread rights abuses.

Anti-Indian protests continued Friday as the region remained under strict curfew to prevent widespread demonstrations as people gathered for Friday Muslim prayers.

Prayers were barred at the major mosques in the region but people were allowed to gather in smaller local mosques.

Hundreds of protesters chanted anti-India slogans in several places across the region.
Ravaged by conflict, Yemen's coast faces rising malnutrition

SANAA, Yemen (AP)  Sitting by her son's hospital bed, Houdaid Masbah looks at her 5-year-old boy's skeletal body and sunken cheeks, helplessness engulfing her like a thick cloud  a desperation she shares with many other mothers in Hodeidah.

Even before the war, Hodeidah was one of the poorest cities in Yemen, the Arab world's most impoverished nation. Now, the destruction of the port city's fishing boats and infrastructure by the Saudi-led coalition's airstrikes over the past 18 months of war has deprived the townspeople of their prime livelihood.

The U.N. estimates that about 100,000 children under the age of five in the city and the surrounding province, also called Hodeidah, are at risk of severe malnutrition.

In this photo taken on Friday, Sept. 9, 2016, Salem, 5, who suffers from malnutrition, lies on a bed at a hospital in the port city of Hodeidah, southwest of Sanaa, Yemen. Even before the war, Hodeidah was one of the poorest cities in Yemen, the Arab worlds most impoverished nation. Now, the destruction of the port citys fishing boats and infrastructure by Saudi-led airstrikes means the U.N. estimates 100,000 children in the province are at risk of severe malnutrition. (AP Photo)

Life became harder for the people in this Red Sea city after March 2015, when the coalition of nine Arab Sunni countries began bombing Yemen's Shiite Houthi rebels to help the internationally recognized government of President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi return to power. The Houthis had pushed Hadi into self-imposed exile in Saudi Arabia and captured large chunks of the country, including the capital, Sanaa.

The coalition suspected the Houthis were using Hodeidah fishermen to smuggle weapons across the sea from Iran. The airstrikes destroyed most of the wooden boats along with fish storage facilities, markets, roads and bridges  leaving the fishermen jobless and fearful after seeing some of their colleagues were killed in the strikes.

As Yemen's conflict dragged on, food prices soared and gasoline ran out.

At Hodeidah's central hospital, the 12-bed unit for children with severe malnutrition has been fully occupied for months. Children reduced to skin and bone cry tearlessly as their mothers watch by their bedsides, unable to help.

Masbah, the mother of 5-year-old Salem Ali Salem, says her boy remembers only hunger.

"From the day I gave birth to him ... till now, we are suffering," said the mother of eight. "He got better for a short period of time and then he relapsed."

Salem's father is a fisherman and the family lives in Baqea, a village nearly an hour's drive from Hodeidah. That's where Ibrahim al-Kaali, a social worker, first saw him and helped bring him to the hospital in early September.

"When I first carried him, I was afraid of crushing his bones under the weight of my hands," said al-Kaali. Salem's family is just one of about 600 impoverished and desperate families in villages along Hodeidah's western coastline, he added.

Before the war, a fisherman could support his family on about 700 rials a day (about 2 dollars), feeding them fish, bread and rice. But with no fish and no money, the villagers' meals were mostly reduced to bread and tea for breakfast and a plate of rice for lunch, said al-Kaali.

"We have 20 Salems, this (situation) is prevalent all over Hodeidah," Ossan al-Abbsi, a pediatrician at the hospital, told The Associated Press, speaking over the phone like others interviewed for this story.

"There is an accelerating increase in the number of children suffering malnutrition," he said. "We used to have five cases while the rest of the beds were empty on any given day. Now, you can never find an empty bed in our unit."

Al-Abbsi says that even after the children improved enough to be discharged from hospital, their condition often deteriorated rapidly as their family struggled once more to feed them.

International agencies have classified Hodeidah among nine of Yemen's 22 provinces that are a step away from famine. A U.N. report in June said that in Yemen, "the highest malnutrition prevalence" is in Hodeidah.

More than 10,000 people have been killed or wounded in Yemen's war so far, and 2.8 million have been displaced. The land-and-sea blockade imposed by the coalition and the Houthis' ground offensives have contributed to the deteriorating situation. U.N.-mediated peace talks in Kuwait were suspended last month, with no signs of progress.

Over half of the country's population of 26 million is suffering from food insecurity, according to U.N. figures. UNICEF said that 2015 nutrition surveys in five of 10 highly affected governorates in Yemen, including Hodeidah, showed that 96,600 children under the age of five are at risk of severe acute malnutrition  compared to 23,000 before the conflict escalated in March that year.

U.N. figures also show fishing declined by 75 per cent in Hodeidah and the western city of Taiz as the Saudi-led coalition restricted access to the sea and bombed boats.

Food prices in Yemen have soared by 60 percent, according to a June-September report by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, which is being used by international organizations to measure food security.

Hodeidah used to have public markets with fresh produce and food items three times a week, while now they are only held once weekly because of fuel shortages, al-Abbsi said.

At least 12 villages along Hodeidah's coastline, including the one where Salem's family is from, have never seen any type of development projects, leaving them marginalized and underdeveloped, al-Kaali said.

When the conflict erupted, they suffered the most.

"Here you won't find a school, a medical center ... drinking water is from the wells. They are already deprived of everything," he said.

Sheikh Dawoud Gunid, a village elder in Baqea, said high levels of illiteracy and a shortage of medical centers, coupled with high transport costs, means children often receive no medical treatment until they are severely ill.

Ali Hassan Tanmina, a fisherman and a father of eight, said the airstrikes have made him fear the sea.

"We can't go to work to get food for our children," he said. "We are besieged by hunger."

In this photo taken on Friday, Sept. 9, 2016, Salem, 5, who suffers from malnutrition, sits on a bed at a hospital in the port city of Hodeidah, southwest of Sanaa, Yemen. Even before the war, Hodeidah was one of the poorest cities in Yemen, the Arab worlds most impoverished nation. Now, the destruction of the port citys fishing boats and infrastructure by Saudi-led airstrikes means the U.N. estimates 100,000 children in the province are at risk of severe malnutrition. (AP Photo)
PICTURED: Islamic site near Mecca among few still preserved

MECCA, Saudi Arabia (AP)  Just outside the city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia lies one of Islam's most important historical sites  a cave where, according to tradition, the Prophet Muhammad spent time in seclusion, contemplation and self-reflection.

It was here, inside Hira Cave located near the top of a steep hill called Noor Mountain, where Muslims believe God revealed to the prophet the first verses of the Quran through the angel Jebril, or Gabriel as he is named in English.

Today, the site is among few still preserved from the prophet's time  with help from Pakistani workers in the kingdom.

In this Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, a Pakistani man living near Hira cave reads before sunrise on Noor Mountain, where the Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. It is one of Islams most important historical sites _ the cave where the Prophet Muhammad spent time in seclusion, contemplation and self-reflection.(AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

Each year, observant Muslims deepen their prayers and supplication in the final 10 nights of the Islamic month of Ramadan, believing that it was during this time some 1,400 years ago that the miraculous revelation took place on Noor Mountain, also known as the "Hill of Light."

The hill itself is not part of the annual hajj pilgrimage, but its location so close to the holy city of Mecca and its significance as a place of enlightenment draws thousands of pilgrims here every year.

But present-day visitors encounter a markedly different summit from the one the prophet experienced.

For starters, there are now more than 1,000 steps that guide pilgrims up the rocky hill to the secluded cave. Along the way, entrepreneurial Pakistanis sell bottled water, snacks and tea to pilgrims exhausted by the climb.

Unlike the quiet and seemingly endless stretch of nature the prophet would have seen from the cave, massive high-rises housing five-star hotels jut into the distant skyline just steps away from the cube-shaped Kaaba, Islam's holiest site.

The Pakistani workers and beggars who live off the mountain's draw say they play a key role in helping to preserve it.

Nizam Din, from the Pakistani city of Quetta, spends his days begging and fixing broken cement steps along the path up Noor Mountain. Jamal Khan, from Karachi, Pakistan's largest city and main port, also earns a living by serving the pilgrims who make their way to the cave.

"Our lives here are better because we do not have jobs back home," he said. "What is a better place to be than here where the Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God?"

Mecca's mayor, Osama al-Bar, says the municipality ensures the area's cleanliness. There are also plans, he said, for the development of a visitors' center near the hill to explain to people its significance and history.

He said the area is watched over by the kingdom's religious police, known as the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, who ensure visitors do not turn it into a place of worship that venerates anything other than God.

Here is a selection of images by Associated Press photographer Nariman El-Mofty showing the Pakistanis who work on Noor Mountain.

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Follow Nariman El-Mofty on Twitter at www.twitter.com/NMofty and on Instagram at www.instagram.com/narimanelmofty .

___

Follow AP photographers and photo editors on Twitter: http://apne.ws/15Oo6jo

In this Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, a Pakistani man begs on Noor Mountain, where Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, reads before sunrise, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Though Hira cave on the mountain remains one of the few sites preserved from the time of the Prophet Muhammad, visitors encounter a markedly different summit than what Muhammad would have experienced. For starters, there are now more than 1,000 steps that guide pilgrims up the rocky hill to the secluded cave. Along the way, entrepreneurial Pakistanis sell bottled water, snacks and tea to pilgrims exhausted by the climb. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, a Pakistani man living near Hira cave on Noor Mountain, where Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, sits alone, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Each year, observant Muslims deepen their prayers and supplication in the final 10 nights of the Islamic month of Ramadan, believing that it was during this time some 1,400 years ago that the miraculous revelation took place on Noor Mountain, also known as the Hill of Light." (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, Sobdar Khan, 35, a Pakistani from Karachi, poses for a portrait on Noor Mountain, where Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Khan, who begs and makes steps out of cement to preserve the mountain, has been living in Mecca for five years. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

This Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, shows a sign asking people to preserve Noor Mountain, where Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. The hill itself is not part of the hajj pilgrimage, but its location so close to Mecca and its significance as a place of enlightenment draws thousands of pilgrims annually. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, Hakim Ali, 30, from Karachi, Pakistan, Poses for a portrait on Noor Mountain, where Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, poses for a portrait, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Ali, who begs and makes steps out of cement for the mountain, has been living in Mecca for three years. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, a Pakistani man, who makes steps out of cement, takes in the view from Noor Mountain, where Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Unlike the quiet and seemingly endless stretch of nature the prophet would have seen from the cave, massive high-rise towers housing five-star hotels hover in the distant skyline just steps away from the cube-shaped Kaaba, Islams holiest site. The Pakistani workers and beggars who live off the mountains draw say they play a key role in helping to preserve it.(AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, Nizam Din, 30, from Quetta, Pakistan, poses for a portrait on Noor Mountain, where Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, poses for a portrait, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Din, who begs and makes cement steps at the site, has been living in Mecca for one year. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, Pakistani men live near Hira cave on Noor Mountain, where Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Unlike the quiet and seemingly endless stretch of nature the prophet would have seen from the cave, massive high-rise towers housing five-star hotels hover in the distant skyline just steps away from the cube-shaped Kaaba, Islams holiest site. The Pakistani workers and beggars who live off the mountains draw say they play a key role in helping to preserve it. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, Noorallah, a Pakistani from Karachi, poses for a portrait on Noor Mountain, where Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, poses for a portrait, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Noorallah, who works as a cleaner at the site, has been living in Mecca for six years. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, a Pakistani beggar who sleeps on Noor Mountain, where Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, poses for a portrait, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, a Pakistan man cleans Noor Mountain, where Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, Fatma Abdullah from Yemen poses for a portrait on Noor Mountain, where Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Abdullah, who left Sanaa a year ago due to the war, says she misses her home country but is happy to be living near Noor Mountain, a scared site, which brings her peace with her family. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Friday, Sept. 9, 2016 photo, people walk up the steps of Noor Mountain, where Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God to preach Islam, on the outskirts of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Each year, observant Muslims deepen their prayers and supplication in the final 10 nights of the Islamic month of Ramadan, believing that it was during this time some 1,400 years ago that the miraculous revelation took place on Noor Mountain, also known as the Hill of Light."(AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)
2nd woman's body identified in Ohio slaying, abduction case

ASHLAND, Ohio (AP)  Authorities on Friday identified the second woman whose body was found in an Ohio home this week, and a judge ordered a suspect arrested and charged with murder held on a $1 million bond.

The Ashland County prosecutor has identified the second woman as 29-year-old Elizabeth Griffith, of Ashland.

Shawn Grate, 40, faces two counts of murder in the deaths of Griffith and 43-year-old Stacey Stanley. Their bodies were found Tuesday inside a supposedly unoccupied home in Ashland after a third woman called 911 from inside a bedroom and said Grate was holding her hostage.

Missing person fliers for Stacey Stanley remain posted on a laundry mat bulletin board on Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2016, in Ashland, Ohio. A woman's report that she was being held captive in a home led to the arrest of a kidnapping suspect, a murder confession and the discovery of the remains of multiple other people, authorities said. Police confirmed Wednesday that one of the bodies was that of Stanley, who'd been reported missing from Huron County. (AP Photo/Ann Sanner)

Police found the bodies after freeing the woman and arresting Grate. Authorities said a third body was then found Tuesday in neighboring Richland County after Grate confessed to killing the woman in June. The third woman hasn't been identified. Authorities haven't said how any of the women died.

The woman in the house said in the 911 call that she had been tied up but had partly freed herself in the same room where her captor was asleep. She said the man had a stun gun, and she was afraid of waking him. She told the dispatcher she had known the man for about a month and a half.

Grate is charged with kidnapping in the woman's abduction. A court document accuses Grate of kidnapping her "to engage in sexual activity."

An Ashland County Common Pleas judge on Friday assigned Grate an attorney after Grate said he had no money, job or place to live. County Prosecutor Christopher Tunnell said during the hearing that authorities believe Grate also abducted Griffith and Stanley.

Grate has another hearing scheduled for Monday morning.

Pictured is the home where police said the two bodies were found

Police execute a search warrant on a home in Ashland, Ohio, where they found the kidnapped woman and two bodies

The third woman hasn't been identified. Authorities haven't said how any of the women died

Authorities said a third body was then found Tuesday in neighboring Richland County after Grate confessed to killing the woman in June. Pictured is the remains of a burned out home near where police found the third body
China says Canadian man it released treated 'based on law'

BEIJING (AP)  China said Friday that a Canadian citizen it detained for two years over spying allegations was allowed to leave the country after a local court issued a verdict in his case, but it refused to say what the verdict was or why he was detained at all.

Kevin Garratt's return to Canada was announced Thursday by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who said he had pressed Garratt's case with top Chinese officials.

Garratt had been indicted by prosecutors in Dandong, a city on the North Korean border where he and his wife ran a popular coffee shop and conducted Christian aid work for North Koreans. He and his wife, Julia, were arrested in August 2014 by the state security bureau. While his wife was released on bail, Garratt remained in custody.

China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in a faxed statement Friday, said Garratt had been treated "according to law." It said China "fully guaranteed all kinds of procedural rights of Kevin Garratt, and fully respected and implemented the consular rights of the Canadian side," the ministry said.

But the ministry declined to say what investigators found or what the outcome of the trial was. A person who answered the phone at the court on Friday, a Chinese state holiday, said officials were not available to discuss the case.

Chinese state media have previously reported that authorities found evidence that implicated Garratt in accepting tasks from Canadian espionage agencies to gather intelligence in China.

Courts in China are widely seen as a tool of the ruling Communist Party and issue decisions in line with the government's thinking on a case.

Garratt's release comes as both sides pledged to strengthen economic ties during Trudeau's visit to China earlier this month for the Group of 20 economic summit, and one week before Premier Li Keqiang is to visit Canada for talks with Trudeau.

___
Trump lawyer says Trump missed foundation payment mistake

WASHINGTON (AP)  Donald Trump's signature, an unmistakable if nearly illegible series of bold vertical flourishes, was scrawled on the improper $25,000 check sent from his personal foundation to a political committee supporting Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi.

Charities are barred from engaging in political activities, and the Republican presidential nominee's campaign has contended for weeks that the 2013 check from the Donald J. Trump Foundation was mistakenly issued following a series of clerical errors. Trump had intended to use personal funds to support Bondi's re-election, his campaign said.

So, why didn't Trump catch the purported goof himself when he signed the foundation check?

This photo made in the Associated Press Washington bureau on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016 shows a copy of a check provided by the New York state attorney general that shows a payment of $25,000 from the Donald J. Trump Foundation to And Justice For All signed by Donald J. Trump. The $25,000 check was sent from his personal foundation to a political committee supporting Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi. Charities are barred from engaging in political activities. Trumps campaign contends that the 2013 check from the Trump Foundation was mistakenly issued following a series of clerical errors and that Trump intended to use personal funds. (AP Photo/J. David Ake)

Trump lawyer Alan Garten offered new details about the transaction to The Associated Press on Thursday, after a copy of the Sept. 9, 2013, check was released by New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman.

Garten said the billionaire businessman personally signs hundreds of checks a week, and that he simply didn't catch the error.

"He traditionally signs a lot of checks," said Garten, who serves as in-house counsel for various business interests at Trump Tower in New York City. "It's a way for him to monitor and keep control over what's going on in the company. It's just his way. ... I've personally been in his office numerous times and seen a big stack of checks on his desk for him to sign."

The 2013 donation to Bondi's political group has garnered intense scrutiny because her office was at the time fielding media questions about whether she would follow the lead of Schneiderman, who had then filed a lawsuit against Trump University and Trump Institute. Scores of former students say they were scammed by Trump's namesake get-rich-quick seminars in real estate.

Bondi, whom the AP reported in June personally solicited the $25,000 check from Trump, took no action. Both Bondi and Trump say their conversation had nothing to do with the Trump University litigation, though neither has answered questions about what they did discuss or provided the exact date the conversation occurred.

House Democrats called earlier this week for a federal criminal investigation into the donation, suggesting Trump was trying to bribe Bondi with the charity check. Schneiderman, a Democrat, said he was already investigating to determine whether Trump's charity broke state laws.

Garten said the series of errors began after Trump instructed his staff to cut a $25,000 check to the political committee supporting Bondi, called And Justice for All.

Someone in Trump's accounting department then consulted a master list of charitable organizations maintained by the IRS and saw a Utah charity by the same name that provides legal aid to the poor. According to Garten, that person, whom he declined to identify by name, then independently decided that the check should come from the Trump Foundation account rather than Trump's personal funds.

The check was then printed and returned for Trump's signature. After it was signed, Garten said, Trump's office staff mailed the check to its intended recipient in Florida, rather than to the charity in Utah.

Emails released by Bondi's office show her staff was first contacted at the end of August by a reporter for The Orlando Sentinel asking about the Trump University lawsuit in New York.

Trump's Sept. 9 check is dated four days before the newspaper printed a story quoting Bondi's spokeswoman saying her office was reviewing Schneiderman's suit, but four days before the pro-Bondi political committee reports receiving the check in the mail.

Compounding the confusion, the following year on its 2013 tax forms the Trump Foundation reported making a donation to a Kansas charity called Justice for All. Garten said that was another accounting error, rather than an attempt to obscure the improper donation to the political group.

In March, The Washington Post first revealed that that the donation to the pro-Bondi group had been misreported on the Trump Foundation's 2013 tax forms. The following day, records show Trump signed an IRS form disclosing the error and paying a $2,500 fine.

Bondi has endorsed Trump's presidential bid and has campaigned with him this year.

She has said the timing of Trump's donation was coincidental and that she wasn't personally aware of the consumer complaints her office had received about Trump University and the Trump Institute, a separate Florida business that paid Trump a licensing fee and a cut of the profits to use his name and curriculum.

Neither company was still offering seminars by the time Bondi took office in 2011, though dissatisfied former customers were still seeking promised refunds.

___
Japan court rejects Okinawa move to block US base relocation

TOKYO (AP)  A Japanese court ruled Friday that Okinawa's governor exceeded his legal authority by revoking a permit to reclaim land for the relocation of a U.S. military base, allowing the central government to proceed with the plan despite protests by local residents.

The decision is part of an ongoing legal battle between the southern island of Okinawa and Japan's government over plans to move the base to a less-populated part of the island, which have stalled for 20 years.

Okinawa said it will appeal the ruling by the Fukuoka High Court to the Supreme Court.

People wait outside Fukuoka High Court for its ruling on a relocation plan of a U.S. air base, in Naha, Okinawa prefecture, Japan, Friday, Sept. 16, 2106. The Japanese high court ruled Friday that Okinawa Gov. Takeshi Onagas revocation of a reclamation permit for a U.S. military base on the southern island was illegal, supporting the central government plan to go ahead with the reclamation despite protests by local residents. The decision is the latest development in a legal battle between Okinawa and Tokyo over the relocation plan that has stalled for 20 years. (Ryosuke Uematsu/Kyodo News via AP)

Gov. Takeshi Onaga, who wants the Marine Corps Air Station Futenma moved off the island, revoked the reclamation permit last October.

Onaga said he was "dumbfounded" by the ruling.

"I was expecting the court to be a guardian of the law, but it turned out to be just a rubber-stamp arm of the government," Onaga told reporters. "The judgment took local governance so lightly and trampled on the feelings of the Okinawan people."

In its ruling, the court said the reclamation permit was legal and that Onaga's refusal to retract its revocation despite a central government request was "illegal."

Opponents and environmentalists have resisted the relocation plan for years, saying it doesn't significantly reduce the burden of hosting the U.S. base, which they want moved off Okinawa.

Okinawa hosts more than half of the 50,000 U.S. troops based in Japan under a security treaty. Many residents complain about the large American troop presence, as well as noise, pollution and crime from the bases.

The Futenma relocation is part of a 1996 bilateral agreement to reduce the burden of the U.S. military presence on Okinawa that also includes the transfer of about 9,000 U.S. Marines outside of Japan. The deal was prompted by widespread outrage over the 1995 rape of a schoolgirl by three American servicemen.

Protests have also intensified recently over Japanese government plans to construct U.S. military helipads at another location, an environmentally protected site in northern Okinawa. The central government recently mobilized hundreds of riot police from outside the island to block the protesters and used Japanese military helicopters to bring in dump trucks and other heavy equipment.

Onaga said he will not give in until the central government finds a site for the Futenma base outside of Okinawa.

The court said the relocation of Futenma to the island's east coast is the only way to reduce both the risk at its current crowded location and the burden of American troops on Okinawa.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga welcomed the ruling as "fully acknowledging the government position." He said the central government will continue its efforts to resolve the dispute through dialogue.

___

Follow Mari Yamaguchi on Twitter at twitter.com/mariyamaguchi

Her work can be found at http://bigstory.ap.org/content/mari-yamaguchi

This aerial June 2016 photo shows Henoko of Nago city, Okinawa prefecture, Japan, where the Japanese government plans to relocate a U.S. air base from one area of Okinawas main island to another. A Japanese high court ruled Friday, Sept. 16, 2016, that Okinawa Gov. Takeshi Onagas revocation of a reclamation permit for a U.S. military base on the southern island was illegal, supporting the central government plan to go ahead with the reclamation despite protests by local residents. (Hiroko Harima/Kyodo News via AP)

Okinawa Gov. Takeshi Onaga attends a news conference in Naha, Okinawa, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016, after a Japanese court ruled that Onagas revocation of a reclamation permit for a U.S. military base on the southern island was illegal, supporting the central government plan to go ahead with the reclamation despite protests by local residents. The decision is the latest development in a legal battle between Okinawa and Tokyo over the relocation plan that has stalled for 20 years. Onaga said he was dumbfounded by the ruling. Its totally unacceptable. Okinawa said it will appeal the Fukuoka High Court ruling to the Supreme Court. (Ryosuke Uematsu/Kyodo News via AP)
In Zika-stricken Miami, aerial pesticide spray adds to fears

MIAMI BEACH, Fla. (AP)  In the only U.S. city confirmed to have mosquitoes carrying the Zika virus, some residents say they'd rather be bitten than be exposed to droplets of chemicals sprayed from planes to kill the bugs.

No assurances from health officials would calm some 200 people packing a Miami Beach City Commission meeting Wednesday. They cursed elected officials and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for mixed messages about aerial spraying over South Beach and refusing to detail all locations where adult mosquitoes have been isolated with the virus.

"At first they said they couldn't do aerial spraying, but then they said yes," said Sadie Kaplan, a fitness trainer who fled her home twice to avoid the spraying. "Pick a side. Don't flip-flop."

FILE- In this Sept. 14, 2016, photo, demonstrators cheer at a city commission meeting in Miami Beach, Fla. Opponents want to stop the aerial spraying of the insecticide naled, used to combat the Aedes aegypti mosquito. (AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee, File)

Some argued the mild flu-like illness that Zika causes in most people doesn't warrant aggressive pesticide use, even booing a doctor presenting evidence of Zika-related birth defects to city commissioners.

"I don't want to be sprayed with pesticides for what I believe is a hoax," said Kiro Ace, a graphic designer who was shirtless but wore a gas mask as he joined protesters chanting, "If you're going to spray, we want a say!"

At issue is the use of naled, an insecticide sprayed since the 1950s for mosquito control in the U.S. It's currently being used in Miami Beach at levels deemed safe by the CDC and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. It's banned from personal use in homes, but the EPA says there's no evidence it causes cancer.

An EPA fact sheet on naled says people exposed to high concentrations can experience nausea, dizziness and confusion. At extremely high concentrations it can be fatal. Ten naled-related calls have been reported to the Florida Poison Control Information Network since Aug. 1, but there's no confirmation of any pesticide exposure or illness, Florida Department of Health spokeswoman Mara Gambineri said in an email.

EPA said a review of its records found only a "handful" of cases over the past 15 years where naled harmed people. EPA said the majority of incidents included minor burns, skin irritation or headaches with no deaths. Agency spokeswoman Nancy Grantham said the numbers are low, considering Florida sprayed about 338,000 pounds of naled on about 6 million acres in 2014.

Not everyone in the community agreed that naled should be ruled out, and on Friday officials confirmed a fifth mosquito sample was found with Zika in the same area of Miami Beach.

Dr. Christine Curry, a University of Miami OB-GYN who is treating Zika-infected women in the affected area, reminded the skeptical audience that there's real health risk.

"There are four women I have spoken to in the last several weeks who have not left Florida and who are suspected to have gotten their infection in our community," she said to boos and jeers. "I frankly don't care which compound we decide to use or not use for mosquito control. I care that we choose an option that this community agrees on."

However, naled use can harm the environment. About 2 million honeybees died last month in South Carolina after some beekeepers weren't notified about aerial spraying, the South Carolina Department of Pesticide Regulation confirmed.

Puerto Rico's governor has refused to authorize the CDC to use naled to fight Zika there, despite widespread infections on the island, amid outrage over its potential effects on people and wildlife.

Officials did say children should stay inside during spraying.

"We don't think this poses a big risk, but people need to avoid unnecessarily being exposed to it. If aerial applications are occurring ... don't let your kids out to play," said Jack Housenger, director of EPA's Office of Pesticide Programs. "If toys are outside, be sure to wash them off. Use common sense."

So far, no beekeepers or conservationists have complained about naled spraying over Miami's Wynwood district last month and over South Beach since last week, Miami-Dade County mosquito control spokeswoman Gayle Love said in an email.

Florida health officials say those are the only areas where mosquitoes have been actively transmitting the Zika virus. Aggressive pesticide spraying could extend beyond the urban neighborhoods, though, if another outbreak is confirmed elsewhere.

The only beekeeper registered in Miami Beach, attorney Darius Asly, said he's still concerned about the government's handling of the fight against Zika. He wants better coordination among agencies.

Still, he's prepared to lose bees to help protect people from Zika.

"If I must lose my bees in order to prevent that some poor mommy should have a sick child  I'd have to be a real jerk to be opposed to that," Asly said.

City commissioners appear to be listening, even though they admit naled may be their most effective tool. Amid the shouts at Wednesday's meeting, they passed two resolutions urging county and state officials to investigate alternative mosquito-control methods.

Spraying in South Beach is scheduled to continue this weekend. City officials said they didn't want it, but their hands were tied by a public health emergency declared by Gov. Rick Scott in February.

Florida health officials now have reported 650 travel-related infections, 86 infections involving pregnant women and 77 cases of Zika contracted within the state.

"We're getting sprayed because the rest of the country sees this as a public health threat," Miami Beach Commissioner Kristen Rosen Gonzalez said. "We're getting sprayed whether we want to or not."

___
The Trump campaign pitched rolling back food safety regulations in a fact sheet, arguing they are burdensome to farmers and 'overkill,' then deleted the proposal from its website and offered no explanation.

After sending out the fact sheet Thursday, the Republican's campaign issued a new release that did not include the food safety language.

The fact sheet was sent out to supplement a speech the billionaire businessman gave to the New York Economic Club that touted fewer regulations but did not specifically mention food safety.

SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks at luncheon for the Economic Club of New York on Thursday. A Fact sheet on food safety regulations that accompanied his speech was deleted from his website after it was distributed

In the original fact sheet, the campaign said that Trump would eliminate several regulations, including the 'food police' at the Food and Drug Administration.

The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment on the food safety proposal or why it was deleted.

The handout said the FDA food safety rules 'govern the soil farmers use, farm and food production hygiene, food packaging, food temperatures' and other ways farmers and food companies do business. It also criticizes increased inspections of food manufacturing facilities as 'inspection overkill.'

The description matches new food safety regulations passed by Congress in 2010 in response to an outbreak of salmonella linked to a Georgia peanut company that killed nine and sickened more than 700 people in 46 states.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that 48 million people  or 1 in 6 in the United States  are sickened each year from foodborne diseases, and an estimated 3,000 people die.

The final food safety rules for produce issued last year and supported by the food industry require farmers to test irrigation water quality, regularly train workers on the best health and hygiene practices and monitor wildlife that may intrude on growing fields, among other measures. The rules are designed to focus on the riskiest foods.

The idea is to put more focus on prevention in a system that for decades has been primarily reactive to outbreaks after they sicken or kill people. In addition to the peanut outbreak, a 2011 outbreak of listeria linked to cantaloupes killed 33 people. Other large scale outbreaks in fresh spinach, cucumbers and eggs have sickened hundreds.

Last year, an outbreak of listeria linked to Blue Bell ice cream was linked to three deaths. FDA inspectors found many violations at a company plant, including dirty equipment, inadequate food storage, food held at improper temperatures and employees not washing hands appropriately.

Michael Taylor, the former FDA deputy commissioner for foods who led the effort to put the rules in place, says it is one area of agreement in the country, since both the food industry and consumers want safe food.

'Eliminating FDA's food safety role would make more consumers sick, destroy consumer confidence at home, and damage American competitiveness in global food markets,' he says.

In the original fact sheet, the campaign said that Trump would eliminate several regulations, including the 'food police' at the Food and Drug Administration

The language in the Trump campaign fact sheet mirrors, almost word for word, parts of a May report from The Heritage Foundation that criticizes increased regulation under President Barack Obama. That report said the FDA rules cast an 'exceedingly broad regulatory net.'

While some Republicans in Congress have made similar arguments about overly burdensome regulations, the FDA worked to tweak the rules to appease farmers and companies that voiced concern about the rules.

Since then, congressional opposition has died down and the Republican House and Senate have given the FDA an increased amount of money to put the rules in place.

Senator Jeff Sessions, the Alabama Republican who has been Trump's biggest supporter in the Senate, said on Thursday that he hadn't yet seen the nominee's proposal on food safety. But he said farmers feel like there are too many federal rules and all regulation needs to be evaluated.

'In Washington, if you propose to pull back any regulation that has a good title, like food safety, then somebody says you want to poison the American people, and so forth,' Sessions said. 'But if it can be established that they are not really beneficial, oftentimes the regulations can actually make things more unsafe.'

Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow, the top Democrat on the Agriculture Committee, also said she had not seen the proposal, but criticized the idea of rolling back the rules.

'I think the public certainly wants basic food safety standards,' she said.

Despite the campaign's apparent desire to roll back the standards, Trump himself has expressed a personal interest in the topic.
Lawmakers say Snowden is no whistleblower

WASHINGTON (AP)  A House intelligence committee report is calling National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden a "serial exaggerator and fabricator" who doesn't fit the profile of a whistleblower.

Snowden's attorney denounced the committee's report, released on the eve of the opening of the movie "Snowden," and called him a "genuine American hero."

Separately, all members of the committee sent a bipartisan letter to President Barack Obama on Thursday urging him not to pardon Snowden.

FILE - This June 6, 2013 file photo, the National Security Agency (NSA) campus in Fort Meade, Md. A House intelligence committee report on NSA leaker Edward Snowden says hes not a whistleblower and that the vast majority of the documents he stole were military and defense secrets that had nothing to do with Americans privacy. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, File)

Snowden's revelations about the agency's bulk collection of millions of Americans' phone records set off a fierce debate that pit civil libertarians concerned about privacy against more hawkish lawmakers fearful about losing tools to combat terrorism. Democrats and libertarian-leaning Republicans pushed through a reauthorization of the USA Patriot Act last year that ended the program.

"Mr. Snowden's claim that he stole this information and disclosed it to protect Americans, privacy and civil liberties is undercut by his actions," the letter said. "Rather than avail himself of the many lawful avenues to express legal, moral, or ethical qualms with U.S. intelligence activities, Mr. Snowden stole 1.5 million classified documents from National Security Agency networks."

The Republican-led committee released a three-page unclassified summary of its two-year bipartisan examination of how Snowden was able to remove the documents from secure NSA networks, what the documents contained and the damage their removal caused to U.S. national security.

Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the ranking Democrat on the House intelligence committee, said the probe revealed that the vast majority of what Snowden took had nothing to do with American privacy.

"The majority of what he took has to do with military secrets and defense secrets," Schiff said in an interview Thursday for C-SPAN's "Newsmakers." ''I think that's very much at odds with the narrative that he wants to tell that he is a whistleblower."

Snowden was an NSA contract employee when he took the documents and leaked them to journalists who revealed massive domestic surveillance programs begun in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. The programs collected the telephone metadata records of millions of Americans and examined emails from overseas.

Snowden fled to Hong Kong, then Russia, to avoid prosecution and now wants a presidential pardon because he says he helped his country by revealing secret domestic surveillance programs.

The Obama administration has urged Snowden to return to the U.S. and face trial. Justice Department spokesman Marc Raimondi has said "there is no question his actions have inflicted serious harms on our national security."

Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., chairman of the House intelligence committee, said Snowden betrayed his colleagues and his country.

"He put our service members and the American people at risk after perceived slights by his superiors," Nunes said in a statement. "In light of his long list of exaggerations and outright fabrications detailed in this report, no one should take him at his word. I look forward to his eventual return to the United States, where he will face justice for his damaging crimes."

Snowden insists he has not shared the full cache of 1.5 million classified documents with anyone. However, the report notes that in June, the deputy chairman of the Russian parliament's defense and security committee publicly conceded that "Snowden did share intelligence" with his government.

Ben Wizner, Snowden's attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union, said the committee' report was an attempt to discredit a "genuine American hero."

"After years of investigation, the committee still can't point to any remotely credible evidence that Snowden's disclosures caused harm," Wizner said. "In a more candid moment, the NSA's former deputy director, who was directly involved in the government's investigation, explicitly said he didn't believe Snowden had cooperated with either China or Russia."

The committee, on the other hand, called Snowden a "disgruntled employee who had frequent conflicts with his managers."

According to the committee, Snowden began mass downloads of classified material two weeks after he was reprimanded for engaging in a spat with NSA managers. The committee also described Snowden as a "serial exaggerator and fabricator."

"A close review of Snowden's official employment records and submissions reveals a pattern of intentional lying," the report said. "He claimed to have left Army basic training because of broken legs when in fact he washed out because of shin splints. He claimed to have obtained a high school degree equivalent when in fact he never did. "

The report said Snowden claimed to have worked for the CIA as a senior adviser, when he was a computer technician.

"He also doctored his performance evaluations and obtained new positions at NSA by exaggerating his resume and stealing the answers to an employment test," the report said.

Speaking by video link from Moscow, Snowden said Wednesday that whistleblowing "is democracy's safeguard of last resort, the one on which we rely when all other checks and balances have failed and the public has no idea what's going on behind closed doors."
Ex-NASCAR star Robby Gordon tries to handle parents' death

ORANGE, Calif. (AP)  Robby Gordon stood outside the Southern California home where his father and stepmother were found dead a day earlier. The man who had faced fear and danger in hundreds of elite auto races had to take a deep breath to hold back tears.

"I'm so sad, and I can't believe it," the former NASCAR star said Thursday. "I grew up on this property my whole life. I learned everything about motorsports out of this little tiny barn over here."

Soon after, police announced how they believe the two died: Robert Gordon, 68, strangled his wife, 57-year-old Sharon Gordon then fatally shot himself, Orange police Lt. Fred Lopez said. No further details on the motive or circumstances were released.

Former NASCAR racer Robby Gordon pauses while making a statement to members of the media gathered outside his home in Orange, Calif., on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Gordon said his family is in shock and grieving the loss of his father and stepmother, who were found dead inside their Southern California home. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Robby Gordon, 47, said he would speak about the deaths in more detail once authorities conclude their investigation.

"The truth will come out, what went down there," he said.

Robby Gordon owns the house where the two were found, one of a few on the property, and had given it to his father.

The elder Gordon also had three daughters, one of whom, Beccy, had just had a baby boy with her husband, 2014 Indianapolis 500 winner Ryan Hunter-Reay.

The younger Gordon recalled how his father, a racer known as "Baja Bob" in the motorsports community, instilled in him a love of speed and competition in the Orange County neighborhood 30 miles southeast of Los Angeles, where many residents own horses and dirt riding trails line the suburban streets.

Robert Gordon started out in horse racing at the local track in Los Alamitos, California, before getting into auto racing.

"He taught me at a young age that one horsepower wasn't going to be enough  go do something different," Gordon recalled his father saying. "And I was fortunate enough to do something different."

Robby Gordon currently races in an off-road series he created in 2013 called Speed Energy Formula Off-Road, following the path of his father. He previously raced on numerous racing circuits, from NASCAR to IndyCar to Champ Car and IROC.

Gordon said an event featuring his off-road racing team scheduled for this weekend in Orange County will go on as planned. Hunter-Reay plans to drive in his race in Sonoma, California this weekend to.

Residents in the upscale Orange neighborhood shared stories about the deceased couple's friendly ways  swapping jokes with neighbors, gifting tickets to racing events and delivering feed personally to local equestrians.

"I can still see them walking hand in hand, walking their dogs down the street," said John Reina, who lives across the street. "To kind of wrap your head around this tragedy is very hard to do."

Racer Dale Earnhardt Jr. tweeted that he was praying for the Gordon family. "Hope they find strength and support," he said.

"Heartbreaking news this morning. Thinking of the Gordon family and friends," NASCAR star Jimmie Johnson said on Twitter.

Known for his aggressive style, he earned three wins in parts of 19 seasons in what is now the NASCAR Sprint Cup. He was a full-time driver early last decade and finished a career-high 16th in the points standings in 2003 driving for Richard Childress Racing. Gordon last raced in the Sprint Cup in 2012.

Gordon is one of only four drivers, joining John Andretti, Tony Stewart and Kurt Busch, to compete in the Indianapolis 500 and NASCAR Coca-Cola 600 on the same day. He nearly won the 1999 Indy 500 before running out of fuel in the closing laps.

___

Associated Press writers Christopher Weber and Andrew Dalton in Los Angeles and AP freelance writer Mike Cranston in Chicago contributed to this report.

This April 2008 photo shows Robert Gordon, father of NASCAR racer Robby Gordon. Police said Robert Gordon and Sharon Gordon were found dead inside a home Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2016, in Orange, Calif. (Michael Goulding/The Orange County Register via AP)

Former NASCAR racer Robby Gordon, right, with family friend Steve Nichols, left, makes a statement to member of the media gathered outside his home in Orange, Calif., on Sept. 15, 2016. Gordon says his family is in shock and grieving the loss of his father and stepmother, who were found dead inside their Southern California home. Gordon spoke briefly to reporters Thursday near the gated house where police discovered the bodies of 68-year-old Robert Gordon and 57-year-old Sharon Gordon. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Former NASCAR racer Robby Gordon makes a statement to members of the media gathered outside his home in Orange, Calif., on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Gordon said his family is in shock and grieving the loss of his father and stepmother, who were found dead inside their Southern California home. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Former NASCAR racer Robby Gordon makes a statement to members of the media gathered outside his home in Orange, Calif., on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Gordon said his family is in shock and grieving the loss of his father and stepmother, who were found dead inside their Southern California home. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Neighbor Jill Dombroske walks her horse Lola outside the home of Robert Gordon and his wife, Sharon Gordon in Orange, Calif., Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Police said they were found dead Wednesday and a neighbor said they were the father and stepmother of former NASCAR racer Robby Gordon. (Ken Steinhardt/The Orange County Register via AP)
Obama hosting political, business leaders for trade event

WASHINGTON (AP)  President Barack Obama will meet with a variety of political and business leaders as he continues to push for approval of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement.

Ohio Gov. John Kasich, former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson are among those on the White House guest list for the Friday meeting.

Kasich was a vocal TPP supporter during the presidential primary season, while eventual GOP nominee Donald Trump described it as a catastrophe that only he could stop.

Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton also opposes the 12-nation trade pact.

Despite the political headwinds, Obama is determined to secure TPP's approval. The agreement would lower or eliminate thousands of tariffs.
Shares of Deutsche Bank plunge amid US legal dispute

FRANKFURT, Germany (AP)  Shares in Deutsche Bank AG plunged Friday after the revelation that the U.S. Department of Justice has proposed the bank pay $14 billion to settle civil claims over its handing of residential mortgage-backed securities.

It's the latest blow for Germany's biggest bank by assets, which is in the middle of a painful transition as it tries to meet tougher regulatory requirements, cut costs and settle multiple legal investigations.

Deutsche's shares were down 8.1 percent at 12.04 euros in afternoon trading in Europe.

FILE - In this June 9, 2015 file photo the headquarters of Deutsche Bank is photographed in Frankfurt, Germany. Shares in Deutsche Bank AG plunged Friday, Sept. 16, 2016, after the revelation that the U.S. Department of Justice is seeking US dollar 14 billion to settle civil claims over its handing of residential mortgage-backed securities. (AP Photo/Michael Probst, file)

The bank indicated that it has "no intent" to settle at the level cited.

"The negotiations are only just beginning," the bank said in a statement emailed in the early hours of Friday. "The bank expects that they will lead to an outcome similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts."

That did little to reassure markets, which have been punishing bank stocks across Europe after a run of weak industry profits. Record low interest rates have narrowed the difference between the bank's borrowing costs and what they earn in interest on loans, eroding profits.

German Finance Ministry spokeswoman Friederike von Tiesenhausen said Germany was "aware that U.S. authorities have agreed with other banks on settlement payments, and so the German government assumes that a fair result will be reached at the end of this process as well, on the basis of equal treatment."

She was asked whether German officials had the impression that the settlement demand was some sort of retaliation to the European Commission's ruling that Ireland gave 13 billion euros in illegal tax breaks to U.S. firm Apple.

"I don't share that assessment," she said.

Deutsche Bank is among many financial institutions investigated over dealings in securities based on mortgages to people with shaky credit in the run-up to the 2008 financial crisis.

The U.S. government has accused the banks of misleading investors about the quality of the mortgage loans. Earlier this year, the Justice Department announced a roughly $5 billion settlement with Goldman Sachs over the sale of mortgage-backed securities. Other banks that settled in the last two years include Bank of America, Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase & Co.

While promoted as relatively safe, such securities contained residential mortgages from borrowers who were unlikely to be able to repay their loans. That led to huge losses for investors, kicking off the recession that began in late 2007 as the housing market collapsed and investors suffered billions in losses.

Deutsche's new CEO John Cryan has led a cost-cutting and restructuring drive that's involved job cuts and the bank's withdrawal from some smaller countries. He has said the bank is determined to clear up its legal problems but has stressed that the matters are not fully in the bank's control.

Deutsche Bank made a scant 20-million euro profit in the second quarter despite 7.4 billion euros ($8.3 billion) in net revenue. That followed a 6.7 billion-euro loss recorded in 2015. The International Monetary Fund in June said the bank was the largest net contributor of risk to the financial system among the world's largest global banks.

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Associated Press writer Geir Moulson contributed from Berlin.
EU leaders look at 6 months for rebuilding EU dream

BRATISLAVA, Slovakia (AP)  With policy splits among European Union countries putting their bloc under existential threat, national leaders agreed Friday on a six-month time table to come up with solutions for the multiple crises hobbling their union. But they delivered few concrete commitments on ways to bridge the deep differences.

While not on the agenda, Britain's decision to leave the EU hung over the meeting, reinforced by the absence of British Prime Minister Theresa May. But the 27 leaders attending talks in the Slovak capital had plenty of other divisive issues to discuss: Migration, a common European defense policy, worrying unemployment and the anemic state of the economy

In the end, the leaders committed to have a clear roadmap of the way ahead and some practical results when they meet in late March to mark the 60th anniversary of the EU founding Treaty of Rome in the Italian capital.

French President Francois Hollande, rear, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, arrive for a press conference after the EU summit in Bratislava Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. The EU summit, without the participation of the United Kingdom, in Bratislava kicked off the discussion on the future of EU following Brexit. (AP Photo/Ronald Zak)

"Europe can, must move forward, as long as it has clear priorities: protection, security, prosperity and the future of the youth," said French President Francois Hollande in a joint news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Merkel called the current situation in the EU "critical," not only because Britain voted in June to leave the EU, the first ever member to do so.

She noted the migration crisis and economic problems that have fed growing disenchantment with the EU among many member states. Still, she said there was a common willingness to bounce back beyond the many issues that divide and even anger individual EU nations.

EU Council President Donald Tusk agreed, saying the mood in the EU now was "sober but not defeatist."

Still, comments by some leaders as they left the meeting suggested hard work ahead.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, the staunchest opponent of liberal EU migration policies, again blamed Germany for refusing to set limits on migrant arrivals under Merkel. Unless Berlin caps arrivals, he said, the flood will continue "because everyone sees ... that there is a place in Europe where the good life can be achieved, where they are welcomed and where their needs are taken care of."

Orban said Hungary should be praised instead of criticized for erecting a razor-wire barrier at its southern borders. "Our job is to stop at the Hungarian border the negative consequences of the suction effect of German domestic politics," he said.

The refugee emergency has been particularly divisive and Orban has been one of the most abrasive voices as he makes common cause with other countries to the East  Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Poland  to oppose solutions coming out of EU headquarters in Brussels.

At the end of a "difficult day" of consultations, Orban said the good news is that all 27 remaining EU members said they would stay in the union and work together to improve it. But he complained that the current "self-defeating and naive" migration policies would remain.

Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, whose country holds the EU's rotating presidency, frankly acknowledged the divisions. "There are different views, different ideas," he said. "We need to be more concrete in the future."

Still, some of Orban's allies noted recent give by Brussels on the notion of mandatory refugee resettlement.

"It is of great importance that we are leaving today with a new political agenda that will open the process of EU reforms," Poland's Prime Minister Beata Szydlo said. "We are opening the process of reforming Europe."

Others also noted some progress in discussions on how to heighten security and defense cooperation, secure external borders and get Europe's unemployed youth back to work.

EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said a decision was taken to award 108 million euros ($121 million) in emergency funding to Bulgaria for border management at one of the most porous borders, with Turkey  a decision praised by Orban. Other EU nations committed extra equipment and personnel.

Added urgency for EU reform comes from planned elections in France and Germany next year where far-right and populist parties are seeking to exploit uncertainty generated by Britain's decision to become the first country to walk out of the EU.

Hollande is trailing in the polls ahead of next May's French presidential elections. His far-right opponent from the National Front, Marine Le Pen, has already said she will call for an in-out referendum on EU membership if she wins.

Europe's weak economy also hampers EU efforts to make common cause. Greece remains in the zone of EU nations using the euro after its third international bailout. But it is still struggling to deliver on its promises to creditors. How to deal with the euro's problems remains divisive  on one side are pro-austerity countries led by Germany, on the other, more social-minded governments.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, whose country has been at the center of the region's debt crisis and seen the arrival of hundreds of thousands of migrants, mostly from Turkey, over the last year, said things cannot continue as they are.

"What Europe should not do is to continue sleepwalking in the wrong direction," he said.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, whose country was one of the EU's founders, insisted internal quarrels were not new.

"When we started with six nations, they were there too," he said. "We have to make sure we can fix them."

___

Associated Press writers Lorne Cook in Brussels, Geir Moulson and Frank Jordans in Berlin, Sylvie Corbet in Paris and Pablo Gorondi in Budapest contributed to this report.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban speaks at a press conference after the EU summit in Bratislava Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. The EU summit, without the participation of the United Kingdom, kicked off the discussion on the future of EU following Brexit. (AP Photo/Ronald Zak)

French President Francois Hollande speaks during a press conference after the EU summit in Bratislava Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. The EU summit, without the participation of the United Kingdom, kicked off the discussion on the future of EU following Brexit. (AP Photo/Ronald Zak)

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, attends a press conference with French President Francois Hollande, after the EU summit in Bratislava Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. The EU summit, without the participation of the United Kingdom, kicked off the discussion on the future of EU following Brexit. (AP Photo/Ronald Zak)

French President Francois Hollande, left, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, attend a press conference after the EU summit in Bratislava Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. The EU summit, without the participation of the United Kingdom, kicked off the discussion on the future of EU following Brexit. (AP Photo/Ronald Zak)
In Senegal, young women challenge boundaries through coding

DAKAR, Senegal (AP)  Youma Fall used to set her school books aside for her younger siblings. Then she realized the books could be put to use in other ways in a country where many students struggle to own even pencils and pens.

Nearly a decade later, the 24-year-old is bringing her idea to life through a program in Senegal that encourages young women in coding and technology. She is developing a mobile phone application that will allow teachers, parents and students to swap books and supplies. It's called WECCIO, or "exchange" in the local Wolof language.

"When I finish this, I truly hope that no child has to say they don't understand something because they didn't have a book to study," said Fall, a design engineering graduate.

In this photo taken on Wednesday, Sept. 7, 2016, design engineering graduate Youma Fall smiles outside her PayDunya office in Dakar, Senegal. Young women in this largely Muslim West African country are pushing cultural and gender boundaries, using coding and entrepreneurial skills to enter a booming mobile technology market traditionally led by men. (AP Photo/Carley Petesch)

She and a new community of young women in this largely Muslim West African country are pushing cultural and gender boundaries, using coding and entrepreneurial skills to enter a booming mobile technology movement traditionally led by men.

Mobile phones are central to online life in Senegal. Nearly 95 percent of internet connections in the country occur via mobile phones, according to research by the Regulation Authority of Posts and Telecommunications of Senegal.

But less than 30 percent of girls in Senegal have chosen to study science and technology fields, such as mathematics, physics or engineering, said Bitilokho Ndiaye, gender adviser at the ministry for posts and telecommunications.

Ndiaye has made it her mission to help Senegal enforce its gender-equal policies in technology, and to create career opportunities for young women.

"Often, people are tempted to think that the girls are not able to do certain professions. This is due to the sexual division of labor, and its history and culture," she said.

Ndiaye helped to create the coding and tech community for young women, called Jiggen Ci TIC, or "Women in Technology" in Wolof, whose partners include UNESCO and telecom provider Sonatel.

There are training opportunities across Senegal throughout the year, including an intensive month-long session that leads to a weekend competition in which teams of girls present mobile apps to address pressing local issues. More than 100 young women participate. The program chooses the three best projects, financing their development. The other girls also receive leadership and entrepreneurial training, with mentoring and support to help complete their projects.

The programs also encourage Senegalese to realize that tech innovation doesn't have to come from beyond the country's borders, said UNESCO's regional Adviser for Communication and Information, Sasha Rubel Diamanka.

One app created by the Senegal project will allow pregnant women to keep medical records for themselves and their children on a mobile device. Another allows Senegalese to identify land that is for sale, using city records to prevent and resolve land disputes.

With its partners, the government plans to set up regular trainings in all regions of Senegal and integrate coding classes into the national curriculum. Ndiaye, the adviser, hopes to one day see a tech incubator only for girls, including mentorship and dedicated teachers year-round.

Senegal's push toward a digital future is strong. Last year, the country was ranked 11th in Africa for information and communication technologies development by the International Telecommunication Union.

The country is building a digital technology park in the town of Diamniadio, about 30 kilometers south of Dakar. Last year, the African Development Bank said it would invest nearly $80 million in the project, estimating that it will generate at least 35,000 direct jobs and 105,000 indirect ones by 2025.

Young women like Fall see the developments as only the beginning.

Fall is now applying the skills she has learned to her job at a mobile banking startup. She also continues coding courses while developing her app with the winning funds. She talks of creating another app to help women sell local products, and of following a career path that encourages other girls to work in the technology field.

"We need models. We need other women to say it's possible for us to reach new levels," she said.

___

Follow Carley Petesch on Twitter at www.twitter.com/carleypetesch

In this photo taken on Wednesday, Sept. 7, 2016, design engineering graduate Youma Fall shows pictures of baskets, the inspiration for another app she might later pursue to help women sell local products from her PayDunya office in Dakar, Senegal. Young women in this largely Muslim West African country are pushing cultural and gender boundaries, using coding and entrepreneurial skills to enter a booming mobile technology market traditionally led by men. (AP Photo/Carley Petesch)
The Latest: UN says Syria meeting canceled

BEIRUT (AP)  The Latest on developments in Syria, where a cease-fire brokered by the U.S. and Russia has been holding since coming into effect earlier this week (all times local):

12:40 a.m.

The United Nations press office says that a Security Council meeting on Syria called by the U.S. and Russia has been canceled.

FILE - In this Sept. 9, 2016 file photo, Secretary of State John Kerry, left, and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov shakes hands at the conclusion of a news conference following their meeting to discuss the crisis in Syria, in Geneva, Switzerland. The U.S. military will have to shift surveillance aircraft from other regions and increase the number of intelligence analysts to coordinate attacks with Russia under the Syria cease-fire deal partly in order to target militants the U.S. has largely spared, senior officials say. (Kevin Lamarque/Pool Photo via AP, File)

It was not immediately clear why the meeting  scheduled to take place late Friday afternoon  would no longer be held but diplomats said the cancellation came at the request of the U.S. and Russia.

The meeting was hastily scheduled Friday morning, a day after Russia's Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said he hoped the Security Council would adopt a resolution endorsing the cease-fire agreement at next week's high-level General Assembly meeting, which draws leaders from around the globe.

___

9 p.m.

The United Nations says it has still not received the necessary guarantees from the United States and Russia for aid convoys to cross the Turkish border into Syria  nor permission from the Syrian government for trucks to get through government checkpoints.

U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters at U.N. headquarters on Friday that the U.N. needs U.S. and Russian leadership "to have the necessary impact and influence over the various parties to ensure that the trucks can roll safely"  and the Syrian government to authorize the right administrative permissions for trucks to get through its checkpoints.

Dujarric says that the U.N. is ready and that "it's for all the parties to see that the needs of the Syrian people are great. And every day that we're unable to move is just another day of suffering for the people of Syria, especially in the hard-to-reach areas."

___

7:30 p.m.

The United States and Russia have called for a meeting of the U.N. Security Council to discuss the situation in Syria.

The council will hold closed consultations later on Friday.

The development comes a day after Russia's Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said he hoped the Security Council would adopt a resolution endorsing the cease-fire agreement at next week's high-level General Assembly meeting, which draws leaders from around the globe.

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said his country would like to publish details of the cease-fire deal he hammered out with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister last week.

___

6:25 p.m.

The Russian military says the Syrian opposition has used the U.S.-Russia-brokered truce to regroup and strengthen its forces.

Head of the Russian Reconciliation Center, Lt. Gen. Vladimir Savchenko, says the opposition units have used the cease-fire declared on Monday to "restore their capability and regroup their forces in the provinces of Aleppo, Hama and Homs."

In Friday's video call with Moscow, a Syrian army officer claimed that the rebels were building up their forces for an offensive on Hama.

Lt. Gen. Viktor Poznikhir of the Russian military's General Staff urged him to observe the truce, but emphasized that the Syrian army has the right to fight back if it faces a rebel offensive. He added that the Russian air force will provide cover if that happens.

___

5:55 p.m.

Russia says it will help ensure the cease-fire in Syria for another three days, but warned the United States to press the rebels to end their violations to prevent the situation from "spinning out of control."

Lt. Gen. Viktor Poznikhir of the Russian military's General Staff on Friday declared readiness to extend the U.S.-Russia-brokered cease-fire for another 72 hours, adding that Moscow expects Washington to take "resolute action" to end violations by the U.S.-backed opposition units.

Poznikhir said that the Syrian army has fully complied with the truce that went into force Monday, while the opposition units have violated it 144 times since then. He says the U.S. has failed to take measures to ensure the opposition's compliance with the agreement.

___

5:45 p.m.

The Russian military says the Syrian army has moved its heavy weapons back to a key highway near the city of Aleppo after the opposition failed to withdraw theirs in sync.

The Russian military says the Syrian army withdrew its armor, artillery and other weapons north of the Castello Road early on Thursday, in line with the U.S.-Russia-brokered truce.

Head of the Russian Reconciliation Center, Lt. Gen. Vladimir Savchenko, says the Syrian army moved the weapons back on Friday as the opposition units had failed to pull back theirs in lockstep.

Russian Col. Sergei Kapitsyn said in a video call from the Castello Road that the rebels fired on government positions overnight, wounding two soldiers and prompting the Syrian army to move their weapons back to the road to prevent the rebels from advancing.

___

5:20 p.m.

Syria's state media are saying that insurgents fired a rocket that hit a church in the northern city of Aleppo, causing material damage but no casualties.

The SANA news agency says the projectile hit the second floor of the Syriac Catholic Church in the city's government-held neighborhood of Aziziyeh.

The government-held side of the contested city of Aleppo is home to a large Christian minority.

SANA said Friday's shelling is a violation of the Russia-U.S.-brokered cease-fire that went into effect four days ago.

SANA says there were 23 violations of the truce deal in Aleppo on Thursday alone.

___

4:40 p.m.

The Russian defense ministry says its officers who watch the road leading into besieged rebel-held neighborhoods of the northern city of Aleppo say the Syrian army is ready to pull back its troops when the opposition is ready, too.

Maj.-Gen. Igor Konashenkov, in a statement issued on Friday, cast doubt on the rebels' "ability to comply" with a U.S.-Russia-brokered cease-fire, which came into effect earlier this week.

Konashenkov says the Syrian government forces are "the only party which is willing to hold talks, comply with the cease-fire and pull back the troops in order to allow UN humanitarian aid convoys."

Konashenkov says Russian officers of the Center for Reconciliation are monitoring the Castello Road leading to Aleppo, but he stopped short of saying whether there were any Russian troops there.

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3:55 p.m.

Syrian state TV is saying that bulldozers are clearing a main road leading into besieged rebel-held neighborhoods of the northern city of Aleppo to make way for aid convoys.

The Lebanon-based Al-Mayadeen TV also reported the same development, airing live footage on Friday afternoon from Aleppo, showing a bulldozer removing sand barriers from the Castello Road on the northwestern edge of Syria's largest city and once commercial center.

The Lebanese station enjoys wide access in government-held areas in Syria and usually has reporters embedded with Syrian troops.

It was not immediately clear when the aid convoy would enter besieged rebel-held neighborhoods east of Aleppo.

Aid deliveries are part of a U.S.-Russia deal that imposed a cease-fire, which started Monday.

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3:20 p.m.

Turkey is complaining because Syrian Kurdish fighters in the border town of Tel Abyad in Syria are still flying U.S. flags they had hoisted earlier.

The state-run Anadolu news agency says three U.S. flags were hung on Thursday around a compound of the Democratic Union Party, or PYD, and were still visible from Turkey on Friday afternoon.

The Syrian Kurdish fighters are an ally to the United States in the battle against the Islamic State group.

But Turkey views them as an offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, which has waged a decades-long insurgency in Turkey and is viewed as a terrorist group by Turkey and the U.S.

U.S. Department of Defense chief spokesman Peter Cook earlier said that Washington has asked the Syrian Kurdish partner forces not to fly the American flag on their own but was unaware of this particular instance.

___

2:10 p.m.

One of the most powerful opposition groups in the northern province of Aleppo has denied that government forces withdrew from a main road leading into rebel-held parts of Syria's largest city.

Nour el-Din el-Zinki group says in statement Friday that their observation posts in the area are confirming that government forces are still on the Castello road.

It accuses the government of not giving permission for the U.N. to deliver trucks of aid to besieged eastern neighborhoods in Aleppo

___

2:05 p.m.

A spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin says Russia is using its influence on the Syrian government to make sure the ongoing cease-fire holds and wants the United States to do the same with regards to opposition groups.

Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Friday that Russia "is still using its influence" to make sure the agreement, hammered out between Russia and the U.S., stands. He says that Moscow hopes that "our American counterparts will do the same."

Russia is a key backer of Syrian President Bashar Assad.

Peskov says Russia believes that "progress is happening although with certain hiccups."

___

2 p.m.

United Nations officials say they are awaiting word from Russia and Syrian combatants on both sides that security and monitoring are in place to allow for deliveries of humanitarian aid into rebel-held parts of the city of Aleppo.

OCHA spokesman Jens Laerke says "it is my understanding" that U.N. officials are waiting for assurances that conditions are safe enough for two convoys of 20 trucks each to proceed from Turkey to eastern Aleppo.

Speaking to reporters Friday in Geneva, Laerke said the trucks are in a "special customs zone" on the Turkish border.

He clarifies that the U.N. does not require authorization from Syria's government for cross-border aid deliveries.

Jan Egeland, a top U.N. coordinator of aid for Syria, says in a text message that the U.N. is waiting for assurances on "monitoring arrangements."

___

12:15 p.m.

Opposition activists and state media are reporting clashes between troops and insurgents as well as shelling in two neighborhoods of the Syrian capital, Damascus.

Syrian state news agency SANA says insurgents shelled government-held areas in the eastern neighborhood of Qaboun, wounding three people.

SANA says the shelling violates the cease-fire brokered by the U.S. and Russia that went into effect Monday.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says Friday's fighting is concentrated in the neighborhood of Jobar, next to Qaboun.

Mazen al-Shami, an opposition activist near Damascus, says government forces tried to storm Jobar but were repelled by opposition fighters.

He says al-Qaida and Islamic State group fighters, who are excluded from the cease-fire, are not present in the area.

___

11:30 a.m.

Russia's deputy foreign minister says the future of President Bashar Assad is an internal Syrian issue and the U.S.-Russia Syria agreement does not deal with it.

Assad has been accused of war crimes in the Syrian civil war and his opponents inside and outside the country have insisted that his departure is a prerequisite for a peace settlement.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov said in an interview with the RIA Novosti news agency on Friday that Assad's future is "purely Syrian business" and that the cease-fire deal that the United States and Russia signed last week did not discuss Assad's future in any way

___

11 a.m.

A Syrian activist says Russian troops have deployed along a main road leading into besieged rebel-held neighborhoods of the northern city of Aleppo ahead of the possible arrival of aid convoys.

Rami Abdurrahman of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says the Syrian government forces that were stationed there have been replaced by Russian troops. He says aid is expected to enter rebel-held Aleppo later Friday.

Aleppo-based activist Bahaa al-Halaby denies that government troops withdrew from Castello road.

Aid deliveries are part of a U.S.-Russia deal that imposed a cease-fire, which started Monday.
UK Defense officials apologize for 2003 drowning of Iraqi

LONDON (AP)  Britain's Ministry of Defense has apologized for the 2003 death of an Iraqi teen who drowned after being forced into a canal by four British soldiers.

Officials said Friday the department is "extremely sorry" for the death of 15-year-old Ahmad Jabbar Kareem Ali, who had been taken into custody by British forces on suspicion of looting in the southern Iraqi city of Basra.

An independent inquiry into the death led by a former High Court judge said the soldiers' failure to help the boy after he started to drown was the "certain" cause of his death. He did not know how to swim.
Merkel's party faces another setback in Berlin state vote

BERLIN (AP)  Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives face possible ejection from Berlin's state government in an election this weekend, while a nationalist party hopes for more gains at the expense of Germany's traditional political forces.

Sunday's vote comes two weeks after Merkel's Christian Democratic Union was beaten into third place by the nationalist Alternative for Germany, or AfD, in the eastern state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, where Merkel has her parliamentary constituency. The CDU has long been weak in Berlin but another feeble result, though not immediately dangerous to Merkel, would keep up political pressure on the chancellor.

Merkel's opening of Germany's borders to migrants last year featured prominently in Mecklenburg, although the influx has diminished drastically. The result there prompted her allies in Bavaria, the Christian Social Union, to step up a drive for tougher refugee policies  an internal dispute that isn't helping the conservatives' poll ratings.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel delivers her speech during an election campaign rally of her Christian Democratic Union party for the Berlin mayor elections in Berlin, Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2016. The German federal state of Berlin will hold elections for the city's parliament on Sunday, Sept. 18. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)

Merkel has defended her approach and, at a rally Wednesday, criticized opponents "who think that if you provoke, if you have snappy slogans ... problems will solve themselves."

"It is not enough ... to know who is to blame, it is not enough just to know what you're against," she said. "We need good solutions that hold our society together."

Local issues are more prominent in Berlin, a city of 3.5 million. That isn't good news for the governing parties: disillusionment is high over the capital's notoriously inefficient bureaucracy and issues such as years of delays in opening its new airport.

Mayor Michael Mueller's center-left Social Democrats lead the local government, with Merkel's CDU as junior partner, a bad-tempered alliance of Germany's biggest parties similar to Merkel's national governing coalition. Mueller says he wants to dump the conservatives for one or more left-leaning partners.

"It looks as though both big parties ... will probably do even worse than last time," said Manfred Guellner, the head of the Forsa polling agency, referring to Berlin's 2011 state election when both were already weak. Voters consider CDU mayoral contender Frank Henkel, like his counterpart in Mecklenburg, an "extremely weak" candidate, he said.

He argued that it suits local leaders to blame the chancellor for the result in Mecklenburg, but only AfD supporters were motivated by the desire to punish Merkel. "They now hate Merkel; for them, national politics are more important than local politics, and the refugee question more important than for all other voters."

As for the effect on national politics, he said "there are always dents" in support immediately after poor results, but they can be ironed out.

Polls suggest that the governing parties may not win a combined majority in Berlin's state legislature, which elects the mayor. That already happened earlier this year in the eastern region of Saxony-Anhalt. It's a novel situation in Germany, caused in part by a long-term erosion of voter loyalty but in particular by AfD's rise.

In Berlin, the conservatives have stressed law-and-order issues, with Henkel, the current state interior minister, also leading calls for a ban on face-covering veils. The governing parties have accused each other of not taking sufficient responsibility for the refugee situation after Berlin's initially chaotic handling of it last year.

The low-key Mueller succeeded long-serving predecessor Klaus Wowereit in 2014 after he stepped down in mid-term. Even under the charismatic Wowereit, the Social Democrats won a lackluster 28.3 percent of votes five years ago, followed by Merkel's party with 23.3 percent.

Polls suggest their support will sink to at most 24 percent and 19 percent respectively. The opposition Greens and Left Party, potential new partners for Mueller, are a few points further behind.

The three-year-old AfD is confident, plastering Berlin with posters proclaiming "First Schwerin, now Berlin!" Schwerin is Mecklenburg's state capital. Still, co-chairwoman Frauke Petry cautions that Berlin "is a significantly more difficult environment to campaign in."

Polls show its support at up to 15 percent in Berlin. The capital is somewhat less promising territory than rural Mecklenburg, where it won 20.8 percent to finish second.

Berlin's 9.7 percent unemployment rate is well above the national average of 6.1 percent, but it also has large immigrant communities and an international outlook.

In the Berlin campaign, led by former army colonel Georg Pazderski, AfD has hammered home its opposition to Merkel's insistence that "we will manage" the challenge of integrating migrants.

Pazderski has said Germany should "train, but not integrate" refugees, preparing them to go home.

Mueller wrote on Facebook Thursday that 10-14 percent support for AfD would "be viewed in the whole world as a sign of the comeback of the right and Nazis in Germany."

The Berlin vote comes about a year before a national election in which Merkel is widely expected to seek a fourth term, though she still hasn't declared her hand. Three more state elections follow next spring.

Polls show nationwide support for AfD of between 11 and 14 percent. Last weekend, however, it polled only 7.8 percent in municipal elections in the western state of Lower Saxony.

That suggests "AfD's anchorage in the electorate isn't far enough along yet that we can talk about an established party," Guellner said.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, 3rd from right, attends an election campaign of her Christian Democratic Union party for the Berlin mayor elections in Berlin, Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2016. The German federal state of Berlin will hold elections for the city's parliament on Sunday, Sept. 18, 2016. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)
Swedish appeals court upholds detention order for Assange

STOCKHOLM (AP)  A Swedish appeals court on Friday upheld a detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, dismissing the latest attempt by the 45-year-old Australian to make prosecutors drop a rape investigation from 2010.

The decision by the Svea Court of Appeal means that the arrest warrant stands for the 45-year-old computer hacker, who has avoided extradition to Sweden by seeking shelter at the Ecuadorean Embassy in London since 2012.

Assange, who denies the rape allegation, has challenged the detention order several times. He says he fears he will be extradited to the United States to face espionage charges if he leaves the embassy.

FILE - This is a Friday, Feb. 5, 2016 file photo of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange holds a U.N. report as he speaks on the balcony of the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. A Swedish appeals court on Friday Sept. 16, 2016, upheld a detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, dismissing the latest attempt by the 45-year-old Australian to make prosecutors drop a rape investigation from 2010. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein, File)

His Swedish defense lawyer, Per Samuelson, said he would appeal the decision to the Supreme Court.

"We are naturally disappointed that Swedish courts yet again choose to ignore Julian Assange's difficult life situation," Samuelson told The Associated Press. "They ignore the risk that he will be extradited to the United States."

Swedish prosecutors say they are not in contact with counterparts in the U.S. and that they would also need Britain's permission should a third country seek his extradition.

Upholding a lower court ruling, the appeals court said Swedish prosecutors are actively trying to move the investigation forward and set up an interrogation of Assange at the embassy. Acting on behalf of Swedish investigators, an Ecuadorean prosecutor is set to question Assange on Oct. 17.

"This means that there is at present no reason to set aside the detention order. Julian Assange's claim to that effect shall therefore be refused," the court said.

It also brushed aside the findings of a U.N. working group, which described his stay at the London embassy as "arbitrary detention." The court noted that the panel's finding wasn't binding on Swedish courts and that Assange's stay at the embassy "is not to be regarded as an unlawful deprivation of liberty."

The investigation stems from Assange's brief relationship with two women he met during a visit to Sweden six years ago. Allegations of sexual molestation and unlawful coercion were dropped last year when the statute of limitations expired. The rape allegation, which involves one of the women, will expire in 2020 if Assange hasn't been indicted by then.

Marianne Ny, the top prosecutor in the case, welcomed the court's decision and said the interrogation with Assange would go ahead as planned.

"I have handled many rape and sex crimes cases," she told AP. "I have never experienced before that someone sought shelter at an embassy. So this situation is really unusual."

___

This story has been corrected to fix the spelling of Per Samuelson's last name.

The Ecuadorian flag flies outside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. A Swedish appeals court has upheld a detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who is wanted by prosecutors in a rape investigation. The decision Friday by the Svea Court of Appeal means that the arrest warrant stands for the 45-year-old Australian, who has avoided extradition to Sweden by seeking shelter at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since 2012. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)

The Ecuadorian flag flies outside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. A Swedish appeals court has upheld a detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who is wanted by prosecutors in a rape investigation. The decision Friday by the Svea Court of Appeal means that the arrest warrant stands for the 45-year-old Australian, who has avoided extradition to Sweden by seeking shelter at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since 2012. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)

A street cleaner works outside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. A Swedish appeals court has upheld a detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who is wanted by prosecutors in a rape investigation. The decision Friday by the Svea Court of Appeal means that the arrest warrant stands for the 45-year-old Australian, who has avoided extradition to Sweden by seeking shelter at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since 2012. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)
Volkswagen's August sales buoyed by Europe and China

BERLIN (AP)  Volkswagen says its global sales were up 6.3 percent in August compared with a year earlier thanks to strong gains in Europe and China.

Those advances helped offset lower deliveries in the United States.

The company said Friday that the Volkswagen Group, whose other brands include Audi, Skoda and Porsche, delivered 759,400 vehicles last month. That's up from 714,400 in August 2015, the last full month before news of the company's emissions-rigging scandal broke in the U.S.

Sales in Europe were up 8.3 percent at 264,500 while deliveries in China rose 19.7 percent to 323,600. In the U.S., sales dropped 3.8 percent to 54,300.
5 convicted in Corsica clash that sparked burkini tensions

PARIS (AP)  A court in Corsica has convicted five people for violence on a beach that was initially believed linked to a woman wearing a full-body burkini swimsuit.

The mayor of Sisco, where last month's clash occurred, said on France-Info radio Friday he hoped the town could now turn the page on this "painful affair." Several people were wounded in the violence between a group of sunbathers of North African origin from a nearby town and local villagers.

Mayor Ange-Pierre Vivoni banned burkinis in his town after the violence, though later conceded he didn't know whether a burkini was involved.
IMF team to visit Mozambique amid concerns over debt

JOHANNESBURG (AP)  A team from the International Monetary Fund will travel next week to Mozambique, which is struggling to reassure investors after the revelation earlier this year of at least $1.4 billion in hidden debt.

The IMF suspended financial aid to the southern African country after learning about the undisclosed borrowing, and has demanded an international audit.

Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi expressed willingness to resolve the problem in a meeting Thursday in Washington with IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde.

IMF spokesman Gerry Rice says the IMF team will look at Mozambique's 2016 revised budget and monetary policy measures recently adopted by the central bank. The team visits Sept. 22.
Famed Turkish actor Tarik Akan dies after cancer battle

ISTANBUL (AP)  Tarik Akan, an acclaimed Turkish actor who earned accolades for the controversial 1982 film "Yol," has died after a brief battle with cancer. He was 66.

The Nazim Hikmet Culture and Arts Foundation, of which Akan was a board member, said the actor died early Friday. Turkey's state-run Anadolu news agency said Akan had been receiving treatment for lung cancer at a private hospital in Istanbul.

Akan starred in over 100 films and directed documentaries and television series in a career spanning more than four decades. He was among the country's leading actors in the 1970s and 1980s and earned an Honorable Mention at the 35th Berlin International Film Festival in 1985 for the film "Pehlivan."

Akan was imprisoned for 2 months following Turkey's 1980 military coup after giving a political speech in Germany. He chronicled his days in prison in a book, "Mother, I Have Lice."

"Yol", which earned the top prize at the 1982 Cannes Film Festival, dealt with the coup's aftermath and was banned in Turkey until 1999.

Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim expressed sorrow for Akan's death. Culture and Tourism Minister Nabi Avci praised Akan's work that he said earned him "a special place in Turkey's cinematic history."
The Latest: German policitician won't give up demand for cap

PARIS (AP)  The Latest on the flow of migrants into Europe (all times local):

12:15 p.m.

The most prominent domestic critic of German Chancellor Angela Merkel's approach to the migrant crisis is insisting that he won't give up his demand for a cap on refugee numbers.

Migrants are evacuated from a camp in the north of Paris, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. Police and city officials are evacuating hundreds of migrants who had been living on the streets of northern Paris for weeks, in the latest of a string of attempts to find solutions for France's migrants. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)

Bavarian governor Horst Seehofer, who leads the Bavarian branch of Merkel's conservative bloc  the Christian Social Union  has urged a tougher approach for the past year. Since an embarrassing defeat for Merkel's party in a Sept. 4 state election in eastern Germany, he has redoubled calls for an annual cap of 200,000 on new refugee arrivals.

Merkel has rejected those calls. But Seehofer was quoted Friday as telling the weekly Der Spiegel: "We will not forego the upper limit of 200,000. This is simply about our credibility."

Germany holds national elections this time next year

___

9:20 a.m.

Police and city officials are evacuating at least 1,600 migrants from Afghanistan, Sudan, Eritrea and elsewhere who have been living on the streets of northern Paris for weeks, authorities said, in the latest of a string of attempts to find solutions for Europe's migration crisis.

City Hall said two operations were carried out Friday morning on a stretch of pavement underneath an elevated metro line not far from the Montmartre neighborhood. One focused on about 80 women and children in the makeshift camp, while the other focused on the men, according to a statement from City Hall.

An official with the Paris regional administration said more than 1,000 people had been transported to temporary shelters by mid-morning, while authorities estimate about 1,600 to 1,800 migrants had been living at the site overall. They are being bused to 74 sites around the Paris region where authorities will give them food and medical treatment and help those who are eligible apply for asylum.
2 Palestinians, Jordanian killed after attacking Israelis

JERUSALEM (AP)  A Jordanian man was shot dead after he tried to stab police officers in Jerusalem on Friday, while in the West Bank, one Palestinian attacker was killed and another wounded after the pair rammed their vehicle into a bus stop. A third Palestinian was shot and killed after he tried to stab a soldier, Israeli officials said.

The assaults were the latest violence in a year of Palestinian attacks that at times were near-daily occurrences but have lately been on the decline. The multiple attacks Friday came after weeks of relative calm.

In the first incident, a man came out of Jerusalem's walled Old City brandishing a knife in each hand, police spokeswoman Luba Samri said. He then waved the knives in the air and shouted "Allahu akbar"  or "God is Great" in Arabic  as he rushed at the officers. They opened fire and killed him, Samri said. The man had both a Jordanian and a Palestinian ID on him, she said.

Shortly afterward, two Palestinians rammed their car into a bus stop, wounding three Israeli civilians, the military said. It said forces at the scene opened fire, killing one of the Palestinians and wounding the other. The attack took place near Kiryat Arba, a settlement near the West Bank city of Hebron.

The three Israelis and the wounded attacker were taken to hospital.

A few hours later, at a junction near Hebron, a Palestinian stabbed an Israeli soldier who opened fire and killed him, the military said.

About 850 Israeli settlers live in heavily-guarded enclaves in Hebron, surrounded by tens of thousands of Palestinians. Much of the animosity in the biblical city is over a holy site known to Jews as the Tomb of the Patriarchs and to Muslims as the Ibrahimi Mosque.

Many of the Palestinian attackers involved in the violence that erupted last September came from Hebron.

The yearlong wave of Palestinian assaults on Israeli civilians and security forces has killed 34 Israelis and two Americans. About 213 Palestinians have also died during that same time; Israel says the majority were attackers.
Turkey detains 24 foreigners suspected of planning IS attack

ISTANBUL (AP)  Turkey's state-run news agency says police have detained 24 foreign nationals suspected of planning an attack in Istanbul for the Islamic State group.

Anadolu said on Friday police raided a location where a Syrian national identified only as Azzov K. was staying following a tip-off about a planned attack.

Police found 23 other men at the same location in Istanbul's Kucukcekmece neighborhood, which abuts the city's main Ataturk airport.

Police said Azzov K. allegedly purchased explosives and ammunition to be used in the attacks.

Authorities said of the 24 suspects in custody, nine were in leadership positions while 15 had arrived in Turkey from abroad to cross into Syria.
A 33-year-old woman hid marijuana in her niece's lunchbox after a sheriff's deputy pulled her car over, an arrest report stated.

Tasha Sims was stopped in Pompano Beach, Florida, on Wednesday, and admitted to the deputy she 'messed up' after driving with a suspended license, the arrest report states.

But when she was released on Thursday night after posting $1,000 bond, Sims hammed it up for the Local 10 cameras, striking a pose and asking how her hair looked while evading questions about her arrest.

tasha Sims was charged with child neglect, possession of marijuana and driving with a suspended license and issued several citations. She is pictured hamming it up for the cameras after posting bail

Sims was stopped in Pompano Beach, Florida, on Wednesday, and admitted to a sheriff's deputy she hid marijuana in her niece's lunchbox. She is seen left in a mugshot and right in a Facebook photo

She was charged with child neglect, possession of marijuana and driving with a suspended license and issued several citations.

The deputy pulled the car over after Sims' niece was spotted in the passenger seat without her seat belt on.

In addition to driving on a suspended license, Sims was in a car registered under someone without a valid license.

The deputy smelled marijuana, and asked Sims if she had anything in the vehicle.

Sims confessed to hiding a metal grinder with about one gram of marijuana inside the girl's lunchbox, the arrest report stated.

Sims said she acted in fear and told her niece not to touch the grinder, but admitted to the deputy she 'messed up', according to the arrest report.

When she was released on Thursday night after posting $1,000 bond, Sims hammed it up for the Local 10 cameras, striking a pose and asking how her hair looked

On Thursday evening, Sims seemed pleased news cameras were outside waiting for her release after posting bond.

But when a Local 10 reporter confronted her about the incident, Sims simply brushed her hair with her hands and asked: 'Are we done?'
Britain's UKIP elects Diane James new leader amid acrimony

LONDON (AP)  Britain's right-wing U.K. Independence Party has chosen European Parliament member Diane James as its leader, replacing the charismatic but divisive Nigel Farage.

James defeated four other candidates in a ballot of party members.

Britain's June 23 vote to leave the European Union was a triumph for UKIP, which had campaigned for years to leave the bloc. Under Farage the party moved from fringe player to a political force capable of winning millions of votes and swaying public opinion.

Diane James celebrates after being named as the new leader of the UK Independence Party at the party's annual conference in Bournemouth, England, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. Britains right-wing U.K. Independence Party has chosen European Parliament member Diane James as its leader, replacing the charismatic but divisive Nigel Farage. James defeated four other candidates in a ballot of party members. (Ben Birchall/PA via AP)

Farage announced his resignation after the referendum, and the party has since descended into feuding.

The leadership race has been acrimonious from the start. Steven Woolfe, a Farage ally and the favorite to win the contest, was excluded because he missed the application deadline by 17 minutes.

Diane James celebrates with Nigel Farage after being named as the new leader of the UK Independence Party at the party's annual conference in Bournemouth, England, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. Britains right-wing U.K. Independence Party has chosen European Parliament member Diane James as its leader, replacing the charismatic but divisive Nigel Farage. James defeated four other candidates in a ballot of party members. (Ben Birchall/PA via AP)

Diane James celebrates with Nigel Farage after being named as the new leader of the UK Independence Party at the party's annual conference in Bournemouth, England, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. Britains right-wing U.K. Independence Party has chosen European Parliament member Diane James as its leader, replacing the charismatic but divisive Nigel Farage. James defeated four other candidates in a ballot of party members. (Ben Birchall/PA via AP)
Police rule out attack as cause of Bali boat explosion

BALI, Indonesia (AP)  Indonesian police said Friday there is no indication that a terror attack was the cause of a tourist boat explosion in Bali that killed two people and injured about 20 others.

Karangasem district police chief Sugeng Sudarso said investigators believe a fuel leak below deck caused a buildup of fumes that ignited, though the finding is provisional.

Sudarso and Bali police spokesman Made Sudana said there was no sign of terrorism and a bomb squad did not find any explosive materials.

Police investigators examine the Gili Cat 2 boat following an explosion while it was enroute to nearby island of Lombok, at Padangbai Port in Karangasem, Bali, Indonesia, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Police on the Indonesian tourist island of Bali said Thursday a German woman was killed and about 20 other people injured in an explosion on a speed boat ferrying them to neighboring Lombok. (AP Photo)

Investigators have recovered body parts and continue to examine the boat, Sudarso said.

Police on the popular tourist island of Bali have given conflicting accounts of the nationalities of the two women killed in Thursday's explosion but now say one was from Austria and the other from Spain.

Sanglah Hospital gave the same information for the nationalities and said the Austrian woman was 28.

About 20 people were injured on the speedboat that was ferrying tourists from Bali to neighboring Lombok.

Bali became a byword for tragedy in 2002 when bombings by Jemaah Islamiyah militants killed 202 people, mostly foreigners.

A sustained security crackdown since then has weakened JI but counter-terrorism officials say there is still a threat of attacks from radicals inspired by the Islamic State group.

This image made from video shows paramedics examining the body of a foreign tourist who was killed in a boat explosion at a hospital in Karangasem, Bali, Indonesia on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. The explosion occurred not long after the boat departed from the resort island of Bali to ferry tourists to nearby island of Lombok. (AP Photo)
German economy minister, business delegation to visit Russia

BERLIN (AP)  Germany's economy minister plans to travel to Russia next week with a business delegation, a trip that comes as Western sanctions and a weak Russian currency have weighed on trade between the two countries.

The Economy Ministry said Friday that Sigmar Gabriel, who is also Germany's vice chancellor, will visit Moscow on Sept. 21 and 22. He plans talks with several members of the Russian government, whom it didn't name, on "bilateral economic relations between Russia and Germany, as well as with the European Union."

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said President Vladimir Putin plans to meet Gabriel.

Canada Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, right, meets with Sigmar Gabriel, Germany's Minister of Economic Affairs and Energy and Vice Chancellor, at the Global Progress conference Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Montreal. (Paul Chiasson/The Canadian Press via AP)

The minister also plans to meet representatives of German companies based in Russia.
London mayor, on US trip, vows city to stay open post-Brexit

CHICAGO (AP)  London's mayor sought Friday to reassure American investors, tourists and students that his city will remain open for business despite his country's decision to withdraw from the European Union.

Sadiq Khan said during a visit to Chicago that London is demanding a seat at the table when the British government begins formally negotiating its exit from the EU, and will ensure the deal is a "good one." London's first Muslim mayor, the son of Pakistani immigrants, came with another message for America, telling reporters that Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump was playing "into the hands of extremists" with his hostile rhetoric toward Muslims.

But Khan and his delegation of London-based entrepreneurs were primarily focused on trying to ease concerns over a British exit from the EU during their five-day trip to Montreal, Chicago and New York. Uncertainty over whether Britain will continue to have access to the EU's single, market has left financial experts worried about a big hit to the country's business sector.

Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel, left, shows the city's architecture to London mayor Sadiq Khan during a boat ride Friday, Sept. 16, 2016, in Chicago. During Khan's visit in Chicago, he was seeking to reassure American investors, tourists and students that his city will remain open for business despite his country's referendum in favor of withdrawing from the European Union. (AP Photo/Tae-Gyun Kim)

"One of the reasons I'm here is to reassure friends in America, businesses, students, tourists, innovators, investors that London is open," Khan said.

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel signed a technology-partnership agreement with Khan on Friday and said he wouldn't have done so if he had doubts about London's future status as a global city.

The two men took a boat tour of the Chicago River, cruising past skyscrapers including one bearing Trump's name in 20-foot tall letters. Emanuel showed off the city's new Riverwalk, a pedestrian and recreational path lined with cafes and businesses. They dropped in on a discussion about entrepreneurship at a Chicago tech hub known as 1871.

Emanuel, who is Jewish, also planned to take Khan to his synagogue.

"You have in Chicago a mayor of Jewish faith," Khan said. "We have in London a mayor of Islamic faith. I think that message  our friendship  is a message that is bigger than the Brexit vote."

On Thursday, Khan delivered a speech at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs on the importance of social integration in diverse cities, saying a failure to do so makes it easier for "terrorists to radicalize our young people." Afterward, he told reporters that Trump plays to extremists.

"We shouldn't inadvertently play into the hands of extremists who say it's not possible to be somebody who is a mainstream Muslim and hold Western liberal values," Khan said.

London mayor Sadiq Khan, left, and Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel speak during a news conference Friday, Sept. 16, 2016, in Chicago. During Khan's visit in Chicago, he was seeking to reassure American investors, tourists and students that his city will remain open for business despite his country's referendum in favor of withdrawing from the European Union. (AP Photo/Tae-Gyun Kim)
Souare out for up to 6 months with injuries from car crash

LONDON (AP)  Crystal Palace defender Pape Souare could be sidelined for up to six months after undergoing surgery on his leg and jaw following a serious car crash.

The Senegal international was airlifted to hospital after being involved in a crash on a motorway last weekend.

Palace manager Alan Pardew said "we think in four, five, six months he will be running and training again."
Russia's election: new rules, old faces

MOSCOW (AP)  Russia's weekend parliament elections take place under new rules that in principle could bring genuine opposition into the national legislature. But the Kremlin-backed United Russia and the parties that almost always follow its lead are set remain the overwhelming presence in the State Duma.

In an election mostly featuring old faces, the new face that may matter the most is someone who's not running  the chairman of the Central Election Commission. Under Ella Pamfilova, a prominent human rights figure appointed to lead the commission less than six months ago, Sunday's vote promises to avoid some of the fraud allegations that have plagued previous elections.

The last election to the State Duma, in 2011, sparked large and persistent protests against fraud that unsettled the government.

Dancers perform in front of an election poster of the Kremlin-backed United Russia party in Moscow, Russia, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Russia's parliamentary election will be held on Sunday. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin)

The demonstrations, many of them attracting upwards of 50,000 people, continued sporadically for five months before a clash between police and protesters resulted in hundreds of arrests, followed by strengthened laws to muffle public dissent.

One of the main targets in those protests was the former election commission head, Vladimir Churov, sarcastically dubbed "The Magician" for authorizing dubious results. Pamfilova's appointment likely will bolster the credibility of the results this time.

"The mistakes that were made during the previous campaigns, the lack of trust  you can't get over it quickly," Pamfilova told reporters this week. "We focused our effort to bring about change, get rid of the things that were broken in the previous campaigns and restore the level of trust."

The vote "is likely to be the cleanest election 1996," analyst Dmitri Trenin, director of the Carnegie Moscow Center, told The Associated Press. "The authorities learned from the protests much more than the liberals did."

While tightening the limits on protests, the Kremlin also pushed through legislation that opens up the elections a bit. Previously, all 450 deputies in the lower house had been chosen by party list, in which seats are chosen in proportion to how much support a party received nationwide. Stifling regulations blocked many political groupings from even getting on the ballot.

Under the new rules, only half the seats will be party list; the other 225 are contested in specific districts. In addition, independent candidates can get on the ballot and the requirements for parties to participate were simplified; there are 14 parties on the ballot this year, twice as many as in 2011. But only 23 independents succeeded in getting on the ballot.

While the new system is more open, there is little expectation that the balance in parliament will change significantly. United Russia is expected to use its immense resources and dominance of the political landscape to boost its candidates in single-district races, which could increase its seats from the 238  a majority  it currently holds.

Voter apathy appears substantial. A survey by the Levada Center, Russia's only independent polling agency, found in late August that 25 percent of the electorate either say they won't vote or are unsure if they will.

That survey of 1,600 people nationwide found that United Russia had the support of half of the likely voters, followed by the Communist Party with 15 percent, the nationalist Liberal Democrats at 14 percent and 9 percent support for A Just Russia  broadly in line with the current Duma composition. A party must win at least 5 percent of the vote nationwide to get a party-list seat; the survey, which claimed a 3.4 percent margin of error, did not find any other parties clearing the 5 percent level.

That would leave the new parliament, like the outgoing one, obedient to the Kremlin.

"They are his majesty's governing party and his majesty's opposition parties," Trenin said, referring to President Vladimir Putin's control of Russia's politics.

"Big change in Russia does not come when there's an election in the Duma and a somewhat different proportion in the parties in the Duma. It comes when there's a change at the top," Trenin said. The next presidential election is to be in 2018.

Outliers in the election include the liberal Yabloko party, which hasn't been represented in the Duma since 2006.

Party leader Grigory Yavlinsky says he wants to continue to compete for the Duma despite dim chances in order to show voters that change is possible.

"I really see that people are interested in what I am saying to them ... but they don't really feel there is an alternative and they simply don't believe it's possible to create an alternative in Russia," Yavlinsky told The Associated Press.

___

Nataliya Vasilyeva and Kate de Pury in Moscow contributed to this report.

An election poster with a portrait of Just Russia party leader Sergei Mironov is placed in St. Petersburg, Russia, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Russia's parliamentary election will be held on Sunday. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky)

A woman walks in front of an election poster of the Party of Growth in Moscow, Russia, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Russia's parliamentary election will be held on Sunday. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko)

An election poster of the Kremlin-backed United Russia party is installed in St.Petersburg, Russia, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Russia's parliamentary election will be held on Sunday. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky)

People walk past an election poster of Just Russia party's candidate Alexei Kovalev in St. Petersburg, Russia, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Russia's parliamentary election will be held on Sunday. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky)

A woman walks in front of an election poster of the Party of Growth in Moscow, Russia, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Russia's parliamentary election will be held on Sunday. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko)

Young people distribute election leaflets at an election poster of the Just Russia party in St. Petersburg, Russia, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Russia's parliamentary election will be held on Sunday. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky)

An election ad of the nationalist party Rodina, or Homeland, is printed on a pavement in Moscow, Russia, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Russia's parliamentary election will be held on Sunday. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko)

A man distributes election leaflets of the Kremlin-backed United Russia party in Moscow, Russia, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Russia's parliamentary election will be held on Sunday. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin)

People walk in the Russian Central Election Commission headquarters in Moscow, Russia on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Russia's parliamentary election will be held on Sunday. (AP Photo/Ivan Sekretarev)

People walk past an election poster of the nationalist party Rodina, or Homeland, in Moscow, Russia, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Russia's parliamentary election will be held on Sunday. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin)
3 mentally disabled brothers found dead after house fire

NEW CASTLE, Pa. (AP)  Three mentally disabled brothers were found dead in a house fire that appears to have been fueled by a flammable liquid in several spots.

The deaths are being treated as homicides because of the discovery of the flammable liquid. Police haven't ruled out that one or more of the brothers may have started the blaze Thursday in Shenango Township, and stressed that there's no immediate threat to the public.

Richard Fombelle, 57; Robert Fombelle, 56; and Daniel Fombelle, 50, had lived alone in the home since their mother died. Nearly everyone else who lives on the secluded, dead-end road is related, including the men's aunt, who lives next door. Family members contacted Friday declined to comment.

In this Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016 photo, firefighters battle a house fire in New Castle, Pa. Three mentally disabled brothers were found dead in the house fire that appears to have been fueled by a flammable liquid in several spots. (Dan Irwin/New Castle News via AP)

"The aunt next door could smell smoke around 5 o'clock this morning," state police Cpl. Jeffrey Martin said Thursday. "They investigated in her house and couldn't find anything. It wasn't until 7:30 (a.m.) when someone passing the house actually saw the fire."

A relative who called 911 said the brothers were mentally disabled, but police and family members haven't specified their disabilities.

Township fire officials initially said they found nobody inside the house, even after searching the basement. The bodies were found hours later, close to one another in a portion of the basement not immediately accessible, police said.

Autopsies were expected Friday, though investigators suspect the men died from smoke inhalation, Lt. Eric Hermick said.

Police couldn't immediately be reached for comment Friday, but they told reporters at the scene that the case is suspicious and being treated as a homicide case pending further tests on the evidence and more investigation.

A dog trained to assist in arson investigations determined the fuel used to start the fire also was found inside a vehicle outside the home that burned. Some fuel was spilled outside the residence, and in at least two other spots in the home where the fire began, police said.

"Right now, we are going to start it at the worst-case scenario and rule it as a homicide for now, and work backwards from there," Hermick said.

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This story has been corrected to show the spelling of the state police lieutenant's name is Hermick, not Helmick, and to show the spelling of the brothers' last name is Fombelle, not Fombell.
The Latest: Clinton campaign protests Trump comment on guns

WASHINGTON (AP)  The Latest on the U.S. presidential race (all times EDT):

9:45 p.m.

Hillary Clinton's campaign is protesting what it calls Donald Trump's "pattern of inciting people to violence."

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks during a campaign rally at the James L. Knight Center, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016, in Miami. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci)

The campaign is reacting to remarks Trump made at a rally in Florida Friday night, when he called for Clinton's Secret Service agents to be stripped of their firearms  and then added, "let's see what happens to her."

Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook has released a statement saying, "This kind of talk should be out of bounds for a presidential candidate."

Mook says, "It is time Republican leaders stand up to denounce this disturbing behavior in their nominee."

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8 p.m.

Donald Trump says the United States has a broader obligation to stand with oppressed people  a comment that seems at odds with his "America first" mantra.

Trump said at a rally in Miami Friday that the people of Venezuela "are yearning to be free" and "yearning for help."

He says, "the next president of the United States must stand in solidarity with all people oppressed in our hemisphere, and we will stand with oppressed people, and there are many."

Trump has often cited the country as a model of a failed state, warning that if rival Hillary Clinton is elected, she'll turn the U.S. into Venezuela.

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7:40 p.m.

Donald Trump says that, if he's elected president, he will reverse President Barack Obama's efforts to normalize relations with Cuba  unless the country abides by certain "demands."

Trump says at a Miami rally that those demands will include religious and political freedom for the Cuban people and the freeing of all political prisoners.

Trump says he'll "stand with the Cuban people in their fight against communist oppression."

The comment marks yet another reversal for the GOP candidate, who previously said he supported the idea of normalized relations, but wished the U.S. had negotiated a better deal.

"Fifty years is enough," he told the Daily Caller last year.

Trump on Friday called the deal "one-sided" and said it only benefits the Castro regime.

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7:30 p.m.

Hillary Clinton says it's "especially tricky for women" to balance the upbeat nature of a presidential campaign with the serious national security responsibilities of the White House.

Clinton says in an interview on NBC's "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon" that Republicans noted she looked "so serious" during a recent forum on national security. She says you don't talk about the Islamic State group "with a big grin on your face."

Clinton says it's a "constant balancing act" to keep a positive spirit while "taking seriously" the issues she needs to discuss as a candidate.

Fallon jokingly donned a white surgical mask and rubbed Purell in his hands after greeting Clinton, who had a recent bout with pneumonia. Fallon's interview with Clinton airs Monday.

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7 p.m.

Donald Trump is again calling for Hillary Clinton's Secret Service agents to be stripped of their firearms  this time adding, "let's see what happens to her."

The Republican nominee often makes sarcastic calls for Clinton's bodyguards to be disarmed, incorrectly suggesting she wants to overturn the 2nd Amendment.

He went a little further Friday night in Miami.

He says: "Take their guns away, she doesn't want guns. Take their  and let's see what happens to her. Take their guns away. OK, it would be very dangerous."

Trump's meaning was not immediately clear. But it was reminiscent of his suggestion last month that "Second Amendment people" could do something to stop Clinton from appointing Supreme Court justices.

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6:30 p.m.

Donald Trump is taking the stage in Miami with a new backdrop  a tribute to the French Revolution with the banner "Les Deplorables."

The song "Do You Hear the People Sing?" from the Broadway hit "Les Miserables" played as Trump saluted the crowd at the James L. Knight Center.

"Welcome to all of you deplorables!" Trump said. The screen behind him glowed with a mock-up of Trump and some supporters in French Revolutionary garb.

The Republican nominee has relentlessly criticized his opponent, Hillary Clinton, for suggesting half of Trump's supporters belong in "a basket of deplorables."

Trump has taken to saying he will be the president "for all Americans, even those who don't vote for me."

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5:50 p.m.

Donald Trump is promising to "be a friend" to Haitian-Americans during an appearance in the Miami neighborhood known as Little Haiti.

The Republican presidential nominee appeared at the Little Haiti Visitors Center on Friday and accused his opponent, Hillary Clinton, and her husband of profiting off Haiti's 2010 earthquake.

Trump claimed "a lot of money" was funneled to "Clinton cronies" and said the community "deserved better."

The Clinton Foundation had a mixed record with its efforts to rebuild Haiti, but no evidence that the Clintons committed any wrongdoing has been produced.

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5:25 p.m.

Joe Arpaio, the Arizona sheriff who's become famous for his hard-line stance on immigration, is coming under new criticism for his investigation of President Barack Obama's birth certificate.

Arpaio launched an investigation in 2012 that remained open as late as two months ago. He defended the investigation by saying people in his county had requested it.

Paul Penzone, Arpaio's Democratic opponent in the November election, says the investigation is "nonsense" and a waste of resources.

Arpaio's campaign manager and the sheriff's office didn't respond to requests for comment.

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump acknowledged Friday that Obama was born in the United States.

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3:35 p.m.

Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump will be the only two candidates at the first presidential debate.

The commission overseeing the debates invited the two major-party candidates to its Sept. 26 event on Friday. Libertarian party nominee Gary Johnson and Green Party nominee Jill Stein did not get invited.

The commission said the two third-party candidates didn't register enough support in polls to qualify. The commission has set a 15 percent threshold. Johnson averaged 8.4 percent in the polls the commission considered, and Stein 3.2 percent.

The third-party candidates could qualify for either of the final two debates in October if their polling average clears 15 percent then. But by missing out on the initial debate, they are losing their best chance to gain the attention needed to achieve that.

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3:20 p.m.

Michelle Obama says President Barack Obama has responded to those who question whether he was born in the United States by "going high when they go low."

Mrs. Obama is in northern Virginia, headlining her first campaign rally for Hillary Clinton.

Mrs. Obama said there are those who continue to challenge her husband's citizenship "up to this very day." She never mentioned Donald Trump by name, but her comments came hours after the Republican nominee acknowledged for the first time that Obama was born in the U.S.

Trump has been the chief promoter of false accusations about the president's country of birth.

Mrs. Obama said it is "excruciatingly clear" that Clinton is the only candidate in the race prepared for the presidency.

____

1:55 p.m.

The head of the Congressional Black Caucus is calling Donald Trump a "disgusting fraud" after the Republican presidential nominee reversed course after five years and said President Barack Obama was born in the United States.

Democratic Rep. G.K. Butterfield of North Carolina made the comments Friday shortly after Trump, who has been a leader of the "birther" movement for several years, made his statement.

Other members of the CBC told reporters that Trump has tried to delegitimize Obama, the first African-American president. California Rep. Barbara Lee called Trump a liar.

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1:30 p.m.

Ohio Gov. John Kasich says the presidential election is "almost surreal" and stranger than fiction.

He says if the story of the election were pitched in Hollywood, it would be rejected as too unbelievable.

The former Republican presidential candidate made the comments at the White House Friday. Kasich met with President Barack Obama and other backers of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal.

Kasich tried to resist commenting on campaign and his party's nominee. But shortly before he spoke, Republican Donald Trump announced he does accept that Obama was born in the United States, after years of questioning that fact.

Kasich joked that Bruce Springsteen has to be happy by the news, "because 'Born in the USA' is probably going to sell a lot more albums."

___

1:20 p.m.

Hillary Clinton says on Twitter that Donald Trump's news conference about President Barack Obama's citizenship was a "disgrace," and her Republican rival expressed "zero regret" for years of "pushing a racist conspiracy theory."

Clinton said in a series of tweets Friday that when Trump tries to "deflect blame" for denying that Obama was born in the United States, her Republican opponent "is lying."

The Democratic presidential nominee said "leading the birther movement is deplorable," and trying to say that Trump "did a great service" to Obama "is asinine."

Trump had made brief remarks earlier Friday in which he finally acknowledged that Obama was born in the United States. He also claimed he had put falsehoods about the president's birth to rest. Trump had long been the most prominent "birther," the name given to those who propagated the false claim that Obama was born outside of the country.

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1 p.m.

A federal judge in San Diego has denied Donald Trump's request for a five-week delay to a trial to determine whether the now-defunct Trump University defrauded customers.

U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel ruled Thursday that the trial will begin Nov. 28, as previously scheduled.

Trump attorney Daniel Petrocelli asked the judge to delay the trial to Jan. 2 because he must be in Los Angeles Nov. 15 for another trial. The judge in that case rejected a delay.

Trump has repeatedly criticized Curiel's handling of the case, suggesting bias because of the judge's Mexican heritage.

Curiel says the class-action lawsuit targeting Trump University is more than six years old and Trump's attorneys did not raise scheduling concerns until late August.

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12:45 p.m.

Hillary Clinton's campaign manager is calling Donald Trump's actions "disgraceful" after the Republican presidential nominee finally acknowledged that President Barack Obama was born in the United States, then claimed credit for putting the issue to rest.

Robby Mook said in a statement Friday that after five years of "pushing a racist conspiracy theory into the mainstream, it was appalling to watch Trump appoint himself the judge of whether the president of the United States is American."

Mook says this "sickening display" shows why "Trump is totally unfit be president."

Mook's statement came shortly after Trump, at his Washington hotel, made brief remarks aimed at putting the false conspiracy theory to rest. Trump also claimed the so-called birther movement was started by Clinton. There is no evidence that is true.

___

12:20 p.m.

Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Kaine says he's not thinking about preparing to become president should anything happen to running mate Hillary Clinton.

In an interview for "On Air with Ryan Seacrest" that aired Friday, the Virginia senator was asked how someone in his position prepares to suddenly become president. Kaine laughed and said, "You don't think about that."

Instead, Kaine said he's focused on making an eventual Clinton administration successful.

Kaine insists that Clinton's recent health scare didn't increase pressure on him to look presidential in case he is unexpectedly pushed into the White House.

Clinton took three days off to recover from pneumonia this week. But she returned to campaigning Thursday saying the time away gave her new perspective on why she's running.

___

11:55 a.m.

Donald Trump ignored reporters shouting questions after he delivered his brief statement reversing his long-held position that President Barack Obama was born outside of the United States.

Trump addressed the so-called "birther" controversy Friday at a campaign event at his new hotel in Washington.

Trump was the nation's most prominent birther, which helped fuel his political rise. As recently as this week, he declined to say where he believes Obama was born. He did not say Friday why he changed his mind or when.

Trump spoke only after first extolling the virtues of his new hotel and after more than 20 minutes of veterans touting the Republican nominee, allowing the candidate to drape himself in patriotism  and receive free publicity from the cable networks carrying the event live.

___

11:40 a.m.

Donald Trump has finally acknowledged the fact that President Barack Obama was born in the United States.

Trump said Friday that "that President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period."

As he did so, the Republican nominee repeated the conspiracy theory that Hillary Clinton's 2008 campaign for president started the so-called the "birther controversy."

There is no evidence that is true, and Clinton and her allies have strongly denied that suggestion.

Trump says of the "birther" movement: "I finished it. You know what I mean."

The Republican nominee has for years been the most prominent "birther," the name given to those who propagated the falsehood that Obama was born outside of the country.

____

11 a.m.

President Barack Obama says he thinks most people know he was born in the United States, and he hopes the election to replace him focuses on "more serious issues."

Obama responded briefly Friday morning to a reporter's question about Republican Donald Trump's recent refusal to say that Obama was born in the United States. A campaign statement later acknowledged Trump's American birth.

Trump helped fuel the so-called birther movement, which falsely claimed Obama was born outside the U.S.

Obama says he's "pretty confident about where I was born, I think most people were, as well."

He said he was "not that shocked" that the question would come up. Obama made the comment before a meeting to discuss free trade.

Obama says, "We've got so many other things to do."

___

10:05 a.m.

Hillary Clinton says rival Donald Trump owes President Barack Obama and the American people an apology for his role in the so-called "birther" movement that questioned the president's American citizenship.

Clinton said at an event with black women that Trump's campaign was "founded on this outrageous lie" and "there is no erasing it."

She says Trump is feeding into the "worst impulses, the bigotry and bias" that lurks in the nation.

Clinton responded to a Trump campaign statement released late Thursday that acknowledged Obama's U.S. birth. Trump was expected to talk to reporters Friday morning at his new hotel in Washington, less than a mile from where Clinton was speaking.

___

10 a.m.

Hillary Clinton's running mate says his views on immigration were "definitely" shaped by living in Honduras as a Roman Catholic missionary in the 1980s.

In an interview with NPR's Morning Edition that aired Friday, Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine recalled Donald Trump decrying immigrants, many from Mexico, as rapists and criminals. But Kaine said that what he saw in Honduras was the value of "family and faith and hard work."

Kaine said that taught him to never "tolerate somebody just using a broad brush to trash somebody because of their national origin."

Asked about Americans frightened about violence spilling into the United States from the southern border, Kaine said he supports "comprehensive" immigration reform, including better border protection.

He said of enhanced border security: "of course you need to do it."

___

9:55 a.m.

Donald Trump says he's "going to make a big announcement" about whether he still believes President Barack Obama was born outside the U.S. in a statement Friday.

Trump has convened the press at his new Washington hotel.

He said on Fox Business Network earlier Friday that he's "going to be making a major statement on this whole thing" and what he claims his rival Hillary Clinton "did" to fuel it.

Trump is repeating the unsubstantiated claim that Clinton questioned Obama's birthplace during the 2008 Democratic primary.

He said: "She is the one that started it, and she was unable or incapable of finishing it. That's the way it worked out."

Trump is also taking credit for successfully getting Obama to release his birth certificate in 2011.

___

9:30 a.m.

Bernie Sanders is urging his supporters not to vote for a third-party candidate in November because doing so might deny Hillary Clinton the support she needs to defeat Donald Trump.

Sanders is the longest-serving independent in the history of Congress and was Clinton's opponent in the Democratic primary. But he says trying to buck the two-party system in this particular presidential election is too risky.

In an interview with MSNBC's "Morning Joe," Sanders said anyone casting a protest vote should imagine four years of Trump as president.

He added: "Let us elect Hillary Clinton as president, and the day after, let us mobilize millions of people around the progressive agenda" adopted as part of the Democratic platform.

___

8:55 a.m.

Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Kaine says he thinks some supporters of Donald Trump "are motivated by dark emotions."

Kaine was trying to explain on National Public Radio the remark by Hillary Clinton that half of Trump's backers belong in a "basket of deplorables."

Kaine said Thursday that Clinton has a duty to draw attention to the messages of some Trump supporters.

Kaine said some "are motivated by dark emotions that are not in accord with American values." He says "silence in the face of divisive, bigoted comments allows it to grow."

Kaine also touched on Clinton's bout with pneumonia, saying she wasn't trying to hide the illness but that she just decided to try to power through it.

___

8:30 a.m.

Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid is bristling at Donald Trump's attempt to make fun of him.

Trump told The Washington Post that Reid "should go back and start working out again with his rubber work-out pieces." Reid fell and broke several ribs and facial bones last year when an exercise band snapped during a workout.

Reid said in a statement Thursday that Trump can make fun of the injury that crushed the side of his face and cost him the sight in his right eye. Reid said, "I've dealt with tougher opponents than him."

Reid said that with his good eye, he sees that Trump inherited his money but pretends he earned it.

The Republican nominee lashed after being told Reid had said that Trump is "not slim and trim."

___

7:50 a.m.

Donald Trump Jr. says his father recognizes that President Barack Obama was born in the United States, but he doesn't know if his father will say so himself.

Speaking Friday on ABC's "Good Morning America," Trump's son said a statement by the campaign Thursday night acknowledging Obama's U.S. birth "should be the definitive end" of questions about Trump's views.

The Republican presidential nominee has been most prominent proponent of the "birther" movement casting doubt on Obama's birthplace. On Thursday, Trump declined to address the matter when asked about it by The Washington Post. The campaign later issued its statement.

Trump Jr. said the statement reflected his father's views. He said, "This is coming from him."

Asked if his father would say it, Trump Jr. said, "I don't know."

___

3:30 a.m.

Hillary Clinton returned to campaigning without offering apologies for keeping her pneumonia a secret, focusing on criticizing opponent Donald Trump instead of the three-day rest ordered by her doctor.

To the strains of James Brown's "I Feel Good," Clinton reappeared on the campaign trail Thursday at a North Carolina rally. It was the Democratic presidential nominee's first public outing since she stumbled and needed support from aides while leaving a 9/11 memorial in New York last Sunday. The episode, caught on video, was attributed to dizziness and dehydration, and led to an acknowledgement that she'd been diagnosed with pneumonia two days earlier.

In New York, Trump announced plans to lower taxes by $4.4 trillion over a decade and cut regulations. A revised tax code is a centerpiece of Trump's plan.

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks during a gathering with military leaders and veterans at the new Trump International Hotel in Washington, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks during a campaign event at Trump International Hotel, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016, in Washington. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci)

The campaign planes for Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump are parked nearby each other on the tarmac at Washington's Ronald Reagan National Airport, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks during a campaign rally at Laconia Middle School, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Laconia, N.H. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci)

Democratic vice presidential candidate, Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va. speaks to supporters during a campaign stop, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Portsmouth, N.H. (AP Photo/Jim Cole)

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks to the Economic Club of New York, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in New York. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci)
PICTURED: The many faces of the female faithful at the hajj

MECCA, Saudi Arabia (AP)  The annual hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia, required of able-bodied Muslims once in their life, brings the Islamic world together across its many languages, ethnicities and individual beliefs  something seen across the many faces of its female faithful.

Arabs, Africans, Asians, Europeans and those from the Americas all followed what tradition holds is the path of the Prophet Muhammad up Jabal al-Rahma, or the Mountain of Mercy. There, the Quran says the prophet delivered his final sermon calling for equality, unity and women's rights.

Women also walked along the path believed to be followed by Abraham's wife, Hagar, when she found the Zamzam water spring to save her son.

In this Sunday, Sept. 11, 2016 photo, Fatma, 25, from Ghana carries her son Hisou as she poses for a photograph in Arafat during the annual hajj pilgrimage, near the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Fatma walked with her son from Madina to Mecca to Arafat and will complete her pilgrimage by walking and not using any vehicles. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

Wanting to follow those examples, a 25-year-old Ghanaian woman who gave her name only as Fatma over concerns about her personal safety carried her infant son Hisou slung over her back, walking long distances in a show of piety.

"I walked from Medina to Mecca to Arafat and I will continue to Muzdalifa then to Mina, carrying my son on my back because this is my faith to do it the right way," she said.

During the hajj, women wear the hijab, a scarf to cover their hair in deference to God. Some decide to return home and continue covering their hair in respect. But for others, their faith isn't tied to the scarf.

"I am not convinced that hijab is a must and sign of faith," said 36-year-old Lebanese woman Dalia, who gave only her first name out of concern of her views affecting her career. "I have been treating people in a way I believe is ethical and human. I will continue to do so after the hajj."

Although gender inequality persists today in parts of the Muslim world, women played a prominent part in the founding of Islam, with the Prophet Muhammad's wife, Khadijah, becoming its first convert. And today, the women who took part in this year's hajj say they found a peace and fulfillment for taking part in the pilgrimage.

"The hajj to me is a combination of childhood dreams coming true and it has taught me unity and diversity," said 29-year-old South African Fathima Akoo.

Here is a selection of images by Associated Press photographer Nariman El-Mofty showing the diversity among the women who took part in this year's hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia.

___

Follow Nariman El-Mofty on Twitter at www.twitter.com/NMofty and on Instagram at www.instagram.com/narimanelmofty .

___

Follow AP photographers and photo editors on Twitter: http://apne.ws/15Oo6jo

In this Sunday, Sept. 11, 2016 photo, an Egyptian woman prays inside the women's camp in Arafat during the annual hajj pilgrimage, near the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. The pilgrimage, required of able-bodied Muslims once in their life, brings the Islamic world together across its many languages, ethnicities and individual beliefs. Thats something seen across the many faces of its female faithful. Many who took part in this years pilgrimage described finding peace and fulfillment by taking part in it.(AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2016 photo, Fathima Akoo a 29 year-old Muslim educator and accountant from South Africak, poses for a photograph inside an only women's camp in Mina, Saudi Arabia. "The hajj to me is a combination of childhood dreams coming true. It's taught me unity and diversity," says Akoo on her experience during the hajj. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016 photo, a Saudi girl gets caught in the crowd of women visiting Al-Masjid an-Nabawi or Prophet Muhammad's Mosque, which situates Muhammad's tomb, as she looks for her mother, in Medina, Saudi Arabia. During the hajj, women wear the hijab, a scarf to cover their hair in deference to God. Some decide to return home and continue covering their hair in respect. But for others, their faith isnt tied to the scarf. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Sunday, Sept. 11, 2016 photo, 70-year old Fatma Mohammed from upper Egypt poses for a photograph as she rests in her tent in Arafat, near the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Mohammed arrived by bus with a group to make her first Hajj pilgrimage. "The hajj was a lifetime dream for me," says Mohammed. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Sunday, Sept. 11, 2016 photo, an African woman makes her way alone through the crowd towards a rocky hill known as the Mountain of Mercy, on the Plain of Arafat, during the annual hajj pilgrimage, near the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Arabs, Africans, Asians, Europeans and those from the Americas all followed what tradition holds is the path of the Prophet Muhammad up Jabal al-Rahma, or the Mountain of Mercy. There, the Quran says the prophet delivered his final sermon calling for equality, unity and womens rights. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Sunday, Sept. 11, 2016 photo, Indonesian women make their way down after prayer on a rocky hill known as the Mountain of Mercy, on the Plain of Arafat, during the annual hajj pilgrimage, near the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Sunday, Sept. 11, 2016 photo, an Iraqi woman uses her prayer beads to make tasbeeh, or meditation, inside the women's camp in Arafat during the annual hajj pilgrimage, near the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Sunday, Sept. 11, 2016 photo, Syrian women from Hama make their way down after prayer on a rocky hill known as the Mountain of Mercy, on the Plain of Arafat, during the annual hajj pilgrimage, near the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Sunday, Sept. 11, 2016 photo, 60-year old Mariam Abdel Karim from Sudan poses for a photograph as she prays on a rocky hill known as the Mountain of Mercy, on the Plain of Arafat, during the annual hajj pilgrimage, near the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Karim walked from Madina to Mecca to Arafat and will complete her pilgrimage by walking. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2016 photo, Saudi women cast stones at a pillar symbolizing the stoning of Satan, in a ritual called "Jamarat," the last rite of the annual hajj, in Mina near the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. The annual hajj pilgrimage, required of able-bodied Muslims once in their life, brings the Islamic world together across its many languages, ethnicities and individual beliefs _ something seen across the many faces of its female faithful. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2016 photo, 36-year old Dalia from Lebanon takes off her hijab to start performing Wudu, a ritual of washing before prayer, inside an only women's camp in Mina, Saudi Arabia. "I am not convinced that hijab is a must and sign of faith. I have been treating people with what I believe is ethical and human. I will continue to do so after the hajj. The Hajj was an opportunity though to look deep into myself and rediscover my faith and maybe to recall its importance in my life. I learned again how to pray after I stopped for more than 25 years," says Dalia on her experience during the hajj. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Thursday, Sept. 8, 2016 photo, Amria from Dagestan, Russia, poses for a photograph near the Kaaba, Islam's holiest site, at the Grand Mosque in the Muslim holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. The annual hajj pilgrimage, required of able-bodied Muslims once in their life, brings the Islamic world together across its many languages, ethnicities and individual beliefs _ something seen across the many faces of its female faithful. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016 photo, a Saudi woman teaches Islam to women in Al-Masjid an-Nabawi or Prophet Muhammad's Mosque, which situates Muhammad's tomb, in Medina, Saudi Arabia. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)
2 arrests reported in probe of Belgian group

BRUSSELS (AP)  Belgian prosecutors say three houses have been searched and two people arrested in connection with an ongoing investigation into the activities of a suspected terrorist group.

Ester Natus, a spokeswoman for the Federal Prosecutor's Office, said Friday's developments were not connected to the attacks claimed by the Islamic State group in Brussels and Paris that killed a total of 162 people over the last year.

Natus provided no details about the activities in which the suspects allegedly engaged or were planning.

The prosecutor's office said in a statement that the searched houses are located in the Schaarbeek and Haren neighborhoods of Brussels, and in the eastern city of Liege,
North Korea rushes to get supplies, shelter to flood victims

ONSONG, North Korea (AP)  North Korean soldiers and relief teams rushed to clear roads and railway tracks, build shelters and provide food and sanitation Friday to tens of thousands of residents in a remote part of the country near the Chinese border that was devastated by heavy downpours and flash floods when a typhoon pounded their villages last week.

Strong winds and flash floods caused by Typhoon Lionrock have killed more than 130 people, destroyed tens of thousands of homes and crippled infrastructure in North Korea's northern tip, according to officials in Pyongyang, the capital, and international aid organizations.

Workers in hard hats and rubber boots used shovels and formed lines on Friday to hand-remove rocks and rubble from flooded areas in Onsong County, where damage was severe, and tried to clear twisted railroad tracks so work could begin to repair them.

Workers repair the flood-damaged train track between SinJon and KanPhyong train stations in North Hamgyong Province, North Korea, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. North Korean soldiers and relief teams rushed to clear roads and railway tracks, build shelters and provide food and sanitation Friday to tens of thousands of residents in a remote part of the country near the Chinese border that was devastated by heavy downpours and flash-floods when a typhoon pounded their villages last week. (AP Photo/Kim Kwang Hyon)

"This flooding in Onsong County is worse than ever before and has resulted in very servere damage," said Sok Gyong U, director of the Municipal Administration Bureau of Onsong County People's Committee. "The first floors of apartment buildings in this area were flooded and buried by earth for several days, so the people here had to move out to take shelter."

A U.N. report issued by the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said the floods displaced tens of thousands of people and destroyed homes, buildings and critical infrastructure.

The U.N. report said the government has confirmed 133 people were killed and another 395 were missing. It said more than 35,500 houses, schools and public buildings were damaged, with 69 percent completely destroyed. It reported widespread inundation of farmland.

North Korean media said it was the worst single case of downpours and high winds since 1945, though that claim couldn't be verified.

Patrick Fuller, Asia Pacific spokesman for the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent, which is on the ground in the affected area, said about 140,000 people are in urgent need of help, including food, water and shelter.

He said that in some villages virtually every building has been partially or completely destroyed, with watermarks on some buildings above head level, indicating how inundated some of the villages were by the waters.

"This is certainly worse than flooding we have seen in recent years and the picture is still unfolding," he said in an interview with Associated Press Television News in Bangkok on Tuesday. "Now, 100,000 people have been displaced from their homes so the challenges of providing shelter for those people in the short and long term are going to be immense."

The OCHA report said humanitarian agencies have released relief materials from their stockpiles inside North Korea, including food, shelter and kitchen kits, water purification and sanitation supplies and emergency health supplies. Aid agencies have also stressed the importance of constructing shelters before the onset of North Korea's bitterly cold winter.

Local officials in Onsong told the AP the first snows of winter are expected to begin falling next month and the ground will be frozen, so they are rushing to build "tens of thousands" of dwellings for flood victims. They said repairing and opening roads and railroads are a top priority so that more supplies and heavy equipment can be brought in.

The hardest-hit areas are Musan and Yonsa counties, near the Chinese border in the northern tip of the country. Musan, Yonsa and Onsong are all in North Hamgyong province.

North Korea has made dealing with the disaster a top priority, sending brigades of soldiers and workers from around the country to help victims, provide medicines and build shelters.

The North Korean media have reported that a 200-day "loyalty campaign" already underway to mobilize the nation behind leader Kim Jong Un has been switched to a call for all citizens to support the recovery effort.

In a very North Korean twist, state media on Thursday reported that an "art agitation squad," including an opera troupe and members of the National Circus, has been dispatched from Pyongyang to encourage the flood victims and relief workers.

The flooding occurred around the Tumen River, which runs between North Korea and China.

North Korea experiences frequent natural disasters that are more devastating because of its often problematic infrastructure and lack of civil engineering projects designed to mitigate damage.

In August last year, major downpours followed by flash floods killed at least 40 people and devastated parts of the Rason area, near the Russian and Chinese borders where a key special economic zone is located.

A series of floods and droughts were a contributing factor in the disastrous famine years of the 1990s  called the "arduous march" in North Korea  that nearly brought the country to economic ruin.

A repeat of that scenario is highly unlikely since the problems in the 1990s were heightened by much broader economic and political difficulties related to the collapse of the Soviet Union and its satellites, which had traditionally been some of North Korea's most important trading partners and allies.

Even so, Fuller said the latest flooding could cause food supply problems down the road.

"We don't know yet how much of the rice crop or the cereal crop was totally destroyed but in a situation where the food security situation in normal times is pretty precarious this could really have a detrimental impact," he said. "It could possibly be a second disaster in the months ahead."

___

Talmadge, the AP's Pyongyang bureau chief, contributed from Tokyo.

Workers repair the flood-damaged train track between Sinjon and Kanphyong train stations in North Hamgyong Province, North Korea, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. North Korean soldiers and relief teams rushed to clear roads and railway tracks, build shelters and provide food and sanitation Friday to tens of thousands of residents in a remote part of the country near the Chinese border that was devastated by heavy downpours and flash-floods when a typhoon pounded their villages last week. (AP Photo/Kim Kwang Hyon)

Workers recover cement blocks flood-damaged areas in Onsong, North Hamgyong Province, North Korea, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. North Korean soldiers and relief teams rushed to clear roads and railway tracks, build shelters and provide food and sanitation Friday to tens of thousands of residents in a remote part of the country near the Chinese border that was devastated by heavy downpours and flash-floods when a typhoon pounded their villages last week. (AP Photo/Kim Kwang Hyon)

Workers recover cement blocks from flood-damaged areas in Onsong, North Hamgyong Province, North Korea, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. North Korean soldiers and relief teams rushed to clear roads and railway tracks, build shelters and provide food and sanitation Friday to tens of thousands of residents in a remote part of the country near the Chinese border that was devastated by heavy downpours and flash-floods when a typhoon pounded their villages last week. (AP Photo/Kim Kwang Hyon)

Workers recover useable materials flood-damaged areas in Onsong, North Hamgyong Province, North Korea, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. North Korean soldiers and relief teams rushed to clear roads and railway tracks, build shelters and provide food and sanitation Friday to tens of thousands of residents in a remote part of the country near the Chinese border that was devastated by heavy downpours and flash-floods when a typhoon pounded their villages last week. (AP Photo/Kim Kwang Hyon)

Workers repair the flood-damaged train track between Sinjon and Kanphyong train stations in North Hamgyong Province, North Korea, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. North Korean soldiers and relief teams rushed to clear roads and railway tracks, build shelters and provide food and sanitation Friday to tens of thousands of residents in a remote part of the country near the Chinese border that was devastated by heavy downpours and flash-floods when a typhoon pounded their villages last week. (AP Photo/Kim Kwang Hyon)

Workers repair the flood-damaged train track between Sinjon and Kanphyong train stations in North Hamgyong Province, North Korea, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. North Korean soldiers and relief teams rushed to clear roads and railway tracks, build shelters and provide food and sanitation Friday to tens of thousands of residents in a remote part of the country near the Chinese border that was devastated by heavy downpours and flash-floods when a typhoon pounded their villages last week. (AP Photo/Kim Kwang Hyon)
Protest targets rail line over Kenya's oldest wildlife park

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP)  Angry protesters marched in Kenya's capital on Friday against plans to build an elevated railway line over the country's oldest national park, saying it will threaten wildlife that includes lions, leopards and giraffes.

The Chinese project would cross six kilometers of Nairobi National Park. Dozens of conservationists and others carried banners saying "Don't rape our park."

World-renowned paleontologist Richard Leakey, the current chairman of the Kenya Wildlife Service, earlier this week said the elevated railway will not harm animals and was the best option.

Kenyans hold up signs as they attend a protest to protect the Nairobi National Park in Nairobi, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. Dozens of angry people have marched in the Kenyan capital Nairobi to protest plans to build a railway line over a national park. The protesters included conservationists and others who wore T-shirts and carried banners saying "don't rape our park." (AP Photo/Khalil Senosi)

"From a housefly to a giraffe, there will be free passage once this construction is completed," he said.

But environmental and other groups have vowed to fight the plan.

"It's our heritage," Nkamunu Patita, a community activist, said Friday.

The chairman of a coalition for wildlife conservation handed the director of the Kenya Wildlife Service, Kitili Mbathi, a petition demanding an alternative route for the railway line.

Mbathi said he welcomes "alternative proposals."

The railway line would be built by China Communications Construction Company Limited and the China Road and Bridge Corporation.

Before construction can proceed, the Kenya Railway Corporation must secure the agreement of the National Environment Management Authority. An environmental and social impact assessment is needed.

"They are doing this in ways that are very unbecoming, in ways that are flouting people's rights, basically, so there will be opposition to this both privately, communally and nationally, yes, definitely," conservationist Kamweti Muto with the Conservation Alliance of Kenya said earlier this week.

Kenyans hold up signs as they attend a protest to protect the Nairobi National Park in Nairobi, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. Dozens of angry people have marched in the Kenyan capital Nairobi to protest plans to build a railway line over a national park. The protesters included conservationists and others who wore T-shirts and carried banners saying "don't rape our park." (AP Photo/Khalil Senosi)
The Latest: Americans killed fighting Islamic State return

DENVER (AP)  The Latest on American men killed fighting Islamic State coming home (all times local):

8:20 a.m.

U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter presented flags to the families of two men, who never joined the U.S. military but died fighting the Islamic State group in Syria, after their bodies arrived back in Colorado on Friday.

The caskets of Levi Shirley, 24, Jordan MacTaggart, 22, along with that of William Savage, 27, arrived Wednesday at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport after a complicated journey without ceremony.

Shirley and MacTaggart returned by train to Denver.

The bodies were delivered to their sobbing loved ones in plain, gray caskets. A team of pallbearers unloaded the caskets from an Amtrak train and lifted them into hearses while sleepy passengers watched curiously.

Savage, of Maryland, was being transported to North Carolina, where his father lives.

___

7:15 a.m.

Relatives of two Colorado men killed fighting the Islamic State group in Syria are huddling together at a train terminal waiting for their bodies to be returned home.

The bodies of Levi Shirley and Jordan MacTaggart are being repatriated Friday after a long and complicated journey.

Standing beside a pair of hearses, the families embraced to keep warm in the morning cold at Denver's Union Station.

U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter says he plans to present the families with a pair of flags flown atop the U.S. Capitol as a sign of respect.

The body of a third American, William Savage of Maryland, is being transported to North Carolina, where his father lives.

___

12:30 a.m.

Three young Americans who never joined the U.S. military but died fighting the Islamic State group in Syria will return home to military-type honors.

The caskets of Levi Shirley, Jordan MacTaggart and William Savage were due to arrive home Friday after a complicated journey without ceremony.

Shirley and MacTaggart are from Colorado. Savage, of Maryland, will be transported to North Carolina, where his father lives.

Their families will each be presented with a flag flown over the U.S. Capitol.

The men died separately in combat after joining the People's Protection Units  the main Kurdish guerrilla group battling the Islamic State in Syria.
Israeli defense minister hails best-ever Cyprus-Israel ties

NICOSIA, Cyprus (AP)  Israel's defense minister says ties between his country and neighboring Cyprus are probably at their best ever.

Avigdor Lieberman said Friday that the two countries are "very, very reliable friends," despite all the political and security problems plaguing the region.

Lieberman says the two countries are closely cooperating on numerous levels including security and the economy.

Cyprus' Foreign Minister Ioannis Kasoulides, left, welcomes Israel's Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman at the foreign ministry house in Nicosia, Cyprus, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. Liberman is in Cyprus for a one-day visit in his new ministry position. (AP Photo/Petros Karadjias)

The Israeli minister was speaking after talks with Cyprus' defense and foreign affairs ministers and its intelligence chief.

Cyprus and Israel are currently talking about jointly developing natural gas deposits discovered off their coasts. The two countries are also in negotiations with Greece to boost energy cooperation.

Last month, Cyprus and Egypt signed an agreement paving the way for supplying gas to the Arab nation via an undersea pipeline.

Israel's Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman smiles during a meeting with Cyprus' Foreign Minister Ioannis Kasoulides at the foreign ministry house in Nicosia, Cyprus, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. Liberman is in Cyprus for a one-day visit in his new ministry position. (AP Photo/Petros Karadjias)
2 men found guilty in spring break sexual assault in Florida

PANAMA CITY, Fla. (AP)  Two former students at an Alabama university are being held without bail after jurors found them guilty of sexual battery during a spring break attack in Panama City Beach.

It took the jury about two hours to reach the verdict Thursday. After their decision was announced, 23-year-old Ryan Austin Calhoun and 23-year-old Delonte Martistee were taken into custody. Sentencing was set for Oct. 21.

The assault, which investigators referred to as a "gang rape," happened in March 2015.

Jurors watched several versions of a video that showed the victim lying on a beach chair while the two former Troy University students fondled her.

The News Herald (http://bit.ly/2cBNcMu ) reports the incident, along with a couple of others that year, led to a slew of new spring break-related laws.

___
Marine pleads no contest in choking Uber driver during trip

CHESTERFIELD, Va. (AP)  A Marine has neither admitted nor denied choking an Uber driver on Interstate 95 in Chesterfield, Virginia, while the car was traveling at 65 mph.

The Richmond Times-Dispatch (http://bit.ly/2cOECgL ) reports 23-years-old Maxwell Sweeney of Mansfield, Massachusetts, pleaded no contest Thursday to unlawful wounding. He was initially charged with injuring a person through strangulation.

Sweeney was with a Marine attachment at Fort Lee when he and another serviceman got into Rene Sanchez Espinozo's car. While traveling on the highway, Sweeney and the driver got into a dispute because the passengers wanted to change their destination.

Chesterfield County prosecutor Juan Vega says Sweeney was drunk and choked Espinozo before running into the woods. Vega says Espinozo now has symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.

The judge withheld a finding of guilt until sentencing Dec. 28.

___
New Jersey school renamed for alum Buzz Aldrin

MONTCLAIR, N.J. (AP)  Students walking in the footsteps of the second man to step on the moon cheered as their New Jersey school was renamed after the famous alumnus.

Montclair's Mt. Hebron Middle School on Friday became the Buzz Aldrin Middle School.

Aldrin reminisced as he credited his experience at the school with fueling his interest in science and math.

Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin, left, salutes the crowd during the dedication ceremony of the Buzz Aldrin Middle School in Montclair, N.J., on Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. Mt. Hebron Middle School was officially renamed after the famous alumnus, the second man to step on the moon. (Patti Sapone/NJ Advance Media via AP)

The West Point and MIT graduate followed Neil Armstrong down the ladder of the lunar module to walk on the moon in 1969.

Aldrin also visited Hackensack UMC Mountainside Hospital, where he was born in 1930.
Judge OKs extradition of British man on US hacking charges

LONDON (AP)  A British man accused of hacking into U.S. military and government computer systems and stealing confidential information should be extradited to the United States to face trial, a judge ruled Friday.

Judge Nina Tempia said Lauri Love faces "extremely serious charges," and his extradition would not be disproportionate.

At Westminster Magistrates' Court, the judge said "I am satisfied Mr. Love's extradition would be compatible with his (human) rights."

British national Lauri Love, who is accused of hacking into U.S. government computers, wipes away tears while speaking to the media after the ruling that he should be extradited, outside Westminster Magistrates' Court in London, Sept. 16, 2016. A judge says Love, who is accused of hacking into U.S. government computer systems and stealing confidential information, should be extradited to the United States to face trial. Judge Nina Templa told Lauri Love on Friday that he can appeal the judgment. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham)

She said Love, who has Asperger's Syndrome, "suffers from both physical and mental health issues," but ruled that the U.S. prison system is capable of meeting his needs.

Tempia sent the case to Home Secretary Amber Rudd, who makes the final decision on extraditions.

Love has 14 days to appeal the judgment to the High Court.

U.S. prosecutors say 31-year-old Love hacked agencies including the U.S. Army, NASA, the Federal Reserve and the Environmental Protection Agency between 2012 and 2013, stealing names, Social Security numbers and credit card information.

Love, from Stradishall in eastern England, was arrested in 2013 on suspicion of computer crimes but has not been charged in Britain.

He has been charged in three U.S. states  New Jersey, New York and Virginia.

Love's lawyers say he has Asperger's, as well as eczema and asthma, and will be at risk of suicide if he is jailed in the U.S.

After the ruling, Love said he worried about the toll the long legal case is "taking on my health and my family's."

But he said "it just means that when we do win, it will have more force."

American attempts to extradite U.K. hackers have often become politicized.

Gary McKinnon, accused of hacking U.S. military computers in 2002, fought a decade-long legal battle which eventually thwarted the extradition bid.

Love's father, prison chaplain Rev. Alexander Love, said outside court that it "is not right that my son can be taken away."

"It is my belief that it is not fair or just that a boy who has mental health issues can be taken away from his family, who are his support network, merely to satisfy the desire of the Americans, to exact what I feel is vengeance on him," he said.

___

This story has been corrected to show the accurate spelling of the judge's surname is Tempia, not Templa.

Lauri Love, who is accused of hacking into U.S. government computers, sings along to a song playing on a sound system he brought with him as he waits outside Westminster Magistrates' Court, where he is due to find out whether he will be extradited from Britain to stand trial in the U.S., in London, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. Love, who has Asperger Syndrome, is accused of having stolen huge amounts of data from U.S. agencies including the Federal Reserve, the Department of Defence, Nasa and the FBI in a spate of online attacks in 2012 and 2013. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham)

British national Lauri Love, who is accused of hacking into U.S. government computers, stands with tears in his eyes while speaking to the media after the ruling that he should be extradited, outside Westminster Magistrates' Court in London, Sept. 16, 2016. A judge says Love, who is accused of hacking into U.S. government computer systems and stealing confidential information, should be extradited to the United States to face trial. Judge Nina Templa told Lauri Love on Friday that he can appeal the judgment. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham)
The Latest: Union: Cop who shot boy did what he had to do

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP)  The Latest on the fatal police shooting of a 13-year-old boy in Ohio (all times local):

12:10 p.m.

A police union leader says the Ohio officer who fatally shot a 13-year-old boy while investigating a reported armed robbery is a well-respected policeman who did what he had to do in that circumstance.

Community members light candles during a vigil for 13-year-old Tyre King Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Columbus, Ohio. King was shot and killed by Columbus police Wednesday evening. (AP Photo/Jay LaPrete)

Columbus police say Officer Bryan Mason repeatedly shot Tyre (ty-REE') King on Wednesday night after the teen ran from investigators and pulled out a BB gun that looked like a real firearm.

Jason Pappas, the president of the police union representing Mason, said Friday it's a situation no officer wants to encounter.

The case started with a 911 call about the robbery. Police say officers followed potential suspects into an alley, and Tyre pulled a weapon from his waistband and was shot.

Mason is on administrative leave as the shooting is investigated.

___

11:10 a.m.

A friend of the 13-year-old Ohio boy who was fatally shot by a policeman investigating a reported armed robbery says the boy had a BB gun that looked like a real firearm and ran from police.

Tyre (ty-REE') King was shot Wednesday night after witnesses reported a group of people had robbed a man of $10.

Nineteen-year-old Demetrius Braxton tells The Columbus Dispatch he had run away with Tyre and was with him when the shooting occurred. Braxton says police told them to get down. He says they did, but then Tyre got up and ran and was shot.

Braxton was interviewed by police but not charged.

A spokesman for Columbus police says they won't comment on how Braxton's comments compare with the officers' accounts of what happened.

___

10:15 a.m.

A coroner isn't immediately releasing autopsy details for a 13-year-old Ohio boy who police say was shot by an officer after pulling a real-looking BB gun from his waistband.

The coroner in Columbus said Friday that Tyre (ty-REE') King's autopsy was done but she isn't yet sharing details, including where he was struck. She says the official manner of death is pending.

The case started with a 911 call about an armed robbery Wednesday night. Police say officers saw three males matching the suspects' descriptions and tried to speak with them, when two of them ran off. The officers followed them into an alley. Police say Tyre pulled a gun from his waistband, and an officer shot him several times.

He died at a hospital. No one else was hurt.

___

12:20 a.m.

The fatal police shooting of a 13-year-old Columbus boy who officers said pulled a BB gun from his waistband that looked like a real weapon will be investigated thoroughly to determine if charges are warranted.

Evidence from Wednesday's shooting will automatically be presented to a grand jury.

Police say Tyre (ty-REE') King died at a children's hospital shortly after the shooting, which started with a 911 call about an armed robbery.

Police say the officers saw three males matching the descriptions of the suspects and tried to speak with them, when two of them ran off. The officers followed them into an alley when police say a suspect, later identified as Tyre, pulled a gun from his waistband, and an officer shot him several times.

Members of Tyre King's family console each other during a vigil for 13-year-old Tyre King Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Columbus, Ohio. King was shot and killed by Columbus police Wednesday evening. (AP Photo/Jay LaPrete)

Members of Tyre King's family console each other during a vigil for 13-year-old Tyre King Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Columbus, Ohio. King was shot and killed by Columbus police Wednesday evening. (AP Photo/Jay LaPrete)

Members of Tyre King's family hold hands while listening to prayer during a vigil for 13-year-old Tyre King Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Columbus, Ohio. King was shot and killed by Columbus police Wednesday evening. (AP Photo/Jay LaPrete)

Members of Tyre King's family hold signs during a vigil for 13-year-old Tyre King Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Columbus, Ohio. King was shot and killed by Columbus police Wednesday evening. (AP Photo/Jay LaPrete)

Community members hold hands for a prayer during a vigil for 13-year-old Tyre King Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in Columbus, Ohio. King was shot and killed by Columbus police Wednesday evening. (AP Photo/Jay LaPrete)

CORRECTS NAME FROM TYREE KING TO TYRE KING - Columbus Police Chief Kim Jacobs holds a news conference about the police shooting of a 13-year-old boy who pulled a BB gun from his waistband just before he was shot and killed by police investigating an armed robbery report, on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016 in Columbus, Ohio. Police say the boy, Tyre King, died at a hospital after the Wednesday evening shooting. (Fred Squillante/The Columbus Dispatch via AP)

CORRECTS NAME FROM TYREE KING TO TYRE KING -Columbus Mayor Andrew J. Ginther talks during a news conference about the police shooting of a 13-year-old boy who pulled a BB gun from his waistband just before he was shot and killed by police investigating an armed robbery report, on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016 in Columbus, Ohio. Police say the boy, Tyre King, died at a hospital after the Wednesday evening shooting. (Fred Squillante/The Columbus Dispatch via AP)

CORRECTS NAME FROM TYREE KING TO TYRE KING - Columbus Police Chief Kim Jacobs holds up a photo showing the type of BB gun that police say a 13-year-old boy pulled from his waistband just before he was shot and killed by police investigating an armed robbery report, on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016 in Columbus, Ohio. Police say the boy, Tyre King, died at a hospital after the Wednesday evening shooting. (Fred Squillante/The Columbus Dispatch via AP)

CORRECTS NAME FROM TYREE KING TO TYRE KING -Columbus Police Chief Kim Jacobs holds up a photo showing the type of BB gun that police say a 13-year-old boy pulled from his waistband just before he was shot and killed by police investigating an armed robbery report, on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016 in Columbus, Ohio. Police say the boy, Tyre King, died at a hospital after the Wednesday evening shooting. (AP Photo/Andrew Welsh-Huggins)
UK man convicted of Islamic State-inspired murder of imam

LONDON (AP)  A British man was sentenced Friday to at least 24 years in prison for the murder of a Muslim cleric who practiced a form of faith healing condemned by the Islamic State group.

A jury at Manchester Crown Court found 21-year-old Mohammed Syeedy guilty of murdering Bangladeshi imam Jalal Uddin. Uddin was bludgeoned to death with a hammer in February in a children's playground in Rochdale, northwest England.

Prosecutors said Syeedy did not carry out the attack, but helped conduct surveillance of Uddin and acted as getaway driver for the killer, 24-year-old Mohammed Kadir.

They said Syeedy was a "knowing participant" in the murder. The pair targeted 71-year-old Uddin because he practiced a form of Islamic healing involving amulets that IS considers black magic, prosecutors said.

Kadir fled Britain after the killing and authorities think he may be in Syria.

Judge David Maddison sentenced Syeedy, a former steward at Manchester United's soccer stadium, to life in prison with no chance of parole for 24 years.

The judge said Uddin was a "gentle, well-respected man" who had been brutally killed.
The bodies of two young Americans who died fighting ISIS in Syria have finally returned home.

Sobbing families of Levi Shirley, 24, and Jordan MacTaggart, 22, were reunited with their sons early Friday, in Denver.

U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter presented them with folded flags - a sign of respect for the men who never joined the U.S. military but felt a need to serve.

Their arrival home, in simple, gray caskets, is the end of a long battle for the families since the men were killed fighting in Syria several weeks ago.

Scroll down for video

The bodies of two young Americans who died fighting ISIS in Syria have finally returned home to their distraught families (Katie Shirley, joins her father, Russ, back, in touching the casket of her brother Levi Shirley)

Shirley's mother, Susan, also broke down as she touches the casket of her son as it was unloaded from an Amtrak train at Union Station early Friday

U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter, D-Colo., right, presents a flag to Susan Shirley, left, after her son died in combat after joining the People's Protection Units

'We waited for this day for nine weeks,' Shirley's father, Russell Shirley, told reporters gathered on the station platform. 'But the last thing I wanted to see was my son carried off that train.'

The men died separately in combat after joining the People's Protection Units  the main Kurdish guerrilla group battling ISIS in Syria.

The body of William Savage, 27, another American fighter who was killed in Manbij on August 10, was returned to the U.S. and was being transported to Raleigh, North Carolina, where his father, Reginald Savage, lives.

The elder Savage said he expected his son's remains would be cremated in time for a Saturday memorial in St. Mary's City, Maryland, his hometown. He planned to drive there overnight.

Levi Shirley, 24, (left) and Jordan MacTaggart, 22, (right) were killed fighting ISIS in Syria

Levi Shirley, from Colorado, died after he stepped on a landmine in Manbij

The 24-year-old vigilante (pictured in the northwestern Syrian town of Tal Tamr in April 2015) left his family home in January to fight 'injustices' alongside the Kurdish troops

The Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) said he was known for his discipline and sense of responsibility

Jordan MacTaggart (left) and Williams Savage were also killed after joining People's Protection Units

Shirley, of Arvada, Colorado, was killed by a land mine July 14. MacTaggart, of Castle Rock, Colorado, had died on August 3 while fighting in a squad that included two Americans and a Swede in Manbij, Syria.

The State Department said it worked to help return the remains of the men to their families. But Turkey's tense relationship with the Kurds and the U.S. since July's failed coup stalled the efforts.

The remains of Keith Broomfield of Massachusetts, believed to be the first American to die alongside Kurds fighting Islamic State, were returned to the U.S. through Turkey last year.

But officials determined it would be too dangerous to repatriate the bodies of Shirley, MacTaggart and Savage through Turkey and instead shipped them hundreds of miles east to Iraq. The bodies were then flown to Amman, Jordan, and on to Chicago's O'Hare International Airport in a process that took weeks.

Susan Shirley said her friends had contacted Perlmutter to help navigate the bewildering terrain. He enlisted aid from people at the White House.

One of the caskets bearing the bodies of Jordan MacTaggartt or Levi Shirley, was unloaded after they arrived by Amtrak train at Union Station early Friday in Denver

Robert MacTaggart, left, chats with U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter, D-Colo., as the caskets were unloaded

'These were good young men who for one reason or another didn't qualify for our military but felt the need to serve in another way,' Perlmutter said.

'Though they did not fight as members of our armed forces, they are Americans and as Americans we have a responsibility to bring these young men home and to give the families relief and closure,' he added.

As he handed MacTaggart's parents a folded flag, he told them quietly, 'He was trying to do something more for all of us in his fight against ISIS.'

Shirley had always wanted to join the Marines but was rejected because of his bad eyesight.

So he had reached out to Kurdish forces online and joined the fight in Iraq and Syria for about three months last year before returning to Arvada in suburban Denver.

'He saw ISIS as a terrible evil, and that just was not OK with him,' his mother said. 'That's the way his mind works. If you are defenseless, he will help you.'

She said her son was involved in about a dozen gunbattles during his first stint in the Middle East and 'that was enough to convince him that war is not as romantic as he thought.' But he had a hard time adjusting to life back in Colorado while working at fast-food restaurants.

He rejoined the Kurds in January.

Amanda MacTaggart, left, of Castle Rock, Colorado wipes away tears as she looks to her mother, Melissa, as they see the casket bearing the remains of Jordan MacTaggartt

Amanda MacTaggart, left, joins her mother, Melissa, center, and father Robert, in walking to a hearse to watch the casket of Jordan MacTaggart, being unloaded

'He had a very big heart,' Shirley said. 'He was so brave to go back the second time, knowing what he was in for. He just really cared about the underdog.'

Shirley died on July 14 after stepping on a landmine.

Like Shirley, Jordan MacTaggart's family said he went to join the fight after hearing about beheadings, stabbings and sexual assaults reportedly committed by ISIS forces. Also like Shirley, he fought in Syria, returned home and then headed back to the battlefield.

'He had a huge heart and he was always affected by any injustice,' Jordan MacTaggart's mother, Melissa MacTaggart, said from the family home in Castle Rock south of Denver. 'It would hurt him, probably more than other people, like he couldn't let it go.'

Savage also died in Manbij on August 10 while rescuing civilians from a building that was being bombed, his father said.

'Thinking of William and what he made himself into is an incredible source of joy for me,' Reginald Savage said. His son was 'torn into pieces' by the plight of the Kurds, which drew him overseas, he said.

Dozens of other Westerners are now fighting with the Kurds, spurred by social media campaigners and a sense of duty rooted in the U.S.-led military intervention in Iraq. The U.S. discourages but so far hasn't banned Americans from fighting with militias against terrorist organizations such as the Islamic State group.

On the train platform in Denver, workers loaded the plain, wooden boxes from a baggage cart into hearses. Russell Shirley, a Vietnam veteran, gave his son a final salute.

Russ Shirley of Rapid City, S.D., composes himself after looking as the casket bearing the body of his 24-year-old son

Susan Shirley, front, of Arvada, Colorado, breaks down in tears as she touches the casket of her son

Unlike fallen members of the armed forces, the young men had no military escorts to accompany their caskets and no 21-gun salute.

Still, the family members said they appreciated the quiet homecoming.

'He had no interest in ceremony,' Robert MacTaggart said of his son. 'Any of this would have been a shock to him.'

He said those fighting with his son had told him over the phone that his son had been shot in the chest while helping a soldier wounded by an improvised explosive device.

The father followed the battles of the Kurdish forces on the Internet and had contact with fighters in Syria to track his son's well-being.

Susan Shirley, said she worked with the State Department to bring her son's body home and her friends contacted Perlmutter to help navigate the frustrating terrain.

He enlisted aid from contacts at the White House.

'It took extraordinary measures by many people to get these men from Syria to the US, especially given the ever-changing and dangerous geopolitical dynamics in the Middle East,' Perlmutter said.
After legal fight, GOP seeks felon voting rights changes

RICHMOND, Va. (AP)  A Virginia Republican lawmaker is pushing for changes to the state's policy of restoring felons' voting rights in the wake of a legal battle with Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe.

Del. Greg Habeeb said Friday that he has introduced legislation that would allow non-violent felons to automatically get their voting rights back after their complete their sentence. Violent felons could get their rights back two years after they finish their sentence, but they would have to apply to the governor first.

Senate Republican Leader Thomas Norment also has proposed automatically restoring voting rights for some non-violent felons. But he wants to permanently bar violent felons from voting.
DC police update body camera police after fatal shooting

WASHINGTON (AP)  Police officers in Washington will have to confirm with dispatchers that they've turned on body cameras when responding to calls or interacting with people.

Mayor Muriel Bowser announced the change Thursday, days after she says an officer didn't activate his camera until the fatal shooting of a motorcyclist who hit a police cruiser. Police say 31-year-old Terrence Sterling, of Fort Washington, Maryland, was fatally shot early Sunday. The shooting is under investigation and the officer is on administrative leave.

Bowser says dispatchers will remind officers to turn on their cameras when relaying emergency call information and officers must acknowledge the reminder.
US imposes sanctions on militant linked to Nice attacks

WASHINGTON (AP)  The Obama administration has imposed sanctions on a French citizen considered to be one of the top Syria-based recruiters of potential militants.

Omar Diaby was added to the State Department's list of Specially Designated Global Terrorists Friday, which imposes sanctions on foreigners or groups who have committed or are looking to commit acts that threaten U.S. security. He is known for his French-language jihadi recruitment videos, notably on YouTube, and was among the first to target girls for recruitment.

The suspect who drove a 19-ton truck into crowds gathered for Bastille Day celebrations in Nice this year was found to have links to Diaby.
Brown reinstates ties to ROTC that it cut during Vietnam War

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP)  Brown University is offering students a way to train to become officers in the Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force for the first time since the Vietnam War.

Brown and other Ivy League schools closed on-campus Reserve Officer Training Corps programs amid protests against the war.

Most opposition to the programs dissolved by 2011 with repeal of the policy that banned gays from serving openly in the military.

Brown formally relaunched its participation in the Navy and Air Force ROTC on Friday, but the school won't host units on campus. Students will instead go to schools in Worcester, Massachusetts, with regional units.

Brown has continued allowing students to go to a nearby Army program.
Collective defense is suddenly a hot topic at EU summit

BRATISLAVA, Slovakia (AP)  Talk of joint efforts to defend Europe is on the lips of EU leaders after decades of leaving collective security mostly to the United States and NATO.

Nobody is suggesting a joint European army, with thousands of tanks and combat planes displaying the EU's star-studded logo. But at a summit in the Slovak capital on Friday, heads of 27 countries named common defense as one of the goals needed to bring the bloc forward as it looks to shake off a sense of inertia.

"There is no continent, there is no union, if there is no defense of what we are when it comes to values and interests," French President Francois Hollande declared.

Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico, left, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, right, alight after taking a boat down the Danube river during an EU summit in Bratislava, Slovakia, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. An EU summit, without the participation of the United Kingdom, in Bratislava will kick off the discussion on the future of EU following Brexit. (AP Photo/Virginia Mayo)

German Chancellor Angela Merkel named a common defense framework as one of the top future EU concerns.

"It's about showing through deeds that we can become better," she said, talking about "cooperation in the field of defense" in the same breath as the fight against terror, economic growth and job creation.

It's not a new idea. The EU's Lisbon Treaty, which took effect in 2009, foresaw a mechanism for permanent defense cooperation inside the bloc. Squabbles among member states, however, have kept the topic in the background at most previous meetings of European leaders.

But new perceived threats, both elemental and existential, have emerged since the treaty became law. Eastern European nations fear a bellicose Russia on their borders. Warfare overwhelmingly includes cyberattacks, violent Islamic extremism and other modern challenges.

Add the EU's desire to demonstrate decisive actions, Britain's pending exit from the bloc and continued U.S. pressure on Europe to become more independent militarily, and the idea of a common defense strategy becomes more compelling than ever.

Most EU members also are in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. But the United States carries by far the greatest burden in that defense organization. And although EU and NATO interests generally overlap, the Americans would welcome more effort from Europe to protect its own house.

U.S. President Barack Obama this year called out the EU for being "complacent about its own defense," adding: "We need a strong Europe to bear its share of the burden."

Europe may be getting the message, even amid protracted squabbling on other issues.

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said this week that the bloc must do more in the defense field, starting with creation of an EU military headquarters and working toward a common military force.

Juncker insisted the bloc's economic and cultural influence isn't enough to safeguard its place in an uncertain world, a theme picked up Friday by Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel.

Michel described European diplomatic efforts as "feeble... if we don't have military capacities."

The Bratislava meeting comes as the EU already is mapping out a global strategy that includes advancing joint defense capabilities.

Federica Mogherini, the EU's chief diplomat, told EU foreign ministers this month that plans have moved from general discussions to having "first operational results" by spring, describing them as the "real stuff."

"The European army is not something that is going to happen any time soon," she said. "But what can happen very soon is member states are committed to advance in the field of European defense with very concrete measures."

The EU already has 18 battle groups consisting of 1,500 troops each, forming the basis of an armed force, But even if those forces grow, leaders of nations most at potential risk from Russia emphasize that the EU initiative is unlikely to match the military deterrence potential packed by NATO.

"We cannot duplicate NATO, we cannot replace NATO," Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite said. "We are talking about better use of military assets."
US to Russia: Syria military cooperation not guaranteed

WASHINGTON (AP)  The United States warned Russia on Friday that potential military cooperation envisioned by a cease-fire deal in Syria will not happen unless humanitarian aid begins to flow into Aleppo and other besieged communities. The warning came as President Barack Obama's top national security aides continued to wrangle over whether and how to cooperate militarily with the Russians in the event those conditions are met.

Secretary of State John Kerry told Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in a telephone call that Moscow must persuade the Syrian government to get the aid moving or a joint facility to coordinate attacks on extremist groups and share intelligence will not be set up, the State Department said. Kerry called the delays in assistance to Aleppo "repeated" and "unacceptable" and said Russia must press Syrian President Bashar Assad to allow deliveries.

Kerry "emphasized that the United States expects Russia to use its influence on the Assad regime to allow UN humanitarian convoys to reach Aleppo and other areas in need," State Department spokesman John Kirby said. "The secretary made clear that the United States will not establish the Joint Implementation Center with Russia unless and until the agreed terms for humanitarian access are met."

Obama discussed the cease-fire agreement and the broader campaign against the Islamic State group with his national security team Friday. The White House said he expressed "deep concern" that Syria continues to block the delivery of humanitarian aid, despite decreased violence across the country.

The president emphasized that the U.S. will not proceed with the next steps in the arrangement with Russia "until we see seven continuous days of reduced violence and sustained humanitarian access," the White House said.

The agreement that Kerry and Lavrov reached last week calls for sustained delivery of humanitarian aid, along with a decrease in violence, as a requirement for the military cooperation to target Islamic State and al-Qaida-linked groups. The arrangements are very detailed on the mechanics of ending violence in Aleppo and opening up a key artery to the city for humanitarian deliveries. The agreement has not been made public but officials familiar with it have told The Associated Press it contains a highly technical series of requirements for both Assad's government and opposition forces.

These include precise calculations, in meters, on how the sides would pull back from a key artery into Aleppo and where they would have to redeploy weaponry. A main focus is on ensuring rapid, safe, unhindered and sustained humanitarian access to all people in need.

The Russian Foreign Ministry's description of the Kerry-Lavrov call said the two men had focused on implementation of the agreement that they reached a week ago in Geneva, according to Russian news agencies.

The ministry said Lavrov had once again called for the United States to make the agreement public and have the United Nations Security Council endorse it. He also restated Moscow's demand that the U.S. use its influence with opposition forces it supports to distance themselves from al-Qaida-linked fighters.

The Security Council had been scheduled to meet Friday to discuss the agreement, but the session was cancelled at the last minute because the U.S. did not want to make the details public, according to Russian and U.S. officials.

Russian ambassador to the U.N. Vitaly Churkin said there was no point in briefing the council if the U.S. did not want to say exactly what was in the deal.

A U.S. official said the session was canceled because the Russians were trying to force the U.S. make the cease-fire deal public and Washington would "not compromise operational security." The official wasn't authorized to be quoted by name and demanded anonymity.

Meanwhile, a senior Russian military official said Moscow would help ensure the cease-fire in Syria for another three days, but warned the United States to press the rebels to end violations of the truce.

Lt. Gen. Viktor Poznikhir of the Russian military's General Staff declared readiness to extend the U.S.-Russia-brokered cease-fire for another 72 hours, adding that Moscow expects Washington to take "resolute action" to end violations by the U.S.-backed opposition units. He said the Syrian army has fully complied with the truce that went into force Monday, while the opposition units have violated it 144 times since then.

The Sept. 9 agreement also sets out a broad outline of how the military cooperation facility would be set up if violence is reduced and aid delivered over the course of seven continuous days.

The Pentagon, however, has serious reservations about coordinating air strikes and sharing intelligence with Russia and has raised objections on numerous grounds, according to U.S. officials.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest downplayed the significance of divisions between the State and Defense departments on the wisdom of deepening military cooperation with Russia. But he confirmed Obama's meeting Friday with his national security advisers, including Kerry and Defense Secretary Ash Carter. The White House said the meeting was scheduled before the cease-fire deal was announced.

"The president didn't staff his national security team with 'yes' men and 'yes' women ... the president expects to receive advice based on their differing perspectives" and expertise, Earnest said. Earnest added that once Obama has made a decision, he expects his team to execute that strategy. "The president has no doubt that will happen," he said.

___
3 suspects in New Mexico girl's death plead not guilty

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP)  The three suspects charged in the horrific killing of a 10-year-old New Mexico girl have pleaded not guilty in state court.

Fabian Gonzales, Jessica Kelley and the victim's mother, Michelle Martens, are charged with child abuse resulting in death, kidnapping and tampering with evidence in connection with the killing of Victoria Martens.

The arraignment hearing came three weeks after authorities say the girl was drugged, sexually assaulted and killed Aug. 24.

Police say the girl's mother told investigators after her arrest that the other suspects drugged and assaulted the victim as she watched.
Israeli settlements have grown during the Obama years

JERUSALEM (AP)  In his landmark speech to the Arab world seven years ago, President Barack Obama warned that Israeli settlements on occupied territories were undermining hopes for peace. "It is time for these settlements to stop," he declared.

As Obama heads into the home stretch of his presidency, he leaves behind an unfulfilled vision. Not only did he fail to stop it, but he watched Israeli construction in the West Bank and east Jerusalem thrive  despite repeated White House condemnations.

According to Israeli government data obtained by The Associated Press, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pushed a wave of construction during the Obama presidency that matched, and even exceeded, the amount of building that took place under his predecessors during the Bush years.

FILE - in this Wednesday, Dec. 5, 2012 file photo, A Jewish settler looks at the West bank settlement of Maaleh Adumim, from the E-1 area on the eastern outskirts of Jerusalem. In his landmark speech to the Arab world seven years ago, President Barack Obama warned that Israeli settlements on occupied territories were undermining hopes for peace. It is time for these settlements to stop, he declared. As Obama heads into the home stretch of his presidency, he leaves behind an unfulfilled vision.(AP Photo/Sebastian Scheiner, File)

The figures show the limits of U.S. influence over its close ally and a reluctance to link financial support to Israel with policy differences. Despite the Israeli defiance over settlements and a long history of friction between Obama and Netanyahu, the two countries signed a deal this week giving Israel $38 billion in U.S. military aid over 10 years, the largest deal of its kind in American history.

Hanan Ashrawi, a senior Palestinian official, said the Obama presidency has been a disappointment for her people. After the promise of his 2009 speeches in Egypt and Turkey pledging to build bridges with the Muslim world, "it's been downhill since then," she said.

Ashrawi said she was "not surprised at all" by the figures and dismissed U.S. criticism as lip service. "They did nothing to stop it. On the contrary, they looked the other way."

The settlement figures, obtained from Israel's Central Bureau of Statistics, show that 12,288 new settlement buildings were started in the West Bank during Obama's term up to June 30, the most recent data available.

In the first half of 2016 alone, work began on 1,195 housing units, figures released this week showed.

Based on that pace of construction, the number could well exceed 13,000 housing units by the time Obama leaves office, not far behind the 14,636 begun during Bush's two terms.

Figures for east Jerusalem, where the Palestinians hope to establish their capital, show a similar story.

According to data gathered by the anti-settlement watchdog group Peace Now, there were 3,915 housing starts during Obama's term as of the end of 2015. Based on recent trends, by the time Obama leaves office that number will almost certainly surpass the 4,191 units started during the Bush years.

Obama did manage to coax Israel into a partial settlement freeze in 2009 and 2010, briefly slowing down construction. In addition, much of the construction has been confined to major "blocs" and areas of Jerusalem that Israel expects to keep under any future peace deal. But to Palestinians, these distinctions make no difference.

Israel captured the West Bank and east Jerusalem, along with the Gaza Strip, in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians claim all three territories for an independent state alongside Israel, a position that has broad international backing.

The U.S., along with the Palestinians and nearly all of the international community, considers settlements to be illegal or illegitimate, viewing them as obstacles to peace. Israel's annexation of east Jerusalem is not internationally recognized.

Over five decades, the Israeli settler population in the West Bank has grown to roughly 400,000 people in dozens of settlements, in addition to 200,000 others in areas of east Jerusalem. Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, and the territory is now controlled by the Islamic militant group Hamas.

Despite the stance that settlements are detrimental to peace, U.S. officials say the U.S. is committed to Israeli security, and that military aid cannot be linked to policy differences.

"It wasn't even hinted at during the discussions," Israel's acting national security adviser, Jacob Nagel, who negotiated the aid package, was quoted as saying by the Haaretz daily.

In a statement marking the deal, Obama said the U.S. "will also continue to press for a two-state solution to the longstanding Israeli-Palestinian conflict, despite the deeply troubling trends on the ground that undermine this goal."

The White House declined to answer questions about the success or failure of its settlement policy. But a senior Obama administration official acknowledged the settlements have continued growing significantly during the Obama years. The official said the U.S. decided against linking the aid package to settlement policy, fearing such threats would embolden Israel's enemies and decrease prospects for peace.

The official declined to say whether Obama plans to take any action in his final months of office, but left open the possibility the U.S. would "carefully consider" supporting a U.N. resolution criticizing Israel if the occasion arose. The official was not authorized to speak on the record and requested anonymity.

Peter Beinart, a liberal American commentator who has been an outspoken critic of the settlements, said Obama had missed an opportunity. He accused the president of "giving up" American leverage because for fear of angering the pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC and its allies.

"American policy toward Israel is a charade," Beinart wrote in Haaretz.

Bush enjoyed warm relations with Prime Ministers Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert during his term from 2001 to 2009. Obama has had a more contentious relationship with Netanyahu since both men took office in 2009. Yet both presidents took similar stances against the settlements, to little avail.

Netanyahu, a longtime ally of the settlers, has dismissed the differences with the U.S. as a friendly disagreement. Last week, he angered his allies by comparing international calls to uproot settlements to "ethnic cleansing."

Hagit Ofran, a researcher at Peace Now, said a president's influence is limited, and that ultimately the Israeli prime minister drives settlement policy. Ironically, she said, construction tends to increase when peace talks are taking place, apparently because negotiators are so focused on reaching a deal.

In a way, the breakdown in talks over the past two years has restrained Netanyahu, she said.

"Now, there is no political process, Netanyahu is exposed. Whatever he is doing gets the full attention," she said.

___

Associated Press writer Josh Lederman in Washington contributed to this report.

FILE - In this March 14, 2011 file photo, a general view of a construction site in the West Bank Jewish settlement of Modiin Illit. In his landmark speech to the Arab world seven years ago, President Barack Obama warned that Israeli settlements on occupied territories were undermining hopes for peace. It is time for these settlements to stop, he declared. As Obama heads into the home stretch of his presidency, he leaves behind an unfulfilled vision.(AP Photo/Oded Balilty, File)
Feds pulled detainees out of troubled Virginia jail in 2014

PORTSMOUTH, Va. (AP)  A federal agency pulled all of its detainees out of a troubled Virginia jail in 2014 because the facility didn't meet national detention standards.

Carissa Cutrell is spokeswoman for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. She tells The Virginian-Pilot (http://bit.ly/2cCtGBk ) that the agency ended its relationship with the jail because it "could not verify the facility's compliance" with standards that ensure detainees are in a safe, secure and humane environment.

Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring has asked federal officials to investigate the jail after the high-profile deaths of two inmates, including a mentally ill 24-year-old, who died months after being jailed for stealing $5 worth of junk food.

Norfolk Sheriff Bob McCabe is the jail's interim superintendent. He says a communication problem contributed to ICE's decision to leave.

___
School district suspends workers amid student injury probe

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP)  A Kentucky school district has suspended 10 employees amid investigations into incidents where students were injured as a result of staff members' actions.

Jefferson County Public Schools spokeswoman Allison Martin tells The Courier-Journal (http://cjky.it/2ct1Rs0) that the employees were suspended Wednesday and will be reassigned to noninstructional duties as the district investigates.

The district says it has been working since March to review 14 past investigations dating as far back as 2005 that "involved student injuries and alleged employee misconduct" to see if those investigations were handled properly.

Among those suspended was a high school security monitor who is accused of slamming a girl's head against a table while using an Aikido training technique to physically restrain her.

___
Comedian Katt Williams arrested again over cellphone dispute

ATLANTA (AP)  Katt Williams was arrested on an outstanding warrant in Georgia after he turned himself in on a separate warrant, authorities said Friday.

Williams  whose real name is Micah Sierra Williams  was booked into the Fulton County Jail on Thursday on a warrant charging him with second-degree criminal damage to property, jail records show.

The case stems from Feb. 28, when a man accused Williams of throwing the man's cellphone, the entertainer's lawyer, Drew Findling, told The Associated Press on Friday. Williams was granted bond, Findling said.

The person making the allegations tried to get Williams to pay him money and, when that failed, the person pursued a warrant, Findling said.

"It's a ridiculous case," Findling added. "It's another example where Katt has a target on his forehead for somebody trying to do a financial shakedown."

Police in East Point, just outside Atlanta, discovered the warrant from the alleged incident in February when Williams showed up to turn himself in Thursday on a different warrant, one issued after he failed to appear in court on charges stemming from a confrontation at an East Point restaurant, police Capt. Cliff Chandler said Friday. Police said that during the April 27 confrontation, Williams threw a salt shaker at a restaurant manager, bloodying the employee's lip.

After he was booked Thursday, East Point police called the Fulton County Marshal's Service, which sent an officer to pick Williams up on the warrant from the alleged February incident, Chandler said.

The comedian has been arrested several times this year at various places in metro Atlanta, and near his home in the Gainesville area northeast of the city, where he has a home near Lake Lanier.

On Feb. 29, Williams was charged with battery after arguing with a worker at a swimming pool supply store in Gainesville. The worker told deputies Williams went behind the counter and punched him. On March 8, the comedian was taken into custody on charges that he threatened to kill his bodyguard during an attack inside the celebrity's home. Williams threatened the bodyguard with death while an acquaintance beat him with a baseball bat and choked him, Hall County sheriff's Deputy Nicole Bailes said.
Residents near ex-Navy bases sue makers of firefighting foam

PHILADELPHIA (AP)  Residents near two former suburban Navy bases are suing producers of firefighting foam once used there, claiming they contaminated the drinking water.

New York law firm Weitz & Luxenberg filed the federal lawsuit Thursday in Philadelphia on behalf of seven people who lived near the Willow Grove Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base and the Naval Air Warfare Center. The lawsuit seeks chemical cleanup and unspecified damages.

Named as defendants are The 3M Co., of St. Paul, Minnesota; UK-based Angus Fire; The Ansul Co., of Marinette, Wisconsin; North Carolina-based Buckeye Fire Protection Co.; Wisconsin's Chemguard; and National Foam, of West Chester.

The residents allege the companies should have known perfluorooctane sulfonate and other chemicals would pose health and environmental risks. They're seeking class action status.

"With this lawsuit, we are fighting to ensure that the companies who manufactured and marketed products containing these chemicals  and put their profits ahead of public health in the process  are brought to justice for their wrongdoing," Robin Greenwald, who heads an environmental unit at the law firm, said in a statement.

The chemical compounds have been found in some firefighting foams that were widely used for decades on military bases throughout the country. They also are found in some household items such as food packaging.

The issue has gotten the attention of environmental activist Erin Brockovich, who spoke with residents at a community meeting in Willow Grove in June. Brockovich, who was portrayed by Julia Roberts in a 2000 movie bearing her name, works as a consultant to Weitz & Luxenberg.

No scientific evidence has consistently linked the chemicals to cancer in humans, although some studies have shown that people exposed to high levels of the compounds had higher incidents of kidney, prostate and testicular cancers, the Pennsylvania Department of Health says.

The Navy and National Guard previously agreed to pay about $19 million to provide residents replacement water and install filtration systems after more than a dozen public wells and 140 private wells in the Philadelphia area were taken offline.

Attorney William A. Brewer III, representing 3M, said the claims in the lawsuit have no merit. He said the U.S. military used the product "because it saves lives, which likely explains why this product remains in use about a decade after 3M exited the sales of it."

The company sold the product with instructions on how to safely use and dispose of it, he said.

Tyco Fire Protection Products was aware of the legal action involving its brands Ansul and Chemguard but declined to comment on the ongoing litigation, a spokeswoman said.
Pentagon: US troops now operating with Turks in Syria

WASHINGTON (AP)  Small numbers of U.S. special operations forces for the first time are accompanying Turkish government forces and their Syrian opposition partners fighting Islamic State militants inside Syria, military and administration officials said Friday.

The move follows a period of U.S. tensions with Turkey, including U.S. criticism of clashes last month between Turkish and Syrian Kurdish forces in northern Syria. Turkey is a NATO ally of Washington's, but it has been angered by U.S. support for the Kurdish YPG militia, which has been the most effective U.S. partner in fighting the Islamic State in Syria.

Separately, the Pentagon announced that a U.S. airstrike near Raqqa, Syria, on Sept. 7 killed an Islamic State leader it identified as Wa'il Adil Hasan Salman al-Fayad. Pentagon press secretary Peter Cook called him one of IS's most senior leaders. Cook said he operated as the group's minister of information and was a prominent member of its senior leadership council.

In a statement explaining the new U.S. role with Turkish troops in Syria, a Pentagon spokesman, Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, said the Americans are advising and providing other assistance to Turks who are clearing territory on the Syrian side of Turkey's border between the Syrian towns of Jarablus and Ar Rai.

"Access to the Turkey-Syria border region is strategically important to ISIL's operations in Syria and Iraq as well," Davis said, using a common acronym for the Islamic State.

"Denying ISIL access to this critical border cuts off critical supply routes in and out of Iraq and Syria and further isolates ISIL's so-called 'capital' in Raqqa," said another Pentagon spokesman, Marine Maj. Adrian J.T. Rankine-Galloway.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest noted the U.S. has long pushed Turkey to enhance security along its border.

"We have been pleased to see the Turkish pursue this kind of decisive, strategically significant action that will aid our efforts," he said.

Davis said the Americans are providing the same training, advice and other assistance that U.S. forces have been providing to other Syrian opposition groups -- such as the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces -- fighting the Islamic State in northern Syria. This is the first time, however, that U.S. troops have performed this role alongside Turkish troops.

Davis did not say how many U.S. troops are working with the Turks, but others said it was approximately a few dozen. They are among 300 U.S. troops authorized by President Barack Obama to provide training, advice and assistance inside Syria as part of the broader military campaign against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.

Officials said not say how long the U.S. special operations troops will work with the Turks and their Syrian opposition partners, but it appeared likely they will help with Turkish-led operations aimed at clearing the towns of al-Bab and Dabiq, which are south and southwest of Ar Rai and are under Islamic State control.

---
What could you get for $175M? A huge estate and a US record

A 63-acre island estate that went on sale this week for the first time in over a century includes a stone mansion, a 21-stall horse stable and a natural cove that can shelter boats in stormy weather.

It also has an asking price of $175 million, which industry experts say would easily break a record for the most ever paid for a residential property in the United States.

Since around 1900 the property in Darien, Connecticut, has belonged to the family and descendants of William Ziegler, an industrialist who made his fortune in baking powder. The family decided to sell the estate, known as Great Island, as younger generations have moved on and the main house has not been occupied for some time, according to David Ogilvy, the listing agent.

In this May 25, 2016, aerial photo provided by Stanley Jesudowich, one of the homes of a 63-acre estate sits on Great Island in Long Island Sound in Darien, Conn. The property went on sale Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, with an asking price of $175 million. Industry experts said that would easily break a record for the most ever paid for a residential property in the United States. Since about 1900, the property has belonged to the family and descendants of William Ziegler, an industrialist who made his fortune in baking powder. (Stanley Jesudowich/David Ogilvy & Associates Realtors via AP)

The record for the most expensive American home was set by a property that sold in 2014 in New York's Hamptons for $147 million, according to Jonathan Miller, president of Miller Samuel Real Estate Appraisers & Consultants, who also tracks luxury home sales as a hobby.

In the rarefied market of super high-end homes, Miller said there was a flurry of listings over $100 million around the country a couple years ago, but many lingered for a year or longer without selling.

"How deep or wide is that pool of buyers? It's not as deep as was assumed a few years ago," he said.

The island sits in Long Island Sound and is connected to the mainland by man-made strips of land. It has a half-mile-long driveway leading to the main house, several additional homes, a polo field, a private beach and dock, as well as a boathouse. It is about a mile from a commuter train station and Interstate 95.

Robyn Kammerer, a local real estate executive with Halstead Property, said she believes the asking price is reasonable considering the property's proximity to Manhattan and its expansive, secluded shoreline.

Given that the main house has been unoccupied, Ogilvy said the new owners likely will want to make renovations. But Kammerer said that probably would not be a stumbling block.

"For $175 million, you're going to want it to your taste," she said.

In this May 25, 2016, aerial photo provided by Stanley Jesudowich, a 63-acre estate sits on Great Island in Long Island Sound in Darien, Conn. The property went on sale Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, with an asking price of $175 million. Industry experts said that would easily break a record for the most ever paid for a residential property in the United States. Since about 1900, the property has belonged to the family and descendants of William Ziegler, an industrialist who made his fortune in baking powder. (Stanley Jesudowich/David Ogilvy & Associates Realtors via AP)
Best friends, ages 15 and 16, slain in New York City suburb

BRENTWOOD, N.Y. (AP)  Nisa Mickens and Kayla Cuevas were inseparable since before they could walk, relatives said. The teenage best friends spent holidays together, went to summer camp together and were on the same basketball team.

They may have died together, too.

The badly beaten and cut bodies of both girls were discovered in their suburban neighborhood early this week.

In this Sept. 15, 2016 photo, family members, friends and community members gather for a vigil in Brentwood, N.Y. at a memorial near the scene where Nisa Mickens and Kayla Cuevas were found dead. Police say the teens may have died together. The badly beaten bodies of both girls, ages 15 and 16, were discovered in their suburban neighborhood this week. (AP Photo/Mike Balsamo)

Mickens was found first, lying dead on a residential, tree-lined street in Brentwood at 8:30 p.m. Tuesday, a day before her 16th birthday.

After a day of searching, Cuevas, 16, was discovered along a fence in the wooded backyard of a nearby home. She lived a block away.

As their families struggle for answers about who would kill the aspiring athletes, police said they suspect the killings were committed by gang members, though why anyone would have targeted the girls is unclear.

Kayla's mother, Evelyn Cuevas, said she just wants her daughter's killer captured.

"She was trying to keep focused, but this nonsense that is out here, it's hard for kids," Cuevas said, tears streaming down her face Thursday as she visited the place where her daughter's body was discovered. "They get bullied if they don't participate. They beat them up, they kill them."

Both girls had recently started the school year at Brentwood High School.

Brentwood, a densely populated suburb of 61,000 people about 40 miles (64 kilometers) east of Manhattan, has struggled with an uptick in gang activity. Suffolk County Police Commissioner Tim Sini declined to say if either girl had a connection to a gang.

On Thursday, friends and relatives gathered near the scene of the attack. Blood still stained the ground as mourners left candles, balloons and cards.

Nisa's grandfather, Robert Mickens Sr., placed a basketball next to the makeshift memorial  a tribute he said was fitting for a teen who loved sports and sneakers. A group of about 50 gathered later in the evening for a prayer vigil.

A larger gathering was planned Friday evening in the stadium at Brentwood High.

Relatives said the girls had a natural chemistry.

"If you see Nisa, you see Kayla," Nisa's mother, Elizabeth Alvarado said. "Those girls mean everything to us. We saw them growing up. We ate at the same plate. We encouraged each other."

Investigators have released few details about how the girls died.

Mickens' father, Rob Mickens, said he dropped his daughter off at Kayla's home just before 7 p.m. Tuesday. She sent him a text message at around 8 p.m. asking him to pick her up at 10:30 p.m., but when he arrived she wasn't there.

He said he didn't learn his daughter had been found dead until later in the evening, when he flagged down a police officer and asked for help.

"My daughter was a very caring girl, affected a lot of lives that I didn't even know," he said. "Kayla, also another great girl, but very misunderstood. But she was a good girl."

Both girls suffered significant injuries to the head and face, according to police. Sini, a former homicide prosecutor, called the injuries some of the worst he'd ever seen.

He declined to say why investigators believed the killings were gang-related.

In this Sept. 15, 2016 photo, Evelyn Cuevas, the mother of Kayla Cuevas, speaks with reporters in Brentwood, N.Y. near the scene where her daughter was found dead. The badly beaten bodies of Kayla Cuevas and Nisa Mickens were discovered in their suburban neighborhood this week. (AP Photo/Mike Balsamo)
Department Of Corrections will investigate security at the halfway house

Prisoners would check in with security then sneak out through the hatch

Inmates removed drywall to create a pathway outside and concealed it

Officers have discovered a false wall with an 'escape hatch' inside a halfway house that holds prisoners nearing the end of their sentences.

They found the false wall while searching for contraband at the Center Point halfway house in Oklahoma City, the Oklahoma department of corrections said Friday.

Inmates removed drywall to create a pathway outside and concealed it with a false wall, according to officials.

Inmates would check in with security then sneak out through the hatch, the department said.

Officials found an 'escape hatch' hidden behind a false wall inside the Center Point halfway house in Oklahoma City (pictured), which holds prisoners nearing the end of their sentences

Center Point (pictured) is a private facility contracted to enable inmates to make the transition between prison life and their return to society

Some inmates may see their sentences lengthened because of the escapes, according to Corrections Director Joe Allbaugh.

The department will investigate security measures at the halfway house. Center Point is a private facility contracted to enable inmates to make the transition between prison life and their return to society.

Those who live at the halfway house can leave to go to work or apply for jobs but must report to security when they come back.

Officials seized 18 cellphones, 87 phone chargers, 39 syringes, marijuana and methamphetamine during the search earlier this week.

Officials also confiscated 18 cellphones, 87 phone chargers, 39 syringes, marijuana and methamphetamine from the Center Point halfway house in Oklahoma City (pictured)

They also found vodka and an item described as 'an improvised sexual device', the department of corrections said in a statement.

'Halfway houses are designed to allow inmates to transition back into society while remaining clean,' Allbaugh said.

'This lack of accountability and oversight is unacceptable. I expect Center Point's cooperation as we look into its security standards.'

Center Point used to operate as a hotel and became a halfway house in 2005. Some of the rooms faced inwards and others faced outwards. Only those facing the inside of the building house inmates.

The escape hatch was created by removing drywall from a bathroom that led to a room facing outside, according to officials.
State Department mourns death of ex-diplomat

WASHINGTON (AP)  State Department spokesman John Kirby says the department is mourning the death of former diplomat John Buzbee, who died Thursday of complications from cancer.

Kirby says the former journalist brought a "reporters' curiosity to the Foreign Service and ability to create imagery out of words."

Buzbee served in Iraq and Egypt, among other posts. Kirby says he was "fascinated by the Middle East and all the issues there."

Kirby says the department will mourn him.
Hundreds attend Las Vegas' celebration of Mexican holiday

LAS VEGAS (AP)  Visitors came from as far away as Mexico City to experience a Mexican Independence Day celebration in Las Vegas.

More than 300 people showed up for Thursday's 90-minute "Grito de Dolores" event, which featured Mariachi artists, trumpeters and violinists at the Forum Shops at Caesars Palace.

A woman in a homemade Mexican-flag-themed vest told the Las Vegas Sun (http://bit.ly/2cd8gXA ) that she, her husband and two friends have celebrated the holiday in Las Vegas for the last five years. The woman, 40-year-old Jessica Gamez, says they travel from Monterrey, Mexico, for the festivities.

Mexico's Independence Day is celebrated on September 16. On that date in 1810, Father Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla led a rebellion against the imperialists from Spain in the small city of Dolores.

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Pope dons scrubs to visit premature babies at Rome hospital

ROME (AP)  Pope Francis has donned a pair of surgical scrubs to visit premature babies at a Rome hospital.

Francis seemed enchanted by the tiny babies squirming, sleeping and crying in the neonatology unit of San Giovanni hospital, where he left a papal medal in each crib.

He cradled newborn Emiliano in his arms, asking "Is he eating well?" and inquired about other babies as he greeted parents and NICU staff.

Pope Francis holds a baby during a visit to the neonatology division of the San Giovanni hospital in Rome, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. (L'Osservatore Romano/Pool Photo via AP)

Each month of his Holy Year of Mercy, Francis spends one Friday afternoon outside the Vatican performing an act of mercy. After visiting the babies, Francis went to a hospice to meet with the terminally ill.

The Vatican says he wanted to send a message about respecting life at all stages, from its start to natural death.
Uruguay: Hunger-striking ex-Gitmo detainee not at death risk

MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay (AP)  An Uruguayan judge on Friday rejected a call to forcibly hospitalize a former Guantanamo prisoner who is on a hunger strike, saying medical officials determined that he's not at imminent risk of death.

Judge Carlos Garcia said the medical evaluation of Abu Wa'el Dhiab found him to be thin but lucid, and that exams were normal. He denied a request by local health authorities to hospitalize the 45-year-old Syrian.

Dhiab has been on a hunger strike for more than a month to press his demands to leave Uruguay, which took him in along with five other former Guantanamo prisoners in 2014. He wants to join his wife and children in Turkey or another nation.

A sign that reads in Spanish "Don't let Jihad die" hangs behind candles outside the U.S. embassy during a demonstration in Montevideo, Uruguay, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. Former Guantanamo detainee Abu Wa'el Dhiab from Syria, also called Jihad, is on a hunger strike, threatening to die if he is not allowed to reunite with his family elsewhere, after he was resettled in Uruguay. (AP Photo/Matilde Campodonico)

Garcia ordered the evaluation on Thursday following alarming reports from doctors and paramedics who have treated Dhiab at an apartment where he is staying in Montevideo.

Dhiab who emerged from a coma this week, has been hospitalized twice, but has asked to return to the apartment, where he continues to reject any food or liquid.

An activist group calling itself Vigil for Jihad Dhiab on late Friday posted the latest in a series of YouTube videos it has made of Dhiab, this one showing him lying on a mattress in his apartment and speaking in English.

In it, Dhiab criticized the court-ordered medical evaluation, saying he was told that if his health deteriorates, the judge will order him to go "to a hospital or give you IV by force."

"I told them that I'm not in Guantanamo and this should not turn into a second Guantanamo," referring to the forced feedings he underwent there.

Dhiab also said in the video that he will agree to resume drinking liquids if Uruguayan officials meet his demands to help reunite him and his family within seven days and gave the government until Sunday to respond to his proposal.

About 50 members of the same activist group also marched in downtown Montevideo Friday, demanding that the government work to rejoin Dhiab with his family abroad.

Dhiab was released from the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in December 2014, but could not return to Syria due to the ongoing civil war.

The former prisoner has grown frustrated that his wife and two children, who are refugees in Turkey, have not come to Uruguay and he has asked the government of the South American country to either send him there or find another country that will accept him.

Dhiab was detained as an enemy combatant with suspected ties to militants for 12 years at Guantanamo but was never charged. While there, he drew international attention by staging a lengthy hunger strike that threatened his health and frequently clashed with guards during his protest.

A photo of Abu Wa'el Dhiab that reads in Spanish "Will you let him die?" covers a street post outside the U.S. embassy during a demonstration in Montevideo, Uruguay, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. Former Guantanamo detainee Abu Wa'el Dhiab from Syria, also called Jihad, is on a hunger strike, threatening to die if he is not allowed to reunite with his family elsewhere, after he was resettled in Uruguay. (AP Photo/Matilde Campodonico)
Colombia road to peace passes near town 15 years on

SAN VICENTE DEL CAGUAN, Colombia (AP)  Fifteen years after negotiations with leftist rebels collapsed in a fury of violence, the road to peace in Colombia once again passes through this remote southern town near where leaders of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia are gathering in a jungle conclave for their last meeting as an armed insurgency.

Once a rebel safe haven, San Vicente del Caguan today is a thriving center of commerce serving cattle ranchers and oil drillers who have arrived in droves. Since the government moved in 2002 to take back a Switzerland-sized demilitarized zone it had ceded to the FARC, the population has tripled, crime is down and the government is making its presence felt in a way it never has before.

Mayor Humberto Sanchez, who was kidnapped held captive by the FARC for several months in 2006, said most people don't even remember the last time the rebels attempted to carry out an attack on the town of 40,000. While sympathizers still clandestinely distribute pro-FARC propaganda from time to time, the fear arising from such actions has largely dissipated and shopkeepers said they're no longer being extorted by the FARC to pay "vaccines" guaranteeing their safety.

Rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) arrive to El Diamante in southern Colombia, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. FARC rebels are gathering for a congress to discuss and vote on a peace accord reached with the Colombian government to end five decades of war. Historically secretive, this congress is the first one open to civilians. (AP Photo/Ricardo Mazalan)

"The permanent siege by the guerrillas doesn't exist anymore," said Sanchez, who belongs to the conservative Democratic Center party that until recently never would have dreamed of gaining a toehold in what Colombians refer to as the "sanctuary" of the rebels.

Starting Saturday, several hours from the town by a muddy and strut-busting dirt road, the FARC is holdings its 10th and final conference as a guerrilla army to ratify the agreement reached last month with government negotiators in Cuba. In an area known as the Yari plains, rebels have been busy building makeshift bamboo structures to house hundreds of delegates who will for the first time be debating their future political strategy instead of battlefield tactics. Hundreds of journalists have been invited to witness the proceedings in El Diamante, a tiny settlement in the larger San Vicente Caguan municipality, which is the size of Haiti.

Sanchez says Caguan's role as host of the event is a small sacrifice in the path to peace that he hopes will be repaid by the government dedicating more resources for the town's development. Top on his wish list are reopening commercial flights the town's airport and construction of a government-run vocational school for 3,000 young adults.

But already the town has seen major improvements, such as the installation of streetlights and a new plaza, as a result of oil royalties that have poured in and the permanent presence of an elite military unit.

Some residents, still embittered by years of mortar attacks and kidnappings committed by the rebels, say they plan to vote against the peace deal in a referendum scheduled Oct. 2. Others are more willing to forgive and even express some disappointment that they couldn't play an even larger role in Colombia's reconciliation.

"The peace deal should've been signed here," said Tatiana Pineda, a 36-year-old store vendor.

A couple walks along a park in San Vicente del Caguan, southern Colombia, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Fifteen years after negotiations with leftist rebels collapsed in a fury of violence, the road to peace in Colombia once again passes through this remote southern village near where leaders of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia are gathering in a jungle conclave for their last meeting as an armed insurgency. (AP Photo/Ricardo Mazalan)

A rebel of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) arrives to El Diamante in southern Colombia, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. FARC rebels are gathering for a congress to discuss and vote a peace accord reached with the Colombian government to end five decades of war. Historically secretive, this congress is the first one open to civilians. (AP Photo/Ricardo Mazalan)

Jackeline, a rebel of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, FARC, sets up camp in El Diamante, in southern Colombia, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. FARC rebels are gathering for a congress to discuss and vote a peace accord reached with the Colombian government to end five decades of war. Historically secretive, this congress is the first one open to civilians. (AP Photo/Ricardo Mazalan)

Rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) visit as they wait to have lunch in El Diamante, Colombia, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. FARC rebels are gathering for a congress were delegates will debate and vote on the accord reached last month with the Colombian government to end five decades of war. (AP Photo/Ricardo Mazalan)

Gina, rebel from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), holds her son as she chats with a fellow rebel in El Diamante, Colombia, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. FARC rebels are gathering for a congress were delegates will debate and vote on the accord reached last month with the Colombian government to end five decades of war. (AP Photo/Ricardo Mazalan)
Russia bans imports of Egyptian fruit and vegetables

MOSCOW (AP)  Russia's food safety watchdog has banned fruit and vegetables imports from Egypt over sanitary concerns, following an earlier decision by Egypt that hurt Russian wheat imports.

Rosselkhoznadzor, the state agricultural safety agency, said Friday that imports of Egyptian plant products will be banned starting next Thursday until Egypt's authorities take steps to ensure their safety.

The move comes after Egypt, the world's largest wheat importer, changed its import regulations to ban any ergot fungus in imported wheat. It had previously accepted 0.05 percent of it in imported wheat, a level considered harmless. The new policy hurt Russia, which is one of major supplier of wheat to Egypt, and others.
The Latest: Officers applaud NYPD's Bratton as he moves on

NEW YORK (AP)  The Latest on the departure of New York Police Department Commissioner William Bratton (all times local):

3:30 p.m.

The New York Police Department has said goodbye to Commissioner William Bratton, who's taking a job as a private security executive.

FILE - In this May 9, 1994 file photo, Police Commissioner William Bratton speaks at a news conference in New York the year he became head of the NYPD for the first time. Bratton, will step down on Friday Sept 16, 2016, as New York City's police commissioner. (AP Photo/Luc Novovitch, File)

Hundreds of officers and commanders in dress blue uniforms applauded and saluted Bratton as he left police headquarters during a ceremony Friday. Bagpipes serenaded the 68-year-old commissioner, who also led departments in Boston and Los Angeles.

Also on hand were several dozen protesters. Some yelled "I can't breathe!" That's the phrase the late Eric Garner repeated as he suffocated during an arrest two years ago.

Over Bratton's career he became known for trying to deter serious crimes by cracking down on smaller offenses, an approach known as the broken windows theory of policing. A recent inspector general's report found no correlation between the strategy and crime reduction. Bratton suggested the report was the work of "amateurs."

___

1 a.m.

William Bratton is at the end of an unparalleled law enforcement career that saw him run police departments in Boston, Los Angeles and New York and advocate crime fighting strategies that were copied across the nation.

The 68-year-old is due to step down Friday after three years in his second stint as New York's police commissioner.

He's taking a job as a private security executive.

Bratton became known for mining crime data to deploy his forces. He also cracked down on smaller offenses to discourage larger ones  an approach known as "broken windows."

A recent inspector general's report rankled Bratton by finding no correlation between broken windows and dramatic drops in crime in New York.

Bratton struck back last week by suggesting the report was the work of "amateurs."

FILE - In this Nov. 25, 2015 file photo, New York City Police Commissioner William Bratton listens during a news conference detailing preparations for the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, in New York. Bratton, will step down on Friday Sept 16, 2016, as New York City's police commissioner. (AP Photo/Frank Franklin II, File)

FILE - In this Nov. 21, 1991 file photo William Bratton, as chief of the New York Transit Police, talks to a homeless man in New York, Nov. 21, 1991, on a routine tour of the New York City subway system, three years before moving up to the posItion of police commissioner. Bratton, who steps down on Friday, Sept 16, 2016, was perhaps best known as a fierce advocate of the "broken windows" approach to policing, which he insisted drove down the city's crime rate to historic lows. It's a claim that his critics say is open to dispute. (AP Photo/Betsy Herzog, File)

FILE - In this April 30, 1994, file photo New York City Police Commissioner William Bratton, left, makes an appeal for calm in the Staten Island borough of New York as Mayor Rudolph Giuliani looks on, after the death of 22-year-old Ernest Sayon, who died while in police custody. Giuliani appointed Bratton as commissioner, for his first time in the job, in 1994. Bratton steps down from his second appointment in the job, on Friday, Sept 16, 2016. (AP Photo/Al Levine, File)

FILE - In this Dec. 21, 2014 file photo, NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton, second from left, is flanked NYPD Chief of Department James O'Neill, left, and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, at a Mass for two slain officers at St. Patrick's Cathedral, in New York. Bratton, will step down on Friday, Sept 16, 2016, as New York City's police commissioner and O'Neill will take his place. (AP Photo/John Minchillo, File)
State attorney general finishes Milwaukee shooting probe

MADISON, Wis. (AP)  Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel says his agents have finished their investigation into the fatal police shooting that sparked riots in Milwaukee.

Schimel said Friday that the Department of Justice has forwarded its findings on Syville Smith's Aug. 13 death to Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm for a charging decision.

Schimel said the DOJ won't release anything to the public until Chisholm decides on charges or determines the material can be released.
Many black voters skeptical at Trump's birther about-face

WASHINGTON (AP)  Black voters reacted skeptically Friday to Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump's admission that he now believes the nation's first black president was indeed born in the United States. Many said the fact that Trump spent years questioning President Barack Obama's national origin was disrespectful, and an insult to all black Americans.

Despite the fact that Obama himself said he viewed this renewed burst of commentary about his birth as "fairly typical" and not surprising, members of the Congressional Black Caucus were clearly angry. During a heated news conference Friday during the CBC's annual legislative conference in Washington, several lawmakers denigrated Trump for perpetrating birther falsehoods for so long.

"He owes an apology to President Barack Obama, he owes an apology to African-American community and he owes an apology to the United States of America," said Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., adding that he considers Trump to be "nothing but a two-bit racial arsonist."

FILE - In this July 8, 2016 file photo, Congressional Black Caucus Chairman Rep. G. K. Butterfield, D-N.C., center, accompanied by, from left, Rep. Joyce Beatty , D-Ohio, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., Butterfield, Rep. Gregory W. Meeks, D-N.Y., and Rep. Al Green, D-Texas, speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington. Black voters reacted skeptically on Friday to Republican presidential nominee Donald Trumps public admission that he now believes the nations first black president was indeed born in the United States. Many said the fact that Trump spent many years questioning President Barack Obamas national origin was disrespectful, and an insult to all black Americans. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)

Reps. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, and G.K. Butterfield, D-N.C., called Trump a "cheap racist" and a "disgusting fraud," respectively.

Many blacks gave Trump no credit for finally letting go of the long dispelled notion that Obama, born in Hawaii in 1961, actually hailed from outside the country he now leads. They said they believed it was some sort of political calculation by Trump in hopes of getting votes from blacks or moderate whites.

"In the black community, it's always been viewed as kind of offhanded racism," said Preston Thymes, a Scottsdale, Arizona, marketing manager.

Roosevelt Brown, 56, said he felt black voters, at least, weren't buying Trump's about-face. "I don't believe in his heart he's saying what he really believes," said Brown, a special investigator in California.

"He's a backtracker," said Bailey Billings, 25, of Madison, Wisconsin. "He says whatever he thinks he should say, what he's directed by his team to say, to make him seem like a better human that we should all vote for. ... I just don't care for anything that he says."

And Trump's attempt to pull Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton into the fray by claiming she endorsed birther tactics against Obama during their 2008 race didn't seem to sit well with some black voters either.

"He's a big liar and he's just trying to put people against Hillary," said Wilma Brown, a 66-year-old Detroit housewife.

Trump's political rise was fueled in part by his presence among birthers, and as recently as this week, he declined to say where he believed Obama was born. In reversing his stance Friday, Trump did not say why, or when, he changed his mind.

Questions about Obama's legitimacy strike a nerve with many black voters, said Corey Fields, a Stanford University sociology professor and author of "Black Elephants In The Room," a book about black Republicans.

"It's an effort to delegitimize a very powerful and compelling achievement by an African-American political leader," Fields said. "Often black voters can translate this to their own lived experience moving through the white professional (world) where the legitimacy of your achievements are often called into question. This is a very similar process on a large scale. This is something that can resonate at an individual level."

Several black Republicans have also expressed disgust at Trump's connections with the birther movement.

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell criticized Trump in leaked emails released earlier this week. "All his lies and nonsense just pile up," Powell wrote. "I just go back to the unforgivable one. Trying to destroy the President elected by the American people with his fictitious investigation into this source of birth. Absolutely disgraceful." Powell has not denied the leaked emails' authenticity.

Others questioned why Trump and his campaign would not squash the issue immediately, with the November election so close. Renee Amoore, who is leading black voter outreach efforts for Trump in Pennsylvania, said Trump has "gotten better" and "been on message" in recent weeks, and is not sure why Trump chose to respond to his role in the birther movement now.

"For whatever reason, somebody thought this was part of the message," said Amoore, referring to Trump's campaign, which released a statement late Thursday on the issue.

Daphne Goggins, 53, a longtime registered Republican who serves as a ward leader in Philadelphia, still blames Clinton's surrogates for propagating the issue, and is angry that Trump is being held responsible for the false claims that Obama was not an American.

"I'm not understanding how she can dump this on Trump now," Goggins said. "Who knows? They may have even been doing it together. But who cares? It shouldn't be an issue."

Rufus Bartell, a Detroit businessman and founder of a retail and consulting group, said there's been too much damage for Trump to make up with many black voters, who have been a powerful voting bloc during Obama's time in Washington.

In presidential election years, the percentage of black voters eclipsed the percentage of whites for the first time in 2012, when 66.2 percent of blacks voted, compared with 64.1 percent of non-Hispanic whites and about 48 percent of Hispanics and Asians.

"I think it's too late, regardless of what he does. But if he really wants a relationship with the African-American community, then it's certainly not too late to start a relationship. It just won't impact this election," Bartell said.

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Jesse J. Holland covers race and ethnicity for The Associated Press. Contact him at jholland@ap.org, on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/jessejholland or on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/jessejholland.

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Kagan: 8-member Supreme Court a problem over time

WASHINGTON (AP)  Justice Elena Kagan says the longer the Supreme Court is stuck with only eight members, the more it has to deal with the prospect of not being able to decide cases.

Kagan said in an appearance at Harvard Law School that the court has decided some cases only by narrowing the issue so much that it left undecided the real reason the court took up the dispute in the first place.

"Over time, that's a problem," she said.

FILE - In this Dec. 15, 2014, file photo, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan at the University of Mississippi in Oxford, Miss. Kagan says the longer the Supreme Court is stuck with only eight members, the more it has to deal with the prospect of not being able to decide cases. Kagan said in an appearance at Harvard Law School on Sept. 8 that the court has decided some cases only by narrowing the issue so much, it left undecided the real reason the court took up the dispute in the first place. (AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis, File)

The law school made a video of her Sept. 8 comments available on Friday.

The high court has been short a member since Justice Antonin Scalia died in February. President Barack Obama has nominated federal appeals court Judge Merrick Garland as a replacement, but Senate Republicans have refused to hold a hearing or a vote during Obama's last year in office.

Kagan gave credit to Chief Justice John Roberts for working to forge compromise on the court, now evenly split with four liberal and four conservative members. She said the justices would continue to find ways to resolve cases.

"But is that cost-free? No, it's absolutely not," she said.

Four cases ended in a tie after Scalia's death. That means the lower court decision remains in place without setting a nationwide precedent.
Obama to meet with leaders of Iraq, Nigeria and Colombia

WASHINGTON (AP)  President Barack Obama will review military strategy against the Islamic State group, press nations to admit more refugees and review progress around the world, despite new challenges, when he makes his final appearance at the U.N. General Assembly session in New York next week, the White House said Friday.

On the sidelines of the session, Obama has scheduled meetings with the leaders of Iraq, Nigeria and Colombia and plans to promote trade between the U.S. and Africa.

Obama heads to New York on Sunday for the General Assembly session that opens Monday, his eighth and final as president.

President Barack Obama talks to media at the start of a meeting with business, government, and national security leaders in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016, to discuss how the Trans-Pacific Partnership can benefit American workers and businesses and further national security. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

He plans to sit down Monday with Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi to discuss progress the country has made countering the Islamic State group, a coming Iraqi military operation to take back the city of Mosul from IS militants, and a brewing humanitarian crisis inside Iraq, said Ben Rhodes, Obama's deputy national security adviser.

Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken said this week while visiting Baghdad that Iraqi forces aided by the U.S.-led coalition against IS had retaken half the territory that militants once held in the country. He also announced more than $181 million in aid to address a humanitarian crisis that has festered in Iraq as a result of the insurgency.

Despite a series of major defeats in recent months, IS has maintained its grip on Mosul, Iraq's second largest city. Iraq hopes to launch an operation this year to retake Mosul.

Obama delivers his final address to the yearly gathering of world leaders on Tuesday, and will use the opportunity to "step back" and review some of the progress over the past eight years along with "some of the trends that have been shaping our international order," said Rhodes, previewing the trip for reporters.

The Syrian conflict continues to confound world leaders, although a recent cease-fire agreement appears to be holding, but Syria has not yet allowed humanitarian aid to flow to the city of Aleppo and other affected areas. Meanwhile, North Korea continues to defy the international community with its recent nuclear and ballistic missile tests.

Obama also plans to meet Tuesday with Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, who has held office for just over a year, to talk about continued U.S. support for security and economic changes in the country, as well the government's efforts to counter the Islamic extremist group Boko Haram.

At a summit on refugees that the president is hosting, Obama is expected to press more nations to open their borders and help double the number of refugees who are resettled around the world. Mexico, Sweden, Canada, Germany, Jordan and Ethiopia are co-hosting the summit along with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

Europe has shouldered a large portion of the Syrian refugee crisis. Canada welcomed 25,000 Syrian refugees, and the U.S. recently met its goal of resettling 10,000 Syrian refugees this year.

Obama will devote a portion of Wednesday, the final day of the General Assembly session, to promoting trade between the U.S. and Africa. He was attending a summit with some 200 American and African CEOs, and African heads of state.

The president also plans to meet with Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, mainly to discuss a historic peace agreement recently struck between Santos' government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia rebel group to end 52 years of hostilities, the Western Hemisphere's longest-running war.

The U.S. supported the peace effort, and the people of Colombia will vote on it a nationwide referendum in early October.

On Sunday evening in New York, Obama was headlining a Democratic Party fundraiser.

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Heathrow expansion must be consigned to the dustbin, Boris Johnson warns

Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has branded Heathrow expansion a "fantasy" destined for the "dustbin".

His fiery remarks came after the ex-mayor of London was excluded from the key Cabinet committee that will decide on airport expansion.

The move was seen as a potential signal that Prime Minister Theresa May is getting ready to approve a new runway at Heathrow.

Theresa May has been urged not to back a third runway for Heathrow

Mr Johnson warned that the taxpayer would foot the bill for the inevitable failure of Heathrow expansion.

"As I've advocated for many years Heathrow expansion is the wrong choice, and if it is chosen it simply won't get built," he said.

"The massive costs and enormous risks mean it's undeliverable, and the taxpayer will be saddled with the bill for failure.

"While we are finding this out our international competitors will be further extending their competitive advantage over us. We need to consign this Heathrow fantasy to the dustbin. We need a better solution," Mr Johnson said, the Daily Telegraph reported.

It is understood that Mr Johnson will still contribute to the debate due to his eight years' experience as London mayor and as the MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip, near Heathrow.

The long-awaited decision on whether to expand Heathrow or Gatwick is politically highly sensitive for the Prime Minister due to divisions within the Tory ranks.

Mr Johnson campaigned against Heathrow expansion while he was mayor, and Putney MP and Education Secretary Justine Greening is also opposed.

Although, as Foreign Secretary, Mr Johnson does not hold a direct interest in airport expansion as part of his job, the decision will affect his brief in terms of Britain's links with the rest of the world, as a new runway could open up new destinations for direct flights.

A Downing Street spokeswoman said: "We will confirm membership of the Cabinet committee in due course."

The previous Cabinet committee on airport expansion, set up by David Cameron, included the then-chancellor, business secretary, transport secretary, environment secretary, Scottish secretary, communities secretary, energy secretary, chief whip and fixer Oliver Letwin.

It emerged last week that ministers may be given a free vote on the issue.

An internal Government paper filmed by a passenger on the London Underground discusses the "potential waiving of collective responsibility" ahead of the forthcoming decision on airport capacity.

In July last year the Davies Commission recommended the building of a third runway at Heathrow, but the Department for Transport announced that further investigation into noise, pollution and compensation would be carried out before a decision is made.

Mr Cameron was expected to indicate which project would get the go-ahead after the EU referendum, but his resignation following the victory for the Brexit campaign meant the decision was left for his successor, Mrs May.

A group of political and business leaders have written to the Prime Minister urging her not to give the go-ahead for a third runway at Heathrow.

Expansion at the London hub would "re-forge its monopoly" in the UK, the 29 signatories said in their letter to Mrs May.
Grime artist Skepta takes Mercury Prize in shock win over David Bowie

Grime artist Skepta has been awarded the 25th Mercury Prize ahead of favourite David Bowie.

He collected the 25,000 prize for his fourth studio album Konnichiwa at a prize-giving ceremony at the Eventim Apollo in Hammersmith, west London on Thursday night.

The album was released on his self-run record label Boy Better Know which he set up with his brother JME in 2005.

Mercury Prize winner Skepta with presenter Jarvis Cocker

Skepta, from Tottenham, north London, dedicated the win to his mother and used the victory as a cry for young people to express themselves.

"Shout out to my mum. I love you - you are the reason. I wouldn't be here without you so thank you very much mum, you can dance as much as you want."

The self-proclaimed king of grime said he wanted to use the prize money to do something positive to help people feel "happy and free".

He added: "I want them [young people] to be themselves."

The win caps a momentous year for grime music which has seen a resurgence after it first appeared in the mainstream when Dizzee Rascal won the Mercury Prize in 2003 for his record Boy In Da Corner.

Skepta said he thinks the win will mean "more people are going to listen to grime" but added he wanted to inspire other genres too.

"I wouldn't say it's a grime revolution. This is a really good time for grime but I think this is a revolution for freedom. Not just in music."

Skepta was joined on the 12-strong shortlist by fellow grime artist Kano who earlier said it was "crazy" for the pair to be nominated.

The duo started their careers playing their music on London's infamous underground pirate radio stations.

"We could have never imagined we'd be here nominated amongst some of the people that are nominated today. It feels like a real landmark year in our genre's history. It's a big moment for us both," said Kano.

Skepta also paid tribute after his win to Bowie, whose album Blackstar - which explores the themes of illness, death and heaven - was released in January on the star's 69th birthday and just two days before he died from cancer.

He said: "Every artist should be just striving to put out the best work that they can do because anything can happen. You can go any time which is the reason I said rest in peace to David Bowie."

The ceremony had earlier paid tribute to Bowie with Blackstar track Lazarus being performed by Dexter star Michael C Hall who is launching a stage production of the same name in London next month.

Blackstar was joined on the shortlist by Laura Mvula for her record The Dreaming Room, Making Time by Jamie Woon, Made In The Manor by Kano, Love & Hate by Michael Kiwanuka, Channel The Spirits by The Comet Is Coming, Anohni's Hopelessness, Adore Life by Savages The 1975's I Like It When You Sleep, For You Are So Beautiful Yet So Unaware Of It, Radiohead's A Moon Shaped Pool and The Bride by Bat For Lashes.

This was reduced to a final six during the ceremony which included Bowie, Radiohead, The 1975, Kiwanuka, Mvula and eventual winner Skepta.
Police keeping open mind on motive for double murder at London flat

Police investigating the murder of a mother-of-nine and her nephew said they are keeping an open mind as to the motive for the shooting.

The victims - named by family members as Bervil Ekofo, 21, and his 52-year-old aunt Anny Ekofo - were fatally shot at a flat in Elmshurst Crescent in East Finchley, north London, on Thursday morning.

Detectives have appealed for witnesses, urging anyone with information to come forward after what they described as a "shocking incident".

Bervil Ekofo pictured with his mother Maymie Botamba - he was gunned down in a double-shooting at a home in North London(Family handout/PA)

Family members who came together to grieve outside the address on Thursday said they did not know what had happened, but believe the two were killed by mistake.

Police were called to the address at 6.25am to reports of two people injured with gunshot wounds.

Three ambulances and an air ambulance also attended, but both victims were pronounced dead at the scene.

In the wake of the deaths Mr Ekofo's mother said she has lost her "life" and her "best friend".

Maymie Botamba told the Press Association: "He was my life, they have taken my life away. He was my best friend.

"He was so lovely and kind to everyone, always surrounded by girls. He had never been in trouble before, he had never been in a fight in his life."

One relative, who did not wish to be named, said: "We think they were at the wrong place at the wrong time.

"We think someone came to the address looking for someone else and when Anny answered the door, they shot her. We think (Bervil) was in his bed sleeping."

Mrs Ekofo's cousin, Fifi Selo, said that Mrs Ekofo and her husband Jean Pierre had been living in the UK for around 25 years after moving from Congo in central Africa.

Ms Selo, 38, said: "They were an amazing family. Anny was the kind of person who was a mum to everybody. She always brought everybody together."

There have been no arrests.

Detective Chief Inspector Andrew Partridge said: "This is a shocking incident that took place in daylight, albeit in the early hours, and at this early stage in the investigation I am keeping an open mind with regards to a motive for the attack."

He added: "It is important that anyone who heard or saw anything suspicious in the vicinity of the shooting contacts the investigation team as they may hold vital information which could assist us."
Missing toddler Ben Needham may have been killed by a digger, police fear

The mother of missing toddler Ben Needham has been told to "prepare for the worst" by detectives who suspect he may have died 25 years ago.

British investigators on the Greek island where the 21-month-old vanished believe he may have been crushed to death by a digger, Kerry Needham said.

Forensics teams are reportedly set to begin excavating at two sites close to where Ben was last seen as he played near his grandparents' home on Kos.

Ben Needham, whose mother Kerry has been told by police to prepare for the worst

The potential breakthrough came after a friend of digger driver Konstantinos Barkas, also known as Dino, said he believes the workman may have been responsible, according to the Daily Mirror.

The driver reportedly died of stomach cancer last year, just months before detectives from South Yorkshire Police arrived on the island for a renewed investigation.

It is understood the friend said the death was accidental, the newspaper reported.

A variety of theories as to Ben's fate and reported sightings have arisen since his disappearance and Ms Needham had been holding out in hope that she would one day be reunited with her son.

However her worst fears appeared to be confirmed during a recent visit by officers.

She told the newspaper: "What they had to tell me was the last thing they would have ever wanted to. They think my Ben could be dead and buried.

"They are no longer looking for a missing person. How do I cope with that? My mother's instinct has always told me he was alive. What if I've been wrong all this time?"

Ben, from Sheffield, disappeared from outside Ms Needham's parents' home on the island on July 24 1991.

Mr Barkas had reportedly been helping to clear land for a local builder, a friend of her father and brother, near the property.

Detectives are said to have carried out initial inquiries at the site, with experts testing soil and surveying the site with drones.

Ms Needham said a dig at the site in 2012 was carried out in a bid to rule out that an accident had taken place and move the probe on as a missing person's enquiry.

However, in light of the latest possible breakthrough, she thinks detectives suspect an accident may have taken place.

After spending 25 years tirelessly searching for her son Ms Needham said she fears dying of "shock and heartbreak" should Ben's remains be found.

She said: "I have spent all these years desperately hoping for that fairytale ending and for Ben to walk through that door.
Hameed and Duckett are ready to be England stars, says selector Whitaker

England are confident they have selected two stars of the future as uncapped pair Haseeb Hameed and Ben Duckett vie to become Alastair Cook's new Test match opening partner.

National selector James Whitaker believes Hameed, who would become England's youngest opener at just 19 if he got the nod against Bangladesh in Chittagong next month, has "run-scoring in his DNA".

Duckett, in Whitaker's opinion, is a "special talent" who will be in contention alongside Hameed to be captain Cook's ninth opening partner since the retirement of Andrew Strauss.

Haseeb Hameed has been named in England's squad for the first time

In two squads announced on Friday to tour Bangladesh for three one-day internationals and two Tests, the other notable inclusions are Surrey pair Zafar Ansari - the third uncapped traveller - and Gareth Batty.

They take England's spin contingent to four in the Test squad, while Duckett - unlike them and Hameed - has been picked in both formats.

Batty will be 39 by the time he has a chance to add to his seven caps and would make history as the player with the largest number of matches between caps, having last featured 11 years ago.

Ansari's selection is also poignant to an extent, after he was first picked for a Test tour 12 months ago only to suffer a badly-broken thumb on the very day the squad was announced to face Pakistan.

It is the precocious Hameed's promotion, however, which will capture the imagination of most English cricket followers.

Whitaker has no doubt, after only 19 first-class matches, that the teenager will be ready.

"Hameed is a real quick learner," he told Sky Sports News. "He's played against some quality county attacks and we've seen progress in every innings.

"We've studied him very hard...and had a lot of conversations with experts in all sorts of fields about him.

"He's really, really tried for this so hard."

Hameed and Duckett could scarcely be more contrasting options - one a studied and ultra-careful right-hander who has yet to play a limited-overs professional match, the other an adventurous left-hander with a three-figure white-ball strike rate to go with his mid-40s four-day average.

Whitaker added of Hameed: "We think he's got loads of technical qualities...and a great temperament.

"Above all else, he's got run-scoring in his DNA.

"Let's not put too much pressure (on him), because he's only a 19-year-old player.

"But we're excited and I'm sure he'll bring lots of quality to the team."

Whitaker believes Hameed also has many more shots in him than have often been apparent in his very productive first full season for Lancashire.

" He's got the shots in the locker, he's just very shrewd as to when he uses them," he said.

"He plays the ball late. He's got good discipline and defence as well. But make no mistake, he's got the shots."

That is more evidently true of Duckett.

Whitaker said of the 21-year-old: "We've given him a challenge to compete for the top of the order.

"He's taken his chances in pressure situations this year - whether it's Lions cricket, Twenty20 finals day [for champions Northamptonshire] or two or three weeks running up to selection.

"He's put his name in the hat and then kept it at the forefront."

Duckett is a crowd-pleaser too, whatever the format.

"He's a marvellous little player," added Whitaker. "We see a special talent. He's given us every belief he can really challenge for a Test match spot."

Batty's long route back into the Test reckoning is a contrasting narrative.

Whitaker insists he has a chance of playing as a third spinner and is not merely included as a mentor for others.

"I've always sought his advice for the last couple of years or so," he said. " He'll be a great asset. His experience will be invaluable, but also his skill levels.

"The last few years he's been up there and comparable with any spinner and I'm delighted for him."

Whitaker also had information to impart about England's two captains.

Eoin Morgan is not currently involved, after pulling out for security reasons from the Bangladesh series along with opener Alex Hales.

But Whitaker expects him to be back to face India in the new year, resuming the captaincy after being temporarily replaced by Jos Buttler.

Cook will arrive earlier than his fellow Test specialists next month, then return home for the birth of his second child and hope to be back for the start of the series.

Whitaker is confident he will have his preparation spot on.

" I'm sure he'll be ready for the first Test," he said.

As for Morgan, he added: "Eoin has done exceptionally well as captain. Over the last couple of years he's established a really good leadership base.

"It's slightly disappointing that he's turned this opportunity down, but we expect him to be captain in India.

"At the same time, we'll review as we do after every series."
George Osborne vows to 'fight for his ideas' from backbenches

Former Chancellor George Osborne has said he will not follow David Cameron out of Parliament, declaring he will stay on the backbenches as a voice of the "liberal mainstream".

His comments, in an interview with BBC Radio 4's Today programme, will fuel speculation that Mr Osborne has not given up his long-term ambition to lead the Conservative Party after being sacked by Theresa May when she became Prime Minister in July.

Following Mr Cameron's decision to quit as MP for Witney earlier this week, Mr Osborne was asked whether he was tempted to leave the House of Commons to seek money-making opportunities like a book about his time in office.

Former chancellor George Osborne makes an announcement about his Northern Powerhouse project

He replied: "I don't want to write my memoirs because I don't know how the story ends, and I want to hang around and find out."

Mr Osborne told Today: "Politics is a tough business, but I think one of the things I'm coming to understand is that you can push and fight for your ideas from different places inside the House of Commons chamber, either as an opposition or as a Government backbench MP."

Mr Osborne said that he had backed Mrs May in the contest to replace Mr Cameron as Conservative leader and Prime Minister because she was "the best person for the job of the candidates who put themselves forward".

Challenged by interviewer Nick Robinson over whether this amounted to an unenthusiastic endorsement for the new PM and a suggestion that he felt there were better potential leaders who were not on the ballot paper, Mr Osborne said that the candidates were "the people with the best chance of bringing a divided Conservative Party together".

He added: "I voted for Theresa May because she was absolutely the best person for the job."

But he indicated differences with the new PM over her planned extension of grammar schools, and suggested that her three-month delay in approving a new nuclear power plant at Hinkley Point in Somerset had made little difference to the final deal.

And he made clear that - unlike Mr Cameron, who said he was leaving Parliament to avoid being a "distraction" to the new regime - he intends to speak out on issues of political controversy, including the need to maintain close trading relationships with the remaining 27 members of the EU following Brexit.

"Certainly, staying in the House of Commons, I will want to draw attention to the issues and the causes that I care about," he said.

"That's the purpose of being a Member of Parliament and one of the reasons for remaining in the House of Commons.

"I will be championing the things that I've always cared about, which is: 'Where is the voice of the liberal mainstream majority in this country who do not want to be governed from the extremes, who want Britain to be internationalist, outward-looking, free-trading, who want a socially just society?'

"That's the cause that I believe in, and, gosh, we are going to have a whole set of decisions over the next couple of years about the kind of country we want to be. I want to be contributing to that debate, not round the Cabinet table but in the Parliament, making clear that these decisions matter not just to me and my constituents but to my children and future generations."

On schools, Mr Osborne said he supported "the goals that Theresa May set out in her speech of delivering first-class education to every child in this country" and said he regarded comprehensive-educated Justine Greening as a "terrific" Education Secretary.

But he insisted the focus of education policy should be on the academy system and free schools, telling Today: "Eighty per cent of the political discussion is about 20% of where the children go, when in fact we should be focusing on where 80% of the children go in a selective system.

"For me, the great transformation of the last six years driven by Michael Gove and Nicky Morgan under David Cameron's leadership has been the academy and free school programme.

"I'm all for elements of selection. I'm not against new grammar schools opening where areas want them. But I think the real focus of education reform remains the academy programme transforming the comprehensive schools that most people in this country send their children to."

On Hinkley, Mr Osborne said: "I'm very pleased that we are going ahead with the Hinkley power plant. I don't think anything has fundamentally changed from the deal that we put together in Government just a few months ago ... It looks to me pretty much like the same deal."

The former chancellor, who was the key driving force behind securing Chinese financial backing for the power station, said that he had been advised when in office that it was not necessary to insist on a "special share" of the kind included in the deal announced on Thursday, which would prevent nuclear plants being sold on without Government approval.

"The advice we got from civil servants in the energy ministry and from the security establishment was that the special share would not add any additional protection beyond what the very tough and tight regulatory regime already provided us," he said.

" It didn't seem to me necessary to have some additional special share. Maybe the advice has changed over the last few months. I don't know, obviously, I'm not in the Government any more."

Mr Osborne said that the new Prime Minister was "perfectly entitled to set out new ideas".

He added: "I think she has made a strong start and she is perfectly entitled as new Prime Minister to set the tone of her administration, to set out her goals in her own way, to use her own language and to take a pause and consider big decisions like whether to go ahead with the Hinkley nuclear power plant."

Mr Osborne admitted he had misjudged the public mood in the EU referendum, when he was accused of taking a Project Fear approach by issuing blood-curdling warnings about the potential damage which Brexit could do to the UK economy.

"I definitely didn't get right my judgment of the national mood," he told Today.

"I don't think I properly understood the alienation that many people felt not just from the EU, but from the establishment, the system of government, and that economic insecurity and a sense of loss of identity in too many of our communities was something we had not properly addressed. I think they were all ingredients in that vote."

He said he hoped that his doom-laden predictions turned out to be wrong, but cautioned that the full impact of the June 23 vote on the economy had not yet been felt.

"The forecasts were made in good faith," said Mr Osborne. "The truth is, you look internationally at the independent forecasts of the UK, they are all predicting a significant slowdown. It's going to be a long drawn-out process.

"In the end, the strength of the British economy is going to depend on our relationship with our major trading partners and one of the things I will be arguing for in the House of Commons is the closest possible free trading relationship with our European partners."

He added: "There is an enormous opportunity now to take part in the decisions that are going to affect Britain. We've taken a big decision, which was to leave the European Union. There are now a whole host of new decisions about what our relationship is with Europe, how we run our economy, how Britain behaves in the world.

"I want to be there in ultimately the place where these decisions are made - the House of Commons - and be part of that decision making process, because I want to fight for the things I care about: an international Britain, a Britain connected with its allies, a Britain taking its full share of responsibilities in the world."

Mr Osborne brushed off claims from Liberal Democrat former energy secretary Sir Edward Davey that he and Mrs May disliked one another while Cabinet colleagues.

"That's genuinely not true," said the Tatton MP. "I've worked with Theresa for 20 years in opposition and in government. I actually think she's a person of integrity and real intelligence, and frankly in a Cabinet that included people like Ed Davey she was one of the grown-ups."

He insisted that he was enjoying a return to the backbenches, which gave him the opportunity to pursue his own priorities, like a Northern Powerhouse thinktank which he was launching in Manchester.

"I was shadow chancellor at the age of 33 and for over 11 years I've been travelling at about 100 miles per hour every day," Mr Osborne told Today.

"I'm not pretending that this is where I thought I would end up this summer, but actually Plan B is quite enjoyable and it's given me a chance to do something which is very difficult to do in government, which is to think again about where I made mistakes, think about the big problems that lie ahead for this country and the challenges that face our country, and that's what I'm enjoying doing at the moment."
William warns of pressures on children after helping aide get back on his feet

The Duke of Cambridge has spoken out about the pressures facing young children - after coming to the aid of a dignitary who fell flat on his back.

William said there were "layers" of pressures on today's youngsters as he visited an Essex secondary school with Kate to learn how pupils are coping with big challenges in their lives.

And during an informal chat with parents the Duke joked about the "perceptiveness" of three-year-olds - an apparent reference to his young son Prince George.

The Duke of Cambridge comes to the aid of Mr Douglas-Hughes outside Stewards Academy

When the royal couple first arrived at Stewards Academy in Harlow William went to the aid of Jonathan Douglas-Hughes, vice lord-lieutenant of Essex, who had tumbled over.

Mr Douglas-Hughes, who was wearing his military-style ceremonial uniform complete with sword and spurs, fell as the Duke was introduced to local dignitaries outside the school.

A gasp went up from around 30 well-wishers as the dignitary stumbled and Kate, who wore an outfit by Altuzarra, was left opened mouthed by the accident.

Mr Douglas-Hughes was helped to his feet by William and others and as the Duke put a reassuring arm on his shoulder he said "Sorry about that'', and the royal replied: ''No, it's all right''.

The dignitary appeared unhurt after his fall and said after the royal visit: "I was stepping back and I tripped over a concrete bollard that was behind me, but I'm ok, I'm fine."

During their tour of the school which has measures - like peer mentors - to support the mental well-being of pupils, William and Kate met a group of people whose children were attending or had left the school.

After each parent had talked about the experiences of their sons and daughters who had faced issues like anxiety or shyness the Duke said youngsters faced "many layers of pressure".

He added: "When we were growing up we didn't have social media, mobile phones, a lot of TV programmes and everything else - social pressures.

"Now, they're so many, plus they have exams, plus they have expectations to do well, plus they have friends to make - it's a lot of layers. You can see why young people buckle, it's a lot."

There were also lighter moments during the discussion when William told the parents how "very perceptive" youngsters could be.

And in what could be a reference to his son George, aged three, he added: "You're only three years old, how do you know that?"

Commenting on what might lie ahead when his children are older he joked: "The challenges you get are sleepless nights - fine - but then you get all the other stuff."

William also confessed to parents "I still think I'm 16 sometimes", and Kate made the group laugh when she replied: "I still think you're 16."

The Duke and Duchess also joined pupils who spoke openly about how they had coped with major events in their lives from the death of a sibling to family break-ups and a parent struggling to cope with depression.

The visit also promoted William and Kate's Heads Together campaign, which was launched, with Prince Harry, in May to encourage a positive national conversation about mental health problems.

They are also working with a number of organisations and charities in the field to help address the issues faced by members of society with psychological issues.

In a speech to a school assembly William said: "Talking can make us realise that we're not alone.

"The opposite of talking is isolation and fear. Sometimes getting something off your chest is an important step in coping with a situation - so you know that you're not alone, you're not failing, and that it is perfectly normal to feel overwhelmed or sad at times. Everybody does.

"To be honest, if we could end the old fashioned idea that feeling down is something to be ashamed of, something that you shouldn't burden others with, we would make our society a much happier and healthier place."

The Heads Together charity partners have put together 10 Tips for Talking, available on the organisation's website, to help parents have conversations with their children about the big changes in their lives.

The Duke of Cambridge comes to the aid of Jonathan Douglas-Hughes, vice lord-lieutenant of Essex

The vice lord-lieutenant of Essex is one of the Queen's representatives

Prince William helped Jonathan Douglas-Hughes to his feet

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge arriving at Stewards Academy in Harlow

The Duchess of Cambridge arrives at Stewards Academy in Harlow, Essex

Two students presented Kate with flowers
Deutsche Bank shares plunge as US officials propose 10bn securities settlement

Shares in Deutsche Bank have plummeted more than 8% after the US Department of Justice (DoJ) proposed it should pay a 14 billion US dollar (10.5 billion) settlement linked to the sale of mortgage-backed securities in the run-up to the financial crisis.

Despite the firm saying it has "no intent" to pay the full amount, shares in the troubled lender tanked.

Earlier this year, the DoJ agreed a five billion US dollar (3.7 billion) settlement with Goldman Sachs over similar claims. Other banks which settled recently include Bank of America, Citigroup and JP Morgan.

The lender expects a settlement in line with other banks, which it said were "materially lower"

Deutsche Bank said in a statement: "Deutsche Bank has no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited.

"The negotiations are only just beginning. The bank expects that they will lead to an outcome similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts."

Deutsche Bank is facing a host of problems as it moves to meet tougher regulatory requirements, cut costs and settle several legal investigations.

German Finance Ministry spokeswoman Friederike von Tiesenhausen weighed into the debate, saying Germany is "aware that US authorities have agreed with other banks on settlement payments, and so the German government assumes that a fair result will be reached at the end of this process as well, on the basis of equal treatment".

She added that she does not "share the assessment" that the DoJ ruling is retaliation for a 13 billion euro (11 billion) tax bill the European Commission slapped Apple with earlier this year.

Deutsche Bank is one of a number of lenders to be probed over dealings involving questionable mortgages during the period, with the principal charge being that banks misled investors about the quality of their loans.

The resultant losses suffered by investors, along with foreclosures across the US, formed one of the triggers for the financial crisis.
Minimum 24-year term for IS-inspired murderer of Rochdale imam

A former Manchester United steward has been jailed for life for the IS-inspired murder of an imam.

Mohammed Syeedy, 21, was consumed by hatred of Jalal Uddin, 71, because he practised a form of Islamic healing in Rochdale's Bangladeshi community which the terror group consider "black magic".

Syeedy acted as getaway driver for another man, Mohammed Kadir, 24, who bludgeoned Mr Uddin to death in a children's play area on the early evening of February 18, Manchester Crown Court heard.

Jalal Uddin was bludgeoned to death in Rochdale

Kadir fled the UK three days after the killing and it is thought he may now be in Syria.

Syeedy held his hands to his face in shock after the foreman delivered the verdict after about four hours of jury deliberations.

He later shook his head several times with his face covered as he sat down.

High Court judge Sir David Maddison handed him a life sentence, with a minimum term of 24 years.

The judge said Mr Uddin was a "gentle, well-respected man" who was attacked and "brutally" killed because he practised Ruqya faith healing.

He told Syeedy: "You and your co-offender saw the practice as a form of black magic that could not be tolerated within Islam."

Defenceless Mr Uddin was dealt at least five savage blows from behind with a hammer, shortly after he entered the park in South Street, Rochdale.

The swift and ferocious attack smashed his skull and drove a piece of bone into his brain.

Their victim was targeted after it was discovered he was providing "taweez", in which he made amulets to bring good fortune to the wearer.

Syeedy was involved in months-long surveillance of Mr Uddin and along with Kadir stalked their prey after he left the Jalalia Mosque to go to a friend's house for an evening meal

The Crown said Syeedy was a "knowing participant" in the murder, and his claim that he had no idea what IS supporter and ex-John Lewis call centre worker Kadir planned and then carried out, was "absurd".

The judge concluded Syeedy was aware Mr Uddin would be seriously injured "as to disable him permanently to prevent him practising Ruqya, through taweez, ever again".

And he said he was satisfied Syeedy had run into his home in Ramsay Street, Rochdale, to grab the murder weapon in a "carefully planned" plot.

Sir David told the defendant: "So slick was this operation that only some 90 seconds passed between the killer getting out of the car, approaching Jalal Uddin, killing him, and then proceeding to the other side of the park, where you picked him up.

"The evidence in this case, to my view, established that you have an interest in jihad, in the sense of armed violent struggle by extremists.

"It is quite plain that you have a strong dislike of the use of taweez."

The judge said there was "no significant" evidence to be certain that he was an active supporter of IS.

In fixing the length of sentence, he said: "I take in to account you were not the actual killer, but it seems to me you were an obviously integral part to the commission of this offence, and it could not have been committed without your involvement."

In a victim personal statement read to the court, one of Mr Uddin's seven children said "the pain and void that has been left with his death has been unbearable".

Saleh al-Arif said his father was "a distinguished Islamic scholar" who had moved to the UK in 2002 to help provide for his family back home.

He began teaching the Koran to children in east London, before moving to Birmingham and then to Rochdale where he became an imam at the Jalalia Mosque.

He said: "He was a devout pacifist and shared love to all he came across. I cannot begin to understand why anyone would want to murder him."

Describing his visit to Oldham mortuary to see his father's body, he said: "I was denied the most basic right, to kiss my father's face, because of this cowardly and horrific attack."

In a statement issued by police, his family added: "Weeks prior to his murder, Jalal had intended to return to Bangladesh and be reunited with his wife, children and grandchildren, whom he had not seen for some 15 years, in which time he had dedicated his life to selflessly serving his family, trying to make ends meet.

"Although Jalal was a Muslim who peacefully practised his faith, he had a love and respect for all religions, cultures and creeds, and the fact that he was murdered by someone inspired by Isil shows the true nature and barbarity of this organisation and those who serve it."
Anne cancels Africa trip on medical advice

The Princess Royal, who is recovering from a chest infection, has cancelled a trip to Africa later this month on medical advice, said Buckingham Palace.

Anne was due to fly to Botswana and Mozambique but her brother, the Duke of York, will now go instead.

A Buckingham Palace spokesman said: "The Princess Royal is still recovering from a bad chest infection. HRH's working programme for next week has therefore been scaled back, with a number of engagements cancelled.

Princess Anne is recovering from a chest infection

"As a precaution, on the advice of doctors, the princess will not undertake the planned visit to Botswana and Mozambique at the end of the month. The Duke of York will now undertake this visit."

Anne has been resting privately at home this week on doctors' orders after her engagements were cancelled following medical treatment for the chest infection.

She was treated at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary on September 9 before being discharged and returning to Balmoral.

At the start of the month she joined the Queen, the Duke of Edinburgh and the Prince of Wales at the Braemar Highland Games, which are held a short distance from the Royal Family's summer retreat in Aberdeenshire.
Kremlin: Obama's Trump criticism anti-Russian, won't foster better ties

MOSCOW, Sept 14 (Reuters) - The Kremlin said on Wednesday it viewed U.S. President Barack Obama's recent statements on Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump as anti-Russian and said they were unlikely to improve fragile relations between Russia and the United States.

Obama on Tuesday strongly criticised Trump for praising Russian President Vladimir Putin and for appearing on a TV channel, RT, funded by the Russian government.

"Unfortunately, we see continued displays of often hard-core Russophobia," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, commenting on Obama's intervention, told a conference call with reporters. "We can only express regret in this regard.
Benefits of 'dark pool' share trading outweigh risks, UK watchdog says

By Huw Jones

LONDON, Sept 15 (Reuters) - The benefits of dark pools, where investors can trade shares anonymously, outweigh the risks, an analysis from Britain's markets watchdog said on Thursday.

Dark pools, which feature in Michael Lewis's best-seller book "Flash Boys", have come under fire from some financial experts who say they are poorly regulated and that traders working in them do not always get the best price for customers.

In January, Barclays and Credit Suisse banks settled federal and state charges in the United States that they misled investors in dark pools. The European Union, meanwhile, is introducing a cap on trading in dark pools from January 2018.

However, Britain's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said its analysis showed dark pools could provide important benefits.

Some investors like using dark pools because other players cannot see when they are executing larger orders. On public exchanges, traders can see a large order going through, and so can move the price against the investor conducting it.

Trading in Europe's dark pools hit nearly 100 billion euros ($112 billion) in June, the highest on record, according to Thomson Reuters Market Share Reporter. This is still only a fraction of overall equity trading turnover, though, which reached 2.3 trillion euros in the same month.

Dark pools execute orders using prices from public exchanges such as the London Stock Exchange (LSE) as a reference.

A major criticism of dark pools is that some of the prices in them are "stale," meaning they lag those on public exchanges. That matters because trading venues are legally required to offer "best execution" to customers, though sometimes a stale price can be better for the investor than an updated one.

In the first analysis of its kind in Britain, the FCA said "stale" bid and offer prices existed in every dark pool it sampled in Britain and their prevalence had risen to just over 4 percent of dark trades in June 2015 from 3.36 percent in 2014.

On peak days, stale trades can top 10 percent, it added.

The FCA analysis also found that high-frequency traders, or those who use computer algorithms to nip in and out of markets at ultra fast speeds, were on the profitable side of stale trades in 96 percent of cases.

However, it estimated the cost to investors from stale prices was just 4.2 million pounds ($5.5 million) a year, a fraction of the 4.9 billion pounds average daily order book trading on the LSE.

"Overall, we find that the costs associated with inferior reference prices are small, and do not outweigh the useful service dark pools provide to market users by providing price improvement and reducing price impact," the analysis said.

Last week a group of asset managers and banks teamed up with the dark pool unit of the LSE's Turquoise arm.

($1 = 0.8897 euros)
Silicon Valley 3D printing startup gets $81 million in new funding

By Ben Gruber

REDWOOD CITY, Calif., Sept 15 (Reuters) - Carbon, a Silicon Valley startup that is developing 3D printers to produce medical devices and car parts on demand, said on Thursday it had closed on $81 million in funding that brought the total it has raised to $222 million.

"We wanted to go find investors that share the scope of our vision and realize what we are talking about here is industrial re-invention," Kirk Phelps, Carbon vice president of product management, told Reuters at the company's headquarters in Redwood City, California.

Founded in 2013, Carbon said the funding round was led by automaker BMW Group, industrial conglomerate General Electric Co, optics and imaging products company Nikon Corp and chemical manufacturer JSR Corp. They joined earlier investors Google Ventures and top tech venture capital firm Sequoia.

"They did an incredibly good job in getting investors," said Terry Wohler of Wohler Associates, an additive manufacturing consultancy firm based in Colorado.

However, Wohler said "the jury is still out" on whether Carbon's technology can match the durability of injection molding, the current industry standard for producing plastic products, or come close to its price point.

The company's first commercial 3D printer, the M1, is available for a $40,000 annual subscription. It uses software that controls a photochemical process that balances the way ultraviolet light and oxygen react within a pool of polymer resin to print plastic objects.

Carbon has developed various resins to diversify what can be printed. It uses heat-resistant hard resins for exterior automotive parts and soft elastic biodegradable resins for medical devices like heart stents.

The company says it can print up to 100 times faster than rival 3D printing companies. That would be a selling point to the manufacturing industry, which until now used 3D printing primarily as a prototyping tool.

"You can imagine that if we give clients a great on-demand manufacturing tool, it's not just the product that changes," Phelps said. "It's the business that changes."
Surge of Haitians leaving Brazil arrive on U.S.-Mexico border

By Julia Edwards

WASHINGTON, Sept 15 (Reuters) - U.S. border officials are struggling to find enough space to temporarily hold hundreds of Haitian immigrants who left Brazil, where they relocated after Haiti's 2010 earthquake, but have decided to move again amid recession and the Rio Olympics ending.

According to an internal U.S. Customs and Border Protection email sent on Wednesday and seen by Reuters, an official in San Ysidro, California, reported 900 Haitians were waiting to cross from Tijuana in Mexico and asked Border Patrol to send Creole speakers to interpret interviews with migrants.

Apprehensions of Haitians in southern Mexico are also on the rise, where an estimated 500 arrived on Monday, indicating that the surge toward the United States could grow when those people travel north.

Border officials need more space to hold Haitians in detention while they go through the process of being interviewed and potentially seeking asylum when they arrive in San Ysidro and Calexico, California, according to internal emails seen by Reuters.

In response to the official's request for interpreters, another official said Border Patrol had three Creole-speaking agents and offered to send them to San Ysidro and Calexico.

A third official stationed in Calexico reported 100 Haitians were in custody on Friday when "the first big wave arrived," but did not specify how many.

After presenting themselves to authorities and being temporarily detained, migrants can make a claim for asylum and be released until their scheduled court date.

Most of the Haitians have traveled from Brazil, where they moved to take advantage of a program that allowed them to work there after the earthquake, U.S. officials said. But with the slump in Brazil's economy and the Aug. 5-21 Summer Olympics over, many have set their sights on the United States to find work.

State Department spokesman Joseph Crook said the agency is "concerned for the safety of all migrants throughout the region, including Haitian migrants seeking to journey northward through South and Central America and Mexico" and they continue to engage other governments on the issue.

U.S. Department of Homeland Security Officials were criticized by Republican lawmakers on a House of Representatives panel on Wednesday for not doing enough to vet migrants and secure the border, a topic that has also played out in the campaign for the Nov. 8 presidential election. Republican Party candidate Donald Trump has said he wants to build a wall along the border with Mexico to stem illegal immigration.

The numbers of Haitians waiting to enter California this week represent a spike in a migration trend that began this fiscal year. Between October and July, 3,538 Haitian migrants arrived in the United States illegally, more than 3,000 of whom were entering through San Ysidro into San Diego, U.S. Customs and Border Protection data showed.

In fiscal year 2015, 712 Haitians attempted to enter the United States without proper documentation.

PRETENDING TO BE CONGOLESE

Another phenomenon that U.S. border officials are dealing with is Haitian migrants turning themselves in and claiming to be Congolese. Mexico does not have the authority to deport migrants to the Democratic Republic of Congo or the Republic of the Congo as it does not have diplomatic ties with them, so its immigration authorities must release those people.

At a migrant detention center in Tapachula, Mexico, on Monday, U.S. and Mexican immigration authorities were inundated when 500 immigrants turned themselves in, claiming to be Congolese, according to the internal emails seen by Reuters.

Two officials, one at the U.S. Department of State and the other at the Department of Homeland Security told Reuters on the condition of anonymity that they are skeptical that the 500 were Congolese because so many Haitians have made that claim.

The Department of Homeland Security official said most, if not all, were likely to be Haitians claiming to be Congolese.

Costa Rican President Luis Guillermo Solis said at the Wilson Center in Washington on Aug. 22 that around February, his country began seeing a rise in migrants claiming to be from West Africa and named Muhammad Ali.

"When we started providing them with services mostly aimed at Muslims and Africans...we realized the French they spoke was not West African French, it was Creole," Solis said. "We then realized that most of them were coming from Haiti."
Colombia accepts role in 1980s killings of leftist politicians

BOGOTA, Sept 15 (Reuters) - Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos on Thursday acknowledged the state's responsibility in the killing of thousands of members of a leftist political party three decades ago and pledged to prevent such assassinations again.

Santos' statement comes less than two weeks before he will sign a peace accord with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), whose members were killed following a previous peace agreement in the mid 1980s when they formed the Patriotic Union (UP) political party.

Some 5,000 UP members and supporters were killed by right-wing paramilitary groups, often working with state backing.

"That tragedy should never have happened, and we must recognize that the government didn't take sufficient measures to impede and prevent the assassinations, attacks and other violations even though there was evidence the persecution was taking place," Santos said during an event where 200 survivors and family members of UP victims were present.

As part of the latest peace agreement with the Marxist FARC rebels, the government promised to guarantee them safety once they hand in their arms. The group plans to launch a political party and stand for office.

"I make the solemn commitment before you today to take all the necessary measures and to give all the guarantees to make sure that never again in Colombia will a political organization have to face what the UP suffered," Santos said.

On Monday, the FARC also apologized for kidnapping thousands of people to fund its half century of conflict with the government.

The two sides are gearing up to sign a peace accord to end the war, which has killed more than 220,000 people and displaced millions. Some 7,000 FARC fighters will be incorporated into society.
Oil prices drop on returning Libya, Nigeria supplies

By Mark Tay

SINGAPORE, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Oil prices fell on Friday on worries that U.S. rig counts would continue to rise and that returning Libyan and Nigerian exports would stoke a global supply glut.

Brent crude futures were trading at $46.32 per barrel at 0107 GMT, down 27 cents, or 0.6 percent, from their last settlement. U.S. West Texas Intermediate futures were down 24 cents, or 0.6 percent, at $43.67 a barrel.

"The focus will turn to drilling activity in the U.S., with another rise expected to raise concerns about a recovery in U.S. output," Australian bank ANZ said in a note.

Baker Hughes U.S. rig count data for the week to Sept. 16 is due on Friday. WTI prices that have held above $40 a barrel since the start of August have supported the growth in the number of U.S. rigs.

U.S. drillers added seven oil rigs in the week to Sept. 9, bringing the total rig count to 414, the most since February.

Returning supply from Libya and Nigeria will hamper a rebalancing of the global crude market, weighing on sentiment, traders said.

Libya is resuming oil exports from some of its main ports which forces loyal to eastern commander Khalifa Haftar seized in recent days and has lifted related "force majeure" contractual clauses, the National Oil Corporation (NOC) said on Thursday.
Fans cheer, but Asia gives iPhone 7 subdued welcome

By Adam Jourdan and Tom Westbrook

SHANGHAI/SYDNEY, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Apple Inc fans from Sydney to Shanghai, the first customers worldwide to snap the new iPhone 7 off the shelves, cheered as they left stores on Friday brandishing their purchases, flanked by applauding sales staff.

But underneath the usual fanfare, the crowds of enthusiasts and overnight campers were smaller than in past years. Some customers complained after the larger version and models with the new jet-black colour sold out.

In part, online pre-ordering has made queues unnecessary for all but diehard fans, and in Chinese stores only those who had ordered in advance were queuing to collect.

Yet in markets like China, online interest in the new phone has also been muted compared to past launches, as cheaper local brands amp up their features, design and marketing.

Wu Ting, a 28-year-old from Nanjing, was surprised to find herself first in line at a downtown Apple store in Shanghai on Friday, a holiday in China.

"I found last year that there were crowds of people, but this year almost no-one. I came an hour early thinking I'd have to wait a long time before getting seen," Wu said.

Sales in China will be the acid test for Apple's year ahead: the success of the iPhone 6 in China drove sales last year, while the slower-burn 6S contributed to Apple's first global revenue drop in over a decade earlier this year.

Chatter about the iPhone 7 launch on Chinese microblog Weibo has been far more muted than when the iPhone 6 debuted in 2014. An index of searches on Baidu Inc, China's most popular search engine, shows the new phone lagging both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 5.

Apple's Greater China sales dropped by a third in April-June, albeit after more than doubling a year earlier, while its market share has fallen to around 7.8 percent, placing it fifth behind local rivals Huawei, OPPO and Vivo.

Apple has been slower to adapt, consumers and analysts say: the new iPhone has few major changes to win over fickle shoppers and the firm's marketing has been generic.

"From Steve Jobs to Tim Cook, Apple has never had any marketing strategy tailor-made for China," said Zhou Zhanggui, a Beijing-based strategic consultant.

"Apple risks losing out more if it does not better cater to local demands in its marketing as well as product design."

In Beijing's fashionable Sanlitun shopping district, several people who had already grabbed new iPhone 7s were hawking them for a markup just outside a flagship store.

But Apple has not lost its shine for all customers.

Marcus Barsoum, a 16-year-old who described himself as a "diehard Apple fan", spent two nights camped outside the Sydney store. By the morning, some 200 people were gathered in light rain to be the first customers globally to own iPhone 7s.

Weary but elated, Barsoum charged into the store at 8 a.m. to the cheers of Apple staff. He emerged with a matte black iPhone 7, although he had wanted a larger 7 plus in jet black.

"It feels great to be the first in the world to have the iPhone 7," he said. "It was 100 percent worth it."
Hungary PM says Visegrad countries to submit joint proposals at EU summit

BUDAPEST, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The four Central European member states of the European Union will submit a text of joint proposals to tackle the problems of the bloc at a summit later in the day in Bratislava, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban told public radio.

"The V4 countries are preparing a (text), and we will submit this ... as a joint Visegrad Four proposal to the European Council, this will be an important moment in the life of these four countries," Orban said in the interview recorded on Thursday and published on Friday morning.

Orban also said that he expected migration pressure to increase in the Balkans again, once the weather worsens and sea routes to Italy become difficult.
GRAPHIC-Why the US is a major roadblock for oil output freeze

By Amanda Cooper

LONDON, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The price of oil has been caught in one of its most volatile couple of weeks in months after OPEC and rival Russia hinted they may discuss a possible output freeze, as demand slows and a global surplus becomes more entrenched.

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and Russia meet on the sidelines of the International Energy Forum in Algiers in two weeks' time. The pressure is mounting on both sides to not only freeze output, but possibly even cut it.

Whatever the rival factions decide, one producer has managed to top them all in terms of production growth over the last five years and will never be likely to join in any group efforts to control supply. And that is the United States.

Since 2010, thanks to the boom in shale oil production, the United States has witnessed more growth in daily output than any other major producer.

U.S. oil output is around 2.87 million barrels per day higher now than it was six years ago, compared with an increase of 2.47 million bpd from Saudi Arabia and a rise of 1.9 million bpd from Iraq.

In fact, the increase in U.S. production is only just above the collective increase for the whole of OPEC, which comes in at around 3.15 million bpd.

"If OPEC were to cut its production in Algiers, or really freeze its production, then prices would rise, and what producer would benefit the most rapidly from those high prices? It would be the U.S.. We would be back soon enough in a situation where the U.S. will move toward its previous boom-rate of growth and therefore start absorbing market share again," Wood Mackenzie analyst Ann-Louise Hittle said.

"It's another reason why it's difficult for OPEC to agree to a freeze" she said. "The U.S., especially now that it can export crude, is a global threat to market share, it's not just a threat indirectly through product exports any more."

In November 2014, OPEC ditched its policy of restraining supply to support the price of oil, which has fallen by more than 40 percent since then to around $46 a barrel.

Increases in the likes of Saudi Arabia or Iraq have been countered by losses in Libya and Nigeria or Venezuela, while Iran is just about approaching output levels registered prior to the introduction of Western sanctions in response to Tehran's nuclear programme that were lifted in January 2016.

Russia, the world's largest producer, has managed to add around 550,000 bpd to its daily output in this time and although Energy Minister Alexander Novak has said a freeze would "help markets", enforcing such a limit could prove tricky.

"The structure of the U.S. oil industry and the high number of players involved in U.S. crude production would simply not allow for a freeze," JBC Energy senior analyst Alexander Poegl said.

"How would you limit production growth, as there is no provision for the government to enforce this?" Poegl said. "This is the same argument Russia has used in the past, to a certain extent, although in Russia, where you have a limited amount of players that are highly connected to politics, it is potentially still easier than in the U.S."
Catalan bonds back in favour as Spain break-up fears ease

By Abhinav Ramnarayan

LONDON, Sept 15 (Reuters) - The premium that investors demand to lend to the Spanish region of Catalonia is shrinking because they believe that efforts to break away and form an independent state are losing momentum.

Reduced investor concern over a possible breakup of the euro zone's fourth largest economy coincides with broader political uncertainty in Spain where a caretaker government has been in charge after two inconclusive elections since December.

Catalonia's debt gained ground on Spanish government bonds this week after investors interpreted reduced turnout at rallies on Sunday -- Catalonia's national day -- as an indication that the independence drive was weakening.

Pressure from separatists in Spain's richest region, home to the city of Barcelona and producing about a fifth of the nation's economic output, is viewed negatively in financial markets.

Ratings agency Standard & Poor's, for example, has said it could reduce Catalonia's B+ credit rating -- already well short of the highest and safest investment grade -- by one or two notches if tensions escalate between the region and Madrid.

"Catalonian bonds have been recovering from the losses suffered earlier this year, given that the independence movement doesn't seem to be going anywhere for the moment," said Mark Dowding, partner and co-head of investment-grade debt at BlueBay Asset Management.

BlueBay AM owns Catalan bonds and has been adding to positions this year, Dowding said.

"At the independence rally this week, a lot less people turned up compared to last time, and that sort of confirms the suspicion that support for independence is decreasing," he said.

Catalonia's "La Diada" national day is an annual rallying point for the independence movement. Police estimate just over 800,000 people took to the streets across the region last Sunday, compared with closer to 1.4 million last year when Barcelona was the focal point.

The yield on Catalan bonds maturing in February 2020 has since fallen as much as 31 basis points to 3.28 percent, and the premium over the Spanish equivalent has shrunk 25 bps to 328 bps, according to Tradeweb data.

This is a far cry from the highs in March, when the yield on that Catalan bond hit 5.21 percent and the spread over Spanish government bonds was 493 bps.

Spanish bonds are rated BBB+ by S&P -- six notches higher than their Catalan equivalents.

RISK NOT GONE AWAY

Home to 7.5 million people, Catalonia has its own language and distinct culture, as well as a long-standing industrial tradition and a thriving tourism sector.

Pro-independence parties won a majority of seats in its regional assembly a year ago but fell short of taking more than half the votes, raising questions about how clear cut support for independence is.

The conservative caretaker national government, led by Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, has resorted repeatedly to legal blocks via the constitutional court to halt the push for independence.

In the June election rerun, Rajoy's People's Party emerged with a larger bloc of seats, even though the outcome was still a hung parliament.

"If there's a new coalition government in Madrid agreed in the next few weeks or even in the case of a third election, it seems like it will be led by the centre-right People's Party," said Daniel Lenz, a DZ Bank strategist.

"That again means (Catalan) independence is more unlikely, because it is only the left parties that have been receptive for a referendum on independence," he said.

Support for independence has ebbed and flowed since surging in 2012 at the height of Spain's economic crisis and after attempts to gain more autonomy were knocked back.

Squabbling between separatist parties has in part dampened enthusiasm, while many have doubts about whether leaders can truly deliver independence for next year as promised.

However, one poll published in July showed support for independence edging ahead of those against it for the first time, though it remained below 50 percent.

Teneo Intelligence analyst Antonio Barroso cautioned against reading too much into the reduced turnout for last weekend's independence protests.

"In the past this issue has been much more in the spotlight so the turnouts were higher. It only takes another episode for everything to flare up again," he said.

Many analysts expect tensions between Barcelona and Madrid to escalate in the coming months, at Catalan leaders come under pressure to press ahead with planning a split from Spain.
British embassy in Ankara closed for security reasons -foreign office

ISTANBUL, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The British government has shut its embassy in the Turkish capital Ankara on Friday for security reasons, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office said on its website, without giving further details.

"The British Embassy Ankara will be closed to the public on Friday 16 September for security reasons," the foreign office said late on Thursday.

The embassy had been closed from Monday to Thursday for the Eid al-Adha holiday this week, one of the two most important festivals of the Islamic calendar.

Turkey has been repeatedly targeted in the past by militants, both Islamist and Kurdish.

A suicide bomber at a wedding in the southeastern city of Gaziantep last month killed more than 54 people, including 22 children, the deadliest such bombing this year. That attack is believed to have been carried out by Islamic State militants.
Czech Republic - Factors To Watch on Sept 16

PRAGUE, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Here are news stories, press reports and events to watch which may affect Czech financial markets on Friday. ALL TIMES GMT (Czech Republic: GMT + 2 hours) =========================ECONOMIC DATA========================== Real-time economic data releases.................... Summary of economic data and forecasts........... Recently released economic data.................. Previous stories on Czech data............. **For a schedule of corporate and economic events: http://emea1.apps.cp.thomsonreuters.com/Apps/CountryWeb/#/2E/events-overview ==========================NEWS================================== CEE MARKETS: Central European government bond prices extended their losses on Thursday amid uncertainty ahead of U.S. jobs data, tracking a rise in euro zone yields. Story: Related stories: ======================PRESS DIGEST============================= BANKS: The Czech banks raised their profits in the first half of the year by 7.3 billion crowns to 44.7 billion crowns ($1.86 billion) overall, data from the central bank showed. Pravo, page 15 (Reuters has not verified the stories, nor does it vouch for their accuracy.) For real-time stock market index quotes click in brackets: Warsaw WIG20 Budapest BUX Prague PX For updates on CEE currencies TOP NEWS -- Emerging markets Prague Newsroom: +420 224 190 477 E-mail: prague.newsroom@thomsonreuters.com ($1 = 24.0260 Czech crowns) (Reporting by Prague Newsroom)
Belgian brewery's pipe dream brings relief to medieval Bruges

By Philip Blenkinsop

BRUGES, Belgium, Sept 16 (Reuters) - A Belgian brewery is turning on the taps of a pipeline buried beneath the medieval city of Bruges to transport its beer to a bottling plant some 3 km (2 miles) away.

Four years in planning and five months in construction, the Halve Maan (Half Moon) brewery will officially open a pipe that will rid the historic city centre and its tight cobbled lanes of beer-laden trucks weighing more than 40 tonnes.

The brewery bid farewell on Thursday to the last of those trucks, one of between 10 and 15 per week, from streets designed for a horse and cart and now packed with tourists.

Half Maan's managing director, Xavier Vanneste, said the idea of a pipe had seemed crazy until he saw local workmen laying underground cables and started looking into it.

The brew master, five generational lines down from founder Henri Maes, said he could have moved the brewing to beside the bottling plant built in 2010 and kept the old site as a museum. But he wanted to retain the beers as products of the old city.

"People want to see something that is alive and not just some dusty museum," he said.

Before World War Two, the city had some 30 beer makers, but Halve Maan is the last of the old guard left and on a site where an earlier "Halve Maan" brewery operated 575 years ago.

The current site still brews the staple blond and brown Brugse Zot and the maltier and stronger Straffe Hendrik, but also welcomes visitors to its bar and more than 100,000 to its museum, both clear adverts for the brands for Belgians and foreigners.

The picture-perfect centre of Bruges is a magnet for some 6.5 million tourists per year and a Unesco world heritage site home to early Flemish painters and filled with Gothic brick buildings, canals and historic churches.

It's not just the pipeline that is novel. The way it was funded is too.

The pipeline cost some 4 million euros ($4.5 million). Halve Maan received a subsidy from the Flemish regional government, but also raised about 350,000 euros through crowdfunding, among the largest ever in Belgium, paying contributors back in beer.

Those paying the top-rate 7,500 euros will be rewarded with a bottle of Brugse Zot every day for the rest of their lives.

Halve Maan should also benefit too after volumes grew by 30 percent to some 5 million litres (8.8 million pints) last year and are set for 20 percent expansion in 2016.
Oil hits multi-week lows on glut worry; gasoline surges

By Barani Krishnan

NEW YORK, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Crude oil prices fell 2 percent on Friday to multi-week lows as swelling Iranian exports reinforced fears of a global glut, while gasoline rallied on refinery and pipeline outages.

Falling U.S. equity markets and a rising dollar also weighed on crude futures and other commodities denominated in the greenback.

Gasoline rose 2 percent after outages on Colonial Pipeline's main gasoline line and in a key unit of BP Plc's refinery in Whiting, Indiana. The profit for turning crude into gasoline <_1RBc1-Clc1> hit three-month highs and pump prices for the fuel rose as well.

Brent crude futures settled down 82 cents, or 1.8 percent, at $45.77 a barrel, hitting a two-week bottom of $45.48.

U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures fell 88 cents, or 2 percent, to settle at $43.03 a barrel. WTI hit a five-week low of $42.74.

For the week, Brent fell 5 percent, while WTI lost 6 percent.

"Crude futures are taking on an increasingly bearish appearance," said Jim Ritterbusch of Chicago-based oil markets consultancy Ritterbusch & Associates.

For WTI, "this can potentially expedite our expected trip south to the $39 area," he said.

Oil slumped after a source familiar with Iran's tanker loading schedules said the third-biggest OPEC producer raised crude exports to more than 2 million barrels per day (bpd) in August, nearing pre-sanctions levels.

Iran and OPEC kingpin Saudi Arabia have been raising exports despite the approaching Sept. 26-28 meeting in Algeria, where the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and other major producers are set to discuss an oil production freeze. Most market participants are skeptical a deal will be reached.

There are also signs of returning output from Nigeria and Libya, where crude exports have been hampered by conflict and unrest.

U.S. oil output, meanwhile, has grown more than that of any producer since 2010, data shows. A weekly reading on the U.S. oil rig count showed a rise for the 11th out of the last 12 weeks.

The rally in gasoline picked up on news BP Plc plans to shut for up to 10 days the large crude distillation unit at its 413,500-bpd Whiting, Indiana refinery. That would add to closure of the refinery's gasoline-producing fluidic catalytic cracking unit.

Analysts expect gasoline pump prices to continue rising in the coming days after Colonial Pipeline Co said it was aiming for a restart by Thursday of its key line that brings gasoline to the East Coast.
Avanti plans debt issue to tide over liquidity concerns

Sept 16 (Reuters) - Satellite group Avanti Communications said on Friday it had begun a process to pay debt due in October by issuing debt that would mature in 2019, in order to address a liquidity crunch.

The company, which put itself up for sale in July, said it launched a consent solicitation process to pay a $32.25 million coupon due next month, by issuing additional senior secured notes due 2019.

The move was supported by about 60 percent of bondholders holding the 2016 debt, Avanti said.

Revenue is expected to grow 35-40 percent annually over the next 2-3 years, Avanti said. In July, the company had said it saw full-year revenue at about $83 million, implying a 35 percent jump.
China launches second experimental space lab module

BEIJING, Sept 15 (Reuters) - China launched its second experimental space laboratory on Thursday, part of a broader plan to have a permanent manned space station in service around 2022.

Advancing China's space programme is a priority for Beijing, with President Xi Jinping calling for the country to establish itself as a space power, and apart from its civilian ambitions, Beijing has tested anti-satellite missiles.

China insists its space programme is for peaceful purposes, but the U.S. Defense Department has highlighted its increasing space capabilities, saying it was pursuing activities aimed to prevent adversaries from using space-based assets in a crisis.

In a manned space mission in 2013, three Chinese astronauts spent 15 days in orbit and docked with an experimental space laboratory, the Tiangong 1, or "Heavenly Palace".

Its successor, Tiangong 2, lifted off on a Long March rocket just after 10 p.m. (1400 GMT) from the remote launch site in Jiuquan, in the Gobi desert, in images carried live on state television.

The Shenzhou 11 spacecraft, which will carry two astronauts and dock with Tiangong 2, will be launched sometime next month.

The astronauts expect to remain in Tiangong 2 for about a month, testing systems and processes for mid-term stays in space and refuelling, and conduct medical and other experiments.

The smooth launch imparts a high-tech sheen to week-long celebrations of China's National Day, starting on Oct. 1, as well as this week's shorter Mid-Autumn Festival holiday that coincides with the full moon.

China would start building its space station starting as early as next year, Xinhua quoted Zhou Jianping, chief engineer of the manned spaceflight programme, as saying.

The station would be more economically efficient than the International Space Station and use "more data", he said.

"Once the lab mission comes to an end, China will start building our own space station," Zhou was quoted as saying.

China will launch a "core module" for the station some time around 2018, a senior official said in April, part of a plan for a permanent manned space station in service around 2022.

China has been working to develop its space programme for military, commercial and scientific purposes, but is still playing catch-up to established space powers the United States and Russia.

China's Jade Rabbit moon rover landed on the moon in late 2013 to great national fanfare, but soon suffered severe technical difficulties.
John Menzies to buy peer BBA's aircraft services unit

By Esha Vaish and Maiya Keidan

Sept 16 (Reuters) - UK airport services and logistics group John Menzies Plc agreed to buy peer BBA Aviation Plc's ASIG commercial aircraft services unit in a deal worth $202 million, taking a major step in consolidating a fragmented industry.

Menzies has been under pressure to revamp its business, as a string of warnings and the departure of top executives attracted criticism from activist investors who have advocated splitting its aviation services and printed media distribution units.

Investor Shareholder Value Management (SVM), which holds over 7 percent of the firm, has urged Menzies to pursue more deals, a call the company answered by naming Dermot Smurfit, with a strong deals background, as its chairman this year.

"We are still very vocal about advocating for a split," SVM analyst Gianluca Ferrari told Reuters. "Nevertheless it has always been our view that the industry needs consolidation. The two things are not mutually exclusive. I think the scale will increase value."

Menzies has been trying to expand the aviation support business, which includes cargo and baggage handling and freight forwarding services and brings in most of its profits, as its once core newspaper and magazine distribution business continues to decline.

Menzies said on Friday the proposed ASIG deal, which is expected to materially enhance its earnings in the first full year, would be funded via a 75 million pound ($99 million) fully underwritten rights issue and a new debt package.

BBA's ASIG unit provides refuelling, baggage handling, equipment maintenance and de-icing services across 80 airports in North America, Central America, Europe and Asia.
Private equity in Africa loses its shine

By Joe Brock

JOHANNESBURG, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Major private equity firms have seen a number of top management departures in Africa, individuals familiar with the matter said, as the funds grapple with investments hurt by a weak economy.

U.S. firm Carlyle, Standard Chartered and emerging market-focused Actis have all seen a change of top executives at their Africa funds, according to these six individuals.

Once seen as a beacon of growth, private equity firms expanded their business in the region just before the financial crash. A weak economy and falling currencies have now taken the gloss off a decade of 'Africa rising' optimism.

Some investments by these companies have struggled in the downturn. The changes at these groups, which pool the money of pension funds and international investors to buy, say, a stake in local companies, bring this decline into focus.

Carlyle's Africa chief, Marlon Chigwende, confirmed that he had left. His departure in August followed a number of unsuccessful buyouts, including in Nigeria's struggling Diamond Bank, two sources familiar with the matter said.

Chigwende told Reuters that investments had done well while he was in charge and that he was now setting up his own fund. Carlyle did not comment on the reasons for his departure.

The Africa chief for Actis, John van Wyk, is also due to leave, two sources familiar with the matter said, asking to remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of the matter. Van Wyk did not respond to a request for comment.

The company's global private equity head Peter Schmid, a veteran of African fund management, said he too would be leaving the group. An Actis spokesman declined to comment.

Standard Chartered is parting ways with its Africa head, Peter Baird, as part of a plan to reduce its Africa team from 11 members to five, two industry sources said.

Standard Chartered's private equity head, Joe Stevens, confirmed that the team was being "streamlined" but said it was not linked to performance.

A confidential investor prospectus, seen by Reuters, shows that Chigwende and two fund managers leaving Standard Chartered, Adrian Smith and Mayowa Ayodele, are planning to launch Arkana Partners, a new African private equity firm.

Smith and Ayodele declined to comment.

DRY UP

The changes come as a slump in oil has hit Africa hard, pushing countries such as South Africa, Nigeria and Angola into or close to recession and sending their currencies tumbling.

This change of fortune is reflected in the private equity sector.

African private equity deals fell to $2.5 billion last year, compared with $8.1 billion in 2014, and fundraising is expected to drop this year, the African Private Equity and Venture Capital Association said.

Many of the hardest hit investments have been in Nigeria, where subdued oil prices have pushed Africa's most populous country and biggest economy into recession.

That has seen the supply of dollars dry up and the local Naira currency weaken, cutting the value of foreign investments in the country.

Standard Chartered's investments include Nigeria's Union Bank, which has halved in value this year.

Both Actis and Carlyle have suffered significant losses from stakes in Nigeria's Diamond Bank.

Actis invested $134 million in Diamond Bank in 2007 and sold its stake in 2014 for an undisclosed amount, during which time the shares fell around 60 percent.

Diamond's Bank stock has slumped a further 90 percent in dollar terms since Carlyle invested $147 million in 2014.

Diamond Bank has been hammered by a shrinking economy, a plunging currency and acute foreign exchange shortages, all a consequence of the slump in the oil price.

Carlyle also bought into J&J Transport and Traxys between 2013 and 2014. J&J is an African transport firm with mining customers, while Traxys trades commodities in Africa and provides logistics for that sector.

Both have been hit by the slump in commodity prices since the private equity firms bought their stakes, two people familiar with the matter said.

An Actis spokesman declined to comment on fund performance, adding that it had worked with Diamond Bank through "a period of considerable volatility to build a strong franchise".

The downturn is in stark contrast to the region's earlier rapid growth, spurred by a commodity boom, debt forgiveness extended by rich nations to some African countries and the spread of mobile phones.

Some in the industry, however, still see potential.

"With the exception of Diamond Bank, the portfolio is performing in line with expectations," Eric Kump, co-head of Carlyle's Africa fund and Chigwende's successor, told Reuters.

"Diamond Bank is the challenging asset."
Bulgaria seeks 160 mln euros in EU aid to stem migrant flows

SOFIA, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Bulgaria has asked for 160 million euros ($180 million) aid from the European Commission to help it protect its borders and stem the flow of migrants and refugees into the country, deputy prime minister Rumiana Bachvarova said on Friday.

Over a million people fleeing conflict and poverty in the Middle East and Africa arrived in Europe last year, many coming via Turkey, and Bulgaria says migrant flows through its territory have been on the rise again since June.

The European Union's poorest country has built a fence and sent army officers to its border with Turkey but needs EU support to maintain proper frontier protection. Prime Minister Boiko Borisov is expected to raise the issue at the EU summit in Bratislava today.

"We have filed three applications for a total amount of 160 million euros to the European Commission. We have asked for technical support, for support to build video surveillance and support for operational activities," Bachvarova told parliament.

Bachvarova said Sofia had been assured that it will receive the main part of the support package very soon.
Iran crude exports hit 5-yr high near pre-sanctions levels -source

By Florence Tan and Osamu Tsukimori

SINGAPORE/TOKYO, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Iran's August crude oil exports jumped 15 percent from July to more than 2 million barrels per day (bpd), according to a source with knowledge of its tanker loading schedule, closing in on Tehran's pre-sanctions shipment levels of five years ago.

The No. 3 OPEC producer has more than doubled its crude exports, excluding the ultra light oil condensate, since December. Economic sanctions targeting Iran's disputed nuclear programme were lifted in January, and it has been battling since then to regain market share lost to other Middle East producers over the previous four years.

The strong demand for Iran's crude in Asia and Europe has enabled it to raise its oil output to just over 3.8 million bpd as of this month, still shy of the 4 million bpd level Tehran says is a precondition for discussing output limits with Saudi Arabia and Russia.

Members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and Russia are expected to meet during the International Energy Forum in Algeria over Sept. 26-28 to discuss a possible output freeze to stabilize oil prices that are still down around 60 percent since mid-2014.

"The only way for producers to maximise their revenues in a low oil price environment to meet budget requirements is to raise production," said Victor Shum, an oil analyst at consultancy IHS. "So there is unlikely to be any supply deal ... in late September," he said.

"We can expect Iran to continue to raise production."

August crude exports from Iran excluding condensate roughly doubled from a year ago to 2.11 million bpd, the source said, based on data compiled from tanker loading schedules.

The crude exports have climbed from 1.9 million bpd in June and 1.83 million bpd in July, the schedules showed.

Iran's August exports are the highest since January 2012, boosted by record purchases from the world's third-largest oil importer India and a 48 percent jump that brought European sales to 630,000 bpd, tanker loadings for last month also showed.

Other sources who track Iran's shipping data or who are familiar with its tanker loadings have slightly different figures for Iran's crude exports in August, but still show a near doubling since January.

For countries like Iran that do not report official trade data, counting tankers is the primary means of estimating their oil trade, although counts may vary from tracker to tracker.

Details on condensate loadings for August remain unclear. But if shipments of the ultra light oil were steady with this year's average of nearly 310,000 bpd, the total crude and condensate exports last month would be this year's highest at 2.41 million bpd, still short of average pre-sanctions exports of 2.5 million to 2.6 million bpd in 2011, according to figures from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Iran's crude exports excluding condensate to Asia in August were 1.48 million bpd, up from 1.40 million bpd in July and roughly steady to this year's previous peak in April.

Loadings headed for India reached a likely record of nearly 600,000 bpd last month, according to data stretching back at least 15 years, up 150,000 bpd from July, and topping 564,000 bpd loaded for China.

Japanese loadings were nearly 230,000 bpd, compared with about 92,000 bpd for South Korea.

Iranian oil was also loaded for Turkey, Greece, and Spain, and exports to Italy more than doubled from the previous month to 87,000 bpd, according to the schedules.

To further boost its exports, Iran expects to complete the building of a terminal by year-end for a new grade.
Strong AfD showing in Berlin vote would be seen as Nazi rebirth -mayor

BERLIN, Sept 16 (Reuters) - A double-digit score for the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) in a Berlin city vote on Sunday would be seen around the world as the rebirth of the Nazis, the mayor of the German capital has warned.

The right-wing AfD has gained support as voters become increasingly uneasy with Chancellor Angela Merkel's open-door refugee policy, which saw about one million migrants arrive in Germany last year.

A poll by Forschungsgruppe Wahlen for broadcaster ZDF that was published on Thursday showed the AfD was set to get 14 percent in the weekend vote in Berlin, historically a left-wing stronghold.

"It would be seen around the world as a sign of the return of the right-wing and the Nazis in Germany," Berlin Mayor Michael Mueller, a Social Democrat (SPD), wrote on Facebook on Thursday.

"Berlin is not any old city - Berlin is the city that transformed itself from the capital of Hitler's Nazi Germany into a beacon of freedom, tolerance, diversity and social cohesion," he said.

The centre-left SPD runs the city of Berlin in coalition with Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU).

The AfD won a shock 20.8 percent in an election in the eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern two weeks ago, meaning the party is now represented in nine of Germany's 16 state assemblies.

When migrants started arriving in large numbers about a year ago, some were met with applause, cheers and gifts, but the mood has since shifted due to concerns about integration and attacks by asylum seekers on civilians this summer.

On Wednesday, locals and asylum seekers clashed in the eastern town of Bautzen. About 80 young people, mainly Germans described by police as being right-wingers, chanted that the town belonged to Germans as 20 asylum seekers stood opposite them. The groups threw bottles and wooden slats at each other.
Turkey detains four for suspected plot against British, German embassies -official

By Orhan Coskun and Paul Carrel

ANKARA/BERLIN, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Turkish authorities detained four people in an investigation into a potential threat against British and German diplomatic missions but found no links to any terrorist groups, a Turkish official said on Friday.

The investigation was prompted by intelligence about a potential Islamic State plot against the embassies, the official said.

"Four people were detained in relation to a potential act against the two embassies. Security remains at the highest level. We continue to cooperate closely and share information with the foreign missions," the official said.

Three of the suspects were detained in the capital Ankara and one of them in Istanbul, state-run Anadolu Agency said.

Britain shut its embassy in Ankara on Friday for what its foreign office said were security reasons, without giving further details.

A spokesman for Germany's foreign ministry confirmed its diplomatic offices were closed this week, citing both a four-day public holiday in Turkey and information, which he described as "not completely verifiable", about a potential attack.

"We take such leads seriously," the spokesman told reporters at a regular news conference in Berlin. "So we decided to keep our diplomatic missions and German schools in Turkey closed this week. It was a precautionary measure."

He said the government would make a decision after the weekend on whether the missions would reopen on Monday.

Government offices and financial markets were closed in Turkey from Monday to Thursday for the Muslim Eid al-Adha holiday.

Turkey has suffered a series of suicide bombings and attacks by Islamic State and Kurdish militants over the past year. It launched its first major military incursion into Syria last month to push the jihadists away from its border and prevent Kurdish fighters from seizing territory as they retreated.
Typhoon kills at least 11 in China and Taiwan; another on the way

SHANGHAI, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The world's strongest storm this year killed at last 10 people in China when it hit the southeast coast, the government said on Friday, as rescuers scoured flooded streets and work crews struggled to restore power to more than a million homes.

Typhoon Meranti had largely dissipated by Friday afternoon, a day after it swept in from the Pacific Ocean, clipping the southern tip of Taiwan, and making landfall near the Chinese port city of Xiamen, in Fujian province.

The storm killed seven people in Fujian and three in neighbouring Zhejiang province, state media and the government said. Eleven people were missing.

More than 330,000 people were returning to their homes on Friday after being forced to flee a storm that meteorologists said was the world's biggest this year.

The typhoon killed one person and injured 38 on Taiwan where people were on Friday preparing for another, Typhoon Malakas, which was forecast to bring heavy rain on Saturday.

The Taiwan weather bureau issued land and sea warnings, urging people to be on alert for severe weather and flooding.

Meranti was the strongest typhoon to hit that part of China's coast since 1949, the Xinhua state news agency said.

Pictures on state media showed flooded streets, fallen trees and crushed cars in Xiamen.

Three power transmission towers were blown down in the city and utility crews were trying to restore power. Across Fujian, 1.65 million homes had no electricity, Xinhua reported.

Dozens of flights and train services were cancelled on Thursday, disrupting travel at the beginning of a three-day Mid-Autumn Festival holiday.
Portugal's bonds reel from worst day since Brexit

By John Geddie

LONDON, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Portuguese bonds reeled from their worst day since June on Friday, before a ratings review that will serve as a prelude for a more crucial test of the country's creditworthiness next month.

Standard and Poor's is not expected to alter its junk rating for Portugal on Friday. But any warnings on its economy -- such as those from Portugal's budget watchdog on Thursday -- may feed fears that DBRS will remove the country's last investment-grade rating, which Lisbon needs to qualify for ECB bond purchases on Oct. 21.

Losing the support of the central bank could raise the prospect of a second bailout for Lisbon in five years, as its anti-austerity government battles a banking crisis and is at loggerheads with Brussels over its budget deficit.

Local media reported on Thursday that Prime Minister Antonio Costa rejected claims there will be another bailout -- but analysts at Commerzbank said the mere mention of the word had spooked investors.

"It may become a self-fulfilling prophecy," Commerzbank strategist David Schnautz said.

While all other euro zone yields fell on Friday, Portugal's 10-year yields rose 4 basis points to 3.45 percent , extending a rise of some 15 bps on Thursday after the country's budget watchdog warned of a slowdown in the economy and a deficit that would miss EU targets.

Thursday's sell-off marked the biggest daily rise in yields since Britain's vote to leave the European Union rattled markets on June 24.

It is against this backdrop that investors are giving such keen attention to a routine assessment of the country's rating by Standard and Poor's, due to be released after markets close on Friday.

Standard & Poor's currently rates Portugal below investment grade at BB+, with a stable outlook. But it said at its last review in March that it expected Lisbon's recovery to moderate throughout 2016.

Another agency Moody's, which has the same rating and outlook as S&P, said this week that a fragile banking sector, stuttering economy and high debts were exerting downward pressures on the country's rating.

Similar warnings by S&P would not bode well for bigger tests next month.

First, Lisbon's coalition government has until Oct. 15 to submit its 2017 budget to the European Commission. Analysts say keeping all parties happy while tightening the belt to meet EU demands may prove difficult.

If this creates any more friction with Brussels, it could prove ominous for the second big test a week later, when DBRS assesses Portugal's rating.

DBRS's BBB (low) rating for Portugal -- the only investment- grade rank of the four ECB-recognised rating agencies -- has been a vital prop, allowing Portuguese bonds to remain part of the European Central Bank's 1.7 trillion euro buying programme.

The rating carries a stable outlook, giving Lisbon some breathing space, but DBRS's sovereign ratings chief told Reuters last month that pressures are building on Portugal's creditworthiness.

"A number of factors are conspiring to see Portugal have by far the highest country-specific risk sensitivity of any of the major euro zone countries," Rabobank said in a note on Friday.
Britain's FTSE set for weekly loss, knocked by banks

By Alistair Smout

LONDON, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Britain's top share index fell on Friday, setting it up for a second straight week of losses, as the heavyweight banking sector dropped after U.S. regulators fined Deutsche Bank more than expected for misselling mortgage-backed bonds.

Royal Bank of Scotland, Standard Chartered and Barclays were down between 2.2 percent and 4 percent, making them the top three fallers on the FTSE 100.

Traders cited readacross from a slump in Deutsche Bank , which fell nearly 8 percent.

"Investors in the sector have been spooked by this fine. It remains to be seen exactly how much Deutsche Bank pays, but it's a reminder of all the regulatory issues that the banks still face," IG market analyst Chris Beauchamp said.

"There are concerns that there could be more fines further along the road."

The FTSE 350 banks sector fell 1.1 percent, taking weekly losses to 3.3 percent, its biggest weekly drop since June.

The FTSE 100 was down 20.33 points, or 0.3 percent, at 6,709.97, by 0809 GMT. It was down 1 percent for the week.

The top riser was Morrison, up 1.5 percent, benefitting from target price upgrades from Barclays, Bernstein and UBS after well-received results on Thursday.
Knorr-Bremse, ZF raise stakes in scrap over Swedish brakes firm Haldex

STOCKHOLM/FRANKFURT, Sept 16 (Reuters) - German car parts makers Knorr-Bremse and ZF Friedrichshafen upped the stakes in their battle for Sweden's Haldex on Friday as both increased their offers for the Swedish brake systems maker.

Knorr-Bremse raised its bid to 5.53 billion Swedish crowns ($652 million), with ZF Friedrichshafen responding with a cash offer worth 5.29 billion crowns.

Several German component makers have been vying to take over Haldex in the past two months, attracted by its expertise in brakes for trailers in particular as they seek to develop integrated autonomous driving systems for commercial vehicles.

Knorr-Bremse, which makes braking systems for rail and commercial vehicles, raised its offer to 125 crowns per Haldex share, up from 110 crowns, while ZF's upped its bid to 120 crowns, from 110 crowns on Wednesday.

With Knorr-Bremse's the highest bid on the table, the market is now awaiting a response from Haldex's board, which had favoured the previous bid from ZF, citing a higher certainty that deal could close quickly due to already received anti-trust clearances, and a lack of overlap in product lines.

Haldex's acting chairman Magnus Johansson said the board would meet to assess the new situation, and that it was likely to issue its view on the bids on Monday

"We emphasise that we are absolutely convinced that we can successfully complete the transaction," family-owned Knorr-Bremse said in a statement on Friday, while a person close to ZF said: "ZF is as determined as Knorr-Bremse to take over Haldex".

Hampus Engellau at Handelsbanken Capital Markets Engellau said Knorr-Bremse's bid valued Haldex at 22-23 times its 2016 forecast earnings, a 40 percent premium versus a mean of key industry peers.

"I think 125 crowns more than enough reflects the long term value of Haldex, and apart from Knorr having a stronger balance sheet than ZF does, Knorr will be able to squeeze out some synergies, so it is not as expensive for them."

ZF holds 21.24 percent of Haldex's shares and Knorr-Bremse 11.4 percent. Both have lowered the minimum acceptance level for their bid to go ahead to 50 percent of Haldex's equity.

ANTI-TRUST CONCERNS

Haldex's expertise in brake and air suspension components for freight trailers complements Knorr-Bremse's portfolio of braking, steering and powertrain systems as well as driver assistance systems, automated driving functions and telematics.

But Haldex's board has warned that anti-trust regulators might require lengthy reviews of a deal between Knorr-Bremse and Haldex because of overlaps in their businesses.

Klaus Deller, chief executive of Knorr-Bremse, said on Friday that he expected to get the green light from competition regulators in a "reasonable time" but would not be drawn on which assets might have to be sold or when a deal could close.

Trading in Haldex shares was halted at 126.25 crowns ahead of the news from ZF and extended gains after the trading halt was lifted, rising 7.8 percent to 127.75 crowns by 1415 GMT, suggesting investors do not think the bidding war is over.
Germany's DFS wins Edinburgh air traffic control contract

FRANKFURT, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Germany's state-owned DFS has won a tender to become air traffic controller at Edinburgh Airport from April 2018, replacing Britain's NATS, it said on Friday.

The 10-year contract for DFS's UK unit Air Navigation Solutions (ANS) follows a win at London's Gatwick Airport, where it took over air traffic control in March.
Swedish court upholds Assange warrant, clears way for questioning in October

STOCKHOLM, Sept 16 (Reuters) - A Swedish appeals court decided to uphold the arrest warrant for Wikileaks founder Julian Assange on Friday, prolonging the six year long legal stand off with prosecutors and clearing the way for the Wikileaks founder to be questioned in London next month.

Assange, 45, is wanted by Swedish authorities for questioning over allegations, which he denies, that he committed rape in 2010.

"The Court of Appeal shares the assessment of the District Court that Julian Assange is still suspected on probable cause of rape," the court said.

Assange avoided possible extradition to Sweden by taking refuge in Ecuador's London embassy in 2012. He says he fears further extradition to the United States, where a criminal investigation into the activities of Wikileaks is ongoing.

Per Samuelson, a Swedish lawyer representing Assange, said he had not yet talked to his client.

"I assume we will appeal, it would be strange if we did not," he said.

The court said the lengthy deadlock and the previous passivity of Swedish prosecutors in pursuing the investigation were arguments for setting aside the warrant, but there remained a strong public interest argument for it remaining in place.

"At present, continued detention therefore appears to be both effective and necessary so as to be able to move the investigation forward," the court said.

Ecuador has set an Oct. 17 date for questioning Assange at its London embassy.

Swedish prosecutors have said the questioning will be conducted by an Ecuadorian prosecutor.

The latest request by Assange to have the warrant for his arrest overturned came after a U.N. panel in February said his stay at the Ecuadorean embassy equalled arbitrary detention, that he should be let go and be awarded compensation.
Turkish army kills Kurdish militants suspected of politician's murder -sources

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Turkish soldiers killed five Kurdish militants on Friday suspected of involvement in the assassination this week of a politician from the ruling AK Party, security sources said, amid surging violence in the largely Kurdish southeast.

The military operation in rural Semdinli, part of Hakkari province close to the borders with Iran and Iraq, targeted the suspected killers of Ahmet Budak, an AKP politician who was gunned down in front of his house on Wednesday.

Three of the suspected PKK militants were killed by artillery fire in one part of Semdinli, while the other two were killed close by, the security sources said, without giving further details on the operation.

Southeastern Turkey has seen a surge in violence since the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group, which has waged a three-decade insurgency for Kurdish autonomy in the region, abandoned a ceasefire in 2015. Thousands of militants, security force members and civilians have since been killed.

Late on Thursday, suspected PKK members killed seven village guards, two soldiers and a civilian in the eastern province of Agri, north of Hakkari, the military said.

The Agri governor's office said the militants had attacked the village guards - residents armed and paid by the state to protect their communities - with long-range rifles as they were on night watch duties.
In Pennsylvania Senate race, unfamiliar battle lines on gun rights

By Joseph Ax

PHILADELPHIA, Sept 16 (Reuters) - As he seeks re-election to his U.S. Senate seat this November, Pennsylvania's Pat Toomey can make an unusual claim. He is the sole Republican nationwide running with the endorsement of top U.S. gun control advocates Gabby Giffords and Michael Bloomberg.

That pair of endorsements could give the first-term senator an edge over Democratic challenger Katie McGinty, a former environmental official in the White House and the Pennsylvania governor's office. The race is one of a handful of close contests on Nov. 8 that could determine whether Republicans, currently with a 54-46 majority, maintain control of the Senate.

Both candidates are targeting educated moderate voters, particularly in the Philadelphia suburbs, many of whom may be turned off by the rhetoric of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, according to political analysts in Pennsylvania.

McGinty, who calls her support of gun control measures stronger than Toomey's, is working hard to dismiss his endorsements from Giffords and Bloomberg, and has touted her own endorsement by a Pennsylvania anti-gun violence group.

Giffords, considered a hero by many gun control advocates, is a Democratic former U.S. congresswoman from Arizona who survived being shot in a 2011 assassination attempt and has become an activist for gun restrictions. Bloomberg is the billionaire former New York City mayor who considered a run for the presidency this year and, since leaving office, has focused much of his energy on gun control.

McGinty has called Toomey's commitment to gun safety "paper thin" and notes that the Republican incumbent received an "A" rating from the influential National Rifle Association gun rights lobbying group during his first Senate run in 2010.

The issue of gun rights is potent in a nation where the right to "keep and bear arms" is enshrined in Constitution's Second Amendment. The NRA opposes candidates who support gun control efforts including restricting the types of firearms people can own or expanding background checks required for gun buyers. Many Republicans side with the NRA, while many Democrats support gun control.

Opinion polls show Toomey's race as virtually tied, even as Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton leads Trump by several percentage points in a state that has voted Democratic in the past six presidential contests, starting in 1992.

Pennsylvania is home both to rural communities where hunting is a popular pastime and big cities including Philadelphia and Pittsburgh where crime and gun violence are major concerns. Shifting attitudes on guns in the state have emboldened both parties in Pennsylvania to distance themselves from the NRA's stance opposing almost any effort to restrict gun rights.

The state's law mandating background checks for private handgun sales already goes beyond federal law, said Terry Madonna, director of the Franklin & Marshall College Poll in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.

"Pennsylvania has a very substantial hunting and fishing culture," Madonna said. "But hunters aren't opposed to that."

'HARD THING TO DO'

Toomey's position on guns sets him apart from most of his Republican U.S. Senate counterparts, as he tries to attract moderates while keeping conservative voters in his column.

In a telephone interview, Toomey said the Giffords and Bloomberg endorsements recognized "that what I did was a very hard thing to do politically." He also emphasized his belief that most gun owners share his position.

"I'm a strong Second Amendment supporter," Toomey said. "I see no contradiction between that support and insisting on background checks, so that people who've got no right to the Second Amendment because they're dangerous criminals or they're dangerously mentally ill or they're terrorists, should be denied a firearm any way we can."

Giffords has also endorsed Illinois Senator Mark Kirk, another Republican running for re-election, though Bloomberg has not weighed in on that race.

In an email, McGinty told Reuters Toomey is "no moderate" when it comes to gun violence.

"Time and again, he has sided with the gun lobby instead of doing what's right to keep communities safe," McGinty said. "Pat Toomey has completely run away from legislation to expand background checks, since it failed to pass the Senate three years ago."

Toomey made headlines in 2013 following an elementary school massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, when he and Democratic Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia introduced legislation to expand background checks for gun buyers nationwide.

That legislation, fiercely opposed by the NRA, failed in the Senate, but Toomey gained praise from Democrats for bucking the majority of his party.

He voted for a similar bill after the mass shooting last year in San Bernardino, California, and supported Republican-backed legislation in Congress this year following the Orlando nightclub shooting to restrict access to firearms for people on official "terrorism watch lists."

McGinty backed a stricter Democratic-backed version. None of the measures passed.

McGinty, who called Toomey's gun control positions weak, favors more sweeping restrictions such as bans on military-style "assault weapons" and high-capacity ammunition clips that Toomey opposes.

In a recent television ad, McGinty used a clip of Toomey telling voters this summer that he had a "perfect record" with the NRA. The NRA has not yet released ratings or issued an endorsement in the race.

Toomey called McGinty a "political opportunist" and again pointed to his support from Giffords and Bloomberg.
Blow for Obama's TPP as Vietnam parliament defers ratification

By Ho Binh Minh

HANOI, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Vietnam will not include ratification of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) on its agenda for its next parliament session, an official said on Friday, adding to uncertainty over the future of U.S. President Barack Obama's signature trade deal.

As arguably the biggest beneficiary of the deal covering 40 percent of the global economy, Vietnam was expected to be among the first to ratify the TPP, the prospect of which helped spur record foreign investment last year in its booming manufacturing sector.

"TPP will not be on the assembly's agenda because the government's proposal is not completed," a parliament source familiar with the matter told Reuters. He did not elaborate.

Vietnamese ratification was widely considered a formality having already been approved in January by the top brass of the ruling Communist Party.

The National Assembly is 96 percent comprised of party members and domestic opposition to the TPP is unheard of. Its next session begins on Oct. 20.

The delay means that at the earliest, ratification by Vietnam would be several months after November's U.S. presidential election, the run-up to which has seen its trade policy come under heavy domestic scrutiny.

Negotiations were completed last year for the TPP, dubbed a "mega-regional accord", to create a trading zone of 12 members with a combined $27 trillion gross domestic product (GDP).

It seeks to raise standards and challenge China's economic influence and debate in the United States has caused jitters among some of its members, which include Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Peru, Chile, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Mexico.

Obama has expressed confidence of winning congressional approval for TPP before he leaves office, warning that failure to do so would undermine U.S. leadership in the region and allow China to set the rules of regional commerce.

With Vietnam's strengths in electronics, textiles, seafood and commodities, the TPP is seen as a game-changer for its export-dominated economy, and a means of boosting U.S. influence in China's backyard.

Friday's Thanh Nien (Young People) daily newspaper cited Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan, the parliament chairwoman, as saying Vietnam's ratification would depend on the Communist Party, the global situation and the outcome of the U.S. election.
Germany's Gabriel faces crunch vote over EU-Canada trade deal

By Caroline Copley

BERLIN, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The political future of Germany's vice chancellor may hinge on the outcome of a vote next week by his Social Democrats (SPD) over whether to back a trade deal between the European Union and Canada.

SPD leader Sigmar Gabriel has championed the Comprehensive Economic Trade Agreement (CETA) as part of his remit as economy minister, and to demonstrate the centre-left party's business credentials.

But critics on the SPD's left wing are sceptical about the benefits of the deal and believe it would give multinationals greater access to European markets without creating jobs.

A failure to secure a majority of delegates at Monday's SPD convention in favour of the accord could scupper Gabriel's chances of standing as the party's candidate for chancellor in national elections next year.

It might also unleash a damaging power struggle within the party, the junior partner in the coalition government led by Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives.

"If he loses the vote and if he decided to step down on the back of it, then there would be chaos," said Gero Neugebauer, analyst at Berlin's Free University.

That would further upset the balance within the coalition at a time when Merkel is looking to the SPD to counter a growing rift between her CDU party and its conservative CSU allies in Bavaria over her refugee policy.

A majority SPD vote in favour of CETA, however, would give a much needed shot-in-the arm to Gabriel, who languishes behind Merkel in approval ratings despite her popularity taking a hit from her decision a year ago to open Germany's borders to refugees.

TIGHT VOTE

Gabriel ruffled feathers last month when he said talks on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) - a parallel trade deal the EU is negotiating with Washington - had "de facto" failed.

But he views CETA, due to be signed by Brussels and Ottawa next month prior to full ratification by EU member states' parliaments, as a chance for the West to set new standards for trade deals and act as a counterweight to China's increasing economic clout.

In a late attempt to win over doubters within his party, Gabriel travelled to Canada on Thursday and wrested guarantees for clarifications on ambiguous parts of the treaty from Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Critics want Gabriel to set out what precise improvements to the treaty text - for example the issue of transparent courts to settle disputes rather than private arbitration - are needed before the SPD can lend its support.

"It's not acceptable in its current form," said Tobias Afsali, who is voting on behalf as a proxy for an SPD delegate from Bavaria, where the party branch has recommended members reject CETA.

Overall, analysts expect Gabriel to clinch a narrow victory.

Hoping to crank up the pressure ahead of the vote, opponents of CETA and TTIP have organised demonstrations against both accords in seven German cities for Saturday. Organisers expect more than 250,000 to attend.
UN expects 20 more nations to join Paris climate deal next week

By Megan Rowling

BARCELONA, Sept 16 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - At least 20 countries have indicated they will join the Paris climate change agreement at a United Nations event on Sept. 21, adding to the 27 that have already done so and raising hopes the deal will enter into force by the end of 2016, U.N. officials said.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has invited states to deposit their instruments of ratification or approval of the Paris deal at the one-hour event on Wednesday morning.

Leaders whose countries are not yet ready to join but plan to do so this year have been invited to contribute videos expressing their commitment, said Selwin Hart, director of the U.N. chief's climate change support team.

"When we start to look at the countries that are joining the... agreement and the countries that are going to commit to join before the end of the year, we are absolutely certain that we will have the Paris Agreement on climate change entering into force by the end of 2016," said David Nabarro, Ban Ki-moon's special advisor on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

To take effect, the Paris climate agreement needs ratification by at least 55 parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, representing at least 55 percent of global emissions.

The officials told journalists in New York on Thursday that the United Nations had so far received 27 ratifications covering 39 percent of global emissions, including from the world's top two greenhouse gas emitters, the United States and China.

Among those expected to join formally next week are Mexico and Brazil. Brazil, which accounts for 10 to 12 percent of global carbon pollution, completed its domestic process on Monday.

Experts with the World Resources Institute calculate that if all the nations that have said publicly they will join the agreement this year fulfill that pledge, it could begin in 2016.

Whether it will take effect even before the annual U.N. climate conference in November in Morocco is unclear. For that, the thresholds would have to reached by Oct. 7, as the deal will enter into force only 30 days after they are passed.

If that does not happen in time for the Marrakesh meeting, the first talks on implementing the Paris deal will take place later in 2017.

The officials said it was "remarkable" the agreement could enter into force so soon after being adopted last December - a process that can often take years or decades.

All eyes are now on the European Union, which has indicated it is looking for a way to speed up its Paris ratification - a complex process involving its 28 member states.

Hart said there was even a possibility the EU could now join this year - but it was a "work in progress".

Under current rules, the European Union and each of the nations it spoke for in Paris must deposit their ratification documents with the United Nations simultaneously, and so far only three states - France, Hungary and Austria - have ratified the agreement.

MIGRATION SUMMITS

Another major focus at the United Nations next week will be two summits on strengthening the world's response to the rising numbers of refugees and migrants.

A draft outcome document for Monday's U.N. meeting on that subject acknowledges that the "adverse effects" of climate change and natural disasters are among the factors causing people to leave their homes.

It refers to implementation of the Paris climate agreement, as well as the Sendai framework to reduce the risks of disasters, and a set of voluntary guidelines to help those forced to cross borders due to disasters and climate change.

But it does not offer new ways of formally assisting those people, who have no protection in international law, unlike refugees fleeing persecution and violence.

Alice Thomas, manager of the climate displacement programme at Refugees International, said the number of people uprooted each year by more extreme weather, coastal erosion and growing food and water insecurity already far exceeds those displaced by conflict, and will continue to rise sharply.

Governments should next week agree to step up efforts to tackle the problem, she said.
EU anti-trafficking unit denies turning back migrant boats

ROME, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The European Union's anti-smuggling and people trafficking operation denied on Friday that it had returned any migrant boats to Libya, after Britain's foreign secretary said it had turned back more than 200.

Boris Johnson said after meeting Italy's Foreign Minister Paolo Gentiloni in Florence on Thursday that the EU mission should turn back migrant boats as a deterrent and that it had "saved 200,000 migrants and turned back 240 boats."

The spokesman for EU's Sophia mission said no boats had been sent back.

"We have disposed of boats after rescuing migrants," Antonello De Renzis Sonnino said, suggesting there may have been some confusion.

Sophia's mission is to "disrupt the business model of human traffickers and smugglers," according to its website. But its ships have also made thousands of rescues.

It only operates in international waters, as the Libyan government has not allowed it to do so off the country's coast, something that might make it possible to send boats back.

EU vessels have pulled almost 26,000 migrants off overcrowded boats, almost 300 of which were subsequently destroyed so they could not be used again and to ensure they did not constitute a hazard for other vessels.
Suicide bomber kills at least 25 in Pakistani mosque

By Shams Momand and Jibran Ahmad

MOHMAND AGENCY/PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Sept 16 (Reuters) - A suicide bomber shouted "Allahu akbar" and blew himself up in a packed mosque in northwestern Pakistan, killing at least 25 people and wounding 30 during Friday prayers, a local official said.

A splinter group of the Pakistani Taliban, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan Jamaat-ur-Ahrar (TTP-JA), claimed responsibility for the blast in Payee Khan, a village in Mohmand Agency that is part of the lawless Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) bordering Afghanistan.

The group said it was a revenge attack, accusing tribesmen in the area of launching an assualt on its forces and of capturing militants and handing them over to the government.

"The suicide bomber was in a crowded mosque, he shouted 'Allahu akbar' (God is greatest) and then there was a huge blast," Naveed Akbar, deputy administrator of Mohmand Agency, told Reuters.

Akbar added that some fatalities appear to have been caused when part of the mosque caved in from the force of the blast.

"A portion of the mosque and verandah collapsed in the blast and fell on worshippers. We are still retrieving bodies and the injured from the rubble of the mosque," he said.

Local tribal elder Haji Subhanullah Mohmand said local tribesmen had gathered a volunteer force, killed one insurgent and captured another.

"It seems to have enraged the militants and they got their revenge by carrying out a suicide attack in a mosque today," Mohmand said.

Pakistan's frontier regions, which are deeply conservative and hard to access due to rough terrain, have long been the sanctuary of fighters from al Qaeda, the Taliban and other militant groups.

In 2014 the army launched a major operation in other parts of FATA including North and South Waziristan against insurgents who routinely attacked government officials and civilians.

Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif condemned the bombing and said the "attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the government's resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country."

Security in Pakistan has improved in recent years - the military says "terrorist incidents" dropped from 128 in 2013 to 74 last year - but Islamist extremists continue to stage major attacks.

A bombing of lawyers in the city of Quetta killed 74 people last month, an attack claimed by both the Islamic State and Jamaat-ur-Ahrar, a breakaway faction of the Pakistani Taliban.

Jamaat-ur-Ahrar also claimed the Easter Sunday bombing in a park in the eastern city of Lahore that killed 72 people, many of them children.

Most of the myriad militant groups that stage attacks inside Pakistan seek to overthrow the government to establish an Islamic theocracy and impose a stricter interpretation of the religion than is practised in much of the country.
Egypt takes delivery of second French Mistral warship

NANTES, France, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Egypt took delivery of a second French Mistral helicopter carrier on Friday, part of a $1 billion deal signed last year.

Egypt took over the ship at a ceremony in the Atlantic coast port of Saint-Nazaire. It was the second of two France agreed last year to sell to Egypt.

The two ships were originally built for sale to Russia, but that sale was cancelled after Russia's annexation of Crimea.

"It has been a very complicated, uncertain period to manage, but thanks to the French government's support, we were able to find a navy that needed it," a spokesman for the state-backed shipbuilder DCNS told Reuters.

The French naval contractor had to strip out all the ship's information systems and instructions written in Cyrillic script and replace them with Arabic and English lettering.

The "Anwar El-Sadat" will sail from Saint-Nazaire early next week for joint exercises with the French navy before setting off for Alexandria.

The Mistral is known as the "Swiss army knife" of the French navy for its versatility. Capable of carrying vessels and tanks, the will serve as command centres for the Egyptian fleet.

Cairo has tried to boost its military power in the face of a two-year insurgency in northern Sinai and fears that civil war in neighbouring Libya could spill over.

Egypt has also ordered four corvettes, 100-metres long, that will be built in two years, and negotiations are under way to order two more, the spokesman for DCNS told Reuters.
Aid for Syria stuck with rising violence undermining truce

By Lisa Barrington and Osman Orsal

BEIRUT/CILVEGOZU, Turkey, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Aid for the divided Syrian city of Aleppo was stuck on the Turkish border on the fifth day of a fragile ceasefire on Friday with rival factions arguing over how the supplies are to be delivered and violence increasingly undermining the truce.

The provision of aid to what was Syria's largest city before the war is a critical test of the ceasefire, brokered by the United States and Russia a week ago with the aim of reviving talks on ending the conflict.

Humanitarian access to Aleppo hinges on control of the main road into the besieged rebel-held part of the city, divided between the government and rebels who have been battling to topple President Bashar al-Assad for more than five years. The Castello Road has become a major frontline in the war.

Russia said the Syrian army had begun to withdraw from the road on Thursday, but insurgent groups in Aleppo said they had seen no such move and would not pull back from their own positions around the road until it did so.

"By today this morning nothing had happened on the Castello Road ... There is nothing new in Aleppo," Zakaria Malahifji, of the Aleppo-based rebel group Fastaqim, told Reuters by phone.

The Kremlin said it was using its influence to try to ensure the Syrian army fully implemented the ceasefire and that it hoped the United States would use its own influence with rebel groups too.

"In general, we can still state that the (ceasefire) process is moving forward, despite some setbacks," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call.

U.N. FRUSTRATION

Hundreds of protesters from the Shi'ite Muslim villages of Nubul and al Zahra - which lie in government-held territory - were meanwhile heading towards the Castello Road with the aim of blocking it and obstructing the passage of aid trucks, an organisation that monitors the war said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said they had come out to prevent aid entering rebel-held eastern Aleppo until there were guarantees that supplies would also be sent to the besieged Shi'ite villages of Kefraya and al-Foua which have been surrounded by insurgents since April 2015.

The United Nations, which says it asked the Syrian government for permission to reach all besieged areas, has voiced increasing frustration in recent days at the failure of the Syrian government to allow access.

"In order to actually initiate the actual movement of these convoys (to besieged areas) we need the facilitation letters. They have not come," Jens Laerke, spokesman for the U.N. Office of Humanitarian Affairs, told a briefing in Geneva.

"It's highly frustrating ... and of course we urge the authorities and everyone with influence over those authorities to push for these letters to materialise as soon as possible."

Two convoys of aid have been waiting since early on Tuesday in no-man's land at the Turkish border for permission to travel into Syria. A U.N. spokesman said the first convoy of trucks was carrying flour for more than 150,000 people, while the second was carrying food rations for 35,000 people for a month.

About 300,000 people are thought to be living in eastern Aleppo, while more than one million live in the government-controlled western half of the city.

TRUCE VIOLATIONS

The government and rebels have accused each other of violating the ceasefire, although the U.S. State Department said on Thursday it was largely holding and that both Washington and Moscow believed it was worth continuing.

The United States and Russia have backed opposing sides in the war, which has killed hundreds of thousands of people, forced 11 million from their homes, and created the world's worst refugee crisis since World War Two.

After three days which saw a significant decrease in violence and no deaths, the first civilians since the start of the truce were killed on Thursday.

Three more died and 13 were injured in air strikes in rebel-held Idlib province on Friday, the Observatory said. A number of shells were also fired by insurgents into besieged al-Foua and Kefraya.

A building belonging to the Syrian Civil Defence, a rescue organisation also known as the "White Helmets" was also hit in overnight air strikes, the group and the Observatory said.

Violent clashes and shells hit areas east of the Syrian capital Damascus on Friday. Residents in the city centre were woken up by a large explosion, a witness said, and shells fell on the eastern gate of Damascus's central Old City area.

The Britain-based Observatory said the violence stemmed from clashes between insurgents and Syrian government forces and their allies in the Jobar district on the eastern outskirts of the capital amid a government effort to advance in the area.

The Syrian military said rebels had attacked military positions east of the city.

Washington hopes the ceasefire will pave the way to a resumption of political talks. But a similar agreement unravelled earlier this year, and Russia's intervention a year ago in support of Assad has given it critical leverage over the diplomatic process.

The United States and Russia will brief United Nations Security Council members behind closed doors on Friday, diplomats said, on the deal the pair agreed to try and put Syria's peace process back on track.

Russia is pushing for the U.N. Security Council to adopt a draft resolution next week endorsing the deal.
Libya says 1,425 migrants turned back over two days

TRIPOLI, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Libyan patrols intercepted some 1,425 migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean to Europe over the past two days, a naval spokesman said on Friday.

Ayoub Qassem said about 1,050 migrants on seven inflatable boats were turned back early on Wednesday. Most were from sub-Saharan African countries and about one third were women and children, he said.

On Thursday two more rubber boats were intercepted with about 300 people on board, as well as three small wooden boats carrying a total of about 75 people.

Qassem said all the boats were found near the western coastal city of Sabratha, the most common point of departure for migrants attempting to cross from Libya during recent months.

Most migrants trying to reach Europe by boat across the central Mediterranean head for Italy from Libya, where years of political turmoil and armed conflict have allowed migrant smuggling networks to flourish.

More than 120,000 migrants have arrived in Italy by boat so far this year, a slight increase over 2015, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

Many of those who make it into international waters are picked up by European rescue ships, while Libyan authorities say they have turned back more than 11,000 migrants.

As of Sept. 6, nearly 3,200 migrants had perished attempting to cross the central Mediterranean, according to IOM data.
Death toll rises to 25 in suicide bombing in Pakistan mosque - regional official

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The death toll in a suicide bombing in northwestern Pakistan on Friday rose to 25, a regional official said, with 30 wounded during the attack on a packed mosque.

"A portion of the mosque and veranda collapsed in the blast and fell on worshippers. We are still retrieving bodies and the injured from rubble of the mosque building," Naveed Akbar, deputy administrator of Mohmand Agency, told Reuters.
Russia: Syrian army ready to withdraw from Castello Road

MOSCOW, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Russian officers monitoring a ceasefire near the city of Aleppo confirmed the Syrian army was ready to withdraw from positions along the Castello Road if it was synchronized with opposition forces, the Russian Defence Ministry said on Friday.

"Thus, there is de facto just one side in Aleppo which is ready to lead negotiations, observe the ceasefire and pull back troops from the U.N. humanitarian aid passage - this is the Syrian government army," the ministry said in a statement.

It said the United States had failed to prove it had control over moderate opposition fighters, and it remained unclear if these forces would abide by the ceasefire.
UK's anti-EU party elects new leader to fill Brexit talisman Farage's shoes

By William James

BOURNEMOUTH, England, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The UK Independence Party picked a new leader on Friday to replace Nigel Farage, a key player in Britain's vote to leave the European Union, with the incoming Diane James pledging to ensure Britain follows through with a full withdrawal from the bloc.

James, a former business analyst and the party's deputy chairwoman, said she would work to ensure that the Conservative government did not negotiate a soft Brexit.

"The threats to the referendum outcome are increasing by the day," she told around 1,000 delegates at the party's annual conference in the southern English coastal town of Bournemouth.

"This is what I want you to believe in and work with me on: Yes to a true, 100 percent, European Union exit."

A member of the European parliament with little public profile, James has the difficult task of succeeding one of the country's most recognisable politicians after winning a ballot of UKIP's 40,000 members with 47 percent of the vote.

She will inherit a party which won 4 million votes in the 2015 national election but is now riven with factional disputes and struggling to redefine itself after achieving its main goal of triggering Britain's exit from the EU.

An ally of Farage defected to the Conservatives on the eve of the conference, saying that Prime Minister Theresa May had delivered key elements of the UKIP manifesto since taking office in July and that droves of UKIP supporters were doing the same.

James, a former analyst with a board-level career in the healthcare sector, said she would ensure the government delivers a Brexit deal that meets the main demands of UKIP voters: more free trade and tighter immigration controls.

"No to unrestricted, or uncontrolled freedom of movement into this country... If they come in, they come in on a fair basis," she said.

PROFESSIONALISE

James said she wanted to professionalise the party, whose colourful and sometimes controversial members have in recent years provided Britain's tabloid newspapers with a litany of scandals and gaffes.

Former Prime Minister David Cameron once dubbed them "fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists".

"Change is going to have to happen," she said, stating her ambition for UKIP to overtake the Labour Party to become Britain's official opposition.

UKIP came third by share of the vote in the 2015 UK election, but under the first-past-the-post electoral system, which favours the two main parties, won only one of the 650 seats in parliament.

Nevertheless, it remains a potent force in British politics.

Under Farage, who tapped into a powerful anti-establishment mood among voters, the party won the European Parliament elections in Britain in 2014 and played a leading role in persuading Britons to vote to leave the EU.

Its right-wing policy agenda on issues like immigration has traditionally taken votes from the Conservative Party, but at last year's election it made big gains in centre-left Labour's heartlands among disillusioned working class voters.

James chose not to participate in the party's leadership hustings and is little known outside political circles - something she acknowledged in her speech - leaving her with a huge task to maintain the party's momentum.

"I am not Nigel-like, I am not even Nigel-lite. I will never ever pretend to be so," she said.

At a later news conference she said that she would be "nuts" to ignore any advice Farage had to offer but that she would not let him become a "backseat" driver for the party.
Poland seeks to annul CVC takeover of utility PKP Energetyka

WARSAW, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Poland's state-owned railways PKP said on Friday it had asked a Warsaw court to annul last year's sale of its utility arm PKP Energetyka to global equity fund CVC [CVC.UL}.

CVC bought PKP Energetyka from PKP in July last year for 1.41 billion zlotys ($366.75 million) excluding debt, or 1.97 billion zlotys including debt.

The sale was criticised by the then opposition party Law and Justice (PiS), which won parliamentary elections in October. PiS has said PKP Energetyka is key to Poland's energy security and should not be controlled by a private fund.

"We confirm filing a motion (to the court)," a PKP spokeswoman said, confirming a report by state-owned news agency PAP.

PKP Energetyka and CVC were not immediately available to comment.

Since coming to power, PiS has called a halt to privatisations, changed management in almost all state-run companies and questioned the rationale and pricing of the previous government's stake sales.

For example, it has questioned its predecessor's privatisation of chemicals group Ciech and the sale of some of the state's shares in miner KGHM.

In April, anti-corruption agency CBA raided the Warsaw offices of chemicals group Ciech and its majority owner Kulczyk Holding in an investigation into the privatisation of Ciech.

Market sources have told Reuters that CVC is eyeing a number of assets for sale in Poland, including Nasper's Allegro, convenience store chain Zabka owned by private equity firm Mid Europa, as well as central and eastern European beer brands put on sale by SABMiller.
Russia urges U.S. to separate moderate Syrian opposition from "terrorists"

MOSCOW, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov urged U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Friday to deliver on his promise to separate moderate Syrian opposition from the Nusra Front and other "terrorist groups", Russia's Foreign Ministry said.

Lavrov, in a telephone conversation with Kerry, also reiterated the need to publish "the entire package" of the Syria ceasefire agreement, the ministry said.

The Nusra Front, associated with the al-Qaeda network, has been renamed Jabhat Fatah al Sham.
Switzerland expects fewer refugees after border clampdown

ZURICH, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The Swiss government expects fewer asylum requests in 2016 than last year, after a clampdown on migrants crossing the Italian border.

Landlocked Switzerland is budgeting for 35,000 asylum requests this year, the Swiss Federal Council said on Friday, down from about 39,500 in 2015 and more than 20 percent less than a previous forecast of 45,000.

With the migrant crisis in its third year, a deal between the European Union and Turkey has reduced numbers of people crossing the sea to Greece, making Switzerland's neighbour Italy the new front line.

In July, more than 25,000 migrants arrived in Italy, 12 percent more than last year, EU border agency Frontex has said.

Despite that, Swiss asylum requests in June, July and August fell by more than a third on last year, according to the Swiss State Secretariat for Migration.

Some two-thirds of the nearly 7,500 migrants who reached Switzerland via the Italian border between July and early August were turned back.

Critics of the clampdown have accused Switzerland of closing its borders, causing a pile-up in northern Italian towns including Como.

But Swiss border officials say the country is merely fulfilling its obligations under Europe's so-called Dublin system for handling refugees, by returning migrants to the first country where they registered.

Switzerland said in June it expected its federal budget deficit to rise to around 600 million Swiss francs ($613 million) next year due to the costs of rising numbers of asylum seekers.

On Friday, the Swiss Federal Council said it was increasing its planned budget spending for 2016 by 107 million francs, or 0.2 percent of the overall budget, mostly to handle asylum seekers.
Total looks beyond Bolivia's Incahuasi to regional gas market

By Bate Felix

PARIS, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Oil and gas giant Total could start the second phase of its Incahuasi gas project in Bolivia as early as 2017 if the right market conditions and incentives for investments are in place, the company's director for the Americas said on Friday.

The $1.2 billion Incahuasi gas and condensate project which will officially be inaugurated on Friday, began production at three wells in August.

Total aims to ramp output to more than 7 million cubic meters of gas per day by the end of September, about 10 percent of Bolivian production, from 5.2 million as soon as a compressor is added to increase pressure, Michel Hourcard told Reuters.

He added that good quality condensate - the liquid byproduct of gas that can be made into motor fuels - was also being shipped from Incahuasi, helping to generate cash.

"We are preparing assessment for phase two of the project. We have said that we will carefully monitor the performance of the field. Depending on the market and conditions in Bolivia, we will be ready to launch phase two in early 2017," he said.

Hourcard said Total was hoping to get the same conditions that enabled it to control costs and complete phase one within budget in the prolonged low oil price environment that has seen companies slash investments and suspend projects.

"There is no magic recipe. There is no hope for projects if we cannot control costs in everything especially with oil below $50 per barrel," he said.

The Bolivian government of President Evo Morales has said Total has committed about $800 million for phase two.

Incahuasi is expected to reassure the market over the Andean nation's ability to meet both export and internal gas demand.

The project is operated by Total which owns 50 percent, alongside partners Gazprom with 20 percent, Tecpetrol with 20 percent, and YPFB Chaco with 10 percent.

Hourcard said about 90 percent of the gas from Incahuasi was destined for export, mostly to Argentina and Brazil via a 100 kilometre pipeline.

ARGENTINA GAS DEBATE

Hourcard said that Total and other companies were in talks with the government in Buenos Aires to bring more projects on stream but that will depend on the price of gas.

This has become a hot political issue and Argentina's Supreme Court ruled in August that the government must hold public hearings before reducing home heating gas subsidies.

Hourcard said Argentina was in need of gas despite its vast resources, including the Vaca Muerta shale reserves which are considered the world's second-largest after the United States.
Rights groups criticise Ivory Coast over cocoa farmer evictions

By Joe Bavier

ABIDJAN, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Rights groups have accused Ivory Coast authorities of failing to provide a minimum level of support when they evicted tens of thousands of illegal cocoa farmers from a national park, leaving them vulnerable and putting pressure on local communities.

The government rejected the criticism on Friday.

Park authorities and security forces started evicting the farmers and their families in July from the 34,000-hectare Mont Peko National Park as part of a nationwide operation to save rapidly disappearing forests.

The United Nations estimated last month that as many as 53,000 people had been driven from the park.

"The evacuation of Mont Peko resembles a forced expulsion carried out without sufficient regard for the rights of populations inside it and in surrounding areas," Ivorian rights group RAIDH's coordinator Bamba Sindou said.

Government spokesman Bruno Kone rejected the criticism, saying the park's inhabitants had been repeatedly told over several years to prepare to leave.

"The government is doing everything it can," he said. "All this time was intended to allow the population to leave with the least possible inconvenience."

Ivory Coast is the world's leading cocoa producer, and exports make up about 15 percent of GDP. But it lost 80 percent of its virgin forest between independence from France in 1960 and 2010, according to the European Union, most of it due to agriculture.

Hundreds of thousands of illegal farmers invaded its national parks and forest reserves during a decade of political turmoil that ended in a 2011 civil war.

The government has pledging to restore forests on 20 percent of its national territory from less than 12 percent today.

New York-based group Human Rights Watch (HRW) said in a statement that, while farmers were notified of the impending evictions, the authorities failed to ensure that villages bordering Mont Peko could shelter and feed them.

The result has been a crush on resources - including food, health and sanitation - in an area that was already a hotbed of tensions left over from years of land conflicts and civil war.
Between reckless ally and old rival, China in a bind over N.Korea

By Benjamin Kang Lim and Michelle Nichols

BEIJING/UNITED NATIONS, Sept 16 (Reuters) - China is in a bind over what to do about North Korea's stepped-up nuclear and missile tests, even though it is annoyed with its ally and has started talks with other U.N. Security Council members on a new sanctions resolution against Pyongyang.

China shares a long land border with North Korea and is seen as the only country with real power to bring about change in the isolated and belligerent nation. However, Beijing fears strengthening sanctions could lead to collapse in North Korea, and it also believes the United States and its ally South Korea share responsibility for growing tensions in the region.

China is in a difficult spot, a source close to the Chinese leadership told Reuters when asked if Beijing's attitude to North Korea had changed after its fifth nuclear test last week.

"On the one hand, China is resolutely opposed to North Korea developing nuclear weapons for fear of triggering a nuclear arms race in the region," the source said, referring to Japan and South Korea following in Pyongyang's footsteps.

"On the other hand, North Korea is a big headache but regime change is not an option," the source added. "Collapse of the regime would lead to chaos in (China's) northeast" bordering North Korea, the source said, requesting anonymity.

The prospect of a unified Korea under Seoul's leadership and the possibility of U.S. troops on China's borders has long been a nightmare for Beijing.

A collapse in North Korea, sending a flood of refugees across the relatively porous border into China's rustbelt northeastern provinces, would also be deeply destabilising to Beijing's rule as well as a huge economic cost.

Those concerns have been around for years, but now Beijing is also deeply angered by a U.S. decision to deploy an advanced anti-missile system in South Korea, the Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (THAAD) system. It has said its own security has been compromised and that North Korea's recent belligerence is due to this deployment.

Publicly, China has not linked the THAAD deployment with whether it will support sanctions on North Korea. It condemned the latest missile and nuclear tests but said sanctions alone could not resolve the issue and has called for a resumption of talks with Pyongyang.

Beijing has also said it will work within the United Nations to formulate a necessary response to its fifth nuclear test.

"We're in negotiations on a U.N. Security Council resolution," Samantha Power, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said on Thursday.

Diplomats said the talks were at an early stage and negotiations were likely to be long and tough.

IRRITATION AND CONSENSUS

One senior U.N. diplomat said Beijing made displeasure with Pyongyang clear at an earlier Security Council meeting called after North Korea tested three medium range missiles at an embarassing time - when U.S. President Barack Obama and other world leaders were gathered for the G20 summit in the eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou this month.

"The tone of the whole discussion was much more consensual, it didn't feel like there was two camps fighting arguing with each other," said the diplomat. "Of course there continue to be different views about sanctions."

The United States has called on Beijing to use its influence to get North Korea to give up its nuclear ambitions, and to close sanctions "loopholes", since the existing ones had done little to prevent Pyongyang from pursuing its nuclear and missile programmes.

Shen Wenhui, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told influential state-run newspaper the Global Times last week that crippling sanctions would cause a "humanitarian disaster" in North Korea.

"In putting sanctions on North Korea, the international community must reduce the effect on ordinary people to the greatest possible extent," Shen wrote.

China's concerns also include the larger issue of what Beijing sees as Washington's attempts to surround it under Obama's strategic "rebalance" towards Asia. Besides THAAD, the dispute in the South China Sea, cybersecurity and human rights have marred ties between the world's two biggest economies.

Chinese officials also say that the West over-estimates its influence with North Korea.

"I think any idea to ask North Korea to abandon nuclear weapons would fail, and any idea to ask South Korea to abandon THAAD would fail," said Shen Dingli, a professor at Shanghai's elite Fudan University and director of the school's Programme on Arms Control and Regional Security.

North Korea is useful for China, Shen added. "China needs North Korea to counter the United States."

In Seoul, some are already accepting that China will not do much more to punish North Korea.
Russian military: Syrian army withdraws arms from Castello Road -agencies

MOSCOW, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Russia's Defence Ministry said on Friday that the Syrian army had withdrawn arms from the Castello Road near the city of Aleppo, while Syrian opposition forces backed by the United States had not done the same, Russian news agencies reported.
India loses WTO appeal in U.S. solar dispute

GENEVA, Sept 16 (Reuters) - India lost its appeal at the World Trade Organization in a dispute over solar power on Friday, failing to overturn a U.S. complaint that New Delhi had discriminated against importers in the Indian solar power sector.
U.S. forces enter Syrian town, then withdraw - rebel source and monitor

BEIRUT, Sept 16 (Reuters) - A small number of U.S. forces entered the Syrian town of al-Rai near the Turkish border on Friday as part of operations to coordinate air strikes against Islamic State, a senior rebel source said.

However, the five or six U.S. military personnel were then forced to withdraw towards the Turkish border after Syrian rebels protested against their presence in the town, the source said.

A monitoring group, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, also reported the incident and said the U.S. forces had left al-Rai but were still on Syrian soil.

One U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said initial reports appeared to confirm the incident involving a small group of U.S. forces.

The Pentagon did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the incident. But it did acknowledge that U.S. special operations forces are accompanying Turkish and vetted Syrian opposition forces battling Islamic State in and around the area of the Syrian border near al-Rai and the town of Jarablus, further east.

Turkey's military said in a statement U.S. special forces were supporting an operation being carried out in northern Syria.

Turkish-backed rebels have been battling Islamic State militants along the border as part of operation Euphrates Shield, which was launched last month, and in recent weeks pushed the jihadists away from the frontier with the support of Turkish warplanes and tanks.

The fighters Ankara supports were pushing south on Friday and five rebels and five IS militants had been killed in the region, the Turkish army said.

The rebel source said the U.S. forces had entered al-Rai, 2 km (1 mile) inside Syria, as part of that operation.

In a video circulated on the internet purportedly showing the incident, fighters in al-Rai chanted anti-U.S. slogans and threatened violence against them as a number of vehicles drove out of the area.

The Turkish operation also aims to push U.S.-backed Kurdish forces, which have separately been fighting Islamic State, away from the border.
REUTERS SUMMIT-Russia's GazpromNeft to start Messoyakha oil in weeks

By Katya Golubkova, Denis Pinchuk and Oksana Kobzeva

MOSCOW, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Russia's GazpromNeft, the oil arm of state gas firm Gazprom, plans to launch its Messoyakha oil field within weeks, a senior executive said, adding to its own fast-growing production and contributing to a global glut.

Messoyakha, in the Russian Arctic, will produce 0.6 million tonnes of oil this year. It will target 3 million tonnes in 2017 and reach 5.5 million by 2020 (60,000 barrels per day to 110,000 bpd respectively) .

Russia - the world's top oil producer - is expected to end this year with production of close to 547 million tonnes, or almost 11 million bpd, which would be a post-Soviet record.

Russia's level of production suggests realising plans for a global deal on freezing crude output, in order to prop up world crude prices, will be difficult.

"We became the world champions in Arctic production. Our projects - Prirazlomnoye, Novy Port, Messoyakha -- are the only ones on the pedestal," Vadim Yakovlev, first deputy chief executive at GazpromNeft, told the Reuters Russia Investment Summit.

"We will start shipments (from Messoyakha) in the nearest future, there are weeks left."

Messoyakha, which is being developed in conjunction with state oil major Rosneft, will add to GazpromNeft's own companywide production, seen at 59 million tonnes of liquid hydrocarbons this year and rising to 62 million tonnes next year, which is more than OPEC member Algeria is producing.

Yakovlev said output at Novy Port field, another of GazpromNeft's Arctic permits, was seen at around 5 million tonnes next year, rising to 6 million in 2018, with that level seen stable for no less than 7 years.

However, the period of plateau output may be extended while the target for volumes could be increased to up to 8 million tonnes a year, depending on additional exploration and the logistics of oil shipments from the field, Yakovlev said.

FISH BONES

GazpromNeft was put under western sanctions over Moscow's role in the Ukraine crisis, which limited its access to western funding and technologies. But oil production, both for GazpromNeft and Russia as a while, is rising, in part because of a weak rouble currency.

GazpromNeft production costs are at around $3.5 per barrel, Yakovlev said, with the average cost of a standard horizontal well at around $1.5 million.

"This is very competitive for the industry. When we give this figures to American oilmen they are very surprised," Yakovlev said.

Horizontal wells, which account for around 40 percent of GazpromNeft's total wells, allow oil firms to unlock complicated geological layers of a field, and were behind the shale oil revolution in the United States.

Novy Port and Messoyakha are largely drilled by horizontal wells. At Messoyakha, in particular, GazpromNeft is also using a network of complicated horizontal wells with a structure that resembles fish bones.

Yakovlev said that this technology alone would allow GazpromNeft to extract around 60-70 million tonnes of the reserves at the field.

"Lowering production would not be economically viable for us. We are producing at a profit," Yakovlev said. "There are a lot of reserves (globally) which could be put into exploration additionally and produce oil even at current oil prices."
Poland seeks to annul CVC takeover of utility PKP Energetyka

By Agnieszka Barteczko

WARSAW, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Poland's state-owned railway company PKP has asked a Warsaw court to annul the sale last year of its utility business PKP Energetyka to private equity fund CVC Capital Partners, PKP said on Friday.

CVC bought PKP Energetyka from the state railway company in July last year for 1.41 billion zlotys ($367 million) excluding debt, or 1.97 billion zlotys including debt.

The sale was criticised by the then opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party, which won elections in October. PiS has said PKP Energetyka is key to Poland's energy security and should not be controlled by a private fund.

"We confirm filing a motion (to the court)," a PKP spokeswoman said, confirming a report by state-owned news agency PAP.

CVC said it did not know the content of the motion, nor any circumstances during the privatisation process that would justify filing such a motion.

"The privatisation process was fully transparent, in line with the law and has been verified by the prosecutors office and the Supreme Audit Chamber revealing no irregularities," said the representative of CVC for Poland, Krzysztof Krawczyk.

PKP Energetyka's spokesman said the situation was not affecting the functioning of the company.

Since coming to power, PiS has called a halt to privatisations, changed management in almost all state-run companies and questioned the rationale and pricing of the previous government's stake sales.

For example, it has questioned its predecessor's privatisation of chemicals group Ciech and the sale of some of the state's shares in miner KGHM.

In April, anti-corruption agency CBA raided the Warsaw offices of and its majority owner Kulczyk Holding in an investigation into the privatisation.

Market sources have told Reuters that CVC is eyeing a number of assets for sale in Poland, including Nasper's Allegro, convenience store chain Zabka owned by private equity firm Mid Europa, as well as central and eastern European beer brands put on sale by SABMiller.
Sweden says EU has capacity to take a million refugees a year

By Daniel Dickson

STOCKHOLM, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The European Union has the capacity to absorb a million refugees a year, and could force through new asylum rules by majority voting if consensus cannot be reached, Sweden's migration minister said in an interview on Friday.

"Europe as a continent must bear its responsibility for the global refugee crisis," said Morgan Johansson, minister for justice and migration in the centre-left government.

"We are the world's richest continent and it is obvious that if anyone can actually handle this, it is Europe with its 500 million inhabitants," he told Reuters.

Sweden punches above its weight on migration issues in the EU because of its historically liberal policies and the fact it accepted more asylum seekers last year than any other country, in proportion to its 10 million population.

But Johansson's comments highlighted the gulf separating Sweden from much of the EU at a time when central European states are fighting the imposition of quotas stipulating how many refugees they should take, and German leader Angela Merkel is under fire at home for her open-door policy.

Some 1.3 million migrants reached Europe's shores last year from countries like Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, prompting bitter rows between member states over how to share responsibility.

Johansson said a permanent mechanism to distribute asylum seekers among EU countries, another quota system to accept a specified number of refugees from camps outside Europe, and more harmonised asylum rules in member countries were all needed.

"And if we cannot agree, there are rules for making decisions that can be used. It is majority decisions that are applied in this area too," he said.

"The European Union should be able to receive 1 million refugees per year."

ANGER WITH HUNGARY

Sweden took a record 163,000 asylum seekers in 2015 but this is expected to fall to around 35,000 this year due to stricter asylum rules and border controls, as well as measures making it harder for refugees to enter the EU. These include a deal with Turkey to reduce the number of people crossing its territory to reach Greece.

Johansson said he had summoned Hungary's ambassador last week to protest against the country's unwillingness to accept asylum seekers who first registered there before travelling on across Europe, and who should be sent back there under the EU's Dublin rules.

He said he and his Nordic colleagues had also written a letter to the EU Commission saying it needed to act against Hungary, which has built a razor-wire fence to keep out migrants and is due to hold a referendum next month on whether to reject refugee quotas.

"Worst case, Hungary will need to be taken to court," Johansson said.

The EU depends on Turkey to keep a lid on the movement of migrants to the bloc, but the promised reward of visa-free travel for Turks has been stalled because of the EU's insistence that Ankara should first relax its anti-terrorism laws.

"When it comes to that, the ball is in Turkey's court, really," Johansson said.

In a reflection of the knock-on effects of migrant flows across Europe, he said Sweden needed to be sure a backlog of unregistered asylum seekers in Germany had been dealt with before it could drop controls on its border with Denmark.
India loses WTO appeal in U.S. solar dispute

By Tom Miles

GENEVA, Sept 16 (Reuters) - India lost its appeal at the World Trade Organization in a dispute over solar power on Friday, failing to overturn a U.S. complaint that New Delhi had discriminated against importers in the Indian solar power sector.

The WTO's appeals judges upheld an earlier ruling that found India had broken WTO rules by requiring solar power developers to use Indian-made cells and modules. The appeal ruling is final and India will be expected to bring its laws into compliance with the WTO rules.

"This report is a clear victory for American solar manufacturers and workers, and another step forward in the fight against climate change," U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman said in a statement.

Indian officials made no immediate comment on the appeal outcome.

U.S. solar exports to India have fallen by more than 90 percent since India brought in the rules, the statement said.

As in the earlier ruling, which was issued in February this year, the judges said India could not claim exemptions on the basis of that its national solar power sector was included in government procurement, nor on the basis that solar goods were in short supply.

There was also no justification on the grounds of ensuring ecologically sustainable growth or combatting climate change.

The dispute, which the United States first launched in February 2013, involved an increasingly common target of trade disputes - solar power, with an increasingly common complaint - local content requirements.

The appeal ruling came just days after India launched a WTO complaint against subsidies for the solar industry in eight U.S. states.

Under WTO rules, countries are not allowed to discriminate against imports and favour local producers, but in the past five years countries keen to support their own manufacturers have frequently resorted to local content requirements, while keeping a sharp eye out for their use by others.

"We strongly support the rapid deployment of solar energy worldwide, including in India," Froman said.
SVG spurns HarbourVest's $1.4 bln bid, says in talks with others

By Simon Jessop

LONDON, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Britain's SVG Capital rejected a hostile bid by U.S. rival HarbourVest on Friday, saying the $1.35 billion offer undervalued the listed private equity firm and that it is in talks with other potential suitors.

Investors have been frustrated for years by Britain's listed private equity sector, which has traded at a discount to the value of its assets, prompting a coup by activist investor Edward Bramson at Electra Private Equity.

The prospect of a rival bid for SVG sent its stock above HarbourVest's 650 pence per share final offer, which already has the support of a large chunk of SVG's investors. By 1517 GMT the shares were up 4.4 percent at 679 pence.

SVG said the HarbourVest bid -- at a discount of 11.5 percent to the fund's July net asset value and a greater discount to the value of the investment portfolio -- undervalued both the company and its assets.

"The latest strong performance builds on the double-digit annual growth of the past six years. In particular, the investments made under the new strategy have performed well," it said in a statement with results for the six months to July 31.

The response comes days after Boston-based HarbourVest, which manages $42 billion, made its bid public. At the time, SVG asked investors to do nothing until it had filed its results.

On Friday HarbourVest said it continued to believe that its offer was offered full value to SVG shareholders and urged them to accept, given the absence of a higher cash offer.

Posting a 12 percent increase in the net asset value per share to 735 pence on Friday, helped by a "significant" currency boost, and a total return from its investment portfolio of 13 percent, SVG again advised investors to sit tight.
Ukraine hands back stolen paintings to Dutch museum

KIEV, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Kiev authorities handed over to the Netherlands on Friday five masterpieces stolen from a Dutch museum in 2005 and recovered in Ukraine earlier this year.

The paintings - part of a group of 24 works valued at 10 million euros when they went missing in 2005 - were said in December to have been discovered in a villa in a pro-Russian separatist controlled area of eastern Ukraine.

Dating from the 17th and 18th centuries, they will now head back to Westfries Museum in Hoorn, north of Amsterdam, from where they first disappeared when thieves hid in the building before closing time and disabled the alarm system before making off with the artworks.

"I can't wait to see these beautiful objects of art back in the place where they belong," Westfries Museum director Ad Geerdink said at a handover ceremony at the Dutch embassy in Kiev. "It will feel like some of our lost sons finally come home."

The Dutch foreign ministry listed the five paintings as Jacob Waben's "Vrouw Wereld" (Lady World) and "Terugkeer van Jefta" (The Return of Jephta), "Keukenstuk" (Kitchen Scene) by Floris van Schooten, Hendrick Boogaert's "Boerenbruiloft" (A Peasant Wedding) and "Nieuwstraat in Hoorn" (New Street in Hoorn) by Izaak Ouwater.
S&P raises Hungary rating to 'BBB-/A-3', outlook stable

Sept 16 (Reuters) - Credit rating agency Standard and Poor's raised Hungary's rating to 'BBB-/A-3' from 'BB+/B', citing improving fiscal, external, and growth expectations while maintaining its outlook on the country's debt as "stable".

"Hungary's fiscal, external, and GDP outcomes have improved markedly since 2008, when Hungarian authorities applied to the European Union and the IMF for financial assistance," the ratings agency said on Friday. (http://bit.ly/2cuikSd)

In May, Fitch was the first of the three big rating agencies to reward Prime Minister Viktor Orban's government for a positive change in the country's risk profile.

Hungary's debt was downgraded to "junk" by major rating agencies after Orban took power in 2010 and embarked on unorthodox policies to steady the budget that included punitive taxes on the financial sector.

But last year Orban made a truce with banks he had squeezed for years and his right-wing government has kept the budget deficit within the European Union's ceiling of 3 percent of economic output since 2012.
UN inquiry blames Syrian military for chlorine bomb attacks - source

By Anthony Deutsch, John Irish and Michelle Nichols

THE HAGUE/UNITED NATIONS, Sept 16 (Reuters) - An international inquiry has identified two Syrian Air Force helicopter squadrons and two other military units it holds responsible for chlorine gas attacks on civilians, a Western diplomat told Reuters.

The finding by the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), the global chemical weapons watchdog, is based on Western and regional intelligence, the diplomat said.

"It was the 22nd Division, the 63rd Brigade and the 255 and 253 squadrons of the Syrian government," the envoy said.

The identification of specific military institutions responsible for attacks could strengthen a push by some Western members of the U.N. Security Council for a robust response, focused on sanctions and accountability.

President Bashar al-Assad's government has denied using toxic gas on the battlefield, and said it will cooperate with the OPCW over accusations it has used poison gas against insurgent-held areas during Syria's civil war.

Responding to the new finding, a Syrian military source told Reuters: "The Syrian state ... and we, the Syrian Arab army, have said more than once that the army has not and will not use any banned weapon, especially chemical or poison weapons."

"This issue is completely void of truth. We consider the United Nations to be a tool in the hands of some countries which support terrorists," the source said, adding that the U.N. had not responded to Syrian requests to investigate alleged use of chemical weapons by insurgents.

The year-long joint U.N. and OPCW inquiry, which is investigating reports of attacks between April 11 2014 and Aug. 21 2015, is due to submit its fourth report to the U.N. Security Council next week. The third report, in August, blamed Syrian government troops for two chlorine gas attacks and Islamic State militants for using sulfur mustard gas.

It is unclear whether the fourth report will assign blame to individuals. The inquiry has focused on nine attacks in seven areas of Syria, where a separate OPCW fact-finding investigation concluded that it is likely chemical weapons have been used.

Eight of the attacks investigated involved the suspected use of chlorine. The inquiry said it had not yet been able to reach a conclusion in six cases, though it said three of those cases warranted further investigation.

"At least two others were chlorine and were carried out at the hands of the Syrian Air Force," the diplomat said. "There is no indication that any opposition groups used chlorine."

Syria agreed to destroy 1,300 tonnes of declared chemical weapons in 2013 under a deal brokered by Moscow, Damascus's main international backer, and Washington, which supports the Syrian opposition.

In a separate confidential report seen by Reuters, OPCW inspectors concluded in July after 16 visits to Damascus since April 2014 that Syria had failed to explain "scientifically or technically" the discovery of banned agents by its inspectors, including sarin and VX nerve agents.

The latest suspected use of chlorine gas was last week, when rescue workers and a monitoring group said there were dozens of cases of suffocation in an opposition neighbourhood in the city of Aleppo.

POSSIBLE SHOWDOWN

Chlorine's use as a weapon is prohibited under the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention, which Syria joined in 2013.

If inhaled, chlorine gas turns to hydrochloric acid in the lungs and can kill by burning the lungs and drowning victims in the resulting body fluids.

The new finding, blaming specific military units, could set the stage for a showdown at the Security Council pitting the United States, Britain and France against Russia and China.

Beijing and Moscow have veto powers as permanent Council members and have protected Syria's government from action by blocking several resolutions, including an attempt to refer the situation in Syria to the International Criminal Court.

Syria is not a member of the ICC, so any war crimes cases against suspects has to be referred by the U.N. Security Council to the court in The Hague.

Some Western diplomats worry that the Security Council could respond weakly to the reported chemical weapons attacks or that the issue could be sidelined because of the fragility of a Syria ceasefire deal agreed by Moscow and Washington.

"We don't want the (U.N./OPCW) report to be taken hostage by the political process in Syria," said a senior Security Council diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity.

A second senior Security Council diplomat said: "Normally on Syria policy, when we go down this U.S.-Russia track, either nothing happens because they can't agree ... or if something does come out it tends to be Russian-flavoured."

"Neither of those outcomes is good," the envoy said.

Some diplomats said U.N./OPCW investigators may ask for more time to finish their fourth report, in which case the Security Council may renew the mandate for the inquiry for a short time.

Samantha Power, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said on Thursday it was important those compiling the inquiry "go as far as they can" to identify individuals and entities involved in the attacks. The United States planned "to push to extract from the council as much as we can" on a response, she said.

"We're in very close contact with other council members about what that might look like," Power said. "We also retain the ability to take what's in the report and act nationally and multilaterally in order to ensure real consequences for those actors who are named."

U.S. President Barack Obama initially said the use of chemical weapons in Syria would cross a "red line," but he did not follow through with threatened air strikes after a sarin gas attack in August 2013 killed as many as 1,400 in the Ghouta neighbourhood of Damascus.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said on Tuesday he would fight vigorously for sanctions on those responsible for the gas attacks being investigated. A French diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Paris had been working on "the contours of what a satisfying resolution would look like for us."

"The American position is not as firm on this issue as ours," the French diplomat said. "What's at stake goes well beyond the Syrian conflict. It's about not making the use of chemical weapons a banality."
Wheat suppliers shun Egypt as more grain rejected abroad

By Maha El Dahan and Eric Knecht

ABU DHABI/CAIRO, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Egypt was unable to garner a single offer from wheat suppliers at its state grain tender on Friday, forcing it to cancel and raising renewed questions about its ability to tap global wheat markets while maintaining a ban on ergot fungus.

Friday's cancelation comes amid a flurry of cargoes either rejected or held from export since Egypt reinstated a zero tolerance policy on ergot last month and applied it retroactively to all outstanding contracts.

Ergot is a common grains fungus that can cause hallucinations when consumed in large amounts but is considered harmless in low quantities.

Egypt is the world's largest purchaser of wheat, on which it depends to run a bread subsidy programme that feeds tens of millions of its citizens and which may suffer if the zero ergot policy continues to block access to global grains.

This week a 60,000-tonne Russian wheat shipment was rejected at Novorossiisk after weeks of inspection. It was the second such GASC purchase which failed to make it past the port of origin following a 63,000 tonne Romanian cargo that fell through at Constanta earlier this month.

Both cargoes were contracted under the previous, less strict ergot rules that allowed for up to 0.05 percent in shipments, a common international standard that state grain buyer, GASC, had adhered to until last month's change.

Russia, one of Egypt's largest wheat suppliers, said on Friday it would ban the import of Egyptian fruit and vegetables after its regulatory watchdog said that the produce had violated international norms, without specifying.

GASC could not be immediately reached to confirm the cancellation and the agriculture ministry spokesman did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

"The risk of offering in GASC's tenders is simply too high at the present time. It is foolish to offer something you know you cannot deliver and zero ergot is not possible," one European trader said, echoing the view of several others.

BREAKING POINT

The decision to apply Egypt's zero tolerance policy on contracts made under the old rules has infuriated traders, who insist that their deals should be honoured.

Eight shipments yet to arrive in Egypt were purchased under the 0.05 percent rule but are now being scrutinised.

Egypt cancelled its last wheat tender on Aug. 31 after receiving just a single offer. That was GASC's first tender since formally reinstating the zero-content policy on ergot, which traders say is impossible to guarantee.

Traders say they expect a decision on the outstanding contracts to be made early next week.

"Hopefully the cabinet can come up with a solution for these eight shipments and for forthcoming tenders by Monday," one Cairo-based trading source said.

Quarrels have persisted between the state's agricultural quarantine authority, which has maintained a zero tolerance policy since late last year, and ministries that support the international norm.

Inconsistent policy statements from the government and rapid changes in legislation governing the issue has sown confusion among suppliers and frustrated GASC's attempts to make purchases.

On Aug. 28 Egypt reinstated the ban on imports of wheat with even the smallest amount of ergot content. This baffled global suppliers who thought the matter had been settled by an earlier agriculture ministry decree passed in July adopting the common international standard.

Some traders saw GASC's attempt to seek tenders on Friday, just days after cargoes had been rejected and held up from shipment abroad, as intentionally designed to fail.

"I suspect GASC wants to show the other Egyptian government departments that international tenders with zero ergot level are impossible, which I think they are," another European said.

Traders say the government's experiment with maintaining stringent quality control out of step with the rest of the world will soon be running against the clock.
Turkish-backed rebels push south in north Syria - Turkish army

ANKARA, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Turkish-backed rebels were pushing south in an operation in northern Syria on Friday, Turkey's military said, and five rebels and five Islamic State militants had been killed across the region.

The Turkish military also said in a statement that U.S. special forces were supporting an operation that was being carried out between the Syrian towns of Azaz and al-Rai.
Trading in Attica Bank shares suspended, lender says operations continue

By Lefteris Papadimas and Angeliki Koutantou

ATHENS, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Trading was suspended on Friday in shares of small Greek lender Attica Bank, which has been struggling to plug a capital shortfall since last year.

An official at the Bank of Greece, which supervises small lenders including Attica, told Reuters the central bank froze new lending by the bank on Thursday until "serious structural problems and corporate governance issues are resolved".

The official said the central bank also blocked the appointment of a new chief executive at Attica as well as other board members because they did not meet some of the criteria under EU regulations.

Greece's four main lenders successfully concluded a 5.5-billion-euro ($6.1 billion) recapitalisation last year but are still grappling with problem loan portfolios.

Attica Bank, which has 79 branches and is majority-owned by the state, raised 90.96 percent of the 749 million euros it sought to fill its capital gap in December.

It has been trying to raise up to 70 million euros since then to meet its remaining capital requirements, but has faced reduced investor appetite.

Attica said later on Friday it had amended the composition of its board "in compliance with the principles of sound corporate governance" and it now expected Bank of Greece to lift the temporary restriction on the disbursement of new loans and credit facilities.

"The Bank, in consultation with the Bank of Greece, continues to fulfil all its obligations and to operate smoothly and without any disruption," it said in a bourse filing.

The stock exchange said trading would be resumed once Attica "informed investors on current developments".

Attica's shares have lost 80 percent so far this year, underperforming the Athens bourse's general index which has shed 11 percent. The news did not affect Greek bank shares which were trading 2 percent down on Friday, analysts said.

"Let's see if those actions will stir investors appetite," said analyst at Eurobank Equities Nick Koskoletos.
Indian activists welcome top court ban on "sterilisation camps" after women's deaths

By Suchitra Mohanty and Nita Bhalla

NEW DELHI, Sept 16 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Women's health activists on Friday cheered a ruling by India's top court ordering the government to shut down "sterilisation camps" within three years following the deaths of hundreds of largely poor rural women across the country.

In a judgment on Wednesday, the Supreme Court said 363 women died between 2010 and 2013 during or after surgery in sterilisation camps due poor management by local authorities which included doctors using dirty equipment and expired drugs.

It called on the federal government to ensure the country's 29 states and seven union territories halt the camps, provide adequate compensation for victims and their families, and hold negligent doctors accountable.

Activists have long campaigned for better regulation of sterilisation camps - where women are gathered for mass surgeries to sever or seal their fallopian tubes - and more investment in alternative forms of contraception.

"We welcome the Supreme Court judgment which we consider a landmark one. Providing quality services to and upholding the dignity of women will now be placed strongly on the national agenda," said Poonam Muttreja, executive director of the Population Foundation of India (PFI).

"This judgment has the potential to shape India's family planning program into a program of national significance."

India's efforts to rein in population growth have been described as the most draconian after China. Birth rates have fallen in recent decades, but population growth is still among the world's fastest.

According to a study by PFI, 85 percent of the country's family planning budget for 2013/14 was spent on promoting and conducting sterilisations on women. Only 1.5 percent was spent on other forms of contraception.

The world's top steriliser of women, India came under global scrutiny for its sterilisation drive in November 2014 when 15 women died and scores of others were hospitalised after surgery at a sterilisation camp in the eastern state of Chhattisgarh.

Investigations found the deaths in Bilaspur district were due to unhygienic conditions, dirty medical instruments and equipment and an overall lack of care for the patients who were poor tribal and low-caste women.

Authorities have put in place guidelines and are training health workers on conducting safe and sanitary surgeries, but incentivised, target-driven sterilisation continue.

Doctors, nurses and health workers receive cash incentives for promoting and carrying out sterilisations. Patients are also given compensation - ranging from 600 rupees ($10) to 1,100 rupees ($17) for tubectomies and vasectomies respectively.

The Supreme Court ruling was in response to a civil petition filed by women's health activist Devika Biswas alleged widespread mismanagement at camps in various states.

The ruling mentioned how a doctor sterilised 53 women over a period of two hours "in an unprofessional and unethical manner" in a village school in the eastern state of Bihar in January 2012.

The sterilisations were conducted under torch light with the women laying on school desks, the surgeon did not have any gloves and there was no running water available, it said.

The patients, it added, were also not given any pre-operative tests, counselling and were not aware of the potential dangers and outcomes of sterilisation.

"A sterilisation surgery does not appear to be complicated and yet several deaths have taken place across the country over the years," said Justice Madan B. Lokur in his order.
S&P upgrades Hungary in surprise gift to PM Orban

By Marton Dunai and Gergely Szakacs

BUDAPEST, Sept 16 (Reuters) - After keeping Hungary in junk for years, rating agency Standard and Poor's lifted the country's debt rating back into investment grade on Friday in a surprise move, rewarding Prime Minister Viktor Orban for fixing state finances and boosting the economy.

The agency raised Hungary to BBB-/A-3 from BB+/B, citing improving fiscal, external, and growth expectations, while maintaining its stable outlook.

The move, which markets had not expected so soon, followed an upgrade by Fitch in May, and immediately boosted the forint. It is expected to drive Hungarian government bond yields lower as some investors will shift money into Hungarian assets.

Returning Hungary's debt to investment grade could boost Orban's standing at home and abroad at a time when he has upset international partners with his tough stance on migrants and refugees. Orban, who showed the IMF the door after he rose to power in 2010, has pursued a go-it-alone economic policy since then.

S&P said Hungary's economy could grow at an average rate of 2.5 percent in coming years, helped by rising consumption, while its public debt was expected to decline to about 70 percent of gross domestic product in 2019 from 75 percent in 2015.

"Hungary's external financial profile, which has improved considerably since 2009 will remain robust," the ratings agency said. (http://bit.ly/2cuikSd)

"Rising employment and real disposable incomes are likely to continue fueling private consumption growth."

In 2016 Hungary's budget deficit is expected to narrow to 1.8 percent of GDP, well below the EU's 3 percent ceiling.

Economy Minister Mihaly Varga said the upgrade was "long overdue" and it could make debt financing cheaper while boosting the forint.

"The good performance of the Hungarian economy has borne fruit. The market has taken this step long ago, now we have returned to the category where we would have belonged for some time," Varga told a news conference.

He said the third big rating agency, Moody's, could lift Hungary's rating to investment grade in November when its next review is due, and that Hungary might tap international markets within a few months with a foreign currency bond, but not in the short term.

Hungary's debt was downgraded to junk by major rating agencies after Orban took power in 2010 and embarked on unorthodox policies to steady the budget, which included punitive taxes on the financial sector.

But last year Orban made a truce with banks he had squeezed for years and his right-wing government has kept the budget deficit firmly under control since 2012.

FUNDS TO SHIFT

Dealers said Hungarian assets would quickly benefit from the upgrade, with the forint gaining further versus the euro and yields falling, even though markets have mostly priced in a positive change in Hungary's credit rating for this year.

"Now, with two agencies at investment grade, Hungary is de facto investment grade, and a number of real money asset managers would likely increase their portfolio exposure based on risk criteria alone," Commerzbank said in a note.

Attila Behan, a chief dealer at KH Bank in Budapest, said Hungarian long-term bonds could be popular with investors now.

"Now it is not only the short end which will be bought but also the medium and long end of the curve, and its steepness can decline markedly," he said, adding that the forint could soon test levels even firmer than 300 to the euro.
Burkina Faso ex-PM detained on charges of killing protesters

OUAGADOUGOU, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Burkina Faso authorities detained a former prime minister on Friday in connection with the violent attempts to put down a protest that ousted ex-President Blaise Compaore, the High Court prosecutor said.

Compaore's 27-year rule over Burkina Faso, Africa's fourth largest gold producer, ended in October 2014 when hundreds of thousands of demonstrators angered by his attempt to extend it further forced him out.

Security forces initially tried to crush the demonstration and rights groups said they shot dead at least 10 people.

Compaore and several of senior members of his government, including the former prime minister Luc Adolphe Tiao, were afterwards indicted by the then transitional government for various offences.

Tiao was charged with "intentional assault, complicity in intentional assault, murder and complicity to murder," Prosecutor Armand Ouedraogo said. He is accused of signing an order authorising the army to crush the protest.

The former prime minister returned voluntarily this week from exile in Ivory Coast, where Compaore also resides and has been given citizenship.

The fall of Blaise Compaore, despite attempts to repress the protests, inspired activists across the continent to hope it would usher in people-power revolutions to oust autocrats in other African countries.

But such protests have been suppressed and many leaders have successfully extended their terms in office.
The Pentagon said on Friday that a U.S.-led coalition air strike on September 7 killed an Islamic State leader who oversaw the militant group's propaganda.

Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said in a statement that the air strike took place near Raqqa, Syria, and targeted and killed Wa'il Adil Hasan Salman al-Fayad, also known as Dr. Wa'il.

Islamic State controls parts of Iraq and Syria and has broadcast its beheadings of journalists and aid workers over the past few years.

Wa'il Adil Hasan Salman al-Fayad, also known as Dr. Wa'il has been reported killed in a drone strike. He was responsible for creating many of ISIS's videos

The group has sympathizers in several countries who have carried out bombings and shootings of civilians.

The Pentagon said Wa'il was minister of information and prominent member of Islamic State's Senior Shura Council, or leadership group.

A U.S. Defense Department official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said Wa'il was targeted by the air strike while he was on a motorcycle outside his house.

'Wa'il oversaw ISIL's production of terrorist propaganda videos showing torture and executions,' Cook said in the statement, using an acronym for the group.

'He was a close associate of Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, the ISIL spokesman and leader for plotting and inspiring external terror attacks.'

Abu Mohammed al-Adnani was reported killed on August 30th. Now coalition forces have killed another of ISIS's leaders

The strike took out one of the very limited number of ISIS leaders who had 'direct access' to Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi, the leader of ISIS, according to a US official.

Cook called Salman one of the 'most senior leaders' in ISIS.

'He operated as the minister of Information for the terror organization and was a prominent member of its Senior Shura Council -- ISIL's leadership group,' Cook added.

'The removal of ISIL's senior leaders degrades its ability to retain territory, and its ability to plan, finance and direct attacks inside and outside of the region,' Cook said.

'Baghdadi's inner circle was already small, and it's getting smaller,' an official told CNN.

Salman is assessed to have been one of the five most-senior officials in ISIS before he and Adnani were killed.

On August 30, Islamic State said Adnani was killed in a U.S. air strike in Syria, which was later confirmed by the Pentagon.
Nigeria's Buhari admits to plagiarizing line from Obama speech

ABUJA, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari plagiarized quotes from U.S. President Barack Obama in a speech promising change in the West African country, his office said on Friday.

Last week, Buhari gave a speech to launch a campaign titled "Change begins with me," part of his credo to end graft in Africa's biggest economy which is gripped by mismanagement and poverty despite sitting on vast energy reserves.

But one paragraph in the speech urging Nigerians not to fall back "on the same partisanship, pettiness and immaturity that have poisoned our country so long" was copied from Obama's victory speech after his election in November 2008.

"It was observed that the similarities between a paragraph in President Obama's 2008 victory speech and what President Buhari read in paragraph nine of the 16-paragraph address... are too close to be passed as coincidence," Buhari's office said in a statement.

"President Buhari urges Nigerians to look beyond this incident and focus on the message of change which the country needs in order to restore our cherished value systems," the office said after a Twitter user joked about the incident.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's August 15 speech, in which he raised the issue of Pakistan's atrocities on the people of Balochistan, seems to have set things in motion.

The Pakistani media reported on September 15 that Baloch leader Brahumdagh Bugti, currently in exile in Switzerland, is set to get Indian citizenship after long negotiations with Indian authorities.

According to Pakistan's Geo News, Bugti will formally apply for Indian citizenship in Geneva after a meeting of his Baloch Republican Party (BRP) on September 18 and 19.

On September 16, Prasar Bharati plans to launch a website and mobile application for All India Radio's Balochi service to reach out to the masses who speak the language across the world. The move to start the service is also in the backdrop of Modi's speech.

India plans to give citizenship to Bugti's key lieutenants in Switzerland as well, including his trusted aides Sher Muhammad Bugti and Azizullah Bugti, sources told Geo News. Outlawed by Pakistan, Bugti is founder of BRP.

On September 13, around the time the 71st session of the UN General Assembly opened, a group of Baloch activists held protests against Pakistan outside the UN headquarters, demanding freedom and highlighting the country's crimes against humanity in Balochistan.

The protestors accused Pakistani forces of killing around 5,000 people in the past few years and causing nearly 20,000 forced disappearances in Balochistan.

Baloch demonstatrion were also held in Dusseldorf, Berlin and Munich on August 30, in the hope that the UN, US, UK, Germany, and the European Union will raise their voices to save the people.

Agitations in London, America, Geneva, Canada, Norway, Sweden, Germany are not new; they have been going on for long but got little media coverage earlier.

On September 4, while talking to the Indian media, Bugti, accused of violence in Pakistan, sought help and hoped the Indian government would issue an Indian ID as well as travel documents, claiming that his family was not safe in Switzerland .

Bugti further said Pakistan was trying to create international pressure by trying to get a Red Corner notice issued against him, and that's why he was seeking Indias intervention to ensure safety for himself and his companions.

Presently, Bugti runs his party from Switzerland without official authorisation from its government. He also claimed that the Swiss government, which declined his application for an official ID in January 2016 since the BRP was on the terror watchlist, was creating hurdles in his work because of pressure from Pakistan.

But he is now full of hope from India. He said: I hope the Indian people who gave refuge to His Holiness the Dalai Lama and supported Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, would recognise the risk that I am facing."

Brahumdagh Bugti is the founder of Baloch Republican Party. (Photo credit: India Today)

While the the Indian government has recently been proactive in highlighting Pakistan's rights violations in Balochistan by citing incidences of abuse of the Baloch, there are areas of sovereign decision-making that can be cited when it comes to the matter of granting a visa or a temporary Indian ID to Bugti and his companions.

There are two views. Some experts on international affairs advocate that India can help Bugti and his colleagues by preventing international organisations like the Interpol from accepting Pakistans case against Bugti.

India too got several Red notices issued in the past against dons like Dawood Ibrahim and Chhota Shakeel, allegedly given shelter by Pakistan, but the country ignored them. So, India too can ignore notices issued by Pakistan against Bugti.

But former external affairs minister Natwar Singh advises caution. India should study his case well before granting him asylum. Caution is the need of the hour as he is the leader of a powerful tribe which has widespread control over a strategic piece of land, he said.

Now the million dollar question is whether the Indian government will provide asylum to Bugti and stand behind the Baloch in their struggle for freedom, and will India play a pro-active role in ending human rights violations and atrocities of Pakistan against them?

Who is Brahumdagh Bugti?

He is the grandson of slain Baloch nationalist leader Akbar Bugti, one of the tallest leaders among Baloch nationalists. The 36-year-old Brahumdagh Bugti fled his hometown Dera Bugti in Balochistan in 2006, following the assassination of Akbar Bugti. He lived in Afghanistan as a state guest first, and was then flown to Switzerland in October 2010. He has been living there since, in political asylum, with his family.

The cause of the struggle

- Under British rule, Balochistan was divided into four princely states. According to the Pakistani version (disputed by many), three of the princely states - Makran, Las Bela, Kharan - decided to merge with Pakistan. But the Khan of the biggest princely state, Kalat, Mir Ahmad Yar Khan, respected his people's sentiments and decided against a merger with Pakistan.

- The state of Kalat was declared independent on August 11, 1947, as its people were against the idea of joining Pakistan. Kalat functioned as an independent democratic country for about eight months.

- After the formation of Pakistan, Mohammad Ali Jinnah formally requested Kalat to merge into Pakistan. On December 16, 1947, Kalat's elected representatives debated Pakistan's request for merger in parliament and unanimously rejected it. The people of Kalat believed that although they are Muslims, they are socially and culturally very different from Punjabi Muslims who dominated Pakistan's polity.

- As soon as Kalat rejected Pakistan's request for merger, Jinnah ordered the Pakistan Army to invade and annex Kalat. The army forced/coerced then ruler Ahmadyar Khan to sign a treaty of accession against the will of the majority. Ahmadyar Khan tried everything possible to prevent the accession.
Tallgrass Energy Partners, LP acquires, owns, develops, and operates midstream energy assets in North America. It operates through Natural Gas Transportation; Crude Oil Transportation; and Gathering, Processing & Terminalling segments. The Natural Gas Transportation segment engages in the ownership and operation of interstate natural gas pipelines and integrated natural gas storage facilities with approximately 4,641 miles of transportation pipelines in Wyoming, Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, and Nebraska. This segment provides its services to on-system customers, including third-party local distribution companies, industrial users, and other shippers. The Crude Oil Transportation segment engages in the ownership and operation of the Pony Express System, a crude oil pipeline serving the Bakken Shale, Denver-Julesburg, and Powder River Basins, as well as other nearby oil producing basins. The Gathering, Processing & Terminalling segment owns and operates natural gas gathering and processing facilities that produce natural gas liquids (NGLs) and residue gas for sale in local wholesale markets or delivers into pipelines for transportation to additional end markets; and crude oil gathering, storage, and terminalling facilities, as well as engages in the transportation of NGLs, and marketing of crude oil and NGLs. This segment also provides water business services primarily to the oil and gas exploration and production industry. The company was founded in 2013 and is based in Leawood, Kansas. Tallgrass Energy Partners, LP operates as a subsidiary of Tallgrass Energy GP, LP.
Watts Water Technologies, Inc. designs, manufactures, and sells products, solution, and systems that manage and conserve the flow of fluids and energy into, through and out of buildings in the commercial and residential markets in the Americas, Europe, the Asia-Pacific, the Middle East, and Africa. The company offers residential and commercial flow control products, including backflow preventers, water pressure regulators, temperature and pressure relief valves, and thermostatic mixing valves. It also provides heating, ventilation, and air conditioning and gas products, such as boilers, water heaters, custom heat, and hot water solutions; hydronic and electric heating systems for under-floor radiant applications; custom heat and hot water solutions; hydronic pump groups for boiler manufacturers and alternative energy control packages; and flexible stainless steel connectors for natural and liquid propane gas in commercial food service and residential applications. In addition, the company offers drainage and water re-use products comprising drainage products and engineered rain water harvesting solutions for commercial, industrial, marine, and residential applications; and water quality products that include point-of-use and point-of-entry water filtration, conditioning, and scale prevention systems for commercial and residential applications. Further, it provides smart mixing system under the IntelliStation name. The company sells its products to plumbing, heating, and mechanical wholesale distributors and dealers, as well as original equipment manufacturers, specialty product distributors, do-it-yourself chains, and retail chains; and directly to wholesalers and private label accounts. Watts Water Technologies, Inc. was founded in 1874 and is headquartered in North Andover, Massachusetts.
New York Community Bancorp, Inc. is the bank holding company for New York Community Bank. New York Community Bank is the nations 47th-largest financial institution and its largest thrift. As a thrift, the bank specializes in real estate and consumer accounts specifically real estate loans and savings accounts and has limited exposure to other forms of business banking. Among the benefits to consumers are interest-bearing checking and saving accounts that come with higher-than-average interest rates.

New York Community Bank was founded in 1859 to serve Queens County, New York. It operated under that name, growing all the while, until 2000 when it changed its name to better reflect the business. The company IPOd in 1993 and has made multiple acquisitions in the time since. As of 6/30/2022, the bank had $63.1 billion in assets and $41.2 billion in deposits.

New York Community Bank operates in greater New York City, New Jersey, Ohio, Florida, and Arizona. The company provides deposit products ranging from interest-bearing checking and money market accounts to savings accounts, IRAs, and CDs. Brands under the companys umbrella include AmTrust in Florida and Arizona, Ohio Savings Bank, Garden State Savings Bank, and Atlantic Bank.

The bank offers a wide range of real-estate-related loans including but not limited to multi-family loans, commercial real estate loans, construction loans, and consumer loans and mortgages. Investment products include annuities, mutual funds, and life insurance. Customers include individuals, small businesses, and organizations and are served through a network of more than 230 branches, and 300 ATMs, online, mobile, and by phone. Many of the locations are open 24 hours and 6 days a week although those hours are not available at all branches. Clients can access their accounts digitally 24/7.

New York Community Bancorp and its underlying business carry investment-grade credit ratings from all the major rating agencies. The credit outlook in the 4th quarter of 2022 was stable as it had been for some time. In New York, it is a leader in the multi-family market specializing in lower-cost housing in rent-controlled areas. As of June 30, 2022, the multi-family loan portfolio accounted for more than 75% of all investments. The company has a stock purchase and dividend reinvestment plan that help to sustain a high level of ownership.






Senator Bernie Sanders is heading to Ohio Saturday to help Hillary Clinton the presidential nominee for the Democrats in an important battleground state where poll numbers for her have been flagging.

Sanders, the independent from Vermont will be focusing on millennials. He was the clear favorite amongst the younger voter during his battle in the primaries with Clinton. He consistently led by an overwhelming majority amongst voters between 18 and 29 years of age.

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Though he lost in Ohio, an exit poll indicated he won over 80% of that particular age bracket in the state.

Sanders at events in Kent, Canton and Akron is tasked with pushing the proposals of Clinton that help young people by amongst other things, eliminating tuition for college for people who work, making community college free and attending college debt free.

Sanders will start his Weekend of Action in Canton and will rally people in Ohio on college campuses in the Akron and Kent areas said an announcement released by the Clinton campaign.

During a recent interview, Sanders said he is helping Clinton through cutting through the focus of the media on personality politics by showing how she tops Donald Trump the GOP nominee on important issues.

Sanders said that what each American voter, regardless if they are an independent, Republican or Democrat, needs to ask themselves issue after issue is what candidate is better overall for them, for working families and for the middle class.

If you go one by one through the issues, including pay equity, raising the minimum wage, family leave, climate change and making universities and college tuition free, on each of the issues and on a number of others, Clinton is much more of a superior candidate, said Sanders.

Sanders, who for most of the month of August was busy writing a book, will campaign as well in New York for Zephyr Teachout and in Pennsylvania for Katie McGinty.

In a fundraising letter during August, Sanders put a great deal of focus on the race McGinty is in and on races for the Senate in Ohio, Nevada and New Hampshire, writing that the outcome of the races in those states could help determine which of the two major parties controls the U.S. Senate beginning in 2017.

Interim chair Donna Brazile of the Democratic National Committee has said she asked Sanders if he would help the Democrats with early voting, voting registration and the get out to vote effort.
Caleres, Inc. engages in the retail and wholesale of footwear in the United States, Canada, China, and Guam. It operates through Famous Footwear and Brand Portfolio segments. The company offers licensed, branded, and private-label athletic, casual, and dress footwear products to women, men, and children. Its retail shoe stores provide brand name athletic, casual, and dress shoes, including Nike, Skechers, adidas, Vans, Converse, Crocs, Puma, Birkenstock, New Balance, Asics, New Balance, Under Armour, Bearpaw, Timberland, Sperry, and Dr. Martens, as well as company-owned and licensed brands, such as Dr. Scholl's Shoes, Blowfish Malibu, LifeStride, Naturalizer, Zodiac, Circus by Sam Edelman, Franco Sarto, and Ryka. The company also operates naturalizer.com, naturalizer.ca, vionicshoes.com, samedelman.com, allenedmonds.com, drschollsshoes.com, lifestride.com, francosarto.com, ryka.com, bzees.com, and zodiacshoes.com, as well as Vince.com, blowfishshoes.com, and veronicabeard.com websites. In addition, it designs, sources, manufactures, and markets footwear to retail stores, such as national chains, online retailers, department stores, mass merchandisers, independent retailers, and catalogs. Further, the company wholesales men's apparel, leather goods, and accessories under the Allen Edmonds brand; footwear for women under LifeStride brand; Italian footwear Franco Sarto brand; athletic footwear for women under the Ryka brand; women's shoe collection under the Vince brand; and women's footwear under the Bzees brand; other footwear under Zodiac brand; and women's footwear collection under Veronica Beard brand, as well as Via Spiga brand. It operates approximately 980 retail stores. The company was formerly known as Brown Shoe Company, Inc. Caleres, Inc. was founded in 1878 and is headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri.
Dunelm Group plc retails homewares in the United Kingdom. The company offers furniture for bedroom, living room, dining room, and office; sofas and chairs; bean bags; bed frames, mattresses, storage beds, divan bases, and headboards, as well as kids beds; and bedding products, such as bed linens, duvets, pillows, mattress toppers, protectors, and baby and kids beddings. It also provides curtains, and poles and tracks; blinds; rugs, runners, and door mats; mirrors, pictures and frames, clocks, wallpapers and DIY, cushions and throws, and accessories; lighting products, including ceiling and wall lights, lamp shades, floor and table lamps, and outdoor lights; kitchen products, such as cooking, dining, utility, and electrical products; and storage products for home, clothes, and kitchen, as well as travel and luggage products. In addition, the company offers garden furniture and storage, garden decoration, and entertaining and dining products; and towels and bathmats, bathroom furniture, bathroom decor, and bathroom accessories, as well as trees and decoration, gifts, cook and dine, and trends Christmas products. It operates 175 superstores and 1 distribution centers, as well as sells its products through an online store at dunelm.com. Dunelm Group plc was founded in 1979 and is headquartered in Syston, the United Kingdom.
The Boeing Company is the worlds largest manufacturer of airplanes and commands more than 50% of the market in some channels and categories. The company and its family of subsidiaries design, develops, manufacture, sell, service, and supports commercial jetliners, military aircraft, satellites, missile defense, human space flight, and related services worldwide. The company operates through four segments including Commercial Airplanes; Defense, Space & Security; Global Services; and Boeing Capital providing products and services to end-users in 150 countries.

Boeing got its start in 1910 when William E. Boeing developed a love for aircraft. Soon after he takes his first plane ride which leads him to build a hangar and begin construction of his first plane. The onset of WWI helped spur the companys growth but business was cut drastically in its wake. The start of WWII was another milestone for the company and one that led to its current position of dominance. The company was incorporated in 1916 and is based in Chicago, Illinois. Boeing employs over 140,000 people in 65 countries making it one of the most diverse employers on the planet.

The Commercial Airplanes segment is built around the iconic 7-series which includes the 737, 747, and 787. The segment provides commercial jet aircraft for passenger and cargo requirements, as well as fleet support services for regional, national, and international air carriers and logistics and freight companies. In terms of global volume, the company estimates about 90% of all air freight is carried aboard one of its jets. This segment also includes the Dreamliner family of planes. The Dreamliner is a game-changing airplane for many carriers as it opens up the potential for new one-stop destinations because of its capacity and range.

The Defense, Space & Security segment develops and manufactures a range of systems including manned and unmanned aircraft, missiles, missile defense systems, satellites, communications equipment, and intelligence systems for governments. Among the many iconic brands within this segment are the AH-64 Apache, Air Force One, B-52, C-17 Globemaster, Chinook, F/A-18, and the V-22 Osprey VTOL aircraft used by the Marines.

The Global Services segment offers a range of products and services that include supply chain and logistics management, engineering, maintenance, upgrades, conversions, spare parts, pilot and maintenance training, technical and maintenance documents, and data analytics to its commercial and defense customers.

Boeing is also a leader in innovation, leveraging its many decades and avenues of experience to further aerospace and defense technology. Among the many innovations is the MQ-25 Stingray which will be the worlds first autonomous aircraft. The Stingray is only one of many areas of research that also include drones and undersea vehicles.
Advance Auto Parts, Inc. provides automotive replacement parts, accessories, batteries, and maintenance items for domestic and imported cars, vans, sport utility vehicles, and light and heavy duty trucks. The company offers battery accessories; belts and hoses; brakes and brake pads; chassis and climate control parts; clutches and drive shafts; engines and engine parts; exhaust systems and parts; hub assemblies; ignition components and wires; radiators and cooling parts; starters and alternators; and steering and alignment parts. It also offers air conditioning chemicals and accessories; air fresheners; antifreeze and washer fluids; electrical wires and fuses; electronics; floor mats, seat covers, and interior accessories; hand and specialty tools; lighting products; performance parts; sealants, adhesives and compounds; tire repair accessories; vent shades, mirrors and exterior accessories; washes, waxes and cleaning supplies; and wiper blades. In addition, the company offers air filters; fuel and oil additives; fuel filters; grease and lubricants; motor oils; oil filters, part cleaners and treatments; and transmission fluids for engine maintenance. Further, it offers battery and wiper installation; engine light scanning and checking; electrical system testing; video clinic; oil and battery recycling; and loaner tool program services. Additionally, the company sells its products through its website. It serves professional installers and do-it-yourself customers. The company operates stores under the Advance Auto Parts, Autopart International, and Carquest brands, as well as branches under the Worldpac name. As of April 23, 2022, it operated 4,687 stores and 311 branches in the United States, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Canada; and served 1,318 independently owned Carquest branded stores in Mexico, Grand Cayman, the Bahamas, Turks and Caicos, and the British Virgin Islands. The company was founded in 1929 and is based in Raleigh, North Carolina.
Equifax Inc. provides information solutions and human resources business process automation outsourcing services for businesses, governments, and consumers. The company operates through three segments: Workforce Solutions, U.S. Information Solutions (USIS), and International. The Workforce Solutions segment offers employment, income, criminal history, and social security number verification services, as well as payroll-based transaction, employment tax management, and identity theft protection products. The USIS segment provides consumer and commercial information services, such as credit information and credit scoring, credit modeling and portfolio analytics, locate, fraud detection and prevention, identity verification, and other consulting; mortgage services; financial marketing services; identity management services; credit monitoring products; and online information, decisioning technology solutions, as well as portfolio management, mortgage reporting, and consumer credit information services. The International segment offers information service products, which include consumer and commercial services, such as credit and financial information, and credit scoring and modeling; and credit and other marketing products and services, as well as offers information, technology, and other services to support debt collections and recovery management. The company serves customers in financial services, mortgage, employers, consumer, commercial, telecommunication, retail, automotive, utility, brokerage, healthcare, and insurance industries, as well as state, federal, and local governments. It operates in the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, the United Kingdom, Spain, Portugal, Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Honduras, Mexico, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, Brazil, the Republic of Ireland, Russia, Cambodia, Malaysia, Singapore, and the United Arab Emirates. The company was founded in 1899 and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia.
Fresh Del Monte Produce Inc., through its subsidiaries, produces, markets, and distributes fresh and fresh-cut fruits and vegetables in North America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia, and internationally. It operates through three segments: Fresh and Value-Added Products, Banana, and Other Products and Services. It offers pineapples, fresh-cut fruit, fresh-cut vegetables, melons, and vegetables; non-tropical fruits, such as grapes, apples, citrus, blueberries, strawberries, pears, peaches, plums, nectarines, cherries, and kiwis; other fruit and vegetables, and avocados; and prepared fruit and vegetables, juices, other beverages, and meals and snacks. The company also engages in the sale of poultry and meat products; and third-party freight services business. In addition, it manufactures and sells plastic and box products, such as bins, trays, bags, and boxes. The company offers its products under the Del Monte brand, as well as under other brands, such as UTC, Rosy, Fruit Express, Just Juice, Fruitini, Mann's Logo, Arcadian Harvest, Nourish Bowls, Broccolini, Caulilini, Better Burger Leaf, RomaLeaf, and other regional brands. It markets and distributes its products to retail stores, club stores, convenience stores, wholesalers, distributors, and foodservice operators. Fresh Del Monte Produce Inc. was founded in 1886 and is based in George Town, Cayman Islands.
The IRONMAN Foundation will distribute $55,000 in charitable giveback to non-profit initiatives and groups in the greater Chattanooga region in conjunction with the 2016 Little Debbie IRONMAN Chattanooga triathlon presented by McKee a Family Bakery taking place on Sunday, Sept. 25. With this most recent donation from The IRONMAN Foundation, a total of $70,000 has been given back to the Chattanooga community this year.

The IRONMAN Foundation Community Fund provides community and volunteerism grant opportunities to non-profit organizations where IRONMAN events are held. The IRONMAN Foundations contribution will provide support to non-profit needs and initiatives within the local community, and brings the total giveback to more than $225,000 in the region. In 2016, The IRONMAN Foundation will distribute more than $1.6 million in grant funding to support the needs of IRONMAN race communities across North America.

Community Grants

The IRONMAN Foundation provides charitable support to a variety of local non-profit organizations that recognize citizens in need and support The Foundations mission. The Foundation works with community leaders to identify projects and initiatives and to provide funding in order to support worthwhile causes. This year, The IRONMAN Foundation Community Fund will provide a $5,000 Community Grant to Downside Up to provide a weekend family camp, Camp Wakawalu, for families in Chattanooga that have children with Down syndrome. This camp will provide a weekend away from daily life to play, relax, and experience fellowship with other families.

We have so many exciting plans for the future and really appreciate The IRONMAN Foundation being willing to be a generous part of making dreams come true for so many, said Theresa Nix, executive director of Downside Up. This grant will strengthen family relationships, develop life-long friendships, and build futures.

Another featured grant recipient, Friends of Outdoor Chattanooga, will receive a $5,000 grant to purchase six Scott Scale Mountain bikes for their Learn to Ride a Mountain Bike Program, providing participants with an entry-level solid bike as they begin their journey in learning core techniques and safety skills to hit the trails.

Outdoor Chattanooga connects people with the outdoors by providing entry level, low cost programs to introduce diverse populations to outdoor recreational activities, teach proper and safe outdoor recreation skills and provide equipment to the individuals that may not have access to it within the community, said Philip Grymes, executive director of Outdoor Chattanooga. The ultimate goal of our Learn to Ride a Mountain Bike Program is to get more people riding safely and confidently on the many mountain bike trails here in Chattanooga.

Grant funding is one way that The IRONMAN Foundation leaves a lasting legacy in the communities where IRONMAN races take place, said Dave Deschenes, executive director of The IRONMAN Foundation. We are thrilled to support the Chattanooga community with these community grant awards.

The IRONMAN Foundation will recognize this years community grant recipients at the athlete welcome ceremony taking place at 6 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 23, at Rosss Landing.

Volunteerism Grants

Within IRONMANs race communities, The IRONMAN Foundation provides a grant program to support organizations that have a volunteerism component. This year, The IRONMAN Foundations Community Fund will provide over $35,000 in volunteer grant donations for the Little Debbie IRONMAN Chattanooga triathlon presented by McKee a Family Bakery.

We are thrilled to continue our support of so many tremendous organizations that selflessly serve others within the Chattanooga region, said Christine Perkins, community relations manager for The IRONMAN Foundation. Last year, volunteer grant funding was distributed among 63 community groups in the region.

TEAM IMF

TEAM IMF is The IRONMAN Foundations fundraising triathlon team. Team members have the opportunity to race in the IRONMAN event of their choice when they commit to raise $3,500 for The IRONMAN Foundations Community Fund. Nine athletes participating in this program through the 2016 Little Debbie IRONMAN Chattanooga triathlon presented by McKee a Family Bakery have raised over $47,000, while collectively all of The Foundations TEAM IMF athletes have raised over $487,000 for The IRONMAN Foundations Community Fund in 2016.
RICHMOND  The Supreme Court of Virginia on Thursday rejected a Republican effort to have Gov. Terry McAuliffe held in contempt over his ongoing efforts to restore voting rights for felons.

In a unanimous one-page order, the Supreme Court said it would not force McAuliffe to return to court to prove that he is complying with the courts July 22 ruling that struck down the governors first attempt to restore voting rights to more than 200,000 felons via executive order. The court also said it would not allow Republican General Assembly leaders to seek documents from the McAuliffe administration through a new discovery process.

The ruling brings to an end the legal fight that cast uncertainty over thousands of ex-offenders just weeks before early voting gets underway for the presidential election.

In a written statement, McAuliffe said he will continue to move forward with the revised process he adopted after the court ruling to grant political rights to would-be voters on an individual basis.

It is my hope that the courts validation of the process we are using will convince Republicans to drop their divisive efforts to prevent Virginians from regaining their voting rights and focus their energy and resources on making Virginia a better place to live for the people who elected all of us to lead, McAuliffe said.

House Speaker William J. Howell, R-Stafford, said Republicans were disappointed by the ruling but respect the courts order.

The governor stretched the bounds of the Virginia Constitution and sought to expand executive power in a manner we viewed as inappropriate and reckless, Howell said in a written statement. The Supreme Court strongly rebuked the governors executive overreach in the original case.

Howell and Senate Majority Leader Thomas K. Norment Jr, R-James City, sued McAuliffe in May, arguing that the governor overstepped his authority by issuing a blanket order restoring political rights to 206,000 felons whose names the governor kept secret. The Supreme Court sided with the Republican leaders in July, ordering state officials to cancel the voter registrations of nearly 13,000 people who had registered under McAuliffes invalidated order.

After the ruling, the governor focused his efforts on restoring rights individually to the group of 13,000 who had already registered, saying they had already shown an interest in rejoining civic life. McAuliffe has said he intends to eventually restore rights to the entire group of more than 200,000, but relatively few in that group are expected to receive individual restoration orders in time for the November election.

Republicans took issue with McAuliffes revised process, saying the governors new process, though different technologically and procedurally, had the same effect as the action the court ruled unconstitutional.

The McAuliffe administration and Attorney General Mark R. Herring argued the state had fully complied with the earlier ruling and said no further court action was necessary. After the Supreme Court agreed, McAuliffes Democratic allies hailed the ruling as a victory for rights restoration efforts.

This contempt motion was completely baseless and Im glad the Supreme Court dispatched it so quickly, said Herring, whose office defended McAuliffes original order and fought the more recent contempt motion.

Virginia Republicans tried to use the judiciary branch in their unwavering effort to disenfranchise voters and today, they failed, Susan Swecker, chairwoman of the Democratic Party of Virginia, said in a written statement.

Democrats urge amendment

Though the summers court battle has ended, the debate over long-term changes to Virginias felon voting policy may have just begun.

On Thursday, group of Democratic lawmakers proposed a constitutional amendment to end the states ban on felon voting.

The amendment, patroned by Del. Marcus B. Simon, D-Fairfax, would strike the sentence from the state Constitution that says no felon is allowed to vote unless his or her political rights have been restored by the governor. In a news release, Simon pitched the amendment as a way to better reflect modern Virginia and move away from the racially motivated politics of a bygone era.

This language is a relic of Virginias 1902 Jim Crow Constitution, which included a laundry list of those not deemed fit to vote, a list that included idiots, insane persons, and paupers as well as those who had participated in duel, Simon said in a prepared statement. Call me politically correct if you will, but I think Virginia has come a long way since then.

McAuliffe has called the states felon voting ban unusually restrictive, saying Virginia is one of just four states that take away felons political rights for life unless a rights restoration request is made to the governor.

Without any accompanying legislation, Simons proposed amendment, co-patroned by six other Democrats, would put Virginia at the opposite end of the spectrum, joining only Maine and Vermont among states that have no restrictions on felon voting.

What else do Maine and Vermont have in common? According to census data, they have the smallest non-white populations, ranked 49th and 50th. So they never needed to get creative about denying people of color the right to vote. There simply werent enough of them to matter, Simon said.

Simons amendment will likely be a tough sell in the Republican-controlled General Assembly, but will nevertheless factor in to what could be a high-profile issue in the 2017 legislative session. Similar proposals have died in previous sessions, but the amendment comes amid unprecedented attention on Virginias felon voting policies and statements from leading Republicans supporting changes to those policies.

Earlier this month Norment introduced a constitutional amendment to automatically restore voting rights to nonviolent felons who have finished their sentences and paid all fines, court costs and restitution. Norments amendment would also strip the governor of the power to restore rights, which means violent felons would no longer have a path to regaining rights.

Howell said Thursday that he has asked House members to begin evaluating the various proposals ahead of what he expects to be a robust discussion when the General Assembly returns in January.

The General Assembly must now review the constitutions provision governing felon voting, Howell said. The current provisions of the constitution are vague, vulnerable to executive overreach, and insufficiently transparent.
Updated at 8:15 p.m.

FREDERICKSBURG  A Louisa woman who police said was abducted at gunpoint Thursday after finishing her school bus route was found safe in Spotsylvania County on Friday with the man suspected of abducting her.

Lisa Crane, 47, was recovered during a traffic stop on Route 208 about noon, Louisa County Sheriffs Office spokeswoman Tabethia Cosner said. Crane was in a vehicle with her former boyfriend, Russell Jefferies, the suspect in Thursdays abduction.

Jefferies, 43, was in the custody of Louisa authorities Friday evening. He has been charged with abduction, use of a firearm in the commission of a felony, possession of a firearm after being a convicted felon and destruction of property, Cosner told The Daily Progress.

According to the Sheriffs Office, Crane had finished her bus route Thursday and was dropping off the bus at Johnny Hall Road in Mineral when she was confronted by her armed ex-boyfriend.

She was forced into a vehicle and taken away. Initial reports stated that two other men were with the gunman Thursday, but Cosner said she was unsure if anyone else was in the vehicle Friday or if anyone else is under investigation.

Louisa officials said the incident stemmed from an ongoing domestic dispute.

Cosner said police had been tracking the phones of Crane and Jefferies since Thursday and later got a solid tip about their whereabouts.

Louisa authorities were behind the suspects vehicle as it left Louisa and entered Spotsylvania on Route 208.
Most of the dusty red bricks are covered in cracked plaster, but the shape is unmistakable: three furnaces sit on a brick hearth, poking out of an arched annex  a snapshot of the past.

The 19th-century chemical hearth is all that remains of a chemistry classroom that was once housed in the University of Virginias Rotunda, and it was just one of several projects developed over the past four years as the school worked to restore the historic building.

With an estimated price tag of $58 million, the project restored the Rotunda to some of its original architecture, while also enhancing the space to give students more room for classrooms and study areas. The building has been closed to the public for the past two years, but will reopen Sept. 26.

Along with archaeological discoveries, such as the chemical hearth, craftsmen installed a new copper roof over the dome, redid the plaster ceiling in the Dome Room and installed new mahogany capitals, which were partly hand-carved according to Thomas Jeffersons original design. New marble capitals also were installed outside of the building and were created by craftsmen in Carrara, Italy  where Jeffersons originals also were hand-carved before being destroyed in an 1895 fire  using 9,000 pound cubes of Italian marble.

Jefferson designed the Rotunda to house UVas library, as well as classrooms, including two rooms used for chemistry classes and a laboratory, according to Mark Kutney, a historic-preservation planner with UVa. The hearth actually was discovered during the planning phase before restoration work began on the building, he said.

The plans and drawings for the building reveal cavities at the ends of both lower Oval Rooms, but architects and historians were unaware of the chemical hearth, until they started poking around, Kutney said.

We knew through research that this space was used to teach chemistry and we knew that the ovens were here, said Kutney, standing in the Lower East Oval Room. It was all bricked up and plastered over, and all you had were two openings.

We didnt even make a hole initially, he said. But someone stuck their head in the there and looked up, and they could see plaster finishes.

Not sure what to do with the space at first, Kutney said they eventually decided to uncover the entire furnace and try to preserve it on display and for future study. Calling in a conservation firm, Kutney said an adhesive was injected into the walls to help stabilize the 19th-century bricks and plaster. Now, the furnace is on display for visitors to study and learn about John Emmets chemistry classroom from the early 1820s.

While the physical evidence of the chemical hearth is sure to give historians and architects plenty to study, Kutney said UVa already knows quite a bit about the early chemistry curriculum, thanks to a special collection of Emmets personal notebooks and early student notes.

We have a lot of historic documentation about the activity that was actually taking place in this room, Kutney said. We know exactly what they were teaching because we have what the students were writing and we have Emmets notebooks.

The physical artifacts that were recovered from the space are just the icing on the cake, Kutney said, and are helping historians match physical objects to the historical documents describing them. Along with fragments of bowls and glass tubing, Kutney found pieces of glass with fingerprints clearly captured in the glass.

I started cleaning one of them and was holding it up and I noticed there were actual fingerprints on it, said Kutney. Theres a fingerprint in some kind of white material, and etched in one corner is 36 N. Theyre not my fingerprints from when I found it because this was found in a stack of glass and I was wearing gloves at the time, so whoever was actually working in the hearth, those are their fingerprints.

I was very careful when cleaning these things and I was thinking, Am I wiping away evidence that we could learn from?

The chemical hearth also could be one of the only surviving chemistry tools from that era, according to UVa, and Kutney said he hopes the school can learn more about how chemistry was taught at that time.

The reason this survived is because it was bricked up and the activity of teaching chemistry lab went to another building, Kutney said. Once it was bricked up, they didnt bother the space  they didnt need it. So were really fortunate that it survived.

It seemed like when they bricked this thing up, they also didnt bother to clean it up, he said. They just walked away from it. We were fortunate that their trash is our treasure. They didnt feel like these things were worth cleaning up.

As crews put the finishing touches on the restoration and UVa prepares to open the Rotunda to the public once more, the school hopes it will be become a better space for student use.

Connor Andrews, a public-policy graduate student, worked as a Rotunda ambassador before the restoration work began and said he thinks the space will be much more inviting to students.

I think its perfect, Andrews said. When I was working here beforehand, you had the same 25 to 30 students coming in here to study every day, just because the only place to study were these tables in the alcoves. But now that theyve opened all of this up, there are going to be more tables and study spaces.

Katharine Graham, a fourth-year architecture student, started as an intern for the historic preservation team at UVa as a first-year and saw the Rotunda through the entire restoration project. Calling it a unique experience, Graham said she was excited to watch the architectural work come together to reveal the newly rejuvenated Rotunda.

I really enjoyed watching them re-do the Dome Room, Graham said. It was a cool experience, how they were able to make it seamless. I really loved seeing the dome skeleton and tiles. That was really cool, as an architect, to see that.

Beginning Sept. 26, students will be able to access the Rotunda for studying from 5 to 10 p.m. three days a week (and more during exams) to use the Upper West Oval Room, the Dome Room and the middle gallery. The gallery, which was constructed in the 1970s, was never used, but now has a new staircase, giving students access to comfortable armchairs.

Open houses for the public are set for 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sept. 24 and Sept. 25.

The building is refreshed, we have some new discoveries, but more importantly, weve got a more dynamic place for student use, Kutney said.
RICHMOND  Virginia appears to be reverting to battleground status as Republican Donald Trump has pulled within the margin of error with Democrat Hillary Clinton, according to a new survey by the University of Mary Washington.

Among likely voters Clinton received 40 percent of the vote to 37 percent for Trump, 8 percent for Libertarian Gary Johnson, 3 percent for independent Evan McMullin and 1 percent for Green Party nominee Jill Stein, according to the survey of 1,006 adult Virginians, which Princeton Survey Research conducted for UMW Sept. 6-12.

Mary Washingtons latest survey demonstrates that Virginia remains one of the nations most purple states, said Stephen J. Farnsworth, professor of political science at UMW and director of the Universitys Center for Leadership and Media Studies that sponsored the poll.

This survey demonstrates that the Trump campaign is wise to focus its resources on Virginia, and that the Clinton campaign is making a mistake by directing its attention elsewhere.

Trump and/or running mate Mike Pence, the Indiana governor, have campaigned in Virginia eight times since Clinton introduced Sen. Timothy M. Kaine, D-Va., as her running mate July 23 in Miami.

Kaine and his wife, Anne Holton, campaigned together on Friday at Old Dominion University, but in recent weeks high-profile surrogates have done most of the campaigning in Virginia for the Clinton/Kaine team.

Clintons daughter, Chelsea, campaigned in Roanoke on Wednesday. First lady Michelle Obama will campaign on Friday at George Mason University in Fairfax, where she will urge young voters to register ahead of the states Oct. 17 deadline.

Kaine and Pence will face off Oct. 4 in a debate at Longwood University in Farmville. Pence also is scheduled to speak at Liberty Universitys Oct. 12 convocation in Lynchburg.

Several polls released in August gave Clinton a double-digit edge in the state. Pro-Clinton forces have not been targeting Virginia in TV ads in recent weeks. Trumps campaign made a Virginia ad buy of about $2 million chiefly airing a commercial about the economy in the expensive Northern Virginia market.

The polls interviewing window of Sept. 6 through Sept. 12 includes last weekend, when Clintons campaign was beset by controversies over her characterization of Trumps supporters and questions about her health.

On Friday night, Clinton said at a New York fundraiser that you could put half of Trumps supporters into a basket of deplorables. The next day Clinton issued a statement in which she said she regretted saying half.

Then on Sunday Clinton left a Sept. 11 observance early and was shown on video unsteadily entering a van. Her campaign subsequently announced that Clinton had been diagnosed with pneumonia two days earlier.

On Wednesday the Clinton camp released a letter from her doctor, Lisa Bardack, who wrote that the former secretary of state is recovering well with antibiotics and rest and continues to remain healthy and fit to serve as president of the United States.

Both major party nominees remain highly unpopular with Virginia voters. Fewer than four in 10 likely voters found either honest and trustworthy, - 39 percent for Trump and 33 percent for Clinton.

The survey found that 51 percent of likely voters had a strongly unfavorable impression of Trump and 50 percent felt that way about Clinton.

Fifty-eight percent said Clinton has qualities of strong leadership and 41 percent said she does not.

For Trump, 48 percent said he has qualities of strong leadership and 50 percent said he does not have those qualities.

While 56 percent said Clinton has the right kind of temperament and personality to be a good president, only 30 percent said Trump has those qualities.

While 58 percent of respondents said Clinton is prepared for the job of president, only 33 percent said Trump is prepared for the job.

President Barack Obamas approval rating was at 50 percent, up from 47 percent in a November 2015 UMW survey.

Kaine was viewed favorably by 42 percent and unfavorably by 28 percent.

The surveys margin of error was plus or minus 3.6 percentage points for results based on the full sample and plus or minus 4.4 percentage points for results based on likely voters.
The first round of projects received funding from the University of Virginias Strategic Investment Fund on Friday.

UVas Board of Visitors approved 13 research projects and academic programs, each vetted by committees made up of faculty members and administrators, for a total of $26 million over the next three years.

The largest projects included about $4.8 million in increased financial support for doctoral students; about $4.8 million for a research center focusing on cyber-physical systems (also known as the Internet of things); and about $4.4 million for software and training designed to help faculty compete for grants.

The board also set aside about $1 million for new merit-based scholarships at the Darden School of Business. Another $1 million will go toward aid and loan forgiveness for School of Law graduates who take public service jobs.

The board debated waiting until it could address concerns about student affordability. Ultimately, it decided to vote on the research proposals and table affordability until December.

Lets get on with it, said member Wittington W. Clement. In December, well have a more complete package that will express and implement the policies we all share.

The Strategic Investment Fund  worth $2.3 billion with an annual payout of up to $100 million  has been a source of contention since July. The university set it aside to help advance research and academics, but critics  including members of the General Assembly  want UVa officials to use it to offset recent tuition increases.

Rector William H. Goodwin said the board will look for ways to use the fund to help with student affordability.

During the boards final session Friday afternoon, Goodwin suggested the board hold a meeting in November to brainstorm, before its scheduled meeting in December. The date for the November meeting is still to be determined.

The board has discussed a few ideas: decreasing loan caps; excluding money saved in the states college saving fund from calculations of need; and a matching philanthropy dollars set aside for AccessUVa, the financial aid program.

But these ideas are still in the development phase.

Tuition and aid are the issues that most concern students, said Phoebe A. Willis, the boards non-voting student member. Willis said many students wanted the opportunity to be involved in the grant request process.

Goodwin pledged to get feedback from students between now and then.

Just like the faculty, theyre going to have a process [to follow] but theyre not going to be excluded, Goodwin said.

UVas Student Council has been lobbying university officials for formal student involvement in the process. After meeting with administrators late last month, the council submitted a list of its suggestions, including student representatives on the committees that evaluate proposals and recommend them to the board.

Council members also want to evaluate proposals that are focused on improving that student experience, as well as a provision that would allow students to make grant requests of their own through a petition system.

Brett Curtis, who chairs the Representative Body (the legislature of the Student Council), said the council hasnt heard much response from officials since it released the suggestions on Aug. 31, but it is in talks with Willis.

After Fridays meeting, Curtis said the council had expected more response in light of the lack of direct student input and lack of transparency in the process.

The changes we requested honor the ideals of student self-governance and will ensure that the SIF is used in ways that students believe will best improve the student experience, Curtis said.

But the council remains optimistic about the prospect of student involvement, Curtis added.

We believe the board is open to creating a system that allows for student feedback, and are hopeful that there will be student representation soon, he said.

Willis, a third-year law student, has the difficult task of mediating between the two parties. She will continue talks with the council  including its president, Emily Lodge  this weekend.

Willis said shell be in an advisory role with the council  trying to help them craft a plan thats palatable to the board.

I dont have a plan for student involvement, but I know its going to happen, she said.

Students have begun to embrace the idea of a Strategic Investment Fund, but there is still some lingering distrust of the board, Willis said. Most of it, she said, boils down to a lack of communication.

Students do feel disconnected from the board, she said. Thats not surprising but I think it could be improved.
Jennifer Vedral-Baron, director of the Department of Veterans Affairs Tennessee Valley Healthcare System will hold a formal ribbon cutting and open house at 2:30 p.m., Monday, Sept. 26, to mark the opening of Tennessee Valley Healthcare Systems new Pointe Centre clinic location in Chattanooga.

The new TVHS clinic is at 1208 Pointe Centre Dr., Suite 100.
SEPT. 17

MAIN UNO YOUTH REVIVAL

Main Uno Baptist Church will host a youth revival Saturday, Sept. 17 at 3 p.m. The guest preacher will be Minister Lindsay Baker, associate minister of Chestnut Grove Baptist Church, Esmont. She will be joined by the youth praise dancers and choirs.

SAINT ISIDORE YARD SALE

Saint Isidore the Farmer Catholic Church will hold a yard sale Saturday, Sept. 17 from 7 a.m.  1 p.m. Proceeds will benefit local children in need. The church is located on Rt. 15, between the towns of Orange and Gordonsville. For more information, call 672-4933.

MAKING JOYFUL NOISE CONCERT SERIES

The Lake of the Woods Church is pleased to bring back Charles Mincey for its Making Joyful Noise concert series Saturday, Sept. 17 at 7 p.m. Mincey will partner with the talents of pianist Kathy Pelligreen. The show will feature smooth and big band jazz, country rock, gospel and show tunes. A pre-concert dinner will be provided at 6 p.m. by Girl Scout Troop 804 featuring slow-cooked chicken and dressing with baked sweet potatoes and homemade pumpkin pie. A voluntary dinner offering will be collected. A cookie concerto reception will follow the performance as well as a meet-and-greet with Mincey. For more information, call 972-9060.

SEPT. 18

WILDON GROVE HOMECOMING

Wildon Grove Baptist Church will hold its homecoming service Sunday, Sept. 18. The morning service will be at 11:30 a.m. with lunch to follow. The afternoon service will begin at 3 p.m. with guest Minister Penny Hawkins of St. John Baptist Church, Cobham. She will be accompanied by her choir. Wildon Grove Baptist Church is located at 6820 Wildon Grove Rd., Gordonsville. For more information, call (540) 406-2193.

HEBRON LUTHERAN HOMECOMING

Hebron Lutheran Church will hold its homecoming service Sept. 18 at 10 a.m. The speaker will be Pastor Covington. There will be a shared luncheon to follow. For more information, call 948-4381.

WOMENS DAY CELEBRATION

The Womens Ministries of Mt. Calvary Baptist Church, Nasons, will host a Womens Day Celebration, Sunday, Sept. 18 at 3 p.m. The program will feature Min. Pansy Frye with the choir and congregation from Mt. Pisgah Baptist Church, Tanners. Lunch will be served at 1:30 p.m.

NAZARETH BAPTIST CHURCH HOMECOMING

Nazareth Baptist Church will hold a morning worship service at 11 a.m. Sunday, Sept. 18. Elder Bobby Dunmore of Restoration House International Church, Maryland, will address the congregation. Elder Frank Reed of the Charlottesville Church of Christ will deliver the homecoming service at 3 p.m.

SEPT. 21

NAZARETH BAPTIST CHURCH REVIVAL

Nazareth Baptist Church will hold its revival service Wednesday, Sept. 21 at 7:30 p.m. The Rev. Harold Arrington of Mt. Pleasant Baptist Church will address the congregation. Thursday, the Rev. Walter Bryant of Mt. Pigeon Baptist Church, Tanners, will speak and the Rev. Ann Lawrence of Zion Grove Baptist Church, Buckingham, will speak Friday.

SEPT. 24

OAG YARD SALE

Orange Assembly of God will hold a yard sale Saturday, Sept. 24 from 7 a.m. - 2 p.m. The yard sale will be held on Route 15 in front of the church. Office furniture, household goods, some clothing and baked goods will be available. Taste of Hope will be selling fried chicken at the yard sale. To donate or sell on consignment, please call 672-3377 or 672-0479 and leave a message.

SEPT. 25

BETHEL UMC HOMECOMING

Bethel United Methodist Church will hold its homecoming service Sunday, Sept. 25 at 11 a.m. The Rev. Henry Aylor will be the guest speaker and special music will be provided by the youth of Oak Grove Mennonite Church. A covered-dish lunch will follow at the pavilion.

OFFICERS DAY AT MT. PLEASANT BAPTIST CHURCH

Sunday, Sept. 25, Mt. Pleasant will celebrate its annual officers day. The guest for the 2:30 p.m. evening service will be the Rev. John Saunders of Emanuel Baptist Church, Orange, along with his choir and congregation. All officers are invited to participate.

OCT. 1

SINGING PASTORS/MINISTERS

Main Uno Baptist Church will host a Singing Pastors/Ministers program Saturday, Oct. 1 at 4 p.m.

OCT. 2

REV. LUNDYS 19TH ANNIVERSARY

Main Uno Baptist Church will celebrate pastor the Rev. Dr. Darnell Lundys 19th anniversary Sunday, Oct. 2 The guest preacher for the 11 a.m. service will be the Rev. Lloyd Feggans, Associate of the New Green Mountain Baptist Church. The guest preacher for the 3 p.m. service will be the Rev. Dr. Lehman Bates of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Charlottesville, along with his choir and congregation.

UNION BAPTIST CHURCH HOMECOMING

Union Baptist Church, located at 312 Cobb Street, Gordonsville, will be celebrating its homecoming Sunday, Oct. 2. Revival services begin Monday, Oct. 3 and continue through Wednesday, Oct. 5. The day begins with Sunday school at 9:30 a.m. followed by the morning worship service at 11 a.m. Lunch will be served immediately after the morning service. Homecoming service begins at 2:30 p.m. with prayer and praise, and a worship service at 3 p.m. The guest pastor for Sunday afternoon will be Bishop Frederick O. Jones, Pastor of the Harvest Assembly Baptist Church, Alexandria. Bishop Jones will be accompanied by his choir and church family. Revival services will be held Monday, Oct. 3 and continue through Wednesday, Oct. 5. Prayer and praise services nightly at 7 p.m. with Bishop Jones. Various choirs will deliver the music nightly. Please contact the church at 832-5293 for more information.

OCT. 9

MAIN UNO BAPTIST CHURCH 94TH ANNIVERSARY

Main Uno Baptist Church will celebrate its 94th church anniversary Sunday, Oct. 9. The guest preacher for the 11 a.m. service will be the Rev. Dr. Earl Pendleton, Assistant to Pastor of Mt. Zion First African Baptist Church, Charlottesville.

OCT. 15

HARVEST FESTIVAL/CRAFT SHOW

Craigs Baptist Church will hold a harvest festival/craft show Oct. 15. Vendors are still needed and may contact 854-5284 for more information. Craigs Baptist Church is located at 14123 W. Catharpin Rd., Spotsylvania Courthouse.

NOTICES

CALL-IN BIBLE STUDY

Beulah Baptist Church, Rixeyville, hosts a free call-in Bible study with Pastor Kenneth Pitts every Wednesday from 7 -- 7:30 p.m., studying the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. The call-in number is (302) 202-1118, access code 862090.

CHRIST ANGLICAN DISCUSSION SERIES

Christ Anglican Fellowship will host a seven-week discussion series, Objections to Christianity, Thursday evenings at 7 p.m. at the Christ Anglican Fellowship Center, located at 153 E. Main St., Orange. All serious inquirers welcome. For more information, call 672-8331.

COMEDIAN WEBCAST

Orange Church of the Nazarene will host SHEjammygans, a not-so-late night live webcast talk show starring Christian comedian Anita Renfroe. Be ready for an hour of laughs, conversations and fun. This event is held the first and third Tuesdays of each month at 9 p.m. in the church sanctuary. For more information, call 661-0145 or visit SHEjammygans.com.

EXERCISE AND DEVOTION SERIES

Orange Church of the Nazarene will host Sweatin with Jesus every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday morning at 9 a.m. at the Fellowship Hall corner of Nelson and Belleview Street in Orange. Come enjoy a free time of low-impact exercise and devotions. For more information, call 661-0145.

CANCER SUPPORT GROUP

A free cancer support group will be held every Thursday 12:30  2 p.m. starting June 2 for eight weeks, facilitated by Counseling Interventions. Meetings will be held at Orange Presbyterian Church. Child care will be provided. For information or to register, call 672-4240. There is no cost to attend.

CRAIGS BAPTIST PROGRAMS

Craigs Baptist Church, 14123 W. Catharpin Road, holds its Sunday morning worship at 9:30 a.m. and Sunday School at 11 a.m., ladies Bible study every Sunday at 6 p.m., midweek worship every Wednesday at 11 a.m. Craigs is hosting an open gym/Bible study Tuesday nights for teens (ages 12 and up) that will run through the summer months. Contact the church office for information on AWANA, VBS, Centershot or teen open gym night at 854-5284.

BASKET RAFFLE AND VENDOR BAZAAR

St. Isidore Farmer Catholic Church has additional spaces available for a two-day gift basket raffle and vendor bazaar on Friday, Dec. 2 from 12 -7 p.m. and Saturday, Dec. 3 from 9 a.m. Items sold should be handmade. The cost for vendor space is $35/day or $50 for both days. Contact Barbara Mosticone at (434) 242-2072 or rhino92@yahoo.com for more information.
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The Chattanooga Library is offering a new sewing class at the downtown branch. The new Sewing Lab officially opens on Saturday afternoon inside the 4th Floor maker space.

The new Sewing Lab will be open Mondays through Saturdays and is free to use for anyone with a current Chattanooga Public Library card in good standing.

The Sewing Lab on the 4th Floor features four new sewing machines, an embroidery machine, a serger, ironing board, individual work stations, sample projects for inspiration and more. Come to the grand opening and sign up for the workshops, one-on-ones, or reserve time on a machine.

Book-a-Seamstress will be available to help start, fix or finish a project. Call to schedule one-on-one time any Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday at 643-7753.

Schedule of events:

Sept. 17: Grand Opening: 2-4 p.m.

Oct. 1: Reusable Tea Bags: 9:30-11:30 a.m.

Oct. 3-7: Creative Juices Happy Hour: 5-6 p.m.

Oct. 6: Sew What! for beginners: 4-5:45 p.m.

Oct. 8: Designer Coasters 9:30-11:30 a.m.

Oct. 13: Sew What! for beginners: 4-5:45 p.m.

Oct. 20: Sew What! for beginners: 4-5:45 p.m.
Just a month before the case goes to trial, a federal judge made several rulings Thursday in the multimillion-dollar defamation lawsuit filed by University of Virginia administrator Nicole Eramo.

In May 2015, Eramo sued writer Sabrina Rubin Erdely, Rolling Stone magazine and its publisher for $7.85 million, claiming she was unduly maligned by the publishing of A Rape on Campus, an article published by Rolling Stone in November 2014 that was intended to expose the culture of sexual assault on college campuses.

The articles centerpiece was the story of Jackie, a former UVa student who said she was gang raped at a fraternity party during her first year, and offered details of how the university supposedly suppressed her claims. Eramo, who at the time was the administrator charged with aiding survivors of sexual assault, was explicitly mentioned several times in the article, and was even portrayed in a photo illustration that accompanied the publication.

The article created a firestorm of controversy, but quickly unraveled under scrutiny  particularly Jackies story. An investigation by Charlottesville police turned over no evidence that could support her claims, and a review by the Columbia Journalism School dubbed the article a journalistic failure.

In her lawsuit, Eramo derides the magazine and Erdely for portraying her as callous and indifferent to Jackies claims, and states that the fallout from the article damaged her reputation, her career and her health.

Since her original filing, attorneys for Eramo, Rolling Stone and Jackie, whos been named as a third party in the case, have fiercely battled over a variety of issues in the case  Jackies level of participation, Eramos status as a public figure, the merits of her defamation claim  but on Thursday, Judge Glen Conrad resolved some key differences before the case goes to trial next month.

Addressing the public figure argument, Conrad sided with the magazine in classifying Eramo as a limited purpose public figure, meaning that she was involved in a public controversy within a narrow area of interest. Because the article in question dealt with sexual assault, Eramo could be viewed as having a public position within that controversy as the chairwoman of UVas Sexual Misconduct Board.

Eramos attorneys previously had argued that their client would not fit this classification, because she never attempted to bring the controversy into the public spotlight.

In a hearing that took place a month ago, attorneys for Rolling Stone further argued that the article and Erdelys process of writing it did not constitute actual malice, or a reckless disregard for the truth.

In previous hearings and filings, Eramo alleged that Erdely had a preconceived notion of what her article was going to say long before she began investigating Jackies claims. They pointed to her long history of reporting on institutional indifference to rape allegations by large organizations, and her original story pitch for what would become A Rape on Campus, in which she said she would seek out a top-tier university to show a similar pattern of indifference.

Eramo also has pointed to an email from Dec. 5, 2014, in which Erdely told her editors that she no longer had trust in Jackies story. Despite Erdely asking for the article to be retracted, the magazine instead republished the article, this time with an editors note acknowledging the inconsistencies in Jackies story. According to Eramo, this constituted a disregard for the truth.

Erdely and Rolling Stones attorneys have rebuked that notion several times, and stated that Eramo had mischaracterized facts in the court record regarding the reporting process and Erdelys trust in Jackie.

Ultimately, Conrad said he was unsure whether the altered Dec. 5 version of the article could truly constitute actual malice as a republishing, but he ruled that the overall actual malice question in the case should be addressed by a jury, rather than the court.

Conrad said Thursday that 100 people will be contacted to serve on what will be a seven-person jury, with no alternates. He added that for the sake of fairness, no employees of UVa will be permitted to serve, but that anyone who has attended the university may be considered.

Finally, Conrad said that while some aspects of the article could be considered hyperbole, quotes and other factual statements made in the article were actionable in the defamation suit.

The case will have one more motions hearing on Oct. 4, followed by a pretrial conference on Oct. 11. The trial is set to begin on Oct. 17 and run through Oct. 28.
The Supreme Court of Virginia on Thursday rejected a Republican effort to have Gov. Terry McAuliffe held in contempt over his ongoing efforts to restore voting rights for felons.

In a unanimous one-page order, the Supreme Court said it would not force McAuliffe to return to court to prove that he is complying with the courts July 22 ruling that struck down the governors first attempt to restore voting rights to more than 200,000 felons via executive order. The court also said it would not allow Republican General Assembly leaders to seek documents from the McAuliffe administration through a new discovery process.

The ruling brings to an end the legal fight that cast uncertainty over thousands of ex-offenders just weeks before early voting gets underway for the presidential election.

In a written statement, McAuliffe said he will continue to move forward with the revised process he adopted after the court ruling to grant political rights to would-be voters on an individual basis.

It is my hope that the courts validation of the process we are using will convince Republicans to drop their divisive efforts to prevent Virginians from regaining their voting rights and focus their energy and resources on making Virginia a better place to live for the people who elected all of us to lead, McAuliffe said.

House Speaker William J. Howell, R-Stafford, said Republicans were disappointed by the ruling but respect the courts order.

The governor stretched the bounds of the Virginia Constitution and sought to expand executive power in a manner we viewed as inappropriate and reckless, Howell said in a written statement. The Supreme Court strongly rebuked the governors executive overreach in the original case.

Howell and Senate Majority Leader Thomas K. Norment Jr, R-James City, sued McAuliffe in May, arguing that the governor overstepped his authority by issuing a blanket order restoring political rights to 206,000 felons whose names the governor kept secret. The Supreme Court sided with the Republican leaders in July, ordering state officials to cancel the voter registrations of nearly 13,000 people who had registered under McAuliffes invalidated order.

After the ruling, the governor focused his efforts on restoring rights individually to the group of 13,000 who had already registered, saying they had already shown an interest in rejoining civic life. McAuliffe has said he intends to eventually restore rights to the entire group of more than 200,000, but relatively few in that group are expected to receive individual restoration orders in time for the November election.

Republicans took issue with McAuliffes revised process, saying the governors new process, though different technologically and procedurally, had the same effect as the action the court ruled unconstitutional.

The McAuliffe administration and Attorney General Mark R. Herring argued the state had fully complied with the earlier ruling and said no further court action was necessary. After the Supreme Court agreed, McAuliffes Democratic allies hailed the ruling as a victory for rights restoration efforts.

This contempt motion was completely baseless and Im glad the Supreme Court dispatched it so quickly, said Herring, whose office defended McAuliffes original order and fought the more recent contempt motion.

Virginia Republicans tried to use the judiciary branch in their unwavering effort to disenfranchise voters and today, they failed, Susan Swecker, chairwoman of the Democratic Party of Virginia, said in a written statement.

Democrats urge amendment

Though the summers court battle has ended, the debate over long-term changes to Virginias felon voting policy may have just begun.

On Thursday, group of Democratic lawmakers proposed a constitutional amendment to end the states ban on felon voting.

The amendment, patroned by Del. Marcus B. Simon, D-Fairfax, would strike the sentence from the state Constitution that says no felon is allowed to vote unless his or her political rights have been restored by the governor. In a news release, Simon pitched the amendment as a way to better reflect modern Virginia and move away from the racially motivated politics of a bygone era.

This language is a relic of Virginias 1902 Jim Crow Constitution, which included a laundry list of those not deemed fit to vote, a list that included idiots, insane persons, and paupers as well as those who had participated in duel, Simon said in a prepared statement. Call me politically correct if you will, but I think Virginia has come a long way since then.

McAuliffe has called the states felon voting ban unusually restrictive, saying Virginia is one of just four states that take away felons political rights for life unless a rights restoration request is made to the governor.

Without any accompanying legislation, Simons proposed amendment, co-patroned by six other Democrats, would put Virginia at the opposite end of the spectrum, joining only Maine and Vermont among states that have no restrictions on felon voting.

What else do Maine and Vermont have in common? According to census data, they have the smallest non-white populations, ranked 49th and 50th. So they never needed to get creative about denying people of color the right to vote. There simply werent enough of them to matter, Simon said.

Simons amendment will likely be a tough sell in the Republican-controlled General Assembly, but will nevertheless factor in to what could be a high-profile issue in the 2017 legislative session. Similar proposals have died in previous sessions, but the amendment comes amid unprecedented attention on Virginias felon voting policies and statements from leading Republicans supporting changes to those policies.

Earlier this month Norment introduced a constitutional amendment to automatically restore voting rights to nonviolent felons who have finished their sentences and paid all fines, court costs and restitution. Norments amendment would also strip the governor of the power to restore rights, which means violent felons would no longer have a path to regaining rights.

Howell said Thursday that he has asked House members to begin evaluating the various proposals ahead of what he expects to be a robust discussion when the General Assembly returns in January.

The General Assembly must now review the constitutions provision governing felon voting, Howell said. The current provisions of the constitution are vague, vulnerable to executive overreach, and insufficiently transparent.
Covenant College alumna Kathryn Kimball 09 has been selected to clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Ms. Kimballs clerkship will run during the 2018 Supreme Court term. Around 36 law clerks are annually chosen to serve with the Supreme Court.

"I'm deeply honored to have the opportunity to clerk for Justice Thomas, a man I respect as both a jurist and person, said Ms. Kimball. I credit the rigorous academics at Covenant College for preparing me for law school and my current job as a criminal prosecutor, and I'm incredibly thankful for the many professors and friends who encouraged me along the way."

After graduating with highest honors from Covenant in 2009 with a BA in economics, Ms. Kimball went on to receive her JD from the Fredric G. Levin College of Law in 2012, where she graduated first in her class. Kimball currently serves as a prosecutor at the Department of Justice in Washington, DC. Ms. Kimball was a Maclellan Scholar during her time at Covenant and served as student body president during her senior year.

Kathryn always approached her studies with faithfulness, diligence, and poise and it's no surprise to hear that she has carried these characteristics into her career, said Sarah Huffines, associate professor of English and co-director of the Maclellan Scholars Program. I'm obviously thrilled for the experience that she will have, and I am confident that those around her will benefit from her presence.

During her clerkship, Ms. Kimball will be deeply involved in the daily work of the Supreme Court, researching issues presented in petitions, writing memoranda about pending cases, and assisting Justice Thomas as he prepares for oral arguments and writes opinions.

Anyone who has known Kathryn Kimball, or has seen her work, knows that she brings energy and insight to all she does, said Dr. Richard Follett, professor of history and pre-law advisor. Ms. Kimball's selection certainly reflects her well-developed knowledge and skills, and I am thrilled that her education at Covenant has helped prepare her for this opportunity. We will look forward to following her career, as she helps to shape the interpretation and application of our country's laws.
LONDON - England - The EU is increasing their federalist state daily, imposing restrictions on nations within the soviet bloc, punishing nations with fines, increasing migration, implementing an EU Army separate from NATO, yadda yadda yadda..

What more reason does Theresa May have to implement Article 50 to complete the mandate of the people of the United Kingdom?

Let us not forget that the majority of people in Britain voted to leave the EU in the EU referendum conducted on June 23 2016.

Since that wonderful day there has only been delaying tactics, and the instatement of Theresa May, a Remain campaigner into office has seen even more delaying tactics.

Its That Article 50 Time

Article 50 must be triggered now. We must trigger Article 50 immediately and there must be no traitorous treachery from the infiltrated crony warehouse: the House of Lords, or from the remaining Remoaners who are predominantly stalwart Marxists.

Trade negotiations will fall into place as they are already doing. As for the Single Market, or what used to be called the Common Market, Britain must reject it because the four tenets required include free movement of people which is unusable with an EU that has porous Schengen zone borders, and this is why many people voted to get out of the EU on June 23.

We Must Invoke Article 50 Now

Free movement of people in the EU is a blight on Britain and has filled our streets with beggars, Romanian gypsies and whoever else simply walked into Europe. It has increased the governments welfare bill hundredfold, furthermore, the NHS is on its last legs and will have to start charging people soon for medical aid.

Britain is full to the brim, and its roads, designed for the horse and cart, are stuck in permanent traffic.

The overcrowded schools where some children have to sit in a class of fifty, and our hospital beds where to get one if you are dying is a luxury, is a disgrace to the tenets of decency.

Article 50

Public transport is a mess especially in London, where people are crammed into carriages coughing and spluttering, the smell of death hangs over the whole transport system.

Overcrowded jobs market, and the jobs, underpriced by migrants and EU grafters who come here, get paid a pittance and send the money home. EU migrants do not benefit Britain as much of their pay is sent immediately to their homelands, as well as their child benefits to their children abroad.

Invoke Article 50 Now

Romanian kingpins and their grotesque mansions are popping up all over the place, all paid for by tax credits and imaginary children. Forged documents are too easy to come by, and these criminals are receiving 5,000 per month from UK benefits.

Did We Mention Article 50?

We must invoke article 50 right now if Britain is to be saved from this dire mess. Do it! Do it now! This is a matter of grave urgency.

Theresa May has to stand by her word to invoke article 50, to get us out of the EU once and for all.

Do it now press the button.

NOW
PARIS - France - Former French president, Nikolas Sarkozy has admitted that it is France's fault that the Calais Jungle refugee camp was created.

Due to free movement policies of the EU within the Schengen zone, of which France is a member, migrants can simply walk across any border into Europe from anywhere in the world. Britain is not a member of the Schengen zone so it is not their problem. I would like to apologise profoundly to the British people and government for French stupidity and arrogance. It is our fault, and our mess. We are really sorry and beg for forgiveness for our folly.

Speaking on the live broadcast on France 2 television he also denied that he is accusing the migrant population of all evils insisting there are issues that have to be addressed.

Mr Sarkozy was reacting to questions from members of the public and specifically discussed the issue of the migrant crisis focusing directly on Africa.

And he said migrants should be transported back to Africa so they can be processed to prevent the clog up and further issues caused by the problems at Calais, but EU regulations prevented such actions.

Once anyone crosses into the EU border they have the right to stay. This is why millions of people from Africa and the Middle East, South East Asia are coming over. The Schengen zone is also a great place for terrorism to flourish, as well as human trafficking and drug running. Welcome to Europe, please all come to France, you are all welcome mes amis, Sarkozy added.
Lee Universitys School of Music will host a piano masterclass with visiting artist Ning An on Wednesday from 2-4 p.m. in the Squires Recital Hall.

The masterclass is a cooperative opportunity with the Chattanooga Symphony & Opera. An will perform as a guest pianist at the CSO on Thursday, Sept. 22. Baritone Robert Barefield and violinist Holly Mulchahy will also teach masterclasses at Lee this spring in conjunction with their guest performances with the CSO.

Mr. An has been hailed as a musician who combines a flawless technique and mastery of the instrument with an expressive power that is fueled by profound and insightful understanding (New York Concert Review). He has placed as a top pianist at Queen Elizabeth, Cleveland, and William Kapell Piano Competitions has performed in Carnegies Weill Recital Hall, Salle Verdi (Milan), and the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China. An has also been a top prize winner of the Paloma OShea Santander Competition, the Tivoli International Piano Competition, the Rachmaninoff International Piano Competition and the Alfred Cortot Prize winner of the International Chopin Piano Competition.

A frequent guest lecturer, Mr. An has taught masterclasses throughout the United States and Asia. He currently serves as the artist-teacher on the piano faculty of California State University, Fullerton and as a visiting artist at Lee.

Accompanying Mr. An during the class will be students from Lee University, UTC and Southern Adventist University.

The masterclass is a free, non-ticketed event and everyone is welcome to attend. Squires Recital Hall is located in Lee Universitys Humanities Center on Parker Street.

For more information about CSO and Mr. Ans performance, visit http://chattanoogasymphony.org/event/opening-night-strauss-and-rachmaninoff/. For more information on the masterclasses or other School of Music events, contact 614-8240.




Dr. Cahill Smith Geoffrey Herd Deanna Anderson Heather Anderson Previous Next

Lee Universitys Faculty Chamber Recital will take place on Friday, Sept. 23, at 7:30 p.m. in Squires Recital Hall.

The recital will feature Lee University Assistant Professor of Piano, Dr. Cahill Smith, as well as violinist Geoffrey Herd, violist Deanna Anderson and cellist Heather Anderson. The program includes piano quartets by Mozart and Brahms.

Deanna. Anderson, a MinneapolisSaint Paul native, is a freelance performer and teacher recently based in Paris, France. She holds degrees from the Juilliard School, the Cleveland Institute of Music, and the Conservatoire de Paris. Through the Conservatoire de Paris, Ms. Anderson has performed in collaboration with the Ensemble Intercontemporain with conductor Mattias Pintscher. She has also participated in numerous small-ensemble contemporary music projects.

Currently based in Chattanooga, Heather Anderson teaches and performs as a chamber and orchestral musician. She has performed with the Greenville Symphony, the Eastman Philharmonia, and the National Orchestral Institute Orchestra, among others. Recently, she has held principal positions with the Orford Academy Orchestra and the Colorado College Summer Music Festival Orchestra. Ms. Anderson holds a Bachelor of Music in Cello Performance from the Eastman School of Music where she studied with David Ying of the Ying Quartet.

Mr. Herd is sought after as a soloist and chamber musician, and has been featured with the Rochester Philharmonic, the Ithaca College Symphony, and the Finger Lakes Symphony, among others. He received an Artist Diploma from Yale University where he was the recipient of the Broadus Erle Prize for excellence in violin, and also holds degrees from the Cleveland Institute of Music and Rice University. Herd recently joined the faculty of the University of Tennessee at Knoxville.

Dr. Smith performs as a soloist and chamber musician in the United States, including three programs at Carnegie Halls Weill Recital Hall, as well as venues in China, Ukraine, England, and Ireland. While pursuing his doctorate at Eastman School of Music, he received the Douglas Lowry award for excellence in performance, won the Eastman Concerto Competition, and was awarded the Prize for Excellence in Teaching as a graduate assistant. He also holds degrees from the University of Michigan and the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

The piano quartet is an intimate chamber ensemble with a beautiful repertoire, said Dr. Smith. With an exciting program and musicians of this caliber, you wont be disappointed! We are looking forward to sharing this music with close friends and our audience.

The recital is free of charge and open to the public. Squires Recital Hall is in Lees Humanities Building on Parker Street.

For more information about the recital or other music events, contact the School of Music at 614-8240 or by email at music@leeuniversity.edu.
Lee University will host the Hold Me Tight couples weekend enrichment experience, Conversations for Connection, Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 24-25, in the Johnson Lecture Hall, in Lees Humanities Center.

The conference is an attachment and evidence-based workshop created by Dr. Sue Johnson, an author, presenter, and leading innovator in the field of couple therapy. Using Johnsons method of Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy, Conversations for Connection will help couples to use attachment and emotion-focused strategies to improve relationship satisfaction, intimacy, trust and safety, thereby decreasing relationship stress and strengthening couples relationships.

The workshop will cover topics such as the science of love, understanding attachment needs, common relationship stressors, repairing relationship losses, practical ways to secure a relationship, methods to increase responsiveness, and the importance of intimacy.

Hold Me Tight will incorporate partner exercises, research-based relationship information, breakout sessions, and couple training activities during the conference.

The conference will be facilitated by Lee University Marriage and Family Therapy graduate intern students.

The event will take place Saturday from 8 a.m.-5 p.m. and resume Sunday, from 17 p.m. There will be a $75 fee per couple which will cover materials and light refreshments. Scholarships are available.

For more information or to register for the workshop email Lees Marriage and Family Therapy Center at dsheffey@leeuniversity.edu or call 614-8415.
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Please focus more on issues than personal attacks.
When Rev. Steve Highlander sat in the chairmans chair of the Hamilton County School Board for the first time Thursday night, several of his fellow board members at the dais looked on with contempt. After accomplishing next to nothing in the next 90 minutes, when he got up the same school board members were glaring in abject disbelief.

Before the much-anticipated meeting, it was whispered that Highlander, a former UTC wrestler and now an inner-city minister, had been maneuvered as the chairman earlier in the week in a carefully-plotted ruse. It was like we had hardly gotten started when Steve was nominated as chair and Karitsa (Mosley Jones) as co-chair. The vote was called and they had the five votes immediately. You could tell who the other board members were who had no idea what was going on, said an eyewitness. It was like, Well here we go again 

Highlander, whose brother is an official with the teachers union, was an unlikely choice from the get-go because it is widely known, as a former educator under the Smith regime, he is not only a member of the spotty good ole boy network but hardly in the league with longtime board member Rhonda Thurman and several other knowledgeable veterans on the much-maligned board.

Thurman, who is probably the best-versed member in school board matters, was appointed as the temporary chairman last month after Jonathan Welch was defeated in the election. At first, Rhonda said she didnt have time to be chairman. Several days later, at the insistence of several other board members, she agreed to serve but by then  without her nor her backers knowledge  Highlander had arranged a take-over using some of the gullible new members to assure enough votes.

David Testerman, the former East Ridge principal, was still fuming before Thursday nights meeting. David, eager to clear the cloud that marred the last board, was among those who urged Rhonda to please use her knowledge to help fix the boards image. Finally Thurman told several other board members that, yes, shed do it if that is what the whole group wanted but the older board members had no way of knowing the Highlander plot was cut-and-dried before the meeting on Tuesday was ever called to order.

As if to confirm the ruse, towards the end of Thursdays session, the first regularly-scheduled meeting that included three newly-elected members, Highlander called a vote on whether the group should vote to decide  yes  to discuss whether to discuss the three firms that were vying to help the Hamilton County Department of Education board in its quest to hire a new superintendent or, no, to wait.

The outcome was so priceless it must be cut in granite as the most unbelievably wanton example of political pay back in Hamilton Countys history. As the board secretary called the roll seeking a yes or no on the vote, the count was an even 4-to-4 as it was handed to the squirming Highlander who, obviously, has had no experience as the chairman of anything.

What you must understand is that most of the four no votes were among the concerted five that had railroaded Highlander into the chairmans job not 48 hours before so get your chisel and a slab of slick rock  heres what you need to etch in the stone. I had planned to vote yes, said the new school board leader, but in honor of those who voted no, Ill vote no too.

Are you kidding me! This guy has just high-jacked the chairmanship of the Hamilton County School Board and he immediately folds like a poker hand with a pair of 2s. Wishy-washy only happens in the systems kindergartens but Thursday night it got a new definition. Highlanders constituents voted for him to make decisions two years ago when he was re-elected but, whoa! Look at this!

In his first-ever split vote as chairman, Highlanders guile calls on him to suddenly want to honor those who voted against what he believed was right so  what!  he admits to abandoning his beliefs to pay back their gratuity. Please. It is nothing more than brazenly unconscionable and, whats worse, Steve Highlander is the first to know it.

If ever one single moment of school board history will shine as a pinnacle of all that is wrong, bad, rotten, sour and glaring in Hamilton Countys educational slide, the newest chairman of the school board showed the parents of 42,000 children why Hamilton County education has reached its lowest depths with no outward appearance of any change. The last election, thought to be one of hope, is anything but.

Joe Wingate, newly elected in District 7, was impressive in his debut  his observations are heady and well-thought -- but the two women, Kathy Lennon in District 2 and Tiffanie Robinson from District 4, were almost laughable as they spoke of transparency and right-doing after their alleged participation in the Highlander caper. Are you kidding me? When they talk of the school board working together, there are already other board members who see Lennon and Robinson with a jaundiced eye. Thats right: Here we go again 

The really big picture? This is why we have had the last three superintendents never finish their terms. This is why the nice schools have gotten the money while the iZone schools have not. This is why the last superintendent, Rick Smith, went absolutely and totally unchecked as the system dropped to the worst metro district in the state the last four years. Our teachers are graded by one standard as the worst in the state. While I disagree about our teachers, no one can dispute the HCDE is today among the one of the worst education models in America.

Thursday nights school board meeting was a travesty. If you are a parent, a teacher or an employer, contact your school board representative and convey the message that youll not stand for such circus. And if this pattern continues, we impeach the lot of them by the New Year. This is absolutely shameful.

royexum@aol.com
Chattanooga-based Unum said it is outsourcing some "high-volume, transactional processes," leading to the elimination of some financial positions.

Unum has contracted with EXL, a firm with headquarters in New York City, but with employees throughout the world, including many in India.

Unum officials said, despite the move, that its local employment is remaining steady.

A Unum employee whose job was cut said that this month Unum "eliminated 36 finance jobs and there will be more to come. They are giving employees three to six months to find a new job or collect severance at their end dates. They are outsourcing finance functions to an Indian-based company called EXL.

"Unum employees are to work with the Indians in a 'knowledge transfer'. There will be two types of training sessions: for those who kept their jobs and for those who are losing their jobs. There will also be cultural sensitivity training for U.S. employees.

"The IT Department is next."

Unum's Mary Clarke Guenther said, "We did eliminate a small number of transactional roles in our finance area, and those employees will all have three to six months to find other jobs with the company. With attrition and the creation of new roles, we hire about 100 people a month throughout the company. Were hopeful internal employees will be able to fill some of these positions.

"The work that is being outsourced involves high-volume, transactional processes. The company weve hired to handle those processes specializes in that kind of work. They can bring superior technology and efficiency to those processes.

"Our employment in Chattanooga has remained relatively constant for the last decade, hovering between 2600 and 2800 employees. In the last two years, the number is actually trending upward. Given the size of our company, the ways we constantly evolve to meet customer expectations, and the ongoing fluctuation of roles in different business areas, a snapshot from this kind of shift would never offer a complete or accurate picture."

EXL was incorporated in April 1999 in Delaware by a group that included Vikram Talwar and Rohit Kapoor.

EXL earlier this year was named " a Top 10 Outsourcing Service Provider" by the Information Services Group (ISG), a leading technology insights, market intelligence and advisory services company.


Electric car rentals should start in Chattanooga in about two to three weeks.

Gustave Occhiuzzo, CEO of GreenCommute, told members of the CARTA board that 20 electric vehicles have been secured.

Charging stations will be at CARTA's north and south parking garages as well as the one on Frazier Avenue. There will be two by Coolidge Park at the Chattanooga Theatre Centre, two on Station Street by the Chattanooga Choo Choo and one at the Incline Railway in St. Elmo.

Charging stations are also to be located at UTC and Southern Adventist University.

The rental rate will be $9 per hour.

Registrations for the program have begun.


Hundreds of people and dignitaries will gather to celebrate the opening of the new Chabad Center for Jewish Learning on Sunday, officials said. The center is located in the Historic Fort Wood, Jo Conn Guild House at 950 Vine St.

"The centers aim is to be a hub for Jewish learning in a warm and welcoming environment. The center is open to all regardless of background or affiliation," officials said.



Schedule for the event:

12:45 p.m.: ribbon cutting - affixing Mezuzah



1:15 p.m.: building tour - discover learning opportunities and programs



1:30 p.m.: celebration - sushi and cocktails



We strive to bring the beauty of Judaism to life in a fun and meaningful way, said Rabbi Perlstein, people from all walks of life enter the doors.

Mr. Kevin Spiegel, president and CEO of Erlanger hospital says understands the need for this facility, As the economy grows in Chattanooga so do the needs of each community, and this facility can service the growing spiritual needs of our Jewish community as a whole.

Bruce, a member and owner of River Street Deli said, It is befitting for Chabad, which is all about exposing the beauty in Judaism and its history, will operate out of such a beautiful and historic building.

Located in Historic Fort Wood Chabad of Chattanooga offers an opportunity to meet the needs of the growing number of Jewish students at UTC and UT Erlanger where there will be a lounge designated for Chabads Jew-TC student group, officials said.



An RSVP is appreciated by those planning attend by contacting Chabad at 423-490-1106 or info@JewishChatt.com.
The practicality of SUVs makes them a popular body type among Indians. They are more spacious than a sedan or an MPV, offer imposing looks and, to top it all, they can take on any terrain with authority. Before you buy a new SUV , check our list of the upcoming utility vehicles in the country.

1. Tata Nexon Compact SUV

Tata will be entering the compact SUV segment with a model based on the Nexon concept. The company is said to be concentrating more on the looks of the Nexon, which, they hope, will attract more buyers. Design wise, the final production-spec Nexon will stay true to the updated concept that was showcased at the 2016 Auto Expo. The Tata Nexon will be offered in both petrol and diesel engine options. The petrol variant will most likely be the new Revotron, turbocharged, 1.2-litre engine making 90PS of peak power and 140Nm of peak torque. On the other hand, the diesel variant is the tried and tested 1.3-litre engine which makes 90PS of power and 200Nm of peak torque. Both variants will likely feature manual and AMT transmissions. Pricing for the petrol variant will be around Rs 6.5 lakh while the diesel will cost around Rs 7.5 lakh.

2. Volkswagen Tiguan

Volkswagen (VW) first showcased the Tiguan at the 2016 Delhi Auto Expo. The Tiguan is a compact SUV based on Volkswagen's universal MQB platform, the same as the current Skoda Octavia and Volkswagen Passat. Mechanically, the car might get the tried and tested 2.0-litre TDI engine. The base variant will be offered as a front-wheel drive, but the higher variants of the Tiguan are expected to get all-wheel drive as an option. The all-wheel drive variants will also get selectable modes for different terrains, which should enhance the Tiguan's abilities as an off-roader. The SUV is expected to be priced around the 28 to 30 lakh mark (ex-showroom). Once launched, it will go up against the likes of Toyota Fortuner, Ford Endeavour , and the Chevrolet Trailblazer.

3. Hyundai Tucson

Hyundai had showcased the third-generation Tucson at the 2016 Auto Expo that was held earlier this year in February. The Korean automaker will slot the SUV between the popular Creta and the Santa Fe. The car will be priced around the 16 to 18 lakh mark. The design of the Tucson will follow Hyundais Fluidic Design language and will also take cues from the Santa Fe and the Creta. The car will also feature projector headlamps with LED tail lights, LED Daytime Running Lamps (DRL), a panoramic sunroof and an electrically operated tailgate. On the inside, Hyundai has equipped the car with a touchscreen infotainment system, navigation, steering-mounted controls and automatic climate control. It will be launched with both the petrol and diesel engine options. Mechanically, the SUV is expected to get a 1.6-litre petrol and a 2.0-litre diesel engine and will be offered with both manual and automatic transmission options. The Tucson will be locking horns the likes of the Honda CR-V and the Skoda Yeti.

4. Toyota Fortuner

The new Fortuner is one of the most awaited upcoming SUVs in India. The Japanese automaker will replace the old Fortuner with an all new next-generation model. The SUV is based on an all-new platform that is lighter and more spacious and features a much more modern-looking exterior compared to the old Fortuner. The 2016 next-gen Fortuner gets a new 2.8-litre, direct injection, four-pot, turbocharged motor that will produce 177PS of power. It will also get a manual and an automatic gearbox option producing 420Nm and 450Nm respectively. The car is expected to be launched by late 2016. The SUV will be pitted against the likes of Ford Endeavour, Chevrolet Trailblazer, and the Honda CR-V. The price of the SUV will hover around the RS 27 to Rs 30 lakh mark, ex-showroom.

5. Skoda Kodiaq

The Kodiaq is a full-sized SUV from the Czech manufacturer. The SUV is the first 7-seater vehicle by Skoda and is based on the Vision S Concept. The India-bound Kodiaq is likely to reach our shores by August 2017. This car is built on the MQB platform and measures 4697mm in length, featuring a long wheelbase and small overhangs, which results in a spacious cabin. The Kodiaq features a large touchscreen infotainment display which is positioned on the centre console, an optional 3-zone climate control with an additional control panel for the rear occupants and a 7-seater module - 60:40 split seats for the middle row and two folding seats for the third row. Mechanically, the SUV is expected to get a 1.4-litre petrol engine which will produce 180PS of power with 250Nm of peak torque and a 2.0-litre oil burner, capable of churning out 150PS of power with 320Nm of torque. The SUV will be available with a 6-speed manual gearbox and a 6 or a 7-speed DSG transmission. While the lower variant will come with front-wheel drive, the top end variant will feature an all-wheel drive. The Kodiaq will face a stern competition from the likes of the Ford Endeavour, next-generation Toyota Fortuner, Mitsubishi Pajero Sport and the upcoming Volkswagen Tiguan.

6. Hyundai Carlino

Hyundai unveiled the Carlino compact SUV at the Auto Expo earlier this year. The Carlino, codename 'HND14', will be placed below the Creta in Hyundai's product portfolio. The Carlino is based on the Elite i20 platform and is likely to share cues with the hot-hatch. However, Hyundai remains cagey about the mechanical details of the car, but we think it could share 1.2-litre/1.3-litre engines with other offerings from the Hyundai family such as the i20 Active and Creta. Ford EcoSport and Maruti Vitara Brezza will be its direct competitors, once its launched. The Hyundais sub-4 metre compact SUV might come within the price range of Rs 7 to Rs 11 lakh (ex-showroom).

Source: Zigwheels.com
China's equivalent of Google, shows the new phone lagging both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 5.

Apple Inc fans from Sydney to Tokyo, the first to snap the new iPhone 7 off the shelves, cheered as they left stores on Friday brandishing their purchases, flanked by applauding sales staff.

But underneath the usual fanfare, and despite complaints that the larger size of the new phone and the new jet black colour were sold out, crowds were smaller than in past years.

Some 200 people were gathered in Sydney light drizzle for the privilege of being the first worldwide to hold an iPhone 7. Apple will launch in its key Asian market China later on Friday.

"It feels great to be the first in the world to have the iPhone 7. It was 100 per cent worth it," said Marcus Barsoum, a 16-year-old "diehard Apple fan" who spent two nights camped outside the Sydney store.

Weary but elated, Barsoum charged in to the store at 8 a.m. to the cheers of Apple staff. He emerged with a matte black iPhone 7 although he had wanted a 7 plus in jet black.

Dale Adams, who works at J.P. Morgan in Sydney, arrived only 15 minutes before the store opened and was able to buy a 7 Plus, having ordered it online more than a week ago.

"I'm certainly not one of the hardcore Apple fans but I think the bigger capacity, better battery, better camera, that's enough to make the jump," he said.

Chatter about the launch on Chinese microblog Weibo has been far more muted than when the iPhone 6 debuted in 2014. An index of searches on Baidu Inc, China's equivalent of Google, shows the new phone lagging both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 5.

Sales in China will be the acid test for Apple's year ahead: the mega success of the iPhone 6 in China drove sales last year, while the slower-burn 6S contributed to Apple's first global revenue drop in over a decade earlier this year.

Stores open in China later on Friday, a holiday.
New Delhi: Unfazed by the protests of bank unions, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley today said the government will go ahead with the merger of associates banks and Bharatiya Mahila Bank with SBI as the proposal has been approved at the highest level by the Union Cabinet.

"All procedure will be followed. The government has already taken decision at the level of the Cabinet to fully support the proposal for the merger," Jaitley told reporters post the meeting with public sector banks for the first quarter performance review.

Government has recently cleared the proposal to merge State Bank of India (SBI) with its five associate banks State Bank of Bikaner & Jaipur, State Bank of Travancore, State Bank of Patiala, State Bank of Hyderabad and the new Bharatiya Mahila Bank (BMB).

In August, SBI had said that all its associate banks and BMB will be merged into it that will add an additional Rs 8 lakh crore to its assets making it a banking behemoth with total assets of Rs 30 lakh crore, an increase of about 36 per cent.

In May, about 50,000 employees of the five SBI associate banks had gone on a day-long nationwide strike to protest the merger with their parent bank SBI. The union, in a protest under the banner of All India Bank Employees Association, had said: "We are protesting against the plan of SBI management to merge 5 large associate banks into it.

Besides, the Kerala Legislative Assembly had passed a resolution in July against the merger of State Bank of Travancore (SBT) with SBI, stating it would adversely affect the state's economic growth.

The resolution, introduced by Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, had asked the Centre and Reserve Bank of India to rescind the decision to amalgamate SBT with SBI. In reply to a question on dilution of stake in IDBI Bank, Jaitley said the matter is still under consideration.

"The issue is still under the consideration of the government. The decision of the government stands." Government is also facing protest from bank unions with regard to divestment of its stake in IDBI Bank.

It is planning to divest up to 49 per cent in a phased manner. As of quarter ended June 30, government shareholding in IDBI Bank stood at 73.98 per cent.
The Union government has formally notified the GST Council, which will decide on the tax rate, exempted goods and the threshold under the new taxation regime. (Representational image)

New Delhi: The Union government has formally notified the GST Council, which will decide on the tax rate, exempted goods and the threshold under the new taxation regime. The council will be chaired by the Union finance minister and have minister in charge of finance or taxation or any other Minister nominated by each state government as its member. Also Minister of State in charge of revenue or finance at the centre would be a member.

In exercise of the powers conferred by article 279A of the Constitution, the President hereby constitutes the Goods and Services Tax Council..., said a notification. Earlier this week, the Union Cabinet had approved setting up of all powerful GST Council, which is expected to thrash out a decision on all major aspects of GST roll out by November 22.

The first meeting of the GST Council will be held on September 22-23. The government is planning to introduce GST legislations in Winter session of Parliament. The legislation would mention the tax rate, exempted goods and also the threshold.
Mumbai: Vidya Balan, who just returned to India after wrapping up the US schedule of her film Kahaani 2, is down with dengue. The actress has been advised complete rest for next few days until she gets well.

According to a close source to Vidya Balan, the actress is stable and hasnt been taken to the hospital. Reportedly, Vidya Balans neighbours where BMC found three mosquito breeding grounds, will be served notices by the pesticide control department.

On work front, Vidya has two films in her kitty right now, Kahaani 2 and Begum Jaan.
10/29/2022

The second season is over for the Cleveland State Cougar Volleyball as they lost in three sets to number one seed Chattanooga State in round one of the NJCAA Region VII single elimination tournament ... more
Actor, director and choreographer Prabhudeva had a health scare last week when he was struck by temporary paralysis while shooting a song for the horror-spoof, titled Devi(L) in Tamil. Speaking in a lighter vein, Prabhu says, Other actors get injured while doing action. I got hurt while dancing! On a more serious note, Prabhu recalls, I was completely paralyzed. I dont know what happened. During one of the dance movements, I felt something give way in my back. And before I knew it, I was down on the floor.

His condition was so serious that he thought he would never walk again. Forget dancing, I thought I was not going to get up on my feet again. I was rushed immobile to the hospital by my co-star and producer, Sonu Soods friend. In the hospital, Prabhu was told he had a severe muscle pull, although a temporary condition. I was really relieved to hear that. But for five hours, I was in unbearable pain. I couldnt move at all. I was thinking about what life would be like without movement... it was scary, he confesses.

Prabhu has now taken a decision to be careful about his dance movements. Ive always been pushing the boundaries of dancing, trying out new steps and moves all the time. No style was taboo for me. Maybe now, I need to be more careful, he says. Though back on his feet, Prabhus body movements took time to become normal  I was back on the sets because we had to complete a song. But my hands wouldnt go up to where the dance steps required them to.

Prabhu says his predicament is a warning to all the actors who push themselves beyond their limits. His advice? Whether it is a fight, dance or emotional scene, please dont overdo it. Nothing is worth ones health. When I was on the floor, my life flashed through my mind. I thought of my two sons future. Thats when I decided I will be careful in the future.
The Odia girl knows Telugu, which has worked to her advantage.

This Friday saw the release of Atharillu wherein actress Athithi Das made her Tollywood debut and has been praised for her role.

Originally from Odisha, the MBA graduate wasnt too keen on films initially. One of my friends forwarded my photos to director Kalyan. He liked it and called me for an audition and I got selected, says Athithi.

After the first day of my shoot, when I saw the scene on the monitor, I was thrilled. Thats when I decided to take my film career seriously, she adds.

Athithi says that she got a good subject for her debut film. Its a horror-comedy and I play the character of an independent girl who comes to support her boyfriend. Thats when the problem starts and its about how we overcome those troubles, says Athithi about the film.

Once she signed the film, Athithi didnt sign up for any workshop or acting class. The director said he wanted natural acting and asked me not to go for any classes. With his and the teams support, I was able to pull off the role well, says the actress, who was eagerly waiting for the films release.

She has already signed a Tamil film and has got a few calls for Telugu ones as well. The actress knows the local language and that has worked to her advantage.

Athithi often gets asked if she is related to actresses Nandita Das or Shraddha Das. I get asked the same question, however I am not, she laughs.
Move over, hot legs or cleavage! A flat stomach and pronounced abs are becoming the hottest trend to sport this season. With celebrities such as Taylor Swift, Katrina Kaif and Serena Williams all showing off their ripped physique at events, in movies and otherwise, everyone is vying for the perfect washboard abs themselves. The reason behind the return of the statement abs could well be the reign of crop tops over the fashion industry. From being a staple on red carpets to trickling down to people on the streets, baring the midriff even in India is no more taboo, but a sign of a chic individual.

Model Teyana Taylor recently had an explosive entrance onto social media with her performance in Kanye Wests music video for Fade. Her prominent abs became the talk of the town with everyone saying they wanted to hit the gym just looking at her buff body! Katrina Kaif also set Twitter abuzz when she performed at the IPL opening ceremony with her toned stomach. Even Taylor Swifts ab crack (a term for the hollow line down your stomach) has been talked about, setting more impossible body standards for women to achieve.

Poorthi Pravin, a model and designer, has noticed a surge in the crop top craze in recent times  but doesnt believe abs are the only way to achieve the look. She says, Fitness only adds to the outfits we create. Of course, everybody cant be thin or fit, but that doesnt mean people cant be fashionable! Style can be altered to suit different bodies. What is of more importance to me is the comfort level. Crop tops are all the rage now, and all the models I work with do enjoy wearing them, but the trend might fade soon.

Sangeetha Gopal, a celebrity fitness trainer, believes this trend has been around for ages. A flat stomach has always been an obsession. Now that we have all the luxury, weve become lazy  but we want to be fashionable and wear crop tops or bandeaus! South Indian women, especially, are pear shaped so if we want to remain fit we must start young  in our 20s  to enjoy a sustained result. Dont just vie to fit into a top  create a body that will look good in everything For that, one needs to work out and eat right early in life.

Sahithya Jagannathan, actress and model, says this is a sign for better and fitter times, I have always wanted to be fit and toned, even before this trend came calling. I am tired of seeing jiggly tummies and flab, even in south cinema. This will lead to a fitter and stronger positive body image, instead of the skinny standards we have created. It could be because of fashion, but it will result in better health!

I got into fitness because I wanted to inspire and motivate people who came to me for counselling. The latest trend is of people getting heavily into fitness, but they are also heading to hospitals to get surgeries for toned stomachs! I always suggest that they head to the gym and work out instead of going under the knife because that may cause complications, says Sumita Hazarika who worked at Apollo and now has one of the fittest bodies in town. She adds, I sometimes do get criticised for my body, since people tend to think Indian women shouldnt be buff and flaunt abs. But I enjoy it and think its worth it.
The accused has been registered under POCSO Act. (Representational Image)

Nashik: A five-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a man at Nandur Naka locality in the city, police said on Friday.

The accused, identified as Sachin Hiraman Patil (34), a resident of Nandur Naka on Nashik-Aurangabad road, has been arrested for the crime that took place on Thursday night, police said.

According to police, the accused took the girl to a washing room near his house and sexually assaulted her. The girl's mother later approached Adgaon police station and lodged a complaint against him, on the basis of which he was

held.

"We have registered an offence against Patil under IPC sections 376 (rape), 506 (criminal intimidation) as well as under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act," inspector S D Sanap, in-charge of Adgaon police station,said.
Kochi: The Supreme Court, while convicting Govindachamy for rape of Soumya, has concluded that the prosecution was unable to prove that he alone was responsible for her fall from the train.

Extracts from the judgment:

It is the further case of the prosecution that prosecution witness (PW) 4 - Tomy Devassia and P.W. 40 - Abdul Shukkur were also traveling in the general compartment attached in front of the ladies compartment. According to the prosecution, the said witnesses heard the cries of the deceased. P.W. 4 wanted to pull the alarm chain to stop the train but he was dissuaded by a middle-aged man who was standing at the door of the compartment by saying that the girl had jumped out from the train and escaped and that in these circumstances he should not take the matter any further as the same may drag all of them to Court. However, when the train reached Shornur Railway Station within a span of 10 minutes, P.W.4 and P.W.40 rushed to P.W.34 - Joby Skariya, the guard of the train and complained about the incident which triggered a search, both, for the deceased and the accused. Eventually, the deceased was found in a badly injured condition lying by the side of the railway track and the accused was also apprehended soon.

P.W. 64 - Dr. Sherly Vasu who was then working as Professor and Head of Department of Forensic Medicine, M.C.H. Thrissur conducted the postmortem examination of the deceased with the assistance of five other doctors (who were also examined). According to P.W. 64, he had noted 24 antemortem injuries on the body of the deceased, details of which have been mentioned by him in the postmortem report. While it will not be necessary to notice the details of each of the injuries sustained/suffered by the deceased, the evidence of P.W. 64 so far as the injury Nos.1 and 2 is concerned, being vital, would require specific notice and, therefore, is extracted below: "Injury No.1 is sufficient to render her dazed and insensitive. It is capable of creating dazeness to head and rendering incapable to respond. These wounds may not be of the nature of exclusive cause of death. This injury will be caused only if the head is forcefully hit to backward and forward against a hard flat surface. Need not become total unconscious. But can do nothing. The injury described in No.1 is caused by hitting 4-5 times against a flat surface holding the hair from back with a right hand. These injuries are photographed in detail in Ext. P.70. CD. This is my independent findings. I have also checked the matters listed in the requisition from an independent evaluation what I understand is that after hitting the head on a flat and hard substance several times and rendering insensitive dropped. (Q) If hit against the wall (of train) holding hair from behind it will occur? (A) Yes. It will occur so.

The opinion of P.W. 64 ( forensic expert Dr Shirly Vasu) as to the cause of death mentioned in the postmortem report is as follows: "The decedent had died due to blunt injuries sustained to head as a result of blunt impact and fall and their complications including aspiration of blood into air passages (during unprotected unconscious state following head trauma) resulting in anoxic brain damage. She also showed injuries as a result of assault and forceful sexual intercourse. She had features of multiple organ disfunction at the time of death.

P.W.64 in his evidence had also explained that the aspiration of blood into the air passage could have been due to the victim being kept in a supine position, probably, for sexual intercourse which may have resulted in anoxic brain damage.

So far as the offence under Section 376 IPC is concerned, from a consideration of the postmortem report, D.N.A. profile and the evidence of P.W. 64 and P.W. 70, there can be no manner of doubt that it is the accused appellant who had committed the said offence. The D.N.A. profile, extracted above, clinches the issue and makes the liability of the accused explicit leaving no scope for any doubt or debate in the matter. We, therefore, will find no difficulty in confirming the conviction of the accused under Section 376 IPC. Having regard to the fact that the said offence was committed on the deceased who had already suffered extreme injuries on her body, we are of the view that not only the offence under Section 376 IPC was committed by the accused, the same was so committed in a most brutal and grotesque manner which would justify the imposition of life sentence as awarded by the learned trial Court and confirmed by the High Court.

This will bring the Court to a consideration of the culpability of the accused for the offence punishable under Section 302 IPC and if the accused is to be held so liable what would be the appropriate punishment that should be awarded to him. The evidence of P.W. 64, particularly, with reference to the injury No. 1 and 2, details of which have been extracted above, would go to show that the death of the deceased was occasioned by a combination of injury no.1 and 2, and complications arising there from including aspiration of blood into the air passages resulting in anoxic brain damage. The same, in the opinion of the doctor (P.W.64), had occurred due to the fact that the deceased was kept in a supine position for the purpose of sexual assault. In a situation where death had been certified and accepted to have occurred on account of injury Nos. 1 and 2 and aspiration of blood into the air passages on account of the position in which the deceased was kept, the first vital fact that would require consideration is whether the accused is responsible for injury No.2 which apparently was occasioned by the fall of the deceased from the running train. Before dealing with Injury No.2 we would like to observe that we are of the opinion that the liability of the accused for Injury No.1 would not require a redetermination in view of the evidence of P.W.4 and P.W.40 as to what had happened in the ladies compartment coupled with the evidence of P.W.64 and the Postmortem report.

However, so far as Injury No.2 is concerned, unless the fall from the train can be ascribed to the accused on the basis of the cogent and reliable evidence, meaning thereby, that the accused had pushed the deceased out of the train and the possibility of the deceased herself jumping out of train is ruled out, the liability of the accused for the said injury may not necessary follow. In this regard, the learned counsel for the State has referred to injury No.1 sustained by the deceased, as deposed to by P.W.64, and has contended that in view of the impaired mental reflexes that the deceased had at that point of time it may not have been possible for her to take a decision to jump out of the train. While the said proposition need not necessarily be incorrect what cannot also be ignored is the evidence of P.W. 4 and P.W. 40 in this regard which is to the effect that they were told by the middle aged man, standing at the door of the compartment, that the girl had jumped out of the train and had made good her escape.

The circumstances appearing against the accused has to be weighed against the oral evidence on record and the conclusion that would follow must necessarily be the only possible conclusion admitting of no other possibility. Such a conclusion to the exclusion of any other, in our considered view, cannot be reached in the light of the facts noted above. Keeping of the deceased in a supine position for commission of sexual assault has been deposed to by P.W. 64 as having a bearing on the cause of death of the deceased. However, to hold that the accused is liable under Section 302 IPC what is required is an intention to cause death or knowledge that the act of the accused is likely to cause death. The intention of the accused in keeping the deceased in a supine position, according to P.W. 64, was for the purposes of the sexual assault.

The requisite knowledge that in the circumstances such an act may cause death, also, cannot be attributed to the accused, inasmuch as, the evidence of P.W. 64 itself is to the effect that such knowledge and information is, in fact, parted with in the course of training of medical and para-medical staff. The fact that the deceased survived for a couple of days after the incident and eventually died in hospital would also clearly militate against any intention of the accused to cause death by the act of keeping the deceased in a supine position. Therefore, in the totality of the facts discussed above, the accused cannot be held liable for injury no.2. Similarly, in keeping the deceased in a supine position, intention to cause death or knowledge that such act may cause death, cannot be attributed to the accused. We are, accordingly, of the view that the offence under Section 302 IPC cannot be held to be made out against the accused so as to make him liable therefore. Rather, we are of the view that the acts of assault, etc. attributable to the accused would more appropriately attract the offence under Section 325 IPC. We accordingly find the accused appellant guilty of the said offence and sentence him to undergo rigorous imprisonment for seven years for commission of the same.

Consequently and in the light of the above discussions, we partially allow the appeals filed by the accused appellant. While the conviction under Section 376 IPC, Section 394 read with Section 397 IPC and Section 447 IPC and the sentences imposed for commission of the said offences are maintained, the conviction under Section 302 IPC is set aside and altered to one under Section 325 IPC. The sentence of death for commission of offence under Section 302 IPC is set aside and instead the accused is sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for seven years. All the sentences imposed shall run concurrently.
New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday set aside the death sentence imposed on the accused in the Soumya murder case but confirmed the sentence of life imprisonment for the brutal manner he raped Soumya, before she jumped out of the train resulting in her death. A three-judge Bench comprising Justices Ranjan Gogoi, Prafulla C. Pant and Uday Lalit gave this verdict on an appeal filed by death-row convict Govindachamy challenging the High Court judgment confirming the order of the Thrissur Fast Track Court awarding him death sentence for the February 6, 2011 incident. The prosecution case was that Gonvid-achamy pushed Soumya out of the compartment of the Ernakulam train after trying to rob her. He then raped the seriously injured woman, who died on Februay 6, 2011.

Justice Gogoi writing the judgment said as per the evidence of prosecution witnesses there can be no doubt that it is the accused who committed the said offence. The DNA profile clinches the issue. We, therefore, will find no difficulty in confirming the conviction of the accused for rape. Having regard to the fact that the said offence was committed on the deceased who had already suffered extreme injuries on her body, we are of the view that not only the offence under Section 376 IPC was committed by the accused, the same was so committed in a most brutal and grotesque manner which would justify the imposition of life sentence as awarded by the trial court and confirmed by the HC.

On whether the appellant had committed murder by pushing the victim from the train, the Bench said the vital fact that would require consideration is whether the accused is responsible for injury which apparently was occasioned by the fall of the deceased from the running train. However, it said so far as the injury is concerned, unless the fall from the train can be ascribed to the accused on the basis of the cogent and reliable evidence, meaning thereby, that the accused had pushed the deceased out of the train and the possibility of the deceased herself jumping out of train is ruled out, the liability of the accused for the said injury may not necessary follow.

In this regard, the Bench rejected the prosecution submission that in view of the impaired mental reflexes that the deceased had at that point of time it may not have been possible for her to take a decision to jump out of the train. The Bench referred to the evidence of a middle aged man, standing at the door of the compartment, that the girl had jumped out of the train and had made good her escape. The Bench said the circumstances appearing against the accused has to be weighed against the oral evidence on record and the conclusion that would follow must necessarily be the only possible conclusion admitting of no other possibility. Such a conclusion to the exclusion of any other, in our considered view, cannot be reached in the light of the facts noted above.

The judges said the intention of the accused in keeping the deceased in a supine position, was for the purposes of the sexual assault. The requisite knowledge that in the circumstances such an act may cause death, also, cannot be attributed to the accused. The fact that the deceased survived for a couple of days after the incident and eventually died in Hospital would also clearly militate against any intention of the accused to cause death by the act of keeping the deceased in a supine position. The Bench therefore acquitted him of the murder charge but maintained the conviction and sentence of life imprisonment for the rape committed by him.
The student said he was threatened with dire consequences if he revealed what was happening to him. (Representational Image)

Mathura: Seven students and a teacher of an engineering college in Mathura have been booked for allegedly sodomising a student in the hostel, police said.

Surya Pratap Singh, a first year student and resident of Farrukhabad district, was allegedly sodomised repeatedly in the hostel of Sanjai Engineering College.

"An FIR under relevant sections of IPC and POCSO Act has been registered against seven students and a teacher, Ayush Yadav in connection with the case," Additional SP (Rural) Arun Kumar Singh said, adding, the accused students have been suspended by college administration.

According to the FIR, Surya was threatened when he opposed to his repeated victimisation.

Rajesh Pratap Singh, the victim's father, alleged in the FIR that even the teacher asked his son to adjust when he raised the matter to him.

"The students were mixing intoxicating drugs in the food of my son and did not hesitate to inject intoxicating injections," he alleged.
Police said tight vigil was being maintained across the state, especially at the Tamil Nadu-Karnataka border. (Photo: ANI/twitter)

Chennai: A dawn-to-dusk bandh called by several farmers and traders bodies over the raging Cauvery dispute began on Friday across Tamil Nadu amid tight security with Opposition parties, including the DMK, supporting it.

DMK leader Kanimozhi, who was protesting along with other party workers over the dispute was detained by the Tamil Nadu police at around 10 am.

The bandh has been called in protest against the violence targeting people from Tamil Nadu who live in Karnataka, and also to seek Cauvery water for the state.

Those who had called for the bandh are carrying out a series of protests, including "road and rail roko". Tamil Nadu farmers' association staged a 'Rail Roko' protest at Saidapet railway station.

Thousands of police personnel have been deployed across the state to maintain law and order. Police said tight vigil was being maintained and no attempts to mar public peace or disruption of free movement of transportation -- on road or rail -- would be allowed.

More than one lakh police men have been positioned all over the state to prevent any untoward incident. (Photo: ANI/Twitter)

Several local grocery shops, which usually open by daybreak, remained shut in view of the protests. State transport corporation-run buses besides trains are being operated as usual though autos, taxis and commercial freight operators remained off the roads.

Major political parties like DMK, Congress DMDK, MDMK, PMK Tamil Maanila Congress and lorry owners, traders associations are supporting the strike in Tamil Nadu.

Normal life has been hit in most parts of the state, especially delta districts. Private schools are closed but most of the government schools will be opened today.

In Chennai, people prepared themselves by buying groceries and vegetables for Friday and many of the supermarkets were crowded. Conscious Chennaiites filled their vehicle tanks in advance as petrol bunks would remain closed. Most of the markets were crowded with women buying vegetables and flowers for worship and pooja, as the bandh day happens to be a full moon day, besides Friday.

The milk vendor associations said they would sell milk, which is listed in the essential commodity category, but extended moral support to the agitations. Pharmacists too came with a similar statement.

Traders unions who are taking part in the protest, said about 21 lakh shops throughout the state would down shutters. Besides, about 4,300 shops in Koyambedu market selling flowers, vegetables and fruits too would not function.

Tight security has been given to central government offices, railway stations and banks including Karnataka-Tamil Nadu checkpost border near Attibele.

The Supreme Court on Thursday had expressed its dismay over people taking the law into their own hands, and insisted that the state authorities take immediate preventive action.
Ahmedabad: Union Ministry of Human Resource Development has proposed to introduce reservation in teaching positions at Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) and will hold talks with the chiefs of these premier B-schools in this regard.

As part of the proposal to introduce quotas in faculty posts at IIMs, chairmen and directors of IIMs will meet at IIM Shillong on September 20 to discuss the matter, HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar said on Friday.

Javadekar said he is also reviewing the existing reservation system for faculty posts in other premier educational institutes like IITs and NITs.

"I recently held meetings of Councils of Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IIITs) in Delhi to discuss this issue," he said.

"I also plan to hold such meetings with National Institutes of Technology (NITs) and central universities. I am conducting a review of all institutes and existing system (for faculty reservation), and government rules pertaining to reservation and related provisions under Constitution."

Javadekar earlier visited IIM in Ahmedabad to interact with faculty members and students.

Currently, there is no reservation for SCs, STs and OBCs in teaching jobs at IIMs, all set up by the government. All IIMs are registered societies governed by their respective Board of Governors.

He said, a Bill, which aims to provide IIMs more autonomy in their governance and allow them to offer degree courses, is currently at "proposal" stage.

"The IIM Bill will provide more autonomy to the IIMs, and allow them to offer degree courses, which they cannot do now because of their status as a society. We will amend existing laws like we did for IITs and NITs to allow them to offer degree courses," he said.

"The new Bill is at proposal stage. It will be taken up by different ministries which will offer their recommendations. It will then go to the Cabinet, and then to Parliament," the Minister said.

"What our government intends is to allow more autonomy to the IIMs and other higher educational institutes so that they grow on the basis of their quality," he said.

Javadekar said the Modi government is working in the direction of "improving the quality of education.

"Our aim is to promote education and make it accessible to all. From KG to PG, 27 crore students are taking education. Our aim is to improve the quality of education."

The government is in dialogue with stakeholders to frame an "effective (education) policy", he said.
New Delhi: The Centre on Friday sought a detailed report from Delhi government on deaths due to dengue and chikungunya, including medical history of the deceased, in the national capital where vector-borne diseases have claimed at least 30 lives and affected nearly 3,000 people.

Earlier in the day, Health Minister J P Nadda also met Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain to discuss the situation and assured all support to the city government even as he asserted that no patient is being turned away without treatment and there is no shortage of doctors and drugs.

The Union Minister also assured support to the Haryana and Uttar Pradesh governments for tackling the vector-borne diseases.

"We have asked for a detailed report on the deaths taking place due to the vector-borne diseases in the city. Also, we have sought medical history of the deceased patients, whether they had any co-morbid conditions," Nadda said on the sidelines of a symposium held here on liver transplantation.

Chikungunya and dengue have wreaked havoc in Delhi with the death toll from the two vector-borne diseases climbing to 30 even as the number of affected people has crossed 2,800.

"Many of the patients diagnosed in Delhi are coming from NCR region and so fever clinics could also be set up there. We are resolving this matter with Haryana and other governments in the NCR.

"I have spoken to Haryana government (and UP) on this and our officers are working on it and in touch with them," he said.

Nadda said adequate numbers of fever clinics are also operating in the central government hospitals for treating the upsurge of patients.

"Have assured all support to the Delhi government and the governments of Uttar Pradesh and Haryana for tackling the rising cases of dengue and chikungunya," Nadda said.

Seven of the 12 chikungunya victims belonged to Uttar Pradesh, including two from Ghaziabad, and five from Delhi.

The Health Minister during the meeting with Jain also assured that while they have adequate strength of beds in the central government hospitals, all measures will be taken to enhance them.

"No patient is being turned away without treatment in these hospitals. There is no shortage of doctors, paramedical staff, drugs, testing kits, labs etc, for treatment of the patients," Nadda said.
Ijeoma Ike has been appointed as in-house legal counsel for the Chattanooga Housing Authority (CHA). In her role as the attorney for CHA, she provides the organization with legal advice, counsel, and representation on a variety of legal matters.

I am happy to be here in Chattanooga and look forward to helping further CHAs mission of creating a strong, sustainable, and inclusive community, said Ms. Ike. A native of Nashville, Ms. Ike graduated summa cum laude from Fisk University in 2009, receiving her bachelor of arts degree in Political Science. At Fisk University, she also became a member of Phi Beta Kappa. She received her Doctor of Jurisprudence from Mississippi College School of Law in 2012.

Prior to joining CHA, Ms. Ike was a staff attorney in the Housing Law Unit of West Tennessee Legal Services, Inc. in Jackson, Tn.

Betsy McCright, executive director of CHA, said, Were very excited to have Ijeoma Ike as the newest member of the CHA team. To have an attorney with her expertise combined with her understanding of the workings of Housing Authorities, makes her a perfect fit to meet our needs."
he two were admitted to a hospital where their condition was critical. (Photo: DC)

New Delhi: A vigilante group stripped two men and thrashed them with rods and sticks on suspicion of cow slaughter and left them for dead at Kanjhawala in Delhis periphery on Wednesday.

The police said that the attack took place despite the fact that madrasa teacher Hafiz Abdul Khalid, 25, and auto-rickshaw driver Ali Hassan, 35, had sacrificed buffaloes on Id for which they had permission from local authorities. The two were admitted to a hospital where their condition was critical. The indecent comes a year after a Muslim man was lynched on suspicion of storing and eating beef in Greater Noidas Bisada near Delhi, sparking a national debate on growing religious intolerance and vigilantism.

In the latest case, the attack took place when the two men and a 14-year-old boy were going to dump the carcasses of scarified buffaloes. This comes amid growing cases of violence against Muslims and Dalits by cow vigilantes across states that forced Prime Minister Narendra Modi in July to lash out at cow vigilantes and perpetrators of violence.

The general secretary of the madrasa, Qari Mohamma Lukman, said when the trio reached Mundka Road village, two vehicles, including a Bolero, waylaid their auto-rickshaw and thrashed the two, while the boy managed to run away and informed locals about the incident who in turn approached the police . The madrasa in Aman Vihar is close to where the attack took place. Locals said when they reached the spot, they found the two men naked with blood oozing out from their bodies.

The victims said the attackers also pulled out their beard. The victims were taken to Sanjay Gandhi Hospital with help from the police. Later, they were shifted to a private hospital.

Cow slaughter is legal only in some Indian states such as Kerala, West Bengal and most parts of the Northeast where butchers are mainly Muslims and Dalits.

India does not officially export cow meat but is one of the biggest exporters of buffalo meata trade that involves mostly Muslims. Rightwing vigilantes fear cow meat is sneaking into buffalo meat export. In the attack at Kanjhawala, the police has arrested four attackers who were identified as Raju, Devesh, Abhishiek and Navin.

They are all locals residents. We are investigating the past records of those arrested to verify if they have links to any fringe group, said a senior police official.

In October last year, a row erupted when Delhi Police entered Kerala House on a complaint that it served beef with a miffed chief minister Oommen Chandy condemning the raid as highly objectionable even as buffalo meat was taken off the state-run guesthouses menu.
New Delhi: The Supreme Court agreed to hear on Monday, a plea seeking cancellation of bail to controversial RJD leader Shahabuddin.

Earlier on Friday, senior advocate Prashant Bhushan had filed a petition in the Supreme Court for the cancellation of bail granted to gangster-turned politician Mohammad Shahabuddin, who walked out of the Bhagalpur jail last week.

Siwan native Chandrakeshwar Prasad, whose three sons were allegedly murdered by Shahabuddin, has also filed a petition in the apex court challenging the Patna High Court's order of granting bail to the RJD strongman.

Prasad said that he would also request for a CBI inquiry if need arises.

"You should either keep such a person out of Bihar or give him capital punishment. We would request the CBI too," said Prasad.

"I did not ask for 'chanda' as Shahabuddin is saying. I am just asking for government help. We are old and are surviving on medicine. We want compensation," he added.

Shahabuddin, who had been in jail for more than 10 years in connection with multiple cases, was granted bail by the Patna High Court on September 7 in connection with the murder of a man who witnessed the killing of two brothers in Siwan.

Shahabuddin's release from jail evoked widespread criticism of the grand alliance in the state with the opposition accusing the government of paving way for his release by not opposing the bail strongly in the court.

The Bharatiya Janata Party had on Thursday demanded the immediate arrest of Shahabuddin and accused the former Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) parliamentarian of being the main conspirator in the murder of journalist Rajdeo Ranjan.

Senior BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi said that sharpshooter Mohammad Kaif is one of the accused in the murder of Ranjan and is the close aide of Shahabuddin. He demanded that that the former parliamentarian should be removed from the party.

However, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has said that law will take its own course in Shahabuddin's case.

"I only want to say that law will take its own course," Kumar said when asked about Shahabuddin.

When asked about comments of some RJD leaders, including that of Shahabuddin, questioning his leadership, he said he does not pay attention to these.

Meanwhile, RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav has said that the controversy over Shahabuddin getting bail has been created by the BJP and the media and the matter should be decided only by the courts.
New Delhi: The High Court on Friday sought the Centre's reply on a plea seeking a slew of electoral reform measures, including setting aside of the six-year cap on the period of disqualification from contesting polls on being convicted and sentenced to two years or more.

A bench of Chief Justice G. Rohini and Justice Sangita Dhingra Sehgal asked the Centre to file its response within four weeks and posted the matter for hearing on December 14.

The plea claimed that the restriction of six years on the period of disqualification of a legislator was beyond the powers of the Constitution.

It sought that two sections of Representation of the People Act (RPA) be declared "void, as they restrict disqualification period up to six years only and allow convicted person to contest Parliament and state assembly elections."

The plea, filed by advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay, has also suggested implementation of electoral reforms proposed by the Election Commission and Law Commission that also favour disqualifying a lawmaker even prior to his conviction, at the stage when charges are framed against him for offences which carry a punishment of imprisonment for five or more years.

Besides, it seeks directions to the government to set minimum educational qualifications and maximum age limit for contesting candidates.

It suggests that political parties should have the responsibility to maintain proper accounts of their income and expenditure and get them annually audited by agencies specified by the Election Commission of India.

The petitioner has sought enhancement of punishment from fine or one year imprisonment to two year jail term for electoral offences like undue influence and bribery at polls and publishing a false statement in connection with an election.

The petitioner has also said in his plea that "candidates violating provisions of the Act should be disqualified and political parties putting up such a candidate should be derecognised and deregistered".

The other issues raised in the plea include proliferation of non-serious parties, process of recognition and de-recognition of political parties, as well as disclosure of assets and liabilities of parties.
Hyderabad: There will be no change in the jurisdiction of universities for the current academic year even after new districts come into being on Dasara.

Colleges will continue to be affiliated with the same university even if they move to another district and the area covered by another university.

Osmania University covers Hyderabad, Ranga Reddy and Medak districts, while Warangal and Khammam districts are under the Kakatiya University. The Telangana University jurisdiction extends to Nizamabad and Adilabad districts.

Karimnagar is with Satavahana University, Nalgonda with Mahatma Gandhi University and Mahbubnagar with Palamuru University.

After reorganisation of the 10 districts to 27, colleges affiliated with one university could move into a district that comes under the jurisdiction of another university.

All private colleges in Jangaon revenue division are under Kakatiya University. A few mandals of the division will be clubbed with Siddipet district, which comes under Osmania University, and some others will be located in the new Yadadri district which will be covered by the Mahatma Gandhi University.

All colleges in the different mandals of Jangaon revenue division will continue their affiliation with KU even after new districts are formed.

TS Council for Higher Education chairman Prof. N. Papi Reddy said there were no plans to make any immediate changes.

The set up will continue at least till this academic year is completed. The UGC has been deliberating a measure to reduce the number of colleges affiliated to each university to 100 or less. It has been in discussion for several years, but nothing concrete has emerged, he said.
New Delhi: As Nepal undergoes a political transition, India on Friday pitched for implementing the country's Constitution by accommodating aspirations of all sections and assured it of all possible support amid China's efforts to gain ground in the Himalayan nation.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi held an "extensive and productive dialogue" with his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal popularly known as Prachanda after which the two sides inked three pacts including one on India extending USD 150 million for Nepal's post earthquake reconstruction.

It is Prachanda's first visit to India after becoming Prime Minister for the second time. KP Sharma Oli quit the top post in July following fresh political turmoil due to protest of Madheshi community against the new Constitution. The two countries also decided to continue cooperation in areas of defence and security.

In a statement to media following the talks, Modi said India hoped Nepal will be successful in implementing the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating aspirations of all sections of its diverse society.

"As immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability and economic prosperity (Shanti, Sthirta aur Samrudhi) of Nepal is our shared objective," the Prime

Minister said in the presence of Prachanda.

On his part, the Nepalese Prime Minister said his country has nothing but "goodwill" for India and that destinies of both the countries are "interlinked".

The Prime Minister said India has been privileged to be Nepal's partner at "every step" of the country development journey and economic progress. "Our friendship is time-tested & unique. We share our burden during difficult times, just as we celebrate each other's achievements."

Modi said both sides have agreed to focus on "close monitoring" and time bound completion of all development projects being implemented by India in Nepal. He said speedy and successful implementation of ongoing hydropower projects will be ensured.

Showering praise on Prachanda for his efforts to bring stability to Nepal, Modi said, "I am confident that under your leadership Nepal will be successful in implementing the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating aspirations of all sections of the diverse society."

"I conveyed to Prachanda that India stands ready and prepared to strengthen the development partnership with Nepal and we will do so as per priorities of people and government of Nepal," Modi said.

About the political transformation in Nepal, Prachanda said his government was making sincere efforts in taking every section of the society onboard while implementing the provisions of the Constitution.

"I shared with Modiji that promulgation of the Constitution last year by the popularly elected Constituent assembly was a historic achievement for people of Nepal. You are aware that my government has made serious efforts to bring everyone on board as we enter the phase of implementation of the Constitution," he said.

In his remarks, Modi said security interests of Nepal and India are inter-linked and both sides agreed that "securing our societies is essential for achieving shared objectives of development and growth".

He said continued cooperation between defence and security agencies of the two countries is important to guard the "open borders" that provide opportunities for interaction to the people.

India has a close relationship with Nepal but off late, China has been trying to have some influence over Kathmandu. Oli had tried to forge a deeper cooperation with China. Nepal had signed a transport and transit treaty with China during Oli's tenure as PM.

In the talks, the Indian side clearly conveyed to Nepal that it was ready and prepared to strengthen development partnership with Nepal.

India is Nepal's biggest trade partner and both the sides also decided to further expand trade and investment.

Prachanda, who arrived here yesterday on a four-day visit, was earlier given a ceremonial welcome at the forecourt of Rashtrapati Bhavan. He is staying at the Rastrapati Bhavan as a state guest.

Nepal has been facing political crisis since the adoption of a new Constitution in September last year. Madhesis, mostly of Indian-origin, have been opposing the new statute as they fear it would marginalise them by dividing the country into seven provinces.

Nearly five-month-long Madhesi protests led to the closure of key trading points with India triggering shortage of essential supplies in the land-locked country.

The blockade of trade points with India ended in February after more than 50 people were killed in clashes with police. Nepal had blamed India for the Madhesi crisis, a charge rejected by New Delhi.

Modi said Prachanda has been a "catalytic force" of peace in Nepal saying he has personally played a role in strengthening democratic institutions. Prachanda also invited Modi and President Pranab Mukherjee to visit Nepal soon.
Buses were torched in Bengaluru during the protest against the sharing of Cauvery River water between Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. (Photo: PTI)

Bengaluru: Doctors in Karnatakas capital smuggled a desperately ill patient across state borders under cover of darkness to receive a liver transplant after police said violent protests would make a journey by ambulance too dangerous.

Police had halted traffic between Tamil Nadu and Karnataka after protesters angered by water shortages began rioting and torching vehicles.

The move forced doctors at a Karnataka hospital to come up with an alternative plan after a liver for transplant became available for their patient at a hospital in Tamil Nadu.

Arikichenin Olithselvan, a doctor at the Manipal Hospital in Karnataka, said they had to ditch their ambulance and wheel the 55-year-old man across the border before finding a local ambulance to ferry him on to the hospital where the operation would take place.

"We had to take out the patient from ambulance and put him on a wheel chair," he told AFP on Friday.

"They (police) did not want to take chance in allowing our ambulance with a serious patient cross the border."

Vehicles from both the states were stoned and burnt by protesters over the sharing of the Cauvery River water, police have not been allowing even ambulances with Karnataka number plates to drive into Tamil Nadu across the tense border.

Thousands of police officers have been deployed in Karnataka and a curfew was declared after protesters set buses and cars ablaze this week.

The protests erupted after the Supreme Court ordered Karnataka to release water from Cauvery River, which starts in drought-hit Karnataka, to ease a shortage in Tamil Nadu until later this month.

Two people have been killed in the violence in Bengaluru.

Olithselvan said the 12-hour transplant operation had gone well and the patient was recovering.
New Delhi: Union Minister Kiren Rijiju on Friday blamed internal dissent in Congress for the political turmoil in Arunachal Pradesh, where Chief Minister Pema Khandu and 42 MLAs have joined a regional outfit PPA.

Rijiju, who hails from Arunachal Pradesh, said his party BJP has no role in the latest political development in the state and the Congress MLAs were "angry with their own leadership" leading to their joining of People's Party of Arunachal Pradesh.

It is the second time this year that the Congress has been hit hard by rebellion.

"Congress MLAs including the Chief Minister in Arunachal are angry with their own central leadership. They have to wait in Delhi for 4-5 days to meet their own leaders. This has eventually led to MLAs joining a regional party. There is no more Congress government in Arunachal Pradesh," the minister told reporters in New Delhi.

The Minister of State for Home said "if the MLAs don't want to stay with Congress, what can the others do".

"The Supreme Court also reinstated the Congress government but ultimately the MLAs' decision is final. Congress tried to blame BJP unnecessarily," he said.

In a shocker for Congress, all but one of its MLAs, including the Chief Minister, on Friday joined the PPA and the party faces the prospect of losing its government.

Sources said Khandu, who two months ago became chief minister in a development that restored the Congress government, along with 42 Congress MLAs joined the PPA and virtually converted it into a PPA government.
Thane: Maharashtra minister Vishnu Sawra on Thursday faced the anger of a tribal woman whose two-year-old son died last month apparently due to severe malnutrition in Palghar district, the video of which has gone viral on social media.

The Tribal Development Minister went to meet the distraught family members, residing in a thatched house at Khoch village in Mokhada taluka, and comfort them. However, the woman, overcome by grief, vented her anger at Sawra, who is also Guardian Minister of Palghar.

"Where were you when my son died. You are coming after 15 days. We do not want to meet you," the woman was heard telling Mr Sawra in the video.

Other villagers also expressed their anger at the administration's "failure" to address the problem of malnutrition in the tribal-dominated taluka, which is not very far from Mumbai.

Asking the minister what had he done for malnourished children, the villagers alleged that they did not get any help from the government and had to "beg" for money to treat the child, who was taken to a health camp in Jawhar taluka earlier this year and then sent home.

However, later the toddler's condition worsened and he was rushed to Nashik Civil Hospital last month where he died reportedly due to severe malnutrition.

Sawra told the villagers the government is taking steps to tackle the problem of malnutrition. However, the villagers claimed that over 600 children had died in the district due to malnutrition since January last.

In the video, the minister and the villagers are seen having heated argument and Sawra left after his efforts to pacify the villagers failed.

Governor C Vidyasagar Rao held a meeting on Wednesday with Mr Sawant, Sawra and Pankaja Munde, the Women and Child Development Minister, and gave them direction to take steps to prevent death from malnutrition. After the meeting Mr Sawra decided to visit Mokhada.

On Tuesday, Health Minister Deepak Sawant had visited Mokhada taluka and met the two families who had lost their children due to malnutrition.
New Delhi: Dismissing beleaguered businessman Vijay Mallya's claim that he is unable to travel back as his passport has been suspended by the Indian authorities, the government on Thursday said any citizen can approach the nearest Indian Embassy or High Commission and apply for an Emergency Certificate to return to the country.

Underlining that the Emergency Certificate is specifically meant to provide a travel document to an Indian citizen to return to India, MEA spokesperson Vikas Swarup said this facility is available to Mr Mallya, should he wish to apply for it.

"Our position is very clear. Any Indian citizen who is outside India and who does not have a valid travel document for any reason, only has to approach the nearest Indian Embassy or High Commission and apply for an Emergency Certificate," Mr Swarup said when asked about Mr Mallya telling a Delhi court that he wants to come to India but is unable to travel back as his passport has been suspended.

Mr Mallya, who is at present in London, made the submission through his counsel before the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate in a case lodged for allegedly evading summons in connection with a FERA violation matter.



On July 9, the court had cancelled the exemption from personal appearance granted to him and had directed him to appear before it.

In his application moved through senior advocate Ramesh Gupta, Mr Mallya requested the court that sometime be given so that his appearance can be secured.

The counsel submitted the copy of an email sent by Mr Mallya, stating that his passport was suspended on April 23, 2016 without giving him any opportunity of being heard.

Enforcement Directorate (ED), however, told the court that Mr Mallya is already evading proceedings in several other cases and sought time to reply to the plea moved by him today.

The court has now put up the matter for further hearing on October 4.

In its plea against Mr Mallya filed through prosecutor NK Matta, the ED had also sought issuance of non-bailable warrant against the Chairman of the now-defunct Kingfisher Airlines to secure his presence in the ongoing trial of the case, which is at its final stage.
The Communist Party of India (Maoist) has been ranked fourth among the deadliest terror outfits, followed by Taliban, ISIS and Boko Haram. (Representational Image)

New Delhi: The Communist Party of India (Maoist), the banned outfit, is the fourth most deadly terror outfit after Taliban, the Islamic State and Boko Haram, data collected by a research centre in the United States has found.

According to reports, a total of 11,774 terror attacks took place across the world in 2015 and India was the fourth worst-affected country. However, attacks in India were relatively less lethal.

The report by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism said that as many as 791 attacks took place in India last year and Maoists were behind 43 percent of them.

At least 176 people were killed in about 343 attacks carried out by the CPI (Maoists) across the country, over half of them in Chhattisgarh (21 percent), Manipur (12 percent), Jammu and Kashmir (11 percent) and Jharkhand+ (10 percent).

The number of attacks in Chhattisgarh rose to 167 in 2015 from 76 in 2014, the data found.

The report also said that at least 862 people were kidnapped/taken hostage by terrorists and insurgent groups in India, a figure that rose three times from 305 in 2014. Of the 862 people, Maoists alone kidnapped/took hostage 707 people last year.

The data provided by the Home Ministry also showed that civilians and 802 security personnel were killed by Naxals between 2010 and 2015.

While CPI(Maoist) carried out 343 terror attacks last year, Taliban was responsible for 1,093 strikes that killed 4,512 people, the Islamic State group or ISIS was behind 931 attacks killing 6,050 people and Boko Haram was involved in 491 attacks that took 5,450 lives.

Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) stood fifth in the National Consortiums data, which showed the outfit active in Turkey carried out 238 strikes in which 287 people were killed.
green|spaces, a Chattanooga based non-profit focused on sustainable living, working and building, will host the first of seven construction tours of its NextGen Homes starting Wednesday, from 3 p.m.4 p.m. The first tour will feature Endurance Brick by General Shale.

Michael Walton, executive director of green|spaces, said, "These homes represent the next generation of residential development in Chattanooga and the Southeast. They generate as much energy as they consume, use water and materials efficiently, and protect and promote the health of the occupants all for the same price as conventional homes on the market. The tours will allow students, designers, builders and the general public to see stage by stage and learn about the innovative design methods and products."



The tours will continue every other Wednesday and will cover air sealing and insulation, Sun Windows, Mitsubishi Mini-Split HVAC, Solar and interior finishes.



We see these homes as another option for buyers in the market. The reason new construction homes today come with granite countertops and hardwood floors is because customers ask for them. This project will prove that a builder can still make a profit while producing a higher quality home and customers should ask for it said Mr. Walton.



Interested buyers can contact Grace Frank of Grace Frank Group 423-342-3759 or email grace@gracefrankgroup.co m . More about the design and tour schedule can be found at www.greenspaceschattanooga.org /nextgen .



Partners and featured products on the home include: Lyndhurst Foundation, Community Foundation of Greater Chattanooga, EPB Smart Build, Sun Windows, Schneider Electric, Tennessee Valley Federal Credit Union, Mitsubishi Electric, Tennessee Solar Solutions, VaproShield, Louisville Tile, Crossville Tile, Ceasarstone, General Shale Brick, and Lowes of Hixson.


People in Af-Pak region will now be able to tune in to All India Radio broadcast in Baluchi through multimedia webpage and mobile app launched on Friday. (Photo: PTI/Representational)

New Delhi: Balochi-speaking people in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region and other parts of the world can now tune in to All India Radio (AIR) broadcast in the language through computers and mobile phones as India's public broadcaster on Friday launched multimedia webpage and mobile app of the service.

Prasar Bharati Chairperson A. Surya Prakash, who launched the mobile app and the webpage, said the move is part of India's efforts to reach out to the neighbourhood for better people-to-people contact.

The move to launch AIR's digital platforms in Balochi came after Prime Minister Narendra Modi brought up the issue of Pakistani atrocities on the people of Balochistan and Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir (PoK) in his Independence Day speech.

India had also raised the issue of atrocities in Balochistan at the meeting of a United Nations body earlier this week.

Prasar Bharati officials said the mobile app and the webpage were just "value addition" as Balochi service of the AIR has been in existence since 1974.

"There are several languages in which services are broadcast by the AIR. Balochi is happening on Friday, it will also happen for other languages," Surya Prakash said.

"As the world's largest democracy, we have the responsibility to disseminate news and information across the world that is factual and correct," he said.

Asked if AIR's services could face obstruction in Pakistan given the prevailing situation, AIR DG F. Shehryar said the radio service is on the short-wave that cannot be blocked.

Responding to queries, Shehryar said that while AIR does not aim at countering any kind of propaganda, it will challenge falsehoods by presenting the correct information.

Shehryar said that, at present, one hour of programming in Balochi language is broadcast daily, but there is a paucity of programmers in the language and the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) has assured it of support in this regard.

Surya Prakash said AIR's Balochi service had been very popular but it was now facing competition from some other broadcasters.

"But AIR has a lot of goodwill among Balochi people, who have an emotional attachment and consider it an authentic source of information," he said.

Speaking about AIR's External Service Division (ESD), the Prasar Bharati chief said that it broadcasts in several foreign languages and around 14 of these are spoken in the neighbourhood.

Some programmers for Balochi service were also present at the event.

One of them, Maria Rakhshani, who came to India as a refugee, said that she has been working for the ESD since 2009.

The programmes are widely popular, she said, adding that apart from programmes in Balochi, Hindi films songs too find an enthusiastic audience among the Balochi-speaking people.

Shehryar said that there is a system of news gathering from the Af-Pak region and that too is a component in the one-hour capsule which is broadcast daily.
Narendra Modi talks with his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal during the signing of memorandum of understanding between two countries, in New Delhi. (Photo: AP)

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday held wide ranging talks with his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal 'Prachanda' on key issues including the political process in the Himalayan nation and ways to strengthen ties.

Prachanda, who arrived in New Delhi on Thursday on a four-day visit, was earlier given a ceremonial welcome at the forecourt of Rashtrapati Bhavan.

The two sides reviewed the full spectrum of relations during delegation level talks at Hyderabad House in New Delhi, External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup tweeted.

External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj also called on Prachanda, who was elected as premier for the second time last month, at the Rashtrapati Bhavan.

"Infusing fresh energy into a special relationship. PM @narendramodi receives Nepal PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda," Swarup tweeted, along with a picture of the leaders shaking hands.

On Thursday, the government said that Nepal's Constitution making process was an "internal issue" which the Nepalese citizens will decide and that India has never been "prescriptive".

Addressing the Nepalese diaspora at an event, Prachanda said the top focus of the new dispensation led by him was to create the "right atmosphere" before the implementation of the Constitution and pave the way for necessary amendments.

"Till the time we don't take the Tharus, Madhesis and janjatis into confidence and address their legitimate demands, the atmosphere cannot be created for implementation of the new Constitution," he had said.
Bengaluru: National Investigation Agencys court on Friday sentenced 13 members of Lashkar-e-Taiba and Harkat-ul-Jihad-E-Islami to five years imprisonment for plotting to eliminate politicians, police officials and journalists in 2012.

After the accused pleaded guilty, Special Judge for NIA cases C. Muralidhar Pai pronounced the verdict and said since they had already spent three-and-a-half years in jail, they would have to serve the remaining one-and-half years term. He also directed them to pay a total of Rs. 31,000 as fine.

The special NIA court had on Thursday completed the final hearing.

In a crackdown ahead of Republic Day in 2012, NIA had arrested the 13 men for allegedly plotting attacks in different parts of the country.

The arrests followed simultaneous searches and raids at 12 locations in six cities  Bengaluru, Tumkur, Mangaluru, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Lucknow, on January 22, with the support of local police. Circuits for detonating explosives were recovered during the searches.

NIA had recovered alleged "incriminating articles, including laptops, unaccounted cash, jihadi literature, videos and certain material for preparation of bombs from these places.

The agency had in 2012 received information that certain individuals from various cities in the country were in the process of organising themselves to commit terrorist acts in different parts of the country. Of the 13 convicts, four are from Karnataka.
Mohammad Nazir Ahmed, 66, a former Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) official and resident of HSR Layout, along with his wife Naida Khanum and three sons arrived at the farmhouse at around 12.30 am. One son- Mohammad Fateh Ahmed, 24, a student in Australia, had flown in to celebrate Bakrid with his family.

Bengaluru: In what could have resulted in a Dadri-like killing in which a man belonging to the minority community was murdered by cow vigilantes in Uttar Pradesh, Bengaluru rural police saved a Muslim family from getting lynched by activists who gathered at the family's farm house in Begehalli village, Anekal taluk on Wednesday afternoon.

The family wanted to sacrifice two bulls, a day after Bakrid and distribute the meat among the poor. They were besieged by nearly a hundred vigilantes who claimed they were gaurakshaks from a Hindu outfit. All the drama began after the family sacrificed the two bulls, until then, the so-called gaurakshaks were wandering around the farm house waiting for the sacrifice to happen, said a family member.

Mohammad Nazir Ahmed, 66, a former Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) official and resident of HSR Layout, along with his wife Naida Khanum and three sons arrived at the farmhouse at around 12.30 am. One son- Mohammad Fateh Ahmed, 24, a student in Australia, had flown in to celebrate Bakrid with his family.

Rural police save Muslim family from getting lynched by cow vigilantes

A Marwadi family residing near the farm house allegedly tipped off the vigilantes about the cow-slaughter. Sensing trouble, Nazir locked his family inside the farmhouse and headed to Bannerghatta police station. By the time I returned with a police constable, hundreds of people had already trespassed into my property, assaulted my son Fateh and vandalized the car breaking its windshield and window panes, said Nazir.

The mob allegedly warned the family members locked inside that they would burn down the farm house. By then, the constable alerted his higher-ups who rushed to the spot, said Nazir adding, I and my family members were whisked away to the station leaving my farm house at the mercy of the vigilantes, who brought a JCB, dug a pit inside the farm house and buried the two bulls that were sacrificed.

At the police station, a cow-slaughter case was registered though I showed them photographs of the two bulls we sacrificed. I even told the station house officer to exhume the carcasses of the bulls to examine if they were cows, said Nazir adding he was aware of the law.

The family members were made to sit at the police station from 2.30 pm until about 11.00 pm on Wednesday as the vigilantes had gathered outside the station and were waiting for them to come out to take their photograph and hand it over to the media.

Bannerghatta police officials stated that there was large number of vigilantes at the farm house on Wednesday and in the aftermath of the Cauvery row violence, they were short-staffed. All what we had in mind was to protect the family by bringing them to the police station, said Murali, sub-inspector, Bannerghatta police station. Nazir is now contemplating filing a police complaint against those who assaulted his son.
Prachanda, who arrived in New Delhi on Thursday on a four-day visit, was earlier given a ceremonial welcome at the forecourt of Rashtrapati Bhavan. (Photo: ANI/ Twitter)

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday held wide ranging talks with his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal 'Prachanda' on key issues including the political process in the Himalayan nation and ways to strengthen ties.

Prachanda, who arrived in New Delhi on Thursday on a four-day visit, was earlier given a ceremonial welcome at the forecourt of Rashtrapati Bhavan.

The two sides reviewed the full spectrum of relations during delegation level talks at Hyderabad House here, External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup tweeted.

External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj also called on Prachanda, who was elected as premier for the second time last month, at the Rashtrapati Bhavan.

"Infusing fresh energy into a special relationship. PM @narendramodi receives Nepal PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda," Swarup tweeted, along with a picture of the leaders shaking hands.

Yesterday, the government said that Nepal's Constitution making process was an "internal issue" which the Nepalese citizens will decide and that India has never been "prescriptive".

Addressing the Nepalese diaspora at an event, Prachanda said the top focus of the new dispensation led by him was to create the "right atmosphere" before the implementation of the Constitution and pave the way for necessary amendments.

"Till the time we don't take the Tharus, Madhesis and janjatis into confidence and address their legitimate demands, the atmosphere cannot be created for implementation of the new Constitution," he had said.
Chandigarh: Punjab Congress will launch a 37-day long intensive campaign from September 26 to reach out to people ahead of the Assembly elections early next year.

Senior vice-president of Punjab Congress Laal Singh on Thursday said the campaign called 'Congress liyao, Punjab bachao' (bring Congress to power, save Punjab) will cover all 117 constituencies of the state.

The modalities of the campaign were worked out and the programme was finalised at a meeting of senior party leaders, zonal coordinators and district presidents today.

During the campaign the party will hold 1,404 meetings, with 54 meetings every day, he said, adding the state has been divided into 13 parliamentary zones with three coordinators each.

Singh said, 13 vehicles in each parliamentary zone will make people aware about the party's messages. The vehicles will be flagged off on September 24 from Congress Bhawan by the party's state chief Amarinder Singh.

Prominent among those present at Thursday's meeting included Amarinder Singh, AICC in charge Asha Kumari, Campaign Committee chairperson Ambika Soni, AICC Secretary Harish Chaudhary, CLP leader Charanjit Singh Channi, Laal Singh and others.

Meanwhile, Panjab University Campus Students' Council (PUCSC), a students' body, on Thursday extended its support to Congress for the forthcoming state polls on the condition that if it comes to power it will fulfill financial commitments towards the University.

Amarinder assured PUCSC if Congress comes to power it will ensure that Panjab University receives the grants due to it.
The dawn-to-dusk Tamil Nadu bandh on Friday on the Cauvery issue called by associations of farmers and traders passed off peacefully. (Photo: PTI/Representational)

Chennai: The dawn-to-dusk Tamil Nadu bandh on Friday on the Cauvery issue called by associations of farmers and traders passed off peacefully even as opposition leaders, including DMK's M. K. Stalin and Kanimozhi, courted arrest while leading protest demonstrations in various parts of the state.

The day was marked by a slew of agitations, attempts to block trains and roads, by the bandh supporters, including opposition parties, across the state. Attempts to stop the Vaigai Express at Dindigul station was foiled by the police.

Hundreds of protesters were held as majority of shops and business establishments across Tamil Nadu downed their shutters in support of the bandh, police said.

They were protesting incidents of violence targeting Tamils in Karnataka and demanding a long-term solution to the vexed inter-state river water issue.

The common man was put to inconvenience as restaurants, shops and petrol pumps remained closed till 6 pm in the state.

However, the bandh did not affect functioning of state and central government offices, their undertakings, banks and PSUs though many of them witnessed thin attendance.

Also, government, state-aided and most of the private schools and colleges functioned albeit with lesser turnout.

State transport corporation run buses, trains plied as usual, though most autorickshaws, taxis, private trucks and commercial freight operators chose to go off the roads.

Cinema shows and film shootings remained suspended during the bandh period.

In Chennai, DMK Treasurer Stalin who led a rally to the Egmore Railway terminal, was detained along with hundreds of party workers when they squatted in front of the terminal attempting to launch a rail roko agitation.

He told reporters that his party would support Chief Minister Jayalalithaa if she meets Prime Minister Narendra Modi or Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah over the Cauvery issue. He also accused her of "only writing letters," over the issue.

DMK Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi, daughter of DMK supremo M Karunanidhi, staged a road roko on arterial Anna Salai here along with party cadres and they were detained.

She said the Centre cannot "keep away" from the Cauvery issue, adding efforts should have been made earlier to protect Tamil people and their properties in Karnataka.

Police, who had made elaborate security arrangements deploying thousands of personnel, including about 15,000 in Chennai, in view of the bandh, later said leaders and party workers detained for holding protests were being released.

Meanwhile, a youth who had set himself afire over the Cauvery issue on Thursday, succumbed to injuries. The activist of Naam Tamizhar Katchi had suffered over 90 per cent burns and died this morning at a hospital here.

MDMK General Secretary Vaiko and VCK chief Thirumavalavan staged protests in Tiruchirappalli and here respectively and were detained by police when they attempted to stage a rail blockade.

"We demand the Centre to constitute Cauvery Management Board," Vaiko said, adding full quantum of water should be released according to the Cauvery Tribunal's Award.

Thirumavalan condemned the large-scal e violence, targeting of vehicles and destruction of properties of Tamil people in Karnataka.

A stray incident of stone-pelting on a car showroom which was open was reported here. Police said that a probe was on in the matter.

Meanwhile, four persons were arrested on Friday for pelting stones on an office of the IOCL on Thursday, they said.

A Coimbatore report said establishments remained shut in Coimbatore, Tirupur and Nilgiris districts, affecting normal life, in response to the bandh call.

In Salem, Mettupalayam, and Pollachi areas most shops were shut.

About 20,000 small and medium scale units in and around the city and over 30,000 garment factories in the textile hub of Tirupur also extended support to the bandh and downed shutters.

Most fireworks manufacturing units too had shut down in the industrial town of Sivakasi.

In Coimbatore, senior leaders of various political parties, including DMK and MDMK and farmers associations were arrested while trying to stage rail roko near railway stations and road blockade.

In the Cauvery Delta regions of Thanjavur, and Tiruchirappalli too farmers, DMK, CPI, CPI(M), VCK and other party volunteers attempted rail blockade and staged protests.

A report from Madurai said the bandh did not affect normalcy in southern and central districts of the state though shops, theatres, hotels and private educational institutions remained shut.

Officials said no untoward incident was reported in the region. But trains were delayed at some places.

They said the impact of the bandh was more in central districts than the southern districts.

Karnataka-based mutts and business establishments were provided police security.

The bandh evoked good response in Nagapattinam and Erode districts.

A report from Puducherry, where a bandh was observed by Tamil outfits and political parties, said an effigy of Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah was burnt outside the bus terminal allegedly by some agitators while a state-run bus was stoned.

Meanwhile, Kanagavalli, wife of Tamil Nadu fuel truck driver Manivelu, who was beaten up days ago allegedly by pro-Kannada activists near Chitradurga in Karnataka, reportedly told a TV channel that the state should take efforts to safely bring him back.
The Centre had appointed a committee headed by a retired IAS officer for bifurcation of these institutions in June 2014. The committee during its term had submitted bifurcation proposals of 59 companies.

Hyderabad: In a setback to the TS government over the division of 89 common institutions listed under Schedule IX of the AP Reorganisation Act, the Centre has revived the status of AP Dairy Development Corporation located in Lalapet, Hyderabad, which had existed prior to bifurcation.

The TS government had formed its own dairy development corporation and transferred all the properties of APDDC to the entity. Following a complaint lodged by the AP government, the Centre revived the original status of APDDC and made it clear that the 89 common institutions cannot be bifurcated unilaterally.

Of these 89 institutions, 80 are in TS, mostly in Hyderabad, and nine are in AP. The TS government, which has suffered legal setbacks on 107 Schedule X institutions and has been forced to share the assets and liabilities with AP under the supervision of the Centre, is worried over the latest directive on Schedule IX institutions.

The Centre had appointed a committee headed by a retired IAS officer for bifurcation of these institutions in June 2014. The committee during its term had submitted bifurcation proposals of 59 companies.

Common institutions worth Rs 50,000 crore

Following this, the AP government had raised a few objections stating that bifurcation should not be confined to just assets and liabilities but also to employees, to which TS opposed. Due to this tussle, the Centre had failed to take any decision and the bifurcation of all institutions remained pending.

In the meantime, the TS government started setting up its own institutions and transferred their properties to the new entities, which was challenged by the AP government. The complaints lodged by the AP government with the Centre over APDDC paid off with the Centre stopping its bifurcation and restoring its original status.

Schedule IX institutions have assets of nearly Rs 50,000 crore. Most of them have expensive properties and lands in Hyderabad. For instance, AP Civil Supplies Corporation alone owns 25 acre in Miyapur which is worth hundreds of crores, said S. Vijaya Mohan, chairman, TS Public Sector Employees Association.

If these institutions are to be shared with AP, TS has to pay 52 per cent of the total worth of these assets. The employees are meanwhile claiming that the Sheela Bhide committee had recommended allotment of these institutions to a particular state based on their geographical location and are urging the TS government to exert pressure on the Centre to implement it. They say while AP is proactive with hectic lobbying at the Centre, TS is confined to the role of a spectator.
Majhi was forced to walk for miles along with his 12-year-old daughter as he had failed to get a vehicle to transport it from a government hospital in the backward district of Kalahandi where she died.

Bhubaneswar: Dana Majhi, the tribal man who carried his wifes body for over 10 kilometres on his shoulders last month due to lack of an ambulance in Odisha, has received a cheque of of Rs 8.87 lakh from Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, the King of Bahrain, who was moved by his plight.

Majhi was forced to walk for miles along with his 12-year-old daughter as he had failed to get a vehicle to transport it from a government hospital in the backward district of Kalahandi where she died. The incident had triggered widespread outrage and shock across the nation and even made it to international papers.

According to reports, the King of Bahrain sent the money for Majhi through a cheque which was received by the Bahrain Embassy in New Delhi. The Kings kind gesture came just days after the Prime Minister of Bahrain had offered financial help to Majhis family.
Bengaluru: Was the torching of 40 buses of a private travel agency in R.R. Nagar in less than 20 minutes on September 12, an organic protest against the Supreme Court order to Karnataka to release 12,000 cusecs of water to Tamil Nadu till September 20? Or was the worst incident of arson and rioting in the recent history of Bengaluru, a planned supari operation, by criminals settling scores with their rivals, to show the government in poor light?

Either way, police, who were caught napping at the unprecedented violence on Monday, want to get to the bottom of the Cauvery conspiracy, and may hand over the case to either the Central Crime Bureau (CCB) of the City police or the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) for an investigation. Bengaluru witnessed widespread arson and rioting in the name of Cauvery agitation. These could not have been spontaneous acts of anger, said an officer on condition of anonymity.

Who was behind it then? Conspiracy theorists are convinced the vandals acted at the behest of political rivals who want to lay the ground for the charge that there was a complete breakdown of law and order, and that the Congress government had lost control of the state, opening the door to the dismissal of the last Congress bastion in the south, and the possible imposition of Presidents Rule. In the run up to the Sept. 20 judgement by the Supreme Court on the Cauvery issue, CM Siddaramaiah is better prepared this time, turning the IT capital into a fortress with the deployment of quick response teams and State and central armed police forces in place.

Any violation of the SC order to maintain law and order will prove costly for the Congress-led government in Karnataka, said the officer.

Twelve inspectors to be suspended?

Following allegations that the police failed to contain the situation during Mondays violent protests, it is learnt that the city top cop is contemplating on suspending a dozen of police inspectors and police staff.

It is said that even a few ACPs would have to face the music. More than 10 inspectors from west and north divisions would be suspended by Police Commissioner N.S. Megharikh in a day or two. As the violent protests took place in those divisions, inspectors of stations would be suspended, according to reliable sources.

The Commissioner has reportedly sought report from other senior officers to know why the situation went out of hand. It is said that, he would initiate further action based on the reports. It may be recalled that DCPs of North and West divisions were shunted out following protests.
Haley Hodgson of Cleveland will compete for the title of Miss Tennessee USA 2017 on Oct. 6, 7 and 8 at Austin Peay State University in Clarksville, Tn. Ms. Hodgson is the daughter of Pam and Neil Hodgson of Cleveland.



Ms. Hodgson, a 2015 graduate of Cleveland High School, attends Cleveland State Community College where she serves as the student senate president. She is also a student ambassador and is a member of the womens softball team, as well as Phi Theta Kappa. She volunteers for ARK of Cleveland, conducts softball camps, and also volunteers for the Day of Change for the Ronald McDonald House.



Im excited about this competition because it is going to be a completely new experience for me, said Ms. Hodgson. I have never been in a pageant before so I am hoping to learn a lot and push myself to be the best that I can be.



Her sponsors for the pageant include Caldwell Paving, Glaze Supply, Elliot Tire, Town House Bakery, Village Tire, Patsys Lye Soap, Prince Heating and Air, Norman Heating and Air, AAA Heating and Air, and Simply Chic Boutique.



After CSCC, Hodgson plans to transfer to either Carson Newman or East Tennessee State University where she will major in Elementary Education.




Heavy police force has been deployed in the area in view of the incident. (Representational image)

Lucknow: Three persons were killed and 12 injured in Bijnore district on Friday when an eve-teasing incident took a communal colour and led to violent clashes. Six people have been arrested in connection with the incident.

The deceased persons are aged between 27 and 30 and five of those seriously injured have been shifted to Meerut for advanced treatment. Trouble began in Paeda locality when a girl was allegedly harassed by some youth belonging to a different community while she was on her way to school on Friday morning.

A passerby objected to this act but he was beaten up by the accused, police said. He then told some persons about the incident and soon a clash started, police said. There were reports of arson also.

According to the Circle Officer of the Bijnore City police station, when the members of the minority community protested they were fired at by the other group members which further led to stabbing and stone-pelting.

One person died on the spot and two others succumbed to the bullet injuries in the hospital. ADG (Law and Order) Daljit Chaudhary has air-dashed to Bijnore to take stock of the situation while the DGP Javeed Ahmad is closely monitoring the situation. Heavy police force has been deployed in the area in view of the incident.

A local police official said that some days ago, there was a communal clash between the Muslim and Jat groups over irrigation of fields and this has been clubbed with the eve teasing incident.

Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav has announced a compensation of Rs 20 lakh each to the kin of the deceased and Rs 5 lakh each to those injured. The Chief Minister has asked the district officials to ensure free treatment is given to the injured and make sure that law and order is maintained in the area.
HYDERABAD: Heavy rain during peak hours caused one of the worst-ever traffic gridlocks in recent times and brought the city to a standstill on Friday. Almost all main corridors and secondary roads were waterlogged and jammed for hours. With traffic remaining jammed even after 9 pm, Hyderabad police commissioner M. Mahendar Reddy ordered law and order cops to help out the traffic police .

Power supply was affected in several areas due to heavy rain. Officials said it was restored in a majority of areas by 9 pm. Deputy commissioner of police (traffic) A.V. Ranganath appealed the people not to come out unless it was an emergency. If it not essential, do not come on to the roads for two to three hours as traffic is moving very slowly on all the roads, he said.

Vehicles that were stalled in the middle of the roads as water entered their engines, or moved to a side, only added to the traffic block. Instead of going down the stormwater drains, water was seen spouting out of drainage chambers.

A pedestrian walks through water on the Punjagutta road near Nims on Friday. (Photo: DC)

The roads resembled swimming pools for almost three hours. Poor road conditions all over the city tested the patience of motorists and Metro Rail works in some corridors added to the traffic problems.

Internal roads affected too

Roads cutting through the areas of Jubilee Hills and Banjara Hills were the worst affected, followed by the Khaira-tabad-Ameerpet-Kukat-pally road, Lakdikapul, Masab Tank, Tolichowki to Lakdikapul and Punjagutta. Road numbers 1 and 12 of Banjara Hills, KBR Park rotary, Jubilee Hills checkpost and Road No. 36 of Jubilee Hills were also affected.

Almost the entire IT hub of Kondapur, Hitec City, Madhapur, the road from Gachibowli to IIIT and Miyapur were inundated too. Sardar Patel Road, Begumpet rail overbridge to Punjagutta via CMs camp office and the stretch from the KCP junction to Masab Tank, MJ Market-Nampally, Koti to Nalgonda crossroads via Chaderghat, Nimboliadda to 6 No Junction were hit too. Traffic flow on the PVNR Expressway was also affected after a minor accident took place on Friday.
Krishnaiahs confession came amidst reports that the SIT probing the case is likely to serve notices to a former minister, two legislators, including one from the Opposition, in the next couple of days for links with Nayeem.

Hyderabad: LB Nagar Telugu Desam MLA and BC leader R. Krishnaiah on Friday admitted that he knew slain gangster Nayeem since 30 years. However, he emphasised that he was never involved in any financial dealing, settlements, land grabbing or other illegal activities with Nayeem.

Mr Krishnaiahs confession came amidst reports that the SIT probing the case is likely to serve notices to a former minister, two legislators, including one from the Opposition, in the next couple of days for links with Nayeem.

Accusing the TS government of a political witch-hunt following his refusal to join the TRS, Mr Krishnaiah, who is the first MLA to admit knowing the gangster, claimed that Nayeem wanted an honest and able BC leader like him to become the Chief Minister.

I am ready to face any inquiry. Let there be a probe by CBI or sitting High Court judge or a group of respected citizens including scribes. I dont have an iota of illegal dealings with Nayeem. If it is proved, I will resign as MLA, take political sanyas and accept any punishment, he told DC.

Mr Krishnaiah disclosed that Nayeem wanted to surrender in the presence of a group of leaders, including himself. Nayeem told me two months before his encounter that there was a threat to his life and he wanted to surrender. He sought my help and of other leaders. I welcomed it. I was against his criminal activities. Nayeem had a high regard for me because I am an honest BC and political leader, he said.

To a question, the MLA said he personally met Nayeem at a function eight or nine years ago but spoke to him on phone. I am a political leader and many people call me up. Whats wrong? Nayeem cannot make me CM. People have to do it, he said.

Asked if he justified Nayeem encounter killing, he replied in the affirmative. I certainly justify police action. But there should be thorough inquiry and all the guilty should be punished, the MLA said.

He said he met Nayeem in 1986/87 in the Osmania University campus when was chairman of a JAC of students organisations and Nayeem was a radical student leader from Bhongir.

Initially, he was committed to Maoist and radical ideology, but later drifted and became a gangster. Four or five of his victims came to me when he threatened them. I spoke to him and cautioned him. He did call me up a couple of times. He called me Anna garu, he explained. The MLA added, I condemned his killing Patlolla Govardhan Reddy and Samabashivudu. In both cases, he said he was forced to do it since they planned to bump him off.
Raghu heard the children crying and pulled all five including his own three kids away from the vehicle.

Hyderabad: A 34-year-old reporter, working with a regional newspaper, was electrocuted while trying to rescue five kids at a Ganesh pandal in Mahabubnagar district on Thursday midnight. Mallepogu Raghu was at the pandal to cover the event when the mishap occurred.

The reporter from Nawabpet in Mahabubnagar was at the Ganesh pandal with his children. The organisers of the pandal set up by Ambedkar Yuvajana Sangham were making arrangement for immersion of their idol.

The activists connected the sound system to a generator attached to the tractor carrying the idol. The generator failed to work and one of the volunteers tried to connect the wires to an overhead electric cable. This caused an electrical short circuit that was felt by those on the tractor. They started shouting. Around five kids got stuck in the vehicle including Raghu's three children.

Raghu rushed to their rescue and pulled two kids out to safety first and then pulled his own children out.

In the process, unfortunately, he himself came into contact with the body of the vehicle and suffered electric shock and fell down.

He was rushed to a nearby hospital, where he died while undergoing treatment, according to Nawabpet SI Praveen Kumar.

The tractor driver and two others were on the tractor when the incident occurred. However, they were not affected by the shock because the current was not conducted to that part.

Raghu was not wearing any footwear because of which he was severely hit by the electric shock. Police registered a suspicious death case and handed over the body to his family after postmortem.

Meanwhile, Telangana state Health Minister C Laxma Reddy visited Raghu's family on Friday and paid condolences to the berieved family.
Islamabad: Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Friday said he would emphatically highlight Kashmir issue at the upcoming session of United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York.

The Prime Minister gave the assurance to the leaders of All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC) belonging to Pakistan Administrated Jammu and Kashmir chapter, at a meeting held in Muzaffarabad. PAK President Sardar Masood Khan and Prime Minister Raja Farooq Haider were also present. The PM held the meeting with Hurriyat leaders to take them onboard before proceeding to New York where he would address the world leaders at the 71st UNGA session. Pakistan will continue to extend diplomatic and political support to Kashmiris, he said.
Union minister Bandaru Dattatreya said that the party will celebrate Hyderabad Liberation Day in a big way across the state on Saturday.

Hyderabad: The BJP and other Opposition parties, besides several organisations have geared up to celebrate Hyderabad Liberation Day on Saturday.

BJP national president Amit Shah will address a huge gathering at Hanamkonda in Warangal district on the occasion which is being projected as the partys TS units launch pad for the 2019 general election bid.

Though the TS government decided not organise official celebrations to bid to avoid any misgivings amongst the minorities as done by past regimes, home minister Nayani Narasimha Reddy will unfurl the National Flag at the Telangana Bhavan.

The TS BJP has been celebrating Tiranga yatra from Independence Day onwards as advised by Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his visit to Hyderabad.

Union minister Bandaru Dattatreya said that the party will celebrate Hyderabad Liberation Day in a big way across the state on Saturday.

It is wrong on the part of the TRS to accuse us of provoking people and whipping up emotions. TRS should avoid vote bank politics. We should celebrate Liberation Day like Maharashtra, Karnataka and Goa do, he said.

Meanwhile, TPCC president N. Uttam Kumar Reddy accused Chief Minister and TRS president K. Chandrasekhar Rao of going back on Hyderabad Liberation Day celebrations after coming to power.

For political gain, he demanded then Congress government celebrate Hyderabad Liberation Day but did a U-turn after coming to power. It is proof of his rank opportunism, Mr Reddy said. The MIM has always opposed the celebrations.

Hyderabad became part of India in 1950: Historian

Deccan Heritage Trust managing trustee Muhammad Safiullah, quoting a Government of India document, said that accession of Hyderabad took place several months later and not on September 17, 1948.

A Government of India report says Hyderabad forces surrendered on September 17 to Indian forces. Accession of Hyderabad State with Indian Union took place on January 26, 1950, Mr Safiullah said.
Majhi had that said despite his all-out efforts, he could not get any help from the hospital authorities to transport the body. (Photo: TV grab)

Bhubaneswar: Dana Majhi, the tribal man who carried his wife's body for over 10 kilometres on his shoulders last month due to lack of an ambulance in Odisha, has received a cheque of of Rs 8.87 lakh from Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, the King of Bahrain, who was moved by his plight.

Majhi was forced to walk for miles along with his 12-year-old daughter as he had failed to get a vehicle to transport it from a government hospital in the backward district of Kalahandi where she died. The incident had triggered widespread outrage and shock across the nation and even made it to international papers.

According to reports, the King of Bahrain sent the money for Majhi through a cheque which was received by the Bahrain Embassy in New Delhi. The King's kind gesture came just days after the Prime Minister of Bahrain had offered financial help to Majhi's family.

Majhi's wife Amang Dei had died of tuberculosis last month at the district headquarters hospital at Bhawanipatna.

The Naveen Patnaik government had launched the 'Mahaparayana' scheme in February, which offers free transportation of bodies from government hospitals to the residences of the deceased. But Majhi said that he failed to get any assistance despite his repeated efforts to get some help from the hospital authorities.

Left with no other option, he wrapped his wife's body in cloth and started walking to his village Melghara in Rampur block which is about 60 km from Bhawanipatna.

Majhi's daughter accompanied him till some local reporters spotted the duo. They called up the District Collector and arranged for an ambulance for the remaining 50 km of his journey.
ALAPPUZHA: The facility of Tourist Visa on Arrival (T-VoA) introduced in Thiruvananthapuram airport on August 15, 2013 and later in Kochi has not made much impact on the tourism scenario in the state. The other airports in the country, however, have witnessed 347 percent growth in tourist arrivals this year over the same period in 2015 using the same facility. According to the data published by the Union Tourism Ministry, a total of 1,15,677 tourists arrived on T-VoA compared to 25,851 in the same period last year after the facility was extended to tourists from 150 countries against the earlier 43.

However, very few foreigners visit Kerala on T-VoA facility with Thiruvananthapuram airport securing just 1.33 percent share. The New Delhi international airport has topped the list fetching 46.76 percent, Mumbai 18.75 percent, Goa 11.11, Chennai 5.55, Bengaluru 5.03, Kochi 2.82, Kolkata 2.38, Amritsar 2.12, and Hyderabad 2.07. The facility was mostly used by the citizens of United Kingdom (27.74 percent), followed by USA (13.41 percent), Russia (7.04), France (6.55), Germany (5.18), China (4.49), Canada (3.89), Australia (3.79), Spain (1.99) and Ukraine (1.66).

As per the Kerala Tourism data, foreign tourist arrivals to Kerala last year were 9, 77, 479, an increase of 5.8 percent over the previous years figure of 9, 23, 366. Most of the tourists visit Kerala as part of package tour. For most foreigners, Kerala is one of several spots in their itinerary in the country. So they land in major airports and reach Kerala through road or train. However, there would be increase in the number of tourists coming on T-VoA facility in the coming years, tourism officials say. Mr Tomi Pulikattil, a houseboat operator here, said the state tourism should bring back the chartered flights which have been suspended in the state since 2013.
Patna: Playing role of a peacemaker in the wake of war of words between alliance partners JD(U) and RJD following Md Shahabuddin release from jail, Lalu Prasad on Thursday said the coalition government was not formed 'foolishly' and the unity among its partners is 'rock-solid'.



"The Grand Secular Alliance government in Bihar was formed not foolishly but after careful thinking," RJD supremo Lalu told reporters seeking to end the political furore.



He advised leaders of the constituents parties to give whatever advise they have to give within their own parties.



President of three constituent parties of the alliance should hold jointly hold press conference, he said by way of a solution to display a stronger unity among the coalition.



"There is a rock like unity in our coalition. Lets bygone be bygone. We should forget what happened in the past and work together for future," he said.



"Nitish Kumar is the leader of the coalition," he said in a bid to clear air.



Lalu's peace making bid came in the wake of war of words between RJD and JD(U) leaders after release of party strongman Mohammad Shahabuddin from jail on Saturday.



The furore was triggered by a statement of RJD vice- president Raghubansh Prasad Singh on Chief Minister Nitish Kumar while supporting Shahabuddin comment that Mr Kumar was a "circumstantial CM".



"There are lakhs and lakhs of workers in our coalition and its natural there can be some difference of opinion. We will find its solution within the platform of the party," Lalu said.



He had earlier criticised Raghubansh Prasad Singh for his "pricking remarks" time and again but had said Shahabuddin did not speak any derogatory thing.



He had also sought to play down the controversy by saying that the turmoil has been created by media.



The RJD boss attacked BJP for making a huge issue over Shahabuddin's release saying "It seems BJP does not have any agenda except Shahabuddin,"



"BJP was trying to create wedge between coalition partners with a lust for power," he said.



On release of Shahabuddin from jail after 11 years, Lalu said "Judiciary has done its work in accordance with the law and will continue to do so in future too.
Siwan: Asserting that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was squirming in its seats because of his release, former RJD MP Shahabuddin said that he was not perturbed with the Bihar Government challenging his bail in the Supreme Court, adding that he would follow the apex court's orders like any other common citizen.

Shahabuddin expressed ease at the development, saying that he does not believe anyone is truly against him.

"I am not different from any other ordinary citizen who has to follow the orders of the court and I will comply with whatever the decision is," he said.

Talking about the controversy of him being spotted with alleged sharpshooter Mohammed Kaif, who is currently embroiled in charges over the murder of journalist Rajdev Rajan, Shahabuddin defended Kaif, saying that he had done nothing wrong and that no charges against him were proven.

"Why can't I have a picture with him (Kaif)? You are calling him a shooter now because of a small disagreement he had in his locality. He works on daily wages and earns 10,000 rupees. He takes care of his entire family on that meagre sum. He does not have the time or the means to go around extorting people," the former parliamentarian stated.

Read: Bihar govt challenges Shahabuddins bail in Supreme Court

Emphasising that all charges against him are a political conspiracy, as he has been cleared by the courts in previous cases and recently was granted bail in another case, Shahabuddin added that the BJP is clearly troubled with his release.

"BJP has a problem with my release. Why is it so bothered with me? Why will a political party have a problem with my release? Clearly they are worried because they are losing their grip in Bihar," he said.

Meanwhile, succumbing to the pressure from the Opposition parties, the Nitish Kumar-led Bihar government today filed a petition in the Supreme Court, challenging the Patna High Court's order of granting bail to Shahabuddin.

Earlier, senior advocate Prashant Bhushan also filed a petition in the top court for the cancellation of bail granted to Shahabuddin, who walked out of the Bhagalpur jail last week.

Siwan native Chandrakeshwar Prasad's also filed a petition in the apex court seeking cancellation of Shahabuddin's bail.

The court will hear Prasad's plea on September 19.

Shahabuddin, who had been in jail for more than 10 years in connection with multiple cases, was granted bail by the Patna High Court on September 7 in connection with the murder of a man who witnessed the killing of two brothers in Siwan.

Shahabuddin's release from jail evoked widespread criticism of the grand alliance in the state with the opposition accusing the government of paving way for his release by not opposing the bail strongly in the court.

RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav has said that the controversy over Shahabuddin getting bail has been created by the BJP and the media and the matter should be decided only by the courts.

Shahabuddin had also downplayed the NDA's demand slapping Crime Control Act against him and put the ball in Nitish Kumar's court while asserting that if the process is initiated then it would be an administrative decision.

"I will do what I have to do. I have always been the way I want. Whatever the government wants to do...can do...what can I comment on that? The grounds for initiating CCA will be prepared and then imposed. According to me, there should not be any grounds for anything but the decision will be taken on what the government says," Shahabuddin said.

"It's not about ego or pride. I don't have any regrets because I think a lot before speaking. I might seem to be angry when I speak. If I can't smile then how can I pretend? I have always spoken the truth," he added.
Child Passenger Safety Week in Tennessee is Sept. 19-23. Ollie the Otter will be traveling to welcome centers across the state visiting motorists.

Ollie will be in Chattanooga on Friday, Sept. 23, with Callie Haskins, Middle Tennessee Ollie coordinator.

They will be installing measuring posters answering questions at two locations. They will be at the Tiftonia Welcome Center from 9:30-10:30 a.m. and then the Chattanooga Welcome Center from 1:30-2:30 p.m.
Lucknow: Locked in a turf battle with his uncle Shivpal Yadav, Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Friday laid bare his angst, saying he "felt bad" after being removed as Samajwadi Party state president and demanded that he be given a say in ticket distribution for the 2017 Assembly election.

Akhilesh said he has rejected the resignation of Shivpal and he will comply with his father and party supremo Mulayam Singh's Yadav direction to re-induct sacked Mining Minister Gayatri Prajapati, adding that "Netaji will find a solution (to the current crisis) and everyone will accept it".

The feud in the Yadav family had spilled into the open after the Chief Minister stripped Shivpal of key ministerial portfolios on September 13, hours after he was replaced with Shivpal as the party's state unit chief by Mulayam. In a dramatic development, Shivpal resigned from all party and Cabinet posts last night.

"I felt bad and you saw its effect. I'm coming here after a discussion with Netaji (Mulayam). Samajwadi Party is a family and there are no differences in the party," Akhilesh said at India TV's 'Chunav Manch' conclave here.

The Chief Minister rubbished reports that he is behind the feud in the family saying, "It's a fight for the chair. If a good person asks for the CM's post, I am ready to give it up.

Read: No division in party till I am here: Mulayam rejects Shivpals resignation

"It's election time. We should all come together and work. There is no fight between Ramgopal Yadav, Akhilesh and Shivpal."

Making it clear that he wanted a say in the distribution of tickets in the upcoming state elections, Akhilesh said, "I say I will give back everything but then I will say I should have the authority to distribute tickets. It will be my 'pariskha' (test) in elections."

Apparently attacking SP Rajya Sabha member Amar Singh for fuelling feud in the family, he said, "Everyone understands who is this outsider, even you know that. I have told Netaji that if an outsider comes between us, he will be thrown out."

"Netaji and I have decided that we will not let outsiders drive a wedge between us," he said.

"If there is some issue, Netaji will find a solution and everyone will accept it. Netaji is my father and also his (Shivpal's) brother, he will find a solution to this issue," he said.

"I have said that I take some decisions on instructions of Netaji, I take some decisions on my own," he said.

On Mulayam's announcement of taking back controversial minister Prajapati, Akhilesh said, "It is my responsibility as a son to accept Netaji's decision. I accept Netaji's decision to bring Gayatri Prajapati back into Cabinet."

On removal of Chief Secretary Deepak Singhal, the Chief Minister said, "Uncle knows why he was removed, he should tell this to people."

In reply to a question, Akhilesh said, "The one who is at the top is all alone, is always lonely."

The removal of Singhal and Prajapati was seen as a bone of contention between Shivpal and Akhilesh.

On the stalled merger of gangster-politician Mukhtar Ansari's Quami Ekta Dal with SP, he said, "We would've merged QED with SP but then media would have blamed us."

Shivpal was said to have shepherded the merger of QED with the Samajwadi Party. When Akhilesh nixed the merger, Shivpal reportedly felt that he was publicly humiliated by his nephew.

Akhilesh was adamant that the merger be called off as he wanted to maintain the clean image he had once sought to establish by opposing former MP D P Yadav in the party before the 2012 state Assembly polls.

His stand had won the party political mileage after it had lost power in 2007 over law and order which is a major poll issue this time as well.

QED, an eastern UP-based political party, is headed by former SP MP Afzal Ansari, who is elder brother of Mukhtar, now in jail in connection with the murder of a BJP MLA.

On Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi's oft repeated remark that SP's 'cycle' (its poll symbol) was punctured, Akhilesh said, "He is fooling farmers. He knows bicycles now come with tubeless tyres. People now trust us that whatever promise we make, we fulfil it."

"If Rahul Gandhi had said that Akhilesh is a good leader then I would have also said he (Rahul) is a good leader. We have also waived loans of farmers," he said.

Attacking BJP which had recent held protests over the law and order issue in the state, he said, "BJP protested at police stations, met the Governor but did not inform me. I will take prompt action if complaints reach me."
Kolkata: West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress (TMC) supremo Mamata Banerjee on Friday slammed party parliamentarian Aparupa Poddar and other party leaders for their "conduct in public life" and asked them to "mend their ways" or they would not get nominations in the next elections.

Banerjee, during TMC's decision making committee meeting, also asked party leaders to prepare themselves for the 2018 panchayat polls in the state.

The chief minister rebuked Poddar for her conduct at a toll plaza where she had reportedly slapped someone.

Banerjee clearly said she will not tolerate any such activities by public representatives as this kind of a conduct will adversely impact the image of the party.

"She also said if a public representative misbehaved with the common man, he or she will not get nominations," a senior TMC leader, who was present at the meeting, said on condition of anonymity.

Poddar is an MP from Arambagh Lok Sabha constituency in Hooghly district.

Banerjee directed the state's ministers to keep their cell phones switched on 24x7 and receive calls at "all hours". She expressed her anguish over the factional fight in Guskara Municipality in Burdwan district and gave a few days time to end it or the civic body board would be dissolved.

"Mamatadi asked the councillors and party leaders of Guskara Municipality to stop factionalism and instead, stress on developmental work. She said she would not tolerate factionalism and the party would not interfere in the developmental projects," another leader who also did not wish to be named said.

The TMC leader added that Birbhum district TMC president Anubrata Mondal has been given the responsibility to mediate and solve the problem in the next few days.
Srinagar: PDP hit out at its MP Tariq Hameed Karra, who resigned from the party as well as Lok Sabha on Thursday, saying he was the one who had advocated an alliance with the BJP, besides proposing the name of Mehbooba Mufti as the Chief Minister.

In a statement issued by the General Secretary of the party, Nazim-ud-din Bhat, after his resignation, the PDP said its alliance with BJP was not for government formation but to eliminate hostility between different regions of the state and also to remove the trust deficit between people of Kashmir and the rest of the country.

Karra quit the party, protesting against "brutal policies" of BJP at the centre and "complete surrender" of the state government before it.

Mr Bhat, a journalist-turned-politician, said it was unfortunate that Mr Karra has chosen to level unfounded allegations despite the fact that "he (Tariq Sahib) had strongly advocated alliance with BJP" and recalled that Mr Karra only had proposed the name of Ms Mufti as Leader of the Legislature Party and Chief Ministerial candidate.

When asked to react to PDP General Secretary's statement, Mr Karra said, "Nizam-ud-din Bhat is too small a fry to comment on such bigger issues. Let Mehbooba Mufti say what she has said and then I will respond."

The PDP leader also accused Mr Karra of not speaking even once in Parliament during his more than two years' tenure.

"Tariq Sahib was elected by the voters of the Srinagar Lok Sabha constituency on the mandate of the PDP to channelize their sentiments and take them to the highest forum of the democracy in the country -- the Parliament.

"But unfortunately Tariq Sahib instead choose not speak even once during his two-and-a-half years' tenure as Lok Sabha member in Parliament," he observed.

He said Mr Karra's engagement with different political parties of the country would have been more fruitful, eventful and dignified for the people of Kashmir rather than indulging into "rabble rousing at the local level".

Mr Bhat said the difference between this year's unrest and those of 2010 and 2008 is that it has remained confined to the Valley only this time while rest of the state remained peaceful.

"It is in Jammu that those who feel heat of the situation in Kashmir, be it students, patients, businessmen, are feeling dignified space," he said.
In a meeting with President Pranab Mukherjee in New Delhi, the Dharmapuri MP also demanded that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Rajnath Singh visit Bengaluru to console the affected.

Chennai: PMK leader Anbumani Ramadoss on Thursday demanded that the Karnataka and Central governments should compensate Tamils in Bengaluru affected by the violence in the wake of the Cauvery issue.

In a meeting with President Pranab Mukherjee in New Delhi, the Dharmapuri MP also demanded that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Rajnath Singh visit Bengaluru to console the affected.

Despite the Supreme Courts ban on the bandh, the communal forces in the State openly called for a bandh on September 9, which was indirectly supported by the state government.

In addition to Tamils being attacked in many places, their properties were ransacked and destroyed. In the meanwhile, the Karnataka government had approached the Supreme Court with an appeal against releasing water to Tamil Nadu sighting Law and Order situation in the State. The Supreme Court not only had condemned the Karnataka government for not abiding by the verdict, it also had ordered to ensure the safety of people living in Karnataka, Mr Anbumani said.

The Karnataka government could have actually averted the violence against Tamils instead they let the riots continue, he alleged.

Noting that The Union government is duty bound to ensure that the situation in Karnataka is brought under control and the Tamils living there feel confident about their safety, he demanded that the Prime Minister and Home Minister visit Bangalore immediately and oversee the affected areas and console the Tamils living in the city.
Itanagar: Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu on Friday said that the decision of 43 Congress MLAs to join Peoples' Party of Arunachal, the lone regional party of the state, was in the interest of the state and the people.

"It is an undeniable fact that for a resource-stressed state like Arunachal it has to depend on the Centre for all its needs. It is difficult to make things done at the Centre with political difference," he told reporters during a press conference in Itanagar.

He said the decision to join the PPA was "conscious and unanimous" as most of the MLAs expressed their views in a meeting convened this morning that to get more development funds from the Centre it was imperative to go for a change.

"Keeping in view how to bring development to the state keeping the regional flavour and sentiments of the people and their aspirations, we have decided to join the PPA," Khandu said.

He said the state as on date had inherited a cumulative deficit of about Rs. 3,700 crore out of which liabilities of about Rs. 1,200 crore had been cleared out of the resources meant for 2016-17.

Read: New govt in Arunachal an 'illegitimate child of BJP': Congress

The Congress party was in for a shock on Friday when 43 of its MLAs in the state, led by Chief Minister Pema Khandu, defected wholesale and merged with the People's Party of Arunachal, just two months after it had regained power.

Khandu, who had replaced Nabam Tuki following a dissident campaign in July, paraded 42 MLAs before Assembly Speaker Tenzing Norbu Thongdok who accepted their merger with the PPA.

The merger would be notified in the Assembly bulletin, formalising the political development that leaves Congress with governments only in Manipur, Meghalaya and Mizoram in the northeast.

The dramatic development in Arunachal Pradesh brought back memories of the famous episode involving Bhajan Lal, who was heading a Janata Party government in Haryana and defected lock, stock, and barrel with all the party MLAs to the Congress after Indira Gandhi came back to power in 1980.

Tuki was the only Congress MLA who did not join PPA, a constituent of the North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA) that was formed on May 24 in Guwahati.

Khandu, on July 16, had become the chief minister after months of political turmoil that unseated Tuki, who himself was reinstated as chief minister by the apex court only two days before.

In a House of 60, the Congress had 44 MLAs with one seat falling vacant after former chief minister Kalikho Pul committed suicide on August 9, while the BJP has 11 members including two Independents.

The status of two Congress MLAs is yet to be decided as they put in their papers before the recent series of political developments that led to first Tuki government falling in January this year, then imposition of President's rule and finally the installation of the late Kalikho Pul government on February 19 for a short span.

Pul was forced to resign in July 13 following a Supreme Court judgement. On March 3, Pul along with 29 Congress MLAs had joined the PPA.

PPA CWC chairman Kameng Ringu termed the development as a "homecoming" after a short temporary self-exile of the party.

Asked for the reasons behind the development, Deputy Chief Minister Chowna Mein said that for a resource-starved state like Arunachal, it is necessary to be with a bigger party to get more development funds from the Centre.

However, Tuki, who was out of the station, could not be contacted for his comments.

The PPA had ruled the state for a brief period from March 3 to July 13 this year under late Pul. Earlier the PPA had formed the government in 1979 when Tomo Riba was the chief minister.

Riba, who took oath on September 18, 1979, ruled the state for 46 days before being deposed on November 3, the same year.

Meanwhile, state BJP President Tapir Gao, while welcoming Khandu's move, stated that the decision should have been taken earlier.

"We are happy that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's dream of a 'Congress-mukt Bharat' is becoming a reality now," Gao said.

While blaming the Congress high command for the mess in the party, Gao said party president Sonia Gandhi and Vice President Rahul Gandhi should have taken care of this.

Asked about the possibility of PPA MLAs merging with the BJP, Gao said the party's door was open.
Lucknow: Newly-appointed Samajwadi Party (SP) Uttar Pradesh chief Shivpal Singh Yadav on Thursday resigned from the state cabinet as well as from all the posts of party held by him.

Shivpal tendered his resignation to Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav after meeting his elder brother party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav in the state capital.

Mulayam had summoned Shivpal, who is at loggerheads with Akhilesh, and held closed door meeting with him to defuse the situation.

Shivpal later met Akhilesh at his official residence, but the meeting lasted only 15 minutes.

Earlier on September 13, Akhilesh stripped Shivpal of key ministerial portfolios, hours after Mulayam replaced him with his uncle as the party's state unit chief.

Shivpal, the younger brother of Mulayam Singh Yadav, could be seen completely powerless as Akhilesh kept the PWD portfolio with himself, while Avdhesh Prasad had been given the charge of Irrigation and Flood Control department and Balram Yadav, the additional charge of Revenue and many other departments, currently being held by Shivpal thus, bringing down the number of ministries held by him from ten to just two.

Earlier in the day, party national general secretary Ramgopal had met the Chief Minister and claimed that "Akhilesh is not angry with anyone and the decision of Neta ji (Mulayam) is final in the party."

He said that "differences" had arisen due to some "misunderstanding" even as he made a veiled attack on Rajya Sabha MP Amar Singh.

Earlier, Shivpal Yadav had reportedly announced the party's first list of 142 candidates for the 2017 polls.

Disagreements between Akhilesh and his uncle have been reported on several occasions, including on the choice of official to be appointed as the state's chief secretary after Alok Ranjan's term ended, and the postponement of Qaumi Ekta Dal's merger with Samajwadi Party.
Lucknow: After his dramatic resignation from party and cabinet posts, SP leader Shivpal Yadav on Friday told his supporters that he was with party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav, whose efforts to broker peace between his warring brother and son Akhilesh have proved futile till now.



"We all have to strengthen Samajwadi Party. We are with Netaji (Mulayam). His message is an order for us. We will not let the party be weakened. In every situation, we are with Netaji," Shivpal said addressing slogan-shouting supporters outside his 7 Kalidas Marg residence here.

Read: SP feud: Shivpal Yadav resigns from all party posts, UP Cabinet

"You have to go to the party office. We have to calmly convey our views to Netaji," he told the agitated party men who had gathered in his support since Thursday night after he submitted his resignation to Mulayam as ruling Samajwadi Party's Uttar Pradesh unit head and as a minister in the cabinet of nephew Akhilesh Yadav.



Mulayam, who rushed here from Delhi last evening after the public feud between Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh and Shivpal deepened, met both the leaders separately but they were unable to reach a truce and Shivpal quit from all party and government posts.



Shivpal's wife Sarla also gave resignation from the post of District Cooperative Bank Chairperson, Etawah, and their son Aditya quit as Chairman of Pradeshik Cooperative Federation, according to sources.



However, Mulayam reportedly refused to accept the resignations, they said.



The feud had spilled into the open after the Chief Minister stripped Shivpal of key ministerial portfolios on September 13, hours after he was replaced with Shivpal as the party's state unit chief by Mulayam.



Mulayam's cousin and SP's national general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav, who is seen as backing the Chief Minister, yesterday said the leadership had committed an unintentional "mistake" by removing Akhilesh as party's UP president.



He blamed "outsiders" for the crisis, an apparent reference to Amar Singh who recently returned to the party after a number of years.

Meanwhile, a number of legislators and ministers also met Shivpal. Gayatri Prajapati, who was sacked as mining minister by Akhilesh just days earlier, went to Shivpal's residence. Assembly Speaker Mata Prasad Pandey also met the leader in an apparent bid to resolve the situation.
SP leader Shivpal Yadav along with his son Aditya Yadav (C) and Gayatri Prajapati (R), outside his residence in Lucknow on Friday. (Photo: PTI)

New Delhi: Its a battle for survival between the chacha-bhatija of Uttar Pradeshs first family. Though the party supremo, Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav made it amply clear that he is still the boss and doused the fire raging in the house of Yadavs for the time being, his brother, Shivpal Yadav and son, chief minister, Akhilesh Yadav too have made it clear that the fight for survival has only begun.

Speculations are rife that Shivpal Yadav could also bargain for the post of deputy chief minister for his son, Aditya, who also resigned on Thursday from the post of chairman of Pradeshik Cooperative Fed-eration.

In this game of throne, Akhilesh Yadav is aware that given an opportunity, his uncle, Shivpal Yadav would move in with full might to snatch power from him. Akhilesh on Friday said, the fight is not about me or with me. The fight is for the chair I am occupying.

Shivpal Yadavs ambition to be the face of the party took a hit when Mulayam Singh chose his son as his successor during the last assembly polls. To make matters worse, Akhilesh had also replaced him as the state unit chief.

Yet unlike Akhilesh, whos more active on the social media, Shivpal has been the organisation man. His hold in the organisation became evident as he flexed his muscles on Friday and virtually forced Akhilesh to step back.

Akhilesh camp is aware that unlike his uncle, the Chief Minister does not have grassroots support and this could prove costly in the long run. As long as Netaji is there, the party will remain intact, a senior party functionary said. Without Mulayam Singh Yadavs active intervention or a pro-active role, the party will split in the middle and Shivpal has the strength to launch his own outfit, an SP functionary said.

Of the 220 MLAs, over 150 are with Shivpal, the functionary pointed out. After being shunted out from his portfolios by his nephew, Shivpal realised he has to fight to survive and accepting any package offered by Akhilesh at this juncture could be a political harakiri.

He unleashed his supporters on the party and the high command buckled. The Akhilesh camp also knows as long as Shivpal Yadav remains, his ambition of being an independent Chief Minister would be there. It may be recalled that addressing party workers recently, Mulayam Singh Yadav too had said, if Shivpal leaves, party will split.
Last Sunday was the 15th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks that stunned the United States and astounded the world with its sheer audacity. It was a crisp Tuesday morning in September 2001 when four airliners commandeered by 19 hijackers crashed into the Twin Towers of New Yorks World Trade Centre, the Pentagon and a Pennsylvania field. Fifteen of the 19 were Saudi Arabian nationals owing allegiance to Al Qaeda led by Osama bin Laden. While a fog of terror enveloped the US, some claimed certain members of the Bin Laden family were allowed to fly out of the US for their own safety while commercial airspace remained closed for even Americans. Republican George W. Bush was then at the White House. A decade and a half later, reports suggest Democratic President Barack Obama may veto a bill that would allow survivors and next of kin of 9/11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia in American courts. Earlier, both Houses of the US Congress unequivocally passed the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act. If nothing else, this only validates the adage that there are no friends or enemies in realpolitik, only permanent interests, and US interests in Saudi Arabia are more than just transient.

Post 9/11, the US response was swift and severe. Afghanistan, already hovering on the fringes of the Middle Ages under brutal Taliban rule, was pulverised back into the Paleolithic Age. Pakistan, Talibans main sponsor, made a quick but superfluous U-turn, becoming a frontline US ally against the very Frankenstein it had spawned in Afghanistan, with one-eyed Mullah Omar and his cohorts. This, too, only after Richard Armitage threatened to bomb Pakistan back into the Stone Age. Saddam Hussein and Iraq fell next to the US juggernaut, even though he had nothing to do with 9/11. The alleged weapons of mass destruction, the smoking gun that launched the Second Gulf War, were an invented yarn. Its quite another matter that he and his venal regime deserved to be ousted, but thats another story. The Arab Spring followed. By late February 2012, monarchs and potentates were ejected from office in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen, mass insurrections had exploded in Bahrain and Syria, massive protests erupted in Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, Sudan and minor demonstrations began in Mauritania, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Djibouti, Western Sahara and the Palestinian territories.

Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali fled to Saudi Arabia on January 14, 2011, after the Tunisian Revolution protests. In Egypt, President Hosni Mubarak resigned on February 11, 2011 after 18 days of huge rallies and a sit-in at Cairos Tahrir Square that ended his 30-year rule. Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi was toppled on August 23, 2011, after the National Transitional Council took control of Bab al-Azizia. He was lynched to death on October 20, 2011, in Sirte, his hometown, as his rivals took control of the city. Yemens President Ali Abdullah Saleh signed the GCC power transfer deal in which a presidential election was held, leading to his successor Abd al-Rab Mansur al-Hadi formally replacing him as President on February 27, 2012, in exchange for immunity from prosecution. However, has anything really changed in the intervening years? Has the world become a safer place after the post-9/11 domino chain of events? The answer is no. In fact, its now a much more dangerous place with ISIS and other non-state actors gaining clout. By the middle of 2015, Europe was besieged. Millions were on the march. They were fleeing to its shores, escaping the depravity of civil wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, southeast Turkey, Yemen, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and northeast Nigeria.

Syria and Libya have almost ceased to exist as the nation states cartography comprehends them as. Half of the 23 million Syrians have become homeless and are seeking refuge. ISIS has rendered another three million-odd Iraqis refugees. Another million and a half have been displaced in Southern Sudan. The multitudes still continue to cross the sea separating West Asia and Africa from Europe in leaky little boats, risking their lives, for their choice is between the devil back home and the deep blue sea they must navigate to reach safety. Americas endeavour to reorder the geography of West Asia, frozen by the Sykes-Picot agreement after the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire, has failed. It has unleashed such tectonic forces of ethnicity, discontent and hate-fuelled narratives of historic injustices that the entire region from the Hindukush to the Straits of Bosporus and beyond into Arab North Africa is roiling in turmoil.

The fact that the US invasion of Iraq was planned long before 9/11 is now no secret and is extensively documented. The Project for a New American Century  a think tank that included key members of the subsequent Bush administration  had written a letter to President Bill Clinton as early as January 26, 1998, urging regime change in Iraq. Though Mr Obama came to office trying to make a distinction between the bad war (Iraq) and the good war (Afghanistan), he wasnt averse to holding off action against ISIS long enough to build pressure for the ouster of Iraqi PM Nouri Kamal al-Maliki. What is also missed in the bewildering array of intrigue that runs concurrent to violence are the larger implications of Russias intervention in Syria. Perhaps, after the disastrous Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, this is the first time Russia has ventured beyond its near abroad. With Istanbul now cosying up to Moscow, the dynamics are fast changing for Turkey, despite it being the eastern anchor of the Nato alliance. It was never included in the European Union as it was a secular Muslim state moving towards Islamism, that made the EUs core quite uneasy.

While Europe has been able to reconcile the wars between Christian states from Westphalia till the Second World War, they found it subliminally harder to surmount the clash of cultures and civilisations as underscored by the siege of the imperial city of Vienna, seat of the Hapsburg dynasty, by the Ottoman Turks in 1683 and their earlier depredations in Europe. Among all these strands of history enmeshed in modern huggermugger, India would do well to wait and watch rather than walk headlong into paradigms like the US-Afghanistan-India trilateral and the other foundational agreements this government is rushing into. All these agreements were on the backburner for good reasons. With an election in the US less than two months away, the former First Lady-turned-Senator from New York-turned secretary of state and now Democratic candidate may want to reassess the corrosive US legacy in the region over the past decade and a half to reset priorities. If it is Donald Trump in the White House, a large part of the world may want to kiss their posterior goodbye...
Indias relations with global firms are getting increasingly clouded by distrust as officials keep making more unreasonable demands. Top global smartphone makers like Apple and Google are unlikely to respond kindly to Indias request (or demand?) to modify their operating systems and devices to allow Aadhaar authentication securely. Smartphones are the absolute future for India as a basic device that a majority of its billion-plus mobile users will own soon as prices steadily fall. What the government is trying to do is further its aims in Aadhaar by getting its citizens identity established by global entities, which obviously dont see eye to eye with India in matters such as breaching individuals privacy. Indias Aadhaar, with 90 per cent adults already compliant, set up an efficient methodology to establish the identity of a population exceeding 1.25 billion, and not just to weed out duplication in government subsidies like the public distribution system of essentials and LPG. There is also concern over intrusions into the privacy of individuals in gathering biometric data for Aadhaar, though its really criminals who have more to fear.

Where official India is going wrong is equating every Indian with the small percentage who are ripping off subsidies. The request to global firms to help India do its job is part of the process of establishing control over erring citizens. Such distrust was evident in frequent government moves to request taking down social media posts considered offensive, inflammatory or incendiary, but too many of them were aimed at criticism or lampooning of politicians rather than security and communal issues. Given such a background of official India trying to control access to databanks by urging global players like Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp to set up servers on Indian soil, the reluctance of global players to any such initiative is understandable. Apple built its own ecosystem, and close rival Google, which powers Android phones, has built a revenue model based on hardware safe zones they offer their clientele.

Some who make devices in India like Samsung, Lenovo and Micromax may oblige for market reasons, but this must be weighed against security risks. The Aadhaar database has a huge amount of sensitive data about which UIDAI must be extremely cautious. To allow access to metadata of personal information to mobile phone makers, operating system vendors and even ISPs entails a huge security risk. To allow organic growth of Aadhaar as the definitive Indian identity system would be the wiser course and our domestic banking systems and mobile phone sellers can build their own secure systems. The global players will fall in line with Aadhaar when market forces become persuasive. The larger question is to ensure the security of a precious database.
With a mission to earn as many points as possible, the GPS seventh graders and their advisors engaged in the annual Downtown Adventure Day on Friday. Teams earned one point for each location visited around downtown Chattanooga, locations they had to determine based on puzzle questions. The experience was similar to a scavenger hunt of their hometown.

The girls took photos of themselves at the locations, completed the mandatory tasks assigned, and used the free Downtown Shuttle to visit the locations in whatever order their advisory determined. The free Downtown Shuttle was filled with GPS Bruisers as they hurried from place to place.

Among the places visited were the Hamilton County Courthouse and nearby statues, the second floor of the Bicentennial Library for fun activities, the Doubletree Hotel for the hotels signature chocolate-chip cookies, and the new Passageway Alley Installations (notice the blocks forming GPS in the photo). At the Bluff View Art District, one advisory had their photo taken with GPS alum Angie Culpepper Supan 92 who manages the River Gallery.

A clue to the Hot Chocolatier said, This Chattanooga business infuses Spanish and French history. It sells a product that was introduced to Europe by Spain in the 16th century following conquests in the Americas. This delicacy - which was primarily consumed as a drink - was then later presented to Anne of Austria as a gift from her 14-year old husband-to-be, King Louis XIII of France in the year 1615.

Another task asked that the students interview three people on the street and get permission to video their responses to the question, What do you think are the two most pressing issues in the community?

It was a full day of GPS teams using creative thinking, teamwork and cameras to document their scavenger hunt on Downtown Adventure Day.
The Supreme Court showed a fine sense of discernment in making it plain recently that Hurriyat Conference leaders in the Kashmir Valley arent terrorists. Firmly refusing to entertain a petition on Wednesday that official funds not be spent on Kashmiri separatists and terrorists, the court clarified the expression terrorist for Huriyat leaders was that of the petitioner, not of the government. The Hurriyat leaders havent accepted the Indian Constitution, dont contest elections, and this raises valid questions on their legitimacy and acceptability by the people of Kashmir, whom they claim to represent. Some seek an independent Kashmir, and some of them want the merger of Kashmir with Pakistan.

This makes them separatists, and places them at odds with us. But by no stretch of the imagination can the Hurriyat leaders be called terrorists, no matter how objectionable many Indians, including Kashmiris, may find their actions and words. Some Hurriyat leaders and their political ancestors were linked with mainstream political parties, and some were bomb-throwers. But as the Supreme Court has noted, no Hurriyat leader has been booked for terrorism-related offences. That makes the petitioners observations wholly misplaced. India is a capacious democracy which allows for free expression of political opinion of every kind. But its Constitution draws the line at violence in support of any cause, political or social. This applies to the Hurriyat too, and they know it. The State does keep an eye on their activities, specially since Kashmir is on the border. But terrorism is something else.
Sometimes parts can stand in for the whole

Think of the universal Shivlingam

When I think for whom the bells toll

I dont think of Hemingway or Donne or death

I think of the quasi-hunchbacks who ring em

From The Boogoo Fables

by Bachchoo

British law has finally caught up with hate preacher Anjem Choudary. He has been jailed for five and a half years and he will, say the prison authorities, be kept in virtual isolation so as not to pervert other prisoners  murderers, rapists, child-molesters, fraudsters or thieves  with his radical Islamist doctrine. Anjem, a lawyer, who didnt trade in the law but lived off the British taxpayer for the last 10 years by receiving welfare benefits, was jailed for supporting the Death Cult (DC) which calls itself ISIS and materially assisting British citizens to journey to Syria and join what he calls the jihad. Anjem will now, for the next few years, still be living off the British taxpayer in one of Her Majestys punitive facilities at a much higher rate per week than when he and his family were living off welfare benefits. His family will, of course, as is only just, continue to draw social security and mortgage payments  as they and everyone in Britain is entitled to when they are out of work. The last minister for these payments, Ian Duncan Smith, renamed them job-seekers allowance.

Anjem himself, with his unerring sense of humour, mischief and loyalty to his cause, renamed it jihad-seekers allowance. Now he is receiving what may be called jail-seekers allowance. However, keeping Anjem in a secure prison for five-and-a-half years will cost the British taxpayer upwards of a quarter of a million pounds. Is this money well spent? I think the British government has got itself into a paradoxical twist here. It spends a few million pounds a year on various projects called, prevent, prepone and pretend (Okay, I made the last two names up!) dedicated to bringing those influenced by Islamist propaganda or those in contact with Internet advocates of the death cult, back to sanity. The people who run the prevent courses report a varied and mostly disappointing degree of success. These efforts and schemes are seen by several experts in the field of de-radicalisation as too little too late. Is there not a case for releasing Anjem from prison, equipping him with loudspeaker systems and soap-boxes, giving him free access to the Internet and Twitter and letting him do what he does avidly?

He will advocate immediate travel to Syria to join the DC. Several radicalised jihadis will step forward and volunteer. Does Britain really want to keep them from their lifes mission and thwart their attempts to join the war in West Asia and seek martyrdom and the promised number of virgins or, in the case of women, 72 studs or if they prefer some fancy handbags and maybe designer shoes and niqabs? If the ambitions of these radicalised people are stifled, might they not turn bitter and try a bit of their interpretation of jihad right here by beheading cartoonists or old ladies or letting off machine-guns in a mall? Quite likely, you might think. How much more logical, and finally beneficial to the country, to use the half million being spent on Anjem and his idiot accomplice who was jailed with him for as long for the same offence, to buy the jihadis one-way tickets to Syria? Considering that it may be difficult to land in one or other Syrian city, I have enquired into the cost of one-way flights to Turkey and adjoining countries. A one-way ticket can cost as little as 50 if you choose the right day.

At that rate, Britain can buy 10,000 would-be jihadis a flight to join the DC from the money they are wastefully spending on Anjem and his stooge. If one scraps one of the prevent-type identify-the-groomee schemes and puts the money into freer one-way travel to the DC, the country could be rid of perhaps several tens of thousands more. This is not to say, and heres my firm denial of any such thought, that there are 50,000 potential British jihadis waiting to get to Syria and martyrdom. So far, a total of a thousand and a few more have been identified as Brits fighting for the DC or making babies for one of their cultists. The numbers dont matter. The principle remains the same. Let Anjem, on an electronic leash perhaps, out of jail, where his proven talent for recruiting would-be terrorists to leave the country can rid us of this unwanted infection in the body politic. If the departees are, as Anjem was, on jihad-seekers allowance, the savings on their welfare handouts will within a week pay for the free ticket the state gives them. The state can even chuck in a final fish-and-chips meal as a sort of last British supper.

Ah, you ask, what if they want to return and create havoc in Luton or Tower Hamlets? Under international law, the country whose passport they hold has to let them in. One of the ways of preventing their return is to get Anjem and his DC associates to start a burn your passport movement in Syria and get the home office to destroy all trace of their citizenship. Anjem and a small squad of persuaders could even be deployed at airports to convince the disillusioned or terror-trained, revengeful returnees that the death cult caliphate is the only way to achieving paradise and that blowing themselves up in a suicide bombing in Oxford Street is not as clear a primrose path. I am confident Anjem can do this as I have read online the rants  I mean philosophical expositions  of his associated Islamist murder-advocates. They actually classify what awaits you in paradise according to the type of jihad youve practised and the nature and method of your martyrdom.
China has launched its second space station in a sign of the growing sophistication of its military-backed program that intends to send a mission to Mars in the coming years.

The Tiangong 2 was carried into space on September 15 night atop a Long March 7 rocket from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on the edge of the Gobi Desert in northern China.

Plans call for the launch next month of the Shenzhou 11 spaceship with two astronauts to dock with the station and remain on board for a month. The station, whose name means "Heavenly Palace," is considered a stepping stone to a mission to Mars by the end of the decade.

The Tiangong 2 module will be used for "testing systems and processes for mid-term space stays and refueling," and will house experiments in medicine and various space-related technologies.

China's first space station, Tiangong 1, was launched in September 2011 and officially went out of service earlier this year after having docked with three visiting spacecraft.

China conducted its first crewed space mission in 2003, becoming only the third country after Russia and the US to do so, and has since staged a spacewalk and landed its Yutu rover on the moon. Administrators suggest a manned landing on the moon may also be in the program's future.

China was prevented from participating in the International Space Station, mainly due to US concerns over the security risks of involving the increasingly assertive Chinese military in the multinational effort.

A source of enormous national pride, China's space program plans a total of 20 missions this year at a time when the US and other countries' programs are seeking new roles.

China is also developing the Long March 5 heavier-lift rocket needed to launch other components of the Tiangong 2 and other massive payloads.

China plans to land a rover on Mars by 2020, attempting to recreate the success of the US Viking 1 mission that landed a rover on the planet four decades ago.

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The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Department of Science and Technology (DST) and Centre for Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences are some of the key players of the initiative.

New Delhi: On the eve of Ozone Day, the Environment Ministry launched a major research and development initiative to develop long-term technology to mitigate the impact of refrigerant gases on the ozone layer.

"The Ministry today announced a sustainable refrigerant technologies as alternatives to HFCs. This R&D initiative brings together government, research institutes, industry and collaborative R&D programme... To develop long term technology solutions to mitigate impact of currently-used refrigerant gases on the ozone layer and climate. With this initiative, India reaffirms its commitment to working with all other countries to safeguard the Earth's natural ecosystem," an official statement said.

The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Department of Science and Technology (DST) and Centre for Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences are some of the key players of the initiative. India has a small carbon footprint at citizen level and its sustainable lifestyle results in low contribution of the country to overall emissions of greenhouse gases and ozone depleting substances, as compared with other developed nations.

However, there is an urgent need for developing new technologies indigenously as alternatives available today are patented apart from being expensive. "A research-based programme to look for cost effective alternatives to the currently used refrigerant gases is essential. The initiative is a significant step forward in line with India's national focus on research, innovation and technology development and Mission Innovation," it said.

The Ministry's research initiative will be led by the CSIR's Indian Institute of Chemical Technology, Hyderabad. The Ministry along with DST and CSIR has decided to create a corpus fund for this research programme, with industry also committing to contribute to the effort. "The collaboration of research institutes as well as industry will create larger ecosystem for developing sustainable solutions, and eventually deploying low global warming potential - GWP HFCs on a national scale.

By establishing an effective collaboration between all important stakeholders, the initiative is focused on prioritising areas of research in new refrigerant technologies and natural refrigerants. "This will help the country leapfrog from the current technology high GWP HydroFluoroCarbons or HFCs to technologies with lower climate impact," the statement added. The proposed initiative is also an important step in the direction of enabling the country achieve national development goals, while continuing to maintain a sustainable environmental footprint.

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After the closing of the agreement, Samsung has agreed to make a $100 million to $300 million equity investment in HP through open market purchases.

HP Inc. announced on their blog on 12th September that they have had a definitive agreement to acquire Samsung Electronics printer business in a deal valued at $1.05 billion. This is the largest print acquisition in HPs history. With the total available market (TAM) of hardcopy peripherals shrinking, this sure will help strengthen HPs position in the market of printer business by increasing their share in the same.

Over years, Samsung has progressively built a formidable portfolio of A3 MFPs that deliver performance on point, especially in terms of power, reliability and easy accessibility. Their printer business also includes intellectual property portfolio of more than 6,500 printing patents and a workforce of nearly 1,300 researchers and engineers who hold advanced expertise in laser printer technology, imaging electronics and printer supplies to support continued innovation in print market solutions. This integration will allow HPs next generation PageWide technologies to create a breakthrough portfolio of printing solutions with the industrys best device, document and data security.

When we became a separate company just 10 months ago, it enabled us to become nimble and focus on accelerating growth and reinventing industries, said Dion Weisler, president and CEO of HP. We are doing this with 3D printing and the disruption of the $12 trillion traditional manufacturing industry, and now we are going after the $55 billion copier space. The acquisition of Samsungs printer business allows us to deliver print innovation and create entirely new business opportunities with far better efficiency, security, and economics for customers.

The acquisition is expected to be accretive in the first full year following closing, with cost synergies and a strong financial model. The transaction is expected to close within 12 months pending regulatory review and other customary closing conditions. After closing, Samsung has agreed to make a $100 million to $300 million equity investment in HP through open market purchases, as per HPs blog.

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In India, 'Samsung Smart Class program is helping over 200,000 students from low income families to experience e-learning at 376 Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya schools.

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. Vice Chairman Mr Jay Y. Lee today met Indias Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi in New Delhi and reiterated Samsungs long-term commitment to the people of India as a strategic partner.

Vice Chairman Lee apprised the Honble Prime Minister of Samsungs business operations and citizenship activities in the country. He explained how Samsung is actively partnering Prime Minister Modis Make in India and Digital India initiatives, with a commitment to growing India as an important production base and central R&D hub, as Samsung continues to view India as an important strategic partner.

He said Samsungs ultimate goal is to be not just a foreign investor but a true local business in India, where Samsung will work with local communities to build a better future. Besides Make in India, Samsung is also committed to Make for India, an initiative to create meaningful local innovations for the Indian consumers.

In India, 'Samsung Smart Class program is helping over 200,000 students from low income families to experience e-learning at 376 Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya schools. In addition, 18 Samsung Technical Schools are imparting skills to youth to enable their employability.

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Apple has already pushed its consumer into a wireless world by eliminating the standard headphone jack in its latest iPhones.

Apple is reportedly working on a new wireless technology in partnership with a technology company Energous to put wireless charging on its upcoming iPhones.

According to the reports, Apple is seeking to employ Energous WattUp technology in its upcoming iPhones, which would help charging the devices from a distance.

Wireless is the future, Apple CEO Tim Cook once said in an event. Though, Apple has not confirmed the reports yet, Energous in a statement to EE Times claimed that it had developed an agreement with one of the top five consumers electronics companies.

DTR Analysts Louis Basenese believes that out of technology companies like Apple, Samsung, HP, Microsoft, and Hitachi, Apple is the only company who meets all the criteria necessary to be the partner in question, reported Venture Beat.

However, this not the first time when Apple has been rumoured to work on wireless charging technology.

In 2010, Apple filed a patent application outlining a technique in which iMac personal computer could be used as a hub for wireless recharging at a distance of about 1 meter using a technique called near-field magnetic resonance.

According to recent rumours, Apple is working to extend the range of wireless charging, as WattUp transmitters can charge device located up to 15 feet away.

Apple has already pushed its consumer into a wireless world by eliminating the standard headphone jack in its latest iPhones and new AirPodswireless earbuds which works on Bluetooth. And now its future products will show to how longer Apple would be able to bet to create a wireless world.

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Neighbouring Uganda hosts the highest number of refugees, and 20,000 have arrived in the past week due to clashes in southern South Sudan. (Photo: AP)

Awell: More than one million refugees have fled South Sudan's ongoing civil war, overwhelming aid agencies and creating one of the world's worst humanitarian disasters.

The United Nations said on Friday that South Sudan joins Syria, Afghanistan, and Somalia as countries that have produced over one million refugees.

South Sudan gained independence from Sudan in 2011, but civil war erupted two years later and tens of thousands have been killed. New fighting in July in the capital, Juba, created a surge of more than 185,000 refugees. Most people fleeing are women and children.

Neighbouring Uganda hosts the highest number of refugees, and 20,000 have arrived in the past week due to clashes in southern South Sudan. Ethiopia, Kenya, Sudan, Congo and Central African Republic also have received tens of thousands of people fleeing. The UN praised the countries, some of the world's poorest, for allowing refugees to enter.

"Many refugees arrive exhausted after days walking in the bush and going without food or water," said Leo Dobbs, a spokesman for the U.N. refugee agency. "Many women and girls said they were sexually assaulted during their flight."

Another 1.6 million people are displaced inside South Sudan.

The fighting that erupted in July between supporters of President Salva Kiir and then-Vice President Riek Machar "has shattered hopes for a real breakthrough and triggered new waves of displacement and suffering," Dobbs said.

A peace deal reached a year ago under international pressure continues to be violated. Machar fled the country during the July chaos.

South Sudan's government has been threatened by the U.N. Security Council with an arms embargo if it does not accept a plan to deploy an additional 4,000 peacekeepers from regional countries with the aim of protecting civilians. The government has called the plan a violation of its sovereignty.
The former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor leaked thousands of classified US documents in 2013 revealing the vast US surveillance put in place after the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Washington: Edward Snowden was a disgruntled employee and not a principled whistleblower, according to a report from Congress released Thursday, which comes amid mounting pressure for a presidential pardon.

The former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor leaked thousands of classified US documents in 2013 revealing the vast US surveillance put in place after the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Several prominent human rights groups have launched a campaign to convince President Barack Obama to pardon Snowden, who is living in exile in Russia.

The whistleblower is also the subject of an Oliver Stone movie set for release Friday in the United States.

But according to a summary of the two-year report prepared by the House Intelligence Committee, Snowden was a disgruntled employee who had frequent conflicts with his managers and was reprimanded just two weeks before he began illegally downloading classified documents.

The report also finds that Snowden did not voice such concerns to any oversight officials at the NSA, and he should not be considered a whistleblower protected under law.

Although the 36-page report is classified, officials released a shorter, unclassified version.

Snowden doctored his performance evaluations and obtained new positions at NSA by exaggerating his resume and stealing the answers to an employment test, the report said, adding that he took advantage of its access as network administrator to search hard drives on his colleagues computers.

Edward Snowden is no hero -- hes a traitor who willfully betrayed his colleagues and his country, committee chairman Devin Nunes said.

Snowden put US service members and the American people at risk, he added.

NSA and Cybersecurity Subcommittee chairman Lynn Westmoreland said Snowden did more damage to US national security than any other individual in our nations history.

Snowden reacts on Twitter

Reacting on Twitter, Snowden addressed several specific allegations in the report before categorically dismissing the document.

Bottom line: after two years of investigation, the American people deserve better, he wrote. This report diminishes the committee.

Congress spent two years writing a report to discourage you from going to see this film, he tweeted later, referring to the Oliver Stone movie. It opens tomorrow.

Following Snowdens revelations, widespread outrage prompted Congress to adopt measures in June 2015 to regulate the NSAs collection of Americans phone call metadata.

However, White House press secretary Josh Earnest dismissed pressure for a pardon on Wednesday, saying Snowden would enjoy legal due process at a trial in the United States, where he faces up to 30 years in prison for espionage and theft of state secrets.

His conduct put American lives at risk and it risked American national security, he told reporters. And thats why the policy of the Obama administration is that Mr Snowden should return to the United States and face the very serious charges that hes facing.
Jesse Morton says hes now a different man, countering in Washington the very same ideology that brought him in the shadow of al-Qaeda. (Photo: AFP)

Washington: He urged extremists to kill in the name of Allah. But Jesse Morton says hes now a different man, countering in Washington the very same ideology that brought him in the shadow of al-Qaeda.

A Pennsylvania native who got out of prison just a year and a half ago and now conducts research at George Washington University, Morton had a rough childhood.

His mother beat him, and no one else cared for him. He lost trust in society. He left home at the age of 16, lived on the street and sold drugs.

I had no sense of belonging or American identity, I was seeking something, anything, said Morton, 38, recalling those early days.

But his is a redemption story: He offers a rare glimpse into the recruitment of a jihadist who eventually found his way back into mainstream society from radical Islam.

Morton converted to Islam when an ultraconservative Muslim friend asked him to recite a few words in Arabic  words whose meaning he did not know  during a standoff when they were surrounded by police.

Those words were the shahada, the Muslim profession of faith in which one declares there is no god but God, and Mohammed is his prophet.

I recited them and we didnt get in trouble (with the police) so I thought, Wow, this is like magic, Morton said.

Some time later, during a stay at a prison in Richmond, Virginia, he learned to become a real Muslim.

In one sense, it was indoctrination from above, in another sense, it was me seeking out something and finding... Meaning inside of this worldview, said Morton, who continues to practice his Muslim faith, although he has renounced extremism.

During his jihadist days, he frequented the Islamic Thinkers Society, a group that is an offshoot of the Al Muhajiroun extremism that seeks to restore an Islamic caliphate.

Back then, he said, he had direct contact with Abdullah al-Faisal, a radical Jamaican imam who spent four years in prison in London. He recruited people to his cause outside mosques.

We were looking for lions, Morton recalled.

Morton got out of prison shortly after the September 11, 2001 attacks  which he praised at the time  and took the name Younus Abdullah Muhammed.

In late 2007, he co-founded Revolution Muslim which would relay al-Qaeda messages online.

Among the Islamic radicals who ended up being influenced by the group was Colleen LaRose  also known as Jihad Jane  an American woman arrested in late 2009 as she was plotting to murder Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks, who was targeted for drawing a cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad.

Police went on high alert in 2009, when Revolution Muslim threatened to kill the writers of popular animated satirical series South Park for an episode that featured the Prophet Mohammed in a bear suit.

In early 2010, Morton fled to Morocco, where he was arrested by the FBI in October 2011 after a stint in Moroccan jails.

Education was the key to his turn from the path of jihadist thinking.

While held in solitary confinement, a guard let him visit the prison library at night. Morton says he read a lot, including Enlightenment writers such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

I started to realise that these principles are universal, humanist, he said, adding that they allow people to be free.

The FBI was keen on obtaining intelligence from Mortons extremist past and his contacts in that world, so he cooperated with the US federal police agency from his cell.

They made me realise that they were only protecting the public and not waging a war against Islam, Morton said, adding that his contributions led to a very successful series of counterterrorism operations.

Thanks to his collaboration, Morton only served less than four years of his 11.5 year prison sentence. His recruitment by George Washington University was a first in the United States.

His life story is instructive, said Lorenzo Vidino, who heads the universitys programme on extremism.

Morton was not only somebody who radicalised himself, but also somebody who was radicalising and recruiting other people, Vidino said.
On Point will host the 3rd Annual Amazing Senior Shake at Cumberland Presbyterian Church on Friday, Sept. 23, from 10:30 a.m.-1 p.m.

The Senior Shake provides Brainerd High School seniors the opportunity to introduce themselves to members of the Chattanooga community, allowing them to present their positive assets and practice networking skills for their transition to college and career. Seniors shake their way around the venue, meeting with community partners and leaders who support their commitment to graduate. Afterwards, students and community members will continue to deepen their connections over lunch. Dr. Kirk Kelly, acting HCDE Superintendent and Brainerd High School alumnae, will provide the keynote address.

The past two years have confirmed that The Senior Shake has indeed been a meaningful experience for our students as they dig into their college and career readiness activities. They have stated they were surprised and touched by the support that exists for them throughout the Chattanooga community. As result, they feel both challenged and hopeful about staying "on point" to achieve their graduation and post-secondary dreams, said school officials.

For additional information please call feel free to call the On Point offices at 899-2615 or email mary@liveonpoint.org .
It followed a request from police to block gay networking services after they busted an online paedophile ring this month that they alleged used Grindr to pimp teenage boys out to adult men. (Photo: Grindr.com)

Jakarta: Indonesia is blocking three gay networking apps after linking the popular service Grindr to a paedophile ring, an official said on Thursday, accusing them of promoting "sexual deviancy".

It was the latest move by the Muslim-majority country against homosexuals, who have faced a sudden backlash this year, with the government recently declaring there is "no room" in the country for the gay community in response to criticism from activists.

The government had decided to block Grindr, Blued and BoyAhoy in the country, communications ministry spokesman Noor Iza said, adding they were the apps most clearly promoting gay lifestyles.

It followed a request from police to block gay networking services after they busted an online paedophile ring this month that they alleged used Grindr to pimp teenage boys out to adult men.

"We are starting to block LGBT applications," Iza said, referring to the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community. He added that authorities were targeting services which promote "sexual deviancy".

The ministry today sent letters to internet providers requesting them to block the apps, and it would likely take a few days for the order to take effect, said the spokesman.

Prominent Indonesian gay rights activist Dede Oetomo accused the government of seeking to "create fear in society", and added authorities were "experiencing a moral panic". At the height of the backlash against the gay community in February, the government had also demanded that all instant messaging apps remove same-sex emoticons or face a ban.

In 2014 the government blocked popular video-sharing website Vimeo after accusing it of hosting pornographic content. Being gay is not illegal in Indonesia.

While homosexuals suffered some discrimination in the past, prior to the recent backlash, members of the gay community had largely been able to quietly get on with their lives. Activists believe the backlash was sparked by anger in Indonesia at an American court ruling last year that legalised same-sex marriage across the United States.
In her complaint, the girl said that her pictures were shared with almost 700 people who were in the friends list of her parents. (Photo: Pixabay)

Vienna: In a bizarre incident, an Austrian girl has sued her parents for allegedly posting her embarrassing pictures on Facebook, without her permission.

According to a report, the girl said that her parents had made her life miserable by sharing the photographs online. In her complaint, she said that her pictures were shared with almost 700 people who were in the friends list of her parents.

The girl said that the images contained her baby pictures, including the ones in which she was naked wearing just a nappy, her potty training pictures and even nappy changing ones.

They knew no shame and no limit and didnt care whether it was a picture of me sitting on the toilet or lying naked in my cot -- every stage was photographed and then made public, the girl was quoted as saying in the report.

She said that she had requested her parents to take down the photographs, but they refused to do so. The girl also claimed that when she asked her father to remove her photographs from Facebook, he told her that since he had clicked those images, he had the right to upload them.

If her parents are found guilty, they might have to compensate her financially. Moreover, they will also be liable for her legal costs, if any.

This case is first of its kind in Austria, but similar cases have been reported from other parts of the world. In France, if a person is convicted of sharing someone's photographs online without their consent, he can face up to one year in prison along with fine of around 45,000 Euros.
Bratislava: France can take the lead in European defence cooperation, but cannot do it all on its own, French President Francois Hollande said Friday as EU leaders held crunch post-Brexit talks.

"France is making the main effort on European defence but it cannot be alone and does not want to be alone," Hollande said as he went into the summit in Bratislava with security top of the agenda.

Hollande, whose country will be the bloc's top military power after Britain's departure, has joined forces with Germany to push the idea of a "more active" defence policy to restore confidence shaken by terror attacks, the migrant crisis and globalisation.

Hollande said France wanted to work with its partners to assure Europe's defence, in line with the alliances it has, namely with the United States in NATO.

But at the same time, Europe was ready to stand on its own two feet if need be, he said, apparently referring to remarks by US Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump that in a crisis the US-led alliance might think of its own interests first before its NATO commitments.

"Let everyone know that if the United States chooses to draw back, Europe must be able to defend itself," Hollande said.

The 27 European Union leaders are meeting without Britain to map out a post-Brexit future, with increased defence cooperation a key issue to rally a disillusioned public.

European Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker this week proposed an EU defence headquarters, underscoring how the EU is keen to move on now it no longer has to worry about Britain's long-term opposition to any European Union army which would undermine NATO's role.
21-year-old Mohammed Syeedy acted as getaway driver for the killer, 24-year-old Mohammed Kadir. (Representational Image)

London: A British man has been convicted of the Islamic State-inspired

murder of a Muslim cleric who practiced a form of healing condemned by the group.

A jury at Manchester Crown Court found 21-year-old Mohammed Syeedy guilty on Friday of murdering Jalal Uddin. Uddin was bludgeoned to death in February in a children's playground in Rochdale, northwest England.

Prosecutors said Syeedy did not carry out the attack, but helped conduct

surveillance of Uddin and acted as getaway driver for the killer, 24-year-old Mohammed Kadir.

They said the pair targeted 71-year-old Uddin because he practiced a form of healing involving amulets that IS considers black magic. Kadir fled Britain after the killing and authorities think he may be in Syria.

Judge David Maddison said he would sentence Syeedy later on Friday
People march along Reforma Avenue demanding the resignation of Mexico's President Enrique Pena Nieto in Mexico City. (Photo: AP)

Mexico City: Thousands of people protested in Mexico City on Thursday, demanding that President Enrique Pena Nieto "resign now" over his handling of drug violence, corruption and his meeting with Donald Trump.

Demonstrators held a sign reading "Pena Nieto INEPT, RESIGN for the good of Mexico!" and waved blackened flags of Mexico on the eve of the country's Independence Day.

They marched across the capital toward the Zocalo square, where the president traditionally stands on a balcony of the National Palace the night before the holiday to replicate the "Grito" or shout of independence made in 1810.

Riot police stood near the Zocalo to block access to protesters, who marched under the rallying cry "resign now."

Parents of 43 students missing since September 2014 joined the protest, with people angry at the government's failure to solve the case, almost two years after they were abducted by police and allegedly killed by a drug cartel.

Some shouted "Pena out!" while one sign read: "We're missing 43. State crime!"

"We don't have a reason to shout 'viva Mexico.' ... There are thousands of injustices," said Cristina Bautista, mother of one of the missing trainee teachers.

Ismael Padilla, a 49-year-old assistant principal at a secondary school who wore a black charro suit, said that was unhappy at Pena Nieto's decision to invite Trump last month, despite the White House hopeful's demands for Mexico to pay for a border wall and description of migrants as "rapists."

"We were apparently independent," Padilla said.

"After the visit of this person who has discriminated against our brothers ... we are outraged and ashamed that he came he like a head of state, because that was the treatment he was given," he said. "We have very little to celebrate."

Nubia Medina, 64, held a sign stating that "all the inept and corrupt must go."

"We are tired that this government has always done things badly," she said.

"It has neglected social issues. They live like princes while the people lives on minimum wage. There are many who have disappeared or died."

Pena Nieto, who took office in December 2012, has seen his approval rating sink to 23 percent in a recent survey by Reforma newspaper.
Violence since October has killed 227 Palestinians, 34 Israelis, two Americans, one Eritrean and a Sudanese. (Photo: Representational Image/AFP)

Jerusalem: Two Palestinians rammed a car into a bus stop used by Israelis in the occupied West Bank on Friday, causing injuries before troops killed one of the assailants, the army said.

The attack came shortly after Israeli police said they shot dead a Palestinian who tried to stab police officers in annexed east Jerusalem.

"Two assailants rammed a vehicle into a civilian bus stop at the Elias junction near the community of Kiryat Arba," the Israeli military said in a statement. It said three people were wounded.

"Forces at the scene fired at the vehicle resulting in the death of one of the assailants while the other was wounded," the army said.

The Palestinian health ministry identified the dead suspect as Fares Khadour.

Kiryat Arba is an Israeli settlement in the southern West Bank close to the flashpoint Palestinian city of Hebron.

It was the second violent incident on Friday, after a 28-year-old man was shot dead in Jerusalem while attempting to stab police officers.

That attack came at the Damascus Gate entrance to east Jerusalem's tourist-heavy Old City, the main entrance for Palestinians.

Violence since October has killed 227 Palestinians, 34 Israelis, two Americans, one Eritrean and a Sudanese.

Israeli forces say most of the Palestinians killed were carrying out knife, gun or car-ramming attacks. Others were shot dead during protests and clashes.
More than 300,000 people have been killed since Syria's conflict started in March 2011 and millions have been forced to flee their homes. (Photo: Representational Image/AFP)

Beirut: Three civilians including two children were killed in air strikes on a rebel-held town in northwest Syria on Friday, the fourth full day of a strained truce, a monitor said.

Another 13 civilians were wounded in the strikes on Khan Sheikhun in Idlib province, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said they were the first deaths in air strikes on an area not held by the Islamic State jihadist group since the truce came into force on Monday.

The Britain-based monitoring group could not identify which war planes carried out the raids, although the government and its Russian ally have regularly bombarded Idlib province.

Like almost all of Idlib, Khan Sheikhun is held by an alliance of rebels, hardline Islamists and jihadists like Fateh al-Sham Front, which changed its name from Al-Nusra Front after breaking ties with Al-Qaeda.

Under the truce deal negotiated by Moscow and Washington, which came into force on Monday evening, fighting is to halt across the country except in areas where jihadists are present.

Observers have noted that the deal will be particularly difficult to implement in areas where Fateh al-Sham has formed strong alliances with local rebels, like in Idlib province.

A video posted online by activists in Khan Sheikhun showed two columns of white smoke emerging from a neighbourhood of concrete buildings.

More than 300,000 people have been killed since Syria's conflict started in March 2011 and millions have been forced to flee their homes.

The new truce deal is the latest effort to put an end to the unrest, which began with anti-government protests but has since evolved into a multi-front war that has drawn in world powers.
The Hague: A Dutch court has banned a group of parents from calling a Dutch school a "terrorist school" because of its alleged links to the Islamic cleric Turkey accuses of masterminding July's failed coup.

Friday's ruling highlights tensions that have emerged at schools for Turkish-Dutch children since the attempt at toppling President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

A court in Haarlem says four parents of former pupils at De Roos primary school in Zaanstad, north of Amsterdam, labelled it a "Fethullah Terrorist Organization school" in a Whatsapp group, saying it had links to US based cleric Fethullah Gulen, whom Turkey alleges is the brain behind the attempted coup.

While ordering parents to stop calling De Roos a "terrorist school," the judge said they could still call it a Gulen school.
The 30-second video clip shows one of the rebels picking up a mobile phone and holding it in the front to click a selfie. (Photo: YouTube Screengrab)

Damascus: A video footage capturing a Syrian rebel blowing himself up after trying to take a selfie with a bomb-rigged phone has surfaced online. The video footage shows members of Free Syrian Army gathering around the camera for a selfie.

In the video, the Syria rebels can be seen singing into a microphone. They can also be seen carrying two rifles in their hands.

The 30-second video clip shows one of the rebels picking up a mobile phone and holding it in the front to click a selfie. As he clicks a photograph, a loud explosion can be heard with flames and smoke filling up the room.

It is assumed that the mobile phone had been rigged with a bomb. As soon as he clicked a selfie, the bomb was triggered, resulting in a blast.

The rebels can then be heard shouting 'Allahu Akbar' as they jump over the camera and escape unhurt.

The Free Syrian Army works in coalition with western countries, including France, US and UK in their fight against Islamic State in Syria. They rebels are also fighting against government forces that are loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
Bugti had in the past applied for Switzerland citizenship, but it was rejected by the government. (Photo: Facebook)

Islamabad: Exiled Baloch activist Brahumdagh Bugti will soon be granted Indian citizenship after long term negotiations with Indian authorities, Pakistani media, Geo News has reported.

The report also states that India will provide citizenship to Bugti's trusted aides in Switzerland including Sher Muhammad Bugti and Azizullah Bugti.

Moreover, the officials talks between Bugti and Indian authorities began earlier this year. And, recently Bugti had called on Prime Minister Narendra Modi to intervene in Balochistan issue, highlighting the human rights abuses there.

"We will use Indian papers to travel around the world to campaign against Pakistan and to highlight our case. We have openly thanked Narendra Modi for his support and we are no more hiding anything. We have no other option. We do not care what our opponents think of our support for Modi and his support for us," a source close to Bugti's party was quoted as saying in a report.

"Everything is agreed and settled between the Indian government and Brahumdagh. He will submit his official request to the Indian mission in Geneva after getting endorsement from his party," the source told Geo News.

The sources also added that Bugti will formally apply for Indian citizenship after a meeting with his party members in Geneva on September 18th and 19th.

Bugti had in the past applied for Switzerland citizenship, but it was rejected by the government. Thereafter, he applied for an Indian citizenship after realising that he might not get a Swiss passport.

Brahamdagh Bugti is the grandson of influential Baloch politician, late Akbar Khan Bugti. He is also the founder and leader of the Baloch Republican Party that has been banned by Pakistan.
Brandon Burger told police he met a female on Facebook who identified herself as Jolene De Marco.

He said they spent the night together in a motel on Lee Highway.

When he woke up the next morning, his vehicle was gone along with his wallet.

Jolene was also missing.

* * *

At the Brainerd Walmart, store personnel said Karen Campbell tried to walk out without paying for $82,82 in items.

She was previously banned from all local Walmarts.

She was charged with theft under $500 and criminal trespass.

* * *

A man said he was entering I-75 from East Brainerd Road and a black male driving a black Ford 500 tried to cut him off.

He said the Ford drove along the shoulder as two lanes merged to one, then began tailgating him.

The man displayed a "fake badge" and said he was a police officer, it was stated.

The two vehicles got off the freeway and stopped at a red light at S. Germantown Road. When the driver of the Ford got out of his vehicle, the other driver fled.

The Ford went toward East Ridge and was not seen again.

* * *

A resident of Kathleen Street said he recently went to court and a judge ordered a female to stay away from him.

He said the woman responded by telling him, "It's on."

The man said he then found one of his kittens dead on his porch. There was also a dead chipmunk.

It could have been a large animal - or the female who threatened him, he said.
Islamabad: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Friday met Hurriyat leaders from Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) and assured them that he would "emphatically highlight" the Kashmir issue at the 71st session of the UN General Assembly next week.

Sharif met with the leaders of All Parties Hurriyat Conference PoK chapter at Muzaffarabad. PoK 'President' Sardar Masood Khan and 'Prime Minister' Raja Farooq Haider were also present at the meeting.

"Pakistan will continue to extend moral, diplomatic and political support to Kashmiris," Sharif said, alleging that atrocities in Kashmir had touched extremes.

Read: Pakistan army chief calls on Nawaz Sharif ahead of his UNGA address

"Oppression is destined to end, and truth will prevail," he said in reference to the ongoing violence in Kashmir. He said the Kashmiris' demand for their right to self-determination was just, which had also been acknowledged by international community.

Calling upon the UN to fulfil its obligation in accordance with its own resolutions, he said: "The movement of Kashmiris will ultimately succeed as the history has precedents that such movements could not be suppressed with oppression. Pakistan will raise voice for the resolution of Kashmir dispute at all fora."

Hurriyat leaders thanked Sharif for taking them into confidence before his visit to UNGA. Sharif is likely to deliver a speech at the UN General Assembly session on September 21.
US President Barack Obama shakes hands with Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington. (Photo: AP)

Washington: The US on Friday warned that Pakistan's fight against terrorism would not succeed until it makes a "decisive shift" in its policy of tolerance towards externally-focused groups and targets all terrorist groups without discrimination.

"While the progress Pakistan has made through its recent operations is laudable, its struggle with terrorism will not come to an end until it makes a decisive shift in its policy of tolerance towards externally-focused groups," Richard Olson, the Special US Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, told member of the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee during a Congressional hearing on Afghanistan.

"US officials have been very clear with the most senior Pakistani leadership that Pakistan must target all militant groups without discrimination - including those that target Pakistan's neighbours - and close all safe havens," Mr Olson said.

Mr Olson, who is the Obama Administration's point person for Afghanistan and Pakistan, told Senators that Pakistan's leaders have assured the US of their intention to do so.

"In this regard, we welcomed Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif's statement on July 6, in which he directed Pakistani military commanders, intelligence agencies, and law enforcement agencies to take concrete measures to deny any militant group safe haven or the use of Pakistani soil to launch terrorist attacks in Afghanistan," Mr Olson said as top American Senators lashed out at Pakistan for its behaviour against terrorism.

"Pakistan continues to be tremendously duplicitous partner in this. They are working against our interest there (in Afghanistan). They are supporting the Haqqani network," Senator Bob Corker, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations said.

In his testimony, Mr Olson said the US continues to support the India-Afghanistan relationship, including through the revival of a US-India-Afghanistan trilateral, which will take place next week on the margins of the UN General Assembly.

"We welcomed India's provision of training and non-lethal security assistance to Afghanistan and its significant development contributions over the past decade-plus," he said.

China's role in the region continues to evolve, and includes its participation in the Quadrilateral Coordination Group.

"We have also welcomed China's bilateral development aid and look forward to seeing China at the Brussels conference," he added.

Mr Olson said while international support for Afghanistan remains strong, regional support continues to be filtered through complex national priorities.

"Despite greater regional cooperation overall, regional players continue to hedge so long as they have doubts about the viability of the Afghan state. We continue to support Afghanistan as it works to improve relations with its neighbours and near-neighbours, promoting broader regional stability," he observed.
China and India pledged on Thursday to further promote cooperation among the BRICS nations and discussed issues such as cyber security, energy security and anti-terrorism. (Photo: AFP)

Beijing: China is willing to join hands with India to implement the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries and properly handle "sensitive issues" to push forward bilateral ties, State Councillor Yang Jiechi has said.

Yang who met National Security Advisor Ajit Doval in New Delhi on Thursday on the sidelines of the BRICS National Security Advisors meeting said development of bilateral ties between the two countries have maintained good momentum.

China and India pledged on Thursday to further promote cooperation among the BRICS nations and discussed issues such as cyber security, energy security and anti-terrorism, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

This is the first meeting between Doval and Yang after Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping met at Hangzhou on the sidelines of the G20 summit on September 4.

"China is willing to join hands with India to implement the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries, deepen mutual political trust, expand pragmatic cooperation and friendly exchanges, and properly handle sensitive issuesin order to push forward the development of bilateral ties in the right direction and promote Asia's development and prosperity," Yang said.

In his meeting with Xi, Modi said both countries have to be sensitive to strategic interests and promote positive convergences and prevent growth of negative perceptions.

Xi said, "China is willing to work with India to maintain their hard-won sound relations and further advance their cooperation". Both the leaders set the direction for the development of bilateral ties for the next phase, Yang said in his meeting with Doval.
Downplaying Prime Minister Narendra Modi skipping the NAM Summit, Vice President Hamid Ansari has said there is no shift in India's foreign policy and asserted that it is participation that matters as it is "not a conference of Prime Ministers".



Ansari is leading the Indian delegation for the Non- Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit in Venezuela's Margarita island in the absence of Prime Minister Modi, who is only the second Indian Premier to not go for the conference after Charan Singh in 1979.



Asked what kind of message was India sending with Prime Minister Modi skipping the 17th NAM Summit, Ansari said, "India is participating. NAM is not a conference of Prime Ministers.



"Prime Ministers have been going but there have been occasions when Prime Ministers for a variety of reasons have not been able to go but India's participation remains," he said.

He also asserted that India will strongly take up its concerns about terrorism at the summit as it has been doing so at all international forums.



"Yes we are doing it (raising concerns over terrorism) on all fora and certainly it (NAM) is an important forum and we will take it up, no question about it," Ansari told reporters on his way to attend the NAM summit.



"Terror is something which impedes everything. If our objective is development, then terror cuts right across it. We need peace, we need social peace, we need international peaceboth these are being interrupted by terror. Whatever the form terror takes, it is terror, it is terrorising civilian populations and therefore if the population is terrorised then it cannot devote itself to its normal pursuits, foremost amongst them is development. So it very much has to be taken up," he asserted.



Asked if there has been a shift in India's foreign policy with the strengthening of the Indo-US partnership and if NAM has become less important, Ansari said there has been no such shift.



"There was a methodology in 1961. The methodology underwent changes in the 70s, 80s, and 90. Again the methodologies are being adjusted but the objectives have not changed...I don't think we have shifted (in our foreign policy) and I don't think it should be seen as black or white, it is always shades of grey," he said.



Vice President, however, emphasised that the Non Aligned Movement has been evolving and must continue to evolve to stay relevant to the times.



"It (NAM) has continuously evolved since its inception in 1961 and therefore it must evolve. Any organisation if it does not respond to the requirements of the day loses its relevance. So whatever our priorities of the day are that is to be determined collectively by consensus. Those priorities have to be addressed there is no way out of it," he said.



Ansari stated that the group of countries that now number 120 came together because there were common concerns and common interests.



"Over the years NAMs agenda has partly remained the same, partly it has evolved with the requirements of times. But a few things remain constant...every country has the same priority in its agenda which is development and development not according to somebody else's perception or diktat but on its own perceptions," Ansari said, adding that the basic objectives remain the same.



Noting that the chairmanship has now moved to Venezuela, he said the priorities of this conference are peace, sovereignty and solidarity for development.



"Basic point is how do you devote your energies to development unless there is peace. If peace does not prevail then attention gets diverted. So we need peace, we need solidarity with the group of countries with a more or less converging objectives and development remains our priority. That is the purpose for which this gathering is taking place," he stressed.



Asked what was India's stand on the economic and political turmoil in NAM's host country of Venezuela, Ansari said India does not have a point of view on what is happening in Venezuela or any other country within their domestic realm.



"It is always been an article of faith with us that we do not interfere in the affairs of other countries. But as long as the policy of the state of Venezuela is subscribing to the basic objectives of NAM we are with them and they are with us," he said.



India is one of the founding members of the Non-Aligned Movement and it had hosted the 7th NAM Summit in 1983 in New Delhi. The last NAM Summit was hosted by Iran in 2012.

The membership of NAM comprises 53 countries from Africa, 39 from Asia, 26 from Latin America and the Caribbean and 2 from Europe (Belarus, Azerbaijan). There are 17 countries and 10 international organisations that are Observers at NAM.



The Non-Aligned Movement came into being 55 years ago when leaders of 25 developing countries met at the 1961 Belgrade Conference.



The summit comes amid political and economic turmoil in the oil-rich country which has skidded into crisis as global crude prices have plunged since mid-2014, pushing President Nicolas Maduro's socialist model to the brink.
The Congress today lost its government in Arunachal Pradesh when 43 of its MLAs led by Chief Minister Pema Khandu defected wholesale and merged with the People's Party of Arunachal, just two months after it had regained power.





Khandu, who had replaced Nabam Tuki following a dissident campaign in July, paraded 42 MLAs before Assembly Speaker Tenzing Norbu Thongdok, who accepted their joining the PPA, Assembly sources said.





The merger would be notified in the Assembly bulletin, formalising the political development that leaves Congress with governments only in Manipur, Meghalaya and Mizoram in the northeast.





The dramatic development in Arunachal Pradesh brought back memories of the famous 'aya ram, gaya ram' episode involving Bhajan Lal who was heading a Janata Party government in Haryana and defected lock, stock, and barrel with all the party MLAs to the Congress after Indira Gandhi came back to power in 1980.





Tuki was the only Congress MLA who did not join PPA, a constituent of the North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA) which was formed on May 24 in Guwahati. Khandu on July 16 had become the chief minister after months of political turmoil that unseated Tuki, who himself was reinstated as chief minister by the apex court only two days before.





In a House of 60, the Congress had 44 MLAs with one seat falling vacant after former chief minister Kalikho Pul committed suicide on August 9, while the BJP has 11 members including two Independents.





The status of two Congress MLAs is yet to be decided as they put in their papers before the recent series of political developments that led to first Tuki government falling in January this year, imposition of President's rule and installation of the late Kalikho Pul government on February 19 for a short span.





Pul was forced to resign in July 13 following a Supreme Court judgement. On March 3 last, Pul along with 29 Congress MLAs joined the PPA. PPA CWC chairman Kameng Ringu termed the development as a "homecoming" after a short temporary self exile of the party.





Asked for the reasons behind the development, Deputy Chief Minister Chowna Mein said that for a resource-starved state like Arunachal, it is necessary to be with a bigger party to get more development funds from the Centre.





However, Tuki, who was out of the station, could not be contacted for his comments.





The PPA had ruled the state for a brief period from March 3 to July 13 this year under late Pul. Earlier the PPA had formed the government in 1979 when Tomo Riba was the chief minister.





Riba, who took oath on September 18, 1979, ruled the state for 46 days before being deposed on November 3, the same year. Meanwhile, state BJP President Tapir Gao, while welcoming Khandu's move, stated that the decision should have been taken earlier.





"We are happy that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's dream of a 'Congress-mukt Bharat' is becoming a reality now," Gao said.





While blaming the Congress high command for the mess in the party, Gao said party president Sonia Gandhi and Vice President Rahul Gandhi should have taken care of this.





Asked about the possibility of PPA MLAs merging with the BJP, Gao said the party's door was open.
Breaking his silence over the factional feud in SP, its supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav today said there can be no division in the party till he is there, a day after the dramatic resignation from Cabinet and party posts by his brother Shivpal.



Addressing party men here, Mulayam said his son and Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav will not defy his words and announced that sacked mining minister Gayatri Prajapati will be taken back in the UP Cabinet, considered a bone of contention between Shivpal and Akhilesh.



"There can be no division in the party, till I am there," said Mulayam, who has been attempting to broker a truce between his son and brother.



"We have a big family, differences may occur... There is no fight between Shivpal Yadav and Akhilesh," the Samjwadi Party supremo asserted while addressing party men, adding that Akhilesh will meet Shivpal at his residence.



The SP supremo said it was election time and all should come together to work unitedly. "There is no fight among Ramgopal, Akhilesh and Shivpal," he told reporters as slogans in favour of Shivpal drowned his remarks.



As the crisis threatened to cast a shadow over the SP's prospects in the upcoming Assembly elections, Mulayam sought to downplay the developments saying, "Every father and son faces issues....There is no rift."



Mulayam, however, said that there is "fault of our people as well who spoke to media" and added that some people created confusion that there was rift in the party.



"Samajwadi Party is a family. There are no differences in the party," he said. Mulayam also defended Prajapati who was dropped by Akhilesh as mining minister, saying "the order of his sacking will be rescinded".



His remarks came hours after Shivpal told agitated supporters who had gathered outside his residence that he was with Mulayam. "We all have to strengthen Samajwadi Party. We are with Netaji (Mulayam). His message is an order for us. We will not let the party be weakened. In every situation, we are with Netaji," Shivpal said addressing slogan-shouting party-men outside his 7 Kalidas Marg residence here.



"You have to go to the party office. We have to calmly convey our views to Netaji," he said. The party men had gathered in his support since last night after he submitted his resignation to Mulayam as ruling Samajwadi Party's Uttar Pradesh unit head and as a minister in the cabinet of nephew Akhilesh.



However, Mulayam reportedly refused to accept the resignations, they said. Shivpal's resignation as minister has also not been accepted by the chief minister.



The ruling party circles witnessed hectic confabulations right from the morning with a number of legislators and ministers meeting Shivpal. Prajapati was among those who went to Shivpal's residence. Assembly Speaker Mata Prasad Pandey also met Shivpal in an apparent bid to resolve the situation.



After his meeting with Mulayam, which lasted hardly for about 15 minutes, Shivpal left for his residence after which Akhilesh Yadav returned home to meet Mulayam and they discussed the situation. Mulayam had rushed here from Delhi last evening after the public feud between Akhilesh and Shivpal deepened.



Shivpal's wife Sarla had also quit the post of District Cooperative Bank Chairperson, Etawah, and their son Aditya resigned as Chairman of Pradeshik Cooperative Federation, according to sources.



Meanwhile in Etawah, hundreds of Shivpal's supporters gathered at Shastri crossing and sat on dharna demanding that all portfolios be restored to him. One of his supporters also tried to immolate himself demanding sacking of Mulayam's cousin Ramgopal Yadav.



In his constituency Jaswant Nagar, shops were shut down by supporters, who also blocked traffic on the national highway. The supporters were shouting slogans "Shivpal tum sangharsh karo, hum tumhare saath hain" (In your struggle, we are with you).



The feud in the Yadav family had spilled into the open after the Chief Minister stripped Shivpal of key ministerial portfolios on September 13, hours after he was replaced with Shivpal as the party's state unit chief by Mulayam.



Mulayam's cousin and SP national general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav, who is seen as backing the Chief Minister, yesterday said the leadership had committed an unintentional "mistake" by removing Akhilesh as party's UP president. He blamed "outsiders" for the crisis, an apparent reference to Amar Singh who recently returned to the party after a long gap.
Is the chikungunya outbreak bigger than what is being reported?





The Centre-run Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme is reporting thrice the number of cases (not deaths) that the municipal corporations have collated so far.



There seems to have been discrepancies in the data collation process of vector borne diseases in city. Hospitals are supposed to inform the South Delhi Municipal Corporation, the nodal agency for collating data. But the latter says that hospital do not inform the civic agency in time about such deaths.



According to the Centre's Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme, the number of cases of Chikungunya so far reported in the capital is 3,358  about three times the figure (1,057) given out by the municipal corporations in their weekly report on Monday.



Similarly, there is a spurt in dengue cases, which stands at 2,926 till September 13 as against the MCD figure of 1,158 cases till September 10.



Every week the South Delhi Municipal Corporation, the nodal agency, prepares the list of vector borne diseases for the entire city.



But the latest weekly municipal report that came out on September 11 missed even the chikungunya death that took place on September 1 at Hindu Rao Hospital, which is under the North Corporation.



Deaths due to vector borne diseases have to be notified with the municipal corporation under the Delhi Municipal Corporation Act.



The South Delhi Municipal Corporation claimed that hospitals may also be delaying reporting the cases by not informing the civic agency about deaths due to vector borne diseases in time.



On Wednesday, the Indraprastha Apollo Hospital confirmed that five chikungunya deaths took place over the past three weeks.



While the hospital claims that it has informed the Centre's Integrated Surveillance Programme (IDSP) about the deaths, officials at the Delhi unit of the IDSP said that "only one death was reported earlier, rest four chikungunya deaths including the one in August was reported to IDSP on Tuesday".



Even municipal health officer of the South Delhi Municipal Corporation, B K Hazarika said that the hospital is yet to report the number of deaths to the civic agency. "So far we have the information about five suspected chikungunya deaths in the city. We have not received information about the rest five chikungunya deaths from Apollo Hospital ," he told Deccan Herald on late Thursday evening.



On Thursday, the chikungunya death toll rose to 13, dengue too has claimed 13 lives so far this season.



According to Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme, an 88-year-old A D Kalra, a resident of Lajpat Nagar, suspected patient of chikungunya died on Wednesday. But the hospital did not confirm the death.




Prime Minister Narendra Modi held an "extensive and productive dialogue" with his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal popularly known as Prachanda after which the two sides inked three pacts including one on India extending USD 150 million for Nepal's post earthquake reconstruction.





It is Prachanda's first visit to India after becoming Prime Minister for the second time. KP Sharma Oli quit the top post in July following fresh political turmoil due to protest of Madheshi community against the new Constitution.





The two countries also decided to continue cooperation in areas of defence and security. In a statement to media following the talks, Modi said India hoped Nepal will be successful in implementing the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating aspirations of all sections of its diverse society.





"As immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability and economic prosperity (Shanti, Sthirta aur Samrudhi) of Nepal is our shared objective," the Prime Minister said in the presence of Prachanda.





On his part, the Nepalese Prime Minister said his country has nothing but "goodwill" for India and that destinies of both the countries are "interlinked".





The Prime Minister said India has been privileged to be Nepal's partner at "every step" of the country development journey and economic progress. "Our friendship is time-tested & unique. We share our burden during difficult times, just as we celebrate each other's achievements."





Modi said both sides have agreed to focus on "close monitoring" and time bound completion of all development projects being implemented by India in Nepal. He said speedy and successful implementation of ongoing hydropower projects will be ensured.





Showering praise on Prachanda for his efforts to bring stability to Nepal, Modi said, "I am confident that under your leadership Nepal will be successful in implementing the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating aspirations of all sections of the diverse society."





"I conveyed to Prachanda that India stands ready and prepared to strengthen the development partnership with Nepal and we will do so as per priorities of people and government of Nepal," Modi said.





About the political transformation in Nepal, Prachanda said his government was making sincere efforts in taking every section of the society onboard while implementing the provisions of the Constitution.





"I shared with Modiji that promulgation of the Constitution last year by the popularly elected Constituent assembly was a historic achievement for people of Nepal. You are aware that my government has made serious efforts to bring everyone on board as we enter the phase of implementation of the Constitution," he said.



In his remarks, Modi said security interests of Nepal and India are inter-linked and both sides agreed that "securing our societies is essential for achieving shared objectives of development and growth".



He said continued cooperation between defence and security agencies of the two countries is important to guard the "open borders" that provide opportunities for interaction to the people.



India has a close relationship with Nepal but off late, China has been trying to have some influence over Kathmandu. Oli had tried to forge a deeper cooperation with China. Nepal had signed a transport and transit treaty with China during Oli's tenure as PM.



In the talks, the Indian side clearly conveyed to Nepal that it was ready and prepared to strengthen development partnership with Nepal. India is Nepal's biggest trade partner and both the sides also decided to further expand trade and investment.





Prachanda, who arrived here yesterday on a four-day visit, was earlier given a ceremonial welcome at the forecourt of Rashtrapati Bhavan. He is staying at the Rastrapati Bhavan as a state guest.



Nepal has been facing political crisis since the adoption of a new Constitution in September last year. Madhesis, mostly of Indian-origin, have been opposing the new statute as they fear it would marginalise them by dividing the country into seven provinces.



Nearly five-month-long Madhesi protests led to the closure of key trading points with India triggering shortage of essential supplies in the land-locked country.



The blockade of trade points with India ended in February after more than 50 people were killed in clashes with police. Nepal had blamed India for the Madhesi crisis, a charge rejected by New Delhi.



Modi said Prachanda has been a "catalytic force" of peace in Nepal saying he has personally played a role in strengthening democratic institutions. Prachanda also invited Modi and President Pranab Mukherjee to visit Nepal soon.

As Nepal undergoes a political transition, India today pitched for implementing the country's Constitution by accommodating aspirations of all sections and assured it of all possible support amid China's efforts to gain ground in the Himalayan nation.
Observing that 'Surya Namaskar' is just a form of exercise good for the body, the Bombay High Court today declined to grant an interim stay on a resolution by BMC making the yoga and (sun salutation) mandatory in the civic schools in the metropolis.





The court made the observation on a PIL challenging the August 23 resolution adopted by the Shiv Sena-BJP controlled Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), which sparked protest from the opposition parties dubbing it as part of the move to "saffronise" education.



The petitioner, Masood Ansari, a social worker, had sought a stay on the civic body resolution holding that it violated fundamental rights and is "malafide and bad in law".



He said children attending the BMC-run schools mostly belong to poorer sections of society and come from all religions, castes and communities.



A Division Bench of Chief Justice Manjula Chellur and Justice M S Sonak observed that people should not look at it just by the name 'Surya Namaskar'.



"Don't go by the name...it is just a form of exercise which is good for the body," Justice Chellur said.



The HC, while posting the petition for further hearing after two weeks, declined to grant an interim stay on implementation of the resolution.



Anjali Awasthi, counsel for the petitioner, argued that minor students cannot be expected to perform 'Surya Namaskar', which is a combination of 12 'asanas', daily.



To this, the HC said it would consider this argument at a later stage and would call for a report to ascertain if the sun salutation exercise can be performed by minors.



The BMC last month had adopted the proposal moved by BJP corporator Samita Kamble to make the Surya Namaskar mandatory in over 1,200 municipal schools.



The resolution was backed by the ruling Shiv Sena, but triggered sharp reaction from the Congress and other opposition parties even as the BJP defended the move saying that religious motives should not be infused into the decision.
Contemplative Outreach of East Tennessee will sponsor a workshop on the Welcoming Prayer from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 1 at Grace Episcopal Church, 20 Belvoir Ave

Providing guidance for those attending will be the Rev. Tom Ward, former chaplain at the University of the South in Sewanee. He regularly holds Contemplative Outreach retreats at St. Marys Sewanee.

The Welcoming Prayer is a way to consent to Gods presence and action in each individuals physical and emotional situations in daily life. No experience necessary.

Cost is $35 in advance or $40 at the door. Deadline for registration is Sept. 23. Lunch is included with advance registration.

The general public is cordially invited. More information may be obtained by emailingmargaret.caldwell.m@gmail.com.
The dawn-to-dusk Tamil Nadu bandh today on the Cauvery issue called by associations of farmers and traders passed off peacefully even as opposition leaders, including DMK's M K Stalin and Kanimozhi, courted arrest while leading protest demonstrations in various parts of the state.





The day was marked by a slew of agitations, attempts to block trains and roads, by the bandh supporters, including opposition parties, across the state. Attempts to stop the Vaigai Express at Dindigul station was foiled by the police.



Hundreds of protesters were held as majority of shops and business establishments across Tamil Nadu downed their shutters in support of the bandh, police said.



They were protesting incidents of violence targeting Tamils in Karnataka and demanding a long-term solution to the vexed inter-state river water issue.



The common man was put to inconvenience as restaurants, shops and petrol pumps remained closed till 6 pm in the state.



However, the bandh did not affect functioning of state and central government offices, their undertakings, banks and PSUs though many of them witnessed thin attendance.

Also, government, state-aided and most of the private schools and colleges functioned albeit with lesser turnout.



State transport corporation run buses, trains plied as usual, though most autorickshaws, taxis, private trucks and commercial freight operators chose to go off the roads.



Cinema shows and film shootings remained suspended during the bandh period. In Chennai, DMK Treasurer Stalin who led a rally to the Egmore Railway terminal, was detained along with hundreds of party workers when they squatted in front of the terminal attempting to launch a rail roko agitation.



He told reporters that his party would support Chief Minister Jayalalithaa if she meets Prime Minister Narendra Modi or Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah over the Cauvery issue. He also accused her of "only writing letters," over the issue.



DMK Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi, daughter of DMK supremo M Karunanidhi, staged a road roko on arterial Anna Salai here along with party cadres and they were detained.



She said the Centre cannot "keep away" from the Cauvery issue, adding efforts should have been made earlier to protect Tamil people and their properties in Karnataka.



Police, who had made elaborate security arrangements deploying thousands of personnel, including about 15,000 in Chennai, in view of the bandh, later said leaders and party workers detained for holding protests were being released.



Meanwhile, a youth who had set himself afire over the Cauvery issue yesterday, succumbed to injuries. The activist of Naam Tamizhar Katchi had suffered over 90 per cent burns and died this morning at a hospital here.



MDMK General Secretary Vaiko and VCK chief Thirumavalavan staged protests in Tiruchirappalli and here respectively and were detained by police when they attempted to stage a rail blockade.



"We demand the Centre to constitute Cauvery Management Board," Vaiko said, adding full quantum of water should be released according to the Cauvery Tribunal's Award.



Thirumavalan condemned the large-scale violence, targeting of vehicles and destruction of properties of Tamil people in Karnataka.



A stray incident of stone-pelting on a car showroom which was open was reported here. Police said that a probe was on in the matter.



Meanwhile, four persons were arrested today for pelting stones on an office of the IOCL yesterday, they said. A Coimbatore report said establishments remained shut in Coimbatore, Tirupur and Nilgiris districts, affecting normal life, in response to the bandh call.



In Salem, Mettupalayam, and Pollachi areas most shops were shut. About 20,000 small and medium scale units in and around the city and over 30,000 garment factories in the textile hub of Tirupur also extended support to the bandh and downed shutters.



Most fireworks manufacturing units too had shut down in the industrial town of Sivakasi.



In Coimbatore, senior leaders of various political parties, including DMK and MDMK and farmers associations were arrested while trying to stage rail roko near railway stations and road blockade.



In the Cauvery Delta regions of Thanjavur, and Tiruchirappalli too farmers, DMK, CPI, CPI(M), VCK and other party volunteers attempted rail blockade and staged protests.



A report from Madurai said the bandh did not affect normalcy in southern and central districts of the state though shops, theatres, hotels and private educational institutions remained shut.



Officials said no untoward incident was reported in the region. But trains were delayed at some places.



They said the impact of the bandh was more in central districts than the southern districts.

Karnataka-based mutts and business establishments were provided police security. The bandh evoked good response in Nagapattinam and Erode districts.



A report from Puducherry, where a bandh was observed by Tamil outfits and political parties, said an effigy of Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah was burnt outside the bus terminal allegedly by some agitators while a state-run bus was stoned.



Meanwhile, Kanagavalli, wife of Tamil Nadu fuel truck driver Manivelu, who was beaten up days ago allegedly by pro-Kannada activists near Chitradurga in Karnataka, reportedly told a TV channel that the state should take efforts to safely bring him back.
With the party losing its government in Arunachal Pradesh, Congress today dubbed the new dispensation as an "illegitimate child of BJP" and blamed Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah for the "diabolical design to decimate democracy".





"Gross and rampant misuse of money power finally delivered an immoral government of opportunists and turncoats. The mandate of the people of Arunachal Pradesh, who voted Congress party to power, has been robbed in broad daylight," Congress' chief spokesman Randeep Surjewala told reporters.



The party lost its government when 43 of its MLAs led by Chief Minister Pema Khandu defected wholesale and merged with the People's Party of Arunachal today, just two months after it had regained power following the Supreme Court's judgement.



Addressing a press conference, along with AICC General Secretary C P Joshi, Surjewala alleged that the People's Party of Arunachal Pradesh is the "illegitimate child of BJP's diabolical design to decimate democracy".



He said the "architects of extinguishing and murdering" the very spirit of democracy and constitutionalism are Modi and Shah who rode to power on the promise of cooperative federalism.



"The prodigal sons of Congress who have jumped ship have made massive ideological and political blunder and compromise," he said, hitting hard at the 43 of its 44 MLAs who defected.



He alleged that the Congress MLAs have also destroyed trust of people of Arunachal Pradesh, who voted for them as candidates of Congress.



"Despite the Supreme Court judgement, the fraud that was committed today is very ominous for democracy in India," Joshi said expressing concern over its impact in the Northeast.



"We have seen what has happened in Jammu and Kashmir. We are concerned that similar situation will be seen in NE India," he said.



Accusing the BJP of using money and muscle power, he said having been thwarted twice, BJP began by engineering defections, inducements and threats to subvert the people's mandate.



Asked why the Congress failed to stop the wholesale defection, Joshi said that the message sent by the BJP was that if any state wanted development, it has to be in tune with the ruling party at the Centre.
In a decision which would help students, Delhi High Court today rejected a plea of some foreign publishing houses against the sale of photocopies of their textbooks, saying copyright in literary works does not confer "absolute ownership" to the authors.





Justice Rajiv Sahai Endlaw also lifted a ban on a photocopy shop located at the Delhi University campus from selling photocopies of chapters from textbooks of some international publishers to the students.



"Copyright, specially in literary works, is thus not an inevitable, divine, or natural right that confers on authors the absolute ownership of their creations. It is designed rather to stimulate activity and progress in the arts for the intellectual enrichment of the public.



"Copyright is intended to increase and not to impede the harvest of knowledge. It is intended to motivate the creative activity of authors and inventors in order to benefit the public," the court said.



The court said the action of making a master photocopy of relevant portions of the books of these publishers "does not constitute infringement of copyright under the Copyright Act".



"If the facility of photocopying were not to be available, they would instead of sitting in the comforts of their respective homes and reading from the photocopies would be spending long hours in the library and making notes thereof.



"When modern technology is available for comfort, it would be unfair to say that the students should not avail thereof and continue to study as in ancient era. No law can be interpreted so as to result in any regression of evolvement of the human being for the better," it observed.



In 2012, a group of publishers, including Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press (UK), Cambridge University Press India Pvt Ltd, Taylor and Francis Group (UK) and Taylor and Francis Books India Pvt Ltd, had moved court alleging that Rameshwari Photocopy Service in DU was infringing their copyright over the text books.



Reacting to the judgement, the publishers in a joint statement said, "it is unfortunate that the court's decision today could undermine the availability of original content for the benefit of students and teachers."



"We brought this case to protect authors, publishers and students from the potential effects on the Indian academic and educational book market caused by the widespread creation and distribution of unlicensed course packs by a copy shop operating from within the premises of the University, where a legitimate and affordable licensing scheme is already in place," the statement said.



the form of a course pack till the final disposal of the said application" till the final disposal of the plea.



Thereafter, the students had moved the court against the interim order seeking lifting of the ban to ensure their welfare and preparation for the upcoming examinations. Their plea was rejected by the court.



The global publishing giants had claimed that the photocopy kiosk violated their copyright and, "at the instance of DU", was causing huge financial losses as students had stopped buying their text books.



The court, however, in its 94-page judgement, also said that nearly all students of the university carry cell phones and most of them have inbuilt cameras which enable them to click photographs of each page of a book and take printouts after connecting the phone to a printer. "The same would again qualify as fair use and which cannot be stopped," it said.



It junked the petitioners' claim observing that "once such an action is held to be not offending any provisions of the Copyright Act, merely because the photocopies are done not by the person desirous thereof himself but with the assistance of another human being, would not make the act offending".



"It matters not whether such person is an employee of the Delhi University or the university avails the services of a contractor. The position of the defendant no.1 (Rameshwari) in the present case is found to be that of a contractor to whom university has outsourced its work of providing photocopying service for its students...," it added.



The judge further observed that the case had cropped up as DU was itself supplying the photocopies instead of issuing the book, which may be sought by a large number of students for a limited period or limited hours.



"It cannot be lost sight of that we are a country with a bulging population and where the pressure on all public resources and facilities is far beyond that in any other country or jurisdiction. While it may be possible for a student in a class of say 10 or 20 students to have the book issued from the library for a month and to laboriously take notes therefrom, the same is unworkable where the number of students run into hundreds if not thousands," the court said.



"According to me, what is permissible for a small number of students cannot be viewed differently, merely because the number of students is larger. Merely because instead of say 10 or 20 copies being made by students individually or by the librarian employed by the university, 100 or 1000 copies are being made, the same would not convert, what was not an infringement into an infringement," the judge said.


Im parked on a patch of gravel outside the old Heinz ketchup bottling factory in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania early on a Monday morning, and Im frustrated. My Uber self-driving car will not start driving itself.



The engineer in the passenger seat next to me, an Uber employee for all of three weeks who asked if I wanted to take a turn behind the wheel, chimes in to say I should turn the car off and start it again, as if rebooting a computer.



In this case, my computer is a modified Ford Fusion hybrid sedan code-named Boron 6, an atomic element often found in magnets, laundry detergent and nuclear reactors.



Uber has outfitted it with more than 20 cameras, seven lasers, a spinning 360-degree laser-based detection system and 1,400 other aftermarket parts that render millions of bits of data about the environment in real time as I drive through it.



If the car works as advertised, someday neither I nor anybody else will sit in the drivers seat of a car again. For now, a few square miles in downtown Pittsburgh represent Ubers dreams of a mobile future, in which people eschew car ownership in favour of hailing a safer, driverless ride directly from their smartphone.



I experienced those self-driving ambitions firsthand this week, riding in Boron 6 for about an hour in light downtown traffic. On Wednesday, Uber rolled out a pilot programme of its driverless cars to its most loyal customers in Pittsburgh, giving them the chance to hail an autonomous Uber for the first time.



With the trial, a handful of test vehicles  Ford Fusions at first  will roam the streets, each car coming with a human safety engineer who has undergone training to reassure riders that the process is safe.



During my ride, most of which I spent as a passenger in Boron 6s back seat, my safety engineer proved his worth. At various moments, he had to take over the wheel and turn through intersections where locals are known to speed. When a truck driver backed out into the road illegally, he put his foot on the brake, immediately taking control of the car.



If the safety engineer felt unsafe, he could at any time smack down a big red button in the centre console  suspiciously similar to a seat ejector switch from a James Bond film  to disengage from self-driving mode. To turn the self-driving feature back on, he need only press a sleek steel button next to an embossed nameplate stamped on the console.



If I felt unsafe as a passenger, I could also request that the driver take over the vehicle, or press a button on a screen facing the back seat that would end the ride. I also monitored the infrared environment the car had rendered from the screen, a 3-D world updating in real time, and took a selfie from a camera built into the console. After the ride, Uber texts to passengers an animated GIF of the 3-D modelled route taken, along with the selfie.



But for most of the ride, I felt safe. In self-driving mode, turns and stops were near seamless, and I often had to check in with my driver to see whether he or the computer was steering the car. I did grow a bit nervous a few times when watching how close the computer drove us to cars parked on the right side of a street. Though, admittedly, that could have been my mind playing tricks on me by being more vigilant than usual about my surroundings.



In many ways, Pittsburgh is the perfect test environment for the company. The city, in essence a peninsula surrounded by mountains, is laid out in a giant triangle, replete with sharp turns, steep grades, sudden speed limit changes and dozens of tunnels. There are 446 bridges, more than in Venice. Residents are known for the Pittsburgh left, a risky intersection turn.



Raffi Krikorian, engineering director of Ubers Advanced Technologies Centre, located in the citys industrial Strip District, put it this way: Pittsburgh is the double-black diamond of driving. The challenge expressed in Krikorians ski analogy is one that Uber has

taken to heart. From the companys point of view, the self-driving vehicle operates more safely than any human driver.



Uber said autonomous cars can reduce vehicle-related deaths, including the nearly 40,000 that occurred in the United States last year, which was the deadliest for automotive-related deaths since 2008 and had the largest year-over-year percentage increase in 50 years, according to the National Safety Council.



There has been at least one reported and confirmed death of a driver operating a semiautonomous vehicle, that of a Tesla owner involved in a crash in May, while the cars Autopilot system was engaged. On Wednesday, the Chinese government television news channel reported that a Tesla owner had been killed in a crash in January in which the Autopilot feature was reportedly in use.



Traffic-rule conscious



My driverless Uber stopped far behind cars in front of us at intersections. It stayed exactly at the speed limit  25 mph where we drove  even when there was no traffic around. At one stoplight, the car waited for the green signal before turning right. The human drivers behind us were not pleased.



As my ride in Boron 6 wound down  in total, I travelled roughly 20 miles in the vehicle  it was hard not to feel like a celebrity, or perhaps more like a Martian. Other motorists gawked, and a boy on a Razor scooter gaped at me from a corner, waving to his mother to come look.



This future has been a long time coming. Advertising for self-driving cars goes at least as far back as the 1950s, with images of families in cars huddled around game boards in the back seat, playing dominoes. Some of the people involved in the Uber project have spent their entire careers working toward a day like Wednesday.



But how they will get rich from it remains unclear. Much of Ubers success has been based on the premise that people could share their idle cars with the public by driving during their spare time. A self-driving car obviates the need for human drivers, a clear source of tension among Uber drivers today. Company executives said self-driving cars would be only one part of Ubers business in the future, with a mix of drivers and autonomous vehicles.



And Uber isnt the first to place big bets on self-driving cars, with Google, Apple, Tesla, Mercedes-Benz, BMW and Infiniti all offering or developing autonomous features for vehicles. Some of these efforts have run into hurdles  Apples initiative, Project Titan, has had ups and downs. All of these companies face an uncertain regulatory environment for driverless vehicles that could impede the rollouts of the cars across the country.



There will be delays and bugs, such as the one I encountered my first time behind the wheel when the self-driving car didnt drive itself. Thats the whole point of the pilot test.

The wealth of sensors and recording equipment will see what happens  warts and all  so we can learn more about what makes drivers and riders comfortable and safe, said Emily Duff Bartel, a product manager at the Advanced Technologies Centre.



For me, it took about 10 minutes of troubleshooting to work through the glitches, but Boron 6 eventually turned on and started driving itself. That is, after a little bit of human intervention.




Israels strongest and more influential backers, the US and Europe, have been shar-ply critical of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus assertion that forcing Israeli Jewish settlers out of the West Bank would amount to ethnic cleansing.





This is despite Israel planting settlements since conquering the territory in 1967. This effort is of course against international law and the Fourth Geneva Convention governing the conduct of occupying powers.



Since January, Israel has retroactively legalised 2,706 housing units for Israelis in West Bank and East Jerusalem settlements, regarded by the UN and the global community as territory where citizens of the occupier are barred from settling. In 1993, when the Oslo Accord, envisioning the two-state solution, was signed, there were 1,10,000 Israeli settlers in the West Bank and 1,46,000 in East Jerusalem. Today, there are 8,00,000 living in 150 Jewish settlements in these areas. They constitute 13% of Israel's Jewish population and a powerful political bloc.



This tactic of approving housing units has succeeded the earlier practice of granting legality to unauthorised settlements built as outposts by wildcat settlers on West Bank and East Jerusalem. Housing units appear to be less of a land grab or a threat to the internationally supported two-state solution  a Palestinian state next to Israel  for the century-old Arab-Israeli dispute.



Of the quartet  the US, UN, European Union (EU) and Russia  the US and EU have not been fooled by the unit-by-unit expansion tactic in the longterm strategy adopted by the Zionist movement in the late 19th century for the colonisation of Palestine. Political pressure is not going to deter Israel's ruling class from reaching this goal although the Israeli peace camp continues to argue the majority of Israelis support the creation of a Palestinian state next to Israel.



The Israeli government, headed by right-wing Netanyahu and key members of his cabinet are not only supporters of settlement building but residents of settlements. Israelis

are encouraged by the government to move to settlements by subsidised housing, tax breaks and allowances as well as constant investment in settlement housing and infrastructure. Netanyahu and his ministers oppose the emergence of a Palestinian state although he has, on occasion, voiced support for the two-state formula.



Settlement construction and expansion is at Palestinian expense. Israel expropriates Palestinian land and bulldozes Palestinian homes to make way for settlements and roads, military camps and infrastructure for settlements. Israeli demolitions of Palestinian structures tripled between January-March 2016 over the average rate of 50 per month between 2012-15.



Most destruction occurred in the 60% of the West Bank within total Israeli control under the Oslo Accord, land which was expected by Palestinians and Israeli peacemakers to be ceded to the Palestinian state.



Palestinian expense



Scores of buildings, wells, schools and clinics constructed for Palestinians by USAID and EU assistance have been dest-royed including 150 financed by the EU during the first quarter of this year. There is an ongoing battle over the Bedouin hamlet of Susiya in the West Bank.



Israel seeks to bulldoze its miserable huts and sheep enclosures to make way for the expansion of a settlement of the same name. Germany contribu-ted solar panels to give residents electricity, Spain built a school, Ireland donated water pump, Italy. Norway and others provided a playground and a shipping container to use as an office.



Israel had previously tried not to anger the EU by avoiding structures it had financed. The EU and member states are major donors to Israel and its largest trading partner. Expropriations and demolitions take place against a background of conflict with the Palestinians who have come to feel they have no future in their native land. Consequently, since last October, mainly youngsters have been lashing out at Israelis, attacking civilians, soldiers, and settlers with knives and bullets.



The two-state solution was meant to prevent the emergence of a Palestinian majority in the land between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River  Israel, East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza  by granting Palestinians their own state. However, only a slender Palestin-ian majority has been achieved in line with predictions for 2016.



There are now about 6.37 million Israeli Jews in this area while there are some 6.4 mn Palestinians, including those who are citizens of Israel. Israels withdrawal from Gaza in 2005 was intended to remove the 1.8-1.9 million Gazans from this equation but since Gaza remains under Israeli control from outside the Strip from land, sea and air, Gaza must be included.



Leading Israelis, including former prime minister Ehud Olmert, who favoured the two state solution, have warned that Israel cannot be democratic and have a Jewish majority if Palestinians are not allowed to form their state. Netanyahu, who hails from the same party, has not listened to his advice.



The US has brushed it aside and granted $38 billion in military aid over the next 20 years, an increase of $0.7 billion a year, although this will be used by Israel to defend its occupation and settlement enterprise.
District In-Charge Minister B Ramanath Rai said ideals and teachings propagated by social reformer Narayana Guru were helpful in bringing about social change in the society.





He was speaking after inaugurating Narayana Guru Jayanthi programme organised jointly by the district administration, Zilla Panchayat and Kannada and Culture department here at Sree Gokarnanatheshwara Temple hall on Friday.



He said Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, after inaugurating Brahmashree Narayana Guru Jnana Mandira at Sajeepamooda village in Bantwal taluk, had announced on April 22 that the state government would observe the birth anniversary of Narayana Guru from this year. The promise has been fulfilled through a government order in this regard to observe Narayana Guru Jayanthi in all the 30 districts and all the taluk headquarters of the state, he added.Rai said the government is committed to the welfare of poor and has earmarked Rs 15,000 crore for the welfare of SC/ST communities.



In his introductory speech, Gokarnanatheshwara Temple spokesperson Harikrishna Bantwal said teachings of Sree Narayana Guru should be spread to arrest challenges posed by religious extremism. Had the people understood the true meaning of Narayana Gurus philosophy of One God, One Religion and One Caste and practised it faithfully, the countrys problems of inequality and untouchability could have been easily overcome, he felt.



Philosophy and teachings of Narayana Guru should be included in school and college curriculum. There is a need to teach humanitarian values among the students, which is declining in the society,

he noted.



Prof M S Kotian of KMC, Mangaluru, said Sree Narayana Guru brought in a change in the society by leading a reform movement in Kerala, rejecting caste system and promoting social equality, at a time when untouchability was prevailing in the country. He built a temple at Sivagiri and brought about social reforms by allowing the backward and oppressed classes to enter inside the temple.



Narayana Guru had also stressed on the empowerment of youths through education, he added.

Dr Ganesh Ameen Sankamar said the state government has contributed for the development of backward classes by observing Narayana Guru Jayanthi. There is a need to follow the teachings of Sree Narayana Guru to check the raging Cauvery dispute, Dr Amen said.




The aromatic flavour of tea in the morning prepares you for the day. The same tea will now give you a kick, thanks to a bunch of scientists who made a wine from the brew.





Rich in health boosting chemicals, the tea-wine has been created by a Himalayan laboratory that is set to transfer the technology to a firm in Mozambique. Two Indian units in Pune and Hamirpur are interested too.



The brown coloured wine is made from tea dust, yeast, sugar and four varieties of fruit, including a Himachal fruit named Kafal and a type of yellow berries. Its alcohol content is 10-13%

The tea-based wine has the potential to compete with the red wine as both are rich in anti-oxidants, which protect the body from cell damage. It contains an anti-oxidant component known as Catechin, which helps remove dangerous free radicals from the body. Green tea is considered beneficial to health because of the its high Catechin content.



We are going to compete with high-end wines. As the global market of organic wine is worth several billions of dollars, we intend to pitch in with our product, Sanjay Kumar, director of the CSIR Institute of Himalayan Bioresources Technology (IHBT), Palampur told DH.



At the IHBT laboratory, four varieties of these wine are available. The most popular one has been named Kargil Sepoy after it was found popular with the armed forces during a three year trial.

Incidentally, one of the Kargil war heroes Captain Saurabh Kalia, who was captured and killed by the Pakistan, hails from this Himachal town.



Though the tea-based wine was developed several years ago, sources said Indian wine industry was not interested because of inherent complexities in the Indian excise rules as the raw material is a new crop. But a fresh push on commercialisation has now come from the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research headquarters after the CSIR was asked by the government to earn more revenue.



Scientists took up the tea-wine project more than a decade ago when the Kangra valley tea sector faced a major economic crisis. The underlying aim was to create more value added products from tea to boost the local economy.


The Press Council of India (PCI) has virtually indicted the Nitish Kumar government, observing that a fear psychosis was prevailing among the mediapersons since the murder of a journalist.





The Council has urged the Bihar government to take corrective measures so that journalists can work fearlessly in the state, according to a statement issued by the media watchdog here on Friday.



The reprimand comes after a fact-finding committee in its report to the council noted that Rajdeo Ranjan, who was heading the news bureau of a Hindi daily in Siwan, was shot dead point blank on May 13 by unidentified assailants, days after his story about a state cabinet ministers meeting with former RJD MP Shahabuddin in jail was published.
Taking suo motu cognizance of reports of large-scale violent protests in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu over the Cauvery issue, the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) on Friday issued notices to the states and sought a report.





Expressing anguish over the incidents, the commission observed that it appears from the national television channels that civil and police authorities in both Karnataka and Tamil Nadu remained mere onlookers. It said the states took no steps to stop the hooligans from indulging in illegal acts that played with the life and liberty of the citizens, the commission said in a statement.



The authorities should have anticipated and prepared themselves to meet the emergency situations in view of the sensitivity of water sharing issue faced by people of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. The police and civil authorities woke up to the situation only after the large-scale physical violence and destruction of public and private property. After the event, imposing curfew further added to the denial of right of access to hospitals and other emergency facilities for three days, the statement from the commission said.



Taking serious exception to the violation of human rights due to the apathetic attitude of the people holding public office and their lack of accountability towards peoples life and safety, the commission has issued notices to the governments of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, through their chief secretaries and the director generals of police, calling for reports on the number of persons injured and destruction of public and private property during these protests.



Jaya orders release of water

Amid statewide protests over the Cauvery issue, Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa on Friday ordered the release of water from the Mettur reservoir on September 20 for delta farmers to carry out agricultural activities, DHNS reports from Chennai.

The shutters were not opened on the scheduled date of June 12 since the water level had not touched 90 ft.

Following a high-level meeting, Jayalalithaa said even though the present level in the dam is 84.76 ft, water will be released in the hope that the northeast monsoon would be normal.

Stating that Karnataka is releasing water following the Supreme Courts order, Jayalalithaa pointed out that as on September 14, the state had received 8.92 tmcft of water.

Delta areas like Thanjavur, Thiruvarur, Nagapattinam and some parts of Salem produce 25 lakh tonnes of paddy every year, with kuruvai and samba cultivation in about 20 lakh acres.

Earlier, the AIADMK government had announced a Rs 64.30-crore package for the delta farmers in six districts, besides providing 12 hours of continuous power supply.
AT&T announced a $5,000 contribution to the Chattanooga State Community College to support non-traditional, underserved students preparing for high-skill jobs requiring technology-based skills in Tennessee community colleges. The donation will fund scholarships to help students begin a path toward completing their college degrees. The contribution was presented today at Chattanooga State Community College.

This type of support from private business is important as we work to find ways to advance higher education in Southeast Tennessee, said Dr. Flora Tydings, President, Chattanooga State Community College. The programs this contribution will help fund gives our students the skills required to compete in todays technology based economy."

This donation is part of AT&Ts $65,000 gift to the Tennessee Board of Regents. Each of the states 13 community colleges will receive $5,000 to award scholarships to encourage students to participate in programs designed to help students succeed in the classroom and be better prepared to enter the workforce. The programs will target non-traditional and underserved students.

"Our state's community colleges serve as crucial pathways to prosperity for students who want to enter the job market as soon as possible," said Rep. Gerald McCormick. "AT&T's commitment to good corporate citizenship in education will allow Tennessee's future workforce to reach its full potential reaping benefits for all Tennesseans."

Success in higher education is very important for Tennessees long-term growth and potential, said Sen. Bo Watson. AT&Ts investment in programs like this exemplifies its commitment to furthering education in Tennessee.

In January 2010, the Tennessee legislature approved an aggressive set of steps to increase the completion rates of students within the institutions of higher education in the state.

We are delighted to support Tennessee students who are acquiring the skills they need to enter the workforce, said Dennis Wagner, Director of External and Legislative Affairs, AT&T Tennessee. Accelerated certificate and degree programs are a great way to ensure our students are fully prepared to enter the workforce and that they can find good jobs right here in Tennessee when they graduate.

The Tennessee Board of Regents Office of Academic Affairs developed a curriculum for accelerated pathways for college completion. The goal is to increase completion rates at the TBR community colleges. TBR created programs of study that encourage and allow students with work and family obligations to enroll on a full-time basis, devoting 20 to 30 hours a week, including online education. Students now have the option to complete required coursework for an Associate of Arts and Associate of Science degrees within three semesters.

Students in these new programs would benefit from scholarships that would enable them to participate fully in the four to five-hour morning, evening or weekend blocks of time required to complete an accelerated certificate or degree program. The proposed AT&T Completion Scholarship program ($5,000 to each of the 13 Tennessee Board of Regents community colleges) would allow the institutions to award financial support to students enrolled in these programs and increase completion and entry into the workforce in Tennessee.

13 Tennessee Board of Regents community colleges include:

Chattanooga State Community College  Chattanooga, TN

Cleveland State Community College  Cleveland, TN

Columbia State Community College  Columbia, TN

Dyersburg State Community College  Dyersburg, TN

Jackson State Community College  Jackson, TN

Motlow State Community College  Lynchburg, TN

Nashville State Community College  Nashville, TN

Northeast State Community College  Blountville, TN

Pellissippi State Community College  Knoxville, TN

Roane State Community College  Harriman, TN

Southwest Tennessee Community College  Memphis, TN

Volunteer State Community College  Gallatin, TN

Walters State Community College  Morristown, TN
A 21-year-old youth, who had set himself on fire during a rally on the Cauvery issue here, succumbed to burns on Friday.



The police said Vignesh was admitted to the government hospital in Kilpauk with 93% burns on Thursday.



Vignesh, hailing from Mannargudi in Tiruvarur district, was shifted to ICU after his condition worsened.

In a suicide note, Vignesh had said he was upset over the ongoing Cauvery row with Karnataka. This should be the last time a life is sacrificed for this cause, the note read.



About 200 cadres of Naam Tamizhar Katchi, led by Seeman, took out a rally in Chennai on Thursday morning. When they reached Egmore, Vignesh set himself ablaze.


The Union Water Resources Ministry is working on resolving the ongoing tussle over river water sharing between Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, before it takes a violent turn.





The two chief ministers are set to meet Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti in New Delhi on September 21 to resolve irritants in sharing of Krishna water. The meeting, initially scheduled for September 19, was postponed on a request from Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao.



Post-bifurcation blues between the states took a serious turn when Telangana unveiled new projects  Palamuru and Dindi  to divert Krishna water. Andhra Pradesh objected, raising apprehensions that the move will affect the existing ayacut in the Krishna delta and parched tracts of Rayalaseema.



In February 2015, special police guarding the Nagarjuna Sagar project on both sides clashed over the lifting of gates to release water.
A three-hour thundershower brought the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad to a standstill on Friday, inundating the roads and hindering thousands from getting home.





Traffic came to a standstill for four hours, as flood water choked the engines of vehicles and grinded them to a halt. Traffic was stalled in the IT and Financial district zone of Cyberabad.



Manikonda, Madapur, Gachibowli, Miyapur, Kukatpally, Amirpet, Somajiguda, Secunderabad Rail Nilayam, Charminar, Chandrayangutta, LB Nagar and Dilsukhnagar areas faced the worst traffic snarls, leaving residents under severe distress.



In Banjara hills, traffic went haywire for up to 4 kilometers with signaling system malfunctioned. The efforts of the GHMC workers to open manholes and de-clog drainages yielded no results as more water joined the overflowing drains.



Inflows from the catchment area triggered the overflow of Meeralam Tank that resulted in the flooding of the nearby Nehru Zoological Park and forcing it to shutdown indefinitely.



The zoos open area, particularly the lion safari, has been inundated with knee-deep water as authorities tried restricting the anilams to their cages.



Zoo authorities said nearly 1500 animals were in the danger of drowning as floodwater began filling their enclosures.



A team of engineers also inspected the Meeralam Tank for breaches and check its strength.

Power supply was affected in many areas including Srinagar colony, Yellareddyguda, Venakatagiri and Yousufguda with rainwater entering transformer enclosures.



South-Central Railway has either cancelled or diverted a few trains after a part of the Vikarabad-Kottagadi line was washed away.


The BJP distanced itself from the political turmoil in Arunachal Pradesh and blamed internal differences in the Congress after Chief Minister Pema Khandu and 42 MLAs switched over to regional outfit Peoples Party of Arunachal (PPA).





The PPA is a constituent of the BJP-floated North East Democratic Alliance.



The Congress, left with lone MLA and former chief minister Nabam Tuki, accused the BJP of engineering a defection despite a rebuke from the Supreme Court to usurp power through undemocratic ways.



The BJP has 11 MLAs in the 60-member Assembly.



Union Minister of Home Affairs Kiren Rijiju blamed the Congress for the political mess and said its cadres do not agree with their own leadership. The Supreme Court had reinstated the Congress government after finding fault with the attempts to foist a BJP-supported government in Arunachal Pradesh through the Presidents rule.



Congress MLAs, including the chief minister in Arunachal, are angry with their own central leadership. They have to wait in Delhi for four-five days to meet their own leaders. This has eventually led to MLAs joining a regional party. There is no more a Congress government in Arunachal Pradesh, Rijiju said.



Rijiju, who hails from Arunachal Pradesh, asked what anyone can do if the MLAs dont want to stay with the Congress.



Switchover gradual

The fresh political turnaround in Arunachal Pradesh was not a sudden development but a process that started right after the Congress government was reinstated in the state.



Sources said that after the Supreme Court order sacking the Kalikho Pul-led government, the 30 rebel Congress MLAs had to return to the party fold as they feared that they may lose their Assembly membership under anti-defection law.
Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Friday said the government would consider naming a metro station after Narayana Guru, a social reformer.





Speaking at the Brahmashree Narayana Guru Jayanthi programme at the Vidhana Soudha, he promised assistance for translation of works of Narayana Guru into Kannada from Malayalam and Sanskrit.
Two more youth succumbed to injures in hospitals, as violence, strike and curfew continued unabated in the Kashmir Valley for the 70th consecutive day on Friday.





Hospital officials said a 13-year-old teenager from south Kashmirs Pulwama district, who had sustained pellet injuries during clashes on September 5, succumbed at SMHS hospital here on Friday.



Rasik Ahmed Bhat (23), son of Muhammad Yousuf Bhat of Nowpora, Kulgam, was hit by a bullet in his head during clashes with security forces on September 5. The doctors declared him dead at 4 pm on Friday.



Another youth, identified as Rasiq Bhat, who was injured last week in clashes with security forces in Kulgam district of south Kashmir, succumbed at SKIMS hospital in Srinagar on Thursday evening, taking the death toll in the ongoing unrest to 82.



In Dooru village of south Kashmirs Anantnag district, 10 people were injured during fresh clashes between protesters and security forces after Fridays congregational prayers, reports said. Three among the injured have suffered pellet injuries.



Reports said at least a dozen protesters, including women, were injured at Ompura in central Kashmirs Budgam district when forces foiled a protest rally in the area. Scores of protesters were also injured during clashes in north Kashmirs Baramulla district.



A police official said curfew was re-imposed in the old city areas of Srinagar and major towns of the Valley to thwart the protests after Friday prayers.



Separatist leaders Syed Ali Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Yasin Malik in their weekly protest calendar asked the people to continue strike till September 22, with no relaxation in evenings. The new protest calendar is harsher than the ones they had been issuing since July 9 after the violence erupted in Kashmir a day after the killing of Hizbul commander Burhan Wani.



Daily protests

The separatists have asked the people to hold daily protests and rallies during the next seven days and not open markets even during the evenings.



The Internet services of all telecom networks and also mobile communications, except of the state-run BSNL, remained suspended for the fifth day in a row throughout Kashmir. The services had been shut a day ahead of Bakrid as a precautionary measure by the state government.



Meanwhile, curfew and deployment of Army continued in the border district of Rajouri in Jammu on the second consecutive day as violence erupted after Muslims were allegedly attacked for slaughtering a camel on Eid day. However, no fresh incident of violence was reported since Thursday night.



Activist barred from travelling to Geneva

The Jammu and Kashmir police on Friday detained a prominent human rights activist after he was barred from boarding a flight to attend UN Human Rights Council summit in Geneva, DHNS reports. The 39-year-old Khurram Parvez, who is the coordinator of the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society, a human rights organisation, was detained by the police at his Srinagar residence and prevented from travelling to Geneva. However, his two colleagues, including lawyer Parvez Imroz, were permitted to travel. Zahir-ud-Din, a fellow activist and journalist, said a magistrate ordered administrative detention for at least five days over charges of breaching the peace. The Amnesty International India in a statement demanded that Parvez must be immediately released, unless he is charged with recognisable criminal offences.
India on Friday prodded Nepal to act swift on amending its new Constitution to accommodate the aspirations of Madhesis, Tharus and other marginalised sections of its society.





I am confident that under your wise leadership, Nepal will successfully implement the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating the aspirations of all sections of your diverse society, Prime Minister Narendra Modi told his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal, as the two leaders addressed the media after a meeting in New Delhi. Dahal, who is also known as Prachanda, is on his first official visit to India after taking over as prime minister of Nepal for the second term on

August 4.



His meeting with Modi in New Delhi was followed by signing of three pacts, including a MoU for project management consultancy services for improvement of road infrastructure in Terai area of Nepal.
A three-year-old boy was charred to death while three passengers sustained burns after the bus they were travelling by caught fire near Humnabad in Bidar district on Friday.





The deceased has been identified as Veeyan, son of Ramprasad and Venkateshwari, residents of Gachibowli area in Hyderabad, the police said. The couple, along with their two children and Ramprasads mother, were returning from a pilgrimage to Shirdi.



The driver of the Hyderabad-bound luxury sleeper bus (PY01-CK-9522) belonging to Kaveri Travels, noticed fire in the rear engine and parked the vehicle near a dabha, three kilometres from Humnabad. The driver jumped from the vehicle and fled the spot. Flames rapidly engulfed the vehicle, police said, quoting eyewitnesses.



As panicked passengers got down from the burning bus, Ramprasad and his family too alighted from the vehicle. As the fire began to spread to the front portion of the bus, the family realised the Veeyan was fast asleep there. It was too late by the time Ramprasad rushed to rescue his younger son.



A major tragedy was averted with Ramavadh Singh, the owner of the dabha and his workers using the water in the dabha to douse the fire. They also broke the rear windshield of the bus to evacuate the passengers, eyewitnesses said. Fire tenders soon rushed to the spot and local people helped in salvaging the luggage of the passengers. Fire brigade personnel suspect that the fire might have erupted from the radiator as the vehicle was driven for long hours at high speed. However, the exact reason could be ascertained only after a probe, they said.



Nagalakshmi Bhavani Shankar, Varun Kumar and Divya, who suffered burns in the accident, were given first aid at the local government hospital and referred to Hyderabad for further treatment. Senior police officials visited the spot. A case has been registered at Humnabad police station.
The Karnataka State Child Rights Protection Commission (KSCRPC) has written to the Director General of Police, Rajasthan, to look into the issue of child marriage in the Gurjar community of that state.





Following the investigation of child marriages in North Karnataka, the commission found that most of the cases were reported from the Banjara community, a nomadic relative of the Gurjars.



Kripa Amar Alva, the commissions chairperson, met Manoj Bhatt, the Rajasthan DGP, to urge him to scrutinise marriages in the Gurjar community of Rajasthan and ensure that the rights of children are protected.



Low literacy rate



The letter states that the community has a low literacy rate and low sex ratio besides primitive practices.



Men as old as 70 years marry young girls between the age of 10 and 18, often taking more than one wife.



The girls are physically and sexually abused, and usually sold into flesh trade within a year. After observing such cases in Belagavi, Dharwad and various districts of North Karnataka, the KSCRPC is bringing the matter to the attention of the authorities in Rajasthan and Gujarat, where the Gurjar population is largely found.



Since such marriages and trafficking occur with the help of a strong network which exists across states, the KSCRPC has sought the help of authorities in charge there.


Life was affected in several districts of Tamil Nadu as the statewide bandh call given by farmers over the Cauvery river water dispute evoked a mixed response on Friday.





Leaders of various political parties and thousands of their cadres were arrested across Tamil Nadu when they tried to stage protests. All major Opposition parties, including the DMK, Congress, MDMK, DMDK, Tamil Manila Congress, VCK and PMK, offered full cooperation to farmers.



In Chennai, more than 200 DMK cadres, led by its leader M K Stalin and his sister Kanimozhi, were arrested when they tried to barge into the Egmore railway station.



Police also stopped similar attempts to blockade rail and road traffic in several districts.



While MDMK chief Vaiko was arrested in Trichy as he led a protest demonstration with the delta farmers, Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi leader Thirumavalavan was detained in Chennai as he tried to organise a rally.



DMDK leader Vijayakanth stayed away from the hunger strike organised by his party in Chennai due to health issues, though his wife Premalatha led the protest.



Barring a few incidents of stone-throwing and rail roko attempts, the bandh was overall peaceful.

In Chennai, protesters pelted an automobile showroom with stones and burnt an effigy of Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah. Transport and other essential services remained unaffected.



However, cinemas, malls, some private petrol pumps and vegetable shops were closed.



Delta districts such as Thanjavur, Tiruvarur, Trichy, Nagapattinam and some parts of Salem nearly came to a standstill with all the shops and businesses downing their shutters. Hundreds of farmers in the delta region were taken into custody when they tried to block roads and stage protests.



As most autorickshaws, taxis, private buses and lorries stayed off the roads in almost all the regions, including Chennai, private schools declared a holiday as a precautionary measure. There were stray attacks on vehicles in Coimbatore, Salem, Karur, Villupuram and other districts.



The strike prompted the government to deploy nearly one lakh security personnel from Thursday night in all the districts. Additional protection was also provided to organisations, business establishments and hotels linked to Karnataka.




The grand opening for the Cougar Cafe by Tasteful Gatherings was held at Cleveland State Community College on Friday. Tasteful Gatherings provides food service for the college, as well as catering service to both the college and the community.
The police on Friday decided to hand over the case of torching buses belonging to KPN Travels India Private Ltd (KPNTIPL) to the CID.





During the arson and riots in Bengaluru on Monday, as many as 42 buses belonging to KPNTIPL were set on fire at its depot at DSouza Nagar, off Mysuru Road.



A senior police officer said: A detailed report about the incident has been submitted to the DG&IGP by the city police. During a meeting with other senior police officers, it was decided that the case be handed over to the CID.



Till Wednesday, around seven people were arrested for torching buses. More arrests will made in the coming days. Bhagyashree, 32, a resident of DSouza Nagar, has been arrested by the police. She was seen attempting to set on fire one of the buses in the video footage obatained by the police.



Various versions about the incident are emerging and they still need to be investigated, added the officer, explaining the need to hand over the case to the CID.



As many as 141 cases have been registered in various police stations and 444 people have been arrested. Thousands of videos have been received from various sources and they are being verified to make sure they are not doctored. An intense investigation will be conducted to make sure that no innocent people are put behind bars, said the police.


Hundreds of commuters faced hardship as buses bound for city from Tamil Nadu were stopped a few kilometres away from the inter-state border at Attibele on Hosur Road on Friday in view of the bandh observed in the neighbouring state over the Cauvery row.





Similarly, buses from the city that were bound for Tamil Nadu were also stopped near the border. Drivers were not ready to cross the inter-state border as they feared violence.



Hapless passengers had to get down from the buses, walk a few kilometres and take buses on the other side of the border to reach their destinations.



A police officer from Bengaluru Rural district, who was camping at Attibele said, We provided security to people who were crossing the border. Announcements were made warning the public not to create any nuisance. The Tamil Nadu police were also appealing people not to panic.



A few volunteers distributed water packets and also served food to people who were stranded near Attibele and also to those who had to walk long distances to find alternative transport facility.



Seemanth Kumar Singh, Inspector General of Police (Central Range) said, Special forces along with the local police were deployed in border areas. The SPs had been directed to keep a vigil and update the senior officers about the situation. The vehicular movement at Attibele was low in view of the recent riots in the city, he said.



In view of the bandh in Tamil Nadu, security was heightened in Bengaluru which had witnessed violence on September 12. No untoward incidents were reported on Friday. The city police and special forces patrolled sensitive areas and those with huge Tamil population.



Police Commissioner N S Megharikh told DH that over 1,000 anti-social elements were taken into preventive custody from Thursday evening till the early hours of Friday.



The special forces and the police will continue to patrol the sensitive areas. Railway stations and major bus terminals have been provided additional security, he added.




The Congress has resolved to seek the support of the JD(S) to hold on to the reins of administration in the BBMP council, said KPCC president G Parameshwara.





Addressing the media after presiding over the officer-bearers meeting in the city on Friday, Parameshwara said members had also resolved to leave the decision on mayoral polls to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and himself.



Asked about the JD(S) demand for the mayors post this term, Parameshwara said his party will not be able to decide till he speaks to the JD(S) leadership. He said that last year, decisions pertaining to the BBMP polls had been finalised only after he had met H D Deve Gowda. This time too, it would be difficult to say anything on the matter, till he meets Gowda and H D Kumaraswamy, he added. He also hoped that the JD(S) might soften its stand after the meetings.



On certain MLCs adding their names to the voters list in Bengaluru in a bid to increase Congress vote count during the mayoral polls, Parameshwara said that there was a provision to do so, and that it was not a violation. After having lived in Bengaluru since 1987, he too had added his name to the voters list in the city recently. He is however planning to cast his vote as a Bengalurean in the 2018 Assembly elections, he added.



Preparations are under way for the mayoral elections, which is scheduled for September 28. Regional commissioner M V Jayanthi held a meeting on Friday with the Bengaluru Urban Deputy Commissioner V Shankar, BBMP Commissioner N Manjunath Prasad and other Palike officials.



She reviewed arrangements made for the elections. Jayanthi gave directions to the officials to make elaborate security arrangements as large number of supporters of the candidates may turn up at the BBMP Council on the day of election. The ACP of Halasuru Gate police sub-division was directed to place enough number of barricades and allow people only after seeing their passes.



BJP no to JD(S) riders on BBMP pact

BJP state president B S Yeddyurappa on Friday said the party was not ready to accept any conditions from the JD(S) for a tie-up in the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP).

Speaking to reporters in Bengaluru, Yeddyurappa pointed out that JD(S) state president H D Kumaraswamy had said that his party is willing to join hands with any party that would offer it the post of the mayor. The BJP cannot accept any conditions. In any case, the party has not applied its mind on this issue. Some party leaders in Bengaluru city unit are speaking to JD(S) leaders informally in their individual capacity, Yeddyurappa said.
The state government will examine if the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangha (RSS) had any role in stoking violence over the Cauvery issue in Bengaluru on September 12.





Speaking to reporters after presiding over the KPCC office-bearers meeting on Friday, Home Minister G Parameshwara said that during the meeting, a KPCC member wondered if the RSS had any role in instigating violence in the city.



He said the police had explored all angles during investigations and had no such suspicions on the RSS role. However, his department would again look into the matter, he added. In his reaction, RSS Kshetreeya Sanghachalak V Nagaraj said that Parameshwara had the malicious habit of making immature charges against the RSS.



Meanwhile, BJP state general secretary and MLA C T Ravi in a press note dubbed Parameshwaras statement as irresponsible and politically motivated. He made a counter-charge that violence in Bengaluru on Monday was stage-managed by Parameshwara with an intention to unseat Chief Minister Siddaramaiah.



Ravi charged that Parameshwara suspects Siddaramaiahs hand in his defeat from the Koratagere constituency in Tumakuru district in the 2013 Assembly elections and was keen on seeking revenge.



On Cauvery



Parameshwara said Karnataka would be doomed if the Supreme Court orders release of the Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu beyond September 20. If such a verdict is given, then I guess we will have no choice other than asking people of Bengaluru to go and settle down in Tamil Nadu, he observed. He said Karnataka would impress upon the apex court on evolving a distress mechanism.




Vice Chancellor of University of Cambridge, Sir Leszek Borysiewicz, was in the city on Friday as part of a delegation to India to focus on the various collaborations between his institution and Indian institutes that include a few from Bengaluru. He delivered a lecture at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc).





The delegation will attend key meetings with government officials and members of the academia. It will also interact with the National Centre for Biological Science and the IISc to decide on partnerships.

Speaking on Global collaboration in the face of global challenges, Borysiewicz explained why collaborations were increasingly important in the recent times.



Globalisation means that information transfers quickly, policy-makers are impatient to implement them, and yet the evidence that we would accept as scientists are imperfect by the time those decisions are made, he noted.



Borysiewicz mentioned the recent formalisation of the India-UK collaboration in crop-sciences  under which the University of Cambridge and other British research institutions will work with Indias Department of Biotechnology on some of the fundamentals of plant science.



The ultimate purpose of the initiative is the translation of this fundamental research into sustainable agriculture, improving food security and the lives of farmers, he said. He said that he would continue advocating closer collaboration between India and UK and more specifically, between our two institutions denoting IISc and the University of Cambridge.



I will continue to do whatever I can to ensure that the fruits of this closer collaboration make a meaningful contribution to society in India, in the UK, and beyond, he said.


Five more chikungunya deaths were reported in the city on Friday, taking the toll to 18 so far this season.





The Delhi government has now termed chikungunya a dangerous disease and directed all the hospitals to report the cases to the municipal corporations.



Dengue, the other mosquito-borne disease which has hit the capital this season, has so far claimed 13 lives.



To tackle the rush of patients which the city government hospitals are receiving from neighbouring states, the Centre-run hospitals will reserve 1,000 beds in its hospitals to treat patients suffering from vector-borne diseases.



In a joint meeting on Friday, the Centre, the Delhi government and the governments of neighbouring states decided to open fever clinics in National Capital Region so that patients are not forced to rush to the national capital and overburden the infrastructure here.



While two more persons died of chikungunya at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital on Thursday, one suspected chikungunya patient had succumbed to the disease on September 9 at another private hospital.



Ganga Ram Hospital authorities said that both patients, aged 70 and 75, were found positive for chikungunya. One of them had hypertension and the other one was diabetic, said the hospital. Both of them were admitted to the hospital in a critical stage. One died at 4.30 pm and the other at 5 pm on Thursday, it added. The Centre-run Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme said that it has received two cases of suspected chikungunya deaths at different hospitals.



Earlier in the day, Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain said that the government has asked the municipal corporations to notify chikungunya as dangerous disease.



It has come to light that hospitals were not providing addresses of the patients to the municipal corporations. Under the law, the MCD has to carry out fogging thrice in the area where the patient lives," said Jain. "But in the absence of addresses, the MCD was not able to do fogging at the residence of the patients, he added.



Jain requested Union Health Minister J P Nadda on Friday to reserve beds for such patients in each of the Centre-run hospitals here.



The Centre has agreed to reserve 1,000 beds in All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Ram Manohar Lohia and Safdarjung hospitals for patients suffering from vector borne diseases, said Jain.



Jain said that AIIMS has stated that 80% of the patients suffering from vector-borne disease, which the hospital is seeing, belong to neighbouring states.



Jain added that fever clinics will be opened at the National Capital Region (NCR) to treat people complaining of fever.



Jain added that some 1,500 beds have been lying unoccupied in Delhi government hospitals. No patient will be turned away.


I am a very proud employee of the Erlanger Health System, but I am also an individual who has experienced what it is like to have loved ones in need of exceptional mental healthcare. I have experience in seeing what happens to family members when they are turned away because the hospital did not feel it necessary to keep them, the illness was not severe enough.

The need for another mental health facility in our area is extremely important. I support Erlanger having the ability to build and operate a mental health facility with all that is in my soul.

I, to this day, know many who suffer from mental illness that cannot get the help they so greatly need and deserve. This is my personal opinion only, but one that I feel should count. The Parkridge appeal is an absolute slap in the face to this community and should be denounced by the great people of Chattanooga and surrounding area.

Jana Letner

* * *

Parkridge Valley stacks patients in hallways due to overcrowding. I am sure that Parkridge enjoys making their hallways prime income. To oppose a mental health facility that would serve the greatly underserved speaks volumes about Parkridge Valley and Hospital.

The lack of access to treatment for mental illness is so grossly under the demand or need, I cannot imagine anyone opposing Erlangers proposed mental health facility. Even with Erlanger's proposed facility, we sill still be an underserved community with regard to access to mental health care.

Erlanger is already the primary receiver of patients for certificate of need evaluations, because they accept everyone. Erlanger is the regions primary trauma center and the place where government transports patients in government custody. There is so little access to mental health care a large majority of the mentally ill end up in government custody.

Erlanger must have a mental health facility for patients requiring in patient mental health care under certificate of need. It is simply unethical to undertreat this population.

I will never have an ounce of respect for Parkridge Hospital for attempting to stop the construction of a facility that would greatly benefit our community, and the quality of life for so many. It is causing distress for so many in the community, who felt hope when Erlanger announced the new facility.

Of course, we, the people, do have say in this matter and timing is everything.

The Tennessee Health Service and Development Agency accepts public comments in advance of voting actions. A letter is very effective and the entire board is allowed to read the comments. I plan to write another one and attend the meeting, because Parkridge Hospital is not meeting all the mental health needs for the community, and is stacking patients in the hallways. Then, has the audacity to claim that Erlanger's proposed mental health facility is not needed. It is very disingenuous, of Parkridge, really it is a huge lie motivated in greed.

We, the people, can be heard in this matter. The Health Services and Development Agency folks listen to all sides.

I was able to get my letter considered by emailing directly to the Tennessee Health and Development Services contact, another means is to fill out a form requesting to speak to the matter. My opinion is that the Health Services and Board really values public perspective and their experiences with local facilities, and what they know about the lack of access to mental health in the Chattanooga area.

This information is directly from the Tennessee.gov website, and it is how I contacted them. Any citizen may have a voice in this matter, our community and our right to speak up.

Please send any comments to Mark Farber



Email: mark.farber@tn.gov

Attention: Mark Farber

502 Deaderick Street

Andrew Jackson Bldg., 9th Floor

Nashville, TN 37243

Phone: (615) 741-2364 or Fax: (615) 741-9884

I just checked the website for HSDA meetings and the agenda for September has not been posted. There is a little time to advocate for those cannot do this for themselves, write letters and be heard.



Let your voice be heard for better access to mental health care in Chattanooga. We probably should rent a bus and go to this hearing. There is a lot at stake. If Parkridge prevails in their mission of greed, our community loses a $25 million facility that will significantly expand mental health care in our community.

It is total shame the Partridge is not conveying truth and willing to harm an entire population of sick people for greed.

April Eidson

* * *

The Chattanooga area is in dire need of a better option/choice for mental health care and, I'm sorry, but Parkridge is not living up to those means with Parkridge Valley.

I've seen firsthand with a family member the way things are done at Valley, and I was none too impressed. Without divulging too much info, let's just say they took a small problem, fueled the fire with a medication against our pleas not to do that, and made it an even bigger problem without even treating the actual issue at hand. So now we had mental health issues and an addict, just as we said we would. Great job, guys.

Then that bigger problem they created landed this family member in their ICU later for an overdose...to which they sent them home in withdrawals. No offer to admit to Valley was ever made. When we asked, they said "Valley is currently at capacity. It's a two week wait." So we were left to deal with their mess.

That situation is only a very, very, very brief outline of what happened. The full details involved so many questionable treatments and practices on the part of the Parkridge system that I'm quite sure if we were the lawsuit happy type -- we'd have a sure win.

We need more options and we need better options. If I'm severely sick and need to go to the ER, I can choose between several area hospitals. Shouldn't we be able to do that with a mental health care facility? Point blank, the whole issue (to me) just looks like a business issue, and Parkridge is afraid they might lose a couple of greenbacks at the hand of big, bad, Erlanger.

Chattanooga and the surrounding area deserve this facility and better access to mental health care, and any company (or hospital) that tries to deny us that is just doing a disservice to their community all in the name of greed. You can ensure I won't forget our dealings with Parkridge...and you can bet I won't discount this little showing out either when I need to choose a health care provider.

Logan Carmichael






MIAMI, 12 September 2016 (University of Miami)  In a first-of-its-kind study, researchers from the University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies at James Cook University showed that increased carbon dioxide concentrations alters brain chemistry that may lead to neurological impairment in some fish. Understanding the impacts of increased carbon dioxide levels in the ocean, which causes the ocean to become more acidic, allows scientists to better predict how fish will be impacted by future ocean acidification conditions. Coral reef fish, which play a vital role in coral reef ecosystems, are already under threat from multiple human and natural stressors, said lead author of the study Rachael Heuer, a UM Rosenstiel School alumna which conducted the study as part of her Ph.D. work. By specifically understanding how brain and blood chemistry are linked to behavioral disruptions during CO2 exposure, we can better understand not only what may happen during future ocean acidification scenarios, but why it happens. In this study, the researchers designed and conducted a novel experiment to directly measure behavioral impairment and brain chemistry of the Spiny damselfish, (Acanthochromis polyacanthus) a fish commonly found on coral reefs in the western Pacific Ocean. During a three-week period, the scientists collected spiny damselfish from reefs off Lizard Island located on Australias Great Barrier Reef. The fish were separated into two groupsthose exposed to ordinary CO2 control conditions and those exposed to elevated CO2 levels that are predicted to occur in the near future, but have already been observed in many coastal and upwelling areas throughout the world. Following the exposure, the fish were subjected to a behavioral test, and brain and blood chemistry were measured. The unique behavioral test, employed a two-choice flume system, where fish were given the choice between control seawater or water containing a chemical alarm cue, which they typically avoid since it represents the smell associated with an injured fish of its own species. The researchers found that the damselfish exposed to elevated carbon dioxide levels were spending significantly more time near the chemical alarm cue than the control fish, a behavior that would be considered abnormal. The measurements of brain and blood chemistry provided further evidence that elevated CO2 caused the altered behavior of the fish. For the first time, physiological measurements showing altered chemistry in brain and blood have been directly linked to altered behavior in a coral reef fish, said UM Rosenstiel School Maytag Professor of Ichthyology and lead of the RECOVER Project Martin Grosell, the senior author of the study. Our findings support the idea that fish effectively prevent acidification of internal body fluids and tissues, but that these adjustments lead to downstream effects including impairment of neurological function. If coral reef fish do not acclimate or adapt as oceans continue to acidify, many will likely experience impaired behavior that could ultimately lead to increased predation risk and to negative impacts on population structure and ecosystem function, said Heuer, currently a postdoctoral researcher at the University of North Texas. This research supports the growing number of studies indicating that carbon dioxide can drastically alter fish behavior, with the added benefit of providing accurate measurements to support existing hypotheses on why these impairments are occurring. The study, titled Altered brain ion gradients following compensation for elevated CO2 are linked to behavioural alternations in a coral reef fish, was published in the 13 September 2016 online issue of the journal Scientific Reports. The studys co-authors include: Rachael Heuer; Martin Grosell; Megan J. Welch and Jodie L. Rummer and Philip L. Munday from the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies at James Cook University. The National Science Foundation, a University of Miami Koczy Fellowship, and the ARC Centre of Excellence provided funding support for the study. Heuer was also funded by an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship to conduct the research.
Michael Giacchino Will Now Compose Music For Rogue One
RCom and Aircel have signed official documents that will lead to the largest-ever consolidation in the Indian telecom sector.

The combination of the Indian number four and its smaller rival would push the resulting entity into third place in Indias competitive market, with around 188 million mobile connections giving it a market share of 18%.

This would position it ahead of the current third placed operator Idea Cellular, which has a 17% share with 175 million connections, and just behind number two Vodafone India, which has a 19% share with 198 million. Bharti Airtel leads the market with 254 million connections giving it a 25% share.

The merged unit  currently known as MergedCo  will be split evenly between the RCom and Aircels parent Maxis Communications, with each holding 50% and being represented equally on the board and committees.

The companies are also looking for a third partner to generate equity of INR60 billion ($895 million). It has been reported that they are in talks with Russian group Sistema, which has a 10% stake in RCom following the Indian firms acquisition of Sistema Shyam Teleservices last year for around $690 million.

Merger negotiations between RCom and Aircel had been underway for almost a year, with the exclusivity period for talks twice extended. The parties agreed fairly early on that if they went ahead with the decision, the resulting entity would have a 50:50 ownership structure.

RCom is including its wireless business in the merger, and is spinning off the unit from the main company to enable this. The operator will retain ownership of its data centre, enterprise and fibre optic assets. The agreement still requires approval from shareholders and the regulator, as well as lenders consent, but if these are granted it is expected to close in 2017.

The merged unit will be able to enjoy spectrum sharing and trading agreements struck between RCom and newcomer Reliance Jio Infocomm after the regulator TRAI relaxed the rules on these practices last year. The debutante firm is managed by Mukesh Amabani, the brother of Reliance Group chairman Anil Ambani.

Jio acquire 800MHz spectrum across nine regions from RCom, while the firms agreed to share bandwidth in 17 of Indias 22 service areas.
Oliver Stone Makes The Edward Snowden Story All Too Simple

By Joel Wicklund in Arts & Entertainment on Sep 16, 2016 1:00PM



Edward Snowden (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is tested in "Snowden." (Photo credit: JArgen Olczyk / Distributor: Open Road Films.)

What is Oliver Stone's least favorite color?

Any shade of gray.

Snowden, the latest film from the wildly overrated director/provocateur, continues Stone's long history of avoiding ambiguities or uncomfortable complexities that might diminish his intended message. Too bad, because Edward Snowden's story is where ambiguity meets irony: the man who did so much to reveal the widespread surveillance abuses of the U.S. government was granted sanctuary in Russiaa country notorious for widespread surveillance abuse.

Snowden's advocates point out that, having been denied asylum elsewhere (largely due to pressure the U.S. applied in the aftermath of his disclosures), the computer intelligence analyst had little choice: either face espionage charges in America, which had taken harsh measures against early whistleblowers, or accept safe haven in Russia. But it doesn't make you an NSA apologist to speculate that Vladimir Putin's government didn't welcome Snowden out of sheer generosity. (Snowden, to his credit, has recently publicly criticized Russian surveillance policy.)

But Stone isn't the kind of filmmaker to dwell on the murkier aspects of Snowden's situation. Instead, his movie paints a portrait of an idealist torn between his deep patriotism and his growing despair as the full scope of his country's internal spying becomes clear. That may be an accurate portrait of Snowden, but it's diminished by the movie's lack of context concerning what led us into this quicksand of invasiveness.

Clearly, throughout American history, many very honorable men and women saw their own ideals slowly eroded in the name of protecting America from its enemies. That was true long before 9/11 and even more so after it. But the Snowden screenplay by Stone and Kieran Fitzgerald assumes mass audiences can't handle grappling with a long, slippery slope to diminished freedom. So Snowden's fictionalized CIA trainer (Rhys Ifans, conveying little but cold menace) goes from being a mere mouthpiece of rationalization to a literal Big Brotherthe projection of his head filling an entire wall as he grills Snowden during a video conference. The ham-fisted symbolism is pure Stone.

To be fair, that scene aside, Snowden shows much more subtlety than many of Stone's films (Natural Born Killers may be his in-your-face nadir). That's largely thanks to a skillful lead performance by Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Capturing much of Snowden's voice and physical attributes, the actor makes the protagonist's intense stress and crushing disappointment in his government palpable.



Shailene Woodley and Joseph Gordon-Levitt in "Snowden." (Photo credit: William Gray / Distributor: Open Road Films.)

As his girlfriend, Lindsay Mills, Shailene Woodley also helps to make some largely expository dialogue feel real. Stone anchors the film as a troubled love story, with Snowden's secrecy taking a toll their life together. It's the most involving part of the movie, but it's overshadowed by an overall dramatic clunkiness.

Top-notch actors, including Tom Wilkinson and Melissa Leo, are wasted in undemanding supporting roles, while Nicolas Cage manages to be reasonably restrained as a sympathetic CIA instructor. But what's the point of a restrained Nic Cage? If he can't let his freak flag of overacting genius fly, why cast him?

Stylistically, Stone remains an empty razzle-dazzle artist. To his credit, he often swings for the fences with off-kilter camera angles, daring tracking shots and energetic editing. He has never been accused of playing it safe, but like the similarly heavy-handed Spike Lee, Stone rarely misses an opportunity to overdo it. He wants to be Scorsese, but he's closer to Tony Scott (Top Gun, The Last Boy Scout).

The issues and themes of Snowden are clearly right up Stone's alley. Important social and political happenings have informed nearly all his movies. But in handling what may be the most vital story about government surveillance in American history, he seems far out of depth.

Snowden's story has been told onscreen before, in the Oscar-winning documentary Citizenfour, and one might argue the weight of the true storyone that could put our faith in democracy in doubtis too much for dramatization.

Yet 40 years ago, All the President's Men managed to carry the same kind of burden with much more finesse. Nixon's Watergate seems almost trivial compared to the massive scandal Snowden shed light on. But All the President's Men showed a dramatic film could tackle an historic moment in government exposure with impressive results. Edward Snowden isn't the wrong subject for a drama, Oliver Stone was simply the wrong man for the job.

Snowden. Directed by Oliver Stone. Screenplay by Stone and Kieran Fitzgerald; based partially on "The Snowden Files" by Luke Harding and "Time of the Octopus" by Anatoly Kucherena. Starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Shailene Woodley, Melissa Leo, Zachary Quinto, Tom Wilkinson and Rhys Ifans. 134 mins. Rated R.

Now playing at theaters nationwide.
Environmental and lifestyle factors have significant effects on obesity among people who carry the most obesity genes, researchers claim.

These findings, presented at the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD) meeting in Munich, Germany reveal that people at high risk of obesity due to environment and genes will find it hard to maintain a normal weight.

Researchers at the University of Exeter said that while susceptibility to obesity and type 2 diabetes has strong genetic links, it is unknown how genes interact with environment to predispose people to these conditions.

Professor Timothy Frayling and Dr Jess Tyrrell say that their findings contradict previous studies that suggest one aspect of environment, such as eating processed foods and sugary drinks, are especially to blame for obesity. Instead, they argue that no one aspect of the environment is to blame.

The findings were made following an analysis of 120,000 individuals from the UK BioBank. The researchers tested several aspects of the environment, such as time spent watching TV and self-reported physical activity, and measured obesity-related genetic variants. They also examined socioeconomic status.

The authors found that people of below socioeconomic status and high genetic risk were more likely to be overweight.

Frayling and Tyrell said that this relationship has not been thoroughly explored before, and added that while socioeconomic differences do not make people obese, they could explain the addition of a few kgs of weight.

Our findings suggest that there is no particular aspect of the environment or behaviour that if altered would have a preferential benefit over others, said the researchers.

Public health measures aiming to alter all aspects of the obesogenic environment in small ways may have more impact in lowering the prevalence of obesity and type 2 diabetes than targeting a single or few aspects.
Clean-tech industrial oil re-refining company Hydrodec s half year revenues rose, boosted by a new plant opening in the US.

For the six months ended 30 June, revenues from the continuing core re-refining business increased by 148% to $8.1m, compared to the same period last year, due the company commissioning a new plant in Canton, Ohio at the end of 2015 and increased market penetration.

Gross unit margins in continuing business were higher than last, despite lower product sale prices and challenging market conditions.

The AIM listed company is continuing to cut costs and during the period costs fell 29% to $1.5m.

The loss on group earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) from continuing operations narrowed by 68% to $1.1m, and the company expects to move to a positive EBITDA in the second half of the year.

The overall loss for the period narrowed by 37% to $5.3m.

Operating cash outflow was reduced by 65.5% to $2m.

Sales volumes of premium quality Superfine, a transformer and base oil, soared to 16.75m litres from 1.7m litres last year. In June there were record sales of 3.2m litres.

The company was improving utilisation as the Canton plant reached 76% in May it said it had improved efficiency in the plant in Bomen, Australia.

The Superfine transformer oil achieved 500 hour oil status in the US, to certify that it is a high quality transformer oil, which is a prerequisite to access the larger power transformer market.

Chief executive Chris Ellis, said: Today's results confirm significant progress in the turnaround of the company over the first half of the year. Our key objective during the rest of the year is to strengthen margins as we grow market share and seek to leverage the recent carbon credit approval in the US, whilst continuing the program of cost reduction.

He added that volumes and margins in the third quarter to date remain consistent with the second quarter and, with both operations now generating positive EBITDA, the company continues to make strong progress towards positive EBITDA in the second half of the year.

Shares in Hydrodec were down 10.67% to 2.68p at 1157 BST.
Admiral Group: Berenberg reiterates hold with a target price of 1804p.

Vodafone: Barclays reiterates overweight, 260p target.

Next: HSBC keeps at hold with a 4485p target.

Asos: JP Morgan reiterates overweight with a 5400p target.

Moneysupermarket: RBC stays at outperform with a 400p target.

Morrison: HSBC keeps at buy with a target price of 135p.

Ocado: Goldman Sachs maintains buy with a target price of 450p.

Hargreaves Lansdown: JP Morgan stays at underweight with a 1100p target.

Faroe Petroleum: Jefferies keeps at buy with a target of 100p.

Associated British Foods: HSB reiterates overweight with a 3150p target.

Ophir Energy: UBS reiterates buy with a 105p target.

BAE Systems: Jefferies stays at buy with a 600p target.
The United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) has a new leader as former deputy leader Diana James takes the reins from the controversial Nigel Farage, who stepped down following Britain's vote to leave the European Union in June.

James had been the favourite to fill Farage's shoes, and won the election with 8,451 votes, ahead of Lisa Duffy on 4,591.

The party gained notoriety in the last four years as anti-Europe sentiment crept in to the UK's political atmosphere, and the culmination was the Leave vote which triumphed in the historic referendum.

At a noisy UKIP conference, James proclaimed "Yes to a 100% European Union exit. Can I be any clearer? Yes to a sovereign independent UK. Yes to a UK free to make trade deals with whoever and whenever we want and yes to an immigration policy that allows entry regardless of origin to those with the skills and the expertise and the social values that this country wants."

The new leader is expected to steer the party in a different direction than the charismatic Farage, and is generally seen as a safe pair of hands.

She challenged new UK prime minister Theresa May - referred to as "Magpie May" - to invoke Article 50 and accused her of stealing her party's ideas for government policy.

"From one grammar school girl to another, stop the faff, stop the fudge and the farce. Get on with it. Invoke article 50 and give Ukip the best Christmas present," James said.
European Union leaders gathered in Bratislava on Friday to attempt to negotiate the fallout from Britain's impending exit discussions, as German Chancellor Angela Merke l described the bloc as having reached a critical point.

27 of the EU's member states met in the capital of Slovakia on Wednesday to discuss how they would approach the issue with the one which was not present, the UK.

Merkel did not downplay the seriousness of the situation that Europe now finds itself in.

"We need solutions for Europe and we are in a critical situation," Merkel said as she arrived at the gathering.

"You can't solve all Europe's problems in one summit," she added. "What we have to do is show in our deeds we can do things better in the realms of security and fighting terrorism, and in the field of defence."

Pressure is mounting among several prominent member states, after Luxembourg's foreign minister attacked Hungary, saying they should be thrown out for their treatment of asylum seekers. The viability of the European project has been propelled into chaos following Britain's shock vote to elope from the union.

French president Francois Hollande issued a rallying cry to other members on his arrival to the conference.

"Either we move in the direction of disintegration, of dilution, or we work together to inject new momentum, we relaunch the European project," he said.

Before the summit, president of the European Council Donald Tusk challenged those at the meeting to be "brutally honest" about the upcoming difficulties that they would face.

"We havent come to Bratislava to comfort each other or even worse to deny the real challenges we face in this particular moment in the history of our community after the vote in the UK," Tusk admitted.

A series of meetings were held in Bratislava as the EU gets to grip with the reality that discussions with Britain are going to happen in the near future, most likely at the beginning of 2017.
US presidential candidate Donald Trump has vowed to bring in a radical overhaul of the country's tax system, in order to stimulate growth and create 25m new jobs.

Speaking in front of the Economic Club of New York, the Republican nominee was attempting to solidify his economic policy, which has been criticised for not taking key considerations into account.

He said the new tax plan would relieve the state of $4.4trn over the next ten years, which would be offset by an increase in revenue and jobs.

"American cars will travel the roads," he beamed, "American planes will soar the skies, American ships will patrol the seas, American steel will send new skyscrapers into the clouds, American hands will rebuild this nation, and American energy harvested from American sources will power this nation."

Trump's proposal included reducing the number of individual tax brackets from seven to three, as well as lowering corporate tax to 15%.

Further proposals ranged from cutting regulations on environmental and consumer protection, to completely scrapping rules on power-plant emissions and food-safety standards.

"My economic plan rejects the cynicism that says our labor force will keep declining, that our jobs will keep leaving and that our economy can never grow as it did once before," Trump added.

Trump has been gaining momentum in the race for the White House as Hillary Clinton falters both physically and in the polls. Recent surveys suggest he is making up ground in key states at the expense of his Democratic rival.

Earlier this week, Oxford Economics predicted that the US economy may actually shrink by a total of $1trn after one term of a Trump presidency, taking into account his proposed tax regulations and the promise to rip up trade deals with emerging nations.
Eight British overseas territories and crown dependencies could face EU economic sanctions for tax evasion, the Guardian reported on Friday.

Anguilla, Bermuda, the British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Guernsey, Isle of Man and Jersey have been flagged up for their low tax rate, which can attract companies or individuals seeking to avoid or evade European taxes.

Experts in Brussels have published a scorecard showing a list of 81 countries with red flag warnings, which will be whittled down to a shortlist of countries selected for further screening after discussions among member states.

The EU Commission is currently discussing which sanctions to impose on the countries on the final list, due to be published by the end of the year. Options include the introduction of additional taxes, known as withholding taxes or the removal of tax deductions.

This would make it much less attractive for companies to invest or do business in these jurisdictions said the European commission in a paper published in January.

Pierre Moscovici, the European commissioner for economic and financial affairs plans to reform behaviour inside the EU by adopting a more coordinated approach to how member states tax multinationals.

Brussels hopes that this coordinated move by EU member states would send a strong signal of Europes determination to address tax avoidance and evasion.

These plans known as the common consolidated corporate tax base (CCCTB) have faced resistance by both Ireland and the UK.

Treasury minister, David Gauke said: The CCCTB has been around a very long time. It is a proposal still looking for a justification.

The UKs ability to influence discussions about which jurisdictions make it on to the final tax haven list however will be limited following the Brexit vote. Britain has previously fought hard to protect the interests of its overseas territories and crown dependencies.

Supporters of the policy, on the other hand, feel the UKs exit from the EU will remove an obstacle to the major tax policy reform.
Phoenix Group has confirmed it is evaluating the possibility of acquiring Abbey Life Assurance from Deutsche Bank following reports on Thursday by Bloomberg and Reuters suggesting the two were nearing a deal over the bank's UK insurance business.

As stated at the time of the interim results on 25 August 2016, Phoenix continues to explore further acquisition opportunities in the UK closed life sector. In this context, Phoenix is in advanced discussions with Deutsche Bank in relation to a possible acquisition of Abbey Life, the FTSE 250 company said on Friday.

It added that there can be no certainty the discussions will lead to a transaction.
Rahm May Discuss How Absentee Fathers Contribute To Gang Violence In Upcoming Speech

By Sarah Gouda in News on Sep 16, 2016 8:35PM



Mayor Rahm Emanuel earlier this year (Getty Images)

Mayor Rahm Emanuel is apparently connecting the city's epidemic of violence with absentee fathers in African-American families, according to sources privy to a preview of an upcoming policy speech.

The Chicago Sun-Times reports:

Sources said stakeholders invited to City Hall to hear broad strokes of the mayors speech were surprised by how direct Emanuel plans to be about a sociological problem he views as a driving force behind Chicagos cycle of gang violence. During sessions akin to focus groups, Emanuel talked about encountering only one black father in all of the homes, hospital rooms, churches and funerals he has visited after innocent children were gunned down or wounded on the streets of Chicago.

An anonymous source called Emanuel's approach "either courageous or foolhardy" given his standing in many communities , "Hes right that there needs to be a conversation about this. Im not sure hes the right messenger. But you cant keep waiting for the right messenger to come along.

Shari Runner, president and CEO of the Chicago Urban League, who was in the audience for one of these previews, told the Sun-Times, "The absence of the father in the black community is not attributable to the fact that they do not want to be there. When all of the fathers are either in prison or dead, they cant possibly be at the bedsides of their children."

The Sun-Times' article may be a trial balloon for Emanuel and his team; deputy mayor Andrea Zopp told the newspaper that the meetings have been very open, honest and authentic" when regarding tough issues.

The mayor also said in these previews that he plans to nearly triple the Becoming a Man program to reach 8,000 students. The initiative was found to cut arrests for at-risk youths by 35% and raise graduation rates by 19%.
The FTSE 250 was in the green in Friday afternoon trading, after banking shares were rattled by news US authorities have asked Deutsche Bank for $14bn to settle an investigation.

Among the leading risers was SVG Capital, after it posted its results for the six months to 31 July on Friday, with a net asset value per share of 735p at period end - a 12% increase in the six months.

The firm reported a significant uplift from currency in the period, with the NAV seeing a 6% increase at constant currencies.

Over 12 months, SVGs NAV had risen 21%.

The board reported its investment portfolio saw total return of 13% over the six months, with its core investment portfolio - 50% of the net investment portfolio - continuing to perform well with 13% total return as well.

Private healthcare provider Spire Healthcare was also surging on Friday following a report that peer Mediclinic was preparing a bid for the remainder of the company.

Betaville cited people familiar with the matter as saying that Mediclinic was working with Morgan Stanley and could be weeks away from submitting a formal approach for Spire.

The offer was seen to be at a 30% premium to Spire Healthcares current share price.

In June 2015, South Africas Mediclinic bought a 29.9% stake in Spire from private equity group Cinven for 360p a share.

Acacia Mining was under pressure, after it earlier reiterated its full-year production guidance for its Bulyanhulu mine and for the group as a whole, despite setbacks in resuming production at its processing plant at the former site following planned maintenance.

Thanks to the strong performance to date at North Mara, one of its three mines in operation in Tanzania, the outfit still expected its total third quarter output to be in line with that of the first quarter.

The gold miner carried out a two-week shutdown of its vertical shaft at Bulyanhulu to modernise the production and service winders. In parallel, a programme of works was undertaken on the process plant.

FTSE 250 - Risers

Spire Healthcare Group (SPI) 406.60p 12.66%

Euromoney Institutional Investor (ERM) 1,172.00p 6.26%

Galliford Try (GFRD) 1,276.00p 5.37%

SVG Capital (SVI) 682.00p 4.84%

Evraz (EVR) 136.90p 4.50%

Countrywide (CWD) 237.70p 3.75%

JRP Group (JRP) 119.20p 3.65%

Millennium & Copthorne Hotels (MLC) 450.90p 3.63%

BTG (BTG) 637.50p 3.57%

Genus (GNS) 2,019.00p 3.54%

FTSE 250 - Fallers

Acacia Mining (ACA) 453.70p -9.26%

Centamin (DI) (CEY) 137.20p -3.24%

Debenhams (DEB) 57.05p -2.56%

Bovis Homes Group (BVS) 860.00p -2.16%

Aldermore Group (ALD) 169.10p -1.74%

Amec Foster Wheeler (AMFW) 537.50p -1.74%

Ashmore Group (ASHM) 346.20p -1.73%

McCarthy & Stone (MCS) 167.80p -1.64%

Polymetal International (POLY) 989.50p -1.64%

Petrofac Ltd. (PFC) 801.00p -1.42%
5 things we learned from Ohio State-Penn State

Ohio State moved to 8-0 with a 44-31 win over Penn State. Here's what we learned about the Buckeyes from their performance Saturday in Happy Valley.
China's National Tourism Administration has joined the investigation into the violent episode between eight Chinese tourists and a restaurant owner in Jeju-do, South Korea.

It's reported that the travelers clashed with the owner last week because of the restaurant's policy banning outside food and drinks.

The restaurant owner is in hospital suffering from a cerebral hemorrhage. The local police arrested the Chinese tourists, five of them remain in custody.

China's consulate-general in Jeju-do said both sides in the case are Chinese citizens, suggesting it would be preferable to seek reconciliation out of court.

The National Tourism Administration has sent staff to learn more about the case and assist the consulate-general with the investigation.

If found guilty, the tourists will face punishment in accordance with Korean law and could also face a blacklist status imposed by the Chinese authorities. This blacklist is imposed on Chinese tourists that display unruly behavior while traveling abroad, and limits their future rights to overseas tourism.
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This is the fourth election cycle in which the Affordable Care Act has been in play, struggling for acceptance from a divided public and politcians.



By RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR

Associated Press

WASHINGTON  President Barack Obama told insurers this week his health care overhaul has had some growing pains. But with premiums rising and marquee insurers bailing, could the real diagnosis be failure to thrive?

The medical term refers to when patients, often youngsters but also adults, fail to achieve or maintain proper weight. This is the fourth election cycle in which the Affordable Care Act has been in play, struggling for political traction and a healthy level of acceptance from a divided public.





. . .
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BURLEY, Idaho (AP)  Federal officials have approved the first geothermal project on Idaho's public land since the 1980s.

The Times-News reports that the Burley Bureau of Land Management has given the go-ahead for Walker Ranch Energy's geothermal project, which will include a plant about 13 miles south of Malta.





. . .
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BOSTON (AP)  America's oldest lighthouse station is being honored as it turns 300 years old.

U.S. Coast Guard Commandant Paul Zukunft called Boston Light a landmark that will stand the test of time at a waterfront Boston celebration Wednesday.





. . .
The Dalai Lama' s recent terrorist-sympathizing remarks have again shocked the world, and provided for those in the West who used to exchange backing him for selfish political gains a chance to see the monk's true colors.

The fugitive Tibetan religious leader is now in France for a six-day visit "to promote Tibetan culture, language and ecological protection," as he has claimed.

While traveling in the European country, he urged talks with the Islamic State extremists, saying talks are "the only way" to end bloodshed in Syria and Iraq without explaining how that is possible.

It is not the first time the monk has made such a highly controversial remark, which has been savagely criticized in Europe and the wider world.

His call for Europe to take in refugees without conditions has also irritated many in the continent, who blame him for being purely hypocritical and totally devoid of common sense. That provides a good enough reason for Paris to shun him.

It is reported that no high ranking French officials, including President Francis Hollande, have plans to meet him. His itinerary was restricted to Paris and Strasbourg, while his audiences were limited to local residential Tibetans, some lawyers and religious leaders, as well as a small number of lawmakers.

Although the Dalai Lama has for long claimed to have abandoned politics and only focus on protecting the Tibetan culture, language and ecology, he devoted his visit to France to mainly spreading his political ideas in a bid to maintain influence.

In an interview with AFP, the Dalai Lama said the purpose of his visit was to meet people rather than shaking hands with the country's leaders.

But if one compares the Dalai Lama's current visit with his previous visits to France, it is easy to see his influence in the West has shrunk rapidly.

It is worth noting that the Dalai Lama, who has been living in India for decades, has never uttered one word about the rampant poverty in that country. On the contrary, he has often caused division and trouble in the Himalayan region and helped stunt economic and social development there.

Moreover, despite his repeated denial, the Dalai Lama has been trying to split Tibet from China.

It is never a secret that some Western politicians have treated the Dalai Lama as a tool to criticize China over its Tibetan policy so as to score cheap political points at home. With his shocking comments, the monk has become for them more of a political burden than an asset. It is also a fine opportunity for the Western governments to start thinking about what kind of relations they should have with the Dalai Lama in the future.

The choice between backing a separatist and terrorist-sympathizer and working with China on the basis of respecting its territorial integrity is not that difficult to make after all.
India today signed an agreement extending a line of credit of $750 million for post-earthquake reconstruction of Nepal, in a step that would bring relief to millions of people affected by last year's devastating earthquake. India also agreed to extend additional line of credit for new projects such as Phase-2 of Terai project, roads, power transmission lines, substations and a polytechnic in Kaski. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Nepalese counterpart Prachanda today held extensive and productive discussions, covering the full spectrum of bilateral cooperation. Modi conveyed to PM Prachanda of India's abiding faith in Nepal and its people and that the country stood ready to strengthen its development partnership with Nepal, adding that whatever this country does, it would do as per the priorities of the people and government of Nepal. ''Open borders between our countries provide great opportunities for cooperation and interaction among our people,'' Modi said, adding, ''We also agree that our security interests are closely aligned and inter-linked.'' ''We must also continue to guard against elements that seek to misuse the border.'' The two sides pledged continued close cooperation between defence and security agencies of the two countries, which, they pointed out, is important for growing trade, economic, cultural and development partnership, and for the well being of our two peoples. ''Trade, connectivity, in all its dimensions development projects and mutual investments are key pillars of our partnership with Nepal. ''India's initiatives for open sky, cross-border power trade, transit routes, cross-border connectivity would directly benefit Nepal and help strengthen our economic partnership. ''Nepal and India are also closely working on a range of areas of economic engagement including energy and water resources sectors, '' Modi said. Besides, he said, the two sides agreed to push for speedy and successful implementation of the ongoing hydro-power projects, and development and operationalisation of transmission lines. This would be a source of much needed energy, and revenue generation for Nepal. We have also agreed on the need to add depth and vitality to links between our societies. We have agreed to show case our shared Buddhist heritage, and focus on the development of Ayurveda and other traditional systems of medicine, Modi said, adding that the two countries will focus on close monitoring and time bound completion of all development projects. And, as Nepal undergoes a political transition, India pitched for implementing the country's Constitution by accommodating aspirations of all sections and assured Kathmandu of all possible support amid China's efforts to gain ground in the Himalayan nation. It is Prachanda's first visit to India after becoming prime minister for the second time after KP Sharma Oli quit in July following fresh political turmoil due to the protest of Madheshi community against the new Constitution. The two countries also decided to continue cooperation in areas of defence and security. In a statement to media after the talks, Modi said India hoped Nepal would be successful in implementing the Constitution through inclusive dialogue, accommodating the aspirations of all sections of its diverse society. ''As immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability and economic prosperity [Shanti, Sthirta aur Samrudhi] of Nepal is our shared objective,'' the Prime Minister said in the presence of Prachanda. On his part, the Nepalese Prime Minister said his country has nothing but ''goodwill'' for India and that destinies of both the countries are ''interlinked''.








The United States has said that it would encourage Afghan President Ashraf Ghani's move of asking Pakistan to include India in the transit trade agreement for stronger trade relations between all the countries of the region. Speaking at the daily press briefing in Washington, deputy spokesperson of the US State Department Mark C Toner said, ''I would just say, speaking broadly, that we would support stronger trade relations within the region. And we've long said that it's a priority for the United States at least, but it should be a priority for the countries in the region to all work more cooperatively and constructively together. And, a trade agreement would be part of that.'' On being asked by a reporter what was his position on Afghanistan asking for India's inclusion in the transit trade agreement it has with Pakistan, Toner replied, ''I think we would encourage, as I said, stronger trade relations between all the countries of the region.'' The Afghanistan-Pakistan Transit Trade Agreement (APTTA) is a bilateral trade agreement between Islamabad and Kabul. It has been renegotiated several times. The treaty was first signed in 1950 and gave Afghanistan the right to import duty-free goods through Karachi. On being asked about Afghanistan's stand that if India is not included, it would deny Pakistan the right to transit its goods to Central Asia through Afghanistan, Toner said, ''I'm not going to weigh in on the negotiations between - bilateral negotiation between Afghanistan and Pakistan.'' He was of the opinion that Afghanistan has rights to make its own decisions with regard to who it decides to allow trade relations with. ''Afghanistan is a sovereign country and it has its own rights  it has rights to make its own decisions with regard to who it decides to allow trade relations with. But broadly speaking, again, it's in the interests of the region, it's been a consistent goal of ours strategically to promote stronger relations between all the countries,'' he added. The APTTA treaty also allows Afghanistan to access to the dry port of Lahore, and also access to a land route up to the Wagah border with India. However, it does not allow India to use the land route to export goods to Afghanistan either. With Prime Minister Narendra Modi announcing $1-billion aid to Kabul, Toner said that the US supports India's generosity and focus on Afghanistan and willingness to help Afghanistan become a stronger and independent country. ''The fact that India is willing to invest in that future we view as a very positive sign and we appreciate India's effort,'' he said.








AIR launches website, mobile app for Balochi audience

All India Radio will launch a multimedia website and a mobile application of its Baluchi services today, in order to make the contents and programmes in Baluchistan's Baloch language available at multimedia platforms for easy access of listeners and create a global audience.

Prasar Bharti chairman A Suryaprakash will launch the services.

The External Services Division (ESD) of AIR broadcasts a one-hour programme in Baloch language every day, which includes daily news.

The ESD service was started in 1974 and is currently broadcast daily in 57 radio transmissions covering over 108 countries in 27 languages.

These include 15 foreign language programmes, mostly from East Asia and South Asian region, including Balochi language.

AIR's move comes a month after Prime Minister Narendra Modi highlighted the human rights violations in Balochistan in his 15 August Independence Day address.

"This technological upgradation will not only provide improved reception quality to the listeners in Afghanistan-Pakistan region, the original target of the service, but would also expand the reach of the service to Baloch Diaspora spread in different countries," an official said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Independence Day speech had brought up the issue of Pakistani atrocities on people of Balochistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, the first time the disturbed areas under the control of Pakistan were mentioned by any Indian prime minister.

Earlier, DD News had also sent a team to Geneva to interview Brahumdagh Bugti, leader of Baloch Republican Party.
The death has taken place of Paul Chatenoud, adopted son of Ardara.

The death has taken place of Paul Chatenoud, adopted son of Ardara.

He passed away peacefully at his home on Wedneday evening.

Born and raised in Morocco, he attended the Sorbonne in Paris and opened one of the citys first and most beloved music book shops, in the shadow of Notre Dame.

He had a dream about Donegal even though hed never heard of it and moved here just under 30 years ago.

When he visited the county one summer, he fell in love with the place and soon learned from his new friends in Nancys of Ardara that a cottage with outstanding views was for sale.

He bought The Green Gate B&B and made it into a huge success, bursting with character reflecting his own inimitable spirit and attracting visitors from all over the world.

Stephen McCahill said he did so much to build up Ardara as a tourist destination. There have been write ups about Paul and his B&B in so many of the major newspapers in the world and in nearly all of the top travel publications. He really brought Ardara and its beauty to the attention of so many who probably would never had heard of it, or visited, without him.

Martin McFadden paid tribute to his friend: He was a man of great intellect whose possessed a huge amount of Gallic charm and wit. I am grateful to have met Paul and to have had so many great chats with him.

The wake is strictly private.

Funeral Mass takes place at 11am on Sunday in the Church of the Holy Family, Ardara, with burial afterwards in Kilternan cemetery.
The possibility of providing a link with London from Donegal Airport should be explored on a trial basis, a Donegal TD has said.

Deputy Pat the Cope Gallagher has called on the Department of Transport, Stobart Air and

the Donegal Airport authorities to explore the possibility of providing a link with London from Donegal Airport.

He said it is now more important than ever that such a link be explored in the context of the possible ceasing of the Derry Airport  London link as being suggested from early 2017.

The uncertainty of the recent announcement regarding the Derry London link must direct the Irish authorities to look at alternatives within the northwest for providing direct links with the UK and London, he said.

Deputy Gallagher said there is an obvious demand for such a service from a tourism, business and connectivity with the diaspora perspective.

There are extremely strong links between the UK and Donegal and the number of people who routinely travel between both jurisdictions is an expanding and growing market.

The ending of the Derry to London flights was a disaster for the northwest region as many people relied on that connection on a weekly and routine basis; it is in the absence of such services and connectivity that Donegal Airport must fill the gap in current services and aim to provide flights to London on a trial basis.

He said the potential removal of the Derry service is most regrettable and should be contested by the relevant authorities in Northern Ireland. However, he said it also provides an opportunity for Donegal Airport to meet the demand for a London service.

It provides the airport with an opportunity to expand passenger choice and the service provider to grow passenger numbers. It is essential that we explore this gap in services which currently exists and advance the case for Donegal - London flights, he said.
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Northern Ireland Assembly First Minister Arlene Foster joined protesters in Belleek a short time ago, supporting their efforts to keep the last remaining bank in the town open.

Ms Foster arrived at half past three and joined the picket outside Bank of Ireland for 15 minutes and she then mingled with locals to find out their views on the proposed closure.

Protests have been held outside the Bank of Ireland on Main Street during the bank's opening hours every day this week.

A petition against the proposed closure has been signed by thousands of people.

Ms Foster told the Donegal Democrat a short time ago that she has now arranged a meeting with Sean Sheehan, Regional Manager of Bank of Ireland NI, in Belleek next week, to accept the petition signed by more than 7,000 people opposed to plan to close the bank.

Praised

The First Minister praised Chamber of Commerce and Belleek Community Association member Bridie Gormley and their group for not taking no for answer on this issue.

Seven days ago more than 200 people, many from Donegal, attended a meeting to oppose the closure.

Bridie Gormley said, This was a cross community and cross border gathering and everyone was in total agreement that we need to do whatever it takes to keep our bank in Belleek.

Bank of Ireland have suggested that the post office could be used for lodgments and withdrawals. But the post office can only cater for sums of 1,000 at a time so that would not be of much use.

This is a very busy bank, with 5,000 customers in the region, including many from Donegal, as this is the nearest sterling area for them.

Already there is uncertainty about Brexit and now we are hit with a double whammy of a threatened closure of the bank."
October is National Bullying Prevention month. We have all heard the phrase bullying, but what does it actually mean? Bullying is defined as unwanted aggressive behavior; observed or perceived power imbalance; repetition of behaviors or high likelihood of repetition.

Bullying is unfortunately a reality for far too many in our communities both young and old. Much like any other form of violence, bullying is not isolated to any particular age group, gender or demography. Just about everyone of us can look back in our lives and recall a time where either we were personally bullied or witnessed one of our friends or schoolmates being bullied. Its hard to believe that with all of the advancements and awareness, this type of behavior still exists, but it does and with the advent of social media, it had actually gotten much worse. This is because unlike in the past, the bully not only impacts your life on the playground or classroom; they now are able to follow you into your personal life due to the constant presence of social media.

There is good news in that we have learned a great deal about what creates these bullies and how to neutralize their ability to isolate and intimidate. The key is for those in authority to respond to reports of bullying immediately to show without question that bullying will not be acceptable. That message needs to follow to our homes with the messages we send our children not only by what we say but by our own actions in how we treat fellow adults. Bullying is without question a learned behavior. It is learned on the playground, in the classroom and follows through to the workplace and social interactions as adults. We need to send a strong message to our own children, a message of empathy and compassion not of ridicule and rumor.

Who are at risk of bullying the most? Typically those who are bullied have one or more of the following risks:

Are perceived as different from their peers, such as being overweight or underweight, wearing glasses or different clothing, being new to a school, or being unable to afford what kids consider cool

Are perceived as weak or unable to defend themselves

Are depressed, anxious, or have low self esteem

Are less popular than others and have few friends

Do not get along well with others, seen as annoying or provoking, or antagonize others for attention

However, even if a child has these risk factors, it doesnt mean that they will be bullied. The important lesson is that we as adults set the tone for how the next generation will interact with each other. Chances are if we show acceptance of others, our children will show acceptance of others. If we engage in demeaning others or spreading rumors, our children will follow suit. So often we as adults underestimate the influence, we have not only on our own children but even those who dont know us but witness our behavior.

While school or workplace policies are an important component, the only way to truly decrease bullying is by denying the bully their victim. We do this by raising strong, confident, resilient children, and speaking out and supporting those who find themselves on the receiving end of this type of behavior. We are all teachers in life lessons and we teach by our actions. Lets all be aware of what we teach.
A year ago, on September 12, 2015, the British Labour Party elected Jeremy Corbyn as its leader with a landslide majority  nearly 60 percent  against three other candidates.

He is the most left-wing socialist to lead the party since its formation in 1900. However a majority of Labour MPs refused to accept his mandate, some actively seeking to sabotage his leadership from day one by trying to discredit him and pave the way for a new leadership contest.

After Britain voted to leave the European Union on June 24, a plot was hatched within the Parliamentary Labour Party to oust Corbyn  a coup backed by most of the party bureaucracy. When Corbyn refused to stand down, despite losing a no-confidence motion in which 172 Labour MPs called for his resignation, a new leadership election was called in which MP Owen Smith was selected as a leadership candidate.

Initially it appeared he was making some headway amongst party members. Media outlets continued to pour scorn on Corbyn's abilities and constantly repeated the mantra that radical socialist ideas cannot possibly win majority support in British society today.

Their argument is that, although there is a constituency of support for socialist ideas, they don't appeal to middle-of-the-road "ordinary" voters. Corbyn's supporters, however, argue that the huge rise in party membership to well over 500, 000 will provide the foot soldiers needed to win over the sceptics.

Corbyn commands enthusiastic support amongst the party masses. They blame the Parliamentary Labour Party for sabotaging his leadership at every step. In fact, the new contest has been a godsend to Corbyn. And the mood has dramatically changed inside the Labour Party compared to a year ago.

Consequently the challenger has had to cast himself as being just as radical as Corbyn, claiming he can challenge the Conservative party more effectively in Parliament because of unique leadership skills that Corbyn apparently, lacks. After all, both candidates are advocating a fundamental rebalancing of economic and political power back towards the working class and poor.

Labour Party grandees argue the very purpose of the Labour Party is to gain a Parliamentary majority, rather than to establish socialism. And the socialism that they envisage is always circumscribed by limitations imposed by the Parliamentary system. Indeed, this is almost certainly why the Labour Party has never come near to establishing a socialist society despite long periods in government.

The nearest Britain came to socialism was under the first majority Labour government in 1945. It carried through a series of radical reforms including the nationalization of important industries, transportation and energy, and they introduced a cradle-to-grave health and welfare system.

However, the sectors nationalized after 1945 were molded to serve the needs of capitalism. That particular Labour government did not fundamentally challenge the power of big private enterprises. And much of the land continued to belong to a tiny minority with close ties to old, aristocratic families.

From the 1970s onwards, in Britain and Western Europe the political consensus accepted widespread welfare rights, health care provision, pensions, education etc. only for this to come under sustained attack amid economic decline. At the macro level, the root cause of sluggish investment has been a fall in the long-term rate of profit.

In order to establish the foundations for an enduring period of economic expansion, private enterprises, and their ideological representatives coalesced around the idea of attacking the organized labor movement and thereby weakening the bargaining power of the workers.

This neoliberal ideology was popularized by the former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and former American President Ronald Reagan in the late 1980s. They sought to fundamentally shift the balance of power back in favor of the owners of capital.

Privatization and cuts in welfare were designed to undermine unions, weaken their bargaining power, and transfer socially-owned resources into private hands. It was argued that the more money the capitalists possess, the more they would invest and this would eventually "trickle down to those below in a sort of capitalist utopia.

Since 2008 the global economic crisis has undermined the material underpinning of this neoliberal ideology. Now after many years the balance of forces is shifting back to the left.

Despite desperate attempts by the Labour Party right and their allies inside the mass media  particularly the BBC  Jeremy Corbyn appears to have an unassailable lead among those eligible to vote in the leadership election.

With a Corbyn victory pretty much inevitable, a mass movement mobilized to fundamentally transform the Labour Party at the grassroots level is now required. This means that some Labour MPs who constantly sabotage the policies supported by the majority of party members will face re-selection by their local constituency parties.

Owen Smith advocates a 200 billion investment program and Corbyn one costing 500 billion. Such huge stimulus packages would be comparable to those undertaken by China after 2008. The main difficulty will lie in structuring investment policies in ways that improve the productivity of labor and enhance knowledge and output of society.

The Labour Party needs to develop concrete perspectives and plans for the realization of radical policies to transform society.

So far, Corbyn and his socialist supporters have been hindered in their bid to reshape the political agenda. Now that his enemies have shown their hand. They will be resoundingly defeated, clearing the way for a transformation of the Labour Party and society as a whole.

Heiko Khoo is a columnist with China.org.cn. For more information please visit:

http://www.china.org.cn/opinion/heikokhoo.htm

Opinion article reflected the views of their authors, not necessarily those of China.org.cn.
Home Four wheelers Mercedes Wary Of Red Bull & Ferrari Pace At 2016 Singapore GP oi-Ajinkya

Mercedes-AMG witnessed a difficult weekend at 2015 Singapore GP. Now, Mercedes claim to have solved the issue that they faced last year. Red Bull Racing and Scuderia Ferrari promises that they will be more competitive than Mercedes in Singapore.

Both Ferrari and Red Bull have made excellent strides in terms of power. They are still not as strong as Mercedes. Singapore is a street circuit, which is contested under flood lights. Cool track temperatures mean that tyre degradation will be at minimum.

Lewis Hamilton has faced difficult times in the last few races. Rosberg has managed to claw back Hamilton's lead to just two points. Hamilton would like to increase his lead and maintain a point buffer between himself an Rosberg.

Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton are sure that Singapore GP will be the most difficult for them. Mercedes will have to bring their 100 percent to challenge Ferrari and Red Bull in Singapore. Last year Mercedes was over a second slower than Sebastian Vettel's pole lap time.

The Marina Bay circuit of Singapore will surely be interesting as every team will be closely bunched. Even McLaren-Honda cannot be ruled out of being competitive around the street circuit. Stay tuned for detailed reports and analysis of the 2016 Singapore GP.
The North East and more specifically a 'M1 corridor' from Dublin to Belfast could become an EU gateway for international payments companies with Dundalk at its heart.

That's the view that came out of the second national ePayments conference held at CityNorth hotel recently.

Over 120 people attended the conference, where Michael Wasserfuhr, CFO of Vesta, and Board member of the Atlanta Transaction Processors Coalition (ATPC), who described how Atlanta has successfully built the largest Payments cluster in the world, where more than 60 percent of the companies in the U.S. payments industry call home, and 70 percent of all U.S. payments are processed annually run through Georgia.

Delegates and attendees discussed if Ireland could offer a similar solution to the EU Payments Industry, with the development of an M1 Payments Corridor from the IFSC to Belfast, and the creation of a National Payments Centre in Drogheda.

Richard Hanlon, SVP of Vestas EU Headquarters in Dundalk, outlined how he is working with partners in the M1 Steering Group, to develop the M1 Payments Corridor as a region that can cultivate indigenous payment-related companies, and attract global firms to its establish EU Headquarters.

The ATPC started with three companies, he said, and in three years, has developed into the primary voice of the Payments industry in the USA.

Its crucial that we build on the current momentum, and take the bold steps needed to become the EU payments gateway.

Other keynote speaker included Louise Phelan, PayPals Vice President of Global Operations for Europe, Middle East and Africa, who delivered a presentation on The Future of Money and how their M1 Dundalk operations has helped them achieve and exceed their EU milestones.
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Domains purchased with payment plans are not eligible to transfer until all payments have been made. Please remember that our 30-day money back guarantee is void once a domain has been transferred.

For transfer instructions to GoDaddy, please click here.
Banks are overcharging and underserving small businesses when it comes to international money transfers, according to Taavet Hinrikus, Skypes first-ever employee and the co-founder of TransferWise.

He spoke to Dynamic Business while in Australia to promote TransferWise, an international peer-to-peer money transfer platform he co-founded with Kristo Kaarmann in 2011. To date, the platform has attracted USD$117 million from investors including Richard Branson and PayPals founders, Peter Thiel and Max Levchin. Since its launch in Australia, last July, more than $1.5 billion AUD has been transferred to and from Australia.

Whether theyre paying freelancers or suppliers overseas, small businesses transferring money abroad have been overcharged and underserved by banks and brokers for decades, Hinrikus said.

Every year $100 billion is sent in and out of Australia, meaning Australians are losing an awful lot of money to the banks. Of those who transfer money overseas, over three quarters have done so up to five times in the last year. But on average we underestimate the amount its costing us by over 10x.

People want to be able to transfer money at a lower cost, faster and with complete knowledge of what it costs them and the exchange rate they get. TransferWise is typically up to 8 times cheaper than banks to send AUD$1,000 and it charges a small, transparent service charge.

Outside of TransferWise, Hinrikus is involved in the startup community as an advisor and angel investor. His investments include Tweetdeck, Mendeley, OMGPOP, Betaworks, Farmeron and Teleportd among others.

I look for companies that are going to have a big impact on the area theyre focusing on: ones that could change the world for the better, he said.

The key thing is that theyre solving a real problem and that theyre clear what this problem is. The solution needs to be 10x better and it helps if its a big market. Then its about the team and their ability to make things happen.
 Flash

China and Inida pledged on Thursday to further promote cooperation among the BRICS nations, and discussed issues such as cyber security, energy security and anti-terrorism.

When attending the 6th meeting of BRICS senior representatives on security issues, Chinese State Councilor Yang Jiechi said that leaders of BRICS nations reached consensus on furthering BRICS cooperation when they met on the sidelines of the G20 summit in China's eastern city of Hangzhou earlier this month.

China is ready to make joint efforts with other BRICS nations to make the upcoming BRICS summit in India's Goa a success and inject new dynamism into the BRICS cooperation, he added.

As the BRICS' chairman next year, China will make good preparations for the BRICS summit and meetings of senior representatives on security and foreign ministers of BRICS nations, said Yang.

When meeting representatives from BRICS nations for the security meeting, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said the BRICS nations are playing an increasingly constructive role in international affairs.

He expressed his belief that the BRICS summit in Goa could yield practical results and cement friendly relations among the BRICS nations so as to enhance the influence of developing countries and emerging economies.

The BRICS nations group Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

Also on Thursday, Chinese State Councilor Yang met with Indian National Security Advisor Ajit Doval.

The Chinese state councilor said development of bilateral ties between the two countries have maintained good momentum.

Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Modi held talks at the G20 summit in Hangzhou, setting the direction for the development of bilateral ties for the next phase, Yang said.

"China is willing to join hands with India to implement the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries, deepen mutual political trust, expand pragmatic cooperation and friendly exchanges, and properly handle sensitive issues in order to push forward the development of bilateral ties in the right direction and promote Asia's development and prosperity."

Yang said BRICS has witnessed 10 years of fruitful cooperation among its member states, and China will fully support India's efforts to host the BRICS summit in Goa successfully.

For his part, Doval said as neighbors and the largest developing countries in the world, India and China have great potential for cooperation.

India is willing to boost political communication, expand pragmatic cooperation and promote cooperation and coordination with China within the framework of G20 and BRICS so as to press ahead with common development and safeguard common interests of the two countries.
 Flash

A senior Chinese diplomat is suggesting expectations are running high around Chinese Premier Li Keqiang's forthcoming attendance to this year's UN General Assembly session in New York. Chinese Premier Li Keqiang has been tapped to address the general debate for this year's session of the UN General Assembly.

Vice Foreign Minister Li Baodong says the Premier will outline China's stance on global governance and international order during his time in New York.

"First of all, China hopes to underline the basic norms of international relations. The international community should jointly maintain the current global governance mechanism based on the UN Charter, and establish a new international order with cooperation and reciprocity at its core. Secondly, we'll stress the importance of handling disputes and seeking consensus through dialogue and consultations in a bid to maintain global peace and stability." Li Keqiang is also expected to outline the steps China is taking toward implementing the UN's 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, as well as measures to cope with various global challenges, both economic and strategic. Following his time at the UN General Assembly, the Chinese Premier will then travel to Canada and Cuba for official visits.

His time in Ottawa will be the first visit by a Chinese premier to the Canadian capital in 13 years.

It comes on the heels of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau attending this month's G20 Summit in China, where he promised a 'reset' of Canadian ties with China after years of stalled ties under the previous Canadian government. Li Baodong says Li Keqiang's time in Canada should help create the conditions needed for that 'reset.'

"The economies of China and Canada are complementary to one another, meaning that there's great potential for both sides to further deepen bilateral cooperation at a higher level in vast areas. Such cooperation is also compatible with the common expectation among both peoples." There are currently around 150-thousand Chinese students studying in Canada.

The two countries have also announced that 2018 will be the Year of China-Canada Tourism.

From Canada, Li Keqiang will then head to Cuba, marking the first visit to the Caribbean nation by a Chinese premier since the two countries established diplomatic ties 56 years ago. Vice Foreign Minister Wang Chao says Li Keqiang's time in Cuba is also expected to open a number of new doors.

"Premier Li Keqiang will hold a bilateral meeting with Raul Castro, President of the Cuban Council of State and Council of Ministers, discussing how to strengthen China-Cuba friendship and cooperation as well as other issues of common concerns. The two sides will also sign cooperation documents in areas such as the economy, technology, new energy, industry and environmental protection." Premier Li Keqiang is due to leave on his 10-day trip to North America on Sunday.
Britains unworn shoes could stretch around the world

There are so many unworn or unused shoes in British households that put heel to toe in a line theyd stretch all the way round the world.

Piled on top of each other all the CDs and DVDs we dont listen to or watch would stretch 7,641 miles into space.

Broken down, the average Brit currently owns 53 items of unworn clothing, 36 CDs and DVDs that are never played, and seven pairs of unwanted shoes.

Liberating ourselves of unwanted clutter in our homes could free an entire room, for new uses.

The study, commissioned by Oxfam, exposed the staggering amount of unneeded stuff the nation own and revealed clothes are most likely to be cluttering up our homes, followed by CDs, books and toys, totalling 143 unused items stashed away in a typical household.

It also revealed one in 10 Brits have never thought about donating their unused items to charity. This is despite almost half of us commonly commenting on the clobber in other peoples houses and losing items among the stacks of stuff we own.

Four in 10 of the respondents admitted theyve not really thought about the amount of space that could be liberated by a good clear out, which the research showed could free floor space equivalent to an entire room.

Oxfam commissioned the study to launch its campaign asking the public to donate unwanted stuff to its shops.

Andrew Horton, Oxfam Trading Director said: There are about 27 million households in the UK, and if each one has 143 unused items, were talking about more than three billion CDs, DVDs, homewares, accessories and clothes cluttering up a mind-blowing amount of space! Our homes are too small to deal with this.

Donating clutter to your charity shop is a great solution for everyone. Not only does it liberate precious floor and storage space in our homes it also raises money for people who really need help.

An average bag of donated stuff  like clothes, books, music, DVDs and homewares  can raise enough money to help two vulnerable families buy desperately-needed food in an emergency. Or buy five buckets specially designed to keep water clean and disease-free.

There are so many ways your unwanted stuff could fight poverty with Oxfam  which is why we urgently need your donations.

According to the study, the unused CDs and DVDs in each house would cover a floor space of 13.48 square metres, equivalent to a main bedroom in an average house.

When it comes to our wardrobes, the research revealed there are 3.8 billion items of unworn clothing lying around, which could take up as much space as a guest bedroom.

When asked what theyd do with the liberated space, four in 10 said theyd leave it empty and enjoy it. Redecorating and converting the space into a home office area was also a popular choice.

Those who are still hoarding their clutter are doing so for various reasons. Two thirds of Brits are keeping unused items just in case they need them again. Thirty-four per cent said they keep some due to sentimental value.

Three in 10 said they have clutter because they cant spare the time to try and sell it all.

Andrew Horton added: What many of us dont realise is how easy it is to donate unwanted items to charity.

Oxfam has almost 660 shops up and down the UK. So its simple to drop off your stuff at one of them. They all desperately need good-quality donations of clothing, homewares like cutlery, crockery, linens, curtains and rugs, books and music and accessories including bags and jewellery. Its satisfying to unburden yourself of the clutter other people are looking for and will love.

Oxfam relies on the generosity of the British public and their donations are incredibly valued and appreciated because we turn them into cash to help people struggling with poverty and in desperate circumstances across the world.

This weekend Oxfam is launching a nationwide donation drive to encourage the public to clear out their clutter, liberate their lofts, banish buckling bookshelves and free themselves from stuff by donating to their local Oxfam shop. Find out more at oxfam.org.uk/donategoods.
Google Fiber this week began reaching its tentacles into North Carolinas Research Triangle, a move that seems to contradict the gloom-and-doom rumors of layoffs and low consumer interest.

Coming soon to the Triangle and starting to connect homes and businesses in Morrisville: https://t.co/M2rdOATtuJ pic.twitter.com/18bbt4nqgB

 Google Fiber (@googlefiber) September 13, 2016

The Triangle is Google Fibers eighth incursion. Its already available in Atlanta; Austin, Texas; Charlotte, North Carolina; Kansas City, Kansas and Missouri; Nashville, Tennessee; Provo, Utah; and Salt Lake City.

The North Carolina activity may alleviate some of the doubts over Google Fibers direction, which mushroomed several months ago, when the company acquired Webpass.

Experimenting With Wireless

Google executives last month filed an Experimental Radio Service License that would allow the company to offer wireless high-speed service in up to 24 U.S. cities, including a number of California cities and towns: Atwater, Mountain View, Palo Alto, San Bruno, San Francisco and San Jose. In addition, they are seeking permission to test wireless in Boulder, Colorado; Kansas City, Kansas and Missouri; Omaha, Nebraska; Raleigh, North Carolina; Provo, Utah; and Reston, Virginia.

The few portions of the application that have not been redacted include detailed explanations of Googles plans to conduct radio experiments in support of Citizens Broadband Radio Service technologies, using experimental transmitters. The authorization would last up to 24 months, according to the filing.

The overarching concern regarding the granting of an experimental license is whether it will interfere with the operation of authorized devices and services, explained FCC spokesperson Mark Wigfield.

Therefore, an experimental license will be coordinated with those responsible for all potentially affected stakeholders, he told the E-Commerce Times, such as other bureaus within the FCC.

In this coordination process, an experimental license can be accepted as is, be modified to prevent interference, or be rejected, Wigfield noted. If approved, an experimental licensee must accept any interference from other parties, and must immediately stop operations if a complaint of interference is made.

Shifting Focus

Google Fiber acquired Webpass in a bid to accelerate its buildout of ultra-high speed broadband access, after struggling for years to gain access to local markets dominated by rival broadband providers like AT&T, Comcast and others.

Webpass provides high-speed service to thousands of customers in the San Francisco Bay area, Chicago, Boston, San Diego, Miami and some surrounding areas, with speeds up to 1000 Mbps. The announcement of the acquisition came after months of controversy surrounding Goodles attempts to access telephone poles in the Bay area, beyond its existing service at Stanford University.

The shift toward wireless broadband makes sense, given the inherent difficulty of breaking through incumbent dominance to gain access to the infrastructure required for competitive broadband service in metropolitan areas, observed broadband analyst Craig Settles.

Googles decision to put chips in the wireless game seems to have taken some folks in the industry by surprise  but why? Those of us involved in municipal broadband since the Philadelphia wireless days know that wireless is cheaper and faster to deploy, especially in urban areas, he told the E-Commerce Times.

Google has long said that ease of deployment  essentially the ability to access telephone poles  was a key driver in the deployment of Google Fiber, Settles noted. What the industry has been waiting for is the innovation necessary to allow gigabyte-level speeds for fixed wireless service.

Despite the promise of wireless broadband, its unlikely to make a major dent in solving the rural access problem, according to Christopher Mitchell, director of community broadband networks at the Institute for Local Self Reliance.

Google acquired Webpass, which uses both wireless and fiber, to connect buildings, he told the E-Commerce Times. I dont know that this is a good solution for single-family homes.
Hewlett Packard Enterprise and HP are facing a potential class action lawsuit brought earlier this month by four former employees.

The companies engaged in widespread age discrimination during a restructuring of the legacy computer and printer manufacturer, according to their complaint, filed in U.S. District Court in San Jose, California.

HP from 2012 to 2015 made a series of discriminatory job cuts involving tens of thousands of workers, the suit alleges. Cuts made late last year, when the company split into two separate units, reflected a well-publicized effort to become younger, according to the complaint.

Diamonds and Pyramids

HPE CEO Meg Whitman (who was then CEO of the undivided HP) in 2013 told a group of securities analysts that the company needed to transform itself from a labor diamond into a labor pyramid or a quite flat triangle with young employees at its base, according to the complaint.

The plaintiffs are seeking to have the suit confirmed as a class action case for former HP and HPE employees who were 40 years old or older when they were cut  a class that potentially could number in the thousands.

The four plaintiffs are Donna Forsythe, who was laid off from HPE in May at age 62; Arun Vatturi, who lost his HP job in January at age 52; Dan Weiland, who was cut from HP in July 2015 at age 63; and Sydney Staton, who was cut in April 2015 at age 54.

HP and HPE officials denied the allegations and said their companies were committed to lawful employment practices.

HP has long been committed to the principles of equal opportunity, diversity and inclusion, said spokesperson Tom Suiter.

Any decision to implement a workforce reduction is always difficult, but we take care to make tough decisions based on legitimate, nondiscriminatory reasons, he added. We are aware of the claims, deny them and plan to defend against them.

HPE also denied the allegations.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise has a longstanding commitment to the principles of equal employment opportunity and age inclusion is no exception, said spokesperson Blair Hinderliter. The decision to implement a workforce reduction is always difficult, but we are confident that our decisions were based on legitimate decisions unrelated to age.

Industry-Wide Problem

The employment practices of Silicon Valley firms have been a subject of scrutiny for some time. The tech industry has developed a reputation not only of lacking racial and gender diversity, but also of blatantly favoring younger employees.

This has been a problem that was well documented at Google and other software companies, observed Kevin Krewell, principal analyst at Tirias Research.

The rationale is that young people are more willing to work long hours and sacrifice work/life balance to deliver a product, he told the E-Commerce Times.

The problem of age discrimination at Silicon Valley companies is compounded by the fact that industry leaders largely have been unapologetic about the practice, Laurie McCann, senior attorney at AARP Foundation Litigation, said this spring in testimony before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

HPs goal apparently was keep salaries down at the company, but the way it was executed may have crossed a line into discriminatory behavior, said Rob Enderle, principal analyst at the Enderle Group.

Whitman has seemed excessively focused on salaries of late, he told the E-Commerce Times.

The nature of her compensation is that she makes more as expenses drop, showcasing a natural affinity for her own income over that of others, Enderle said. The intent wasnt to discriminate by age, but that appears to be the result.
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Last weeks Colonial Pipeline spill has prompted Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley and Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal to both declare states of emergency over gasoline shortages on Thursday.

Aerial photo of two of the three mine water retention ponds at the site of a pipeline leak that spilled an estimated 250,000 gallons of gasoline in Shelby County, Ala. The retention pond on the right is where the gasoline has been contained. Colonial Pipeline

The Sept. 9 break has leaked 6,000 barrels (approximately 250,000 gallons) of fuel into Shelby County, Alabama, the operator estimated, up from its original estimation of 1,000 barrels. The cause of the leak is currently unclear.

Colonial Pipeline, the largest refined products system in the nation, operates 5,500 miles of underground pipe and above ground storage tanks and pump stations, delivering more than 100 million gallons of refined petroleum products a day. Their customer base is an estimated 50 million Americans, between Houston and New York City.

CNN Money said that the disruption threatens to drive up prices and leave service stations without fuel to sell.

This is a VERY, VERY, VERY big deal: 900k b/d of #gasoline supply to US East Coast missing because of #Colonial pipeline shutdown #OOTT  Javier Blas (@JavierBlas) September 16, 2016

In response to the spill, the Alpharetta, Georgia-based company closed its main gasoline line, Line 1, that runs from refineries in the Gulf Coast to the East Coast. About 500 employees and contractors are currently working to clean up the site and repair the impacted segment of pipe.

The Birmingham Business Journal reported that most of the spilled gasoline has been contained in a nearby mining retention pond as workers skim the pond to remove the gasoline. Underflow dams are also being constructed to prevent gasoline seepage into the nearby Cahaba River.

However, Billy McDanal, a landowner living near the river, spoke to AL.com over his concerns about the spill.

Thats our water, he said. I guess in a way I am worried about the drinking water.

Colonial Pipeline initially said that the line would be running by this weekend but delays this week caused by gasoline vapors on site has slowed operations.

Working in close consultation with local, state and federal officials, Colonial Pipeline continued around-the-clock response operations on location in Helena, Alabama, into the evening yesterday, the company announced on Sept. 15. However, work activity was intermittent overnight due to unfavorable weather conditions that caused gasoline vapors to settle over the site. Operations are resuming as officials deem conditions safe. The top priority of the unified response effort remains the safety and protection of the public, responders, and the environment.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is aware of the incident and has established a joint incident command with state and local authorities, the Business Journal noted.

AL.com reported that Colonial Pipeline is working with conservation groups Cahaba Riverkeeper and Tri-State Bird Rescue and Research to minimize the spills environmental impact.

Cahaba Riverkeeper David Butler told AL.com that the company has been aggressive in its response and is genuinely concerned about protecting the river.

Every concern weve had, theyve addressed with really no pushback, Butler said. As bad as any situation like this is, all you can really ask is that they be responsible and accountable and I certainly havent found any fault in their response so far.

The burst is expected to affect prices at the pump. Colonial Pipeline said that parts of Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, North Carolina and South Carolina will be the first markets to be impacted by any potential disruption in supply.

Patrick DeHaan, senior petroleum analyst at GasBuddy, told the Wall Street Journal that with supplies tightening, retail gasoline prices could spike by 5 to 20 cents a gallon.

#GasPrices may rise 5-15c in GA, NC, TN, VA and 10-20c in SC over the next week due to supply/pipeline outage. Some stations may run out.  Patrick De Haan ? (@GasBuddyGuy) September 15, 2016

The company has restarted Line 2, its distillate line, due to the shutdown of Line 1.

To minimize potential supply disruptions caused by the interruption to Line 1, Colonial Pipeline has executed a contingency plan to move gasoline on Line 2, which normally carries distillate such as diesel, jet fuel and home heating oil to points north, Colonial said.

Reuters reported that Fridays spill was the largest on the Colonial line in 20 years. In 1996, 22,800 barrels of fuel oil leaked in South Carolina.
France is taking another big step towards being more environmentally conscious by implementing a controversial new law that will ban plastic cutlery, plates and cups.

The measure was part of the Energy Transition For Green Growth bill that was passed in 2015 and went into effect last month. But producers of disposal plates, cups and cutlery will have until 2020 to make sure their products are made with biologically sourced materials and can be composted.

The ban was initially proposed by the Europe Ecologie-Greens Party to help cut the energy used in making plastic in addition to the waste it creates. While the move is sure to please environmentalists, opponents argue that product bans hurt consumers.

Pack2Go Europe Secretary General Eamonn Bates told The Associated Press the company is urging the European Union to take legal action against France for violating the European Unions rules on free movement of goods.

He also argued that there is no proof the ban would be beneficial to the environment adding that it will be understood by consumers to mean that it is OK to leave this packaging behind in the countryside after use because its easily bio-degradable in nature. Thats nonsense! It may even make the litter problem worse.

France enacted laws requiring supermarkets to donate unsold food to charity in February and banned single-use plastic bags in July.
The Town of Wawayanda is in the fertile, black dirt region of New York State, not far from Pennsylvania. Like many communities in neighboring Pennsylvania, the rural way of life in this area of Orange County is now under threat from Americas shale gas boom.

New York has banned fracking, but not the mass build out of fracked gas infrastructure and thats put many New York communities on the fossil fuel chopping block.

If these plants are built you can say goodbye to New York City.

Competitive Power Ventures (CPV) has proposed to build a 650-megawatt fracked gas power plant in Wawayanda. The residents of Orange County already know firsthand that living near fracked gas infrastructure poses many of the same health risks as living next to fracking wells.

In 2013, a fracked gas compressor station was built in nearby Minisink, New York to move gas along the Millennium Pipeline. Because of emissions from the compressor station children living nearby began suffering from nosebleeds, rashes, headaches and dizziness.

A study done by the Southwest Pennsylvania Environmental Health Project in November 2015 found that the air pollution around Minisink was worse than that of a big city. Families with homes close to the compress station have walked away from them.

CPVs fracked gas power plant would release 43 times the emissions as the compressor station. And its just one of some 300 fracked gas power plants that are being proposed all over the country. If these plants are built you can say goodbye to New York City.

Researchers are finding that the web of fracked gas infrastructure that crosses all over the country has a big emissions problem. And those emission arent just bad for local air, theyre catastrophic for the climate.

Methane, the main component of natural gas, is 86 -105 times more potent of a greenhouse gas than C02 in the first 20 years its in the atmosphere. Cornell Earth systems scientist Robert Howarth said since the planet responds so quickly to methane, if we want to slow global warming, we must immediately and drastically reduce methane emissions.

But what Howarth and other researchers studying emissions are finding are scary rates of leakage from extraction to delivery. Theres continual leakage at the wellhead, theres leakage from the storage and processing facilities, purposeful venting and also accidental leaks. Theres leakage in the pipeline systems, distribution systems and storage systems.

If just 3 percent of the fracked gas being mined and supplied to the power plant leaks throughout its life cycle, natural gas is worse than coal for global warming. In the Uinta Basin, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration found 6 to 12 percent leakage rates for natural gas production. And before the Aliso Canyon disaster, they found leakage in the Los Angeles Basin was 17 percent. Harvard found that the U.S. shale boom over all has increased global methane emissions by more than 30 percent.

The U.S. has a serious methane problem that will go from bad to dire pretty fast if we build 300 fracked gas power plants.

Thats why the first New York screening of my new documentary on climate change will be with community members fighting to stop the CPV Valley fracked gas power plant.

Our climate will get fracked unless we do.

If you live in the Sugar Loaf, New York area, join us for this historic screening or click here to find other screenings throughout the U.S.

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For many children, the beginning of the school year is a time of anticipation to rejoin old friends, meet new teachers, and find new classes. But for the nations identified 1.3 million preschool and K-12 homeless children and youth who attend public schools, the return to school also means a reliable meal, shelter for at least six hours a day, a stable routine, and a chance for a better life.

This is a historic school year for homeless students, as new requirements for education under the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Actwhich passed nearly 30 years ago and was reauthorized with the passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act in 2015go into effect Oct. 1. The new requirements are designed to help schools better identify and support homeless students.

But to translate the promise of the law into meaningful changes, schools will need robust community partnerships; leadership from state and local education officials; and accurate measurements of progress that include not only academic performance for these students, but also how well schools are identifying homeless young people.

Ive worked with homeless children and youth for over 20 yearsas a tutor for such children in Washington; at the National Coalition for the Homeless; and as the current director of policy and programs at the National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth.

Homeless students face many challenges. They move from place to place and never know when they might be forced to leave. They lack food, clothing, and health care, as well as a quiet place to do homework. They struggle with trauma and loss and, sometimes, abuse and neglect.

But perhaps the greatest barrier to the education of homeless students is their invisibility to the educators and leaders around them. Most homeless children and youth do not stay in readily accessible places like homeless shelters. In fact, less than 15 percent of the homeless children and youth enrolled by public schools nationally stay in shelters or transitional housing. As a result, most homeless students stay on couches and floors, or in motels, cars, and other hidden places.

At the same time, the school district personnel who are specifically designated under federal law to assist homeless studentsschool district homeless liaisonsoften wear many hats and may not receive essential training on how to identify and support those students.

Until we improve the identification of homeless children and youth, we will not be able to provide the support necessary for school access and success."

A recent report about Americas homeless students, released in June by the GradNation campaign, found that over 90 percent of liaisons also have other official duties; in fact, 89 percent say they spend half their time or less on their responsibilities as liaisons. Additionally, one-third of liaisons report they are the only person within their school district who receives training to help identify and intervene with homeless children and youth. As a consequence, too many homeless students go unseen and unserved.

The new requirements address these challenges by requiring that liaisons carry out their duties and participate in professional development. The U.S. Department of Education recently issued guidance for specific strategies to help districts implement these new requirements. The guidance includes suggestions for how to determine the amount of time liaisons should dedicate to these students and how to identify some of the most hidden homeless students, from preschool-age children to older youth, who may be homeless and possibly living without a parent or legal guardian.

The guidance directs administrators of local education agencies to review data indicating the prevalence and needs of homeless children and youth in each school district. Suggested identification methods include using a questionnaire to gather information about students registering for school in the district, providing ongoing professional development and training for school staff on signs of homelessness, and outreach to community agencies.

For the 2017-18 school year, when ESSA goes into full effect, all states will also be required to report on the academic achievement and graduation rates of homeless students. These reports will shine a spotlight on the impact of homelessness and create a baseline from which to assess state and national progress for helping these most vulnerable students.

Of course, its one thing for a law to spell out new responsibilities. Its quite another to make sure that the words on paper transform systems and save lives. To that end, schools cant be the only lifeline for homeless students.

Schools need to form diverse partnerships with housing programs, service agencies, faith-based organizations, and businesses. They need to engage leadership from governors, mayors, and other elected officials to raise the profile of student homelessness, recognize its urgency, and prioritize efforts to address it. Some school districts have formed local task forces to bring key stakeholderstogether, while others haven taken an active role in supporting state and local legislation. As the only universal safety net for homeless children and youth, school participation is essential in local, state, and federal plans to address homelessness.

How will we know if these efforts are successful? Initially, the numbers of homeless children and youth identified and reported by public schools should increase. Until we improve the identification of homeless children and youth, we will not be able to provide the support necessary for school access and success. Over the longer term, schools should see improvements in academic outcomes, high school graduation rates, post-secondary access and completion, and employment.

Finally, even as educators and policymakers work to implement new requirements to support homeless students, we must accept that the ultimate goalhealthy, productive, housed citizensis a long-term endeavor. Only then can we start to see the beginning of the true end to student homelessness. If todays homeless students receive the education and the supports they need, their childrenthe students of tomorrowmay not be homeless.
Theres a new research dispute to add to the ongoing debate over whether charter schools outperform regular public schools: Whose graduates earn more money in adulthood?

Two recent studies attempt to answer that question.

The first, released in April by researchers at Georgia State University, Vanderbilt University, and Mathematica Policy Research, looked at charter school students in Florida and found that, yes, they do go on to earn significantly higher salaries than their noncharter peers.

But an examination of charter school students in Texas released last month by researchers from Harvard University and Princeton University found the opposite: Charter school students had lower future earnings.

What are educators and parents supposed to make of these contradictory findings?

Theres not a lot of research on the long-run effects of charter schools, said Kirabo Jackson, an associate professor at Northwestern Universitys school of education and social policy. Jackson, who was not involved with either study, described both as high-quality, and said the questions the researchers were attempting to answer are important.

If you take a step back and ask yourself what is the purpose of education, I think most people will say that the education system should be designed to provide students with the skills and capacities to be productive members of society.

Scant Research

The reason there has been so little research on long-term outcomes of charter schoolingsuch as earningsis because charter schools simply havent been around that long.

The first law creating charter schools was passed in Minnesota 25 years ago this summer. Texas passed its law in 1995, and Florida in 1996. In many states, charter graduates are just starting to enter the workforce in large enough numbers to study. But other hurdles remain for researchers.

One limitation, of course, is just the fact that were trying to look at long-run outcomes, and so were limited to the charter schools that started up fairly early in Florida, so that we can track students long enough into the labor force, said Tim Sass, an economics professor at Georgia State University and one of the authors of the Florida study. And it may be that those charters were different than charters that are operating today, and it also limits the size of the sample we can look at.

David Dunn, the executive director of the Texas Charter Schools Association, believes those same issues were in play in the Texas study.

Because they needed to look at kids who had graduated a number of years ago, they had to look at charter data from many years agoand many of those schools have been closed for lack of performance, he said.

In addition to the positive effects on future earnings, the Florida study also found that charter school students were more likely to graduate from high school and enroll inand stay incollege. Specifically, the researchers found that charter school graduates were 12 percent more likely to persist through their second year in college and, by the time they were in their mid-20s, earned 12 percent more than their district school counterparts.

However, attending a charter school in Florida didnt seem to improve students test scores.

Using data from the Florida education department on student test scores, demographics, and college enrollment, as well as state employment data, the studys primary analysis compared 2,282 students that attended charter schools throughout high school to those who switched from a charter middle school to a district high school. The study was published in the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management.

Meanwhile, the Texas study found that while attending a no excuses charter schoolwhich the study describes as having stricter rules, uniforms, and longer school days and yearsleads to higher test scores and four-year college enrollment, it has no meaningful effect on earnings. The study was published by the National Bureau of Economic Research as a working paper.

Charter schools that did not meet the definition of no excuses, however, stumbled on all three measures: hurting test scores, four-year college enrollment, and earnings.

Higher Scores, But Not Wages

Economists Will S. Dobbie of Princeton University and Roland G. Fryer Jr. of Harvard University, propose several potential causes for the results they found in Texasparticularly for why some charter schools raised test scores but not earnings.

They suggested that although math and English/language arts instruction are important to improving standardized-test scores, subjects such as art and history may be equally important to success in the workforce. In other words, the heavy focus on math and reading in no excuses charters, which serve mostly low-income minority students, may be whats depressing charter students wages later in life, even though they did better on tests and were more likely to go to college.

The Texas study compared students in charter middle and high schools with students in district schools with whom they had attended the same noncharter elementary schools. Using data from three state agencies, Dobbie and Fryer tracked students from kindergarten through college and into the workforce.

Neither study included earnings data from former students who went on to work out of state, adding another wrinkle to the results.

If high achievers tend to leave the state for work, then both studies might be misrepresenting the effect of schools on earnings, said Jackson.

Many variables could account for the studies opposing findings, from small differences in methodological approaches to differences in student populations and even in schools, said Jackson and Sass.

Although the two studies turned up different results on earnings outcomes, they did both find that charter school graduates were more likely to stay in college.
No matter how diligent teachers and administrators are, its easy for bullying to happen under the noses of adults at school. In the bathrooms, the hallways, and on social media, students are often the only ones around to police themselves.

Thats why researchers at Princeton, Rutgers, and Yale universities are analyzing middle schoolers social networks to find the students most likely to change their classmates attitudes around bullying. They are finding that bullying is generally driven not by a few bad apples but by a majority of students within the overall culture of a school. Shifting alliances and cycles of harassment and retribution can all play into that culture, and undercut adults anti-bullying campaigns.

Adult-identified leaders are often very different from student-identified leaders, said Hana Shepherd, an assistant sociology professor at Rutgers University. Adults look at traditionally defined popular kids, the good kids, while kids who are leaders of smaller groups might not be on the social radar of adults, but often are [influential] too.

During the 2012-13, school year, Shepherd, Elizabeth L. Paluck, a Princeton psychology professor, and Peter M. Aronow of Yale University repeatedly surveyed more than 24,000 students across 56 middle schools about the students they respected most and liked spending time with online and in person, out of a list of every student in their schools. They also asked students to list peers they had conflicts with, and the social norms in each school around behaviors shown to increase conflict, such as retaliating on behalf of a friend who has been bullied.

Not Just Popular Kids

The researchers used the data to create network maps of student friendships in each school, identifying not just the most popular students or those whom teachers considered leaders, but the students who are most influential to different peer groups throughout the school. Of those so-called seed students, the researchers randomly invited half to participate in the Roots program, an anti-bullying program intended to support students in recognizing and finding ways to improve their own school climate around bullying.

In a study published late last fall, the researchers found schools using Roots had 30 percent fewer discipline reports on student conflict than similar schools not using the program.

Through 10 sessions over the course of the 2012-13 school year, Paluck said a breakfast club of influential students in different cliques in each school met to think out their own responses to bullying and discuss ways to reduce peer conflicts. Even the wording mattered. Rather than discussing bullying"a term that prior research has shown is linked more with stereotypes of physical intimidation and lunch-money theftthe students typically referred to conflicts as drama. Students talked through exercises among themselves about how they would respond if they either saw or heard about conflicts among students.

Critically, the seed students also discussed how their peers would react to their responses, and how they could influence their classmates better. In each school, students came up with their own projects, such as creating positive GIFs, or looping animations, for Instagram or handing out wristbands to reward a student who is seen de-escalating a fight or supporting a bullying victim.

We treated students as politicians, campaigning for a better school. The theory was that their public behaviors and statements could change norms, Paluck said.

Results in Brief

It seems they did. Across the nearly 12,000 students in schools using the program, the total number of discipline incidents fell from 2,695 to 2,012 in one school year.

By the end of the 2012-13 school year, the researchers found the rate of reported disciplinary incidents for student conflictssuch as bullying or harassmentwas 0.2 times per student in schools that did not participate in Roots, but .06 times per student in the 23 middle schools that used the program. Students in Roots schools were also significantly more likely to report they had talked with friends about ways to reduce conflict. In schools where at least 20 percent of the influential students opted to join the program, the average rate of discipline reports dropped by 60 percent.

Peer pressure has a long history as a lever in interventions, but most such strategies have focused on direct interventions by adults: role-playing with students on how to intervene if they see bullying, or displaying statistics about classmates views on harassment or drug use to convince students that it is not widely condoned, for example. Allowing the students to decide their own approaches to changing school culture has also enabled the researchers to dig into how peer influence really works in adolescencethe most socially focused period of child development.

The researchers are continuing to dig into what they say is now the largest set of longitudinal data on student social networks and bullying, looking at the roles of gender and teacher opinions. The New Jersey education department included the program in a teacher-training meeting this summer, but its unclear how many schools are using it this year.
Ely, Cambridgeshire is best known for its majestic cathedral dubbed the 'Ship of the Fens' because it dominates the flat landscape. The city, which is the second smallest in England, is about 14 miles north-northeast of Cambridge and about 80 miles by road from London.

09:00, 30 OCT 2022
Media investment to boost job market

The Department of Economic Development is hoping that investment in media will create jobs on the Island.

Satellite firm SES are developing a high-tech teleport to benefit television production and other businesses, while media companies will be provided with assistance setting up on the Island.

A number of industry experts spoke at an event to launch the scheme at the Isle of Man Motor Museum in Jurby this week.

Chris Corlett from the DED told MTTV that a number of media companies are already interested [play audio].

Media

Chris Corlett
Editors note: Beginning today and continuing over the weekend, we are delighted to offer three excerpts from Bruce Buffs new novel, The Soul of the Matter, with the permission of Simon & Schuster/Howard Books. See David Klinghoffers review here.

Cambridge, Massachusetts

Stephen Bishop would soon have the power to reshape the world  for good. The universes greatest secrets were within his reach. The conflict between science and religion would be over. Fact and reason would finally replace ignorance and dogma.

Sitting at his office desk, he marveled at the image unfolding before him. On a large monitor, a series of numbers and ratios were connected by colored lines to different parts of a mannequin view of the human body. Using the Bluetooth trackball connected to his notebook computer, he zoomed in on areas of the image, smiling as he looked at the rough features of a human being. Once the processors in the nearby data center had finished their calculations, hed be able to examine the image in detail.

He had done it! Within his grasp was the blueprint for all life, and potentially much more.

For months, he and Alex Robertson had spent a nearly continuous stream of long nights toiling in secret, trying to crack what had to be the most extraordinary encryption ever devised. What they had encountered should have been unbreakable.

It was remarkable that, through a series of astounding discoveries, they had gotten as far as they had, only to be stymied by a final puzzle that had defied solving.

It was even more remarkable that the answer to hat last obstacle had suddenly come to him this morning. Realizing the implications of what they were about to obtain, he had decided to wait until he was certain what it would reveal before sharing his breakthrough with Alex. There was no telling how Alex would react to something that would challenge his worldview so dramatically. Still, after all they had done together, he questioned his decision.

Unsettled, Stephen rose from his desk, walked to the window, and looked out into the darkness. His office was on the top floor of the ten-story Human Betterment Corporation building, on the southwest side of Cambridge, overlooking the Charles River. HBC, as it was generally known, was one of the worlds leading biotech corporations, focused on understanding the human genome and developing genetic-based treatments. As its president, he was in charge of all its research, though the work he was doing with Alex was outside his HBC work and unknown to them.

Though it was after midnight, and the sky was blanketed by thick clouds, swaying street lights illuminated the patches of snow and ice scattered across the gray lawn. In the shifting light, it created the impression of turbulent waters-or of a troubled soul.

Returning to the desk, he picked up a flat, glass paperweight etched with the yin-yang symbol. In good, the seeds of evil. In evil, the seeds of good . He turned it over a few times, wondering how much more hed have to compromise in his pursuit of knowledge and goodness .

Alex was one of his smaller concerns. Twenty minutes earlier, believing they were still a long way from cracking the code, Alex had walked into Stephens office, pointed to the adjacent conference room, and said, We need to talk.

Without responding, Stephen had followed Alex into the room. A long, dark oak oval table, surrounded by brown leather chairs, took up the majority of the ten-by-twenty-foot area. A whiteboard covered most of one of the long walls. Alex stopped in front of it.

Alex was barely five foot seven, with a round physique, and his wavy gray hair streaked with traces of black was pulled into a small ponytail. With his baggy clothes, and a craggy face adorned with black, horn rimmed, glasses, Alex resembled a gnome. But Alex had a fearsomely sharp mind . For thirty-five years, hed taught physics to PhD candidates at MIT. Hed also used his exceptional mathematical skills to master advanced cryptology. Both of Alexs skill sets were indispensable to Stephen. Without them, Stephen never would have been able to crack the codes. Alex had also provided the technology to perform and protect their work.

Picking up a blue marker, Alex said, Look. We know that a dozen complex elements form the last code, as he rapidly drew complex shapes on the white board.

You still dont like calling them symbols.

To be symbols, they have to be symbolic to someone or something. And since you claim the origin of most of the coded information is from DNA, and Im not ready to accept the connotations of that, Im not going to call them symbols.

Whats wrong with a complete understanding of science and reason that points to something much bigger than us?

Give me concrete proof and then ask me the question.

Break the code and youll have your proof. Theres only about a half billion permutations. Whats the big deal? Get to it, Stephen said facetiously.

Four hund red seventy-nine million, one thousand, six hundred, to be precise. There must be something that can help us narrow down the possibilities to a manageable number.

Yes, there is, Stephen thought. And that morning, he had become the only person in the world to know it. Now he was about to decode what could be the Rosetta Stone of all of life. Only there was much more to it than that.

With luck, well figure it out in the next few days, before weve moved to the new computer infrastructure, Stephen said, referring to the planned migration off HBCs network to something new Alex was setting up. While Alexs encryption had kept their work hidden from prying eyes, it wasnt strong enough to withstand a determined examination, and they couldnt keep pressing their luck. Sooner or later, some IT person or senior researcher at HBC would notice the computer activity and ask Stephen about it, drawing unwanted attention that could be problematic.

Remember, theres at least two sets of codes to break, maybe a third if your intuition is correct, Alex said. The number I gave you is the very low end of what were facing.

Relax, go home, get some rest. Something will come to us, Stephen said calmly, though inwardly he was bothered by his own words. Hed always been a straight shooter, known for his integrity. Yet his single-minded pursuit to break the codes had led him to more and more deceit, for what he told himself were good reasons.

Whats the saying? From your lips to Gods ears, Alex replied.

Trying to ease the tension in the room, Stephen said, Im not worried about what God hears; Im more concerned what Hell do.

Near as I can tell, Alex said, walking out the door, if He exists, He doesnt do much of anything.
Facebook and Twitter have joined the First Draft Coalition, a Google-led alliance formed last year to combat fake news and hoaxes and to ensure only verified news is published online.



The social media giants have become the latest members of First Draft, an organization that boasts members like YouTube, The New York Times, The Washington Post, BuzzFeed News, CNN, etc.



As per First Draft's website, the organization defines itself as a collaborative body and a community of specialists from the various fields of content, brought together to "work on ideas and initiatives, including a train-the-trainer programme, the launch of a collaborative verification platform, and the creation of a voluntary code of practice."



"This network will also create a feedback loop for representatives from each social media platform to connect with journalists and develop ideas for ways to streamline the verification process, improve the experience of eyewitnesses and increase news literacy amongst social media users," First Draft's MD Jenni Sargent wrote in a post on the organization's website.



"We live in a time when trust and truth are issues that all newsrooms, and increasingly the social platforms themselves, are facing," she further added. "Each partner is committed to sharing knowledge, developing policies and devising training in how journalists use the social web to find and report news."

Read more news about (internet advertising India, internet advertising, advertising India, digital advertising India, media advertising India)
Hi



My company have prepared my I-129S to renew my L1-B visa and my I-94 which expires in Jan 2017.



The plan is for me to leave the US and go to a US Embassy in Canada. I am a UK citizen. I will have an appointment on the Monday and stay for the week until my passport is returend with a new visa.



My wife is an L2 visa holder with an EAD that expires also in Jan2017. My company can not file or prepare documentation for her. I believe she will need to complete form I-539 - please correct me if I am wrong here.



The question is, can we both travel to Canada together and present our applications at the same time?



Although we have 4 months until expiry, we wish to file early to give her enough time for her EAD renewal - last time it took 120 days!



Any advice or experiences are appreciated.

Thanks
The personal blog of Peter Lee a.k.a. "China Hand"... Life is a comedy to those who think, a tragedy to those who feel, and an open book to those who read. You are welcome to contact China Matters at the address chinamatters --a-- prlee.org or follow me on twitter @chinahand.
My Attendees Demand Quick Answers, Shortcuts And Tips

The Consequences Of Responding To The Give-Me-The-Answers-Now-Audiences

The Better Conference Experience Using Questions

It is much more effective to provide opportunities for conference participants to solve their own problems, then telling them how to solve it. (Paraphrase Dr. A. Gidget Hopf, President & CEO of The Association for the Blind and Visually ImpairedGoodwill Industries.)Conference organizers automatically assume that if someone is attending their event, they expect the conference to help them solve their problems. They believe that the conference should provide the answers.Telling attendees the answer is not the key to conference success. Nor is sharing an experts successful steps the source of real attendee ROI. There is another way!We live in a rapid changing, instant-demanding, speedy-results-nowworld.We have vast amounts of information at our finger tips. We expect real-time, immediate resolutions to our pressing challenges. We want hints or tips immediatelyAnd we complain if a presenter makes us work for them. Or think on our own.I came to hear from the expert , not talk to my peer, is the lazy brains response to authentic learning. (If you really believe you learn from just listening to an expert and doing nothing else, then just buy audio books and listen to them through your ear buds.)We are a society of you-must-help-me-solve-my-problems-immediately people.When our attendees clamor and demand fast answersand often any answerwe must resist the impulse to provide recipe steps.Ultimately, when conference organizers respond to attendee pressures of providing great ideas or fast solutionswe risk sacrificing the very thing we need for conferences to be successful. We risk forfeiting deep, transformational learningattitude, behavior and skill changein the name of faux, surface learning. We put attendee temporary satisfaction over effectiveness.Then our conferences suffer from a lack of loyalty because little change occurs from attending the event. So attendees dont return.Instead, we need to lead attendees to ask pivotal questions so those very attendees can generate both short- and long-term results from their own learning.

When someone engages me in a question, it wakes me up. Im in a different place Chad Holliday, CEO and chairman of the board of DuPont.

Conference education sessions that lead with questions can do much more than just draw out information. Questions can encourage conference attendees to become participants and collaborators in solution finding. Questions can spur innovation, out of the box thinking and empower others say the authors of Leading With Questions.

To paraphrase Harvard professor, author and expert John Kotter, the key differences in forward-thinking progressive conferences and traditional conferences is that forwarding-thinking conferences focus on helping participants ask the right questions about their futures, their profession and their work. Traditional conferences focus on finding solutions to yesterdays problems.

Successful leaders know that they cannot get the right answer without asking the right questions. Successful conference organizers foster asking the right questions because then they can get at the right practices for their participants.



Conference Cultures That Promote Curiosity And Questions

Conferences that lead participants from good to great dont just secure successful experts that have all the answers and then motivate everyone to follow their messianic vision, to use Jim Collins language. It means having participants struggle with provocative questions that will lead the collective to the best possible insights.Then event professionals can build conference cultures for which questions are welcomed, assumptions challenged and new ways to solve problems are explored.

Asking lots of questions opens new doors to new ideas, which ultimately contributes to your competitive edge, says Michael Dell.

Conferences that ask tough questions through their education offerings will be more dynamic, agile, collaborative and creative. They will foster attendee curiosity which is the foundation for leadership development!

For more info on using questions:


Thursday, September 15, 2016

Attract the Right Job or Clientele: Turn Why Me into Yes Me!

Almost everyone Ive spoken with will admit to having experienced dark days. Many have shared that they almost quit their work. But there is one common factor as to why they did not quit ~ they enjoy what they do too much! In spite of the bad days, the work has become their way of life.

Embrace the joy in your life to find true reward.

My Story

Putting in long hours to improve my delivery is the norm. Continual change makes this endeavor even more tedious. Given the long hours, it admittedly becomes stressful when negativity from others arises.

This past week, I began to question every current avenue undertaken and its worthiness. Giving up wasnt the answer. But I needed to come to terms with what wasnt quite right.

These are two strategies to follow when uncertainty hits:

Find the better route.

Turn a negative frame of mind around into a positive.

Explosion

My favorite glass dish was filled with food and put into the oven to bake just as it always has for a number of years. Only this time, I heard an explosion. Teensy pieces of glass were seen all over the oven!

This could have been the last straw. Instead, I began to laugh hard. A sales technique referred to as reframing took over. My decision was to view this as a second 4th of July explosion of fireworks. It symbolically represented a new beginning of sorts. All of the recent grievances faded away as a new perspective was put in place. This of course includes buying a replacement glass dish!

Your Story

On the occasion you are experiencing doubt, take private time to consider the why that is. Most likely, one of your peers will have had a similar experience. Have a conversation about how they dealt with it and ask for recommendations on handling it. Their insights dont necessarily even matter. Its more about the conversation itself. Many times just letting it all out is all it takes to get back up full throttle.

[embedded content]

Top Performing Habits

Examine the best and the worst in place

Tweak the best and discard the worst

Revitalize the motivation to move forward

All of the above applies to the agony of seeking work and the job interview. Another aspect is to budget time and money in order to relax and enjoy life, too. Are you taking time off to be with family, friends, or to exercise and explore the world around you? The outside interests tend to provide further ideas and motivation to continue moving forward in the journey.

Sales Tips

When negativity hits, stop to examine the origin. Decide whether changes need to be made. Should changes be in order, decide whether they are minor or major. Begin the process by eliminating the no longer needed. Create a list of what needs to be fixed. Prioritize the list in order of immediate need. Add new trends to those venues you wish to maintain. Continually stay abreast of new trends to be ahead of the curve. Reenergize yourself and business by communicating your news. Talk about the newfound insights with followings and peers to further build business.

Smooth Sale! Following these guidelines will lead you to the

For Business Consultation and Conference Speaking

Schedule an Appointment to Learn More: elinor@smoothsale.net

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Releases from NASA, NASA's Galex, NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, HubbleSite, Spitzer, Cassini, ESO, ESA, NASAs Chandra X-ray Observatory, Royal Astronomical Society, NRAO, Astronomy Picture of the Day, Harvard-Smithsonian Center For Astrophysics, Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics, Gemini Observatory, Subaru Telescope, W. M. Keck Observatory, Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, JPL-Caltech, Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, ICRAR, etc
WASHINGTON  The U.S. Department of Agriculture and U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman filed a complaint against China this week concerning excessive government support provided for Chinese production of rice, wheat, and corn.

Bipartisan members of Congress joined in announcing the complaint, which challenges Chinas use of market price support for these three crops, in excess of Chinas commitments under World Trade Organization rules.

Excessive support

In 2015, Chinas market price support for these products is estimated to be nearly $100 billion in excess of the levels China committed to during its accession.

Chinas excessive market price support for rice, wheat, and corn inflates Chinese prices above market levels, creating artificial government incentives for Chinese farmers to increase production, according to USDA.

The USDA is challenging Chinas government support to help reduce distortions for rice, wheat, and corn, and help American farmers to compete on a more level playing field.

These programs distort Chinese prices, undercut American farmers, and clearly break the limits China committed to when they joined the WTO, said Froman. We will not stand by when our trading partners fail to follow the rules like everyone else.

Vilsack said China is still a major U.S. trade partner for ag products  but that trade would be even greater if the playing field was level.

Through tariff cuts and the removal of other trade barriers, China has gone from a $2-billion-a-year market for U.S. agricultural products to a $20-billion-plus market, Vilsack said. But we could be doing much better, particularly if our grain exports could compete in China on a level playing field. Unfortunately, Chinas price supports have encouraged wheat, corn and rice production in China that has displaced imports.

When China joined the WTO, it committed to limit this kind of trade-distorting support, which it has failed to do, Vilsack said. This has resulted in significant losses to American producers.

We see substantial opportunities to meet import demand for grains in China if China is willing to operate a WTO-consistent trade regime, Vilsack said.

History of actions

This trade enforcement action marks the 14th complaint brought by the Office of the United States Trade Representative against China at the WTO since 2009.

Eliminating barriers to trade, and gaining access to new markets is critical for our producers, said Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry. But, those efforts will go without reward if the existing trade rules are not enforced.

Held accountable

Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., ranking member of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, said we need to hold countries like China accountable for anti-competitive trade practices that hurt American farmers and businesses.

House Ag Committee Chairman and U.S. Rep. Michael Conaway, R-Tex., said China also is failing to report the support it offers its farmers.

Not only does China refuse to abide by the commitments it made in joining the WTO, it attempts to obscure its illegal actions by consistently failing to even report on the support it is providing to its farmers, Conaway said.
Get your fishing in while you can: Mark Ermer
Shropshire

A Full-Time position is available for an assistant herdsperson on a family dairy farm in mid Shropshire. We have a 250 dairy herd rearing own replacements together with a b...
Northern Ireland's Agricultural Minister Michelle McIlveen has put forward a "profitable" agri-food industry, a "healthy" environment and a "thriving" rural economy at the heart of her vision for the future.

During a briefing for the Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs Committee, the Minister said since taking the post of Agricultural Minister, she made priorities in order to achieve a vision of a "thriving and sustainable" economy, environment and rural community.

Miss McIlveen told Members of the Legislative Assembly that in order to achieve her vision she will prioritise three broad, strategic and interdependent objectives.

These will be to deliver a "profitable" agri-food, fisheries and forestry sector; to ensure a "clean, healthy" environment that benefits people, nature and the economy and to promote a "thriving" rural economy that contributes to prosperity and wellbeing.

She said that in delivering profitability across all sectors, her focus will be on improving the economic and environmental performance of businesses.

'Significant potential for further growth'

She went on to say: "The agri-food sector plays a pivotal role in the local economy, with an annual turnover of almost 5billion and over 20,000 employees.

"Despite the recent difficult trading environment, there is still significant potential for further growth.

"Soon I will announce the opening of the Farm Business Improvement Scheme capital element which, I believe, will help to sustainably grow the sector.

"Growth must be sustainable, there is no point producing more if the market is not available."

"I am also acutely aware of the very challenging market conditions that farmers have faced.

"There has been an improvement on the price of sheep, cattle and milk for our local farmers"

"Whilst the vast majority of contributing factors are outside our control, we will continue to do all that we can to assist.

"In October, we will issue a 70% advance to Basic and Greening Payments to eligible farm businesses where all checks have been completed.

"I also recognise the importance of research. Over the next two years I intend to commission over 7million of new research from AFBI and our local universities.

"This will be done in collaboration with other institutes across the world and will allow us to access important research with a value of over 30million."

'Streamline and transform environmental regulations'

Addressing the issue of a clean and healthy environment, the Minister told MLAs there are plans to regulate, educate and incentivise organisations, businesses and individuals to protect and improve the natural environment.

"This includes the Environmental Farming Scheme, a programme to streamline and transform environmental regulations and look for opportunities to work in partnership to meet both environmental and economic needs," Miss McIlveen said.

"We are also exploring the most effective and efficient way of delivering environmental advice to our customers in order to comply with legislative requirements; to improve the environment; and to enable businesses to be profitable and sustainable."

The Minister then touched on her plans for promoting a thriving rural economy which contributes to prosperity and wellbeing.

She said: "Almost 40% of our population lives in a rural area and I will ensure that the needs of those living in rural areas are articulated around the Executive table.

"My focus will be to ensure we support local businesses to grow. I would like to see job creation as the cornerstone of our programmes."

'Positive Brexit impact'

Addressing the issue of Brexit, the Minister told the committee there has been a "positive Brexit impact" on the agri-food industry.

"We have seen a significant depreciation on the value of sterling compared to both the euro and dollar and this is beneficial to exporting companies.

"As a result, there has been an improvement on the price of sheep, cattle and milk for our local farmers.

"Northern Ireland goods are more competitive in export markets and the costs of food products coming into the UK are more expensive compared to locally produced products.

"More visitors and shoppers are coming to Northern Ireland and, in particular, to our rural towns and villages.

"Devaluation of sterling is likely to have a positive impact on the value of basic farm payments to farmers."

'Sustainable growth and competitiveness'

Miss McIlveen went on to outline her policy priorities as the UK moves towards exiting the European Union.

"We will continue to roll out the various programmes within the Rural Development Programme and have agreed a process to consider future implications on a case by case basis after the Autumn Budget Statement.

"Secondly, I am acutely aware of the importance of the agri-food sector to our economy. I want an agricultural policy framework that underpins its sustainable growth and competitiveness.

"t is vital that we get the best deal possible for Northern Ireland as the UK negotiates the terms of exit.

"I want to see open trading arrangements continue for existing markets, and a much more progressive approach to developing new markets across the world," Miss McIlveen concluded.
37 leading agri-business companies have today launched the Global Agri-Business Alliance (GAA) in Singapore.

Their aim is to collectively tackle the major environmental and social challenges facing agricultural supply chains and rural communities across the world.

The CEO-led private sector initiative is seeking to "contribute significantly" to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly with regards to the second SDG on tackling hunger, nutrition, food security and sustainable agriculture.

The launch members  which include growers and producers, traders, seed suppliers and agri-service providers  are geographically varied spanning different continents as well multiple commodities such as grain, edible nuts and sugar.

While many agri-companies already collaborate with non-governmental organizations, technical implementers, consumer brands and retailers, the members of the GAA will harness their collective strengths at the front-line of agricultural production to help bring the scale and impact required to drive major change.

'Critical sector'

Paul Polman, CEO of Unilever, and a member of the SDG Advocacy Group, said the Global Agri-business Alliance is a "major step" in aligning this "critical" sector behind the Sustainable Development Goals.

"We know the SDGs cannot be achieved without business and we must all go beyond our own individual supply chains towards broader sector wide and value chain approaches.

"The alliance can catalyse likeminded businesses and collaborate with other business platforms to deliver the positive impact the world needs."

Lord Mark Malloch-Brown, chair, Business and Sustainable Development Commission commented: "Agri-business is most clearly linked to SDGs related to reducing hunger and ending poverty, but it is also critical to protecting livelihoods, achieving gender equality and fulfilling education.

"The companies of the Global Agri-business Alliance understand that their sector must help achieve sustainable development, but they also recognise the SDGs represent a tremendous business opportunity.

"We at the Business Commission look forward to working with the GAA and its member companies to seize these opportunities and create a more inclusive, sustainable world."
Wouldnt it be great to find a way of feeding birds and bees while raising much needed funds for a cancer charity?

Sunflowers are the solution, says Merseyside arable grower Olly Harrison, who has set aside a hectare of land to grow the crop.

He says it is a "brilliant source of food" for bees, birds and other wildlife.

Olly, of Water Lane Farm in Tarbock Merseyside, estimates there are 75,000 flowers in his field.

For each one he wants to raise a 1 for an independent charity called Sunflowers that supports cancer patients, survivors and carers in Merseyside.

Olly says: "I grew the five acre field of sunflowers and millet after rabbits ate all the winter wheat that was on it.

"Originally I wanted to see if the flower would grow well in my region."

"After standing in the field watching bees feeding on flowers I thought it would be a shame to harvest them and would be nice to leave them for the birds to feed on over winter.

"It was at this point that I came up with this idea of raising money from them for charity.

By visiting Ollys JustGiving page, you can pledge money to the charity and your support for British farmers who have embraced the conservation agenda.

Farmers have planted or restored 30,000km of hedgerows and reserved the borders of fields to plant wildflowers for birds and bees.

They are also ensuring cleaner water by using less fertiliser and pesticides than ever before.

Olly adds: "I will lose money on the field by not harvesting the flowers but that's farming at present.

"I am already loosing on the rest of my crops this year with a poor harvest and poor prices so giving something to a good cause will cheer me up and if it's successful I will grow some more next year."
United Dairy Farmers' commitment to pay suppliers a significant winter milk production bonus has been welcomed by the Ulster Farmers' Union.

United Dairy Farmers is a leading UK dairy co-operative owned by farmer members in Northern Ireland, England and Scotland with a turnover in excess of 400 million per year and employing around 1,000 people.

UFU dairy chairman William Irvine said that since United was the biggest buyer of milk it was 'encouraging' that farmers were set to gain from a policy that reflected what was happening on dairy markets.

"Price improvements will boost farmers' confidence"

"It seems ironic that as the EUs Voluntary Milk Production Reduction Scheme is being implemented, United finds itself in the position of needing more milk to satisfy the business it has through its Dale Farm brand.

"This is encouraging news for producers  and I hope other processors will follow United's lead to allow farmers to benefit from what is happening on national and global dairy markets," said Mr Irvine.

The UFU, who has just recently completed a series of meetings with local dairy processors encouraging them to pass the recent commodity price gains on to producers, says the United bonus will come as a welcome cash flow boost for farmers at a time of the year when costs begin to climb.

Boost farmers' confidence

Mr Irvine said he was hopeful the winter would bring the combination of a higher milk price and manageable costs.

He stressed however that this would not cure the problem the industry has faced for the past couple of years.

"It is encouraging to see developments like this.

"Price improvements will boost farmers' confidence, but there is a long way to go before the industry is back on an even keel.

"Part of this is clearing the huge debts that have built up operating below the cost of production for such a long time.

"However, farmers are positive by nature, and they will see this move by United as a big step in the right direction, said Mr Irvine.

The dairy committee chairman added that while some farmers might gain from the EU scheme to cut milk production, this latest development underlines why the UFU was never convinced that the answer to low prices globally was to reduce production here.

The indications are that markets are recovering and that is why United is offering a bonus, and farmers want to be in a strong position to meet market demand, said William Irvine.
A Yorkshire poultry farm has embarked on ambitious plans to increase bird production by a third thanks to Yorkshire Bank.

Patrick Wedgewood and his wife Lindsey, who operate North Riding farm in Tholthorpe, are replacing two existing poultry sheds in a move that will enable them to increase the number of birds on site from 130,000 to 174,000 per crop.

The project is being assisted by a six figure funding package from Yorkshire Bank. It is part of ambitious plans to modernise and expand the farm, which Patrick and Lindsey farm in partnership with Patricks parents.

As well as installing the new poultry sheds, which are 66x400ft compared to the existing 40x400ft sheds, Patrick and his wife have added a biomass system to heat the sheds and reduce energy bills. The initiative was also funded by Yorkshire Bank.

Patrick said: As a family business, we have long enjoyed a strong relationship with Yorkshire Bank.

"As well as providing support, its knowledgeable team are always on hand with expert advice and invaluable insight into the market place.

We welcome the Banks support for our latest growth plans and we look forward to continuing our partnership as we develop and expand.

The deal was delivered by Gordon Blackwood, an agricultural relationship manager based at Yorkshire Banks North Yorkshire Customer Banking Centre.

David Hannon, Head of Agribusiness at Yorkshire Bank, said: Patrick and his family are highly experienced poultry farmers, with a strong understanding of what it takes to innovate and achieve growth.

It is rewarding to be supporting such a longstanding family business with fantastic growth potential.
"No matter how much cash or desire you have or how excited you are, until you have someone to back you, whether it be foreign investment or ownership, super funds or bigger players in our industry I don't think it matters, I think we need to embrace it."
"They are seeing their on-property prices and averages come up and they are saying we can afford to add a bit more to budgets," he said.
The future of Fauquier Times now depends on community support. Your donation will help us continue to improve our journalism through in-depth local news coverage and expanded reader engagement.

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That faint gobble, gobble youre hearing in the distance can only mean one thing: Thanksgiving is near! Both ACTS and SERVE are gearing up for their holiday programs, and your help is needed.
What was it like to be an Oath Keeper? John Zimmerman can tell you

John Zimmerman said he was active with the Oath Keepers from September to November 2020, then left after a falling out with founder Stewart Rhodes.
Former Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva was charged Wednesday with spearheading a corruption and kickback scheme tied to Petrobras contracts.

Brazilian prosecutors charged Lula with corruption and money laundering for his alleged role as the boss of the multi-billion kickback scheme.

Prosecutors said Wednesday that Lula was the conductor of a criminal orchestra that they claim aimed to keep the leftist Worker Party in power through criminal means.

Authorities havent confirmed if they will seek an arrest order for the 70-year old former president.

Prosecutors allege that Lula collected just over $1 million in kickbacks and a luxury apartment from engineering firm OAS.

Lula has denied that he owns the apartment and had previously denied any wrongdoing.

Lawyers representing Lula said the charges are politically motivated and are intended to stop Lula from running during Brazils 2018 election, according to Reuters.

Prosecutors added that they believe the Petrobras corruption scandal has cost Petrobras shareholders and Brazilian tax payers about $12.6 billion, Reuters said.

Lulas wife, Marisa Leticia Lula da Silva, has also been charged in connection with the case.

Lula helped found the Workers Party and served as Brazils president from 2003 to 2010.

Lula is the most prominent politician to be pulled into the Operation Car Wash probe that has focused on kickbacks and money laundering tied to Petrobras contracts.

News that Brazilian authorities were investigating Lulas role in the Petrobras scheme first broke earlier this year.

In May, Brazilian federal police detained Lula for questioning as part of the corruption probe.

That investigation was made public a little under a year after Brazilian authorities announced they were investigating Lula for alleged influence peddling.

In July 2015, prosecutors confirmed that they were investigating whether Lula used his influence to help Brazilian construction firm Odebrecht win overseas business after he left office.

Odebrecht CEO Marcelo Odebrecht was sentenced to 19 years in prison earlier this year on charges of money laundering, corruption and taking part in a criminal association.

Lead prosecutor Carlos Fernando dos Santos Limas told Reuters in June 2015 that he had no doubt that Odebrecht and other executives were running a cartel that systematically inflated the price of Petrobras contracts and skimmed off excess funds.

The Lula Foundation said at the time that it believes the former president had done nothing wrong.

____

From the Petro Global News Wire Service  2016 All Rights Reserved
The DOJ indicted two former executives of a Singapore-based defense contractor for a conspiracy to steal more than $5 million from the U.S. Navy.

The indictments are the latest in a huge bribes-for-secrets scandal thats rocking the Navys command structure in the Pacific.

Neil Peterson, 38, and Linda Raja, 43, both of Singapore, were charged with submitting false claims and conspiracy to commit wire fraud.

Singapore authorities arrested them at the request of the U.S. government.

The DOJ unsealed the indictment Thursday.

Peterson and Raja worked for Glenn Defense Marine Asia. Peterson was the vice president for global operations and Raja served as general manager for Singapore, Australia, and the Pacific Isles.

Theyre being held in Singapore pending extradition to the United States.

The DOJ said they plotted with the owner of Glenn Defense, Leonard Glenn Francis  also known as Fat Leonard  to cheat the U.S. Navy out of more than $5 million.

They allegedly submitted false price quotes from non-existent companies on letterhead created from graphics cut and pasted from the internet, the DOJ said.

Glenn Defense-owner Francis, 51, has already pleaded guilty to bribing scores of U.S. Navy officials with luxury travel, meals, cash, electronics, parties, and prostitutes.

His company provided Navy ships with food, water, cleaning, and other port services in Asia.

Federal agents arrested the Malaysian citizen after luring him to San Diego to talk about new Navy contracts.

Hes waiting to be sentenced.

A total of 16 individuals have now been charged in connection with the scandal.

Of those, 11 are current or former U.S. Navy officials.

Most of the Navy personnel have been charged with taking bribes from Francis in exchange for passing to him sensitive information about ship movements and schedules. Some were charged with lying to investigators about their relationship with Francis and his company.

They are:

Admiral Robert Gilbeau

Captain (ret.) Michael Brooks

Commander Bobby Pitts

Lt. Commander Gentry Debord

Captain Daniel Dusek

Commander Michael Misiewicz

Lt. Commander Todd Malaki

Commander Jose Luis Sanchez

Petty Officer First Class Daniel Layug

NCIS Supervisory Special Agent John Beliveau, and

Paul Simpkins, a former DoD civilian employee who oversaw contracting in Singapore.

Gilbeau, Dusek, Misiewicz, Malaki, Beliveau, Sanchez, Layug, and Simpkins have pleaded guilty.

In January, Layug was sentenced to 27 months in prison and Malaki was sentenced to 40 months in prison.

In March, Dusek was sentenced to 46 months in prison.

In April, Misiewicz was sentenced to 78 months in prison and fined $100,000.

Gilbeau, Beliveau, Sanchez, and Simpkins are wating to be sentenced.

Brooks, Pitts, and Debord were charged in May and their cases are pending.

Other Glenn Defense executives charged are Alex Wisidagama and Ed Aruffo.

Both have pleaded guilty.

Wisidagama was sentenced in March to 63 months in prison and ordered to pay $34.8 million in restitution to the Navy.

Aruffo awaits sentencing.

____

Richard L. Cassin is the publisher and editor of the FCPA Blog. Hell be the keynote speaker at the FCPA Blog NYC Conference 2016.
'Star Wars' legend Mark Hamill claims up to 90 per cent of signed memorabilia from the franchise is "fake".

Mark Hamill

The 64-year-old actor - who plays Jedi Knight Luke Skywalker in the sci-fi series - is dismayed at the collecting industry that surrounds the movies and insists much of what is advertised as signed items is bogus.

Speaking to BBC One show 'Rip Off Britain' - presented by Angela Rippon - he said: "There are more fake autographs than real ones it just breaks your heart [to see fans duped]."

When asked how much of the autographed memorabilia is phoney, he answered: "It's in the 50 to 90 percentile".

Hamill has developed a technique so his signed merchandise can be identified as genuine - he personalises each autograph for each fan.

He revealed: "A true fan would love that."

Hamill also is happy to inspect anything claimed to have been signed by him if fans send him photos on social media of the alleged autographed items.

He explained: "Every day it's like homework. You have to sit down and go through 30, 40, 50 of these things, and sometimes they're really close calls. It doesn't bring me any pleasure to disappoint someone and say, that's a fake. On the other hand, [forgeries] are just so pervasive - there are more fakes than there are real ones."

Hamill first portrayed Luke in the original 'Star Wars' trilogy - created by George Lucas.

He has reprised the key role in a galaxy far, far away in Disney and Lucasfilm's new trilogy, although he only made a brief appearance in 'The Force Awakens'.

He will next be seen as the character in 'Star Wars: Episode VIII' alongside the returned Daisy Ridley (Rey), John Boyega (Finn), Adam Driver (Kylo Ren) and Carrie Fisher (Leia Organa).

Hamill is also expected to be in 2019's 'Star Wars: Episode IX' when it is released in 2019.
Duchess Catherine's cover shoot for Vogue magazine was kept secret for four months.

Duchess Catherine

The 34-year-old royal recently appeared on the front cover of the fashion magazine's 100th anniversary edition and it has now been revealed that Vogue editor Alexandra Shulman kept it quiet for 16 weeks.

Richard Macer, who shot a documentary at Vogue magazine's headquarters, said: "Trust. It's a critical ingredient in any successful documentary. My job is to make the contributor feel them can speak openly and honestly in an unfettered way.

"But for some reason Alex felt she couldn't tell me about the royal photo shoot. It wasn't just a case of withholding information. She actively lied. More than that, she developed an elaborate ruse."

And Richard was impressed that Alexandra managed to get the "scoop of the year".

He added: "The centenary issue is selling like hot cakes and Alex is still at the top of her game. Far from announcing her retirement, she'd pulled off the scoop of the year."

Richard also revealed he was kept in the dark about the shoot until April 28, where the photos of the Duchess of Cambridge were revealed.

Speaking in the BBC2 documentary, 'Absolutely Fashion: Inside British Vogue', he added: "I'm told I must not discuss this with anyone, even Alex. I can't stop thinking about this surprise announcement,' he said of the longest-serving editor of British Vogue. Maybe she's going to tell everyone she's leaving.

"I think it's a surprise party for her staff to say thanks for all their hard work. I've been speculating quite a lot about what she's going to say but the truth is, I have no clue."
Prince Charles honoured New Zealand's fallen soldiers at a moving ceremony in France on Thursday (15.09.16).

Prince Charles

The 67-year-old royal attended the New Zealand Somme Centenary Commemorations in his official role as the Field Marshal of the New Zealand Army to remember those who died serving their country during the First World War.

Speaking at the ceremony, he said: "Standing in this peaceful scene today it is hard to imagine that a century ago this was an infernal, blasted wasteland, which my predecessor as Prince of Wales, my great-uncle Edward, described as 'the nearest approach to hell imaginable' ...

The footprints we leave today mark the centre of a struggle that found twenty-five countries from five continents on opposing sides in a terrible and exhausting trial of strength. None came further to serve here than the New Zealanders who, on the Somme, confirmed their reputation as exceptional soldiers.

"They engaged, with boundless courage and tenacity, in defence of values of liberty that we still hold dear to this day. What occurred here 100 years ago did not create national character - it revealed it. The depth of contribution and sacrifice by Pakeha and Maori soldiers was extraordinary."

The Prince of Wales - who is next in line to the throne - was escorted to the event by the New Zealand Defence Force's Maori Cultural Group, where he urged for conflict across the world to cease.

He added: "Long after 1916, one Otago soldier recalled how at a New Zealand regimental aid post wounded men were evacuated under heavy shellfire 'with no favour or distinction of nationality'. It was he thought 'an insane paradox - every energy in the one place devoted to the extermination of life, and the other to its preservation!'

"My hope is that today we can re-dedicate ourselves to a future free from intolerance and conflict. We do this in honour of the memory of those who fought and died here so long ago."
Joanna Lumley has lashed out at the BBC's decision to reboot the popular 80s comedy 'Are You Being Served?'.

Joanna Lumley

The 'Absolutely Fabulous' actress admitted the original show, featuring Mollie Sugden, John Inman and Wendy Richard, is as clear in her mind today as it was when it last broadcast in 1985, and therefore doesn't warrant a revisit.

She told The Daily Mirror newspaper: "I can remember so vividly the people from the old 'Are You Being Served?'. I'm slightly divided. You do think, 'Maybe you should move on a bit?' But maybe it entertains the young."

And the subject of a reboot is no doubt close to the 70-year-old star's heart as she played a German shopper and minor character Miss French in two episodes in 1973.

She was also married to co-writer Jeremy Lloyd in 1970, before the marriage was dissolved a few months later.

Last month, 'Are You Being Served?' returned for a special one-off episode, where Sherrie Hewson played Mrs. Slocombe and John Challis played Captain Peacock.

But it was heavily criticised by viewers who called it "terrible" and some even demanded back their licence fee.

The show was remade, along with a series of other old programmes such as 'Porridge', 'The Good Life' and 'Young Hyacinth' as part of the BBC's Sitcom Season.

Meanwhile, although she's made it clear she's not a fan of remaking old shows, Joanna is no stranger to remakes herself as she rose to fame playing Purdy in 'The New Avengers' in 1976.

Speaking of that remake, she said: "There was a 10-year gap ... After they had seen everybody - I mean they were going through grandmothers - I got the part."
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DuPont Advanced Printing has introduced Artistri Xite S1500 dye sublimation ink, which offers superior product consistency, jetting reliability and colour print performance. Artistri Xite S1500 digital ink is particularly suitable for printing on polyester textile substrates and is also designed to work with coated dye sublimation papers.The new ink meets the needs of quality conscious textile printers in multiple areas including garment decoration, fast fashion, couture, point of purchase signage and trade booth construction, the company said.

DuPont Advanced Printing has introduced Artistri Xite S1500 dye sublimation ink, which offers superior product consistency, jetting reliability and colour print performance. Artistri Xite S1500 digital ink is particularly suitable for printing on polyester textile substrates and is also designed to work with coated dye sublimation papers.#

Artistri Xite S1500 achieves exceptional colour standards with deep, rich blacks and outstanding colour saturation. It also offers excellent jetting characteristics, which means less cleaning and ink waste, lower down time on press and a more trouble-free workflow, Ken Hogrefe, technical marketing manager at DuPont Advanced Printing said. (AR)

Fibre2Fashion News Desk  India
Specialty fibre producer Lenzing has created a solution to measure softness in textiles. Using a softness measuring device from Emtec Electronic and the well-known ring method, Lenzing has concluded that higher the amount of Lenzing Modal in the textile , the softer it becomes, while also concluding that MicroModal is the softest fibre among all its fibres.According to Lenzing, softness is becoming increasingly important as a comfort factor in brands and with retailers and Modal fibre is the softest fibre in its portfolio, which can even be felt from the feel of the fabric.

Specialty fibre producer Lenzing has created a solution to measure softness in textiles. Using a softness measuring device from Emtec Electronic and the well-known ring method, Lenzing has concluded that higher the amount of Lenzing Modal in the textile, the softer it becomes, while also concluding that MicroModal is the softest fibre among all its fibres.#

However, an increasing number of customers are asking for measurements to explain the softness of our fibres in physical terms, Claudia Mommer, product manager for Lenzing Modal said. The test method should quickly depict the degree of softness of fabrics with Modal, to help customers communicate softness at point of sale. (AR)

Fibre2Fashion News Desk  India
Its Money Honey

Priyanka Chopra is placed at No. 8 in the Forbes list of highest paid TV actresses from around the world.

$10 Million

Deepika Padukone earned $10 Million through movies in India. Well, Dips is certainly not far away in earnings!

Big Money

Priyanka Chopra earned her spot in the Forbes list of highest paid TV actress through Quantico.

High Capability

We never know, a year later Deepika Padukone might turn the tables and beat Priyanka Chopra and others as well.

In A Cool Place

Priyanka Chopra is certainly in a cool place and doing the right things at the right time as of now.

Padmavati

Well well, now that Deepika Padukone has signed for SLB's Padmavati, her paycheck is growing by leaps and bounds.

Two Steps Forward

Priyanka Chopra is a household name in India and is also known in the United States as well.

Long Way

Deepika Padukone is certainly come a long way in Bollywood and will soon debut in Hollywood as well for the xXx sequel.

All Eyes On PeeCee

Priyanka Chopra's Hollywood debut Baywatch would release worldwide in 2017. The film will give a big boost to her image.

Deepika vs Priyanka

Be it Deepika Padukone or Priyanka Chopra, we're sure the audiences love both these wonderful women equally.
We all know that Sushant Singh Rajput is very excited about his upcoming film MS Dhoni: The Untold Story. Recently, the actor revealed that Dhoni loved the film and was very moved by it.

In a candid chat, the actor told Pinkvilla, ''Dhoni has watched it. He was very moved by it and he didn't anything for about good 20 minutes and smiled all through. And then we met for the trailer launch, and since he's promoting the film. It means that he really loved the movie."

In the same interview, Sushant also shared that he met Dhoni only thrice when he was shooting for the movie. He said, "I was training for this film for good 12 to 14 months. During that period, I've met him thrice. It was in three phases actually. Whenever I was free in between those days and I structured the preparation in that way, that I was not wasting his and my time.''

Also Read: SRK Is A Charmer! Read What Shahrukh Khan Did For Anushka Sharma's Boyfriend Virat Kohli In Prague



''The first time I just asked him to tell me his story. He was talking and I was just listening and recording things. The second time was when after four and five months went into preparation, I was asking him questions and he was answering,'' Sushant said.

''And also I remember, I came up with some 250 hypothetical and multiple-choice questions that what if this happens what will you do and he was not allowed to think through, so it was just his instincts. And the third time, when we met, was just for the script so that we know this has happened," he said.
Celebrated songstress Taylor Swift, who has just broken up with British actor Tom Hiddleston just about last week, has already set her sight for another Hollywood actor, Zac Efron.

"Swift has been talking about him non-stop since her breakup with Tom. She's always said she feels a strong connection to Zac, but could never act on it because they've always been dating other people," a source revealed.

The source also confirmed that Taylor and Zac had been pretty close even during Hiddleton, and also quite flirty with each other at a number of occasions.

"Taylor and Zac have always been pretty flirty with each other. She's reached out to Zac and told him that they should hang out and maybe go to dinner together, and he's into it. It just hasn't happened yet because of their schedules," the source added further.

However, this is not the first time that Taylor and Zac have come under the rumour scanner. It was believed that the two were in a kind of relationship in 2012 and were also spotted having dinner together from the time they had worked for the movie The Lorax.

But, Taylor had earlier denied the rumours by saying they were just co-stars.

"We are not a couple. He's awesome, we are not a couple, though. You hear people get together when they're shooting movies, co-stars," Taylor had said earlier.
Popular actor-filmmaker K Bhagyaraj is said to have been roped in to play a pivotal role in Mysskin's next Tamil directorial Thupparivaalan, which will go on the floor next month.

The film stars Vishal and Rakul Preet Singh in the lead.

"Bhagyaraj sir has been roped in for a very interesting role. Mysskin is known for surprising audiences with his choice of actors and the inclusion of Bhagyaraj sir will be a masterstroke," a source from the film's unit told IANS.

Tipped to be an investigative thriller, the project marks the first time collaboration of Mysskin and Vishal. In the film, Vishal will be seen as a suave detective, working on a case involving a series of murders.

Thupparivaalan also stars Prasanna in another important role.

Stay tuned for further updates on this upcoming interesting project.

Also Read: Cauvery Issue: Tamil Film-maker Hits Out At Kannada Actors?
LONDON, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

Abingworth, the international investment group dedicated to life sciences, today announced that it has seeded GammaDelta Therapeutics Ltd, a new immunotherapy company. GammaDelta Therapeutics also received support from three organisations, Cancer Research Technology (CRT), King's College London and the Francis Crick Institute. The company is being incubated at Abingworth's London office.

GammaDelta Therapeutics has been founded on pioneering research by Professor Adrian Hayday and Dr Oliver Nussbaumer at King's College London and the Francis Crick Institute, funded in part by Cancer Research UK, into gamma delta T cells. These are a unique and conserved population of lymphocytes that contribute to many types of immune responses and immunopathologies. The new company is focused on exploiting this work to develop improved immunotherapies for cancer and potentially other diseases.

Peter Goodfellow, an advisor to Abingworth and formerly Senior Vice President for Discovery Research at GlaxoSmithKline, is Chairman of the board, which also includes, Prof. Hayday; Raj Mehta of CRT; Stephen Parker, Institutes Director; Mike Owen, formerly Senior Vice President for Biopharmaceuticals Research at GlaxoSmithKline; and Tim Haines, Managing Partner of Abingworth.

Raj Mehta, Founder and Interim CEO, said: "We are delighted to have attracted the support of Abingworth to the founding and development of GammaDelta Therapeutics and will use the proceeds to help us advance our innovative programmes into the clinic."

"GammaDelta's technology is differentiated from other approaches to immunotherapy being pursued and has the potential to make a significant impact on the treatment of cancer," said Abingworth's Tim Haines. "We look forward to working with the team to advance the discovery and development of novel therapeutic candidates based on this exciting approach."

About GammaDelta Therapeutics

Founded in 2016, GammaDelta Therapeutics is developing the potential of gamma delta cells to create improved immunotherapy of cancer and other serious diseases. The company plans to exploit unique properties of tissue resident gamma delta T cells for effective immunotherapy.

About Abingworth

Abingworth is an international investment group dedicated to collaborating with life sciences entrepreneurs to develop their ideas into products that have a dramatic impact on health. With over $1 billion under management, Abingworth invests at all stages of development, from start-ups to publicly traded companies, and across all life science sectors.

Supporting its portfolio companies with a team of 27 at offices in London, Menlo Park (California) and Boston, Abingworth has invested in 142 life science companies, leading to 63 IPOs and 40 mergers and acquisitions. http://www.abingworth.com
TORONTO, ONTARIO -- (Marketwired) -- 09/15/16 -- Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada

At the 2016 Spotlight Awards today, the Honourable Navdeep Bains, Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development, presented the Lifetime Achievement award to Tom Jenkins, Chairman of OpenText Corp.

The Minister was joined by co-presenter Nadir Mohamed, former Rogers Communications Inc. CEO and president.

Mr. Jenkins has had a profound and lasting impact on the high-tech community in Ontario's Kitchener-Waterloo region. He is currently the Chancellor of the University of Waterloo and was a founder of Kitchener's Communitech, a hub that helps technology companies start, grow and succeed. He has also served as a director of national organizations such as the C.D. Howe Institute and the Canadian Council of Chief Executives.

Mr. Jenkins is also well respected for his work on behalf of the Government of Canada to promote the digital economy. He was appointed Officer of the Order of Canada in 2011 for his efforts to promote and develop Canada's high-tech sector.

Since 2015, he has been Chair of the National Research Council of Canada. He has also chaired two government panels: the Defence Procurement panel and the Review of Federal Support to Research and Development panel, which submitted final reports in 2011 and 2013 respectively.

Quote

"No one is more deserving than Tom Jenkins of a lifetime achievement award. Despite his long, hectic workdays as a corporate executive, he has always demonstrated leadership by mentoring the next generation of tech entrepreneurs. He has also devoted himself to public service. In all of his activities, Tom has never lost sight of the fact that it's people who drive innovation. That's why it's so important to nurture the skills and talent of Canadians, who are our greatest resource. I congratulate Tom and all the winners of this year's Spotlight Awards for their dedication and hard work."

- The Honourable Navdeep Bains, Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development

Quick facts

-- Since joining OpenText in 1994, Mr. Jenkins has served as Chief Executive Officer, President and Chief Strategy Officer. He is currently Chairman of the information management company. -- Mr. Jenkins is also an Honorary Colonel of the Royal Highland Fusiliers of Canada. -- The Spotlight Awards celebrate Canadian entrepreneurship in the technology sector. Other 2016 Spotlight Award winners include WIND, Hootsuite, Kik and AppDirect.

Associated link

-- Spotlight Awards (English only)

Follow Minister Bains on social media.

Twitter: @MinisterISED

Contacts:

Philip Proulx, Press Secretary

Office of the Minister of Innovation,

Science and Economic Development

343-291-2500



Media Relations

Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada

343-291-1777

ic.mediarelations-mediasrelations.ic@canada.ca




Regulatory News:

Skanska (STO:SKAB) has signed a contract with University of Virginia to renovate and expand the current University hospital in Virginia, USA. The contract is worth USD 42M, about SEK 350M, which will be included in the order bookings for Skanska USA Building in the third quarter 2016.

The contract consists of early site work, utility relocations and installing the building foundation system. The entire multi-phased hospital expansion and renovation project is slated for completion in December 2020.

Construction services began in the June 2015 and this phase of the project is expected to be complete in September 2017.

Skanska USA is one of the leading development and construction companies in the country, consisting of four business units: Skanska USA Building, which specializes in building construction; Skanska USA Civil, specialized in civil infrastructure; Skanska Infrastructure Development, which develops public-private partnerships; and Skanska USA Commercial Development, which develops commercial projects in select U.S. markets. Headquartered in New York, Skanska USA has more than 10,000 employees and its 2015 revenues were SEK 54.5 billion.

The information provided herein is such as Skanska AB is obligated to disclose pursuant to the EU market securities act (EU) no. 596/2014.

Skanska is one of the world's leading construction and project development companies, focused on selected home markets in the Nordic region, other European countries and North America. Supported by global trends in urbanization and demographics, and by being at the forefront in sustainability, Skanska offers competitive solutions for both simple and the most complex assignments, helping to build a sustainable future for customers and communities. The Group currently has 43,100 employees in selected home markets in Europe and North America. Skanska's sales in 2015 totaled SEK 155 billion.

This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160915006705/en/

Contacts:

Skanska USA

Pamela Monastra, Communications

tel +1 404 946 75 33

or

Skanska AB

Andreas Joons, Press Officer

tel +46 (0)10 449 04 94

or

Direct line for media

tel +46 (0)10 448 88 99

or

This and previous releases can also be found at www.skanska.com
The MSCI Emerging Europe 10/40 Index rose by 1.8% in August in USD terms. The Company outperformed the index and was up by 2.7% in USD terms.



Most of the region's equity markets saw positive returns in August with the exception of the Czech Republic, which suffered as key stocks surprised negatively on dividends. While Hungary (+2.8%), Russia (+2.6%) and Poland (+1.8%) were top performers, Greece (+0.3%) and Czech (-10.2%) were the laggards.



Hungary reported solid 2Q16 GDP expansion of 4.5% quarter on quarter and a strong pick-up in the annual growth rate, both of which helped bolster that market. In Poland, the market reacted favourably to a revised proposal for the conversion of CHF mortgages which would significantly reduce the cost for banks. Russia reversed course in August buoyed by strong 2Q earnings and the rise in oil. Turkey also rebounded from July's politically driven lows. President Erdogan's response to last month's failed coup attempt has helped his approval rating move to an all-time high. Turkey is also working on improving relations with Russia, which should have a positive read across for tourism revenue in Turkey. Greece was flat for the month despite the banks reporting good results for 2Q16.



Focus on: Poland's CHF mortgage conversion proposal

Poland continues to work towards a solution for the conversion of CHF mortgages. In August, President Duda announced a revision to his previous proposal which would appear to have very positive implications for the banks. The revised proposal envisions lowering the costs for banks from PLN 9-15 billion to PLN 3-4 billion. In return the banks will be encouraged to voluntarily convert the loans from CHF to PLN or face higher capital weights. This news combined with strong results from PKO Bank led to the stock being a top performer for the Company in August. PKO Bank is Poland's largest bank. It has one of the strongest deposit franchises in the country, helping it to have a structurally lower cost of funding than its peers. We like the company given its attractive valuation relative to the other Polish banks.
PRAG (dpa-AFX) - Czech producer prices decline slowed less-than-expected in August, figures from the Czech Statistical Office showed Friday. The industrial producer prices index dropped 3.4 percent year-on-year following a 4 percent slump in July. Economists had expected a 3.2 percent decline. Producer prices have decreased every month since January 2014, except in August 2014, when they were unchanged. On a month-on-month basis, prices declined 0.2 percent in August. Separately, the agency announced that import prices fell 4.5 percent year-on-year in July after 5.4 percent slump in June. Compared to the previous month, import prices rose 0.2 percent following a 0.7 percent gain in June. Export prices declined 3.2 percent after a 3.8 percent tumble in the previous month. Month-on-month, export prices were unchanged from June, when edged up 0.1 percent. 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.
LONDON, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

Hawes & Curtis, the quintessentially British brand, has created an exclusive collection in collaboration with HRH The Prince of Wales's charity The Prince's Trust.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160915/408366LOGO )



(Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160915/408367 )



The collection consists of limited edition shirts for men and women, as well as cufflinks, silk ties and pocket squares, all featuring the special Hawes & Curtis/ Prince's Trust label.

The youth charity will benefit from the sales of these products and the proceeds will help disadvantaged young people move into work, education or training. The collection will launch in stores and online on 13 September 2016 and will be available for three months.

Hawes & Curtis CEO, Touker Suleyman said: "We are very proud to support The Prince's Trust in its continuous efforts to give more of Britain's young people the chance to fulfil their potential."

Tara Leathers , Director of Fundraising at The Prince's Trust said: "We are very proud to partner with Hawes & Curtis for this exclusive collection. This year we are celebrating 40 years of helping young people move into work, education or training. 825,000 young people have been supported by The Prince's Trust since 1976. But our job is far from over; there are still many young people who need support to turn their lives around. Our collaboration with Hawes & Curtis will raise vital funds for The Trust as we support 100 more young people each day. We are hugely grateful to Hawes & Curtis for creating this very stylish collection and for their enthusiasm and commitment to our work."

Notes to editors:

About Hawes & Curtis

Hawes & Curtis is a quintessentially British brand specialising in fine tailoring and accessories for men and women. Founded in 1913 by Ralph Hawes and George Frederick Curtis, Hawes & Curtis has since become the go-to brand for British classics whilst continuing to deliver the promise of exceptional quality, innovation and outstanding value. These values are now synonymous with the Hawes & Curtis name.

A Jermyn Street shirtmaker for more than 100 years, Hawes & Curtis opened its first store in the Piccadilly Arcade and has had many distinguished clients through its doors, including the Duke of Windsor, Lord Mountbatten, Fred Astaire and Cary Grant. As a result of Hawes & Curtis' commitment to impeccable service and product excellence, the brand has been awarded four Royal Warrants. Officially granted to Hawes & Curtis in 1922 was the Royal Warrant of HRH the Prince of Wales, followed by the Royal Warrant of HRH King George VI in 1938. In 1948 Hawes & Curtis received a third Royal Warrant appointed by HRH King George VI and HRH the Duke of Edinburgh awarded a fourth Royal Warrant in 1957.

Hawes & Curtis currently has more than 20 stores in the UK and a store in Germany. Hawes & Curtis' flagship store remains in the heart of London on Jermyn Street, famous for its resident shirtmakers.

About The Prince's Trust

Youth charity The Prince's Trust helps disadvantaged young people to get their lives on track. Founded by HRH The Prince of Wales in 1976, this year it is celebrating 40 years of supporting 13 to 30 year-olds who are unemployed and those struggling at school and at risk of exclusion.

Many of the young people helped by The Prince's Trust are in or leaving care, facing issues such as homelessness or mental health issues, or they have been in trouble with the law. The Trust's programmes give vulnerable young people the practical and financial support needed to stabilise their lives, helping develop self-esteem and skills for work. Three in four young people supported by The Prince's Trust move into work, education or training.

The Prince's Trust has supported 825,000 young people in the last 40 years and this year it will support over 100 more each day.

Further information about The Prince's Trust is available at princes-trust.org.uk or on 0800-842-842.
DANVERS, Massachusetts and HELSINKI, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

Neutron Therapeutics, Inc (NT) and Helsinki University Hospital (HUH) have entered into an arrangement whereby HUH Cancer Center acquires a nuBeam suite for boron-neutron capture therapy (BNCT). nuBeam is a compact accelerator based neutron source which can be installed in a hospital environment. Under the arrangement NT and HUH will collaborate in developing BNCT towards clinical use in a number of cancer indications. A biologically targeted form of radiation therapy, BNCT has previously been applied by the HUH in the treatment of severe cancer cases using a research nuclear reactor as the neutron source.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160915/408249LOGO )



(Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160915/408248 )

BNCT is a biologically targeted form of radiation therapy. The patient is infused with a tumor-localizing drug containing boron. The tumor tissue is then irradiated with epithermal neutrons, which are captured by boron. This neutron capture reaction results in the emission of high-energy charged particles, thereby resulting in biologically destructive radiation which is intended to selectively destroy cancer cells while sparing surrounding normal tissue. Particularly in Finland and Japan, BNCT has successfully been used to treat cancer patients in cases where other treatment options have been exhausted.

The lack of neutron sources suitable for hospital environment has limited the adoption of BNCT. NT's nuBeam suite is the first accelerator-based neutron source of its kind to operate in the world. NT's accelerator-based nuBeam neutron source has unparalleled efficiency and neutron beam quality and its revolutionary design is the result of several years of development effort by NT's technology team. nuBeam has a unique, electrostatic accelerator design and proprietary rotating solid lithium target technology, which result in a system with unprecedented value and reliability.

A pioneer in the use of BNCT and the only Comprehensive Cancer Center in Northern Europe, the HUH has successfully applied BNCT in the treatment of recurring head and neck cancer. Over 100 patients with locally recurrent in-operable head and neck cancer and a short estimated life expectancy were treated with BNCT using a research nuclear reactor as the source of neutrons with exceptional results.

HUH and NT have entered into an agreement whereby NT will deliver to HUH a nuBeam BNCT suite consisting of an accelerator based neutron source and ancillary systems and NT and HUH will engage in a collaboration to further develop BNCT in a number of cancer indications.

Dr. Petri Bono, Medical Director of HUH: "BNCT holds the promise of changing the landscape of cancer treatment and it is a key focus area for HUH. We aim to start treatments in 2018. NT's nuBeam suite represents the cutting edge of accelerator based neutron sources. We were particularly impressed by its unparalleled efficiency, durability and neutron beam quality."

Ted Smick, CEO of NT: "We are very pleased with HUH interest in applying and further developing BNCT and that HUH has selected NT as its partner. We were impressed and attracted by HUH's position amongst the leading cancer hospitals in Europe and its leading expertise in practicing BNCT. NT's nuBeam suite has raised considerable interest with cancer hospitals globally and we are in a number of discussions with hospitals interested in offering BNCT to their patients."

Neutron Therapeutics in brief

Neutron Therapeutics is a medical equipment company founded in the US in November 2015. It is working to bring Boron Neutron Capture Therapy (BNCT) out of the realm of medical research and transform it into a widely available first-line cancer therapy. Neutron Therapeutics Finland Oy is responsible for the supply of BNCT accelerator and collaboration with Helsinki University Hospital.

Additional information:

Ted Smick, CEO, Neutron Therapeutics, inquiries@nt-bnct.com

Petri Bono, Medical Director, HUH, petri.bono@hus.fi


PETAH TIKVAH, ISRAEL -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- Cellebrite, the leading developer and provider of Mobile Lifecycle solutions, today announces that it is supporting the launch of the new iPhone 7 by offering fast, secure in-store content transfer for new owners of the industry's latest smartphone.

Via Cellebrite's in-store platforms, retail associates will be able to transfer a customer's content from their old device to their new iPhone 7 handset. As part of the device lifecycle, operators and retailers will also be able to provide diagnostics for the new device.

The iPhone 7, which is available in-store on 16 September, is one of some 7,000 mobile devices for which Cellebrite provides point-of-sale transfer solutions. Cellebrite technology empowers retail associates to deliver fast, consistent service across more than 75,000 retail service points globally.

"New phone launches such as this have the potential to drive significant traffic for our customers - operators and retailers," comments Yehuda Holtzman, CEO, Mobile Lifecycle at Cellebrite. He continues: "We are dedicated to making mobile device care easier and more efficient, including equipping sales associates with the tools they need to support new iPhone 7 owners from day one. This way, they can still deliver the same consistent service that customers expect during these peak periods."

The new device will also be supported by Cellebrite's Hybrid Content Transfer whereby productivity essentials, such as contacts are immediately transferred at the point of sale, while the more time-intensive task of moving large volumes of multimedia data is subsequently completed via Cellebrite's self-service mobile app. This allows retail sales associates to meet each customer's needs and effectively manage in-store traffic, especially during peak periods expected around the launch of the new iPhone 7.

About Cellebrite

Cellebrite's Mobile Lifecycle business unit is a world leader in providing Operators, Retailers and Aftermarket Service (AMS) Providers, with advanced mobile lifecycle solutions to enhance the customer experience, increase revenue, improve satisfaction, and reduce cost. With delivery channels in-store, on-device, and over the web, mobile retailers can take advantage of Cellebrite's full suite of mobile lifecycle solutions: diagnostics, phone-to-phone content transfer, backup, restore and wipe, automated phone buyback, and application and content delivery. In addition, Cellebrite offers retailers monitoring, statistics and analysis of all activities. Cellebrite's global leadership is demonstrated through its deployment of over 75,000 units at more than 100 mobile operators and retailers globally, representing well over 50,000 stores handling hundreds of millions of transactions per year.

Founded in 1999, Cellebrite is a subsidiary of the Sun Corporation, a publicly traded Japanese company (6736/JQ).

Contacts:

Mobile Lifecycle

Jade Kahn

Senior Director of Marketing

+972 (50) 201 4222

Jade.Kahn@cellebrite.com




The new company will specialize in high temperature film capacitors

Murata Manufacturing Co., Ltd. (TOKYO:6981) (ISIN:JP3914400001) today announced that Murata has signed an agreement to establish a joint venture company with Shizuki Electric Co., Inc. This joint venture will specialize in the development and manufacturing of high temperature film capacitors (HTFC) mainly for automotive applications.

Murata and Shizuki have started R&D and sales collaboration already some years ago, and the establishment of a joint venture is the next step to deepen the successful collaboration. By combining Murata's deep expertise in materials technologies, resources and extensive global sales network with Shizuki's know-how in film capacitor manufacturing this joint venture enables both companies to expand their business within power electronics for the automotive market, to further develop next generation HTFCs and to offer new value to customers worldwide.

The new company owned 65% by Murata, and 35% by Shizuki, will be based in Akita, Japan. The start of the operations is estimated for the beginning of October 2016.

About Shizuki Electric Co., Inc.

Established: March 1939

Sales: 21,728 million yen (as of March 31, 2016)

Business: Manufacture and sale of capacitors and related equipment and facilities, electrical machinery and equipment, and information equipment.

Number of employees: 1,295 (as of March 31, 2016)

About Murata Manufacturing Co., Ltd.

Established: October 1944

Sales: Consolidated basis: 1,210,841 million yen (as of March 31, 2016)

Business: Design, manufacture and sale of ceramic-based passive electronic components and solutions, communication modules, power supply modules, and other.

Number of employees: 54,674 (as of March 31, 2016)

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005183/en/

Contacts:

Media Contact

Murata Manufacturing Co., Ltd.

Taku Makino, +81-75-955-6786

Corporate Communications Office

prsec_mmc@murata.com
VIENNA (dpa-AFX) - U.K. shares erased early losses to turn flat on Friday, even as banks plummeted deep into the red on concerns about Deutsche Bank's fragile finances. The benchmark FTSE 100 was up 5 points or 0.08 percent at 6,735 in late opening deals after hitting as low as 6,706 earlier in the session. Barclays fell over 2 percent, Standard Chartered dropped 2.5 percent and The Royal Bank of Scotland Group tumbled more than 3 percent after Deutsche Bank said it has no intent to pay the $14 billion sought by the U.S. Justice Department to settle potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited. Satellite group Avanti Communications Group soared 8 percent on winning a new contract from the European Space Agency. Shares of SVG Capital climbed 5 percent. The private equity group said it believes the unsolicited final offer from HarbourVest BidCo undervalues the company and its assets. BBA Aviation rallied 2.5 percent. The aviation support and aftermarket services provider has agreed to sell ASIG commercial aircraft services unit to peer John Menzies in a deal worth $202 million. Phoenix Group Holdings rose 1 percent on saying it is in 'advanced talks' with Deutsche Bank to buy the German lender's British insurance business, Abbey Life Assurance Co. Electra Partners jumped 3.5 percent after announcing the successful 266 million pounds initial public offering of its portfolio company Hollywood Bowl Group Plc., the U.K.'s largest ten-pin bowling operator. 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.
LOS ANGELES, CA -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- BRC Advisors, Inc., one of the top commercial real estate brokerages in the Greater Los Angeles area, today announced the sale of the William Penn Apartment Homes in downtown Los Angeles. The historic, 190-unit reinforced brick apartment complex, which just underwent over $3 million in renovations, is located at 2200 W. 8th Street in Los Angeles, just west of downtown and sold for $17,825,000. Los Angeles -- based BRC Advisors is a significant powerhouse in the Western U.S., having closed more than 3/4 of a billion dollars in real estate transactions in 2015. BRC Advisors has five offices in Greater Los Angeles: Downtown LA, Beverly Hills, Manhattan Beach, Encino, and Mid-Wilshire.

Rich Enderlin, BRC Advisors' COO and Managing Partner credits top agent Ardy Ishal in making the deal happen saying, "While the William Penn deal was a rare value-add opportunity, there is a very small niche market for brick buildings and predominantly studio units in Los Angeles. The property was on the market for several months, in and out of escrow. It took Ardy to not only find the "Needle in the Haystack" buyer but to navigate the deal to its successful closing."

On August 1, 2016, BRC Advisors announced that it has entered into a joint venture with Sperry Commercial Global Affiliates to provide a full-service commercial real estate franchise providing investment sales, leasing, and management services. As part of this collaboration, BRC Advisors' CEO and founder James Huang will serve as president of the Sperry Commercial Global Affiliates team adding 100 of its firm's brokers to the new platform.

By offering a more collaborative brokerage platform, designed to benefit both large and small firms, teams will gain access to innovative technology platforms and training that can heighten the success of each transaction. BRC Advisors' Huang states, "Aligning with Sperry Commercial Global Affiliates gives an individual and firm access to people and training that will benefit their future success and their clients' outcomes as well as providing added leverage with the Sperry and BRC Advisors brands for all of their commercial real estate deals."

Since making this groundbreaking announcement in early August, Enderlin notes that BRC has entered into formal negotiations to open four new offices in the Bay area and has preliminary agreements from two independent affiliates in Dallas, Texas and Gaithersburg, Maryland.

For more information, please visit: www.brcadvisors.com.

Image Available: http://www2.marketwire.com/mw/frame_mw?attachid=3054102



Media Inquiries, please contact:

Rich Enderlin

BRC Advisors

COO

(213) 226-8714

Email Contact




WHITSTABLE, England, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

Q'Straint, the specialist in wheelchair and passenger safety solutions, announces that they will be launching inQline at Rehacare in Dusseldorf, 28th September - 1st October 2016.

inQline (patent pending) has been developed to integrate both winch and retractor systems, removing the need for two separate systems in vehicles. As the first system with the ability to steer a wheelchair passenger as they enter a vehicle, inQline offers much smoother loading. Another first is the ability for the system to offer automatic tensioning once the passenger is in place, offering new levels of safety and flexibility.

Utilising state of the art research & development facilities in both the UK & US, Q'Straint designed inQline to embody the company ethos to keep the safely of wheelchair passengers at its core, building on previous products and feedback from the industry. Dramatically reducing rearward excursions in crash scenarios, inQline has been tested to comply with international standards with wheelchairs up to 200kgs, at the recently unveiled iQ testing facility.

A key feature of inQline is the innovative thumb controller allowing complete control of the loading and unloading of wheelchair passengers. With the unique ability to steer the wheelchair, inQline offers a truly safe and effective load and unload experience without the usual tendencies for wheelchairs to go off track or get lodged due to uneven weight distribution, large castors, or vehicles parked on uneven surfaces.

With the ever increasing reduction in space inside wheelchair accessible vehicles, it is becoming increasingly difficult to ensure all traditional restraint systems are fully tensioned. inQline removes that issue due to its ability to automatically tension once the passenger is in place in the vehicle. A "final squeeze" of the restraint webbing ensures that the passenger is transported in a safe and secure fashion, whilst reaching a new level of ride comfort.

The inQline system consists of two units, small enough to be placed under the seats of vehicles or built into the drop floor pan, but with the additional benefit of being able to be installed in multiple orientations. This gives vehicle converters total confidence that inQline can meet a maximum number of configurations across different vehicles, while continuing to provide the stability necessary for safe transportation.

Visit Q'Straint on Stand A81, Hall 6 at Rehacare 2016 to see inQline in action!

Q'Straint will also be showcasing inQline on Stand I21, Hall 11 at IAA Nutzfahrzeuge in Hanover between 22nd & 29th September.

About Q'Straint:

For over 30 years, Q'Straint has remained focused on one mission:To develop the most innovative solutions that advance the safety and effectiveness of wheelchair passenger travel. Our reputation as a global leader is the result of making transportation safety and customer needs the highest priority. We are committed to continued product leadership and innovation; we have the most exhaustive and comprehensive research and testing programs and for more than two decades we have played a key role in developing regional and international safety standards. Today, our diverse global staff serves customers in more than 70 countries throughout North and South America, Europe, Australasia, Asia, the Middle East and Africa. For more information visit QStraint.com. Follow us on Twitter at https://twitter.com/qstraint and Linkedin at https://www.linkedin.com/company/q'straint
CANBERA (dpa-AFX) - The Canadian dollar drifted lower against its major counterparts in the European session on Monday. The loonie slipped to 1.4504 against euro, a level unseen since November 2016. The loonie eased to 1.0190 against the aussie and 1.3350 against the greenback, from its early near 2-week high of 1.0155 and a 4-day high of 1.3321, respectively. The loonie remained lower against the yen with the pair trading at 82.66, after falling to more than a 4-month low of 82.56 early in the session. The loonie is likely to locate support around 81.00 against the yen, 1.345 against the greenback, 1.46 against the euro and 1.03 against the aussie. 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.
NEW YORK CITY (dpa-AFX) - Pfizer Inc. (PFE) announced that the European Commission has approved IBRANCE (palbociclib) for the treatment of women with hormone receptor-positive, human epidermal growth factor receptor 2-negative (HR+/HER2-) locally advanced or metastatic breast cancer. The approval is for IBRANCE to be used in combination with an aromatase inhibitor. The approval also covers the use of IBRANCE in combination with fulvestrant in women who have received prior endocrine therapy. IBRANCE is the first medicine to be approved in Europe that works by inhibiting cyclin-dependent kinases 4 and 6 (CDK 4/6). It also is the first new medicine approved for the treatment of women with this type of metastatic breast cancer in the first-line setting in nearly 10 years. Women with HR+/HER2- metastatic breast cancer represent about 60 percent of all metastatic breast cancer cases. 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.
VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- Japan Gold Corp. (TSX VENTURE: JG) ("Japan Gold" or "the Company") (formerly Sky Ridge Resources Ltd.) (TSX VENTURE: SYR.H) is pleased to announce that further to the announcement on July 6, 2016, the Company has acquired Southern Arc Minerals Japan KK ("SAMJ") and launched the first foreign mineral exploration company to focus solely on Japan. SAMJ has filed 80 mineral prospecting rights license applications in Japan (the "Japan Licenses") and has begun exploring for high-grade gold and porphyry copper-gold mineralization.

Upon completion of the acquisition and the C$7 million financing, Sky Ridge consolidated its share capital on one-for-two basis (the "Consolidation") and changed its name to Japan Gold Corp. Shares of Japan Gold will commence trading at the market open on September 19, 2016 under the symbol "JG".

Highlights:

-- Japan Gold is the first foreign mineral exploration company to focus solely on Japan -- Japan Gold holds 80 mineral prospecting license applications across eight distinct projects prospective for high-grade gold and porphyry copper-gold mineralization, including several historical high-grade gold mines -- Board of Directors with decades of technical and resource industry experience, including Mitsuhiko Yamada, who recently retired from a distinguished career as Executive Officer and General Manager of the Sumitomo Corporation Mineral Resources Division -- Executive team with a proven track record of identifying mineral deposits and advancing them to production -- Completed C$7 million financing to undertake exploration and advance the properties

"Japan Gold Corp. has 'first mover' advantage as the first foreign (international) mineral exploration company to focus solely on gold opportunities in Japan," said John Proust, Chairman & CEO of Japan Gold. "We have been working in Japan since early 2013, following a change to Japanese mining laws in 2012 that allowed Japanese subsidiaries to hold mineral exploration rights and mining permits. We have been reviewing historical exploration and production data and confirming our research with field reconnaissance in order to pinpoint the most promising exploration targets.

"Japan Gold was the first foreign exploration company to file applications for prospecting rights licenses. We have assembled a portfolio of very promising projects, and have the capital required to undertake a substantial exploration program and rapidly advance the properties. We have also recruited a leadership team with decades of resource industry experience and the business and technical expertise required to build a leading mineral exploration company.

"The input from Mitsuhiko Yamada on Japan Gold's inaugural Board of Directors will be particularly valuable," continued Mr. Proust. "Mr. Yamada had a distinguished 41-year career with Sumitomo Corporation, ultimately achieving the position of Executive Officer and General Manager of Mineral Resources. His insight into the Japan mining industry will be invaluable as we move ahead."

Financed for Exploration

Japan Gold issued shares for the acquisition of SAMJ. Southern Arc Minerals Inc. (TSX VENTURE: SA) received 23,750,000 post-Consolidation common shares, and Saltanpove Consulting received 1,250,000 post-Consolidation shares. Japan Gold also issued 500,000 post-Consolidation shares to Fiore Management & Advisory Corp. with respect to the acquisition. Japan Gold has granted 4,625,000 post-Consolidation options to directors, officers and consultants of the Company exercisable at C$0.40 with a ten year expiry.

In connection with the acquisition of SAMJ, Japan Gold completed a financing involving the issuance of 17,500,000 post-Consolidation common shares at a price of C$0.40 per share, for gross proceeds of C$7,000,000. Proceeds of the financing will be used primarily to advance exploration of the Japan Licenses and for general working capital.

The current share capital of Japan Gold consists of 55,297,679 common shares, 5,494,831 options and 150,000 warrants (expiring September 24, 2016), for 60,942,510 shares on a fully diluted basis.

About the Japan Licenses

The Tertiary volcanic arc terrains of Japan host 76 known past-producing gold mines and five one-million-plus-ounce gold deposits.(1) These include one of the world's highest-grade gold mines, the Hishikari Mine on Kyushu Island, which has been in production since 1985. The Hishikari Mine had produced 210.2 tons (more than 6 million ounces) of gold as of March 2014 and continues to produce more than 200,000 ounces of gold per year at a grade averaging 40 g/t gold.(2) Management considers Japan to be largely underexplored, despite a history of significant gold production and known mineral occurrences.

When Japan's mining laws were changed in 2012 to re-activate the mining industry, SAMJ moved quickly to review historical data and identify key exploration targets and was the first foreign exploration company to apply for prospecting licenses. Japan is considered one of the most stable and corruption-free jurisdictions in the world. The mining regulatory framework is well established and transparent, with easy access to government officials and a comprehensive support program to facilitate stakeholder consultation. SAMJ deliberately chose applications in sparsely populated areas with a history of mining, and has received strong local support to date.

Based on a desktop review of historical gold production and Japan's extensive geoscientific database, SAMJ pinpointed areas that are very compelling from a geological perspective. The company has lodged 80 prospecting rights license applications throughout Hokkaido and northern Honshu, for a combined area of 27,153 hectares over eight project areas (Figure 1). All 80 of the prospecting rights license applications have been accepted for further government review, reserving the land for SAMJ and allowing for low impact forms of exploration such as mapping, surface sampling and geophysics.

To view Figure 1. SAMJ Application Area Locations: Northern Honshu and Hokkaido, please visit: http://media3.marketwire.com/docs/1069600f1.jpg

Four of the project areas, Ikutawara, Numanoue, Aibetsu and Buho, target high-grade epithermal gold deposits. The other four project areas, Ponkutosan, Minamikyabe, Kobui and Eboshi, target prospective epithermal gold deposits and areas of gold-bearing advanced argillic alteration lithocaps, which could indicate the presence of a porphyry mineral environment.

Ikutawara (38 contiguous applications) is SAMJ's most advanced project (Figure 1), with mapping/sampling and orientation ground magnetics completed in 2015. The Ikutawara applications host numerous historical gold workings including the Kitano-o mine, which has recorded production of 96,450 ounces of gold between 1924 and 1943 from sinterous and sub-sinter quartz veins.(3) SAMJ has investigated in detail two of the many historical mine locations covered by its applications and expects to apply for drilling permits in early 2017. Additional regional exploration is underway, including detailed stream geochemical sampling and geochemical mapping. SAMJ is also planning an aeromagnetic survey at 100-metre line spacing to gain further information on geology, host structures and alteration.

The technical information in this news release has been reviewed by Japan Gold's President & COO, Dr. Mike Andrews, PhD, FAusIMM, who is a Qualified Person as defined by National Instrument 43-101.

Japan Gold Board of Directors and Executive Team

The Japan Gold Board of Directors and executive team brings decades of technical and business experience to the company, with a proven track record of identifying mineral deposits and advancing them to production.

John Proust, CDir

Chairman & CEO

John Proust has successfully founded and managed a number of resource companies. Mr. Proust has served on the boards and held senior operating positions, and has directed and advised public and private companies regarding debt and equity financing, mergers and acquisitions and corporate restructuring since 1986. Mr. Proust is currently Chairman & CEO of Southern Arc Minerals, Chairman and a director of Canada Energy Partners, Chairman & CEO of CarbonOne Technologies, Interim President & CEO and a director of Outrider Energy, and a director of Q Investments. Mr. Proust has extensive experience in corporate governance, is a graduate of The Directors College, Michael G. De Groote School of Business at McMaster University and holds the designation of Chartered Director.

Dr. Michael Andrews, PhD, FAusIMM

President and COO, Director

Mike Andrews is a geologist with more than 30 years of research and mining industry experience in gold, copper, coal and iron exploration. He holds an honours degree in Geology from the University of Reading, and a doctorate in exploration geochemistry from the University of Wales. Dr. Andrews is currently President & COO and a director of Southern Arc Minerals and a director of Q Investments. He was a founding director of Kingsrose Mining and played an instrumental role in the discovery, exploration, feasibility and development of its Way Linggo Gold Mine in Indonesia. Dr. Andrews also held the positions of Executive Director and Chief Geologist of AuIron Energy Ltd., Director of Gold Operations for Meekatharra Minerals Ltd., and managed the Teck-MM Gold Indonesian Joint Venture, an exploration portfolio of thirteen gold and copper projects in Indonesia. He also held senior exploration positions with Ashton Mining Ltd, Aurora Gold Ltd and Muswellbrook Energy and Minerals.

John Carlile, BSc, MSc, FAusIMM

Executive Vice President, Director

John Carlile is a geologist with more than 35 years of experience in the resource industry. Mr. Carlile has held senior executive and director positions with both major and junior resource companies, including as President of Indonesian and Philippines subsidiaries of Newcrest Mining Limited. As a geologist, Mr. Carlile has a proven track record of mineral discovery and business building in Asia, most notably as Exploration Manager, Asia for Newcrest Mining Limited when it discovered its Gosowong mine. Mr. Carlile has served on the boards of several resource companies, and currently holds the position of director for Southern Arc Minerals, Equator Gold and Arc Exploration Limited. He holds a BSc in Geology from University of Reading, England, and an MSc in Mineral Exploration from the Royal School of Mines, Imperial College, University of London. Mr. Carlile is a Fellow of the AusIMM and a Fellow of the Geological Society of London.

Mitsuhiko Yamada, BA

Director

Mitsuhiko Yamada is a mining business professional with international experience overseeing all aspects of mining projects from exploration through to production. He earned his degree in International Economics at Keio University and spent his career with Sumitomo Corporation. Mr. Yamada worked around the globe for Sumitomo, managing various mining projects and overseeing joint venture relationships with some of the world's biggest mining companies, including Newmont, Phelps Dodge, Teck, Xstrata, Rio Tinto and Sherritt. Mr. Yamada held increasing senior roles with Sumitomo, ultimately achieving the position of Executive Officer and General Manager of Mineral Resources. Mr. Yamada retired from Sumitomo Corporation in 2012 and is currently a Lecturer of English at the Department of Industrial Engineering & Management at Kanagawa University.

Robert Gallagher, BApSc

Director

Bob Gallagher has worked in the mining industry for more than 32 years and has extensive knowledge of the development and operation of large-scale mining projects. Mostly recently, he was President & CEO and a director of New Gold, an intermediate gold producer with projects on three continents, from 2008 until retiring in June 2016. Mr. Gallagher continues to serve as a director of New Gold. Prior to the merger of Peak Gold, Mettalica, and New Gold, Mr. Gallagher was the President & CEO of Peak Gold. Previously, he spent 15 years with Placer Dome Inc. and seven years with Newmont Mining Corporation, most recently as Vice President Operations of Newmont Asia Pacific. During his time at Newmont, Mr. Gallagher oversaw the development of the Batu Hijau Mine, the billion-ton, world-class copper-gold mine located in Indonesia.

Sally Eyre, PhD (Economic Geology)

Director

Sally Eyre is a mining finance professional with extensive experience in global resource capital markets and mining operations. During 2011 to 2014 she served as President & CEO of Copper North Mining and prior to Copper North Mining she served as President & CEO of Etruscan Resources Inc. (now Endeavour Mining Corp.), a gold company with producing assets in West Africa. She has served as Director of Business Development for Endeavour Financial Ltd. and has held executive positions with a number of Canadian resource companies. Dr. Eyre was appointed Senior Vice President, Corporate Development of Petro Rubiales Energy Corp. (now Pacific Rubiales Energy) and also served as Vice President, Corporate Affairs of UrAsia Energy Ltd. (now Uranium One). In 2003 she served as President & CEO of TLC Ventures Corp. (now Calibre Mining Corp.). Dr. Eyre has a PhD in Economic Geology from the Royal School of Mines, Imperial College, London. Dr. Eyre is a member of the Society of Economic Geologists (SEG) and a former Director of the SEG Canada Foundation.

David Farrell, BComm (Finance), LL.B

Director

David Farrell is President of Davisa Consulting, a private consulting firm working with junior to mid-tier global mining companies. He has over 20 years of corporate and mining experience, and has negotiated, structured and closed more than US$25 billion worth of M&A and structured financing transactions for junior and mid-tier natural resource companies. Prior to founding Davisa, he was Managing Director of Mergers & Acquisitions at Endeavour Financial, working in Vancouver and London. Prior to Endeavour Financial, David was a lawyer at Stikeman Elliott, working in Vancouver, Budapest and London. David serves as a director of both Fortuna Silver where he chairs the compensation committee and is a member of the audit and corporate governance committees, and Northern Vertex Mining where he sits on the audit and compensation committees. Mr. Farrell graduated from the University of British Columbia with a BComm (Honours, Finance) and an LL.B and is called to the bar in both British Columbia and England. David has also served for 12 years as a board and finance committee member of Yaletown House, a non-profit, critical-care seniors' residence in downtown Vancouver.

Dr. Kotaro Ohga, PhD

Chief Engineer

Kotaro Ohga held the position of Associate Professor at Hokkaido University in the Graduate School of Engineering. With a PhD in Mining Engineering, Dr. Ohga has extensive experience with permitting and drill programs in Japan. As Chief Engineer, Dr. Ohga is the main point of contact between Japan Gold and the Japanese Government, offering invaluable insight and expertise as Japan Gold advances its properties.

Andrew Rowe, BSc, MAusIMM

Country Manager

Andrew Rowe comes to Japan Gold through his previous position with Southern Arc Minerals. Mr. Rowe joined Southern Arc in 2006 as a Senior Geological Consultant and was soon promoted to Chief Geologist and then Executive Vice President, leading Southern Arc's exploration programs from grassroots exploration through to completion of the first resource estimate at the Company's West Lombok Project. Mr. Rowe planned and implemented large-scale exploration programs, managing both the technical and administrative aspects of the projects. Mr. Rowe briefly left Southern Arc in December 2014, and then rejoined the Company as a consultant in August 2015 to continue with Southern Arc's exploration projects in Japan. Mr. Rowe graduated with a Bachelor of Applied Science degree in Geology from the University of Technology, Sydney, Australia. He is a Member of the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy and a Fellow of the Society of Economic Geologists. Mr. Rowe has experience in mineral exploration and project management in Australia and various countries in Southeast Asia including Thailand, Indonesia, Mongolia, China and Laos. During this time he held exploration positions with Renison Goldfields, Normandy Anglo Asia, Phelps Dodge, Aurora Gold and Ivanhoe Mines. Immediately prior to joining Southern Arc he was the principal geologist for Pan Australian Resources Ltd (Laos) and part of the team responsible for successfully bringing the Phu Kham Cu-Au porphyry deposit through to bankable feasibility.

Vincent Boon, CPA, CA

Chief Financial Officer & Corporate Secretary

Vince Boon is a chartered accountant with over ten years of professional accounting experience with private and public companies focusing on financial reporting, regulatory compliance, internal control and corporate finance activities. Mr. Boon's experience includes financial reporting for both Canadian and U.S. listed companies with international subsidiaries, strategic planning, tax planning, corporate governance, equity financings and due diligence for acquisitions. As an employee of J. Proust & Associates Inc., an organization providing public company management and venture capital to start-up and junior companies, Mr. Boon is also the CFO of Southern Arc Minerals and Canada Energy Partners, and the Controller of CarbonOne Technologies. Mr. Boon holds a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of British Columbia and is a Chartered Professional Accountant, CPA, CA.

On behalf of the Board of Japan Gold Corp.,

John Proust, Chairman & CEO

About Japan Gold Corp.

Japan Gold Corp. is a Canadian mineral exploration company focused solely on gold and copper-gold exploration in Japan. The Company has applied for 80 prospecting rights licenses in northern Japan for a combined area of 27,153 hectares over eight separate projects. The applications cover areas with known gold occurrences and a history of mining, and are prospective for both high-grade epithermal gold mineralization and gold-bearing lithocaps, which could indicate the presence of porphyry mineralization. Japan Gold's leadership team has decades of resource industry and business experience, and the Company has recruited geologists and technical advisors with experience exploring and operating in Japan. Low-impact surface exploration is underway, with the expectation of applying for drilling permits in early 2017. More information is available at www.japangold.com or by email at info@japangold.com.

Cautionary Note

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as such term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

This news release contains forward-looking statements relating to expected or anticipated future events and anticipated results that are forward-looking in nature and, as a result, are subject to certain risks and uncertainties, such as general economic, market and business conditions, competition for qualified staff, the regulatory process and actions, technical issues, new legislation, uncertainties resulting from potential delays or changes in plans, uncertainties resulting from working in a new political jurisdiction, uncertainties regarding the results of exploration, uncertainties regarding the timing and granting of prospecting rights, uncertainties regarding the Company's ability to execute and implement future plans, and the occurrence of unexpected events. Actual results achieved may vary from the information provided herein as a result of numerous known and unknown risks and uncertainties and other factors.

(1) Konomai Mine: 2.1 Moz, Sado Mine: 2.2 Moz, Kushikino Mine: 1.6 Moz, Taio Mine: 1.0 Moz, Hishikari Mine: 7.6 Moz. Data collected from the Metal Mining Agency of Japan database.

(2) Metal Mining Agency of Japan database and Sumitomo Metal Mining Co., Ltd. website.

(3) Metal Mining Agency of Japan database.

Contacts:

John Proust

Chairman & CEO

604-609-6143

info@japangold.com

www.japangold.com




INDIANAPOLIS (dpa-AFX) - Eli Lilly and Company (LLY) announced the European Medicines Agency's (EMA) Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) has issued a positive opinion recommending the granting of a conditional marketing authorization for olaratumab, in combination with doxorubicin, for the treatment of adults with advanced soft tissue sarcoma not amenable to curative treatment with radiotherapy or surgery and who have not been previously treated with doxorubicin. The EU submission is based on data from Phase 2 JGDG, an open-label, randomized trial. As part of a conditional marketing authorization, Lilly will need to provide results from an ongoing Phase 3 study. This study, ANNOUNCE, is fully enrolled. Until availability of the full data, the CHMP will review the benefits and risks of olaratumab annually. Lilly has also submitted the results of the study to the U.S. FDA for regulatory review. The FDA recently granted Lilly Priority Review status for olaratumab. 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.
WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Shares of Navidea Biopharmaceuticals (NAVB) gained around 24 percent in the extended trading on Wednesday after the biopharmaceutical company announced a definitive asset purchase agreement with Cardinal Health (CAH). Under the deal, Cardinal Health will purchase Navidea's Lymphoseek product for lymphatic mapping, lymph node biopsy and the diagnosis of metastatic spread to lymph nodes for the staging of cancer in North America. Navidea will receive $80 million at closing, plus the opportunity to earn up to $230 million of contingent consideration based on certain milestones through 2026, with $20.1 million of that amount guaranteed over the next 3 years. As part of the transaction, Cardinal Health will license a portion of the acquired intellectual property back to Navidea to allow Navidea to develop and sell new immunodiagnostic and immunotherapeutic products for specific purposes in North America, and to continue to produce and sell Lymphoseek, mostly under a different brand, outside of North America. The proposed deal has been approved by the Board of Directors of each company, but remains subject to customary conditions. The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2017. Michael Goldberg, President and Chief Executive Officer, Navidea said, 'This transaction is very exciting for Navidea and its shareholders as it will enable the company to extinguish the CRG debt and to focus the company on several attractive development efforts.' 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.
TORONTO, ONTARIO -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) announced today that it, together with the management of Ascot, has signed an agreement with American International Group (AIG), to acquire 100% of Ascot, AIG's Lloyd's platform, for a total consideration of US$1.1 billion. The transaction involves the acquisition of Ascot Underwriting Ltd. (Ascot) and Ascot Corporate Name Ltd., as a capital provider for Syndicate 1414 at Lloyd's, and is subject to customary regulatory approvals and closing conditions.

Based in London, England, Ascot is a Lloyd's of London syndicate and a global specialty insurance underwriter. Ascot operates globally, with expertise spanning multiple lines of businesses including Property, Energy, Cargo, Terrorism and Political Risk, Marine Hull and Liability, Casualty, Renewable Energy, Excess of Loss Reinsurance, and Specie and Fine Art. Ascot is well respected within the Lloyd's market for its ability to underwrite complex and critical risks, with many of its underwriters recognized as experts in their respective classes of business. Lloyd's is the oldest and most prominent marketplace for specialty risk. CPPIB expects to pursue mutually beneficial business opportunities with AIG through Ascot moving forward as we seek to build on the collaborative relationship developed through this transaction.

"This acquisition represents another important step in our strategy to achieve scale in targeted sub-sectors within financial services through long-term platform investments. We have studied the global property and casualty insurance sector for several years and specifically identified Ascot as an ideal platform through which CPPIB can access diverse global insurance premiums at scale," said Ryan Selwood, Managing Director, Head of Direct Private Equity, CPPIB. "Ascot's proven track record of superior underwriting performance through pricing cycles, standing in the Lloyd's specialist insurance market and highly experienced management team, provides CPPIB with turn-key access to an asset class that is well-suited to our long-term horizon."

Upon closing, Ascot will continue to operate as a stand-alone, independent business governed by its own board of directors and will retain its entire senior management team and approximately 194 employees responsible for its long-term success, led by its CEO, Andrew Brooks.

"Ascot is thrilled to be entering into a strategic partnership with CPPIB that will have at its core a common philosophy, understanding and long-term vision, and which will enable Ascot to position the business in a way that will significantly enhance the services that it can offer to both its clients and brokers," said Andrew Brooks, Ascot's CEO. "CPPIB ownership and their depth of capital resources will allow Ascot to move to the next stage in its development and to deliver a business plan for profitable growth over the long term with strongly aligned goals and objectives. Ascot is excited about the future opportunities that CPPIB's ownership and capital strength will bring."

CPPIB continues to expand its global platform strategy, which leverages our comparative advantages of a long-term focus and access to capital at scale. As a AAA-rated long-term investor, our approach emphasizes creating enduring partnerships with proven management teams and we form these partnerships with the goal of generating attractive risk-adjusted returns through business cycles. In Ascot, CPPIB is acquiring a best-in-class global platform in the property & casualty insurance sector, which will provide durable cash yield and an attractive scalable investment for the Fund.

About Canada Pension Plan Investment Board

Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) is a professional investment management organization that invests the funds not needed by the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) to pay current benefits on behalf of 19 million contributors and beneficiaries. In order to build a diversified portfolio of CPP assets, CPPIB invests in public equities, private equities, real estate, infrastructure and fixed income instruments. Headquartered in Toronto, with offices in Hong Kong, London, Luxembourg, Mumbai, New York City and Sao Paulo, CPPIB is governed and managed independently of the Canada Pension Plan and at arm's length from governments. At June 30, 2016, the CPP Fund totalled C$287.3 billion. For more information about CPPIB, please visitwww.cppib.com or follow us on LinkedIn or Twitter.

About Ascot Underwriting

Ascot Underwriting Ltd. is a global specialty (re)insurer writing insurance and reinsurance business in Property, Energy, Specie & Fine Art, Cargo, Terrorism & Political Risk, Marine Hull, Marine Liabilities, Renewable Energy, Casualty, Personal Accident, and Excess of Loss Reinsurance. Ascot leads in most of these classes and leads over 40% of the slips it writes. Operating within the Lloyd's market (Syndicate 1414), Ascot enjoys the credit ratings assigned to Lloyd's: A+ (Strong) from S&P, AA- (Very Strong) from Fitch, and A (Excellent) from A.M. Best. Based in London, Ascot also has offices in Houston, New York, Dallas, Chicago, and Singapore.

Contacts:

Dan Madge

Senior Manager, Media Relations

+1 416 868 8629

dmadge@cppib.com



Mei Mavin

Director, Corporate Communications

+1 646 564 4920

mmavin@cppib.com




DENVER, CO -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- Ubiquitech Software Corp. (OTC PINK: UBQU), CEO and the management of (UBQU) and HempLife Today is announcing plans to start BETA testing what it believes will be one of its strongest marketing platforms to date. A Free Sample of its popular CannazALL CBD GelCaps to all new first time visitors to the HempLifeToday.com site.

The company is looking to further capitalize on the existing traffic to its various landing pages and main Website (www.HempLifeToday.com ) by capturing more potential customers and letting them "feel" the CannazALL difference in their own lives. All internal company data show that the recurring customers, and repeat orders, as well as additional referrals, will make this the most effective marketing platform the company currently has.

The company has chosen its CannazALL CBD GelCaps for their CBD potency, ease of dosing, ease of shipping, and cost effectiveness, for this new marketing platform.

Because this will be a truly free sample giveaway, and not be tied to any other promotion, sale, continuity program, or purchase. HempLife Today is expecting at least 20% - 40% of its current traffic to take advantage of this incredible offer. The company believes this new marketing campaign can add thousands of new recurring customers with zero additional advertising costs. Thus adding to the company's growing profit margins.

"We know that people love our products and how effective they seem to be for so many," said Tim Zorn, CEO HempLife Today. "And, we also know that these customers keep buying, weekly, monthly, and refer others. So, once we looked at our data and crunched the numbers, we know we have a winner with this new program."

The company will begin BETA testing to its own list of Subscribers (who have not yet purchased a CannazALL CBD product), in October, and then roll out of this new platform will begin in November. Well before its upcoming name and symbol change also scheduled for announcement in October.

"Anytime we can add thousands of new customers without spending precious cash flow on advertising then that's a great thing," said James Ballas, CEO of parent company (OTC PINK: UBQU). "With our free sample program we are capitalizing on organic traffic that we already have coming to our sites because of the popularity of our products, not from advertising efforts... It just doesn't get any better than that for growth because we can then spend dollars on other areas like R&D, product research, new products, and more."

"This additional marketing platform, plus our upcoming name and symbol change, and all of the exciting plans we are implementing, will continue our never ending goal of being the leader in this industry," said James Ballas, CEO.

About Ubiquitech

Ubiquitech Software Corp., through its subsidiaries is a dynamic multi-media, multi-faceted corporation utilizing state-of-the-art global internet marketing, Direct Response (DRTV) Television, Radio, and traditional marketing, to drive traffic to the new and emerging multi-billion dollar industries like its subsidiary HempLifeToday.com

HempLifeToday focuses on the exciting and dynamic new thinking in the world today that recognizes the important health and life enriching enhancement that CBD Oil from the Hemp plant can bring. Through its network of quality USA growers HempLifeToday.com has developed multiple and proprietary CannazALL CBD oil products that include; It's popular CBD Tinctures, Oils, GelCaps, CBD Powder, Skin Salve, Wax Crumble, and e-liquid, all offered @ www.HempLifeToday.com

This press release contains forward-looking statements. Words such as "expects", "intends', "believes', and similar expressions reflecting something other than historical fact are intended to identify forward-looking statements, but are not the exclusive means of identifying such statements. These forward-looking statements involve a number of risks and uncertainties, including the timely development and market acceptance of products and technologies, the ability to secure additional sources of finance, the ability to reduce operating expenses, and other factors described in the Company's filings with the OTC Markets Group. The actual results that the Company achieves may differ materially from any forward-looking statement due to such risks and uncertainties. The Company undertakes no obligation to revise or update any forward- looking statements in order to reflect events or circumstances that may arise after the date of this release.

Image Available: http://www2.marketwire.com/mw/frame_mw?attachid=3056786



Contact:

Ubiquitech Software Corp.

Investor Relations

E-mail: Investors@UbiquitechSoftware.com




BRUSSELS (dpa-AFX) - The Labor Department is scheduled to release its consumer prices data for August at 8:30 am ET Friday. Economists expect the index to increase by 0.1 percent month-over-month, while the core consumer prices may have increased by 0.2 percent. Ahead of the data, the greenback traded mixed against its major counterparts. While the greenback declined against the yen, it advanced against the euro, pound and the franc. The greenback was worth 1.1223 against the euro, 1.3171 against the pound, 0.9747 against the franc and 101.85 against the yen as of 8:25 am ET. 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.
CAMBRIDGE, MA -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- Student entrepreneurs from 12 of Massachusetts' top public and private colleges and universities will go head-to-head on Wednesday, September 28th at Hatch Fenway for the fourth annual Beantown Throwdown pitch competition. Sponsored by SevOne, the competition is a signature event of HUBweek, a weeklong, city-wide festival celebrating innovation and creativity in the Boston area hosted by MIT, Harvard University, The Boston Globe and Mass General Hospital.

A marquee event for the MIT Enterprise Forum (MITEF) of Cambridge, the Beantown Throwdown features teams from Babson College, Berklee College of Music, Boston College, Boston University, Harvard University, Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences (MCPHS), MIT, Northeastern University, Tufts University, UMass Boston, UMass Lowell and Wentworth Institute of Technology. Expecting another standing room only crowd, this year's startups are:

DropZone For Veterans/Babson College: Connecting vets to the resources they need.

bistara/Berklee College of Music: Empowering students to be their own bosses.

EchoMe/Boston College: Turning every smart device into a personal DJ booth.

Chuzu/Boston University: Peer-to-peer platform that allows users within the BU community to rent or buy and sell designer clothing and accessories.

Aday/Harvard University: Using machine learning to take the pain out of hourly work scheduling.

AskMolly/MCPHS: Providing medical professionals and first responders with a real time resource to detect illicit drugs in emergency situations.

Rendever/MIT: Helping aging populations by way of virtual reality.

Cookin/Northeastern University: Offering "buy-it-yourself" alternatives to expensive meal plan services.

Hujambo Group/Tufts University: Bringing connectivity to millions across the globe.

CircularBlu/UMass Boston: Redefining the value of waste.

VeteransQRF/UMass Lowell: Helping military veterans transition to civilian life.

Dragonfly/Wentworth Institute of Technology: Making bike commutes safer.





The evening will open with remarks from Jim Melvin, Chief Marketing Officer, SevOne. Next, Scott Kirsner, Boston Globe Innovation Economy columnist and Innovation Leader co-founder and editor, will moderate a fireside chat about startups and innovation. Panelists include:

Elsa Sze, Founder and CEO of Agora, an online platform that aims to facilitate civic engagement. Agora was named one of BostInno's 50 on Fire and was recently recognized by the White House for its role in civic engagement.

Frederick Townes, Co-Founder and COO, Placester, which fuses technology and design to improve the home buying process for consumers, brokers and agents. Prior to Placester, Fred was a member of the founding team at Mashable.

Rebecca Liebman, Co-Founder, LearnLux, a financial education company for Millennials. Rebecca was included on the 2016 Forbes 30 Under 30 list for education and founded two startups by the age of 20.

Maia Heymann, General Partner, Converge Venture Partners, a widely respected investment firm works with entrepreneurs building software and data-enabling tech companies. Maia has been investing in tech companies since 1993, on the east and west coasts.

"In four short years we've seen the Beantown Throwdown grow from a two school rivalry to an energetic regional competition that draws the best talent from Massachusetts' world renowned colleges and universities," said Katja Wald, executive director, MIT Enterprise Forum of Cambridge. "Our region is fortunate to have thousands of creative, smart students -- the next generation of big-thinking entrepreneurs -- and this event provides the opportunity to showcase their ideas to executives, investors and other luminaries from the Bay State's technology and innovation community."

Following the team pitches, the audience of public and private company executives, angel and venture investors, members of the media, top service providers, students and others will determine the winners by serving as "VCs for the Evening" -- each investing $1 million of MITEF Money in the startups they believe best positioned for success.

First Prize: $12.5K of legal services from Morse Barnes-Brown & Pendleton (MBBP); 2-hour lunch/PR brainstorming session with CHEN PR; VC Perspective Lunch with MITEF Cambridge board members Graham Brooks (.406 Ventures), Reed Sturtevant (Project 11) and Wan Li Zhu (Fairhaven Capital); a two-hour digital marketing workshop with getfused; HUBweek Change-Maker profile; and a guaranteed place at the MITEF Cambridge Startup Spotlight event in June 2017.

Second Prize: $7.5K of legal services from MBBP; 2-hour lunch/PR brainstorming session with CHEN PR; VC Perspective Lunch with MITEF Cambridge board members Graham Brooks (.406 Ventures), Reed Sturtevant (Project 11) and Wan Li Zhu (Fairhaven Capital); a two-hour digital marketing workshop with getfused; a guaranteed place at the MITEF Cambridge Startup Spotlight event in June 2017; and a feature in a HUBweek winners blog post.

Third Prize: $5K of legal services from MBBP; a guaranteed place at the MITEF Cambridge Startup Spotlight event in June 2017; and a feature in a HUBweek winners blog post.

Additionally, all teams receive a one-year membership to the MIT Enterprise Forum of Cambridge.

Beantown Throwdown registration and networking reception begins at 5:30 p.m., followed by the opening panel at 6 p.m. This event will sell out, so preregistration is strongly encouraged.

HUB Presents: Next Generation of Ideas, Featuring MITEF Cambridge Beantown Throwdown

Wednesday, September 28

5:30pm - 9:00pm

Hatch Fenway, 401 Park Drive, Boston, MA 02215

Registration and Information

About The MIT Enterprise Forum of Cambridge

The MIT Enterprise Forum of Cambridge is the founding chapter and one of 25 worldwide chapters comprising the MIT Enterprise Forum, Inc. Offering more than 40 programs and events annually that inspire innovation, MIT Enterprise Forum of Cambridge initiatives facilitate critical one-on-one mentoring while providing team services that increase the skills and expertise necessary for entrepreneurs to succeed.

About HUBweek

HUBweek is a festival for the future. A first-of-its-kind civic collaboration between The Boston Globe, Harvard University, MIT, and Mass. General Hospital, HUBweek engages the Greater Boston community to celebrate innovation and creativity at the intersections of art, science, and technology. In 2016, over 130 organizations have come together to celebrate the future in Boston and will explore three themes at HUBweek: inclusive innovation, ideas to impact, and intersections. From hands-on workshops, full-day summits, and a massive Demo Day to open studios, film festivals, and even beer brewed from the Charles, HUBweek will showcase the most creative and inventive people making an impact in Boston and around the world.

Image Available: http://www2.marketwire.com/mw/frame_mw?attachid=3056823



Carro Halpin

CHEN PR for MIT Enterprise Forum of Cambridge

781-672-3132

Email Contact




Axalta Coating Systems (NYSE: AXTA), a leading global manufacturer of liquid and powder coatings, has a rich heritage in motorsports, and its support of student racing teams is perhaps the most rewarding.

This Smart News Release features multimedia. View the full release here: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005100/en/

The OS.CAR Fachhochschule team from the University of Applied Sciences in Vienna, Austria, painted its internal combustion engine race cars at the Axalta Refinish Training Centre in Oeynhausen, Austria. (Photo: Axalta)

Formula Student

Axalta is supporting five different teams competing this year in Formula Student, an internationally recognized motorsports competition for students from universities around the world. The competition brings teams together to develop, to design, and to construct racing car prototypes, gaining valuable practical engineering and scientific experience.

Matthias Schonberg, Vice President of Axalta and President for Europe, Middle East, and Africa, said, "The students participating in Formula Student learn the importance of team work and have the opportunity to put their theoretical knowledge into practice. We support them in this important step in their educational journey and believe in investing in our future engineers."

Axalta technicians helped the students paint various components of the vehicles, including the chassis of both classes of race cars Formula Student Combustion and Formula Student Electric which are judged separately.

For the third consecutive year the OS.CAR Fachhochschule team from the University of Applied Sciences in Vienna, Austria, painted its internal combustion engine race cars at the Axalta Refinish Training Centre in Oeynhausen, near Vienna.

Axalta technicians also painted race cars for the Green Lion Racing Team, from Wuppertal, Germany, and the ImpulsEracing Team from the University of Oviedo, Spain. The Green Team from the University of Stuttgart, Germany, and the KA-RaceIng Team from the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany, each had support from Axalta with coatings for the electric motors.

For further information on Axalta Coating Systems, please visit Axalta at www.axaltacoatingsystems.com.

About Axalta Coating Systems Celebrating 150 Years in the Coatings Industry

Axalta is a leading global company focused solely on coatings and providing customers with innovative, colorful, beautiful and sustainable solutions. From light OEM vehicles, commercial vehicles and refinish applications to electric motors, buildings and pipelines, our coatings are designed to prevent corrosion, increase productivity and enable the materials we coat to last longer. With 150 years of experience in the coatings industry, the 12,800 people of Axalta continue to find ways to better serve our more than 100,000 customers in 130 countries every day with the finest coatings, application systems and technology. For more information visit axaltacoatingsystems.com and follow us on Twitter @axalta and on LinkedIn.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005100/en/

Contacts:

DA Public Relations Ltd

Chantal Bachelier-Moore

D +44 207 692 4964

chantal@dapr.com
ALBANY, New York, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

Transparency Market Research (TMR) has announced the release of a new report on the global embedded systems market. The report examines the historical trajectory of the global market and presents detailed forecasts regarding the market's development from 2015 to 2021. The report examines the competitive dynamics, segmentation, and major drivers and restraints of the global embedded systems market in order to provide a complete overview. The report is titled 'Embedded System Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends and Forecast 2015 - 2021' and is available for sale on the official website of TMR. According to the report, the global embedded systems market was valued at US$152.9 bn in 2014. Exhibiting a sturdy 6.4% CAGR between 2015 and 2021, the market is expected to reach a valuation of US$233.1 bn.

Free PDF For Full Details with Technological breakthroughs is @ http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=995

According to this new publication by Transparency Market Research, the competitive rivalry in the global market for embedded systems is expected to remain intense over the coming years, owing to the large shares held by a small number of key players. The overall proportion of regional players is extremely small due to the massive amounts of capital required to remain abreast in this fast-paced market.

Most embedded systems manufacturers are directly catering to consumer electronics and are therefore solely reliant on this industry's demand for their profits and production rates.

Making their products smaller, cheaper, faster, and more reliant are the basic principles that all key players abide by, therefore keeping the rate of technological development as high as possible.

Automotive Industry Continues to Report High Demand for Embedded Systems

The automotive industry has consistently provided the top demand for embedded systems over the recent past and TMR analysts believe that the industry will retain its leadership in demand and revenue generation for embedded systems till 2021. By the end of 2021, the revenue for embedded systems from the automotive industry is expected to reach US$42.64 bn, owing to a wide range of applications in modern cars and internal systems.

The demand for consumer electronics is similarly high and is expected to keep increasing over the next few years, owing to a booming consumer electronics industry.

Embedded systems are highly reliant on stable hardware, a fact shown by the dominance of embedded hardware against software. By the end of 2021, the revenue generated by embedded systems hardware is expected to reach US$182.14 bn.

Access Full Report at http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/embedded-system.html

High Demand for Embedded Systems in Smart Electronics to Spur Production Rates

"Smart devices are currently one of the more sought-after electronic devices in the world today, in all industrial and commercial aspects," states a TMR analyst. "More and more people are seeing the advantage of using mobile devices that can perform special tasks that would otherwise require stationary computers," the analyst adds.

The recent rate of development of electronics and embedded systems has been particularly strong, creating significant scope of use and functionality of smart devices and connected electronics. The modern embedded systems are used to create and maintain communication between these devices and thus create the smart network that industries are looking for to improve operational efficiency.

Real-time Computing Load Still a Problem for Embedded Systems

One of the key restraints on embedded systems that affect all manufacturers is the difficulty of achieving high end real time calculations using smaller embedded systems. Airplanes, automobiles, audio electronics, and even military equipment are the more common places where embedded systems need to be extremely small, light, produce the least amount of heat, and consume as little power as possible. This can take a considerable toll on the real-time applications of embedded systems, thereby restricting their current scope of use.

"However, future applications of embedded systems will be greater in scope through the expected development of the system-on-chip technology, where low performance controller based utilities will be integrated on to a microcontroller chip," states the analyst. This could mitigate the above restraint to a high degree, allowing for a more efficient use of embedded systems in real time calculations.

Browse Research Blog: http://www.tmrblog.com/2016/02/embedded-system-market.html

Key Takeaways:

A majority of the demand for embedded systems lies in the ones that use medium scale microcontrollers, a segment is expected to reach US$124.75 bn by the end of 2021.

by the end of 2021. Embedded hardware systems are expected to dominate the market demand based on types and are expected to generate US$182.14 bn by 2021.

by 2021. Key demand for embedded systems has and will continue to come from North America , which is expected to reach a value of US$89.87 bn by 2021.

Key segments of the Embedded System Market

Global Embedded Systems Market, by Functionality

Stand alone

Real time

Networked

Mobile

Global Embedded Systems Market, by Microcontroller

Small scale (8 bit -16 bit)

Medium scale (16 bit -32 bit)

Large scale (32 bit -64 bit)

Global Embedded Systems Market, by

Embedded hardware

Embedded software

Global Embedded Systems Market, by Application

Automotive

Telecommunication

Healthcare

Industrial

Consumer Electronics

Aerospace and Defense

Others

Global Embedded Systems Market, by Geography

North America

Europe

Asia Pacific

Rest of the World

Recent Research Reports by Transparency Market Research:

GaN Semiconductor Devices Market:

http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/gallium-nitride.html

Rugged Electronics Market:

http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/rugged-electronics-market.html



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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.
CHICAGO, IL--(Marketwired - September 16, 2016) - Last night the Illinois Technology Association (ITA) revealed the winners of its 2016 CityLIGHTS Awards. The CityLIGHTS Awards is the premier annual event that celebrates and honors achievements from the local tech community.

Because of the rigorous and balanced judging process, the awards have become a strong indicator of future success. Not including last night's honorees, CityLIGHTS award winners have amassed $51 billion in exits, $1 billion in IPO and $2.5 billion in venture capital.

"This year's winners exemplify the kind of technology companies that Chicago is becoming famous for -- hardworking, pragmatic businesses that are focused on customer collaboration and satisfaction over self-promotion," said Fred Hoch, CEO, ITA. "That's a big part of why we believe the CityLIGHTS Awards are so important. We want to recognize and celebrate the tremendous technology development and innovation happening in our city."

The 2016 ITA CityLIGHTS Awards winners are:

CityLIGHTS Award: The CityLIGHTS Award, ITA's highest honor, is presented to the company or individual who actively and consistently supports the growth of the Illinois technology industry through leadership and/or collaboration.

Amanda Lannert, CEO, Jellyvision

CEO of the Year: Presented to the company CEO whose leadership, strategy, and ability to attract and retain talent has resulted in company growth and visibility.

Jeff Silver, CEO, Coyote Logistics

Technologist of the Year: Presented to the individual whose talent has championed true innovation, either through new applications of existing technology or the development of technology to achieve a truly unique product or service.

Martin Logan, Guaranteed Rate

Prominent Woman in Tech: Presented to a preeminent woman in the local industry who has championed a leading role for women by supporting their growth and prominence in the industry.

Nicole Yeary, Ms. Tech

Rising Star Award: Presented to the company with the strongest potential to emerge as a leader in the technology industry ($5 to $25 million in annual revenue).

Hireology

Lighthouse: Presented to the company with more than $25 million in revenue that, through innovation in products, services or business approach, has grown to become a serious competitor in the marketplace.

kCura

Outstanding Technology Development: Presented to the company or organization that utilizes or has developed a technology tool, process or service that has made a substantial improvement on business metrics.

Yello

Industry Disrupter: Presented to the company that has developed and/or introduced an ingenious, non-traditional and innovative product or service that has significantly disrupted its industry.

Uptake

Thank you to our 2016 ITA CityLIGHTS Awards sponsors:

Rock Star Sponsors: Armanino, Gogo, Hyde Park Angels, Liquidus, Madison Dearborn Partners, Silicon Valley Bank, Southpoint Insurance

Star of the Bar: Context Media, Uptake

VIP Backstage & Opening Act: Lantern Partners

Roadies: Grant Thornton, Weber Shandwick

Event Partners: 3D Printing Experience, Clique Studios, Jewell Catering, Spothero

About ITA

The Illinois Technology Association (ITA) scales Illinois tech companies. With innovative resources that allow members to collaborate with each other, build their talent networks and elevate their local and national presence, ITA is the region's strongest advocate for fostering innovation and growth. Founded in 2005 and supporting 500-plus growth-stage tech companies, ITA has a rich history of driving the business forward. For more information, visit illinoistech.org, follow @ITAbuzz on Twitter or find us on LinkedIn.

Contact:

Julia Kanouse

julia@illinoistech.org

+1.312.924.1443
BRUSSELS (dpa-AFX) - The University of Michigan is scheduled to release its preliminary U.S. consumer sentiment index for September at 10 am ET Friday. The index is expected to increase to 90.8 from 89.8. Ahead of the data, the greenback advanced against its major counterparts. The greenback was worth 1.1176 against the euro, 1.3112 against the pound, 0.9775 against the franc and 102.06 against the yen as of 9:55 am ET. 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.
WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - After bashing Donald Trump as a 'spoiled brat' and a 'human leech,' Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., is continuing his assault on the Republican presidential nominee. Reid released a statement attacking Trump on Friday after the real estate tycoon seemed to make fun of the exercising accident that caused the Senator to suffer broken ribs and facial bones and lose vision in his right eye. 'I may not be able to see out of my right eye, but with my good eye, I can see that Trump is a man who inherited his money and spent his entire life pretending like he earned it,' Reid said. 'Trump rips off working people with scams like Trump University,' he added. 'And while the people he ripped off suffer, Trump sits at the posh resort he bought with his daddy's money, with no understanding of the misery he caused.' The statement comes after Trump joked about Reid's accident in an interview with the Washington Post. Asked about Reid's comments that he is 'not slim and trim,' Trump said, 'Harry Reid? I think he should go back and start working out again with his rubber work-out pieces.' Reid was injured in January of 2015, when a resistance band he was using to exercise snapped and hit him in the face, causing him to fall. The back-and-forth comes after Reid took to the Senate floor on Thursday to assert that Trump is only running for president to benefit himself. 'Let's be clear about Donald Trump. He is a spoiled brat, raised in plenty, who inherited a fortune and used his money to make more money,' Reid said. 'And he did a lot of it by swindling working men and women.' He added, 'Why would he change as president? The answer is simple: Trump won't change. He is asking us to let him get rich scamming America.' Reid went so far as to describe Trump as a 'human leech who will bleed the country' and laugh at the money he has made while working people have been hurt and ruined. 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.
AURORA, CO--(Marketwired - September 16, 2016) - Colorado Harvest Company, a vertically integrated enterprise that grows and sells its own natural cannabis, is celebrating its first anniversary of operations in Aurora, Colorado, with storewide specials through the month of September 2016.

After obtaining two of 23 licenses from the city to operate marijuana dispensaries in 2014, Tim Cullen, CEO of Colorado Harvest Company, planned carefully to open a store that would be a community asset and serve local customers as well as tourists. Investing more than $1 million, Cullen's company purchased a small abandoned strip mall at 11002 E. Yale Ave., at the corner of Yale and Parker roads, and renovated the property to open the third Colorado Harvest Company dispensary. Today, the property is beautifully maintained and hosts a new tenant. In just the past year, Colorado Harvest Company has been featured in many national news stories in the United States as well as news documentaries produced for national television audiences in China, Denmark, Canada, Italy, the Netherlands and Germany.

"We've been enormously successful at this location," Cullen said. "We focus on customer service, security and of course, we sell our own naturally grown cannabis flower and carry the most extensive product selection of any dispensary in Colorado."

Cullen listed a few fun facts that represent his first year of operations in Aurora:

Completing 57,000 customer transactions Creating 15 full time jobs and supporting numerous local contractors (maintenance, security, building/design/construction, technology, etc.) Renovating a commercial property that houses another small business tenant Paying $113,228 sales tax to the city of Aurora and $261,272 to the State of Colorado just for the Yale location Hosting television crews and news reporters from 11 national and international news outlets to share the story of a well-run legal cannabis company

Cullen's policy of open communication with city officials, law enforcement and community groups contributes to the confidence his customers experience at Colorado Harvest Company. In addition, the store offers fun and entertaining amenities such as a completely renovated 1967 VW bus that has been converted to a photo booth. Customers can watch a talented artist who operates a fully equipped glass blowing studio within the store and creates marijuana themed pieces for sale.

"We measure our customer preferences so we can manage our inventory well," he said. "We know that 80 percent of our customers at Yale generally prefer flower-based products followed by edibles, concentrates and topical based products."

Cullen will present his strategies for operating a successful and compliant cannabis business to the Fifth Annual Marijuana Business Conference, the largest industry conference in the world, in Las Vegas, Nevada, in November 2016.

About Colorado Harvest Company

Colorado Harvest Company produces and sells its own naturally-grown cannabis for adult medicinal and recreational use. Colorado Harvest Company was the first to commission an independent economic impact study of its business and has since become an industry model for financial transparency. Dedicated to providing customers with the highest quality naturally-grown cannabis and courteous customer service, Colorado Harvest Company's reputation represents the benefits of the legal cannabis movement. Tim Cullen, CEO, is one of Colorado's most knowledgeable cannabis authorities by nature of his years of experience, formal education and training; public efforts to support legal compliance; industry involvement; community philanthropy and thoughtful media commentary.

Please visit http://coloradoharvestcompany.com. Tim Cullen video.

Image Available: http://www.marketwire.com/library/MwGo/2016/9/15/11G114463/Images/YALE_Shots_photo_smaller-1607e5fcc05a8d11ab96ad2b12f455c0.jpg

Contact:

Ann Dickerson

ann@coloradoharvestcompany.com

303-319-4330
VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- Glance Technologies Inc. (CSE: GET) (FRANKFURT: GJT) congratulates its Chief Operating Officer and co-founder Penny Green on the recent news that Ms. Green's law firm Bacchus Law Corporation has been ranked as no. 314 in the 28th annual Profit 500 ranking of Canada's Fastest-Growing Companies by Canadian Business and PROFIT.

As founder and CEO of Bacchus for 18 years, Ms. Green played a pivotal role in developing the law firm's operations and legal presence, with a keen focus on working with emerging high-growth companies. Additionally, Ms. Green has received numerous awards for her business success, including ranking as one of PROFIT W100 Top Female Entrepreneurs in Canada and as a finalist for the 2012 RBC Canadian Women Entrepreneur Awards.

"It's a great honour to have my company ranked as No. 314 this year and included in the PROFIT 500 for two consecutive years," says Green, "Now I am thrilled with the continuing opportunity to apply my experiences running a multi-million dollar enterprise and working with many fast growing companies to build Glance into an international fintech leader. Glance is growing at a very fast pace and our goal is to make Glance Pay the industry standard for mobile payments for restaurants."

Ms. Green has been the full time COO of Glance since February 2016 and has been instrumental in growing and operating the company. The other founder of Glance Technologies is Desmond Griffin, who previously co-founded and acted as the CEO for PayByPhone, which he took from concept to a platform processing tens of millions of mobile payments annually for millions of consumers in over 100 cities around the world. Ms. Green continues to be a member in good standing with both the Law Society of British Columbia and the Washington State Bar Association.

Ranking Canada's Fastest-Growing Companies by five-year revenue growth, the PROFIT 500 profiles the country's most successful growth companies. A joint venture between Canada's premier business media brands, the PROFIT 500 is published in the October issue of Canadian Business and online at PROFITguide.com.

Additionally, Glance is pleased to announce the appointment of Laura Gallagher as Glance's Vice President of Finance. Ms. Gallagher is an experienced Chartered Accountant, with a broad range of business knowledge. She has a unique blend of skills, which includes coordinating financial audits across various industries, as well as extensive knowledge of marketing and strategy initiatives. Ms. Gallagher spent four years working as a Senior Auditor at KPMG, where she worked with publicly listed companies.

Glance also announces that, in accordance with the terms of Ms. Gallagher's employment, it has granted to Ms. Gallagher incentive stock options to purchase an aggregate of 55,000 common shares of Glance at an exercise price of $0.28 per share.

About Glance Technologies Inc.

Glance Technologies owns and operates Glance Pay, a streamlined payment system that allows customers to pay their restaurant bill instantly with their mobile device. Glance Pay aims to revolutionize how smartphone users choose where to dine, settle their restaurant bills, access their payment records and interact with their favourite restaurants. Glance Pay intends to become the industry standard as one of the four pillars in restaurant payments, beside credit cards, debit cards and cash. Glance trades on the Canadian Securities Exchange under the ticker symbol GET.

For more information about Glance, please go to www.glance.tech or www.glancepay.com and follow Glance Technologies and Glance Pay on Facebook, twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram.

Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains certain forward-looking statements within the meaning of applicable securities law. Forward-looking statements are frequently characterized by words such as "plan", "expect", "project", "intend", "believe", "anticipate", "estimate" and other similar words, or statements that certain events or conditions "may" or "will" occur. In particular, forward-looking statements in this press release include, but are not limited to, statements with respect to the completion of the offering.

Although Glance believes that the expectations reflected in the forward-looking statements are reasonable, there can be no assurance that such expectations will prove to be correct. Such forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results, performance or developments to differ materially from those contained in the statements.

Contacts:

Glance Technologies Inc.

Christina Rao

Vice President, Investor Relations

(604) 723-7480

christina@glancepay.com




WISeKey to establish a Mauritius based center to work on this project with the Mauritius Board of Investment

WISeKey International Holding Ltd ("WISeKey")(SIX:WIHN), a leading cybersecurity company, during its participation at the Mauritius Investment Board Blockchain event, announced its intention to establish a BlockChain Centre of Excellence in Mauritius to deploy a Trusted Blockchain as a Service platform, to assist the Mauritius Government to create a Blockchain Ecosystem.

WISeKey will work with experts from industry, government, and academia to address businesses' most relevant blockchain developments with practical, standards-based solutions using available blockchain technologies. This dedicated center of excellence will conduct research, rapid pilot prototyping, co-creation of use cases and IP creation on blockchain technology and platforms. The Mauritius BlockChain Centre of Excellence will recommend a National Blockchain Platform to facilitate enterprises to swiftly adopt and on-board blockchain based solutions and services.

The Mauritius Blockchain Center of Excellence will help position the country as a key and active player in the blockchain space. It will provide access to both policy, technical and business expertise around blockchain. WISeKey will be cooperating with local companies participating at the center on building points of view, proof of concepts, policies, educational materials including addressing all the distributed ledger capabilities across different blockchain schemes (public, consortium and private), with industry verticalization and domain specialization (IoT, transactions, messaging, etc.), underpinned by the best underlying technologies from startups, our key partners and from the community.

Carlos Moreira, Founder and CEO WISeKey said: "We strongly believe that the Blockchain Center of Excellence will disrupt business flows and processes across different industries in Mauritius and will position the country as one of the Blockchain Platforms and Hubs."

WISeKey will be localizing in Mauritius at the development of the WISeID Blockchain which is constantly growing as new blocks are added to it with a new set of recordings. Each WISeID node gets a copy of the WISeID Blockchain and gets downloaded automatically upon joining the WISeID network. Through the WISeID BlockChain app users are always in control of their digital identity stored on their mobile, IoT sensor and or computer and is only the user who determines which identification attributes are shared with social media, credit cards, merchant sites etc. never disclosing the Personal Identifiable Information (PII) if not required or necessary. WISeID uses BlockChain as a public, immutable ledger that allows third parties to validate that the original Identity or Attribute certifications provided by a Third Trusted Party has not been changed or misrepresented. Keeping control of Digital Identity is key to protecting user's personal data.

The Mauritius Event: The next Blockchain Valley

Organized by Board of Investment (BOI) of Mauritius

The Board of Investment (BOI) is the national investment promotion agency of the Government of Mauritius with the mandate to promote and facilitate investment in the country. It is the first point of contact for investors exploring business opportunities in Mauritius and the region. BOI also assists investors in the growth, nurturing and diversification of their business.

BOI Announcement:

BMPL Ebene Cybercity has today been the scene of a historical landmark in the shaping of our digital economy.

The very first seminar on Blockchain exceeded our expectations with overwhelming appreciation from the audience. More than 200 stakeholders across various sectors, including Banks, Assets Management, Insurance, Tourism, ICT and entrepreneurs from over the world attended the seminar.

As an indication, investments in bitcoin and Blockchain infrastructure have already topped USD 1 billion, and every major bank in the world is increasingly paying attention to this technology.

The seminar saw the participation of renowned international speakers who intervened on diverse themes, namely demystifying Blockchain, developing its ecosystem, its regulatory framework and the potential applications of Blockchain in today's innovation-driven economy.

Mr. Carlos Creus Moreira, Chairman, CEO Founder of WISeKey made a clear presentation of Blockchain technology. He highlighted the differences between Blockchain and other technologies such as cloud computing, and expanded on the potential in creating revolutionary solutions which do not exist in the marketplace today.

Mr. Sebastien Couture, co-founder of Stratumn, demonstrated how Blockchain builds consensus around multiple institutions, enterprises and individuals working together by eliminating the role of the middleman and improving efficiency while at the same time improving trust between all the parties.

His colleague, Mr. Anuj Das Gupta, Head of Research at Stratumn, elaborated further on the subject by discussing the potential applications of Blockchain, including in KYC systems and Smart cities. He also suggested that Blockchain technology could be used in diverse sectors such as energy and healthcare.

We also had the pleasure of listening to Ms. Primavera de Fillippi, Researcher at Centre National de Recherche Scientifique, who elaborated on the need for a shift in the regulatory mindset, moving from a bureaucracy base, friction and permission (permission-based rules) to one based on accountability, transparency and innovation (information-based rules) in a bid to reconcile the objectives of providing comfort and security to users while ensuring that regulations do not stifle innovation.

Finally, Mr. Larry Christopher Bates, Chief Security Officer and President of Bitland Global, suggested that Mauritius can become the "Blockchain Valley" through the advent of a cyber-security Hague for international data-houses. He maintained that this will inevitably contribute to economic growth.

Blockchain as a technology is here to stay. The onus remains on us to harness its advantages and leverage them for the benefit of Mauritian businesses, consumers and the Government. In addition, Blockchain KYC's efficiencies and cryptographic protocols deliver stronger security and faster compliance with reduced operating costs.

The seminar has set the scene for this technological revolution. We now have to develop the Blockchain ecosystem, including devising an appropriate regulatory framework, build the local manpower and encourage both public and private sectors to integrate the technology in their structures to trigger a new phase of efficiency led by the growth of their ventures.

A small country, Mauritius has the potential to rapidly implement Blockchain in day-to-day business.

Far from being the end, this is rather the dawn of a new beginning. We will follow up on this seminar with another one in a few months. The objective is to maintain the momentum, attract more global players and position Mauritius as a trusted and secure platform in the region for the deployment of Blockchain technology.

Already, WISeKey and Bitland have indicated that they are considering setting up operations in Mauritius.

This can only bode a bright future for the next 'Blockchain Valley.

About WISeKey

WISeKey (SIX Swiss Exchange:WIHN) is a leading cybersecurity company and selected as a World Economic Forum Global Growth Company. WISeKey is currently deploying large scale Internet of Things ("IoT") digital identity ecosystems and has become a pioneer of the "4th Industrial Revolution" movement launched this year at the World Economic Forum in Davos. WISeKey's Swiss based cryptographic Root of Trust ("RoT") integrates wearable technology with secure authentication and identification, in both physical and virtual environments, and empowers IoT and wearable devices to become secure transactional devices. The RoT serves as a common trust anchor, which is recognized by the operating system and applications, to ensure the authenticity, confidentiality and integrity of on-line transactions. With the cryptographic RoT embedded on the device, the IoT product manufacturers can use code-signing certificates and a cloud-based signature as a service to secure interactions among objects and between objects and people. WISeKey has patented this process in the USA as it is currently used by many IoT providers.

Disclaimer:

This communication expressly or implicitly contains certain forward-looking statements concerning WISeKey International Holding Ltd and its business. Such statements involve certain known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which could cause the actual results, financial condition, performance or achievements of WISeKey International Holding Ltd to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. WISeKey International Holding Ltd is providing this communication as of this date and does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements contained herein as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

This press release does not constitute an offer to sell, or a solicitation of an offer to buy, any securities, and it does not constitute an offering prospectus within the meaning of article 652a or article 1156 of the Swiss Code of Obligations or a listing prospectus within the meaning of the listing rules of the SIX Swiss Exchange. Investors must rely on their own evaluation of WISeKey and its securities, including the merits and risks involved. Nothing contained herein is, or shall be relied on as, a promise or representation as to the future performance of WISeKey.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005594/en/

Contacts:

WISeKey:

Carlos Moreira, +41-22-594-3000

Founder CEO

cmoreira@wisekey.com

or

Investor Relations (United States)

The Equity Group, Inc.

Lena Cati, 212-836-9611

lcati@equityny.com
The Other Art Fair Looks to Expand its Fair Presence to North America, Asia and Europe

Demand Media, Inc. (NYSE:DMD), a diversified internet company comprised of several media and marketplace properties, announced today that it has acquired The Other Art Fair, the U.K.'s leading art fair for discovering emerging artists. The Other Art Fair will complement Demand Media's leading online art gallery marketplace, Saatchi Art. With more than 50,000 artists from over 100 countries and over 500,000 available works, Saatchi Art features an unparalleled selection of paintings, photography, sculpture, and drawings from some of the world's most exciting emerging artists and rising stars. This transaction will allow Demand Media to offer buyers the ability to purchase art from emerging artists from across the globe, both digitally through Saatchi Art's online art gallery and offline through The Other Art Fair events, thereby unifying the two fastest growing sectors of the art market and further disrupting the traditional art sales model.

The Other Art Fair, based in London, is well known amongst U.K. and Australian art lovers for its ability to introduce the best undiscovered talent through direct interactions between artists and buyers and experiential programming, appealing to a new generation of art collectors. Since the launch of its first London fair in 2011, The Other Art Fair has seen 327% growth in onsite attendance; its October 2016 edition to be held in London is expected to host approximately 15,000 attendees. This success has led to expansion, both in the U.K. and internationally, as The Other Art Fair currently presents established shows in Bristol, London and Sydney. With this acquisition, Demand Media will look to expand The Other Art Fair's international presence with plans for additional fairs in Europe, Asia and North America.

"Saatchi Art provides an unrivaled online gallery for displaying and offering for sale the works of emerging artists. However, Demand Media has also long recognized the important role physical presence plays in the art buying decision for many consumers," said Sean Moriarty, CEO, Demand Media. "Our acquisition of The Other Art Fair is a natural progression in the growth of our art marketplaces. Art fairs are one of the fastest growing categories of live events and The Other Art Fair is the leading fair for discovering emerging artists. The pairing of unparalleled access through online technology and the emotional connection created onsite at art fairs is a key factor in driving business expansion and increased audience reach."

According to research from Hiscox, 2015 online art market sales reached $3.27 billion, a 24% increase year over year. Even with this strong online growth, 46% of millennial art buyers still prefer to purchase art offline. TEFAF recently reported that art fair sales are up 49% since 2010, with nearly $13 billion in sales worldwide in 2015. With this acquisition, Saatchi Art and The Other Art Fair are in a unique position to engage art buyers year-round, through continuous online access and global offline events, all highly curated by two of the art world's most important destinations for emerging art.

"With a shared mission of identifying and supporting emerging artists from all over the world, Saatchi Art and The Other Art Fair are natural partners," said Rebecca Wilson, Chief Curator and Vice President of Art Advisory, Saatchi Art. "The alliance of these two brands sets a new precedent for the art world, with seamless integration between Saatchi Art's online gallery and The Other Art Fair's offline events, creating even more opportunity for artists and art lovers alike."

"We are thrilled to be working alongside Saatchi Art, the world's leading online art gallery," added Ryan Stanier, founder of The Other Art Fair. "This partnership will allow our distinctive brands and offerings to continue to build meaningful relationships with artists and art buyers through online tools while introducing new emerging art fairs and expanding our offline footprint to new markets."

The Other Art Fair will continue to be headquartered in London and led by its founder Ryan Stanier, who leads a team managing the art fairs' day-to-day operations.

About Saatchi Art

Saatchi Art features the world's largest selection of original art and helps people all over the world find art and artists they love. The online gallery offers more than 500,000 original paintings, drawings, sculptures and photographs by over 50,000 emerging artists from over 100 countries. Saatchi Art is redefining the experience of buying and selling art by providing art lovers with free art advisory services and an expertly curated selection of art, while giving artists a convenient and welcoming environment in which to exhibit and sell their work. To discover the world of Saatchi Art, please visit www.saatchiart.com. Saatchi Online, Inc., which operates Saatchi Art, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Demand Media, Inc. (NYSE:DMD).

About The Other Art Fair

The Other Art Fair, the leading artist fair for discovering emerging artists, provides a platform for artists to present and sell their work directly to art buyers. Using a selection committee of art experts and a guest curator, each fair presents 130 artists and their work, enabling both collectors and first-time buyers to buy directly from emerging artists. In five years The Other Art Fair has hosted 11 fairs working with over 1,000 artists from more than 20 countries. Unlike "other" fairs, The Other Art Fair creates an accessible and open fair designed for visitors to enjoy an interactive and immersive experience. www.theotherartfair.com

About Demand Media

Demand Media, Inc. (NYSE: DMD) is a diversified Internet company that builds platforms across its media (eHow and LIVESTRONG.com) and marketplace (Society6 and Saatchi Art) properties to enable communities of creators to reach passionate audiences in large and growing lifestyle categories. In addition, Demand Media's custom content solutions (studioD) and diverse advertising offerings help advertisers find innovative ways to engage with their customers. For more information about Demand Media, visit www.demandmedia.com.

Cautionary Information Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005482/en/

Contacts:

for Saatchi Art

Investor contact:

Jeff Misthal

Senior Vice President, Finance

jeff.misthal@demandmedia.com

or

Media contact:

Sharna Daduk

PR Director

Sharna.daduk@saatchiart.com


VIENNA (dpa-AFX) - The European markets ended Friday's session firmly in negative territory. Bank stocks were under extreme pressure at the end of the trading week due to concerns over Deutsche Bank. The U.S. Department of Justice has fined the German lender $14 billion to settle claims over a mortgage securities probe. Deutsche has set aside just $5.5 billion to resolve legal issues.



The sheer size of the fine caused traders to flee bank stocks, since there are other European banks that are facing similar probes. Energy stocks also turned in a weak performance, as crude oil prices slipped beneath $43 a barrel.



Investors also remained in a cautious mood ahead of the Bank of Japan and Federal Reserve policy meetings next week. U.S. consumer prices climbed more-than-expected in August, which helped to renew hopes that the Federal Reserve is likely to tighten monetary policy in coming months.



The pan-European Stoxx Europe 600 index weakened by 0.65 percent. The Euro Stoxx 50 index of eurozone bluechip stocks decreased 1.30 percent, while the Stoxx Europe 50 index, which includes some major U.K. companies, lost 0.82 percent.



The DAX of Germany dropped 1.49 percent and the CAC 40 of France fell 0.93 percent. The FTSE 100 of the U.K. declined 0.30 percent and the SMI of Switzerland finished lower by 0.66 percent.



In Frankfurt, Deutsche Bank plunged 8.47 percent. The lender said it has no intent to pay the $14 billion sought by the U.S. Department of Justice to settle civil claims over the bank's sale of residential mortgage-backed securities related to the 2008 financial crisis. The lender said it has 'no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited.' Rival Commerzbank also dropped 2.03 percent.



Utility E.ON weakened by 4.03 percent and rival RWE fell 1.92 percent.



Volkswagen declined 3.68 percent and BMW lost 2.76 percent. Daimler also finished lower by 2.64 percent.



In Paris, Societe Generale decreased 2.73 percent and BNP Paribas surrendered 2.29 percent. Credit Agricole also forfeited 0.75 percent.



Peugeot dropped 1.62 percent and Renault fell 2.36 percent.



In London, Royal Bank of Scotland declined 4.43 percent and Barclays lost 2.83 percent. Standard Chartered also finished down by 2.74 percent.



Shares of SVG Capital climbed 3.23 percent. The private equity group said it believes the unsolicited final offer from HarbourVest BidCo undervalues the company and its assets.



Electra Partners jumped 2.65 percent after announcing the successful 266 million pounds initial public offering of its portfolio company Hollywood Bowl Group Plc., the U.K.'s largest ten-pin bowling operator.



Consumer goods giant Unilever finished lower by 0.85 percent on reports that it is in talks to buy Honest Co., the consumer-products retailer co-founded by actress Jessica Alba, in a deal valued at over $1 billion.



Eurozone hourly labor cost grew at a slower pace in the second quarter, Eurostat reported Friday. Hourly labor costs increased 1 percent year-on-year, slower than the 1.6 percent growth registered a quarter ago.



Consumer prices in the U.S. increased by slightly more than expected in the month of August, according to a report released by the Labor Department on Friday. The Labor Department said its consumer price index rose by 0.2 percent in August after coming in unchanged in July. Economists had expected prices to inch up by 0.1 percent.



With an improvement in consumer expectations offset by a deterioration in views of current economic conditions, the University of Michigan released a report on Friday showing that U.S. consumer sentiment has been unexpectedly flat in September.



The University of Michigan said the preliminary reading on its consumer sentiment index for September came in at 89.8, unchanged from the final August reading. Economists had expected the index to inch up to 90.8.



Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX

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According to the latest market study released by Technavio, the global computational fluid dynamics (CFD) market is expected to reach USD 1.82 billion by 2020, growing at a steady CAGR of nearly 9%.

This research report titled 'Global CFD Market 2016-2020' provides an in-depth analysis of the market in terms of revenue and emerging market trends. The report presents the vendor landscape and the corresponding detailed analysis of the major vendors in the market based on revenue. The report, also, considers the revenue obtained from the sales of software licenses.

The aerospace and defense industry manufacturers are facing high pressure to reduce the product development cycle. CFD is mainly used in the second stage of the product development cycle. In the designing stage, the simulation and optimization processes are carried out using software such as computer-aided engineering (CAE) software. The designing stage is a vital stage in the product development life cycle as it can reduce the time and cost of production of aerospace and defense products. Hence, industries are highly dependent on the software to reduce product development cycle time.

Request a sample report: http://www.technavio.com/request-a-sample?report=52389

Technavio's sample reports are free of charge and contain multiple sections of the report including the market size and forecast, drivers, challenges, trends, and more.

Technavio's ICT analysts categorize the global CFD market into four major end-user segments. They are:

Aerospace and defense industry

Automotive industry

Electrical and electronics industry

Others

Ask an analyst: http://www.technavio.com/content/ask-analyst?report=52389

Ask Technavio's lead analysts a question about this market and they will have your answer within 24 hours.

Aerospace and defense industry

The aerospace and defense industry accounted for a market share of almost 41% in the global CFD market in 2015. Most of the major players in the market are owned or controlled by the governments of their countries and consider the revenue generation as confidential. In 2015, the high adoption of CFD by companies such as Boeing, Lockheed Martin, United Technologies, General Dynamics, and Bombardier Aerospace for R&D activities contributed to the growth of the global CFD market. The aerospace and defense industry also had high R&D investments in 2014 and 2015.

Before the evolution of CFD, aircraft manufacturing companies used wind tunnel testing and flight testing to check the performance of designed products. With the development of fast and highly efficient computers, the traditional tools and methods of testing were replaced by numerical simulation methods based on the Navier-Stokes equation. The Navier-Stokes equation is used to describe the motion of fluid substances using Newton's second law of motion.

According to Ishmeet Kaur, a lead enterprise application research analyst from Technavio, "CFD is widely used in various design stages of aircraft manufacturing and R&D. It is also used to design external aerodynamics, fuel systems, engine core compartments, missiles, cockpit and cabin ventilation, and submarines

Automotive industry

The automotive industry accounted for a market share of over 30% in the global CFD market in 2015. The increase in sales of automobiles and commercial vehicles in General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler made 2015 a profitable year for automakers in the US. The demand for more sophisticated technologies from customers has increased resulting in a greater demand for CFD. CFD is mainly used in the design and development of interior and exterior features such as enhanced night vision with pedestrian detection and automatic high beam control.

"Advances in computing and complex code solving programs has helped the CFD market in the automotive industry with more accurate prediction and analysis. CFD is used for all components that interact with fluids such as lubricants, fuel, water, coolants, and exhaust gases," says Ishmeet.

Electrical and electronics industry

The electrical and electronics industry was one of the fastest growing segments in the market in 2015 with a market share of approximately 13%. This industry is growing at a fast pace in APAC because of the growing demand for semiconductor components, consumer durables, electronics goods, and high-technology products, especially in China, South Korea, India, and Japan. The countries in APAC that played a significant role in the cloud CFD market include China, Japan, and Taiwan. Smartphones were the major areas of R&D in the electrical and electronics industry.

The adoption of CFD in the electronics industry is higher compared to the electrical industry. This is because electronics components are more sensitive to heat and pressure variations and their designing process requires proper CFD analysis. Miniaturization is a trend in the electronics industry, which will drive the need for proper design.

The top vendors highlighted by Technavio's research analysts in this report are:

ANSYS

CD-Adapco

Mentor Graphics

Browse Related Reports:

Global Cloud CFD Market 2016-2020

Global CFD Market in Aerospace and Defense Industry 2015-2019

Global CFD Market in the Industrial Machinery Sector 2015-2019

Do you need a report on a market in a specific geographical cluster or country but can't find what you're looking for? Don't worry, Technavio also takes client requests. Please contact enquiry@technavio.com with your requirements and our analysts will be happy to create a customized report just for you.

About Technavio

Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. The company develops over 2000 pieces of research every year, covering more than 500 technologies across 80 countries. Technavio has about 300 analysts globally who specialize in customized consulting and business research assignments across the latest leading edge technologies.

Technavio analysts employ primary as well as secondary research techniques to ascertain the size and vendor landscape in a range of markets. Analysts obtain information using a combination of bottom-up and top-down approaches, besides using in-house market modeling tools and proprietary databases. They corroborate this data with the data obtained from various market participants and stakeholders across the value chain, including vendors, service providers, distributors, re-sellers, and end-users.

If you are interested in more information, please contact our media team at media@technavio.com.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005025/en/

Contacts:

Technavio Research

Jesse Maida

Media Marketing Executive

US: +1 630 333 9501

UK: +44 208 123 1770

www.technavio.com
FORT LAUDERDALE-DAVIE, FL--(Marketwired - September 16, 2016) - In an expansion of the international reach of its already-recognized global consortium, Nova Southeastern University (NSU) Shepard Broad College of Law has announced two new exciting educational initiatives with Israeli educators.

The College of Law is partnering with the Hebrew University (HU) Faculty of Law to provide a student exchange program, conducted at HU Law's Mount Scopus campus in Israel. Under a memorandum of Understanding, NSU will recognize the credits its students receive there and count them toward completion of the Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree.

The agreement also opens the door to future institutional cooperation, including teaching, research, exchange of faculty and students, and staff development between the two universities.

As part of the agreement, HU Law's faculty and PhD students will be able to conduct research at NSU Law and will be given dedicated space and library support. Additionally, HU Law faculty and students will be provided with all of NSU Law's Global Consortium for International Legal Education Member benefits.

"It's a welcome and timely opportunity for our students to broaden their horizons to include first-hand exposure to a critical arena in our world, giving our students a greater global perspective," said Jon M. Garon, dean of the Shepard Broad College of Law.

NSU also has appointed Rifat Azam, LL.D., as an Adjunct Professor of Law and Scholar in Residence. Professor Azam teaches and does research in tax law and policy, international taxation, e-commerce and human rights. His book on e-commerce taxation was published by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem press and his articles have been published by Virginia Tax Review and other leading law journals.

Professor Azam completed his studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem School of Law in 2006 (LLB, LLM, LLD). He clerked for Chief Justice Aharon Barak of the Israeli Supreme Court and served as legal assistant to the Chief Justice and the Supreme Court from 1997-2006. Professor Azam comes to the Shepard Broad College of Law after spending the past year at Columbia Law School as the Israel Institute Visiting Professor of Law. While at Columbia, he conducted international taxation research and taught on The Role of The Israeli Supreme Court in Democracy and Society.

"Strong Israeli partners are helping strengthen NSU Law's role throughout the region," Dean Garon added. "The combination of additional international partners with the College of Law and international visiting faculty enable NSU to provide a rich, multifaceted experience and broaden our students' preparedness for the global environment in which they practice law."

Be sure to sign up for NSU's RSS feed so you don't miss any of our news releases, guest editorials and other announcements. Please sign up HERE.

Shepard Broad College of Law: Nova Southeastern University's College of Law offers a cutting edge, skills-centered academic program in three-year full-time and four-year part-time divisions. With its recently redeveloped clinical programs, every NSU Law student is guaranteed a live-client experience. In-house clinical studies are supplemented by full-time field placement opportunities practicing law in Florida, across the United States, or select locations throughout the globe. To solidify student success after graduation, NSU Law pioneered a curriculum on the business of lawyering through the Global Law Leadership Initiative. NSU Law students have a myriad of curricular opportunities, including a rich, diverse curriculum, concentrations in International Law or Health Law; dual degree programs abroad in Rome, Barcelona, or Prague; dual degree programs at many of NSU's 17 colleges; and much more. For more information, please visit www.law.nova.edu.

About Nova Southeastern University (NSU): Located in beautiful Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Nova Southeastern University (NSU) is a dynamic research institution dedicated to providing high-quality educational programs at the undergraduate, graduate, and first-professional degree levels. A private, not-for-profit institution with more than 26,000 students, NSU has campuses in Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers, Jacksonville, Miami, Miramar, Orlando, Palm Beach, and Tampa, Florida, as well as San Juan, Puerto Rico, while maintaining a presence online globally. For more than 50 years, NSU has been awarding degrees in a wide range of fields, while fostering groundbreaking research and an impactful commitment to community. Classified as a research university with "high research activity" by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, NSU is 1 of only 50 universities nationwide to also be awarded Carnegie's Community Engagement Classification, and is also the largest private, not-for-profit institution in the United States that meets the U.S. Department of Education's criteria as a Hispanic-serving Institution. Please visit www.nova.edu for more information about NSU and realizingpotential.nova.edu for more information on the largest fundraising campaign in NSU history.

Kevin Boyd

Office of Public Affairs

954-288-9509 (cell)

kevinboydpr@comcast.net
IRVING, Texas, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --Darling Ingredients Inc. (NYSE: DAR) (the "Company") today announced that management will present at the Credit Suisse 2016 Global Credit Products Conference to be held at the Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami Beach, Florida, on September 21-23, 2016. Randall C. Stuewe, Darling's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, is scheduled to present on Thursday, September 22nd, at 9:20 a.m. EDT, and will hold one-on-one meetings throughout the day.

The investor presentation will be webcast and accessible via the Investor Relations section of the Company's website at http://www.darlingii.com.

About Darling

Darling Ingredients Inc. is the world's largest publicly-traded developer and producer of sustainable natural ingredients from edible and inedible bio-nutrients, creating a wide range of ingredients and customized specialty solutions for customers in the pharmaceutical, food, pet food, feed, technical, fuel, bioenergy and fertilizer industries. With operations on five continents, the Company collects and transforms all aspects of animal by-product streams into useable and specialty ingredients, such as gelatin, edible fats, feed-grade fats, animal proteins and meals, plasma, pet food ingredients, organic fertilizers, yellow grease, fuel feedstocks, green energy, natural casings and hides. The Company also recovers and converts used cooking oil and commercial bakery residuals into valuable feed and fuel ingredients. In addition, the Company provides grease trap services to food service establishments, environmental services to food processors and sells restaurant cooking oil delivery and collection equipment. For additional information, visit the Company's website at http://www.darlingii.com.

Safe Harbor Statement

Some of the statements made in this press release are forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are based upon our current expectations and projections about future events and generally relate to our plans, objectives and expectations for the development of our business. Although management believes that the plans and objectives reflected in or suggested by these forward-looking statements are reasonable, all forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties and actual future results may be materially different from the plans, objectives and expectations expressed in this press release. Many of these risks and uncertainties are described in Darling's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ending January 2, 2016 and our other filings with the SEC.
VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- Cannabix Technologies Inc. (CSE: BLO)(OTC PINK: BLOZF) (the "Company") is pleased to report it has entered into a definitive license agreement with the University of Florida ("the University") for US Patent 8,237,118 ("the Patent"). Earlier this year, the Company announced its intention to exercise its option for the patent. The agreement provides Cannabix exclusive worldwide rights in the area of breath analysis of controlled substances. Cannabix and University researchers are developing an innovative FAIMS (field asymmetric waveform ion mobility spectrometry) based instrument for the detection of delta9-tetrahydrocannabinol ("THC") in human breath. In consideration for the patent license, the Company has issued 603,870 common shares to the University.

The Company also reports that development of the Cannabix Marijuana Breathalyzer prototype for the detection of trace amounts of THC, is progressing well and expected to be completed by late fall 2016. In July, the Company announced the development of its "Beta 1.0" bench-top device with a proprietary configurable high voltage power supply which operates on conventional power sources. All components in the "Beta 2.0" bench-top device have been reduced in size even further, some as much as 5X. The Beta 2.0 device will also deliver greater sensitivity. The company expects to have a pilot test ready device for scientific trials for later this fall, while the company continues to develop its Beta 3.0 version which will be a completely portable handheld device.

Scientific trial protocols for testing will be developed with the assistance of Cannabix Scientific Advisors Drs. Marilyn Huestis and Bruce Goldberger and in accordance with the requirements in Canada of the Minster of Justice in Canada and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in the United States. The trials will consist of live breath testing utilizing medicinal marijuana users in correlation with blood THC testing to assess the accuracy of the breath test device and its sensitivity and specificity.

Kal Malhi, President of Cannabix stated, "Cannabix is a leader in the development of a hand held marijuana breathalyzer and we are fortunate to have the guidance of Drs. Huestis and Goldberger as we move towards scientific field trials of our device. Both are a vital part in helping Cannabix to move towards this milestone and get closer to delivering a highly accurate and court accepted evidence gathering tool that law enforcement can use to enforce marijuana impaired driving."

About Professor Dr. Dr. (h.c.) Marilyn A. Huestis

Professor Marilyn Huestis is an advisor to Cannabix Technologies and is one of the world's foremost experts on the effects of marijuana use on driving impairment. She is a sought after international speaker, scholar and scientist, and the author of 426 manuscripts based on her research on cannabinoid agonists and antagonists, effects of in utero drug exposure and the neurobiology and pharmacokinetics of novel psychoactive substances. Professor Huestis was a tenured Senior Investigator and Chief of Chemistry and Drug Metabolism at the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) (retired in 2016). She is an Adjunct Professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. Professor Huestis received her Bachelor's degree in Biochemistry from Mount Holyoke College, a Master's in Clinical Chemistry from the University of New Mexico, and a Ph.D. in Toxicology from the University of Maryland Baltimore. Professor Huestis received a Doctor Honoris Causa in Medicine and Surgery from the Faculty of Medicine, University of Helsinki in Finland in 2010. Other important awards include 2016 Marian W. Fischman Lectureship Award from the College on Problems of Drug Dependence, 2016 Saferstein Memorial Distinguished Lecturer at Northeastern University, Excellence in Scientific Research, Women Scientist Advisory NIDA Investigator Award 2015, Norman P. Kubasik Lectureship Award, AACC, Distinguished Fellow Award from the American Academy of Forensic Sciences (AAFS) in 2015, The International Association of Forensic Toxicologists (TIAFT) Alan Curry Award in 2010, the American Association for Clinical Chemistry Outstanding Contributions in a Selected Area of Research Award in 2008, the International Association of Therapeutic Drug Monitoring and Clinical Toxicology (IATDMCT) Irving Sunshine Award in 2007, the AAFS Rolla N. Harger Award in 2005, and the Irving Sunshine Award for Outstanding Research in Forensic Toxicology in 1992. The journal Clinical Chemistry featured her as an "Inspiring Mind". She currently serves on the National Commission on Forensic Sciences, and the Organization of Scientific Area Committee on Toxicology, World Anti-doping Agency's Prohibited List Committee, Transportation Research Board Committee on Alcohol and Other Drugs, and the National Safety Council's Alcohol, Drugs and Impairment Division Executive Board. Professor Huestis is past president of the Society of Forensic Toxicologists, past Chair of the Toxicology Section of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences, and the first woman president of The International Association of Forensic Toxicologists.

About Dr. Bruce Goldberger

Dr. Bruce Goldberger is a Professor and the Chief of the Division of Forensic Medicine in the Department of Pathology, Immunology and Laboratory Medicine in the College of Medicine at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida. Dr. Goldberger is the Technical and Administrative Director of the Forensic Toxicology Laboratory at the University of Florida which provides toxicological services to Medical Examiner Offices and State and local law enforcement agencies throughout the State of Florida. Dr. Goldberger has been qualified as an expert witness more than 300 times in forensic toxicology in Federal, State, Military and Canadian courts of law.

Dr. Goldberger is the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Analytical Toxicology. Dr. Goldberger is a past-President of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences, the President of the American Board of Forensic Toxicology, the Vice President of the Society of Forensic Toxicologists, and the Treasurer of the Forensic Specialties Accreditation Board.

About Cannabix Technologies Inc.

Cannabix Technologies Inc. is a leader in marijuana breathalyzer development for law enforcement and the workplace. Cannabix has established breath testing technologies in the pursuit of bringing durable, portable hand-held tools to market to enhance detection of marijuana impaired driving offences on roads at a time when marijuana is becoming legal in many jurisdictions globally. Cannabix is working to develop drug-testing devices that will detect THC - the psychoactive component of marijuana that causes intoxication - using breath samples. This technology would be used to provide detection of use of THC at the roadside to identify drivers intoxicated by the recent use of marijuana. In particular, Cannabix is focused on developing breath testing devices for detection of recent use of THC, in contrast to urine testing for THC metabolite that requires an invasive collection and reflects use days or even weeks earlier. The devices will also be useful for other practical applications such as testing employees in the workplace where intoxication by THC can be hazardous.

We seek Safe Harbor.

On behalf of the Board of Directors

Rav Mlait, CEO

Cannabix Technologies Inc.

The CSE has not reviewed and does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains forward-looking information that involves various risks and uncertainties regarding future events. Such forward-looking information can include without limitation statements based on current expectations involving a number of risks and uncertainties and are not guarantees of future performance of the Company, such as final development of a commercial or prototype product(s), successful trial or pilot of company technologies, no assurance that commercial sales of any kind actually materialize; no assurance the Company will have sufficient funds to complete product development. There are numerous risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results and the Company's plans and objectives to differ materially from those expressed in the forward-looking information, including: (i) adverse market conditions; (ii) risks regarding protection of proprietary technology; (iii) the ability of the Company to complete financings; (v) the ability of the Company to develop and market its future product; and (vi) risks regarding government regulation, managing and maintaining growth, the effect of adverse publicity, litigation, competition and other factors which may be identified from time to time in the Company's public announcements and filings. There is no assurance that the marijuana breathalyzer business will provide any benefit to the Company, and no assurance that any proposed new products will be built or proceed. There is no assurance that existing "patent pending" technologies licensed by the Company will receive patent status by regulatory authorities. The Company is not currently selling commercial breathalyzers. Actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such information. These and all subsequent written and oral forward-looking information are based on estimates and opinions of management on the dates they are made and are expressly qualified in their entirety by this notice. Except as required by law, the Company does not intend to update these forward-looking statements.

Contacts:

Cannabix Technologies Inc.

Rav Mlait

CEO

604-551-7831

info@cannabixtechnologies.com

www.cannabixtechnologies.com




OTTAWA, ONTARIO -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- Public Services and Procurement Canada

Canadians from coast to coast to coast provided their input and ideas to the Government of Canada to find a new public use for 100 Wellington, an important heritage building facing Parliament Hill.

The Honourable Judy M. Foote, Minister of Public Services and Procurement thanks Canadians who took the time to participate in the process and share their ideas on how to best transform the 100 Wellington building into a key Canadian destination.

Public Services and Procurement Canada (PSPC) launched these public consultations on August 18, 2016, to seek feedback from interested Canadians, international visitors, and key stakeholders on the preferred use for the heritage building located directly across from Parliament Hill. The Department presented six potential uses for the building and also provided respondents the opportunity to share their own ideas to shape the future of the public space.

PSPC received over 7,000 responses to its online survey over the three-week consultation period. This indicates a strong interest in shaping the future of Parliament Hill. The results of the public consultations, including data, will be made public and shared online, in the final consultation report, which is expected to be released by the end of 2016.

The consultation report will then be used to develop the recommended options for government to make the final decision on the future use of this building. The report will also inform the broader strategy of restoring and modernizing the heritage buildings in the Parliamentary Precinct.

Quotes

"Thank you to those who shared their views on the future of 100 Wellington and attended our information session, open houses and provided their opinions through our online survey. Your feedback will help us shape the future of this important heritage building in your nation's capital. The work needed to revitalize and restore 100 Wellington will support the local economy and enhance the experience of those who live in and visit the National Capital Region."

The Honourable Judy M. Foote, Minister of Public Services and Procurement

Quick Facts

-- A public information session was held and webcast live across Canada on August 18, 2016 to kick off the three-week public consultations. -- The public consultations took place from August 18, 2016, to September 9, 2016. -- During the consultation phase, over 7000 surveys were completed by Canadians from coast-to-coast-to-coast. This indicates a strong interest in shaping the future of Parliament Hill. -- The consultation results will be publicly available by the end of 2016. -- The results of the consultations will be used in making decisions on the re-development of 100 Wellington. The final decision on the future use rests with the government.

Follow us on Twitter.

Follow us on Facebook.

Contacts:

Annie Trepanier

Office of the Honourable Judy M. Foote

819-997-5421



Media Relations

Public Services and Procurement Canada

819-420-5501

media@tpsgc-pwgsc.gc.ca




Technavio has announced the top five leading vendors in their recentglobal dishwashing detergent marketreport. This research report also lists 10 other prominent vendors that are expected to impact the market during the forecast period.

In an attempt to increase the awareness of the availability of products and build brand image in emerging markets such as Brazil, China, India, Russia, and Malaysia, manufacturers of dishwashing detergents are focusing on innovation, consumer understanding, branding, productivity, and go-to-market execution. They are also leveraging the scale and scope of their businesses. Vendors are also focusing on upgrading their existing brands to increase their respective market's share and brand awareness, and also on improving their supply chains.

Ask an analyst: http://www.technavio.com/content/ask-analyst?report=53210

Ask Technavio's lead analysts a question about this market and they will have your answer within 24 hours.

Competitive vendor landscape

According to the report, the global dishwashing detergent market is marked by the presence of multiple established vendors offering a wide array of products. Major players operating in this space include P&G, Unilever, Reckitt Benckiser, Henkel, and Colgate-Palmolive and are very competitive in terms of their product offerings.

Unilever, Reckitt Benckiser, and Henkel are European MNCs based in the Netherlands, the UK, and Germany, respectively, while P&G and Colgate-Palmolive are North American companies based in the US. In 2015, the three European MNCs together contributed 19.84% of the global revenue, whereas the other two companies contributed 26.42% of the global revenue for household cleaners at large.

"While P&G is a leading player in all categories of household cleaners, Reckitt Benckiser is a leading vendor in the automatic dishwashing detergent segment with its brand Finish and in surface cleaners," says Brijesh Kumar Choubey, a lead retail goods and services research analyst from Technavio.

Request a sample report: http://www.technavio.com/request-a-sample?report=53210

Technavio's sample reports are free of charge and contain multiple sections of the report including the market size and forecast, drivers, challenges, trends, and more.

Top five dishwashing detergent market vendors

Colgate-Palmolive

Colgate-Palmolive has a strong brand image, which improves its credibility among customers. The company's strong brand image makes it a leader in many product categories of global oral care and personal care markets through its flagship brands Colgate, Palmolive, Protex, Irish Spring, and Softsoap. The company also has a significant share of the global home care market through its flagship brands Ajax, Palmolive, and Fabuloso.

Henkel

Henkel has been focusing on untapped markets such as MEA to promote its household cleaning products. The company is building its own growth opportunity in these markets by introducing new lines of its globally popular brands of household cleaning products. In 2015, the launch of Pril 100 Lemons Power in MEA was successful. In addition, the company is focusing on introducing innovative hand and automatic dishwashing products.

In 2015, the company launched the new variant Pur Gold Care under the Pur brand in Eastern Europe, in the hand dishwashing category. The innovative formula of this product is especially effective against odors.

P&G

The company focuses strongly on product development and research activities for bringing new products into the markets. It constantly concentrates on internal and external R&D in order to launch new products and enhance its existing product portfolio. Innovative new products earned P&G five of the top 10 spots in the IRI New Product Pacesetters ranking of the most successful non-food product launches of 2015.

Among these five the list contained two lines from the home care segment, including Gain Flings and Cascade Platinum. This achievement has underscored P&G's focus on driving business growth through a strong portfolio of innovative products.

Reckitt Benckiser

Reckitt Benckiser has positioned its dishwashing brand Finish as the first automatic dishwashing detergent brand. The company has thus achieved fast-mover advantage and the brand has become the top selling brand for automatic dishwashing. The company continues to launch of new lines under the Finish brand to provide more specific solutions for consumers. For instance, during the first quarter of 2016, the company launched Finish Supercharged Powerball. Through this launch the brand had a good start for 2016 and had been witnessing a significant sales growth in the US.

Unilever

In 2015, the home care segment of Unilever provided a year of underlying growth. The underlying sales growth was at 5.9% in 2015. The home care segment also witnessed an increase in operating margin by 1.3% (operating margin was 7.6% and 6.3%, respectively, in 2015 and 2014. The growth stemmed from a strong range of new product launches, including Comfort Intense and Omo, which had a global re-launch with an upgraded formulation.

The other prominent vendors are

Bombril

Church Dwight

Godrej Consumer Products

Goodmaid Chemicals

Kao

McBride

Rohit Surfactants

SC Johnson Son

Seventh Generation

The Clorox Company

Browse Related Reports:

Dishwashing Detergent Market in Europe Market Research 2015-2019

Global Liquid Detergent Chemicals Market 2016-2020

Global Organic Laundry Detergents Market 2016-2020

Do you need a report on a market in a specific geographical cluster or country but can't find what you're looking for? Don't worry, Technavio also takes client requests. Please contact enquiry@technavio.com with your requirements and our analysts will be happy to create a customized report just for you.

About Technavio

Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. The company develops over 2000 pieces of research every year, covering more than 500 technologies across 80 countries. Technavio has about 300 analysts globally who specialize in customized consulting and business research assignments across the latest leading edge technologies.

Technavio analysts employ primary as well as secondary research techniques to ascertain the size and vendor landscape in a range of markets. Analysts obtain information using a combination of bottom-up and top-down approaches, besides using in-house market modeling tools and proprietary databases. They corroborate this data with the data obtained from various market participants and stakeholders across the value chain, including vendors, service providers, distributors, re-sellers, and end-users.

If you are interested in more information, please contact our media team at media@technavio.com.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005029/en/

Contacts:

Technavio Research

Jesse Maida

Media Marketing Executive

US: +1 630 333 9501

UK: +44 208 123 1770

www.technavio.com
Technavio has announced the top eight leading vendors in their recenthuman capital management (HCM) software market in Germanyreport. This research report also lists 12 other prominent vendors that are expected to impact the market during the forecast period.

The introduction of the Employment and Labor Law 2016 in Germany will increase the adoption of HCM software. The law regulates the employee-employer relationship by providing a set of guidelines such as contractual agreements, proper documents of employee and working conditions, and work time. It also facilitates protection of employees from unlawful employer activities such as insufficient wages. HCM software has employee-related compliance management where the process is automated to ensure all the regulations are satisfied.

Ask an analyst: http://www.technavio.com/content/ask-analyst?report=53136

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Competitive vendor landscape

According to the report, the market is fragmented with the presence of many multinational vendors. Several vendors have established a sizeable market presence in the HCM software market in Germany. ADP, SAP, Oracle, and Workday are the leading players in the market.

"Competition has intensified due to the increasing demand for HCM software among large enterprises and SMEs. Price wars among players have increased, driven by the need to form high-value partnerships with large enterprises," says Ishmeet Kaur, a lead enterprise application analyst from Technavio.

The highly fragmented nature of the market is affecting the proportion of target audiences, with vendors struggling to build clear business cases. Large players require multiple vendors to mitigate risks, especially when they wish to discontinue their business with a specific vendor. Established vendors will acquire smaller vendors to expand their product portfolio and increase their market share. Through such acquisitions, large companies acquire advanced technologies and have an opportunity to enter new markets. In addition, smaller service providers have less success in establishing effective working relationships with end-users, compared with their larger counterparts.

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Top eight HCM software market vendors in Germany

ADP

ADP offers HCM solutions for both SMEs and large enterprises. The functionalities of HCM solutions provided by the company are talent management, human resource management, tax and compliance, benefits administration, payment solutions, and time and attendance management.

Oracle

Oracle offers database and middleware software, cloud infrastructure software and hardware systems (includes Oracle engineered systems, servers, storage, networking and industry specific products), and application software, along with support and related services. Oracle Taleo HCM solutions and Oracle HCM solutions help the company manage human resources, recruit employees, and set compensation.

SAP SuccessFactors

SAP SuccessFactors provides cloud-based business execution solutions. Its solutions help enterprises improve their business strategy, team execution, and people performance. The company provides HCM application suite that integrates recruiting and onboarding, social collaboration, learning management, performance management, applicant tracking, succession planning, talent management, and HR analytics.

Workday

Workday is a provider of enterprise cloud applications for finance and human resources. The company delivers solutions for financial management, human capital management, and analytics. It offers HCM solutions for medium-sized and large enterprises under segments such as education, financial services, government, healthcare, insurance, manufacturing, retail, and hospitality. The functionalities of the solutions help enterprises manage complex and dynamic operating environments.

BambooHR

BambooHR provides online HR software for small and medium-sized businesses to manage their employee information. The company serves tens of thousands of employees in 70 countries worldwide

The company offers HR solutions for SMEs. The functionalities of the solutions help the enterprises secure employee data in one location and manage complex and dynamic operating environments.

PeopleFluent

PeopleFluent provides HR solutions with functionalities such as talent management, recruiting and onboarding, compensation management, succession planning, performance management, workforce compliance, learning management, workforce planning and analytics, and social collaboration.

Ultimate Software

The HCM solutions provided by the company delivers functionalities such as recruiting and onboarding, payroll management, time and attendance management, performance management, succession planning, talent management, business intelligence, people management, and benefits management.

Zoho

The company offers solutions such as online office, collaboration and business productivity suite, HRM, HCM, customer relationship management, network management, sales, enterprise IT management, social media management, accounting, and e-mail marketing. The HCM-related solutions provided by the company help enterprises automate the human resource processes.

Browse Related Reports:

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Global IT Asset Management Market 2016-2020

Global Enterprise Cloud Services Market 2016-2020

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About Technavio

Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. The company develops over 2000 pieces of research every year, covering more than 500 technologies across 80 countries. Technavio has about 300 analysts globally who specialize in customized consulting and business research assignments across the latest leading edge technologies.

Technavio analysts employ primary as well as secondary research techniques to ascertain the size and vendor landscape in a range of markets. Analysts obtain information using a combination of bottom-up and top-down approaches, besides using in-house market modeling tools and proprietary databases. They corroborate this data with the data obtained from various market participants and stakeholders across the value chain, including vendors, service providers, distributors, re-sellers, and end-users.

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WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Ohio Governor John Kasich claims he is undecided on who he will vote for in the upcoming presidential election but said he is 'very unlikely' to vote for Republican nominee Donald Trump. Kasich, the popular Republican governor of a key swing state, spoke briefly about the election in an interview with CNN's Dana Bash broadcast Friday. When asked if it was possible if he would support Trump, Kasich said it was 'very unlikely' before adding, 'Too much water under the bridge.' The Ohio governor was among the last candidates challenging Trump for the GOP nomination and declined to attend the Republican National Convention even though it was held in his home state. However, Kasich ruled out voting for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and suggested he hasn't considered supporting Libertarian Gary Johnson. Kasich did say he would work to get Republicans out to vote to re-elect Senator Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and others down-ticket and acknowledged that could benefit Trump. He also said he would try to work with the eventual president, noting that he will have two years left as governor of Ohio. Kasich was in Washington to meet with President Barack Obama and others to discuss the massive trade deal known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which he described as vital. (Photo: Michael Vadon) 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.


CHELMSFORD, United Kingdom, March 06, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Consumer behaviours and new marketing innovations are quickly changing the future of the Financial Services sector and with a number of trends set to be implemented throughout this year, Absolute Digital Media are taking a close look at the new strategies they can implement for their clients to help improve their client's conversions, user experience and more.



One of the things that Absolute Digital Media will be looking at is the focus on micro interactions. With the focus on mobile search indexing this year, micro interactions are becoming a bigger part of UX design. This can help to make data, charts and touch points feel a lot more creative, keeping the user's attention when dealing with dry or confusing numbers and stats.



CEO, Ben Austin, said: 'The financial services sector can be one of the most competitive industries when it comes to digital marketing, and it is important that they keep up with the demands of their consumers in order to enhance their brand and retain customer loyalty.'



Another consideration that Absolute Digital Media will be looking at when it comes to their clients in the financial services sector, is the emergence of new technologies such as Blockchain technology. Blockchain technology is looking to very quickly transform the finance sector, with improvements set to be implemented by increasing efficiency and security, and helping to reduce overall costs.



Santander issued a report back in 2015, estimating that blockchain had the potential to 'reduce banks' infrastructure costs by around US$15 - 20 billion per annum by 2022.'



A further look at social media and how their clients in the financial services sector can use it has also shown Absolute Digital Media a new avenue for improvement and innovation. With a number of social media strategies set to be implemented this year, the finance sector will be needing to capitalise on this new form of one-to-one customer service in order to ensure their customers remain loyal.



Absolute Digital Media are a full service digital marketing company who specialise in offering a range of services including SEO, PPC, social media, content marketing and more. By combining market intelligence, creativity and a team of experts, Absolute Digital Media deliver some of the most efficient results for their clients in the financial services sector and across a range of other industries on a local, national and international level.



Contact Info: Email: b.austin@absolutedigitalmedia.com Tel: +44 1245 287 864



This announcement is distributed by Nasdaq Corporate Solutions on behalf of Nasdaq Corporate Solutions clients. The issuer of this announcement warrants that they are solely responsible for the content, accuracy and originality of the information contained therein.



Source: Absolute Digital Media via GlobeNewswire



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MEXICO CITY (dpa-AFX) - President-elect Donald Trump lashed out at the media on Friday for seeming to suggest he was going back on his campaign promise to make Mexico pay for construction of his proposed border wall.



Trump claimed the media is being dishonest after reports indicated Republicans intend to include funding for the border wall in an upcoming spending bill.



'The dishonest media does not report that any money spent on building the Great Wall (for sake of speed), will be paid back by Mexico later!' Trump said in a post on Twitter.



The tweet from Trump came after numerous reports said Republican plan to build the wall under a 2006 law signed by President George W. Bush that authorizes over 700 miles of barriers along the southern border.



The law was never fully implemented and GOP lawmakers will reportedly seek to include funding for the wall in an appropriations bill that must pass before the end of April to avoid a government shutdown.



The plan is designed to speed up construction of the border wall and Trump has claimed U.S. taxpayers will eventually be paid back, although Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto has refused to pay for the wall.



The Trump campaign argued it could compel Mexico to pay for the wall by cutting off remittance payments from Mexican nationals working in the U.S, enacting trade tariffs, and raising visa fees.



(Photo: Gage Skidmore)



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HALIFAX, NOVA SCOTIA -- (Marketwired) -- 01/16/17 -- Corridor Resources Inc. ("Corridor") (TSX: CDH) is pleased to report that, on January 15, 2017, the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board ("C-NLOPB") issued exploration license EL-1153 to Corridor in exchange for the surrender of exploration license EL-1105 covering the Old Harry Prospect in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The new exploration license expires on January 14, 2020, subject to extension by Corridor for an additional one year period (January 14, 2021) with the payment of a $1 million deposit.

Corridor intends to purchase a user license for a Controlled Source Electro Magnetic ("CSEM") data program over the Newfoundland and Labrador side of the Old Harry prospect on EL-1153. CSEM data is a marine geophysical tool developed in recent years to investigate the resistivity of geological prospects, similar to resistivity logging in well bores of potential hydrocarbon zones. Highly resistive layers in a geological structure measured with CSEM technology could indicate hydrocarbon bearing reservoirs and, therefore, would serve to reduce exploration risk and increase the likelihood of finding commercial quantities of hydrocarbons. The undertaking of the CSEM program over the Old Harry prospect, currently planned by an independent service provider for a seven day period in the fall of 2017, is subject to the receipt of the necessary regulatory approvals and vessel availability. Corridor will provide an update once it is certain when the CSEM program will proceed.

Corridor is a Canadian junior resource company engaged in the exploration for and development and production of petroleum and natural gas onshore in New Brunswick and Quebec and offshore in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Corridor currently has natural gas production and reserves in the McCully Field near Sussex, New Brunswick. In addition, Corridor has a shale gas prospect in New Brunswick, an offshore conventional hydrocarbon prospect in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and an unconventional hydrocarbon prospect through a 21.67% interest in Anticosti Hydrocarbons L.P., a joint venture which has undiscovered resources on Anticosti Island, Quebec.

Forward Looking Statements

This press release contains certain forward-looking statements and forward-looking information (collectively referred to herein as "forward-looking statements") within the meaning of Canadian securities laws. All statements other than statements of historical fact are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking information typically contains statements with words such as "anticipate", "believe", "plan", "continuous", "estimate", "expect", "may", "will", "project", "should", or similar words suggesting future outcomes. In particular, this press release contains forward-looking statements pertaining to: Corridor's business plans and strategies including plans to purchase the CSEM data program and the timing of undertaking such program in 2017.

Undue reliance should not be placed on forward-looking statements, which are inherently uncertain, are based on estimates and assumptions, and are subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties (both general and specific) that contribute to the possibility that the future events or circumstances contemplated by the forward-looking statements will not occur. There can be no assurance that the plans, intentions or expectations upon which forward-looking statements are based will in fact be realized. Actual results will differ, and the difference may be material and adverse to Corridor and its shareholders.

Forward-looking statements are based on Corridor's current beliefs as well as assumptions made by, and information currently available to, Corridor concerning anticipated regulatory approval of the CSEM program, the availability of a vessel and also the financial performance, business prospects, strategies, regulatory developments, future natural gas commodity prices, future natural gas production levels, the ability to obtain equipment in a timely manner to carry out development activities, the ability to market natural gas successfully to current and new customers, the impact of increasing competition, the ability to obtain financing on acceptable terms, and the ability to add production and reserves through development and exploration activities. Although management considers these assumptions to be reasonable based on information currently available to it, they may prove to be incorrect. By their very nature, forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties, both general and specific, and risks that forward-looking statements will not be achieved. These factors may be found under the heading "Risk Factors" in Corridor's Annual Information Form for the year ended December 31, 2015.

The forward-looking statements contained in this press release are made as of the date hereof and Corridor does not undertake any obligation to update publicly or to revise any of the included forward-looking statements, except as required by applicable law. The forward-looking statements contained herein are expressly qualified by this cautionary statement.

Contacts:

Corridor Resources Inc.

Steve Moran, President and CEO

(902) 429-4511

(902) 429-0209 (FAX)

www.corridor.ca




Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - September 16, 2016) - Blackrock Gold Corp. (TSXV: BRC) (the "Company") is pleased to announce that it has closed the first tranche of the non-brokered private placement that was announced on August 22, 2016 and September 9, 2016. The Company has issued 3,133,332 units at a price of $0.075 per unit for gross proceeds of approximately $235,000. Each unit is comprised of one common share and one share purchase warrant. Each warrant entitles the holder to acquire one additional share in the capital of the Company at a price of $0.15 until September 16, 2018.

If during the exercise period of the warrants, but after the resale restrictions on the shares have expired, the Company's shares trade at or above a weighted average trading price of $0.30 per share for 15 consecutive trading days, the Company may accelerate the expiry time of the warrants by giving written notice to warrant holders that the warrants will expire 30 days from the date of providing such notice.

Finder's fees of 7% payable in cash were paid to Canaccord Genuity Corp. and Richardson GMP with respect to a portion of the private placement.

The common shares comprising the units and any shares issued upon the exercise of any warrants in this tranche are subject to a hold period expiring at midnight on January 16, 2017.

For further information, please contact:

David Robinson, Chief Executive Officer

Blackrock Gold Corp.

Phone: 1.403.399.9047

Email: drobinson@blackrockgoldcorp.com

The TSX Venture Exchange has not reviewed and does not accept responsibility for the accuracy or adequacy of this release. Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Service Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

This press release contains forward-looking statements. All statements, other than statements of historical fact, constitute "forward-looking statements" and include any information that addresses activities, events or developments that the Company believes, expects or anticipates will or may occur in the future including the Company's strategy, plans or future financial or operating performance and other statements that express management's expectations or estimates of future performance.

Forward-looking statements are generally identifiable by the use of the words "may", "will", "should", "continue", "expect", "anticipate", "estimate", "believe", "intend", "plan" or "project" or the negative of these words or other variations on these words or comparable terminology. These statements, however, are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the actual results, level of activity, performance or achievements of the Company to be materially different from those expressed, implied by or projected in the forward-looking information or statements. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ from these forward-looking statements include but are not limited to the ability of the Company to attract financing and the general market conditions of the industry in which the Company operates and the other factors discussed in the sections relating to risk factors discussed in the Company's continuous disclosure filings on SEDAR.

There can be no assurance that any 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 should not place any undue reliance on forward-looking information or statements. Except as required by law, the Company does not intend to revise or update these forward-looking statements after the date of this document or to revise them to reflect the occurrence of future unanticipated events.

NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION TO UNITED STATES NEWS WIRE SERVICES

OR FOR DISSEMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES
TORONTO, ONTARIO -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- BeWhere Holdings Inc. (TSX VENTURE: BEW) ("BeWhere" or the "Company"), is pleased to announce that further to its news release dated August 30, 2016 it has closed a non-brokered private placement of 8,533,332 Units (the "Units") of BeWhere at a price of $0.15 per Unit for gross proceeds of $1,280,000. Of the total gross proceeds, $200,000 was subscribed by Owen Moore and Chris Panczuk, directors and officers of the Company.

Each Unit consists of one common share in the capital of the Company and one half share purchase warrant (a "Warrant"). Each full Warrant will entitle the holder to purchase one additional common share in the capital of the Company (a "Warrant Share") at a price of $0.25 per Warrant Share, on or before September 15, 2019. The net proceeds from the Units will be used for general corporate working capital.

A finder's fee will be paid by the Company to finders who introduced to the Company purchasers of Units in relation to the private placement, which finder's fee is payable: (i) in cash in the aggregate amount of $73,850 which is equal to 7% of the gross proceeds of sale of Units to such purchasers; and (ii) warrants to purchase an aggregate of 492,333 Units which is equal to 7% of the number of Units sold to such purchasers, which warrants expire on September 15, 2019.

In addition to the private placement, the Company also retired $80,000 of debt owed to Senior Management by issuing 533,333 common shares at a price of $0.15 per share.

The securities issued pursuant to the private placement and the debt retirement, and the securities issuable to the finders are subject to the statutory 4 month hold period as prescribed by regulatory authorities that expires on January 17, 2017.

BeWhere designs and manufactures Bluetooth beacons that in combination with mobile applications, middle-ware and cloud based solutions, provide users with real-time information on the condition and location of their items in transit or at facilities.

ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD

Owen Moore, CEO & Director

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

Cautionary Statements Regarding Forward-Looking Information

Certain statements in this press release constitute forward-looking statements, within the meaning of applicable securities laws. All statements that are not historical facts, including without limitation, statements regarding future estimates, plans, programs, forecasts, projections, objectives, assumptions, expectations or beliefs of future performance, are "forward-looking statements".

We caution you that such "forward-looking statements" involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual and future events to differ materially from those anticipated in such statements.

Forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements with respect to commercial operations, including technology development, anticipated revenues, projected size of market, and other information that is based on forecasts of future results, estimates of amounts not yet determinable and assumptions of management.

BeWhere Holdings Inc. (the "Company") does not intend, and does not assume any obligation, to update these forward-looking statements except as required by law. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties relating to, among other things, technology development and marketing activities, the Company's historical experience with technology development, and uninsured risks. Actual results may differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bewhereinc/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/bewhere-inc-

Contacts:

BeWhere Inc.

Owen Moore

CEO

1 (844) 229-4373

info@bewhere.com




GRAND CAYMAN, CAYMAN ISLANDS -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- Tethys Petroleum Limited ("Tethys" or the "Company") (TSX: TPL)(LSE: TPL) today announces a corporate update.

Olisol Transaction

As previously announced on September 2, 2016 the Company continues to work with Olisol to complete the private placement of 181,240,793 shares at C$0.054 per share for proceeds of C$9.8 million whilst at the same time evaluating other funding arrangements. At present Olisol owns 15.76% of Tethys' ordinary shares and if the private placement is completed would own 42.03% of the enlarged share capital.

On September 9, 2016 Olisol provided US$2.94 million working capital funds to the Company in addition to the previously announced US$452,000 provided during the week ended September 2, 2016. The total working capital loan from Olisol now stands at US$5.70 million and Olisol has indicated that it wishes to use the proceeds from the repayment of the loan to satisfy a portion of the C$9.8 million subscription price due for the private placement. The Company plans to complete the private placement with Olisol once the remaining funds due have been received and all other conditions of closing have been met. These conditions include compliance with the offering and placement requirements of the Kazakhstan Stock Exchange in accordance with Republic of Kazakhstan legislation. The Investment Agreement has an outside date of October 27, 2016 unless extended.

Kazakhstan legal proceedings

As previously announced on August 24, 2016 the Court dismissed the claim brought against the Company and its subsidiaries in Kazakhstan and ordered the lifting of the seizure order over the Company's assets. The claimant lodged an appeal on August 29, 2016 which is scheduled to be heard on September 26, 2016. Until the claimant's appeal is heard restrictions remain in place over the operation of the Company's bank accounts in Kazakhstan.

Tajikistan arbitration proceedings

As previously announced, Total and CNPC, the Company's partners in Tajikistan, filed for arbitration proceedings at the International Court of Arbitration in relation to the Company's cash call defaults and the partners' notice to the Company to withdraw. The partners are seeking to enforce the withdrawal notice and their claim for damages of US$9.0 million (and continuing) plus costs. The Company has submitted its response to the request for arbitration and has made a counter-claim against the partners of US$10.1 million.

At the present time the partners and the Company have appointed their respective arbitrators and are in the process of jointly agreeing the third independent arbitrator who needs to be appointed before arbitration proceedings can commence.

About Tethys

Tethys is focused on oil and gas exploration and production activities in Central Asia and the Caspian Region. This highly prolific oil and gas area is rapidly developing and Tethys believes that significant potential exists in both exploration and in discovered deposits.

About Olisol

Olisol is headquartered in Almaty, Kazakhstan and its subsidiaries and affiliates have investments in energy and oil and gas operations in the Russian Federation and Kazakhstan. Olisol has worked with Tethys in Kazakhstan for over seven years, is joint owner of the Aral Oil Terminal with Tethys and has its own fleet of special oil trucks involved in oil transportation from Tethys' oil field. Olisol, through its affiliates, is engaged in railroad transportation, processing of oil, storage and sale of oil products.

Disclaimer

Some of the statements in this document are forward-looking. Forward-looking statements include statements regarding the intent, belief and current expectations of the Company or its officers with respect to Olisol's access to funds, the placing to Olisol, advances under the working capital facility, potential alternatives to the transactions with Olisol and related transactions. When used in this document, the words "expects," "believes," "anticipates," "plans," "may," "will," "should" and similar expressions, and the negatives thereof, are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Such statements are not promises or guarantees, and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual outcomes to differ materially from those suggested by any such statements including risks and uncertainties with respect to completion of the placing, advances under the working capital facility and related transactions. In addition, certain regulatory approvals lapsed on September 3, 2016, and there is no certainty that the Company will be able to obtain an extension. Should the Company be unable to obtain an extension, it may not be able to complete the placing even if Olisol proposes to do so. Moreover, there is a risk that the Company's counter-claim against Total and CNPC will not be successful and that the Company will be required to compensate Total and CNPC. There is also a risk that restrictions on the Company's bank accounts in Kazakhstan will be extended.

No part of this announcement constitutes, or shall be taken to constitute, an invitation or inducement to invest in the Company or any other entity, and shareholders of the Company are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the forward-looking statements. Save as required by the Listing Rules and applicable law, the Company does not undertake to update or change any forward-looking statements to reflect events occurring after the date of this announcement.

Contacts:

Tethys Petroleum

info@tethyspetroleum.com

www.tethyspetroleum.com




WASHINGTON, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- The conservation and protection of our oceans is of paramount importance to the Government of Canada. We continue to take tangible steps, both domestically and internationally, to conserve and protect our precious marine environments.

Parliamentary Secretary Serge Cormier, on behalf of the Honourable Dominic LeBlanc, Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard, today concluded a successful visit to the third annual Our Ocean Conference, hosted by Secretary of State John Kerry, in Washington D.C. from Sept 15 to 16, 2016.

At the conference, Parliamentary Secretary Cormier announced that Canada's contribution towards joint Canada-U.S. conservation efforts off the Atlantic coast will be the designation of both the Jordan Basin and Corsair and Georges Canyon as Sensitive Benthic Areas, thereby protecting significant concentrations of Atlantic Canada's ocean deep sea corals from bottom contact fishing activities.

Parliamentary Secretary Cormier also reaffirmed Canada's commitment to protect 5% of marine areas by 2017, and 10% by 2020, and highlighted Canada's continued efforts to increase understanding of existing and potential Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) through scientific collaboration with the U.S. The two countries have planned scientific expeditions in the Gulf of Maine and the western Scotian Shelf to better understand the species and ecosystems of the area.

The Government of Canada is also collaborating with the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency (NOAA) on the Market Probe - Illegal Sell / Possess Prohibited Fish Species project, a new enforcement-based initiative to combat illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing around the globe. A proud supporter of the U.S. Safe Ocean Network, Canada is committed to working together with the U.S. to fight illegal fishing.

Quote

"Today's announcements demonstrate the actions the Government of Canada is taking to conserve and protect our oceans. We stand firm with our international partners such as the United States to ensure that marine environments both domestically and internationally are preserved not only for now, but for the generations who follow."

- Serge Cormier, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard

Quick Facts

-- Budget 2016 proposed $123.7 million over five years to support marine conservation activities. This includes the designation of new MPAs under the Oceans Act specifically the Hecate Strait and Queen Charlotte Sound Glass Sponge Reefs in the Pacific and another very important MPA in the Arctic known as Darnley Bay as well as the development of new national parks and National Marine Conservation Areas (NMCAs), including the Lancaster Sound NMCA, Nunavut and Thaidene Nene National Park, Northwest Territories. -- Budget 2016 also committed almost $200 million over the next five years to reinvigorate Canada's capacity to undertake fisheries and oceans science, which will enhance our ability to make informed, evidence-based decisions on priority issues. -- Approximately 30% of total global fish catches comes from IUU fishing. In some cases, IUU catches can be three times higher than legal catches. -- Experts estimate that IUU fishing costs the world economy $10 to 23 billion USD annually.

Related Products

- Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) Fishing - DFO Website

- Canada's High Seas Monitoring, Control and Surveillance Activities

Internet: http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca

Follow us on Twitter! www.Twitter.com/DFO_MPO

Contacts:

Media Relations

Fisheries and Oceans Canada

613-990-7537

Media.xncr@dfo-mpo.gc.ca



Patricia Bell

Press Secretary

Office of the Minister

Fisheries and Oceans Canada

613-992-3474

Patricia.Bell@dfo-mpo.gc.ca




VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA -- (Marketwired) -- 09/16/16 -- Millennial Lithium Corp. (TSX VENTURE: ML), ("Millennial" or the "Company") wishes to announce that it has closed (the "Closing") its acquisition of the Pastos Grandes Lithium Project (the "Project") in Argentina and has also closed its concurrent private placement financing (the "Financing"). The acquisition constituted a Fundamental Acquisition under the policies of the Exchange and was first announced in a news release on July 19, 2016.

Closing of the Acquisition of the Pastos Grandes Lithium Project:

Millennial has received Exchange approval for, and closed, its acquisition of the Project.

The Company entered into a definitive agreement (the "Definitive Agreement") with Jorge Enrique Moreno and Alba Silvia Salas (the "Vendors") dated September 16, 2016 to acquire a 100% interest in and to the Project. The Definitive Agreement replaced an earlier agreement (the "Initial Agreement") disclosed in the July 19, 2016 news release.

Under the terms of the Definitive Agreement, Millennial will complete its purchase of a 100% interest in the Project in consideration of the following payments and share issuances to the Vendor:

i. Paying to the Vendors a $200,000 (US) deposit (the "Deposit") on execution of the Initial Agreement (completed); ii. Paying to the Vendors $500,000 (US) (the "First Installment") on closing (completed) and issuing 500,000 common shares (the "First Share Installment") to the Vendors (completed); iii.Paying, on April 6, 2017, $500,000 (US) (the "Second Installment") to the Vendors and issuing to the Vendors $500,000 (US) (the "Second Share Installment") worth of the Company's common shares; iv. Making exploration expenditures of $1,600,000 (US) (the "Required Exploration Expenditures") on or before September 16, 2017; and v. Paying to the Vendors $1,000,000 (US) (the "Final Payment") on or before October 6, 2017.

The initial shares issued to the Vendors under (i) above are subject to a hold period expiring on January 17, 2017. The shares issued to the Vendors in (iii) above will be subject to an Exchange hold period expiring four months from their date of issuance.

A finder's fee (the "Finder's Fee") on the Project of 5% of all cash payments paid and shares issued to the Vendors is payable, to Synergy Resource Capital Pty Ltd. (the "Finder"), as those cash payments are paid and as those shares are issued. Accordingly, the Finder's Fee is payable as follows:

i. Upon payment of the Deposit above, $10,000 (US)payable to the Finder (paid); ii. Upon payment of the First Instalment, $25,000 (US) payable to the Finder (paid) and issuance to the Finder of 25,000 shares (the "Closing Finder's Shares") of the Company (issued); iii.Upon payment of the Second Instalment, $25,000 (US) payable to the Finder and issuance to the Finder of 25,000 shares of the Company; and iv. Upon payment of the Final Payment, $50,000 (US) payable to the Finder.

All shares issued to the Finder, including the Closing Finder's Shares are subject to an Exchange hold period expiring four months from their date of issuance. The hold period on the Closing Finder's Shares expires on January 17, 2017.

The Project is subject to a royalty (the "Royalty") equal to 1.5% of the gross annual sales of lithium from the Project net of value added taxes and other taxes applicable to the sale of lithium. The Royalty comes into effect on October 6, 2019. At any time until October 6, 2019, the Company can terminate the right of the Vendors to the Royalty in consideration of a payment in the amount of $3,000,000 (US) to the Vendors.

The Project is strategically located within the Argentine portion of the "Lithium Triangle", which is host to some of the world's largest lithium resources. The Project is approximately 1200 hectares in size and ideally situated in the center of the Pastos Grandes Salar in Salta, Argentina. The region exhibits significant lithium and potassium brines and historically the Project has been tested by surface geochemical sampling, Magnetolluric (MT) surveying, CSAMT, vertical electrical sounding (VES) geophysical surveying and by 4 pumping wells testing and measuring brine flows in aquifers with significant lithium and potassium assays. Millennial is planning to continue with exploration and development of the Project and expects to report on such exploration plans in the coming weeks.

Closing of the Concurrent Financing:

The Company has closed its private placement Financing of 7,500,000 units at $0.65 per unit for proceeds of $4,875,000. Each unit is comprised of one common share and one-half of one share purchase warrant (a "Unit"). Each whole share purchase warrant (a "Warrant") is exercisable for a period of two years from closing at an exercise price of $1.00.

The Units, and any common shares of the Company issued upon exercise of the Warrants, are subject to a four month hold period expiring on January 17, 2017.

Commissions of up to 6%, payable in cash or units at the finder's option, have been paid in connection with a portion of the Financing. This resulted in the payment of $106,938.20 in cash and the issuance of 164,137 Units.

All Units issued to the finders, and any common shares of the Company issued upon exercise of the Warrants in their units, are subject to a four month hold period expiring on January 17, 2017.

Proceeds of the Financing are to be used to meet the Company's obligations under the Definitive Agreement including funding Required Exploration Expenditures on the Project.

This news release has been reviewed by Brent Butler, director, qualified person as that term is defined in National Instrument 43-101.

MILLENNIAL LITHIUM CORP.

Graham Harris, Chairman

NEITHER THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE NOR ITS REGULATION SERVICES PROVIDER (AS THAT TERM IS DEFINED IN THE POLICIES OF THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE) ACCEPTS RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ADEQUACY OR ACCURACY OF THIS RELEASE.

This news release may contain certain "Forward-Looking Statements" within the meaning of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 an applicable Canadian securities laws. When used in this news release, the words "anticipate", "believe", "estimate", "expect", "target, "plan", "forecast", "may", "schedule" and similar words or expressions identify forward-looking statements or information. These forward-looking statements or information may relate to future prices of commodities, accuracy of mineral or resource exploration activity, reserves or resources, regulatory or government requirements or approvals, the reliability of third party information, continued access to mineral properties or infrastructure, currency risks including the exchange rate of USD$ for Cdn$, fluctuations in the market for lithium, changes in exploration costs and government royalties or taxes in Argentina and other factors or information. Such statements represent the Company's current views with respect to future events and are necessarily based upon a number of assumptions and estimates that, while considered reasonable by the Company, are inherently subject to significant business, economic, competitive, political and social risks, contingencies and uncertainties. Many factors, both known and unknown, could cause results, performance or achievements to be materially different from the results, performance or achievements that are or may be expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. The Company does not intend, and does not assume any obligation, to update these forward-looking statements or information to reflect changes in assumptions or changes in circumstances or any other events affections such statements and information other than as required by applicable laws, rules and regulations.

Contacts:

Millennial Lithium Corp.

Investor Relations

(604) 662-8184

info@millenniallithium.com




AutoGrid Systems, a Redwood City, CA-based provider of energy internet applications, raised a Series C-2 funding round from Total Energy Ventures (TEV), the corporate venture arm of Total S.A. (NYSE: TOT).

The amount of the deal was not disclosed. TEV joined a consortium of other investors which invested $20m in May.

The company intends to use the funds for further development of its applications.

Led by Dr. Amit Narayan, CEO, AutoGrid builds software applications that enable a smarter Energy Internet. Its suite of Energy Internet applications allows utilities, electricity retailers, renewable energy project developers and energy service providers to deliver energy by managing networked distributed energy resources (DERs) in real time and at scale. AutoGrid applications are all built on the AutoGrid Energy Internet Platform (EIP), with patented Predictive Controls technology that leverages petabytes of smart meter, sensor and third-party data, along with data science and computing algorithms, to monitor, predict, optimize and control the operations of millions of assets connected across global energy networks.

The companys solutions are used by leading energy companies, including E.ON, Bonneville Power Administration, Florida Power & Light, Southern California Edison, Eneco, Portland General Electric, CPS Energy, New Hampshire Electric Cooperative, NextEra Energy and CLEAResult.

FinSMEs

16/09/2016
Intarcia Therapeutics, Inc., a Boston, MA-based biopharmaceutical company, held $215m first close of an equity financing.

Backers included institutional investors, family offices, Lucion Venture Capital Group (VC/PE fund located in China) as well as existing investors.

Led by Kurt Graves, Chairman, President and CEO, Intarcia employs the proprietary (subcutaneous) Medici Drug Delivery System to advance ITCA 650 (continuous subcutaneous delivery of exenatide) as a once or twice-yearly therapy for the chronic treatment of type 2 diabetes.

Exenatide, the active agent in ITCA 650, is a glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) receptor agonist that is currently marketed globally as twice-daily and once-weekly self-injection therapies for type 2 diabetes.

Total proceeds from the financing, as well as more than $500m in major milestones expected over the next 2-3 years, position Intarcia through the first full year of launch for ITCA 650, as well as the planned advancement of several pipeline programs into the clinic.

Following a positive and constructive pre-NDA meeting, the company expects to submit the NDA for ITCA 650 to U.S. regulatory authorities within the next 30-60 days.

Upon U.S. NDA submission, Intarcia will also receive the 3rd and final $100M milestone payment from the $300M royalty/equity convert financing it completed last year.

FinSMEs

15/09/2016
Harshvardhan Kapoors Mirzya, inspired by the tale of the legend of Mirza-Sahiban, will hit the theatres on October 7 and while Anil Kapoors youngest child is confident and not stressed about the creative expectations, hes nervous about its promotions.

I dont know whether we are doing the right thing or we should be doing something more. What if we had some more time in hands for promotions? I hope it reaches maximum people. I have been wondering about these things over the last few days."

"I am a strongly opinionated person and fortunately Mehra (director Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra) and others involved with the project do listen to me because its very important for people to experience who you really are, says Harshvardhan.

He has a lot to say about his debut film, Mirzya, I was blown away by the complex, romantic and poetic script of Mirzya, which is also a musical. I realised that I was getting a chance to be a part of something so poetic, and beautiful, and it suits my personality. Its very rare to find scripts that are poetic and very romantic. When I was 22, I was reading so many other scripts but I feel this is the most contemporary romantic script ever.

The biggest challenge for the 25-year-old actor was working on the film for three long years and to bring the popular folklore on screen. "I have given so much to this film that a part of me will die when it's out. When it releases I will feel as if I have lost a part of me. I was so involved with every aspect of the film. I was doing something so creative for the first time with so much honesty. I can't describe the feeling, it is like falling in love for the first time," he says.

But why didnt Harshvardhan want to start his career with a commercial candy-floss love story, a so-called safe film, as his launch vehicle, instead of picking up a tragic love story?

"If we look at what is happening around us we can see that some of the most 'unsafe' films have done well. So I feel I'm being safe by being unsafe. People are ready to see different cinema and if it doesn't do well commercially still our work will be appreciated. There have been so many incredible moments, everybody will take something or the other," says Harshvardhan, who considers Aamir Khan and Ranbir Kapoor as his inspiration.

Being a star-kid, there is bound to be comparisons made between him and his actor-father, Anil Kapoor.

In fact, few days back at the music launch of Mirzya, the senior actor ended up saying that Harshvardhan was not one bit like him. But, however, one may feel that the father and sons strategy might have been similar. Anils first Hindi film in a leading role was Woh Saat Din (1983) opposite Padmini Kolhapure, which wasnt a commercial potboiler.

Harshvardhans take on this is, After Woh Saat Din and Mashaal, my dad started doing more and more commercial cinema. Woh Saat Din was a surprise hit, nobody expected it to be so. But circumstances are different and we cant compare our choice of cinema. That way Im more artistically inclined and I go by my very first instinct.

But there are definitely some lessons to be learnt from someone who has spent about three-and-a-half decades in this unpredictable industry. Says the new star-kid on the block, Keep going and dont dwell on success and failure. Being raised in the industry environment and deeply influenced by the culture, Harshvardhan talks passionately about it and his growing up days.

Even as the industry has moved into the world of studios, it still remains a family industry. That is the reason independent producers have survived. I like it when you make films in family culture. Its amazing to be a Juhu boy as a lot of industry lives here. There is an interesting story in every house. Next to my home lives Ekta Kapoor, then there is Hrithik, the Deols, the Bachchans. When Im free, I go to the beach in the morning and pass by all their bungalows and homes."

Mirzya pairs Harshvardhan opposite newcomer Saiyami Kher. Does Harshvardhan feel that if he was launched with a star daughter, the film would have generated more hype, say for instance Ranbir Kapoor and his sister Sonam Kapoor's launchpad Saawariya?

"Ranbir opposite Sonam was definitely a big deal, but Sayami has got a great image which may not be public and mainstream. Shes the granddaughter of yesteryear actress Usha Kiron, then she is Shabana Azmis niece, but I dont think Mehra cast her for that. She is incredibly beautiful and very good for the role. After I was cast, he took good eight months to find his Sahiban," reveals Harshvardhan.

Unlike other newcomers, Harshvardhan, who is getting many offers, took a quick decision on his next film, Vikramaditya Motwanes Bhavesh Joshi, a superhero flick. He informs, I liked the story; it is about Bombay, its a vigilante film and about an ordinary superhero. I have grown up watching superhero films and I am also a Mumbaikar.

The budding actor has no qualms about saying that he enjoys media attention and that he's ready to face the paparazzi. I enjoy it. Its wrong for people to oppose it because if you are a public figure then people would want to know about you, we should be open to it, says Harshavardhan.
Every sleazy hand that ever groped you, every insulting conjecture ever made, every lascivious remark ever thrown at you, every lewd gesture, every leering eye, they may all come to mind as you watch director Aniruddha Roy Chowdhurys Pink. This is a film about male privilege, prejudice, sexual violence, and the many systems that support them.

The starting block of Pink is a rock show on the outskirts of Delhi where Minal Arora (played by Taapsee Pannu), Falak Ali (Kirti Kulhari) and Andrea Tariang (a character who shares her name with the actress playing her) meet Rajvir Singh (Angad Bedi), Dumpy a.k.a. Raunak Anand (Raashul Tandon) and Vishwajyoti Ghosh a.k.a. Vishwa (Tushar Pandey). Falak already knows Vishwa. They get chatting. The women accept an invitation to drinks and dinner at a nearby resort.

Things go awry when Rajvir mistakes their sociability for sexual availability and forces himself on Minal. She resists, he gets aggressive, in a state of panic she smashes a bottle on his head. This opening incident is revealed through a smart narrative device between the opening and end credits that tests our own biases as viewers in the he-said-she-said game that ensues.

The film is about Rajvirs quest for revenge with the help of his friend Ankit Malhotra (Vijay Varma), the girls quest for justice, and societys interpretation of the meaning of consent.

At a time when sections of upper-class Delhi and Mumbai seem disturbed by the action taken in the Tehelka and Mahmood Farooqui rape cases, and coming from an industry that continues to make light of heroes molesting heroines in the guise of courtship, Pink is a huge milestone simply by virtue of its choice of theme.

Mainstream Hindi cinema persists in perpetuating the notion that it is okay for a man to read a womans no as maybe. Just weeks back, director Ali Abbas Zafar (Mere Brother Ki Dulhan, Gunday, Sultan) told me in an interview: There are two ways of stalking. One way is ugly, one way is politically correct. For such an industry to make a film taking an undiluted position that a no from a woman means no is in itself a reason to celebrate.

What goes against Pink though is an occasional self-consciousness, an overt awareness that it has been created to send out a message on womens rights  an awareness that begins with its cliched title (pink for girls, blue for boys, you know) and ultimately leads to some overly dramatised courtroom episodes that cross the border into almost ridiculous, self-defeating territory.

It is the films good fortune that those scenes arrive very late in the day. Until then and after they are through, there is plenty in this film that makes it worthy of our time and discussions, from the many significant nuanced arguments it takes up in the matter of violence against women to the top-of-the-line performances of the three talented female leads and the four men playing their antagonists. Chowdhurys heart is in the right place and that in itself is worth toasting.

Pink smoothly packs multiple debates into a single compact film: how society judges single women, the pre-conceived notions about women not staying with their parents, the assumption that if women receive male visitors at home then they must be promiscuous, the social definition of provocation, the stereotyping of women from certain communities, the manner in which patriarchy paints men as helpless victims of their hormones, the gentle reminder that patriarchy could not survive without the collusion of at least some women and the reminder too that feminists may well be men (a kindly landlord who refuses to buy into gossip about his female tenants, the watchful neighbour, the sympathetic lawyer, the considerate judge).

Pink also delivers a slap on the face of status quo-ists who are alarmed at the tiny gains made by Indias womens rights movement in recent years. The whispers are no longer whispers, as panic-stricken men anxious about a potential loss of millennia-old privilege paint pictures of hordes of women filing false cases of violence and discrimination against helpless men in a world rapidly switching to female dominance. Pink has something to say about all this and more.

Half the battle is won for the film because Chowdhurys clarity of thought is complemented by his smashing cast. Pannu is relatively new to Bollywood but an established star of Kollywood and Tollywood. Kulhari has done a few Bollywood films, but none so far have been box-office successes. Both women have already proved that they are extremely natural performers. They live up to that track record in Pink (though Pannu needs to work on her enunciation of coward which was jarring in the film considering that the rest of her diction was well-suited to a presumably public-school-educated Punjabi girl from Delhi).

Andrea Tariang is a welcome addition to the Mumbai cinemascape. Firstly, it is a joy to see a Hindi film that actually features a character from Meghalaya  Bollywood tends to pretend that the North-east of India does not exist. It is such a relief to see the character being played by an actor from Meghalaya, unlike Mary Kom that avoided risking a newcomer from Manipur, instead having a Manipuri Mary Kom played by a part-Punjabi-part-Bihari-part-Malayali Priyanka Chopra since she is an established star. Most important: Tariang is good.

The lead trios perfect chemistry is the bedrock of this film, as is their demeanour. They come across as real-life friends and real-life middle-class working women living in south Delhi.

This would not have been possible without the credible characterisation and effortlessly flowing Hindi-English dialogues by writer Ritesh Shah. His screenplay also does full justice to the four villains of the piece and all four actors are excellent. Varma and Bedi merit a special mention for the conviction with which they convey seething arrogance and male entitlement.

Those clenched jaws, their sneering speech, the way one of them snarls aisi ladkiyon ke saath aisa hi hota hai (this is exactly what happens to such girls) capture their furious resentment towards women who dared to say no and now dare to ask questions. These are not creepy-looking fellows. That would have been the lazy casting choice to make. They are, in fact, exceedingly attractive. It is not their looks but their words and deeds that make them both scary and slimy.

Every tiny satellite role in Pink has been carefully cast, though my pick of the supporting players are Mamta Malik as investigating officer Sarla Premchand and veteran Dhritiman Chatterjee as the judge  they are both superb. Megastar Amitabh Bachchan plays Deepak Sehgal, a manic depressive retiree who re-dons his lawyers robes to fight for the women  his is the only awkwardly written role in the film and it shows in his slightly affected performance.

This is where Pink falters.

It is not set up as a song-dance-and-dishoom-dishoom saga in the Damini mould, so you do not go to court expecting dhai kilo ka haath kind of dialoguebaazi. Pink does not head off completely in that direction through Sehgal, but it is certainly not as true-to-life in its judicial proceedings as you might expect from the treatment up to that point.

(Spoiler alert) In a film that gets so much else right, it is especially infuriating to watch that ridiculous scene in which Sehgal badgers one of his own clients to reveal intimate details of her sexual past in a crowded courtroom. Womens rights movements worldwide have fought  are fighting  long and hard to end such intrusive, suggestive interrogations of women victims by defence lawyers.

To have such behaviour from a womans own lawyer be projected as a clever legal move is bizarre. Just as bizarre is the scene involving a woman victim claiming that she accepted money for sex, though she did nothing of the sort. Why did she make this false admission? Because she wanted to drive home a complex point that a woman is well within her rights to withdraw her consent once it is given.

Even if you accept that a beleaguered, frustrated woman might speak impulsively when harassed in a witness box, it is unthinking of the film to suggest that she was being brave and intelligent not brainless. Really? That is an intelligent move in a system already stacked against women? Gimme a break. (Spoiler alert ends)

This is why in some ways I missed Rituparno Ghosh while watching Pink. No contemporary Indian film I have seen has as effectively and believably captured the torture a woman victim of violence is subjected to in court in the way Ghoshs Dahan did. These instances of melodrama in Pinks courtroom scenes are absolutely unnecessary since there is so much drama intrinsic to the situations anyway.

For the most part though, Pink maintains a realistic tone.

Chowdhury seems to have a clear vision of what he wants to say and how. The air of tension he builds around the three women is almost palpable. It is tension that rights-conscious women can identify with as we live out our lives so constantly on edge that we ourselves may not notice our own instinctive actions and gestures of self-preservation  the fact that many of us avoid making eye contact with male strangers in public places especially in a culture of gender segregation where men tend to misconstrue affability, the manner in which our arms reflexively go up to cover our torsos in crowded spaces, the way we plan our safety while planning our schedules.

It is hard, therefore, not to be moved by the trauma and humiliation of Minal, Falak and Andrea who have to justify their life choices, their clothing choices and their tiniest moves before the world because one of them defended herself against an influential man who tried to rape her. Its flaws and that title notwithstanding, Pink is a powerful film.
Now that the reviews for Amitabh Bachchan starer Pink are out and the film is already being applauded for its feminist story-line, here's a little more info on the three young woman who star as the lead protagonists alongside Bachchan.

Directed by Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury, Pink is produced by Rashmi Sharma and filmmaker Shoojit Sircar. The film deals with the aftermath of a sexual molestation incident gone wrong in Delhi. Here are the three girls who made the film a success:

Andrea Tariang

Andrea Tariang, who made her Bollywood debut with Pink, is in fact new to Bollywood and Hindi as well. PTI reports that Tariang prefers reading books over movies and is not fond of watching TV either.

"I did not grow up watching Bollywood films because I don't understand Hindi that well. The only Bollywood movie I watched recently was Piku. That was before we shot for the film (Pink)," she said in an interview.

"I don't really watch movies. May be once I might have sat down to watch films with my mom when I was child. I read books, my friends usually ask me, 'how do you survive?' But I don't like watching TV that much," she added.

Andrea, along with Taapsee Pannu and Kirti Kulhari, plays one of three young women who face assault charges after being molested by a group of men in Pink. Her lack of understating Hindi very well did come across as a hindrance initially, especially while she was doing her workshops with her co-star Piyush Mishra, but Taapsee and Kirti were always a help.

"They helped me a lot. I used to ask them 'How do I do this, how do I say this' because there were quite a few dialogues I didn't understand especially when Piyush Mishra was speaking. He speaks so fast I couldn't understand what he was saying," she quipped.

Andrea, daughter of famous Shillong-based musician Rudy Wallang, shot her very first scene for Pink with Bachchan and ended up getting praised by him. "The biggest challenge for me were the cameras. There were so many around me when I was shooting and I was so scared. I was always nervous for the first few shoots that we did. My first shot was with Bachchan sir. I had just three words to say to him. My nervousness actually helped the scene because I had to look a little scared. We finished that shot in one take. He stood up and congratulated me."

Post Pink, Andrea is keen to do more Bollywood films, "...that is if I can improve my Hindi first" but is also eager to sing for a film as she is unsure of how the music her band composes can fit in the Bollywood context.

Kirti Kulhari

Meanwhile Kirti Kulhari, who has acted in Shaitan has been very vocal about the misogyny faced by women in today's society. I am sure there are worse countries than us but that doesnt mean we are any good. Its good there are some changes happening but we have a long way to go, she said in an interview. The women have been suppressed a lot as a gender, in general, in the country. Even today, a girl in a normal house will be told how not to dress up, not to come late in the night, not to smoke, the actress said to PTI.

The actress, who has worked in films like Khichdi: The Movie and Jal, considers her role in Pink one of her career-best. Kirti, however, feels sad about the lack of good writing when it comes to female roles, which she says are highly cliched.

In Bollywood, everything is very one dimensional. This is a girl, she laughs a lot, is forever happy, chirpy and thats all she is doing throughout the film. Thats not how we are.

Unfortunately theres such bad writing in Bollywood that, things are so bad in the writing stage itself that you cant do much. I look for characters which will show different aspect and make it feel real, she said.

Taapsee Pannu

Taapsee Pannu talked about portraying her character. Cinema pundits have already started predicting awards for the website, reports IANS.

An an interview, she talked about her role in Pink, The impact of showing minimal emotions is chilling. We in Indian cinema dont like to hold back emotions. We like to show all of it coming out in a flow. I realized while shooting in Pink there is much virtue in restrain, she said.This is the first film Ive done with absolutely no makeup. And believe me, it was liberating. Ive always felt burdened with the war paint that we girls are required to put on for the camera. I dont use any makeup in real life. I dont even know how to apply an eyeliner on my own.

In many ways, the character I play in Pink is closest to who I am in real life, though luckily Ive never gone through what my character has to suffer in the film, she said.

The actress, who played a government agent in the Akshay Kumar starrer Baby, has been in the industry since along time.

(With Agency Inputs)
Difficulty in getting timely permissions and lack of incentives are the key reasons why affordable housing is not taking off in the country, according to Vijay Wadhwa, chairman of Mumbai-based The Wadhwa Group.

The company with about 47 years of experience in real estate is developing about 15 million square feet presently in the commercial and residential space in the city. The company is also planning to launch an affordable housing project in Panvel, Navi Mumbai, in which it investment is estiamtes to be around Rs 700 crore.

Wadhwa in a interview to Firstpost said that getting permissions continue to be a big hurdle despite the government expressing its intention to ease up processes.

"Our Panvel project has been there for the last eight years. We are waiting in the line for permissions. We got the consent from the chief minister four years back. It should be under priority sector. After working, we got water connection, water line permission, electric permission. Because permission from Cidco has not come, all those permissions are lapsing. Now, again we have to start again from zero," he said.

Meanwhile, the interest amount on the debt, taken at high rates ranging from 14-18 percent from various sources, is rising, he said explaining the difficulties the builder is facing in completing the project.

According to him, half of his office is running from pillar to post to get approvals from various government departments. He laments that he doesn't get time to concentrate on his core competence - innovating and planning.

"My expertise of planning, innovating, thinking something new has stopped. I am only monitoring whether we got the permission today or not," he laments.

He, however, doesn't blame the government entirely for the mess. "The government wants to ease up the processes. But down the line, it is not percolating. The officials think that they are obliging us by giving us the approvals," he said.

Secondly, he also points to the lack of incentives for entering segment.

"There is no incentive for allotment of land for affordable housing. Unless land is available cheap, unless cost of construction is within the budget, premiums are practical, how can we deliver affordable housing? The only thing is that we are compelled to go on cutting the size of the houses," he says.

He offers solutions also for the problems the sector faces. For one, the government should give permissions on tatkal basis.

"Don't give us land, give us permissions on tatkal basis," he says.

He also feels the developers and architects should be allowed to certify their own projects.

"If the income tax department, who owns the exchequer of our country, is allowing us to certify out own returns, why can't the architects and the developers not certify their own plans? Let them certify their own plans that they are as per the law and then start the work. If the government feels there is some problem, they can tell us in the due process of time. And if any builder does anything wrong he should be penalised," he argues.

He says the builders are not looking for big margins in such projects, "but at least we should be able to make our two ends meet."

"I think the government should start giving faster approval, not land. The more approval they give, the more supply in the market. This will bring down the prices automatically."

Secondly, he wants SEZ status for affordable housing. "In SEZ, the units get tax benefits. If you get tax benefit, you can pass it on to the purchaser. In afforbale, my building material is same price, cement is same price. We can reduce the size and then we can say we are making affordable," he says.

Watch the entire interview above.

(The article has been updated with corrections.)
That Patanjali, the brand that stands for everything indigenous, is now planning to come out with its label of Swadeshi jeans has raised curiosity as to what exactly is this product going to be. To start with, jeans as such is not a swadeshi wear.

The brand actually deserves credit for having been able to garner a large clientele in the FMCG sector, mostly hard-core MNC loyalists who have now swerved in their loyalty towards him. So it is only natural that the company is looking to enter a sector where multinationals have a dominance.

Though most people Firstpost spoke with were eager to know what would come out as jeans from the Patanjali stable, none were excited about the announcement. The question that is uppermost in peoples minds is what is the differentiator that the Patanjali brand will be offering?

The denim jeans market has a huge growth potential in India. It is expected to grow at CAGR (Compounded Annual Growth Rate) of 15 percent over the next five years, according to Teknopak Advisors.

The denim market in India was estimated to be worth Rs 17,661 crores in 2015. The local jeans brands contribute to approximately 25 percent of the overall brand landscape, according to Teknopak Advisors. However, a lot of denim jeans business is taken care of in an unorganised manner through various selling and distribution channels.

The most preferred brands, according to Teknopak Advisors, are international brands such as Diesel, Clevin Klein, GAP, Levis, Pepe, Lee, Wrangler, Flying Machine.

The price for denim ranges from less than Rs 500 for unbranded jeans to over Rs 5,000 for high-end brands. The price point preference depends upon the demographics and economic background of the customer. The average selling price of jeans for masses is approximately in the Rs 800-1,000 range.

According to The Times of India, half the population in the country is in the 20-59 age group while 9 percent is above the age of 60. So which category is Patanjali brand of jeans catering to? Not much has been revealed about the new category under the Patanjali umbrella except that it will be made `entirely with cotton, according to an interview in The Economic Times.

Isnt denim jeans 100 percent cotton fabric? That is the question that perplexes everyone about the new announcement from Patanjali. A jeans is usually a basic 5 pocket denim apparel. There are various versions of this base model. All the biggest and successful brands that make jeans, be it global names and some Indian brands too, are manufactured in India, says Sanjay Vakharia, director and COO, Spykar Lifestyles Pvt ltd, makers of Skpkar jeans, an Indian brand. The company has been operational for the past 23 years. He is intrigued by the word `Swadeshi jeans  as mentioned by Acharya Balkrishna, CEO, Patanjali. He asks if the term swadeshi can be lent to everything that is made in India. By that yardstick, Spykar is also swadeshi, he contends, as it is made in India and a large client base of the brand is Indians.

If Patanjali had drawn a distinction between making organic fabric versus cotton jeans, it would have been understandable. But that is not the case. Leading fashion designer Narendra Kumar Ahmed says every pair of jeans in the world is made in India and the cloth is sourced from the country. India exports denim fabric to the world. Benetton, the worlds largest casual wear apparel firm, has a design studio in India. Making jeans in India is not a new concept, Ahmed points out.

Vakharia hazards a guess whether the word swadeshi refers to possibly differentiating between handloom cloth versus mill-made fabric. That certainly would be a differentiator, he says.

Baba Ramdev and Patanjali are trying to extend their success quotient from food and consumer products to clothing, which is the second largest consumer spend in the country. If his ambition to expand the product portfolio to 10x succeeds, then he is on the right path, say analysts. If he were to make yoga mats, clothing for yoga practitioners, for instance, that would still sync in with the image of Baba Ramdev and the brand, analysts point out.

However, there is a catch to Patanjali's ambition of making jeans. The dynamics of fashion and clothing is far different than FMCG. The latter largely remains the same while clothing as a category faces changes periodically and season after season," points out Arvind Singhal, Teknopak Advisors.

You will have to make jeans, even in the case of Patanjali, from the point of view of contemporary fashion. That fashion changes at a far quicker rate than a FMCG product, for instance, Singhal points out.

Another question that is uppermost in peoples minds is about what is not suited to Indian culture about jeans that Patanjali is setting forth to alter with their brand of jeans. A large section of the populace that wears denim is the Young India. Puritanical thought and virtues are not qualities that this section wants to hear when they wear their favourite clothing or go out to buy one. I am not sure what differentiation the company has in mind. You could it make it baggier for modesty for women. But when you decide on fashion product, a young woman in India would go for the latest in fashion, says Singhal.

Patanjali products are sold on the premise it is healthy, natural, ayurvedic, etc. Also, it is priced low compared to other products in the same category. The in-the-face advertising in the form of small outlets across India has also helped the brands success.

The customer perception is that if you buy Patanjali products, they are pure, says Singhal. But, how does this attribute translate to clothing? He says, Fashion is external and it does not sell on the premise of purity and trust and what-have-you. Patanjali products, be it food or any other FMCG category, does well because purity of formulation and quality at the right price which are the narratives but that cannot be extended to fashion. Fashion does not need a purity or an effectiveness promise. This is, to my mind, a brand stretch."

The fact that Patanjali has achieved brand recall in even smaller towns and cities in India works in its favour though. That could be a good reason why jeans from Patanjali may work in the firm's favour. Baba Ramdev has created a large base for himself with his various other initiatives and he can use this base to drive consumers with his latest product, jeans, at a mass level. Swadeshi jeans is a great idea. The term also exudes self-confidence and there is a great essence of nationalism because of the government of the day. And this new initiative can be driven around it. There is a revival of textiles in India and it is used for high fashion, too, says Ahmed.

Even Vakharia of Spykar believes that the Patanjali brand may work in the country. Though it is a very ambitious thought, it is achievable, he says. I also believe the traction that Patanjali has created in the market with regard to its other product offerings and consumer loyalty could work in its favour with its new plans of swadeshi jeans.

The challenge, says Vakharia would be the styling itself. The product has to have new designs. Research and development has to focus on washing, processing and stitching, he suggests.

Swadeshi as a quality or attribute to sell is good, but prices will have to match with that concept too. That is what the market is looking at. What price points would the jeans sell at. The plank of swadeshi is very good and ripe at the moment with all that is happening around the country. Given the current environment and focus on everything Indian, the product could do well provided it makes clear what is its focus and importantly, the price would be. Peter England as a brand sells shirts at a low price but it is doing well. It is a volume business. If that is the target for Patanjali, it could do well, too, says Ahmed.

Would it be possible to sell jeans from small outlets like Patanjali does with its other products? That would be possible but would that attract customers is the question. Singhal points out that the dynamics of distribution and supply of FMCG products and fashion is different. He confesses he cannot see the `extension of the brand in this new category.

When Patanjali says it will manufacture jeans, what do they have in mind? Denim dhotis, dhoti jeans? I am curious, says Ahmed. He offers a name for the brand. It could be called Patan jeans. There might be a lot of customers for it. Who knows?

The country will get to know more about the jeans that Patanjali wants to make once it reveals the details on the style, manufacturing, design, age groups that are its target, or when the jeans are out in the market, whichever is sooner.
Bengaluru: Karnataka unit of BJP on Friday said Prime Minister Narendra Modi's intervention in the raging Cauvery row with Tamil Nadu was not possible at this juncture and termed the demand by the Congress government in the state as "petty politicking".

It was an attempt by the state government to divert people's attention from its "failure" on the matter, state BJP President BS Yeddyurappa charged. "At this juncture, Prime Minister cannot intervene...We have to try to get justice through courts," he told reporters.

He said: "During the the all-party meeting, Mohan Kataraki (senior counsel) had very clearly, in the presence of the Chief Minister and other Congress leaders, said it was not possible for the Prime Minister or the central government to intervene as the issue is before the Supreme Court."

Flagging the "extreme unrest" in Karnataka over the release of Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah had on 9 September dashed off a missive requesting Modi to call forthwith "on a few hours notice" a meeting of Chief Ministers of the two states to end the impasse.

After violent protest in the city following the apex court's amended order directing Karnataka to release 12,000 cusecs of water daily to Tamil Nadu till 20 September, Siddramaih had on Tuesday sought for an immediate appointment with the Prime Minister, a response to which is still awaited.

Yeddyurappa said BJP was of the "considered view" that repeated demand for Prime Minister's intervention in this dispute is "politically motivated" and termed it as a devious attempt to divert the attention of people from the "abject failure" of the state government.

"Instead of indulging in petty politicking, I demand the state government to concentrate in fine-tuning its legal battle...maintain law and order," he said. Lashing out at the state government for offering to release 10,000 cusecs to Tamil Nadu, Yeddyurappa alleged that the government raised the issue of law and order while presenting its case before the court, instead of furnishing the facts relating to water level at reservoirs in both the states.

Apart from Congress and JD(S), several pro-Kannada and farmers groups, who are at the forefront of Cauvery agitation, are seeking the Prime Minister's intervention to resolve the issue. Several political parties in Tamil Nadu have also asked for the Prime Minister to intervene.
Chennai: DMK leaders MK Stalin and Kanimozhi were among several leaders detained on Friday while staging protests in support of a bandh called in Tamil Nadu over the Cauvery row by farmers, traders and supported by the Opposition. The statewide strike received a mixed response.

Meanwhile, a youth who had set himself on fire over the Cauvery issue on Thursday, succumbed to injuries, police said.

The activist belonging to Naam Tamizhar Katchi had suffered over 90 percent burns and died Friday morning.

"We were giving him all possible treatment. However, he suffered a cardiac arrest and despite our best efforts, he could not be revived," a senior hospital official told PTI.

Several establishments remained shut in Coimbatore, Tirupur and Nilgiris districts, affecting normal life, in response to the bandh call.

About 20,000 small and medium scale units in and around the city and over 30,000 garment factories in the textile hub of Tirupur also extended support to the bandh and downed shutters, according to reports.

In Chennai, DMK treasurer Stalin led a rally from Rajarathinam stadium to Egmore Railway station. He then squatted in front of the railway terminal along with hundreds of party workers after his attempt to stage a rail roko was foiled by police, who detained him along with his protesters.

DMK Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi, who staged a road roko on arterial Anna Salai along with DMK supporters, was later detained by police in a marriage hall. She has sought convening of an all-party meeting over the Cauvery issue.

In Coimbatore, senior leaders of various political parties, including DMK and MDMK and farmers associations were arrested while trying to stage rail roko near railway stations and road blockade.

The bandh did not affect functioning of state and central government offices in Tamil Nadu, which remained open.

While state transport corporation-run buses besides trains are operating as usual, some auto rickshaws, taxis and commercial freight operators stayed off the roads. Farmers' leader PR Pandian also took part in protests with farmers of various organisations.

VCK Chief Thol Thirumavalavan, who staged a rail roko with his supporters by blocking a North India bound express train, was detained by police near Basin Bridge in Chennai.

Meanwhile, DMDK leaders and party workers led by party leader Premalatha Vijaykanth, went on a fast at the party headquarters in the state capital. They held aloft placards and raised slogans against the Centre and Tamil Nadu and Karnataka governments.

They condemned the violence against Tamils in Karnataka and sought protection for them.

In Tiruchirapalli, MDMK supremo Vaiko courted arrest while trying to block trains.

Large-scale demonstrations were on in Thanjavur and the Cauvery delta region by VCK, MDMK and Left parties.

The bandh has been called to protest the violence targeting Tamils in Karnataka and also to seek Cauvery water for the state.

Barring the ruling AIADMK, its allies and trade unions affiliated to it, all other opposition parties, including DMK, Tamil Nadu Congress, DMDK, MDMK, Left parties and PMK, are supporting the bandh.

Thousands of police personnel, including armed reserve have been deployed in Tamil Nadu and in Chennai alone, over 15,000 police personnel are on duty.

Protection is being provided for Karnataka related business establishments, schools, institutions and areas where Kannada speaking people live, including Krishnagiri district.

A Puducherry report said an effigy of Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah was burnt outside the bus terminal by some agitators and that the flames were doused by police.

A Puducherry Road Transport Corporation was stoned on Vazhudavoor road, following which it was brought to the shed. No passenger was injured, police said.

Around 200 volunteers of Tamil outfits were arrested after they picketed the municipal bus terminal.

The report said all shops and establishments remained closed. Autos, private buses and stage carriages were off roads and government buses operated in convoys. Hotels and cinema houses were also closed.

BJP workers took out a procession and raised slogans, condemning the attack on Tamils in Karnataka and staged a picketing near the bus stand.

The party's local unit president V Saminathan told reporters that the Karnataka government had 'failed' to protect Tamils and their properties.

Police said attendance in government offices was normal. Government schools functioned, but not with a full complement of students.

A branch of the Karnataka Bank remained closed as a precautionary measure and police were deployed in Chennai.

Passengers proceeding to neighbouring districts of Tamil Nadu were stranded at the bus terminal, it said.

Police patrolling was intensified and all vulnerable areas were taken care of, a senior police officer said.
Tamil Nadu is bracing for a dawn-to-dusk bandh supported by Opposition parties on Friday on the Cauvery with police deploying thousands of personnel across the state to ensure peace even as a youth set himself on fire on Thursday over the water sharing row.

The bandh call given by several farmers and traders bodies, including Tamil Nadu All Farmers' Federations and Tamil Nadu Vanigar Sangangalin Peramaippu (a traders' collective) is supported by main Opposition party DMK, Tamil Nadu Congress Committee, MDMK, PMK, TMC, CPI(M), and CPI.

Protesters have also called for rail and road 'rokos'.

Primarily to protest the violence targeted against the Tamils in Karnataka, the bandh is also aimed at seeking Cauvery water for the state and a final solution to the problem.

#TamilNaduBandh Heavy security deployment at Karnataka-Tamil Nadu checkpost border near Attibele pic.twitter.com/eXZ5IF2K38  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

Ruling AIADMK and trade unions affiliated to it have been non-committal on their participation in the bandh.

After Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah wrote to his Tamil Nadu counterpart Jayalalithaa, urging her to ensure protection of Kannada speaking people, police said all measures have been taken to ensure peace.

Thousands of police personnel, including armed reserves will be deployed in Chennai and other parts of the state.

Over 15,000 police personnel will be on duty.

Protection was being provided to Karnataka-related business establishments, schools, institutions and areas where Kannada speaking people live, including Krishnagiri district.

Commercial firms, including over 35,000 jewellery and fuel outlets are expected to remain closed. However 'Company Owned and Company Operated Fuel Outlets' of Indian Oil, Bharat Petroleum and Indian Oil will operate, officials said.

While sporadic demonstrations were held on Thursday too, a 24-year-old man set himself on fire at a rally held by Nam Tamizhar Katchi (NTK) for "retrieving Tamil Nadu's rights in Cauvery," and to condemn attacks on the Tamils in Karnataka.

An official of the Kilpauk Government Medical College Hospital, where he has been admitted, told PTI the "man has sustained 93 per cent burns, his chances of survival are dim."

"It is a painful act. We do not support it. No one should do such a thing," NTK leader Seeman said.

Before he set himself afire, he threw pamphlets urging people to fight for rights of Tamil Nadu people on Cauvery and other issues. Blaming the Centre on Cauvery, unidentified persons pelted stones at an office of Indian Oil Corporation Limited and some glass panes were damaged, police said.

Tamil outfits in Union Territory of Puducherry have called for a similar bandh on Friday.

State-run transport corporations' run buses besides Chennai-specific local and MRTS (Mass Rapid Transit System) trains, and metro rail will function as usual, authorities said.

Similarly, state-aided and government schools are all set to work as usual. As regards private schools and colleges, only a section of them are participating in the bandh.

Autos, taxis, trucks, private buses, commercial freight services, are, however, slated to keep off the roads.

In a joint statement, Tamil film industry representatives including producers, directors, actors, workmen, theatre owners, and small screen artistes said they will participate in the bandh.

K R Nandakumar, General Secretary, Tamil Nadu Nursery Primary Matriculation and CBSE (private) Schools Association, said circulars have been sent to 18,000 schools in the state about the body's decision to close down educational institutions on Friday on account of the bandh. The quarterly exams scheduled for Friday have been proposed to be conducted on Saturday, he told PTI.

TN Private Schools Association President R Visalaksh, however, said, "we are supporting the bandh cause, but, we are not participating as rescheduling exams is not possible."

Vegetable and milk vendors will also join the bandh, members of respective organisations said. Further, vegetable

vendors will down shutters.

V R Sounderrajan, Advisor, All Wholesale Traders' Association at the Koyambedu market in Chennai, said thousands of vegetable vendors and related workers would participate in the bandh by staying away from work.

Tamil Nadu Milk Agents Welfare Association Founder and President, S A Ponnusamy said "Since over 75 lakh retail vendors and 1.5 lakh agents will be participating in the bandh, there will be a 50-60 per cent shortage in supply."

Though it is a dawn-to-dusk bandh, vendors and agents will participate only between 9 am and 5 pm by closing distribution centres and retail outlets, keeping in view needs of children, senior citizens and patients, he added.

In neighbouring union territory of Puducherry, more than 30 Tamil fringe outfits have announced a 12-hour bandh.

DMK's local unit announced its support to the bandh while Puducherry Traders Federation said all business establishments will remain closed on Friday.

".... All necessary steps have been taken to ensure that law and order does not face any setback," Puducherry Chief Secretary Manoj Parida said.

Puducherry bandh

All necessary steps have been taken to ensure law and order and avoid any inconvenience to the public during the dawn-to-dusk bandh called by various Tamil outfits in the Union Territory on Friday, the government said on Thursday.

"The government is keen that public do not face any inconvenience because of bandh and necessary steps have been evolved. All necessary steps have been taken to ensure that law and order does not face any setback," Puducherry Chief Secretary Manoj Parida told reporters.

More than 30 Tamil fringe outfits have announced the 12-hour bandh in the Union Territory, condemning the violence against Tamils in Karnataka in the wake of Cauvery water row.

Local unit of DMK announced its support to the bandh while Puducherry Traders Federation said all business establishments will remain closed on Friday.

Convenor of DMK S P Sivakumar said the party pledged support for the bandh in line with the decision taken by the party high command in neighbouring Tamil Nadu, where also a dawn-to-dusk shutdown is being observed on Friday.

On Cauvery water for Karaikal, in the tail end of the river system, Parida said with Supreme Court ordering release of 12,000 cusecs by Karnataka, Puducherry should get 270 cusecs of water.

He hoped that the water would be available in Karaikal in the next couple of days.

The Chief Secretary said he would participate again in the deliberations of the Cauvery Supervisory authority on 19 September and ensure the interests of Karaikal farmers were fully protected.
New Delhi: Hitting back, BJP on Friday asked Congress to stop blaming it for the desertion by its MLAs in Arunachal Pradesh, saying it has become a "sinking boat" with leaders leaving as they have lost faith in the leadership.

"Chief minister and MLAs have left the Congress party and formed a new party in Arunachal Pradesh. It is good for Arunachal Pradesh and bad for Congress. Who is responsible for this. See the state of Congress; one after another senior leader is leaving the party. The reason for this is that they have lost faith in the leadership. They are all tired of their leadership," Union Minister M Venkaiah Naidu said.

"Whom will Congress blame now? Whom will they criticise now? Congress party should tell us why this happened. We have been telling from the beginning that all is not well within Congress in Arunachal," he said.

BJP's earlier attempt to topple the Congress government there came unstuck after the Supreme Court reinstated it and Friday's development has given the saffron party much to cheer about.

Naidu accused Congress of putting forth "wrong facts" in the Supreme Court and claimed that BJP's stand has been vindicated.

"What was our point has been vindicated...The Congressmen left their party and formed a regional party. They have realised that Congress has become a sinking boat so everybody is trying to come out of that boat," he said.

The party's national secretary Shrikant Sharma said Congress should introspect instead of blaming it for the crisis in its organisation.

"We always said that it was an internal feud of the Congress. Its leaders from Rahul Gandhi to others down the line blamed us for their crisis. What has happened today has only proved us right," he said.
Patna: Playing the role of a peacemaker in the wake of war of words between alliance partners JD(U) and RJD following Mohammad Shahabuddin release from jail, Lalu Prasad on Thursday said the coalition government was not formed 'foolishly' and the unity among its partners is 'rock-solid'.

"The grand secular alliance government in Bihar was formed not foolishly but after careful thinking," RJD supremo Prasad told reporters seeking to end the political furore. He advised leaders of the constituents parties to give whatever advise they have to give within their own parties.

President of three constituent parties of the alliance should hold jointly hold press conference, he said by way of a solution to display a stronger unity among the coalition. "There is a rock like unity in our coalition. Let bygones be bygones. We should forget what happened in the past and work together for future," he said.

"Nitish Kumar is the leader of the coalition," he said in a bid to clear air.

Prasad's peace making bid came in the wake of war of words between RJD and JD(U) leaders after release of party strongman Shahabuddin from jail on Saturday.

The furore was triggered by a statement of RJD vice-president Raghubansh Prasad Singh on Chief Minister Nitish Kumar while supporting Shahabuddin comment that Kumar was a "circumstantial CM".

"There are lakhs and lakhs of workers in our coalition and its natural there can be some difference of opinion. We will find its solution within the platform of the party," Prasad said. He had earlier criticised Raghubansh Prasad Singh for his "pricking remarks" time and again but had said Shahabuddin did not speak any derogatory thing. He had also sought to play down the controversy by saying that the turmoil has been created by media.

The RJD boss attacked the BJP for making a huge issue over Shahabuddin's release saying, "It seems BJP does not have any agenda except Shahabuddin,"

"BJP was trying to create wedge between coalition partners with a lust for power," he said.

On release of Shahabuddin from jail after 11 years, Prasad said, "Judiciary has done its work in accordance with the law and will continue to do so in future too.
Samajwadi Party (SP) supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav on Friday tried to make light of the ongoing battle of supremacy in the party between Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav and Shivpal Yadav and said that till he was around there was no way the party would get divided.

Addressing workers in Lucknow at the party headquarters after separate meetings with both the warring leaders, Mulayam also said for him the SP was not just a political entity but a family. Pointing out that workers and supporters of the party were worried about the unfolding events within the party, Mulayam said that Akhilesh would go and meet his uncle Shivpal. The Yadav chieftain also ruled out any major differences between Shivpal, Ram Gopal and Akhilesh Yadav.

Meanwhile, Akhilesh laid down new rules for his father and said that he wanted to be reinstated as the state party president and for the upcoming Assembly elections he wanted the responsibility of distributing party tickets. News18 reported that Akhilesh has also told Mulayam that he is ready to give Shivpal's ministries back to him after the assurance from the party supremo that his demands will be met. A meeting between Mulayam-Akhilesh-Shivpal will also be held.

As party workers raised slogans in favour of Shivpal, the SP chief shouted them down and said they should remain quiet as he was speaking. He also dropped a bombshell later when he reversed the decision of his Chief Minister son and announced that former mines minister Gayatri Prajapati will be reinstated in the government. Prajapati was sacked on Monday based on serious charges of patronising illegal mining and minting ill-gotten money.

This move is likely to dent the authority of Akhilesh further. Mulayam's silence on return of Shivpal to the state cabinet is however being interpreted in different ways in political circles.

Sources told IANS that a solution has been thrashed out wherein all portfolios held by Shivpal prior to Tuesday would be given back to him and he will also remain the state party president.

Mulayam rejects Shivpal's resignation

Meanwhile, Mulayam on Friday rejected the resignation of Shivpal as the state party chief. Sources told IANS that in the 15-minute one-on-one meeting at Mulayam Singh's 5, Vikramaditya Marg residence, the SP chief tore up Shivpal's resignation letter. What transpired thereafter is not known and the two are likely to meet once again at the party headquarters, the sources said.

According to the sources, the SP chief, who has so far not been able to broker peace between the warring "chacha-bhatija", has made up his mind "for some tough decisions" which, an aide said "opened all possibilities".

Meanwhile, a large crowd of supporters thronged the residence of Shivpal and demanded that the "mantri ji" be reinstated with full dignity and that Akhilesh apologise to him.

"Shivpal ji has brought up Akhilesh as his son, would pedal for miles to take him to school as Netaji was busy with politics. Is this the way you treat a person like him," asked an angry supporter.

Supporters, wearing t-shirts emblazoned with images of Shivpal, also demanded action against party general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav, who had on Thursday termed Rajya Sabha member Amar Singh as the villain behind all the party's troubles.

Supporters of Shivpal who were shouting anti-Akhilesh slogans and threatened to go on fast and even indulge in self-immolation, said that it was, in fact, Ram Gopal Yadav who was behind the conspiracy to upstage the former minister.

The Samajwadi Party is a typical Hindu family party which won't split so easily, at least not because of these reasons, wherein two warring factions  a new generation trying to usher in new rules and regulations and the other which is the old guard and a tried-and-tested political war horse

Akhilesh's TV interview

Mulayam in his address to the party members on Friday hinted that people from the party, close aides of SP, have been speaking to the media and have said things they should not have. Maybe the SP supremo was hinting at his cousin brother Ramgopal Yadav's interview to ETV, where, the senior SP leader candidly painted Rajya Sabha member Amar Singh as the villain who was trying to manipulate the "innocent netaji" and formenting trouble within the party.

"Netaji comes off as a leader who cannot differentiate between good and bad; someone who keeps flip-flopping on his stand; and as someone who can easily be tricked into doing things in haste by someone he trusts, only to repent later. Netaji is a simple-hearted person in politics, even though he has built his party up from the scratch. Some people (read Amar Singh) have been taking undue advantage and those who kept abusing the party and even Netaji, now get him to do things that they want," Ram Gopal told ETV.

Or maybe, Mulayam was hinting at son Akhilesh's TV interview where the chief minister openly claims that the fight within the party is not because of him but because of the position he holds. "Jhagra meri wajah se nahi hai, meri kursi ki wajah se hai." The problem, many political observers have noted, is the generation gap within the party. While Mulayam wants to teach Akhilesh the valuable lesson that an electoral win will happen only if the party survives, Akhilesh wants to drive the point home that development and honest policing is what the UP government is all about. Like Ambikanand Sahay points out in this article, the generation gap is so wide within the family (and the party) that not only do the key players think differently, they even act separately. Blood is the only thing that unites them. Nothing else.

It becomes extremely tough for Akhilesh as well to run a government where his father and uncles hold the power reins in their hands. When Akhilesh assumed the chief ministers office, the cabinet was staffed with Mulayams loyalists.

"The principal secretary to chief minister, Rakesh Garg, and secretary to the chief minister, Anita Singh, had both served in Mulayam's Pancham Tal as well. Mulayam even deputed his long-time personal security officer Shiv Kumar with Akhilesh. However, in the past two years, Akhilesh has brought in many officers of his choice to Pancham Tal," a report in The Economic Times said.

But with Shivpal being stripped off crucial cabinet portfolios, Akhilesh is sending a message to all his detractors and his family that he, as the chief minister, does not live in anyones shadow and will not compromise on crucial issues like law and order and corruption.

The ongoing tussle may benefit rivals BSP and BJP massively as the election is emerging as a tight three-cornered contest

No word on Shivpal

Mulayam's address to his party member on Friday came as no respite for brother Shivpal, who represents the older guard of the party and a tried-and-tested war horse. Mulayam in his speech spoke of party and family unity and how his son Akhilesh will never defy his father's orders. However, Mulayam did not mention the party's verdict on Shivpal's future in the party.

Considering that Akhilesh has already laid down his demands in front of Mulayam, it only remains to be seen what solution does Mulayam bring to the table. Shivpal in the past has maintained that he will abide by whatever Mulayam orders him to do.

The Samajwadi Party is a typical Hindu family party which won't split so easily, at least not because of these reasons, wherein two warring factions  a new generation trying to usher in new rules and regulations and the other which is the old guard and a tried-and-tested political war horse. Mulayam has to bridge this gap and most of the party members have blind faith that he will. Political observers say the reconciliation will eventually happen. But at what cost? This family drama has served a massive blow to the ruling party, and especially couple of months before they are going to fight the biggest election of 2017.

Tussle will deal a sever blow to SP in elections

The SP supremo said it was election time and all should come together to work unitedly. "There is no fight among Ramgopal, Akhilesh and Shivpal," he told reporters as slogans in favour of Shivpal drowned his remarks. As the crisis threatened to cast a shadow over the SP's prospects in the upcoming Assembly elections, Mulayam sought to downplay the developments saying, "Every father and son faces issues... There is no rift."

The ongoing tussle may benefit rivals BSP and BJP massively as the election is emerging as a tight three-cornered contest. Opinion polls have forecast a hung Assembly and if the tussle within team SP is not resolved, it could give its rivals the decisive advantage. Analysts have observed that if SP wants to stand out in the upcoming elections they will have to stand out amid the negative publicity and have each other's back.

Since Akhileshs accession to the chief minister's post in 2012, one of his biggest problems has been managing his father and Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam. Akhilesh and Mulayams politics are very different. Mulayam, being a political veteran, tries to tell his son that elections are won by people and not officers while Akhilesh seems to be trying really hard to shut his detractors up by trying to fix the law and order situation in the state.

And at a time when the state Assembly elections, which is being touted as the biggest political event of 2017, is already approaching fast, the party needs to maintain the semblance of holding things together.

With inputs from agencies
Lucknow: Defending 'outsider' Amar Singh, Samajwadi Party leader Shivpal Yadav on Friday advised nephew and Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav not to develop an ego and to "gain more experience".

"Anyone sitting on the chair of the Chief Minster should not develop an ego. I have seen many Chief Ministers. Akhilesh needs to gain experience. He should learn from Netaji (SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav) and me as well," Shivpal said at India TV's Chunav Manch conclave.

Defending Amar Singh who has been criticised over his alleged role in the feud between Shivpal and Akhilesh, he said, "His name should not have been taken. He can never cause any harm to our family. No decision in the party is taken without Netaji's consent. Need to tactfully deal with outsiders, if any, and one should apply his mind."

On Akhilesh's demand for more say in ticket distribution, he said, "Netaji will decide on ticket distribution. How elections are fought are perogative of the party chief. Netaji will allocate responsibilities."

With regard to the ongoing dispute in the Yadav family which has spilled out in the open, Shivpal said, "There could be problems in the family. It is conveyed to the Chief. I have conveyed my views to Netaji."

On the chief minister stripping him of key ministerial portfolios, he said, "Portfolios are prerogative of the chief minister. I have no competition with him. In 2017, if we get majority again, I will propose his name. I'm not in the race for chief ministership. Akhilesh was with me since he was 4-years-old, he is like my son."

"We will not allow SP to go weak. Elections are near, we need to work hard. I was state president till 2011 and was in middle of a meeting when I was removed from the post but I didn't utter a word," Shivpal said about the responsibility of state president which was given to him by Mulayam.

On his resignation from the Cabinet, he said, "As I was having responsibility of one department, it was better to quit the government and work for the party."

Shivpal had last night submitted his resignation as ruling Samajwadi Party's state unit head and as a minister.

On reaching an agreement in the dispute, he said, "Netaji has heard all of us. He will talk to some others, if he wants and will take decision by tomorrow."
Pakistan: A suicide bomber killed at least 20 people and wounded more than 30 others as they attended Friday prayers at a mosque in a northwestern Pakistani tribal area, officials said.

The bombing took place in the village of Butmaina in the Mohmand tribal district bordering Afghanistan where the army has been fighting against Taliban militants.

"At least 20 people have been killed and more than 30 others wounded," deputy chief of Mohmand tribal district administration Naveed Akbar told AFP, adding that the bomber came in as Friday prayers were in progress and blew himself up in the main hall. A curfew was later imposed in the area.

Another local government official confirmed the information.

Shireen Zada, a resident who had prayed at another mosque, said he heard the blast as he was walking home.

"I rushed to the spot and when I went inside the hall there was blood and human remains everywhere and people crying out," he told AFP.

"I brought my pick-up truck, loaded three wounded and drove them to the hospital in Khar," he said, referring to the nearest town.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif later condemned the bombing, saying the government would remain steadfast in their fight against extremists.

"The cowardly attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the government's resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country," read a statement from Sharif's office.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but the Pakistani Taliban routinely attack soft targets such as courts, schools and mosques.

On 2 September, at least 14 people were killed and more than 50 wounded after a suicide bomber attacked a court in the Pakistani city of Mardan in an assault targeting Pakistan's legal community that was claimed by the Jamaat-ul-Ahrar Taliban faction.

The group has also said it was behind an attack on lawyers in southwest Quetta, which killed 73 people on 8 August, as well as the Lahore Easter bombing that killed 75 in Pakistan's deadliest attack this year.

Pakistan's deadliest ever attack occurred in Peshawar in December 2014, when Taliban militants stormed a school killing more than 150 people, mostly children.

The army launched an operation in June 2014 in a bid to wipe out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas and so bring an end to the bloody insurgency that has cost thousands of civilian lives since 2004.

As a result security in the country has since improved. Scattered attacks still take place, but they are fewer and of a lesser intensity than in previous years.

According to data from the South Asia Terrorism Portal, 457 civilians and 182 security forces were killed in Pakistan from 1 January to 11 September, putting 2016 on course for fewer casualties than 2015.

Last year, the country recorded its lowest number of killings since 2007, when the Pakistani Taliban was formed.
Beijing: Typhoon 'Meranti' has left at least 16 people dead or missing in China and an ancient bridge destroyed as it wreaked havoc on the country's eastern coast, the government said Friday.

The storm, described by the official Xinhua news agency as the world's strongest typhoon this year and the worst to hit Fujian province since records began in 1949, had killed seven people by Friday morning, the civil affairs ministry said in a statement.

Another nine people were missing and more than 330,000 residents had been relocated, it added.

The typhoon, which had earlier skirted the southern tip of Taiwan, made landfall in Xiamen early Thursday packing winds of around 170 kilometres per hour (105 miles per hour) and bringing downpours across the province, said the statement.

Flooding destroyed an 871-year-old bridge that was a protected heritage site in Yongchun county, Xinhua reported Friday.
Washington: Myanmar's de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi on Thursday called for US companies to bring responsible investment to the former pariah state, saying economic success would help convince people and the powerful military that democracy is the best way forward.

Suu Kyi was addressing the US business community, a day after President Barack Obama announced that the US would lift sanctions and restore long-lost trade benefits as the Southeast Asian nation emerges from half a century of oppressive military rule.

Suu Kyi, whose party won national elections last November, said that lifting sanctions entailed some political and economic risk, but added, "It is time now for our people to depend on themselves."

Many of the companies and individuals still subject to US sanctions are linked to the military, which retains major political and economic interests, despite the shift to civilian government. Human rights groups say the US should continue applying pressure on Myanmar to change. Massive illegal trade in goods including jade and timber continues, as does civil war with many ethnic minorities.

Suu Kyi said that economic development could help foster national reconciliation. She said the transport and energy sectors were suffering from decades of neglect, and support was needed to build the education and health systems and the skills of its people.

"Economic success is one of the ways in which can persuade everybody in our country, including the military, that democracy is the best way forward for our union. This is the best way forward for us to achieve unity and prosperity," she told a dinner hosted by the US Chamber of Commerce and the US-Asean Business Council  a group that supports American business ties with Southeast Asia.

Tables at the function at an upscale Washington hotel went for up to $25,000.

Obama aide Ben Rhodes said that the "national emergency" with respect to Myanmar that authorises the sanctions would be terminated in the "coming days."

Myanmar, also known as Burma, is a nation of more than 50 million and rich in natural resources. Before a military coup in 1962 it was among the region's stronger economies. Today it's among Asia's least developed and poorest countries, with more than a quarter of the population living in poverty.

Both Myanmar and US businesses have welcomed Obama's decision, the culmination of a five-year engagement and gradual easing of restrictions against a former adversary. Broad sanctions on trade and investment ended in 2012, but US-Myanmar goods trade totaled just $227 million in 2015, and US companies account for less than 1 percent of total foreign investment.

Suu Kyi said she wanted US companies to bring investment "best practices" and urged them to report any signs of corruption.

"When you are trying to invest in Burma, please don't think you have to go with a suitcase bursting with dollar bills," she said.
Although Africas growth has slowed, the long term fundamentals are strong, big business opportunities lie ahead and the overall outlook is positive. These facts are contained in the latest McKinseyGlobal Institute Report just released today titled, Lions On The Move II: Realizing The Potentials of Africas Economy.



According to the MGIS new report, four fundamentals are likely to underpin Africas economic growth. Firstly, Africa has the fastest urbanization rate in the world. Over the next ten years, 187 million more Africans will live in citiesequivalent to half the US population today.Secondly, it has the biggest working-age population in the world of 1.1 billion in 2034larger than in either China or India. Thirdly, it has the largest reserves in the world of many key natural resources (e.g., 60 percent of the worlds unutilized but potentially available cropland, and the largest global reserves of vanadium, manganese, and many others). Additionally, Africa has the chance to leapfrog old technologies using mobile and digital (e.g., penetration of smartphones expected to hit 50 percent in 2020 vs. 18 percent in 2015).

The new MGI report confirmed that spending by consumers and businesses in Africa today totals $4 Trillion. By 2025, the total could be $5.6 Trillion. Household consumption is expected to grow by 3.3% a year and reach $2.1 Trillion by 2025. The total could be $5.6 Trillion, reflecting an expanding African consuming class. Business spending is expected to grow from $2.6 Trillion in 2015 to $3.5 Trillion by 2025, and Africa has an opportunity to nearly double manufacturing output from $500 Billion today to $930 Billion in 2025. AFRICAS economies are no longer a story about exporting commodities- but about tapping into vibrant domestic demand. Accelerated industrialization could lead to a steep change in productivity and and the creation of 6-14 million stable jobs over the next 10 years.

AchaLeke, a McKinsey Senior Partner and Report Co-author, said:Our new research shows how in coming years Africa will benefit from strong fundamentals including a young and growing population, the worlds fastest urbanization rate, and accelerating technological change. These will help drive rapid growth in consumer markets and business supply chains, and will offer opportunities to build large, profitable industrial and services companies. Tapping Africas consumer markets will require companies to have a detailed understanding of income, demographic, and category trends. Thriving in business markets will require businesses to offer products and develop sales forces able to target the relatively fragmented private sector. But what our research also shows is how much work needs to be done both by companies themselves and by Africas governments to translate opportunity into tangible economic benefits.To make the most of the opportunities, Africa needs more large companies. MGIS new database of Corporate Africa, shows that the continent has 700 companies with revenues of more than $500 million, of which 400 companies have revenues of more than $1 Billion. AFRICAS companies are growing faster and are generally more profitable than their global peers. Africas top 100 companies have achieved success by developing strong positions at home, staying the course to build their businesses over decades, integrating what other companies would usually outsource, and investing in building and retaining talent. Further success is possible in six high-potential sectors with high growth, high profitability, and low consolidation. These are: wholesale and retail, food and agro-processing, health care, financial services, light manufacturing, and construction.

Governments need to play a stronger role in unleashing renewed dynamism. Six priorities emerge from this research. Firstly, mobilize more domestic resources, taking bold steps to mobilize more of its own funding to finance development. Secondly, aggressively diversify economies, encouraging growth in high-potential sectors in close cooperation with business, based on a clear understanding of their countries comparative advantages. Then accelerate infrastructure development and deepen regional integration.

Additionally, create tomorrows talent, ensuring that educational and training systems build work-relevant skills, and that students are aware of, and encouraged to enter, these vocations and that the private sector builds on best practice. Finally, ensure healthy urbanization, so that cities grow with the infrastructure required to make the biggest positive economic and social impact possible. Delivering on these six priorities will require the vision and determination to drive far-reaching reforms in many areas of public lifeand capable public administration with the skill and commitment to implement such reforms.
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Samsung has released Samsung Focus App which is aimed at offering all-in-one productivity. Similar to the BlackBerry Hub, Samsung Focus app will merged your emails, notifications from supported social networks, and calendars all in one place.

Samsung Focus app is being dubbed as unified productivity application, which allows Exchange ActiveSync, IMAP and POP3 users to better manager their email, calendar, task, memo, and contacts. The app supports Exchange Server 2003 SP2/SP3 and above, Google, Naver, (IMAP/POP3), Office 365, Hotmail, Outlook.com and other servers supported Exchange ActiveSync such as IBM Notes Traveler, Groupwise, Kerio, Zimbra, Horde, IceWarp, MDaemon etc.

Samsung says that it does not operate any cloud server and connects only to the actual mail servers. It stores your accounts data on the device and Samsung Electronics never access any users data at all. The Samsung Focus app is fully compatible with most Samsung devices powered by Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow and above.

Samsung Focus App

via
Samsung Electronics Vice Chairman Jay Y. Lee today met Indias Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi. He reiterated Samsungs long-term commitment to the people of India as a strategic partner.

Lee apprised the Prime Minister of Samsungs business operations and citizenship activities in the country. He stated that Korean technology major Samsung is working in synchrony with Make in India and Digital India initiatives in growing India as an important production base and central R&D hub.

He said Samsungs ultimate goal is to be not just a foreign investor but a true local business in India, where Samsung will work with local communities. Besides Make in India, Samsung is also committed to Make for India, an initiative to create meaningful local innovations for the Indian consumers.

Last year in January, Samsung invested Rs. 517 crores for the expansion of Noida mobile phone plant.

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Lightning lamb burger

Easy

1) Preheat the griddle. Tip the lamb mince into a bowl with the pesto and the cheese. Mix well until the pesto and cheese are thoroughly mixed into the mince. (You may find this easier to do with your hands). 2) Divide the mixture into four and s
If you want to make money in the stock market, time and time again analysts and academics have found that the best way to do it is through buying and holding stocks for the long term. You'll want to invest in stocks that have sustainble competitive advantages that will be hard to disrupt, as well as reasonable stock prices that give them a good chance of generating returns. Three stocks that really stand out as great investments for a decade-long time horizon are Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A 3.20%) (BRK.B 3.36%), American Tower (AMT 3.04%), and Nucor (NUE -1.11%). Here's a quick look at why all three are worth considering as long-term holdings in your portfolio.

Diversity & strong performance in one package

I know that I'm not trotting out anything revelatory here, but Berkshire Hathaway has been one of the best at capital allocation, thanks to the shrewd nature of Warren Buffett and his partner in crime, Charlie Munger. As a result, Berkshire has an empire of companies underneath it that today generate about $5.2 billion in free cash flow annually, which Buffett mostly uses to fuel stock investments or outright purchases of companies. This isn't large numbers working in the company's favor, either. Over the past 12 months, Berkshire has posted net income margins of 12.5% returns on equity of 10%.

This is what makes Berkshire such a compelling investment for decade-long time horizons. It is an incredibly diverse holding company, ranging from insurance, railroads, electric utilities, industrial manufacturing, and consumer goods. This immense diversity means that the cyclical nature of one part of the business doesn't have as large of an impact on the company as a whole. Typically, that amount of stability comes at the sacrifice of performance. As those numbers above suggest, though, you don't have to make that trade-off.

At a price to book value of 1.38 times -- the metric Buffett himself uses when evaluating Berkshire's stock -- it would seem that today's share price is a pretty reasonable time to buy into Berkshire and hang on for a decade or two.

Profiting from people burying their heads in mobile devices

For a long time, there were two certainties in this world: death and taxes. Nowadays, we can add a third thing to that list: the need for data. Every day, our mobile devices chew through more and more data, and that is a trend that is only expected to rise, as faster options like 5G start to take hold. In 2015, average monthly data usage was 2.4 gigabytes. By 2020, that number is expected to grow to 14 GB per month.

The knee-jerk reaction for many investors would be to invest in the companies developing the technology that will make that much data usage possible. If there is one constant with technology, though, it's that it can rapidly become commoditized, and a company's pricing power evaporates. That is why American Tower is a great investment to ride this trend. You aren't investing in the technology that will drive this change; you're investing in the infrastructure that will make it happen.

American Tower is in the business of owning and operating cellular towers and leasing space for wireless equipment on them to telecom companies. This model gives the company a stable revenue source, as telecom companies sign lease contracts that can be 20 years or more. As customers demand more and more data, the property value on these towers will continue to increase, since telecom companies need more installed equipment to handle the required bandwidth. It should also be noted that American Tower is structured as a Real Estate Investment Trust, so it throws off cash to fuel a rapidly growing dividend.

It's hard to see a situation where we will use less data over the coming years, so that means we will need a very robust telecom infrastructure that will likely be installed on American Tower's base of communications towers. This is a trend that could fuel huge gains for investors over the coming decade.

When the time is right

Buying into cyclical industries like steel isn't a great idea all of the time. Like so many other commodities that are essential to development, it is an industry that is consistently going back and forth between times of incredible oversupply or undersupply. For years, China has been the primary engine for steel demand, so when demand there stagnated, it resulted in the low price environment we have been experiencing in recent years. It may seem a little counterintuitive, but this is a great time to invest in the industry, and Nucor is one of the best stocks to invest in steel.

The domestic steel industry has received a little bit of a boost lately from the Commerce Department's imposing anti-dumping tariffs on imported steel from several countries, most importantly China. While this is something that will improve margins, the real gains will come as the steel manufacturing overcapacity gets worked out of the global system. Eventually, unprofitable facilities will be shut down, and rising demand will lead to higher prices for Nucor and its peers.

What makes Nucor a more compelling investment, though, is that the company has remained a solidly profitable company throughout this downturn, thanks to its unique employee incentive structures and its lower debt burden. Both of these things deliver better bottom-line results, and they're also part of the reason that Nucor has been able to maintain a 42-year streak of dividend raises.

With shares trading at 3.1 times tangible book value and a dividend yield of 3.15%, I'll admit that this isn't the absolute lowest valuation for Nucor's stock. It is, however, a pretty good valuation to buy shares -- especially if you plan to hold those shares for 10 years or more.
An investment in Newmont Mining Corp. (NEM -0.46%), as in any other company, carries some degree of risk. With great risk can come great reward, though, so let's look at the three greatest risks facing this gold mining leader.

Aye-Aye, Captain Obvious

Whether one chooses to buy gold coins, shares of a gold ETF, or stock in a gold-mining company, all gold investments bear the same risk: volatility in the market price of gold. And there's no shortage of factors that people believe influence the price of gold. In the company's 10-K, Newmont's management presents a non-exhaustive list of 13 factors, which it recognizes as variables influencing the price of gold.



Oftentimes, a decline in the price of gold adversely affects revenue, net income, and operating cash flow. For example, in 2015, gold sales decreased $118 million compared with 2014, in part because the average net realized price of gold fell $117 per ounce.

But the deleterious effects can reach much further -- beyond the financial statement and into the company's pipeline. From identifying a gold deposit to operating a mine that's producing gold, there are several steps, which often take many years.

One of Newmont's strengths is that it has a healthy pipeline of projects at varying stages of development, positioning the company nicely for future success. According to management, should the price of gold decline too much, it may be required to "halt or delay the development of new projects," as well as "reduce funds available for exploration and advanced projects."

Fill 'er up

Once Newmont digs gold out of the ground, it must make sure it has a new direction where it can point its drills, but this isn't a simple task. Like the volatility in the price of gold, the company's inability to continually replace its gold reserves is a conspicuous risk. As the company states in the 10-K, it must "continually replace reserves depleted by production to maintain production levels over the long term and provide a return on invested capital." During 2015, for example, Newmont reduced its proven and probable reserves by 5.1 million ounces.

There are several ways in which the company can replace its reserves. For one, it can expand production at known ore bodies -- something the company is currently pursuing at its Tanami mine in Australia. Tanami produced 436,000 ounces of gold at an all-in sustaining cost (AISC) of $724 per ounce in 2015. Once the expansion is complete and production begins, management forecasts, on average over the first full five years, for Tanami to produce between 425,000 and 475,000 ounces at an AISC approximately $50 per ounce lower than the $724 per ounce it reported in 2015.

Besides expanding production, the company can also replace its reserves by finding new deposits; however, this is easier said than done, and many times exploration activities don't lead to the identification of new deposits. Even if a new deposit is located, though, it doesn't mean the company's reserves will be replaced anytime soon.

It can take 10 years or more before the site begins the commercial production of gold. And don't forget how the volatility in the price of gold compounds the risk.

A third option is to replace its reserves through acquisitions -- something Newmont did in 2015, when it acquired the Cripple Creek and Victor gold-mining business from AngloGold Ashanti for $821 million. Replacing reserves through acquisitions, however, is not a solution to which management often turns.

Digging into costs



Once again, from the 10-K, we find the most generic of statements: "Our operations are subject to risks of doing business." Thankfully, management narrows this generality down further: "Exploration, development, production, and mine closure activities are subject to regional, political, economic, community, and other risks of doing business."

Having seen these generic "risks of doing business" come into better focus, let's see how they've recently manifested themselves to better understand Newmont's position.

Political risk, for one, is something with which Newmont is quite familiar. Beginning in 2014, the Indonesian government issued new regulations that made it harder for Newmont to obtain the requisite export permits; consequently, Newmont shut down operations at its Batu Hijau mine because of an inability to export and sell its copper concentrates. Several months later, though, after agreeing to pay higher royalties and export duties, Newmont resumed operations.

Although the strained relations with the Indonesian government related to copper -- not gold -- the Batu Hijau mine still represented a significant source of value. In 2015, the mine produced 676,000 ounces of gold, which meant that Indonesia accounted for 21% of Newmont's revenue that year. Despite these figures, management recognized that the risk was too great, and this past June, Newmont announced that it had entered into an agreement to sell its interest in the Batu Hijau copper and gold mines.

Indonesia isn't the only area where political risk rears its ugly head. Following local political and community protests, Newmont suspended construction operations at its Conga Project in Peru -- a site of 6.5 million attributable ounces of gold reserves -- at the request of the country's central government in November 2011. And there doesn't seem to be a silver lining to this cloud. Management makes clear in the 10-K that "under the current social and political environment, the company does not anticipate being able to develop Conga for the foreseeable future."

The takeaway

When considering mining stocks, investors must recognize the various ways in which market volatility can affect the company and its operations. A significant drop in the price of gold could severely hamper the company's ability to sustain operations at a given project, forcing management to shut down the project and possibly incur significant losses.

And although political and social risks are relevant to nearly every business, mining companies are especially sensitive to them -- something Newmont knows well from its dealings with Batu Hijau and Conga. But the discussion of the risks facing Newmont Mining isn't meant to dissuade investors from considering a position -- merely to educate them. After all, the best type of investor is an informed investor.
What happened

Shares of Cobalt International Energy (NYSE: CIE) are up 14.9% as of 10:45 a.m. EDT after the company announced yesterday after the market close that it has agreed to the early termination of a rig it contracted with Rowan Companies (RDC).

So what?

If investing in pure-play oil and gas companies didn't have enough speculation in it already for investors, there was Cobalt International Energy. When the company IPOed in 2009, it wasn't producing oil and gas. Instead, it was a speculative bet on a bunch of deepwater properties that would be developed. Since that time, the company has logged several discoveries in the Gulf of Mexico and Angola, but it has just barely started producing from its Hiedelberg field.

This means the company has been completely reliant on raising capital from debt and equity to fund development. The problem with this approach, though, is that it's getting harder and harder for Cobalt to raise capital. As a result, it's scaling back its operations. This early termination will help the company reduce its capital spending. Cobalt and Rowan agreed to end the contract on the Rowan Reliance drillship in March of 2017, 1 year earlier than originally contracted.

The only reason Rowan was willing to agree to this early termination -- which will impact its bottom line -- is because Cobalt agreed to use Rowan as an exclusive rig contractor for five years. So when Cobalt is ready to start spending money again, Rowan will get the business.

Now what?

Cobalt may be getting out from under a rig contract early, but that doesn't change the fact that its spending program has no support from operational cash flows. Management has stated that it wants to monetize -- aka, sell off interest stakes -- some of its Angola assets, but it hardly seems like the time to be selling assets with oil prices where they are today. For investors, this company has "stay away'" written all over it.
Merseyside Police is appealing for information after a staff member was wounded by a knife during an armed robbery at a service station on Thursday 15 September.

At around 5am, a man armed with a knife entered Shell Service Station on Hoylake Road in Moreton. He jumped over the counter and punched a staff member, before stealing the staff members rucksack and a number of cigarettes. During the incident, the staff member sustained a superficial cut to his hand from the knife. The man is believed to have made off on foot towards Moreton Cross.

The man is described as white, around 20 years of age, with a black moustache and stubble. He is believed to have been wearing a dark hooded top with his face covered. CCTV and forensic enquiries are ongoing at the scene.

Wirral detective chief inspector Paul Sutcliffe said: If you were in the area, on foot or driving past, and saw a man matching this description on Hoylake Road around 5.00am, call us immediately.

Thankfully the member of staff was not more seriously injured, but this was an appalling attack which would have been an extremely distressing experience.

We are determined to find the man responsible and bring him to justice so provide any details, however small, which could be vital in our investigation.

Anyone who has information which could help the police with their inquiries can contact Wirral CID on 0151 777 2265, call 101, or Crimestoppers on 0800 555111.
In a world of slack growth and low returns, investors have been flocking to Asian companies with booming businesses and profits. But with these stocks now the priciest in 13 years relative to less loved firms, funds are starting to explore cheaper names.

Fundamental factors are signaling to investors that they are missing out on good value in some of the less exuberant firms.

The gap between the average price-to-forward earnings ratio of the MSCI Asia ex Japan growth index and the MSCI Asia ex-Japan value index is the widest since at least 2003, based on the earliest available data on Thomson Reuters DataStream. http://bit.ly/2cq2u85

This extreme gap has been underpinned by relentless demand for high-growth stocks as a sluggish global economy has starved investors of attractive returns. But some investors, loath to overpay for crowded trades, are turning to cheaper companies that have been overlooked and undervalued.

"We think the value gap is extreme and there are some very attractive opportunities in value stocks," said Matthew Vaight, portfolio manager for global emerging markets at M&G Investments in London.

The Asia growth stocks index is now trading at 17.3 times 12-month forward earnings, compared with its historical average of 13.7, the most expensive since the global financial crisis in 2009.

While the high multiples are a salient feature of many growth stocks, whose earnings are expected to rise faster than their industry or market average, fund managers caution investors against overlooking value stocks that usually trade at a lower price than their fundamentals suggest they should.

Indeed, the value index is significantly cheaper, at 10.1 times earnings, below its average of 10.6 times. The broader MSCI Asia ex-Japan benchmark is trading at 12.7 times earnings.

Norman Boersma, chief investment officer of Templeton Global Equity Group, said the valuation gap indicates the risk-reward proposition is now skewed in favor of long-term value investors.

"If you're looking for something that's safe or has good growth rates, if you're buying into an area where valuations are hugely elevated, that doesn't really look safe to me," he said.

In fact, a turnaround may be in the offing.

The value index slid 14.7 percent in 2015, almost double the loss of the growth index. But this year the value index has only slightly underperformed, rising around 7.5 percent versus a 9.7 percent gain for the growth index.

A look at a few companies provides a compelling case for value-investing.

For instance, the most expensive company in the Asia ex-Japan equity benchmark, Ctrip.com , a fast-growing Chinese internet travel services provider, trades at a whopping 268 times forward earnings. Compare this with the cheapest: Korea Electric Power <015760.KS>, priced at 4.34 times earnings, and Chinese Chongqing Changan Automobile <200625.SZ>, at 4.43 times. 200625.SZ>015760.KS>

But investors such as Peter Sartori, head of Asian equity at Nikko Asset Management in Singapore, remain unconvinced given the tepid global growth environment.

"Most of the so-called cheap value-type sectors in Asia are in areas of the economy that are not where the growth of future Asia is," Sartori said.

Analysts say the materials sector might prove a risky bet as its fundamentals are closely linked to China's uncertain economic outlook. However, those that have been indiscriminately sold off - such as energy and financials - may offer bargains.

Templeton's Boersma flags opportunities in industries that are not so cheap, such as technology and healthcare.

"In healthcare, biotech stocks have been pushed through the roof," he said.

"But we've found a lot of value in the older guys, with nice cash flow, reasonably stable earnings growth, good dividend yield."

(Reporting By Nichola Saminather; Editing by Shri Navaratnam)
The U.S. House Financial Services Committee has opened a probe into Wells Fargo's sales practices and plans to call the company's chief executive before lawmakers at a hearing later in September, the committee chairman said on Friday.

Wells Fargo has settled with regulators over allegations that its staff opened more than two million bank accounts and credit cards for customers without their consent to meet internal sales goals. As part of last week's settlement, Wells Fargo agreed to pay $185 million in penalties and $5 million to customers.

Committee Chairman Representative Jeb Hensarling said the committee was "requesting all records related to the allegations of fraudulent or improper activity by Wells Fargo employees" from the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and also requested records from the company.

(Reporting by Susan Heavey)
How can Ford use plug-in hybrid technology to make its F-150 pickup even more appealing to its customers? That's the kind of question the Blue Oval has been pondering. Image source: Ford Motor Company.

Like most big automakers, Ford Motor Company (NYSE: F) recognizes that the world is moving away from gasoline engines and toward "electrified" vehicle drivetrains, plug-in hybrids and fully electric vehicles, and it wants to be in front of that trend.

But there's an obstacle: Electrified vehicles cost more to build than their internal-combustion counterparts. That will probably change in time, as battery technology advances and Ford builds experience and scale. But Ford has to get there.

While Ford's executives seem committed to the benefits of zero-emission vehicles, the company doesn't really have a choice. Even if Ford didn't want to build electric and hybrid cars, tightening fuel-economy and pollution regulations will force its hand in a few years. Ford doesn't want to wait for that.

That's why CEO Mark Fields and his team have been pondering this question: How can Ford convince consumers to pay a little more for advanced hybrids and full-on electric vehicles in an era of $2-a-gallon gas?

On Wednesday, during Ford's annual Investor Day presentation, the team showed us their answer.

Ford's strategy isn't about little electric cars

"We want to become a top player in electrified solutions, and I call it moving from a compliance mind-set to one of leading where we can win, such as with our commercial vehicles," Fields said during a presentation to investors on Wednesday.

What's that mean? It means that Ford will focus its electrification efforts on highly profitable market segments where Ford has a strong position. That will help it build expertise and manufacturing scale that in time will make it cost-effective to bring electrified drivetrains to the rest of its lineup, along with an infrastructure to support those vehicles, all while building market awareness with some of Ford's most popular and visible products.

Image source: Ford Motor Company.

Here's what Ford's product chief, Raj Nair, said on Wednesday:

Trucks, commercial vehicles, sport-utilities, and performance vehicles are all parts of the market where Ford has a strong position, and where it currently generates big profit margins. Those are the segments where Ford will focus its electrification efforts, on the theory that those customers are most likely to buy into Ford's innovations -- and are most willing to pay for them.

In other words, rather than building an electric vehicle just to satisfy regulatory requirements (what Fields meant by "compliance mind-set"), Ford is planning to bring electric drivetrains to market in ways that will make customers feel they add significant value.

What might these products look like?

How might Ford incorporate electric drivetrains into its most gas-guzzling products in ways that will make its customers willing to pay extra?

Think about a plug-in hybrid Ford pickup that can summon its electric motors' immense torque to start a heavy load moving, or an SUV with an electric motor at each wheel that can adjust its traction on the fly in slippery conditions, or a plug-in hybrid Mustang that runs on electric batteries in normal driving -- but that instantly starts its powerful gasoline V8 when you floor it. Or a fleet of electric commercial delivery vans that operate quietly and don't ever need fuel, just a nightly recharge.

Clearly, there's a lot of potential for Ford to use electric and hybrid drivetrains in ways that add value to its most profitable products. In time, all Fords will be electric. Getting there will be a challenging and expensive journey. But it sounds like Ford has hit on a formula to give its customers some extra value, and its bottom line a little less pressure, along the way.

A secret billion-dollar stock opportunity The world's biggest tech company forgot to show you something, but a few Wall Street analysts and the Fool didn't miss a beat: There's a small company that's powering their brand-new gadgets and the coming revolution in technology. And we think its stock price has nearly unlimited room to run for early in-the-know investors! To be one of them, just click here.

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F-16 production is winding down in the U.S. -- but could take off abroad. Image source: Getty Images.

Lockheed Martin's (NYSE: LMT) F-16 fighter is -- by a large margin -- the most popular fighter jet in the world. Across the country and around the world, Lockheed Martin has sold more than 4,500 F-16s over the past 40 years -- half of which are still flying today.

But now, at long last, the F-16 era may be approaching a close.

Lockheed is reportedly moving to shutter production of the F-16 at its facility in Fort Worth, Texas next year, and production numbers are already dwindling. Lockheed Martin's quarterly filingswith the SEC show that the company delivered just three F-16s last quarter, two the quarter before that, and two the quarter before that. At its current rate, the company is on course to build just 10 F-16s this year, fewer than the 11 F-16s built last year, and the 17 manufactured in 2014.

By all indications, the era of F-16-building is ending -- except for one thing...or maybe two.

To India, with love (for the F-16)

You've probably heard by now that India is in the midst of a multiyear plan to upgrade its armed forces. As part of that effort, India placed an order for 126 high-end Dassault Rafale fighters back in 2011 -- but it later backed out of that deal. Now, India is negotiating with the United States instead, and looking to have Lockheed Martin shift F-16 production to India once it closes down in Texas.

Such a shift could conceivably breathe new life into Lockheed's F-16 program. Here in the U.S., Lockheed Martin is currently focused on getting the F-16's successor, the F-35 stealth fighter, ready for prime time. At the same time, though, a shift in production to India could help Lockheed win new sales among customers who cannot afford the fifth-generation F-35 -- but who could conceivably afford the fourth-generation F-16.

Winning the Indian contract could generate billions in new revenue from the old warbird. What's more, assuming lower costs of production in India than in the U.S., Lockheed could find that by producing the F-16 abroad, it will open new markets for the F-16 elsewhere in the region.

The enemy of my friend is also my friend

Not everywhere in the region, though. As it turns out, one monkey wrench could trip up Lockheed's effort to dominate both the high and the low ends of the international market for fighter jets, and it lies right across the border from India. Earlier this year, you see, Pakistan made a bid to buy nearly a full year's worth of Lockheed's (now diminished) F-16 production, asking Congress for permission to buy eight new F-16s for its air force. Pakistan had hoped to obtain discounted rates on these aircraft ($270 million up front, versus the full sticker price of $700 million for the planes).

Now, Congress declined to green-light this particular deal. But Pakistan likes the F-16 so much that, undeterred, it approached Jordan instead, with an offer to buy 16 used F-16 fighter jets from the Jordanian military. The deal's not yet set in stone, but if Jordan approves, these fighters would join 14 used F-16s that Pakistan bought from Jordan two years ago.

What it means for Lockheed

Now, you might think that Lockheed Martin's move to begin producing F-16s in India would offer a neat solution to this problem, lowering the price of F-16 production, and making it easier for Pakistan to buy new F-16s instead of old ones. Thus the money Pakistan was preparing to hand over to Jordan could flow into Lockheed Martin's coffers instead.

But here's the problem: India and Pakistan, while both U.S. allies, don't like each other very much. In fact, just last week, the Indian government accused Pakistani troops of violating a ceasefire along the countries' mutual "Line of Control" in Kashmir. Pakistan's army, says India, began "unprovoked and indiscriminate firing on Indian army posts" in what the India Times calls the second ceasefire violation in less than a week.

One imagines that these and similar conflicts within the region would tend to hinder Lockheed's ability to export F-16s from India, even to other markets in the region that would very much like to buy the F-16.

Then again, with Pakistan wanting to buy eight F-16s, but India in the market for as many as 126, at least you can say this much: If Lockheed Martin does end up shifting F-16 production abroad, to take advantage of continuing demand in the region...it's clearly picked the more lucrative side of the border to set up shop.

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The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Wells Fargo (NYSE:WFC) CEO John Stumpfs career could be in jeopardy, according to sources close to the under fire executive, the FOX Business Network has learned after the banks employees were caught creating fraudulent accounts without their customers consent. The bank was forced to settle with the Consumer Federal Protection Bureau (CFPB) for $185 million.

Federal regulators discovered employees, since 2011, were secretly creating millions of unauthorized bank and credit card accounts without ever telling their clients. The bank told the CFPB that they had fired over 5,300 employees over the last five years in connection to the improper behavior of their employees.

Analysts have projected that bank employees opened over 1.5 million deposit accounts that may not have been authorized and submitted over 560,000 credit card accounts without customer knowledge.

Even after settling with the CFPB, Wells Fargo is starting to feel mounting regulatory pressure. The U.S. Department of Justice has opened up an investigation as did the House of Representatives, who are seeking interviews with numerous bank executives in light of the scandal. The DOJ investigation could lead to additional penalties and criminal charges.

That being said, some Wall Street analysts believe Stumpf will survive. Dick Bove, analyst at Rafferty Capital, believes the Wells Fargo board wont fire him because that would be admitting the bank did something wrong and they arent going to do that. When you fire the CEO you are giving massive credence to the issues in the company and they arent going to do that, said Bove.

However, that doesnt mean other company executives wont feel the heat. Along with the 5,300 who were fired in connection with the scandal, potentially other employees up the chain of command may be held accountable. Bove agrees, Human resources are the group that needs to be shaken up because the fact of the matter is: what type of people were they hiring who would do something like this?

Indeed, sources tell FOX Business, before the settlement employees were going to human resources with evidence implicating those who were creating the fraudulent accounts and management did nothing. Other sources close to Wells Fargo say that this scandal is just the beginning and the bank has been plagued with practices that are even worse than fraud. They did not elaborate further.

Wells Fargo declined to comment. After asking the CFPB if they were investigating other issues at the bank, spokeswoman Moira Vahey said, We dont have further comment about the consumer harms identified beyond what is in our public order. However, I can say that we will remain vigilant about taking action against any company within our jurisdiction who is engaging in harmful actions.

Wells Fargo can try to avoid holding their top executive responsible but the House and Senate committees are not going to look the other way. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) will be among the lawmakers grilling Stumpf when he appears on Capitol Hill next Tuesday to face a Senate panel licking their chops at the chance to lay the blame of the scandal on him. The House Financial Services Committee is also set to hold a hearing at the end of the month and has requested that Stumpf testify.

The customers are not planning on going down without a fight. Today a lawsuit was filed against Wells Fargo on behalf of bank and brokerage customers in a Utah Federal Court for alleged fraud, negligence and invasion of privacy.

Wells Fargo shares have lost 10.6% this month.
Apple Inc fans from Sydney to Tokyo, the first to snap the new iPhone 7 off the shelves, cheered as they left stores on Friday brandishing their purchases, flanked by applauding sales staff.

But underneath the usual fanfare, and despite complaints that the larger size of the new phone and the new jet black color were sold out, crowds were smaller than in past years.

Some 200 people were gathered in Sydney light drizzle for the privilege of being the first worldwide to hold an iPhone 7. Apple will launch in its key Asian market China later on Friday.

"It feels great to be the first in the world to have the iPhone 7. It was 100 percent worth it," said Marcus Barsoum, a 16-year-old "diehard Apple fan" who spent two nights camped outside the Sydney store.

Weary but elated, Barsoum charged in to the store at 8 a.m. to the cheers of Apple staff. He emerged with a matte black iPhone 7 although he had wanted a 7 plus in jet black.

Dale Adams, who works at J.P. Morgan in Sydney, arrived only 15 minutes before the store opened and was able to buy a 7 Plus, having ordered it online more than a week ago.

"I'm certainly not one of the hard core Apple fans but I think the bigger capacity, better battery, better camera, that's enough to make the jump," he said.

Chatter about the launch on Chinese microblog Weibo has been far more muted than when the iPhone 6 debuted in 2014. An index of searches on Baidu Inc, China's equivalent of Google, shows the new phone lagging both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 5.

Sales in China will be the acid test for Apple's year ahead: the mega success of the iPhone 6 in China drove sales last year, while the slower-burn 6S contributed to Apple's first global revenue drop in over a decade earlier this year.

Stores open in China later on Friday, a holiday.

(Reporting by Tom Westbrook in SYDNEY, Sijia Jiang in HONG KONG and Adam Jourdan in SHANGHAI; Editing by Stephen Coates)
A group of African-American doctors is calling on President Obama to ban the sale of menthol-flavored cigarettes, which data shows are heavily favored among black smokers. The African-American Tobacco Control Leadership Council sent a letter to the president in August, asking him to direct the Federal Drug Administration (FDA) to remove the products from the marketplace.

Young African-Americans die disproportionately from tobacco-related disease compared to other people in the population, Dr. Philip Gardiner, council co-chairman, told NBCNews.com. The punchline here about menthol is it allows the poisons in tobacco cigarettes to go down easier.

In 2013 the FDA found that menthol cigarettes likely pose a greater public health risk than regular cigarettes, but the agency stopped short of recommending a ban, according to the report. The FDA concluded menthol flavoring is associated with increased smoking initiation by younger people and greater addiction among all smokers.

A 2010 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report found that 83 percent of black adult smokers and 72 percent of underage black smokers prefer menthol-flavored brands, according to the report.

What we are asking of you, President Obama, can be accomplished rapidly with the stroke of a pen, the letter to Obama said. Your strong and decisive leadership can give our community a fighting chance against the number one killer of Black people, tobacco."

R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., which makes Newport cigarettes, told NBCNews.com Thursday that menthol cigarettes are not more harmful than non-menthol cigarettes and therefore do not need to be regulated differently.


Some parents see their own features in their babies when looking at a prenatal ultrasound, but one Georgia mom saw her future childs patriotism.

Meghan Merriott, who is 12 weeks pregnant, noticed her child saluting in her latest ultrasound, WTVM reported. Merriotts boyfriend, Robert Cooper, Jr., is a Marine.

"The baby was being very stubborn and did not want to wake up for the doctor to get the pictures that she needed," Merriott told the news channel. "So baby threw their hand up there! It almost made me cry I thought it was the sweetest thing."

Merriott, Cooper, and the couples 3-year-old son told WTVM they are excited to meet their future proud American in March 2017.
Sleep problems and gloomy daydreams may worsen the symptoms of a rare psychiatric disorder that causes people to feel as though they are "unreal," a new report of one man's case suggests.

In the report, researchers in the United Kingdom looked at sleep problems and daydreaming habits in a man with a disorder called depersonalization-derealization disorder, which makes the person feel disconnected from the real world. It turned out that, the worse he slept on a given night, the more severe his symptoms were the following day.

Moreover, repetitive and negative daydreams that the man experienced on some days were also linked to worsened psychiatric symptoms.

The new findings suggest that some of the symptoms of the disorder may be treated by addressing the persons sleep problems and daydreaming in therapy, the researchers wrote in the study, which was published in August in the journal Frontiers in Psychology.

Feeling unreal

Between 1 and 2.4 percent of the population may have depersonalization-derealization disorder, according to a 2013 study that was published in the journal BMC Psychology. People with the condition may have the persistent feeling that they are observing themselves from outside of their bodies. They may also feel as though the things around them are not real, according to the Mayo Clinic.

Traditionally, psychiatrists don't consider that sleep problems are a potential contributor to the symptoms of dissociative disorders, but the new study suggests that perhaps such problems should be considered, and addressed with treatments, Dr. Matthew Lorber, acting director of child and adolescent psychiatry at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, told Live Science. Lorber was not involved in the study.

The patient in the new study was 24 years old, and had experienced trauma during his childhood that included an assault. Dissociative disorders are usually rooted in severe past trauma, the researchers noted.

At the start of the study, the researchers assessed the man's mental health and told him what exactly the study was going to involve. During this initial meeting with the researchers, the patient told the researchers that he often had vivid dreams, and that his sleep patterns were irregular.

Then, for 40 days, the researchers texted the man six times a day with questions about his psychiatric symptoms, mood, sleep quality and the frequency of his daydreaming experiences, and recorded his replies.

They found that the symptoms of his disorder were worse on those days that followed nights when he had not slept well.

Good daydreams, bad daydreams

Moreover, his symptoms were also worse on the days that the man experienced negative daydreams. In contrast, when his daydreams were more positive, his symptoms did not get worse, according to the study.

Previous research has also suggested that there is a link between daydreaming and the worsening of this disorders symptoms, but the new study shows that only daydreams with negative, and not positive, content may affect these symptoms, the researchers said.

The new findings are in line with some other research, which has suggested that improving sleep quality in people with dissociative disorders may help to improve their symptoms, the researchers said.

However, Lorber said that more research is needed to test the new findings in a larger number of patients.

Originally published on Live Science.

Copyright 2016 LiveScience, a Purch company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Ryan Segovia started high school not in a classroom but in a hospital bed, fighting a disease that threatened to take his life. The now 16-year-old junior from Long Island, New York, was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) in 2015, and the illness caused him to miss out on the typical teenage experience that most of his peers enjoyed.

It was pretty hard, Segovia, who was homeschooled throughout his sophomore year, told FoxNews.com. It took a while to actually get teachers, and once I finally got all of my teachers having to go every single day to get chemotherapy, I had to cancel a lot of my meetings with the teachers and I cancelled so many for math that my teacher actually quit and I had to get another tutor.



But now, although hes still fighting cancer, things are looking up for Segovia, as a program offered at his hospital is helping him regain his footing at school.

The School Intervention & Re-entry Program at Stony Brook Childrens Hospital has begun offering a college planning workshop targeted to teens like Segovia who are diagnosed with pediatric cancers and blood disorders and are looking to transition back into school.

We are addressing things from college selection and applications like, What kind of a college should I be going to? to very specific issues faced by children who have cancer and blood disorders, like, Do I go to a college far from home or do I need to be close to a treating institution? Nicole Gutman, coordinator of The School Intervention & Re-entry coordinator at Stony Brook Childrens Hospital, told FoxNews.com.

The free workshop, which was funded through a grant from CureSearch for Childrens Cancer and the Long Island Association of Pediatric Hematology Oncology Nurses, will also feature elements of a traditional college expo with admission representatives from nine colleges present. Gutman said the response for the programs first expo has been positive, with 150 people expected to attend the session.

In addition to the speakers, attendees will be provided with resources regarding overview of school intervention services, the role of school personnel in the support of students, medical, psychosocial and education issues, symptoms and effects of treatments that necessitate physical therapy, overview of the need for rehabilitation services and strategies to address physical challenges in these students.

We think its a really unique program that were offering, Gutman said. There have been other college expos that address children with health care needs, but Im not sure they have addressed these facets. Were really proud to be offering such a unique pilot program here.

Now that Segovia is back with his classmates, he is looking forward to meeting new friends who joined the school while he was out. He also has dreams to pursue his college education in California and will be in attendance Sunday with his mother as a panel of financial planners, admission counselors and a visiting lecturer help answer important questions regarding the application process.

Im just trying to learn whatever theyre teaching us, Segovia said. I hear a lot of stuff about scholarships, so I want to look into that.


When Britain voted to leave the E.U. in June -- by a comfortable margin and with a record turnout -- it may have seemed the fight was won. Yet political elites who believe they, not the people, are sovereign are gearing up for one more siege to deny the British independence.

New Prime Minister Theresa May, although a "Remainer," has shown promising commitment by making her motto: Brexit means Brexit.

Others in British and European political establishments have not followed her example. The Daily Telegraph reported Friday that top E.U. officials meeting at a summit in Bratislava are planning to make life hell for Britain during negotiations, in the hope that a wobbly British political elite will simply give up and remain in the E.U. Relations are already so toxic that Brexit Secretary David Davis recently called one of the E.U. negotiators Satan.

The pressure is on in Britain too. Just as political elites across Europe have frogmarched voters back into the voting booths before when the vote doesnt go their way, the familiar call is now being rattled out by left-wing politicians, the BBC, The Guardian and on social media -- the British must vote again, or the referendum should be ignored altogether.

Pro-E.U. demagogues at home and abroad have gone through an embarrassing litany of excuses of why the vote doesnt count: the voters were conned, they didnt know what they were voting for, the voters were too old, the sample size was too small, and dont forget: RACIST, RACIST, RACIST!

The argument settled on -- perhaps the most brazen in its disregard for the voter -- is that the referendum was merely advisory and therefore either the voters or parliament should vote again. This time, they claim, the vote should be on when to trigger an obscure mechanism (Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty) to formally begin the process to leave the E.U.

The idea that the referendum, which dominated the national and international news for months and costs millions of pounds, was merely a practice run for the real thing, or was simply a glorified poll for parliaments general amusement, is of course total tripe. The vote was advisory only because it was assumed that our politicians would abide by fair play and didnt need to be forced to do what a clear majority of voters want.

It is also contemptuous of democracy. Labour MP David Lammy recently grumped that parliament is sovereign. No, Mr. Lammy -- the people are sovereign, and parliament is sovereign only in that it represents the people. And the people have spoken directly, they should not have to repeat themselves in order to be heard.

Lammy is not the only one who wants to repeat elections over and over again until he gets what he wants, as if Britain were some third-world tin-pot dictatorship. Tony Blair has said Britain could still stay in the E.U., while wannabe Labour leader Owen Smith said if he were prime minister, his party would work to shut down Brexit.

We still think you should think again he scolded the British people on a radio show.

Thankfully May has shown a hard head so far and reportedly intends to trigger Article 50 without consulting parliament, despite the howls of the left-wing commentariat. This is unsurprising considering the poll numbers, which show her Conservative Party (Tories) screaming ahead of Labour by 14 points -- a surge that can be put down to the Tories honorable stance to stand by the vote.

Yet the pressure is on. There is no clear Brexit party -- even a majority of Tories backed Remain -- and so the situation remains precarious if the vote were to go to parliament. Additionally, the bureaucratic jihadists of the E.U. will use every piece of legislative trickery to try and force Britain out of its unacceptable and uncouth desire for independence.

Regrettably, even major politicians from America -- a land known for valuing independence -- are against Brexit. Obamas famous comment ahead of the vote that Britain would be at the back of the queue infuriated Brits to the point many believed it helped the Brexit cause.

Last month, Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton took the unusual step of calling out Nigel Farage -- the retired leader of the U.K. Independence Party -- as part of a global brand of extreme nationalism led by Vladimir Putin. She also accused Farage of stoking anti-immigrant sentiment to win the referendum. The implication was clear -- not only is Farage a racist, but so are those who voted with him.

As Britains economy glows despite the predictions of doom, those committed to the European behemoth are becoming more desperate, and the attacks are likely to only get more sinister and more hysterical. It remains to be seen if Britain can hold fast.

Yet Britain has a good record for resisting such pressure. Britain was told it had to join the Euro -- it didnt. It was told it had to distance itself from the senile Ronald Reagan -- it didnt. It was told it should give up the Falkland Islands to the Argentinian brownshirts -- it didnt. It was told it couldnt possibly hope to resist the Nazi onslaught -- it did.

I wish, dear reader, I could assure you Brexit will happen no matter what. I can offer no such assurance -- the battle for Brexit will be tough, bloody and long. Brexit hangs in the balance, but the signs are encouraging. Here is to hoping the Churchillian spirit of we shall never surrender continues to guide Britains leaders as they face the challenge of a generation.
While the zika virus poses worrisome human health concerns, another potential health problem is brewing that threatens both humans and domesticated animals --the importing of foreign dogs for adoption.

Many people are unaware that the U.S. has become something of a favored nation for countries looking to export their rescue dogs due to several reasons.

First, Americans are big-hearted, and when seeking dogs many chose animals made available through rescues.

Second, theres a readymade market here  Americans love canines and own an estimated 80 million dogs.

The vast majority of imported rescue dogs are not tracked in the United States  either upon arrival or after they enter rescue channels.

Lastly, import rules on dogs can be easily flouted, allowing foreign exporters to send us their sick animals.

The vast majority of imported rescue dogs are not tracked in the United States  either upon arrival or after they enter rescue channels. Patti Strand, founder and national director of the National Animal Interest Alliance, a non-profit that studies shelter trends and the importation of rescue dogs, estimates that close to one million rescue dogs are imported annually from regions not known for stellar canine health and safety standards. They include dogs from Puerto Rico, Turkey, several countries in the Middle East and as far away as China and Korea. That compares to about 8 million dogs annually acquired as pets in the U.S.

All of this underscores that without improved oversight of pet rescue organizations, theres no way of definitively identifying how many foreign rescue dogs are put up for adoption here.

These foreign rescues may be well-intentioned, but they are courting disaster.

While it is often a challenge to gather information on an abandoned dog here in the U.S., it is even harder for a dog that originated overseas. Information may be missing, poorly translated or unreliable.

Challenges are especially serious when it comes to health and safety. Animals from other countries are not subject to the health and welfare laws of the U.S. and may arrive carrying serious and infectious canine diseases. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), although importation laws require all dogs to be examined by a licensed veterinarian, foreign paperwork is hard to verify and is commonly invalid or forged.

Likewise, the tracking, health and welfare standards that are required for dogs bred in the United States and sold in pet shops do not apply for pets identified as sourced from rescues.

Scores of puppy mill bills like New Jerseys S. 63/A. 2338 that ban pet stores from sourcing professionally-bred pets in lieu of pets sourced from rescues threaten to expand the problem to epic proportions.

The threat to public health is anything but theoretical. On May 30, 2015, eight dogs rescued in Egypt arrived in New York, all but one bound for U.S. rescues. Within days, a dog sent to Virginia became ill and was diagnosed with rabies.

The discovery necessitated an enormous public health investigation involving four state departments of health, three U.S. agencies, the transporting airline and the Egyptian government. Numerous people were interviewed from the airline, rescue organization and veterinarians office. In the end, 18 people were vaccinated for rabies either due to direct exposure or concern for possible contact. The rabies vaccination certificate for the dog had been forged, according to the CDC.

This is just one case. The CDC reports a significant uptick in public health concerns and incidents of disease in imported dogs that can be passed between animals and humans.

For example, an outbreak last year in the Midwest of canine influenza that sickened more than 1,100 dogs was traced to the importation of foreign animals, very likely a foreign dog or cat.

There are multiple international groups who are rescuing dogs from the meat market in Korea and shipping them into the U.S., and we have sketchy quarantine requirements if any at all, said Dr. Ed Dubovi, director at Cornell Universitys Animal Health Diagnostic Center.

Also at issue is the safety and suitability of foreign rescue dogs as family pets. Sources of dogs that are not socialized or bred to be pets are likely to require special handling and training that typical adopters -- and even rescues --are not equipped to provide.

Without knowledgeable care, these dogs will end up back in a shelter situation.

Opening our doors is having other undesirable effects. Though some imported dogs are taken by legitimate U.S. rescues, others are becoming the product of unregulated, informal markets, including online retail rescues. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture and U.S. Customs and Border Patrol, there have been numerous incidents involving smuggling of underage and sick animals. Substandard foreign breeders are taking advantage of all of these avenues into the U.S. market, rescue or otherwise.

The importation of rescue dogs does nothing to address issues at the source, and it actually encourages irresponsible breeding overseas. It has created an incentive for irresponsible brokers to round up street animals, buy dogs from Asian livestock markets and allegedly breed animals specifically for export to U.S. rescue markets. And because the animals are labelled as rescues, standards appear to be optional.

A pipeline for unrestricted imports of foreign rescue animals undercuts the mission of U.S. rescues, while creating a potential health and safety crisis.

The CDC is exactly correct in its analysis of the problem and its potential risks to Americans.

Considering the public health risk posed by importation of animals for the purposes of placing them in adoptive homes in the United States, and the current oversupply of adoptable animals already in the United States, persons and organizations involved with importing pets for the purposes of adoption should consider reevaluating, and potentially redirecting, their current efforts, the agency wrote.

Plenty of domestic dogs are languishing in shelters and in need of homes. Our duty is to help these dogs first.
What a difference a year makes.

Last year, Donald Trump, the billionaire businessman who was then leading the Republican presidential field in the polls, was all for defending Ukraine against Russian aggression.

In an unusual appearance by satellite last September, Mr. Trump told a gathering of the European elite in the Ukrainian capital that America and Europe should be doing far more to support the struggling country.

Specifically, he told participants at the annual, pro-Western Yalta European Security conference (YES) that President Obama was partly responsible for Russian president Vladimir Putin's aggression against Ukraine by paying only "lip-service" to reversing Russia's seizure of Ukraine's Crimea over two years ago. "Our president is not strong and he's not doing what he should be doing for the Ukraine," Trump said. "Putin does not respect our president whatsoever.

A year later, Donald Trump, now the Republican Partys nominee for president who is leading against Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, is President Putins best bud and can barely find Ukraine on a map.

In a stunning reversal of his earlier criticism of the Russian leader and Russias occupation of Crimea, Mr. Trump has not only praised Mr. Putin as a strong leader for Russia but denied that Russias seizure of Crimea constitutes an invasion. He has even implied that he might not come to the aid of NATO allies threatened by Russia.

What has happened in a year to so alter Mr. Trumps view of Mr. Putin and Americas strategic rival?

Officials, journalists and analysts can only speculate. In an article in July in Slate, Franklin Foer suggested that Mr. Trumps slavish devotion to Mr. Putin was rooted in his longstanding quest to do business in Russia, and that Mr. Trump, in fact, had received indirectly Russian money for several of his signature projects that had helped him preserve his image as a great builder as he recovered from bankruptcy.

Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets, Mr. Trumps son, Donald Trump Jr. has been quoted as acknowledging.

Such indirect financial support in exchange for political fealty is part of a consistent policy by Mr. Putin to undermine European unity and pro-American sentiment by buying influence with European leaders and such right-wing, anti-American politicians as Frances Marine Le Pen, who has gotten well-documented transfusions of cash to keep her presidential prospects alive, and former Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi, whom an American ambassador in Rome accused of having profited personally and profitably from Russian energy deals.

Mr. Foers article documents several questionable deals between Mr. Trump and Mr. Putins close financial allies.

Others point to the influence of Mr. Trump's now former campaign manager, Paul Manafort, whom Mr. Trump summarily dismissed after The New York Times revealed his own connections to the ousted pro-Russian Ukrainian leader Viktor Yanukovych.

Mr. Manafort worked to recraft the disgraced Ukrainian leaders image, but failed to register as a foreign lobbyist, as U.S. law requires.

Mr. Manaforts handiwork, including his indirect payments to Republican and Democratic lobbyists to advance Mr. Yanukovychs interests in Washington, helped pull Ukraine further Putins sphere of influence.

Other journalists and European politicians here in Kiev speculate about whether Mr. Trump is beholden to Mr. Putin because of alleged Russian hacking of the Democratic National Committee emails and the steady flow of embarrassing leaks about Hillary Clinton and her tenure as Secretary of State, experience which she has touted to bolster her foreign policy credentials and fitness for the highest office.

In a country all too familiar with the Soviet practice of silencing anti-Russian critics by secretly collecting compromising information against them, several conference attendees speculated about whether Mr. Putin had secured such potentially embarrassing information about Mr. Trump, and threatened to disclose it should he waiver in his enthusiasm for Russias autocratic president.

Most of those interviewed here at these two-day gathering of some 350 Western leaders, European officials, non-governmental organization representatives, and journalists, however, said only that they were mystified and outraged by Mr. Trumps enthusiasm for Mr. Putin. It is simply shocking that Americans -- who are usually so patriotic, no matter their political allegiance -- would support a presidential candidate who prefers Vladimir Putin to President Barack Obama, said Bernard-Henri Levy, a leading French intellectual who has staunchly supported Ukrainian independence.

But at the conference on Friday, Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko declined to weigh in on the American race and its implications for his country.

Asked whether he was troubled by Mr. Trumps statements praising Mr. Putin, Mr. Poroshenko said only that he was trying to meet both American candidates during his visit next week to the U.S. for the annual United Nations General Assembly. While Mrs. Clintons campaign had confirmed a meeting, he said, he had still had no word from Mr. Trumps campaign.
The shrillness of this presidential campaign continues 24/7. If youre like me, you worry about the impact of the cynical, bare-knuckled, in-your-face political season is having on our young people.

Kids need heroes to look up to and emulate. They arent going to find them in Washington anytime soon.

But I would like to suggest that families pause to reflect on two real life heroes who remind us what values are worth living and, if necessary dying for.

America just paused to mark the 15th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist outrages. There were so many heroes that day that we know about and many more whose heroism can be written down and commemorated in the Heavenly Court.

We owe it to our children to teach them that life is about choices, big and small and that there are true heroes in each generation to remind us of our capacity to stand up to evil; people like firefighter, Stephen Siller and teacher, Jane Haining.

As I drove from my moms apartment to Manhattan, through the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel this week, I thought of the incredible humanity of Fireman Stephen Siller.

On September 11th, 2001, that Staten Island resident had gone off duty and exited the tunnel enroute to home, when he heard about the attacks.

He tried to turn his truck around but was stopped at the entrance. Manhattan was already sealed off.

No one would have questioned Stephen if he had then gone home to await further instructions. Siller instead strapped on 60 pounds of gear and ran from the Brooklyn side of the tunnel directly to the World Trade Center.

He died pushing back against evil, while trying to help the innocent.



And then there is the remarkable legacy of another person who chose, not to flee evil, but to fearlessly confront evil while trying to protect and reassure the innocent.

New documents and photos were unearthed recently in a Scottish Church presenting us a full picture of a person whom the Nazis reduced to a number, 79467, but whose humanity they failed to extinguish, even in her final days.

Jane Haining was 47-years-old when she died at Auschwitz, but unlike the millions of Jews, Gypsies, Poles, she could have avoided being deported there in the first place.

Jane Haining was not a Jew, Gypsy or Pole.

She was a teacher from Scotland who volunteered for service as a missionary in 1932, becoming matron of the girls' home at the Scottish Mission School in Budapest. Haining looked after 50 of the school's 400 pupils (most of whom were Jewish), and quickly became fluent in Hungarian. Throughout the first years of WWII, she managed to keep her students safe.

In 1944, even when the Nazis moved on Budapest, she refused to return home to the safety of Scotland.

She insisted on staying with her girls, "If the girls need me in the days of sunshine, how much more do they need me in the days of darkness," she asked.

Haining was eventually taken from the school, arrested and accused by the Gestapo of eight offenses, including working among Jews, weeping when seeing the girls attend class wearing yellow stars and visiting British prisoners of war.

Haining was deported to Auschwitz, where she died with some of the girls from the Jewish Mission School.

It should come as no surprise that her last letter, written in the shadow of death and dated just two days before her murder at Auschwitz dealt mainly with her concerns not about her tragic fate but rather about the welfare of others.



As parents, our first instinct is try to protect our children from harsh realities of the world. But like it or not, everyone is going to be confronted with the ugliness and treachery of evil.

While most of us probably would never choose to put our own safety at risk to save others, we live in a world where young people watch their elders as they too often choose to avert their eyes and shut their mouths when confronted by evil doers.

We owe it to our children to teach them that life is about choices, big and small and that there are true heroes in each generation to remind us of our capacity to stand up to evil; people like firefighter, Stephen Siller and teacher, Jane Haining.

May their selflessness and sacrifices inspire generations to come.
The chairman of the House committee investigating Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server said Thursday that the computer specialist tasked with setting it up "needs to come and testify."

Bryan Pagliano did not attend Tuesday's Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing regarding the case, despite being supoenaed to do so. His attorneys said in a letter to Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, that Pagliano would continue to assert his constitutional right not to testify.

"Subpoenas are not optional in this country," Chaffetz told Fox News' "The Kelly File" Thursday night. "You have to comply with them."

Pagliano previously told the FBI under immunity that there were no successful security breaches of the server. However, he said there had been failed login attempts that he described as "brute force attacks."

Last year. Pagliano refused to testify before the House Select Committee on Benghazi.

On Thursday, Chaffetz told Megyn Kelly that he had sent Pagliano a second subpoena asking him to produce the document granting Pagliano immunity and had received no response.

"This is one of the largest security breaches in the history of the United States State Department," Chaffetz said. "Of course we have questions for him."

When Kelly asked Chaffetz why Pagliano should be required to appear when he was most likely to plead the Fifth Amendment, Chaffetz replied, "Sometimes they talk, sometimes they plead the Fifth, but you have to provide that opportunity and we expect them to show up."

When challenged again by Fox News contributor and Democratic political consultant Julie Roginsky, Chaffetz said, "You don't actually know what they're going to do. I want to hear from him, himself."
A House intelligence committee report issued Thursday condemned Edward Snowden, saying the National Security Agency leaker is not a whistleblower and that the vast majority of the documents he stole were defense secrets that had nothing to do with privacy.

The Republican-led committee released a three-page unclassified summary of its two-year bipartisan examination of how Snowden was able to remove more than 1.5 million classified documents from secure NSA networks, what the documents contained and the damage their removal caused to U.S. national security.

Snowden was an NSA contract employee when he took the documents and leaked them to journalists who revealed massive domestic surveillance programs begun in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. The programs collected the telephone metadata records of millions of Americans and examined emails from overseas. Snowden fled to Hong Kong, then Russia, to avoid prosecution and now wants a presidential pardon as a whistleblower.

Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., chairman of the committee, said Snowden betrayed his colleagues and his country.

"He put our service members and the American people at risk after perceived slights by his superiors," Nunes said in a statement. "In light of his long list of exaggerations and outright fabrications detailed in this report, no one should take him at his word. I look forward to his eventual return to the United States, where he will face justice for his damaging crimes."

Snowden insists he has not shared the full cache of 1.5 million classified documents with anyone. However, the report notes that in June, the deputy chairman of the Russian parliament's defense and security committee publicly conceded that "Snowden did share intelligence" with his government.

Ben Wizner, Snowden's attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union, blasted the report, saying it was an attempt to discredit a "genuine American hero."

"After years of investigation, the committee still can't point to any remotely credible evidence that Snowden's disclosures caused harm," Wizner said. "In a more candid moment, the NSA's former deputy director, who was directly involved in the government's investigation, explicitly said he didn't believe Snowden had cooperated with either China or Russia."

Snowden's revelations about the agency's bulk collection of millions of Americans' phone records set off a fierce debate that pit civil libertarians concerned about privacy against more hawkish lawmakers fearful about losing tools to combat terrorism. Democrats and libertarian-leaning Republicans pushed through a reauthorization of the USA Patriot Act last year that ended the program.

There was little evidence that the phone records or other surveillance programs Snowden revealed ever thwarted an attack.

Snowden is seeking a presidential pardon because he says he helped his country by revealing secret domestic surveillance programs. Separately, all members of the committee sent a bipartisan letter to President Barack Obama urging him not to pardon Snowden.

"The vast majority of what he took has nothing to do with American privacy," said Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the ranking Democrat on the House intelligence committee.

"The majority of what he took has to do with military secrets and defense secrets," Schiff said in an interview Thursday for C-SPAN's "Newsmakers." ''I think that's very much at odds with the narrative that he wants to tell that he is a whistleblower."

The Obama administration has urged Snowden to return to the U.S. and face trial. Justice Department spokesman Marc Raimondi has said "there is no question his actions have inflicted serious harms on our national security."

The committee report says that he was a "disgruntled employee who had frequent conflicts with his managers."

Publicly revealing classified information does not qualify someone as a whistleblower, the report said. The committee "found no evidence that Snowden took any official effort to express concerns about U.S. intelligence activities to any oversight officials within the U.S. government, despite numerous avenues for him to do so."

According to the committee, Snowden began mass downloads of classified material two weeks after he was reprimanded for engaging in a spat with NSA managers. The committee also described Snowden as a "serial exaggerator and fabricator."

"A close review of Snowden's official employment records and submissions reveals a pattern of intentional lying," the report said. "He claimed to have left Army basic training because of broken legs when in fact he washed out because of shin splints. He claimed to have obtained a high school degree equivalent when in fact he never did. "

The report said Snowden claimed to have worked for the CIA as a senior adviser, when he was a computer technician.

"He also doctored his performance evaluations and obtained new positions at NSA by exaggerating his resume and stealing the answers to an employment test," the report said.

Speaking by video link from Moscow, Snowden said Wednesday that whistleblowing "is democracy's safeguard of last resort, the one on which we rely when all other checks and balances have failed and the public has no idea what's going on behind closed doors."

The 33-year-old addressed a New York City news conference where advocates from the American Civil Liberties Union, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International announced an online petition drive to urge Obama to pardon Snowden before he leaves office. The supporters called Snowden a hero for exposing the extent of government surveillance by giving thousands of classified documents to journalists.

The report was released one day ahead of Friday's opening of director Oliver Stone's film "Snowden."
When womens mag Cosmopolitan met with Chelsea Clinton in February, they gave her the kid-glove treatment, asking whether shed live in the White House if her mother wins and whether she had fun moments to share. But when the same interviewer sat down this week with Ivanka Trump, those gloves came off.

Prachi Gupta, senior writer at Cosmopolitan, gave Ivanka Trump agrilling Wednesday over her fathers newly unveiled child care policies, which include a mandatory six weeks of paid leave for new working moms.

Not being a candidate herself, and being interviewed by a womens mag that predominantly writes about fashion and celebrity news, Trump may have thought shed be given a comfortable platform to talk about maternity leave and perhaps how her fathers policy broke with Republican orthodoxy.

No such luck. First question: Why did the Trump campaign wait so long to release this policy?

Then, Gupta asked why the policy did not cover paternity leave for gay men: Well, what about gay couples, where both partners are men?

Ivanka responded, The policy is fleshed out online, so you can go see all the elements of it. But the original intention of the plan is to help mothers in recovery in the immediate aftermath of childbirth.

Gupta kept pressing the issue. So I just want to be clear that, for same-sex adoption, where the two parents are both men, they would not be receiving special leave for that because they don't need to recover or anything? she asked.

Well, those are your words, not mine, Trump responded. Those are your words. The plan, right now, is focusing on mothers, whether they be in same-sex marriages or not.

Gupta then asked Trump if she would talk a little bit about comments Trump made 12 years ago when he described pregnancy as an inconvenience for business.

It is at this point, Trump objected to the line of questioning.

So I think that you have a lot of negativity in these questions, and I think my father has put forth a very comprehensive and really revolutionary plan to deal with a lot of issues. So I don't know how useful it is to spend too much time with you on this if you're going to make a comment like that, she said.

Apparently undeterred, Gupta asked how several of her dad's plans would be paid for. After saying that balancing the budget would be part of his tax reform plan, Trump ended the interview.

I'm going to jump off, I have to run. I apologize, she said.

Gupta was immediately praised on social media for her tough questions.

However, that hard-hitting method did not seem to be applied when Gupta interviewed Chelsea Clinton in February. Questions included:

What do you think of [Donald Trumps] attacks on your parents?

What are the three biggest issues young American women face today, and how will Hillary Clinton's campaign address those issues?

Has there been any family time on the campaign trail? If so, do you have any interesting or fun moments you can tell us about?

If Hillary Clinton were elected president, would you and your family move into the White House?

Clinton was allowed to talk in depth on each question, and apparently was not challenged about any of her answers.

Ivanka Trump declined to comment, but a source close to her told FoxNews.com: Ivanka's focus raising awareness of these issues among a broader more bi-partisan audience have significantly increased the likelihood of this type of legislation being passed during the next administration  whether it is Democratic or Republican."

"Its disappointing that such a respected womens publication would be so dismissive of these proposed policies which clearly advance the cause of helping women and families of all backgrounds, simply because of their feelings about the Republican nominee, the source said, adding that the interview was scheduled as a brief conversation, and that Trump answered all the questions, and didn't duck out early.

Gupta did not respond to a request for comment from FoxNews.com.
A push to close the countrys privately run or contracted immigration detention centers is drawing fire from lawmakers and law enforcement experts worried that doing so could lead to more overcrowding -- and even amount to a post-election gift to public employee unions.

The Homeland Security Advisory Council will make recommendations to Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson on Nov. 30 on whether to close the private centers. Johnson announced a review of the sites on Aug. 29, shortly after the Justice Department announced the Bureau of Prisons would reduce and ultimately end the use of privately run federal prisons in response to an audit.

However, closing the contracted immigration sites would require an 800 percent expansion of Immigration and Customs Enforcement capacity, according to ICE.

Theres obviously a need for these private prisons, Rep. John Culberson, R-Texas, told FoxNews.com, citing ICEs own numbers in saying theyre arresting more than 100,000 criminal illegal immigrants.

He said, Ive registered my concerns [with the administration] and I strenuously oppose closing these private facilities.

While the Obama administration already is moving to end the use of private general-purpose prisons, ending the use of such centers to hold illegal immigrants could have a far bigger impact. While only 10 percent of federal prisoners are in private facilities, about 60 percent of ICE detainees pending deportation procedures are held in contracted facilities. Their population fluctuates, but averages nearly 34,000 per day, according to ICE.

Immigration rights activists originally asked President Obama in August to close down those detention centers.

But there could be another factor at play.

Matthew Vadum, senior vice president for the Capital Research Center, a think tank that investigates liberal nonprofits, said the push is driven to benefit activists and labor unions.

This will benefit government unions by providing more opportunities for federal workers and expand unions. De-privatizing doesnt mean shutting down all of these detention centers, Vadum told FoxNews.com. Some will be taken over by the government. This is a gift to the labor movement, but first and foremost its ideological, based on the de-incarceration movement.

As of August, ICE uses 182 adult detention facilities, only 10 percent of which are federal government-owned. The rest are in contracted facilities, in many cases with local governments such as county jails.

This admittedly makes the immigrant centers more complex than the federal prisons, said Jeremy Mohler, spokesman for the liberal group, In The Public Interest, which has long advocated against both private prisons and detention centers. He acknowledged that public employee unions favor closing the centers but said it goes beyond self-interest.

Federal employee unions are interested in having public facilities because that means more union employment in the long run and work conditions will be better, Mohler told FoxNews.com. Its not just self-interest. Unions are interested in not throwing [immigrant] families into torturous situations.

In The Public Interest is a project of the Partnership for Working Families, a coalition of several progressive groups that includes labor unions.

The private immigration centers are actually in the interest of the illegal immigrant detainees, contends Gerges Scott, a former deputy secretary for the New Mexico Department of Corrections.

If DHS closes these detention centers, the detainees will be shipped to overcrowded federal centers, Scott said. Women and children, they will be separated, but they will still be in the same facility with dangerous illegal immigrants. As a former corrections official and taxpayer, this is a concern to me.

During Scotts time in office from 1999 through 2002, New Mexico was under a federal order to deal with state prison overcrowding and the state legislature was in no mood to build new prisons. So, the state contracted with private prisons, which he said are more accountable and efficient.

Private prisons have the same standards and guidelines as federal prisons, Scott said. There is a lot more accountability for private prisons. Union workers in public prisons provide a lot of leniency for their employees. In a private prison, a majority are not unionized, so the oversight is very rigid.

The American Civil Liberties Union disputes that assessment. The legal group helped conduct a review that found over a two-year period, six of the eight deaths attributable to substandard medical care in the immigration centers were at contract facilities, ACLU staff attorney Carl Takei told FoxNews.com. But, he adds, if the DHS is going to conduct a meaningful review, it has to tackle ICEs incarceration policy.

The head of one large private prison operator, GEO Group, Inc., said he welcomes the review.

Our public-private partnership has allowed ICE to transfer services from older public jail facilities that did not meet the most up-to-date national standards to GEOs highly rated, cost-effective facilities, said George C. Zoley, GEOs chairman, in a statement. We are confident that this independent review will show that GEO has provided needed, cost-effective services that have resulted in significantly improved safety outcomes for the men and women in ICEs care and custody.

ICE reportedly has had $1.18 billion in contracts with GEO since 2008. Another private firm, Corrections Corp of America, got $689 million in ICE contracts since 2008.

CCA spokesman Jonathan Burns said the company has worked with the federal government for 30 years and also welcomes the review.

"This effort builds on the unfettered, daily, onsite access ICE officials have to our facilities and the thousands of government audits were subject to each year," Burns told FoxNews.com. "Were proud of the quality and value of the services we provide and look forward to sharing that information."
As poll after poll shows the presidential race tightening, Hillary Clinton has already fired most of her heavy artillery at Donald Trump.

She has called him temperamentally unfit, too dangerous for the Oval Office and ignorant about foreign policy. She has said he makes racist statements and that many of his followers are in fact racist, sexist, xenophobic, homophobic and Islamophobic. She has said hes built his campaign on prejudice and paranoia. She has denigrated his business record, mocked his corporate bankruptcies and accused him of stiffing small contractors.

What else has she got? How do you stage an October surprise if youve gone nuclear in July, August and September?

No wonder Democrats are getting nervous.

After all the stuff dumped on Trump by the Hillary camp and the media, hes tied in the CBS/New York Times poll, trailing by 1 point in a new Fox News poll, and ahead in such crucial states as Florida and Ohio. So what should Clinton do now?

Rich Lowry made the point quite concisely in Politico:

The Clinton campaign has already used his greatest hits of most offensive statements in countless TV ads. I was appalled that Trump mocked a disabled reporter, but even I am sick of seeing the clip every other time I turn on the TV. If none of this has sunk Trump and the race gets even closer, whats left that is going to have a new and different shock value?

This was always the danger in making the Clinton campaign primarily about demonizing Trump in a change election in which she is undeniably the establishment candidate. He does the same to her, but Trump is identified with a few signature issues: immigration, terrorism and using his business background to create jobs.

Clinton has position papers on everything under the sun, but no single issue that generates excitement and no shorthand to sum up her candidacy. The other guys crazy isnt the most inspiring slogan.

One thing that Clinton could do is sell herself as the better choice to the white working-class voters who are defecting to Trump. What will she do to make their lives better? These are folks who are drawn to the Trump brand because theyve heard so many empty promises over the years and want to shake up Washington.

One thing shes barely done is to accuse Trump of flip-flopping after having supported Democratic policies in the pastprobably because she doesnt want voters to think hes actually a closet moderate.

Trump, hardly an orthodox Republican, is trying to make inroads onto Democratic turfand appeal to womenby proposing paid maternity leave and child-care tax credits. Clinton has her own proposals, but Trump got more attention by using his daughter Ivanka as a TV surrogate. Its been fascinating to watch conservative pundits say they dont favor an expansion of the welfare state, then quickly pivot to why this is good politics for Trump.

Theres no question that Clinton, back on the trail yesterday after fighting pneumonia, will continue hammering Trump, in part because thats what generates headlines. She asked whether America can put a loose cannon in charge of the country. But have we reached the point where were desensitized to the terrible things these candidates say about each other?
Donald Trumps claim Friday that Hillary Clinton and her 2008 campaign started the Obama birther controversy touched off a series of instant fact-checking from media outlets who branded the claim false  but it seems they may have jumped the gun.

Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it, Trump said in Washington, D.C. Friday, referring to theories President Obama was not born in the United States. President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period.

Media outlets immediately branded his claim about Hillary Clinton's involvement as an outright falsehood.

Trump admits Obama born in U.S. but falsely blames Clinton for starting rumors, declared The Washington Post.

Trump drops claim but falsely accuses Clinton of starting it, said The New York Times.

However, that assertion was itself cast into doubt when former McClatchy D.C. Bureau Chief James Asher tweeted that long-time Clinton confidante Sidney Blumenthal had encouraged him to investigate the rumor that Obama was not born in America.

His version of events raises questions about the Clinton campaigns denials that it had anything to do with the controversy, but media outlets didnt suggest any gray area.

Clinton 2008 campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle seemed to muddy the waters even further when, in denying that there was a connection, admitted that there was an Iowa volunteer who forwarded an email promoting the conspiracy.

There was a volunteer coordinator, I believe in late 2007, I think in December, one of our volunteer coordinators in one of the counties in Iowa. I don't recall whether they were an actual paid staffer, but they did forward an e-mail that promoted the conspiracy, she said on CNN, adding that Clinton herself made the decision to fire the person immediately.

Trumps campaign immediately jumped on the Doyle interview, saying it vindicated Trump.

With Clintons 2008 campaign manager admitting on national television and on Twitter that they promoted the rumors surrounding now-President Obamas heritage, Mr. Trump has been fully vindicated, spokesman Jason Miller said in a statement.

Not only was a Clinton campaign worker blamed and fired over the activity, we have now been informed that Secretary Clinton was aware of what was going on, with Clintons campaign manager even apologizing to Obamas campaign manager, he said.

Clinton meanwhile, continued to blast Trump for his involvement in the controversy, tweeting: President Obamas successor cannot and will not be the man who led the racist birther movement. Period.
Small numbers of U.S. special operations forces for the first time are accompanying Turkish government forces and their Syrian opposition partners fighting Islamic State militants inside Syria, military and administration officials said Friday.

The move follows a period of U.S. tensions with Turkey, including U.S. criticism of clashes last month between Turkish and Syrian Kurdish forces in northern Syria. Turkey is a NATO ally of Washington's, but it has been angered by U.S. support for the Kurdish YPG militia, which has been the most effective U.S. partner in fighting the Islamic State in Syria.

A Pentagon spokesman, Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, said the Americans are advising and providing other assistance to Turkish troops who are clearing territory on the Syrian side of Turkey's border between the Syrian towns of Jarablus and Ar Rai.

"Access to the Turkey-Syria border region is strategically important to ISIL's operations in Syria and Iraq as well," Davis said, using a common acronym for the Islamic State.

"Denying ISIL access to this critical border cuts off critical supply routes in and out of Iraq and Syria and further isolates ISIL's so-called `capital' in Raqqa," said another Pentagon spokesman, Marine Maj. Adrian J.T. Rankine-Galloway.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest noted the U.S. has long pushed Turkey to enhance security along its border.

"We have been pleased to see the Turkish pursue this kind of decisive, strategically significant action that will aid our efforts," he said.

Davis said the Americans are providing the same training, advice and other assistance that U.S. forces have been providing to other Syrian opposition groups -- such as the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces -- fighting the Islamic State in northern Syria. This is the first time, however, that U.S. troops have performed this role alongside Turkish troops.

Davis did not say how many U.S. troops are working with the Turks, but others said it was approximately a few dozen. They are among 300 U.S. troops authorized by President Barack Obama to provide training, advice and assistance inside Syria as part of the broader military campaign against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.

Officials said not say how long the U.S. special operations troops will work with the Turks and their Syrian opposition partners, but it appeared likely they will help with Turkish-led operations aimed at clearing the towns of al-Bab and Dabiq, which are south and southwest of Ar Rai and are under Islamic State control.
Donald Trump tried to tamp down a newly revived campaign dust-up Friday over his views on President Obamas birthplace, declaring the president was born in the United States  period  after declining to make that statement earlier this week.

The Republican presidential nominee also tried to blame Hillary Clinton for starting the controversy back in 2008, which her team denies. He cast his remarks as a bid to put the issue to rest once and for all, at a time when his poll numbers are rising.

Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it, Trump said in Washington, D.C. President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period. Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again.

He spoke at his new Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., a visit that began with lengthy remarks from military supporters and veterans. He briefly addressed the birther issue at the end.

The statement comes after Trumps response on the matter in an interview Wednesday revived the issue. In the interview with The Washington Post, Trump was asked whether he believed Obama was born in the U.S. "I'll answer that question at the right time," Trump told the paper. "I just don't want to answer it yet."

Trumps campaign spokesman, trying to calm the waters, said overnight the Republican candidate now believes Obama was born in the U.S. Campaign spokesman Jason Miller said Trump "did a great service to the country" by bringing closure to the debate.

"In 2011, Mr. Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate," Miller said.

But the Clinton campaign seized on Trumps reluctance to address the issue in his Post interview.

Speaking shortly before Trump across town at the Black Women's Agenda Symposium, Clinton said Friday the Republican nominee was feeding into the bigotry and bias that lurks in our country  and should apologize.

Barack Obama was born in America, she said. Donald Trump owes him and the American people an apology.

Her campaign called his Friday comments "disgraceful."

The dust-up comes as Trump gains on Clinton in national and battleground state polls, even surpassing her in some states.

A new Fox News poll shows Clinton topping Trump by just one point among likely voters in the four-way ballot nationally.

In the head-to-head matchup, Trumps up by one point.

Both candidates were fundraising Friday after events in Washington. Clinton has endured a rough week on the campaign trail, after criticizing some Trump supporters last Friday as "deplorables" and then having to take time off from the campaign due to a bout of pnemonia.

She used the birther issue to try and go back on offense.

While Obama was born in Hawaii, Trump several years ago was a key figure in stoking the so-called "birther" controversy. Critics saw it as an attempt to delegitimize the nations first black president.

Trump has said repeatedly during the campaign that he no longer talks about the "birther" issue.

The Trump campaigns statement late Thursday claimed that Clinton launched the birther movement during her unsuccessful primary run against Obama in 2008.

"Hillary Clinton's campaign first raised this issue to smear then-candidate Barack Obama in her very nasty, failed 2008 campaign for President," the statement said. "This type of vicious and conniving behavior is straight from the Clinton Playbook. As usual, however, Hillary Clinton was too weak to get an answer."

Clinton has long denied the claim, and fact-checkers previously have found no public evidence that she or her campaign directly pushed the issue. Rather, Trumps comments appear to refer to reports that Clinton supporters circulated an email during the bitter 2008 primary race questioning Obamas citizenship.

Yet former McClatchy D.C. bureau chief James Asher said on Twitter Friday that Clinton confidant Sidney Blumenthal in fact told me in person that Obama was born in Kenya.

Obama had released a standard short form of his birth certificate before the 2008 presidential election. Anyone who wants a copy of the more detailed, long-form document must submit a waiver request, and have that request approved by Hawaii's health department.

In 2011, amid persistent questions from Trump about his birthplace, Obama submitted a waiver request. He dispatched his personal lawyer to Hawaii to pick up copies and carry the documents back to Washington on a plane.

The form said Obama was born at 7:24 p.m. on Aug. 4, 1961, at Kapiolani Maternity and Gynecological Hospital in Honolulu. It is signed by the delivery doctor, Obama's mother and the local registrar.

At the White House on Friday, Obama declined to comment at length on the issue, saying hes got other business to attend to  and is confident about where he was born.

Fox News Nicholas Kalman and Tamara Gitt and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
Governments around the world are pushing an ambitious initiative to share agricultural data in an attempt to eradicate hunger.

Born out of the 2012 G-8 Summit, Global Open Data for Agriculture and Nutrition (GODAN) aims to unlock existing but often unavailable agriculture and nutrition data. The effort is a step towards the U.N.s goal of ending hunger by 2030.

According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), almost 800 million people in the world struggle with hunger and malnutrition.

GODAN, which has over 363 partners spanning governments, non-governmental organizations and companies, kicked off a two-day summit to harness open data in New York Thursday.

The concept behind GODAN is simple  more openness and more transparency, more sharing of information, said U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, during a keynote presentation Friday.

Vilsack also used the event to launch the U.S. Department of Agriculture Branded Products database, a free online resource that contains nutrition details of more than 80,000 name brand prepared and packaged foods. He also announced an update to the Global Agricultural Concept Scheme (GACS), a thesaurus of over 350,000 terms in 28 languages that establishes common terminology across agriculture and nutrition worldwide. GACS is a collaboration between USDA, the FAO and the Centre for Agriculture and Bioscience International (CABI).

Many countries outside the U.S., such as Kenya, are keen to share agricultural data.

Information is going to play a critical role, Willy Bett, Kenyas Agriculture Minister, told FoxNews.com at the GODAN summit. Kenya, he explained, is creating an agricultural information system that will provide the likes of satellite data, soil and crop information, as well as details of local infrastructure, population demographics and Kenyan agricultural regulations.

This could help improve productivity within Kenya itself - if you are growing soy bean, for example, where is the most ideal place to grow soy bean? he said. You have information on how to do your agriculture better.

Open data can also help drive external investment, according to Bett. We have a lot of people that want to invest in Kenya, and they would need to know some of this information, he explained.

The Minister, however, acknowledged the broader challenges of sharing vast quantities of data globally in ways that are easily searchable. This is the push were trying to see now, he said. Were looking at a situation from the visionary perspective where we would have a global portal where all this information will be posted in a certain format  which would be accessed easily by any user.

Its not easy  certain countries have restrictions in terms of the legal framework, he added.

Other countries supporting GODAN include Mexico, Argentina, the U.K., Canada, Brazil and Nigeria.

A number of companies have also thrown their weight behind GODAN, including crop technology specialist Syngenta. The call here is for people to just have a mindset, a cultural change, where they think not just about producing the data for their particular purposes, for today, Derek Scuffell, Syngentas Research and Development data strategist, told FoxNews.com. You ensure that that data is connectable to the rest of the data in the world  there are technical frameworks that can help with that.

In 2013 Syngenta published its Good Growth Plan, which sets out six ambitious objectives to improve agriculture around the world in terms of crops, biodiversity and the people who work in agriculture. The plan is based on data collected from 3,600 reference farms in 41 countries.

Follow James Rogers on Twitter @jamesjrogers
A picture snapped by an amateur photographer in Scotland has created a huge splash because it appears to show the fabled Loch Ness Monster.

The photographer is 58-year-old Ian Bremner, a worker in a whiskey warehouse who was in the area looking for red deer, Britain's South West News Service (SWNS) reported. On Saturday, he snapped the photo of what some say is Nessie when it or whatever it is in the picture was close to the coast between two villages on the southeast side of the long lake.

While theres no definitive word on whats in the image, it certainly shows something: perhaps a single creature of some kind, or maybe three seals, as some have suggested. The Scotsman newspaper has even headlined an article about the picture: Most convincing picture of the Loch Ness monster ever taken?

This is the first time Ive ever seen Nessie in the loch, Bremner said, according to SWNS. I would be amazing if I was the first one to find her.

His sighting is just one of over a total 1,000 reported sightings of the mythical creature the idea of which has captivated people for years and years.

Purported sightings of the Loch Ness Monster continue to be hotly debated, with some described as hoaxes or just caused by natural phenomena, like logs.
Samsungs ongoing Galaxy Note7 woes are perfectly timed for Apple, say tech experts, as the eagerly-anticipated iPhone 7 hits the market Friday.

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission announced an official recall of Samsungs Note7 phone Thursday, citing serious fire and burn hazards on the device. The recall affects 1 million devices, according to the CPSC. "Samsung has received 92 reports of the batteries overheating in the U.S., including 26 reports of burns and 55 reports of property damage, including fires in cars and a garage," it said.

Samsung's woes with the product recall for Note 7 could well play to Apple's advantage, especially as its happening just as the first iPhone 7's hit the market, Barry Kirk, vice president of consumer loyalty specialist Maritz Motivation Solutions, told FoxNews.com, via email. Samsung has what we would call true loyalty -- loyalty that goes beyond price and is based on the quality of the product experience. That works great unless that brand experience ever falls on its face -- like when a phone catches fire -- at which point those customers are up for grabs.

The Note7, which offers iris scanning technology to unlock the phone, was unveiled in a blaze of publicity last month and garnered rave reviews. Earlier this month, however, Samsung ordered a global recall of the jumbo phones after its investigation of explosion reports found the rechargeable lithium batteries were at fault.

Apple unveiled the iPhone 7 on Sept. 7 and signs suggest massive pent-up demand for the latest version of the iconic phone. The tech giant told TechCrunch earlier this week that all versions of the larger iPhone 7 Plus and jet black models of the iPhone 7 are already sold out and will not be available for customers walking into Apple stores.

The Cupertino, Calif.-based firm said that availability for different iPhone finishes will vary at partner locations and recommended that customers check directly with its partners.

Drexel Hamilton analyst Brian White described Samsungs global recall as propitious for Apple in a note released earlier this month, with images and videos of burning Galaxy Note7 devices causing some damage to Samsungs brand and further bolstering Apples. Earlier this week White also noted big iPhone 7 pre-orders numbers at carriers T-Mobile and Sprint.

Other analysts have noted similar trends. "Based on our survey work, U.S carrier promotions have driven strong initial demand for the new iPhone 7 products, said Canaccord Genuity analyst Michael Walkley, in a note released on Friday. Between the aggressive U.S. carrier promotions, favorable premium tier competitive environment due to the Galaxy Note 7 battery issues, and stronger than anticipated initial consumer demand, we believe initial replacement sales for the iPhone 7 are better than our expectations, leading us to slightly increase our estimates."

Canaccord Genuity increased its estimate for fiscal 2017 iPhone sales from 221 million to 226 million phones.

Apple took the bold decision to remove the headphone jack on the iPhone 7 and also launched new wireless AirPods, which have been grabbing plenty of attention. Other new features on the phones include a solid state home button and stereo speakers, as well as new dual camera technology on the iPhone 7 Plus.

The timing couldn't be worse from Samsung's perspective  their big flagship was launched just weeks before the iPhone 7 was announced, and was supposed to be on sale for a couple of weeks before the iPhone 7, but in the end you can't buy a Note7 anywhere, analyst Jan Dawson of Jackdaw Research, told FoxNews.com, via email. Apple will definitely benefit at least some from a combination of Note7 buyers whose phones were recalled and would-be Note7 buyers who will now buy an iPhone instead. It's not going to make an enormous difference, but it'll certainly help a little.

Pricing for the iPhone 7 starts at $649 and pricing for the iPhone 7 Plus starts at $769. AirPods are priced at $159.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.



Follow James Rogers on Twitter @jamesjrogers
LINCOLN  Prisons Director Scott Frakes turned in his long-anticipated request for state funding Thursday, his first such proposal.

Frakes is asking Gov. Pete Ricketts and the Legislature for an increase of $15.3 million in state general funds, and 164.5 corrections worker positions in the next two fiscal years.

Combined with other funds, including money for construction projects, the total rises to $54 million over the two fiscal years of 2017-18 and 2018-19.

The $15.3 million general fund proposal would add to a $208 million budget base.

Frakes said he believes the governor is supportive of his request, but now Ricketts has the task of working in the prisons' financial and personnel needs with the many other agency requests for next year's budget proposal, which could total more than $8.7 billion.

Going into the budget process, Frakes acknowledged his agency had significantly fewer resources than he was accustomed to in Washington, where he last worked. It had a clear maintenance backlog that needed to be addressed and employee pay challenges -- all accumulated before he was brought in by a newly elected Ricketts 19 months ago.

But in terms of meeting the needs of the department into the future, Frakes said he felt Ricketts was responsive, thoughtful and had good insight.

His budget request includes a $75 million reception and treatment center at Lincoln Correctional Center, with $40.3 million proposed in the next two-year budget and another $35 million in the following two-year budget.

The new construction would combine the existing Diagnostic and Evaluation Center and the Lincoln Correctional Center on the West Van Dorn Street campus.

It would house the intake center for male prisoners and residential mental health beds, including 32 additional mental health beds for the sickest and most dangerous mentally ill men. It would also house a 32-bed skilled nursing facility for acute and serious medical needs.

"This to me is so important to create this," he said. "We'd have properly designed space for the people that are actively psychotic, treatment resistant, violent."

Lincoln Sen. Kate Bolz was among a small group of senators and legislative staff who were briefed Thursday on the corrections request. She serves on both the appropriations and corrections special investigative committees.

"I think it's pretty clear that there's real need for protective services staff," Bolz said. "And I think they're making some smart investments in programming and education staff positions."

What may need more work, she said, are the needs for significant pay increases for corrections officers and other protective services staff, investments in their health insurance and longevity pay.

The department also has critical needs for recruiting and retaining behavioral health staff for the prisons, she said.

"I don't know that we saw a really specific proposal or investment around that area," Bolz said.

She also has questions about the $75 million proposal for the reception and treatment center. More thorough discussion is necessary on how those needs will be met and how the plan intersects with needs and demands of the Lincoln Regional Center, she said.

The Department of Correctional Services Special Investigative Committee has three more hearings scheduled in the next couple of months to better determine the department's needs. And employee salary negotiations are ongoing and still a question mark.

The proposal will not be available on the Department of Administrative Services budget division website until next week, but Frakes held a briefing on the funding request Thursday for reporters in a effort, he said, to be transparent and accountable.

The funding requests are consistent with the department's staffing analysis, master plan and the need to provide programming to prepare prisoners to transition back into the community.

"Our priority, reflected in this budget, is to keep people safe, he said.

Other highlights of the budget include:

 Hiring 96 protective services staff over the two years, including 44 for Lincoln Correctional Center, four for the Diagnostic and Evaluation Center, 25 for the Nebraska State Penitentiary, 20 for Omaha Correctional Center and three for Tecumseh State Correctional Institution. They would be phased at 12 per quarter in both years.

 Seven positions would be created for a transportation unit to coordinate transfers between prisons, pick up out-of-state parole violators, and for absconders and medical transports, for example.

 Seven positions would be hired to support the cognitive behavioral interventions program.

 The practice of sending inmates to contracted county jails to ease prison crowding would end. Frakes added the projected decrease of about 800 inmates in the prisons by next June -- due to changes in sentencing laws in the past two years -- may take a few more months than expected.
A cell phone battery caused an inflight disruption after catching fire on a Delta Air Lines flight from Norfolk, Va. to Atlanta Friday morning.

According to The Virginian-Pilot, the fire started about 15 minutes after flight 2557s departure.

Passenger Kristi Parrotte says she had just fallen asleep when she started to smell smoke and heard someone call out to crew. She says she was seated about two rows behind the fire and was able to see a plume of smoke coming from the seats.

"It wasn't a big flaming fire, it was more smoldering smoke," Parrotte told the Pilot. She says there was confusion among the flight attendants as they tried to locate the origin of the smoke.

"We're all up out of our seats wondering where the smoke was coming from and what to do," said Parrotte.

According to the passenger, retired military personnel aided the flight attendants in extinquising the fire by using a bottle of water until a fire extinguisher was located. Others helped passengers get out of the cabin area filled with smoke.

"The passengers all worked really well together," Parrotte said. "It was good to see."

Though there was some damage to the seats, no one was hurt during the incident and the smoke cleared out of the cabin within a few moments. Flight attendants said the owner has not been identified.

The type of phone involved in the cabin fire has not been released but the report comes amid the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commissions official recall of Samsungs Note7 phone yesterday after numerous reports of the product overheating and catching fire.

At the departure gate in Norfolk, Parrotte says passengers were told to keep all Samsung Galaxy Note7 phones turned off and not to charge them. Another announcement was made after passengers boarded the plane. After the fire, a flight attendant told passengers to turn off all cell phones, regardless of make.

A Delta Air Lines representative was not immediately available for comment.
In response to a recent survey about travelers avoiding Florida due to the Zika virus outbreak, the Walt Disney Co. announced Thursday that the mosquito-borne illness has not hurt its theme park business in Orlando.

According to Bloomberg.com, a spokeswoman for Disney said that the company does not believe the Zika virus outbreak in regions of Florida had any real impact on cancellations or future bookings. She reiterated remarks made by Disney CEO Bob Iger last month. But this was before cases of Zika were confirmed outside the Miami area.

The comments were in response to an analysis and tourist survey that stated the Zika virus was causing travelers to reconsider plans to visit resorts in Florida, including the Disney parks in Orlando.

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As a result, media analyst Rich Greenfield suggested investors sell their stock in the company.

Disney is keeping a close eye on the situation, but it has already been proactive by handing out free mosquito repellent in its Orlando parks and hotels since Aug. 28.

The spread of the Zika virus is alarming, though, as the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Florida Health Department are reporting a total of 70 cases have been confirmed in Orange County alone.

Miami and its surrounding areas have been impacted most by the Zika virus outbreak, and hotel operators in the area have noted a handful of cancellations, but say they have been very sporadic. As a result, hotels in the region are taking extra steps to protect guests, including removing standing water and handing out insect spray on site.
Are you thinking about taking a cruise vacation in the late fall?

Cruising during the autumn affords some fantastic seasonal sailings. From checking out the changing colors while sailing along the Northeast to celebrating warmer weather down in the Caribbean, here are some of fall's best cruise trips.

Fall for foliage.

Like cruises to Alaska, those in Canada and New England are offered seasonally, usually in the summer from around May to October. But now is the time to book travel to catch fiery fall foliage as the autumn leaves change color. Cruise options in these parts include smaller expedition ship adventures and larger ones aboard mainstream lines.

Intimate itineraries can be found on American Cruise Lines American Star. Its eight day Hudson River Cruises itinerary roundtrip from New York City visits Poughkeepsie, Troy/Albany, Kingston, West Point, Sleepy Hollow and more. The dramatic Catskill Mountains and Taconic and Berkshire Hills skirt the river route. Rates aboard the 100-guest ship start at $3,545 per person.

To save some money, travelers can opt to sail on a larger ship, like the Regal Princess from Princess Cruises, which is offering North American trips beginning at $599 per person. The five day voyage also departs roundtrip from New York City with fewer stops at Saint John, New Brunswick and Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Halloween on the high seas.

If warmer weather is more your speed, don a crazy costume and celebrate the Halloween holiday at sea, where parties and other activities are hosted on board several lines including Carnival Cruise Line to Disney Cruise Line.

Carnival fleet guests will be in for a spooky good time as its ships feature everything from costume contests and pumpkin carving to Halloween film screenings and photo-ops. The lines Carnival Breeze, for example, leaves from Galveston, Texas for a weeklong voyage on Oct. 30 with prices beginning at $469 per person. Guests will enjoy Halloween on a sea day before visiting Montego Bay, Jamaica; Grand Cayman, Cayman Islands and Cozumel, Mexico.

On the Disney Cruise Line, its signature Halloween on the High Seas festivities will be under way with Mickey Mouse and friends dressed up alongside passengers for family-friendly fun. Only on Disney will you also find Jack Skellington and Sally from The Nightmare Before Christmas along for the ride. A three-night Oct. 28 sailing on the premium Disney Dream starts at $1,650 per person. Cruises are also scheduled on the Disney Magic and Disney Fantasy. The Disney Wonder is sitting the 2016 holiday out as its redesigned with new features during this time.

A Thanksgiving cruise feast.

This holiday season, be thankful for a little vacation. Celebrate Thanksgiving with family and friends on one of many cruise lines putting out the spread like Norwegian Cruise Line and Royal Caribbean International.

West Coast residents will enjoy Norwegians five day Mexican Riviera departure roundtrip from Los Angeles on Nov. 20 with rates beginning at $519 per person. Besides enjoying all of the fixings  which the line says includes festive-themed menus and sumptuous array of dinner and dessert options  guests will visit Cabo San Lucas before returning home.

Also serving up turkey day meals is Royal Caribbeans Empress of the Seas. The trip leaves from Miami on Thanksgiving day, for a five night roundtrip out to Key West, Fla. and Cozumel, Mexico, before sailing back to Miami. Prices start at $198 per person.


A Missouri man considered a person of interest in his ex-girlfriend's 2007 disappearance remains in jail after being charged with burning another missing woman's SUV.

Kylr Yust made his first court appearance on the felony knowingly burning charge Thursday. He's accused of torching 21-year-old Jessica Runions' small sport utility vehicle. The suburban Kansas City woman went missing last week. A judge entered a not guilty plea on Yust's behalf.

Police say Yust is a person of interest in his teenage ex-girlfriend's 2007 disappearance. Kara Kopetsky was last seen at her high school south of Kansas City.

Here's a look at the cases and the investigation:

___

THE LATEST CASE

Yust hasn't been charged in Runions' disappearance and police haven't said whether he knows her. The woman from the Kansas City suburb of Raymore was last seen leaving a party on Sept. 8, and her SUV was found burned and abandoned two days later in Kansas City. Yust was arrested the next day. Police say they are treating it as a suspicious missing-person case.

___

OTHER VICTIMS

Court records show 17-year-old Kopetsky filed for a protection order on April 30, 2007, alleging Yust kidnapped, restrained, choked, stalked and threatened to cut her throat during their nine-month relationship. A judge granted Kopetsky's request and scheduled a hearing for May 10, 2007, but Kopetsky went missing six days before that.

Police in Belton, where Kopetsky was last seen, say Yust is a person of interest in the case, but he hasn't been charged in the disappearance.

Yust spent time in jail for assaulting his pregnant then-girlfriend in 2011. The woman, who was 18 at the time of the incident, later won a protection order. She told authorities a drunken Yust choked her, threatened to kill her and told her he had "killed people before, even ex-girlfriends out of sheer jealousy."

___

THE SUSPECT

Yust turned 28 on Wednesday. His father, Ken Yust, told The Associated Press he was heartbroken about his son's "crappy decisions," saying his behavior toward women has left "nothing but shame on this end."

Kylr Yust, who is on parole in a drug case, has said he started drinking alcohol at 11, first used cocaine at 14 and tried heroin by the time he was 16, according to The Kansas City Star, which cited court records.

Yust commented about Runions to a TV reporter Wednesday when he was about to be returned to Kansas City from the jail in Benton County, where he was arrested over the weekend. "I have no idea, sir," he told the KSHB reporter who asked what happened to Runions.

When asked if he killed Runions, Yust replied: "Did you?"

As he was placed into a police car, Yust said, "Hi, Mom."

___

WHAT'S NEXT

The judge on Thursday ordered an evaluation to see if Yust is eligible for a public defender and scheduled his next court appearance for Sept. 29.

Investigators continue to look into the disappearances of Runions and Kopetsky.

Court records show investigators took two 9 mm bullets, clothing, Yust's hair samples and other items from a home in Benton County, southeast of Kansas City, where Yust spent time. A shirt and other items were seized from his grandfather's Kansas City-area home, according to media reports.
Businesses that regularly receive calls from customers realize how difficult it can be to provide 24/7 support. Keeping friendly, skilled representatives on hand around-the-clock can quickly drain a business's payroll. Yet, cutting corners by hiring unhelpful employees will send customers directly to competitors.

Knowledge bases are a great way to give customers the help they need without having to pick up the phone or wait for regular business hours. When done correctly, you'll create a positive user experience and save your help desk team a phone call. Here are five ways you can create an effective knowledge base.

1. Make it easy to find.

User-friendliness should be at the top of your priority list as you develop your knowledge base. If customers get frustrated, the resource will be useless. Offer access to your knowledge base through a "Help" button available on every page of your site.

When customers click on that button, make sure the knowledge base is featured as an option. Some businesses merely set up a search box for customers to enter their issue, leading them to relevant knowledge base articles. If they can't find the appropriate answer, they can then see the option to contact your help desk directly.

Another option is to offer a subscription to your knowledge base, which provides opt-in options like an email alert. You can also consider adding a blog post macros to your knowledge base home page that then lists the latest information posted and offers visitors the opportunity to subscribe to new alerts through RSS.

Within your knowledge base, also make sure that visitors can find exactly what they are looking for by adding a labels list macro that then allows them to search by a label or topic. This makes it easy to quickly locate an area of interest, keeping visitors within your knowledge base for a longer period of time.

Related: How to Maintain Institutional Knowledge When Your Company Depends on Freelancers

2. Fully stock it.

Your knowledge base is only good if it contains the information that customers need. In the early stages, focus on populating the database with content, refining it later. Ask your help desk technicians to enter each resolved ticket into the database, including both the issue and the solution.

Appropriate employees can review the content and correct any grammatical errors or inconsistencies. You can also copy from past help desk tickets, using the information employees have entered in the resolution field. Also consider creating templates that can be used to more efficiently and consistently enter the information in a way that follows a standard and approved format for your company.

Related: The 4 Rs of Content Management

3. Match common requests.

If you've been taking calls for a while, you already have an extensive databank of common issues with your products or services. In addition to extracting this information and including it in your knowledge base, you can also ask your help desk representatives which issues they face most often.

Create a list of top-mentioned issues and work with your team to brainstorm other items that might need to be included. This information can truly enhance your knowledge base because you are focusing on some of the most relevant information related to your company's products or services.

4. Use visuals.

When a customer clicks over to read an article in your knowledge base, long blocks of text can be daunting. Visuals help break up that text, making your information more pleasing to the eye. You can add videos to your knowledge base although it's best to create a transcript or explanatory content to go with it. Without that information, your video won't be as searchable as other articles within your knowledge base.

You don't have to spend a fortune on professional photography or videography. Simply use screen-capture software or shoot a smartphone video of a knowledgeable team member explaining a concept. You can also pull great pictures from your company's Instagram account if you have one or encourage employees to take their own pictures or create other types of visuals that can be added that will enhance the written content.

5. Monitor searches.

Once your knowledge base is in use, consistently monitor activity to determine its effectiveness. If you notice customers are contacting your help desk on specific issues because they can't find the information they want, spend extra time beefing up that section.

Note common searches and make sure customers get the answers they want from the articles you've uploaded. You can use analytical tools that include monitoring video interaction with your knowledge base, determining what search terms failed so you can address these issues, and cataloging the top articles and categories most searched to know where more content is necessary.

Related Book: Success Secrets of the Online Marketing Superstars by Mitch Meyerson

Keep your knowledge base active.

A knowledge base can help you provide a better experience to your customers who need help. It may take time to build it, but once you've stocked it with initial content, your own employees will be able to add to it as new issues emerge. Just remember to avoid neglecting your knowledge base once you have it in place since outdated information can cause customers to discredit the content. As long as your team keeps it active, your knowledge base can serve as a valuable resource for your business, creating loyal customers, and reducing the number of calls your own employees must take.
A divided federal appeals court ruled that a decades-old federal law indefinitely banning people committed to mental health treatment from owning a gun could violate the Second Amendment.

The Sixth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday revived a lawsuit filed by a Michigan man who failed a background check while attempting to buy a gun in 2011. Clifford C. Tyler had been committed to a mental institution 25 years earlier but since has received a clean bill of health.

Judge Julia Smith Gibbons, writing for the Sixth Circuit majority, said government lawyers offered compelling evidence for prohibiting people currently or recently suffering from mental illness from possessing a gun. That evidence included the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre, committed by a student whom a court had ordered into outpatient treatment.

But, she wrote, none of the governments evidence squarely answers the key question at the heart of this case: Is it reasonably necessary to forever bar all previously institutionalized persons from owning a firearm?

Mr. Tyler sued the U.S. attorney general and his local sheriff in Hillsdale County, Mich., in 2012, alleging that the Gun Control Act of 1968 effectively created a permanent ban on his Second Amendment rights. A federal trial court dismissed his lawsuit, and Mr. Tyler appealed to the Cincinnati-based Sixth Circuit.

The 1968 law bans convicted felons, habitual drug users and others from possessing a firearm, including anyone who has been adjudicated as a mental defective or who has been committed to a mental institution involuntarily.

The director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is empowered to restore the rights of those who can demonstrate that they arent a danger to public safety and whose possession of a firearm wouldnt be contrary to the public interest.

But Congress defunded the review program in the 1990s. Thirty-one states have created mechanisms to review applications by people seeking to have their rights restored, but Michigan, where Mr. Tyler lives, isn't one of them.

A probate court committed Mr. Tyler to as many as 30 days of inpatient treatment in 1986, after his wife of 23 years ran away with another man and depleted his finances, according to Thursdays ruling. His daughters, fearing that he was a danger to himself, had contacted police.

After the episode, he returned to work and remarried.

Mr. Tylers 2012 psychological and substance-abuse evaluations showed no evidence of mental illness or issues with alcohol or drugs, according to the ruling. Mr. Tyler, now 74, tried to purchase a gun in 2011 but failed the FBI background check.

Click for more from The Wall Street Journal.
Police and the New York City Department of Buildings were investigating after an architect accidentally fell to his death from the roof of a New York City skyscraper, according to reports.

Bruno Travalja, 52, the owner of a New Jersey architectural firm, had gone to the roof of a 48-story building on W. 52nd Street in midtown Manhattan Thursday afternoon.

Sources told New York 1 Travalja may have kneeled down to take a measurement and when he stood up he got dizzy.

An official told the Daily News that a glass barrier for a rooftop terrace was going to be installed there.

The official told the paper that Travalja was wearing a safety harness on the roof but it was not secured to anything. He walked near the ledge which was protected by an 18-inch-high parapet or safety barrier.

After kneeling to check something, he stood up and then plummeted over the parapet, the paper reported.

It's more of an unfortunate tragic accident, the official told the paper.

The building is being converted into a condominium and offices, The Gothamist reported.

Travalja had applied for a permit for use of a construction crane in 2015, records show.

A Buildings Department spokesman told the Gothamist that there was an "ongoing investigation into the incident."

The offices of Travaljas company were closed Friday and would reopen Monday, according to reports.
A grand jury has indicted a Cleveland police officer on a misdemeanor charge of negligent homicide in the death of an 18-year-old man who had broken into a neighborhood store.

The Cuyahoga County Prosecutor's Office announced the indictment of patrolman Alan Buford on Friday.

The prosecutor's office says Buford for "reasons unknown" shot 18-year-old Brandon Jones in the chest when Buford and his partner tried to arrest him outside the store in March 2015.

Prosecutor Tim McGinty says it's unreasonable for officers to use deadly force if they have no reason to think a person is a threat to police or the public.

A police union attorney for Buford says he believes the officer acted properly and within the scope of his duties to protect the community's safety.
To the Blackfeet tribe, the Badger-Two Medicine is sacred land -- 115,000 acres of mountains, ridges, river valleys and wetlands along Montanas Rocky Mountain Front that was home to its members for more than 10,000 years.

It is also the center of a decades-long legal fight between an energy company and the U.S. government over access to drill for oil and gas.

Solenex LLC, a Louisiana-based energy company, is asking a federal judge to reverse the cancellation of a 33-year-old oil and gas lease on 6,200 acres of the Badger-Two Medicine -- part of the Lewis and Clark National Forest -- that it had acquired in 1982.

After years of legal hurdles, U.S. Interior Department officials cancelled the lease in March, arguing it was improperly issued in part because environmental studies did not consider the effects of drilling on the tribe.

Lawyers for Solenex, however, claim the terrain in dispute is not "pristine" wilderness, and note the land is no longer part of the Blackfeet Tribes reservation. It was ceded to the U.S. government in 1896.

On Monday, the company filed court papers seeking a judgment in the case that's before U.S. District Judge Richard Leon in Washington, D.C. Government attorneys must respond to the company's request to restore the lease within two weeks.

The fight over exploratory drilling in the area -- which sits just outside Glacier National Park and the Blackfeet Indian Reservation -- is a complex one.

While the land no longer belongs to the Blackfeet, tribal leaders argue that such "illegally granted oil and gas leases" threaten the Blackfeet's history and sacred and cultural values. And some members say the tribe should never have lost the land in the treaty that turned it into what is now a section of the Lewis and Clark National Forest. Eighteen other tribes, including the Sioux, Crow and Northern Cheyenne, have asked the government to cancel leases in the Badger-Two Medicine.

Several conservationist groups have joined the tribes in their opposition, claiming the drilling would be destructive to wildlife and the environment.

Steve Lechner, an attorney representing Solenex, told FoxNews.com Thursday, "Were talking about one well. Were talking about an area that is not pristine. The well site is three miles from the Great Northern Railroad, U.S. Highway 2 and private land. Its not in wilderness."

"All these arguments about conservation have only recently come up in an effort to block the well," he claimed. "When the lease was issued in 1982, there were no protests or appeals  nobody cared. Thirty years later, its allegedly the most pristine part of the country, which is simply not true."

Lechner -- who described the Badger-Two Medicine as a "prime prospect" for natural gas -- also took issue with the word "sacred" when calling the land off-limits.

"Its not on the reservation. The Blackfeet gave the land back to the United States in 1896. Even if it was 'sacred,' you cannot deny someone the ability to exercise their property rights in the name of religion because that violates the First Amendment," he said.

A spokesman for the U.S. Department of Interior was not immediately available Thursday. In 2006, Congress acknowledged the cultural and ecological significance of the Badger-Two Medicine and banned any further oil and gas leasing.

"That is a very big statement," former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt, who served under the Clinton administration, told Montana Public Radio last year.

"That is a national policy statement about the primary cultural and environmental importance of this area. And obviously taking into account the important opinions of the Blackfeet Tribe," said Babbitt, who suspended the Solenex lease and others in 1993 -- after it was finalized earlier that year following 70 appeals.

"After all this is their historic area. Its not formally a part of the reservation, but theyve been there for a long time and they have a lot of use rights," he told the radio station. "It sort of melded into their cultural and spiritual values, and the United States Congress has recognized that."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
A man who nearly burned to death after being shot with a stun gun following a police pursuit has pleaded guilty to drunken driving and eluding police.

The Richmond Times-Dispatch (http://bit.ly/2cORqRK ) reports that 27-year-old Miles November pleaded guilty Thursday to three of the four charges against him. A charge of felony assault of a police officer will be tried separately on Nov. 29.

November filed a $95 million lawsuit in February accusing a Chesterfield County police officer of negligence when he shot November with a stun gun following a February 2015 pursuit and crash. November's clothes had touched spilled gasoline and caught fire. Police say November had punched another officer.

November received burns over 86 percent of his body. He faces up to seven years in prison on the three charges.

___

Information from: Richmond Times-Dispatch, http://www.timesdispatch.com
A Delaware man has pleaded guilty but mentally ill in the fatal stabbing of a psychiatrist who once treated him.

Twenty-two-year-old Christopher Frick entered the plea at a court hearing Friday. He faces a mandatory sentence of life in prison without parole at his Nov. 18 sentencing.

Frick was charged with killing 55-year-old Caroline Ekong, who was found dead in her home in October 2015.

Authorities say Frick later called 911 and said he had killed Ekong.

Three mental health experts concluded that Frick suffers from a host of mental disorders, but the judge found him competent to enter the plea.

Frick's attorney said he understands that what he did was wrong and that he needs to be punished, and that he has dedicated his life to Christianity.
The Pentagon says U.S. troops for the first time are operating alongside Turkish government forces who are fighting Islamic State militants inside Syria.

A Pentagon spokesman, Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, said Friday the American special operations forces are accompanying Turkish troops who are operating with moderate Syrian opposition forces. He said the Americans are providing the same training, advice and other assistance that U.S. forces have been providing to other Syrian groups -- such as the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces -- fighting the Islamic State in northern Syria.

Davis did not say how many U.S. troops are working with the Turks, but others said it was approximately a few dozen.

Davis said the Americans are just south of the Turkish border, between the towns of Jarablus and Ar Rai.
The 38-year-old wife of a Philadelphia pastor shot and wounded a shotgun-wielding mugger who attacked her husband, according to a report Friday.

The woman pulled the weapon out of her handbag Thursday night and fired once after the would-be robber hit her husband in the head with the butt of the shotgun, Fox 29 Philadelphia reports. Police said she shot the 66-year-old suspect in the leg.

He didnt get anything except the bullet, which is good, Robert Cook, pastor of St. James Lutheran Church in the citys Frankford section, told the station.

Police said the suspect confronted the pastor, his wife, and their 12-year-old son as they were getting out of their vehicle after returning home around 11 p.m.

Cook, 48, told the station what happened after he spotted the suspect hunched over.

All of a sudden he was 6-foot-tall and in my face, Cook said. He had hit me in the head and I bent over for a second. He grabbed the wallet and broke the chain and then somehow when my wife shot him the wallet ended up on the deck.

Cook ran after the suspect who got away by grabbing onto the roof-rack of a passing SUV.

Police found the man near a hospital, limping and bleeding from a wound to his right leg, Fox 29 reported.

The pastors wife was a licensed gun owner, according to the station.

Click here to read more from Fox 29 Philadelphia.


Authorities in western Colorado apologized to a family with several young children after officers smashed their way into a home, mistakenly thinking a large stash of drugs was inside.

Grand Junction police received a tip Wednesday that methamphetamine was inside a home in the neighboring town of Clifton. The informant provided an exact address and specific details about where officers could find the drugs.

Armed with a search warrant, sheriff's deputies and police officers knocked on the front door but no one answered. They plowed through the door and broke multiple windows to get into the home, only to find the innocent family. Two adults and five children between the ages of 3 and 12 live there.

"We got some pretty detailed information from this informant," police spokeswoman Heidi Davidson said. "The name we were given was associated with the address. It just wasn't current."

Investigators were trying to determine what went wrong and whether the informant was credible, Davidson said.

The police department and the Mesa County Sheriff's Office planned to pay to replace the windows and fix the door. They also were arranging for new carpet to be installed because of concerns about tiny pieces of glass from the broken windows.

"We are so grateful that no one was hurt, and we want to publicly apologize to the family, and acknowledge what a frightening and disconcerting experience this must have been for them," the agencies said in a joint statement.
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Avoiding a horrible real-life plot twist, a writer dashed past firefighters into his burning New Orleans house Thursday to rescue two completed novels stored on his laptop.

"Anybody that's ever created art, there's no replacing that," Gideon Hodge, 35, told The New Orleans Advocate after safely making it out of the burning building with the computer. "It's got pretty much my life's work."

Hodge, who describes himself as a playwright, novelist and actor, told the Advocate that he didn't hesitate before running in. "Despite my better sense, I just ran inside and grabbed it. I didn't think to be scared."

His computer was intact, Hodge said, having been sheltered by a table from water being used to douse the fire.

The fire in New Orleans' Broadmoor neighborhood had spread to the house where Hodge lived from an empty, single-family house next door. It took 67 firefighters more than two hours to subdue the three-alarm blaze. A huge column of black smoke was visible for miles, but no injuries were reported.

Hodge's home, along with his family's belongings, was destroyed. His friends responded by setting up a GoFundMe page that's already raised almost $6,000 in less than 24 hours.

Hodge posted a message of gratitude on his Facebook page late last night: "I thank you all for the outpouring of love that came forth during all of this...You have been more help than I could have imagined."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Authorities say several people are injured after an apparent accidental gas explosion near the train station in the eastern French city of Dijon.

Mayor Francois Rebsamen said on BFM and i-Tele television that one person remained trapped and several were evacuated by emergency workers after Friday's blast. He said it was "not an attack."

Rebsamen said witnesses described a strong odor of gas and described it as a domestic accident.
A team from the International Monetary Fund will travel next week to Mozambique, which is struggling to reassure investors after the revelation earlier this year of at least $1.4 billion in hidden debt.

The IMF suspended financial aid to the southern African country after learning about the undisclosed borrowing, and has demanded an international audit.

Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi expressed willingness to resolve the problem in a meeting Thursday in Washington with IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde.

IMF spokesman Gerry Rice says the IMF team will look at Mozambique's 2016 revised budget and monetary policy measures recently adopted by the central bank. The team visits Sept. 22.

The IMF has said the previously undisclosed loans pushed total debt at the end of 2015 to 86 percent of Mozambique's GDP.
The Islamic States decision to oust the leader of Boko Haram -- who had a penchant for using children as suicide bombers  is fracturing the Nigerian terror group as bloodthirsty militants are divided amid a new push to attack Christian communities.

The self-proclaimed caliphate announced in August that Musab al-Barnawi will be the Nigerian groups new governor after Abubakar Shekau, its notorious former leader, apparently became too much for ISIS leadership in the Middle East, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Barnawi, rumored to be a son of the groups founder, reportedly told ISIS newspaper that jihadists should shift their focus to Nigerias Christians, in a bid to win over public support after Shekau spent years attacking Muslim villages that didnt join Boko Harams ranks.

The group, an ISIS affiliate, should be booby-trapping and blowing up every church that we are able to reach, and killing all those we find from the citizens of the cross, Barnawi told the newspaper, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Such a move could exploit existing tensions in Nigerian communities with split Muslim and Christian populations, the newspaper added.

Under Shekau  who took control of the group in 2009  Muslim civilians became the majority of the casualties in the violence, with militants frequently enlisting children to carry out suicide attacks.

You cant really be more barbaric and more savage than Shekau, Issoufou Yahaya, a political analyst and head of the history department at the Niamey University in Niger, told The Wall Street Journal. Hes the pinnacle of barbarism.

But Shekau has not recognized Barnawis appointment, accusing him of apostasy and saying that ISIS leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, has been duped.

The two factions have been clashing as a result, accusing each other of abandoning their faith, The Wall Street Journal reported.

A new Boko Haram video released this week that declared allegiance to Shekau vowed to kill Nigerias president and army chief, according to The Associated Press.

Boko Haram controls large sections of Nigeria, in addition to territory in neighboring Niger, Cameroon and Chad.
The Latest on the flow of migrants into Europe (all times local):

12:15 p.m.

The most prominent domestic critic of German Chancellor Angela Merkel's approach to the migrant crisis is insisting that he won't give up his demand for a cap on refugee numbers.

Bavarian governor Horst Seehofer, who leads the Bavarian branch of Merkel's conservative bloc  the Christian Social Union  has urged a tougher approach for the past year. Since an embarrassing defeat for Merkel's party in a Sept. 4 state election in eastern Germany, he has redoubled calls for an annual cap of 200,000 on new refugee arrivals.

Merkel has rejected those calls. But Seehofer was quoted Friday as telling the weekly Der Spiegel: "We will not forego the upper limit of 200,000. This is simply about our credibility."

Germany holds national elections this time next year

___

9:20 a.m.

Police and city officials are evacuating at least 1,600 migrants from Afghanistan, Sudan, Eritrea and elsewhere who have been living on the streets of northern Paris for weeks, authorities said, in the latest of a string of attempts to find solutions for Europe's migration crisis.

City Hall said two operations were carried out Friday morning on a stretch of pavement underneath an elevated metro line not far from the Montmartre neighborhood. One focused on about 80 women and children in the makeshift camp, while the other focused on the men, according to a statement from City Hall.

An official with the Paris regional administration said more than 1,000 people had been transported to temporary shelters by mid-morning, while authorities estimate about 1,600 to 1,800 migrants had been living at the site overall. They are being bused to 74 sites around the Paris region where authorities will give them food and medical treatment and help those who are eligible apply for asylum.

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A Swedish appeals court has upheld a detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who is wanted by prosecutors in a rape investigation.

The decision Friday by the Svea Court of Appeal means that the arrest warrant stands for the 45-year-old Australian, who has avoided extradition to Sweden by seeking shelter at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since 2012.

Assange, who denies the rape allegation, has challenged the detention order several times. It was not immediately clear whether he would appeal the decision to the Supreme Court.

Acting on behalf of Swedish investigators, an Ecuadorian prosecutor is set to question Assange in the embassy on Oct. 17.

The rape allegation stems from Assange's visit to Sweden in 2010.
A Swedish appeals court on Friday upheld a detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, dismissing the latest attempt by the 45-year-old Australian to make prosecutors drop a rape investigation from 2010.

The decision by the Svea Court of Appeal means that the arrest warrant stands for the 45-year-old computer hacker, who has avoided extradition to Sweden by seeking shelter at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since 2012.

Assange, who denies the rape allegation, has challenged the detention order several times. He says he fears he will be extradited to the United States to face espionage charges if he leaves the embassy.

His Swedish defense lawyer, Per Samuelsson, said he would appeal the decision to the Supreme Court.

"We are naturally disappointed that Swedish courts yet again choose to ignore Julian Assange's difficult life situation," Samuelsson told The Associated Press. "They ignore the risk that he will be extradited to the United States."

Swedish prosecutors say they are not in contact with counterparts in the U.S. and that they would also need Britain's permission should a third country seek his extradition.

Upholding a lower court ruling, the appeals court said Swedish prosecutors are actively trying to move the investigation forward and set up an interrogation of Assange at the embassy. Acting on behalf of Swedish investigators, an Ecuadorian prosecutor is set to question Assange on Oct. 17.

"This means that there is at present no reason to set aside the detention order. Julian Assange's claim to that effect shall therefore be refused," the court said.

It also brushed aside the findings of a U.N. working group, which described his stay at the London embassy as "arbitrary detention." The court noted that the panel's finding wasn't binding on Swedish courts and that Assange's stay at the embassy "is not to be regarded as an unlawful deprivation of liberty."
Britain's Ministry of Defense has apologized for the 2003 death of an Iraqi teen who drowned after being forced into a canal by four British soldiers.

Officials said Friday the department is "extremely sorry" for the death of 15-year-old Ahmad Jabbar Kareem Ali, who had been taken into custody by British forces on suspicion of looting in the southern Iraqi city of Basra.

An independent inquiry into the death led by a former High Court judge said the soldiers' failure to help the boy after he started to drown was the "certain" cause of his death. He did not know how to swim.

The soldiers were tried in a British court for manslaughter and were acquitted in 2006.
Volkswagen says its global sales were up 6.3 percent in August compared with a year earlier thanks to strong gains in Europe and China.

Those advances helped offset lower deliveries in the United States.

The company said Friday that the Volkswagen Group, whose other brands include Audi, Skoda and Porsche, delivered 759,400 vehicles last month. That's up from 714,400 in August 2015, the last full month before news of the company's emissions-rigging scandal broke in the U.S.

Sales in Europe were up 8.3 percent at 264,500 while deliveries in China rose 19.7 percent to 323,600. In the U.S., sales dropped 3.8 percent to 54,300.

For the first eight months of 2016, sales were up 1.8 percent compared with a year earlier at 6.66 million vehicles.
In this rapidly developing topic, we aim to provide you with the ability to share your experiences, questions and news with us. Simply choose one of the options below and your story may be featured in this section.

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Yum! Brands Names Expected Board Of Directors Of Yum China Holdings

LOUISVILLE, KY and SHANGHAI - September 15, 2016  Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE: YUM) today announced the expected composition of the Board of Directors of Yum China Holdings, Inc. (Yum China).

The nine new directors announced today, seven of whom are independent, are expected to serve on the Yum China Board of Directors following the completion of Yum Chinas spin-off from Yum! Brands, which is expected to occur after the close of business on October 31, 2016.

As previously announced, Dr. Fred Hu, chairman and founder of Primavera Capital Group, a China-based global investment firm that will make a strategic investment in Yum China, will serve as non-executive chairman of the Yum China Board once the distribution and the Primavera investment are complete. In addition to Dr. Hu, the Board will include:

Micky Pant , chief executive officer of Yum China.

, chief executive officer of Yum China. Peter A. Bass i, former chairman and president of Yum! Restaurants International and current lead director for BJs Restaurant and Potbelly Sandwich Works.

i, former chairman and president of Yum! Restaurants International and current lead director for BJs Restaurant and Potbelly Sandwich Works. Christian L. Campbell , owner of Christian L. Campbell Consulting LLC and former senior vice president, general counsel, secretary and chief franchise policy officer of Yum! Brands.

, owner of Christian L. Campbell Consulting LLC and former senior vice president, general counsel, secretary and chief franchise policy officer of Yum! Brands. Ed Chan Yiu-Cheong , vice chairman of Charoen Pokphand Group Company Limited.

, vice chairman of Charoen Pokphand Group Company Limited. Edouard Ettedgui , non-executive chairman of Alliance Francaise, Hong Kong and non-executive director of Mandarin Oriental International Limited.

, non-executive chairman of Alliance Francaise, Hong Kong and non-executive director of Mandarin Oriental International Limited. Louis T. Hsieh , director and senior advisor to the chief executive officer, and former chief financial officer and president of New Oriental Education & Technology Group.

, director and senior advisor to the chief executive officer, and former chief financial officer and president of New Oriental Education & Technology Group. Jonathan S. Linen , director for Yum! Brands and Modern Bank N.A., former adviser to the chairman of American Express Company and former vice chairman of American Express Company.

, director for Yum! Brands and Modern Bank N.A., former adviser to the chairman of American Express Company and former vice chairman of American Express Company. Zili Shao, co-chairman of King & Wood Mallesons  China.

Yum China also expects to name one additional independent board member in connection with the spin-off.

I am honored to lead the Yum China Board alongside such experienced and talented individuals, said Dr. Hu. My fellow directors bring proven track records of success in the food, service, finance, legal and other industries in China. We all also understand this market well, and I look forward to working collaboratively to build a strong business and create sustained value for Yum China shareholders.

Mr. Pant said, I am confident that this Board has the right mix of experience and knowledge of our industry and the evolving consumer trends in China to drive future success for Yum China. I am excited to have the opportunity to work with my highly-qualified colleagues on the Board as we execute on our strategic plans to drive growth across our brands.

Greg Creed, chief executive officer of Yum! Brands, said, Were pleased to have announced the composition of the Yum China Board of Directors as we near the completion of the separation. We are confident that these business leaders will offer the market insights and strategic vision required to enable Yum China to reach its full potential.

About the Yum China Board of Directors

Peter A. Bassi served as chairman of Yum! Restaurants International from 2003 to 2005 and its president from 1997 to 2003. Prior to that position, Mr. Bassi spent 25 years in a wide range of financial and general management positions at PepsiCo, Inc., Pepsi-Cola International, Pizza Hut (U.S. and International), Frito-Lay and Taco Bell. Mr. Bassi currently serves as lead director and chair of the nominating and governance committee for each of BJs Restaurant and Potbelly Sandwich Works. He has been a member of each board of directors since 2004 and 2009, respectively. In addition, Mr. Bassi serves on the Value Optimization Board for the private equity firm Mekong Capital, based in Vietnam. Mr. Bassi served on the board of The Pep Boys  Manny, Moe & Jack from 2002 to 2009, and served on the board of Amrest Holdings (Poland) from 2012 to 2015.

Christian L. Campbell is currently owner of Christian L. Campbell Consulting LLC, specializing in global corporate governance and compliance. Mr. Campbell previously served as senior vice president, general counsel and secretary of Yum! Brands from its formation in 1997 until his retirement in February 2016. In 2001, Mr. Campbells role was expanded to include chief franchise policy officer. In these positions, Mr. Campbell oversaw all legal matters at Yum! Brands and was responsible for the oversight of Yum! Brands purchasing as a director of YUMs purchasing cooperative with its franchisees. Prior to joining Yum! Brands, Mr. Campbell was a senior vice president and general counsel at Owens Corning, a leading global producer of fiberglass insulation and composite building materials. Prior to Owens Corning, he was vice president and general counsel for Nalco Chemical Company. In addition, Mr. Campbell was a founding director of Restaurant Supply Chain Solutions, Inc. (RSCS), a purchasing cooperative for Yum! Brands U.S. franchising partners, and he served on RSCSs Board of Directors from its formation in 2001 until 2015.

Ed Chan Yiu-Cheong is currently a vice chairman of Charoen Pokphand Group Company Limited and has been an executive director and vice chairman of CP Lotus Corporation since April 2012. Mr. Chan was regional director of North Asia of the Dairy Farm Group and a director of Dairy Farm Management Services Limited from November 2001 to November 2006. Mr. Chan was the president and chief executive officer of Walmart China from November 2006 to October 2011. Mr. Chan is also a non-executive director of Treasury Wine Estates Limited, a company listed on the Australian Securities Exchange and an independent non-executive director of Link Real Estate Investment Trust, which is listed on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong Limited.

Edouard Ettedgui currently serves as the non-executive chairman of Alliance Francaise, Hong Kong. Mr. Ettedgui also currently serves as a non-executive director of Mandarin Oriental International Limited, the company for which he was the group chief executive from 1998 to 2016. Prior to his time at Mandarin Oriental International, Mr. Ettedgui was the chief financial officer for Dairy Farm International Holdings, and he served in various roles for British American Tobacco, including business development director, group finance controller and group head of finance. Mr. Ettedgui has also held senior finance positions in seven countries at Philips International.

Louis T. Hsieh currently serves as a senior adviser to the chief executive officer and as a director of New Oriental Education & Technology Group. Prior to his current role, Mr. Hsieh served as that companys chief financial officer from 2005 to 2015 and president from 2008 to 2016. In addition, Mr. Hsieh serves as an independent director, member of the corporate governance committee and chairman of the audit committee for JD.com, Inc., and independent director and chairman of the audit committee for Nord Anglia Education, Inc. Previously, Mr. Hsieh also served as an independent director, member of the corporate governance committee and chairman of the audit committee for Perfect World Co., Ltd. and China Digital TV Holding Co., Ltd.

Fred Hu is chairman and founder of Primavera Capital Group, a China-based global investment firm (Primavera). Dr. Hu has served as chairman of Primavera since its inception in 2010. Prior to Primavera, Dr. Hu served in various roles at Goldman Sachs from 1997 to 2010, including serving as chairman of Greater China at Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. From 1991 to 1996, Dr. Hu served as an economist at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Washington D.C., where he engaged in macroeconomic research, policy consultations and technical assistance for member country governments including China. Dr. Hu also served as director of the National Center for Economic Research and professor at Tsinghua University. He is the author of several books and of numerous other publications in the areas of economics and finance and on China and Asian economies. Dr. Hu has advised the Chinese government on financial and pension reform, state-owned enterprise (SOE) restructuring, and macroeconomic policies. Dr. Hu is a trustee of China Medical Board and the co-chair of the Nature Conservatorys Asia Pacific Council.

Jonathan S. Linen is a member of the board of directors of Yum! Brands, a position he has held since 2005, and of Modern Bank, N.A. Mr. Linen served as advisor to the chairman of American Express Company from January 2006 to August 2016. Prior to his role as advisor to the chairman, Mr. Linen served as the vice chairman of American Express Company since August 1993. Mr. Linen served on the board of directors of The Intercontinental Hotels Group from 2005 to 2015. In addition, Mr. Linen is a former director of Bausch & Lomb.

Micky Pant is expected to serve as the chief executive officer of Yum China. Mr. Pant has served as chief executive officer of Yum! Restaurants China since August 2015. Over the past decade, Mr. Pant has held a number of leadership positions at Yum! Brands, including chief executive officer of the KFC Division, chief executive officer of Yum! Restaurants International and president of Global Branding for Yum! Brands and president of Taco Bell International. Before joining Yum! Brands, Mr. Pant built a foundation in marketing and international business with Unilever and worked at PepsiCo, Inc. and Reebok International Ltd. Since December 2014, Mr. Pant has served as an independent director on the board of Pinnacle Foods, Inc., where he also serves on the audit committee.

Zili Shao has served as co-chairman of King & Wood Mallesons  China since April 2015. From 2009 to 2015, Mr. Shao held various positions with JPMorgan Chase & Co., including chairman and chief executive officer of JPMorgan China, vice chairman of JPMorgan Asia Pacific and chairman of JPMorgan Chase Bank (China) Company Limited. Prior to JPMorgan, he was a partner with Linklaters LLP, a global premium law firm. He held positions as Greater China managing partner and managing partner of Asia Pacific.

About Yum China Holdings

Yum China Holdings will become a licensee of Yum! Brands in Mainland China. It will have exclusive rights to KFC, Chinas leading quick-service restaurant concept, Pizza Hut, the leading casual dining brand, and Taco Bell, which is expanding globally but is not yet in China. It will also own the Little Sheep and East Dawning concepts outright. The new company will be well positioned for growth thanks to its strong competitive position, integration of its brands into Chinese popular culture and consumers daily lives, expanding geographic footprint in China and existing operational expertise. It will have a strong capital position, no debt and expects to continue growing its system sales and profit by adding new restaurants and through growing same-store sales. Yum China has more than 7,200 restaurants in over 1,100 cities in China and generated over $8 billion in system sales in 2015. The growth of consumption in China is being fueled by a new generation of younger consumers who are digitally sophisticated and brand driven. The additional growth of the middle class and urban population in China is expected to create the worlds largest market for restaurant brands, with Yum China poised to be the market leader.

About Yum! Brands

Yum! Brands, Inc., based in Louisville, Kentucky, has nearly 43,000 restaurants in almost 140 countries and territories. Yum! Brands is ranked #218 on the Fortune 500 List with revenues of over $13 billion in 2015 and is one of the Aon Hewitt Top Companies for Leaders in North America. The Companys restaurant brands  KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell  are the global leaders of the chicken, pizza and Mexican-style food categories. Worldwide, the Yum! Brands system opens over six new restaurants per day on average, making it a leader in global retail development.

Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

Certain statements in this communication contain forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements can be identified by the fact that they do not relate strictly to historical or current facts. These statements often include words such as may, will, estimate, intend, seek, expect, project, anticipate, believe, plan, could, target, predict, likely, should, forecast, outlook, model, ongoing or other similar terminology. Forward-looking statements are based on our current expectations, estimates, assumptions or projections concerning future results or events, including, without limitation, the planned separation of the Yum and Yum China businesses, the timing of such separation, the completion of the anticipated investments by Primavera Capital and Ant Financial in connection with the Yum China separation, the future composition of the Yum China board of directors, the future earnings and performance as well as capital structure of Yum or any of its businesses, including the Yum and Yum China businesses on a standalone basis if the separation is completed. Forward-looking statements are neither predictions nor guarantees of future events, circumstances or performance and are inherently subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and assumptions that could cause our actual results to differ materially from those indicated by those statements. We cannot assure you that any of our expectations, estimates or projections will be achieved. Factors that could cause actual results and events to differ materially from our expectations and forward-looking statements are included in reports filed with the SEC by Yum from time to time, including those discussed under the heading Risk Factors in our most recently filed reports on Form 10-K and 10-Q, as well as in the Form 10 filed with the SEC by Yum China. You should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date hereof. We are not undertaking to update any of these statements.

SOURCE Yum! Brands

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OMAHA  The Omaha city prosecutor wants an electronic system that would streamline the time it takes to obtain a judge's signature on a warrant seeking a blood test for suspected drunken drivers.

City prosecutor Matt Kuhse said there are legislative proposals coming from his office as well as the Douglas County Attorney's Office and the Nebraska Attorney General's Office to alleviate a recent ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court that makes it harder to prosecute drunk driving cases.

The Supreme Court ruled 5-3 on June 23 that police can't forcibly draw blood from people suspected of driving drunk without a warrant. The ruling stems from three cases in North Dakota and Minnesota in which divers challenged "implied consent" laws as a violation of the Constitution's ban on unreasonable searches and seizures.

"After the initial shock, everyone took a deep breath," Matt Kuhse said. "Then we said, 'We can work this out.'"

Kuhse said he hopes the Nebraska Legislature can create a digital warrant system to make the process more efficient. Electronic warrants would save time for law enforcement officers by allowing them to get permission without having to travel to the judge's home to get a signature and then a hospital to get the blood test.

Kuhse said speed is critical because alcohol dissipates from the body at a rate of about .015 percent of blood alcohol content per hour.

The ruling has impacted about 20 DUI cases so far, Kuhse said.

In the meantime, Kuhse said local authorities have drafted a template for warrants to help investigators move quickly, and several Douglas County judges have volunteered to make themselves available to review warrants around the clock.

"I sat down with the county judges and explained (the problem) to them," he said. "Judges who live in close proximity to a hospital said, 'Hey, if time is of the essence, call me.'"
Laser Rangefinder Market Analysis 2016-2021 with Industry Chain Structure, Competitive Landscape

The Laser Rangefinder Industry Research Report of 150 pages and providing rich tables and figures to support the Laser Rangefinder market analysis is now available.

--

For people who are keen on the Laser Rangefinder Market the Global and Chinese Laser Rangefinder Industry, 2010-2021 Market Research Report would be a useful report to refer to as it is an exhaustive study on the present market scenario of this industry. The report also gives a special insight into the growing Global & Chinese market of this industry. The report summarizes key statistics of the market and the overall status of the manufacturers in this industry. The report is a valuable source of guidance and direction for companies and individuals interested in the industry.

The report encapsulates all the latest news and developments in the industry along with the progress in the technology front. The information summary helps the reader of this report to be updated on all the activities of the industry. It mentions the recent trend in this market along with a market outlook both at the Global and Chinese market level. The report mentions top eight manufacturers of this market. The details covered in this portion include a detailed profiling of the company along with its products offerings, product information over the period of 2010-2016 along with the key contact person in the firm. So a person looking to diversify the business knows his competitors and also has a fair idea on the business offerings of its competitors. The Laser Rangefinder Market report covers the capacity of production of this industry along with production value, supply and consumption. It includes the level of competition in this market and the performance of the players in specific geography like USA, EU, Japan and China.

Order a copy of this report at http://www.rnrmarketresearch.com/contacts/purchase?rname=670661

The total market analysed in this report is divided by company, by country, and by application or type for the competitive landscape analysis. The report also estimates 2016-2021 market development trends of Laser Rangefinder industry. Analysis of upstream raw materials, downstream demand, and current market dynamics is also carried out. To end with the Laser Rangefinder Industry report includes ten proposals which cover the market entry strategies, suggestions on managing economic challenges and various marketing channels. This section of information is very useful for a prospective market player who is planning to startup something new in this industry. In order to prevent the new players in the market from any unpleasant experiences and safeguard against market giants there is a feasibility analysis of New Project Investment. The investment research gives a snapshot of all the pros and cons of this industry as well as speaks about the opportunities and threats. Overall, the report provides an in-depth insight of 2010-2021 Global and Chinese Laser Rangefinder market covering all important parameters.

Major Points from Table of Contents

Chapter One Introduction of Laser Rangefinder Industry

1.1 Brief Introduction of Laser Rangefinder

1.2 Development of Laser Rangefinder Industry

1.3 Status of Laser Rangefinder Industry

Chapter Two Manufacturing Technology of Laser Rangefinder

2.1 Development of Laser Rangefinder Manufacturing Technology

2.2 Analysis of Laser Rangefinder Manufacturing Technology

2.3 Trends of Laser Rangefinder Manufacturing Technology

Chapter Three Analysis of Global Key Manufacturers

Chapter Four 2010-2016 Global and Chinese Market of Laser Rangefinder

4.1 2010-2016 Global Capacity, Production and Production Value of Laser Rangefinder Industry

4.2 2010-2016 Global Cost and Profit of Laser Rangefinder Industry

4.3 Market Comparison of Global and Chinese Laser Rangefinder Industry

4.4 2010-2016 Global and Chinese Supply and Consumption of Laser Rangefinder

4.5 2010-2016 Chinese Import and Export of Laser Rangefinder

Chapter Five Market Status of Laser Rangefinder Industry

5.1 Market Competition of Laser Rangefinder Industry by Company

5.2 Market Competition of Laser Rangefinder Industry by Country (USA, EU, Japan, Chinese etc.)

5.3 Market Analysis of Laser Rangefinder Consumption by Application/Type

Chapter Six 2016-2021 Market Forecast of Global and Chinese Laser Rangefinder Industry

6.1 2016-2021 Global and Chinese Capacity, Production, and Production Value of Laser Rangefinder

6.2 2016-2021 Laser Rangefinder Industry Cost and Profit Estimation

6.3 2016-2021 Global and Chinese Market Share of Laser Rangefinder

6.4 2016-2021 Global and Chinese Supply and Consumption of Laser Rangefinder

6.5 2016-2021 Chinese Import and Export of Laser Rangefinder

Chapter Seven Analysis of Laser Rangefinder Industry Chain

7.1 Industry Chain Structure

7.2 Upstream Raw Materials

7.3 Downstream Industry

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Source: http://marketersmedia.com/laser-rangefinder-market-analysis-2016-2021-with-industry-chain-structure-competitive-landscape/132214

Release ID: 132214

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Local Financial Professional Paul Tarins RICP Affiliates With The Society For Financial Awareness

( September 15, 2016 ) Winter Park, FL -- Mr. Paul Tarins, founder of Sovereign Retirement Solutions of Winter Park Florida, announced that he has become a member of the Society For Financial Awareness. Mr. Tarins was inspired by the Society's mission of "Help all to find financial comfort".

He commented on the value of financial literacy: "So often financial comfort is simply a matter of education. If we can help folks make choices with their money that have a long-term focus we can help lessen the significant disparities in financial well-being that our communities face every day."

More About The Society For Financial Awareness: (Source: http://www.sofausa.org/about/)

"The Society for Financial Awareness is a 501(c)(3) Non Profit Public Benefit Corporation. Our mission is to provide financial education across America, one community at a time.

We are comprised of professionals, throughout the nation, with varying specialties. These professionals, and the independent businesses they operate, provide valuable services to their communities. One of the ways they do that is through informational workshops and seminars that are presented to individuals, companies, and organizations. These events are designed to educate and help them both understand and address a variety of financial topics and concerns.

Our members include Financial Advisors, Estate Planning Attorneys, Insurance Professionals, Accountants, Realtors, Mortgage Brokers, Credit Counselors and Health & Wellness Practitioners.

Founded in 1993, we have had the opportunity and privilege to work with various prominent companies and organizations across America. Our educational and informational financial outreach, and years of continued success, has provided us name recognition and a reputation of excellence."

About Paul Tarins, RICP

From http://www.sovereignretirementsolutions.com/; "Paul Tarins,RICP, president and founder of Sovereign Retirement Solutions has been a resident of Central Florida for over twenty five years. He received his bachelor's degree in Economics from Florida State University. He began his career in 1998 acquiring experience in the financial services profession ranging from working for major financial institutions to working with smaller boutique broker dealers. This developed into a vision of owning a business that focused solely on providing honest, simple financial advice. The advice he provides is focused on a philosophy of sound and conservative principles that utilize a wide variety of financial products and services with a focus on cost efficient portfolios, asset distribution, and wealth preservation."

Paul is a fully licensed Insurance Producer in the State of Florida. He has completed all course work for the Retirement Income Certified Professional designation through the American College of Financial services.

About Sovereign Retirement Solutions 62951:

As described on the firm's website:

As an investment advisor representative of Portfolio Medics, Paul acts in a fiduciary capacity, meaning he accepts fiduciary responsibility by acting in the legal best interest of his clients and putting his client's interests always ahead of our own.

"Risk management is an important part of our investment strategy. Our investment goals are to consistently achieve reasonable returns on investments over time based on a plan specifically created for the individual client. We prefer consistent and reasonable to sporadic and extreme. We will manage and monitor your assets unlike the typical financial advisor's one size fits all management approach."

Investment advisory services are offered through a separate entity, Portfolio Medics, a registered investment advisor. Sovereign Retirement Solutions and Portfolio Medics are not affiliated. Sovereign Retirement Solutions provides insurance services to clients through Paul M Tarins LLC.

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Wireless Audio Electronics Company Photive Buoyed By Report Of Strong Market Growth

The team at wireless audio electronics company Photive is pleased with a new report from Transparency Market Research that says the global wireless audio devices market will see a compound annual growth rate of 1.5 percent between 2014 and 2024.

--

Wireless audio electronics company Photive is thrilled with a new report from Transparency Market Research that says the wireless audio market will have a worldwide compound annual growth rate of 1.5 percent between 2014 and 2024.

The growth of the market is being driven by behavioral shifts among consumers, according to the research company, who are being influenced by the growing penetration of smartphones and tablets and who are also changing preferences for media consumption towards streaming services such as Deezer, Pandora and Spotify.

In addition to that, wireless audio companies are responding to consumers' desires to have both high audio functionality, plus appealing aesthetics in their wireless audio equipment.

"The purchase decision of any customer is not only influenced by the audio performance of a wireless audio device," Transparency Market Research said in a press release. "Manufacturers are therefore required to focus on bringing both audio features and ergonomics of devices at an equilibrium to positively influence a consumer's buying decision."

With the United States and Europe leading the way, the global wireless audio devices market is poised to reach US$10.12 billion by 2024, from US$9.04 billion in 2014, the market research company added.

The report is great news says Ian Sakkal, President of Photive, which recently released its latest wireless audio equipment, the HF1 Wireless Bluetooth Headphones on Amazon.

"This report paints a pretty rosy picture of the future of wireless audio and we are, of course, happy to see that," Sakkal said. "As wireless audio technology continues to improve, more and more consumers will start demanding the convenience of going wireless. As long as the equipment is sturdy and it looks aesthetically pleasing, consumers are going to want it. What's going to really set a company apart now is its innovation.

The automotive industry is also driving the push toward wireless audio technology, as the report says. It's not just personal audio equipment, but also the equipment that will sync with their cars that consumers are interested in."

Photive, which also manufactures and sells power banks, portable chargers and mobile phone cases, has seen its own sales rising over the past few years, mirroring what the Transparency Market Research report is saying about the industry.

Emerging markets like China and India are also on the radar of the big firms in the wireless audio electronics field, according to the report, and while Photive is largely concentrating on the lucrative United States market, expansion into other markets, including the aforementioned emerging markets, is a possibility for the company in the future.

For more information, please visit http://photive.com/

Contact Info:

Name: Ian Sakkal

Email: support@photive.com

Organization: Photive



Source: http://marketersmedia.com/wireless-audio-electronics-company-photive-buoyed-by-report-of-strong-market-growth/132729

Release ID: 132729

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ApartmentLove.com, Landlord Web Solutions & RentSync Sign Multi-Year Extension

Apartment Rental Website ApartmentLove.com Signs Multi-Year Extension with Landlord Web Solutions and RentSync

--

PRESS RELEASE

Calgary, AB (September 15, 2016) - Leading apartment rental website ApartmentLove.com is pleased to announce that it has signed a multi-year extension with Landlord Web Solutions, Canada's premiere rental listing aggregator, and the RentSync listing system.

ApartmentLove Rental Listing Statistics:

- Five Hundred Thousand (500,000) active apartment rental listings

- Eight Thousand Eight Hundred (8,800) markets across Canada and the United States

"The multi-year extension with ApartmentLove.com means our property management partners from across Canada will be able to seamlessly integrate their entire rental listing inventories with ApartmentLove.com," said Jason Leonard - Co-Founder & President of Landlord Web Solutions. "ApartmentLove has demonstrated strong growth since their launch. We're excited to have them as partners on the RentSync platform and are looking forward to working with them for many years ahead," he added.

ApartmentLove.com launched in the fall of 2015 and advertises more than 500,000 active apartment rental listings on behalf of private landlords, property managers and large-scale apartment owners and operators from across Canada and throughout the United States. "Thanks too strong and mutually-beneficial partnerships like the ones we've secured with Landlord Web Solutions and RentSync, we've been able to scale and execute our business plans as intended," explained Trevor Davidson - President & CEO of ApartmentLove.com. Primarily targeting the millennial generation (namely students, young professionals and new families) looking for apartments for rent, ApartmentLove.com is a carefully targeted, beautifully styled, professional and proven effective apartment finder website with an easy-to-use apartment search interface that resonates with both landlords and tenants from around the world.

Best described as "the feeling of home" from the moment you step through the door, ApartmentLove is the energy and excitement of a new home and the phenomenon that has you placing your furniture and planning your housewarming party long before even signing the lease. Supported by a responsive website design that automatically adjusts to fit any mobile device, ApartmentLove.com is accelerating the online apartment rental process for both landlords and tenants by getting the most desirable listings into the hands of well-qualified and action-oriented prospective tenants faster than ever before.

RentSync customers will receive free property rental listing syndication to ApartmentLove.com until March 31, 2017 as part of a special offer from Landlord Web Solutions, RentSync and ApartmentLove.com.

--

About ApartmentLove.com

Powered by a custom and responsive website design that automatically adjusts to fit any mobile device, ApartmentLove.com is the professional rental website sought by both landlords and tenants from around the world. Carefully targeted and beautifully styled, ApartmentLove.com resonates with today's millennial generation because of its easy-to-use interface, comprehensive listing inventory and attractive brand. Bringing together the best qualified tenants and the most desirable rental listings from across Canada and throughout the United States, ApartmentLove.com is among the largest apartment rental websites in the world.

For more information, visit: www.ApartmentLove.com, or follow them on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram for the latest in home decor, interior design and apartment rental listings.

About Landlord Web Solutions

Landlord Web Solutions (LWS) is a Canadian-based, niche-focused website design and online marketing company that caters exclusively to the rental industry. Co-founded by Jason Leonard and David Koski in 2010, LWS has quickly become a leader and trusted supplier in the rental industry. Over the past number of years, LWS has built outstanding websites for many of the largest property management firms in Canada.

For more information, visit: www.landlordwebsolutions.com and www.rentsync.ca

For more information, please visit https://apartmentlove.com/

Contact Info:

Name: Trevor Davidson

Organization: ApartmentLove

Address: 15 Floor, 850 - 2nd Street SW

Phone: 4034726510

Release ID: 132901

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Travel Industry Pros (TIP) Launches New Booking Engine Allowing Subscribers To Save On Hotel Stay At 350,000 Hotels And Resorts

Travel Industry Pros (TIP) is launching a new Hotel and Resort Booking Engine, offering huge savings on Hotels around the world, with a low-price guarantee, and a 30-day free trial subscription offer.

--

Travel Industry Pros (TIP), based out of Florida, USA is about to create a major shakeup in the Hotel and Travel Industry. Everybody likes to travel, but for many traveling on a budget, it can be challenging to find affordable accommodations at 4 and 5 star resorts. Many travelers are relinquished to stay at lower quality hotels, making the vacation and travel experience, less enjoyable, and sometimes even downright disappointing. Everybody likes to save, so even those who are used to staying at 4 and 5 Star Hotels will be able to enjoy savings from hundreds, to even thousands of dollars while on vacation, by booking through TIP's Booking Engine.

TIP, promises to match subscribers with 4 and 5 Star Hotels and Resorts, at prices that are even lower than those found on some of the major online booking engines. In fact, TIP even offers a price guarantee, and will refund up to $50, if a subscriber finds the exact same accommodation, at a lower price within 24 hours.

While subscription based discount and rewards plans are not a new concept, TIP has reinvented the model to provide something for everyone, and at a much lower subscription cost than other companies. Travel Industry Pros, believes so much in their product, that they are even offering subscribers to try it out for free. Those interested in saving money on Hotel and Resort stay can try out TIP's Hotel and Resort Booking Engine for free for the first 30 days. During that time, free subscribers can book an unlimited amount of discounted Hotel and Resort accommodations. After the 30 day free trial, if a member decides to continue using the Booking Engine, there will be a monthly subscription of $20.

According to TIP, CEO, Fernando Laguda,TIP fulfills for its distribution network and customers through Airline Promotions, Inc. (API).API, is a full-service ARC and IATA accredited travel agency. At its Fort Lauderdale, Florida, headquarters it maintains its Sabre equipped reservations and in-house customer service. With TIP's Executive Team's International leadership and management experience, combined with the API infrastructure and customer service platform, TIPPros will have the ability to support and add over one million customers and affiliates over the coming months.

"We are not just offering a sample of savings on Hotel and Resorts. Our subscribers can actually have unlimited access to our Booking Engine for free, for 30 days, and book as many Hotel and Resort stays as they wish. We are so confident in our ability to save our subscribers considerable money, and we know that they will become lifelong subscribers to our service after their savings experience with TIP." ~Fernando Laguda, TIP CEO

With his background in creating online affiliate and tracking systems, Fernando Laguda wanted to provide a way for ordinary people to get rewarded for sharing TIP with their friends and family. That led Laguda to develop a social media sharing system, called TipPros that allows subscribers to "click and share" the TIP Booking Engine on Social Media. The system tracks where the shared link originated, and rewards the person who shared the link. Laguda says; "When you tell someone about a great deal at a store, or talk up a great movie, or send your online friends a pic of the wonderful meal you're eating at a restaurant, none of those businesses reward you for helping them grow. My goal was to create the perfect model that would benefit those looking for savings, and reward those that are responsible for sharing TIP. I believe that we have created the perfect model with our TipPros System.

Travel Industry Pros, and the TipPros platform, have caught the attention of Veteran Internet Marketers like Eric Grant and Chris Cartmill, who co-founded the Technology and Home Business Blog, www.Qastme.com (pronounced: Cast-Me). Eric Grant, an entrepreneur with a 20 year background in marketing and building Global Sales Networks, and Chris Cartmill with an extensive background in SEO and SEM, teamed up several years ago to create a better way to reach out to networkers and individuals interested in making money from home. They've built several sales networks into multiple thousands of individuals, utilizing their online skills and methods.

Connect with Eric and Chris

"TIP is a perfect fit for our partners and networks. With the Hotel discounts offered by TIP and the click-and-share platform, everything is much simpler. I don't have to spend months putting together my own system. Thanks Fernando!" ~Eric Grant, Co-Founder, QastMe.com

For more information, please visit http://www.qastme.com

Contact Info:

Name: Eric Grant

Email: egrantonline@gmail.com

Organization: QastMe

Phone: +1 206.227.7821

Video URL: https://youtu.be/t55l0HTMa4Q

Source: http://marketersmedia.com/travel-industry-pros-tip-launches-new-booking-engine-allowing-subscribers-to-save-on-hotel-stay-at-350000-hotels-and-resorts/132949

Release ID: 132949

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Bankers say weak farm income continues to weigh down the economy in rural parts of 10 Plains and Western states.

The overall rural economic index for the region remained in negative territory and declined to 37.3 in September from August's 41.1.

Survey officials say any score below 50 on any of the survey's indexes suggests a decline in that area.

Creighton University economist Ernie Goss says farm income is expected to decline 12 percent over last year. That is limiting spending by farmers and hurting the economy in rural areas.

Bankers from Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming were surveyed.

Goss says the number of farm loan defaults hasn't increased significantly over the past year, but more loans are being restructured.

A survey released Wednesday shows farmland values in Iowa have dropped nearly 9 percent over the past year.

The survey, from the Iowa chapter of Realtors Land Institute, says farmland values have dropped about 25 percent from a 2013 peak.

The state's average farmland value through September was $6,486 an acre. The average value in September 2013 was $8,750 an acre.

The survey says all nine crop reporting districts showed year-over-year declines ranging from 6.7 percent in northeast Iowa to 11.7 percent in southwest Iowa. According to the report, the only gains seen were in non-tilled timber.

Land values are expected to continue to fall due to declining corn and soybean prices.

"Land values will continue to decline until they're supported by the income generated from the property," said Kyle Hansen, a real estate broker with Hertz Real Estate Services.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, national farm income is expected to be 42 percent lower than its peak in 2013.

Hertz is a farm management company based in Nevada, Iowa. Hansen compiled the survey, which is based on sales and assessments from about 150 real estate brokers, bankers, appraisers and other farm professionals.
Dog Training Website Pet-Guide.net Releases Comprehensive Training Collar Guide

The blog's writers want to help pet owners make an informed decision before investing their hard-earned money in a training collar, reports http://pet-guide.net/.

--

Dog Training website Pet-Guide.net has announced the release of their comprehensive Dog Training Collar Reviews and Buying Guide. The writers behind the newly-launched site aim to help pet owners everywhere learn about the different types of training collars, understand what features they should be looking for when buying a collar, and get a glimpse of the top five training collars available on the market today. The guide is available for readers to access on the front page of the Pet-Guide.net website.

"One of the biggest concerns that people have about dog ownership is being able to train their pets to behave properly. While there are a number of methods, courses, and devices that claim to help in this matter, many pet owners have found that training collars go a long way in getting their canine friends to obey their commands and display good behavior," said Jonathan F. Cline of Pet-Guide.net. "However, it's also important for pet owners to realize that not all collars have been created equal, and this is the reason we have written and published our new training collar guide. We don't want our readers to waste their money on training collars that don't work, and the information contained in the guide will help ensure that they make the right buying decision."

The new Pet-Guide.net guide begins with an explanation of what training collars are designed to accomplish and a rundown of the different types of collars sold by manufacturers and retailers. The Bark Collar Reviews and Buying Guide then launches into an explanation of the pros and cons of using a training collar before providing a link to a detailed listing of the five training collars that the Pet-Guide.net writers have found to be the best on the market.

As Cline continued, "We want our readers to know that we love our furry friends just as much as they love theirs. Whether we're writing a Wireless Dog Fence Reviews and Buying Guide or recommending a different device or training method, it is this love for animals that drives us to provide objective and reliable information. It is our hope that they will use this information in a way that will bring them closer to their pets and help them develop a more enjoyable relationship."

About Dog Training:

Pet-guide.net provides plenty of blog posts on various types of dog-friendly products, including bark collars and wireless dog training fences. Their main goal is to provide authentic information and straightforward, in-depth reviews on the best dog products out there on the market. Jonathan F. Cline and his team of writers have challenged themselves to help pet owners everywhere make informed decisions about the pet products they buy as well as providing articles, tips, tricks, tutorials, and case studies to help them make the most of their relationships with their pets.

For more information, please visit http://pet-guide.net/

Contact Info:

Name: Jonathan F. Cline

Organization: Dog Training

Phone: (+1) 3.693.889

Source: http://marketersmedia.com/dog-training-website-pet-guide-net-releases-comprehensive-training-collar-guide/132973

Release ID: 132973

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LiveWireGPS Inc Reports on Cost Savings Achieved with the Help of GPS Technology

Companies find the GPS devices pay for themselves in a very short period of time thanks to the savings that may be achieved, announces LiveWireGPS.com

--

Research shows employees, when aware they are being monitored, are 100 times less likely to waste time, saving businesses money. Furthermore, they are ten times less likely to put the vehicle at risk through behaviors such as speeding. Companies that have yet to incorporate GPS tracking in their fleet vehicles should reconsider doing so, as these are only two of the many benefits associated with installation of this technology in company vehicles.

In addition to improved employee performance, GPS tracking helps to keep idling costs down. Many business owners don't recognize what a problem this is, yet every hour the engine idles, a gallon of fuel is consumed, on average. This can lead to a loss of $7,200 per year for companies with five fleet vehicles. Furthermore, this doesn't take into account the amount of wear and tear on the vehicle, which is equivalent to driving a semi 64,000 miles, according to the American Trucking Association.

"LiveWireGPS Inc offers a variety of products designed to meet the needs of business owners. Law enforcement often needs one type of device, while businesses want another to monitor their employees. We have devices designed for both purposes, along with those designed to track the elderly, teens and vehicles which have been stolen, as we recognize everyone has their own unique needs. We work to accommodate all who wish to obtain a GPS tracking device," George Karonis, spokesperson for LiveViewGPSInc, announces.

The systems allow businesses to track many things simultaneously. This includes the route of their driver, the speed of the vehicle and idling. With the help of this information, businesses find they are able to reduce or eliminate costs they may not even be aware are minimizing their profits. The system starts to pay for itself in a very short period of time.

"Visit our site today to learn more about GPS tracking and how it benefits your business. Furthermore, parents with teen drivers may wish to consider GPS tracking for personal vehicles. It's nice to know where a child is at all times and learn more about their driving habits, and this technology allows them to do so. This is only one of the many ways families benefit from this technology, and there are numerous others. Be sure to check them out while on the site," Karonis states.

About LiveViewGPSInc:

LiveViewGPS provides GPS tracking systems that are easy to use straight out of the box with no software to download. The company remains one of the most reliable available today with 99.9 percent server uptime, and billing is on a month-to-month basis. Customers receive both desktop and mobile access to GPS data.

For more information, please visit http://www.liveviewgps.com

Contact Info:

Name: George Karonis

Organization: LiveViewGPS Inc

Phone: 661-294-6805

Source: http://marketersmedia.com/livewiregps-inc-reports-on-cost-savings-achieved-with-the-help-of-gps-technology/132971

Release ID: 132971

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KissStrategies.com Launches KissStrategies Lifetime Website Hosting

KissStrategies.com announced the continued availability of their lifetime website hosting "KissStrategies Hosting" available at http://kissstrategies.lifetimehosting.site/. More information can be found at http://kissstrategies.com/.

--

Customers looking for an exceptional value in website hosting should look at lifetime website hosting now available from KissStrategies Hosting by KissStrategies.com. Stephen Collins, owner at KissStrategies.com has just released more in depth details relating to the development of KissStrategies Hosting.

KissStrategies Hosting is designed to appeal specifically to businesses and serious hobbyists and includes:

1) Lifetime website hosting - This was made part of the product since a one time cost provides website hosting for the lifetime of the website. Customers who buy KissStrategies Hosting should enjoy this particular feature because it will save them a great deal of money reducing operating costs. KissStrategies Hosting provides lifetime hosting for four (4) domains for a lifetime with the basic hosting package.

2) Better hardware for a faster loading website - KissStrategies.com made sure to make this part of the KissStrategies Hosting's development as load speed greatly increases the satisfaction of the website visitor. Customers will likely appreciate this because prevents the frustration of slow loading web pages so visitors stay longer and visit more frequently.

3) Providing 247 technical support - This feature was included because increases client satisfaction and confidence. This is great news for the consumer as provides fast resolution of any technical problems for greater reliability.

Stephen Collins, when asked about KissStrategies Hosting said:

"KissStrategies Hosting provides quality, dependable website hosting at an unbeatable one-time price."

KissStrategies Hosting is provided in cooperation with Lifetime.Hosting, a company with over 14 years experience in providing exceptional website hosting.

This is one of KissStrategies.com's most important website related services and Stephen Collins is particularly excited about this product because the addition of lifetime hosting will enhance the other services provided especially website design and search engine services.

In celebration of the new service, new customers will be able to have a WordPress website installed at no additional cost. WordPress has become a favorite choice among website developers offering many benefits including rapid deployment and fast, easy maintenance.

Those interested in learning more about the KissStrategies.com can do so on the business website at http://www.kissstrategies.com/

Those interested at investigating the advantages of KissStrategies Hosting can go directly to the product listing, here: http://kissstrategies.lifetimehosting.site/

For more information, please visit http://www.kissstrategies.com/

Contact Info:

Name: Stephen Collins

Organization: Stephen Collins

Address: Owosso, Michigan

Phone: 1 517 899 0917

Release ID: 133068

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He is the life of all,

the salvation of all

faithful and unfaithful,

just and unjust,

pious and impious,

healthy and sick,

young and old

just as the diffusion of light,

the sight of the sun,

and the changes of weather

are for all alike;

for there is no respect

of persons with God.

 John Klimakos
The Australian government has confirmed it will scrap a plan to limit lifetime pension contributions to AU$500,000, instead raising the cap to $1.6m.

That means UK expats would be able to transfer pension pots worth 900,000, rather than 280,000, according to todays exchange rates.

However, the new lifetime cap applies to pot size rather than contributions, meaning if investment returns push the total to $1.6m  regardless of how much has been contributed  the member cannot contribute any more.

As a compromise to those in favour of stricter controls on tax relief, Australian Treasurer Scott Morrison also lowered the annual after-tax contribution limit from $180,000 (102,000) to $100,000 (57,000).

That meant (ignoring investment returns) it would take a British expat 16 years to transfer the full $1.6m.

Given the UK government only allows transfers to Australian superannuation funds after age 55, an expat would be 71 before the full amount had been transferred to an Australian fund.

The governments decision to back down on the $500,000 lifetime allowance came as a result of fierce opposition from the right wing of prime minister Malcolm Turnbulls own party  a faction that includes former prime minister Tony Abbott.

This group had long supported the use of Australias superannuation as essentially a tax haven for the very wealthy, a function that Mr Turnbulls original policy sought to address.

Geraint Davies, a financial planner who specialises in advising clients moving from the UK to Australia, said the new rules made more sense than those originally proposed, because the $500,000 cap would be easily filled by people with relatively low wealth.

However, he stressed that the system remained scarily complicated.

He pointed out that, not only are expats limited to transferring $100,000 a year to an Australian superannuation fund, but they are also only allowed to begin after age 55.

Thats because Australian primary legislation allows super fund members to withdraw their cash before 55 in the case of financial hardship or terminal illness, something which contravenes UK law, he explained.

It is now an extremely complicated financial planning advice area  and its getting more and more complicated, he said.

He urged the UK and international regulators to look at advice that has been delivered in this area.

He said many providers  particularly those offering Qrops as over-simplified products  were not adequately alerting their clients to the tax implications, burying disclaimers that they are not tax advisers in the small print.

Advice should not be given if you do not understand the tax implications, Mr Davies said.
The amount of land entering the market privately has spiked in some regions as farmers look to test the autumn market without drawing attention.

Amid Brexit uncertainty and lower commodity prices, some agents report a growing acreage for sale privately, along with heightened interest from prospective sellers who are keen to understand their options.

Ben Taylor, partner at Bidwells, said selling land privately seemed to be in vogue, due to the potential for different outcomes of a sale.

See also: Coping with low prices  German farmers tell their stories

But the picture varies across the UK with many agents advising clients to find their lands true value by selling publicly.

Charlie Evans, Strutt & Parkers head of farm agency in south-west England, said he had 2,385 acres across 10 farms available privately this autumn, compared with four farms comprising 864 acres this time last year.

Some people are thinking they dont want to lose the impact of their farms in the market through a public launch if it turns out the market is weak (post-Brexit), so this is a way to test the market discreetly, he said.

I also think [that in] the current climate, in terms of profitability, some have decided if they can get a good price for their farm they will sell, but dont want to alert neighbours, suppliers or staff to the fact they are open to leaving the industry.

A South-West trend?

David Hebditch, head of rural at Somerset-based Humberts, said in the past 12 months about 35-40% of sales were being done in private  up 10 to 15 percentage points.

He added that most off-market deals involve large estates at the top end of the market and tend to not affect bare blocks or small farms.

Selling privately allows buyers and sellers flexibility to negotiate terms such as sale and leaseback or periods of holdover, which arent always available with a public sale, he said.

But George Alder, a partner at Stags which operates in Dorset, Devon and Cornwall, said most of his clients still preferred to sell publicly.

Some people are nervous buying off market because they dont know if theyre paying a fair price  no-one quite knows where the value lies, he told Farmers Weekly.

Further east, Symonds & Sampson partner Andrew Tuffin, said: I am involved in some off market deals but I would not say they are necessarily increasing.

Demand and prices are remaining strong in Wessex, which is largely down to poor supply, therefore more often than not we still advise public marketing.

The national picture

Private sales have traditionally been preferred by high-profile buyers and sellers, and by those who have sensitive reasons for sale such as divorce or financial difficulty.

But James Prewett, Knight Franks head of regional farm sales, said he had noticed a variety of sellers interested in using a private launch to test the market.

I think more smaller scale farms or lots between 60 acres and 150 acres are trading privately than previously, he said.

Its a case of people wanting to understand their position in the market post Brexit, so more sellers are keen to begin with a quiet private launch to gauge interest.

An acreage equivalent to about one-third of publicly marketed land is estimated to sell privately each year.

But in 2013, more than 65% of farms and land handled by northern agent George F White was sold off market.

Across North Yorkshire we are now seeing about 20% of land and farms sold privately, said Matthew Brown, a rural practice surveyor at the company.

Dealing privately can cut out advertising costs and be more convenient, and with some properties, sellers prefer not to go public for a variety of reasons.

Harry Baines, a land agent at East Midlands-based Shouler & Sons, said: I feel it is much harder now than 12 months ago to advise a vendor what the market value of land is without properly testing it on the open market.

Off-market estate sales in Scotland rise

In Scotland, CKD Galbraith said more private deals are being done in the estates market than the farmland market.

More estates are available and selling privately than farms and actually the farm market still benefits from public exposure rather than private placement, said valuer Simon Brown.

Alex Lawson, national farms and estates director for Savills, added: You can never be certain than you havent missed the best buyer in the market. Sometimes these properties can appeal to someone who may not actually be looking.
A prolific fly-tipper once dubbed Britains worst fly-tipper is back behind bars after committing a string of further waste crimes.

Marcus Bairstow, 41, was convicted of numerous counts of fly-tipping at Southampton Magistrates Court, and breaching his anti-social behaviour order (Asbo).

He pleaded guilty to five offences, was sentenced to 30 months in prison and ordered to pay a 150 victim surcharge.

See also: Police probe after waste dumped on farms

Judge Elisabeth Bussey-Jones said Mr Bairstow committed deliberate acts which were carried out for financial gain and were a flagrant breach of his court order.

The court heard Mr Bairstow was convicted in March 2011 following a major multi-agency investigation into the dumping of waste in Hampshire.

He collected waste in Southampton and took it out into the countryside to fly-tip. Bairstow was convicted on numerous counts, given two years in prison and a five-year Asbo.

The order bans him from most waste activities other than lawfully carrying waste. He was also exposed by the BBCs Rogue Traders programme, which bugged and tracked waste and filmed Mr Bairstow dumping it.

Waste dumped on farm

But in January 2015, Mr Bairstow, of Chelveston Crescent, Southampton, was caught dumping waste again.

The Environment Agency said a developer had waste on site at Padwell Road in Southampton, which was collected by Mr Bairstow.

A farmer later found that entry to his land near Rownhams had been forced, and this waste had been dumped there.

Also a van belonging to Mr Bairstow was seen fly-tipping waste in the car park of the Talking Heads pub in Portswood, in February 2015.

In May 2015, Mr Bairstow rented a small plot of land at Park Farm, in Eastleigh, but fires started to accumulate.

In July 2015, police and fire services discovered a fire on the site had burned a tree and fencing. The blaze also set alight timber belonging to a builder in a neighbouring unit.

Nigel Oliver, of the Environment Agency, said: Mr Bairstow was clearly aware of his obligations and responsibilities in the handling and treatment of waste, but yet again wilfully ignored them, putting the local environment at repeated risk.
Story Highlights 14% say the economy in general is the greatest problem

11% name both unemployment and dissatisfaction with government

Americans give GOP slight edge to handle the most important problem

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- With the first presidential debate approaching, no one issue clearly dominates Americans' minds when they are asked to name the most important problem facing the U.S. The economy (14%) continues to lead the list, followed closely by dissatisfaction with government (11%) and jobs and unemployment (11%) as the top problem cited. Other top concerns for the U.S. include the election itself (8%), race relations (7%), immigration (6%), terrorism (5%), national security (5%) and national morals and ethics (5%).

Most Important Problem -- Recent Trend What do you think is the most important problem facing this country today? [OPEN-ENDED] July 2016 August 2016 September 2016 % % % Economy 12 17 14 Dissatisfaction with government 16 13 11 Unemployment/Jobs 7 8 11 Elections/Election reform 5 7 8 Race relations/Racism 18 7 7 Immigration 6 8 6 Terrorism 5 9 5 National security 6 7 5 Ethics/Morals 6 3 5 Shown are problems listed by at least 5% of Americans in September 2016

These issues, as recorded in a Sept. 7-11 Gallup poll, will likely be among the most pressing issues atop Americans' minds as they watch Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump debate for the first time later this month.

Mentions of dissatisfaction with government are down slightly since August and are at their lowest point since October 2012. At the same time, the percentage of Americans who name elections or election reform as the greatest U.S. problem has been rising while the presidential campaign dominates political news coverage. In recent election years, a smaller percentage of Americans, typically 1% to 2%, have mentioned the election as the top problem for the U.S. But the issue has gained prominence over the past year, likely because of the controversies surrounding the two (highly unpopular) major-party nominees.

Republicans Retain Lead on Party Better to Handle Top Problem

Potentially helpful for the Republicans, including Trump, is the slight edge Republicans have over the Democrats in Americans' view of which party can better handle the issue they named as the top problem. While similar to the results in 2014 and 2015, it is a markedly better positioning for the GOP than in recent presidential election years, when the Democrats enjoyed a strong edge on this question.

Bottom Line

As Americans tune in for the first presidential debate of 2016, the economy, dissatisfaction with government and unemployment are the issues they see as most pressing for the country.

While Americans have slightly greater faith in the GOP to handle the issue they deem most important, the Democratic Party is within striking distance on the question, underscoring the tight race this election. This is also the case for the specific issues of the economy and foreign affairs, for which Republicans' edge is smaller than it has been in the past.

These data are available in Gallup Analytics.

Survey Methods

Results for this Gallup poll are based on telephone interviews conducted Sept. 7-11, 2016, with a random sample of 1,020 adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. For results based on the total sample of national adults, the margin of sampling error is 4 percentage points at the 95% confidence level. All reported margins of sampling error include computed design effects for weighting.

Each sample of national adults includes a minimum quota of 60% cellphone respondents and 40% landline respondents, with additional minimum quotas by time zone within region. Landline and cellular telephone numbers are selected using random-digit-dial methods.

View complete question responses and trends.

Learn more about how the Gallup Poll Social Series works.
Story Highlights 20% approval is up slightly from 18% in August

Democrats' approval up to 30% from 2016 low of 13% in June

Republicans and independents lower on scale of approval

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Americans' job approval rating of Congress continues to edge upward to 20% in September, an increase of two percentage points from last month and seven points from July. The 20% mark is notable given that congressional approval has reached this level only three times since 2012.

Congressional approval was in the 30% range for the first several months of President Barack Obama's first term in office, before sliding into the 20s later in 2009. Throughout most of his presidency, congressional approval has teetered from the 10s to the 20s, even falling to 9% in November 2013 after the government partially shut down in September. The current 20% reading comes from a Sept. 7-11 Gallup poll.

Democrats Rise Rapidly Since June

At 30%, Democrats' approval of Congress is the highest it has been in the past year and is a marked increase from their 2016 low of 13% recorded in June. Democrats have bounced between the 10s and 20s all year.

Republicans' approval of Congress, on the other hand, has been mired in the single digits and teens in the past year. At 16%, Republicans' current approval is double what it was one year ago but abysmally low for the party in control of Congress. Historically, Gallup has found that supporters of the majority party in Congress rate the institution much more positively than do nonsupporters of that party. Since taking control of Congress in early 2015, Republicans have expressed frustration with their congressional leaders. Though they view House Speaker Paul Ryan more positively than negatively, the change in speakership last fall has done little to brighten Republicans' outlook.

Independents' approval of Congress is at 15%, down slightly from 20% in August. Approval among those who identify as independents has stayed in a tight 10% to 20% range for the past year.

Bottom Line

Congressional approval is modestly improving, but only one in five Americans say they approve of the legislative branch -- still historically low. With few legislative accomplishments this year, Congress may still fail to inspire Americans to rate the institution highly, even though it has avoided political brinkmanship involving government shutdowns and other budgetary impasses seen in the recent past.

Democrats' improved rating of Congress is more peculiar. It is possible that Democrats may believe the Senate -- and possibly the House -- is in play for a Democratic takeover this fall, fueling a rise in approval of the branch. Since 2009, Democrats have generally been more favorable than Republicans toward Congress, likely because a Democrat is in the White House. The election season has also brought about a decline in congressional activity, including GOP-led attempts to block Obama's agenda.

Republicans' low approval of Congress could reflect frustration with Congress not fulfilling the GOP agenda since Republicans assumed control of the House after the 2010 midterm election.

If there is one party controlling both the executive and legislative branches come January, it is possible that ratings of Congress will improve, as they did at the beginning of Obama's first term, when Democrats also had the majority in both houses of Congress. Many political experts expect Republicans to keep control of the House, so unified control of government is more likely if Republicans maintain their Senate majority and Donald Trump defeats Hillary Clinton.

Historical data are available in Gallup Analytics.

Survey Methods

Results for this Gallup poll are based on telephone interviews conducted Sept. 7-11, 2016, with a random sample of 1,020 adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. For results based on the total sample of national adults, the margin of sampling error is 4 percentage points at the 95% confidence level. All reported margins of sampling error include computed design effects for weighting.

Each sample of national adults includes a minimum quota of 60% cellphone respondents and 40% landline respondents, with additional minimum quotas by time zone within region. Landline and cellular telephone numbers are selected using random-digit-dial methods.

View complete question responses and trends.

Learn more about how the Gallup Poll Social Series works.
Hitman confesses before Senate hearing: "They were killed like chickens

Claims killings were of opponents, not criminals

Duterte has vowed to eradicate online gambling in the Philippines

Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte reportedly ordered the killings of approximately 1000 dissidents, criminals and opponents when he was still a city mayor, claims hitman Edgar Matobato.

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The 57-year-old told the nationally televised Senate committee hearing that he heard Duterte order some of the killings and acknowledged he himself carried out about 50 of the abductions and deadly assaults, including a man who they fed to a crocodile in 2007 in southern Davao city.

"Our job was to kill criminals like drug pushers, rapists, snatchers," Matobato said under oath, adding some of the targets were not criminals but opponents of Duterte and one of his sons in Davao city.

"They were killed like chickens," said Matobato, who added he backed away from the killings after feeling guilty and entered a government witness-protection program.

A spokesperson for Duterte has denied the allegations.

When asked by a reporter if he thought Duterte was capable of giving such directive, Martin Andanar said: "The Commission on Human Rights already conducted an investigation years ago, when the President was still a Mayor, and charges were not filed, they did not see any direct evidence."

Since taking office this summer, the new Philippines President has made the eradication of gambling a number one priority . A number of gambling operators in that nation have expressed to Gambling911.com their apprehension with being there in recent weeks.

"Online gambling must stop. It has sprouted here and there, Duterte declared before obliterating PhilWebs nearly 13- year monopoly on the industry. This is out of control."

One can take these changes as the government overhauling and realigning the industry into something that is more controlled and regulated by weeding out the small gaming companies, said Jonathan Ravelas, chief market strategist at Manila-based BDO Unibank Inc., the nations biggest lender. But over the short term, these changes will be taken negatively as markets by nature dont like disruptions.

- Jagajeet Chiba, Gambling911.com
'Limitless' Season 2 Air Date, Spoilers & Cast News: Bradley Cooper Gives Up On Series?

It has been a while since we have heard of any news regarding "Limitless" Season 2. But, if recent developments are to be believed, it looks like the show will be cancelled for good.

It can be remembered that "Limitless" Season 2 was cancelled earlier this year, according to Hollywood Reporter. This was despite decent ratings for the show (it had a minimum of 6.5 million viewers per episode in the Live + 7 numbers). It was also what happened to fellow CBS show "Supergirl," which had the fortune of being transferred to the CW, where it will be alongside other DC comic book adaptations.

Producers tried shopping "Limitless" Season 2 to other networks and streaming services when CBS cancelled the series, according to TV Line. However, Netflix and Amazon did not sign any deal with them to continue the development of "Limitless" Season 2, ending hopes that the series will continue on any platform.

However, those hopes were renewed when it was rumored that executive producer and recurring cast member Bradley Cooper is determined to have the show's second season to air. But due to his busy schedule due to his upcoming debut directorial project in the latest remake of "A Star Is Born." The movie will also serve as Lady Gaga's first time to become the lead star in a film.

Since the production of the "Limitless" Season 2 is still in limbo, there is still no news as to when "Limitless" season 2 will come back to television. GameNGuide will be covering more developments on the production of "Limitless" Season 2 in the coming weeks.

Do you think "Limitless" Season 2 will ever see the light of day? What do you think of this news that Bradley Cooper has given up on bringing the show back? GameNGuide is looking forward to hearing your thoughts in the comments section. Meanwhile, watch the teaser preview for the first season of "Limitless" in the video below.
Google Adds Gett & Lyft To Google Maps' App

Google Maps has just included ride-hailing services Lyft and Gett, alongside Uber which it previously added in 2014. The app will feature fare estimates and pick-up times that is expected to lower fare prices as well. However, Uber is rumored to have its own mapping service in the works as Google is also rumored to set-up its own hailing service as well.

Google recently announced that it was adding Lyft and Gett in the U.S. to its mapping service, Fortune reported. 'Google Maps' previously made Gett available for U.K. users. Currently, Gett ride is only available in New York.

A button will appear on 'Google Maps' for ordering a ride from Uber, Lyft, or Gett. The move was made to give more options to users beyond Uber and other transportation options such as public transit, walking, and driving.

Users can now compare prices and locate the nearest ride-hailing service available on the 'Google Maps' app when searching for an address. From there, a ride-hailing service can be selected as the app will redirect users to the specific mobile app so that users can immediately request for a ride.

In Google's case, the giant tech company had formed a partnership with the software company similar to what Facebook had done previously. Hence, the rules for independent outside developers do not apply, an Uber spokeswoman had said.

Lyft had offered a similar explanation, but declined to give a comment on whether the transportation network company has a financial arrangement with Google. A similar app called 'Citymapper' also offers fare and pick-up time estimates for Lyft and Uber just like Google, presumably forming a partnership with them as well.

'Google Maps' may however, let go of Uber in the future as the software company is reportedly doling out a $500 million investment to develop its own map system so that it would no longer need to rely on Google, Science World Report said. For now, the updates for Gett and Lyft are available iniOS and Android versions of 'Google Maps'. The new additions are expected to make commuting easier and may even lead to overall lower prices.

Take a tour of the new Google Maps
Samsung Galaxy Note 7 Release Date, News & Update : Recall, Return, Exchange, What's Next

Samsung Galaxy Note 7 has only been released in the market last month but major problems occurred with the device resulting in a dangerous and potentially lethal device. This is in reference to the battery problems that the Note 7 has which got out of control. Reports of burning and explosion have prompted users to stop using their new Samsung device at once.

The US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) warned users with a Samsung Galaxy Note 7 to power it down and stop charging or using the device, CPSC reported. The warning was based on reports involving lithium-ion batteries in some Note 7 devices that resulted in fires, CPSC said. The report added that the incidents happened while charging and during normal users.

The top four US carriers that sold Samsung Galaxy Note 7 are now allowing the return or exchange of the devices. First, Verizon has waived its restocking fee for those who want to exchange or return their smartphone. AT&T is also calling on Note 7 owners to return their devices at an AT&T store without restocking or early termination fee. Customers can also select a Galaxy S7, Galaxy S7 Edge, Galaxy S7 Active in exchange for their Galaxy Note 7 phones for $25 per device. Those who bought the Note 7 from T-Mobile can also get a full refund. Sprint will also allow its customers to return their device or exchange for another Samsung device with a $25 service credit.

Meanwhile, the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 could have avoided the problem which was a quality check issue. Apparently, the company was in a rush to deliver their next-gen smartphones ahead of Apple and LG but had to skip some major quality check. Additionally, the device could have been saved from the fiasco had it been built with a replaceable battery, Tech2 reported.

Samsung Galaxy Note 7 has already been recalled and sales of the device have been halted. However, those who want to stick with the phone, as it is said to be Samsung's best phablet yet, may have to wait until it is in inventory again. Samsung may also opt to "kill" the Note 7 and head off to the Note 8 instead.

Watch Any Galaxy Note 7 Recall Return & Refund Process
Health officials said the local coronavirus outlook remained stable this week, though they continued to warn against a potential winter surge.
From high drama to delicious comedy, mid-valley stages will be offering a full buffet of theatrical offerings this year. Here's a preview of what's coming up:

Albany Civic Theater

111 First Ave. S.W., Albany

 "100 Lunches - A Gourmet Comedy," Sept. 23 - Oct. 8.

 "The Runner Stumbles," Oct. 28-Nov. 5. A drama based on an actual murder trial in the early 1900s.

 "The Butler Did It!" Dec. 2-17.

 "Last of the Boys," Jan. 6-14.

 "Big Fish (the Musical)," Feb. 10-March 4. The musical version of the novel by Daniel Wallace and acclaimed film by Tim Burton.

 "The Trouble with Cats," March 24-April 8.

 "Sweeney Todd (the Musical)," May 12 - June 3.

 "Red, White and Tuna," June 23-July 8. A satirical ride into the hearts and minds of the polyester-clad citizens of Texas' third smallest town.

 "Little Women," July 28-Aug. 5.

 "Roald Dahl's Willy Wonka Jr." Aug. 25 - Sept. 2.

Majestic Theatre

115 S.W. Second St., Corvallis

 Majestic Reader's Theatre: "Farenheit 451," Sept. 25.

 "The Full Monty," Sept. 30-Oct. 16. This musical comedy, based on the movie by the same name, is about six unemployed steel workers who form a male striptease act, and about the women who cheer them on.

 Majestic Reader's Theatre: "Talk Radio," 3 and 7 p.m. Oct. 23. The Eric Bogosian drama.

 "Magick Theatre: for madpersons only." Music by That Coyote. Oct. 29.

 Majestic Science Theatre 3000: "Killers from Space," Nov. 4.

 "No Class: The Role Playing Game Inspired Improv Show," Nov. 6.

 School of Enchanting X-per-Tease, Nov. 11. Tart of the Valley Burlesque presents a university-themed burlesque play.

 Majestic Reader's Theatre: "The Man from Earth," Nov. 27.

 "A Christmas Story," Dec. 2-18. Based on Humorist Jean Shepherd's memoir of growing up in the Midwest in the 1940s.

 Santiam Christian Schools present "Egad, The Woman in White (Sealed in a Madhouse)" Jan. 19- 21.

 Majestic Reader's Theatre: "Distracted," Jan. 29.

 "Mort," Feb. 10-19.

 Majestic Science Theatre 3000, Feb. 24.

 Majestic Community Film Festival, Feb. 25.

 Majestic Readers's Theatre: "Terra Nova," Feb. 26.

 Terpsichore: A Community Dance Concert, March 4.

 Majestic Reader's Theatre: "Crossing Delancey," March 26.

 Willamette Apprentice Ballet performance, April 7-8.

 Improv Smackdown, 7:30 p.m. April 14.

 Majestic Reader's Theatre: "Think Twice," 3 and 7 p.m. April 30.

 "Evita," May 5-28. Argentina's controversial first lady is the subject of this musical.

 Majestic Reader's Theatre: "Why Torture is Wrong and the People Who Love Them," May 28.

 The Majestic Follies, June 3.

 Downtown Dance Spring Showcase, June 9-10.

 Modern Dance Technique Spring Celebration of Dance, June 16-17.

 Majestic Reader's Theatre: "The Price," June 25.

 "The Fantasticks," June 30-July 9. The longest-running musical in Broadway history is a romantic and funny tale about a boy, a girl and their two fathers who try to keep them apart.

 Majestic Reader's Theatre: "Approaching Simone," 3 and 7 p.m. July 30.

 Majestic Reader's Theatre: "Transformations," 3 and 7 p.m. Aug. 27.

Linn-Benton Community College

6500 Pacific Blvd. S.W., Albany

 "Ben Speaks," Oct. 18.

 "The Path of Love," November (date TBA). "The Path of Love" is a commedia dell'arte play created and directed by LBCC student Jamie Vorce.

 Oregon Shakespeare Festival Performance, Nov. 18.

 South Albany High School vs. West Albany High School Improv Smackdown, Dec. 2.

 Legacy Ballet presents "The Nutcracker," Dec. 8- 10.

 Annual Children's Show: "Winnie the Pooh," Feb. 2017.

 "Peace Be Upon You" (working title), May 11-20. This is an original community engaged play about Middle Eastern Muslims living in rural Oregon.

Oregon State University

122 S.W. Waldo Place, Corvallis

 "James and the Giant Peach," Nov. 3-13.

 "For the Love of Lies," Feb. 16-26. A commedia dell'arte scenario directed by Dan Stone.

 "Boom," March 9-12.

 "The Upward Beating Heart," May 11-21. An original devised play based on Rainer Maria Rilke's "Letters to a Young Poet," directed by Elizabeth Helman.

 Spring One-Act Festival, June 1-4.

Corvallis high schools

Corvallis High School Theater Arts - 1400 N.W. Buchanan Ave., Corvallis.

 "A Wrinkle in Time," 7 p.m. Nov. 3-20. James Sie's adaptation of the Madeline L'Engles book has not been performed in Oregon. (The recent Oregon Shakespeare Festival production featured a different adaptation.)

 "Cats," Feb. 23-March 12. The long-running Broadway musical based on "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats" by T. S. Eliot.

Philomath High School

2054 Applegate St., Philomath

 "Beauty and the Beast," Dec. 1-3.

 "The Taming of the Shrew," March 16-18.

South Albany High School

3705 Columbus St. S.E., Albany

 South Albany High School vs. West Albany High School Improv Smackdown, Dec. 2 (LBCC).

 The "Ho Ho Holiday" Improv Spectacular, Dec. 9.

 "Back to the 80's: The Totally Awesome Musical," Jan. 13 - 21.

 "Improvnado 2: Son of Improvnado!" March 24.

 "Agatha Christie's A Murder is Announced," May 19 - 22.

 Improv Smack Down: South Albany High School vs. Corvallis High School, May 26. (LBCC).

 Final Performance for advanced acting class, TBA, June 2.

West Albany High School

1130 Queen Ave. S.W., Albany

"Much Ado About Nothing," Oct. 28-29.

 South Albany High School vs. West Albany High School Improv Smackdown, Dec. 2. (LBCC).

 "Almost Maine," Jan. 6-8.

 "Cinderella," April 20-May 6.
As soon as the heat from the flames hit their faces from more than 50 feet away, Caitlin Burke and Rachel Becker saw the value of the Greek Fire Academy on Thursday morning at Oregon State University.

The flames came from a specially equipped Corvallis Fire Department trailer designed to provide a live fire demonstration showing the difference between a blaze in a room with a sprinkler system and one without. The demonstration, which took place in Reser Stadiums parking lot, served as the grand finale to the 13th annual Greek Fire Academy. It featured a lecture on fire safety and interactive fire activities with fire extinguishers, a smokehouse trailer and firefighter exercise.

While most of the days events focused on education through fun and games for the nearly 100 students attending the academy, the uncontrolled fire demonstration put a serious stamp on the day.

We could feel the heat on our faces and it got scary, said Caitlin Burke, vice president of Alpha Phi sorority. You can be educated and know what to do about a fire, but you can still think it wont happen to you. Seeing the flames and feeling that heat  now we know, it can definitely happen to us if were not careful.

Becker, assistant risk manager at Alpha Phi, agreed.

It doesnt take much; it could be something super simple like lighting a candle, or something we take for granted every day, that can turn our lives so tragic so quickly, she said. I hope the Greek community takes this seriously, because we are a community and we do look out for each other. But it starts with us making the right choices.

The volunteer academy, organized through the Corvallis Fire Department, is designed to educate fraternity and sorority leaders on fire safety practices so that they can educate their individual houses throughout the year.

For Jane Stevens, Alpha Phis house director, the mix of fun activities and serious lessons in the academy was the perfect combination to ensure that the lessons stick for the students.

Theyre getting to see that this isnt just fun and games  this really hit home, Stevens said. Without this, it would be a lot more difficult to explain to them why this is so important and get them enthusiastic about passing this along to everyone else.

Thursdays turnout of 100 students represented nearly 100 percent of OSUs Greek leadership, said Jim Patton, fire prevention officer with Corvallis fire.

We had a small fire in a fraternity a couple of years ago, but other than that weve had a really good track record with our fraternities and sororities on campus, and we think this is a big part of that, Patton said. I feel like theyve embraced this very strongly. Right now is a really busy time for them, with recruitment and house work week, but these leaders have managed to send three people from virtually every chapter to this training.

While the one-day academy wrapped Thursday, the fire safety training is to continue through the school year as the houses compete for the annual Greek Fire Safety Achievement Trophy. The award is handed out to one house each year that passes inspections conducted by firefighters. Last year, after restructuring as the result of a 2013 suspension, Kappa Sigma fraternity won the trophy.

Scott Merrill, chapter president for Kappa Sigma, said the trophy was emblematic of hard work at the fraternity following a renewed effort on safety.

Weve been rebuilding and last year we restructured our leadership, and we all put in a lot of hard work to do the right things, Merrill said. A lot of people moving into college have never been on their own and have never had to worry about fire inspections or know what city codes are. You throw a bunch of people who dont know what theyre doing into one house, you increase the chances of a fire. But if youre willing to learn and pay attention, it makes a difference.

As does the academy, Merrill said.

This is really eye-opening. I think they need to open up this academy to the public as a whole and maybe expand it to get all chapter members involved.
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Bonn Hauptbahnhof : New displays at Bonn central train station

BONN The makeover of Bonns central train station continues. New displays show passengers the arrival times.

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Its just a few days until the Christo-like wrapping of Bonns central train station will disappear. Revealed will be a freshly cleaned and shining facade, brighter than it was before. Another improvement has already been made and many passengers have noticed. New displays over the platforms show passengers what time the next two trains will be arriving. With that, Deutsche Bahn (German Rail) addresses an often heard customer wish.

In late fall, work will begin on a complete renovation of the platform area. Within two years, a new roof will be built to replace the old one. Beginning in November, workers will start dismantling the old roof piece by piece. The new platform hall is expected to be modeled very close to the original historical building, only it will be lighter.
Luftbilder von der Verbandsgemeinde Altenahr : Wie Drohnen den Katastrophenschutz im Ahrtal verbessern sollen
Digitalization in Bonn : Wi-Fi desert in the city

Bonn Those looking for free Wi-Fi networks in Bonn will come up empty. Most networks are password protected or do not function properly. Attempts at progress are slow and expensive.

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Those looking for Internet in Bonns inner city are quick to notice: Bonn is a Wi-Fi desert, just like many other cities in Germany. If you are still eager to try and find freely accessible Wi-Fi, be sure to bring a lot of patience and keep your wits about you. Bonn is still at the very beginning, says Johannes Mirus, a digital consultant who also blogs about digitalization in Bonn. Out and about with a laptop and a Smartphone, the city was put to the test by Mirus and a General Anzeiger reporter.

At Marktplatz, there are around a dozen Wi-Fi networks available; most however, are password protected. The Deutsche Post offers free access, but after 10 minutes of failed attempts to log in, GA Reporter Andreas Dyck and Mirus gave up. Sadly, this is something that happens to me quite often, laments Mirus. The team tried to log into the 30-minutes-free Telekom network, but this also failed or the connection only lasted only a few moments. Many other networks around town in cafes or shops require the customer to input a password.

With a new Telemediengesetz (German Teleservices Act) passed in May, the political parties CDU and SPD showed their intent to strengthen the free Wi-Fi cause in Germany. This was supposed to stop users from logging into private networks without permission. Activists like the Digital Gesellschaft (Digital Society) argue, however, that this doesnt include any legal security for those with open networks. This was also criticized by the German Federal Assembly.

The new laws under the Act are meant to result in more private businesses, cafes and restaurants offering access to their Wi-Fi networks. Simon Muller, a 35-year-old computer scientist and member of the Freifunk-Initiative (Free Network Initiative) discourages such practices, referencing so-called provider privilege. Freifunk-Initiative members are opening their networks to let in potential users while protecting themselves from being held responsible for a users unlawful behavior.

Muller, however remains skeptical: I think that Bonn is mostly a Wi-Fi desert, and that wont change so quickly. Bonn lacks the funds to offer free Wi-Fi all over the city. Such networks cost 1500 euros or more- for a single location.
Overseas Twitter Users Attack Nigerian Migrant Rescued From The Mediterranean Sea

clarajancita at 16-09-2016 03:51 PM (6 years ago) (f)

Emmanuel was one of the Nigerian migrants rescued yesterday, from the Mediterranean by the Migrant Offshore Aid Station (MOAS). The Malta, Italian search and rescue agency shared the Nigerian migrant's photo today with the caption:

Emmanuel was one of the Nigerian migrants rescued yesterday, from the Mediterranean by the Migrant Offshore Aid Station (MOAS). The Malta, Italian search and rescue agency shared the Nigerian migrant's photo today with the caption: Quote "Emmanuel is one of 8 children. For him, Europe is the only hope to care for his family in Nigeria. #RescueHumanity"

The reaction from it is anything but positive with many of them calling for Emmanuel to be sent back to Nigeria. See some of the comments and more photos of African migrants, including Nigerians, rescued yesterday, September 15th.

The reaction from it is anything but positive with many of them calling for Emmanuel to be sent back to Nigeria. See some of the comments and more photos of African migrants, including Nigerians, rescued yesterday, September 15th.



















Tens of thousands of EU-bound migrants have been rescued in the Mediterranean Sea, miles off Libya in the past few months. And thousand more are willing to risk their lives in the hope of a better and safer future they all believe Europe will offer them. Smuggling networks facilitate the movement of people from various African and war-torn Middle Eastern countries, like Syria and Afghanistan to Libya which is the transit country into Europe. Unfortunately, thousands have died without achieving the dream, as the weak rubber boats conveying them capsized and threw them into the deep water. Tens of thousands of EU-bound migrants have been rescued in the Mediterranean Sea, miles off Libya in the past few months. And thousand more are willing to risk their lives in the hope of a better and safer future they all believe Europe will offer them. Smuggling networks facilitate the movement of people from various African and war-torn Middle Eastern countries, like Syria and Afghanistan to Libya which is the transit country into Europe. Unfortunately, thousands have died without achieving the dream, as the weak rubber boats conveying them capsized and threw them into the deep water.

Post Reply I am a metro reporter on Gistmania, I have been publishing news materials for over 5 years Posted: at 16-09-2016 03:51 PM (6 years ago) | Hero

gogoman at 16-09-2016 04:08 PM (6 years ago)

(m) welcome to racist EUROPE!! una go see pepe Posted: at 16-09-2016 04:08 PM (6 years ago) | Addicted Hero welcome to racist EUROPE!! una go see pepe Reply

diutopep at 16-09-2016 04:12 PM (6 years ago)

(f) Is it bcos he said...Europe is d only hope to care for his family in Nig...dat made them to attack him? He only said his mind o Posted: at 16-09-2016 04:12 PM (6 years ago) | Gistmaniac Is it bcos he said...Europe is d only hope to care for his family in Nig...dat made them to attack him? He only said his mind o Reply

Jeonleon at 16-09-2016 04:14 PM (6 years ago)

(m) I weep for Africa....

After being raped by the colonial masters, We're now being raped by our own leaders.... smh



That's why lowlives from Europe can open their mouths to vomit trash on us........ Posted: at 16-09-2016 04:14 PM (6 years ago) | Upcoming I weep for Africa....After being raped by the colonial masters, We're now being raped by our own leaders.... smhThat's why lowlives from Europe can open their mouths to vomit trash on us........ Reply

osarobo62 at 16-09-2016 04:15 PM (6 years ago)

(m) shege barawo banza to all of una.....when una grandpapa come Africa, force our grandpapa and mama into slavery and carry dem go una land, why una no complain .



all our politicians wey steal our money full europe,.... why una no complain Posted: at 16-09-2016 04:15 PM (6 years ago) | Hero shege barawo banza to all of una.....when una grandpapa come Africa, force our grandpapa and mama into slavery and carry dem go una land, why una no complainall our politicians wey steal our money full europe,.... why una no complain Reply

sandler at 16-09-2016 04:23 PM (6 years ago)

(m) WASTED GENERATION Posted: at 16-09-2016 04:23 PM (6 years ago) | Gistmaniac WASTED GENERATION Reply

kison at 16-09-2016 06:02 PM (6 years ago)

(m) Y'ALL BETTER be careful,Y'ALL be very very careful, CAREFULLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL... Posted: at 16-09-2016 06:02 PM (6 years ago) | Hero Y'ALL BETTER be careful,Y'ALL be very very careful, CAREFULLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL... Reply

christianity at 16-09-2016 06:10 PM (6 years ago)

(m) wateva Posted: at 16-09-2016 06:10 PM (6 years ago) | Gistmaniac wateva Reply

senatordee01 at 16-09-2016 06:47 PM (6 years ago)

(m) generation of vipers Posted: at 16-09-2016 06:47 PM (6 years ago) | Gistmaniac generation of vipers Reply

emytex74 at 16-09-2016 06:57 PM (6 years ago)

(m) Oyibo pple neva see anything this is just the beginning Posted: at 16-09-2016 06:57 PM (6 years ago) | Gistmaniac Oyibo pple neva see anything this is just the beginning Reply

Bebold at 16-09-2016 07:26 PM (6 years ago)

(m) What they are saying is the truth Posted: at 16-09-2016 07:26 PM (6 years ago) | Gistmaniac What they are saying is the truth Reply

teamac at 16-09-2016 08:06 PM (6 years ago)

(m) We taking over! U mutherphyukers invaded our territories back then.its payback bitches! Posted: at 16-09-2016 08:06 PM (6 years ago) | Upcoming We taking over! U mutherphyukers invaded our territories back then.its payback bitches! Reply

crocatum at 16-09-2016 08:28 PM (6 years ago)

(m) The past is past, the zeal and the energy and the faith he put into going to Europe, can be used to find a means to survive and thrive here in Nigeria. Posted: at 16-09-2016 08:28 PM (6 years ago) | Gistmaniac The past is past, the zeal and the energy and the faith he put into going to Europe, can be used to find a means to survive and thrive here in Nigeria. Reply

Otikadinje at 16-09-2016 08:46 PM (6 years ago)

(m) Europe my booth, I will make it in Naija for sure Oscardeejay Posted: at 16-09-2016 08:46 PM (6 years ago) | Gistmaniac Europe my booth, I will make it in Naija for sure Reply

Freddie333 at 16-09-2016 08:52 PM (6 years ago)

(m) Naija no good, una dae run commot go another country by fire by force, na wisdom una think say una get ba? O k oo, we are watching!! Posted: at 16-09-2016 08:52 PM (6 years ago) | Upcoming Naija no good, una dae run commot go another country by fire by force, na wisdom una think say una get ba? O k oo, we are watching!! Reply

jeroba1 at 16-09-2016 10:01 PM (6 years ago)

(m) OK I c. Posted: at 16-09-2016 10:01 PM (6 years ago) | Gistmaniac OK I c. Reply

CHRISETTE at 16-09-2016 10:47 PM (6 years ago)

(f) Them dey fear we will soon enter your country and take over Posted: at 16-09-2016 10:47 PM (6 years ago) | Hero Them dey fear we will soon enter your country and take over Reply

EDDYPRINCE at 17-09-2016 12:07 AM (6 years ago)

(m) Where did they actually think they re going to? Posted: at 17-09-2016 12:07 AM (6 years ago) | Addicted Hero Where did they actually think they re going to? Reply

winace at 17-09-2016 08:17 AM (6 years ago)

(f) Na wa o Posted: at 17-09-2016 08:17 AM (6 years ago) | Addicted Hero Na wa o Reply
5 Major Problems in Samsung Galaxy Note 7 and How to Solve Them Features oi -Prajith

Samsung Galaxy Note 7 has been making rounds on the internet for all bad reasons, thanks to its exploding batteries. Many airlines including the Indian Airlines have issued a ban on carrying the Galaxy Note 7.

However, this is not the only issue with the device, but one of them. Here are 5 common issues with the Samsung's latest iteration of Note series and solutions to fix them.

Iris Scanner is a hit and miss

Iris Scanner, is a good feature to have on a smartphone, but do we need it when we already have the quick fingerprint scanner? We will leave that for you to decide but if there's one common problem it is its occasional malfunction.

SEE ALSO: How to activate Reliance Jio 4G SIM on Microsoft Lumia Phone

Moreover, a few people complained on the internet that they've been struggling to make it work properly.

How to fix it?

There's one thing you can do. Clean the upper part of your screen (near the infrared iris scanner) and make sure that it has no fingerprint smudges.

Also, when you're trying to unlock your phone, try to hold it between 10 to 14 inches from your face.

If all of the above fail, try registering your iris scanner again. To do this head to Settings > Lockscreen & security > Irises > Remove Iris.

Recall for explosion

Unless you've been living under a rock, you'd be aware of the battery explosions of the Samsung Galaxy Note 7.

The solution, you ask?

Well, Samsung is offering replacements for the handsets irrespective of the time you bought it.

Green band on display

A few users on the internet have complained about their Note 7 screen turning green intermittently. Given the company's history, it's not something uncommon. It has happened before with the Note 5 and even with the recently released Galaxy S7.

Fix for the green screen

Try to restart your device in Safe Mode. If the issue still occurs then probably an app is causing this to happen. Take a backup of your Note 7 and factory reset the device. Make sure you don't install or update any apps.

SEE ALSO: 5 Strong Reasons to Choose BSNL BB249 Plan in India

If the problem still occurs, then it should be a hardware-related problem. Take your phone to the nearest Samsung service center to get your display replaced.

Improper functioning of speakers after submerging in water

This problem arises when water gets into speaker holes. The Galaxy Note 7 is IP68 certified, meaning it's resistant to dust and water to a good extent. So, you don't have to worry about your device.

How to fix it?

You can simply allow the water to dry by itself or you can shake it or tap it to remove the water from the speaker. Once, its dry your speaker should function as usual.

Google Now Launcher is not working properly

Lot's of people like the stock Android-like look and for this reason, alone they prefer to use Google Now Launcher. However, many users have raised complaints that the Google Now Launcher is causing issues on their smartphones.

Here's how to fix this!

This problem is caused by the Samsung's KNOX security software. To get rid of this problem, uninstall the Google Now Launcher first, next head straight to Settings > Lock screen & security > Secure Folder > Uninstall > Back up & uninstall to disable KNOX.

Then install the Google Now Launcher, configure it and reactivate the Secure Folder by going to Settings > Lock screen & security > Secure Folder

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Reliance Jio now says operators violating portability norms News oi -GizBot Bureau

Reliance Jio has sought the industry watchdog's intervention over the three main telecom operators -- Airtel, Vodafone and Idea -- refusing to allow porting of their subscribers to its own network, in an alleged disregard to licensing norms.

"Reliance Jio Infocomm, vide letters dated September 2, 2016, sent individually to Bharti Airtel, Idea and Vodafone, who are the incumbent dominant operators, informing them that Reliance Jio would be commencing its services from September 5," the company said in its letter.

SEE ALSO: Reliance Jio Welcome Offer is not Unlimited: You Can Enjoy Only 4 GB High Speed Data

"In spite of being under legal and contractual obligation to port the numbers after a valid request is made, the incumbent dominant operators have rejected all the requests made for porting between Sep 5 to Sep 12," said the letter to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI).

The letter said against 201 total requests made to the three operators -- to Airtel the most, followed by Idea and then Vodafone -- 161 of them have violated the contractual obligations and eight were subject to wrong coding, among other issues.

None were successfully completed, it said, and elaborated upon the portability regulations.

"Please note that these rejections are in addition to the rejection of mobile number portability request of 4,919 corporate mobile numbers issued to employees and members of Reliance Industries Group by Bharti Airtel in August 2016," it said.

"Reliance Jio sincerely requests that the TRAI take serious cognizance of this complaint and intervene by taking strict action against incumbent dominant operators under the relevant provisions of the mobile number portability regulations and the unified licence," it said.

SEE ALSO: 4 Ways to Unlock Your Reliance Jio 4G Android Smartphone Without a Password

The letter comes just as the incumbent operators and Reliance Jio appeared to be in the process of settling their differences over providing enough points of inter-connect for calls from the latter's network to go through to their own subscribers.

Source IANS

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'Feels Like Home Season 2' offers something real and tangible to think about; takes home a pertinent point - if your intentions are good, there is nothing in life that isn't achievable.
Service Chiefs: Budget Uncertainty, Funding Levels are Biggest Challenges

By Cheryl Pellerin DoD News, Defense Media Activity

WASHINGTON, Sept. 15, 2016  The military service chiefs today unanimously named budget uncertainty and reduced funding levels leading to gaps in readiness as their most critical long-term budgetary challenges.

Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee were Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark A. Milley, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John M. Richardson, Commandant of the Marine Corps Gen. Robert B. Neller and Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David L. Goldfein.

Army Budget Challenges

In his remarks before the panel, Milley said the most important of the Army's many challenges is consistent, sustained and predictable funding over time.

"The Army is committed to winning our fight against radical terrorists and enduring conflict in other parts of the globe," he said, noting that the Army prioritizes readiness in the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2017 because the global security environment is increasingly uncertain and complex.

"I anticipate that we will have to continue to prioritize readiness for many years to come," Milley said. "While we cannot forecast precisely when and where the next contingency will arise, it is my professional military view that if any contingency happens it will likely require a significant commitment of U.S. Army forces on the ground."

Today the Army provides 52 percent of the global combatant commander demand for military forces and 69 percent of emerging combatant commander demand, the general added, and 187,000 soldiers are committed in 140 countries conducting the nation's business.

"To sustain current operations at that rate and to mitigate the risks of deploying an unready force into future combat operations, the Army will continue to prioritize and fully fund readiness over end strength, modernization and infrastructure," Milley said. "In other words, we are mortgaging future readiness for current readiness."

Another challenge for the Army, he added, "is to sustain the counterterrorist and counterinsurgency capabilities that we have developed  and simultaneously rebuild our capability in ground combat against higher-end, near-peer, great-power threats."

Milley asked for the resources to fully man and equip combat formations and conduct realistic combined arms combat training at home station and combat training centers, and continued support for modernization in five areas: aviation, command-and-control networks, integrated air and missile defense, combat vehicles and emerging threat programs.

The general said near-term innovation efforts are focused on developing overmatch in mobility, lethality, mission command and force protection with emphasis on the following systems: long range precision fires, missile defense, directed-energy weapons, ground vehicles, vertical lift, cyber, electronic warfare, robotics, networks and active protective system for ground and air.

Navy Budget Challenges

In his remarks to the panel, Richardson described the Navy's challenges as a "triple whammy," the first being continued high demand for naval forces.

"The past 15 years of high op tempo in support of the wars has put tremendous wear and tear on our ships and aircraft. It's also taken a toll on the sailors who take those platforms out to sea, on the skilled Navy civilians who build and repair them and on our family members," the admiral said.

The second is budget uncertainty in the form of eight years of continuing resolutions, including a year of sequestration -- severe budget cuts called for by the Budget Control Act of 2011.

These, he said, "have driven additional cost and time into just about everything we do. The services are essentially operating in three fiscal quarters per year now. Nobody schedules anything important in the first quarter [and] the destruction that this uncertainty imposes translates directly into risk to our Navy and our nation," Richardson said.

The third whammy, he told the panel, is the reduction in resource levels determined by the Budget Control and Bipartisan Budget acts.

"Funding levels require us to prioritize achieving full readiness only for our deploying units. These are ready for full-spectrum operations but we are compromising the readiness of those ships and aircraft that we will have to surge to achieve victory in a large conflict. And we have also curtailed our modernization in a number of areas critical to staying ahead of our potential adversaries," Richardson said.

Marine Corps Budget Challenges

In Neller's testimony, he told the senators that based on the current top line and the future budget projections, and though the Marine Corps is meeting its current requirements, "I believe we are now pushing risk and the long-term health of the force into the future."

As an example, Neller added, the Marine Corps submitted an unfunded priority list of approximately $2.6 billion -- the largest they've ever submitted.

The Marines are as busy and as committed now as they were during the height of operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, the general said.

"Current op tempo balanced against fiscal reductions, instability of continuing resolutions and the threat of sequestration during the past years have driven us to critically review the allocation of our resources in order to meet these commitments," Neller said.

"Our readiness priority has been deployed and next-to-deploy units. Current readiness shortfalls in aviation, facilities sustainment, future modernization, retention of critical skills and building the depth on our ready bench forces at home are our primary concerns," he told the panel.

Air Force Budget Challenges

In his remarks Goldfein said the Air Force must maintain stable, predictable funding for the F-35, the KC-46 and the B-21 to outpace its adversaries and with the Navy must modernize its aging nuclear enterprise.

"While we continue to extend the life of our existing fleets, we need the flexibility to retire aging weapon systems and reduce excess infrastructure in order to afford the technology needed to maintain our advantage given adversary advancements in satellite-enabled precision, stealth, cruise and ballistic missiles, [intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance] and other anti-access/area denial capabilities that  proliferate worldwide," the general told the panel.

To regain full-spectrum readiness, the Air Force would have to move from Bipartisan Budget Act end-strength totals for fiscal 2017 of 492,000 airmen, 317,000 of which are active duty, to 321,000 active-duty airmen by the end of fiscal 2017.

Goldfein said this is based on current and projected global demands for airpower to deter and if required defeat challenges presented by China, Russia, Iran, North Korea and violent extremism.

"This remains our top priority in the current budget request," he said.

To maintain its technological edge, Goldfein said the Air Force is laser focused on fighter, tanker and bomber recapitalization.

This includes nuclear modernization, preparing for a war that could extend into space, increasing capability and capacity in the cyber domain, and leveraging and improving multidomain and coalition-friendly command and control as the foundation of future combined arms operation, he said.

From fiscal 2018 on with its current requirements, the general said the Air Force will be "forced to continually make strategic trades to simultaneously sustain legacy fleets engaged in the current fight while smartly investing in modernization and the future technologies that will be required to meet combatant commander demands in the information age of warfare."

Essential to success, he added, are repealing sequestration, returning to stable budgets without extended continuing resolutions, and allowing the Air Force the flexibility to reduce excess infrastructure and make strategic trades.

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U.S. Department of Defense

Press Operations

News Release

No. NR-323-16 September 15, 2016

Navy to Christen Littoral Combat Ship Wichita

The Navy will christen its newest Freedom-variant littoral combat ship, USS Wichita (LCS 13), during a 10 a.m. CST ceremony Saturday, Sept. 17 in Marinette, Wisconsin.

Wichita, designated LCS 13, honors the city of Wichita, Kansas.

Sen. Tammy Baldwin, the junior senator from Wisconsin, will serve as the principal speaker. Novelist and editor Kate Lehrer, the wife of former PBS news anchor and Wichita native Jim Lehrer, will serve as the ship's sponsor. The ceremony will be highlighted by Lehrer breaking a bottle of sparkling wine across the bow to formally christen the ship, a time-honored Navy tradition.

"The christening of the future USS Wichita brings this warship one step closer to joining our nation's growing fleet," said the Honorable Ray Mabus, secretary of the Navy. "The skill and dedication of the men and women who brought this ship from an idea to a realityour country's incomparable shipbuilderswill be remembered for years to come as the LCS 13 deploys around the world."

The future USS Wichita is the third naval vessel to honor Kansas's largest city. The first (CA 45) was a heavy cruiser in service from 1939 to 1947. Active during World War II, Wichita supported amphibious landings during Operation Torch in November 1942 in the European Theater and later participated in the Battles of the Philippine Sea and Leyte Gulf and the invasion of Okinawa in 1944 in the Pacific Theater, earning 13 battle stars for wartime service. The second USS Wichita (AOR 1) was a first-in-class replenishment oiler in service from 1969 to 1993. During her first three deployments, AOR 1 made numerous line swings to replenish ships on "Yankee Station," earning four battle stars for service during the Vietnam War.

The LCS class consists of two variants, the Freedom variant and the Independence variant, designed and built by two industry teams. The Freedom variant team is led by Lockheed Martin (for the odd-numbered hulls, e.g. LCS 1). The Independence variant team is led by Austal USA (for LCS 6 and the subsequent even-numbered hulls).

Each LCS seaframe will be outfitted with a single mission module made up of a mission system and support equipment. A dedicated ship crew will combine with aviation assets to deploy manned and unmanned vehicles and sensors in support of mine countermeasures, anti-submarine warfare or surface warfare missions.

Media may direct queries to the Navy Office of Information at 703- 697-5342. For more information about the Littoral Combat Ship class: http://www.navy.mil/navydata/fact_display.asp?cid=4200&tid=1650&ct=4.

http://www.defense.gov/News/News-Releases/News-Release-View/Article/946082/

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U.S. Department of Defense

Press Operations

News Release

No. NR-325-16 September 15, 2016

Readout of Secretary of Defense Ash Carter's Meeting With Japanese Minister of Defense Tomomi Inada

Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook provided the following readout:

Secretary of Defense Ash Carter held a bilateral meeting today with the new Japanese Minister of Defense Tomomi Inada, at the Pentagon.

During their inaugural meeting, the two leaders discussed the rapidly evolving security environment, including the persistent North Korean threat and maritime issues in the East and South China Seas. Secretary Carter affirmed that the Senkaku islands are administered by Japan and fall under Article 5 of the U.S.-Japan Mutual Security Treaty. They also affirmed both governments' determination to uphold the principle of freedom of navigation, and to continue to conduct maritime operations in accordance with international law.

Secretary Carter and Minister Inada exchanged views on building a principled and inclusive security network in the Asia-Pacific, to include enhancing trilateral cooperation with the Republic of Korea, Australia, and India. They also discussed building the capacity and capability of Southeast Asian partners through dialogue, exercises, training, and defense equipment cooperation.

The two leaders committed to further efforts to transform the alliance by implementing the Guidelines for U.S.-Japan Defense Cooperation, and reaffirmed that the U.S.-Japan alliance remains unwavering and continues to serve as the cornerstone of peace and security in the Asia-Pacific region.

http://www.defense.gov/News/News-Releases/News-Release-View/Article/946214/

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Two Former Executives of Foreign Defense Contractor Charged in Expanding Fraud and Corruption Probe

Department of Justice

Office of Public Affairs

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Thursday, September 15, 2016

Two former executives of a foreign defense contractor have been charged in an indictment unsealed today with participating in a conspiracy to submit fraudulent information, price quotes, claims and invoices to the U.S. Navy in an effort to steal millions of dollars as part of a years-long corruption and fraud scheme.

Assistant Attorney General Leslie R. Caldwell of the Justice Department's Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Laura E. Duffy of the Southern District of California, Acting Director Dermot O'Reilly of the Department of Defense's (DoD) Defense Criminal Investigative Service (DCIS) and Director Andrew Traver of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) made the announcement.

Neil Peterson, 38, and Linda Raja, 43, both of Singapore, were each charged with one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States with respect to claims; one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud; and multiple counts of making false claims. Both defendants have been arrested by authorities in Singapore at the request of the U.S. government.

According to the indictment, Peterson and Raja worked for Singapore-based Glenn Defense Marine Asia (GDMA) and conspired with Leonard Glenn Francis, the owner of GDMA, in order to defraud the U.S. Navy for GDMA's financial benefit. The indictment alleges that Peterson served as the Vice President for Global Operations for GDMA and Raja served as GDMA's General Manager for Singapore, Australia and the Pacific Isles.

The indictment alleges that Peterson and Raja submitted more than $5 million in false claims and invoices to the U.S. Navy. In addition, Peterson and Raja allegedly worked to perpetuate and cover up their fraud by consistently misrepresenting to the U.S. Navy the cost of providing services to its ships in Asia, even going so far as to submit false price quotes from non-existent companies on letterhead created from graphics cut and pasted from the internet.

Including Peterson and Raja, a total of 16 individuals have been charged in connection with the GDMA corruption and fraud investigation. Of those, 11 are current or former U.S. Navy officials, including Admiral Robert Gilbeau; Captain (ret.) Michael Brooks; Commander Bobby Pitts; Lt. Commander Gentry Debord; Captain Daniel Dusek; Commander Michael Misiewicz; Lt. Commander Todd Malaki; Commander Jose Luis Sanchez; Petty Officer First Class Daniel Layug; NCIS Supervisory Special Agent John Beliveau; and Paul Simpkins, a former DoD civilian employee who oversaw contracting in Singapore.

Gilbeau, Dusek, Misiewicz, Malaki, Beliveau, Sanchez, Layug and Simpkins have pleaded guilty. On Jan. 21, 2016, Layug was sentenced to 27 months in prison and a $15,000 fine; on Jan. 29, 2016, Malaki was sentenced to 40 months in prison and ordered to pay $15,000 in restitution to the Navy and a $15,000 fine; on March 25, 2016, Dusek was sentenced to 46 months in prison and ordered to pay $30,000 in restitution to the Navy and a $70,000 fine; and on April 29, 2016, Misiewicz was sentenced to 78 months in prison and ordered to pay $95,000 in restitution to the Navy and a $100,000 fine. Gilbeau, Beliveau, Sanchez and Simpkins await sentencing.

Brooks, Pitts and Debord were charged in May 2016 and their cases are pending.

Also charged are three additional GDMA executives: Francis, Alex Wisidagama and Ed Aruffo, and all three have pleaded guilty. Wisidagama was sentenced on March 18, 2016, to 63 months in prison and was ordered to pay $34.8 million in restitution to the Navy. Francis and Aruffo await sentencing.

An indictment is merely an allegation and the defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.

DCIS, NCIS and the Defense Contract Audit Agency are investigating. Assistant Chief Brian R. Young of the Criminal Division's Fraud Section and Assistant U.S. Attorneys Mark W. Pletcher and Patrick Hovakimian of the Southern District of California are prosecuting the case. The Justice Department's Office of International Affairs provided substantial assistance in this matter.

Anyone with information relating to fraud or corruption should contact the NCIS anonymous tip line at www.ncis.navy.mil or the DOD hotline at www.dodig.mil/hotline, or call (800) 424-9098.

16-1049

Criminal Division

Criminal Fraud

USAO - California, Southern

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Statement by Acting NATO Spokesperson Carmen Romero on risk reduction and transparency

NATO - North Atlantic Treaty Organisation

15 Sep. 2016

As part of our continuing dialogue with Russia, the NATO Deputy Secretary General, Ambassador Alexander Vershbow, met today with the Ambassador of the Russian Federation, Alexander Grushko.

They discussed ways to increase transparency and risk reduction, following up from the agenda of the last Ambassadorial meeting of the NATO-Russia Council (NRC) on 13 July 2016.

Ambassador Vershbow welcomed Russia's expressed interest in transparency and risk reduction. NATO has a firm and long-standing commitment to these issues.

He informed Ambassador Grushko that Allies have carefully considered the proposals presented by Russia at the last meeting of the NRC.

The Deputy Secretary General confirmed that NATO stands ready to take our dialogue forward, in line with the decisions taken at the Warsaw Summit.

There is no change in NATO's policy towards Russia. Our practical cooperation remains suspended following Russia's aggressive actions against Ukraine. At the same time, we decided to keep channels of political dialogue open.

The Alliance also remains open to the use of military lines of communication to address the critical issues we face.

The NATO Secretary General, Jens Stoltenberg, looks forward to discussing these issues and next steps with the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, in the near future.

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Saudi says 5 soldiers killed in clashes with Yemeni forces

Iran Press TV

Thu Sep 15, 2016 10:25AM

Saudi Arabia has confirmed that five of its soldiers have been killed in separate clashes with fighters of the Yemeni Houthi movement in the kingdom's southern border regions of Dhahran Janoub, Jizan and Asir.

Major General Mahya al-Otaibi, Jizan Border Guard chief, told the state-run SPA news agency on Wednesday that conscript Musa bin Mohammed Daeli was killed in Dhahran al-Janoub region near the border with Yemen's mountainous northwestern province of Sa'ada.

Major General Nasser bin Saleh Aldojse, Jizan police chief, added that officer Hamoud Mohammed Awaji lost his life in the southern flank of Saudi Arabia.

Additionally, Saudi Arabia's Minister of the National Guard Mutaib bin Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud said a soldiers was critically wounded during a heavy exchange of gunfire in the al-Rabu'ah town of the southwestern Asir region.

The three senior Saudi officials, however, did not provide any information about the time when three soldiers were killed and the circumstances surrounding their deaths.

Arabic-language Saudi Arabian daily newspaper Okaz also reported that officer Ahmed bin Hassan Atif was killed in the southern part of the kingdom.

Moreover, Akhbar 24 online newspaper reported that a soldier, identified as Ahmed Tohara, died during clashes on the southern border of Saudi Arabia with Yemen.

The developments came as three Qatari soldiers of the Saudi-led military coalition against Yemen were killed during operations in the conflict-ridden country on Monday.

Qatar's state-run QNA news agency did not give any information on how or where they lost their lives.

Over the past few weeks, there have been multiple losses of life within the ranks of Saudi army soldiers and border guards during encounters with Yemeni soldiers and allied Ansarullah fighters.

Earlier this month, Yemeni snipers fatally shot two Saudi troops in al-Rabu'ah. A Saudi military vehicle also went up in flames after Yemeni soldiers and their allies targeted it with a guided missile at a camp in the same southwestern Saudi town.

Saudi Arabia has been incessantly pounding Yemen since March 2015, with the UN putting the death toll from the military aggression at about 10,000. The offensive was launched to reinstate Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, a Saudi ally who has resigned as Yemen's president.

UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Yemen Jamie McGoldrick said last month that the death toll from the Saudi military aggression could rise even further as some areas had no medical facilities, and that people were often buried without any official record being made.

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Philippines Diplomat Cautions US Against Human Rights Lectures

By Mary Alice Salinas September 15, 2016

The top Philippines diplomat has cautioned the United States against lecturing his government on human rights, prompting a White House spokesman to urge all countries, especially allies, to uphold universal human rights.

Speaking Thursday in Washington, Foreign Secretary Perfecto Yasay called for mutual respect between his country and its former colonial power, saying Filipinos are not "the little brown brothers of America.''

However, Yasay assured a group at the Center for Strategic and International Studies that Manila is committed to a positive relationship with the United States.

His appearance followed a string of controversial statements by new Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte.

Duterte urged U.S. President Barack Obama not to question him about extrajudicial killings, or, he warned, "Son of a whore, I will swear at you."

After the remarks, Obama called on his advisers to determine whether a scheduled meeting with Duterte at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations summit in Vientiane, Laos, last week would be productive. The White House canceled the meeting, although the leaders exchanged "pleasantries" during a brief meeting at the ASEAN dinner gala.

Obama later said Duterte's remarks did not affect relations between the allied nations.

'Look at our aspirations'

"I am asking our American friends, American leaders, to look at our aspirations," Yasay said. "We cannot forever be the little brown brothers of America. ... We have to develop, we have to grow and become the big brother of our own people."

The foreign secretary urged Washington not to give lectures on human rights as a condition for receiving American help.

"You do not go to the Philippines and say, 'I am going to give you something. I am going to help you grow, but this is the checklist you must comply with. We will lecture you on human rights,' " said Yasay.

At the White House, spokesman Josh Earnest said Obama "has made quite clear that human rights impacts our relationship with the Philippines."

The U.S. has worked closely with Manila on combating terrorism, extremism and violence connected to the drug trade, Earnest said.

"It's important, however, that as those kinds of operations and efforts are undertaken, that universal human rights are protected, and engaging in that kind of law enforcement activity consistent with our commitment to human rights is important," he added. "And we certainly encourage countries around the world, particularly our allies, to do exactly that."

Duterte has drawn the ire of the United States for his bloody crackdown on the drug trade, killing more than 3,000 suspected drug users and dealers since assuming the presidency in June.

Security ties

Yasay also sought to walk back suggestions by Duterte that Manila plans to curb its security alliance with Washington. He said the Philippines is committed to a defense pact that gives the U.S. access to five Philippine military bases.

However, Yasay confirmed that Manila does not want to take part in joint U.S.-Philippines patrol exercises in disputed waters in the South China Sea, as it previously has done.

At the Pentagon Thursday, a spokesman, Navy Commander Gary Ross, said, "We have conducted three [such] patrols. The first patrol was conducted in March, with the second completed in early April. Our last joint patrol was in July.

"Our relationship with the Philippines is broad and our alliance is one of our most enduring relationships in the Asia-Pacific region. It has been a cornerstone of stability for over 70 years. The Filipino people are some of our closest friends and allies, and our relationship is built on shared sacrifices for democracy and human rights and strong people-to-people and societal ties."

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T-X Family of Systems

Boeing T-X is an all-new aircraft designed specifically for the U.S. Air Force training mission. Boeings design takes advantage of the latest technologies, tools and manufacturing techniques. It is an advanced aircraft designed to evolve as technologies, missions and training needs change. The design is more affordable and flexible than older, existing aircraft.

The Boeing T-X aircraft has one engine, twin tails, stadium seating and an advanced cockpit with embedded training. The system also offers state-of-the-art ground-based training and a maintenance-friendly design for long-term supportability. T-X will replace the Air Forces aging T-38 aircraft. Initial operating capability is planned for 2024. Boeing and its partner Saab AB will use their two production T-X aircraft, revealed Tuesday 13 September 2016, to show the US Air Force the performance, affordability, and maintainability advantages of their approach. Our T-X is real, ready and the right choice for training pilots for generations to come, said Boeing Defense, Space & Security President and CEO Leanne Caret.

On 06 December 2013 Boeing and Saab AB signed a Joint Development Agreement (JDA) to jointly develop and build a new advanced, cost-efficient T-X Family of Systems training solution for the upcoming competition to replace the U.S. Air Force's aging T-38 aircrew training system. The JDA, with Boeing as the prime contractor and Saab AB as primary partner, covers areas including design, development, production, support, sales and marketing. The winner of the T-X competition will eventually replace the Northrop T-38 Talon, which has served as the USAFs advanced jet trainer since the 1960s. The procurement could reach up to 350 units.

Saab and Boeing were tight-lipped about their collaborative bid for the USAF's T-X program. While other bidders had a preference for existing designs, it was said that Saab and Boeing decided on a clean-sheet design that would not be a variant of the Gripen. Boeing had previously released T-X concept art.

"Teaming with Saab will bring together our companies' formidable technical expertise, global presence, and willingness to present an adaptable and affordable advanced pilot training solution," said Boeing Military Aircraft President Chris Chadwick. "Boeing and Saab form the foundation for what will be the strongest, most cost-effective industry team. Our comprehensive Family of Systems approach provides a new, purpose-built T-X aircraft supported by innovative training and logistics support to offer total-life-cycle cost benefits to the U.S. Air Force and taxpayers."

"Saab is proud to join with Boeing for the T-X competition, thus creating a highly capable team to deliver unprecedented value to the customer. We are sure this is the best way to supply affordable first-class trainers to the U.S. Air Force," said Saab President and CEO Hakan Buskhe. "We will invest in development of this completely new aircraft design over the coming years. This cooperation with Boeing is part of our strategic development and we confirm our long-term financial targets."

Boeing and Saab look forward to the upcoming acquisition process, which will lead to the customer awarding the contract. The U.S. Air Force T-X program will include aircraft and training that will prepare warfighters for the next 40 years. The Air Force plans to replace the T-38 with a new Advanced Pilot Training Family of Systems and about 350 aircraft, plus associated ground-based training systems and logistics and sustainment support.

The trainer solution from Boeing and Saab with other potential team members will be a completely new designed aircraft, built to meet the needs of the Air Force. Swedish defense and security company Saab serves the global market with world-leading products, services and solutions ranging from military defense to civil security. Saab has operations and employees on all continents and constantly develops, adopts and improves new technology to meet customers changing needs. Saab is a $4 billion business with approximately 14,000 employees in about 35 countries.

A unit of The Boeing Company, Boeing Defense, Space & Security is one of the world's largest defense, space and security businesses specializing in innovative and capabilities-driven customer solutions, and the worlds largest and most versatile manufacturer of military aircraft. Headquartered in St. Louis, Boeing Defense, Space & Security is a $33 billion business with 58,000 employees worldwide.

The link with Saab became possible when the Swedish government launched development of the new JAS 39E version at the beginning of 2013. Sweden and Switzerland planned to order only JAS 39E single-seaters, but the two-seat 39F is a straightforward development.

Early reports on a "decontented" Saab Gripen have been dispelled. On 12 September 2013, Lennart Sindahl, Saabs execuctive vice president and head of Saabs Business Area Aeronautics, clarified the companys position on teaming with Boeing on the T-X program using a Gripen derivative. With the new development of the Gripen E version we expect it to remain in that position for many years to come. But a great fighter aircraft does not necessarily make a good trainer. We remain focused on the continued development of the Gripen E and the fighter will never be a trainer, Sindahl said.

In August 2016 Boeing quietly launched new content on its website related to its T-X design, a co-development with Saab, which had been kept under a blanket of secrecy for years. The site includef four video sneak peak looks at computer generated images of the plane from various angles, as well as a pair of new promo images. It had been widely been expected that Boeing and Northrop will both bring their designs to the annual Air Force Association meeting in Washington DC starting 19 Septembe 2016.

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US Sanctions 2 Men as IS Financial Facilitators

By Esha Sarai September 15, 2016

The U.S. government imposed sanctions Thursday on two men identified as financial facilitators for the Islamic State group.

Mohamad Alsaied Alhmidan and Hussam Jamous, both based in Turkey, have been designated by the U.S. Treasury Department. The action makes their property and interests in property subject to U.S. legal judgments, and they cannot engage in transactions with anyone in the U.S.

The Treasury says Alhmidan facilitated the movement of tens of thousands of dollars and foreign fighters, and provided logistical support to Islamic State.

Jamous was also allegedly involved in the movement of foreign fighters, and served as a financial intermediary for Islamic State members.

"Today's action marks the latest step in Treasury's efforts to cut off ISIL's finances and underscores that ISIL financial facilitators are not beyond the reach of the international campaign to defeat ISIL," a Treasury statement released Thursday said, using an acronym for Islamic State.

The two join a long list of Islamic State members who have been sanctioned for their roles in facilitating funds sent to the terror group over the past year.

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Brazil prosecutors file corruption charges against Lula

Iran Press TV

Thu Sep 15, 2016 5:30AM

Prosecutors in Brazil have filed charges of involvement in money-laundering and corruption against former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and his wife.

Federal prosecutors on Wednesday indicted the couple for alleged implication in graft schemes and the embezzlement of more than $2 billion from the country's giant state-run oil company, Petrobras.

The former Brazilian president and his wife were also charged with receiving a luxury apartment at a seaside resort in Sao Paulo from a major construction company involved in the Petrobras corruption scandal.

The 70-year-old ex-president has strongly denied any wrongdoing and repeatedly declared his innocence, saying the prosecution against him and his associates is politically motivated.

Lula's lawyers also said that prosecutors lacked evidence to support their allegations, which they said were part of political scheme to hinder his chances to run for the 2018 presidential election in Brazil.

"This Lula-centered farce was trumped up as an affront to the democratic state and intelligence of Brazilian citizens," Cristiano Zanin, one of his lawyers, said.

Despite all accusations targeting Lula and his party, recent opinion polls have indicated that he enjoys sizable popularity among Brazilians and stands a much higher chance to win the next presidential election than potential rivals.

Lula, who was key to bringing the summer Olympics to Rio, left office with huge popularity thanks to social programs during his administration, which lifted tens of millions of Brazilians from poverty.

His legacy, however, has been seriously tainted by the emergence of the Petrobras scandal, in which dozens of politicians and executives stand accused of having embezzled from the huge state oil company in a web of inflated contracts, kickbacks and bribes during his presidency.

A scandal also affected Lula's successor, Dilma Rousseff, leading to her impeachment by Congress last month over breaking budget rules and her handling of Brazil's worst recession since the 1930s.

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Chinese, Russian navies depart for joint drill at sea

People's Daily Online

(Xinhua) 22:37, September 15, 2016

Chinese and Russian fleets sailed out of a port in Zhanjiang in south China's Guangdong Province Thursday to predetermined waters for joint naval drill.

The "Joint Sea 2016" drill, starting Sept. 12, will run until Sept. 19, consisting of three phases: preparation at port, exercise at sea and summary.

China and Russia will present a total of 13 surface ships, two submarines, 11 fixed-wing aircraft, 10 ship-borne helicopters and amphibious armored equipment as well as 256 marines in the drill.

In the preparation phase, participants from both sides carried out map deduction and discussion and marines from the two militaries conducted joint training.

In the coming days, the two sides will undertake joint air defense, anti-submarine operations, coordinated three-dimensional island seizing, search and rescue, landing and examining and weapon use.

The coordinated three-dimensional island seizing activity is jointly operated by the two militaries for the first time.

"The exercise shows a high level of mutual trust between the two navies," said Zhang Junshe, a military expert.

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UK government refuses to give MPs vote on arms sales to Saudi Arabia

Iran Press TV

Wed Sep 14, 2016 10:22PM

The British government refuses to give lawmakers a vote on whether to keep selling arms to Saudi Arabia, engaged in war crimes in Yemen.

In a leaked draft report last week, the Committee on Arms Exports Control echoed both the European Parliament and the Commons International Development Select Committee in calling for arms sales to the monarchy to end.

If the report is finalized, the MPs on that committee would add their names to recommendations by the House of Commons International Development Committee who have also urged an end to the weapons sales.

However, there have been reports of political maneuvering in the parliament in order to prevent lawmakers from blocking arms sales to Saudis.

The Guardian reported that MPs are seeking to water down the committees on arms export controls draft report and so preserve the current strong UK relations with Saudi Arabia.

Green party leader Caroline Lucas is among those who believe British MPs should be given a say on the issue.

"Britain's continued arming of Saudi Arabia is a stain on our reputation on the world stage. While they continue to breach international law in Yemen, we are aiding and abetting their wrongdoing by supplying them with military equipment. MPs should be given a chance to debate and vote on our continued arms sales to this brutal regime," she told The Independent.

The government's resistance to end Saudi arms sales adds strength to Britain's seemingly untouchable relationship with the House of Saud. Last week, Prime Minister Theresa May staunchly defended selling arms to the kingdom despite facing criticism for being supportive of a human rights violator.

Opposition Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has called on May to halt the arms sales because of the "humanitarian devastation" caused by the aggressive war on Yemen.

Britain is now the second biggest arms dealer in the world and since 2010, two-thirds of weapons have reportedly gone to the Middle East.

Britain signed off a contract worth 3.3 billion of arms exports to Saudi Arabia in the first year of the country's bombardment of Yemen, which included drones, helicopters, and other aircraft.

Saudi Arabia has been incessantly pounding Yemen since March 2015, with the UN putting the death toll from the military aggression at about 10,000.

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Syria aid trucks cross Turkish border, enter buffer zone: UN

Iran Press TV

Thu Sep 15, 2016 1:46PM

The United Nations has confirmed that trucks loaded with desperately needed aid for Syria's war-rattled city of Aleppo have crossed the Turkish border and entered a buffer zone between the two countries.

Jan Egeland, head of the UN humanitarian task force for Syria, said Thursday that the 20 trucks were in the buffer zone after successfully crossing the border.

He voiced hope that the humanitarian items could reach the Syrians in Aleppo, northwest of the country, by Friday.

The United States and Russia extended a ceasefire for Syria earlier in the day after reports said the fragile agreement was mostly holding across the country. However, the truce, which began on September 12, has achieved almost nothing in terms of aid delivery as hundreds of thousands in cities such as Aleppo have been affected by weeks of fierce fighting and are desperately in need of aid.

Opposition sources said Thursday that the exit of the trucks from the buffer zone could be delayed as neither Damascus nor Russia had made any announcement about the withdrawal of troops from the road linking the border area to eastern Aleppo.

The so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said government forces were still on Castello Road and no demilitarization had taken place as anticipated based on the truce deal.

Officials in Russia said a day earlier that militants were to blame for the delay in the withdrawal, saying they continued to target pro-government forces with mortars.

Both the United States and Russia are expected to guarantee the security of the UN aid convoy through influencing the government and militants. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said Wednesday that the trucks would be able to cross the lines in case "the necessary security arrangements" were made by Moscow and Washington.

The UN says the convoy of 20 trucks is stocked with a month's worth of food supplies for 40,000 residents of Aleppo.

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English German

Basilea grants Asahi Kasei Pharma exclusive license to develop and commercialize isavuconazole in Japan

Basilea eligible for upfront and milestone payments of up to CHF 67 million and double-digit royalties





Basel, Switzerland, September 15, 2016 - Basilea Pharmaceutica Ltd. (SIX: BSLN) announced today that Basilea Pharmaceutica International Ltd. (Basilea) has entered into a partnering agreement with Asahi Kasei Pharma Corporation (Asahi Kasei Pharma) for Basilea's antifungal drug isavuconazole in Japan.

Under the terms of the agreement, Asahi Kasei Pharma is granted an exclusive license to develop and commercialize isavuconazole in Japan. Basilea will receive an upfront payment of CHF 7 million and will be eligible to receive up to approximately CHF 60 million (at current exchange rate) of additional payments upon achievement of regulatory and commercial milestones. Basilea will also receive double-digit tiered royalties on product sales in Japan.

Asahi Kasei Pharma will be responsible for conducting clinical studies necessary to apply for Japanese marketing authorization for isavuconazole for the treatment of invasive aspergillosis and mucormycosis. It will purchase product for commercialization of isavuconazole from Basilea.

Ronald Scott, Basilea's Chief Executive Officer, stated: "We are very pleased to partner with Asahi Kasei Pharma, which has a proven track record in the successful clinical development of innovative drugs and a strong commercial presence in the hospital area, including intensive care units and hematology. We look forward to making isavuconazole available to patients in this important market. Isavuconazole may provide a new treatment option for patients in Japan in this area of substantial unmet medical need."

About isavuconazole

Isavuconazole is an intravenous and oral azole antifungal and the active agent of the prodrug isavuconazonium sulfate. Isavuconazole is approved in the United States for patients 18 years of age and older in the treatment of invasive aspergillosis and invasive mucormycosis.1 In Europe, it received marketing authorization for the treatment of adult patients with invasive aspergillosis and for the treatment of adult patients with mucormycosis for whom amphotericin B is inappropriate.2 Basilea has licensed the US rights to Astellas Pharma Inc. and the Japanese rights to Asahi Kasei Pharma Corporation. Basilea commercializes isavuconazole as CRESEMBA in Germany, Italy, the UK and Austria and is seeking national pricing and reimbursement in additional EU countries. The drug is commercialized in the US by Astellas Pharma US. Outside the US and the EU, isavuconazole is currently an investigational product and not approved for commercial use. The drug was co-developed by Basilea and Astellas.

About invasive aspergillosis and mucormycosis

Invasive aspergillosis and mucormycosis are life-threatening fungal infections that predominantly affect immunocompromised patients, such as patients with cancer. Invasive aspergillosis is known for high morbidity and mortality. Mucormycosis (also known as zygomycosis) is a rapidly progressing and life-threatening invasive fungal infection, known for high morbidity and mortality.

About Basilea

Basilea Pharmaceutica Ltd. is a biopharmaceutical company developing products that address increasing resistance and non-response to current treatment options in the therapeutic areas of bacterial infections, fungal infections and cancer. The company uses the integrated research, development and commercial operations of its subsidiary Basilea Pharmaceutica International Ltd. to discover, develop and commercialize innovative pharmaceutical products to meet the medical needs of patients with serious and potentially life-threatening conditions. Basilea Pharmaceutica Ltd. is headquartered in Basel, Switzerland and listed on the SIX Swiss Exchange (SIX: BSLN). Additional information can be found at Basilea's website www.basilea.com.

Disclaimer

This communication expressly or implicitly contains certain forward-looking statements concerning Basilea Pharmaceutica Ltd. and its business. Such statements involve certain known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which could cause the actual results, financial condition, performance or achievements of Basilea Pharmaceutica Ltd. to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Basilea Pharmaceutica Ltd. is providing this communication as of this date and does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements contained herein as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

For further information, please contact:

Peer Nils Schroder, PhD

Head of Corporate Communications & Investor Relations

+41 61 606 1102

media_relations@basilea.com

investor_relations@basilea.com

This press release can be downloaded from www.basilea.com.

References
CHATHAM  In the final appeal hearing of a Freedom of Information Act case that was first heard in June 2015, Judge James Reynolds ordered a writ of mandamus into effect for the Agriculture Development Board.

The ag board must keep and produce minutes publically for every meeting is holds for the next 18 months, with a possibility of rescinding the order at that time.

The board was technically exempt from needing to take minutes, but if minutes were taken, they would become public record  and must be published, according to Virginia law.

The original complaint from Deborah Dix, Philip Lovelace and Karen Maute alleged that the ag board had failed to maintain minutes of all open meetings, it had gone into closed meeting to discuss a personnel matter in violation of state law, gone into closed meeting in violation of state law and resuming open meeting in violation of state law, and failure to ensure free entry to the open meeting upon resumption of closed meeting in violation of state law  as well as not maintaining written minutes of its open meetings since it was formed in 2007.

Maute requested meeting minutes for the April 8, 2015, ag board meeting, and was told by County Attorney J. Vaden Hunt that the board did not have the minutes, because the board was not required to keep minutes, and therefore could not produce them. However, those records were sent to Maute amidst many other meeting minutes in November 2015 by USPS as the result of another FOIA request.

While Reynolds did not find merit in some of the allegations on July 28, he did feel hoodooed by Hunts claim that all records that existed had been previously given, but had not. Reynolds offered Hunt the ability to explain the confusion at another hearing, which took place Thursday.

Hunt was unavailable to testify at Thursdays hearing, according to attorney Jim Guynns statement in court. In a later conversation, Guynn said that Hunt had already testified, and Guynn as an attorney decided that there was no need to waste the courts time when they already had the testimony from the first hearing.

Reynolds also authorized the payment of the attorneys fees to Barbara Hudson  which Supervisor Elton Blackstock confirmed that he still intends to pay himself, instead of the county paying it. Hudson intends to donate her attorneys fees for this case to the SPCA of Pittsylvania County.

Simkiss reports for the Danville Register & Bee.
To the editor:

The word bigot is defined as one who is strongly partial to ones own group, race, religion or politics, and is intolerant of those who differ. I would guess that all of us are strongly partial in most if not all of these categories.

In my opinion it is the intolerant part that presents the problem. We all have different beliefs based on our backgrounds, and many of them will not change and we should be able to express our views in a calm reasonable way without someone calling us a bigot or some other word used to define a form of bigotry.

Intolerance is defined as a refusal to allow opposing views. Today this is expressed too often in violence leading to death, injury and property damage. Intolerance is also expressed by others abetting the problem by not blaming the people who are causing the damage and saying it was justified. It should never be justified.

We also see intolerance today in education, politics and the news media where only one side of a discussion is allowed and any other views are dismissed as not worthy of comment. Much of the intolerance we see in these groups is caused by their support of a political party. We also see in tolerance in our federal departments in Washington and that too is primarily caused by federal unions supporting a political party.

I believe the two-party political system of government creates much of our intolerance. People are too involved in getting candidates elected rather people elected. If several people could run for an office based on individual beliefs, we could have many more ideas about how to solve problems. Congress votes too often along party, lines so our representatives cant vote for what they believe. They can only vote on the consensus of the party leaders and the party leaders often vote the way large donors want them to vote. I dont believe large donors could control an individuals vote as easily as a party vote. We need to get rid of the party system or add many more for better diversity.

RAY F. LAWSON

Danville
VANCOUVER, Sep 15, 2016 - True North Gems Inc. (TSX VENTURE:TGX) ("True North" or the "Company") announces that it has been advised by the trustees in bankruptcy for True North Gems Greenland A/S ("TNGG") that the bankruptcy estate has reviewed and considered the binding offers received and has entered into a business transfer agreement with the successful bidder.

True North made a bid, but its bid was not successful. The trustees have not identified the successful bidder to True North. True North is further advised that the agreement entered into with the successful bidder is conditional on the Greenlandic authorities' consent to the assignment of the key licenses.

True North is TNGG's largest creditor. The trustees have advised True North that creditors of the bankruptcy estate will, on an ongoing basis, receive information of the status of the bankruptcy proceedings in accordance with the requirements set out in the the Bankruptcy Act in Greenland.

True North will provide further updates as information becomes available.

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

This document contains "forward-looking information" and "forward-looking statements" (together, "forward-looking statements") within the meaning of applicable securities legislation, which are made as of the date of this document or the document(s) referred to herein. Statements that express predictions, expectations, beliefs, plans, projections, objectives, assumptions or future events or performance (often, but not always, using words or phrases such as "expects", "anticipates", "plans", "projects", "estimates", "intends", "strategy", "goals", "objectives" or variations thereof or stating that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will" be taken, occur or be achieved, or the negative of any of these terms and similar expressions) are not statements of historical fact and may be forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements include, without limitation, statements with respect to: the amount of mineral reserves and mineral resources; the amount of future production over any period; net present value and internal rates of return of the proposed mining operation; capital costs; operating costs; strip ratios and mining rates; and mine life. The forward-looking statements are made based upon certain assumptions which, if untrue, could cause the actual results, performances or achievements of the Company to be materially different from future results, performances or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. These assumptions include, without limitation: the price of gemstone products produced; anticipated costs; the presence of and continuity of gemstones at modeled grades and values; the capacities of various machinery and equipment; the availability of personnel, machinery and equipment at estimated prices; exchange rates; appropriate discount rates; tax rates applicable to the proposed mining operation; financing structure and costs; anticipated mining losses and dilution; gemstone recovery rates; reasonable contingency requirements; and receipt of regulatory approvals on acceptable terms. By their very nature, forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results, performances or achievements to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. These include, without limitation: price volatility, discrepancies between actual and estimated production, mineral reserves and resources and metallurgical recoveries, mining operational and development risks, regulatory restrictions (including environmental regulatory restrictions and liability), activities by governmental authorities (including changes in taxation), currency fluctuations, the speculative nature of gemstone exploration, the global economic climate, dilution, share price volatility, competition, loss of key employees; additional funding requirements and defective title to mineral claims or property. This list is not exhaustive. See also, for example, the risks disclosed in the Company's other disclosure documents filed at www.sedar.com, including, without limitation, those disclosed in the Company's management's discussion & analysis. The Company expressly disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, except as otherwise required by applicable securities legislation.







Contact



Nicholas Houghton, President and CEO

604-687-8055

info@truenorthgems.com

www.truenorthgems.com


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100-turbine facility set for Scurry County

By Brian Bethel, bethelb@reporternews.com

A 253-megawatt wind farm in Scurry county that will generate 1,000,000 megawatt hours of wind energy yearly was announced Thursday by Amazon.

Amazon Wind Farm Texas will produce enough energy in a year to power almost 90,000 homes.

The location will include more than 100 turbines, each with a rotor diameter twice as long as the wingspan of a Boeing 747, according to a news release from the Internet service company.

Scheduled to open in late 2017, Amazon Wind Farm Texas will be the company's largest renewable energy project to date.

Amazon previously announced wind and solar farms in Indiana, North Carolina, Ohio and Virginia that deliver energy to the electrical grids supplying both current and future Amazon Web Services (AWS) Cloud data centers.

The company was criticized by Greenpeace in 2014 for not being among the "greenest" Internet companies for not relying more on renewable energy.

The five wind and solar projects together will generate more than 2.6 million MWh of renewable energy each year, enough to power more than 240,000 U.S. homes, the company said.

"We're excited to work with the community in Scurry County and Lincoln Clean Energy to generate one million MWh of renewable energy each year from West Texas," said Kara Hurst, director of sustainability with Amazon, who called the project the "newest milestone in our long-term sustainability efforts across the company."
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Art, beverages meet downtown

Longtime local business owner Lisa Curry is bringing abstract art to the San Angelo masses with Raw 1899 Art Gallery & Bar at 38 N. Chadbourne St.

The business, expected to open late this year, is one of nine buildings First Baptist Church sold to David Mazur, owner of David Mazur Construction.

"I think there are six right now that are sold, and two other artists have purchased" some of the buildings, Curry said. "I know one for sure is going to paint there, but I don't know if they'll have galleries as well."

Curry and her business partner, Thana Cox, were drawn to the building's history and unique architectural features, such as its high tin ceilings and the quarried rock that was also used to construct the buildings at Fort Concho.

"We ran into that building; it was so pretty that we thought we had to share it," said Curry, who owns Waterford Wellness Spa on Abe Street. "We're not 100-percent sure, but we traced (the history) to 1853. It looks like a fort kind of church. We're thinking we have the whole church."

Though the structure was constructed in 1853, the first deed on the building is dated 1899  hence the year in the business' name.

"We're going to keep it as raw and natural" as possible, Curry said, explaining the rest of the name.

According to a building permit filed with the city of San Angelo, work to the building will include new electrical panels, a renovated front facade, new HVAC, an outdoor patio area, front canopy, brick sidewalk and fire alarm system. The value of the project is listed at $218,000.

Curry said she and Cox hope the business will broaden San Angelo's view of abstract art.

"We'll have San Angelo artists" featured, Curry said. "We'll have in-house artists doing studio work there. We're hoping we can bring in artists from all over; that's our plan.

"I'm excited about the block. I'm excited for everybody to get going (on the other buildings) too."

In addition to the gallery, Raw 1899 will also feature a wine and beer lounge and will be an events venue that can be rented out for private parties and gatherings.

Burger chain getting overhaul

As part of its corporate brand transformation plan, San Angelo's Wendy's, 5555 Sherwood Way, is getting a face-lift.

The overhauls are estimated to cost $250,000, according to an August report on the city of San Angelo's website.

"Wendy's brand transformation is re-energizing all of our touch points with consumers," said Emil Brolick, the company's president and CEO, on Wendy's website. "From bold restaurant design to innovative food that consumers want to improved customer service, this exciting evolution of our brand reinforces our mission to position Wendy's as a cut above."

According to its website, changes include fireplaces, revised seating options, Wi-Fi and flat-screen televisions and digital menus.

Dave Thomas opened the first Wendy's in 1969 in Columbus, according to its website. In 2013, as part of its brand reinvention, Wendy's launched a new logo for the first time in 30 years.

In addition to North America, Wendy's now has locations in 30 countries, including Asia Pacific, the Caribbean, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America.
Author James Patterson's 150-page book, which comes out November 1, tells of an obsessed fan out to get King and of the detective trying to save him.

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By Hillel Italie, Associated Press

NEW YORK  A new novel from James Patterson has a title that calls for a disclaimer and a spoiler alert: "The Murder of Stephen King."

"A work of fiction," readers are assured. "All incidents and dialogue, and all characters with the exception of Stephen and Tabitha King, are products of the author's imagination and are not to be construed as real."

And, yes, the story has a happy ending. But still, that title.

"I think it's a good title," Patterson told The Associated Press during a recent telephone interview. "It's exactly what the book is."

Not exactly  the murder is only attempted.

"I guess we could have put in 'attempted,' " he added.

Patterson's 150-page book, which comes out Nov. 1, tells of a fan out to get King and of the detective (who happens to be named Jamie Peterson) trying to save him. The novel is part of his "BookShots" series of "pulse-pounding thrillers under $5 and 150 pages or less." The prolific Patterson, who averages several best-sellers a year and openly works with co-authors, collaborated with Derek Nikitas on the King story.

Other fiction writers have imagined  or least suggested  the demise of a public figure. Hilary Mantel's short story "The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher: August 6th 1983" came out in 2014, after the former British Prime Minister had died. Rush Limbaugh and other conservatives were angered by Nicholson Baker's 2004 novel "Checkpoint," in which an opponent of the Iraq War considers killing then-President George W. Bush and a friend tries to dissuade him.

King, through an assistant, declined comment on Patterson's book, but confirmed he has received an advance copy.

In "The Murder of Stephen King," the villain's motive is explained at the start: "He'll write a tell-all book from his prison cell and be crowned the new King of Horror. All the readers will scream: The King is dead; long live the King!" Patterson says the novel is clearly an homage to the author, with praise for his work and for King. He notes that King has included crazed readers in his books, notably in "Misery," and that Patterson has encountered his own share of "buzzing pests" and "scary kooks."

Patterson says he doesn't know King, although he has heard he's a "neat guy." The book is entirely imagined, down to the King household, as seen by Detective Peterson.

While Patterson speaks warmly of King, King has not returned the compliments in the past. In a 2009 interview with USA Weekend, he said Patterson was "a terrible writer but he's very successful." Speaking to the AP, Patterson is dismissive of King's remarks, calling them "hyperbole," in the style of Donald Trump.

"I know I'm not a terrible writer," he says. "That's a little over the top."

Patterson said those who know about his book have not objected to the title, and that some have even found it funny.
Yfat Yossifor/Standard-Times Nick Moore wraps photos as he works to move everything out of the San Angelo Mr. Gatti's, which closed Sunday.

SHARE Yfat Yossifor/Standard-Times A sign tells customers that San Angelo's Mr. Gatti's is closed. Yfat Yossifor/Standard-Times Shrimp and grits plates are available at the newly opened Cajun Creations, 4545 Sherwood Way. Yfat Yossifor/Standard-Times Patrons eat lunch Tuesday at Cajun Creations.

By Rashda Khan, Rashda.Khan@gosanangelo.com/@rashda_SAST

It was a bittersweet week for San Angelo's restaurant scene. While a longtime restaurant said goodbye, a Cajun addition waved hello.

Mr. Gatti's Pizza at 4349 Sherwood Way closed its doors Sunday after 17 years of serving San Angelo families. The all-you-can-eat pizza buffet and gaming center hosted hundreds of birthday parties, play dates and other functions.

"We hate closing the store. We had a lot of friends and customers here," said Nick Moore, president and chief operating officer of Foodservice Management Systems, the Austin-based management company that operated the location on behalf of a group of investors. "This was purely a financial decision, a business decision."

The move comes on the heels of Foodservice not being able to reach a rent agreement with the building landlord. However, the 25,615-square-foot San Angelo store also had the lowest sales  while being one of the biggest locations  of the Gatti's franchises operated by Foodservice.

Moore said the investors had been patient with the store but were unwilling to put additional money into the location.

"I was here the day this store opened. We made $103,000 in the first week," said Moore, wiping down a framed picture he had just taken off a wall of the empty store. "We'd never broken $100,000 before and we were extremely optimistic."

However, about six months later reality set in. "We loved it here in San Angelo, but there's not dynamic growth," Moore said. "It just ended up being too big a store in too small a town."

He said in 1999, when the store opened, San Angelo's population was about 97,000. Now, almost 20 years later, it's estimated to be 100,450  an increase of only 3,450.

The San Angelo location employed about 50 people, mostly part-timers, but also some longtime employees. Employees were offered the option to relocate to other stores owned by Foodservice, but "they all declined and left on good terms," Moore said.

Later in the week, many of the employees helped Moore clean up and pack up items to ship to other stores. They also phone calls from distraught customers. "We have had a lot of folks call up and tell us how much they enjoyed bringing their children here and their memories," said a staff member who didn't want to be identified.

The building is owned by Hawtex Limited Partnership, a company with a Florida address that couldn't be reached for comment. Moore expects, given the size of the building, it will probably house a big box tenant in the future.

Customers who still have Gatti's game cards can use them at the following Gatti's locations:

Midland: gattispizzamidland.com

Odessa: gattispizzaodessa.com

Lubbock: gattispizzalubbock.com

San Antonio/Universal City: gattispizzauniversalcity.com

New Restaurant

Cajun Creations opened for business at 4545 Sherwood Way, right next to Marble Slab Creamery. The dining area, with its picnic tables and seafood motif, definitely captures Louisiana's easygoing casualness. The restaurant features both Cajun and Creole-inspired dishes.

Diners can try specialties such as crawfish etouffee, sauteed shrimp over cheesy grits, and gumbo as well as the more innovative catfish salad or stuffed crab platter. Or they can keep it simple and choose from fried catfish and shrimp plates and po boy sandwiches. The humbler fare comes with crisp, cool coleslaw, hush puppies, fries or fried okra.

A children's menu is also available. The house specialty dessert is Hot Puffs: warm, pillowy fried biscuits rolled in cinnamon and sugar and served with a side of honey.

Owners James and Jim Mathews hired Pat Gutierrez as head chef. Gutierrez was the chef for the sit-down cafe portion of Green's Grocery until it closed and also worked at the former Southern Sea restaurant in San Angelo, which helped start the annual Spring Chicken Affair fundraiser for West Texas Rehabilitation Center.

Make sure to ask for the chef's special spice mix on the side if you like your food with an extra kick of flavor and heat.

"We didn't want a 40-item menu," James Mathews said. "We decided to start out with some basic items and do daily, weekly or monthly specials  just add to it as we go."

IF YOU GO

What: Cajun Creations

When: 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Saturday

Where: 4545 Sherwood Way

Cost: $3.75-$12.50

Contact: 325-223-0255





IF YOU GO

What: Cajun Creations

When: 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Saturday

Where: 4545 Sherwood Way

Cost: $3.75-$12.50

Contact: 325-223-0255






Giles Keyte/Universal Pictures Bridget Jones (Renee Zellweger) is pregnant, and she doesn't know if Mark Darcy (Colin Firth, left) or Jack (Patrick Dempsey) is the father.

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Director comes back to help revive Zellweger vehicle

By Lindsey Bahr, Associated Press

Renee Zellweger is charming as ever in "Bridget Jones's Baby," a lively return to form for the unlikely trilogy about an ordinary woman and her professional and romantic woes. It turns out a little break is just what this series needed to find its footing after the manic missteps of "Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason," which fell into some of the all too common traps of sequels looking to up the stakes (hello, Thailand prison sequence).

That's likely due to the fact that Sharon Maguire, who directed the practically perfect "Bridget Jones's Diary," is back (Beeban Kidron directed the second), working from a script from author Helen Fielding, Emma Thompson (very funny as an unamused doctor), and Dan Mazer.

Let's get over the silly fact that this movie essentially had to press reboot on the happy ending of the second, when Bridget said at the end how even at 33 she was able to find love and happiness with one Mark Darcy (Colin Firth). Cut to 12 years later (between movies), Bridget is in her 40s and Mark Darcy has gone off and married someone else.

But this is an evolved Bridget. She might be eating desert alone in that same old London flat on that same old couch listening to the same old Celine Dion song, but it's not tragic. It just is. Her friends all flaked on her and so she has a night by herself. The sense is "whatever" not "woe is me."

Indeed, her life looks pretty good. She's now a high-profile TV news producer who seems happy at work  gone are the fireman's pole humiliations of on-camera life. She's also fitter (and quite happy about it) and gotten a fancier wardrobe befitting of her success.

When her younger friend and co-worker Miranda (a terrific Sarah Solemani) invites her to a weekend getaway, Bridget arrives to the airport looking like a Nancy Meyers leading lady in cream and white. Of course, she doesn't realize they're going to an outdoor music festival. So, she falls in some mud but she also gets the attention of Jack (Patrick Dempsey). He's a single, not-sleazy relationship guru who is immediately smitten with Bridget.

She has a good time with Jack and goes on her way. A few weeks later, she finds herself having an unexpectedly romantic night with a now-separated Darcy. She walks away from that, too, and continues on with life until she gets the news that she's pregnant. It could be either Darcy's or Jack's.

Both men hop to the challenge, trying to out-partner one another at every turn. Is this a fantasy, or is this just men being kind to the woman who is possibly carrying their child? Does it really matter?

Much of the original cast is back and wonderful (Jim Broadbent, Gemma Jones, Sally Phillips and Shirley Henderson), save for a sorely missed Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant). You'll find out what happened to him.

There is still a slapstick jitteriness to dear Bridget, but calmness has emerged too  that of a woman who has finally grown into her own skin. She is messy in that way that women in other rom coms say they are but never actually are. And she is certainly not the other single gal of her time, Carrie Bradshaw, who seemed to become less and less relatable as the years went by.

Though the premise of "Bridget Jones's Baby" makes it all seem like it's all about the guy again, it's never felt so much like Bridget's story. The man is just gravy. This movie, for all its comedic ridiculousness and wild circumstance of the paternity crisis, is a jubilant celebration of women.

If we're lucky, we'll get to check in with her again in another few years.
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By Staff Report

Volunteers from the San Angelo Police Department, Atmos Energy, The Life Church, Tapia Construction, Goodfellow Air Force Base firefighters, Frontier Communications and Angelo State University's Honors Student Association will join forces to construct ramps for the elderly or disabled.

The project, a one-day-blitz set for Saturday, aims to empower individuals with the freedom and accessibility to enjoy activities outside their homes.

The Texas Ramp Project uses community volunteers throughout Texas to give low-income elderly or disabled people the independence for a better quality of life.

Breakfast will be provided to blitz volunteers courtesy of Diego's Burritos, Walmart and The Dazzling Dames.

Call 325-660-1778 or 325-227-7802 for more information.
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HOW TO WRITE YOUR BUSINESS PLAN

The Angelo State University Small Business Development Center is offering free a training event, "How to Write Your Business Plan Part I: Focus on the Narrative," from 3 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. Sept. 22. at the Business Resource Center, 106 N. Chadbourne St.

Looking for your road map to success? Then you need a business plan. Attend this seminar to learn how to write your business plan. A good business plan can save a business thousands of dollars in the long run and is a great way to avoid common pitfalls in the startup stage of any business venture.

This seminar is part one of a two-part Business Plan Series; Part one will focus on the business outline, writing proper narrative, and more; part two will focus on how to create proper financials for your business plan.

Register in advance. To find out more, call the ASU-SBDC at (325) 942-2098 or register online at www.sbdc.angelo.edu.

APACHE DECLARES DIVIDEND

HOUSTON  The board of directors of Apache Corp. on Sept. 15 declared the regular cash dividend on the company's common shares.

The dividend on common shares is payable Nov. 22, 2016, to stockholders of record on Oct. 21, 2016, at a rate of 25 cents per share.

Apache is an oil and gas exploration and production company with operations in the United States, Canada, Egypt and the United Kingdom. Its operations include sites in the Permian Basin.

PATTERSON-UTI ACQUIRES CANADIAN OPERATION

HOUSTON  Patterson-UTI Energy, Inc. announced Sept. 14 that it has entered into an agreement to acquire Warrior Rig Ltd. and certain related entities. Based in Calgary, Warrior designs, manufactures and services high-spec rig components with a recent focus on top drive technology for improved drilling performance. The pending transaction is subject to customary closing conditions, and is expected to close promptly.

Patterson-UTI CEO Andy Hendricks said, "This acquisition will enhance our competitive position within the high-spec rig market and expand our technology portfolio. We are very excited by the innovative technology that Warrior offers, and we look forward to welcoming the highly talented group of people from Warrior into the Patterson-UTI family."

Patterson-UTI Energy, Inc. subsidiaries provide onshore contract drilling and pressure pumping services to exploration and production companies in North America. Patterson-UTI Drilling Company LLC and its subsidiaries operate land-based drilling rigs in oil and natural gas producing regions of the continental United States and western Canada. Universal Pressure Pumping, Inc. and Universal Well Services, Inc. provide pressure pumping services primarily in Texas and the Appalachian region. The company's operations include a substantial presence in the Permian Basin.

ANADARKO BUYS GULF ASSETS FOR $2B

HOUSTON  Anadarko Petroleum Corp. announced Sept. 12 it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire the deepwater Gulf of Mexico assets of Freeport McMoRan Oil & Gas for $2.0 billion. The transaction, effective Aug. 1, 2016, is expected to close before year end.

Anadarko CEO Al Walker said the acquisition doubles the company's ownership in the Lucius development, adding about 80,000 BEO per day to Anadarko's production in the area. Anadarko is an international independent energy production firm with operations that include properties in the Eagle Ford Shale and the Permian Basin.
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By Franco Ordonez, McClatchy Washington Bureau (TNS)

WASHINGTON  U.S. Border Patrol agents will apprehend more family members entering the United States along the Southwest border this fiscal year than they did in 2014, when a massive surge of Central Americans found the Obama administration detaining thousands of mothers and their children.

Newly released U.S. Customs and Border Protection statistics show that while overall apprehension numbers are down from two years ago, the number of family members being apprehended will almost certainly surpass the total of two years ago.

Family apprehensions and detentions of unaccompanied children have shown dramatic increases over last years totals  with family detentions nearly doubling and the number children traveling without parents increasing 52 percent.

Those increases raise serious questions about the Obama administrations strategy to curb the flow through a combination of immigration enforcement and humanitarian assistance.

It has been a failure, because people are still coming, said Amy Fischer, the policy director for the Texas-based Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services.

Many migrants from Central America cite violence in their homelands as the reason for seeking refuge in the United States. The Obama administration has created a variety of programs, including aid to Central American governments, to try to tamp down that violence. The administration acknowledged over the summer that efforts have been insufficient to address the number of people who may have legitimate refugee claims.

A total of 68,445 family members were apprehended in 2014, when a surge of Salvadoran, Honduran and Guatemalan mothers and children fleeing violence and poverty raced into the Rio Grande Valley of Texas.

This year, with one month left in the fiscal year, more than 68,080 family members have been apprehended. With apprehensions averaging 6,189 a month, the annual total is certain to be a record. No month this year has seen fewer than 3,000 family members detained. In August, Border Patrol agents apprehended 9,359 family members, the highest yet of the year.

Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador are three of the most violent countries in the world.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees warned last October that women from Central America would continue to flee their countries because of the escalating tide of violence, including domestic violence and rape, fueled by sophisticated transnational gangs.

The number of Central Americans seeking asylum in the United States has grown nearly eightfold in the last six years. Mexico, Canada, Nicaragua and Costa Rica also have seen an increase in Guatemalans, Hondurans and Salvadorans seeking refugee status, according to the United Nations high commissioner for refugees.

Federal officials have an obligation under national and international law to protect the vulnerable. The challenge is determining who qualifies as a bona fide refugee and who has come for family or economic reasons.

The surge has exacerbated an already long backlog of hundreds of thousands who are awaiting cases in immigration court. To receive asylum in the United States, applicants must prove they have well-founded fears of persecution because of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group or political opinion. These cases can take years to resolve.

Homeland Security officials said they continued to monitor migration trends and were working aggressively to deter unauthorized migration, while ensuring that those with legitimate humanitarian claims are afforded the opportunity to seek protection.

The White House reached an agreement with Costa Rica in July to host up to 200 Central American refugee applicants while the United States assessed their asylum claims. It was part of a larger package of measures put in place to protect migrants that included expanding the number of people who can apply to the U.S. refugee program for children. The administration also worked with Congress to secure $750 million to help El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras fight poverty and violence as well as reform their governments.

President Barack Obama has authorized spending up to $70 million to meet the unexpected urgent refugee and migration needs related to the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program.

But Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson has made it clear that deportations of Central Americans will continue despite recognition of the crisis.

As long as we have border security and as long as our borders are not open borders, Johnson told reporters last month. We have to be consistent with our priorities.

Critics find it hypocritical for the administration to say that those from Central America are potential refugees while it conducts immigration raids on Central Americans, detaining them in family detention centers and deporting them to the same violent region.

There are three U.S. family detention centers where women can be held with their children while their asylum cases are heard. Nearly two dozen women held with their children at the Berks County Residential Center in Central Pennsylvania launched a hunger strike last month to protest their and their childrens long detentions, some of which have lasted more than a year.

Carol Anne Donohoe, a Pennsylvania-based immigration lawyer who represents several of the Central American women at the Berks center, said the women were fighting for their lives. She said that if the administration truly recognized the situation as a humanitarian crisis, it would initiate temporary protective status for the families.

If you are fleeing violence, if youre fleeing your burning house, it doesnt matter whether someone said, Dont come, because well punish you for it. Youre saving your life, Donohue said.
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Depending on the mood of the country, immigrants are either welcome additions to a melting pot that always needs youth, or they're a pox upon our country, contributing to violence, crime and disease.

But research dating back at least a century unequivocally shows that the foreign-born are involved in crime at significantly lower rates than their U.S.-born peers.

"We don't always express these strong levels of apprehension or anxiety toward immigrants. Rather, these feelings build as the immigrant population grows," said Bianca E. Bersani, an associate professor of sociology at the University of Massachusetts and the lead author on a new paper investigating the link between immigration and crime.

"There is an ebb and flow that coincides with increasing and decreasing levels of immigration to the U.S."

Alex R. Piquero, a criminologist at the University of Texas at Dallas and Bersani's co-author, added, "Immigrants simply do not commit crimes at the rates that people think they do. The anxieties are in large part because immigrants are, to natives, 'not like us.'

"They bring different cultures, religions, language and demographics than what many are used to and that frightens us and contributes to a pervasive view, absent any empirical data, that immigrants bring problems and take our jobs. That is simply not consistent with the facts, especially when it comes to crime."

Bersani and Piquero's data analysis reinforced previous research showing that the foreign-born pose no unique criminal threat. But they went a step further and answered the question: "How can we know the respondents didn't lie about their interactions with law enforcement?"

Misrepresentation is a problem with all research that relies on people self-reporting information that may put them in a negative light. And in the case of immigrants  both legal and unauthorized  it's well-known that they sometimes don't trust, or understand, the criminal justice system.

But when Bersani and Piquero set out to learn whether immigrants' lower levels of crime (compared with first- and subsequent-generation U.S.-born people) might be influenced by differing crime reporting practices between these generations, they found that immigrants do not have a greater tendency to underreport their offenses.

Their analysis of data that included both individual self-reports of crime and official records found "no evidence that foreign-born, first-generation immigrants underreport their arrest history. In fact, when evidence of divergence exists, it is in the direction of immigrants overreporting arrests."

Pervasive myths die hard, and the authors have already fielded inquiries about whether their research differentiates between legal and unauthorized immigrants.

Though overstaying a visa or entering the United States without authorization is a civil offense  not a criminal one  illegal immigrants are often viewed as being definitively linked to violence and crime.

"In our analysis we don't have the level of detail to distinguish citizenship status for the foreign-born group," Bersani told me in an email. "That said, we can't rule out that the data do not include illegal entrants either, but there are two things to note here.

"One, others who have looked at differences in offending comparing legal and illegal immigrants do not find that illegal immigrants are significantly different from legal immigrants. And, two, in practice, the lines between legal and illegal are often blurred, and other research has established that in many people's minds the status of immigrant, regardless of legality, is deemed 'intrinsically delinquent.'"

Predictably, the authors have been accused of pro-immigrant bias.

Piquero, the only one of the pair of researchers who is the child of immigrants, told me: "Many people think we are absolving illegal immigrants because they believe that immigrants and illegal immigrants are one and the same, and they are not. The science and data rule the day. Any person, regardless of their demographic, would have arrived at the same conclusion that we did."

As Bersani noted, the fervor with which negative assertions are made against immigrants varies depending on the circumstances.

According to the Pew Research Center, growth and dispersion of the U.S. Latino population has slowed since 2007, and immigration from Latin America has cooled even as Latino fertility rates have fallen. Immigrants from China and India  who, for better or worse, carry with them the "model minority" halo  are outpacing those from Mexico.

Maybe this demographic shift to an even more diverse group of new immigrants can help reverse some people's willful insistence on seeing all immigrants in a negative light.

Esther Cepeda is a Washington Post columnist. Contact her at estherjcepeda@washpost.com.
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The following editorial appeared in the Sept. 8 (McAllen) Monitor:

There's a general agreement among demographers who are familiar with Texas that the makeup of the people of the Rio Grande Valley represents the future of this country.

So it's baffling that, once again, elected officials in Austin threaten to marginalize South Texas demographics by insulting the history of the fastest-growing segment of the population, in this case through a school textbook that is being considered by the State Board of Education.

The book is entitled, "Mexican American Heritage," and it is rightfully drawing fire from historians for a number of inaccuracies that collectively paint Hispanics in Texas in an unfavorable light.

Exercising one of its most influential roles as an elected body, the SBOE will take a vote during its November meeting on whether to approve this textbook for use in Texas public schools.

For decades this approval process has given the SBOE influence far beyond the borders of Texas. This is because textbook publishers, seeing a lucrative market in serving the state's 5 million public school children, often placate Texas and distribute the textbooks that our board selects to other states with fewer students  and less clout.

In years past, the SBOE had even more substantial influence  and power  because of its ability to influence the state's curriculum.

But political power plays, driven by a social agenda by a majority of the board, caused the Texas Legislature to cut back the board's authority.

Despite this, social activists, who once tried to downplay for Texas children the role of Martin Luther King Jr., in U.S. history, are once again attempting to diminish the contributions of people of color  in this case Hispanics.

"It is an utter shame we must deal with racially offensive academic work," said Ruben Cortez Jr., who represents South Texas on the SBOE and, admirably, is denouncing the textbook.

Earlier this month, Cortez released the results of a study of the textbook that concluded it had 69 factual errors, 42 interpretive errors and 31 errors of omission.

We commend Cortez for waging this battle against a bigotry that is as overt as one passage in the textbook that reads, "In contrast, Mexican laborers were not reared to put in a full day's work so vigorously. There was a cultural attitude of 'manana,' or tomorrow when it came to high-gear production."

We urge residents of the Rio Grande Valley to speak out against this book at this week's public hearings, as well as a final set of hearings set for Nov. 16-18, before the SBOE is set to vote on the textbook.

We call on the South Texas delegation to the Texas Legislature to weigh the actions of the SBOE, which continues to embarrass the state, and consider curtailing the powers of this board  or at least its makeup  to once again to stop it from its political posturing at the expense of our school children.

Finally, we demand that Gov. Greg Abbott denounce this textbook and all that it represents in the name of his Hispanic wife and the millions of Hispanic Texans whom he represents.

Texas has generally been able to steer clear of the ethnic conflicts that have plagued nearby Arizona. The adoption of this textbook would represent a giant step in the direction of Arizona.

It's a step that the people of the Rio Grande Valley should not have to take on behalf of social bigotry emanating from Austin.
So far its been a quiet year for data breaches. No major state and local cyberattacks have yet been reported in 2016. Of course, that doesnt mean attackers are taking a break. Evidence suggests theyre merely spending less time developing new approaches and instead refining some old but proven ways to hack, according to Verizons recentThe break in action is giving state and local governments some much-needed time to regroup, though. Its true governments have always faced an uphill battle against cyberattacks. Shrinking budgets and a lack of specialized talent have been chronic problems. But recently agencies nationwide have begun to broaden their use of a few conventional tactics to mitigate the rising tide of attacks: teamwork, employee training and insurance.Fighting hackers from just about every corner of the globe is a gargantuan task, but doing it by yourself makes it even harder. Thats why a growing number of state governments are creating multiagency groups to tackle cybersecurity. In Arizona, the state has formed the Cyber Threat Response Alliance to analyze real and emerging dangers. The alliance, which includes the FBI, Homeland Security and academic institutions, hopes to better understand what kind of barriers might slow down coordinated responses to cyberattacks.Similarly, the New Jersey Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Cell is focused on information sharing around cyberthreats. With help from the feds, states and localities are able to access up-to-date information on data breaches, obtain risk assessments, get the latest tips and learn how to practice better cyberhygiene. Other states with multiagency programs include Georgia, New York and Washington.When it comes to security, government CIOs are haunted by the old cliche, You are only as strong as the weakest link. If youve ever happened to watch the cyberthriller series, then you know that human error is one of the major sources of breaches and intrusions. To counter this problem in government, states and localities have developed whats known as security awareness training. The idea is to make government employees more conscious of security overall and to reduce the kind of mistakes that can launch an intrusion, trigger an attack or inadvertently allow certain types of fraud.The awareness training can range from rudimentary classes to sophisticated online programs that keep careful track of employee progress. While awareness training isnt cheap, especially for a state government that may have tens or hundreds of thousands of employees, the payoff in better protection is invaluable, according to Michael Roling, Missouris chief information security officer.With 40,000 state employees taking regular courses on a monthly basis on everything from avoiding phishing attacks -- emails disguised to look like official business, but that can trigger an intrusion once opened -- to what constitutes a secure password, Roling says continuous training has resulted in fewer cybersecurity problems. Awareness training is one of the most important components of our security posture, he says.When all else fails, states and localities have the fallback option of purchasing cyberinsurance. Available for years in the private sector, the coverage is just beginning to catch on in state and local government. In 2014, hackers broke into the Montana Department of Public Health and Human Services server. Fortunately for Montana, the state had insurance, which helped it cover the cost of investigating the attack, notifying individuals impacted by the breach and recovering the theft of government funds.Not surprisingly, insurance isnt cheap, costing as much as $20,000 for every $1 million in coverage. On the plus side, though, getting insurance has the added benefit of shoring up your defenses: After all, you wouldnt be able to get it unless you were doing something right.
Maine voters who didn't like the way elections turned out in the past have chosen an entirely different voting system.A ballot measure approved by voters will make Maine the first state to implement something known as ranked-choice voting. It's different than the traditional method, where the candidate who receives the most votes wins -- regardless of whether it's a majority.Under the new system, assuming it survives legal challenges, voters will rank candidates from most to least preferable. If no one receives a majority on the first ballot, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated and voters' second choices are counted up. The process continues until a candidate earns a majority of the remaining ballots."People like it because they really feel strongly that candidates should be supported by a majority of voters," said Kyle Bailey, the campaign manager for the initiative.Ranked-choice voting -- sometimes known as instant-runoff voting -- has already been adopted in about a dozen cities, including Minneapolis, San Francisco and Oakland, Calif.It turned out to have a special appeal in Maine. Because of relatively strong independent candidates, the winner in nine out of the last 11 gubernatorial elections in Maine came away with less than a majority of the vote.That includes incumbent Gov. Paul LePage, who won twice with pluralities. After his first victory in 2010, some Maine residents put "61 percent" stickers on their cars, identifying themselves as part of the large majority that voted against LePage.Ranked-choice voting, some political scientists found, can lead to more civilized politics. Candidates can't run a slash-and-burn campaign against their opponents because they can't afford to alienate anyone's supporters and risk a shot at being second choice."When candidates have to campaign for a second- or third-place vote, it changes the dynamic from a zero-sum game," said Caroline Tolbert, a political scientist at the University of Iowa who has conducted surveys in cities with both ranked-choice voting (RCV) and traditional voting. "Respondents in RCV cities felt that the campaigns were less negative."But other political scientists who have studied the method have identified some problems.One challenge is voter "exhaustion," according to a study by researchers Craig Burnett and Vladimir Kogan. Looking at several local elections in California, they found that 10 to 27 percent of voters eventually stopped completing their ballots and thus did not participate in the final round that picked the winner."This idea that a large number of people are going to have their ballots not counted is a huge problem in every context where RCV is used," said Kogan, who teaches at Ohio State University.Ranked-choice voting may also lead to an overall decline in voter participation. According to a study by Jason McDaniel at San Francisco State University, the new system led to lower turnout in San Francisco mayoral elections, particularly among some demographic groups."When voting is made more difficult," said McDaniels, "we should expect there to be some negative consequences with respect to ballot errors and voter participation, especially among those with less education, among certain racial minority groups who are less likely to participate, and among some portions of the elderly population."Several localities that have adopted ranked-choice voting later eliminated it. That includes Burlington, Vt., where people were unhappy with the candidate chosen in the 2009 mayoral election.But David Kimball, a University of Missouri-St. Louis political scientist who has studied RCV, notes that, "using the regular system, there are plenty of cities that don't like the mayor they got, either."
Oregon and software giant Oracle have ended their bitter legal fight.Gov. Kate Brown announced today the settlement of the six lawsuits the state and the company filed against one another after the failure of the Cover Oregon health exchange website.The settlement, valued at $100 million, includes cash payments to Oregon as well as a six-year license agreement for products and services that Brown said can be used to "significantly modernize state government's IT systems.""Today's settlement agreement ends years of turmoil and taxpayer expense related to a troubled health exchange program I dissolved in March 2015," Brown said.At a press conference Thursday morning, Brown said the risks of going to trial were too great. Legal fees alone would have topped $1.5 million a month, she said.Oracle's $100 million consists largely of technology. Only $25 million will come in the form of cash. And all of that will go to pay the state's legal fees and other costs. Oracle also agreed to contribute $10 million to a state technology education program.All in all, it's a far cry from the $240 million the state paid to Oracle for the failed Cover Oregon project. The company's army of IT experts worked for years on the exchange, repeatedly missed deadlines and never produced a functional exchange. In late 2013 and early 2014, Oracle sent in its "A-team" to complete the work. But the first-stringers were no more successful than the junior varsity, state officials claimed. (Oracle disputes this.)The state fired Oracle in the spring of 2014 and killed the Cover Oregon project. Instead, Oregon adopted the federal healthcare exchange.Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum, at the request of then-Gov. John Kitzhaber, filed a lawsuit against Oracle. It was an aggressive complaint, accusing Oracle and several executives of fraud, filing false claims and racketeering. It sought more than $6 billion in damages.The complaint led to discord within the top ranks of Oregon government. Brown, who replaced Kitzhaber in the wake of the Cylvia Hayes influence-peddling scandal, viewed the Oracle beef as a political liability and pressed for a settlement. Brian Shipley, Brown's former chief of staff, spent hours with Oracle executives in 2015 seeking common ground.Oracle claimed they'd reached a deal with Shipley and Brown to settle for $25 million worth of software. The governor's office steadfastly denied it.The company filed one of its many countersuits against the state claiming it had improperly reneged on the deal.But Brown clearly wanted the Oracle mess to go away. Rosenblum resisted the pressure to settle. Oracle executives said Rosenblum refused Brown's direct order to settle, which they claimed was unconstitutional.The legal effort proved extraordinarily expensive. By August, the Department of Justice confirmed it had paid $16 million to Markowitz Herbold and the three other firms hired to handle different aspects of the case. By Thursday's settlement, state officials pegged the total legal costs at $25 million.Oregon's hands weren't clean in the Cover Oregon mess. The state's oversight of the project was marred by mixed signals, feuding state bureaucracies and questionable technical competence.The state never hired a so-called systems integrator to act as a general contractor with ultimate authority. Instead, it hired Oracle to a time-and-materials contract, which allowed the software giant to run up massive bills.Given the state's own culpability, Rosenblum's aggressive attack made no sense, critics said. On Thursday, Republicans were scathing calling the settlement "the end of one of the most embarrassing chapters in Oregon's history.""Despite the state's obvious culpability, Attorney General Rosenblum put tens of millions of taxpayer dollars on the line for a legal strategy that was motivated by politics and never stood a realistic chance of recovering everything that was lost," said Mike McLane, House Republican Leader.The Republicans were muted compared to Oracle, which repeatedly blasted state officials for their decision to sue the company. Executives accused Brown of lying and Rosenblum of defrauding her own state.On Thursday, Oracle took a more diplomatic tone. "We are pleased to have this contentious litigation behind us and to provide Oregon with the flexibility to obtain the software and technical support it desires to address the State's needs over the next several years, said Dorian Daley, Oracle general counsel.Rosenblum also praised Thursday's deal. "This settlement outcome is a 'win-win' for the people of Oregon--without the expense and continued impact on our collective psyche," she said.The state's main case against Oracle was scheduled to go to trial in January. Oregon had won a series of favorable rulings in court, defeating Oracle's attempt to move the case to federal court and winning on its motion to seek punitive damages on top of the treble damages it could have collected if it had won on the racketeering charges.But Brown wasn't willing to roll the dice on a trial.One of the lasting ironies of the settlement is that it could increase Oregon's reliance on the software company that was the chief author of the Cover Oregon disaster. State officials said the settlement and the software licensing deal could allow a thorough overhaul of many of the state's information technology systems with Oracle products and expertise.When asked about the wisdom of exposing other state agencies and projects to Oracle, state officials said it would be difficult to launch an upgrade without Oracle given its dominance in the information technology business.
With the Obama administration poised to welcome thousands more Syrian refugees into the country, Gov. Bill Haslam said Thursday he has confidence in the vetting process for those making a new home in Tennessee after fleeing a war zone.His shift in perspective comes just four months after he agreed to let the state sue the federal government over refugee settlement, and just one day after the Obama administration announced it plans to sharply increase the number of refugees accepted by the United States to 110,000 in fiscal 2017.Haslam told the News Sentinel on Thursday he doesn't object to Syrian refugees or others settling in Tennessee.During an appearance at a luncheon in Anderson County, the governor said he recently met with U.S. State Department officials and Catholic Charities and is convinced "they're doing a good job" vetting refugees coming to Tennessee.The Republican governor said there aren't many times he trusts the federal government, "but I do think they have all the right controls and procedures in place" regarding background checks and vetting for resettlement.The Obama administration said the additional refugee intake is necessary to help stem a migrant crisis gripping Europe and the Middle East. The new target is a 29 percent increase over the 85,000 refugees accepted this fiscal year and a 57 percent hike over the 70,000 allowed in each year between 2013 and 2015.More than 10,000 Syrian refugees have been allowed into the country this year, and new figures released Thursday provide a clearer picture of where they're resettling.Some 240 have resettled in Tennessee, according to the State Department Refugee Processing Center. Of those, 124 are in Nashville, 112 are in Memphis, three are in Germantown and one is in Spring Hill.Tennessee ranks 17th among states in resettled Syrian refugees.Resettlement has proven controversial in many states, including Tennessee, where the Legislature voted earlier this year to instruct Attorney General Herbert Slatery to sue the federal government for noncompliance with the Refugee Act of 1980.Proponents argued the legal proceedings were necessary because the federal government didn't consult with the state on the resettlements.Haslam allowed the resolution calling for the lawsuit to take effect without his signature. Slatery, however, declined to file the suit, saying the state was unlikely to succeed.At the White House, an adviser to President Barack Obama sought Thursday to reassure states worried about the influx of Syrians entering the country.Syrian refugees must undergo extensive background checks that can last up to two years. U.S. and United Nations officials verify asylum seekers' stories and check possible ties to terrorist organizations, said Avril Haines, principal deputy national security adviser."Syrian refugees get a more extensive vetting than anybody else," Haines told reporters for regional newspapers across the country.The vetting process is working, Haines said, adding that 80 percent of those allowed into the United States are women and children and just a small percentage are men over age 18."Looking at the process and looking at the track record should give people some solace in the vetting process," she said.
James Williamson Bosler

THE HISTORY: James Williamson Bosler was born: April 4, 1833, to Abraham and Eliza Herman Bosler in Silver Spring, Cumberland County.

According to archives.dickinson.edu, Bosler attended Dickinson College as a member of the class of 1854 but did not finish his degree. Bosler moved west and taught school in Columbiana County, Ohio, where he also built his first store. After moving to Iowa, the businessman eventually started a real estate company and a bank before building his fortune in the cattle market.

Bosler returned to Carlisle in 1866 and married Helen Beltzhoover of Boiling Springs. They had four children and were continuous supporters of Dickinson College.

According to archives.dickinson.edu, Bosler pledged $10,000 to the college and after his death in 1883, Helen Bosler donated nearly seven times that amount to build a new hall to house a library, insisting that only the finest, most durable materials be used in the construction.

The James W. Bosler Memorial Hall was completed in 1886, and housed the colleges library until 1967. Today, Bosler Hall is home to the modern language departments. The Bosler Memorial Library in Carlisle is named after James W. Boslers brother, J. Herman Bosler.

HOW THEY DIED: Bosler died on Dec. 17, 1883.

GRAVESITE: Buried in Ashland Cemetery, Carlisle, Cumberland County.
Ohio Gov. John Kasich's wish to spend more time in the Oval Office will be granted Friday. But this time, he'll go to support an embattled trade pact that President Barack Obama wants passed.Kasich -- who liked to joke during his 2016 GOP presidential run that he got his peak amount of time in the Oval Office when he was a young Ohio State University student visiting then-President Richard Nixon -- will meet with Obama Friday morning.He'll go to support the Trans-Pacific Partnership, an embattled trade agreement between the U.S. and 11 other Pacific Rim countries that Obama has struggled to win approval for. Obama has made passing the trade deal one of his key priorities in the months he has left in office, but he has met with a wall of congressional opposition that includes Democrats and Republicans.In appearing at the White House, Kasich, a Republican, is demonstrating how the agreement is one of the few that breaks party lines in both support and opposition. Both presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump oppose the agreement, saying they're concerned about its impact on U.S. workers. Sen. Rob Portman, a former U.S. Trade Ambassador, has also said he cannot support the agreement in its current form. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, also opposes the deal.But Kasich during his presidential run endorsed the agreement, saying in one GOP debate that it would help the U.S. economically as well as allow the U.S. to create "strategic alliances."Kasich will join a bipartisan group that includes former U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, who served under President George W. Bush; Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards, a Democrat; former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, an independent; IBM President and CEO Virginia Rometty; Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed, a Democrat; and former NATO Supreme Allied Commander Admiral James Stavridis (Ret).A White House official said the meeting's attendees "represent decades of leadership and a wide breadth expertise as well as a bipartisan range of political views."The official, who spoke on the condition that he not be named, said the conversation would focus on how "trade agreements like the Trans-Pacific Partnership are critical to ensuring that American workers can compete -- and win -- in a global, interconnected economy and furthering America's strategic and security interests abroad.""Properly enforcing the rules of free trade and extending them to more and more markets only gives American workers and companies new opportunities to grow and thrive, and I urge Congress to act now to throw open these doors to job creation," Kasich said in a release announcing the visit.Kasich, who flew in Thursday night, will also grant a handful of interviews for cable TV and Sunday shows while he is in D.C.
A Columbus, Ohio, police officer shot and killed a 13-year-old boy who pulled a BB gun from his waistband following a report of an armed robbery on Wednesday night, according to authorities. The gun was "practically identical" to the weapons police use, Columbus Police Chief Kim Jacobs said.The boy, Tyree King, died at Nationwide Children's Hospital about half an hour after being shot several times by the officer in an alley in the the city's Olde Towne East neighborhood.King is black. The officer who shot him, Bryan Mason, is white. He has been on the force for nine years and has been placed on administrative leave, city officials told reporters Thursday.The shooting comes as officers around the nation have been under scrutiny for deadly shootings of black Americans. Nearly two years ago, a Cleveland police officer shot and killed Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old boy holding a replica pellet gun.Police responding to a robbery report Wednesday night arrived at the scene at about 7:40. A man told officers that a group, including one person with a gun, had demanded money from him. He said he gave them what "money he had," according to police, and kept walking down the street.Police say they found three people nearby who matched the descriptions the man gave them, two of whom ran away and were chased into an alley. That's when one of the people, later identified as King, pulled a gun from his waistband and an officer shot him several times, police said.Crime scene investigators later determined that the weapon King had was a BB gun, said Sgt. Rich Weiner, a Columbus police spokesman.A second person was arrested without injury and later released, police said. Police did not say what happened to the third person who ran; they are looking for additional suspects. The case is being reviewed internally, standard procedure for Columbus police.King was in the eighth grade at Linden STEM Academy, according to reports.Police were not wearing body cameras at the time of the incident. The city began testing body cameras last month among a group of 30 officers, and officials have said they want to have the camera program fully running by the end of the year."You have to feel for the family in this and you also have to think about what the officer's going through," Weiner said. "There's no winners here."The case is being compared to that of Rice, who police shot dead in November 2014 after a 911 caller reported seeing "a guy with pistol" that was "probably a fake" pointing it around at a city park. The caller also said the person was "probably a juvenile." Officers responding to the call were not aware that the caller suggested the gun may not be real, and heard a description of a "male black sitting on a swing and pointing a gun at people."Last year, a grand jury declined to indict the officers involved in Rice's shooting. At the time, Cuyahoga County prosecutor Timothy J. McGinty announced the decision by saying that Rice had reached for the gun, which he called "indistinguishable" from a real gun.Cleveland this year settled a $6-million civil suit with Rice's family over the death.Jacobs, the Columbus police chief, said Thursday that it's too soon to draw comparisons to Rice's death.Columbus Mayor Andrew Ginther appeared to choke up Thursday as he called for the community to come together to help ensure children remain safe. He questioned why an eighth-grader would have a replica of a police firearm."There is something wrong in this country, and it is bringing its epidemic to our city streets," Ginther said. "And a 13-year-old is dead in the city of Columbus because of our obsession with guns and violence."
Tablets for free web browsing are being shut off at city-sponsored internet kiosks after complaints that some users were hogging the terminals and viewing pornography in public.LinkNYC, which runs about 400 kiosks on streets in three boroughs, made the announcement Wednesday. The terminals have replaced abandoned phone booths with device charging stations and Wi-Fi hot spots.Last month, Mayor Bill de Blasio quipped that "no good deed goes unpunished" -- the aim to expand internet access to the underserved -- and the city was working on a plan to address the complaints, which also included reports of users committing lewd acts while surfing the Internet.The web browsing is being removed while LinkNYC figures out how to implement "potential solutions, like time limits," according to a statement.Nearly 475,000 users have signed up to use the free broadband offered by the kiosks, and have accessed the service over 21 million times.On Monday, the NYPD arrested a man on charges that he commited lewd acts at a kiosk in Murray Hill, Manhattan."We also know that some users have been monopolizing the Link tablets and using them inappropriately, preventing others from being able to use them while frustrating the residents and businesses around them," the statement said. "The kiosks were never intended for anyone's extended, personal use."Features like free phone calls, maps, charging and access to 311 and 911 would continue, as will the free Wi-Fi.The New York Civil Liberties Unions earlier this year expressed concerned that LinkNYC, and CityBridge, the consortium backing the kiosk, collect personal information about users.The terms of service required users to submit their email addresses and agree to the collection of details such as what websites are visited, what links are clicked and how long the page is viewed.
Description

GIS  16 September, 2016: A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for Collaboration in Academic Activity with focus on Academic Professional Technical Certification was signed between the Ministry of Technology, Communication and Innovation and IBM on 14 September 2016 at Sicom Tower, in Ebene. The objective is to leverage on IBMs Middle East Africa (MEA) University programme, which is a new Academic Professional Technical Certification Programme for Universities in areas of latest emerging technologies. This initiative is also in line with Governments aim to offer innovative and technology-driven training in the current knowledge economy which will contribute to the economic growth of Mauritius in a sustainable and inclusive manner.

Signatories were the Minister of Technology, Communication and Innovation ( MTCI), Mr Etienne Sinatambou, and the General Manager of IBM Central and West Africa, Mr Tejas Mehta.

Both the MTCI and IBM share an appreciation for the value of an advanced educational and training environment in Mauritius and, it is in this context that the MoU, which is specifically about academic, professional, technical certification, has been finalised, said the Minister in his address.

The Minister spoke about a two-fold phenomenon which exists not only in Mauritius, but also worldwide, that is: one the difficulties of Universities to keep up with the ever-changing curricula when it comes to technology, and second, the mismatch between the academic skills which are imparted to the students and the level of skills they require in order to be employable.

According to Mr Sinatambou, this is where the MoU with IBM actually comes into play. We are committed as a Government, as a country, to transforming Mauritius into a skills human capital, into a skills talent pool of international ability, which is why we are trying not only with IBM but also with other world-class leaders in their fields such as Oracle, Huawei to see how we can get Mauritian citizens to reach the level of skills which would ensure their employability, he pointed out.

The Minister also observed that the Technology, Communication and Innovation sector could become the main engine of growth and by itself be the prompter for the second economic miracle.

For his part, Mr Mehta welcomed the partnership with the Mauritian Government where IBM will train University students and University faculties around some key technologies in cloud computing, security, mobile, and analytics. It is recalled that IBM group is dedicated to basic and applied research both in the United States and abroad and is one of the world leaders in research.

MEA University programme

The MEA University programme covers several Certification Tracks, which prepare students for job positions that are currently required in the IT Sector, such as Cognitive Technologies, Cyber Security, Data Science, Business Intelligence, E-Business and Enterprise Applications.

Under the MoU, IBM subject-matter experts will be coming to Mauritius to deliver the training to faculty who will then train the trainers. Essentially the faculty would then train the students on ongoing technologies. Students will also be provided 24/7 free access to an on campus educational private cloud environment.
WINNER: Demonstrated Excellence in Project Management

WINNER: Best Application Serving an Agencys Business Needs

2016 Hugh L. Carey Leadership Award Winner This year's Hugh Carey Award was given to Nonie Manion, executive deputy commissioner of the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance, for her expertise in and commitment to using technology to advance the department's work  most notably for her role in the implementation of the data-driven case identification and selection system (CISS), which sifts through millions of tax returns, identifying the most suspicious. Last year, CISS prevented New York from paying out more than $500 million in fraudulent refunds.



Manion also was the driving force behind the department's development of its Data Analytics Center of Excellence, called the Tax Analytics Solution Center (TASC). She knew the department needed to understand all of the data in its possession and optimize its use, as she firmly believes such data can best inform the department where to focus its resources, said Robert Plattner, New York state deputy commissioner for tax policy during the awards ceremony held Sept. 15 in Albany.



"Still in its infancy, TASC has begun to fulfill its promise," he said, "gleaning valuable insight from the data as to when and how the Department can best communicate with taxpayers to maximize voluntary compliance."



Manion is the sixth recipient of the Hugh L. Carey Leadership Award.





WINNER: Best Application Serving an Agencys Business Needs

WINNER: Most Innovative Use of Social Media/ Citizen Engagement

WINNER: Most Innovative IT Workforce Initiative Quality Management Center

WINNER: Best Application Serving the Public

WINNER: Best Mobile/Wireless Project

WINNER: Best IT Collaboration Among Organizations

WINNER: Best IT Collaboration Among Organizations

WINNER: Best Data Analytics/ Business Intelligence Project

SPECIAL AWARD: Building the Foundation for a Smarter City

Each year, the Best of New York Awards program, conducted by the Center for Digital Government (CDG)*, acknowledges the best of the best in government and educational IT projects and professionals, and on Friday, Sept. 16 at the New York Digital Government Summit held in Albany, this year's awardees were made public.From a financial system overhaul to citizen engagement portals and apps, winners of this year's survey serve internal and external stakeholders well, proving the dedication and hard work in designing and creating these projects was well worth the effort  and will continue to be for years to come.Throughout many of the projects, collaboration emerged as a theme.At the New York City Department of Finance, Michelle Miao, program director of the Business Tax System (BTS), managed that particular project in a way that emphasized collaboration: Every day, a team of Department of Finance employees, programmers and coders from the vendor and subject matter experts from each city agency that use this project were on-site with Miao helping build the system and creating training documents.And two projects  the Court Actions Portal from the Suffolk County Clerk and the Health Disparities and Inequalities Collaboration Platform from University at Albany, SUNY won full-fledged collaboration awards.Ingenuity, collaboration and a lot of hard work on the part of New York government departments have yielded great innovations that are improving government interactions with citizens, said Todd Sander, executive director of the Center for Digital Government.As program director for the city's Department of Finances Business Tax System, which replaces two legacy mainframe systems that processed more than $10 billion in business and excise taxes annually, Michelle Miao has led a team of internal and external stakeholdersto launch a system that integrates the processing of taxes across six Department of Finance divisions: Payment Operations, Audit, Enforcement, Collections, Legal, and Tax Policy.Not only did Miao deliver phase one of the project  the largest and most complex, which launched in January 2016  on time and on budget, she also managed the project in a way that encouraged an open and honest environment, emphasized collaboration, focused on how to best address business challenges, and solved communication gaps that are inherent with large-scale projects.For Miao, success depends, in part, on having a solid team in place."I have very talented teams," she said. "And in my position, you need to have a vision of how the teams can work together, whos doing what best in their role."Miao emphasized that she's not a micromanager, so she must have a team in place that she can trust to get the work done by specified deadlines, and that it will be done correctly. And she also said she has an excellent quality assurance team on site from research and advisory firm Gartner.Also on site each and every day is the vendor, about 20 to 30 people, working side-by-side with city employees  and full-time subject-matter experts (SMEs) from each business unit within the Department of Finance."They are required to be the very best from each [business unit]," Miao said, "because the new system is going to be used by these [units]." And someone who's been integral in its creation will be on-hand back at the ranch, so to speak, to work with their [business units]."The team also consists of full-time testers, whom the vendor also helps to train. And yet another unique piece of this project, Miao said, is that these testers will eventually become trainers for their respective business units and they participate in crafting the training materials."So they have ownership," she said. "Its a very different approach, but its a very successful approach because the business units feel that they own the process."All of the teamwork, buy-in and effort on the part of Miao and her team paid off: The Business Tax System was named as the survey's Best Application Serving an Agency's Business Needs.The system serves both the Department of Finance's needs and those of constituents, as it includes modules that support taxpayer registration, payment processing, tax return processing, financial and revenue accounting, refunds issuance, workflow, letters, reporting,and data warehousing."For one agency, it's much more efficient, Miao said, noting that the two legacy systems that BTS is replacing are very old mainframe systems that make it very difficult to make corrections. "For this administration, tax and reform has been the top priority on Mayor [Bill] DeBlasio's agenda, and replacing this 30-year-old legacy system is an integral part of that. And in city government, there are always legislative changes, and with this new system, that's much easier because it's more flexible, and it's more efficient and transparent."The public-facing portal, called eServices , helps taxpayers to manage their tax accounts online. The portal is easily configurable, and offers improved processing of tax returns, payments, refunds and audits.On the whole, the Business Tax System helps the Department of Finance to better manage taxpayer's cases, view registered contacts, access transactional history and view other information useful in understanding the background of a case. And it helps department officials make more informed decisions.Miao also noted that in addition to a stellar team, another key factor in this being a successful project is the buy-in from top-level officials. Department of Finance Commissioner Jacques Jiha trusts her 100 percent, she said, and department CIO Seb Formoso offers guidance and support whenever she needs it. "I get absolute full support from my commissioner and the senior leadership."Also at the local level, the town of Brookhaven's Investigator app received the Best Application Serving an Agency's Business Needs award.In addition to giving town employees tasked with answering resident queries a one-stop shop for various departments' information, it also has helped investigators and other field workers be more efficient and responsive to constituents for quality of community concerns.But Brookhaven did not create this app on its own; it collaborated with Suffolk County, and in addition to including town department information and data, also includes Suffolk County GIS services, police and law enforcement data, and legislative data.At the state level, the New York State Senate Public website was named as the Most Innovative Use of Social Media/Citizen Engagement, which means the purpose of the site's 2015 redesign  to more effectively connect New York citizens with their Senate representatives  was fulfilled. It's now much easier for citizens of New York to follow Senate legislative sessions and public hearings, and get ahold of such information as bills, resolutions, calendars and committee agendas.A new set of tools on the site lets constituents support or oppose bills, follow issues they care about, sign petitions, and send messages to their senators. It also gives senators tools to organize and respond to the high volume of feedback they're receiving, and they can access dashboards with summary statistics.Since the site's launch in January, more than 22,000 messages of support or opposition to bills have been sent, and state policy issues have been subscribed to more than 30,000 times.In New York state government, the practice of quality assurance (QA) is not standardized, so the Quality Management Center for the Human Services Cluster has created a standard quality assurance process that is being adjusted for use in agencies across the state. The ultimate goal in QA standardization is to minimize risk and provide a better product to citizens.The center is engaged in an ongoing and intensive effort to convert the manual functional testing practice that has been the standard in the past to automation testing. This provides a quicker timelines for the delivery of application changes while still maintaining a very high quality product to the public.The NYC311 Mobile App has transformed the way millions of customers access information, submit requests and receive updates from NYC government. The mobile app -- powered by a team from the city's Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications and NYC311  was enhanced over the past year to align with the strategic goal of meeting customers where they are and evolving a customer-centric tool that promotes equity, equality and opportunity for all Android and iOS users.Over the past year, the App was downloaded 130,000 times, and the customized NYC Today feature  which gives users immediate access to the citys most requested updates for parking, garbage and recycle schedules, and public school status  was accessed 500,000 times. The App has significantly reduced operating expenses for NYC as it is a lower-cost method for citizens to file service requests.The NYS Veterans Mobile App is a collaboration between the the New York State Division of Veterans' Affairs (DVA) and the state's Information Technology Services agency  and is one of the nations first Veterans Affairs mobile apps.After conducting surveys, DVA determined there was a critical need to enhance its delivery of timely, easy-to-navigate information to veterans and their families, and most importantly, helping veterans to better understand services and resources available in their own backyards.The app provides the 900,000 veterans and their families living in New York state easy-to-navigate information about federal and state services and resources, as well as efficient localized access to assistance and advocacy at the state and county levels.The state of New York has mandated that the New York State Court Electronic Filing System (NYSCEF) be used for filing all Supreme Court mandated documents, but because these mandated documents are a subset of the total documents filed within the Suffolk County Clerk's office, this meant using two separate systems to maintain Supreme Court records.Using two separate systems is an inefficiency recognized by clerk staff, so to bridge the gap until all filings must go through the NYSCEF system, the clerk's office developed an Integrated Court Actions Management System (ICAMS) to allow for a seamless transition. The unified system has resulted in a 75 percent reduction in the overall backlog of document filing, and is an integrated solution that unifies applications from three different agencies into one application. ICAMS has reduced the filing of documents from six to eight weeks to less than three weeks.A virtual research community called the Health Disparities and Inequalities Collaboration Platform now enables faculty, researchers and clinicians at the University at Albany and SUNY Downstate Medical Center to communicate, access real-time information, and share ideas and resources in a cloud-based environment. The goal? To strengthen research and funding pursuits focused on health disparities.The collaboration platform serves as a one-stop destination to develop scientific and research proposals, as well as access a wide range of resources and information including faculty and researchers in the news, federal funding opportunity announcements, national data analytic resources, and a communications and notification/alert portal, to name a few. AnalyzeNY gave users across all agencies secure access to a state data warehouse, and has increased the efficiency and accuracy of a process that was previously a spreadsheet created from various sources. Now, various decision-makers have a statewide view of financial and human resource information, and users from Finance and Human Resource offices in every state agency now have online access to their agency data.Movement tackling urban problems is never easy, especially for older municipalities. But try improving energy efficiency, public safety, parking and public works on a tight budget. The city of Schenectady is doing just that by building a digital infrastructure of wireless networks, LED lighting that includes sensors, cameras and other linked devices that are smart and responsive. The new lighting is expected to cut energy consumption by 50 to 70 percent; a wireless network connected to mobile cameras on streetlight poles will provide the police with extra eyes to fight crime; the same cameras can also monitor parking and when synced up with a software app, alert drivers when theres a free parking space. The cameras can also provide public works with periodic updates on road conditions.To make sure it has the right talent and technology, the city has partnered with local industrial giant GE and various tech companies, including Cisco, Sensity Systems and Presidio, to help with development and deployment. While the project is still in its early stages, Mayor Gary McCarthy expects that by investing in the right kind of technology now, the city of just over 66,000 people will benefit immensely from a smart, connected infrastructure that generates important data for city services.This really is a new kind of opportunity," McCarthy said, "and this technology will enable us to move forward and do great things within Schenectady and regionally.Government Technology
Rhode Islands launch of a pricey new public benefits system this week has not gone as smoothly as some had hoped. The $364 million IT project, meant to give state residents access to food stamps, cash assistance, and child and health care services, stalled following its rollout and prompted frustration on the part of benefit seekers and staff.Following an assault on one employee in the Department of Human Services Providence field office, local media reported state employees were unable to log into their computers and that benefits paperwork was backing up.The project marks the largest IT undertaking in the state, and was focused on replacing a network of decades-old systems with the assistance of information technology contractor Deloitte.Despite the reported setbacks to the project and charges from union representatives that the system was an absolute mess, a spokesperson for the states Department of Administration told theissues with the system had been addressed.But the setbacks were not completely unexpected, as Department of Administration Director Michael DiBiase told the newspaper in statement We have dedicated considerable time and resources to making this transition as smooth as possible," he said, "but we know that we will encounter some issues in the immediate days, weeks and months after the launch."Other state officials said that they were pleased with the with the new eligibility system, though the need for a change in business operations was acknowledged.Our employees have been performing well, and we are pleased with the launch of the new eligibility system. That being said, we do recognize that any time there is a massive change to the way we do business, there will always be workers and customers that will experience challenges, Secretary of Health and Human Services Elizabeth Roberts said in a statement to theDeloitte did not return's request for comment by press time.
(TNS) -- The free rides in self-driving cars that Uber began offering in Pittsburgh Wednesday wouldnt be allowed in California.In Michigan, legislators are considering changing a law that requires a safety driver to be behind the wheel of self-driving vehicles to handle unexpected or emergency situations.A Chicago alderman wants to ban them completely.And the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is still developing guidelines for states to consider when writing their laws for self-driving vehicles. Pennsylvanias Autonomous Vehicle Task Force is waiting for those guidelines before it releases its own recommendations to the Legislature in November.That hodgepodge of standards for self-driving vehicles is raising concerns among consumer groups and safety experts who say the laws are lagging behind the technology that is fueling the race among a handful of companies developing autonomous vehicles. The lack of strong rules is causing some to question the safety of Uber beginning to carry non-paying passengers.Uber became the first in the U.S. to begin public use of self-driving cars in the U.S. Wednesday when it began offering free rides to regular customers in the Downtown and Strip District area. A company in Singapore began deploying self-operating taxis in a 2.5-square-mile area last month.We need to have some real safety standards in place, said John Simpson, private project director for California-based Consumer Watchdog. It seems to me you are endangering the public by allowing Uber to operate with passengers in the vehicle and no rules for safety or transparency for the public to see their safety record.Uber couldnt be reached for comment Thursday, but at a media event Tuesday to demonstrate its self-driving vehicles the company said it is important to do live testing with passengers to continue developing the technology. It says it has a safety driver and a technician in the front seat of its self-driving Ford Fusions for safety reasons.The state Public Utility Commission issued a statement Thursday calling for vigorous public discussion on rules for self-driving vehicles. Uber can operate its self-driving vehicles with passengers as long as it doesnt charge a fee, but it would need PUC approval once it begins charging.Any business offering transportation services to the general public for compensation must secure proper authority from the PUC before beginning that service, and clearly demonstrate the technical ability to operate safely, the PUC statement said. To date, no entity has applied for such authority in Pennsylvania, and the Commission has not authorized any use of fully autonomous vehicles for transportation services that fall under the jurisdiction of the PUC.Nils Hagen-Frederiksen, a spokesman for the PUC, said the agency is having on-going discussions with Uber. Uber has run afoul of the PUC in the past, and two weeks ago the agency affirmed an $11.4 million fine against Uber for not receiving agency approval before providing paid rides in vehicles with drivers.Kurt Myers, co-chairman of the state task force, said it is difficult to write comprehensive rules for self-driving vehicles because technology is changing monthly, sometimes even weekly.I am saying I believe Uber is operating within the law as it is written now, he said. Will there be more robust rules coming? The answer is yes.Mr. Simpson said California has the toughest rules governing self-driving vehicles. They include requiring companies to file a report annually describing every time during testing that the safety driver intervenes to override the self-driving system, even if it is just tapping the breaks, and report within 10 days any accident with a self-driving vehicle.A draft bill in the state Senate includes those provisions, but Mr. Myers said he expects many changes before legislation is introduced.Some have concerns about the reliability of requiring a safety driver.Carryl Baldwin, an associate professor and director of Human Factors and Applied Cognition at George Mason University, said extensive studies have shown for decades that humans dont do well monitoring situations. Studies on radar operators show their attention often is compromised within 15 minutes by external factors such as conversation or internal factors such as daydreaming.[Monitoring] is just a task humans are not very good at, she said.Ms. Baldwin, who works with federal officials and private companies, said she expects manufacturers to develop a type of warning system within a year or two to help safety drivers pay attention.As far as liability in a crash, the responsibility remains the same whether a vehicle has a human or electronic driver, said James Lynch, chief actuary at the Insurance Information Institute in New York City.You dont become more liable because your machine went haywire and caused a crash than if your driver went haywire, he said.
(TNS) -- On the heels of Uber beginning free rides in self-driving cars Wednesday, the state Public Utility Commission today called for vigorous public discussion regarding the regulatory, legal and technical issues on autonomous vehicles.The commission issued a statement in which it encouraged state and federal officials, as well as the general public, to be involved in discussions of the regulations needed to govern the emerging technology.The agency stressed that it has not received an application from any company to operate self-driving vehicles for a fee, which would be required under state law. Uber began offering free rides in self-driving vehicles  with a safety driver and technician in the front seat  to select customers in the Downtown and Strip District Wednesday as part of its live testing of the system.Any business offering transportation services to the general public for compensation must secure proper authority from the PUC before beginning that service, and clearly demonstrate the technical ability to operate safely, the PUC statement said. To date, no entity has applied for such authority in Pennsylvania, and the Commission has not authorized any use of fully-autonomous vehicles for transportation services that fall under the jurisdiction of the PUC.PUC spokesman Nils Hagen-Fredericksen said the agency has had on-going discussions about its activities in Pittsburgh. Uber has run afoul of the PUC in the past and two weeks ago the agency affirmed an $11.4 million fine against Uber for providing rides for fees in vehicles with drivers without receiving PUC approval.The state Department of Transportation has convened an Autonomous Vehicle Task Force that is expected to release recommendations to the state legislature for laws governing self-driving vehicles by the end of the year. The federal National Highway Traffic Safety Administration also is in the process of developing federal guidelines.
(TNS) -- An hours-long standoff in the darkness of the high desert came to a novel end when Los Angeles County sheriffs deputies used a robot to stealthily snatch a rifle from an attempted murder suspect, authorities said Thursday.Officials said the use of the robot to disarm a violent suspect was unprecedented for the Sheriffs Department, and comes as law enforcement agencies increasingly rely on military-grade technology to reduce the risk of injury during confrontations with civilians."The robot was a game changer here, said Capt. Jack Ewell, a tactical expert with the Sheriffs Department  the largest sheriffs department in the nation. We didn't have to risk a deputy's life to disarm a very violent man."It began late in the evening of Sept. 8, when deputies in Lancaster were pursuing a man suspected of trying to kill one person and robbing two others.The suspect, Brock Ray Bunge, 51, fled into a dark, remote field in the Antelope Valley. A sheriffs helicopter eventually tracked him down to a dirt berm, where he holed up surrounded by shrubbery and wire fencing.Deputies ordered Bunge to surrender several times but he refused. A sheriffs SWAT team arrived with armored vehicles and tried to coax him to surrender for more than six hours.Eventually, officials deployed the robot to gain a closer view of Bunges hideout. The camera showed him on his stomach, with his rifle at his feet, Ewell said.To seize the firearm, they hatched a plan that relied on distractions. Deputies in an armored vehicle approached to the front of Bunge, yelling at him through a public address system to surrender. A helicopter whirred overhead.From behind, the olive-colored robot approached and extended its claw into Bunges hideout."The robot was able to move up and grab the gun without him noticing, Ewell said. He never knew it happened.Deputies quickly reversed the robot and recovered the gun. Then, they sent the device back to the berm and had the robot grab the wire fencing, exposing Bunges hiding spot."He only realized the gun was gone when the robot returned to pull down the wire, Ewell said.Bunge surrendered immediately.The Andros robot cost about $300,000, and Ewell said the department typically uses the device for bomb disposal. Increasingly, however, the agency is using the robot during encounters with armed suspects.When it saves lives, it is more than worth it, he said.During the hours-long standoff with Micah Johnson, the killer of five police officers this summer in downtown Dallas, police relied on a small, remote-controlled robot to ferry an explosive device close to the gunman.Police detonated the device, killing 25-year-old Johnson.We saw no other option but to use our bomb robot, Police Chief David Brown said at a news conference. Other options would have exposed our officers to grave danger.Last year, sheriffs deputies used a robot during a 22-hour standoff with a woman in Woodland Hills. She twice shot at a police robot that approached her, and eventually crawled under her home. SWAT deputies arrested her after pulling her out.In April, a standoff with a barricaded man near the state Capitol Building in Sacramento saw police use a robot while attempting to contact the suspect in his car.After Bunge was taken into custody, the Los Angeles County district attorneys office filed felony charges against him including attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon, vandalism, robbery and making criminal threats.He pleaded not guilty to the charges during a court appearance Tuesday and is being held in county jail in lieu of $1.575 million bond, according to court records.
Kevin Magnussen has admitted to some frustration about Renault's delayed decision about the shape of the works team's 2017 driver lineup.

Earlier, it was believed the team would inform the Dane of its decision in Singapore, but team boss Frederic Vasseur has now been quoted as saying the call could be made as late as a week before winter testing.

"Hopefully it will be soon," Magnussen told the Danish newspaper Ekstra Bladet in Singapore.

"Otherwise, I will take it (a decision). I am a racing driver and to race, I cannot wait until the week before the first test. It's not an option.

"I don't know if that's exactly what he (Vasseur) said, but if it's true that he believes Renault can wait until a week before the first test, then it will not be me," said Magnussen.

Renault has a 2017 option on Magnussen's services that will expire in two weeks.

"I cannot sign somewhere other than Renault before the option expires," he confirmed.

Asked if he would sign something after then, Magnussen added: "If I have a better offer, yes."

The 23-year-old suggested the problem could be a power struggle at the top of the team, with Vasseur and Cyril Abiteboul apparently in conflicting roles at present.

"I don't think there is so much I can do about the situation right now, and it's frustrating," said Magnussen.

"If it was quite clear who was in charge at Renault right now, I am sure there would be a decision. But there certainly is not," he added.

He said he has asked Vasseur about the situation and got only positive feedback, including about his leadership skills.

"I asked him and he said he has nothing to complain about. Whether it's true or not I don't know," Magnussen said.

(GMM)
Reliance Communications and Aircel to be merged

Published: September 15, 2016

Anil Ambani led Reliance Communications (RCom) has signed a deal with Maxis Communications Berhad (MCB) for merger of wireless businesses of Aircel Limited with itself.

The merger is considered as the largest-ever consolidation in the Indian telecom sector. The merged entity will be countrys fourth-largest phone company in terms of customers and revenue.

Key Facts

The merged company will have second-largest spectrum holding amongst all operators in the country aggregating 448 MHz across the 850, 900, 1800 and 2100 MHz bands.

It will be one of Indias largest private sector companies, with an asset base of over $9.7 billion (Rs. 65,000 crore) and net worth of $5.2 billion (Rs. 35,000 crore).

RCom and MCB will hold a 50% stake each in the merged entity, with equal representation on the Board of Directors and all Committees.

The Company will be managed by an independent professional team under the supervision of the Board.

Month: Current Affairs - September, 2016

Topics: Aircel  Business  Current Affairs - 2017  Current Affairs 2016  Economy  Reliance  Telecom sector

Latest E-Books
GREENSBORO  Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton declined to say Thursday when her running mate, Virginia senator Tim Kaine, was informed that she'd come down with pneumonia.

"My senior staff knew and information was provided to a number of people," Clinton said at a rare briefing with select reporters, including the News & Record, following her remarks at UNC-Greensboro on Thursday. "Look, this was an ailment that many people just power through and that's what I thought I would do as well. I didn't want to stop. I didn't want to quit campaigning. I certainly didn't want to miss the 9/11 memorial. ... It didn't work out."

Clinton, 68, resumed campaigning in Greensboro after a days-long bout with pneumonia that began Friday but surfaced publicly with a near fainting spell at a Sept. 11 remembrance ceremony in New York. Clinton's campaign confirmed her ailment hours later.

Kaine had declined previously to disclose when Clinton had informed him she was ill. When pressed about it Thursday, Clinton said only that the two had spoken several times in the past few days.

"We communicated. We communicated," she said. "I am not going to go into our personal conversations, but I feel very comfortable and confident about our relationship."

Clinton and her staff, she acknowledged, could have done a better job of releasing the information.

"My campaign has said they could have been faster and I agree with that," she said. "I certainly expect them to be as focused and quick as possible. I have to say, from my perspective, I thought I was going to be fine and I thought there wasnt really any reason to make a big fuss about it. So, I should have taken time off earlier. I didn't. Now I have and I'm back on the campaign trail."

Clinton's visit in Greensboro was the start of a renewed push to Election Day, one that's focused on issues and policy proposals rather than responding to Republican opponent Donald Trump's remarks.

"I came to Greensboro today to talk about my vision for the future of our country and why I so strongly believe we are actually stronger together," she said. "I want to give Americans something to vote for, not just against."

Recent national polls have shown Clinton's lead over Trump narrowing, but the candidate said she's unfazed by the numbers.

"I've always said this was going to be a tight race," Clinton explained. "I said it from the very beginning  whether I was up or down, it didn't matter. I think those are the kinds of presidential elections we have in America at this point in our history."
On Monday, at the Greenwich RTM meeting, there will be a vote on the challenge of municipal improvement status assigned to the rebuilding of New Lebanon School.

The Representative Town Meeting should only focus on whether the rebuilding of New Lebanon School does indeed, within the current system of municipal improvement, improve our municipality, both for Byram and the Town of Greenwich as a whole.

In reference to a recent letter to the editor in the Greenwich Time by Mr. Oscar Rodriguez (op-ed, Sunday, Sept. 11, Dont derail New Leb plan), I would like to reinforce several details which may assist RTM members with their decision.

The size of the proposed new, New Lebanon School addresses all current and future needs of the Greenwich School district and the New Lebanon community. Please note because of space issues for the past few years, the district has been forced to hold Kindergarten classes at the Byram Archibald Neighborhood Center. Also, a major contributing factor to New Lebanons racial imbalance is the lack of space for current non-minority students who live in the New Leb attendance zone. These students opt to temporarily attend other schools until their own school is large enough to accommodate them

As recently as this past Monday, it was announced that enrollment throughout the Greenwich School district increased this school year with New Lebanon needing to add another section of first grade. The students who will utilize the larger New Lebanon School are already here. Additionally, having taught in a neighboring district and witnessing several school rebuilding projects we established a very important motto:  if you build it, they will come. Shortly after all school rebuilding projects are completed, these schools max out their expected enrollment. Families want their children to attend a new state-of-the-art school. They purposely move into areas which have new school buildings. In Greenwich, take a close look at the enrollment for Glenville School shortly after it was rebuilt (the first time) in 1978 and (the second time) in 2010. Or Cos Cob School after it was rebuilt from the fire of 1990. Or Dundee, after it was re-opened as an International Baccalaureate School in 2001. It happens ... time and time again. The larger, state-of-the-art school currently being proposed does indeed improve our municipality.

New Lebanons IB program will provide choice for many students across the district and is the predominant reason the state agreed to the districts racial imbalance plan and to a larger construction reimbursement. The alternatives are forced redistricting of the entire school district to address racial imbalance (how will the rest of the town feel about school redistricting as an option to the current proposed building project?) and with little or no construction reimbursement. Building a larger New Lebanon School which can accommodate the additional students into its IB magnet program does improve our municipality.

Arguments against the current proposed school building have all been vetted by numerous town committees. The proposed site, building size, state reimbursement, and favorable property tax implications were all reviewed by the New Lebanon Building Committee, the Board of Education, the Board of Selectmen, the Planning & Zoning Commission and the Inland Wetlands Agency ... all of which had public forums and supported the current municipal improvement status of the project.

Now I do respect Mr. Matthew Popp who seems to be the New Lebanon building projects chief opponent. He makes compelling arguments about Byrams open space and the Plan of Conservation and Development. However as it was demonstrated at Mondays meeting of the RTMs Land Use Committee, Mr. Popps data and talking points are old and come from first draft design proposals. Many if not all of his concerns have been rectified by the architect and building committee with guidance from the Towns Conservation Coordinator, Planning & Zoning Commission and Inland Wetlands Agency. That is why they signed off on the project. It meets or exceeds their specifications.

Additionally, Mr. Popp makes erroneous conclusions about the (lack of) success of the towns magnet programs at New Lebanon and Hamilton Avenue Schools and their efforts toward correcting racial imbalance. Mr. Popp lists no education or teaching qualifications in his resume. He has no criteria or data for siting successes in any schools. At Mondays meeting Mr. Popp consistently gave his opinion on magnet school success with no supporting documentation.

Please understand Mr. Popp does not speak for the Byram community. The countless number of Byram residents (young and old), PTA members and above all students to which Ive spoken want the new school as it is currently proposed and are tired of the delays.

Finally, let me reiterate as Mr. Rodriguez mentioned in his article that the system of requesting and approving municipal improvement in our town government is questionable. It is definitely deserving of a discussion by the Legislative and Rules Committee and the entire RTM in conjunction with other government officials. I encourage them to proceed with these discussions to clarify the system of municipal improvement and perhaps make future changes.

However as it stands now with the current system of municipal improvement as sited in our Town Charter, the current proposed project of rebuilding New Lebanon School has met and in fact exceeds all criteria for municipal improvement status.

John Macri, Jr. recently retired as a public school teacher after 38 years where he taught in Greenwich and a neighboring school district. He is a lifelong resident of Byram.
       : -       , '  ,     '
WESTON  The home at 18 Godfrey Road in Weston is a magical place to grow up.

Just ask Nate Hasenauer, the 5-year-old whos spent his life exploring the 3-acre property

From the tree house his father built in the backyard, to the stream where he searches for gold and is the worlds greatest adventurer, to the nooks and crannies of the antique house where he and his little siblings play hide and seek, to the fireplace in his bedroom where the family gathers to roast marshmallows, the home is a childs paradise.

I like to go in my tree house and I like to go on the swing, Hasenauer said.

I like to go down to the stream because you can find amazing gold down there, he added. We also try to explore and help creatures but one time Charlotte (his 4-year-old sister) got stuck in a tree and mommy had to help her.

Hasenauer is the unofficial tour guide for the home, which is now on the market for $1.2 million through Laurie Morris and the KMS Partners team at Coldwell Banker.

Much like their son, Hasenauers parents were entranced by the antique charm of the property. Brooke Hasenauer said her husband Eric, who grew up down the street from the property, had always wanted to live there, so as soon as he heard it was for sale 10 years ago, insisted they consider purchasing it.

I think it was maybe 10 days from the time we first had that conversation to the time we put the offer in, Brooke Hasenauer said. Ever since he was a little boy he ran by this house all the time. It wasnt really a discussion, it was Were going to buy this house.' And I loved it too ... its beautiful, it's picturesque in all four seasons. I'm a little bit of a romantic too. I envisioned sitting by the fire, reading a book and drinking coffee, and I did for a long time before we had kids."

According to a compiled history of the property, the antique home was built in or around 1813. The land on which it sits was acquired by Thaddeus Bur, Sr., one of the wealthiest men in Fairfield County, in 1743 and was part of a much larger 405-acre parcel known as the Rowland Farm. Through a series of transfers and subdivisions, the property fell into the hands of Elias Andrews, a stonecutter who served with the 23d Connecticut Regiment, Company E in the Civil War, whose father, John, is supposed to have built the house. Elias lived there until his death in 1900 when the property was inherited by his wife, Rachel.

Following Rachels death in 1922, the home was sold to Irving Lockwood who rented and later sold the property to Frances Cowan, a commercial cartoonist. One of the few people with a steady income during the Great Depression, Cowan added the cottage, which today serves as an in-law apartment or attached rental, and the kitchen.

Its also rumored that a shed that still stands in the back yard was once used as part of the Underground Railroad, though Morris said thats never been officially confirmed.

When the Hasenauers finally had the opportunity to purchase the home, they contacted Morris who had known Eric since he was a child. While he insisted he didnt even need to see the inside to know he wanted it, she made him see at least two other homes before he made an offer on the Godfrey Road property.

As he and Brooke expected, the inside was just as charming as theyd envisioned. Unlike many antiques, the ceilings are slightly higher than usual, an indication that the original owner was wealthy. The original three-story portion of the home still features wide-plank floors, two centralized beehive fireplaces that are still functioning and many other original features.

Morris said the home has appealed to buyers of all ages and familial structures because of its charm and centralized location.

I remember when I lived across the street and Id come home late, it'd be dark outside and Id look over and the lights would be on here, and it just looked so cozy and welcoming and friendly, Morris said.

Brooke Hasenauer said she's sad to be leaving the home behind, but because theyve added three members to their family since moving in, it's time.

We bought it before we had kids, and theyve absolutely loved it here," Hasenauer said. And Ive loved watching my children grow up in a place where you want to be outside. Watching them in this old house and thinking about all the children that have come through before them ... theres just something magical about that.

KKrasselt@scni.com; 203-354-1021; @kaitlynkrasselt
On February 14, 1929, one of the most infamous gang killings happened in Chicago: the St. Valentine's Day Massacre.

On this day, seven men associated with the Irish gangster George "Bugs" Moran were shot down by men wearing police uniforms, history.com writes.
An officer with the Bonne Terre Police Department was led on a pursuit that ended in Washington County Tuesday evening.

Bonne Terre Police Chief Doug Calvert said one of his officers attempted to pull over a motorcycle for improper lane usage and the driver took off on him.

There was really no further incident, he just refused to stop, said Calvert. They got into Washington County on Highway 47 and Terre Du Lac joined the pursuit. Washington County deputies got involved at Highway 21 and Highway 47 and I told my guys to terminate the pursuit there.

Calvert added just shortly after he terminated the pursuit, the guy stopped on his own at a commuter parking lot, for reasons unknown at this time and turned himself over to the Washington County deputies and Bonne Terre officers.

I dont think the guy had any warrants or anything else, said Calvert. I guess he just thought he could outrun us. They never reached high speeds, which is why I let the pursuit go for as long as I did. They were only going about 70 mph and it was at night. It wasnt like it was during school hours. If it had been I would have terminated it a lot sooner.

Calvert added the guy was arrested and will be charged with careless and imprudent driving, failure to yield to an emergency vehicle and other violations.
Back in the day, New Yorkers only had to worry about their favorite old restaurants being replaced by banks in Manhattan. Now, it appears the plague has landed in Staten Island, which  though it might be on the cusp of becoming hot  has so far been immune to the worst consequences of New Yorks mad gentrification dash. After 83 years on Victory Boulevard, German restaurant Schaffers Tavern will close early next year, and the corned-beef sandwiches will be swapped out for ATM fees when its replaced by a branch of Victory State Bank. Staten Island might be known as a fortress of chicken parm, but its also home to a small, scattered German food scene, which includes the great Killmeyers, Nurnberger Bierhaus, and Nurnberger Bierhalle.
In its latest campaign, Motorola hosts a focus group with a bunch of loyal iPhone customers. What the moderator did was ask them about the latest iPhone 7 announcement and what they thought of it. Some were clearly not impressed by the improvements made by Apple.

Then the focus changes to what the moderator calls an iPhone 7 prototype (which was actually a Moto Z). The participants are intrigued by the phone and its Moto Mods, even prompting some to incorporate how they would use these accessories in their daily lives. The Mods shown to the group were the snap-on battery pack, SoundBoost JBL speaker, and finally the Insta-share projector. I didnt expect to see that one guy said.

The idea of the campaign is kind of like a blind taste test, if you will. The participants had Apple on their minds but it was far from the new iPhone 7. In any case, the video is worth checking out even for a couple of laughs.

The tagline for the campaign is #skipthesevens. Moto also makes the following bold statement.

You can make new announcements. Or you can break new ground.

Via
There have already been rumors that Samsung is working on a 'C' series smartphone dubbed Galaxy C9. In fact, the device's existence has even been confirmed by Zauba, where it was spotted last month. Now, a new rumor has revealed the launch time-frame for the phone.

The rumor says that the handset will arrive sometime in the October-November time frame, which is basically within a couple of months from now.

Sadly, nothing much is known about the device at this point in time, except that it will sport a 5.7-inch full HD display, something that was corroborated by the latest rumor as well. However, we expect more details to emerge as the launch date nears.

Via
These are the best offers from our affiliate partners. We may get a commission from qualifying sales.
Samsung Galaxy Note7 users in Canada who participated in the exchange program have started receiving their replacement units, presumably making Canada the first country where new Note7 devices have begun shipping. The company had earlier given a shipping date of September 19.

While there have been reports that the new lot will have a blue S on the box as well as green-colored battery indicator instead of white, that appears not to be the case with the units that have so far arrived in Canada. There's, however, a small black square on the box label.

If you are in the US and have participated in the Galaxy Note7 exchange program there, it's worth knowing that the South Korean company has confirmed that replacement stock will start arriving in your country by September 21.

Via | Reddit
Shortly after the US CPSC announced an official recall of the Samsung Galaxy Note7 smartphone, Samsung US has apologized for the whole fiasco. The apology came in the form of a video featuring Tim Baxter (President & COO of Samsung Electronics America).

He also revealed that a total of 130,000 units have been exchanged so far.

In case you don't already know, around 1 million Note7 phablets have been recalled in the country, meaning the figure shared by Baxter stands at just 13% of the total faulty units in the US.

However, with Samsung confirming that replacement units will be available in the country "no later than September 21," it is expected that there will be a spike in the number of Note7 users participating the South Korean company's US exchange program.

Source (video)
A woman who conspired with her husband to coerce a distraught 15-year-old girl from Madison, Illinois, into prostitution at truck stops and trailer parks last summer was sentenced Thursday to 20 years in federal prison.

Chief U.S. District Judge Michael J. Reagan told Robin (Lott) Thompson, 25, whose last known address was in Park Hills, that her crime was one of the worst he has ever seen.

What you and your husband did was strip an individual of the right to feel secure, control and trust what she did with her own body, Reagan said at a hearing here. He was one of the enablers in your case but I think there were numerous times when you could have said, Enough is enough, and Stop.

In addition to 20 years, Robin Thompson was given 10 years of supervised release and fines.

Thompson and her husband, Marcus D. Thompson, 29, also of Park Hills, admitted in May that they used the girl for prostitution in at least three states, advertising sex encounters by posting explicit pictures of her on the website Backpage.cm.

The victim reported the couple to authorities in July 2015 from Cardinal Glennon Medical Center in St. Louis, telling police she believed the four other girls enticed into the operation were 12 to 18 years old. She told authorities that one of the girls died in her arms and that they were beaten and threatened with being fed to alligators in a swamp if they tried to escape.

The teen had been missing since June 9. She was walking down a street in Madison when Marcus Thompson approached in a white pickup with the four other girls inside, court documents said.

She had been contemplating suicide that day by jumping off a bridge after arguing with her father over becoming pregnant, Reagan said Thursday.

Federal investigators subpoenaed Backpage.cm and found that the Thompsons cellphone was used to place ads in Orlando and Pensacola in Florida, as well as Atlanta, Nashville, Tenn., and Dallas in June and early July 2015.

As part of an agreement with federal prosecutors, Robin Thompson pleaded guilty of conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of a child by force, fraud or coercion. Her husband pleaded guilty in May to the conspiracy charge and child sex trafficking. At his sentencing hearing set for Sept. 29, Marcus Thompson faces 27 to nearly 34 years in prison.

Her lawyer, Gary Milone, argued for a lighter sentence, saying Robin Thompson had never run afoul of the law before meeting her husband. The lawyer said she had an uphill climb all her life and pointed to her lack of criminal record, and her drug-addicted mother, history of child abuse and methamphetamine addiction.

Milone said she dropped out of high school her junior year, and at the time was ranked 232nd of 239 classmates.

Robin Thompson said Thursday in court, My biggest mistake was not being able to tell people no. She added, I admit I was wrong but Im not this horrible person everyone makes me out to be.

She told Reagan she didnt know the teen was underage until later on. Reagan said he didnt believe her.

Robin Thompson negotiated prices, arranged meetings at truck stops, booked hotel rooms, provided condoms, kept a ledger of the transactions and threatened to harm the girl if she tried to escape.
Bback in March this year, there were reports that Spotify's Japan launch is on the cards. Now, TechCrunch is reporting that the music streaming company will launch its services in the Asian country sometime this month.

Local business publications say Spotify Premium would cost around 1,000 yen ($10) per month. The launch in Japan - which is the world's second largest music market based on sales - would come nearly six months after Spotify arrived in Indonesia.

The company is also said to be focusing on India as its next launch market in Asia, but there is nothing concrete to report at the moment.

Via
US CPSC said to be looking into reports of other Samsung smartphones catching fire

According to a new report, the US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) - which has just announced an official recall of the Samsung Galaxy Note7 - is also looking into reports of other Samsung smartphones catching fire.

As per the report, there have been at-least six incidents worldwide where Samsung phones other than the Galaxy Note7 have caught fire or posed a risk to user safety.

"Those include a man in Port St. Lucie, Florida, who says his Galaxy S7 was charging in his car when the car caught fire; a woman in the U.K. whose Galaxy S7 appeared to melt and start smoking in a restaurant; and a 6-year-old boy in Brooklyn, New York, who reportedly suffered burns when an S4 exploded while he was watching videos on it," the report said.

For its part, the South Korean company has refuted the claim that there are battery issues with several of its other smartphones as well. "The battery cell issue announced earlier this month is isolated to one battery manufacturer for one specific phone model," the company said.

Via
A local police department is looking to thank a "Good Samaritan" who was in the right place at the right time.

Farmington Police Chief Rick Baker said the events taking place about 6:45 a.m. on Tuesday were pretty unique compared to most incidents.

Through the turn of events, Steven J. Lewis, 41, of Sullivan, is now in the St. Francois County Jail.

At that time on Tuesday, Baker said, an officer was sitting in his patrol car on a parking lot on Maple Street near Alexander Street speaking to a victim of a forced entry burglary from a residence in Leadington.

The victim works at Steak n Shake and noticed an individual walk into Steak n Shake with a large, Army camouflage backpack that she believed to be hers and stolen from the burglary, Baker said. She also said this individual had a glove on one hand that was saturated with blood.

Baker said the victim reported there was glass broken during the burglary, with a substantial amount of blood left at the scene.

The report states the officer observes an individual matching the victims description walk past his patrol car while still on the phone with the victim.

It is reported the officer then made contact with the individual on Maple Street near Harrington Street by asking about why the suspects hand is bleeding through the glove.

Baker said the officer reported he noticed anxiety in the suspects voice as soon as the conversation began.

The officer asked the individual if he minds if (the officer) looks in the Army camouflage bag to verify the items, Baker said.

During the search, the officer reported the individual was still not cooperative during that time. At that point, the report states, the individual reached for the backpack, grabbing some items and attempting to flee.

The officer was able to grab the individual and a short scuffle took place, Baker said. Before the back-up officers arrived, a passer-by stopped to assist the officer in getting the individual under control. The other officers arrived shortly after.

The suspect received minor injuries in the scuffle and was transported to Parkland Health Center for treatment of injuries.

But, Baker added, before the suspect was transported for treatment the officer asked the victim of the burglary to stop by to identify the items found.

She actually identified the items and stated the black sweatpants and gray shirt the individual was wearing belonged to her boyfriend, Baker said.

Lewis is currently being held in the St. Francois County Jail on a $15,000 bond. Charges filed against Lewis will included receiving stolen property (under $500), felony resisting arrest and third-degree assault on a police officer.

In the meantime, the department is hoping to find out who it was that stopped to lend a hand.

Before the officer could thank (the passer-by), he got in his car and left, Baker said. We dont know who this is, but we want to make sure if hes out there  we thank him for his assistance.

The person who stopped is described as an older white male driving a silver Dodge Dakota with a Missouri plate.

In these times, with the way some people see police officers, we really want to say we appreciate him stopping to assist, Baker said. We want to let the community know we appreciate this. Not everyone would get out to stop and assist us and it was a good Samaritan-type thing.




Haiti - News : Zapping politics...





Strengthening of the security at the Consulate of Miami

The Consulate General of Haiti in Miami is working to provide a safe environment for customers and employees. Therefore, new security measures were installed. We ask all people wanting to enter the Consulate to get in line to go through the metal detector. Consulate thank you in advance for your understanding and your cooperation.



168th School Digicel

Earlier this week in Petit-Goave, the Digicel Foundation inaugurated in the community of Hyacinthe, its 168th school: the Priestly School of St Anne. Digicel remains on course towards achieving its main objective which is the construction of 175 schools across the country by March, 2017.



Training of Electoral Security Agents

The Provisional Electoral Council (CEP) informs the parties, political groups and candidates in particular, that training sessions for the Electoral Security Agents (ESA) of West I and II, will be held from 16 to 22 September 2016, at the Police Academy, located at Route de Freres. https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-18631-haiti-news-zapping-politics.html . Note that the ASE is not an innovation of this new CEP as believed wrongly by some. These electoral security agents were present in the elections of 25 October 2015 and even during the 2010 elections with the CEP of Gaillot Dorsinvil.



Inauguration of the St. Michel Hospital

On Wednesday, Dr. Ginette Michaud Privert, de facto First Lady of the Republic, took part in the Inauguration of the St Michel Hospital in Jacmel.



Minister Laurore receives the new FAO Representative

Pierre Guito Laurore, the Minister of Agriculture has received in his office the new FAO Representative in Haiti Nathanael Hishamunda, a high-level professional of agriculture https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-18630-haiti-agriculture-new-fao-representative-in-haiti.html . The Minister Laurore wished him a warm welcome and expressed hope that Haiti will benefit greatly from his knowledge and experience.



Training of MBV

The Executive Directorate of the Provisional Electoral Council informs that the training sessions for Polling Stations Members (MBV) will be held from 22 to 25 September in the National Schools and High Schools of different communes of country. CEP Directorate invites all entities involved in these sessions to do everything for the success of this important step in the electoral process.



HL/ HaitiLibre


















Published on 2016/09/16 | Source

Added final episode 16 captures for the Korean drama "W" (2016)

Advertisement

Directed by Jeong Dae-yoon

Written by Song Jae-jeong

Network : MBC

With Lee Jong-suk, Han Hyo-joo, Jung Eugene, Lee Tae-hwan, Park Won-sang, Cha Kwang-soo,...

16 episodes - Wed, Thu 22:00

Synopsis

A mysterious melodrama about a parallel universe which depicts a man and a woman who live in the same Seoul but in different environments.

Broadcast starting date in Korea : 2016/07/20

More
Harlow is a former New Town in Essex with a population of 86,000. Located in the upper Stort Valley, it was built in the decades after the Second World War to ease overcrowding and London and provide homes for people bombed out during the Blitz. It includes Britain's first pedestrian precinct and first modern residential tower block, The Lawn. Old Harlow, the historic part of the town, was mentioned in the Domesday Book. David and Victoria Beckham's former home, Rowneybury House, nicknamed 'Beckingham Palace', is nearby.

09:44, 30 OCT 2022
DEAR ABBY: Years ago, I dated an awful guy. He possessed just about every negative quality you could imagine. I dated him anyway because I was immature, depressed and lonely.

Since we broke up and I got my mental health back on track, my life has been wonderful. I keep moving up and forward in life. I hear through the grapevine that his life, on the other hand, is in shambles.

I blame myself for wasting the time I did with him. Sometimes when he pops into my head I get sick to my stomach. I'm afraid he might come back into my life and harm me because he blames me for his miserable life and bad choices.

How do you remove such a negative person from your memory? Is it possible to forget -- especially when you want to? -- ANNOYED IN TEXAS

DEAR ANNOYED: Your experiences have made you the person you are, and at this point in your life, you have made yourself successful and happy. Congratulations for that. Now it's time to stop listening to news about your ex-boyfriend through the grapevine.

When friends bring him up, tell them you aren't interested. If he lives nearby, frequents the same places you do and has threatened you, talk to law enforcement or move. Give it time; time has a way of healing. It's important that you continue getting on with your life. You may find fears will dissipate once you find a new significant other.

DEAR ABBY: I'm someone who's been chronically hot for as long as I can remember. In winter, I usually wear lighter clothes than most people so I can be comfortable. Unfortunately, complete strangers feel compelled to ask several times a day, "Aren't you cold?" or say, "You're crazy for dressing that way!"

I don't feel I should have to justify my wardrobe, and I think calling someone crazy is out of line. I have pointed out to some people that how I dress is none of their business, at which point they take offense. (One guy even told me to "shove it where the sun don't shine.") I don't think my response was inappropriate considering that they were the ones judging me. I'm the one who should have been upset. What can I say to these judgmental people without justifying myself and without evoking an angry response? -- NOT CRAZY, JUST COMFORTABLE

DEAR NOT CRAZY: Most people are curious when they see something "different." Wearing lightweight clothing in the dead of winter qualifies as different. If you are asked, all you need to say is that your body temperature runs hotter than most people's, and you are perfectly comfortable. Period.

DEAR ABBY: A friend of mine died recently. My question is, how much time should I wait before asking his widow if she saved his hearing aids from the crematorium and if so, could I have them? -- CHEAP MINNESOTAN

DEAR MINNESOTAN: You didn't mention how long ago your friend died, but if it was yesterday, give the widow a week or two to recover from the shock of her loss. I say this because if you wait too long, somebody else may grab them, but if you ask too soon, she may give you an earful.

DEAR ABBY: Ill bet this is an issue in many homes. When my son Chet graduated from high school, we gave him a very nice graduation party, which included his friends and family. He received many gifts. I gave my son thank-you cards, stamps, and a detailed list of whom to send the cards to. So far, he has refused. Chet is normally thoughtful and considerate. I dont know what to do. Im embarrassed by his lack of gratitude. I have told him we have received thank-yous from his friends and that the cards can be brief. Should I send the thank-you notes myself, or just let it go?  EMBARRASSED MOM IN CALIFORNIA

DEAR MOM: If the amount of mail I receive from readers complaining that their gifts are not acknowledged is an accurate barometer, your problem is very common. Without being confrontational, ask your son why he refuses to thank the people who gave him gifts. If the answer is he doesnt know what to say and hes embarrassed that he has procrastinated, offer to help him by making suggestions. Youre right; the thankyous dont have to be lengthy. But DO NOT write them for him. Chet is a big boy and the responsibility is his.

DEAR ABBY: I am a divorced, single woman in my 50s. I love my grandchildren dearly but am faced with a dilemma. I work full-time and take my grandchildren some nights and on the one day I have off  usually on weekends. I cant plan things on a weekend without feeling I have made it difficult for my son and his wife to find someone to watch their children. Her mom, a stay-at-home wife, watches them several days a week. I want to continue spending time with my grandkids, but I also want the freedom to be there when I choose to be. I realize finding a sitter you can afford and trust to watch your children is a challenge. I have tried talking to my son, but it doesnt seem to get through to him. I know I need to do something, but what? Im afraid I wont see the kids at all if I take a stand.  LADY ON THE LAKE IN MICHIGAN

DEAR LADY: Check your calendar and plan some time for yourself  one or two weekends a month. Then tell your son and his wife which ones you will be AVAILABLE. Free baby-sitting services are hard to come by, and you are not giving yourself enough credit. If the unspoken threat is that its all or nothing, then, frankly, you should step back further and let your son and daughter-in-law shoulder even more responsibility for the children they brought into this world.

DEAR ABBY: Im the middle child. Our father died in the Gulf War. None of us really knew him, but my younger sister, Delia, has no memory of him at all. She has been acting out for years now, and has broken our mothers heart more times than I can count. Whenever she messes up, she blames it on not knowing our father and the life she could have led. It has been 20 years, Abby!

The past is the past. Delia continues to ruin her future and blame our mom. It has Mom wondering why she was able to survive this crisis 20 years ago but cant manage to deal with my sister. I think Delia may have a chemical imbalance, or just never dealt with our fathers death. How do you convince someone to get help? How do you make her see that Dad died so she could enjoy the many freedoms of America?  DRAINED IN DELAWARE

DEAR DRAINED: Im sorry for your familys loss, but we are all responsible for our own behavior and our own emotions. You cant force help on your dysfunctional sister. Before shell be willing to accept that she needs it, she will have to accept that SHE has been responsible for her own mistakes and behavior. If your father had lived, her life might not have been any different than it is.

The person who COULD use some professional help might be your mother. Counseling might help her to quit trying to rescue her adult daughter, or blaming herself for the problems Delia has created for herself. Im not saying it will be easy  letting go rarely is. But it might improve her emotional and physical health.

DEAR ABBY: I am an attractive, physically fit, well-educated, 41-yearold divorced woman with two young children. Recently a co-worker I have known for several months asked me to accompany him on a weekend hiking trip. (Hes 23.) After a few conversations, he confessed that he was deeply in love with me and hoped we could begin a serious relationship. Abby, hes mature, good-looking, financially independent and has a great sense of humor. Im attracted to him.Should I pursue this relationship, or wait until Im attracted to someone closer to my own age? Help!  A.S. IN SAN DIEGO

DEAR A.S.: Whoa! Slow down. Regardless of the age difference, an overnight first date (with a co-worker, yet) seems like an awfully speedy beginning to me. If youre smart, start with a coffee date, graduate to a dinner date, and pursue the relationship from there. Only time will tell if this is the real thing.

DEAR ABBY: I have been best friends with Jean ever since grade school. We get along great, except for one thing  shes a cheapskate! Jean is single and still lives with her parents; I am a single mother living on my own. We earn about the same amount of money. Whenever Jean is invited out for drinks, she brings only enough cash for one drink, and then comments loudly that she doesnt have enough money on her for another one and waits until someone offers to pay for it.

When going out to eat, she eats at home first, and then asks to sample everyone elses food. If she wants to see a movie, she makes sure to bring a date to pay for her ticket. I think her stingy behavior is keeping her from having serious relationships because she expects to pay for nothing. It has reached the point where I dont want to do anything with her because of her penny-pinching ways. Mutual friends have asked me to speak to her. What can I say to keep my friendship intact?  SEPARATE CHECKS, PLEASE, IN OHIO

DEAR SEPARATE CHECKS: Because you have reached the point that your relationship with Jean is in jeopardy, talk with her about how her behavior has affected you. But do not allow yourself to be the appointed spokeswoman for anyone else. And unless you know for a fact that her stingy behavior is keeping her from having serious relationships with men, keep it to yourself. In the future, if you go out with Jean and she says she didnt bring enough money for a second drink, allow her to suffer the consequences. And when she asks to sample what youre eating, tell her calmly youd rather she didnt. I agree that when behavior like hers becomes a pattern  and the person is able to pay but is mooching  that its obnoxious. But it wont be corrected by enabling her, and that is what everyone has been doing.

DEAR ABBY: Because Im a florist, my niece asked me to do the flowers for her wedding. I gladly agreed. Misty put the priest through a lot to make this a very special occasion. She hadnt attended church prior to the wedding. When the priest asked Misty for a contribution to the church for having her wedding there, she was miffed. I asked her, Who do you think pays the utilities and upkeep for the church for one-time users like you? She hasnt spoken to me since! Was I wrong?  MIFFED MYSELF IN NEW YORK

DEAR MIFFED: Wrong? You gave your niece a dose of reality, and stated it very well. It appears Misty has some growing up to do. Perhaps when her bridal fever subsides, she will realize that life isnt one freebie after another, and offer the apology she owes you. P.S. I hope she thanked you for the flowers.

Dear Abby is written by Abigail Van Buren, also known as Jeanne Phillips, and was founded by her mother, Pauline Phillips. Contact Dear Abby at www.DearAbby.com or P.O. Box 69440, Los Angeles, CA 90069
National HR Summit was recognised as the best business event in Australia at the 20annual Publish Awards held last night in Sydney.A crowd of 450 publishing industry professionals gathered at the Royal Randwick Racecourse to hear winners announced across 34 categories recognising the best consumer, B2B and custom publishing across print, digital and events.From a record number of nominations received, the National HR Summit was named the winner of the Event of the Year (Business) category.Preparations are underway for the 2017 National HR Summit and to celebrate this achievement, HC is offering the first 50 delegates tickets at less than half price First launched in 2002, the National HR Summit will mark its fifteenth year in 2017, returning to Luna Park Sydney on 29-30 March. Program details will be available in coming weeks and months - delegates can expect compelling content from industry thought leaders and award winners, panel discussions, live interviews, interactive sessions, networking events and much more.The pre-program discount tickets are strictly limited to the first 50 delegates and represents a significant saving of over 50% on the standard price for the event.
By Jesse Wood

On a foggy Friday afternoon, just before the ribbon cutting ceremony of Appalachian Regional Healthcare Systems Foley Center at Chestnut Ridge facility, Blowing Rock Mayor JB Lawrence spoke to the importance of the new post-acute care center to the beloved village.

Because if a community does not have a first-class healthcare facility, it is a dying community, and I never want to see Blowing Rock die. We always want it to be here and flourish, Lawrence said.

Atop 68 acres, The Foley Center is an 87,500-square-foot, 112-bed healthcare facility features on-site physicians, short and long-term care, skilled nursing, rehabilitation services, memory support, assisted living and palliative care. ARHS says that this center will serve as a cost-saving alternative for patients healthy enough to be discharged from the hospital (post-acute), but not quite ready to safely return home.

The facility features private and semi-private bedrooms, a rehabilitation gym, community dining areas and six living rooms  all with a view. The attached Davant Medical Clinic and Boone Drugs Village Pharmacy are scheduled to open on the property later this fall.

Also speaking at the event were NC Secretary of Transportation Nick Tennyson, Appalachian Regional Healthcare System CEO Richard Sparks and ARHS Senior Vice President of System Advancement Rob Hudspeth.

The Foley Center at Chestnut Ridge is named after Dennis and Diane Foley, as the lead donors gave $3.5 million for this construction project. In 2002, Diane was diagnosed with lymphoma and after two years of treatment under the care of Dr. Herman Godwin at ARHS Seby B. Jones Regional Cancer Cneter, she was declared cancer free, according to a ARHS release announcing the gift last June.

The Foleys were among the three thanks that Sparks gave out to either individuals or entities regarding sharing ARHS vision and donating generously to the project. Sparks said his themes were based on sharing, catching the spirit and commitment.

The Foleys fell into the sharing category.

They gave us flexibility to pursue what this community really needed in terms of the delivery of quality healthcare. It is very unusual for someone to make those kind of contributions that they did and say spend it the way you need, Sparks said.

He also thanked Jerry Hutchins for catching the spirit of the project. Prior to Sparks talking Hutchins out of retirement to perform a similar role, Hutchins worked as the Vice Chancellor for Advancement at Appalachian State, and his passion was evident.

He caught the spirit of this project and told everyone he met why it should be built and did so with a passion and explained why you would want to be apart of this, Sparks said. Thank you for your spirit.

He added that Hutchins also came up with the Chestnut Ridge moniker that is named after the road that leads to the old Blowing Rock Hospital property adjacent to downtown Blowing Rock.

Lastly, Sparks praised the State of North Carolina and the N.C. Department of Transportation for the funding the construction of the winding road up to the facility and the access bridge, which was named in honor of Reba and Grady Moretz of App Ski Mtn. at U.S. 321.

Sparks noted that the state could have backed out of their promise (i.e., commitment) to build access over the past several years. He also noted that it was very unusual for a project two cross over into two administrations  and succeed.

Gov. Pat McCrory was scheduled to attend the ceremony but changed his plans after a police officer in Shelby was shot and killed, according to his stand-in, Sec. Tennyson, who spoke for 10 minutes at the event.

Following the ceremony, McCrorys administration issued a press release on the Foley Center at Chestnut Ridge.

This is a great day for western North Carolinas economy, health care and overall quality of life, Governor McCrory said. The Foley Center will help fulfill two of our teams central philosophies: to get people back to work and help those who cant help themselves while encouraging those who can.

For more information about the facility, click here.

Photos below by Ken Ketchie

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Editors Note: This is from releases sent to High Country Press. If Counts opponent, Rep. Jonathan Jordan  and other local candidates  send releases leading up to the general election, High Country Press will publish those, too.

Jim Hunt, North Carolinas longest-serving governor, spoke to supporters Tuesday about the importance of electing retired Watauga County Cooperative Extension Director Sue Counts to the NC House.

Speaking to a crowded room at Appalachian Ski Mountain he said, Sue Counts is the kind of leader that I admire so much, and appreciate so much. Shes spent her life[] working for all kinds of people. She knows how to organize and partner with people.

Gov. Hunt cited the need to raise North Carolinas teacher salaries to the national average and disrupt Raleighs right-wing corporate agenda as reasons to elect Sue. Referring to the current partisan lock on NC government Hunt proclaimed, Its hurting this state. Its hurting our children. Its hurting our grandchildren. And it is wrong.

Sue responded to Gov. Hunts statements saying, I am honored to have former Gov. Hunt supporting my campaign to fight for schools and an economy that works for all of us, just like he did.

Added Gov. Hunt, When Sue Counts gets there, the legislature wont know what hit em.

Sue Counts has been endorsed for N.C. House seat 93 by the North Carolina Association of Educators.

Retired as the Watauga County extension director for the N.C. Cooperative Extension Service, Counts decided to run for office because she could no longer sit by and watch her beloved state wander down the path which is destroying the gains that have been made. Since moving to Boone 35 years ago, she has been an active member and leader in the community. Her years of experience span everything from public health to teaching and consulting on the local, state, and national levels. One issue that is very important to Counts is education. She believes that funding for public schools need to be increased in order for North Carolina to once again be a leader in public education.

Sue Counts stands on a deeply rooted respect for education and educators. She realizes the importance of keeping education a community focus, said Jennifer Lacy, president of the Watauga County Association of Educators. Sue Counts will be a strong, vocal advocate for public education, and she will put our students needs first with regard to funding, programs, and policies. We are excited to endorse an active candidate who is willing to listen to teachers and use that knowledge to rebuild the respect and value of the education profession in North Carolina.

NCAEs focus is to support candidates who can help fully restore education funding to North Carolinas public schools and move the state forward. The Associations 2016 Legislative Agenda put priorities on retaining and recruiting quality educators, increasing per-pupil expenditures (43rd in the nation) and funding for textbooks, restoring teacher assistant positions, eliminating additional funds for private school vouchers, and providing professional compensation for all educators (41st in the nation).

NCAE is the states largest education advocacy organization for public school employees and represents active, retired, and student members.

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DEAR HARRIETTE: After almost a decade of working through the state, I have decided it is time to open my first private practice. I scoped out locations in my town, and I think I found the right office for my budget. The problem is, the office looks a little run-down. I don't have the funds to completely renovate the space, but I think I would drive away clients if I were to open my practice this way. I need the money, though. Do you think I should open with the promise of renovating soon? I don't see another way right now. -- Fixer Upper, Upper Marlboro, Maryland

DEAR FIXER UPPER: Is there any way you can stay on the job long enough to save the requisite funds to complete the basics of the renovation? By your own account, you say the new office in its current state will drive away clients. Unless you can come up with an incentive that will promote your business and allow for the space to be imperfect, you should stay in your job. But give that some thought. What can you come up with to attract clients to your business despite the shabby environs? If you can make it worth the wait for a spruced-up space, go for it. Otherwise, wait and get everything in proper order.

DEAR HARRIETTE: My husband and I are older parents to one child. Our daughter has just become a teenager, and while she does enjoy spending time with us, it can be torturous for her to go to adults-only parties that last for hours with no friends. Knowing this, whenever I can manage it, I find her something else to do.

Recently, my husband ran into an old friend from college and was excited to show off his family to the guy and his friends. My husband's friend invited us to a dinner party, but I cannot go because I have been under the weather. My husband insists that my daughter go anyway. While I imagine it will be nice for our daughter to meet these people, I'm certain she will be bored. Given that she could stay at home with me and chill and be more comfortable, what can I do to make it possible for her to stay home? How can I convince him to go have fun and let the teenager stay home with me? -- Compassion for the Teen, Milwaukee

DEAR COMPASSION FOR THE TEEN: If you can capture your husband's attention, remind him of how painful being the only teen in a room can be. Acknowledge that for him it would be great to show off your daughter, but what about her? Get him to think about her for a few minutes, and see if that helps him to reconsider. Remind your husband that your daughter will probably want to come home before he does. Ask him to at least split the difference for the curfew for their evening.

DEAR HARRIETTE: I am a Japanese-American woman married to an American man. In the Japanese culture, the eighth wedding anniversary is said to give your marriage good luck. I mentioned the significance of our upcoming anniversary to my husband, but he shrugged this off. I find it important to celebrate my culture in the marriage as well as his. How can I turn my husband, who isn't really caring, into someone who will allow me to celebrate this little victory in my culture? -- He Doesn't Get It, Roosevelt Island, New York

DEAR HE DOESN'T GET IT: Springing this concept on your husband may have been the mistake here. Your job is to teach your husband about your culture over time so that he will be interested. Little lessons here and there can go a long way. Since you are approaching your anniversary now, it is up to you to make it special in ways that will acknowledge your heritage and include your husband without being annoying.

Think about what makes your husband happy about your union and what is special to him. Plan to emphasize what he appreciates, and let him know the plan. Incorporate the concept of good luck into your overall plans, including any special activities that should be part of the actual celebration, but don't make them highlights. Instead, make them accents.

I will add that if you have not incorporated aspects of your Japanese heritage into your celebrations in the past, but you really want to do so, now is your chance to speak up for yourself and make that known. On one hand, you will need to accept your husband for who he is and how he flows through life. On the other, you can help him evolve to embrace your cultural ways. Do it with baby steps.

Harriette Cole is a lifestylist and founder of DREAMLEAPERS, an initiative to help people access and activate their dreams. You can send questions to askharriette@harriettecole.com or c/o Universal Uclick, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106
By Cramer Lewis and Jessica Isaacs

Whats even more rare than finding a four-leaf clover? Finding a five-leaf clover, of course!

Second-grader Owen Ireland, 7, was lucky enough to find one of these unusual green gems just outside of his classroom at Two Rivers Community School on Sept. 1, right by the site of the schools brand new playground, the final touches on which are being applied this week.

Ireland said he found it in a small clover patch by the school and took it home to find out what it could mean.

I didnt really know how rare it was. I didnt know I would be on the newspaper, he said. I really like looking at three-leaf clovers that have really big leaves. I just picked it out and just waited until I got home.

With the help of his parents, Ireland did some homework online and read stories about other children around the country who have found these lucky little clovers.

We found out that people who found it were allowed to go on the newspaper, he said. We found out that it was extra rare and extra good luck.

Ireland later framed the clover for safekeeping in his home, where it reminds him that the world around us offers an endless array of wondrous things to enjoy.

Some sources say the chances of finding a five-leaf clover are nearly 1,000,000 to 1.

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Renowned conservationist and naturalist John Muir once described Grandfather Mountain as the face of all Heaven come to Earth.

Muir, founder of the Sierra Club, celebrated Grandfathers natural splendor during his Sept. 25, 1898, visit. Now, Grandfather Mountain is returning the favor.

John Muir Day will take place Sunday, Sept. 25, offering free admission to Sierra Club members.

John Muir visited Grandfather Mountain in late September of 1898, said Mickey Shortt, director of education and natural resources for the Grandfather Mountain Stewardship Foundation, the nonprofit organization that oversees the Linville nature preserve and travel attraction. While here, he seemed most impressed by the diversity of trees in the deciduous forest around Grandfather and the endless ridges that came into view from the peaks.

As such, Grandfather Mountain is inviting Sierra Club members to visit the park to honor the work and legacy of Muir and the organization he founded, Shortt said.

Lisa McWherter, outings leader for the Wenoca Group of the Sierra Club, can see why Muir was so impressed, calling Grandfather Mountain an unusually beautiful area.

Muir, on the hand, wasnt quite as succinct. Just prior to his visit, hed been ill with a bronchial cough for months, but wrote to his wife after climbing Grandfather, The air has healed me. I think I could walk 10 miles and not be tired.

And according to an article in American Museum Journal, Muir wrote of the view from the top, saying, I couldnt hold in and began to jump about and sing and glory in it all.

The visit also came during a considerably active period in Muirs career.

The time he was at Grandfather Mountain was actually pretty significant  because it was just after he founded the Sierra Club, and the creation of the National Parks was just getting off the ground, said Jesse Pope, executive director of the Grandfather Mountain Stewardship Foundation. For him to come to Grandfather Mountain and recognize its significance, compared to all the national treasures and wonders of the Western United States, I think that says a lot of about the diversity and landscape of Grandfather Mountain.

Muirs endorsement, as it were, isnt something that Grandfathers naturalist staff takes lightly.

Our mission is to inspire conservation, and I think thats what John Muir was all about, Shortt said. He wanted to protect places so future generations could enjoy them. Thats the intent with our (educational) programs  to leave visitors with something that moves them to care about the resources across the country and also in their backyard.

Muirs legacy is shared among the Sierra Clubs approximately 2.4 million members and supporters. As a way of honoring their commitment to conservation, on Sept. 25, Grandfather Mountain will grant free admission to Sierra Club members with valid proof of membership.

For more information on Grandfather Mountain and John Muir Day, as well as additional events and programming, visit www.grandfather.com, or call (828) 733-2013. For more information on the Sierra Club, visit www.sierraclub.org.

The not-for-profit Grandfather Mountain Stewardship Foundation strives to inspire conservation of the natural world by helping guests explore, understand and value the wonders of Grandfather Mountain. For more information, call (800) 468-7325, or visit www.grandfather.com to plan a trip.

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The Ministry of Finance estimates in its latest economic survey that, regardless of the modest recovery, the gross domestic product will be around 3 per cent and industrial output around 20 per cent lower two years from now than in 2008.

The Finnish economy is expected to expand by 1.1 per cent in 2016.

Finland will according to the economic survey also continue to lose its share of world trade due to the continuing struggles of export-oriented industries.

The employment situation is similarly unlikely to improve in accordance with the objectives of the Government. The Ministry of Finance estimates that the employment rate will creep up to 70 per cent in 2019, two percentage points short of the target set for the end of the electoral term by the Government of Prime Minister Juha Sipila (Centre).

Olli Karkkainen, a private economist at Nordea, says the forecast casts doubts especially over the efforts to improve the employment situation in Finland. The deficit will be around 80,000 people in 2019, he highlights on Twitter.

The Ministry of Finance forecasts that the unemployment rate will improve moderately to 9.0 per cent in 2016 but voices its concerns about the continuing growth of structural unemployment and the modest pace of decline in unemployment.

Mikko Spolander, a senior financial advisor at the Ministry of Finance, revealed in a press conference yesterday that the long-term unemployed already account for more than one-third of all unemployed, according to statistics published by the Ministry of Employment and the Economy.

The long-term unemployed are people who easily give up job-seeking and are difficult to place also in the event that the economic recovery really starts to spur labour demand, he said. Economic growth alone won't eliminate structural unemployment, [] but structural measures are needed to fix this structural problem.

The unemployment rate is forecast to continue to improve to 8.8 per cent in 2017 and to 8.5 per cent in 2018, after peaking at 9.4 per cent in 2015.

Aleksi Teivainen  HT

Photo: Markku Ulander  Lehtikuva

Source: Uusi Suomi
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Younger drug users and more women are coming to the capital's only needle exchange due to an increase in the use of cheap, widely-available drugs.

Of the 2,676 individuals who attended the needle exchange at Merchant's Quay Ireland (MQI) in 2015, 461 of those were first-time users of the service.

Tony Geoghegan, CEO of MQI, said poly-drug use is still common amongst drug users who attend the service.

The increase could also be explained in the availability of Benzodiazepines or "Benzos" which can be picked up for 1 or 2 Mr Geoghegan said.

"They crush the tablets and inject them," he said.

Injecting drugs can lead to a wide variety of health issues and in 2015 there were around 1,600 visits to the GP by people who accessed the needle exchange service for issues such as minor wounds, abscesses or more serious long-term illnesses, the experienced drugs worker said.

"People tend to get lured into injecting and it becomes a ritual in itself ... if you take a tablet it takes a while to come on but with injecting it [the drug] gets straight into the bloodstream," he said.

"Benzos are usually highly indicated in all overdose deaths along with opiates and alcohol," he added.

Mr Geoghegan said that the charity are pushing for more rehabilitation beds and better pathways to care for people who want to come out of drug use.

"If we really want to stop street drug use we need pathways out of it for people and it is also enmeshed with homelessness," he said.

MQI also runs some residential detox and drug-free rehabilitation programmes and in 2015 there were 175 admissions across these services with an 83pc detox completion rate.

MQI also run services for homeless people which all saw a significant increase in 2015.

Homelessness

The increase in people forced into homelessness because of their economic situation has made it even harder for those who are homeless because of mental health or addiction issues to seek the help the need he said.

"How can you tackle your mental health issues or your addiction if you are living on the street," Mr Geoghegan asked.

More than 7,500 people accessed our homeless services and the charity provided 98,865 meals for Ireland's homeless and hungry over the course of the year.

Another service run by the charity which saw a significant uptake was a night cafe which was opened in January 2015 as part of a range of measures introduced following the death of homeless man Jonathan Corrie.

Mr Corrie died in December 2014, just yards from the Dail where he was sleeping rough. During the year 1,972 individuals used the cafe, and the service was forced to increase to accommodate 70 people instead of the original 50 it was planned for.

Mr Geoghegan said the charity originally thought it would be an emergency response but that it is now a key part of the services run by the charity.

MQI's full annual report will be launched this afternoon by Drugs Minister Catherine Byrne. Work is underway in Ms Byrne's department on a new national drugs strategy which will come into effect next year.
A father-of-two became aggressive towards gardai who saw him getting "up into people's faces" during a late-night row, a court heard.

Stephen Duffy (37) had had an argument with his girlfriend and acted "completely out of character" when gardai tried to calm him down.

Judge Bryan Smyth told him he will leave him without a criminal record if he makes a 200 donation to charity.

Duffy, with an address at Whitestown Park, Mulhuddart, pleaded guilty to threatening, abusive and insulting behaviour with intent to cause a breach of the peace. Dublin District Court heard the public order incident happened at Crampton Quay in the city centre on July 29 last year.

A garda sergeant said in evidence that officers were on patrol in the area at 12.50am when they saw Duffy gesturing towards a group of people in an aggressive manner.

He was "getting right up into their faces" and gardai heard him using verbally abusive language toward the group, the sergeant said.

Agitated

When they approached him, Duffy also became agitated and aggressive towards the gardai.

He continued to behave in this manner despite being asked to calm down and was arrested and charged, the sergeant continued.

He had no previous convictions of any kind and had never been in trouble before.

Duffy had two children and was unemployed at the time of the incident, his solicitor Amanda Connolly said.

He was now working on the Poolbeg site as an electrician.

"On the night in question, he was out and had a row with his girlfriend, things got heated and he acted completely out of character," Ms Connolly said.

He apologised and Ms Connolly asked the judge to be as lenient as he could in the circumstances, given the defendant's guilty plea.

Judge Smyth adjourned the case to a date next month and said he would strike the charge out, leaving the defendant without a conviction if he makes a 200 donation to the Garda Benevolent Fund.

The charge against Duffy was under Section 6 of the Public Order Act. He did not address the court and was remanded on continuing bail.
A former boyband member and semi-finalist on The Voice of Ireland who sexually assaulted a colleague on a night out has been told he can avoid a criminal record.

Alan Fitzsimons (40), was a senior product manager at Eir, formerly Eircom, when he groped the man on the dance floor at a company event.

Judge Bryan Smyth told him he will leave him without a conviction if he co-operates with the probation service for the next year.

He must also pay 2,000 to charity.

Judge Smyth gave him six months to pay this after hearing that his past music career "wasn't that successful".

Fitzsimons was a semi- finalist on RTE's The Voice in 2012. He was also a member of chart-topping Irish boyband, OTT, who had three top 10 singles in the 1990s.

Garda Kevin Lawless told Dublin District Court the assault happened in the Royal Hospital Kilmainham on September 16, 2015.

There was a free bar at the event, which was attended by some 200 Eir staff. The defendant took the victim's arm in an invitation to dance.

Gda Lawless said Fitzsimons then groped the victim's genitals and leaned in for a kiss, which the victim avoided.

The defendant and the victim were unknown to each other, but had mutual friends and colleagues.

Fitzsimons, of Holywell Meadows, Feltrim Road, Swords, had lost his job at Eir.

Probation

The case was heard previously and was back before the court for the production of a probation report.

This recommended a 12-month adjournment for continued co-operation with the service.

Defence solicitor Pat McGonagle said Fitzsimons was anxious to continue to engage with the probation service.

"The victim, when he read out his victim impact statement was very clear as to how it affected him in all aspects of his life," the judge said.

He added that the amount Fitzsimons had to drink did not excuse what happened.

He said the accused should also pay 2,000 to charity.

"I know in a previous life he had a successful career, I don't know if he's in receipt of royalties or anything like that," the judge said.

"It wasn't that successful," Mr McGonagle replied.

Judge Smyth gave him six months to pay the money to the Rape Crisis Centre.

He said if everything is in order on the next court date, he would leave the accused without a conviction.

Fitzsimons, wearing a navy blazer, white shirt and blue jeans said: "Thank you, your honour."

At the original hearing, Fitzsimons said he had "no clear memory of the incident due to the alcohol he had taken", so was unable to challenge the victim's version of events.

In a statement, a witness described the sexual assault as occurring "within a split second".

During a victim impact statement the court was told that the injured party "was not on alert" and believed himself "to be in a safe environment" on the night.
A grieving young mum was horrified when she received a call asking to confirm an appointment for her baby daughter - who died three months ago.

The call to Lorraine Nelson came from Dublin's Temple Street Hospital whose doctors, she claims, sent her baby girl home to die, offering no further aid to little Milllie when she was diagnosed with a rare condition.

Lorraine, from Navan, Co Meath, had to fight for medical help for her daughter who battled the most severe form of Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA) Type 1 which causes the wasting of the voluntary muscles and impaired breathing.

Lorraine and her husband Gary refused to give up after doctors at Temple Street advised them to secure palliative care for their precious girl.

With the help of social media and UK parents with SMA Type 1, they were able to contact a respiratory specialist in the UK. Unfortunately, Millie was too weak to travel so he helped to arrange a meeting with his counterpart in Crumlin Hospital.

Millie, who was just three months old, was then able to access a machine to help her breathe.

Infection

The little fighter defied the odds and won battle after battle until, sadly, she died suddenly from a non-SMA Type 1-related infection three months ago, at just 16 months old.

Lorraine was just coming to terms with her baby's death when she received the shock call last Friday while where she was being treated for anaemia.

"I was waiting to see the nurse for my next injection when I got the phone call. I was knocked for six and my legs nearly buckled from under me," she said.

"The call was from the respiratory department of Temple Street - the same department that we fought to get Millie care in, only to be told it was not international practice.

"They diagnosed Millie here and sent us home in a taxi, telling us that Millie was dying.

"Without Professor McNally and the care team in Crumlin, we would not have been able to share Millie's first Christmas or first birthday.

"As far as I'm concerned Temple Street washed their hands of Millie when she was a few weeks old and now 17 months later, they want to see her in their clinic - three months after she gained her angel wings.

"A week after Millie's plight appeared in the media last May, I received a letter from Temple Street advising that Millie had been put on a waiting list for respiratory care when it was imperative that she was seen immediately because of her fatal condition.

Timeline

"I heard nothing else from them in regard to any timeline or appointment for over a year, only to get this phone call out of the blue."

A statement from Temple Street Hospital said they are looking into the "erroneous" phone call.

"In the case of a patient or family making personal information public, this does not relieve the HSE and all HSE-funded hospitals of its due to preserve/uphold patient confidentiality at all times," it added.
The head of Channel 4 has promised fans of The Great British Bake Off that the programme will have a "safe home" on the channel.

Jay Hunt, Channel 4's chief creative officer, sought to allay worries the hit baking competition will founder when it leaves the BBC without its popular presenters, Sue Perkins and Mel Giedroyc, after the current season.

Judges Mary Berry and Paul Hollywood, mainstays of the programme since it began in 2010, have yet to confirm if they will follow.

Ms Hunt said the programme's makers will be the key ingredient in its future success, while the move will keep it on free-to-air television.

"Great British Bake Off will have a safe home," she said.

"The show of soggy bottoms and good crumb will be made by exactly the same team who have always made it. We love it just as it is. And for an amateur baker like me, that's a real cause for celebration."

Ms Hunt used the recent move of Formula One from the BBC to Channel 4 as an example of their "good track record on protecting and growing the shows that viewers love".

The former BBC executive said Channel 4's intervention had prevented it being gobbled up by a pay-to-view television service.

Quaint

"The BBC and Love Productions grew Bake Off from a quaint idea into a global hit. But when they were unable to reach agreement on future series, Bake Off risked coming off free-to-air television altogether.

"By bringing the show to 4, Love Productions have ensured it will be on a terrestrial channel for audiences to enjoy for years to come."

Perkins and Giedroyc said they had "made no secret of our desire for the show to remain where it was" and were not "going with the dough".
COMMUNITY

KING UNIVERSITY ALUMNI: Washington, D.C. 400 New Jersey Avenue, Hyatt Regency Washington in Thornton Room & Lounge. Sept. 23, 7:30 p. m.: Dinner on Capitol Hill invites Kings alumni to gather together. Cost $10 per person, RSVP by Friday, Sept. 16, Dawn McMurray 800-621-5464 or 423-652-6399. WASHINGTON FARMERS CO-OP: Abingdon, Va., 517 West Main Street. Sept. 17, noon  1 p. m.: Rabies Clinic, dogs, cats welcome, fees 1 year Rabies vaccination $10, 3 years Rabies vaccination $20, Dog and Cat Distemper and Parvo vaccination $15, pets under 1 year old can only be vaccinated for 1 year Rabies, 276-628-9135.

TN AUTISM SOCIETY SOCIAL SCENE: Hampton, Tenn., Doe River Gorge. Sept. 29, 5:30 p.m.: Train ride departs at 6 p.m.; returns and parks at 7 p.m. Explore facility from 7-8 p.m. All families affected by autism are welcome. RSVP by Sept. 26 at http://www.meetup.com/East-TN-Autism-Social-Scene/events/234069898/. Cost: $5 per person cash or check preferred. Credit card accepted but takes time to process.

ROCKY TOP GUN PERMIT SCHOOL: Elizabethton, Tenn., 135 Keensburg Road, Sept. 17, 8 a. m.: Hand-gun permit, state certified class, instructor Ken Potter, enroll call 423-341-1709 or 423-543-6048.

BUFFALO RURITAN CLUB: Bluff City, Tenn., 200 Willowbrook Drive, Sept. 17, 8  10 a. m.: 1st Annual Benefit Run, cost $15 per person, 50/50 drawing at end of ride, best hand $100, for info call Ralph Roark 423-276-8848 or Keith Crussell 423-534-0210.

CRISIS CENTER, INC.: Bristol, Va., 300 West Valley Drive, Sept. 20, 10:30 a. m.: Bristol Special Needs Support Group, monthly meeting, speaker Project Lifesaver to speak with special needs families, RSVP James Almaroad 276-466-2218.

ST. ANNE SCHOOL: Bristol, Va., 300 Euclid Avenue in school gym, Sept. 24, 9 a. m.  3 p. m.: Craft Bazaar, vendors from all over the area, 276-669-0048.

SPEEDWELL CEMETERY: Jonesborough, Tenn., 3326 Cherokee Road, Oct. 8, 9 a. m.: Prepare cemetery for the winter months, Speedwell Board of Trustees need volunteers, volunteers must bring on equipment to clean, call Elaine 423-257-2264 or Chad, chadfredb@gmail.com.

COMMUNITY INFANT MEMORIAL SERVICE: Mountain City, Tenn., 999 Honeysuckle St., Sunset Memorial Park, Oct. 15, 6 p. m.: Remember our little ones a service to anyone who lost a child during pregnancy or infancy, for any reason, office@communitymemorialbabies.com

KINGSPORT CAROUSEL: Kingsport, Tenn., Wednesdays  Saturdays, 17 p.m.: $1. 423- 343-9834 or www.EngageKingsport.com

ALZHEIMER/DEMENTIA CAREGIVERS MEETING: Abingdon, Va., View United Methodist Church, 18416 Lee Highway. For more, call Sissy Frye or Brenda Jones at 276-783-8157 or 1-800-541-0933.Brenda Jones at 276-783-8157 or 1-800-541-0933.

PTERODACTYLS BMW MOTORCYCLE CLUB: Johnson City, Tenn., 2801 Boones Creek Road, 3rd Saturday, 9 a.m. Contact David Robertson, 423-323-2046 or drobertson@btes.tv.

BRISTOL BINGO: Bristol, Va., 516 Birthplace of Country Music Way, Bingo Saturdays and Sundays, 6 p.m. early bird and 6:30 p.m. regular, sponsored by VFW Post 6975. 276-669-2446.

WATAUGA VALLEY FIFE & DRUM CORPS: Elizabethton, Tenn., Sycamore Shoals State Historic Area, 1651 West Elk Avenue. Saturdays, 10 a.m. noon. The Fife & Drum Corps open to anyone ages 13 and up. Musical experience is welcome but not necessary. Meet volunteer coordinator John Large at the visitors center. Lessons are free; call and let us know youre coming. 423-543-5808.

SONS OF CONFEDERATE VETERANS: Bristol, Va., 1601 Euclid Ave., Bristol Life Saving Crew, monthly meeting will be the third Monday of each month. New members welcome. renegade24201@yahoo.com, 276-591-6732.

WASHINGTON COUNTY JAM: Abingdon, Va., 25236 Hillman Hwy., Southwest Virginia 4-H Educational Center, after-school program, or youth (4th through 8th grade) in Washington County, who are interested in learning traditional, old-time musical instruments and Southern Appalachian culture. Classes will run through May 2016. 276-6676-6180 or programs@swva4hcenter.org.

CHEER WITH THE NATIONAL CHAMPIONS: Johnson City, Tenn., Oakland Ave., Princeton Arts Center, Learn cheers, jumps, splits, tumbling, dance routines, builds with National Champion Taylor Melons. Beginners cheer, ages 3-6, $25 per month; Competition Cheer, ages 7-12, $60 per month. 423-283-5800 or email tricitiestalent@hotmail.com.

MOUNT ROGERS REGIONAL ADULT EDUCATION PROGRAM: Providing free GED classes at the following locations and times: Marion Baptist Church on Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 1-4 p.m., Marion Senior High Library on Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 4-7 p.m., Northwood High School - Room 105 on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 5- 8 p.m., Old Chilhowie High School on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 12-3 p.m. Classes and materials are free to adults 18 and older. 1-800-322-7748 or www.mrraep.com.

JACKSON THEATRE PHOTOS NEEDED: Jonesborough, Tenn., The Town of Jonesborough and the Heritage Alliance are seeking old photos of the Jackson Theatre in Jonesborough. Photos are needed for the exterior of the building or interior, and they can be of any time period going back to when the building was a furniture store in the very early 1900s. 423-753-1031 or virginiac@jonesboroughtn.org.

SENIOR CENTER MEMORIAL PARK COMMUNITY CENTER: Johnson City, Tenn., 510 Bert Street. Join the Senior Chorale Thursdays 10 a.m. No audition required. (423) 434-5750.

VIRGINIA COOPERATIVE EXTENSION: Abingdon, Va., One Partnership Circle, Southwest Virginia Higher Education Center, Oct. 5, Oct. 13, Oct. 19, and Oct. 27: Offering an opportunity to train as Master Food Volunteer, training includes, lunches, training material, apron, tote bags, and supplies. Application due Sept. 23, contact Sandy Yarber 276-619-4336.

FARMERS MARKETS

ABINGDON: Downtown Abingdon, Virginia, corner of Remsburg Drive and Cummings Street (!-81 Exit 17). Through November: Saturdays, 8 a.m.-1p.m. and Tuesdays, 3-6 p.m. More than 50 full-time vendors, offering local meats, eggs, cheeses, vegetables, fruits, wines, prepared foods, art and , plants and a couple food trucks. Haley Stewart, 276-698-1434; abingdonmarket@gmail.com or www.abingdonfarmersmarket.com.

BRISTOL: Downtown Center, 810 State Street. Saturdays, 8 a.m.-noon, Through Oct.; Wednesdays, 2-6 p.m. Through Sept. Vendor apps at Slater Center, 325 McDowell St., Bristol, Tenn. Accepts SNAP/EBT cards. 423-764-4026. Farmers Market closed Saturday Sept. 17, for Rhythm and Roots reopens Wednesday. September 21.

GLADE SPRING: Downtown Glade Spring, Virginia, 100 Town Square St. (I-81 Exit 29) Through Oct. 31: Saturdays, 9 a.m.-noon. Fruits, vegetables, flowering plants and cut flowers, mushrooms, honey, meats, eggs, herbs, lotions, baked goods and more. Paul Case, info@gladespringfarmersmarket.com.

MARION: Downtown Marion, Town Square Parking Lot, corner of Cherry and Chestnuts streets. Through Oct. 29, Saturdays, 8 a.m.-noon. 276-783-4113.

FOOD PANTRY

THE TABLE: Bristol, Va., 1754 Kingmill Pike, Community Baptist Church, every fourth Friday 1  4 p. m.: Food pantry, donations are welcome, contact Pastor Todd Crusenberry, 423-646-8760.

PARKS

STEELE CREEK PARK: Bristol, Tenn., Wildlife Weekend annual event Oct 7 - 8, featuring variety of children activities, speakers, interpretive walks all relating nature, amateur photographers contest for all ages, entries will be displayed at Wildlife Weekend celebration, deadline for submitting photos Friday, Sept. 23, 4 p. m., application available Nature Center, Steele Creek Park or Tennessee Parks and Recreation Department, Slater Center on McDowell Street, Bristol, Tenn., 423-764-3336.

BREAKS PARK: Breaks, Va., Campground and Rhododendron Restaurant open. Boat dock closed. Front lobby at the lodge will be open daily from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. during the week and 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on week-ends. The administration office will be open Monday-Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Park lodging is open year round. Conference Center is open with regular catering services available. New activities: lodging packages with whitewater rafting excursions and elk tours. 276-865-4413 ext. 3201 or www.BreaksPark.com.

SYCAMORE SHOALS STATE HISTORIC AREA: Elizabethton, Tenn., 1651 W. Elk Ave. The park grounds open daily from dawn to dusk. Visitors Center: 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday; 1-4:30 p.m. Sunday; closed Mondays. Visitor Center open weekends 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. 423-543-5808 or www.sycamoreshoalstn.org, www.tnstateparks.com/SycamoreShoals.
Last week, I discussed the worm-eating warbler, which is one of the more drab warblers in terms of appearance. I think that must have started a trend, because so far this migration season has been dominated by some of the less colorful  but still very interesting  warblers. The opening days of September brought with them the annual fall parade of migrating warblers. As usual, this yearly opportunity to view visiting warblers began as a trickle of species but has picked up in intensity as each day passed.

By Sunday, Sept. 11, I had already observed close to a dozen species of warblers, including hooded warbler, black-throated green warbler, Northern waterthrush, ovenbird, magnolia warbler, chestnut-sided warbler, black-and-white warbler, Tennessee warbler, and American redstart.

One of the first warblers to arrive at my home this spring was the enigmatic ovenbird. With its loud, ringing song  Teacher! Teacher! Teacher!  its impossible not to notice the arrival of this warbler. Why describe this warbler as enigmatic? For starters, ovenbirds do not easily permit even stealthy birders to glimpse them. I have gotten good looks at ovenbirds throughout the years, but they are still difficult to observe. They are one of the warblers more easily heard than seen. When they are observed, its usually no more than a fleeting look before the bird dives back into heavy cover. Thats not always the case, however.

Ive actually seen three different ovenbirds this fall, with increasingly good looks at this warbler each time I have encountered it. The ovenbird is not one of the brightly colored warblers, such as black-throated blue warbler or yellow warbler. The ovenbird is a small brown bird with a white breast with dark streaking  an appearance that bears a superficial resemblance to the larger thrushes that share the same woodland habitat. The only hint of color is an orange crown bordered by dark stripes atop the birds head. Even this orange crown patch is not easily seen. When agitated, an ovenbird may raise its head feathers, which makes this orange mark easier to detect. The ovenbirds Ive observed recently have all shown off that orange crown patch to great effect. The ovenbird also has a distinct white ring around its eyes, as well as pink legs and a pinkish bill.

The ovenbird, unlike many warblers, is not named for its appearance. Instead, the birds name derives from the shape of the nest it builds. The nest is a domed structure placed on the ground, woven from vegetation and containing a side entrance. Early European settlers in North America thought the nest looked like a Dutch oven, hence the name ovenbird for the small warbler with the intricate nest.

Rather than hopping along the length of a branch or limb, an ovenbird walks in a deliberate fashion. This bird feeds on insects, spiders and other small prey items foraged from the woodland floor. On rare occasions, a lingering ovenbird shows up at feeders during the winter months.

Ovenbirds spend the summer nesting season in mature deciduous and mixed forests across Canada and the eastern United States. They do not make as lengthy a migration as that undertaken by some of their relatives. Ovenbirds migrate each fall to the southeastern United States, the West Indies, and from Mexico to northern South America for the winter season.

The two warblers most closely related to the ovenbird are the Louisiana waterthrush and Northern waterthrush. These atypical warblers share a preference for leading lives spent mostly near the ground adjacent to streams. The Louisiana waterthrush seeks out the rushing water of our mountain streams during early spring while the Northern waterthrush prefers quiet pools of water farther north during its nesting season. The ovenbird, however, is not as closely associated with water.

While I have used the adjective drab to describe some of these brown warblers, it is not truly accurate. Although these warblers lack bright colors like orange, yellow and blue, they have an incredible, subtle beauty all their own. In the coming weeks, I will discuss some of the brighter warblers in this fascinating family of migratory songbirds.

Warblers are not the only birds migrating through the region. Other notable migrants Ive observed recently have included common nighthawks, red-eyed vireos and green herons.
Political prisoner, activist, journalist, hymn-writer, emerging think tanker, aspiring novelist, "tribal elder", parliamentary candidate for North West Durham, Shadow Leader of the Opposition, Speedboat, proudly banned from Twitter so officially more dangerous than the Taliban, eagerly awaiting the second (or possibly third) attempt to murder me.
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Marilyn Lustig attended the first of a monthly series "My Jewish Roots" workshop on Sept. 6. By attending the workshops, sponsored by the Jewish Genealogical Society of Greater Orlando (JGSGO), Lustig hopes to learn more of her family's history. More information on the workshop series and the International Conference on Jewish Genealogical to be held next summer, is at the end of the article.

While doing research on my family via Ancestry.com, I found a Family Tree very similar to my own, created by a Paul Auerbach. Ancestry allows you to contact other researchers so I did this and discovered that Paul is the husband of my cousin Nancy, the granddaughter of my Uncle Jacob (Jack) Levine. I had met Nancy as a child but knew very little about her family as an adult. Paul and I both had a variety of information about my uncle that we had found on Ancestry.com, like census information, draft registration cards, wedding announcements for Jacob's children, etc.

From both his Petition for Naturalization and Certificate of Arrival we learned that he had arrived on the SS Ryndam from Rotterdam on March 16, 1909. In addition to "Jacob" and "Jack," relatives had also called him "Meyer" and "Maurice," which were on those and other records, however, we couldn't find him on the actual ship's manifest under any of those names. So, the search was on for anything that would verify his arrival in the U.S.

Paul contacted Barbara Zimmer, a genealogy researcher who has helped many others. She suggested that he check Jacob's gravestone to see if more could be learned. Paul and Nancy then went to Jacob's grave, which was not far from where they live in Massachusetts. The gravestone showed Jacob's name in Hebrew to be Meyer Yitzchak!

Noting that Jacob was shown on the 1920 and 1930 U.S. Census records as immigrating in 1910, Barbara Zimmer then researched March 16, 1910 under Meyer Yitzchak and the diminutive "Itzke." She found that an Itzke Levine had arrived on the SS Ryndam on that date.

Barbara then accessed a copy of the actual ship manifest on Ancestry.com and found that Itzke is shown as about 18 years of age, his occupation was 'salesman,' and his race 'Hebrew.' He was shown as coming from Drab, which was a mistake for Trab (a.k.a. Traby) which was also shown by other relatives as their town of origin in Lithuania. (Traby became Poland between the World Wars and now is in Belarus.) Most important, the name of his closest relative is shown as his mother, my grandmother, Michla Lewin. Mystery solved!

In the process of uncovering some key family history, I also found previously unknown relatives and experienced the intense joy of discovery when all the information matched. It's like solving the best puzzle you have ever worked on and finally getting the right piece in the right place.

One discovery in genealogy frequently leads to other questions. Following the tradition of naming children after a deceased ancestor, I know that my great grandfather's name was Meyer but who was Yitzhak? And yet other questions I'll never get the answers to, like why did Jacob/Meyer choose the name Itzke to put on his manifest? Why did he choose Jacob as his American name?

The next in the series of workshops will be "Connect to the Experts and Key Resources," with Marlis Humphrey, IAJGS president. It will be held Wednesday, Oct. 5, 2016, 7 p.m.-9 p.m. at The Roth Family Jewish Community Center, 851 N. Maitland Ave., Maitland, FL 32751. The workshop is free and open to the public. Please bring your own laptop to participate in the lab portion. It is also possible to attend live via the Internet.

A family get together, on the far left, front row, is 'Jacob,' aka 'Jack,' 'Meyer,' 'Maurice' and 'Itzke.'

Pre-registration is required to participate either in-person or online: http://www.jgsgo.org/MyJewishRoots.

These workshops will help the Orlando Jewish community get the most out of the upcoming 37th Annual International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies (IAJGS) International Conference on Jewish Genealogy. This premiere international conference will be held for the first time in Florida July 23-28, 2017 at the Disney Swan Hotel with local host JGSGO. For more information, visit http://www.iajgs2017.org.

The Jewish Genealogical Society of Greater Orlando (JGSGO) is a non-profit organization dedicated to sharing genealogical information, techniques and research tools with anyone interested in Jewish genealogy and family history. For more information visit http://www.jgsgo.org and "like" us at http://www.facebook.com/jgsgreaterorlando. Questions? Email info@jgsgo.org or call us at 407-347-7727.
Ina Porth, who has a rich 38-year history of commitment to the Greater Orlando Jewish community, is one of the recipients of the 2016 Kipnis-Wilson/Friedland Award from the Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA).

The award was presented during the International Lion of Judah Conference, held Sept. 11-13 in Washington, D.C.

The distinction, named for Lion of Judah founders Norma Kipnis-Wilson and Toby Friedland z"l of the Miami Jewish Federation, honors the most inspiring women in Jewish communities throughout North America.

Porth was nominated for the award by the Jewish Federation of Greater Orlando for exemplifying the values embodied in the notion of a woman of valor. "Ina is a true Eshet Chayil who has set a high standard of caring, philanthropy and volunteerism," JFGO Executive Director Olga Yorish said. "Ina's love for everything Jewish shines through and is truly infectious."

Porth is a past JFGO President, having served from 1990-91. In addition, she has been chair of the Federation's Women's Division twice and chair of the Annual Campaign four times, as well as the chair of several other JFGO committees. She currently serves as a Federation board member and is a chair of the Jewish Community Relations Council.

Porth has previously been recognized by JFGO for her leadership, receiving both the Byron B. Selber Young Leadership Award and the Jerome J. Bornstein Leadership Award. In 2015, she was awarded the Harriet Ginsburg Woman of Choice Award, the highest honor for a Jewish woman in Orlando. A longtime Lion of Judah, Porth has established a Lion of Judah Endowment to perpetuate her philanthropy.

In addition to her work with the Federation, Porth has proudly served on boards of the Roth Family Jewish Community Center of Greater Orlando and Congregation Ohev Shalom, as well as the University of Central Florida Judaic Studies Advisory Board. She is a lifetime member of Hadassah and ORT. She has been a member of the UJA Young Leadership Cabinet and had been extremely active in the Soviet Jewry movement.

Porth said in a 2015 interview that even though her family came from Russia, it was not until she attended her first rally in college that she became fully aware of the plight of Soviet Jews and life in Russia.

She became increasingly active in the Soviet Jewry movement throughout the 1980s, and in 1988 she was one of 70 people from Orlando who participated in a rally for Soviet Jewry in Washington, D.C. As a Congregation Ohev Shalom volunteer, Porth helped settle Soviet Jews who came to Orlando.

"In every single endeavor in which she's been involved, Ina brings passion, creativity and a natural ability to inspire others," Yorish said. "All of us at Federation are deeply honored to call her our friend."
Speaking at UN High Level Forum on Anti-Semitism, at United Nations headquarters in New York, Mark Weitzman, the Simon Wiesenthal Centers Chief Representative to the UN (NY) exhorted the world body to immediately appoint a special representative on anti-Semitism with the authority to investigate and act on appearances of anti-Semitism in all circles of the UN.

Weitzman also urged the United Nations to immediately adopt the Working Definition of Anti-Semitism, which included examples related to attacks on the Jewish state, that was adopted by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance.

This is a necessary first step for the UN to take if it is finally to become part of the solution, instead of a leading contemporary cause of historys oldest hate... The Wiesenthal Center also urges that all funding should be immediately halted for programs validating and promoting anti-Semitism and that officials in such undertakings should be removed.

Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the leading Jewish Human Rights organization which has NGO status at the UN and UNESCO added, to have any lasting impact, todays UN event must be followed up with strong, unequivocal leadership from the top of the UN, starting with the secretary general and the president of the General Assembly. The canards demonizing Israel as barbaric Nazis and an apartheid state are too often heard in the halls of the United Nations, spreading and validating anti-Semitism globally. Without leadership from the top, without real consequences for those who use the UN as a platform of hate and dangerous double standards against the Jewish state, there is little hope that worlds chief body to safeguard human rights will change anytime soon, Rabbi Cooper concluded.
An Israeli legal rights NGO and an attorney, who together won the largest judgment ever against the Palestinian Authority (PA) in America, say a U.S. Appeals Court decision to dismiss the judgment sets a bad precedent for future legal attempts to hold the PA responsible for terrorism against Americans in U.S. courts.

The Shurat HaDinIsrael Law Center had joined forces with attorney Kent Yalowitz, of the law firm Arnold & Porter LLP, to sue the PA on behalf of 10 American families of victims of the Second Intifada. They won a $655.5 million compensation judgment in February 2015 after a Manhattan Federal Court jury found the PA was liable for terrorist attacks in which Americans were hurt. The U.S. Appeals Court then overturned the judgment on Aug. 31, blowing a hole in the legal effort to hold the PA and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) accountable for the deaths of 33 Americans in terror attacks that occurred in Israel between 2001 and 2004.

The case was dismissed on a technicality, Shurat HaDin Director Nitsana Darshan-Leitner told JNS.org.

The appeals courts decision stated that the PA and its parent organization, the PLO, do not have sufficient ties to the U.S. for American courts to have jurisdiction on their prosecution, citing the due process clause of the U.S. Constitution. Nor did the court believe there was any evidence the terror attacks targeted U.S. citizens specifically.

PA lawyer Gassan Baloul, of the firm Squire Patton Boggs LLP, welcomed the new ruling, telling the Jerusalem Post, we are very gratified that the court fully accepted our clients consistent position that the PA and the PLO are not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States courts in these matters.

We obviously dont agree, Darshan-Leitner said, adding that the new ruling flies in the face of the Anti-Terrorism Act, passed in 1990 to protect Americans traveling around the world, and to make it easier for U.S. terror victims and their families to sue terrorists for civil damages. The act followed the 1985 murder of Jewish-American appliance manufacturer Leon Klinghoffer, who was thrown overboard the Achille Lauro by Palestinian hijackers.

Darshan-Leitner said Shurat Hadin would appeal the new decision. It also plans to reach out to Congress to request that it address the loophole in the act.

Jonathan Schanzer, vice president for research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), told JNS.orgthat Congress will likely need to go back and assess how to fill these loopholes. It will be crucial for this to happen, in my view. The PA and PLOs ability to evade responsibility for terrorist attacks sets a very dangerous precedent.

Attorney Kent Yalowitz also told JNS.org that while Congress passed the Anti-Terrorism Act to protect traveling Americans, the same terrorists who prompted the passing of this law are now hiding behind the U.S. Constitution to avoid responsibility for their crimes.

No one denies, as the federal jury has found, that the Palestinians carried out these attacks and killed and injured these American citizens, who will not give up seeking justice from the courts, he said. And he calls on Congress and the U.S. State Department to intervene on the side of American victims of terror to ensure that these families are compensated by the PA and PLO for these crimes.

In the meantime, Darshan-Leitner believes that other litigation the group undertakes against the PA and the PLO could be affected by the ruling. Lawyers for the defendants could raise the decision in those courts, prompting the judges to issue similar rulings.

The families of the American citizens who were murdered by the Palestinian terrorists have waited too many years to see justice done, Rabbi Joel Meyers, chair of the U.S. branch of the World Jewish Congress (WJC), said in a statement. No amount of money can compensate for the pain and loss of loved ones, but those who knowingly planned, financed and carried out vicious terrorist attacks that led to the murder and injuries of American citizens should be held accountable and punished as was decided by the lower court.

He added, We hope this dismissal will be appealed and that terrorist entities and those who support them will be held responsible for their horrific crimes.
The Jewish Federation of Greater Orlando (JFGO) recently awarded $7,800 in Jewish Teen Education Grants for the 2016-17 academic year.

JFGOs Jewish Teen Education Network (JTEN), now in its third year, awards the grants to support ongoing academic Jewish teen educational programming in the Central Florida community. For the 2016-17 academic year, six Central Florida congregations received awards: Temple Shir Shalom/Temple Israel, Congregation of Reform Judaism, Congregation Ohev Shalom, Southwest Orlando Jewish Congregation (SOJC) and Congregation Beth Am.

The topics offered in the JTEN courses are diverse as teens themselves, with classes on faith, social action, self-expression through art, music and technology, community service, leadership and Hebrew language studies. Wrote Rabbi Hillel Skolnik of SOJC, In our years of teaching Hebrew High School here... we found a common thread among all our students, which is that they want to learn how to speak Hebrew... Were applying for a JTEN grant this year focused on teaching our students to speak Hebrew. Without this funding, we would not be able to give our teens this incredible opportunity.

The JTEN grants cover all or a significant portion of the costs of the synagogues educational program. Some of the grant money may be designated for a specific purpose, such as SOJC using a portionof the funds to train an instructor to facilitate the Ulpan-Or Hebrew speaking program.

The JTEN programming is unique in that each class is open to all teens in the community, regardless of synagogue affiliation, and offered at the same cost for members and non-members. All the classes will meet throughout the school year with at least 8 sessions.

JTEN grants were awarded for these 2016-17 classes:

 Temple Shir Shalom/Temple Israel: BYachad: A Collaborative Program of Jewish Arts, Learning and Service. Each month, BYachad participants will explore a Jewish value over two sessions. One session will focus on the arts; the second will take teens out into the community to participate in social action projects. Both sessions will be grounded in Jewish text study.

 Congregation of Reform Judaism: Planting Trees and Drawing Circles: Building a Jewish Future and Changing the World. This project will engage teens in Project Based Learning using text study and student cooperative learning. Teens will work together to design a learning project of their interest, which will benefit the community in a significant way.

 Congregation Ohev Shalom: DDD: Dinner, Daber & Dvar. The program begins with dinner, followed by Hebrew through song, and then discussion of a different Judaic topic each semester. Now in its third year, DDDs overall theme this year is Ahava (Love) Wins, The program provides participants with a foundation grounded in Jewish text and law, why we answer the call to action, and opportunities to act on this knowledge.

 Southwest Orlando Jewish Congregation: Kahn Mdabrim Ivrit. This program will focus on teaching our students to speak Hebrew using a program called Ulpan-OR, which combines in-class and learning at home in a way that allows each student to progress at his/her own pace.

 Congregation Beth Am: Religion, Music, Technology, and YOU! Popular music and media can be a useful educational tool, tapping student enthusiasm while reinforcing Jewish teachings in both a formal and informal manner. This course of study will mix Torah-based interactive programs with music, lyrics, videos, technology, and media as triggers for discussions and activities.

JTEN Educator Partners meet throughout the year to help plan and coordinate JTENs Communitywide Teen Education programs, the next of which is scheduled for Monday, Nov. 7, at Congregation of Reform Judaism.

Your Voice, Your Vote, Making a Difference will be held the evening before Election Day and will educate teens on the importance of getting involved in the political system, whether or not they are old enough to vote. The Nov. 7 program will help teens become civically engaged, learn about issues through a Jewish lens, discover the important roles Jews play in the political system and discuss all sides of issues that are important to teens.

For more information on JTEN programming or Novembers Communitywide Teen Education Day, contact Jennifer Cohen, JFGOs Director of Outreach and Engagement, at 407-621-4039 or jcohen@jfgo.org.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry implied that the world would be better served if the media did not report about terrorism as often.

Perhaps the media would do us all a service if they didnt cover it quite as much. People wouldnt know whats going on, Kerry said to the press during a meeting in Bangladesh.

No country is immune from terrorism. Its easy to terrorize. Government and law enforcement have to be correct 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. But if you decide one day youre going to be a terrorist and youre willing to kill yourself, you can go out and kill some people, said Kerry, who spoke about how the U.S. will help Bangladesh achieve greater prosperity by tackling issues such as establishing security and fighting for worker rights.

Kerry said terror groups such as the Islamic State attack culture and history, and only seek to divide. Fighting them requires a different kind of battle and will take a generation or more to solve.

Its not just the battlefield; its the minds, Kerry said. And if we have too many young people who cant go to school, or too many young people who are frustrated, or they cant find a jobif we leave those minds out there for extremists to recruit, then it will continue and none of us would be doing our jobs if we allowed that to happen.
Dr. Yudit Greenberg, George and Harriet Cornell Endowed Professor of Religion and director of the Jewish Studies Program at Rollins College, is pleased to invite the community to a public lecture on the lost tribes of Israel on Wednesday, Sept. 28 at 7 p.m. in the Galloway Room, Mills Building, at Rollins.

The speaker, Dr. Tudor Parfitt, the world's foremost authority on the mystery and history of the lost tribes, is the Distinguished professor of Sephardi and Mizrahi Studies and the director of the Global Jewish Studies Program at Florida International University.

Dr. Parfitt will share how, with the aid of modern technology and scholarship, we can learn about the quest for the remnants of the tribes, the evolving identity of these communities in remote parts of the world, with a focus on India and Africa.

A light Middle Eastern meal will be provided.

This program is free and open to the public. It is sponsored by the Jewish Studies Program, the Department of Philosophy and Religion, and the Center for India and South Asia.

Parking is available in the SunTrust Plaza Parking Garage on Lyman Avenue. For questions about the event, contact Dawn at 407-646-2139.
On Nov. 20, 2016, three Conservative congregations will hold an event to honor individuals from each of their participating synagogues for outstanding leadership within their synagogue and their community. The event, called Man of the Year/Youth of the Year will be held at Temple Israel in Winter Springs.

The three Conservative temples in Central Florida sponsoring the event are Congregation Beth Am, Longwood; Temple Israel, Winter Springs; and Congregation Ohev Shalom, Maitland.

All of the Mens Clubs belong to the International Federation of Jewish Mens Clubs (FJMC). The honorees are:

 Congregation Beth Am: Dr. Robert Rosenberg (Man of the year) and Lila Gaber (Youth of the year)

 Temple Israel: Dr. Bob Kaplan (Man of the year)

 Congregation Ohev Shalom: Howard Kaplan (Man of the year) and Lily Brenner (Youth of the year)

Cocktails, music, and an awards presentation and dinner will begin at 4:30 p.m. Reservations can be made through any of the participating synagogues.
JERUSALEM (JTA)-Most Israeli Jews would prefer Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump as the next president of the United States, even though more of them think Trump would be better for the "Israeli government's policy."

According to a poll released Sept. 6, 43 percent of Israeli Jews prefer Clinton as president, compared to 34 percent who want Trump. But 38 percent say Trump would be better for Israel, compared to 33 percent who say Clinton would be.

On both questions, a large number of people don't pick a candidate.

The Israel Democracy Institute think tank and Tel Aviv University released its latest Peace Index monthly survey after polling 600 Israelis at the end of August. The margin of error is 4.1 percent.

Some respondents support Clinton, the former first lady and secretary of state, even though they don't think the Democratic candidate "will be better from the standpoint of the Israeli government's policy," as the survey puts it. Thirteen percent of the Jews who say Trump, the Republican nominee, would be better for Israel want Clinton to be president. Only 2 percent of Jews who said Clinton would be better for Israel want Trump to be president.

"There seem to be people who support Clinton even though they think she will put more pressure on Israel or be less easy for Israel to deal with in terms of all the support we need from the United States," Chanan Cohen, a researcher at the Israel Democracy Institute who helped lead the survey, told JTA.

Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson and the Green Party's Jill Stein were not included in the survey.

Since the primary season, when Trump pledged to be a "neutral" broker of Israeli-Palestinian peace, he and the Republican Party have tried to boost their pro-Israel bona fides.

"I expected the right-wing voters to support Trump in bigger numbers, but we can see less than half did," said Cohen. "I know that in the United States, the right has concerns about Trump's personality, and we can see this also on the Israel right."

Among Israeli Arabs, who make up about 20 percent of Israel's population, 58 percent prefer the Democratic nominee and 11 percent the Republican.

In another poll released Sept. 6, a CNN/ORC survey of likely American voters showed Trump with a 45-43 percent advantage over Clinton.
By Ron Kampeas

WASHINGTON (JTA)The Trump and Clinton campaigns issued tough-on-Iran statements in the wake of a report alleging that negotiators allowed Iran secret loopholes in the nuclear agreement.

The Institute for Science and International Affairs, a think tank founded by a former United Nations nuclear weapons inspector, David Albright, said in a report released this week that Iran complied with most of the sanctions relief for the nuclear rollback deal when it was implemented in January.

However, the report also said there were a number of exemptions, citing anonymous sources.

The Obama administration strongly denied the thrust of the report, saying the deal was being implemented according to the letter. Parties to the deal were Iran, the United States, Germany, France, Britain, China and Russia.

The campaign of Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, pounced on Thursday, taking a shot at his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, who as secretary of state in President Barack Obamas first term helped set the stage for the deal.

The deeply flawed nuclear deal Hillary Clinton secretly spearheaded with Iran looks worse and worse by the day, said a statement by the campaign attributed to Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, a former director of the Defense Intelligence Agency who is now advising Trump.

Its now clear President Obama gave away the store to secure a weak agreement that is full of loopholes, never ultimately blocks Iran from nuclear weapons, emboldens our enemies and funds terrorism, he said.

Republicans have strongly opposed the deal. A number of candidates during the GOP presidential primaries pledged to trash it, but Trump, while decrying it as a giveaway, has said he would first consult with his national security advisers should he be elected president.

Clinton, in subtle ways, has sought to differentiate herself from the deals outcome, praising the agreement while suggesting she would be more vigilant in keeping Iran on track.

In a statement sent to JTA, the Clinton campaign did not address the report co-written by Albright directly, but called for reauthorization of sanctions and sounded a tough note about how she would oversee its implementation.

Hillary Clinton supports a clean reauthorization of the Iran Sanctions Act and believes Congress should get this done in short order when they return from recess, said her spokesman, Jesse Lehrich. And as president, she will also continue to enforce, and strengthen as necessary, sanctions on Irans support for terrorism, human rights abuses, and ballistic missile activity.

The Obama administration says it does not need a reauthorization of sanctions first passed in the 1990s and enhanced over the years to force compliance, but would not oppose a reauthorization. Many of the sanctionsbut not allhave been waived as part of the deal.

Democrats in Congress favor a clean reauthorization that they say would allow any future president to quickly snap back sanctions, while Republicans want to add new provisions to address Iranian misbehavior not addressed by the deal, including backing for terrorism and activities in other countries.

Democrats and Clinton oppose the Republican proposals, saying they are stealth maneuvers to undercut the deal.

She has always made clear that while the historic deal passed last year represents a crucial step forward toward preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, we must proceed with a distrust and verify approach, Lehrich said of Clinton. Maintaining the infrastructure to immediately snap back sanctions if Iran violates the terms of the deal is essential. Congress should put partisanship aside and send the president a clean ISA reauthorization bill for his signature.

Citing a single anonymous senior knowledgeable official, the report -- first covered in the general media by Reuterssaid the joint commission administering the deal allowed Iran to keep more than the prescribed amount of low enriched uranium. The joint commission comprises representatives of Iran, the six major powers and the European Union.

Under the deal, Iran is allowed to keep up to 300 kilograms of low enriched uranium, an amount too small to be turned into material sufficient to make a bomb. The report did not say how much uranium above the maximum that Iran was allegedly allowed to keep.

The report also said the joint commission allowed Iran to continue to operate 19 hot cells, protected enrichment devices, that were larger than the 6 cubic meters prescribed by the deal, which permits Iran to keep the smaller hot cells to continue plutonium enrichment for medical purposes. The larger hot cells can be misused for secret, mostly small-scale plutonium separation, according to the report, which also noted that Iran was permitted to maintain the larger hot cells with the approval of the joint commission.

According to the report, the joint commission also allowed Iran to export a larger amount of heavy water than agreed upon, although this was previously reported. The knowledgeable official source said the exemptions were granted because Iran was not yet in full compliance by implementation day, Jan. 16.

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee said it was troubled by Albrights report.

If the report is accurate, this unwarranted leniency sets a dangerous precedent concerning adherence to the agreement, the pro-Israel lobby said in a statement. No further concessions should be granted to Iran, and complete transparency related to the deals implementation must be provided.

The Obama administration, in its responses, said there were no shortcuts.

The major powers didnt allow Iran any shortcuts implementing @TheIranDeal, and Irans commitments have not changed, Ben Rhodes, the deputy national security adviser, said in a tweet.

John Kirby, the State Department spokesman, speaking Thursday to reporters, said the parameters of the deal had not changed, but that the joint commission was empowered to address implementation issues when they arise. He said the workings of the joint commission were confidential.
The Holocaust Memorial Resource and Education Center is kicking off its fall cultural season with a new exhibit titled Two Regimes. The exhibit features the work of two women: Teodora Verbitskya, who chronicled her experiences in Russia in the first half of the 20th Century, and her daughter Nadia Werbitzky, a professional artist who translated her mother's writings into striking pieces of art. The exhibit will be on display at the Holocaust Center through Jan. 6, 2017.

Upcoming events:

I Remember: Eyewitnesses to the Holocaust

A Conversation with Eva London Ritt

Sunday, Sept. 18 at 2 p.m.

The Center's Survivor series continues with Eva London Ritt who fled with her family from Germany to the United States. Eva was born in Hamburg in 1933, the same year Hitler came to power. Her experiences during the Holocaust influenced her to be a lifelong advocate for the oppressed. Join us as Eva tells her personal story of survival.

Education Forum

Operation Barbarossa and the Beginnings of the Final Solution

Thursday, Sept. 22, at 6 p.m.

Resource teacher, Mitch Bloomer will address Nazi Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union and the resulting onset of the "Final Solution." Participants will explore the reasoning behind this fateful transition and will learn that it was driven as much by initiatives of local occupation officials as it was from Berlin.

The World Premiere of "Bearing Witness"

Wednesday, Sept. 21 at 5:30 p.m. & 8:30 p.m.

Mad Cow Theatre

The Holocaust Center is excited to partner with the Global Peace Film Festival to bring this performance to our community. Thomas Bird, a Vietnam War veteran and creator of VETCO (Vietnam Veteran's Ensemble Theatre Company), brings a very personal story to the stage in this one-man performance. The pain of war and the horror of the Holocaust are explored in this theatrical experience, culminating in the ultimate recognition and acknowledgement of healing through love and understanding between father and son.

Tickets available at madcowtheatre.secure.force.com/ticket

These programs are open to the entire community. For more information, call Terrance at 407-628-0555.
Jewish Pavilion staff and volunteers will be welcoming Shabbat with new friends at Brookdale Lake Mary the first Friday of each month.

A lovely Kabbalat Shabbat, with a room filled with interested and seasoned residents, was held with many thanks to the staff for coordinating this program, Joanne Berman for providing the beautiful Judaica items for Brookdale, and Jewish Pavilion volunteer Barbara Abramson (on left with residents) for leading the blessings and readings.

With the support and help of volunteers, Jewish Pavilion is privileged to serve hundreds of seniors in area senior-living communities. The warmth and sincere appreciation is felt from every resident.

Call the Jewish Pavilion office at 407-678-9363 for more information on Brookdale Senior Living communities and how to become a JP volunteer.
NEW YORK (JTA)We are committed to helping ensure that the State of Israel welcomes Jews of all colors.

We say we have black lives that matter in Africa.

In America, race has been a central area of Jewish concern historically.

These are all statements that have been made in the course of a well-orchestrated public relations campaign to hasten the implementation of an Israeli government decision, reached in 2015, allowing the immigration of a number of Ethiopian citizens. These Ethiopians claim Jewish lineage as Falash Mura, descendants of converts to Christianity, and family ties to Ethiopian Jews.

While the Israeli Cabinet decided that members of the community be brought to Israel, and sent a senior official to Ethiopia to begin implementing that decision, advocates for the community protest that the process has been delayed.

As the statements cited above clearly show, the campaign has become steeped in the language of the struggle against racism. The dog-whistle message of this language is unmistakable: Israel is delaying the implementation of this decision because the people in question are black. Had they been white, they would have long been living in Israel.

One of the leaders of the campaign, Dr. David Elcott, left the unequivocal impression that the question is one of racial discrimination.

I met with Dr. Elcott, who presented his initiative as an heir to the civil rights movement. I was consumed with anger, literally unable to sleep for several days. I was surprised by the intensity of my emotional reaction. After all, having represented Israel in diplomatic missions across the world for over 10 years, I had already become accustomed to hearing many such calumnies against the Jewish state.

So why was I so enraged by this one?

It eventually dawned on me that I was outraged not as an Israeli but as an African. My own father came to Israel from Africa with the Ghana Embassy in 1965, at the height of the love affair being rekindled today between the Jewish state and the African continent. On the eve of the Six-Day War of 1967, my father threw in his lot with the embattled Jewish nation and was subsequently witness to its miraculous salvation. He went on to convert to Judaism, join the Israeli army and make Israel his one and only home.

Proud of my African heritage and lineage, I was incensed by the assumption implicit in the racial tenor of this campaign: If it involves Africans, its probably about race. Race is, after all, the essential, defining property of Africans, isnt it?

The racial framing of their supporters campaign is not only in language but in argument. Advocates have claimed that Israel is applying a standard to black Africans that it did not apply to Europeans who were welcomed as olim even when questions arose about their Jewish lineage. This is simply and factually false. The one and only criterion for making aliyah, which in Israel is a legally binding term, is the Law of Return. It speaks not of being a Jew according to halachah, or rabbinic law, but of having been born to a Jewish grandparent. The law has always applied and will always apply equally and unwaveringly to any human beingof any race and of any persuasion.

The fact that the government of Israel has had to make, and is in the process of implementing, a special ad hoc humanitarian decision to facilitate the immigration of these communities in the first place is precisely because the Africans were found not to meet the criteria for aliyah set out in the Law of Return. Nonetheless, in view of the hardships they face and on account of family ties to Jews in Israel, the Israeli government unanimously decided to facilitate the naturalization of people from these communities and even grant them full benefits as olim.

This demonstrates that Israel is not less sensitive to the community in Ethiopia, but in fact more sensitive to their plight than to that of any other such group in the world. Once this fact is obfuscated, the spotlight turns naturally and unjustly to the question of race.

Moreover, in the public debate in Israel over the Falash Mura and their relations, the staunchest voices against their immigration were often those of Ethiopian Jews. They complained that Ethiopian Christians, who had come to Israel by claiming Jewish lineage, had no intention of identifying as Jews and were even continuing to use the same anti-Semitic slurs against the Ethiopian JewsFalasha and Budaas they had done in Ethiopia. Some even reported attempts by such groups to convert Ethiopian Jews to Christianity.

One can criticize these voices for holding the many responsible for actions of the few and for bearing longstanding grudges. Indeed, it is to the great credit of the Israeli government that it decided to allow immigration from Gondar and Addis despite the accusations. But the objections of Ethiopian Israelis belie the notion that the question at hand is one of white versus black.

To continue portraying the issue as one of race is symptomatic of a difficulty to see Africans outside the prism of skin color. In the year-and-a-half since I came to the United States, for every day of which I am truly grateful, I have encountered this attitude on numerous occasions, an experience not always pleasant. At so many dinner tables, speaking engagements and social gatherings, I have been met with stares.

Arent you going to talk about your background? the question rings time and again.

For some in the U.S., there is something inherently puzzling about an African Jew discussing Middle Eastern geopolitics and not making any reference to race relations. Again, it is assumed, if there is an African involved, it must somehow relate to race.

To be clear, I am not ascribing this attitude to straightforward racism. More often than not, the positions articulated toward me qua racial issues are supportive and sympathetic. But that does not make any less alienating the perception that everything I do, everything I am involved in and everything that concerns me must somehow be in the context of race. Even in the case of the current campaign for those claiming to be Falash Mura, one of its advocates, while trying to exhort me to come on board, quoted from the Book of Esther, saying maybe this is the moment for which you got to where you are.

Really? I thought to myself. The culmination of my diplomatic career necessarily predicated on the color of my skin?

The desire of American Jews to see the implementation of a humane and compassionate decision by the government of Israel is a noble one. Their campaign is welcome and praiseworthy. Jews in America are and must always see themselves as stakeholders in the Jewish state and as rightful partners in its decision-making process. This government decision, as well as others, must certainly be followed through with effective and determined action. The 50 rabbis and community leaders who initially attached their names to a petition on the Ethiopians behalf were expressing the best of the ethical legacy of Judaism. This campaign could be a true blessing to the community and to the State of Israel.

But wrongly invoking racial conflict, misappropriating the language of the struggle for racial justice in America and insinuating that the decisions of the Israeli government are informed by racism are harmful, hurtful and unjust. Propagating the perception that Israel is on the wrong side of the fight against racism introduces a toxin into the relations between American and Israeli Jewsa toxin that will take many years to expunge. Who can expect young American Jews to want anything to do with Israel if they are systematically led to believe it is racist?

Moreover, such language threatens to taint and discredit a cause that could otherwise be a beautiful example of the sincere and caring conversation within the Jewish people.

The implementation of the Israeli governments concerning remnants of the Falash Mura community with family ties to Israel will continue, and so must the campaign supporting it. But for the sake of all of us, let us not make this one a question of race.

Shimon Mercer-Wood is spokesman and consul for media affairs at the Consulate General of Israel in New York.
NEW YORK (JTA)Over 300,000 Jewish college students have arrived or will arrive shortly on American campusesand what they experience there is likely not only to broaden their minds and uproot long-held assumptions, but shake their Jewish selves to the core.

They will contend with powerful faculty and student voices accusing them of complicity in a regime of privilege and oppression here in America and of colonialism, genocide and apartheid in Israel.

The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement and its campus allies have far had little impact thus far either on the investments made by universities or the policies of the governments of Israel or the United States. They are, however, diverting enormous time and resources from important work of Jewish education and community building. No less important, they are causing untold numbers of students to keep their heads down where Israeland Judaismare concerned, and to feel ashamed when they have every reason to be proud.

I am not afraid that Jews or other college students will fall for the Big Lie about Israel. The world is a dangerous mess right now, nowhere more than in the Middle East. Simplistic narratives of good and evil like those propounded by the BDS movement are unlikely to prove persuasive to anyone who reads up on the matter or exercises their minds.

But I do fear growing doubt among some Jewish undergraduates that the Jewish community and tradition are worthy of their involvement and commitment. I worry about increased suspicionthanks in part to language endorsing BDS positions in the platform released by a coalition affiliated with the Black Lives Matter movementthat students can stand up for justice as Jews, and can fight mass incarceration and racism as supporters of Israel. I want all to know that they can and should maintain deep ties to the Jewish community and tradition at the same time as they claim membership in larger communities and work alongside others for universal causes of justice and peace.

My message to students, this fall in particular, is this: Have pride in your Judaism. Learn about its history and Israels. Keep your minds and hearts open. Maintain the moral courage to reject claims that Israel practices apartheid and genocidebecause they are unequivocally false. Work to create spaces on campus where one can openly, and lovingly, question choices and actions made by Israels leadership, and Americas, without giving up attachment to either. As Jews, we must stand beside those fighting against inequality and injustice, and should do so regardless of the incorrect views that others hold of Judaism and Israel.

As a committed Jew, I am commanded to have unceasing concern for both Jewish learning and the struggle for justice. That same passion attracts me to the State of Israel, which I view as an attempt to translate age-old Jewish values into policy. This attempt, which will always fall far short of perfection, deserves our enduring supportand, when necessary, our critique. Like any nation, Israel requires such challenge and correction if it is to remain true to its founding ideals. Israel has a lot to figure out, many wrongs to make right, incredible achievements on which to build, deep-seated currents of bigotry to overcome, a proud tradition of democracy (the only one in the Middle East) to develop, and the hopes of many millions and many centuries that it dare not betray.

But history shows that whenever people say that Jews (or any other group) are largely to blame for significant portions of the worlds ills, or that things would be perfect if only Jews stopped insisting that we, too, have a right to live in the world, or that the Jewish state, or the Jewish community, has no right to exist unless it conforms to allegedly universal ideals demanded of no other people as a condition of legitimate survivalsomething is dangerously wrong. That point of view, which sadly has a long history behind it, must be resisted.

Though they will hear its rhetoric and see its demonstrations, few students will ever visit the BDS website, where one learns that the movement is avowedly part of the Palestinian national struggle against the very existence of the State of Israel. BDS materials say nary a word about the partial responsibility of the corrupt Palestinian government in the West Bank or the murderous Hamas regime in Gaza for the failure of the peace process thus far. One hears a great deal from BDS and affiliated groups like Jewish Voice for Peace about Jewish and Israeli culpabilitybut nothing about mistakes made on the Palestinian side, oppression committed by it, the blatant anti-Semitism built into its policies and publications. BDS is silent about the many countries that are guilty of abuses far worse than those charged to Israel.

Much of the Middle East is in flames. The Syrian death toll has passed 400,000. And not a single Middle Eastern society guarantees equality and justice for all its citizenswomen and men, Christian and Muslimto anything like the degree that Israel does, however imperfectly.

As we approach Rosh Hashanah, my hope for the new year is that no Jewish students leave Judaism behind in the name of universal idealsor leave Israel behind in the name of Judaism. The world desperately needs the skills and knowledge they will acquire on campus. Judaism needs their passion, perspectives and engagement. Israel needs their voices, proud and strong.

Arnold M. Eisen is the chancellor of The Jewish Theological Seminary.
While walking through my Jerusalem hotel dining room thinking about the news from the states that a U.S. court has tossed out a $655 million terrorism judgment, a young woman came up and gave me a big Hi!

Seeing that I was not connecting her face and name, she spared me that now all too frequent embarrassment and quickly said, Sarah. She was one of the first girls that my late daughter Alisa met when we moved to West Orange, New Jersey in 1978. She and Alisa attended nursery school and then started yeshiva together, and it was this now 41-year-old woman who, as a 5-year-old, became our first Shabbat afternoon guest.

She was in Jerusalem with her family attending several family celebrations. And there she sat with two of her own daughters. We caught up on things in a couple of minutes and then she had to run as she needed to get the day started.

Finishing breakfast, I picked up my iPhone and started to type. Always saying I pay more attention to this mini-computer than her, my wife, Rosalyn, turned to me with more than her normal annoyance and said, Who are you texting now?

I had a hard time getting the words out. The thought that crossed my mind a minute earlier that caused me to pick up the phone and write was, that could have been Alisa sitting there, 41 years old, attending family celebrations in Jerusalem.

As her eyes filled with tears, Roz put down her coffee cup and looked out the window into the distance as parents of murdered children often do.

I know Im not the first parent of a terror victim to have thoughts of what their children would be doing today. Its that it just doesnt happen very often to me.

Instead, every day I face the reality that Alisa was taken from us 21 years ago, that I will never again have a new photo of her, that my four granddaughters named after her will eventually be older than she was allowed to become, and that she will never be sitting in a Jerusalem hotel dining room getting ready to celebrate a family event. I accept all of that.

Understand that none of the things that our family has done since her murder was undertaken in the belief that wed somehow get Alisa back. Instead, what weve attempted to do over these past 21 years is to try to wrest some sense out of the insensible and to control a small part of what happens to us going forward.

We struck back at the Iranian government for its role in the bombing that took the lives of Alisa and seven others and injured more than 40. We did so using the power of a U.S. law that gives terror victims the right to haul murderers into U.S. courts. And we got a verdict in our favor.

But efforts to enforce our judgment were stymied by the same federal government under former President Bill Clinton that put this law on the books.

Thus, it was no surprise to me that a federal court overturned a judgment similar to ours in the case of American citizens, mostly young men and women who, like Alisa, were murdered in cold blood while studying or just enjoying being in Israel at the time of their death.

The appeals court, that threw the latest victims out of court, states that the trial court which found in favor of the plaintiffs had no jurisdiction to hear the case. How could the lower court have gotten it so wrong? The judge was not ignorant, he read the law and he determined there was jurisdiction, and the defendants were responsible for the deaths and injuries to the plaintiffs. But the appeals court disagrees and a dozen families, who smelled victory in the air a year ago, are now left to ponder their next moves as the wounds of lives lost are ripped open.

As the father of terror victims rights cases, our lawsuit was the first, I can only shake my head in frustration at this latest turn in events.

Would the result have been different if, rather than urging the court to go easy on the defendants and not require a stiff money bond on appeal, the government had stayed out of the case? I dont know. But if the U.S. government wont weigh in on the side of terror victims and stand united with them, who will. And, if not now, when?

Stephen M. Flatow is a frequent contributor to JNS.org. His daughter Alisa was murdered in a 1995 terror attack while she was a student in Israel.
Political theorist Mark Lilla has noted the irony that Once upon a time, the Jews were mocked for not having a nation-state. Now they are criticized for having one, and their stubborn determination to defend it.

That is why the dramatic reassertion of national sovereignty in the Brexit vote is important for Israel. Nor was the British public alone. Laurent Wauquiez, former French minister for European affairs, said in the wake of the Brexit vote, [T]he result would have been the same in any other country in the EU. Perhaps an even greater rejection in France.

At the core of the concept of national sovereignty, writes Lilla, is the notion of autonomy, which in political terms means the capacity to defend oneself, and when necessary, wage war. A corollary is that nations have a duty to value the lives of their citizens above those of citizens of other countries. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were fully justified by the projected loss of a million American servicemen in an invasion of the Japanese mainland. (More Japanese civilians would also have died in that invasion than perished at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.)

And if Hamas or Hezbollah fire missiles at Israeli civilians from amidst their own civilian populations, Israel has the duty to do everything necessary to stop that fire, while trying to minimize civilian casualties.

European nations have lost the ability to advance the interests of their citizens or to defend themselves. One thousand young English girls were impressed into sex slavery by Pakistani immigrants in Rotherham, over a period of 20 years. The authorities did not intervene lest they be accused of Islamaphobia. When rapes of Swedish women in Stockholm increase 15 fold as 1.5 million Muslims enter the country, opposition to unfettered immigration is neither racism nor xenophobia but simple self-preservation.

Another aspect of national sovereignty is the ability of each nation to control its borders and determine who will become citizens. Thus the central place of immigration debates in America and Europe today.

Current EU rules require Britain to admit any immigrant from another EU country. As a consequence, job seekers from eastern bloc countries in the EU have flooded England. Drawn by Britains comparatively free labor markets, resulting in more unskilled jobs, they have claimed 70 percent of all new unskilled jobs. And if they fail to obtain jobs, they are immediately entitled to all the benefits of Britains welfare system.

Underlying the sovereignty debates is a deeper philosophical one: Are all men essentially alikehomo economicus, each rationally pursuing a slightly larger slice of the economic pie? And can they be organized, economically and politically, according to rational principles best administrated by an elite of trained bureaucrats?

Never mind the abject failure of every centrally-planned economy or of the EU itself. Today Europe is the only continent with a declining percentage of world economic activity. Its common currency, the euro, almost brought down the entire banking system when Greece went bankrupt, and remains vulnerable to worse disaster if Spain or Italy follow suit.

The opposing, Burkean view that human beings are products of particular cultures, bound to one another by ties of history, kinship, and language, underpins the case for national sovereignty.

For Burke human beings are not abstractionsrandom sets of individuals born to another random set of individuals. Rather they are products of an organic historical development, the nether reaches of which cannot be determined by abstract thought experiments ala John Locke. Those living today are part of a pact with previous generations and those yet unborn.

Appalled by the devastation of two world wars, European elites sought to jettison nationalism and the nation-states that were thought to have caused that destruction. The vision of a European political union resulted. But to say that modern Europe was born in the ashes of Auschwitz, notes Alain Finkielkraut, is also to forget that Europe is heir to a great civilization and results in a passion for sameness.

For those who reject all pride in ones country or culture, there is nothing worth defending past ones time on this mortal coil or worth transmitting to future generations. The yet unborn remain unborn. Witness Europes demographic suicide.

The stubborn refusal to acknowledge the depth of culture differences led Angela Merkel to throw open the gates of Europe to millions of refugees from an alien culture, who have proven unassimilable even in much smaller numbers.

No people ever insisted on its own uniquenessindeed chosen statusto the same degree as the Jewish people. Without a sense of special mission, we could not have survived for millennia apart from our Land.

Not by accident did the first great theorist of national sovereignty, Jean Bodin, draw heavily on Jewish sources. Jews have been the fiercest opponents of those spreading one universal culture from the Seleucid Greeks to Napoleans armies. The Jews rejected paganisms easy acceptance of a pantheon of gods. And we stood against the monotheistic faithsChristianity and Islamthat sought to unite all mankind under one banner.

When Napoleans liberating armies approached Russian, Rabbi Shneur Zalman MLiadi, the founder of Chabad, prayed for his defeat. He realized that the slogan of the French RevolutionTo the Jews as individualseverything; as a nationnothingmight be good for individual Jews but would spell the end of Jewish history.

Resurgent pride in place and people may well unleash old genies in Europe. But Europes rationalist bureaucrats have not exactly done a bang-up job of defending Jews or Israel. The Jewish people will never be well served by those for whom religion and national identity are atavistic holdovers from a less enlightened past.

Jonathan Rosenblum is a columnist for the Jerusalem Post and Israeli director of Am Echad.
When individuals move to Israel, most are transformed by the new experience in obvious ways. Some become more religious, others become more right wing, and many become more, well, Israeli. Over the last 13 months, Ive witnessed my own transformation as the aliyah experience has challenged me, encouraging growth and risk taking. I didnt realize the extent to which my mentality had changed until a recent phone conversation with my mom. I spoke with her about my plans for that evening, only to realize how much the plans entailed completely stepping out of the proverbial box.

That evening, from 5 11 p.m., I would lead two 40-person groups as part of separate programs. The first, a new program called Meet the Israelis, was organized by a good friend of mine. Its a simple yet powerful idea: get a group of college-age Jewish students to meet a diverse group of young Israelis who represent different sectors of Jewish life in Jerusalem. The group takes turns talking to each Israeli individual: a soldier, a convert, an Ethiopian, a left-winger, a completely secular individual, and an oleh chadash. Guess which one I represented? Obviously, not the Ethiopian. So, yes, I represented the oleh chadash, the Israeli immigrant, and the group took turns grilling me with extremely personal questions. They asked about my previous work as a pro-Israel activist on my college campus, my life in Israel, the triumphs and challenges that I face, the reasons why I made aliyah, and about my Jewish identity. After speaking to the students on two separate occasions, I can say that Ive successfully stepped out of my comfort zone without feeling uncomfortable about it. During the program, I often get very private questions about my politics, ideology, and relationship to God. These are topics that I often think about when Im alone, but never have been asked to recite my beliefs concretely and concisely to people I just met, until now. I truly surprised myself at the ease with which I was able to become vulnerable and open up to strangers whose opinions and backgrounds Id most likely never know.

The second group I led that evening was completely different, but I had to step out of my comfort zone even more so. I was asked to lead an Indian cooking workshop for a group of Israelis. Of course, I had cooked Indian food before, but never instructed any type of cooking, for that matter. I took on the challenge, knowing it would be a learning experience at the worst. So I planned the recipes: lentil dal and mango lassi. I perfected the recipes the evening before, and they were perfect. But the day of, the head chef switched around the recipes. Now, Id make chutney instead of a dal, a welcomed change, as I also love to make mango chutney, but still a change that frightened my Type-A personality. When the workshop began, it only got scarier. I didnt get all of the ingredients I asked for nor the utensils I needed. But I took a deep breath and told myself the famous Israeli mantra: yihyeh beseder, it will be okay. The set up was not great, to say the least; but somehow, I got through it with a smile. And after all that was said and done, Id even call it a success! Everyone said the food turned out great! One girl even made one of the recipes at her home the day after and said it turned out just as she had hoped. All in all, my teaching skills were A-Okay and I realized that I am always harder on myself than anyone else.

As I reflect on the phone conversation with my mom, as I explained to her what Id be doing, her surprise surprised me. I guess I hadnt realized the extent to which I was naturally stepping out of the box in my new life. Months ago, when someone would ask me about my relationship with God, I would likely brush off the question and change the subject to something less private. Who was I - a secular girl raised by Conservative parents - to share my opinion about my views on God? And months ago, I would never have volunteered myself to lead a cooking class. My mom likes to joke that I didnt know where our oven was back in Seattle. After all, I was always considered the runt of the family when it came to cooking. (My brother was already featured in the newspaper for his cooking prowess at age 13, and my dad is a decorated chili chef who smokes his own mouth-watering meats and cooks authentic ethnic dishes.) What I learned in all of this, other than I can make a mean mango chutney, is that Ive become more comfortable taking risks and stepping out of the box since making aliyah.

Of course, making aliyah was a pretty strong precedent in taking a risk. And stepping out of the box in Israel, specifically, intensifies this truth of risk leading to growth. Israel is a nation made to take risks. Israels entire existence was, and is, somewhat of a risk. On the first day of its establishment, Israel was attacked! Of course, Israels founders knew of this risk but chose to take it anyway. That tendency towards risk still exists today in Israeli businesses, technology, politics, the army, and even socially. Israelis feel that this time on Earth is a blessing, but not a given. In other words, they never take life for granted and are therefore more open to taking risks, a true YOLO mentality. Buy the expensive wine, take the international trip, and put yourself at risk of failing, because nobody knows if tomorrow we will have the same opportunity. There is a definite freedom in moving to a new place and absorbing its culture; a freedom to reinvent oneself, try new things, step out of the box, fail once in a while, but most of all, learn and grow from those experiences.

Eliana Rudee is a fellow with the Haym Salomon Center and the author of the Israel Girl column for JNS.org. She is a graduate of Scripps College, where she studied international relations and Jewish studies. Her bylines have been featured in USA Today, Forbes, and The Hill. Follow her column on JNS.org.
What one 'Our 2 Moms' star from Statesville has to say about the show's theme: ... It's really hard to love who you love and be in a very conservative town."
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Maharashtras social fabric is coming under increasing strain with Dalits planning to launch their own agitation to counter an ongoing one by Marathas for puportedly amending the Scheduled Caste Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 to prevent its misuse. The Maratha agitation is gathering momentum as it moves closer to the state capital where it is expected to culminate with a massive procession in the last week of October.

The protest marches by Marathas in Aurangabad, Beed, Solapur and Jalgaon among other places have forced the Maharashtra government to finally take cognisance and attempt to address their grievances. On Tuesday Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis held meetings with BJP functionaries, including MPs and MLAs to discuss the issue and evolve a way out of a possible crisis.

While the chief ministers exercise was inconclusive, the government could run into another problem. There are now rumblings about Dalits in Maharashtra taking out counter morchas to challenge the Marathas. This pits not only Marathas against Dalits but also Hindu Dalits against Buddhists as various leaders of the communities take positions against each other on the issue.

Marathas feel the cases registered against them under the Scheduled Caste Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 are unjustified and used to score political brownie points or settle personal scores. But now, after NCP chief Sharad Pawar also made out a case for modification of the law to include safeguards against its misuse, Dalits are alarmed.

But the planned counter morchas has brought Dalit leaders and those from the RSS and BJP into direct confrontation with each other.

Speaking to Hindustan Times, president of the Bharip-Bahujan Mahasangh, Prakash Ambedkar has openly accused the RSS of attempting to pit Dalits against Marathas, The RSS and the BJP are in power in both the Centre and Maharashtra. It is their job to find a solution within the ambit of the government for the grievances of all communities. But this is a deliberate attempt to create chaos between various communities, he said.

Ambedkar is attempting to unite OBCs and Dalits under one banner and will kick off with a demonstration for Dalit unity along with Left parties in New Delhi.

Ambedkars statement comes after BJP MP from the Rajya Sabha, the head of its scheduled caste wing, Amar Sable, gave a public call for a counter morcha by Dalits to challenge the Marathas.

If the Marathas are holding morchas for reservations there are no issues. But if they want the repeal of the Atrocities Act, that is unacceptable, Sable says while accusing Ambedkar of systematically targeting the BJP and the RSS in recent months.

Ambedkar, however, is curt about not wanting to react to Sables allegations. But he goes on to ask, Who are these Dalits who will be holding the counter morchas? He has appealed to Ambedkarite Dalits (read Buddhists) not to participate in the demonstrations and says, The Matang Samaj is not part of it, nor is the Charmakar Sangh. Even the Kakkaya Mahasangh is not participating in these demonstrations.

While Ambedkar will not say it in as many words, there is enough indication that it is not just Buddhist Dalits who are wary of becoming part of this counter morcha against Marathas. The other communities all belong to the Hindu fold and that he says is a clear indication that the retaliation does not have popular support and many Dalits do not want to be part of the RSS game plan to pit communities against each other.

However, there is a confluence of views between Ambedkar and Sable in one aspect. The latter points out that the atrocities law is a central Act and there is no way the state governments can interfere with it or even amend its provisions. Ambedkar criticizes Pawar saying, If he really wanted amendments to the Act, he is such a veteran politician and parliamentarian, he should have brought it up in the Lok Sabha. In the last parliament session there was a major discussion on this act. If its provisions were really unjust, why did not various political parties move for amendments in the Lok Sabha? Calling the Act unjust is just political posturing to mislead the people.

Ambedkar says he is very clear. Any Dalits joining this counter morcha are not Ambedkarite in spirit and ethos. They are just stooges in the hands of the ruling dispensation.

But Dalit activist Tushar Jagtap has a different view. Even if a morcha is retaliatory, every community and citizen has the right to demonstrate within the ambit of the law and the Constitution. So long as there is no violence, why should anyone be stopped from demonstrating for or against any issue? But it is the responsibility of the government to make sure that that violence does not happen during these demonstrations. However, over the past months, one notices, that neither the Centre nor the state governments in Haryana, Rajasthan, Gujarat or even Maharashtra have been able to control these agitations. It is either their administrative failure or they are mere passive observers not realising the consequences of their inaction.

Jagtap does not name anybody but it is clear who he means when he says, Politicians and leaders who have lost elections and grassroots support should not be allowed to create unrest between various communities (read Pawar and NCP). We must guard against them at all costs.

Jagtap has a startling observation about the course these demonstrations are taking. Traditionally in Maharashtra, Marathas and Brahmins have benefitted by association with each other. But, of late many Maratha organisations had been raging , sometimes violently, against Brahminism (though not against individual Brahmins). There is some unseen hand that has shifted the focus of Maratha ire towards Dalits and away from Brahminism. All communities must guard against those mischief makers who are pitting them against each other.

Meanwhile the distrust between Marathas and Dalits looks inevitable.

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For all of you who think K Asifs Mughal-E-Azam was the biggest film Bollywood ever made, heres some good news: Acclaimed director Feroz Abbas Khan is all set to direct the cult classic, which featured Prithviraj Kapoor, Dilip Kumar and Madhubala in lead roles, into a Broadway-style musical playsome good news for fans of K. Asifs Mughal-E-Azam, that featured Prithviraj Kapoor, Dilip Kumar and Madhubala in lead roles. Khan says the adaptation is his tribute to the original film.

Watch all the songs of Mughal E Azam

Khan, best known for his award-winning film Gandhi, My Father and successful plays like Tumhari Amrita, Salesman Ramlal and Mahatma VS Gandhi, will stage the play at the NCPA (National Centre For Performing Arts) in Mumbai, from October 21 till first week of November for a limited engagement of two weeks. The play will then travel to Delhi in December and will be staged in the capitals Siri Fort Auditorium.

Muughal E Azam was the most expensive film made at the time (in 1960) and the musical play, too , is being made on a grand scale. Interestingly, it will also feature eight songs from the film to be performed as part of the narrative. Looks like it will be one grand musical live theatrical production witnessed in India.

Acclaimed director Feroz Abbas Khan is all set to direct Mughal-E-Azam - a Broadway-style musical play - which will be a tribute to the original film.

Speaking about the adaptation, Feroz Abbas Khan said in a statement, Mughal-E-Azam is apt because even the film was inspired by a play, Anarkali, which K Asif saw and borrowed passages of dialogue from. Its a dramatic father-son story with the nation at stake. In its writing skills and mounting, it was close to perfection with great dialogues and emotional story-telling, complemented by eye-catching visuals and a terrific score.

The upcoming musical has another connection with the original cult classic-- the musical will be co-produced by none other than Shapoorji Palanji, the 150-year old business conglomerate that had funded K. Asifs Mughal-E-Azam with a budget of fifteen million rupees in 1960, making it the most expensive film made at the time.

Other than Feroz Abbas Khan, other names attached to this ambitious project are costume designer Manish Malhotra, award-winning lighting designer David Lander, Emmy award nominee projection designer John Narun, production designer Neil Patel and choreographer Mayuri Upadhya.

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Once a breeding ground for eastern UPs gangs, Chandasi coal mandi near Varanasi is turning out to be a thriving marketplace for bogus micro small and medium enterprises (MSME) of Madhya Pradesh dealing in illegal sale of subsidised coal.

Cops in MPs Katni district of Madhya Pradesh have identified as many as 11 bogus MSMEs that have been possibly sourcing high quality coal from collieries of South Eastern Coalfields Limited (SECL) in MP and Chhattisgarh at subsidised rates and diverting it in open markets of UP and MP, including Chandasi in eastern UPs Chandauli district, just 10 km from Varanasi.

The revelation was made following the arrest of five persons, including Balaji Traders chief Gokul Das Vishwakarma and Prahlad Enterprises chief Prahlad Agrawal alias Pappu, last month by Katni police.

The five were among the eight persons booked for running a racket that sourced coal through a bogus MSME Balaji Traders at a subsidised rate of Rs 1,900 per tonne and selling it through a licensed coal stockist Prahlad Enterprises at double or triple rates in markets, particularly in UP.

Investigations revealed the possibility of more licensed coal stockists like Agrawal operating in Katni via bogus MSMEs.

We got a list of 45 MSMEs in Katni getting coal at subsidised rates from SECLs collieries in Shahdol, Anuppur and Umaria (MP) and Koriya in Chhattisgarh, superintendent of police Katni Gaurav Tiwari told HT on Thursday.

On verification, at least 11 of these MSMEs, including Balaji Traders who were into production of ceramics, lime, minerals and chemicals, were found to be bogus as they were not in operation for four months to a year despite getting subsidised coal during the same period, Tiwari said.

Katni police have asked these MSMEs to respond to questionnaire by September 17 to determine the monetary gain they have garnered by possible illegal sale of subsidised coal. A source said that the coal sourced from Jharkhand fetched prices ranging between Rs 6,500 and Rs 7,500 per tonne while those bought from MP and Chhattisgarh was priced between Rs 4,000 and Rs 6,000 per tonne. After registering as MSME, firms got 100 to 1,200 tonnes of coal per month from SECL under a Fuel Supply Agreement (FSA) for production of goods and services.

But instead of using the coal for their own production (coal candies in Balajis case), it was diverted to open markets with the help of a licensed coal stockist.

The subsidised coal was also sold at higher prices to brick kilns in Madhya Pradesh, besides other enterprises and business units, particularly in Indore and adjoining areas. Weve already written to the SECL in Bilaspur for suspending the FSA and related coal supply to these bogus companies and are also working with the states anti-corruption watchdog Lokayukta special police for probing the actual financial gains, said Tiwari.

Also under police scanner are some chartered accountants who could have helped these MSMEs to furnish false coal usage certificates to ensure uninterrupted supply of coal from SECL collieries. Surprisingly, no action on verifying the actual business of these MSMEs was taken by police despite complaints since 2009. In the past, Chandasi mandi, one of the biggest coal markets in India, has been a breeding ground for gangs of eastern UP, including the Mukhtar Ansari-Munna Bajrangi gang and the rival headed by jailed UP MLC Brijesh Singh.
Bollywood actors Alia Bhatt and Varun Dhawan completed the second leg of shooting for Dharma Productions romantic-comedy Badrinath Ki Dulhania.

The film, that was earlier said to be a sequel to 2014 movie Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhania, is directed by Shashank Khaitan.

Alia shared the news of wrapping up the second schedule on social media.

A " looking into the sunset kinda moment " for my lovely director as we wrap the second schedule of #badrinathkidulhania !!!!! Will miss the madness...Will NOT miss all the forceful feeding though haha  @shashankkhaitan @varundvn A photo posted by Alia  (@aliaabhatt) on Sep 15, 2016 at 8:11pm PDT

Varun, too, posted on his Instagram page:

It's a wrap on the 2nd sched of #badrinathkidulhania. Shot all over Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. Such beautiful people and locations. Until next time #love #badree #comingsoon A photo posted by Varun Dhawan (@varundvn) on Sep 15, 2016 at 11:49am PDT

The actors enjoyed shooting the film as is evident from their social media posts.

Shot with these champs in the morning.#badrinathkidulhania #badreeland. Children are the coolest A video posted by Varun Dhawan (@varundvn) on Sep 14, 2016 at 2:03am PDT

#badrinathkidulhania in #KOTA A photo posted by Varun Dhawan (@varundvn) on Sep 12, 2016 at 10:33pm PDT

#badreeland #kota #badrinathkidulhania. A video posted by Varun Dhawan (@varundvn) on Sep 9, 2016 at 11:49pm PDT

Roof-top mania #badreeland A photo posted by Varun Dhawan (@varundvn) on Sep 9, 2016 at 11:04pm PDT

My friends. Such beautiful mystical creatures #badrinathkidhulaniya A video posted by Varun Dhawan (@varundvn) on Sep 7, 2016 at 5:56am PDT

There's nothing better then working out in the wild. #badrinathkidhulaniya A photo posted by Varun Dhawan (@varundvn) on Sep 7, 2016 at 3:07am PDT

Cosy-ing up to a script on my day off. Time well spent I would say!  #lifeofanactor #badrinathkidulhania A photo posted by Alia  (@aliaabhatt) on Sep 3, 2016 at 4:56am PDT

Prep time for Badri and the Dulhania#badrinathkidulhania #ShootLife A photo posted by Alia  (@aliaabhatt) on Aug 31, 2016 at 4:23am PDT

This will be the third movie where Alia and Varun are working together. They made their Bollywood debut with Student of the Year in 2012.

Badrinath Ki Dulhania is slated to release on March 10, 2017.

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Kalki Koechlin is known for two things - her versatility as an actor and her feminism. From featuring in satirical YouTube videos to reciting poetry at little-known Mumbai cafes, she goes all the way to promote womens cause. In a new campaign to create awareness about women empowerment, Kalki performed a soul-stirring wo-man-logue, a solo theatrical monologue, at Young FICCI Ladies Organisation, New Delhi on September 12.

In her monologue, Kalki starts from the beginning and talks about Adam and Eve - how everything was blamed on Eve and how we were sidelined from the Big Bang!

Kalki during the 'Wo-Manlogue', a theatrical monolgue on womanhood in New Delhi on Monday. (PTI)

Talking about the various limitations and expectations a woman is supposed to live with, Kalki keeps the tone engaging and continues, I want to be George Clooney basically, but with breasts and a muffin. But no, no Shhh. Control! Keep it down, stuff it up, bottle it in, switch it off, cross your leg, wear a bra, sit straight and smile sweetly please for the camera!

She then calls out to the men: Dear men. Dear, powerful men! I know you care about women, I know you about her, you want to make her feel like a princess, put her on a pedestal. Make her a goddess and give her a her a special day like International Womens Day. Lets be nice to her for one day.

(PTI)

Calling upon women to embrace their sexuality and refrain from competing with men, she said, Dear women, will you atleast stand up for me? Enough of the disposed foetus and the unwanted daughter. Enough of girls in fairy dresses, with bulemia and major complexes.

She even questions the role of religion: What if your religion told you to do whatever you felt like? Spit, scream, gossip, fight, make noise, pollute, marry a child, perform an honour killing, rape, torture, discriminate, keep locked up, keep uneducated, keep under your control. Does God have a say in such a religion? Has God become a politician?

Kalki is currently working on her next film Ribbon. (PTI)

She signed off with a powerful punchline: Sometimes I just want to breathe. Like when you have a man pounding on top of you incessantly in a daily routine, its hard to breathe When the underwire of your bra is poking into your ribs and its too hot to be wearing all this, its hard to breathe. When you want to stop being stared at by everyone who always is your watchman, your rickshaw wala, your neighbours husband Theyre all watching your chest heave every time you breathe Sometimes as a woman you feel guilty to just breathe. Well, of course we are going to be hysterical. Of course were gonna be screaming! Of course were gonna be unreasonable, do you think its REASONABLE TO RESTRAIN BREATHING?

Watch Kalkis wo-man-logue here

We simply love Kalki for mouthing all the injustices and cruelties meted out to womenkind, and in such a poetic manner. What do you think?

Tweet your thoughts @htshowbiz

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Actor Soha Ali Khan is an avid social media user and she often takes to Twitter to share about her films, new projects and of course candid moments.

Recently when the actor posted a picture of her seeking blessings at a Ganpati Pandal in Mumbai, she was attacked by social media bullies who hurled abuses at her, and posted nasty comments, questioning her religious beliefs and calling her non-Muslim. The same happened earlier this month, when she visited the Golden Temple to promote her upcoming film, 31st October.

Responding to these religion-based trolls, the actor says, I feel what my religion is and how I practice it is not anybodys business. I really dont understand why it upsets them so much because it doesnt affect them. Its not like a particular religious community has any ownership over me. And I am not a torchbearer of Islam. I think these people use stars to promote their slightly more insidious agendas and we shouldnt allow this.

Read: I was lucky to have been selected for Rang De Basanti: Soha Ali Khan

Actor Soha Ali Khan visits Andhericha Raja Ganesh Mandal. (IANS)

While many comments asked Soha if her Hindu husband (actor Kunal Kemmu) would celebrate Eid with her, the actor says since she doesnt know these people, so there is no emotional reaction. Im sometimes surprised that somebody would be so passionate about some people they have never met and that they care so much about what I or my husband does. I dont feel the need to tell anyone whether Kunal has been to a mosque or if he prays or celebrates Eid, or whether I celebrate Diwali or Holi with him and his family. Its not something I should discuss with anyone because religion happens and how many Gods you believe in and how you choose to pray is something completely private, says the 37-year-old, adding that she doesnt get worked up about such comments.

Read: 31st October trailer: Vir Das, Soha Ali give us a heart-wrenching drama

We often see (non-muslim) Bollywood stars visiting Ajmer Sharif ahead of their films release but when a Muslim actor visits a Ganpati pandal, it causes outrage. Responding to this, Soha adds, Strength of India has always been our diversity and the fact that we have respect for each other traditions. Islam also is a religion that respects other traditions and has lived and coexisted with other religions. So if someone judges me based on my religion, I feel there is no real solid education or exposure behind an opinion like that.

Soha has had more encounters with social media trolls. In the past when the London School of Economics (LSE) graduate tweeted about RBI Governor Raghuram Rajans exit announcement, she was trolled on Twitter. Agreeing that theres always a flipside to social media presence, Soha says, I understand that social media platforms are what we voluntarily put ourselves on. So if the positive side is that I can put my pictures and direct comments out there to my followers, flipside is that you read what people say about you as well. And not all of it has to be flattering or even sensible. At times, it tends to be a lot more than personal. So I have an ability to completely take it in my stride without it upsetting me because these are not people I know and they certainly not going to affect me.

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Actor Vidya Balan who just returned from US, is down with dengue. The actor had just returned to Mumbai after wrapping up the US schedule of Kahaani 2, a sequel to her hit 2012 film, Kahaani.

Mid Day quoted a source close to her as saying, Vidya is suffering from dengue and the doctors have asked her to rest for 10 days.

Read: Vidya Balan promotes Marathi film Ekk Albela in Australia

Vidya isnt the only one down with fever, thanks to mosquitoes. Actor Emraan Hashmi is suffering from malaria and has been advised complete bed rest by the doctors.

He had to cancel his upcoming films promotions in Jaipur, Delhi and Chandigarh.
In return for allowing India to tax investments routed through it, Mauritius wants an economic aid package. With this demand the finance minister of Mauritius, Pravind Jugnauth met Arun Jaitley on Thursday.

Mauritius feels that the change in the bilateral tax treaty will lead to flight of companies from Mauritius, which will lead to job losses there and so the demand for economic support, said a top official in finance ministry, who did not wish to be named.

India is thinking about a line of credit and investments in the island nation to develop infrastructure, keeping in mind, political mileage of having a friendly and stable neighbour. Mauritius wants Indias help in developing their infrastructure sector. They want Indias promise for sustained direct investment in that country, said the source quoted above. He added that India wants cordial relations with its neighbours, especially the island nations in the seas around it. They are strategically placed around India. We dont want to cede space to other countries to jump in and take advantage of these small nations, said another source in the finance ministry.

After meeting Jaitley, Mauritian Minister of Finance and Economic Development said the negotiations on Preferential Trade Agreement (PTA) and Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Partnership Agreement (CECPA)are moving ahead. In fact, there is now a delegation from Indian side visiting Mauritius. There has been a preliminary draft agreement which will need to be further looked up and discussed, Jugnauth said.

After long-drawn negotiations, the amendment to the 1983 Double Taxation Avoidance Convention was signed by India and Mauritius in May this year. With the changes, India can impose capital gains tax on investments routed through Mauritius. For two years starting April 1, 2017, capital gains tax would be levied at 50% of the prevailing domestic rate and after that, full rate would be applicable.

The renegotiated tax treaty has taken the advantage for foreign companies to open bases in Mauritius for investing in India. This the island country fears will lead to these companies closing down their units, which will lead to job losses.

India received as much as $8.3 billion Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) from Mauritius last fiscal. Mauritius accounted for 33% of the total FDI inflows to India during April 2000 to March 2016.

A large proportion of foreign investment in the stock market comes through companies registered in the Indian Ocean island nation and are exempted from tax in India under the treaty.

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If you want to see Sikh fundamentalism in action, look not towards the villages of Punjab but the streets of Britain. On September 11, dozens of men occupied a gurdwara in the British town of Leamington Spa, leading to people being intimidated and locked out. Armed police soon surrounded the temple and later arrested 55 people.

The gurdwara was occupied because the men objected to inter-religious marriages, and inside a Sikh was due to marry a Hindu. But that is not the full picture. Behind the scenes a bigger struggle was taking place: While some Sikhs were taking a stand against fundamentalism, others wanted to punish them for it.

In August last year, gangs of Sikhs in different British cities suddenly disrupted several gurdwara weddings where the groom was not a Sikh. But hardly anyone knew about it. I got a hold of videos from these incidents and posted them on Facebook to show how these gangs were intimidating and threatening Sikhs. The videos went viral and caused an outcry.

Read | Girl who assaulted elderly Sikh in Britain denied bail

These incidents started about five years ago. Youth groups started mobilising Sikhs through Whatsapp and Facebook to stop weddings either in advance or on the day. They wanted an end to all inter-faith marriages at gurdwaras. Most gurdwaras initially resisted the calls by youth groups but soon pressure became too much. Videos of committee members were posted online with abuse, and people started getting threats. A BBC investigation found lots of Sikhs who wanted to speak out but were too scared of the backlash. One family had their windows smashed for not cancelling the wedding ceremony. Yet the line was that this was an issue for Sikhs to resolve themselves and they did very little. They were too scared of being called racist.

The protesters say inter-religious marriages go against the Sikh Rehat Maryada (code of conduct), and the Anand Karaj (marriage ceremony) should only be between two Sikhs. They also say they are not against inter-religious marriages, but do not want them taking place at a gurdwara.

Read | Indian American woman soldier bridges the gap between US and Indian army

The Rehat Maryada was approved in 1945 after a long process and several attempts by Sikhs to agree on a code of conduct and conventions. Technically the protesters are right: It stipulates that Sikhs should only marry Sikhs. But thats only half the story. The Rehat Maryada is not divine scripture and can be amended to reflect the fact that millions of Sikhs now live in areas where they are a small minority.

The protesters have their own double-standards too. If the Rehat Maryada was followed to the letter then only Amritdhari (baptised) Sikhs would be allowed to marry at a gurdwara. Furthermore, many of the men in these gangs themselves dont wear turbans, shave their beards and go out drinking and dancing  going by their Facebook pictures.

Ironically, most Sikhs protesting mixed-marriages cant be bothered to follow the same rules they want others to.

But the incident last week was significant for another reason. Last year, after my videos exposed the issue, British Sikh groups agreed on a temporary ban on mixed weddings and protests to find a compromise. But they still havent managed to agree on anything.

Read | Hazur Sahib principal preacher killed in Punjab road mishap

One large group of Sikh institutions and key figures, led by Leamington Spa Gurdwara, wanted a more tolerant approach. They wanted to allow the Anand Karaj between mixed couples as long as the non-Sikh partner learned about the faith. But for the fundamentalists this wasnt enough. They wanted gurdwaras to only allow such weddings if the non-Sikh partner converted to Sikhism, even if only for marriage. They were angry at Leamington Spa Gurdwara and others for trying to find a compromise and open-minded approach, and were looking for an opportunity to attack its management. Last week they got their chance.

The increasing number of wedding disruptions is part of a trend towards intolerance among some British Sikhs. There have been no such protests in America or Canada, where millions of Sikhs live, where they are more integrated. Neither have I heard of such disruptions in India.

Read | Kirpan-carrying Sikhs ordered to leave store in Canada

For many Sikhs opposed to mixed marriages, this isnt just about the rules, this is about maintaining Sikh purity. They have developed a dislike of other religions and dont want to mix. Like fundamentalists of other religions they want to purify their community by driving out those who dont follow it to their standards. If you want to marry a non-Sikh then youre better off out.

The tragedy is that instead of seeing mixed marriages as a way to welcome newcomers into the Sikh community, the fundamentalists are driving people away. The tolerant and welcoming principles of the Sikh gurus have been cast off by their most zealous devotees.

Sunny Hundal is a writer and lecturer on digital journalism based in London

The views expressed are personal

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NEW DELHI: Puducherry lieutenant governor and BJP leader Kiran Bedi accused the Delhi government on Thursday of having no intention to help people and of never being present when they are required, in the wake of rising numbers of dengue and chikungunya cases.

Bedi said the Aam Aadmi Party government wants to remain in news because their actions are totally opposite to the promises that they have made so far.

It is all about intention, if their intentions are genuine to serve the people, then they should all get together and perform work with full dedication. If you are negligent, then there will be problems and to serve the people you will have to be on toes. It is all about intention and your behaviour speaks a lot, said Bedi.
Aman Vihar in outer Delhi reported 40 rape cases in 2014, the maximum in an area covered by one police station. The gang rape of two girls by five youths in the same neighbourhood on Wednesday shows how police have failed to make the area safer.

Two months ago, two minors were sexually assaulted in Aman Vihar, leading to a massive protest against the police for failing to check crimes against women.

The Aman Vihar police station covers 24 sq km  one of the largest in Delhi. Large tracts of open fields and congested semi-urban villages fall under its jurisdiction.

There is just one police officer for every 4,100 residents. In contrast, the police public ratio for the rest of Delhi is 1:250.

Accommodation is cheap. Small factories run from many houses in the area. One can get a room for about Rs 1,000. Migrant workers often bring their families along and work in these factories.

On Wednesday, two girls, aged 17 and 18 years, out for an evening stroll with their male friends, were gang-raped by five youths.

A police officer said the girls, both residents of Kirari, went to meet their male friends at the Mundka Metro station at 7.30 pm. The two couples went to field, near a Metro construction site.

Five youths from a nearby slum who were passing by the area spotted them. The youths approached the couples and threatened the girls that they will call the police, an investigating officer said.

When the two male friends protested and accused the youths of moral policing, the youths beat them and forced them to leave, the officer said.

Police said that the two girls tried to escape, along with their male friends, but they were overpowered and gang-raped by the five youths. Before fleeing the crime spot, the youths threatened to kill the girls if they reported the crime to anyone, said the officer.

Read more: Aman Vihar, Narela areas in Delhi have the highest number of missing children

The girls returned home and informed their family about the incident. An officer said that a medical examination of the girls confirmed rape.

DCP (outer) Vikramjit Singh said police have caught four youths involved in the case. Police refused to name the four and said that they are verifying their age.

We registered a case under sections of protection of children from sexual offences (POCSO) Act and Indian Penal Code (IPC). Investigation is on, Singh said.

Read more: Ambedkar Nagar, Aman Vihar see a sharp rise in rapes

An officer said of the four accused, one is a pursuing his graduation and the others are school drop-outs and unemployed.

Identities of the alleged rapists were established based on the description given by the victims. We used our local intelligence sources to track the accused. Four of them were caught by Thursday evening. Efforts are on to nab the fifth suspect, the deputy commissioner said.
BHAGALPUR: The TM Bhagalpur University (TMBU) in Bihar is set to initiate a move to cancel the law degree issued to former Delhi law minister Jitendra Singh Tomar.

The university on Wednesday decided to place a proposal for cancellation of Tomars degree before the examination board next week, an official of TMBU said on the condition of anonymity as he was not authorised to speak on the matter.

Following the approval by the board, the TMBU syndicate would have to give the proposal a go-ahead, he said, adding that the matter would then be sent to the chancellor for his assent.

Action is also likely against employees indicted in the report of TMBUs internal inquiry. More than one dozen employees, including some senior ones, have been indicted.

Meanwhile, a three-member Delhi Police team that arrived here on Tuesday, visited the campus on Wednesday again. Sources said, the team continued cross-examination of TMBU officials and found several irregularities in issuance of the degree.

Tomar had claimed he had been a student of Vishwanath Singh Institute of Legal Studies, Munger, which is under TMBU, between 1994 and 1998 and go this LLB degree after passing the exams on September 15, 2012.

It is alleged that Tomar never attended classes and managed to get the degree with the help of the staff of the law college.

Tomar, however, said he has not received any communication from the university in this regard. I have no information about the issue. But I dont think, the university can do that as per law. The matter is sub-judice, Tomar said.

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NEW DELHI: The Delhi governments preliminary findings on what caused 12 chikungunya-related deaths in city hospitals is likely to be sent to the Union Health Ministry on Friday.

The Delhi government is conducting an independent investigation on the cause of the deaths. We have spoken to the Delhi government, and sought the investigation report. We will get some parts of the report by Friday, which will clear the air somewhat, said a senior official from the Union health ministry.

The Delhi government is examining if chikungunya infection killed people or if they died of complications not related to the mosquito-borne infection.

The infection is known to cause complications and lead to death in the elderly.

Even after the death of 12 people over past one month, both the Centre and the state government are clueless on how to certify the death a person who died of complications caused by chikungunya infection.

The Centre says it is for the Delhi government to investigate why people with chikungunya are dying but the state says it doesnt have the expertise to conduct an in-depth investigation, and would need technical support.

The health ministry denies having received any request for help.

We would certainly help if asked for it. So far, we have not received any such requests from the Delhi government. They are conducting an independent investigation, said the health ministry official.

The g rowing number of deaths in people diagnosed with chinkungunya has experts worried. The World Health Organisation issued a statement on Thursday, saying chikungunya is also outbreak-prone like dengue.

We cant call these chikungunya deaths per se as theres no concrete evidence they died of the disease. Most of these patients were in their 60s, 70s and 80s, with co-morbid conditions such as diabetes, kidney problem, hypertension etc., said Dr DS Rana, chairman, Ganga Ram Hospital.

The hospital reported five deaths due to multi-organ failure in chikungunya positive patients.

We never said the deaths were due to chikungunya. They may or may not have died of the viral infection, we dont really know. The cause needs to be investigated, said Dr Rana.

During the 2006 chikungunya outbreak, deaths were reported from Kerala that National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme( NV B DC P) had begun investigating.

There was no outbreak after that and studies cant be done in an artificial environment. Our teams are working on the subject , said Dr AC Dhariwal, director, NVBDCP.

Dengue can be contracted through four viral strains while chikungunya is caused only by one strain.

The disease was largely limited to south India. But with an explosive outbreak in Delhi this year, experts are suspecting variation in the strain that is infecting people in the north, who dont have immunity against the disease.

Also, in dengue cases, some strains are more virulent than other ones. The number of rising cases of chikungunya this year after the 2006 spike could be due to an evolution in its strain, which needs to be studied, said Dhariwal.

The latest person to succumb at Ganga Ram is a 75-year-old who had tested positive for chikungunya on Thursday morning.

Five died in Indraprastha Apollo, one each in All India Institute of Medical Sciences and Hindu Rao Hospital.

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NEW DELHI: Despite permission from the police to avoid confusion over the sacrifice of buffaloes on Eid-al-Adha, two men were beaten up allegedly by a group of cow vigilantes.

The two men were beaten in outer Delhis Kirari village on Wednesday when they were on their way to dump the remains of animals, sacrificed in a madrasa in Outer Delhi on Wednesday.

The victims, Hafiz Abdul Khalid, 25, and Ali Hassan, 35, are residents of Prem Nagar-2.

Family members said they were carrying the remains of the buffaloes sacrificed on behalf of over 100 people.

Hundreds of residents had contributed money for the sacrifice of 18 buffaloes at the local madrasa.

The madarsa administration said they had permission from the police for the same.

Its a common practice on Eid for people to contribute money to offer sacrifices to god.

The incident took place at 7.30 pm, when a group of 25 people chased three people who were in an auto, loaded with remains of buffaloes.

One of them, Abdus Salam, managed to escape.

Salam narrated the incident to the family, which called the police asking for protection. The police had taken the two injured people to hospital by then.

Salam was frightened when he came back. He had seen how badly these youth were beaten up, said Qari Mohammad Lukman, rector of madarsa and father-in-law of Khalid.

The locals, who accompanied the victim, named Jaibeer and Virender as suspects in the case because the two had reportedly been following them for the past few days. According to the locals, last year too the duo had issued threats.

Khalid and Ali have been admitted at Sanjay Gandhi Memorial Hospital and will remain under observation. They have sustained head injuries apart from the injuries on other body parts. Khalid teaches students at a madarsa, while Ali Hassan is a driver.

Dr Shekhar Shivam, a surgeon at the hospital said, The condition of patients is stable. Both have head injuries so both will remain under observation.

DCP (Outer), Vikramjit Singh, said that four men have been arrested. Singh said that on Wednesday, locals gathered on being informed that animal meat was being carried.

They asked them to stop and explain the meat, which triggered a fight. Other locals also joined in and thrashed them. We have booked all of them for attempt to murder and are on lookout for others.

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NEW DELHI: The Delhi government on Thursday asked residents to spread awareness and undertake initiatives to control the spread of vector-borne diseases such as chikungunya and dengue.

Delhi water minister Kapil Mishra said several organisations, religious institutions, celebrities, associations, communities and volunteers have responded to the governments requests and helped the One Delhi campaign.

The initiative is aimed at spreading awareness about measures to check the spread of diseases.

We received a phenomenal response to our appeal requesting everyone to come together to fight vector-borne diseases that have spread across Delhi and adjoining states, Mishra said.

Religious institutions such as the Gauri Shankar temple, Tilak Nagar gurudwara, Jama Masjid and Orthodox church have all come forward to help spread awareness about the diseases, the minister said.

He said the campaign received support from Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, Founder Art of Living . Volunteers of the foundation will visit households across Delhi to spread awareness about the disease.
NEW DELHI: To check on the increase in pollution levels in the Yamuna, before and after idol immersions on Ganesh Chaturthi, the Delhi Pollution Control Committee collected water samples from the ghats few days back and will again take samples after Thursday.

This year, seven Yamuna ghats  Kudsia, Geeta, Haathi, Shyam, Kalindi Kunj, Mayur Vihar and Geeta Colony  were earmarked for the idol immersions by the authorities.

According to a senior Delhi government official, apart from spreading awareness regarding the use of environment friendly colours and biodegradable materials in the idols, the pollution watchdog of the state government will also monitor the water quality before and after the immersions.

Samples have already been collected a few days before Ganesh visarjan, too. Then we can compare the difference in water quality and the exact impact of idol immersion in the river can be ascertained, the official told Hindustan Times.

This year, from the samples picked up from seven points in the river between ITO and the Najafgarh Drain, the dissolved oxygen (DO) content was between 0.24 parts per million and 0.32 parts per million. DO levels in healthy water are supposed to be above four.

Activists welcomed the DPCC initiative dubbing it as a step in the right direction. Water activist Manoj Misra, who is also the convenor of the Yamuna Jiye Abhiyaan, said along with other arrangements for immersion this year, this monitoring can help calculate the damage to the river.

It is a good move but needs to be done in a systematic manner. Then you can see results. It needs to be monitored whether while removing idols, the authorities concerned are also taking away other materials which can be harmful for the river and the environment. More sample testing, with a gap of a few days, can give better clarity, Misra said.

Idol immersions and dumping of religious objects in the river increase the level of toxicity every year. The National Green Tribunals order to prevent dumping of harmful material is not helping because of lack of implementation of the order.

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LUCKNOW: Uttar Pradesh cabinet minister Shivpal Yadav quit the government as well as his position as chief of Samajwadi Partys state unit on Thursday, in what is seen as a blow to the party ahead of state elections due early next year.

The move signal led an attempt by Shivpal to distance himself from his nephew and chief minister Akhilesh with whom he has been involved in a bruising fight for influence. It was not immediately clear if a split in the party was in the offing, but sources said the turn of events meant Akhilesh might have emerged stronger for now.

Sources said Akhilesh had rejected Shivpals resignation from the cabinet, but the party had made no decision yet on his offer to quit as its state chief.

The late night development came after a day of separate meetings between party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav, his brother Shivpal and Akhilesh raised hopes of a truce between the uncle and nephew.

Mulayammet with the two separately to ask them to end their feuding. A meeting between the uncle and nephew lasted barely 15 minutes at the latters office.

Two days ago, Akhilesh stripped Shivpal of three top departments after the chief minister himself was removed as the partys state chief and Shivpal given the post. Their differences, a badly kept secret for years, had become public over the past months.

The partys Rajya Sabha MP, Amar Singhs, alleged role in the crisis also figured in discussions during the day, with Akhileshs second uncle Ramgopal Yadav and party leader Naresh Agarwal hinting at his interference in party matters. Akhilesh Yadav had also mentioned about an outsider which is seen as a reference to Amar Singh, who is seen as close to Shivpal.

Earlier in the day, Akhilesh found support from Ramgopal, who said the party should have consulted the chief minister before sacking him as state party president.

Differences do take place on some minor point and they can be resolved, Ramgopal said.

He (CM) should have been asked to resign and he would have tendered it. He could have been told that elections are coming and you continue as CM and the work of state president will be taken care of by him (Shivpal). Some misunderstanding has taken place and there is nothing more to it, he said.

Shivpal also spoke to journalists in Lucknow and asserted that the party was not in any kind of trouble.

Whoever is given responsibility, whatever it be...we have to follow that. The party is not in trouble. If I am given a responsibility, I will work to the fullest for it. Nobody can challenge netajis (Mulayam) decisions, he said .

In 2011, when I was the state president, back then I was removed and Akhilesh was given responsibility and I accepted that. Netaji took that decision carefully and after consideration surely.
NEW DELHI: The ground zero of a crippling chikungunya outbreak in Delhi is in the backyard of the countrys premier hospital, the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS).

Ayur Vigyan Nagar, a residential colony housing doctors and staffers from AIIMS, and neighbouring Gautam Nagar and Masjid Moth have recorded the highest number of chikungunya cases in Delhi this year, according to data provided by municipal agencies till September 10.

At least 12 people suffering from chikungunya have been killed in the Capital this year in one of the worst outbreaks of the mosquito-borne ailment that causes acute joint pain besides fever.

After Dwarka, which has officially reported 20 cases, Ayur Vigyan Nagar, with 18, is the second worst affected neighbourhood in Delhi, where the Safdarjung Hospital is also located. But unlike Dwarka, a sprawling sub city over a 56 sq km radius, Ayur Vigyan Nagar is a gated community with 1,300 staff quarters and spread over one square km. Neighbouring Masjid Moth has reported 12 cases and Gautam Nagar nine.

Bharat Agaria, 20, whose death due to dengue last year had led to unrest among AIIMS staffers, was also a resident of AV Nagar.

Dr Manju Saini, 32, got a high-grade fever in the last week of August and was diagnosed with chikungunya. As a doctor, she had studied about chikungunya in medical school and knew that the symptoms high fever, rashes and joint paincould be managed at home.

However, her condition worsened and she had to be admitted to AIIMS. Three days later, her five-month-old daughter started running a temperature too.

We havent even named her yet, said Saini, whose husband is also a junior resident at AIIMS.

South Delhi Municipal Corporation head Puneet Goel suspects the (AIIMS) staff is infected inside the hospital, leading to spread of the disease in the locality. Ask anyone in AV Nagar, they would know a neighbour, a relative or a friend who is down with a mosquito-borne illness.

I know of at least seven people here who have been diagnosed with chikungunya and several others who have fever and joint pain, said Manjeet Bhalla, 57, a nursing staff at the cardiology department of AIIMS. She herself is recovering from chikungunya.

Bhalla, however, attributed the high numbers in the locality to awareness among the residents who go to the hospital to get tested.

The greenery, crammed quarters and overflowing pools of water were said to the reasons for the high number of mosquitoes and mosquito-borne illnesses.

Also, the houses here are very close to each other, if one person gets dengue or chikungunya, the chances are high that several others would, she said.

Bhalla, on the other hand, blames the water that collects in front of her house from the over-head tanks.

A malaria inspection officer, who has been in the area for eight years, said, The residents love for greenery is the main reason behind the increasing number of cases at AIIMS residential quarters. This has been the trend for many years.
NEW DELHI: The South Delhi Municipal Corporation has asked its councillors to discuss with residents welfare associations (RWAs) about allowing civic health workers to check mosquito breeding in houses.

HT reported on Thursday that several houses, especially in gated colonies, dont allow domestic breeding checkers (DBCs) to enter.

One meeting was held in Malviya Nagars Gita Temple on Thursday. BJP leader and ward councillor Satish Upadhyay, SDMC commissioner Puneet Goel and SDMC staff attended it. Members of at least 12 RWAs participated.

Upadhyay requested the RWAs to cooperate with the DBCs. Along with RWA members, the commissioner and 50 residents, he conducted an awareness drive and distributed pamphlets.

This is an extraordinary situation (crisis) in front of Delhi. So, extraordinary steps need to be taken, he said.

They also supervised fogging as they went from one house to another in Malviya Nagar.

SDMC has no dearth of men, machine and material; the entire staff is working hard, hence there is no need to any panic , said Goel.

NORTH MCD SUSPENDS 3

In an awareness drive launched by North Delhi Municipal Corporation, standing committee chairman Pravesh Wahi and commissioner Praveen Gupta expressed displeasure over the poor sanitary conditions in Rohini Sector17. The area district commissioner suspended two assistant sanitary inspectors and a safai karamchari.

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With the reported Chikungunya death toll climbing to 12 in the national capital, Health minister Satyendra Jain on Friday rejected complaints of vector-borne disease patients about the shortage of beds in Delhi hospitals and claimed that at least 1,500 beds are still unoccupied.

At least 1,500 beds are vacant at hospitals under Delhi government, it will be very wrong to say that patients are denied bed. We have also ordered for five MRI machines and ten CT scan machine, he added.

The data that was release by AIIMS showed that there were deaths due to dengue. Not everyone who have died due to dengue are from Delhi, there are many from neighbouring states too, we need to segregate data, he added.

Responding to opposition criticising AAP-led Delhi government over Chikungunya death toll, Jain said if people want to do politics they can do but politics can wait.

Because right now, everyone should help us in fogging. I urge everyone to co-operate with the state government to deal with situation, he added.

After facing flak from several quarters, AAP government suddenly became active on Wednesday with two of its ministers Satyendra Jain and Water Minister Kapil Mishra doing rounds in the city.

Jain visited several hospitals on Thursday to take stock of the situation.

Meanwhile, Union health minister JP Nadda spoke to the health ministers of Haryana and Uttar Pradesh regarding the dengue and chikungunya cases.

In a tweet, Nadda said, community participation is important to stop mosquito breeding which is responsible for these diseases.

He said, he will also meet Satyendar Jain to discuss the situation.

The Delhi government is likely to submit a detailed report to the Union Health Ministry on the chikungunya deaths in the national capital.
Civic agencies do not know where half the chikungunya cases are coming from as they say most hospitals record details of only those patients who get admitted and not of those who visit their out-patient departments (OPDs).

Of the 1,057 chikungunya cases reported till September 10, at least 400 dont have patients addresses. In 105 cases, addresses given by patients are wrong, shows official data.

It seriously hampers efforts to control the outbreak, say municipal officials. We have to intensify fumigation and spraying in areas from where cases are reported because the chances of the infection spreading in the vicinity are higher, said municipal health officer of South Delhi Municipal Corporation, Dr BK Hazarika.

After infecting a person, the same mosquito can spread the virus among four to five people We cant prevent it if we dont know the locations, Hazarika said.

Ideally, all hospitals should be instructed to record the addresses of all patients referred for blood test, another health official said.

Last week, All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) shared the list of over 100 patients infected with chikungunya. But in all these cases, the addresses were missing. We wrote to them seeking complete information, said Dr Hazarika.

An AIIMS official said their records were complete as it was mandatory for government hospitals to record details of all patients, even those visiting the OPD. In fact, it is the municipal dispensaries where details are recorded in registers or temporary files. The problem can be sorted out if the government makes it mandatory for all medical institutions to record the details of patients, said AIIMS spokesperson, Amit Gupta.

Read more: Dwarka has most chikungunya cases in Delhi

Meanwhile, the Centres nodal agency, National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme, asked the state government and municipal corporations to ensure proper documenting of all cases. We had asked them to send their surveillance teams to hospitals (government as well as listed private ones) to get the actual data, said the programmes additional director, PK Sen.

Union health minister JP Nadda also asked the Delhi government for a detailed report on the deaths caused by chikungunya as well as the cases which were untraceable, said sources.

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Our male friends just sat as mute spectators, watching us being raped, the two teenage girls allegedly gang-raped by five youths in outer Delhis Kirari area on Wednesday told the police.

We expected them to intervene and save us. We kept shouting for help but they did nothing, the teenagers told police.

Sources told HT that the two male friends, who were with the girls aged 17 and 18 years near the Mundka Metro station when the five youths spotted them, did not try to stop the rape and saw the entire episode sitting in a corner. One of them even refused to record his statement, an investigating officer said.

Police on Thursday arrested two youths and caught two juveniles in connection with the case. One youth, however, managed to escape. Teams have been sent to arrest him. We have mounted technical surveillance on the fifth youth and are trying to trace his location. We have sought help from the local intelligence. Three teams have been sent to different directions to raid his possible hideouts.

The probe is on and arrest will soon be made, an investigator said. While one of the accused is pursuing graduation through distance learning, the others are unemployed, he added.

As per the police, Manish (19), Shivam (19) and three others, were passing by from the area when they spotted the two girls sitting with their male friends near the metro station at a secluded spot. The stretch was isolated and there were no streetlights around 7.30pm.

Read more: Tales of promises, betrayal abound in Delhis Aman Vihar

The five youths allegedly approached the girls and teased them. When the girls stood up to leave the area, the youth allegedly caught hold of them and molested them. The youth allegedly slapped the male friends of the girls and then dragged them further to a dark spot where they took turns to rape them, while the male friends silently witnessed the assault, a police source said.

After raping the girls, the men fled. It is only later that the girls made a PCR call and informed the police.

Locals told HT, that this was the third case of rape reported from the same area. Earlier this year, an 8-year- old girl was abducted and raped in the area and body of a woman was also found inside a sack at the same spot. People said that despite their demands for putting up sufficient lights and increased patrolling, nothing has happened.

Read: Delhis Aman Vihar unsafe for women, one policemen for every 4,100 residents

Angry residents gathered at the police station and several intersections of the area to protest the gang rape.

Congress leader, Pratyush Kanth, said, Our area has become a safe haven for criminals. Lack of police presence due to the fact that Kirari is the only constituency which doesnt even have a police station of its own is the reason why criminals roam here freely. People living here have to walk at least 10 kilometers to Bawana, where the Aman Vihar police station for Kirari residents is located. There is no police patrolling and not even a single security camera has been installed till date, said Kanth.

Police said that the men were not known to girls. A case under protection of children from sexual offences (POCSO) Act and India Penal Code has been registered.

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A Jet Airways flight to from Delhi to Dhaka had to return to the capital midway to offload a wrong baggage. The confusion happened when two passengers with similar surnames were scheduled to travel but one of them could not board the flight.

The first passenger arrived from London by 9W 121 at 12: 50 pm and was to travel to Dhaka by 9W 272, which was scheduled to depart at 1:25 pm. But he could not reach at boarding gate on time. Due to non-reporting, he was not allowed to board the plane, said an airline official.

Due to some confusion, the registered baggage of another passenger with a similar surname was offloaded, while the baggage of the first passenger was loaded into the plane. When the error was spotted, the airline called back the plane and the whole process took about two hours. There were 129 passengers and six crew members on board. The flight departed for Dhaka at 1:50 pm and returned at 3:10 pm. After offloading the baggage, the plane departed again at 3:55 pm.

Jet Airways flight 9W 272 from Delhi to Dhaka did an air turn back to Delhi to offload baggage of a guest who was not able to make the flight connection in time. As a safety of our guests and crew is our utmost priority, we regret the inconvenience caused to our 135 guests onboard the Boeing 737 aircraft, said a Jet Airways spokesperson.
The Noida police claim to have foiled an abduction bid of an Amity University student, in which his cousin was allegedly involved.

On Thursday evening, a patrolling team of Phase 3 police station arrested Pappu Kumar Rai and Abhishek Kumar after a brief gunfight, police said.

During interrogation, it was found that they were going to abduct the cousin of their friend and demand a ransom of `5 crore from the boys father.

A police checking team spotted a WagonR with a registration number of Jharkhand. When signalled to stop, the occupants left the car and tried to flee by firing in the air. The police team retaliated and nabbed both of them. We recovered one illegal revolver, a country-made pistol, sedatives and other tools that they were planning to use in the abduction, said Pankaj Pant, station house officer, Phase 3 police station.

The police said Pappu Rai, has a factory of garment manufacturing in Lucknow. About 10 days back, his friend Abhliash, who hails from Ballia, approached him and said he wanted to abduct his cousin (son of his paternal aunt) who is a student of law at Amity University. The students father is an advocate.

Pappu and Abhilash came to Noida and started staying in a rented accommodation. Pappu sought help from one of his friends Vicky, a resident of Sector 49 in the abduction. Vicky introduced them to his friends Abhishek and Iliyas and they started planning the abduction. They gathered weapons and other paraphernalia for the crime, said Pant.

Police said they did a recce of the area more than three times. Meanwhile, Abhilash met his cousin to gain his confidence.

On Thursday evening at about 8 pm, accused Pappu and Abhishek started from Sector 49 in a WagonR car to abduct the victim from his rented accommodation at Sector 126. They were, however, intercepted by a police team near Parthala village.

Accused Abhliash, Iliyas and Vicky are still on the run. An FIR has been registered against them and a manhunt launched to arrest them. Pappu and Abhishek were produced in the court and were sent to jail, said Pant.
The Delhi high court dismissed on Friday suits by three international publishers against the sale of photocopied books and pages in Delhi University, a landmark verdict likely to have a wide-reaching impact on copyright laws in India.

Justice Rajiv Sahai Endlaw also lifted a ban on the photocopier kiosk from issuing copies of chapters from textbooks of the three international publishers to students.

In November 2012, the court had banned the iconic Rameshwari Photocopy Service located near the Delhi School for Economics in north campus on a petition moved by publishers including University Press, Cambridge University Press and Taylor & Francis.

The international publishing giants had alleged that the kiosk was violating their copyright and at the instance of Delhi University was causing huge financial losses as students stopped buying their text books.

But Delhi University supported the photocopiers, saying the use of reproduced copyrighted books by student was a reasonable educational needs and should not be treated as infringement. Students also rallied behind the kiosk, saying most of the books were too expensive.

The university argued that calling reproduction of copyrighted books for educational purpose as infringement was wrong. Under the copyright Act, 1957, there are exemptions on fair use of work including educational propose from the purview of infringement, it had said.

It argued the photocopy of copyrighted books at the universitys campus were done by students for preparation of their course and was not meant for commercial exploitation.

Intellectual property experts hailed the verdict, saying the court had correctly upheld the supremacy of social good over private property.

Copyright laws are meant to balance public and private interests but in recent years, the public interest has been eroded due to lobbying. The HC has restored that balance, said Shamnad Basheer, intellectual property law expert.

The court has actually said that copyright is not divine and that education is an important social need. This is a huge moment.

Analysts also pointed out that the verdict put India at the centrestage of a global debate on intellectual property rights, first triggered three years ago when the Supreme Court denied a patent to pharma major Novartis.

The HC decision also sent out a signal that the country wouldnt follow global trends that have tended to side with private copyright demands, they added. We are not going to blindly adhere to western norms. We will look at our laws and requirements. This judgment cements that stand, Basheer said.
With no vaccine available for dengue and chikungunya, consumers are rushing to grab the latest mosquito repellents in whatever form they can get -- creams, oils, gels, sprays, stickers and vapourisers.

The sale of repellents is 10 times more than what it was in summer, according to unofficial estimates by companies.

Anti-mosquito product makers, including Dabur, Reckitt Benckiser and Godrej are planning to introduce more products in keeping with this demand. Apart from aggressively launching products, companies are waging a price war by offering products as low as R1.

Godrej, makers of brand Good Knight, is planning to enter the outdoor repellent space.

We plan to launch an entire range of outdoor mosquito repellents, which will also include antimosquito stickers, said a company official. We are present in the indoor mosquito repellent category but the diseases are spread by the aedes aegypti mosquito in the morning, when people are out of their home and working, the official added.

Dabur, makers of the outdoor-mosquito repellent cream, Odomos, is also planning to expand its range.

Read: Two more die of chikungunya at Delhi hospital, death toll now 15

We are working on two more innovations. We want to launch them soon but this will be decided only after checking their efficacy, said Praveen Jaipuriar, marketing head, personal care, Dabur India.

While Godrej has launched the GoodKnight card, a paper-based mosquito repellent for just R 1, Dabur has also launched its Odomos sachet for the same price.

Considering the changing patterns of mosquito-borne diseases, Reckitt Benckiser (RB) has also launched products under its popular brand, Mortein.

Due to changing climatic conditions, such as extended winters, summers and the delayed monsoon season -- mosquitoes are showing signs of changing seasonality, said a company spokesperson. RB is witnessing an increase in demand for liquid electric diffusers, the spokesperson added.

German drug and chemical maker Bayer has launched a pack of tablets in India, which control the breeding of mosquitoes in water.

As 80% of a mosquitos life stage is spent in water, it is important to control the breeding of mosquitoes. In order to enhance the duration of control, we have launched an innovative larvicide called Barcelo Tab, to control the breeding of mosquitoes in water, said a spokesperson at Bayer.

The product is used by local municipal corporations for community-based larva control in societies and homes. The company, globally, is investing in newer product development as well.

Read: Infection may be under reported, not all with symptoms get tested, say doctors

Indias insect repellent market clocks R 4,400 crore in retail sales a year, according to a report by Euromonitor. Coils are the top selling repellents with a 50% market share, although sprays are also gaining popularity.

The World Health Organisation said in a statement on Thursday, that till date, there is no vaccine available to prevent dengue and chikungunya, although research is ongoing. The only effective preventive measure is protection against mosquito bites and vector control, it said.

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It was an afternoon of celebration for students, teachers and photocopy shop owners in Delhi University as the Delhi High Court lifted the ban on Rameshwari Photocopy Service.

The shop, located near Delhi School of Economics in north campus, was fighting the case since August 2012.

Students can now photocopy study material from books published by international publishing giants.

Overjoyed students said it was not just about the photocopy shop, but the larger right to access resource material for education, which was upheld by the court.

Dharmpal Singh, owner of the photocopy shop, said although he was yet to read the order, this meant a huge victory for the students.

Read:Publishers lose copyright case against DUs photocopy shop

Most of the books are not available in the country and those which do, cost anywhere from Rs 3,000 to 8,000 and above. It is just not possible for students to buy these books. This made them buy locally sourced books, most which were not up to the mark, he said.

Singh has been running the kiosk for 20 years.

Students enrolled in the Masters and PhD courses, in particular, were the worse-affected. Photocopying course packs (reading compilations) was the only option, as most of these books (reference readings) were out of print.

While there is a batch of 80-100 students in each course, the university library has only a single copy of the book. In this case, photocopying remained the only option, said Apoorva Gautum, president, Association of Students for Equitable Access to Knowledge.

The association was formed soon after the ban was imposed in 2012 and became a party to the case. It includes around 200 students, including those in Delhi School of Economics and various central and state universities.

Teachers hailed the decision, saying it was a landmark judgment, not just for the country, but everywhere in the world where there is a curb on reproducing study material from books by big publishing houses.

In subjects such as social sciences, we expect students to read from at least 30 different resources. Also, in India we have students from different social and economic backgrounds and access to course material is a basic right for all of them. The judgment will cite an example for academic institutions across the world, said Sudha Vasan, professor, department of sociology.

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: Two more deaths from chikungunya-related complications at New Delhis Sir Ganga Ram Hospital took the death toll in Delhi-NCR to 15, with the number of people with fever symptoms visiting Delhi hospitals going up three times.

Both patients were men above 70 and had diabetes, one of the two was also hypertensive. They were referred to Sir Ganga Ram from other hospitals in a critical state and were admitted straight to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU), said a hospital source, requesting anonymity.

Both the patients died on Thursday evening.

Thirty-one patients with chikungunya are admitted in the hospital, two of whom are serious.

Another 60-year-old woman, who was also positive for chikungunya, died at Fortis Hospital in Shalimar Bagh, on Thursday night.

The deaths show all patients followed a similar pattern of illness, beginning with acute kidney injury, progressive fall in blood pressure, resistance to life-saving drugs, and eventually leading to respiratory and circulatory failure, said Dr DS Rana, chairman, nephrology, Ganga Ram.

Whether this is a casual association or causal association with chikungunya, it needs to be established, he said.

The emphasis on investigating the cause of deaths was also put because most deaths took place at private hospitals. Of the 15 deaths, only two deaths have been reported at public hospitals, including the All India Institute of Medical Sciences and Hindu Rao hospital.

Chikungunya numbers may be higher than what has officially been reported as not all who show symptoms get tested. Those who do may show false negative results if they get tested either too early or too late for diagnosis.

We usually do not prescribe chikungunya tests in patients who show symptoms of the disease. Only where we suspect chikungunya or dengue but the patient doesnt show clear symptoms do we ask for these tests to confirm, said Dr Srikant Sharma, senior consultant, medicine department, Moolchand Hospital.

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The Bombay High Court on Friday declined to grant an interim stay on implementation of a resolution making yoga and Surya Namaskar (sun salutation) mandatory in civic schools in the metropolis, saying it is just a form of exercise which is good for the body.

Masood Ansari, a social worker, had filed a public interest litigation in the HC challenging the August 23 resolution passed by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), contending that it violated fundamental rights and is malafide and bad in law.

According to the petitioner, children attending BMC-run schools mainly belong to poorer sections of society and come from all religions, castes and communities.

Read more: Surya namaskar and yoga made mandatory in Mumbai civic schools

A division bench of Chief Justice Manjula Chellur and Justice MS Sonak, however, observed that people should not look at it just by the name Suryanamaskar.

Dont go by the name... it is just a form of exercise which is good for the body, Chief Justice Chellur said. The HC, while posting the petition for further hearing after two weeks, declined to grant an interim stay on implementation of the resolution.

Anjali Awasthi, counsel for the petitioner, argued on Friday that minor students cannot be expected to perform `Surya Namaskar, which a combination of 12 asanas, daily.

To this, the HC said it would consider this argument at a later stage and would call for a report to ascertain if the sun salutation exercise can be performed by minors.

Read more: Heated discussion expected on introducing suryanamaskar in schools
Chikungunya, a viral infection spread by the bite of the Aedes aegypti mosquito, last caused an outbreak in India in 2006, when more than 1,500,000 cases and several deaths were reported.

This year, at least 12 people have died of complications related to the disease in the national capital that is battling one of its worst outbreaks.

The Delhi government is examining if chikungunya infection killed these people or if they died of complications not related to the mosquito-borne infection. The infection is known to cause complications and lead to death in the elderly.

Heres how to tell whether you need to get tested for the joint-breaking infection:

 Symptoms of high fever (102-104F), joint swelling and pain (lower back, ankle, knees, wrists or fingers), rash, headache, nausea and fatigue.

 High fever and joint pain are the most common symptoms.

 Acute pain in the joints of the knees, ankles and elbows make movement very painful. Chikungunya means to become contorted in Kimakonde language spoken in parts of Tanzania and Mozambique, which refers to the way the infected, who develop severe joint pain, walk.

 Most people recover within a week but the joint pain may persist for weeks to months.

 Its likely to be chikungunya if you live in a neighbourhood where other people have been diagnosed with the infection. The fever lasts for two to three days but the virus remains in the human body for up to a week. Mosquitoes biting a sick person during this period can spread disease to others around them.

 You need emergency hospital admission if you develop vision problems, drowsiness, hallucinations, delirium; have persistent vomiting; have difficulty breathing.

 People at risk are newborns infected around the time of birth, older adults over 60 years with medical conditions such as uncontrolled diabetes, hypertension, kidney problems, etc.

 Recovery from chikungunya infection gives life-long immunity, so your fever and pain is not likely to be chikungunya if youve had it before.

Source: World Health Organisation, Centers for Disease Control

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Irrfan Khans new Hollywood film, Inferno, is already getting an early release in India, and now, his face is featured prominently on the films new poster.

Inferno is the third movie adapted from Dan Browns Robert Langdon mystery series. The phenomenal bestsellers have previously been adapted into The Da Vinci Code and Angels & Demons, both starring Tom Hanks as the Harvard symbologist.

For this film, based on the latest Langdon mystery, Hanks reunites with director Ron Howard. Irrfan Khan plays a shadowy character known only as Provost.

Although he hasnt been too prominently featured in the trailer (perhaps in an attempt to generate mystery around his character), this new poster rectifies that problem.

Infernos plot synopsis on IMDb reads: When Robert Langdon wakes up in an Italian hospital with amnesia, he teams up with Dr. Sienna Brooks, and together they must race across Europe against the clock to foil a deadly global plot.

The film arrives in India two weeks before its US debut (October 14, with the US release scheduled for October 28). The film also stars Felicity Jones, Ben Foster, Omar Sy and Sidse Babet Knudsen.

Follow @htshowbiz for more
Three people were killed and more than a dozen injured after clashes between residents of Nayagaon and Peda villages in Bijnor on Friday over accusations of harassment of girls.

According to the police, some girls from Nayagaon told people in their village that boys from Peda harassed them when they went to board a bus for school in Bijnor.

A group of male residents from the village then escorted the girls and beat up a boy named Talib after he was reportedly found harassing one of the girls. Talib, however, called more people from his village who attacked the Nayagaon inhabitants.

The injured boys managed to escape to their village where they narrated the incident. Following this, a group from Nayagaon and a neighbouring village reached Peda armed with guns and wooden staffs and attacked the villagers.

Both the sides exchanged fire and pelted stones at each other.

Read: A riot of rumours: What UP can do to stop communal violence

Ahsan, a Peda resident, died after being hit by a bullet. Two others  Sarfaraz and Hashimuddin  were pronounced dead at the hospital.

At least a dozen people sustained injures. Five of them were sent to Meerut Medical College, and the condition of two of them is said to be critical.

Agitated villagers blocked roads, demanding the immediate arrest of those who indulged in violence.

DIG Moradabad range Omkar Singh rushed to the spot with ADG (law and order) Daljeet Choudhary and other senior officers. Heavy force was deployed in and around the village and officers assured residents that action would be taken against culprits.

In September 2013, three people were killed in Kawal village in Muzaffarnagar in a riot following an incident of harassment. It had also led to violence in Muzaffarnagar and adjoining Shamli district.

Read: For Muzaffarnagar Muslims, it feels like Partition
Jignesh Mevani, the face of the Gujarati dalit agitation, was on Friday detained by state police, moments after he arrived at Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel international airport in Ahmedabad.

Mevani, who has been spearheading the agitation triggered by the Una flogging incident, was reportedly arrested as a preventive measure as Prime Minister Narendra Modi was expected to arrive at the same airport an hour later to begin his two-day Gujarat tour. The tour coincides with his 66th birthday on Saturday.

Mevani was coming from Delhi after addressing a public meeting at Jantar Mantar. Fearing that he might create some problem at felicitation event organized for Modi near airport, he was detained, said Subodh Parmar, his aide and member of Dalit Adhikar Manch.

Read: Dalit protesters postcard to Big B: Come, smell the stink of Gujarat

Hours before, in Delhi, Mevani had announced that a rail-roko agitation would be launched from October 1 in Gujarat, if the government did not comply with their demand for a 5-acre land to be alloted to every dalit family in the state.

Dalits had made this demand at the flag-hoisting ceremony in Una on August 15 at the end of a 10-day march against the alleged atrocities against the group.
As Karnataka continues its legal battle over the Cauvery, the states capitalalmost entirely dependent on the riverwastes half the water it receives, according to an IndiaSpend analysis of water-use data.

The only Indian city that wastes water at a greater rate is Kolkata. The situation in Bengaluru will worsen.

Every Bangalorean8.5 million people live in Indias third most populous cityshould get 150 lt of water per day. But what she gets is 65 lt, the equivalent of four flushes of a toilet. Water is supplied, on average, thrice a week.

Over the next nine years, the citys water demand is predicted to be three times more than supply.

Its population density 13 times higher than Karnatakas average, Bengaluru consumes 50% of Cauvery water reserved for domestic use in Karnataka. As much as 49% of this water supplied is what is called non-revenue water or unaccounted for water, i.e. water lost in distribution, according to the Bengaluru Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) data.

Inequitable supply to different parts of the cityranging from one-third to three times the average per capita daily supplymakes this worse, Krishna Raj, associate professor at the Institute for Social and Economic Change (ISEC), Bengaluru, and author of this 2013 paper on the citys water supply system, told IndiaSpend.

Bengalurus water loss is the second highest among Indian metros: Kolkata leads at 50%. The wastage figure for Mumbai is 18%, New Delhi, 26% and Chennai, 20%. Across the world, cities lose only about 15 to 20% of their supply, said the ISEC study, which pegged Bengalurus losses at 48 per cent three years ago.

Former BWSSB chairman, T M Vijaybhaskar, admitted to a loss of about 46% water at a conference in February 2016. Of 1,400 MLD (million litres per day) of water pumped to the city, 600 MLD goes to waste, he said.

Widespread leaks and theft across Bengaluru

The ISEC paper attributed the wastage to two types of distributional losses: First, damages and leakages in the water supply system and, second, unauthorised water connections.

Water leakages largely take place at distribution mains, service pipes and stand posts and together account for 88.5 per cent of water spillover, the rest being low leakages at main valve, meter joint stop valve, ferrule, air valve and others, the paper said. This huge loss is directly attributed to the water seepage at various stages of supply.

Of the 270 thousand million cubic ft (TMC) of Cauvery water allotted to Karnataka by the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal, Raj estimated that, roughly, about 80% is used for agriculture and industry (down from over 90% in 2007). This leaves about 20% for rural and urban domestic use, of which Bengaluru records the highest demand.

The city receives about 19 TMC of Cauvery water. Recently, the Karnataka state urban development department provisionally raised supply by an additional 10 TMC to meet the needs of 110 villages added to the metropolitan area in 2007. A formal proposal to raise the citys water supply to 30 TMC from the Cauvery basin has been forwarded to the central government.

60% of water supply budget spent on pumping water over 100 km

Sourced from a distance of 100 km, up to a height of 540 m, the BWSSB spends nearly 60% of its budget in pumping water to the Bengaluru metropolitan region. With groundwater reserves overexploited and polluted, and its other two ageing reservoirsthe 120-year-old Heseraghatta and 83-year-old Thippegondanahalli of Cauverys Arkavathi tributaryunreliable, Bengaluru is almost entirely dependent on the disputed river.

The large water losses, which ISEC has recorded for the last five years at least, offset any efforts to augment water supply through various stages of Cauvery river water supply projects. Thus, efforts to enhance per capita water availability to 150 lt per capita per day (LPCD) to meet World Health Organization (WHO) and Central Public Health and Environmental Organisation (CPEEHO) standards remain unfulfilled.

After Stage IV Phase II of the Cauvery Water Supply Scheme (CWSS) was commissioned recently, Bengaluru now receives 1,350 MLD of water daily, said Raj. For the citys population of 8.5 million (Census 2011), this quantity officially raises per capita water availability to 158.82 lt, which is more than sufficient to meet the WHO and CPEEHO standards.

If unaddressed, the situation is only likely to worsen. In nine years, the citys demand (currently 1,575 MLD) is estimated to rise by 71%, while the supply (currently 1,350 MLD) will rise only by a third, thereby tripling the demand-supply gap, according to the ISEC study of water demand and availability.

By 2031, Bengalurus water supply will reach its optimum level (2,070 MLD) and stay there while the citys water demands rise further in the decades thereafter widening the shortfall progressively, showed BWSSB data.

Whenever the demand for water exceeds supply, urban water utilities quickly design water supply strategies, giving little importance to demand control or management. Failure of water supply authorities to incorporate demand-side factors in their policies leads to system-collapse or institutional failure, the 2013 paper said.

As per the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal award, Karnataka receives lesser water per sq km1 TMC of water is distributed over 134 sq km here, whereas in Tamil Nadu, it is supplied to 116 sq km, Raj said. Add to this, there is inefficiency and inequity in Bengalurus supply which must be addressed.

The story was first published in the IndiaSpend.
The Bihar government moved the Supreme Court on Friday challenging a Patna high court order granting bail to former parliamentarian Mohammad Shahabuddin, shortly after the top court agreed to hear a similar plea by a Siwan resident.

The former Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) MP walked out of jail last week after being incarcerated for 11 years in connection with dozens of cases, including the murder of two brothers, whose father has challenged the bail to the political strongman known as the Bahubali of Bihar.

The RJD is part of the Nitish Kumar-led alliance government which has faced flak from the opposition BJP and activists for the release of the controversial leader from Siwan.

I do not know what the state government has done. We will see, RJD chief Lalu Prasad said.

After his release, Shahabuddin had termed Nitish Kumar a chief minister of circumstance, triggering a political slugfest between RJD and JD(U).

Read | Crackers, slogans, cavalcade: Shahabuddins unruly homecoming under lens

In its appeal, the Bihar government told the apex court that the state was not heard before he was granted bail. No report was called for by the trial court as well, it pointed out.

Lawyer and activist Prashant Bhushan moved the petition filed by 69-year-old Chandrakeshwar Prasad before a bench headed by chief justice TS Thakur. Bhushan requested for an urgent hearing, which the bench acceded to.

Shahabuddin is accused of murdering Prasads three sons  two in 2004 and one in 2014. The RJD leader was convicted in the 2004 twin murder case. But the trial in the 2014 incident is yet to start and citing the delay the HC granted him bail.

Prasad said the HC did not take note of the fact that Shahabuddin is a history sheeter and dreaded criminal who has absolutely no regard for the law. It was a cryptic order and suffered from total non-application of mind.

Read | Scenes of 2003 surrender come alive as Shahabuddin walks out on bail

The appeal said, the RJD leader has been booked in 58 criminal cases of which in at least 8 he has been convicted. He has been sentenced to life in two cases.

According to Prasad, a surprise raid was conducted at the Siwan jail after the death of a Hindustan journalist in which the officials found 40 phones with fake SIM cards. They also learnt that many visitors included politicians met Shahabuddin inside the jail without permission.

The criminal-turned-politician was elected for four successive terms to the Lok Sabha from Siwan between 1996 and 2008 but was debarred from contesting polls in 2009 following his conviction in one of the many criminal cases.

Also read | The making of Mohammad Shahabuddin, a mix of crime, manipulation & politics

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Senior DMK leader MK Stalin was taken into preventive custody on Friday after staging a rail roko at the Egmore Railway station in Chennai. Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi also courted arrest as the entire state witnessed a shutdown over the ongoing Cauvery water-sharing dispute and the violence against Tamils living in Karnataka.

Chennai: DMK workers stage protest over #Cauvery water dispute row, DMK leader Kanimozhi also present pic.twitter.com/8B4qNYE2Fh  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

The bandh, which will last from dawn to dusk, was called by all political parties and their affiliated trade organisations, barring the ruling AIADMK and its allies.

More than 12,000 policemen have been deployed across Chennai to maintain order. Police stated that no attempt to disrupt public peace or prevent the free movement of transportation would be tolerated.

The senior DMK leaders, who launched their protest rallies in Egmore station and on Anna Salai, are currently courting arrest.

MDMK leader Vaiko and his party cadre were arrested earlier in Tiruchy after attempting to stage a rail roko.

The Supreme Court on Thursday slammed both the governments of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu for failing to prevent violence over its order, and stated that its verdict had to be complied with. But the dispute has seen large-scale violence across Karnataka  especially in Bengaluru  where rampaging mobs have torched vehicles and damages property worth crores.

Read | Cauvery cocktail: River dispute exposes Karnataka, Tamil Nadu fault lines

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A 21-year-old man died in Chennai on Friday after immolating himself during protests against Karnataka over the Cauvery water-sharing dispute.

Vignesh, a member of the fringe group Naam Tamilar Katchi doused himself with petrol and set himself on fire during a rally in Chennai on Thursday against alleged violence faced by Tamils in Karnataka.

He was admitted to the Kilpauk Government Hospital on Thursday night with 93% burn wounds, and died on Friday morning. He hailed from Mannargudi in Tiruvarur district.

Vignesh had, in suicide note later, written about the imposition of Sanskrit in Tamil Nadu, as well as the ongoing Cauvery dispute. The protest was led by party leader N Seeman.

The death comes on a day when the state is observing a day-long bandh that has seen the detention of top leaders of the opposition DMK but otherwise no violence.

Karnataka and Tamil Nadu are locked in a bruising dispute over the quantum of Cauvery waters to be shared. The fight has seen large-scale violence across Karnataka  especially in Bengaluru  where rampaging mobs have torched vehicles and damages property worth crores.

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Hundreds of slogan-shouting supporters of Samajwadi Party leader Shivpal Yadav gathered outside his residence in Lucknow on Friday morning, hours after his dramatic resignation from the state government dealt a blow to Uttar Pradeshs ruling party ahead of assembly polls next year.

Former minister Gayatri Prasad Prajapati  whose sacking by Shivpals nephew and UP chief minister Akhilesh Yadav on Monday is said to have triggered the crisis -- was also seen entering the ministers residence. The two later came out to greet Shivpals supporters.

Addressing his supporters, Shivpal asked them to march to the party headquarters.

Meanwhile, Shivpals son, Aditya Yadav, said that his father is talking party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav and Akhilesh on the phone.

Supporters of Shivpal Yadav gathered outside his official residence early Friday morning and demand his restoration as state party chief and the portfolios taken away from him. (Pankaj Jaiswal/HT Photo)

Restore Shivpals honoursreturn all departments to him---return the SP state presidentship, the supporters chanted after spending most of the night outside Shivpals residence.

The slogans came after an eventful night that saw Shivpal step out of his residence after midnight to assure his supporters and ask them to go home and sleep. Na soyenge, na soney denge (Wont sleep, will give sleepless night to others) the crowd chanted.

Shivpal Yadav  who held a clutch of important departments -- quit the government as well as his position as chief of Samajwadi Partys state unit on Thursday, an attempt to distance himself from Akhilesh with whom he has been involved in a bruising fight for influence.

Sources said Akhilesh had rejected Shivpals resignation from the cabinet, but the party had made no decision yet on his offer to quit as its state chief.

The late-night development came after a day of separate meetings between party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav, his brother Shivpal and Akhilesh raised hopes of a truce between the uncle and nephew.

Shivpal resigned from his state party presidentship and the UP government late on Thursday (HT Photo)

Mulayam met with the two separately to ask them to end their feuding. A meeting between the uncle and nephew lasted barely 15 minutes at the latters office.

Two days ago, Akhilesh stripped Shivpal of three top departments after the chief minister himself was removed as the partys state chief and Shivpal given the post. Their differences, a badly kept secret for years, had become public over the past months.

The partys Rajya Sabha MP, Amar Singhs alleged role in the crisis also figured in discussions during the day, with Akhileshs second uncle Ramgopal Yadav and party leader Naresh Agarwal hinting at his interference in party matters.

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A man whose three sons were allegedly murdered by Mohammad Shahabuddin filed an appeal in the Supreme Court challenging the Patna high courts order granting bail to the former RJD MP.

We will be challenging how bail has been given to a person who is a history-sheeter. Facts are being verified about the number of cases etc. and convictions that have taken place against him, advocate Rohit Singh from Prashant Bhushans office had said earlier. Bhushans office filed the appeal on behalf of Chandrakeshwar Prasad.

Shahabuddin, who was granted bail on September 7, was released from Bhagalpur jail on September 10. He was in jail for 11 years in connection with several cases against him. The controversial RJD strongman was granted bail in the 2014 murder case of Rajiv Roshan, son of Chandrakeshwar Prasad.

Roshan was a witness to the murder of his brothers Gitish and Satish, who were drenched with acid in 2004. The trial for Roshans murder is yet to begin.

Meanwhile, facing flak over Shahabuddins release from jail, the Bihar government is also reportedly considering filing an appeal in the Supreme Court against the bail granted to him.

This has been an established process followed by Nitish Kumar government in the past 11 years that if the state is not satisfied with the bail of somebody, it goes in appeal in higher court, JD(U) spokesperson Ajay Alok said, adding that it has been done in the past and would be followed in the present case of Shahabuddin too.
The Congress is out of power in Arunachal Pradesh again after all but one of its MLAs joined a regional party on Friday, barely two months after the partys government was restored by the Supreme Court.

The fresh crisis for the Congress could potentially lead to another prolonged turmoil in one of the most politically fickle states in the country that has seen chief ministers play musical chairs and legislators hop from one party to another over the years.

Forty-three MLAs led by chief minister Pema Khandu joined the Peoples Party of Arunachal (PPA), leaving the Congress with only former chief minister Nabam Tuki. The 43 includes assembly speaker TN Thongdok.

Read: Arunachal crisis timeline: Kalikho Puls expulsion to restoration of Cong govt

The Congress, which accused the BJP of engineering the defection, described the PPA as the

illegitimate child of the saffron party.

Sadly the architects of extinguishing and murdering the very spirit of democracy and constitutionalism, are PM Modi and (BJP chief) Amit Shah who rode to power on the promise of cooperative federalism, Congress spokespersonRandeep Singh Surjewala said in Delhi.

Union minister Kiren Rijiju, who is from Arunachal Pradesh and allegedly behind the power struggle there, countered the charge.

What can we do if MLAs do not want to stay with Congress? The Supreme Court had reinstated the Congress government but it is ultimately the decision of the MLAs, Rijiju said.

In December, more than 30 Congress rebels backed by the BJP had sided with the PPA, leading to formation of a government of the regional party led by Kalikho Pul.

Read: Its a political potboiler in Arunachal as BJP, Cong fight over MLAs

It was subsequently struck down by the Supreme Court and the Congress had managed to wean back the rebel MLAs with Khandu at the helm.

Deputy chief minister Chowna Mein said the new government is likely to be installed within the next few days, deputy chief minister Chowna Mein said.

We joined PPA because we want friendly relationship with the Centre to ensure better flow of funds. We have a huge liability and it is important for us to be with the central government, Khandu said in Itanagar.

While the PPA has 43 MLAs in the 60-member assembly, the BJP is the second largest group with 11 legislators. Two independent MLAs also backed the new front and two Congress MLAs resigned last year under controversial circumstances.

One seat is vacant after Pul committed suicide on August 9.

The fresh developments also came a few days after the Centre sacked governor Jyoti Prasad Rajkhowa, who had summoned a controversial assembly session that ultimately led to imposition of Presidents Rule on January 26. The Congress had then accused the central government of using Rajkhowa to topple the Tuki government.

This is a homecoming for our PPA leaders after a temporary self-exile, Kameng Ringu, chairman of PPA, told Hindustan Times, denying the BJP had a hand in driving the switch.

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The government has refused to divulge information about riot control weapons and ammunition used to disperse protesters, saying this was sensitive defence information and making it public could jeopardise the countrys security.

A Delhi-based rights activist Venkatesh Nayak had filed a right to information (RTI) request asking the Ordnance Factory Board for details on the sale of weapons and ammunition, particularly pellet shotguns that have injured thousands of protesters in Kashmir.

Nayak also wanted access to the studies that the state-run arms manufacturer had conducted on the efficacy of these guns before putting them up for sale, as well as police forces that had bought them.

The government had told the Delhi high court last month that the central reserve police force (CRPF) deployed in J&K had used 8,650 tear-gas shells, 1750 rubber bullets and 3,665 pellet cartridges between July 8 and 11 August 11.

When the government can disclose the exact number of ammunition used to quell violent protests, why can the price, quantum of sale and efficacy reports of the shotgun be shared with people? Nayak asked.

The efficacy reports would have indicated if the ordnance factories that make the shotguns consider them as a riot control weapon if used with metal pellets. The ordnance factory boards website suggests the shotgun could be used for this purpose only if used with rubber pellets. CRPF officials have said they used metal pellets, with or without a rubber coating.

The activist said there was overwhelming public interest in putting out information on the evaluation reports of riot control weapons, given how their use has led to serious injuries on a large scale.

It was on Nayaks RTI request that the government had earlier released the 2010 report of the panel that recommended non-lethal weapons for crowd control measures as well as the standard operating procedures to be followed by the police.

The documents show that the home ministry panel had not considered pellet shotguns a non-lethal weapon for crowd control.

The RTI disclosure had revealed that the pellet shotguns introduced by the home ministry in 2010 did not have the support of the panel on non-lethal weapons.

A similar panel constituted after protesters were killed, and maimed in security crackdowns in Kashmir this year has, however, backed its use in rare cases.

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India and Pakistan are gearing up for a showdown over Kashmir at the UN General Assembly later this month, with foreign minister Sushma Swaraj expected to give a befitting response to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharifs plan to focus on the unrest in the state.

Sharif will address the world body on September 21 and Swaraj, who will lead the Indian delegation as Prime Minister Narendra Modi has decided to skip this years meeting, will take the podium on September 26.

Indian officials said Swaraj will give a befitting reply to any charges that Sharif makes.

The Pakistan government has upped the ante on Kashmir in recent weeks, sending envoys to world capitals to raise rights violations during the unrest triggered by the killing of militant commander Burhan Wani. Pakistans Foreign Office made it clear on Friday there would be no let-up when Sharif makes his address.

Sharif, the Foreign Office said in a statement, will specifically focus on the current situation, particularly the continuing grave violations of human rights by Indian troops in Kashmir. He will also call on the world community and the UN to live up to their promise of the right to self-determination of the Kashmiri people.

Sharif held wide-ranging consultations with leaders of Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) and the PoK chapter of the All Party Hurriyat Conference on Friday. He consulted PoK president Masood Khan and prime minister Sardar Farooq Haider along with federal ministers Pervaiz Rashid and Barjees Tahir and his special assistant Tariq Fatemi.

Indian sources said Pakistan was readying to make provocative statements at the UN that will be effectively countered.

The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) will hold its annual coordination meeting of foreign ministers and a meeting of its contact group on Jammu and Kashmir on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. This would again see the two countries making sharp exchanges. The OIC has invited the chairman of the moderate Hurriyat faction, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, for the meeting of the contact group.

This will be the second year in a row that Swaraj will counter Pakistans charges on Kashmir at the UN General Assembly. Though Modi attended last years meet, he only addressed the gathering on sustainable development goals.

Though India and Pakistan often rake up the Kashmir issue at the General Assembly, Indias raising of the human rights situation in Pakistans Balochistan province, which borders Afghanistan and Iran, has added a new dimension to the sparring.

On September 14, India made a reference to Balochistan at the UN Human Rights Council for the first time. There are also reports that Baloch leader Brahumdagh Bugti, living in self-exile in Switzerland, could get asylum in India. There was, however, no official word on this issue.

Read: India sends another letter to Pak, says talks only about terrorism, PoK

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After a chill in ties over the past year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi sought to bring India-Nepal relations back on track by welcoming Nepals new Prime Minister and Maoist leader Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda as a catalytic force for peace and terming his visit a significant day in the history of the relationship.

The Nepali leader reciprocated by lauding Indias successes, expressing the desire to learn from it and saying the two countries were friends and were bound to remain friends.

But amid the warmth and affirmation of the unique nature of the relationship, including the open border, India maintained its message on the constitution. This had provoked protests by the Madhesi people across the southern plains and disrupted bilateral ties in late 2015.

Top-level Nepali sources told HT that Kathmandu wanted Delhi to welcome the constitution  India had only noted its promulgation. But in the absence of a firm constitutional amendment and continued Madhesi dissatisfaction, India did not think it could go so far.

Read: No link between constitution amendment and visit to India: Nepal PM

But Delhi recognised the Prachanda governments public commitment and assurances that it would address the issues through an amendment.

Modi pinned hopes that under Prachandas wise leadership, Nepals constitution would get successfully implemented through inclusive dialogue and accommodating the aspirations of all sections of your diverse society. Prachanda responded, You are aware that my government has made serious effort to bring everyone on board as we enter phase of constitution implementation in the interest of all segments of Nepali society.

SD Muni, JNU professor emeritus and a Nepal expert, said: Maoists and Nepali Congress together brought changes in Nepals political system in 2006, including the republic. India is hoping that the same coalition will address constitutional issues.

This will, however, not be easy. For one, the ruling parties will have to draft an amendment acceptable to the Madhesi parties. To get it passed requires a two-thirds majority of Parliament. Prachandas predecessor KP Olis party UML has already opposed the amendment.

Read: India visit aimed at building trust and confidence: Prachanda

During the visit, the two countries also signed three agreements  on Tarai roads, operationalising lines of credit on development projects and earthquake reconstruction. Given the perception that many projects committed by India have faced execution challenges, the two countries also agreed to have joint monitoring mechanisms to make them more efficient.

Prachanda also had separate meetings with President Pranab Mukherjee, external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj, finance minister Arun Jaitley and BJP general secretary Ram Madhav. He met Opposition figures such as Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar, Congress leader Karan Singh and NCP MP DP Tripathi.

Modi gifted Prachanda a coffee table book  A Day in the Life of Kathmandu  by Jawed Ashraf, Indias High Commissioner-designate to Singapore, who has earlier served in Nepal. The book, containing images of Nepals capital from dawn to dusk taken over the past decade, is dedicated to the victims of the Nepal earthquake.

Read: How Nepal PM Prachandas relationship with India turned with the tide

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The death toll from the violence in Kashmir rose to 85 with a youth succumbing to his injuries on Friday, leading to curfew being reimposed in many parts of the Valley.

Normal life remained paralysed for a 70th consecutive day after the killing of militant commander Burhan Wani in July sparked protests and led to locals clashing with security forces.

Shops, business establishments and petrol pumps remained shut while public transport was off the roads.

Basit Mukhtar, who was injured by a tear gas shell on September 5 in south Kashmirs Pulwama, died at a hospital on Friday, a day after 25-year-old Rasiq Ahmad Bhat died from his injuries sustained on the same day as Mukhtar.

Read | 2 killed as clashes break out in Kashmir after morning prayers for Eid

Separatists on Friday issued their new weekly protest calendar, calling for a harsher movement than the previous weeks, saying there would be no relaxation in the protest shut down.

In the previous weeks, the separatists had allowed markets to open from 6 pm to 6 am.

The Separatists call comes a day after the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)s Lok Sabha member, Tariq Hamid Karra, resigned from all party posts.

The party didnt take too kindly of Karras decision, accusing him a back-stabbing them.

He has back-stabbed the party at a time when there was a need to strengthen the government and the Chief Minister, education minister and government spokesman Naeem Akhtar told PTI.

Read | Its yesterday again: Kashmirs old wounds need political healing

He said Karra, who quit over the governments handling of the ongoing unrest and PDPs alliance with the BJP, had been elected on our agenda and our ticket and hence should not have taken such a decision.

The BJP-led NDA recently sent an all-party delegation that attempted to speak to the separatists, but were met with closed doors.

(With agency inputs)

Also read | Narendra Modi is implementing the Doval doctrine in Kashmir

Also read | The Kashmir manifesto: Delhis policy playbook in the Valley
Police detained prominent Kashmiri activist Khurram Pervez in Srinagar early on Friday morning, his family alleged, a day after he was stopped from boarding a flight to Geneva.

Sources said police visited Pervez at his Srinagar residence on Thursday night around 8pm and asked him to come to the local station for questioning. He reportedly refused, saying he would come to the station at 10am on Friday, following which the police team left the premises.

But another team of the police returned to his house at 12.30 am on Friday, sources added, and insisted he come to the police station to meet the superintendent of police. He drove to the station in his car and was detained by the station house officer at Kothibagh station.

There was no formal arrest or warning given, his family told HT. Police couldnt be reached immediately for a comment.

The dramatic arrest came a day after Delhi airport authorities barred him from flying out of India despite holding a valid visa, a move his group described as an attempt to deny human rights in the violence-hit region.

Pervez, coordinator of the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS), was on his way to Switzerland when immigration officials detained and blocked him from boarding his flight at Delhis Indira Gandhi International airport.

He was scheduled to attend a UN Human Rights Council session from September 14-24 in Geneva, where he was expected to brief officials on the ongoing situation in Kashmir -- an area that has been reeling from almost daily protests and violence.

Authorities told (Pervez) that due to orders from the Intelligence Bureau, he cannot travel to Geneva.

It appears that Khurram Parvez is not being allowed to travel because he has been highlighting violations of human rights, Parvez Imroz, president of JKCCS, said in a statement.

The Indian State seeks to isolate the people of... Kashmir at all costs, and disallowing human rights activists access to the UN is a part of this attempt to isolate and ensure impunity for violence and denial of human rights.

85 people have been killed in protest since July 8 when a militant leader was shot dead by security forces, making it one of the deadliest bouts of violence in decades. Two more youth have died in the last 24 hours. Both were injured in firing on September 5.

Violence erupted in the state following the July 8 killing of Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani. Since then thousands have been injured in widespread clashes with security forces across the state.

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A Centre-appointed committee on Friday came down heavily on the Aam Aadmi Party government in Delhi, saying it had used state money on advertisements to project chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and his party in violation of Supreme Court guidelines, and asked the party to reimburse it.

The three-member committee, headed by former Chief Election Commissioner BB Tandon, had been constituted by the information and broadcast ministry on directions of the top court to address issues related to content regulation in government advertising.

The committee had received a complaint from Congress leader Ajay Maken accusing the AAP government of splurging public money on advertisements.

Read | Mufflerman Kejriwal odd-even ad irks BJP, Cong

In its order, the committee concluded that the Government of NCT of Delhi has violated guidelines issued by the Honble Supreme Court of India in six of the nine areas listed by the complainant.

The violations include outstation advertisements, false/misleading advertisements, advertisements for self- glorification and to target political opponents, advertisements against media, advertisements mentioning the party in power by name and also advertisements issued on incidents occurring in other states.

The panel, which also comprised adman Piyush Pandey and journalist Rajat Sharma, also said that AAP should be made to reimburse the expenditure, an assessment of which should be made by the Delhi government.

Also read | Kejriwal spending Delhi taxpayers money on ads in Punjab: Capt

Also read | Kejriwal accuses Modi of taking credit for AAP govts achievements
Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav on Friday forged an uneasy truce between his chief minister son Akhilesh and brother Shivpal to end a damaging power struggle in the party five months ahead of the state election.

The young chief minister, however, looks determined to come out of his powerful fathers shadow and have a say in the poll strategy, which is decided by Mulayam -- or Netaji as he is better known as -- and his brothers since the partys inception in 1992.

I am ready to return party posts and even portfolios but I must have the power to distribute tickets because the forthcoming poll is after all a test for me and my party, Akhilesh told India TV during an election programme.

The CM agreed to comply with Netajis order to take back Gayatri Prasad Prajapati in the cabinet and reject Shivpals resignation from the party and the government.

He also took a dig at Amar Singh, a close aide of his father who returned to the party recently and was rewarded with a Rajya Sabha berth. I will no longer refer to that outsider as uncle, Akhilesh said in an obvious reference to Singh.

Singh is considered close to Shivpal and his return was opposed by Akhilesh and other party leaders.

Akhilesh is the CM face and he would like to have the final say in the selection of party candidates. Sources said he didnt want to repeat at least 55 members of the legislative assembly.

He is likely to face stiff resistance from Shivpal, who said at the same TV programme that Mulayam wanted him to continue as the UP party chief.

Ticket distribution will be done by Netaji, said Shivpal, who doesnt seem ready to cede any ground to his nephew, which could lead to fresh round of infighting.

Mulayam Singh Yadav held a meeting at his residence to thrash out a solution on the ongoing power struggle between his son and chief minister Akhilesh Yadav and his younger brother Shivpal Singh Yadav. (Sonu Mehta/HT Photo)

The belligerent words from Shivpal and Akhilesh came hours after Mulayam, who flew down to Lucknow on Thursday, sat down his feuding son and brother to end the family war that threatens to tear apart the party.

The simmering differences between the two came out in the open when Akhilesh stripped Shivpal of three important portfolios after Mulayam removed him as the UP party chief and named his brother to the position.

Akhileshs decision to sack Prajapati and another minister Rajkishore Singh, both facing corruption charges, and replace the states top official had not gone down well with Shivpal.

Shivpal, however, looked isolated on Friday. Most of the ministers stayed away from him and Ram Gopal Yadav, Mulayams cousin, confidante and an influential figure in SP, chose to side with the chief minister.

Mulayam declared at the party office in Lucknow that there was no rift and the party would not split till he was around.

Read: No fight in Samajwadi Party; Akhilesh wont defy me, says Mulayam
China has invited scientists from Pakistan, Germany, France, Italy, Russia and the EU to watch the launch of its next months manned space flight to send two astronauts to join a space lab which has been put into orbit, a media report said on Friday.

The scientists were invited to watch the launch of Shenzhou 11 capsule from Inner Mongolia next month, Hong Kong- based South China Morning Post reported.

The capsule will be propelled by a Long March 2F rocket similar to the one which put the experimental space lab Tiangong-2 into orbit on Thursday without a hitch.

The Tiangong-2 launch was telecast live on state TV.

Read: China successfully launches second experimental space lab

China has been helping Pakistans space programme. It has launched Pakistans communication Satellite PAKSAT-1R in 2011.

Recent reports from Islamabad said the two countries had signed an agreement to launch a remote sensing satellite in 2018 to monitor the USD 46 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CEPC).

The invitation to scientists from Germany, France, Russia and EU showed Chinas growing confidence in its space programme, a commentator on state-run CCTV said last night.

The two astronauts will spend 30 days in orbit on the lab, twice as long as the last crew on Tiangong 1, and conduct over 40 studies.

The experimental space lab was part of efforts by China to build its manned space station by 2022, the time when US-led International Space Station is expected to go out of service.

Also analysts say that the heavy rocket being used to lift large payload like the space lab also demonstrates Chinas growing prowess in missile and rocket technology.

Read: China plans to launch over 20 space missions this year

Meanwhile state-run Xinhua news agency reported today that Chinas space lab Tiangong-2 may serve for over five years and coexist with Chinas first space station expected to crash to earth next year.

With a designed life of two years, Tiangong-2 was originally built as a backup to Tiangong-1, which completed its mission in March, Zhu Congpeng, chief designer of Tiangong-2 told Xinhua.

But we expect Tiangong-2 to serve for more than five years given the introduction of an in-orbit propellant technique for the first time, Zhu said.

In April 2017, Chinas first cargo spaceship Tianzhou-1 will be sent into orbit to dock with the space lab, providing fuel and other supplies.

If the fuel-supply experiment goes well, China will then become the second country after Russia to master the in-orbit propellant technique, Zhu said.

While in space, the 8.6-tonne space lab will maneuver itself into orbit about 393 kms above the Earths surface.

As it is higher than past manned space missions, which were conducted at 343 kms the Tiangong-2 will be more cost-effective and have a longer lifespan, Zhu said.

Though it looks similar to Tiangong-1, Tiangong-2s interior living quarters and life support system have been improved to allow longer astronaut stays.
The report of seven biryani samples collected from Mewat has confirmed the presence of meat of cattle species in each of them, but said the document is not for vetro-legal purposes, holding the police back from filing a case.

Mewat police officials were seeking a second opinion from the lab authorities on whether meat of cattle species specifically meant beef, official sources said. The police will also seek clarity about the vetro-legal status of the report, according to a senior government official.

The Haryana Gauvansh Sanrakshan and Gausamvardhan Act 2015 defines beef as flesh of cow in any form including contained in sealed containers and imported in the state. The Act makes cow slaughter punishable with rigorous imprisonment up to 10 years and a fine of Rs 1 lakh.

Read | Haryana govt collects biryani samples from Mewat, sends to lab to detect beef

The samples, collected in first week of this month from Mundaka village of Ferozepur Jhirka tehsil, were tested at Lala Lajpat Rai University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Hisar.

HT accessed, through government sources, contents of the one-page report that is yet to be made public.

A report mentioning not for vetro-legal purposes or not for medico-legal purposes cannot be used in legal process and has no standing in the court of law. It also means the medical staff who conducted test will not come to the court for evidence.

A few social organisations had also raised questions over the validity of the report for vetro-legal purposes.

Mewat SP Kuldeep Singh denied having received the report.

Read | Chicken biryani? No thanks: Mewat sellers in a fix after crackdown on beef

A senior scientist at the university said cattle is specifically considered cow species in India. Our lab tests meat samples using the q-PCR (real-time polymerase chain reaction) technique that has been parented by the university he added.

Haryana Gau Seva Aayog chairman Bhani Ram Mangla said the samples were collected following complaints of use of beef in the dish. The government will decide its action on the report soon, he added.

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At least a dozen Pakistani doctors holding long-term visas and work permits have resigned after the arrest of a Pakistani doctor for allegedly raping a patient inside the ICU of Apollo Hospital.

Reports in local media suggested that they were asked to put in the papers following the rape complaint last week against Dr Rajesh Chauhan, a Pakistani national.

All doctors of Pakistani nationality have resigned. I cannot comment further as other matters are sub-judice, said the spokesperson of Apollo Hospital, Sandip Joshi.

The hospital is located in Bhat village of Gandhinagar district -- around 10 km from Ahmedabad city.

On September 8, Gandhinagar police arrested Dr Chauhan and a ward boy named Chandrakant Vankar for allegedly raping a 19-year-old girl who was being treated for dengue.

Read: Doctor among two arrested for raping dengue patient at Gandhinagar hospital

Investigation revealed that Dr Chauhan had flouted his visa conditions by accepting a job outside Ahmedabad city.

Gandhinagar superintendent of police Verendra Singh said police will seek information from the hospital about other Pakistani doctors on its staff too.

Chauhan was not supposed to work outside Ahmedabad, but he accepted job in that hospital. Now as the issue has come up, we will seek information from hospital to find out (other) such doctors, said Singh.

The special branch of Ahmedabad city police would also look into the matter.

As per the rules, a person who has been granted work permit along with Long Term Visa (LTV) must live and work within the geographical limits mentioned in the permit. We will probe the issue in detail after we get a report on Dr Chauhan from Gandhinagar police, said the joint commissioner of police, special branch, R V Jotangiya.
Jan Adhikar Party (JAP) chief and Lok Sabha legislator from Bihar Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav has called for the social boycott of doctors charging arbitrary fee at their private clinics and nursing homes.

Doctors are worse than jallads (hangmen), he said in Bhagalpur on Thursday.

A hangman charges money for his job when the person on death row is still alive. But the doctors realise money from the bereaved family even after the death of a patient, Yadav said.

Yadav, who represents Madhepura constituency of north Bihar in the Lok Sabha, was in the city to support the Bhagalpur bandh call given by his party to protest rising incidents of crime, lapses in the distribution of flood relief, doctors fleecing patients in private clinics and uncontrolled activity of the education mafia.

His wife Ranjeet Ranjan is the Congress MP from Saharsa.

Throw rotten eggs at government doctors found running private clinics and lock the nursing homes if a patient dies there due to the negligence of medical practitioners, he said while calling for more stringent provisions in the clinical establishment act.

While admitting that there could be a few doctors dedicated to the service of humanity, he said it was difficult to segregate them when the majority in the profession is insensitive to problems of a common man.

The issue of doctors indulging in unethical practices would remain high on the agenda of JAP, Yadav added.

Yadav and his parliamentarian wife have held many jan adalats (peoples courts) against doctors for allegedly charging an exorbitant fee and fleecing poor patients in many north Bihar districts.

In 2014, he prescribed fees for doctors in his constituency in accordance with their qualifications. He also threatened to launch an agitation as well as legal action in case they did not adhere.

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Tamil Nadu is witnessing a one-day bandh on Friday after various farmers associations and trade organisations called for a statewide shutdown to protest against the ongoing violence against Tamils in Karnataka over the Cauvery issue.

The principal opposition party, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), along with other parties, declared its support for the bandh, effective from 6am to 6pm.

DMK president M Karunanidhi issued a statement urging all members of the party to support the bandh.

Members of the Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam (DMDK), the party of Vijayakanth, will hold a hunger strike at the party headquarters in Chennai, while Thol Thirumavalans Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK) will participate in a rail blockade.

Read | Cauvery cocktail: River dispute exposes Karnataka, Tamil Nadu fault lines

Petrol bunks, schools, private milk distributors and many grocery shops will remain closed. The Tamil Nadu Petroleum Dealers Association said nearly 4,600 petrol bunks will be affected.

While more than 1.5 lakh private milk distributers have also decided to close shutters, Aavin Milk will be available at licensed booths around the state.

Chennais main vegetable and produce market in Koyambedu will be closed, along with 3,500 smaller grocery shops.

Nearly 3 lakh lorries will also keep off the roads. In a day, nearly 35,000 lorries ply between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, said Kumara Samy, president of State Lorry Owners Federation, Tamil Nadu. The federation has also demanded compensation for losses caused during the ongoing dispute.

Government buses will still operate on Friday.

The bandh is a response to the violence in Karnataka which targeted Tamils after the Supreme Court ordered the release of 15,000 cusecs of water from the Cauvery to Tamil Nadu on September 5. The court reduced the amount to 12,000 cusecs on Monday, but extended the period of release till September 20.

Karnatakas capital Bengaluru saw riots erupt with buses being burned and public property being vandalised. There was violence even in Mandya and Mysore. Dozens of vehicles with Tamil Nadu registration numbers were torched and shops owned by Tamilians were attacked.

Read | Karnataka accepts SC order on Cauvery water sharing, 2 dead as tension simmers

Across the border, there were a few reported incidents of violence carried out by fringe Tamil groups, including the attack on a popular hotel in Chennai.

On Monday evening, Section 144 was imposed across Bengaluru, Pandavapura and all four dam sites as violence intensified. It was lifted on Wednesday in 16 police station limits of Bengaluru, albeit with prohibitory orders still in place.

Youth attempts self-immolation in protest

Meanwhile, a 25-year-old attempted to self-immolate himself in Chennai on Thursday in protest against Karnataka.

Identified as Vignesh, a member of Naam Tamizhar Katchi founded by film director Seeman, the man is said to be in critical condition.

The party was holding a rally here to protect Tamil Nadus rights over Cauvery river water when Vignesh poured kerosene and lit himself. Though the fire was doused, he suffered severe burn injuries and was taken to a government hospital.

For full coverage click here

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The family of AN Ashwath is inconsolable. After the debt-ridden farmer of Mandya in Karnataka killed himself some 11 days ago, their future looks bleaker.

We are doomed. We may have to sell the fields to repay the loans and become labourers, Ashwaths brother Chetan says. The farmers young widow, Abhilasha, is even unable to speak.

The sombre mood at Ashwaths home is mirrored across the region, considered the states sugar belt. Inadequate rains resulting in successive droughts have farmers living on either side of a glittering highway connecting Bengaluru with Mysore worried. The swanky hotels and car showrooms barely hide their gloom.

Many are nervous that the situation could get worse following the Supreme Court decree to Karnataka to release 12,000 cusecs of precious Cauvery river water to neighbouring Tamil Nadu over the next few days. Our lands are already parched. They will now go bone dry, points out an agitating farmer.

The violence that Bengaluru witnessed earlier this week over the Cauvery water-sharing dispute has put ties between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu under renewed strain. But nowhere is the tension more pronounced than in Mandya, the region Karnataka farmers organisations say will be the worst hit following the arbitration.

More than 150 farmers are believed to have killed themselves in Mandya in the last one-and-a-half years. Now as water is going to Tamil Nadu, more farmers may die, says Yearaganhalli Ramasheshayya, state secretary of Karnataka Rajya Rytu Sangha. Both the central and state governments are starving farmers to death, alleges Konasala Narasaraju, another farmers leader.

Ninety-two-year old G Madhe Gowda (in the centre) is on a dharna over the Cauvery water issue. Farmers of Karnatakas Mandya region claim they will be the worst-hit by the SC order to Karnataka to release 12,000 cusecs of Cauvery river water to neighbouring Tamil Nadu over the next few days. (KV Lakshmana / HT Photo )

Mandya hasnt seen any violence yet, but the mood is unmistakably restive. Many are claiming the farmer deaths were not suicides, but plain murder. Cauvery nammadu, nammadu (Cauvery is ours) is also a refrain that is increasingly being heard.

Do not test our patience and do not provoke us into doing something we do not want, warns Ramasheshayya. If water continues to flow after September 20, we will stop paying taxes, electricity bills and even jump into Cauvery river to stop the release of water, he says.

Ninety-two-year old G Made Gowda, the president of Cauvery Hitarakshana Samithi, is highly regarded locally for his calm advice. But the nonagenarian has also been sitting on a dharna over the Cauvery issue, saying the disobedience and non-cooperation threatened was justified.

Farmers crowding around him readily agreed. Ayyo, Ayyayyo, Anyayam, Anyayam (injustice, injustice), they shouted. Jayalalithaa ke dhikkara (Jayalalithaa down down and Beke, beke Nyayam beku (give us justice) were the other full-throated slogans raised.

Back at Ashwaths family home, the problems faced by his family are more pressing. As they huddled together to perform his 11th day rituals, they also pondered over how to fend off money lenders likely to show up soon for the Rs 8 lakh that Ashwath had borrowed. We are drowning in our misery, laments a relative.

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Twelve days, 150 men and a job well done. Preparing thousands of land deeds and hundreds of cheques to Singur farmers in a few days notice was a herculean task. But thanks to the officers and staff of Hooghly district land and land reforms and land acquisition department, the job looked easy.

My wife was very angry when I told her that I could not take her for puja shopping. But when I saw chief minister Mamata Banerjee handing over the cheques and land papers among the farmers, I felt that all the sacrifice I made was worth it, an officer of the land reforms department told HT on Thursday.

Read: Mamata returns land to Singur farmers, offers plot elsewhere for auto unit

The officer was part of the team that toiled 24x7 since September 2 to ensure that all farmers got back their land.

My bosses told me to ensure that all land papers and cheques are ready by September 14, he said.

On August 31, the Supreme Court had quashed the erstwhile Left Front governments acquisition of land for the Tata Nano factory in Singur and ordered that the plots be returned to the farmers within 12 weeks. A day after the top court verdict, the Mamata Banerjee government announced that it would return the land on September 14.

Read: Grocers extending credit to Singur farmers once more

Initially, around 120 officers from Hooghly district were roped in to arrange the land documents. Later, 26 more officers were roped in to get the job done on time.

Machines like this were pressed into service to clear the factory land of weeds to facilitate survey. (HT Photo)

In order to help officers stay in Singur and work night and day, the district administration had made a temporary camp at the factory premises itself.

Around 80 people are staying there currently. We have arranged bed and blankets for them and made nearly 35 temporary washrooms. A local caterer is providing them food, the officer said.

Read: It will be a long journey from Singur to Delhi

The administration tried to ensure they worked every minute. Putting them up at the factory plot ensured even travelling time from home could be saved and put to work.

Ironically, locals said they witnessed similar frantic pace of activity of the administration in 2006/07 when the Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee government had to hand over the land to Tata Motors.

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RAAZ REBOOT

Direction: Vikram Bhatt

Actors: Emraan Hashmi, Kriti Kharbanda, Gaurav Arora

Rating: 1 / 5

If you have a dark past in Romania, whats the one place on earth you avoid going back to? Romania, right? Yet our brooding, intrepid hero, the generically named Mr Rehaan Kapoor (Gaurav Arora), takes a job in Romania. And signs on for five years.

If youve already started with the slow claps, wait. Theres so much more. Raaz, director Vikram Bhatts genre-bending series  masquerading as horror, but providing laughs since 2002  does not disappoint in its so-called Reboot.

Turns out Kapoors wife, Shaina, also has a bit of a Romanian past: a vaguely explained chapter with an ex-lover, Aditya (Bhatt boy Emraan Hashmi, hamming away to hell; no apparent relation to Aditya from Raaz 3). Shaina (Kriti Kharbanda) was a model. Aditya was a fashion photographer. (Let it go; you dont dwell on cliches in a Bhatt film).

Blood rains from a laptop, CGI eyes stare out of bathroom sinks. There is something under the bed and, of course, eventually a ghost in the bedroom.

But her days of wild romance and racy photoshoots over, Shainas settled down with the love of her life (Career? Who needs that?). The trouble starts even before theyve begun unpacking. She wants a child. He does not. Sensitive Mr Kapoor is so harrowed (by the fight that ensues, but more by the Romanian raaz), he sleeps in a different bedroom.

Mrs Kapoor sobs silently, alone in a cavernous room, in full evening dress and complete make-up. And as she cries, like a good wife, she starts unpacking. And discovers a blood-stained laptop. What would you do? Confront your husband? Take it to the cops? Well, they never discuss it. Why is it even there, packed neatly in a carton, presumably shipped from India? Who knows...

Read: Emraan Hashmi on his own spooky encounter

Soon enough, though, all hell breaks loose. Blood rains from the laptop, CGI eyes stare out of bathroom sinks. There is something under the bed (of course). And Mr Kapoor comes home one day to find Mrs Kapoor naked on the dining table (Im feeling hot, so f**king hot). It still takes a friend to suggest a psychiatrist. Which our man brushes aside adamantly with a lame spiel on madness.

Visuals are blatantly borrowed from the genre, and then a Bollywood masala twist added  in one case in the form of a mangalsutra from Vaishnodevi, no less.

Instead, soon after, he resorts to psychometry mumbo-jumbo when hes back to feeling the love for the wife, and now guilt for having ignored her. Meanwhile, shes gone to a tarot reader  egged on by Aditya  to discover the husbands raaz. Made for each other, did someone say?

From here, wed happily take the predictable path: tie up girl, summon ghost, exorcise. Wed even pardon the visuals blatantly borrowed from the genre (The Exorcist series; The Exorcism of Emily Rose) and the aerial shots of a car through a wintry landscape (The Shining).

Except, in Bollywoods borrow-add-masala school of filmmaking, theres a mangalsutra  from Vaishnodevi, no less  thrown into the mix. At one point, the ghost in the bedroom is even washed in romantic morning light as the hero now sobs silently. Told you, genre-bending.

In a defining moment, a supernatural tattoo reads love u. Because, you know, millennial ghost story.

Still care to find out what happens next? Good luck.

Watch the Raaz Reboot trailer

ott:10:ht-entertainment_listing-desktop

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Chief minister Devendra Fadnavis is leading a delegation to the United States to ink a major memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Oracle, a multinational computer technology corporation, in California. The delegation is also expected to meet executives from leading IT companies during the four-day visit.

According to the officials from Mantralaya, the visit scheduled between September 18 and 22 would witness signing of that would ensure huge investment by the IT giant. The agreement is being seen as one of the largest investments that the Fadnavis government has attracted in its two-year stint. It is probably larger than the investment agreement with the electronic manufacturing giant Foxconn, which signed the MoU for the investment of 5 billion USD in August last year, an official said.

Vijay Kumar Gautam the principal secretary of Information Technology and Kaustubh Dhawase, the officer on special duty in CMO, will accompany the Fadnavis on the tour.

This will be the 8th foreign tour and second US tour of the CM-led delegation intended at attracting investment into the state. Fadnavis has toured Switzerland, Germany, Japan, Israel, China and Russia since October 2014.
City doctors performed the citys 28th heart transplant after the family members of a brain-dead man from Pune donated his heart on Thursday morning.

The donor was a 31-year old man who died from intracranial bleeding at Ruby Hall Clinic, Pune. His family consented to donate his liver and kidneys, saving three other lives.

The heart recipient, a 31-year-old woman from the Buldhana district of Amravati, had a fatal condition called postpartum dilated cardiomyopathy, said doctors who were treating her. They added that she had been on the waiting list, prepared by the Zonal Transplant Coordination Committee, for the last three months. A transplant was absolutely essential to save her life, according to specialists.

A team of doctors travelled to Pune to retrieve the donors heart. The organ was transported from Pune to Mumbai by air in just above an hour.

The patient had been moved to the ICU and is under observation. We hope that this encouraging story inspires more people to come forth and join the cause, said Dr Anvay Mulay, head of cardiac transplant team, Fortis Hospital, Mulund.
State tribal minister Vishnu Savaras casual response to a question about the death of 600 children allegedly because of malnutrition in Palghar district, just 100km north of Mumbai, has landed the politician in hot water. Savaras let it be remark made twice in response to the deaths came during his visit to a grieving family in the district that had lost their 6-year-old son Sagar Wagh to malnutrition.

The remarks captured in a video clip went viral forcing chief minister Devendra Fadnavis to seek a clarification from the minister on the issue by evening. Savara clarified later that his response was only to silence some activists, who were not allowing him to speak with the family of the victims.

Savara, who belongs to the tribal community, is also the guardian minister of Palghar district. He had gone to console the family of Wagh, who died on August 30, but the family members had refused to meet him. In the ensuing argument, Savara also snapped at people surrounding him, saying they tend to argue too much over everything.

The tribal ministers statement came two days after governor CV Rao expressed his displeasure over the spurt in malnutrition cases in the state, especially in Mokhada tehsil of Palghar.

How can I say such a thing when I myself belong to the same community and have been working in the area for more than 30 years, Savara told HT.

It is a political conspiracy hatched against me, he said.

The tribal affairs minister even claimed that malnutrition cases have reduced in the two years since the BJP-led government came to power. He said that until July this year, only 126 malnutrition deaths have been reported, while last year the number of deaths was more than double that. However, he could not confirm the exact number of malnutrition deaths that occurred last year.

In a clear blame game, the minister also stressed that the role of the tribal affairs department is only to provide funds for various schemes, while the actual responsibility to implement the schemes is of departments such as women and child development and public health.

The Opposition, however, is using the issue to attack the government, with both the Congress and the NCP demanding action be taken against Savara.

Sunil Tatkare, state NCP president, termed Savaras statement insensitive. We condemn his remarks and demand action against him, Tatkare said.

Both leaders of Opposition, Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil and Dhananjay Munde, have now planned a visit to Palghar district on Saturday, indicating that this issue is far from over and will now be politicised.

Dr Deepak Sawant public health minister, who belongs to the Shiv Sena, also denied there had been as many as 600 malnutrition deaths, even though he admitted to a spurt in such cases. He said head injury, drowning and falling from tree, among others, were some of the reasons for the deaths in the district. I am not a person who hides anything, Sawant said.

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MUMBAI: The most popular mandal in the city, Lalbaugcha Raja, has worked out an immersion plan for Friday.

For the first time in the history of the festival, mandal members have acquired a specially designed, electrically operated raft, which is in the form of a small ship that has a separate portion at the side for the Ganesh idol to be seated during immersion.

This portion will tilt at an angle of 45 degrees to immerse the idol 3km into the Arabian Sea from Girgaum chowpatty at 8am on Friday. We have spent two years acquiring and implementing this technology to immerse Bappa, said Balasaheb Kamble, president, Lalbaugcha Raja Sarvajanik Ganeshotsav Mandal.

Earlier this year, our mandal members visited Bharuch, a city at the mouth of the river Narmada in Gujarat, where we got in touch with a private shipping company that helped us acquire the raft. After observing several trial runs in the Narmada , the raft was finally selected for this years immersion. The main idea was to carry out the whole procession smoothly and with this automated immersion technology, the chances of any mishaps at sea are negligible, said Kamble.

Priced at Rs28 lakh, the 19x19foot reddish-brown raft is five-foot high and weighs 12 tonnes. The separate 8X8-foot portion is where the 1.5 tonne idol will be placed . A 10-kg generator, which powers the raft, will tilt this separated portion at a 45-degree angle. Previously, the idol used to be carried on a much smaller raft with more than 50 mandal members, devotees and lifeguards immersing the idol manually. In 1934, when the mandal was formed, the idol would be taken into the sea using small boats. Over the years, the style kept evolving, until rafts started being used. Today, we have successfully implemented a mini ship with an automatic immersion technique, Kamble said.

Mandal members have taken all the precautionary measures. Even if the electric generator fails, there is a backup to immerse the idol. Using hydraulic machinery, a manually operated handle is located at one end of the raft, which will allow the portion where the idol is seated to slowly tilt. We will have mandal members to support the idol if anything goes wrong, said Kamble.

In its 83rd year, the pandal has been designed as a palace (made from fibre) with a 12-foot idol, made of Plaster of Paris, which is covered in 4.5kg gold over the hands, trunk and crown. The idol also wears a gold necklace, thread and ring . Last year, the pandal was visited by 1.25 crore people over 11 days. This year, there has been an attendance of 15 lakh per day.

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In the ongoing feud in the first family of Uttar Pradesh, the opening round has gone to chief minister Akhilesh Yadav. After his uncle Shivpal Singh Yadav resigned from his post in the government and the party, deep cracks have appeared both in the Yadav parivar as well as the Samajwadi Party.

And no one will be sadder than its founder president Mulayam Singh Yadav, whose various formulas failed to placate his brother. To save the party from an imminent split ahead of the 2017 assembly elections, he will have to take some urgent steps that do not ruffle his son and yet placate the brother.

Statements by the Yadav family on Thursday gave enough indications about their differences over Mulayams buddy Amar Singh. While Akhilesh and partys Rajya Sabha member Ram Gopal Yadav hinted at action against Amar, Shivpal, who had brought him back to the party, came out in his defence.

As such, the partys rank and file is worried about Akhileshs belligerent mood, fearing that he may even take the extreme step of walking the poll trek independent of his father and uncles. Close party sources reveal that if pushed to the wall, Akhilesh may take the extreme step. After all, he has Mulayams blood running in his veins, they add with pride.

Mulayam has fought his way to the position he now holds in Indian politics. Otherwise also, Mulayam knows how to cajole family members into agreement, says a senior leader while insisting the party will not split till Netaji is around.

But it seems Netaji failed to bring about a truce between his brother and son.

Many are also of the view that the party needs Akhilesh, who has cultivated a popular support base, both in the party and among the public, to sail through the choppy waters just as he requires his fathers blessings to rein in trouble-makers in the SP.

In the words of a political expert, Young Akhilesh is the future just as Mulayam is its past. We have accepted it, its high time the seniors too realise it. He has established his political mettle by manoeuvring his way through the chakravyuh (stranglehold) of his uncles.

Indeed, with Thursdays development, Akhilesh has also got rid of the tag that his government was run by his uncles.
For Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief Lalu Prasad Yadav, two photographs, which surfaced on two consecutive days, are causing quite a bit of trouble.

In a photograph that picked up traction on social media on Thursday, Bihars health minister and Yadavs elder son Tej Pratap Yadav is seen in the company of Javed Mian, an alleged suspect in the murder of journalist Rajdev Ranjan.

Mian is also an alleged henchman for former MP Mohammad Shahabuddin who was recently released from jail after 11 years on bail. In another picture that surfaced, Mian is seen in dark glasses and holding a rifle.

On Wednesday, another photograph appeared, showing Tej Pratap with Mohammad Kaif, another alleged henchman for the Siwan strongman Shahabuddin.

Both Kaif and Mian are suspected for the murder of Ranjan, the bureau chief at Hindustan, a sister publication of the Hindustan Times. Ranjan was shot dead while on his way home on May 13 this year.

Kaif is on the Bihar police wanted listwhile Mian is wanted in a slew of cases ranging from the murder of a jeweller to threatening shopkeepers and extorting money from businessmen, sourced said.

Kaif was present when Shahabuddin was released from Bhagalpur jail on September 10, and photographs show him with the former politican both in Bhagalpur and Siwan.

Yadavs son Tej Pratap attempted to dismiss the controversy, saying thousands of people had met him and posed for a picture with him. So, there was no way of him knowing the backgrounds of each of them.

The ministers supporters tried to manage the storm by reasoning that someone such as the Prime Minister has aslo been photographed with allegedly controversial people. However, the Janata Dal (United), upset with Shahabuddins verbal attack on chief minister Nitish Kumar, advised Tej Pratap to avoid being caught in such situations.

Tej Pratap ought to be cautious in such matters, party spokesman Sanjay Singh had said.

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local court on Friday awarded life imprisonment to six convicts in a case of kidnapping of a Canada-based NRI in April 2012.

The court of additional district and sessions judge RK Jain held Pradeep Malik (28) of Gohana, Haryana; Sanjeev Kumar (32) alias Soni of Kurukshetra; Anil Kumar (35) of Gannour; Ajit Singh (26) of Hisar; Nitin (25) of Jhajjar and Sukhdev (34) of Kurukshetra, Haryana, guilty in the case on Wednesday. All accused have been fined Rs 18,500 each. They had been charged with kidnapping, robbery and wrongful confinement.

The NRI, Navneet Singh Chatha, was kidnapped on April 10, 2012, for Rs 1 crore ransom. A UT crime branch team rescued him after an operation in a Kurukshetra village within a few hours. The NRIs brother, who is also a Canadian resident, had received the ransom call.

The UT police recovered Rs 52.5 lakh, 720 Canadian dollars, victims Honda Accord car besides a Maruti Swift Dzire , snatched from a Panchkula resident and two mobile phones.

Victims brother got clue in ransom call

Chatha appearing before court through video conferencing last year, said, I refer to my brother as Ginnu or Garry. That day I called him by his complete name  Gurneet Singh Chatha  to hint that I was in trouble.

I could not have told him that I was kidnapped as the kidnappers had forced me to call him at gunpoint and demanded Rs 1 crore. I told my brother that the money was for a land deal and it made him suspicious. He called for help, said Chatha, who identified Pradeep, Sanjeev, Anil and Ajit Singh by the colour of their shirts. He failed to identify Nitin and Sukhdev.

Court observations

In its order, the court said that at the time of identifying the accused there was a technical problem through video conferencing. As all accused were earlier named and were all there for the crime of commission, the benefit could not be extended to accused Nitin and Sanjeev for not getting them properly identified through video conferencing, the court added. It referred Amit Kumar, the servant of victim Chatha, as the star witness.

Amit had identified the accused as they collected money from him from the Sector 18 residence of the victim.

Tha case

* Canada-based NRI Navneet Singh Chatha was kidnapped on April 10, 2012, for Rs 1 crore ransom. A UT police team rescued him after an operation from a Kurukshetra village within hours of kidnapping.

* The NRIs brother, who is also a Canadian resident, had received the ransom call

* The victim was kept in a farmhouse owned by one of the accused

* A trap was laid at the farmhouse and after an exchange of gunshots between the police and the kidnappers, the accused were nabbed
The Aam Aadmi Partys (AAP) candidate from Ludhiana-West assembly segment, Ahbaab Singh Grewal, was allegedly faced an attack by some people in Baghapurana village of Moga district on Friday evening.

While no one got injured and he has not named any party, the police detained two men and said it appeared to be a case of a fight among the group with whom Grewal was holding a meeting. It was around 6.30 pm when Grewal was taking a meeting of the party workers regarding a planned protest on Saturday over an earlier attack on some AAP volunteers. He said the 10-12 attackers targeted him particularly but ran away when party workers intervened, hence no one was injured.

Moga senior superintendent of police (SSP) Snehdeep Sharma said, Two persons who were apprehended by AAP workers have been detained by the police. It has emerged that a feud took place between those present in the meeting. Police will record the statements before taking any further action.

On September 11, the AAP held a well-attended rally at Baghapurana where its chief Arvind Kejriwal released the partys poll manifesto for farmers.

Also read | Road to assembly polls: In stronghold Ludhiana, AAP raises stakes, fields big guns
Asserting that rivals are spreading rumours against the Delhi-based central leadership of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), its Punjab affairs in-charge Sanjay Singh on Friday declared that the partys chief ministerial candidate will be from Punjab.

We (leaders from Delhi) are only workers. We wont even contest for gram panchayat elections in Punjab, what to talk of contesting assembly elections. I want to assure all party supporters that the CM face in the state will be from Punjab; will be a true Punjabi, in every sense of the word, he said, addressing a gathering at Chhapar village in Ludhiana on the occasion of the historic annual mela (fair).

This comes days after Sucha Singh Chhotepur, who was sacked as Punjab unit chief of the AAP, alleged that AAP supremo and Delhi Cm Arvind Kejriwal wants to be CM of Punjab.

Watch video | Open to joining Sidhus front: Sacked AAP Punjab chief Chhotepur

Sanjay, lashing out at the Akalis and the Congress over their comments that AAP knows nothing about Punjab, also said, Badal never says Italy ki Sonia Gandhi (Congress president); nor do they say Delhi ka Rahul Gandhi (Congress vice-president), or Himachal ki Asha Kumari (Congress state affairs in-charge). That is because the Badals and the Congress are together when it comes to spreading rumours about AAP and saying that we are not Punjabis.

Sanjay also hit out at the newly formed fourth front and said, Agar kisi chauthe morche ko vote dia, toh vote jayegi seedhi Badal ko (Voting for a fourth front will mean voting for the Badals).

Phoolka makes lead appearance

Phoolka addressing the Chhapar mela rally of the AAP near Ludhiana on Friday. (JS Grewal/HT Photo)

What appeared to be a looming crisis seemed to have been resolved for now, as senior AAP leader HS Phoolka was the key speaker at the rally in Chhapar, which falls in Dakha segment from where he is contesting. Phoolkas was the main face projected in posters of the AAP that dotted the walls across the village.

After he was noticed missing from the Bhagapurana (Moga) rally on September 11, there were speculations that Phoolka is upset with the party for sidelining him. Today, he finally made an appearance dispelling all rumours. Phoolka, in his speech, slammed Badals for making false claims of being saviours of the Sikh religion. He said that Badal has done nothing for the victims of the 1984 killings in Delhi and the attack on Harmandar Sahib (Golden Temple) in Amritsar, whereas I have fought a legal battle for 25 years to bring the culprits to book.

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The Punjab and Haryana high court on Thursday adjourned hearing on the petition of Sikh preacher Ranjit Singh Dhadrianwale demanding a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into May 17 attack on him.

The matter would be taken up on October 18. On the last date of hearing on August 17, the CBI had told high court that no inter-state ramifications were involved into the FIR registered for attack on Dhadrianwale. Hence, Punjab Police be allowed to continue with the probe. The state government is yet to respond to allegations of the Sikh preacher.

Acting on the petition of the Sikh preacher, his driver and two of his followers in June seeking CBI probe, the high court had sought response from the government. Preachers aide Bhupinder Singh was killed and Dhadrianwale injured in the shooting on May 17 in Ludhiana.
A car was robbed at gunpoint from an Amritsar-based jeweller by five car-borne unidentified youth in Kartarpur town, situated at Jalandhar-Amritsar highway on Thursday morning.

The victim, Sanjeev Kumar of Sai Dass Road, filed a complaint with Kartarpur police about the crime.

According to the police, Kumar was heading towards Amritsar from Delhi after a business deal in his Hyundai Verna car. When he was at Kartarpur Chowk highway, on Thursday at 6am, five youth in a silver Honda City car followed him.

Suddenly, they overtook and stopped his car. One of the miscreants came out and put the gun on the victims forehead.

The robbers threw him out of the car near Kishangarh and handed over Rs 500 to him as a fare to reach Amritsar. The robbers took away his laptop, two mobile phones, Rs 15,000 cash and other accessories in the car.

Kumar reached Kartarpur, called up his family and informed the police. Following this, senior police officials reached the spot and initiated investigation into the case.

The police said that an alert has been issued in the district and the nearby areas. They are hopeful that the robbers will be nabbed soon. The police claimed that they are also going through footages from CCTV cameras installed on the incident stretch.

A case under many sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) has been registered against the unidentified accused at Kartarpur police station.
The farm labourers, on Thursday, started a three-day round-the-clock protest at Lambi, the constituency being represented by Punjab chief minister Parkash Singh Badal in the state assembly.

The labourers, under the banner of the Punjab Khet Mazdoor Union, started gathering at Lambi in the morning and sat in a dharna near the local police station. A heavy police force was deployed on the spot to maintain law and order.

Joga Singh Nasrali, state president of the union, said the SAD-BJP government had failed to fulfil their demands, as promised during a meeting with the chief minister in April.

He claimed that Badal had promised allotment of 10-marla plots to poor people, to remove encroachments from the shamlat land, to streamline the system of issuing blue cards for subsidised rationing, to waive loans of labourers and to give adequate compensation to families of the labourers, who committed suicide in the past, bur no promise has been kept.

It is sorry a state of affairs that the government has not met even a single commitment till date, he said.

The union threatened to extend their three-day protest for an indefinite period if the government didnt show a positive response towards their demands by Saturday afternoon.

The other demands of the union included land reforms, arrangements of permanent employment and end to exploitation of Dalits by gau rakshak organisations. Lachhman Singh, general secretary of the union, said it had also come to notice that the government had issued blue cards to the people, who were not at all eligible to be covered under the scheme.

Even the government was not serious in implementing the MNREGA scheme in the villages. We are also demanding an increase in old age, widow and handicapped pension from Rs 500 to Rs 3,000, he said.
As the first international flight from the city took off on Thursday, it was also a time for key office-bearers and members of Mohali Industries Association (MIA), the organisation that filed a public interest litigation in the Punjab and Haryana high court seeking the start of international flights in December 2015, to celebrate. And celebrate they did.

Must read | Row over Mohali airports name after it gets international tag

Starting off from the MIA Bhawan in Phase 7, around 175 members, some with families, carried out a 70-car rally starting at 3pm to the airport. On the way to the airport, the association had also installed hoardings expressing gratitude to Punjab deputy chief minister Sukhbir Singh Badal. Finally, at the airport, MIA members outnumbered politicians. Sensing their enthusiasm, Sukhbir walked up to the members of the MIA to greet them.

Time for prediction

It was also a time for reflection and predicting happy times ahead.

It is historical day not just for the region but for the MIA as well, said KHS Dhindsa, an industrialist.

International flight is real boom for the industry which brings SAS Nagar on global platform, said Sanjeev Garg, another MIA member.

Punjab deputy CM Sukhbir Singh Badal greets a pilot of the Chandigarh-Sharjah flight on Thursday. (Photo: Facebook)

Other CII member reactions

Munish Goyal, MD, Madhav Group, said, This will bring in greater investment. The CII road show with Punjab government in Dubai is an outreach exercise to attract investments to Punjab, Challanges to boosting trade have been addressed.

Sachit Jain, MD, Vardhaman Textiles, said, Industry needs connectivity. The new flight will increase efficiency.

JS Bedi, chairman, Gyan Jyoti Institute of Management and Technology, SAS Nagar, said  The globe-trotting youth from the region, especially from the tricity, have a lot to cheer. Aspirations of the youth from the region to get exposure at institutes of learning abroad can now be easily met.

Kamna Aggarwala, director, GDPA Fasteners, West Asia is being looked at for both incoming investments and expansios. Road shows work as refreshers of new developments.

Among other industrialists who boarded the flight, Vivek Kapoor, industrialist from SAS Nagar, said, I feel so honored and lucky to be a part of this historical event. Apart from convenience to the residents of tricity, this will be a major economic boost. JS Randhawa, general manager, exports, PSIECI, said, People from Chandigarh, J&K, Punjab, and parts of Haryana, will benefit. This will save time and unnecessary hassle.

(By Hillary Victor, Ifrah Mufti, Shailee Dogra and Tanbir Dhaliwal)
With stray dogs ruling the roost even in the posh areas of the city and injuring residents in some of the cases, municipal corporation (MC) has sterilised nearly 17,500 in a project launched one-and-a-half year ago (February 2015).

Nearly 500 dogs are sterilised every month by a Hyderabad-based company, Vets Society for Animal Welfare and Rural Development authorised by the MC. The company charges Rs 700 to sterilise one stray dog.

In a survey in 2006, the MC had put the total number of stray dogs in the city to 25,000. Experts say that the number must have been more than double at present as no exact figure was available with the civic body.

On the other hand, Guru Angad Dev Veterinary and Animal Sciences University (GADVASU) started sterilisation programme recently but has been able to operate on only 25 dogs that were brought to the varsitys operation theater by non-government organisations (NGOs) or individuals.

However, with the increasing menace of stray dogs the effort by GADVASU was appreciated by the residents. NGOs and individuals have been urged by the varsity to bring stray dogs to it on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursdays when sterilisation operations are done.

SPS Ghuman, head of the department, veterinary clinic complex, said that the sterilisation programme at the varsity was started only to provide some relief to the residents who could bring the stray dogs to the clinic for sterilisation.

Our target is not to sterilise entire population of stray dogs but only those that have created menace and could be brought to us by anybody,said Ghuman.

However, due to the pre and post operative hassles and limited number of sterilisation done, the MC programme is being seen as significant.

A sterilisation centre has also been specially set up by the MC for this project near Haibowal Dairy Complex on Hambran Road. The hospital comprises an operation theater and three rooms.

Vipal Malhotra, health officer of MC, said that the dogs are being sterilised using conventional technique which is approved by Animal Welfare Board of India.

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The local government medical college and Ludhianas Dayanand Medical College (DMC) were most sought-after for MBBS among top rankers on the first allotment list that Baba Farid University of Health Sciences (BFUHS) uploaded on Friday.

The Patiala college has 92 general-category seats. Its last-admitted candidate is ranked 172, while the 93-rank student was the last to get a general category seat at the DMC.

Among the government medical colleges, including those at Amritsar and Faridkot, the last allotment in the general category was to rank 280, while the general ranking among the government-quota seats in private colleges has gone up to 451. After the DMC, Sri Guru Ravi Das Medical College, Amritsar, is next favourite, while the Punjab Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS), Jalandhar, is last on the students preference list.

Experts hope for a significant improvement in the cut-off ranking in the second round of counselling that will start with fresh choices on September 21. The major factor in favour of middle rankers is that many of those allotted seats on Friday have joined other colleges already based on their NEET (National Eligibility Cum Entrance Test) ranking.

For instance, candidate Ritwik Garg, ranked 30 in the PMET and allotted seat at the DMC, has already joined Vardhman Mahavir Medical College, New Delhi. Candidate Dhruv Sood, also allotted seat at the DMC on Friday, has joined Vardhman-Delhi. Students Samanyu Handa (ranked 20) and Simranjit Singh Gill (ranked 52) have joined Chandigarh Medical College.

Last year, the last allotment in the government colleges was to a candidate ranked 480. So there is hope for improvement in the second list, said an expert.

Second helpful factor is the likely conversion of vacant NRI seats in government colleges to the general pool. They have 41 seats to transfer but the only hitch is the petition pending in the Punjab and Haryana high court. The hearing is on September 19, before the second counselling, and there is no relief, so far, to the petitioner who has challenged the state governments filling NRI quota seats through an entrance test, because of which, not many NRI students could qualify.

All students allotted seats on Friday are required to report the college concerned by September 20
Having failed to crack the case of murder of Chand Kaur, wife of former Namdhari sect head late Satguru Jagjit Singh, the Punjab government has requested for transfer of investigation to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) through a notification on September 11.

Also, the state has sent the 2011 murder case of another Namdhari leader, Avtar Singh Tari, from Sahnewal area in Ludhiana, and the Maksudan (Jalandhar) tiffin bomb case, to the CBI, stating that all these cases are interlinked.

Chand Kaur, 88, was shot dead on April 4 by two unidentified bike-borne men at the Bhaini Sahib gurdwara complex, headquarters of the sect, at Bhaini Sahib near Ludhiana.

Sources said the probe carried out by a special investigation team (SIT) in the Chand Kaur murder pointed towards some influential people of the same sect. The government took the plea that the assailants belonged to some other state and fled back to their respective areas after committing the crime. In such conditions, when accused are from other states, the police could not investigate the cases effectively, it has said.

The government also stated that the same weapons were used in the murder of Chand Kaur and of Tari.

Additional chief secretary (home) Jagpal Singh Sandhu confirmed that the cases have been sent for the CBI to take up.

The CBI has already taken up the case of an attack on Brigadier (Retd) Jagdish Gagneja, Punjab vice-president of the Rashtriya SwayamSewak Sangh (RSS).

Earlier, deputy chief minister Sukhbir Singh Badal had on April 25, while addressing a function on the birth anniversary of BR Ambedkar, claimed that the state police SIT had got a breakthrough and that the killers of Chand Kaur would be behind bars soon.
All 41 NRI seats have fallen vacant in government medical colleges across the state as none of the seven NRI students, who qualified through a separate entrance test, appeared in the counselling at Faridkot on Thursday.

Fifteen of the 28 students, who qualified through NEET, claimed NRI seats in private colleges against 74 seats reserved for them.

It means that all the vacant quota seats, both in government and private colleges, will be now open for general category students. The two-phase admission process starts from Friday.

We will consider changing the NRI seats into general category after the first counselling that ends on September 20, said Baba Farid University of Health Sciences (BFUHS) vice-chancellor Raj Bahadur said.

The only hitch in conversion of quota seats is the pending petition in the Punjab and Haryana high court. An NRI student recently filed a petition challenging the state governments move to fill NRI quota seats through an entrance test. The plea will be heard on September 19.

Director, Medical Research and Education Dr Manjit Mohi said the governments response would be filed on the next date of hearing.
400 Class 4 employees of Government Rajindra hospital went on an indefinite strike on Friday, locking the hospitals operation theatre (OT).

The employees are demanding job regularisation.

OPD and emergency services are functional. Due to the strike, patients are facing harassment and scheduled operations have been postponed.

Hundreds of employees have been working on contractual basis for teh past ten years. We have held several meetings with the state government but to no avail. We demand regular jobs and have started an indefinite strike. The operation theatre services have been stopped but emergency services are open, Ram Kishan, president of the Class 4 employees union, said.

15 operations of the orthopaedic department and 10 surgeries were scheduled for Friday.

Patients troubled

Many patients have been waiting outside the OT.

15 operations of the orthopaedic department and 10 surgeries were scheduled for Friday. (HT Photo)

My daughter has not eaten for the past three days because she had to come for her operation. But, now we were being told that the OT is locked. We have already purchased the required medicines and fulfilled all requirements for the operation, Sunita, who came here from Rama Mandi, Bathinda, said.
Its a matter of shame that unconventional sordidness eclipsed the proceedings of the last session of the 14th Vidhan Sabha in Punjab. Such a downright decline of values in legislatures behaviour puts a question mark on future of the Parliamentary democracy.

As an avid student of Parliamentary practices and procedures, I have been watching the proceedings of the Punjab assembly for the past 40 years as a spectator and also as a member of the House. But never before have I seen the dignity of the House being brought to such ignominy.

Unfortunately, all men and women, who mattered in the assembly, contributed to diminishing its glory, and speaker Charanjit Singh Atwal was no exception. He miserably failed to uphold the dignity of the august chair. The unprecedented disorderliness, unleashed by some over-enthusiastic members of the House, showed the legislatures collective failure to uphold the minimal standards of decorum and graciousness. An unfairly dogmatic attitude of the speaker has contributed to chaos that marred the monsoon session of the assembly. As a former presiding officer of the Vidhan Sabha, I beg to differ with the premeditated unconventional decision of Atwal to do away with the question hour on September 14, the last sitting day of the House, just to facilitate the government in hurriedly passing the legislative business.

As many as 21 important bills were passed in a jiffy  and without any debate or discussion. The question hour is never bargained, even at a time when the House agrees to discuss the adjournment motion admitted by the speaker. The adjournment motion is ordinarily taken up soon after the question hour is over.

Yes, the speaker has the power to suspend the question hour or any other listed business if there is an extreme emergency, such as the death of a sitting member or a natural calamity. But he cannot help the government to rush through the legislative business. This was a monumental drift on the part of the speaker. He should have resisted the government pressure in the larger interest of laid down procedures and dignity of the House.

While the opposition members were to be squarely blamed for showing scant disregard to the rules of procedures and conduct of business, the speaker could also not be absolved of the responsibility for creating the chaotic paroxysm in the House. So much so that Jalandhar Cantt MLA Pargat Singh, who resigned from the primary membership of the Akali Dal and intended to make a statement thereafter  in the form of personal explanation under Rule 56 of the Rules of procedures and conduct of business  was not allowed to do so.

After the shoe-hurling incident and free exchange of filthy diatribe thereafter, the speaker was well within his powers to address the House. But he refused to listen to the MLAs voices.

The Constitution of India is an instrument that unambiguously codifies the codes of procedures to enact laws by the legislatures through strict adherence to the spirit of the Parliamentary democracy. That ensures a wider participation of legislatures in meaningful debates on the issues before the House. That spirit, however, was given the go-by when the speaker allowed the passage of 21 legislations a hush-hush manner.

Even the theatre of absurd and comedy circus have some semblance of civility and self-control, but the ruckus in the Punjab Vidhan Sabha surpassed all canons of decorum. This kind of classic disgracefulness calls for a serious introspection by all the members of parliamentary institutions. The dignity of the House has to be restored if our Parliamentary institution has to survive with glory and righteousness. This would be possible if Punjab MLAs express fair degree of remorse on malevolence that marred the concluding session of Punjab assembly.

birdevinders@gmail.com

(The writer is former deputy speaker of Punjab. The views expressed are his personal)
The Supreme Court on Thursday reinstated the 170-member general house of the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) elected in 2011. The court also disposed of a petition by the gurdwara panel over Sehajdhari Sikhs right to vote in SGPC elections as the case had become irrelevant following an amendment to the Sikh Gurdwaras Act-1925.

Must read | HT Explainer: Whats behind excluding Sehajdharis from Sikh body polls?

With the SC decision, the Sehajdhari Sikhs have been barred from voting in the committee polls, and the elected house of SGPC that was constituted in December 2011 has become functional again, SGPC advocate Satinder Singh Gulati told HT. The amendment from the retrospective effect would also make the 2011 SGPC elections legally valid. The Shiromani Akali Dal which controls the SGPC  the mini-parliament of Sikhs  is behind the amendment to the Act. Now as per the provisions of the Act, the Centre will hold the elections for office-bearers of the SGPC, which will elect the 15-member executive committee. This committee will further elect president and other office-bearers. The process to elect new office-bearers will begin soon, said SGPC chief secretary Harcharan Singh.

In 2003,the Union home ministry had amended the 1925 Act by way of a notification which was quashed by the Punjab and Haryana high court after a petition by Sehajdharis in 2011, saying that the procedure laid in the Act was not followed.

Correcting its course, and following the procedure of the 1925 ACT, the Union cabinet passed the amendment in March this year. Later, it was cleared by both the Houses of Parliament.

The orders came at the time when the polls to elect 170 members of the SGPC general house had just got over and members were notified.

The SGPC moved the SC challenging the 2011 judgment by the HC restoring Sehajdharis right to vote. In a temporary relief, the apex court had ordered that the executive body of the SGPC --- functional before 2011 polls --- would continue to run day-to-day affairs.

The move will help the SAD woo back Panthic voters, who were feeling alienated after a series of sacrilege incidents. It may also lead to removal of current SGPC president Avtar Singh Makkar.

Sehajdhari issue

1) The court also disposed of a petition by the gurdwara panel over Sehajdhari Sikhs right to vote in SGPC elections as the case had become irrelevant following an amendment to the Sikh Gurdwaras Act-1925.

2) With the SC decision, the Sehajdhari Sikhs have been barred from voting in the committee polls, and the elected house of SGPC that was constituted in December 2011 has become functional again,SGPC advocate Satinder Singh Gulati told HT.

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Two sewermen died of asphxia while cleaning a chocked sewage line in Ludhianas Namdhari Mohalla on Friday.

The deceased have been identified as Naru and Sonu. They were working without any safety gear.

Dont miss| HT SPOTLIGHT Life in the gutter: Manual scavenging banned, really?

Sewage of Namdhari Mohalla was chocked and the duo was pressed in for cleaning. While cleaning, both the sewermen fainted. They were rushed to the civil hospital where the doctors declared them dead.

After the incident, municipal corporation employees gathered at the civil hospital. Heavy police force has been deployed in area to avoid any untoward situation.

Must read | By the way: Dying for Swachh Bharat
US-based radical organisation Sikhs For Justice (SFJ) protested against Aam Aadmi Partys Punjab convener and film actor Gurpreet Ghuggi at Tracy, California, on Wednesday, calling him anti-Sikh.

The protesters claim that Ghuggi was on the team of artistes that then-Punjab-DGP (director general of police) KPS Gill assembled in the 1990s to perform in the states villages to divert public attention from police excesses against Sikhs (during militancy).

Ghuggi also hurt Sikh sentiments by comparing his party leaders from Delhi and Uttar Pradesh to the Panj Pyaras (five beloved ones of the Guru), SFJ legal adviser Gurpatwant Singh Pannun told HT over telephone on Thursday. Why did the AAP make a comedian its Punjab convener when it has a more able leader in (senior lawyer) Harvinder Singh Phoolka?

Pannun claimed that Ghuggi had said in a public address in Amritsar on September 4 that: If first of the Panj Pyaras came from Lahore, the second was from Uttar Pradesh, and Guru Gobind Singh didnt question why he was from outside Punjab.

The SFJ said Ghuggi had earlier praised Punjab Police on national television, crediting it with paving the way for cultural performances in the 1990s by controlling terrorism. The protest against Ghuggi is a wake-up call to the AAP that, so far, had the backing of Khalistan supporters in the US and Canada, said Pannun.

Reportedly, sensing trouble, Ghuggi has sought an apology but the SFJ has rejected it as lame, before a thin gathering.

SFJ international policy director Amardeep Singh Purewal said since Ghuggi failed to tender unconditional apology to radical-Sarbat-Khalsa-appointed (parallel) jathedar (and Beant Singh assassination convict) Jagtar Singh Hawara, they will mobilise Sikhs to confront him across America with protests.

Speaking on the SFJs losing credibility for opposing all leaders coming to North America from Punjab, Pannun said: We oppose only those who support anti-Sikh tirade in India.

Ghuggi unfazed

Ghuggi said the protesters were only a handful of people, against the 1,500 who had come to listen to him on weeklong tour to the US. He said he hasnt sought apology but only clarified certain things, asking the American Punjabis to ignore rabble rousers. If the peoples sentiments are hurt due to misinformation spread against me, I am ready to seek apology, he said. On Friday, he will address Punjabis in Californias Fresno town and then leave for New York.

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The UTs director, school education (DSE), got a shocker during inspection of government schools in Dhanas on Thursday when he was told by some teachers that some students were hooked to drugs and they receive threats from them.

The director Rubinderjit Singh Brar contacted Chandigarh SSP Sukhchain Singh Gill and urged him to provide extra security outside Dhanas schools during the opening and closing hours. Being a periphery area, there have been complaints about students taking drugs and teachers said they receive threats. The SSP has assured to depute cops from Friday, Brar said.

The SSP said, I have asked the Sarangpur SHO to meet the principals. A police van will be stationed outside the high school for 20 minutes at 2pm daily.

Brar made the surprise visit to two high schools and a senior secondary school in Dhanas in the afternoon. On Sunday, Chandigarh MP Kirron Kher had got complaints against some teachers from students.

Principal of GMHS, Dhanas, Bharati Sharma refused to comment. A teacher of the same school, requesting anonymity, said, Its easy to blame; but only we know what we go through. We are scared of scolding students.

Principal of the senior secondary school, Harmeet Kaur, said, Some students of Class 12 are hooked to drugs and we have been working to reform them. Sources said a former teacher of the school was threatened repeatedly as she was strict on discipline. Some students had smashed her cars windowpane too.

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With the authorities facing a tough time trying to curb illegal mining in bordering areas of Kangra district, the Himachal Pradesh government has again sought for the demarcation of its boundary from Punjab, to put an end to the illegal mining by people, from Punjab.

Problem of rampant illegal mining is prevalent in rivulets of Nurpur and Indora areas which share borders with Punjab, as people from the other side take advantage of unclear boundary line between the two states.

Himachal government had written to the Punjab government in this regard in June this year, said sources.

In response to request by Himachal government, the Punjab government has directed deputy commissioner (DC) of Pathankot to take up the matter with his Kangra counterpart.

The revenue department in a letter sent last month has now directed the Kangra officials to liaison with Pathankot administration to conduct joint demarcation as soon as possible and submit a report in this regard.

Earthmovers used for mining on the Punjab-HP border. (HT Photo)

It is not for the first time that Himachal Pradesh government has taken up the issue with Punjab. Earlier, in June 2015 Kangra administration had taken up the matter with Pathankot counterparts seeking demarcation of interstate boundary from Khanni to Kandwal and Kandwal to Jagat Giri Ashram along the Chakki Khud.

Later, the issue of illegal mining in border areas of Kangra came up for discussion in Himachal Pradesh State Assemblys monsoon session in 2015 when the Nurpur MLA Ajay Mahajan raised issue of unclear demarcation of interstate boundaries leading to person from Punjab carrying out illegal mining in Chaki rivulet.

Admitting to the fact, the revenue minister Kaul Singh Thakur had informed the house that Himachal would seek for demarcation of its boundary satellite imagery to put an end to the illegal mining.

In September 2015 the field staff of the revenue departments from Pathankot and Nurpur had conducted a joint demarcation exercise but left it incomplete.

Chakki rivulet, a tributary of Beas marks the boundary between Himachal and Punjab, but in absence of demarcation, the police and authorities find it difficult to take action against people from Punjab who carry out mining. Sometimes, when we chase mafia the Punjab police come to their rescue and raise the issue of jurisdiction, said a Kangra police official.

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A major fire broke out in the godown of Pungrain at Jawahar nagar locality here on Wednesday night and over 2 lakh empty gunny bags were gutted in the incident. As the godown was full of gunny bags, it took more than eight hours for 28 fire tenders to control the fire.

The official sources said about 10 pm some nearby residents noticed flames emanating from the godown and subsequently informed the police and fire department.

Though, three fire tenders reached the spot in 30 minutes, they could not mange to douse the fire as all of them got empty quickly. To stop the fire from spreading into the adjoining locality, the department sought help from fire Amritsar, Pathankot and Gurdaspur, following which upto 28 fire tenders came and collectively poured water and doused the flames.

Though, we managed to drag out more than 50,000 bags but the rest were gutted. We asked Pungrain officials to provide labourers and JCB machine to drag out the gunny bags, but they could not help us, said, Batala Fire Brigade in-charge Balwinder Singh Sekhon.

An investigation is underway; however, officials said there was no electricity connection in the godown.

Meanwhile, the residents of the locality appealed to the administration to shift the godown to someplace else as it may again result into any major accident
Pooja Hegde, last seen in Hrithik Roshan starrer MohenjoDaro, will soon be working with Allu Arjun in upcoming Telugu film DJ - Duvvada Jagannadham, revealed a source.

Pooja has been finalized as the leading lady for DJ. She plays a contemporary girl in this romantic drama and her role will appeal to all sections of the audience, said the source from the film unit.

To be helmed by Harish Shankar, the project will be bankrolled by Dil Raju, who has reunited with Arjun after seven years.

The regular shooting of the project will commence from October. This will be Poojas third Telugu outing after Mukunda and Oka Laila Kosam.

Allu Arjuns last outing Sarrainodu was a smash hit. (AlluArjun/Facebook)

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Popular Malayalam actress Lissy Lakshmi on Friday confirmed that her marriage with filmmaker Priyadarshan has officially ended. Calling the procedure an ordeal, she said she now feels relieved.

My marriage with Priyadarshan officially ended today. We both have signed the final papers at the family court in Chennai. This has been a real ordeal, Lissy said in a statement.

The couple had married in 1990, and soon after Lissy gave up acting. They had filed for divorce in March.

In recent times, all celebrity divorces, from Hrithik (Roshan) and Sussanne to Dilip and Manju (Warrier) to most recently Amala (Paul) and Vijay all have been mutually agreed divorces. I am sure it also must have been painful to those couples but whatever differences they may have had, they all decided to respect each other, she said.

Priyadarshan, a veteran of Malayalam and Hindi cinema, recently delivered a big hit called Oppam. (DirectorPriyadarshan/Facebook)

However, she says her relationship was the only exception.

It was often fierce and uncivilised battle on and off the courts until a compromise was reached at the Madras High Court. Perhaps the ugliness of our divorce proceedings says all about the kind of marriage we have had. Anyway, I feel relieved now, she added.

Lissy feels this is the end of a long and often very difficult road, and its time to move on.

Lissy Lakshmi in happier times: With her grown-up daughter (right)... (Lissy.actress/Facebook)

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Samsung Electronics Co Ltd formally recalled 1 million Galaxy Note 7 smartphones sold in the United States, replacing or refunding the flagship phones, whose susceptibility to catching fire has damaged the image of the Korean powerhouse.

Samsung received 92 reports of batteries overheating in the United States, including 26 reports of burns and 55 cases of property damage, the company said as it announced the recall in cooperation with the US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC).

The recall is a costly setback for Samsung, which was counting on Galaxy Note 7 to bolster sales as rivals such as Apple Inc launch new devices. The scale of the recall is unprecedented for Samsung, the worlds largest smartphone maker.

Samsung said on Thursday that new Note 7 replacement devices will be available at most retail locations in the United States no later than Sept. 21.

Earlier this month, Samsung said it would recall all Note 7 smartphones equipped with batteries it found to be fire-prone and halted their sales in 10 markets, denting a revival of the firms mobile business.

While recalls in the smartphone industry do happen, including for rival Apple Inc, the nature of the problem for the Note 7 is a serious blow to Samsungs reputation, analysts have said.

The CPSC said on Thursday that consumers should immediately power down and stop using the recalled Galaxy Note 7 devices.

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration has asked airline passengers to switch off and unplug the recalled Note 7s during flights.

Some 2.5 million of the premium devices worldwide need to be recalled, Samsung said. Some analysts say the recall could cost Samsung nearly $5 billion in lost revenue this year.
Netflix has given the green light to a 10-series episode order of Shes Gotta Have It, a remake of Spike Lees 1986 debut film, with Lee attached to direct.

In addition to directing each half-hour installment, Lee will also executive produce the project with his wife and producing partner Tonya Lewis Lee.

As reported by Variety, the series will revolve around Nola Darling, a Brooklyn-based artist in her late twenties struggling to define herself and divide her time amongst her Friends, her Job and her Three Lovers: The Cultured Model, Greer Childs; The Protective Investment Banker, Jamie Overstreet; and Da Original B-Boy Sneakerhead, Mars Blackmon.

Spike Lee forayed into Hollywood with Shes Gotta Have it in 1986. (Reuters)

Commenting on the on the series pickup Lee released the following statement: Shes Gotta Have It has a very special place in my heart. We shot this film in 12 days (2 six day weeks) way back in the back back of the hot summer of 1985 for a mere total of $175,000...We are hyped that Netflix is onboard with this vision...

Follow @htshowbiz for more
Instead of colourful, handmade caps for sale to Syrians and foreign tourists, Zakaria Mosuli -- the last tailor in Aleppos battered Old City -- now sews military headwear almost exclusively for soldiers.

More than five years of war have turned Aleppos historic city centre, a UNESCO-listed World Heritage site home to an imposing citadel, into a makeshift military barracks.

Syrian shoppers and foreign backpackers have been replaced by war-weary troops, and colourful souvenir stands have given way to checkpoints dividing the ancient market into rebel- and government-held zones.

I am the only tailor left in Aleppos old city, says Mosuli in his modest shop in a regime-controlled street of the district.

He snips carefully from camouflaged military-style fabric at his shop, one of a handful in the souk that are still open.

In the past, I used to sew colourful hats for children and women and young people, he says.

But today, my speciality is making army-style caps, as this whole neighbourhood has become a military zone and Syrian army soldiers are everywhere.

Violence broke out in Aleppo in mid-2012, more than a year after anti-government protests first erupted across Syria.

The 13-kilometre (8-mile) ancient market -- the largest souk in the world -- became a front line.

Its streets are littered with rubble and walls are scarred by years of gunfire, rockets and mortar rounds.

Rubble-strewn Castello Road, the main route for humanitarian assistance in to divided Syrian city of Aleppo. (AFP)

Zakaria says he and his family refused to leave and do not regret their decision.

He brings in fabric from a government-held district into Old Aleppo, crossing several checkpoints and dodging shelling and snipers along the way.

I have loyal customers who come from inside Aleppo, but most of my customers these days are soldiers and officers.

Pointing to two small birds that swooped into his apartment, Zakaria says: These are my only friends. The people have all left.

Read: In Aleppo zoo, Saeed the lonely monkey lives to tell the tale of war

Of the 200 families that once lived in the Old City, just 15 remain.

Most shops were shuttered long ago with metal gates painted in the tricolour Syrian government flag.

Other storefronts are charred black from car bombs and shelling, and many have had their windows blown in by rocket attacks.

When an AFP correspondent visited the market, soldiers were strolling through the ruined streets.

A US-Russia truce deal has seen guns fall silent in large parts of Syria, including Aleppo.

Mohammed Zakaria, a 65-year-old barber in the souk, has been wounded three times by shelling and rocket attacks on the old city.

But he says work is good as long as soldiers are still around.

This area was especially a touristic area. My customers were all tourists or Syrians from other provinces, the hairdresser says.

But today, as this district has turned into a military barracks, my customers are all soldiers and officers, he tells AFP.

People gather near burning tyres during a demonstration against forces loyal to Syria's President Bashar al-Assad and calling for aid to reach Aleppo near Castello road in Aleppo on Wednesday.

I want to die here

In Bab al-Faraj, a neighbourhood adjacent to the ancient souk, Yehya Qoteish stands next to a vegetable stall stocked with tomatoes, aubergines, peppers and watermelon.

There are a lot of displaced people who fled here because the rents are very low. People have taken to living in abandoned hotels, he says.

My customers are displaced people and soldiers, the 57-year-old says.

Further along in Khan al-Wazir, near the citadel, a pro-regime fighter carrying a baby and followed by his wife trudges home among the rubble.

Elsewhere in the Old City, 66-year-old Sarkis still sits outside his storefront every day -- even though he hasnt had a customer in years.

He learned about photography and camera equipment from his brother, and stayed in the Old City to keep their shop running, despite the increasingly dire situation.

Read: Now playing in Syria: Ceasefire, the sequel with the wrong cast

I got used to seeing dozens of tourists in my shop, but today, there are only soldiers who pass by just to check in on me, not to be photographed.

Sarkis says he could not bear to leave the neighbourhood where he was born and raised: These few metres (yards) around my shop are my life, not just my livelihood.

His children visit him every week, begging him to leave the ravaged district, but Sarkis refuses.

I was born here. I want to die here.

Still, Sarkis says, he wishes that just a single customer would come by to ask about photographic equipment or even just a camera battery.

Id give it to him for free!
Cosmetic surgery is making millions of people happy in China. Those going under the knife are happy for their sharper, younger looks, and companies for the money the surgeries are raking in  the industry is worth more than $77 billion.

The total value of cosmetic surgeries in 2015 was around 500 billion Yuan (around $77.16 billion), a state media report quoted an industry survey as saying on Friday.

With a solid 15% growth rate every year, the industry is expected to touch 1 trillion Yuan by 2019, making it the worlds largest market.

Why is cosmetic surgery so popular in China?

The answer could be in what Sadie Zhang, a manager at a Beijing-based medical skincare company, told state-run China Daily newspaper: Good appearance helps relationships and workEven teenagers have come to us for a better look. It is no longer a treatment only for celebrities.

The newspaper report said: Corporate employees, government civil servants and businesswomen accounted for more than 70% of the number of people using medical beauty services in 2015, suggesting the advantages and benefits brought by good looks. But, the newcomers participating in such treatment are getting younger each year.

It suggested that the age group of those opting for the surgeries is falling. Twenty to forty-year-olds demand entry level or skin enhancement, while those who are in their 40s choose more anti-ageing treatment, it said.

Wang Qianqian, the mother of a three-year-old, spent 50,000 Yuan (about Rs 5 lakh) to tighten the skin on her face and remove spots on her cheeks.

It is the most valuable investment Ive ever made, Wang, a senior executive of an internet and culture company in Beijing, told China Daily. I am more confident since my face skin looks tighter and brighter.

The internet too is fuelling the growth of the industry.

Internet platforms have emerged as a new way for cosmetic surgery institutes to attract customers as traditional advertisers are costing them too much, said Lou Jun from a venture capital firm.

But there are problems in the industry. The main problems facing Chinas cosmetic surgery industry are non-transparent costs and lack of trust on quality. Many Chinese customers instead go to nearby South Korea, which is well known for its plastic surgery, Zhang Bin, head of the Chinese Association of Plastics and Aesthetics, told official Xinhua news agency.
The UK Independence Party - once described as an insurgent party but which grew exponentially in recent years with its exit-EU slogan - on Friday elected Diane James as its first woman chief to replace outgoing leader Nigel Farage.

UKIPs rise was a major factor in former prime minister David Cameron announcing and holding the June 23 referendum on Britains membership of the EU. It polled the third highest number of votes in the 2015 general election after the Conservative and Labour parties.

James, 56, was regarded the favourite to succeed Farage, who was one of the leading campaigners for Brexit before the referendum. A Member of the European Parliament from southeast England, James is a former businesswoman and the party's home affairs spokeswoman.

Noting the ripples the party has generated in British politics in recent years and its key plank, Farage said in his last speech as leader at the party conference in Bournemouth that he had given it all he had, and now wanted his life back.

Holding up a copy of the European passport held by British people, Farage said: "The only time we'll know Brexit means Brexit is when that has been put in the bin and we get a British passport." He warned Prime Minister Theresa May that she must pass three tests to make sure Brexit means Brexit - regaining control of fishing rights, getting out of the single market and returning to the old British passport.

James overcame four contenders: Bill Etheridge, Lisa Duffy, Liz Jones and Phillip Broughton. However, observers said the UKIP will struggle for relevance after the Brexit vote and the departure of Farage. James will also have to contend with infighting.

She said she was truly honoured to take it on from Nigel, and added: Project Fear tactics have had their days and we are going to ensure they never rise from the political ashes ever again.

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Edward Snowden was a disgruntled employee and not a principled whistleblower, according to a report from Congress released Thursday, which comes amid mounting pressure for a presidential pardon.

The former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor leaked thousands of classified US documents in 2013 revealing the vast US surveillance put in place after the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Several prominent human rights groups have launched a campaign to convince President Barack Obama to pardon Snowden, who is living in exile in Russia.

The whistleblower is also the subject of an Oliver Stone movie set for release Friday in the United States.

But according to a summary of the two-year report prepared by the House Intelligence Committee, Snowden was a disgruntled employee who had frequent conflicts with his managers and was reprimanded just two weeks before he began illegally downloading classified documents.

The report also finds that Snowden did not voice such concerns to any oversight officials at the NSA, and he should not be considered a whistleblower protected under law.

Although the 36-page report is classified, officials released a shorter, unclassified version.

Snowden doctored his performance evaluations and obtained new positions at NSA by exaggerating his resume and stealing the answers to an employment test, the report said, adding that he took advantage of its access as network administrator to search hard drives on his colleagues computers.

Edward Snowden is no hero -- hes a traitor who willfully betrayed his colleagues and his country, committee chairman Devin Nunes said.

Snowden put US service members and the American people at risk, he added.

NSA and Cybersecurity Subcommittee chairman Lynn Westmoreland said Snowden did more damage to US national security than any other individual in our nations history.

Snowden reacts on Twitter

Reacting on Twitter, Snowden addressed several specific allegations in the report before categorically dismissing the document.

Bottom line: after two years of investigation, the American people deserve better, he wrote. This report diminishes the committee.

I could go on. Bottom line: after "two years of investigation," the American people deserve better. This report diminishes the committee.  Edward Snowden (@Snowden) September 15, 2016

Congress spent two years writing a report to discourage you from going to see this film, he tweeted later, referring to the Oliver Stone movie. It opens tomorrow.

Congress spent two years writing a report to discourage you from going to see this film. It opens tomorrow. https://t.co/MEUxqvgXPw  Edward Snowden (@Snowden) September 15, 2016

Following Snowdens revelations, widespread outrage prompted Congress to adopt measures in June 2015 to regulate the NSAs collection of Americans phone call metadata.

However, White House press secretary Josh Earnest dismissed pressure for a pardon on Wednesday, saying Snowden would enjoy legal due process at a trial in the United States, where he faces up to 30 years in prison for espionage and theft of state secrets.

His conduct put American lives at risk and it risked American national security, he told reporters. And thats why the policy of the Obama administration is that Mr Snowden should return to the United States and face the very serious charges that hes facing.

lby/ch/grf
Kevin Garratt, a Canadian held in China for two years and charged with spying, returned to Canada on Thursday in what was a diplomatic triumph for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

The Canadian leader had raised Garratts case during an official visit to China this month when he both pressed for closer economic ties and openly discussed human rights, which is a sensitive matter in Beijing.

On Thursday, September 15th, Kevin was deported from China and has returned to Canada to be with his family and friends, the family said in a statement requesting privacy.

A Canadian government official said Garratt had been formally sentenced earlier in the week and then released on bail. He flew into the Pacific city of Vancouver.

In a statement, Trudeau said he was delighted that Garratt had returned safely.

Garratt and his wife Julia were detained in August 2014 near Chinas border with North Korea. He was charged with spying and stealing state secrets.

Julia, who was not charged, was released on bail and left the country.

A source close to the case, who requested anonymity because of its sensitivity, said Garratt was tried on April 20.

The release came as a surprise, since there were few signs of a breakthrough when Trudeau flew to China. Indeed, while he was in Beijing, the Garratt family expressed their frustration at the lack of progress.

We raised this case at the highest levels when we were there. Its just indicative of the mature and healthy relationship we have that we can do so, said the government official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The affair had undermined efforts by both countries to boost economic ties. China wants a free trade deal with Canada but opinion polls show most Canadians are cool to the idea, in part because of Beijings human rights record.

The Canadian official declined to say what the Chinese might have received in return for Garratts release.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang is due to visit to Canada from Sept. 21-24.

Brock University professor Charles Burton, a former Canadian diplomat who had served two postings in China, said in an email that Beijing was likely to press for the return of what it has said are corrupt officials who had fled to Canada to avoid arrest.

China does not have extradition treaties with United States, Canada or Australia, which Chinese state media say are the three most popular destinations for suspected economic criminals.

Yang Tianwen, a spokesman at the Chinese embassy in Ottawa, said he was unaware of Garratts release.
Donald Trumps hair--a crusty, complex, yellowish affair that has become one of the enigmas of a very weird US presidential race --got messed with big time on Thursday.

The usually brash presidential candidate talked in subdued tones and played the good sport as he appeared on one of Americas most popular late-night broadcasts, The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.

Fallon did his very popular impression of Trumps speaking style, ribbed him right and left and concluded his interview with a request.

Can I mess up your hair? Fallon said.

The comic explained that this might be the last time he could ask to do something unpresidential with Trump, lest he win election in November against Hillary Clinton.

The crowd went nuts over the idea.

Trump grinned and agreed.

Fallon reached out with his right hand and mussed Trumps hair with a vigorous, repeated rub. The Republican nominee endured it with a broad smile.

Trump, 70, has an elaborate hair-do centered on what seems to be an ambitious comb-over.

Nothing fell off with Fallons intervention but the result was not very pretty as Trumps long locks ended up pointing messily every which way. On other matters, Fallon christened what he called Trumps bromance with Vladimir Putin as Vlump, and asked him about his penchant for eating fast food.

At least you know what youre getting, Trump said. He added that if he went to an unknown place, If they dont like me ... I dont know. Im better off with fast food.

Fallon also thanked Trump for providing what he described as grist for so much comic material.

You say some shocking things, Fallon said.

But Im trying not to anymore, Trump replied.
Republican Donald Trump acknowledged for the first time on Friday that US President Barack Obama was born in the United States, reversing himself on a controversy that he helped launch but found it became a distraction to his White House bid.

President Barack Obama was born in the United States. Period, Trump, who has questioned Obamas citizenship for years, said at a campaign event at his new hotel in downtown Washington. Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again.

Trump accused Democratic rival Hillary Clinton of starting the so-called birther controversy during the 2008 primary campaign against Obama, an accusation that independent fact-checking sites have rated as false.

The New York businessman led the birther movement aimed at Obama, who was born in Hawaii to an American mother and a Kenyan father.

The issue has not been a factor in the campaign for the November 8 presidential election, but it resurfaced again in recent days, taking the focus of Trumps campaign away from topics such as immigration, trade and the economy, which he has been using to hit Clinton.

Trump has recovered ground against Clinton in recent national opinion polls after revamping his campaign staff in August and taking steps to give a more polished performance on the campaign trail.

But the birther movement, which casts doubt over whether Obama is legally able to be president, incenses black Americans whose votes Trump has been trying to court.

Although Trump had been expected to address the issue from the start of Fridays event, half an hour or so was taken up with testimonials on his behalf from retired military officers. His statement at the very end took up less than a minute.

Earlier, Clinton demanded that Trump apologise to the president for bringing up the birther topic again.

Barack Obama was born in America, plain and simple, and Donald Trump owes him and the American people an apology, Clinton said in an address to the Black Womens Association in Washington. She said Trump was trying to delegitimise our first black president.

His campaign was founded on this outrageous lie. There is no erasing it in history, Clinton said.

Trump on Thursday declined to say whether he believed Obama was born in Hawaii during an interview with The Washington Post.

Ill answer that question at the right time. I just dont want to answer it yet, Trump told the newspaper.

His campaign released a statement later in the day saying the candidate is convinced of the legitimacy of Obamas presidency. A US president must be a natural-born citizen.

Obama declined to comment on Trumps revival of the birther issue, telling reporters he had better things to do.

Im shocked that a question like that would come up at a time when weve got so many other things to do  well, Im not that shocked actually, Obama said.

A few years into his presidency, Obama, the first African American to win the White House, released a longer version of his birth certificate to answer those who suggested he was not US born.
At least 25 people were killed and another 50 injured when a suicide bomber targeted a mosque in the Mohmand tribal region of northwest Pakistan during Friday prayers.

The bomber entered the crowded mosque and shouted Allahu Akbar before detonating explosives attached to his body. Officials said they feared the death toll could rise as some of the injured, including children, were in a serious condition.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack at Payee Khan, a village in Mohmand Agency that is part of the lawless Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) bordering Afghanistan.

Confirming the incident, the assistant political agent of the semi-autonomous region told the media that the mosque was in Anbar tehsil. It was a suicide blast, the official quoted a witness as saying.

The attack occurred in an area believed to be controlled by the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).

Naveed Akbar, the deputy administrator of Mohmand Agency, said some deaths were apparently caused when part of the mosque caved in from the force of the blast. A portion of the mosque and verandah collapsed in the blast and fell on worshippers. We are still retrieving bodies and the injured from the rubble of the mosque, he said.

Tribal elder Haji Subhanullah Mohmand said the attack may have been carried out by militants seeking revenge after local tribesmen raised a volunteer force and killed one insurgent and captured another.

It seems to have enraged the militants and they got their revenge by carrying out a suicide attack in a mosque today, Mohmand said.

Pakistans frontier regions, which are deeply conservative and hard to access due to rough terrain, have long been the sanctuary of fighters from al Qaeda, the Taliban and other militant groups.

In 2014 the army launched an operation in other parts of FATA, including North and South Waziristan, against insurgents who routinely attacked officials and civilians.

Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif condemned the bombing and said the attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the governments resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country.

Security in Pakistan has improved in recent years  the military says terrorist incidents dropped from 128 in 2013 to 74 last year  but extremists continue to stage major attacks.

A bombing in Quetta, which killed 74 people last month, was claimed by both the Islamic State and Jamaat-ur-Ahrar, a breakaway faction of the Taliban.

(With inputs from agencies)
A Swedish appeals court will on Friday decide whether to maintain an arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange over a 2010 rape accusation which he fears could lead to his extradition to the US.

Assange has always refused to travel to Stockholm for questioning over the allegation, which he denies, due to concerns Sweden will extradite him to the United States over WikiLeaks release of 500,000 secret military files on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Fridays hearing will be the eighth time the European arrest warrant has been tested in a Swedish court, with all seven previous rulings having gone against him.

The 45-year-old Australian sought refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy in London in June 2012 after exhausting all his legal options in Britain against extradition to Sweden.

The hearing comes a day after WikiLeaks released medical records claiming Assanges mental health was at risk if he remained confined in the embassy.

Mr Assanges mental health is highly likely to deteriorate over time if he remains in his current situation.... It is urgent that his current circumstances are resolved as quickly as possible, said a report published by the organisation on Twitter.

The 27-page medical report accompanied by supporting documents is attributed to an unnamed trauma and psychosocial expert in London and dated December 11, 2015.

Assanges lawyers have urged Sweden to respect a non-binding legal opinion by the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, which on February 5 ruled that his confinement in the Ecuadorian embassy amounted to arbitrary detention by Sweden and Britain.

A Stockholm district court, however, rejected the finding, ruling that Julian Assanges stay in the embassy should not be considered a detention.

It said the arrest warrant against him needed to be maintained because there is still a risk that he will abscond or evade justice.

The appeals court will announce its decision at 11am (0900 GMT).

Interrogation in October

Ecuador announced earlier this week that Assange agreed to answer questions from Swedish investigators at the embassy from October 17.

The Swedish Prosecution Agency had asked that their own investigators be allowed to interrogate Assange in person, but Quito denied that request.

Instead, the Swedish prosecutors will provide their questions in writing and an Ecuadorian prosecutor will conduct the questioning.

Swedish prosecutor Ingrid Isgren and police investigator Cecilia Redell will however be allowed to be present.

The Swedish prosecution agency has defended itself against criticism that it has let the case drag on since 2010 without any progress.

Among other things, prosecutors insisted that Assange travel to Sweden to answer the allegations, although they dropped that demand in March 2015 and agreed to allow the questioning to take place in London.

Prosecutor Marianne Ny has insisted Assange was to blame for the lengthy delays.

Mr Assange hasnt made himself available, which follows from the proceedings in Swedish courts, she told reporters on September 7.

Assange has meanwhile maintained that he has been sufficiently accommodating to Swedish justice officials.

The statute of limitations on the rape allegation expires on August 17, 2020.
Israeli forces shot dead three Arab assailants in separate incidents in East Jerusalem and the West Bank on Friday, police and the military said, in a flare-up of a nearly year-old wave of Palestinian street attacks.

With most anti-Israeli assaults carried out since October by individuals without any central guiding hand, it was difficult to gauge why violence had surged on Friday. The frequency of what had been near-daily attacks had slowed in recent months.

At the heavily patrolled Damascus Gate, a main entrance to Jerusalems walled Old City, a knife-wielding man attempted to stab police officers and was shot dead by Israeli forces, a police spokesman said.

He was identified by police as a resident of Jordan. It was not immediately clear if he was a Jordanian national.

The military said in a statement that a car carrying two Palestinians rammed into a civilian bus stop at a junction near the settlement of Kiryat Arba, outside the town of Hebron in the occupied West Bank.

In the attack, three civilians were injured. In response to the immediate threat, forces at the scene fired at the vehicle, resulting in the death of one of the assailants while the other was wounded, the statement said.

The body of Palestinian Fares Khadour, one of two assailants who rammed a car into a bus stop used by Israelis in the occupied southern West Bank, is seen on the ground as Israeli security personnel cordon off the site on Friday. The attack came shortly after Israeli police said they shot dead a Palestinian who tried to stab police officers in annexed east Jerusalem. (AFP)

Several hours later, a Palestinian stabbed an Israeli soldier at a junction near Hebron, and forces at the scene shot the attacker dead, the military said.

At least 214 Palestinians have died in violent incidents since October in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip. Of them, 143 were identified by authorities as assailants while others were killed during clashes and protests.

Palestinians, many of them acting alone and with rudimentary weapons, have killed at least 33 Israelis and two visiting Americans in attacks that have waned in recent months.

Earlier in the day, a Palestinian who was shot during an Israeli army raid on Thursday near Hebron died of his wounds, the Palestinian health ministry said. The military said troops fired at him while he was fleeing arrest.

In a statement, the Palestinian presidency called the killings crimes...that confirm once again that the Israeli government is pursuing a policy of escalation and ignoring international peace efforts.

Palestinian leaders say assailants have acted out of desperation over the collapse of peace talks in 2014 and Israeli settlement expansion in occupied territory that Palestinians seek for an independent state, with East Jerusalem as its capital. Israel says anti-Israeli incitement by Palestinian officials and on social networks have stoked attacks.
Republican nominee Donald Trump branded a US pastor a nervous mess on Thursday after she shut him down a day before as he criticised White House rival Hillary Clinton.

Trump had travelled to the suffering Michigan city of Flint to see how it has dealt with a health crisis rising out of lead contamination of its drinking water.

But when the Republican presidential hopeful arrived at Bethel United Methodist Church, a predominantly black congregation, he turned political, assailing Clinton for having failed on the economy, just like shes failed on foreign policy.

Everything she touched didnt work out. Nothing, Trump said.

As he spoke, Reverend Faith Green Timmons walked over, her hands clasped, and interrupted him.

Mr Trump, I invited you here to thank us for what weve done in Flint, not to give a political speech, Timmons said in a low voice.

Oh, oh, oh, OK, Trump said, appearing somewhat flustered before shifting his remarks to conditions in Flint.

On Thursday, Trump told Fox News that he felt something was up when Timmons introduced him.

Everyone plays their games, it doesnt bother me, Trump said, suggesting Timmons might have had a political motive for stepping in.

She was so nervous, she was like a nervous mess, Trump said.

Rev Faith Green Timmons speaks before Trump at the Bethel United Methedoist Church on Wednesday. (AFP)

Clinton herself had been sidelined by a bout of pneumonia for three days this week. But on Thursday she returned to the campaign trail in North Carolina, where she weighed in on the Flint affair.

He called her a nervous mess, Clinton noted to reporters after a campaign rally in Greensboro. Thats not only insulting, its dead wrong.

Timmons is a rock for her community in trying times, Clinton said. She deserves better than Trumps criticism.

Trump insisted on Fox that those at the church had been welcoming.

What really made me feel good, the audience was saying, Let him speak, let him speak. The audience was so great, he said.

Trump clearly has been more disciplined on the campaign trail in recent weeks, following a year of pointed rhetoric that has antagonized many.

But his criticism of the pastor -- 11 days after he visited a black church in nearby Detroit and courted African-American voters -- highlights his willingness to stray from that regimen in order to push back against perceived affronts.
Britains parliamentary standards commissioner will open an investigation into the alleged breach of MPs Code of Conduct by senior Labour lawmaker Keith Vaz, who was allegedly linked to male prostitutes with references to drugs as revealed by tabloids recently.

Scotland Yard is currently assessing whether any criminal offences had been committed during Vaz's encounter with the male escorts at his London flat in August. The Sunday Mirrors expose also included references to drugs.

The standards commissioner said Vaz was among MPs who are currently the subject of its investigations, but added that the move had been suspended pending the outcome of the assessment by Scotland Yard.

The commissioner is specifically looking at the alleged breach by Vaz of two paragraphs in the Code of Conduct of the House of Commons applicable to MPs.

Para 10 states: Members shall base their conduct on a consideration of the public interest, avoid conflict between personal interest and the public interest and resolve any conflict between the two, at once, and in favour of the public interest.

According to para 16 of the code, Members shall never undertake any action which would cause significant damage to the reputation and integrity of the House of Commons as a whole, or of its Members generally.

Vaz, the senior-most MP of Indian or Asian origin elected from Leicester East since 1987, resigned as chairman of the influential Home Affairs Committee of Parliament after the expose. There are also questions over his continued membership of a key Labour committee.

The Office of the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards deals with the application of the Code of Conduct and related rules that apply to members of Parliament. This includes the registration of financial interests held by MPs and the investigation of allegations that MPs have breached the rules set out in the Code of Conduct.

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WASHINGTON: Hillary Clinton returns to the campaign trail by addressing a rally in North Carolina, armed with a letter from her doctor that says the Democratic nominee is healthy and fit to serve as president of the United States, notwithstanding her recent bout of pneumonia.

The two-page note details her illness - the impact of which was captured on video by a bystander as an unsteady Clinton was hoisted into a van after she abruptly left a 9/11 memorial service - the medication and her health in general.

Donald Trump, who has come under pressure to also disclose more about his health as a result of his rivals health situation, released a similar note from his doctor to The Washington Post, which called the Republican nominee overweight and said he takes a cholesterol lowering drug and low-dose aspirin. Otherwise, he is in excellent physical health.

Trump s note is expected to be made public on a popular TV health show that airs on Thursday. Trump produced it unexpectedly during the recording of the show on Wednesday, after his campaign had said he wouldnt, and he gave it to the host, who was seen taking along look at it in promotional clips.

The health of the two nominees had been an issue before Clinton s illness forced it centre stage because of their age. If elected, Clinton, who is 68, will be only the second oldest individual to make it to the White House after Ronald Reagan, who was 69. And Trump, at 70, will be the oldest.

They have been certified as fit and healthy by their doctors - in hyperbolic terms by Trumps - but they have been under pressure to disclose more.

Health is an important issue for any candidate, but its especially true with two candidates who would be governing in their 70s, David Gergen, who worked in Bill Clinton s White House and has served three Republican presidents, told The Wall Street Journal.
ISLAMABAD: Six people were killed and more than 150 injured when a passenger train collided with a freight train in Pakistans Punjab province early on Thursday, raising questions about the safety of the countrys ageing railway infrastructure.

Most of the passengers on the Karachi-bound Awam Express were returning home after the Eid holidays which ended a day earlier, officials said. The Awam Express, which originated in Peshawar, struck a stationary freight train at a stop near the southern Punjab city of Multan.

Most of the injured were taken to Multans Nishtar Hospital. Officials of the Edhi Ambulance service, a private rescue organisation, said some serious cases had been airlifted to Karachi. There was chaos at the site of the accident as railway staff were attacked by angry passengers. Railway officials blamed the driver of the Awam Express for not stopping at a red signal ahead of the crash site.

TV news channels aired footage of injured people waiting to be transported to Multan. The footage also showed rescue officials working around crumpled and overturned bogies in the darkness.

Edhi staff said the government had initially made no arrangements to transport the dead and injured to nearby hospitals and this was done with the help of private volunteers.

News agencies later quoted an official of the rescue emergency service in Multan as saying that rescue operations had been completed. He said 40 ambulances and 200 rescuers from Lodhran, Muzaffargarh and Multan participated in the operations.

All rail traffic to southern Pakistan came to a halt because of the accident.

Punjab chief minister Shahbaz Sharif, the younger brother of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, ordered an inquiry into the accident.
BEIRUT/GENEVA: Syrian government forces and rebels had yet to withdraw from a road needed to deliver aid to the city of Aleppo on Thursday, threatening the most serious international peacemaking effort in months as the sides accused each other of violating a truce.

The aid delivery to rebel-held eastern Aleppo, which is blockaded by government forces, is an important test of a US-Russian deal that has brought about a significant reduction in violence since a ceasefire took effect on Monday.

The UNs Syria envoy Staffan de Mistura said the US and Russia were expected to manage the disengagement of forces from the road, but also criticised Damascus for failing to provide permits needed to make aid deliveries to other areas.

France, which backs the opposition, became the first US ally to publicly question the deal with Moscow, urging Washington to share details of the agreement and saying that without aid for Aleppo, it was not credible.

Control of the Castello Road is divided between the government and rebels who have been battling to topple President Bashar al-Assad for more than five years. It has been a major frontline in the war.

Russia, whose air force helped the Syrian government to blockade opposition-held Aleppo this summer, said on Wednesday it was preparing for the Syrian army and rebel fighters to begin a staged withdrawal from the road. But on Thursday morning, both Syrian government and rebel forces were still manning their positions. An official in an Aleppo-based Syrian rebel group said international parties had told him aid was now due to be delivered on Friday.
WASHINGTON: The United States has rejected fresh calls for presidential pardon for Edward Snowden, the NSA contractors whose leaks about the agencys surveillance programmes shook up the world.

Edward Snowden is not a whistleblower. There actually is a specific process that is well-established and well-protected that allows whistleblowers to raise concerns that they have, particularly when it relates to confidential or classified information, to do so in a way that protects the national security secrets of the US, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said on Wednesday.

That is not what Mr Snowden did.

The appeal was issued after the release of the biopic Snowden over the past weekend.

Snowden himself joined the call for pardon in a videoconference from Moscow, where he is in self-exile, with representatives from rights groups American Civil Liberties Union, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International earlier this week.

From time to time we see that governments redraw the boundaries of our rights behind closed doors, Snowden said. If we are to sustain a free society for the next century, we must ensure that whistleblowers can act safely.

Snowden is an Oliver Stone film, made with Snowdens cooperation.
CHEYENNE: The worlds oldest man turned 113 on Thursday and the Holocaust survivor living in Israel readied for the Bar Mitzvah he was denied a century ago, his family said. Yisrael Kristal, an observant Jew from Zarnow in what is now Poland and living in the city of Haifa, was born on September 15, 1903.

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Warren Buffet is a philanthropist as well as a billionaire businessman. The Oracle of Omaha owns many companies but bulk of his wealth is credited to Berkshire Hathaway. Buffet has been a main stay in the "World's Billionaires List" of Forbes, with a strong hold in the third spot.

However, when news of Wells Fargo's grave scandal broke last Tuesday, Warren Buffet's net worth was grimly affected. His $66.9 billion net worth just this Monday was diminished to $65.5 billion, a heartbreaking 2% (approximately) decrease.

With this, the philanthropic billionaire lost his spot as the world's third richest person as Jeff Bezos, Amazon CEO, swaps place with him.

With Wells Fargo's "fake accounts" scandal, the bank is suffering both financially and morally. The bank has to pay $185 million for its violations comprising $100 million from Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. More importantly, the bank's stock dropped to 3% as both investors and customers lose confidence.

Buffet directly owns 2 million shares of the bank while his main company, Berkshire Hathaway, owns 9.51% (As of June 30, according to FactSet). Consequently, Berkshire Hathaway's stock also dropped to a close 2% since Monday.

What went wrong with Wells Fargo?

Wells Fargo is recognized as the world's largest and most reputable bank. Or at least it used to be before the scandal was known to public. The San Francisco-based bank has been found guilty of opening and collecting fees from bogus accounts and credit cards without customers' knowledge.

According to Forbes, the fake accounts were rooted from retail bankers wanting to attain sales targets (determined by new accounts) set by the bank. The bank is already in the process of removing these sales goals, as disclosed by Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf. Moreover, 5,300 employees connected with the scandal were already laid off.
Star Trek, the well-loved television series turned movie franchise, is currently celebrating its 50 years of existence. The TV series of Star Trek aired for the first time in September 8, 1966 and since then, have awed and inspired.

If Kirk and Spock are real, it looks like they have been spotted by NASA going boldly to explore where no one has gone before. Yes, the heavens gave all Trekkies something to be delighted about on the anniversary of the show.

The Spitzer Telescope of NASA was able to capture images of what look like the two versions of the U.S.S. Enterprise from the historic Star Trek.

To make it simpler and easier for everyone to see, NASA released the images with and without the superimposed lines (see below).



On the right most image, one can see that there are two Enterprise images present. The left image being the original U.S.S. Enterprise or NCC-1701 of Captain James T. Kirk and Spock. While the right image is Enterprise-D or NCC-1701-D of Jean-Luc Picard from "Next Generation" Star Trek. Real Trekkies maybe will no longer need the lines NASA provided and can perceive the Enterprise ships just by looking at the left image alone. Of course, these images are merely products of imaginations of recognizing objects while looking at the heavens. This has been a known phenomenon called Pareidoila. The most common example would be the constellation we try so hard to see at night. As explained by NASA, the truth and scientific explanation of the images of the perceived Enterprise ships is simple. In visible light, these are actually two regions of star formations behind a haze of dust. NASA's very powerful telescope, Spitzer, has the capability of looking deep into this dust clouds. This is the very reason why the telescope was able to capture the images of what appears to the Enterprise ships.

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The United Kingdom will soon be imposing a 10-year maximum sentence in order to repel online piracy. The Digital Economy Bill, which is now on its second reading in the Parliament, intends to put away online violators with a penalty that is normally meted for hardened criminals.

Anti-piracy groups such as the Federation Against Copyright Theft (FACT) have often seek sharper punishments for those committing fraud rather than the appropriate charge of infringement. Currently, UK's copyright regulation offers only a two-year custodial sentence. Under the new law, offenders will be tried as infringers but their sentencing will carry enough weight. Pirates selling copyrighted CDs, DVDs and other related materials can go to jail for up to ten years.

The Digital Economy Bill has a new draft which was published last July. Law makers are also eyeing amendments for sections of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988 to better suppress the proliferation of online piracy. Karen Bradley, the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, has pointed out that the government will assist businesses from attacks against intellectual property. She has added that the two-year sentence for criminal gangs who prey on online creations of others will be increased to ten.

In a consultation response, the UK government has cited that copyright infringement warrants a longer sentence considering that, in a case, five defendants have received punishments totaling to 17 years for releasing more than 2,500 of the latest films on the internet. In March 2015, a study commissioned by the UK Intellectual Property Office (IPO) has concluded that short term jail terms present a message that online infringement is not a serious offense. By increasing the length of punishments, the infraction will be in the same league of rape, rioting, child cruelty and firearms transgressions.

According to Intellectual Property Minister Baroness Neville-Rolfe, it is vital that creative industries, which are worth more than seven billion pounds to the UK economy, should be protected from online criminal enterprises.

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The year 2016 has been the year for UFO sighting as at numerous instances and at multiple places, UFOs were spotted by the UFO enthusiasts as well as by regular people. Last Sunday, it was France, which is reported to have witnessed a mysterious flying object.

France, the country which is famous for its historical landmarks, rich culture, and good food, recently witnessed a mysterious flying object at the Aixe-sur-Vienne. The object which was about 500 meters left behind a slight trail. It seemed that the object was making its own cloud as its speed was faster than clouds, UFO Sightings Daily reported. A photo was also posted by the news outlet.

Witnesses of the UFO, Danielle and Charles Barbanes, said that they were just relaxing and enjoying a regular Sunday night when they saw strange things happening in the sky. Describing the experience to be paranormal, they stated that they saw a round object which was about the size of half the moon and it emitted a sort of yellow light. It was there for a good 40 seconds. Moreover, Morning News USA reported that the retired couple also spotted as many as five balls in a minutes' time but they did not make any noise like a drone or an aircraft.

It must be mentioned here that the retired couple was the only ones who spotted the mysterious object and due to lack of any pieces of evidence like a video or other eye witnesses, it cannot be said with surety whether it was the UFO or some other phenomena that were taking place. Reportedly, no abnormal activity was also reported by the control tower of the Limoges airport in that sector.

Notably, this comes after Washington witnessed a teardrop-shaped alien ship on Sep. 4. According to previous reports, eye witnesses saw the object, which was black in color and it had a sparkling shape behind it. Corsica also witnessed alien ships being burned down by lightning bolts and many people had gathered to see the specular show.

In other news, it has been said that humans and aliens share the universe. It is after the discovery of the new earth-like planet, Proxima b, that ex-NASA scientist, Leroy Chiao, has stated that his belief in the existence of aliens has been confirmed.

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President Obama's chief science adviser, John Holdren, said Earth is not fully prepared for a possible asteroid strike.

According to reports from DailyMail, he warned that an impact of the strike could do a potential damage to Earth and that people would have to be "smarter than dinosaurs" when such event comes.

"We are not fully prepared, but we are on a trajectory to get much more so," the chief science advisor said in a statement at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center regarding their talks about the agency's $1.4 billion Asteroid Redirect Mission.

He said that people should take matters like these seriously and cited the two catastrophic events in history - the February 2013 meteor explosion over the Russian City of Chelyabinsk and the 1908 Tunguska airburst.

The 2013 Chelyabinsk strike, injured about 1,200 people and was caused by an object that is thought to be about 20 meters wide. The Tunguska event, on the other hand, was believed to be much more massive because a space rock 40 meters exploded over a mostly unpopulated region of Siberia, which flattened 2,070 square kilometers of forest.

The 1908 and 2013 events were extremely rare, according to Holdren, with the Chelyabinsk strike to occur once every hundred years and the Tunguska airburst believed to occur every 1000 years. But no matter how rare these events happen, he stressed that people should have enough knowledge about these.

However, Holdren stated that if we are going to be as capable a civilization as our technology allows, we need to be prepared for even those rare events, because they could do a lot of damage to the Earth.

"This is a hazard that 65 million years ago the dinosaurs succumbed to. We have to be smarter than the dinosaurs," he said.

The chief advisor also added that if we are going to be as capable a civilization as our technology allows, we need to be prepared for even those rare events, because they could to a lot of damage to the Earth.

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"Rick and Morty" Season 3 will run longer than the previous episodes with "XXX: Return of Xander Cage" actor Vin Diesel playing a pivotal character. Plus, new characters are going to be introduced when the adult animated series returns summer next year.

The 3rd season of "Rick and Morty" has officially been extended. According to Yahoo! Tech, Adult Swim has ordered four more episodes for a total of 15 episodes instead of the usual 11-episodic run.

Other than that, Vin Diesel has been rumored to make a guest appearance in "Rick and Morty" Season 3. Parent Herald reported that the 49-year old American actor, producer, director and screenwriter is said to be the voice actor behind the character of D&D.

Such rumors stemmed when series co-creator Dan Harmon tapped Vin Diesel to dub the pivotal character during his speech in the San Diego Comic-Con.

Vin Diesel is yet to agree whether or not he will join the fun with Rick and Morty or not.

In addition, speculations suggest that new characters will be introduced to the adult animated series. iTech Post has mentioned that Summer Smith (voiced by Spencer Grammer), the other granddaughter of Rick, will be added to assist Mortimer "Morty" Smith Sr. in helping her grandfather escaped jail.

It has been featured in the second season that Summer's grandfather has been sentenced to life imprisonment in a Federal prison.

As of now, the official premiere date of "Rick and Morty" Season 3 has not been officially announced by the series creators and the network just yet. However, speculations suggest that the adult animated series is expected to air around April 2017 on Adult Swim.

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Researchers say that Sakurajima volcano is due for a major explosion sometime in 2044. According to the Scientific Reports journal, a team of volcanologists have introduced a new model for forecasting Sakurajima's behavior. Many believe that this approach will lead to better prepare for natural disaster worldwide.

The peak, which is known for its small but daily eruptions, sits on the edge of Kyushu Island in Japan. Recent observations have unveiled that the mountain is predicted to spit hundreds of tons of sizzling rock, ash and lava.

This is not the primary attempt at anticipating Sakurajima's outbursts. A model developed in the 50s has presented a simple pen-and-paper calculation. The approach has operated under the assumption that the volcano's internal magma pool was spherical and the surface above flat. However, this model cannot be banked upon to determine the mountain's activity.

According to Dr. James Hickey, a volcanologist at University of Exeter and the study's lead author, the new model takes into account the unusual topography of the area immediately surrounding the volcano including the different properties of each layer of the earth's crust. From this context, forecasting Sakurajima's erratic behavior is closer to being accurate.

Sakurajima's last major eruption has occurred in 1914. The explosion, which killed 58 people, has caused considerable flooding and intense pyroclastic flow in the nearby city of Kagoshima. Lava outpour, which is unusual for Japanese volcanoes due to high silica content, has gone on for months.

Using a seismometer and GPS data, the team has found that the magma reservoir within the mountain grew at a considerable rate. Taking this development into consideration, it has been estimated that the next major burst will happen about 130 years after the previous one which means that eruption will be in 25 to 30 years.

The Sakurajima volcano is roughly 32 miles from the Sendai nuclear power plant. For the 600,000 residents at Kagoshima City, lava blast and plumes of ash are becoming a regular activity.

Researchers have found that magma, at around 14 million cubic meters annually, is being supplied to the volcano's system at a faster rate than it can be released through smaller and regular eruptions which is why observations indicate a growing potential for a larger burst within the next three decades.

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According to The Guardian, US independent investigator, Blaine Gibson, has previously found airplane debris before, but this time around, he again found several parts on beaches in Madagascar which he thought to be from the missing Malaysian aircraft, MH370.

Five pieces of airplane parts were found and two of them reportedly appeared to be burnt. Gibson said he had notified the Malaysian and Australian authorities regarding this but the parts were still not collected by Malaysia, which will require an analysis if said parts were really from the missing plane.

According to reports from NEWS.au, "If confirmed to have come from the plane, it will be the first evidence that a fire - possibly an electrical one - brought down MH370 rather than the actions of a suicidal pilot."

It has been more than a year since Gibson has been investigating the plane's disappearance and he reportedly found several pieces of debris on beaches bordering the Indian Ocean. He had delivered five separate parts for analysis at the Australian Transport Safety Bureau in Canberra, according to reports.

Gibson said, "I brought it myself this time because I was coming to Australia and because the Madagascar authorities have been waiting for three months for them to pick the other pieces up."

The Malaysian aircraft have been missing since March 2014 while flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, with 239 passengers on board. Official reports regarding the reason behind the aircraft's disappearance have not been announced yet.

The private investigator said in a statement from BBC, that he was touched by the plight of the families. He added, "I just couldn't imagine how they felt, knowing nothing about their loved ones for a year... So I just decided, I'll go look for it for myself." Gibson stated that he has no formal training in plane crash investigation but he has reportedly found 13 of the 27 MH370 fragments washed up from beach borders.

In a report from The Week, the private investigator was with three locals during the event of finding the suspected debris of the missing aircraft.

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Blog Hinangai

While there is much discussion in Guam about the economic benefits of increasing the islands military presence, the damages/dangers that they represent are rarely mentioned. This blog, a supplement to the Peace and Justice for Guam Petition, is meant to counter that by providing information about the US military in Guam, with the hopes of steering policy away from a dangerous unilateralist course to more sustainable notions of regional development and a strengthening international solidarity.
The recent nuclear test of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) endangered its neighboring countries. It was the fifth and biggest nuclear tests that the country's military ever conducted.

In light of North Korea's actions, China, their most important ally, came under fire for not utilizing its influence to curb the country's nuclear dreams.

In response, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told Japan that unilateral sanctions alone are not enough, according to CNBC. Wang also reiterated that he disagreed with North Korea's military ambitions and that they are prepared to propose harsher penalties.

For years, North Korea has always fought to maintain their isolation from the rest of the world. But the next incident in their country had them reaching out for help despite the globe's increased awareness in their nuclear activities.

Typhoon Lionrock hit the North Homgyang province earlier this week and it cause over 100 people killed and another 400 missing. Because of the province's already dire situation even before the typhoon hit, the country is now facing a humanitarian crisis.

Because the surrounding mountains were too bare to protect the land from further disaster, flooding and landslides only exacerbated the circumstances.

"Families here lost everything during the floods," United Nations International Emergency Fund (UNICEF) Deputy Representative Murat Sahin said in a press release.

"We met the household doctor for the community. She told us that 11 out of 15 pregnant women in the community had miscarriages since the floods."

With homes and crops destroyed and winter fast approaching, the country is definitely feeling the devastation.

According to The Japan Times, United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) stated that while the whole country suffers from malnutrition, the provinces directly affected by the flooding are in the worst possible situation.

Now, North Korea is struggling to cope with a disaster that they have not experienced in over 60 years while also facing the sanctions that the world will put the nation through after their nuclear stint that could have endangered its neighboring countries.

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This September's full moon is going to coincide with another spectacular celestial event. A penumbral lunar eclipse is set to occur on Sep.16, thereby, making the full moon appear even more spectacular.

The partial lunar eclipse will be visible in Africa, Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Western Australia, reports Space.com. Those who are interested in watching the event can get to see it live at Slooh.com. The Slooh Community Observatory has allied with Old Farmer's Almanac to broadcast the harvest moon eclipse and the broadcast will begin at 12:45 p.m. EDT.

What is more, the webcast will be accompanied by a complete explanation of the event, courtesy Slooh astronomer Paul Cox. Another expert, Eric Edelman, will also be part of the exercise and he will shed light on the different types of eclipses and their special features. Bob Berman, astronomy editor for The Old Farmer's Almanac will talk about the moon's movement around the earth while Janice Stillman, another editor, will discuss at length the history and folk tales surrounding the Harvest Moon.

For those who do not know, September's full moon is also known as the Harvest Moon, claims National Geographic. The name was coined because this month's moon is closest to the autumn equinox, occurring in the Northern Hemisphere and it gives added light (more time) to the farmers to harvest their crops. This is because it rises half an hour later each night.

This year's special Harvest Moon is definitely going to be a delight for space enthusiasts but it would be slightly less dramatic in comparison to last year because, in 2015, September full moon coincided with a total eclipse. Last time, the moon's surface turned completely blood red but this time, it will be partially darkened. The darkest phase of the moon will be visible at 2:54 p.m. ET.

Therefore, those who want to catch it live, cannot depend on their naked eyes and will have to resort to binoculars and telescopes to get the best view. Also, the event is a must-catch as it is the last Harvest Moon eclipse that will not be repeated until 2024.

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Google are up to bringing their new smartphones, which are scheduled to be announced any time this month. However, it seems that Google changed it plans of retaining the classy names for their smartphones and have instead decided on naming them "Pixel".

The fact that Google have never released a phone under the new name "Pixel" is actually inducing a lot of doubt among Google loyalists as they were expecting for a new "Nexus".

The point is Google have decided to ditch the "Nexus" branding.

Amid being a rumor, the plans seem progressing as the phones have been redesigned with the new logo.

In any case, we're expecting two smartphones, Pixel and Pixel XL, from Google this year. They are both reportedly built by Taiwan's HTC and will feature the brand new Android 7.0 Nougat OS. All rumors point to Google launching the new Pixel and Pixel XL on Oct. 4 at a dedicated press conference.

The two phones, Pixel and Pixel XL, are something that users already heard on their codenames - 'Sailfish' and 'Marlin'.

The Pixel will be a sequel to the Nexus 5X while Pixel XL will follow the more high-end Nexus 6P. Google Pixel will feature a 5-inch Full HD display - that's 1,920 x 1,080 pixels while Pixel XL is said to feature a larger 5.5-inch QHD display - that's 2,560 x 1,440 pixels.

When Google announced its plans for the future of Android phones at the I/O developer conference earlier this year, it lauded "high-density" displays as a must-have for VR. That immediately sparked speculation that the next Google phone may feature a 4K display. However, there are reports that Google might stick to 1440p and not 4K due to battery consumptions.

Google Pixel will reportedly be featuring a Snapdragon 820 chip with about 4GB of memory alongside a 2770mAh battery which is alright for a 5-inch display.

Pixel XL will ship with Qualcomm's brand new Snapdragon 821 chip. It's a spin-off from the 820, and offers a 10 percent boost to processor performance. The newly implemented chipset is also reportedly said to be VR ready, which would instantly boost Google's daydream project.

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
An extradition request for Lauri Love, 32, who has Asperger's Syndrome, was approved by a London court on Friday despite warnings that he might kill himself if sent to a U.S. jail.

Love will face trial for hacking high-security state computers of the U.S. including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. army, Missile Defense Agency and Federal Reserve. He faces a lifetime in prison in the U.S. if found guilty in the series of hacks that occurred in 2012 and 2013.

Authorities believed Mr. Love was connected to Anonymous, the international Guy Fawkes mask wearing group of hackers responsible for orchestrating hacks on U.S. institutions. His actions were said to have caused millions of dollars' worth of damage and that he had stolen employees' personal details.

Love, who suffers from episodes of depression and psychosis, had warned that he could take his own life if sent to a U.S. prison. Tor Ekeland, his U.S. based lawyer, said the U.S. penal system would have an irreparable effect on him that can be life threatening.

"They want to destroy him because they want to use him as an example," Ekeland told Reuters.

Mr. Love's lawyers are expected to file an appeal to the Home Secretary of the Interior Minister in the United Kingdom as he is the only one that can ratify the London judge's decision.

They have also argued that he should be tried in Britain pointing to new rules that make it easier for British courts to try people for crimes committed in the country. Such rules were introduced in 2012 after the extradition of Scottish hacker Gary McKinnon to the U.S. was blocked by then Home Secretary Theresa May, who is now Prime Minister.

McKinnon, who also had Asperger's, had hacked into U.S. state computers for what he believed to be a "moral crusade" to find classified documents about UFOs. Ms. Theresa May said he was seriously ill and extradition would violate his human rights therefor the ruling was overturned.

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
The debris of the ill-fated Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 that was recovered off the coast of Tanzania led investigators to believe that the missing plane went for a "death dive" and not into a foiled attempt of crash landing.

The fragment, which was part of the inboard section of the right and outboard flap of the plane, was retracted prompting investigators to believe that the ill-fated flight was already unmanned when it made an impact.

Officials from the Australian Transport Safety Bureau assumed that the pilot were already incapacitated, possibly through lack of oxygen, and the aircraft was on a death dive after running out of fuel.

If the pilots were in controls, the plane could have glided onto the sea while extending the flaps using hydraulic switch.

The ATSB made the confirmation after the Italian part manufacturer asserted that the recovered parts off Pemba Island belong to the missing plane.

The flap bears date stamp, Boeing part numbers and an "OL" numbers that were all unique to the manufacturer.

"The flap section was being examined for any evidence of interaction with mechanisms, supports and surrounding components that may indicate the state of flap operation at the time of separation from the wing," it said.

In an interview of Australian Associated Press, ATSB head Peter Foley said MH370 had not deployed its flaps when it hit the water but retracted inside the wing. A pilot attempting a soft landing would have extended the wing flaps.

"The rate of descent combined with the position of the flap - if it's found that it is not deployed - will almost certainly rule out either a controlled ditch or glide," he said.

HNGN News and Global Headlines earlier reported that the search teams have scaled around 110,000 sq.km. in search for the missing plane with over 20 nations embarking the operations.

As this posting, 22 pieces of debris were recovered along coasts off South Africa, Mozambique, Mauritius, Madagascar and Tanzania.

With the development, Malaysia Transport Minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong said the search will continue to cover another 120,000 sq km.

"We will continue our search for the missing plane. We have to cover another 120,000 sq km. I promised to the world to complete the 120,000 sq km search area by end of December this year," he told reporters during his official visit to Bintulu Port Authority yesterday.

"This confirmation means a lot to us as we can further examine the debris and uncover new insight into the circumstances surrounding flight MH370," he added.

The plane was carrying 239 people when it went off radar in March 2014. It was on its way to Beijing, China from Kuala Lumpur.

@ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
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News, events, history, and other mid-week tidbits.

Tuesday, October 25, 4:30  7 p.m.

Orr Area EMS Open House

Brats and burgers will be served. Event includes a new ambulance tour and blood pressure screenings. For more info: 218-780-3798.

Orr Fire Hall

4540 Lake St., Orr

Tuesday, October 25, 12  6 p.m.

Essentia Health Job Fair

Talent recruiters and department managers will be on-site at Essentia Health-Virginia. Candidates from all backgrounds are encouraged to attendnurses, nursing and clinical assistants, surgery technicians, radiology technicians, respiratory therapists, human resource professionals, and those interested in environmental services or nutrition services. Essentia staff will greet candidates, conduct an initial screening and filter them to appropriate hiring managers for interviews. Select candidates will be verbally offered a position before leaving. Candidates are asked to bring a resume, but its not required. Attire is business casual. For more info: www.essentiacareers.org.

901 9th St. N., Virginia
LEIPZIG, GERMANYMelia Hotels International has opened Innside by Melia Leipzig, as part of the Spanish group's design and lifestyle brand.

The new four-star superior hotel with 177 rooms and suites is located here at the corner of Dittrichring and Gottschedstrae. Opposite the St. Thomas Church, the hotel complex is an architectural ensemble that consists of two historical buildings and a modern glass roof structure integrating two palace buildings.

In addition, an entire new structure was erected in between the bank and the Kosmos building that brought the facade of Schlobach Palais back to the cityscape. The facade was designed by the architect Arwed Rossbach in the middle of the 19th century, featuring extensive front decorations with its six-ft. stone sculptures.

Following the design concept of the Innside by Melia upscale brand, the property combines an architectural style that blends into the cityscape. With its modern furnishings and partly floor-to-ceiling windows, the rooms are designed in monochrome colors that match the wood look of the floors. Indirect lighting provides an eye-catching accent to the space.

All rooms and suites offer king or queen beds, adjustable air conditioning, a 40-in. LED television, a free soft drink minibar, complimentary WiFi, desks including a media hub and high-speed internet access, as well as open bathroom concepts with a rain shower.

The hotel provides a special highlight on the fourth floor with its Balcony Suite, offering views of St. Thomas Church. With its separate living room and ample floor space, this suite can also be used as an exclusive conference room or a location suitable for dinners.

Three flexible meeting rooms are fully equipped with state-of-the-art media technology, full climate control and daylight. A fitness room with a sauna and relaxation room are also on the property.

In addition, the hotel's F&B concept is designed for connecting and sharing, according to the company.

"The Innside by Melia opened at exactly the right time. It goes perfectly with Leipzig's current self-confidence and its dynamic development. As an exciting synthesis of history and avant-garde, the new hotel hotspot ideally integrates into the trade fair city. It is our goal to enrich Leipzig's hotel landscape with lifestyle, design and Spanish flair," said Kai Lamle, managing director, Germany, Melia Hotels International and area VP, Melia Hotels & Resorts, EMEA. "We want to present the perfect address for modern hospitality to international travelers as well as Leipzig citizens in equal measure."

About Melia Hotels International

Founded in 1956 in Mallorca (Spain), Melia Hotels International operates more than 390 hotels (portfolio and pipeline) throughout more than 40 countries, with brands including Gran Melia Hotels & Resorts, Paradisus by Melia, ME by Melia, Melia Hotels & Resorts, INNSiDE by Melia, Sol by Melia and TRYP by Wyndham. The Company is the global leader in resort hotels, while also leveraging its experience to consolidate the growing segment of the leisure-inspired urban market. Its commitment to responsible tourism has led the Group to become the third most sustainable hotel company in the world in 2018, according to RobecoSam, the investment company to produce the Dow Jones Sustainability Index. Melia Hotels International is also included in the IBEX 35 Spanish stock market index and it is the Spanish hotel leader in Corporate Reputation (Merco Ranking). Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin and Instagram meliahotelsinternational.com

Communications Department

+ 34 971 22 44 64

Melia
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The Gresham Hotel in Dublin Sold for 92 million

The Riu Plaza The Gresham Dublin will be an addition to the collection of urban Riu Plaza hotels that are currently present in New York, Miami, Panama, Guadalajara and Berlin, and will strengthen the brand's presence in Europe

RIU has completed the purchase of the historic Gresham Hotel on O'Connell Street, one of the most famous in Dublin, for 92 million. The hotel occupies a majestic building approaching its 200th anniversary and, thanks to a recent renovation, it offers the best of the Irish capital city's tradition and history, with modern and up-to-date services.

The Riu Plaza The Gresham Dublin hotel has 323 rooms and suites, 20 function rooms, a restaurant and a bar, as well as an unbeatable location in the centre of the city. Its facilities are a short walk from famous Dublin sights such as the River Liffey crossing the heart of the capital, Croke Park, Dublin Castle, the iconic Temple Bar and the Henry Street shopping area. It is also 20 minutes from the airport and very close to the new Convention Centre of Dublin.

"Dublin is now one of the most interesting cities for investment. Its tourism industry is booming, demand for rooms rising and the city is putting a lot of money into its infrastructure. We are extremely pleased with the purchase of this hotel in one of the most beautiful European capitals. We are sure that it will be the perfect addition to our collection of Riu Plaza hotels and many returning RIU clients will be drawn to discovering this destination with us", says Luis Riu, CEO of RIU Hotels & Resorts.

As well as being an attractive building, it was also renovated in 2013. As a result, it will need only a few minor adjustments for the facilities to represent the RIU brand and standards.

Ireland has been welcoming record numbers of tourists over recent years. Between January and June this year it was visited by 4.4 million foreign visitors, representing a 13% increase on the same period in 2015. The country is known for its history and beautiful landscapes, while the Irish are renowned for being generous and hospitable. This all makes the country, and its capital, a very attractive tourist destination, in particular for European visitors.

This Irish addition to the collection of Riu Plaza urban hotels will extend RIU's list of international destinations. The hotel is set to become RIU's second city hotel in Europe, after the Riu Plaza Berlinopened in September 2015, and the brand's sixth in all. Together with Riu Plaza Panama, Riu Plaza Guadalajara, Riu Plaza Miami Beach and Riu Plaza New York Times Square, they currently make up the urban hotel line of RIU Hotels & Resorts.
When one hears Goose wit another one, expect to experience the full star quality of whatever rapper comes on the track. Goose has spent much of his young career alongside two particular stars, Young Thug and Rich Homie Quan, whom came to fame together as the duo known as Rich Gang, which dissolved in early 2015. Goose was there for most of Rich Gangs regrettably short-lived takeover, assisting in the production of several songs on the Birdman-hosted tape, Tha Tour: Part 1, now hailed as a classic.

Thug and Quan both possess a freedom with their artistry that sets them apart from other rappers who began their careers making street-focused music. Trap is rightly a genre in itself, one that looms large over most all of Atlanta hip-hop, but the word never seemed to neatly encompass either member of the Rich Gang duo. Their music comes packed with an array of feelings  romance, sadness, rage  each one expressed purely so as to resonate on a universal level. Goose sees it as his role to create the proper ambiance for his artists to fully express themselves. If it werent for the producers that Thug and Quan around, he explains, their message would probably be different. You gotta take advantage of the position youre in and understand it.

He sees artists like Thug and Quan as not rappers but full-on pop stars. He knows theyre capable of using their voices to convey nearly transcendent emotional experiences, and its his job to give them the right backdrops to do so. Accordingly, he also brings the sounds of pop  experimenting with lighter, more delicate melodies than many of his peers  into his beats. He takes influence from acts like Maroon 5 and Ellie Goulding, the latter whom he sampled for Thugs Slime Season track Calling Your Name, which Thug apparently called one of those superhero beats.

That style has always been my wave, says Goose of euphoric, above-the-clouds anthems like Calling Your Name. When I started listening to EDM and pop-type records, I wanted to bring that over into my world. I wanted to bring that to Thug and Quan cause nobody had really done it.

Goose is grateful to have spent his whole life in the ATL; Im glad I was born and raised in the right spot. He began producing early into high school after getting his first computer and stumbling upon a pirated copy of FL Studio. After graduating, he attended the Atlanta Institute of Music for a short while before calling it quits, as he was turned off by the engineering focus of the program, instead wanting to connect with artists as a hands-on producer.

But he had no connections to rappers or to anyone in the industry. His hopes lay in the Internet, and he made an effort to connect with artists before they attained serious followings. Quan was the first artist who actually hit him back. In early 2013, he messaged Goose on Twitter a day before the release of his breakout tape, Still Goin In, telling him that one of his beats had made it onto the project  on the triumphant final track Ayoo. The reloaded version of Still Goin In, released a few months later, still sits well within the top crop of Atlanta mixtapes over the past few years.

Quan was turning into a big deal, and he soon found himself under the watchful eye of Birdman, who situated him with another young sensation in Young Thug. Quan brought Goose along with him to be a part of Birdmans master plan, and thus began the nonstop studio camp that led to the creation of Tha Tour: Part 1. Joining Goose behind the boards were other adventurous ATL producers like London on da Track, Dun Deal, and Isaac Flame.

Quan would be in one room, Thug in the other, and both their doors would be open, says Goose of his time spent working in the Rich Gang studios. I might go in there and do something with Thug, then he might go to Quan and ask him to hear something. Goose knew he was in a special place, but he was so immersed in the collaborative experience that he didnt think about how the work would be received. At the time, we wasnt really thinking were making one of the biggest tapes ever in hip-hop.

Of the several songs on Tha Tour: Part 1 he was a part of, Goose cites Bullet as his personal favorite. It was the first time I did a song with them where Quan and Thug were in the booth together going back and forth. On my beat. It was special for me.

Tha Tour: Part 1 was just a small portion of all that was created during those days, and Gooses biggest regret about the Rich Gang fallout  aside from seeing two close friends part ways  is that the world never got to hear the Rich Gang album that had been in the works. Not much has changed regarding his own personal dealings in the wake of the break-up, as hes continued to work frequently with both artists despite them steering clear of one another.

With Barter 6, the Slime Season series, Im Up, and now JEFFERY, Young Thug has continued to approach superstardom at a steady rate. Theres no telling how high he could be at this time next year. Goose contributed two beats to the original Slime Season and three to its follow-up. Most all of them showcase Thug as the unrestrained yet increasingly engaging vocalist heard on JEFFERY, his latest project, which presented a marked shift in the pop direction.

On two of the notable Slime tracks, Thats All (SS1) and Phoenix (SS2), Goose makes use of the more tranquil sounds of EDM and creates blissfully atmospheric soundscapes kept grounded with trickling, occasionally explosive 808s. Its beats like these that bring Thug into his element and thus show why hes so special.

Another one of Gooses most prized productions came on Proud of Me, a song that never saw an official release as it was part of the massive Young Thug leak that unearthed incomplete recordings of several months worth of material. And the song is likely a favorite of those who dug through those leaks, as Gooses melody inspires a passionately sung hook from Thugger that ranks among his most memorable. I know that song couldve been a top ten record on radio, says Goose. Im mad that it leaked, but it pushes me. If we can do that once, then we can do it again.

Goose was a part of a leading candidate for one of JEFFERYs potential radio hits, Floyd Mayweather, which he helped produce as part of a supergroup that includes TM88, Wheezy, and the Billboard Hitmakers. The team is like the youthful Atlanta counterpart to the array of industry playmakers behind Kanye Wests beats. Theres a certain chill to the Floyd Mayweather instrumental thats a product of the trap foundation the production cast was raised on. But whats most striking about the beat is not its toughness but its careful arrangement. Atlanta producers are known for their productivity and understanding of how to set a record off in the club. Beats like Floyd Mayweather warrant increased respect for their musicianship.

Compared to his former sidekick, Quans post-Rich Gang output hasnt been received with nearly the same enthusiasm. To be fair, he hasnt received the same industry backing, and his If You Ever Think I Will Stop Goin In Ask RR, on which Goose produced I Been, is an excellent exhibit of what hes capable of as a solo artist.

Though Quan can sound hoarse to the uninitiated listener, few artists can translate real-life pain into their vocals in the way he can. A prime example is on the Goose-produced Why, a standout off Novembers Album Before The Album tape, Quans most recent project. Goose builds an entrancing vocal melody underneath Quans free-flowing confessions, giving his words an existential grace. It turns out that Quan was in a particularly tormenting frame of mind when recording the song.

It [Why] was around the time his dad had gotten shot, explains Goose. He called me one day, and he asked me for something slow, a beat made for storytelling. He wanted to get deeper. I went home, played the keys  and I dont even really play the keys like that. I put it together quick, sent it to him. The next day he sent it back, and I knew it was a smash. One of those type of records.

Being the first artist to ever bank on one of his beats, Goose enjoys a rare sense of trust when collaborating with Quan. They each have complete faith in each others respective duties. When Im working with Quan, he never listens for more than 5 seconds before he tells me hes loaded up. He dont wanna hear it anymore. He trusts that Ima bring my end on the beat, and that opens him up on his end  that helps us keep our relationship up. And hes the only artist like that.

In addition to the former partners whove been much of the present focus, Goose has also put out records with YFN Lucci, Trouble, Lil Bibby, Shy Glizzy, and G Herbo. His work with the latter non-Atlantans offers a taste of the more menacing sounds hes capable of when producing for more straightforward street rappers. He expects Quan to make a strong comeback and will continue to be one of Thugs secret weapons. Should the time ever come for the eccentric ATLiens to reunite, Goose will be ready to lock in for whats sure to be another classic.

Goose
Jonah Hill has cancelled his remaining French media appearances in promotion of War Dogs thanks to Ornella Miss Meteo Fleury, the weather presenter who took a couple jabs at him during a recent interview.

Hill, who stars alongside Miles Teller in War Dogs, became visibly pissed off when Fleury started cracking jokes about him and although she has since issued an apology, hes not hearing it.

Heres the exchange that set him off, followed by an excerpt from her formal apology:

When I saw you get sodomized by a three-meter-tall demon in This Is the End, I told myself, Now thats the man of my dreams! I hear you get sodomized pretty often, Hill shot back. She added, We would meet up in a hotel room at night. We would chat, youd make me laugh. Then all of a sudden, youd bring your friends (Leonardo) DiCaprio and Brad Pitt, and then youd go away. I really had the impression that I knew you, she said. I thought I was just messing around with a friend, but the reality is that we are not friends.

Its worth noting that Hill was quick to fire a joke back at Fleury, saying Im glad I came on this show to get ridiculed by your local weather girl, but the conversation ended there.

War Dogs, the film based on a true story of two young men who won a $300 million contract from the Pentagon to arm Americas allies in Afghanistan, is in theaters now.

[Via]

Jonah Hill
FOCUS ON DEFENSE CAPABILITY DEVELOPMENT IN SOUTHEAST ASIA AND OCEANIA
Funny man Katt Williams was arrested yet again in Georgia, this time on a charge of criminal damage to property in the second degree. Jail records show that the charges date back to February but it wasnt until yesterday that Katt was booked. He was later released on $10,000 bond.

Just last month he was sued for $1 million in damages by a former assistant who claimed he violently attacked her on a movie set back in 2014. Getting into a fist fight with an Atlanta teenager and assaulting an employee at a Georgia pool supply store are some of Katts other recent run-ins with the law.

Despite all of his troubles, he managed to land a role in the upcoming 2017 comedy called Bastards which stars Owen Wilson and Ed Helms, and has numerous tour dates lined up for October and November- assuming he can stay out of jail.

Katt Williams
Jordan Brand always closes out the year with a number of highly coveted releases for the Holiday Season, and this year will be no different. Joining classics like the Space Jam Air Jordan 11s and True Blue Air Jordan 3s is this Space Jam Air Jordan 9.

This classic white, black and team red colorway originally released in 1993 and the 2016 edition looks just as slick as they did 23 years ago. However, this time around theyve been given the Space Jam moniker, as Jordan Brand continues to celebrate the films 20th anniversary.

Some may recall that during the film Daffy Duck and Bugs Bunny had to go back to MJs house in 3D Land to retrieve his basketball gear, which included a pair of the OG Air Jordan 9s, which is why Jordan Brand is billing this release as a Space Jam sneaker.

Check out that video clip below and mark December 3rd on your calendars if you like what you see- the kicks will retail for $190.

Item #1
A case of both bad news and good news.

Alexandre Desplat, who is known for his work on both the Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows films as well as Argo and Grand Budapest Hotel, was set to score the first official Star Wars spin-off theatrical movie. He would be the first composer for a Star Wars movie not named John Williams.

He has now left the Rogue One project, presumably because of the reshoots, which may preclude the use of his music. But fear not! With this cloud, there is a silver lining, and Michael Giacchino will take his place. In addition to scoring all of your favorite summer blockbusters, he has worked closely with Disney and Pixar, even being nominated for the Grammys for his work on The Incredibles and Ratatouille, the latter of which actually won him the award.

Advertisement

So far, the trailers have looked great, and the presence of Giacchino means that it will probably sound great, too.
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WASHINGTON - Amid hundreds of protesters chanting "Standing Rock" and waving signs reading "Stand Up to Big Oil," Jonathan Vez looked out of place in his black suit and eyeglasses.

A business trip to Washington happened to coincide with a protest outside the White House - one of a series across the country aimed at stopping an oil pipeline near the Standing Rock Sioux reservation in North Dakota. As vice president of the Navajo Nation, Vez wanted to show his support. But back home on the 27,000-square-mile Navajo reservation spanning New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado and Utah, dealing with oil and gas development in recent years was not so straightforward.

"It's been a real problem. You get all the fumes coming off the drilling sites, which is a real concern for us in terms of ozone depletion and asthma," Vez said. "But boy, those (oil) companies will give out some good royalties."

As the shale boom spread across the American West over the past decade, oil and gas drilling have increasingly found their way onto Native American reservations, long impoverished and eager for the royalty checks and jobs that oil brings. But with that development has come an uneasy tension for Native Americans whose traditions are based around a deep spiritual connection to the land upon which they live.

'Modern-day gold rush'

A hundred miles north of where protesters are squaring off against the Dallas company Energy Transfer Partners to block its Dakota Access pipeline, the Mandan, Hidatsa and Sahnish Nation have become hugely wealthy from the oil boom in the Bakken Shale. Two years ago the tribes reported their wells were producing more than 180,000 barrels of crude a day - about one-fifth of the entire production of North Dakota.

"It's a modern-day gold rush," Tex Hall, former chairman of the tribes, told his membership at the time.

That same year a pipeline carrying the brackish water that is a byproduct of oil and gas drilling burst, spilling some 1 million gallons into a nearby ravine and killing off plants and trees. Combined with the increasing truck traffic and sight of pump jacks across the landscape, opinion among some Native Americans is turning against oil and gas development, said Marisa Miakonado Cummings, chief of tribal operations for the Omaha Tribe of Nebraska.

Last year, Dine Citizens Against Ruining our Environment, an activist group within the Navajo tribe, joined with national environmental groups in a federal lawsuit to block a drilling project in New Mexico that they said threatened the tribe's limited water supplies and encroached upon historic ruins.

"We know the minerals in the ground are part of earth mother. It's what we're taught as little kids," Cummings said. "As more tribes opened up their land to drilling, we've seen the consequences of that."

Greater autonomy

For now, however, some tribal leaders continue to push the expansion of oil and gas operations across their lands.

Through lobbying operations in Washington, they have joined forces with the oil industry to try to loosen federal rules around drilling on tribal lands.

The Southern Ute tribe in Colorado, for example, was among the plaintiffs that sued to block the Obama administration's increased regulation over hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, the drilling technique that spurred the shale oil and gas boom.

Oil and gas drilling has made the Southern Utes one of the nation's wealthiest tribes, and the tribe's oil company, Red Willow Production Co., has expanded beyond the reservation, including to the Gulf of Mexico.

Now, the Southern Utes and other tribes are backing legislation to reduce the authority of the Bureau of Indian Affairs in energy development on Native American lands. The bill, which passed the House last October and is under debate as part of the Senate's larger energy bill, would give the tribes greater autonomy over the leases and presumably open more land for drilling.

A report last year by the nonpartisan U.S. Government Accountability Office found that oil and gas production on tribal lands, which operate under a complex set of regulatory statutes dating back to the 1800s, lagged those on private lands. In one case, the GAO said, a tribe waited eight years for the Bureau of Indian Affairs to review energy projects, resulting in $95 million in lost revenue.

"Like other so-called energy tribes, we continue to face bureaucratic barriers that unnecessarily and unfairly impede our ability to carry out even basic realty transactions," Clement Frost, chairman of the Southern Ute, testified before Congress last year. "These are hurdles that our neighbors operating on state or private lands do not face."

The Bureau of Indian Affairs did not return multiple phone calls and emails for comment.

Sovereign nations

So far, anti-drilling and pro-drilling factions within tribes appear to be maintaining a respectful distance from each other. In part, the drop in oil and gas prices in recent years has eased tension by slowing development everywhere, including tribal lands. But the tortured history of Native Americans, through the Indian Wars and later resettlement onto modern reservations, has made protecting basic tribal sovereignty a priority.

Despite their own need to get oil out of North Dakota to out-of-state refineries, the Mandan, Hidatsa and Sahnish Nation have proclaimed their support for the Standing Rock Sioux in their fight to force the federal government to cancel the pipeline project.

As the pipeline protest wrapped up in Washington Tuesday, Tara Houska, one of the organizers and an advisor to former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, said she understood the financial pressures that encouraged many tribes to develop their oil and gas deposits.

"Tribes are sovereign nations," she said. "They have to make their own decisions."
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One of the most confusing aspects of this presidential race is the conservative cognitive dissonance of opposing global trade to protect American workers, but then refusing to raise the minimum wage.

Recently I've been defending the North American Free Trade Agreement and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and many readers have let me know how vehemently they disagree. Many support Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump's promise to throw all of the trade deals out and renegotiate them to benefit American workers.

If the other nations don't agree, and they won't, Trump promises to reduce the budget deficit by slapping huge tariffs on imported goods, contradicting every trade deal negotiated over the last 70 years.

When questioned, my self-proclaimed conservative readers say they are more than happy to pay the huge hike in prices that imposing tariffs will cause. They know the reason why manufacturers move overseas is to lower prices and sell more products, and they understand that making those goods in the U.S. will cost American consumers more.

Basically, they want to levy a huge tax on Americans to bring jobs back to America.

Ask them about raising the minimum wage, though, and they become indignant. Why should American consumers pay more for goods to guarantee that 2.6 million American workers can support themselves with only one full-time job?

I guess the tariffs appeal to patriotism, while the raising the minimum wage offends their belief in self-reliance. But one hurts the U.S. economy, while the other would help it.

Imposing tariffs on foreign-made goods would cost Americans billions of dollars and dramatically reduce their consumption, but a new study by S&P Global Ratings found that raising the minimum wage would boost the U.S. economy, not hurt it.

"Just as regular maintenance of the country's transportation infrastructure bolsters GDP, raising the minimum wage is an investment in the 'human infrastructure' of the labor force," said Satyam Panday, an economist at S&P Global Ratings, a non-partisan financial analysis service.

"A higher floor under wages won't solve every problem in the labor force, but it can start a transition to a high-wage, high-productivity economy. Better-paid workers tend to work harder and quit less readily," he added. "Firms have an incentive to invest in new equipment and training programs. All of these factors can boost productivity, which is the lynchpin of prosperity."

There is no academic support for right-wing propaganda that claims raising the minimum wage a reasonable amount leads to layoffs. Putting more money in a poor person's pocket, by the way, boosts the economy more than giving it to a rich person because the poor are more likely to spend it.

How much is a reasonable increase? Consider that an increase in the minimum wage to $9 an hour would raise a worker's annual pay to $18,000, from the current $14,500. An increase to just $10.10 would generate $20,200 a year, enough to push the person's work income above the poverty threshold for a family of three, according to the report.

I imagine most people reading this column can't imagine supporting a family of three on $20,200 a year. But that's certainly better than the current $14,500 a year.

Rather than try to claw back lost jobs by making the American consumer pay more for goods-which is socialism, by the way-why don't we invest in training workers for the next generation of good-paying jobs? Why not pay a livable minimum wage, and boost the economy that way?

Let's more America forward, not backward.
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Book fans, block out the first weekend in November for a road trip to Austin. The Texas Book Festival has just announced a spectacular lineup of authors.

More than 280 writers will be reading, chatting with fans and signing their books in Austin Nov. 5-6. The list includes a little bit of everything - some up-and-coming Texas writers, a handful of celebrities and some of the hottest names in publishing right now.

Some of the highlights:

Emma Cline, author of the summer bestseller "The Girls," about a teenager who gets sucked into a Charles Manson-like cult;

Yaa Gyasi, author of the critically acclaimed debut novel "Homegoing";

Justin Cronin, who recently finished his Passage trilogy with the bestselling "The City of Mirrors";

Don DeLillo, whose novel "Zero K" got excellent reviews when it was released in May;

Benjamin Alire Saenz, who won this year's Texas Writer Award;

Lois Lowry, author of "The Giver," whose memoir, "Looking Back," was out Sept. 6;

Carl Hiaasen, whose latest novel, "Razor Girl," is out now;

Jacqueline Woodson, author of the National Book Award-winning "Brown Girl Dreaming" and the new novel "Another Brooklyn";

and several authors who have books coming out this fall, including Francine Prose ("Mister Monkey," Oct. 18, Ha Jin ("The Boat Rocker," Oct. 25) and T.C. Boyle ("The Terranauts," Oct. 25)

You'll also get a peek at celebrity authors including:

Jenna Bush Hager and former First Lady Laura Bush, who recently published a kids' book called "Our Great Big Backyard";

Singer Kelly Clarkson, who will promote her children's book (out Oct. 4), "River Rose and the Magical Lullaby";

Alberto Gonzales, the former attorney general, whose new memoir is "True Faith and Allegiance: A Story of Service and Sacrifice in War and Peace";

Nick Offerman  from "Parks and Recreation" and "Fargo"  whose new book, "Good Clean Fun," comes out in October;

and Padma Lakshmi, whose new book "The Encyclopedia of Spices and Herbs" comes out in October.

The Texas Book Festival is Nov. 5-6 on and around the grounds of the Texas Capitol building in Austin. It's free to attend. For more information  and a complete list of authors  go to texasbookfestival.org.
Two governmental entities have given their support as part of an industry incentive package being formulated for a prospective industry in the Cabool area.

The Cabool board of education gave its approval last week, and the Texas County Commission gave a letter of support for an enhanced enterprise zone, which gives a 75 percent abatement for 10 years on city and county real estate taxes.

The prize? A $50 million project by a potential unnamed employer that would hire 90.

Other economic development incentives include a Missouri program  Chapter 100  that offers a 75 percent abatement on personal property taxes.

The Cabool City Council is expected to approve a resolution on Monday.

According to estimates from Cabool, if successful, an additional $150,000 annually in tax revenue would be generated.
Subscribing to our services is a three step process. First you have to create an account and then you have to pick if you want to subscribe to digital and or print.

Some people only want to be a digital subscriber to get access online and others want to also receive the print edition.

If you are already a print subscriber and want online access, it is free, you simply have to create an online account and then attach your print subscription account number to the online account you create.
In the last few years, corporate and nonprofit industries have begun to experience a transformational shift in culture expectations and attitudes of their young and emerging professionals. There is increasing demand for workplaces that equally value and focus on people, planet and profits and for leaders who understand that everything is connected. In this interview of Inspire, we speak with Tatiana Sehring, Director of Corporate & Strategic Relationships at American Public University System, about her thoughts on these trends, leadership skillsets and styles that are rising in prominence to help support this transformation. Q: What inspired you to become a contributor to the Inspire Series? Tatiana: Ive been fortunate to have worked with many diverse leadership styles throughout my career. Some leaders were incredible; others sort of average, and some were just plain bad. (Laughing) Regardless, I value these experiences because each one helped me to discover the types of leadership that best defined me. Its been both a rewarding and challenging journey. Sometimes, adversity forces us to tackle conflicts head on and can lead us to finding more about ourselves and that were capable of so much more. At one point of my career, I was in a situation where I was completely disheartened by the relationship I was experiencing when the good work that I was providing wasnt aligning with my managers expectations. There was a real disconnect...
When all heads turned to Heather to see how best to proceed, there was a profound silence in the room. The project had not been going well. It seemed that every problem they could come across, they encountered. Key suppliers could not deliver products with certain specifications. Partner organisations did not deliver on their end of the deal causing significant delays and cost overruns. Many dedicated staff tried from all involved organisations championed the importance of the project to their respective teams and managers. Much of it fell on deaf ears. The business analysts stressed the profitability of the undertaking was now in jeopardy. Morale had been depleted by falling short of several key milestones and seemingly endless overtime with little progress. And now the team looked at Heather, for a key decision to be made: To inform the client that the project will cost a lot more than quoted and will be delivered at a far later date, if at all, or to inform the client that work will cease. Much of the literature around leadership is focused around motivating one's self and teams to work for a common goal. It is in fact a key component of a competent leader: To engage and encourage those around them to actualize a vision. The ability to do this is crucial to the success of teams and organizations. What is often neglected in the literature is when to assess a situation and end an undertaking because it is not achieving the desired results. When efforts do not yield...
eading cloud computing company has created a storm in the HR world after poaching a top Microsoft exec to become its inaugural chief equality officer.Washington-based Tony Prophet joins Salesforce following a two-year stint at Microsoft, where he was most recently employed as the VP of education marketing  a role which included overseeing the companys efforts to reach more students.While in this position, Prophet launched a number of social initiatives including Blacks at Microsoft and BlackLight  an organization for empowering black marketers.Tony will be an incredible addition to our leadership team as our first chief equality officer, said Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff. His experience as a leader in technology companies and his deep commitment to social issues make him the perfect fit for this key role.Prophet, who also enjoyed an eight-year stretch at HP  will be responsible for a number of company initiatives including diversity, equal pay, social activism, and inclusion.Prophet and Benioff  who have been friends for many years  both share an ardent interest in philanthropy with the former being a supporter of the new Benioff Childrens Hospital in San Francisco.Prophet also helps with non-profits in the area, particularly those working on child healthcare, educational opportunities for low-income teens and HIV-positive women.
Linn-Benton Community College has shut off water to eight sinks at its facilities in Linn and Benton counties due to high lead levels that exceeded the Environmental Protection Agencys standards.

They were pretty much handwashing sinks, not that someone couldnt get a drink of water out of them, said Dale Stowell, college spokesman.

For example, two of the sinks were in bathrooms at LBCCs downtown center in Lebanon, Stowell said.

Five of the sinks were located on the Albany campus, and one was in a basement classroom of the Benton Center in Corvallis.

LBCC tested 171 water sources where people might draw drinking water, Stowell said. If you could turn the handle on and fill something up, we tested it, he added.

Test results were returned on Wednesday and the sinks were shut off the same day.

The sinks with high lead levels will remain shut off until they are replumbed and retested in the coming weeks, said Dave Henderson, LBCC vice president for finance and operations.

That should cost an estimated $5,000 to $10,000, and funding will come from the maintenance budget for emergency repairs, Stowell said.

The college decided to test its water after reports of lead issues at other educational facilities, Henderson said.

Stowell said LBCC wasnt required to test for lead, unlike K-12 schools in Oregon.

But given what was going on, with results in older buildings, we thought this was a good idea for us.  This was something we needed to know so we could take care of it, he added.

Henderson said the issues will be relatively easy to fix. Temporarily turning water off at the sinks until we can address this issue wont cause any hardships or disruptions, he said.

The testing, which cost about $3,400, was done using EPA guidelines, which call for the water to remain stagnant in the lines for at least eight hours.

K-12 school districts began testing lead levels in their drinking water statewide after a scare earlier this year in the Portland School District. In August, the State Board of Education adopted rules requiring school districts and public charter schools to develop plans that include lead tests, and to report test findings and information on ongoing monitoring to the public within five days of receiving the results.

The Albany and Corvallis school districts found that a number of water sources at their schools contained elevated lead levels.

Lead can get into drinking water when service pipes that contain lead corrode, according to the EPA. Structures built before 1986 are more likely to have lead pipes and fixtures, the agencys website states.

Young children, infants and fetuses are particularly vulnerable to lead, and even low levels of lead in the blood of children can result in behavior and learning problems and other issues.

Adults exposed to lead can suffer from increased blood pressure, hypertension and other cardiovascular effects, decreased kidney function and reproductive problems, according to the EPA.
What comes to mind when when you think of Ottawa?

Is it a frozen Rideau Canal ripe for ice skating?

Maybe it's the nightly light shows at Parliament Hill.

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Or perhaps it's this guy.

Well, if you make the trip to Canada's capital and look around, you're bound to see a combination of the three.

But if you look up, you might discover an experience that'll make you forget about the city's reputation for all things politics.

Such was the case for "Like A Tourist" host Dan Rodo as he travelled to Camp Fortune, located 15 minutes from downtown Ottawa-Gatineau in Chelsea, Que. to experience zip lining first-hand.

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Check out the video above for yourself to see what you're missing out on.

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It's good to be a CEO.

In Canada, the top CEOs make 159 times what the average worker does, according to a human resources consulting firm. But that hardly approaches the ratio you see at the top of a public company in the U.S.

The estimate of CEO pay was drawn up in a recent report by Gallagher McDowall Associates, which is based in Toronto.

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The report, titled "Does Size Matter?," looked at compensation for 58 CEOs in the S&P/TSX 60 Index, and those of another 60 at the top of the next biggest companies on the Toronto Stock Exchange.

It included compensation such as base salaries, annual bonuses and share- and option-based award grand values, using figures for 2015. It also looked at pension values, among other things.

The first group of CEOs made an average of $7.89 million last year  159 times more than the Canadian average industrial wage of $49,510.

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Average compensation among the second group was $4.13 million, 83 times the average industrial wage.

Higher taxes

Of course, higher pay also comes with a heavier tax burden. The first CEO group owed an average of $3.47 million in taxes last year, compared to $8,067 owed by average workers.

The second CEO group owed $1.79 million, 222 times higher than average employees.

The CEO groups owed 44 and 43 per cent of their income to the government, respectively, while the everyday worker owed about 16 per cent.

But the pay ratios pale in comparison to what top executives take home down south.

CEOs in the U.S. make over 300 times what the average worker does, Gallagher McDowall managing director Bob Levasseur told The Financial Post.

Levasseur said that simply looking at CEO pay next to average employees isn't the best way to determine their value. He said a better method is to look at how much wealth they've pulled in, relative to the company's success.

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"If the company was worth X billion dollars, has, during this person's tenure, the value increased?" he asked.

Higher salaries don't guarantee returns

The study comes months before the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is set to require public companies to disclose their CEO-to-median compensation pay ratios, starting Jan. 1, 2017.

Canadian public companies face no such requirement.

Paying a CEO more money doesn't necessarily translate to higher returns for shareholders.

Earlier this year, a study by analytics firm MSCI found that companies made 39 per cent more when CEOs were paid below the median levels in their sectors.

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Another day, another designer being accused of cultural appropriation.

Who now? Marc Jacobs.

On Thursday, the designer closed off New York Fashion Week by showcasing his spring 2017 collection using models adorning pastel-coloured dreadlocks.

Watch our Marc Jacobs Spring '17 show in 15 seconds, or in its entirety on https://t.co/lPefBl9Fnu  pic.twitter.com/LRWwrXlEHH  Marc Jacobs (@marcjacobs) September 15, 2016

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And it has to be noted, the show featured predominantly white models, including Gigi Hadid, Kendall Jenner, Bella Hadid, Karlie Kloss, Taylor Hill and Irina Shayk.

According to Fashionista, the wool hair pieces used in the show were created by "a (white) woman from Florida name Jena," who Jacobs and legendary hairstylist, Guido Palau, found on Esty (we repeat, Esty) by doing a Google search (we repeat, a Google search).

When The Cut asked Palau what inspired the look, he said transgender director Lana Wachowski, rave culture, Boy George and Harajuku (just to name a few).

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"The interesting thing about Marc is how he takes something so street and so raw, and because of the colouration of the hair and the makeup, it becomes a total look," Palau told Harper's Bazaar. "Something that we've bypassed on the street and not really looked at, or seen a million times, he makes us look at it again in a much more sophisticated and fashionable way."

When Cut beauty editor-at-large Linda Wells asked Palau whether he was inspired by Rastafarian culture, he said, "No, not at all."

Cue the backlash:

@marcjacobs ok so y'all just want controversy and to disrespect black ppl I see.  Macy Quartz (@macytweets2u) September 15, 2016

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were there no black models available to wear their cultural hairstyle on the runway that isnt fashion? @marcjacobs  Richey Collazo (@RicheyCollazo) September 15, 2016

@marcjacobs So, I guess this means POC can wear our locs freely now and not be blocked from a promotion or job in general?  Imani Ashante (@dopuhmean) September 15, 2016

But despite all the hate Jacobs received, he clapped back. Hard.

Posting a response from his personal account on a runway photo posted on the brand's account, Jacobs argued he "doesn't see colour."

#MarcJacobs is being criticized for using white models with dreads for his #NYFW show.. Well he's clapping back ! What are your thoughts on his response? #ClapBackSeason A photo posted by The Shade Room (@theshaderoom) on Sep 15, 2016 at 8:55pm PDT

"All who cry 'cultural appropriation' or whatever nonsense about any race or skin colour wearing their hair in any particular style or manner  funny how you don't criticize women of colour for straightening their hair," Jacobs wrote. "I respect and am inspired by people and how they look. I don't see colour or race  I see people."

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@bellahadid and @kendalljenner backstage at our Spring '17 show  #MJSS17 A photo posted by Marc Jacobs (@marcjacobs) on Sep 15, 2016 at 3:02pm PDT

The designer, who clearly refused to acknowledge that, yes, this may offend black culture, went on to write, "I'm sorry to read that so many people are so narrow minded ... love is the answer. Appreciation of all and inspiration from anywhere is a beautiful thing. Think about it."

Sadly, this isn't the first time Jacobs has been accused of appropriating a black hairstyle. In his spring 2015 show, he sent the models down the runway donning Bantu Knots and noted Bjork as his inspiration.

A model walks the runway at the Marc By Marc Jacobs fashion show during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015 at Pier 94 on September 9, 2014 in New York City.

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As Harper's Baazar Jenna Rosenstein says, "the lines between artistic expression and political or cultural correctness are growing murkier."

That they are.

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A Lebanon man was charged with three counts of first-degree sex abuse in Linn County Circuit Court on Thursday afternoon.

Wessly Tryton Hart, 19, was arrested by the Linn County Sheriffs Office on Wednesday.

According to the charging document, the victim is a child younger than 12 years old.

One of the crimes allegedly occurred between January and July of 2015 in Jefferson in Marion County, and two counts were from August of 2016 in Albany.

During Thursdays court hearing, Judge Daniel Murphy set Harts bail at $50,000 and appointed Tyler Reid as his attorney.

Prosecutor Ryan Lucke had asked for $100,000 security in the case, saying that all three crimes were Measure 11 offenses, and each brought the possibility of several years in prison.

The next appearance in the case was set for Sept. 26.
If you've never visited Calgary before, the first few things that come to mind might be mountains, cowboy boots and country music bars.

Stereotypes aside, Canada's fifth most-populated city has plenty to offer tourists and locals alike. That's especially true for anyone looking to break out of their comfort zone and tap into their adventurous side.

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Enter "Like A Tourist" host Dan Rodo and Calgarian Yeny Lara. Together, the two team up to uncover Calgary's hidden gems that are perfect for any thrill seeker. You can join their adventure in the full episode below.

Where To Go: Skyline Luge Calgary

88 Canada Olympic Rd. S.W., Calgary, Alta.

If you've got a need for speed in Calgary then you don't go go-karting, you go luging. Make your way to Calgary's Canada Olympic Park where Skyline Luge has repurposed part of the venue from the '88 Winter Olympics. The ski lifts are still there but now concrete tracks snake down the mountainside for you to challenge your friends to a race.

What To Do: Rage Yoga

Dickens Pub, 1000 9 Ave. S.W., Calgary, Alta.

Yoga doesn't sound very adventurous, does it? Well, throw in some heavy metal, a few pints and a heathy number of "f*ck yeahs" and now we're talking! Rage Yoga at Dickens Pub ditches the quiet background music and scented candles for sessions that involve yelling and swearing in the pursuit of zen. Sessions happen twice a week and class sizes run between five to 15 people.

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What To Eat: Native Tongues Taqueria

235 12 Ave. S.W., Calgary, Alta.

Street luging has your adrenaline pumping. Rage yoga has you zen as f*ck. It's time to refuel but that doesn't mean the adventure has to stop. Make your way to Native Tongues Taqueria for small snacks like octopus tostadas or a platter of beef tongue tacos if you're feeling hungry. The upscale taco joint has earned accolades for making their corn-flour tortillas from scratch and a wide selection of Mexican spirits if you're ready to call it a day with a drink.

"Like A Tourist" takes on Calgary:

With files from Sarah Rieger

Also on HuffPost
Earlier this month, millions of students around the world -- including my son -- headed back to school for a fresh year of learning and growth. Families acclimatized to routines new and old - packing lunches, arranging drop-offs and pick-ups, picking clothes or pressing uniforms, and making sure that everyone gets to school or work on time.

This time of year, parents are acutely aware of the complexities of raising a child. But imagine if another variable -- a potentially deadly disease -- could affect your child at any moment. For millions of people around the world, uncertainty is a daily reality as families face the ongoing threat of mosquito-borne malaria.

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A mother and son under a mosquito net in their home in Burkina Faso. (Photo: Plan International/Nyani Quarmyne)

Malaria is spread by the bite of an infected mosquito. Its initial symptoms present much like the flu, though some strains can be severe, capable of causing permanent disability or even death. In recent years, we've made tremendous progress in the fight against this epidemic: between 2000 and 2015, we have witnessed a 60 per cent drop in malaria deaths. Much of this is thanks to the Global Fund, a partnership of governments, NGOs, the private sector and citizens around the world who are working together to accelerate the end of the malaria epidemic, as well as tuberculosis and AIDS.

Plan International has been partnering with the Global Fund since 2004, during which time we have been able to educate over 30 million people about malaria prevention, distribute 36 million lifesaving bed nets, refer 25,000 tuberculosis cases, and provide 32,000 members of vulnerable communities with HIV testing, prevention, and support services.

People around the world can -- and should -- take pride in these "good news" stories. However, we must not lose momentum. We've come a long way, but these hard fought victories could be lost if we do not press forward with the same vigour that has brought us to this point. We find ourselves at an amazing moment in history: the end of these three deadly epidemics is finally in sight.

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But what will it take for us to close this gap for good? At Plan International Canada, we know that reaching the finish line depends on reaching the most vulnerable -- especially girls and women, who are disproportionately affected by malaria, tuberculosis and AIDS. All three of these epidemics are also major gender issues. For example, tuberculosis kills more women globally than any other single infectious disease, despite the fact that it is both curable and preventable. In some cases, this is because male family members are unwilling to pay for their treatment. The same is often true of women suffering from malaria.

A woman waiting for treatment for her son's malaria at a health clinic in Liberia. (Photo: Plan International/Vincent Tremeau)

We could try to address these issues by simply reaching out to the people we know to be the most vulnerable. We could improve access to health care facilities for women, or ensure that funding is available for their care. These techniques would be effective, and are certainly a part of the solution. But in order to create and sustain the kind of progress that we need in order to actually end these epidemics, it's going to take more.

Specifically, we need to challenge the social and cultural norms that make vulnerable groups vulnerable in the first place. This means working with everyone -- women, men, boys, girls and people of other gender identities -- to recognize and deconstruct the ways in which traditional gender stereotypes can be harmful for everyone involved.

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For instance, in order to fully address women's struggles to access malaria and tuberculosis treatments, all people must recognize that women's lives are valuable and important. Without this shift toward promoting and protecting our collective human rights, the end of these epidemics will continue to elude us.

The Global Fund's Fifth Annual Replenishment Conference is taking place September 16 and 17 in Montreal, bringing together organizations from around the world to discuss next steps in our fight to accelerate the end of the malaria, tuberculosis and AIDS epidemics. The conference is also raising awareness among Canadians of the vital work ahead of us.

I know that many young people across the country are already engaged in their own efforts to raise awareness and funds through programs like Plan International Canada's Spread the Net Student Challenge, which supports programs combating malaria in Africa. I would encourage all Canadians to follow their lead, and learn more about the innovative ways that we can collectively raise awareness and support this important work.

When we recognize gender equality as an important key to health, these girls in Liberia, and their families, face a brighter, healthier future. (Plan International/Vincent Tremeau)

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I want my son to grow up in a world where he and his peers can talk about the malaria, tuberculosis and AIDS epidemics in the past tense. When the next generation of parents around the world sends their kids off to school, I want them to be able to focus on their child's education -- not on a deadly disease.

Our planet is currently home to the largest youth population that it has ever seen, and they stand to inherit a host of big issues, including climate change, an uncertain economy and ongoing refugee crises. Let's give them one less issue to wrestle with. Together, we can help to pave an easier path and leave a positive legacy for young people. Let's end the malaria, tuberculosis and AIDS epidemics. For good.

Follow HuffPost Canada Blogs on Facebook

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In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Maria's father stays close as his daughter struggles to beat malaria. Children in 'fragile' places have much lower chances of surviving such illness. Photo/World Vision

When four-year-old Maria finally arrived at the government hospital in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) she was barely conscious. Holding her unresponsive body in his arms Maria's father, Ngoy, clung to what life she had, but in the back of his mind he assumed he would lose her.

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Malaria is no stranger to Maria's family who live in mosquito-stricken DRC. The moment their daughter's body temperature rose, Maria's parents knew what they dealing with. But a parent's love can only go so far when treatment options are limited.

The violence of conflict is a constant threat for people living in the DRC. But the fighting that erupts so frequently also compromises DRC's brittle health system, allowing the more silent killer, malaria, to continue unchecked.

Hope in fragility

Malaria feeds off fragility. In neighbouring Burundi, the disruption from recent political unrest has contributed to an unprecedented malaria outbreak, affecting half the country and putting millions of lives at risk.

Instability brings uncertainty, and methods used in more stable countries don't always work.

But there is also hope in fragility when local communities are equipped with effective, low-cost solutions. World Vision Burundi has trained 3,400 local health workers who have been deployed to fight the disease in their communities. One worker, Diomede Ndayisenga, regularly combs his community to check up on people, rather than waiting until they desperately need a hospital.

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One mother, whose child was diagnosed with malaria said, after seeing Ndayisenga, "I am happy my child is diagnosed and treated close to home." She knows that when certain types of malaria strike, it is a race against time before the disease could become fatal. Ensuring that people have access to healthcare is vital in combating infectious diseases like malaria, as well as AIDS and tuberculosis.

Different challenges

This approach is helping save lives in Burundi. But in the DRC, it isn't as simple. That's because working in fragile states -- countries like DRC and South Sudan -- is incredibly complex. Instability brings uncertainty, and methods used in more stable countries don't always work.

When Maria's parents, Ngoy and Kona, noticed their daughter's unusually high fever, they raced her to their village's health care centre where they were told what parents in the DRC dread hearing: the clinic had no medication for their child.

This is a hallmark of conflicted or fragile places like the DRC, says Amanuel Gidebo a health specialist for World Vision Canada.

"It means that health facilities are not fully functional as they aren't adequately stocked and often there isn't enough manpower to support the patients," he says. "In some communities the situation is so dire that for us, at World Vision, it can often mean building a health system from scratch."

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Racing against time

Ngoy and Kona's village clinic may have had malaria treatment the month before, but the month when their daughter got sick, it did not. Racing against time, Ngoy left his wife to care for their newborn baby and took Maria on his motorbike to the government hospital in Kapolowe -- a day's ride away.

Unresponsive, Maria arrived at the hospital where she was finally diagnosed with severe malaria and anaemia. But in order to get treatment and the blood transfusion she needed, Ngoy first had to ensure payment. In a desperate effort to do anything that would help save his daughter's life, Ngoy gave the hospital his motorbike as a warranty.

Malaria takes a different toll in different places. Because Maria lives in a fragile place, her chance of surviving the deadly disease is much lower. Photo/World Vision

Advanced-stage malaria isn't new to the nurses at Kapolowe. In fact, Maria is considered lucky to have arrived with a glimmer of a fighting chance. Nurses are thankful that World Vision has supplied Kapolowe residents with nets and educated them about malaria but those who live in remote areas remain difficult to reach given the instability of the country.

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Prevention is key

After spending a week in hospital, Maria was able to go home. In fact, World Vision's Gidebo says the treatment of malaria is the easy part. "Once the child gets on the right medication before there are any complications, it's easy to treat. There is no reason why we can't end the epidemic of malaria."

Ending the epidemic is precisely what's on World Vision's agenda. In partnership with the Global Fund and in alignment with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, World Vision is part of an ambitious global effort to end the epidemics of AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria by 2030.

Wiping away these deadly illnesses for good is going to take more than money.

In southern Zambia, Stephen used to get malaria frequently. But since World Vision distributed nets in 2014, his family no longer suffers and doesn't need to rely on the clinic for treatment. Photo/World Vision

Annually, World Vision together with the Global Fund equips more than 2.5 million people with access to healthcare for infectious diseases like malaria. That's an amazing achievement. But there are still far too many children dying of these preventable illnesses. And if one of them is your child, the success statistics mean very little.

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Canada can help

Wiping away these deadly illnesses for good is going to take more than money. We'll need to go further than ever before to reach the world's most vulnerable people -- people like Maria and her family.

More than half of the world's child deaths occur in fragile places like South Sudan and Afghanistan. Yet Canada only commits 25 per cent of its official development budget to these areas. To go the distance to reach the world's most vulnerable people, the figure needs to change.

Canadians can help the millions of children like Maria by joining World Vision in asking the Canadian government to increase its budget and shift its focus to the most vulnerable populations and fragile places.

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Earlier this month, a conservation success story resonated around the world. The giant panda, perhaps the preeminent poster species of nature conservation, was down-listed from a global status of endangered to vulnerable on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species.

Decades of conservation work, including establishing new nature reserves, creating wildlife corridors and working with local communities have shown results and population numbers of wild giant pandas are on the rise. A testament to how focussed conservation efforts can recovery rare species.

Glimpses of panda recovery should give us hope, but there is still much work to be done. The number of Red List species continues to climb around the world, and today sits at almost 24,000. So far in 2016, more than 1,400 species have been assessed as vulnerable, endangered or critically endangered by the IUCN. Our planet's most threatened inhabitants that we are at risk of losing for future generations.

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Polar bear mother and cub, Jones Sound, Nunavut. Photo by NCC.

Canada has not been immune to global trends of species loss and endangerment. The number of Canadian species on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species has more than doubled since 2010. While some of these species such as the polar bear, sea otter or whooping crane are in the public eye, the fate and future of many is guarded by a just handful of committed Canadians.

As the number of Canada's IUCN Red List species continues to grow, we find ourselves with 40 species that are now more endangered than the giant panda. These are Canadian species that have been assessed as critically endangered or endangered. They are facing a very high risk of extinction in the wild in the immediate or near future on a global scale.

Some of these species are marine mammals and fishes (such as fin whale or Atlantic bluefin tuna) that have large ranges, and recovery will require multi-national cooperation. But many of these species have all or large portions of their global range in Canada. Their endangerment is the result of our actions. Their recovery our responsibility.

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Species protection is a cornerstone of conservation.

The Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC) has an important role to play in protecting Canada's IUCN Red List species, particularly those in southern Canada that are most threatened by habitat loss. IUCN Red List species that have been assessed as critically endangered or endangered and that are found on NCC properties include:

Wood turtle. Photo by Ryan M. Bolton.

In addition to 40 critically endangered or endangered species, Canada has 78 species that have been assessed by the IUCN as vulnerable (the same status as the giant panda).

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We should expect the list to grow as additional species are assessed, and the population and range of some species continues to decline. These assessments are critical for tracking both our successes and failures in conservation. This information also helps NCC to identify important areas for conservation, and globally IUCN Red List species are being used to identify key biodiversity areas.

Species protection is a cornerstone of conservation. Slowing, and ultimately reversing, the current trend of species loss is one of the greatest conservation challenges we face in Canada. While the copper redhorse may never receive the same level of public attention as the giant panda, and there is unlikely to be a popular plush-toy made of the boreal felt lichen, our Canadian Red List species are critical for conservation. They also point to how our work at NCC not only protects rare Canadian biodiversity, but helps safeguard biodiversity on Earth.

This post originally appeared onLand Lines, NCC's blog.

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You may remember the students from the Centre for Global Education program. We told you about the white paper on climate change policy in Alberta they wrote and presented to Premier Rachel Notley well before the provincial NDP announced Alberta's Climate Leadership plan last November.

Premier Notley was so taken with these students she went back to meet with them at another virtual town hall meeting when the Alberta team of students started researching and writing a follow-up white paper on climate change action in Alberta schools.

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The new white paper recommends infusing climate change into the curriculum, new strategies for student learning, making school infrastructure sustainable and funding climate leadership projects in schools.

Green Energy Futures went to that student town hall meeting and now the students have finished their paper Climate Leadership in Alberta Schools. These intrepid students were then invited to present the paper to the Hon. Shannon Phillips, Minister of Environment and Parks and Hon. David Eggen, Minister of Education for Alberta.

Students want climate change in the curriculum

"We engaged the opinions and the passion of over 3,000 students," says Gareth Thomson, of the Alberta Council for Environmental Education, who acted as a resource to the student-led project. "We had 45 student leaders who spent time every week hanging out together, learning together. We had 2,200 students who responded to a survey that was sent out by the student leaders in eight high schools, both urban and rural across Alberta. It was a tour de force."

They want more learning to happen outside in the environment and they want to work with community leaders -- to learn how to address the real-world issue of climate change.

On June 7, a delegation of students took their white paper to the Alberta Legislature to meet with the ministers, just minutes after Bill 20, the Climate Leadership Implementation Act was passed in the Alberta Legislature.

Grade 11 student Stephanie Zuwaduk calls climate change "The defining issue of our generation."

"We understand that climate change can be intimidating and overwhelming. But we believe that the antidote to despair is action. We must not stand idle and wait for someone else to initiate change. We must initiate change as the youth and as Albertans so that we have a brighter future in the wake of climate change," Zuwaduk told the ministers.

Students from Fort McMurray, Bonneyville and Edmonton came to meet the ministers and present their ideas for how to take action on climate change by creating new curriculum and taking action right in schools.

The students did their own research, they invited resource experts to give presentations and then a delegation of 10 students locked themselves in a room for a weekend with some graduate students from the University of Alberta to boil inputs from 3,000 students down into a sophisticated set of recommendations for change.

Mudassar Javid, a grade 11 student from Queen Elizabeth High School, told the ministers they want initiatives to reduce the carbon footprint of students and schools. They want more learning to happen outside in the environment and they want to work with community leaders -- to learn how to address the real-world issue of climate change.

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Javid also said students want "equality of voice" a place on advisory committees in schools, at school boards and in the provincial government to ensure their voice is heard.

Students want schools to become models of sustainability

"We don't want small-scale change," said Leah Buchannan, another grade 11 student, to ministers Phillips and Eggen. "We're looking for Alberta-wide change. We're looking for solar panels on the roof of every school. We're looking for students who are being inspired by their teachers like we are. We can only achieve these things with your help."

For Helen Wang, a student from Westwood High School in Fort McMurray, climate change is even more important in the wake of the devastating wildfires that ripped through her home city.

"Well, I think more strongly of those issues now with the recent events that's happened," said Wang. "Again those events that are likely a result of the changing climate because this spring has been the driest and the hottest and the most sudden of all springs. That really hits the point closer to home. It gives additional motivation to make a difference."

She says integrating climate change into schools and the curriculum means "Students will be learning about climate change and how to prevent it through all subjects every year."

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So what does the future look like if the students are successful?

"There will be fewer people denying climate change," said Wang. "There will be more awareness. There will be more activity done to address this issue. Of course, there will be physical changes like solar panels on the roofs, wind turbines and more renewable methods of energy."

In this weird new world, you might expect government ministers to cringe at the thought of being lobbied by a group of idealistic students, but the Hon. David Eggen, minister of education thanked the students for their hard work and said: "We're looking for ways to reduce our carbon footprint in Alberta and we're also looking for ways to diversity our economy."

Shannon Phillips, the minister of environment, parks and climate change, who had just passed Bill 20, The Climate Change Leadership Implementation Act, told the students: "The act that we just passed is the architecture, now we move the furniture in. Initiatives like yours are exactly the kinds of partnerships we want to explore moving forward."

"That's the thing that people leave out of this conversation, how ready Albertans are to move this province forward," said Phillips. "We see it with folks like you, with solar co-ops, with dairy farmers in rural areas. People are doing these fantastic initiatives with no support whatsoever! Imagine what we can do now that we have the ability to reinvest a price on carbon into these initiatives."

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Many of the students confirmed their deep pessimism when they started their climate leadership project, but as Helen Wang from Fort McMurray says: "I'm feeling far more optimistic than I was. Meeting with the leaders... really, really helps with the optimism."

Alberta has its Climate Leadership Implementation Act, it has even committed $3.4 billion to phasing out coal plants and building enough renewable energy for Alberta to get 30 per cent of its electricity from clean sources by 2030.

The proof will be in the pudding as they say, but it seems like the students have a powerful starting point for ensuring schools are models of sustainability and that students are equipped to deal with the real world challenges that will shape our future.
'Ithaca is gorges,' proclaim both the t-shirts found throughout New York State and the first words of the Ithaca tourism website. Ithaca is also the home of Cornell University, an Ivy League school of high repute. Hardly surprising, then, that navigating its campus requires crossing bridges -- seven of them.

More surprising, perhaps, that each of these bridges is fitted with netting -steel mesh netting -- to prevent a recurrence of the horrific events of 2010 when no fewer than six students jumped deliberately to their deaths.

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Clinical Psychologist and renowned speaker Dr. Murray Banks in 'How to Live with Yourself' describes mental illness as 'failure to make the necessary adjustments to life,' and suicide as, 'an extreme form of adjustment.'

He also shocked his audiences with the information that there were more people in the mental hospitals of the USA than in all that country's universities and colleges put together. But the implied thought that students in higher education and people with mental illness were entirely separate groups is increasingly, and regrettably, incorrect, for in 2015, Rebecca Chopp, a former President of Colgate University and now Chancellor of the University of Denver, told an audience of 5500 teachers that universities across the continent were struggling to deal with a significant, and growing, number of students exhibiting anxiety and depression.

Many such students drop out during their first year, and constitute a significant proportion of the almost 30% of first-year university students who do not graduate.

Why does this happen? Though there are many contributing factors, they all add up to the same thing. Murray Banks would have said that many students have not learned how to live with themselves, Pamela Gunter Smith, President of York College in Pennsylvania opines that students too often lack perseverance and emotional maturity, while Nan Keohane, former President of both Duke University and Wellesley College, believes they lack the capacity to deal well with their new-found independence. In short, many students enter university lacking the skills to cope and the resilience to persevere while gaining those skills.

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The transition from High School to University will almost inevitably lead to lower marks than a student has previously experienced with no familiar teacher to turn to for reassurance; school friends of long standing are no longer around, so loneliness can easily ensue; money needs to be managed now, and it evaporates at what seems amazing speed; laundry does not just happen; meals do not just appear; the structure of the day has changed completely and scheduling seems more complicated; the campus is huge, the class sizes massive!

The instant gratification of praise from many quarters has vanished! Just last June, the student was top dog but now, just two or three months later, that same student may feel inconsequential, uncared for and helpless. Such students need help, and many recognize that, but they do not know where to turn, so they self-medicate, often with alcohol, frequently with other drugs.

Of course, all these changes happen to all the students, so how is it that not all descend into anxiety and depression? How did those students who do have the capacity -the resilience, the emotional maturity-to persevere and succeed, develop it?

In short, by being allowed to!

It is unlikely that they were hampered in their quest for resilience by helicopter parents, some of whom now land in the Offices of the Presidents at the universities to complain, on behalf of their doomed offspring, about the colour of the residence drapes or the fact that the English Professor has not yet marked last Friday's essays! More likely they were encouraged to keep trying when they were cut from a team, or work harder for the teacher they thought did not like them.

If they had pets, they also had the real responsibility of looking after them; if they had part-time jobs, they had parents who urged them to respect the job and their employer by not feigning sickness. In short, they likely had parents who taught them the necessity of responsibility, for others and themselves.

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They were probably more fortunate than others in their choice of school, too. If they were products of a school that truly respected them, they would have had to earn their marks by working well; they would have been taught in a structure that required them, and enabled them, to be responsible for their own learning, to meet deadlines, to organize large parts of their own time, to collaborate in their learning, to prioritize commitments and meet them all, to persevere through difficulties, to seize all opportunities for high-impact learning -that which takes place on field trips, internships, international exchanges, service projects and the like-and which insisted that they wrote well, read copiously, spoke with clarity, and listened intently.

The good fortune of excellent parents and a fine school will ready most students for the adjustments needed for success in university -at least on the study front.

There is, however, one aspect of university choice that is too often neglected by students and counsellors. That is the underlying ethos of the university. Good students, by the time of High School graduation, have well-developed interiority. They know what their values are and how, at least in broad terms, they see the world. They are about to embark on at least four years in a new community. They would be wise to ensure that it is one in which they can feel at home. Canadian students contemplating studying in the USA or overseas, should always take care to 'feel' the university under consideration before applying for a place.

Starting in university and living away from home is akin to a novice sailor crossing the harbour bar. The water will become more testing, the wind more fierce, and the coast-guard ever more distant. But the sailor who is expecting the storm will be prepared for it, enjoy the challenge it presents and fling the tasseled hat high in the air upon triumphantly reaching the shore.
chris2766 via Getty Images

"First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out -- because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out -- Because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out -- Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me -- and there was no one left to speak for me." --Martin Niemoller

The late Protestant pastor Martin Niemoller (1892-1984) is perhaps best remembered for this widely cited quote. An outspoken public foe of Adolf Hitler, pastor Niemoller spent the last seven years of Nazi rule in concentration camps. Still for many years the pastor harbored anti-Semitic sentiments and only in 1963 did he acknowledge as much and express regret.

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Regrettably, to this day, the message continues to be lost on far too many people including those who themselves have been victims of discrimination. Anti-racist activities have employed the quote to advance the notion that those who harbor prejudice against one community will inevitably feel prejudice towards others. Activists have tirelessly struggled to defend the idea that solidarity amongst communities is a pre-condition to successfully combating discrimination and attempt to instill empathy in the younger generation to put themselves in the place of the victim.

Too often empathy seems to be in short supply. Clearly empathy is not part of the mindset of terrorists, and regrettably they have enjoyed success in eroding tolerance and goodwill that is the key to social harmony in pluralistic societies.

Racist slurs and vilification of others are the worst possible response to the groups that the terrorists purport to represent. Racists are not known to play favourites. In North America and Europe, they succeed when they can get people from communities whose members have experienced discrimination to agree that certain other vulnerable communities are victimizers and not victims. In other words, racists succeed when they can get one vulnerable community to blame another for its own situation.

More than a few people overlooked France's former Front Nationale leader Jean-Marie Le Pen's denial of the Holocaust because of his popular tirades against Muslims. Some seemed persuaded that he was wrong about the Holocaust and right about Muslims, while others thought he was right about the Holocaust but wrong about Muslims.

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In the United States, some Republicans want persons of Hispanic origin to see persons of African descent as a real source for concern while they simultaneously communicate the idea that actions of Mexicans trump all other problems. Racists seem especially delighted when some immigrants say it's those immigrants that are the issue that needs to be dealt with. Stigmatizing certain communities is seen by some leaders as a political opportunity, regardless of how deplorable such politics can be.

When stigma is attached to a community by populist political leaders, there appear fewer persons ready to come to the defence of the targeted group. In part, members of other communities see such support as a partisan issue. Others fear that such defence will result in their being associated with the group that is deemed unpopular.

By consequence, rather than viewing support for the vulnerable group as building solidarity and strengthening alliances, the key determinant towards taking action becomes what is in it for the supportive group. Its members will wonder if the situation were reversed would the vulnerable group come to their defence. The resulting inaction means that we simply get an answer to the question.

For those who think that the racists are wrong about them but right about others, the following survey results may provide some useful guidance. According to a 2016 poll conducted by Leger Marketing for the Association for Canadian Studies and the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, 60 per cent of those Canadians holding a very negative opinion of Jews hold a very negative opinion of Blacks and Muslims and 40 per cent see Asians and French Quebecers in an unfavourable light.

An earlier survey revealed a tendency amongst many Canadians to see the victims of racism as responsible for their own plight. Some 42 per cent of Canadians agree that Muslims are to blame for discrimination directed towards them (there is a wide gap on the basis of age when it comes to the extent to which Muslims should be blamed, with the youngest cohort far less likely than the oldest to feel as such).

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In the case of Jews, just over one in four feel they are to blame for the discrimination against them (some 49 per cent of Francophones feel that they are mainly to blame for their plight compared with 18 per cent amongst Anglophones, and 24 per cent amongst Canada's allophones).

The results serve as a reminder that solidarity remains badly needed in the fight against racism if we're to successfully overcome the dead end of giving in to mutual recrimination.

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mdmworks via Getty Images The Convocation Hall of the University of Toronto; CN Tower in distance

Success in higher education depends on attracting highly qualified professionals -- graduate students, researchers, and professors -- to universities. In a world dominated by brands, Canadian universities lag far behind their American and European counterparts to attract global talent to Canada. To compete globally, Canadian universities must achieve a global brand recognition.

Already, engineering research labs in Canada are predominantly staffed by foreign-born graduate students. Even in business, not enough applicants are available in Canada to fill the 9,000-plus available MBA slots. In fact, in a given 15-month period, fewer than 2,000 individuals in Canada satisfy the minimum admission requirements for MBA. No wonder, a large number of students pursuing MBA in Canada have completed undergraduate degrees abroad.

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Earlier in September, a global ranking of top universities mentioned not a single Canadian university among the top 10 or 20. The highest-ranking Canadian universities, McGill at 30 and the University of Toronto at 32, in the QS University Rankings should make academics and governments curious about the reasons that have kept the Canadian universities from claiming the top positions on a global stage.

A review of the top-ranked universities, e.g., MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Chicago, and Oxford, reveals some distinct structural differences with those in Canada. For starters, the top-ranked universities have a much higher concentration of graduate students. Furthermore, these institutions, especially in the United States, have a student-to-faculty ratio of fewer than 10. In Canada, undergraduate students predominantly dominate enrolments with much higher student-to-faculty ratios.

While this comment is based on the QS University rankings, several other rankings, including the UK-based Times Higher Education, Shanghai Ranking Consultancy Services, US News and World Report, and others also exist. Given their different evaluation criteria, the rankings are not consistent in their evaluation of universities. However, they are consistent in placing not a single Canadian University in the top-15.

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Whereas numerous other factors, in addition to the concentration of graduate students and faculty-student ratios, influence rankings, university administrators and governments in Canada should think and act strategically to help improve the rankings of Canadian universities, which is necessary to attract global academic talent.

At the same time, Canada should reconsider how it funds higher education where public sector universities are funded based on bums in seats model. More students mean more tuition and government support income for the universities. Thus, the schools expand undergraduate students' enrollment hoping that the marginal increase in revenue will exceed the marginal increase in costs, consequently diverting the surplus revenue to research and other activities.

The overwhelmingly undergraduate student population at Canadian universities is similar to that of Colleges or non-research universities in the United States. Even at the highest-ranking Canadian universities, i.e., McGill and the University of Toronto, graduate students constitute fewer than 35 per cent of the student body. At Harvard University, in comparison, at least two graduate students are enrolled for each undergraduate. Similarly, at Columbia, Chicago, Johns Hopkins, MIT, Stanford, and University College London graduate students outnumber undergraduates.

A structural change in the student body makeup is needed to shift the focus of the top-ranked universities in Canada on research and learning, rather than teaching large undergraduate classes. This is not to suggest that undergraduate teaching is less important. It is equally important as teaching high-school and elementary students. However, university instructors seldom line up to teach at high schools or even colleges. Recognizing that the primary role of research-focussed universities is learning through research and innovation, which primarily involves graduate students, will help the Canadian universities improve their global standings.

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Smaller sized and mainly graduate-student focused institutions will also have a lower student-to-faculty ratio, providing enhanced opportunities for training and mentorship for students pursuing research and innovation.

Once can think of devising research-intensive schools in two ways. First is to divide research-focussed universities into separate institutions, i.e., a primarily undergraduate university and an independent mostly graduate school with some undergraduate programs. This could be done by extracting, for instance, STEM programs from the larger university into a separate entity. Caltech is one such example of science and engineering focussed top-ranking institute. The other option is to launch new research-focussed universities in Canada that are mandated to generate solutions for socio-economic growth and prosperity.

Such research-focussed institutions are not without precedence in Canada. In fact, INRS (Institut national de la recherche scientifique) in Quebec could serve as a prototype for establishing research-focused national or provincial universities. INRS "brings together professors, researchers, graduate students, and postdoctoral fellows in its four research centres." Already, INRS is the most research-intensive institute of higher learning in Canada. In 2015, INRS researchers generated, on average, C$415,500 in research income per faculty member. McGill University, by comparison, generated C$282,000 per faculty member. At MIT, the average research revenue per faculty member was US$850,000.

The university funding/revenue model for research-focussed institutes needs to change from the bums-in-seats model to evidence-based, goal-oriented funding that rewards institutions for innovative research and its subsequent adoption by the industry. Consider MIT where research income in 2015 accounted for 48 per cent of the operating revenues and tuition accounting for just 10 per cent. The shift to research-based revenue being the dominant source of income for a University (and not necessarily from just the government) will break the dependence of research-focused Canadian universities on government support and undergraduate enrolments.

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In summary, Canada's potential to excel in research and innovation will be enhanced by improving its ability to attract graduate students, researchers and professors in diverse fields as business, engineering, and sciences from across the globe. To attract this talent, Canadian universities need to possess a global brand recognition. University rankings help build brand recognition and therefore assist in attracting highly sought-after researchers and students to support research and innovation needed for socio-economic prosperity in Canada.

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Paul Bradbury via Getty Images People working together in office

How to bring your local business to the next level with digital marketing

Relevancy is a huge part of marketing today. For most brick and mortar businesses, localization is a key element of relevancy. After all, your business depends on people in your area being aware of you and able to find you.

I have worked with many such businesses and always get the same questions: "Why am I not converting?" "Why customers not showing up?"

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Whether you are a diner, a car dealership, a coffee shop, a dentist or a marketer, simply adding your business to the local directory will not cut it. You need to think bigger!

Here are 7 key tips for marketing your local business online:

1. There is no one-size-fits-all approach

The approach you take depends on the results you want to see, and how quickly you want or need to see them.

For example, building SEO establishes long term visibility, typically with higher conversions, but takes commitment and time before you see results. SEM, on the other hand, delivers results only for your period of investment, but the results are more immediate.

2. Think mobile

Most mobile search results are location based. If you are serious about attracting people into your business, you cannot ignore mobility. When someone is on the go, looking for a good lunch spot, they're not going to go home to check their computer. They're going to whip out their smartphone! A responsive, easy to navigate, mobile-friendly site is an absolute must.

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Additionally, Google factors mobile-friendliness into their search rankings, so a mobile-friendly site can also improve your overall search rankings.

Check if your site is mobile friendly here:

https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly/

3. Think holistically

When setting up your physical business, you look at the whole picture. You don't just need to get people in the door, you need to create an experience for them once they're inside! You consider decor, product placement and accessibility, lighting, music, staffing and more.

You need to take a similar approach to the digital side of your business. You need to concentrate on both the post-click phase as well as the pre-click phase, and ensure it's aligned with the big picture. Once someone clicks on your ad or search listing, what happens next? Pay attention to the landing pages, messaging, visitor paths, site flow and ease of navigation.

4. Think local in your messaging

Your messaging - the words, phrases and sentences you use on your site - has a big impact on your search results. Be sure to work your location into your messaging.

For example, if you are a Montreal-based photographer specializing in headshots, use phrases like "Montreal headshots", "Montreal headshot photographer" and "headshot photography Montreal" on your site. More generic phrases like "headshot photographer" are too broad, difficult to rank for and don't capitalize on your location.

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5. Think first impressions

For most businesses, brick and mortar storefronts are no longer a customer's first impression. People today go online to find virtually everything. Your website is now your first impression. And just as in real life, first impressions are everything on the internet.

Be ready for your customers' arrival. Just as you keep your physical store looking its best, make sure your website is giving off the right impression.

6. Think education

Thanks to the internet, customers today are more educated about products, services and, most significantly, your competitors, than they have ever been before.

Choose to see this as a positive thing and use it to your advantage. Be the one who is educating them. Drive value in best possible ways by providing tips, news and ideas relevant to your brand, product and target market.

When you are seen as a source of knowledge, you are seen as an expert.

7. Don't always think budget

A low budget is not an issue. Inaction is an issue. The most important thing is to start somewhere and measure results. Even a small investment will give you something to analyze and optimize, so that you can continue to improve results and drive more business.

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For local businesses to thrive, online marketing is a must. Searching online is now the number one way people find the products, services and businesses they're looking for. You need to make sure they're finding you and they're getting the best possible experience when they do.

Inspired by years of marketing local businesses and The Ultimate Guide to Local Business Marketing Book - By Entrepreneur
Chris Wattie / Reuters Green Party leader Elizabeth May takes part in a news conference in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, August 22, 2016. REUTERS/Chris Wattie

Normally, political party conventions end with leaders trumpeting their satisfaction with their party's progress and accomplishments. Not so last month with Canada's federal Greens.

Barely able to wait for the doors to close on August's three-day convention, Green leader Elizabeth May publicly and harshly criticized a key outcome of the convention. At issue was the passage of a resolution calling for the party to adopt the international Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement. BDS is a tactic to pressure Israel to respect the human rights of Palestinians.

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"As leader, I am disappointed that the membership has adopted a policy in favour of a movement that I believe to be polarizing, ineffective and unhelpful," May announced on the evening the convention closed.

But as leader of a party which so frequently touts the need for "evidence-based policy," Elizabeth May herself has fallen woefully short in recent weeks. In fact, her behaviour since the convention may well tear the party apart.

First, BDS is far from a fringe movement in Canada. Major Canadian organizations have endorsed BDS or its principles, including unions, non-profits, church conferences, and student government associations.

Second, grassroots support for Palestinian human rights, per se, is quite strong in Canada. Progressive author Yves Engler cites a poll that suggests that 16 per cent of Canadians have strong sympathies for the rights of Palestinians. May would be wise to note that this figure is about five times the support that the Greens got in the last federal election. In fact, this calculation may be part of the reason that both the US and UK Green Parties have unhesitatingly adopted BDS.

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Maclean's columnist Martin Patriquin concurs, saying, "[I]n coming out so stridently against BDS, [May] robs the Greens of a significant political space left vacant by the country's three major political parties."

Not only has May misread the political realities of the BDS movement, she has also undermined the democratic processes of the party.

On the flip side, it's hard to imagine how May's unabashed denunciation of BDS will ever attract right-leaning voters to go Green.

But aside from offending a potentially supportive constituency, May also misreads the support for BDS within the existing Green membership. Since the convention, May has asserted that BDS does not have broad-based support within the party. Yet none of the polls taken within the party in recent months support this position.

In an online vote prior to the convention, 58.5 per cent of Greens supported the BDS resolution. At the convention itself, the BDS resolution passed overwhelmingly on the floor. In an imperfect internal survey launched by the Green Party after the convention -- with May threatening to resign over the BDS resolution -- only 44 per cent of members recommended repealing the resolution. So, in fact, none of these polls support May's recent assertion that the "vast majority" of Greens are with her on this issue.

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Not only has May misread the political realities of the BDS movement, she has also undermined the democratic processes of the party. The Green Constitution asserts that the party's leadership respect the decisions coming out a general meeting of members. Yet May has moved heaven and earth to call for a new meeting of members in early December, ostensibly to "revisit" resolutions passed in August.

Perhaps more destructive to the party, however, has been May's disparaging behaviour toward the BDS resolution's Green sponsors and supporters. Following the convention, she has referred to them as "one-issue people," and suggested that many of them became Green members simply to push the BDS issue. In response to the attacks, the BDS resolution's author, lawyer Dimitri Lascaris, responds: "There are 32 sponsors of this resolution, and the vast majority are longstanding members of the party who have advocated for many different causes over the years other than Palestinian rights."

Earlier this week, May fired three well-liked members of her shadow cabinet -- including Lascaris -- who were also sponsors of August's BDS resolution. Following weeks of highly public attacks on the BDS resolution, the shadow cabinet members had joined other sponsors of the resolution to defend their BDS proposal.

In their statement, the group responded to criticisms of their resolution from B.C. Green leader Andrew Weaver, who had referred to them as an "extremist fringe element." In their admittedly measured response, the group suggested Weaver was "misguided" for being unable to appreciate the need for such a resolution. May demanded that her shadow cabinet members apologize to Weaver; when they refused, they were sacked.

Through all this vitriol, a lot of the Green's dirty laundry has been aired. Alex Tyrrell, Quebec Green Party leader had little good to say about May's leadership style. He also provided email evidence that May had told federal Greens to have no association with him. Another member of the shadow cabinet expressed shock at May's seeming willingness to "sow division" among Greens.

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May, naturally, has a very different spin. In an interview earlier this week, May stated, "The reasons we have any signs of people being unhappy is because there were winners and there were losers." May would be wise to note that her side was the one that "lost" the BDS vote at the August convention. But in the end, all Greens will end up losers if May tears the party apart over this issue.

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Nov. 28, 1958  Sept. 11, 2016

Debra L. Weygandt, 57, of Albany passed away peacefully with her family by her side on Sunday, Sept. 11, at Samaritan Evergreen Hospice House following a short battle with cancer.

Debbie was born on Nov. 28, 1958, in Albany, the daughter of Don and Diane (Walden) Meader. She attended Albany schools, graduating from South Albany High School in 1977. Some of her favorite memories were of performing on the Southern Belles dance team with her friends.

She became ill with Crohn's disease as a teenager and was plagued with health issues throughout her life, but she endured and thrived in spite of her medical problems.

She worked as a cashier at many restaurants and businesses through the years, including Mary Anna Bakery and Sizzler Family Steak House where she met her husband, Steve.

They were married on Sept. 20, 1983, in Albany and immediately moved to Jacksonville, North Carolina, where Steve served in the Marine Corps. They had many travels and adventures during their time on the East coast, eventually settling back in Albany after their time in the military was complete.

In 1990, they were blessed with their only child, Becky, her parent's pride and joy. Debbie was a loving and devoted mother and considered raising her daughter to be the greatest achievement and contribution of her life.

Although Debbie and Steve eventually went their separate ways after 32 years of marriage, their strong bond of affection, respect and friendship endured and kept them very close until the end.

Debbie loved animals, especially the many cats that owned her heart through the years. But her favorite companion of all was her faithful dog, Ruffles, who passed away in her arms a few short years ago.

She loved to travel, and spent a lot of time with her family relaxing, camping, boating and fishing at the coast or in the beautiful mountains of Oregon that she loved. She was especially fond of Clear Lake where she spent many memorable and happy days as a child and as an adult enjoying the serenity and beauty of that place.

She was passionate about the same 65 Ford Mustang that she had owned twice in her lifetime. She vowed that, given the opportunity, she would find it and purchase it again and relive all the good times associated with that car.

Her many hobbies included cross-stitch, word puzzles, cooking and collecting miniatures, and she loved anything with butterflies on it which was evident throughout her home.

Debbie will always be remembered by her friends and family for her sweet, kind and bubbly personality. She had an amazing sense of humor and a way of putting a smile on everyone's face. She made friends easily and kept them for a lifetime.

She loved and embraced this life, but she wanted it to be known that she was happy to be going to her eternal home in heaven where she could reunite with loved ones, especially her mother and her older brother, Donnie Meader, who preceded her in death,

She is survived by her daughter and son-in-law, Becky and Eric Nicolarsen of Monmouth; former husband, Steve Weygandt of Albany; father and step-mother Don and Norma Meader of Albany; and numerous aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, nephews, and in-laws.

A memorial service celebrating her life will be at 2 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 1, at Oak Creek Christian Center, 5775 Columbus St. S.E., Albany. Debbie's final request was that some of her ashes be scattered near Clear Lake in the Oregon Cascades.

Contributions in her memory may be made in care of AAsum-Dufour Funeral Home to help with her final expenses or to Samaritan Evergreen Hospice House in Albany.

Condolences for the family may be posted online at www.aasum-dufour.com.
The five things you need to know on Friday, September 16, 2016

1) AL-PHA MALES

Owen Smith today has a speech declaring that there are five days left to save the Labour party. Tony Blair famously claimed in 1997 there were 24 hours to save the NHS, but few MPs believe Smiths warning will prove as effective.

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Last night Alastair Campbell, a veteran of those Blair years, clashed with John McDonnell on BBCs Question Time and it wasnt pretty. The Big Al v Big Mac bout saw McDonnell describe the former spin chief as nauseating because you are the one, above all else, who actually created the environment where no one believed a word a politician said. Campbell hit back: We won three general elections John and later tweeted McDonnell was a man who hates anyone who helped Labour win. Word is they nearly came to blows when the show was over.

Anna Soubry called McDonnell a nasty piece of work and the row over the hit list of MPs rumbled on. Several Labour MPs spotted that despite offers to personally apologise to all 13 MPs on the list, McDonnell yesterday said the list was a response to incoming flak and was just a factual report.

At his Bloomberg event, Corbyn himself told me Im very keen on providing olive branches, and indeed a number of olive branches have been offered to me, he said. In typical Jez fashion, the Labour leader added: As a practical start for this Im growing an olive tree on the balcony of my office and its doing very, very well. Its thriving. My colleague Ned Simons has got a pic of the actual olive tree. Im not making this up.

There are interesting developments on the work behind the scenes to unite the party after next Saturday (see HuffPost later today). But with MPs refusing to accept apologies (and believing theyre not real apologies at all) and a lot of bad blood spilled in recent months, its going to be a huge task.

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We report today on how the activist who so upset the Jewish Labour MP Ruth Smeeth last night doubled down on his stance, claiming she was "a right-wing Labour MP who was consorting with the Daily Telegraph".

2) THE OSBORNE IDENTITY

George Osborne is clearly determined to carve out a post-Brexit legacy that lasts a tad longer than David Camerons new Commons office suite. Although his very political future hangs in the balance after a boundary review that abolishes his constituency and pits him against the formidable Graham Brady, the former Chancellor has announced he will fight on for a Cheshire seat.

And Osborne is very keen to maintain his own political identity. And he wants to be remembered not for austerity but for his Northern Powerhouse project. Devolving power to metro city regions, connecting up Manchester and other cities with new rail links, pumping science and tech cash into the north west, that was all meant to be his lasting policy achievement.

Many Labour MPs derided it all, and contrasted it with the council and other cuts leading to a Northern Poorhouse. But worse for Osborne was that having been sacked by Theresa May, she hasn't been keen to even utter the words Northern Powerhouse since coming to office and instead said she wanted to boost the whole economy.

Today, Osborne is launching a new think tank the Northern Powerhouse Partnership. Hes written a piece for the Sun, which has a headline Hands Off May, and says its a direct challenge to the PM to not water down his pet plan. On the BBC last night, Ed Davey said that in Cabinet May and Osborne had "really disliked each other.

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Still, May is smart enough to know she can cherry pick the bits of the project (key to the long-term political fortunes of the Tories in northern marginals) and take it on her own terms. The Telegraph quotes old Osborne ally Sajid Javid saying I warmly welcome the launch of the Northern Powerhouse Partnership. And Andrew Percy is a specific Northern Powerhouse minister.

Osborne was on Today, so hes still got some media pulling power. He went on to make plain his discomfort with May's new grammars, praised Justine Greening's focus on 'all' pupils not just a few, questioned whether there was a need for a new 'special share' on Hinkley and even damned May with faint praise, saying she was the best of the Tory leadership candidates 'who put themselves forward'. Asked if he would be a distraction to the new PM, he replied: "Not necessarily." If this is a truce, it's not an easy one.

3) KIP-KIP FORAY

Its the UKIP conference in Bournemouth and we will find out at lunchtime who will replace Nigel Farage as its leader. Our resident Kipper expert Owen Bennett says the smart money is on Diane James but warns that Lisa Duffy has some grass roots backing.

One thing thats for sure is that Farages departure has laid bare all the splits that were previously papered over. Deputy leader Paul Nuttall says the party could die unless it gets its act together, which prompts the question: why didnt you stand for leader then?

After Brexit, UKIP obviously faces the existential question of just what it is for now that were quitting the EU. And Theresa May will be delighted at further defections back to the Tories. Party director Steve Stanbury quit live on air on the Daily Politics saying the Conservatives offered him everything he now needed. Former media chief Alex Phillips has today told the BBC shes also going back to the Tories.

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The Express (as close as it gets to being UKIPs in-house paper) splashes on a story that lots of party members have spoiled their ballots, asking for Nigel to return.

And Farage himself has again slammed UKIPs only MP Douglas Carswell: I dont know why he joined. I genuinely dont. He doesnt seem to support anything we stand for. Its very odd. He doesnt really matter, does he? He doesnt really contribute to what we do as a national party. Will Carswell be next to go back to his old party? What would they need to offer to tempt him back?

BECAUSE YOUVE READ THIS FAR

Quentin Letts last night said Labour hated grammars because schoolboys stuffed in tight blazers never voted for socialists. Watch John McDonnells side-eye response.

4) TIMMY TIME

Just as the UKIP conference ends this weekend, the Lib Dem conference starts (tomorrow) and Tim Farron is trying his best to accentuate the positive for his party as it continues its long, long haul back. Having just 8 MPs (as many as the Democratic Unionist Party) makes life difficult but Farron knows that he can still get noticed with the right quote or bit of research.

Councils are where the party needs to rebuild first and last night they had a decent ward byelection victory, taking a Derbyshire seat from Labour with a big swing. We know how much Jeremy Corbyn values local council byelections so he may have been a tad disappointed (then again the by-election was propmted by the resignation of a Labour councillor who had bitten a teenager on the nose - no, really). But a week ago the Lib Dems also took a council seat in Sheffield from Labour.

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Farron has done a round of sit-down interviews this week (in the Standard he signalled that people like Vince Cable were set for a spring general election). In the Guardian today he tries to woo Labour MPs and voters, saying he admires Tony Blair (he meant his first two albums, not his difficult later work).

And on Corbyn, Farron says something straight out of the Owen Smith random-speech-generator: I think he and his movement are potentially going to be responsible for landing us with a Tory government for the next quarter of a century.

5) GREEN PAPER

Damian Greens finding out how difficult life is in the DWP. Yesterday he put out a written ministerial statement on housing benefit caps, signalling a new ring fenced cash plan to protect womens refuges and housing for people with learning disabilities. The Sun hails this as a victory for its Give Me Shelter campaign, and Labours Jess Phillips (who has led the campaign against the cap) was clearly pleased the Government was not going ahead.

But the Mirror points to Mencap saying that the decision to postpone the changes until 2019 wasnt enough and that The Governments proposals will compromise the right for people with a learning disability to live independently, and must be reconsidered urgently.

Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary Debbie Abrahams also attacked Green for "sneaking this out yet again the day before our recess" instead of turning up to Parliament. Other items taken out with the trash yesterday included courts cuts, pension reforms delays and City bonuses returning to an all-time high.

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Over twenty years have elapsed since Israel and the Palestinians launched the Oslo process towards a permanent two-state solution and much ink has been spilled on trying to understand why it has failed. To me, one thing is clear: there are real gaps between the parties on all core issues. Do not believe those who tell you that the parties ever came "that close."

Of the core issues, security has usually been characterised, alongside territory, as a 'practical issue' easier to resolve than the 'narrative issues'. Indeed, since the latter subjects such as Jerusalem, refugees and mutual recognition touch on the deep, core identity of each party they are extremely difficult to reconcile. However, the parties are yet to come to an agreement on the 'practical issues', which also involve a heavy dose of psychology and perceptions.

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Israel considers security to be paramount because although the country is militarily strong, it is highly vulnerable due to its lack of strategic depth, limited resources and location in a hostile environment. Security is all the more sensitive regarding a comprehensive withdrawal from the West Bank because the 1967 lines which the Palestinians see as a baseline for an agreement leave Israel with a dangerously narrow waist along its coastal plain - less than 15km at its thinnest point - and overlooked by the West Bank's commanding hills. This narrow strip contains Israel's major cities, about 80 per cent of the country's gross domestic product, 70 per cent of its population, as well as its main infrastructure and sole international airport.

Israel's threat perception envisages potential threats emanating from a future Palestinian state, (such as an Islamist takeover), regional challenges, and combined threats between the two. Israel is highly concerned about potential dramatic changes in the strategic regional landscape, which have happened more than once, especially in recent years. No analyst accurately predicted the eruption of the 2011 Arab Spring or the emergence of ISIS, and certainly no one knows what the situation will be in 20 years. None of these scenarios are reason not to seek a deal - rather the contrary - but it is reason enough to carefully craft security arrangements.

Israel therefore seeks solid arrangements which will compensate for the required compromise in a two-state solution and enable it to protect its critical national security if things go wrong. Yet this stance inherently clashes with the Palestinian desire for independence, sovereignty and dignity.

To address Israel's threat perception, the country developed, and consistently presented, a comprehensive security concept for the permanent-status solution based on three complementary pillars: firstly, Israel seeks territorial adjustments to the 1967 lines to establish more secure, defensible boundaries, primarily by incorporating the major settlement blocs along the 1967 lines (as part of territorial swaps) in order to modestly beef up the country's depth.

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Secondly, Israel wishes to create 'conditional strategic depth' through a series of non-territorial security arrangements, first and foremost the demilitarisation of a Palestinian state.

Thirdly, Israel seeks to establish a special security regime on the two sides of the Jordan River, including a limited yet effective Israeli military deployment for an agreed period of time. Such a regime would verify demilitarisation, serve as a deterrent factor, tripwire against military threats, provide early warning, and deal with daily threats of terrorism. It was Israel's Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin who, given Israel's lack of strategic depth defined the Jordan Valley as the country's eastern security - though not necessarily political - border. This position is informed by deep Israeli concerns about long-term stability in Jordan (which is a paramount Israeli strategic interest) as well as hostile state, state-sponsored or jihadi threats from the east.

During peace negotiations, the Americans made several important technological-operational suggestions for a border regime, which would make it hard to cross without being identified and stopped. However, Israel was no less focused on the strategic dimension. Even an operationally perfect border system cannot address a scenario in which Hamas takes over the State of Palestine or if Jordan is destabilised by jihadists. Israel has made it clear that if such scenarios materialise and turn into real emergencies marginalising the border regime, it will not gamble on its national security and may need to send troops into Palestinian territory in order to pre-empt or respond to the emerging threats.

In the history of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations none of these issues were fully resolved, though the principles of territorial adjustments and demilitarisation were agreed upon. Behind the gaps, among other things, stands the fact that while Israel views its security in a broad regional context, the Palestinians perceive the security dimension in strict bilateral terms.

This is not to suggest that there are no solutions. Cracking the security challenge is possible. It requires thinking outside the box, deeper involvement by Egypt and Jordan in security arrangements in Gaza and the West Bank respectively, and perhaps broader regional security architecture.

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Often looking inward (and perhaps gazing too much at it's own toned, teenage-model navel), fashion, for all the illusion of creativity and dynamism that it exudes to a captive public audience, is, in reality, largely conservative. "I don't see much innovation in fashion" says Martine Jarlgaard, ex-Vivienne Westwood Red Label Head Designer who has also designed for All Saints and Diesel. It's a broad professional backdrop from which she launched her namesake brand in 2014 and is presenting for the first time in an immersive 'mixed reality' experience on the official schedule at London Fashion Week in September 2016.

"I wanted to wait until I had a significant reason to present" said Martine, following a long discussion about the current state of the fashion industry and concerns about the environmental impact of mass production and waste in the garment manufacturing industry. These are concerns that have been simmering for some time and a handful of emerging designers are tackling these issues head on. Martine is one. She is "disappointed with fashion" and feels a universal transparent system that untangles and delineates the supply chain and sourcing of materials is needed so that it is possible for brands and consumers to understand the impact of the materials being chosen and make informed decisions. Many designers, for example, are not aware that some fabrics are created using devastatingly toxic chemicals that pollute and endanger workers and local populations. Currently, this is not transparent. She says it's time for the fashion industry to be re-envisioned and re-defined and find the investment to create alternatives to the current polluting and wasteful processes.

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Martine Jarlgaard London X Alcantara X NJAL

As this article goes to print I read a piece by Richie Siegel about the expected future domination of Amazon Fashion, despite its current lack of curation and aesthetic appeal to fashion shoppers - a problem now being addressed. Amazon's pricing model is not based on large margins and sales discounting to shift stock like traditional fashion retailers. Its margins are small, prices are keen and products are produced to fill gaps in the market - an already more 'sustainable' and pragmatic model - where a t-shirt costing 5 to produce is sold to consumers at around 6.50, in contrast to a traditional retailer who would squeeze suppliers down to a price of closer to 2 in order to sell to the consumer at 6.50. Since Amazon would potentially sell tens of thousands of units (based on it's market penetration and 65 million worldwide subscribers) it follows that if the products created by Amazon were sustainably and ethically produced it could trigger a big shift in the current polluting, inefficient, land-fill creating fast fashion sector. Granted, this still may result in a lot of product eventually finding its way to land-fill, but the business model and the motivations are promising, especially if cleaner production methods are employed, and the customer is at the centre of this model. For more information about calculating the cost of fast fashion, see my previous article Fashion Data: Calculating the cost of the fashion machine.

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Martine is a curious and impassioned designer with a rich educational background (she gained a BA/MA at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen and did a stint at Rhode Island School of Design where she studied sculpture, artistic anatomy and anthropology amongst other broader fine art and design subjects, and has always worked in a cross-disciplinary manner. She feels that the solutions and impetus for the change needed in the fashion industry to achieve a level of responsible, sustainable manufacturing will come from outside the industry and that technology will most likely find the solution. Amazon is a technology company, and as mentioned above, looks set to disrupt fast fashion and provide some solutions to production excess and bloated inventories.

Martine and I discuss current examples of big brands tackling sustainability and I mention the Nike Flyknit trainers, manufactured using a single knitting process creating the upper with minimal wastage - no leather tanning and sewing of component layers is required - and it can be manufactured anywhere in the world as it is machine driven. This knitted upper began as a running shoe style and has now been used in a vast array of styles including the classic Air Force One and Nike Air Max. Hershel have recently released their 'ApexKnit' range of backpacks using the same knit technology and other product lines will surely follow. Digital knitting provides a solution that creates superior design, comfort, wearability and sustainability. Maybe that's the key. The sustainability looks like a bonus here, as the design and product performance is enhanced AND the product is sustainable. It is also cheaper and easier to develop and iterate, therefore creating a far superior solution to the old leather, fabric and foam uppers made of many components requiring man power for stitching and assembly.

Martine mentions being inspired by Nike's presentation at the Copenhagen Fashion Summit in which they explained the commercial and sustainable success of FlyKnit, achieved through technology and innovation. Martine later clarifies that Nike displayed a rare level of honesty at the summit, expressing frustration with the slow pace of change towards sustainability in the fashion industry. She happens to be wearing a pair of flyknit trainers during our interview, along with a gorgeous pinky, fleshy shimmering silk peaked slash neck blouse from her AW15 collection.

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Martine Jarlgaard London AW15

We discuss luxury fashion in this context and when Martine mentions the apparent lack of desire for true innovation in this sector our discussion leads to a lack of cross-disciplinary teams in luxury fashion and a persistent uniformity and conservatism. Where a team's perspective is limited, perhaps the resulting creative expression through product is too. It's difficult to find varied perspectives on solutions to creative problems if every team member has a similar professional experience and background, which tends to be the case in the luxury fashion sector.

Since launching her brand, Martine has used a combination of sustainable, recycled and surplus fabrics from luxury mills in Italy. Her design philosophy is to create garments with a lifespan beyond one season, that are made to the highest quality, with a minimal aesthetic and an element of the unexpected. She explores the tension between minimal and maximal so that her pieces have a personality and cites sculptural three dimensional creation of the garments as a driver for the silhouettes.

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Martine Jarlgaard London AW16

Martine's SS17 collection will launch at London Fashion Week on September 17th with a mixed reality experience using Hololens, in collaboration with DoubleMe, who provide a novel 3D capture system, HoloPortal, that converts 2D videos into dynamic 3D models in real-time and supported by the Fashion Innovation Agency. Hololens is a headset that projects a hologram in front of the wearer and allows them to interact with it by walking around it and moving nearer or farther, giving a truly immersive and personal experience dictated by the wearer. Martine's collection will be presented via Hololens, meaning technically, it could be viewed by anyone in any location who possesses the headset, and physically in an accompanying garment presentation at the W Hotel London, marking the first ever holographic 3D mixed reality fashion 'show' for want of a more appropriate word. So why this rather than a fashion show? The fashion show format has barely changed since its inception in the early 1900's and does not allow any kind of personal experience with the clothes - it is passive - as is much of the interaction in the way fashion is presented. There is a lack of true engagement when sat at a distance viewing clothes zoom past on a runway and in a matter of minutes, the whole experience is over. The format of a fashion show is also restrictive in that there is an intense build-up and planning and a huge team required to deliver a show to very tight deadlines within a remit that can curb the creativity of the designers and restrict the selection of garments shown, as outlined in a recent interview with London-based designers Fyodor Golan.

Martine found complete synergy with Hololens because it allows her to work across disciplines with their digital team and create a 3D experience befitting her sculptural design approach. Here, the presentation format is symbiotic with her design approach and affords her the opportunity to showcase that and tell a story which can then be navigated from the viewer's perspective, making another leap forward in our journey to the experiential as a form of fashion presentation. Crucially, her buyers are "super-excited" about the presentation format. Fashion is changing, albeit slowly, and it feels like Martine is at the foot of what will ultimately be the crest of an experiential fashion wave. She plans to work with this technology for coming seasons, declaring that this is in no way a one-off, but rather the beginning of an exciting journey to differentiating her brand in an intelligent and meaningful way and raising awareness of her successful creation of sustainable luxury fashion.

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Online Influencer Diipa Khosla in Martine Jarlgaard London at London Fashion Week

For details of Martine's previous collaboration with Alcantara SpA click here

Follow Martine on Twitter and Instagram

For information on first forays into fashion design using Hololens, click here

For a run down of fashion's exploration of VR to date, read Emma Hope Allwood's piece on Dazed Digital

Follow Techstyler on Instagram

First published on Techstyler.fashion

This September The Huffington Post UK Style is focusing on all things sustainable, for the second year running. Our thirst for fast fashion is dramatically impacting the environment and the lives of thousands of workers in a negative way. Our aim is to raise awareness of this zeitgeist issue and champion brands and people working to make the fashion industry a more ethical place.
Olivia Harris via Getty Images

You'd think the naming and shaming of political opponents within one's party would be reserved for the authoritarian parties of North Korea, China and their Cold War inspirations. The opposite is true however. Labour, previously a bastion of tolerance, has issued a list of MPs who have dared to cross their dear Corbyn. The list, released by Corbyn's team, singles out 14 MPs in the party who have undermined the leadership, including deputy leader Watson who called Momentum activists a "rabble".

The situation proves once again how the party is becoming a kernel for left-wing conservatives who don't seem able to tolerate an opinion other than their own. Yes, it's cosy not to hear opposing arguments but it's not healthy. By writing this list, the Corbyn team comes across as extremely intolerant and authoritarian. "Anyone who questions the leader should be purged" is the attitude that the list conveys. Owen Smith, for instance, was referred to as a "real disunity candidate" presumably because he threatens Corbyn's position as leader of the party.

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It is not the first time Corbynites have shown this attitude. The activist group Momentum, set up to support Corbyn's power, have been accused of trolling MPs who don't agree with the leader. In a time when "Blairite" is used as an insult, Corbyn's "New Politics" proves that newer is not always better. It also suggests that for the frighteningly large group of Labour supporters that is Momentum, power is more important than the principle of debate and democracy since they're prepared to denounce any uncomfortable opinions as establishment rhetoric and dissent. When "Blairite" and "Blue Labour" are used as snubs, it is clear Labour has, then, gone from a liberal party of debate and tolerance, where views could be aired, to a party where differing views can get you trolled and on a "deselection list".

Corbyn's "New Politics" proves that newer is not always better

With the party struggling to find much to unite on, this list makes any such attempts futile anyway. It undermines any crumbling facade of order that Labour may have had and it is difficult to believe that Corbyn wants to reach a consensus. The deeply divisive list makes the party seem both incompetent as the opposition and unelectable. Despite the poor electoral chances however, the far left still leaches onto the leadership of the party, proving once again that they are more concerned with a sniff of power than real change and accountability - a concept vital to democracy. A united opposition is always important, whichever party is in power. It prevents arbitrary governmental power and overreach, and also ensures debate and representation. Without it we risk an over-powerful government that can avoid acting on behalf of the people

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On 19 September, the United Nations will host a high-level summit to address large movements of refugees and migrants, with the aim to better coordinate the international response to this challenge that has reached a global dimension.

"Since earliest times, humanity has been on the move." These are the opening words of "The New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants" to be adopted next week. Indeed, migration was present all throughout the history of humankind. Humans always moved from the places where they started living, or they settled for shorter or longer periods of time, driven by hunger, by the cold or the floods, by invasions of other more powerful groups, or by fear of persecution.

In recent decades, people also migrate to experience different types of school and university education, for cultural exchanges or a better professional accomplishment. Migrations were blamed for having brought destruction of illustrious civilizations and Empires - like the Persian, the Roman or the Maya - but in other circumstances they were the engine of development of strong and rich countries, and what better example than the history of the American continent.

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This phenomenon has reached now unprecedented levels: 244 million international migrants in 2015, with 65 million people forcibly displaced from their homes - more than at any time since the end of the Second World War (more than 40 million displaced people within countries, over 21 million refugees and 3 million asylum seekers). Last year almost one million refugees crossed the Mediterranean Sea to Europe, while 3,500 died at sea. Only last week, thirteen thousand migrants and refugees dropped on the Italian shores. There are 400 refugee camps in the world. Without proper means to resolve its causes, it is to be expected that every migration wave will outrank the previous one.

The basic root-causes of such large movements can be found in conflicts, terrorism, human rights violations, poverty, growing inequalities, poor governance, climate change, environmental disasters. Many people move for a combination of these factors. Currently, 1.5 billion persons live in countries affected by violent conflict. The stabilization of conflict zones is therefore a prerequisite to bringing to an end the flow of refugees and to creating the premises for a safe return of individuals to their countries of origin. At the same time, a World Bank report released in 2016 found that water scarcity exacerbated by climate change can generate waves of migration, violence and conflicts within countries.

Romania contributes to alleviate the refugee situation by hosting, already since 2008, the Emergency Transit Center for Refugees in the city of Timisoara which, at the time of its establishment, was the first such facility in the world. Based on the principles of solidarity and shared responsibility, we are also part of the European Union efforts to relocate individuals who arrived in Europe in need of international protection. Additionally, Romania increased its financial contribution to UNHCR and the World Food Program. Many other countries do the same. But no State can manage such movements on its own. The large scale refugee crisis calls for a global approach and requires global solutions. We need a renewed multilateralism, and the best place for it is the United Nations.

The UN undertook a series of initiatives in 2016: the conference on the Syria humanitarian crisis in London (February), the Resettlement Plus conference in Geneva (March), the World Humanitarian Summit in Istanbul (May), and the High-Level Summit on managing large movements of migrants and refugees in New York, which will be the biggest issue at the gathering of world leaders at the United Nations next week.

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This Summit is expected to be a historical landmark for creating a more responsible and predictable system to address the root causes of large movements of refugees, the positive contributions of migrants and the international cooperation on this issue, as well as to shape a comprehensive refugee response framework and a global compact for safe, regular and orderly migration. It will also tackle the vulnerabilities of refugees and migrants on their journeys from the countries of origin to the countries of arrival.

There are separate legal definitions for "refugees" and "migrants". Refugees are persons who are outside their country of origin for reasons of persecution, violence or conflict, and they require international protection. International migrants are persons who change their country of residence, irrespective of the reason for migration or legal status. However, refugees and migrants have the same universal human rights and, as stated in the UN documents prepared for the Summit, "they face many common challenges and have similar vulnerabilities," which may suggest that the boundaries between these groups are blurred.
Walk into any pub in London today and you will find a craft beer on the bar. You will find a shelf dedicated to gins, a fridge stocked with multiple tonic options, a spirit rail with an unfamiliar brand of vodka and perhaps even a cocktail list devoid of Woo Woos and Fizz Bangs.

Pertinently, you will find choice, which is a stark and welcomed contrast from a decade or so ago when your tap options would be limited to an Australian or Danish lager brand, an Irish stout, creamflow bitter and a brand of teeth-rotting cider. It seems just as the mega corporates secured their grip around Britain's food and drink industry the public rebelled, and we're without question all the better for it.

But now the wave is moving back in the other direction. You may find craft beer in every boozer, but it's likely to only be one of four brands and most of those are being swallowed up by the sort of conglomerations we rebelled against in the first place.

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Take Meantime Brewery in Greenwich. As Roger Protz notes in this year's Good Beer Guide, Meantime has already been passed from SABMiller to AB InBev and then to Asahi as part of an initial 120 million sale, and Camden has also been gobbled up for 85 million by AB which will help it undercut competitors. For a market supplied by supposedly small-scale brewers, that is potentially problematic.

In a special interview for the Guide, Professor John Colley of Warwick University's Business School, who is an expert on global companies, says the likes of AB InBev and SAB Miller can strip costs from production as a result of their ability to bulk buy such raw materials as grain and hops at enormous discounts. Big brewers enjoy 40 per cent lower costs than even medium size producers. He says that when AB bought Modelo of Mexico it stripped 20 per of costs from the company. With Beck's in Germany it took out 15 per cent of costs.

With craft beer, as well as the democratisation of spirits and other such drinks, there are certainly reasons to be optimistic. More than 200 new breweries opened up in the past year, with 1,540 now operating in Britain. But are we at risk of spoiling a good thing before it has barely started? BrewDog has done a marvellous job of homogenising an encyclopedia of beer varieties, but has it missed the point in doing so? Is the notion of 'craft' beer really about having everything under one roof, or is it, as the Scottish brewers themselves would like you to define it, simply about creating new and interesting beer?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not just rebelling for rebelling's sake. BrewDog have created a lot of very good beers and can consider themselves pioneers of the industry. But I also don't feel compelled to be trendy for trendy's sake, and for reasons unbeknownst to be, there's something that really gets under my skin about them. Most likely, it's their presumption that they own the craft beer industry when there's fifteen hundred other brewers doing the same thing. It could even be their Steve Jobsesque approach to selling their beer in their BrewDog stores and BrewDog bars that offer the full immersive experience thanks to their BrewDog geniuses, who coincidentally often know sod-all about beer.

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But mainly, it's because deep down I really wanted craft beer to be about the democratisation of beer production, not the homogenisation. I wanted it to be about micro not macro, local not country-wide, good beer not branding gimmicks, and I certainly didn't want to feel compelled to shave my head and grow my beard out just to fit in. As craft beer becomes increasingly popular, we should be looking at ways of promoting smaller brewers rather than feasting on large-scale producers who just tip extra hops into the mash tun and charge an extra quid on the pint for it.
Using a silo approach to counter the crime of modern slavery is foolish. Slavery spans a journey - whether at source, in transit, or at destination, exploitation is extensive. Each part of the journey requires a unique, coordinated response and through the work I am developing, with a range of Nigerian agencies and organisations, this is something I am determined to see delivered.

Modern slavery and human trafficking are gross injustices on modern society. With an estimated 13,000 enslaved in the UK, 45 million around the world, there is much to be done. One victim is one victim too many, and overcoming these crimes cannot be overlooked.

At Source

In fighting against this evil trade in human life, one must first consider action at source. Countries of origin bring a supply of victims, and depending on the country, the supply can be shockingly high. Nigeria, for example, provides one of the most persistent global trafficking flows of victims to Europe, with the trafficking of Nigerian women and girls now at crisis level.

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Despite the scale and volume of human trafficking originating from Nigeria, a significant proportion of it is a highly localised phenomenon. In fact it is estimated that 94% of Nigerian victims of trafficking for sexual exploitation rescued outside of Nigeria are from one single place - Edo State.

I have visited Nigeria on a number of occasions and spent most of my time in Edo State. I have seen the suffering, witnessed the deception and heard of the abuse. The numbers are alarming, and yet the population of Edo is estimated to represent less than 2% of Nigeria's total. There is much to be done.

Through community engagement in Edo State, I want to see attitudes changed and awareness increased. If individuals become aware of what lies ahead, it is my hope that they would not fall for the lies of the trafficker. We must then create opportunities through sustainable development - opportunities that ultimately protect the vulnerable from being enticed by traffickers. With the right projects leading to real prospects, local work could become the number one choice for those looking to build their life. Finally, we must improve the capacity of the criminal justice system to crack down on trafficking gangs at source. We need to pursue perpetrators and punish proportionally if we ever hope to provide more than a band-aid solution.

In Transit

Upon leaving home, victims of slavery find themselves in transit - another significant area of focus to be fought. I have heard numerous accounts of women being raped in so-called 'connection houses' in Libya, kept in prison-like conditions whilst they wait to be crammed onto boats to make the perilous voyage across the Mediterranean. Others face abuse and threats as they embark on what they believe to be their journey towards freedom.

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I met one mother in Edo who told me that her eldest son was murdered by traffickers in Libya. She then had to sell all of her possessions to secure the release of her younger son.

Her one wish was for others to know about the true dangers of the journey, in order to prevent them going through the same heartbreak.

The suffering inflicted on the vulnerable in transit cannot be underestimated. We can focus efforts on origin and destination countries, and this is essential, but we must not miss the misery that takes place in the midst.

Protection measures in transit need not cost vast sums of money. Small interventions carry immense influence. Emergency relief programmes can incorporate anti-trafficking awareness raising; for example, an understanding of slavery risks can be included in the training of emergency response workers; information on false employment offers can be shared in food banks; those at border posts can be informed of slavery indicators. These are simple ideas that will bring safety to many.

At Destination

Finally, we must better understand the situation in destination countries, addressing demand, criminality and support for victims. A large number of victims originating in Nigeria and travelling through Europe end up exploited in the UK. Well established criminal networks are in operation and need to be pursued and punished accordingly. We cannot allow perpetrators to operate with impunity. If we do, victims who are rescued will simply be replaced with an ever growing supply of vulnerable people, and the cycle of abuse will continue.

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I recently met with border officials at London Heathrow airport, who had been part of an operation to sentence a 38-year-old trafficker to 22 years in prison. To combat slavery, the pursuit of offenders who commit these abhorrent crimes of abuse has to become common place, as we improve our response to this increasingly prevalent crime.
If we're being honest, the Brexit referendum was never run with a mind to having a well-informed vote on a matter of profound consequence for the nation. Instead it was reduced to a bartering chip, the promise of a referendum being a cynical route to victory for the Conservatives at the 2015 general election - and not much thought was put in thereafter.

It is the hard right of the Tory Party, the Murdoch owned press and the euroskeptic UKIP who had catapulted Brexit on to the agenda. And their conduct (or lack thereof) has been in the firing line of the Electoral Reform Society, who recently disdained "glaring deficiencies" in the debate which occurred this summer. Which, I think, sums up how we are all feeling.

Whereas democratic processes are supposed to foment understanding between different perspectives, the Brexit referendum seemed to further entrench bias. Issues prominent in the leave campaign received disproportionate coverage, creating bias and the near dominance of the discourse by one group.

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Not enough left wing voices were heard for either leave or remain. A Loughborough University report from June found Labour was almost invisible in coverage. Topics foregrounded in their agenda were either absent or marginal, whilst Leave got an unlimited platform.

Such a blatant unbalance in coverage makes bias unavoidable. If the press can selectively and comprehensively filter out alternative points of view, can the debate be said to be democratic at all? It begs the question.

Besides this unbalance in coverage, it is impossible for citizens to come to informed judgement on the basis of misinformation. In the case of Brexit, it was wilful misinformation. It didn't take too long after victory for Nigel Farage to unceremoniously dump that now notorious promise to spend 350 million a week on the NHS.

In the end, the public has been left with a negative impression of both campaigns. They have been driven away by plastic promises, whether the 4300 better off claim of Remain or the 350 million lie of Leave, and by big name politicians, who more often than not just inspired voters to vote for the other side.

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The Electoral Reform Society drew a sharp contrast with the 2014 Scottish Independence Referendum which they hailed for a "vibrant, well-informed, grassroots conversation that left a lasting legacy of on-going public participation in politics and public life".

Instead, what we are left with after Brexit is a confused, disabused and disenfranchised public.

Katie Ghose of the Electoral Reform Society said:

"There were glaring democratic deficiencies in the run-up to the vote, with the public feeling totally ill-informed. Both sides were viewed as highly negative by voters, while the top-down, personality-based nature of the debate failed to address major policies and issues, leaving the public in the dark."

Leave looked like it never wanted a broad debate about the truth of immigration. Instead it opted for the politics of fear, stoking paranoia, which is apt to create a short-sighted electorate who have elected to cut themselves adrift based on a knee-jerk reaction to propaganda rather than based on a balanced take of the facts.

The dog-whistle tactics and ulalating xenophobia of the right has also stirred and incited unacceptable violence against our neighbours in recent months, which should make us stop and think very carefully about the standards of debate and the very real consequences these words have in our communities.

The right wing roots of the Brexit referendum show that referendums aren't won by the governed. They are offered by elites. And conducted by elites. Who we can't trust to conduct them in the ways that are necessary to promote healthy democracy.

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I wonder how the small businesses of the UK will look back on 2016 in years to come - it has certainly not been quiet or boring! Perhaps it will be with a sense of melancholy at the loss of so many national treasures - Alan Rickman, David Bowie, Victoria Wood.... Or will we remember the global security fears, or the economic uncertainty? It is a lot to take in, over and above the daily challenges of running a business. It would be totally understandable if we all felt overwhelmed by it all, or a sense of foreboding about what it all means.

But I just don't buy that. I don't see businesses being pulled down by the sometimes lead-weighted worries that 2016 has thrown their way. Just this week, I have been hearing from two fantastic business leaders - Martha from Love Give Ink (http://www.lovegiveink.com/) and Steph from Don't Buy Her Flowers (http://www.dontbuyherflowers.com/ ) who are both moving into their first offices from being home businesses. Sure, it is scary - terrifying levels of unaccustomed overhead, new staff, new hurdles to get over. It is a journey that many small businesses will go through - and indeed hope to go through! But it is not without its challenges. And what I see from both of them more than anything is hope. These businesses have such a strong sense of positivity about the future that it is infectious. Everyone who comes into contact with them is swept away by their hope.

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Hope is in fact what I see throughout the Small Business Saturday campaign, and hope is what I am planning on seeing into 2017.

There is a built in optimism in the Small Business Saturday campaign that small businesses can do more and can BE more. Yes we can get more customers out on the 3rd December. Yes we can make this pay dividends year round as customers come back again and again. Yes we can have the best year ever!

This goes back to the very origins of the campaign in the US. When American Express launched Small Business Saturday in the US in 2010, it was a rallying call to all local communities to support their small businesses coming out of the big recession - a real message of hope. In a time of difficulty, it is even more important to support those around us who make our lives and communities so vibrant.

President Obama famously said that the nation's recovery will be through small businesses, "These entrepreneurial pioneers embody the spirit of possibility, the tireless work ethic, and the simple hope for something better". That message of hope still resonates today in the UK as small businesses deal with the big challenges and come out thriving.

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'I sat exams at school in German, French, Italian, Latin and Bengali.' Flickr: Jayneandd

This post originally appeared in Varsity.

Sheikh Zayed City, Giza, Egypt. I stared at the three of them. "Muhammed Ashraf fein?" I was ready for this - they were asking where my friend was. "Neyim," I answered eloquently. Sleeping. A word tells a thousand pictures, I thought. I was met with a unexpected barrage of Arabic, and I stared at them again. The oldest man colourfully mimed waking up from his slumber, and the penny finally dropped for me.

They weren't going to let me pick Muhammed's laundry up for him. I trudged back home through the dusty streets empty-handed, and wondered why I put myself through it all again.

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A deep desire to become fluent in several languages has haunted me for years. All the cliches about languages opening doors to new worlds inspired me, and I sat exams at school in German, French, Italian, Latin and Bengali, and studied linguistics for four years at university. My relatives boasted about my linguistic prowess to anyone who would listen, attributing languages to me almost at random. I still have no idea why they thought I knew Sanskrit.

I felt like a fraud - no matter how many years I studied a language, I could never get past a sort of half-baked, rough conversational level.

Despite this, during my year abroad to Hong Kong, I was determined to become fluent in Cantonese, no matter how seemingly indistinguishable its manifold tones, or how complex its thousands of characters. While there, I took advice from a philosophy student called David, who had managed to get pretty good at the language before even setting foot in China.

"You know something," said David, suddenly animated, "I think that 99 per cent of the exchange students here know nothing about Hong Kong." He sounded very earnest, but unfortunately, his Swiss-German accent took something away from the gravity of his words. He added, "I really respect how you spend most of your time with locals."

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Learning languages opens new horizons. Flickr: Barnyz

I agreed enthusiastically - it was a compliment, after all, adding modestly that the language barrier was probably an issue for most. On that note, what was the secret of David's success? "You should see a website I used," he answered, "called All Japanese All The Time (AJATT). It's by a guy who became almost native in Japanese in eighteen months without leaving America." I mentally bookmarked the website, but managed to forget about it for the following six months.

During those six months, I put a real effort into learning Cantonese. I bargained with the University administration for a local roommate, listened to Chinese pop music and carefully jotted down new swearwords in my notebook whenever I heard them. My progress was enthusiastically received by my local friends, but fluency eluded me.

After half the year had gone by, I wondered impatiently what on earth it would take for me to be able to speak confidently and lucidly at length. Remembering the curious case of David, I typed the website address into my browser.

What I found felt revolutionary. AJATT's creator had indeed become impressively fluent in Japanese in a short time while living in the US, and he credited it with his method of learning - All Japanese, All The Time - which entailed creating a 24/7 environment exclusively in the language for oneself. After all, that was how most humans learnt their mother tongue; they weren't given a choice about it.

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He treated language courses with disdain - how could you expect to learn a new language in a matter of hours when it took you tens of thousands to learn English? It seemed obvious; people pour large sums of money into language lessons but emerge from them still unable to function in the native language environment. He switched his computer language to Japanese, consumed only Japanese media, and spoke only in Japanese to Japanese friends for a year and a half.

Full-scale immersion requires going beyond the classroom. Flickr: Victor Bjorkund

I was sold. In the last month or so, I tried to implement his technique, although fell short of a fully immersive environment by continuing communication with my English-speaking friends. I started to learn faster and it felt incredible: I watched Ip Man without English subtitles and found I understood most of it.

But I left Hong Kong, and gradually lost my commitment to the language, and I don't know where all this has left me. I flirted again with all my old flames, and watched Lost in German, Friends in French, Pokemon in Cantonese and various films in Mandarin Chinese. Now trying to learn Arabic during my last two months before heading into the world of work, I wonder if I was right to believe I could become fluent in a foreign language.

Even though it became clear it was the best way, the immersion method requires real commitment and sacrifice. Is it really worth turning one's life upside down for the sake of language learning? As I have grown older, my feeling has grown that there is too much to do and too much to learn. Prioritising languages means neglecting my other dreams and commitments: starting a political forecasting business; learning about religion and philosophy; campaigning on animal welfare; visiting friends and family abroad.

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Feb. 2, 1934  Sept. 10, 2016

Pearl Campbell Doolin, 82, of Kent, Washington, died Sept. 10, in Renton, Washington.

Pearl was born in Corvallis to Roy and Clara Campbell. She grew up in the Corvallis area and lived there until 2014. She graduated from Corvallis High School in 1952 and she attended Linn Benton Community College.

Pearl worked for Oregon State University as a secretary for 35 years. She was a loving mother, grandmother and great-grandmother. Her contagious smile will be missed greatly.

She enjoyed dancing, traveling, baking and writing stories.

Pearl is survived by her daughters, Gwyn Wiley and Diana Hall; sister Jane Grim; grandchildren Elizabeth Wiley and Chris Hall; and three great-grandchildren.

She was preceded in death by her husbands, Glen William Gathercoal II, Jack Powell and Richard Doolin; brother Kenneth Campbell; and sister Thelma Pope.

A memorial service will be at 1 p.m. Friday, Sept. 23, at the First Congregational Church, 4515 S.W. West Hill Road, Corvallis.

Memorial contributions may be made to the American Cancer Society or SafeHaven Humane Society.
I've always been fascinated by beauty, and started selling Avon products (with help from my mum) at the age of 14, then going on to train at the London College of Fashion in the 1980s.

After that I set up my own beauty salon, catering to a select group of celebrity clients.

Though leaving the industry to raise my children, I now work training beauty students in providing beauty services, including manicures, pedicures, waxing, and facials.

However I have always been committed to charity work and improving the lives of others, I participated in a number of charity events, including climbing Kilimanjaro in 2011 for Climb for Freedom to buy a house for sex trafficking victims. However it wasn't until I went to India that same year that I saw how the beauty industry could make a real change in the lives of impoverished women, or those trying to escape prostitution or trafficking.

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My journey to India began after hearing a friend talk about walking down what is known as the Mumbai "Street of the Little Flowers", and seeing young girls chained to beds, imprisoned by their sex traffickers. The image haunted and sickened me, and a few years later I headed to Mumbai to visit a rescue house for young trafficked victims.

Once there, seeing young girls, some the same age as my daughters - 14 and 15 - I knew I needed to do something to help them. Back home I was setting up a salon in Cambridge, and looked at the candles and embroidery produced by these girls in the Mumbai Rescue Home. However, I knew these items would never sell. Then the thought hit me: Give me a pot of nail varnish and a nail file, and I can teach a skill, that no one could ever steal from them. They could use that skill to earn money, and provide for themselves and their families. The next day, the charity I was visiting said they needed beauty therapists who could teach the girls beauty skills. The charity leaders invited me to return to India, still, I hesitated.

I set up my Cambridge salon and climbed Kilimanjaro, and then after a year of careful thought, I set up the charity, Born to be Beautiful. Business at the salon was steady, but eventually, the charity took over. It took me two months alone to read through the Charity Commission website, but after that the charity took off. Someone offered to design the logo and website, and I tapped into the immense talent in Cambridge to secure volunteers, the charity started growing.

We taught our first course to impoverished women and trafficking victims in India, 2011, returning in 2014 to teach another course. One woman who was severely disabled believed she would never work. Now, because of her manicure and pedicure training, she can attract clients and generate an income just by sitting on her doorstep.

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We headed to Kampala in 2012 where we were invited by local charity Watoto to train HIV+ women to perform beauty skills. After the first two weeks, two of our students already had paying clients.

We are now traveling to Sierra Leone in November, and will be one of the few international NGOs to return to the country post-Ebola. The trip has been five years in the making, and I'm excited to work with local charity Lifeline and give girls there an opportunity to learn a marketable skill. So many girls had their education interrupted by the Ebola epidemic and by unplanned pregnancies, and we can give them the tools to move forward.

We are hoping to establish a self-sustaining beauty salon and training school in Sierra Leone, which will admit girls with no educational qualifications who are denied education because of their socioeconomic status. Once the school can stand on its own feet, we will open other salons and schools where needed.
By Kevin M. Kennedy*

The United Nations and its partners stand ready to provide urgently needed humanitarian assistance following the agreement reached by the US and Russia reinstating the cessation of hostilities in Syria. As we await the green light for the convoys to roll in safety to besieged and hard-to-reach locations across the country, including Aleppo city, it is timely to recall the challenges we face in executing our humanitarian mission.

Over the past several months, the United Nations has been subjected to a range of allegations that it has abandoned its core principle of impartiality in the Syrian conflict. Specifically, the recent decision by a coalition of Syrian NGOs to suspend some information sharing with the UN has been presented as evidence that the UN is being manipulated by the Syrian regime or, worse, complicit in the conflict - that the UN has in effect taken sides.

This is gross misrepresentation of the UN's work in an extremely fraught environment, and one that utterly fails to address the complex and dangerous reality faced by humanitarian workers in Syria, both UN and NGO, throughout the entire country, while putting them at real risk.

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First, I want to stress that the Syrian NGOs who have suspended information sharing with the UN include some of the bravest and best that I have encountered in a quarter century of humanitarian work. They represent thousands of Syrian women and men at the front line of the effort to save lives and alleviate suffering. For nearly six years they have faced enormous and sometimes fatal risks in their effort to deliver aid in parts of Syria that many, including the UN, have been unable to reach.

As a reward for their efforts, they have been caught in the crossfire of this brutal conflict - oftentimes, it seems to me, deliberately. They have been bombed, maimed, and killed trying to reach civilians who are being deliberately besieged by forces, on all sides, hell-bent on victory by any means. By many reports, the number of fatalities among Syrian medical and humanitarian workers now exceeds 850.

And even as they struggle heroically on, they see the international community repeatedly fail to demonstrate the political will to resolve the conflict.

Yet, while I share the frustration of the Syrian humanitarian partners, I disagree in the strongest possible terms that the UN has in any way compromised or abandoned its core principle of impartiality. I am also disappointed by the sustained negative media reporting on this, which does not address the real failure: that the actions of the parties to the conflict, and their sponsors, are the sole cause both of Syrians' suffering and of our challenges in meeting their needs.

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Portraying the work of the UN and our partners as lacking neutrality or impartiality discredits the work of hundreds of national and international humanitarian aid workers who risk their lives on a daily basis to help people in need. Oftentimes a humanitarian's sole and best defense is his or her reputation for not taking sides, and for providing aid solely on the basis of need. To accuse us of partiality - from a safe distance - is, through the scale of the misrepresentation, to subject us to even greater risk. Such 'armchair allegations' are especially harmful, potentially fatally so, for those brave humanitarians, both UN and NGO, at the front lines, serving in Aleppo or in Idleb, in Homs or in Menbij.

The grim reality is that Syria is a war zone, a particularly pitiless one, where civilians and aid agencies are seen as fair game by all sides. In this context the UN, like every humanitarian organization operating in Syria, has to deal with local conditions, with all actors exerting control on access, tailoring our operations to reach as many people as possible. As in every armed conflict, we are impartial in who we will talk and work with, for the sake of achieving our objective: the delivery of humanitarian assistance.

We are certainly not working hand-in-glove with any of the combatants, let alone aiding and abetting one side over another.

It is not the UN that is removing surgical supplies from UN convoys, it is not the UN that is not allowing for medical evacuations, it is not the UN that is besieging towns and restricting humanitarian access.

In fact, it is the UN that has spoken out most loudly and frequently to decry these practices, to call for the lifting of sieges and for unconditional access. The Secretary-General and the Emergency Relief Coordinator, Stephen O'Brien, have been outspoken in their condemnation of actions that restrict humanitarian operations. We work every day with all parties, to increase our access and reach. This is precisely why we have a Whole of Syria approach, to join up the hundreds of organizations, including those based inside Syria and those operating from neighboring countries, to draw upon all available capacities to meet needs.

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Our approach, from which we have never wavered, is to reach those in need, through all available means, across borders and across conflict lines, in full conformity with our principles of humanity, impartiality and neutrality. In a war such as Syria's, the unpalatable reality is that these principles entail working with all sides. Excluding areas held by ISIL, where there is very little aid, around 60% of people in need are in Government-held areas. To reach these people, we can only work from Damascus and in partnership with relevant players such as the Syrian Arab Red Crescent (who have lost 50 staff killed in the war) and relevant line ministries.

To reach the remaining 40%, we work across both conflict lines and across international borders, tailoring our efforts to achieve most impact. Our cross-border work is done in partnership with neighboring governments, Syrian NGOs and local 'de facto' authorities.

We work with whomever we can, where we can, to get the job done.

Amid the messy reality of conflict, particularly in the context of a conflict as ugly and as bitter as the war in Syria, our core principles invariably come under intense strain. The paradox at the heart of humanitarian action is the occasional, unavoidable need to work with parties for whom our principles are meaningless, if not an impediment. No one pretends this does not entail hard, frequently agonizing choices amid the moral squalor of civil conflict. But what is the alternative? To paraphrase a line of Churchill's, working with everyone, to help as many as possible, is the worst possible solution - except, that is, for all the others.
The waves were strong that Saturday in Mauritius. Our small group of scientists was snorkeling out past the placid, turquoise waters of the coral-protected lagoon.

We had just wrapped up a week-long training workshop under the OceAn pH Research Integration and Collaboration in Africa (ApHRICA) Program. Eighteen scientists from nine countries had received classroom, lab, and field training in how to study and monitor ocean acidification and its effects.

Now, seven of us were being pushed about by these great ocean waves, looking down at the marvelous reef beneath us. The reef fish were being pushed too! The whole school of tropical reef fish slid back and forth with the ebb and flow of the waves.

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As our bodies and the hundreds of fish moved in sync with the waves, I realized, "We're all in this together. We are all on this ride together."

When it comes to ocean acidification we truly are all in this together. Water knows no boundaries. Chemistry plays by its own set of rules. The ocean is becoming increasingly acidic as carbon dioxide we emit from burning fossil fuel dissolves into the ocean.

Ten years of expansion of the ocean acidification field and yet, there are entire regions where there is no scientific assessment of local ocean chemistry or how local species are being affected by these changes. In these regions, few, if any, scientists have received training in the theory and protocols for studying ocean acidification. This leaves coastal communities around the world with no way to understand or respond to the very real threat of ocean acidification.

In 2013, groups came together to address this problem: The XPRIZE Foundation launched the $2 million Wendy Schmidt Ocean Health XPRIZE to incentivize the development of a cost-effective and accurate ocean pH sensor. The U.S. Department of State highlighted ocean acidification at the first Our Ocean conference in 2014. The Ocean Foundation committed to raising $1 million for the Global Ocean Acidification Observing Network (GOA-ON), to build capacity in regions with little or no data.

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Through the ApHRICA program, we are trying to address a big information gap: Africa. The July workshop included attendees from Mauritius, Mozambique, Seychelles, South Africa funded under the ApHRICA program, and attendees from Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Cameroon, Algeria and Egypt funded by the International Atomic Energy Association's Ocean Acidification International Coordination Center (IAEA OA-ICC).

Participants watched James Beck, CEO of Sunburst Sensors, take apart and walk through the ins and outs of the XPRIZE winning iSAMI sensor. World famous ocean chemist Dr. Andrew Dickson, of Scripps Oceanographic Institute, demonstrated the precision needed to measure the carbonate chemistry of a water sample. And students got their hands wet with ocean acidification pioneering biologist Dr. Sam Dupont, of The University of Gothenburg, as he demonstrated how to set up laboratory experiments to study the biological effects.

Participants also saw the first ever deployment of the iSAMI sensor in African waters. A prototype iSAMI has been left for collaborative use by The University of Mauritius, the Mauritius Oceanographic Institute, and the Mauritius Ministry of Environment.

Over the next six months, Sunburst will finalize the development of the iSAMI. International ocean acidification experts will include the iSAMI in the first ever complete kit for ocean acidification monitoring and lab study. Four of these kits will be deployed by The Ocean Foundation to the ApHRICA countries: Mauritius, Mozambique, Seychelles and South Africa.

The ApHRICA program is part of a larger effort: The workshop in Mauritius was the third in a series to build capacity in Africa, following a 2015 workshop in Cape Town, South Africa, and one held earlier this year in Mozambique. These workshop have built the foundation for a regional ocean acidification observing network, which allows African scientists to collaborate and build a self-sufficient research and training network that meets their region's needs.

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We're all in this together. Despite this success in Africa, there is much more to do across the globe. The Ocean Foundation is committed to raising awareness and funds until there are no gaps in the GOA-ON, and strong, regional networks around the world can equip communities with what they need to address ocean acidification. Because when we are all in this together, we all have to work together.
What is the future for billions of people around the world who depend on seafood for nutrition? Many experts will tell you that wild fisheries collapse is on the rise, and that fishermen are trying to get more from the oceans today, leaving a lot less for the future. If nothing changes more than 80% of fisheries will be in need of recovery by 2030. But this dismal scenario doesn't need to be our future, and in fact, fishermen and women are our best hope for healthy, abundant oceans that can feed a lot more people.

I understand that for a conservationist like me to say that the primary user group of a natural resource can be the key to its recovery is rather surprising. But my personal and professional experiences have shown me why it's true.

Growing up on the water and at the beach in Massachusetts, I became an oceans advocate from an early age. My grandfather taught me how to skipper a boat, fish "stripers", and dig for quahogs. He'd take the family whale-watching, and once, when we were miles offshore, I got to swim with humpbacks. I was hooked. But I struggled to reconcile my passion for the wildlife of the oceans with my concern for the people who harvested them. Even my ancestors fished for food and livelihoods.



The crux of the challenge became clear to me as a graduate student studying the collapse of the green sea urchin in coastal Maine. Sea urchin roe, or uni, is a common food in sushi. The fishery boomed in the early 1990s--called "green gold" locally, but by the time I arrived in 1999, it had already gone bust. Urchin harvesters were part of my dive research team. During our long days on the water I'd ask them why they didn't just stop fishing when it was clear that the fishery was being wiped out. What I heard repeatedly was "If I don't take the last urchin, someone else will." What a deeply unsettling answer: the urchin harvester knew he was killing his own job, but he also knew that he could not change the final outcome even if he tried. This is the epitome of hopelessness, and unfortunately is a story repeated the world over.

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The good news is that there is a better way. We need to shift our assumptions so that fishermen's self-interest isn't just viewed as a risk, but rather as an asset in the recovery of the oceans. Rather than forcing fishermen into a false choice between protecting the resource and putting food on the table, they can be empowered to do both. This isn't an academic hypothesis. Secure fishing rights are a social contract in which fishermen and communities agree to adhere to strict, science-based fishing limits in exchange for the right to a secure share of the catch or to a traditional fishing area. This gives fishing communities a long-term reason to conserve; they benefit as fish populations recover and catches increase.

Here in the U.S. the results are compelling, with more fish in the ocean, more food on the plate and more prosperous fishing communities. Along the Gulf coast, there are three times more red snapper; fishermen have safely caught twice as many of them; and revenues have doubled. Fishermen say they've figured out how to "fish smarter, not harder." On the West coast, groundfish fishermen operating with fishing rights are advocating new protected areas because they understand how breeding grounds help seed their futures. Secure fishing rights coupled with a strong federal fisheries law have led to a 60% drop in overfished species and many depleted species are recovering decades ahead of schedule.

Secure fishing rights are showing promise on other shores too. In two communities in Belize, illegal fishing dramatically declined, coral reef health improved, and communities saw a better future ahead. Word quickly spread and fishermen demanded more. The government began implementing fishing rights nationwide in June, showing the world that there can be a better tomorrow for fishermen and fish in small-scale, developing world fisheries too. Similar stories of hope are beginning to unfold around the world.

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With fishermen at the center of the solution to global overfishing, hopelessness can become an upward spiral of recovery so that the oceans feed an additional half a billion people, while supporting twice as many fish for conservation, and three-times more income to fishermen and communities. Moreover, benefits accrue quickly as most fisheries can recover in as few as ten years.

I see this as the best path to ensuring others can grow up swimming with whales, spending time with their grandfathers, and appreciating the generosity of the oceans for generations to come.
"My name is Chivvaun and I'm so excited to share a little bit of what I know with you today." This is how Chivvaun begins her free dance clinic. All twelve girls have trickled into the dance studio one by one donning their leotards and dance shoes, an apprehensive look in their eyes. They've never been to a dance workshop before and they're not too sure what to expect.

Chivvaun takes a moment to get reacquainted with her surroundings. In what I can only imagine is a sudden burst of nostalgia, her eyes begin to tear. Nothing too dramatic but enough to let me know that she doesn't take for granted the importance of this very moment.

This is the dance studio that started it all for her: The Lois Seiler Academy of Dance was her former stomping ground. Long before she dreamed of dancing alongside primas and honing the craft of ballet, this studio was home.

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As she happily engages the girls in spatial awareness activities, my mind drifts just a bit. Chivvaun's flight out of Nassau landed at 7 o'clock in the morning and no less than 12 hours ago was she strutting down the poolside of the Albany resort for the first segment of Miss Universe Bahamas in the costume competition.

Donvaria Duncombe, an up and coming designer out of Freeport Grand Bahama, had her work cut out for her when she realized her design would hit the Miss Universe Bahamas stage.

Surrounded by towering blue marlins and feathers bending to sweep the grounds around us, stood a fairy like figure in the brightest yellow and hints of green, Chivvaun was our national flower, the yellow elder.

There was almost a hush that came over the crowd when Chivvaun began her walk. Many of the girls that came before her had slipped into costumes that were beautiful and elaborate but laborious to maneuver and difficult to have fluid movement.

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Whereas the spectators found beauty and excitement in these larger than life costumes, many of them also found grace and poise in Chivvaun's delicate yellow elder ensemble.

Some may get tired of hearing that Chivvaun is a dancer, but to a certain extent it is at the core of who she is. It's the reason I dedicated an entire series to her journey transitioning from the Centre Stage of dance to a completely different one. Donvaria clearly wanted this encapsulated in her costume. Free flowing material with yellow petals and delicate vines wrapped around her creating the perfect illusion of a flower flourishing in any environment.

The inspiration behind the costume was the yellow elder. Up until this point I've not really taken the time to examine it despite it being our national flower. The more I looked at it, the more I realized that it is not only beautiful but it's majestic, delicate and graceful. All of which I believe can be used to describe Abigail (Chivvaun). So those are the elements I focused on when thinking about the design.

To go against some of the best career costume designers and to be able to hold her own on a stage of that magnitude took courage. Donvaria earned nothing less than my respect that night.

I'm pleased at the way it came out and would also like to thank my friend, Latoya Saunders, for painstakingly handcrafting each flower and my sister, Donvarcia Duncombe, for her creative direction and inspiration.

Chivvaun seemed to float down the runway allowing people to see different elements of her simple yet contradictorily intricate costume. A master of movement, she allowed people to engage with her without the exchange of words, Just the sincerest of glances and the warmest smile one can muster while being judged for it.

" I was a bit nervous. My costume wasn't as large as the other girls and I wasn't sure how receptive people would be towards it, but I'm really grateful people were able to see the beauty in its simplicity." Chivvaun is explaining this to me at 6' o'clock in the morning. We're in the domestic section of Lynden Pindling International Airport as she awaits her departure from Nassau to begin preparing for her dance clinic. That conversation that happened merely hours ago brings me back to where I am. Right here in a small dance studio attached precariously to one of the main gyms on the island, little girls are staring up into the face of a young woman who just might be the future Miss Universe Bahamas.

Chivvaun doesn't make mention of the competition at any point. She wants nothing to overshadow the knowledge she can possibly impart on the girls looking up to her. With bated breath they watch as she moves gracefully across the floor correcting their stances and encouraging them to try again even when something seems impossible.

I know the parents of one or two of the girls personally. I know that dance classes, for them, are a massive sacrifice. A free dance class provided by one of the best Bahamian dancers is something many can only dream about.

It is known that Grand Bahama has seen brighter days and is slowly, but surely rising out of the ashes, which was a devastating economy. But, on days like this one, much like the bright hue of the yellow elder Chivvaun brought a bit of hope to some of the girls in that dance studio.

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With the official crowning happening on September 17th, my time with Chivvaun is dwindling and I feel more than honored to have had a front row seat to a life-changing event for both parents and students alike.

The next part of my journey will find me writing from the Marley Resort in Nassau. As I make a daily commute to the Albany resort where the pageant will be held, I cannot wait to see what the capital has in store for myself, and the young Miss Universe Bahamas hopeful.
While House and Senate members were taking more than 50 days of summer vacation, 4,500 Americans were shot to death. We can't afford the consequences of their inaction!

Music has always been key to helping to heal, create joy and bring communities together. If you agree that gun violence is a public health crisis in America, you can show your support for this issue on September 25 by attending one of the approximately 300 concert venues across the country, including 150 that are faith-based. Check them out: http://concertacrossamerica.org/

And when the presidential candidates debate on September 26, we need to hear solid solutions to America's gun violence epidemic. Tell the debate moderator, Lester Holt, that you want an extensive question on gun violence during the debate. Tweet: Hey @LesterHoltNBC ask how candidates will #EndGunViolence at the #debate on 9/26 so we can #VoteAcrossAmerica for solutions

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Let the moderators hear from you regarding questions on this issue during the other debate dates, October 4, 9 and 19, as well.

Take a moment to view this video, an example of the power of music. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RIKDx4fUXNs



You can also take action to #RockItToStopIt by signing this petition.
In a century that traveling into outer space is common place, we are still dealing with weird U.S. governing laws that you would think would have been taken off of the books decades ago. The 2016 U.S. presidential campaign has not only been contentious, but most would say perhaps the most eccentric. As we get closer to election day many are thinking how can this political circus get any crazier.

Unspoken about weird laws have been around for years. With a bizarre presidential contest taking its place in history, it is fitting to take a look at some bizarre regulations that are still on the books. From laws pertaining to voting, members of legislature as well as the National Anthem there are a few standouts that definitely lead the way to crazydom.

Texas Bill of Wrongs



Texas attempts to get around the separation of Church and State in politics. The Texas Constitution, Article-I Bill of Rights states, "That the general, great and essential principles of liberty and free government may be recognized and established." Yet Section four, with the heading Religious Tests, alludes that Texas disallows anyone who is an agnostic from holding office.

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"Sec. 4. Religious Tests. No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office, or public trust, in this State; nor shall any one be excluded from holding office on account of his religious sentiments, provided he acknowledge the existence of a Supreme Being."

Tennessee Warns Duelists

Beware duelists holding office in Tennessee. You will be punished and your office title will be taken away if you fight or are part of a duel challenge. As per Article-VI Disqualifications they leave the punishment up to the state legislator.

"Any person who shall, after the adoption of this Constitution, fight a duel, or knowingly be the bearer of a challenge to fight a duel, or send or accept a challenge for that purpose, or be an aider or abettor in fighting a duel, shall be deprived of the right to hold any office of honor or profit in this State, and shall be punished otherwise, in such manner as the Legislature may prescribe."

Under the same article Tennessee takes separating church and state literally forbidding clergy from serving in government. Although under the same Article, Tennessee bans any person who denies a supreme being from holding office in the state's civil department.

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No Arrest for Working Washington State Legislators

Any Washington State Legislator that is working during a legislative section cannot be arrested for anything below a felony action. Section 16 in the Washington State Constitution, Article-I Bill of Rights states, "Members of the legislature shall be privileged from arrest in all cases except treason, felony and breach of the peace; they shall not be subject to any civil process during the session of the legislature, nor for fifteen days next before the commencement of each session." Lucky legislators can speed to their heart's content, smoke in nonsmoking areas and litter without worry about being ticketed as long as they are working.

McCarthyism Still Exists in Oklahoma

Is Oklahoma paranoid or perhaps this state knows secrets that no one else in the U.S. has been privy to. Worried about the threat of communism continuing to post imminent peril, the state of Oklahoma continues to see a need to state this in Title 21. Crimes and Punishments 21-1266.1. Existence of communist conspiracy.

"Upon evidence and proof already presented before this legislature, congress, the courts of this state, and the courts of the United States, it is here now found and declared to be a fact that there exists an International Communist conspiracy which is committed to the overthrow of the government of the United States and of the several states, including that of the State of Oklahoma, by force or violence, such conspiracy including the Communist Party of the United States, its component or related parts and members, and that such conspiracy constitutes a clear and present danger to the government of the United States and of this state."

Massachusetts Fines for not Singing Complete National Anthem

From beginning to end, when in Massachusetts make sure you know all of the words and sing out loud the complete Star Spangled Banner or risk being fined. Whether at a school event or sporting the National Anthem must be sung in its entirety as intended. Do not think of deviating from the original words or melody, or even dancing as you sing or you may get a fine of up to $100.
One of the first (and usually embarrassing) lessons we learned during my family's four years of living in England was the absolute truth of the statement that "England and America are two countries divided by a common language."

All of us North Americans made gaffes. No matter how astute we thought ourselves, there were always stumbles.

A Canadian friend of ours won the prize for the most embarrassing gaffe. After her interview for a new job, on hearing the good news that she was hired, she asked her proper English male employer, "Is it alright if I wear pants to work?" She was puzzled by his awkward reply and only later discovered to her chagrin what had been lost in translation. In Britishese, "pants" refers to underwear. Our friend had just asked her boss if it was permissible to wear underwear on the job!

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If different meanings to the same words isn't enough of a challenge, there is the fact that even within a single culture, words have a way of changing. How many kids have rolled their eyes when their parents used some out-of-date expression?

Earlier generations were quite comfortable using the word "man" or "men" for all humanity. Today, it sounds a little odd to our modern ears to hear our own Declaration of Independence remind us that "all men are created equal." Never mind the fact that, despite the universal meaning of "men" in the English language back then, that revered statement actually didn't ensure equality for Native Americans, slaves, women, or other males who didn't own land.

If that important American document were being crafted today, a modern Thomas Jefferson would ignite a firestorm of protests if he chose the same outdated wording. Language is dynamic.

Enter the world of Bible translations, and the linguistic stakes are even higher.

Bible Translations Divided by a Common Language

Crossway recently released the 2016 and

final

edition of the English Standard Version (ESV) Bible. After edits to 29 out of more than 31,000 verses, they declared the 2016 version to be "the Permanent Text of the ESV Bible." Their statement goes on to assert,

"In making these final changes, the Crossway Board of Directors and the Translation Oversight Committee thus affirm that their highest responsibility is . . . to guard and preserve the very words of God as translated in the ESV Bible."

The changes they made are listed here.

The most controversial change is to words of curse in Genesis 3:16. ESV editors changed their earlier translation from "Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you," to "Your desire shall be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you."

Others are weighing in on the serious implications of this translation change and the thinking behind it. See here and here.

What also troubles me, however, are the changes that weren't made in the new version. According to General Editor Wayne Grudem, a major motive that led to the first version of this "essentially literal" (word-for-word) translation was what he calls the "gender-neutral" language he found in other translations--specifically the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV), but also found in other popular translations such as Today's New International Version (TNIV) and the New Living Translation (NLT).

This final version of the ESV continues to resist what Grudem labels as "gender-neutral" language. The translations he opposes are matters of serious concern for female readers in particular.

Consider two examples.

When an apostolic letter begins with a greeting to "the brethren" or "the brothers," the author is not addressing males only, but both men and women. The ESV translates Colossians 1:2 "To the saints and faithful brothers in Christ at Colossae." Unless "saints" refers to women, the female members of the church appear to be suddenly excluded. The TNIV more accurately translates the same text to reflect Paul's intended audience. "To God's holy people in Colossae, the faithful brothers and sisters in Christ."

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Because of the awkwardness of the ESV translation, I've heard pastors in churches with ESV Bibles in the pews abruptly interrupt their public Bible reading to explain that the actual meaning of the text is "brothers and sisters."

Another example is in the creation narrative, where God says "Let us make man in our image and likeness," defining "man" as "male and female," (Genesis 1:26 and 27). The Old English term "man" describes all humanity. Yet the ESV retains the Old English language, while the TNIV and NLT substitute "human beings." That modern linguistic clarification doesn't make the text gender-neutral, but rather gender-accurate--reflecting the actual meaning of the biblical text.

Evidently, the original ESV translators were unbothered by modernizing the Old English word "ass" to "donkey" (cf., Numbers 22:22; Joshua 6:21). Apparently their editors deemed it more important to clarify the meaning of "ass" than "man."

In his Systematic Theology, Grudem defends his complementarian rational for insisting on retaining "man" for human beings:

"The theological issue is whether there is a suggestion of male leadership or headship in the family from the beginning of creation. The fact that God did not choose to call the human race "woman," but "man," probably has some significance for understanding God's original plan for men and women. Of course, this question of the name we use to refer to the race is not the only factor in this discussion, but it is one factor, and our use of language in this regard does have some significance in the discussion of male-female roles today" (440)

As you may surmise, I feel strongly about the importance of gender-accurate translations. The ESVs "gender-exclusive" language obscures an accurate understanding for modern readers that impacts multiple texts in the Bible and can lead to false interpretations. Gender-accurate translations answer legitimate questions women are asking when we read the Bible: "Is this text addressing me? Or am I eavesdropping on a message that only applies to men?"

Modern readers must not be left in doubt as to whether the text is addressing everyone or just some of us. It is misleading to describe this kind of clarity as making the Bible "gender-neutral," when it is a clearer literal statement of what the author actually intended. The 2016 ESV cements into the final version words that obscure the true meaning of the text.

Readers need to be aware of that.

Missing Daughters?

But here's what makes this gender issue so complicated and, why it is important to consider carefully our translations.

In a letter the Apostle Paul wrote to believers in Turkey, the same translation problem surfaces. What the ESV translates as "So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God," the TNIV translates "So you are no longer slaves, but God's children; and since you are his children, he has made you also heirs" (Galatians 4:7)

This text follows the often-quoted statement, "There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, neither male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus" (3:28).

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Paul was writing to a mixed audience. So to make sure readers understand that Paul is also including daughters, gender-accurate translations substitute "children" for sons. The sonship offered through Jesus is not just for sons (versus daughters). This has the unfortunate effect of obscuring something powerful Paul is communicating.

Ironically, the ESV sticks to "sons," evidently unaware that they have unleashed one of the most powerful counter-cultural gender statements in the entire New Testament. Given the fact that in the first century patriarchal culture sons were prized above daughters--who didn't inherit, didn't show up in genealogies, and were married off to build another man's family--the fact that Paul is telling a mixed audience that they are "all sons" is not diminishing women in the least. To the contrary, Paul's words are elevating them to the same high status in God's family as their brothers. Paul is telling women, Gentiles, and slaves that, in God's family, they are all sons!

Jesus' gospel is a revolutionary force in human society that re-establishes human equality. We are all sons!

This is why I keep saying, "Patriarchy is not the Bible's message. Rather, it is the fallen cultural backdrop" that reveals the radical nature and potency of the Bible's gospel message in contrast to the patriarchal world. We need to understand that world and patriarchy in particular--much better than we do--if we hope to grasp the radical countercultural message of the Bible.

So choose your Bible translations carefully. Important ideas can get lost in translation. Gender-accuracy matters and is important for all of us.

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The latest institutional developments around who will be monitoring Goal 6 for water and sanitation were presented at the World Water Week in Stockholm. It's a complicated plot.

The big brother: UN Inter-governmental body on water

First, we have the proposal for a UN Inter-governmental body on water which is being promoted by six European countries (Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, The Netherlands and Switzerland) taking the recommendations of the final report of UNSGAB.

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This platform would serve to hold States accountable for the progress they make on implementing the Sustainable Development Goal - SDG 6 and other water-related targets in their countries. The proposed Inter-governmental body would provide one single platform for monitoring progress towards SDG 6 in an integrated way encompassing the different subsectors (WASH, waste water, irrigation and water resources) facilitating less fragmentation and better coordination between its actors and subsectors. At Stockholm, participants raised some concerns that the initiative is being led by just 6 European countries and it was not clear how or when they could get the support from more politically heavy countries to table it and get it endorsed at the United Nations General Assembly. Endorsement by the G77 for instance will be crucial for moving this initiative forward.

On this platform governments would be able to review progress, identify backlogs and make agreements on corrective action sharing lessons learnt and discuss how to overcome barriers to achieve the Goals. There are several suggestions on the frequency and composition of the meetings. Those who were less optimist mention that the platform would possibly convene once every two years and would most likely not consist of the more powerful WASH sector ministers but country official representatives to the UN (diplomats) limiting effective learning and sharing and turning these into action.

The plan is for the Inter-governmental body to be in place before the High Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development. Some say that United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) would be the most likely institution to provide for the secretarial function in support to the Inter-governmental body as it is already mandated to provide secretarial functions. However, UN-Water wants to host the secretariat.

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The cool cousins JMP, GLAAS and the new kid on the block GEMI

Targets 6.1 and 6.2, which are about universal access to water and sanitation will be monitored by WHO/UNICEF using the JMP as it is happening already

Targets 6.3 to 6.6. which focuses on wastewater and ecosystem resources would be monitored by a new global monitoring initiative which is under development: GEMI

Targets 6.a which focuses on international cooperation and capacity-building and 6.b on participation of local communities would be done by GLAAS which already monitors many of the indicators proposed

The methodologies for GEMI are being tested in Jordan, The Netherlands, Peru, Senegal and Uganda and will be further rolled out to Bangladesh and The Philippines. JMP will also field test its adjusted methodology during 2017 (countries not decided yet). The results will also feed into a first global synthesis report on SDG 6 (2018).

While it's uncertain that the Inter-governmental body will be established, UN Water is already taking an important responsibility for coordinating the monitoring of SDG 6 by the various UN agencies mentioned above.

The distant grandfather: High-level Panel on Water

Finally, there is the joint United Nations and World Bank Group High-Level Panel on Water (not be confused with the High-level Political Forum) co-chaired by the Presidents of Mauritius and Mexico. It aims to mobilise effective action to accelerate the implementation of Sustainable Development Goal 6 and its related targets.The Water Sherpas were in Stockholm discussing the scope of this Panel, which they aim to present at the United Nations General Assembly in the third week of September 2016. This panel includes not only heads of state of European but also of African, Asian and Latin American countries. DESA is also involved in the Secretariat.

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Critical questions remain unanswered

It was difficult to compile this information during the many Stockholm formal, informal and closed-door sessions, but it is clear that a lot of the processes are still taking shape. Some questions that were left unanswered:

How transparent will all these proposed platforms be?

How will these platforms coordinate with existing sector platforms such as the Sanitation and Water for All, Global Water Partnership and other networks that have also a role in monitoring progress of SDG 6?

What are the options and means for civil society organisations to influence the SDG global water architecture?
ALBANY POLICE

Meth-dealing arrest  2:53 a.m. Tuesday, Linn County Jail. Stefanie Leigh Foltyn, 32, of West Sacramento, California, was arrested on charges of delivery and possession of methamphetamine and unlawful possession of firearms. She was released from jail without posting bail later that day.

Stolen vehicle arrest  12:02 a.m. Wednesday, Periwinkle Trailer Court, 1010 Geary St. S.E. A stolen vehicle out of Salem was recovered. Justin Dean Russell, 40, of Albany, was arrested on charges of unauthorized use of a vehicle, possession of methamphetamine, first-degree theft and unlawful entry of a motor vehicle. He also had a warrant for probation violation. Russells initial bail was set at $2,500.

LINN COUNTY SHERIFF

Recovered vehicle  6:45 p.m. Wednesday, 49000 block Fairview Street, Mill City. A Honda Accord, reported stolen out of Albany, was recovered after it was abandoned.

Stolen truck  6:28 a.m. Thursday, 39100 block Griggs Drive. A white 2012 Dodge 2500 pickup was reported stolen. The truck was parked in a shop with a key inside of it. The vehicle was last seen at 9 p.m. the previous evening.

Stolen boat  8:13 a.m. Thursday, 600 block Loucks Way, Brownsville. A custom 12-foot jet boat and a trailer were reported stolen.

SWEET HOME POLICE

Identity theft arrest  3:50 a.m. Wednesday, Linn County Jail. Melissa Ann Dewar, 43, of Sweet Home, was arrested on charges of identity theft, second-degree theft and third-degree theft.

BROWNSVILLE FIRE

House fire  10:43 a.m. Thursday, 37900 block Mountain Home Drive. A house was destroyed by a fire, which was moving into nearby brush before it was stopped. Little other information was available. Though the blaze was put out, firefighters were still on the scene monitoring the situation on Thursday afternoon.
I've had a number of readers ask me if this post is "satire" or "unfortunate reality." I'm afraid it's both. The piece is intended as satire. The fact that so many people have taken it seriously reflects the utter nonsense of the 2016 presidential election, and in particular, the GOP candidates. When the story of this campaign is finally recorded, the most accurate depictions of it will come not from reporters but from satirists and editorial cartoonists. Thank you all for your comments.

Mike Pence, GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump's running mate, told the news media at a press conference Thursday that he no longer wants to be called a vice presidential candidate.

The Indiana governor, an evangelical Christian, explained that he opposes the word "vice" on religious grounds. Pence said that the Bible has strict prohibitions against vice. He said the word "vice" means, among other things, "immoral" or "wicked behavior."

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"That's not who I am, and that's not who I want people to think I am," he said. "I can't in good faith willingly condone a word I find deplorable without violating my Christian principles."

Pence's statement came a few days after he refused to use the word "deplorable" to characterize David Duke, former Imperial Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, who has endorsed the Trump-Pence ticket.

Pence's comment about Duke came in response to a question after Hillary Clinton, the Democratic candidate for president, referred to Trump supporters, including Duke, as a " basket of deplorables."

Pence was asked during his press conference if he condemned the word "vice" on Christian principles, why then didn't he condemn the Ku Klux Klan, a white supremacist organization, that openly participates in immoral and wicked behavior?

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"I would," he answered. "But if we start criticizing deplorables, we run the risk of losing half our voters."

Pence, who regularly touts his Christian faith, often describes himself as "a Christian, a conservative, and a Republican, in that order."

Pence's critics, however, say he uses the Bible to justify his intolerance for gays but ignores scripture when it comes to feeding the hungry, comforting the persecuted, and helping the needy.

A reporter reminded the Indiana governor that he cut tens of thousands of Hoosiers off food stamps in 2014, saying it would be "ennobling" for poor people.

"The Bible says that the Lord helps those who help themselves," Pence responded.

"But governor," the reporter responded, "that phrase is not in the Bible."

"Never mind," Pence responded, "it's in the Republican Bible."

Another reporter asked Pence about his executive order late last year that ordered an end to the resettlement in Indiana of Syrian refugees - most of whom are women and children -- who were fleeing their war-torn country.

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The Archdiocese of Indianapolis, among other religious organizations, defied the governor and accepted the refugees. A federal judge overruled Pence's order by saying it "clearly discriminates" against Syrian refugees. Pence challenged the judge's order.

The reporter then referred to Biblical scripture in a follow-up question: "Didn't Jesus say, 'Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me'?"

Pence was then asked if he considered it hypocritical to claim he was a Christian but refuse to allow desperate refugees to seek sanctuary in his state.
In Washington, DC

Republican Presidential candidate just announced, after 8+years, that President Obama was indeed born in the United States.

****

Yesterday, we attended a panel "Reshaping The Criminal Justice System" at the annual Conference of the Congressional Black Caucus. It was hosted by Congress persons Cedric Richmond, New Orleans, Hakeem Jefferies, Brooklyn, and Barbara Lee, Oakland, CA. The moderator was Clint Smith.

Panelists included Bobby Seale, founder of the Black Panther Party, Alicia Garza, co-founder Black Lives Matter, Tamika Mallory, former Exec Director, National Action Network, and Albert Woodfox, member of "Angola 3". Mr. Woodfox, until this past February 17, 2016 spent 44 years in solitary confinement.

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"44 years ago, deep in rural Louisiana, three young black men were silenced for trying to expose continued segregation, systematic corruption, and horrific abuse in the biggest prison in the US, an 18,000-acre former slave plantation called Angola.

Peaceful, non-violent protest in the form of hunger and work strikes organized by inmates caught the attention of Louisiana's elected leaders and local media in the early 1970s. They soon called for investigations into a host of unconstitutional and extraordinarily inhumane practices commonplace in what was then the "bloodiest prison in the South." Eager to put an end to outside scrutiny, prison officials began punishing inmates they saw as troublemakers.

At the height of this unprecedented institutional chaos, Albert Woodfox, Herman Wallace, and Robert King were charged with murders they did not commit and thrown into 6x9 foot solitary cells, where they remained for decades.

Their struggle for justice continued until Robert was released in 2001 and Herman in 2013"

We were especially interested in the panelists opinions, about the current presidential election. There was little direct discussion of this. However, there were several comments and innuendos and cynicism expressed about the two major parties' commitment to address the failures in our criminal justice system.

After the end of the session we went up and shook hands with Albert Fox. We spoke and asked him how he had been able to cope and endure 44 years in solitary confinement? He held our hand, looking directly at us and said, in effect, that he "was not going to let them break him and admit to something he had not done."

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We walked away and asked ourselves the obvious question: Could we have had the capacity to endure 44 years in solitary confinement for our beliefs under similar circumstances?
New York, NY USA - July 16, 2016: Donald Trump speaks during introduction Governor Mike Pence as running for vice president at Hilton hotel Midtown Manhattan

10. He's really isn't "that rich". His tax returns could reveal that he has less money now than what he inherited from his KKK supporting father.

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8. Perhaps Trump's taxes could show that he was audited for a dubious attempt to claim a "medical deduction" for treatment for a small body part.

7. Trump has questioned whether women can be journalists; Hispanics and Muslims can be judges. In Trump's mind, only white men can hold top jobs and judge him, and the IRS also employs women and minorities.

6. Trump's taxes would likely show that he gives very little to charity. He uses other people's money for his foundation, and spends that money for personal purchases (for which he is now being investigated for).

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4. Donald Trump's taxes could expose financial connections to his most loyal followers, white supremacists.

3. It would show that Trump took 9/11 money, which was intended to go to businesses which helped victims (something Trump didn't do with the money).

2. His taxes could expose further attempts to hinder investigations into the illegal business practices of Trump University such as the $25,000 donation to the Attorney General of Florida who subsequently dropped her investigation into Trump's so-called school. It was an organization that was described by its own employees as a "fraudulent scheme that preyed on the elderly and uneducated to separate them from their money."

1. It may show that Trump earned less money that a woman, Hillary Clinton (who has released her tax returns).

Of course, Donald Trump still refuses to let the public see his tax returns, so we can only speculate about what he is hiding.

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Before you vote, ask yourself this question:

If Donald Trump is so afraid of releasing his taxes because it would show that his finances completely contradict American interests and values, why would he care about the well being of American citizens if he was elected president?

-Dan Rosenberg



Dan Rosenberg is a journalist and music producer. He has travelled to over 40 countries across the globe reporting on news, music and culture for various publications and media outlets, including The Times (London), The Huffington Post, Islands, The Rough Guides, Afropop Worldwide, NPR, the CBC, and PRI's "The World", and is currently producing the recording, "Yiddish Glory: The Lost Songs of World War II".
The vice presidential candidates in 2016 for the two major parties are, in terms of their religious backgrounds, an interesting mix of similarities and differences. Mike Pence and Tim Kaine are both native sons of the Middle West, born in the late 1950's into Irish Catholic Democratic families. Both men were very young when the Catholic Church implemented its Vatican II reforms in November 1964, which means that probably neither of them can remember what American Catholicism was like before then. Studies of older American Catholics in the 1960's revealed that they viewed the most revolutionary change associated with Vatican II as not the switch from Latin to English during religious services, as important as that was, but rather that the priest now turned around, faced the congregation, and spoke to it directly.

Their post-Vatican II upbringing means that Mike Pence and Tim Kaine are part of a distinctive cohort of American Catholics who experienced a kind of religious service much closer to mainline Protestant ones than had ever been true before. Like Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney's running mate in 2012, Pence and Kaine are also part of a distinctly newer and different cohort of Catholic politicians. Older Catholic candidates for the Vice Presidency such as Edmund Muskie of Maine, Thomas Eagleton of Missouri, Sargent Shriver of Maryland, Geraldine Ferraro of New York, and Joseph Biden of Delaware, grew up at a time when the American Catholic world was more distinct from the that of mainline Protestantism. Younger Catholic politicians like Pence and Kaine from the post-Vatican II era tend to blend in more easily with Protestants.



That change has had far-reaching consequences for both Pence and Kaine. Let's consider the GOP nominee first. Mike Pence's family was heavily involved in his local Catholic Church (Saint Columba) in Columbus, Indiana, where he and this three brothers all served as altar boys and attended the parochial school connected to it. At Hanover College in southern Indiana in the late 1970's, however, Pence began moving away from his Catholic roots. The reason for that was simple. At Hanover, which was affiliated with the Presbyterian Church, Pence began meeting evangelical Christians who spoke about having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. That appealed to the deeply religious Mike Pence, and it was something he felt that the formality and rituals of American Catholicism had not provided him. And so, to the surprise of his family (and the distress of his mother), Pence became an evangelical Christian in the 1980's. Although in no way hostile to Catholicism (he calls himself an "evangelical Catholic"), Pence left that world. By the 1990's, he and his wife Karen, whom he met while studying law at Indiana University, were attending an evangelical megachurch in Indianapolis.

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That shift in religious identity contributed to a change in his political one as well. During the 1980's, Mike Pence went from being a Reagan Democrat to a Reagan Republican. The issue of abortion was evidently very important to that switch. As the Democrats nationally became ever more supportive of the Roe v. Wade decision and the Republicans steadily less so, Pence felt drawn toward the GOP. His success in Indiana politics - where he has served as a congressman and as governor - stemmed from Pence's ability, rooted in his own life story, to unite morally traditional Catholics and Protestant evangelicals behind his campaigns. With that kind of support, Pence became one of the most socially conservative major politicians in a socially conservative state. What made him distinctive was his refusal to demonize his opponents while still taking very right-wing stands on such issues as reproductive rights and gay marriage.

For Tim Kaine, growing up in a post-Vatican II Catholic environment produced a very different outcome. Kaine mostly grew up in a middle-class suburb of Kansas City, Missouri, where he went to Catholic schools, including a Jesuit high school. While a sophomore there, he went on a mission trip to Honduras to deliver donations to a Jesuit mission in the town of El Progreso. After college at the University of Missouri (which he completed in just three years), Kaine moved on to Harvard Law School, where he decided to take a break and go back to El Progreso to do volunteer work. There he became involved with a group of Catholic clergy who had been influenced by "liberation theology," which emphasized support for oppressed working-class people. Liberation theology had a Marxist tinge to it, which put off some senior Catholic clerics, most notably Pope John Paul II, but all the indications are that the young Tim Kaine liked that more populist kind of Catholicism. His time in Honduras also gave Kaine a more doubtful view of the goodness of U.S. military intervention there, and elsewhere in Latin America, during the 1980's. The repression of dissidents by the military in Latin America then, and the assistance given to the armed forces there by the Reagan administration, appear to have moved Kaine in a more liberal, though still Catholic, direction.

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After returning to Harvard Law School, from which he graduated in 1983, Tim Kaine chose to settle in Richmond, Virginia, the hometown of Anne Holton. They had met a few years earlier, when they were both students at Harvard Law, and married in 1984. Anne Holton was the daughter of the former liberal Republican governor of Virginia, Linwood Holton, a Presbyterian who gave each of his four children a Bible with underlined passages about the good Samaritan. While governor from 1969 to 1973, Holton had sent his children to racially mixed public schools in Richmond, while pushing the state to comply at long last with the Brown school desegregation decision. At the time Anne Holton met Tim Kaine in law school, she was attending services at a local Quaker meeting house. Holton's churchy leftism appealed to Kaine, and her family's political background, so different from his own, intrigued him. After settling down together in Richmond, they joined St. Elizabeth's, a primarily African-American Catholic church.

Thanks mostly to Anne Holton's influence, Tim Kaine entered Virginia politics, where he was elected to the Richmond City Council, and then became mayor, lieutenant governor and governor before winning a seat in the U.S. Senate. Crucial to his success was his ability to appeal to a multi-racial electorate with a moderately liberal message. A white Catholic guy who belonged to a predominantly black church and spoke fluent Spanish, Kaine proved adept at navigating the racially and ethnically diverse electorate of Virginia as it is now.
On September 13, the Census Bureau released a report that the U.S. economy had performed well for many Americans in 2015. The report indicated that the poverty rate had fallen by 1.2 percentage points last year - which was the biggest decline in one year since 1968.

That is good news, in fact very good news, for the state of poverty in the United States. But, even with this shining light, shadows remain across the country. States of poverty still exist and much more needs to be done to reduce them.

Unfortunately, in the run-up to the election there has been a poverty of discussion regarding poverty. The news cycles have been dominated by reporting and commentary on the personalities, the platform performance, and the problems of the presidential candidates.

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Little attention has been paid to policy matters. When policy issues are addressed, it is usually around hot-button issues such as immigration, terrorism, and the demise of the middle class. Poverty is at the bottom of the list.

The national progress on poverty in 2015 provides the platform for focusing and intensifying our poverty-related efforts and initiatives going forward. To accomplish that it is essential to understand and grapple with the states of poverty.

In a recent New York Times article, Quoctrung Bui examined the size of the gap between rich and poor in the period from 2000 to 2014. Bui found that in poorer states like Louisiana, Arkansas and Mississippi the gap narrowed. But, in wealthier states like New York, California and New Jersey the gap widened significantly.

The changes have not just occurred at the state level. They have also occurred within states as well. Earlier this year, the Economic Policy Institute issued a study that presented its findings on changes in economic inequality by state, metropolitan areas, and counties based upon its analysis of 2013 data.

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As might be expected, at the state level, the gap had widened most substantially in states such as New York and Connecticut. Surprisingly, Wyoming was also on this list.

At the metropolitan area level, the widest gap was for Jackson Hole, which straddles Wyoming and Idaho, where the top 1 percent earned on average 213 times the average income of the bottom 99 percent of families. Other areas with the biggest gaps included: Naples-Immokalee-Marco Island, Florida (73.2%), Gardnerville Ranchos, Nevada (46.1%); and, San Angelo, Texas (40.9%).

The widest gaps by county tended to mirror the gaps by metropolitan area. For example, the widest gap of 233 percent was in Teton, Wyoming which includes part of Jackson Hole. Other counties with big gaps were LaSalle, Texas (125.6%), and Shacklelford, Texas (117.1%).

While there are widening gaps and significant differences between the rich and the poor within states, there are also significant differences in terms of the incidence of poverty across a state. Even though they are wealthier states, New York, Texas and Florida all have many counties with high poverty rates.

Illinois has 102 counties. In its Report on Illinois Poverty issued in January 2015, the Social Impact Research Center put 46 of those counties on its warning or watch list because they are "experiencing particularly negative conditions and trends on four key indicators: poverty, unemployment, teen births and high school graduation." The Center's report also disclosed that in the period from 2000 to 2013 the share of the poor in the suburbs in the six-county Chicago region had grown from 34% to 48%.

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The bottom line is that data in the aggregate conceals as much as it reveals. To truly understand and address the state of poverty within the U.S. it is essential to drill down deeply into the states of poverty.

Those states are defined not only by geography but by the conditions and psychology of the individuals and families in poverty. One way of looking at poverty from that perspective is in three states: struggling, stagnating and suffering.

The struggling state can be characterized as the conditions and circumstances of the working poor or lower incoming working class. The State of Working Florida report issued recently by Florida International University disclosed that the lowest income working class in Florida grew by 1.1 in the past year. The five main occupations for lower wage workers were sales; food preparation and service; office and administrative support; building and maintenance cleaning; and, transportation and material-moving jobs. During the past five years, the average wage for those workers dropped by 6.7 percent.

The stagnating state can be characterized as the conditions and circumstances of those who have dropped out of the workforce and are no longer seeking jobs. As a White House Report released in June of this year highlighted many of those individuals are prime age males (ages 25-54). The percentage of those out of the workforce has gone from a peak of "98 percent to 88 percent today." The reasons for declining labor force participation in this group include: reductions in the demand for lower-skilled labor; lack of appropriate education; and, increased incarceration.

The suffering state can be characterized as the conditions and circumstances of those who are locked in generational poverty. They were born poor and for the most part they stay poor. In chapter 2 on "The Facts" about poverty in its important report, Opportunity, Responsibility, and Security: A Consensus Plan for Reducing Poverty and Restoring the American Dream, a working group from the American Enterprise Institute and the Brookings Institution observed, "In contrast to the decline in poverty rates, there has been no progress in increasing economic mobility."

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In conclusion, the states of poverty are complex and interdependent. They demand both place-based and person-based solutions. There is no one size fits all answer.

As we noted in our last blog, "An American Elegy", there are a number of groups and individuals that have developed material that can be used as input and reference points to craft those solutions.
Anyone following the recent pricing controversy over the EpiPen might be surprised to learn that its inventor never collected a penny in royalties.

Sheldon Kaplan first invented the ComboPen, an auto-injector filled with nerve gas antidote, for the U.S military in the 1970s.

Around the same time, he developed a similar device for civilians facing their own enemy: anaphylaxis.

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Greek for "without protection," anaphylaxis is a severe allergic reaction that occurs when the body launches a full-scale attack on a seemingly innocuous substance like a peanut or a latex glove.

French physiologist -- and eugenicist and paranormal researcher -- Charles Richet was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1913 for describing and naming the phenomenon, which he studied by injecting dogs with jellyfish venom.

In the most serious version of anaphylaxis, the body's blood pressure plummets and the airways close off, meaning that a person can go from eating dinner to fighting for their life within minutes.

With the EpiPen, a treatment for anaphylaxis is always close at hand.

Discovery of adrenaline

Epinephrine, or adrenaline, constricts and patches leaky blood vessels, which raises blood pressure and opens airways back up.

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A Japanese-American biochemist named Jokichi Takamine is generally credited with the discovery of adrenaline, which he announced around the turn of the 20th century. Takamine is also responsible for Washington D.C.'s famous cherry trees, a gift he arranged from the mayor of Tokyo.

Soon after his discovery, scientists figured out how to synthesize and produce the hormone cheaply. The drug enjoyed a brief career as a panacea, used to treat everything from bubonic plague to bed-wetting.

Eventually, adrenaline (which came to be known as epinephrine in the United States) settled into its role as a surgical aid, a treatment for asthma, and a means of reversing anaphylaxis.

Just in time, too. Beginning around the 1960s, anaphylaxis seemed to be happening more often -- not just in clinical settings as a reaction to medicine.

As a result, doctors began prescribing epinephrine kits, stocked with a vial of medicine and syringes, to at-risk patients.

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Enter the EpiPen

When the EpiPen was approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 1987, it was met with a sigh of relief from needle-averse patients and their families.

Kaplan's design releases a spring-loaded syringe pre-filled with a dose of adrenaline. It's designed to be delivered through a person's clothing -- eliminating the time-consuming act of filling a syringe and requiring no medical expertise beyond a short tutorial.

Although Kaplan's name was listed on the patent, he never received royalties for the invention, which belonged instead to his employer, Survival Technology Inc.

The EpiPen changed hands several times, eventually landing at the now-vilified pharmaceutical company Mylan in 2007.

Mylan quickly launched a full tilt marketing and advocacy campaign aimed at getting schools to stock EpiPens, an effort galvanized by the high-profile deaths of several schoolchildren.

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In 2013, President Obama signed the School Access to Emergency Epinephrine Act, which provides financial incentives to schools that keep epinephrine auto-injectors on hand.

Although the bill doesn't refer to the EpiPen brand specifically, Mylan has come under fire for allegedly restricting schools' access to competing auto-injectors, few though they may be.

Not much competition

The AuviQ, a smaller and more discreet auto-injector, equipped with a voice function that talked a patient through its deployment, was recalled last year for delivering inconsistent doses of the drug.

Another option, Twinject, has also been discontinued.

Adrenaclick is the only other auto-injector still available to consumers. It retails for about a quarter of the price of the EpiPen and its manufacturer also makes a generic version. Mylan announced several weeks ago that it will be pushing through its own generic.

But as the first and longest-lasting auto-injector on the market, doctors and patients alike have come to trust the EpiPen brand over any other device.

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Also, change can be more than just inconvenient in an emergency situation.

The Adrenaclick is deployed a little differently, so a person using it for the first time would have to re-orient themselves to unfamiliar instructions.

Until the FDA wades through a backlog of other auto-injector applications -- or until a novel delivery system like an under-the-tongue tablet is approved -- epinephrine technology seems to have stalled.

Some doctors are now suggesting patients cut costs by carrying kits composed of epinephrine and syringes, a system that Kaplan, who died in 2009, must have thought would be relegated to the history books.

By Rose Rimler
It's that time of year again, when children, families and teachers leave summer days behind and take up the rhythms of a new school year. Children waiting at bus stops with brightly colored backpacks, laughing and reconnecting with friends; teachers everywhere opening carefully prepared lesson plans with high hopes for engaging every student; parents switching gears and back in the loop with others hoping the schools will do well by their children, preparing them for a bright future.

Given the events of last summer, this seasonal surge of anticipation and hope for the year ahead is more important to hold onto than ever. So many times in the past few months we have tuned in to media showing us the reality of innocent lives taken by the Syrian war, earthquakes in Italy, and deranged terrorists - seemingly everywhere, among so many other tragedies. Almost daily, we saw or read about lives and futures lost to gun violence, intentional or by a chance encounter.

I remember especially a young African-American student who escaped the killing spree on Chicago streets while at college and came home to celebrate his Mom's birthday. He was shot and killed in front of her house - not the intended target.

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For years, the world's top scientists have provided indisputable evidence of the human role in climate changes that are destroying our planet. Last summer we witnessed unprecedented climate disasters - mudslides and raging wildfires, drought and water shortages, wild tornadoes and hurricanes flooding and destroying whole communities, record high temperatures on Earth. Yet our leaders pretend these are aberrations in a world unchanged.

Some citizens, frustrated and angry, have given up on government to lead us through to a better future. Of our presidential candidates, one espouses the regressive dark side of human character and division as a model for governance, while the other promises progress and tolerance through a fog of mistrust. How promising do children's futures look, what models can we offer them, when we see presidential candidates demonstrating corrupt values and poor judgment while claiming they are nothing of the sort?

But actually, I think there is promise, and hope. Look beyond the top-of-the-fold headlines focused on human scandal and tragedy and be inspired by the many, many recent stories that reflect the best in humanity. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is planning a $1 billion cleanup of abandoned uranium mines poisoning Navajo reservations. President Obama has taken executive action to protect ocean environments off the shores of Hawaii and Massachusetts. Scientists are coming closer to curing, or at least alleviating, devastating diseases such as ALS, Alzheimer's, hepatitis C, several varieties of cancer and schizophrenia. Sri Lanka has eliminated deadly malaria.

Within these organizations that seek to serve humanity, there are legions of anonymous individuals making their living doing work for the greater good. As the president of Wheelock College for 12 years, I know that each year thousands more young teachers and human service providers graduate into the world intent on doing exactly the same.

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Look deeper into smaller, less flashy media stories, and you'll discover individual and group acts of natural goodness and courage. You'll find individuals running into danger to save the lives of strangers from a burning car or from flood waters; longtime residents organizing to successfully defend Muslim neighbors against hate-driven bullies; the extraordinary commitment to physical endurance and perfection of Olympic athletes but also, even more inspiring, of the Special Olympic competitors whose "can do" hearts and mindset know no limits.

Did you hear about Emma Yang, a 12-year-old girl who has created the first app to help Alzheimer's patients keep track of activities and daily needs? She did it because her grandmother needed it. And Siouxsie Downs and Conrad Farnsworth, who have created a new nuclear fusion reactor, one that doesn't destroy lives but desalinates water and reduces waste in impoverished countries?
A well-crafted marketing asset is invaluable for any B2B company.

However, if you want to create high-quality content that adds genuine value to your prospective clients, you must first understand that content creation is a process.

Kiosked recently published a beautiful & content-rich eBook, The Advertisers' Guide to Programmatic, in an effort to give brands access to a holistic explanation of programmatic advertising.

We spoke with Kiosked's CMO, Hope Frank, as well as their Head of Content, Christine Goos, to find out the steps they took to create such an incredible piece of content.

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1) Clarify Your "Why"

If you're looking to create something of substance, a piece of content that adds substantial value to the market, you need to need to work from a defined foundation.

Why this project? Why now? What are our outcome objectives?

For Kiosked, their "why" was to create a resource that offers an easy entry to understanding programmatic advertising. Rather than letting people Google programmatic-related questions on their own, they proactively looked at producing a piece of content that would serve a wide audience and contain easy to understand content in a visually engaging format.

"We wanted to create something visually beautiful, easy to read, and inspiring... To educate, delight, and add value," said Kiosked's Head of Content, Christine Goos.

2) Identify Your Target Audience

Now that your foundation is set, and your team is on board with the "why" behind the content initiative, the next step is to pinpoint who your target audience is.

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Is the content focused on generating widespread awareness for your brand? Or is the content intended to move your existing prospects through a certain stage of your sales funnel?

In this case, Kiosked wanted content that would provide both advertising fundamentals, and also inspire marketers to build their own in-house creative team. So their eBook is a medley of content that has been tailored to provide the basics, but still engage with seasoned marketers.

3) Find a Champion

Any significant undertaking takes a curated team of individuals to see it through to completion.

From researchers, designers, and copywriters to senior level executives, if you want to create premium content for your target audience, you should be engaging more than only your creative team.

Keep everyone on the same page and working toward the same goal by nominating a project lead, or, as Kiosked CMO Hope Frank phrased it, a project "champion."

"It always takes a champion for beautiful work to see the light," says Hope in reference to her eBook champion, Christine, in New York and Head of Design, Minna-Kaisa Kuosmanen in Helsinki.

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Your champion should be passionate about the project and about enabling each team member to contribute their best work.

4) Create an Outline

Once you know your "why", "who", and have assembled a great team with a dynamic and enthusiastic leader, it's time to start creating the asset.

To get started, you'll need to draft an outline for what you want your asset to include.

If it's an eBook, create a table of contents. If it's a video series, list working titles of the content you want to cover. Want to build a custom app? Layout what features and functions you want included to meet your outcome objectives.

For Kiosked's eBook, this stage was the ideal time to engage their sales team.

By engaging their sales team during the outline phase, they were able to identify pain points with existing customers, both local and global. This insight helped Christine (the eBook's champion) determine the specific content that needed to be included throughout the eBook.

Note: As you're building the outline, don't be afraid to draw from the well of your existing content. Get creative, but don't feel like you need to generate all new content.

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5) Do Your Homework

You don't want to sacrifice the integrity of the asset because you failed to cross your t's and dot your i's.

Current & Correct Language

Get at least one industry expert from your team to fact-check your content to ensure that you're using the most current and correct language. If you're not able to get an industry expert involved, Google is your best friend!

Research

Assign someone from your team to do some digging and look into what other voices in your industry are saying. You don't want to find yourself in a situation where your competitor has created a similar asset and it looks like you've "stolen" their idea right out from under them.

Global Context

If the content you're creating is meant for a global audience, it's essential that it's formatted for each audience, with correct spellings, translations, and conversions, as applicable.

6) Set Aggressive, but Manageable Goals

Definitive deadlines are the gears that keep your content creation machine in motion.

A set of mini-deadlines spread throughout the initiative keeps all team members accountable for their portion of the project. These deadlines are also a good indicator for your project champion to assess where more resources need to be invested to get the project across the finish line.

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In addition to the mini-deadlines for the individual tasks associated with completing the eBook, Kiosked set a final deadline for publishing -- a go-live date where what was finished, was published. This is an excellent way to instill urgency as you're requesting final approval from senior executives.

7) Get Your Money's Worth

You spent a ton of time creating this asset, so you'll want to make sure that you're milking it for all it's worth. Make sure that you think through a variety of ways that your target audience can engage with the resource.

For Kiosked, their eBook is a highly visual and stimulating resource that lended itself to being chopped up into bite-sized pieces they could then share.

Screenshots and visuals from their eBook can be easily repurposed as social media posts, serving as stand-alone content that points back to the original asset.

This is less about marketing the original asset, and more about leveraging the resource to add value to your audience in a variety of formats.

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8) Promote, Promote, Promote

Obviously.

At this point, you know exactly who you're trying to reach with this marketing asset. So focus your promotion on both paid and unpaid tactics that will get the most engagement from that specific audience.

Social media, your website, and your email lists are great tools for unpaid promotion. And hyper-targeted paid advertising can help you reach segments of people that aren't already connected to your brand.

As you're thinking through your promotion strategy, don't forget to promote the asset internally...specifically to your global sales team.

If the entire sales team doesn't know that the asset is available, they can't leverage it to open doors or close deals...and that would be unfortunate.

Conclusion

Creating content that's both beautiful and relevant takes more than just a wish and a prayer.

It takes a highly-engaged team, committed to producing great work.

The 8-step process that Kiosked followed to create their most recent eBook isn't rocket science. But it's highly effective.

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When you follow a process that's proven, you'll win. And your brand will reap the benefits.

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James Carbary is the founder of Sweet Fish Media, a podcast production service for B2B companies. He's a contributor for the Huffington Post & Business Insider, and he also co-hosts the B2B Growth Show: a podcast dedicated to helping B2B executives achieve explosive growth.

___________________________________________________________

The Premier Monetization Solution for Global Publishers

Kiosked is a global publisher monetization platform that leads the way to a new era in digital advertising. Kiosked generates new revenue opportunities for publishers with highly viewable, dynamic, and contextually relevant ad placements. Kiosked is the first company to launch programmatically traded 360 ad formats for immersive digital advertising. Headquartered and founded in Helsinki, Finland, today Kiosked has offices in North America, Asia Pacific, and EMEA. www.kiosked.com


Donald Trump isn't an alien invader from outer space who landed his flying saucer on American soil and seized control. Rather, he's the terminus of an intentional and insidious journey the GOP has been taking for years. He epitomizes what they have ultimately pursued all along, and only now are they learning that the journey's end is a place of devastation for them. As the headlines blast the message of the impending demise of the GOP, and as the Republican leadership desperately tries to keep things afloat with unsuccessful interventions, the party is coming to understand that Trump represents the final leg of the GOP journey which has led to its downfall.

The issue is quite simple: the GOP is imploding not because of Trump; it is imploding because of what the Republicans themselves brought to the political table over the past several years, their just dessert a Trump GOP nomination victory. Trump is not the disease that infects the Republican party; Trump is the final symptom that appears as the disease consumes and destroys.

For many years, the GOP has been focused on one thing: hating Democrats, and hating them personally. The focus has not been on providing opposing points of views or opposing plans. The GOP modus operandi has not only been to demonize and delegitimize Democrats as messengers of opposing ideas, but as people. From Sarah Palin, Mike Pence, Michelle Bachmann and the others, they attack Democrats by claiming illegitimacies of citizenship, by stripping them of their identities, and by describing them not by policy differences but by personal attributes which dehumanize. They say that President Obama isn't an American and that he's not Christian. They say that Hillary Clinton is a thief, a murderer, and also is not Christian. They develop personal conspiracies about the Democrats, and they suggest ad hominem violence as a mechanism for eradicating Democrats. Republicans have moved from principles to personal hatreds, personal conspiracies, and personal vendettas. And they blame the media. They hate the media. These are the politics of personal hatred that have become core to the Republican party for some time. All Trump has done is vocalize it in a much louder way.

Trump's language is simply a continuation of the GOP's focus on character assassination, just taken a step further and more crude. From "crooked" Hillary, "Pocahontas" Elizabeth, "foreign-born Muslim" Barack Hussein Obama, to all the other name-calling we've come to hear from him. But Trump is not the author of these barbs; the GOP defined these attributes long before this election cycle. Trump simply goes further and calls people "weak" and "loser" and "ugly". He demeans US judges, and war heroes, and their families. And he does what the Republicans think of as unfathomable; he says those things about Republicans, too. He says things like "lying" Ted and "little" Marco. No one is immune to his personal name calling. He typically doesn't call his opponents by their last names or their titles, other than President Obama whom he calls by his full name, making sure to include his middle name. It's not President Obama, or Senator Clinton or Madame Secretary, or Senator Warren, or even Senator Rubio or Senator Cruz. His name games are a way of degrading people on a personal level. Strip them of their titles and positions, infantilize them and taunt them.

These kinds of taunts are also hurled at the media, particularly female reporters. From Megyn Kelly to Katy Tur, he targets them individually, then threatens leaders with physical harm. But the GOP has talked hatefully about the media for years, perhaps just not in such an open and crass manner as Trump.

Trump focuses on conspiracy theories that indict his opponents. He says that President Obama and Hillary Clinton are the founders of ISIS. He says that the election is rigged. He says that Ghazala Kahn was forced to be silent because of her religion. He claims that Senator Cruz's father was part of the Kennedy assassination. Although I am not a Cruz supporter, and I disagree with him on almost all issues, I do not believe that his father was a co-conspirator in Kennedy's death. But the incubation of conspiracy theories is not new to the GOP. It's been part of their tactics for years.

Here's the fundamental issue: the Republicans see politics as sport. One team wins; one team loses. One is victorious; one is humiliated. In sports, there is no compromise, no win-win, no working together, no common goal. It's about being the victor. That's not politics, where common vision and common purpose should prevail, albeit with opposing views on the best way to achieve that vision and purpose. Politics should be different than a sporting match. But Republicans have taken the competitive approach. No compromise. No consensus-building. Win at all costs. Shut the government down if necessary. Never reach across the aisle. Don't find common ground. Do whatever it takes to humiliate the opposition. Trump has adopted this same approach, just with much more gusto.

Trump merely exaggerates the plays taken from the GOP playbook. The Republicans don't say things like "Unemployment is down significantly since President Obama took office, and that's good for America. But we think we can bring it down even more with the following plan..." Instead, they say that the unemployment statistics are rigged. They don't say "Benghazi was a terrible tragedy, and we foolishly supported the reduction of funds for embassy security. But we think we can better protect our embassies in the future with the following plan..." Instead, they claim the attack and supposed cover-up were some kind of conspiracy initiated by then Secretary Clinton. The list of purported conspiracies is endless, and those conspiracies are so byzantine in nature that they could make even fiction writers' heads spin.

All this results in GOP talk of impeaching President Obama, dismissing specific Supreme Court justices who don't support GOP interests, refusing to appoint a new SCOTUS justice, and in the end, suggesting retaliation and physical harm against individual opponents. Pointed threats to specific people and reporters. Anti-Hillary Clinton shouts of "lock her up", ""hang her", or illusions to assassination. This is where this GOP approach ends up. Not just in the gutter, but in the morgue.

This is now the public perception of the GOP. And Americans don't like it. They are turning against the Republicans in droves, and to make matters worse for the GOP, Trump is even turning on his own.

So as we listen in horror to the rantings of Trump at his rallies and during interviews, and read his twisted tweets, we need to appreciate that the problem isn't Donald Trump. The problem is the Republican party that promoted an agenda of personal attacks against opponents, rather than proposing alternate ideas for the future of America. A party that gleefully chose hatred, cultivated conspiracy theories, and normalized calls for violence against persons. Trump is simply the fruition of these GOP tactics.

As we watch the GOP implode, we can only hope that whatever new party emerges will have learned a lesson and will rebuild on a foundation of ideas, plans and policy. This will take years, and in the meantime President Hillary Clinton will keep our nation safe and steady. Reince Priebus, Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell and the rest of the Republican leadership will bemoan their and Trump's devastating losses, probably unable to see that it was the GOP itself that created the monster that destroyed it, not the other way around.


Two weeks ago, North Carolina became the first state to release the names of those who, by passing the bar exam and meeting other requirements, had qualified for admission to the bar. Thousands of people will become lawyers in the various states within the next couple of months.

For many of these newly-minted lawyers, this period marks a spectacular transition. They will go from accumulating student debt, to making an income. They will go from attending lectures, to providing important legal services. However, there is a hidden danger awaiting these new lawyers - insider trading violations.

Surprise!

Insider Trading and Lawyers

The practice of law is steeped with opportunities to violate insider trading laws. This is, in part, because a requirement for such a violation is the use of material, non-public information. Clients disclose such sensitive information to their lawyers regularly for purposes of representation.

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It is obvious that a securities lawyer or corporate lawyer might come into contact with material, non-public information. The classic example of such information is that of a merger, quietly negotiated, that will offer the target company's shareholders a high premium in exchange for their shares. A lawyer who learns of the premium while working on the merger and uses that information to purchase shares of the target company would likely violate insider trading laws.

Similarly, intellectual property lawyers will naturally find out about patents, patent infringements, and litigation settlements that affect their corporate clients before the public. Just imagine what Apple's intellectual property lawyers knew about the iPhone 7 before Tim Cook took the stage earlier this week. That is some very material information.

Less obvious, but just as real, are opportunities that arise for lawyers working far afield from corporate affairs. A family lawyer, for example, who represents a corporate insider in a divorce may learn material, non-public information about the corporation in the process. A lawyer drafting a will faces the same possibility. So might a criminal defense attorney. The chance to make a fortune on a stock trade was never imagined when these lawyers began their practices. That is why insider trading is a dangerous trap for the unwary.

Lest one think this warning is purely theoretical, examples of lawyers being prosecuted for insider trading are many. One of the most famous insider trading cases is United States v. O'Hagan, which featured the misappropriation of insider information by a securities and medical malpractice litigator . A Ropes & Gray litigator was sentenced to 30 months in prison for insider trading in 2011. A former partner at Fox Rothschild who practiced insurance law was sentenced to 6 months in prison for insider trading in July. An intellectual property lawyer and former partner at Hunton Williams was charged with insider trading just last month. These are just a few high-profile examples.

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Simply put, the danger is real.

Avoiding Insider Trading

So what is a new lawyer to do?

One option is to avoid investing in securities like stocks and bonds entirely. That is safe. But it would "guarantee you'll have nothing at the end of the trail" for retirement. Not good.

Another option is to try to thread the legal needle with advice from a securities lawyer. You may still wind up facing allegations of insider trading though. As a lawyer, you could be investigated by the SEC, DOJ, and your state bar. That wouldn't be fun either.

Fortunately, there is a third option for avoiding the long list of embarrassed, disbarred, and imprisoned lawyers who have engaged in insider trading. The even better news is that this option may make you wealthier in the long-run than investing with a professional portfolio manager . It is called indexing or passive investing .



Passive investing involves owning funds that invest in an index of securities (e.g. S&P 500). The inclusion of securities in index funds is not influenced by the decisions of the investor or even a fund manager. The fund simply invests in whatever is on the subject index. By passively investing in index funds rather than picking individual securities like the lawyers in the above-cited cases, lawyers can avoid the appearance that they have traded a security on material, non-public information.

I know that some of the new lawyers reading this article are chaffing at the notion of passive investing. You're thinking that because you passed the bar exam you are too smart to forego the fantastic profits you would make actively investing. I heard this from my classmates in law school, so I am prepared to address your concerns.

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First, irrelevant! Being a lawyer has no relationship to investing. You probably didn't study economics, business, or finance in law school. Also, there's reason to believe you are bad at math. In short, you're competent to practice law, not actively invest.

Second, even if you had the ability to successfully trade securities, you won't have time. Your new employer wants you to put in 1700-2300 billable hours this year , which means you'll be spending every waking minute on client matters.

Third, passive investing doesn't mean you've lost the ability to build a smart portfolio. You can and should maintain a portfolio of investments that reflects your investing time horizon and risk appetite. You can also tailor your portfolio to reflect your belief that, say, companies with gender diversity or with drugs at the clinical trial stages should be supported.

Passive investing is clearly the best option.

Conclusion
The world is on the move, and the number of international migrants today is higher than ever before. In 2015, 244 million people lived in a country other than where they were born, including more than 20 million refugees and asylum-seekers escaping violence or persecution in their home countries.

People have always moved in search of sustenance, safety and opportunity. By crossing borders and residing in other lands, they have contributed to cultural diversity, economic and social development, and mutual understanding amongst peoples and nations.

In only a few days, on the 19th of September, the United Nations General Assembly will convene the UN Summit for Refugees and Migrants. The purpose of the Summit is to guide the development of a global approach to addressing large movements of persons across international borders.

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The political declaration adopted at the Summit will strengthen the commitment by governments to ensuring the human rights, safety and dignity of all refugees and migrants. It will also set in motion a process to create a more predictable, systematic and equitable means of managing international migration for the future.

This Summit presents an historic opportunity. It is taking place at a time when many people are on the move, sometimes in the face of grave danger and uncertainty.

The number of persons forcibly displaced from their homes due to war, violence or political oppression is higher now than at any time since the Second World War: roughly 65 million at the end of 2015, according to data provided by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

Although most remain in their own countries as "internally displaced persons", or IDPs, more than 20 million are living elsewhere as refugees or asylum-seekers.

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The increasing trend is not limited to refugees and others who have been forced to migrate. The total number of international migrants has continued to grow as well. According to estimates prepared by our team in the Population Division of the UN's Department of Economic and Social Affairs, this number increased from 173 million in 2000 to 244 million in 2015.

It is important to acknowledge the benefits of human mobility. Migration is widely recognized as a powerful force that contributes in multiple ways to sustainable development, for countries of origin and destination alike.

Remittances are an important part of the economic impact of migration. In 2015, migrants sent home $432 billion to developing countries, which is more than triple the global total of Official Development Assistance (ODA). Remittances help families in countries of origin to attend school, pay for medical care, save for the future and launch new business initiatives.

When the Heads of State and Governments adopt the Summit's outcome document, known as the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants, the international community will take an important step towards a more humane and welcoming world, where the burdens and responsibilities of assisting refugees and other vulnerable migrants will be shared more equitably in a spirit of international cooperation.

Beyond the short-term response to the migration crisis currently affecting countries in various parts of the globe, the declaration will also initiate a process of reflection and negotiation over the next two years, as governments seek to address migration issues also from a long-term perspective in the context of sustainable development. Specifically, the declaration commits the United Nations to organizing an intergovernmental conference on international migration to be held in 2018.

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The ultimate goal of the conference in 2018 will be the creation of a global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration. The compact will lay out principles, commitments and understandings among countries regarding international migration in all its dimension. Its ambitious objective is to produce breakthroughs in the global governance of international migration, a topic that has become more and more challenging in recent years for countries big and small, rich and poor, North and South, and East and West.

Ambitious plans always carry the risk of failure. However, the risks of inaction on this topic are even greater. The world needs to approach issues of international migration with calm and reason, and with understanding and compassion. In doing so, I am confident that genuine breakthroughs will be possible.
Rob Daly via Getty Images

Globally-conscious investors, corporations, and innovators are convening in San Francisco this week to expand a community of change. SOCAP16 (Social Capital Markets) commences its annual conference today to continue a tradition of building "connections and conversations at the intersection of money and meaning."

I'll be there to join the "If we don't want gentrification we need to...!" panel to discuss the challenges of uprooting long-established communities and replacing them with shiny, new Starbucks, galleries and megaplexes. Other panels include "Impactful Matchmaking" (no, it's not speed dating, but how investment advisors can introduce impact investing to their clients), "The Importance of Home: How Can We Do Anything without an Affordable Place to Live?" and "Finance as an Instrument of Hope: Investing in Refugees."

The event began in 2008 to address investment strategies affecting social, environmental, and philanthropic issues. Since then, SOCAP has established itself as a global platform in the discussion and implementation of impact investing, a movement to place capital in businesses and corporations that spark positive societal and environmental progress. Through interactive panels and events, SOCAP conferences have cultivated a network of investors, entrepreneurs, policymakers, and leaders who seek economic inclusivity and global change.

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This year's event will focus on themes including neighborhood economics, inclusive entrepreneurship, and clean energy for all. Speakers will discuss the benefits of meaningful human interaction in the exchange of capital, support of business ventures regardless of race, age, class or gender, and the opportunity for a 100% clean energy future.

Amy Cortese of Locavesting will moderate the "If we don't want gentrification we need to...!" panel. Other participants include Rodney Foxworth of Invested Impact, Konda Mason of Impact Hub Oakland, and Scott Sporte of Capital Impact Partners. I will share how my company, American Homeowner Preservation, crowdfunds the purchase of nonperforming mortgages at big discounts and then provides sustainable solutions to keep struggling families in their homes. Retaining homeowners can strengthen communities and make them more resilient to the ill effects of gentrification.

To continue the dialogue year round, SOCAP 365 hosts events in San Francisco, Berkeley, New York City, and Washington, D.C. These smaller exchanges allow investors and entrepreneurs to connect locally. SOCAP 365 is part of the organization's co-operator, Mission Hub. Owning and operating four "Impact Hub" locations, Mission Hub provides versatile venues and communities where organizations or individuals can host high impact events.
Glorious sky with sun rays beaming over the ocean and waves at Robert Moses State Park, Babylon, Long Island.

More than ever before, we understand the many ways in which oceans shape our lives: as a source of food, jobs, medicine, energy, comfort - right to the very air we breathe.

Yet if anything, the threats to our oceans have grown. Climate change, ocean acidification, overfishing, pollution - these pressures know no borders, and they are expected to increase. Our previous indifference has come back to haunt us. Now the world needs to act, together, to nurse our oceans back to health.

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That is why a vast coalition of ocean champions is coming together in Washington this week, for the third edition of the Our Ocean conference.

Set up by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry in 2014, these conferences allow us to share ideas and experiences, to find out what is working and where more needs to be done.

But what makes them stand out is their focus on concrete commitments for action. Delegates are expected to set out how they plan to make our oceans healthier - and, crucially, report back on their progress.

In the European Union, I am proud to say we are well on track. We are making good progress to achieve good environmental status of our waters by 2020. We are halfway to our goal of setting aside 10 percent of our oceans and seas as marine protected areas by 2020. And we are on target to have maritime spatial planning for all EU waters by 2021.

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The European Union is also delivering on its commitment to make global fishing more sustainable: in the last 12 months, we have tightened rules for EU fishing vessels above 15 metres, proposed rules to better monitor and control our fishing fleet, and continued to use a budget of 675 million euros - roughly 760 million dollars - to help countries in Africa and Asia fight illegal fishing and develop sustainable fisheries of their own.

But we can do more.

First, we want to share our experiences - and learn from others in return. So we are launching a transatlantic "twinning" project on marine protected areas with countries in Africa, North and South America. Next year, we will co-organise an international conference to work on global guidance on maritime spatial planning.

Second, we want to step up our fight against marine pollution. In December, we proposed ambitious waste targets that address marine litter "upstream", to prevent our waste from even reaching the ocean. The next step is to present a targeted strategy on plastics by 2017, to keep plastic and microplastics from contaminating the marine and coastal environment.

Third, we want to boost ocean research and knowledge. We have more than doubled our initial commitment, setting aside 250 million euros or 280 million dollars until 2020. We are also looking to strengthen scientific cooperation with our transatlantic partners: in spring next year, we will launch a science action plan for the south Atlantic, complementing our excellent cooperation with the United States and Canada.

Finally, we want to ensure a more sustainable use of the oceans and their resources around the globe. This means continuing our fight against illegal fishing, boosting regional fisheries bodies, closing legal gaps, cooperating more effectively, strengthening enforcement - in short, better ocean governance. I intend to launch a major initiative on international ocean governance before the end of the year.

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The Our Ocean conferences have created momentum for change. Now we need to keep that momentum. In this spirit, I am proud that the European Union will be hosting the fourth edition of the Our Ocean conference on 5-6 October in Malta next year. In the spirit of Washington and Chile, it will seek new concrete initiatives from around the globe while following up on previously made commitments.

I am also looking forward to engaging more with a sustainable blue business and finance community. Next year in Malta, I would like to hear success stories of investments in the blue economy that helped preserve or restore the marine environment while creating jobs and growth for coastal communities. Let's share some best practices and hear some commitments from the private sector.
The highest court in the country has spoken, and now Backpage.com, considered one of the most common places for child sex trafficking victims to be advertised, must finally release subpoenaed files to a U.S. Senate committee investigating the website's practices. Backpage.com has long resisted the Senate's subpoena, even after lawmakers held the website in contempt. In a victory for anti-trafficking advocates, the U.S. Supreme Court declined on Monday to block the Senate subpoena, and Backpage.com must deliver the requested files within ten days.

The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations is seeking information about the practices of the website after evidence emerged to indicate the website has been accepting and editing advertisements to conceal the age of those selling sex for cash. It is the first time in 20 years that the Senate has held an organization in contempt for ignoring a subpoena. Backpage.com and its CEO Carl Ferrer argued unsuccessfully that the subpoena threatened their First Amendment rights, but a U.S. District Court judge ruled in August that "[u]nderstanding the magnitude of Internet sex trafficking and how to stop it substantially outweighs Mr. Ferrer's undefined interests." The Supreme Court agreed.

For years, Backpage.com has hidden behind the Communications Decency Act, arguing that it merely publishes content that others write, much like Facebook or other bulletin board sites. Backpage.com argues that Internet Service Providers cannot be considered accountable for what people post on them, or the internet would grind to a halt.

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But in a staff report from the Investigations Committee, there's clear proof that Backpage.com officials, including Mr. Ferrer himself and an Indian company hired to monitor escort ads, were involved in editing questionable ads, apparently having a hand in shaping the content on the site. According to the report:

We find substantial evidence that Backpage edits the content of some ads, including by deleting words and images, before publication. The record indicates that in some cases, these deletions likely served to remove evidence of the illegality of the underlying transaction.

The report includes an email in which Mr. Ferrer explained to site moderators that they would have to take out mentions of specific time periods for escort encounters: "Removing bad pics and removing bad text like 15 min 1/2hour is critical. I think you will be busy."

A 2012 memo from the moderation company noted: "IF IN DOUBT ABOUT UNDERAGE: the process for now should be to accept the ad and note the link."

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We know all too well that ads for kids made it through these shoddy screenings. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children reports a family member who wrote to Backpage.com pleading:

"Please remove this. This is my 16 year old daughter's picture. I e-mailed already. Whoever's posting this please block their card or email from posting."

The auto-response from Backpage?

"If you accidentally reported this ad, do not worry. It takes multiple reports from multiple people for an ad to be removed."

Senator Rob Portman, chair of the Senate investigations committee, noted that a Backpage.com ad had appeared on the site with a missing child poster in the background, including the name and age of the girl being sold, as well as topless photos of her.

"We'd certainly like to know what supposedly market-leading screening and moderation procedures missed that one," he said.

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In courts and in state legislatures across the country, we see increasing efforts to keep vulnerable young people from being sold online. In shelters and police stations across the country, we see the broken, traumatized kids trying to escape lives of serial rape and exploitation. Here at Covenant House, we know the trauma endured by young trafficking survivors. We have safe houses for trafficked youth in Guatemala and Honduras and opened a safe house for trafficking survivors near New York City in 2015. This month we are opening our newest residence, a transitional home for trafficking survivors in Toronto.
Dear Wolf Blitzer:

Do you ever watch your own show on CNN?

I don't think so, because if you did, you'd notice that you have a very odd verbal tic. You obsessively, weirdly punctuate comments and questions with the phrase "if you will."

You use it as often as some people say "ummm."

But you use it incorrectly. All the time.

Just the other day I heard you use it twice inside the same sequence of questions. Once you mentioned hacking and added "if you will." But you were talking about straight-up hacking. There was absolutely no need to add any qualifier.

Maybe you're not aware of this, but "if you will" is a more formal version of "so to speak." When someone uses "if you will," the person is indicating that what they've said might be something of a stretch.

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As grammarist.com points out somewhat tartly:



Writers often use it to apologize for a weak phrase--often a bad metaphor, a corny coinage, or a phrase the writer is reluctant to use. And sometimes it's used when a writer doesn't trust his or her readers to understand a metaphor.

But you don't use it that way at all. You use it after perfectly normal, understandable, clear-cut words and expressions. I've heard you talk about tensions between Turkey and Russia, and you've asked someone, "What will Russians do to retaliate, if you will..." Why? There's nothing ambiguous or unclear about the word "retaliate."

For some reason, you seem to be addicted to this phrase, and it undercuts the quality of your reporting.

It's time to seek help. Please.

Because Laurie Anderson got it right when she said "language is a virus" and your bad habit has been infecting other reporters on CNN--and even MSNBC!

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Sincerely,

A Concerned Viewer
"Yes Baby I'm happy! We had a perfect view of his entire collection and we're meeting later in the week to go over my order" says Harper referring to Christian Siriano's show this past Saturday afternoon at Artbeam on 540 West 21st St. Face timing during New York Fashion Week with her 50 year old lover who's in Dallas Texas overseeing his brokerage firm, he promises Harper that she can have anything she wants as money is no object. Looking out the window of her hotel room at The Plaza in Midtown West she says "Christian knows how to dress these Texas curves and I'm sure we are going to have the same success with Oscar!"

This is Harper, whose name has been changed to protect her identity, and she and her twin Riley are the cream of companions, the Maserati's of their gender in Goddess form. And just like driving a Maserati carries a certain amount of status, so does having either of these girls on your arm. Not yet old enough to drink, but engineered to master the skillset needed to harvest only the wealthiest of men to be companions for, by their Mother. Their Mother ensuring they are smooth rides worth every penny a luxury package offers.

"Sit still Angel, your iv is going to come out!" smiles Elisa, the twins Mother who patiently fidgets as Harper and Riley are worked on by a team of stylists like pit crews readying race cars at Daytona while attached to vitamin B drips before Oscar de la Renta's show this Monday afternoon.

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As Elisa, whose name has also been changed to protect her identity, gets up to inspect her 2 human masterpieces, she notes that Riley, the older twin, has a chip on the Red Carpet Amor 24 Polish of her right index fingernail. And this just won't do for this $5k 24 karat gold gel manicure.

"Can someone please fix this?" asks Riley, whose name has been changed to protect her identity, politely gleaming a perfect set of teeth.

"I remember being 5 years old, Mother tapping my tummy and telling me to suck it in as she painted my nails saying "A man always deserves for you to be at your best and chipped polish Riley is you not being at your best!" Harper says she remembers their training started when they weren't allowed to eat cake at a friend's 11th birthday party as their Mother said to let the other kids have those calories, they would thank her later for making them pass on the chocolate deliciousness.

Managing the logistics of their physical transformations and calculating a mapped out future of luxury for her daughters has not been an easy task.

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"We WERE and ARE like regimented soldiers going to war daily. Focused solely on the embodied version of what a perfect woman looks like, IS like and WHAT that perfection can buy. Plastic Surgeons in LA are our best friends! When we tell you that Mother has them on speed dial....." Harper's voice trails off as she smiles and shakes her long gorgeous red hair.

Harper goes on to say that their physical beauty is just one aspect of being WHAT the wealthy want to be seen with. Now that they are of legal consensual age, they are expected to be "experts in the bedroom" as well.

Along with over $200k in plastic surgery for each of the girls, and their monthly $20k in maintenance a piece, another $150k has been applied to in house sessions with sex brokers who expertly navigate the twins to captain the bedroom as every man's fantasy would.

"This is a competitive society we live in! It is important for Harper and Riley to be aware that your beauty goes like that" says Elisa snapping her finger "Why waste it on Frat boys who don't offer a payday when you can skip all the boy's with big dreams and start at the top with their Fathers who are already accomplished." Elisa says that she has made the girls hyper aware that meeting their wealthy lover's every need bares fruit as with this trip to New York has so far. "Yes, both my girls are involved with married men, but this isn't some covert mission in which the plan is for them to leave their families and marry my girls! Not at all! This is for them to travel in the circles of luxury so when they have built a cushion of extravagance and indulgence, they will be ready to marry affluent fellows who will continue to provide the opulence and leisure the twins are used to. They are my business and I micro manage because I only want what is best for them!"

Elisa says she doesn't like the term "Sugar Baby" as it defeats how hard she has worked to create quality companions in her twins. She emphasizes that Harper and Riley are NOT just a couple of transient girls on social media with "go fund me" pages who want a boob job. Her daughters, says Elisa, are so much more than that and equates them to Socialites traveling in all the right circles, not commoners.

I wonder if her daughters have ever been referred to as "gold diggers" by anyone or has anyone accused her of being a pimp. "Of course not! The twins are wealth seekers not gold diggers! Gold diggers have cheap extensions and post naked selfies, my daughters are trophies, huge difference! As far as myself, I don't run a brothel, I manage a process and don't ask for 50% of the money they bring home! I'm their Mother, not their pimp!"
by Joan Blades

In theory our education system was designed to give us an educated electorate. Yet somehow among eligible voters, 18 to 24 year olds are the least likely to vote.

Maybe one cause is a lack of political discussion in classrooms. And this absense is understandable, considering how hard it is for teachers to encourage talk about politics in the classroom without getting pushback. Parents don't want their children to be given biased information. Teachers don't want to offend anyone in the classroom, or create divisions among their students. Since we live in a world were we are increasingly seeing news only from either the left or right and our society seems to be more and more divided on political issues, what is a teacher to do?

Good news. Teachers now have tools so they and their students can talk about politics, making sure that all sides are covered and that everyone is respected. Take a look at the new "Elections and Relationships" program by AllSides for Schools, created by AllSides.com in partnership with Living Room Conversations. It provides a smorgasbord of online tools, discussion guides, background materials and current news from multiple perspectives that teachers can integrate into their curriculum.

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Kristin Montville of Rising Tide Charter School in Plymouth, Massachusetts has been using AllSides.com for two years, even before there was a formal AllSides for Schools program. "We look at media bias, personal bias, and cognitive bias - we use the news page to analyze different news sources' reporting of the same issues."

Providing materials that are balanced is not the only challenge, political exchange is increasingly negative and disrespectful. High school students are taught how to debate - identify two sides - and argue until a winner and loser are established. However, we know most issues have many shades of gray and that win/win solutions are more sustainable than win/lose. It is important that our children and our citizenry understand that win/lose debate is not necessarily the best way to have conversations about differences. The AllSides for Schools program guides students and teachers into conversations that allow for win/win.

When we teach children to engage in a respectful and thoughtful way we positively impact the quality of conversations and potential outcomes, and we support social emotional learning. They learn that differences need not divide us and that respectful discourse is a more effective way of engaging with others than positional thinking and debating. The consequences of learning these skills are far reaching -- from reducing bullying to laying the foundation for healthy relationships and learning to problem-solve using the creative tension of differences. AllSides for Schools starts by exploring the value of good relationships so that a foundation of respectful engagement allows for truly productive discussion of different points of view.

Science has established that feelings are more influential in decision making than facts. We also know that once people care about each other they hear things in a very different way. Grounding students in the power of respectful engagement and valuing differences sets them up with a refresher in relationship skills that will serve them well when working together in class and outside of class. These qualities will also prepare them to be the kind of voters and leaders our country needs.

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If you're a fan or practitioner of improvisational comedy and are not already clued into the Improv Nerd soundcast, hosted by Chicago improv stalwart Jimmy Carrane, you've got a lot of binge listening to catch up on. He's had a lot of improvisers on as guests, both sung and unsung, and although he often ends episode by doing an improvised scene with them, the show plays more like a take on Inside The Actor's Studio.

Comedian and self-professed non-actor TJ Miller (Silicon Valley, Big Hero 6) doesn't end up doing any scene work with Carrane in the latest installment but he makes for a very entertaining guest nonetheless. No stranger to soundcasting (Cashing in With TJ Miller), Miller knows how to play the microphone, the host, and everything else in the room.

He and Carrane have improv history and the host does a nice job setting his guest up to talk about how improvisation forms the basis of every role he takes on, be it for TV, movies, or voiceover. Without classic acting training, Miller points out that being in the moment is his key to finding the character and discovering what's happening in the scene, no matter if it's the audition or the role itself in production. And he's not alone, as he explains that both he and Silicon Valley co-star Thomas Middleditch (another Chicago improv veteran) rarely prepare or even diligently memorize each episode's script.

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There's lots of stories and comedic insight to be had in this hourlong chat.

  

The Unwritable Rant

Epi55: Driveway drinking, an imp bearing gifts, and a drug fueled exorcism

Podcastland has its well-known male monologists of the microphone: Bill Burr, Greg Proops, Marc Maron (in the upfront portion of WTF), etc. Less evident are the female soundcast hosts who can riff solo without a co-host or a guest to bounce off of during an episode.

Which is why Juliette Miranda comes across as a refreshing difference. The author (Morning Neurosis), essayist, part-time misanthrope, and enthusiastic bourbon drinker (the beverage may count as a silent co-host in these transmissions), has a ballsy style in the rants she delivers. Covering several topics per episode, which tend to run around 20 minutes apiece -- a quick, breezy listen -- there's never a sense of a rant wearing out its welcome.

In this latest installment, she talks about an annoying neighbor slipping in under her radar with a distracting pitcher of margaritas, followed by a fun tale from her teenhood where she accompanied her mother as she performed an impromptu exorcism for a drug-addled friend who thought Satan was in her closet.

  

Podcasts I'm also listening to this week: Illusionoid -- S6E1: The Night Journey with Ashley Botting ; and Dark Angels And Pretty Freaks -- Epi130

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Humanity's relationship with the ocean can be summed up in two words: exploration and exploitation. Together, they are driving a sea change in the health and future prospects of the ocean. Sustaining the energy, food, minerals and jobs that make up our Blue Economy--while at the same time conserving the ocean, has become one of our most important collective global challenges.

Given how vital a healthy ocean is, I am delighted that countries have created their own annual international conference - the Our Ocean Conference. First launched by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry in 2014 it is being held this year in Washington, DC September 15-16th. The Blue Economy challenge will be firmly on the table, and for us at The Nature Conservancy (TNC) this is an opportunity to shift the narrative away from viewing the ocean as another problem, and instead treating it as part of the solution.

Our global Blue Economy is growing so rapidly that the impacts have not yet been fully assessed. From oil and gas to offshore wind, we increasingly rely on energy that comes from the ocean. We have developed an aquaculture industry that provides half the world's seafood and is the fastest growing food production sector. Marine tourism is projected to triple in the next 15 years.

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Investment in the Blue Economy is soaring, and many sectors are set to grow exponentially by 2030; offshore wind by as much as 8,000%, and aquaculture and fish processing by over 300%. The potential for food, jobs and renewable energy production is enormous.

But, alongside these rewards come huge risks. We know that the ocean is bearing the brunt of climate change: it has absorbed 90% of our excess heat and 25% of our carbon emissions, causing it to become 30% more acidic. According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, 85% of global fish stocks are "overexploited, depleted, or recovering from depletion," while illegal fishing costs coastal nations up to $25 billion a year.

Our efforts must ensure that developing the Blue Economy does not come at the cost of ocean health. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) projects that under a sustainable scenario, with high economic growth and low ecological deterioration, the ocean economy will more than double its global value added to reach $3.2 trillion by 2030.

The question for me is not if we will continue to explore the ocean and exploit its resources; it's how, when and where we should do it. Blue Growth by Design is an approach to ocean conservation and management that balances the interests of people and nature, while ensuring that conservation has a voice. At TNC, we believe that the most important levers are: 1) international, collective action; 2) smarter use of sea space based on new science and technology; 3) increased investments in natural solutions to address climate change; and 4) strong, cross-sector collaboration.

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More than 40% of our planet--the high seas--lies outside any national jurisdiction. Fish stocks, pollution and climate change aren't contained by national boundaries and to manage resources, we need international cooperation and legally binding laws and treaties.

Blue Growth and climate change are exerting growing pressure on ocean areas, only about 3% of which are protected. The "30/30" target, to protect 30% of the ocean by 2030, is an important goal to help offset this pressure and build ocean resilience. But simply setting targets is not enough. Establishing smart, effective marine protected areas (MPAs) based on scientific planning and strong management will preserve ocean wealth.

The reality is that little can be achieved without funding. The ocean covers over 70% of our planet, yet in 2013 less than 5% of the $9.7 billion donated to environmental issues was devoted to marine causes.

In response, TNC is using innovative financing methods, like first-of-their-kind debt conversions, to leverage more of this money. For example, in February 2016, with a combination of grant and impact capital, we helped the Government of the Seychelles finance a more than $20 million debt buy-back from its Paris Club creditors, to help create a marine spatial plan for their entire Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and place 30% of it - 400,000 km2 - into biodiversity protection zones. By working with other Small Island Developing States to provide similar financial opportunities, we intend to facilitate an additional 2 million km2 of MPAs.

None of this work can be done alone. I know from my years as EU Commissioner for Maritime Affairs that it's essential to build strong partnerships. TNC is working with fishermen, governments, scientists, the insurance industry, the tourism industry, the World Bank, the Red Cross, and business to help drive the changes we need.

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We see the current boom in ocean industries as a call to action, a chance to design sustainable Blue Growth. I am confident that together we can get this right.

Image credits: Photo #1 - Diving under a breaking wave at the reef crest near Penguin Spit within Palmyra Atoll in the equatorial Northern Pacific. Photo  The Nature Conservancy (Tim Calver). Photo #2 - A view arcoss the rocky inner reef towards an evening sky filled with rainclouds and golden light near the village of Utwe on the Island of Kosrae, Micronesia. Photo  The Nature Conservancy (Nick Hall).

This post is part of a series produced by The Huffington Post in partnership with Secretary of State John Kerry's Our Ocean conference and Ocean Unite, an initiative to unite and activate powerful voices for ocean-conservation action. The series is being produced to coincide with the Our Ocean Conference (September 15th, 16th) as part of HuffPost's "What's Working" initiative, putting a spotlight on initiatives around the world that are solutions oriented. To read all the posts in the series, read here. The State Department does not endorse the content of this blog. Follow the conversation on Twitter with the hashtag #OurOcean #MakeASplash.
What's to become of the traditional work office?

Is it possible that communications tools like Skype, Zoom.us and Google Hangouts will have the effect of making communal office spaces obsolete?

Is the day coming when organizations will redeploy workers to home offices - where they'll have no commute, and the freedom to work all day in play clothes?

A few years ago, researchers at iconic furniture maker, Herman Miller, began a deep-dive into the future of the global workplace driven by the desire to answer questions like these. Clearly, technology already makes it possible for many people to work away from conventional offices. The question is whether that's ultimately the best thing for workers, not to mention the companies that employ them.

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As part of the study, a team reviewed academic literature on psychology, anthropology, sociology and behavioral sciences - looking as far back as the B.C. era when human beings first began documenting ideas about work.

The research conclusions were then presented at the Dive! Innovation Conference held this summer in Rennes, France, which I attended. The following is a summary of the firm's most compelling discoveries as shared by Mark Catchlove, Herman Miller's Director of Knowledge and Insight. His overriding conclusion is that many of us will indeed end up working remotely, just not all the time.

People Have Six Fundamental Needs They Seek To Meet Through Work

A consistent finding from over a half-century of the company's research is that human beings are inherently diverse. But what emerges from the new study is an understanding that across all cultures, genders, generations and organizations, people have basic needs in their experience of work that must be met in order for them to thrive and be optimally productive. While an organization's leadership practices and culture play essential roles in determining whether these needs are supported, where and how people work is also a key contributor:

1.Sense Of Achievement: We strive for excellence and to feel a sense of mastery in our accomplishments.

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2.Autonomy: We seek freedom in our actions and decisions - and desire to no longer work in one place eight hours a day.

3.Belonging: We are tribal, social beings who require meaningful connection with other people. Given the importance of work in our lives, we seek strong bonds with colleagues.

4.Sense Of Purpose: We want to make a meaningful difference and to know our work matters.

5.Sense Of Security: We desire health and physical safety, but also "social security," the need to feel connected to a team.

6.Status: We seek to be respected and appreciated for our work, and to have a working environment that inherently esteems us.

Because these needs are so deep and universal in people - and so essential to human productivity - Herman Miller now believes supporting them must become the cornerstone of all future workplace design.

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People Only Thrive When They Have Connection And Community

Gallup research shows that the ability to work remotely at least some of the time has become one of the greatest drivers of employee engagement.

But Catchlove says too much alone time backfires. New research by Gretchen Spreitzer at the University of Michigan shows that continual isolation inevitably makes people feel lonely and "socially adrift."

"The human need for belonging is so profound that we must always provide employees with a secure base," Catchlove says. "Most companies will continue to have offices just so people can routinely reconnect and collaborate with co-workers."

But Herman Miller also advises that traditional workplaces be given an extreme makeover. Says Catchlove, "people must be given greater choice on where they work including more than one option within their own office. Less and less, you won't see people sitting in the same place for eight hours as firms provide workers with a collection of settings in which to move around."

Ironically, researchers found that a significant number of people don't have adequate space to work from home. So while co-working spaces will become more prevalent in the future, it will always be expected that employees return to the nest for consistent rejuvenation.

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Technology Firms Are Doubling Down On Traditional Workspaces

If there's any doubt that large office campuses will continue to be where most of us work, we only need to look to Silicon Valley. Apple is spending $5 billion to build its new flying saucer-shaped headquarters. Amazon is putting up tree-filled spheres so employees can hold meetings in forests - and Google will soon build a massive futuristic complex featuring translucent canopies allowing air, light and nature to influence the workspace.

To Holly Honig, who led Herman Miller's research team, these massive investments are simply a reflection of highly informed leadership.

"Businesses today face unprecedented challenges recognizing the speed of change, disruptive technologies and the need for sustainable growth. At the same time, a few enlightened organizations know what we do - that people create ideas and drive their execution. So when workers are highly engaged - when those six human needs are answered - their firms are propelled into prosperity."



Create Spaces That Show You Love Your People

Under traditional leadership theory, companies that "squeeze" employees can expect to have the greatest financial performance. But with a preponderance of data now proving just the opposite, organizations have begun investing much more heavily in workspaces to intentionally convey to workers that they are valued and worth every penny. (Herman Miller has sold 7 million of its uber-pricey Aeron chairs, for example).

"When we look at company P & L's," says Catchlove, "seventy percent of their investment is already in people. Recruitment is expensive. Training is expensive. So leaders are slowly being persuaded that looking out for their workers is really smart business. Our argument to company leaders is that the wisest thing they can do is to love and care for their biggest investment by far."

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Herman Miller's study also confirmed what most of us already know intuitively: that workplace design and furnishings have an enormous impact on the human spirit and contribute greatly to how people feel in their jobs.

"We know that people are looking at different lenses at their total experience of work," says Catchlove, "and their physical environment is a big piece of that."
You might have noticed the call for help a couple of weeks ago from the man who runs the state's program to accredit marijuana labs: Gary Ward, who runs the Oregon Environmental Laboratory Accreditation Program, sent a letter to officials at the Oregon Health Authority that the program was "on the verge of collapse" because of increased workload and inadequate staffing.

In response, the state borrowed staff from the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality and stopped all accreditation work involving out-of-state labs. But that's not at all the end of the story. More on that later.

First you need some background about why this accreditation work is important: Starting Oct. 1, new products headed to marijuana dispensaries will have to be tested at accredited labs. The testing standards are intended to address concerns over pesticide contamination, a big issue in states with legal pot markets. If this backlog doesn't ease, it could become a major thorn in the side of the state's booming marijuana business.

Despite the state's quick response to the backlog, Ward said it isn't enough: As The Oregonian reported this week, Ward fired off another letter this week, in which he said the state would have to stop assessing marijuana labs next week. He said the extra bodies from the Department of Environmental Quality lacked the necessary expertise to make much of a dent in the backlog.

Ward also said the decision to stop testing out-of-state labs could have dire budget consequences for the program, since those labs pay a premium price for the accreditation work. (It's the same theory under which out-of-state students pay premium tuition to attend our public universities.)

In other words, the mess that broke out a couple of weeks ago still shows all the signs of being a mess.

Legislators are watching carefully. As they gather next week for committee meetings in Salem, expect at least some of them to say that they've run out of patience with the Health Authority and to suggest that this accreditation program (and, potentially, others related to marijuana, such as medicinal pot) be shifted to the state's Oregon Liquor Control Commission.

Rep. Andy Olson, the Albany Republican who serves on the joint committee that's been working over the last few years on legalized marijuana issues, is among the legislators who are leaning that way.

In Olson's view, OLCC has done outstanding work thus far in helping to develop the regulations that have guided Oregon in its experiment with legalized recreational marijuana.

And the Health Authority, he noted, just seems to be swamped. "Maybe there's just too much on its plate," he said.

The entire incident helps to highlight a related point: The Legislature's committee overseeing marijuana issues (the official name, quite wonderfully, is the Joint Committee on Implementing Measure 91) has had plenty of work to keep it busy since the November 2014 statewide vote on that measure, which legalized recreational pot.

This blowup over the marijuana accreditation program suggests that plenty of work remains. It's not clear yet whether the Legislature's leadership sees a need for the joint committee to continue with its work. The events of the last couple of weeks suggest that shutting down the committee now would be premature at best, and downright foolish at worst. (mm)

Correction

Wednesday's editorial about proposals to rein in some of the costs related to Oregon's Public Employees Retirement System incorrectly reported the amount of money that governmental entities are currently contributing to the system. The amount is about $1 billion per biennium, not $1 billion per year.
By Mark Dubowitz and Behnam Ben Taleblu

Two American reconnaissance planes flew one mile wide of Iran's airspace over the weekend, and according to a U.S. Navy official, kept a safe distance from known surface-to-air missile (SAM) sites. Iran warned the planes if they remained on course, they would be shot down, according to U.S. defense officials who called the threat "unprofessional."

Iran's ongoing harassment of the U.S. military vindicates the predictions of those claiming last summer's nuclear deal would embolden rather than moderate the regime's behavior. It also underscores the dangers of a revitalized Iran flush with billions of dollars in cash and confident in the lack of any U.S. response.



The Islamic Republic has undeniably become even more aggressive since inking the nuclear accord. In addition to the most recent threats against American surveillance planes, the Islamic Republic has taken American sailors at gunpoint, harassed military ships in international waters, taken American citizens as hostages, fired missiles able to carry nuclear payloads, and broadened its support for the rogue regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria, as well as Hezbollah and other anti-American forces and terrorist groups in the Middle East.



The confrontations with the American military are primarily taking place in international waters and international airspace. Iran is challenging the U.S. right to patrol the Gulf through which 20 percent of the world's oil travels and on which the global economy depends. According to a recent Fox News report citing American defense officials, Iranian confrontations with the U.S. Navy have "nearly doubled in the first half of 2016" compared to the first half of 2015. For their part, Iranian security planners appear keen to learn from these encounters to exploit American weaknesses.

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Thanks to Moscow, things have gone from bad to worse. Because of the lack of enforcement of U.S. sanctions after the nuclear deal, Iran recently received a sophisticated Russian SAM called the S-300 and reportedly deployed it around the Fordow nuclear facility. Why does Tehran need the S-300 to defend a so-called peaceful civilian nuclear facility that for the next fifteen years is not supposed to be enriching uranium? Of equal concern is that the S-300 can be used offensively. In the future, Iran may be tempted to move S-300 batteries south towards the Persian Gulf coastline. This would permit the platform's acquisition radar to lock onto aircraft as targets in a heavily trafficked international airspace, adding enhanced credibility to Iran's threats.



The Islamic Republic feels it can act aggressively with impunity. Just this week, the Commander of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy (IRGC-N) derided the U.S. for "seeking direct [communications] links to the IRGC-N" in the Persian Gulf, touting that Iran was in "complete control" of those waters. He also claimed that "the presence of America in the Persian Gulf makes no sense and we have and will always know them to be the driver of insecurity and wickedness."



Despite the fact that Iran's military capabilities pale in comparison to the U.S., there has been little to no push back by the Obama administration against these provocations. Indeed, as recently noted by U.S. Naval Commander Jeremy Vaughan, the administration's fear of upsetting the delicate nuclear deal with Iran appears to have curbed even "defensive" behavior by the U.S. in the Persian Gulf.



The White House has not only failed to stand up to the regime's aggression, it is paying for it in cash. The Administration in January of this year reportedly transferred $1.7 billion dollars on pallets purportedly to settle a decades old claim by Tehran against Washington over a weapons contract inked before the extremists toppled the pro-American Shah of that country in 1979. About $400 million of that money was transferred on the same day Iran released five U.S. hostages setting off a firestorm of allegations that the Obama administration had paid a ransom. The $1.7 billion has already been allocated to the Iranian military.

We may yet learn about more cash transfers. After all, President Obama insists that the U.S. can't work with Iran through the banking system. So, with all the sanctions relief provided to Iran from the nuclear deal and the preceding negotiations since January 2014, the regime may have received as much as $33.6 billion in cash and gold. Even a portion of that cash and gold transferred to the leading state sponsor of terrorism is unprecedented in American history.



The Obama administration has weakened America's position in the Persian Gulf. The next president will be forced to break this dynamic and forcefully respond to escalating Iranian provocations. To back down further risks even more dangerous and destabilizing behavior.



Mark Dubowitz is Executive Director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, where Behnam Ben Taleblu is a Senior Iran Analyst.
This comment piece is based on a position paper by VENRO (Association of German development and humanitarian aid NGOs) and MSF (Artze ohne Grenzen e.V.). The full paper is available in German and English.

Germany's Chancellor, Angela Merkel, has on several occasions publicly stated that global health will be part of the G20 agenda during Germany's upcoming presidency. Following the G20 Hangzhou Summit, the G7 Ise-Shima Summit and most recently the Kobe Health Ministers' Meeting, Germany will soon outline its G20 plans for 2017, including on global health. As G20 members have all committed to implement the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the 2030 Agenda, expectations for an aligned and ambitious G20 global health agenda are high - and should be, if G20 members are serious about attaining the SDGs.

The paper proposes that the German government places three concrete global health issues on the G20 agenda:

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First, in alignment with the SDG's commitment to "leave no one behind", the G20 should focus on vulnerable groups (such as women and children), hard-to reach groups (due to e.g. geographical location) and people who are discriminated against (ethnical minorities, those discriminated due to their sexual orientation, etc.). The G20 global health agenda should reflect the needs of these vulnerable groups, aligned with the SDG health goals. A focus on single diseases would undermine the new SDG paradigm.

Second, the G20 should not forget the key lessons from the Ebola crisis: a need for a multi-sectoral approach to health (including water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH), education, or data systems), a strong focus on prevention through health systems and underpinned by universal health coverage (UHC), and a strong, fully-funded WHO. The G20 agenda should build on the G7 priority areas of the German and Japanese presidencies, and not narrowly define global health as crisis management. Therefore, we call for the G20 to incorporate global health in the G20 Development Track (not just the Health Track), as health is not only an outcome, but also a precondition for human development.
I don't want to bring down the Government. But if it takes that, I will have to.

I am not going to be f***ed over by anybody. I don't care if it is the man on the street or some guy threatening me. And you can print that.
Oliver Stone's excellent new film "Snowden" is a primer on life in the digital age - the perils to privacy, professionalism and the personal. Through an extended series of flashbacks in the life of whistleblower Edward Snowden, Stone shows us the impacts of global surveillance on relationships from international to interpersonal.



Stone's dramatization builds around and out from Laura Poitras Academy Award winning documentary "Citizen Four." We meet Edward Snowden (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) in the prison like confines of his Hong Kong hotel room, a refugee of conscience, blowing the whistle on his U.S. spy agency employers.

Through a series of flashbacks,

Snowden emerges a brilliant, geeky, well considered patriot from a military family. He is moved by the events of 9/11 to volunteer for Special Forces training. After breaking both legs, Snowden is forced off the active front lines into intelligence service. He eagerly joins CIA global communications at their headquarters in Langley, Virginia.



Snowden excelled in computer science. But with greater success came more responsibility and direct involvement in CIA covert operations. Coordinating cyber security in Geneva, Snowden becomes enmeshed in a plot to use illegally harvested data to blackmail an international banker. Straight arrow Snowden's morals were not as flexible as his fellow CIA operatives. He begins to become disenchanted with intelligence misused and reaches out to register concern, particularly over the illegal intrusion into virtually every electronic communication both domestic and international.

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He is not as good at communicating with his girlfriend Lindsay Mills (Shailene Woodley). Snowden instead opts to protect her from surveillance, though the relationship suffers from his not being able to share the secret nature of his work. He becomes progressively disillusioned. Through moves through the CIA, National Security Agency and Booz Allen Consulting in Geneva, Japan, Maryland and Hawaii, Mills suffers Snowden's professional disenchantments without realizing the dangers of his position . . . dramatic tension achieved at the cost of domestic tranquility.

Snowden's voyage from military family enlistee to ex-pat whistleblowing patriot is hastened by his witnessing the testimony of Director of National Intelligence James Clapper perjuring himself before a Congressional committee in March 2013, stating that the NSA does not collect any type of data at all on millions of Americans. Snowden, of course, has firsthand knowledge that this is exactly what our intelligence services do, U.S. Constitution notwithstanding. Terrorism becomes the excuse to violate Fourth Amendment protections from unreasonable searches and seizures. The promise of security becomes the agent for economic and social controls.
Air Force Flag Folding Ceremonies Morph into Religious Rituals



A strange thing happened in 2004. In that year American flag-folding scripts, unofficially written on home computers to be used at Air Force retirement ceremonies, began to appear throughout the Air Force. The scripts emanated for the most part from the Colorado Springs area, the site of my alma mater (and the alma mater of my 2 sons, daughter-in law and son-in-law), the United States Air Force Academy. Bereft of historical reference or evidence, the scripts boldly proclaimed that particular, numbered folds in the flag-folding ceremony represented ONLY Judeo-Christian "values."

For example, the most popular of these unauthorized scripts (said to have been written by a chaplain in the 1980s (and still readily available on the internet) without the slightest degree of historical support, stated, "The fourth fold of the flag represents our weaker nature, for as American citizens trusting in God, it is to Him we turn in times of peace as well as in times of war for His divine guidance." The inference is inescapably clear; the Nation's flag is not for atheists, agnostics, secularists or humanists, even if they honorably serve in a uniform of the United States Armed Forces.

Then the popular script goes on to boast, "The eleventh fold, in the eyes of a Hebrew citizen, represents the lower portion of the seal of King David and King Solomon, and glorifies, in their eyes, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob." The inescapable question that the non-"Hebrew (Jewish) listener must ask, "Does the US flag have any religious significance for me? Does it honor MY religious or nonreligious beliefs?

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The question is rapidly answered when the script concludes by reciting, "The twelfth fold, in the eyes of a Christian citizen, represents an emblem of eternity and glorifies, in their eyes, God the Father, the Son, and Holy Ghost." Hurrah for the Trinity! The United States flag represents the religious beliefs of Christian service members attending the ceremony. Now all Airmen know that the flag (and thus our national values), support SOLELY Judeo-Christian Airmen. The inference is again clear; the Nation's flag, and its values, support Christian and Jewish Airmen and, by the absence of any mention of other religions or non-faith belief systems, our flag supports NOBODY else, either in or out of uniform. The unstated message is inescapable; to Hell with atheists, non-theists, Muslims, Shinto, Wiccans, Native American religions, Hindus, and anyone else; our nation is a restricted club; it is not open to other religions or to those who doubt or reject the existence of one or more deities.

The Air Force Counters to Stop Flag-Folding Religious Triumphalism

In 2005, the Air Force's response to complaints over the widespread resurgence of this mean-spirited, bigoted, anti-inclusive flag-folding script was to recognize that all Airmen of every religion, or no religion, can serve with equal honor and distinction, and that our Nation offers a home to all irrespective of any religious or nonreligious affiliation. So, the Air Force promulgated Air Force Instruction 34-1201, addressing flag-folding scripts to be recited at retirement ceremonies. Paragraph 2.15 of the Instruction required that a secular script, with solely historical and specifically no religious references, be used in flag-folding ceremonies. The approved script was attached to the Instruction, so there would be no doubt as to what script to use in future ceremonies. That was the Air Force's position for the last 11 years. During that time, flag-folding ceremonies were conducted in the Air Force with great dignity and patriotic passion befitting retirement ceremonies. Inclusivity was the order of the day and the incontrovertible essentials of military command structure (good order, morale, discipline and unit cohesion) were nourished and flourished.



The Air Force Caves to Religious Extremist Pressure

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And then, on April 3, 2016, at Travis Air Force Base in northern California, despite being specifically disinvited as a ceremony participant (however, not as an attendee though), an Air Force retiree attempted to force his way into a flag-folding ceremony during an on-base retirement ceremony. He attempted to read (actually, per his past history, wildly shout and yell) his favorite overtly religious flag-folding script, during the planned flag-folding ceremony. He was removed before he could do so.

It is with the deepest regret that I must report the following disgrace. After bending to right-wing, fundamentalist Christian, political pressure following the ejection of this disinvited retiree, the Air Force has abruptly rescinded paragraph 2.15 as of September 9, 2016, to include the paragraph's requirement that, if a script is to be used, ONLY the nonsectarian script cited in para 2.15 must be used. In its place, the Air Force substituted new language in paragraph 2.15, which opens the door wide to any script that anyone cares to design in their wildest imagination, because-get this- the flag-folding ceremony is now deemed "unofficial." Got Pandora's Box, Air Force?

The newly substituted paragraph 2.15 simply states, "Although there are flag folding ceremony options offered by various national interest groups, these are not official ceremonies." By no longer mandating the exact wording of the flag-folding script and without saying more, the Air Force has willfully obliterated the restriction on flag-folding exercises. Today, absolutely ANY and all religious references in a flag-folding script are "good to go" by the Air Force. Why? The specious and cowardly answer is because, by bureaucratic fiat in paragraph 2.15 of the Instruction, the Air Force has concluded that flag-folding ceremonies, regardless of where they are conducted and by whom they are conducted, are now "not official."

To say these flag-folding ceremonies are "unofficial" is a ridiculous fiction, contradicted universally by EVERY salient fact germane to and surrounding these ceremonies. Just for the moment, let's leave aside the unadulterated fact that attendance at Air Force retirement ceremonies by subordinate ranking airmen are only "voluntary" in the most ridiculous sense of the word and that severe direct and indirect career sanctions can and will apply to those who do not enthusiastically attend these proceedings. Let's now take a quick look at how these ceremonies go down. Flag-folding ceremonies customarily occur on military bases, in Air Force facilities funded by U.S. taxpayer dollars, as part of retirement ceremonies presided over by senior Air Force leaders who appear in full Air Force uniform. The participants folding the flag are likewise in full uniform and are often members of the installation's elite Honor Guard. Customarily, all participants are "on duty," paid by the American taxpayer, and not on leave status.

The First Amendment of our secular Constitution states, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof...". The courts have consistently held for generations that this bedrock prohibition applies to NOT just Congress, but ALL elements of the government, to include the United States Air Force. By authorizing flag-folding scripts which recite that folds in the flag represent particular exclusive Judeo-Christian values, the Air Force is authorizing base and vile bigotry. The Air Force is telling its Airmen that other religious or nonreligious beliefs are not represented by our national flag. The message is understood by all ... those religions or non-beliefs are second rate; not American enough and not Air Force sanctioned. Now, by official Air Force decree, the established, state sanctioned religion is Judeo-Christian (ahem, read, "Christian"). By sanctioning religious flag-folding ceremonies in Air Force facilities, conducted by Judeo-Christian Airmen, the Air Force has taken prohibited state action to condone interference with the free exercise by Airmen of other religions (or those who have no religion) which are not mentioned in the script. These unfortunate "others" are not welcomed. This travesty is a clarion message that non-Christian and non-Jewish Airmen better get on board and convert to Judeo-Christian religions or be considered second class citizens and second class Airmen. Without a doubt, our Air Force's action of just 3 days ago interferes mightily with the religious free exercise rights of non-Judeo-Christian Airmen.

Curiously, less than three months before its revision of paragraph 2.15, the Air Force Public Affairs Office released guidance on June 22, 2016 to Air Force installations stating that "retirement ceremonies are personal in nature" and that flag-folding ceremonies, when part of a retirement ceremony are therefore "unofficial". The attendant hypocrisy is lethal.

Air Force Legal Staff Rulings Do Not Support Bogus "Unofficial" Flag-Folding Displays

However, the Air Force General Counsel's Office effusively disagrees. In its September 2012 guidance, the General Counsel states that military members should be offered a retirement ceremony because they have earned the honor, that a general officer should preside if possible, and that the presiding officer is entitled to use official travel funds to pay for travel expenses (e.g., transportation and lodging). Government travel funds are authorized by Congress for official duty travel, not for personal use such as attending or presiding at unofficial events. Therefore, it only stands to reason that the retirement ceremony is an "official" event, which may be personal to the honoree, but which is still an official event for which government funding is authorized (e.g., the presiding Air Force official's travel and the participants' salary expenses). Were it not so, presiding officials would have to pay for their own travel and participants (to include the honoree) would have to be in a leave status.

The Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) of which I am the Founder and President, asserts that somehow the flag-folding ceremony conducted in the middle of an otherwise official retirement ceremony is a momentarily/suddenly "unofficial" lapse and therefore ANYthing goes during the flag-folding ceremony, is more than just disingenuous. It's dishonest and disgusting. It's repugnant to the Constitution all Airmen swear their oaths to. It's a damn lie. Every Airman knows it's a breach of their first Air Force core value, "Integrity First."

Air Force Creates Brave New World of Prejudice, Bigotry and Sectarian Religious Supremacy

But if there are to be NO restrictions on religious speech in flag-folding scripts because (wink-wink, nod-nod) they are "unofficial," then we can soon expect to hear the following:

"The first fold of the flag represents the fact that America was founded as a Christian nation and others must convert or get out."

"The second fold in the flag represents that marriage can only be between a man and a woman and gay, bisexual, lesbian and transgender Airmen who violate this principal will suffer the Fires of Hell."

"The third fold represents that a woman should not serve in a combat role, as God intended their role to be subservient to man and not to substitute for the role of man."

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Seriously? Is our nation's Air Force honestly ready to tolerate and actually promote this kind of heinous, hate-filled speech on the putrid pretext that the flag-folding ceremony in an otherwise official retirement ceremony is a "momentary lapse" into an unofficial, unconstrained event? As the nation's flag is folded by uniformed members and a uniformed general officer presides over the ceremony, is the Air Force prepared for the appearance of unconstitutional impropriety and fundamentalist religious supremacy and primacy that such a wretched scene entails when hate-filled speech, disguised as permissible religious "free expression", begins to malodorously fill the air?

If so, it's a sad day for our First Amendment, for our core values, for our Air Force and for our Nation.

For god's (or no god's) sake, we are better than this.
We are not meant to be in service to the economy. The economy is meant to be in service to us. Yet today many of us feel powerless to an economic system that is collectively leading to results that no one wants. We have been taught scarcity and hyper-individualism, that it is "us versus them." Nowhere more so than in business.

What we were taught was developed from a worldview that we accept as true: That we are separate from each other. That the world is a dangerous place. That there is not enough for everyone.

These beliefs have shaped our lives and our institutions.

We can choose other beliefs. Create different institutions, and communities.

We Are All Connected

I believe another truth is re-emerging. Its roots are in indigenous cultures and spiritual wisdom that has always understood the real nature of life. It is the organizing principle of interdependence. We are all deeply connected to each other and to all life on earth.

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"In a real sense all life is interrelated. We are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be, and you can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be... This is the inter-related structure of reality." ~ Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Fifteen years ago Judy Wicks co-founded BALLE as an extension of a transformational shift she had made personally. She shifted from trying to be the heroic, famous model of socially responsible business, to a recognition that we are all in this together. She knew that no meaningful, lasting change would happen unless she taught her competitors to adopt her ways. Her love for people and animals -- pigs in particular -- overcame her fear of competition. She took the ideas she had pioneered, and built a network of entrepreneurs who accomplished much more together than she ever could have done, alone.

The Emergent: The Mindset out of Which the System Arises

In the past 15 years I've also seen the violence and destruction that can be caused by "socially responsible businesses" that follow the path-breaking work of pioneers. Companies copy the "what" but don't always cultivate the "why," neglecting the source of inspiration and continued innovation. Whether it's "micro-finance" or "free-range chicken," when business people simply follow the rules of these methods, but are motivated only by profits without deeper connection and care, significant harm can follow. Lady Eve Balfour, one of the earliest advocates for organic farmers, said that the best kind of farming could not be reduced to a set of rules. The farming that produces the kind of food we really want to eat, she believed, depends "on the attitude of the farmer."

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Similarly, in scientist Donella Meadows well-known essay, "Leverage Points: Twelve Levers of Systems Change", she names the top lever as the "mindset out of which the system arises." This is because, based on what we believe about ourselves and each other, we design systems that support those beliefs. Then we build institutions, policies and procedures that support those systems.

The Shift

We have a world coming that we cannot predict.

The UN and WHO say that in just one generation, because of climate change and population growth, we will require 70% more food than we produce now. That's my daughter's kids and that horrifies me.

In two generations, half of all people won't have access to clean water.

Does that just have to mean .... a whole lot more war?

In this time of deep and growing inequality, and with so much additional change on the horizon, it is no real surprise to see some people turning toward fear and wanting to put up bigger walls to each other.

While we are seeing disconnection and pain, we are also seeing many others who are leading in a different way, everywhere and across sectors -- from government to natural sciences, to organizational development and finance. People are standing up to say what is actually going to be necessary to achieve the scale of change that's required is a shift in consciousness, ala Einstein's insight that "we cannot solve problems from the same level of consciousness that created them."

"Me versus you" thinking cannot address complex crises of this era. New systems conditions require new leadership capacities, and we are being called to a new era of business leadership.

We need leaders who have cultivated their ability to see the "whole," and so can take action that benefits the whole -- including themselves, and not only themselves.

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The Science of Connection

Charles Eisenstein wrote, "Love is the felt experience of connection to another being. Your sense of self expands to include other beings."

That's what I'm talking about.

We will not build a new economy without tapping into a deeper level of our humanity, of who we really are, and who we want to be as a society.

Some of you might be thinking, "But Michelle, um, I'm afraid we're not that good!"

To that -- I have good news. Current science into happiness and well-being shows that people universally want connection.

The Greater Good Science Center based at University of California Berkeley has spent two decades investigating what makes humans deeply "well." Their research shows that regardless of geography and demographic, humans feel well primarily in four scenarios:

1. When we feel connected to ourselves and our "reason for being here"

2. When we feel connected to each other

3. When we feel connected in reverence to the larger natural world or something bigger than ourselves

4. When we've been generous and compassionate

In other words, the evolution we need for an economic transition is entirely possible because it is aligned with what makes us deeply well. Our common human-ness is interdependence and connection. And happily, research shows that even if we don't feel it now, these capacities can be cultivated.

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Practice Connection

I am not saying it is easy; I know it is not easy for me. We all get scared. One thing I know for sure is that everyone has a story. We have all had personal and painful journeys and there are many reasons we have grown guarded with each other.

So - we take one step at a time - and we practice opening. As Audre Lorde said, "We have to consciously study how to be tender with each other until it becomes a habit." We practice, a bit at a time, to love without armour and protection even through fear, and pain.

As natural resources on our planet decline, as we experience ever greater trauma, we practice so that we have known the feeling of connection and know that we are safer, all of us, in community.

It's going to get harder. Our choice will be in how we respond.

Today we see one path -- 56% of our food picked by illegal migrant workers who are treated with the abuses you'd expect given their lack of power. The CEO of Nestle saying water is not a human right, while buying up the rights to water springs. Redlining and discriminatory banking practices still facing people of color. McDonald's personal budget counseling for their employees showing "two 40-hour/week full time jobs" as their only realistic path to solvency...and we all know this story.

Here's Another Path....

Our founder Judy Wicks teaching her competitors how to do what she did, because she loved her community and the animals and the land more than her fear of competition. In the process inspiring a whole movement of people focused on "local" to re-root transactions in relationships and connection.

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Businesses are leading revolutions in every sector, from a place of radical love and connection. Even realizing that zero might be a legitimate price point for some customers (Aravind). Questioning why profits are being extracted to the top (Mars). Advising the wealthiest investors to aim for a negative rate of return, to move wealth where it is needed most (Leslie Christian).

And businesses are showing us that thousands of small experiments can add up to a movement: a cafe in Israel offering discounts to Israelis and Palestinians who don't know each other, to sit together for their meal. A moving company that provides free services to women escaping domestic violence. "Pay-it forward" coffees and bowls of soup so that a bite to eat can always be offered to someone who is hungry. A police force evaluated by how much compassion they show in an arrest. A company that not only hires the formerly incarcerated, but offers a suite of healing services, knowing a job is just one of many needs for these colleagues. A bank that offers zero interest loans for up to $50,000 to anyone remodeling, to offer refugees a home.

These modern day "parables" are the stories we need to tell ourselves -- because they become how we are with each other.

I was talking once with Jay Bad Heart Bull, a BALLE Local Economy Fellow who is Lakota, and he said that it is uncomfortable to him to raise money from foundations for his community work for a few reasons, one being that it felt odd and culturally wrong for him to bow before the one who had hoarded the most. In his family's culture, a man of honor -- the one you bow before -- would be the one who had given it all away. This touched me to my core.

Business Leaders: Choose Connection

There are tremendous examples all around us. They've always been there. BALLE's founder Judy Wicks hosted table talks at her restaurant inviting in people to share different beliefs. She brought her customers on sister restaurant tours to build connections to parts of town they didn't normally go. She intentionally practiced connection in ways that informed her business' innovation.

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Congressman John Lewis, a civil rights leader, talks about how the leaders who were behind the civil rights we enjoy today practiced together fiercely. They role-played, they looked to see the best in themselves and in those who opposed them. They imagined the "beloved community" until they could see it, and therefore make it so. Today we see the same commitment and solidarity in the National Domestic Workers Alliance and the Movement for Black Lives. We see efforts toward Compassionate Cities, Social and Emotional Learning in schools, and deepening empathy and eliminating unconscious bias in health care.

But I would posit, none of this will matter if business leaders don't do the same. Our economic system is destroying much of what is precious on this planet -- and fast. If we don't cultivate our own ability to see the world as a connected and loving place, and bring that into being, we will only move further toward building a world that divided and dangerous.

My friends, we were made for these times. Literally. Connection is our common humanity. But it is not guaranteed. It does requires a choice.
TOPSHOT - A woman walks through life jackets which have been collected from the beaches of Chios, Greece and used by adults and children,on display at the Brooklyn Bridge park ahead of next week's UN Summit for Refugees and Migrants in New York on September 16,2016. / AFP / KENA BETANCUR (Photo credit should read KENA BETANCUR/AFP/Getty Images)

I am travelling to New York in a couple of days with the Prime Minister of Sweden, the Swedish Minister for Foreign Affairs and the Swedish Minister for International Development Cooperation and Climate at the UN Summit on Refugees and Migrants on 19 September. Together with our colleagues from around the world, we are entrusted with a certainly daunting task: finding innovative and sustainable solutions for the sixty-five million refugees and internally displaced people around the world. At the same time creating the conditions for safe, regular and orderly migration for the 244 million international migrants in the world. In 2018 we are to present our results.

I am convinced we can succeed. We need to succeed. For the countries affected, for countries hosting refugees, but most of all for the people in the midst of the crisis and those fleeing from it. The need for international co-operation, responsibility-sharing and solidarity is today greater than ever before.

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Approaching 2018, I believe we need to focus on five areas in order to deliver on our task at hand:

First, we need solutions to the sixty-five million refugees and displaced people based on solidarity and responsibility sharing.

Together we need to support first countries of asylum, increase co-ordination at the international level and more timely respond to persons in need of protection. This is a responsibility that can be shouldered in various ways. One example is providing secure and legal options, such as resettlement in cooperation with UNHCR, for people in need of international protection.

Second, we need to do more to address the root causes of forced migration. People need to migrate out of choice, not out of necessity.

This includes providing humanitarian assistance as well as long-term development cooperation in host and neighbouring countries. Sustained political leadership and dialogue to prevent and end conflicts and thereby address root causes of forced displacement is also important. Efforts need to be coupled with long-term tackling of the root causes of forced displacement in order to effectively manage forced movement.

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Third, we need to provide opportunities for legal migration while ensuring that migrants are not exploited.

Labour migration, for example, offers opportunities for economic development and acquisition of knowledge and skills. However, this is only possible if migrants receive fair terms of employment. We need to prevent labour exploitation and discrimination of migrants as well as step up our efforts to address corrupt and unethical recruitment practices. Furthermore, decent working conditions are key to sustainable business practices.

Fourth, we need a long-term strategy to harness the positive effects of migration on development.

It is a great success that migration is included in a comprehensive manner in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Addis Ababa Action Agenda. We now need to deliver on our commitments. The commitment to facilitate orderly, safe, regulated and responsible migration and movement of people gives support for humane, sustainable and integrated migration policies where relevant policy areas interact. We further need to deliver on our commitments to lower the transfer costs of remittances, increase cooperation on access to and portability of earned benefits, enhance the recognition of foreign qualifications, lower the costs of recruitment for migrants and combat unscrupulous recruiters. Migration in the 2030 Agenda and Addis Ababa Action Agenda will help to better integrate migration into development policy. It will also contribute to foster collaboration between multilateral actors as international organizations with related mandates are encouraged to consider the development effects of migration. We are already seeing this happen.

Fifth, we have to improve the international governance of migration.

The UN needs to take a comprehensive approach to migration issues. We have taken a crucial step by including the International Organization for Migration, IOM, in the UN system. IOM has great knowledge on migration and long experience of practical work on migration in all its parts. Member States and the UN system now have to contribute to IOM's successful integration into the UN system. Only then can IOM contribute to better coordination within the UN system as well as strengthen its roles of knowledge generation and providing policy relevant advice on migration. The UN Secretary-General's Special Representative for International Migration, Peter Sutherland, will have a central role in this work.

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Improved international governance of migration also requires strengthened cooperation between States. Here, the Global Forum on Migration and Development, the GFMD, has contributed enormously by creating greater trust between countries around the world.

Sweden is taking its commitment to refugees and migrants seriously:

Sweden is ranked as the number seven largest humanitarian donor and the number one donor of non-ear marked financial a humanitarian financing which is adequate, flexible, predictable and consistent, to enable host countries and communities to respond both to the immediate humanitarian needs and to their longer-term development needs.

Sweden actively promotes the strengthening of bi-lateral partnerships between other third other countries and major refugee host countries, with a view to pursue long-term development co-operations inspired by the Swedish Syria Strategy.

Resettlement is and has been a priority for Sweden for many years. We are now committed to expand the Swedish resettlement programme to 5 000 annual places before the end of 2018. We strive to make refugee resettlement a high priority on the EU- as well as on the international agenda and encourage states to contribute and pledge their fair share.

Sweden has a long-standing commitment to creating dialogue and cooperation on migration at the global level. Already in 2003, we co-chaired the Global Commission on International Migration (GCIM). We also chaired the Global forum on migration and development, GFMD, 2013-14.

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Sweden has one of the world's most open labour migration systems. To ensure that labour migrants receive fair terms of employment, the Swedish Government has appointed a commission of inquiry to propose measures to strengthen labor migrants' rights in the labor market. Sweden also supports the development of a global certification system for ethical recruitment (IRIS) and the creation of a website to compare transfer costs of remittances from Sweden.

Through the Swedish Prime Minister's initiative Global Deal, which promotes workers' rights and social dialogue, Sweden aims to step up engagement in order to make globalisation work for everyone, including migrants.
Whenever I read a story of a refugee, I am reminded of my own story. My story began when I was 13, and spanned from Eritrea to the UK. The war in Eritrea was getting fierce and volatile where the liberation movement was taking over the larger cities in the country. Despite my father cooperating with the rebels, he decided it was best for us to leave the country. It was one of the hardest things we've had to do.

We left Eritrea under the guise of my father taking a pilgrimage to Mecca and a family wedding in Sudan. That was when I became a refugee, like millions of others around the world today. Travelling with rebels towards the border and being stopped and questioned was a terrifying experience that has stayed with me since that age. We stayed with family for a while - like many Eritreans that were fleeing to Sudan - but eventually rented our own accommodation. We were the lucky ones unlike others trying to escape persecution. People in Sudan were welcoming and hospitable, but for me life was difficult, mainly due to a language barrier - the education system was in Arabic. By the end of the first academic year in Sudan, I had a good understanding of subjects, but my achievement was poor due to the fact I couldn't express myself clearly.

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We eventually left Sudan to join my father in Saudi Arabia where my Arabic improved and two years later I received a scholarship to continue studying in Libya. With all the moving around, I was continually being put into school classes at lower levels than were suitable for my age, which I found frustrating.

My formative teenage years were spent as a refugee. By the age of 20, I had lived in Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Libya, Egypt and the United Kingdom. After studying in the UK for a couple of years, the nomadic lifestyle seemed to suit me and I was hoping to go and study in France, but my father encouraged me to stay in the UK. I had a fairly safe route going from country to country and stayed with my family throughout my childhood.

My journey was one of relative calm, but refugees today are facing a totally different experience. Those who are fleeing places like Syria, Iraq and Somalia today are facing trials and challenges at every step of their journey to safe havens in Europe and beyond; and finding further barriers in their host communities. We have heard stories of refugees being met with racism, xenophobia, accusations of crimes they have not committed and loss of lives. We need to ensure that refugees are treated with dignity and are given protection at every step of their journey. It can and should not be the case that refugees and forced migrants who are escaping upheaval and destruction of their homes then face policies and rhetoric in their host communities which leave them feeling unsafe, unwelcome and unwanted.

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Fear, sadness, anticipation and anxiety are feelings, I am sure, shared by every man, woman, boy and girl that has ever has been forced to leave their home to start a new life somewhere else. We must stand in solidarity with refugees.

Invariably, when speaking to leaders and policy makers, these personal experiences of mine partially inform what I say. I am watching the biggest humanitarian crisis of recent times unfolding before my eyes and my heart aches - knowing that I am in a position to help as the CEO of the world's largest Muslim humanitarian INGO, and yet, like many others around the world, at times I feel helpless and heartbroken seeing the plight of children like Alan Kurdi and Omran Daqneesh. In Islam, we are repeatedly commanded in the Qur'an to treat migrants and refugees with dignity and a welcoming spirit.

The Qur'an calls on humankind to fulfil the role of protectors and helpers to "those oppressed men, women and children, who cry out, 'Lord, rescue us from this town where people are oppressors!'" (Qur'an 4:75) - and promises that those escaping persecution will find "many a refuge and a great plenty in the earth" (Qur'an 4:99).

Islam has a rich tradition and history of protecting migrants and refugees, the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) was also a migrant, having to flee his birth town of Mecca to travel to Medina, 300 miles away, where he found refuge from persecution, discrimination and death.

At Islamic Relief, we are committed to the protection of refugees and to the establishment of a more humane and productive response to hosting refugees and supporting their long-term resilience. We provide life-saving assistance and support to refugees and forced migrant communities in countries including Jordan, Kenya, Iraq, Lebanon, Pakistan, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, and Yemen.

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This article has been submitted as part of the Natural Capital Coalition's series of blogs on natural capital by Mark Gough, Executive Director of the Natural Capital Coalition

We often feel safer when we're surrounded by people with complementary views. In few places is this more obvious than at the IUCN World Conservation Congress, where 10,000 passionate and dedicated individuals come together to rally around the conservation of the natural world.



The event takes place every four years, and allows the IUCN, and the conservation community at large, to build consensus about the direction that conservation should take. As you may imagine, there are many different views as to what should and should not be done, and some fierce debate.



At this year's Congress, the Guardian described a resolution to end the domestic trade in ivory as 'descending into acrimony' as delegates and national representatives fought over the what they believed to be the most effective methods of protecting native elephant populations.



To many, it may appear commonsensical that the legal ivory trade must be immediately abandoned. A recent report detailing that nearly a third of African savannah Elephants have been wiped out between 2007 and 2014 and an understanding of Elephants as ecosystem engineers, may only strengthen this resolve.



However, an awareness that the closure of legal markets will serve to significantly increase global ivory prices, and may subsequently encourage and embolden poachers - many of whom are desperately poor - may give some reason to take pause.



As with any global challenge, conservation is vastly complex, and answers that may appear clear in one light suddenly become opaque when taken in the context of geo-political issues such as poverty, climate change, and globalization.



Based in Hawaii, this year's Congress sat at a mid-point between the East and the West, (and to some degree, between the North and the South), making it an appropriate venue for a global meeting. The beautiful setting, and its rich biodiversity, serve to remind delegates what's at stake.



I attended this year's Congress to help launch the Natural Capital Protocol to the conservation community. Although the Protocol is aimed predominantly at businesses, it will only be successful if all of nature's stakeholders support it, and the conservation community are a vital piece of this puzzle. Indeed, 35 conservation organizations are part of the Coalition, including the IUCN, Conservation International and the WWF; all three of whom were involved in the Protocol's development process.



While the natural capital movement has progressed significantly over the last couple of years, it was clear at Congress that there are many who still reject the concept. For some, natural capital approaches are not only an ineffective method of protecting nature and the natural environment, but they actually serve to hasten their demise. This is a narrative reflected by some in the media, most recently in a widely shared article from the Conversation, and most famously by British writer George Monbiot.



Much of this distrust stems from the use of the term we have coined for this work, 'capital' and the connections this has to 'capitalism'. More still stems from the suggestion that such approaches split nature into neat little packages, and place isolated monetary 'prices' on each, leaving them open to commodification and privatisation.



The suggestion that we 'put a price on nature', is one I am often confronted with. While these concerns are well-intentioned, I believe the charge is a category error. We don't price nature, we illuminate the value that we already receive from it.

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This is a vital distinction. Price and value are not one and the same. You don't pay a price for the air that you breathe, but does that mean that it holds no value?

In this way, we can also communicate the value of clean air, without assigning it a price. This is the aim of natural capital in a nutshell.

Translating this value into monetary terms can certainly be very useful. Financial values are understood near-universally, and allow businesses and governments to make decisions using comparable sets of information. However, monetary valuations are only one element of natural capital, qualified or quantified information is often enough to inform our decisions.



It's important to remember that even when monetary values are used, this valuation is not a 'price' for which the natural capital can be 'bought', nor is it 'commodifying nature'. Rather, it is demonstrating the value that we already receive from the natural world, in ways that allow it to be incorporated into traditional decision making frameworks, leading to better outcomes for all.

If a 'price' is used at all, it often reflects the cost of doing nothing. Valuing clean air for instance, does not involve assigning a dollar value to each particle of unpolluted oxygen. We might however value clean air in terms of the financial costs associated with air pollution.

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If 9,500 people in London die each year from poor air quality , the value of clean air for Londoners should be calculated, (in part), in terms of the financial cost to the NHS of treating related illness. If a recent study linking air pollution from automobiles to Alzheimer's disease turns out to be correct, clean air may appear even more valuable to us. Again, this is not 'pricing nature', but highlighting our dependence on its systems, (and the cost of its degradation), in terms we can all understand.

Of course, these values cannot reflect the true and total intrinsic value of the natural world, this is something that cannot be expressed in words, let alone numbers. What they can do however, is to make one dimension of nature - the dependence of successful human societies on the natural world - discernible to decision makers, and in ways that enable their integration into government and organisational policy.

Once our dependencies on the natural world are understood in this way, even in the absence of moral or ethical arguments about the innate value of the natural world, the argument for conservation in fantastically strong, and arguably appeals to a much greater audience.



It's also important to remember that it's not the 'separate units' of natural capital that are valued, but the services that they collectively provide. So in natural capital, we don't value an individual bee, or a bee hive, or a collection of bee hives, we value the service of pollination. This works to take ecological complexity into account, by valuing all pollinating insects, their habitats, and the ecosystems (i.e. the other organisms, habitats and phenomena) that allow the pollinating insects to flourish.



I spent a lot of my time at the Congress listening to the concerns of people working on the front line of conservation. We had discussions around the risks of providing numbers for things that are innately priceless, and the need for businesses to fundamentally change their models of working.





It became obvious as we talked through practical examples, that both those applying natural capital approaches, and those challenging them, share, for the most part, largely identical concerns. Although there are challenges, there are also many great opportunities to finally work together across the system, with the goal of conserving and enhancing our natural world.



I came away contemplating an article which argues that (somewhat paradoxically), in this dispute at least, it's possible to be on both sides of the debate.



The author caricatures the debate as it is often seen: as an argument between 'Idealistic Dreamers' & 'Neoliberal Pragmatists'. As he then outlines, this depiction is a fiction.



Proponents from either side of the discussion rarely, if ever, magnetise to one or the other of these poles. Rather, our beliefs, ideals and concerns are often much closer than we think, and this leaves the door open for honest dialogue.



As with many situations in life, the answer to conflict is to sit down, look each other in the eye, and be honest about our fears and aspirations. Often our fears are unfounded, or we come away with different perspectives and understandings. Good communication is probably the best tool we have to address the challenges we face in the world.



As well as being an opportunity for the conservation community to meet and share experiences and solutions, the Congress also provides an opportunity for IUCN members to agree their future mandate.



Last weekend a motion was passed that requires the IUCN Director General to 'establish with urgency an inter-disciplinary and multi-sectoral working group' on natural capital, which will 'explore the conceptual and ethical underpinnings of natural capital approaches and related policies'.



This is a significant step forward for us all, as it formalises the role that the conservation community can play in this work, and will allow them to bring their expertise and concerns into the fold, providing a space for challenges to be addressed, and new partnerships to be formed.



The most astounding thing for me though, was how much support this motion gained. 98% of member governments and 96% of the Non-Governmental Organizations voted in favour.



Quoting a poster I saw in a cafe in Hawaii, 'The wave is coming. Either drown, or pick up your surf board'.

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Disclaimer: Articles in this series are submitted by people who work in organizations who are part of the Natural Capital Coalition, or people who are involved in the natural capital space more generally, the views expressed here do not necessarily represent the views of The Natural Capital Coalition, other Coalition organizations, or the organization that employs the author.

Mark Gough is the Executive Director of the Natural Capital Coalition.

Follow Mark Gough on Twitter: @Mark_Gough

On 13th July 2016, The Natural Capital Coalition launched a standardized framework for business to identify, measure and value their impacts and dependencies on natural capital. This ' Natural Capital Protocol' has been developed through a unique collaborative process; a World Business Council for Sustainable Development consortium led on the technical development and an IUCN consortium led on business engagement and piloting. The Protocol is supported by practically focused 'Sector Guides' on Apparel and Food & Beverage produced by Trucost on behalf of Coalition.

Keep up to date with the Natural Capital Coalition on Twitter: @NatCapCoalition


Donald J. Trump released his long-awaited medical records (if we can call them that) this week on the 'Dr. Oz Show'. In true showmanship manner, he got precisely what he wanted: intense media hype, suspense, high ratings and most importantly - control of the narrative. While many have criticized Dr. Oz for preemptively stating that he wasn't going to ask the Donald any questions that he didn't want to answer, and subsequently allowed him to share only what he wanted, the real tragedy in all of this actually has nothing to do with Trump's health at all. What most Americans, including some of Trump's ardent supporters, may not realize is that Dr. Oz is Muslim - yes, Muslim. At a time when attacks against Muslims are skyrocketing and there is a direct correlation between this election cycle and such hate crimes, Dr. Oz's inability to question Trump on his Muslim ban and varied vile statements on the subject was nothing short of an epic fail.

The son of Turkish immigrants, Dr. Oz was raised in a Muslim household where his father was more traditional and his mother secular as he once described to Henry Louis Gates, Jr. on PBS. He identifies himself more on the spiritual side of the religion as he explained. The extent or level of Dr. Oz's faith however, is irrelevant. Just as there are folks who never go to church and only find their faith around Christmas time (but still identify as Christian when asked), there are Muslims that are secular, semi-practicing or only celebrate the Eid holidays. Just like any other group, Muslims aren't homogeneous and they are as diverse as humanity itself as I often say. That in and of itself is all the more reason why Dr. Oz, with such a huge national platform and as the son of Muslim immigrants, could and absolutely should have held Trump accountable for his words and ideas because the reality is, they have already had a detrimental effect on Muslims in America.

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Adelphi University recently published preliminary results of a study they conducted on the impact of this election's Islamophobia on American Muslims. They included 600 Muslims in the study, nearly half of whom were born in the U.S. - and the results were staggering to say the least. As the Long Island Press highlighted, nearly two-thirds reported experiencing discrimination in the past year, and a shocking 93% said that election-year Islamophobia had "some to extreme negative impact" on their lives and on their families' lives. A few more depressing stats: 62% said they feel the need to prove that they are Americans, 56% said they experienced their loyalty being questioned and 89% said they feel their lives have less value.

As alarming as the Adelphi study is, it sadly isn't an outlier. Earlier this year, Georgetown University's Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding published a report highlighting the correlation between a rise in anti-Muslim attacks and the 2016 election cycle. Just between March 2015 and March 2016, they logged 180 acts of anti-Muslim violence which included murders, acts of vandalism, assaults, arsons and more.

In New York City, the supposed bastion of diversity, there's been a frightening rise in attacks against Muslims in just the past few months alone. Two Muslim women were attacked on a Brooklyn sidewalk last week as they pushed their toddlers in strollers. The suspect in custody reportedly punched one of the women in the head and tried to rip her hijab off while screaming, "get the f--k out of America b----s, you don't belong here." The woman accused of this horrendous incident allegedly pushed one of the strollers to the ground as well, and now faces two counts of felony assault as a hate crime and two counts of acting in a manner injurious to a child.

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Last weekend, a Scottish Muslim woman standing on Fifth Ave. in the heart of Manhattan had her clothes set on fire in what police are investigating as a hate crime. These outrageous incidents follow on the heels of random deaths of Muslims in the City. The aunt of an NYPD cop was stabbed to death as she walked ahead of her husband down a Queens sidewalk last month. Nazma Khanam, 60 years old, was dressed traditionally when the stabbing took place. Police have said she may have been the victim of a robbery attempt even though the family points to the fact that she was found with all of her possessions and they insist this was nothing short of a hate crime.

In the same borough of Queens, not long before Khanam's death, a prominent Imam in the Bangladeshi community and his assistant were killed as they walked from their mosque in broad daylight. They were shot execution style. While there has been an arrest in this case, police have yet to identify a motive and family members in this tragedy again highlight the fact that nothing was taken from the two men. Needless to say, the community is on edge.

All across the country, there have been random acts of violence taking place against Muslims and those perceived to be Muslim, their places of worship and anything that may symbolize Islam. In Tulsa, OK, a Christian Lebanese American was shot and killed last month by a neighbor who had called him a 'dirty Arab', and previously ran over the victim's mother with his car according to reports (she survived).

Meanwhile in Florida, a 32-year-old man has been arrested and is facing arson and hate crime charges for a fire that severely damaged a mosque (that the Orlando shooter reportedly attended in the past). According to reports, this suspect's Facebook page contained anti-Islamic rhetoric, including things like "All Islam is radical". This arson is just one of many against mosques around the country. CAIR, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, just released a report concluding that 2016 is on track to be one of the worst years ever for anti-mosque incidents with a total of 55 cases recorded as of mid-September; last year there were 79.

And these are just the cases that we know of.

As often is the case with crimes committed against a marginalized community that includes immigrants who may have language barriers, may not fully grasp the system or be fearful of retribution, things often go underreported. Ever since Trump touted his Muslim ban, "extreme vetting" process and need to figure out "what the hell is going on," people have been warning of an imminent backlash against the community. Not only is that backlash very real, but as studies show, there is a direct link to the vitriol of the 2016 campaign. For Dr. Oz, as one of the most powerful Muslims in this nation, to give in to the temptation of a ratings boost and allow himself to be used by Trump without holding him accountable is just pitiful and disappointing at best.

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Hillary Clinton was back on the campaign trail this week after suffering from pneumonia. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

By: Jack Noland

Many Americans, understandably, want to elect a healthy president. With Hillary Clinton's recent pneumonia diagnosis, the media has increased its focus on the relative health of both Clinton and Republican nominee Donald Trump as the presidential race enters its final two months.

When considering contributions from employees and PACs in the health sector, though, it's no contest. Clinton has built up a tremendous fundraising lead over Trump in a number of health-related industries.

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Health professionals - an industry classification that includes physicians, nurses, psychiatrists and more - had donated more than $6 million to Clinton's campaign and outside groups backing her candidacy by midyear. This total amounts to almost $1.5 million more than workers in the field gave to also-ran Marco Rubio, who netted the next-highest contribution levels. Donald Trump lands on the list at number seven, taking in just $627,849.

The three physicians who ran or are running for president this year - Republicans Ben Carson and Sen. Rand Paul (Ky.) and Green Party nominee Jill Stein - have been unable to exchange their medical cache for cash, placing fifth, eighth and 23, respectively.

Hospital and nursing home employees and PACs have also given more to Clinton than any other candidate, donating over $2.5 million. Trump's support from this industry, too, lags behind, as the Republican has received $117,503 - less than 5 percent of Clinton's take.

The health services/HMO industry, which includes non-residential health care services and medical laboratories, bucks the trend, with employees and PACs in the field having contributed most to back defeated Republican candidate Jeb Bush. The former Florida governor racked up more than $1.6 million in support of his bid, while Clinton sits at second on this list, having received over $1.1 million.

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The widest gap between Clinton and her rivals is in the pharmaceutical industry. PACs and employees in that arena have given over $10 million to back her candidacy, roughly $8.5 million more than they have donated to support Bush, the next-top candidate, and 168 times more than they have thus far given to Trump.

And, speaking of pharmaceuticals, employees of Pfizer, which manufactures the Prevnar 13 pneumonia vaccine, have donated more to support Clinton than to any other presidential candidate, contributing $115,091 total.

We don't know if Clinton had the vaccine, but to treat her pneumonia, she was prescribed a 10-day treatment of Levaquin, an antibiotic manufactured by Janssen Pharmaceuticals. Employees of Janssen's parent company, Johnson & Johnson, have also backed Clinton over her rivals, to the tune of $72,236.
Depending upon whom one chooses to ask, the chances of Donald J. Trump prevailing in November's presidential election are either very good or very poor. Many, if not most, oddsmakers have Hillary Clinton taking the White House in various magnitudes of landslide, but, as this particularly silly election season still has several weeks to go, taking any possibility off the table seems like a poor play.

What is already known is that Donald Trump's presidential run has fomented the rise of a particularly hideous form of xenophobia the likes of which this country hasn't seen in decades. Some of the most vile and ugly racists have used his candidacy as an excuse for slithering out from under their rocks and broadcasting their loathsome message of hate.

Included among the targets of the Trumpian troglodytes are immigrants (legal and undocumented), Muslims (born here or not - doesn't matter) and women (unless they're named or work for Trump).

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Trump seems to want to shoot America in the foot. The United States has a rich tradition of immigration. It's a nation built almost entirely on the ability of people from different parts of the world to contribute to and build a society in different ways, whether that's at a desk, on a farm, or in public service. Trump could be reminded that America is in a global competition to fill the "skills gap" for talent. Though hating someone for their race or origin is vile all on its own, the ramifications of frightening off skilled labor from abroad are far reaching. China, India, Europe, even Canada would love to welcome Ivy League technology and business graduates to their shores.

Trump's run has attracted racists like fresh dung attracts flies. Some are well known, like KKK leader, Holocaust denier, and convicted felon David Duke. Others are less known, like Florida attorney Sara Blackwell. Fresh off a charge of allegedly beating her ex-husband in front of her children, Blackwell decided to enter politics when she became involved with a lawsuit against Disney by former employees who say they were fired and replaced by foreign workers.

Vamping for a typically raucous crowd of about ten thousand waiting on the Republican presidential nominee earlier this year, and apparently well versed in the latest alt-right dog-whistle phrases, she said that Americans face a looming invasion of foreigners at work, where they may stroll in on a Monday to "find an Indian or Asian sitting at their desk." She has become something of a celebrity in the anti-immigration movement, lobbying officials from California and Delaware to draft proposals to block many of America's immigrants, including those with advanced degrees, from accepting jobs in the United States.

In addition to teasing racists out of hiding, the Trump campaign is responsible for invigorating a latent hatred for Muslims in America. Trump's campaign has signaled that it may soften the anti-Islam rhetoric, but there are candidates across the country who feel no such need to dial down the hate. Businessman and property developer Carlos Beruff, a Republican candidate for Senate, eloquently detailed his ham-handed approach to "Muslim immigration," or immigration from Middle Eastern states. Beruff said he would ban immigration from "pretty much anybody that's got a terrorist organization in it, which is pretty much all the Middle East," with Israel being an exception, thanks to their "pretty strong" security. He saw no need to cast a small net, either, saying that the ban would apply to even non-Muslims as well.

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It's not an exaggeration to say that this November's election will be a turning point. The electorate has a choice between hate, fear, and ignorance, and reason and decency. Unfortunately, we will always have people in this country who harbor hate in their hearts and look for any opportunity to spew the poison within them. It's no surprise that elements from the Republican Party are trying hard to distance themselves from the Donald.

Trump's running mate is trying, but fortunately, has yet to overcome his boss' rhetoric. A self-described "born-again, evangelical Catholic," Mike Pence's recent campaign to rally the GOP around Trump ended poorly, with a large number of congressmen taking aim at the controversial positions aired during the campaign. Meanwhile, James Glassman, former undersecretary of state under George W. Bush, is spearheading a campaign to recruit life-long Republicans to vote for Hillary Clinton.


Photo by Jake Raynor

Mitzi Peirone is making her debut in the filmmaking industry with Braid; a psychological thriller that will be the first feature film in the United States to be funded through an equity crowdsale using cryptocurrency. The 25-year old model, painter, and writer met entrepreneur Joseph Lubin, founder of ConsenSys - the leading company in blockchain technology application development - at a music festival on the Woodstock grounds in 2015, and soon after forged a partnership with the mission to democratize filmmaking. Braid will use WeiFund, the blockchain based equity crowdfunding platform developed by ConsenSys, to partially finance the film.

Watch the trailer

Braid illustrates the power of imagination in creating reality as an extension of human consciousness, and follows the infernal journey of three women into a violent psycho wonderland of make believe and torture.



When it comes to funding, independent filmmakers often resort to open crowdfunding platforms, such as Kickstarter or Indiegogo; but a Kickstarter funded film could make millions of dollars and its donors wouldn't see any return. With Weifund, donors who believe in the vision of the film become investors who can profit should it be successful. The young female writer/director is pioneering a new approach to filmmaking that is not reliant upon the traditionally wealthy white male investment pool that is commonly used to get films off the ground. This independence allows for the preservation of artistic integrity, putting the story first, rather than star power or mainstream appeal. An equity crowdsale is a perfect tool for Indie Filmmaking as it enables new and creative stories to be told that might have been turned away by Hollywood executives.

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Mitzi's disruption squad is composed by Business and Marketing partner Ryan Gittleson, Associate Producer Jacquelini Carini, Krish Jagirdar from Brand New Matter, Documentarist Hilary Steadman, and Bogdan Burcea (Creative Director of ConsenSys).

The story of the film follows Petula Thames and Tilda Darlings, two self proclaimed artists who moved to NYC to follow their dreams and got involved in drug dealing and prostitution instead. One night they lose 80 thousand dollars worth of narcotics and are given 48 hours to pay their vengeful druglord back. The girls leave town to rob their wealthy childhood friend, Daphne Peters, who has grown into a dangerous schizophrenic agoraphobe, prisoner of the fantasy world the three created as children. To take her money, the girls have to take part in Daphne's twisted and violent game of make believe. The three of them quickly descend into a deadly maze of hallucinations, role play, torture and murder.

Braid's message is about making your dreams become your reality, and WeiFund is the innovative platform that will help make that happen.
Sometimes, Fashion Month can feel as much (if not more) about the crazy, over-the-top outfits showgoers wear as, well, the shows themselves. There's inherent fantasy in both: The runway represents the forefront of fashion, to be distilled for the masses as the months go by; street style, on the other hand, gives us a voyeuristic entryway into exactly how fun and expressive personal styling can be -- even if we're not about to layer two jackets with three crossbody bags and Rihanna-level stilettos anytime soon.

This genre of photography has evolved greatly in the past century, largely due to the late Bill Cunningham and the emergence of independent blogs like The Sartorialist, which document the goings-on -- and, most importantly, the clothing -- of the exceptionally dressed. Naturally, as the audience of fashion grew, so did what the art form encompassed: an earnest celebration of individuality through style that came to be grouped with what can sometimes be best described as biannual mass peacocking (which sometimes involves a few outfit changes in a single day). There's merit in that, too -- during Fashion Month, it gives us context for our favorite (often outrageous) runway pieces, and what they would look like in a relatively relatable context. (Couture on the sidewalk? I mean, why not.)

Sure, we may not be able to actually buy a majority of the clothes seen, but we can take away a few styling lessons that make our everyday looks feel that much more forward-thinking. And while purposefully wrinkled shirts may not be as much of a hit with your business-casual colleagues as they are with your fellow style-stalking friends -- same with too-oversized pants, probably -- there's no shame in experimentation. That's why we asked six intrepid staffers to put these trends to the test, with a little sense of humor and a goal not to have our garments interrupt our day-to-day plans. Below, we break down our interpretations of these larger-than-life pieces, how it feels to wear such statement-making items when you're simply going about your day, and how you, too, can take them for a spin without feeling totally ridiculous.

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Photographed by Alex Thebez of Gifriends.

Jacquemus Turtleneck Top, $399, available at Shopbop; Samuji coat; Nu New York pants (model's own); Topshop boots (model's own).

The Off-The-Shoulder Jacket

It's long been a joke within the industry that fashion editors don't know how to wear their jackets -- well, it's not that they don't know, but they'd rather perch them on their shoulders like capes, allowing their hands to be free to text, Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook Live, or what have you. Then, a few seasons ago, we were introduced to Jacket Draping Level 2: slouching your jacket so that it's worn half-off the shoulder, or belting an oversized style at the waist, and letting the shoulders slouch around your arms. Fast-forward to fall '16, and Demna Gvasalia sends off-the-shoulder motos and puffers down his inaugural Balenciaga runway -- and, like with anything he touches, not knowing how to wear a jacket became the trend to follow.

This trick is interesting, because it seemingly gained traction backwards: from editors to street style stars to the runway -- as opposed to the typical reverse cycle. Its unique trajectory doesn't make it any less impractical, though. It's a style that requires constant readjustment, a particular posture, and enviable sweat resistance. So, we tasked fashion market writer Alyssa Coscarelli with the challenge. (On a balmy August day, no less. She's a trooper and a street style star in her own right, though, so she graciously complied.)

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"I was admittedly pretty excited to try the forced-off-the-shoulder puffer-jacket trend, since it was the focal point of one of my favorite looks from Balenciaga's fall '16 show," Coscarelli says after the shoot. "But, I was nervous about how practical this trend would be IRL -- and rightly so. As is the struggle with any off-the-shoulder piece, I ended up feeling like I had total T. rex arms, which means I could hardly swipe my MetroCard or hold on to the higher subway rails without totally throwing off my look. And, I felt like the forced off-shoulder manipulation made the coat jut out weirdly in the front instead of just laying flat."

"At the same time, though," she counters, "I felt super-chic. People were staring, but I was feeling this styling move. It may not be the most ideal in situations where you have to lift your arms or generally live life, but I still think there's something that looks so perfectly disheveled, yet editorial about this styling trick, especially over an amazing turtleneck, so I'm not nixing it from my fall and winter styling arsenal just yet." There you have it, folks: a solid not no.

Merch-On-Merch

If we're talking about industry-sweeping trends, we need to talk about tour merchandise. For a while, it felt like all we were discussing: The Life of Pablo (Kanye West), Purpose (Justin Bieber), Revival (Selena Gomez), Lemonade (Beyonce)...you didn't even need to attend a concert to get your hands on a branded T-shirt. (Better yet, find a pop-up.) It was a good year for music-licensing company Bravado, that's for sure. This quickly became about much more than memorabilia, though. "It's important for an artist to break out of that idea of merch as a T-shirt, as a simple memento souvenir," Mat Vlasic, chief executive at Bravado, told The New York Times this summer. "At the end of the day, they're driving the trends. They're driving fashion." Sure enough, Bieber- and Pablo-tagged garments began appearing at various fashion events, on bloggers and influencers across the globe -- a continuation of the larger influence of streetwear in fashion.

Now, I'm a notoriously late adopter of trends. Never mind that I spend most of my day writing about them: I'm a hesitant shopper and an indecisive spender, which means that by the time I convince myself that, yes, a choker might be worth it -- boom, it's over. However, over the past few months, I've gradually accumulated various pieces of merch or otherwise celebrity-branded pieces -- namely, a long-sleeved Pablo T-shirt and furry Rihanna Puma sandals. I didn't normally wear them outside of the house, though. (I saw these items more as memorabilia, by some weird, cost-ineffective logic.) So, for this challenge, I took it upon myself to pile on as much merch as possible, and try to be professional at the same time.

Granted, I work at a very progressive media company without a real dress code, so I already wouldn't face the issue of curbing HR-mandated dress requirements. Still, I felt pretty conspicuous walking around with a Justin Bieber hoodie tied around my waist, and having "I Love Kanye Like Kanye Loves Kanye" emblazoned across my back.

When we've seen merch crop up in street style, it's usually a singular item, with the fandom element distilled down with designer garments and more sophisticated staples. We're betting big on seeing more of these branded pieces across Fashion Month -- and they'll likely look less hype-y when different tours aren't arbitrarily stacked together.



Ader Error Stripe T-shirt Long, $80, available at Ader Error; Mango pants and shoes (model's own).

Extra-Extra Long Sleeves

This time last year, fashion experienced a sleeve-lengthening phenomenon seemingly at every level: We dubbed them "spaghetti-sauce sleeves" when we saw them on the runway, and just straight-up impractical IRL. (Outside of the practical considerations of a desk lunch, how does a handshake or high-five go down when you've got so much fabric hanging down your arm?) It's one of those trends that looks great on the catwalk and in an editorial, but that we shrugged off as unrealistic. For the sake of an experiment, though, we baited senior fashion editor Erin Cunningham with the promise of a midweek burger and fries -- as long as she consumed said meal while wearing comically long sleeves. There's no such thing as a free lunch, after all.

Here's what Erin had to say about it: "Spaghetti sleeves are not for people who like to eat spaghetti...or anything, for that matter. But I'm not totally against it. 1. It looks cool. (Seriously: As someone who stands at only 5-foot-1, I felt like the extra-long length actually made me look taller, even if that was only in my mind.) 2. They're fun. They're fashion. And you have to appreciate them for just that. They're not practical in the least bit, but, then again, are any of the best runway trends?"

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Whether this is a "10/10 Will Try Again" trend, though, Erin's not so sure. "Maybe," she says. "It depends on the length -- I'll likely stick to something that falls slightly below my wrist, but that also won't get dragged through a pile of ketchup. (This is a serious concern; I eat ketchup on everything.) Plus, since this style is 'in,' trips to the tailor are basically unnecessary -- and who isn't all for a little money-saving when you can?"

Zara Gathered Tulle Dress, $39.90, available at Zara; Vans Embossed Stingray Slip-On, $65, available at Vans; Dune London Cat Ear Pom Pom Key Ring, $30, available at Dune London; Forever 21 jeans (model's own); Adidas Originals T-shirt (model's own); Skagen bag and watch (model's own).



The Daytime Ball Gown

No matter how many times we've seen her do it, Susie Lau of Style Bubble always tugs at our fashion heartstrings (and outfit dreams) when she breaks out a voluminous, tulle gown -- a la Molly Goddard -- and wears it over denim. She makes the outfit look so absolutely envious, we wonder why we relegate these party dresses to the barely touched "special occasion" sections of our wardrobes. There was only one person on our team who could do this trend justice: fashion market writer Ray Lowe, who has been known to hand over her credit card at the sight of any garment with cat ears and whose personal style can best be described as Whimsical Extra in a Classic Disney Movie. Naturally, she was game.

"I've been wanting to try this Susie Bubble trademark ball gown trend for a while now," she confesses. "The only thing stopping me was the justification of blowing cash on a pretty dress, just to wear it over a T-shirt and sneakers. But the finished ensemble made me feel really cool. Everything was just a bit over-the-top (slip-on Vans and tulle!) and street style ready."

For Ray, finally taking this on-trend plunge also involved a personal-style realization: how little she experimented with the contents of her closet -- but how easy it was to actually execute. However, it wasn't all fun and games and #OOTDs. "By the time I stepped outside, every little breeze set the skirt flying," she says. "My main mode of transportation in the city is hopping on a Citi Bike, and I was reminded why I thought twice about trying this trend to begin with. Between getting the skirt stuck in the spokes and flying over my handlebars, there's a reason you've never seen anyone speeding past in a tulle dress before."

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Still, she notes this getup was a compliment magnet. "We're a fashion-forward office, but the amount of kudos I received walking around in this look made it," she recalls. "It didn't feel too absurd and outside of my personal style: It has a sort of modern, punk-rock-princess vibe to it (just without the Avril Lavigne studded belt). While I'd probably exclusively be getting around in an Uber in it, I'd definitely try this trend again. My next take would be picking out a dress with a shorter and more structured skirt."

On Connie: Michaela Buerger Flowers Everywhere Long Sleeve Top, $340, available at Shopbop; Milly Modern Mini Skirt, $245, available at Shopbop; model's own sunglasses, bags, and shoes. On Alexandra: Michaela Buerger Flowers Everywhere Long Sleeve Top, $340, available at Shopbop; Carven Skirt, $290, available at Shopbop; All Birds Women's Wool Runners, $95, available at All Birds; Marc Jacobs Snapshot Colorblock Small Camera Bag, $295, available at Marc Jacobs; Dior sunglasses (model's own).

Matchy-Matchy Dressing

Last September, the statement piece to beat at New York Fashion Week was definitely Veda's Best Friend moto jackets, spotted on Caroline Vreeland and Shea Marie of Peace Love Shea. Soon enough, we began seeing a new wave of matchy-matchy dressing -- one that involved pairing up, but not mirroring your partner. The idea is to coordinate on one piece or an overall formula for an outfit, and have each person interpret their own aesthetic within those parameters.

It sounds easy enough -- but the challenge becomes straddling this line between cheekiness and the costume-y nature of overly planning your look. Luckily, fashion features director Connie Wang and senior fashion news editor Alexandra Ilyashov spend enough time together as it is, so this was a natural next step in their relationship. The result was only a tad bit creepy.

Connie went into this challenge a seasoned matchy dresser. "I'm no stranger to dressing alike (see: here), so matching with Alex was no big deal," she explains. "There's definitely a performative aspect to matching a friend in a way that actually feels very Hadid- and Jenner-approved -- wherever Alex and I would go, people wouldn't only look and stare, but they'd do it with the kind of expectation that we were about to put on a show. The fact that we didn't have anything prepared was kind of a letdown." However, street style is a form of performance, she says -- so it wasn't too far off: "It definitely makes sense that people would want to match a bestie. But for regular occasions, the pressure for showtime was too much."

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Alexandra, for her part, was a little more hesitant. "Confession: I used to loathe having matchy outfits with my sister for family photos and/or as Hanukkah gifts," she admits. Since then, though, she's had a change of heart -- and even kind of enjoyed twinning as an adult. "I got a kick out of walking around crowded, tourist-clogged City Hall Park, coordinated with Connie," she reflects. "Our chaste, high-necked, long-sleeved white shirts felt very 'just escaped the Victorian sanatorium in our (very chic) straightjackets.'" She concurs with Connie on the performative aspect of it all. "There was definite anticipation about what we were there to do, exactly, besides eat ice cream," she explains. "Some folks even whipped out their phones to snap a pic while the photographer was shooting -- hey, it's the closest I've ever come to feeling like a B-list celebrity overseas."
Contrary to popular opinion, and with all due respect to Gary Larson (creator of the iconic cartoon, in which whatever we say is heard as blah-blah-blah by our dogs), dogs actually do understand us. According to the August 31 print issue of the Washington Post (Note to Readers: If you don't know what a print issue newspaper is, don't worry. Soon, no one else will, either), scientists in Hungary have found that "dogs understand both the meaning of words and the intonation used to speak them."

This was big news for Life in the Boomer Lane, who always assumed that if she smiled and said in a very excited voice "Do you want to go into your doggie carrier and stay there all day with no food or water?!" any of her several dogs through the years would wag his/her tail and spin around in complete ecstasy. Conversely, she believed that if she frowned and said in a monotone "Would you like a bowl of treats now, followed by a long walk?" her dogs would lower their heads, place their tails between their legs, and slink away.

Not so, according to the Hungarian scientists who conducted the study. It turns out that dogs use the same parts of their brain to understand words and intonation. The scientists learned this by placing 13 family dogs (mostly golden retrievers and border collies) and instructed them to sit still for seven minutes in an MRI scanner, so they could assess their brain activity.

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It should be noted at this point that LBL's younger son, at age 13, was unable to complete with these dogs for their ability to act appropriately while having an MRI. During his own MRI, he moved and declared he was unable to stop moving, an event that caused the MRI to be terminated (after an excruciating 30 minutes) and LBL to lose two entire afternoons and her son two days of school. LBL seems to remember that sedation was necessary on a subsequent attempt, but she can't be sure. Said son now has his own golden retriever, so LBL won't tell him about this research, in the event he thinks that LBL is making a statement about the failure of his intelligence, as compared to that of his pet.

Back to the research study. The female trainer spoke various words to the dogs, some of them positive and some negative. "Each dog heard each word in both a neutral tone and a happy, attaboy tone." The result was that dogs responded to happy tones only when the words used were positive. According to the Post, "That means we aren't as special as we like to think, at least when it comes to how our brains deal with language."

(LBL would like to insert at this point that recent global and national events have confirmed that we aren't quite as special as we like to think, regarding any number of issues, and, at this point, are in competition for inclusion in the 30-50 percent of all species that will evaporate, due to climate change.)

Feline lovers (those who love cats, rather than cats who love each other) should know that the article then went on to bring up the issue of cats, specifically whether cats also use both words and inflection together to interpret what is said to them. Scientists began by placing cats into the same MRIs as the dogs were placed in and attempted to make them stay there. As soon as these scientists are released from the hospital, they will discuss their findings.

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In the meantime, a national spokescat remarked, "We are lodging a protest about the use of cats in any scientific research. And we really don't give a shit about any of this research, anyway. Dogs fall for this all the time. Next, they'll be asked who they would vote for, as though their vote would actually matter. It's complete nonsense."

The spokescat then went on to announce that, rather than taking up his valuable time to address cat-related issues in the future, he would designate a surrogate to speak for him. "I have applications pending from Rudy Juliani,Chris Christie and Katrina Pierson." I should be making a final decision after the election."

Earlier on Huff/Post50:
Nobel prize-winning US economist Joseph Stiglitz poses during an interview in Paris on September 13, 2016. / AFP / ERIC PIERMONT (Photo credit should read ERIC PIERMONT/AFP/Getty Images)

Joseph Stiglitz speaks with Richard Eskow on "The Zero Hour."

Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz has a new book out entitled "The Euro: How a Common Currency Threatens the Future of Europe." We spoke with Professor Stiglitz on "The Zero Hour" about the tension between globalization and democracy, the mistaken thinking that gave rise to the euro experiment, and what that experience can tell us about the need to resist bad trade deals like the Trans-Pacific Partnership, renegotiate older ones like NAFTA, and invest in jobs and growth in the United States. He also expressed opposition to a tax giveaway that's reportedly in the works for corporations like Apple.

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Stiglitz described the euro as "a fascinating experiment from an economist's perspective," adding that "it's a failed experiment" but "there's a lot we can learn." As with globalization overall, he said, "the economics advanced faster than the political institutions that would make it work."

Stiglitz noted that 62 percent of the voters in Spain, Portugal and Greece voted against the draconian austerity policies imposed upon them by the Germans and the European Central Bank. He shared the concern that these policies are undermining European democracy and giving rise to extremist parties and movements on the far right.

In the era of Trump, is that a lesson for the United States? "Very much so," said Stiglitz, "and it's precisely that sort of connection that provided some of my motivation for writing the book. It's often easier to see what's gone wrong by looking at other countries than by looking at one's own country."

Stiglitz added:

"In the United States we've had similar promises about how NAFTA [the North American Free Trade Agreement] and other trade agreements would bring greater prosperity, and for large fractions of America that is not been the case. Even now, President Obama is ... pushing forward on a trade agreement, TPP, the Trans Pacific Partnership... that benefits corporate interests, not ordinary Americans."

Stiglitz is, however, optimistic that the current political mood will help defeat the TPP. "I'm hopeful," he said, "that there is the beginning of a realization that blindly going forward globalization is not going to bring the country prosperity - at least, not to the bottom 90 percent."

But why did center-left parties in Europe, and the Democratic Party leadership here, support these deals and the thinking behind them for so long? In Stiglitz's view, that may have been a defensible position 20 or 25 years ago but is not today, given the experience of the last two decades.

Then why so many policymakers in Europe and the United States continued to push globalization, despite the evidence? "In American politics," Stiglitz replied, "part of the reason is of course the influence of money." He pointed out that both presidential candidates now say they oppose the TPP, which he takes as a hopeful sign.

Stiglitz laid the blame for some of the trade agreements' most harmful policies on our own government:

"Occasionally you'll hear somebody say 'we bargained badly' in these trade agreements. Well, the fact of the matter is, it wasn't our trading partners that were demanding many of the provisions that have been so painful to ordinary Americans - the kinds of provisions that make it more difficult to protect our environment, the economy, our health, our safety, raising drug prices, and so forth. It's actually America's trade negotiators or TPP negotiators reflecting corporate interests ..."

Stiglitz said that, if the next president wants to renegotiate past deals like NAFTA, "I believe we could make significant progress."

While Stiglitz sounded an optimistic note on trade, he expressed greater concern about bank regulation. On taxation, he said, "there's a real worry that multinationals like Apple will get tax relief. They're supposed to be paying taxes of 35 percent; they've taken advantage of this special loophole, shipping money abroad. Now there's lots of discussion that ... we'll pass a special bill that allows them to bring it back at very low rate."

"We'll be rewarding them for not investing in America," Stiglitz concluded, "which is just wrong."

Stiglitz is a strong advocate for infrastructure investment, but expressed concern about backroom negotiations.

"The danger right now is that discussion is going on behind closed doors to support (infrastructure spending), but to get the revenues they're going to do a tax deal with the big corporations," he said. "And so we may get the investment, but the price of that investment will be to let multinationals like Apple off the hook, to pay less taxes while ordinary citizens will have to continue to pay their taxes like we've always done."
As we enter the final stages of the Presidential campaign, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton continue to intensify their attacks on one another.

While Secretary Clinton was forced to quickly apologize for her remarks Friday that many of Trump's supporters were "deplorables," Donald Trump has gotten to this point in the Presidential campaign by viciously maligning a broad swath of America, fostering a "culture of hate" that does not align with American values.

Regardless of the outcome of November's election, Donald Trump has ushered in an ugly renaissance of xenophobia in America characterizing, among many other insults, Mexican immigrants as "criminals" and "rapists." Trump's fiery rhetoric has brought out some of the ugliest elements of American society who believe that their antiquated and bigoted views now somehow have a credible national voice once again.

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In the recent days, President Bill Clinton pointed out that the slogan "Make America Great Again" has deep anti-immigrant and racist undertones. "If you're a white Southerner, you know exactly what it means, don't you?" President Clinton told a group of supporters in Florida. "What it means is, 'I'll give you the economy you had 50 years ago, and I'll move you back up on the social totem pole, and other people down," the 42nd President of the United States pointed out.

Louisiana's David Duke, a white nationalist and former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard, was quick to urge listeners of his U.S. radio program to volunteer and get out to vote for Donald J. Trump for President, telling his supporters that "voting against Donald Trump is really treason to your heritage."

In July, when it was clear that a larger window may be opening, David Duke announced his candidacy for the United States Senate. Having run for state and federal office numerous times over the last four decades, the former Klan leader clearly believes that Trump's "alt right" vision creates a unique opportunity for him to finally ride political coattails into public office. This is just one of the extreme "alt-right" political candidates who embody Trump's extreme vision for America and are his most ardent supporters.

Sara Blackwell, a vocal anti-immigration advocate in Florida, has shared the campaign stage with Trump. An attorney who has found a niche peddling her services to Americans who feel they've lost their jobs to foreigners, Blackwell recently wrote on her blog that "it is time that WE TAKE BACK THIS COUNTRY," [emphasis hers]. Her blog, which includes a large donation button for her new non-profit to bankroll her anti-immigrant agenda. Blackwell recently told a Trump rally audience of 10,000 people that Americans need to worry that they could go to work and "find an Indian or Asian sitting at their desk waiting to be trained." It is just this kind of backwards thinking that illustrates the sad backing of Trump's so-called deportation force, meant to cleanse American society of immigrants, the people that have truly helped make America "great."

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Like the former grand wizard, Blackwell announced a run for public office as a Republican earlier this year. Her candidacy was short-lived. Blackwell's campaign came to an end after her law firm clients began to question her motives, combined with embarrassing revelations regarding her own brushes with the law.

Equally disturbing is Donald Trump's anti-immigrant rhetoric in relation to Muslims. His post-Democratic Convention attack against a Gold-Star Muslim-American family who had lost their son in Iraq took the election to yet another low. As we've all heard, last December, Trump called for a "complete and total shutdown on all Muslims entering the United States."

Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban, a position the Trump campaign has recently signaled he may back away from, has encouraged other extreme candidates to put banning immigrants at the centerpiece of their own campaigns. Robert Blaha, a Colorado Republican primary candidate stated publicly that he wanted to go beyond Donald Trump's proposal to ban Muslims, though, fortunately left the gory details to himself. This didn't sit well with the people of Colorado. The primary, in a state with an increasingly-diverse electorate, rejected Mr. Blaha and his divisive ideas.

Not to worry. Shortly after his defeat, the Colorado Republican was named co-Chair of Trump's state campaign.

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While some Trump supporters genuinely believe that the political or economic system is not working for them, Blaha, Blackwell, and Duke seem to be using this fear to advance their own hateful agendas.
Today, many consumers feel a real sense of accountability to address global issues and they look to brands to be their partners in social good. There's a new app for that!

Mido Desanti, CEO and Founder of Pixhug, launched this venture in August 2016 to "bring social value to social media." Here's a conversation I recently had with Desanti about their startup story and the mission of Pixhug.

Why did you create Pixhug? Briefly explain it's purpose:

Desanti: Pixhug was created to elevate awareness of charitable causes, support philanthropy, and make giving easier and more transparent than ever before by harnessing the power of social media and photo sharing. Pixhug brings charities and sponsors together through a unique and fun user engagement. For every LIKE on Facebook, a corporate sponsor gives ten cents to a specific cause/campaign.

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What was your background before launching Pixhug?

Desanti: I moved to Monaco in 2002 to finish my studies at the International University of Monaco. While there, I built a concierge business that basically served the one percent of the one percent, which was a group of about ninety people. As privileged as they were, there was still a desire for them to have access to local events that were frequently closed to residents. We built a successful membership business model based on this need and I expanded to another business that would cater to the other 45,000 people who work mainly in the service industry in Monaco and live in France or Italy. It was a Groupon sort of business, where members paid a discounted rate for local services and events.

I enjoyed these businesses, they were lucrative but didn't feel as fulfilling as I hoped my career would be. I wanted to move into a more tech oriented business. In 2011 we sold our Monaco businesses and my wife and I decided to do something to do more meaningful and tech centric.

I joined the board of Julian Lennon's foundation called White Feather Foundation where we worked on conserving life in all forms; whether human, plant or animal. Julian and I wanted to work on causes close to our hearts while also working with other organizations to help scale their work both by eliminating inefficiencies and reducing the cost of fundraising. The business of fundraising is extremely inefficient. Sometimes the cost to raise $1 is $1.31. That, along with the lack of transparency and reporting shouldn't be happening in 2016 with social media.

We looked at social media because the demographic of 18-27 yr. olds are very keen and educated on global issues and causes, more so than 35+ yr. olds., but they don't have the means to support charities financially. However, they will happily volunteer and spread the word. This notion eventually led to Pixhug.

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Talk about the social media component to Pixhug:

Desanti: Corporate America is donating $20 billion dollars annually to causes while they're also trying to reach this younger demographic. When you think about the actual reach of donations, it's frequently not maximized.

Corporate reach is limited by the way companies spend their funds and build brand equity. Often, they are confined to the old school public relations photo op; a picture of the giant check that's is very 1991. My wife was working in PR but is a psychologist by trade, so she looked into the behavior of that demographic and of social media in general. Julian Lennon offered feedback from his charitable research and I looked into the analysis of corporate donations.

We decided to merge these three constituents onto one platform that's win/win/win for (1) people, (2) charities and (3) corporations. My wife and I co-founded Pixhug with savings and then invited family and friends to invest. We spent a year fine tuning the business model. Pixhug was born in August 2016 and we launched in partnership with Variety as a sponsor at their Power of Young Hollywood event. It was a very successful soft launch.

It showed how quickly this can take on a life of its own. We worked with Variety and internet celebrity Cameron Dallas raising money for the Make-A-Wish foundation. Now, we're reaching out to more celebrities to partner with corporate sponsors. When celebrities support a cause it's exciting because their fans are usually spectators, but now they can work together by providing and promoting Facebook 'likes.'

Explain the structure of the platform:

Desanti: The key for us was to keep it simple. We didn't want to have to do too much educating.

We wanted to add purpose to the existing behavior of photo sharing. We use photos as a vehicle to send a positive message. A picture is worth a thousand words, but now a picture can be worth a thousand meals or a thousand blankets.

On Pixhug, Facebook, 'likes' translate into tangible, measurable results for those that need them the most. 'Likes' become a currency for social change and empower everyone to participate in making the world a better place, regardless of their financial means. We are a unique platform on the market that transforms social media into charitable donations.

At the core though, we are a marketing platform. For example, a corporation like Variety can reach 50,000 people for $5000 instead of just donating $5,000 directly to a cause. This is more purposeful sharing that allows more people to learn about the cause as well. Our fee to a corporation is 10% of the campaign goal and comes directly from the company, not the charity.

Facebook is a personal space that corporate brands want to participate in and the market is saturated. Marketing budgets are much larger than donation budgets, so Pixhug works well taking the marketing budget spend and turning it into exposure by adding social value to the donation/campaign. The company cost for doing this is minimum and it's a write a off through the marketing budget.

How does the app work?

Desanti: Pixhug is fully integrated on Facebook, it's available for download on iOS right now, android is coming soon.

Open the Pixhug app

Choose a campaign that you like

Click on Support the Cause tab

Take a picture

It will post on your Facebook page

Your friends see it and like it and contribute to to the awareness of the campaign while the corporate sponsor donates for each 'like'

The platform empowers everyone to be philanthropist. Once a charity's goal is met, the campaign is closed and the corporate sponsor sends the donation to the charity.

What were some lessons learned during startup?

Desanti: One of the biggest challenges for many entrepreneurs is finding the right team. We've had our struggles and setbacks with this as we moved from Europe to Vancouver to start the company. But we've overcome that and now have a great team. We plan on opening an office soon in L.A. to be closer to influencers who are so instrumental in growing the platform.

Since we are working with three different communities with different wants and needs, we utilized focus groups which was a fun process that provided useful constructive criticism. It's important to allow people to destroy the business model and see how it can't work; realizing all the ways it could go wrong was valuable. Silicon Valley's philosophy is that if you wait until something is perfect, you may have waited too long. So, we went to market with our MVP (minimum viable product) and are currently working on several iterations.



83% of people want a product from a company with a social component. People want to see companies become more socially responsible. Pixhug is launching a movement where we all come together and make a difference. We hope that if we can empower people to be compassionate and kind online that it will translate into offline behavior/kindness. This is a driving force behind our mission.

We completely remove the individual ask from charities. People can support a cause with a simple Facebook 'like' and charities are finding that users want to learn more about causes and will likely donate in the future.

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Talk about the other technology that you're adding to the platform:

Desanti: Charities utilize KPI (key performance indicators) for data analysis. A lot of charities spend marketing dollars to send a message to the masses instead of targeting the right people, it's very inefficient. Think about if a beer company is marketing to people who don't drink alcohol. We collect data and are working to improve on the KPI dashboards for charities so they can see donor growth and then pinpoint that specific market. We are building the backend to help charities reduce fundraising costs.

Pixhug provides analytics from basic dashboard but will soon introduce an entire SaaS platform where charities can purchase more analytics for approximately $20-$60 per month. This will provide real time monitoring of fundraising efforts and allow them to communicate more efficiently.

You set out to disrupt fundraising, how does it feel now?

Desanti: Yes, we wanted to disrupt fundraising. It should be disrupted; it should be more transparent, cheaper and accessible to everyone. We are focused more on corporate donations because marketing budgets are far greater than donation budgets and companies have more challenges reaching consumers and building brand equity. What better way to build brand equity than through spreading a positive message? That's the holy grail of any marketer who asks 'How do we get our consumers to talk positively about us?' Pixhug digitizes that to make it simple and affordable.

What are your goals for the next 12-18 months?

Desanti: Our goals are:

Take 10% of the corporate donations market in next 12 months, which means getting2 billion of the approximately20 billion donated by corporations to go through Pixhug. That translates to a lot of social engagement.

Launch that comprehensive analytics dashboard.

Ultimately, Pixhug will be like a dating site between corporations and charities to come together on a mutual project. We want to simplify this process for partnerships. The key is to have as many charities and corporations onboard where they can meet and collaborate.
2.Terrorism is not a religious issue. In essence terrorism is a political phenomenon regardless of its agents, targets, and techniques. Terrorism is not an individual endeavor - it is a group or communal activity trying to gain power. Also, a large majority of Islamic communities and groups who do not care for politics or for old political institutions do not participate in these attacks and do not justify them. Even all political Islamists do not use terror. However, Islamic terrorism is fully bound with a political agenda; it came from the USA plans to win Cold War (e.g. the Taliban) or came from local political organizations. Political philosophy of Islam always denounces taking power, even from a corrupt ruler, through rebellion. The latest development in political philosophy of Islam up to twenty century illustrated how to cope with various political systems. Muslim militias are the product of a mixture of Islam with modern ideologies including Marxism and Anti-imperialism. 3.The major terrorists are partially educated and criminal. To get an idea about this background, many Islamist leaders including Sayyid Qutab, Abul Ala Maududi, and the terrorists they inspire including Osama Bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawaheri are graduated from secular institutions, not a Madrasah, and are self-educated in Islam. They are known among Madrasah-educated as ignorant of the occasions of the Quranic revelation which affect the interpretation of the Quran. Moreover, more often members of terrorist groups of Muslims are half-educated people with a background in crime or at least alienated. I personally learned in Afghanistan that suicide attacks happen by Talibs who does not know how to practice daily prayers (Salat). 4.Islamic terrorism occurs under name of Islam. I call it Islamic for two reasons: first, they use Islamic sources and second, they call for a return to original Islam. Of course, in my view, like the perspective of a great majority of Muslims, they misuse many verses of the Quran and some Prophetic Traditions (Sunnah). Because of them, the Islamic slogan Allah Akbar is known everywhere and unfortunately immediately creates fear. Only look at their propaganda, for example an ISIS journal, to see this great abuse. However, Muslims need to transform not reinvent Islam, a transformation based on a human understanding of Sharia and an updated Islamic theology (Kalam), Islamic philosophy and Sufism. Denying these verses and narratives they use will not solve the problem; we have to encounter them and reinterpret them in terms of both the objectives of Shariah and the modern achievements in hermeneutics. 5.Muslims are the majority of victims of Islamic terrorism. Only a statistic from CCN correctly highlighted the majority of victims of ISIS are Muslims living outside Western countries, despite their frequent calls for attacks in Europe and the United States. It refers to The Global Terrorism Index 2015, DATA 2000-2014 showing that the number of western victims is only 2.6% of the total number of terrorism victims. We need only to look at what has occurred recently and is going on everyday in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Bangladesh. The honest and effective fight against terrorism must consider this sad reality and not discriminate between victims. 6.Islamic Terrorism appears as a saving force to Muslims. Most Muslim countries are under-developed, particularly with regards to humanities which constitute the foundations of modernity. They suffer from the problems of modernization. Look at the Persian Gulf countries; these oil-rich countries earn huge sums of money and are building a massive amount of infrastructure and buildings, they spend great sums of money on engineering and scientific education but ignore the humanities necessary for living the self-examined life. In Saudi Arabia women are not allowed to drive and many graduated women disappear after school. Iran which is proud of the humanities and its republican system does not consider Afghani refugees to possess the same humanity. Developed buildings are filled with undeveloped minds. This creates a crisis which terrorist groups use to create crises in other lands. It must be added that both traditionalists and Islamist groups spread nostalgia for the Golden Age of Islam. All these directly or indirectly help terrorist Islamists to grow and inspire an Islamic renaissance which would deconstruct modernity rather than construct society. They inspire hate rather than hope for all humanity and for Muslims who do not agree with them. 7.Terrorism is reactionary and requires mutual responsibilities to combat. Many forms of modern terrorism happened and still happen as a reaction to colonization and appear in the process of decolonization to fight Western imperialism. Advocacy of "The Philosophy of the Bomb" and the explosion of a bomb under Viceroy Irwin's train in 1929 by the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association and the apology for political violence by Franz Fanon are instances of that. Another example is Afghani Jihadists. At the same time, they enjoyed the support of the USA they spread hatred of the USA. However, colonialism is something historical for the Westerners but is a contemporary problem in Islamic societies. They still suffer from two Western policies: Western governments back corrupt governments in the region and the West applies their political agenda and interests under name of humanitarian objectives or great ideas like human rights. In the true fight against terrorism, the West needs to accept its role and take an honest part in solving the problem. 8. Both Muslims and Westerns suffer from essentialist perspectives. Many Muslims believe the nature of modern civilization in the West is atheism. They associate the West with a lack of moral values. Some even go further and equate it with an evangelical campaign of conversion. They believe these are the essential elements which shape the current West. On the contrary, many Westerners equate Islam with war and violent religion. Many consider Muslims to be fools who do not want to learn and change and who enjoy dictatorship. These essentialist views block the way for mutual dialogue and cooperation for the betterment of humanity and then reduce the connection to business and politics. 9.The majority of Muslims are silent on the topic of Islamic terrorism. Although many Islamic scholars speak out against terrorist attacks, it seems as if the majority of Muslims do not publically denounce the extremism of terrorism. We see few protests against ISIS and other terrorist groups. Even some positions taken by Islamic leaders against terrorist groups are viewed as political maneuvers rather than as true denunciations. Even though they do not support them, the masses of Islam do not denounce terrorists because of the memory and continuing problems of colonialism. Both Muslim leaders and the masses of Islam need to speak out against these Islamic terrorists. They need to tell others that terrorists are not achieving revenge but are destroying future generations. They must not ignore their responsibility to others due to the memory colonialism or out of fear of terrorists. 10.The fight against terrorism needs to pressure corrupt politicians instead of searching for an authentic faith. Western political leaders would do better to focus on corrupt and immoral leaders rather than try to reinterpret Islam. Western leaders need to change who they ally themselves with because many Middle Eastern leaders are skilled in using two faces. In public they agree with Western leaders on human rights and human dignity; however, they quickly forget those words when they rule their own lands. Working with corrupt politicians does not defeat terrorist Muslims but also embitters the future generations. How can a country which limits its political power to a single family be an advocate of human rights and democracy? How can a country which hosted Osama bin Laden and the Taliban be an authentic partner with the West in the fight against terrorism?
Candidates vying to be the next United Nations Secretary General debate in the General Assembly at U.N. headquarters in Manhattan, New York, U.S., July 12, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Segar TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY

This year's presidential campaign has touched on many topics, from private emails and private tax returns to immigrants and gun violence. But with the 2016 United Nations General Assembly underway in New York City this week, there has been next to nothing said about the UN or the role of the United States in that institution.

What we do know is that as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton urged the Congress to provide the funds for the United States to meet its financial obligations to the UN. We also know that in 2005 Donald Trump said he supported the UN, but in March of this year he said it "is not a friend of democracy" and "not even a friend to the United States of America."

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It is worth recalling that the UN was established in San Francisco in 1945, and no country played a larger role in drafting the UN Charter than the United States played. The UN's primary mission was to prevent, through intergovernmental cooperation, another calamity like World War II, especially after the failure of the League of Nations, which the United States never joined, decades earlier.

Over the past 70 years it has been painfully apparent that the UN is only as effective as the Secretary General, the 193 member states, and particularly the five permanent members of the Security Council, want it to be. Depending on one's point of view, the UN has become an unwieldy and wasteful bureaucracy and elitist debating society that adopts too many resolutions with little or no effect; or, to the contrary, it plays a crucial role in helping to prevent conflict and assist countries that have suffered from war or natural disasters, and to address global challenges such as caring for refugees and responding to climate change.

There is truth in both these perspectives. As former UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjold famously remarked, "The UN was not created to take mankind to heaven, but to save humanity from hell." It can also be said that the world as a whole, including the United States, has never needed the UN more than it does today. There are countless examples of this, like violent extremism that can lead to war. If we have learned anything from the debacles of Afghanistan and Iraq, it is that the naive use of military power can eliminate enemies in the short term, while making matters worse in the long term by igniting extremism, factionalism, and instability. There is no way that any country, including the United States, can effectively prevent or respond to the spread of extremist violence alone, any more than we can singlehandedly prevent the oceans from being polluted and depleted of fish, or control nuclear proliferation, or prevent the spread of contagious diseases in an age when dangerous viruses are only a plane flight away.

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Each year, these and other threats grow more complex in a world where billions of impoverished people, many of them ruled by repressive, corrupt governments, need access to electricity, education, jobs, and the right to freely choose their leaders. Meanwhile, many Americans, feeling ignored by Washington and reacting to a simplistic narrative that the United States is losing its predominance in the world, are turning inward.

The world is undeniably different today than it was in the late 1980s when we celebrated the collapse of the Soviet Union, when China was a country of farmers on bicycles, when climate change and ISIS were not global threats, and when North Korea did not have nuclear weapons. It now is a more complicated and dangerous world, a multipolar interdependent world, and it is harder to be confident about the future.

But while the UN is not yet the institution its founders envisioned, it has the potential to play a more proactive, catalytic role in conflict prevention, in equitable social and economic development, and in promoting and defending fundamental rights. It is a role the United States needs the UN to play, but it will only be possible if the UN's leadership puts forth a bold strategy of reform and an enhanced diplomatic role in pursuit of peace and building accountable government institutions, and if the next U.S. president sets an example for other member states by strongly supporting it.

In the weeks ahead, the UN will choose a new Secretary General, to replace the indefatigable Ban Ki-moon. It is a choice in many respects as consequential as our own presidential election. Never has the UN had a greater need for a confident and visionary leader with top-level executive, political, and international experience, a demonstrated commitment to human rights, and an understanding of the indispensable role the UN must play as a force for prevention - prevention of conflict, of discrimination, and of poverty, for sustainable development, for gender equality, and for the principles of humanitarianism. With the right person in charge who has the strong backing of the United States, the UN could finally fulfill its potential as the preeminent institution for promoting global peace and security that the world needs.
Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.

Morality cannot be legislated, but behavior can be regulated. Judicial decrees may not change the heart, but they can restrain the heartless.

A right delayed is a right denied.Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a man's sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the true with the false and the false with the true.

Martin Luther King Jr.

No one is born hating another person People must learn to hate and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.

Nelson Mandela

We can disagree and still love each other, unless your disagreement is rooted in my oppression and denial of my humanity and right to exist

James Baldwin

There is a fine line between free speech and hate speech. Free speech encourages debate whereas hate speech incites violence.

Newton Lee

The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil, but by those who watch them without doing anything.

Albert Einstein
Father Warren Hall is the former campus minister at Seton Hall University in South Orange, New Jersey. Fr. Hall says he lost his job as campus minister after posting a pro-NOH8 campaign message on Facebook. Shortly after this, Fr. Hall came out publicly as gay in an interview with OutSports. Most recently, Fr. Hall was suspended by the Newark archdioceses for supporting a Catholic high school counselor who was in a same-sex marriage. I reached out to Fr. Hall to discuss these and other topics in greater detail.

Q: Why did you support Kate Drumgoole after she was fired from her job as high school counselor at Paramus Catholic High School?

Warren: As someone who was fired from my school position unjustly, I immediately felt a connection to her even though we've never met.

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I feel that the injustice of Kate's firing lay in the fact that although she is living in a relationship not recognized by the church, so are any persons who are divorced and remarried, those who are cohabitating, among others. Not that I want to see this happen, but unless we see this action taken against them, then firing a LGBT employee is discrimination. If you single out a lesbian teacher, that's wrong. They have to maintain church teaching across the board. You can't pick and choose. That's not religious freedom, that's discrimination.

Fr. Peter Daly, when writing for National Catholic Reporter in May 2014, stated, "Sacramental heterosexual marriages are not threatened by the civil law's recognition of gay marriage." Do you agree with Fr. Daly's assessment?

Warren: I'm a gay man. If I wasn't a priest and I met somebody for me who was a soul mate, who I enjoyed being with, who had all the things somebody who is marrying looks for in a relationship, I'd want to be married. I'd want to have the ability to marry that person. I'm a priest, so I took a vow of celibacy. But how could I, with integrity, be against gay marriage if it's something, probably in a different circumstance, I would want for myself.

Now, am I saying the church has to bless it? Make it a sacrament? Then the answer to that is no. I don't know why the church has to be so negative towards same sex marriage. Same sex marriage has not threatened heterosexual marriage. As Fr. Daly said, the sky didn't fall. Just people who love each over now have that legal bond, that legal right.

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Last July, you wrote to Pope Francis asking him to address the concerns of LGBT Catholics. Do you think Pope Francis has taken steps to address these concerns over the course of his papacy?

Warren: Pope Francis has opened the door for dialogue. That is a BIG step and one that we haven't seen a pope take. Overall the ministry of Pope Francis seems to be aimed at outreach to all those who are on the fringe of the church; divorced, remarried and LGBT people being the most notable. Pope Francis also seems to be making changes in church personnel such as appointing bishops who share his ideas and sidestepping those who are slow to come on board.

Millennial Catholics appear to be overwhelmingly open and accepting of LGBT Catholics. Why do you think this is?

Warren: With the recent phenomenon of people "coming out" at an earlier age almost everyone can say they know someone or know of someone who is gay and that personal experience is what enhances and furthers acceptance.

After you were suspended, you said on Twitter that reforms are taking too long. What reforms would you like to see?

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Warren: In regard to LGBT people, I certainly want to see a more welcoming environment. This is already happening in many parishes but it has to come from the Church in general. The language that is used referring to LGBT is insulting and hurtful so that has to change.

You know, there was a time when Catholics only married Catholics. If you wanted to marry a Protestant, you had to be married in the rectory. We look back and we laugh. Now it's not even an issue. Who knows on the LGBT issue and other issues where we'll be in fifty years.

Do you have any advice for LGBT Catholics who feel marginalized and are looking for guidance?

Warren: My message has always been to stay connected to the church especially to parishes that are welcoming and nourishing your faith. Change is slow especially in the church but it's happening.

During these challenging times, where do you draw strength from?

Warren: Of course from my faith. Ever since I was a little kid I had this sense that God loved me and I still have that. When I realized that I was gay I still felt that God loved me. When I was fired from Seton and when I was recently suspended from priestly ministry I still feel that God loves me. The Archbishop may not, but God does.

What inspired you to become a priest?
This statement, endorsed by a growing list of doctors, neuroscientists, psychologists, researchers, and leading thinkers on the human - water connection was released as part of our commitment to the U.S. Department of State Our Ocean Conference in Washington, D.C. Please feel free to endorse and share it.

The Blue Mind Rx: Healthy, Wild Waters Can Be Lifelong Medicine for All People

Our wild waters provide vast cognitive, emotional, physical, psychological, social, and spiritual values for people from birth, through adolescence, adulthood, older age, and in death; wild waters provide a useful, widely available, and affordable range of treatments healthcare practitioners can incorporate into treatment plans.

The world ocean and all waterways, including lakes, rivers, and wetlands (collectively, blue space), cover over 71% of our planet. Keeping them healthy, clean, accessible, and biodiverse is critical to human health and well-being.

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In addition to fostering more widely documented ecological, economic, and cultural diversities, our mental well-being, emotional diversity, and resiliency also rely on the global ecological integrity of our waters.

Blue space gives us half of our oxygen, provides billions of people with jobs and food, holds the majority of Earth's biodiversity including species and ecosystems, drives climate and weather, regulates temperature, and is the sole source of hydration and hygiene for humanity throughout history.

Neuroscientists and psychologists add that the ocean and wild waterways are a wellspring of happiness and relaxation, sociality and romance, peace and freedom, play and creativity, learning and memory, innovation and insight, elation and nostalgia, confidence and solitude, wonder and awe, empathy and compassion, reverence and beauty -- and help manage trauma, anxiety, sleep, autism, addiction, fitness, attention/focus, stress, grief, PTSD, build personal resilience, and much more.

Chronic stress and anxiety cause or intensify a range of physical and mental afflictions, including depression, ulcers, colitis, heart disease, and more. Being on, in, and near water can be among the most cost-effective ways of reducing stress and anxiety.

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We encourage healthcare professionals and advocates for the ocean, seas, lakes, and rivers to go deeper and incorporate the latest findings, research, and insights into their treatment plans, communications, reports, mission statements, strategies, grant proposals, media, exhibits, keynotes, and educational programs and to consider the following simple talking points:



~ Water is the essence of life: The ocean, healthy rivers, lakes, and wetlands are good for our minds and bodies.

~ Research shows that nature is therapeutic, promotes general health and well-being, and blue space in both urban and rural settings further enhances and broadens cognitive, emotional, psychological, social, physical, and spiritual benefits.

~ All people should have safe access to salubrious, wild, biodiverse waters for well-being, healing, and therapy.

~ Aquatic biodiversity has been directly correlated with the therapeutic potency of blue space. Immersive human interactions with healthy aquatic ecosystems can benefit both.

~ Wild waters can serve as medicine for caregivers, patient families, and all who are part of patients' circles of support.

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~ Realization of the full range and potential magnitude of ecological, economic, physical, intrinsic, and emotional values of wild places requires us to understand, appreciate, maintain, and improve the integrity and purity of one of our most vital of medicines -- water.



The Blue Mind Rx includes (but is not limited to) swimming, board sports, floating, soaking, diving, boating, voyaging, fishing, paddling, interacting, beach and coast walks, wildlife watching, and other blue space activities as best practices for health and wellness.

Extending this conversation to new sectors, constituencies, and areas of research and educating the public about the true value of healthy, wild waters is of utmost priority.

As NASA scientists search the universe they use a simple mantra "Follow The Water", it is source, matrix, and sustenance of all known life.

Healthy waters also enhance our quality of life in many important ways.

A more complete understanding of the full value of the aquatic environment will build a stronger, deeper, wider, and enduring Blue Mind movement and underline the importance of restoration, conservation, and protection efforts.

By improving education about the health benefits of water and improving access for all communities, a healthy ocean and wild waterways can be lifelong medicine for all people.

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"I would rather not have to vote for her," he says, a "70-year old (sic) person with a long track record, unbridled ambition, greedy, not transformational, with a husband still dicking bimbos."

Yikes.

Powell is furious that Clinton kept trying to cite his purported advice as the reason she set up her disastrous private e-mail system.

"Dumb. She should have done a "Full Monty" at the beginning. She was using email when she took over. They put the personal system in the basement a few months later. The dinner was June 16th. She didn't need any advice or ok from me; she was already doing it. I gave her written guidance on why and how I had been doing it. I warned her staff three times over the past two years not to try to connect it to me. I am not sure HRC even knew or understood what was going on in the basement.

"Everything HRC touches she kind of screws up with hubris. I told you about the gig I lost at a University because she so overcharged them they came under heat and couldn't (pay) any (speaking) fees for awhile. I should send her a bill."

The Persian Gulf War hero who was wounded in Vietnam and earned six Distinguished Service Medals reports that most in his circle who know both Trump and Clinton detest Trump but also "intensely dislike" Hillary.
Tahrir SqaureEgypt's revolution was led by those for whom freedom was not a given but a dream.

When, in January 2011, young Egyptians took to Tahrir Square to demand the downfall of a dictator, Egyptian journalist and war correspondent Yehia Ghanem joined them, eager to understand what it was that drove these seemingly privileged young people to confront power. He joined their representatives as they embarked on negotiations with the government, he shared in their celebrations when Mubarak stepped down and he experienced their sorrow when the sentiments of the revolution were slashed with such tragic consequences for so many, finding himself standing trial in an Egyptian court. Read the rest of his series, Caged

Cairo, Egypt - 2009 to 2011 and beyond

I was at my son's school, waiting to talk to the headmaster, when I started a conversation with one of the pupils. He must have been 11 or so. "What would you like to be when you're older?" I asked him. It seemed a perfectly normal sort of question to ask a child.

He stopped to think before answering. "Hmm," he began. "When I grow up, I would like to be free."

It was 2009, a couple of years before Egypt's revolution, and I'd expected him to answer with "a doctor", "an engineer", or perhaps "a teacher". But "free"? I was shocked.

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In democratic countries, freedom is a given. But, in Egypt, it was something to aspire to, to dream of.

Freedom before food

It is often the aim of dictators to persuade those living under them that freedom is a luxury and that food, shelter and employment are, in fact, more important. But meeting such basic needs can never be guaranteed if you are not free and do not live in a free country.

When the Arab Spring began, it was triggered by young people who sought, first and foremost, freedom. They understood that only freedom could guarantee them food, shelter and the most basic right to life and physical safety.

When people spend their youths looking over their shoulders, fearing their country's security apparatus, and with little hope of making a living, it creates a lethal cocktail: hopelessness mixed with indignity.

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In Egypt, we could smell the revolution before it arrived. Poverty had reached unprecedented levels: at least 25 percent of people were living on less than $2 a day. It wasn't unusual to see people rummaging through dumpsters, waist-deep in rubbish, looking for something to eat.

We imagined that, when it came, the revolution would be led by the poor and the hungry.

So when, in the weeks before January 25, young upper class and upper middle class people filled their social media accounts with calls for a revolution, nobody thought much of it, least of all the government. The then president, Hosni Mubarak, mocked them in a speech addressing a rally of his National Democratic Party. "Let them entertain themselves a bit," he said, as the rally erupted into laughter.

January 25 seemed like any other day - but it wasn't. Tahrir Square was filled - not with the poor and underprivileged - but by young people who had attended the most prestigious universities and drove the best cars. But here they were, giving up their comforts and risking their lives to confront the country's 30-year dictatorship. From where did they get such conviction, I wondered.

Over the following days, I spent hours talking to them to find out.

"It's true we belong to wealthy families and have many comforts, and with the opportunity to attend the most expensive universities both here, in Egypt, and abroad," one graduate from the American University in Cairo told me. "However, we still feel the needs of the poor and underprivileged."

"Morally and ethically we must fight for those who have less," said another young man. "But that is not the only reason [why we are here]. Pragmatically speaking, if we turn a blind eye to our fellow Egyptians being victimised by a corrupt and tyrannical regime it will put our own lives at jeopardy sooner or later. If we turn our faces away from the agonies of the poor, those who represent the majority, it would not only be selfish but also self-destructive for when they explode, it will be hell."

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I expected these young people, surrounded by soldiers, to yield within a matter of hours. But they remained.

By midnight on that first day, when the security forces had severely injured scores of demonstrators, I again expected them to disperse. But, instead, they offered flowers to those who beat them.

READ MORE: Egypt's revolution through the eyes of Mohamed

As the night wore on, they never attempted to defend themselves, but rather reassured the soldiers that their aim was to defend them and their impoverished families. Two days later, after several demonstrators had been killed, they resorted to throwing stones at those who attacked them.

Within two days, tens of thousands of people had joined them.

Talking to the prime minister

On February 3, the government started to reach out to the young demonstrators. But their first encounter with a representative of the government was not, as is commonly believed, with General Omar Suleiman, the vice president and former minister of intelligence, but with Ahmed Shafik, the then prime minister. I'd helped to arrange the meeting, which took place at the Ministry of Civil Aviation, next to Cairo's airport, as the prime minister's office was located in Tahrir Square.

Fearing that they were facing annihilation as snipers started to target them, I told some of the demonstrators that I thought that they should compile their demands to present to the authorities. At first, they were opposed. Their only demand, they said, was that Mubarak should go.

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But, eventually, two or three of them agreed.

I knew a university professor who had intelligence contacts and who I thought might be able to put us in touch with the prime minister. I asked the professor to come to Tahrir to witness what was unfolding with his own eyes. He asked me if I could guarantee his safe passage. The demonstrators agreed. Within an hour, he was standing, shocked, in the middle of the square.

He put us in touch with the prime minister, who agreed to talk. But for two days, the demonstrators argued among themselves about whether to go. Some feared that they risked arrest if they left the square.

The prime minister assured them that they'd be able to return to Tahrir after the meeting, which began at 11pm and went on until 5am.

Those representing the demonstrators were firm in the face of the prime minister's demand that they end their sit-in. They would remain until Mubarak stepped down and took his corrupt officials with him, they explained. Shafik remained polite throughout.

Two further sessions of talks followed, but they, too, resulted in nothing.

After 18 days, the army, which was already unhappy with Mubarak's efforts to pass the presidency to his non-military son, forced his resignation. I was live on TV when the news came through. On the monitor before me, I could see the scenes from Tahrir: there was shouting and screaming, firecrackers going off. I burst into tears on camera and, unable to carry on, removed my microphone and headed back to the Square.

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With nothing but their determination, idealism and unity, the young demonstrators had withstood the police, the army as well as hired thugs to bring down a dictator. Even as some among them were killed and maimed, they remained peaceful but refused to relinquish their revolution, driven by their desire to shape their own futures and, in so doing, the future of their country.

Mistaking the man for the machine

But the demonstrators had mistaken the man for the machine, believing that in removing the dictator himself, they had also removed the system. They were soon proved wrong.

Within months, the dictatorship machine began rolling again: demonising the revolution, dashing hopes and carrying out massacres, forced disappearances and, eventually, convicting thousands of people on phony charges, sentencing some to death.

More than five years after the revolution, tens of thousands of people have been jailed, and Egypt is building new prisons to accommodate them all.

READ MORE: Inside Egypt's prisons

It sometimes seems as though the older generations of Egyptians, those who have lived for decades under a dictator, have forgotten what freedom tastes like and failed to fight for it.

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But I will always remember that 11-year-old boy whose dream for the future was simply that he would be free. There are many more like him. And they will have their way.


By Natasha Nesic, ZEALnyc Contributing Writer, September 16, 2016

No one enjoys returning to work after summer vacation. The leftovers of wanderlust sit chilling in the refrigerator of your soul. (Or the frigid air conditioning of your office.) Is there any chance for escape, when you've already used up your vacation time and Christmas seems too far off to be real?

Yes.

This fall's dance festivals allow you to tour worlds you've never seen -- all without leaving New York. So take a peek to see where you might want to go.

Movement to the People Dance Company performs La Ironia del Duende at the Making Moves Dance Festival in Jamaica, Queens on September 24. Award-winning choreographer Joya Powell invokes a dark, daring homage to Flamenco and Gypsy culture. The price is right--admission is free.

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New York City Center's Fall For Dance Festival features many familiar faces, including Alvin Ailey, American Ballet Theatre, alongside Hong Kong Ballet and Bangarra Dance Theatre. The 10-day festival runs from September 26 through October 8 and has five different programs for two performances each, so get your tickets pronto, since all seats are reasonably priced at $15. City Center, an active presenter for dance, will be bringing the Vail Dance Festival, the Netherlands Dans Theater, and Flamenco Festival 2017 in March of next year, among many others, so be sure to keep up with this venue's exciting programming.



Netherlands Dans Theater

The day after the opening of Fall for Dance at City Center, the Joyce Theater, New York's only dedicated venue for dance, opens their season with NY Quadrille - conceived and curated by Lar Lubovitch where he has commissioned four different choreographers to develop new works for the series. The Joyce season continues presenting some of the world's preeminent companies in week-long residencies.

Having been recently honored by First Lady Michelle Obama, the Dance Theatre of Harlem will appear in a special benefit performance on September 28 at York College in Jamaica, Queens for the Milton G. Bassin Performing Arts Center honoring former Director Matthew Katz and Arts in Christian Theater's Executive Director Beverly Ceasar. It's a "first annual event" so your presence will ensure you being a trendsetter.



Dance Theatre of Harlem

The dance world's equivalent of the Academy Awards are the Bessies (named for Bessie Shonberg) and the Brooklyn Academy of Music will host the 32nd annual celebratory event on October 18 this year. The pre-show "Angel Party" will be hosted at the nearby Mark Morris Studios and the afterparty at BRIC is free. Make your plans now.

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American Ballet Theatre

In the wake of an accidental flood in August, Ballet Hispanico defies tragedy and is set to take on the Apollo Theater on November 18-19. And soon after, the holidays are looking bright with the arrival of various productions of The Nutcracker, from the traditional Balanchine version presented by New York City Ballet to The Mark Morris Dance Group's wonderfully retro-modern The Hard Nut presented at BAM. Or if you've had enough Nutcrackers, you can always check out Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo when they arrive at the Joyce Theater December 13-31. The antics of the all-male company will be sure to end your year on an a high note, or should I say, en pointe!



Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo

_________________________________

Natasha Nesic is a Contributing Writer with ZEALnyc and writes about dance and fine arts.

For more of ZEALnyc's Fall Preview series read:
This year's 'Best of' goes to local
Music Publishing News Roundup: Friday, September 16, 2016

The European Commission will be reforming European copyright laws, and plan to force sites like YouTube to pay more to creators and rights holders. The plans also call for easier access to online content across all EU countries and to reform copyright rules for research and education.

Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the EC, said "I want journalists, publishers, and authors to be paid fairly for their work, whether it is made in studios or living rooms, whether it is disseminated offline or online, whether it is published via a copying machine or hyperlinked on the web."

 New advocacy organization SONA, Songwriters of North America, is suing the United States Department of Justice over consent decree decisions. Songwriters Michelle Lewis and Kay Hanley founded SONA in the Spring of 2015 to fight consent decrees, but their many attempts with other songwriter organizations to negotiate with the Department of Justice have mostly failed. The organization has now filed a complaint against the government based on how individual songwriters will be adversely financially affected, how collaborative relationships will be destroyed, and the havoc that will be wreaked within the licensing ecosystem.

 Indias government issued a memorandum clarifying that the internet is covered under Statutory Licensing provisions of the 2013 Copyright Act. This has brought relief to the countrys streaming services like Gaana, Saavn, and Wynk, and encourages global services like YouTube, Spotify, and Pandora to enter the market. The clarification makes it so music users can simply send a notice to rights holders and pay the rates set by the Copyright Board in order to use their songs, rather than being at the mercy of notoriously high rates set by the countrys societies, PPL and IPRS.

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A former South Dakota police chief has been accused of murdering his fiancee to collect over $900,000 in insurance money.Russell Bertram, 64, was charged Wednesday with first-degree murder in the October 2009 death of Leonila Stickney, 26, who was pregnant at the time. During the opening statements of the trial, prosecutors argued that Bertram also killed Stickney out of jealously. Purportedly, Bertram underwent a vasectomy and knew that the child could not be his.Bertram and Stickney began a relationship in 2009. Not long after, $750,000 life insurance policy was taken out on Stickney. Another small policy was taken out with a $150,000 accidental death benefit, with Bertram as the beneficiary.It was not until late last year that Bertram was charged. Court documents detailed that David Stickneythe victims estranged husbandreceived a letter months after her murder from a life insurer that was processing a claim from Bertram. David then contacted the South Dakota attorney general's office criminal division with the information in hand, helping launch an investigation into the matter that led to a murder charge last fall.Assistant Attorney General Mikal Hanson told the jury that Bertram changed his story in every interview, giving different accounts on how the gun was fired, when he found out that Stickney was with child, and what Stickney's last words were.Bertram asserted that he was storing his shotgun into his truck after a hunting trip in Gregory County when the weapon accidentally discharged and hit Stickney in the abdomen.On Wednesday, Bertram's defense team argued the case has nothing to do with jealousy and maintained that the insurance policy was Stickney's idea so that she could financially support her family back in the Philippines if anything happened to her.Mike Butler, one of Bertrams lawyers, told that court that court Bertram had sent money occasionally Stickney's family before he was arrested. Butler also said that the case had been thoroughly investigated at the time, with the authorities deciding against arresting Bertram.Court records noted that Bertram traveled to the Philippines after Stickney's death, marrying her sister Melissa del Valle. Melissa has since filed for divorce, citing Bertrams extreme cruelty as the reason.Butler said that there is no evidence to suggest that Bertram abused either woman. He, however, noted that Bertram did use Stickney's cellphone after her passing to send messages to the man he suspected got her pregnant. Butler upheld, however, that such a fact should not have any bearing on the case.As for evidence of moral conduct, I suppose some would argue as inappropriate, Butler remarked. I'm not here defending a morals case. I'm defending a murder case.
New York Assistant Attorney General David Ellenhorn asserted Tuesday that the state pressed on with its 11-year-old lawsuit against former American International Group Inc. ( AIG ) CEO Maurice R. Greenberg to send a warning to other executives that such fraud will not go unpunished.Ellenhorn told New York Supreme Court Justice Charles E. Ramos during the trials opening statements that Greenberg was "not your typical 91-year-old" as he explained in court why the state persisted in pursuing the case against the former CEO and his alleged conspirator, former AIG CFO Howard I. Smith.The state is seeking an order that prohibits Greenberg from working in the securities industry or as an executive for any public company. It is also seeking $53 million, which includes bonuses Greenberg received during the period he supposedly manipulated AIGs losses. Justice Ramos will decide the case without a jury.Assistant attorney general Ellenhorn elaborated that he wanted to send a message to other executives: "You cannot manipulate the books of a public company to give a false impression of your company."Both Greenberg and Smith are accused of manipulating AIGs accounting records in 2000 and 2001 to withhold from investors information that the company had sustained hundreds of millions of dollars in losses.Ellenhorn described Greenberg as "spry, active, vigorous" and even detailed that the man traveled recently to China and was running an investment advisory firm.Greenbergs attorney, David Boies, told the judge that Ellenhorn had not identified any witnesses or evidence to support his claims."He relied exclusively on hearsay and speculation," Boies asserted. "This case is devoid of any admissible evidence that ties Mr. Greenberg to anything."It was former Attorney General Eliot Spitzer that first brought a civil fraud case against the two back in 2005.According to Fox Business, AIG paid $1.64 billion in February 2006 in a settlement of civil fraud charges with federal and New York state authorities. The company apologized for deceiving investors and regulators with its ambiguous accounting practices which have spanned two decades.
Attorney Jody Lehrer provided a presentation on regulations and zoning related to medical marijuana dispensaries.

Adams Looks at Medical Marijuana Dispensary Process

ADAMS, Mass.  The Selectmen and Zoning Board of Appeals got a detailed primer on medical marijuana, zoning and state laws.



The joint session held at the Selectmen's workshop meeting Wednesday included a presentation by attorney Jody Lehrer of the Northeastern Institute of Cannibis and was prompted by discussions over the taxation potential of marijuana dispensaries.



Selectman Joseph Nowak brought the idea forth earlier in the summer and although some Selectmen questioned it, they all agreed that the town must have something on the books so to regulate a possible dispensary.



"What we are really looking at tonight is the zoning regulations, the state regulation and how an entity becomes a registered medical marijuana dispensary," Town Administrator Tony Mazzucco said at the public meeting held at the Visitors Center. "That is really what we need if the town wants to go forward and craft a zoning bylaw."



Lehrer briefly went over the history of medical marijuana in Massachusetts, which in 2013 became the 18th state in the country to legalize it when a ballot question received 63.3 percent of the vote.



As of this summer, there are 635 patients who are licensed to use medical marijuana. Adams itself has 34.



Lehrer said people can apply for hardship cultivation and grow from home in other parts of the country if they can prove specific difficulties in reaching a dispensary. Because there are only seven dispensers in Massachusetts, patients in Adams right now can grow their own marijuana under specifications without hardship cultivation approval.



"They can only grow in their primary residence in an enclosed locked facility that can be any room in the house, including a closet," she said. "It can be accessible only to the person or the caregiver."



Lehrer said communities can develop local laws and policies in regards to a dispensary.



"Municipalities have a role in adopting local laws controlling land, buildings and structures and that includes dispensaries," she said. "You can approve zoning regulations or a bylaw that control the development and operation of the dispensary as long as they are consistent with state law."



She said boards of health can adopt policies and regulations and communities can mandate that the dispensary license with the town and charge a fee.



Cities and towns really are not required to be involved at all and can solely rely on state Department of Public Health regulations.



But communities cannot prohibit home cultivation and accessory use, require registration of patients through the town, limit home cultivation to certain areas, require a special permit for home cultivation, prohibit home delivery or set buffer zones around home cultivation.



She said communities can set their own zoning or none at all.



"I have seen it range from 300 feet to 100 feet," she said. "Some of the setbacks I have seen are schools, churches, libraries, swimming pools, places that sell alcohol, [Alcoholics Anonymous] and [Narcotics Anonymous] meetings, sober houses and public housing."



If a community does not designate zoning, it adopts the default state 500-feet law that applies to schools and daycares or other places children meet regularly.



Lehrer said once a dispenser follows the long state approval and licensing process, a dispensary must meet very stringent testing standards and operational standards. She said the state is very thorough with testing.



Also, there is no advertising.



"You cannot have 'women get in free' night, you can't have promotions, you can't put fliers on the car windows, you can't have billboards," she said. "You can't have promotional material, you cannot use neon ever and you can't light up the outside of the dispensary more than a half hour before sundown."



She said products cannot be visible from the street and the name can't mention medicine, marijuana or anything related or allude to it.



ZBA member Peter West said he was recently in Denver and found that the dispensaries are discreet and actually hard to find in the downtown area. Colorado was the first to legalize recreational pot in 2012.
Southwestern Vermont Medical Center Hosts Blood Drive

BENNINGTON, Vt.  Southwestern Vermont Medical Center is hosting an American Red Cross Blood drive from 11:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 29, in its employee cafeteria.



This drive provides an opportunity to make a double donation of red blood cells. Red blood cells are the most frequently used blood component and are needed by almost every type of patient requiring transfusion. Double red cell donation is done with the help of a special machine which collects the red cells but returns most of the plasma and platelets to the donor. Choosing to donate double the red blood cells is a way to make a greater impact during a single donation. To learn more, search "double red blood cell donation" at www.redcrossblood.org.



In addition, Red Cross blood donor eligibility requirements have changed recently. Those who have been deferred from donating in the past are encouraged to check their eligibility again. The website www.redcrossblood.org has more information about eligibility. Potential donors can also call 1-800-RED CROSS for more information about whether they are eligible to donate.



To make an appointment to donate, visit www.redcrossblood.org, call 800-RED CROSS, or text bloodapp to 90999 to download the app to your smartphone. As always, walk-ins will be accommodated as well. Those who are unfamiliar with the SVMC campus may stop at the information desk in the main lobby for directions to the drive.
SVMC Nurse Named as Examiner for 2016 Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award

BENNINGTON, Vt.  Jennifer Fels, Southwestern Vermont Medical Centers director of utilization management and clinical documentation improvement and the director of Bennington Blueprint for United Health Alliance, has been named to the Board of Examiners for the 2016 Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award by the Commerce Departments National Institute of Standards and Technology. The Baldrige Award is the nations highest honor for organizational innovation and performance excellence.



Appointed by the NIST director, examiners are responsible for reviewing and evaluating applications submitted for the Baldrige Award. The examiner board is composed of more than 350 leading experts competitively selected from industry, professional, trade, education, health care, and nonprofit (including government) organizations from across the United States.



Those selected meet the highest standards of qualification and peer recognition, demonstrating competencies related to customer focus, communication, ethics, action orientation, team building and analytical skills. All members of the board must take part in a nationally ranked leadership development course based on the Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence and the scoring/evaluation processes for the Baldrige Award.


MCLA Welcomes 11 New Faculty Members

NORTH ADAMS, Mass.  Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts recently welcomed 11 new, full-time faculty members to eight departments on campus, including two associate professors, eight assistant professors, and one instructor.



Marisa Benson has joined the campus's Department of Biology as an instructor. A doctoral candidate in science education from Syracuse University in Syracuse, N.Y., her dissertation focuses on the use of capsaicin administration to attenuate atrophying skeletal muscle. This study employs the use of aging and disuse/reloading models to investigate whether capsaicin will preserve muscle, and the integrity and function of the muscle during periods of atrophy.



Benson comes to MCLA from Syracuse University, where she worked in the Laboratory of Skeletal Muscle Plasticity and Aging. She also served as an adjunct professor at Le Moyne College in Syracuse, N.Y. She holds her Bachelor of Science and Master of Science degrees from the University of Rhode Island in South Kingstown, R.I.



Eric Doucette, a botanist and plant systematist, has joined MCLA's Department of Biology as an assistant professor, and will teach ecology, biodiversity and botany. His research interests include the floristics of vascular plants and bryophytes, as well as lichenology and natural history.



Doucette received his bachelor of science degree and his Ph.D. from the University of Maine in Orono, Maine, where he worked on the systematics of the genus Amelanchier (serviceberries). The president of the Josselyn Botanical Society of Maine, he has worked as a professional consulting botanist/ecologist.



Tara Ferriter, MBA '13, has joined the College's Department of Business Administration and Economics as an assistant professor, and will teach courses in accounting. Licensed by the United States Department of Treasury as an enrolled agent, she also has published questions for the Special Enrollment Examination and continues to work with the Prometric company regarding the test's development.



Ferriter, who is the chief executive officer of Tarm Tax Services, and serves on the Landmark Credit Union Board of Directors, holds her bachelor's degree from the University of Phoenix and her Master of Business Administration (MBA) from MCLA.



D. Gilson has joined MCLA's English/Communications Department as an assistant professor. He primarily will teach classes in creative nonfiction and American literature, as well as cultural theory. He is the author of multiple published works, including "I Will Say This Exactly One Time: Essays" (Sibling Rivalry, 2015); "Crush" with Will Stockton (Punctum Books, 2014); "Brit Lit" (Sibling Rivalry, 2013); and "Catch and Release" (2012), winner of the Robin Becker Prize.



Gilson holds a Ph.D in American literature and cultural studies from George Washington University in Washington, D.C., and an master of fine arts degree in creative writing from Chatham University in Pittsburgh, Pa.



Anna Jaysane-Darr has joined the college's Sociology, Anthropology and Social Work Department as an assistant professor. She is a cultural and medical anthropologist who specializes in reproduction, medicalization, neurodiversity and refugee studies. Her recent projects include autism in the United States and South Africa, global public health interventions in behavioral health, and lab-based research on autism spectrum disorder etiologies and treatment.



Jaysane-Darr comes to MCLA from Tufts University in Medford, where she was a lecturer in anthropology and women's, gender, and sexuality studies, and from Worcester Polytechnic Institute's interdisciplinary and global studies program in Worcester. She received her bachelor of arts degree from New York University in New York City, N.Y., her master's degree from the University of London in London, England, and her Ph.D. from Brandeis University in Waltham. Her areas of specialty include cultural awareness, engaged education and global citizenship.



Erin Kiley has joined MCLA's Department of Mathematics as an assistant professor, and will teach a variety of mathematics classes on campus. For more than 10 years, her research has been in the broad realm of mathematical modeling and computer simulation of microwaves. Most recently, she wrote a mathematical model and corresponding multi-physics computer simulation of microwave sintering.
Burkett, the ceremonys principal speaker, is a professor of law at the University of Hawaii whose scholarship and activism focus on international climate justice, policy change, and adaptation for island peoples and the most vulnerable.

Williams College to Award Bicentennial Medals at Convocation

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass.  Williams College Bicentennial Medals will be presented at Fall Convocation on Saturday, Sept. 17, to Convocation Speaker Maxine A. Burkett, Class of 1998, and four other accomplished alumni.



President Adam Falk and College Council co-presidents seniors Michelle Baland Caitlin Buckley will welcome the Class of 2017 at Convocation, which formally launches the academic year. The event will begin at 11 a.m. in Chapin Hall after a formal procession.



Established in 1993 on the occasion of the colleges 200th anniversary, Bicentennial Medals honor members of the Williams community for distinguished achievement in any field of endeavor. This year's medalists are being recognized for their achievements in the broad fields of conservation, energy, environmentalism, and sustainability in conjunction with the 2016-17 campus-wide theme of inquiry, Confronting Climate Change.


The BSO's Mark Volpe, left, Michele Butler, Giovanna Fessenden, Cindy Bartlett and state Sen. Benjamin B. Downing pose at Thursday's Trendsetter event.

Trendsetter Winners Named at Celebrate the Berkshires Event

LENOX, Mass.  Seven individuals and organizations were feted on Thursday night as the this year's Berkshire Trendsetters.



The awards were presented at the sixth annual Celebrate the Berkshires event at Tanglewood before a crowd of more than 300 with state Sen. Benjamin B. Downing, D-Pittsfield, as master of ceremonies. The awards are a program of 1Berkshire.



The night's special honoree was Tanglewood, summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, for "Putting the Berkshires on the Map." Mark Volpe, managing director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, accepted the award.



Over the past 10 years, close to 3.5 million people have enjoyed the "Tanglewood Experience" and it has been a cornerstone in defining the Berkshires to visitors from all over the world. Volpe was given a one-of-a-kind, hand-crafted mobile from Joel Hotchkiss of Hotchkiss Mobiles Gallery in West Stockbridge, named, appropriately, "Overture."



The Berkshire Trendsetter Awards recognize the many different ways that people and organizations excel in several categories that showcase the Berkshires. After a comprehensive process of reviewing more than 120 quality nominations, 35 local companies and business leaders were selected as Trendsetter Awards finalists. Out of those 35, seven winners were announced at the event.



In the Creative Economy Standout category, BlueQ of Pittsfield was chosen for its vast array of interesting and unique products in addition to innovative approaches to business management, teamwork, and employee growth.



The city of North Adams received the Comprehensive Marketing Campaign award for implementing a successful year-round marketing campaign that rebranded the city and attracts visitors from all over the country by combining traditional, digital, and social tactics, and has resulted in increased visitation rates to North Adams and the Berkshires.


We work towards an equitable,

gender-just, self-reliant and

sustainable fisheries,

particularly in the small-scale,

artisanal sector

We work towards an equitable,

gender-just, self-reliant and

sustainable fisheries,

particularly in the small-scale,

artisanal sector

We work towards an equitable,

gender-just, self-reliant and

sustainable fisheries,

particularly in the small-scale,

artisanal sector

We work towards an equitable,

gender-just, self-reliant and

sustainable fisheries,

particularly in the small-scale,

artisanal sector
Retail continues to be one of the Philippines most dynamic industries, a leading economic growth driver buoyed by the robust consumer spending and a market that has become increasingly sophisticated. With local and global brands all vying for the attention of Filipino shoppers, success in the retail space may not only be determined by providing quality products and value for money, but also great customer sales experience.

The SMART Store Manager solution is one such offering from PLDT Enterprise that helps retailers enhance customer service delivery. It aims to improve the shopping process by enabling customers to check out their purchases assisted by store personnel deftly managing transactions through the mobile Point-of-Sale (POS) solution. SMART Store Manager also acts as a tablet-based menu, providing images that highlight the product or service customers are paying for, allowing them to fully appreciate the shopping choices they are about to make.

SMART Store Manager is one of the many solutions of PLDT Enterprise that aims to support Philippine enterprises in growing their business, said Gio Abaquin, Head for Digital Mobility, Disruptive Business Group (DBG), the emerging technologies business unit of PLDT Enterprise. Such innovative solutions let enterprises build their competitiveness, distinguish themselves from other industry players, and deliver superb shopping experiences to their customers.

Aside from enhanced customer experience, the SMART Store Manager also offers a range of benefits for enterprises operations-wise. Not only does it eliminate the need to invest in electronic registers or expensive software, it also frees up valuable store space -- usually taken up by cash registers -- to be used for other purposes such as merchandise display. Furthermore, the SMART Store Manager bundles the Mobile Application, Tablet, and SIM-based connectivity in one affordable package, so retailers can readily deploy their mobile POS in their stores.

With an engaging, user-friendly interface and reliable connectivity to ensure that customers enjoy seamless shopping, SMART Store Manager truly creates an enhanced and differentiated digital retail experience for todays Filipino consumer. added Chet Alviz, Head of SMACS (Social, Mobile, Analytics, Cloud & Security).

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Imperial Valley News Center

Energy Department Launches Up to $30 Million Effort to Improve Solar Module Materials

Washington, DC - The U.S. Department of Energy today announced a new Energy Materials Network (EMN) consortium, the Durable Module Materials (DuraMat) National Lab Consortium led by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). DuraMat is designed to accelerate the development and deployment of new, high performance materials for photovoltaic (PV) modules to lower the cost of electricity generated by solar power, while increasing field lifetime.

The Energy Departments SunShot Initiative will provide DuraMat with an estimated $30 million over five years, subject to appropriations. Leveraging these funds, DuraMat will utilize the expertise and capabilities of the national laboratories to develop innovative new materials for module components. The consortium will support materials-improvement projects in partnership with industry and academia to further optimize reliability and energy harvest of low-cost PV modules. Sandia National Laboratories, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory will join NREL as collaborators in the consortium.

The Energy Departments Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) in February announced the launch of EMN, an initiative crafted to give American entrepreneurs and manufacturers a competitive edge in the global race for clean energy. EMN focuses on tackling one of the major barriers to widespread commercialization of clean energy technologiesnamely, the design, testing, and production of advanced materials. By strengthening and facilitating industry access to the unique scientific and technical advanced materials innovation resources available at the Energy Departments national labs, the network will help industry bring these materials to market more quickly.

DuraMat is the latest EMN consortium created by EERE. Others already in progress are the Lightweight Materials Consortium (LightMat) on lightweight materials for various applications, Electrocatalysis Consortium (ElectroCat) on new catalysts for fuel cells, and Caloric Cooling Consortium (CaloriCool) on refrigerant materials for cooling applications. Three more consortia are anticipated to be announced in fiscal year 2017.

EERE envisions that dramatically accelerating the development of new PV module materials will clear the way for significant reductions in the cost of solar power. It is expected that DuraMat will lead to dependable, high-performance, low-cost PV module materials and architectures by:

Developing module technologies that will enable dramatic reductions in the levelized cost of energy from solar power.

Building a network of active collaborations from within the national laboratories, academia, and industry to design, develop, and deploy advanced module materials.

Moving highly promising module materials and technologies from early stages of research to successful deployment in the marketplace at an accelerated rate.

Overall, the EMN consortia will form a network of advanced materials R&D capabilities and resources that will support the Administrations commitment to revitalizing American manufacturing and maintaining a competitive edge in the clean energy economy. This effort supports the Presidents Materials Genome Initiative, which has been engaged in work to discover, manufacture, and deploy advanced materials twice as fast, at a fraction of the cost. EMN also supports the recommendations of the Advanced Manufacturing Partnership 2.0, a White House-convened working group of leaders from industry, academia, and labor, which highlighted the importance of producing advanced materials for technologies critical to U.S. competitiveness in manufacturing.
Navy Celebrates 2016 Hispanic Heritage Month

Washington, DC - The Navy joins the nation in celebrating the contributions of Hispanic Americans during Hispanic Heritage Month September 15-October 15.

This year, the theme "Embracing, Enriching, and Enabling America," represents Hispanic Americans walking together with those who share in the honor of calling this nation home.



"It is an honor for me to carry on the legacy of millions of Hispanic Americans who have gone before me in service to our nation," said Rear Adm. Moises DelToro III, deputy commander for Undersea Warfare, Naval Sea Systems Command and commander, Naval Undersea Warfare Center.



The observation began in 1968 as Hispanic Heritage Week under President Lyndon Johnson. In 1988, it was expanded by President Ronald Reagan to cover a 30-day period, paying tribute to the generations of Hispanic Americans who have positively influenced and enriched our nation and society. The unique dates of this heritage month were chosen to encompass the Independence Day anniversaries for Latin American countries Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Mexico and Chile.



"Throughout my career, I've been privileged to lead diverse teams of Sailors and civilians to design, operate, and maintain some of the most technologically advanced ships and systems in the world," said DelToro III. "Our Navy maintains its competitive advantage thanks to the professionalism and dedication of the combined team."



There are more than 57,000 Hispanic Sailors currently serving in the Navy and more than 16,000 Hispanic civilian employees working for the Department of the Navy (DoN). Making up a total of 15 percent of the Navy, 2.5 percent are serving as flag officers and 11 percent represent the E8-E9 leadership. Representation is present in every rank and in a wide variety of career fields to include fighter pilots, physicians, nuclear engineers, policy makers, boatswains and corpsmen.



Hispanic Americans have served at sea in every war of our nation's history. There are many Hispanic Americans that helped pave the way for some of today's current Hispanic leadership.



Senior leaders serving in the Navy today, who are Hispanic American, are:



Rear Adm. Moises DelToro III, Deputy Commander for Undersea Warfare, Naval Sea Systems Command and Commander, Naval Undersea Warfare Center, grew up in South Bend, Indiana and enlisted in the Navy in 1980. He was commissioned in 1987 and commenced his career as a submarine officer.



Rear Adm. Christina Alvarado, Commander, Reserve Component Expeditionary Medicine, is a registered nurse and has worked in the clincal areas of orthopedics, neurosurgery and intensive care. She was the first nurse to command Naval Reserve Expeditionary Medical Facility Dallas One, a commissioned unit whose mission is expeditionary medicine. In 2008 she launched a business consulting company focusing on health policy and strategy solutions in a dynamic market.



Rear Adm. Peter J. Clarke, Joint Task Force, Guantanamo, following an assignment as deputy director, Joint Interagency Task Force South. Clarke was born in Panama City, Panama, but grew up in Richmond, Virginia. He is a career submarine officer.



Rear Adm. Linda Wackerman, Deputy Naval Inspector General, was commissioned from Aviation Officer Candidate School and designated a naval aviator in October 1987. She is currently the vice-chairman for the Secretary of the Navy's National Navy Reserve Policy Board.



Rear Adm. Christopher Murray, commander, Naval Safety Center was commissioned from Aviation Officer Candidate School and designated a naval aviator in October 1985. He completed training in the F-14A Tomcat in October 1986.



The Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute provides printable posters, presentation, guidance for organizing observance, and education facts on their website, http://www.deomi.org/ under the section "Special Observances."
El Salvador's National Day

Washington, DC - Secretary of State John Kerry: "On behalf of President Obama and the people of the United States, I send best wishes to the people of El Salvador as you mark the anniversary of your nations independence.

"The United States values its abiding friendship and the close family and commercial ties that exist between our two countries. My government is firmly committed to working closely with you as El Salvador seeks to expand economic opportunity, strengthen its democratic institutions, increase the security of its people, and uphold the rule of law.

"Salvadorans have a richly deserved reputation for hard work, courage, resilience, and a commitment to social justice. On this Independence Day, as you come together to celebrate your country and its heritage; I offer my congratulations and warmest hopes for a safe and prosperous future."
Nicaragua's National Day

Washington, DC - Secretary of State John Kerry: "On behalf of President Obama and the people of the United States, I am pleased to congratulate the people of Nicaragua as you commemorate 195 years of independence on September 15.

"Independence Day is an opportunity for Nicaraguans everywhere to remember the men and women from past generations who have contributed to your proud nations history. Nicaragua is well known for its rich cultural diversity and for the energy and warmth of its population. In the United States, we understand and share your desire for a more prosperous, secure and democratic future.

"As you celebrate this special day, we offer our best wishes for a happy and successful year to come."
Ambassador Russell Travels to Saudi Arabia

Washington, DC - Ambassador-at-Large for Global Womens Issues Cathy Russell is on travel to Riyadh from September 1718.

She will meet with a range of business leaders, gender equality advocates, lawyers, and government officials, to discuss womens economic and political participation, as well as gender-based violence. The visit will explore how women increasingly play critical roles in the countrys economy, governance, health sector, and academic life.
Pakistan Fans are Rooting for India's Win Against South Africa in T20 World Cup With Memes
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The official trailer for the Fifty Shades of Grey sequel, Fifty Shades Darker, has beaten Star Wars: The Force Awakens to become the most watched trailer within the first 24 hours.

In just a single day, the first official trailer was watched 114 million times, beating out the sci-fi film by over two million, according to Universal.

Debuting on Wednesday, the view count includes multiple platforms, such as YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. According to the studio, the video uploaded to the official Facebook page garnered 2.5 million views in just one hour.

The majority of views came from outside the US, with 74.6 being from international markets, 39.4 million from the states, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Show all 24 1 /24 Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Dakota Johnson and Jamie Dornan as Anastasia Steele and Christian Grey during a Fifty Shades sex scene Chuck Zlotnick Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Dakota Johnson and Jamie Dornan kiss in a lift as Anastasia Steele and Christian Grey's love affair takes off Chuck Zlotnick Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Jamie Dornan as Christian Grey outside Grey Enterprises in Fifty Shades of Grey Chuck Zlotnick Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Anastasia Steele with Christian Grey in his offices in Fifty Shades of Grey Chuck Zlotnick Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Jamie Dornan and Dakota Johnson as Christian Grey and Anastasia Steele in her hardware shop Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey has just under 20 minutes of sex scenes Chuck Zlotnick Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Anastasia Steele (Dakota Johnson) with her mother Carla (Jennifer Ehle) in Fifty Shades of Grey Chuck Zlotnick Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Sam Taylor-Johnson, Jamie Dornan and Dakota discuss the filming of Fifty Shades of Grey on set Universal Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Oscar winner Marcia Gay Harden stars as Dr Grace Trevelyan Grey in Fifty Shades of Grey Chuck Zlotnick Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Anastasia Steele's best friend Kate, played by Eloise Mumford, in Fifty Shades of Grey Chuck Zlotnick Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Dakota Johnson lets out a brief moan in Christian Grey's bed Universal Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Christian cradles Ana Universal Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Dakota Johnson holds a pencil seductively as Anastasia Steele Universal Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Ana Steele and Christian Grey have an 'interesting' relationship Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Mr Grey will see you now: Christian Grey introduces Anastasia Steele into the world of S&M Universal Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Jamie Dornan and Dakota Johnson as Christian Grey and Anastasia Steele in a hardware store Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Jamie Dornan stars as protagonist Christian Grey Universal Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Dakota Johnson stars as Anastasia Steele Universal Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Christian Grey surprises Anastasia Steele in Fifty Shades of Grey Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Jamie Dornan and Dakota Johnson pictures together as Christian and Anastasia Universal Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Dakota Johnson stars as innocent student Anastasia Steelee Universal Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Rita Ora plays Christian Grey's sister Mia Universal Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Jamie Dornan as playboy billionaire Christian Grey Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Fifty Shades of Grey film stills Jamie Dornan stars as Christian Grey Universal

Fifty Shades Darker continues the misadventures of college student Anastasia Steele (Dakota Johnson), caught up in the covert sexual shenanigans of hunky business tycoon Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan), a man described both as a romantic hero and an abusive creep - depending on who you're talking to.

Of course, Fifty Shades of Grey abruptly ended with Anastasia leaving Christian after realising the pair are simply incompatible, though it's a separation unlikely to last; the sequel picking up with Christian's attempts to entice Ana back into his life, which she accepts under a new arrangement of her choosing.

However, their temporary bliss is interrupted by the return of shadowy figures from Christian's past; promising plenty of steamy drama, with the final film in the trilogy Fifty Shades Freed pitched for a 2018 release.

Fifty Shades Darker hits UK cinemas 10 February 2017.
Our September/October Annual Labor issue is printing now, and the full-color pdf has been sent to electronic subscribers. (Not a subscriber? Click here to subscribe.) We have posted our lead feature, Class Struggle By Other Means: Tennessee, Volkswagen, and the Future of Labor, by Chris Brooks, and also John Millers Up Against the Wall Street Journal column, Equal Pay Is Not So Equal.

This issue features a gorgeous cover collage and several interior illustrations by Brian Hubble.

Here is the pg. 2 editorial note from this issue:

If Youre Not Moving Forward, Youre Moving Backward

The U.S. labor movement has been in a rut for decades. Its problems, to be sure, are not all of its own making; it got into its predicament with no little amount of shoving from employers and the state. But the leadership of the official union movement has often been the movements own worst enemy.

Conservative business unionism, a lack of attention to or enthusiasm for new organizing, and a cozy relationship with employers and the state contributed to a long downward slide from the 1950s on. Over sixty years later, were still not out of the rut. The unions tactics of friendly relations with employers and government officials simply do not cut itnot even in industries that used to be union strongholds.

In this issues lead feature, Chris Brooks takes us to the auto industry, and the case of Volkswagen in Tennessee, against a backdrop of lavish government giveaways for companies and austerity for the working class. Instead of organizing aggressively around issues like the crushing pace of work, the United Auto Workers (UAW) staked itself on labor-management cooperation, loudly proclaiming its commitment to company competitiveness. Brooks calls for a more militant approach, based not only on facing up to conflict with employers and the government, but also on championing a broader agenda for the working class as a whole.

There are several other ways, highlighted in this years Annual Labor Issue, in which the labor movements future depends on its ability to adapt and fight in a changing industrial and political landscape.

Labor lawyer Ira Sills puts an encouraging piece of breaking newsthe National Labor Relations Boards recent ruling that graduate teaching assistants at private universities are, indeed, employees entitled to the protections of the National Labor Relations Actinto a broader historical context. As Sills points out, the NLRB became increasingly politicized from the 1980s on, especially with the appointment of anti-labor ideologues who were hell-bent on making things as hard on workers and unions as possible. The unions, accustomed to organizing within the NLRB election system, were not successful in finding other ways to organize. But the successes of graduate employee organization and public institutions and the struggles of graduate employees to organize at private institutions certainly provided some of the impetus behind the recent legal change.

The question of who is regarded as an employee has wider implications in the U.S. economy today, especially in light of the rise of contingent or gig employment. Economist Anders Fremstad looks at the reality of work today in one the highest-profile segments of the contingent labor marketsharing economy companies like Uber and Lyft. Fremstad argues that the sharing economy may work for underused physical assets (that, when lying unused, can be rented out at little cost to the owner), its a different story when it comes to labor time. Using even spare time for labor takes something away from the gig worker, and the huge slice of revenue that companies like Uber take off the top makes it very hard for sharing-economy workers to scratch out a living. Fremstad argues, instead, for alternative types of sharing economy enterprisessuch as public enterprises connecting workers with consumers, without the exploitive cut taken by private for-profit companies.

Jeremy Brecher tackles the question of labor and the vexing challenge of climate change. He outlines an appealing and feasible program, originated by the Labor Network for Sustainability, that would bring about needed reductions in greenhouse gas emissions while creating more robust job growth than a business as usual (fossil-fuel based) scenario. The aim is not just to defuse any possible labor oppositionfounded on the canard that environmental regulations are job killersto climate policy. It is also to create the foundation for a new relationship between the labor and environmental movements.

New visions for the labor movement like thesevisions of broad solidarity rather than narrow interest, of alternative economic institutions, of active struggle for a sustainable futureshow how labor can move forward again.

Also in this issue: John Miller on the gender wage gap, Arthur MacEwan on the supposed threat of artificial intelligence, Gerald Friedman on the bleak jobs picture, and more.
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When outsiders think of Sierra Leone on film, stock images come to mind: gun-running, blood diamonds, disease, poverty, corruption. In documentaries and in feature films alike, the portrayal of the country tends to be very downbeat. In Graham Greene adaptation The Heart Of The Matter, (1953) Trevor Howard played a colonial policeman in Sierra Leone driven to suicide. More recently, Sorious Samuras Emmy-winning Cry Freetown (2000) captured the horrific atrocities in the civil war of the 1990s. The 27-minute documentary is said to have influenced the UK to take military action in Sierra Leone.

As Samura notes, such films, even his own, provide only a very limited view of a country that used to be known as the Athens of West Africa and that has an extraordinarily rich cultural tradition.

Samura is part of a team currently preparing a major new documentary, Sierra Leone: An Artists Journey, which will look in depth into the countrys cultural history. The film, which Samura is producing and which is directed by Clive Patterson, will follow Sierra Leones most celebrated theatre director Charlie Haffner as he prepares and stages a hugely ambitious new play.

Emmy and Bafta award-winning filmmaker Sorious Samura, procucer of the new documentary (Clive Patterson)

Through theatre, Haffner is trying to reconnect the people of the country with their past and to enable them to make sense of the upheaval through which theyve lived in recent times.

It is very bold. The idea of doing a post-Shakespearian epic about the history of Sierra Leone is fascinating, enthuses the BBCs documentary supremo Nick Fraser, who is executive producing the project. What I hope from the project is that you will get some idea of Sierra Leone which isnt just the normal level of mayhem depicted in the international media.

There are some very big hurdles to be overcome first. For example, Sierra Leone doesnt actually have a single dedicated theatre venue.

Charlie has been one of the pioneers of theatre and culture in Sierra Leone, Samura says. He is one of the soldiers who has just kept pushing on and on, regardless of the lack of respect and lack of funding. He genuinely believes in art and in culture. He believes that is the one way you can empower a nation. He is one person who believes that if you neglect your culture, you are neglecting the people.

Haffner has been involved in theatre groups in Sierra Leone since the late 1960s. Samura first met him at the Methodist Boys High School in Freetown. Haffner had just left the school but came back as a teacher when Samura was a pupil. The two kept in touch and were both involved in the theatre company, Tabule. Samura realised quickly how street theatre helped bridge the gap between rival tribes.

Thanks to his documetaries such as Cry Freetown and Living With Hunger, Samura has sometimes been accused of (as he puts it) selling out to the West, of being a puppet of the West and of being used by the West to tell negative stories about Africa. Fellow journalists and politicians have attacked him for portraying the continent in such a negative light at a time when many of ts own citizens are fleeing to build new lives elsewhere. After Cry Freetown, when he travelled to Liberia to make a film about dictator Charles Taylor, he was arrested and tortured  and only finally released after Nelson Mandela intervened on behalf of him and his crew.

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Samura argues that such work simply articulated the concerns of ordinary people whove been confronted with corruption and calamity in their backyard. But that hasnt quite yielded the end goals and aims that I had wanted, the filmmaker reflects.

The new film promises to be very much more upbeat. The filmmakers are looking to find a way of telling the other story of Africa  of getting people to understand that there is another Sierra Leone, especially after Ebola. Samura and his fellow filmmakers are aiming to counter the stereotype of a country that cant look after itself, a desperate country, where people are waiting with begging bowls. I know that this is a beautiful country I grew up in and that I meet other people (from Sierra Leone) who are amazing. I think that if we can tell that other side, maybe investors and tourists can see this country differently and want to do business with this country.

Daniel Platzman of Grammy-award-winning band Imagine Dragons is composing an original score, combining locally sourced and recorded Sierra Leonean music with dramatic, percussive compositions for the film.

Part of the fascination of the documentary is that nobody knows just how Charlie Haffners epic play will turn out. Jonathan Ossoff, managing director and chief executive of Insight TWI (the outfit making the film, acknowledges that the project is very different from the usual current affairs, investigative filmmaking the company specialises in. The film is in pre-prdouction and starts filming in earnest in September. This is the most respected artist in this country taking on the most ambitious project in his life, really the magnum opus toward the end of his career, a work of theatre that can have a lasting impact on Sierra Leones cultural identity, Ossoff says of Charlie Haffners play.

Whatever happens, the filmmakers will be there to chronicle it. One prediction can safely be made. Their documentary will offer a very different vision of Sierra Leone to that found in any other move made in or about the country  and Samura wont be arrested for making it.

Sierra Leone: An Artists Journey will be released next year
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The person on everybody's lips following the 2016 Mercury Prize is deservedly grime artist Skepta who went away with the coveted prize at last night's ceremony (15 September).

The 33-year-old won for Konnichiwa beating albums released by Radiohead, Michael Kiwanuka and David Bowie.

Such is the format of the ceremony that each act takes to the stage to perform a track from their nominated record. In place of Bowie - who was nominated posthumously for Blackstar - was Michael C. Hall, the lead actor in Lazarus, the play filled with songs from the musician's back catalogue. The Dexter actor paid tribute to the artist with a haunting performance of the play's title track.

It was down to Pulp frontman Jarvis Cocker to announce the winner at last night's ceremony.

"If David Bowie was looking down on us here tonight," he said, "he would want the 2016 Mercury Prize to go to... Skepta."

Blackstar was released two days before Bowie passed away in January.

Following a popular run in the US, the production of Lazarus will be brought to London next month.
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Before Donald Trump appeared on Jimmy Fallon's The Tonight Show last night, the host was widely expected to mock the Presidential candidate.

However, during the segment, Fallon asked whether he could mess up Trumps hair, to which - after seconds of deliberation - he agreed, allowing the Tonight Show host to ruffle his combover.

While intended to be funny, the segment was lambasted on Twitter, many accusing Fallon of humanising the controversial figure and being overly nice to him.

Jimmy Fallon inviting Trump on is part of the normalising of hate, wrote Mike Signorile. Should be ashamed of himself. Lost all respect from me.

Tweeters also questioned how Fallons house band The Roots were reacting to Trump appearing on the show, the band having so far not spoken about the guest slot.

London mayor Sadiq Khan recently spoke out against Trump, saying how the candidate is playing into the hands of Isis.

"Donald Trump said that Muslims from around the world - I'm paraphrasing - would not be welcome into the United States of America. Not only does that show a lack of understanding and awareness of the great country that is the USA and its history and legacy, it's also inadvertently playing into the hands of Daesh and so-called Isis because it implies it's not possible to be a Western liberal and mainstream Muslim.

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

Trump previously said that London is so "radicalised" that there are areas where the Metropolitan police are "afraid for their lives".
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If bedtime is a battle, an excellent pair of PJs may well be the answer to getting your kids excited for bed. Whether its a cool print, glow-in-the-dark touches or simply a soft and snuggly fabric, the perfect childrens pyjamas need to have a decent amount of kid appeal, whether its for sleeping or lazy Saturday mornings at home.

PJs are an essential buy for every family and there are certain things worth paying attention to if you want to find a pair that lasts. Fabric quality is hugely important  you want pyjamas your child will feel comfy in all night long, so 100 per cent cotton is always a winner. Every pair of PJs in our round-up has received the thumbs up from our little testers for comfort  its guaranteed, itch-free fabric only from here on in!

When there are kids involved, you need to pick pyjamas that are easy to pop into the machine and ones that wash well, with minimal to no shrinkage or bobbling of the fabric.

Often, its worth spending a little more to get great quality pyjamas that can be passed down from sibling to sibling  with this in mind, unisex designs are always a safe bet. To get the most wear out of each pair of PJs, look for stretchy fabric, drawstring waists or foldable cuffs, that can grow with your child.

Read more:

How we tested

Our two-and-a-half-year-old and five-year-old testers tried many different pairs of pyjamas over the course of a month, to help us create this round-up of the very best kids PJs out there. Paying special attention to comfort, fabric softness, how easily and well they washed, the pattern or design and, most importantly, which pairs our testers picked out for themselves most nights, these are the pyjamas we think are really worth buying.

The best kids pyjamas for 2021 are:

Best overall  Polarn O. Pyret heart print kids pyjamas: 26, Polarnopyret.co.uk

 Polarn O. Pyret heart print kids pyjamas: 26, Polarnopyret.co.uk Best personalised pyjamas  My 1 st Years personalised red check pyjamas: 32, Myfirstyears.com

 My 1 Years personalised red check pyjamas: 32, Myfirstyears.com Best traditional pyjamas  Annafie horse carousel pyjamas: 45, Annafie.com

 Annafie horse carousel pyjamas: 45, Annafie.com Best for softness  Mori snoozy pyjamas: 32.50, Babymori.com

 Mori snoozy pyjamas: 32.50, Babymori.com Best value pyjamas  Next snuggle pyjamas, 3 pack: 23, Next.co.uk

 Next snuggle pyjamas, 3 pack: 23, Next.co.uk Best glow in the dark pyjamas  JoJo Maman Bebe spacedog glow-in-the-dark pyjamas: 17, Jojomamanbebe.co.uk

 JoJo Maman Bebe spacedog glow-in-the-dark pyjamas: 17, Jojomamanbebe.co.uk Best gender-neutral pyjamas  MarMar Copenhagen sleepwear set: 31, Smallsmart.co.uk

 MarMar Copenhagen sleepwear set: 31, Smallsmart.co.uk Best for younger children  Kidly organic pyjamas: 20, Kidly.co.uk

 Kidly organic pyjamas: 20, Kidly.co.uk Best pyjamas for a good cause  Scamp & Dude x Young Lives vs Cancer pyjamas: 28, Scampanddude.com

 Scamp & Dude x Young Lives vs Cancer pyjamas: 28, Scampanddude.com Best stylish pyjamas  Lola & Blake floral disco classic pyjamas: 39.95, Lolaandblake.co.uk

 Lola & Blake floral disco classic pyjamas: 39.95, Lolaandblake.co.uk Best for fun prints  Frugi polperro pyjamas: 26, Welovefrugi.com

Polarn O. Pyret heart print kids pyjamas Best: Overall Rating: 10/10 Made from GOTS (Global Organic Textile Standards) cotton, with a hint of elastane for a bit of stretch, these super-soft pyjamas won our five-year-old tester over. In fact, it was a struggle to convince him to wear normal clothes rather than hang out playing Lego in these PJs all day, they were that comfy. Often prone to overheating in the night, these pyjamas kept our tester cosy without the need to kick the duvet off mid-sleep, thanks to the excellent quality fabric. Theres also no scratchy label at the back of the neck to contend with, which was a welcome touch. Coming in sizes that span two years in age (from one to 12-years-old), we really rated the foldable cuffs around the wrists and ankles, which meant our tester (a little tall for his age) could wear the 6-8 years size comfortably, but with plenty of extra growing room. A little detail like this adds a serious amount of longevity, aligning with Polarn O.Pyrets dedication to sustainability and to creating clothes with a long lifespan, designed to be passed down. It also makes them great value for money. Available in a choice of six prints, we loved the cute heart pattern, especially as you can buy a matching pair in adult sizes (which we can confirm are a dream to wear)  perfect for a bit of family outfit twinning. Buy now 26 Polarnopyret.co.uk {{#hasItems}} Price comparison {{#items}} {{ merchant }} {{ price }} Buy now {{/items}}

My 1st Years personalised red check pyjamas Best: Personalised pyjamas Rating: 8.5/10 The traditional red tartan design of these pyjamas really appealed to us (serious nostalgic, festive vibes), but our toddler tester was most impressed by the fact they had her name on them. You can choose to have up to 12 characters embroidered in white onto the pyjama top, for free, making these an excellent, personalised Christmas present, from 6-month-olds and up. Although these are button-down PJs, you dont have to worry about faffing about with doing these up when getting your youngest dressed  we found the top easy to slip over our testers head with just the top button undone, thanks to the loose-fitting cut. The elasticated waist of the trousers gives a comfortable fit, and the 100 per cent cotton fabric is delightfully soft. We were pleased that these didnt lose any of their initial softness after washing (you can machine wash at 40 degrees), in fact, the only downside is that these stop at size 5-6 years. Buy now 32 Myfirstyears.com {{#hasItems}} Price comparison {{#items}} {{ merchant }} {{ price }} Buy now {{/items}}

Annafie horse carousel pyjamas Best: Traditional pyjamas Rating: 9/10 These Annafie childrens pyjamas really are a thing of beauty. From the classic cut and 100 per cent fine cotton fabric, down to the exquisite hand-embroidered carousel design, these are pyjamas youll want the kids to show off. We really love Annafies approach to sustainability, making everything in small batches, with the smocking and embroidery all done by hand by Madagascan craftswomen, and  in their own words  with longevity at the core of the designs and materials. Theres no doubt that these are pyjamas made to last and to be passed down. The quality is undeniable and the care thats gone into every little detail, like the fabric covered buttons and piped edges, is clear. The loose-fitting style and light fabric made these PJs super-comfy to wear. Our little testers loved the cute carousel detail, but it was the fact these pyjamas have pockets that really gave them hero status  every toddler needs pockets to carry random objects around in, even at bedtime. Buy now 45 Annafie.com {{#hasItems}} Price comparison {{#items}} {{ merchant }} {{ price }} Buy now {{/items}}

Mori snoozy pyjamas Best: For softness Rating: 8.5/10 Quite possibly the softest pyjamas in the world, this snuggly pair from Mori are exactly the kind of thing you want next to your baby or toddlers sensitive skin. The fabric is the brands signature mix of organic cotton and bamboo, which is naturally breathable and helps to regulate your childs temperature as they sleep, making them a great choice whatever the time of year. With sizes going from newborn up to six years, these are really designed with babies and toddlers in mind and include poppers around the neck in designs up to two years. Oddly we did find it a little tricky to pop our two-and-a-half-year-old testers head through the normal 3-4 years size, which we felt was a little small, but apart from that the fit was perfect, with plenty of growing room. Our little tester thought the design on the PJ top was very cute and she loved wearing these to bed each night  there was a lot of stroking of pyjamas and sooo soft from our toddler, so they definitely get the thumbs up when it comes to comfort. Mori also offers a sleep club subscription service, where you can receive new sleepwear each month, tailored to your kids age and size. A great gift idea for new parents who have enough to think about! Buy now 32.50 Babymori.com {{#hasItems}} Price comparison {{#items}} {{ merchant }} {{ price }} Buy now {{/items}}

Next snuggle pyjamas, 3 pack Best: Value pyjamas Rating: 9/10 Whats better than a pair of dinosaur pyjamas? A pack of three, thats what. Nexts multi-pack snuggle pyjamas have gained cult status among parents for offering excellent quality at a really good price. With a thick cuff around the waist, ankles and wrists, these snuggle-fit PJs are easy for children to get on and off themselves, and they dont lose their shape or softness no matter how many times they end up in the washing machine and tumble dryer. Available in sizes that run from nine months up to 12 years, these pyjamas come in a huge choice of patterns, with this dinosaur trio declared as very cool by our five-year-old tester. The bold, monochrome dinos mixed with the bright colours of the pyjamas make these kid-friendly, and we appreciated the more unusual colour scheme of ochre, burnt orange and teal, which made a nice change from the usual primary colours youd expect. Starting at just 23 for a set of three pyjamas, you really cant go wrong. Buy now 23 Next.co.uk {{#hasItems}} Price comparison {{#items}} {{ merchant }} {{ price }} Buy now {{/items}}

JoJo Maman Bebe spacedog glow-in-the-dark pyjamas Best: Glow in the dark pyjamas Rating: 8.5/10 Pyjamas that actually glow in the dark? Yes, you heard that right! When we received these pyjamas our five-year-old was hopping around desperate for bedtime so he could put them to the test. After previous fails with supposedly glow-in-the-dark clothing, we had relatively low expectations, but after holding these pyjamas up to the light for a few seconds we were so impressed with how glowy they actually were when the lights went out. The glow-in-the-dark element works perfectly with the space dog print and the kid appeal is very strong with this pair of pyjamas. Thankfully, as well as ticking all the boxes for our young testers, these PJs ticked ours too. The natural cotton fabric offered plenty of stretch and our tester thought they felt really comfy as he bombed around the house. Machine washable and suitable for tumble drying, they wash well and hold their size  we didnt notice any shrinkage at all. Buy now 17 Jojomamanbebe.co.uk {{#hasItems}} Price comparison {{#items}} {{ merchant }} {{ price }} Buy now {{/items}}

MarMar Copenhagen sleepwear set Best: Gender-neutral pyjamas Rating: 8.5/10 The perfect antidote to the many heavily-gendered kids pyjamas on sale, this offering from cool Danish label, MarMar Copenhagen are a fantastic bedtime staple. Made from Oeko-Tex certified material (so you know theyre free from any nasties and produced sustainably), these modal and cotton pyjamas are incredibly soft to touch, as well as managing to feel lightweight and cosy at the same time. We loved the simple, pared-back ribbed design, which would work well for kids of all ages. Our five-year-old loved the feel of these and even used them as thermal layers under his clothes on a snow day. In all honesty, these could quite easily work as daytime basics too, as they dont look overly like pyjamas, making them a handy multi-use addition to your childs wardrobe. We wouldnt mind a pair ourselves. Buy now 31 Smallsmart.co.uk {{#hasItems}} Price comparison {{#items}} {{ merchant }} {{ price }} Buy now {{/items}}

Kidly organic pyjamas Best: For younger children Score: 8.5/10 These cool pyjamas are a great choice for bedtime, as well as snuggling on the sofa watching a film or playing with toys on a slow Sunday morning. Made from 100% GOTS-certified cotton, theyre cut in a closer-fit style, meaning your child can be comfy and cosy, without any restrictions. They come in sizes six months up to five years and are available in nine different patterns, designed to be mixed and matched together. This is such a clever idea, especially when youve got a child whos prone to covering their PJ top in breakfast and ends up wearing the strangest combination of pyjamas on a regular basis. We tested the stripy set, which our two-and-a-half-year-old tester thoroughly approved of. We found these fitted true to size, with plenty of stretch and managed to keep our little tester warm on the coldest night of the year so far. Buy now 20 Kidly.co.uk {{#hasItems}} Price comparison {{#items}} {{ merchant }} {{ price }} Buy now {{/items}}

Scamp & Dude x Young Lives vs Cancer pyjamas Best: Pyjamas for a good cause Score: 10/10 British brand Scamp & Dude is known for its colourful, lightning bolt-print clothes and accessories, as well as its dedication to supporting childrens charities. These special edition kids pyjamas are made from soft, organic cotton and feature the signature lightning bolt as part of a fun, smiley face print. Available in either pink or electric blue, each with a neon pink print, they run from age one to 13 years, and there are also matching adult pairs if you want to get in on the action. Our five-year-old tester adored the smiley face print and said the lightning bolts made him feel like a superhero, and you cant get higher praise than that! While they, without a doubt, look amazing, feel soft and are fantastic quality, what we love most about these is that for every pair sold, Scamp & Dude will donate 5 to Young Lives vs Cancer, helping children and their families dealing with a cancer diagnosis. Buy now 28 Scampanddude.com {{#hasItems}} Price comparison {{#items}} {{ merchant }} {{ price }} Buy now {{/items}}

Lola & Blake floral disco classic pyjamas Best: Stylish pyjamas Score: 10/10 Have you ever seen a cooler pair of kids pyjamas? Lola & Blake is all about designing colourful and creative gender-neutral nightwear for children (and adults), that are to be worn, loved and passed down  and we are obsessed! The hand-illustrated print on these floral disco pyjamas is something else; packed full of intricate detail, it manages to seamlessly combine all kinds of flowers, in a riot of colour, with butterflies, bugs and sparkly disco balls. Our two-and-a-half-year-old had a great time pointing out all the things she could find each time she wore these. We can also confirm that, crucially, they did not restrict our toddlers moves during a kitchen disco. Made from pure cotton, these lightweight pyjamas have pearlized buttons down the front, electric blue piping and a pocket on the PJ top (hooray). The cut is relaxed, with a drawstring waist to make sure you get the perfect fit. You can buy matching adult pyjamas, as well as some gorgeous quilts if you want to go all out with your coordination at bedtime. Theres also the option of getting your pyjamas personalised with embroidery. Buy now 39.95 Lolaandblake.co.uk {{#hasItems}} Price comparison {{#items}} {{ merchant }} {{ price }} Buy now {{/items}}
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I am sitting at Andre Brinks desk. I am using Andre Brinks computer to write this. I am sitting next to Andre Brinks tough yet vulnerable young widow, Karina, at the old colonial-style Brink home in a leafy part of Cape Town. It was probably pure chance that she happened to mention Rule 3010 (from a poem by Finuala Dowling), Dont sleep with married men.

Good rule, I said. I sure as hell try not to.

Last year, she had been speaking publicly about Flame in the Snow, the love letters between Andre Brink and the poet Ingrid Jonker, but people said they wanted her story. Now she has just finished writing her memoir with the title, The Fifth Mrs Brink. The story is a myth that happens to be real. Or, as Jeanne-Marie Jackson, a visiting professor from Johns Hopkins University, suggested to me, ''its more literary than literature''.

Old writer, young wife. There was a moment that dramatised the age difference. We were all sitting around a table and Leon de Kock, who is writing the authorised biography, The Love Song of Andre P Brink, was telling me about Brinks adventures in Paris in 1963 and Karina chipped in, 'When my father was aged 6'

In 1977, Elvis Presley died; Star Wars came out; and Karina Magdalena Szczurek was born. Twenty-nine years later, in June 2006, Karina married Andre, aged 71. They had met in 2004 when the grad student went to collect the revered outlawed South African writer, author of A Dry White Season, at Vienna airport. He was wearing jeans and a leather jacket and didnt look old. She had hair down to her waist, he had hair, short and wavy. She knew his work well and had once read his post-apartheid novel The Rights of Desire in a single sitting. Now she and the author began to fall in love on the train to Salzburg, corresponded from afar for the next nine months. He sent her Umberto Ecos On Beauty. She wrote an essay about his An Instant in the Wind, a love story involving a runaway slave and a white woman, in which she wrote that 'whether something happens or not is not the issue, what is most important is the possibility and the faith in the chance of its happening''. A full-blown romance in Paris followed.

They had 10 years together, making a home in South Africa, but travelling all over the world to attend literary conferences, never apart. Then, in February 2015, on a plane high over Africa, Andre Brink dropped dead, aged 79. With Karina right there on the plane too, next to him. She watched him die. She was only 38. She had landed in what she called 'the foreign country of grief''.

Andre and Karina in Cape Town in 2006 ... they had 10 years together before he died

Which is when I got to know her. It was not Andre Brink that brought us together but Jack Reacher, Lee Childs immense fictional hero. Her husband had ceased to exist. Karina espoused Jack Reacher instead. He didnt exist either, of course. And is therefore impossible to kill off. She wrote that 'I reached out to Killing Floor [the first in the series] at a time in my life when everything had become difficult, including breathing. And to stay alive, I need reading as much as I need breathing.' It turned out she and Reacher had a coffee habit in common, and a certain passion for numbers and chronology. Karina quickly started consuming Reachers the way she drank coffee. With an addictive fervour.

Her diary records that on 22 April she spent the entire morning in bed with Reacher and that 'I have fallen for this guy, big time''. The works of Lee Child came to fill the void her husband had left behind. Reacher was, in effect, a surrogate partner. A stand-in. One who would never die, on a plane, over Africa. Lee Child in New York got wind of his most evangelical convert in South Africa. He laughed at the idea of Reacher as a perfect husband ('He would keep running off and coming back home a mess. And he would never mow the lawn either.') But in late 2015 he sent Karina a signed copy of Make Me and I threw in a copy of my book about the making of Make Me, Reacher Said Nothing.

Karina called it the 'Christmas miracle'. Nine months later, I was in Cape Town for the Open Books festival and she was speaking to Lee Child in New York via video link and thanking him for saving her. There is a line in her novel, Invisible Others, where a character picks up a book like a lifeboat after a shipwreck.

Born in Poland, Karina became a refugee and a nomad, studying at different times in Salzburg and Aberystwyth, picking up languages as she went. She liked going to foreign countries. 'Nobody knows me here, I can do anything,' she thought to herself when she arrived in a new place. It was her postgraduate study of Nadine Gordimer that brought her into contact with Andre Brink. He had recently divorced his fourth wife. As his biographer Leon de Kock put it, 'he was on a life-long quest for marriageable romance''. He was also a 'fanatical narrativist'.

His journals are a treasure-trove for the biographer. In 1968 alone he filled four 250-page notebooks with his neat, tight handwriting. Typing with one finger, this was the same year in which he broke two typewriters, and then 'he borrowed one from a woman and he broke that too''.

'The typewriter or the woman?' said Karina. She had a point. Sex, politics, and literature were intimately intertwined for Brink. 'Narrative was his meat and bread,' de Kock said. Likewise sexual love. 'By his own admission he had chronic sexual need.' He would seek an outlet in the red light districts of Paris and Amsterdam. At school he was 'too intense, too fevered'. Girls shied away from him and he 'married the first woman who would have him'. But she was 'sexually withholding'.

Then he found Ingrid Jonker. Jonker was his Brigitte Bardot, who embodied the brave new world of sexual freedom. His personal sexual revolution led him to turn his back on Grahamstown, where he taught at Rhodes University, colonial, provincial, Calvinist, racist, repressive, where even dancing was prohibited. He and his wife had to pray before sex. Then, with Jonker, 'everything explodes'. Henceforth, he revolts against religion and apartheid and the whole South African system. His books are gloriously banned. ''We are dealing with a man who spent his entire life looking for romantic love in a loveless world,' said De Kock, and here he looked across the table at Karina. 'And he died in its embrace.'

Andre and Karina in Austria: the romance began on a train to Salzburg

The Fifth Mrs Brink gives us insights about Brink that perhaps only a partner could. The word chocolate appears three times on the first page of her manuscript by way of homage to the lifelong chocoholic that was Brink. He had a habit of ordering desserts in restaurants first. He was also a fan of jelly and custard, and something of an expert in making creme brulee. As a kid, he once spent all his accumulated pocket money on a confectionery binge with some idea that he would thereby overcome desire. A few days later he was craving chocolate yet again. A valuable lesson about the nature of desire. Sublimation and self-repression never made any sense to him. Life was all about the fulfilment of desire, even if you might feel a little sick about it afterwards.

Another inescapable theme of the book is the twilight of the idol. The waning of Brinks powers, physical and intellectual. He never really recovered from knee surgery and ended up in a wheelchair. Like the rest of us, he was slowly but surely losing his mind. In writing his last completed book Philida, he was struggling so much to keep track of his own plot  in two languages (Brink would always write in English and Afrikaans)  that they printed out hundreds of pages and spread it all out on the floor in the living room until it all made sense. Towards the end, he was in excruciating pain. When he died on the plane, it was like the death of the High Lama in Lost Horizon. It was 'semi-voluntary', a way of 'letting go'.

''We did everything we wanted to do together,' Karina reflects and recalls one incident which illuminates their married life. They had just returned from a trip to Switzerland. At 4am on a Sunday Karina woke up convinced that Rudolf had vanished. Rudolf is a two-inch high cuddly toy, 'half-dog, half-bear, half-guardian angel' that she carries around with her in a pouch she knitted herself. Andre spent the next two hours searching the house high and low without complaint before Rudolf turned up tucked into the side pocket of a case. Karina burst into tears, partly for the return of Rudolf but also because she realised, 'this man really loves me''.

One of the things I did in Cape Town was to go shark cage-diving. You are lowered into the water and the sharks circle around you eyeing you up. Being a young and attractive widow in Cape Town (or anywhere else), it occurred to me, is a little like that. Every now and then, if you stick a hand through the bars, you are going to get nibbled. In fact, lets face it, this metaphor is unfair, because there are other predators a lot worse than sharks, and they pretend to be nice before coming in for the kill.

Andre and Karina with her brother (left) and her parents (right)

But I do not fear for Karina Szczurek. There is something of the Jack Reacher about her. She only looks fragile. Aged 12, back in Austria, she warned an older boy who was bullying her that he had better stop. He didnt. So Karina punched him on the nose. The sight of blood 'gave her endless satisfaction''. One of her favourite words is 'integrity', which she finds exemplified in the world of Andre Brink, Lee Child, and George Lucas. She is wearing BB-8 ear-rings, modelled on the droid in the new Star Wars film. And she too wants to set the world to rights.

She is a great numbers freak. She is in love with 28. Conversely, she refuses to send out any article or book whose word count contains the number 17. She has to stir sugar in coffee 8 times and only 8. And she often has to wait to send an email at a particular hour. But above all she is self-confident enough to write The Fifth Mrs Brink. She doesnt mind appearing to subordinate herself to her husbands name, because (a) she doesnt in fact feel the least bit subordinate and (b) she can then 'surprise everyone by not being a Polish bimbo'. She started a new novel, Fake Lives, on September 1.

I went back to Andre Brinks desk before I left their house. There were three things on it that seemed to me to triangulate Brinks life. One, a coaster emblazoned with a picture of Marilyn Monroe. Two, a miniature Declaration des droits de lhomme, 1789; and, lastly, a copy of Albert Camus novel, The Outsider, where Brink has underlined the sentence in Camus own afterword, describing the book as 'the story of a man who, without any heroic pretensions, agrees to die for the truth'.
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The British government has signed a 30 million deal to build a laser cannon before 2019.

The Ministry of Defence is spending the money as part of its Innovation Fund thats aimed at creating the weapons of the future. That same fund is paying for research into cutting edge anti-missile systems, tiny insect-inspired surveillance drones, quantum gravitational detectors, advanced protective materials, and airborne threat-targeting laser weapons, according to a government statement.

The new Laser Directed Energy Weapon (LDEW) will initially be developed as a prototype, to be ready in 2019. The aim will be to show how that laser weapon technology can be used in the future.

Gadget and tech news: In pictures Show all 25 1 /25 Gadget and tech news: In pictures Gadget and tech news: In pictures Gun-toting humanoid robot sent into space Russia has launched a humanoid robot into space on a rocket bound for the International Space Station (ISS). The robot Fedor will spend 10 days aboard the ISS practising skills such as using tools to fix issues onboard. Russia's deputy prime minister Dmitry Rogozin has previously shared videos of Fedor handling and shooting guns at a firing range with deadly accuracy. Dmitry Rogozin/Twitter Gadget and tech news: In pictures Google turns 21 Google celebrates its 21st birthday on September 27. The The search engine was founded in September 1998 by two PhD students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, in their dormitories at Californias Stanford University. Page and Brin chose the name google as it recalled the mathematic term 'googol', meaning 10 raised to the power of 100 Google Gadget and tech news: In pictures Hexa drone lifts off Chief engineer of LIFT aircraft Balazs Kerulo demonstrates the company's "Hexa" personal drone craft in Lago Vista, Texas on June 3 2019 Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures Project Scarlett to succeed Xbox One Microsoft announced Project Scarlett, the successor to the Xbox One, at E3 2019. The company said that the new console will be 4 times as powerful as the Xbox One and is slated for a release date of Christmas 2020 Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures First new iPod in four years Apple has announced the new iPod Touch, the first new iPod in four years. The device will have the option of adding more storage, up to 256GB Apple Gadget and tech news: In pictures Folding phone may flop Samsung will cancel orders of its Galaxy Fold phone at the end of May if the phone is not then ready for sale. The $2000 folding phone has been found to break easily with review copies being recalled after backlash PA Gadget and tech news: In pictures Charging mat non-starter Apple has cancelled its AirPower wireless charging mat, which was slated as a way to charge numerous apple products at once AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures "Super league" India shoots down satellite India has claimed status as part of a "super league" of nations after shooting down a live satellite in a test of new missile technology EPA Gadget and tech news: In pictures 5G incoming 5G wireless internet is expected to launch in 2019, with the potential to reach speeds of 50mb/s Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Uber halts driverless testing after death Uber has halted testing of driverless vehicles after a woman was killed by one of their cars in Tempe, Arizona. March 19 2018 Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures A humanoid robot gestures during a demo at a stall in the Indian Machine Tools Expo, IMTEX/Tooltech 2017 held in Bangalore Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures A humanoid robot gestures during a demo at a stall in the Indian Machine Tools Expo, IMTEX/Tooltech 2017 held in Bangalore Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Engineers test a four-metre-tall humanoid manned robot dubbed Method-2 in a lab of the Hankook Mirae Technology in Gunpo, south of Seoul, South Korea Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Engineers test a four-metre-tall humanoid manned robot dubbed Method-2 in a lab of the Hankook Mirae Technology in Gunpo, south of Seoul, South Korea Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures The giant human-like robot bears a striking resemblance to the military robots starring in the movie 'Avatar' and is claimed as a world first by its creators from a South Korean robotic company Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Engineers test a four-metre-tall humanoid manned robot dubbed Method-2 in a lab of the Hankook Mirae Technology in Gunpo, south of Seoul, South Korea Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Waseda University's saxophonist robot WAS-5, developed by professor Atsuo Takanishi Rex Gadget and tech news: In pictures Waseda University's saxophonist robot WAS-5, developed by professor Atsuo Takanishi and Kaptain Rock playing one string light saber guitar perform jam session Rex Gadget and tech news: In pictures A test line of a new energy suspension railway resembling the giant panda is seen in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures A test line of a new energy suspension railway, resembling a giant panda, is seen in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures A concept car by Trumpchi from GAC Group is shown at the International Automobile Exhibition in Guangzhou, China Rex Gadget and tech news: In pictures A Mirai fuel cell vehicle by Toyota is displayed at the International Automobile Exhibition in Guangzhou, China Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures A visitor tries a Nissan VR experience at the International Automobile Exhibition in Guangzhou, China Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures A man looks at an exhibit entitled 'Mimus' a giant industrial robot which has been reprogrammed to interact with humans during a photocall at the new Design Museum in South Kensington, London Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures A new Israeli Da-Vinci unmanned aerial vehicle manufactured by Elbit Systems is displayed during the 4th International conference on Home Land Security and Cyber in the Israeli coastal city of Tel Aviv Getty

Building the prototype will allow the government to see how the system can find and track targets, and its expected that it will work over land and water and in an array of different weather conditions, the government said. It also said that it will be precise enough for people to shoot it without putting themselves in danger from engaging with enemies.

That laser weapon would be able to sit alongside or replace traditional weapons, the government said. It might used at sea to stop ships being fired at by missiles for instance, or deployed on land to stop soldiers from being fired at by enemy mortars.

The laser cannon was the headline part of a new 800 million Innovation Fund that the government hopes can be used to build new technology for the army. Other parts of that plan include a decoy system that can be used to send out radar emissions and confuse missile systems to send them somewhere else, and a special tablet that can be used to transmit medical data in real time.
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Apple has been ordered to pay about 12bn yen (89m) in taxes for improperly reporting income associated with its Japan iTunes unit, according to reports.

The news comes weeks after the EU hit Apple with a record 11bn tax penalty, ruling its 25-year sweetheart deal with Ireland was illegal.

Apples unit in question has reportedly paid the amount that was asked by the Tokyo Regional Taxation Bureau.

The tax authority argued that the iTunes unit, which sends parts of its profits earned from fees paid by Japanese subscribers to another Apple unit based in Ireland, had not been paying a withholding tax on these earnings in Japan, according to local broadcaster NHK.

It was not immediately clear when the bureau issued the penalty or when Apple agreed to pay it, and the tech giant did not respond to a request for comment.

The EU has been a strong critic of multinational companies such as Apple, Starbucks and Fiat Chrysler that have benefited from keeping their money overseas.

The move allows these companies to avoid paying hefty taxes they could face by bringing the money back to the US.

 EU orders Apple to pay up to 13 billion euros tax to Ireland

European Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, in charge of competition policy said that EU member states cannot give tax benefits to selected companies, after Apple was ruled to pay 11bn in tax to Ireland last month. This is illegal under EU state aid rules. The commissions investigation concluded that Ireland granted illegal tax benefits to Apple, which enabled it to pay substantially less tax than other businesses over many years, she said.

In fact, this selective treatment allowed Apple to pay an effective corporate tax rate of 1 per cent on its European profits in 2003 down to 0.005 per cent in 2014.

Tim Cook, Apples chief executive, said the Ireland tax ruling was total political crap and maddening.

10 of the biggest tax havens in the world Show all 10 1 /10 10 of the biggest tax havens in the world 10 of the biggest tax havens in the world Luxembourg There are an estimated 2.5 trillion shares of mutual funds registered in the Grand Duchy, 1 trillion of which cannot be traced to an owner 10 of the biggest tax havens in the world Cayman Islands The Cayman Islands contain 6% of the world's total banking assets, but just 0.000008% of its population 10 of the biggest tax havens in the world Isle of Man David Cameron has said the Isle of Man, where there is no corporation, capital gains or inheritance tax, should not be considered a tax haven 10 of the biggest tax havens in the world Jersey There are over 3.5 billion assets per square mile on the self-governing Channel Island 10 of the biggest tax havens in the world Ireland Ireland made headlines last year when it emerged Apple was registered in the country in order to dodge over 40bn in taxes 10 of the biggest tax havens in the world Mauritius The Mauritian government notionally charges corporation tax, but companies can easily make this back through generous tax credits for foreign businesses 10 of the biggest tax havens in the world Bermuda Google holds more than 30bn in offshore cash reserves, primarily via Bermuda 10 of the biggest tax havens in the world Monaco A popular domicile for super-rich private individuals, Monaco has the most expensive property in the world. 1 million will buy just 225 square feet 10 of the biggest tax havens in the world Switzerland Switzerland has such secretive banking laws that it took until the 1990s to secure the release of Nazi cash reserves 10 of the biggest tax havens in the world Bahamas David Cameron's father ran an offshore fund which hired Bahamas residents to complete paperwork, thus dodging British tax bills

Apple and Dublin plan to appeal the ruling, arguing the tax treatment was in line with EU law.

Theresa Mays new government fuelled the debate over tax avoidance saying it would welcome any company to the UK just hours after the EU announced the Apple decision.
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Deutsche Bank shares slumped after receiving a $14 billion (10.6 bn) claim from the US Justice Department to settle an investigation into the firms sale of residential mortgage-backed securities, a figure the German lender said its not willing to pay.

Deutsche Bank has no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited, the company said in a statement early Friday in Frankfurt.

The negotiations are only just beginning. The bank expects that they will lead to an outcome similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts.

Chief Executive Officer John Cryan, 55, has struggled to boost profitability by selling risky assets and eliminating jobs as unresolved legal probes and claims add to concerns that the lender will be forced to raise capital.

Reaching a mortgage deal would clear a major hurdle for Deutsche Bank, which has paid more than $9 billion in fines and settlements since the start of 2008, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

While this number seems very large, its obviously a first negotiation point, Chris Wheeler, an analyst at Atlantic Equities, told Francine Lacqua on Bloomberg Television. Theres going to be an awful lot of management time spent on it to get to a sensible number.

Deutsche Bank dropped as much as 8.2 per cent and was down 6.7 per cent at 12.22 (10.41) at 11:23 am in Frankfurt.

Other European lenders probed in relation to residential mortgage-backed securities also declined, with UBS Group down 2.2 per cent and Credit Suisse slipping 4.4 per cent.

Royal Bank of Scotland dipped 2.9 per cent, while Barclays fell 1.8 per cent.

The banks 1.75bn (1.49bn) of 6 per cent additional Tier 1 bonds, the first notes to take losses, fell 5 cents to 78 cents on the euro, the biggest drop since the UK voted to leave the EU. Deutsche Banks 650m of 7.125 percent notes fell 5 pence to 81 pence on the pound, also a record fall.

They are dropping like a stone, said Tomas Kinmonth, a credit strategist at ABN Amro Bank in Amsterdam. The fine, even if reduced, could surpass all provisions held by the bank.

DOJ Negotiations

Germanys largest lender confirmed that it had started negotiations with the Justice Department to settle civil claims the US may consider over the banks issuing and underwriting of residential mortgage-backed securities from 2005 to 2007. The Wall Street Journal reported the $14bn claim on Thursday.

Bank of America paid $17bn to reach a settlement in a similar case in 2014, the biggest such accord to date. Goldman Sachs agreed to a $5.1bn settlement with the US earlier this year, including a $2.4bn civil penalty and $875m in cash payments, to resolve US allegations that it failed to properly vet mortgage-backed securities before selling them to investors as high-quality debt.

The settlement included an admission of wrongdoing.

The Justice Department, in concluding previous investigations into the sale of mortgage-backed securities that soured during the financial crisis, typically has presented initial penalties higher than what banks ultimately paid, people familiar with those negotiations have said. The sides may negotiate over the final tab, as well as what conduct the bank will acknowledge and whether individuals will be sanctioned.

Pushing Back

Justice Department spokesman Peter Carr declined to comment on the negotiations.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. analysts wrote in a note to clients earlier Thursday that a settlement of about $2.4bn would be taken very positively, and that an agreement exceeding $4bn would pose questions about Deutsche Banks capital positions and force it to build additional litigation reserves. The lenders common equity Tier 1 ratio, a key measure of financial strength, was at 10.8 per cent at the end of June.

In defense of protecting its shareholders money, Cryan is well within his rights in negotiating a more equitable and just settlement with the US government, and calling this one a punishment thats several orders of magnitude greater than the crime, said Tony Plath, a finance professor at the University of North Carolina. Plath expects a final settlement of about $4bn to $5bn.

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Getty Biggest business scandals in pictures Rogue trader A French court cut the damages owed by rogue trader Jerome Kerviel from 4.9bn (4.2bn) to just 1m (860,000). The court ruled on that Kerviel was partly responsible for massive losses suffered in 2008 by his former employer Societe Generale through his reckless trades. Kerviel has consistently maintained that bosses at the French bank knew what he was doing all along. AP Biggest business scandals in pictures Barclays CEO under investigation for trying to identify whistleblower - Monday Paril 10 Authorities have launched an investigation into Barclays chief executive officer Jes Staley for trying to identify a whistleblower, the bank said on Monday. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) are both investigating Mr Staley after the bank notified them that Mr Staley had tried to identify the author of two anonymous letters, which were sent to the board and a senior executive in June 2016. 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Mark Johnson, global head of foreign exchange cash trading in London, was reportedly arrested on Tuesday. He will appear before a federal court in Brooklyn on Wednesday charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, Bloomberg said. Getty Biggest business scandals in pictures Former PwC employees found guilty in 'Luxleaks' tax scandal - June 2016 Two ex- PricewaterhouseCoopers staffers were found guilty in Luxembourg of stealing confidential tax files that helped unleash a global scandal over generous fiscal deals for hundreds of international companies. Antoine Deltour and Raphael Halet face suspended sentences of 12 months and 9 months and were ordered to pay fines of 1,500 (1,230) and 1,000 (822) for their role in the so-called LuxLeaks scandal. Despite the minimal sentences, the ruling was described by Deltours lawyer as shocking and a terrible anomaly. The ruling puts on guard future whistle-blowers, Deltour told reporters.The LuxLeaks revelations sped beyond Luxembourg, causing European Union regulators to expand a tax-subsidy probe and propose new laws to fight corporate tax dodging, while EU lawmakers created a special committee to probe fiscal deals across the 28-nation bloc. Reuters Biggest business scandals in pictures Goldman Sachs dealmakers lavished Libyan officials with prostitutes to win contract - June 2016 A former Goldman Sachs dealmaker trying to persuade Gadaffi-era Libya to invest $1 billion with the investment bank procured prostitutes and invited Libyan officials to lavish parties in the hope of winning the business, the High Court heard on Monday June 13.The Libyan Investment Authority sovereign wealth fund is suing Goldman Sachs for inappropriately coercing its naive staff into giving its sovereign wealth fund cash to the bank to invest in products they did not understand. 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A Swiss criminal investigation into the pair is ongoing. Getty Biggest business scandals in pictures Libor fraudster City trader Tom Hayes, 35, has become the first person to be convicted of rigging Libor rates following a trial at London's Southwark Crown Court. Hayes worked as a trader in yen derivatives at UBS before joining the American bank Citigroup in Tokyo. He was fired from Citigroup following an investigation into his trading methods. He returned to the UK in December 2012 and was arrested following a two-and-a-half year criminal investigation by the SFO. Getty

Settlement Goal

Cryan has said that he aims to settle major outstanding legal issues as soon as possible as part of his wider overhaul. Deutsche Bank had 5.5bn euros set aside for settlements and fines at the end of June, with Chief Financial Officer Marcus Schenck saying in July that the lender will probably face material litigation charges in the second half.

In addition to the US mortgage investigation, Deutsche Bank faces litigation and regulatory probes relating to issues such as foreign-currency rate manipulation and precious metals trading. The German bank is a party to 47 civil actions concerning the setting of interbank lending benchmarks, according to its 2015 annual report published in March.

Obviously I dont like this amount, its too high and it seems that with every settlement, the DOJ wants to get more from European companies, said Andreas Domke, a portfolio manager at Allianz Global Investors, which owns shares in the lender. Its good that Deutsche Bank is pushing back.

 2016 Bloomberg L.P
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A Swedish appeals court has upheld a detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

Mr Assange is wanted by prosecutors in a rape investigation stemming from his visit to Sweden in 2010.

The decision made by the Svea Court of Appeal on Friday means the arrest warrant stands for the 45-year-old Australian, who has avoided extradition to Sweden by taking shelter in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since 2012.

Mr Assange denies the rape allegation and has challenged the detention order several times.

Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade Show all 12 1 /12 Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade Edward Snowden NSA leak Articles in The Guardian revealed that the US and the UK spied on foreign leaders and diplomats at the 2009 G20 summit. Reuters Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade WikiLeaks' US diplomatic cables leak In 2009, former US soldier Chelsea Manning, downloaded hundreds of thousands of classified US Government documents, and passed them on to Jullian Assange's whistleblowing website WikiLeaks. Among the documents were 250,000 State Department diplomatic cables. One disclosed the close relationship between Russian President Vladimir Putin and then-Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, the Guardian reported. Allegations included "lavish gifts", lucrative energy contracts and the use by Berlusconi of a "shadowy" Russian-speaking Italiango-between. Getty Images Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade WikiLeaks' US diplomatic cables leak WikiLeaks' US diplomatic cables leak: In a revelation which bruised the UK's 'special relationship' with the US, WikiLeaks published conversations by US commanders criticising Britain's military operations in Afghanistan. Getty Images Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade WikiLeaks' US diplomatic cables leak WikiLeaks' US diplomatic cables leak: One document disclosed startling levels of corruption in Afghanistan, including an incident involving the then vice-president, Ahmad Zia Massoud, who was reportedly stopped and questioned in Dubai when he flew into the emirate with $52m in cash. Getty Images Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade WikiLeaks' US diplomatic cables leak Another cable documented fears in Washington over Pakistan's nuclear weapons programme, in a volatile country with a strategic position in the Middle East. PA Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade WikiLeaks' US diplomatic cables leak Day four of the gradual drip of leaks exposed allegations that Russia and its intelligence agencies are using mafia bosses to carry out criminal operations, with one cable reporting that the relationship is so close that the country has become a "virtual mafia state". Getty Images Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade Edward Snowden NSA leak In 2013, The Guardian published classified US National Security Agency (NSA) documents, from a then anonymous whistleblower. Four days later he was exposed as former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. A month after the initial leak, the New York Times allegeded that the NSA received emails, video clips, photos, voice and video calls, social networking details, logins and other data held by a range of US internet firms. Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade Edward Snowden NSA leak Since Snowden revealed that the US had eavesdropped on German Chancellor Angela Merkel's phone, German-US relations have been strained. In May 2014, Mrs Merkel said still had significant differences with the United States over surveillance practices and that it was too soon to return to business as usual," according to the New York Times. Getty Images Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade Edward Snowden NSA leak On 7 June, The Guardian published the Presidential Policy Directive 20, whcih included a list of potential targets for cyber-attacks by the US Government. Rex Features Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade Samy Kamkar iPhone and Android expose In April 2014, hacker and researcher Samy Kamkar revealed that Android phones collect user location data every few seconds. Files are then transited to Google several times an hour. Getty Images Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade Samy Kamkar iPhone and Android expose It is believed Apple and Google are using the data to better target adverts to smartphone users, according to The Guardian. Getty Images Whistleblowing controversies of the last decade Samy Kamkar iPhone and Android expose The two companies have since justified the collection of data. In a letter to the US congress Apple confirmed it collected the data and said that, in order to be useful, "the databases [of tower and network locations] must be updated continuously". A Google spokesman told the Guardian Android phones explicitly asked to collect anonymous location data when users turned them on. Getty Images

It is unclear whether he will make an appeal against the decision to the Supreme Court.

Upholding a lower court ruling, the appeals court said Swedish prosecutors are actively trying to move the investigation forward and set up an interrogation of Mr Assange at the embassy.

Acting on behalf of Swedish investigators, an Ecuadorian prosecutor is set to question Mr Assange on 17 October.

"This means that there is at present no reason to set aside the detention order. Julian Assange's claim to that effect shall therefore be refused," the court said.

Additional reporting by AP
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London mayor Sadiq Khan said Donald Trump is playing into the hands of Isis as he travelled around North America.

Speaking at a global progress summit in Montreal alongside Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau, he told the audience that the Republican nominees plan to temporarily ban Muslims from entering the US showed a lack of understanding.

"Donald Trump said that Muslims from around the world - I'm paraphrasing - would not be welcome into the United States of America.

"Not only does that show a lack of understanding and awareness of the great country that is the USA and its history and legacy, it's also inadvertently playing into the hands of Daesh and so-called Isis because it implies it's not possible to be a Western liberal and mainstream Muslim.

"I think it's important that the USA maintains her role as a beacon for tolerance, respect and diversity.

"I think it's important for those of us who are foreigners to stay out of the US elections. I hope the best candidate wins and I hope she does win with a stomping majority."

Mr Khan was involved in a spat earlier this year with the presidential candidate, when Mr Trump said that the new London mayor would be an exception to his Muslim ban.

In a speech at a summit in Chicago on Friday, where he met mayor Rahm Emanuel, he re-iterated the need for immigrants to not be socially excluded and to allow them to keep their own traditions and heritage.

"We shouldn't be embarassed to say that we expect people moving to our cities to learn about our way of life," he said.

"I think people doing public-facing jobs in London should speak English. And clearly government and cities need to improve the support we provide for them to do so, because a common language is necessary for a common life."

More support and more integration, he said, would build "bridges rather than walls" and would fight radicalisation.

"As much as I love the USA, it's up to Americans to decide who runs your country. But I will say this: we play straight into the hands of those who seek to divide us... we imply it's not possible to hold values we hold dear and be a Muslim," he said.

He added at the summit that global leaders have a responsibility to ensure the integration of ethnic minority communities.

The mayor, who is still to travel to New York, told the Associated Press that he would still be open to meeting Mr Trump to "discuss the joys of London".

Mr Trump previously said that London is so "radicalised" that there are areas where the Metropolitan police are "afraid for their lives".
Tons of fresh mangoes will be hitting Australian shelves from this month.

Australia has finally issued a decision to allow imports of Vietnamese mangoes after seven years of negotiations, the Vietnam News Agency reported.

The Vietnam Trade Office in Australia said that the first batch of mangoes produced by the Suoi Lon Cooperative in the southern province of Dong Nai will reach the Australian market this September. From then on, 18 tons of mangoes from the cooperative will reach Australian supermarkets and wholesale markets each day.

Vietnam first sought approval to export its mangoes to Australia in 2009.

Following several rounds of negotiations and evaluations made by Australian experts, mangoes have become the second Vietnamese fruit to be given access to the demanding market after lychees.

To promote sales, the Vietnamese Embassy and the Vietnam Trade Office introduced Vietnam mangoes at an international food trade held in Australia from September 12-15.

The trade office also signed an agreement with the Association of Vietnamese Business People in Australia to boost sales of Vietnamese agricultural products including fresh fruit like lychees and mangoes.

Vietnamese dragon fruit is highly likely to be the third fruit accepted by the Australian market after its Department of Agriculture finished a draft assessment report that said fresh dragon fruit from Vietnam had passed import requirements.

The final decision will be published by the Australian government at the end of 2016.

Apart from Australia, other demanding markets like the U.S., Australia, Canada and Japan have developed a taste for fresh Vietnamese fruit like rambutan, lychees, longan and star apples.

Agricultural experts said that expanding its export markets will allow Vietnam to reduce its dependence on China, currently the largest buyer of Vietnamese fruit and vegetables.

Related news:

> Vietnamese mangoes to enter US market

> Enter the dragon fruit: Australia beckons Vietnamese growers
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A woman who escaped Isis sex slavery has become the first survivor of captivity with the group to be appointed a United Nations Goodwill Ambassador.

Nadia Murad, who has also been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize, will act as an ambassador for the Dignity of Survivors of Human Trafficking for the UNs Drugs and Crime body.

The 23-year-old, who is Yazidi, was captured by the jihadi group in 2014 and subjected to sexual and physical abuse after being sold as a slave several times but eventually managed to flee.

Since Isis declared their so-called Caliphate in August 2014, they have presided over the slaughter and enslavement of the minority Yazidi people, who they regard as devil worshippers.

The monotheistic sect were exiled from their ancestral homeland, Sinjar in northern Iraq after the militants vowed to purify the country of non-Islamic people.

In addition to the thousands of women and girls who were enslaved, thousands of men and boys were slaughtered including Ms Murads six brothers.

In a statement, the UN said her ambassadorship would focus on advocacy initiatives and raise awareness around the plight of the countless victims of trafficking.

The appointment marks the first time a survivor of atrocities is bestowed with this distinction," a statement said.

Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Show all 15 1 /15 Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis Displaced people from the minority Yazidi sect, fleeing violence from forces loyal to the Isis in Sinjar town, walk towards the Syrian border, on the outskirts of Sinjar mountain, near the Syrian border town of Elierbeh of Al-Hasakah Governorate Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis Displaced people from the minority Yazidi sect, fleeing violence from forces loyal to the Isis in Sinjar town, walk towards the Syrian border, on the outskirts of Sinjar mountain, near the Syrian border town of Elierbeh of Al-Hasakah Governorate Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis Displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community settle at a camp at Derike, Syria. In the camps here, Iraqi refugees have new heroes: Syrian Kurdish fighters who battled militants to carve an escape route to tens of thousands trapped on a mountaintop Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis A pilot based at RAF Marham entering a Tornado GR4 prior to taking off for the reconnaissance mission over Iraq. Several RAF Tornado jets set off from RAF Marham in Norfolk this afternoon to travel to a "pre-position", from where they will fly to northern Iraq to provide improved surveillance of the situation on the ground. The jets, fitted with Litening III targeting and surveillance pods, will be able to fly over the crisis area to provide intelligence and help with the delivery of humanitarian aid Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis A British Royal Air Force (RAF) Tornado GR4 aircraft equipped with the Litening III pod from RAF Marham, eastern England, on their arrival at RAF Akrotiri Cyprus for their reconnaissance mission over Iraq Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis Aid inside a Royal Air Force (RAF) Hercules C130 J aircraft before being airdropped to civilians in Iraq Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis A Royal Air Force (RAF) Hercules C130 J military transport plane at RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus. Britain made a third round of airdrops of supplies to aid refugees stranded on a mountain in northern Iraq, officials said, as Tornado fighters arrived at an RAF base in Cyprus preparing to provide surveillance support for the humanitarian effort Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis Royal Air Force (RAF) Tornado GR4 aircraft, flown in from Britain, stand on the tarmac at RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis A displaced man helps a woman, both from the minority Yazidi sect fleeing violence from forces loyal to the Isis in Sinjar town, as they make their way towards the Syrian border, on the outskirts of Sinjar mountain, near the Syrian border town of Elierbeh of Al-Hasakah Governorate Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis Iraqis including Turkmen, Shabaks, Kurds, Yezidis and Christians, fleeing from assaults of army groups led by Isis, take shelter at Bahirka Camp in Arbil Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis Displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community look for clothes to wear among items provided by a charity organization at the Nowruz camp in Derike, Syria Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis Displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community gather for food at the Nowruz camp in Derike, Syria Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis Displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community gather for food at the Nowruz camp in Derike, Syria Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis Syrian Kurdish Peshmerga fighters take a sick Iraqi Yazidi woman to the clinic at Nowruz camp in Derike, Syria Iraq crisis: Yazidi nightmare on Mount Sinjar Iraq crisis Sick displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community wait for treatment at a clinic at Nowruz camp in Derike, Syria

In December 2015, Ms Murad briefed the UN Security Councils first ever session on human trafficking.

She described being rounded up by Isis, also known as Islamic State, and witnessing the militants shooting men and boys in cold blood.

In her statement, she said: The Islamic State (sic) didnt come to kill the women and girls, but to use us as spoils of war, as objects to be sold with little or to be gifted for free.

Their cruelty was not merely opportunistic. The Isis soldiers came with a pre-established policy to commit such crimes.

Thousands of Yazidi women were taken captive when Isis seized control of Sinjar, Iraq, in August 2014 (AHMAD AL-RUBAYE/AFP/Getty Images) (AFP/Getty)

Isis had one intention, the destroy the Yazidi identity by force, rape, recruitment of children, and destruction of holy sites they captured, especially against the Yazidi woman where the used rape as a mean of destruction for Yazidi women and girls and ensuring these women will never return to a normal life.

She said she and 150 other girls were taken to Mosul from her village in Kocho, where there were already over one thousand Yazidi women and girls were to be offered as gifts to Isis fighters.

She was finally able to escape after three months of imprisonment and fled to Germany where she currently lives.

Commenting on her appointment, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon said: Nadia survived horrific crimes.

I cried when I heard her story. But I didn't only cry out of sadness.

I was also moved to tears because Nadia has so much strength, courage and dignity.

She rightly calls for a world where all children live in peace."
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Jay Z is calling the US governments war on drugs an "epic fail".

Beyonce's husband recently collaborated with filmmaker Dream Hampton, illustrator and Vice editor Molly Crabapple and the Drug Policy Alliance for a video essay critical of the decades-long policy.

The four-minute video for The New York Times argues that the governments global fight against drugs has caused mass incarceration and unfairly targeted people of colour.

Jay is a former drug dealer-turned-rapper-turned-business mogul so the collaboration makes sense given his status as one of the most recognizable voices amongst black Americans.

He describes how the war started with President Richard Nixon in 1971, when the role of federal drug control agencies increased and mandatory prison sentences were imposed.

As Jay puts it, Ronald Reagan doubled-down on the effort in 1982, by declaring illicit drugs a threat to national security. Young men like me became the sole villain and drug addicts lacked moral fortitude, Jay says, before blaming the worlds second largest prison population on the war on drugs.

The video comes at a time when politicians, analysts and activists are highly critical of the war on drugs. The Obama administration has previously called the effort counterproductive, and The Brookings Institute condemned the punishment model as a burden on taxpayers, with little opportunity for prisoners to access drug treatments.



Jay also questions the punishment of drug dealers in the present, while states such as Alaska, Colorado, Oregon, and Washington have legalised marijuana. The 45-year-old asks, "Why are white men poised to get rich doing the same thing African-Americans have been going to prison for?"

"Venture capitalists migrate to [states where weed is legal] to open multibillion dollar operations, but former felons can't open a dispensary," he continues. "Lots of times, those felonies were drug charges caught by poor people who sold drugs for a living but are now prohibited from participating in one of the fastest-growing economies."

The short has already drawn praise from political circles, most notably, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders who tweeted his support. Jay Z is right, he said on Twitter. We have to end the war on drugs.

However, there are signs that the authorities' strategy is changing. This year is the first since 1980 in which the White House plans to spend more money on research and treatment than law enforcement initiatives.

By the end of the video, Jay concludes that its time to rethink our policies and laws since the rate of drug use is virtually the same as it was when the so-called war on drugs began.
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The death of a Chinese actress from cancer has reignited the debate over alternative therapies after she initially shunned chemotherapy treatment for traditional Chinese medicine.

Xu Ting, 26, was diagnosed with lymphoma in July and decided not to undergo chemotherapy because she feared it would be too painful or even speed up her death.

She said she wanted to "enjoy every day happily", adding: "I dont want chemotherapy to torture me until I have no beauty or talent left."

Instead, she chose traditional Chinese medicine, including cupping, acupuncture and gua sha - a skin scraping therapy.

Pictures from Xu Ting's Sina Weibo social media account show the aftermath of a cupping session (Xu Ting/Sina Weibo)

Other images show her undergoing gua sha skin scraping therapy (Xu Ting/Sina Weibo)

She documented her treatment on China's Sina Weibo social media site, sharing photos of her cupping and scraping treatments.

By mid-August, Xu Ting's sister said her treatment had failed and she had decided to try chemotherapy and accused the traditional Chinese medicine "master" of being a "fraud".

However, her immune system had become weakened and she died on 7 September.

The actress shared pictures of herself being treated in hospital (Xu Ting/Sina Weibo)

Her death has renewed debate over alternative medicine and the hashtag #XuTing'sDeathAndChineseMedicine began trending on Sina Weibo.

However, some have argued that traditional Chinese medicine cannot be blamed for her death.

"Some people say that traditional Chinese medicine cant cure cancer, so therefore traditional Chinese medicine is a sham. This kind of logic is ridiculous," a journalist for the Beijing Evening News wrote, according to a translation from The Nanfang.

"There are many cancer patients who still pass away after receiving chemotherapy. Will these same people also say that western medicine is a sham?"

Others argued she should have taken both forms of treatment, using the chemotherapy to target her tumour and alternative medicine to help alleviate her symptoms.
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The Ministry of Defence has said it is extremely sorry for the death of an Iraqi boy who drowned after being forced into a dirty canal by British soldiers.

A judicial investigation found that Ahmed Jabbar Kareem Ali, 15, was left alone to flounder and drown in Basra in May 2003.

Sir George Newman, a former High Court judge, found the teenager had unlawfully treated by soldiers struggling to deal with chaos engulfing the city.

British soldiers check Iraqis leaving Basra in 2003 (Getty)

After reviewing evidence from dozens of commanders, troops and civilian witnesses, he concluded that the circumstances in which Ahmed died should never have occurred.

The boy was detained by three other suspected looters near Basra General Hospital and driven in an armoured vehicle to the Shatt al-Basra canal.

The soldiers, having detained him for looting, forced him to enter the canal and left him floundering, Sir Georges report said.

He should not have been detained and held in armed and confined custody in a Warrior [vehicle], he should not have been transported in the Warrior to the canal, he should not have been forced to enter the canal, let alone left there to flounder and drown.

The judges scathing findings said Ahmed was aggressively manhandled and assaulted by soldiers who then unlawfully forced him into the water.

Residents fleeing the Iraqi city of Basra in March 2003

Like many Iraqis, he was unable to swim, and soldiers failed to rescue the teenager after watching him go under the surface - the plain and certain cause of the boy's death.

It was a clumsy, ill directed and bullying piece of conduct, engaged in without consideration of the risk of harm to which it could give rise and, in the event which occurred, there was a manifest failure to take action to save the life of Mr Ali, Sir George wrote.

He is leading the Iraq Fatality Investigations (IFIs) - independent inquiries into civilian deaths linked to Britains involvement in the conflict.

The soldiers involved in Ahmed's death were tried in a British court for manslaughter and acquitted in 2006.

British troops have recently taken Basra from Saddam Husseins army as part of the Iraq invasion but their victory was followed by a state of chaos and widespread looting.

The police force was ineffectual and in the absence of a court system, looters could not be properly arrested and tried, sparking attempts at ad hoc punishments and mass detentions at a local gymnasium.

Soldiers admitted wetting suspects by throwing them into rivers, seeing detainees handcuffed with sandbags put on their heads in attempts to humiliate them, and driven miles out of the city and left to walk home in attempts to deter disorder.

The most iconic images from the war in Iraq Show all 20 1 /20 The most iconic images from the war in Iraq The most iconic images from the war in Iraq U.S. Navy Hospital Corpsman HM1 Richard Barnett, assigned to the 1st Marine Division, holds an Iraqi child in central Iraq, March 29, 2003 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq An explosion rocks Baghdad during air strikes March 21, 2003 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq An Iraqi woman watches U.N. weapons inspectors leave Saddam airport in Baghdad March 18, 2003 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq An Iraqi girl holds her sister as she waits for her mother (R) to bring over food bought in Basra March 29, 2003 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq U.S. Marine Corp Assaultman Kirk Dalrymple watches as a statue of Iraq's President Saddam Hussein falls in central Baghdad's Firdaus Square, April 9, 2003 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq US Marines kick in a door while securing a building next to the main hospital in central Baghdad April 15, 2003 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq A soldier of U.S. Army's 4th Infantry Division (Task Force Ironhorse) searches through dense vegetation around the Diala river where Iraqi militants are hiding outside Baquba early November 13, 2003 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq An Iraqi detainee gestures toward U.S. soldiers through bars of his cell at Abu Ghraib prison outside Baghdad May 17, 2004 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq Mays, a young Iraqi Shi'ite girl, cries after a mortar shell which landed outside the family's home in a Najaf residential area injured her uncle August 18, 2004 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq U.S. Marines carry an injured colleague to a helicopter near the city of Falluja, November 10, 2004 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq An Iraqi man suspected of having explosives in his car is held after being arrested by the U.S army near Baquba, Iraq, October 15, 2005 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq A wounded Iraqi woman is helped after several bomb attacks in central Baghdad, July 27, 2006 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq A man runs down a street warning people to flee shortly after a twin car bomb attack at Shorja market in Baghdad, February 12, 2007 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq An Iraqi girl holds her hands up while U.S. and Iraqi soldiers search her family house in Baquba early June 30, 2007 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq An Iraqi woman tries to explain that she has nothing to do with illegal fuel as soldiers from the 2nd battalion, 32nd Field Artillery brigade patrol search for illegal fuel sellers in Baghdad August 6, 2007 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq U.S. President George W. Bush (L) walks in front of Humvees with Defense Secretary Robert Gates (C) and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice following remarks to the press after nightfall at Al-Asad airbase in Anbar Province September 3, 2007 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq U.S. soldiers blindfold an Iraqi man after arresting him during a night patrol at the Zafraniya neighborhood, southeast of Baghdad September 4, 2007 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq An Iraqi baby lies in a cradle while a woman argues with U.S. soldiers of 1/8 Bravo Company searching for weapons, explosives and information about militants in the area during a foot patrol in a neighbourhood of Mosul June 26, 2008 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq Policemen cry during a funeral of their colleague a day after a bomb attack in Baghdad's Jihad district November 3, 2010 Reuters The most iconic images from the war in Iraq Staff Sgt. Keith Fidler kisses his wife Cynthia, as their son Kolin looks on, during a homecoming ceremony in New York, April 8, 2011 for the New York Army National Guard's 442nd Military Police Company's return from Iraq Reuters

The report said the soldiers' actions gave rise to grave concerns about their ability to cope with their orders and the adequacy of the resources available to them.

It also highlighted serious concerns over the soldiers' training and ability for troops in Basra to act as both policemen and combatants simultaneously.

The IFIs provide an inquisitorial investigation akin to a coroner's inquest in order to meet investigative requirements under the European Convention on Human Rights.

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Defence said had established a team to review the Chilcot report that would also have responsibility for taking Sir Georges findings into account.

This was a grave incident for which we are extremely sorry, he added. We are committed to investigating allegations of wrongdoing by UK forces and will use Sir Georges findings to learn lessons to help ensure nothing like this happens again.

Amnesty International UKs said it had repeatedly raised Ahmed's death with authorities.

Today's apology from the MoD for the death of Ahmed Jabbar Kareem Ali is a long overdue but important step on the road towards accountability," said the charity's head of policy and government affairs, Allan Hogarth.

We've always said it's vitally important that the UK sets an example internationally by making sure any credible allegations of human rights violations are both independently and thoroughly investigated."
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A hacker who allegedly infiltrated the computer systems of the FBI, the American Missile Defence Agency and Nasa is to be extradited to the US, where he might face up to 99 years in jail if convicted  despite a British court hearing he has Aspergers and may kill himself in prison.

Lauri Love, a prison chaplains son from Suffolk, has had indictments issued against him in three different US states.

Arrested at his parents home in the village of Stradishall, he faces accusations he repeatedly hacked US government systems, supposedly joked about owning lots of Nasa sites and allegedly accessed the personal information of 104,000 US Energy Department employees.

His lawyers have told reporters that Love, 31, who lives with his parents, could spend up to 99 years in a US jail if found guilty.

The computer science graduates father Rev Alexander Love, who himself works with vulnerable prisoners at risk of suicide, told Westminster Magistrates Court in London he feared his son might take his own life.

Ten days ago, Mr Love himself told a BBC interviewer: If I went into a US prison, I dont think Id leave again.

But, in a case with strong echoes of fellow hacker and Aspergers sufferer Gary McKinnons ten-year fight against extradition, District Judge Nina Tempia told Westminster Magistrates Court: I am going to extradite Mr Love.

The McKinnon case had ended in 2012 when Theresa May, the then Home Secretary, blocked Mr McKinnons extradition, saying he was a suicide risk. Loves case will now be sent to the Home Secretary for formal confirmation of his extradition. It is understood that due to recent rule changes, the Home Secretary only has very limited powers to stop the extradition.

Love is also expected to launch a High Court appeal against the decision to extradite him.

He was granted bail on condition that he reports regularly to a police station and that his passport remains surrendered.

Love sat impassively in the dock as the judge announced her decision. He mother, however, put her head in her hands as his father tried to comfort her.

The decision was also greeted with an audible gasp from the public gallery.

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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A three-day extradition hearing in June had heard Rev Love plead with the court on his sons behalf. The prison chaplain said the bitter experience of leading funerals for people who had killed themselves led to the regret that everyone has, that they didn't see it coming.

In Lauris case, said Rev Love, we do see it coming. That is the big difference.

In regard to my son ... Lauri is somebody who strikes me as somebody who will do this. The probability is quite high. At times Lauri is in utter despair.

Rev Love was backed by psychologist Prof Simon Baron Cohen, who told the court: About two thirds of people with Aspergers have suicidal thoughts. The overwhelming priority is to keep him alive.

But in her written judgement, Judge Tempia said: "It is in the interests of justice for the case to be tried in the United States. The offences for which Mr Love is sought are serious.

There is a strong public interest that the United Kingdom should honour its extradition treaty obligations.

The judge accepted that there will be a high risk he will commit suicide if extradited, but she insisted: A high threshold has to be reached to satisfy the court that Mr Loves mental condition is such that it would be unjust or oppressive to extradite him.

The key issue then is what measures are in place to prevent any attempt at suicide being successful. I have found these safeguards are in place to ensure Mr Love does not commit suicide in transit.

On arrival in the United States I have also found there are arrangements in place to prevent suicide.

Rejecting suggestions that American sentencing policy would be disproportionate, she said: Certainly the sentencing regime is harsher in the United States than in the United Kingdom [but] factors can be taken into consideration at sentencing. The mental health of the defendant may be relevant in this.

I do not agree [that] Mr Love faces a real risk of suicide and inhuman and disproportionate punishment.

The US authorities have accused Love of substantially impairing the functioning of dozens of computer servers, causing millions of dollars in damage to government agencies, and of planning to use social media to publicise his work.

One US indictment claimed he sent a message to friends saying he would like to announce one of his hacks: So it rolls along the morning news in US and gets Europe for the afternoon and evening.

He was also accused of messaging associates: LoL Nasa. Ahaha, we owning lots of Nasa sites  I think we can do some hilarious stuff with it.

 Huge cyber attack hits US government workers

Loves supporters, however, have always insisted his alleged hacking was not for personal gain and should be considered in the context of online activisim.

Before his arrest in October 2013, Mr Love had been an activist in the anti-austerity Occupy movement, becoming heavily involved in the seven-month Hetherington House occupation of 2011 at the University of Glasgow, where he was studying Computer Science and Physics.

Among the allegations against him is that he participated in the Anonymous-led Operation Last Resort which protested against the US authorities alleged mistreatment of the coder Aaron Swartz, who killed himself in 2013 while facing prison under computer misuse charges.

Swartzs family blamed his death on a criminal justice system rife with intimidation that overreacted to an alleged crime that had no victims.

Since he was arrested when the National Crime Agency raided his parents home and confiscated computer equipment, Love has stressed how he wants to put his hacking skills to good use.

He is thought to have launched a cyber-security consultancy start-up, and in May, in an article for Freuds Cyber Security Journal that was reproduced in The Independent, he wrote: I am a hacker. I like technology and I would like to use it to make the world a better place.

Suggesting that kids will always play pranks, he added: Most of what might be considered illegal hacking is conducted without any criminal motive, any attempt to cheat or make malicious gain, but rather, its the natural human desire and drive to understand the world in which we find ourselves.

Arguing the need for more constructive approaches that could help bring many of our brightest and best kids back into society, he wrote: The first thing is for people in the Government to realise that you cant prosecute your way out of this problem.

Just like with the drugs problem, people thought if you arrest enough people then they would stop using drugs, and that didnt work  although it has taken about 60 years for people to start realising this.

Locking people up is not going to help them.

Emphasising his fears for his son in a BBC interview last month, Rev Love said: My son has Aspergers and depression. He also suffers from very bad eczema and asthma, which have psychological triggers and, at the very heart of it all, is his emphatic statement that he will kill himself.

He needs the support of his family. He chooses to live at home because its the only place he feels safe. If the Americans have their way, a whole ocean will be put between us and him.

When Lauri says he will kill himself if he is taken to America, I believe he is stating something he intends to do.

Loves supporters fear that he will not be granted bail in the US and will spend his time awaiting trial in an American jail.

Outside court, Love stressed that his battle against extradition was not yet over because he would be appealing to the High Court.

Its not the end of the road, he said. I would like to thank the judge for giving us an opportunity to win at a higher court and set a stronger precedent. Its just unfortunate for me and my family that we have to go through another six months of legal stuff.

I really worry for the toll it is taking on my health and my familys health.

In an impassioned speech on the courtroom steps, his father said: I have been alive a long time, but all my life I have believed in that to be born in these islands was to win the lottery of life. That in our society, there was decency and fairness, that our laws were just.

I dont criticise the judge. She has sought to pass judgement on a law that is flawed.

This is not right, that my son can be taken away. It is not fair or just that a boy who has got mental health issues can be taken away from his family merely to satisfy the desire of the Americans to exact what I feel is vengeance on him.

Moments later, as his son began speaking to reporters, Rev Love broke down sobbing, repeating: I can't believe it, I can't believe it.
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Unions have reacted with disbelief to news that the owners of Southern Railway have been shortlisted for a community award.

Govia Thameslink Railway is in the running for a Passengers Matter accolade in a competition run by the Association of Community Rail.

Southern services have been disrupted for months because of staff shortages and industrial action in a long-running dispute over the role of conductors.

The National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers' general secretary Mick Cash said: "The only 'hard work and community dedication' going on at Southern Rail is from the frontline staff who are being attacked and undermined by the company bosses at every turn.

"They are the unsung heroes and heroines who have fought tirelessly to defend safety, services and access to rail for all against a torrent of smears and abuse from the GTR dirty tricks machine.

"The idea that the company top brass, who have systematically run the Southern Rail routes into the ground, could be considered for a Passengers Matter accolade is way beyond satire. These are the highly-paid mob responsible for axing guards, closing ticket offices and throwing the catering trolleys off the trains."

The awards, being announced later this month, celebrate community projects.

Press Association
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Britain will no longer be relevant to China if it goes through with Brexit, a senior French politician has said.

Emmanuel Macron, the former economy minister, has warned that outside of the European Union the UK will not have the protections afforded to a trading bloc and will therefore find it difficult to see off commercial competion from Beijing.

He said the UK alone would be incapable of stopping an influx of cheap imports and cited the recent crisis in the steel industry to demonstrate the difficulties Britain could face from the superpower.

The UK is definitely not relevant to China. And the big mistake of countries is not to play the European game, the Times reported Mr Macron as saying.

During the past two years we were attacked by the Chinese, the Indians and the Russians and especially the Chinese on steel. An unfair attack. Nothing to do with globalisation and trade. They just had their own overcapacity.

They didnt want to deal with that and they inundated our markets, killing prices with their steel. Did we protect our industry and our workers? No. You saw that here in Port Talbot.

 Nigel Farage: Brexiters were "mildly irresponsible"

Mr Macron, who stepped down last month to contest the French presidency, also warned Brexit could kill the European Union in months.

I think the UK has a choice: option one, you come back to the people and say Brexit was a mistake. It is impossible to be implemented. We will ask our people to think again about that through a general election or a new referendum. I respect that, Mr Macron added.

Brexit reactions  in pictures Show all 10 1 /10 Brexit reactions  in pictures Brexit reactions  in pictures Supporters of the Stronger In campaign look at their phones after hearing results in the EU referendum at London's Royal Festival Hall AP Brexit reactions  in pictures Leave supporters cheer results at a Leave.eu party after polling stations closed in the Referendum on the European Union in London Reuters Brexit reactions  in pictures Mr Cameron announces his resignation to supporters Getty Brexit reactions  in pictures Donald Tusk proposes that the 27 remaining EU member states start a wider reflection on the future of our union Getty Brexit reactions  in pictures Ukip leader Nigel Farage greets his supporters on College Green in Westminster, after Britain voted to leave the European Union PA Brexit reactions  in pictures Supporters of the Stronger In Campaign react as referendum results are announced today Getty Brexit reactions  in pictures Boris Johnson leaves his home today to discover a crowd of waiting journalists and police officers Getty Brexit reactions  in pictures Leave EU supporters celebrate as they watch the British EU Referendum results being televised at Millbank Tower in London Rex Brexit reactions  in pictures Supporters of the Stronger In Campaign react as results of the EU referendum are announced at the Royal Festival Hall Reuters Brexit reactions  in pictures Supporters of the Stronger In campaign react after hearing results in the EU referendum at London's Royal Festival Hall PA

Second option: you want to implement the exit and try to find something new regarding free movement of labour.

But if the rest of the EU agrees to allow Britain to limit free movement of people, in strategic and political terms there is a big incentive for all the other member states not to respect the rules of the club.

And for sure in six months, one year or three years we have killed the European Union. I am not in favour of such a move.

The comments were made by Mr Macron during a trip to London.
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Liberal Democrat Leader Tim Farron has made a direct call to people voting for Owen Smith in the Labour leadership contest to get alongside him to stop Britain falling out of the EU.

Mr Farron warned that if Jeremy Corbyn wins as expected, then it will be left to his party in England to stop Brexit and the problems he believes it will bring for low income families.

In an exclusive interview with The Independent, he said: With me you will not have some dogmatic lurch to the left, somebody who believes protesting and rallies is more important than holding power and making a difference.

The Lib Dem Leader claims that Labour has abandoned mainstream politics and the idea of being a serious opposition and has little chance of winning any seats from the Tories.

But he points to a string of Lib Dem/Tory marginals in the South West of England and elsewhere, arguing that his party could win in the small number of constituencies needed to leave Mrs May without a Commons majority.

On the eve of his partys conference in Brighton, he said the Lib Dems are the only ones offering the British people a referendum on the Brexit deal that will be struck between the UK and EU states.

Mr Farron said he would be willing to work with Mr Smith, who has also pledged a vote, if he wins Labours leadership contest, but said if he did not then that chance would be lost.

In a message to the Labour contender's supporters, the Lib Dem leader said: I fully respect the really difficult situation they are going through.

I respect the fact that people will have great loyalty to the Labour party. Loyalty is a virtue normally. Im going to be careful not to behave like a home-wrecker.

 Tim Farron attacks Michael Gove

But these are serious times. As things stand we are going to limp out of the European Union, out of the single market and into a very difficult place economically for all of us.

At the same time we are going to face nearly a quarter of a century of Tory rule. No tribal loyalty can get in the way of stopping that surely.

Less help for low-income families, protection for refugees, the environment, a better NHS and a return to the 11-plus are things he said Mr Smiths supporters risk, if Mr Corbyn wins the contest.

He added: Frankly I need them to get alongside me.

He claimed that a lack of proper opposition to the Tories had allowed Mrs May free rein to bring forward a more right-wing agenda than David Cameron.

In particular he pinned Mrs May's plan to bring in new grammar schools on the problem.

He added: You dont come up with something as daft and as evidence-free as that if you are being properly held to account by an opposition that is on its game.

 Grammar schools dominate PMQs

He argued Mrs Mays plans would mean the majority of young people are relegated to the second division at the age of 11, with most coming from less well-off backgrounds.

The Lib Dem leader then warned that the political path Labour will chose under a victorious Mr Corbyn will render it incapable of winning the centre-ground voters it needs to beat the Tories.

He then said: It is the case that in the South West and in other parts of the country the Liberal Democrats are definitely in the market to gain the seats we would need to take the Tories out of majority.

He added: Lots of people who voted Conservative last time round consider themselves to be moderate, liberal conservatives and they see Theresa May is taking the party into a more authoritarian place.
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EU Council President Donald Tusk told European leaders Brexit resulted from the failures of British politicians, as he invited them to discuss the UKs departure from the Union.

He said anti-EU politicians often launched attacks on Europe to cover up their own shortcomings, a sentiment echoed in stinging comments made by EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker.

It comes as leaders of 27 EU member states gathered in Slovakia to discuss the future direction of the bloc at a summit excluding Britain.

In a letter sent to leaders inviting them to the Bratislava meeting, Mr Tusk said the EU did have shortcomings and that it was sometimes justified to criticise it.

But he added that national leaders had a responsibility to the EU, saying: It also means refraining from the constant accusations aimed at the Union, which sometimes are justified, but more often than not they serve as an easy excuse for one's own failures.

This was also one of the reasons behind the Brexit vote.

Europe's leaders face a difficult task plotting a way forward for the bloc, given internal divisions, a lack of clarity around the terms of Brexit and no clear indication on whether the country even intends to stay in the single market.

Despite some irritation, Theresa May has insisted she will not trigger Article 50, launching formal Brexit talks, before the end of the year.

 Jean-Claude Juncker says Brexit talks must start 'as soon as possible'

There is the added difficulty for German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande who face crunch national elections in 2017.

Uncertainty over the pace, and scope, of Brexit was highlighted by former Council President Herman Van Rompuy, who said detailed withdrawal negotiations may not start until the end of 2017.

Mr Van Rompuy described the outcome of the EU referendum as a "political amputation".

Brexit racism and the fightback Show all 9 1 /9 Brexit racism and the fightback Brexit racism and the fightback Demonstrators protest against an increase in post-ref racism at London's March for Europe in July 2016 PA Brexit racism and the fightback These cards were found near a school in Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire, the day after the EU referendum Twitter/@howgilb Brexit racism and the fightback Getty Brexit racism and the fightback Romford, Essex, June 25 @diamondgeezer Brexit racism and the fightback A worker at this Romanian food shop was asleep upstairs at the time of this arson attack in Norwich on July 8, but escaped unharmed. Hundreds later participated in a love bombing rally outside the shop to express their opposition to racism and their support of the shop owners. JustGiving/Helen Linehan Brexit racism and the fightback This neo-Nazi sticker was spotted in Glasgow on June 26 Courtesy of Eoin Palmer Brexit racism and the fightback But after news emerged of neo-Nazi stickers appearing in Glasgow, some in the city struck back with slogans of their own. Courtesy of Eoin Palmer Brexit racism and the fightback Getty Brexit racism and the fightback More signs began to appear in some parts of the UK, created by people who wanted to show their opposition to post-referendum racism Courtesy of Bernadette Russell

In an interview, Mr Juncker claimed 40 years of "lies" were responsible for Britons deciding to leave the EU and that the result showed "something was wrong in Britain", as well as with the European project.

He said it was not surprising a majority were in favour of quitting the EU after being told repeatedly the Brussels-based organisation was "stupid".

The refugee crisis, counter-terrorism and tax regulation, are also set to be major issues at the summit.
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George Osborne has taken a swipe at Theresa May's key policies including her flagship grammar schools plan, amid claims he disliked her and was rude to her in Cabinet.

Just a week after Mrs May signaled a new wave of grammars, the former Chancellor said education policy should not focus on selection. He also revealed that while in office, he was advised that her much touted new security measures for the Hinkley nuclear project would make no difference.

In his first long interview since leaving office, Mr Osborne would only give muted endorsement of Mrs May's premiership, saying she was the best of the candidates that came forward.

It follows claims made by a former Lib Dem minister that the Tory ex-Chancellor and Mrs May failed to get along in meetings.

Speaking to the BBC, Mr Osborne accused Mrs May's administration of having a momentary "wobble" over his pet 'Northern Powerhouse' project to boost economic growth outside London.

As he prepared to set up a new think tank to pursue the initiative, he was asked what he thought about Mrs May's controversial plans to open new selective grammar schools.

He said: "I always have thought with the debate about grammars, that 80% of the political discussion is about where 20% of the children go, when in fact we should be focusing on where 80% of the children go in a selective system.

"For me the great transformation of the last six years driven by Michael Gove and Nicky Morgan, under David Cameron's leadership, has been the academy and free school programme."

He said he was not against new grammars where they are wanted, but added: "The real focus of education reform remains the academy programme. Transforming the comprehensive schools that most people in this country send their children to."

 Osborne won't be PM

It comes as Mrs May faces a Tory backlash over her sweeping reforms to education, headed by former Education Secretary Mrs Morgan.

Mrs May also faces criticism after approving the 18 billion Hinkley nuclear power project, despite security concerns and claims that it could leave UK bill-payers having to fork out 30 billion.

Mr Osborne was the deal's key backer before Mrs May paused it on coming into office, raising hopes the contract would be renegotiated. It was announced Thursday that the price paid for electricity would not change, but that the Government had introduced a 'golden share' to increase security, which allowed the Government to keep a stake in Hinkley and other new projects.

The 6 most important issues Theresa May needs to address Show all 6 1 /6 The 6 most important issues Theresa May needs to address The 6 most important issues Theresa May needs to address Brexit The big one. Theresa May has spoken publicly three times since declaring her intent to stand in the Tory Leadership race, and each time she has said, Brexit means Brexit. It sounds resolute, but it is helpful to her that Brexit is a made up word with no real meaning. She has said there will be no second referendum and no re-entry in to the EU via the back door. But she, like the Leave campaign of which she was not a member, has pointedly not said with any precision what she thinks Brexit means Reuters The 6 most important issues Theresa May needs to address General election This is very much one to keep off the to do list. She said last week there would be no general election at this time of great instability. But there have already been calls for one from opposition parties. The Fixed Term Parliaments Act of 2010 makes it far more difficult to call a snap general election, a difficulty she will be in no rush to overcome. In the event of a victory for Leadsom, who was not popular with her own parliamentary colleagues, an election might have been required, but May has the overwhelming backing of the parliamentary party Getty The 6 most important issues Theresa May needs to address HS2 Macbeth has been quoted far too much in recent weeks, but it will be up to May to decide whether, with regard to the new high speed train link between London, Birmingham, the East Midlands and the north, returning were as tedious as go oer. Billions have already been spent. But the 55bn it will cost, at a bare minimum, must now be considered against the grim reality of significantly diminished public finances in the short to medium term at least. It is not scheduled to be completed until 2033, by which point it is not completely unreasonable to imagine a massive, driverless car-led transport revolution having rendered it redundant EPA The 6 most important issues Theresa May needs to address Heathrow expansion Or indeed Gatwick expansion. Or Boris Island, though that option is seems as finished as the man himself. The decision on where to expand aviation capacity in the south east has been delayed to the point of becoming a national embarrassment. A final decision was due in autumn. Whatever is decided, there will be vast opprobrium PA The 6 most important issues Theresa May needs to address Trident renewal David Cameron indicated two days ago that there will be a Commons vote on renewing Britains nuclear deterrent on July 18th, by which point we now know, Ms May will be Prime Minister. The Labour Party is, to put it mildly, divided on the issue. This will be an early opportunity to maximise their embarrassment, and return to Tory business as usual EPA The 6 most important issues Theresa May needs to address Scottish Independence Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP are in no doubt that the Brexit vote provides the opportunity for a second independence referendum, in which they can emerge victorious. The Scottish Parliament at Holyrood has the authority to call a second referendum, but Ms May and the British Parliament are by no means automatically compelled to accept the result. She could argue it was settled in 2014 AFP/Getty

But asked about Mrs May's new measure, Mr Osborne said that his advice had been that it would not make any difference.

He said: "When it comes to this debate about the so-called 'special share' or 'golden share', it did come up in 2013 and we were asked the question should we offer this policy, should we create a special share.

"Now the advice we got, we all collectively got from civil servants in the energy ministry, from the security establishment was that the special share would not add any additional protection beyond what the very tough and tight regulatory regime already offered us."

He added: "It didn't seem to me necessary to have some special share."

Asked if he supported Mrs May's premiership he initially said she was "the best person of the candidates who put themselves forward", before later qualifying it by adding that those who put themselves forward were the people with the best chance of uniting the Conservative party.

Former Lib Dem Energy Secretary Ed Davey recently said Mr Osborne and Mrs May "disliked each other", partly because the ex-Chancellor saw her as a rival.

Mr Davey said: "He could be quite rude to her in Cabinet. Theresa May, I don't agree with everything, but she would be well-briefed, she would have evidence and arguements and statistics to back up her arguements and George Osborne rarely did."

Mr Osborne said in response: "In a Cabinet that included people like Ed Davey, [Mrs May] was one of the grown ups."
September 16, 2016 | 01:17 am PT

Hoang Anh Gia Lai's board chairman Doan Nguyen Duc says the group's debts are still under control. Photo by VnExpress

Hoang Anh Gia Lai is desperate to find a way to settle its $1.44 billion debt.

Vietnamese real estate conglomerate Hoang Anh Gia Lai is planning to sell a large area of its rubber plantations in Laos to Chinese investors to deal with increasing debts and shrinking profits.

Doan Nguyen Duc, the companys chairman, said at a board meeting on Thursday that the company is still waiting for results from the governments plan to restructure its debts at local banks.

If that does not work out, the company is going to sell 20,000 hectares (49,400 acres) of rubber fields in Laos to a Chinese partner who has offered around VND8 trillion ($360,000), Duc said.

That will leave the company, which now mainly operates in the real estate and agricultural sectors, with around 60,000 hectares of agriculture land left.

He said the company will continue selling less important assets to cut debts.

There are no big companies in the world that do not owe money. Our companys debts are still under control, he said.

Hoang Anh Gia Lai reported nearly VND32.64 trillion ($1.44 billion) in debts at the end of last year, up 54.5 percent from 2014 and equivalent to more than 67 percent of its total assets.

The group's post-tax profit fell 46.5 percent year-on-year to VND678.62 billion ($29.94 million) in 2015.

Related news:

>Vietnam threatens to scrap $3.5-bln property project as Malaysian investor dawdles

>Vietnam's central bank imposes more control on property loans
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The Government and a number of independent bodies released a blizzard of documents this week before the Commons took a break for party conferences.

Publications dealt with a number of potentially controversial topics, including housing for disabled people, arms sales to Saudi Arabia and the financial fate of a generation.

Parliament will not reconvene until 10 October, meaning MPs will be unable to properly scrutinise the documents.

These are some of the less well-publicised announcements:

The government admits millennials will be poorer than previous generations, but doesnt know what to do to help.

A report from the Government Actuary's Department admitted millennials  those aged from 16 to those in their early thirties  are asset poor and are likely not to enjoy the same level of pension provision as previous generations. Providing financial and social care for Millennials once they age will be challenging, the Government admitted.

While older generations will enjoy security in old age from their property assets and pensions, the reports said Generation X - those aged in their thirties to fifties - are the last generation likely to have such significant housing and pension equity at the point of retirement.

The departments recommendation is to provide incentives to save through targeted campaigns.

As millennials grew up with social media, they should be more receptive to change, the report said, but did not outline how this would compensate for the lack of money and care infrastructure.

Funding cuts for disability supported housing and homeless hostels

Housing for disabled people, those with learning difficulties and homeless hostels are to suffer an annual reduction of one per cent in the Government contribution to their rent  amounting to millions.

The cuts will happen from 2017 to 2019, when a delayed final decision regarding accommodation provision for vulnerable people will be made.

The decision was met with dismay from housing charities, including Mungos, who claimed the cuts would leave them 3million worse off. A spokesperson for Mencap said it would cause huge strain.

Labour called the government cowardly and said it left tens of thousands of the most vulnerable people in limbo.

UK news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 UK news in pictures UK news in pictures 28 October 2022 A cosplayer attends the MCM Comic Con London 2022 at the ExCel Centre in London Reuters UK news in pictures 27 October 2022 98-year-old D-Day Veteran Bernard Morgan, whose story is among those featured on the giant poppy wall, during the launch of The Royal British Legion 2022 Poppy Appeal, at Hay's Galleria in central London PA UK news in pictures 26 October 2022 A meerkat explores a pumpkin in the enclosure at Wild Place, Bristol, where some of the animals are having pumpkin treats as part of their environmental enrichment PA UK news in pictures 25 October 2022 King Charles III welcomes Rishi Sunak during an audience at Buckingham Palace, where he invited the newly elected leader of the Conservative Party to become Prime Minister and form a new government PA UK news in pictures 24 October 2022 Rishi Sunak celebrates with Tory MPs outside the Conservative Campaign Headquarters after becoming the new leader of the Conservative Party Reuters UK news in pictures 23 October 2022 The Green Man at October Plenty, Borough Market's annual Autumn Harvest festival, in London, which returns for the first time post pandemic PA UK news in pictures 21 October 2022 Sculptor Peter McKenna puts the finishing touches to a pumpkin that will form part of the Planet A Hebden Bridge Pumpkin Trail in the West Yorkshire town PA UK news in pictures 20 October 2022 Britains Prime Minister Liz Truss delivers a speech outside of 10 Downing Street in central London to announce her resignation AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 19 October 2022 Salmon leap up Stainforth Force on the River Ribble in the Yorkshire Dales as they swim upriver to their spawning grounds during the annual Salmon migration PA 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. City went on to win the match at Molineux Stadium three goals to nil. 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

MPs called for UK arms sales to Saudi Arabia to be stopped

A cross-party group of MPs called for the end of the sale of British weapons to Saudi Arabia, which has been leading a coalition of forces against Houthi rebels in Yemen.

But the Saudis conduct in the intervention has been strongly criticised by rights groups, who have collected wide-ranging evidence of the targeting of Yemeni civilians and the use of cluster bombs.

The Saudi government has taken too long to report to the UN Human Rights Council the results of its internal investigations into the alleged [human rights] violations, the report by the Business, Innovation and Skills and International Development Committees said.

We therefore recommend that HM Government suspend sales of arms which could be used in Yemen to Saudi Arabia until the independent, UN-led investigation has come to its conclusions.

The report is a damning indictment of the government's conduct with its controversial Middle East ally.

However, two other committees examining the issue did not press for an end to arms sales, with the Foreign Affairs committee saying a decision on the matter should be determined by the High Court. Another committee was unable to come to a decision.

 Theresa May claims selling arms to Saudi Arabia helps 'keep people on the streets of Britain safe'

Pension Protection Fund delayed

The Pension Protection Fund (PPF), despite reportedly being ready to go, has been delayed again, this time for a consultation.

The time spent in review means the PPF has not come into effect and workers who have lost pension contributions because their employer became insolvent cannot get the compensation they are entitled to.

Richard Harrington, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Pensions, said it will last for eight weeks, but it could be more.

Two busy London courts to close

As part of government plans to remove surplus capacity, a consultation has been opened regarding the proposed closure of Camberwell Green and Hammersmith Magistrates Courts and moving their cases elsewhere.

Camberwell Green is described as not fit for purpose without investment and repairs. But cases would be moved to Croydon Magistrates' Court, which would also require work to accommodate the extra personnel. Some of Croydons courtrooms are also not at the minimum standard and would require improvement works, the Croydon Advertiser reported.

The London Criminal Courts Solicitors Association (LCCSA) strongly criticised the decision.

To launch a consultation immediately after the deadline for new legal aid contract tenders closed is a travesty for those firms trying to plan and predict areas and volume of work, LCCSA president Greg Foxsmith told the Law Society Gazette.

The proposed closure of Hammersmith, opened just 20 years ago, is even more baffling.

Defendants, lawyers and witnesses will face longer journey times and greater expense to secure justice. And the strained resources of the court service will be further depleted by job losses for the admin staff. It is that announcement that suggests this consultation is merely a masquerade, with the ministry capitulating to the Treasury.

The consultation closes on 27 October, allowing politicians only 17 days to discuss the changes after Parliaments conference break.

Eighty-six court closures are planned across the country over the next two years.

 Commuters stage protest against Southern Railway at Victoria station

The train company which owns Southern had the worst punctuality in the country in the summer

Figures revealed that 29.6 per cent of trains belonging to Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR), who own Southern, arrived at least five minutes behind schedule between 26 June and 23 July  the worst of any service in the country.

Virgin East Coast were the second worst service, with 17.8 per cent of trains delayed by at least five minutes, followed by Hull trains, with 16.4 per cent of their trains.

Across England and Wales, the average delay over five minutes was 12.9 per cent of trains.

Meanwhile, Southern has been nominated for a number of industry awards, despite its widely criticised service.

Troops strongly criticised over death of Iraqi child

A report into the death of Ahmed Jabbar Kareem Ali, who died in Basra in 2006 after British soldiers assaulted him and forced him into a canal, has strongly criticised the troops actions.

The soldiers, having detained him for looting, forced him to enter the canal and left him floundering, report author Sir George Newman wrote. He should not have been detained and held in armed and confined custody in a Warrior, he should not have been transported in the Warrior to the canal, he should not have been forced to enter the canal, let alone left there to flounder and drown.

The soldiers were cleared of manslaughter in 2006.
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Nigel Farage has accused elements in the Conservative cabinet of still fighting the referendum to keep Britain in the EU.

The former Ukip leader made a valedictory speech at Ukips conference in Bournmouth on Friday in which he warned Ukip had won the war on Brexit but must now win the peace.

Outlining three tests that he said would make good Theresa Mays promise of Brexit means Brexit, the MEP warned that Tory voters would flock to Ukip if the PM did not take a strong eurosceptic position.

Recommended Read more Nigel Farage reveals he will stay on as MEP despite Brexit vote

We have a new Prime Minister who, when she started, looked to be very surefooted on this issue [of Brexit]  but I have a feeling that things are beginning to change, he told rapt delegates at the party's first conference since the referendum result.

When I saw her at the G20 she said the British people voted for some control of immigration from the European Union. No, Prime Minister, we voted to take back control of our borders. Simple as.

We have cabinet members like the Home Secretary still fighting the referendum  half this Cabinet did not only fail to support the referendum, but it seems like they want to do their utmost to keep us part of the single market. There is going to be a great political battle ahead.

In contrast to the tone of the EU referendum campaign, Mr Farage also pivoted strongly in explicitly calling for Britain to leave the EU single market. He said he favoured a hard Brexit rather than a soft Brexit.

Mr Farage said his three tests of whether Brexit means Brexit were whether Britain opted out of the common fisheries policies, whether it completely left the single market and its regulations, and whether the cover of British passports returned to a blue colour and dropped any reference to the European Union.

He said that in the event of a so-called soft Brexit that very large number of Conservatives would see Ukip as the only party they could support.

 Jean-Claude Juncker has head in hands while Nigel Farage addresses EU Parliament

The MEP also announced he would continue to lead his partys European Parliament grouping and would continue to support Ukips new leader.

Mr Farages speech was well received by his audience and took a triumphalist tone throughout. He received a standing ovation upon taking the stage, followed by a two-minute ovation upon finishing his speech.

Without us there would have been no referendum, he told Ukip delegates.

Without you and the peoples army there would have been no ground campaign and together we have changed the course of British history.

Weve brought down a Prime Minister, weve got rid of the Chancellor, and weve got rid of the European Commissioner.

I said four years ago, I predicted that Ukip would cause an earthquake in British politics. Well, we have.

Britain voted to leave the European Union by 52 per cent to 48 per cent in a referendum help on 23 June this year.
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Nigel Farage has clarified that he is not retiring from political life following his stepping down as Ukip leader.

The eurosceptic politician and MEP made his comments in an interview on the first morning of his partys conference in Bournemouth on the south coast.

Recommended Read more Nigel Farage expects Article 50 to be triggered in January

The two-day gathering, the partys first major conference since the EU referendum result, will see the announcement of Mr Farages successor.

Mr Farage, who has twice stepped down as leader before and twice returned  said he would support whoever was elected leader, but that he would now have a bit of life to himself.

Things move on in life, Ive been doing this for over two decades, Ive done my bit, Ive pushed the party on, we won [the] referendum, its time for somebody else to take up the reigns, he told ITV1s Good Morning Britain programme.

So look, Im stepping back from the frontlines, Im not retiring, Im not going away, I will support whoever the next leader is but I will also, for the first time in years, have a bit of a life as well.

Nigel Farage's most controversial moments Show all 12 1 /12 Nigel Farage's most controversial moments Nigel Farage's most controversial moments When he unveiled that 'breaking point' poster during the referendum Mr Farage was accused of deploying Nazi-style propaganda when he unveiled a poster showing Syrian refugees travelling to Europe under the next Breaking point. Users on social media were quick to compare the advert to a Nazi propaganda film with similar visuals and featuring Jewish refugees. The poster was particularly controversial because it was unveiled the morning of the killing of Labour MP Jo Cox Rex Nigel Farage's most controversial moments When he said hed be concerned if his neighbours were Romanian In May 2014 Mr Farage was accused of a racial slur against Romanians after he suggested he would be concerned living next to a house of them. I was asked if a group of Romanian men moved in next to you, would you be concerned? And if you lived in London, I think you would be, he told LBC radio during an interview. Asked whether he would also object to living next to German children, he said: You know the difference Bongarts/Getty Images Nigel Farage's most controversial moments When he said the EU campaign was won 'without a bullet being fired' Nigel Farage has said the next Prime Minister has to be a Leave supporter AFP/Getty Nigel Farage's most controversial moments When he resigned as Ukip leader and came back days later After failing to win the seat of South Thanet at the general election, Nigel Farage stepped down as Ukip leader  as he had promised to do during the campaign. Days later on 11 May he un-resigned and said he would stay after being convinced by supporters within the party. Well see how long his resignation lasts this time AP/Matt Dunham Nigel Farage's most controversial moments When he blamed immigrants for making him late Mr Farage turned up late to a 25-a-head meet the leader style event in Port Talbot, Wales in December 2014. Asked why he was late, he blamed immigrants. It took me six hours and 15 minutes to get here - it should have taken three-and-a-half to four, he said. That has nothing to do with professionalism, what it does have to do with is a country in which the population is going through the roof chiefly because of open-door immigration and the fact that the M4 is not as navigable as it used to be Getty Nigel Farage's most controversial moments When he wanted to ban immigrants with HIV from Britain Mr Farage has used his platform as Ukip leader call for people with HIV to be banned from coming to Britain. Asked in an interview with Newsweek Europe in October 2014 who he thought should be allowed to come to the UK, he said: People who do not have HIV, to be frank. Thats a good start. And people with a skill. He also repeated similar comments in the 2015 general election leadership debates Getty Nigel Farage's most controversial moments When he defended the use of a racial slur against Chinese people Defending one of Ukips candidates, who used the word ch**ky to describe a Chinese person, Mr Farage said: If you and your mates were going out for a Chinese, what do you say you're going for?" When he was told by the presented that he honestly would not use the slur, Mr Farage replied: A lot would Lintao Zhang/Getty Images Nigel Farage's most controversial moments When he said parts of Britain were like a foreign land The Ukip leader used his 2014 conference speech to declare parts of Britain as being like a foreign land. He told his audience in Torquay that parts of the country were unrecognisable because of the number of foreigners there. Mr Farage has also previously said he felt uncomfortable when people spoke other language on a train Screengrab Nigel Farage's most controversial moments When he said the British army should be deployed to France At the height of trouble at Britains Calais border Mr Farage proposed a novel solution. The Ukip leader called for the British army to be sent to France to put down a migrant rebellion. In all civil emergencies like this we have an army, we have a bit of a Territorial Army as well and we have a very, very overburdened police force and border agency, he said. If in a crisis to make sure weve actually got the manpower to check lorries coming in, to stop people illegally coming to Britain, if in those circumstances we can use the army or other forces then why not AFP/Getty Nigel Farage's most controversial moments When he said breastfeeding women should sit in the corner Mr Farage sparked protests from mothers after he told women to sit on the corner if they wanted to breastfeed their children. I think that given that some people feel very embarrassed by it, it isnt too difficult to breastfeed a baby in a way that's not openly ostentatious, Mr Farage said. He added: "Or perhaps sit in the corner, or whatever it might be AFP/Getty Images Nigel Farage's most controversial moments When he said the gender pay gap exists because women are worth less At a Q&A on the European Union in January 2014 Mr Farage said there was no discrimination against women causing the gender pay gap. Instead, he said, women were paid less because they were simply worth far less than many of their male counterparts. A woman who has a client base, has a child and takes two or three years off - she is worth far less to her employer when she comes back than when she went away because that client base won't be stuck as rigidly to her portfolio, he said Getty Nigel Farage's most controversial moments When he said he actually couldnt guarantee 350m to the NHS after Brexit During the EU referendum campaign the Leave side pledged to spend 350 million a week on the National Health Service  claiming that this is what the UK sends to Brussels. Nigel Farage didnt speak out against this figure and also pledged to spend EU cash on the health service and other public services himself. Then the day of the election result he suddenly changed his tone, saying he couldnt guarantee the cash for the NHS and that to pledge to do so was a mistake Getty

Mr Farage has long been the face of Ukip and a regular media performer. One of the most regular panelists in history of the BBC Question Time programme, his ubiquity has at times led to Ukip being branded a one-man band.

The runners and riders to replace Mr Farage are Diane James, the co-deputy chair of the party, Elizabeth Jones, an NEC member, Bill Etheridge, an MEP for the West Midlands, Lisa Duffy, a councilor and official, and Phillip Broughton, the partys candidate for Hartlepool at the 2015 general election.

The election comes amid a low-level factional civil war in the party. Mr Farage last night hit out at the partys only MP, Douglas Carswell, who he accused of not supporting large parts of the partys platform.
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New York police are investigating the death of an architect who fell from a high-rise in Midtown Manhattan.

Authorities identified the victim as 52-year-old Bruno Travalja, the owner of Crown Architectural Systems. He was reportedly taking measurements for a glass barrier to be installed on a rooftop terrace of the Flatotel when witnesses said he became dizzy and plummeted almost 47 stories Thursday afternoon.

The New York Daily News reported that Travalja was wearing a safety harness, but it was not secured to anything.

(Google Earth (Google Earth)

His body was found on the second floor ledge of the building, only blocks away from Rockefeller Centre.

City officials ordered a halt to construction at the scene. NYPD and Department of Buildings officials are investigating the scene.

He was the most honest, hard-working, truthful human being who ever walked the face of the planet, his wife, Alexis Travalja, 40, told the Daily News. It was a tragic accident.

Travalja founded his company 11 years ago in Ridgewood, New Jersey. He was raised in Queens and attended the Pratt Institute, Ms Travalja said.

He leaves behind a 17-year-old daughter, and two sons, aged 15 and 13.
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Sightings of creepy clowns trying to lure children away are spreading across the US, with no-one sure whether the whole thing is a hoax or a terrifying new trend in abductions.

Four states have now reported the sinister sightings.

They began in South Carolina, before spreading to North Carolina and have since surfaced in Georgia and Alabama.

Even the horror writer Stephen King, whose 1986 novel It did more than anything to promote the idea that clowns could be terrifying, says the sightings are frightening.

Kids love clowns, but they also fear them; clowns with their white faces and red lips are so different and so grotesque compared to normal people, he recently told the Bangor Daily News. The clown furor will pass, as these things do, but it will come back, because under the right circumstances, clowns really can be terrifying.

In Georgia, police said they had received numerous reports of clowns trying to talk to children as well as a threat by someone promising to dress up and kidnap school pupils.

In a Facebook post, the local police department condemned the threat.

This behaviour is not cute or funny... if applicable, you may face charges, it said.

Officers finally solved part of the mystery on Thursday, saying they had charged two people with making false police reports after they say the pair called 911 to report that people dressed as clowns were trying to lure children into a white van.

Police who responded to the calls found found two people in a white van who had run out of gas, and found no clown masks or costumes, and the 911 callers admitted the whole thing was a hoax.

The reports are not entirely new, however.

Bakersfield was among the towns in California that was gripped in 2014 by dozens of reports of clown sightings including some saying they were armed.
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Israel has 200 nuclear weapons, according to the latest revelation hidden in a cache of Colin Powell's leaked emails.

The former US secretary of state revealed the information in an email he sent to a colleague last year, which was obtained by the hacking group DCLeaks and published on LobeLog, a foreign policy blog.

Israel has a policy of nuclear ambiguity and has never talked about the type or size of its weapons, even if it has been an open secret that the US ally is well armed.

Some Israel watchers estimate the country has as many as 400 weapons but Mr Powell is one of the most authoritative sources to date.

He was writing to business partner and democratic donor Jeffrey Leeds regarding Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahus speech to US Congress, warning them against the nuclear deal with Iran which would limit Tehran's nuclear ability in return for lifting international oil and financial sanctions. The deal was nonetheless finalised last summer.

Negotiators cant get what he wants, wrote Mr Powell in the email.

Which countries have nuclear weapons? Show all 14 1 /14 Which countries have nuclear weapons? Which countries have nuclear weapons? USA Have nuclear weapons Getty Which countries have nuclear weapons? Russia Have nuclear weapons Getty Which countries have nuclear weapons? UK Have nuclear weapons Getty Which countries have nuclear weapons? France Have nuclear weapons Getty Which countries have nuclear weapons? China Have nuclear weapons Getty Which countries have nuclear weapons? India Say they have nuclear weapons Getty Which countries have nuclear weapons? Pakistan Say they have nuclear weapons Getty Which countries have nuclear weapons? North Korea Say they have nuclear weapons EPA/Rodong Sinmun Which countries have nuclear weapons? Israel Believed to have nuclear weapons Getty Which countries have nuclear weapons? Belgium Nations hosting nuclear weapons Getty Which countries have nuclear weapons? Germany Nations hosting nuclear weapons Getty Which countries have nuclear weapons? Italy Nations hosting nuclear weapons Getty Which countries have nuclear weapons? Netherlands Nations hosting nuclear weapons Getty Which countries have nuclear weapons? Turkey Nations hosting nuclear weapons Getty

Anyway, Iranians cant use one [a nuclear weapon] if they finally make one. The boys in Tehran know Israel has 200, all targeted on Tehran, and we have thousands. As Akmdinijad (sic) [said], What would we do with one, polish it? I have spoken publicly about both nK and Iran. Well blow up the only thing they care about  regime survival. Where, how would they even test one?

The US-Iran deal requires Iran to reduce its stockpile of low-enriched Uranium, used to fuel bombs, by 98 per cent, as well as limit their enrichment capacity and research and development for the next decade and a half.

 Obama faces off opposition in Congress over Iran deal

Yet Mr Powell publicly endorsed the agreement  he told NBCs Meet the Press in September 2015 that it was a pretty good deal  but did not seem so keen in another email to Mr Leeds a few months later. He expressed doubt to Mr Leeds that Iran could test out a nuclear weapon within a year.

In the email, the retired statesman and general also acknowledged that sanctions would not be enough to halt Iran if it was really bent on developing nuclear weapons.

 Iran nuclear deal, a year on

They [the Iranians] say, correctly, that they have every right to enrich [uranium] for energy. Russians helped build a power reactor at Busher. Cant get enough sanctions to break them Lots of bs around about their progress. Bibi likes to say a year away, as do our intel guys.They say it every year. [It] aint that easy to do.

The leaked emails have also exposed the former top American diplomat for insulting Donald Trump as a national disgrace and an international pariah, as well as calling Hillary Clinton a greedy, not transformational politician.

 Trump Blasts Clinton Over Leaked DNC Emails

In another twist, president Ronald Reagans former chief of staff, Ken Duberstein, had urged Mr Powell not to publicly support the deal, but Mr Powell wrote back to defend it being good for the country.

The Iran deal is a good one for the country and our alliances. Retired generals and admirals popping off. I have studied it pretty thoroughlyI have done emails before on tv. Have to deal with ISIS. Richard] Haass, Petraeus et all claiming to be undecided. BS, they are just protecting their future options. I dont have or want any. Baker, Shultz know whats right, as does Henry. Brent showed some guts.

The website which leaked the emails has links to Russian military intelligence hacker group dubbed Fancy Bear, according to the Washington Post, and the FBI is investigating an apparent Russian attempt to undermine political competence in the US.

The news comes shortly after Mr Trump was accused of treason for encouraging the Russians to hack Ms Clintons emails to search for the 30,000 missing documents that were not handed over to the FBI.

Mr Powell has been discovered, via more leaked emails, to have tried to distance himself from the email scandal surrounding Ms Clinton, which had dogged her election campaign.

I have a great deal of respect for Colin Powell, and I have a lot of sympathy for anyone whose emails become public, Ms Clinton told CNN on Thursday, declining to discuss the issue.
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NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden has slammed a critical new report by the US House intelligence committee, which claims his leaking of classified documents and government intelligence programmes caused tremendous damage to national security.

In its three-page summary of a two-year investigation into the case, the committee dismissed Mr Snowdens claim to be a government whistleblower, describing him instead as a disgruntled employee who had frequent conflicts with his managers, not to mention a "serial exaggerator and fabricator". Most of the documents he leaked, they argued, were defence secrets unrelated to the privacy of US citizens.

Mr Snowden, 33, who currently resides in Russia, responded in a series of tweets disputing the committees findings. The report, he wrote, is so artlessly distorted that it would be amusing if it werent such a serious act of bad faith.

The former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor has been living in Russia since 2013, shortly after he released information regarding mass phone and internet surveillance programmes carried out by the US government under the auspices of the War on Terror.

The report is being released amid a new push by Mr Snowden and his supporters to obtain a presidential pardon, and in the same week as director Oliver Stone's broadly favourable biopic, Snowden, reaches cinemas.

In a teleconference on Wednesday, Mr Snowden said he ought to be pardoned for having exposed unconstitutional activities that have since been limited or discontinued in light of his revelations. I love my country, he said. I love my family. I have dedicated my life to both of them.

Writing in the Guardian, former Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders joined a chorus of influential voices speaking out on Mr Snowdens behalf. Mr Sanders called for some form of clemency or a plea agreement that would spare him a long prison sentence or permanent exile.

The White House said this week that President Barack Obama still believes Mr Snowden ought to face prosecution. White House spokesman Josh Earnest said that if he did return to the US, he would be treated fairly and consistent with the law.
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A woman called authorities in Ohio to say she had been kidnapped and was just inches away from her alleged abductors bedroom, Ashland police have revealed.

Please hurry, the woman whispered to an emergency dispatcher, according to the 911 emergency phone call released by Ashland police. "I'm afraid he might hear me and catch me and he's strong.

When authorities arrived at the scene 20 minutes later, 40-year-old Shawn Grate was allegedly armed with a taser but he was arrested. Police found the remains of two bodies when they searched the abandoned house.

Mr Grate was later charged with kidnapping and two counts of murder.

Authorities identified one of the bodies as 43-year-old Stacey Stanley, from Greenwich, Ohio, the Mansfield News Journal reported. Her family said she had been missing since last week. She was last seen alive at a local gas station attending a flat tire.

Her family has set up a fundraiser on GoFundMe to pay for her funeral costs. Her uncle said Ms Stanley was a recovering heroin addict and had finally been displaying signs of success.

She had been off of the stuff the last six months and was living with her sister, going to work every day, her uncle told People.

She was sober and was taking care of herself. She had reclaimed her life.

Officials said the other woman, who has not been identified, was killed between August 13 and September 13.

Mr Grate, who was described by investigators as homeless, has a lengthy arrest record in the Crawford and Mansfield Municipal Courts including a domestic violence charge against his former girlfriend, Cleveland 19 reported.

He was being held in Ashland County Jail.
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Muslims are the most disapproved group in America, according to a new study, amid increasing anti-Muslim rhetoric from conservative politicians.

A new study from sociologists at the University of Minnesota, which analysed Americans perceptions of minority faith and racial groups, found that their disapproval of Muslims has almost doubled from about 26 per cent 10 years ago to 45.5 per cent in 2016.

Amid increasing focus on immigration, refugees and national security and in the wake of multiple terrorist attacks around the world, the study found that almost half of those surveyed would not want their child to marry a Muslim, compared to just 33.5 per cent of people a decade earlier.

The report found that anti-Muslim violence spiked after the attacks on the Twin Towers in 2001, as did attacks on Sikh Americans, who are often confused with Muslim Americans.

"Even the generally tolerant millennials exhibit relatively strong anti-Muslim sentiments," the report read.

Hussein Rashid, a professor at Barnard College in New York, told Religion News that the spike in intolerance is reflected by current political rhetoric.

"In 10 years, people have a more negative perception of Muslims, Jews, gays, Latinos, and Blacks," he said.

Muslim fashion designer features hijabs at New York Fashion Week Show all 8 1 /8 Muslim fashion designer features hijabs at New York Fashion Week Muslim fashion designer features hijabs at New York Fashion Week Anniesa Hasibuan show, runway, Spring Summer 2017, New York Fashion Week Rex Muslim fashion designer features hijabs at New York Fashion Week Anniesa Hasibuan show, runway, Spring Summer 2017, New York Fashion Week Rex Features Muslim fashion designer features hijabs at New York Fashion Week Anniesa Hasibuan show, runway, Spring Summer 2017, New York Fashion Week Rex Muslim fashion designer features hijabs at New York Fashion Week Anniesa Hasibuan show, runway, Spring Summer 2017, New York Fashion Week Rex Muslim fashion designer features hijabs at New York Fashion Week Anniesa Hasibuan show, runway, Spring Summer 2017, New York Fashion Week Rex Features Muslim fashion designer features hijabs at New York Fashion Week Anniesa Hasibuan show, runway, Spring Summer 2017, New York Fashion Week Rex Features Muslim fashion designer features hijabs at New York Fashion Week Anniesa Hasibuan show, runway, Spring Summer 2017, New York Fashion Week Rex Features Muslim fashion designer features hijabs at New York Fashion Week Anniesa Hasibuan show, runway, Spring Summer 2017, New York Fashion Week Rex Features

"As a new America is taking shape, with all its diversity, there is a reactionary response that wants a mythic America of everyone being exactly the same."

The survey, completed by 2,521 people between February 2014 and March 2016, found that Jews, Latinos and Asian-Americans also saw their disapproval ratings jump by about 10 points each.

Atheists were the second most disapproved group in the US, as they were associated with a "lack of morals".

 Pro-Muslim Protesters Removed from Trump Rally in Virginia

The news comes as the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has announced that 2016 is on track to be one of the worst years for anti-mosque incidents, with 55 cases reported as of mid-September. There were 79 incidents in 2015.

"This trend of increasing violence targeting the American Muslim community is deeply troubling," said CAIR national executive director Nihad Awad.

He added that 2016 was one of the worst years on record, involving vandalism, intimidation and physical assault.

"It is important for presidential candidates and other public figures to unify Americans against hate," he added.

"Any American should be able to freely practise his or her religion without fear of harm or intimidation."

 Pro-Muslim Protesters Removed from Trump Rally in Virginia

The most recent cases in September included someone throwing rocks through a window of a mosque in New Hampshire, a driver of a tractor-trailer being rammed twice into a mosque in Maryland and a man setting a mosque on fire in Florida.

In Georgia, Newtown County officials recently reversed their decision to ban the building of a new mosque and small cemetery on land purchased by the Muslim community, following concerns from locals that the land would be turned into an Isis training camp.
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Struggling to get his campaign back on track after its sudden diversion into the twilight zone of whether or not President Barack Obama was born in the United States, Mr Trump announced that, yes, indeed he was.

In the same breath he contended that the birther movement that had sought to cast doubt on the Presidents place of birth had been started by Hillary Clinton and not by him at all.

He made the pronouncement in the clear hope that he could quickly dispense with an issue he once reveled in but which had, since Thursday, threatened to sow chaos in his campaign and potentially torpedo his nascent attempt to build bridges with black and minority voters.

President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period, Mr Trump said at a press conference at his newly opened hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue, blocks from the White House in Washington DC. Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again.

It was, almost unbelievably, the first time that Mr Trump has formally disavowed the basic premise of the birtherism movement that he led earlier in this decade that held that Mr Obama had failed to demonstrate that he had actually been born in Hawaii.

It was a movement that clearly helped propel the conspiracy theories held by some on the alt-right flank of American politics that Mr Obama was somehow an imposter from another nation and  worse, in their contorted vision of the world  from a Muslim nation.

Since declaring his run for the presidency, Mr Trump has shied away from the topic, presumably aware that for great numbers of voters it had variously made him look foolish, if not racist and bigoted. But it burst back into the open on Thursday when he was asked outright to disavow it by The Washington Post in an interview and he demurred.

That led his own campaign to issue a statement later in the day insisting that Mr Trump did believe Mr Obama was born in Hawaii. It was in that statement that the campaign also for the first time made the astonishing claim, offering no evidence whatsoever, that it was Ms Clinton who had started the whole birtherism fandango when she was running against him in the 2008 primaries.

Hillary Clintons campaign first raised this issue to smear then-candidate Barack Obama in her very nasty, failed 2008 campaign for President, that statement, emailed to reporters, declared. This type of vicious and conniving behavior is straight from the Clinton Playbook. As usual, however, Hillary Clinton was too weak to get an answer. Even the MSNBC show Morning Joe admits that it was Clintons henchmen who first raised this issue, not Donald J. Trump.

Mr Trump made the same claim about Ms Clinton at his hotel on Friday. I finished it. You know what I mean, he added, a reference to the fact that in 2011 Mr Obama produced a long-form version of his birth certificate to put the whole issue to rest. Mr Trump has suggested that that only happened because of the pressure he had exerted and he had therefore done a service to the country.

Also in Washington DC on Friday, Ms Clinton lit into Mr Trump on the issue, demanding that he apologise to the country and to Mr Obama himself for having sown doubts about his birthplace.

Speaking to a group of black Democrat women, she said the whole Trump campaign had been founded on this outrageous lie and there is no erasing it from history. She added that Mr Trump is playing with the worst impulses, the bigotry and bias that lurks in the nation.

Think about how dangerous it would be, she said, to have a leader in the Oval Office who traffics in conspiracy theories and refuses to let them go no matter what the facts are.

Donald Trump is unfit to be present of the United States, she said to loud applause. We cannot become insensitive to what he says and what he stirs up. We cannot just accept this, we have got to stand up to it. If we dont, it wont stop.

President Obama himself seemed to be conflicted between laughing at the latest Trump-led furore and denouncing it. I am shocked that a question like that would come up when we have so much else to do, he told reporters at the White House on Friday morning.

Actually I am not that shocked, he went on, not missing the opportunity to at least deliver a jab to Mr Trump. I am petty confident about where I was born, I think most people were, as well.

Senator Bernie Sanders, who will be returning to the campaign trail in Ohio at the weekend on Ms Clintons behalf, also weighed in on the issue. This is pathetic and this goes to the root of what Trumps campaign is about, it's about bigotry, he told CNN on Friday.
For the first time, Uber pays tax in Vietnam

An illustration picture shows the logo of car-sharing service app Uber on a smartphone next to the picture of an official German taxi sign September 15, 2014. Photo by Reuters/Kai Pfaffenbach/Illustration/File Photo

The popular service promises to adhere to regulations after the finance ministry announced tax rates in an unmistakably tough move to tackle evasion.

Uber, the popular ride-sharing service, has paid VND241 million ($10,667) in taxes to Vietnam for the first time, after being accused of tax evasion over the past two years and forcing local authorities to take tough actions recently.

The company is working on procedures to pay more taxes, the Vietnam Television news site reported Thursday, quoting a tax official from the Ministry of Finance.

Following a prolonged legal back-and-forth, the finance ministry in a recent regulation ordered Uber International Services Holding B.V. to pay a value added tax rate of 3 percent on its revenue and a 2-percent corporate income tax.

The unit, based in the Netherlands, is responsible for operating Uber services in Vietnam.

It has also been told to pay taxes on behalf of Vietnamese drivers, which includes a 3-percent value added tax and a 1.5-percent personal income tax.

Uber said in a statement on September 12 that it is committed to fulfill its tax obligations in Vietnam.

The company also hopes to soon get the nod from the government to officially, and legitimately, launch its services here.

Uber proposed legal frameworks for providing ride-hailing services in Vietnam in October last year, but the proposal was rejected as the company did not designate a legal entity that would handle contracts with Vietnamese partners.

Vietnams Ministry of Transport then asked Uber to revise its proposal. No further action has been taken since.

For now, only Grab Taxi, a Malaysia-based company, and Vietnams Vinasun have received permission from local authorities to operate e-hailing services.

Related news:

> Vietnam gets tough on Uber in alleged tax evasion case

> Uber lost at least $1.27 bn in first half of year
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The campaign for the White House has descended once more into the realms of the surreal with Donald Trump reigniting his old game of casting doubt on whether President Barack Obama was born in the United States by refusing to answer a question about it in a newspaper interview.

Asked during an interview with The Washington Post whether he was ready to finally say that he accepts that Hawaii was the birthplace of President Obama, Mr Trump demurred. Ill answer that question at the right time, he said. I just dont want to answer it yet.

It was a non-answer that triggered an instant whirlwind on the campaign trail, beginning with Hillary Clinton giving him a scalding rebuke at an event for Hispanic leaders in Washington calling Mr Trumps language ugliness and bigotry.

Shortly afterwards the Trump campaign rushed into damage control issuing a statement first asserting that the entire issue of where Mr Obama had been born had been raised by Ms Clinton in the first place when she was running against him in the 2008 primaries and then stating that Mr Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.

But even that statement, which argued that Mr Trump had done a great service to the country and to Mr Obama himself by compelling him to release his full-form birth certificate in 2011, cannot be taken as the end of the matter since it was signed not by the candidate but by a spokesman.

That did not go unnoticed for the simple reason that in the interview with the Post, Mr Trump also played coy when asked about recent remarks by his campaign manager Kellyanne Conway saying that he had had in fact come to the conclusion that Mr Obama had been born in the US.

Its OK, he responded. Shes allowed to speak what she thinks. I want to focus on other things.

On Friday morning, there was speculation that Mr Trump would use a visit to a new hotel bearing his name in Washington DC finally to announce his acceptance of Mr Obama as a true American - a statement that would finally bring him in line with his own campaign.

Yet Thursday nights developments were threatening to develop into a new fiasco for Mr Trump that could become a dangerous distraction at a time when there had been signs of his campaign both become more focused and disciplined and of new poll movement in his favour.

Not only was Mr Trump widely ridiculed for becoming the leader of the so-called birther movement before it petered out in 2011, it also was seen by many black and Hispanic voters as nothing short of racist in nature. For that now to be revived today as he struggles to reach out to both those groups could be a disaster.

Which explains why Ms Clinton saw an opening, after a rocky few days of her own, and seized on it on Thursday night as evidence that however much Mr Trump might try to change his spots as Election Day approaches, he will never be able to.

He was asked one more time where was President Obama born and he still wouldn't say Hawaii. He still wouldn't say America, Ms Clinton said. This man wants to be our next president? When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?
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Bernie Sanders is returning to the campaign trail for Hillary Clinton, making several appearances at college towns through Ohio where she appears to be in a dead heat with Donald Trump.

With so much at stake in the Buckeye State, Mr Sanders has been given the key mission over this weekend of firing up the energy of younger voters, with whom he was so popular when he gave Ms Clinton a run for her money during the primaries before she clinched the nomination.

It is an effort that wont be left to the Democratic Socialist Senator from Vermont alone. Also making stops in Ohio this weekend will be Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.

Both figures, popular with the progressive left of the Democratic Party, have agreed to help defeat Mr Trump in what remains of the election campaign, even if they have both put Ms Clinton on notice that they expect her to give more than lip service to their liberal ideals.

He is pathetic, Mr Sanders said of Mr Trump on Friday, commenting on the Republicans meandering on the issue of whether President Barack Obama was or was not born in America. This goes to the root of what Trumps campaign is about  its about bigotry, he told CNN.

The deployment of Mr Sanders and Ms Warren to Ohio is a sign, however, of growing nervousness in the Clinton campaign of a recent narrowing of the national polls and polls in swing states. Keeping Mr Trump at bay in states like Florida and Ohio  no Republican has won the White House without winning Ohio first  is crucial for Ms Clintons campaign.

US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Show all 12 1 /12 US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Republican U.S. presidential nominee Donald Trump shakes hands with Democratic U.S. presidential nominee Hillary Clinton at the conclusion of their first presidential debate at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York Reuters US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures President Barack Obama embraces Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton on stage at the party's convention in Philadelphia US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Donald Trump's wife Melania delivered a speech at the GOP convention in Cleveland that was later found to have been cribbed in part from Michelle Obama's 2008 convention address AP US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Hillary Clinton talks to reporters aboard her new campaign plane on Labour Day, 5 September, her first 'press conference' since 2015 (Getty Images) US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Donald Trump held a joint press conference with Mexican leader Enrique Pena Nieto in Mexico City in August, hours before reiterating his harsh immigration plans at a campaign rally in Arizona Reuters US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Bernie Sanders officially endorsed Hillary Clinton, saying his progressive vision for a transformed America would be best served by the defeat of Donald Trump Reuters US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Khizr and Gazala Khan appeared at the DNC to slam Trump for his stance on Muslim immigration, citing the case of their son Humayun Khan, who was killed in combat while serving as a Captain in the US Army in Iraq US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson is doing better in polls than any third party candidate since Ross Perot, 20 years ago Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Green Party candidate Jill Stein (centre) marches with supporters in Colorado AP US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Hillary Clinton and Virginia Senator Tim Kaine at a rally in Kaine's home state in July, days before Ms Clinton tapped him to be her running mate Getty US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Trump on the campaign trail with his vice presidential pick, Indiana governor Mike Pence AP US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Former Ukip leader Nigel Farage appears at a Trump rally in Mississippi in August, where he told the crowd that he 'wouldn't vote for Hillary Clinton if you paid me'.

In Ohio, both senators will be emphasising Ms Clintons education plans, in particular to eliminate college tuition fees for less well-off Americans and to make attendance at community college free, as well as the possibility of studying without accumulating debt, for every young person.

Mr Sanders tour has been billed as a Weekend of Action and will see him attending events in Canton, Kent and Akron in northern Ohio. He will also stress other issues popular with younger votes including action to combat climate change, widening access to health care and Ms Clintons commitment to raise the minimum wage.

What every American  Democrat, Republican, independent  has got to ask themselves, issue by issue, [is], Who is the better candidate for them, for the middle class, for working families? Mr Sanders told USA Today.

And if you go through the issues  raising the minimum wage, pay equity, family leave, making public colleges and universities tuition free, climate change  on all of those issues and many, many others, clearly Hillary Clinton is far and away the superior candidate. Thats what has to be dealt with and thats the point that well try to make.

As well as reminding millennial voters in Ohio of the basics of Ms Clintons platform, Ms Sanders will also be urging them to register vote before a mid-October deadline. While the Clinton campaign has vastly superior on-the-ground, get-out-the-vote organising infrastructures in all the swing states, there is still concern that she is suffering from an excitement deficit.

Concerns about the likely turn-out will be especially key where victories for Ms Clinton may rest in part on ensuring that minorities go to the voting stations on 8 November. That means firing up the African American vote in Ohio, especially in those northern urban centres like Akron and Cleveland. In Florida the campaign is also very focused on getting Hispanic voters to the polls.

That will also mean encouraging voters to engage in early voting in those states that allow it. The time I want Bernie  and I love him  is for early voting, Donna Brazile, the interim chair of the Demoratic National Committee, said. Bernie Sanders is going to help Democrats up and down the ticket.

In 2012, some 35 per cent of ballots were cast early. This year, 37 states and the District of Columbia allow some form of early voting. Indeed early voting will begin first in several states  Idaho, Minnesota, South Dakota, Vermont, Wyoming  on 23 September. In other words, in one week.

Ohio is among the battleground states where Mr Trump and Ms Clinton are suddenly in a dead heat or he may just be slightly ahead. A Suffolk University poll released on Thursday showed the Republican ahead in the state by 42 per cent to 39 per cent  within the margin of error. The poll showed him comfortably ahead of Ms Clinton in Ohio among younger voters
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Hillary Clinton has returned refreshed to the presidential campaign trail, days after she was caught on camera staggering on a New York street amid a bout of pneumonia. The Democratic nominee emerged onstage at a rally in Greensboro, North Carolina on Thursday to the strains of James Browns I Feel Good, claiming that the time off had provided her with a rare opportunity to reconnect with the most important aspects of the election.

Recommended Read more Donald Trump tells Dr Oz he feels as good as he did at 30

Apparently marking a shift from easy criticism of her Republican rival, Donald Trump, to a full-throated promotion of her own agenda, Ms Clinton promised henceforth to give Americans something to vote for, not just against. For the remaining 50 or so days of the election, she said, Everywhere I go, Im going to talk about my ideas for the country.

The 68-year-old former Secretary of State said she felt lucky to be able to take time off to recuperate at home in Chappaqua, New York, when so many working Americans would not be able to afford such a break. With just two months to go until election day, sitting at home was pretty much the last place I want to be, she said. And yet, she went on, Its important to sit with your thoughts every now and then. It helped me reconnect with what this whole campaign is about.

US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Show all 12 1 /12 US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Republican U.S. presidential nominee Donald Trump shakes hands with Democratic U.S. presidential nominee Hillary Clinton at the conclusion of their first presidential debate at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York Reuters US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures President Barack Obama embraces Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton on stage at the party's convention in Philadelphia US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Donald Trump's wife Melania delivered a speech at the GOP convention in Cleveland that was later found to have been cribbed in part from Michelle Obama's 2008 convention address AP US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Hillary Clinton talks to reporters aboard her new campaign plane on Labour Day, 5 September, her first 'press conference' since 2015 (Getty Images) US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Donald Trump held a joint press conference with Mexican leader Enrique Pena Nieto in Mexico City in August, hours before reiterating his harsh immigration plans at a campaign rally in Arizona Reuters US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Bernie Sanders officially endorsed Hillary Clinton, saying his progressive vision for a transformed America would be best served by the defeat of Donald Trump Reuters US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Khizr and Gazala Khan appeared at the DNC to slam Trump for his stance on Muslim immigration, citing the case of their son Humayun Khan, who was killed in combat while serving as a Captain in the US Army in Iraq US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson is doing better in polls than any third party candidate since Ross Perot, 20 years ago Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Green Party candidate Jill Stein (centre) marches with supporters in Colorado AP US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Hillary Clinton and Virginia Senator Tim Kaine at a rally in Kaine's home state in July, days before Ms Clinton tapped him to be her running mate Getty US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Trump on the campaign trail with his vice presidential pick, Indiana governor Mike Pence AP US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Former Ukip leader Nigel Farage appears at a Trump rally in Mississippi in August, where he told the crowd that he 'wouldn't vote for Hillary Clinton if you paid me'.

Ms Clintons return to the podium came as polls showed the race tightening after a disastrous week for her candidacy. First there was the flap over her description of half of Mr Trumps supporters as a basket of deplorables. And then came the news that she had withheld disclosure of her pneumonia diagnosis for two days, acknowledging the illness only after her poor health forced her to leave a 9/11 memorial event in Manhattan.

The Clinton campaign has long been dogged with accusations over its perceived lack of transparency. At a press conference after the event in Greensboro, Ms Clinton appeared to admit that even her running mate, Tim Kaine, had been unaware of her condition until her fainting fit was captured on video on Sunday. Describing pneumonia as an ailment that many people just power through, Ms Clinton insisted: That's what I thought I would do as well.

Questions about the health of both candidates have been at the forefront of the campaign in recent days, and on Thursday Mr Trump claimed in an interview with tabloid television physician Dr Oz that he feels as good as he did at the age of 30. At a rally in Ohio on Wednesday, the property mogul cast aspersions about his opponents stamina, asking the crowd: Do you think Hillary Clinton would be able to stand up here for an hour?

Ms Clintons own doctor wrote in a letter released this week that in spite of her pneumonia, she remained healthy and fit to serve as President.
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Michelle Obama made her debut on the 2016 presidential campaign trail on Friday, urging young voters to support Hillary Clinton in a speech at George Mason University in the swing state of Virginia. Its not enough to just come to a rally and take a few selfies. Its not enough to get angry, Ms Obama said. We must take action.

The First Lady boasts approval ratings close to 60 per cent, making her the most popular surrogate in the Clinton campaigns formidable arsenal. Known on Barack Obamas two presidential campaigns as The Closer, her speech at the Democratic Convention in July was widely thought the most effective of the four-day event.

With a pop cultural cachet that transcends partisan politics, Ms Obama has recently appeared on talkshows hosted by James Corden and Ellen DeGeneres, and is being deployed now to energise two key groups in the Obama coalition on Ms Clintons behalf: young people and black voters, both of whom need to be turned out in large numbers in swing states.

US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Show all 12 1 /12 US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Republican U.S. presidential nominee Donald Trump shakes hands with Democratic U.S. presidential nominee Hillary Clinton at the conclusion of their first presidential debate at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York Reuters US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures President Barack Obama embraces Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton on stage at the party's convention in Philadelphia US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Donald Trump's wife Melania delivered a speech at the GOP convention in Cleveland that was later found to have been cribbed in part from Michelle Obama's 2008 convention address AP US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Hillary Clinton talks to reporters aboard her new campaign plane on Labour Day, 5 September, her first 'press conference' since 2015 (Getty Images) US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Donald Trump held a joint press conference with Mexican leader Enrique Pena Nieto in Mexico City in August, hours before reiterating his harsh immigration plans at a campaign rally in Arizona Reuters US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Bernie Sanders officially endorsed Hillary Clinton, saying his progressive vision for a transformed America would be best served by the defeat of Donald Trump Reuters US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Khizr and Gazala Khan appeared at the DNC to slam Trump for his stance on Muslim immigration, citing the case of their son Humayun Khan, who was killed in combat while serving as a Captain in the US Army in Iraq US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson is doing better in polls than any third party candidate since Ross Perot, 20 years ago Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Green Party candidate Jill Stein (centre) marches with supporters in Colorado AP US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Hillary Clinton and Virginia Senator Tim Kaine at a rally in Kaine's home state in July, days before Ms Clinton tapped him to be her running mate Getty US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Trump on the campaign trail with his vice presidential pick, Indiana governor Mike Pence AP US election 2016: the race for the White House in pictures Former Ukip leader Nigel Farage appears at a Trump rally in Mississippi in August, where he told the crowd that he 'wouldn't vote for Hillary Clinton if you paid me'.

In Virginia, where the 17 October voter registration deadline is approaching, the First Lady was met with chants of four more years! But as she praised her husbands record, she also made a full-throated case for Ms Clinton to be his successor. Its excruciatingly clear theres only one person in this election we can trust, she said, and it is our friend, Hillary Clinton.

When I hear folks saying they dont feel inspired in this election, I disagree, I am inspired, Ms Obama went on. I am inspired by [Hillary Clintons] persistence and her consistency, by her heart and her guts Weve never had a candidate with this much experience... And yes, she happens to be a woman.

Though she did not mention him by name, the First Lady offered pointed criticism of Donald Trump and the Republican's divisive campaign. The presidency doesnt change who you are, it reveals who you are," she said.

"The same thing is true of a presidential campaign. So if a candidate is erratic and threatening, if a candidate traffics in prejudice, fears, and lies on the trail, if a candidate has no clear plans to implement their goals, if they disrespect their fellow citizens - including folks whove made extraordinary sacrifices for our country - let me tell you that is who they are. That is the kind of president they will be.

Being the president," she added, "isnt anything like being on reality TV.

With the issue of President Obamas birthplace back in the headlines, his wife also contrasted her husbands dignified response to the so-called birther controversy with Mr Trumps previous, racially-charged pursuit of his birth certificate. Barack has answered those questions with the example he set by going high when they go low, Ms Obama said.

She also reflected wryly on the new realities that would face the couple and their daughters after leaving the White House in January. My husbands going to need a new job, she said. Im going to have to find a job. Were going to be moving to a new home so well have to pack. Weve got to get the old house cleaned up so we can get our security deposit back."
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The man who caused outrage by posing with an inflatable sex doll by the 9/11 memorial has been identified as a high-flying British accountant.

Alex Jerrett, 33, from South Wales, was on his stag party in New York when he was photographed grinning by the two fountains of the former Twin Towers, where almost 3,000 people were killed, with the doll under his arm.

The former rugby player is due to wed his fiance, model Kiri John, this weekend, as reported by the Daily Mail.

Ms John was reportedly upset by the incident, which happened two days before the 15th anniversary of 9/11, sparking national outrage.

The accountant reportedly had to carry the doll around as part of a forfeit in a game. The group, which included his banker brother, Tom, and their retired school teacher father, Clive, took more selfies beside the monument before they were asked to leave by a police officer.

Ms Johns stepfather, Peter Newnes, told Mail Online that Mr Jerrett was upset by what he had done.

The weirdest and most shocking news stories Show all 30 1 /30 The weirdest and most shocking news stories The weirdest and most shocking news stories What do horse semen, an elephant and a yurt have in common Leading removals company AnyVan.com operates on the premise that they can move anything anywhere, an undertaking which has certainly given them more than they bargained for over the years. In addition to the more common requests to move homes, furniture and pianos, listings have included a horse semen, live elephant, a cabinet engraved with the Kamasutra, a phallic statue, a dungeon gynaecological bondage chair, a yurt and an ice cream van The weirdest and most shocking news stories Couple find dead lizard inside the can of tomatoes A couple in Birmingham were making lunch when they found the surprise addition of a dead lizard in a can of tomatoes. Muhammad Hussain and his wife Sanam discovered the critter had managed to get into the can that Mrs Hussain had been using to cook a curry. Mr Hussain was alerted to the presence of the lizard when he heard his wife screaming as she made lunch BBC The weirdest and most shocking news stories Greggs (a bakery) has actually stopped selling loaves of bread You'd have thought a bakery would be the one place you'd be guaranteed to buy a loaf of bread. Well, not at Greggs. According to the companys website, customers are able to buy white or malted sliced loaves which are freshly baked every day. So when one customer went into his local Greggs in Burton-upon-Trent, he was surprised to be told they didn't stock them any more. According to the company, they will now focus on the food to go market, which means most of the bread that the company sells is in sandwiches AFP The weirdest and most shocking news stories Man trolls plane passengers by painting sign on his roof welcoming them to the wrong city One US homeowner has taken trolling to another level by painting a message on his roof top to deliberately trick aeroplane passengers into thinking theyve boarded the wrong flight. Mark Gubin painted the sign Welcome to Cleveland on his home which is next to Mitchell International Airport in Milwaukee. Milwaukee is a city in Wisconsin, some four hundred miles away from Cleveland, in the state of Ohio, prompting passengers to fear theyve accidentally boarded the wrong flight as they spy the trick lettering from the aeroplane window Google Maps The weirdest and most shocking news stories Missing cat found after spending 64 days trapped inside a mattress A family who thought theyd lost their cat as they prepared to move 3,000 miles across the US, were relieved when they found their pet inside a mattress some 64 days later. Moosie, a 2-year-old tabby cat, disappeared when Kymberly Chelf and her husband Jesse Chelf boxed up their belongings in preparation for their move from El Paso, Texas, to Anchorage, Alaska. In early June, the familys belongings arrived at their new home along with a big part of their old life. When the Chelfs heard a meow coming from inside the box, Mrs Chelf said: "it just sounded like he [Moosie] was giving it everything he had just to let us know he was there." The cat had been trapped for over two months without light, food or water. Moosie emerged from the ordeal suffering from severe dehydration and with a damaged liver, but vets have said he is in a good condition, CNN reported AP Photo/Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, Eric Engman The weirdest and most shocking news stories There's a lottery in which the prize is a 20-year supply of bacon Indiana's Hoosier Lottery is switching from cold, hard cash to hot, crispy bacon for its prize, offering players the chance to win 20 years-worth of the stuff. $5,000 of bacon will be dished out in 20 annual instalments to winners, according to the rules, presumably because no-one has the freezer space for 20 years of bacon. It's an ingenious ploy, given that anyone who tried to eat 20 years of bacon would probably struggle to live 20 years The weirdest and most shocking news stories Demonic CIA Osama Bin Laden doll goes up for sale at auction for $5,000 One of the strangest propaganda weapons of the War on Terror has gone up for sale at auction, and it could be yours for only $5,000. The item in question is a doll of Osama Bin Laden, designed to terrify the children of the Middle East so much that they would be permanently put off from joining Islamist groups. The doll is a fairly faithful recreation of the late terrorist leader, complete with white robes, combat boots, and a scraggly black beard. The propaganda value in the bizarre toy comes from the heat-sensitive paint used on the doll's face. When children played with the doll, the heat from their hands would activate the paint, and change Osama into a terrifying green-eyed, red-faced demon, with black markings all over his face Nate D. Sanders The weirdest and most shocking news stories The mystery of the 25-year-old Australian cat which turned up in Northern Ireland An Australian cat has been mysteriously found in Northern Ireland, sparking speculation as to how he made the 12,000 mile journey. The ginger cat was picked up by Cat Protection helpers in County Armagh last week. When animal welfare officers took him to the vet for a health check, it was discovered that he had been micro-chipped in Australia. The plot thickened as the chip revealed he has also been found as a stray across the Irish Sea in London Photo: Cat Protection The weirdest and most shocking news stories Replacement found after 'over-enthusiastic' bull breaks his own penis A prize bull has had to be taken off his farmers breeding programme after he suffered a broken penis. The injury, which the Simmentall bull sustained at the beginning of the breeding season, was probably due to being over-enthusiastic, according to his owner, Tommy Moyles. According to the Irish Mirror, Mr Moyles was then forced to bring another bull, which was previously destined for the slaughterhouse, out to provide his services Ian Forsyth/ Getty The weirdest and most shocking news stories Thieves steal four pints of bull semen from Minnesota farm A group of thieves have stolen about four pints of bull semen from a farm in southern Minnesota in the US - and could sell it on for an extraordinary amount of money. Police in the town of Leroy said they are investigating the theft of a $500 storage container with around 90 filled vials. On the open market, that amount of semen would be worth around $70,000 (47,000) Screengrab via CBS News The weirdest and most shocking news stories Charcoal has become the hot new flavouring If you want to be in on the latest trend in Britain's restaurants and bars, you're going to have to feel - and indeed taste - the burn. Some words of comfort next time you overfry, overbake, overboil or otherwise burn your dinner to a crisp: charcoal, in all its dark and mysterious forms, is being embraced by some of the best in the food and drinks business. It's not just about cooking on a grill (although that's also a booming market), but charcoal as an actual ingredient  bringing flavour, colour, texture and a touch of playfulness to plates of food and bottles of juice. This news comes on the heels of Burger King Japan's Kuro Pearl offering, a burger with a jet-black bamboo charcoal bun, which met with a mix of hysteria and confusion upon its launch last year. 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An individual with savant syndrome will display remarkable and sometimes spectacular talents, according Jonathan Hiles, Principal Lecturer of Health and Life Sciences at De Montford University, in an online article regarding the condition Getty The weirdest and most shocking news stories This octopus learned to use a camera faster than some humans A brainy octopus at a New Zealand aquarium has learned how to take photos - using a waterproof camera specially designed to be operated with tentacles. Rambo the octopus, a popular attraction at Kelly Tarlton's Sea Life Aquarium in Auckland, New Zealand, stunned her trainers with how quickly she got to grips with the camera. Speaking to Cult of Mac, Mark Vette, Rambo's trainer, said: "When we first tried to get her to take a photo, it only took three attempts for her to understand the process. That's faster than a dog." He added: "Actually, it's faster than a human in some instances" ULI DECK/AFP/Getty Images The weirdest and most shocking news stories 4-year-old leaves home at 3am to buy a 'Slushie' drink Its commonplace to see strange sights on the night bus. But passengers were completely baffled to witness a little girl boarding the vehicle alone at 3am just to satisfy her sweet-tooth. Four-year old Annabelle Ridgeway climbed onto a bus, having been drenched in the rain and without her parents knowledge, to find a place to buy a crushed-ice beverage. Bus driver Harlan Jenifer, 52, quickly called for assistance and Annabelle was taken to a local hospital to wait for her mother YouTube The weirdest and most shocking news stories Little girl goes off on surprising tangent after being told she's going to be a big sister It starts like one of those classic, schmaltzy parent-and-child YouTube videos. 3-year-old Kathryn's dad informs her in no uncertain terms that she's going to get a little sister. 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She fell heavily on to her back, the long cape and hood she had been wearing failing to separate from her other clothes The weirdest and most shocking news stories 'Left Shark' steals Super Bowl 2015 as Katy Perry is upstaged by her out-of-time support dancer While Katy Perry strutted her stuff during the half-time show  which involved multiple costume changes, an entrance on a large metallic lion and duets with Lenny Kravitz and Missy Elliott  social media users were left star-struck by the figure now known as Left Shark. Within minutes, Left Shark had its own Twitter account  which has since expanded to no fewer than six different accounts  but it was not the sharks killer moves and deadly accuracy on stage that gained so much attention, but rather the fact that it had no idea what it was doing. Perhaps even drunk, Left Shark was out of time with Right Shark, who was a picture of perfection as he moved with the beat and in time with Perry  who by this time was already onto her third costume change and bursting into a rendition of Teenage Dream Getty Images The weirdest and most shocking news stories Kim Kardashian breaks the internet Kim Kardashian West has recreated the iconic "champagne incident" image by Jean-Paul Goude for the December issue of Paper magazine. Kardashian West is pictured on the cover of the magazine popping open a bottle of champagne which lands in a glass perched on her bottom. In another image released by the American publication, Kardashian-West is pictured naked from behind provocatively dropping her dress. Two further images were released by the magazine last night which show the reality TV star baring all; in one full-frontal shot and another topless image The weirdest and most shocking news stories Zombie cat A US cat owner has been left baffled after he claimed his dead pet turned up outside his front door  five days after being buried. Ellis Hutson told vets in Tampa Bay, Florida, that he had found his black and white cat Bart lying in a pool of blood after he was hit by a car. According to Fox 13, Hutson told the Human Society of Tampa Bay that he had taken Bart away and buried him, and could not explain how the cat came to be spotted by neighbours a full five days later YouTube The weirdest and most shocking news stories 'F*ck it, I quit': KTVA reporter Charlo Greene quits live on air in spectacular fashion KTVA reporter Charlo Greene quit her job on live TV last night, outing herself as the owner of an Alaskan cannabis club and declaring "f*ck it." Having grown weary of reporting the news, Greene told viewers she would instead be putting all her energy into the fight to legalise marijuana in the state, having previously reported on the Alaska Cannabis Club without mentioning her connection to it KTVA The weirdest and most shocking news stories Nation in shock as Cadbury's changes the Creme Egg recipe In a bilateral attack on the glory of Easter, Cadbury's has stunned consumers by changing the recipe of its Creme Eggs and reducing their number in boxes from six to five. Reports that the latest batch of Creme Eggs tasted different were followed up by The Sun, wih Cadbury's confirming to the tabloid that it has switched out Dairy Milk for a "standard cocoa mix chocolate" in the shell Cadbury's The weirdest and most shocking news stories Chocolate Digestives revelation could change the face of biscuit eating forever Shut the biscuit tin, defenestrate your cup of tea, this is serious snack news: you have been eating chocolate biscuits upside down. Biscuits in fact have the chocolate on the bottom of the biscuit, not the top, McVitie's have confirmed, meaning Digestives, Hobnobs and more have a history of being eaten the wrong way up. The news sent shockwaves across the UK's subreddit, after a user posted an email from United Biscuits explaining their composition. "For your information," a spokesperson wrote, "the biscuits go through a reservoir of chocolate which enrobes them so the chocolate is actually on the bottom of the biscuits and not on the top" The weirdest and most shocking news stories Dollar store toy wand has hidden picture of demonic child cutting herself with a kitchen knife A mother in Dayton, Ohio was shocked when she purchased a toy wand for her child at a dollar store only to find it ran not on unicorn hair but a picture of a child slicing her arm open. In fairness to the dollar store (literally called '$.100 store') the product was named 'EVIL STICK', though the pink lettering, fairies, swirls and snowflakes on the packaging ensured it would catch the eye of toddlers. The fact that the wand emits a cackling laugh when activated is probably permissible, the horrific hidden image less so WHIO The weirdest and most shocking news stories Hello Kitty is not a cat - she's a British girl The revelation comes from Sanrio, the creators of the international toy, who contacted University of Hawaii anthropologist Christine R. Yano who was putting together a 40th anniversary retrospective of Hello Kitty in Los Angeles. Professor Yano, speaking to the LA Times, said: That's one correction Sanrio made for my script for the show. Hello Kitty is not a cat. She's a cartoon character. She is a little girl. She is a friend Getty The weirdest and most shocking news stories Cannabis-eating sheep munch through 4,000 in plants dumped in bag near farm Cannabis is known to leave its smokers feeling woolly-headed, but it seemed to have little effect on a flock of sheep who chomped their way through thousands of pounds worth of the drug. The hungry hash-eaters came across seven black bags containing the class B banned substance that had been dumped at the edge of their farm in Merstham, Surrey, and started scoffing Getty The weirdest and most shocking news stories Tesco cash machine offers 'free erection' because of mistake translating sign into Welsh Aberystwyth councillor Ceredig Davies took this picture after the new cash machine became the talk of the town, explaining that 'codiad am ddim' translates colloquially as 'free erection' Ceredig Davies The weirdest and most shocking news stories Parrot returns to British owner speaking Spanish - four years after disappearing Nigel, a grey African parrot, flew away from his home in California in 2010 but was returned to his British owner, Darren Chick, after he was discovered in Torrance, California. Although the Spanish-speaking bird bit Mr Chick when he first saw him, the happy owner said: "He's doing perfect. Mr Chick says his birds British accent is gone, replaced by fluent Spanish  and someone called "Larry". Even though he has no idea where the bird has been for the last four years, he claimed: "It's really weird, I knew it was him from the minute I saw him" Getty

Alex is an educated high-flyer but where was his common sense? Kiri is supporting him but we are all gutted by what happened on his stag.

His mother is gutted too, he's a very intelligent guy, he's no fool. But if you look at the photographs you can see he just didn't realise what he was doing.

He added that the timing was dreadful just days before the wedding.

Michael Frazier, executive vice president of communications and marketing at 9/11 Memorial and Museum, said the image of Mr Jerrett and the doll was disturbing and showed a blatant lack of respect.
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Hundreds of horseshoe crabs have washed up dead on a beach in southern Japan, leaving experts mystified.

The blue-blooded creatures arrive on the shore in southern and western Japan each year to lay eggs, and it is normal for some to die.

But this year the death rate has been more than eight times higher than normal, according to the Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun.

Usually around 50 to 60 dead horseshoe crabs are found on the Sonehigata tidal flats, but 490 have already been discovered this year.

Hiroko Koike, a researcher at the Kyushu University Museum who studies horseshoe crabs at Sonehigata, told the newspaper: Rises in the sea level caused by global warming, shortages of places to lay eggs and a lack of nutrition could have resulted in their deaths.

We have to be careful to identify the cause.

The dead crabs first started appearing in January, a time when the crabs are usually dormant, according to Shungo Takahashi, head of a local branch of an organisation that strives to protect the species.

He told the paper the number of dead crabs started increasing around late June and continued to rise in July and August, adding that more than 10 dead crabs had been found on some days.

Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 finalists Show all 11 1 /11 Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 finalists Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 finalists 'Termite tossing' by Willem Kruger (South Africa) Termite after termite after termite  using the tip of its massive beak-like forceps to pick them up, the hornbill would flick them in the air and then swallow them. Foraging beside a track in South Africas semi-arid Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, the southern yellow-billed hornbill was so deeply absorbed in termite snacking that it gradually worked its way to within 6 metres (19 feet) of where Willem sat watching from his vehicle. Though widespread, this southern African hornbill can be shy, and as it feeds on the ground  mainly on termites, beetles, grasshoppers and caterpillars  it can be difficult for a photographer to get a clear shot among the scrub. The bird feeds this way because its tongue isnt long enough to pick up insects as, say, a woodpecker might, and though its huge bill restricts its field of vision, it can still see the bills tip and so can pick up insects with precision. Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 finalists 'Swarming under the stars' by Imre Potyo (Hungary) Imre was captivated by the chaotic swarming of mayflies on Hungarys River Raba and dreamt of photographing the spectacle beneath a starlit sky. For a few days each year (at the end of July or beginning of August), vast numbers of the adult insects emerge from the Danube tributary, where they developed as larvae. On this occasion, the insects emerged just after sunset. At first, they stayed close to the water, but once they had mated, the females gained altitude. They filled the air with millions of silken wings, smothering Imre and his equipment in their race upstream to lay their eggs on the waters surface. Then they died, exhausted, after just a few hours. This compensatory flight  sometimes as far as several kilometres upstream  is crucial to make up for the subsequent downstream drift of the eggs and nymphs, and luckily for Imre, it was happening under a clear sky. Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 finalists 'The disappearing fish' by Iago Leonardo (Spain) In the open ocean, theres nowhere to hide, but the lookdown fish  a name it probably gets from the steep profile of its head, with mouth set low and large eyes high  is a master of camouflage. Recent research suggests that it uses special platelets in its skin cells to reflect polarized light (light moving in a single plane), making itself almost invisible to predators and potential prey. The platelets scatter polarized light depending on the angle of the sun and the fish, doing a better job than simply reflecting it like a mirror. This clever camouflage works particularly well when viewed from positions of likely attack or pursuit. What is not yet clear is whether the fish can increase its camouflage by moving the platelets or its body for maximum effect in the oceans fluctuating light. The lookdowns disappearing act impressed Iago, who was free-diving with special permission around Contoy Island, near Cancun, Mexico. Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 finalists 'Nosy neighbour' by Sam Hobson (UK) Sam knew exactly who to expect when he set his camera on the wall one summers evening in a suburban street in Bristol, the UKs famous fox city. He wanted to capture the inquisitive nature of the urban red fox in a way that would pique the curiosity of its human neighbours about the wildlife around them. This was the culmination of weeks of scouting for the ideal location  a quiet, welllit neighbourhood, where the foxes were used to people (several residents fed them regularly)  and the right fox. For several hours every night, Sam sat in one fox familys territory, gradually gaining their trust until they ignored his presence. One of the cubs was always investigating new things  his weeping left eye the result of a scratch from a cat he got too close to. I discovered a wall that he liked to sit on in the early evening, says Sam. He would poke his head over for a quick look before hopping up. Setting his focus very close to the lens, Sam stood back and waited. Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 finalists 'Thistle-plucker' by Isaac Aylward (UK) Try keeping a flying linnet in sight while scrambling down rocky embankments holding a telephoto lens. Isaac did, for 20 minutes. He was determined to keep pace with the linnet that he spotted while hiking in Bulgarias Rila Mountains, finally catching up with the tiny bird when it settled to feed on a thistle flowerhead. From the florets that were ripening, it pulled out the little seed parachutes one by one, deftly nipped off the seeds and discarded the feathery down. Isaac composed this alpine-meadow tableau with the sea of soft purple knapweed behind, accentuating the clashing red of the linnets plumage. Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 finalists 'Crystal precision' by Mario Cea (Spain) Every night, not long after sunset, about 30 common pipistrelle bats emerge from their roost in a derelict house in Salamanca, Spain, to go hunting. Each has an appetite for up to 3,000 insects a night, which it eats on the wing. Its flight is characteristically fast and jerky, as it tunes its orientation with echolocation to detect objects in the dark. The sounds it makes  too highpitched for most humans to hear  create echoes that allow it to make a sonic map of its surroundings. Mario positioned his camera precisely so that it was level with the bats exit through a broken window and the exact distance away to capture a head-on shot. The hard part was configuring the flashes to reveal the bat and highlight the edges of the glass shards. His perseverance paid off when he caught the perfect pose as a bat leaves the roost on its nighttime foray. Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 finalists 'Collective courtship' by Scott Portelli (Australia) Thousands of giant cuttlefish gather each winter in the shallow waters of South Australias Upper Spencer Gulf for their once-in-a-lifetime spawning. Males compete for territories that have the best crevices for egglaying and then attract females with mesmerizing displays of changing skin colour, texture and pattern. Rivalry among the worlds largest cuttlefish  up to a metre (3.3 feet) long  is fierce, as males outnumber females by up to eleven to one. A successful, usually large, male grabs the smaller female with his tentacles, turns her to face him (as here) and uses a specialized tentacle to insert sperm sacs into an opening near her mouth. He then guards her until she lays the eggs. The preoccupied cuttlefish (the male on the right) completely ignored Scott, allowing him to get close. A line of suitors was poised in the background, waiting for a chance to mate with the female (sometimes smaller males camouflage themselves as females to sneak past the male. Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 finalists 'Blast furnace' by Alexandre Hec (France) When the lava flow from Kilauea on Hawaiis Big Island periodically enters the ocean, the sight is spectacular, but on this occasion Alexandre was in for a special treat. Kilauea (meaning spewing or much spreading) is one of the worlds most active volcanoes, in constant eruption since 1983. As red-hot lava at more than 1,000C (1,832F) flows into the sea, vast plumes of steam hiss up, condensing to produce salty, acidic mist or rain. Alexandre witnessed the action and returned in an inflatable the following evening to find that a new crater had formed close to the shore. Capturing the furious action in a rough sea was no easy task. From 100 metres (328 feet) away, he was blasted with heat and noise  like a jet taking off. In a moment of visibility, his perseverance paid off, with a dramatic image of glowing lava being tossed some 30 metres (98 feet) into the air against the night sky. Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 finalists 'Splitting the catch' by Audun Rikardsen (Norway) Sometimes its the fishing boats that look for the killer whales and humpbacks, hoping to locate the shoals of herring that migrate to these Arctic Norwegian waters. But in recent winters, the whales have also started to follow the boats. Here a large male killer whale feeds on herring that have been squeezed out of the boats closing fishing net. He has learnt the sound that this type of boat makes when it retrieves its gear and homed in on it. The relationship would seem to be a win-win one, but not always. Whales sometimes try to steal the fish, causing damage to the gear, and they can also become entangled in the nets, sometimes fatally, especially in the case of humpbacks. The search for solutions is under-way, including better systems for releasing any whales that get trapped. Having grown up in a small coastal fishing community in northern Norway, Audun has always been fascinated by the relationship between humans and wildlife. Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 finalists 'Golden relic' by Dhyey Shah (India) With fewer than 2,500 mature adults left in the wild, in fragmented pockets of forest in northeastern India (Assam) and Bhutan, Gees golden langurs are endangered. Living high in the trees, they are also difficult to observe. But, on the tiny man-made island of Umananda, in Assams Brahmaputra River, you are guaranteed to see one. Site of a temple dedicated to the Hindu god Shiva, the island is equally famous for its introduced golden langurs. Within moments of stepping off the boat, Dhyey spotted the golden coat of a langur high up in a tree. The monkey briefly made eye contact and then slipped away. Today, there are just six left on the island, and, with much of the vegetation having been cleared, the leaf-eating monkeys are forced to depend mainly on junk food from visitors Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 finalists 'Playing pangolin' by Lance van de Vyver (New Zealand/South Africa) Lance had tracked the pride for several hours before they stopped to rest by a waterhole, but their attention was not on drinking. The lions (in South Africas Tswalu Kalahari Private Game Reserve) had discovered a Temmincks ground pangolin. This nocturnal, ant-eating mammal is armour-plated with scales made of fused hair, and it curls up into an almost impregnable ball when threatened. Pangolins usually escape unscathed from big cats (though not from humans, whose exploitation of them for the traditional medicine trade is causing their severe decline). But these lions just wouldnt give up. They rolled it around like a soccer ball, says Lance. Every time they lost interest, the pangolin uncurled and tried to retreat, attracting their attention again. Spotting a young lion holding the pangolin ball on a termite mound close to the vehicle, Lance focused in on the lions claws and the pangolins scratched scales, choosing black and white to help simplify the composition.

Mr Takahashi estimated there were 2,400 horseshoe crabs at the tidal flat this year, meaning the dead 490 crabs accounted for 20 per cent of that population.

According to the Fukuoka Fisheries and Marine Technology Research Centre, the seawater temperature off Fukuoka Prefecture this summer was one degree higher than usual, which has been put forward as a reason for the high number of deaths.
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A mother-of-three and a man were tortured and hanged from a tree in a so-called honour killing after they were accused of having an affair.

Khalida Bibi and her alleged boyfriend, 21-year-old Mohammad Mukhtar, were murdered in a family courtyard in the village of Mian Channu, in eastern Punjab province.

Pakistani police have arrested Ms Bibi's father, husband and brother, who confessed to killing her and Mr Mukhtar for having an affair, police official Allah Ditta told the Associated Press.

Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Show all 19 1 /19 Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Afghanistan Recommendation: I urge the Government of Afghanistan to adopt legislative reforms to ensure that sexual violence offences are not conflated with adultery or morality crimes and to establish infrastructure for the delivery of protection, health and le gal services to survivors. I call on the Ministry of the Interior to accelerate efforts to integrate women into the Afghan National Police, thereby enhancing its outreach and its capacity to address sexual and gender-based violence Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Central African Republic Recommendation: I urge the authorities of the Central African Republic to ensure that efforts to restore security and the rule of law take into account the prevention of sexual violence and that monitoring of the ceasefire and peace agreement explicitly reflects this consideration, in line with the joint communique of the Government and the United Nations on the prevention of and response to conflict-related sexual violence signed in December 2012. I further encourage the authorities to make the rapid response unit to combat sexual violence operational and to establish a special criminal court Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Colombia Recommendation: I commend the Government of Colombia for the progress made to date and its collaboration with the United Nations, including through the visit of my Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict in March 2015. I encourage the authorities to implement Law 1719 and continue to prosecute cases of sexual violence committed during the conflict to ensure that survivors receive justice and receive reparations. Conflict-related sexual violence should continue to be addressed in the Havana peace talks, as well as in the resulting accords and transitional justice mechanisms. Particular attention should be paid to groups that face additional barriers to justice such as ethnic minorities, women in rural areas, children, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex individuals and women abused within the ranks of armed groups. I encourage the Government to scale up its protection measures and share its good practices with other conflict-affected countries Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Congo Recommendation: I urge the Government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo to ensure full implementation of the armed forces action plan against sexual violence, to systematically bring perpetrators to justice and to deliver reparations to victims, including payment of outstanding compensation awards. I call on donors and the United Nations system to support the Government in its efforts and to pay increased attention to neglected areas, including unregulated mining regions Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Iraq Recommendation: I commend the Government of Iraq for its national action plan for the implementation of Security Council resolution 1325 (2000) and urge its swift implementation, including by training its security forces to ensur e respect for womens rights. Programmes to support the social reintegration of women and girls released from captivity by ISIL are urgently needed, as is community-based medical and psychological care. The capacity of the United Nations system should be enhanced through the deployment of Womens Protection Advisers or equivalent specialists Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Libya Recommendation: I urge the national authorities in Libya to implement Decree No. 119 and Resolution 904 of 2014 to ensure redress for all victims, including those affected by the current conflict, through the establishment of multisectoral services and the adoption of legislation to categorically prohibit sexual violence Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Mali Recommendation: I urge the Government of Mali, with support from United Nations Action against Sexual Violence in Conflict, to develop a comprehensive national strategy to combat sexual and gender-based violence and to ensure the safety of humanitarian workers so that services can reach remote areas. I further call on all parties to ensure that conflict-related sexual violence is addressed in the inter-Malian dialogue and that perpetrators of sexual violence do not benefit from amnesty or early release Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Myanmar Recommendation: I urge the Government of Myanmar to continue with its reform agenda and, in the process, take practical and timely actions to protect and support survivors of conflict-related sexual violence and to ensure that security personnel accused of such crimes are prosecuted. Sexual violence should be an element in all ceasefire and peace negotiations, excluded from the scope of amnesty provisions and addressed in transitional justice processes. It is critical that women be able to participate consistently in and influence these processes Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Somalia Recommendation: I reiterate my call to the Federal Government of Somalia to implement the commitments made under the joint communique of 7 May 2013 and its national action plan to combat sexual violence in conflict, including specific plans for the army and the police. I encourage the adoption of a sexual offences bill as a matter of priority Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life South Sudan Recommendation: I urge the parties to the conflict in South Sudan to adopt action plans to implement the commitments made under their respective communiques. I call upon the Government of South Sudan to address the negative impact of customary law on womens rights and to reflect international human rights standards in national law. I also encourage the African Union to make public and act upon the report of its Commission of Inquiry on South Sudan Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Sudan (Darfur) Recommendation: I call upon the Government of the Sudan to grant the United Nations and its humanitarian partners unfettered access for monitoring and the provision of assistance to people in need in Darfur. Given that there has been grave concern over sexual violence in Darfur for more than a decade, I encourage the Government to engage with my Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict to develop a framework of cooperation to address the issue comprehensively Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Syria Recommendation: I acknowledge the Governments invitation to my Special Representative to visit the Syrian Arab Republic and call upon the authorities, in the context of such a visit, to agree on specific measures to prevent sexual violence, including by members of the security forces. I condemn the use of sexual violence by ISIL and all other parties listed in the annex to the present report and call on them to cease such violations immediately and allow unfettered access for the delivery of humanitarian assistance Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Yemen Recommendation: I urge the authorities in Yemen to undertake legislative reform as a basis for addressing impunity for sexual violence, ensuring the provision of services for survivors and aligning the minimum legal age of marriage with international standards. I further call on the authorities to engage with local community and faithbased leaders to address sexual and gender-based violence and discriminatory social norms Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Bosnia and Herzegovina Recommendation: I urge the relevant authorities in Bosnia and Herzegovina to harmonize legislation and policies so that the rights of survivors of conflict-related sexual violence to reparations are consistently recognized and to allocate a specific budget for this purpose. I further call upon the authorities to protect and support survivors participating in judicial proceedings through, inter alia, referrals to free legal aid, psychosocial and health services, as well as economic empowerment programmes Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Ivory Coast Recommendation: I urge the Government of Cote dIvoire to ensure the effective implementation of its national strategy to combat gender-based violence and the action plan for FRCI, and call on the international community to support these efforts. It is critical to accelerate disarmament, demobilization and reintegration and strengthen law enforcement to ensure that ex-combatants who have been reintegrated into the transport sector do not pose a risk to women and girls who are reliant on those services. The Government and the international community must provide monitoring and awareness-raising to mitigate the possibility of a recurrence of sexual violence in the context of the presidential elections to be held in October 2015 Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Liberia Recommendation: I call on the Government of Liberia to continue its critical efforts to combat sexual and gender-based violence including through the United Nations-Government of Liberia Joint Programme, and in the context of recovery from the Ebola virus epidemic Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Nepal Recommendation: I encourage the Government to ensure that survivors of conflict-related sexual violence are recognized under the law as conflict victims, which will enable them to access services, judicial remedies and reparations. I further call on all parties involved in the transitional justice process to ensure that the rights and needs o f survivors of sexual violence are addressed in institutional reforms and that these crimes are excluded from amnesties and statutes of limitations Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Sri Lanka Recommendation: I call upon the newly elected Government of Sri Lanka to investigate allegations of sexual violence, including against national armed and security forces, and to provide multisectoral services for survivors, including reparations and economic empowerment programmes for women at risk, including war widows and female heads of household Countries where sexual violence has become a way of life Nigeria Recommendation: I encourage the Government to implement its national action plan on the implementation of Security Council resolution 1325 (2000) to ensure that womens protection concerns are mainstreamed throughout its security operations. I also call upon the authorities to guarantee security in and around internally displaced persons camps and to extend medical and psychosocial services to high-risk areas

Mr Ditta said the bodies of the murdered couple had been taken to hospital for an autopsy.

Hundreds of women are murdered every year in Pakistan, often by their own relatives, for going against their families' wishes in matters of love and marriage.

The latest case took place weeks after police arrested the father and ex-husband of a British woman Samia Shahid on suspicion of her murder.

A police investigation concluded Ms Shahid's father stood guard while her ex-husband raped her, before the two men strangled her to death.

Over 1,000 so-called honour killings were recorded in Pakistan in 2015, although the true number is likely to be higher.
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At least 25 people have been killed in a suicide bombing claimed by a Taliban splinter group at a mosque in Pakistan.

The blast struck as Muslims gathered for Friday prayers in the village of Payee Khan in Mohmand Agency district.

The suicide bomber was in crowded mosque, he shouted 'Allahu Akbar', and then there was a huge blast, Naveed Akbar, deputy administrator of the region, told Reuters.

 Pakistan: Quetta blast targets lawyers at hospital

Officials said at least 25 people were killed and 30 injured and there were fears the death toll could rise as rescue operations continued.

Pakistani Taliban faction Jamaat ul-Ahrar claimed responsibility for the attack, with local tribal elder Haji Subhanullah Mohmand suggesting it may have been revenge for the killing of a militant by tribal volunteers.

It seems to have enraged the militants and they got their revenge by carrying out a suicide attack in a mosque today, he said.

Nawaz Sharif, the Prime Minister of Pakistan, condemned the bombing and said attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the government's resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country.

The military says security is improving, with recorded terrorist incidents dropping from 128 in 2013 to 74 last year - but Islamist extremists continue to stage major attacks.

In pictures: Pakistan hospital attack Show all 10 1 /10 In pictures: Pakistan hospital attack In pictures: Pakistan hospital attack A man reacts after his relative was killed in a bomb blast in restive Quetta EPA In pictures: Pakistan hospital attack Residents light candles to honour victims of the blast in Quetta during a candellight vigil in Peshawar Reuters In pictures: Pakistan hospital attack People carry the coffin of a victim of suicide bomb attack at a hospital for burial in Quetta REUTERS In pictures: Pakistan hospital attack Pakistani victims injured in a suicide bombing are treated at a hospital in Quetta AFP/Getty Images In pictures: Pakistan hospital attack A lawyer who was injured in a bomb blast wait to receive medical treatment in restive Quetta EPA In pictures: Pakistan hospital attack A doctor treats an injured lawyer at the scene of a bomb blast in restive Quetta EPA In pictures: Pakistan hospital attack People comfort a man mourning the death of a family member who was killed in suicide bombing, at a funeral in Quetta AP In pictures: Pakistan hospital attack People transfer an injured man from the blast site in Quetta Rex Features In pictures: Pakistan hospital attack Pakistani security officials and lawyers gather around the bodies of victims killed in a bomb explosion at a government hospital premises in Quetta AFP/Getty Images In pictures: Pakistan hospital attack The scene following a bomb blast outside a hospital in Quetta Naseer Ahmed/Reuters

Friday's bombing came a day after a woman was killed by a grenade in Lower Mohmand Agency when militants attacked a pro-government tribal elder's home.

Mohmand lies in Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas, a semi-autonomous tribal region bordering Afghanistan.

Largely deeply conservative, the territory is remote and hard to access, providing sanctuary for extremist fighters targeted in decades of military operations and drone strikes.

Tehrik-i-Taliban (Pakistani Taliban) militants are waging an Islamist insurgency in the area and have launched a series of bombing attacks and assaults on security services.

Its Jamaat ul-Ahrar faction claimed responsibility for a bombing targeting lawyers that killed 74 people in the city of Quetta last month, as well as the the Easter Sunday blasts in Lahore that killed 72 people, many of them children.

Al-Qaeda fighters are also present in Pakistan, while Isis has recently bene seeking to increase its presence in the country and neighbouring Afghanistan, where it has founded an affiliate called Khorasan Province.
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An Australian woman has reportedly discovered her colleagues have been tracking her menstrual cycle to avoid her when she is having a period.

The woman, who has not been named, said the revelation emerged when a male colleague asked her if it was her time of the month after a small argument in the office.

She said she asked how he knew and he admitted to tracking her cycle on a calendar and sending himself reminders of when her period was about to start.

They want to stay away from me when Im PMSing, because I get a bit moody, the woman told news.com.au.

The man responsible for the tracking had sent the calendar to all male colleagues and said it was a good way to avoid unnecessary situations, the Daily Mail reported.

 What if men had periods?

He justified his actions by claiming it was not inappropriate, as they were really good friends.

Im just trying to stay away from trouble, he reportedly added.

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

There are a number of apps available that allow people to track menstrual cycles.

PMS buddy, which is no longer on the market, was directed primarily at men and claimed to save relationships one month a time, according to news.com.au.
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A voyeur has been secretly filming womens feet on his mobile phone and uploading the footage to a porn site in Switzerland.

The man, who goes under the online username Khurer has thousands of views on dozens of videos showing womens feet in flip-flops and sandals.

His online profile gives his location in the city of Chur, Switzerland, and a local newspaper has placed the images at the local train station, supermarket and pharmacy among other everyday locations.

The videos mostly zoom in on feet and ankles but sometimes show womens bodies and faces, the Sudostschweiz newspaper reported, with more than 35,000 views on Khurers page so far.

Roman Ruegg, a spokesperson for the local police force, told The Independent Kantonspolizei Graubunden were aware of the apparent foot fetishists activities.

According to our current information, no criminal offence has been committed, he said.

We will give the matter appropriate attention as part of normal investigations in the city of Chur.

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

Under Swiss law, a person identified in public footage can pursue civil grievances under the data protection laws, but to do so they would need to be aware of being filmed and to identify the culprit.

But police have received no complaints from women so far, suggesting that Khurer has so far evaded detection.

Last year a man was prosecuted for secretly filming women in Aargau and posting the videos on a porn site, being fined 4,000 Swiss francs (3,100) for libel and defamation according to local reports.

In the UK, voyeurism is a crime under the Sexual Offences Act 2003, offenders can be fined or jailed for up to two years for secretly observing or filming another victim for sexual gratification.
Vinamilk products are displayed for sale at a Vinamilk shop in Hanoi, Vietnam May 16, 2016. Photo by Reuters/Kham

The privatization push in giants such as Vinamilk and FPT could raise billions of dollars.

Vietnam has set a timeline for divesting from major state-owned companies by early next year, the Finance Ministry's online portal cited Dang Quyet Tien, a senior official from the ministry, as saying on Thursday.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc specifically ordered the State Capital Investment Corporation (SCIC), the government's investment arm, to continue divestments from state-owned enterprises during a meeting last month.

The companies on the list include 10 major listed enterprises with public stakes managed by the SCIC, and unlisted breweries Sabeco and Habeco, currently under the control of the Ministry of Industry and Trade.

It is estimated that the government could rake in more than $5 billion from share sales in the big ten, that includes Vinamilk, IT giant FPT and insurer Bao Minh.

Successful exits from Sabeco and Habeco will add about $2 billion to the state budget.

The latest push for privatization of state-owned enterprises will be conducting in accordance with market forces, said the Prime Minister, who promised an equal chance for both foreign and local investors.

Vietnam has removed a long-standing 49 percent foreign ownership cap, allowing foreign investors to acquire a 100 percent stake in companies such as Vinamilk, in which the government currently holds a 45 percent share.

For other companies, the government will divest gradually to prevent the stock market from overheating, said top trade official Tien.

The privatization of Sabeco and Habeco has been long delayed because they are among the few state-owned enterprises that are performing well.

Sabeco has 46 percent of the local beer market while Habeco has 17 percent. They remain 90 percent and 82 percent state-owned, respectively.

Foreign investors have had their eyes on the two breweries for some time now after seeing the strong growth rate of Vietnams beer market. The Vietnam Beer Alcohol Beverage Association forecast the country will raise annual beer output by 25 percent by 2020.

The proceeds from the divestments will be partially funneled into existing state-owned enterprises, while the rest will be used to boost infrastructure and fund social welfare, Tien added.

Vietnam has sold shares in more than 500 companies in the past five years, government statistics show.

Related news:

>Vietnam to rake in $7 billion from massive divestment push

>Vietnam's fresh privatization push puts local firms on edge

>Vietnam's leading state owned giant Vinamilk says scrapping foreign ownership cap
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Nearly 80 sheep have been ritually slaughtered in a field in the Austrian Alps in what animal protection staff described as a "flagrant breach of the law".

An unnamed farmer in the Styria region said he had lent his field to a friend for a month so 131 sheep could graze.

But the friend did not tell him the sheep were being bred to be sacrificed as part of Islamic Eid al-Adha or the Feast of Sacrifice.

During the festival, which comes in the middle of the Haji, Muslims slaughter sheep, goats or cows to commemorate the day they believe Abraham, known as Ibrahim to Muslims, was told by God to sacrifice his son but was eventually allowed to kill a sheep instead.

Muslims who can afford it are supposed to sacrifice their best animal as a symbol of Ibrahims willingness to sacrifice his only son for God and then donate at least part of the meat to the poor.

After seeing what was happening witnessed called the police, who rushed to the scene and prevented 52 sheep being slaughtered.

Under Austrian law, all sacrifices performed as part of the festival had to take place in official slaughterhouses where humane conditions can be guaranteed but the 79 animals reportedly bled to death for several minutes.

Slaughtered animals must be drained of blood as consuming it is forbidden in Islam.

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. 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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

A police spokesman told the Local that it appeared the sheep had their carotid arteries cut in accordance with Muslim tradition and an investigation into animal cruelty had been launched.

Slaughtering animals in public is also illegal in Austria.

The head of a local animal shelter, Herbet Oster, told Austrian newspaper Die Presse: "There is lack of awareness that it is a terrible injustice and a flagrant breach of the law".
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The mother of Ben Needham, who vanished as a toddler 30 years ago, says she will keep on searching for her son.

The fate of the toddler has remained a mystery since he went missing on the Greek island of Kos at the age of 21 months in 1991.

Police say he was crushed by a digger at a building site near his grandparents home on the island.

A friend of local construction worker Konstantinos Barkas said he believes the builder was responsible.

Mr Barkas, who died of stomach cancer, reportedly told his friend he had accidentally killed Ben before covering up the body.

But the day before the anniversary of Bens disappearance, his mother, Kerry, said she believed they were wrong and that he was still alive.

She told The Mirror she was pinning her hopes on three new witness testimonies.

The witnesses claim Ben could be a blond boy found that year on a beach 587 miles away in Corfu.

Who was Ben Needham?

Ben was a toddler from Sheffield who was playing near his maternal grandparents holiday home in the village of Iraklis on 24 July 1991 when he disappeared.

On the day of his disappearance, Ben had been playing in and around the farmhouse the family were renovating at the time when they realised he had disappeared at around 2.30pm.

Initially, the family searched the area looking for Ben and assumed he had wandered off or been taken out by his teenage uncle Stephen on the latter's moped.

The Needhams called the police when they couldnt find their son, but local officers came to suspect the family themselves and failed to notify nearby ports and airports asking staff to be on the look out for the child.

What happened to him?

No one really knows. No trace of Ben has ever been found despite numerous investigations by both British and Greek police.

His mother has never given up hope that he is still alive.

There have been more than 300 reported sightings of Ben since his disappearance.

Ben's mother Kerry appealing for information (Getty)

In 2015 a man came forward to say he thought he may be Ben after the family made an appearance on Greek TV to launch a fresh appeal to find him.

The man felt he resembled a mock-up of what Ben would look like now but he was later confirmed to be an old lead by police.

In 2012, South Yorkshire Police were granted 700,000 by the Home Office to reopen the investigation after the family complained that the matter had never been properly investigated.

They excavated the land on Kos where Ben is believed to have gone missing but no trace of DNA evidence was found.

What do the family think happened?

Until the reported confession came to light, the family believed Ben had been abducted by human traffickers to be sold as an adoptive baby.

What happens now?

Police are no longer treating the investigation as a missing persons inquiry.

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Detectives from South Yorkshire Police carried out a three-week search of Kos in 2016.

The force said: We continue to hold the view that Ben died as a result of a tragic accident on the day of his disappearance. However, should any new viable line of inquiry come to light, we would seek to work with the Greek authorities to support them in their investigations.

Additional reporting by PA
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A US-led coalition air strike in Syria has killed the Isis minister of information, the Pentagon confirmed.

Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said the attack took place near Raqqa, and killed Wa-il Adil Hasan Salman al-Fayad, also known as Dr Wail.

In a statement the Pentagon said Wail was one of the Islamist militant groups most senior leaders.

The statement said: He operated as the minister for information for the terror organisation and was a prominent member of its Senior Shura Council [Isiss leadership group].

Wail oversaw Isils production of terrorist propaganda videos showing torture and executions.

The removal of ISIL's senior leaders degrades its ability to retain territory, and its ability to plan, finance, and direct attacks inside and outside of the region. We will continue to work with our coalition partners to build momentum in the campaign to deal ISIL a lasting defeat.

US officials said Wail was killed in strikes which were carried out by drones targeting his home in Raqqa.

Wail was a close associate of Isis spokesman Abu Muhammad al-Adni, who was the groups second most senior member and was also killed by US-led airstrikes on 30 August.

Al-Adni was also responsible for the plotting of the organisations overseas terrorist attacks, including those in Paris last November and the airport attacks in Brussels and Ankara.

The US air campaign has continued targeting high-profile members of the terrorist group, recently killing Chechen commander Abu Omar al-Shishani.

The loss of several senior leaders has been described as a major blow to the group whose extensive use of social media and propaganda videos have been used as effective recruitment tools.

In pictures: Civilians freed from Isis in Manbij Show all 11 1 /11 In pictures: Civilians freed from Isis in Manbij In pictures: Civilians freed from Isis in Manbij Women and children celebrating after being freed from Isis in Manbij, Syria, on 12 August Reuters In pictures: Civilians freed from Isis in Manbij A man cuts the beard of a civilian who was freed from Isis by the SDF in Manbij on 12 August Reuters In pictures: Civilians freed from Isis in Manbij Women carry newborn babies while running after being freed from Isis in Manbij, Syria, on 12 August Reuters In pictures: Civilians freed from Isis in Manbij A woman freed from Isis hugs an SDF fighter in Manbij on 12 August Reuters In pictures: Civilians freed from Isis in Manbij A woman adding her veil to a pile of niqabs burning in Manbij, Syria, after being freed from Isis on 12 August Reuters In pictures: Civilians freed from Isis in Manbij Children celebrating on top of a lorry after being freed from Isis in Manbij, Syria, on 12 August Reuters In pictures: Civilians freed from Isis in Manbij A man and child freed from Isis by the SDF in Manbij on 12 August Reuters In pictures: Civilians freed from Isis in Manbij A woman carrying her children walks towards SDF fighters after being freed from Isis in Manbij, Syria, on 12 August Reuters In pictures: Civilians freed from Isis in Manbij A woman and child freed from Isis in Manbij, Syria, on 12 August Reuters In pictures: Civilians freed from Isis in Manbij An SDF fighter kisses a crying man who was freed from Isis in Manbij, Syria, on 12 August Reuters In pictures: Civilians freed from Isis in Manbij Hundreds of civilians freed from Isis in Manbij, Syria, on 12 August Reuters

Isis is also attempting to contain an uprising which was sparked after 20 people were executed near the city of Deir ez Zour, an Isis stronghold in eastern Syria.
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UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has slammed the claim made by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that opposition to Israeli settlements in Palestine amount to ethnic cleansing.

In one of the strongest statements he has made on the issue to date, Mr Ban said on Thursday that Israel's stifling and oppressive occupation of Palestinian territory must end.

Over the past few decades Israel has built communities which are now home to more than 300,000 Israeli citizens in the West Bank, which have been declared illegal under UN law.

In a videoed statement, Netanyahu rejected the idea that settlements are an obstacle to peace, going on to point out Israels diversity as a multicultural state which includes nearly two million Arab citizens.

Yet the Palestinian leadership actually demands a Palestinian state with one pre-condition: No Jews, he said. There's a phrase for that: It's called ethnic cleansing.

The video was posted to Facebook last Friday. The prime minister has already been rebuked by rights groups and the US State Department for his comments.

Tales from the West Bank: Palestinian Raja Shehadeh chronicles life during occupation Show all 8 1 /8 Tales from the West Bank: Palestinian Raja Shehadeh chronicles life during occupation Tales from the West Bank: Palestinian Raja Shehadeh chronicles life during occupation westbank_1024x768.jpg EPA Tales from the West Bank: Palestinian Raja Shehadeh chronicles life during occupation 5431774.jpg AFP/Getty Images Tales from the West Bank: Palestinian Raja Shehadeh chronicles life during occupation 5431776.jpg Bassam Almohor Tales from the West Bank: Palestinian Raja Shehadeh chronicles life during occupation 5431775.jpg Getty Images Tales from the West Bank: Palestinian Raja Shehadeh chronicles life during occupation 5431777.jpg Getty Images Tales from the West Bank: Palestinian Raja Shehadeh chronicles life during occupation 5431778.jpg Bassam Almohor Tales from the West Bank: Palestinian Raja Shehadeh chronicles life during occupation 5431779.jpg Getty Images Tales from the West Bank: Palestinian Raja Shehadeh chronicles life during occupation 5431780.jpg Getty Images

Addressing the UN Security Council on Thursday, Mr Ban said he wanted to be absolutely clear: Settlements are illegal under international law.

Settlement construction in the West Bank is up 41 per cent for the first half of 2016, the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics has said.

The policy remains one of the major stumbling blocks for hopes of a two-state solution in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Mr Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas have agreed in principle to meet for talks in Moscow, but no date has been set.
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Syrian rebels have chased American forces out of the town of al-Rai, according to local sources.

The Associated Press reports that US troops headed back towards Turkey after a dispute about their presence.

The five or six US special forces were there to support Operation Euphrates Shield, which began last month with Free Syrian Army fighters backed by Turkish artillery and jets.

In recent weeks they have managed to push jihadists of the Islamic State (IS) back from the Turkish border.

However, the latest episode highlights the complexity of the conflict in Syria.

Purported video of the incident appears to show FSA fighters chanting anti-American slogans.

Dogs, agents of America, one man can be heard to say in Arabic, according to a translation by Middle East Eye, while others chant They are crusaders and infidels, Down with America, 'Get out you pigs and They are coming to Syria to occupy it.

 Syrian rebels and Turkish tanks 'seize' ISIL-held town

The episode will be deeply embarrassing to the US as it struggles with criticism that it lacks a coherent Syria policy. The FSA is seen by the US as a moderate rebel group fighting to bring down the regime of Bashar al-Assad.

And it comes after clashes between Turkish-allied forces and the Kurdish YPG militia -a key American partner in the fight against IS - which have have created tension between Washington and Ankara.

Meanwhile, a shaky ceasefire continues to hold amid complaints that the aid is not being delivered to cities in need.

On Friday, the United States told Russia it would not proceed with plans to set up a committee to enable joint targeting of militants in Syria until humanitarian supplies began to reach the besieged city of Aleppo and other areas.

Mr Kerry, US Secretary of State, delivered the message in a phone call to Sergei Lavrov, his Russian counterpart.

A State Department spokesman said: "Secretary Kerry expressed concerns about the repeated and unacceptable delays of humanitarian aid, and emphasised that the United States expects Russia to use its influence on the Asad regime to allow UN humanitarian convoys to reach Aleppo and other areas in need."
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The British embassy in the Turkish capital Ankara is closed for the day because of a security threat, the Foreign Office has confirmed.

The embassy was due to reopen on Friday after five days of Eid-al-Adha celebrations.

Four people have been detained by police as part of an ongoing investigation, Turkish state media said.

Cities across Turkey have suffered several bomb attacks targeted at civilians and state apparatus in the past 18 months, carried out by either Kurdish militants or Islamist terror group Isis.

In a statement on Twitter, British Ambassador to Turkey Richard Moore said that the embassy was working closely and co-operatively with Turkish authorities.

The Foreign Office currently advises against all travel to within 10km of the Syrian border and the south-eastern city of Diyarbakir.

The German embassy said it will offer limited services, and has closed the embassy, consulate offices and a school following similar threats.
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Plenty of people have been asking: what will life will be like for British travellers after Brexit? In truth, its still very hazy. But reports suggest that red tape for travellers could get significantly more tangled, with UK passport holders needing to apply online to visit Europe.

Such a move could increase the cost as well as complexity of holidays and business trips. With an EU passport, as the British travel document currently is, there are currently minimal formalities. If youre travelling to Europe by ferry or train, you just need to show your UK passport. Airlines have to collect advance passenger information to provide to national governments for security purposes, but the process is light touch. And of course British passport holders can use the fast-track lanes for EU citizens and a few other lucky nationalities.

Could all that change? What ultimately happens depends on whether the EU decides the UK should be granted special status, or whether we should be regarded as outsiders.
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So Hillary Clintons back on the campaign trail, and Donald Trump has released a medical report confirming the obvious: he may a dreadful man, but hes the picture of robust health. Message to Planet Earth: you can start rotating again. And message to the American media: there is other and more important news out there than Hillarys brief bout with pneumonia.

You get the impression that Americans are paranoid about presidential health, that they see them with fury at the documented cases of previous presidents who have concealed alarming health problems. Not so.

Gallup did a poll on the issue  admittedly back in 2004, before the 24/7 news cycle had fully taken root, and before the internet and social media could turn the fluttering of a few butterfly wings into a full-scale hurricane. But its findings are fascinating.

Only 38 per cent thought a president should be legally obliged to release health information that might affect her ability to serve  compared to 61 per cent who thought he or she had the same right to privacy as an ordinary citizen.

 Clinton Gives First Speech Since Pneumonia Diagnosis

That said, four out of five believed he or she should undergo a thorough annual physical and mental exam to make sure they were still up to the job. The mental part undoubtedly reflects the Alzheimers that Reagan (who died of the disease that same year of 2004) had visibly suffered, during his second term especially.

These figures seem pretty reasonable to me. Id bet a similar poll in Britain tomorrow would produce a very similar result. And despite the current hoopla, Id bet Americans feelings havent changed greatly either. The problem isnt health, its secrecy; and the merciless, omnipresent spotlight generated by this most brutal and unconventional election in modern times.

Yes, Clinton and Trump are among the oldest aspirants to the White House. Hed be the oldest president ever to take office. Shed be the second oldest, after Reagan. Nonetheless, though shes had her health problems, shes in decent shape for a woman of 68. Anyone can get the flu, or a mild case of pneumonia.

Its not the crime, however, but the cover-up which matters. Boy, did she make a mess of telling us about it, reinforcing the conviction that shes pathologically addicted to secrecy, that she simply cant come clean quickly about anything, be it her health or her emails.

Donald Trump's childhood home in Queens, New York, up for auction Show all 6 1 /6 Donald Trump's childhood home in Queens, New York, up for auction Donald Trump's childhood home in Queens, New York, up for auction Donald Trump Home exterior Laffey Fine Homes Donald Trump's childhood home in Queens, New York, up for auction Living Room Laffey Fine Homes Donald Trump's childhood home in Queens, New York, up for auction Fireplace Laffey Fine Homes Donald Trump's childhood home in Queens, New York, up for auction Kitchen Laffey Fine Homes Donald Trump's childhood home in Queens, New York, up for auction Office Laffey Fine Homes Donald Trump's childhood home in Queens, New York, up for auction Bedroom Laffey Fine Homes

If Americans are told about candidates health issues upfront and early  even issues far more serious than Clintons  theyre not too bothered. Dick Cheney, one of the most powerful vice-presidents ever and the proverbial heartbeat from the Oval Office for eight years, had been plagued with heart problems that continued throughout the George W Bush administration (twice I had to update The Independents standing obituary of him during that time.)

But people werent bothered. No one suggested Cheney wasnt up to the job because of his precarious health. You might detest his hard-right neo-conservatism, but that was another matter. Ditto John McCain, who, had he won in 2008, would have been the oldest ever president. McCain, savagely treated as a POW in Vietnam, had a long medical history and suffered from skin cancer. He released hundreds of pages of medical records. Problem solved. The issue rarely arose in his campaign against Barack Obama.

Keep quiet though, and youre asking for trouble  as Trump may soon learn, on another topic. Still he refuses to release his tax returns, as every presidential candidate has done since Nixon. Hillarys returns for the last 20 years are out there for all to see. Trump refuses, seeking to hide goodness knows what. That he doesnt pay a cent in tax? That hes in cahoots with Russian oligarchs? That hes not the generous donor to charity he pretends to be? Those tax returns would tell us far more about his fitness for office than Hillarys medical records say about hers.
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Suicide bombers are central to a new style of warfare that has emerged during the Iraq, Afghan and Syrian wars and is shaping political and military developments across the world. The tactic is effective because it turns thousands of untrained religious fanatics  most of whom come from the Salafi-jihadi variant of Islam  into devastating weapons of war. All the bomber needs is a willingness to die.

What is different about suicide bombing in the wars currently being fought in the Middle East and beyond, is that the bombers are skilfully deployed in great numbers. The impact of many individuals wearing explosive vests or driving vehicles packed with explosives on the battlefield can counter-balance the other sides control of the air and superiority in heavy weapons. For instance, when Isis forces were trying to capture the last government strongholds in Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province, in May last year, it sent 10 bombers driving specially armoured Humvees to blast their way through the fortifications.

 Syria war: Heavy fighting ahead of ceasefire

The devastating effectiveness of suicide bombing is relevant to the prospects for the current ceasefire in Syria and the plan for the US and Russian air forces to launch attacks on Isis and Jabhat al-Nusra, formally the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda that has renamed itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham. More "moderate" armed rebel groups are meant to move away from Nusra forces so they can be targeted, though it is more likely that the Jihadis would offer their comrades-in-arms a choice between solidarity with them or death

Observers in Damascus point out that the non-Isis armed opposition in Syria is dominated by Nusra fighters, saying that without Nusra the non-Isis armed opposition would be very weak. Nusra has led all the successful rebel offensive against the Syrian army. It has overcome any rebel opponents who resisted it in a matter of days. Nusra has no incentive to maintain a ceasefire directed against itself and every reason to see it fail.

The very existence of a moderate armed opposition of any strength inside Syria has always been a matter of wishful thinking by Western leaders. Some intelligence agencies were aware of this from an early stage, but they were either ignored or governments did not really care who they were backing in trying to displace President Bashar al-Assad. As early as August 2012, the Defence Intelligence Agency, the Pentagons intelligence arm, had written a report which firmly stated: The Salafists, the Muslim Brotherhood, and AQI [al-Qaeda in Iraq] are the major forces driving the insurgency in Syria.

Several cogent explanations have been given for the dominance of Salafi-jihadi movements such as Isis and Nusra in the Sunni Arab armed opposition in Iraq and Syria. These include their ideological commitment, their ferocity and their support from Sunni states such as Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. But there is an additional reason seldom mentioned why Isis and Nusra, and some allied movements, have become the chief fighting arms of a Sunni Arab insurrection in both countries. They alone can recruit and motivate the thousands of suicide bombers who, over the years, have enabled them to fight and, on occasions, to overcome the Syrian and Iraqi armies, despite their air support and artillery. The use of suicide bombers does not guarantee success or necessarily avert defeat, but it does give Isis and Nusra a fighting chance against their enemies. Even where they fail to break through, the precautions necessary to stop them  like getting bulldozers to dig a deep trench in advance of the front line as happened earlier this year outside Mosul during a small advance by the Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga  slows down the enemy.

In pictures: Turkey launches operation in Syria Show all 9 1 /9 In pictures: Turkey launches operation in Syria In pictures: Turkey launches operation in Syria Turkish tanks driving to the Syrian-Turkish border town of Jarabulus yesterday AFP/Getty In pictures: Turkey launches operation in Syria Turkish-backed gather on the outskirts of Jarabulus, Syria, ahead of an offensive on 24 August 2016 Reuters In pictures: Turkey launches operation in Syria Turkish army tanks make their way towards the Syrian border town of Jarabulus, Syria August 24, 2016 Reuters In pictures: Turkey launches operation in Syria Turkish soldiers return from Syria to Turkey with tanks after a military operation at the Syrian border as part of their offensive against the Islamic State (IS) militant group in Syria, Karkamis district of Gaziantep, Turkey, 25 August 2016 EPA In pictures: Turkey launches operation in Syria Turkish army tanks and Turkey-backed Syrian opposition forces move toward the Syrian border as pictured from Karkamis, Turkey, AP In pictures: Turkey launches operation in Syria Turkish tanks on their way to the Turkish-Syria border during an operation against Isis on 24 August 2016 EPA In pictures: Turkey launches operation in Syria Syrian opposition fighters being transported during preparations to enter Jarabulus in Karkamis, Turkey, on 24 August 2016. EPA In pictures: Turkey launches operation in Syria An air strike hitting Isis-controlled territory near Jarabulus, near the Turkish border, on 24 August 2016. EPA In pictures: Turkey launches operation in Syria A Turkish army tank and an armoured vehicle stationed near the border with Syria. Turkish media reports say Turkish artillery has launched new strikes at Isis targets across the border AP

Suicide bombing is not new. I first encountered it in Damascus in about 1980 when Muslim Brotherhood militants were occasionally driving vehicles filled with explosives into government buildings. Massive concrete flower tubs were placed in the streets to stop vehicles getting close to potential targets. More spectacularly, Shia suicide bombers belonging to the precursor of Hezbollah in Lebanon blew up the US embassy in Beirut in 1983 and, some months later, destroyed the US Marine barracks by the airport where 242 Marines were killed. The blast was powerful enough to blow out the supporting concrete columns so the floors pancaked on top of each other.

Al-Qaeda integrated into their ideology the idea of suicide attacks as a public demonstration of Islamic faith by the perpetrator, the most infamous instance of this being the hijacking of planes and crashing them into the World Trade Centre and Pentagon on 9/11. Soon after the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, there were multiple suicide attacks that rapidly took away the initiative from the US military, greatly superior though it was to the insurgents in terms of numbers, training and equipment. But it was only with the re-emergence of what was to become Isis in Iraq from about 2011, and its offspring Nusra in Syria from 2012, that suicide bombing was lethally combined with traditional infantry tactics such as IEDs (Improvised Explosive Devices), booby traps, snipers and mortar teams.

Does this mean that the US-Russian agreement on 10 September  on a ceasefire, aid convoys to besieged cities and a joint campaign against Nusra and Isis  is bound to fail? Not really, though it is important to realise that the peace plan is coupled with a war plan and the two contradict each other. One of several problems is that the most important armed force on the non-Isis rebel side, Nusra, is expected to obey a ceasefire from which it is excluded and under which it will shortly be targeted.

These contradictions might be overcome if the US and Russia continue their efforts to implement the agreement with the same determination with which they negotiated it. They need to do so because both must pressure their allies and proxies in the region  the Syrian government, Iran, Hezbollah in the case of the Russians and Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar in the case of the US  not to covertly undermine the accord. If put under enough pressure, none of the parties on the ground in Syria can ignore their outside backers.

There is a further difficulty facing the implementation of the agreement: This is its lack of institutional and media support in the US where Secretary of State John Kerry had to defend it against aggressive questioning by, among many others, NPR which cited open scepticism in the Pentagon. Kerry emphasised that President Obama had signed off on the agreement and that there was no alternative to it except an escalating war. He rightly said that the grim alternative to the accord is to allow us to get from 450,000 people, whove been slaughtered, to how many thousands more? That Aleppo gets completely overrun? That the Russians and Assad simply bomb indiscriminately for days to come and we sit there and do nothing? What is so culpable in the case of US and European critics of the accord is that they offer no practical alternative to it and, while pretending humanitarian concerns, accept that the present horrors should continue.
The maker of the iconic Saigon Beer is one of the most sought after Vietnamese companies at the moment.

Vietnam's top brewer Sabeco is seeking approval from the government to list its shares on the Ho Chi Minh stock exchange, the nation's largest bourse, an industry ministry official said on Thursday.

Sabeco, or the Saigon Beer, Alcohol, Beverage Corporation, has filed documents seeking approval from the Ministry of Industry and Trade to join the index, Phan Dang Tuat, head of the ministry's enterprise renovation and development committee, told Reuters. He did not elaborate.

State-owned Sabeco has received interest from several major foreign brewers since the government earmarked it for privatization several years ago. The selloff, however, has been repeatedly delayed.

Related news:

> Holy Beer?
The border between the Republic and Northern Ireland in the village of Bridgend, Co Donegal

An inquiry into the fate of the Irish border as Britain prepares to leave the European Union has been launched by a parliamentary watchdog in London.

British MPs will investigate whether Northern Ireland should have a special status in a post-Brexit UK and what changes to visa controls might be needed.

It will also probe how the 310-mile frontier could be policed under a new arrangement.

The Northern Ireland Affairs Committee said it will hold public hearings in November and December as part of its inquiry.

MP Laurence Robertson, committee chairman, said the focus will be on maintaining the existing free movement of people and goods between Northern Ireland and the Republic.

"There is a desire on all sides to maintain the existing open border with the Republic," he said.

"Our inquiry will assess the different options open to the Government that will achieve that objective, with the aim of producing recommendations and conclusions ahead of the start of formal negotiations between the UK and the EU."

The inquiry team, headed by 13 MPs, is also seeking written submissions from individuals and organisations on the future of the border by October 21.

It will assess options under different potential scenarios.

These will include possibilities for keeping the existing Common Travel Area arrangement, a decades-old deal which allows British and Irish citizens move freely throughout the UK and Ireland.

MPs will examine arrangements in other parts of the EU that have an external land border, such as between Norway and Sweden/Finland, or between Switzerland and its neighbours.

It will also assess what would happen if the UK pulled out of the EU customs union, which allows countries to trade more freely with each other without tariffs or taxes on imports.

If Britain were to leave the customs union, some observers say it would be much more complicated to maintain a soft border in Ireland.

Foreign Affairs Minister Charlie Flanagan has said he was "taken aback" by reports that International Trade Secretary Liam Fox is pressuring Prime Minister Theresa May into leaving the customs union as well as the EU.

Mr Fox reportedly wants to leave the customs union to make it easier for Britain to strike new trade deals with non-EU countries after Brexit.
Dublin Bus users with monthly and yearly tickets are being offered refunds for every day lost in the strike.

With the stoppages now in their fourth day and another 15 days of walk-outs planned, the company said the pay dispute has already cost it four million euro.

But bus users who want to claim back costs for the disruption to their journeys and commutes will have to wait until the strike is called off and a deal done with unions.

"To date, this industrial action has cost the company in excess of four million euro and continues to impact the financial stability of the company," Dublin Bus said.

Refunds will compound the financial pressures on the company with some users in line for refunds of more than 100 euro if the strikes run as planned.

Transport Minister Shane Ross has repeatedly insisted he cannot step in to try and resolve the dispute with newly-announced stoppages this month set for September 27 and 28.

These are in addition to the 48-hour strike already scheduled for next week, on September 23 and 24.

Next month, further strike days are planned for October 1, 5, 7, 10, 12, 14, 18, 19, 24, 26 and 29.

Bus users with Leap Cards for annual and monthly travel will be issued a refund by Dublin Bus for each day lost due to the strikes.

These can be collected at the company's head office on O'Connell Street while others who missed out on Sightseeing Tours and Airlink services can also seek refunds or ask for their trip to be rescheduled.

Transport Minister Shane Ross refused to budge on calls for the Government to intervene.

"I say to them once again, to management and unions, that we are not going to open the chequebook for them. They have got to do this on their own," he said.

Mr Ross rejected suggestions that he was not doing enough to get a deal and insisted it was not the shareholders' role to try and broker a settlement.

"I feel great empathy for everyone involved, particularly the commuters who have been greatly inconvenienced. I'm certainly not inactive, I'm monitoring it closely, on an hourly basis," he said.

"It is very important to us that we are not seen to be a soft touch or that we are going to produce the state's cheque book. It wouldn't be right to do that."

Siptu said it sympathised with the public and workers, who have been greatly inconvenienced.

Its members at Dublin Bus repeated calls for the company bosses and Mr Ross' civil servants to immediately open talks.

Senior union representative Owen Reidy said: "There is only one way that this dispute will end, and that is through serious talks aimed at agreement on a long-term funding model for Dublin Bus."

Mr Reidy said the talks should also involve workers.

"The Minister for Transport cannot stand aloof from talks aimed at securing the future of a public transport company whose main funder, outside of the public's contribution through fares, is the state," he said.

"It is time that everyone in this dispute stood up and accepted their responsibilities to the travelling public and focused on creating a long-term sustainable funding model for Dublin Bus which is based on best international practice."

Siptu leaders also insisted the workers' resolve remained strong, despite four days of strikes.

Union organiser John Murphy said: "The resolve of our members to secure a long-term solution to the problems at Dublin Bus is only growing.

"Although individuals in Government and at management level, who may seldom use the public bus system, would seem intent on attempting to drive a wedge between service users and staff, our members merely remain focused on securing a just resolution to this dispute."
Taoiseach Enda Kenny greets Donald Tusk , the President of the European Council, on his arrival for a working lunch at Government Buildings. Pic Tom Burke

The UK will trigger a formal move to leave the European Union early in the New Year, Taoiseach Enda Kenny has said.

The formal application to exit the EU under Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty will officially begin Britain's separation from the union. Since the June 23 vote in the UK, any plan by the British government to trigger the exit has remained a mystery.

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However, speaking in Dublin, Mr Kenny said he believed the crucial step would be taken within months. His view was based on talks with British cabinet ministers who have visited Dublin in the past week.

Mr Kenny also gave the clearest signal yet that the special VAT rate for hotels, pubs and restaurants will be kept in next month's Budget.

He warned, however, that it will be ditched if prices are not passed on to customers. "I do hope that the industry recognises what it's got," he said.
The findings reveal that 41pc of respondents said that they did not foresee Brexit having a negative impact. Stock image

The effect on Ireland of the Brexit referendum may not be as bad as first feared, according to a survey of foreign business travellers to Ireland.

The survey, carried out by Europcar, asked 500 business travellers a range of questions about their view on Ireland in the wake of the UK referendum.

The findings reveal that 41pc of respondents said that they did not foresee Brexit having a negative impact.

The survey also shows that just 8pc believed it would adversely affect their dealings here.

A level of lingering uncertainty was reflected by the answers of 46pc of respondents, who stated that they did now know how the Brexit vote was likely to impact on their business in Ireland.

Policy makers will be pleased to learn that over half (52pc) of those questioned believed that Ireland will become an increasingly attractive place for multinationals to do business as a result of Britain's decision to leave the EU.

Ireland's low corporation tax is also seen as a significant boon for the economy, with 55pc of respondents saying that Ireland's low tax regime would boost the country's appeal to multinational firms.

Only one in ten said they believed Ireland would become less attractive for international companies.

The survey found that 73pc of all business professionals coming to Ireland arrive from the UK, with a total of 21pc coming from the US, France and Germany.

The general sentiment towards the country's economy is positive, with 72pc of people saying the economy was performing "reasonably well".

One tenth of respondents said they believe the economy is performing "very well".

The importance of the tech industry in attracting visitors is underlined by the fact that 19pc of all business tourists come from the sector. Healthcare attracts 10pc of visitors, while the pharmaceutical industry attracted 9pc of business tourists.

One third of respondents said they do business regularly in Ireland with the majority of trips occurring over a two to three-day period.

Ireland's increasing attractiveness as a destination for industry seminars was also revealed in the survey findings, with 12pc of people saying they came to attend conferences.

The quality of the Irish labour force is emphasised by the fact that 69pc of those surveyed said they thought the Irish workforce was "very good" or "excellent". Just 2pc of respondents believe that the workforce here is poor.

Ireland's growing reputation as an innovative business hub is highlighted by the fact that 14pc said they were visiting the country to pursue a new business venture.

Foreign SMEs are the most likely visitors to Ireland, with SME employees representing 30pc of all those questioned.

That was followed closely by employees of large scale plcs, who accounted for 29pc of visitors.

More than one third of people said they spent more than 1,000 on their visits, while a quarter of visitors spent between 250 and 500.

The survey found that the integrity of Irish business people was viewed as the best trait by foreign business people, with 40pc saying they felt that was the characteristic they liked most about the Irish.

Innovation and problem-solving skills were also attributes which foreigners recognised in their Irish counterparts.
Article 50 is fast-becoming the most quoted but least read legal provision in the contemporary world. It is also one of the most controversial but least understood provisions. It is being cited by many but read by few. Triggering it is seen as a day of hope or a day of doom depending on one's perspective.

There is an enormous focus on when it will be "triggered" as if that alone will solve or cause problems. In fact, its triggering will simply be one moment (and, even then, a potentially anti-climactic moment) in a potentially long process.

Article 50 permits withdrawal by a Member State from the EU. There was no explicit withdrawal provision until this article was inserted into EU law by the Treaty of Lisbon on December 1, 2009.

The provision is ambiguous, incomplete and awkward to apply - it is not meant to be invoked or applied easily. But how will this provision operate?

International law generally has limited precedent of significant states withdrawing from major international organisations. The UK's withdrawal from the EU would be the most significant ever given the scale of the UK and the EU.

Even the United Nations Charter has no explicit provision to allow withdrawal. Despite Indonesia purporting in 1965 to withdraw and communicating its intention to do, when the country changed its mind, the UN and Indonesia moved on, almost pretending that the incident ever occurred.

A critical issue now is whether serving Article 50 is irreversible. It is significant not least because it could take years for its effects to materialise and there could be, during that timeframe, circumstances which would trigger a rethink.

Read More: Business travellers bet on Ireland escaping Brexit fallout

Many assume that once Article 50 is triggered, it's a trip to Mars, not to the Moon - it would be long, you don't return and you could even be burned up on arrival. Their arguments are straightforward. The provision does not provide for the notice to be withdrawn. It is too serious a matter for flip-flopping. The provision is solemn and should not be used as a bargaining tactic to get a better deal.

However, could the UK withdraw the Article 50 notice? It is submitted that it is legally possible. Politically, it would probably require another referendum in the UK but, legally, there are reasons why it is reversible.

Often in the EU, the law follows the politics: if Member States want to keep the UK in, and the latter withdraws the Article 50 notice, then in all probability the law will be interpreted or, if needed, rewritten to accommodate that outcome.

Triggering Article 50 is a unilateral act by the relevant state and is not dependent on agreement by other states other than to agree the withdrawal agreement. If the putative withdrawing state triggers Article 50 then the other states have to accept it provided the notice is served validly and in accordance with the state's internal constitutional requirements. Other states may not veto either its serving or its withdrawal.

Importantly, Article 50 refers to the Member State announcing its "intention" to leave - this is not a binding irrevocable commitment. Sovereignty theory supports withdrawal. States which have joined the EU may decide to remain or leave. It is a sovereign unilateral decision and the only exception is where the expulsion provision applies which is not an issue here. There is national case law in Germany and the Czech Republic for the right of unilateral withdrawal.

Practice in comparable areas supports withdrawal. There is ample precedent that States have signed up to positions in the EU and then reversed those positions. Norway, for example, signed the Treaty of Accession in 1972 to join the EEEC along with Denmark, Ireland and the UK but changed its mind after a referendum; no one could force Norway to join and the EU even entertained a subsequent application by Norway to join later which again did not proceed.

If a state had triggered the notice but maintaining it was no longer in accordance with the state's "constitutional requirements" then presumably the triggering is no longer valid.

Ireland and Denmark have voted to reject ratification of some EU treaties only to later change their mind in referenda. No one insisted, like a quiz master, "we are sorry, we have to accept your first answer".

More importantly, Article 50 does not trigger withdrawal in its own right. Article 50 is just a procedural enabling provision and it only has effect if no agreement is reached within the time limits specified in the article. There has to be a withdrawal agreement which is what really matters and that would require agreement and even ratification.

There is no guarantee that the UK notice will be withdrawn and no preference is being expressed here as to whether it should be withdrawn but it is clear that, as a matter of law, the balance of the argument favours the argument that an Article 50 notice may be withdrawn.

So there is a need for politicians, business executives and all concerned not to freeze everything during the Article 50 process (life must go on) and also not to assume that there can be only one outcome (Brexit). It is best to plan for Brexit but contemplate the possibility of an alternative. Given the timeline involved - three years or more - anything can happen.

But don't pin too many hopes on a reversal without realising that to reverse the decision on June 23, there would have to be difficult dark days (such as a recession, a crisis or a fundamental shift of views by all or many of the parties) but stranger things have happened.

The world is slowly learning it is much easier to say "Brexit means Brexit" than to win the prize for completing, in ten words or less, the slogan: "Brexit means....." But it is also reasonably clear that one can now say with some degree of confidence that "Brexit does not have to be forever".

Dr Vincent J G Power, is EU law partner at, A&L Goodbody
The bank has opened a data lab in Dublin that will create 40 new jobs

The US Department of Justice is asking Deutsche Bank to pay $14bn (12.4bn) to settle an investigation into its selling of mortgage-backed securities, Germany's flagship lender said on Friday.

The claim against Deutsche, which is likely to be negotiated in several months of talks, far outstrips the bank's and investors' expectations for such costs.

While it is yet to become clear what the final payment will be, if it were to be as high as $14bn, this would be a severe strain for Deutsche's fragile finances and would likely further rock investor confidence in the bank.

The bank's US-listed shares fell 8pc in after-hours trading.

"Deutsche Bank has no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited. The negotiations are only just beginning. The bank expects that they will lead to an outcome similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts", Deutsche Bank said in a statement on Friday.

The Department of Justice declined to comment.

The Wall Street Journal earlier reported the department's demands.

The Department of Justice has taken a tough stance in settlement negotiations with other banks, requesting sums higher than the eventual fine.

In 2014, it asked Citigroup to pay $12bn to resolve an investigation into the sale of shoddy mortgage-backed securities, sources said. The fine eventually came in at $7bn.

In a similar case, rival Goldman Sachs agreed in April to pay $5.06bn to settle claims that it misled mortgage bond investors during the financial crisis.

That settlement included a $2.39bn civil penalty, $1.8bn in other relief, including funds for homeowners whose mortgages exceed the value of their property, and an $875m payment to resolve claims by cooperative and home loan banks among others.

Deutsche Bank's settlement will comprise a different list of recipients, a source close to the matter said, adding that the lender had already settled some claims three years ago.

In late 2013, Deutsche Bank agreed to pay $1.9bn to settle claims that it defrauded US government-controlled Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, America's biggest providers of housing finance, into buying $14.2bn in mortgage-backed securities before the 2008 financial crisis.

A $14bn fine, or even half that sum, would still rank among one of the largest paid by banks to US authorities in recent years. In 2013, JPMorgan Chase agreed to pay $13bn to settle allegations by the US authorities that it overstated the quality of mortgages it was selling to investors in the run-up to the 2008-2009 financial crisis. In 2014, Bank of America agreed to pay $16.7 billion in penalties to settle similar charges.

Deutsche Bank has not said what it has set aside in anticipation of a settlement over the sale and packaging of resident mortgage-backed securities before 2008. Its overall legal provisions stood at 5.5 billion euros at the end of the second quarter.

Deutsche was once one of Europe's most successful players on Wall Street. Like many of its peers, it has since faced a slew of lawsuits that often trace back to the boom years before the crash. Its litigation bill since 2012 has already hit more than 12 billion euros.

Claims filed by individuals, companies and regulators against Deutsche, outlined in the bank's 2015 annual report, relate to mis-selling of subprime loans and manipulation of foreign exchange rates or gold and silver prices. Other lawsuits are for the rigging of borrowing benchmarks Libor and Euribor, used to set the price of mortgages and derivatives.

In July, Chief Executive John Cryan said he hoped to close the four largest remaining litigation cases this year.

These are the mortgages and FX cases, an investigation into suspicious equities trades in Russia and allegations of money laundering.
Namas failure to investigate its former adviser, Frank Cushnahan, is one of the more troubling aspects of the Project Eagle controversy.

The damning report by Comptroller & Auditor General (C&AG) Seamus McCarthy on the loan sale does not speculate to any great degree about Namas motivation for deciding not to take steps to get to the bottom of things.

However, it does bring into the public domain documents that indicate the agency was seriously concerned its reputation would be damaged if details of Mr Cushnahans activities became public.

Read More

Namas board was informed on March 11, 2014 that a potential issue had arisen during discussions with investment firm Pimco, which had been pursuing a deal to buy the portfolio since the previous April.

During a conference call, a lawyer for Pimco told Nama representatives about a success fee arrangement the firm proposed paying in the event of a successful bid.

The Pimco lawyer said this involved three parties  New York law firm Brown Rudnick, Belfast solicitors Tughans and Mr Cushnahan, a former member of Namas Northern Ireland Advisory Committee (NIAC).

They were to split a fee of either 15m (17.6m) or 16m (18.8m). There are varying accounts of the figure.

It is clear the news set alarm bells ringing at the board meeting. Minutes show it was noted that Mr Cushnahan, who quit the NIAC the previous November, had never disclosed any conflict of interest while in office.

The board noted external NIAC members such as Mr Cushnahan did not have access to sensitive confidential information about debtors.

However, there was a recognition that he would be knowledgeable about Namas strategy in Northern Ireland.

Nama also knew Mr Cushnahan had business links with at least seven Nama debtors, who together owed the agency almost 1bn (1.18bn). The board felt his involvement with Pimco raised a significant reputational risk to Nama.

The minutes show the board discussed whether Pimcos bid, at this stage, was fatally flawed.

Two days later, the board was informed that Pimco felt obligated to withdraw.

Given the level of concern evidenced in the minutes, it seems strange that Nama did not pursue Mr Cushnahan for an explanation.

Nama chairman Frank Daly said this week that there was little point in pursuing him at the time as the Pimco deal was dead.

However, the C&AG was troubled by this line of thinking. He found Nama should have sought advice or written to Mr Cushnahan to seek an explanation. Mr McCarthy also found that Nama never briefed Lazard, the advisory firm conducting the sale on its behalf.

Had Lazard been told, it could have assessed whether the entire sales process had been compromised. Instead, knowledge appears to have been confined to the Nama board and a small number of senior executives.

The proposed fee arrangement only became public when it was disclosed by Mr Daly at the Dail Public Accounts Committee in July last year after police began investigating corruption claims.

Pimcos withdrawal left Nama with two bidders, Cerberus and Fortress, with Cerberus eventually submitting the winning bid.

Nama received an assurance from Cerberus that no one connected to Nama would receive a fee in respect of the deal, but again it seems Nama failed to ask enough questions.

The agency only discovered as the deal was going through that Cerberus had agreed to pay fees to Brown Rudnick and Tughans, the firms who had worked alongside Mr Cushnahan on the Pimco deal. Around 7.5m (8.8m) subsequently paid to Tughans ended up being diverted by its managing partner, Ian Coulter, to an account in the Isle of Man.

The UKs National Crime Agency is investigating who was destined to benefit from the cash. In a secret recording broadcast by the BBC, Mr Cushnahan said 6m (7m) of it was for him.

If Namas inaction after it learned of the links between Pimco and Mr Cushnahan was motivated by a desire to ensure damaging information did not become public, it is a strategy that has failed spectacularly. The damage its board was so worried about has only been exacerbated by its failure to act on that information.
Several investment firms that expressed an interest in the controversial Project Eagle deal were excluded from bidding.

Nine major investment firms were contacted by agents for Nama when it decided to sell more than 850 loans linked to properties owned by developers in the North.

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But an examination of the sale by the Comptroller & Auditor General (C&AG) found eight other companies that expressed interest were excluded from getting involved.

A number of these parties expressed frustration and unhappiness at being left out, according to emails detailed in the C&AG's damning report on the sale.

C&AG Seamus McCarthy said that generally Nama's aim when carrying out a loan sale was to attract as large a pool of suitable potential bidders as possible. But he found the marketing approach used for Project Eagle was different, and restricted competition.

Nama defended its approach, saying there was a limited number of potential bidders with the financial capacity to buy a portfolio with an asking price in the region of Stg1.3bn.

Lazard, the financial advisory firm that conducted the sale for Nama, said it excluded the eight companies for a variety of reasons.

These included ensuring the confidentiality of the sale process, the need to adhere to a timetable, and maintaining the motivation of bidders already in the process.

However, an email to Nama from a Lazard executive in February 2014 detailed how one interested firm was "frustrated" and demanded an explanation "given that Nama typically runs open processes".

The Lazard executive said: "I explained that this transaction was unusual in that respect, but that I was not in a position to elaborate."

Frustrated

A second email from a Lazard executive to Nama in the same month said a representative of another company "was very frustrated that his firm had not been included in the first place, given their track record in Ireland and their relationship with both Nama and Lazard".

Of the nine firms that were contacted by Lazard, only two, Cerberus and Fortress, would end up submitting bids, with Cerberus winning with a bid of Stg1.241bn (1.6bn at the time) in April 2014.

Investment giants Pimco, Oaktree, Goldman Sachs and Lone Star withdrew from the competition.

Blackstone, Starwood and Apollo all declined to participate.

Lazard said companies that declined to enter cited exposure to Northern Ireland, limited due-diligence information available and a lack of confidence in being able to compete with initial frontrunners Pimco.

The C&AG found restrictions imposed by Nama meant potential bidders were prevented from contacting debtors, or availing of the services of valuers in Northern Ireland. This led some firms to pull out, citing the difficulty they would have in carrying out due diligence without such third-party assistance.

A virtual 'data room' made available to bidders to do due diligence contained about 2,800 documents relating to roughly 850 properties.

The C&AG noted that in contrast, Nama's subsequent Project Arrow sale involved a data room with 22,000 documents for around 1,900 property assets.
The country's biggest employers' group, Ibec, named former Anglo Irish Bank director Anne Heraty as its president ahead of its annual dinner last night.

The founder of recruitment giant CPL Resources is one of the country's most successful business leaders and was the first woman to head an Irish stock market-listed company.

However, the appointment may prove controversial because the Longford-born business woman was a non-executive director of Anglo in the run-up to its massive 2008 state rescue. The collapse of the bank ultimately left taxpayers nursing losses of 29bn.

Along with four other non-executive directors of the bank, Ms Heraty resigned from the board of Anglo in January 2009, shortly before it was taken into public ownership by the Government.

She had been appointed to the board just over two years earlier. In the immediate wake of the bank's nationalisation, she also stood down as a director of state agencies Forfas and Bord na Mona.

Since the financial crisis she has continued to lead the expansion of Cpl, the country's biggest recruitment company.

Ms Heraty is highly regarded in the business community for her successful development of the into a global recruitment and outsourcing business with 36 offices worldwide.

Along with her husband Paul Carroll, she owns a 40.7pc stake in the firm which is worth more than 70m.

In the unpaid but influential role of Ibec president, she will become a key figurehead and representative of the Irish business community. She is only the second woman to hold the presidency, after Julie O'Neill of Gilead Sciences in 2011.

Her appointment was confirmed last night at a black tie dinner at the RDS in Dublin where Taoiseach Enda Kenny was the keynote speaker.

Mr Kenny told business leaders at the event that Ireland remains committed to the 12.5pc corporate tax rate.

In relation to Brexit, he warned that negotiations between the UK and the remaining EU member states will be difficult but of vital importance.

"Nobody should think that the negotiations ahead will be easy, or that they can be viewed through a purely economic lens," he said. "For the remaining EU members there are matters of historic and fundamental importance at stake. It will be a hard bargain to strike."

In her inaugural speech as Ibec president, Ms Heraty called for business taxes to be overhauled to match UK levels.

"This should include a radical reform of our entrepreneurs' capital gains tax regime and improvements to our incentives for investment, innovation and up-skilling in SMEs," she said.

Labour costs should be kept down, but income tax is too high, she added.
With a thriving street-side cafe and bar culture, young population and rising middle class, Vietnam is luring top brewers.

With a thriving street-side cafe and bar culture, young population and rising middle class, Vietnam is luring brewers such as Heineken from the Netherlands and Sapporo and Asahi from Japan.

Japanese brewer Sapporo, which arrived in Vietnam in 2010, said the company has established connections with about 2,000 restaurants, outlets and beer clubs. Sapporo said the the cost of financing is considerable though it didn't reveal the figure.

Sapporo is widely considered as having the most aggressive spending program among existing brewers in the country's beer market.

Besides sponsoring the street-side bars, the Japanese company employed about 700 promotional staffs in 2015.

In addition, the company also hires an additional 6-10 people to welcome and introduce products at every major event.

Meanwhile, Heineken Vietnam Brewery Ltd. (VBL) has been spending hundreds of billions of VND (VND1 billion is equivalent to US$45,000) on establishing connections. VBL has enjoyed strong growth and has continued to increase its production in the country.

President of Heineken in Asia Pacific Frans Eusman said the company is pouring money into Vietnam, its second most profitable market behind Mexico. In 2015, the company raked in trillions of VND in profit.

The third largest beer company in Vietnam - Saigon Beer-Alcohol-Beverage JSC - commonly known as Sabeco, also spent nearly VND1.3 billion on promotional activities last year, an increase of 43.2 percent compared to 2014.

A Sabeco official said beer companies are happy to spend a large amount of money on promotions at restaurants, bars and clubs because that's where the demand comes from.

Vietnam is the number one market in Southeast Asia for beer consumption, and the profits outweigh promotional costs, he said.

According to a recent report released by the Vietnam Beverage Association (VBA), Vietnamese people drank more than 3.4 billion liters of beer in 2015, a 40 percent increase from 2010, putting the country in the top 10 global consumers of alcohol.

Sabeco is the countrys largest brewer by sales and claimed 40 per cent of the market last year, followed by Heineken and Habeco with 20 per cent each, according to Nguyen Van Viet, chairman of the VBA.

Related news:

> Nearly half of Vietnamese men drink alcohol at 'hazardous level'

> Da Nang could ban alcohol sales after 10 p.m.
Smurfit brothers Michael and Dermot are set for multi-million euro cash windfalls after US private equity giant Madison Dearborn agreed to buy Finnish packaging firm Powerflute for 268m (314m).

Overall, the brothers will gain 65.58m from the deal. While executive chairman Dermot is directly invested in Powerflute, his brother, Michael, attained shares through his investment vehicle, Bacchantes.

The deal, which will see all shareholders except the Smurfit parties receive 90p (1.05) per share, comes after a failed attempt by Madison Dearborn last December where the Chicago firm made a bid of 261.5m.

The US firm had already agreed in private negotiations to buy the Smurfit's shares in the company before the offer was made public.

The offer was made by Nordic Packaging and Container Holdings, a Madison subsidiary recently established for the purpose of making the offer for Powerflute.

Between them the Smurfit brothers own around 27.5pc of the firm, amounting to around 82m shares. As part of the deal the brothers stand to receive 80p per share in cash.

Madison's offer represents a premium of around 22pc on the closing price of Powerflute shares on Wednesday, which closed at 73.75p. After failing in a bid to buy the firm late last year Madison re-entered negotiations with Poweflute in April before submitting an indication of interest on May 10.

In the offer Madison said there was a "strong rationale" for making a move for the Finnish packaging firm.

"Powerflute has an attractive market position and a strong management team. However, Madison also believes that certain of Powerflute's near-term operating activities and strategic opportunities could be addressed most effectively as a private company," the company said.

The Poweflute board terminated talks between the two firms just two weeks after the original offer was made after consultation from independent members and shareholders.

The Smurfit brothers were likely to benefit more so from the original offer given they had a larger stake in the company at the time, around 36pc.

This isn't the first time Madison has done business with the Smurfits. In 2002 the investment firm moved for box-maker Jefferson Smurfit before it merged with Kappa Packaging in 2005. Powerflute, which was set up by Dermot Smurfit in 2005, was in a strong position ahead of the deal, doubling its revenue in 2015 thanks in part to the "transformational" acquisition of coreboard-maker Corenso.

Speaking in March, the Powerflute chairman said his company was on the lookout for bolt-on acquisitions. Mr Smurfit also revealed that the original bid failed because of the price offered by Madison.

Powerflute's business is split up into three main units, namely Poweflute, which produces semi0chemical fluting, recently acquired Corenso, and wood supply and procurement company Harvestia.
Here are the main business stories from today's papers:

Irish Independent

* Britain looks set to trigger Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty to begin its exit from the European Union early next year, Taoiseach Enda Kenny has said.

The formal application to exit the EU under Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty will officially begin Britain's separation from the union. Since the June 23 vote in the UK, any plan by the British government to trigger the exit has remained a mystery.

* Smurfit brothers Michael and Dermot are set for multi-million euro cash windfalls after US private equity giant Madison Dearborn agreed to buy Finnish packaging firm Powerflute for 268m (314m).

Overall, the brothers will gain 65.58m from the deal. While executive chairman Dermot is directly invested in Powerflute, his brother, Michael, attained shares through his investment vehicle, Bacchantes.

* The European Commission has warned it will no longer support telecoms mergers similar to the 780m deal struck between 3 Ireland and O2 Ireland.

Criticising the practice of using 'virtual' operators as a facilitator, Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager said such deals may restrict competition.

The Irish Times

* The sale of Finnish paper and packaging firm looks set to land Smurfit brothers Michael and Dermot 77.2m in a cash windfall for their stake in the business.

Powerflute is to be bought by Chicago-based equity firm Madison Dearborn partners in what is a second attempt to secure control of the company.

* The owners of Dundrum Town Centre is looking to either develop or sell an adjoining six-acre site with original plans to turn it into further retail space waning.

According to a report in The Irish Times, Dundrum owners Hammerson is exploring the option of entering a joint-venture to develop the land, which may become an apartments-led scheme.

* Next month's budget will focus around getting Ireland ready for Britain's Exit from the European Union, Taoiseach Enda Kenny has said.

Mr Kenny was speaking at an event organised by employers' group Ibec, where he said the pension deficit would be under 1pc in 2016.

Irish Examiner

* Irish consumers are set to reap the rewards of an energy price war after Electric Ireland became the latest provider to cut its prices, this time by 5pc.

The cut is set to net consumers around 40 per year in savings.

* Irish exporters began to feel the pinch caused by Brexit in July as the value of goods exported fell by 1.15bn month on month.

On a seasonally adjusted basis exports slipped by 11.5pc to 8.92bn during the month with a number of analysts tipping Brexit for the fall.

* Finnish paper and packaging company Powerflute is to be sold for up to 315m after US equity firm Madison Dearborn reached an agreement for the business.

The deal for Powerflute is the second time Madison has come in for the company within a year after failing with a bid last December.
Logistic and delivery service Nightline has created 150 jobs as part of a 3m investment.

The investment comes as the company expands its premium services, which include same day, evening, and weekend deliveries.

Nightline has opened three new depots: in Swords in Dublin; Omagh in Tyrone; and Kilbarry in Waterford.

The new positions, which include roles for delivery drivers, depot support staff, and sorting shift staff, will be spread out across Ireland.

Nightline founder John Tuohy said the company continues its expansion after nearly 25 years in business.

"With the heavy demand for online shopping we are seeing a strong and steady need for parcel and delivery services and this expansion is in line with the desire to continually give our growing customer base a first-class service."

Jobs minister Mary Mitchell O'Connor welcomed the news. "Indigenous Irish businesses such as Nightline are important to not only the national economy but also local communities, delivering a valuable economic contribution across the country through increased employment and local expenditure," the Minister said.

"Ireland has one of the fastest growing employment rates in Europe, and it is homegrown companies such as Nightline which are helping to sustain this," she said.

"I am particularly pleased that this expansion will lead to job growth in regions around Ireland. I want to wish Nightline and their employees continued success for the future."

Nightline said a significant portion of its expansion was down to continued growth in e-commerce and the introduction of the Eircode system.

Mr Tuohy said the new system has allowed the company to continue innovating with its products. "The implementation of Eircodes has also greatly improved our business' efficiency and has allowed us to enhance our customer delivery experience," he said.

The company also announced an increase in the number of subscriptions to its Parcel Motel service.

The company launched its Parcel Motel to stop online shoppers waiting at home for their delivery. The service allows consumers to rent a locker at a given location so they may collect it at any given time.

The company launched the service off the back of strong growth in online shopping, which is set to surpass 500bn Europe-wide this year.

Nightline is Ireland's largest independent parcel delivery business, servicing both domestic and international markets.

The firm now employs over 800 people and handles 40,000 parcels every day.

Mr Tuohy predicted that drone deliveries will take off in rural areas and said the service won't be constricted to built-up areas.

While the Nightline boss conceded it may not happen soon he did say it will happen eventually. He is also understood to be looking at international expansion for the firm.
There can be no room for mergers that harm competition and raise prices for consumers, said Margrethe Vestager. Photo: Bloomberg

The European Commission has warned it will no longer support telecoms mergers similar to the 780m deal struck between 3 Ireland and O2 Ireland.

Criticising the practice of using 'virtual' operators as a facilitator, Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager said such deals may restrict competition.

"A virtual operator can't help being dependent on the companies that carry its data and its calls," said Ms Vestager.

"So it's difficult to design agreements that give virtual operators the freedom to really compete. And you risk having to monitor the arrangement for years, to make sure physical operators aren't preventing them from competing."

Her predecessor, Joaquin Almunia, agreed to allow 3 Ireland take over O2 Ireland in a 780m deal if 3 Ireland facilitated two new virtual operators into the Irish market. Those new operators, Virgin Mobile and iD Mobile, have guaranteed network capacity from 3 Ireland's physical network.

However, Ms Vestager said that such a use of virtual operators to strike merger deals is now frowned upon in such takeover propositions.

"That's why, in the Italian case [merger between 3 Italia and Vimpelcom], we had a clear preference for a structural solution The solution in that case involves a new independent network operator [Iliad] entering the Italian market with its own towers and its own share of the airwaves." The remarks will be interpreted as a signal that the Commission is to pursue a hard line on telecoms consolidation throughout Europe.

"More than half of all internet access is through mobile devices and that means affordable mobile networks are essential," she said.

"To get that, you need competition. So there can be no room for mergers that harm competition and raise prices for consumers. We recently dealt with two planned mergers that would have done just that.

"So we had to block the merger between Three and O2 in the UK. And we were on the way to blocking Telenor's joint venture with TeliaSonera in Denmark, when the companies decided to abandon it."

Ms Vestager also said Brussels is to continue investigating restrictions on trading across the EU through the practice of geoblocking.

However, despite almost half of European retailers reporting price restriction practices from suppliers, she said that some price-fixing was "valid".

"Pricing restrictions can help to stop physical shops from disappearing," she said.

"Without them, people might go to a brick-and-mortar shop only to get a feel for a product, but then buy it more cheaply online.

"And limits on where products can be sold can help to keep up the exclusive image that people look for in certain brands."
Business intelligence and information provider Informa Plc has agreed a deal to buy Penton Information Services for 1.18bn (1.38bn) to add exhibitions and professional services in the US to its operations.

The London-listed company will fund the purchase through new debt and equity, according to a statement yesterday. The sellers, MidOcean Partners and Wasserstein & Co, will receive about 1.1bn (1.4bn) in cash and 76m in Informa equity.

Informa has accelerated its expansion under chief executive officer Stephen Carter, a former head of UK media regulator Ofcom who was named ceo in 2013. Informa, which has a market value of about 4.5bn, employs more than 6,000 globally across five divisions: business intelligence, academic publishing, knowledge, events and support, according to its website.

"We have been very focused on growing in the US over the last few years," Mr Carter said. "This feels to us like a natural next step in our expansion plan." Informa rose 1.3pc at 702.5 pence at 8:27am in London yesterday.

In 2014, Informa bought US trade-show and conference operator Hanley Wood Exhibitions and Virgo. The latest deal makes the US Informa's largest single market. It will generate less than 10pc of revenue in the UK after the acquisition.

Informa was undeterred by the UK's June 23 vote to leave the European Union, which caused a plunge in the pound. Informa runs 170 trade and consumer shows annually around the world, including events like World of Concrete, Arab Health and China Beauty Expo. The company also owns research firms such as Ovum and Datamonitor and academic publishers including Taylor & Francis Group. (Bloomberg)
Owners of vacant properties will be given up-front payments by the State in a scheme designed to bring thousands of homes back into use.

As much as 30,000 will be provided to bring properties up to a standard allowing them to be rented to social housing tenants or families in need of State support, before long-term leases of up to five years are agreed.

Housing Minister Simon Coveney said the Repair and Lease scheme would help alleviate short-term demand until delivery of new homes was ramped up.

He added that a pilot project was under way in Carlow and Waterford, and that both local authorities and Approved Housing Bodies (AHBs) could enter into arrangements with private landlords.

"It will be extended to AHBs, and they may be a more effective vehicle for delivery," he told the Irish Independent. "Local authorities might advertise in the paper seeking expressions of interest, but an AHB will go out and knock on doors and ask who owns property and see if they will accept three or five years' rent up front.

Read more: Landlords to be offered five years' rent for vacant properties

Read more: Revealed: the property hotspots that should be on house hunters radars

"That hands-on approach is needed. There's thousands (of vacant units) in urban areas and we need a scheme that brings a portion of those properties back into the market.

"It's much quicker than building a house or going through planning permission. The reason why I think this is important is we need a solution for the next two years while the overall housing stock increases. We need solutions for people today."

Census 2016 says there are some 200,000 vacant properties across the country, and the Department of Housing will begin compiling a register of vacant units when the final census figures are released later this year.

The Repair and Lease scheme is designed to make vacant private properties in need of renovation capable of being rented for social housing or to those in receipt of housing assistance payments (HAP).

In many cases, families may have inherited a property after a parent passed away but were reluctant to sell. These families would be given a portion of the rent up front to make necessary upgrades. The amount was likely to be around 15,000, but could rise to 30,000 if required, the minister said. Once expressions of interest were received, local authorities or AHBs would negotiate rents.

Some 1m is being provided over the coming months, with 2m next year. Based on average rents being demanded this year, at 929 per house, the allocation could fund delivery of more than 2,100 units.

"I'd see this as a really good response to short-term housing need but we need to show that the model works," Mr Coveney added. "It's a much cheaper way of getting housing than building or buying."

The property owner will have no role in managing the property, which will be handled by the local authority or AHB, which will also ensure it is maintained.

AHBs including Focus Ireland, the Peter McVerry Trust and Simon Community will be given resources to fund the works, and it is expected that much of the demand will be in the cities. However, vacant units in any area of need can be utilised.

The scheme is in addition to the Housing Agency's 70m budget to spend on vacant properties. It is negotiating with banks in relation to 1,600 vacant units linked to bad loans. The homes will be sold to councils and AHBs, allowing the fund to be continuously recycled.
A 3D printed Apple logo is seen in front of a displayed Irish flag in this illustration taken September 2, 2016. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo

Apple and other US multinationals will face new curbs on tax loopholes under a rule imposed by Washington on Thursday, part of a scramble among governments worldwide to bolster their corporate tax bases.

Acting shortly after a European Union grab for billions of dollars in back taxes from Apple, the US Treasury said it was tightening restrictions on companies' use of foreign tax credits to reduce what they owe in US taxes.

"We are closing another tax loophole that contributes to the erosion of our tax base," Treasury Assistant Secretary for Tax Policy Mark Mazur said in a statement.

The fight for multinational tax revenues escalated on August 30 when the EU ruled Ireland was giving improper state aid to Apple in the form of a deal for low taxes. The EU ordered Apple to pay Ireland 13bn in back taxes, prompting US Treasury Secretary Jack Lew to express concern the EU ruling could undermine the US tax base.

Analysts have speculated whether Apple would be able to cut its US tax bill by claiming foreign tax credits for its extra tax bill in Ireland.

Under normal circumstances, US companies can reduce the taxes they owe the US government by the value of the tax credits they claim for taxes paid abroad on foreign profits. No US tax is due on those profits until they are brought into the United States, or repatriated.

The new rule will prevent companies faced with back tax bills from "splitting," a strategy that allows companies to bring foreign tax credits into the United States without repatriating the income from which they were derived.

Apple had no comment on Treasury's tax notice. The technology giant is not the only US company in the crosshairs of EU state aid investigations.

Starbucks Corp has been ordered to pay up to 30m to the Dutch state, while Amazon.com Inc and McDonald's Corp are under investigation by the EU's executive arm.

The new rule was likely to ratchet up transatlantic tensions over corporate taxes while eliminating one more strategy US companies can use to cushion the blow from increasingly aggressive EU tax collection efforts.

The tax notice specifically cited European Union state aid investigations as a risk to US revenues.

The Treasury had no comment on whether its notice would have an impact on Apple directly, but a spokesperson said the notice applies to all companies required by a foreign government to pay additional taxes, including those hit by state-aid cases.
What do you think the main differences are between the Mayo and Dublin training regimes in the run up to the All Ireland Final? The 2 Johnnies give us a fair idea in this hilarious video.

While the Mayo men are running down a country road and chopping planks of wood, the Dublin men are training in a gym and pretending theyre on Moore St fighting away merchants from the stalls.

This is a pretty hilarious take on the differences between how the two counties "train."

My mam is from Dublin, so I'd be shot if I didn't shout for the Dubs, said John OBrien, one of the comedians in the sketch.

Every neutral will be praying for Mayo. My God they have gone through some hardships, losing seven all Ireland finals, since last winning one.

The reaction to the video has been great, neither set of fans have been too insulted by it, he told Independent.ie.

We try to always make light of both sides and ourselves in our videos.

There is a massive contrast between Mayo and Dublin, as teams, as fans and as counties.

Sunday's game is going to be an interesting one, that's for sure.
Sex workers wait for customers on the street in Hanoi. Photo by Nguyen Le/VnExpress

Sex workers have to deal with regular police raids and persistent fears.

Sex workers, possibly the most vulnerable in Vietnam, have to deal with regular police raids and persistent fear of theft and violence, a new study has found.

As part of the research, the International Labor Organization interviewed male, female and transgender sex workers as well as pimps and local authorities in Vietnam, and strongly suggested that the country do something about the occupational safety and health risks that come with the industry.

Most workers had casual jobs before they chose to enter the sex industry, after considering it a better option.

Out of the 73 workers surveyed, only one reported to having been deceived into selling sex, but many workers had their movements controlled by employers and some had their identity papers held, the study found.

According to the workers, conditions would be better in well-maintained, expensive bars, discotheques, spas, massage parlors and restaurants, while brothels and cheap cafes, restaurants, karaoke bars and parlors are dirty and do not guarantee security and safety.

However, no matter where they work, there is always the threat of violence and police raids, especially for women working on the streets.

A full-time worker usually works ten to 12 hours each day, and women provide sexual services to between six to ten clients on average, and up to 30 per day. Male workers serve between three and ten clients each day, a workload considered heavy by many pimps interviewed by the ILO.

Many employers provide condoms but regular use of contraception is low.

These factors do not only expose sex workers to high risks of sexually transmitted diseases and drug use, but many also have stress and mental issues, the study found.



They do not enjoy their work, Pham Thi Thanh Huyen, national coordinator for the ILO in Vietnam, said in a statement. Many were also forced by employers, clients or themselves to drink alcohol, which resulted in permanent stomachaches. Others suffered from trauma due to too much sex or injuries from gang rapes."

Vietnam outlaws sex work, but there seems to be no way to stop the business. Latest figures indicate there are nearly 101,300 sex workers, including 72,000 female sex workers, in Vietnam.

Chang-Hee Lee, director of ILO Vietnam, said in the statement that the government and relevant agencies need to make employers protect the safety and health of their employees.

He also said local health and labor inspectors should be trained on the matter.

Related news:

>Legalize brothels, stop punishing sex workers who solicit: U.K. parliamentary watchdog

>Prostitution in Saigon: sex trade finds a new face
Culture Night with RTE in the grounds of Dublin Castle. Pic Maxwells

Culture Night with RTE in the grounds of Dublin Castle. Pic Maxwells

Culture Night with RTE in the grounds of Dublin Castle. Pic Maxwells

Culture Night with RTE in the grounds of Dublin Castle. Pic Maxwells

Culture Night with RTE in the grounds of Dublin Castle. Pic Maxwells

Culture Night with RTE in the grounds of Dublin Castle. Pic Maxwells

Culture Night with RTE in the grounds of Dublin Castle. Pic Maxwells

As the first handfuls of curious culture vultures appeared across Dublin, you could have imagined a rather reserved Friday evening in Dublin.

But Culture Night 2016 proved it wasnt going to be a quiet event, as soon thousands arrived in the capital to savour some of the best of Irish creativity.

Arts Minister Heather Humphreys was among the first to hit the cultural trail, arriving early to Dublin Castle.

This is a busy night, but its a really, really good night, she said.

Caoilfhinn Groake from Killiney came with her two children Euan (8) and Romilly (11), and was one of the first in line to have her face painted in St Stephens Green.

We just wanted to bring the children in while its early, she said.

Well stick around the Trinity area tonight and bring them to see the Alliance Francaise, the Little Museum and the square, she added. Wed like to show them the atmosphere and what Dublin looks like at night.

Spectacular scenes were spotted in Temple Bars Meeting House Square, as Aerial Cirque performed a truly stunning and magnificent vertical dance.

Expand Expand Expand Previous Next Close Culture Night with RTE in the grounds of Dublin Castle. Pic Maxwells Culture Night with RTE in the grounds of Dublin Castle. Pic Maxwells Culture Night with RTE in the grounds of Dublin Castle. Pic Maxwells / Facebook

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Abseiling down the surrounding buildings, the troupe bounced off a canvas while weaving designs in red wool.

Near St Stephens Green, Boston College was the scene of a magic lantern show, a music for deaf audiences workshop and a Nigerian choir performance.

Meanwhile, Amnesty International invited the curious to Fleet St to hear the stories and poetry of migrants in Calais and Dunkirk.

Outside of the capital, Galway hosted events as wide ranging from stories of direct provision to a sneak peak into the building of Galway Hookers, the citys iconic cargo boats.

Video of the Day

Those seeking more hands-on events were also treated to a brief lesson in aerial yoga, hoola-hooping and balancing acts with Galway Community Circus in Shantalla.

Night owls then plan to head to the Culture Night Party in the Roisin Dubh, featuring sessions from local acts like My Fellow Sponges, New Pope and Tracy Bruen.

Meanwhile, Wexford town embraced culture from outside of Ireland, welcoming three Shaolin masters for a spectacular Kung Fu display at the Irish National Heritage Park.

But the varied programme ventured far further than Irish shores. Capitals across the world also joined in the festivities, with the showcasing of several Irish artists.

Belfast painter Colin Davidson opened his exhibition, Reflected Gleams, at the Irish Arts Centre in New York.

Colin has immortalised famous faces from Angela Merkel to Glen Hansard, and his new collection will run in the Big Apple until the end of the month

Meanwhile, the Centre Culturel Irlandais in Paris hosted The Souvenir Shop, an art installation taking inspiration from Tom Clarkes 1916 tobacconist.

Caoilfhionn Groarke, from Killiney, with her son Euan (8) and daughter Romilly (11), getting their faces painted in Boston College. Below, Hannah Thomson, from Glanmire, with Elisabetta Mazza of the Glucksman Gallery, Cork having fun at the Teddys Bear Walk.
Actors, from left, Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson and Rupert Grint attend the premiere of 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1'. Photo: AP Photo/Evan Agostini

Daniel Radcliffe agrees there is a lack of roles for women in the film industry.

Daniel Radcliffe agrees there is a lack of roles for women in the film industry.

The Harry Potter actor has spoken out in support of recent comments made by his former co-star Emma Watson, who was appointed UN Women Goodwill Ambassador in July 2014.

The actress serves as an advocate for UN Womens HeForShe campaign in promoting gender equality.

Daniel thinks it's sad that women still have to declare themselves feminists, and staunchly agrees there is a shortage of roles for talented actresses.

Expand Close Actors, from left, Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson and Rupert Grint attend the premiere of 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1'. Photo: AP Photo/Evan Agostini / Facebook

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Whatsapp Actors, from left, Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson and Rupert Grint attend the premiere of 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1'. Photo: AP Photo/Evan Agostini

"Its sad that people are having to come out as feminist. I thought wed have got beyond this point. I would hope it would be assumed of me that I was one," he told British magazine Elle in an excerpt from its forthcoming October issue.

You see amazing male characters, and there is an absolute dearth of roles for women.

The Now You See Me 2 actor previously admitted he was unaware of the inequality in Hollywood until the Sony email leak in 2014, which revealed the female stars of American Hustle were on a 7 per cent pay deal, while their male co-stars were on a 9 per cent deal.

The 27-year-old told Australia's Daily Telegraph newspaper at the time, "That, to me, is shocking... stuff like that is crazy and the thing I cant help but think is Who? Whos doing that? What guy is sitting in a studio somewhere thinking lets f**k the girls out of some money?

The British actor can next be seen in crime drama Imperium and thriller Jungle, based on the memoir Lost in the Jungle from Yossi Ghinsberg. The story follows three young men on a trek through the Amazonian rainforest.
The Grand Tour featuring Jeremy Clarkson will launch exclusively for Amazon Prime customers on November 18. Photo: Amazon Prime/PA Wire

Charlize Theron and Matt Damon will reportedly appear as guests on Jeremy Clarkson's new motoring show The Grand Tour.

The Hollywood A-listers have filmed guest segments with Jeremy and his fellow former Top Gear hosts Richard Hammond and James May, according to editors at British newspaper The Sun.

The new show, which will air on Amazon's streaming service, Prime, later this year (16), marks the return of the presenters to broadcasting after Jeremy's controversial axing from Top Gear last year.

Top Gear's popularity has floundered without the popular trio, and an insider tells The Sun that the former hosts new project is set to trump the BBC show by featuring some hugely famous names.

"All the early signs suggest The Grand Tour will have a much bigger pulling power than Top Gear," the source divulged. "Matt and Charlize are just two of the names involved. More big stars will follow. Top Gear's influence and power has clearly waned without Jeremy at the helm."

BBC bosses didnt renew Jeremy's Top Gear contract after he was involved in a fracas with a member of the show's production team, and his co-presenters subsequently decided not to return for another series.

A rebooted version fronted by U.K. TV and radio personality Chris Evans and Friends star Matt LeBlanc struggled to draw in viewers after debuting in May (16).

One criticism disgruntled fans had of the show was that producers struggled to attract A-list celebrity guests on a regular basis, with funnyman Kevin Hart and actor Jesse Eisenberg the biggest stars who signed-up to appear.

The first episode of The Grand Tour, a 12-part series, will debut on 18 November (16).
In January, the show broadcast a demonstration of the invention by Galway-based entrepreneur TJ Gormley, which holds baby lambs in place so they can be tagged.

The Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) has rejected a complaint against RTE for a segment on the 'Late Late Show' in which a baby lamb was put into a machine called the Lamb Carousel.

In January, the show broadcast a demonstration of the invention by Galway-based entrepreneur TJ Gormley, which holds baby lambs in place so they can be tagged.

A complaint was submitted to the BAI by Pawel Rydzewski, under the headings harm and offence, protection and harm, and importance of context.

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Mr Rydzewski argued the lamb was just a few days old, was distressed by the experience and that it would have been more appropriate for the piece to have been filmed on location.

In response, RTE said there was no evidence whatsoever that the item had any negative impact on the lamb in question, before, during or after the programme.

It emerged in the BAI's written decision that the lamb was subsequently named Dynamo by Mr Gormley's family and had been chosen to be used as a pure-bred to sire the next generation of lambs and sheep for his farm.

The BAI compliance committee unanimously rejected the complaint.

Two separate complaints against the 'Late Late Show' for comments made by Paul Williams were also rejected.

They alleged the 'Irish Independent' crime correspondent was allowed to "vilify" those who vote for Sinn Fein.

He had told the show the only people who would vote for the party based on their manifesto promise to get rid of the Special Criminal Court were drug dealers and killers.

The BAI found the comments had context, and the assertion that Sinn Fein wanted to abolish the Special Criminal Court was factual.
A former accountant turned brothel keeper has been freed on a six-month suspended jail sentence.

Paul Ervine, from Ballymacash Park in Lisburn, was also fined 2,000 (2,354) after pleading guilty to a total of seven charges including managing three brothels, controlling a prostitute, having over 3,000 (3,531) in criminal property, and inciting a woman to become a prostitute.

Unfortunately for the 62-year-old former tax adviser, the woman he was trying to recruit was reporter Patricia Devlin, who secretly recorded him boasting of the thousands of pounds to be made as a call girl.

The report by the former Sunday Life journalist led to a police investigation into his illegal activities.

Ervine later claimed that he thought he was doing nothing illegal, believing he was acting as an agent for the women, and very different from those acting as a pimp or operating a brothel.

In all, Ervine was involved in managing brothels in Belfast's Kitchener Street, Connsbrook Avenue and University Court on dates between January and December 2014.

When initially arrested by police in May 2015, officers also recovered 3,210 (3,778) in cash, which he accepted was "criminal property".

Yesterday at Antrim Crown Court Judge Gordon Kerr QC told the shamed former accountant that in determining the appropriate sentence the court had to look at the nature of his offending, in particular were any young women being trafficked so that they could be exploited.

However, in his case he was told that the "activities" of the woman he "intentionally controlled" was already an established prostitute.

Nevertheless, said Judge Kerr, Ervine was operating for "pure profit", organising clients and running the brothels.

The judge said that with regard to the current sentencing guidelines, the appropriate sentence was one of six to 12 months, but that given his guilty pleas, co-operation with police and his limited record, the majority for motoring offences, with nothing of a similar nature, he could suspend any custodial sentence.

Judge Kerr said that there was also nothing to suggest that Ervine, who had a good work record, posed a danger to the community, and was assessed as a low risk of reoffending, and that the proper sentence should be one of six months suspended for two years.

However, the judge added that Ervine accepted that the monies recovered by police were from his criminal activity, and he ordered the disposal of the 3,210 (3,778), and because he had intended to profit from his wrong doing, Ervine would be fined 2,000 (2,354).
A gynaecologist has said a doctor at the centre of a medical inquiry was "not entitled" to recommend medication that would end a mother's early pregnancy.

Methotrexate - a drug used to end an ectopic pregnancy - should only be advised if the consultant is certain the pregnancy is not viable.

Dr Philip Owen, a leading British obstetrician and gynaecologist, said poor professional performance was shown by a Clonmel-based consultant who administered methotrexate to Laura Esmonde in 2013.

A Medical Council inquiry heard claims that mother-of-three Ms Esmonde (38), from Tipperary, was wrongly diagnosed as having an ectopic pregnancy when she attended the South Tipperary General Hospital in Clonmel on January 6, 2013. The consultant, an obstetrician-gynaecologist, faces allegations of poor professional performance.

He has been referred to as 'Doctor A' during the course of the inquiry which was adjourned yesterday to resume on November 14.

The inquiry heard that Ms Esmonde had gone to the hospital after suffering a blood clot in her leg.

She was told an ultrasound scan revealed she was pregnant but that it was probably an ectopic pregnancy, a non-viable pregnancy outside the womb.

She told the inquiry Doctor A gave her three options: surgery or the use of drugs to end the pregnancy, or letting the pregnancy end naturally.

She said he had warned against surgery and he told her she could die in her sleep if there was a rupture.

She opted to take methotrexate, and had a miscarriage on February 2.

It was claimed at the inquiry that Doctor A misinterpreted ultra sound scans by concluding the woman's pregnancy was outside the womb.

The inquiry was told earlier an ultrasound scan done on January 26 in Cork University Hospital showed a possible presence of a gestational sac inside the womb or else a "pseudo sac".

Dr Owen said yesterday Doctor A could not have reached the level of certainty required to diagnose an ectopic pregnancy.

He should not have ruled out a pregnancy within the womb at that stage and he should have kept her in hospital before coming to any final conclusion.

Ms Esmonde did not show symptoms of an ectopic pregnancy, said Dr Owen.

Earlier, Dr John Coulter, consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist at Cork University Maternity Hospital, said the first time he saw Ms Esmonde was on January 27 and found no evidence of an ectopic pregnancy.

Following a scan, he said it was not possible to determine if there was a viable pregnancy in the womb.
The man held over the killing of Gary Hutch was also investigated by police probing the murder of another Irishman in Spain.

Gangland criminal James Quinn (34) made his first formal court appearance before a Spanish judge yesterday following his arrest in connection with the shooting of Hutch.

The Irish Independent can reveal he was previously investigated for the killing of Gerard 'Hatchet' Kavanagh (44), who was gunned down in Harmon's Irish Bar in Elviria in September 2014.

Sources revealed last night that gardai have received information that Quinn was involved in the murder but Spanish police have never gained enough evidence to charge him for that crime.

The 34-year-old from Basin Street, in Dublin's south inner city, is also a suspect in a number of other gun attacks.

Quinn, a nephew of veteran criminal Martin 'The Viper' Foley, appeared in front of an investigating judge after being taken to a duty court in the Costa del Sol resort of Fuengirola for the behind-closed-doors hearing.

He was rushed into a courtroom out of sight of waiting press amid tight security yesterday morning.

Quinn was due to spend his first night last night at Alhaurin de la Torre prison as the investigation into last September's murder of Gary Hutch continues.

The maximum security jail is also where Quinn's associates Christy Kinahan and his two sons Daniel and Christopher were remanded in custody after their arrests in May 2010, following a major police investigation into drugs trafficking and money laundering.

Suspects under Spanish law can be held for a maximum of four years without charge - although a new application to continue holding them in custody has to be sought by officials after two years.

It is not yet known if Quinn's lawyer made a request for bail for his client at the hearing or whether Quinn agreed to answer questions about the Hutch murder.

The killing of Kavanagh was part of an implosion within the Kinahan cartel which also led to the brutal gun slaying of his brother Paul in Drumcondra six months later.

Two masked gunmen burst into Harmon's Irish Bar and the assassins opened fire on Kavanagh with a machine pistol while he tried to flee, at 4pm on September 6, 2014.

When he fell to the floor, one of the two assassins stood over Kavanagh and fired a last shot to his temple as he lay dead.

Senior sources say that Quinn is considered a "trusted enforcer" for the Kinahan cartel.
RTE First Dates Ireland star Daphney Sanasie has been charged with harassing celebrity chef Dylan McGrath

THE trial of an RTE First Dates star accused of harassing Dylan McGrath has been delayed after a court heard the celebrity chef is bed-ridden from back pain.

Daphney Sanasie (26), a South African model is pleading not guilty to harassment and the hearing was due to go to ahead at Dublin District Court later this month.

However, when the case came before Judge Cormac Dunne today for mention, a State solicitor said Mr McGrath was to ill to attend the trial.

Judge Dunne postponed it and asked gardai to keep in touch with the chef in relation to his medical condition.

Ms Sanasie, with an address at Jamestown Road in Dublin 8 is charged with harassment of Dylan McGrath (39) at various locations in the State from Sept. 9 until Nov. 21 last.

The injured party recently had serious surgery on his back and is currently under medical consideration, the State solicitor said. He is not in any fit way to come to court. It is not definitive at this point when he will be able to come to trial.

Defence barrister Rachel McGovern said she was opposing the prosecutions application for an adjournment.

She said Ms Sanasie was finished her studies in Ireland and wished to return to Cape Town. She was anxious that the case is heard.

Ms McGovern said a medical report before the court was open-ended and there was no indication of when Mr McGrath would be available.

Judge Dunne said justice was a two way street and if the accused was indisposed the court would be asked to accommodate her.

Theres no deliberate interference with justice here, there is an ill witness, Judge Dunne said.

He said the medical report stated the witness mobility was impeded and there was nothing unclear about that.

Garda Colm Kelly of the Bridewell Station said Mr McGrath was in a bad way.

Mostly, hes bed-ridden, he said, explaining this was due to the pain he suffered when he was mobile.

The court heard there would be 12 witnesses in the case. Garda Kelly said this could be streamlined if the detention of the accused was not being contested.

The accused is also entitled to as early a trial as possible, Judge Dunne said.

He adjourned the case to October 28, for mention and asked Garda Kelly to ask Mr McGrath how he was progressing.

Ms McGovern made a request to have the two phones involved in the case independently forensically analysed.

The prosecution had had the opportunity to have both phones examined and the defence wanted the same opportunity, she said.

Garda Kelly said everything relevant to the case had been disclosed to the defence. Ms McGovern said hard copies had been received but content was disputed and she wanted to have the phones expertly examined.

Judge Dunne deferred a decision on this application, saying it might be premature.

Ms Sinasie, wearing a red dress, black ribboned hat and black shoes, did not address the court.

She first appeared in court on April 15 last. At a previous hearing the court was told that the DPP has directed summary disposal of the case meaning it is to stay in the district court and not go forward to the circuit court which has tougher sentencing powers.

The offence, at district court level, can result in a fine and a maximum 12 month sentence.

The accused was known as Federica Sanasie when she appeared on RTE matchmaking TV series First Dates earlier this year.

Mr McGrath  one of Ireland's best known chefs  was a proprietor of Mint restaurant in Ranelagh which was awarded a Michelin Star before he opened the Rustic Stone by Dylan McGrath on South Great George's Street.

He was also a judge on the Irish version of hit show Masterchef.
Trinh Xuan Thanh, the former chairman of PetroVietnam Construction JSC, in a file photo. The Ministry of Public Security has issued an international wanted notice for him.

The police are tracking down a former PetroVietnam official.

Vietnamese police are tracking down a former executive charged with financial malfeasance at a unit of the state-run oil and gas giant PetroVietnam following the arrest of four other senior executives.

The Ministry of Public Security said in a statement late Friday that they have issued an international wanted notice for Trinh Xuan Thanh, the former board chairman of PetroVietnam Construction JSC (PVC), after charging him with letting the company incur losses of around VND3.2 trillion ($147 million) under his watch between 2011 and 2013.

On Friday, the police arrested Vu Duc Thuan, PVCs former general director, his two deputies and chief accountant. All these officials are being probed for "violating economic management regulations causing serious consequences, according to the Ministry of Public Security.

Thanh sought overseas sick leave in mid-August and has never returned since, the police said. He was expelled from the Communist Party last week, a move that would pave the way for him to face any criminal charges.

PVC piled up huge losses of VND3.2 trillion, or more than $147 million, between 2011 and 2013, when Thanh, 50, was its chairman.

Government inspectors found that Thanh and his team starting in 2009 had launched many offshoot companies and partnered with many companies, but few of the ventures proved effective. Most of their business projects during the period ended up being delayed or even canceled.

PVC was assigned as the main contractor for major PetroVietnam projects, but then either assigned the contracts to member units or transferred them to private companies. This showed "a lack of responsibility and loose management," according to the inspectors.

Despite his track record, Thanh continued to be kicked upstairs, holding various government positions before taking his latest post as vice mayor of the Mekong Delta province of Hau Giang.

He caught media attention in June for driving a $230,000 Lexus with a government license plate. The matter caused public uproar over the waste of public money, prompting Communist Party chief Nguyen Phu Trong to order a probe into his promotion process.

I think the real question is why he kept on getting promoted when there were all sorts of red flags, including large losses under his watch, said Zachary Abuza, a Washington-based Southeast Asia analyst.

Last year, the then PetroVietnam chairman, Nguyen Xuan Son, was also arrested for abuse of power and violating economic management regulations.

Vietnams top echelons have exhibited determination to rein in the corruption-prone, bloated state sector in the wake of the collapse of state shipping giant Vinashin in 2008. But little headway has been made.

In 2014, Transparency Internationals Corruption Perceptions Index, an international standard gauge of government malfeasance, ranked Vietnam 119 out of 175 countries and territories; the country was ranked 116 in 2013 and 123 a year earlier. Its position has barely budged, moving to just 112 in 2015.

It is in this context that the latest crackdown probably speaks of just how glaringly bad the situation was, Abuza said.

Illustrated by VnExpress/Tien Thanh

Related news:

> Former execs arrested for $150 million losses at PetroVietnam unit

> Vietnams lawmaker-elect dismissed for economic mismanagement, lavish lifestyle

> How the internationally wanted Trinh Xuan Thanh rose to power
A senior pharmacist in the Lloyds chain - which was forced to pay a 12m settlement to the HSE over incorrectly claimed fees - is also a council member of the State watchdog overseeing standards in the pharmacy industry.

Joanne Kissane is the superintendent pharmacist at Lloyds, which was forced to pay 12m following a probe into the way it operated the 'My Med' payment scheme for elderly customers.

The pharmacy chain boosted its dispensing fee income by claiming multiple payments from the State for single prescriptions presented by medical card holders. A spokeswoman for Lloyds yesterday confirmed that Ms Kissane is also on the council for the Pharmaceutical Society of Ireland, which is the regulator responsible for overseeing standards and protecting the public.

The 21-member council, which is appointed by the Minister for Health, is its powerful decision-making arm.

The spokeswoman said Ms Kissane had indicated that if the regulator examined the allegations against Lloyds she would "absent herself" and avoid any conflict of interest or "inference of same".

A spokesman for the Pharmaceutical Society of Ireland told the Irish Independent that it is aware of the settlement payment of 12m and it is "considering whether any regulatory issues arise". He said the regulator has extensive powers of investigation under the Pharmacy Act 2007 and can also consider complaints made about pharmacists and pharmacies under the statutory disciplinary process, outlined in the act. "As it is a statutory complaints process we cannot comment on any matter regarding complaints."

The HSE has refused to give further details of how the settlement was made and said it is also investigating four more pharmacies for similar allegations.

Lloyds has also refused to say if anyone had been disciplined or what changes it made to schemes involving public money. Lloyds pharmacy confirmed it increased its income from dispensing fees by 66pc per patient using the My Med scheme. Under the scheme, pharmacies can dispense drugs in four compartmentalised trays, one for each seven-day period.

The pharmacy is paid a fee of around 5 by the HSE and another 3.27 for each weekly tray for the rest of the month's supply. A medical card patient on five medication scripts would generate dispensing fees of 74.05 per month for the pharmacist in this scheme, compared with 25 if the medications were given as part of a normal month's supply .

The HSE claimed Lloyds breached its contract by giving patients four trays in one visit instead of on a phased basis over a month. An internal newsletter found Lloyds had set targets for its stores and highlighted how staff visited local day-care centres to sign up patients.
The boom may not be back just yet but some could be forgiven for thinking it was 2006 rather than 2016

Musgrave Retail Partners Ireland have revealed that they have been forced to hold a recruitment day in Poland as they are struggling to fill posts at their warehouse in Kilcock, Co Kildare.

The major chain, which incorporates SuperValu and Centra, revealed that they hosted two recruitment days in Poznan "for warehouse opportunities" in the store on Wednesday and Thursday.

They have appealed to staff in the store who have family members or friends in Poland to contact their HR Generalist.

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A statement, released to Independent.ie, by Musgrave confirmed that they are struggling to fill the posts.

"We have a number of open positions in our warehouse facilities in Kilcock and these opportunities are being advertised in Ireland.

"We have been unable to fill all of the positions to date, so we have also arranged open days in Poland as the rate of applicants based in Ireland is low."

it continued: "We are an equal opportunities employer and nationality is not a factor in determining salary levels. We operate the same pay rates for all colleagues, regardless of where they are from or what country they are recruited from."

One reader contacted Independent.ie on Facebook to query the move.

He wrote: "Why are they only looking for Polish workers and not list it in Ireland for all to see?"
A hardline Republican water protester was arrested at a hospital by heavily-armed detectives investigating the activities of the IRA.

Donall OCeallaigh (32) was one of three men who were arrested at St James Hospital in a planned surveillance operation on Tuesday by members of the Special Detective Unit (SDU).

Sources have revealed that armed gardai seized a grey powder substance and a number of mobile phones in the planned operation and the three men were arrested.

It had still not been determined last night what the suspicious powder is. The men were being questioned last night at different Dublin garda stations about membership of an illegal organisation.

CUSTODY

The other two arrested men are from the capitals south inner city and Ballinteer on Dublins southside.

Gardai confirmed that three men aged in their 60s, mid-40s and early 30s were in custody at Irishtown and Kevin Street Garda stations.

Donal OCellaigh is considered a major pest by gardai and who have been investigating if he has links to the Continuity IRA.

With an address at Emmet Road, Inchicore, he was previously fined after throwing an egg at former Tanaiste Eamon Gilmores car.

Then Tanaiste Eamon Gilmore was attending an event to promote the childrens rights referendum when his car was attacked by protesters on October 5, 2012, in Ballyfermot.

During the proceedings for that incident, his solicitor asked the judge to change the name of the accused on the charge sheets to its Irish version, Donall OCeallaigh, to which the judge replied an mhaith.

No damage was caused to the car and OCeallaigh was fined 250 in the District Court.

On his social media account, OCeallaigh has a number of posts relating to Republican campaigns and events.

In one image posted earlier this year he posed beside the headstone of a former IRA chief of staff while wearing a green military uniform.

The grave belongs to Sean OBradaigh, who was also a former Sinn Fein TD as well a president of Republican Sinn Fein.

Another image he shared shows support for Continuity IRA prisoners who are currently imprisoned in Maghaberry Prison in Northern Ireland.

In posts last year when he

attended a number of water meter installation protests OCeallaigh shared pictures of his charge sheets that he received for public order related offences.
The Government has committed to trebling funding for mental health and primary care services for homeless people to 6m in an effort to tackle the mounting homelessness crisis. Stock photo. Credit: Jonathan Brady/PA Wire

Families living in homeless accommodation will have access to more educational supports and free public transport passes under a new policy to be launched next week.

The Government has also committed to trebling funding for mental health and primary care services for homeless people to 6m in an effort to tackle the mounting homelessness crisis.

The policy will be launched by Taoiseach Enda Kenny, Children's Minister Katherine Zappone, Health Minister Simon Harris and Housing Minister Simon Coveney next week.

It will set out a range of measures including providing nutrition plans for families, alternative spaces where children can complete their homework and a family can cook a meal together, and family days out.

Some 300 homes for the long-term homeless, up from 100 this year, will also be provided.

"Homelessness requires a very strong housing and health response," a source said.

"We're very focused on getting families out of hotels and into a much more normal situation, but we cannot forget the more traditional homeless people.

"That will require a very significant investment."

The policy will be launched next Thursday.
Taoiseach Enda Kenny was shameless in delivering a pledge to his audience.

He made the promise after consulting with embattled Junior Minister John Halligan and Education Minister Richard Bruton.

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It wasn't a second cardiac lab for Waterford Hospital. Instead, Mr Kenny told the children of St Brigid's Primary School in Dublin that they would get "no obair bhaile" yesterday evening.

It was a popular measure, resulting in a round of applause at the launch of the Action Plan for Education.

Mr Kenny was joined by Independent Alliance minister Mr Halligan at a public event for the first time since the row over Waterford Hospital broke out.

Mr Halligan has considered quitting Government amid the war over what he was or wasn't promised in relation to a second catheterisation lab for his local hospital.

But you'd never know it from the bonhomie on display during the school visit. Mr Kenny - with his newly rediscovered mojo - was singing 'Oro Se Do Bheath Abhaile' as he entered the hall where the launch was taking place - having just heard a stirring rendition by the school choir.

He sat down, with Mr Bruton taking a chair beside him, only for Mr Kenny to insist "John, sit in the middle here" with a comradely slap on the back as Mr Halligan sat down. The pair bonded on a galactic level in their speeches. Mr Kenny told the children they may end up driving the space stations of the future.

Mr Halligan said his speech "will be like a comet - brilliant, bright and passing very quickly". He said that's because he'd been "doing a lot of speaking in the last week", though he didn't reference the infamous interview where he said he'd "bring all hell down" on the Government if they didn't deliver the lab.

And perhaps he does think he's talked about it enough. Mr Halligan has pulled out of a planned 'Late Late Show' appearance tonight. Given he was appearing on stage with Mr Kenny, is the row all settled? Mr Halligan said he was continuing to do his job as minister for training and skills. "We have had some disagreements within Government which is not unusual and we are endeavouring to work these disagreements through over the next week or two."

"I'm sure it'll come to an agreeable solution," he added. After the last 10 days, others wouldn't be so sure.

Mr Bruton, meanwhile, quipped that Mr Kenny "never lets me off my obair bhaile".
September 16, 2016 | 12:01 am PT

Ninh Binh Fertilizer Plant in northern Vietnam has stayed idle for months this year. Photo by Vietnam Plus

Drought and a falling fertilizer market have landed the company in hot water.

The state-owned Vietnam National Chemical Group (Vinachem) has asked the government to freeze more than US$300 million of debts at two loss-making fertilizer plants.

Vinachem said its fertilizer sales have been going down, both in local and overseas markets, and thus asked for a series of privileges at its two fertilizer plants in Ninh Binh and Ha Bac, near Hanoi.

The company said months of severe drought have killed 100,000 hectares (247,000 acres) of rice fields in the Mekong Delta, adversely affecting its fertilizer business.

It asked for a VND2.7 trillion ($121 million) loan the Ninh Binh plant took out from the Vietnam Development Bank to be treated as state investment or be frozen for the next five years.

Operations at the plant have been idle for more than half of this year, while its losses by the end of June had reached VND2.7 trillion, well beyond its registered capital of VND2.5 trillion.

Vinachem also asked the government to freeze another Vietnam Development Bank loan of nearly VND4 trillion ($178 million) for a project to renovate the Ha Bac plant, which lost VND675 billion ($30.3 million) last year, and is projecting further losses of VND488 billion ($22 million) this year.

The company has asked the Prime Minister to instruct major banks like BIDV, Vietcombank and Vietinbank to continue lending money to the plants to keep them in operation.

Related news

>PM calls for faster privatization of state-owned firms

>Mega bargain: Vietnam SOE sells unused dock 13 times less than buying price
Three noggins, three mugs, a bowl and two jugs,A crock and a pan something lesser, A red fourpenny glass, to draw at for mass, Nailed up to a clean little dresser.

These treasures were listed among the prized possessions of Thady O'Brady, subject of an anonymous poem written around 1800. In average Irish country homes, the kitchen dresser took pride of place.

There are many different kinds of dressers, but most were simply made from pine planks by local carpenters and painted in the same livery as the rest of the kitchen furniture.

Claudia Kinmonth, a historian who specialises in Irish country furniture, is one of the speakers at the Irish Antique Dealers Fair, which runs at the RDS from September 23 to 25. "A good dresser should be, and probably was, painted," she says. "People couldn't afford new furniture so they used to upgrade it with paint."

Some were painted dark red to look like the mahogany furniture in the 'Big House'. Others were green and cream or pale blue and pink. "The only colour I hardly ever see is purple."

Although many dressers lost their paint to the 1970s trend for stripped pine, they are more valuable and more interesting with their original layers of paint intact.

An Irish country dresser dating from the 18th or 19th century can be a valuable piece of furniture. Fireside Antiques in America currently has an "Irish 19th century painted pine farmhouse dresser" on sale for $3,995 (3,580), reduced from $4,995 (4,476). Kinmonth agrees that it could be an authentic Irish piece, but that its real date is probably closer to 1900 than the listed 1850. "Dating country furniture is an uncertain art and dealers tend to err on the side of age." There's no record of what the dresser's original owner received for the piece. In Ireland, a 19th century dresser could fetch up to 600 to 800 at auction, although many sell for as little as 200.

If a dresser has wide backing boards, about 1ft wide, it may well be an old one. Other obvious signs of age include sledge feet, attached to the base of the dresser like the runs of a sleigh. These both spread the load of the dresser across an uneven kitchen floor and elevated it from the damp.

The inexpensive deal of which dressers were made was vulnerable to decay and the sledge feet could be replaced by a carpenter as required.

In general, the upper section of an Irish dresser was divided into shelves for display of both practical and precious items. Plates and platters were stacked vertically, leaning forward on the rail so they didn't gather dust; bowls were stored upside down; mugs and jugs hung from hooks. Until the 19th century, when mass produced ceramics became widely available, most Irish tableware was made of wood or pewter.

Crockery was known as 'delph' and considered so precious that an English traveller of the 1770s observed that broken cups were kept for display on Irish dressers, with the flaw turned inwards. English farming families were a bit more extravagant and threw out their broken crockery.

"Sometimes the display on farmhouse dressers doesn't change much over the generations," says Kinmonth, who has just visited an Irish farmhouse where the pewter plates have sat undisturbed since the 18th century. She has also discovered that some dressers have small holes in the shelf from which spoons dangled.

The lower half of the dresser was used for storage or, in one of the most interesting variations, a hen-coop. The hens would run around the farmyard during the day and be ushered into the kitchen at night to roost in the dresser.

A few years ago, a 19th century Irish chicken coop dresser sold for 3,200 at Cloverhill Antiques, in Cavan. "It came from the Donegal/Leitrim border," says auctioneer Victor Mee.

Claudia Kinmonth is one of the speakers at the Irish Antique Dealers Fair, which runs at the RDS from September 23 to 25 (iada.ie). She is a Visiting Research Fellow at NUI Galway and the author of Irish Country Furniture 1700-1950 (1993) and Irish Rural Interiors In Art (2006). Cloverhill Antiques are consigning for their annual period pine sale in mid-October, see cloverhillauctioneers.com.

In the salerooms

DE VERE'S

If you have an Irish painting or sculpture and are wondering if it's worth anything, there's an opportunity to run it by an expert at De Vere's valuation day, which takes place at The Ballymaloe Grainstore on Thursday, September 22 (2pm to 6pm).

There's no charge and no obligation to sell. The valuation will be followed by a talk given by John de Vere White on the best strategy for putting together a collection, including artists to follow and various pitfalls to avoid. This takes place at 7pm. The talk is free, but you have to book.

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The event will also include a preview of some of the works coming up for auction at De Vere's Irish Art Sale in Dublin, scheduled for November 22. Highlights of the sale include 'Gold Painting' by Patrick Scott (25,000 to 35,000); 'Men Walking Dogs' by Sean Scully (200,000 to 300,000) and 'Girl Looking At An Andy Warhol' by Robert Ballagh (above), est 10,000 to 15,000. See deveres.ie.

IRISH ANTIQUE DEALERS FAIR

The 51st Irish Antique Dealers Fair takes place at the RDS from September 23 to 25, with an expected audience of more than 15,000 people and a full lecture programme.

At noon on Friday, September 23, Julian Radcliffe of the Art Loss Register will outline the drama of recovering stolen art and antiques. On Sunday, also at noon, Dr Tom Sinsteden of the Dublin Assay Office will give a talk entitled 'Fakes and Forgeries of Irish Silver'.

At 4pm, Cathryn Day Carrigan will instruct the audience on 'Gilding And Establishing Authenticity Of Original Frames'. The show's star turn, the American interior designer Carleton Varney, will speak on Saturday at 2pm on 'Decoration Around Your Personality: From Dromoland Castle (1962 to the present)'. Admission to the fair, which includes the lecture programme, is 10 at the door. See iada.ie.

HERMAN & WILKINSON

The first evening auction at Herman & Wilkinson, 161 Lower Rathmines Road, Dublin 6, takes place on Monday, September 19 at 6.30pm. This may be a handy one for those whose work commitments don't allow them to attend auctions during the day.

"Dublin had a huge tradition of evening auctions organised by well-established auctioneers like Morgan Scales in Rathmines, Gartlan's on the Quays, Mulvaney & Very in North Street, Sherry's in Baggot St and Ballycorus in Dundrum," says David Herman, auctioneer. "They left a huge vacuum in the market after they ceased in the late 1960s and early 1970s. We hope to recreate that tradition."

See hermanwilkinson.ie.

O'REILLY'S

The next auction of Fine Jewellery, Watches & Silver at O'Reilly's will take place on September 21 at 1pm. Those that love emeralds will find much to interest them in this sale.

Pricier pieces include a Victorian emerald and diamond cluster pendant, with a single cushion shape Columbian emerald at centre surrounded by eight old cut diamonds (14,000 to 16,000) and an emerald and diamond cluster ring (12,000 to 16,000).

Smaller and quirkier pieces include some pretty examples of Victorian butterfly jewellery: a late Victorian gold, emerald, ruby, pearl and diamond butterfly scarf slide (400 to 500) and a diamond, ruby and emerald butterfly pin (100 to 150).

See oreillysfineart.com.
How many of us would want to be brought into the world using a technique that meant we never had a genetic mother because she never even existed?

Some children are deprived of a mother through death. Others are deprived of a mother because the mother has walked out. We always consider that the child in this situation has suffered a tragic loss. But what of the child who has never had a mother? That is to say, the mother has never even existed?

If this sounds like something out of a science fiction film, that might soon be about to change. Research published in the journal 'Nature Communications' reports that three generations of mice have been created without the necessity of using a female egg.

Instead, the skin cells of mice have been 'tricked' into becoming de facto eggs that have then been fertilised using sperm.

The cell might come from a male mouse and the sperm from that same mouse, meaning this mouse is both the 'mother' and the father of its offspring. The infant mouse would still have to be gestated in the womb of a female mouse - a surrogate mother - but that female would 'merely' be the birth mother of the infant mouse, not the biological/genetic mother.

The scientists behind this research believe that soon they may be able to do the same thing with humans. A surrogate mother would still be needed to carry the child, but no egg need be involved. A single man, for example, could use his own sperm to fertilise an 'egg' created from a cell taken from his skin.

If this raises no ethical concerns among us, then something has gone very badly wrong. About the only defensible use I can think of for this technique is when a woman cannot produce eggs of her own and a cell from her body is 'tricked' into becoming a de facto egg. In this case, the child would have a biological mother.

This aside, it is impossible to justify any other use for this promised breakthrough. Producing motherless children is unconscionable. How many of us would like to be brought into being in such a way, to never have had a mother, to never be able to see so much as a picture of your mother because your biological 'mother' and your biological father were one and the same person?

And even if the sperm of one man was combined with the 'egg' of another man, the child would still have no biological mother. His biological parents would be two men.

We are rightly concerned when adopted children go looking for their natural parents (it is usually the mother they seek out) and can't find them. How much worse would it be if they had to be told that the nearest thing they ever had to a mother was the surrogate who carried them for nine months and who they have no contact with anyway?

In time, scientists may even develop artificial wombs so that no woman at all need be involved in the making of a baby. They are also likely in the future to be able to 'trick' female cells into becoming 'sperm' and so a man need in no way, shape or form be involved in the making of a baby either. There has already been talk of this. The baby would be fatherless in the most radical way possible.

So what we are rapidly moving towards is essentially the dehumanisation of the process of making babies, or at a minimum the 'de-sexing' of it in the sense that sex need not be involved (that is obviously already the case because of the likes of IVF), and in the sense that both sexes will not be required.

For the first time in human history, in other words, the male and the female of the species will not be required to produce a child even though this is the one and only reason why our species consists of male and female. It would be a rejection of something incredibly fundamental about ourselves and the way we perpetuate ourselves.

The children brought into being using this promised technique will obviously have no say in the matter and if, as they grow up, they object to how they were conceived they will be told to be quiet on the grounds that they would not even exist if this technique had not been used.

This is already what children brought into being using purchased sperm or purchased eggs or rented wombs are being told, so why would that change?

I can imagine that the debate over this promised new way of bringing children into the world will somehow be dragged into the 'religion versus science' debate. That would completely short-circuit it and bring an end to all rational discussion. If the objection to this technique is seen to be mainly religious, then all further objections will melt away on the grounds that religion cannot be allowed to 'impede' science.

But actually this is really a dispute between science and ethics. Just because science can do it, doesn't mean it should do it. Science must be bounded by human rights.

If we cannot agree that a child has a human right to have a mother and should never be deliberately deprived of a mother to the point where a biological mother to the child never even existed, then 'human rights' have taken a very wrong turn.

Unfortunately, this issue could well be dragged into the 'science versus religion' debate and then 'science' will win. We will permit babies to be brought into being in this way in the name of 'progress' and 'choice'.

But there is nothing 'progressive' about bringing into being motherless children. If the will is there, we can stop it and it is something everyone who is concerned about true human rights, whether they are religious or not, should be able to agree about.
One of the most frustrating things about being a 'Northerner' living in the Republic (as I have for 20 years) is the indifference of our brethren south of the Border to those in the 'beleaguered six'.

Despite the feel-good factor about the Good Friday Agreement and the Peace Process (a late add-on in the recent Brexit debate), at times it feels like the North is another country.

The long-standing indifference, occasionally bordering on contempt towards the North, is the reason why I doubt the Republic would vote for a United Ireland if the opportunity arose anytime soon. And it helps explain the initial lethargic 'whatevs' response in the 26 counties to the staggering controversy surrounding Nama and the 1.6bn sale of Project Eagle.

The 'up there' mentality helped shield Nama in the early stages of the controversy which, in contrast, sent political shockwaves throughout Northern Ireland.

First it was alleged that Frank Cushnahan, a member of Nama's Northern Ireland Advisory Committee (Niac), stood to earn stg5m had one bidder, global investment firm Pimco, been successful in its bid for the Project Eagle portfolio.

The bid was ultimately won by mega US investment firm Cerberus in April 2014. Then it emerged in the wake of that deal that Cerberus indirectly paid a fee of stg7.5m to Tughans, a Belfast law firm where businessman and solicitor Ian Coulter had served as managing partner.

A large portion of that money was then moved to an Isle of Man bank account under the control of Coulter, who last November was questioned under caution by the UK's National Crime Agency.

The account was allegedly intended to facilitate payments to non-lawyers or deal fixers.

When these sensational claims were unleashed, Nama shrugged its shoulders, distancing itself from Cushnahan and stating that members of the Niac had no role in relation to Nama debtors or the assets securing their loans.

The Niac had "no decision-making powers", and trumped Nama in the manner of a recalcitrant child who has been told off at school.

The toxic loans agency (hasn't that Nama moniker taken on a fresh meaning in the wake of the C&AG report?) dismissed the controversy surrounding Cushnahan, comforting itself that any potential skulduggery was done on the "buy side".

It didn't even contact its former Northern star after Pimco revealed to the agency that it had agreed to stump up a stg5m success fee.

Just think about that. And weep.

Then came last week's staggering BBC 'Spotlight' programme, which aired a recording of Cushnahan accepting a stg40,000 payment from a Northern Ireland developer.

The recording was reportedly made in 2012 when Cushnahan was still a member of the Niac.

Nama belatedly filed a complaint to the gardai last Friday in the wake of the programme. But it wasn't until the publication two days ago of the C&AG report that Nama finally started to accept the scale of the problem posed to the integrity of its overall sales process courtesy of its Northern adventures.

Even then, Nama chairman Frank Daly took to the airwaves to dismiss the Niac as "a talking shop".

But Nama owns the shop and what happens on or off its premises matters.

The creation of the Niac was itself a political sop, a compromise in lieu of a permanent Northern Ireland board member - even though Ronnie Hanna, Nama's former head of assets recovery, is from Northern Ireland.

It was the late Finance Minister Brian Lenihan who agreed to appoint Cushnahan to Nama on foot of a recommendation from Democratic Unionist MP Sammy Wilson, his former counterpart in the North.

David Sterling, the North's Department of Finance and Personnel permanent secretary, told an inquiry in Stormont that the decision about who sat on the Niac committee was a matter for Mr Lenihan.

So too is the conduct of the Niac the responsibility of Nama.

Not for the first time, we have ignored the North at our peril.

The Government will seek to hermetically seal the North in the terms of reference for its forthcoming inquiry.

History tells us that would be a fatal mistake.
As the contents of the Comptroller and Auditor General's report into the sale of Project Eagle were laid bare at Wednesday's Cabinet meeting, the eyes of several ministers glazed over.

As one Fine Gael figure present put it afterwards: "I felt a real sense of deja vu. It was like Irish Water all over again."

Indeed, the controversy that has engulfed Nama and the sale of its Northern Ireland loan book shares at least some of the hallmarks of the Irish Water debacle.

Once again we have an agency of the State that is facing accusations of not acting in the best interests of the taxpayer.

Similar to the Irish Water controversy, the more populist members of the Oireachtas are demanding that the operations of Nama be brought to a halt.

And, as was the case two-and-a-half years ago, the Government of the day is under serious pressure to get to grips with the latest scandal that has crossed its desk.

But above all, we now have a situation once again where a body set up to serve the best interests of the taxpayer is fast losing public confidence.

In fact, some ministers believe a large chunk of the public has never had confidence in Nama because it has, since its formation in 2009, operated under a cloud of unrivalled secrecy.

Telling an impatient and untrusting public that a body that handles billions of euro worth of property transactions must be able to operate in secret won't wash in modern-day Ireland.

This is a public that just last month - whether rightly or wrongly - was told the State coffers have lost out on 13bn as a result of an alleged sweetheart deal extended to Apple.

Now, according to C&AG Seamus McCarthy, Nama has signed off on a bad deal in relation to its sale of Project Eagle to US investment firm Cerberus, leaving the State nursing a loss of 220m.

The public has every right to feel aggrieved.

After all, they have been presented with details of success fees involving a former insider Frank Cushnahan, as well as allegations of a far more sinister nature courtesy of Mick Wallace and BBC's 'Spotlight' programme.

And so, perhaps like Irish Water, there is now serious doubt surrounding the prospect of Nama ever winning over the public's trust.

That is not just one of the major challenges facing Nama boss Frank Daly and his senior officials, but also Enda Kenny and Michael Noonan.

Mr Kenny and his party were not responsible for setting up the country's bad bank but, like a lot of things, they have inherited it from their predecessors in government.

Without doubt, Mr Kenny and Noonan don't want a scenario whereby the Nama issue becomes synonymous with this administration.

And so, the decision by the Government yesterday to agree a statutory inquiry - in conjunction with the leaders of the Opposition - should be welcomed.

With law-enforcement agencies investigating in a number of different jurisdictions, the approach from Dublin is that an inquiry must not be rushed.

Every effort must now be made to ensure this latest probe can achieve the one single objective demanded by the public - unearthing the truth behind Project Eagle.
Attempting to interpret the unintelligible is as pointless as trying to understand the combined tactics of Dublin Bus, the Minister for Transport, and the drivers.

The only significant movement in the dispute yesterday was in its escalation; no doubt the capital's 400,000 commuters were also moved somewhat on learning they face 13 more days of chaos.

All concerned know that they are inflicting pain on each other and causing misery to hundreds of thousands of people, apart from the 4m cost of the strike to date.

You won't find reason in a war which is joined purely because belligerents won't speak to each other, and all sides seem to have chosen quicksand as the ideal location to hold their stand. Siptu's Owen Reidy argued that: "Despite the fact we are currently in the third day of strike action resulting from this dispute, it would seem that the management of Dublin Bus and the Department of Transport have little interest in resolving the outstanding issues." Mr Reidy fails to acknowledge that for the public the "outstanding issue" is the removal of buses from the capital's streets. Every day of strike reduces the company's ability to pay even the 8.25pc already rejected by workers.

As for Minister Ross? He greatly regrets the inconvenience to passengers but nonetheless sees fit to reiterate that any action by him would be seen as an agreement to open up the State cheque book.

This is the only intervention the minister seems capable of imagining. For the record, there are others, Mr Ross. How about offering alternatives, like the Army to alleviate the distress, contain the costs, get people to and from work, and remind all concerned that the public is not to be held to ransom.

Or are we wrong to believe that a core function of his office is to see that the public can get from A to B on vehicles they paid for as taxpayers? And having also paid the bus drivers; that same public also harbours a flickering hope that the said minister might stir himself to ensure they be conveyed to where they hope to get. Or is he of the opinion that to travel hopefully is better than to arrive?

Welcome relief for parents on costs of going to school

Richard Bruton's pragmatic and progressive policy platform in the Department of Education continues to develop.

The tried and trusted formula for reform that the minister initiated in the Department of Enterprise is now being transferred to Marlborough Street with the Action Plan for Education.

Mr Bruton wants our education system to be the best in Europe in 10 years' time. Aspirational, to say the least, but the hundreds of incremental reforms he has outlined in the plan can only bring about improvements and will not do any harm. The lack of detail on additional funding, particularly at third-level, is certainly a deficit, though.

This list of items to be delivered upon will grow and evolve over the coming years. Cleverly, the plan says who is responsible for the individual action, so it will be evident where the buck stops if there is no movement.

Importantly, the outcomes will be measured every three months, so it will be possible for parents and interested parties to measure the progress being made and whether deadlines for delivery are being met.

One area close to the hearts of many parents will be the minister's desire to cut uniform and school book costs. He plans to use parent power to force schools to come in line and bring down prices. Welcome relief is on the way.
Recent events in Cork concerning the usage of the Irish language have set me thinking.

The issue was over the use of the nation's selected first language. The question is what is our first language and how is this defined? Does a government decree decide the primary perceived communication of the populous?

Looking without the use of green-tinted glasses, the primary tongue of our country is English. There is no Irish-speaking person in this land who does not speak English, and there are few who dream in Irish, one of the markers of the first embedded language.

When pressed or pressured on any technical issue or any issues which require abstract thought, English is the first selection of the majority of the nation.

Apart from creating a cottage industry for mna ti and for translators in the European Parliament who labour to produce endless documents in Irish which will never be read or understood by the majority populous, then the use of Irish is limited.

Consider also the Proclamation written to found the State, this was written in English so as to reach the largest, English-speaking audience.

The selection of Irish as the first language to me is not a reflection of the linguistic ability of the nation.

Ray Dunne

Enfield, Co Meath

Primary schools and religion

The "baptism barrier" and the virtual monopoly of primary school patronage by religious institutions have rightly received much coverage in the media, but these are only two of the three locks of the 'triple lock' that religious institutions have over our primary-school system.

The third lock is the 'integrated curriculum'. It is often said that Irish primary schools spend up to two hours on 'faith formation' each week, but because of the 'integrated curriculum', faith formation can and often does permeate the entire school day, in the guise of 'religious education'.

'Religious education' is, in the context of the Irish primary school system, an oxymoron. It is not provided in an objective, critical or pluralistic manner that avoids indoctrination. It crosses the line from objective information and places emphasis on the patron's religion.

The truth is that "religious education" (Irish-style) is itself a form of faith formation that can and often does permeate the entire school day. This doctrinal integrated curriculum renders an opt-out from faith formation virtually impossible.

It has been well-documented that the lack of objectivity and neutrality in the teaching of the integrated curriculum has resulted in the involuntary indoctrination of children in Irish publicly funded schools.

Because 96pc of primary schools are under the patronage of religious institutions, there is no alternative to the integrated curriculum model across much of the country.

This all leaves children and parents in a system where religiously dominated, publicly funded schools can discriminate against them in their admissions policies on religious grounds and then indoctrinate children against their parents' wishes when they are admitted.

Rob Sadlier

Rathfarnham, Dublin 16

Fine Gael? Never again . . .

I was stunned a few nights ago to see a tired and weary Michael Noonan say we voted for more public services so that is what we will get in the Budget.

Where has all the logic gone that lower taxes create more growth and hence more tax?

Very simply my situation is - I voted for Fine Gael in the last election and consequently for water charges. I get the Fianna Fail solution;

I voted for Fine Gael's policy of low taxes, and I get the Fianna Fail solution.

So why in the name of God should I vote for Fine Gael again?

John Murphy

Dublin 9

Time for six-month policies

With the large increases in car insurance, perhaps the time has now come to ask insurers to offer six-month policies, similar to the facility currently offered for motor tax?

This would allow motorists to manage the increases better and also take more than one opportunity per annum to check the market for a better quotation.

Owen Davin

Ferrybank, Waterford

Fit to run the country

If fears regarding a presidential candidate's health are to be taken into account, surely the state of a candidate's mental health should easily trump any nervousness about some physical imperfection.

Ray Cranley

Greystones, Co Wicklow

A land of myths and legends

We seem to be living in a world of fairytales in Ireland and the EC.

There is the myth of the free 13bn, which falls in the category of the crock of gold at the end of the rainbow.

It was made very clear that other EC countries and the USA would have claims against this sum and it is more likely that we would receive much closer to zero than 13bn, as the 'Big Three' in Europe have made clear that their interest in the smaller countries is waning.

Multinationals (Google, Starbucks, Apple, etc) and the billionaires, who comprise the 4pc with more wealth than the other 96pc living on this Earth, probably have caused much of the instability and poverty in this world and deserve no sympathy.

Aside from Brexit, there is the myth of the EC being our "friends". The EC contributed very much to driving Ireland's recession by making us bail out the banks and shareholders. They have told Ireland we need more cutbacks, must have water charges, and must not do deals with multinationals, etc - yet we are still supposed to get ourselves into credit! The 'Big Three' now claim they want a level economic playing field, therefore they have looked at Ireland, Belgium and the smaller countries who have been giving tax breaks. It is very 'noble' of them to want the multi-nationals to pay a fair tax but the level playing field that they seek will also guarantee that with their greater resources they will profit more than anyone else.

The last government believed their own publicity that they had steadied the ship and deservedly got their answer at the polls. We are yet again hearing the economy is growing, things are much better, but outside the metropolitan areas like Dublin, Galway, Cork, etc, is this really true? There is little evidence of it in many rural areas - is this just another myth?

I read in the 'Sunday Independent' an article on the over-50s being happier and better off, which is fine, but an "average" figure of 767 per week was given as their income. I would imagine that this would be a surprise to many people in that category who are fighting to survive the "average"daily grind.

Stan McCormack

Kilbeggan, Co Westmeath
More needs to be done in the Bridgetown area, according to Cllr Mick Roche

Councillor George Lawlor called for an increase in communication between the Gardai and local authorities in a bid to tackle anti-social behaviour.

'Gardai don't always look to local authorities as the body we should report to so the council may never hear about any issues,' he said. 'Given that we have the JPC and a good relationship with the Gardai, is it possible that where there are incidents of anti-social behaviour, they inform us about them?'

Chief Superintendent John Roche said that if there was a pattern in anti-social behaviour, it would be beneficial for them to inform the local authorities. However, he said that data protection rules may determine the amount of information that they can provide. He told Cllr Lawlor that he will look into the possibility.

Cllr Lawlor went on to say that he had been informed of three consecutive nights of anti-social behaviour in an area the previous week.

'It's in everyone's interest to put something in place,' he said.

Cllr Ger Carthy said that he attended the scene on Friday night after the ambulance was called to assist a man having a seizure. He said that when they arrived they found people 'killing each other' on the street.

Councillor Mick Roche also spoke about anti-social behaviour, saying that more needs to be done to prevent it in the Bridgetown area.

'There are no amenities in the area. There is no community centre,' he said. 'There is nothing for young people to do but congregate in corners.'
A ranger gestures before performing a post mortem on a rhino after it was killed for its horn by poachers in South Africa's Kruger National Park, August 27, 2014. Photo by Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko/File Photo

The ultimatum of sort comes ahead of a high-profile intn'l conservation conference.

Vietnam has to crank up its efforts to crack down on the illegal trade in rhino horn and failure to do so could see trade sanctions on the country, the World Wildlife Fund said in a statement Thursday.

Vietnams failure to shut down illegal markets, disrupt the trafficking networks and prosecute the traffickers will top the agenda of the 17th Conference of the Parties (CoP17) to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) , which will open next week in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Despite widespread evidence of rhino horn openly for sale in Vietnam, authorities have made no significant rhino horn seizures within their borders and have reported no successful prosecutions, the WWF said.

Vietnams poor law enforcement record speaks for itself: ending the illegal rhino horn trade and helping to save Africas rhinos is clearly not a priority for the government, said Ginette Hemley, WWF head of delegation to CITES.

With around three rhinos being poached each day, there is no time to lose. CITES must take a tough line with Vietnam: swiftly implement critical measures to tackle the illegal rhino horn trade or face trade sanctions.

According to the WWF statement, Vietnam must agree to enact new regulations to treat wildlife crime as a serious crime with a minimum sentence of four years in prison; legislate to treat fake rhino horn as real rhino horn for enforcement and prosecution purposes; and successfully target and prosecute illegal traders and traffickers.

Otherwise, CITES must call on countries to prohibit trade with Vietnam in all CITES-regulated wildlife, the statement said.

Statistics compiled by conservation groups show that South Africa has lost nearly 6,000 rhinos to poachers since 2007, including more than 700 so far this year.

International conservation groups have identified Vietnam and China as the world's two major consumers of rhino horns -- a charge the two countries have bristled at.

South Africa and Vietnam have signed a pact on biodiversity management to curb the rampant illegal trade in rhino horns.

Vietnams official stance on this issue is that the country has strictly prohibited the trade in wildlife species that is against Vietnamese laws and international conventions to which the country is a signatory.

What's more Vietnam has outlawed the commercial use of rhinoceros horn, which is composed largely of the protein keratin, the chief component in human hair and fingernails. The trade has been fueled by a misguided belief in its supposed medicinal properties, including its ability to cure cancer. Many also flaunt the horns as a status symbol.

The upcoming meeting in South Africa will be the largest CITES meeting ever with participation of 181 countries and a record number of items up for negotiation, including wildlife trade issues relating to elephants, sharks, pangolins and tigers. But given its location, rhino issues will be high on the agenda, according to the WWF.

Related news:

> Don't catch them all, warn Pangolin protectionists

> Endangered pangolins rescued as police bust smugglers in northern Vietnam
Vogue Williams hit back at body shamers who made "ridiculous" comments about her weight.

The former Fade Street star (31) was pictured in a black bikini on the beach in Ayia Napa on Wednesday and the pictures landed in most newspapers and websites.

Speaking to Ryan Tubridy on RTE Radio One today, the model said that she was told by trolls that she needed to "lose two stone" and they criticised her "cankles" and cellulite.

I just saw so many vile comments about my body and my weight... to the point that it went too far. People telling me I needed to lose two stone, that I was fat, that I have cellulite - which I do and I'm proud of, I'm a woman, we all have it - it just really bothered me. I couldn't believe it. I know you shouldn't read the comments but sometimes you can't help yourself.

"Certainly I'm not overweight. I'm the perfect weight for my height. I just think it sends out the wrong message to people."

"I want to promote a healthy lifestyle where I'm toned, I'm not too skinny, I'm the weight I want to be."

Vogue said that trolls called her "dumpy" and "fat" and slagged off her "cankles".

But the up-and-coming presenter took to Instagram yesterday and posted a photo of her laughing, aimed at those who commented on her weight.

I always knew filming a travel show was the dream job! Wearing @virginiamacari A photo posted by voguewilliams (@voguewilliams) on Sep 13, 2016 at 11:30pm PDT

"This one is for everyone who made ridiculous comments about my weight yesterday. Regardless of if I'm a size 6 or 26 it's nobody's business and nobody has the right to body shame me or anyone else," she wrote.

"I'm 5'11 a size 8/10, 64kgs and 17% body fat, that's my healthy weight and I'm not changing it for anyone. It's no wonder so many people suffer with body image issues.

Video of the Day

"Be careful with your words because next time you may get someone that is not as strong as me. Better still if you don't have anything nice to say don't say anything at all."

Vogue is currently filming RTE's travel show Getaways, with co-host Joe Lindsay, and will be traversing around Europe over the coming weeks.

Williams is famously fit and takes her exercise regime seriously, working out six times a week as she sees looking good as "part of her job".

"Most weeks, I train five or six times. I'll always fit it in, even if it means getting up crazy early. I do lots of free weights and high-intensity workouts," she said earlier this year.

"I do a lot of classes that incorporate the same types of training. You will never see me on the bike or treadmill for long periods of time; I just use them for one-minute sprints between sets.

Read More

"I stay focused on training because I see it as part of my job, and I hate the way I feel if I don't train too. But of course I have days where I don't feel like training and if I really don't want to, I'll just take the day off and train harder the next day."

While the tv star has been busy promoting her new show, she has remained tight-lipped on ex-husband Brian McFadden's reported new romance with British athlete Danielle Parkinson - a dead ringer for both her and his ex-fiancee Delta Goodrem.

McFadden said in July that he and his former wife of three years no longer speak, while she told Irish Tatler that they are still in contact, but it "isn't fair on anyone" to discuss the relationship in the press anymore.
A Brazilian actor has drowned in a river where he shot scenes for a soap opera, with h is body recovered hours after a companion was unable to pull him from the water.

Domingos Montagner went for a swim on Thursday afternoon in the Sao Francisco River in Caninde, a small town in the north-east state of Sergipe.

Actress Camila Pitanga, who was with him, told police that he was carried away by a strong current while she managed to swim to a rock and twice tried to grab Mr Montagner's hand.

Ms Pitanga got out, alerted authorities and a large search was begun. Mr Montagner's body was found several hours later, lodged between two rocks, according to rescue crews.

Jose Aparecido Cardoso, director of the state Legal Medical Institute, told G1 news portal the well-known actor's body was found 60 feet (18 metres) below the surface and 1,000 feet (320 metres) from where he was last seen. He confirmed that the actor had drowned.

The 54-year-old starred in the popular Velho Chico soap opera as a farmer who often had to fight off gunmen. Globo TV, which produces the series, said the crew had been shooting in the area.

The actors "thought the area they picked to swim was safe, but in fact it's one of the most dangerous places to bathe", Antonio Francisco Filho, a local government official, told G1. "This is a part of the river in Caninde that isn't common for bathers."

Mr Montagner had been a circus performer and acted in the theatre before getting into television in the last few years. Local media reported that he was married and had three children.

Globo TV showed scenes from a previous episode of Velho Chico, in which Mr Montagner is shot and left for dead in the Sao Francisco River. He is later rescued by Indians in the area.

AP
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaking at one of his hotels (AP)

Donald Trump has admitted that US president Barack Obama was born in the United States and claimed credit for putting the issue to rest.

After five years as the chief promoter of the false idea that the president was not born in the country, Mr Trump said: "President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period."

Mr Trump went on: "Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again."

But as he sought to put that to rest, he claimed the "birther movement" was started by rival Hillary Clinton. There is no evidence that is true.

"Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it," Mr Trump said. "I finished it, you know what I mean."

The Republican candidate spoke against a backdrop of veterans in a sprawling ballroom at his new Washington hotel.

His short statement came after a lengthy campaign event featuring military officers and award winners who have endorsed him.

Mr Trump did not address the issue until the end of the event, turning it into a de facto advert. The major cable TV networks aired it live in anticipation of his comments as it had been hyped hours before.

"I'm going to be making a major statement on this whole thing and what Hillary did," he told the Fox Business Network. "We have to keep the suspense going, OK?"

Mrs Clinton said Mr Trump owes Mr Obama and the American people an apology.

Speaking at an event with black women, she said that his campaign was "founded on this outrageous lie. There is no erasing it in history".

She said Mr Trump is "feeding into the worst impulses, the bigotry and bias that lurks in our country".

The birther idea, which he now denies, provided Mr Trump with his entry into Republican politics. For years he has defined his status as an "outsider" who is willing to challenge convention.

As late as Wednesday, he would not acknowledge that Mr Obama was born in Hawaii, declining to address the matter in a Washington Post interview.

"I'll answer that question at the right time," he said. "I just don't want to answer it yet."

Mrs Clinton seized on Trump's refusal during a speech on Thursday night before the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute.

"He was asked one more time where was President Obama born and he still wouldn't say Hawaii. He still wouldn't say America," she said. "This man wants to be our next president? When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?"

Hours later, campaign spokesman Jason Miller issued a statement that suggested the question had been settled five years ago - by Trump.

"In 2011, Mr Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate," Mr Miller said.

"Mr Trump did a great service to the president and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised," he added.

"Inarguably, Donald J Trump is a closer. Having successfully obtained President Obama's birth certificate when others could not, Mr Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States."

The facts of Mr Trump's actions do not match Mr Miller's description. He repeatedly questioned Mr Obama's birth in the years after he released his birth certificate.

In August 2012, for example, he was pushing the issue on Twitter. "An 'extremely credible source' has called my office and told me that @BarackObama's birth certificate is a fraud," he wrote.

Mr Trump's comments speculating on Mr Obama's birthplace have been seen by many as an attempt to delegitimise the nation's first black president.

They have turned off many of the African-American voters he is now courting in his bid for the White House.

Mr Obama attacked Mr Trump, saying: "We're not going to be able to solve our problems if we get distracted by sideshows and carnival barkers."

"I was pretty confident about where I was born. I think most people were as well," he said.

Mr Miller's claim that Mrs Clinton launched the birther movement during her unsuccessful primary run against Mr Obama in 2008 is unsubstantiated and long denied.

The theory was pushed by some bloggers who backed Mrs Clinton's primary campaign eight years ago, but Clinton has said Mr Trump "promoted the racist lie" that sought to "delegitimise America's first black president".

AP

On Twitter Mrs Clinton said the news conference about Mr Obama's citizenship was a "disgrace" and Mr Trump had expressed "zero regret" for years of "pushing a racist conspiracy theory".

Mrs Clinton said that when Mr Trump tries to "deflect blame" for denying that Mr Obama was born in the US, her Republican opponent "is lying".

And trying to say that Trump "did a great service" to Mr Obama "is asinine".

Mrs Clinton's campaign manager Robby Mook said that after five years of "pushing a racist conspiracy theory into the mainstream, it was appalling to watch Trump appoint himself the judge of whether the president of the United States is American".

He said the "sickening display" showed why "Trump is totally unfit be president".

AP

First Lady Michelle Obama said her husband has responded to those who question whether he was born in the US by "going high when they go low".

Mrs Obama was in northern Virginia, headlining her first campaign rally for Mrs Clinton.

She said there were those who continue to challenge her husband's citizenship "up to this very day". She did not mention Mr Trump by name.

AP
German chancellor Angela Merkel with other EU leaders during an EU summit at Bratislava Castle (AP)

European Union leaders have given themselves the winter to prepare a fundamental reset of the bloc after Britain's planned exit.

The leaders, 28 minus British Prime Minister Theresa May, committed to have a clear roadmap of the way ahead and some practical results when they meet in late March to mark the 60th anniversary of the EU founding Treaty of Rome in the Italian capital.

"Europe can, must move forward as long as it has clear priorities: protection, security, prosperity and the future of the youth," said French president Francois Hollande at a joint press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Mrs Merkel called the current situation in the EU "critical" and said the next months would be "decisive".

She mentioned the migration and economic problems that have left an increasing disenchantment with the EU across many of the member states. She also said there was a common willingness to bounce back beyond the many issues that divide and even anger individual EU nations.

EU Council President Donald Tusk said the current mood in the EU is "sober but not defeatist".

Summit co-host and Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico added that exchanges were frank at the summit.

"There are different views, different ideas," he said.

In a centuries-old castle in the middle of their fractious continent, the EU leaders anxiously sought to forge a sense of common purpose.

At the top of the agenda was how to heighten security and improve defence cooperation, secure external borders to deal with chaotic immigration and come through on measures to get the vast ranks of unemployed youth in Europe back to work.

In the joint Bratislava Roadmap, the 27 leaders said they were determined to never allow a return to the "uncontrolled flows of last year and further bring down" the number of migrants entering illegally.

They added they would "ensure full control of our external borders".

EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said a decision was taken to award 108 million euros (154 million) in emergency funding to Bulgaria for border management at one of the most porous borders with Turkey. Other EU nations committed extra equipment and personnel.

The refugee emergency has been specifically divisive. Countries in the east - Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and others - have openly opposed proposed solutions coming out of the EU headquarters in Brussels and even defied the wishes of their neighbours.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has been one of the most abrasive voices on the issue, saying there should be no more "lawmaking tricks" from EU institutions, which he said circumvent the sovereign decisions and will of the nation-states on the migration issue.

He said that while the EU leaders had voted for voluntary refugee resettlement quotas, the EU parliament and the EU Commission transformed them into mandatory quotas.

"I asked them not to do this anymore because the nation-states cannot accept it," he said.

Mrs Merkel said that "further efforts are needed to reach consensus on migration policy," but denied that contentious issues were left out of the discussion.

"We didn't specifically have a bilateral conversation with Victor Orban," she said.

Added urgency comes from the fact that countries like France and Germany hold elections next year where far-right and populist parties are seeking to exploit uncertainty generated by Britain's decision to become the first country to walk out of the EU.

Mr Hollande is under intense pressure to come upwith some success as he is trailing in the polls ahead of next May's French presidential elections. His far-right opponent from the National Front, Marine Le Pen, has already said she will call for an in-out referendum on EU membership if she wins.

The weeks preceding the Bratislava summit have seen an endless array of regional meetings of government leaders on how the EU should be run in the future. Divisions have emerged along geographical or ideological lines, or a mix of both.

While the EU seeks to create common cause, Europe's economy remains weak.

Though Greece may have secured its euro future last year after its third international bailout, it's still struggling to deliver on its promises to creditors. How to deal with the euro's problems remains divisive - on one-side pro-austerity countries led by Germany, on the other more socially-minded governments.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, whose country has been at the centre of the region's debt crisis and seen the arrival of hundreds of thousands of migrants over the last year, said things cannot continue as they are.

"What Europe should not do is to continue sleepwalking in the wrong direction," he said.

AP
Stuart Brownhill, a convicted murderer who has absconded from North Sea Camp prison in Lincolnshire

A convicted killer who strangled a woman after attempting to rape her has absconded from prison.

Stuart Brownhill had only been free from prison for nine days when he murdered Lynne Taylor while her 11-year-old son slept in their home in Werneth, Oldham, in 1984.

Ms Taylor met Brownhill on a night out on August 30. They took a taxi from outside a nightclub, and when they arrived at her home he asked if he could come in for a cup of tea.

The following morning, her body was found in the terraced property which Brownhill had set fire to in a bid to cover his tracks.

He later admitted he had strangled Ms Taylor after trying to rape her and that he knew the boy was asleep in the property when he started the fire.

He was given a life sentence at Manchester Crown Court in 1985 and was most recently held at North Sea Camp prison near Boston, Lincolnshire.

Lincolnshire Police said 59-year-old Brownhill was found to be absent during a roll call at 5am on Friday.

He is described as 5ft 8in, bald, and has a green right eye and a blue left eye.

Officers said they believe he may be wearing a brown jacket and black boots.

Police are asking members of the public not to approach Brownhill but to contact them on 999 immediately.

Anyone with information on his whereabouts is asked to call 101.

A Ministry of Justice spokesman said: "Public protection is our top priority. When an abscond takes place, police are immediately notified and are responsible for locating the offender.

"Those who do abscond are returned to much tougher, closed prisons where they will have to serve additional time."
Far-right protesters blocked an ambulance reaching an injured asylum seeker after violent clashes broke out between the two groups in an east German town.

Witnesses in the town of Bautzen described running street battles between teenage asylum seekers throwing bottles and far-right protesters shouting neo-Nazi slogans.

More than 100 police officers were needed to end the violence between around 80 far-right activists and some 20, mostly teenage, asylum-seekers, at least two of whom were injured.

The clashes in the town of around 40,000 people began at around 8.50pm on Wednesday evening in the Kornmarkt, a central square.

"When the police arrived, a crowd of around 80 young men and women had gathered. The apparently violent persons were largely from the far-right," the police said in a statement.

"They chanted slogans that Bautzen and the Kornmarkt belong to Germans. Ranged opposite them was a group of around 20 young asylum-seekers. Verbal and physical altercations had already taken place between the two groups. Witnesses described bottle throwing and bodily injuries," polive said.

According to eyewitnesses the clashes began earlier in the evening when police tried to move on a group of teenage asylum seekers from the square.

Residents at a government shelter for young refugees in the town have reportedly been causing trouble in the square for some weeks, behaving drunkenly and throwing bottles.

The teenage migrants refused to move on and some were violent towards the police, said Andrea Kubank, a local resident. A group of far-right protesters quickly gathered at the scene.

"They rushed up to the police and refugees chanting 'This is our Bautzen', 'Foreigners out' and 'This is our Nazi neighbourhood'," Ms Kubank said. "Everyday racism is very common in Bautzen," Ms Kubank added.

The asylum seekers attacked police with bottles and wooden boards, according to an official police statement. Police ordered the asylum seekers back to the government shelter, where all 32 residents were told to remain inside for their own safety.

Messages have now been circulating on far-right websites calling for further actions against the asylum-seekers.

( Daily Telegraph, London)
A woman and a man from Niger rest, aboard a rescue boat from the Spanish NGO Proactiva Open Arms, after they fell into the water from the rubber boat in which they were traveling in, with other refugees and migrants, on the Mediterranean Sea, about 18 miles North of Sabratha, Libya.

At least 235,000 migrants and refugees are on the coast of Libya waiting to cross the Mediterranean to Italy, a United Nations official has warned.

"We have on our lists 235,000 migrants who are just waiting for a good opportunity to depart for Italy, and they will do it," said Martin Kobler, the head of a UN mission that is seeking to bring peace and stability to the North African country, which is divided by rival governments, militias and Isil.

The only way to stop the exodus is to bring together Libya's competing factions and vanquish Isil in their stronghold in the coastal city of Sirte, he told 'La Stampa', an Italian newspaper.

Libya needs a strong army, police and coast guard to be able to take on the smuggling gangs who make millions of euro trafficking men, women and children across the sea to the shores of Italy.

Isil's position is being steadily eroded after a months-long assault by Libyan forces. "Very soon, Isil will no longer have control over territory in Libya," Mr Kobler said.

"This is quite encouraging and could give hope to the country. At the same time, however, we need to stay vigilant, because terrorism is not finished and Isil's militants will try to disperse to other regions."

So far this year, more than 128,000 migrants have reached Italy from the North African coast, straining to the limit Italy's capacity to accommodate them and process their asylum applications.

Libya's UN-backed Government of National Accord, which is based in the capital, Tripoli, is struggling to assert its authority. It is opposed by a rival administration based in the east of the country, which is supported by General Khalifa Haftar.

Attempts by his forces to secure oil installations are "very worrying", Mr Kobler said.

Fighting for control of the nation's oil wells has renewed fears of a civil war in Libya, five years after the fall of Muammar Gaddafi, the former dictator.

Migrants continue to die with tragic regularity as they attempt to cross the Mediterranean in overcrowded rubber dinghies and decrepit fishing boats.

Already this week the crew of the Irish naval ship LE James Joyce recovered five dead bodies from vessels that were intercepted north of the Libyan coast. Working with ships from the Italian navy and a privately-run rescue boat, they managed to save the lives of around 650 people.

Two reports released yesterday highlighted the immense scale of the refugee and migrant crisis. The United Nations refugee agency reported that of the world's six million refugee children, fewer than half are in school. Of those, nearly 900,000 are Syrian children, their lives shattered by their country's civil war.

"This represents a crisis for millions of refugee children," said the UNHCR's Filippo Grandi. His comments came ahead of the first-ever UN summit on refugees and migrants, to be held in New York on Monday.

The following day there will be a conference, hosted by President Barack Obama, in which countries will be encouraged to pledge more aid to help refugees around the world.

On average, refugees are displaced from their home countries for about 20 years, Mr Grandi said.

"As the international community considers how best to deal with the refugee crisis, it is essential that we think beyond basic survival," he said.

So many children are being wrenched from their normal lives that an additional 12,000 classrooms and 20,000 teachers are needed each year. (Daily Telegraph London)

Telegraph Media Group Limited [2022]
A woman has been arrested after her mother's body was found in a freezer sold at a garage sale.

Police in Goldsboro, North Carolina, in the US, said 56-year-old Marcella Jean Lee was arrested on Thursday in Carolina Beach, 100 miles away from the town.

They said she had been sought for more than three months over failure to report a death.

A post mortem in June found no signs of foul play in the death of 75-year-old Arma Roush, who lived with Lee and was last seen in August 2015.

Police said a neighbour bought Lee's freezer for 30 dollars (23) last spring. It was taped shut and Lee told the neighbour that friends would collect the contents. The buyer opened the freezer weeks later and found the body.

AP
People wait in line outside an Apple store to purchase Apple's new iPhone 7 and 7 Plus at Tokyo's Omotesando shopping district, Japan, September 16, 2016. Photo by Reuters/Issei Kato

Sales in China will be the acid test for Apple's year ahead.

Apple Inc fans from Sydney to Tokyo, the first to snap the new iPhone 7 off the shelves, cheered as they left stores on Friday brandishing their purchases, flanked by applauding sales staff.

But underneath the usual fanfare, and despite complaints that the larger size of the new phone and the new jet black colour were sold out, crowds were smaller than in past years.

Some 200 people were gathered in Sydney light drizzle for the privilege of being the first worldwide to hold an iPhone 7. Apple will launch in its key Asian market China later on Friday.

"It feels great to be the first in the world to have the iPhone 7. It was 100 percent worth it," said Marcus Barsoum, a 16-year-old "diehard Apple fan" who spent two nights camped outside the Sydney store.

Apple customers wait in the rain outside the company's Australia's flagship store in the minutes leading up to the first sale of the iPhone 7 and Apple Watch Series 2 in Sydney, September 16, 2016. Photo by Reuters/Steven Saphore

Weary but elated, Barsoum charged in to the store at 8 a.m. to the cheers of Apple staff. He emerged with a matte black iPhone 7 although he had wanted a 7 plus in jet black.

Dale Adams, who works at J.P. Morgan in Sydney, arrived only 15 minutes before the store opened and was able to buy a 7 Plus, having ordered it online more than a week ago.

"I'm certainly not one of the hardcore Apple fans but I think the bigger capacity, better battery, better camera, that's enough to make the jump," he said.

Apple's new iPhone 7 Plus is displayed after the new iPhone 7 Plus went on sale at the Apple Store at Tokyo's Omotesando shopping district, Japan, September 16, 2016. Photo by Reuters/Issei Kato

Chatter about the launch on Chinese microblog Weibo has been far more muted than when the iPhone 6 debuted in 2014. An index of searches on Baidu Inc, China's equivalent of Google, shows the new phone lagging both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 5.

Sales in China will be the acid test for Apple's year ahead: the mega success of the iPhone 6 in China drove sales last year, while the slower-burn 6S contributed to Apple's first global revenue drop in over a decade earlier this year.

Stores open in China later on Friday, a holiday.

Related news:

> Vietnamese camp outside Singapore shops in wait of iPhone 7

> New iPhone 7 ditches the audio jack; offers adapter

> Apple plans to take a $1 billion bite into central Vietnam
Japan's defence ministry officials answer questions from a group of protesters who oppose US military proposals (AP)

A Japanese court has ruled that Okinawa governor Takeshi Onaga's revocation of a reclamation permit for a US military base on the southern island was illegal.

The ruling supports the central government's plan to go ahead with the reclamation, despite protests by local residents.

This decision is the latest development in a legal battle between Okinawa and Tokyo over the relocation plan that has stalled for 20 years.

Okinawa said it will appeal the Fukuoka High Court ruling to the Japanese supreme court.

Mr Onaga revoked approval for the permit last October. The reclamation is required by the US in order to relocate Marine Corps Air Station Futenma to a less populated area on the island.

Many residents regularly complain about the large American troop presence on Okinawa and want the Futenma base closed, rather than moved.
Police investigate the scene where a man was shot by police in New York City Credit: Reuters

An Irish detective suffered serious injuries after he was struck in the head by a man with an 11-inch meat cleaver in New York.

Off-duty NYPD officer Brian O'Donnell, from Co Offaly, suffered a six-inch gash from his temple to his jaw when he attempted to tackle Akram Joudeh during the 5pm attack on Wednesday.

Footage of the father-of-three - who has been living in the US since the early 90s - leaving the hospital have been released this evening.

Det O'Donnell previously served in the US navy and has been a police officer for around 16 years.

#NYPD Det. Brian ODonnell leaves hospital after he was slashed with meat cleaver in midtown #Manhattan #nbc4ny pic.twitter.com/ufq0h25OZ0  Steven Bognar (@Bogs4NY) September 16, 2016

He was also involved in the rescue and recovery operation on September 11.

His sister Aoifa is the CEO with employment services company EAP in New York while brother John O'Donnell runs a restaurant in the MGM Grand casino in Las Vegas.

Akram Joudeh from the borough of Queens in New York City, was shot several times after he launched the savage attack.

Joudeh, who has a long criminal history, was initially stopped by police near Penn Station, in the middle of Manhattan, as he tried to remove a wheel clamp from his illegally-parked car.

Jimmy ONeill, the new NYPD police chief  who only takes over officially on Friday from the retiring Bill Bratton  said that Joudeh then ran through the streets around Macy's department store in the middle of rush hour.

Officers joined in the pursuit, and one uniformed sergeant deployed a stun gun to no effect.

Expand Expand Expand Previous Next Close Akram Judeh Credit: NYPD Police officers block off West and 32nd street in New York City following the shooting Credit: AP / Facebook

Twitter

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Whatsapp Akram Judeh Credit: NYPD

Joudeh pulled out an 11-inch cleaver from his waistband and began running toward Sixth Avenue, officials said.

Det O'Donnell attempted to intervene but was struck across the face.

The dad, who lives in Long Island, was taken to Bellevue Hospital, where he's listed in serious condition, officials said.

Mr Bratton and Bill de Blasio, the mayor of New York, visited him in hospital and said he was in good spirits.

A spokesman for the NYPD told Independent.ie that Detective O'Donnell was "stable".

He added: "Detective O'Donnell is doing pretty good. We are hoping that he will be released at noon or 1pm Irish time."

Det O'Donnell moved to the US from Co Offaly 16 years ago and he previously worked with the US navy. He signed up to the New York Police Department and friend say he was four years from retirement.

A bystander, Jonathan Schneier, said when he left work to get coffee he saw a balding man holding a meat cleaver, surrounded by a small group of officers yelling at him to drop the knife. One officer had a Taser out. Others had handguns.

"I give credit to the police officers. They gave him many opportunities," Mr Schneier said.

Expand Expand Previous Next Close The cleaver allegedly used in the attack. Source: NYPD Akram Judeh's car / Facebook

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Whatsapp The cleaver allegedly used in the attack. Source: NYPD

He said the man with the knife "did not look very stable."

The man turned and ran, Mr Schneier said. He ran one city block and then jumped on top of a NYPD car.

After Det O'Donnell was struck three uniformed NYPD officers then fired a total 18 times at Joudeh, striking him several times.

Two other officers were taken to the hospital with non-life threatening injuries from the encounter, although it was unclear how they were injured.

Joudeh was described as being in a critical but stable condition. He has 15 prior arrests, including one on August 27, after he was found carrying knives near a synagogue.

His last known address was in Queens, though police say he may have been living in his car.

The incident caused gridlock in central Manhattan, with streets shut and the FBI sending agents from the Joint Terrorism Task Force to the scene as a precaution.

Detective O'Donnell has two sisters living in Dublin, a sister living in New York and a brother who runs a bar in Las Vegas.

He is a massive GAA and New York Yankees fan and his family has strong GAA connections.

He has a long distinguished career with the NYPD and was the arresting officer when actor Christian Slater was charged with sexual harassment.
Lindsey Radomski is pictured in this undated booking photo

A jury has acquitted an Arizona woman accused of flashing under-age boys at a bar mitzvah last year and performing a sex act on one of the teens.

Lindsey Ann Radomski (34) was found not guilty on all 18 misdemeanour counts after a seven-week trial.

She cried and hugged her lawyers after the verdict was read by a judge in Scottsdale, Arizona.

"I'm just incredibly happy it's over. Thank God," Ms Radomski said outside the courthouse.

She faced a sentence of up to six months in jail, a $2,500 (2,225) fine and three years' probation if convicted.

She was arrested in March last year on charges that included public sexual indecency with contact and contributing to the delinquency of a child.

A grand jury refused to indict her on felony charges because of a lack of evidence.

According to police, the yoga instructor invited seven boys aged 11 to 15 into a bedroom at a bar mitzvah and flashed her newly augmented breasts at them.

Drinking

She reportedly allowed the boys to fondle her breasts and then allegedly performed a sex act on a 15-year-old boy.

However, Ms Radomski said that she was drinking alcohol that night and does not remember what happened.

Her lawyer argued that she was drugged while at the event, and that it was she who actually was the victim and that the boys sexually assaulted her.

Prosecutors said Ms Radomski may well have been drunk at the bar mitzvah, but she still should be held responsible for her actions regardless.
Donald Trump's US presidential campaign has proposed - then deleted - rolling back American food safety regulations.

The Republican nominee's team had argued in a factsheet that the rules are burdensome to farmers and amount to "overkill", but later deleted the proposal from its website.

After sending out the factsheet on Thursday, the campaign issued a new release which did not include the food safety references.

The factsheet was sent out to supplement a speech Mr Trump gave to the New York Economic Club which touted fewer regulations, but did not specifically mention food safety.

In the original sheet, the campaign said that Mr Trump would eliminate several regulations, including the "food police" at the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment on the food safety proposal or why it was deleted.

The handout said the FDA food safety rules "govern the soil farmers use, farm and food production hygiene, food packaging, food temperatures" and other ways farmers and food companies do business. It also criticised increased inspections of food manufacturing facilities as "inspection overkill".

The description matches new food safety regulations passed by US Congress in 2010 in response to an outbreak of salmonella linked to a Georgia peanut company that killed nine epople and made more than 700 others sick in 46 states.

The Centres for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that 48 million people - or one in 6 in the United States - become ill each year from food-borne diseases, and an estimated 3,000 people die.

The final food safety rules for produce issued last year and supported by the food industry require farmers to test irrigation water quality, regularly train workers on the best health and hygiene practices and monitor wildlife that may intrude on growing fields, among other measures. The rules are designed to focus on the riskiest foods.

Michael Taylor, the former FDA deputy commissioner for foods who led the effort to put the rules in place, said it is one area of agreement in the country, since both the food industry and consumers want safe food.

"Eliminating FDA's food safety role would make more consumers sick, destroy consumer confidence at home, and damage American competitiveness in global food markets," he said.

AP
Humanitarian response, peace and security and countering terrorism and violent extremism will be top priorities for the United States as delegates join those of 193 nations during the high-level week of the 71st session of the United Nations General Assembly.

The United States remains firmly committed to employing multilateralism to advance its national interests and promote a more peaceful, productive and prosperous world. U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs Sheba Crocker, said events and activities throughout the week will advance key U.S. multilateral objectives.

Humanitarian response will be at the top of the agenda when President Barack Obama along with leaders from Canada, Ethiopia, Germany, Jordan, Sweden, Mexico and U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon co-host the Leaders Summit on Refugees.

The Presidents summit responds not just to the headlines of yesterday and today but to the broader and enduring strains on the humanitarian system, said Assistant Secretary Crocker.

We expect that the summit will result in significant new, sustained commitments to UN humanitarian appeals, expanded refugee resettlement programs or alternative legal pathways for admission, and new opportunities for refugees and their host communities to benefit from improved refugee access to education and to legal employment.

The U.S. will continue to support efforts to promote peace and security, relying on UN envoys to advance political tracks in Syria, Libya, Yemen and other crisis-stricken countries. To this end, Secretary of State John Kerry will attend a Security Council session focused on Syria and will cohost a ministerial event on Libya, among other meetings.

The U.S. will build on previous commitments to the UN Peace Operations, aiming to enhance the UNs ability to undertake conflict prevention, mediation and peacebuilding activities, while at the same time promoting accountability for conduct for peacekeepers.

The United States will continue to strengthen multilateral cooperation on counterterrorism and countering violent extremism, with emphasis on global initiatives to counter Daesh or ISIL, other violent extremist groups, and foreign terrorist fighters. We will also seek to enhance the UNs capacities to implement the recommendations of the Secretary-Generals Plan of Action to Prevent Violent Extremism.

The United States will also move forward with UN member-states on a number of other issues of continuing importance, said Assistant Secretary Crocker. These include climate change, sustainable development, human rights, nuclear disarmament, and UN reform.
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Dr. Ruth Woods Pike High School classroom is a sanctuary. Instead of stained glass windows depicting final suppers and the iconic images of patron saints, the walls are covered in colorful pennants from HBCUs and photos of recent graduates. Among them are aviation specialists, high-ranking military personnel, educators, doctors and architects. She takes great pride in sharing each one of their stories. See the young man in the blue there, Eric? Guess whose money he takes care of? P. Diddys, she said, beaming. Hes on Wall Street.

Woods, who has been involved with the Indianapolis Black Alumni Council (IBAC) for more than three decades, has an interesting connection to Black institutions of higher learning. Her great great grandfather and his brothers built three of the buildings on Kentucky State Universitys campus. Despite that lineage, Woods graduated from Indiana University in Bloomington, though if the choice was entirely in her control at the time, she would have chosen differently.

Im a part of the civil rights movement, so my dad had sued for me to attend a white school, she said. He wouldnt let me go to Kent State, but I made him a promise that if I ever had any kids they would go to Black schools. I was so angry and so upset. I ended up marrying my sophomore year of college, and me and my husband were so angry because we wanted to do the opposite of what our parents wanted us to do. I promised him if he let me get married that Id stay in school, so I did. Woods also kept her promise and sent each of her children to HBCUs.

Woods passion for this work continued past her own offspring through her involvement with IBAC. During her tenure, the group has hosted an annual college fair and various other programs geared toward college prep.

The roots of IBAC began in the late 70s with Black College Row, an exhibit of HBCUs at the Indiana Black Expos annul summertime event, organized by Alexander Brown, an alumnus of Clark Atlanta University, and Martha Mitchell, a graduate of Talladega College. In October of 1978, the idea was had to branch off the success of that effort and form a fully functioning organization. Since then, the group has assisted thousands of students across the Midwest and beyond with scholarships to Black schools.

Woods shared that it is her mission and vision to help further promote awareness of the opportunities and options that HBCUs offer. Another hope of hers is to end the myth that these schools are for students with poor grades and nowhere else to go.

The troubles that have plagued Black schools in recent years are well documented. In 2012, Morris Brown, which was founded in 1881, was forced to file bankruptcy after issues with financial mismanagement causing enrollment to drastically decrease, among other things. The institution appears to be on the mend, but much of what happened has transpired at other schools, as well. Despite those blights, the rich history and legacy continues. According to the U.S. Department of Education, HBCUs have provided undergraduate training for three-fourths of all Blacks holding a doctorate degree, three-fourths of all Black officers in the armed forces and four-fifths of all Black federal judges. The data goes on to reflect that HBCUs rank high in terms of the proportion of graduates who pursue and complete graduate and professional training.

In Woods experience, HBCUs are staffed by educators who are dream makers, not dream breakers, who have a vested interest in student success. She considers her role in connecting students to the experience and benefits to be one of divine order.

This is a ministry for me. Its not a job. Its developed into that, and I have a passion for our kids.

The 37th annual IBAC HBCU College Fair will be held on Sept. 22 from 69 p.m. at Crispus Attucks Medical Magnet High School, located at 1140 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. St. The fair will host dozens of Black colleges from all over the country, information on scholarships and an interactive aviation exhibit presented by Elizabeth City State University. Pre-registration for the event is highly encouraged. For more information or to register, visit ibacindy.com.

IBAC Stats

Number of students reached through Distance Recruitment Network  330*

Number of HBCUs represented at program  69*

College Fair attendees  1,392*

Scholarship dollars awarded to date  $4.3 million

*Data reflects 2015 College Fair
Sue Ellspermann, Indianas former lieutenant governor and the first-ever woman president of the countrys largest singly accredited statewide community college system, has in her own words been bitten by the Ivy Tech bug. That bite is evident not only in the passion faculty and staff showcase in serving the eager minds that come through the classroom, but also in the dedication of the students themselves. With more than three decades of experience in education, politics and workforce development, Ellspermann hopes to take Ivy Tech to the next level. Her tenure, which officially began in July, comes as part of a three-year contract that will reportedly pay her $300,000 per year. Of the many concerns she and her team will address, increasing graduation rates and meeting the ever-growing demands for skilled mid-level workers seem to be the most pressing. Ellspermann shared that she will be working to craft a strategic plan for the college (to be released in January) and implementing new technology and partnerships to assist in these efforts. One addition will utilize a data-mining algorithm to track students behaviors and levels of engagement to figure (with 81 percent accuracy) whether or not a student is on track to succeed in their coursework. Ellspermann shared that this is just one of many efforts she plans to enact through her new position.

The Recorder recently sat down with Ellspermann to discuss her transition and her plans for the institutions future.

Indianapolis Recorder Newspaper: What has the transition been like for you, moving from politics to education?

Ellspermann: As the lieutenant governor, I had the opportunity to travel all 92 counties and saw the need back then, even four years ago, that employers were beginning to experience. Unemployment was still high, but it was coming down, and it was beginning to get more challenging to get employees. As vice chair of the Indiana Career Council, the challenge was to align K12 and higher education to meet the needs of workforce. I spent two years in that role helping to craft Indianas strategic plan, so my understanding of the workforce side and the needs/role of Ivy Tech was very good coming in. What I didnt know was how did it really work? What were all of the programs, people, talent and strategies that Ivy Tech was deploying? I had a great month in June just visiting 14 of our 32 campuses and getting to know 700 or more of our employees across the state. It helped to give me a flavor for the people and their concerns for the institution and what was important to them. The last two months have been spent really learning how this institution works and what we can do to further leverage it to help students meet the demands of the workforce. As any new leader, you see opportunities, but the goal is not to change everything in a day; its to really look thoughtfully at what were doing.

During your time so far, what have you learned about the people of Ivy Tech?

The commitment of the faculty and staff here  people use the term you get bit when you get here you just become part of this vocation of serving individuals. For many of them, a traditional college degree was not something they had the opportunity to pursue. A couple weeks ago, I sat down with a mother and her triplets who were all here attending at the same time; (the triplets) were 19, so they were more traditional. Two of the students I get to talk to every evening as Im leaving and theyre leaving classes, one a young man  who is 26 and works in HVAC  is coming back for his associate degree; he wants to be an electrical engineer. Im very excited about his future and his experience here is going very well. I met our oldest student, GG (which stands for grandma), and she has five degrees from Ivy Tech. I wont say what her age is, but shes been here for a long time, and she loves being here and learning.

Ivy Techs past president, Tom Synder, has been honored nationally for his work with the college. In 2015, his efforts earned him a recognition and appointment from President Barack Obama. What are your thoughts on his legacy and building upon that foundation?

He absolutely led amazing changes at this institution  things like the co-rec model instead of traditional remediation, (and) some of the programs were offering now, like Inside Track, where students get a phone call every Monday to make sure that if theyre at risk, they get the help they need. ASAP, the one-year associates program, is working so well, and I think we have more than 70 minority students on the Fall Creek campus that are a part of that. That said, we still have to do more. Its not a problem where you can do these six or 10 things and its solved. Weve made marked improvement in most areas, and yet, we expect (a lot) of ourselves and the state expects even more of us, and our students deserve the very best we can give. Well continue to look for even more ways to improve.

On preparing students for the workforce, while overall unemployment is down, minority unemployment is still high. What are your thoughts on reaching minority students?

On this campus, our minority enrollment is at least 15 percent, which is higher than most places in the state. But certainly the good news is, I think the minority community sees us as a good place to come and further their education. Weve developed a number of programs  with ASAP, were doing an Ivy Works form of that specializing in jobs in the logistics supply chain areas, and in that program, 40 percent of the students are African-American. I think in all cases we will be elevating the demand-driven, high-wage, high-need jobs and trying to help get that word out. We recently signed an MOU (memorandum of understanding) with Fisk University, an HBCU, and we are going to Nashville at the end of October to make that official. We want to elevate those kinds of opportunities to transfer. Our students will have to meet Fisk requirements, but what a great opportunity. I think there are lots more opportunities, from internships all the way to how we engage with students.

Recently, Ivy Tech was slated to host an event on policing and race. (The event was canceled due to inclement weather but has been rescheduled for Oct. 10) Why is it important for places of higher learning to be engaged in conversations of this type?

We want to be a place where these kinds of dialogues happen. We are, to this point, viewed that way in the community. My background is facilitating and problem solving, so that is a very natural thing to want to do. We want to (show) that we are that safe place where people can have different points of view, can share their concerns, air them and talk about them, and hopefully out of that come some ideas on how we can work forward together. We dont have all the answers, but the answers will come from all of us as we learn to work with each other and have a safe space to talk about these things.
A park in Wolf Point, on the Fort Peck Reservation in Montana. Photo by Royalbroil



Federal authorities laid murder and other charges in connection with the death of a one-year-old girl on the Fort Peck Reservation in Montana.

Janelle Red Dog , 42, was indicted on one charge of first-degree murder, one charge of second-degree murder, one charge of felony child abuse and one charge of being an accessory after the fact. Authorities say she abused and killed Kenzley Olson on April 19.

The accessory after the fact charge speaks of the involvement of a "John Doe" in the crime. According to the indictment, Red Dog knew the unnamed offender committed "aggravated sexual abuse" on the same day Kenzley died.

Kenzley Olson was born on March 4, 2015. Photo from Clayton Stevenson Memorial Chapel



Red Dog pleaded not guilty to all of the charges on Thursday, The Great Falls Tribune reported. She faces a trial on November 21, the paper said.

Tribal leaders blamed Kenzley's disappearance and death, as well as a kidnapping of a four-year-old girl earlier in the year, on rampant drug abuse on the reservation. Chairman Floyd Azure said the problem is contributing to sex trafficking and sex crimes.

Read More on the Story: Poplar woman enters plea in child homicide case (The Great Falls Tribune 9/15)

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Making the numbers count on this election



Making the numbers count on this election

By Native Sun News Today Editorial Board

It is puzzling that we, American Indians, do not utilize the numbers we have in our favor when it comes to local, state and national elections.

The vote has always been the power broker in the white society. It is the power of their vote that has kept the Indian people powerless.

We, as a people, have not been able to use the power of our numbers to bring about change simply because we do not use the power of our vote effectively.

A few national elections ago Tim Johnson ran against John Thune for the U. S. Senate. As the votes were counted, mostly from the eastern and central parts of South Dakota because of the time zone differences, Thune and his followers felt they had an insurmountable lead because there were just a couple of precincts left to be counted and they were on the Indian reservations. They were all relaxed and ready to pop the corks on the champagne when the voting results from Pine Ridge and Rosebud began to roll in.

Voila! The Lakota voters had turned out for this particular election in large numbers and the count soon changed and the Indian vote helped to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat for Tim Johnson. We had the numbers and we made them count.

This should hold true for elections we often to not pay much attention to and those elections are for the city council, county commissioners, mayor, state representatives and state senators. All of these elective positions will eventually hold sway over our future. It is time we place some of our own people in these positions in order to bring us representation where there is none.

We do have the numbers. If we stick together and vote as a block we can help determine who will be are next elected officials and that includes the national seats of president and members of Congress and the Senate. Native Sun News Today throws its support behind Paula Hawks for Congress and Jay Williams for the U. S. Senate. We will have more on both of these candidates as we draw closer to the election.

So stay tuned because as we said, we got the power and it is time to use it.

Find more news and opinion on the Native Sun News Today website: Making the numbers count on this election

(Contact the NSN Editorial Board at editor@nsweekly.com)

Copyright permission Native Sun News

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Construction has continued on the Dakota Access Pipeline in areas west of Lake Oahe near the #NoDAPL encampments in North Dakota. Photo by Rob Wilson Photography [GoFundMe]



A federal judge forced an apology out of the Obama administration for its handling of the #NoDAPL case as attorneys returned to court in Washington, D.C.

After spending considerable resources writing a 58-page opinion in the closely-watched dispute, Judge James Boasberg said he was surprised by the press release issued shortly afterward. He accused government attorneys of being less than forthcoming about their intentions regarding the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline

"Why did you wait until minutes after my order?" Boasberg said in court on Friday afternoon. "You waited for my opinion to issue it," he said, answering his own question.

Michael Thorp, a senior attorney from the Department of Justice , struggled to explain why the extraordinary joint statement didn't change the government's stance in the lawsuit. He noted that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers , the defendant in the case, has yet to issue a crucial easement for the pipeline to cross the Missouri River at Lake Oahe.

"The easement has always been under consideration," Thorp, who was making his first appearance in the case so far, told the judge

But the judge wasn't the only one in the room with questions. William Leone, an attorney for the Dakota Access partnership, was reeling too.

"We are as surprised as anyone," Leone told the judge of the Obama administration's action. "We are as shocked as anyone."

Ongoing Coverage: Construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline is ongoing at multiple sites 2 miles south off exit 123... Posted by Rob Wilson Photography on Wednesday, September 14, 2016

The sparring came as the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe work feverishly to stop construction of the pipeline in areas that remain out of the federal government's reach. They have asked the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals for an injunction while they pursue an appeal of the 58-page opinion that Boasberg issued last week.

The proposed injunction would cover both sides of Lake Oahe. Dakota Access has continued construction activities on the west side, in areas where the tribes are concerned about damage to sacred sites and burial grounds.

As for the east side of Lake Oahe, Leone said: "The pipeline is in the ground."

The tribes are hoping the D.C. Circuit will issue a ruling on their motion by the end of Friday. But with no answer so far, Boasberg saw no need to extend a temporary restraining order that had applied to the areas east of Lake Oahe.

That order, which was issued on September 6 , essentially had no effect because Dakota Access wasn't working east of Lake Oahe at the time and still has no immediate plans to do so.

"The work is done east of Lake Oahe," Leone noted.

Officially, Energy Transfer Partners , the parent company of Dakota Access, has vowed to complete the pipeline. But the #NoDAPL movement has dealt a significant public relations and financial blow to the partnership.

"This company has lost $5 billion in market value" in the last couple of weeks, Leone said in court.

Arguing that the "media" has painted the Obama administration's action as a "victory" for the tribes, Leone urged the judge to resolve the case as quickly as possible. Previously, he has said Dakota Access wants to start shipping oil on the pipeline by January 1, 2017, so a decision is of great financial importance to the partnership.

"With the case hanging over the pipeline, it's going to interfere with the pipeline," Leone said.

Jan Hasselman, an attorney from the non-profit Earthjustice who is representing the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, agreed that the case should be resolved as quickly as possible. He didn't appear at the hearing in D.C., in person, instead participating by phone.

Along those lines, Boasberg ordered the Army Corps to file its official answer to the tribe's complaint by October 11 and to file what is known as administrative record -- essentially, the documents used during the agency's consideration of the pipeline -- by November 10. He also scheduled another hearing on November 10.

Erica Zilioli, another Department of Justice attorney, had been asking for a delay to file those responses. Her proposal would have kept the tribes and Dakota Access waiting for the administrative record, which she described as lengthy and complex, until mid-December.

"The Corps is working diligently in compiling the administrative record," said Zilioli.

While Zilioli has been assigned to the case from the start, Friday's hearing marked the first time she argued in court. In prior hearings, government attorney Matt Marinelli handled the arguments.

As of 5pm Eastern, the online record system for the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals did not indicate any rulings on the tribes' motion for the injunction.

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Nevada Department of WildlifesOperation Game Thief Trailer will be at the intersection of SR225 and Gold Creek Road by the entrance of Wild Horse State Park this weekend. The public is welcome to stop by to see the display of illegally taken wildlife and to get their hunting questions answered.

NDOW will also have literature for hunters including hunter fact sheets for the area, some maps of places to hunt and information on Operation Game Thief. OGT is similar to secret witness programs that other agencies use. Citizens may report wildlife crimes that they observe, remain anonymous and collect rewards for information that leads to a conviction.

The area biologist will be on hand part of the time, as well as state game wardens and reserve wardens. Anyone interested in the Reserve Warden program is welcome to stop by and ask questions.

To report a wildlife crime you can call 1-800-992-3030 and you can remain anonymous. Poachers are not hunters and are stealing your wildlife.

WILD HORSE

The cold rain, wind and weather did wonders for clearing up the algae in the lake, though right after the storm, the fishing still hadnt picked up. The lake is a little over 40% of capacity and the state park boat ramp is still usable, but larger boats will want to use caution. Fishing has been slow for all species and slow to fair for trout. Trollers are having the best luck, but it is still slow to fair for them as well. Fly fishermen are having some luck with black or olive wooly buggers, leeches, damsel fly nymphs and hares ears under an indicator. Expect chironomids to start playing a bigger part in a couple of weeks. Gear anglers should be using minnow type imitations in fire tiger, black over white and blue over white. The usual PowerBait or worms are working best first thing in the morning or later in the evening for trout. Bass fishing has been slow and fishing for catfish has been fair for numbers good for size. Expect trout fishing to start picking up with the cooler water temperatures.

SOUTH FORK RESERVOIR

The water has cleared quite a bit, but is still a little turbid. Water temperatures have dropped into the low to mid 60s and the weeds are starting to die off. Trout are moving up into the water column and anglers report catching them five to eight feet deep. The usual wooly buggers, seal buggers and leech patterns as well as the more common nymphs are all effective. Closer to October expect chironomids to become much more effective. This is the time of year that anglers can have good luck for both bass and trout as they both start to feed more aggressively in preparation for winter and the ideal water temperatures for them cross paths. Bait anglers have had luck along Jet Ski Beach and near the dam using PowerBait or worms.

JIGGS/ZUNINO RESERVOIR

The water level has dropped a bit due to evaporation but anglers from float tubes report good fishing for trout with some of the larger fish that were stocked earlier in the spring being caught. Expect fishing to continue to improve as the water temperatures fall. The usual PowerBait or worms should work for bait anglers and small spinners are the ticket for spin fishermen. Fly rodders are having luck with dark colored buggers, leeches, hares ears and nymphs with peacock herl. Expect the same techniques and presentations that work at South Fork, to work here as well. Shore fishing can be especially productive early in the morning and in the evening. Anglers are being asked to return any bass or blue gill they catch to help re-build those populations in the lake.

WILSON RESERVOIR

The road is in good shape and both bass and trout fishing has been fair to good. Most of the trout are averaging 12 to 14 inches while the bass are averaging less than 10 inches. The lake is about 60% of capacity and the boat ramp is usable. The water is clearing here and the water quality is good. Trout were being caught from the boat ramp through the campground. Fly rodders are having luck with olive buggers and leech patterns as well as damsel nymphs. Mayfly nymphs and emergers are also still effective in late afternoons. PowerBait and worms are also working along the western shoreline for trout.

RUBY LAKE NWR

Narciss boat ramp is bone dry, you cant even launch a stick. The main boat ramp water level is also very low and the floats holding up the dock are resting on mud. The concrete ramp is completely out of the water and only car-toppers, canoes and kayaks are recommended at the main boat ramp. Bass fishing continues to be good for those anglers who are able to get on the lake. However, with the smaller boats, some of the afternoon winds have made it difficult to move around on the water. The best time to fish is first thing in the morning or late in the afternoon as the shadow of the mountain is hitting the water. Soft plastic worms and grubs in dark greens, purple, blue and motor oil with sparkles in them rigged weedless are the way to fish for bass here. In the collection ditch fishing is fair to good for anglers willing to put the time in and move along it until they get into fish but watch for snakes especially later in the morning and afternoon as it warms up. Fishing the collection ditch has been fair to good for 12 to 14 inch tiger trout using a variety of flies, spinners and lures. Flies that are working include prince nymphs, frostbite chironomids, black or olive wooly buggers, crystal buggers, PTs, black callibaetis and mayfly emerger patterns. Dry flies should include Adams, PMDs small elk hair caddis, damsel fly adults, hoppers, ants and small stimulators. The collection ditch is artificial lures only. With the cooler temperatures expect the bass bite to start dropping off and the trout bite to pick up.

JAKES CREEK/BOIES RESERVOIR

Fishing has been fair to good here for both trout bass. Anglers need to use a small car-topper type boat or float tube to get past the weeds though they are starting to recede. For trout, worms or PowerBait are effective along with black and gold spinners. Fly rodders should be using damsel fly nymphs, prince nymphs, hares ears, pheasant tail (PT) nymphs and wooly buggers in olive or brown. Shore fishing is almost impossible due to the weeds. Anglers will have the best luck using float tubes or small boats casting from open water towards the weeds.

CAVE LAKE

Fishing has been fair to good for 10 to 13 inch fish using the usual worms and PowerBait. Small wooly buggers and the usual nymphs such as prince, hares ears and pheasant tail nymphs should all work. Damsel fly nymphs in olive or tan are working as well. Spinners in gold, black or dark green with contrasting spots on them have been working as well.. Worms under a bobber, or PowerBait floated off of the bottom using a slip sinker are both good ways to fish this lake.

COMINS

Trout fishing is starting to improve with the cooler temperatures though it is still slow to fair here with the best time being first thing in the morning. Expect the usual PowerBait and worms to work. Fly rodders should plan on using damsel fly nymphs, olive or black wooly buggers, prince nymphs and hares ears. Dry fly patterns such as the Adams, mosquitos, Griffiths gnats, renegades and hoppers are all worth a try if you see fish rising. Best time to fish for trout is first thing in the morning, though right before dusk, it may pick back up. Anglers are being asked to return any bass they catch back into the lake to help build up the bass fishery.

ILLIPAH

Fishing has been good first thing in the morning for anglers and the water level, while lower, is still good. A few anglers report 20-30 fish mornings starting at sunup and fishing until about 10:00 am. Most anglers have been using worms, PowerBait, and spinners. Hares ears, damsel fly nymphs, sheep creek specials, and olive or black wooly buggers are the ticket for fly fishermen. Browns should start becoming more active as we get closer to their spawn in late September, early October.

COLD CREEK RESERVOIR

The water level is still holding here and fishing has been fair to good for bass and good for trout. Late afternoons and early evenings have been productive with dry flies. Fly rodders should use the usual assortment of prince nymphs, PT nymphs, hares ears, small buggers, elk hair caddis, Adams, PMDs and Griffiths gnats. As the water cools and the hatches die down, fly anglers will want to switch primarily to nymphs and small crystal buggers.

ANGEL LAKE

The trout are starting to move back up into the water column. The usual worms or PowerBait are both successful here. Small spinners in black and gold, green and gold and black and red are effective. Fly rodders should be using anything olive or with peacock for nymphs and buggers, while red or yellow are the preferred colors for the bodies of dry flies.

ALPINE LAKES

Anglers continue to report good success at all high mountain lakes. This should continue as the fish are eating a lot in preparation for the long winter at higher elevations. Expect the same flies that work at Angel Lake to work in the most of the high mountain lakes. While dry flies are working, a dry and a dropper is a good starting point. Also sub-surface presentations using nymphs or emerger patterns fished just below the surface have been effective. If you see fish dimpling the surface look to see if there are any bubbles. If there are, they are taking insects off of the surface, if there arent any bubbles, they are taking the insects just below the surface. Bait anglers should have success using worms or live grasshoppers that are found along the shorelines of all the lakes. PowerBait can also be effective and of course small spinners work very well.

STREAMS

Streams flows are still below normal in most of our waters as the dry summer is making stream fishing a little harder. Pray for precipitation. The Jarbidge and the Bruneau have both seen a small increase in their flows and dry fly fishing using hoppers or yellow stimulators is good. Flows may increase a little over the next month as the temperatures cool and the vegetation along the streams start to go dormant using less water. Look for pools and beaver ponds for best fishing, though a few streams may still fish fairly well even with the lower flows. Anglers continue to report good fishing for tiger trout in the upper meadows of Lamoille Canyon. Hoppers are still everywhere so start with either a hopper or yellow stimulator, especially in the afternoons. Elk hair caddis, renegades, mosquitos, stimulators, hoppers, ants and just about any good floating dry fly with red or yellow are all good patterns for the streams this time of year. As of Thursday, September 15, the South Fork of the Humboldt below the dam was flowing at approximately 10 cubic feet a second (cfs), Lamoille Creek at 5 cfs, Bruneau River 12 cfs, the Jarbidge at 6 cfs, and the East Fork of the Owyhee at 6cfs.
Technological advancements and the resources it empowers us with cannot be ignored. Without a shadow of a doubt, technology is the reason we are the way we are today. Having said that, technology has also invaded our privacy in ways unimaginable. While some governments bodies believe they are keeping a tab on people for their own safety, the masses feel it's a complete breach of an individual's privacy.

cbsistatic.com

What's happening?

Google is known to have made things easy for everyone, even hackers and spies apparently. If the Free Thought Project is to be believed, Google's voice recording feature, that has been integrated into phones to provide more accurate and hands-free search results, has been secretly recording our voices with our consent. The stats revealed by the website are also nothing short of shocking. Google now processes over 40,000 searches per second worldwide. That is the average. That brings us to over 3.5 billion searches per day and a staggering 1.2 trillion searches per year!

Bgr

The data from these searches are then stored for each individual which is then used for targeting ads and making search more user-friendly. In the same way, Google can also predict trends of the future thanks to the magnanimous database they have. Even though it is true that Android devices are more vulnerable than iOS, if you're still using Google for your web searches, the company is listening to you. Think of it like a diary on you, that keeps a record of everything you know, like or hate. Especially the most intimate details.

What Google says

When this information got revealed, Google didn't deny the allegations but defended them instead by saying that the information gathered on the user is never used personally against any one of them. Instead, it is only done for the purpose of making the user's experience on the web, better. Which is all great, but what if all this lands in the hands of someone who wants to use all this information against us. Will we be able to do anything to stop that person?

What the experts say

Experts say our search history is tied to the location data of the device we used to conduct the search. So apart from knowing what your interests are, Google also knows your specific interests based on your location at any given point in time. In their defence, though, Google also gives you the power to change your privacy settings.

How to stop Google from recording everything

Go to -

1. history.google.com

2. Click on the three dots that you see on the top-right and click on the Activity controls.

3. Scroll down to Voice & Audio activity and click on Manage Activity.

4. Here you'll find a whole list of the times Google has recorded your voice. With or without you coming to know. It's quite spooky guys, so be prepared.

5. You can delete each of these voice notes manually by clicking on the three dots on the top right corner of each card.

You can also switch off the function altogether if you don't want the app to keep listening to you again. The power lies with you.

Cover image from BGR.

You can check out the original article on Free Thought Project here.
Photographs speak a thousand words - a cliche, wouldn't you say? But then again, cliches are cliches for a reason, aren't they? Regardless of your stance on this thought, there are a few photographs, especially unposed spontaneous images taken at the right place and the right time, that are a waterfall of emotions and feelings. We've curated some such images of Indians that came to define tragic events, and became a symbol of sorts for that happening.

1. The Odisha man

Indian Express

In August, a destitute man became a talking point all over the world, for nothing joyful but for carrying his dead wife's body on his shoulders for 10km with his minor girl walking by his side. The hospital where Dana Majhi's wife died denied him an ambulance to take his wife back for burial. She died in the district hospital in Bhawanipatna town in Odisha.

ALSO READ: Odisha Man Carried His Wife's Body For 10kms After Being Denied An Ambulance

2. The face of the Brussels attack

AP

One of the most powerful images that surfaced from the attack at Brussels airport in March was that of Nidhi Chaphekar, a Jet Airways employee. The picture of her covered in dust and blood and with shredded clothes was taken while she sat in absolute shock on a bench at the airport.

ALSO READ: Woman Hurt In The Brussels Attack Identified As Indian

3. The pleading image of the Gujarat Riots

Reuters

Qutubuddin Ansari was 29 when a Reuters photographer clicked a picture of him folding his hands with bloodshot and teary eyes. His face came to define the 2002 Gujarat Riots and was used by most newspapers and webzines thereafter the incidents. Earlier this year, he asked for politicians to stop using his image as a poster for their propaganda because it was interfering with his life.

ALSO READ: Qutubuddin Ansari, Face Of The 2002 Gujarat Riots, Wants Politicians To Stop Using His Photo

4. The mummified baby of the Bhopal gas tragedy

Raghu Rai

It's been over 30 years since the extremely unfortunate Bhopal gas tragedy, one of the worst industrial disasters of the world. In December 1984, about 30 metric tons of toxic gas escaped into the atmosphere, immediately killing around 2,500 people and affecting 500,000 others. Till date, victims have not received justice and autopsies of the dead continue.

ALSO READ: Why, Even After 31 Years, We Should Not Forget The Bhopal Gas Tragedy

5. The image capturing the injustice against Dalits

ALSO READ: Three Cow Vigilantes Arrested For Assaulting Dalit Youths After They Skinned A Dead Cow

In July this year, four people, Dalits to be precise, were chained to a car and beaten, by a team of "gau rakshaks" for supposed cow smuggling. The victims' jobs was to dispose cow carcasses and they were beaten for carrying a cow for the same purpose.

6. One face of the many elephants run over by trains

abeatingheart

Every year, elephants are run over by speeding trains. This image of the biggest land animal lying dead on this back with his mouth gaping open after being run over by a train, though, has in a way come to define the brutality against elephants in India. This particular elephant was killed and then dragged for 200 meters on the track.

7. The Partition's poster

India-Pakistan partition was one of the biggest and bloodiest mass migrations in history and it sketches an image of thousands piled on a train. This black and white image encapsulates the horror and uncertainty for Indian and Pakistani refugees in 1947.

When it comes to capturing captivating photographs, there's always the debate between taking the photo, which has an important story to tell or stepping out from behind the camera and helping the victim. Do you freeze a moment in time with your camera so future generations have access to history or do you do the apparently moral and human thing?

Food for thought.
Nearly two months after it went missing the Indian Air Force has formally informed the families of those on board the ill fated flight are presumed to be dead.

AFP/ Representative Image

The Court of Inquiry, upon very careful scrutiny of circumstantial evidence available, and in light of extensive search and rescue operations carried out, has concluded that it is unlikely that the missing personnel on board the ill-fated aircraft would have survived the accident, the presumed death certificate issued by the IAF which is dated on August 24 reads.

PTI quoting IAF sources reported that the presumed death certificate were issued so that the families of those missing could complete the administrative and legal formalities including claiming insurances and pensions.

BCCL

Even though they passengers and crew have been presumed dead, the search for the missing flight will continue.

More than 201 search and rescue sorties, using all suitable aircraft at our disposal were undertaken. Approximately 2,17,800 square nautical miles have been covered multiple times by these aircraft, during the search.

BCCL

The IAF AN-32 with carrying, 29 people, including 21 military personnel, six crew members and two civilians, was on its way to Port Blair when it disappeared from radar on July 22.

India had launched one of the largest search and rescue operations in recent years, to trace the the missing flight, but to no avail.
Weeks after Prime Minister of Bahrain Khalifa Bin Salman Al Khalifa offered financial help to Dana Majhi, who was in in the news for walking ten 10 km carrying wife's body on his shoulder, the Prince has fulfilled his promise.

Majhi on Thursday collected a cheque of Rs 8.87 lakh from officials of the embassy of Bahrain, in Delhi on Thursday.

BCCL

It was a gift from the Prime Minister of Bahrain Prince Khalifa Bin Salman Al Khalifa. The Prince, from one of the world's richest royal families, like the rest of the world had been moved by the sight of Majhi, a tribal man, trying to carry his dead wife back home after she died at the district hospital in Bhawanipatna.

bahrain-talk

Majhi told media persons, at a press conference arranged by his well-wishers, that he would deposit the money in the bank for his three daughters to use someday. "I don't know who gave me the money, but I was told that Bahrain prince donated the money after learning about my story," he told the media.

BCCL

On August 24, Majhi lost his wife - his first wife had also died giving birth to his daughter - to tuberculosis. Reportedly, unable to find help from the hospital staff, Majhi had decided to walk back home with his wife.

BCCL

Ten kilometers along the road, a reporter had filmed his tragedy, which had gone viral after that. Life has since not been the same. Majhi has been surrounded by curious, sympathetic and interested people who have stepped up to help the man who had but his teenage daughter in his saddest moment.

After the haunting images went viral, help poured in for Majhi who was too poor to hire a hearse last month. Since then he has received other donations including Rs 5 lakh from Sulabh International.

The state administration, under Naveen Patnaik's government, which was criticised for abandoning him had also extended Rs 30,000 and benefits under state schemes for the poor including money for a pucca house under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana.

Majhi's children have also been admitted to the Bhubaneswar's Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences.
Brahumdagh Bugti a Geneva based Baloch leader and the president of Baloch Republican Party might soon get Indian citizenship. According to reports in Pakistan media India has in principle agreed to grant citizenship to him.

Geo News quoting sources said Bugti will formally apply for citizenship after a meeting of his party's officials in Geneva on 18th-19th September. Read more

1. India Is The Fourth Worst Affected Country By Terrorism, Maoists The Biggest Threat

The world witnessed 11,774 terror attacks in 2015, in which 28,328 people were killed and 35,320 injured. India was the fourth worst-affected country after Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, with 43% of 791 attacks in the country carried out by Naxalites. A total of 289 Indians died in terror strikes.

Data collected by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism contracted with the US state department revealed that Taliban, Islamic State and Boko Haram were the three deadliest terror groups globally. They were followed by CPI (Maoist), a banned outfit. Read more

2. At Least 16 People From Across Maharashtra Lost Their Lives During Ganpati Visarjan

The immersion of thousands of idols of the elephant-headed ended in most parts of Maharashtra on a tragic note with at least 16 visarjan-related deaths in the 24 hours to Friday morning, officials said. So far, two people are reportedly missing.

At least seven deaths took place in Nashik during immersion ceremonies in the district lashed by rains since Thursday. Read more

3. Four Men Arrested For The Gangrape Of Two Teenagers In Delhi

An open expanse abutting a slum in outer Delhi's Aman Vihar, the haunt of the area's lovers, became the site of a shocking incident when two girls aged 17 and 18 were allegedly gang-raped by five youngsters. The male friends of the girls were thrashed by the youths, some of whom may even be minors, when they fought back.

Relying on the description provided by the girls, police arrested four of the youths on Thursday. Read more

4. Bengaluru Police On The Hunt For Woman Who Allegedly Led The Group Who Torched KPN Buses

Three days after an angry mob torched 42 vehicles belonging to Tamil Nadu-based private travel firm, KPN, at D'souza Nagar, a police probe has revealed that an unidentified woman was controlling and instigating the mob.

The woman is now the main suspect in the case after police arrested seven youths, reported to be part of the violent mob confessed to the woman's role in the arson attack. Read more

5. All 29 Onboard The Missing AN-32 Presumed Dead Says Indian Air Force

Nearly two months after it went missing the Indian Air Force has formally informed the families of those on board the ill fated flight are presumed to be dead.

PTI quoting IAF sources reported that the presumed death certificate were issued so that the families of those missing could complete the administrative and legal formalities including claiming insurances and pensions. Read more

6. Armed With Chilli Powder, Gang Steals 950 iPhones Worth Rs 2.5 Cr From A Truck In Delhi

The incident happened near Vasant Kunj in south Delhi, late on Tuesday night. Kalam Singh, a truck driver was on his way to Dwarka with a consignment of iPhones when he came under attack.

According to Singh, while he was approaching Vasant Kunj, someone threw a packet containing a red powder into his truck's cabin. He presumed it to be a prank by children, but soon felt his eyes and skin smarting. Read more
With Vijaya Mallya being arrested in London today, the speculation whether he will be extradited to India or not has once again started gathering storm. Mallya who is accused of syphoning off a mammoth Rs 9,000 crores of loan taken from different banks in India was on run away and India had been trying to extradite him from United Kingdom ever since he fled to London last year.

But extradition is far more confusing and difficult a process than what it sounds like and it would be tough nut to crack for the government to extradite Mallya from UK despite him being arrested.

Here is all you need to know about extradition, why it is difficult to execute and who are the main people whom India hasn't been able t extradite till now despite its herculean efforts.

Whether it's the 1993 Mumbai blast accused Dawood Ibrahim, 26/11 masterminds Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi and Hafeez Saeed, or the defaulter liquor barren Vijay Mallya - India has a long list of people who it seeks to extradite from different countries.

But with the UK's recent denial to extradite Mallya and Pakistan's perennial jiggery-pokery in handing over Dawood, Lakhvi and Saeed - three of India's most wanted, a majority of diplomatic attempts have been futile.

In fact, most of us don't even know the basics. What is extradition? What are the conditions mandatory to extradite somebody? How many countries does India has an extradition treaty with?

Well, look no further.

What is extradition?

Extradition refers to the surrender of a criminal to one country by another. The process of extradition is regulated by treaties between the two countries. Extradition is important because it helps to maintain the sanctity of the penal code of one country or territory. The penal code says that it shouldn't apply its criminal law to a person who committed an offence outside its territories except when the crime is related to the country's national interest.

What are the internationally accepted conditions for extradition?

1. The crime done by the accused should fall in the category of dual criminality. This means that it should be a punishable offence according to the laws of both countries - the one where the accused has taken refuge, and the one that seeks extradition. For example, homosexuality is an offence in India under section 377 of the IPC, but in many countries of the West, it is legal. Therefore, India can't request any western country to extradite a person who is charged with a homosexuality-related offence.

AFP

2. Persons charged for political reasons are generally not extradited.

3. There are countries where capital punishment is banned. If a fugitive has taken refuge in such a country, and if the establishment of that country thinks that, if extradited, the accused might get capital punishment, the country most likely refuses to extradite. For instance Australia, Canada, Macao, Mexico, and most European nations refuse to extradite a criminal if the person in question might get capital punishment after his extradition.

Extradition laws in India

In India, the Extradition Act, 1962, regulates the surrender of a person to another country or the request for arrest of a person in a foreign land. According to the act, any conduct by a person in India or elsewhere mentioned in a list of extradition offences punishable with a minimum one year of imprisonment qualifies for an extradition request.

TOI

The process of extradition is to be initiated by the central government. Currently, India has extradition treaties with 38 countries.

If there is no treaty with the country from which the fugitive is to be extradited, then there arent any defined guidelines for the law to be applied and procedure to be followed. In such a scenario, a lot depends on the cooperation and coordination between different authorities of the two countries. Another option is to resort to a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty wherein both countries agree to exchange information in order to enforce criminal laws.

If the extradition request comes from two or more countries, then the government has the right to take the call to decide which country is fittest for the request. Since 2002, India has extradited 44 fugitive criminals to various countries. On the contrary, India has got 61 criminals extradited to itself from different countries since 2002.

What are the conditions under which the government can deny extradition?

1. In case the government believes that the case is trivial, and it thinks that the surrendering of the person is not being made in good faith, or in the interests of justice, or for political reasons, it can deny the request.

2. If the surrender is barred by time in the law of the country which seeks extradition, then also the person can't be extradited from India.

3. The government can also stop the process if it feels that the person will be charged with an offence not mentioned in the extradition treaty.

4. The government can put extradition on hold if it feels the person accused will be charged for a lesser offence disclosed by the authorities.

5. If the person is serving a jail term for an offence on Indian soil, which is different from the offence for which the person is wanted abroad, then also the extradition process can be stopped. Similarly if a fugitive criminal has committed an offence which is punishable with death in India, while the laws of the foreign state do not provide death for the same offence, the criminal will get life imprisonment in India.

http://cbi.nic.in/



Who are the major criminals India seeks to extradite?

1. Warren Anderson

indiatvnews

The main accused in the 1984 Bhopal Gas Tragedy, the CEO of Union Carbide, Warren M Anderson managed to flee India after the mayhem. The government of India sought his extradition from the US, but all efforts were futile as in 2014, he breathed his last in the US.

2. Ottavio Quattrocchi

AFP

The prime accused in the Bofors scandal that tarnished the otherwise clean image of former PM Rajiv Gandhi is still far from being extradited. India has been trying for extradition since the late 1980s, but all efforts seem to have gone in vain.

3. Dawood Ibrahim

The don aka bhai aka Dawood is the prime accused in the series of bomb blasts in 1993 in Mumbai. According to conjecture, and some credible intelligence sources, Dawood lives in Pakistan's commercial capital Karachi, but India, till date, hasn't been able to extradite him.

4. Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi

AFP

Lakhvi is the alleged mastermind behind the 26/11 attacks in Mumbai. In the recent development, all charges against him have been called off in the trial he is under in Pakistan.

5. Hafeez Saeed

AFP

The co-conspirator with Lakhvi in the 26/11 attacks on Mumbai.

6. Vijay Mallya

AFP

Vijay Mallya is accused of siphoning off Rs 9000 crores from different banks in India that he took as loans. Despite India's attempts, UK has denied the request to extradite him to India.

Abu Salem

He was convicted for the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts case, and the murder of music baron Gulshan Kumar in 1996 along with 50 other cases. On 20 September 2002, he was arrested along with Bollywood actress Monica Bedi, by Interpol in Lisbon, Portugal. In February 2004, a Portugal court cleared his extradition to India to face trial in the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts case.

In November 2005, Portuguese authorities handed him over to India on the assurance by the Government of India that the death penalty would not be handed out. In March 2006, a special TADA court filed eight charges against him and his alleged associate Riaz Siddiqui for his role in the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts case. He stands accused of ferrying and distributing weapons.

AFP

A lower court in Portugal cancelled his extradition to India for violation of deportation rules by Indian authorities by instituting fresh cases against him which attracted the death penalty. In July 2012, the Portuguese Supreme Court of Justice questioned the legal right of Indian authorities to challenge the cancellation of the extradition order.

Abu Salem is currently incarcerated in high-security Arthur Jail in India.
Brahumdagh Bugti a Geneva based Baloch leader and the president of Baloch Republican Party might soon get Indian citizenship.

According to reports in Pakistan media, India has in principle agreed to grant citizenship to him.

Geo News

Geo News quoting sources said Bugti will formally apply for citizenship after a meeting of his party's officials in Geneva on 18th-19th September.

"Everything is agreed and settled between the Indian government and Brahumdagh. He will submit his official request to the Indian mission in Geneva after getting endorsement from his party," the source told Geo News.

"We will use Indian papers to travel around the world to campaign against Pakistan and to highlight our case. We have openly thanked Narendra Modi for his support and we are no more hiding anything. We have no other option. We do not care what our opponents think of our support for Modi and his support for us," the source from BRP added.

BRP

The development comes nearly two weeks after he appealed for political asylum for Baloch activists including him in India. According to the BRP, India which provided political asylum to Dalai Lama against Chinese objection should have no problem in accommodating him.

Also read: Pakistan's Raw Nerve, Balochistan - A Story Of Occupation, Human Rights Violations And Genocide

There were also reports that Switzerland had turned down his plea for asylum in the country.

33-year-old Bugti is the grandson of Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti, the man who led the Baloch uprising for decades. Akbar Bugti was killed in a Pakistan military operation ordered by the then President Pervez Musharraf in 2006.

His killing had triggered unprecedented revolt against Pakistan in Balochistan, with a call for outright independence. Brahumdagh Bugti fled his hometown Dera Bugti in Balochistan in 2006 following the assassination of his grandfather.

BRP

Ever since he has been an active international campaigner against Pakistan's atrocities in Balochistan.
The face of the Brussels terror attack, Jet Airways crew member Nidhi Chaphekar, is limping back to normalcy: she has now finally gone off crutches. Chaphekar, who underwent a minor ear surgery at Breach Candy hospital on Wednesday, also won a bravery award from the Air Passengers' Association of India recently .

img.thesun

A family member said that doctors at the hospital performed a tympanoplasty to repair a hole in the eardrum caused due to the bomb blast that went off at the Brussels airport in March.

The surgery went off smoothly and she will be discharged in a day, said her husband Rupesh Chaphekar. Nidhi, who was on crutches since the time she returned from Belgium--that is, for almost five months--has managed to go off crutches.

Also Read: Jet Airways Brings Back 242 Stranded Indians Home From Brussels To Moist Eyes And Hugs! #Respect

Nidhi said, "It is slightly difficult to walk without support, but I have been managing for the last few days. I have been using the walker for the last five months. Without the walker, it is sometimes painful as the ankle surgery is still pending. But I am trying to do things independently with support from my family members."

BCCL

On the bravery award given to her by the Air Passengers' Association of India, one of her family members said, "She was not informed about it, but she got to know about it from her colleagues and we are all proud of her." Jet Airways plans to give her the award in a separate ceremony soon.

Also Read: One Of The Suspected Bombers Who Attacked Brussels Airport Arrested, Belgian Media Reports

Though her ankle surgery is still pending, Chaphekar is planning to join work soon."She may not be allowed to get back to her routine job soon, but she may consider going to the office for two to three hours for a few days in the week if her organisation permits," said a family member, adding doctors have not yet permitted her to take up her usual assignment as a cabin crew member.

BCCL

About the picture that made her the global face of the attacks, Nidhi had earlier told TOI: "The picture gave my family a sense of relief that I was alive for the eight hours when nobody could contact me. There was hope that I could be traced. I am glad it was clicked."

Also Read: Photos And Videos Which Capture The Horror Of Todays Terror Attack In Brussels

While many found the picture offensive, Chaphekar's husband Rupesh and their two children, they told her later, could only see their tigress fighting for her life despite her wounds.
She's been a rebel even while growing up in the small town of Siliguri. But today, after receiving the Innovator of the Year Award, 2016 in San Francisco, Honey Bajaj (30) feels her hard-work has paid off with her eternal desire to invent.

Honey Bajaj

Honey, who is currently a researcher and a student pursuing a Masters in science and engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, (MIT) Cambridge, has been in the world of innovation for eight years now. Alexandria - an emergency response device for the deaf and hard of hearing (2016), a low-cost infant warmer (developed in 2010 and available in 16 countries), Kisana  an application for farmers to boost agricultural productivity (2007), a manual and solar-powered water-filter for army jawans that converts snow into drinking water (2006) and a device for autistic children to read and write better (2009) are some of the exemplary concepts, designs and products that Honey has worked on.

It is AVIR Labs, her latest initiative at MIT, soon to start clinical trials in rural India, which has earned her the award in the field of healthcare at Flight 2 Freedom Summit held last month in San Francisco.

AVIR Labss first project, Udaan, is a low-cost diagnostic mobile kit using a smartphone that empowers a community health worker (known as accredited social health activists or ASHAs) to screen maternal and infant health to bring a paradigm shift in maternal deaths. According to WHO, 830 women die each day due to pregnancy and childbirth complications and 99% of these deaths occur in developing countries.

Honey Bajaj

Currently 700,000 ASHAs are women selected and trained to work in their communities. The ASHAs face challenges such as gender bias, digital illiteracy, lack of resources, insufficient training and limited credibility.

While for us in cities, healthcare services are available a few steps or even a call away, in most Indian villages, even a weighing machine for assessing a babys health is rarely available, explains Honey over a call from her home in Cambridge.

At present, villagers suffering from any illness go about dealing with it on basis of assumptions. For most villagers a primary healthcare centre could be anywhere between 20-50 kms away. People wait for long for their disease/problem to escalate before which they can go and seek treatment as its a major task in itself to access this basic facility. Udaan seeks to empower the ASHA so that the screening of a problem can be done at the primary stage, explained Honey.

What does the award mean to her? My journey has been full of barriers and the road less travelled. Making it this far is a validation of all that I have been striving for. she says thoughtfully.

What could have been a hurdle for one who has an impressive portfolio of innovations, conceptualising and developing path-breaking products, devices and applications?

I don't know where to start... girls in our society are expected to fit in a box of what they should and should not do. Be it travelling or riding a motorbike, people have dissuaded me from all, but I went on to do them, says Honey. There has been a time when she has lived on $10 a day for over two months between 2014 and 2015, but did not give up.

Honey Bajaj

Coming from a traditional family, her parents wanted her to pursue an MBA or pursue a career in HR. Though her heart was in design and innovation, she interned with a bank after completing schooling. But soon realised that she was not cut for the job.

I never stood first in the class and always questioned the convent education system. We need to contextualise and innovate as per the needs of India. Honey believes.

Contextualising requires identifying the gaps and developing accordingly which requires experimentation. But people think experimenting is synonymous with failure. If you are an experimenter and it does not succeed, you are labelled a failure.

Honey Bajaj

Wanting to put behind the discouragements and negativity, the lady does not want to recollect how her family reacted to her dreams around 2014. Society can have a huge control over one's life she feels. They still live in the community back home, is all she says.

The year 2014 has been the most difficult for her so far she recounts. It is a personal trait that whenever I'm low, I seek to gain skills and improve myself, she says. Thus, she drove over 2000 miles from Delhi to Leh  one of the most difficult routes in the country, in 20 days in August 2014 to learn from hardships of others living in extreme environments, and to push physical and mental strength completed a paragliding pilot certificate in December of the same year.

Honey Bajaj

Honeys is also a story of sheer determination and perseverance. After completing the first year of English Honours from Delhi University, she realised her heart was totally in design and enrolled for the Product Design at Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology, Bangalore. Her last year at English course (2006) ran parallel to her first year of design.

I was putting 16 hours a day in the design program, but did not want to waste two years of life given to English. Plus, I wanted to get the English degree to help me in pursuing future education,says Honey.

In her first designed product  Step Forward (2006)  she developed a water filter for Indian Army which converts snow into potable water by using manual and solar energy only. By this, Honey addressed a problem that had stayed with her since her early teens, when she accompanied her father to the army camps in Siliguri. She had seen how army men stationed at high altitudes faced a crisis of drinking water.

Honey Bajaj

In the years since, she has been in the area of innovating products and improving quality of life for people from various segments of society. Nest (2010)  the infant warmer she co-invented as part of Embrace Innovations, is perhaps the best among her innovative designs so far. Nest is a low-cost infant warmer for at-home use in rural areas of developing countries where millions of premature babies suffer/die due to absence of the traditional costly incubators.

On a field trip to a village outside Bangalore, Honey met family members of a baby girl whose life was saved after being kept in Nest. Full of gratitude, they requested Honey to name the baby. When I said I could not do that, they asked me if they could name her Honey... that was the biggest moment of my life. I know someone somewhere in this world is named after me, Honey says.

Honey Bajaj

All her projects have had a humble starting in India and won her accolades across the globe. Nest, for one, is being manufactured and distributed through a non-profit programme across 16 countries. In 2009, she created a device that helps autistic children learn, read and write better and in 2008, when they were yet to be introduced to iPads, she worked on a project that created a digital tablet. While on a winter break in 2008, she reached out to Wikipedia and worked on a project that helps create linguistic data for the free Internet encyclopedia.

The device for autistic kids was shaped out of empathy as I had done community service for a children society in Bangalore and that had stayed with me... but I chose to do the WikiBabel project to improve user interfaces for budding writers on digital platforms, explains Honey.

The intent of innovation is not just creating something new but also empowering communities and bringing awareness and smiles on users' face, she says passionately.

But its not all work and no play for this go-getter. I am a fun-loving, happy person! And I love dancing! I have certificates of dance participation from almost all colleges in Delhi University and have danced at national and international platforms too! explains the folk and free-style dancer. At present, she's taking courses in fencing and pistol-firing at MIT.

For her second year at MIT, shes been awarded the prestigious MIT Legatum Fellowship and the excitement shows in her voice and on her Facebook posts. But its impossible to believe it when you hear her talking about how she reached MIT.

Honey Bajaj

After completing graduation, working with various organisations and doing innumerable design workshops for over 4000 students across India, she wanted to grow further. In June 2015 I applied to MIT and received an acceptance letter but I had no money or personal assets for a bank loan to take me there, Honey says.

Within a week she started a crowdfunding campaign and collected over $2500 in five days, which she realised will not take her to MIT. With nothing to lose she reached out to 10 of the world's biggest philanthropists. Some emails bounced while there was no reply to some phone calls. Then I got a response from Mr Ratan Tata. It changed my life. It was empowering for a small town girl from Siliguri to make it MIT. said Honey, who got the full scholarship for year one at MIT.

Honey Bajaj

Then on, there has been no looking back for this girl. She is working towards launching Udaan soon. If all goes well, Udaan should be working in full-fledged mode in about a year's time from now.

She aims to continue working for those at the bottom of the pyramid. A lot is being done for those at the top of this pyramid. I wish to build a technology company that builds quality products for the bottom of the pyramid. More importantly, empowers women.
The ubiquitous 'selfie' has been turned into a weapon to fight online abuse of women in Madhya Pradesh.

Girls in Hoshangabad district of the state are actively participating in a campaign called 'TI mera bhai hai' (TI stands for thana incharge) - a brainchild of the local police.

expertmedia/Representative image

Under the campaign, school and college girls have been asked to click selfies with the local police station in-charge and upload them as display pictures (DP) on their WhatsApp profiles with the status message 'TI mera bhai hai' (the TI is my brother).

The police feel that this would deter stalkers on social media. More than 500 girls took selfies with the TI within a week after the campaign started.

expertmedia/Representative image

"WhatsApp stalking is emerging as a major problem these days. While thinking on how to resolve the issue, the idea of selfie with TI came to my mind. When the TI was sent to schools and colleges to meet girls and explain to them this idea, we got an overwhelming response," said AP Singh, Hoshangabad superintendent of police.

"A DP of a selfie with a policewala in uniform is enough to scare a stalker. But if he still presses on, we have our `traditional' ways to solve the problem."

Police in Hoshangabad district (80km from Bhopal) had received many complaints of WhatsApp stalking in the last few months. Most of the complainants had received obscene pictures and vulgar texts from different numbers. In one case, the stalker had threatened the student with uploading her picture and mobile number on porn websites.

"Girls were very excited to take selfies with me. Each and everyone wanted to have a picture. I have not only allowed selfies but have also exchanged my numbers with these students in case they need it," said Mahendra Singh Chouhan, TI of Kotwali police station, taking the unique campaign ahead.

mppolice/Representative image

Like AP Singh, SPs across 51 districts of the state have planned different strategies in their region in a run-up to the `best practices' award announced by DGP Rishi Kumar Shukla.

Last week, more than 12 best practice initiatives were reported, of which three, including the citizen-cop mobile application by Indore police, were shortlisted.
ELKO  Sept. 10, World Suicide Prevention Day, was also the 11th anniversary Walk in Memory Walk for Hope in Elko sponsored by Nevada Coalition for Suicide Prevention.

Every year the number of participants increases in the 5K Walk. Sadly, we are there to support one another who has lost a loved one or friend to suicide and in hopes to prevent more suicides.

On Sept. 8 Survivors of Suicide Loss of Northeastern Nevada hosted a More Than Sad: Suicide prevention and mental health form at Great Basin College Theater. In attendance were about 30 community members to learn about suicide prevention and mental health.

Suicide is a health concern in Nevada, in our own backyard, Elko County. Tuni Theonnes, Behavioral Health Services at A+ Total Care, was one of the presenters at the forum. Theonnes stated in her practice at least one person on a daily basis wants to end their life.

Suicide is a big concern in Elko County, she said. Im going to be frank. Why are there only 30 people here in attendance? Where is everybody?

Where is that line for you, if your wife, your child, husband, friend or family member is not emotionally getting better, they are miserable and suffering. How much and how far are you willing to go? When do you decide enough is enough and do something constructive about your misery or their misery?

Dont think this cant happen to you in your own backyard. Suicide knows no age, no economic status, no race, or no religion. Suicide can happen to any family, at any time.

What is the answer to stopping suicides? Communication and education. Listen to those who are begging for help through verbal communication or red flags of a suicidal person. Educate yourself by reading and attending classes on how to prevent suicides and what to do if you or someone you know is suicidal.

Break the stigma in seeking professional help for mental health. If you broke your leg you would consult a doctor to cast your leg. You need to consult your primary care doctor, counselor, or psychologist for your emotional health. Your mind is more complicated. It is not as easy to detect problems within your brain.

There is help and there is hope for a better, complete life by advocating for yourself and for others. Stop suicides, it can happen in your backyard.
The bail granted to Mohammad Shahabuddin  former MP from Siwan  is like death sentence for 70-year-old Chandrakeshwar Prasad aka Chanda Babu and his ailing wife Kalawati Devi, who reside in a small squalid in Siwan  barely 5 km away from Pratappur, the village of the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) muscles man.

But does the elderly couple think so?

Their three among four young sons were brutally murdered allegedly by henchmen of the undisputed lord of Siwan's underworld. Their two sons  Girish Raj (20) and Satish Raj (25)  were drenched in acid before being killed at Pratappur, about 7 km southwest of Siwan district headquarters town and 150 km northwest of Patna, on August 16, 2004.

Indiatimes

Their third son Rajeev Raushan, who was the only eyewitness in the double-murder case, was later murdered in Siwan on June 16, 2014. In his statement before the court, he had said that he had seen Shahabuddin on the spot when his brothers were bathed with acid before being killed.

Taking to Indiatimes, Chanda Babu recalled what happened that fateful day. Here's what he said:

I had two shops  one grocery and the other a departmental store  on Goshala Road in Siwan town. We were not rich but the income from the two shops was enough to make ends meet. I was the father of six  four sons and two daughters. On August 16, 2004, I was in Patna for work and staying with my brother who was an officer with Reserve Bank of India posted in the city.

The two shops were opened with Satish taking care of the grocery shop and Girish dealing with customers at the departmental store. Before leaving for Patna, I had got a ransom demand of Rs 2 lakh.

A truck loaded with Dalda had just arrived and we had Rs 2.5 lakh in cash to make the payment. The henchmen of the don-turned-politician reached my grocery shop and asked for the ransom money demanded earlier. Satish offered them Rs 30,000-40,000 pleading that we do not have Rs 2 lakh to pay them.

The armed criminals picked up a quarrel with my son and looted Rs 2.5 lakh.

Rajiv suddenly reached the shop. Witnessing that his brother is being mercilessly thrashed, he took a bottle of diluted acid kept in an adjoining bathroom and threatened to throw it on the goons. Girish was unaware of the entire incident.

The Hindu

The criminals fled the spot returned with several others. They looted our shops, set them on fire, picked up Satish, Girish and Rajeev and took them to the don's native village Pratappur.

Rajeev was separated from his two brothers and held captive in a sugarcane field. Satish and Girish were brutally tortured. Rajeev heard Shahabuddin saying that since Girish had threatened to pour acid at his men, he should learn how acid hurts human beings.

His men then bathed Girish and Satish with acid and then hacked them to death. Rajeev somehow managed to escape from their custody after two days.

I got an anonymous call and the caller informed me that my two sons have been killed and the third is in their custody. I was asked not to dare enter Siwan. I was helpless and decided to stay in Patna.

I got another call the day Rajeev escaped and the caller gave false information that Rajeev has met an accident and is admitted in PMCH (Patna Medical College & Hospital). I was asked to come over there. In fact, it was a conspiracy to eliminate me.

I went to Siwan after few days and tried to meet the then superintendent of police (SP) but I was not allowed to do so. I met then Station House Officer (SHO) of the police station concerned. To my utter surprise, he too suggested me to leave the town instead of helping me and proving security to our family.

Already terrified, I felt helpless. I could not go to see my wife and a physically challenged son as to how they are living. I had no information about my son as to whether he is alive or dead.

I came back to Patna and managed to meet netaji (RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav) at his residence in the state capital. When I apprised him of my sufferings, he lost cool and told me why I came to meet him with a complaint from Siwan.

I then moved to Delhi to meet Sonia ji (Congress President Sonia Gandhi). Although she could not meet, Rahul ji (Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi) gave me time. He assured me of strong action against the culprits.

The assurance was like a ray of light for me in my lone battle. After returning from Delhi, I gathered courage to go to Siwan again. I wanted to hand over a letter to the SP and therefore, asked some of my neighbours to accompany me but all of them refused fearing Shahabuddins terror.

I went to the SPs residence in the wee hours with my face covered. Finally, the SP met me but he was also of no help. I gave him my letter and urged him to provide us security which he refused. He too suggested me to leave the town as it was not safe for me.

Facebook

I was extremely disappointed and this disappointment gave me courage to fight back and face all the hurdles that come in the way. I decided to stay in Siwan.

I met an angel in the form of the then DIG who directed the SP to provide us security. He told the SP if the district administration does not have additional policemen, he would give some jawans from Bihar Military Police (BMP) to ensure our security.

One day, Rajeev returned home safely. I dont have words to describe the moment when we saw him alive. Later we got him married.

But destiny had something else stored for us. Eighteen days after his marriage, he was shot dead on June 16, 2014 when returning from court after testifying. (Shahabuddin is named as a conspirator in Rajeevs murder case, for which the trial is going on).

This is how Shahabuddin destroyed our lives and a happy family. I am not the lone survivor, there are several others who have lost their loved ones for refusing to dance on his tune.
Pakistanis love to live as if there is no tomorrow and one example of this was seen during the holidays of the recently concluded Eid-al-Adha, when more than 4800 people landed in various hospitals after overeating. As per Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS), some 973 patients with acute gastroenteritis, mainly caused by overeating meat products, were brought to PIMS. Polyclinic reported 450 such cases in the same period.

Doctors, however, say that a majority of the cases weren't serious and the patients were discharged after basic treatment.

AFP

If a person normally eats half-a-plate of meat on a normal day and then [on Eid days] stuffs himself with four plates of meat in one day, hes definitely going to upset his stomach, Polyclinic media coordinator Sharif Astori was quoted in Pakistan's The Express Tribune. PIMS head Dr Javed Akram later told The Express Tribune that almost three quarters of the patients were men, 21 percent were women, whereas nearly 5 percent were kids.

Lahore alone saw more than 1500 people being rushed to hospitals after the complain of stomach ache caused by food poisoning and gastroenteritis, including some who were brought after they met with accidents in different areas of the city. At least 120 people were admitted to various hospitals for orthopaedic surgery and 90 people were brought to emergency wards with injuries caused by knives during animal slaughtering.

Alamy

Dr Salman Kazmi of Mayo Hospital in Lahore told The Express Tribune At least 300 gastro patients were brought to the hospital in three days. The hospital treated 20 people who had suffered cuts while slaughtering animals. At least 100 gastro patients and 30 people injured in road accidents were admitted to Jinnah Hospital, said Dr Asad Ali who was treating patients at the emergency ward.

Ali further added that hospital staff attended to more than 500 patients in emergency during Eid holidays and a majority of the cases were of indigestion, nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain and diarrhoea. The emergency ward was jam-packed with patients on the first day of Eid, Ali was quoted. Dr Azeem of Services Hospital later said that he was called into an emergency by the hospital due to a huge rush of people suffering from knife injuries, road accidents and gastro. The rush at the emergency wards reflects on our social behaviour, he said. Doctors advised people to eat moderately, but to no avail, Dr Azeem added.

While Lahore was battling abdominal chaos, Karachi had its share of problems. Around 3,000 patients visited the accident and emergency wards of Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC) during the first three days of Eid, The Express Tribune quoted JPMC official, Dr Javed Jamali. Further explaining, Dr Jamali said that most people consumed red meat beyond their capacity during the festival. Patients had consumed red meat twice or thrice a day since the first day of Eid. Our body organs are not used to the excessive meat we consume during Eid, added Dr Jamali.
"We are an established business in the heart of Cape Breton, rich in jobs, land, and potential, but no people."

A beautiful community in the Canadian town of Cape Breton has everything one can hope for. It has jobs, lands, and a whole lot of opportunities. Now all it needs is people who are willing to call it their home.

Dan Maclean/The Farmer's Daughter Country Market

Situated in Nova Scotia, the town's beauty is positively affected by all seasons, with ample beauty to keep you company for life. With a population of just 150,000 people, the community is now ready to welcome more folks.

Dan Maclean/The Farmer's Daughter Country Market

And running the show here is The Farmer's Daughter Country Market that is a bakery-cum-general store with good amounts of jobs and lands to offer.

The Farmer's Daughter Country Market

So after they hired all the locals they could find to match their business requirements, they posted the following call for people on Facebook. Anyone who wishes to move and fits their prerequisites will be offered not only a job but also two acres of land.

Sounds too good to be true? Well, the best part is that it is true.
Were excited to announce that indmin.com is now part of fastmarkets.com.

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A compromise appeared overnight in the impasse in terms of the appointments of new board members for the non-systemic Attica Bank , with government officials pointing to a reshuffle of proposed candidates in order to gain the Bank of Greeces approval.
ELKO  The Elko Regional Airport continues its search for a restaurant to operate in the facility through different marketing strategies and will advertise the spaces availability.

The Elko City Council unanimously voted to reject all bids associated with the concession area and re-advertise for proposals.

The airport received one bid, which did not include financial statements  an essential component to the process.

If this does not come to fruition, Airport Director Mark Gibbs said he would bring the subject before the council again and work with City Manager Curtis Calder.

However, Calder advised Gibbs to place an ad in the newspaper as the City manager would like to cast the net as far as possible to hopefully find a good, local concessionaire to take that on and do a good job.

The City has seen this before and thinks it can happen again, said Calder.

The airport serves over 33,000 travelers each year through Delta Air Lines flights by SkyWest, said Gibbs on the airport website.

Wed really like to see a startup restaurant go out there and be successful, because their success is our success, he said, explaining that it is a benefit to the City to have a concessionaire in that space due to its investment in the equipment.

This concession is based on sales, said Calder, who was not aware of upfront costs.

Gibbs called it the sweetest deal for a start up restaurant that he has found, explaining there is 5 percent revenue sharing of up to $10,000 per-month. All utilities, rodent and pest control, code requirements for annual inspections as well as maintenance of the equipment and the marquee on Mountain City Highway are paid for by the City.

However, if the revenue increases so does the percentage given to the City.

He cited the statistic that two-thirds of startup restaurants fail in the United States within the first year and success seems to be a gray area.

Gibbs called the potential venture a turnkey operation, while recognizing the challenges of opening a restaurant in an airport environment and the benefit to airport patrons.

The more successful they are, the more successful we are, said Calder, telling the the council there is hope of finding the right fit, especially in consideration of previous success when Flying Fish was located there.

This business sometimes contributed to higher cost-sharing percentages, said Calder, which aided in an increased revenue.

Calder said he did not think the previous business models attracted customers outside of the airport.

If the City cannot find a restaurant, Calder would like to explore options to place vending machines to still provide customers with food and beverages.

Following a question from Mayor Chris Johnson, Calder said the business could be open any time the airport is, but the City would like to ensure the restaurant provides for Elkos morning and afternoon flights.

There is also free and two-hour parking on the premises.

Johnson said there could be a lot of potential and it is a great building.

Councilman Reece Keener suggested trying to attract a different ethnic variety of food not currently available in Elko. In pursuit of this, he suggested advertising in the Reno Gazette-Journal online and possibly in a Sunday paper.

That was one thing that was really unique when the Flying Fish was there. That was the only source of sushi, he said.
Greeces education ministry on Friday denied same-day press reports claiming that representatives of the countrys institutional creditors demanded a revocation of recent legislation extending increased job security to educators in the private sector
Home Sign up for our FREE Daily Email Newsletter How Do You Handle a Problem Like Rodrigo Duterte? By Peter Lee September 16, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - " China Matters " - - Awkwardly, apparently. Awkward facts surrounding Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte's awkward estrangement from the United States seem to produce some awkward reporting. I have a piece up at Asia Times about Sonofawhore-gate i.e. Philippine President Rodrigo Dutertes alleged insult delivered to President Obama that got the Duterte-Obama confab in Laos canceled, and was breathlessly reported in much of the Western press to the exclusion of the issues Duterte was raising: Truth and Duterte in Media Crosshairs.

Read it. Repeatedly! Tweet it! And tell your family and friends. Gotta build traffic.

As a langniappe, it provides a deep dive into what was apparently the most important issue in US-China relations, Stairgate, the cock-up with the delivery of the motorized stairs needed for President Obama to deplane from Air Force One at the G20 meeting in Hangzhou in the proper presidential fashion.

Probably unfairlyI dont read all the coveragebut I feel reporting on Duterte has been pretty shallow in terms of explaining his attitude toward the US presence in the Philippines. Seems Ive pretty much held that corner alone. [Update: Reader GW pointed me to a fine piece by Adele Webb of the University of Sydney on the same theme. So I do not have this corner all to myself.]

Long story short, the American presence in Dutertes home ground of Mindanao has been a 115 year horror show that Duterte is trying to end. The most recent iteration is Dutertes declaration that he wants all U.S. Special Forces removed from Mindanao.

Duterte has appalled the United States not only by criticizing the US presence, but by engaging bilaterally with China on the issues brought to a head by the UNCLOS arbitral award instead of doing that shoulder-to-shoulder Pivot Thunder! thing to confront the PRC as part of a US-orchestrated united front.

Ive written some pretty nifty pieces on the issues surrounding Duterte and the US:

Mindanao, Duterte, and the Real History of the Philippines

Meiring, Murder, Subversion, and Treason: Dutertes Beef with US

Mamasapano: The Philippines Benghazi

Heres another one! focusing on the under-reported consequences of Dutertes drug war.

Dutertes first priority is the drug war which is reported in the Western press primarily through the lens of the vigilante killings.

To keep the frame on Dutertes excesses in a way that makes it easier for Human Rights Watch to flay his policies as death squads run amok for no justifiable reason, there have been interesting attempts to dismiss the Philippine drug problem as no big deal.



But apparently it really is a big deal in terms of its social costs (the Philippines has the highest rate of meth use in East Asia), multinational implications (Philippine mules are getting executed in China and in Indonesia, the Sinaloa cartel has even started exploring the Philippine as a market and source of material), and as a driver for corruption of Philippine government and security forces that reaches up to the highest level.

The actual story is that Duterte is not only using the threat of summary executions to round up addicts and pushers; hes naming names, both of cartel leaders and the national and local politicians and officers who shelter them. Its a rather thrilling high stakes gameallegations emerged this week that the bombing in Davao that killed 14 people and was apparently an assassination attempt on Duterte was actually conducted by threatened narcopoliticians, not the Abu Sayyaf Islamist bandittibut the US press has apparently shown little interest in covering these ramifications.

Also I havent seen a lot of reporting on the fact that Dutertes drug war necessitates deeper PRC-Philippine engagement in several important aspects.

First of all, the Philippine drug tradeprimarily meth, locally known as shabuis dominated by Chinese Triads by virtue of the fact that the large and poorly regulated PRC drug industry is a ready source of the intermediates needed to make the drug and also by the fact that Triads are deeply embedded in the major Chinese-diaspora presence in Filipino society. The PRC has a lot to offer in terms of tighter enforcement on the mainland and perhaps in using its good offices to encourage crackdowns in a key Triad operational base, Hong Kong.

On the other hand, the PRC can make life difficult for Duterte if it wants to, by turning a blind eye to the export-oriented meth trade. So there you have it.

Duterte made his expectations concerning PRC assistance quite clear by summoning the PRC ambassador back in August:

The Philippines government said on Wednesday it had summoned the Chinese ambassador earlier this week to explain reports that traffickers were bringing in narcotics from China, opening a new front in President Rodrigo Dutertes controversial war on drugs.

On Tuesday, the countrys police chief told a Senate hearing that China, Taiwan and Hong Kong were major sources of illegal drugs, and Chinese triads were involved in trafficking.

Foreign Affairs Secretary Perfecto Yasay told a Senate hearing on Wednesday that the Chinese ambassador had been summoned for an explanation, and the government would also send a diplomatic communication to Beijing to pursue this in a more aggressive note.

Another area of potential Philippine-PRC cooperation is PRC assistance in a crash program to rehabilitate the Philippine drug users who have turned themselves in to the police to avoid getting targeted by the death squads.

Though virtually unreported in the Western media, over 700,000 users have turned themselves in.

Let me repeat that. 700,000 drug users have turned themselves in.

And they presumably need to get a clean "rehab" chit to live safely in their communities, presenting a major challenge for the Philippines drug rehabilitation infrastructure. Duterte has called on the Philippine military to make base acreage available for additional rehab camps and the first one will apparently be at Camp Ramon Magsaysay.

Duterte has turned to the PRC to demand they fund construction of drug treatment facilities, and the PRC has obliged. According to Duterte and his spokesman, preparatory work for the Magsaysay facility has already begun.

Theres an amusing wrinkle here.

Magsaysay is the largest military reservation in the Philippines. It is also the jewel in the diadem, I might say, of the five Philippine bases envisioned for US use under EDCA, the Enhanced Defence Cooperation Agreement that officially returned US troops to Philippine bases. It looks like the US military might be sharing Magsaysay with thousands of drug usersand PRC construction workers.

I expect the Pentagon is quietly fuming at Dutertes presumption.

Duterte is understandably leaning on China to assist him with his drug war. The Philippine establishment may or may not be thoroughly corrupted by drug money, but its probably happy to restrain him by slowwalking legislation related to the war.

And although the United States quickly committed $32 million for law enforcement and training, who knows when and if itll show up and where it will end up. I also get a feeling the US wouldnt mind seeing Duterte and his drug war fall on their *sses, so the civilian and military Philippine establishment could get back to its main mission of pleasing the United States and returning to a pivot-centric foreign policy.

So Duterte is going executive decree, and twisting Chinas arm to get quick, effective facts on the ground i.e. rehab camps. I suspect the camps are absolutely essential to Dutertes plan; if he cant process the users, hell have to leave them in their communities and the drug war will be revealed as a damp squib and a farceunless the death squads are up to massacring another 700,000 people, which I think is beyond even their murderous capabilities.

It looks like Duterte thinks that the UNCLOS ruling could be put to better use extorting Chinese cooperation to house an army of drug addicts, instead of gratifying the United States by a futile attempt to evict the PRC from Scarborough Shoal (the PRC, by the way, appears to be allowing Filipino fishing boats to work the shoal, at least for now).

Interesting, no?

But an immense social and political upheaval concerning drugs and highlighting the interdependency of China and the Philippines is apparently not really worth reporting, since the designated US theme is that the existential issue for Asia is meeting the military threat of rising China by a big reboot of the US presence in the Philippines.

The US government and US-friendly Western press may be unhappy with Duterte and his tilt away from the US, but finding a news hook to demonize him is a little difficult.

For one thing, the way the US and Aquino administration structured EDCA oh-so-cleverly to avoid legislative review apparently put control of implementation completely in the hands of the President of the Philippines--who turned out not to be a pliable member of the Manila set but Rodrigo Duterte. If the US gets too pointed in its criticism, US access to bases in the Philippines, a cherished US objective since the eviction of US forces in 1993 and an important chess piece in the South China Sea, might get restricted.

Secondly, Duterte is a non-socialist business-is-business guy whose election was, as we say, free and fair. So the Philippines Putin/Chavez/Assad frame doesnt fit very well.

Third, Duterte is popular thanks to his whole-hearted prosecution of the drug war. His approvals are up in the 80s I believe.

Fourth, the US record in the Philippines is genuinely god-awful. The mission that the United States wants to focus onwhat I call the sailor suit/battleship/yo ho ho democracy and freedom confronting China in the SCSis a small fraction of the reality of the US presence in the Philippines and its corrupting penetration of the Philippines military and security forces and the Manila elite. Doing a deep dive into Americas Duterte problem means acknowledging that the US presence in the Philippines recapitulates the Indian Wars, Vietnam, and Iraq: a gigantic and bloody imperial botch.

No need, I think, to trouble the beautiful minds of American readers with the realization that Dutertes tilt away from the US is completely understandable and probably justified.

So I expect the roots of Dutertes problems with the United States will not get a particularly extensive and honest airing in the Western press.

However, I expect alternative reporting frames have to be developed to guide a bewildered readership if Duterte persists in twisting Americas bayag.

There has been some road-testing of Duterte is a paid-for Chinese stooge to explain his otherwise inexplicable lack of America love and willingness to go bilateral engagement with the PRC, but that doesnt seem to have acquired sufficient legs.

The US government and press seems to be settling into the Philippines Donald Trump mode i.e. Duterte is an unstable reactionary goon unfit for the high mission of sustaining the rules-based international order thats all the vogue these days, and blind to the fact that in the age of rising China the Philippines has no space to run a non-aligned foreign policy.

The best way to understand Duterte is to listen to him in his own words sans filter.

Heres the video of his infamous press conference before he embarked to Laos (in my AT article I incorrectly placed the presser at Manila; he was actually leaving from Davao International Airport; sorry!).



Only 19 minutes and well worth your time. At the end, youll understand Duterte and his priorities pretty well.

And at the end, you also get a harbinger of things to comeDutertes impending clash with the Manila elites who he believes are being egged on by Washington to impede his policies. In his final words, Duterte provided this characterization of the local critics who felt it was more important for Duterte to respond to questions from Obama concerning human rights abuses in the drug war than to assert Filipino sovereignty and dignity:

There are others with mental capacity of dogs who lap at the ass of the Americans.

As it transpired, Duterte discarded his prepared remarks in Vientiane to deliver a denunciation of US historical crimes in Mindanao, complete with atrocity photos.

Duterte says a lot of interesting and important things. But I doubt youll read a lot about them in the Western papers. Peter blogs at http://chinamatters.blogspot.co.uk/ See also - Fact or propaganda? President Duterte 'ordered killing of 1,000 people and fed his enemies to crocodiles ,' former hitman claims : A spokesman for Mr Duterte denied he ordered the killings and said an inquiry into the allegations set up when he was Mayor of Davao was abandoned due to a lack of evidence. Click for Spanish , German , Dutch , Danish , French , translation- Note- Translation may take a moment to load. What's your response? - Scroll down to add / read comments Sign up for our FREE Daily Email Newsletter For Email Marketing you can trust Donate



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Legion of the Tinfoil Hat By Fred Reed Conspiracy theories hold charm for such as I, who regard them as we might a species of rare insectivorous marsupials who glow in the dark, and for the conspiracy theorists themselves, who seem to derive from their conditions a satisfying sense of esoteric penetration. Yet they become wearisome by constant repetition. Some have. In particular, Nine/Eleven. In the following we will ignore the more abundantly silly theories, such as that there were no Jews in the Towers on the day of the attacks. Some thoughts:: The Pentagon At the time of Nine/Eleven, I was living in Colonial Village in Virginia, a few hundred yards from the Virginia terminus of Key Bridge. The bike path ran from there parallel to the Potomac past the Pentagon and National Airport to the Washington Sailing Marina. On the wooden deck overlooking the water a concession sold snacks and Budweiser. A mixed group of oddballs foregathered daily to socialize. One was Dave Winslow, whom we called Broadcast Dave to distinguish him from a couple of other Daves, Winslow having been involved in radio broadcasting in an earlier life. We often swapped journalism stories. His apartment was nearby. The day after the Pentagon blew up, he recounted being at home, hearing a plane coming in unusually low, looking out the window, and seeing the tail flash by, boom. So much for conspiracy theories about the Air Force attacking the Pentagon with a missile. But Fred, this guy was part of the conspiracy. Dont you see? Or oh my God, I see it now. Fred, YOU are part. Dave Winslow, actually a robot sent by the Trilateral Commission, and planted at the Washington Sailing Marina years earlier to deceive me about seeing the airplane. It was really a missile. My photo. Here missiles are tricky to discuss because of the lack of specificity. What missile, fired from what? Most of the theorists couldnt tell a TLAM from a back hoe. Reflect that firing an air-to-ground missile, probably a Hellfire and launched perhaps from an F16, would involve a lot of people: pilot, ground crew, weapons-storage bureaucracy, base commander, and so on. Those in on it would talk to others, even if ordered not to. A loadout of live munitions inside the US is very odd except for carefully scripted training missions. Those involved would talk to others. They might think, Hmmm, F16 take off with Hellfire, come back no Hellfire. Where go Hellfire? Pentagon blow up. Heap strange. But Fred, it was a super-secret outfit especially trained to attack the United States. Nobody has ever heard of them which proves they are supersecret. If the missile was a Tomahawk launched from a ship the whole crew would know of the launch. Many mouths, much talk. It would take a very odd captain to fire a cruise missile at the Pentagon. But Fred, the crew and the officers and men are in on the conspiracy. A Tomahawk Land-Attack Missile, presumably what the conspiracy people mean, if they have any idea what they mean, when they say cruise missile. Now, Flight AA77, which didnt fly into the Pentagon. There are three possibilities: First, the fight never existed. The entire travel industry would know this, along with everyone else having access to Sabre, the ticketing system. American Airlines would scream like a scalded dog at this total fabrication, There would be no insurance claim on record for loss of the plane, and so on. But Fred, the entire travel industry, along with everyone else having access to Sabre, and American Airlines, are part of the conspiracy. Second, Flight AA77 existed, and landed wherever it was supposed to. In this case the entire travel industry, American Airlines, the undead passengers, and so on, would have pointed this out. The press would have jumped on it. But Fred, the entire press corps and the passengers were part of the conspiracy. Everyone knows this. Actually, they have a point. The entire press corps must be complicit, since five phone calls would have sufficed whether the flight had existed or disappeared. Third: AA77 ran into the Pentagon. New York The Twin Towers were brought down not by airplanes, but by a controlled demolition. Possibility one: There were no airplanes. The airplanes we saw on television were done in Final Cut or other software. I have seen videos claiming this. Lets think about it. Shortly after the nonexistent planes did not ram the Towers, every television screen in Manhattan showed smoking impacts. Now, what were the most visible objects in the city? Probably the Twin Towers. What would be the reaction of everyone in New York watching the screen? Answer: Run out to look for themselves. All millions of them would notice that the screens didnt match the buildings. They didnt point this out, which can only mean that. Fred, you fool, dont you see that the entire population of Manhattan is part of the conspiracy? Possibility two: There were airplanes and a controlled detonation. Why the redundancy is not clear. The explosives were secretly placed, meaning that the entire security and maintenance staff were complicit, until some airplanes could be found to run into the buildings. Ockham, call your office. Since we have already established that the military blew up the Pentagon, it being characteristic of militaries to blow themselves up, we must assume that the military also was part of the conspiracy of the Twin Towers. That is, it seems unlikely that purely by chance the Pentagon decided to blow itself up and somebody else did the Towers the same day. Possibility three: The buildings were brought down by airplanes. Now, let us consider the controlled demolition itself. What is involved in a real demolition? From Controlled Demolition Inc. a firm that does such demolition: On March 26, 2000, the firm used 4,450 pounds of dynamite placed in 5,905 carefully sited holes and 21.6 miles (34.8 km) of detonation cord inserted over a period of four months to take down the 25,000-ton concrete roof of the Kingdome in Seattle, Washington in 16.8 seconds. The Trade Centers singly or in combination, plus Building Seven, represented a far larger project. A pawn of the government like myself might wonder how tons and tons of explosives could be placed in a fully occupied building without anyones noticing. Those doing the placing would have to have been fully qualified and highly experienced in controlled demolition. (How many of these are there, and how hard to find?) Maybe, though, the occupants of the Towers just werent paying attention. New Yorkers are famous for a tight focus on business. A businessman thinking about an international contract might easily not notice piles of rubble in the corridors, walls torn out, countless men attaching bundles of girders, the screech of saws cutting partway through steel to weaken it, and endless elevator loads of explosives in packages labeled Sex books to prevent suspicion. I imagine Marylou Nicodemi, a legal secretary, asking a man tearing down the wall of her office: What are you guys doing? Were the exterminators, maam. Weve had complaints of rats. Oh. Are you going to do this to the entire building? Yes maam. Rats re devious creatures. If you dont fight them on the lower floors, you have to fighter them on the upper floors. We have no choice. Realistically, the occupants of the towers would have to have noticedfrom which we must conclude that. Fred, they were part of the conspiracy. To kill themselves? Fred, you dont understand the lengths . On some of the conspiracy sites I have read that actually the security guards planted the explosives in a manner requiring little or no wiring, no damage to the building, and few explosives. Not only were they expert at demolitions, admittedly the norm among janitors, but much better at it than Controlled Demolition Inc. Fred, they are Illuminati, Residual Cathars, Thirty-Fifth Degree Masons, and they train in a secret base in Atlantis, with Lex Luther Running through all of this is that lots of people would be involved, yet none have come forward and blown the scam. You dont obtain many tons of explosives without leaving a paper trail. The multitudinous security people in the Towers would all have to have been carefully placed there in advance, as even one informant would have blown the whole thing. The government would have to be complicit, given that the FBI could easily have tracked down the security people. But Fred, they are all. Here is the First Law of conspiracy theories, that to protect the theory you have to expand it. The press is a good example. Any reporter would slit the throats of his entire newsroom to break that story. Instant Pulitzer, national fame, huge book contracts, a movie, choice of jobs anywhere. The paper that did it would have the story of the century. It would have been easy. Think Seymour Hersh. Yet nobody did it. The only explanation is, again, that the entire press corps. Expand the conspiracy. Fred, a keyboard mercenary with a disorganized past, has worked on staff for Army Times, The Washingtonian, Soldier of Fortune, Federal Computer Week, and The Washington Times. http://fredoneverything.org/
Frustrating The War Lobby By Stephen Kinzer September 16, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - " Boston Globe " - By trying to block a $1.15 billion arms sale to Saudi Arabia, a bipartisan group of US senators is challenging one of the key forces that shape American foreign policy: the arms industry. Their campaign shines a light on the role that this industry plays in whipping up fears of danger in the world. How do Americans know that Saudi Arabia is a peace-loving country dedicated to fighting terrorism? The same way we know that Russia is a snarling enemy on a rampage of conquest: The arms industry tells us so. We must respond to the rise of ISIS terrorism, Russian aggression on NATOs doorstep, provocative moves by Iran and North Korea, and an increasingly powerful China, the Aerospace Industry Association recently declared. Issuing warnings through its own mouthpieces, though, is not enough to shape public opinion. The industry also sponsors think tanks that obligingly issue alarming reports warning of increasing peril everywhere. Many are run by former diplomats or military commanders. Their scary warnings, which seem realistic given the warners personal prestige and the innocent-sounding names of their think tanks, are aimed at persuading Americans and foreign governments to spend more billions of dollars on weaponry. The ludicrously misnamed United States Institute for Peace, for example, is run by Stephen Hadley, a former national security adviser who also earns hundreds of thousands of dollars each year for his service on the board of Raytheon, a leading arms maker. Another arms maker, Lockheed Martin, which has just sold Poland an air-to-surface missile system and wants to sell more, has given the institute $1 million. Its been a good investment. Hadley has urged that the United States raise the cost for what Russia is doing in Ukraine because even President [Vladimir] Putin is sensitive to body bags. The Institute of Peace wants European countries to double their military spending and also favors sending more weapons into the Ukraine powder keg. The US Committee on NATO was founded by a former Lockheed executive and pushed successfully to expand the NATO alliance onto Russias doorstep. That sharply increased tension in Europe, which produces a handsome profit for the arms industry. Another influential think tank, the Atlantic Council, is funded by Raytheon and Lockheed. It faithfully produces articles with headlines like Why Peace is Impossible With Putin, and urges the United States and European countries to commit to greater defense spending and confront a revanchist Russia. Critics of wasteful military spending have bitterly denounced the trillion-dollar project to produce a new fighter jet, the F-35, arguing that it is already obsolete in the age of drone warfare. Nonsense, replied the director of the Lexington Institute. In a recent article he called the F-35 a revolutionary platform with capabilities that far exceed any current Western fighter. Left unspoken was the fact that the Lexington Institute is another front for the arms industry, supported by contributions from Lockheed  the manufacturer of the F-35  and from Boeing, Northrop Grumman, and other defense contractors. Washington think tanks are only part of the matrix that promotes the American weapons industry. The roughly 50 companies that make up the industry shower members of Congress with millions of dollars in campaign contributions. They also parcel out contracts across the country, in order to employ people in as many congressional districts as possible. Components for the F-35, for example, are being made in 46 states. This practice is fiendishly effective in assuring that members of Congress continue to support new weapons projects, no matter how ill conceived. The congressional rebellion against a new arms deal with Saudi Arabia is extraordinary. Four senators  two from each party  have offered a resolution that would force a Senate vote on the deal. Sixty-four members of the House of Representatives have signed a letter warning that the deal would have a deeply troubling effect on civilians in Yemen, where Saudi Arabia is conducting a fierce military campaign. The United Nations has estimated that the Saudi-led coalition bombing Yemen is responsible for twice as many civilian casualties as all other forces put together. Yet the Obama administration wants to sell the Saudis 153 battle tanks made by General Dynamics, some of which are to be used in Yemen, as well as machine guns, grenade launchers, and other weapons. Since taking office in 2009, Obama has made 42 arms deals with Saudi Arabia, worth a staggering $115 billion. For some members of Congress, the latest deal is a breaking point. They are reluctant to send weapons that will be used first in Yemen and then in other ways that support Saudi interests  which are not necessarily those of the United States. There is an American imprint on every civilian life lost in Yemen, said Senator Chris Murphy, a Connecticut Democrat who is a cosponsor of the resolution to block the deal. Another cosponsor, Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, called the deal a recipe for disaster and an escalation of an ongoing arms race in the region. Not surprisingly, the arms industry has mobilized its considerable power on Capitol Hill to block this Senate resolution. We are fighting General Dynamics, one supporter of the resolution said last week. A vote could come soon. Blocking this arms sale would be a rebellion against one of Washingtons richest lobbies. That would send welcome chills through the corridors of power in the Pentagon, the war industry, and Saudi Arabia . Stephen Kinzer is a senior fellow at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University. Follow him on Twitter @stephenkinzer.
Standing with Syria By Margaret Kimberley There is only one question now: when will America tell its minions to stop fighting? September 16, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - " BAR " - American and NATO aggressions must be opposed wherever they surface in the world. That statement ought to be the starting point for anyone calling themselves left, progressive, or anti-war. Of course the aggressors always use a ruse to diminish resistance to their wars of terror. In Syria and elsewhere they claim to support freedom fighters, the moderate opposition and any other designation that helps hide imperialist intervention. They label their target as a tyrant, a butcher, or a modern day Hitler who commits unspeakable acts against his own populace. The need to silence opposition is obvious and creating the image of a monster is the most reliable means of securing that result. The anti-war movement thus finds itself confused and rendered immobile by this predictable propaganda. It is all too easily manipulated into being at best ineffectual and at worst supporters of American state sponsored terror. For five years the United States, NATO, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Qatar and Turkey have given arms and money to terrorist groups in an effort to topple Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. Some of those bad actors felt flush with success after overthrowing and killing Muammar Gaddafi in Libya. They had high hopes of picking off another secular Arab government. Fortunately, Assad was hard to defeat and the barbarians cannot storm the gates. Most importantly, Russia stopped giving lip service to Assad and finally provided military support to the Syrian government in 2015. American presidents, beginning with Jimmy Carter, have all used jihadists at opportune moments when they want regime change. The United States government is responsible for the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Syria. The so-called barrel bomb doesnt kill more people than conventional weapons provided by the United States and its puppets. There would not be bombs of any kind, sieges, starving children, or refugees if the Obama administration had not given the green light to the rogues gallery. Whatever their political beliefs or feelings about Assad, Syrians did not ask the United States to turn their country into a ruin. They dont want ISIS to behead children, as they infamously did on camera. American presidents, beginning with Jimmy Carter, have all used jihadists at opportune moments when they want regime change. The name of the country under attack changes but the story ends with massive human suffering. Instead of siding unequivocally with Americas victims some in the anti-war movement instead live in greater fear of being labeled pro Assad. Assad didnt invade Iraq and kill one million people. George W. Bush did that. Assad did not give support to jihadists to destroy Libya, kill 50,000 people, ignite a race war and create another refugee crisis. Barack Obama did that. The list of human rights abuses carried out by the American government is a long one indeed. There is torture in the United States prison system, the largest in the world. American police are given tacit permission to kill three people every day. Yet the fear of being thought of as an Assad supporter is so powerful that it silences people and organizations who should be in the forefront of confronting their country domestically and internationally. Of course American propaganda is ratcheted up at the very moment that sides must be chosen. Any discussion or debate regarding Syrias political system was rendered moot as soon as the United States targeted that country for destruction. There is only one question now: when will America tell its minions to stop fighting? The fear of being thought of as an Assad supporter is so powerful that it silences people and organizations who should be in the forefront of confronting their country domestically and internationally. Obama didnt start a proxy war with an expectation of losing, and Hillary Clinton makes clear her allegiance to regime change. The United States will only leave if Syria and its allies gain enough ground to force a retreat. They will call defeat something else at a negotiating table but Assad must win in order for justice and reconciliation to begin. Focusing on Assads government and treatment of his people may seem like a reasonable thing to do. Most people who call themselves anti-war are serious in their concern for humanity. But the most basic human right, the right to survive, was taken from 400,000 people because the American president decided to add one more notch on his gun. Whether intended or not, criticism of the victimized government makes the case for further aggression. The al-Nusra Front may change its name in a public relations effort, but it is still al Qaeda and still an ally of the United States. The unpredictable Donald Trump may not be able to explain that he spoke the truth when he accused Obama and Clinton of being ISIS supporters, but the anti-war movement should be able to explain without any problem. Cessations of hostilities are a sham meant to protect American assets whenever Assad is winning. If concern for the wellbeing of Syrians is a paramount concern, then the American anti-war movement must be united in condemning their own government without reservation or hesitation. Margaret Kimberley's Freedom Rider column appears weekly in BAR, and is widely reprinted elsewhere. She maintains a frequently updated blog as well as at http://freedomrider.blogspot.com. Ms. Kimberley lives in New York City, and can be reached via e-Mail at Margaret.Kimberley(at)BlackAgendaReport.com.
Al Qaedas Ties to US-Backed Syrian Rebels The U.S. is demanding the grounding of Syrias air force but is resisting Russian demands that U.S.-armed rebels separate from Al Qaeda, a possible fatal flaw in the new cease-fire, writes Gareth Porter. By Gareth Porter September 16, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - The new ceasefire agreement between Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, which went into effect at noon Monday, has a new central compromise absent from the earlier ceasefire agreement that the same two men negotiated last February. But it isnt clear that it will produce markedly different results. The new agreement incorporates a U.S.-Russian bargain: the Syrian air force is prohibited from operating except under very specific circumstances in return for U.S.-Russian military cooperation against Al Qaeda and the Islamic State, also known as Daesh, ISIS or ISIL. That compromise could be a much stronger basis for an effective ceasefire, provided there is sufficient motivation to carry it out fully. The question, however, is whether the Obama administration is willing to do what would certainly be necessary for the agreement to establish a longer-term ceasefire at the expense of Daesh and Al Qaeda. In return for ending the Syrian air forces operations, generally regarded as indiscriminate, and lifting the siege on the rebel-controlled sectors of Aleppo, the United States is supposed to ensure the end of the close military collaboration between the armed groups it supports and Al Qaeda, and join with Russian forces in weakening Al Qaeda. The new bargain is actually a variant of a provision in the Feb. 27 ceasefire agreement: in return for Russian and Syrian restraints on bombing operations, the United States would prevail on its clients to separate themselves from their erstwhile Al Qaeda allies. But that never happened. Instead the U.S.-supported groups not only declared publicly that they would not honor a partial ceasefire that excluded areas controlled by Al Qaedas affiliate, then known as Nusra Front, but joined with Nusra Front and its close ally, Ahrar al Sham, in a major open violation of the ceasefire by seizing strategic terrain south of Aleppo in early April. As the Kerry-Lavrov negotiations on a ceasefire continued, Kerrys State Department hinted that the U.S. was linking its willingness to pressure its Syrian military clients to separate themselves from Al Qaedas forces in the northwest to an unspecified Russian concession on the ceasefire that was still being negotiated. It is now clear that what Kerry was pushing for was what the Obama administration characterized as the grounding of the Syrian air force in the current agreement. Al Qaedas Ties Now that it has gotten that concession from the Russians, the crucial question is what the Obama administration intends to do about the ties between its own military clients and Al Qaeda in Aleppo and elsewhere in the northwest. Thus far the primary evidence available for answering that question is two letters from U.S. envoy to the Syrian opposition Michael Ratney to opposition groups backed by the United States. The first letter, sent on Sept. 3, after most of the Kerry-Lavrov agreement had already been hammered out, appears to have been aimed primarily at reassuring those Syrian armed groups. As translated by al-Monitor, it asserted, Russia will prevent regime planes from flying, and this means there will not be bombing by the regime of areas controlled by the opposition, regardless of who is present in the area, including areas in which Jabhat Fateh al Sham [the new name adopted by Al Qaedas Nusra Front] has a presence alongside other opposition factions. Ratney confirmed that the U.S. would in return offer Russia coordination from our side to weaken al Qaeda. But he also assured U.S. clients that their interests would be protected under the new agreement. [W]e believe this ceasefire should be stronger, he wrote, because it should prevent Russia and the regime from bombing the opposition and civilians under the pretext that its striking Jabhat al Nusra. The Ratney letter makes no reference to any requirement for the armed opposition to move away from their Al Qaeda allies or even terminate their military relationships, and thus implied that they need not do so. But in a follow-up letter, undated but apparently sent on Sept. 10, following the completion of the new Kerry-Lavrov agreement, Ratney wrote, We urge the rebels to distance themselves and cut all ties with Fateh of Sham, formerly Nusra Front, or there will be severe consequences. The difference between the two messages is obviously dramatic. That suggests that one of the last concessions made by Kerry in the Sept. 9 meeting with Lavrov may have been that a message would be sent to U.S. military clients with precisely such language. The totality of the two letters from Ratney underlines the reluctance of the United States to present an ultimatum to its Syrian clients, no matter how clearly they are implicated in Al Qaeda operations against the ceasefire. Last spring, the State Department never publicly commented on the participation by the U.S.-supported armed groups in the Nusra Front offensive in violation of the ceasefire agreement, effectively providing political cover for it. The decision by U.S.-supported armed groups in March to defy the ceasefire was taken in the knowledge that Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia had agreed to resupply the Nusra Front-led commands in the northwest and had even provided shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles to Nusras close ally Ahrar al Sham. Turkeys Dubious Role Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogans recent shift in policy toward rapprochement with Russia and his talk of ending the war in Syria are fueled by determination to prevent Syrian Kurds from establishing a unified Kurdistan along the Turkish border. The Wilson Centers Henry Barkey, a leading specialist on Turkey, told a meeting sponsored by the Middle East Institute last week that Erdogans Syria policy is 90 percent about the Kurds. But Erdogan does not appear ready to pull the rug out from under Turkeys client groups in Syria. In fact, Turkey suddenly dialed back its rhetorical shift on Syria in July just when the newly renamed Jabhat Fateh al Sham revealed for the first time that it was about to launch its major offensive for Aleppo. The domestic political context of U.S. Syrian policy remains strongly hostile to any joint U.S. operations with Russia that could affect U.S.-supported anti-Assad clients, even though it is now generally acknowledged that those forces are marbled with troops of Al Qaedas franchise, especially in Aleppo. During the spring and summer, Reuters, The Washington Post and other media outlets reported a string of complaints from the Pentagon and the CIA about Obamas plans to reach an agreement with Russia on Syria that would commit the United States to cooperate against Al Qaedas Syrian franchise. These complaints argued that the Russians could not be trusted and that they intended to target U.S supported groups in a proxy war. The real reasons for these attacks on the negotiations with Russia, however, were more parochial. The Pentagon is determined to maintain the line that Russia is a dangerous threat and should be firmly opposed everywhere. The CIAs clandestine service has long wanted a more aggressive program of military assistance for its Syrian clients, which would be a major CIA covert operation. Thus, even though the new agreement calls for U.S. coordination with Russia of air strikes against Al Qaeda forces, the Obama administration can be expected to raise objections whenever it sees that a proposed operation would come too close to targets associated with its clients. Otherwise, more leaks from opponents of the agreement in the Pentagon and CIA  or even in the State Department  would surely follow. Gareth Porter is an independent investigative journalist and winner of the 2012 Gellhorn Prize for journalism. He is the author of the newly published Manufactured Crisis: The Untold Story of the Iran Nuclear Scare .
Brazilian actor, Domingos Montagner has died following a drowning during the shooting of a TV soap opera Velho Chico. The 54-year old went for a swim shortly after the end of shooting for the day.

He went for a swim with an actress, Camila Pitanga, who was also on set but in tragic circumstances, he was swept away by the rivers strong currents.

Despite crying out for help, many onlookers thought it to be just a scene in the soap opera and by the time his body was recovered, he was already dead.
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Lagos State has condemned the Change begins with me campaign recently launched by President Muhammadu Buhari, saying the initiative had portrayed Nigeria as a bad country in the eyes of the rest of the world.

The party argued that the campaign lent credence to the erroneous belief that Nigerians around the world were so badly behaved that they needed to undergo such a reorientation and rehabilitation programme.

The Lagos PDP expressed these views in a statement on Thursday by its Publicity Secretary, Gani Taofik.

According to the Lagos PDP spokesman, he had been receiving negative reviews about the initiative as well as condemnation from outside the country.

Taofik said that the campaign had continued to elicit condemnation from within and outside the country.

Change begin begins with me that President Buhari launched denotes that things are really bad for Nigerians, and also showed that we Nigerians are bad citizens across the world, he said.

On this newly launched programme, I know the number of friends abroad that had called me that the project will affect Nigerians abroad because it means that every Nigerian needs rehabilitation, being a worst character already, the opposition party spokesman said.

He opined that rather than introduce a new campaign, the Buhari administration should have continued with the policies laid down by former President Goodluck Jonathan, especially the campaign on Good people, great nation.

Instead of this new campaign, which I see as a strategy for 2019, hes supposed to carry on with the policies of Goodluck, especially on the campaign of good people great nation, Mr. Taofik said.

Assessing the performance of the Buhari administration, the Lagos PDP spokesperson admitted that it had scored a pass mark on the war against Boko haram insurgency.

Though Buharis government has destabilized Boko Haram, they have not done anything worthy of praise for this country. Look at how much we left fuel for him, and look at the price for a litter today. None of the promises made to Nigerians has ever been fulfilled. Is this the change Nigerians were expecting? The campaign of change is derogatory. Its a mobilization towards 2019.

He claimed that President Buharis political ambition would have remained a dream but for PDPs internal wrangling, which led to its defeat in the 2015 general elections.

Nigerians vote never won Buhari the seat he is occupying today but the internal wrangling that erupted and spoilt show for the party (PDP), he said.

Mr. Taofik, however, urged Nigerians to persevere under the Buhari government until 2019 when the PDP would regain power.
Nigerians have been warned by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) not to deposit money in any institution that is not insured by the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC).

The bank through its the acting Director of Corporate Communications, Mr. Isaac Okoroafor, warned especially on the trending MMM Nigeria community.

Okoroafor said: At times like this when the economy has suffered some decline, Nigerians should be very careful with those they deal with. Any institution that is not licensed by the CBN to accept deposits should not be given money to keep under any guise.

We can vouch for the banking system. The deposit money banks are the only licensed institutions to take deposits. If you need to deposit money in any form, go to any of the deposit money banks and put your money, you can buy fixed income instruments or invest in stocks.

These people always come with very interesting propositions. These are fraudsters who are just out there to collect peoples money and run away as soon as they hit their target. There is no insurance because the NDIC does not even protect them against such risks when they occur.

There is a new Ponzi scheme called MMM that is spreading like wildfire. A lot of young school leavers have already signed on to this scheme, which the promoters are marketing as a mutual fund

MMM offers its participants 30 per cent growth rate per month for each and every donation they make into the system MMM belongs to the community, its sustainability depends on the activities of the people that make up the MMM Nigeria community, that is me and you and other MMM Nigeria participants,

Typically, what promoters of such pyramid scheme do is that they offer rates far beyond what is obtainable in commercial banks. This would always attract a lot of people who would always rush in to stake their funds. But, those who join the scheme late would always be the ones to lose their shirts as they would have been convinced by those that joined earlier to invest huge amounts of money.

SEE ALSO: 11 Things Which Prove MMM Is A Ponzi Scheme
The Obamas certainly seem to be the couple everyone is stealing words from! Just last month, Donald Trumps wife, Melania was accused of plagiarizing Michelle Obamas speech after lifting several words from Michelles 2008 speech.

The latest culprit of plagiarizing the Obamas is Nigerias President, Muhammadu Buhari. Buharis speech during the launch of the Change Begins with me campaign contained several lines from Barack Obamas 2008 speech.

SEE ALSO: Buharis Change Begins With Me Campaign Is Dead On Arrival

In 2008, Obama said at a rally in Grant Park; In this country, we rise or fall as one nation, as one people. Lets resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long.

So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism, of responsibility, where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves but each other.

Let us remember that, if this financial crisis taught us anything, its that we cannot have a thriving Wall Street while Main Street suffers.

President Buhari lifted a whole paragraph in his Change Begins with me speech as he said; We must resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship, pettiness and immaturity that have poisoned our country for so long. Let us summon a new spirit of responsibility, spirit of service, of patriotism and sacrifice, Let us all resolve to pitch in and work hard and look after, not only ourselves but one another, What the current problem has taught us is that we cannot have a thriving army of rent seekers and vested interests, while the majority suffers.

Its ironic considering the Change Begins With me is a drive to encourage transparency and integrity among Nigerians.
ELKO  Domestic well use may change after the 2017 legislative session.

The Legislative Commissions Subcommittee to Study Water has recommended the state write a bill that at times of curtailment, by priority by the Office of the State Engineer Division of Water Resources, only withdrawals for outdoor use would be curtailed  with an exception for the watering of pets and livestock.

Randy Brown, assistant county manager and natural resources manager, told Elko County Commissioners the public was concerned about the well issue. Many thought the subcommittee recommended domestic well use would be eliminated during curtailment.

The realization, the truth is, that right now  NRS 534 allows the State Engineer, during curtailment, to  without limitation  restrict all wells, Brown said. What the State Engineer was attempting to do was protect a certain amount of usage from those wells because they are junior to senior water rights.

The proposed change would provide some protection to domestic wells, he said.

In my mind, and I think for the most part a lot of people Ive talked to, this is an improvement in state statute, Brown said.

If the law is not changed, the State Engineer could restrict water use for all wells without limitation during a curtailment.

Another bill draft request could affect new domestic wells. The bill would provide that in severely over-appropriated basins and designated critical management areas, the Office of the State Engineer limit withdrawals from new domestic wells to 0.5 acre-feet annually.

Brown said the proposed bill came out of Nye County because of a situation in the Pahrump Valley concerning over-appropriated basins. He also thought it may be an effort to push water conservation.

I own a domestic well, Brown said. I have 2-acre feet of water or 1,800 gallons a day, every day of the year. I planted accordingly.

The 0.5-acre feet would encourage water conservation, but it only affects new wells and does not apply to existing domestic wells or domestic wells that require rehabilitation, refurbishment or replacement.

Brown told commissioners he expects to see more of this, but the issue is a bigger deal in areas with larger populations such as Pahrump or Fallon.

However, Brown said some parcels in Elko County are not buildable or usable because of water issues. He said the proposals also may call for meters on wells.

Commissioner Demar Dahl said all of the supplemental wells for irrigation in the Humboldt Basin require meters.

Our water right is based on first in time, first in right, so everybody should understand, he said, but they dont.

In Starr Valley, I have some 1868 water rights on one place and in another it might be 1893 or even a permit with a 1910 permit, so if there is a shortage of water, the junior right loses their right until the senior right is satisfied and filled, he said.

Brown said many people dont understand water rights.

When you buy a property and you sink a domestic well, that is not a water right, he said.

Brown said he expects the bill draft to go through.
Nigerias former First Lady, Dame Patience Jonathan, has accused the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, of presenting unknown persons as representatives of the four companies that pleaded guilty to money laundering charges preferred against them by the anti-graft agency yesterday.

The companies are: Pluto Properties and Investment Company, Seagate Property Development Company, Trans Ocean Property and Investment Company Ltd, and Avalon Global Property Ltd.

The EFCC on Thursday charged the companies, alongside three other people  former domestic aide to ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, Warpamo-Owei Dudafa; Amajuoyi Briggs, and Adedamola Bolodeoku (a former official of Skye Bank)  who before a Federal High Court in Lagos for money laundering to the tune of $15, 591, 700.

The anti-graft agency alleged that the accused had between November 13, 2013 and June 2015, used the different companies to commit the offences.

They were also alleged to have conspired to retain the over $15m, which they ought to have known formed part of the proceeds of crime.

While the four companies, represented in court yesterday by Friday David (Pluto), Agbor Obaro (Seagate), Fredrick Dioghowori (Trans Ocean) and Taiwo Ebenezer (Avalon), pleaded guilty to money laundering, the trio of Dudafa, Briggs and Bolodeoku, pleaded not guilty.

In her immediate reaction, the former First Lady pointed out that representatives of the companies did not show any letter from their respective boards authorizing them to appear in the case.

A statement by Mrs. Jonathans media aide, Chima Osuji said: This is a clear evidence of the desperation of the prosecution to pull down the former first lady and confiscate her hard-earned money.

According to Osuji, It is an irony. It was the former first lady who went to court for the repatriation of her confiscated money when she realized that the EFCC and its co-travellers were playing politics with this issue, after she had come out publicly to say that the said money belongs to her and that she had all evidence to prove the sources of her money. Up till this very moment, EFCC has refused to interrogate or invite her for questioning.

The statement added: Mrs. Jonathan is not a director, shareholder, promoter and/or participant in any of the four companies now under trial, and she was the sole signatory to all the said accounts, contrary to the fabrication that she used her driver and cook as proxies.

The media aide stressed that Mrs Jonathan had denied ever receiving monies from any unknown sources into her accounts and that the accounts were opened in order to facilitate her travel overseas particularly for medical treatment and sundry purchases for herself and her late mother, Mrs. Charity Oba (Mama Sisi).
The Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, NSCDC, in Kwara State has arrested a former Territorial Manager of the Nigerian Telecommunications Limited, Nitel,Mr Benedict Uwulekhue, 62, alongside eleven others over allegations of vandalism, criminal conspiracy and illegal sale of the telecommunication companys equipment.

The State Commandant of the NSCDC, Mr Pedro Ideba, while parading the suspects said their officers were offered a bribe of N140,000 by the ex-Nitel staff and two of his accomplices to stop criminal investigation of their alleged offences.

He added that some equipment like vandalised high tension cables, electricity transformer and containerised transmitter, were allegedly sold to two suspected buyers in the Ilorin metropolis.

He recalled that the defunct Nitel Company in the state capital still had some telecommunication equipment in its premises, saying that the arrested suspects include three security men on guard at the company.

The NSCDC boss, who said the buyers of the Nitel equipment could not produce document to authenticate ownership of the items, added that it was during further investigation into one of the buyers house that two industrial electricity generating plants belonging to government were discovered.

He stated that the security men attached to the Nitel premises had confessed to the crime, adding that all the accused persons would be arraigned in court after conclusion of investigation.

The former Nitel Manager, Mr Uwulekhue, while maintaining his innocence bluntly refused to give details of what transpired saying his actions was done on good faith.

One of the alleged buyer, Chukwudi Mba, identified as auto electrical dealer, said he bought the items from auction sale organised by NATCOM in April this year, adding that he had documents.

The industrial electricity generator he said was bought at N650, 000 each and the containerised Nitel transmitter and high tension cables at N700, 000.
As part of efforts by the Federal Government to ease the effects of recession, the sum of N350billion ($1.1billion) is to be injected into the economy with another $1billion to be raised in Eurobonds by mid-December, the Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun has said.

The minister made this known while addressing a press briefing in Abuja on Friday.

According to her, the additional funding, which comes after the initial N420billion released in May, is primarily for capital expenditure projects that would also involve support from local banks and transaction partners.

Mrs. Adeosun noted that Nigeria plans to borrow a total of N1.8trillion at home and abroad to fund an expected budget deficit of N2.2trillion.

Aimed at reviving the crashed economy, the Federal Government has approved external borrowing plans, which would see the country taking loans from the African Development Bank, China, Japan and World Bank with rates of 1.25 percent and a 20-year maturity.
A violent gas explosion has occurred in the eastern French city of Dijon. Several people have been reported injured, and at least one person trapped under rubble.

The blast occurred Friday morning with early reports saying nine people were injured.

The impact of the blast was so enormous that a four-storey building collapsed.

Fire, police and ambulance crews rushed to the scene of the explosion in the centre of Dijon.

Plumes of thick white smoke billowed from the surrounding houses in the city.

Local councillor Laurent Bourguignat said paramedics and rescue teams were at the scene shortly after 9am.

Reports said the local attorney had ruled out terrorism, saying the explosion was the result of an accident or a suicide attempt.
A group of elders in Kaduna State have advised the State Governor, Malam Nasir el-RufaI, to modify his administrations style of governance.

The elders said that measures and policies Gov. El-RufaI took since he assumed office over a year ago were unpopular and not in the interest of people in the state.

The elders spoke under the aegis of the Kaduna Development Elders Initiative, KDEI.

The elders, arising from an executive meeting in Kaduna Thursday, said they resolved to continue advising the governor for the state to experience physical and human development.

The KDEI, in a communique signed by its publicity secretary and first civilian governor of Kaduna State, Alhassan Balarabe Musa, said el-Rufais promise of making Kaduna great again did not seem to reflect the reality.

According to them, Kaduna is now sinking into a quagmire of neglect and inaction.

The people of Kaduna State deserve better than what is being given to them now and the sooner the governor realizes that the better. He should, therefore, change his gear now, the communique said.

It further alleged that civil servants and pensioners have been in agony due to what it called endless verifications exercise, resulting in the withholding of salaries for many months.

The elders also expressed displeasure with the appointment of non-indigenes into key positions in the state, saying that might be in accordance with Gov. El-Rufais refusal to distinguish between indigenes and citizens.

It could, therefore, be seen that Governor el-Rufai is walking a tight rope in Kaduna State, high above his people, totally indifferent about their aspiration, hopes for obtaining dividend of democracy they have toiled hard to install.
President Muhammadu Buhari on Thursday urged local government administrators across the country to push for an amendment to the Constitution that will limit the powers of state government over their activities.

This will limit the damage they can do to you. The quicker you do this the better, so that you can help your people much more, the president was quoted as saying in a statement by his media aide, Garba Shehu.

President Buhari yesterday gave the advice while receiving the leadership of the Association of Local Governments in Nigeria (ALGON) at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

He said a constitutional amendment was urgently required to clearly define the relationship among the three tiers of government.

The president, who described the frosty relations between states and local governments in the country as a very serious constitutional problem, urged the ALGON executives to hold consultations with their people and lawyers with a view to presenting a bill that would seek an amendment to the constitution to free the councils from the stranglehold of the states.

The relationship between the three tiers of government is not a very nice one, especially that between the local governments and the states, Mr. Buhari said.

The states feel like they own the local government, if they are of the same party. It is worse if they are not.

This is a very serious constitutional problem and unless there is absolute clarity and transparency, the relationship will continue to be exploited against the interest of the ordinary people of the country, he said.

He also acknowledged the request by the ALGON leadership for the release of $3.2 billion wrongfully deducted by the Federal government as part of the 2005 national debt settlement.

The president said though the federal government recognised the judgment debt, the timing of the request for its repayment was wrong given the current economic situation in the country.

Earlier in his remarks, Acting ALGON National President, Alhaji Ibrahim Ahmed Karaye, who presented a six point demand to Mr. Buhari including the repayment of the $3.2billion debt and the need to ensure the sovereignty of local government administration in the country.

Mr. Karaye told the president that local government workers would be grateful if he could help resolve the stalemate.

The ALGON leaders also expressed their support to the Buhari administrations programmes on improving security, anti-corruption campaign and economic revival.

The statement also said Minister of Finance, Kemi Adeosun, was present at the meeting.
A Faskari Senior Magistrates Court in Katsina, Friday, admitted Bishir Wada-Faskari to bail in the sum of N20,000 for allegedly embezzling N10 million Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) funds.

Wada-Faskari was arraigned on a two-count charge of criminal breach of trust and cheating, which he pleaded not guilty.

The Senior Magistrate, Malam Isah Ibrahim, ordered Wada-Faskari to provide two sureties in like sum, and adjourned the case till October 6 for hearing.

The N10 million was donated to the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in Katsina by Alhaji Umar Tata, the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) governorship candidate in the state in the 2015 general election.

Tata brought the action through direct criminal complaint against Wada-Faskari.

He said he donated the money to cater for children orphaned by cattle rustlers attack on communities in Faskari and Sabuwa Local Government Areas in 2014 which claimed 116 lives and about 900 families displaced.

Tatas counsel, Mr Masud Alebelewe, had told the court on August 11, that Wada-Faskari allegedly converted the N10 million to his personal use.

Alebelewe said that the accused was entrusted with the money in March 2014 to administer for the education of orphans of those killed in the attack.

He said the accused failed to do so and all efforts to retrieve the money had failed.

Source: NAN
The National Examination Council (NECO) on Friday released the 2016 June/July Senior School Certificate Examination (SSCE) results with 88.51 per cent of the candidates obtaining five credits pass and above in English Language and Mathematics.

There is a one percent increase in the general performance of candidates this year compared with 2015, NECO Registrar, Prof. Charles Uwakwe, said while announcing the release of the results at the headquarter in Minna, Niger State.

He said 905,011 or 88.51 per cent out of the 1,022,474 candidates that sat for the examination in Nigeria and other countries got five credits and above, while 84.54 per cent got credit pass and above in English Language and 80.16 per cent obtained credit pass and above in Mathematics.

Uwakwe who enjoined students to go on NECOs website to check their results, added that 194 schools were involved in mass cheating, while 14 schools have been derecognized by the body for examination malpractice.

He lamented the rate at which schools are involved in examination malpractice, stressing that any school caught will be derecognized.

The Registrar attributed the increased candidates performance in the examination to the staff of NECO, contributions from his predecessors who have laid a good foundation and the seriousness of the candidates.

He maintained that NECO would not reduce its standard especially as it intends to make its mark in the global assessment industry.

I want to solicit for support from all our stakeholders. NECO should be seen as a Nigerian baby that requires the care and support of all to enable her attain that first class international status.

We are working hard to ensure NECO makes her mark in the global assessment industry, he said.
The Federal Government has been urged to do everything legally possible to pull the country out of the current economic recession.

The call was made Friday by the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF) at the end of its extra-ordinary meeting held at the Old Banquet Hall of the Aso Rock Presidential Villa, Abuja.

Addressing State House correspondents on some of the resolutions reached at the end of the meeting, Chairman of the NGF and Governor of Zamfara State, Abdulaziz Yari, stated: The governors resolved with the commitment to encourage the Federal Government to continue along the line to bring the country out of recession.

He disclosed that the forum equally resolved that the issue of the Boko Haram insurgency be treated as a matter of national emergency.

Yari said the Forum also agreed to activate the states task force on polio as well as the primary healthcare to be led by the deputy governors.

Mr. Yari added that members of the forum also committed to pay their counterpart funds towards polio eradication just as they resolved to engage with the Minister of Health, Prof. Isaac Adewole, so that urgent attention would be given to Lassa Fever.
YBNL boss, Olamide, is set to release his sixth solo studio album in the last month of 2016.

The Nigerian rapper who has released a studio album every year since his debut in 2011, is working on maintaining his tradition by dropping a studio album this December.

This will be Olamides 7th album in all. In 2011, he released his debut album Rapsodi, followed by YBNL (2012), and Baddest Guy Ever Liveth in 2013. Since then, Olamide has continued the tradition to release an album every year including Street OT (2014), 2 Kings (joint album with Phyno, 2015), and Eyan Mayweather (2015).
ELKO  The upcoming legislative session may consider bills on issues such as shooting across a road to kill a varmint to prohibiting the State Engineer from considering wildlife a beneficial use when perfecting a water right.

The Legislative Committee on Public Lands, which includes Elko Countys representatives Sen. Pete Goicoechea and Assemblyman John Ellison, made several recommendations to the Legislature.

The committee wants the state to draft a resolution urging Congress to enact federal legislation requiring the approval of the Nevada congressional delegation prior to the designation of any future monuments in the state.

The recommendations also included three other bill draft requests.

The public lands committee is requesting a bill to allow the discharge of a firearm on or across a federal, state, or county road for the purpose of varmint control; and carrying a loaded weapon on or along a public way in a vehicle with the intent to shoot varmint(s).

Goicoechea said the bill draft came out of Humboldt County because of ground squirrels.

I was a little concerned with the language on that one, he said about the proposal to shoot across a road. ... I doubt that language will make it in the BDR.

He said current law doesnt allow people to shoot from a motor vehicle. He thinks the language may change so people could shoot varmints from the shoulder of county roads.

Goicoechea said the complaint from residents in rural areas was that by the time they get out of the vehicle and step out the squirrel is gone.

The committee also wants a bill to clarify that a properly marked barbed wire fence meets the definition of a legal fence.

Goicoechea said this was to clean up some language in the law.

The committee also requests a bill to prohibit the State Engineer from considering wildlife a beneficial use when perfecting a water right.

Goicoechea said it was proposed to stop federal agencies from taking control of how water is used in the state.

We want to make sure the State Engineer cant consider wildlife as a beneficial use for water, he said.

These bill draft requests will be forwarded to the Legislative Commission, which may submit them to the 79th session of the Nevada Legislature in 2017.
Super Eagles midfielder Ogenyi Onazi has expressed his gratitude to the police for apprehending the robbers who raided his country home in Jos, Plateau state.

The 23-year-old use Twitter as a medium to thank the police.

The Trabzonspor player wrote: The 5 armed robbers that robbed my family home In jos have been apprehended at Epe, Lagos. I really thank God almighty.

The 5 armed robbers that robbed my family home In jos have been apprehended at Epe, Lagos. I really thank God almighty.  Onazi Ogenyi Eddy (@OnaziOgenyi) September 15, 2016

Officially,I thank the DIG Abuja Mr Joshak Habila, CP Plateau state, AIG and CP Lagos state, and most importantly Mr Victor Ugoh.

Officially,I thank the DIG Abuja Mr Joshak Habila, CP Plateau state, AIG and CP Lagos state, and most importantly Mr Victor Ugoh.  Onazi Ogenyi Eddy (@OnaziOgenyi) September 15, 2016

Before also adding, For the concern and support I got from everyone I am truly grateful.thank you so very much and God bless you all.

For the concern and support I got from everyone I am truly grateful.thank you so very much and God bless you all.  Onazi Ogenyi Eddy (@OnaziOgenyi) September 15, 2016

The robbers were reported to be arrested by the Lagos State Police Command Thursday morning.

SEE ALSO: Super Eagles Onazi Ogenyi Takes a Spin in His Porsche 911(Photo)
The Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN, has said that the countrys power generation has improved from 3,810 megawatts recorded on September 8, 2016 to 4,285.90 megawatts on Friday.

The News Agency of Nigeria reports that the power generation record was reported in the website of Nigerian Electricity System Operator on Friday.

The TCN said that 4,285.90 megawatts was the total output by power generation companies, and had been transferred to the 11 distribution companies across the country.

Electricity generation in the country has been stable in the last two months, rising from about 2, 983 megawatts to over 4, 000 megawatts.

Although power has improved, many parts of the country have remained with poor supply owing to problems with the distribution companies, including provision of pre-payment meters.

The Acting Chairman of Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC, Anthony Akah, recently disclosed that no fewer than four million electricity consumers in the country were awaiting supply of the meters.

Mr. Akah said that although the commission had improved on metering system, unavailability of meter manufacturing companies was hindering the maximum provision of the product to Nigerians.

He said the commission would sanction any distribution company which failed to comply with directives relating to the distribution of meters.

(NAN)
The Federal Government in a bid to stimulate economic activities says it is releasing additional N350bn for capital projects captured in the 2016 budget.

The Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, gave the figure on Friday while briefing journalists on interventions measures being taken by the government to reflate the economy which is currently in recession.

She said that the release of the additional N350bn brings the total capital releases made by the government to N760bn.

She said with the economy in recession, the level of consumer demand would be reduced drastically hence the need for government to step in by injecting liquidity.

She said, What government wants to do is to step in and begin to spend and pushing more money into the economy and then get things moving again.

Since the budget was passed in May we have released and cash backed fully N420bn capital releases. As we speak now, we are about releasing another N350bn thats between May and now.

One of the sectors we spent the money on, of course the largest has been power, works and housing. Quite a lot has gone on defence because we need to rebuild the credibility of our army to continue in their efforts in the new phase, interior, transport.

The minister said out of the N350bn, the government would be setting aside N60bn for the implementation of the social intervention programme.

She said the implementation of social safety schemes was vital as it would enable the government provide direct cash to vulnerable Nigerians.

Source: Punch
We earlier reported that robbers who raided the family home of Super Eagles Ogenyi Onazi have been apprehended.

The 5 suspects were earlier today paraded at the Lagos state Police command in connection with the robbery.

The suspects arrested are

(1) Ali Adamu aged 20years of No. 11 perverge Street Gboko, Benue States

(2).Ogechukwu Ebuka aged 20years of No. 2 Kampala Rukuba Road, Jos, plateau States

(3). Joseph Ozoenieke aged 20years of no fixed address

(4) Kingsley David aged 20years of No. 16 Polo Field opposite, NEPA, Jos, Plateau State and

(5). Osita Ezeama aged 23 years of no fixed address.

They were arrested at Shobiri Hotel, Ajagbandi area of the state at about 7pm yesterday, Spetember 14, while they were trying to dispose off the highlander jeep with Reg. No. GMU 300 AA which they snatched from the victim.

The commissioner of police, CP Fatai Owoseni while parading the suspects said the Nigeria Police Force under the Inspector General of Police, IGP I.K. Idris is well more positioned and poised to ensure that criminal elements, no matter where they commit crimes are pursued and apprehended. The suspects will be transferred to Plateau State for further investigation and prosecution.

SP DOLAPO BADMOS

POLICE PUBLIC RELATIONS OFFICER

LAGOS STATE COMMAND.
Former Governor of Katsina State, Ibrahim Shema, who was declared wanted on Wednesday by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, for allegedly diverting N18 billion of governments fund to his private account has turned himself in.

Shema reported to EFCC office in Abuja around 9:30 a.m. Friday, reports indicated.

It will be recalled that Recall that the EFCC had said that the ex-governor, a member of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, was declared wanted after efforts to get him to respond to the allegations through invitations by the EFCC failed.

Shema turned himself in because he is a law abiding citizen who has absolutely nothing to fear, his spokesperson, Oluwabusola Olawale, said in a statement.

He added that Shema went to submit himself to the EFCC even though the agency has not been fair to him in handling his case.
Security through obscurity has been trumped. Let's hear it for security through "clunky."

In an attempt to assuage concerns that Russian hackers might succeed in hijacking U.S. presidential election results, FBI Director James Comey said recently that "the beauty of the American voting system is that it is dispersed among the 50 states, and it is clunky as heck."

Comey has proven himself a master of clunky statements and often appears baffled by technology. One story about his misinformed campaign against encryption was summed up in the URL slug: "FBI Dude Dumb Dumb." In addition to his incessant rants about terrorists "going dark," Comey infamously dismissed constitutional protections against illegal searches, calling them a "typo" in the law. Then there was his over-the-top bluster about how only Apple was capable of breaking into a terrorist's iPhone -- right up until the moment the phone was cracked without Apple's help.

In other words, Comey's credibility on technology-related matters has "dispersed" in a puff of smoke.

Bruce Schneier and other security experts have been sounding the drumbeat about the insecurity of our election system for years. "We need to return to election systems that are secure from manipulation. This means voting machines with voter-verified paper audit trails, and no internet voting," Schneier writes. "I know it's slower and less convenient to stick to the old-fashioned way, but the security risks are simply too great."

Or as a report from the Institute for Critical Infrastructure Technology puts it: "Voter machines, technically, are so riddled with vulnerabilities that even an upstart script kiddie could wreak havoc."

The insecurity of our voting machines is real, but it isn't news. What is new -- and more serious for the long term -- is the prospect of a foreign government waging a cybercampaign to disrupt and influence the upcoming election. Russia is believed to be behind the recent hack of the DNC and leak of Colin Powell's emails, as well as the hacks of voter registration systems in Illinois and Arizona.

"The pattern we see [of hacks and leaks] is intended to call things into question, to sow doubt, to create uncertainty.  You can't patch this psychological vulnerability," Thomas Rid, a professor at King's College London, told Wired.

As media outlets jump on any election news they can find, hackers are able to manipulate coverage. "The media is certainly being used as a battlefield here," Rich Barger, CIO with security firm ThreatConnect, told the IDG News Service.

Hw do we defend against hackers manipulating the media to influence the election? "Folks have to say, where is this information coming from?' and not just focus only on the information," Barger said. "If the hackers have 100 documents, they can choose only to give [the press] 25 of them, because the rest don't fit their narrative."

It would also help if candidates refrain from actively inviting foreign attacks against political opponents and making repeated, baseless claims about rigged elections. "After everyone has voted, it is essential that both sides believe the election was fair and the results accurate. Otherwise, the election has no legitimacy," Schneier says.

This kind of campaign of disinformation is one of the vulnerabilities of democracies, said John Bambenek, a threat intelligence researcher with Fidelis Cybersecurity. "They can be more susceptible to this kind of mass influence of the public."

As it turns out, democracy itself is "clunky."
Limit up on Wheat? Banghart Properties - Sat Oct 29, 7:09PM CDT News broke over the weekend that could help wheat trade limit up when it reopens.

Rains in the Plains, Dow soars Sidwell Strategies - Sat Oct 29, 8:38AM CDT 1st winter wheat ratings Monday; consider carbon for cash flow during drought

Open Enrollment 101: Make the Most of Your Benefits Young & The Invested - Sat Oct 29, 6:00AM CDT The 2022 open enrollment season will be a difficult one as workers have to factor in persistently high inflation while they choose their coverage. These tips can help you maximize your benefits.

Hogs Rebound into Weekend Barchart - Fri Oct 28, 4:39PM CDT Lean hog futures ended the Friday round with 32 to 97 cent gains to fade the triple digit losses from Thursday. The USDA National Average Base Hog Price was $90.54 in the PM update, down by $1.15. The... HEZ22 : 86.100s (+1.15%) HEJ23 : 92.700s (+0.62%) KMZ22 : 96.125s (+0.37%)

Cotton Falls Triple Digits Barchart - Fri Oct 28, 4:39PM CDT December cotton ended the day locked limit lower on the 3c loss. The March contract worked back off the limit for the bell, but still went home down by 274 points. For the week, Dec cotton closed 702 points... CTZ22 : 72.11s (-3.99%) CTH23 : 72.07s (-3.66%) CTK23 : 72.30s (-2.99%)

Cattle Market Fades on Friday Barchart - Fri Oct 28, 4:39PM CDT Live cattle futures ended the weeks last trade day down by 35 cents to $1.02 with soon to expire October down the most. Cash trade picked up later in the week with some Friday catch up sales mostly... LEV22 : 150.375s (-0.68%) LEZ22 : 153.000s (-0.28%) LEG23 : 156.325s (-0.33%) GFX22 : 177.875s (-0.14%) GFF23 : 180.375s (-0.04%)

Loss for Friday Wheat Barchart - Fri Oct 28, 4:39PM CDT Wheat futures faded on Friday with the front month contracts going home 6 1/4 to 9 1/4 cents lower in SRW. For the December contract that completed the week with a 21 1/2 cent loss. KC futures closed down... ZWZ22 : 829-2s (-1.10%) ZWH23 : 849-0s (-1.05%) ZWPAES.CM : 7.6281 (-1.18%) KEZ22 : 925-0s (-0.78%) KEPAWS.CM : 8.8324 (-0.81%) MWZ22 : 945-0s (-0.58%)
Senator Rita Barbera walking out of her house on Thursday. MIGUEL ANGEL POLO (EFE)

Senior members of Spains Popular Party (PP), which heads the countrys interim government, are divided over a veteran members decision to give up party membership while clinging to her Senate seat despite being at the center of a corruption probe.

Several high-ranking officials within the conservative party have expressed indignation at the fact Rita Barbera is refusing to give up her seat, which grants her immunity from the lower courts.

She has made a mistake, and by remaining in the Senate she is only prolonging her agony

PP official Javier Maroto

Barbera, a veteran party member and personal friend of acting prime minister Mariano Rajoy, served for 24 years as the mayor of Valencia, a major city on Spains Mediterranean coast.

The 68-year-old politicians image has been tarnished after her name turned up in Operation Taula, an investigation into illegal financing in PP-run towns and cities across the Valencia region.

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court announced that it will investigate her alleged role in an illegal party financing network thought to have operated out of Valencia City Hall. She could soon become an official suspect in the case.

On Thursday, several PP officials publicly voiced their discontent with Barberas attitude, which could hurt the party ahead of regional elections in Galicia and the Basque Country on September 25.

Madrid regional premier Cristina Cifuentes has also criticized Barbera for hanging on to her seat. EL PAIS

It is evident that she is hanging on to her seat in order to preserve her aforamiento [partial legal immunity], and this decision does not comply with the principles of politics, a public service where dignity and leading by example should be the guiding rules, said Javier Maroto, deputy secretary for Sectorial Action.

She has made a mistake, and by remaining in the Senate she is only prolonging her agony, he added.

The PPs official spokesman, Pablo Casado, noted that giving up her seat would be better for her and for the party. Similar thoughts were voiced throughout the day by Madrid premier Cristina Cifuentes, Senate deputy speaker Pedro Sanz, and the head of the Catalan branch of the PP, Xavier Garcia Albiol.

Only the partys secretary general, Dolores de Cospedal, said it was enough for Barbera to turn in her party membership.

Barbera was awarded a Senate seat in July 2015, shortly after losing the Valencia mayors office to Joan Ribo, of the leftist regional party Compromis. Her appointment, and that of other former mayors and regional premiers, prompted public criticism to the effect that the Spanish Senate is a chamber for retired elephants.

English version by Susana Urra.
Loyal IP readers know that we normally don't cover grants provided by state or federal government agencies. And while we won't get too deep into the National Endowment for the Humanities' (NEH) recent $350,000 grant to Duke University, we'd nonetheless like to bring it to your attention since the underlying strategy of the grant is whole-heartedly endorsed by the biggest player in the liberal arts space, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

Before we look at the Duke grant, let's first contextualize it.

The Chronicle for Higher Education published a piece entitled Grants Seek to Foster a Culture Change in Humanities Graduate Education. "With help from the National Endowment for the Humanities and other groups," it explains, "some colleges are experimenting with ideas for reorienting the humanities Ph.D. to todays job market.

The endowment recently handed out nearly $1.7 million in grants to 28 colleges to help them "rethink how they prepare doctoral students for career paths outside higher education." Why? For some obvious reasons, actually:

"If graduate programs wish to make a case for the continuation of graduate education in the humanities," says William D. Adams, the endowment's chairman, "they're going to have to think about the professional futures of their students in entirely different ways. The future were accustomed to training them for is disappearing."

Yup, disappearing, is what Adams said.

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, of course, whole-heartedly agrees. As we noted in recent post summarizing its six goals for the liberal arts space, Mellon has been particularly active in charting bold new career paths for doctoral students. Examples include a $400,000 grant to the University of California, Davis' Humanities Institute to launch a new program that will support humanities graduate students in leading community-based research projects and its ongoing support for "humanities labs." Meanwhile, with Mellon support, the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) is helping Ph.D.s find opportunities in public service.

All of which brings us back to the NEH's gift to Duke. The three-year grant will support skills training relevant for both academic and non-academic career paths, a wide array of new internship opportunities, and curricular innovations that incorporate collaborative research, computational humanities/media, and engagement with policy analysis for for doctoral students in the humanities.

The grant ultimately acknowledges that most doctoral students won't end up in academia. Indeed, a growing number of Duke graduate students expressed interest in expanding their training to incorporate such arenas as social entrepreneurship, policy analysis, and beyond. "We want to prepare our doctoral students to make a difference, whether within academia, in NGOs, in government agencies or the private sector," said Paula D. McClain, the dean of Dukes Graduate School.
Chicago Protest for Trayvon Martin. Credit: Ralgis via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0)With racial tensions in the U.S. higher than theyve been in decades, we've been closely watching to see what new initiatives might emerge from foundations to foster trust between law enforcement officials and communities of color.

The latest news on this front comes from California, where seven powerful foundations have committed over $1.3 million to a new effort centered on faith-based community organizations.

Many of the biggest names in the California funding world are behind this effort: The California Endowment, the California Wellness Foundation, the San Francisco Foundation, and the Hewlett, Irvine, Rosenberg, and Weingart foundations. This is quite a group to coalesce around one cause, largely based in the Bay Area but extending down to Los Angeles as well.

The new initiative is called Building Trust Through Reform, and its led by PICO California, which is a network of over 500 faith-based organizations.

PICO is already deep into the policing issue. Its leader, Reverend Ben McBride, trained over 700 officers with the Oakland Community Police Department about understanding different perspectives, listening skills and establishing trust. This much-lauded effort put officers, activists and community members in conversation and at the same table.

Not surprisingly, the Building Trust Through Reform initiative is first being launched on a pilot basis in Oakland. Through honest conversations about history, respect and bias, PICO and the seven funders are looking for long-term solutions to protect both community members of color and police officers. After Oakland, the program will expand over the next two years to Sacramento, Stockton, Richmond, Berkeley, San Francisco, Fresno, Modesto, Bakersfield, Los Angeles County, San Bernardino, Riverside and San Diego. Down the line, it would seem, we're talking about much a larger expenditure of grant dollars than what's been announced so far.

It's worth noting that public safety isnt a top grantmaking focus of any of the funders putting up money for this new initiative. Right now, though, a great many major foundations are feeling like they need to be responsive to the highest level of racial unrest in the United Sates since the 1960s. The willingness here of some of these California foundations, like Hewlett, to step outside of familiar program areas and relationships to deal with an urgent issue makes this initiative significant.

Meanwhile, the approach of the work itself should command some attention at the national level. Maybe its most unique aspect is how it aims to empower community members to teach police officers about unconscious bias. PICO California organize at least 120 meetings to devise improvements for police-community relationships. As well, the faith dimension of this effort is intriguing, especially since we don't see big foundations and faith-based groups working together as often as you might think. It will be interesting to see what emerges hereand what solutions might be exported to other states across the U.S.

Related:
Tri-Sons Storage, a Missouri-based self-storage operator, has sold a five-property portfolio in Branson, Mo., to an unidentified private investor. The facilities comprise 127,449 rentable square feet in 751 units, including 694 which are climate control. Tri-Sons lists six self-storage locations on its website.

The buyer and seller were represented in the transaction by a team from commercial real estate firm Marcus & Millichap, including Trey Hammond, investment specialist, and Michael A. Mele, senior vice president of investments, according to a press release.

"Branson is very tertiary market, and we were able to field multiple offers that resulted in choosing an out-of-state buyer looking to take advantage of the higher [capitalization] rates achievable in the marketplace, Hammond said. Throughout the escrow process, we continued to field inquiries. The total interest and offers throughout the process was a clear indicator of capital migration into new markets searching for greater returns."

Branson has undergone a high volume of construction since 2015, the release stated. This is a great example of the increasing number of private-client deals in the market today, Mele said.

Tri-Sons lists six facilities in Branson, Forsyth, Kirbyville and Merriam Woods, Mo.

Founded in 1971, Marcus & Millichap is a commercial-property investment firm with more than 1,500 investment professionals in offices throughout Canada and the United States. The firm closed more than 8,700 transactions in 2015 with a value of approximately $37.8 billion.
Tillsonburg, ON (September 16, 2016)- Race report from the Tillsonburg Outlaws Racing Club. Tillsonburg Lubricare Beginners were joined this week by Morgan Schutz. That made a nice group of five. Kyeriah Mararcle being one of the oldest beginners decided it was time to see if she was ready for the Box Stock division which made her ineligible for points this week with the bigger restrictor. I think she will be just fine in the Box Stocks. That event moved Easton Longthorne into 1st followed by Zak Stewart and Keiran McDonald.

What action in the Smale Powder Coat Box Stock division this week. With 8 racers on the A side and a combined 10 on the B side.

#44 Jayden Dunn is looking very comfortable on the B side and took the win in the combined heat. # 45 Nick Sheridan was smooth as usual and won the A side.

Then the track changed with a big hole in turn one. There were three choices for the drivers. Stay inside of the hole, bounce through the hole or go high around the hole.

All three tactics were used in the Feature race with 13 entries. #84, Jacob Ross led most of the feature but was being hunted down by Jackson, Pellizzari and Sheridan. With the rough track, not all the drivers have learned to avoid a hole yet and so there were more cautions than normal. Still, Ross was able to stay in front but somewhere along the way, bobbled which let John Jackson Jr get by and take the win. Neither Pellizzari nor Sheridan were able to follow suit and took 3rd and 4th behind Ross.

The nights results? Jackson and Sheridan tied for 1st. Ross and Pellizzari tied for 2nd and Ashton Vanevery and Noah Longthorne tied for third. These last two drivers only just moved up from Beginner into this very tough Box Stock class this year and have already moved their way up into the top third of the field. Pretty darn good if you ask me.

Survival was the word in the Chesterman Power Products Opens this week.

The Sprint had good conditions and everyone was very fast. At the checkers, it was Syd Hess first across the line followed closely by John Smibert and Holly Porter. The only drivers not on the lead lap had DNFs which is kind of amazing. With the field inverted for the Feature, they went at it again, but this time with a much rougher track at the pit end. The race started with way too many cautions but as we worked our way through them, the field was slowly dwindling. Scott Hall left missing a wheel, Syd Hess with some broken pedals, Andrew Marshall with repeated traction problems, John Miller with a disconnected carburetor. The rest made it to the end with Scott Chesterman, Holly Porter, John Smibert and Ken Pellizzari finishing in that order.

Only two races to go, Sept 20th Indoors and 24th outdoors, followed by the Awards banquet, Oct. 22 2016 and then the 2017 Club meeting on November 12

From: CHESTERMAN POWER PRODUCTS

14493 BAYHAM DR

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TILLSONBURG, On N4G4G8

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Joaquin Guzman shortly after he was captured in January. PGR

More information La extradicion de El Chapo entra en la cuenta atras

Mexican drug lord Joaquin El Chapo Guzman will take one step closer to being sent for trial in the United States on September 26 when a court in Mexico City hears an extradition request from the US authorities.

But even if the court accepts the petition, Guzmans lawyers have said they will appeal to the countrys Supreme Court to prevent the man who once headed the worlds largest drugs cartel from leaving the country.

The Sinaloa Cartel is credited with dominating the illegal drug market in much of the US for two decades

Guzman has already filed numerous appeals and injunctions related to criminal charges and to the United States request to extradite him. One of the first injunctions was filed in January soon after Guzmans arrest. It would block any extradition order for Mexican authorities to extradite Guzman to the United States.

But handing Guzman over to the US has become a matter of state in Mexico following his embarrassing escape in July 2015 via a tunnel under his cell from a maximum security prison. Once he was recaptured, Mexican president Enrique Pena Nieto made it clear he would cooperate fully with the United States.

El Chapo now finds himself increasingly alone and unprotected. A turf war has broken out in northern Mexico that in August saw a rival gang kidnap his youngest son. His mothers house, in his home state of Sinaloa, was ransacked earlier in the year.

Guzmans reign is over. His only hope now is to avoid extradition to the United States. If we reach agreement we will withdraw the appeals, his lawyer, Jose Refugio Rodriguez, has said.

The US authorities are refusing to budge and say that there will be no deals until he faces trial in the United States and pleads guilty.

The courts disagree whether the January injunction is valid, as it was filed months before the US extradition order was approved by Mexicos Foreign Affairs Ministry. Whether or not the injunction is valid would determine which court has jurisdiction.

Guzmans reign is over. His only hope now is to avoid extradition to the United States

Guzmans defense team argues the injunction is valid, citing a newspaper article in which Pena Nieto admitted ordering an accelerated extradition process against Guzman.

His appeals against extradition could take one to three years to conclude, assuming he goes all the way to the Supreme Court.

The Sinaloa Cartel is credited with dominating the illegal drug market in much of the United States for two decades.

Guzman first escaped from prison in 2001 by hiding in a laundry cart after bribing prison guards, and was re-captured in February 2014. He was captured again in the city of Los Mochis in his home state of Sinaloa on January 8 after escaping again, this time from the Altiplano Federal Prison in July 2015.

English version by Nick Lyne.
The news spread like wildfire across trading floors in New York, Boston and Connecticut: The Federal Bureau of Investigation had raided four hedge fund firms looking for evidence associated with suspected insider trading.

The date was November 22, 2010; the firms in question were Barai Capital Management, Diamondback Capital Management, Level Global Investors and Loch Capital Management. Within months all four had closed, after experiencing significant redemptions from investors as a result of the raids, while the U. S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, Preet Bharara, proceeded with his insider trading investigation across the hedge fund industry. In 2012, Bharara filed charges against 12 individuals from two of the targeted firms. But one man was never charged: David Ganek.

While the founder and principal of New Yorkbased Level Global was named in the affidavit submitted to a judge by the FBI in support of the 2010 search warrant, neither he nor his firm  which had $4 billion in assets and was worth approximately $400 million at the time it was raided  were ever charged with a crime. Now Ganek is pushing back.

Ganek is seeking to clear his name. Addressing a crowd of nearly 400 investors and other financial professionals at this weeks Delivering Alpha conference, co-sponsored by Institutional Investor and CNBC, the erstwhile hedge fund manager told Andrew Ross Sorkin that he had not originally planned to sue the government: Its funny, because out of 100 people I may have asked about should I sue the government, I got 100 Are you crazy? [responses]. But, Ganek explained, as he talked through his situation with noted civil rights attorney Barry Scheck  co-founder of the Innocence Project, which works to free people incarcerated for crimes they did not commit  and his staff, it became increasingly clear to the Level Global founder that he had a case.

A review by Institutional Investor of Ganeks legal case, as well as of a separate insider trading investigation involving Level Global, lays open the inner day-to-day workings at his hedge fund. The two cases show how, despite seemingly strict compliance controls, some individuals at the firm became party to information on securities from company insiders.

In February 2015, four years after he shut down his firm, Ganek filed a complaint in the U.S. Southern District Court of New York against Bharara, members of the FBI and the U.S. Attorneys Securities and Commodities Fraud Task Force involved in the November 2010 raid and related investigation. The complaint accuses Bharara and the other defendants of violating Ganeks constitutional right not to be deprived of property or reputation. The case claims that Ganek should not have been included in the search warrant because the affidavit in support of the warrant contained false statements  that Ganek had knowledge of the alleged insider trading taking place at Level Global  and the defendants either knew or should have known that the information was false. The subsequent failure on the part of Bhararas office to make clear that Ganek was not a target of the investigation further compounded the problem, causing a rush of investor redemptions that left the hedge fund manager with no choice but to close his business. Ganek has requested a jury trial.

A former partner with the Stamford, Connecticutbased hedge fund firm SAC Capital Advisors  itself the subject of a high-profile Bharara probe into insider trading  Ganek started Level Global with fellow SAC alum Anthony Chiasson. According to Ganeks complaint, however, the two were not equal partners: Mr. Ganek was the principal partner, with a large majority interest in the business. Mr. Ganek was also the more prominent of the partners and the public face of Level Global, known broadly in New York and national finance circles as a successful asset manager, as well as for his philanthropy, service on boards of trustees, and as a sophisticated collector of modern art. Ganeks wife, Danielle, is a socialite and author; the two live in the same Park Avenue apartment building as hedge fund manager Israel Englander, founder of Millennium Management. (In 2013 the building experienced a series of burglaries, with the Ganeks losing $100,000 worth of jewelry and watches and Englanders wife, Caryl, losing a $7,500 gold watch.) The Ganeks put their apartment up for sale in 2014; it is currently listed for $32.5 million.

In Ganeks version of events, as laid out in his complaint, the prosecutors clearly wanted his high-profile scalp. Indeed, of all the people to have been caught up in the probe spearheaded by Bharara and the FBI, Ganeks reputation  and wealth  was second only to that of SAC founder Steven Cohen. (Cohen has also never been found guilty of any insider trading charges, though in January 2016 he was found guilty by the Securities and Exchange Commission of failure to supervise and barred from the industry for two years. Cohen, who today runs his family office, Point72 Asset Management, neither confirmed nor denied the Commissions findings.) Yet, as court documents make clear, there is little or no evidence to suggest Ganek knew of any insider trading taking place at his firm.

The Level Global case is made more complex by what happened subsequent to the raid. In May 2013, Todd Newman, a former Diamondback trader, and Chiasson were found guilty of conspiring with six others to earn $72 million by illegally trading technology stocks  specifically, PC maker Dell and semiconductor company Nvidia Corp. The state witness in the case was a former Level Global analyst, Spyridon (Sam) Adondakis.

Chiasson and Newman were each sentenced to six and a half years in prison. In December 2014, however, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in Manhattan overturned the ruling, citing erroneous instructions to the jury. In the decision  which also nullified the convictions against Newman and Chiassons alleged co-conspirators  the appeals court found that to prove insider trading the prosecutor had to show beyond reasonable doubt that the tippee knew that an insider disclosed confidential information and that he did so in exchange for personal benefit. The court also decided there was insufficient evidence to prove that Chiasson and Newman knew they were trading on insider information.

The Supreme Court chose not to hear the governments appeal of the case, effectively ending the prosecution. This January, Level Global won a federal court case to dismiss the $21.5 million civil penalty the firm had paid to the SEC on related charges. A few months later it was reported that Chiasson had launched his own firm, Aurmedis Global. Yet Ganek, who for the past five years has been investing via his own family office, Apocalypse 22, in New York, still wants exoneration.

In his complaint, Ganek says his firm likely could have survived the raid and probe if the U.S. Attorneys office had made clear that he was not the subject of the insider trading investigation. Large hedge fund investors and their advisers have a sophisticated understanding of the potential impact of federal investigations, argues Ganek. They knew that while a hedge fund could survive the investigation and prosecution of lower-level employees, or even a minor partner, the risk to their own investments was too great if the principal of the hedge fund was a target or a focus of a much-publicized raid.

Ganeks lawsuit offers numerous examples to show that he was not party to insider information. Under oath, Adondakis repeatedly testified that Ganek did not know the source of the insider information on trading ideas. (Ganek alleges that the defendants falsified evidence to suggest that the managing partner did know about the source of the information in order to obtain the warrant.) The hedge fund manager also paid for two internal audits of his firm, both of which showed he was not aware of any improprieties.

Nonetheless, the evidence in Ganeks case and the defendants appeal, filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, suggests something was awry with the way at least one analyst at Level Global was obtaining information, even if that did not meet the bar for illegal insider trading.

Under oath at trial Adondakis testified to using insider information  provided by, in each case, a contact at the company in question  in his investment analyses of both Dell and Nvidia, and that Chiasson, as well as others at Level Global (though not Ganek), knew about the nature of the source of that information. Asked if he implicated Chiasson in insider trading, Adondakis answered, I told the truth about what happened, and I guess does that, I guess that implicates him. Chiassons defense, however, has always vehemently denied that Chiasson knew Adondakis had access to insider information. In court Chiassons lawyers demonstrated how Adondakis would doctor e-mails that he sent to Chiasson so that the tech analysts bosses did not know the source of the information. On cross-examination Adondakis testified that he had a protocol for changing his e-mail communications to eliminate incriminating evidence.

In his case against Bharara and others, Ganek says that in May 2010, Level Global determined that Mr. Adondakis had violated the compliance regime [at Level], and he was asked to leave the company. Ganeks statement suggests that what happened with Adondakis was an isolated incident  one which the firms own compliance efforts rooted out.

The Newman and Chiasson case, however, is not the only insider trading prosecution involving a Level Global analyst. In an Atlanta court in November 2014  in a case unrelated to the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York but brought about through efforts by the Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force, established by President Barack Obama in 2009  an ex-employee of Level Global pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud.

Former Level Global consumer sector analyst Mark Megallis guilty plea was part of an insider trading case connected to trading in shares of childrens apparel manufacturer Carters. The court sentenced Megalli to two years in prison.

After the New York Second Circuit Court overturned the Newman and Chiasson verdict, Megalli, who was also required to pay a civil penalty of $62,003 on related charges, is seeking to have his criminal case overturned. His appeal is pending on the outcome of a Supreme Court ruling on a different insider trading case.

At no point in the court transcripts and filings reviewed by Institutional Investor did Megalli or the criminal or civil prosecution suggest that Ganek knew about the tainted nature of the intelligence that the former Level Global analyst had received about Carters. As with the New York case, however, Megallis sheds light on the inner workings of Level Global, and on how insider information came to be used to make trades.

According to the facts of the case, Megalli directed trading in Carters stock twice after receiving insider information, once in October 2009 and again in July 2010. Megalli received his information from Eric Martin, who had been vice president of investor relations at the childrenswear company. Martin, also the subject of litigation, had been hired as an outside consultant by Level Global and was getting insider information from a former Carters colleague still at the firm.

In the court transcript of the October 2015 hearing for the civil case brought by the SEC, Megalli explains how he had been hired by Ganek to build up a consumer sector investment business at Level Global. It was common, Megalli says, for the firm to use outside consultants for research. There were multiple people that we would use for research and analysis that were third parties to Level Global, Megalli told the court. These were either sell-side stock researchers or they had consulting companies and so forth.

In describing how the investment and research process worked at Level Global, Megalli revealed that technology expert Chiasson also served as head of research. The firm would occasionally conduct research meetings at which its top ten analysts would pitch their best ideas before the entire investment staff. Often Chiasson would explain what the technology team  which, in addition to making investments in Level Globals main fund, managed a separate technology hedge fund  was thinking.

Megalli states as well that Ganek ran what he called center book, for which Ganek cherry-picked the best ideas. Traders would pitch Ganek their ideas for inclusion in that portfolio. Megalli says he never pitched Carters to Ganek because it was not an important enough position for consideration by the managing partner.

Ganek is not unaware of the ironies of his case or of the parallels between apparent compliance failures possible at a firm when an analyst is keen for information that he or she can turn into dollars and what might happen within a results-hungry prosecutors office.

I think one of the ironies here is that the line is very thin between the ambitions of the prosecutors, the shortcuts to success that they experienced, and not unlike the very same things they are trying to prosecute out and rid the markets of, Ganek told the audience at Delivering Alpha. And its a disturbing combination. And its not something that should exist.

Bharara and the other defendants appealed to have Ganeks case tossed out of court. In May a judge upheld some, but not all, of Ganeks charges, allowing the case to proceed. A second appeal is pending.

When Bharara spoke at Delivering Alpha in July 2013, during the height of his offices prosecution of alleged insider trading activities at hedge funds, the U.S. attorney general joked that he was sorry that he had not brought subpoenas for everyone in the room. If Ganeks case is successful  and legal scholars have said the bar to win is set very high  Bharara will likely wish the FBI had issued one fewer search warrant on that day in November 2010.

Follow Imogen Rose Smith on Twitter at @imogennyc.
This content is from: Opinion

Cryptos descent into hell, rather than sending institutional investors straight for the exits, has triggered a hunt for the next big bet.(Part of the crypto column series.)
Following controversial comments from the chairman of Lloyds on commissions yesterday an Australian industry leader has spoken out on broker commissions.John Nelson, chairman of Lloyds, said that due to insurers and reinsurers coming under increasing pressure to reduce costs, brokers fees should be targeted for reduction. NIBA CEO, told Insurance Business that the value brokers provide has to be remunerated by the market.I dont think it is a question of commission, I think it is a question of value, Booth said.So long as brokers are continuing to provide the value that they provide by being a trusted adviser to their clients and are providing an efficient service, distribution service and intermediation process for insurers, they have a valid role to play and the value that they offer will be remunerated.Booth noted that there are many existing models on the remuneration front and with brokers providing value to both insurers and clients, brokers are perfectly entitled to be rewarded appropriately.From time to time comments are made about the levels of remuneration versus the value provided but I think that is something that the manufacturers, the brokers and the broking groups, are in constant discussion about.I think things change from time to time and it is entirely appropriate for the markets to work those matters out.Booth noted that brokers need to remain aware of other outside threats such as insurtech and start-ups as they look to demonstrate their worth to clients in the future.Brokers are absolutely aware of developments in digital technology and the potential use of that in distribution, Booth continued.Insurers are happy to provide cover through a variety of mechanisms so brokers are fully aware of the need for them to continue to demonstrate and present their value proposition both to insurers and their clients.
In a bid to protect insurance customers, Emergency Services Levy (ESL) insurance monitor Professor Allan Fels has issued guidelines to insurance companies ahead of next years removal of ESL from insurance premiums.The guidelines prohibit insurers from price exploitation and false and misleading conduct, punishable by penalties of up to $10 million to corporations and $500,000 to individuals.Fels said they would closely scrutinise any moves to increase premiums on property insurance prior to the anticipated removal of ESL in July 2017.The ESL, or the levy charged by the NSW Government to insurance companies each year to help fund fire services and the State Emergency Service, is worth around $800 million on the property insurance premiums of NSW homeowners and businesses.Fels was appointed by the NSW Government, along with deputy monitor Professor David Cousins, to monitor pricing by insurers during the transition period and ensure that policyholders receive the full benefit of the ESL removal from policies from 1 July next year.I want insurers to understand [that] we are already closely watching to ensure they do not take early advantage of the opportunity to put premiums up as a result of the levys removal next year, Fels said.The NSW Government has provided me with extensive powers to ensure that consumers are protected in the transition, under a price oversight regime that is in place ahead of the abolition of the levy.We have powers to monitor back to July 2014 and to take action against unreasonably high prices from 10 December 2015  the date the Government announced the appointment of the monitor.This is some months ahead of the legislation to bring in the property-based levy, and a significant departure from how the reform was done in Victoria. Having the monitor in place early means the potential for premium increases in anticipation of removal of the levy is kept in check, Fels said.The guidelines state that the abolition of the levy should decrease the cost of property insurance premiums.The guidelines were developed in consultation with the insurance industry, and were submitted for industry feedback in early July.December last year, the NSW Government introduced the new system of funding fire services, the Emergency Services Property Levy (ESPL), to replace ESL. Effective 1 July 2017, local councils will collect ESPL from all property owners alongside council rates.Click here to access the guidelines.
An account manager at Willis Towers Watson, Melbourne has won the $5,000-worth of travel vouchers courtesy of the Underwriting Agencies Council ( UAC ) and Lloyds.Sophie Jordan won the prize after having all 45 participating UAC members sign her passport at the UAC-Lloyds Village in the village exhibition hall during the annual National Insurance Brokers Association ( NIBA ) Convention in Melbourne this week.Jordan failed to win a car worth $25,000 during the second part of the prize, however. Because Jordan was absent on the day of draw, which was not a requirement for eligibility, UAC board member Emily Walker selected the number on her behalf. The draw was overseen by Cunningham Lindsey.Jordan was delighted with the travel prize, and is now planning a 2017 trip to Greece with her husband Josh, only a month after their trip to the United Kingdom, Ireland, and Rome.It was Jordans first time to attend a NIBA Convention in her 29 years of service with Willis. William Legge , UAC GM, said the major prizes on offer, which were made possible through the support of Beazley Underwritings contingency insurance product and the expertise of its contingency underwriter Nic Jobling, were an added attraction of the UAC Lloyds Village to brokers besides access to product expertise offered by UAC members.
Boston, Mass., Mayor Martin J. Walsh, the Boston Transportation Department and the Mayors Office of New Urban Mechanics, in partnership with the World Economic Forum, announced the launch of a new program to explore autonomous technologies within the City of Boston.

The collaboration will include a year-long engagement focused on creating policy recommendations and supporting on-street testing of autonomous vehicles, also known as self-driving vehicles, to advance the safety, access and sustainability goals identified by the public during the Go Boston 2030 transportation planning process.

Bostons collaboration with the World Economic Forum represents our commitment to creating a safe, reliable and equitable mobility plan for Bostons residents. We are focused on the future of our city and how we safely move people around while providing them with reliable mobility choices, said Mayor Walsh in a press release issued by the Mayors Office announcing the programs launch.

Boston was selected as the lead partner city for the World Economic Forums City Challenge, an initiative designed to support cities in their efforts to prepare for the future of urban mobility. With the help of the Forum and its partner, The Boston Consulting Group, the City of Boston will develop a strategy for new mobility, including autonomous driving, and develop a framework for the testing of autonomous vehicles on city streets.

During the next year, City of Boston and Commonwealth of Massachusetts leaders will work with the World Economic Forum, The Boston Consulting Group, international cities and mobility industry leaders on developing policy goals and autonomous vehicle testing scenarios for Boston. The collaboration kicked off in July with an advisory group meeting in Boston led by Mayor Walsh focused on exploring autonomous shared vehicle technology and will continue with a series of targeted focus groups.

This work with Boston builds on prior World Economic Forum research into Personal Mobility and Self-Driving Vehicles, conducted in 2015 in partnership with The Boston Consulting Group, and the Future of Cities. The results show that improving affordable transportation options could be a strong factor contributing to individuals escaping poverty. Additionally, results indicate that autonomous vehicles, when shared, have the potential to take 60-70% of cars off the road. Because this could reduce crashes due to human error, it is projected that autonomous vehicles could reduce road fatalities by up to 90%. Since autonomous vehicles would likely be electric, the City of Boston expects to reduce emissions from vehicles by 2-4% over time.

Source: Boston Mayors Office
American International Group Inc. has agreed to sell its interest in Ascot Underwriting Holdings Ltd. (AUHL) and related syndicate-funding subsidiary Ascot Corporate Name Ltd. to Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) for $1.1 billion.

Total consideration for the deal is $1.1 billion inclusive of CPPIBs recapitalization of Syndicate 1414s Funds at Lloyds (FAL) capital requirements.

AIG will receive approximately $240 million in net cash proceeds from the transaction, reflecting AIGs 20 percent stake in AUHL and ownership of ACNL.

CPPIB is an investment management organization that invests the assets of the Canada Pension Plan and its 19 million contributors. As of June 30, 2016, the CPP Fund totaled C$287.3 billion.

The Wall Street Journal reported last month that the deal was under consideration.

The transaction is subject to regulatory approvals.

Ascot and AIG founded the managing agency and the syndicate in 2001. As a global specialty insurance underwriter, Ascot focuses on property insurance, marine insurance, and reinsurance.

AIG will maintain its strategic partnership with Ascot Underwriting Bermuda Ltd. (AUB). While AUB is a wholly-owned subsidiary of AUHL and part of the sale to CPPIB, AUB will continue to serve as the managing general agent for AIG-Ascot Re, which writes assumed treaty reinsurance business on behalf of AIGs wholly owned subsidiary American International Reinsurance Co. Ltd. (AIRCO) in Bermuda.

As part of the agreement, AIG, CPPIB, and Ascot said they intend to expand a collective commercial relationship in Bermuda, and for AIG to be a preferred reinsurer to Syndicate 1414.

This deal successfully repositions our strategic focus and underwriting capacity to our relationship with Ascot in Bermuda, while monetizing our position in the syndicate at an attractive value and retaining exposure to the syndicate as a reinsurer, said Robert Schimek, chief executive officer, Commercial Insurance. We are also pleased to start a collaborative relationship with CPPIB who we see as an ideal partner for Ascots outstanding management team.

AIG has been overhauling its business and selling off selected units while resisting pressure by activist shareholder Carl Icahn to split the insurer in three. Last month it announced it would sell its mortgage-guaranty unit, United Guaranty, to Arch Capital Group Ltd for about $3.4 billion. In January, AIG agreed to sell AIG Advisor Group to investment funds affiliated with Lightyear Capital. Last week, it was reported to be seeking to raise about $190 million by selling its remaining shares in Chinas PICC Property and Casualty Co. Ltd.

This is not CPPIBs first insurance acquisition. In 2014,it agreed to buy U.S. reinsurer Wilton Re Holdings Ltd for $1.8 billion.

Related:

Topics Excess Surplus Reinsurance Lloyd's Canada
The re/insurance industry needs to innovate and become more efficient. It is facing more risk, but premiums are declining. Some of its products have become shop-worn and less relevant. Competitive pressures are immense.

These are just some of the negative trends facing the industry, according to Mike McGavick, CEO of XL Group, who emphasized, however, that the industry is still relevant because of its unique expertise in creating products that lead to pools of insurable risks.

Speaking at this years reinsurance Rendez-Vous de Septembre in Monte Carlo, McGavick discussed the industrys relevance in a technology-dominated global economy.

He pointed to the fact that in 2009, for the first time in history, the property/casualty industry started growing slower in its rate of participation in the global economys growth  and that trend has continued ever since.

Insurance products have almost nothing to do with the risks that are being created by technology.

There is more economic activity; in fact, we as risk professionals would also say there is more risk, and yet premiums paid to our industry are declining  and that includes a hard cycle right in the middle of it, he said during his speech which covered the topics of trends, cycles and disruptions.

Whats going on? McGavick explained that the industrys products are becoming shop-worn and less relevant to the actual use of the clients, and unless they are reinvented, clients will continue to find them not terribly useful.

As an example, he said that technology is connected to approximately 70 percent of global GDP, but the re/insurance industrys solutions have almost nothing to do with the risks that are being created by the unique dependence society now has on technology.

So there you are: theres all the growth and were [not a participant]. If there were ever a clarion call for innovation, I dont know what else it could possibly be, he said.

Insurance Cycle

McGavick then commented on the insurance cycle. The reality is we know this cycle is unsustainable. Risk is not given its full charge or price

And yet with the industrys current product array, we cannot encourage the customer to pay an appropriate price. They do not see it as useful enough to justify a full and transparent price. This is on us, he noted.

When we are in this phase of the cycle, the pressures are enormous; the pressures across the value chain are enormous and they grind every day.

He said the re/insurance industry is the only industry he can think of that does not know the costs of goods sold. Our largest portion of costs, of course, is claims and we only have speculation based on the past about what that dimension of the costs will be.

What this means, he added, is that when the industry is wrong, we can be wildly wrong.

When clients are not willing to pay the full cost of their business risk, the industry slowly but surely underprices the actual risk premium, he said.

Anybody who thinks that something spectacularly unexpected cant happen hasnt been alive very long, McGavick continued. There will be an enormous event of some kind and it is usually going to be coincident with that point in time where our comfort has gotten so great that were no longer appropriately charging for the risk.

When the big event does happen, the industry once again will wake up to the actual purpose of insurance  the unexpected event  and will briefly charge the right risk premium until the usual competitive pressures return, he said.

However, the idea that the cycle is going away because the industry is so much smarter is utter nonsense and is a fundamental misunderstanding of what it is we do and the inherent unknowability of all risk.

He did think that cycles are likely to be less violent than in years past as a result of the sectors increased knowledge, along with the availability of different forms of capital. Further, when the market hardens again, the industry is likely to react in a more efficient way that is less disruptive to our clients, [which] would be a good outcome.

Rampant & Wild Disruption?

Despite believing the industry is facing many challenges, McGavick does not think disruption will be rampant and wild. He said he thinks it is a bit nonsensical to imagine that the world will explode with peer-to-peer insurance that would totally dominate the industry.

He cited two reasons: regulation and the industrys expertise, which together act to make the insurace industry so different and so difficult.

Were in the business of promises. If we dont pay the day the promise is due, that is a horrible day, because it chips away at the trust that makes our product useful.

As a result, regulators have a very clear and useful role in making sure that everyone who made their promise is there to pay, which is facilitated with collectivized vehicles for risk sharing that the industry already happens to have in place, McGavick explained.

While there is talk that the great analytics companies will become the new insurers, McGavick did not agree because the industry has expertise that is not manifest elsewhere.

Think of a needle in a haystack; technology enables us much more quickly than ever  to rapidly find that needle.

But first you need to know you are looking for a needle and, second, you have to know what to do with the needle, he continued.

We in insurance and reinsurance know what to do with the needle. We are in the art of creating pooled products that lead to pools of insurable risks. That is not an expertise others have and it is the central expertise that matters.

As a result, he predicted that a group of industry incumbents will maintain their position as stewards of that expertise, which provides enormous benefit to the progress of mankind and the functioning of the global economy.

McGavick ended his speech on these positive notes about the industrys future.

My view is simple. [The industry will make] all kinds of radical changes because we know our business is inherently inefficient, he said.

But change isnt necessarily bad, he indicated. How we harness technology, how we work with it, all of that can lead to wonderful [imaginative solutions] about how we could make this whole ecosystem wildly less costly.

Related:

More from Reinsurance Rendez-Vous 2016:

Topics Carriers Tech Reinsurance Market
Chubb has expanded its cyber risk engineering capabilities in the U.K. and Ireland, as it continues to invest in building its cyber enterprise risk management proposition in the region.

Chubbs U.K. and Ireland dedicated cyber risk engineering team, headed by Nick Bellamy, senior technology specialist, will provide cyber policyholders across all industry segments with risk engineering and loss mitigation services.

Risk engineers will engage directly with customers to better understand their cyber risk exposures and work to help them improve their cyber risk management profile. Additionally, the team will offer cyber training sessions throughout the U.K. and Ireland for customers and distribution partners. Previously, these services were available only for clients in the info tech sector.

Chubbs Cyber Enterprise Risk Management also includes immediate incident response when a cyber event occurs. Policyholders have access to the Chubb Cyber Incident Response Platform, a single point of contact and a 24/7 incident response platform to report cyber incidents, supported by Crawford & Company, a global leader in claims and crisis management. Qualified incident managers will help insureds deal with the complexities of a cyber incident from start to finish and offer access to a global network of crisis management service providers.

Chubb provides commercial and personal property and casualty insurance, personal accident and supplemental health insurance, reinsurance and life insurance to clients around the world.

Topics Cyber Chubb
Mexican solldiers and federal police officers in Jalisco. EFE

More information Un comando secuestra a 15 pasajeros de autobus en Tamaulipas

The roads and bus lines that run through the Mexican state of Tamaulipas, along the American border, have turned into a trap for Central American migrants who use this route to enter the US.

On Monday, 15 bus passengers were kidnapped at gunpoint as they were traveling along the border between the towns of Nuevo Laredo (Tamaulipas) and Hidalgo (Coahuila).

Mexican authorities said that a group of gunmen hijacked the bus and took away the group, according to the bus drivers version of events.

Nearly 400,000 Mexicans and Central Americans try to cross into the US each year, aided by smugglers who work for drug cartels

The bus, which had departed from Nuevo Laredo station, was stopped by armed people riding on several trucks.

The driver managed to close the doors and drove to our [military] facilities to request assistance, said Victor Zamora, the Coahuila secretary of state, in a public statement. Logically, when they saw the bus was coming towards us, the trucks that were following it pulled away.

Although the public official did not provide information about the passengers, it is believed that they were immigrants headed for Hidalgo, an unwelcoming town filled with smugglers and safe houses specializing in getting people across the border.

Mexican president Enrique Pena Nieto introduced heightened security measures in 2014. ALEX CRUZ (EFE)

Mexican authorities have shown little concern for the case, which underscores the ease with which cartels kidnap dozens of migrants every month.

Although it took place on Monday, the kidnapping was not confirmed until Wednesday, and then only when Coahuila governor Ruben Moreira was making a speech on a completely different subject.

The secretary of state has informed me about an incident outside our states borders, but when they reached our state line the incident ended, and the people who had been chased arrived in our territory of peace and asked us for help, he said.

Later, Zamora confirmed the news and provided further details.

In March, 24 migrants from Honduras were kidnapped by an armed group in Altamira (Tamaulipas) as they rode a bus. They were released 14 hours later following a raid by federal forces.

Tamaulipas is one of Mexicos most violent states, home to the Zetas cartel, which routinely perpetrates atrocious crimes against Central American migrants. Chief among these is the August 2010 massacre of 72 people who were hacked to death in the town of San Fernando.

Faced with escalating violence in Tamaulipas, in 2014 the Pena Nieto administration introduced a security strategy that deployed thousands of soldiers and purged law enforcement agencies that had in many cases been on the cartels payroll.

Nearly 400,000 Mexicans and Central Americans try to cross into the US each year, aided by smugglers who work for drug cartels.

English version by Susana Urra.
The Iowa Supreme Court heard arguments and must now decide whether to weigh in on a federal lawsuit that pits the water supplier to 500,000 central Iowa residents against upstream farmers accused of contaminating rivers with nitrates from crop fertilizer.

The case was filed by Des Moines Water Works, which is asking the court to decide whether agriculture drainage districts have immunity from lawsuits and whether the water utility can seek monetary damages.

Water Works says it spent $1.5 million last year alone to remove nitrate from water to meet federal health standards. The utility draws water from the Raccoon and Skunk rivers, which have sometimes in recent years exceeded the 10 milligrams per liter considered safe to drink by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Water Works sued three northwest Iowa counties that oversee 10 agricultural drainage districts. The lawsuit is seeking to overturn a century of legal precedent that has protected the drainage systems from lawsuits.

But this is the first time the courts have had to consider the public health impact of pollution sent downstream by the drainage systems, said Des Moines Water Works attorney John Lande.

He said drainage districts basically exist for the good of public health and welfare. He said that is inconsistent when the water sent downstream at times carries nitrate levels four times the EPA limit.

They dont have to pollute in order to drain the land, he said. Thats the point Des Moines Water Works claims in this case.

Justice Brent Appel acknowledged Iowas long history of protecting drainage systems, but he asked whether it continues to be the right approach today when views of liability have changed.

Its right because you told us its right, said Michael Reck, an attorney representing the counties.

Reck pointed to several cases in which the court upheld legal immunity for drainage districts. He also said the Iowa Legislature could have changed laws protecting the districts but has not.

The lawsuit is filed in U.S. District Court in Des Moines. In January, Judge Mark Bennett agreed to ask the Iowa Supreme Court to clarify state law questions including drainage district immunity.

Besides seeking monetary damages, Water Works also wants the drainage districts to be forced to comply with federal Clean Water Act standards, which could require permits, monitoring of the water coming out of the drainage pipes and efforts to limit contaminants released.

Even if the state Supreme Court determines the districts cannot be sued for monetary damages, the federal regulatory portion of the lawsuit could move forward.

The lawsuit has farm groups worried. The Iowa Farm Bureau Federation and the state associations for corn and soybean growers have offered to help pay the legal bills of the three counties being sued  Buena Vista, Calhoun and Sac.

The case also has prompted the Iowa Legislature to consider funding conservation practices that could help minimize the loss of nutrients from farmland. A proposal that Gov. Terry Branstad backed last year would defer a portion of a tax that school districts use for building maintenance for water quality projects, but it failed to move forward. A plan to approve a 3/8-cent sales tax that would generate about $150 million a year for water quality initiatives also didnt advance.

The 3/8-cent sales tax proposal could surface again this year, but passing a tax increase in a highly partisan election year will likely be difficult.

Related:

Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Topics Lawsuits Agribusiness Pollution Iowa
An ex-convict who posted anti-Islamic rants online confessed to setting fire to a mosque that the Orlando nightclub shooter occasionally attended, and said he was embarrassed by the crime, according to an arrest affidavit released Thursday.

St. Lucie County sheriffs detectives wrote in the affidavit that after Joseph Michael Schreiber was arrested Wednesday, he told detectives that he had set the fire at the Islamic Center of Fort Pierce on Sunday, the 15th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The blaze also coincided with the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha.

Schreiber, 32, told detectives he never intended to hurt anyone. No one was injured in the fire, which burned a 10-by-10-foot hole in the roof at the back of the mosques main building and blackened its eaves with soot.

Schreiber, who previously served two prison terms for theft, was developed as a suspect partly because of a tip from the public, the affidavit said.

He was arrested without incident Wednesday and charged with second-degree arson with a hate crime enhancement, a crime that carries a maximum 30-year sentence.

St. Lucie County Judge Philip Yacucci ordered Schreiber held without bail Thursday, calling him a danger to the community and a flight risk. He also noted that Schreiber had made anti-Islamic posts on social media. Last July, Schreiber posted on Facebook that All Islam is radical and that all Muslims should be treated as terrorists and criminals.

Schreiber, who is Jewish, stated that, IF AMERICA truly wants peace and safety and pursuit of happiness they should consider all forms of ISLAM as radical.  ALL ISLAM IS RADICAL, and should be considered TERRORIST AND CRIMANALS (sic) and all hoo (sic) participate in such activity should be found guilty of WAR CRIM (sic) until law and order is restored in this beautiful free country.

Wilfredo Amr Ruiz, a spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations-Florida, said Schreiber obviously doesnt know about the efforts our community is engaged in with our cousins, the Jews, not only in Florida but throughout the nation.

Omar Saleh, an attorney for CAIR, described both Schreiber and nightclub shooter Omar Mateen as degenerates and punks.

Just like on June 12, when I was stressing that Mateens actions do not speak on behalf of Islam, I know that whatever religion Mr. Schreiber is, his actions do not speak on behalf of his religion, Saleh said.

Mateen was killed by police after opening fire at the Pulse nightclub on June 12 in a rampage that left 49 victims dead and 53 wounded, making it the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history. Mateen professed allegiance to the Islamic State group. His father is among roughly 100 people who regularly attend the mosque.

Schreiber was previously sentenced twice to state prison for theft, according to records from the Florida Department of Corrections. The records show he served his first sentence from March 2008 to July 2009 and his second from June 2010 to August 2014. The public defenders office had no immediate comment on Schreibers case.

A weekend surveillance video from the mosque showed a man on a motorcycle approaching the building while talking on a cellphone, according to the affidavit. He carried a bottle of liquid and some papers and left when there was a flash. The first 911 calls were made about 45 minutes later, after the fire had spread to the attic. It took about four-and-a-half hours for firefighters to extinguish the blaze.

The FBI and the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives joined the investigation into the fire.

Rabbi Bruce Benson, a chaplain with the Port St. Lucie Police Department, was outside Schreibers home Wednesday night. He said Schreiber attended his synagogue for about a month last spring to study the Torah, but left little impression, and gave no indication he might act violently in the future.

Benson said Schreibers father showed up at his office after his son was arrested, even though he wasnt a member of his synagogue.

I guess he didnt know where else to go, Benson said, adding that Schreibers parents are shocked, just like any of us would be if it were our child.

Benson said his reform synagogue, Temple Beth El Israel, has tried unsuccessfully in the past to reach out to the mosque.

We would welcome the opportunity, Benson said. Theyre a community feeling under attack. If we could all talk a bit, maybe things like this wouldnt have to happen.

Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Topics Florida
Uber Technologies Inc. won permission to settle claims it misled consumers by charging them a 20 percent gratuity even though drivers got only about half of it.

U.S. District Judge Edward Chen in San Francisco on Thursday gave preliminary approval to a deal in which Uber will pay about $384,000 for 47,000 users of the ridesharing companys app.

Passengers claimed that for a one-year period, Uber said on its website and in other marketing materials that it automatically charged users their metered fares plus a 20 percent tip for drivers. Uber didnt pass along the full 20 percent, but instead took a cut of 40 percent to 50 percent of the tip for itself, according to the complaint.

Lawyers for consumers urged Chen to approve the settlement because Ubers payment represents essentially a full refund of the amount at issue in this suit, according to a court filing. Uber collected about $860,000 from users for the gratuity charge, according to the filing.

Chen last month rejected Ubers $100 million settlement of a lawsuit by drivers seeking to be treated as employees rather than independent contractors and compensated for unpaid expenses and tips.

The judge concluded the deal was unfair, partly because it low-balled potential claims under California law. He said he also wasnt convinced that changing the companys tipping policy would result in the substantially increased income for drivers as promised. The company and drivers have since told a federal appeals court theyve resumed settlement negotiations.

The case is Ehret v. Uber, 14-00113, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California (San Francisco). The drivers case is OConnor v. Uber Technologies Inc., 13-cv-03826, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California (San Francisco).

Related:

Copyright 2022 Bloomberg.

Topics California USA Legislation
Among the middlemen tasked with making today's healthcare efficient and cost-effective is UnitedHealth Group Inc. (UNH), the largest healthcare company in the United States and Canada by revenue. UnitedHealth Group generates revenue from a variety of sources, including premiums on risk-based products, fees from various services, sales on healthcare products, and services and investment.

UnitedHealth Group began in 1974 as Minnesota-based Charter Med Incorporated, reorganizing just a few years later into United HealthCare Corporation and eventually into its current structure and name. Throughout its history, the company has acquired a number of competing healthcare providers; most recently, in June of 2019, UnitedHealth Group purchased online patient platform PatientsLikeMe for an undisclosed sum, according to MobiHealthNews.

Primarily an insurer, UnitedHealth Group claims over 147 million customers worldwide. The company has two divisions: UnitedHealthcare, its benefits arm, and Optuma branch that encompasses three separate sectors: Optum Rx, a mail-order pharmacy; Optum Health, which operates health savings accounts; and Optum Insight, a payment processor for healthcare providers. UnitedHealthcare dwarfs Optum, accounting for about 78% of UnitedHealth Group's revenue in FY 2021.

UnitedHealth Group has a market capitalization of more than $492.82 billion as of Sept. 8, 2022. In 2021, it reported $287.6 billion in revenue, up 12% from $257.1 billion for 2020. The company's revenue has ballooned in recent years: for context, in 2019 UnitedHealth Group reported revenues of just over $242.1 billion.

Across all of its business, UnitedHealth Group served more than 147 million people as of Sept. 2022.

UnitedHealth Group's Business Model

From at least one perspective, health insurance seems like a great deal for the consumer. It provides a sense of security knowing that if you get into an accident or contract a serious illness you'll be taken care of. Health insurance companies, such as UnitedHealth Group, foot the bill for numerous surgeries and treatments costing tens of thousands of dollars each. So how can this be a good business? The reason is that the healthy customers are essentially paying for the sick ones.

Take, for example, appendicitis. Five to nine people out of 100 will get appendicitis at some point in their lives, and many of those will need an appendectomy. The average annual individual health insurance cost was about $5,250 in 2022 and the surgery drastically ranges from $1,800 to $82,000hence the people who didn't need the surgery, the other 90%95%, cover the ones who do.

Health insurance is one of those phrases thats gone from clear to idiomatic to bearing no resemblance to its original meaning. Most forms of insurance in other realms involve paying a small amount to insure against the risk of massive loss. Health insurance as its currently constituted, at least in the U.S., means partnering with an enormous corporation to pay for even routine maintenance. Its akin to your home insurance policy covering vacuuming. And, since March 23, 2010, you're required to use insurance whether you want to or not. The result: 300 million mandated customers and only a handful of approved insurers. The differences among one insurer and the next are often indistinguishable; every giant insurer has to offer health savings accounts, summaries of benefits and coverage, etc. UnitedHealthcare offers cheaper plans than some of its competitors given comparable deductibles, thanks to a larger network of physicians and other medical clients. It should be noted that UnitedHealth Group pulled out of the individual market in 2017, but in 2022 is offering marketplace health insurance in 18 states.

UnitedHealth Group primarily generates revenue through its premiums, its fees for various medical and consulting services, and sales of medical products and services. It also generates revenue from investments and other income sources, which we will not cover here.

Key Takeaways UnitedHealth Group earns revenue from premiums, fees, sales, and investments.

The company divides its operations into UnitedHealthcare, its benefits branch, and Optum, which is further divided into subcategories for Optum Rx, Optum Insight, and Optum Health.

UnitedHealth Group is the largest healthcare company in the U.S. and Canada by revenue.

UnitedHealth Group's Premiums Business

Co-pays cover just about every healthcare transaction that an insurer makes. UnitedHealth Group pays out a lot, but it also takes in a lot. The company billed more than $100 billion in Medicare and retirement premiums in 2021. Advanced-age care comprises UnitedHealthcares largest sector, which makes sense, given the relative indisposition of elderly folks. Its followed by premium revenue from employer and individual plans. People in the workforce have cheaper upfront costs than retirees and they outnumber them greatly. In total, premiums accounted for about $226.2 billion in revenues for UnitedHealth Group in 2021, or nearly 79% of total revenues.

UnitedHealth Group's Products and Services Business

UnitedHealth Group's other products and services range from healthcare equipment and tools to consulting and technology, among many others. These are often delivered via consultants, direct sales, or wholesale agents. Products generated $34.4 billion in revenues for 2021, while services brought in $24.6 billion in revenues.

About 79% of UnitedHealth Group's revenue is generated from premiums.

UnitedHealth Group's Optum Business

Insurance is UnitedHealth Groups primary moneymaker, but the Optum group is a nimble and aggressive secondary business that is more than earning its keep. Optum Health provides care delivery, consumer engagement, and health financial services, among other products. Optum Insight is focused on major participants in the healthcare industry, providing expertise, technology, and other services. OptumRx is a pharmacy care company. In 2021, Optum Health generated $54 billion in revenue, while Optum Insight brought in roughly $12 billion and Optum Rx claimed $91.3 billion.

Future Plans

As UnitedHealth Group acknowledges in its 2021 annual review, the U.S. is in the early stages of a dramatic re-envisioning of healthcare thanks to technological development, regulatory changes, and more. The company aims to be at the forefront of these new developments and has already worked to harness new technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) to improve its patient care and product offerings. UnitedHealth Group is also aiming to grow along with changes to the ecommerce and retail landscapes, particularly with regard to its Optum Rx platform.

Key Challenges

As an insurance company making most of its money from premiums, UnitedHealth Group always faces the risk of miscalculating medical and administrative costs. With approximately 80-85% of premium revenues going to pay the medical costs of healthcare delivered to its customers, UnitedHealth Group has a relatively slim margin for error in these calculations.

An Uncertain Future for Healthcare

Another major challenge is the constantly shifting regulatory landscape, which holds tremendous power over healthcare companies. With the Affordable Care Act still a highly contentious political issue, UnitedHealth Group must position itself to be able to adjust its business model in the face of potential changes in regulation.

Given its significant number of customers, UnitedHealth Group is particularly vulnerable to information breaches, cyber attacks, and similar challenges as well.
Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN), one of the largest companies in the world, is a global leader in e-commerce and cloud computing. The company operates an online marketplace offering a vast variety of products mostly from other merchants, including electronics, apparel, furniture, food, and toys. It also offers video and music streaming services. Amazon's cloud services platform hosts online applications for a broad range of customers.

Founded in 1994, Amazon started out as an online bookstore. But its founder and former chief executive officer (CEO), Jeff Bezos, envisioned Amazon as more than merely an online retailer. Instead, Bezos saw Amazon as a technology company whose competitive advantage was making online transactions simpler for consumers. Amazon shares began trading following an initial public offering (IPO) in May 1997. Its stock is listed on the Nasdaq Global Select Market.

Amazon has long been based in Seattle. In 2018 it unveiled plans for a "second headquarters" in Arlington, Virginia, which is slated to open in 2023. Andy Jassy has been the e-commerce giant's CEO since succeeding Bezos in July 2021. Bezos remains as executive chair. Amazon is grouped with consumer discretionary stocks for investing purposes, though it is also included in many mutual and exchange-traded funds focused on the technology sector in recognition of Amazon Web Services' (AWS) status as a leading cloud computing provider. The company's main competitors include brick-and-mortar retailers like Walmart Inc. (WMT), the e-commerce platform operator eBay Inc. (EBAY), and cloud computing services rivals Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) and Alphabet Inc. (GOOGL). Amazon posted net income of $33.4 billion on net sales of $469.8 billion in FY 2021, which ended Dec. 31, 2021.

Key Takeaways Amazon is an online retailer, streaming services provider, and cloud computing company.

Amazon's rivals include Walmart, eBay, Microsoft, and Google parent Alphabet.

Amazon earned $33.4 billion in net income on net sales of $469.8 billion in FY 2021.

On March 9, 2022, Amazon's board of directors approved $10 billion in share buybacks and a 20-for-1 stock split that went into effect on June 3.

Amazon's Recent Developments

On May 2, 2022, the results of the second of two unionization votes at Amazon facilities were announced. The first vote came out in favor of unionization, the second against.

On March 9, 2022, Amazon's board of directors approved a 20-for-1 stock split and authorized a buyback of up to $10 billion in shares over an indefinite period of time. Shareholders of record on May 27 received their additional shares on June 3, with the stock resuming trading on a split-adjusted basis on June 6.

Also in March, one U.S. judge dismissed an antitrust suit by the District of Columbia over the company's pricing rules for third-party merchants, while another U.S. judge refused to dismiss a private class-action suit challenging similar practices.

On April 1, 2022, workers at one of the company's warehouses in Staten Island, New York, voted to be represented by the recently formed Amazon Labor Union, the first successful unionization vote at an Amazon facility.

What's Happening with the Amazon Union Votes? On April 1, 2022, workers at Amazon's JFK8 warehouse in Staten Island, New York, elected the recently formed Amazon Labor Union to represent them in collective bargaining, the first successful unionization effort at an Amazon facility. On April 8, 2022, Amazon filed a motion with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) asking it to invalidate the Staten Island election results, alleging legal violations by union backers and bias in favor of the union by the NLRB's regional office. On April 9, 2022, the NLRB said workers at an Amazon warehouse in Alabama rejected union representation on March 31, in an election re-run because the NLRB ruled the company improperly interfered with the first vote. On April 18, 2022, an administrative law judge ruled Amazon illegally fired an Amazon Labor Union from his job at the Staten Island warehouse in 2020 in retaliation for protected organizing activities. On April 25, 2022, workers at a second Amazon warehouse in Staten Island began voting on union representation. However, the effort to unionize the Staten Island warehouse failed, with 618 employees voting against joining the union and 380 for, according to results released by National Labor Board announced on May 2, 2022.

What's Happening with Amazon's Product Recall? In mid-July 2021, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) sued Amazon to force it to recall hazardous products sold on its marketplace by independent merchants. The products included 24,000 faulty carbon monoxide detectors, 400,000 hair dryers sold without the required immersion protection devices to guard against electrocution risk, and an unspecified number of children's sleepwear garments that failed to meet mandated flammability standards. While Amazon removed some of the hazardous product listings, notified purchasers they presented a hazard and offered a refund in the form of an Amazon gift card, it failed to comply with all the requirements the CPSC imposes on product distributors, including issuing an agency-approved recall notice specifying the hazards, tracking product returns and documenting the destruction of hazardous products, Amazon contended it was a third-party logistics supplier exempted from CPSC distributor rules. On, Jan. 19, 2022, an administrative law judge ruled Amazon must comply with CPSC distributor rules because it handles functions that qualify it as such, including decisions on product returns and consumer refunds.



What's Happening with the Antitrust Lawsuits Against Amazon? On March 18, 2022, the a U.S. Superior Cout judge dismissed an antitrust suit filed against Amazon by the attorney general for the District of Columbia, ruling the suit failed to show that Amazon's agreements with third-party merchants obligating them to price their products on Amazon no higher then they do elsewhere serves to increase consumer prices. On April 13, 2022, the attorney general for the District of Columbia sought reconsideration of the ruling, arguing the agreements allow Amazon to charge higher fees for third-party listings than other online marketplaces, because merchants can't pass on the lower listings fees to consumers. On March 11, 2022, a U.S. district court judge in Washington state refused to dismiss a class action suit against Amazon over the same "most favored nation" pricing rules, brought by two frequent Amazon shoppers and several law firms.





What's Happening with Amazon's Acquisition of MGM? On March 17, 2022, Amazon said it completed its acquisition for $8.45 billion of MGM, along with its catalog of more than 4,000 films and 17,000 TV shows. MGM was not the same company as MGM Resorts International (MGM). The acquisition, announced on May 26, 2021, was Amazon's second-largest after its $13.7 billion deal for Whole Foods in 2017, and will allow the company to augment its video streaming offerings. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which closely scrutinized the deal, reportedly did not attempt to block it because its four commissioners were split along party lines on the matter.

FAQs

Has AMZN ever split its stock? Amazon has split its stock four times, as follows. The first three stock splits took place in its first two years as a public company, and the fourth more than 20 years later. as follows: June 2, 1998: a 2-for-1 split.

Jan. 5, 1999: a 3-for-1 split.

Sept. 1, 1999: a 2-for-1 split.

June 3, 2022: a 20-for-1 split.



Does AMZN pay a dividend? No, it does not pay a dividend.

How many shares of AMZN stock are there? As of Apr. 20, 2022the date of the last official disclosureAmazon had 508,720,481 shares outstanding. Following its June 3 stock split, Amazon has 10,174,409,620 shares outstanding.

Who is Amazon's CEO? Andy Jassy, who succeeded founder Jeff Bezos on July 5, 2021. Jassy is also a member of the board of directors, where Bezos is executive chair. Jassy founded AWS, Amazon's highly profitable and fast-growing cloud computing platform. He was CEO of AWS from April 2016 until July 2021. Jassy has been with Amazon since 1997.


ARE YOU A TOP COMPANY?

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To be a Top Company in Irish Construction Industry Magazines Top Companies listing means far more than just a rank and position in an ordered catalogue of names. To us, it means that your efforts to be the best you can be and to excel in your industry and sector have been effective and have paid dividends. To us, it means that your determination and commitment to develop and instil a positive work culture and environment have brought your business due success plus satisfaction. We see it as you being a supportive and inclusive place in which to work that strives to bring the best out of everyone across every level of the organisation.

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An Irish adventurer dubbed the 'lawnmower man' has become the first to fly from Ireland to Africa by paramotor writes Eoin English.

Oisin Creagh from Cork finally got a break in the weather this morning and took off from Spain, crossed the Straits of Gibraltar, and touched down in Morocco earlier with his lawnmower engineer-powered back-mounted propeller aircraft and parachute-style wing.
A father and son whose family business sold dangerous teeth-whitening products have been jailed for 18 months.

Merthyr Crown Court heard that John Hargreaves, 69, and his son Matthew, 44, sold the unsafe beauty treatments at shows and shopping centres across the UK, as well as online, netting 3.4 million in the process.

A Trading Standards' investigation later found the dental products had hydrogen peroxide levels up to 110 times more than the legal level.

The pair, from Knutsford in Cheshire, managed to sell the goods for eight years - giving unhappy customers and Trading Standards' officials the slip by folding one company before starting another with a new name and address.

Judge Philip Harris-Jenkins described the family's business - which also saw 71-year-old mother Jean pitch in - as "sophisticated and highly organised".

He said: "You duped the public into purchasing unsafe teeth-whitening products and placed them at risk of serious harm.

"You placed personal greed before public safety."

The court heard that Hargreaves senior had previously been cautioned in 2007 after sales of "too strong" teeth-whitening gel at the Royal Cornwall Show prompted a deluge of complaints.

However, the company director ignored the warning from the authorities and they continued to advertise the product - insisting to customers that it was safe.

Prosecutor Mark Wyeth QC said their business proved extremely lucrative, and saw the defendants enjoy a lavish lifestyle - living in a large Cheshire house and owning seven luxury vehicles, including a Range Rover.

However, when complaints started to mount up, Mr Wyeth said the defendants used a number of tactics to try to "evade Trading Standards and unhappy customers" by starting up new companies.

He added: "Fifty four various addresses were used as prophylactic against complaints.

"They not only defrauded the general public but also the authorities, without any regard for people's safety."

The court heard that one woman, named only as Mrs Hague, suffered chemical burns to her mouth and gums from the Hargreaves' teeth-whitening product.

The pair were caught out following an operation by Powys County Council's trading standards, with undercover officials buying products from the Hargreaves' stall at the Royal Welsh Show in 2013.

Officers found that as well as numerous false claims about the gel, which included "used by leading dentists across Europe", it also contained 11% hydrogen peroxide.

Cosmetic product regulations allow sales of products containing up to 0.1% hydrogen peroxide, and anything higher than 6% is classed as being potentially dangerous to health.

Powys council's Operation Gleam later expanded to include 10 other local authorities who had tried to catch the two men.

They pleaded guilty to participating in a fraudulent business, an offence under the 2006 Fraud Act.

They were each handed 18-month immediate custodial sentences and banned from becoming company directors for 10 years.

The court heard that Mrs Hargreaves also played a role in the family business, albeit in a more administrative role.

She pleaded guilty to the less serious charge of engaging in unfair commercial practice, and was handed a six-month sentence suspended for two years and banned from being a company director for five years.

After sentence was passed she broke down in tears as her husband and son were taken into custody.

Powys council's cabinet member for trading standards John Powell welcomed the outcome.

He said: "We cannot have unsafe products being brought into Powys, which could harm our citizens or visitors, particularly as the Royal Welsh Show is our premier event.

"This result also vindicates our decision to embark on a nationwide investigation, demonstrating the excellent skills that our trading standards team possess."

Clive Jones, the council's professional lead for trading standards and community safety, also praised the officers in the case after they took more than 90 statements and collected 6,000 exhibits.

He added: "We will be working with the General Dental Council (GDC) on future campaigns as this was one of the largest cases ever taken and we need to ensure that such sharp practices are stamped out."

Katie Spears, of the GDC, said: "The GDC continue to work hard to proactively spread the message that tooth whitening is the practice of dentistry and that only registered dental professionals can legally and safely provide such treatment.

"We are particularly proud of the collaborative approach taken here with Powys trading standards to promote patient safety and will continue to work with trading standards and other stakeholders to guard against the promotion of potentially dangerous illegal tooth-whitening practices."
An appeals court in Sweden has decided to uphold the arrest warrant for Julian Assange.

The 45-year-old is wanted by Swedish authorities for questioning over allegations, which he denies, that he committed rape six years ago.
The United States and Russia have called for a meeting of the UN Security Council to discuss the fragile ceasefire in Syria.

The council will hold closed consultations later on Friday.

The development comes a day after Russia's Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said he hoped the Security Council would adopt a resolution endorsing the ceasefire agreement at next week's high-level General Assembly meeting, which draws leaders from around the globe.

The move comes as clashes were reported between government forces and rebels, violating the ceasefire which came into effect on Monday.

The UN said it has not received the necessary guarantees from the US and Russia for aid convoys to cross the Turkish border into Syria - nor permission from the Syrian government for trucks to get through government checkpoints to deliver badly need supplies.

UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the UN needs US and Russian leadership "to have the necessary impact and influence over the various parties to ensure that the trucks can roll safely" - and the Syrian government to authorise the right administrative permissions for trucks to get through its checkpoints.

She said the UN is ready and that "it's for all the parties to see that the needs of the Syrian people are great. And every day that we're unable to move is just another day of suffering for the people of Syria, especially in the hard-to-reach areas".

The Russian military has accused the Syrian opposition of using the truce to regroup and strengthen its forces.

Head of the Russian Reconciliation Centre, Lt Gen Vladimir Savchenko, said opposition units have used the ceasefire to "restore their capability and regroup their forces in the provinces of Aleppo, Hama and Homs".

Russia pledged to help ensure the ceasefire holds in Syria for another three days, but warned the US to press the rebels to end their violations to prevent the situation from "spinning out of control".

First Person: A day in the life of Syrias White Helmet volunteer rescue workers. https://t.co/viLsaFNFFG pic.twitter.com/qZQoh5dsVX  huck (@HUCKmagazine) September 16, 2016

Lt Gen Viktor Poznikhir claimed the Syrian army has fully complied with the truce while the opposition units have violated it 144 times.

Earlier the Syrian army moved its heavy weapons back to a key road near the city of Aleppo after the opposition failed to withdraw theirs in sync.

The Russian military said the Syrian army withdrew its armour, artillery and other weapons north of the Castello Road early on Thursday then moved the weapons back on Friday as the opposition units had failed to pull back theirs as agreed.

Rebels are said to have fired on government positions overnight, wounding two soldiers and prompting the Syrian army to move their weapons back to the road to prevent the rebels from advancing.

Clashes were also reported between troops and insurgents as well as shelling in two areas of the Syrian capital, Damascus.

Syrian state news agency SANA said insurgents shelled government-held areas in Qaboun, wounding three people.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights say the latest fighting was concentrated in the area of Jobar, next to Qaboun.
Exports decreased by 11.5% to 8.92bn on a seasonally adjusted basis in July, with analysts pointing to the impact of Brexit for weaker than expected trade data released by the CSO yesterday.

While the initial impact of Brexit has been largely contained, economic confidence has taken a hit as businesses and consumers assess the likely outcome on their personal positions.

Merrion Stockbrokers chief economist Alan McQuaid said that while trade activity has been relatively robust in the first half of the year, the statistics released yesterday suggest a slowdown is on the cards in the latter part of the year.

Business and consumer confidence have been dented in recent months by the uncertainty surrounding Brexit, said Mr McQuaid. However, the trade data for the first half of the year were quite positive, though we expect to see a slowdown in activity in the second half of 2016 and July numbers would tend to bear this out.

Imports in July dipped by 10.7% on a seasonally adjusted basis while the trade surplus decreased by 510m to 3.527bn.

Julys surplus was only marginally above the lowest surplus posted to date this year, in March, of 3.523m.

The unadjusted value of goods exports for July was 9.12bn, representing a decrease of 292m (-3%) when compared with July 2015.

The value of exported goods from January to July was 65.86bn, an increase of 1.7bn, or 3%, compared with the opening seven months of 2015.

On an unadjusted basis there was a surplus of 4.13bn in July, 480m higher than the surplus of 3.64m posted in the seventh month of 2015, said Mr McQuaid.

In the first seven months of 2016, the cumulative trade balance amounted to 27.69bn, which was 3.14bn higher than the surplus of 24.55bn in the same period last year.

The revised total 2015 surplus of 42.2bn was the second-largest ever recorded.

Despite such a lofty target, Mr McQuaid said he still believes this years trade surplus will be higher than that of last year despite the weak July trade data and the potential continued impact of Brexit.

He said Brexit was likely to have a negative impact on Irish trade in the medium term with SMEs set to be hardest hit should tariffs and other trade barriers be introduced.

One can only speculate as to how Brexit will impact Ireland in the coming months and years, but there is likely to be a negative impact on trade, said Mr McQuaid.

The UK is the second- largest single country for Irelands goods and the largest for its services. At the same time, Ireland imports 30% of its goods from the UK. While the UK might only account for 16%-17% of Irelands total exports, 30% of all employment is in sectors which are heavily related to UK exports.

Comparing July 2016 to July 2015, the exports of electrical machinery, apparatus and appliances, rose by more than 200% while exports of medical and pharmaceutical goods dipped by almost a fifth.

The EU accounted for 4.46bn (49%) of total goods exports in July, of which 1.05bn went to Belgium and 1.07bn to the UK.

The US was the main non-EU destination, accounting for 24% of exports in July.
NewsBrands Ireland, the representative body for all national newspapers in print and online, highlighted the effectiveness of advertising carried by media organisations at its first-ever townhall event last night.

The event, which took place in Dublins Smock Alley Theatre on Exchange St Lower, brought together representatives all of the bodys members.
He reaffirmed the companys commitment to Ireland, and to Cork in particular, the base of its only manufacturing plant outside the US, despite the EUs 13bn tax ruling against it.

Some 5,500 people work at its Hollyhill facility, with up to 1,000 more jobs set to come on stream when a plant extension is completed towards the end of next year.
The 17-year-old was released on supervised probation for the next 12 months but warned by Judge John OConnor that he would be detained for two years if he broke the terms.

The attack happened after the troubled boy got angry that care workers would not take him out for a drive because of his aggressive behaviour, the Dublin Childrens Court heard.

Judge John OConnor was told the incident took place at a residential care home for teenagers in Dublin on a date in August last year.

The care worker said the boy was 15 to 20 feet away from him holding the wok with a full fry, and he just lobbed it at me. I blocked it with my left arm.

He said that it happened so quickly I just had time to put my hand up, I was covered in boiling meat.

After losing the case, during which the victim faced cross-examination, the youth instructed his solicitor to apologise on his behalf. However, the judge had said Im not buying it.

He said the victim was put under pressure as if his behaviour had contributed to the incident when there was no evidence of that.

The court heard the youth had seven prior criminal convictions for criminal damage and public order offences and had been given a suspended sentence earlier this year. He is also awaiting trial for another alleged assault. The teenager was accompanied to the hearing by care staff, his social worker, and his mother.

He had apologised to the care worker.

Id like to say Im sorry, you shouldnt have been in that situation regardless how I was feeling at that time, he said. I should not have thrown the pan at you and acted aggressively. I was going through a lot of stuff at the time. I was not thinking what I was doing. I wasnt thinking I would end up in a situation like this.

Im honestly sorry. You took care of me when I was there and I did get on with you well.

The care worker said he accepted the apology and thanked the teen.

The court heart that in another incident, he seriously injured a woman in Dublin on July 4. Judge OConnor was told there had been an incident at the care home in which the youth damaged a wiper on a car, and a drain pipe.

The judge said the youth had significant issues but his behaviour was outrageous.

However, he gave the youth a chance by imposing the 12-month probation bond. The teenager must engage with a mental health service, Probation Service, and be in education or get a job. Otherwise he will get a custodial sentence, the judge warned.
Relatives, friends, and staff from the emergency services paid respects to Caitriona Lucas at her funeral at St Brigids Church, Liscannor, Co Clare.

The mother of two  an artist, librarian, animal lover, and lifesaver  died on Monday when the rescue boat she was in with two colleagues capsized in heavy Atlantic swell off Kilkee.

Caitriona Lucas, who lost her life during a mission in Kilkee when the lifeboat she was travelling in capsized in heavy swell.

As scores of Irish Coast Guard staff, in their distinctive black uniforms and white peaked caps, flanked the entrance to the church, Ms Lucas husband Bernard and son Ben fought back tears to describe their loss.

Taking a leaf from his wifes philosophy on life, the widower told mourners: Dont put things off, do them now. Time is short. Life is very precious.

With a trembling voice, the couples 20-year-old son gave mourners in the packed church and grounds a glowing insight into his mother.

My mother was an exceptional person in every way, he said.

She loved life and gave everything she did 100%. She loved the sea and the coastguard, her work in the library, especially with the projects she did with the children.

From left: Catrionas husband Bernard, also a coastguard volunteer, her daughter Emma, 18, and son Ben, 20. Picture: RollingNews.ie

My mother had lots of great qualities. She was caring, loving, kind, and above all dedicated.

She was an inspiration to everyone around her and I always will remember her smile and her laugh.

She will be missed by everyone and she will always be in our thoughts and our hearts.

Goodbye to our wonderful mother. Love always. You are my hero.

Before the Mass a video compiled by Ms Lucas 18-year-old daughter Emma was played showing aspects of her mothers life.

Ms Lucas, 41 and originally from Ballyvaughan, Co Clare, was the first member of the Irish Coast Guard to die on duty. She and her husband Bernard volunteered with the Doolin unit.

Ms Lucas had gone to sea off Kilkee on Monday in the search for missing teacher David McMahon, 33, from Lisseycassey, Co Clare.

Two colleagues, who were also thrown into the sea in the accident, coxswain James Lucy and Jenny Carraway, were rescued and suffered minor injuries.

Mourners heard how the family had kayaked the River Inagh last week and planned another trip.

Members of the coastguard at the funeral of Caitriona Lucas at Liscannor Church, Co Clare. Picture: Eamon Ward

Ms Lucas had also planned a Roald Dahl weekend for children at the library to mark the 100th anniversary of the writers birthday, including painting windows and preparing masks for youngsters to complete.

Parish priest Father Denis Crosby told mourners flags were flying at half-mast as a mark of respect.

To salute a great spirit, to salute a spirit of service and a gracious, wonderful woman, the priest said.

Words will not sum up the occasion.

Fr Crosby recalled Ms Lucas compassion, generosity, and child-like spirit.

She carried the light wonderfully into our world. She was a light in a world thats very often dark and careless, he said.

Fr Crosby said Ms Lucas embodied the spirit of helping a neighbour and recalled how she overcame her fear of heights while training to be a rescue volunteer and once went over a cliff edge in Carrigaholt to save a dog.

Members of the search and rescue dog unit were among those who formed a guard of honour at the funeral. Picture: Eamon Ward

In Caitrionas life we have the perfect living out and embodiment of the mystery of love. It wasnt just words and talk but actions and commitment.

To give your life doesnt mean just to die. She gave her life, all her life, and she knew that living means giving.

And the creed and the colour and the name didnt matter. As long as there was need she was there. First always to answer the call.

The funeral was attended by Shane Ross, minister for transport, tourism and sport, and representatives of President Michael D Higgins and Taoiseach Enda Kenny.

Ms Lucas was buried in Kilmacreehy cemetery, Liscannor, with the thousands of mourners walking the road to the graveyard overlooking the Atlantic and the beach in nearby Lahinch.
The latest Residential Tenancies Board rent index shows that, nationally, rents rose by just under 10% during the second quarter of this year, compared with a year earlier.

The index also shows that significant increases were not confined to the Dublin region, but also occurred in other parts of the country.

The RTBs Quarterly Rent Index is compiled on its behalf by the Economic and Social Research Institute and is the most accurate and authoritative rent report of its kind in Ireland.

The index is based on 22,103 new tenancies which commenced in April, May and June this year and were registered with the RTB.

It reflects the actual rents being paid, according to the RTBs records, as distinct from the asking or advertised rent.

In particular, it shows that properties with a weekly rate of more than 300 are up from 7% in 2013 to 25% now.

Nationally, rents were 9.9% higher over the second quarter of this year, compared to the same period last year  up from 869 to 956.

Rents for houses were 9.3% higher  up from 850 to 929, while apartment rents were 11.7% greater than in the same quarter of 2015  up from 908 to 1,014.

The RTB now has a total of 323,271 tenancies registered, representing 172,121 landlords and 704,332 occupants.

The Simon Communities said the RTBs rent index showed that the market is not slowing down, despite rent stability measures introduced last year.

The homeless and housing organisation said additional initiatives are needed alongside rent stability measures.

National spokeswoman for the Simon Communities, Niamh Randall, said the Government must prioritise the proposed Strategy for the Private Rental Sector.

Ms Randall said many of the people who are becoming homeless are coming from the private rental sector and insisted that action must include rent certainty and enhanced security of tenure for both landlords and tenants.

The rent stability measures that were introduced in November 2015 are having little impact as rents are continuing to rise, she said.

Ms Randall said the solutions to this crisis involved preventing people from losing their homes and providing access to decent, affordable housing.

The chairperson of the housing charity, Threshold, said many of its clients had experienced rent increases as high as 30%.

Speaking on RTE radio yesterday, Dr Aideen Hayden compared the rental market to a runaway train and called for urgent action.

Dr Hayden said the organisation is disappointed that the Governments housing strategy did not introduce a model of rent certainty to link rents to an index.
Methotrexate is a a drug used to end an ectopic pregnancy. It should only be advised if a consultant is completely certain of this diagnosis, expert witness and gynaecologist Philip Owen told the Medical Council inquiry in Dublin yesterday.

The hearing is looking into claims that a consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist working at South Tipperary General Hospital  referred to as Dr Awrongly diagnosed an ectopic pregnancy in the case of mother-of-three Laura Esmonde, 38, when she presented at the hospital on January 6, 2013 with a swollen leg. Dr A then advised methotrexate to end the pregnancy, which Ms Esmonde took on January 8.

Dr Owen, an obstetrician and gynaecologist based in Glasgow, said yesterday that he believed an ultrasound taken on January 7, 2013, by Dr As registrar indicated a fluid- filled cyst on the right ovary, rather than an ectopic pregnancy.

Following this scan, Dr A conducted a transvaginal scan, at which point, said Ms Esmonde, he told her she had an ectopic pregnancy of unknown location. He then recommended methotrexate.

Dr Owen yesterday said Dr A did not have enough information to confirm a diagnosis of an ectopic pregnancy, and should not have recommended methotrexate.

In my opinion, he did not have enough information to advise methotrexate. He didnt have enough information to exclude an intrauterine pregnancy  quite the opposite, in fact, said Dr Owen. If everything fits, you can make a diagnosis with confidence, but if everything doesnt fit, you cant make a diagnosis with confidence. What it boils down to is this: the entitlement to recommend the administration of methotrexate. Have you met this criteria? No [in this case].

Dr Owen said Dr A did not note Ms Esmondes lack of symptoms for an ectopic pregnancy, nor discuss her potential risk for these pregnancies with her.

This is important because ectopic pregnancies account for 1% of pregnancies, he said.

Earlier yesterday, the consultant at Cork University Maternity Hospital, John Coulter, told the inquiry he saw evidence of a pregnancy inside Ms Esmondes womb in late January 2013.

Mr Coulter, a consultant gynaecological oncologist, said he performed abdominal and vaginal exams on Ms Esmonde on January 27, 2013. These exams showed no symptoms of an ectopic pregnancy, he said.

Mr Coulter prescribed Ms Esmonde folic acid in case the pregnancy was viable, and arranged for a scan the week after. However, before the scan took place, Ms Esmonde returned to hospital, on February 2, 2013, suffering from a miscarriage.

Pathologist Peter Kelehan, who examined a sample of tissue from Ms Esmondes miscarriage, also gave evidence yesterday, which appeared in contrast to Dr Coulters testimony.

Dr Kelehan, based in Barringtons Hospital, Limerick, only found evidence of tissue from the womb lining, but no evidence of chorionic, or placental, tissue. A lack of chorionic tissue often signals an ectopic pregnancy, but does not exclude an intrauterine one, Dr Kelehan said.

Under cross-examination, Simon Mills, BL, who is representing Dr A, asked Dr Kelehan whether there was any evidence of an intrauterine pregnancy, at a pathological level.

No, said Dr Kelehan.

Dr A denies the allegations against him. The inquiry adjourned until November.
Dorothea Dowling, formerly of the Motor Insurance Advisory Board (MIAB), appeared yesterday before members of the joint Oireachtas committee investigating the rising cost of motor insurance.

She told the committee she was sorry to say that price is not the only problem with the insurance industry.

The Government should focus on making Ireland a benign environment, she said, as reputational damage is acting to discourage new entrants to the insurance market.

The committee also heard from the Consumer and Competition Protection Commission, which on Tuesday announced it would investigate potential price signalling in the industry.

The CCPC said its consumer helpline received 1,466 queries about motor insurance in the last year, 227 of which specifically related to increasing motor insurance premiums.

The organisation said it met with Insurance Ireland in October 2015, but has since become concerned at statements forecasting price increases.

We have been frankly very concerned by these statements and this week, after detailed planning over a number of months, we issued summonses and formal requests, under our powers, for information to players in the sector, said Karen OLeary of the CPCC.

She said that in 2005, the CPCC  then operating as the Competition Authority  had identified the need for insurance companies to share more data.

Committee chairman John McGuinness said it had heard from witnesses during the week who were calling for greater transparency from the insurance industry.

He asked the CPCC why this recommendation was not acted on earlier by the organisation if it had identified this factor in 2005.

The CPCC said it had not received any complaints in relation to this.

The committee questioned if the CPCC will have legislative power to access raw data held by Insurance Ireland, which said it will if it believes there is a reasonable breach.

The Irish Brokers Association told the committee that current increases reflect pricing being restored to correct levels, as they were too low five years ago.

Later in the day, Insurance Ireland said: We do not deny this was a factor; rates had become too low, and a correction was needed, but on its own, under-pricing does not explain the level of premium increases we have seen.

Insurance Ireland reiterated its view that rises in premiums are related to increases in claims.

However, both senator Gerry Horkan and TD Sean Sherlock said this contradicted statements from the Personal Injury Assessment Board from earlier in the week.

Michael Horan of Insurance Ireland said premiums are primarily dictated by the cost of claims in general and by an individuals claims experience.

Insurance Ireland also rejected calls for more transparent data, saying it shares with the Central Bank data that is published as part of the banks annual report.

Mr Sherlock said: Youre saying the data is available and it is clearly not. We dont have visibility into the stark profit levels that can be made by insurance companies.
Education Minister Richard Bruton made the commitments at the launch of an action plan for education.

They come as the Government prepares to pay for an extra 650 teachers in the budget next month.

Mr Bruton outlined details of the action plan, which will be reviewed annually and aims to make education here the best in Europe by 2026.

Early school leaving will be reduced to 10% in DEIS or disadvantaged schools, it was announced.

The number of apprenticeships for students who leave school will be significantly increased. This will see apprentice numbers increased to 50,000 by 2020 with 100 types of placement. Junior education minister John Halligan said the number and types apprenticeships had significantly dwindled since the c recession.

The Government also intends to introduce courses on computer coding in primary schools by 2018.

Mr Bruton said: It is something very practical that equips them with skills for real-world situations.

He said introducing coding early in the schools system is essential but that the programme must be planned.

Mr Halligan said he wants to try to also introduce research and development courses for school students.

Pupils will also be encouraged to take up Chinese, the action plan said, as it was unveiled at St Brigids School in the Coombe, Dublin.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny said the plan would allow children to chose which career or path was best for them: With this plan we want to lead you on a journey of discovery, where you find your gifts, be the person you want to be in the world.

However, Fianna Fail education spokesman Thomas Byrne TD criticised plans for third-level education.

Despite the deep crisis affecting the third-level sector  with some third-level colleges at financial breaking point  funding for universities and institutes of technology gets practically no mention in the action plan.

Fianna Fail will not stand back and allow the minister to ignore the third-level funding crisis. We will be insisting that this matter is addressed in the budget in the coming weeks, as part of the confidence and supply agreement.
British Prime Minister Teresa May announced the 21bn project would proceed on the Somerset coast after a review process sparked by security concerns over the involvement of China in providing a third of the finance required to build the facility.

The plant, Britains first for 20 years, will be beside two existing nuclear power plants, in a move criticised by environmentalists.
Taoiseach Enda Kenny met opposition TDs yesterday after which it was agreed proposed terms on an inquiry or commission of investigation would be submitted by the end of next week.

A spokesman for Mr Kenny said there had been a growing consensus among all present on the need for an inquiry, following a critical report by the States financial watchdog this week.

The Comptroller & Auditor General found potential conflicts of interest were not assessed sufficiently and that taxpayers suffered a loss of 190m from the Northern Ireland loan book sale.

Mr Kenny yesterday met with Green Party leader Eamon Ryan, Independent TD Catherine Connolly, Labour leader Brendan Howlin, Sinn Feins Pearse Doherty, and Fianna Fail leader Michael Martin.

Mr Martin said an inquiry could potentially be split into modules. Terms for one and a chairperson needed to be decided quick, potentially before the budget, he said.

It was possible other deals or asset sales by Nama should be examined or warranted attention, said Mr Martin. The issue of success fees, the potential conflict of interest, and how the sales process differed from other deals all needed to be investigated, he said.

He also said it seemed the process of Nama selling its assets had been over accelerated and this needed to be investigated. This claim follows suggestions there was political pressure on the agency to wrap up its work.

Mr Kenny, asked about this yesterday, said: In general the longer you leave an entity like Nama in situ [and the longer] you leave it with bad debts, the less time it has to reduce the overall debt for the taxpayer. In the context of accelerating that, obviously Nama is ahead of schedule and they expect to return a surplus of profit for the taxpayer in line with their remit.

Mr Martin also agreed that Finance Minister Michael Noonan had questions to answer and this would likely form part of any inquiry.

Regarding concerns that an inquirys powers may be limited, he pointed to the successful completion of the Oireachtas banking inquiry. There was also an acknowledgement that there may be difficulties compelling witnesses from the North to give evidence, added Mr Martin.

However, he said he had doubts about co-operation working North and South for a Project Eagle inquiry. This has been suggested by the Public Accounts Committee and Labour also put forward this idea last night.

Mr Howlin wrote to TDs outlining how the SDLP in the North supporting such a move. There was existing legislation which allowed for a cross-border inquiry, he said. Labour has also drafted legislation which could be used for a cross-border probe into Project Eagle, he wrote.

The purpose of this bill is to provide for the establishment of commissions of investigation jointly with the competent authorities in Northern Ireland.

It will be necessary for comparable legislation to be enacted in Northern Ireland, and I understand from my discussions with the SDLP that they will make complimentary proposals in Belfast and London.
However, the money will be paid as credits to customer accounts which are in limbo following the Governments suspension of household water charges, so it is unclear if customers will get to benefit from them.

Irish Water has moved to clarify arrangements with its domestic customers during the suspension period which runs to the end of March next year. The suspension is to allow the Governments expert commission on water charges to examine if charges should be scrapped and, if so, how water services should be funded.

In the meantime, the company is encouraging customers to keep engaging with it on issues to do with rebates, discounts for being subject to boil water notices or undrinkable water, new connections, leaks, and other matters.

It says domestic customers whose metered water consumption came in at less than quota between January 1 last year to March 31 this year, but who were charged for the quota, can still claim a rebate so long as they do not have any outstanding bills.

However, it states: Irish Water will apply the rebate as a credit to each applicable domestic customers account. That presumes water charges will be reinstated at some stage.

The Commission for Energy Regulation, which is the regulator for Irish Water, also stressed that the relationship between Irish Water and the public had not been altered by the suspension of charges. Those served by the Irish Water network remain Irish Water customers, it said.

That meant the company had to provide all the services available before charges were suspended, and respond to complaints as before.

The commission on water, headed by former Labour Court chairman Kevin Duffy, has been meeting behind closed doors and is due to return with recommendations by the end of November.

Water charges remain an incendiary issue for the partnership government with Fianna Fail saying this week it now wants charges permanently scrapped.

Meanwhile, a major demonstration is planned for Dublin this Saturday to demand the abolition of water charges once and for all.

The event, organised by the Right2Water campaign, comes ahead of the first trial of a protester charged with false imprisonment over the Jobstown demonstrations that saw then Tanaiste Joan Burton trapped in her car for up to two hours in 2014.
A complaint to the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) concerned an advert for Twos Company broadcast on Sunshine 106.8, which the complainant states contained false and misleading statements.

The agency stated it was the only regulated matchmaking agency in Ireland. However, the complainant  Intro Matchmaking  pointed out that there is no official regulator of matchmaking, dating or introductions agencies in Ireland.

It pointed out that the regulator referred to in the advert is the Association of British Introduction Agencies (ABIA), which is based in Britain and Northern Ireland and is not registered as a company in Ireland.

Intro Matchmaking said the advert could lead the public to believe the service that it provides is less reputable or trustworthy as it implies that they are not members of this regulator.

In response, Sunshine 106.8FM said it investigated the complaint and pointed out that Twos Company is accredited by the ABIA and operates a dating and introduction agency on the island of Ireland and has offices in Dublin and Belfast.

The BAI upheld the complaint, stating there is no specific regulation of dating services in Ireland and that it considers the ABIA to be an industry body and not a regulator.

The BAI also upheld two other complaints about a wind energy advertising campaign called The Power to Power Ourselves co-ordinated by the Irish Wind Energy Association (IWEA).

Francis Clauson submitted two complaints about the advert on TV3 and RTE.

He stated the IWEA is a special interest lobby group supported by state and semi-state organisations and that the advert was in contravention of the ban on political advertising.

The BAI upheld the complaint stating the advert was broadcast in the immediate run-up to a general election where planning and other issues related to wind energy and to a lesser extent renewable energy, were live and contentious issues in a range of constituencies.
With the company losing 600,000 for each day that drivers strike, it denounced the planned action days as unnecessary and unjustified.

Passengers are facing a second successive day today without services in Dublin, and the prospect of another 48-hour stoppage next Friday and Saturday were previously announced.

But in addition, Dublin Bus services are now also scheduled to come to a halt on September 27 and 28. The extra strike dates roll through to the end of October, with most planned between two and four days apart but a 48-hour stoppage proposed again on Tuesday and Wednesday, October 18 and 19, if the dispute remains unresolved.

However, if the threat of increased disruption was designed to prompt Government involvement, the unions tactic appears to have backfired.

The Department of Transport said yesterday evening that Minister Shane Ross greatly regrets the grave inconvenience caused to the travelling public. But he called on management and unions to engage with each other immediately.

He is acutely aware of calls for him to directly intervene but must reiterate, that as any ministerial intervention could be interpreted as a commitment to open the State cheque book, it would be inappropriate for him to do so, Mr Rosss department said.

It followed the laying of the blame for escalation directly at the Governments door by Unite regional officer Willie Quigley.

The Governments continued disengagement from this dispute is particularly ironic given the current problems are largely due to the continued shrinkage of the subvention to Dublin Bus, he said.

The company said it would assess the implications of the unions announcement of additional strike days.

To date, this industrial action has cost the company in excess of 4m and continues to impact the financial stability of the company, a company spokesperson said.

Dublin Bus is adamant it is open to negotiations, but it says they must hinge on the terms of a Labour Court recommendation for a pay increase of 8.25% over three years.

National Bus and Railworkers Union (NBRU) general secretary Dermot OLeary said the companys offer to talk included a pre-condition that worker productivity would be required. He said a previous proposal involving productivity had been rejected by unions so the idea can not be on the table going into any fresh negotiations.

With staff having got the company back to profitability, he likened productivity demands in return for further pay rises to asking staff to pay for their own increases.

Workers in Dublin Bus have no problem talking about productivity if this matter has been resolved, Mr OLeary said.

He acknowledged the disruption to passengers but said union members were also losing out on pay for each day they are out on strike.

It is not just the bus company and its staff who are feeling the effects, however, as Dublin Chamber of Commerce warned the threat of more service cuts is affecting businesses ability to make strategic jobs decisions, while working arrangements have had to be altered because of the impact on employees.

But it also said that a significant lack of investment in Dublins transport infrastructure over the past decade means the city grinds to a halt when one cog in the machine goes down.
In a move that is likely to anger families and groups that have campaigned for cards, Michael Donnellan, the IPS director general, confirmed that medical cards will be automatically issued to all prisoners once they are released.

The process has already begun at Cork Prison, where Mr Donnellan said they were going to test the system for the next few weeks, but it is going nationwide.

He said arrangements had been made whereby the prison service will notify the HSE when an inmate is being released, as well as supplying the address at which the prisoner intends to reside.

So on the day they get home, there should be a medical card there for them, said Mr Donnellan.

Earlier this year, a draft document on the development of the HSEs centralised medical card unit said between 30,000 and 50,000 medical cards would be cut in 2016 due to more people getting a job, as well as reviews of eligibility and retention criteria. However, those cuts will not affect the prison population.

Michael Donnellan: Medical cards huge issue for prisoners.

Mr Donnellan said the need for medical cards for prisoners was a huge issue, especially for people on methadone or on medication. It would mean they now had the ability to access medication on leaving prison.

He said there were about 1,000 prisoners on methadone every morning, or about a quarter of the entire prison population.

Giving medical cards to every prisoner on release day would not cost the State, he said, because a lot of inmates were on a level of income that entitled them to a medical card anyway.

So there is no cost here other than giving people their entitlement, he said.

Earlier this week, it emerged that the prison service is to spend almost 550,000 over the next three years on clothing for inmates.

Asked what would happen with the large number of prisoners who find themselves homeless and therefore with no forwarding address, Mr Donnellan said: The reality is in very exceptional cases, not in Cork but in Dublin, some people have to be released onto the street, and thats a problem.

Mr Donnellan was speaking at Narrowing the Disconnect: The Ethics of Supporting Desistance from Crime, organised by the Cork Alliance Centre, a support group for people released from prison.

He also spoke about making prisons less security- orientated and said they were in talks with an eminent architect from the UK about improving prisons, not just new builds but existing prisons, starting with the Dochas Centre womens prison in Dublin.

They had no plans for the old Cork Prison he said, which had been suggested as possible accommodation for homeless people.

Cork Prison governor Pat Dawson said it was not fit for prisoners so why would you put homeless in there?.

Cork Prison

Mr Donnellan said the old prison would be mothballed: Its not fit for purpose, the roof is leaking, there is no fire protection, its a dungeon, we moved out of it because its a dungeon.

The new prison, which is twice the size, did not require additional staff.

Asked if there were plans to get rid of annualised hours on foot of a recent finding by the Comptroller & Auditor General that it had failed to make any substantial savings for the State when it replaced overtime, Mr Donnellan said not at the moment.

The old prison, the site of the execution of 1916 patriot Thomas Kent, is open to the public this evening after 5pm as part of Culture Night.
The road rage incident took place at a roundabout in the Tralee Park, where the speed limit is 30km per hour, on September 14, 2015.

Liam Walsh, aged 42, of Limerick Road, Castleisland, had pulled out in front of 79-year-old Jeremiah Griffin, who was exiting the Manor West Shopping Park.

A year later, Walsh was before the district court in Tralee charged with two counts  a minor assault under the Non-Fatal Offences Against The Person Act, and a breach of the peace, under the Public Order Act.

The court heard how Mr Griffin of Marian Park, Tralee, was exiting the shopping centre in his 1995 Silver Saab.

The 3-litre black 12 KY 4x4 pulled out in front of him and Mr Griffin braked, and took evasive action to avoid a collision.

Mr Griffin beeped and Walsh got out of his 4x4, approached Mr Griffin, opened the door, and according to the prosecution, grabbed him by the throat and started shouting abuse at the 79-year-old.

There were no injuries, said Sgt Miriam Mulhall Nolan.

His client accepts that technically he assaulted the other man Padraig OConnell, solicitor, told Judge James OConnor.

However, Mr Griffin had started beeping the horn and was shaking his fist at his client, the solicitor also said. He said his client did not catch the other man by the throat, but had merely put his hand on his shoulder.

Judge OConnor asked why Mr Walsh was so vexed.

The solicitor said he felt there was ample room between him and the other car.

This was totally out of character and he over-reacted on the occasion. He totally apologises, said Mr OConnell.

Walsh had no previous conviction.

Sgt Mulhall-Nolan said the public order charge was brought because a few expletives were used by Mr Walsh.

Judge OConnor asked her to elaborate and the Sergeant told how Walsh had said to Mr Griffin Shut your effing mouth you effing c*** or I will redden the lot of ye

Mr Griffins wife, aged 82 ,was in the back seat of the car, the court also heard, and the judge said must have suffered mental scarring.

The judge said: Its nasty. He got more than annoyed. He went and physically assaulted him in reality.

However, the judge accepted it was an aberration on the part of Walsh and said he would strike it out.

The public order summons was withdrawn and Walsh, who the court heard works in the construction business, peeled off 1,500 in cash  1,000 for the driver and 500 for his wife. He also paid 1,000 into the court poor box. The assault charge was struck out.
He said he along with other members of the party have been the subject of really, really gross abuse across social media.

However, speaking at the partys think-in in Co Meath, Mr Adams said he has never made an issue of abuse he received online.

I simply just block the people. But I myself have been subjected to it on many, many occasions, said the Sinn Fein president.

The party invited members of Twitter to address the meeting of TDs, senators, and members of the Northern Ireland Assembly which continues today.

Mr Adams is an avid social media user and has amassed 120,000 followers on Twitter. He has been known to tweet about his many teddy bears and his rubber duck.

Yesterday his speech from the Sinn Fein away day in Gormanstown was streamed live on Periscope through his Twitter page.

LIVE on #Periscope: Sinn Fein Away Day https://t.co/aYuQqvXL6u  Gerry Adams (@GerryAdamsSF) September 15, 2016

However, Mr Adams said his party are very resolute on the issue of cyberbullying within the party and provided a strong warning to members.

No one representing Sinn Fein should be engaged in anything other than the very, very best of behaviour in whatever form of dialogue, or debate, or argument theyre involved in, but particularly in terms of social media, he said.

Because a lot of peoples heads were down when they were on the receiving end of it.

Asked about the internal review of salaries for Sinn Fein Oireachtas members, Mr Adams said the ard comhairle was scheduled to deal with the issue in the next week.

We have to keep pace with the demands that are on people in these difficult times, he said.

We always saw the need to subsidise our activists as people have families to rear and do all of the things we all have to do like mortgages and getting kids through college and so on. We have been well served by the system we have had in place until now.

But what we are now trying to do is put in place a system which is fair, which makes sure that people can keep pace with the demands on their lives but also which will service us for the next 15 or 20 years.

LIVE on #Periscope: At the opening the Sinn Fein Away Day in Gormanstown, Co. Meath https://t.co/xfHSk1eNAZ  Gerry Adams (@GerryAdamsSF) September 15, 2016

He added that the heart and the pulse of the party is its volunteers and the party wants to maintain this ethos.

ICTU general secretary, Patricia King also addressed the meeting yesterday. The think-in continues today with Brexit among the topics up for discussion.
Health insurance expert, Dermot Goode, warns that Ireland is heading back to the bad old days of regular private health insurance price increases.

Mr Goode, a health insurance analyst with totalhealthcover.ie, said some health insurance companies are raising prices twice a year, and in some cases, more often.

It is a worrying trend and the Minister for Health, Simon Harris, has yet to decide whether he will increase health insurance levies and, if he does, they will get passed on to consumers as well.

The VHI director of marketing and business development, Declan Moran, said the company has sought to keep the price increase as small as possible without compromising cover: The main reason for the price increase is the rising cost of claims and, in particular, the rising cost of claims in public hospitals. We are constantly reviewing our health insurance plans to ensure they are comprehensive and relevant.

Mr Goode said it was no surprise that VHI was increasing the cost of its plans from November 1. What is really worrying is that the main driver behind this price increase appears to be public hospitals.

People with health insurance who opt to be treated as a private patient when admitted to a public hospital can be charged between 813 and 1,000 a night.

The statutory charge for overnight and day in-patient services is 75 a day up to a maximum of 750 in any 12 consecutive months.

However, the 75 charge does not apply to medical card holders and other patient groups.

Mr Goode said all public hospitals now ask patients with private health cover to sign a form so their insurance companies can be billed.

According to the Health Insurance Authority, VHI has 53% of the private health insurance market, but 83% of the insured population is over 80 years of age.

The number of people insured at the end of last year was 2.12m or 46% of the population. There was an increase of 97,000 on 2014.

The increase was due to a combination of factors, including rising employment and the introduction of lifetime community rating (LCR).

Under LCR, community rating is modified to reflect the age at which a person takes out private health insurance.

Mr Goode said the latest premium hike is a wake-up call for everybody.

Dont just automatically renew your cover. You might be very surprised by what is out there  you could avoid the price increases altogether.
Calling for greater priority to be given to internet safety education, CyberSafeIreland said according to a survey it carried out most national school teachers do not feel equipped to educate children on internet safety.

While many connections are harmless, CyberSafeIreland says there are cases where the contact is of significant concern, particularly for the 5% of children who are in touch with a stranger daily. In all, 28% of the children surveyed are in contact with a stranger either occasionally or every day though through online gaming or accepting social media requests from people they do not know.
Road Dahl died on November 23 1990 yet this giant of childrens literature has never been so present in our imaginations. He vies with JK Rowling and Enid Blyton for the title of worlds favourite childrens author, with one of his books estimated to be sold somewhere in the world every 10 seconds.

In the past number of years, meanwhile, four of his novels have received lavish Hollywood adaptations: James and the Giant Peach, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Fantastic Mr Fox and, just this year, The BFG, directed by Steven Spielberg.

He hated, it is true, 1971s Willy Wonka and The Chocolate Factory. But who could question that the movie has entered the pantheon of great kids films? (largely due to Gene Wilders simultaneously mesmerising and menacing Wonka).

Gene Wilder as Willy Wonka

Now, on the 100th anniversary of his birth, a dedicated Dahl festival is to be held in Cardiff. Road Dahls City of the Unexpected will honour the writers life and career with reading and live stagings of his work, with contributions from the National Theatre of Wales and the Dahl estate.

He lives on in other ways also. Before Dahl, childrens novels were prim and moralistic: they told kids how they should feel rather than appealing to their love of the absurd and affinity for the underdog (being themselves small, helpless people in a big and scary world). Dahl changed that, his writing spiked with irreverence and sprigs of nastiness.

Dahls books had teeth, but they also had heart, says childrens writer and illustrator Oisin McGann. He showed you how the world could be nasty and weird, but made you feel like youd have a good time exploring it too, if you dared. And, of course, they were funny. Humour is pure gold when it comes to childrens books, and despite all the misery lit that draws attention from critics and wins literary awards, humour is the hardest thing to write.

The covers of The Twits and The Witches

This barbed wit would have an enduring influence: peruse the childrens section in any bookstore and you will find books about magic underpants, unpleasant grown-ups and orphans made to suffer awful fates. Is there a more quintessentially Dahl-esque character than Harry Potter, a pasty-faced young boy packed off to live with his horrid relatives? Dahls fingerprints are so ubiquitous we dont even recognise them when they are right in front of us.

He got away with stuff that other writers couldnt at the time, partly due to his success, partly because of how engaging his writing was, but early on he just had the sheer nerve to do it, says McGann. I also think he just didnt give a hoot about normal conventions. Theres a scene in Fantastic Mr Fox where three characters, one of them a child, rave about the wonders of cider  this goes on for a full page. Youd probably struggle to get that past a childrens book editor even now.

Dahl was himself a hodgepodge of contradictions. He was, by every account, hard work  witty and generous, yes, but also prejudiced, philandering and capable of immense cruelty. Sometimes his behaviour verged on deranged  consider the alleged anti-semitism that led his Jewish editor Robert Gottlieb, to fire Dahl, alleging bullying behaviour towards him and his staff.

Theres a trait in the Jewish character that does provoke animosity, Dahl told the Spectator magazine in an infamous 1983 interview.  I mean there is always a reason why anti-anything crops up anywhere; even a stinker like Hitler didnt just pick on them for no reason. (He later denounced Salman Rushdie, then receiving death threats over The Satanic Verses, as a dangerous opportunist).

That Dahl would have a sour view on life is perhaps unsurprising. Tragedy was a constant, beginning with the death from appendicitis of his older sister Astri when she was aged seven (and he three) and, just weeks later, of his 57-year-old father. In a horrific case of history repeating, his own daughter, Olivia, was claimed by measles also at seven while, at four months, his son sustained permanent brain damage when his buggy was struck by a taxi.

The covers of The BFG, Matilda and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

As a writer of adult fiction, Dahls misanthropy was front and centre. His early novels and short-stories were sadistic, unpleasant and sexually degenerate (one of his most notorious stories, the Playboy-published Bitch from 1974 concluded with the character transformed into a seven -foot phallus).

These noxious pieces arrived at a steady clip through the sixties and seventies. However, by the the time he found his stride as a childrens novelist, his outlook had sweetened somewhat. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The Twits, etc., were sneery and sadistic in their way  but with a playfulness that took the edges off. Meanwhile, he was beginning what would prove a life-long creative partnership with illustrator Quentin Blake, whose manic pencil-strokes seemed to channel Dahls zany energy.

Its hard to think of Roald Dahl without also thinking of Quentin Blake, another demi-god of childrens literature, whose sketchy ink and wash drawings are the perfect match for Dahls texts, says writer and illustrator Sheena Dempsey.  A few perfectly placed lines here and there are just enough to suggest a character or a world without ever being forced or overdone. His drawings seem to casually spring from his nib, although this is of course just an illusion and his process is actually very intentional.

Quentin Blake doodling one of the creations for Dahls books. PA Photo/BBC/Andrew Thompson

Moreover, having had life kick sand in his face, Dahl knew how it felt to be the underdog  a sensibility that infuses his greatest works, such as Matilda, The Witches and The BFG  books he would publish in a late blaze of glory through the Eighties.

Roald Dahl has been often copied but hes never been equalled, says Irish childrens author Judi Curtin. Children still love him for his delightfully wicked villains and his empowered young protagonists. His books are wonderfully funny, encouraging irreverence and rule-breaking  anyone whos spent ten minutes in the company of a nine-year-old will understand why that works!

The reason Dahls work is so beloved to people is because he touches people at their heart - true relationships mixed with nonsensical fun and imagination, agrees childrens book illustrator Tarsila Kruse.

Theyre both easy and complex reads, offering different levels of understanding and reaching the depths of feelings in children and adults.

As to whether Dahls anarchic style would find an audience were it published todays era of hyper political correctness... the consensus is that the sheer energy of his work would win through.

Childrens publishing has definitely loosened up in a lot of ways, but its also become more cautious in others, says McGann.

Dahl would absolutely be published now, although his stories have influenced generations of writers since they first came out, me included, so I dont think hed stand out as much as he did back then. His stories are still sharp and fresh and, for the most part, dont feel dated at all, and hes got one of the most successful brands ever to come out of publishing, so I dont think hell be going anywhere for a long time.
OVER the last 30 years, consumers have reaped the benefits of dramatic technological advances.

In many countries, most people now have in their pockets a personal computer more powerful than the mainframes of the 1980s.

The Atari 800XL computer that I developed games on when I was in high school was powered by a microprocessor with 3,500 transistors; the computer running on my iPhone today has 2bn transistors.

Back then, a gigabyte of storage cost $100,000 and was the size of a refrigerator; today its basically free and is measured in millimetres.

Even with these massive gains, we can expect still faster progress as the entire planet  people and things  becomes connected. Already, 5bn people have access to a mobile device, and more than 3bn people can access the internet. In the coming years, 50bn things  from light bulbs to refrigerators, roads, clothing, and more  will be connected to the internet as well.

Every generation or so, emerging technologies converge, and something revolutionary occurs. For example, a maturing internet, affordable bandwidth and file-compression, and Apples iconic iPhone enabled companies such as Uber, Airbnb, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter to redefine the mobile-customer experience.

Now we are on the cusp of another major convergence: Big data, machine learning, and increased computing power will soon make artificial intelligence, or AI, ubiquitous.

AI follows Albert Einsteins dictum that genius renders simplicity from complexity. So, as the world itself becomes more complex, AI will become the defining technology of the 21st century, just as the microprocessor was in the 20th century.

Consumers already encounter AI on a daily basis. Google uses machine learning to autocomplete search queries and often accurately predicts what someone is looking for.

Facebook and Amazon use predictive algorithms to make recommendations based on a users reading or purchasing history.

AI is the central component in self-driving cars  which can now avoid collisions and traffic congestion  and in game-playing systems like Google DeepMinds AlphaGo, a computer that beat South Korean Go master Lee Sedol in a five-game match earlier this year.

Given AIs wide applications, all companies today face an imperative to integrate it into their products and services; otherwise, they will not be able to compete with companies that are using data-collection networks to improve customer experiences and inform business decisions.

The next generation of consumers will have grown up with digital technologies and will expect companies to anticipate their needs and provide instant, personalized responses to any query.

So far, AI has been too costly or complex for many businesses to make optimal use of it. It can be difficult to integrate into a businesss existing operations, and historically it has required highly skilled data scientists. As a result, many businesses still make important decisions based on instinct instead of information.

This will change in the next few years, as AI becomes more pervasive, potentially making every company and every employee smarter, faster, and more productive. Machine learning algorithms can analyse billions of signals to route customer service calls automatically to the most appropriate agent or determine which customers are most likely to purchase a particular product.

And AIs applications extend beyond online retail: Brick-and-mortar stores still account for 90% of retail sales, according to the consultancy AT Kearney. Soon, when customers enter a physical store, they will be greeted by interactive chat-bots that can recommend products based on shopping history, offer special discounts, and handle customer-service issues.

Advances in so-called deep learning,.a branch of AI modelled after the brains neural network, could enable intelligent digital assistants to help plan vacations with the acumen of a human assistant, or determine consumer sentiments toward a particular brand, based on millions of signals from social networks and other data sources.

In healthcare, deep-learning algorithms could help doctors identify cancer-cell types or intracranial abnormalities from anywhere in the world in real time.

To deploy AI effectively, companies will need to keep privacy and security in mind. Because AI is fuelled by data, the more data the machine gains about an individual, the better it can predict their needs and act on their behalf.

But, of course, that massive flow of personal data could be appropriated in ways that breach trust. Companies will have to be transparent about how they use peoples personal data. AI can also detect and defend against digital security breaches, and will play a critical role in protecting user privacy and building trust.

As in past periods of economic transformation, AI will unleash new levels of productivity, augment our personal and professional lives, and pose existential questions about the age-old relationship between man and machine.

It will disrupt industries and dislocate workers as it automates more tasks. But just as the internet did 20 years ago, AI will also improve existing jobs and spawn new ones. We should expect this and adapt accordingly by providing training for the jobs of tomorrow, as well as safety nets for those who fall behind.

AI is still a long way from surpassing human intelligence. It has been 60 years since John McCarthy, a computer scientist and nominal father of AI, first introduced the term during a conference at Dartmouth College, and computers have only recently been able to detect cats in YouTube videos or determine the best route to the airport.

We can count on technological innovation to continue at an even more rapid pace than in previous generations. AI will become like electrical current  invisible and augmenting almost every part of our lives.

Thirty years from now, we will wonder how we ever got along without our seemingly telepathic digital assistants, just as today its already hard to imagine going more than a few minutes without checking the 1980s mainframe in ones pocket.

Marc Benioff is CEO of Salesforce, a cloud computing company. Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2016.
Junior education minister John Halligan at the weekend threatened to bring all hell down on the Government over a refusal to upgrade cardiac services in Waterford. However, as we all know, a day or two is a long time in politics.

As you see on the right, the Independent Alliance minister stood trapped beside Taoiseach Enda Kenny bang in front of the television cameras yesterday, swamped by schoolchildren at a launch.

It was the first public outing for the two since the row over the Waterford cath lab.

John Halligan is now quickly sliding back into his foxhole after the row threatened to disrupt relations between Government partners Fine Gael and the Alliance.

He told reporters yesterday the issue of a second lab and services for the South- East were still being worked out. Thats a whole lot different from his weekend threats.

Furthermore, the Irish Examiner understands the colourful TD has pulled out of an agreement to speak to RTE presenter Ryan Tubridy on tonights The Late Late Show.

It had been reported widely this week, but Alliance sources confirmed yesterday Mr Halligan had changed his mind.

He had committed. But, politically, it would suit if he didnt. He was adamant about setting the record straight. But something came up in Waterford, which suited. This is moving out of the political realm, into the clinicians, said a source.

So thats that then. The truculent minister has literally been put back in his box. Plans for an Alliance pre-Dail think-in also look dead in the water, partially because Mr Halligan is flying to Slovakia and Japan for work trips in the next two weeks.

The junior minister told reporters: Weve had some disagreements in government which is not unusual and we are endeavouring to work through them and see how we can do in the next week or two.

So much for ministers being dishonourable to the Waterford TD or down promises for Waterford Hospital. Mr Halligan, now all magnanimous, has been disarmed until the next time he comes out all fired up.

Enda Kenny knew it well at the school launch yesterday, as he quietly picked up the refrain of the rebel ballad Oro se do Bheatha Bhaile that young pupils at St Brigids School at the Coombe, Dublin, had sung earlier.

John Halligan is forgiven and looks like being welcomed home to government.
ON SATURDAY afternoon, on MacCurtain St, in Cork City, dozens of volunteers will attend the inaugural meeting of the Social Democrats Cork north-central branch. Theyll come armed with hope, aspirations, and questions.

Irish voters, especially those impacted by the economic downturn, are seeking a fresh voice in politics.

As a party with two TDs, we have to fight harder to get our message across and to have our voice heard  but we are punching above our weight and have called in reinforcements.

We have hired new staff, who will develop the party and build it across Ireland. They will take up their positions in time for the resumption of the Dail, while we recruit new members and establish new branches.

In November, the party will host its first national conference, where our plans for the future will be debated and analysed. We believe our supporters are the party, and so their input will shape our policy decisions and direction.

Roisin Shortall

Since its foundation, in July of last year, the Social Democrats have prioritised policies that will create a strong, prosperous, fair, and democratic country.

At the cornerstone of the party is the belief that public services must be better-resourced, whether thats in childcare, transport, housing, or health.

Under the last Fine Gael-Labour government, cuts to public services had a devastating impact, resulting in a growing housing-and-homelessness problem and widespread rural isolation.

We have led the call for an anti-corruption agency, we played a pivotal role in the establishment of the Siteserv investigation, and successfully called for the new, all-party Dail committee on the future of heatlh care (chaired by Roisin Shortall, TD).

And were only getting started.

We believe that building towards an Irish National Health Service is crucial if we are to fix our current health-service structure.

To do that, we need to take a long term view  not to be hand-tied by party politics and a fixation on the election cycle.

A small nation like ours should not have a two-tier health system, by which the wealthy receive adequate medical attention and the less well-off are forced to wait months for appointments and vital procedures. More investment in primary care is a must.

Catherine Murphy

We want to reduce the cost of living and develop sensible, achievable, and sustainable policies to make that happen.

Ireland is the fourth-most expensive country in the EU, yet our public services lag so far behind those of other countries. Its inexcusable that young drivers are paying thousands of euro each year for car insurance and that families pay huge chunks of their wages on childcare.

Building on the establishment of the Siteserv commission, we will seek to expose corruption and responsibly bring to attention clear wrong-doings, so that action can be taken for the good of the Irish public.

We support the campaign to remove the Eighth Amendment from the Constitution, and will fight for greater equality in society, as we did, to great effect, in the marriage-equality referendum.

As a party, we are partly inspired by the Nordic model of social democracy, and we will seek to learn from public-policy decisions there, which we believe could transfer, just as effectively, to our shores.

Over the course of the next Dail term, we will also bring forward policies to assist job-creation, especially in small- and medium-sized enterprises. The Social Democrats are pro-business and believe that a strong, flexible economy must go hand-in-hand with policies that protect all the people of the nation, and ensure the gap between the haves and have-nots, which widened so glaringly in recent years, will be reduced.

The fall-out from the Brexit result in the UK is likely to impact negatively on all aspects of our economy, and we will continue to put pressure on our Government to prepare for that inevitability.

In being the first party to strongly resist the removal of the universal social charge, we showed that we are not a populist party. Where difficult, but responsible, decisions are to be made we wont hide.

Make no mistake. We want to be in government in the future  but not to prop up an administration in which we have no confidence.

Though it is far from perfect, this era of New Politics does offer small parties and independents a greater opportunity to make a difference, and well grab those opportunities in the months ahead.

These are exciting times for our party and, of course, there will be stumbles along the way.

But we can promise all those who come to our meeting in Cork, on Saturday, and those who want a more progressive and fair Ireland, that were not going anywhere  the Social Democrats are here to stay.

Roisin Shortall and Catherine Murphy are joint leaders of the Social Democrats
THERE was an awful lot of hoopla surrounding Taoiseach Enda Kenny this week. There was that photograph tweeted by RTE, of Enda doing an interview for Morning Ireland, in which he looked ridiculously young. There he was in a crisp, white shirt, looking like hed just made his Confirmation, despite being almost eligible for a bus pass.

Apart from how well he looks, I wonder why he would choose to say he didnt enjoy the recent general election, and I wonder about how open he was about the need to find makey uppy jobs for the few in his parliamentary party who did not land big jobs in the Fine Gael government bonanza.

In fact, 27 out of 50 Fine Gael TDs have posts as either senior or junior ministers, and a further scattering have roles chairing Oireachtas committees. These include malcontents like Jim Daly, Pat Deering, and Brendan Griffin.

But as Enda knows only too well, the devil makes work for idle hands. It was refreshing how open he was about his plan to quieten these troublemakers by giving them a range of opportunities to involve everyone.

Any pups in the Cabinet thinking of a heave against Enda have the prospect of a reshuffle to look forward to in the near future, with Enda reflecting on the make-up not just of the Cabinet, but also his ministers of state.

That has involved threats and bribery, and fear. The Taoiseach stressed how we are facing the most challenging times our country has seen for a long time. So, who you gonna call at a time like this? Well, Enda Kenny, of course. Hes the man with the mandate.

So what has happened in the mind of Enda Kenny since he told senior members of Fine Gael, following the partys disastrous general election, that he would hang around until the negotiations with independents were sorted, but he would then clear off?

Well, the workings of Endas mind are a mystery to all, be it on the topic of leadership, or how, for instance, a general election campaign might be run. After his cringe-inducing mojo declarations and clear intention to hang on to the job of Taoiseach like a limpet, we can only guess what is going on. A safe enough gambit is that his ego is telling him he is the only man for the job.

I feel sympathy for the Fine Gaelers. They face a particularly complicated scenario. There are more variables at work here than a drunken game of Jenga. On the one hand, they tell themselves, it makes a degree of sense to keep Enda in place.

The new politics is bedding in, they have lolly loads of government jobs, and Fianna Fail wont want to go to the country for a while yet. There is also the issue of Endas vast experience in Europe and how he looks like the best man to deal with the Brexit fallout.

On the other hand, if things were to fall apart politically, overnight, and a general election was called, they would be stuck with Endas face on the posters.

It was intriguing to hear him say he didnt enjoy the general election. By putting it in such terms, he is painting himself as victim, a man forced to endure a campaign that was definitely not enjoyed by the voters.

I was one of you, Enda seems to be telling those who felt utterly at odds with the tone-deaf FG campaign.

The official election report compiled by Marian Coy, a former head of the Galway-Mayo Institute of Technology, found the campaign wanting in a host of areas, including empathy, vision, planning and communications.

But was the Taoiseach and leader of the Fine Gael party not ultimately the person in charge of the campaign? Expressing himself in such terms was a rather neat form of passive aggression against the others in his party who were key members of the campaign.

Most senior Fine Gael party members say now that it was a mistake not to hold the election in November, rather than in February. The word is that once their boss made it clear there would be no campaign until 2016, wider election planning shut down. They mutter about how everything was kept to the Taoiseach and his small circle of trust.

The Coy report apparently mentions a fortress mentality emanating from campaign headquarters.

This certainly tallies with what has been said. In modern-day politics, it does seem a quite extraordinary way for a party leader to behave, or, looked at another way, to allow those around him to behave. The report, produced by party TDs and presented to the FG think-in by new deputy, Kate OConnell, speaks of how slogans should be stress-tested within the parliamentary party setting and amongst members of the party.

Kate OConnell

Looked at in totality, it is almost as if the rank-and-file TDs and candidates were sent out to campaign and try to win seats with slogans and ideas that they did not own.

Compounding the dilemma for the Fine Gael party is that if Enda is forced to step down, and a new leader is elected, Fianna Fail could insist that the deal they negotiatied to facilitate the Government was with Enda Kenny, and not with whoever replaces him.

This is an entirely legitimate concern. As the political events since the election have shown, the FFers could happily spend each day teaching the FGers how to suck eggs.

The Fine Gael party is on the horns of a dilemma. But if you ask yourself what would Fianna Fail do in a similar situation, you cant help but think they would have themselves a new leader this side of Christmas.

They would have moved on from the trauma of the failed heave against Enda Kenny, in the summer of 2010, rather than sport the psychological scars that are now interfering with their political judgement.

In a set of particularly difficult circumstances, Enda Kenny played a bit of a blinder this week, as a man who wants to stay in the top job and who has left potential challengers in confused disarray.
Depending on your perspective such a prospect may, or may not, be a positive one. However, the opposite also stands, as many of those denied educational opportunities, or the cultural encouragement needed to exploit them, will confirm.

A child in an environment where education is not a priority, where it is not a driving, defining ambition of a family or a community, faces huge challenges if they are to make the best use of the opportunities offered by our schools and colleges. A new OECD report confirms this and reopens the age-old nature-or-nurture debate so beloved by educational psychologists and social reformers. The OECD, however, frames the consequences of indifference to, or limited access to, education in the starkest human and social terms.

Educational disadvantage, the organisation finds, is a legacy issue in Ireland, far more so than in the great majority of developed countries. It runs through families and communities with disproportionate consequences for children born into very specific environments.

An Irish child of parents who did not complete second-level education stands a one-in-three chance of following their footsteps  of quitting second-level education before securing a leaving certificate qualification  a pretty basic qualification in todays cutthroat jobs market. Across the EU only Italy, Spain, England, Northern Ireland, Slovakia, and Greece have higher rates of children not at least equalling their parents educational achievements.

In the majority of cases, though there are spectacular rags-to-riches exceptions, this condemns these young people to at best low-paid, part-time, backbone jobs  or as is ever-more likely in this post-industrial world, long-term unemployment. This must be of even greater concern as social scientists have warned that we on the cusp of an increasingly automised world where there will be a permanently redundant, dependent and non-productive, class who will never find work. This may be just a more dystopian view of the extra leisure time plamas advanced by early technocrats but it has a ring of truth to it that cannot be ignored.

The OECD report considers how access to a quality education can make society more inclusive, facilitate social mobility, and improve the economic circumstances of swathes of society more used to disadvantage. But of course much more needs to be done at all levels. Government must, finally, make a decision that will win it no friends no matter what it decides  how third-level educaion will be funded.

It can make that decision however, secure in the knowledge that a society can, by making education universal and easily accessed, do more to protect itself from everything from Islamic State to hunger, from poverty to hatred, from tax-minimising conglomerates to climate change than by any other means. Yesterdays announcement of ambitious plans in the sector are just another step in an endless and noble obligation.
Burma Burma Army Soldiers Sentenced to Five Years With Hard Labor for Killing Civilians

A funeral was held in early July for five civilians killed by Burma Army soldiers near Mong Yaw Village, Lashio Township, northern Shan State. / Sai Kaung Loi Pha / Facebook

RANGOON  A court martial on Thursday at the North Eastern Command headquarters in Lashio, northern Shan State found seven soldiers guilty of murdering five civilians in Mong Yaw village in June this year.

They have been stripped of their positions and sentenced to five years in prison with hard labor.

Four commissioned officers were included in the sentencing, which took place at 12 p.m. according to Wann Lern Kham, a Shan Nationalities League for Democracy lawmaker from Lashio who has been assisting the victims families.

The victims families were invited to attend court, where each of the soldiers were sentenced to five years, he said.

The length of the sentence and lack of compensation was met with criticism in Lashio. The five victims were all breadwinners and some of the victims families had expected compensation.

At the court on Thursday, we did not dare say anything even though we were unhappy with the length of the sentence, Aye Lwart, a wife of one of the victims told The Irrawaddy. On top of that, we did not even receive any compensation from the army.

However, Wann Lern Kham said, The best punishment is that they have had their identities exposed and that high ranking officers have been removed from their positions.

This was the second session in this high-profile court martial. At the first court session, the four commissioned officers admitted giving the orders to kill the villagers, while the lower-ranking soldiers admitted to carrying them out, according to a translator employed at the hearing.

Uncharacteristically for military tribunals in Burmawhere even verdicts are generally not shared with the publicboth sessions were open to the victims families to observe.

The five civilian residents of Mong Yaw village were arrested at their farm in late June and taken to an unknown location by soldiers from the Burma Army Light Infantry Battalion 362, according to the victims families, who found their bodies the next day buried by a corn field at the bottom of a nearby mountain.

One of the soldiers sentenced to murder admitted forcing the victims to wear rebel uniforms before killing them.

At the initial court hearing in August, Sgt Sein Win Maung alone protested that he was not guilty of murder as he stated that he acted under orders from superior officers. Another sergeant, Maung Ohn, and a corporal, Maung Maung Htwe, pleaded guilty.

The four commissioned officersone colonel, Myo Aung, two majors, Tin Myo Zaw and Aung Nay Myo, and one captain from Military Intelligence, Lin Naing Soeplead guilty.

The Burma Army also stands accused by locals of shooting dead two young men riding motorbikes not far from the village on the same day. The Burma Army have countered that they were killed in the crossfire between the Burma Army and an unspecified ethnic armed group.

Northern Shan State has Burmas highest concentration of ethnic armed groups in conflict with the Burma Army. Fighting involves the Taang National Liberation Army, the Shan State Army-North, the Kachin Independence Army and the Myanmar Nationalities Democratic Alliance Army.

In its counter insurgency campaigns, the Burma Army has been accused of detaining, torturing and murdering civilians accused of supporting rebel groups, and forcing others to work as porters.
News DKBA Splinter Group Lose Several Bases to Burma Army and Border Guard Force

A group of displaced villagers take refuge at a hall in Myaing Gyi Ngu village, Karen State. / Hsa Moo

The Burma Army and the allied Border Guard Force (BGF) took at least three bases from a splinter group of the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), as fighting escalated in Karen States Mae Tha Waw area on Thursday, amid claims that the Burma Army and the BGF have been forcibly conscripting locals as porters.

Capt. Saw Ye Htet, an information officer of the DKBA splinter groupnamed after their late commander Maj. Na Ma Kyarsaid their troops withdrew from several bases following heavy artillery fire from the Burma Army and BGF advance.

We couldnt use defensive tactics to repel them because they dared not advance on the ground, instead firing heavy artillery shells from far away. So, we changed tactics. We withdrew from our bases and used guerilla tactics, said Capt. Saw Ye Htet.

The joint force overran the Wa Klu Lu, Kulu Htaw and Yeika Gone bases, all located in the Mae Tha Waw area of Hlaingbwe Township in Karen States Hpa-an District.

In Facebook video posts, believed to have been uploaded by BGF affiliates on Thursday evening, two BGF officers declared that they had captured all of the bases belonging to the Na Ma Kyar group on Thursday.

There are reports that Maj. San Aung, a leader of the DKBA splinter group who is on a Burma Army wanted list, was injured in battle. Other reports say that he died.

Capt. Ye Htet said that he had also heard that Maj. San Aung was injured but could not confirm until contact was made.

The Irrawaddy also could not reach Maj. Saw San Aung.

Locals and DKBA splinter group sources claim that the Burma Army and the BGF have suffered scores of deaths since fighting broke out in early September. DKBA splinter group sources stated that two of its soldiers have been injured in the same time frame, but some expect that the casualty rate to be higher on their side.

Meanwhile, sources in Karen States Myaing Gyi Ngu village said that the Burma Army and the BGF were forcibly conscripting young men as porters to carry food, supplies and ammunition to the frontline.

A housewife in Htee Tha Dawt Hta, a village near Myaing Gyi Ngu, said that locals do not let their sons or husbands travel to Myaing Gyi Ngu village for fear of them being conscripted in this manner.

I heard from my friend in Myaing Gyi Ngu that they [the BGF and the Burma Army] conscript many young men as porters. So, we are afraid that they will conscript more porters in other villages including ours, said the housewife, who asked to remain anonymous for safety reasons.

DKBA splinter group sources also claimed that the Burma Army and the BGF has seized villagers for use as human shields in battle. They said fighting had reached its peak since breaking out in early September.

Due to the fighting in the areas of Mae Tha Waw and Myaing Gyi Ngu, about 3,800 villagers have fled their homes and are staying in Maying Gyi Ngu village at a local hall, monasteries, and in locals houses, while others have fled across the border to Thailand.
Burma Forestry Police Hit the Ground in Crackdown on Illegal Logging

Forestry police after a raid on an illegal logging camp. / Forestry Department

Forestry police numbering 215 have been deployed since Sept. 1 across multiple states and divisions, to protect forestry department personnel in a continued crackdown on illegal logging, which has previously drawn violent reprisals from criminal gangs.

The forestry police was established in 2013 as a division of Burmas Police Force, under the military-controlled Ministry of Home Affairs.

Their new deployment areas are: Dekkhinathiri District in Naypyidaw; Rangoons Northern District; Pyay, Taungoo, Tharrawaddy and Pegu districts in Pegu Division; Shwebo, Monywa and Katha districts in Sagaing Division; Pakokku and Gangaw districts in Magwe Division; Taunggyi and Lashio districts in Shan State; and Pathein District in Irrawaddy Division, according to the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation.

U Myo Min, a director at the ministry, said they would cooperate with the Burma Army, as well as with other government departments, in the illegal logging crackdown.

U Sithu Lwin, a retired forestry department official, called the fresh deployment of forestry police a good move, but thought that, if conventional forestry officers were allowed to carry gunsas they were before 1988the extra expense would be saved.

The ministry has called on the President to impose a halt on the logging of teak and other hardwoods starting from this fiscal year, ending March 2017, until further notice. Also starting this fiscal year, logging in the Pegu mountain range of central Burma will undergo a ten-year ban.

In Parliament on Wednesday, the minister U Ohn Win said they were taking a tough line on illegal logging.

U Ohn Win admitted to Parliament that a truck carrying 15 tons of smuggled logs crosses the border into China every seven minutes on average.

I am dismayed to hear that. Our country has lost a lot of its resources since the military took administrative power. These things need to be changed now, said Sithu Lwin.

Lawmaker U Aung Kyaw Kyaw Oo of Rangoons Hlaing Township quoted in Parliament a 2015 report by the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization, which ranks Burma third among countries for its rate of deforestation. He alleged that sections of the Burma Army and of ethnic armed groups, as well as forestry department personnel, are involved in illegal logging.

Since the new government took office in April, 19,108 tons of smuggled teak and other hardwoods, and 992 units of machinery used in illegal logging, had been seized by the end of August, with 3,316 smugglers arrested. According to ministry figures, 631,000 tons of smuggled teak and hardwoods, and 13,956 units of machinery, have been seized over the past 16 years, with 100,943 smugglers arrested.

Burma lost an average of 1.7 percent of its forests annually from 2010-15, leaving total forest cover at 45 percent (around 29 million hectares), according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization. Fifteen years before, this stood at 65 percent, the agency said.

Since 2014, the legal logging sectorwhose methods, under the state-owned Myanmar Timber Enterprise, have received a large part of the blame for Burmas deforestationhas been restricted according to an annual quota. Log exports were then suspended from April the same year.

Translated from Burmese by Thet Ko Ko.
Burma Looking Inside Arakan Advisory Commissions Closed-Door Meeting

A visit by the Kofi Annan-led Arakan State Advisory Commission to Sittwes Aung Mingalar quarter in Arakan State last week. / Marayu / Facebook

RANGOON  Former UN general secretary and chair of the Arakan State Advisory Commission Kofi Annan conducted a closed-door meeting in Rangoon earlier this month with members of the Arakanese Buddhist and Muslim communities, The Irrawaddy has learned.

Commission member Al-Haj U Aye Lwin confirmed that the one-hour meeting took place on September 8 at the Sule Shangri-La Hotel, and was attended by lawyers, civil society representatives, political party leaders, and the Rangoon chapter of the Rakhine (Arakanese) Thahaya Association.

U Aye Lwin said that representatives from both sides appeared open-minded, and presented findings to contribute to the advisory commissions impartial report, which will be submitted to the State Counselors Office upon completion. Mr. Annan re-stated to the meeting attendees the objective of the commission: to pursue conflict resolution, humanitarian assistance, reconciliation and development in Arakan State.

Hla Maung Thein, chair of Rakhine Thahaya Association, told The Irrawaddy on Wednesday that he had attended the meeting and talked with Mr. Annan, cautioning him against coming to what could be perceived as a one-sided conclusion and encouraging investigation of the root causes of ethno-religious violence in Arakan State.

Some of the meetings Buddhist Arakanese attendees reportedly said that they welcome the commission and demanded naturalized citizenship be provided to stateless self-identifying Muslim Rohingya in line with existing laws, which could require them to first identify as Bengali migrants of Bangladesh. This, meeting attendees said, could avoid dissatisfaction from Arakanese nationalists, many of whom do not want those who identify as Rohingya to have citizenship at all. The Rohingya maintain that they are not Bengali migrants, and that they have roots in Arakan State.

The Muslim delegation to the meeting included lawyers U Chit Lwin and U Kyaw Hla Aung, and U Kyaw Min from the Democracy and Human Rights Party (DHRP), which represents Rangoon-based Muslims but did not win any seats in the 2015 general election.

U Aye Lwin said that some of the more flexible Buddhist Arakanese had recognized that the affairs of Arakan State had long been featured on the international stage, despite recent Arakanese protests against Kofi Annan, calling his and other international actors involvement in the commission a threat to national sovereignty.

Citizenship Discussions

Arakanese delegates at the meeting reportedly emphasized that the issuing of citizenship cards in line with Burmas 1982 Citizenship Lawwhich defines citizenship along ethnic lineswould be the best option for stateless Muslims in the region. U Aye Lwin recalled that Muslim delegates agreed that citizenship scrutiny could be performed alongside existing laws, but expressed concern that the government implementation of the law and the letter of it were not in agreement.

U Aye Lwin said that even he was surprised when Muslims at the meeting accepted a verification process in line with the controversial law, adding that those within some displacement camps in Sittwethe Arakan State capitalhad also agreed to the suggestion.

However, U Aye Lwin told The Irrawaddy that he hopes the Burmese government can be encouraged to amend the existing citizenship law.

What we suggest is to analyze and review the 1982 law with the support of legal experts, with the aim of recommending amendments which will easy for everyone to understand, concerning application and interpretation, said U Aye Lwin.

Any attempt to amend the 1982 Citizenship Law in the Union Parliament could be faced with the objections of the military appointees and the ethnic bloc, especially the nationalist Arakan National Party (ANP) who have consistently stood against changing it.

According to U Aye Lwin, Muslim community leaders from Buthidaung and Maungdaw townships in Arakan State are on board with efforts to explore and tackle concerns relating to what is perceived as an insecure border with neighboring Bangladesh.

The advisory commission also asked the Muslim leaders to perform a headcount of the population in villages and quarters home to the minority group. In May, an unsubstantiated rumor spread throughout Buddhist communities in Sittwe that Aung Mingalarthe Arakan State capitals Muslim quarterwas housing a growing number of undocumented migrants. Buddhist nationalists demanded the government inspect the entire quarter; officials found no evidence to back the allegation.

Recently, some villages in northern Arakan State refused to collaborate with a headcount, which they say was a continuation of the policies of Burmas previous, military-backed government and would not provide benefit to the Muslim community; an estimated 1.3 million self-identifying Rohingya Muslims were not enumerated in Burmas 2014 census, carried out under the former government administration.

To diminish distrust between the two communities, a headcount process is crucial, said U Aye Lwin.

Equal Rights

In the past, Muslims from Arakan State held identification documents known as tri-fold cards. These documents were issued starting in 1958 and originally entitled holders to equal rights as other Burmese citizens, until the 1982 Citizenship Law re-defined citizenship eligibility.

A citizenship verification drive initiated under the former Thein Sein government and continued under the current National League for Democracy-led government led to the registration with national verification certificates (NVCs) as a precursor to citizenship scrutiny. While many registered in the scheme, the NVCs were also rejected by some Rohingya Muslims who questioned why their ethnicity and religion were omitted from the documents.

U Kyaw Min, from the DHRP, told The Irrawaddy that if the government could resolve citizenship within a legal framework it would also simultaneously resolve any perceived issues surrounding migration.

Declining [citizenship for] the Rohingya is not going to solve the problem. The real problem in Arakan State is equal rights, not [the presence of] the Rohingya, said U Kyaw Min.

U Zaw Zaw, a resident of Sittwes Aung Mingalar quarter who self-identifies as Rohingya, told The Irrawaddy that the problem in Arakan State is a lack of equality; the riots and violence which swept the region in 2012 were derived from oppression, he said.

We want citizenship which is granted by the law and the protection of the government, he added, yet U Zaw Zaw worries that if his community is granted citizenship, the surrounding Arakanese society will strongly object to the action.

Both U Kyaw Min and U Zaw Zaw said that they have more faith in the advisory commission than in the government; while the commission will make recommendations, it will be up to the countrys leadership to practically implement any solutions laid out by the commission.

The government needs to amend the law. But I dont hold much hope, said U Kyaw Min, pointing out that many of the State Counselors closest aides and advisors also had ties to the previous Thein Sein-led administration.

The advisory commission members, including chairman Kofi Annan, will begin their second trip to Arakan State at the end of October, and are scheduled to visit Buthidaung and Maungdaw townships.
Burma NGO Calls US Govt to Support Jade Trade Reform After Lifting Sanctions

Small-scale miners search for jade stones in Hpakant, Kachin State, April 2016. / Nang Lwin Hnin Pwint / The Irrawaddy

London-based NGO Global Witness urged the United States government to support reform of Burmas vast, dirty jade trade following an announcement on Wednesday that the US would lift many of the remaining sanctions on Burma.

Plans to lift economic sanctions on Burma came after State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi met with US President Obama in Washington DC on Wednesday. The US President intends to terminate the national emergency act in respect to Burmathe order that has authorized sanctions since 1997.

In a statement released on Thursday, Global Witnesswhich documented human rights abuses and environmental impacts due to extraction of natural resources over time in Burma and campaigned for changesaid US efforts must focus on clearing army companies and families out of a sector worth up to US$31 billion in 2014, and support local calls for reform and peace.

By dropping the sanctions, Juman Kubba of Global Witness said the United States drops its leverage over the former generals, drug lords and military-owned companies that still secretly control critical industries like jade.

The US president will lift sanctions which were imposed under five laws and six presidential orders, including the national emergency actwhich banned cronies and drug lords from trading with or traveling to the US, the Burma Freedom and Democracy Act of 2003 and a 2013 presidential order prohibiting certain imports of Burmese jadeite and rubies.

Juman Kubba was quoted in the statement as saying despite efforts by the National League for Democracy (NLD) government led by the State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi to reform the jade sector, the job is nowhere near complete.

She said, The US has invested a great deal, across several administrations, in helping Myanmar turn the page on its past and build a peaceful and prosperous future for its people. This simply wont happen unless the new government can clear the most notorious figures from that past out of the jade trade  so what is the plan?

Burma is not a member country of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI)a global standard for governance in regards to a countrys natural resourcesand lacks a clear plan to tackle the number of cronies and military-backed companies benefiting from jade extraction.

Regarding holding cronies accountable, Sai Leik, Shan Nationalities League for Democracy spokesperson, said Parliament is key and that it needs to draft the necessary laws and bylaws.

Activists in Burma have also pushed for transparency in the jade industry, which is majority controlled by the militarys Union of Myanmar Economic Holdings Limited, because ongoing fighting between the Kachin Independence Army and the Burma Army over the control of natural resources continues in the northern part of the country.

Figures on jade production and procurement were not publicly released under the previous quasi-civilian government. U Win Myo Thu, environmentalist and director of local environmental NGO EcoDev, said, transparency is key to gaining accountability and responsibility of businesspeople in this sector so that big companies will pay [their taxes] and rid themselves of illegal connections. It will help our countrys income, so whether sanctions are removed or not, the country should act on it.

U Win Myo Thu stated that the current NLD government showed little to no interest in implementing the recommendations made in a Myanmar-EITI report, which was submitted in January. Myanmar-EITI consists of representatives from the government, business and civil society organizations. The group is not currently active as it has not yet been reformed under the new government.

It is not only about jade extraction. It is also related to the peace building process, he said.

U Win Myo Thu said he hopes the removal of sanctions will benefit smaller companies with no record of human rights violations trade with the United States and Europe.

But he warned that the industry would suffer if crony companies could expand their markets to the US while continuing to commit human rights violations inside the country. He added that he believes US technology can closely examine these trades to ensure they are in line with their standards and policies.
Burma Suu Kyi Urges US Investment to Spur Democratic Transition

State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi in a round-table discussion with students at the Roosevelt High School in Washington DC on Sept. 15 / Jonathan Ernst / Reuters

WASHINGTON, United States  Daw Aung San Suu Kyi called Thursday for US companies to bring responsible investment to Burma, saying economic success would help convince people and the powerful military that democracy is the best way forward.

The State Counselor was addressing the US business community, a day after President Barack Obama announced that the US would lift sanctions and restore long-lost trade benefits as the nation emerges from military rule.

She said that lifting sanctions entailed some political and economic risk, but added, It is time now for our people to depend on themselves.

Many of the companies and individuals still subject to US sanctions are linked to the military, which retains major political and economic interests, despite the shift to civilian government.

Human rights groups say the US should continue applying pressure on Burma to change. Massive illegal trade in goods including jade and timber continues, as does civil war with many ethnic minorities.

Daw Aung San Suu Kyi said that economic development could help foster national reconciliation. She said the transport and energy sectors were suffering from decades of neglect, and support was needed to build the education and health systems and the skills of its people.

Economic success is one of the ways in which we can persuade everybody in our country, including the military, that democracy is the best way forward for our union. This is the best way forward for us to achieve unity and prosperity, she told a dinner hosted by the US Chamber of Commerce and the US-Asean Business Councila group that supports American business ties with Southeast Asia.

Tables at the function at an upscale Washington hotel went for up to US$25,000.

Obama aide Ben Rhodes said that the national emergency with respect to Burma that authorizes the sanctions would be terminated in the coming days.

Both Burma and US businesses have welcomed Obamas decision, the culmination of a five-year engagement and gradual easing of restrictions against a former adversary.

Broad sanctions on trade and investment ended in 2012, but US-Burma goods trade totaled just $227 million in 2015, and US companies account for less than 1 percent of total foreign investment.

Daw Aung San Suu Kyi said she wanted US companies to bring investment best practices and urged them to report any signs of corruption.

When you are trying to invest in Burma, please dont think you have to go with a suitcase bursting with dollar bills, she said.
Burma Can Rangoon Become a Disabled-Friendly City?

Visually impaired people walk the streets of Rangoon as they commemorate International White Cane Day, on October 15, 2012. About 760 blind and visually impaired people from around the country took part in the event. / Soe Zeya Tun / Reuters

RANGOON  She stands still at the side of the road until somebody nearby tells her she can cross. Being afraid of cars, crossing roads is a big challenge for her.

I have never gone far from my hostel alone, the 21-year old Ah Me Sar said. My teachers dont even allow me to do so.

Ah Me Sar, an ethnic Lisu women from the ruby-mining town of Mogok in Mandalay Division, partially lost her eyesight when she was eight years old, after experiencing a severe fever. A surgical error then left her permanently blind.

In 2007, she came to Rangoons Kawechan School for the Blinda school, with an attached hostel, that provides vocational skills and formal education to visually impaired young people, in partnership with government schools.

Rangoons pavements are really narrow, she said. Cars normally park alongside the pavements and blind pedestrians like us always walk into them, as well as lamp posts sometimes, she explained, describing the challenges she faces everyday in attending classes at the government school nearby.

In late August, The Irrawaddy visited the school and saw Ah Me Sar confidently walking in the school compound, holding a stick and accompanied by another young woman who also appeared partially blind.

Even going to classes is a challenge, she said. Taking buses or taxis without the company of someone who can see, even partially, is just impossible for me, she explained.

Ah Me Sar is one of around 250,000 disabled residents of Rangoon, accounting for 10 percent of Burmas disabled population according to the 2014 census. The most common type of disability in Burma is blindness or partial sight, afflicting 2.5 percent of the total population.

Ah Me Sar said she envies some of the older students at her hostel, who are able to travel alone to their universities, which are often far from the city center. Ah Me Sar said she hopes to be able to do so too when she finishes high school. Among those currently making the commute is 25-year old Than Tun Win, who studies philosophy at Yangon Western University, and was born blind. But commuting alone to his university is harder than Ah Me Sar supposes.

1.7 percent of Rangoons population has some form of visual impairment. Most have to rely on buses for transport, which presents considerable hardship.

We have to listen to bus conductors carefully, concentrating on the names of the bus stops they shout out so we know where we are, Than Tun Win said.

When buses race with each other and skip bus stops, or when the conductors dont shout, we are helpless, he explained with a smile. He has frequently faced such scenarios and had to ask other passengers on board for help.

We can never commute independently in Rangoon, he said. Without help from somebody nearby, we cant even see which taxis are available when we need one.

Other students at the hostel told similar stories. Associations for the disabled are now raising their voices louder.

Nay Lin Soe, a former polio sufferer, founded the Myanmar Independent Living Initiative five years ago, with a mission to enable people with disabilities across Burma to live independently. He told The Irrawaddy that the absence of disabled-friendly public infrastructure in Rangoon presents a fundamental physical barrier.

Rangoons public transport does not include any facilities for those with hearing and sight impairments, while buses and trains are also not accessible for people with wheelchairs, Nay Lin Soe explained.

Many pavements do not even have slopes or ramps for wheelchair-dependent persons, he said. Foot-bridges have also not been built with disabilities in mind.

Maung Aung, the secretary of Rangoon Divisions Transport Authority, confessed that most buses in the city are old models without disabled-friendly features. The Yangon Bus Public Co.the citys first bus rapid transit (BRT) system, chaired by Maung Aunghas pledged to improve the commercial capitals main public transport system, but its buses are not yet accessible for the citys disabled population.

Currently, we are struggling with bus reform, he said. We will consider disabled passengers later.

He mentioned that the new imported buses in the BRT system actually came equipped with features for disabled passengers, including ramps and wheelchair restraints, but he claimed they could not be used because the rest of the citys physical infrastructure, including pavements, do not allow for it.

Lin Khaing, the deputy head of the Yangon City Development Committees engineering department for roads and bridges, told The Irrawaddy that they had in fact built pavements with slopes and ramps in most areas of the city, stopping short of other infrastructure due to budgetary restraints.

Besides these physical barriers, prevailing attitudes and discrimination also discourage the disabled community from stepping out of their houses, Nay Lin Soe explained.

When people in wheelchairs hail a taxi on the street, drivers immediately ask which hospital he or she wants to go to, assuming that disabled people have no reason to go out besides for medical purposes, he said.

We are not [medical] patients, he said. We have abilities and qualifications to participate in the areas of health, education and human rights.

Aung Ko Myint, who chairs the Myanmar National Federation of People with Disabilities, echoed Nay Lin Soes opinions. As a visually impaired person, Aung Ko Myint shared his experience of taking buses in Rangoon.

Bus conductors call disabled people sick, he said. They consider us burdens, delaying their buses.

Dont even talk to me about trains! he said. There is so much to be done with Rangoons trains, even for people without disabilities.

However, he expressed some optimism, saying that bus conductors dont refuse to take disabled people like they used to.

Aung Ko Myint believes that the disabled community is wasted as a potential workforce because structural barriers force them to stay inside instead of contributing to society.

The Myanmar National Association of the Blind, also led by Aung Ko Myint, has held several training workshops for bus conductors and drivers under Rangoon Divisions Motor Vehicles Supervisory Committeeknown locally by the Burmese language acronym Ma Hta Thaon accommodating and aiding visually impaired passengers.

Hla Aung, who chairs Ma Hta Tha, said the committee is keen to encourage further trainings of this kind, after the committee had observed an improvement in bus conductors and drivers helping visually impaired passengers.

According to Aung Ko Myint, rapid development in Rangoon is making it even harder for disabled people to cope, with frequent changes in the physical environment brought about by a construction spree over recent years.

Rural areas may be safer for disabled people with fewer vehicles and less change, he said.

Aung Ko Myint believes that proper legal protection would be most effective in lowering physical barriers and combating discrimination. A new law on the rights of persons with disabilities was enacted in June 2015; the government is preparing by-laws while consulting different stakeholders.

Aung Ko Myint is not fully satisfied with the law, however, saying it is too generic and wasnt drafted inclusively, considering different varieties of impairment.

The law requires that new public infrastructure including pavements, foot bridges, schools and hospitals be made accessible to disabled people, but it does not outline punishments or fines for those who fail in this regard.

When leaders pledge to work for all people in the country, they have to know that the country houses disabled people too, Nay Lin Soe said.

When policymakers talk about inclusive education and disabled-friendly working environments, it is important to understand the role of accessible public transport in allowing disabled people to reach their schools and workplaces, he explained.

Everybody has their own weaknesses but our weaknesses are visible, he said. Our abilities should not be neglected because of this.

Emphasizing the great deal that needs to be done for the countrys disabled population, which has been neglected by past governments, Aung Ko Myint said it was important that it be understood that disabled people are not asking for privileges but equality and inclusivity.

We dont want sympathy, but we ask for empathy, he said.
Friday, September 16th, 2016 (2:12 pm) - Score 1,082

Communications provider MS3, which last week announced plans to roll-out an ultrafast Fibre-to-the-Home (FTTH/P) broadband network around parts of Hull in East Yorkshire (here), has today confirmed an initial investment of 500,000 and named their first trial area of 1,200 homes.

Apparently MS3s announcement drew a remarkable level of interest from residents across the City and beyond, reaching as far as Brough and Thorngumbald. Never the less the operator, which will be taking on the local incumbent of KCOM that has a similar FTTP network of its own, has been able to identify an initial area in West Hull for their first trial of the service.

Residents in the following streets will be included in the trial: Calvert Lane, Hamlyn Avenue, Cardigan Road, Meadowbank Road, Roslyn Road, Morris Road, Woldcarr Road, Northfield Road, Springfield Road and Parkfield Drive.

We note that the entire trial area actually reflects a total of 2,813 properties and MS3s current calculations estimate a cost of 500 per home passed, which is similar to how much Cityfibre, Sky Broadband and TalkTalk have been quoting for their FTTH/P roll-out in the city of York.

Tony Hales, MS3s Managing Director, told ISPreview.co.uk: We are delighted at the responses weve had so far from residents in Hull regarding ConnectHull. There is clearly a huge demand for a genuine fixed line alternative to KCOM. We have now identified an initial area to undertake a trial of the service and we are confident this will be a great benefit to both the local community and to Hull on a much wider scale.

Anyone in the initial trial area that requires a service can sign up at connectHull or call 01482 221721 and residents of other areas can still register their interest on the same website and will then be notified when it is available in their area.

The ISP said they were now putting together roll-out plans to reach in excess of 20,000 homes per year from 2017 onwards, with those areas expected to be announced in December 2016. Meanwhile the first trial customers could be connected in October 2016, with development starting this month.

Prices start from just 24.99 inc. VAT per month (no phone line rental required) for the 50Mbps service (10Mbps upload) and this will only attract a monthly rolling contract, although it is hobbled by a 200GB download limit. Meanwhile the top 1Gbps (100Mbps upload) package would attract a 1TB allowance (1000GB) for 59.99.
Major: Communication

Hometown: Brazil, IN

Student Media Involvement: Syc Creations

Favorite Food: Burgers with everything but mustard

Fun Fact: He really loves superhero movies, and wants to make his own someday
Summer has passed all too quickly, and to make sure you aren't missing out we have compiled the latest headlines from European Technology Assessment organizations. Lets take a quick look at current news and events!

ITA (Austria)

Help us shape Europes future! Healthy food? Clean energy? Take part in this online consultation and tell us what you expect for your future: This is your chance to communicate your ideas and needs to EU decision makers. We want to know what matters, in order to forward those recommendations to Europes largest research program, Horizon 2020. Please follow the link to attend the survey.

Neuro-Enhancement  What is really possible? In August, the ITA finished a three-year project on neuro-enhancement. Do we know enough about the brain to chemically or electrically improve its function? In more than 100 events taking place in 19 countries, the EU-funded NERRI project tried to answer this and other questions. Formats ranged from science cafes to student and teacher workshops. An online consultation explored the acceptability of chemical or technical methods among citizens. Main outputs were the stirring of the European debate, insights into individual hopes and fears concerning neuro-enhancement and new perspectives on actual technical possibilities and limitations. Detailed results will be published shortly, for updates go to http://www.oeaw.ac.at/ita.

ITAS (Germany)

Two years ago, the Final Storage Commission appointed by the German Bundestag made a new start on the search for a final storage site for highly radioactive waste material in Germany. Among representatives from politics, society, and science was ITAS director Armin Grunwald as co-chairman of the work group "Societal and Technical-scientific Decision Criteria and Criteria for Error Corrections". Following the hand-over of the final report in July 2016, Grunwald stressed that "the commission fulfilled its mandate to forge a societal consensus on both a procedure and criteria for the search for a final storage for highly radioactive waste in Germany." The tools provided would enable the government to start with the search for a waste site within the coming months. "If we implement new technologies and release them into society, we are obliged to think things through to the end. The commission did this subsequently for nuclear energy in Germany."

Read more or watch a video interview (German) with Armin Grunwald.

NBT (Norway)

CRISPR is a recently developed method for making targeted changes in the genetic material DNA. It functions as a pair of "genetic scissors" which can remove, replace or add specific segments of DNA in humans, animals and plants, and has the potential to radically change the way we produce food and medicine. The Norwegian Board of Technology has in cooperation with the Norwegian Biotechnology Advisory Board written a policy brief which outlines five upcoming debates we need to address. Questions discussed at a meeting in the Norwegian Parliament were: Should we regulate CRISPR as GMO? Must we modify animals in order to stay competitive? Should we alter the human lineage? Should we use it for treatment or artificial enhancement? Do we need more or less control?

TA-Swiss (Switzerland)

TA-SWISS is launching two new studies: The first will look at the very controversial topic of "social freezing". In industrial societies, women increasingly delay motherhood, freezing their unfertilized eggs to forego a loss of fertility. Societal, ethical and medical questions surrounding this kind of technological backup plan are i.e.: Is egg freezing still within the scope of reproductive autonomy and what will be the long term consequences of the ongoing medicalization of reproduction? Is it really the ultimate boon offering women more reproductive freedom?

The second study will examine the opportunities and risks of the blockchain, the technology behind digital currencies like Bitcoin. Simply put, the blockchain is a vast, globally distributed ledger running on millions of devices and open to anyone. This makes it a digital version of trust with the potential to render all kinds of third-party intermediaries superfluous. Thus, costs around contracting and making payments are bound to plummet and by supporting fully transparent e-voting systems, the blockchain may even boost democracy. What else will change, when the internet will be as much about the exchange of value as about the exchange of information? You'll find the call for tenders for this second study by October 2016 on http://www.ta-swiss.ch.

POST (UK)

In the UK, there are almost 3 million users of e-cigarettes and their popularity is rising. POST did a briefing on e-cigarettes in January 2014 and then many of the questions around the safety and quality of devices, the role of e-cigarettes in reducing or stopping smoking and health risks were still being researched. POST has completed a new briefing building on the 2014 publication incorporating the latest evidence.

The key points are: A growing body of evidence shows that e-cigarettes are much less harmful than tobacco, and could in help smokers quit tobacco. Further evidence suggests that e-cigarettes do not encourage tobacco smoking among non-smokers or children. The public perceptions, however, is shifting: 25 percent think that e-cigarettes present a risk of harm similar to that of tobacco smoking, compared with seven percent in 2013. Read the full POST briefing on e-cigarettes.

This newsletter brings together institutions from across Europe researching how science and technology is impacting our lives, society and legislation. Through publicizing news of the many varied projects going on we hope to capitalize on sharing knowledge and address the problems that extend beyond national boundaries. If your TA institution wishes to contribute, please contact us with your suggestions. (16.09.2016)
Tesla Motors is again under scrutiny for the safety of its autopilot system after its Model S sedan was involved in a fatal crash in China in January.

Gao Yaning, 23 years old, died Jan. 20 in a crash wherein his father's Tesla Model S sedan that he was driving slammed into a street cleaning truck. The accident destroyed the vehicle's logs. However, released dash cam footage shows the car slamming into the slow-moving truck, killing the driver instantly.

The report reveals that the autopilot feature of the vehicle was engaged during the fatal crash. Based on the video captured, there were no signs that the vehicle or the car applied the brakes before crashing into the truck.

The victim's family has sued Tesla in Beijing Chaoyang District People's Court. Tesla, however, can't confirm if the autopilot feature of the vehicle was turned on during the accident. They also maintained that the victim's family had not cooperated with their investigation.

"We were saddened to learn of the death of our customer's son. We take any incident with our vehicles very seriously and immediately reached out to our customer when we learned of the crash," Tesla said in a statement. "Because of the damage caused by the collision, the car was physically incapable of transmitting log data to our servers and we therefore have no way of knowing whether or not Autopilot was engaged at the time of the crash."

This is not the first time Tesla faced scrutiny over the safety of its autopilot system. In May, an American died in a car crash while driving Tesla's Model S. Similar but non-fatal accidents also happened in Switzerland and China. Recently, the company updated and revised language on its Chinese website reiterating that its autopilot feature is not the same as self-driving.
Google 4 Doodle is back. The annual contest by tech giant Google officially started last Wednesday.

It has been 8 years since Google started Google 4 Doodle. The competition started in United Kingdom and became increasingly popular in other countries as well.

Countries such as United States, Singapore, and India joined the doodle competition craze. Over the past years, there have been at least 100,000 entries. The competition in Singapore alone was able to receive over 30,000 entries, which was held last January 2010.

This year's theme is "What I See for the Future" . Regular kids must blend the letters G-O-O-G-L-E on their art work. A lot of prizes is at stake in this competition.

Pride, glory, and honor - just to name a few. Who doesn't want their artwork to be posted on the most popular search engine in the history? In addition to that, the overall winner will receive $30k towards scholarship in college and an outstanding amount of $50k for their schooling.

But wait, there's more! Winning the competition will give you a chance to collaborate and work with the doodlers in Mountain View, CA.

The best doodle will be selected by a panel of judges. You can vote as well by visiting their corresponding website. The said contest is until December 2, 2016. This gives the artist ample of time to visualize what their artwork would look like.

The content of the artwork must be original and should be made by kids or K12; that is. Joining the competition encourages the kids to be engaged and interactive with their surroundings by means of creating a doodle.

"We're asking kids to imagine what awaits them in the years to come and represent that vision of this year's theme: "What I see for the future ...," Google's official blog said.

Last year, Akilah Johnson,10th-grader at Eastern Senior High School in D.C won the competition.
Despite the presence of vulnerability rewards programs from Google and other companies, numerous unique, high-quality security bugs have been found as a result of hacking contests. Hoping to continue the tradition of great bugs, a new contest has been formulated by Google's Project Zero: The Project Zero Prize.

The objective of this contest is to find a vulnerability that achieves remote code execution on multiple Android devices knowing only the devices' phone number and email address. Successful entries will be qualified for the following prizes.

First Prize

$200,000 USD, awarded to the first winning entry.

Second Prize

$100,000 USD, awarded to the second winning entry.

Third Prize

At least $50,000 USD awarded by Android Security Rewards, awarded to additional winning entries.

In addition, participants who submit a winning entry will be invited to write a short technical description of their entry, which will be posted on the Project Zero Blog.

This contest will be organized a bit differently than other contests. Rather than saving up bugs until there's an entire bug chain, and then submitting it to the Project Zero Prize, contestants are asked to report the bugs in the Android issue tracker. They can then be used as a part of the submission by the participant any time during the six-month contest period.

Take note, however, that only the first person to file a bug can use it as a part of their submission, so makes sure to file early and regularly! Of course, any bugs that don't wind up being used in a submission will be considered for Android Security Rewards. Those who don't make it for the high-profile contest can also qualify for any other rewards program at from the tech giant after the challenge has ended.

Unlike other contests, the public sharing of vulnerabilities and exploits submitted is extremely important. Participants will submit a full description of how their exploit works with their submission, which will eventually be published on the Project Zero blog. Every vulnerability and exploit techniques used in each winning submission will be made public.
A few weeks back SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket exploded. An investigation into the explosion has currently derailed the SpaceX program. Even so, the SpaceX program is determined to resume its flights by this November.

SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said that the program would resume flights this November, as Business Insider reports. She said during the September 13 satellite industry conference in Paris that the company is anticipating flights back by November. However, some are skeptical if November might be a good target time to resume.

"It is hard to see how SpaceX could fly Falcon 9 by November, especially since they have [publicly] stated that they don't have a root cause established," Wayne Hall said. He is a former NASA space shuttle director and an engineer as well as a rocket accident investigator. Hall added that it took him three months just to establish a root cause for the last accident he investigated and then several more months to have corrective plans in place.

For its part, SpaceX has said that they would identify and resolve the incident well before launch time.The next launch could be done either at Pad 39A at Kennedy Space Center or else at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, as the Daily Caller says in its report.

The cause of the explosion is being speculated to either be a fuel leak a problem with the rocket staging. Its true cause would be known once the investigation on Falcon 9 explosion has ended. Finding its cause and correcting is critical as clients would want to know if it's safe to have their cargo fly with SpaceX. Clients who aren't satisfied might look to rivals to deliver their cargo.

SpaceX is said to still have nine more launches scheduled for the year and cannot afford to have further delays in its schedule. If launches are delayed the company could have financial issues, something it cannot afford right now.
After all the battery explosion incidents and Samsung's Note 7's recall program, the device's misfortune hasn't ended yet. Apparently, the Note 7 is now beginning to get banned, and Stockton University is the first to do a total campus ban of the Galaxy Note 7. The question right now is if other universities and establishments would follow this measure or not.

New Jersey Stockton University On Note 7 Ban

Amid the non-dying issue about the dangers brought about by the Galaxy Note 7, Stockton University initiated the ban of the said device. Samsung has started a recall program on more than two million units of Note 7 that have already been sold. However, it is possible that not everyone has returned their devices yet, as there are still a few incidents of battery explosions that get reported every few days.

Dean of Stockton University Pedro Santana says that the university wants to take a proactive step to assure everyone that their campus is safe and far from possible fire. According to a source, the ban started at 5 pm and all students who own a Note 7 were not allowed to use the phone while they are inside the campus. This new rule was sent to students via email and social accounts. According to the dean, the ban will not end until all units that have been part of the first release have successfully been replaced.

As per another source, there have not been any incident of Note 7 explosions on the Stockton campus. However, the university officials took initiative and prevented such misfortunes by banning the Note 7. Santana said, "The bottom line is, we don't want it on our campus,"

More Companies Taking A Safety Step Against Note 7

A few weeks ago, there have also been reports about airlines banning the use of the Note 7 while in flight. A couple of Australian airlines have implemented a rule banning passengers from using or charging the Note 7 while flying. According to authorities, these airlines initiated the ban themselves without having to be told. This incident only goes to show the scare brought about by the Note 7 units that are a part of the recall program.

As of now, it's not yet clear whether all units have been sent back or not. Until Samsung officially announces that all units that are in the hands of consumers are safe, then nothing is certain yet.


Many people may agree that Lenovo is one of the most underrated brands when it comes to laptops and tablets. While everyone is busy looking at other popular brands, Lenovo is busy developing devices with groundbreaking designs. One of these devices is the Yoga Book.

Lenovo Yoga Book Specs

The Yoga Book is a 10.1 inch 2-in-1 device from Lenovo that has a main goal of letting users have a 'real pen and paper' experience on a laptop. The device features a touchscreen monitor and a separate surface that is touch sensitive. The said surface is where users can write or draw using an included stylus. For typing, the flat surface also has an illuminated keyboard that can actually simulate a real keyboard.

The Lenovo Yoga Book's stylus is dubbed as the 'Real Pen'. That name probably roots from the fact that the said stylus has real ink and can be used as an actual pen on an actual paper surface. Further specs of the device include a 4 GB RAM, 64 GB internal storage, 128 GB microSD capacity, 8 MP rear camera, 2 MP front camera, and 8500 mAh battery that can last up to 13 hours of general usage.

Lenovo Yoga Book Release

As per Neowin, the Lenovo Yoga Book is now available for pre orders in the UK. The device is available in Gunmetal Grey and Champagne Gold variants and it comes with Android 6.0 Marshmallow operating system. This is priced at 429.99.

According to the source, buyers can also opt for a Windows 10 version of the Lenovo Yoga Book. However, the color options is limited to one, the Carbon Black color. It is also priced differently as it comes with a higher price of 509.99. Both the Android and Windows versions are now available for pre orders. However, the delivery time varies. The Windows models will be arriving in less than two weeks. The Android models on the other hand will come in about a month.

The Yoga Book is just one of Lenovo's impressive devices. The company's Yoga series is actually known for its powerhouse specs and physical elegance. Basing on the devices' specs sheets, the Yoga devices can easily take on its competitions when it comes to features and specs.


In June 2015, the cameras of NASA's approaching New Horizons spacecraft first spotted the intriguing large reddish polar region on Pluto's largest moon, Charon, which stretches more than 1,000 miles. Mission scientists by that time never saw anything like it yet in anywhere in the Solar System and thus, they conducted a study to know the story behind it.

Over the past year, after conducting a study and analyzing the images and other data that the New Horizons spacecraft had sent from its July 2015 flight going to the Pluto system, scientists think they have solved the puzzle behind the mystery.

The researchers published their findings this week in the international scientific journal Nature, where they concluded that Charon's polar red spot comes from Pluto itself. As the methane gas that escapes from Pluto's atmosphere and becomes "trapped" by the moon's gravity and it freezes at the moon's pole.

After that, it is followed by chemical processing by ultraviolet light that comes from the sun and transforms the methane into heavier hydrocarbons and it will eventually turn into reddish organic materials called tholins.

"Who would have thought that Pluto is a graffiti artist, spray-paint in its companion with a reddish stain that covers an area the size of New Mexico?" asked Will Grundy, one of the New Horizons co-investigator from Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona and the lead author of the paper.

The research team combined analyses from the detailed images of Charon with computer models of how the ice evolves on the moon's poles and using the models of Pluto and Charon which is 248-orbit around the sun, it showed some extreme weather at the moon's poles where 100 years of continuous sunlight and then another century of continuous darkness. During these long winters, it can actually reach up to -430 degrees Fahrenheit or -257 degrees Celsius, causing the freezing of methane gas.

"The methane molecules bounce around on Charon's surface until they either escape back into space or land on the cold pole where they freeze into solid forming a thin coating of methane ice that lasts until sunlight comes back in the spring," Grundy said. While the methane ice quickly sublimates away, the heavier hydrocarbons create from it remains on the surface.

The models also suggested that in the moon's springtime, the returning sunlight triggers conversion of the frozen methane back to gas but while the methane ice quickly sublimates away, the heavier hydrocarbons created from the evaporative process remain on the surface. Sunlight then further exposes those leftovers into reddish material which is called tholins, which, in turn,slowly accrued on the Charon's poles over millions of years.

New Horizon's observations of the moon's other pole which is currently in winter darkness and can only be seen through the reflecting light from Pluto.

"This study solves one of the greatest mysteries we found on Charon, Pluto's giant moon and it opens up the possibility that other small planets in the Kuiper Belt with moons may create similar event, or even more extensive 'atmospheric transfer' features on their moons," said Alan Stern, New Horizons principal investigator from the Southwest Research Institute and one of the study co-author.
Mobileyes' chairman warns Tesla over safety issues and believes being associated with the automaker could potentially hurt in the long-term Mobileye's reputation.

Mobileyes Parts Ways With Tesla

According to Computerworld, Autopilot tech supplier Mobileyes fears that Tesla is pushing safety envelope too far. Mobiileye is the former technology supplier of Tesla's semi-autonomous Autopilot driving technology.

Amnon Shashua, chief technology officer and executive chairman at Israel-based technology supplier Mobileye, told Reuters Wednesday, Sept. 14, that the Autopilot system has not been designed to safely cover all possible chars situations. His comments came just the same day a lawsuit was filed against Tesla by the father of a man involved in a second fatal accident. When the fatal crash took place the man was allegedly driving a Tesla Model S that had its Autopilot system on.

The lawsuit filed in July in a Beijing court alleges that the accident was the fault of Tesla's advanced driver assistance system (ADAS). This week Tesla confirmed that it is investigating the fatal crash. However, due to the extended amount of damage sustained by the vehicle, Tesla said that it cannot be confirmed whether the Autopilot was engaged at the time of the accident.

According to Fortune, Tesla Motors said on Thursday, Sept. 15, that the reason why its former camera supplier Mobileye is critic over the safety of the Autopilot assisted driving technology is the fact that the automaker was developing its own vision system.

A Tesla spokeswoman said that the upcoming versions of the Autopilot semi-autonomous system would be using Tesla's own vision system. Once Mobileye has found out about Tesla's plans, it attempted to force the carmaker to discontinue this development, keep using their products in future hardware and pay them more.

Tesla's strong defense of Autopilot technology comes as response to the the need to assure regulators and consumers that the system is safe. According to auto market experts, there are huge stakes in the race to perfect self-driving technology.
Following the announcement of Pokemon Sun and Moon anime series, the first trailer of the upcoming series was released on Thursday.

Pokemon Sun and Moon official Japanese website posted the clip with the tagline, "Let's go! Be your very best! Big adventures!" The video also notes that the Pokemon anime dives into a new series with big adventures in the Alola region!

In a recent report here in iTech Post, Pokemon Sun and Moon, which is based on the upcoming 3DS game with the same title, will feature Satoshi a.k.a. Ash as a student. The story will follow his journey both in battle and in school. In fact, one of the key visuals in the upcoming series is Ashs aim too graduate.

In addition, Ash will use the new Z-Moves in battle, just as players use them in the upcoming game. In the trailer, Ash can be seen wearing a Z-Ring and doing the dance with Pikachu to perform a Z-Move.

According reports, Z-Moves are a new technique in the Pokemon games. Each Pokemon will be able to hold a Z-Stone to upgrade one of their moves. So far, there are only two types of Z-Move confirmed  the type-specific Z-Stone that allows Pokemon to perform an upgraded attack of the same type and a species-specific Z-Stone, just like the special Munchlax that allows an evolution, Snorlax, to learn a devastating new attack.

As reported, Pokemon Sun and Moon will also get a game and manga version. The said manga version will be titled Pokemon Horizon and will be part of the October issue of Shogakukans Coro Coro Comics.

Pokemon Sun and Moon anime series is set to air in November on TV Tokyo and its affiliated stations in Japan.


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Armenia-Azerbaijan: EU sets up monitoring capacity along the international borders

PACE co-rapporteurs on Armenia concerned by reports of alleged war crimes or inhuman treatment perpetrated by Azerbaijans armed forces

There is still 35% gender pay gap: Sona Ghazaryan

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Global Finance Names Ameriabank the Safest Bank in Armenia

Mikayel and Karen Vardanyans provided 136 million AMD support for the overhaul of the Myasnikyan statue, which was in unsafe state of disrepair

Believe me, as a representative of a country which uses the Schengen system very often, it is quite important. Vardanyan

I really look forward to having answers from the Azerbaijani side for these alleged gross human rights violations: Secretary General

I call on Armenian and Azerbaijani parliamentarians to use this Assembly as an agora of opportunities President Tiny Kox

UCOMS SPECIAL OFFER OF THE UNLIMITED INTERNET IS NOW TERMLESS

There is no place for the death penalty in a State that respects human rights: PACE General Rapporteur

EU and CoE call on two Member States that have not yet acceded to this Protocol  Armenia and Azerbaijan  to do so without delay

An urgent debate requested on "The military hostilities between Armenia and Azerbaijan".

UCOM AND PES-PES CONTINUE COOPERATION WITHIN THE FRAMEWORK OF EDUCATIONAL PROJECT

The statement of the meeting between Prime Minister Pashinyan, President Aliyev, President Macron and President Michel of October 6, 2022

Largest Corporate Bond Program at the Securities Market of Armenia Completed Successfully

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The statement of the Defender on the video of the execution of Armenian PoWs by the Azerbaijani armed forces

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STATEMENT BY SECRETARY ANTONY J. BLINKEN

This criminal act is another proof that the Armenophobia policy. Tatoyan

Nikol Pashinyan, Nancy Pelosi discuss a number of issues related to the Armenian-American agenda and regional developments

Delegation by Nancy Pelosi Accompanied by Alen Simonyan Visits Tsitsernakaberd Memorial Complex

Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi Arrives in Yerevan

Armenian Revytech, global technology leader SAP and financial services software specialist SAP Fioneer sign a cooperation agreement

With 120 million drams donated by Mikael Vardanyan, the defenders of the homeland will be treated in a new building

OSCE Chairman-in-Office and OSCE Secretary General call for immediate cessation of hostilities along Armenia-Azerbaijan border

Statement by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Artsakh

USA Embassy Message for U.S. Citizens

ANCA Issues National Call to Action to Stop Taxpayer Funding of Aliyevs Aggression
Shortcomings in Electoral Code (video)

The changes in the Electoral Code cannot guarantee that Armenia will hold free and fair parliamentary elections in 2017. We still remember the outcome of previous elections. Until recently, we have witnessed continuous fraud, even disgraceful fraud, including vote buying, pressure on voters, intimidation and violence, says Artur Sakunts, a leading human rights activist in Armenia. If the changes come in force, the entire voting process will be broadcast live from a polling station. Also, the names of voters will be published but the number of observers will be limited in a polling station. Mr. Sakunts stresses that electoral fraud and violations in polling stations were mainly detected, protocolled and prevented by observers and representatives of mass media. Now, the new Code limits their presence in a polling station. Without civilian control one cannot guarantee fraud-free elections, the human rights activist said. Hovsep Khurshudyan, a member of the Heritage Party, says in turn, In those polling stations, where they intend to commit fraud, lights might go out all of a sudden or the technical device might break down Everything is in their hands. Even if you detect electoral fraud and have enough evidence, you cannot invalidate election results. Nor does the judicial system allow it. No matter how many cases of violations you produce  25 000 or 125 000, Gagik Harutyunyan will say you have not presented enough evidence and announce the elections as legitimate. The parties that concluded a deal with the government did not consider all the aforesaid shortcomings. All these parties voted for Armenias accession to the Eurasian Economic Union and I think everything was agreed upon with the EEU, said Mr. Sakunts.
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By Raed Jarrar | ( Otherwords.org)

Both Democrats and Republicans are spreading the same Islamophobic message: you're either with us, or you're against us.

On August 31, Nazma Khanam, a 60-year-old Muslim woman, was stabbed to death while walking near her home in Queens.

The culprit was charged with second degree murder and robbery. But Khanams family believes the killing was a hate crime, noting that no personal possessions were stolen.

Just a few weeks earlier, also in Queens, an imam Alauddin Akonjee and his assistant Thara Miah, were shot in the back of the head on their way home from afternoon prayer. They, like Khanam, were dressed in Muslim garb, and their community also believes they were victims of a hate crime.

These arent the only instances of violent attacks on Muslims. In fact, a recent report by Georgetown Universitys Bridge Initiative noted a spike in these hate crimes and their correlation to the 2016 presidential election.

At the Democratic and Republican National Conventions, I witnessed our leading politicians broadcast the kind of Islamophobic messages that can motivate the murder of innocent Muslims.

Millions of Americans who followed the DNC heard former President Bill Clinton speak these words about American Muslims: If youre a Muslim and you love America and freedom and you hate terror, stay here and help us win.

I was there watching the speech live. The crowd cheered, but I didnt.

First of all, Islam has deep roots in American history. It was brought to the United States in the hearts of many of the Africans who were forced here on slave ships. So Islam is not some foreign entity to the U.S. that can choose to stay here. It has been here for centuries.

But even if Muslims just landed on the shores of this country more recently, they shouldnt be subjected to additional tests that gauge how much they love America in order to earn the right to live here.

As a Muslim-American myself, Im appalled by the suggestion that unless I prove I love freedom and hate terror, I may not be afforded the right to stay. I dont see any other groups faced with this prerequisite.

Clintons statement was even more painful to hear than the overtly anti-Muslim rhetoric spewed in Cleveland at the RNC. The types of Islamophobic messages perpetuated by the former president are arguably more insidious, because theyre coated in the liberalism and progressivism assumed by the Democratic party.

Their meaning may be harder to detect, but those words can be just as deadly.

This reductionism of Muslims was shown again on the final night of the DNC, when the Khan family, grieving the loss of their fallen son, were invited to speak. The Khans were used as props to perpetuate a narrative that reduces the Muslim community to the single issue of terrorism  either those committing it or those fighting it.

For Muslims, politicians at the RNC and DNC had the same message: youre either with us or youre against us. Youre either violent or youre fighting violence. And either way, youre defined by it.

But I refuse to be reduced to either a threat or a tool of national security.

My rights as a citizen of the United States shouldnt be restricted by my religion. And I certainly wont be a pawn in the so-called War on Terror politics that have targeted, surveilled, occupied, detained, incarcerated, and led to the killing of communities of color and innocent Muslims like Nazma Khanam, Alauudin Akonjee, and Thara Miah.
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Maan News Agency |  

BETHLEHEM (Maan)  Israeli forces Thursday evicted a Palestinian family from their home in the neighborhood of Saadiya in the Old City of occupied East Jerusalem in order to make room for Jewish-only housing managed by right-wing settler group Ateret Cohanim.



The family of Mazen Qirrish was evacuated from their home in the Saadiyya neighborhood of East Jerusalems Old City. (MaanImages, File)

Mazen Qirrish, the owner of the house, told Palestinian Authority (PA)-run Wafa News Agency that Israeli police broke into the house and gave him an eviction order issued by an Israeli court, claiming that Qirrish was no longer a protected tenant.

Muhannad Jubara, the lawyer for the family, told Maan in May that the Qirrish family fell under protected status, which refers to certain Palestinians in East Jerusalem who held rental agreements with the Jordanian government before 1967, when Israel occupied the Palestinian territory.

Leaseholders are considered protected tenants for three generations. However, when the last family member of the third generation dies, the family loses the status.

The Israeli-issued court order evicted Qirrish and eight family members from a home they had lived in for 58 years, according to Wafa.

A video of the family sitting on a street with backpacks stuffed with their belongings was posted online by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), showing Qirrish visibly distraught and condemning the eviction.

My home is my soul. They (Israel) took it away from me. I couldnt defend it alone, Qirrish said in the video, adding that every piece of earth in our home is very dear to us.

The family has battled eviction orders for several decades. Most recently, the family had challenged the eviction orders by appealing to Israeli courts, but their appeal was rejected in May.

Jubara told Maan at the time that Palestinian owners rented the house to the Qirrish family since the 1930s. However in 1986, the Palestinian owners surreptitiously sold the property to Ateret Cohanim.

The Palestinian owners of the home had attempted to evict the Qirrish family in 1988 following the transfer of the property to Ateret Cohanim, but lost the case due to the familys protected status. However, ten years later, Ateret Cohanim filed a case against the family.

In 2009, the last living member of the Qirrish familys third generation died, stripping them of their protected status, according to Jubara.

Qirrish told Maan that in July 2010 Israeli settlers seized parts of the house. Following the settler takeover, an Israeli court ruled that the family had to evacuate the property completely.

The eviction order was reportedly approved by both the Jerusalem district court and Israels Supreme Court.

Ateret Cohanim is an Israeli pro-settlement nonprofit organization  receiving tax-deductible donations from the United States through their financial intermediary American Friends of Ateret Cohanim  which focuses on Judaizing East Jerusalem through a Jewish reclamation project working to expand illegal settlements and facilitate Jewish takeover of Palestinian properties across the Green Line into Palestinian territory.

Ateret Cohanim, along with other pro-settler organizations, commonly uses Israels 1970 Legal and Administrative Matters law to evict Palestinians from their homes. According to the law, Jewish Israelis are allowed to claim ownership of property if they can prove it was under Jewish ownership before 1948.

However, the law only applies to Jewish Israelis, and not to Palestinians who were dispossessed of their lands and properties prior to and after the establishment of Israel in 1948, despite their right being upheld by UN General Assembly Resolution 194.

Ateret Cohanim has forced out several Palestinian families from properties which were owned by Jewish families before 1948, with some 30 families currently threatened with eviction in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Batan al-Hawa, as hundreds of Palestinians have been targeted through discriminatory legal channels.

The organization has also worked to purchase property from Palestinians to increase Jewish presence in East Jerusalem, while deterring Jewish families from selling property to Palestinians.

There are an upwards of 300,000 Israeli settlers residing in East Jerusalem, as the settler population in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem continues to increase at a faster rate than the population in Israel.

The presence of Israeli settlers in occupied Palestinian territory is considered illegal under international law according to the Fourth Geneva Convention.
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By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment)

The French sociologist and philosopher Jean Baudrillard wrote a book in 1991 entitled The Gulf War did not Take Place .

In the same way, the 2016 presidential election did not take place.

Baudrillard did not mean to say, of course, that no war was prosecuted by the US and its allies, positioned in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia, against the Iraqi occupation army in Kuwait, eventuating in the expulsion of the Iraqi tank corps.

He did think that for Western audiences, the war was a staged television conflict, an imitation of reality or simulacruma phony copy of reality. The weeks of US bombing of Iraqi lines that kicked off the war beginning in mid-January left behind black carbon dust. Iraqi soldiers, many of them poor Shiite conscripts, might have wanted to surrender. But they werent allowed to raise a white flag to the F-16s pulverizing them from 30,000 feet. That isnt a war, that is shooting fish in a barrel. When the land war did begin, it was clear that the war directors connived at having the handful of Egyptian troops drive into Kuwait City first, for the cameras, so that Kuwait was liberated by the Arab League, not by 600,000 Western troops.

In some ways Baudrillards point goes back to an insight of the early twentieth century Belgian painter, Rene Magritte, who adhered to the surrealist school. His 1928-29 painting, The Treachery of Images shows a pipe, but then underneath it Magritte wrote in French, This is not a pipe. Of course it is not a pipe. It is just an imaginary copy of a pipe. It now hangs in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

If the Gulf War was a television spectacle, the 2016 election is much more of one, with the added phony copies of reality flying around on social media. Not only did the election not take place, Donald Trump did not run. He has virtually no campaign machine, few functioning district offices. He holds rallies, which are dutifully televised by the cable news networks they actually just turn their airtime over to him on a regular basis (while not doing any such thing for Hillary Clinton). His campaign is his staged rallies, which then are piped out to millions gratis. Trump is given free airtime because he is a creature of television, a reality show star, famous for being famous (i.e. for no particular reason; lots of real estate magnates are not famous, e.g.) He is given air time because viewership rises when he is on tv, and networks can charge advertisers more if they have more viewers.

Trump, in other words, functions for cable news in the same way as the ghostly Malaysian Airlines Flight 370 did for CNN in particular. Apparently hundreds of thousands of Americans were riveted by 6 months of rank speculation as to whether the airliner had landed in Tibets Shangrila or been kidnapped by Vladimir Putins air force. We are told that

From 10pm-12am, [CNNs] All Business: The Essential Donald Trump ranked #1 among adults 25-54 with 448k, beating the combined delivery of Fox News and MSNBC. Fox News averaged 193k. MSNBC trailed with 101k.

Lets repeat that. A quick and dirty basic cable documentary on Trump outdrew both Fox and MSNBC live magazine news shows among the target demographic (the elderly, from a marketing point of view, do not actually exist). The non-Trump, the copy of Trump over at CNN, overshadowed Greta van Susteren and Lawrence ODonnells news shows, which faded into unreality in comparison. Van Susteren demonstrated her own inability to grasp reality when she doubted that Fox poobah Roger Ailes had been a serial sex harasser; but then as reality sank in, she began to flicker and after a while, when she had accepted the non-televised non-Fox reality, she could no longer be found on the airwaves herself. Not only is there no election, but those who acknowledge the hard facts obscured by the 24 hour news cycle also come not to exist.

Did the press demand that Trump, the oldest person ever to have the prospect of taking office as president for a first term, reveal his physicians health report?

Trump has an eccentric doctor write up a very brief one-pager, and then Trump shows it to Dr. Oz, Oprahs physician, on afternoon television. Done. The health report is public because televised. No matter that it was a skeleton report, and raised questions about weight and cholesterol. There was no real health report of the sort the reporters had in mind, and which past candidates had released. There was only a phony copy of such a report in the form of a t.v. broadcast with a t.v. quack, half of whose statements about medicine and treatment appear to be ungrounded in reality.

As with a scripted reality show, Trump creates and keeps tension in his story line. His character is the grumpy anti-immigrant who shouts, You furriners get off my lawn! But if he does that consistently there is no tension. So in late August he asked the audience at a town hall (a phony t.v. town hall) whether he should soften his stance. He created a frenzy. Sarah Palin and Ann Coulter, bit players in the reality show, are stricken, in tears, angry and betrayed. Donald, you were our great white hope how could you do this to us. Serious journalists were made to sit in televised roundtables (phony t.v. substitutes for actual reportage) and discuss ad nauseam whether Trump was softening. Or the serious journalists were switched out for campaign surrogates like Corey Lewandowski, hired by CNN to parrot Trump even though he was still on Trumps payroll. Cable news journalism made its own journalism disappear. This is not a journalist, the ticker underneath should read.

Then the scripted reality character grumpy Trump comes out and gives a fiery speech denouncing immigrants, resolving the tension he had artificially created.

The one-week softening crisis never actually took place. There was no softening. Just as there is no election.

The unreality of the election is easily demonstrated. The controversies broadcast both on television and radio and on social media do not refer back to any verified, reasoned facts. More dramatic tension was introduced just yesterday when the Trump campaign (which doesnt really exist) announced that Barack Obama was not actually born in Kenya. But the star, Trump, is sulking and wont say that, wont allow the concrete reality of the hospital in Hawaii in 1961 to seep into the televised rally, the holodeck of Trumps spaceship.

The controversies are not about farm policy or who will be appointed to the Treasury, as in the actual elections of the past. They are over whether Hillary Clinton has a brain tumor, or whether her cough indicates she might expire any moment, like Monty Pythons parrot (which the pet shop owner insisted was alive, insofar as it was only a television simulacrum of a parrot, sort of like Magrittes non-pipe).

The controversies are over whether Trump is a Manchurian candidate being run by Russian President Vladimir Putin or whether Hillary Clinton deliberately endangered national security with classified emails (not marked classified) that would inevitably fall into Putins hands.

The figure of Putin as the eminence grise of the non-election underscores its unreality, since Putin has nothing to do with the election. Aside from a few ineffectual sanctions over Crimea (increasingly resisted by the Europeans), the Washington power elite has acquiesced in eastern Ukraine as a Russian sphere of influence, and increasingly in Syria as a Russian sphere of influence. Trump and Clinton may talk a different game around these realities, but neither of them is likely to depart dramatically from Obamas current course. Putin is irrelevant to domestic politics But in the un-election of 2016, he is elevated to a spectral presence standing behind everything from Trumps hotel deals to Clintons fiendish email ploy.

Likewise with climate change, which Trump and most of the Republicans insist is a mirage, just as the pet store owner insists that the parrot is alive. Although Hillary Clinton says she believes in the reality of climate change, she has given no indication at all of wanting to move dramatically to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. When she gave conditions under which she would now not support fracking, she did not bring up its CO2 emissions! She seemed to want localities to make the decision (but many Red states are forbidding localities to make the decision). Hydraulic fracturing is the single biggest threat to climate change amelioration, but that doesnt cause her simply to call for it to be banned. What is the difference between denying that human beings are altering the climate with their emissions and acknowledging it but doing nothing significant about it?

In short, friends, this is not a pipe. As for the parrot, it is no more, has ceased to be, is bereft of life, and this is an ex-parrot.
VANCOUVER, BC--(Marketwired - September 15, 2016) -

NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION TO UNITED STATES NEWS WIRE SERVICES OR FOR DISSEMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES

SolidusGold Inc. ("SolidusGold" or the "Company") (TSX VENTURE: SDC) is pleased to announce that the Company has entered into a definitive purchase agreement (the "Agreement") with Newmont USA Limited and certain of its affiliates ("Newmont") for the purchase by the Company of the Northumberland Project in Nevada for US$20 million.

SolidusGold will host a conference call on September 22, 2016, at 8:00 a.m. Pacific Time/11:00 a.m. Eastern Time for members of the investment community to discuss the acquisition. Dial-in details for the conference call can be found at the bottom of this press release.

The Company also announces that it has engaged Haywood Securities Inc. as agent to raise aggregate gross proceeds of up to C$40 million (the "Offering"), which will be used to fund the acquisition of the Northumberland Project, an initial work program on the property and for general working capital purposes. The Company has received indications of support from GF Capital, LLC and certain strategic investors who may subscribe for up to C$20 million worth of subscription receipts as part of the Offering. Certain insiders of the Company have also indicated that they will participate in the Offering.

Transaction Highlights

Acquisition of a large-scale gold asset in a pro-mining jurisdiction with established infrastructure. The historically defined deposit areas are located wholly on patented private land and not subject to any royalty.

Northumberland Project hosts significant known mineralization, including an historic resource estimate completed by Fronteer Gold Inc. (formerly Fronteer Development Group Inc., " Fronteer ") (2008), which identified a resource deposit. Substantial drilling completed subsequent to this historical resource estimate has not yet been incorporated into an updated block model, and the mineralized area remains open to potential expansion.

") (2008), which identified a resource deposit. Substantial drilling completed subsequent to this historical resource estimate has not yet been incorporated into an updated block model, and the mineralized area remains open to potential expansion. SolidusGold plans to initiate a two-pronged strategy: expanding and advancing the near-surface oxide gold mineralization amenable to heap leaching; plus exploration of deeper sulfide gold mineralization. Significant metallurgical work has been completed subsequent to the historical resource estimate.

The transaction represents the creation of a new junior gold company, holding one of only a few remaining large-scale gold exploration assets in North America, and leverages the Company's significant experience in resource exploration and development.

Rick Van Nieuwenhuyse, Chairman and Interim CEO of SolidusGold, commented: "We are very pleased to have come to an agreement with Newmont to acquire the renowned Northumberland Project containing over 3 million ounces of historical gold resource. Subsequent to the historical resource estimate, approximately US$17.5 million has been spent advancing the Project. Based on our evaluation, our team sees excellent potential for further expansion. Due to continuous M&A activity, the availability of large-scale gold exploration assets in mining-friendly jurisdictions has become a rarity. SolidusGold looks forward to putting our team's expertise to work in Nevada."

The Northumberland Project

The Northumberland Project is a gold project located near the geographic center of Nevada in northern Nye County, approximately 250 miles southeast of Reno and 30 miles north of Kinross's Round Mountain Mine. The project area is comprised of approximately 24,000 acres (8,900ha) of unpatented lode claims and 3,885 acres (1,572ha) of patented (private) mining claims, mill site patents, and fee lands. Historic open-pit heap-leach mining activities were undertaken at the Northumberland Project from 1981 through 1990, with a historic production of approximately 231,000 oz Au and 486,000 oz Ag.

The Northumberland Project has a historical resource estimate as reported in the document titled 'Technical Report on the Northumberland Project, Nye County, Nevada, USA: Resources Update 2008, Amended August 8, 2008' prepared by Fronteer (the "Northumberland Report") with an effective date of August 8, 2008. All of the historical resources outlined in the Northumberland Report lie within the patented (private) land claims. The historical resource estimate for the Northumberland Project is as follows:

INDICATED Cut-off Grade Gold Silver AuEq* Resource Type Au g/t Au opt Tonnes g/t opt oz g/t opt oz oz Open Pit Oxide 0.3 0.01 13,627,000 1.23 0.036 538,000 7.31 0.213 3,202,000 602,000 Open Pit Sulfide 1.0 0.03 22,575,000 2.32 0.068 1,687,000 8.01 0.234 5,815,000 1,803,000 Underground 2.5 0.07 316,000 3.35 0.098 34,000 4.43 0.129 45,000 35,000 TOTAL 36,518,000 1.92 0.06 2,259,000 7.72 0.23 9,062,000 2,440,000

INFERRED Cut-off Grade Tonnes Gold Silver AuEq* Resource Type Au g/t Au opt g/t opt oz g/t opt oz oz Open Pit Oxide 0.3 0.01 17,000 2.38 0.069 1,300 10.98 0.320 6,000 1,400 Open Pit Sulfide 1.0 0.03 1,335,000 2.59 0.075 111,000 7.69 0.224 330,000 118,000 Underground 2.5 0.07 5,574,000 3.70 0.108 664,000 5.95 0.174 1,067,000 685,000 TOTAL 6,926,000 3.49 0.10 776,300 6.30 0.18 1,403,000 804,400

* AuEq calculated at an Au:Ag ratio of 50:1, and assumes 100% recovery of both metals.

The historic resource estimate does not include any subsequent drilling done by Fronteer and Newmont between 2008 and 2016. However, the Company understands that approximately ~18,600 meters were drilled and approximately US$17.5 million was expended over that period of time.

Details of the gold and silver historical resource estimate can be found in the Northumberland Report which is available on SEDAR. This resource is an historical estimate and a qualified person has not done sufficient work to classify the historical estimate as current mineral resources or mineral reserves. As a result the historical estimate is not being treated as a current mineral resource.

Transaction Terms

Under the terms of the Agreement, dated September 15, 2016, the Company will pay to Newmont a total of US$20 million upon closing. In addition to the purchase price, the Company has also agreed to replace Newmont's existing surety arrangements with the United States Forest Service and other state and federal governmental authorities. Newmont will retain a preferential right of first offer to process sulfide materials mined from the Northumberland Project in certain circumstances. The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions, including TSX Venture Exchange approval. The transaction is expected to close on or before November 30, 2016. The transaction is at arm-length.

Private Placement

The Company has concurrently entered into an agreement with Haywood Securities Inc. (the "Agent") whereby the Agent has agreed to offer for sale, on a commercially reasonable efforts agency basis, up to 114,285,800 subscription receipts at a price of C$0.35 per subscription receipt (the "Issue Price") for aggregate gross proceeds of up to C$40 million. In addition, the Company has granted the Agent an over-allotment option exercisable at any time up to two business days prior to the closing of the issuance of the subscription receipts to sell up to an additional 17,142,870 subscription receipts at the Issue Price which, if exercised in full, would result in additional gross proceeds to the Company of C$6 million. Each subscription receipt will, subject to completion of certain escrow release conditions, including the satisfaction or waiver of conditions precedent to the closing of the purchase of the Northumberland Project, be deemed to be converted into one common share in the capital of the Company for no additional consideration immediately prior to the closing of the purchase of the Northumberland Project by the Company. The closing of the issuance of the subscription receipts is expected to occur on October 20, 2016.

The Company has received indications of support from GF Capital, LLC and certain strategic investors who may subscribe for up to C$20 million worth of subscription receipts as part of the Offering.

Certain insiders of the Company have also indicated that they will participate in the Offering. Such participation would be considered to be a "related party transaction" as defined under Multilateral Instrument 61-101 ("MI 61-101"). The transaction will be exempt from the formal valuation and minority shareholder approval requirements under MI 61-101.

The net proceeds of the Offering will be used to fund the acquisition of the Northumberland Project, an initial work program on the property and for general working capital purposes.

The Company has agreed to pay a cash commission of 5% of the gross proceeds under the Offering and to issue such number of compensation subscription receipts as is equal to 2% of the subscription receipts issued to subscribers pursuant to the Offering, excluding president's list subscriptions. Upon the satisfaction of the escrow release conditions, each compensation subscription receipt will be automatically exchanged for one compensation option to acquire one common share at the Issue Price for 12 months.

The Offering is subject to customary conditions including approval of the TSX Venture Exchange. The subscription receipts and the common shares issued upon conversion of the subscription receipts will be subject to a hold period expiring four months and one day from the date of issuance.

Conference Call

SolidusGold will host a conference call on September 22, 2016, at 8:00 a.m. Pacific Time/11:00 a.m. Eastern Time for members of the investment community to discuss the acquisition. Dial-in details for the conference call are as follows:

Toll-Free: 1-877-394-5901 (North America) Toll/Int'l: 1-416-548-6023 Conference ID: 7959114# View Presentation Live: https://global.gotomeeting.com/join/332569240

Historical Resource Estimate

A qualified person has not done sufficient work to classify the historical estimate reported in the Northumberland Report as current mineral resources or mineral reserves and accordingly the Company is not treating it as a current estimate of mineral resources or reserves. However, the Company believes that the historical estimate is relevant and reliable, as it was prepared by a reputable mining company utilizing modern quality assurance program and quality control measures and drilling procedures. In order to upgrade or verify the historical estimate as current mineral resources the Company anticipates that it will need to perform confirmatory drilling, including twin holes and additional infill drilling, on both the oxide and sulfide portions of the mineralization. The historical resource uses the categories set out in sections 1.2 of National Instrument 43-101. There are no more recent estimates available to the Company. The historical estimate was not prepared by Newmont or Newmont Mining Corporation.

Northumberland Report- Key assumptions, parameters and methods used to prepare the historical resource estimate:

The following disclosure is sourced directly from the Northumberland Report. Please see the Northumberland Report for the referenced tables and additional information.

Resource Classification

Gold resources were classified on the basis of: (i) geological confidence, (ii) the average distance of the model blocks to composite samples used in the estimate, and (ii) the minimum number of composites used to estimate the block grades (Table 17.16). The average distances are those measured in the unwrinkled block model, and correspond to approximately  the variogram range for Measured,  the range for Indicated and the full range for inferred. In all cases the classified blocks lie at least partially within a defined mineral zone. In cases where a block was coded to both high and low grade domains, the classification parameters for the highest tonnage domain in the block were used.

No silver resources are classified as Measured due to the lack of time spent studying the geology of its occurrence, the high silver CV's, and the generalized nature of the estimation. Silver was not modeled independently of the gold, so that only silver lying within the limits of the modeled gold zones was estimated. Significant additional silver lies outside of the gold zones and therefore was not estimated. This is far from an optimum method of estimating silver grades and tons, but it does serve to provide some insight into the magnitude of the silver mineralization associated directly with the gold. There is a good possibility that when estimated properly, the grades and tons will change.

The Northumberland resource contains approximately 27 million tonnes at a grade of 1.77 g/t Au (0.05 opt), or approximately 1.5 million ounces Au, that was formerly assigned to the "Measured" category to reflect the high confidence levels in that portion of the resource. However, due to less rigorous sampling of the silver contained in these blocks, the silver grade estimates do not meet the requirements of a "Measured" classification and the combined gold-silver resource is here amended and re-classified as "Indicated". Fronteer is currently collecting the necessary information to upgrade the combined gold-silver resource to the "Measured" category.

The gold resources are tabulated using three gold-grade cut-offs that are applied to the block model on the basis of reasonably expected mining methods, metallurgical characteristics, and comparisons with similar mining operations in Nevada. A cut-off grade of 0.3 g/t Au (0.01 opt) is applied to blocks that can reasonably be considered to be available for potential open-pit extraction and heap-leach processing; all blocks above an elevation of 2,286 m (7,500 ft) with a cyanide extraction ratio of 50% or higher are deemed to be potentially mineable by open-pit methods and oxidized sufficiently to be amenable to heap leaching. The 2,286 m (7,500-ft) elevation limits blocks potentially available to open-pit mining. This elevation is supported by internal scoping-level economic studies undertaken by Jim Ashton, Senior Engineer, Fronteer. The 0.01 cut-off grade for oxide material is derived from comparable open-pit heap-leach operations in Nevada.

Two cut-off grades are used for sulfide material, which will likely require oxidation prior to cyanide leaching. The sulfide material is identified by cyanide extraction ratios less than 50%. Sulfide blocks that lie above 2,286 m (7,500 ft) can reasonably be considered available for potential open-pit extraction and are compiled using a cut-off grade of 1.0 g/t Au (0.03 opt). This cut-off was chosen with consideration given to the Fronteer internal economic analyses mentioned above. Blocks lying below 2,286 m (7,500 ft) will likely require more costly underground mining methods and are compiled using a cut-off grade of 2.5 g/t Au (0.07 opt).

The gold grades for each block represent the weighted average of the grades estimated for each of the mineral domains included in the block; they are not diluted to full blocks but rather to the mineralized zone only. Similarly, the tons of a block are derived from that portion of the block below surface topography and within the gold mineral domains. The silver resources are compiled from all gold resource blocks based on the gold cut-off grades discussed above; no silver cut-off is applied. The Indicated and Inferred gold and silver resources are summarized in Table 17.17. The gold resources at additional cut-offs are listed in Table 17.18.

Other Mineralization

In addition to the resources reported in Table 17.17, there are approximately 80 million tons grading 1.5 g/t Au (0.04 opt) at a cut-off of 0.3 g/t Au (0.01opt) [which] were estimated in the model but excluded from the resources. This additional gold mineralization is not currently considered to have reasonable prospects for economic extraction. The portion of this material that lies above 2,286 m (7,500 feet) warrants re-evaluation, if silver mineralization is properly modeled, which may lead to added value, or if positive changes are realized in such factors as commodity prices, operating-cost efficiencies, or metallurgical advances. In addition to the other gold mineralization described above, a significant amount of silver lies outside of the gold mineral domains and therefore was not estimated.

Block Model

A 3D block model was created using Gemcom software to capture all of the relevant data for resource estimation. Block codes were assigned for each grade envelope in each deposit along with the percentage of each domain falling within the block. Each block was assigned a gold and silver grade, a density, oxidation indicator, and an extraction ratio, according to the estimation process and modeling described below. Block model dimensions are given in Table 17.11. A separate unwrinkled block model was created for each layer at an arbitrary elevation below the actual deposit to capture the grade estimates. The unwrinkled block model dimensions were chosen to mimic the original block model in the X and Y directions, but with half the vertical thickness to account for the reduced uniform thickness of 100 ft. The unwrinkled block dimensions are: 25 feet in the X direction, 40 feet in the Y direction and 10 feet in the Z direction.

Grade Estimation

Gold grades were estimated using Ordinary Kriging in a single pass for each of the unwrinkled block model layers. Each block was assigned a high grade value and a low grade value using only those composites coded from each respective domain. The estimation parameters for the samples used in the grade estimates are given in Table 17.12. These parameters were derived from the variography for each separate domain and represent approximately 90% of the full range defined by each respective variogram model. Silver grades were estimated in a single pass by Inverse Distance Squared weighting in the unwrinkled block models, using the same search parameters as those used for gold. All grade estimates in the unwrinkled block models were back-transformed into real space and used to update the real space block model. A single back-transformed grade value was used to populate each block with a nearest neighbour interpolation.

Density and Oxidation Modeling

Specific gravity ("SG") measurements of mineralized Northumberland material were made by WSMC using the immersion method and the Marcy direct-reading pulp-density scale. For the immersion method, selected samples of core were cleaned with a brush and sprayed with a thin lacquer (Krylon) to prevent the samples from absorbing water during the test (Lanier, 1992b). Hip chain string was used to suspend the samples, which were weighed suspended in air and in tap water. Bulk specific gravity was then calculated using the following equation:

SG = A / (A - B)

where: A = weight in air; and B = weight in water

A comparison was made of 30 Marcy measurements with determinations on the same samples using the immersion method. The Marcy and immersion method measurements averaged 2.59 and 2.61, respectively (Lanier, 1997). In addition to the WSMC data, Core Laboratories, Inc. of Dallas, Texas determined the SG of 19 samples for Cyprus.

A total of 295 SG, or tonnage factor ("TF"), measurements collected from mineralized Northumberland samples were used to determine densities. The SG results vary principally by lithology and oxidation. Since a lithologic model of Northumberland has not been created, average TF's were estimated for each deposit based on the percentage of each lithology in the deposit. Lithologic codes of all samples assigned to gold domains were used to estimate the relative amounts of mineralized dolostone, limestone, siltstone/silty limestone, jasperoid, hornfels, and intrusions in each deposit (Table 17.13). The average TF values for each of the lithologies were then weight-averaged to determine the 'unfactored' TF for each deposit. These values were increased by a 2% factor in oxidized rocks and 1% in unoxidized rocks in order to account for unmeasured void spaces, such as open fractures (Table 17.14).

In order to assign the tonnage factors to the blocks, an oxidation model was estimated using the oxidized ("2"), mixed ("1"), and unoxidized ("0") codes in the drill sample database. Oxidation trends within the deposits mimic the stratigraphy. Drill hole geologic codes were therefore contoured to create a digital surface representing the base of the Roberts Mountains Formation. The relative vertical distance of the blocks to the Roberts Mountains surface were calculated and stored in the block model. The block model was then used to code the relative vertical distance to the 10-ft oxidation composites. These procedures normalize true elevations of the composites and blocks to the Roberts Mountains surface, effectively flattening the undulating stratigraphy for the purposes of the oxidation estimation.

The oxide code was interpolated using the inverse-distance-cubed method that recognized the relative distances stored in the composites as the elevation values. Each geologic area was interpolated separately with unique search parameters. The search ellipses were highly anisotropic, with relatively long axes in the horizontal directions and short minor axes in the vertical direction in order to honor the stratigraphic control. The lengths of the major and semi-major axes of the search ellipses ranged from 550ft in geologic area 1 to 440ft in areas 4 and 5, while the minor axes used ranges of 35ft to 50ft. A minor amount of blocks were not estimated in the Zanzibar deposit. These blocks were set to zero (unoxidized).

The oxide codes were interpolated to assign blocks oxidation codes to the first decimal place. All blocks greater than or equal to 1.5 were assigned oxidized tonnage factors, while the remaining blocks were assigned unoxidized tonnage factors.

Metallurgical Modeling

Portions of the Northumberland gold-silver mineralization are amenable to direct cyanidation, while other portions require metallurgical treatment that includes oxidation prior to cyanidation (see Section 16). Due to the significant difference in costs involved in the recovery of gold and silver from these two styles of mineralization, unique grade cut-offs are necessary for the purposes of resource reporting. A generalized metallurgical model was therefore developed to define both the mineralization that is amenable to direct cyanidation and the mineralization that requires oxidation prior to cyanidation. These types of mineralization were identified on the basis of gold cyanide extraction ratios, which are defined as the ratios of cyanide leach assays to original fire assays expressed in percent. The metallurgical modeling, therefore, has been completed solely for the purposes of tabulating the Mineral Resources at appropriate cut-offs. Additional work, including the possible development of a new metallurgical model, would need to be completed prior to taking these resources to reserves.

Variography performed on gold cyanide extraction ratio data indicated maximum ranges of about 700 to 800ft in both global and directional variograms, with most of the relationship between samples accounted for at a range of 550ft.

Cyanide extraction ratios were estimated by the inverse-distance-cubed ("ID3") method using the parameters in Table 17.15. Relative elevations of the 10-ft composites to the Roberts Mountains surface were used in a similar fashion as the oxidation estimation described above. Cyanide extraction ratios derived from gold assays of less than 0.005 oz Au/ton were not used in the composites, as these low assay values can lead to spuriously high cyanide extractions and otherwise rather meaningless ratios. Only cyanide extraction ratios within the mineral domains were composited.

Approximately 90% of the blocks were estimated by the inverse-distance interpolation. The equation of a best-fit line derived from the relationship between cyanide extraction ratios and logged oxidation code was applied to the interpolated oxidation codes to calculate the cyanide extraction ratios for the unestimated blocks. The data used to derive the best-fit line were constrained to samples that: (1) have a minimum fire assay value of 0.01 oz Au/ton; (2) lie within the gold mineral domains; and (3) have a maximum extraction ratio of 115%.

The minimum fire assay limit is imposed in order to remove many of the spurious extraction ratios well in excess of 100% and otherwise meaningless ratios, which are common at grades of less than 0.01 oz Au/ton. Only data lying within the mineral domains were used in the estimation. While the best fit line reflects the expected positive relationship between increasing oxidation and increasing extraction values, the correlation is not strong (correlation coefficient = 0.49). This is partially due to the subjectivity associated with various loggers assigning codes of 1, 2, and 3 in the description of oxidation state. The interpolated extraction ratios were capped at 100%.

Qualified Person

Rick Van Nieuwenhuyse, Chairman of the Board and Interim Chief Executive Officer of the Company, is a Qualified Person for the purposes of National Instrument 43-101 and has reviewed and approved the information of a scientific and technical nature contained in this news release. Mr. Van Nieuwenhuyse has reviewed, but has not verified, the Northumberland Report.

For more information please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements: This news release includes certain forward-looking statements and forward-looking information (together, "forward-looking statements"). All statements other than statements of historical fact included in this release, including, without limitation, statements regarding the acquisition of the Northumberland Project, the Offering, other future plans and objectives of the Company and potential mineralization on the Northumberland Project are forward-looking statements. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate and actual results and future events may vary from those anticipated in such statements. Important risk factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the Company's plans or expectations include failure to obtain TSX Venture Exchange acceptance of the acquisition of the Northumberland Project and the Offering (together, the "Transaction"), failure to remove conditions to completion of the Transaction, failure to raise sufficient funds on the proposed terms or at all and risks associated with mineral exploration, including the risk that actual results of exploration will be different from those expected by management and the risk that potential mineralization will not be upgraded or verified, and the other risks disclosed in this news release. The forward-looking statements in this news release were developed based on the assumptions and expectations of management, including that TSX Venture Exchange acceptance for the Transaction will be obtained, conditions will be satisfied, required fundraising will be completed, the other assumptions disclosed in this news release and that the risks described above will not materialize. There can be no assurance that the Transaction will complete. The Company expressly disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as otherwise required by applicable securities legislation.

This news release does not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy, nor shall there be any sale of these securities, in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of such jurisdiction, including the United States. The securities referenced in this press release have not been and will not be registered under the United States Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "U.S. Securities Act"), or any state securities laws and may not be offered or sold within the United States or to, or for the account or benefit of, a "U.S. person," as such term is defined in Regulation S under the U.S. Securities Act, unless an exemption from such registration requirements is available.
TORONTO, ON--(Marketwired - September 16, 2016) - Gran Colombia Gold Corp. (the "Company") (TSX: GCM) (OTC PINK: TPRFF) announced today that, in light of current market conditions and the Company's improved operational and financial performance this year, it has engaged GMP Securities L.P. as its exclusive financial advisor to conduct a strategic review process that will explore alternatives to enhance shareholder value. The strategic review process will be broad and could include, but not be limited to, a strategic investment in the Company by a third party, a business combination with another entity, a recapitalization of the Company, a reduction of the principal outstanding under the Senior Secured Convertible Debentures due 2020, a sale of the Company, or some combination of the foregoing.

At present, there can be no assurance as to what, if any, strategic alternatives might be pursued by the Company. The Company does not intend to disclose further details with respect to its review of strategic alternatives unless and until the Board of Directors has approved a specific transaction or otherwise determines that further disclosure is warranted.

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, potential strategies for the Company's future. 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 30, 2016, 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.
[JURIST] The EU General Court [official website] on Thursday upheld sanctions [judgment] against former Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych [BBC profile]. Following an uprising in 2014, Yanukovych fled to Russia, and the EU imposed sanctions for embezzlement and wrongdoing. Yanukovych successfully challenged the sanctions from March 2014 to March 2015 due to lack of evidence, but the court upheld the sanctions from March 2015 to March 2016. The EU has extended the sanctions to 2017, and Yanukovychs lawyer says he plans to challenge [Reuters report] those sanctions as well.

Russia has also received financial sanctions from the EU. In June a senior adviser to the European Court of Justice submitted an advisory opinion [JURIST report] finding the July 2014 EU economic sanctions against Russia legally valid. In 2014 the Russian discount airline Dobrolet suspended all flights [JURIST report] as a result of the tightening EU sanctions. The EU responded that the airlines service from Moscow to Crimea facilitate[d] the integration of the illegally annexed Autonomous Republic of Crimea into the Russian Federation and undermines Ukrainian sovereignty and territorial integrity. The economic sanctions against Russia were expected to cause more damage to the Russian economy than those imposed earlier that year, though economists and analysts expected Western economies to be impacted by them as well. The sanctions targeted the countrys energy, banking and defense sectors and included a ban on the purchase or sale of new bonds, stocks or long-term debts from some Russian banks.
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I call on Armenian and Azerbaijani parliamentarians to use this Assembly as an agora of opportunities President Tiny Kox

UCOMS SPECIAL OFFER OF THE UNLIMITED INTERNET IS NOW TERMLESS

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UCOM AND PES-PES CONTINUE COOPERATION WITHIN THE FRAMEWORK OF EDUCATIONAL PROJECT

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Largest Corporate Bond Program at the Securities Market of Armenia Completed Successfully

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Former president of Brazil, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva [BBC profile], on Thursday denounced charges filed against him in a corruption scandal [BBC backgrounder] involving more than 50 of the countrys politicians. The charges [WSJ report], including corruption and money laundering, were filed on Wednesday. The former president speculated that the charges may be a method used by prosecutors to tarnish the 13-year reign of his political party, the Workers Party. Brazilian authorities allege that da Silva and his wife orchestrated a ring of criminal activity, which benefited the couple through power and money. Authorities are investigating $6.2 billion worth of illegal contracting between da Silva and oil company, Petroleo Brasileiro [website]. For now, the charges only center on the money da Silva and his wife allegedly used for personal expenses.

More than 100 individuals and 50 politicians have been arrested in connection to the Petrobras scandal that continues to plague the country as it prepares for the upcoming summer Olympics. In July da Silva filed [JURIST report] a petition with the UN Human Rights Committee, claiming that his corruption investigation has been riddled with impartiality and abuse of power by the judge. In May Brazils Supreme court suspended [JURIST report] lower house speaker Eduardo Cunha after being suspected of obstructing investigations into his allegedly corrupt activities. Also in May local media in Brazil reported [JURIST report] that the countrys top prosecutors had requested an investigation into sitting-President Dilma Rousseff over alleged connections to the Petrobras corruption scandal. In April the Supreme Federal Court in Brazil ordered [JURIST report] the legislature to commence impeachment proceedings against Vice President Michel Temer.
The US House of Representatives [official website] on Thursday approved [HR5351 actions] a bill [text, PDF] that would temporarily block the transfer of detainees from the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. The bill, which passed with a 244-174 vote, would prevent [CNN report] transfers until a 2017 military budget is passed or until President Barack Obama leaves office. The Obama administration has cleared 20 of the remaining 61 detainees for transfer. The bill is not expected to survive as the White House has threatened [UPI report] to veto even if the bill does pass through the Senate. Proponents of the bill argue it is necessary due to the recurrences of recidivism [DNI report]. To date, more than 693 detainees have been released during the Bush and Obama administrations, 122 of whom are known to have returned to militancy, while others are suspected of having returned to terrorist activity.

Last month Vice President Joe Biden stated at a press conference in Sweden that he hopes and expects [JURIST report] that the Guantanamo prison will be closed before Obama leaves office. Also last month the US Department of Defense announced the transfer [JURIST report] of 15 Guantanamo detainees to the United Arab Emirates. Earlier in August a US Senator released a Pentagon Report [JURIST report] detailing the profiles of those currently detained in and recently released from the Guantanamo Bay detention center. Senator Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) concluded that closing the facility would not be in the US best interests and would pose a safety risk. White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough told Fox News in January that Obama intends to fulfill [JURIST report] his promise to close the Guantanamo detention facility before leaving office. Last November the US Senate passed [JURIST report] the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2016 (NDAA), which prohibits Guantanamo detainees from being transferred into the US. Obama signed the bill into law, despite the fact that it could delay his plan to close the prison. The NDAA comes after the DOD said [JURIST report] they were sending teams to review three Colorado prisons as part of Obamas efforts to close the facility last October. The Guantanamo Review Task Force was created in response to a 2009 presidential executive order to review the status of all detainees. In September White House Spokesperson Josh Earnest said Obama was considering a wide array of options [JURIST report] for closing the prison.
[JURIST] The International Criminal Court (ICC) [official website] will work to prosecute environmental crimes, according to a policy paper [text, PDF] published [press release] Thursday detailing how the court will select and prioritize cases. The court made the paper available to the public in order to increase transparency but clarified that the paper is an internal document that gives rise to no legal rights and is subject to revision as experience mandates. The court noted that it will begin prosecuting illegal exploitation of natural resources, arms trafficking, human trafficking, terrorism, financial crimes, land grabbing or the destruction of the environment, which some have noted as a marked shift [AP report] from their primary focus on crimes committed during armed conflict.

Environmental destruction has been an issue plaguing much of the world, including the US. Last week environmentalists sued [JURIST report] the US Environmental Protection Agency regarding federal water quality standards. In March Governor Rick Snyder of Michigan was served with a class action lawsuit [JURIST report] over the water contamination in Flint, Michigan. In February BP supervisors were found not guilty [JURIST report] of a Clean Water Act violation after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Also in February the Supreme Court blocked [JURIST report] the EPAs Clean Power Plan, which meant to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.

In January, a Hungarian court acquitted [JURIST report] 15 employees of the Mal Corp for their role in the toxic red sludge spill that killed 10 people in 2010 after a reservoir burst. Also in January, Brazils Federal Police accused seven people and three companies of environmental crimes [JURIST report] in its probe into the major Fundao dam collapse that occurred on November 5.
Recently appointed Kosovo war crimes prosecutor David Schwendiman of the Special Investigative Task Force [official website] vowed [Reuters report] to investigate all war crime suspects, fairly, vigorously and without fear on Thursday. Many of the suspected offenders are former members of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) and now hold important political positions. Additionally, many are viewed by ethnic Albanians as freedom fighters. It is suspected that President Hashim Thaci may have played a role in war crimes committed against Serbs during the conflict. The court, established [JURIST report] in January, will operate under the authority of the EU Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX) [official website]. Although the court will be under Kosovo law, it will be located in the Netherlands, funded by the EU, and the judges and prosecutors will be internationals. Registrar Fidelma Donlon said the court hoped to commence judicial activity in the first half of 2017.

Failure to fully prosecute war crimes committed during the 1998-99 Kosovo conflict contribute to the continued strain between Serbian and Kosovo relations. EULEX was established to aid Kosovo in the rule of law application when it comes to instances such as war crimes that may cause conflict with in the region. In June the Assembly of Kosovo voted to extend [JURIST report] the EULEX mandate for two years. The move comes after the EU voted to extend and fully fund the mandate until 2018. Kosovos Parliament approved [JURIST report] the creation of the special war crimes court in August of last year.
A Swedis appellate court in Stockholm on Friday upheld the arrest warrant [order, PDF; press release] and detention order issued six years ago against Julian Assange [BBC profile]. The warrant, which Assange has challenged multiple times, was issued in 2010 in connection with sexual assault charges involving two women he met in Sweden at the time. Assange has consistently maintained his position [Guardian report] that any and all sexual relations with the two women were consensual and that these charges were politically motivated. Assange has thus far avoided extradition to Sweden by staying at the Ecuadorian embassy in London, and the detention order seeks to bring Assange in for questioning. UN officials have determined Assanges six-year detention order without charge is an arbitrary detention [JURIST report] and thereby unlawful, but the court rejected this determination as not binding on Sweden. The court further stated that Assanges stay at the embassy cannot be regarded as an unlawful deprivation of liberty. Swedens prosecutors are currently planning to interrogate Assange sometime within the next few months while Assange remains inside the embassy in England. Meanwhile, Assanges lawyers are currently planning to appeal the decision to the Sweden Supreme Court.

This is the eighth time that the arrest warrant against Assange was challenged in a Sweden court and all of the rulings thus far have gone against Assange. Assange concerns about being extradited to Sweden primarily relate to his fear of being extradited by Sweden to the US on espionage charges in connection with his role, as founder of WikiLeaks [advocacy website], in the release of classified US government materials to the public The WikiLeaks trials [JURIST op-ed] have also garnered much debate in the US. Last year US Army Major General Jeffery Buchanan upheld [JURIST report] Private Chelsea Mannings conviction and prison sentence for turning over classified information to WikiLeaks. In September 2013 Manning filed for a presidential pardon of the 35-year sentence [JURIST reports] she received in August. The sentence came a month after she was found guilty [JURIST report] of violating the Espionage Act but was acquitted of the more serious charge of aiding the enemy.
A new UN report [text, PDF] released Thursday found a dismal situation in eastern Ukraine [BBC profile] with regards to human rights. As a result of escalating hostilities the past few months, the report cites an increasingly disturbing disregard for the protection of civilians by both sides during the conflict. The report found [OHCHR press release] a 66 percent increase in conflict-related civilian casualties from May through August. The UN Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights (OHCHR) [official website] has recorded 9,640 deaths and 22,431 injuries among Ukrainian armed forces, civilians and members of the armed groups since the conflict began over two years ago. The majority of civilian casualties have resulted from shelling and a considerable number have also been killed by mines and other booby traps. Civilians in these areas are deprived of protection and access to services and aid and are unable to move. Furthermore, there have been countless cases of torture, ill-treatment and detention.

Russia and Ukraine have been in conflict since the annexation of Crimea [JURIST backgrounder] in March 2014. In July AI and HRW released the 56-page report detailing how Ukrainian government officials and Russia-backed separatists in the Ukraine have subjected citizen to prolonged, arbitrary detention, torture, or other forms of inhumane treatment, including refusing necessary medical attention [JURIST report]. In June the UN human rights office reported that the human rights situation in Ukraine remains troublesome [JURIST report] following two years of conflict with Russia. In February Russia filed suit [JURIST report] against Ukraine over Ukraines default on $3 billion in bonds. A Ukrainian official said in January that the nation plans to sue Russia [JURIST report] in the International Court of Justice on claims of financing terrorism. Last August a Russian military court sentenced [JURIST report] two Ukrainian activists to substantial jail time for the charge of conspiring to commit terror attacks. In March of last year the EU committed to stand by its policy of refusing to recognize Crimeas annexation [JURIST report].
Farmers in Aghavnadzor close all facilities, demand pay for last years produce

Residents of Aghavnadzor community in Vayots Dzor marz have closed for an indefinite time all working facilities of the village, including the village hall, kindergarten and school, Headman Ashot Galstyan told A1+ on the phone. Only the hospital continues to work in the village. The villagers demand payment for the grapes they sold to distilleries last year. Unlike other marzes and villages, Areni is the most widespread variety of grape in this community, which is purchased by "VEDI ALCO" CJSC. The company owes local grape-growers AMD 126 million for their produce it bought in 2015. Ashot Galstyan says all relevant agencies are aware of the problem, but so far, no one has responded to them. The governor of Vayots Dzor marz had urged the farmers to wait until the formation of a new cabinet and then they would try to solve the problem. However, the farmers say they have been hearing empty promises for a long time and cannot wait any longer, Mr. Galstyan said. The head of the village says they do not know what to do with this years produce. Villagers of Aghavnadzor started protests from September 1, refusing to send their children to school at the beginning of the new academic year.
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It emerged this week that French dairy giant Danone could be preparing to pull its Dumex infant formula brand from Vietnam. It is not yet clear what the company plans for the Dumex business throughout the rest of Asia. The move does, however, come as further evidence that Danone is cutting its losses and de-emphasising the Dumex brand, which has failed to emerge from the long shadow of a 2013 recall. Katy Askew reports.

Danone is apparently pulling the plug on its Dumex brand in Vietnam. Danone Vietnam CEO Martin Hoelscher is quoted as telling local media that it has decided to gradually withdraw Dumex from Vietnam due to declining market share. According to Hoelschers interview with the English-language Vietnamnet, the CEO said: Danones activities in Vietnam will continue as normal for the next few months. Dumex will be available until early next year.

The Vietnamese infant formula sector is developing rapidly. Rising incomes, urbanisation and an increasing number of women in the workplace are all acting as fuel for expansion. A recent research paper led by Dr. Phillip Baker from Australian National University found that global infant formula growth is being led by East Asian countries, with Vietnam among those nations at the head of the pack.

In 2008-2013 world total MF sales grew by 40.8% from 5.5 to 7.8kg per infant/child/year, a figure predicted to increase to 10.8kg by 2018. Growth was most rapid in East Asia particularly in China, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam and was led by the infant and follow-up formula categories, the researchers note.

So why would Danone choose to withdraw an established brand from a high-growth market?

The Vietnamese infant formula sector is highly competitive. Dumex is not a category leader in the Vietnamese infant nutrition space. Data from Euromonitor International reveals that Dumex is the tenth largest infant formula brand in Vietnam. The companys share of sales in the infant nutrition category trails the likes of Abbott Labratories-owned Similac and PediaSure, FrieslandCampinas Friso and Dutch Lady/Bella Holandesa, Mead Johnsons Enfagrow and Nestles Nan brands. The countrys two largest infant formula brands are, however, owned by domestic businesses. Vinamilks Dielac and NutiFood Nutrition Foods Nutrifood brands are the largest and second-largest brands by sales respectively.

These local players  known for their quality products and affordable prices  are stiff competition for more up-scale international brands. In particular, they will continue to benefit form a government-imposed price ceiling until the end of 2016 and ongoing restrictions on marketing. This has to date limited the growth experienced by premium international brands in the country.

While the Vietnamese infant formula category might be a competitive space in which to operate, Danone is not a company to shy away from such a challenges easily. In truth, the Dumex brand has been hamstrung in Vietnam  and throughout the rest of Asia  ever since a 2013 product recall. Danone was forced to issue a consumer facing recall of certain Dumex products after Danone was supplied by New Zealand dairy Fonterra with whey that was thought to be contaminated with a botulism-causing bacteria. While it transpired that the recall was a false alarm  and Danone acted quickly and transparently to remove products from the shelf  there can be little doubt that Dumexs reputation has never recovered.

Raphael Moreau, food analyst at Euromonitor, comments: Dumexs reputation in China and beyond has been victim to a false product safety scare from which it has failed to recover, and which could lead to its exit from Vietnam by the end of 2016.

Danone has obviously decided that it wants to distance itself from Dumex. Last year, the French food maker said it will merge Dumex in China with the infant formula business of local dairy giant Mengniu in order to build a strong local platform in the sector.

At the time, Danone said Dumexs China sales were well below pre-recall levels. As a consequence, Danone revised downward Dumexs long-term sales forecast and registered an impairment charge of EUR398m (US$435.5m).

Sanford Bernstein analyst Andrew Wood said the decision to distance the company from Dumex follows a long-standing Danone approach of solving problem businesses by simply shedding them. Wood observed the deal with Mengniu removes a problem business from Danones headline numbers in the knowledge that investors will overlook the P&L impact as one-off and non-cash.

Danones shift is, arguably, about more than removing a drag on the top line however. By removing responsibility for reinvigorating a damaged brand from local management, the company is freeing up resources to concentrate on its higher-end, higher-margin, infant formula brands. Indeed, while the company has stepped away from Dumex, through its other premium brands it has successfully regained pre-recall market share of 15%.

It is not currently clear what the company is planning for the infant formula sector in Vietnam. Country chief Hoelscher did not comment on the potential impact of the decision on Danones wider activities in the country and Danone has yet to respond to just-foods request for information.

Euromonitors Moreau believes that if Danone is to retain a presence at all it will have to significantly step-up activity around its other brands. In Vietnam, Danone has a much smaller presence with other brands and it would need to step up its reach with premium brands, notably Aptamil, or risks losing out in a fast-growing market.

He also suggested that the move could be the beginning of a domino effect, with Danone withdrawing from other markets in the region. While the company mentioned that the likely exit Vietnam was not going to have repercussions on other Asian markets, it remains to be seen whether this may be still prelude to a longer-term withdrawal from Thailand, a much larger market for the Dumex brand than Vietnam.
PepsiCo is targeting the UK popcorn category with the launch of a new brand, Pop Works & Company.

Free Report Unilever- A Deep-dive into Product Launches and Advertising Strategy Track product launches by FMCG companies to get an understanding of the product-level strategies including geographic concentrations, innovation types, product claim, category focus and more

Monitoring the advertising strategies of various brands and gain insights into channel focus, regional focus, and more

Perform company-level analysis to understand business model, size, and geographic focus Dont miss out on key market insights that can help optimize your next investment  read the report now. Unilever product advertising is mainly through mainstream TV channels. Out of the products advertised so far at least 50% (over 850) of ads have been run on TV, while print media comes second with 496 ads. Unilever also utilizes social media platforms for advertisement. Unilever products are categorized by innovation ratings and tags in our product launch database. The North American region consists of almost 74 products with innovations related to the formulation of the product. Europe and other regions also have more products categorized under formulation-related innovation, followed by the packaging and positioning of the products. Most Unilever products are tagged with High Vitamins, Recyclable, and Natural tags to understand what the product differentiator is from other products available in the market. The majority of products belong to the personal care industry with a total of 5,788 products to date. This report, through the Unilever Example, illustrates how GlobalData Explorer enables you to:Dont miss out on key market insights that can help optimize your next investment  read the report now. by GlobalData Enter your details here to receive your free Report. Please enter a work/business email address Country United Kingdom United States Afghanistan Aland Islands Albania Algeria American Samoa Andorra Angola Anguilla Antarctica Antigua and Barbuda Argentina Armenia Aruba Australia Austria Azerbaijan Bahamas Bahrain Bangladesh Barbados Belarus Belgium Belize Benin Bermuda Bhutan Bolivia Bosnia and Herzegovina Botswana Bouvet Island Brazil British Indian Ocean Territory Brunei Darussalam Bulgaria Burkina Faso Burundi Cambodia Cameroon Canada Cape Verde Cayman Islands Central African Republic Chad Chile China Christmas Island Cocos (Keeling) Islands Colombia Comoros Congo Congo, The Democratic Republic of The Cook Islands Costa Rica Cote D"ivoire Croatia Cuba Cyprus Czech Republic Denmark Djibouti Dominica Dominican Republic Ecuador Egypt El Salvador Equatorial Guinea Eritrea Estonia Ethiopia Falkland Islands (Malvinas) Faroe Islands Fiji Finland France French Guiana French Polynesia French Southern Territories Gabon Gambia Georgia Germany Ghana Gibraltar Greece Greenland Grenada Guadeloupe Guam Guatemala Guernsey Guinea Guinea-bissau Guyana Haiti Heard Island and Mcdonald Islands Holy See (Vatican City State) Honduras Hong Kong Hungary Iceland India Indonesia Iran, Islamic Republic of Iraq Ireland Isle of Man Israel Italy Jamaica Japan Jersey Jordan Kazakhstan Kenya Kiribati Korea, Democratic People"s Republic of Korea, Republic of Kuwait Kyrgyzstan Lao People"s Democratic Republic Latvia Lebanon Lesotho Liberia Libyan Arab Jamahiriya Liechtenstein Lithuania Luxembourg Macao Macedonia, The Former Yugoslav Republic of Madagascar Malawi Malaysia Maldives Mali Malta Marshall Islands Martinique Mauritania Mauritius Mayotte Mexico Micronesia, Federated States of Moldova, Republic of Monaco Mongolia Montenegro Montserrat Morocco Mozambique Myanmar Namibia Nauru Nepal Netherlands Netherlands Antilles New Caledonia New Zealand Nicaragua Niger Nigeria Niue Norfolk Island Northern Mariana Islands Norway Oman Pakistan Palau Palestinian Territory, Occupied Panama Papua New Guinea Paraguay Peru Philippines Pitcairn Poland Portugal Puerto Rico Qatar Reunion Romania Russian Federation Rwanda Saint Helena Saint Kitts and Nevis Saint Lucia Saint Pierre and Miquelon Saint Vincent and The Grenadines Samoa San Marino Sao Tome and Principe Saudi Arabia Senegal Serbia Seychelles Sierra Leone Singapore Slovakia Slovenia Solomon Islands Somalia South Africa South Georgia and The South Sandwich Islands Spain Sri Lanka Sudan Suriname Svalbard and Jan Mayen Swaziland Sweden Switzerland Syrian Arab Republic Taiwan, Province of China Tajikistan Tanzania, United Republic of Thailand Timor-leste Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad and Tobago Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan Turks and Caicos Islands Tuvalu Uganda Ukraine United Arab Emirates United States Minor Outlying Islands Uruguay Uzbekistan Vanuatu Venezuela Viet Nam Virgin Islands, British Virgin Islands, U.S. Wallis and Futuna Western Sahara Yemen Zambia Zimbabwe Download free Report By clicking the Download Free Report button, you accept the terms and conditions and acknowledge that your data will be used as described in the GlobalData privacy policy By downloading this Report, you acknowledge that we may share your information with our white paper partners/sponsors who may contact you directly with information on their products and services.



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The premium line utilises a wet popping method that PepsiCo said creates a light and crunchy popcorn. It includes four varieties: sticky toffee pudding, peanut butter & caramel, apple pie, and sweet & salty. The line has an RRP of GBP1.50 (US$1.98) for a 90g pack.

The Pop Works launch will be supported by a unique digital campaign and experimental shopper marketing, partnering with social influencers and vloggers.

According to data provided by PepsiCo, the UK popcorn sector grew by 170% between 2010 and 2015. PepsiCo UK MD Thomas Barkholt revealed that the company expects the category to maintain this growth rate over the coming five years.

Popcorn already presents a tremendous opportunity for retailers and we anticipate that the segment will maintain its rate of growth in the next five years, so we are keen to support retailers and help them to take advantage of the growth in demand, he said.

PepsiCo currently accounts for 29% of global popcorn sales.

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Compared to traditional criminals, cyber-criminals are typically much more difficult to catch. From hacking to sexual exploitation, cyber-criminals commit their crimes behind the anonymity and relative safety of a computer screen. However, law enforcement is catching up to cyber-criminals. You can now report internet scams and other types of internet crimes directly to the FBI through its Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3).

As Texas federal internet crimes lawyers, we are always monitoring developments in the area of cyber-crime. Technology seems to evolve more quickly than anything else, so its important to stay on your toes to protect yourself from falling prey to an online scam.

According to a Wall Street Journal report, cyber-criminals have begun targeting dating websites in the latest round of internet scams.

What Are Romance Scams?

When most people think of a romance scam, they might picture mail order brides or similar scenarios. Although there are undoubtedly plenty of happy couples who have met through so-called mail order bride websites, they are probably the exception, not the rule.

Unfortunately, cyber-criminals have created a new way to exploit people looking for love and companionship. Romance scams have started popping up on popular dating websites, such as Match.com and eHarmony. Cyber-criminals go to an online dating site, create a fake profile using another persons photos and fraudulent information, and strike up online conversations with the sites users. They may spend months developing a rapport with a user, making the person believe they are interested in a romantic relationship.

In many cases, cyber-criminals pretend to be an American working overseas temporarily. They lure their victim into wiring money to an offshore bank account, claiming they are stranded without access to funds. According to the FBIs IC3, Americans paid $120 million to cyber-criminals in romance scams in the first six months of 2016  an increase of 23 percent compared to the first half of 2015.

In several cases, federal authorities have extradited cyber-criminals from other countries to the U.S. to face prosecution. In one case, an 84-year-old Indiana woman sent over $120,000 to an account in London, believing she was helping a man she met on an online dating website.

The co-founder of a dating website for individuals over age 50 said the site rejects about 15 percent of applicants every day due to scamming.

Cyber-security experts encourage people who use internet dating sites to check profile images with free apps that allow you to reverse-image search a photo to identify its origin. In many cases, cyber-criminals who use fake dating profiles pull images from stock photo sites, or simply find a third partys photo online and pass it off as their own. Internet security experts also warn against sending anyone money online, especially if you have never met the person.

Dallas Federal Cyber-Crime Lawyers

If you have been charged with an internet crime, you could be facing serious penalties. Law enforcement is tough on cyber-criminals. Dont wait to speak to a federal cyber-crime defense lawyer about your case.

Call the Dallas criminal defense Mick Mickelsen to discuss your defense today. Contact us or call 214-720-9552 today. You can also get in touch with us through our online contact form.

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Some have suggested that this shows that the President does not value law and order. I disagree. I applaud what he has done, and I believe his commutations promote fairness, justice, and respect for our criminal justice system, adds Dallas federal drug defense attorney John Helms.

First, it is important to understand what commuting a sentence means. Commuting a sentence is different from a pardon. A pardon means that the persons conviction is wiped off the records. A commutation means that the person is freed from prison before their sentence has ended, but they still have a conviction on their record.

To understand why the commutations were necessary, it is important to understand some background on federal drug sentences. For many years, the federal system effectively required inordinately long sentences for people who participated in drug trafficking, even if their involvement was relatively minor and there was no violence. Judges also had little discretion to give shorter sentences, even if the facts called for them. Almost everyone who actually works in the federal criminal justice system realized that the system was broken reveals drug trafficking lawyer Helms.

Over the last several years, there have been a number of reforms that have made significant improvements. The Federal Sentencing Guidelines, which are no longer mandatory, have been modified to make recommended drug sentences more reasonable. The U.S. Justice Department has also implemented policies that federal prosecutors follow that increase fairness for the accused in drug cases. In the last few years, sentences in federal drug cases have therefore been more fair and reasonable than they were in the past.

But those reforms did not address sentences handed down before the reforms. President Obamas commutations do. The commutations apply the principles of the reforms to past sentences by effectively reducing them. In other words, we have addressed the problem going forward, and the President is attempting to right the wrongs of the past by freeing people after they have already served a lengthy sentence, but before they have completed it.

Now that a wider range of punishment options are possible in federal drug cases, the efforts of a criminal defense lawyer can have even more impact on the final sentence. It is, therefore, more important than ever for drug defendants to hire a skilled and experienced federal drug defense lawyer. As a former federal prosecutor with a number of recent federal drug sentencing successes, I welcome the opportunity to help those accused of federal drug crimes when they need it most.

If you or someone you know has been charged with a federal drug crime or are facing any other criminal charges, contact John Helms federal drug defense attorney in Dallas immediately. Call 214-666-8010.

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Last week, in a federal court in Detroit, James Robert Liang pleaded guilty to wire fraud and criminal violation of U.S. environmental laws in connection with the Volkswagen diesel emissions scandal, reports John Helms a wire fraud attorney in Dallas. Mr. Liang worked at VWs headquarters in Wolfsburg, Germany. He admitted that he and others installed software in VW diesel models, called a defeat device, that would detect when the car was undergoing emissions testing and turn on emission controls, but turn the controls off at all other times, like when the car was being driven normally. He says he did it because VW engineers realized they could not meet emissions goals at the performance levels the company wanted. The defeat device was installed in over 500,000 vehicles sold in the U.S.

Mr. Liang is cooperating with federal prosecutors and law enforcement. He is the consummate insider. He knows who else was involved at the corporate headquarters and, at least to a point, how high in the company knowledge went. In return for his cooperation, he will probably get a reduced sentence, opines wire fraud lawyer Helms.

Mr. Liang happened to be living in the U.S. when he was indicted. It remains to be seen whether any other VW employees can be prosecuted in the United States, but you can bet that U.S. law enforcement is working with prosecutors in Germany who will be able to bring charges against responsible German citizens.

As a practicing wire fraud lawyer, I have written elsewhere that the best strategy for a federal criminal defendant is sometimes to cooperate with the government in order to get, hopefully, a reduced sentence. The prosecution of Mr. Liang is a great example of how a defendant can sometimes get a lot of credit just for providing information.

To get credit for information, it must be things the government does not already know, and it must be valuable. Mr. Liang surely knows almost everyone who was involved in creating, installing, and covering up the use of the defeat device. He has already disclosed, for example, code names for it that engineers used when communicating with each other, like the acoustic function. This and other information he can provide will help law enforcement and prosecutors understand cryptic emails and documents. Even if Mr. Liang never has to testify against anyone, he can prove to be an invaluable resource and give prosecutors leverage in charging other wrongdoers. Given the scope of what he did, Mr. Liang is unlikely to avoid prison time, but it will probably be far less than if he had not cooperated.

If you or someone you know has been charged with a fraud or are facing any other criminal charges, contact John Helms wire fraud attorney in Dallas immediately. Call 214-666-8010 .

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Four-year-old Joshua Warren of Altoona got to thank the person that helped save his life on Thursday.

The little boy was born with just one kidney that only operated at 15 percent. That meant he tired easily, and couldn't just be a kid. After moving to Altoona in December, he went on the waiting list for a new kidney. In July, his parents found out a kidney was available, so they traveled to the UI Children's Hospital for the transplant.

Ruth Powell, who works for University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics in the physical therapy department, gave him the kidney. Powell says she decided to donate, because it just seemed like she was in right place in life to do that.

Powell and the Warrens finally got to meet on Thursday when they were in Iowa City for a follow-up appointment.
LINCOLN  The director of Nebraskas troubled prison system laid out an ambitious proposal on Thursday to add 164.5 new full-time positions and build a $75 million prison addition for elderly and seriously mentally ill inmates.

Scott Frakes, who was hired 19 months ago to turn around the Department of Correctional Services, unveiled a budget proposal for the next two fiscal years that would increase state spending on the Corrections Department by about 7.4 percent, or $20.1 million, on top of the new prison construction.

Its a very different day, Frakes said in response to a report earlier Thursday that referred to the department as an agency starving for funds.

He added that he feels very supported in his proposals by Gov. Pete Ricketts, who has called for a change of culture in the department.

State prisons have seen an array of problems in recent years, from chronic overcrowding to the mistaken early release of hundreds of inmates and a riot last year at Tecumseh State Prison that left two inmates dead and more than $2 million in damages.

State Sen. Kate Bolz of Lincoln, a key senator on prison issues, said she was pleased that the departments proposal addressed some of its most critical needs, such as staff shortages and lack of programs to rehabilitate inmates.

But Bolz said she wants more details about the expensive prison construction proposal, and a clearer idea of how the department plans to fill vacancies in its behavioral health staff.

There are 55 vacancies in health services, which includes both behavioral health and medical staff.

Frakes said that a recent staffing analysis, as well as an escape by two inmates from a prison in Lincoln, pointed out the need for additional staff.

Of the 164.5 new positions sought, 135 would be protective services staff  those who guard inmates. The additional positions would represent about a 10 percent increase in staff. Frakes said they would be added at a rate of about 12 per quarter through mid-2019.

Staff turnover is still high, he said, and has been running above 30 percent for corrections officers, corporals and caseworkers. That is about twice the turnover rate that is manageable for prisons, Frakes said in a briefing with reporters.

He said he hopes to reduce that turnover by negotiating better pay for protective services staff, by better engaging them in their jobs and by improving working conditions.

Staffers have regularly complained about required overtime  about 16 hours a week  and the inability to get days off because of staff shortages. The state labor union that represents corrections officers says a lack of raises for longevity has been a major issue in the high turnover problem.

Inmates have also complained about the lack of programs and recreation, which contributes to unrest and assaults. One proposal unveiled on Thursday would invest about $3.6 million at the Tecumseh State Prison for a new job center for Cornhusker State Industries (CSI), the Corrections Department work program that builds furniture and other items using inmate labor. About 25 new jobs for inmates would be created; surplus funds from CSI would finance the structure.

The proposed $75 million reception and treatment center in Lincoln would include a 32-bed skilled nursing home for elderly, infirm inmates and a 32-bed secure mental health unit for the most seriously mentally ill and dangerous prisoners. It would replace facilities that are obsolete and ill-designed, he said, and would expand capacity.

The new facility, which wouldnt open until 2020 or 2021, would also include expanded kitchen facilities for the adjacent Diagnostic and Evaluation Center and the Lincoln Correctional Center, which are among the most overcrowded prison facilities in the state.

The ACLU of Nebraska has threatened a lawsuit over the states overcrowded prisons, which hold about 1,900 more inmates than their design capacity.

Two prison expansions to address that threat are already in the works: a 160-bed addition at the Community Corrections Center in Lincoln and a 100-bed dormitory at the same facility.

Those two additions, plus an expected reduction in incoming inmates due to sentencing reforms adopted by the State Legislature, should ease overcrowding by the middle of next year, Frakes said.

He said that the reforms adopted in Legislative Bill 605 are reducing incoming prisoners at a slower rate than expected, but still should do enough to allow an end to using county jails to house state inmates. That would save about $3.6 million a year.

Frakes said that, overall, the Nebraska prison system had significantly fewer resources than he had been used to when he worked in Washington state. He said that his budget proposal is a measured effort at closing that gap.

Thursday was the deadline for state agencies to submit their budget proposals for the next two fiscal years. The Nebraska Legislature will debate those proposals in the 2017 session that begins in January.
with Marga Gomez and Frank Liotti  Voiceover audition waiting rooms; juice cleanses and lack of taste and smell; Keiths wife doesnt get Keiths social cues; NYCs failed WiFi porn kiosks; Italy decriminalizes public masturbation; Gene Wilder was upset with Gilda Radner; redoing school

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This photo made in the Associated Press Washington bureau on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016 shows a copy of a check provided by the New York state attorney general that shows a payment of $25,000 from the Donald J. Trump Foundation to And Justice For All signed by Donald J. Trump. The $25,000 check was sent from his personal foundation to a political committee supporting Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi. Charities are barred from engaging in political activities. TrumpAos campaign contends that the 2013 check from the Trump Foundation was mistakenly issued following a series of clerical errors and that Trump intended to use personal funds. (AP Photo/J. David Ake)
Curtis Khan, founder of the app BookJane which allows people to find babysitters and senior caregivers, poses for a photo in Toronto on Wednesday, September 14, 2016. Karen Barzilay recently found herself in a bind when she was unexpectedly called into work while her nanny was out of the country. That's when her neighbours told her about BookJane, a mobile app that helps Torontonians find caregivers on demand. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Michelle Siu
FILE - In this July 28, 2016, file photo, a screen magnification feature of the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 is demonstrated, in New York. U.S. regulators issued an official recall of Samsung's Galaxy Note 7 phone on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, because of a risk of fire. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File)
Writer and actor Gideon Hodge , front left, speaks with a fire official after running into his burning home to save his laptop, Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016, in New Orleans, La. Hodge rushed into the structure Ai past firefighters yelling at him to stop Ai to grab his laptop, which he said had two completed novels on it. (Matthew Hinton/The Advocate via AP)
Lawyer Alan Lenczner is seen outside court in Toronto on Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016. Lenczner represents Ecuadorian villagers trying to collect in Ontario on a US$9.5-billion pollution judgment against U.S.-based Chevron Corp. from its subsidiary, Chevron Canada. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Colin Perkel
The Ecuadorian flag flies outside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, Friday, Sept. 16, 2016. A Swedish appeals court has upheld a detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who is wanted by prosecutors in a rape investigation. The decision Friday by the Svea Court of Appeal means that the arrest warrant stands for the 45-year-old Australian, who has avoided extradition to Sweden by seeking shelter at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since 2012. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)
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Food is love, my partner jokes as she unloads mountains of food from her latest trip to Costco. I cant help it! Im Jewish! she protests, when I wonder aloud how the two of us will ever manage to consume all that food.

As the lineups at superstores attest, for a great many people being able to prepare and serve meals is a vital way of showing love.

I never expected to encounter this among families caring for someone who is nearing the end of their life. But that is precisely what I see week after week at the residential hospice where I have volunteered for the past 15 years.

When we are caring for someone who is seriously ill or dying, food can be one of the most important sources of comfort for caregiver and patient alike. No longer able to enjoy socializing or dinner at a restaurant, a person with a terminal illness may still enjoy a special meal, treat, or even a dish of ice cream topped with Baileys Irish Cream.

At the hospice, family members load the fridge with special items  meat loaf, lasagna, smoked salmon, pickled onions, cream puffs, chocolate chunk ice cream  anything to ensure that their friend or family member feels loved and catered to. This may be especially true if they are no longer able to provide care at home. Losing the caregiver role that has become central to their identity, they can at least still provide sustenance.

When my sister was dying of metastatic melanoma, finding things that she might enjoy became my ongoing challenge. Whether because of the pain medication or the disease itself, Carol felt nauseous nearly every day. This was compounded by the fact that she was lactose intolerant, allergic to many foods, and perpetually constipated (the result of the opioids she was taking.) Not surprisingly, she was reluctant to eat or drink. I scoured specialty grocery stores in vain searching for something besides ginger ale that she could tolerate.

When someone is dying, they will gradually eat and drink less and less until finally, they may be unable to tolerate any food and drink as their organs shut down. This stage can be extremely alarming for family members. A wife who has cooked special meals for her husband in hopes that he would keep up his strength may be devastated when he turns away from her special soup.

My husband is so stubborn I could kill him, one woman blurted out in frustration. She would have nothing to do with my explanation that his unwillingness to eat might be the natural outcome of the disease process.

The son or daughter who has been bringing supper to their mother throughout her illness may feel lost without that tangible demonstration of their love. A mother or father, caring for their seriously ill or dying child, may feel as if there is nothing else they can do.

In the final stages of life, food and drink can prove to be fatal. A patient who has difficulty swallowing may aspirate even a tiny piece of the food or liquid, causing pneumonia and death. For patients with a bowel obstruction, any amount of food can cause pain, bloating, and even a perforated bowel.

To prevent such outcomes, it is important for health care providers to explain the dying process to family members and caregivers. Reassure them that refusing food and drink is a natural occurrence at the end of life, not a rejection of their love. They are welcome to offer sips or tastes, but they must never attempt to force their loved one to eat or drink.

As I learned from my caring for my sister, providing food is not the only way to show your love. Your presence  calm, patient, loving  is by far the most important gift you can provide. Watching a movie, reading aloud, playing music or singing  all are ways to ease their journey and demonstrate your love. In the final phase of life, being present is much more important than being busy trying to help.

Katherine Arnup is a hospice volunteer. She is the author of I dont have time for this: A compassionate guide to caring for your parents and yourself. S he blogs at Hospice Volunteering.

Image credit: Shutterstock.com
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On the way to work the other day, I heard a radio commercial advertising a local hospital networks cardiac care services. In it, a patients daughter related her overwhelmingly positive experience with the hospital team that treated her 90-year-old father with a transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR), a minimally-invasive alternative to open heart surgery.

It was a good commercial. It had all the elements: I was worried at first, the doctors earned my trust, the surgery went well, everyone was so nice, now Dad is back at home and doing all the things he used to do, thanks to hospital X.

The problem with commercials like these is that theyre misleading, and they dont really tell you anything at all about the hospital or its services. From a consumer standpoint, it may be easier to relate to individual patient narratives, but the ones chosen for radio and TV ads are, of course, the outliers, selected to boast of the miracles the hospital is capable of. They do not represent the aggregate patient experience  nor are they meant to  and they do little to assist potential patients in making informed decisions about their care.

What a customer really wants to know, and deserves to know, are the results for the average patient. How many 90 year olds have successful TAVRs at your hospital? Whats the readmission rate? Whats the one-year mortality? Five-year?

Evidence would suggest that things arent as rosy as this one commercial makes them out to be. Make no mistake: Performing a TAVR on a 90 year old is relatively safe, but it is not without risk. Strokes occur at twice the rate of those undergoing open surgery, and data shows that one in four TAVR patients die within a year, and more than one in three die before two years. Clearly, this is too much information to convey in a 30-second radio spot. But it is crucial knowledge for anyone considering such a major procedure.

My hospital is guilty of this kind of self-promotion too. The site for our new publicity campaign features the story of Kim, a woman who was in critical condition at a hospital in Vermont, out of options and seemingly destined for death. Apparently, an elite cardiac team from our institution arrived by jet and transported her to New York for multiple life-saving surgeries; she pulled through and is now back in Vermont, healthy, with only a telltale tracheotomy scar on her neck to serve as a reminder of her improbable recovery.

I dont know how representative Kims story is, but I suspect it is exceedingly uncommon. I do not think my hospital makes a habit of chartering air ambulances to other states, no matter how noble the intention. But someone looking at the website may assume that this is standard operating procedure  that the hospital moves mountains for all its patients. And when the hospital inevitably fails to deliver on this perceived promise, the only possible result is disappointment.

Nowhere is the practice of advertising miracle cases more exploited than in the world of cancer treatment. One need look no further than the website of Memorial Sloan Kettering, one of the nations premier cancer institutes, for a prime example. Here we are shown a video about Suzanne, a young mother who received the rare and terrible diagnosis of stage IIB small cell carcinoma of the cervix. Small cell cervical cancer of any type has a dismal prognosis: 30 percent survival at five years. Surviving stage IIB is virtually unheard of. And yet Suzanne beat the odds: Not only that, her doctors scheduled her treatment to be completed before her wedding, which was four months away.

Suzannes story is amazing; it is a miracle. She won the lottery. Her survival probably had more to do with luck than with the treatment she got at Sloan Kettering. For an organization with the motto More Science, Less Fear, it seems counterintuitive and somewhat hypocritical to attract customers by capitalizing on the tremendous anxiety that surrounds a cancer diagnosis. After watching this video, a patient with small cell cervical cancer or another equally aggressive malignancy may go to Sloan Kettering expecting a miracle. Unfortunately, science  research and trials and data  does not recognize miracles, and she will find that even with the best doctors, the odds are not in her favor. Nothing provokes more fear than losing faith in those whom you trusted to heal you.

Hospitals should be held to a higher standard when it comes to publicizing themselves. An advertisement is a promise, of sorts: This detergent will eliminate grease, this shoe will make you run faster. Hospitals are selling a product  there is no doubt about that  but one which has real consequences if it fails its recipient. And when it comes to medicine, failure is always a possibility. I am reminded of the disclaimer on ads for personal injury lawyers who have won millions for their clients: Prior results do not guarantee future outcomes. Perhaps if medicine approached self-promotion with data-driven realism rather than inspiring anecdotes, patients would be better informed, less frustrated and, ultimately, less afraid.

Eric Beam is an internal medicine resident who blogs at The Long White Coat.

Image credit: Shutterstock.com
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It started, as far as I know, with a twinge. A back spasm in a healthy, but prone to back spasms, 68-year-old man, who soon was reduced to near tears in the parking lot of the Thai restaurant where wed gone to get take out. It was early summer, and I was on a short visit to the east coast. My mother was the one to worry about. She had advanced breast cancer, stage IV as my dad frequently called it, in a way that he felt made it easier to convey to the world the seriousness of the situation but never allowed my mother a moment of peace to forget her mortality.

In those days, my dad thought only of the transience of her life, never his. He was a paragon of health, a man who had found running in his 30s and started a lifelong daily habit on the rural roads of Pennsylvania. Independent, he chopped his own wood and heated their home solely with it, scouring the landscape with a probing eye for downed trees, and driving his pickup and chainsaw to the site to claim the wood as if it was a treasure. He eschewed doctors, despite that I was one, and that his own background was one of science. As he used to say, if he didnt outlive his own father, who died in his early 90s after a life of hard living, the world was unjust.

Over the next month, the spasms became more frequent. I, in California midway through my pediatric anesthesia fellowship and weary of years of long distance medical concerns from my mothers prolonged illness, received weekly updates via phone call but was too wrapped up in my own life to put it together.

Im interviewing for jobs, Mom  finally the end of ten years of medical training!

Your father has lost that 30 pounds he always wanted to!

Hes hot all the time  I just bought new sheets so we can change them more frequently  they are damp every day.

But the pain was what he was focused on. He finally went to a doctor, because of the severe pain that left him breathless and screaming on the floor.

Acute myelofibrosis was the final diagnosis. In a period of mere months, his bone marrow had turned to useless fiber. This is very rare, said the specialty Philadelphia teaching hospital where I finally brought him, desperate for answers. How long does he have? Maybe six months. The pain, though, no one could understand. It wracked him, left him screaming and shaking. As an anesthesiologist, I was accustomed to witnessing severe pain, then standing at my patients bedside pushing medicine until it resolved. Of his pain, I could do nothing other than to explain to physician after physician: Until two months ago, he never even took Tylenol; he has an extremely high pain tolerance. They shook their heads in disbelief: We dont think this disorder causes pain. Yet it did. They treated his pain as best they could, but it was never enough.

Of death, he knew, but he didnt know. A lifelong hunter whod grown up on a farm, he was accustomed to the cycle of life and death, yet always colored by the element of the one with control. It is difficult to describe retrospectively the stages of disbelief, rage, and acceptance he went through. Before he came back from the hospital for what would be his final time, my husband and I cleared the house of his entire gun collection. We feared my father would do something desperate; throughout his life, he would say if he ever had a serious illness he would just take his hunting rifle and end it.

It seemed so wrong; society says suicide, giving up is wrong, and guns are violence. So, my husband and I acted. But now I understand this man was terrified that he had run out of options, that I had taken away what he saw as his only alternative.

Why? He moaned over the phone after Id left, back safely in my fellowship in California. I would have just gone in the woods and taken care of it. Im scared.

I started to understand.

Ill help you, Dad. But I need to help you in a way that is legal. Ill take a leave from fellowship, and well move to a state with physician-assisted suicide, and establish residency, and theyll help you, Dad.

But that was a pipe dream. The closest state was Vermont, at least an eight-hour drive with a man screaming in constant severe pain and a requirement to first establish residency. No, no, he said, Ill find another way. My mother, perhaps because she was there and living with the consequences of his disease, or perhaps because the stigma of suicide ran strong in our small Pennsylvania community, focused on preventing his desired death.

In the end, he died in hospice care in a hospital on Thanksgiving day, in a morphine induced haze from which he would occasionally awaken and scream. Home was not an option; no hospice provider serviced IV opiate medication in our rural area of Pennsylvania. It was his worst nightmare come true: a diapered hell. On the day before he died, he had one moment of clarity, like when you awaken from a bad dream and are trying to figure out if it is real or not.

Chrissy, am I OK?

Dad, Im here.

No, Im not OK!  dissolved into the moans of severe pain, soon followed by the delirium of more morphine.

I am haunted by the end of my fathers life, by the lack of control he felt, by his terror, and by the role I was forced into. I witnessed what I knew to be his worst fear, for someone as independent as he: I never want to die in my own filth in a hospital somewhere. Yet there was no option. I had taken away the only other real option for someone as incapacitated as he, to die by his own hand with a gun in his beloved woods.

Yet why, in his home state, did society dictate my dad had but two, equally inhumane and unacceptable options? Why was a physician-assisted dignified death, with a semblance of choice and control in a situation that was otherwise so helpless, not available to my father?

Physician-assisted suicide is currently available to terminally ill patients in four states. Nothing can change the death of my father. But especially as a physician, I owe it to him to argue for death with dignity, to advocate for patients to have the option he did not have, so other daughters do not have to feel the conflicted helplessness I cant forget.

Christine Jette is a pediatric anesthesiologist.

Image credit: Shutterstock.com
The man recommended to take charge as Laredo ISD's next police chief has been officially selected.

Roberto Villarreal is currently a police sergeant at United ISD. He was one of two recommendations made by Dr. Marcus Nelson to the Board. The first was Raul Martinez.

When that motion failed, Villarreal was recommended. His appointment was approved with two Board members voting against.

No decision has been made when Villarreal will officially begin.

The position had been vacant since early August, when Former Chief Richard Palomo resigned to take a position in San Antonio.
A candidate for the Fourth District Court of Appeals made a campaign stop in Laredo on Friday.

Irene Rios has served over 14 years as a trial judge, and was formerly a judge for Bexar County.

Rios graduated from St. Mary's University School of Law in 1990, and has been licensed to practice law for 25 years.

Originally from El Paso, Rios visited Laredo to talk about her goals, if elected into the Fourth Court of Appeals.

"Making decisions very carefully, understanding that decisions affect people for many years, and sometimes permanently," Rios said. "So having a fair judge is important, so that's my message. Having a fair judge."

Rios will face Incumbent Justice Jason Pulliam in the November General Election.
Gardai who attended a report of a 'noisy house party' met the defendant who was abusive and offensive, Kilkenny District Court heard.

Kalem Hogan, 62 St Fiachra's place, Loughboy had his case adjourned to March 21 for the preparation of a probation report and assessment for community service.

On May 1, 2015 gardai responded to a call of a house party. The nature of the complaint was that it was a 'noisy house party'.

On arrival gardai spoke to a number of people and several other ran through the fields. Gardai spoke to the defendant outside the house. The defendant told gardai to 'f**k off' and referred to them as 'f**king pigs' and punched the patrol car and ran off. The defendant was observed drinking in a public place and became abusive again and was arrested under the Public Order Act.

Solicitor Chris Hogan told the court that at the time of the offences his client was 18 years of age.

On the night in question it was a foolish mix of alcohol and youthful exuberance, he said adding that his client works part time for a local publican. He has been admitted on a course as a security man and has attended therapy.

Judge Colin Daly adjourned the case to March 21 for a probation report and a community service assessment.

Youthful exuberance is a different matter. He was being offensive and threatening to gardai, he said.

Judge Daly also ordered that the defendant enter into a probation bond until March.
Residents of Carrigeen in south Kilkenny have benefitted from an Irish Water investment of 500,000 to replace aging watermains supplying the town.

Irish Water says the upgrades will result in significant improvements in terms of security of supply and the frequency of water outages. The project involved the installation of 2.7km of new watermains in Carrigeen.

The project commenced in August and took two months to complete. Ageing and fragile water mains are a common problem across the country resulting from decades of under investment in water infrastructure.

Irish Water has said it is committed to addressing this, and the replacement of these agEing watermains is part of an ongoing investment in Irelands water infrastructure.

The new watermains are intended to result in significant improvements in network performance and level of service to customers in terms of security of supply.

The replacement of these aging watermains will ensure that customers in the area will have a more reliable water supply, said David Sharry, southern programmes specialist said.

Irish Water recognised the importance of upgrading the water network in Carrigeen as a result of the frequency of bursts resulting in significant disruption to the community last winter and also over Easter. We prioritised work to enable the upgrade of the network as soon as possible.

All work on the watermains has now been completed and we hope to conclude the commissioning process over the coming weeks.

Watermains rehabilitation is one aspect of Irish Waters plan to reduce leakage. Lost water is estimated at 47% nationally and 40% in County Kilkenny.

Leakage is also being targeted through Irish Waters First Fix Free Scheme, which supports customers in reducing leaks on their property, benefitting over 270 householders in Kilkenny to date.
In this publication, we warn regularly of the risk involved in storing wealth in banks. Theyve made the removal of your deposits increasingly difficult, in addition to colluding with governments to allow them to legally freeze or confiscate your money. To add insult to injury, theyre creating reporting requirements with regard to the contents of safe deposit boxes and restricting what can be stored in them  again, at risk of confiscation.

More and more, banks are becoming one of the more risky places to store wealth in any form. Not surprising, then, that many people are returning to those facilities that treat wealth storage the way the first banks did, millennia ago  vault facilities that store your wealth for a fee, but engage in no other banking activities.

But, in suggesting to our readers that such facilities are a better bet, Ive also repeatedly warned readers that many such facilities dont store actual, physical gold. They instead provide a contract to you that states that they will deliver an agreed-upon amount of gold upon demand. The trouble with this idea is that it becomes tempting for such facilities to sign such a contract with you and collect the purchase price, but never actually purchase and store any gold. Its been estimated that the total worldwide value of such contracts equals 150 times the amount of gold in existence in the world.

Oh-oh.

This is why its imperative that you purchase only physical, allocated gold.

And another caution: Ive repeatedly stated that, although many of the most secure facilities in the world are located in North America and Europe, these jurisdictions are on the cusp of economic crisis, a fact that suggests that, if and when the crisis arrives, the rule book will be thrown out the window. Governments and facilities alike may prove untrustworthy and, at some point, you may drop by the facility to withdraw your gold and be told, Sorry, were unable to provide delivery. There could be a multitude of reasons given, hoops to jump through and endless red tape to deal with. And still, in the end, you may never be able to take delivery.

Its for these reasons that we advise that, although nothing in life is guaranteed, you should always protect your wealth by choosing the least risky option.

This means that you should follow two simple rules - Rule #1: Select the jurisdiction with the best laws and reputation. Rule #2: Make sure theres a reputable storage facility in that jurisdiction that has a Class III vault and a contract that meets your needs.

But, am I being overly cautious when I so frequently offer this advice? Unfortunately, no. Ive predicted that, in the future, as we get closer to a monetary crisis, banks and storage facilities that are located in countries that are likely to be heavily affected, will work ever-harder to avoid releasing either money on deposit (in the case of banks) and precious metals (in the case of storage facilities).

Recently, the reports that Ive been receiving from wealth storage facilities in advantageous jurisdictions are indicating that that prediction is beginning to come to fruition. In case after case, clients are having a harder time getting their money and their metals out. In most cases, those institutions that dont wish to deliver are creating red tape, stalling techniques (which are costly in both time and money) and, in some cases, outright refusals to deliver.

Lets look at two actual examples  one of a bank, one of a wealth storage facility.

USA: A client asks his bank to wire transfer US$178,000 in funds to an overseas facility to purchase precious metals for storage. The bank then created a series of roadblocks:

Required a written request, with an original, signed copy to be hand-delivered.



Once that was done, a voice authorization of the letter by phone was required.



Once that was done, it required the client to receive a PIN number, which would take several days to create and would need to be sent by courier.



After the client jumped through all those hoops, the bank changed its requirements completely, requiring that a cashiers cheque be sent instead, which required ten days clearance.

Lost time  four weeks from date of first request.

Austria: A client tries to transfer his allocated 138 gold Philharmonics from his bank to a facility in another jurisdiction. The bank repeatedly produced roadblocks, as follows:

Refused to ship the products themselves and refused to arrange shipment.



Refused to release the goods to FedEx when they arrived, even though proof of insurance was provided. The bank then insisted on the hiring of a Brinks truck.



They then refused to release the coins at all, except to another bank.



They then claimed that they were not ready to release the coins. The client was invited to try again if he wished. (Eight attempts were required.)



Finally, they agreed to release the coins, but only if a 1% withdrawal fee were applied (not part of the original agreement  essentially a ransom.)

There are many, many more examples already, but these should suffice to illustrate the growing trend: If you wish to get your money or metals out of an endangered jurisdiction, such as an EU country or North America, the window of opportunity is closing. Expect them to make it difficult, costly and even impossible for you to get out.

But why should this be? What are these institutions up to? Dont they realize that theyre sending a message to clients that theyre not helpful partners?

Well, yes they do, but theyre also aware of another factor thats more important to them. As the economic crisis gets ever-closer, they understand that the day will soon come when a banking emergency is declared and the banks will shut their doors for an as-yet unknown period of time (presumably until a solution is found). What will the new rules be? No one knows. Will the banks and storage facilities be obligated to deliver in full, if the doors open once again? No one knows.

Therefore, in the final stretch of this race to the bottom, they want to be holding as much of your money and metals as they can.

The above examples are just the thin end of the wedge and we can expect the future to reveal greater restrictions. Whilst, in an economic crisis, there are no guarantees, what we can do is opt for the situation thats least likely to cost us our wealth. Again, Choose a jurisdiction that has the best track record - a long history of a low-tax, or no-tax regime, a stable government and legislation that protects, rather than victimizes the foreign investor.

Choose the jurisdiction thats easiest for you to access. In Europe this might be Switzerland or Austria. In Asia, this might be Singapore or Hong Kong. In the Western Hemisphere, this might be the Cayman Islands.

Choose the best facility within that jurisdiction  the one that has the best reputation and offers the best contract (competitive rates, Class III vault facility, 24-hour viewing access, etc.)

At this juncture, we cant say how long the need to safeguard wealth will be as essential as it will be in the near future. It may be brief (a few years), or it may be many years before the dust has settled. Whatever the outcome of the coming economic crisis, those who have chosen the safest havens for their wealth will be those who will fare best.

Jeff Thomas

International Man and Strategic Wealth Preservation

jeff.thomas1066@gmail.com
HANOI, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Here's a snapshot of Vietnamese dong exchange rates in the official market and indicative SJC gold prices in Hanoi at 0052 GMT.

Sept 16 Sept 15 USD/VND mid-point 21,956 21,958

USD/VND interbank 22,305/22,310 22,305/22,310 SJC gold (mln dong/tael) 36.01/36.27 36.06/36.32

NOTES: As of Jan. 4, 2016 the State Bank of Vietnam has begun setting the mid-point rate on daily basis, allowing dollar/dong transactions to move in a band of +/- 3 percent around the mid point. The dong's exchange rate against other currencies is not restricted by a band. Interbank quotes are indicative bid/ask prices.

One tael is equivalent to 37.5 grams or 1.21 troy ounces. SJC gold prices are quoted by state-owned Saigon Jewelry Co, the gold manufacturer.

Interbank offered rates are indicative, quoted from market sources.

For Vietnam market overview click on: Vietnam's bonds market auctions: Bonds auction results: (Compiled by Hanoi Newsroom)
Cost of insuring Deutsche Bank's debt rises 8 percent after DOJ fine - Markit



LONDON, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The cost of insuring Deutsche Bank's debt against default rose around 8 percent on Friday after the U.S. Department of Justice asked the lender to pay $14 billion to settle an investigation into its selling of mortgage-backed securities. Data provider Markit said credit default swaps on Deutsche Bank's five-year senior debt rose to 211 basis points, up 16 bps from Thursday's close of 195 basis points. Credit default swaps on equivalent Deutsche subordinated debt rose to 421 basis points, up 33 bps from Thursday's close of 388 bps.

(Reporting by John Geddie, editing by Nigel Stephenson)

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and may not reflect those of Kitco Metals Inc. The author has made every effort to ensure accuracy of information provided; however, neither Kitco Metals Inc. nor the author can guarantee such accuracy. This article is strictly for informational purposes only. It is not a solicitation to make any exchange in precious metal products, commodities, securities or other financial instruments. Kitco Metals Inc. and the author of this article do not accept culpability for losses and/ or damages arising from the use of this publication.

kitco news
Following are news stories, press reports and events to watch that may affect Poland's financial markets on Friday. ALL TIMES GMT (Poland: GMT + 2 hours):

DATA Polish statistics office will reveal employment and corporate sector wages data for August at 1200 GMT.

UNICREDIT , PEKAO , PZU Poland's state-run insurer PZU is convinced that it will buy a stake in Pekao from UniCredit by the end of October, Gazeta Wyborcza daily said citing Financial Times.

The only issue to discuss for PZU and UniCredit is the price, the paper said.

EDF Polish state-run utilities, including PGE , Energa , PGNiG <PGN.WA and Enea are working on a joint bid to buy France's EDF Polish assets, Puls Biznesu daily said quoting unnamed sources.

IPO

Video and mobile games producer PlayWay plans to debut on the Warsaw Stock Exchange , Puls Biznesu daily said quoting the company's chief executive producer.

UBER Ride-hailing firm Uber will hire 150 people in its business service centre in Krakow, south of Poland, Puls Biznesu daily said. Uber has invested 40 million zlotys in Krakow the daily also said.

THALES Poland may become European center for production of Thales' armoured vehicle Hawkei, Thales Deputy Chief Executive Officer Michel Mathieu told Rzeczpospolita daily. Thales is one of arms industry giants aiming to supply hardware for Polish army.

****Reuters has not verified these stories and does not vouch for their accuracy.****

For other related news, double click on: Polish equities E.Europe equities Polish money Polish debt Eastern Europe All emerging markets Hot stocks Stock markets Market debt news Forex news For real-time index quotes, double click on: Warsaw WIG20 Budapest BUX Prague PX Keywords: POLAND FACTORS/
HANOI, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Here's a snapshot of Vietnamese dong exchange rates in the official and unofficial markets, indicative SJC gold prices in Hanoi and interbank offered rates at 0433 GMT.

Sept 16 Sept 15 USD/VND mid-point 21,956 21,958 USD/VND interbank 22,275/22,340 22,305/22,310 USD/VND unofficial 22,300/22,310 22,300/22,310 SJC gold (mln dong/tael) 35.94/36.21 36.06/36.32

Interbank offered rates Overnight 0.4-0.8 0.4-1.0

1 week 0.4-1.0 0.4-1.1

1 month 1.7-2.4 1.7-2.4

3 months 3.3-4.2 3.3-4.2

NOTES: As of Jan. 4, 2016 the State Bank of Vietnam has begun setting the mid-point rate on daily basis, allowing dollar/dong transactions to move in a band of +/- 3 percent around the mid point. The dong's exchange rate against other currencies is not restricted by a band. Interbank offered rates are the latest indicative bid/ask prices, quoted from market sources.

One tael is equivalent to 37.5 grams or 1.21 troy ounces. SJC gold prices are quoted by state-owned Saigon Jewelry Co.

For more interbank rate fixings released at 0400 GMT, click on .

For Vietnam market overview click on: Vietnam's bonds market auctions: Bonds auction results: (Compiled by Hanoi Newsroom)
Ugandan shilling slips on dollar demand from energy, manufacturing firms



KAMPALA, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The Ugandan shilling was a slightly weaker on Friday, hurt by an uptick in demand for dollars from energy and manufacturing firms. At 0910 GMT commercial banks quoted the shilling at 3,375/3,385, slightly weaker than Thursday's close of 3,370/3,380. UGX Spot Rate..... Ugandan Shilling Money Guide.... Calculated Cross Rates.......... Deposits..................... Deposits & Forwards............. Uganda Equities Guide....... Uganda All Share Index........ Shilling background ..... Ugandan Debt Guide............ All Uganda Bonds............. Uganda T-Bills.............. Uganda Benchmark............. Central Bank ................ Ugandan Contributor Index.... Uganda Coffee Prices....... (Reporting by Elias Biryabarema; Editing by Edmund Blair)

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and may not reflect those of Kitco Metals Inc. The author has made every effort to ensure accuracy of information provided; however, neither Kitco Metals Inc. nor the author can guarantee such accuracy. This article is strictly for informational purposes only. It is not a solicitation to make any exchange in precious metal products, commodities, securities or other financial instruments. Kitco Metals Inc. and the author of this article do not accept culpability for losses and/ or damages arising from the use of this publication.

kitco news
(Adds details, background)

OTTAWA, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The head of Canada's statistics agency resigned in a surprising move on Friday over concerns that the agency's independence is being compromised, making him the second top statistician to quit in recent years.

In an email sent to the members of an independent advisory board, Wayne Smith said he was stepping down as head of Statistics Canada due to concerns about confidentiality and efficiency stemming from changes to the agency's data infrastructure, said Ian McKinnon, chair of the National Statistics Council, who received the email.

Statistics Canada is responsible for producing major economic data reports on everything from jobs to international trade.

In an arrangement under the previous Conservative government, responsibility for Statistics Canada's informatics infrastructure was transferred to a department that oversees information technology services across the government.

"He felt that losing control of the data infrastructure was incompatible with the continued independence of the agency," McKinnon said.

McKinnon said Statistics Canada has also been very concerned that it might not be able to meet release dates, which are typically set about a year in advance.

The government agency was criticized earlier this year for technological issues that delayed the release of some economic data reports on its website. Smith came to the job after Munir Sheikh resigned in 2010 in protest after the previous Conservative government scrapped the long-form census.

Anil Arora, who previously helped run Canada's census, will become chief statistician as of Monday, replacing Smith, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a statement.

The Liberals said during their election campaign last year that the party would give the agency more independence.

In a nod to the concerns, Innovation Minister Navdeep Bains said on Friday the government was working closely with the agency toward the reinforcement of its independence.

The concerns voiced by Smith come on top of some hiccups with releases in the past, said Doug Porter, chief economist at BMO Capital Markets.

"It's going to raise a lot more questions than would have been in place before," said Porter.

The agency was forced to withdraw a jobs report in 2014, citing a flaw in the way the figures had been processed. The employment report can be volatile, which has often prompted economists to question its validity.

(Reporting by Leah Schnurr; Editing by Grant McCool and Leslie Adler)
A bear who was struck and killed on Holly Road on Friday morning was removed by the Kitsap County Public Works Department and will be buried in a county-owned quarry. (CONTRIBUTED PHOTO / RANDY KRUZAN)

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By Christina Henry of the Kitsap Sun

SEABECK  A motorcyclist struck and killed a bear on Holly Road Friday morning.

The collision occurred at 5:13 a.m. on the 9700 block of Holly Road, according to the Kitsap County Sheriff's Office.

The motorcyclist was not injured, according to a witness.

The Kitsap County Public Works Department, which removes road kill from county roads, arrived and found a person on scene who wanted to keep the bear for meat, according to Doug Bear, spokesman for the county.

A new law that took effect in July allows for salvage of deer and elk killed by motor vehicles. Salvaging bears is not allowed, said Sgt. Ted Jackson of the Washington State Department of Fish & Wildlife.

The adult black bear was put in a front loader and taken to a county-owned quarry in the vicinity of Wildcat Lake, where the county buries dead animals removed from roads. The county notifies Fish & Wildlife in the event of a bear or cougar death, Bear said.

Fall is a time of increased activity for bears, whose foraging ramps up before winter sets in. Bears in Western Washington do not hibernate in the classic sense, Jackson said, but they do slow down in winter.

Fish & Wildlife has seen a recent spike in reports of bears in people's yards. A bear was sighted last week near Suquamish Elementary School.

"They're just doing what bears do, fattening up, looking for as much food as possible," Jackson said.

A single bear usually travels in 5- to 10-mile radius.

Fish & Wildlife advises people to remove food sources, such as bird feeders and garbage cans from their property. Be alert when out walking, and keep dogs on a leash. If you encounter a bear, back away and yell at it, Jackson advises.

The bear killed on Holly Road will be buried. "It just goes back into the food chain," Jackson said.
SHARE North Kitsap Fire and Rescue firefighter Tyler Horner works to snuff hot spots Thursday in the remains of an old barn that was set afire by its owner near Port Gamble. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO / NORTH KITSAP FIRE AND RESCUE

By Kitsap Sun Staff

NORTH KITSAP  A fire Thursday that destroyed a barn on Highway 104 was intentionally set by the owner, North Kitsap Fire and Rescue reported.

Firefighters were called just before 9:30 a.m. to the property near Highway 104's intersection with Waterview Way to find the 60- to 70-year-old structure fully engulfed in flames and collapsed. Adjacent trees were catching fire.

The property owner told firefighters he no longer needed the 20-by-40-foot structure, so he had set it on fire. The blaze grew more quickly than he expected, he said.

Firefighters extinguished the fire and prevented the flames from spreading further into the trees. It took another hour to fully extinguish the embers. Highway 104 was limited to one lane while crews worked.

The Kitsap County Fire Marshal's Office responded. The office issued an outdoor burn ban Aug. 19, prohibiting all outdoor burning except recreational fires in designated pits.

Regardless of the ban, "It is never legal in Kitsap County to burn anything except natural vegetation without a special permit," NKFR spokeswoman Michele Laboda said.
Bremerton's Public Works and Utilities Operations on Oyster Bay Road.

MEEGAN M. REID / KITSAP SUN

SHARE Chal Martin, director of Bremerton Public Works observes traffic at Washington Avenue and Sixth Street. MEEGAN M. REID / KITSAP SUN FILE

By Josh Farley of the Kitsap Sun

BREMERTON  Bremerton Public Works Director Chal Martin will serve a week suspension and several other employees in his department were disciplined following a series of internal investigations that uncovered safety violations, harassment and sinking morale within its ranks.

An employee in the street department was fired for failing to follow basic safety standards, a mechanic was disciplined for harassment, and the operations manager for the entire department was terminated without cause, though he had been disciplined for failing to act when allegations surfaced, according to documents released to the Kitsap Sun in a public records request.

Martin's suspension was due to his handling of the turmoil within the city's street department.

As a result, Mayor Patty Lent is restructuring public works. Its operations and personnel duties will go to administrative division manager Milenka Hawkins-Bates. The mayor believes the revamp, combined with additional training and counseling for public works employees, will steer the department "in a positive direction."

"City employees must have confidence in their leadership and respect of one another up and down the chain of command," she said.

'ESSENTIALLY SILENT'

In May 2015, the city's legal department hired a consultant to investigate Charles Ernst, a city mechanic, on allegations that he made "belittling, demeaning and derogatory comments" to colleagues "on a daily basis" and that some employees feared bringing vehicles to the city garage because of him. While he was given a week off without pay and put on probation for a year, city officials started a second investigation to determine how Ernst's behavior had continued unabated.

The consultant found that Ernst's performance reviews, conducted by operations manager Jim Orton, "sporadically reflect" concerns about his lack of customer service and impact on his fellow workers, but they are "essentially silent" on the subject from 2006 to 2013. As a result, Orton received a one-week suspension without pay. A year later, following further turmoil in the department, the city terminated Orton without cause. He received three months' severance pay.

In July 2015, Colen Corey, a 32-year city employee and 28-year veteran of the city's street department, became its supervisor. Public Works Director Martin said in a later investigation that while Corey was qualified, Martin had heard from some employees concerns about an accident nearly a decade earlier. On Aug. 22, 2007, Dean Westcott, a public works employee, was killed on the job when he was struck by a pickup. Though Corey was working at the site with Westcott, two investigations cleared him of any wrongdoing.

In the months after Corey took over the street department, Martin held five meetings with him attempting to address the accident. To Corey, it was a surprise and forced him to "continually relive both the accident and the associated guilt." Martin was found to have violating city employment rules on harassment, and the mayor reprimanded him formally in August. Martin also apologized to Corey.

Martin's attempts to intervene in the street department came at a time when it was "in chaos" this spring, according to investigative documents. Following some alleged safety violations reported by employees, an email, which contained some erroneous information, was shared with the entire team at a meeting.

That led to finger-pointing, "drama" and fears of retaliation.

'A DIFFICULT STRETCH'

An investigation by the city's human resources department did find one worker, 11-year city employee Ghryn Hobson, had committed multiple safety violations this spring. Hobson failed to pull an emergency brake on his truck as they were working on Hartford Avenue, resulting in the truck rolling about 20 feet and narrowly missing a parked vehicle. He also did not put up necessary safety equipment while filling a pothole on Old Belfair Highway, and a probationary employee had to remind him to wear a safety vest there. Hobson, who also was suspended two weeks without pay for shooting a deer in the city's watershed property last fall, was fired.

The city hired a psychologist to help counsel the street department to work out its internal issues. However, during the psychologist's interview with Martin, witnessed by a shop steward, the public works director "distributed confidential information, which including (sic) specific concerns/comments made by employees." For that release, Lent gave her director a week off without pay, beyond the reprimand he'd received for repeatedly bringing up the work death with Corey. He'll serve that penalty this month.

"Your actions have caused distress to the employees whose confidentiality was breached," Lent wrote to Martin. "They no longer trust that they can bring concerns to you without it being shared with other individuals. These actions have undermined the street division supervisor's chances of succeeding in his position."

Martin admitted he did not address the issues in the street department either "properly or timely."

"It's been a difficult stretch," he said.

Lent said she still has confidence in her public works director, a position she's had to fill three times in her seven years as mayor. She's placing more authority in Hawkins-Bates, too, the former public works director in Sonoma, California. Orton's operations position won't be filled and those duties will go to Hawkins-Bates, as will some personnel duties now handled by Martin.

Mark Fuller, who represents many of the employees involved on behalf of the Teamsters Local 589, said he believed the mayor's moves were appropriate.

"With restructuring, it will make for a better work environment and hopefully help our members get through any issues they might've had," he said.

Lent believes the investigations and discipline did not interfere with the ability of the public works department to carry out its duties of maintaining the water, sewer and stormwater utilities to city ratepayers. Yet Lent's written reprimand of Martin on Aug. 9 did acknowledge that it was delayed "by the number of investigations being conducted in the public works department," documents released to the Sun said.

"When management's attention has been deviated, it does cause a concern," Lent said this week. "But our public works employees are well-trained and skilled to carry out their jobs. I think they kept up their responsibilities."
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The House voted 310-116 Wednesday to arm the Department of Veterans Affairs, exclusively among federal departments, with tougher employee "accountability" tools to punish misconduct and better protect whistle-blowers.

It's the latest political fallout from the patient wait time scandal of 2014 and multiple smaller investigations into misbehaving VA supervisors and staff that have become the primary focus of the House Veterans Affairs Committee under chairman Rep. Jeff Miller, R-Fla., who is to retire January.

The VA Accountability First and Appeals Modernization Act of 2016 (HR 5620), introduced by Miller in July, would provide new authorities for VA to withhold financial incentives or to demote or fire employees faster than current federal employee protection law allows.

The same bill would reform the VA claims appeal process so that veterans who file challenges to benefit claim decisions don't have to wait years, as they do now, to get final determinations.

The Obama administration praised the bill's provisions to restructure the claims appeals process, saying it has been failing veterans and taxpayers for years.

"Today, more than 450,000 appeals are pending at some point in the process, with veterans waiting an average of at least 3 years for a decision," explained the Office of Management and Budget in a statement on HR 5620.

In the same document, however, OMB joined federal employee unions in complaining that the toughened "accountability" tools in the bill go too far and would unfairly weaken due process protections for the 330,000 federal workers serving veterans, a third of them being veterans themselves.

Essential rights and protections "available to the vast majority of other employees across the government" would be diminished at VA, undermining its need to attract and keep quality employees and thus hindering the department's ability to serve veterans, OMB warned.

Rep. Mark Takano (Calif.), the VA committee's ranking Democrat, led an unsuccessful floor fight to soften the misconduct provisions, as the Republican majority defeated every substantive amendment. In the end, with Miller citing support from 18 prominent veteran groups, 69 Democrats joined the united Republican front to pass the bill convincingly.

It would shorten the process to fire, demote or hear the appeal of rank-and-file VA employees, from an average of more than a year to no more than 77 days. It also would end involvement of the Merit Systems Protection Board in such actions for VA senior executives; give the VA secretary authority to recoup bonuses and relocation expenses from employees who misbehave, or to reduce pensions of senior executives convicted of felonies that influenced their performance reports.

Additionally whistle-blowers would get new protections from reprisals and the bill would mandate strict accountability to supervisors or colleagues who would reprise against them, the VA committee explained.

The Obama administration said it already "is strongly committed to strict accountability standard" for employees, and that the HR 5620 provisions are "focused primarily on firing or demoting employees without appropriate or meaningful procedural protections."

It predicted a constitutional challenge, particularly over how the bill would compress time periods for employees to react to employer actions.

Like most federal civilians, VA workers now are entitled to 30 days' advance written notice before being terminated or demoted. This would be cut to 10 days, a period "completely inadequate" to review evidence, secure legal representation and present supporting evidence, argued the American Federation of Government Employees AFL-CIO (AFGE).

Management also must inform employees now of specific instances of unacceptable performance and how critical elements of the job are impacted. Both requirements would end, limiting an employee's ability to answer performance-based charges, AFGE said.

Employees have 30 days from date of a job action, or receipt of an agency decision, to appeal to the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB). At VA this would fall to seven days after date of removal or demotion. AFGE predicts a disproportionate effect on lower wage employees who can't afford legal representation.

While the House debated HR 5620, VA Secretary Bob McDonald testified before the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee about the Commission on Care recommendations to reform the VA health care system, an opportunity the House committee failed to provide him last week, he noted.

McDonald pointedly blamed the Congress failing to act on top reform priorities for veterans including a package of new authorities to streamline VA community-based care programs that have languished since last October.

He also took a poke at Senate leaders for failing to bring to the floor for debate the Veterans First Act, 75 days and counting since it cleared the VA committee with needed reforms to the claims appeal process and steps to strengthen VA accountability without weakening employee protections. House Republicans this week used the Senate's inaction to argue that passage of HR 5620 would at least show one chamber isn't blocking key reform bills.

Congress is holding up critical legislation, McDonald told the Senate committee. Meanwhile the VA already has taken many steps to reform the department including more appropriate punishment of wrongdoers, he said.

"All told we've terminated over 3,755 employees in the past two years. And we've made sustainable accountability part of our ongoing leadership training," McDonald said. "The Veterans First Act would help us hold people accountable, and we look forward to seeing it brought to the Senate floor."

Contact Tom Philpott at P.O. Box 231111, Centreville, VA, 20120, or milupdate@aol.com.
Andrew Geddis writes:

So what Stuart Nash is calling for here is Ministers to completely ignore fundamental precepts of our constitution. Now, I get why he is doing so  hes seeking to capitalise on some widespread outrage with how Delegat was treated (more on that in a moment). But the fact is that the Government cannot and should not do what hes saying it should, and hes completely out of order to demand that it do so. Because if he wants to one day be Minister of Police, he will have to respect and abide by these rules that hes so cavalierly calling on National Ministers to ignore. Simply put, if he were the Minister, he couldnt (and shouldnt) do what hes saying the National Party Ministers ought to do  which makes his calling for this action deeply disingenuous at best, and something much worse at worst.

Ministers can and should not interfere or comment on individual sentencing decisions, before appeals have been exhausted.

Graeme Edgeler writes:

The Minister of Police shouldnt be commenting of sentences before the appeal period is up in the first place, but criticising a Minister for not holding firm on the proposition that people who assault cops should be charged with the more serious aggravated assault charge (rather than the less serious assault on Police charge) is ridiculous when you are discussing a case where the person pleaded guilty to a charge of aggravated assault.

The key thing here is that Delegat was not charged with the lesser charge of assault on a police officer, but the more serious aggravated assault. All the media have missed this.

So, news media, you suck at this. Why, in the biggest criminal justice story in New Zealand for several days, did not a single news article (well, not a single news article accessible on google news at any rate) mention what the person at the centre of it was actually convicted of? Several news articles mention both Nikolas Delegat and aggravated assault, but only ever in the context of it being the charge he originally faced, which appears not to be true.. Stuart Nash, you suck too, assuming that the quotes from you in this Herald article is accurate (and, because I already seem to have forgotten what Ive just written, my assumption is still that it is). First, you shouldnt really be calling on the Government, and especially the Minister of Police to interfere with a prosecution, which you are reported as doing here 

Now assaulting a police officer has a maximum six month sentence and aggravated assault is a maximum three year sentence.

I do not think a first time offender should get jail for an ordinary assault. But there are two aspects that make me think it may be warranted in this case.

The first is that Delegat not only pummeled the officer into unconsciousness, but kept hitting here when she was unconscious. This is a desire to inflict serious damage on her. Permanent brain damage could occur. Even being knocked unconscious can have long-term effects, let alone being punched once you have gone unconscious.

This to me is quite different to throwing some punches in a fight, or even punching an officer to prevent them arresting you (still deplorable). He carried on just to inflict as much damage as possible.

The second factor is touched on by Geddis:

Delegats attempt to deflect responsibility for his actions away from himself and towards the rather out-of-control drinking culture at Otago carry echoes of the statement to court from the rapist (and former Stanford University student) Brock Turner. In seeking to minimise his offending, Turner pointed to the party culture and risk taking behavior that I briefly experienced in my four months at [University]

Dont blame the drinking culture. Blame yourself.

UPDATE: Whoops typo in the headline. Should of course be shut up not shit up 

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The YWCA Knoxville hosted the 32nd Annual Tribute to Women Awards at the Bijou Theatre this evening to honor 21 outstanding women from East Tennessee. From those finalists, the following honorees were chosen in their categories by out-of-state judges:

Lifetime Achievement: Avice Evans Reid

Arts and Education: Sylvia Peters

Business and Professional Leadership: Nikitia Thompson

Community Service and Government: Ola Blackmon-McBride

Health and Human Services: Dottie Thompson

Technology, Research and Innovation: Andrea Rocha

The YWCA encourages everyone in East Tennessee to nominate an amazing woman in their life for next year's Tribute to Women. Visit www.ywcaknox.com, in 2017, for all of the details.
Morgan Saylor and Brian Sene Marc in a scene from "White Girl."

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By Katie Walsh, Tribune News Service

Elizabeth Wood's feature directorial debut "White Girl," starring "Homeland's" Morgan Saylor, exploded at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, and for good reason. This arresting film will haunt you, sticking around with all the tenacity of a bad hangover. It's a wild nightmare of girlhood in New York City, a compendium of the miseries and ecstasies of being female.

Saylor plays Leah, a rising sophomore at a New York-based university, spending the summer sharing an apartment with her friend Katie (India Menuez), gentrifying the border of the farthest reaches of Bushwick, in Ridgewood, Queens. Leah is a bold bottle blonde from Oklahoma City, and, as she quickly announces, she really likes drugs.

That proclivity leads her to make the acquaintance of Blue (Brian Marc), a Latino drug dealer, and soon the two are falling into a drug-fueled lust. Lest you think Blue's the bad guy here, think again. This sensitive guy might be seen as a thug and a criminal, but he's the only man who nurtures and protects Leah. In fact, she seems drawn to him as a protector, having been sexually harassed and assaulted by her dirtbag boss (Justin Bartha) at a magazine internship.

"White Girl" is specifically about race, and the way that it affects how these characters experience the world, their mobility on the street and in life. Bodies of color are judged, contained and restrained, while Leah enjoys the affordances granted her simply by the way that she looks and the way that people read her socially. When the two hook up, she brings him into her world of Manhattan parties, where he makes triple on his deals. The next morning is another matter, and Blue, snagged by an undercover cop, is shipped off to Rikers.

Leah quickly jumps into action to spring her lover from the clink. "I always figure it out," she says, blowing lines of cocaine for inspiration, and leveraging her friends, family, connections, his stash and her sexuality in any way to raise enough money to hire Blue a real lawyer (Chris Noth) and get him out of jail.

But in the same way that the film announces that it's about race, right there in the title, it's also about Leah's gender, and the way that men exploit and prey upon her. The litany of sexual misdeeds Leah endures, from subway leering and catcalling, to molestation, coerced sex and rape, feels like Wood nailing her list of grievances on behalf of women to the wall, an indictment of men, specifically white men, for their crimes against women. It's angry and visceral.

Saylor is the whirling dervish at the film's center, giving a raw, feral, performance as Leah spirals out of control, diving deeper into a world of drugs and sex. It's the extremely dark version of a girl gone wild, unfettered, vulnerable to the world and its whims, much more powerful than her determination and resourcefulness.
By Kristi L. Nelson of the Knoxville News Sentinel

For the first time in 12 years, the Knox County Health Department won't be offering FluMist nasal vaccine at in-school clinics.

This year, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention deemed the mist ineffective against influenza and told providers not to use it.

So the health department's shot to save its in-school vaccination program will come from an older method: the injectable vaccine.

See also: Participating schools, times and dates, and consent forms

Clinics are scheduled during school hours Sept. 26-Nov. 2 in several public and private elementary, middle and high schools throughout the county, as well as in some larger child-care facilities. (Find the schools, dates and times at www.knoxcounty.org/health/schoolflu.php.)

Also, the health department is in the process of scheduling Saturday clinics at two high schools, as well as evening clinics at the main health department and its West and Teague locations.

Health Department Director Dr. Martha Buchanan said that in a survey, 70 percent of parents said their child's school during school hours was the most convenient time and place for the vaccine. Saturdays and evenings were next, she said.

"My son receives weekly allergy shots, so this will not be a big deal for him," said Stephanie Hill. "If he was younger, I would like the option of being there if necessary, but he is in middle school now, so I am not worried about it. It saves us a trip to the doctor and time away from his studies."

Other parents said their children had FluMist in-school but would not get the shot there.

"I am taking my kids to their pediatrician," said Kristin Haun, who has two elementary-age children. "Both of mine have shot anxiety, so school would have been rough. I see there being a lot of tears, crying, etc."

Buchanan said the health department will change the way shots are administered versus the mist  such as possibly having children in quieter, more private spots, instead of lined up together in front of the nurse.

"It's really about how they approach the child, and taking their time," she said. "These clinics will take a little longer, working up to giving that injection."

She said it's likely more parents will want to be present for the shot than for the spray. That could make participation in the program lower this year, she said. Knox County has typically vaccinated 45 percent of school-age children through the in-school clinics.

Nurses will not restrain children or force them to get the shot, she said, so some parents could end up taking children elsewhere anyway. And some parents vaccinate children before their schools' scheduled clinics, or go to Free Flu Shot Saturday on Oct. 1.

"But the message we want to get out is, vaccinating children doesn't just protect the kids, it protects the community," she said. "The vaccine is just as effective if they get it in a doctor's office or a pharmacy or a clinic."

No child will be vaccinated without a signed consent form, available from the schools or online.

In the early years Knox County offered FluMist, the county had a grant from the vaccine's maker to help cover costs. But for the past several years, the clinics have been a line-item budget for the county, Buchanan said. The health department will file insurance if parents offer information, but parents are never charged, she said. The federal government also provides vaccine for children who fall into certain categories.

Knox County has done in-school flu shots, although not on a wide scale. Buchanan said the health department has provided special-needs children with in-school shots.

Melody Lee said her daughter, who is in high school, wasn't able to get in-school FluMist because she has asthma.

"I'm glad they are giving the shot," said Lee, who has three school-age children. "I can't afford to take off work to take them to their pediatrician's office for it."
SHARE Cadence Crowley, left, raises her hand for a question, as Gov. Bill Haslam visits the fourth-grade classroom of Abbey Kidwell at South Clinton Elementary School on Thursday. The event was part of the governor's Capitol to Classroom tour to visit members of the Teachers Cabinet. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL) Gov. Bill Haslam visits the fourth-grade classroom of Abbey Kidwell at South Clinton Elementary School on Thursday. The event was part of the governor's Capitol to Classroom tour to visit members of the Teachers Cabinet. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL) Gov. Bill Haslam visits the fourth-grade classroom of Abbey Kidwell at South Clinton Elementary School on Thursday. The event was part of the governor's Capitol to Classroom tour to visit members of the Teachers Cabinet. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL) Gov. Bill Haslam, center, poses for a group photo with the fourth-grade classroom of Abbey Kidwell at South Clinton Elementary School on Thursday. The event was part of the governor's Capitol to Classroom tour to visit members of the Teachers Cabinet. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL)

By Lynda Edwards, lynda.edwards@knoxnews.com

CLINTON  Tennessee's economic recovery from the Great Recession has surged ahead of the national average, thanks in part to a falling unemployment rate and increased foreign investment, Gov. Bill Haslam said Thursday.

Haslam outlined his take on the recovery and discussed the state's educational successes and challenges during a luncheon hosted by the Anderson County Chamber of Commerce at the Hollingsworth Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership.

Haslam described the unemployment rate as falling more swiftly and foreign investment as increasing more rapidly for Tennessee than other states in the nation.

The governor called Tennessee's drop in unemployment faster than the nationwide norm and praised Tennessee Promise, the program that gives two years' community college tuition to any of the state's high school graduates. He said the program should give hope to even Tennesseans who were "55 and failed the last grade they attended" that a new chance to earn a good living in a secure job was possible.

Haslam told the audience that 9,000 Tennesseans had volunteered to be mentors to students who were the first in their families to go to college. Haslam said volunteers can support a timid first-time college student by checking to make sure they show up to take their SATs and seeing them off to their first day of college.

When an audience member expressed concerns about the Tennessee Department of Transportation getting adequate funding for road improvements, Haslam conceded better technology has created a revenue problem.

"Cars get better gas mileage now, so there is less money coming from gas taxes to use for roads and bridges," he said.

The governor had noted earlier that the state's rainy day fund had tripled in size but said even if that money were spent on infrastructure, a more permanent solution to the continuing need for road repairs had to be found.

Haslam told the audience that when he visited China recently, he was surprised by the pomp and ceremony with which he was greeted. At one point, a dignitary brought him a rose bouquet so enormous, Haslam's wife said it contained more flowers than he had given her in their entire marriage.

Later a Chinese official told Haslam the roses and the formality had all been a rehearsal for an American guest who would be arriving in a few weeks. The Chinese were pretending Haslam was President Barack Obama so they could practice their big welcome.

Haslam's first stop in Anderson County was the South Clinton Elementary School as part of his Capitol to Classroom tours in which he gets feedback from members of his Teachers Cabinet, such as fourth-grade teacher Abbey Kidwell. The governor watched Kidwell as she taught a math lesson. He said he meets with the 17 teachers in his cabinet four times annually to hear their concerns and brainstorm solutions.

Haslam said the state would give various colleges that produce outstanding teachers a system of letter grades so as to make teacher recruitment easier for Tennessee. He said the state had invested $400 million more in teachers' salaries under his administration.

The governor also noted some challenges facing Tennessee education, especially shortages of teachers in rural areas.

"In one part of the state, there is one physics teacher for five schools," he said.

He didn't say where.
The U.S. Supreme Court in Washington. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)

Hey, remember Merrick Garland? Hes the guy President Obama nominated to fill the Supreme Court seat vacated after Justice Antonin Scalia died. Its been six months, and his nomination isnt going anywhere at least until after the election. It could easily be March  a year after Garland was named  before the seat is filled.

Its not going anywhere because the Supreme Court is extremely powerful, and an appointment is, almost always, for life. Thus the stakes on filling any vacancies become huge: Just one vacancy and appointment can switch the court from 5-4 on an issue (or many issues) to 5-4 the other way. And, as former Justice William Brennan, Jr. used to say, with five votes you can do anything around here.

As the Supreme Court, once a body that mostly ruled on purely legal questions, has gotten more and more involved with every aspect of American life, the Supreme Court appointment process has become more political. Senate confirmation used to be almost pro forma, without even a hearing. Then we got hearings, which have now turned into political circuses of their own. (Remember Clarence Thomas?)

Even the election of a President  the most important selection that we make as a nation  has become about the Supreme Court. Partisans of both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have argued that, whatever the flaws of their own candidate, the importance of not letting the other side make potentially transformative Supreme Court appointments is reason enough to stand behind him or her.

Making a presidential election turn on Supreme Court appointments has the effect of minimizing lots of other important aspects of the election. The argument in favor of it is that it applies some degree of democratic accountability to the Court. But if you want democratic accountability, why not eliminate the middleman? Why not elect the Supreme Court?

Thats not a very popular idea: When Ted Cruz floated a much more moderate proposal  retention elections for Supreme Court Justices  pundits reacted with outrage. But maybe the real problem is that Cruz didnt go far enough.

The idea that judges should be above politics is a good one, especially when applied to trial judges who make lots of judgment calls about things like evidentiary points that can swing a case but arent obvious to casual observers.

But the Supreme Court isnt above politics  as recent history has made more than clear, its very much a part of politics. The extent of the importance attached to the Court in this election makes that plain and often, as in the Obamacare case, so does the behavior of the Court.

And to the extent that decisions are deeply influential on all sorts of aspects of Americans lives, the Supremes are functioning more like a legislature than a court. No one would suggest that a legislature should be above politics, and not accountable to the people.

An elected Supreme Court would probably also be more diverse: Right now the current Supreme Court is composed entirely of people who went to law school at Harvard or Yale. Theres nothing wrong with those schools (I went to one of em myself) but at a time in American politics when many voters feel that elites dont have their welfare in mind, it represents a troubling lack of diversity. An elected Court could draw on a wider range of candidates than those who are tailor-made to impress the Senate Judiciary Committee.

And rather than lifetime appointments, perhaps members of the Court should be elected for a fixed term: say 10 years, so as not to match the incumbency of any single president. (We do something similar with the FBI director, who serves a 10-year appointment, for similar reasons.)

Many states have elected Supreme Courts, and they do fine  and its not as if hiding politics behind a smokescreen of appointment and confirmation makes the current selection process any less political. It just makes it less accountable.

We often hear that the Constitution needs to grow and change with the times. Perhaps we should have a national conversation on whether, in these times, the Supreme Court should be chosen by the voters rather than the elites.

Glenn Harlan Reynolds, a University of Tennessee law professor and the author of The New School: How the Information Age Will Save American Education from Itself, is a member of USA TODAY's Board of Contributors.
Sinkholes are a threat to the people and property above them, and must be taken seriously. Thus, we should be alarmed by the cavalier attitude Knox County has taken toward the sinkhole-prone land set for the planned Midway Road Business Park.

The global record of sinkholes and industrial/business parks should give us pause. In 2013 a massive sinkhole collapse took the lives of five factory workers outside an industrial park near Hong Kong. The hole was 33 feet wide.

Closer to home we've had plenty of incidents. A 7-foot-deep, 3-foot wide sinkhole in 2011 scared workers in the Kings Industrial Park in Hanford, California. Two years later two sinkholes opened up following heavy rain at a South Windsor, Connecticut, industrial/business park.

"The building continually sinks," said one employee, "They just built a wall a few years ago because the parking lot sank. So you're a little scared."

The parking lot sinkhole was dwarfed by another that nearly swallowed a dump truck and backhoe.

In late 2015 a Canadian truck driver narrowly escaped crashing into a former mine shaft when a sinkhole opened up under his vehicle while he was making a delivery in a Nova Scotia industrial park. The hole was roughly 20 feet wide and 21 feet deep.

In June of this year San Antonio officials struggled with a large sinkhole that opened up in a business park. The hole was about 8 feet wide, 20 feet long, and at least 15 feet deep. Michael Shackelford, a spokesman for the property owner, tied a camera to a string and lowered it into the hole. "It looked like a cavern. It was really deep," he said. He also was amazed that much soil could "implode" and joked that "it kind of looks like El Chapo's tunnel."

Knox County's geology presents us with sinkhole challenges. One tally put us at 1,663 sinkholes, 697 of them larger than 3 meters (9.84 feet). The logical response should be to redevelop our existing business and industrial zones rather than tear up green spaces, adding to our sprawl problem.

At the very least we should avoid putting business parks atop areas with great potential for both sinkholes and polluting runoff into water supplies.

The 1995 East Knox County Sector Plan explained about the area's geology: "Carbonate rock, dolomite and limestone are the most prevalent. Since they are soluble in water, and dissolve, many parts of the sector contain sinkholes, solution channels, and caverns. These formations are especially concentrated in the Thorngrove area, between Interstate 40 and Asheville Highway and immediately south of the Holston River.  Intensive land development, such as industrial plants and uses which could impact groundwater, are not usually suited to such terrain."

Knox County Commission in December was warned about these problems and heard my suggestion the land in question is better suited for agritourism. At that meeting, geologist Terri Brown specifically warned of serious dangers to the aquifer, our groundwater supply.

Nevertheless, county commission chose, with only one dissenting vote, to rezone the area to accommodate the Development Corporation of Knox County's plan for a business park.

Last Thursday the Metropolitan Planning Commission voted 8-4, over the objections of several area residents and the 8th District Preservation Association, to approve the Midway Business Park plan.

Every time these warnings are ignored I get a sinking feeling.
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State education leaders are doing the right thing in responding quickly to help the 1,900 students whose degree programs were cut short when ITT Technical Institute announced last week it was closing.

ITT's decision followed a number of tough sanctions by the U.S. Department of Education against the for-profit institute's parent company. For example, the government prohibited the school from enrolling students who depended on federal loans, a large source of the school's revenue. It also required the school to boost its reserves from $94.4 million to $247.3 million within 30 days.

In addition, no fewer than 19 state attorneys general have filed lawsuits or have launched investigations into ITT over its recruitment of students, job placement numbers and marketing. The federal Securities and Exchange Commission and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau also are looking into possible action against ITT.

According to a story in The Los Angeles Times, the school's closing of its 137 campuses nationwide means that 35,000 students who would have started classes this month will have to find alternate routes to the degrees they were pursuing. In Tennessee, "The most important thing we can do is open the lines of communication with students," said Mike Krause, executive director of the Tennessee Higher Education Commission. "And that's what we did."

Krause said the closing of ITT Tech presents an "unprecedented challenge" both for the state and the nation. In Tennessee, students were enrolled online and at campuses in Knoxville, Nashville, Chattanooga, Johnson City and Cordova near Memphis.

The state's assistance includes a hotline for ITT students and a new webpage. Krause encouraged students to use the commission's hotline (615-741-5293) and to sign up for email updates. The commission also will gather transcripts for ITT students and create an email distribution list to keep students informed.

Some ITT students might be eligible to have their loan indebtedness forgiven, federal officials have indicated, and Krause said that THEC would connect students with those resources when it is possible.

The commission also is working with state colleges to develop transfer options that would enable ITT students to maintain their status as they advance toward a degree. That could take time to work out, however, since ITT and state colleges in Tennessee are accredited by separate agencies.

About 18 months ago, another corporation that supported for-profit schools, Corinthian Colleges Inc., closed its doors after government allegations of false job placement rates. Despite the closings of these high-profile institutions, however, there are many for-profit colleges in Tennessee and across the nation.

Tennessee has earned deserved plaudits from federal education officials for its swift response and its work to aid the transition of ITT students to other schools. With the state striving to improve the percentage of residents with a college degree or technical certificate, keeping the lines of communication open and proactively aiding the transition offer the best and most compassionate approach.

The ITT students represent a lot of potential in the state. They do not need to fall through the cracks.
Closing loopholes in the latest U.N. Security Council sanctions should be a key priority in putting together new penalties against the communist regime for conducting its fifth nuclear test, a U.S. expert said.



Bruce Klingner, a senior Korea expert at the Heritage Foundation, made the point in an recent article, stressing that the latest sanctions, even though billed as the toughest-ever restrictions on Pyongyang, have several loopholes that allowed the North to skirt around sanctions.



The sanctions, adopted in March in response to the North's fourth nuclear test in January, require mandatory inspection of all cargo going in and out of the North, and ban exports of coal, iron and other mineral resources, a key source of hard currency that accounts for nearly half of the country's total exports.



But those sanctions are not applied in case of cargo or exports for "livelihood purposes."



"In response to the latest nuclear test, the U.S. and its allies should urge the U.N. to close several loopholes to the sanctions resolution, most notably eliminating the 'livelihood purposes' exemption on the ban of North Korean export of its resources," Klingner said in an article posted at the foundation's website.



Klingner said that China will remain a "reluctant partner" in those efforts as it fears that "a more resolute international response could trigger North Korean behavior or regime collapse."



"China's reluctance to strongly pressure its ally provides Pyongyang a feeling of impunity that encourages it toward further belligerence," he said. "North Korea is willing to directly challenge China's calls for peace, stability, and denuclearization by repeatedly upping the ante to achieve its objectives?including buying time to further augment its nuclear and missile capabilities."



The expert also noted that China has typically demanded weaker punishments for the North and recently prevented any U.N. response to a North Korean missile test retaliation for U.S. plans to deploy the THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) ballistic missile defense to South Korea.



After Friday's nuclear test, the U.N. Security Council held urgent consultations, condemned the test and pledged to immediately begin work on a new sanctions resolutions.



So far, the council adopted five sanctions resolutions against the North, first after the North's first nuclear test in 2006, then its second nuclear test in 2009, its long-range rocket launch in late 2012, its third nuclear test in early 2013, and the fourth test in January this year.



Cooperation from China is key to the U.N. Security Council's push to adopt a new sanctions resolution as the country is one of the veto-holding permanent members of the Security Council, along with Britain, France, Russia and the U.S.



China is North Korea's top trading partner and supplies almost all of the isolated nation's energy needs, but analysts have long said Beijing fears that pushing Pyongyang too hard could lead to its collapse, instability on its border with China and the ultimate emergence of a pro-U.S. nation. (Yonhap)




North Korea is capable of building seven nuclear warheads a year in addition to the existing stockpile of fissile material for some 20 bombs, and is expected to master the capability to fly nuclear missiles to the U.S. in a decade, a top U.S. nuclear scientist said Monday.



Siegfried Hecker, a Stanford University professor known for having a first-hand look at North Korea's uranium-enrichment facility during his 2010 visit, made the remark in an article to the website 38 North, calling for diplomatic efforts, rather than sanctions, to curb Pyongyang's runaway nuclear and missile programs.



"This test must be viewed with great concern, not for any specific capabilities it may have demonstrated, but as part of this enormous buildup of North Korea's nuclear arsenal," Hecker said, referring to the North's fifth nuclear test.



"Five tests conducted over a ten-year period, sufficiently spaced that the test results can inform the next test, are deeply alarming," he said. "What are the greatest threats from the rapidly expanding North Korean nuclear program? Left unchecked, Pyongyang will likely develop the capability to reach the continental United States with a nuclear tipped missile in a decade or so."



Hecker said the North is believed to be capable of producing seven nuclear bombs worth of fissile material a year at the Yongbyon nuclear complex -- one bomb worth of plutonium from its 5-megawatt nuclear reactor and six bombs worth of highly enriched uranium.



"With the two successful nuclear tests this year, we must assume that the DPRK has designed and demonstrated nuclear warheads that can be mounted on some of its short-range and perhaps medium-range missiles. Its ability to field an ICBM fitted with a nuclear warhead capable of reaching the United States is still a long way off, perhaps 5 to 10 years, but likely doable if the program is unconstrained," he said.



What's more troubling for now is that its recent nuclear and missile successes may give Pyongyang a false sense of confidence and dramatically change regional security dynamics, Hecker said.



"The likely ability of the DPRK to put nuclear weapons on target anywhere in South Korea and Japan and even on some US assets in the Pacific greatly complicates the regional military picture. That situation would be exacerbated if Pyongyang decides to field tactical nuclear weapons as its arsenal expands and its confidence in its nuclear arsenal grows," he said.



The professor also said that the more the North has nuclear bombs, the difficult it is to secure them in the event of internal turmoil or a chaotic transition. In addition, a financially desperate leadership of the North may risk the sale of fissile materials or other nuclear assets, perhaps to non-state actors, he said.



"So, what to do? The latest nuclear test demonstrates conclusively that attempting to sanction the DPRK into submission and waiting for China to exert leverage over Pyongyang's nuclear program do not work," Hecker said.



"Increasing sanctions and adding missile defenses in South Korea to that mix will also not suffice and make China even less likely to cooperate. What's missing is diplomacy as much as Washington may find it repugnant to deal with the Kim regime," he said. (Yonhap)




Missouri State University said Friday that it will look for ways to cut expenses on its renovation of Glass Hall, the home of the College of Business. Gov. Jay Nixon on Thursday withheld $1.875 million of a $5 million appropriation that the Legislature approved last spring.

The withholding is part of $57.2 million worth of planned state spending that Nixon cut on Thursday after the Legislature on Wednesday overrode Nixon's veto of two tax cuts. The governor says the spending cuts equal what his staff thinks the tax cuts will cost the state. Republican leaders of the Legislature says the tax cuts will cost the state far less than that, and say Nixon's budget cuts are unnecessary.

Here's a statement from MSU on Friday morning:

Yesterday the governor announced a capital appropriation restriction of $1.875 million for Missouri State Universitys fiscal year capital appropriation for the College of Businesss Glass Hall renovation project. The total fiscal year capital appropriation is $5 million.

The $33.8 million project is being funded by revenue bonds, gifts to the Missouri State University Foundation, university reserves and capital appropriations.

Missouri State will deal with this restriction by modifying the work to be completed and minimizing construction deviations, said President Clif Smart. This is unfortunate, but responsible stewardship requires that we react appropriately.

Should the $1.875 million restriction not be released, university reserves and Foundation gifts will make up any shortfall after modifications to the project have been made.

End of statement on Friday morning

Information from MSU website on Glass Hall renovation, posted last May:

In 2013, a committee was formed to begin working on a complete renovation and expansion for the physical space of Glass Hall, which houses the College of Business. The project will include a 37,000 square foot addition, thanks in part to a significant gift from the Robert Gourley family. The gift was announced at the groundbreaking ceremony Oct. 15, 2015, for the Robert Gourley Student Success Center at David D. Glass Hall.

Students within the College of Business at Missouri State will be amazed at the transformation planned for Glass Hall, said Missouri State University President Clifton M. Smart III said. This gift, along with so many others, allows us to give our business students a place to sharpen their skills, collaborate on projects and become prepared for successful careers."

Gifts for Glass Hall exceed $5 million

The Missouri State University Foundation announced gifts and pledges totaling more than $5.4 million for the building and another significant gift from David D. Glass.

We are so pleased with the numbers of alumni and friends that have made major gifts to this project, said Brent Dunn, vice president for university advancement and executive director of the Missouri State Foundation. Our fundraising will continue and we anticipate more people will make investments in this important project.

The addition of the Robert Gourley Student Success Center and renovation of Glass Hall will allow the College of Business to better serve its current student community while also providing space for growth and unique educational opportunities. The state-of-the-art teaching facilities will prepare students for global careers in business, as well as provide space for business, community and alumni events.

Other significant donors

Other donors to the project include:

 OReilly Auto Parts

 American National Insurance

 BKD, LLP and BKD Wealth Advisors, LLC

 Central Bank of the Ozarks/Central Trust

 Marlin Network

 James K. and Patricia A. Jones

 Jack and Stacey Thurman

 Jeffrey E. and Lisa Allen (and the Allen Family)

 Kevin and Marla Elliott

 Brian and Kim Hammons

 Dwain and Donna Hammons

 William D. and Heather Perry

 Scott and Jennifer Huff

 Richard and Teresa Ollis and family

 Gifts in honor of Dr. Vincel Bixler

 Jon and Jo Baker

 Scott and Allison Salmon

 James H. (Jim) Wilson

 Nancy and Randy Allen

 Richard L. Bullock and family

 Dr. Stephanie and Gary Bryant

 Dr. Steve and Jane Parker

 James and Robin Robeson

 Bradley Thomas

 John E. and Lori K. Wanamaker

Addition, renovation include many new features

Renovated and expanded Glass Hall

Features within the new Student Success Center and renovated spaces of Glass Hall include:

 A state-of-the art finance and trading lab, simulating the New York Stock Exchange trading floor

 Entrepreneurship and sales labs

 Dedicated career placement and business advisement centers

 Corporate interview rooms

 A corporate recruiter touch-down space

 An advertising agency lab, which will function as a working advertising agency

 A production studio

 Collaboration and team meeting spaces

 A full-service cafe

The renovations to Glass Hall are expected to be completed by fall 2017.
Missouri State University recently agreed to pay $99,000 to a former employee who sued the university and its West Plains campus chancellor last year. The university doesnt admit any fault but decided it was cheaper to settle than to defend itself in court.

Amanda Niemotkas lawsuit said she was the victim of gender discrimination in her job, and accused West Plains chancellor Drew Bennett of assault and battery. She filed the case in Howell County but it was transferred to Shannon County, where a judge recently dismissed it after attorneys said theyd settled.

Of the $99,000, $14,000 is for back pay, $50,000 is for alleged personal injury, and $35,000 is for her attorneys from St. Louis. In return for the payments, Niemotka agreed not to seek any other damages or make any other claims against the university for anything arising from her employment, and not to apply for another job with the university.

Part of the settlement details comments that both sides would make to reporters if they are asked about it.

"It was important for me to bring this lawsuit. I appreciate the support of the West Plains community. It is time to put this behind me," Niemotka agreed to say to reporters.

"Missouri State University has resolved the case of Niemotka v. Missouri State University and Chancellor Drew Bennett out of court. Not only does this bring closure to all parties involved, it also significantly limits the cost of attorneys fees that would have been incurred by the University had this matter proceeded to trial. Neither the University nor Chancellor Bennett admit liability in this matter; they strongly deny the allegations set forth in the plaintiffs petition, the university agreed to say to reporters.

Niemotka was the Development Events coordinator for the West Plains campus from July 2012 until October 2014, when the university terminated her after a four-week leave of absence. She filed her lawsuit in the spring of 2015 after getting a right to sue letter from the Missouri Commission on Human Rights.

Niemotka worked in the same building as Bennett, although he was not her direct supervisor. Her lawsuit said Bennett once violently berated her because he didnt like how an event was set up, causing her to have to leave the event because she was so upset. The lawsuit also said Bennett at other times made comments that she perceived as sexual harassment.

The lawsuit said Niemotka tried to avoid Bennett, and became ill when she had to be in close proximity to him, to the point her chest tightened, she had difficulty breathing, and she felt a sense of rising panic. At one event at which she pulled into the parking lot and saw Bennetts car, she said she began to cry uncontrollably and thereafter was not able to attend events at which Bennett was present, making it difficult for her to do their job. That led to her four-week leave of absence and her termination.

The lawsuit said Niemotka made a formal complaint about Bennetts behavior to her direct supervisor, who passed it on to other university officials. The lawsuit says Niemotka was told later that there is no question you are telling the truth, that Bennett had admitted to MSU president Clif Smart that he had grabbed and pulled her at the event at which he berated her, and that disciplinary action had been taken against Bennett, although he would get to keep his job as chancellor.

In the universitys and Bennetts answers to the lawsuit, they denied all of Niemotkas allegations.
It seems the drama isnt over yet. You all read the first part here yesterday and now heres part 2.

The Shepard-in-charge of Genesis Model Intl, Celestial Church of Christ, prophet Israel Oladele Ogundipe popularly known as Genesis, has described some Pentecostal pastors as marketers.

Ogundipe said this at the Grand Ballroom of Oriental Hotel, Lekki, while giving a speech at the recently heard Excel 2016 in Lagos.

In his keynote address, Ogundipe who also doubled as the host said, I see lot of Nigerian pastors as marketers. If you want to know a true pastor, he or she would be working on furthering the gospel and not to undermine the efforts of others.



He also noted that the opulent lifestyle of some so called men of God is appalling and not according to the command of God. When i see a true pastor i know and when i see a marketer it will be glaring, he said.

He admonished those who are confusing preaching the gospel with marketing of themselves for the accumulation of worldly riches.

However, Ogundipe was full of praises for men of God such as Pastor E.A Adeboye of Redeemed Christian Church of God and some others who have contributed immensely to the spread of the gospel

According to those who should know, Ogundipe allegedly said this against the backdrop of the blackmail leveled against him and his denomination, the Celestial Church by some Pentecostal pastors.

Ogundipe was said to have invited America born preacher, Dr. Mike Murdock to be part of Excel 2016, and in which the preacher agreed to as evident in the advert aired on Channels TV, a day to the event. But at the last minute, on his arrival in Nigeria, some Pentecostal pastors allegedly led by a Nigerian pastor who has the biggest church in UK, were said to have approached Murdock not to honour the invitation, alleging that his reputation would be soiled if he graces the event.

And on hearing this, the preacher made a U-turn and left the awaiting crowd disappointed.

However, the event went on fine as over 10,000 worshippers had a swell time, listening to the word of God and songs of praises. . Lanre Teriba, George Audu Sax, Big B, Lara George and the Genesis choir added excitement to the event with their performances.

Follow Us on Facebook  @LadunLiadi; Instagram  @LadunLiadi; Twitter  @LadunLiadi; Youtube  @LadunLiadiTV for updates
A Pakistani mother-of-three and the man she was allegedly having an affair with were hanged from a tree on Thursday, with police blaming her husband, brother and father for carrying out the killings.

The grisly murders occurred in the village of Chak 56 around 55km northeast of the central city of Multan.

Hundreds of so-called honour killings, in which the victim, normally a woman, is killed by a male relative or relatives for bringing shame to the family are carried out in Pakistan every year.

A woman and her alleged boyfriend were hanged to death by the womans father, brother and husband after the woman was caught on a date with her boyfriend in the backyard of her house, Sardar Afzal Dogar, chief of the local police station said.



The victims were named as Khalida Bibi, who was in her late twenties, and Mukhtiar Muhammad, who was around 19.

He said all three suspected murderers were arrested and had confessed to their crimes, adding the womans husband had brought the alleged affair to the attention of the others.

The incident was confirmed by other local officials at the police station. They were beaten up before being strung up in the tree and hanged, another official said.

Pakistans law minister in July announced that bills aimed at tackling honour killings and boosting rape convictions would soon be voted on by parliament, following a slew of high profile cases including the killing of racy social media starlet Qandeel Baloch by her brother.

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The SLFP does not condone the continuation of the Emergency Regulations (The Public Security Ordinance) more than a day necessary

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PRESS RELEASE

Fed Has Just Told Congress To Repeal Gramm-Leach-Bliley: Expert

Sept. 15, 2016 (EIRNS)In a column in yesterday's American Banker, Cornell University Prof. Saule Omarova wrote that the Federal Reserve recommendations to Congress released on Sept. 8 amount to the repeal of the 1999 Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act. Professor Omarovas piece was headlined "Fed Becomes Latest Cheerleader for Glass-Steagall-Like Reform." She ended the column,

"The Fed has issued a challenge to Congress, and Wall Street is bound to respond. It is critical that those at both ends of the political spectrum who support the idea of making banks safer and more manageable [Omarova had begun by referring to both party platforms calling for Glass-Steagalled.] join forces in support of the Feds courageous move."

That move may have resulted in significant part from the seminars on "ending too-big-to-fail" held this year by the Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank, according to one indication received by EIR.

"U.S. bank regulation," Omarova wrote,

"has traditionally been based on the fundamental principle of keeping banking separate from any and all non banking, commercial business. Strict activity limitations are designed not only to protect publicly insured banks from unnecessary risks, but also to ensure that banks allocate credit to commercial firms in a fair and efficient manner. "With the passage of Gramm-Leach-Bliley, however, the traditional legal separations between publicly subsidized banking and general commerce became much fuzzier and harder to police. The 1999 law authorized formation of big bank conglomerates with wide-ranging powers not only to trade and deal in securities and other risky financial instruments, but also to invest in purely commercial companies"

and therein, she explained, was included the ability to own commodity operations from oil [Morgan Stanley] to aluminum [Goldman Sachs] to electricity [JPM Chase], and manipulate their prices with destructive results.

Now, in a report under Dodd-Frank Section 620 and awaited for six years, the Fed recommends that Congress reverse this. "Though carefully avoiding any reference to restoring Glass-Steagall," Omarova noted, the Fed recommended repealing "the very same Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act that formally ended the Glass-Steagall era in 1999."

The Fed "cannot guarantee that nothing bad would happen on its watch unless these bank activities are disallowed just as they were before 1999."
PRESS RELEASE

Steinmeier Pushes for Ceasefire in Ukraine

Sept. 15, 2016 (EIRNS)German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier is pushing for a viable ceasefire in southeast Ukraine, where a series of efforts over the past two years have failed to completely silence the guns. Steinmeier was in Kiev yesterday, along with his French counterpart, Jean-Marc Ayrault, where they met with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavel Klimkin for discussions on the situation. They also met with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, about which Steinmeier said that Poroshenko told him he would guarantee observance of the ceasefire by the regime. "We came here with announcements from Moscow that ceasefire would take effect today as of 24:00 hours," Steinmeier said, according to TASS. "During the meeting with Poroshenko we spoke of our satisfaction with the fact this result had been achieved," he said, adding that Poroshenko told him Ukraine would abide by the ceasefire. If both sides do abide by the ceasefire, Steinmeier said, "then I hope well get an opportunity to coordinate a further withdrawal of troops in several pilot areas." TASS added, however, that despite the agreement to test the ceasefire in ten pilot areas, only two have so far been agreed on, one each in Donetsk and Luhansk.

Today, the three foreign ministers visited government-held Kramatorsk, in the conflict zone. "Anyone familiar with such conflicts ... will know that we have no reason to be optimistic," Steinmeier said in an interview with Deutsche Welle. But, he added, the ceasefire would likely be a good "stepping stone toward renewed negotiations."
PRESS RELEASE

Kerry on Syrian Agreement with Russia: What Alternative Is There?

Sept. 15, 2016 (EIRNS)U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry defended the Syria ceasefire agreement that he worked out with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, during an interview that was aired on National Public Radio yesterday, making the point that there is no other choice. In its coverage of the interview, Reuters notes that the Pentagon and the U.S. military have been loudly saying that Russia cannot be trusted. "Well, the President of the United States is ready and I think the military therefore will be ready," he said. "Nobodys asking people to abrogate our standards, but it is important for us to keep our part of the bargain," Kerry added.

"Whats the alternative?" Kerry went on to say in the NPR interview, indicating that the only alternative was continued warfare of much greater levels of violence, given that the United States has decided not to send in ground troops. "If you fail to get a cessation in place now and we cannot get to the table, then the fighting is going to increase significantly," he said. When asked about the problem of separating US-backed opposition groups from terrorist groups, Kerry insisted that the US supported groups will be separated from Al Nusra. "We are not going to support people who are fighting alongside al-Qaida," he said.

The separation question was apparently at the center of a telephone conversation between Kerry and Lavrov that took palce yesterday.

"Lavrov pointed to the need for the fastest implementation of the U.S. promise to separate Washington-sponsored moderate opposition forces from Jabhat al-Nusra and the groups that have in fact merged with that part of Al-Qaeda,"

said the Russian Foreign Ministry, reported TASS.

U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter, during a news media appearance in Austin, Texas yesterday, offered a back-handed endorsement of the ceasefire agreement, putting the onus on Russia to "get it right" in Syria. He commended Kerry for getting the agreement, noted that theres still much work ahead to implement it, but if it is, the suffering of the Syrian people will be eased. "It will mean that Russia gets on the right side of things in Syria, not on the wrong side and thats good news," he said.

It was probably this Pentagon attitude, as reflected in Carters remarks, that Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova was responding to when she said, yesterday, that Washingtons doubts about Moscows readiness to implement the agreement on Syria are illogical and do not help solve the situation.

"For some reasons the U.S. colleagues consider that the ceasefire regime is a kind of a test for Russias reputation. This is strange. We believe that such statements are illogical and counterproductive,"

Zakharova said. "Its regrettable that despite the positive outcome in Geneva we hear such statements that do not do good," she added.

A Washington, D.C. source stressed to EIR yesterday, that Kerry and Lavrov intend to push forward as hard as possible on the ceasefire, despite the opposition against it in both Washington and in Syria.
A state appeals court has agreed to review a controversial California Public Utilities Commission decision to greenlight a proposed $2.2-billion power plant in Carlsbad.

Opponents of the natural gas-fired Carlsbad Energy Center celebrated the news, hoping that it would boost the chances of stopping the plant from getting built.

Its the wrong technology in the wrong place at the wrong time, said April Rose Sommer, executive director at Protect Our Communities Foundation, or POC, one of a number of environmental activists opposed to the construction of the project.

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The 1st District Court of Appeal in San Francisco late Wednesday afternoon agreed to a petition filed by POC and the Center for Biological Diversity to take a closer look at a 4-1 vote by the PUC in May 2015 that granted approval of a contract for the Carlsbad Energy Center.

The PUC vote raised objections from opponents of the power plant that the vote was held without a public bidding process and after an aide for PUC President Michael Picker met privately with the developer of the project about downsizing an earlier plan that had been rejected.

The Carlsbad Energy Center would replace the aging Encina Power Station and sell power to San Diego Gas & Electric.

NRG Energy, which would build the proposed plant, said it is confident the decision to award the contract will be upheld.

The unfortunate thing is any further delay in the construction of the Carlsbad Energy Center, which is a clean-burning natural gas facility, continues to delay the retirement of the regions last costly, inefficient and high-emissions power plant [Encina], said Stephanie Donovan. SDG&Es senior communications manager.

When asked for reaction from the commission and Picker, PUC spokeswoman Terrie Prosper said in an email, The court has decided to review our Carlsbad decision, and has not reached any substantive decision.

The 62-year-old Encina Power Station is being forced into retirement in large part due to its cooling systems that suck in seawater, a process called once-through cooling that regulators have come to oppose in recent years because it harms marine life.

Supporters say the Carlsbad plant would provide the area with quick-starting power to help back up renewable sources in order for California to meet its target of 33% of clean-energy generation by 2020 and 50% by 2030.

Opponents say it will harm the environment along the coastline and that the growth in renewable energy makes the plant unnecessary.

The numbers show we do not need this additional generation, Sommer said.

Donovan described the Carlsbad Energy Center as the new workhorse for the region.

The reality is we cant just go forward with all-renewables and only renewables, Donovan said. This plant is still needed because it is actually not in competition with renewables or any other resource. We really need a balanced mix of all of the above.

The appeals court decision does not block the potential construction of the Carlsbad Energy Center. Rather, it means a panel of judges will review the approval of the contract passed by the CPUC.

Nonetheless, the decision to accept the review caught some by surprise because courts typically show deference to decisions made by state agencies.

Last week the 2nd District denied review of a similar case against the PUC for approving contracts for three new power plants in the Los Angeles area.

Nikolewski writes for the San Diego Union-Tribune.

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Last year, it seemed Honest Co., the Santa Monica start-up co-founded by actress Jessica Alba, was well on its way to becoming a Wall Street star.

The consumer goods company  best known for touting its environmentally friendly diapers and cleaning products  was valued at $1.7 billion following a funding round that raised $100 million. Among its investors were Fidelity Management & Research Co. and Wellington Management Co., two backers with the heft to stand behind an initial public offering.

But now, Honest Co. is in talks with Unilever about a possible acquisition, according to the Wall Street Journal. The sale price under discussion is above $1 billion, but well south of its soaring valuation price, the report said.

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For a company said to be eyeing an IPO later this year, this about-face has the start-up community asking: What happened?

Barrett Daniels, managing partner of Nextstep Advisory Services, which helps companies go public, said he was shocked when stories leaked earlier this year that Honest was hunting for a buyer.

I was totally surprised because they had one of the hot companies, Daniels said. Everyone was excited that maybe they would be one of the IPO darlings.

Honest said it cant confirm anything. Unilever said it does not comment on market rumors. The Journal described the talks as being in the early stages.

But longtime observers say it was probably an escalating series of events that led executives and investors to rethink the plan of forging ahead alone: backlash about the brands unique selling point, a valuation off the mark and a lackluster IPO market overall.

True to its name, Honests brand was built on a promise of honesty and transparency. But that took a hit in March after the companys laundry detergent was said to contain a chemical it pledged never to use.

Honest Co. is also facing class-action lawsuits in New York and California that accuse the company of falsely advertising a number of its products as natural and free of harsh chemicals. (Honest has dismissed reports about its laundry detergent and also disputed the merit of the suits).

That certainly took the shine off the company, said Miro Copic, a branding expert and marketing lecturer at San Diego State. And it likely prompted Honest to ponder if it had the resources to repair its brand and fight legal battles, he said.

The more lawsuits, the more negative publicity, the bigger chink in the armor  even if its just one or two products, Copic said. They have enough goodwill and celebrity star power that they can bide some of their time, but their options become limited.

Then theres the astronomical valuation price of $1.7 billion, which some experts have questioned. Many high-profile start-ups that have notched eyebrow-raising valuations, calculated on predictions about future growth, ultimately fall short of original forecasts, analysts said.

A couple of years ago, money was just everywhere, Daniels said. Almost everybodys valuations were wrong.

That could be the case of Honest, whose hype attracted scores of investors who were falling over themselves to get a part of it, he added. This is a story that repeats itself over and over with hot unicorns, or start-ups that are valued at $1 billion or more.

At Honest, investors who have weighed going public, a risky endeavor, versus a sale, which guarantees a payout, probably looked at those elements and decided a sale was the most rational option, observers said.

Other Los Angeles start-ups have made similar calculations. In July, mens grooming company Dollar Shave Club sold to Unilever for $1 billion.

A sale could provide resources that help Honest realize its more grand ambitions. Alba has said she hopes to build the company into a global brand. Shes also talked about opening bricks-and-mortar stores that combine retail with play spaces for children.

Honest reportedly pulls in $300 million in sales a year. Unilever, in comparison, raked in sales of $58 billion in its 2015 fiscal year.

Unilever can really help you move more quickly, said David Pakman, a partner at Venrock Partners, which led several early fundraising rounds for Dollar Shave Club. They have incredible distribution leverage.

As for Unilever, the consumer products giant will buy itself a well-known brand in the booming sector of green and natural goods without undertaking the cost and risk of building a rival in-house.

That Honest could ultimately fetch a price closer to fellow Los Angeles start-up Dollar Shave Club, whose annual sales were about half of Honests at $150 million, reveals the nitty-gritty details of how an acquisition fits into a much larger multinational firm like Unilever.

Dollar Shave Clubs inexpensive razors and grooming products have huge potential growth online, in retail stores and also internationally, analysts said. Honest, meanwhile, is already in retail outlets such as Target and Whole Foods, and is also a premium brand that would be harder to sell abroad, especially in less wealthy countries.

Dollar Shave Club has achieved its sales on just a handful of products, leaving the door open for future expansion. Honest, meanwhile, already has a sprawling lineup of merchandise that spans product categories.

Honest also faces more competitors than Dollar Shave Club. Theres also a possibility that its products could steal market share from other Unilever brands instead of rival companies such as Procter & Gamble.

Speculation is rampant that P&G could also be a suitor. Other possibilities include Clorox, the cleaning giant, and Henkel, the owner of Dial soap.
In October, a Newport Beach investor purchased a run-down 109-year-old Craftsman home on 30th Street in the South Los Angeles neighborhood of Jefferson Park.

Five months later, the garbage was cleared out, hardwood floors restored and renovations done  with Trimar Properties selling the house for $686,000, roughly double its purchase price for a property it once viewed as a disaster.

The same thing happened on 6th Avenue, 28th Street and 31st Street, where in mid-August an investor sold a home for nearly $800,000 after purchasing it for $305,000 in December.

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We definitely like that neighborhood, said Trimar principal Matt Naehring. Its definitely up and coming.

More precisely, Jefferson Park and adjacent West Adams, largely working-class neighborhoods west of USC, have become some of the hottest real estate markets in the city.

Flippers are active, bidding wars are common and sales prices have topped last decades bubble  a threshold surpassed by only certain neighborhoods, including the Westside and gentrifying neighborhoods in Northeast Los Angeles.

With land prices sky high elsewhere and higher-income individuals moving in, commercial real estate investment is also rising, including projects from some of Los Angeles leading developers. The real estate blog Curbed LA even named West Adams as its Neighborhood of the Year for 2015.

Its one of the best neighborhoods left, said developer David Pourbaba, who is planning a mixed-used complex on Adams Boulevard, where he can purchase land for around $80 a square foot, compared with $500 a square foot downtown.

The boom is bringing excitement among some who have long clamored for more investment in South Los Angeles. But its also displacing tenants and, with many of the new residents white and wealthier, sparking tension in an area with a problematic history with race.

Its a dynamic seen across Los Angeles in recent decades as home prices have soared amid job growth and a lack of new housing, especially in wealthy neighborhoods where development faces significant resistance. Priced out of more expensive areas, especially the Westside where a tech boom is underway, young professionals are scooping up fixer-uppers and newly remodeled homes in neighborhoods they can afford.

In particular, Jefferson Park and West Adams  largely bounded by the 10 Freeway to the north, Exposition Boulevard to the south, La Cienega to the west and Western Avenue to the east  have been attractive given their location halfway between downtown and the Westside.

The two booming areas are now linked by the Expo Line light rail. And come 2019, the Crenshaw Line is slated to connect the Expo Line to a station near Los Angeles International Airport.

Metro has been a big driver, said Teles Properties agent Robert Rodriguez. You can walk to the Expo line and go all the way to Santa Monica.

Thats what drew Tara Amerian-Donnelly and her wife, Stephanie, to a home near the Exposition-Crenshaw stop.

When the West Hollywood residents quickly ruled out that expensive city as a place to buy their first home, they decided they wanted to be near the Expo Line to have an easy commute  for Tara to her downtown architecture job and for Stephanie, who teaches at Santa Monica College.

So they looked at Culver City but were priced out.

We were slowly working our way east and then we got to this house and this was charming, Amerian-Donnelly said of their two-bedroom, 1920s home they purchased for $607,500 in February. Its so easy to get anywhere.

Such added that demand is sending prices sharply higher.

The median price in Jefferson Park and West Adams hit $550,000 in the second quarter, 17.6% higher than a year earlier and nearly 1% more than the peak reached last decade, according to data firm CoreLogic.

In the past, many preservationists bought and rehabbed the majestic mansions north of Adams Boulevard, but now flippers are focusing on less-expensive bungalows to the south.

The flipper penetration, local real estate agent Adam Janeiro said, we have never seen it to this extent.

The areas have among the highest rate of flips in the county. In Jefferson Park and West Adams, 15% of homes sold in the last year sold twice in 12 months.

Sothebys agent Andrea Dunlop said remodeled homes south of Adams can sell north of $700,000. She said at least 60 people showed up on a recent Saturday to view an $849,000 listing for a remodeled mid-century modern that her client purchased for $360,000 last fall.

She got multiple offers over asking.

Renovators like Dunlops client are picking up old homes after longtime owners pass away or want out.

Sandra Semien, for example, grew up in a Victorian cottage on 36th Place in nearby Exposition Park, where her daughter lived until recently.

Unable to afford repairs, Semien said she decided to sell the money pit in November and had no trouble doing so.

We had 25 offers, she said.

In December, an investor purchased the home for $405,000, flipping it for $690,000 six months later.

While commercial investment has been less robust, more is coming.

Last year, near the corner of Adams and La Brea Avenue, Mike Ross of hip-hop label Delicious Vinyl and designer Fred Sutherland launched Delicious Pizza, where they host live music and album listening parties. Around the same time, an art gallery, Gallery 38, popped up across the street.

Then earlier this year, Danny Henry, a 44-year-old who grew up nearby, opened his Academy of Strength and Sport gym a few doors down from Delicious, driven he said by a desire to do good for the community, not to cash in on the new wealth.

Los Angeles developer CIM Group has also quietly purchased several properties along Adams, including the building next to Henrys gym, public records show.

And developer Carmel Partners, the firm behind downtowns ultra-luxurious Eighth & Grand complex, is planning a massive development with a 30-story tower off the corner of La Cienega and Jefferson.

The project, which has drawn a lawsuit from some community members, would include 1,218 homes and up to 300,000 square feet of office, retail and restaurant space on a former radio broadcast facility. Fifty-five of the apartments would be set aside for people earning 80% to 120% of the average median income.

The upswing is spurring interest  and concern in an area where the median household income is around $30,000, well under the county median.

Ariyana and Stephan Hernandez, who are renting, said they want to invest in what they consider an up-and-coming neighborhood.

The fashion industry workers this month toured a three-unit property on Norton Avenue advertised for $795,000 and pitched as close to the new Expo and soon-to-be-completed Crenshaw lines. The young couple, in their mid-20s, thought they could live in one of the units and rent out the other two.

In the backyard, music played as family and friends celebrated the 15th birthday of the daughter of Misael Aquino, who rents one of the units.

If their complex sells, the 41-year-old construction worker hoped to stay, but couldnt be sure.

I dont have any idea, he said.

For some investors, the market has simply gotten too hot. The area still has some of the highest rates of flipping, but its down from a peak of around 25% in 2014.

Flipping houses just got harder and harder, said Timothy Braseth of ArtCraft Homes, who recently stopped buying homes in the area. People are way overpaying. Everyone is trying to flip houses in Jefferson Park.

All the investment has weighed on some longtime residents.

Sandra Pruitt, who represents Jefferson Park on the neighborhood council, said some homeowners resent new residents who they feel are telling them how to live. That includes how to maintain their historic homes and complaints over fireworks around the Fourth of July.

It can be difficult at times, Pruitt said. You dont feel respected.

Part of that stems from the areas history.

Jefferson Park, West Adams and nearby Leimert Park were among Los Angeles first suburbs, and racial covenants kept the areas largely white for decades until the U.S. Supreme Court ruled racial deed restrictions unenforceable in 1948.

As middle- and upper-class African Americans purchased homes, many white residents and businesses left and in 1952, a black homeowner was bombed. The largely African American and Latino area has struggled to attract investment for decades, particularly after the 1992 riots.

Now, long-term residents are concerned they and their families will lose their place in the neighborhood as it grows more expensive.

Its interesting, once the color of the people changes, they want to start investing, Pruitt, who is African American, said of developers. We want the same kind of stuff, we want a great grocery store and they ignored this area.

Now the people that have lived here the longest cant afford to live here.

Among those being pushed out is Zoe Guillory, whose vintage boutique on Adams is near Delicious Pizza and next to Henrys gym.

In February, the small retail and residential building where she rents space was sold to a company registered to the address of CIM Groups Wilshire Boulevard headquarters and whose officers are CIMs founders. CIM declined comment.

At the end of August, Guillory and other businesses in the building received a 30-day eviction notice, which a property manager offered to extend another month for Guillory after The Times inquired about her situation. Guillory said she overheard contractors say a restaurant will replace her boutique.

They did not give me an option to stay at all, she said. Why dont you give some of the small business owners [the chance] to be a part of your plan?

Residents of the upstairs apartments said they also were told to find new homes.

They told me I had to go, said Curtis Jeter, a 63-year-old who previously looked forward to living in a better neighborhood when new businesses opened nearby.

He left his unit in August. Hes yet to find a permanent home.

Times staff writer Sandra Poindexter contributed to this report.

andrew.khouri@latimes.com

Follow me @khouriandrew on Twitter

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California employers quieted any lingering doubts about the states economy in August, as an uptick in hiring helped absorb hordes of new job-seekers.

The state added a net 63,100 jobs last month and the unemployment rate remained at 5.5%, according to data released by the Employment Development Department on Friday.



For the record: An earlier version of this story misstated the rate of growth for manufacturing jobs in California. Those jobs have increased 2.5% since the worst of the recession, half the national growth pace.

Across the nation in August, employers added a net total of 151,000 new positions, meaning that California accounted for 42% of all U.S. job growth last month.

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These are astounding numbers, said Michael Bernick, an attorney at Sedgwick, a San Francisco firm, who directed the EDD from 1999 to 2004. Each time we think growth has to slow down, it just continues.

The report brought the state good news in the wake of two consecutive months of a rising unemployment rate, up from 5.2% in May to 5.5% in July.

Since last August, the state has boosted payrolls by 378,000 workers  a 2.3% gain. Despite new paid-leave mandates, a rising minimum wage and strict environmental regulations, California has managed to grow faster than the rest of the country for several months.

In Los Angeles, unemployment rose to 4.9%, from a seasonally adjusted 4.8% in July. The county piled on another 20,000 jobs in August, for a yearly gain of 73,900 jobs. Motion picture and sound recording registered the largest gains, adding 5,500 new people.

Californias strongest industries were government, professional services and trade, transportation and utilities, which together recorded a net hiring gain of 51,300 positions.

Manufacturing, long the bulwark of Californias economy, shrank again in August as 3,400 net jobs were cut. Since the depths of the recession in 2009, the states manufacturers added jobs at a rate of 2.5%. The country as a whole has seen the sector grow twice as fast.

The loss of factory jobs is particularly harsh for the states poorer regions, such as the Inland Empire, that depend more on blue-collar jobs.

In San Bernardino and Riverside counties, unemployment stood above 6% in August. In Imperial County, unemployment reached 23%  the highest rate in the state.

Job numbers like this would make you think Gee, anyone should be able to get a job. But it remains highly competitive, Bernick said.

It reflects what we have seen for some time  the disconnect between our urban areas and the Central Valley and other inland areas.

Natalie.Kitroeff@latimes.com

Follow me @NatalieKitro on Twitter

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1:55 p.m.: This article has been updated with Los Angeles County data and additional details.

This article was originally published at 8:45 a.m.
Its a question dreaded by anyone interviewing for a job: Whats your salary history? Say too much, and put yourself out of contention. Say too little, and worry youll be underpaid.

Three Democrats in Congress think employers should be banned from asking it. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.), a nonvoting delegate, and Reps. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) and Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) said in a recent announcement that they planned to introduce a bill that would prohibit employers from asking about candidates past compensation before making them a job offer.

The reason, however, isnt simply to eliminate a question no one likes. Its because of the role its said to play in perpetuating the lower salaries that women and people of color receive more often, even early in their careers.

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Ultimately, the only way to make sure women and minorities will be treated equally is to remove the early biases that exist, both in hiring practices and salary negotiations, Rep. Nadler said in a statement announcing the plans Aug. 30. Our bill works to eliminate those obstacles by requiring employers to offer salaries based on the value of the work.

Its the latest sign that efforts to dump the dreaded question could be gaining momentum. In early August, Massachusetts became the first state in the nation to ban the question when Republican Gov. Charlie Baker signed an equal pay bill into law that passed unanimously by both of the states legislative branches. Similarly, it said employers could not ask about salary history until a job offer was made, though lawyers said it did not prevent candidates from volunteering the information or appear to keep employers from asking about a desired range in pay.

That recent law was cited in the Democrats announcement. Massachusetts has taken a bold step forward in closing the wage gap by preventing employers from asking salary history in interviews, Rep. DeLauro said in the statement, and I strongly urge Congress to follow the states lead and enact this legislation.

In California, an amendment to the states Fair Pay Act, which went into effect at the beginning of this year, would prohibit employers from basing compensation decisions on prior salaries alone. Colorado is also weighing a bill that addresses prior salary, said Noreen Farrell, the executive director of Equal Rights Advocates, a nonprofit that sponsored equal rights legislation in California. She thinks theres been a change in tide from the business community that could be helping the momentum on the issue.

I tend to be a realist, but I have been really been very buoyed by business support for very strong fair pay laws, Farrell said.

Meanwhile, some high-profile human resources executives have spoken out against the question. Googles former head of people operations, Laszlo Bock, wrote in an op-ed in the Washington Post in April that the fundamental problem in fixing the gender wage gap is hidden in the way we make pay decisions. Fixing it requires us to focus on paying people what a job is worth -- and not basing a pay decision on someones current salary.

Still, the chances of such a bill becoming law in todays legislative environment in Washington, particularly any time soon, dont seem particularly promising. The Paycheck Fairness Act, or bills similar to it legislating equal pay, have been introduced in every Congress since 1997, according to the website GovTrack.

Still, it shouldnt be counted out yet, said Fatima Goss Graves, a senior vice president at the National Womens Law Center.

People can see the connection of the deep unfairness of carrying past discrimination with you to job after job, she said. And the support the issue received from the business community in Massachusetts could be galvanizing. When states show that something is possible, thats extremely reinforcing.

Even if it doesnt go anywhere at the national level, Goss Graves believes that more states could follow suit. Just as were seeing Congress take this up, she said, in 2017 I think this will be an issue to watch.
Uber Technologies Inc. got the green light on Thursday to settle claims it pocketed about half of a 20% gratuity charge that passengers thought they were paying to drivers.

U.S. District Judge Edward Chen in San Francisco, who is also presiding over a separate lawsuit against Uber concerning the classification of drivers, granted preliminary approval of a settlement in which Uber will create a fund of $343,861.46 to pay 46,882 customers who used the app over a one-year period.

Payment will be limited to customers who received a promotional email between April 20, 2012 to March 25, 2013 advertising that 20% of a rides fare was for gratuity. Uber drivers wont receive any additional payment through the settlement.

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Each affected passenger will receive an amount equal to 40% of the gratuity charge, which is essentially a full refund, the plaintiff attorney said in court documents.

Uber customers who qualify for the class-action settlement will soon receive an email at the address affiliated with their Uber account, at which point they can accept the payment or object to it. Those who wish to take part can provide the settlement administrator with an address to receive a check in the mail, or have the amount credited to their Uber account.

Plaintiff Caren Ehret filed the lawsuit against Uber in 2014, alleging that Uber kept 40% to 50% of the tips. Unlike its competitor, Lyft, Uber does not offer an in-app tipping function. While the company previously discouraged drivers from accepting cash tips from customers, it recently relented as part of a proposed settlement in a separate lawsuit, allowing drivers to solicit cash tips from passengers.

Uber did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

samantha.masunaga@latimes.com

For more business news, follow me @smasunaga

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Halloween is growing so big, its scary.

To crank up the fright levels, Universal Studios Hollywood is employing directors and producers of creepy movies and television series to help create new attractions for this years Halloween celebration.

Six Flags Magic Mountain in Valencia has expanded its annual spookfest by an extra weekend and built its biggest outdoor maze ever, a 40,000-square-foot labyrinth haunted by post-apocalyptic killers.

And for the first time, Warner Bros. Studios has jumped into the competition for Halloween fans this year by launching a nighttime tour of the Burbank studio lot, plus a screening of two Warner Bros.-distributed horror films: The Conjuring and The Conjuring 2.

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The newest Halloween upgrades at Southern Californias theme parks are a testament to the autumn holidays freakish growth and profitability.

Halloween has become high stakes certainly for the biggest theme parks, said Martin Lewison, a business administration professor and theme park expert from Farmingdale State College in New York. They always have to stay on top, always have to be cutting edge.

He compared the expansion of Halloween events at theme parks to the decision by fast-food giant McDonalds in the 1970s to add breakfast to the chains meal offerings.

Its called capital intensity, he said. You increase by taking your investment and squeezing more money out of it.

1 / 28 An actor on stilts walks through a scare zone inspired by The Purge film trilogy at Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Hollywood. The event runs on select nights through Nov. 5. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 28 An actor catches guests off-guard in the scare zone at Halloween Horror Nights. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 28 John Murdy, creative director of Universal Studios Hollywood and executive producer of Halloween Horror Nights, at the Psycho House at Universal Studios Hollywood. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 28 An actor brings his character to life in Eli Roth Presents the Terror Tram. Roth, the producer of such horror films as Hostel, Cabin Fever and The Stranger, has been recruited to remake the parks iconic tram ride by populating it with maniacal, serial killer clowns. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 28 Actors scare guests near a wrecked airliner in Eli Roth Presents the Terror Tram. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 28 Actors scare guests near a wrecked airliner in Eli Roth Presents the Terror Tram. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 28 A scene from Eli Roth Presents the Terror Tram at the annual Halloween Horror Nights employee run-through at Universal Studios Hollywood. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 28 A scene from Eli Roth Presents the Terror Tram at the annual Halloween Horror Nights employee run-through. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 28 A scene from Eli Roth Presents the Terror Tram at the annual Halloween Horror Nights employee run-through. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 28 Actors with chain saws greet guests during Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Hollywood. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 28 An actor scares a woman at the annual Halloween Horror Nights employee run-through. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 28 An actor scares guests at the annual Halloween Horror Nights employee run-through. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 28 Actors scare guests at the annual Halloween Horror Nights employee run-through. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 28 Actors with chain saws scare guests at the annual Halloween Horror Nights employee run-through. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 28 An actor appears in a maze in which three chapters of American Horror Story come to life. The maze was designed by the TV series creator, Ryan Murphy. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 28 An actor catches guests off-guard in a maze in which three chapters of American Horror Story come to life. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 17 / 28 An actor appears in a maze in which three chapters of American Horror Story come to life. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 18 / 28 Three chapters of American Horror Story come to life in a maze designed by series creator Ryan Murphy. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 19 / 28 A clown stands at the entrance to Eli Roth Presents the Terror Tram at Universal Studios Hollywood. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 20 / 28 An actor appears in a maze in which three chapters of American Horror Story come to life. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 21 / 28 Actors appear in a maze in which three chapters of American Horror Story come to life. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 22 / 28 An actor catches guests off-guard in a maze in which three chapters of American Horror Story come to life. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 23 / 28 Guests react to an actor in a maze in which three chapters of American Horror Story come to life. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 24 / 28 Three chapters of American Horror Story come to life in a frightening maze that takes guests through Ryan Murphys horror anthology to encounter scenes and characters designed to jolt them to the core. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 25 / 28 An actor appears in a maze in which three chapters of American Horror Story come to life. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 26 / 28 An actor catches guests off-guard in a maze in which three chapters of American Horror Story come to life. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 27 / 28 An actor appears in a maze in which three chapters of American Horror Story come to life. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 28 / 28 An actor appears in a maze in which three chapters of American Horror Story come to life. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

Nationwide, more than 300 amusement parks operate Halloween attractions, generating at least $500 million in revenue annually, according to Hauntworld, a website based in St. Louis that promotes businesses with haunted or Halloween themes.

An annual Halloween industry show in St. Louis that began eight years ago in a 50,000-square-foot hall has grown to 250,000 square feet, including booths that sell scary props, ticket-dispensing equipment, lighting and hayride equipment, among other Halloween items, said Larry Kirchner, a spokesman for Hauntworld.

The number just keeps growing on a level you cant imagine, he said.

Most Southern California theme parks charge a separate admission fee to attend the Halloween events that begin in the evening. Six Flags Magic Mountain allows daytime visitors to stay after dark but they must buy a wristband to enter the individual horror attractions. The tickets range from $40 to more than $200 for a pass that lets visitors avoid the lines.

At Universal Studios Hollywood, Eli Roth, the producer of such horror films as Hostel, Cabin Fever and The Stranger, has been recruited to remake the parks iconic tram ride by populating it with maniacal, serial killer clowns.

Universal Studios Halloween Horror Nights begins Friday and runs on select nights through Nov. 5.

Roth compared the Halloween mazes and attractions to live concerts or music festivals where large groups share in the experience.

You cant replicate the live experience, Roth said. You just have to make the pilgrimage and be a part of it.

Ryan Murphy, the creator of the American Horror Story television series, said he wanted to help build a maze haunted by evil spirits, scenes of gore and freak show actors because he always admired the Halloween attractions at Universal Studios Hollywood.

For me, if your show is made into a theme park ride, you know youve made it, Murphy said.

The American Horror Story maze will be replicated at Universal Studios Orlando in Florida as well.

Murphy calls the attraction a hit. I peed my pants a couple of times, he quipped about of his experience in the maze.

Its not the first time that Universal Studios has turned to horror masters to boost its Halloween attractions. In 2012, macabre rocker Alice Cooper helped create a Universal Studios maze. Greg Nicotero, executive producer of the hugely popular Walking Dead TV series, helped create a permanent zombie attraction for the park this year.

Although Universal Studios paid licensing fees to use branded images and characters, Roth and Ryan say the real lure was helping to promote their creepy style of horror at a park that draws millions of visitors per year.

Roth, co-founder of an online horror channel, Crypt TV, will show video clips from the channel on the television screens of the tram ride during Halloween Horror Nights.

The trailers for the new season of American Horror Story, which started Wednesday, will be shown to guests waiting in the queue to go into Murphys maze.

Its a way to increase awareness and grow the brand, Murphy said.

At Warner Bros. Studios, the idea for a new Halloween event was sparked last October when the studio displayed a few props from iconic horror movies. The response was so great that studio executives decided to launch two new evening Halloween tours Oct. 28 and Oct. 29 that focus on the horror movies filmed at the studio.

There are so many fans of the horror genre that it makes sense for us to do it, said Danny Kahn, executive director of Warner Bros. Studio Tours.

At Six Flags Magic Mountain, the celebration dubbed Fright Fest starts Saturday, a week earlier than last year, and runs on select nights through Oct. 30.

This year, an attraction about a post-apocalyptic world has been expanded to three times its previous size to contain fire and fog effects and props that are nearly five stories tall, park spokeswoman Sue Carpenter said.

It was one of our most popular mazes and we had the space available, so we made it three times larger, she said.

Knotts Berry Farm in Buena Park, which launched its first Halloween event in the 1970s, is unveiling 13 spooky attractions, including a new maze that puts virtual reality goggles on guests to create bigger scares.

For Walt Disney Co.s Anaheim parks, Halloween is more playful than frightful.

However, Disney California Adventure is trying to lure big crowds this year by promoting Twilight Zone Tower of Terror rides final Halloween. The attraction will be closed in January to be remade featuring Marvels Guardians of the Galaxy characters.

hugo.martin@latimes.com

To read more about the travel and tourism industries, follow @hugomartin on Twitter.

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The House Financial Services Committee has launched an investigation into improper sales tactics at Wells Fargo & Co., and plans to call the banks chief executive to testify at a hearing this month.

Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas), the committees chairman, said Friday that the probe would look into alleged fraud that led to the opening of unauthorized customer accounts at Wells Fargo and the role of Washington regulators in monitoring and investigating this activity.

The panels investigation comes as the Senate Banking Committee is looking into the matter and will hear testimony from Wells Fargo Chief Executive John Stumpf at a hearing Tuesday. The Justice Department also has started an investigation that could lead to civil or criminal charges.

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The probes come after the bank agreed last week to pay $185 million to settle investigations by Los Angeles City Atty. Mike Feuer and federal regulators.

The sales tactics, first uncovered by the Los Angeles Times in 2013, involved thousands of bank employees opening as many as 2 million accounts that customers did not authorize in order to meet aggressive sales goals.

Wells Fargo has fired 5,300 employees for improper sales tactics since 2011.

In a letter to Wells Fargo general counsel James M. Strother, Hensarling said that the committee is very concerned by these serious allegations. He requested all records related to the questionable sales tactics that were produced or made available to Los Angeles and federal officials.

The committee also requested documents from the federal regulators involved in the settlement: the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which imposed a $100-million fine on Wells Fargo, its biggest enforcement action ever.

Reps. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles) and Al Green (D-Texas) had requested Sept. 9 that Hensarling hold a hearing.

We need answers as to how this happened and why this happened. We need answers about whos being held accountable for this fraud, Waters told reporters on a conference call Friday.

Wells Fargo said Friday in a statement that, We welcome the opportunity to provide the committee with information on this matter and to discuss steps we have taken to affirm our commitment to customers.

In addition to calling Stumpf to testify at the hearing, Hensarling requested that four Wells Fargo executives be made available for interviews with committee staff.

They include Carrie Tolstedt, senior executive vice president for community banking, who headed the unit in which the unauthorized accounts were opened. Wells Fargo announced in July that she was retiring at the end of the year.

There have been calls for Wells Fargo to recover some of the money paid to executives involved with the scandal, including Tolstedt, who Fortune magazine estimated will receive $124.6 million in a retirement pay package. The process is known as a clawback.

Five Democratic senators wrote to Stumpf on Friday asking whether the bank would use clawback provisions to recover compensation paid to Tolstedt and other top executives.

This was not the work of a few rogue employees over the course of a few weeks. Wells Fargo had a longstanding, systemic problem created by stringent sales quotas and incentives imposed by senior management, said the letter from Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Sherrod Brown of Ohio, Jack Reed of Rhode Island, Bob Menendez of New Jersey and Jeff Merkley of Oregon.

In response to the furor, Wells Fargo said this week that it would eliminate all sales goals for credit cards, checking accounts and other retail banking products starting Jan. 1.

Chief Financial Officer John Shrewsberry said the bank also had invested $50 million to improve its monitoring of employees activities, including adding a mystery shopper program to identify improper sales tactics.

At the same time, Shrewsberry and Stumpf sought to deflect blame for the scandal from upper management, with Shrewsberry saying the terminated employees were really more at the lower end of the performance scale, where people apparently were making bad choices to hang on in their job.

Stumpf during an appearance on CNBCs Mad Money said he was fully accountable for the problems but does not plan to resign.

Also Friday, the public interest group Public Citizen said it had filed a shareholder resolution with Wells Fargo asking the board of directors to study whether the bank should be broken up because it is too large to be effectively managed.

Rather than acknowledging a management breakdown, CEO John Stumpf blamed a minority of bad employees, the resolution said. He claimed there was no reason for the employees to commit the fraud.  Taking CEO Stumpf at his word, then, we believe he effectively argues that his firm is so large as to be unmanageable.

The banks shares fell 72 cents, or 1.6%, to $45.43 on Friday. The shares are now off nearly 9% since announcement of the settlement Sept. 8.

jim.puzzanghera@latimes.com

Follow @JimPuzzanghera on Twitter

UPDATES:

3:50 p,m.: This article was updated with comment from Wells Fargo and additional background.

10:45 a.m.: This article was updated with information about a shareholder resolution filed by Public Citizen.

This article was originally published at 10:20 a.m.
As Californias five-year drought continues, and with fire danger an ongoing threat to many homeowners, it comes as no surprise that insurance companies are feeling increasingly antsy about the risk of policyholders property going up in flames.

But that doesnt mitigate the kick in the teeth some homeowners are receiving from insurers by losing their coverage.

Our house has been covered by Hartford for 18 years, San Dimas resident Lloyd Parry told me. As of next month, our coverage is being stopped because of what they say is greater wildfire exposure.

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Thats nearly two decades of shelling out roughly $1,800 a year, never once, he said, submitting a claim or missing a payment  all counting for nothing because someone, somewhere within the Connecticut insurance heavyweight decided that Parrys numbers no longer pencil out.

I called Hartford and asked what was different, he said. They wouldnt tell me anything except that Im not being renewed.

I took a look at Parrys two-and-a-half-acre Scarborough Lane property on Google Maps. There seemed to be considerable open space between his house and nearby foliage.

Nothings changed, he said. Same trees. No brush. Everything is the same.

Well, at least did someone from Hartford come out and inspect the property before pulling the trigger on his coverage?

No. Ive asked them to, but no one has come.

Its perfectly reasonable that homeowners at greater risk of losses should pay commensurately higher premiums than those facing less risk. A growing threat of drought-related brushfires has caused some California residents rates to rise by as much as 40%, according to recent reports.

Termination of coverage, on the other hand, is a more extreme response by the insurance industry. Rather than face greater risk, some insurers are deciding to simply cut and run.

We know theres a problem out there, but we dont know how big it is, said Amy Bach, executive director of the advocacy group United Policyholders. She said theres not enough data available yet to determine how many homeowners share Parrys fate.

There have been some non-renewals, acknowledged Mark Sektnan, vice president of the Property Casualty Insurers Assn. of America. But remember, were still dealing with a very competitive market.

He said that even if a homeowner is cast adrift by his or her insurer, dozens of other firms stand ready to talk turkey.

Nancy Kincaid, a spokeswoman for the California Department of Insurance, said the same. Although there have been complaints about peoples coverage not being renewed for fire-danger reasons, she said, officials believe such people still have options.

If nothing else, theres the California Fair Plan Assn., an industry-financed entity providing insurance as a last resort that is usually less comprehensive.

That might come as little comfort to people like Parry, who are being told by insurers that their business is no longer wanted.

It feels really personal, we get it, Kincaid said. Its not personal.

Whats happening, say officials and insurance-industry representatives, is that insurers are trying to reduce their exposure to risk by limiting the number of homes covered in fire-prone areas. This is known in industry jargon as adjusting the books.

Insurers look at their book of business and make assessments based on their loss history, said Janet Ruiz, California representative for the Insurance Information Institute, an industry-backed organization. Its a normal process.

Kincaid said theres nothing illegal about not renewing an insurance policy after years of coverage, provided the homeowner receives sufficient notice before the termination date.

She also said that as analytical tools improve, insurers are able to drill more deeply into fire data and risk projections, giving them a better sense of how many homes covered in any given area could tilt the risk balance against them.

And thats all fine and dandy, except that insurers use proprietary systems to crunch these numbers, so its difficult to say whether theyre displaying unfairness toward consumers.

I contacted the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, a.k.a. Cal Fire, which provides information on fire risk to local governments. A spokesman said the area in which Parry lives is not considered a very high fire hazard severity zone, according to the most recent data available.

Bach at United Policyholders said its questionable what criteria insurers are using to determine the fire risk of specific homes. She said its unclear why one home may be deemed an acceptable risk while a nearby property will be ruled unworthy of coverage.

Insurance companies seem less like theyre in the business of risk and more like theyre in the business of protecting profitability, Bach said.

So what does Hartford have to say about giving Parry the heave-ho? Not much, unfortunately.

Matthew Sturdevant, a spokesman for the company, said that the Hartford continuously evaluates the risks of doing business in states to appropriately manage our overall exposure, which enables us to pay homeowners claims when customers need us the most.

In California, he said, that evaluation includes looking at wildfire exposure and risk. We evaluate each property using industry standard wildfire risk criteria.

I asked why Parrys home is a greater risk this year than over the last 18 years. I also asked why no one from the company visited Parrys property to, you know, get the lay of the land.

Sturdevant replied that his previous statement was the extent of our comment.

Im not disputing that insurers have a responsibility to manage risk. Nor does it seem as if Parry is out of insurance options.

But any company that cant explain itself clearly to a longtime customer is a company that doesnt care for peoples business.

If I was insured by the Hartford, which Im not, Id give some serious thought to that.

David Lazarus column runs Tuesdays and Fridays. He also can be seen daily on KTLA-TV Channel 5 and followed on Twitter @Davidlaz. Send your tips or feedback to david.lazarus@latimes.com.

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Comedian-actor Chris DElia has listed his home in lower Beachwood Canyon for sale at $2.1 million.

DElia, known for his roles on the sitcoms Whitney and Undateable, isnt the only comic to have lived in the house. Comedian and television host Craig Ferguson owned the property for more than a decade before selling it to DElia in 2013.

Built in 1930, the Spanish-style home is tucked behind walls and privacy hedges on nearly a quarter of an acre.

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Classic details are evident inside and out. Decorative tile risers adorn the front entrance, which opens to a foyer lined with arched doorways. Beamed ceilings and vintage tile continue the style throughout the home.

A grand living room with a fireplace, a center-island kitchen, a media/family room, an office, three bedrooms and four bathrooms lie within nearly 2,600 square feet of interiors. An arched window in the living room takes in a view of downtown L.A.

Outdoors, white-picket fencing surrounds a swimming pool and patio. Another covered patio sits off the first floor.

Kathryn Shafer of Keller Williams Beverly Hills holds the listing.

DElia, 36, has produced two stand-up specials, including last years Incorrigible. This year he had a part in the Netflix flick XOXO and will appear in the upcoming film Half Magic.

neal.leitereg@latimes.com

Twitter: @NJLeitereg

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During a recent trip to New York City, photographer Dan Winters had a chance encounter with a personal hero: Robert Frank, whose 1958 book The Americans helped to alter the direction of photography as art, shattering the traditional boundaries of mood, texture and content in street photography.

Winters and Frank spoke for half an hour in the Bowery that day. At the end I said, Would you mind if I made a portrait of you? says Winters, who has his own body of work documenting the gray streets of New York in the tradition of Frank, Garry Winogrand and others. So many people have used that city as a proving ground. Its a very saturated genre: New York City street photographs. I call them public photographs.

Winters has collected his three decades of New York pictures into a book, The Grey Ghost, which is also the subject of an exhibition at the Fahey/Klein Gallery on La Brea Avenue through Oct. 15. The black-and-white images are a dramatic contrast to his vivid, colorful work as an acclaimed magazine photographer.

Statue of Liberty, 1990. (Dan Winters) (Test)

The New York pictures date to the early 1990s, when Winters relocated from Thousand Oaks to pursue a photography career. During days off, he would wander the city for pictures, drifting from Staten Island to Times Square to the Empire State Building. And he didnt stop: Some pictures were shot in the last couple of years.

Once in a while when I get one of those moments that fits with that body of work, its a real joy, Winters says. One recent image was that impromptu black-and-white portrait of Frank. He said, Is that a digital camera? May I see that? And he took it and did a picture of me, Winters says with a laugh. It was one of those wonderful full-circle things.

Staten Island Ferry, 1988. (Dan Winters) (Test)

Flatiron, 2006. (Dan Winters) (Test)

The Grey Ghost, 2015. (Dan Winters) (Test)

Follow The Times arts team @culturemonster.

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Helen Frankenthalers canvases bare only the sheerest layers of color and paint. Yet with these works the artist straddled two of the most important artistic movements of the 20th century.

She first achieved renown as one of the few female Abstract Expressionists  that rowdy boys club symbolically spearheaded by Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning.



For the record: Update: Additional information was added to the post to clarify the exhibition at which Clement Greenberg met Helen Frankenthaler.

But her innovations with paint  she would often pour thinned paint onto unprimed canvases for work that felt liquid and lush  went on to inspire Color Field artists, who werent so much interested in using paint as a tool of expression, but in the ways color could be rendered on canvas. (Her 1952 painting, Mountains and Sea, was a turning point in this direction.)

Now a new exhibition at Gagosian Gallery in Beverly Hills explores some of her later works, from the 1960s to the 80s (she passed away in 2011), works where the painter was exploring the division between drawing and painting.

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Curated by John Elderfield, the former chief curator of painting and sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, Line Into Color, Color Into Line, as the exhibition is titled, offers a chance to re-examine works by an artist who doesnt get much air time in Los Angeles. (Frankenthalers last solo museum exhibition in the city was at the L.A. County Museum of Art in 1990.)

In advance of the Gagosian show, which features 17 canvases from the holdings of the artists namesake foundation in New York, Elderfield sat down for a wide-ranging discussion about the New York artists life. In this lightly edited conversation, he discusses her legacy, her very determined character and the unpopular political move that made her a controversial art world figure.

Frankenthaler  along with painter Joan Mitchell and Grace Hartigan  was one of the few women to make a name for herself among the Abstract Expressionists in mid-century New York. How did she become connected to that school of painters?

Through her friendship with critic Clement Greenberg she got to meet all of these people. She had met Greenberg when she was at Bennington College in Vermont. And she got Greenberg to come and look at an exhibition of alumnae work at Jacques Seligmann & Co. gallery in New York, which he agreed to do  if there was booze.

But in New York there was a big division between the boys club and the other people. The Tibor de Nagy Gallery was very open to showing women and was generally more eclectic in how it operated. But none of the big guys showed there at all. Helen was able to be included in some of the group shows which were being organized at the time. She worked hard and was enormously inventive. Her 50s things are quite extraordinary within their time.

Helen Frankenthaler tips a can of paint onto a canvas on the floor. (Ernst Haas / Getty Images )

What set her work apart from other Abstract Expressionist painters?

It ended up being something which some people found bothersome  and it was because her works were so thinly painted. From Mountains and Sea onward, its thinly stained paint on canvas.

Compared to De Kooning and Pollock and [Franz] Kline, it was thought that there was something weaker about them because they were more thinly painted. And it was then that there was this sort of equation between these lightly painted pictures and her being a woman (though neither Mitchell nor Hartigan painted in this way). There were some people, like [critic] Harold Rosenberg, who was a big supporter of the idea of the painting being made out of heroic gestures. And with her work there are no gestures.

Her work ended up being quite influential to the Color Field painters  figures such as Morris Louis and Kenneth Noland  whose work was all about the way color sat on a canvas. How did that come about?

Greenberg arranged for Louis and Noland to look at Mountains and Sea in 1952 and it started them using thinned-down paint, with the idea that by reducing the kind of tactility of the paint, the color would be more purely color. And they did so in a very abstract way, wherein a kind of drawing persists in Helens work, which still had a kind of representational association.

She was a little bit to the side of what these painters were doing. She had a marginal relationship to Abstract Expressionism. She had a marginal relationship to the Color Field painters. She always had to be herself. Thats the extraordinary thing about her.

You got to know her while she was alive.

She was fun to be with and a nice person. But she was also, This is what I want to do. She was very clear-minded.

My first contact with her was after Id done a show of fauvism at MoMA. She left a note at the information desk saying, Just saw your show. It was so wonderful, would love to see you. A couple of days later, the phone rings. Its Helen Frankenthaler. She says, Did you get my note? I said, Yeah. She said, And you didnt think to call me?

She invited me to her studio for a drink. She said, I just finished reading your catalog for the show. I dont suppose you would want to write a book about me? I said, I have a day job. I cant do this. But 10 years later, thats what I was doing.

She had a marginal relationship to Abstract Expressionism. She had a marginal relationship to the Color Field painters. She always had to be herself.  John Elderfield, curator

An installation view, from left, of Syzygy, 1987, and Milkwood Arcade, 1963, at Gagosian Gallery. (Carolina A. Miranda / Los Angeles Times )

The new show you have put together at Gagosian explores the ways in which Frankenthaler employed painting and drawing in her work. What makes drawing and painting different? And what is remarkable about the way she combined them?

The traditional way, of course, is to make a drawing as the basis of a painting, then add color to it.

In Mountains and Sea, you can see thats what she did. There is the drawing, and then the color goes in. But in later works, you see that the color is not shaped by the drawing. Its shaped by color. And these two things were of interest to her  to make a painting without a preliminary drawing, but to also find ways of setting down color that reads as clearly as the track of a mark in a drawing.

In a 1990 review of the Frankenthaler survey at LACMA, Times critic Christopher Knight wrote that Frankenthalers later works devolved into decorative grandiloquence. You are showing her later works, from 1962 to 1987. What is your response to that conclusion?

I think its easy to valorize breakthrough moments and therefore be less interested in things that come later. What one is aware of in Helens work is that she is someone who is supremely intelligent about how painting works. Painting is difficult. When someone says, Painting is dead, its not dead. Its just difficult. To work with a traditional medium like this and to find new options in it to my mind is inventive and courageous.

There was a time when nobody had anything good to say about late Picasso. Nothing good at all. Or nothing good to say about Matisse after 1917. Even with Cezanne, there were things that people were very down on  like the bathers pictures. Like, why would someone want to work with such hackneyed subjects?

But you realize later that it doesnt matter. By taking on subjects or mediums which seem to be utterly un-promising, it gives the artist more freedom to work with them.

In the late 80s, Frankenthaler earned the enmity of the art world when, as a member of the National Council on the Arts, she criticized the National Endowment for the Arts for giving grants to Robert Mapplethorpe and Andres Serrano, stating that the organization was supporting work of increasingly dubious quality. Has the art world moved beyond that?

I think she made a big mistake about that and I told her. And she said, I dont believe artists should be supported in that way. I said, Helen, you always had sufficient funds to do what you wanted to do. It was difficult. Helen was very open and liberal about lots of things, but things related to government stuff, she was just on the other side. It did make it difficult for her among her artistic peers.

I think that it isnt so unusual about artists who are a mixture of liberal and conservative at the same time. Cezanne, for example, was trying to get a petition up to prevent the city of Marseilles from putting up street lights because he felt it spoiled the twilight. And Degas was on the wrong side of the Dreyfus Affair [a 19th century French treason case centered on an anti-Semitic campaign].

How have you seen Frankenthalers influence in painters working today?

There are a lot of people, like Lynda Benglis, of course, who is known for pouring on the floor. But Ive also had surprising people talk to me about her work.

Last year, I wrote an essay about Jenny Saville [known for her towering, expressive figure paintings], and I asked her, Whose work do you like? She said to me: You knew Helen Frankenthaler. I just loved her work. And I said, You loved her work? She said, Yes. Im trying to paint thinly to achieve greater transparency and I constantly look to her to figure out how she did it.

There are others. [Carroll] Tip Dunham, Sue Williams, Kara Walker  a whole range of people.

The preparators here [at the gallery] are all artists. Hanging the show yesterday, there was a couple of them talking. And a painting came out of a box and one of them said, Omigod, this woman can paint!

+++

Line Into Color, Color Into Line: Helen Frankenthaler, Paintings, 1962-1987

Where: Gagosian Gallery, 456 N. Camden Drive, Beverly Hills

When: Opens Friday and runs through Oct. 29

Info: gagosian.com

Sign up for our weekly Essential Arts & Culture newsletter 

Find me on Twitter @cmonstah.

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Review: Doug Aitken: Electric Earth: Why MOCAs big new show has too few sparks
An Austrian painter who mines the weird and the psychological. L.A.s urban environment mapped. An imaginative monsters ball. And an installation that takes on the backseat. Plus, Tom Knechtels intricate paintings, Karon Davis sculptures on caring and death, and USCs big new gift. Here are seven shows to check out in the coming week:

Fran Siegel, Reconstruction, at ACME. The artist uses intensely elaborate pieces that bring together drawing, cut-outs and collages to capture the urban environment on a massive scale. In a new series of works going on view at the gallery, Siegel sets her sights on Los Angeles, capturing patterns of migration, settlement and evolution. A new way to see the city that surrounds us. Opens Saturday at 6 p.m. and runs through Oct. 22. 6150 Wilshire Blvd., Carthay, Los Angeles, acemlosangeles.com.

 Artist Tom Knechtels studio and work.

Tom Knechtel, Astrolabe, at Marc Selwyn Fine Art. The artist, known for theatrical pieces that often border on the surreal (think: wrestlers in skirts and humans with bird heads) is unveiling three new paintings as well as a series of intimate new drawings consisting largely of portraiture and self-portraiture  areas that this master draftsman had not previously explored. Opens Saturday at 6 p.m. and runs through Oct. 29. 9953 S. Santa Monica Blvd., Beverly Hills, marcselwynfineart.com.

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Maria Lassnig, A Painting Survey, 1950-2007, at Hauser Wirth & Schimmel. This is the first Los Angeles solo exhibition for the late Austrian artist, known for her inventively weird figurative paintings. The show traces the artists journey over a nearly six-decade period, from her early abstractions to the mildly distorted, even cartoonish, paintings of people and settings that are more about capturing psychological states of being than rendering exact figures. Opens Saturday and runs through Dec. 31. 901 E. 3rd St., downtown Los Angeles, hauserwirthschimmel.com.

Abraham Cruzvillegas, Autocancion, at Regen Projects. In his work, the Mexican artist has long riffed on the improvised nature of Latin American informal architecture  so-called autoconstrucciones. For his second show at Regen, Cruzvillegas is exploring similar territory, though on this occasion, he is employing the backseat of every car he has ever used (a nod to SoCal car culture). These will be affixed to planters bearing plantings from our the region. Opens Saturday and runs through Oct. 11. 6750 Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood, regenprojects.com.

Karon Davis, Pain Management, at Wilding Cran Gallery. Employing plaster casts and shredded medicine bills, the artist has re-created the hospital environment that her husband, artist Noah Davis, was forced to inhabit as the result of a fatal illness. (He passed away last summer.) These are used to create a series of figurative sculptures that conjure notions of preservation and mummification. Opens Saturday and runs through Nov. 12. 939 S. Santa Fe Ave., downtown Los Angeles, wildingcran.com.

Marnie Weber, Chapel of the Moon, at Gavlak Gallery. The Los Angeles artist has created a cast of mythical characters employed in her first feature film  a modern-day fairy tale titled The Day of Forevermore, which recently screened at the Theatre at the Ace Hotel  and these serve as the source of a new series of multimedia works at the gallery. Expect works that play with fantasy, reality and the mildly satanic. Opens Saturday and runs through Nov. 5. 1034 N. Highland Ave., Hollywood, gavlakgallery.com.

A Generosity of Spirit: Celebrating the Gift of Eugene Rogolsky, at the Fisher Museum. The Los Angeles patrons acquired an eclectic range of works over the course of his years as a patron, including photography and painting. One of the highlights: The significant number of works he acquired by the prominent Chicano painter Carlos Almaraz. Through Dec. 3. USC, 823 W. Exposition Blvd., Exposition Park, Los Angeles, fisher.usc.edu.

LAST CHANCE

Alex Da Corte, A Season in Hell, at Art + Practice. An exhibition by the New Jersey-born conceptual artist includes a series of works inspired by French poet Arthur Rimbauds influential prose poem, A Season in Hell, which explores topics of morality, desire and death. In video and in sculptural installations  works that employ banal consumer goods and pop cultural tropes  Da Corte takes on these topics and others, touching on issues of identity, alienation and instability. Through Saturday. 4339 Leimert Blvd., Leimert Park, Los Angeles, hammer.ucla.edu and artandpractice.org.

Tanya Aguiniga, Loie Hollowell and Lenore Tawney, 3 Women, at the Landing. A three-woman show  inspired by the Robert Altman movie of the same name  serves as a cross-generational gathering of works that blur the line between craft and fine art. These are represented by the weavings of Tawney, a contemporary of painter Agnes Martin; Hollowell, who paints pulsing abstractions inspired by the female form; and Aguiniga, who uses modern and traditional weaving techniques to create wild biomorphic forms. Aguiniga will join curator Jenelle Porter and Kathleen Mangan of the Lenore Tawney Foundation to discuss the generational differences in their work on Saturday at 2 p.m. Through Saturday. 5118 Jefferson Blvd., West Adams, thelandinggallery.com.

Reflections on the Self, at the California African American Museum. Drawn from the museums permanent collection, this wide-ranging exhibition looks at the representation of the self, examining the idealized and mythologized ways that artists have portrayed pop and cultural icons, from Malcolm X to Thelonious Monk to a New Orleans grand marshal. Also on view at the museum is Oh Snap! West Coast Hip Hop Photography, which will feature an array of hip-hop artists who came up in the 90s, such as Ice Cube, Tupac Shakur and others.Through Sunday. 600 State Drive, Exposition Park, Los Angeles, caamuseum.org.

Play: Open Call 2016, at the L.A. Municipal Art Gallery. A community-based biennial riffs on the notion of play  featuring works of painting, photography, collage and more by 300 L.A. artists. Through Sunday. 4800 Hollywood Blvd., Hollywood, lamag.org.

ONGOING EXHIBITIONS

In the Cut, at Gallery Luisotti. A group show curated by Michael Pena explores the myriad meanings of the phrase in the cut  from the idea of a wound to places that are remote, either physically or psychologically. The show brings together photography by Sam Contis, Whitney Hubbs, Lisa Ohlweiler and Cindy Bernard, depicting secluded desert spaces, nudist camps and a Riverside ranch, among other spaces. Through Sept. 24. An artists reception will be held at 6 p.m. Aug. 13. Bergamot Station, 2525 Michigan Ave., Building A2, Santa Monica, galleryluisotti.com.

Fast Forward: The Architecture of William F. Cody, at the Architecture and Design Museum. A new exhibition looks at the career of one of Palm Springs most notable Modernist architects  known for a range of designs (some quite flamboyant) that included homes, condominiums, commercial centers and the temple-like El Dorado Country Club for a clientele that included Frank Sinatra, Walt Disney and Bing Crosby. Through Sept. 25. 900 E. Fourth St., downtown Los Angeles, aplusd.org.

Karla Klarin: Subdividing the LAndscape, at CSUN Art Galleries. The San Fernando Valley-raised artist examines some of our citys more quotidian landscapes in a series of painted works that take sprawl and the suburban as points of inspiration. But dont expect the cookie cutter: Klarins works have a way of capturing grit. Through Oct. 8. A reception will be held Saturday at 4 p.m.; an artist talk will take place Monday at 10 a.m. Cal State Northridge, 18111 Nordhoff St., Northridge, csun.edu.

Bosco Sodi, Malpais, in a pop-up exhibition at 143 N. Robertson. The Mexican artist is known for densely pigmented monochromes and geometric clay cubes (evocative of the work of Isamu Noguchi) that play with color and the visceral qualities of his earthy materials. This one-off show is presented by the New York-based Paul Kasmin Gallery with Brandon Davis Projects and Jose Mestre. Through Oct. 8. 143 N. Robertson Blvd., Beverly Grove, Los Angeles, brandondavisprojects.net.

Tong Kunniao, Why Dont You Eat Stinky Tofu? at Nicodim Gallery. The Chinese-born artist features messy assemblages and kinetic sculptures crafted from detritus that includes Barbie dolls and religious souvenirs. Through Oct. 15. 571 S. Anderson St., Suite 2, Boyle Heights, nicodimgallery.com.

Kenyatta A.C. Hinkle and Tyler Matthew Oyer, Exploring The Nowannago: Kentifrican Modes of Resistance, at Grand Central Art Center. A combination of performance and video piece, Exploring the Nowannago is part of Hinkles long-running exploration of the ways in which black female bodies are commoditized and exoticized. Also on display is Jesse Kees sound installation featuring a series of pieces drawn from the artists experience working in Santa Ana. Through Oct. 16. 125 N. Broadway, Santa Ana, grandcentralartcenter.com.

James Richards, Hack the Analog, at Shoshana Wayne Gallery. A series of new paintings play with their structure in pieces that function partially as sculpture and partially as weaving. Through Oct. 22. Bergamot Station, 2525 Michigan Ave., B1, Santa Monica, shoshanawayne.com.

Edith Beaucage, Sequencer, Spectrum, Reverb, at Luis De Jesus Los Angeles. In loose, wild brush strokes, the L.A. artist captures figures in hallucinatory landscapes that evoke a painted rave. Also on view will be an exhibition of photographs and large-scale video by Bryan Zanisnik, a New York-based artist preoccupied by the architecture of monuments and theatrical sets. Through Oct. 22. 2685 S. La Cienega Blvd., Culver City, luisdejesus.com.

Clint Woodside, Under Cover Cars, at These Days L.A. The artists first solo exhibitions gathers five years worth of images chronicling SoCal cars draped in all manner of plastics and tarps. Through Oct. 23. 118 Winston St., 2nd Floor, downtown Los Angeles, thesedaysla.com.

Leben, leben / Life, living, at 1997-1998, 1998, by Hanne Darboven, at Spruth Magers. (Timo Ohler / Spruth Magers - Hanne Darboven Foundation / ARS )

Hanne Darboven, at Spruth Magers. The first solo exhibition devoted to the German conceptualists work in half a dozen years contains three installations that riff on the nature of time and other concepts through monumental pieces laden with obsessively detailed charts and calendars. This includes work dating to the 1970s (Darboven passed away in 2009). Through Oct. 29. 5900 Wilshire Blvd., Mid-Wilshire, Los Angeles, spruethmagers.com.

Mira Schor, War Frieze (1991  1994) and Power Frieze (2016), at CB1 Gallery. Schor, the New York-based feminist artist who first made her name in the 70s at CalArts is back in L.A. with a new selection of paintings that riff on politics, art world politics and the body. A separate space features her historic work, War Frieze, created between 1991 and 1994, a series of panels that, when presented together, runs more than 200 feet. Through Oct. 30. 1923 S. Santa Fe Ave., downtown Los Angeles, cb1gallery.com.

Tom Knechtel, The Reader of His Own Self, at CB1 Gallery. The Los Angeles painter renowned for rendering fantastically detailed paintings that seem to channel William Blake and Hieronymus Bosch in equal parts is displaying a selection of prints and drawings produced throughout his career  including new works that riff on the personal, such as two new prints created especially for the show. The exhibition also serves as a prelude to a show of the artists paintings that will open at Marc Selwyn in Beverly Hills next week. Opens Saturday at 3 p.m. and runs through Oct. 30. 1923 S. Santa Fe Ave., downtown Los Angeles, cb1gallery.com.

Henry Taylor, at Blum & Poe. The artists latest solo exhibition features a series of new paintings and sculptures displayed in three unique environments that tackle ideas of class  including a dirt lot and a grassy lawn. As part of the exhibition, he will also be screening a film by friend and collaborator Kahlil Joseph, who last year hypnotized with his installation, Double Conscience, at the Museum of Contemporary Art in downtown Los Angeles. The gallery will also be having a concurrent show of the early sign paintings of Mark Grotjahn. Through Nov. 5. 2727 S. La Cienega Blvd., Culver City, blumandpoe.com.

Wu Tsang, The Luscious Land of God Is Sinking, at 356 Mission. The L.A.-based filmmaker and performer is screening her recent film, Duilian, about a Chinese feminist revolutionary who was executed for attempting to foment revolution in the early 20th century. She will also be showing new sculptures, photographs and a limestone plaque that will be embedded in the sidewalk out front. Through Nov. 6. 356 S. Mission Road, Boyle Heights, Los Angeles, 356mission.com.

Dissent: What They Fear Is the Light, at Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions. A group show explores issues of privacy, control and surveillance, in our hyper-connected, always-logged-on digital world. Through Nov. 6. 6522 Hollywood Blvd., Hollywood, welcometolace.org.

London Calling, at the Getty Museum. Drawn primarily from the collection of the Tate in London, this exhibition brings together six of the leading British painters of the 20th century, figures who resisted trends toward abstraction to focus on the figure, revolutionizing the act of painting in the process. Through Nov. 13. 1200 Getty Center Drive, Brentwood, Los Angeles, getty.edu.

 WATCH: Writer-director Guillermo del Toro takes us on a tour through Bleak House, his suburban L.A. home where he has amassed a formidable collection of art, books, horror movie props and other oddities that serve as inspiration for the filmmaker.

Guillermo del Toro: At Home With Monsters, at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. The filmmakers work  which includes movies such as Pans Labyrinth, Hellboy and Pacific Rim  all play with notions of the fantastical. This exhibition looks at the directors artistic process, including plenty of drawings and maquettes, along with the objects that inspire him (including some truly odd and macabre works from LACMAs permanent collection). These are presented in a series of thematic rooms that explore magic, occultism, death and monsters. A totally wild ride. Through Nov. 27. 5905 Wilshire Blvd., Mid-Wilshire, Los Angeles, lacma.org.

Marcos Ramirez ERRE and David Taylor, Delimitations: A Survey of the 1821 United States-Mexico Border, at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego. In 2014, Ramirez and Taylor set out on a more than 3,000-mile journey to mark the 1821 border between the U.S. and Mexico, which took them to unlikely places such as Medicine Bow, Wyo., and Dodge City, Kan. This exhibition presents photography and other documentation from that journey, one that looks at the fragile nature of political borders. Also on view will be the wild urban architecture-inspired sculptures of L.A. artist Ruben Ochoa  rising like monsters from the gallery floor. A pair of shows not to miss. Through Nov. 27. Jacobs Building, 1100 Kettner Blvd., downtown San Diego, mcasd.org.

American Mosaic: Picturing Modern Art Through the Eye of Duncan Phillips, at the Orange County Museum of Art. In the early 20th century, at a time when many U.S. moguls were focusing on amassing European masters, banking and steel scion Duncan Phillips focused his collecting efforts on American art, acquiring canvases by now venerated painters such as Thomas Eakins, Marsden Hartley, Winslow Homer, Georgia OKeeffe and Helen Frankenthaler. This exhibition brings together more than five dozen works from his collection. Through Dec. 4. 850 San Clemente Drive, Newport Beach, ocma.net.

The Spun Universe: Wixarika (Huichol) Yarn Paintings, at the Fowler Museum. A new show at the Fowler gathers the brightly woven yarn paintings of Wixarika artist Ramon Medina Silva, known for his elaborate compositions depicting astral figures, holy plants and important ritual objects, all crafted with brilliant threads. Through Dec. 4. UCLA, 308 Charles E. Young Drive N., Westwood, Los Angeles, fowler.ucla.edu.

Jud Fine and Barbara McCarren, AND/OR, at the University Art Museum. A survey exhibition includes works old and new by the L.A.-based art-making couple. This features a number of pieces related to such topics as offshore banking and the nature of currency, and a new installation, Continental Edge Dwellers (CED), that explores the coast  that blurry line between land and water. Its a good subject to marinate in at a time when Californias coast is subject to struggles over development. Through Dec. 11. Cal State Long Beach, 1250 Bellflower Blvd., Long Beach, web.csulb.edu/org/uam.

Betye Saar, Black White, at Roberts & Tilton. The grand dame of L.A. assemblage art (who is about to open a one-woman show at the Prada Foundation in Milan) is showing four decades worth of sculptures and wall pieces in the gallerys project space  transformed to reflect both the colors and politics of black and white. Also on view will be the abstract paintings of Evan Nesbit. Through Dec. 17. 5801 Washington Blvd., Culver City, robertsandtilton.com.

MOLAA at Twenty: 1996-2016, at the Museum of Latin American Art. The Museum of Latin American Art in Long Beach is celebrating two decades in existence with a show that draws from the museums permanent collection of more than 1,600 objects. These include works by renowned Modernists Joaqun Torres-Garca and Wifredo Lam, Argentine conceptualist Len Ferrari as well as contemporary figures such as Alexandre Arrechea and Patssi Valdez. Through Jan. 1. 628 Alamitos Ave., Long Beach, molaa.org.

Ernesto Yerena Montejano, Espejismo/Cicatriz, at La Plaza de Cultura y Artes. A series of intensely detailed, layered collages by the Los Angeles-based artist explore issues of identity in the Latino community. Through Jan. 1. 501 N. Main St., downtown Los Angeles, lapca.org.

Senses of Time: Video and Film-Based Works of Africa, at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. For one of its long-term installations, the museum has gathered works of video or film by contemporary African artists that explore the body and the looping nature of time. This includes pieces by figures such as Yinka Shonibare, Sammy Baloji, Berni Searle, Moatax Nasr and Theo Eshetu. Through Jan. 2. 5905 Wilshire Blvd., Mid-Wilshire, lacma.org.

The Serial Impulse at Gemini G.E.L., at LACMA. Over the course of five decades, the innovative Los Angeles print studio has produced historic limited edition works for renowned artists such as Richard Serra, Claes Oldenburg, Vija Celmins, David Hockney and Robert Rauschenberg. Now the museum, in conjunction with the National Gallery of Art, brings together some of the most exquisite examples of work produced at the famed West Hollywood shop, including Rauschenbergs 1967 print, Booster, a 6-foot-tall print that in its day was the largest art print ever made. Do not miss Oldenburgs pieces, which ruminate on the nature of Los Angeles.Through Jan. 2. 5905 Wilshire Blvd., Mid-Wilshire, Los Angeles, lacma.org.

Doug Aitken, Electric Earth, at the Museum of Contemporary Art. The L.A. artists first North American museum survey features an array of collage, photographic and video installation works from throughout his career  including the cinematic Song 1, from 2012, screening on a massive circular screen, and Electric Earth, the 1999 video installation that earned him the International Prize at the Venice Biennale.Through Jan. 15. Geffen Contemporary, 152 N. Central Ave., downtown Los Angeles, moca.org.

100 Days of Film and Performance, at the Hammer Museum. This four-and-a-half-month program will bring a series of screenings, performances, film and video to the museum  including a Hawaiian dance troupe (from New York), the gender-bendy Dynasty Handbag, performances inspired by William Faulkner and a street march that touches on the history of womens political power. Through Jan. 25. Check the schedule for events and times. 10899 Wilshire Blvd., Westwood, hammer.ucla.edu.

Non Fiction at the Underground Museum. An emotionally charged exhibition curated by the late Noah Davis, in collaboration with the Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles brings together works that explore issues of race and violence. This includes important works from MOCAs permanent collection by artists such as Robert Gober, Kara Walker, Henry Taylor and David Hammons. Through March. 3508 W. Washington Blvd., Arlington Heights, Los Angeles, theunderground-museum.org.

Islamic Art Now: Part 2 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Contemporary works from LACMAs permanent collection by 20 artists who live in or have roots in the Middle East look at questions of society, gender and identity. Runs indefinitely. 5905 Wilshire Blvd., Mid-Wilshire, lacma.org.

Loris Greaud, Sculpt, at the L.A. County Museum of Art. The entire theater has been taken over by the European artist for a film that only screens to one person at a time. The nonlinear picture follows a man about whom we know very little, who seems to be constantly developing the concept of what experiencing beauty, thought, or obsession can be, according the write-up. Times critic Christopher Knight describes it as pretentious and uninvolving. A good hate-watch, maybe? On view through a yet to be determined date. 5905 Wilshire Blvd., Mid-Wilshire, Los Angeles, lacma.org.

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Mark Wahlberg is no longer pursuing a 2014 request to be pardoned for assaults committed in Boston in April 1988, when he was 16.

A Massachusetts parole board spokesman told the Associated Press on Thursday that the 45-year-old actors petition has been closed after Wahlberg didnt answer to a letter asking if he wanted to keep it open.

The Deepwater Horizon star and executive producer told reporters at the Toronto International Film Festival on Tuesday that he regrets asking for the pardon but noted that some good did come out of it because he was able to meet one of the victims and apologize, the AP said.

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In his November 2014 petition, Wahlberg said he was deeply sorry for the assaults and had worked hard to become a role model.

See the most-read stories in Entertainment this hour >>

The father of four has said he was trying to steal beer when he punched Johnny Trinh in the eye after first hitting another Vietnamese man in the head with a large stick and hurling racial slurs. Wahlberg spent 45 days of a two-year sentence in prison for the felony.

Though it was reported that Trinh was blinded in one eye during the attack, the victim said in 2014 that hed lost the eye in a grenade explosion when he was with the South Vietnamese army in 1975.

He was young and reckless but I forgive him now, Trinh told the Daily Mail. Everyone deserves another chance.  I would like to see him get a pardon. He should not have the crime hanging over him any longer.

At the New York premiere of The Gambler in December 2014, Wahlberg told the Associated Press that he was seeking the pardon for multiple reasons but in no way, shape or form did he think his celebrity alone was a reason for it to be granted. Among the reasons: On the pardon application, he said he wanted to get a concessionaires license for Wahlburgers, the restaurant chain he owns with his brothers.

Deepwater Horizon, about the 2010 BP oil spill, will have its U.S. premiere Monday in New Orleans. It opens in U.S. theaters Sept. 30.

Follow Christie DZurilla on Twitter @theCDZ.

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The ongoing clash between activism and politics played out on the ice floes of Atlantic Canada is penetratingly  and unflinchingly  portrayed in Huntwatch, a chronicle of the efforts of the International Fund for Animal Welfare as personified by its soulful founder, Brian Davies.

Originally invited by the Canadian government back in the mid-60s to monitor seal-hunting practices off the coast of Newfoundland, the Welsh-born Davies would end up spending the rest of his life bearing witness to the wholesale slaughter of baby harp seals, determined to stop hunters, often struggling fishermen, in their inhumane tracks.

Among his attempts to get the word out long before social media was an option, the media-savvy Davies would fly groups of people, from airline attendants to Brigitte Bardot, out to view the carnage first-hand.

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As effectively demonstrated by director Brant Backlund, the efforts of the IFAW to bring international attention to the annual hunt didnt sit well with local politicians who over the years would raise quotas during times of economic hardship.

The Canadian government accused me of manipulating the media, which, of course, I was doing, Davies, now 78, explains in his calmly matter-of-fact, Anthony Hopkins-esque, tones.

Produced and funded by the IFAW, the Ryan Reynolds-narrated documentary (it also begins airing on Discovery next week), would obviously have to be considered propaganda in its own right.

Still, when taking in a disturbingly graphic sequence of a clearly grieving mother seal helplessly watching her skinned-alive baby being dragged away in the crimson-streaked snow, its hard to begrudge the agenda.

-------------

Huntwatch

Not rated

Running time: 1 hour, 28 minutes

Playing: Ahrya Fine Arts, Beverly Hills.

See the most-read stories in Entertainment this hour 
For his first film, 2013s The Dirties, which revolved around two high school friends making a film about the schools bullies that goes awry, Matt Johnson wanted to make it so authentic he enrolled in a high school and convinced students and teachers he was an actual student.

After The Dirties picked up the grand jury prize at the Slamdance Film Festival, the 31-year-old Toronto-based filmmaker and his crew thought about expanding the model they created for the first film and make a period documentary.

The end result is the clever found-footage conspiracy thriller Operation Avalanche, which premiered in January at Sundance and opened Friday at the Nuart Theater in West Los Angeles.

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The film is set during NASAs Apollo program in the 1960s. Johnson and Owen Williams plays nerdy CIA agents, aptly named Matt Johnson and Owen Williams, who go undercover as documentary filmmakers at NASA to investigate the possibility of a Russian mole at the space center. After they learn that the NASA wont make it to the moon by 1969, they convince the CIA they can shoot a fake moon landing.

 The trailer for Operation Avalanche.

And just as in the movie, Johnson and his small cast and crew were able to persuade the Johnson Space Center in Galveston, Texas to let them shoot there.

Inspired by Zelig and Forrest Gump, Johnson and his crew blend new footage they shot with historical clips from that era. And Johnson even interacts with Stanley Kubrick when the CIA gang visits Shepperton Studios when the legendary filmmaker was directing 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Johnson, who recently received a masters degree in film at York University in Toronto, chatted on the phone from his hometown this week.

It seemed awfully easy to for you and your crew to get permission from NASA to film there by telling them you were college students doing a documentary on the Apollo mission.

Well, I was a college student. This is my masters project.

But you didnt tell them it was a conspiracy film?

No, we didnt say that. I said I was making a movie about NASA in the 1960s, which is true. But the centerpiece of it was NASA not being able to make it to the moon  the CIA faking a moon landing. At the time we didnt even know if we were going to be possible to make this movie because we needed to get certain stuff from NASA.

Was the stuff you needed that historical footage from the Apollo program?

We needed them to [find] the film clips, which they did, which was really amazing. Right now that photographic department is closed at NASA, sadly. NASA is criminally underfunded. Our production company is the largest individual carrier of NASA archival footage in the world. Its actually kind of sad.

Besides going to NASA you also visited Shepperton Studios where Kubrick shot 2001: A Space Odyssey. Did you tell the officials at Shepperton what you were up to?

No. That was very different. Jared Raab, one of the [directors of photography], and I [were] going to England  The Dirties was being released and we went over [to promote] that movie. We took a train to Shepperton and thought we would just try to go on tour and take some pictures. But our tour guide never showed up. We just just took the visitor pass security handed us and just ran to get these shots  until security grabbed us and threw us out. We almost got in a lot of trouble. We were able to get away, claiming we were just Canadian students.

How did you achieve the vintage cinema verite 16-millimeter style of the film? Was it shot on 16 and then transferred to digital?

That was our first big challenge. We started shooting the color footage on 16 and then we started realizing that we were shooting so much footage  we were going through 10,000 feet a day. We realized we could get a film artist to [reprint digital footage] on 16mm. Conor Fisher used a lab and did a one-to-one exchange of every single frame of the film. It took him four months.

We did a full color grade on the digital and then our film artist did multiple prints on different film stocks to get different [looks]. We did physical damage. I took a piece of the movie, hung it on my bike and rode my bike around the university campus so that it would get all destroyed.

Even though you have lived your entire life in Toronto, you decided not to have Operation Avalanche premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival last fall, for Sundance this past January.

That was really important to me to screen at Sundance. Young filmmakers screening their own work in their own cities, you never get the reception that international filmmakers get, especially in Toronto. They promote outsiders, they dont just with Canadians. We just dont have the same celebrity culture around our arts. You have to have made it in the States before Canadians will acknowledge you, which is so sad.

So I have to ask: Since Operation Avalanche was your masters thesis, what grade did you get?

You know what? Its pass/fail. I passed. My professors were really happy with the film. They thought I was crazy at first, but in the end I think they were surprised I was able to do it.
The occasional Brooklyn or Inside Out notwithstanding, this has not been a great few years for the once-towering category of the movie tear-jerker. Blame it on irony, or a tendency toward the meta, or the simple fact that movies lately have been busy trying to get us to do a lot of other things besides cry. Whatever the reason, Kleenex shortages are not multiplexes main problem these days.

Yet at the cinematic barrage that is the Toronto International Film Festival over the past week, its been hard to ignore a sub-trend of sorts: There has been an awful lot of crying.

Were talking simple and unadulterated sobbing. Good, old-fashioned, take-out-the-tissues waterworks. Sometimes, even, red-eyed, blown-nose, head-angled-from-strangers bawling.

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FULL COVERAGE: Toronto Film Festival 

Three of the most high-profile  and, notably, best-received  fall movies screened at the festival traded openly in sentiment. Denis Villeneuves sci-fi-oriented Arrival follows Amy Adams linguist, encountering mysterious alien visitors as she remains haunted by the death of her daughter. It leads to an emotional wallop.

J.A. Bayonas A Monster Calls finds a young boy grappling with impending grief as his mother lay dying, his bereft feelings soothed by a magical tree  and creating an equally devastating coda.

And in Garth Davis dislocated-child tale Lion, an Indian boy is separated from his family and grows up in Australia, worrying and pining for the mother and brother he left behind. The ending filled tear ducts with more liquid than a Molson glass.

These movies teased and tantalized the most primal parts of ourselves, building crescendos on feelings, about love and mortality and all the rest that really gets to us. They did so unabashedly, asking us to take out the tissues, keep them out through the credits and, if we were with more professional or unknown companions, make beelines for the bathroom to hide it all after it ended. The one phrase Ive heard most at Toronto parties  well, besides you really think it can get an Oscar nomination?  was I totally ugly-cried. (Why no one ever beauty-cries is another matter.) Yep, the weepie is back.

Even the throwback musical La La Land, the most purely buoyant movie at this and many other festivals, struck its share of melancholic notes, including and especially at its end. When the lights came up, I couldnt help noticing, for all the mid-screening applause and humming along, more than a few red eyes and runny noses. Director Damien Chazelle summed up his intentions this way: I wanted to do a musical and ground it in real life with stuff that feels a little messier. And real life doesnt always live up to the subjects in the movies.

This is the part of a story where film journalists like myself would attribute this burst to a specific cultural factors  artists are reflecting on the state of the world and its inequalities so crying comes out in our films, etc. etc. But I think the reason were seeing a tear-jerker uptick is far simpler: a number of filmmakers have come back around to the idea that crying is a pretty potent reaction in a movie theater.

Cameron Bailey, the artistic director of the festival, gave that thought further shape. With such a crowded media landscape, with all of us bombarded by so many distractions, I think some filmmakers are looking for something that really penetrates, that can generate an emotional impact, he said when asked about the Toronto tear-jerkers.

Those filmmakers would be right. For all the ways weve come to disdain at least unearned sentiment, many people still love crying in a movie theater if the movie comes by it honestly  heck, on more than one occasion at this festival Ive found myself talking to people who said they loved a movie simply because it made them cry. Yet oddly we dont see those works often enough. I once asked Zach Braff, a director whos certainly not afraid to push emotional buttons, why this was, and he said it baffled him too.

Were living in a very cynical world, he said. I love to cry in a movie. I love the feeling I have when tears are streaming down my face and Ive just laughed. Thats my favorite experience.

Are we at the beginning of a new era? Its difficult to imagine that truly happening. This is, after all, hardly a full-on return to form, not compared with other times in film history. Over a 36-month span beginning in late 1979, for instance, audiences were fish-gutted by Kramer vs. Kramer, The Elephant Man, Ordinary People, On Golden Pond and Chariots of Fire, to name just a few. The idea that wed be entering a period, in volume or quality, to rival that one is naive. Studios, financiers and even some filmmakers are often too worried about making people walk out of the theater sad (when theyre making dramas at all) because of a fear of what that sadness will do to their films word of mouth.

At the very least, many dont want the crying to be a movies only notable aspect. Its worth noting that even among the trio of TIFF tissue-pullers, only one, Lion, comes purely in the tradition; the others are genre pieces as much as they are dramas. (Another movie, Barry Jenkins coming-of-age drama Moonlight, has a heartbreaking quality to it though is not explicitly a tear-jerker). I didnt want to do a sad film  I wanted to find the light at the end of the tunnel, Monster director Bayona said in an interview about this tiptoe.

And even if filmmakers wanted to crank out these films, they would face a bigger problem: Making us cry is not as easy as it used to be. Weve seen more such tricks in cinema and built up a resistance. Weve also been exposed to a lot more violence and sadness in the media, which has its own hardening effect.

Still, theres something noble about the effort. After all of these years of movie gambits, after so many different genres and so much postmodernism, the goal, and even litmus test, returns to what it was long ago: Did you walk out of the theater feeling moved to tears?

Pack the Kleenex. Its going to be a weepie few months.

See the most-read stories in Entertainment this hour 

On Twitter: @ZeitchikLAT

ALSO:

Taraji P. Henson brings tears to TIFF

Barry Jenkins Moonlight makes the case for quiet eloquence

Dev Patel: Its such a shame to compare Lion to Slumdog Millionaire

Exclusive Arrival interview: We talk to Denis Villeneuve, the director being compared to Christopher Nolan

Is it finally Amy Adams turn to win an Oscar?
Like a lovely young woman drunkenly flirting with a stranger in a bar, the first thing the new Amazon series Fleabag does is dare you to think that you know her.

This particular young woman is played by Phoebe Waller-Bridge, who also created the series. She introduces herself as she stands in her doorway awaiting a booty call. Speaking to the camera, she explains the events that led to this moment with the wry mix of self-mockery, resignation and defiance that we have come to recognize as the Modern Female Narrator.

Carrie Bradshaw, Ally McBeal, Meredith Grey, Mindy Lahiri  the list of female characters providing real-time, and often quite hilarious, running commentary of their own lives is endless. (And not confined to television; the first character Fleabag evokes is Bridget Jones, if Bridget were 20 years younger and a fan of Girls.)

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Phoebe Waller-Bridge at Amazons presentation at the TCA Summer Press Tour in August. (AFP / Getty Images )

Who decided that female characters must be either tightly wound or at destructively loose ends?

Fleabag next brings us along as she travels through London and a series of frank sexual and/or emotional encounters. A long and graphic joke about anal sex, a memory of masturbating to President Obama, a hilarious and disturbing moment when she unintentionally flashes the man to whom she has applied for a loan, a meeting with her hyper-tense sister Claire (Sian Clifford) are all accompanied by the voice inside her head made vocal.

The only thing harder than having to tell your super-high-powered, perfect, anorexic, rich, super-sister that youve run out of money, our heroine confides at one point, is having to ask her to bail you out.

Developed on stage as a one-woman show, Fleabag is instantly engaging but also, initially, a bit infuriating. Why, you wonder as Waller-Bridges wide eyes and admirable comedic timing sweep you along, do so many comedies about women require this soundtrack of self-loathing/aggrandizement? Who decided that female characters must be either tightly wound or at destructively loose ends? And when did a mercurial mix of courage and self-destruction, frankness and utter delusion  fueled, of course, by loads of boundary-less sex and lots of alcohol  become the standard definition of the young urban experience?

All of which just goes to show that you cant judge a show by its voice-over.

Your week-by-week guide to the best TV shows of the fall season 

As it rolls out its familiar setup, Fleabag becomes a small but shattering heartbreak of a comedy, unafraid to brazenly call out many familiar defensive mechanisms, including the trick of brazenly calling out familiar defense mechanisms.

Waller-Bridge leverages all the standard belated-coming-of-age tropes and more: Fleabags failing business is a cafe that she started with BFF Boo (Jenny Rainsford), who has just died. Claire has a high-powered job but a weird hound-dog of a husband (Brett Gelman) and many control issues. The two share an oblivious father (Bill Paterson), controlling stepmother (Olivia Colman) and an inability to properly grieve their dead mother.

But once set in play, each of these devices gets turned inside out  quickly (each episode is 30 minutes) and surreptitiously (the action, like Fleabags life, jumps from scene to scene), but with a clear eye for truth that often becomes, like all good comedy, quite devastating.

In her relationship with Claire, and especially her father, Fleabag runs up and down the multiple octaves of family life, the odd hysterical silences and sudden passionate eruptions that rise from the essential swirl of love and need and fear.

Our narrator may proudly wield a professional adolescent smirk as she predicts, or explains, the next disaster in her life, but Fleabag is not about coming of age. Its about coming to terms. With loss, with anger, with the imperfection of oneself and the limitations of others. With the fact that the voice in your head is often full of crap.

While her characters journey is the central one, Waller-Bridge has surrounded herself with a tremendous cast. One by one, in small but powerful moments, Rainsford, Clifford and especially Paterson turn caricatures into people, their unexpected dimensions obvious even to a young woman drowning in sorrow.

As they strip so must she, reminding us that there is no age to come to, no point in life when the heart is safe from itself. Instead, the biggest joke of the human comedy is that, as the poet once said, we are all wobbling naked, under our clothes and our cheeky personas.

Fleabag

Where: Amazon Video

When: Anytime starting Friday

Rating: TV-MA (may be unsuitable for children under the age of 17)

On Twitter: @marymacTV

ALSO

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When Adam Vanunu, founder and creative director of Los Angeles brand Cotton Citizen, opened his first boutique on hip Melrose Place last month, it was a long way from his start in the fashion industry.

At the opening, fashion insiders including stylist Maeve Reilly, model and designer Sami Miro and blogger Natasha Oakley mingled with L.A. designers Rob Garcia of En Noir and Lamar Taylor of XO in the jewel-box boutique with futuristic backlit alcoves and a single rack running the length of the store.

Every piece of the luxury casual wear line on display  the cropped hoodies and the sharply cut joggers, the slouchy tees and well-cut tank tops in mens and womens styles  was a particular shade of mint green.

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Vanunus obsession with color and all its permutations drives the line with its hand-dyeing and distressed effects that distinguish it from other brands as fashion increasingly turns to streetwear-inspired styles. (Prices range from about $80 for a T-shirt to $245 for a sweatshirt dress.)

Each season, Vanunu intends to introduce a handful of colors  as he did for this fall, with burgundy, rose and olive along with the mint green. So every few weeks, the concept-driven stores merchandise will turn, putting the spotlight on about 30 mens and womens pieces in a single hue. (Ongoing basics such as black, white and navy are available online.)

Black is a color, and white is a color, says the 27-year-old designer. But to really bring something to life and captivate an audience, you have to produce a color.

It can be just as simple as this T-shirt I am wearing, he adds, referring to his mottled but bright orange shirt  a preview of his upcoming holiday season palette. Its so vibrant and so rich. Its a trend color, but it can live beyond that season.

And Vanunu should know. A few days after the August opening, he was in a side conference room with built-in racks of samples far from Melrose Place. He was in a vast industrial tract in Willowbrook, about 20 miles south of his boutique.

He was sitting in the place where it all began: his familys sprawling factory, a dye house that specializes in coloring, distressing and finishing for premium denim brands such as J Brand that are made in L.A.

In one area of the factory, there were industrial washers for dyeing and, in another, enormous commercial dryers. On the second level of the building, jeans were being hand-sanded while hanging on inflated forms or individually distressed with the rips and fraying that each style demands.

The first time I came to the factory, Vanunu says, I was in a stroller. He grew up tagging along with his father, who owned the South Los Angeles factory that specialized in denim.

When I was finished with high school, I said to my father, I want to go to FIDM [the Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising]. I want to go to fashion school, Vanunu recalls. And he said, Nope. If you want to get involved, you get your hands dirty. Come over here, and you learn this business hands-on.

So he started at the bottom, running back and forth to the laundry. He learned how to work the machines, mix dyes and make the formulas. He also learned about sewing and construction.

After his fathers death, Vanunu, then 19, was tasked with keeping the factory going.

Vanunu started playing around with wash treatments for T-shirts about five years ago after his life stabilized. He was looking for something that was his own  something that wouldnt compete with the denim companies that were clients at the factory.

With an early assist from retailer Ron Robinson at Fred Segal, Vanunu found his footing and then went on to expand into a full designer collection. Ron Robinson still carries the line, which also is sold at Saks Fifth Avenue and American Rag.

Now, hes planning to roll out more concept stores and expand his colorful view into home furnishings next year. Recently he highlighted the factory setting, which has shaped his life and brand, in a series of advertising shots for fall that were featured on Cotton Citizens website.

I love it, Vanunu says. Even now, the initial samples we make for each collection, I physically make myself. When we find the silhouettes were working for, I go in and experiment with all the colors and make every single formula from scratch. I go in and run the machines myself. Still, to this day, its a very hands-on product.

image@latimes.com
Sizzling, savory and irresistible, bulgogi is usually steak  the words literal translation is fire meat sliced into ribbons, often marinated in soy, sugar, black pepper, garlic and sesame oil, then seared to a charry succulence on a griddle. Along with galbi and bibimbap, its surely the most popular dish in L.A.s many Korean restaurants, including fine bulgogi purveyors such as Parks, Soot Bull Jeep or Gwang Yang.

When not grilled table-side, few dishes are more theatrical. Its rushed from the kitchen on a red-hot griddle, sizzling, spitting, steaming on its tiny cast iron altar like an offering, leaving an umami vapor trail between tables  often as not, it is a dish you wear home, on your clothes. For several minutes, its too hot to eat, a state of limbo that only heightens the expectation for the first bite.

Most diners, either at Korean restaurants or at home  bulgogi is easily ordered as take-out or made in your own kitchen  wash down that first bite with often lackluster lagers such as Hite or OB. Theres soju, which in terms of food-pairing is like throwing gasoline on a brazier. Wine is almost certainly a better alternative. But which bottles?

See the most-read stories in Life & Style this hour >>

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Pairings with bulgogi come with a couple of hurdles. The first is that it can often be sweet, with sugar added to the marinade to offset the peppery heat. So this is an instance when the red-meat-with-red-wine dictum can be comfortably overturned, since several white wines would serve as a good foil.

These can be wines with a touch of sweetness in their own right. The right dry Riesling, from Alsace, from the Rheingau, from Washington State, will pair well, as would a not-so-dry Pinot Gris from Alsace or Oregon. Chenin Blanc, from the Loire Valley regions of Anjou, Montlouis and Vouvray, will also have the acid and the mineral resolve to go up against this fire meat. Certain orange wines will also have the stuffing, as would a sturdier variety of rose from Bandol, say, or maybe a dark Cerasuolo from the central Italian region of Abruzzo.

As for reds, the heat-and-sweet dictates of bulgogi eliminate anything excessively tannic, full-bodied or oaky. Instead, you want a red wine thats high in acid, low in tannin, firm but not astringent or drying on the palate, light but not exactly delicate.

Those strictures should point you to Barbera from the Piemonte, a Mencia from the Ribeira Sacra in Spain, or toothy Continental reds from Austria, Hungary, Slovenia and Croatia. These are wines you may not be familiar with  made with varieties like Plavac, Blaufrankisch, St. Laurent and Teran  but these are places whose cool climates largely prevent them from making tannic monsters. Instead, theyre known for reds with dark berry flavors and firm, high-acid detail  and they wont clash with the bulgogi.

And lets not leave out Lambrusco  the sparkling red wine from northern Italy justly renowned for its spectacular conjugality with challenging meat dishes. The wine is earthy and a bit funky when first poured, and most Lambruscos possess an inherent fruitiness that will mollify the heat and not get puckery. Theres an ever-growing number of very good dry Lambruscos on the market (mostly gone are the days of the sweet, cloying iterations), and theyll make you very happy alongside a sizzling plate of barbecue.

Here are six wines to uncork when you want to drink something other than beer or barley tea with your Korean barbecue. Call any restaurant before you bring in bottles of your own or order your bulgogi to go.

2014 Eroica Columbia Valley Riesling

Zippy and lean, with a lemony scent and flavors more given to apple, Eroica has enough give and breadth to offset both the sweet and the heat in food. About $18 at Wallys, Mission Wines and Woodland Hills Wine Co.

2014 Cirelli Cerasuolo dAbruzzo Rosato

Cerasuolo, roughly translated, means like a cherry, and this wines color resembles a pint of Montmorency cherries, with robust raspberry tones and a gripping firmness of texture. About $17 at Lou Wine Shop.

2014 Vietti Barbera dAsti Tre Vigne

A lean strawberry scent and soft peppery accents meld with plum and red fruit flavors in Viettis flagship Barbera; its a textbook high-acid red for braised meats. About $18 at Manhattan Fine Wines and Hi-Time Wine Cellars.

2011 Terzolo Istria Teran

An indigo grape of Croatia with a scent that reminds you slightly of consomme, Terans dark plum flavors turn precise and on point in the finish, with mouthwatering acidity. About $18 at the Wine House, Lou Wine Shop, Rosso Wine Shop and Venice Whole Foods.

2015 Algueira Mencia Ribeira Sacra

Attractive scents of fruit blossom give way to a grippy, granular suite of red cherry flavors. The texture is clean and invigorating, with a palate-cleansing mineral finish. About $16 at Wine House, Wine Exchange and Mission Wines.

2015 Fondo Bozzole Lambrusco Oltrepo Mantovano

This toothsome Lambrusco (the name, Incantabiss, means snake charmer) is purple-fruited and smoky with a dark mousse, or effervescence, and savory scent. Its dry, dark plum flavors have a seductive velvety texture thats charming indeed. About $17 at Domaine LA, Buzz Wine and Silverlake Wine Arts District.
A month after Amanda Knox was released from prison, a pair of rookie filmmakers flew to Seattle to meet her.

She had just spent nearly four years behind bars in Italy, accused of murdering a woman she shared a home with during a college exchange program. She and her onetime Italian boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito had been exonerated on appeal by a lack of DNA evidence implicating them in the crime.

Upon her return to Washington, paparazzi began to stalk her. On the nightly news, anchors questioned how she would capitalize on her newfound fame  might she join Dancing With the Stars or sell her life rights to a Hollywood director? Even though her name had been cleared, to many Americans, she was still Foxy Knoxy, a tabloid staple  or even worse, a wolf in sheeps clothing.

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So why, after being burned by the media, would she ever agree to be a part of a documentary about her ordeal? Brian McGinn and Rod Blackhurst knew it was a long shot. But they traveled to Seattle anyway, hopeful that Knox might hear them out.

They were young  McGinn is 31 now, Blackhurst, 35  and they thought that their age might make Knox more inclined to trust them. A mutual friend made the introduction, and Knox agreed to a meeting.

We just sat and listened, recalled Blackhurst. I think she just saw us as two young guys, and we werent the stereotypical people that were probably reaching out to her at the time. We didnt have any preconceived ideas about her or the case.

Still, it would take two more years for her to agree to take part in Amanda Knox, McGinn and Blackhursts documentary that had its premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival this week and debuts on Netflix on Sept. 30. And Knox wasnt the only subject the pair had to persuade to be in their movie. The film focuses on four individuals who were integral to the case: Knox, Sollecito, Italian prosecutor Giuliano Mignini and Nick Pisa, a journalist who covered the trial extensively for the Daily Mail.

In their interviews, all four look directly into the camera with a simple backdrop behind them. That was intentional, said the filmmakers, who wanted the audience to feel as if the subjects were speaking directly to them, sans distraction.

What is it that everyone really cares about? I think people love monsters.  Amanda Knox

Neither McGinn nor Blackhurst was particularly familiar with the ins and outs of the Knox saga before they began working on the documentary. After the duo met in line at a 2010 Nathaniel Rateliff concert in Echo Park  McGinn needed a ticket, Blackhurst and his wife had an extra  they began working together on a handful of Funny or Die videos starring Dave Franco. But they wanted to transition to long-form content, and in 2011 a friend of theirs suggested Knox might make for an interesting subject.

At the time, four years had passed since the killing of Meredith Kercher, and on the surface, it seemed there was little left to mine. Dozens of journalists had long been camped out in the small Italian town of Perugia, following the trials ins and outs and broadcasting even the most minute developments.

McGinn and Blackhurst decided to head to Italy anyway.

Once we got there and spent some time understanding who the people were and contextualizing things, we found that there was no clear understanding of what had happened, said Blackhurst, sharing a late breakfast with McGinn the morning after their premiere. The humanity at the heart of the story had been lost. People had forgotten that there were real people whose lives were at stake. People had forgotten that someone had lost their life. It had become these headlines. And we were fascinated by that.

While Amanda Knox gives a detailed ticktock of how the case unfolded  using prison recordings and court documents to ground the story in facts  it also raises questions about the medias role in turning the story into a global phenomenon. At the premiere on Friday, members of the crowd seemed audibly disgusted by Pisa, the Daily Mail journalist, who at one point in the film likens getting a front page byline to the buzz one gets after having sex.

And yet, he makes the point that it was consumers logging on to read the latest and the greatest  not that its a way to explain it away, but it is this strange circle that exists, said Blackhurst, who grew up in upstate New York.

Once Internet journalism started, headlines became so hooky that they almost created cliffhangers, added McGinn, a Palo Alto native. Instead of wanting the next episode of Law & Order, it was like, Can I get the next headline?

Its what the duo believes has driven the recent interest in the spate of true crime tales  from Adnan Syeds plight on Serial to Steven Averys story in Making a Murderer to the re-exploration of the O.J. Simpson and JonBenet Ramsey cases.

We use these people up, we spit em out and people move on to the next thing, said Blackhurst. Its lost that something tragic happened  youve gone ahead and subjected all these people to your judgments, and theyve suffered now too for it.

Knox, for one, seems deeply affected by the ordeal she faced in Italy. I really thought that I was going to be OK, she says at one point in the film. But I wasnt the same person to come back to Seattle.

But her life now, at age 29, is a bit of a mystery. The documentary gives only a glimpse of Knoxs day-to-day in Seattle: Cameras trail her briefly as she returns home with groceries, heading into the kitchen to knead some meatballs for dinner. Three cats wander in and out of the room.

Knox traveled here this week for the films premiere, though Netflix did not make her available for any interviews. At the screening, McGinn and Blackhurst noted her attendance, though she did not take part in the question-and-answer session following the film.

At the airport on her way to the festival, paparazzi took photos of her and her boyfriend. Its something, she says in the film, that still bothers her  being gawked at in public.

What is it that everyone really cares about? she questions. I think people love monsters. And so when they get the chance, they want to see them. Its people projecting their fears. They want the reassurance that they know who the bad people are, and its not them. So maybe thats what it is: Were all afraid, and fear makes people crazy.

amy.kaufman@latimes.com

Follow me on Twitter @AmyKinLA
Two big events hit the presidential campaign this week, and they provide a test case of what actually matters for election outcomes.

On Sunday, Hillary Clinton was caught on video nearly collapsing as she tried to get into a van. She then had to admit she had hidden a pneumonia diagnosis for two days, hoping she could power through. As Mark Barabak noted, the incident amplified the concerns that many voters have had about Clintons penchant for secrecy to the point of evasiveness.

On Tuesday, the Census Bureau announced that average incomes had risen faster last year than at any time since the Census started measuring incomes.

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Which will have a bigger effect?

Good afternoon, Im David Lauter, Washington bureau chief. Welcome to the Friday edition of our Essential Politics newsletter, in which we look at the events of the week in the presidential campaign and highlight some particularly insightful stories.

CLINTON HITS A SKID

Political science would say that the rapid improvement of incomes after years of stagnation will have the greater impact: Voters respond to economic conditions more than almost anything else, years of research has shown.

Campaign practice, however, would bet on those images of Clintons knees buckling. The president may no longer be the single-combat warrior of the Cold War  the image that Tom Wolfe coined in The Right Stuff. But visible signs of weakness remain a liability for anyone who aspires to the Oval Office.

In the short term, its been no contest. This past week has been Clintons worst on the campaign since the Donald Trumps nominating convention, judging by both national polls and those in battleground states.

In addition to the health controversy, Clinton had to apologize for calling half of Trumps supporters deplorables. Republicans immediately seized on the deplorables remark as a campaign theme, although it remains to be seen whether it will have the kind of impact that they hope, as Seema Mehta explained.

By midweek, what had seemed a solid Clinton lead over Trump had grown much more tenuous.

But its important to keep in mind how quickly news events can fade from public attention.

As the week progressed, Trump and Clinton both released some medical details, but as Noah Bierman and Evan Halper noted, the nature of the releases drew more questions.

By Friday, the campaign discourse on cable television already had moved on from health to whether Trump would disavow or apologize for years of claims that President Obama wasnt born in the U.S.

For the next week, the campaign will be dominated by the run-up to the first televised debate between the two candidates. By the time they take the stage, everything that has happened so far may fade into the background.

The one thing that is clear is how high the stakes will be for that debate.

We will be tracking all of it, so keep up with the news over the weekend on Trail Guide.

THE POLARIZED ELECTORATE

Part of the reason that controversies such as those weve seen this past week usually have a limited impact is that so few voters are truly up for grabs.

A couple of decades ago, that was less true. The U.S. once had far more swing voters than it has now. But for years, the trend has been toward ever-greater voter polarization. Now, as the nonpartisan Pew Research Centers data demonstrates, Democratic and Republican voters are further apart than theyve been in a generation.

For candidates, that puts a priority on mobilizing their core supporters  the base, as political consultants say. One way debates have an impact on the election is by mobilizing  or discouraging  those supporters.

Throughout the campaign, Trump has had trouble consolidating his base. He gets the support of more than 80% of Republicans in polls but has yet to reach the 90% level that Mitt Romney achieved.

As for Clinton, she does pretty well with most of the Democratic base but continues to have a lot of trouble with young people, as our poll this week of California voters showed. As Cathleen Decker wrote, its not that young voters like Trump  he actually comes in third place in several polls of millennial-generation voters  but they continue to flirt with third-party candidates.

Clinton has plans to get millennials to vote, as Chris Megerian wrote. But a big part of the effort will rely on her surrogates, from Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, who campaigned for her in Ohio in recent days, to Obama, who brought tough words about Trump to an audience in Philadelphia.

Ultimately, the Clinton campaign hopes that its superior organization will turn out Democratic voters in a way that Trumps campaign cannot match. Nevada is a test site, for that strategy, Barabak reported. It pits Clintons huge organizational edge against the enthusiasm of Trumps supporters.

POLICY? YES, THERES THAT TOO

Clinton and Trump disagree about nearly every major issue facing the country. This past week, several of those issues have come into focus.

Trump set out his economic plan but left many questions unanswered, as Bierman and Don Lee wrote. Trump also outlined a child care plan, saying his daughter, Ivanka, had insisted on it.

Overall, the two candidates have very different approaches to policy, Noam Levey and Mike Memoli, reported. Clinton has enough policy to fill a book, Trump, not so much. She thinks it matters a lot; he doesnt.

SELLING TRUMP TO LATINOS AND SOME OTHER GREAT READS

Helen Aguirre Ferre may have the toughest job in American politics. As the Republican National Committees chief of Hispanic communications, her job is to sell Trump to Latino voters. Bierman brings us her story.

Lisa Mascaro looks at how Trumps language is affecting political discourse. Believe me, its huge.

DONT FORGET THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE

As our interactive electoral map shows, Clinton currently leads in enough states to secure the White House. But if the race tightens further, some of those states could begin to change.

Winning requires 270 electoral votes. How to get there? Weve updated the map with our best estimates. Now you get to play political strategist and try out as many scenarios as you like.

FOLLOW OUR TRACKING POLL

The USC Dornsife/LA Times tracking poll has been tracing Trumps and Clintons trajectories since early summer. The poll shows a better outcome for Trump than many other surveys. Why is it different? Here are several of the reasons. and heres what the poll tells us about Trumps potential path forward.

QUESTIONS ABOUT TRUMP, CLINTON? WEVE GOT ANSWERS

Where they stand on issues, what theyve done in their lives, their successes, their failures, what their presidencies might look like: Weve been writing about Clinton and Trump for years, and weve pulled the best of that content together to make finding what you want to know easier. So check out All Things Trump and All Things Clinton.

LOGISTICS

If you like this newsletter, tell your friends to sign up.

That wraps up this week. My colleague Christina Bellantoni will be back Monday with the weekday edition of Essential Politics. Until then, keep track of all the developments in the 2016 campaign with our Trail Guide, at our Politics page and on Twitter @latimespolitics.

Send your comments, suggestions and news tips to politics@latimes.com.
Outside a synagogue on Pico Boulevard, home to the independent charter City High School, signs beckoned families to join: Now Enrolling! 9th and 10th grade.

But on Friday morning, the classrooms were mostly empty. Instead, the blue chairs on which students sat for the last month were arranged in a circle outside on the courtyards cracked asphalt. Parents, students and teachers passed around a palm-sized stuffed lion and mourned the loss of their school, just a month into its second year.

Its like a funeral, said Tiffany Bowen, whose son Sudan was in 10th grade. You know how I feel? You know on the iPhone, theres an emoji with a bandage on its head? Thats me.

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The charter schools board of directors voted Monday evening to close the high school, citing financial and facilities problems. L.A. School Report first reported the news Thursday.

Mother Tiffany Bowen says she is so attached to the school she is already planning a get-together for the parents. (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times )

The shutdown left City Highs 116 students scrambling to make other arrangements. As of Friday morning, all but five to 10 students had other options, including other independent charters and campuses run by the Los Angeles Unified School District, Principal Sheri Werner said.

The school closing is the latest high-drama episode for an organization that has won praise for its academic strength but generated controversy within the local community.

The high school was part of City Charter Schools, a network that includes an elementary school and a middle school. City High opened last year on the Los Angeles High School campus with about 60 ninth-grade students, Executive Director Valerie Braimah said The plan was to add a grade each year, building up to 12th grade.

But, this year, City High was displaced by a new all-girls L.A. Unified-run school.

So the school district offered City High space at Dorsey High School in the Baldwin Hills-Crenshaw area, but the charter school turned it down.

It was too far away. They didnt offer us enough classrooms, Braimah said. And there was a lot ofopposition in the community at Dorsey to us being there.

The charter turned instead to rented space in a synagogue on Pico Boulevard. The added costs meant that about 40 more students were needed to stay afloat, Braimah said.

Werner said she expected 150 students, but about 25 of those who enrolled simply didnt show up.

Families and teachers share their feelings about City High School closing. (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times )

And the facilities had problems, including the lack of a working air conditioning, which would take weeks, and be costly, to fix, Braimah said.

Sarit Rogers, a parent and yoga teacher at City High, said some Westside parents had a problem sending their kids east to L.A. High in Mid-Wilshire, as well as south to Dorsey. They preferred a Westside location.

City High served a diverse student body, but that was less true of Citys middle school, located on the Westside, from which the high school had expected to build its enrollment. Last year the charters middle school was 57% white, among those who reported an ethnicity (and a third declined to do so). In its inaugural year, the high school was about 28% white.

In contrast, L.A. High was 78% Latino and about 13% black last year, and Dorsey was 45% Latino and 52% black.

Rogers said she didnt think the resistance to Dorsey was racially motivated, but Dorsey is below the 10 Freeway  in a neighborhood that some parents associated with crime and poverty.

The Westside families that were connected to City Middle...were attached to their idea of everything having to be on the Westside, Rogers said. It felt like it became about entitlement and privilege.

L.A. High is in the heart of the area that City had promised to serve when it asked the school district to approve its petition to open. And Dorsey isnt far from it. Citys middle school is outside the targeted Zip codes, although it is well-situated for the Westside families who helped start the charter network.

Students Zoe Miles, 14, left, and Pearl Green, 15, appear somber as they mark the last day at City High School. (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times )

Critics have long accused City Charter of concealing its real role as a school founded for and by prosperous Westside parents. These critics included parents at the district-operated Emerson Middle School, which also is on the Westside.

Those parents were trying to revive Emerson as a strong neighborhood campus and resented that City siphoned Emerson students, who were outside Citys target area.

In 2015, L.A. Unified staffers caused an uproar when they proposed putting City Charters new high school into underused classroom space at Emerson. Within a week, Emerson parents gathered 330 signatures for an anti-City petition. Community groups joined their cause.

L.A. Unified eventually withdrew the offer, saying the school couldnt spare the space.

Citys leaders have insisted that increasing diversity remains a top priority.

City High still was technically open this week, and some students showed up, though little instruction took place. On Thursday, those who came were bused to other area schools for tours.

L.A. Unified assembled a transition team for students after City High informed the district on Tuesday that the school was ceasing operations, spokeswoman Shannon Haber said in an email Thursday.

We will continue to monitor this situation closely, Haber said.

The closure also leaves teachers in the lurch. They will receive severance through the end of October and school leaders are trying to help them find new jobs.

I have a family, and Im the main breadwinner, science teacher Sara Laimon Luke said. I was planning on teaching about macro-molecules today  not looking for a new job.

Reach Sonali Kohli at Sonali.Kohli@latimes.com or on Twitter @Sonali_Kohli.

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UPDATES:

7:35 p.m. Sept. 16: This article was updated with additional details.

This article was originally published at 9:50 p.m. Sept. 15.
The retired LAPD sergeant who leaked a recording of his controversial stop of Django Unchained actress Daniele Watts filed a lawsuit Thursday against the Los Angeles Ethics Commission to block the public disclosure of his and other police officers personnel records.

Retired Sgt. Jim Parker is seeking a court order to prevent an administrative law judge and the Ethics Commission from holding a public hearing this month over the commissions misconduct allegations against him, according to the lawsuit filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

The Ethics Commission formally accused Parker last year of misusing his position and disclosing confidential information by giving TMZ the recording of his encounter with Watts, according to the lawsuit.

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Parker contends in court papers that at the hearing slated for Sept. 26, he would need to introduce his personnel records in order to adequately defend himself.

He also contends that the commissions enforcement director wants to introduce a list of all LAPD employees, including officers, who participated in an online Ethics Commission training and their test results. The lawsuit argues that making such peace officer personnel records public would violate the Penal Code.

The L.A. city attorneys office and the Ethics Commission could not be reached for comment.

Administrative Law Judge Samuel D. Reyes, who is named in the lawsuit and is convening the hearing later this month, also could not be reached for comment. In June, Reyes denied Parkers motion to dismiss the commissions accusation.

On Sept. 11, 2014, Parker responded to a report of a couple having sex in a parked car in Studio City and found Watts and her boyfriend, Brian James Lucas. The pair matched the description of the couple in the initial report, police said.

The police officer asked them for identification. Lucas provided his identification but Watts refused and walked away, police have said. Other officers handcuffed her but the actress was released when Lucas gave authorities her identification.

Afterward, both Watts and Lucas gave a public account of their brief detention, sparking outrage and criticism amid a national debate over the treatment of minorities by law enforcement.

On Facebook, Lucas claimed that police acted as if the pair had engaged in prostitution because he is white and Watts is black.

In a recording first leaked to TMZ, which Parker later admitted he had submitted to the media outlet, the sergeant can be heard asking for Watts identification. She responds by questioning whether she was being stopped because she was black.

Who brought up the race card? Parker said.

Im bringing it up, she said.

I said nothing about you being black, Parker said during the exchange.

Parker has said he had no plans to arrest either Lucas or Watts. The couple ultimately pleaded no contest to a charge of disturbing the peace, and were ordered to write a letter apologizing to Parker. The city attorneys office dismissed lewd conduct charges against them as part of the plea deal.

Parker has said that he leaked the recording to quell the escalating public controversy and defend his and the LAPDs reputation.

The LAPD opened an internal affairs inquiry and accused Parker of insubordination for speaking to the media without permission. He retired in June 2015, ending a 26-year career with the department.

Parkers attorney, Larry Hanna, has previously told The Times that the Ethics Commissions charges were unprecedented and called the commission very vindictive.

The Los Angeles Police Protective League, the union representing the LAPDs rank-and-file officers, joined Parker in filing the lawsuit.

Times staff writer James Queally contributed to this report.

matt.hamilton@latimes.com

Twitter: @MattHjourno

kate.mather@latimes.com

Twitter: @katemather
An hours-long standoff in the darkness of the high desert came to a novel end when Los Angeles County sheriffs deputies used a robot to stealthily snatch a rifle from an attempted murder suspect, authorities said Thursday.

Officials said the use of the robot to disarm a violent suspect was unprecedented for the Sheriffs Department, and comes as law enforcement agencies increasingly rely on military-grade technology to reduce the risk of injury during confrontations with civilians.

The robot was a game changer here, said Capt. Jack Ewell, a tactical expert with the Sheriffs Department  the largest sheriffs department in the nation. We didnt have to risk a deputys life to disarm a very violent man.

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It began late in the evening of Sept. 8, when deputies in Lancaster were pursuing a man suspected of trying to kill one person and robbing two others.

The suspect, Brock Ray Bunge, 51, fled into a dark, remote field in the Antelope Valley. A sheriffs helicopter eventually tracked him down to a dirt berm, where he holed up surrounded by shrubbery and wire fencing.

Deputies ordered Bunge to surrender several times but he refused. A sheriffs SWAT team arrived with armored vehicles and tried to coax him to surrender for more than six hours.

Eventually, officials deployed the robot to gain a closer view of Bunges hideout. The camera showed him on his stomach, with his rifle at his feet, Ewell said.

To seize the firearm, they hatched a plan that relied on distractions. Deputies in an armored vehicle approached to the front of Bunge, yelling at him through a public address system to surrender. A helicopter whirred overhead.

From behind, the olive-colored robot approached and extended its claw into Bunges hideout.

The robot was able to move up and grab the gun without him noticing, Ewell said. He never knew it happened.

Deputies quickly reversed the robot and recovered the gun. Then, they sent the device back to the berm and had the robot grab the wire fencing, exposing Bunges hiding spot.

He only realized the gun was gone when the robot returned to pull down the wire, Ewell said.

Bunge surrendered immediately.

The Andros robot cost about $300,000, and Ewell said the department typically uses the device for bomb disposal. Increasingly, however, the agency is using the robot during encounters with armed suspects.

When it saves lives, it is more than worth it, he said.

During the hours-long standoff with Micah Johnson, the killer of five police officers this summer in downtown Dallas, police relied on a small, remote-controlled robot to ferry an explosive device close to the gunman.

Police detonated the device, killing 25-year-old Johnson.

We saw no other option but to use our bomb robot, Police Chief David Brown said at a news conference. Other options would have exposed our officers to grave danger.

Last year, sheriffs deputies used a robot during a 22-hour standoff with a woman in Woodland Hills. She twice shot at a police robot that approached her, and eventually crawled under her home. SWAT deputies arrested her after pulling her out.

In April, a standoff with a barricaded man near the state Capitol Building in Sacramento saw police use a robot while attempting to contact the suspect in his car.

After Bunge was taken into custody, the Los Angeles County district attorneys office filed felony charges against him including attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon, vandalism, robbery and making criminal threats.

He pleaded not guilty to the charges during a court appearance Tuesday and is being held in county jail in lieu of $1.575 million bond, according to court records.

matt.hamilton@latimes.com

Twitter: @MattHjourno.

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State regulators want to leave more water for fish and wildlife in the heavily tapped tributaries of the San Joaquin River, setting the stage for another bruising California water fight.

The proposal to keep more water flowing in the Merced, Tuolumne and Stanislaus rivers could spread the pain caused by environmentally related water cuts to irrigation districts and cities that have largely escaped them, thanks to their location and seniority in the hierarchy by which the state allocates water rights.

Officials with a stake in those rivers water came out swinging Thursday within hours of the release of new proposed flow standards.

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Our community has never faced a threat of this proportion, proclaimed a statement from the more than century-old Modesto and Turlock irrigation districts, which called the draft standards an uncompromising, misguided plan that would steal the regions livelihood.

The proposal by the State Water Resources Control Board focuses on major Sierra Nevada-fed rivers that much of the time lose 60% or 70% of their natural flow to dams and diversions. This water helps quench San Franciscos thirst and waters crops on the east side of the San Joaquin Valley. And its diversion devastates populations of salmon and other native fish.

The cost to species has been enormous  We cant ignore the flow needs anymore, water board Chairwoman Felicia Marcus said.

The draft plan, which could be revised after public hearings and comments, sets February through June flow standards of 30% to 50% of the water that would naturally course down the river beds if there were no reservoirs or diversions. An initial requirement of 40% could vary within that range depending on what other measures water users take to improve fish conditions.

Flow alone is not the answer, said Les Grober, deputy director of the boards division of water rights.

Other harmful factors, such as loss of habitat, predation by nonnative species and high river temperatures could be alleviated by restoration programs and different water management practices, board officials said.

Acknowledging the potential losses to irrigation districts and cities that depend on the tributaries for much of their supplies, the board is encouraging users to come up with voluntary plans to boost salmon populations and keep the flow requirements in the lower range.

The 40% standard is greater than an earlier board proposal but significantly less than the 60% recommended for fishery protection in a 2010 board report.

That number did not take into account nonenvironmental needs, which board officials said it is their duty to consider.

Marcus called the plan an attempt at balancing competing interests -- to share the river with each other and with nature.

The tributary proposal is just one part of a major update of water quality standards for the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and its sprawling watershed. The agency will also develop new flow requirements for the Sacramento River and for outflow from the delta to the sea  steps that will also be controversial.

We are long overdue for this tune-up and we need to act, Marcus said.

While the Oakdale and South San Joaquin irrigation districts condemned the flow proposal as the worst kind of government overreach, a fishing group called it a historic step to right a wrong.

Leaving a little bit more water in the San Joaquin River and its tributaries is absolutely benefiting humans since that water will translate into more salmon fishing and salmon for people to eat, said John McManus, executive director of the Golden Gate Salmon Assn.

Doug Obegi, a staff attorney with the environmental group Natural Resources Defense Council, said the 40% standard falls short of what is needed to build sustainable fish populations in the heavily drained rivers.

Though diverters with senior water rights are likely to challenge the boards authority to make them leave more water in the rivers, Obegi noted that the courts have upheld the boards power to protect public resources.

Its not a legal question, he added. Its a political question.

Holders of senior water rights in the delta watershed have had to take steps to protect native fish, such as screening river intakes or altering diversion schedules. But they have been generally immune to the sometimes significant environmental cuts imposed on southbound delta deliveries to the western San Joaquin Valley and Southern California.

This is the first time San Francisco is potentially going to be on the hook to boost river flow, Obegi said.

bettina.boxall@latimes.com

Twitter: @boxall

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A man went on a rampage across Venturas Main Street using perhaps the most unlikely of weapons Thursday, after police say he allegedly broke into the gift shop of a historic Spanish mission and attacked pedestrians with stolen crucifixes.

Calls began flooding into the dispatch center about 6 a.m., with reports of a person out of control in the 200 block of East Main Street downtown, police said.

Witnesses said the man, later identified as 35-year-old Forrest Brantley, broke into the San Buenaventura Mission, founded in 1782, stole two crucifixes and headed outside.

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He then allegedly tried to rob someone of their cell phone in the mission parking lot but was denied, thwacked the person with a crucifix and headed east.

Two more people who came across Brantley were also attacked, police said.

Then Brantley spotted a 75-year-old man sitting in his vehicle, smashed open the window and hit the man in the face so hard he had to be hospitalized, police said.

But his tear across downtown wasnt finished, authorities said: Brantley allegedly shattered the window of a thrift shop and stole a bicycle, then rode east to the next block.

By this time he had gathered a following of witnesses who were calling police. He hit yet another person with a crucifix and was arrested about four blocks later when he reached Chestnut Street, police said.

Brantley was booked on suspicion of three counts of attempted robbery, two counts each of commercial burglary and vandalism, and one count each of assault with a deadly weapon and elder abuse.

Joseph.serna@latimes.com

For breaking California news, follow @JosephSerna on Twitter.
Ammon Bundy showed up for court this week wearing what he usually wears these days  blue jail scrubs.

Mr. Bundy, said his attorney, J. Morgan Philpot, desires to appear as he is, a political prisoner not free to dress as if presumed innocent.

Bundy, among seven defendants facing conspiracy charges for the takeover of a federal bird sanctuary, also complained before the start of the Thursday session that hed been molested like an animal at the county jail, where hes locked up during the trial. Judge Anna Brown asked if his attire was his choice  or did someone in the slammer make off with his suit?

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No comment, said Bundy.

Outside, flag-waving supporters, some in boots and cowboy hats, marched around the courthouse, in part hoping jurors might see one of their signs stating Google: jury nullification. Thats the legally permissible act of finding guilty defendants not guilty in the belief the law itself is wrong.

For their soapbox, the dozen demonstrators have staked out a park across the street where they sometimes parade their livestock. On Sunday, two riders raced their galloping horses along the sidewalk for a block, startling pedestrians.

Also on Thursday, Matthew Thomas Mglej, 27, was arrested by Homeland Security officers as he walked near the courthouse carrying an unloaded rifle hidden in a towel. His intent was unknown. Mglej had been arrested near the courthouse two years ago, too, for playing the violin  naked.

Welcome to another day of liberty and justice for all, Portlandia edition.

Galloping horses aside, the trial of the anti-government protesters who claimed ownership of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge for 41 days hasnt yet turned into the full-blown circus some expect it to become.

But the first week of testimony has achieved at least sideshow status, with a cast of rural-West characters, legal oddities, and courtroom humor, intended or not  a harbinger, perhaps, of what is estimated to be two months of intensifying performance art.

Those on trial are part of a group calling themselves Citizens for Constitutional Freedom, though theyve been mocked on the Internet as Yall Qaeda. They tend to come from the wide open spaces of Nevada, Utah, Arizona and Idaho, and some on social media have not been kind to their cause. Typical is a staged photo on Twitter showing how to trap one of them: an open cage of sorts, with a case of beer inside as bait.

The federal trial, of course, is an otherwise serious proceeding. Prison sentences of up to six years await those found guilty of conspiring to impede federal employees, who prosecutors say were forced by the armed invaders to leave or stay away from the 187,000-acre refuge in southeast Oregon.

Led by Ammon Bundy, 41, and Ryan Bundy, 43, sons of Cliven Bundy  the cantankerous Nevada rancher and de facto leader of the Wests land-use rights movement  the self-described patriots held the fort from Jan. 2 to Feb. 11.

One protester, Arizona rancher Robert LaVoy Finicum, 54, was shot and killed Jan. 26 by Oregon state police while attempting to evade arrest. In the end, 26 occupiers were charged with federal violations; 11 have pleaded guilty and eight others are slated for trial here in 2017.

Federal prosecutors are laying out their case in the packed ninth-floor courtroom of the Mark O. Hatfield Federal Courthouse (a well-attended overflow court on the 13th floor has a live video feed).

The defendants and their attorneys are corralled into seven tight rows of small tables with microphones and computer screens in the remodeled courtroom, where they chat a lot. Brown has admonished those in the back of the room to hold down the conversations after jurors complained the buzz interrupted their concentration.

Dave Ward, sheriff of Harney County, where the refuge is located, said he felt right at home in the courtroom. His office in Burns is about the size of this witness box.

The refuge squatters easily outnumbered his force  a squad of four deputies and, on a good day, maybe two jailers.

Judge Brown, a Clinton nominee, is often smiling and patient, giving those new to courtrooms and the law room for error. We all make mistakes, she has had to say more than once.

But she also told defendant Shawna Cox not to take screwball positions while acting as her own attorney. That was after Cox, 59, from Utah, countersued the government for damages from the works of the devil, seeking in excess of $666,666,666,666.66.

Protesters at the trial of seven who occupied a federal wildlife reserve recall one occupier who was killed by authorities. (Don Ryan / Associated Press )

Brown interrupted Cox several times during her opening remarks when she spoke of personal and religious beliefs. If you dont get to the Malheur issues, the judge said, youre going to have to sit down.

Brown was not impressed, either, when Ryan Bundy, also representing himself, tried to hand out copies of the Pocket Constitution to jury members (she did allow him to file one as an exhibit).

In his opening remarks, he quoted from the Declaration of Independence and said the takeover goal was to promote liberty. Earlier, he filed a motion declaring himself a sovereign citizen of the Bundy society and an idiot of the Legal Society, asking Brown to agree he was not subject to U.S. law. Motion denied.

Ryan Bundy this week filed a motion asking Brown to recuse herself, apparently because she keeps ruling against him. She ruled against him.

One day the judge and Ryan Bundy had the courtroom laughing when the attorney/defendant got up to say he backed his brothers wardrobe protest.

Do you wish to change clothes too? the judge asked.

He was fine with his suit for now, an amused Bundy answered.

Anderson is a special correspondent.

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With Snowden set to open, House panel calls former NSA contractor a serial exaggerator and fabricator
Edward Snowden exaggerated his resume, stole test answers and failed training on U.S. surveillance law before he copied an estimated 1.5 million classified documents from the National Security Agency, according to a summary of a House Intelligence Committee report released Thursday.

The committee unanimously adopted the investigative report a day before Oliver Stones Snowden premieres in movie theaters. The film apparently portrays the former NSA contractor as a heroic whistle-blower.

Civil liberties advocates have launched a national publicity campaign calling on President Obama to pardon Snowden, who has been accused of espionage, before he leaves office.

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Committee members sent a bipartisan letter to Obama urging him not to pardon Snowden.

The House report provides new details about Snowdens background, and calls into question his self-declared motivations and his work at the NSA before he fled to China and then Russia, where he now lives.

It describes him as a serial exaggerator and fabricator.

Contrary to Snowdens self-portrayal as a principled whistle-blower, the committee said in a statement, he was a disgruntled employee who had frequent conflicts with his managers and was reprimanded shortly before he began downloading the trove of NSA documents.

Release of the digital documents to media groups in 2013 did severe damage to U.S. national security, compromising the intelligence communitys anti-terror efforts and endangering the security of the American people as well as active-duty U.S. troops, the committee said.

The release also led to a public debate about U.S. intelligence powers, and new restrictions on how far the NSA can go in surveillance of U.S. citizens.

Committee members said their two-year investigation found most of the files Snowden took had no civil liberties concerns, but instead revealed spying programs against adversaries and allied governments.

Edward Snowden is no hero  hes a traitor who willfully betrayed his colleagues and his country, Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Tulare), the committee chairman, said in a statement. In light of his long list of exaggerations and outright fabrications detailed in this report, no one should take him at his word.

Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Burbank), ranking member of the committee, said the investigation found that Snowdens claims that he acted to defend Americans privacy were self serving and false and that he did profound damage to national security.

While those disclosures did spark a useful public debate, the collateral damage has been extraordinary, Schiff said.

Snowden disputed how he was characterized by the committee, writing on Twitter that Congress spent two years writing a report to discourage you from going to see Stones film.

Their report is so artlessly distorted that it would be amusing if it werent such a serious act of bad faith, Snowden wrote.

The 36-page investigative report remains classified, but a three-page summary released by the committee shows that Snowden failed an internal training for NSA employees on Section 702 of surveillance law, which targets foreign Internet traffic.

Part of that training, lawmakers concluded, included privacy provisions in place to protect the rights of U.S. citizens from data collected inadvertently while the NSA vacuumed up online data.

After reviewing Snowdens employment records, the panel found he had engaged in what the summary called a pattern of intentional lying.

Snowden obtained new positions at NSA by exaggerating his resume and stealing the answers to an employment test, the summary states.

He claimed to have left [Army] basic training because of broken legs when in fact he washed out because of shin splints, it says. He claimed to have obtained a high school degree equivalent when in fact he never did. He claimed to have worked for the CIA as a senior advisor, which was a gross exaggeration of his entry-level duties as a computer technician. He also doctored his performance evaluations and obtained new positions at NSA by exaggerating his resume and stealing the answers to an employment test.

Snowden has lived openly as a fugitive in Russia since June 2013, frequently giving interviews and appearing at conferences via video hookups.

Intelligence officials have said that material he leaked helped Russia and China protect themselves from U.S. surveillance, and taught terrorist groups such as Islamic State to better hide their tracks.

The House report is based on hundreds of secret documents and dozens of briefings with intelligence officials.

The committee concluded that Snowden is not a whistle-blower because he did not try to raise his civil liberties concerns through official channels or with Congress, and most of the data he stole from NSA computers was not related to privacy concerns.

The report does not outline specific damage to national security but lawmakers said the disclosures exacerbated and accelerated existing trends in the use of encrypted messages by adversaries and terrorist groups.

Lawmakers also expressed concern that intelligence officials have not done enough to prevent future thefts. The Department of Defense has reviewed all 1.5 million documents Snowden removed, but the intelligence community has not conducted such a comprehensive review.

The government has spent hundreds of millions of dollars and will eventually spend billions to mitigate the damage caused by the leaks, the committee concluded.

The American Civil Liberties Union, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and other organizations have urged Obama to pardon Snowden.

It is indisputable that our democracy is better off thanks to Snowden, and its precisely for cases like his that the pardon power exists, ACLU Director Anthony D. Romero said in a statement. President Obama should use this power for good instead of leaving an American whistle-blower stranded in exile.

brian.bennett@latimes.com

Follow me @ByBrianBennett on Twitter

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UPDATES:

4:50 p.m.: This article was updated with a comment by Snowden.

This article was originally published at 4:30 p.m.
Clinton: You dont talk about ISIS with a big grin on your face

Hillary Clinton on Friday slapped at a Republican critique of her lack of smile during a national security forum.

The other night I was on a show being asked about ISIS and Iran and I was serious. These are important issues that the country needs to talk about and the Republicans were saying, Oh, she looks so serious. Well, you dont talk about ISIS with a big grin on your face, Clinton said, using an acronym for the Islamic State terrorist organization. Theyre a barbaric, evil group that we have to defeat and wipe out.

Clinton appeared to be referring to a national security forum last week. Afterward, Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus tweeted about Clintons demeanor and that she wasnt smiling during the event.

@HillaryClinton was angry + defensive the entire time - no smile and uncomfortable - upset that she was caught wrongly sending our secrets.  Reince Priebus (@Reince) September 8, 2016

Clinton made the remarks during a taping of The Tonight Show that will air at 11:35 p.m. Monday on NBC.

The comment was in response to a question from host Jimmy Fallon about the trickiness of showing her optimistic side on the campaign trail with the bad-ass Hillary that some voters want to see whos going to protect us and be tough.

Clinton responded that it was a balancing act and tricky, especially for a female candidate.

Earlier, when she walked onto the set, Fallon put on a face mask, a reference to Clintons recent bout of pneumonia that prompted her to take a break from the campaign trail.

Clinton laughed heartily and gave Fallon a high five. The late-night host immediately whipped out a bottle of hand sanitizer and rubbed his hands, prompting more laughter from the Democratic nominee and the audience.

GOP rival Donald Trump appeared on the show on Thursday, when Fallon mussed his famous bouffant.
Clinton urges Latino voters to get off the sidelines

(Andrew Harnik / Associated Press)

President Obama is a tough act to follow, in more ways than one, Hillary Clinton said as she followed him onstage at a gala dinner in Washington on Thursday night.

And in her remarks that followed, the former secretary of State urged the diverse coalition of voters who powered Obama to two national victories to be just as committed to turn out to vote for her.

We cannot be on the sidelines, she said at the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute dinner. This is the most consequential election of our lifetimes.

Clinton thanked the group for traveling throughout the country to help register new voters she hopes will turn out for her.

You stayed focused no matter what kind of outlandish and offensive comments we have heard from my opponent and his supporters, she said before adding to laughter and applause: By the way, I personally think a taco truck on every corner sounds absolutely delicious. (A Trump supporter had warned last month that a flood of new immigrants would result in such a scenario.)

Clinton praised the role immigrants have played in American history, saying Latino voters in particular are not strangers or intruders, but our neighbors, our colleagues, our friends.

She also continued to test-drive a closing message for the final seven weeks to election day.

I intend to close my campaign the way I began my career: fighting for kids and families. It is the cause of my life. It will be the passion of my presidency, she said.

Donald Trump sinks even lower just when it seems he has already hit rock bottom, she said. She cited a newly released interview the Republican nominee did with the Washington Post in which he again declined to answer a question about whether Obama was born in the United States.

He still wouldnt say Hawaii. He still wouldnt say America, she said. This man wants to be our next president? When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?

Trumps campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway, and his running mate, Mike Pence, both have said Obama was born in the U.S. The campaign often has attempted to clarify Trumps positions when he has chosen not to do so himself.

Clinton said there were no dog whistles anymore with Trump, meaning he wasnt sending out messages only select followers could hear.

Its all right out there in the open now, she said. So weve got to come back twice as strong and twice as clear.

Clinton and Obama spent 15 minutes together between their two speeches, their first face-to-face interaction in weeks. The White House had previously not said whether the president had spoken with Clinton since she was diagnosed with pneumonia last week.
If the government is going to impose a punishment as medieval and irreversible as the death penalty, it should take pains to ensure that the penalty is invoked only for the most heinous crimes and that it is applied fairly and consistently. Data compiled by the state attorney generals office, however, suggest that California is falling short of those ideals because of the individual judgments of local prosecutors.

To be eligible for a death sentence in this state, a person must be convicted of first-degree murder enhanced by any one of about three dozen special circumstances  more than just about any other state (if California wants to reduce death sentences, it could start by reassessing these threshold crimes). Theres murder for hire. Murder to silence a witness. Killing a police officer. Wrecking a train. Using poison. Murder, even, when killing wasnt the intent but occurred during the commission of any of a dozen other crimes. And on and on.

A jury doesnt consider a death sentence unless a prosecutor asks it to. And thats one of the places where capital punishment is inherently inconsistent.

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Who decides whether a murder case involves one of those special circumstances, and thus warrants the death penalty? A jury, followed by the trial judges affirmation (a judge can reduce a death sentence, but not order one if the jury didnt recommend it). A jury, though, doesnt consider a death sentence unless a prosecutor asks it to. And thats one of the places where capital punishment is inherently inconsistent. National studies have found that whether someone faces a death sentence depends significantly on the county in which the crime is committed because county-level prosecutors are the ones who decide whether to put the death penalty in play. In fact, 2% of counties nationwide account for a majority of death sentences.

How inconsistent is application of the death penalty? From 2011 to 2015, California juries handed down 74 death sentences, more than half from Los Angeles and Riverside counties, with 23 each. Yet Riverside County is only one-quarter the size of Los Angeles County and had fewer than one-sixth of the homicides during that same time. Is the nature of homicide in Riverside that much more heinous than in Los Angeles County? No. The difference between the two counties lies in the makeup of the prosecutorial teams deciding whether to seek the death penalty, with the standard set by the elected district attorney.

Tellingly, there was a change in the Riverside district attorneys office in January 2015, and the current top prosecutor, Mike Hestrin, has been less aggressive in pursuing the death penalty than his predecessor, Paul E. Zellerbach, who himself sought it less often than the D.A. he replaced. Further evidence that individual prosecutors make a difference: Hestrin inherited 22 capital cases and, after reviewing them, dropped the death penalty against seven defendants. So two different district attorneys, looking at the same seven cases, came to different conclusions on whether the crimes merited a death sentence.

Hestrin and others argue that county district attorneys represent the views of their constituents, which explains why liberal San Francisco County tends not to seek the death penalty and more conservative Riverside County does (of the 747 people on death row, one is a San Francisco County case compared with 89 from Riverside). Yet that is one of the many grave flaws of capital punishment in general, and in California specifically. Capital punishment is authorized only by state law, but there is no objective statewide standard against which factors are weighed and a decision is made. It is unconscionable that the specifics of a crime are subordinate to a prosecutors whim in determining whether a death sentence will be sought.

Such arbitrary application of the death penalty is just one of a passel of reasons why the immoral practice should be abolished. California voters can do so by voting yes on Proposition 62, which would ban the death penalty and convert the current death sentences to life without parole. At the same time, voters should say no to Proposition 66, which affirms the death penalty and would, among other things, speed up the legal appeals process at the possible expense of constitutional protections.

Because of legal challenges to Californias lethal injection protocol, no one has been led to the death chamber at San Quentin in more than a decade. Since the death penalty was revived in 1978, California has executed only 13 people, and those came so long after the crimes took place  an average of 17 years and six months  that the executions served no purpose other than vengeance.

Its far past time this state, and American society in general, ends this barbaric practice.

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Six years ago California voters were asked to make recreational marijuana legal under state law and they declined to do so. But the close decision  46% voted yes on Proposition 19  suggested that the battle was not yet over. At that time, The Times opposed Proposition 19 not because legalization was necessarily a bad idea, but because it was a poorly drafted mess that would have created a regulatory nightmare.

In the years since, a lot has changed. Four states, starting with Colorado and Washington, have legalized adult recreational use, without major problems. Half of the states now allow medical marijuana. Canada is working on legislation to legalize adult use next year. And Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump have suggested that, if elected, they wouldnt use the federal prohibition against marijuana to undermine state legalization efforts.

For the record: An earlier version of this editorial said that Proposition 64 would call for people under 21 who are caught with marijuana to be sentenced to drug education and community service. That provision would apply to those under 18.

There has also been a huge shift in thinking on drug policy, as more people question the effect of the decades-long war on drugs on law enforcement expenditures, overcrowded prisons, marginalized communities and violent drug cartels. In the case of marijuana, there is growing support for the argument that the cost of enforcing prohibition is too great and delivers too few benefits.

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By sending mixed messages, the federal government has effectively ceded its role and left it to states to create a new national marijuana policy.

In November, Californians will again consider whether to legalize pot, this time with Proposition 64, the Adult Use of Marijuana Act. Voters will have to ask themselves whether the time has come to treat marijuana less like heroin and more like alcohol  as a regulated but acceptable product for adult use. Do the risks of legalization outweigh the costs of prohibition? Does Proposition 64 strike the right balance between allowing adult Californians to make their own recreational choices and protecting their health and safety? Does the measure put cannabis-industry profits ahead of public health? What does it mean that marijuana will be legal under California law but still illegal under federal law?

On balance, the proposition deserves a yes vote. It is ultimately better for public health, for law and order and for society if marijuana is a legal, regulated and controlled product for adults. Proposition 64  while not perfect  offers a logical, pragmatic approach to legalization that also would give lawmakers and regulators the flexibility to change the law to address the inevitable unintended consequences.

The reality is that California has already, essentially, legalized marijuana. Virtually any adult can get a medical marijuana recommendation and buy pot products legally at a dispensary. And those who cant be bothered to fake a headache or back pain can buy it on the black market without fear of going to jail.

Proposition 64 would end the need for such ruses and deal a blow to the illegal market, which thrives on prohibition. If it is passed, adults 21 and older would be allowed to grow, buy and possess marijuana for their personal use in private homes or at businesses licensed for on-site consumption. The state would license and regulate businesses that grow, process, deliver and sell marijuana. Pot shops could not sell tobacco or alcohol. Cities would have the ability to set local regulations and even ban marijuana businesses, but they couldnt bar adults from growing, using or transporting marijuana for personal use.

The measure would impose state taxes on commercial cultivation and sales that could eventually raise more than $1 billion a year. The measure would dedicate the new revenue to youth drug education, prevention and treatment programs, law enforcement programs to reduce driving under the influence, and environmental restoration of land damaged by illegal cannabis cultivation.

For decades, drug enforcement  and particularly enforcement of the marijuana laws  has disproportionately affected African American and Latino men, leaving them with criminal records that make it harder to get a job or to advance in their careers. Though California decriminalized marijuana possession in 2010 and misdemeanor arrests have fallen by 90%, there are still people serving time for marijuana crimes or who are hindered by past marijuana convictions. If the initiative passes, individuals could ask to have their sentences reduced, or if they are no longer incarcerated, they could ask the courts to have their criminal records changed. Also, Proposition 64 would take a less punitive approach to youth enforcement: People under 18 caught with marijuana would be sentenced to drug education and community service.

Proposition 64 gets a lot right, but the measure still asks voters to make a tremendous leap of faith. The fact is, the health effects of marijuana consumption are still not fully understood, particularly the long-term, regular consumption of todays high-potency cannabis products. It is known that young people, whose brains are still developing, can suffer long-lasting effects and are at increased risk of addiction and mental disorders from frequent use. That is why it is so important to use a portion of the Proposition 64 revenues to educate teens on the risks of regular, daily use.

Public health experts had recommended treating marijuana more like tobacco  a legal product that the state has an interest in discouraging through regulations and high taxes. But because a key goal of Proposition 64 is to foster a legitimate, regulated marijuana industry, some of those experts fear that Big Weed may become the next Big Tobacco, using its profits and lobbying power to minimize research into negative health affects and to stymie regulations that curb consumption. Proposition 64 already offers a lot to the industry; it would not, for instance, strictly limit advertising or bar marijuana industry representatives from serving on advisory committees on cannabis regulations, as public health experts had recommended.

Proposition 64 would give the Legislature the ability to amend the marijuana industry regulations by a majority vote; other changes to the law would need a two-thirds vote. Regulatory agencies would be given the flexibility to develop rules as issues arise. That flexibility is welcome if lawmakers and regulators use it to make sure the law meets its objectives  not to grant the wishes of an army of marijuana industry lobbyists.

Proposition 64 would not change the fact that marijuana is still illegal under federal law, and that is a serious complicating factor. Growers, sellers and even consumers are at risk if a new administration in Washington suddenly decides to enforce federal law. Is that likely to happen? Four states have already legalized recreational use and five more, including California, are voting on legalization in November, and 25 states allow medical marijuana. By choosing not to stop the states, President Obama and Congress have essentially permitted more liberal marijuana laws. At the same time, however, they have been unwilling to amend federal law to make clear what is and isnt allowed. In fact, the Drug Enforcement Agency decided last month to maintain marijuanas status as a Schedule 1 drug, meaning it is as addictive as heroin and has no medical value, despite the fact that half the states in the nation permit medicinal use.

By sending mixed messages, the federal government has effectively ceded its role and left it to states to create a new national marijuana policy that legalizes marijuana with minimal harm and meaningful protections. Proposition 64 is Californias attempt to do just that. The Times urges a yes vote.

Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion and Facebook

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In the last six years, two whistle-blowers have exposed government wrongdoing in the war on terrorism. Both have been punished for their actions  one with imprisonment, the other with exile. Both recently made progress in their struggles with the government, but only one enjoys the high-profile support that both deserve.

This week, the ACLU and Amnesty International launched a campaign urging President Obama to pardon Edward Snowden, the former CIA employee and government contractor who leaked more than a million classified documents in 2013. The campaign  endorsed by luminaries including Maggie Gyllenhaal, Daniel Radcliffe, George Soros, Michael Stipe, Jimmy Wales and Steve Wozniak  was timed to coincide with the premiere of a major Hollywood biopic, Snowden, with Oliver Stone directing and Joseph Gordon-Levitt in the starring role. The New York Times Magazine published a cover story chronicling the films production, and the day after the ACLUs announcement, the Guardian released a new interview with Snowden in which he laid out his case for a pardon, arguing that the benefits of his actions far outweigh any negative consequences.

There has never been any public evidence that any individual came to harm as a result [of what I did], he said.

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Without minimizing Snowdens ordeal, it is still fair to say that Manning is in greater need of aid and assistance.

With the countrys most prominent human and civil rights organizations, Hollywood and the international press behind him, Snowden is mounting a powerful effort to return home. Theres reason for him to feel optimistic about his chances.

Also this week, three years into a 35-year sentence for disclosing classified information to WikiLeaks, the former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning went on hunger strike. She demanded minimum standards of dignity, respect, and humanity while in prison at the military barracks in Ft. Leavensworth, including the ability to undergo gender reassignment surgery, as her doctors have long recommended.

After four days, the Army relented. Yet the fact that Manning felt the need to take such drastic measures suggests how dire her time in prison has been so far. Although she came out as transgender in 2013, and although there is no question that she has struggled with gender dysphoria for most of her life, she is still housed with male inmates and required to keep her hair short. She attempted suicide in July, and in response the Army threatened to place her in indefinite solitary confinement, which psychologists and legal experts increasingly agree is a form of torture.

Manning is not without allies. She is represented by lawyers from the ACLU, and various organizations have expressed support for her. But there is no Manning biopic in the works, nor is there a coordinated, star-studded effort to obtain a pardon.

Why does the Free Snowden movement seem to have so much momentum and energy when compared to the effort to free Chelsea Manning?

Both published extensive evidence of wrongdoing among the American military and intelligence services: the killing of eleven unarmed Iraqi civilians in Mannings case, and the unlawful surveillance of many millions of Americans in Snowdens. Both did so not for personal gain or to settle a professional vendetta but because they believed that their government was in the wrong. Both decided to act in full knowledge of the consequences.

Exile is no joke, but Moscow is not exactly a military prison. Snowden can give interviews via teleconference robot whenever he likes, whereas Mannings ability to communicate with the world has been severely restricted. Without minimizing Snowdens ordeal, it is still fair to say that Manning is in greater need of aid and assistance.

Perhaps Snowden is so much more popular  for lack of a better word  because he is male and straight, his sexuality confirmed by the attractive girlfriend who left the United States to live with him in Moscow. He is also charismatic and clear-spoken, running through the technical ins and outs of the governments complex surveillance system with an approachability and confidence that wouldnt be out of place in Silicon Valley.

Manning, meanwhile, is a trans woman, a member of one sexual minority that most people still feel comfortable denigrating publicly. It seems many people are not yet willing to associate transgenderism with the kind of self-sacrificing civic heroism that has traditionally been attributed to men.

Mannings story is also harder to look at, less Hollywood-ready, because of what it says about how the government treats dissidents. In return for her act of conscience, prosecutors charged Manning with aiding the enemy, a capital offense. She escaped the death penalty, but must serve decades in a military prison. Thats not the kind of thing we like to see on movie screens. Its not as uplifting, or exciting, as Snowdens flight across the Pacific to Hong Kong and later Moscow.

Although Manning can go forward with gender reassignment surgery, she faces new charges related to her suicide attempt. No one should face legal punishment for trying to take their own life, nor should Mannings upcoming surgery be viewed as anything other than a good start  no whistle-blower should be in prison to begin with. Chelsea Manning deserves widespread, coordinated support for a full pardon, just like Edward Snowden.

Richard Beck is an associate editor of n+1.

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Parents everywhere tend to think that the way they raise their children is the best way, and Americans are no exception. Contemporary American parents seek to optimize their childrens lives, treat them as equals, and reduce their risk of harm to zero; anything less may seem negligent. Yet many of the practices Americans hold as sacred are quite rare in other countries  and the burdens Americans place on themselves are often unwarranted.

One of the major challenges in the first year of parenting, any new mom or dad can tell you, is training a child to sleep. American middle-class parents routinely put their infants to sleep in a separate bed or a separate room, on the assumption that there might be serious risks to having the baby next to them. This is largely due to expert advice: The American Academy of Pediatrics advises against parent-child co-sleeping, or bed-sharing, citing safety concerns from accidental suffocation or falls. Doctors worry that tired  or intoxicated  parents will roll onto their infants in the middle of the night without realizing it. Putting babies in cribs or cots in a separate room is also customary in Britain, Germany and other parts of Western Europe.

In most of the rest of the world...parents think its downright cruel to put a baby in a separate room or even a separate bed. Who would be so heartless?

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In most of the rest of the world, however, parent-child co-sleeping is well-established, as we have found in our studies in Africa (Nigeria, Kenya and Zambia), Asia (Nepal, India) and Latin America (Mexico, Colombia) and as other anthropologists have reported from other sites in those areas. Indeed, many parents think its downright cruel to have a baby sleep alone. Who would do such a heartless thing?

Of course non-Western countries tend to have higher infant mortality rates, but theres no reason to think that has anything to do with co-sleeping. In Japan  a large, rich, modern country  parents universally sleep with their infants, yet their infant mortality rate is one of the lowest in the world  2.8 deaths per 1,000 live births versus 6.2 in the United States  and their rate of sudden infant death syndrome, or SIDS, is roughly half the U.S. rate.

Theres reason to believe that co-sleeping isnt just safe, but also beneficial. The biological anthropologist James McKenna, who has investigated mother-child co-sleeping at his Mother-Baby Sleep Laboratory at the University of Notre Dame, has provided detailed evidence of the physiological synchronization between mother and infant when they sleep together, especially when the mother also breastfeeds responsively. He considers this arrangement optimal and calls it breastsleeping.

When we asked mothers of the Gusii tribe in Kenya, where co-sleeping is common, whether their babies slept through the night, they didnt know what we were talking about  why should babies wake up? When we compare Gusii and American mothers, it is the Americans who seem to make infant care more complicated and difficult by putting their infant to sleep in a separate room, setting the stage for sleep disruption due to infant crying.

American parents may also worry that sharing a bed increases a childs dependence on his parents, yet Japanese children appear to be just as mature and independent as American children.

Christine Gross-Loh writes in her 2013 book, Parenting Without Borders: After years of living [in Japan] on and off, my husband and I (and even our kids) have noticed that most children  the same children who sleep with their parents every night  take care of themselves and their belongings, work out peer conflicts, and show mature social behavior and self-regulation at a young age. Japanese parents expect their kids to be independent by taking care of themselves and being socially responsible. They expect them to help contribute to the household or school community by being capable and self-reliant.

All things considered, we have to agree with McKennas conclusion: the proven benefits of mother-infant co-sleeping far outweigh the largely imaginary risks. Putting a baby in a separate room at night encumbers parents and leads to their exhaustion without guaranteeing the safety or future character development of their children.

American parents also add to their burdens in other ways that are rare elsewhere in the world: for example, by offering their toddlers choices (about what to eat, what to wear, even where to cross the street), by making chores and responsibilities optional, and by fostering the childs early speech development without rules to restrain interrupting adult conversation.

The anthropologist Margaret Mead once proposed that human diversity in child rearing was like a grand experiment enabling American parents to read the answers to their questions  without having to try them out at home. We no longer believe that reading the answers is as simple as Mead implied in 1930, but if Americans looked to parents in other cultures, they would perhaps realize that the best way to raise a child is not necessarily the most difficult, and ease up a bit.

Robert LeVine is professor of education and human development, emeritus, at Harvard University. Sarah LeVine is a former research fellow in human development at Harvard University. They are the authors of Do Parents Matter? Why Japanese Babies Sleep Soundly, Mexican Siblings Dont Fight, and American Families Should Just Relax.

Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion or Facebook.

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In the United States today, 13% of all black men are denied the right to vote because they have been convicted of a felony.

Felon disfranchisement, as this phenomenon is called, is a stain on our democracy left by laws intended at their inception to prevent newly freed slaves from participating in the political process. Black people, just 12% of the U.S. population, comprise 38% of those denied their voting rights because of a felony conviction.

Only two states, Vermont and Maine, place no voting restrictions on people with a felony conviction. But as California implements criminal justice reform, it has an opportunity to take a leading role by curtailing its own use of felony convictions to deny voting access.

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Research shows that restoring the right to vote for people with criminal convictions facilitates reentry into their communities and reduces recidivism.

After the Civil War, the punishment of disfranchisement was commonly tied to crimes prosecuted primarily against African Americans. Some states, for instance, targeted black citizens by denying the right to vote for minor property crimes like theft  but not for more serious offenses such as robbery or murder, which white people were believed more likely to commit.

Today, racial minorities remain disproportionately excluded from voting as a result of the documented bias in drug law enforcement and sentencing. The war on drugs and subsequent decades of mass incarceration have locked millions of people out of the electoral process indefinitely: From 1976 to 2010, the number of Americans who could not vote because of a felony conviction increased by 500%. In some states, such as Alabama, felon disfranchisement bars as many as one-third of black men from voting.

In California prisons, 3 of every 4 men are either African American, Latino or Asian American. African Americans, who comprise less than 7% of Californias voting-age population, represent 28% of those who cannot vote because of felon disenfranchisement.

Gov. Jerry Brown has on his desk Assembly Bill 2466, which would curb felon disenfranchisement. The legislation would protect 50,000 people at risk of losing their rights because of ambiguity in how a felony conviction affects voter eligibility.

California currently restricts voting for those imprisoned or on parole for the conviction of a felony. But under the Criminal Justice Realignment Act of 2011, California created new sentencing categories for low-level, nonviolent offenders to remedy unconstitutionally overcrowded state prisons. Instead of time in state prison, minor felony convictions now result in a term in the county jail followed by release under whats known as mandatory or community supervision.

Alameda County Superior Court already has held that people subject to this new form of mandatory or community supervision are not on parole and therefore retain their right to vote. AB 2466 would codify that ruling, and also clarify that time in county jail does not carry with it the antiquated and discriminatory punishment of losing the fundamental right to participate in our democracy.

Felon disfranchisement is part and parcel of a broader, systemic attack on voting rights  including the weakening of the Voting Rights Act and the wave of discriminatory voting restrictions that followed  that has made it harder, and in some cases impossible, for people of color to exercise their right to vote. These restrictions threaten to prevent millions of eligible voters from casting a ballot in November.

In addition to furthering equality and encouraging electoral participation, legislation like AB 2466 has public safety benefits for everyone. Research shows that restoring the right to vote for people with criminal convictions facilitates reentry into their communities and reduces recidivism.

California has been at the forefront of protecting voting rights. In 2002, it became the only state to pass its own Voting Rights Act to stop the dilution of the votes of minority groups. Last year, it introduced a form of automatic voter registration. With AB 2466, California can reinforce its commitment to inclusive voting laws and lead the nation toward ensuring that an increasing number of voices can participate in our democracy.

Janai Nelson is the associate director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund.

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A Lebanese Nigerian billionaire donor to the Clinton Foundation sued seven federal agencies Thursday over being denied entry to the U.S., saying his reputation was damaged by the disclosure to the Los Angeles Times of reports alleging he may have facilitated fundraising for Hezbollah.

Gilbert Chagoury  a friend of Bill Clinton, an ambassador to the Vatican and owner of a hilltop mansion in Beverly Hills  said he wanted an opportunity to correct what he said was false information. He said it damaged his reputation and prompted a bank in California to close his accounts.

Last month, The Times reported that the State Department denied a visa to Chagoury, a British citizen, on terrorism-related grounds, a broad category that can apply to anyone suspected of providing any kind of support to an extremist group.

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According to government documents, the decision was based at least in part on unconfirmed reports alleging that Chagoury was assisting a Lebanese politician in funneling money to Hezbollah, the Shiite Muslim group designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S.

Chagourys suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Washington, names agencies with access to classified information in databases the government uses to track known or suspected terrorists: the FBI, the Justice Department, the National Counterterrorism Center, the State Department, CIA, Homeland Security and Customs and Border Protection. He does not name The Times in the lawsuit.

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I have always been told that American justice demands due process, yet I was given no explanation for having my visa revoked, and no opportunity to rebut these falsehoods before my reputation was dragged through the mud, Chagoury said in a statement. That is not the America I know and love. I only want to clear my name.

In challenging the government, Chagoury has kept to legal channels and has not asked for help from any of his powerful friends, including Bill or Hillary Clinton, according to his spokesman, Mark Corallo.

He has assiduously avoided asking the Clintons or any of their staff for anything, Corallo said.

Chagoury, 70, a friend and supporter of Bill Clinton since the 1990s, donated between $1 million and $5 million to the Clinton Foundation. Last month, his name surfaced in a release of State Department emails showing connections between the foundation and the State Department under Hillary Clinton. Doug Band, an aide to Bill Clinton, asked Huma Abedin, a top aide to then-Secretary Hillary Clinton, to arrange a meeting for Chagoury with an American diplomat in Lebanon.

As you know, hes key guy there and to us, Band wrote in 2009. The disclosure of the email was one of several in recent months that have renewed questions about State Department access granted to foundation donors and about Clintons level of transparency as she runs for president.

Bill Clinton suggested Chagoury pursue that meeting, after the two discussed the messy politics of Lebanon, Corallo said Thursday. Chagoury had wanted only to share political insights, and no meeting ever happened, Corallo said.

The State Department told Chagoury last year that he was denied a visa on terrorism-related grounds, the complaint says, adding that the agency could only wrongfully conclude Gilbert Chagoury is a terrorist threat by relying on false information stored in a government database.

Chagoury asked for a waiver but was denied, said his lawyer, Stewart Baker.

He never was told what the supposed terrorist connection was, or even asked any questions, according to Baker, a former official at the Department of Homeland Security.

He would have welcomed an opportunity to engage on the merits of these charges, and he didnt get it, Baker said.

Chagoury made his fortune in Nigeria, where he prospered during a close relationship with a corrupt dictator; he was implicated in schemes to steal public money, and his conviction was expunged after he returned millions to the Nigerian government.

Chagoury also has been deeply involved in the fractious politics of Lebanon; he has donated money to Christian relief organizations in the Middle East but has not provided any support for Hezbollah or any other terrorist groups, the complaint says. Hezbollah has enemies, the suit said, noting the group is at war with Islamic State. To be falsely cast as a supporter of Hezbollah is to have ones life and the lives of ones family put at risk.

After publication of The Times story, a bank in California closed his accounts, an action the lawsuit blames on concerns about breaking rules prohibiting doing business with known or suspected terrorists. Because of the banking problems, Chagoury is finding it increasingly difficult to pay for maintenance, property taxes and other continuing expenses on his house in Beverly Hills.

Even though Chagoury was denied entry into the U.S., other officials in the State Department have continued to pursue a deal to build a new Lagos consulate at Eko Atlantic, a futuristic development owned by the Chagoury family. The State Department said Eko was first identified by a real estate firm; no deal has been signed.

The suit says Chagoury was damaged by a deliberate, outrageous and unlawful leak of information, and more importantly, misinformation to The Times. Chagourys lawyers will also ask the agencies to investigate who disclosed it, the suit says.

In 2010, Chagoury was pulled off a plane after he showed up on the Department of Homeland Securitys no-fly list, again because of unspecified suspicions of terrorism links; his attorneys challenged the decision, and he was taken off the list and given a letter of apology. During that episode, Chagoury also never called the Clintons or any other friends for assistance, Baker said.

But there is little legal recourse for non-citizens like Chagoury, a British citizen who has spent summers in Beverly Hills for 35 years, to challenge the State Departments visa decisions.

According to Baker, the lawsuit is the first complaint filed under the Judicial Redress Act, signed into law in February by President Obama, which may extend U.S. privacy protections to European citizens. The new law, a response to negotiations with European Union countries over privacy rights, may extend to those countries citizens the same protections against unauthorized disclosure of government information.

joseph.tanfani@latimes.com

Twitter: @jtanfani

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The 2016 presidential campaign has followed a pattern: In a contest featuring two widely disliked candidates, each has risen in response to the others failings and each has fallen due to self-inflicted wounds.

Hillary Clinton rose in polls this summer after Donald Trumps undisciplined attacks on a Gold Star family, and other remarks that insulted racial or ethnic minorities, pushed away centrist voters.

Trump, more recently, has risen on concerns about Clintons family foundation, her description of half his voters being a basket of deplorables, and her reluctance to be fully transparent about her health.

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Just when he might have sought to cement and extend his new, narrow lead in some swing states, Trump on Friday delved into a topic he recently had tried to avoid  his long effort to prove President Obama is not an American citizen. And he did so by making fresh, and demonstrably inaccurate, accusations against Clinton.

Trumps problem is that to gain a foothold on the Republican electorate, he adopted a false claim  that Obama was not born in the United States and was, therefore, an illegitimate president. And he doggedly stuck to that assertion for five years.

But the accusation appeals to far fewer voters than a candidate needs to win the White House. So Trumps advisors  if not the candidate, himself  have eagerly looked for a way he could climb down.

Nothing Trump said on Friday will loosen the grasp of his fervent supporters, who have granted him a wide berth and who, in interview after interview, indicate they are less concerned about what Trump says than their belief that hes speaking for them.

The voters who havent yet chosen sides, however, indicate they want more  including details about how he would govern.

The impact of Trumps latest statements cannot be measured immediately. But if his point was to appeal to those voters by putting his birther campaign behind him, he will not be helped by the endless loop of television clips showing him casting doubt on an increasingly popular president.

But for Trumps own actions, those voters might have been hearing Friday about the economic plan he had released the day before, or the child care proposals he made earlier this week. Instead they were reliving a fight that started five years ago, of Trump punching against the truth.

Trumps terse comments, and his erroneous statements about Clinton, followed a day in which he behaved more like the old Trump who had worried suburban and less-partisan voters in whose hands the election increasingly seems to rest.

He refused to concede Obamas birthplace in a Washington Post interview published Thursday. He claimed Friday morning that he couldnt tell Fox broadcaster Maria Bartiromo what he believed because we have to keep the suspense going  as though stoking interest in a coming reality show.

Later Friday, at the close of an event in Washington that also served to promote his new hotel, Trump falsely claimed that Clinton and her 2008 presidential campaign started the birther controversy and that he had finished it.

Theres no evidence that Clinton or her campaign ever circulated the idea that Obama had not been born in the U.S., although some individual supporters of hers made that claim late in the 2008 primary season.

Trump then said that Obama was born in the United States, period.

Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again, he said, as though that ended the conversation.

He offered no apology for stoking fears about the presidents legitimacy. He also did not explain what had caused him to change his mind, since no new facts have emerged in the years he has been suggesting Obama was born in Africa -- a claim he had repeated in interviews as recently as 2014, long after Obama released his birth certificate.

For more on politics 

For both candidates this year, a big part of the campaign has been about convincing voters to overlook  or forgive  their flaws.

For Clinton, that means getting voters past fears about her trustworthiness and willing to embrace a third consecutive Democratic term in the White House.

She has offered reams of policy proposals  enough to collect in book form  but since much of the campaign this year has focused on Trump, she has had a hard time getting out her own message.

Instead, high-profile embarrassments have put out a message she does not want to circulate.

In the case of her recent bout with pneumonia, her supporters worry that refusal to disclose an illness until video surfaced of a near-collapse would further the perception of dishonesty and create a fresh opening for Trump.

In Trumps case, his campaign has been about persuading voters to disregard his showman instincts and his sometimes-coarse manner and instead seize on him as a transformative figure ready to punish the purveyors of politics as usual.

Recently, under his third set of campaign managers, Trump had behaved more conventionally. He began using a teleprompter to hew more closely to his planned speeches and limit the freewheeling asides that have often gotten him in trouble. He started talking more about the policies he would push as president.

The changes have been a clear effort to appeal to voters who remained on the sidelines because they were uncomfortable with his old ways  those in states such as Pennsylvania and Ohio who will be key to this years outcome.

But as a result of his own actions, the voters he needs are now being hit with the reminders of Trump advocating a fringe belief about Obama.

And in the latest continuation of the campaigns pattern of each candidate exploiting the others flaws, Clinton has seized on the issues re-emergence as proof of her claim that Trump is unfit to be president.

In remarks she made before Trump spoke on Friday, Clinton said Trump owed Obama and the American people an apology.

His campaign was founded on this outrageous lie, she said. There is no erasing it in history.

If this campaigns pattern holds, a new self-inflicted wound has now put Trump in peril of losing ground to Clinton once again.

cathleen.decker@latimes.com

Twitter: @cathleendecker

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Donald Trumps rise to political prominence grew partly out of his willingness to stoke fringe theories about President Obamas birthplace, views that made him popular with many Republicans and conspiracy buffs but became a drag on his White House aspirations.

Trump sought to sweep away five years of questioning Obamas legitimacy in a few seconds Friday. He did so not with a thoughtful reflection exploring his change of heart or an apology, but a quick statement at the end of a promotional media spectacle showcasing his newest hotel.

And rather than acknowledge his role in the so-called birther movement that spread false claims about the president, Trump instead sparked two new unfounded theories: He blamed rival Hillary Clinton for having started it and took credit for being the one who finished it.

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President Barack Obama was born in the United States. Period, Trump said in quick remarks at an event honoring supportive veterans. Now, we all want to get back to making America strong and great again.

As the press shouted questions, Trump walked off stage and began touring the new hotel for the cameras.

Election 2016 | Live coverage on Trail Guide | Sign up for the newsletter | The race to 270

The moment was classic Trump, a nothing-to-see-here reversal that may allow the GOP to begin to put Trumps birther days behind them, but not without facing critics who say Trumps campaign is built on falsehoods with few limits on what he will say in his pursuit of the presidency.

We know who Donald is, Clinton said to an African American womens group in Washington, accusing Trump of feeding the worst impulses of bigotry with his campaign.

For five years, he has led the birther movement to delegitimize the first black president, she said. His campaign was founded on this lie. There is no erasing it in history.

The episode drew in Obama, who has endured questions about his birth in Hawaii for years, and appeared disdainful when asked about it Friday in the Oval Office.

I was pretty confident about where I was born, Obama told reporters. I think most people were as well, and I would hope that a presidential election reflects more serious issues.

As the presidential contest narrows, Trump has come under increasing pressure to distance himself from his role in the birther movement, which had long been consigned to the realm of fringe conspiracy theories. Democrats  and even some Republican leaders  have called the theory an effort to undermine the nations first black president.

Trump was the most prominent person to promote the view that Obama was born elsewhere, which aligned him with white nationalists but alienated many mainstream voters who have little interest in such conspiracy theories and whose votes are vital in the final weeks of the chaotic campaign. In 2012, Trump offered to donate $5 million if Obama would produce records related to his citizenship.

Long after Obama released a copy of his birth certificate and others had stopped pressing the case, Trump continued promoting the view.

The president should come clean, Trump said on Irish television in 2014, in a clip unearthed by BuzzFeed late Thursday that showed him refusing still to accept that Obamas Hawaii birth certificate was genuine proof. A lot of people feel it wasnt a proper certificate.

As recently as Wednesday, Trump refused to concede in an interview published Thursday by the Washington Post that Obama was a natural-born American, which is a requirement for the presidency.

On Friday, the staging of his announcement, like so much of the campaign, was unusually promotional for such a serious issue.

As protesters rallied outside Trumps Pennsylvania Avenue hotel, Trump told Fox Business News that he did not yet want to answer a question about Obamas birthplace because he wanted to keep the suspense going.

Trump gathered media for what was expected to be a frank exchange. But it ended up being little more than a showcase for his new position  and new Trump property.

Nice hotel! Trump exclaimed, taking the stage in the Presidential Ballroom, a gold and neon-accented venue with several hanging chandeliers in the new hotel blocks from the White House.

After listening to veterans who endorse him laud his candidacy, Trump made his statement and abruptly left, ignoring reporters questions after claiming credit for resolving the problem.

In a statement, his aides accused Clinton of promoting the rumors during her long and fraught 2008 Democratic primary fight against Obama. At the time, a Clinton advisor had suggested in an internal memo that the campaign should focus on her middle-American roots, a counter to Obamas multicultural upbringing in Hawaii and Indonesia. The strategy was rejected and no evidence has emerged that she or her staff embarked on any organized effort to target his citizenship.

The Trump campaign promoted a clip Friday that seemed to show the opposite of what was intended  in it, Clintons 2008 campaign manager, Patti Solis Doyle, talks about firing either a low-level staffer or a volunteer who admitted to forwarding an email espousing unfounded assertions about Obamas birthplace.

And as for Trumps insistence that he finished the debate over Obamas birthplace, he continued to question it long after 2011, when, his campaign said, he brought this ugly incident to its conclusion when Obama released his long-form birth certificate.

What a liar, Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, the top Democrat in the Senate, said in a CNN interview shortly after Trumps announcement. He is just such a phony.

Leaders of the Congressional Black Caucus, who were holding an annual gathering in Washington, denounced Trump as a fraud and con artist.

Its a defining moment for all those who want to denounce bigotry and racism, said Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Oakland). Demand an apology from this man.

Rep. G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C.), the chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, said, Most Americans can see right through what he was trying to do today.

Republicans, though, were pleased that Trump has distanced his campaign from some of the harsh rhetoric in its final weeks.

This is a lets move on moment, said Frank Luntz, a Republican who helps candidates craft messages. He has to become tolerable among independents and swing voters. With every passing day, he becomes more tolerable and she becomes less, he said of Clinton.

Others, though, were less enthused, seeing instead a nominee who once again veered off message when his campaign has been gaining in polls.

The bar is so low with Trump that admitting that the incumbent president was born in the United States was viewed as progress by some, said Ryan Williams, a GOP consultant and former spokesman for Mitt Romney.

I dont think its enough to sway undecided voters, he said. It really says a lot about things when major news outlets say its breaking news that the Republican nominee for president admits the outgoing president is legitimate, eight years after he took office.

Times staff writers Michael A. Memoli and Evan Halper contributed to this report.

Twitter: @lisamascaro @noahbierman

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UPDATES:

3:25 p.m.: This story was updated with reaction to Trumps statement.

This story was originally published at 9 a.m.
Hawaiian honeycreepers have lived in the islands tropical forests for millennia, but the colorful finch-like birds are facing imminent collapse on Kauai, experts say.

Scientists have observed severe population declines in almost all of the islands honeycreepers, a famously diverse family of forest birds, and multiple extinctions are likely in the coming decades, according to a recent study in Science Advances.

Rising temperatures on the island are probably responsible, since they allow mosquito-borne diseases to spread across the islands avian community, the study authors say.

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As the Earth warms, the areas suitable for mosquitoes  and the diseases they carry  are expanding. Kauai, a mountainous island covered in forest, used to be cool enough to keep diseases such as avian malaria and avian poxvirus at bay. Now the warming climate is pushing mosquito-free zones higher up the mountains, restricting prime honeycreeper habitat to small pockets.

We suggest that a tipping point has been crossed, wrote lead author Eben Paxton, a research ecologist with the U.S. Geological Survey, and colleagues.

At the current rate of decline, the study predicts multiple extinctions in the coming decades.

And Kauai may just be the beginning.

On Kauai, forest bird habitat lies much lower in elevation than on other islands, such as Hawaii and Maui. That means the march of mosquitoes into the upper reaches of the birds habitat has hit Kauai first.

Kauai represents an early warning for the forest bird communities on the Maui and Hawaii islands, as well as other species around the world that are trapped within a climatic space that is rapidly disappearing, the study authors wrote.

For now at least, the taller mountains of Hawaii and Maui still provide some refuge for certain species of honeycreeper, which generally do not migrate from island to island. According to recent climate change and disease models, however, the temperature will have increased enough to bring disease up to the highest forests by 2100, Paxton said in an interview.

Already we are seeing declines of other species on Hawaii and Maui Islands, Paxton said. We think that is, in part, [due to] disease slowly moving up in elevation across all the islands.

In addition to pressures from climate change and disease, the honeycreepers also face competition from non-native birds and from invasive plants that often overtake their usual food sources.

Among birds, Hawaiis forest birds are something of an evolutionary novelty.

More than 5 million years ago, a kind of Asian finch made its way across the ocean and settled on the island chain. As volcanic activity created more islands, the ancestral finches hopped from place to place, establishing new populations that eventually diverged from their founder species over millions of years.

At least 55 species of Hawaiian honeycreepers evolved, including at least one distinct species on each of the Hawaiian islands.

A lot of people say if Darwin had landed on Hawaii, he would have gotten his theory of evolution much quicker, Paxton said.

Four of the six species currently in decline are found only on Kauai. None are found beyond the Hawaiian Islands.

In the study, researchers counted individual birds among the islands eight native forest bird species, as well as several non-native birds. They documented a 68% average population decline among six species of honeycreepers in their core habitat and a 94% average decline along the periphery of the birds range.

Weve definitely seen a much more rapid decline in the more recent years, Paxton said. The rates of decline are increasing.

See the most-read stories in Science this hour 

The two endangered honeycreeper species  the akikiki and the akekee  showed the most severe declines. A 2012 survey failed to find any of the birds outside of their core range.

Since 2000, these two species, along with the anianiau and the iiwi, have experienced such severe range contractions that they are now limited to a remote area of the Alakai Plateau that covers no more than 25 square miles. Another endangered species, the secretive puaiohi, lives in narrow river gorges and was too poorly sampled to count.

But as the honeycreeper populations declined, a different bird, the Kauai elepaio, increased by 88% in its core habitat range.

The elepaio, a kind of monarch flycatcher, include three different species, including one found on Kauai. These three species have shown a resistance to avian malaria.

Scientists think the elepaio owe their immunity to the species more recent arrival to the Hawaiian islands.

Until about the mid-1800s, mosquitoes and the diseases they carry were unknown to the Hawaiian islands. Over time, the Asian finches that first colonized the island chain might have lost their immunity to avian malaria, while the latecomers retained their natural resistance.

All of this is new to these birds who lived for millions of years without any vector-borne diseases, Paxton said.

For the honeycreeper family, extinction isnt a new threat.

The birds have seen waves of extinctions over the centuries. When the Polynesians arrived on the Hawaiian islands roughly a thousand years ago, they introduced the rat. Then Europeans brought the black rat, a much more efficient predator. As recent as 12 years ago, the black-faced honeycreeper, the poo-uli of Maui, is believed to have gone extinct.

Whats going on on Kauai is a sad story, Paxton said. There are a number of things that can be done. It may not save all the species, but I think if a big effort was made soon it could save a number of species.

The islands remote and rugged terrain makes traditional mosquito control techniques  such as pesticide spraying  impractical.

Other options include releasing sterilized male mosquitoes or introducing Wolbachia bacteria into the wild mosquito population, which can interfere with malaria infection. Each option, while promising, holds technological, social and financial hurdles, Paxton said.

I think we can save these birds, but we need to act now, Paxton said. And if we do, I think we can create a great framework to ensure the persistence of birds on Maui and the Big Island.

Follow me on Twitter seangreene89 and like Los Angeles Times Science on Facebook.

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When people old enough to remember the presidency of Lyndon B. Johnson reflect on that period, their thoughts invariably turn to the war in Vietnam, a tumultuous period in the mid-1960s that convinced LBJ not to seek reelection in 1968.

Theres plenty of conflict there, but its not even referenced in Robert Schenkkans riveting historical drama All the Way, which opens South Coast Repertorys new season under the superb direction of Marc Masterson. What we see instead is LBJs equally unsettling first year in office, from his sudden ascension upon the assassination of John F. Kennedy to his triumphant moment the following November, when he crushed Sen. Barry Goldwater in the presidential election.

In between, however, came the true greatness of the Johnson years, the struggle for and eventual passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which enfranchised millions of African Americans (referred to then as Negroes) as it aimed to end segregation.

It took a herculean effort for a Southern president to spearhead such legislation, and to do so with the fractious support of the upper ranks of the black community, upset because voting rights were not part of the package. Though beset from all sides by myriad pressure, Johnson ultimately prevailed, and the nation was transformed.

At SCR, an enormous ensemble coalesces on the Segerstrom Stage to recount this pivotal year, and its captained by a raging, rampaging performance by Hugo Armstrong as LBJ. This dynamic actor brilliantly demonstrates the arm-twisting, butt-kicking political style that Johnson perfected as Senate majority leader before signing on to JFKs ticket. Armstrong bemoans his accidental presidency but vows to carry on Kennedys civil rights crusade.

Real-life political figures surround him  the eloquent Martin Luther King, cerebrally but edgily depicted by Larry Bates; the diehard segregationist (and close friend of LBJ) Sen. Richard Russell, well rendered by Larry John Meyers; the witch-hunting FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, a strong, steely performance from Robert Curtis Brown; and LBJs closest ally (and future vice president) Hubert Humphrey, played by the facial if not physical ringer JD Cullum, enduring the presidents often verbally violent mood swings with a reserve of inner strength.

On the distaff side, Nike Doukas adds grace and good humor as the long-suffering Lady Bird Johnson, Tracey A. Leigh excels both as Coretta King and a victimized African American woman brutally treated by Southern lawmen, and Lynn Gallagher functions nicely as the wives of Humphrey and George Wallace.

Regular SCR audience members will recognize founding artist Hal Landon Jr. by voice, if not by sight, as the elegantly coiffed Sen. Everett Dirksen  moments after Landon appears more familiarly as Sen. Strom Thurmond. Darin Singleton is effective in a lower key as loyal Johnson aide Walter Jenkins, whose sex scandal (in an election year) nearly derailed the Johnson presidency.

The marble-columned setting is a work of modern art from designer Ralph Funicello, and Holly Poe Durbins 1960s costumes work well in depicting the era. Jaymi Lee Smiths complex lighting designs are a paramount element in the shows success.

All the Way (the show takes its title from the 1964 campaign slogan All the Way with LBJ) may go only part of the way in fleshing out Lyndon Johnsons complicated presidency, but its enough to fill three hours of mesmerizing theater at South Coast Repertory.

TOM TITUS reviews local theater.

*

IF YOU GO

What: All the Way

Where: South Coast Repertory Segerstrom Stage, 655 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa

When: Tuesdays through Sundays at varying curtain times through Oct. 2

Cost: $22 to $77

Information: (714) 708-5555
Indian food has always worn many faces in Orange County, from formal to fast casual to fusion.

Maybe its because were just a few miles on the wrong side of the county line to lay claim to L.A.'s famous Little India  the ample crowding of traditional restaurants and glimmering sari stores that line Artesias Pioneer Boulevard  but O.C. has forged its own South Asian food culture that stretches from Laguna Beach to Anaheim to the epicenter of Indian lunch buffets that is Tustin.

The most nationally recognized Indian restaurant on our turf is Irvines Clay Oven, run by chef Geeta Bansal, the queen of modern Indian food, whose innovative takes on her countrys flavors and aromas (plus her insightful articles and interviews with other big-name chefs) have made her kitchen a destination for food lovers from across Southern California.

But beyond Bansal, Indian food can be found served every which way in Orange County: in industrial-park-adjacent lunch buffets (see: Vishnu), where you stuff yourself with samosas, stews, meats and more before waddling back to work; from suburban retail center storefronts that serve fast-food takes on home-cooked Indian food (see: Dude Wheres My Curry) as combo plates a la Panda Express; at Indian markets (like Ninas Indian Grocery) that have so many shelves of spices and dry goods that they cant help but put some of them together and serve it all up from a counter in the back; and of course in the dozens of white-tablecloth, sit-down restaurants (see: Punjabi Tandoor) where you can get everything from dosas to lentils to plates of chicken tikka masala along with pappadam, naan and a bomber of Taj Majal.

And this doesnt even mention the much newer riffs on the cuisine, like the contemporary Indian street foods (aka chaat) found at Adyas Anaheim Packing House stall or the naan-not-buns burgers served at Rockfire Grill.

Into this complex fray dropped a low-key offshoot of Artesias Wok N Tandoor, which opened earlier this year on Tustin Avenue in Orange. As an express version of the more upscale, sit-down sister restaurant of the same name (they opened two weeks apart), Oranges Wok N Tandoor is an entirely different Indian food experience, not just for O.C. but beyond.

The name alone hints at the restaurants cross-cultural expertise  a well-defined mash-up of Chinese and Indian food thats been a staple in the latter country since a small community of Chinese settled in Calcutta more than 100 years ago. Yet, even those who are familiar with the Szechuan-inspired sauces and masala-fied stir frys that define so-called Indo-Chinese cuisine will find Wok N Tandoors fast-food presentation a new adventure.

Hallmark dishes like Gobi Manchurian (crispy cauliflower in a sweet-salty gravy) and chili chicken (Szechuan chicken with ginger and fresh chilis)  which typify the Indo-Chinese combination of Chinese techniques with Indian ingredients  have long been found hiding amid menus of more traditional fare at places like Tustins Haveli and Annapoorna in Irvine.

At Wok N Tandoor, though, Indias favorite foreign cuisine is placed front and center, incorporated into more than just a few plates of wok-tossed specialties.

The Artesia location succeeds with a wide menu of fancy Bombay-style Indo-Chinese creations, like Szechuan prawns, kung pao veggies and deep-fried chicken lollipops along with a full bar. For Orange, the brand flipped the script again, focusing instead on counter-ordering, family-style grub with some house inventions that blend not only Indian and Chinese flavors but American ones too.

This means that in addition to the usual Indo-Chinese suspects (like gobi Manchurian, chili chicken and chow mein-style Hakka noodles) you can also get a cheesy tomato-sauce-free chicken tikka pizza, a lamb-stuffed, burrito-like kati roll or a heap of crinkle-cut fries tossed in a sweet and spicy Szechuan sauce, like some forkable Asian disco fries.

Add to that one of O.C.'s best lineups of chaat, those crunchy, puffy, sweet and tangy not-quite-snacks-not-quite-meals of puri and pau bhaji and more, made famous on Indian street carts but available at Wok N Tandoor in their intended quick-service form. If you only have stomach space for one, try the fascinating Chinese bhel  a volcano pile of crispy-fried noodles tossed in sweet chutney and spicy sour sauce.It might be the only Indo-Chinese dish that made it back over the border, landing back into the street-food culture of Southern China.

In a region awash with Indian restaurants of all styles and sizes, Wok N Tandoors express experiment is the one weve been so sorely missing. Finally, a hearty chunk of Artesias Little India has landed in Orange County. And what luck that it also came with a groundbreaking menu (and a case of fresh sweets from Rasraj) that goes beyond the intriguing Indo-Chinese emphasis to expose even more novel new nooks of a seemingly ubiquitous cuisine.

--

SARAH BENNETT is a freelance journalist covering food, drink, music, culture and more. She is the former food editor at L.A. Weekly and a founding editor of Beer Paper L.A. Follow her on Twitter @thesarahbennett.
The Newport Beach City Council signed off Tuesday on a three-year contract with the citys new police chief.

Jon Lewis, a 25-year veteran of the Newport Beach police force, will receive $213,500 in annual compensation as part of his contract, which the council approved unanimously.

City Manager Dave Kiff announced in March that he had chosen Lewis, 44, to take over for retired Chief Jay Johnson, and the city officially promoted the former deputy chief to the top job during a ceremony at the Civic Center.

In addition to his salary, Lewis will be provided with a cellphone allowance, a city-owned car and uniforms. The uniforms cost about $1,350 annually, according to the contract.

Lewis began working part time at the Newport Beach Police Department in 1991 while attending Cal State Long Beach, where he earned a bachelors degree in criminal justice. Lewis also holds a masters degree in criminal justice from Chapman University in Orange.

In 1996, Lewis joined the Newport department full time as an officer and steadily rose through the ranks, taking assignments including bike patrol, SWAT, detective, training officer and executive officer to the chief.

Lewis was promoted to deputy chief in 2014 and most recently oversaw the departments patrol and traffic division.

He also is an adjunct faculty member at the Golden West College Criminal Justice Training Center in Huntington Beach and a member of the steering committee of the colleges Leadership and Ethics Institute.

--

hannah.fry@latimes.com

Twitter: @HannahFryTCN
Beginning Sept. 26, drivers in Laguna Canyons Sarah Thurston Park neighborhood will have to use another route to get to their homes while crews begin a months-long project to remove a deteroriating bridge that connects Laguna Canyon Road with Milligan Drive.

Temporary access to the neighborhood will be provided through a vacant lot at 113 Canyon Acres Drive from Laguna Canyon Road, according to a news release. Working hours will be 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mondays through Fridays, excluding holidays.

The current bridge, made of wood with an asphalt overlay, will be replaced with a bridge of reinforced concrete and steel measuring 23 feet long and 16 feet wide, project manager Tri Nguyen wrote in an email.

Property owners in the surrounding area paid $321,275 toward the projects $645,000 price tag, with the city footing the remaining cost for design and construction, Nguyen said.

The bridge is within a California Department of Transportation right-of-way, thus staff from the city and the state agency will discuss responsibilities for future maintenance of the bridge, Nguyen said.

The city has notified affected residents by mail of the upcoming work. The project is scheduled to be completed in January.

bryce.alderton@latimes.com

Twitter: @AldertonBryce
The store owner unlocked the jewelry case and lifted a ring to the light.

This is a raw, untreated black diamond from Santa Monica, she said to a visitor. Thats something you dont see every day.

Presenting such an unexpected element is the business philosophy of Alchemy Works, a brand known for its heirloom jewelry made by local designers, plus home accents, clothing and accessories.

Three years after opening Alchemy Works in the Arts District in downtown Los Angeles, husband and wife Raan and Lindsay Parton have ventured to Newport Beach to open their first Orange County store.

The airy 1,300-square-foot space in Lido Marina Village, a recently renovated shopping destination, features concrete striped flooring hand-painted by a local artist, custom fixtures, wooden tables and two glass cases highlighting vintage estate jewelry and leather accessories.

The store, in a 1940s-era black house that sits in front of the harbor, will stock not only ready-to-wear items, accessories and fragrance collections but also a selection of decor  vintage and contemporary  curated by the couple.

My husband grew up in Santa Barbara, and he is nostalgic about Californias golden era and what used to be here, Lindsay Parton said. We saw that in this area and recognized that it didnt have as much of independent retail that it should have.

The boutique, which is divided into two rooms, was designed to be like a well-appointed home with contemporary designs mixing vintage furnishings and collected objects.

A floor-to-ceiling midcentury shelf system holds books, candles, office accessories and leather shoes made in Mexico.

Brands such as handbag label Vere Verto, Weiss Watches and Victoria Morris ceramics occupy wooden and glass displays.

Black-and-white prints from 10 contemporary photographers, including Will Adler and Morgan Maassen, are for sale in the new shop.

The location also features Orange Countys first Warby Parker showroom. The American brand of prescription eyeglasses and sunglasses partners with nonprofits to provide a buy one, give one model, in which for every pair of glasses sold, a pair is distributed to someone in need.

Alchemy Works also is home to Apolis, a lifestyle brand of apparel and accessories founded by Raan Parton and his brother Shea.

The line, which originated in Los Angeles, forms manufacturing partnerships with nonprofits in Uganda, Peru, Bangladesh and Nepal.

At Alchemy, Lindsay Parton said, a shopper can find pieces ranging from $10 to $4,800.

We want to have that approachability here because were very community-driven and want everyone to have a space to shop, Parton said. Its a fun new home.

Alchemy Works is at 3408 Via Oporto, Newport Beach. Store hours are 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays and 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Fridays through Sundays.

For more information, call (949) 438-1183 or visit alchemyworks.us.

kathleen.luppi@latimes.com

Twitter: @KathleenLuppi
Authorities appear to have no answers for a mysterious smell that a Seal Beach resident said gave him nausea and a headache and has other residents fearing for their health.

Steve Stasoiski, a 16-year resident of Seal Beach, said he was at his home in Old Town around 8:30 p.m. Sunday when he began to feel ill. This was the first time Stasoiski was sickened by the unknown smell, but it wasnt the first time he had experienced the gas-like odor. Stasoiski said it comes around every few months.

I have smelled this multiple times, but this was the strongest its ever been, Stasoiski said. I am not someone that gets sick easily, but the smell gave me bad nausea and a headache.

Wendi Rothman, a 25-year city resident, said the odor smells chemical and oily.

It makes my eyes burn and it gives me nausea, she said. You can taste it.

Seal Beach City Council member Ellery Deaton was moved to action after Sunday nights event, which she said was so intolerable she had to close all the windows in her home. She contacted City Manager Jill Ingram this week, and according to Deaton, Ingrams staff will be looking into the cause of the odor.

Deaton said the mysterious smell has been around since she moved to Old Town in 1993, but she still doesnt know whats causing it. She said it smells like natural gas.

Assistant City Manager Patrick Gallegos confirmed that city staff is investigating the matter. It has not yet identified the source of the odor, he said.

Sergio Jimenez, a spokesman for Southern California Gas Co., which serves Seal Beach and most of Southern California, said company inspectors went to the area Sunday night and did not find anything.

However, Jimenez said, the smell definitely was not natural gas.

He did not know whether inspectors had responded in the past to any calls from Seal Beach residents regarding the odor.

In March, the Daily Pilot reported that authorities said a similar odor experienced in the Costa Mesa area probably originated offshore, possibly from a drilling apparatus.

But authorities had no answers for Sundays episode in Seal Beach.

Sam Atwood, spokesman for the South Coast Air Quality Management District, said the organization received 39 odor complaints from Seal Beach residents Saturday through Monday. The AQMD has received reports about unpleasant odors in Seal Beach for a few years, he said.

The organization has sent inspectors to the area several times for testing but never found a cause for the smell, he said. An inspector was sent Sunday night, but the findings were not yet available.

Ray Hiemstra, associate director of programs for Orange County Coastkeeper, a Costa Mesa-based environmental organization, said he had not received any reports from residents about the incident and that if there had been a spill or contamination of a body of water, his group probably would be aware of it.

Some residents said they feel left in the dark, especially now that the problem seems to be getting worse.

Weve been exposed to an unknown source of a cocktail of gases, said Mark Dennison, a 24-year resident of Seal Beach. It has been around for quite some time, years probably. But it is occurring more frequently. People are detecting it all over. It cant be good for you.

Stasoiski said he and his neighbors have commiserated over the odor on social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter.

Noxious petroleum smell in Seal Beach for the umpteenth time, one Twitter user said Sunday.

How can we bring attention to horrible gas smell in air in Seal Beach? another said. Been problem for a while.

On Sunday, residents created a forum on Nextdoor, a social networking website for neighborhoods, to discuss the smell. Since Sunday, the forum has compiled posts from more than 80 people, Rothman said.

benjamin.brazil@latimes.com

Twitter: @benbrazilpilot
Today I sentenced a man to death. It is a sobering experience and a decision I will live with the rest of my life. My conscience will bear it.  Facebook post, Jan. 11.

A powerful comment from James Vaughn  Laguna Hills resident, Harvard graduate, consultant for the Congressional Management Foundation in Washington, D.C., and former board president of Men Alive  Orange County Gay Mens Chorus.

Vaughn usually posts pictures of his dogs, husband and fun with friends.

Not this day. Vaughn was a member of the jury that recommended a death sentence for convicted murderer Daniel Wozniak.

To recap, Wozniak, a community theater actor from Costa Mesa, killed and dismembered Army Veteran Sam Herr, 26, in May 2010.

He also shot Herrs friend Juri Julie Kibuishi, 23, to try to frame Herr for her killing as part of a convoluted plot to steal $62,000 from Herrs bank account.

Vaughn, who had never served on a jury prior to this, said before the case that he was slightly in favor of the death penalty but thought these cases deserved special scrutiny.

After the trial?

My view is that there are crimes where we should draw the line as a society. I could support the death penalty if there was no doubt whatsoever of the guilt of the person involved. Wozniak confessed voluntarily and it was recorded, he said.

Vaughns voice cracked with emotion as I asked if he had watched NBCs Dateline episode about the case on Jan. 15.

He said it was like reliving the trial all over again.

Some of the same cropped crime scene photos seen on the show were shown during the trial.

1 / 2 June Kibuishi, attending court this month with her husband, Masa, clasps a ring that her daughter Juri Julie Kibuishi wore the night she was killed by Costa Mesa community theater actor Daniel Wozniak in May 2010. Behind them at left is Steve Herr, father of Sam Herr, who also was killed by Wozniak. (File photo / Daily Pilot) 2 / 2 Raquel Herr embraces Ruben Menacho Salas, a friend or Herrs son Sam, during the December trial for Daniel Wozniak, who was convicted of murdering Sam Herr in 2010. (File photo / Daily Pilot)

Vaughn says jurors saw the uncropped versions in the jury room, and they were difficult to view.

Hearing the victims family members testifying in their grief was emotional as well.

You brace yourself for it. You could see the tears from the jury box, and courtroom sobbing was audible. It was really tough, he said.

Then there was Wozniak.

I kept looking at this man and trying to imagine how someone who looks so normal and has such a simple demeanor could do something so heinous, Vaughn said.

Vaughn said Wozniak kept looking at the jury, trying to be engaging.

This guy killed two people and cut off Sams head  it was very surreal, Vaughn said.

How did jurors cope with hearing and seeing such horrific testimony?

Its weird  you have 16 strangers who have one thing in common and cant talk about it, Vaughn said.

He said some talked about having nightmares. Others coped with comfort food. A couple of people even went to Disneyland to lighten their moods.

Vaughn said he would spend hours trying not to cry when he got home.

Until the trial started, he hadnt heard of Wozniak or the killings.

I dont read that kind of news. I read mostly political news, he said.

When the case went to the jury initially in December, he and another juror had one question of the judge. They wanted legal clarification on the count dealing with the Kibuishi killing and financial gain.

I didnt want to hold it up but I was trying to be fair for the defendant. Thats what were told to do, Vaughn said.

The judge answered the question within an hour, and we all agreed on guilty on all other counts on the first vote, Vaughn said.

When it came to the penalty phase, its one thing to intellectually have a discussion about the death penalty, its another when youre faced with the reality, he said.

Watching Dateline was the first time Vaughn heard Wozniaks fiancee, Rachel Buffett, speak.

Hearing from Rachel was new; she didnt testify. We werent allowed to find out why, and we were asking that, Vaughn said.

After the trial, questions remain for Vaughn about Buffett. He feels she wasnt the innocent bystander she claimed to be on Dateline.

But it seems the most disturbing aspect of this case for Vaughn was the randomness with which Kibuishi was selected to be murdered.

Apparently, Wozniak tried luring another woman to Herrs apartment before her. When that woman said no, he texted Kibuishi.

This sticks with Vaughn.

He has contacted the Orange County School of the Arts, Kibuishis alma mater, and wants to help with funding a guest arts program at the school in her name. He wants to work with her parents on this.

Their daughter should be remembered for more than just being a random victim in a sick murder plot for money, Vaughn said.

Its admirable that hes looking to create something positive out of this tragic situation.

ABCs 20/20" and CBS 48 Hours are doing shows about the trial. Vaughn has agreed to participate.

BARBARA VENEZIA lives in Newport Beach. She can be reached at bvontv1@gmail.com. Listen to her weekly radio segment on Sunday Brunch with Tom and Lynn from 11 a.m. to noon on KOCI/101.5 FM.
What a mess local politics has become in Newport Beach. We see it in the upcoming election.

First we had the disgraceful episode of campaign consultant Dave Ellis and resident Bob McCaffrey, supporters of candidate Lee Lowrey, trying to disqualify candidate Jeff Herdman from the ballot. The courts quickly rejected this dirty tactic, but not before Herdman was forced to spend precious campaign funds to defend his right to run.

Then we had the shameful effort by Councilman Scott Peotters brother to force Fred Ameri to run under a different name. Once again, this was quickly rejected by the courts. It seems that bigotry knows no bounds with the Peotters.

To his credit, candidate Will ONeill repudiated the Peotter effort. My guess is it will not be the last time he is forced to denounce the campaign tactics used by his supporters.

With Measure MM, we saw Scott Peotter, Mayor Diane Dixon, Mayor Pro Tem Kevin Muldoon and Duffield hijack a measure I authored, put their own names on it as ballot signers, and add ONeill to help his campaign.

What kind of integrity and ethics does that demonstrate? This kind of game-playing belongs in Sacramento, not in Newport Beach. At least this time they stole a good idea.

Voters may wonder about the newspaper editorials by council members and McCaffrey emails regarding this issue when the very authors themselves had already pulled it from consideration.

What they are trying to do is raise a general level of anxiety on debt and confuse voters without any real proposals or intent to advance their flawed debt limit or to do anything about it.

Basically, they are too lazy to come up with new issues, so they want to rerun the 2014 election. The duplicity and cynicism of this is indicative of their whole approach.

For the second time we are seeing candidates, those supported by Ellis and McCaffrey, declining to participate in candidate forums, such as Feet to the Fire, most likely to expose their positions on the issues.

When they do show up, they simply decline to tell voters where that stand on major development issues, including the Museum Tower project. Voters should be outraged by this demonstration of contempt.

Puppet masters Ellis and McCaffrey need one more vote to fully control the council. Unless voters play close attention to the election, they may get it.

KEITH CURRY is a Newport Beach councilman.
I am baffled as to how any neighbors near Hoover High School can possibly complain about the marching bands practice hours. I have lived within half a block of the Hoover High School complex for the past 40 years. My daughter graduated from Hoover and participated in the Drill Team. I remember when she had to rise and shine early in order to be at the school gym by 7 a.m. to practice with the school band and drill team. It made me happy to hear the band practicing. I remember back then the band and drill team would march down Olmsted Drive and then turn around and march back to the field.

The fact that there is a renewed effort with new field lighting, band uniforms and a band leader who is inspiring teenagers to join the band is wonderful. Instead of worrying about what and where teenagers are, we have a group of kids practicing their hearts out and experiencing the joy of making music. The morning and afternoons practicing while building memories of their high school years, learning personal discipline and forging friendships should assuage any thoughts of upset neighbors. Letter writer Judy Taylor is correct  complaining neighbors can close their windows.

Ann Segal

Glendale

Excuses sound alarm bells

I believe professional persons who understand the imperative necessity for security and privacy in their fields are surprised at the excuses Hillary Clinton provides to the American people to justify her complete lack of intelligence and concern for the safety of our people and our country in using a private server for her correspondence. This is inexcusable in view of her many years in the U. S. government. She especially should know better.

My husband escaped from behind the Iron Curtain. His attempts to become an American citizen were delayed many years due to his escape and the need for American investigation that he was not a Communist. My sister worked for the immigration office and told me that he had a thick file. I asked about the contents and my sister advised me that she could not disclose what was in that file for security reasons.

I worked for the Treasury Department and was in contact with many celebrities. When someone approached my desk I covered my work and at night we put our cases in locked files. All this for privacy and security reasons.

I was on jury duty seven times. Each time we were instructed frequently during the trial that we could not discuss the case among ourselves or to anyone else. That is security.

Yet we had a secretary of state who had such contempt and disregard for the intellect and safety of the American people, who and was extremely careless about the protection of the United States of America. She thinks we do not know any better and that we believe her lame excuses and lapse of memory. Now she wants to preside over us. God help America.

Ang Vukos

Glendale

Diatribe leaves one to wonder

It is interesting that two weeks after a letter I submitted was published, there were two articles regarding the same subject appearing in the Sept.10 edition of this paper. There was a Forum article written by Ray Richmond, detailing Donald Trumps underhandedness in avoiding payment to a photographer, as well as the chicanery exhibited when divorcing his second wife. The second was a letter to the editor submitted by Rasik Demirdjian, who extolled the virtues of Donald Trump while denigrating Hillary Clinton.

Richmond provided more evidence of Trumps lack of character; which any reasoning person long ago could have concluded disqualifies that the man from assuming the presidency. It is Demirdjians diatribe that concerns me.

I too am an immigrant, arriving in 1952, and also now a citizen. Since then, I have observed statesmanship degenerate to crass showmanship. I now find it hard to fathom why people make the political choices they do; is it out of ignorance or their unwillingness to place into context the historical record?

Demirdjian mentions Reagan and Benghazi. On Reagans watch, 240 Marines based in Lebanon were killed in a terrorist attack. Where was the Republican outcry? There was none.

Four died in Benghazi, and the Republican investigations since have been endless; all finding nothing culpable. In such attacks, first reports are always conflicting. It is called the fog of war. Clinton has acknowledged being the victim of such.

As for Trump, has he ever owned up to anything? To have faith in him defies logic. If one does so, their indignation regarding Clinton masks their hypocrisy. As the old saying goes, There are none so blind as those who will not see.

Howard H. Gething

Montrose
Its never too soon to plan your summer European vacation, especially if you see a $587 round-trip fare that includes all taxes and fees for travel from LAX to Dublin, Ireland. The fare is on Ethiopian and is subject to availability, although you may be able to find fares for holiday and summer travel.

It is for travel on Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays through August of next year. You must stay a Saturday night. Nonstop flights are available.

Info: Ethiopian Airlines. To call from the U.S., dial 011-25-111-665-6666; www.ethiopianairlines.com.emove the words ethiopian airlines from print

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Source: Airfarewatchdog.com

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If you want to do a little grape stomping, head to the fall harvest at this a winery in an unlikely location: the southern Nevada desert.

Yes, grapes grow quite well in the foothills of the Spring Mountains at the Pahrump Valley Winery, a one-hour drive west of the Las Vegas Strip.

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Various wines made exclusively with Nevada-grown grapes will be showcased during the winerys Grape Stomp on Oct. 1 and 2.

Stompers get to climb into half-barrels full of grapes for two minutes of frenzied fruit mashing. The action begins at noon each day with heats every 15 minutes. It costs $50 for each two-person team.

Teams win points for the most juice extracted, with prizes awarded to the best juicers and the worst stompers. All participants receive winery T-shirts.

For those who dont want to stomp, $10 allows you to enjoy live music, food and craft booths, and tastings of various locally made wines. Among those to be sampled are Cabernet Sauvignon, Desert Blush, Merlot and Sweet Melody, a new chocolate wine.

Also, you can stop for lunch and dinner at the winerys restaurant, Symphonys. Entrees range from $19.75 for Winery Chicken Tuscany to $27.75 for wild Alaskan halibut.

And youll be able to buy wines like Barbera, Nevada Ridge, Primitivo, Silver State Red and Tempranillo, all made from locally grown grapes.

Bill and Gretchen Loken bought the winery in 2005, the same year the vineyard produced its first batch of Zinfandel grapes. After aging for more than two years in small batches, the result was the 2008 release of the first bottles of Nevada Ridge.

The 2015 harvest produced 26 tons of grapes; a slight increase is expected this year. Previous attempts to grow grapes in Pahrump had been thwarted not only by the Mojave Deserts sometimes harsh weather but also by a herd of wild horses that trampled the vines back in the 1990s.

Info: Pahrump Valley Winery, 3810 Winery Road, Pahrump; (775) 751-7800
Set sail on an expedition into the past on a 12-day river cruise though Myanmar. Rich history, vibrant markets and ancient Buddhist stupas and pagodas can be seen on this journey on the Chindwin River, a tributary of the Irrawaddy, celebrated in Rudyard Kiplings poem Mandalay.

The tour begins in the city of Mandalay, former royal capital and center of Burmese culture, where participants spend two days before setting sail.

The colonial-style river vessel passes remote villages and former British outposts during the cruise, with the itinerary concluding with two nights in the city of Yangon.

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Dates: The 12-day, 11-night cruise operates upstream and downstream on alternating weeks from late September through March.

Price: From $4,182 per person, double occupancy. Includes meals, excursions, local beer and spirits and gratuities. International airfare not included.

Info: Red Savannah, (855) 468-5555

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Mahamad Reza Rohi ducked behind the door of his tricked-out Ford hatchback, slipped out of his street clothes and climbed into a red jumpsuit fresh out of the dry cleaners plastic.

The guys in his pit crew  buddies from the Tehran suburbs  were making quick work of breakfast: cream cheese and discs of flatbread spread out on newspaper across the shiny hood of the Ford.

More cars pulled into the gravel lot: Toyotas, Hondas, Peugeots, Iranian-made sedans and the occasional BMW. The morning stillness over the tree-filled park was obliterated by the thrum of engines and the screech of tires.

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Friday is not just for prayers in Iran. For a small community of car enthusiasts, it is also race day.

We do it for love, said Rohi, a 30-year-old civil servant who is a fixture in the weekly amateur drag races hosted by the Motorcycle and Automobile Federation of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Drivers get their cars inspected before the drag racing begins at a racetrack in Tehran. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times )

In an economy laid low by international sanctions, drag races, even amateur ones, would at first seem like an unaffordable luxury. Just that day, inside a grand hall at the other end of town, a turbaned, gray-bearded cleric was lecturing about the virtues of austerity as he led hundreds of worshipers in weekly prayers.

But Tehran is home to a serious car culture, which can be seen on its clogged highways and  as in Havana, another city long isolated from the world economy  in the mechanics who manage to keep decades-old vehicles chugging along.

Most of the 60-odd stock cars at the racetrack outside Azadi Stadium, on Tehrans western edge, were a decade old or older. Many were outfitted by the drivers themselves, some with exposed wires snaking down the consoles.

Foreign-made car parts are often hard to come by in Tehran due to international sanctions. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times )

Rohi grew up with fast cars. He idolized his father, a decorated driver who often refereed at the races, which have been running for more than two decades.

The tires, gearbox, engine  everything but the body, really  were ripped out of Rohis Ford Festiva. He spent about $10,000 on an engine he located in Dubai, removed the rear seats to reduce weight and scavenged other parts from local garages.

I save money and I cut my other expenses to do what I love to do, he said. Im single; I dont have any children.

He patted the hood of his Ford lovingly.

This is my wife, he said, his friends howling with laughter.

Two things were in evidence on race day. One was the disposable income that marked the drivers as members of a privileged middle class. The other was testosterone.

A few hundred spectators  nearly all of them men  packed into bleachers in the late morning, a sheet-metal awning providing little respite from the summer sun. There was a separate seating area with a handful of women, mostly wives or girlfriends of the drivers.

In a grassy pit area separated from the track by a chain-link fence, Alireza Emamgholipour, a 29-year-old with spiked hair and knockoff Diesel wraparounds, stood over his modified gray Peugeot, eyeing a new set of tires.

A mechanic, Emamgholipour poured the profits from his garage in western Tehran into his own car, a modest 10-year-old sedan that looked more like a taxi than a speed demon. But inside he had changed the suspension, brakes and gearbox, and installed a four-cylinder Japanese engine.

He cranked the ignition, eliciting a low roar from under the hood.

Cars were my obsession as a child, he said. You dont give that up very easily.

Nearly all the drivers acknowledged that parts were hard to come by. Irans domestic automobile industry, once the envy of the Middle East, churns out spares, but serious drivers prefer costlier, foreign-made parts.

My wife tolerates it. Its a lot of late nights in the garage, but she doesnt complain.  Hadi Khalethi, who has modified a Honda Civic

Hadi Khalethi, who runs an interior design company, said it took nearly two years to track down the engine he wanted for his Honda Civic. His main innovation, he said, was a large silver box where the rear seats used to be  a gas tank fashioned from aluminum, to reduce drag.

He did not want to estimate how much he had spent on the car.

My wife tolerates it, Khalethi said. Its a lot of late nights in the garage, but she doesnt complain.

There is little financial reward in this club. Members pay about $100 annually in dues, and $35 to enter a competition. Winners get trophies, but rarely any cash.

Drivers and spectators are predominantly male at a racetrack in Tehran. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times )

The first pair of cars stood at the starting line, separated by judges who watched an electronic clock. The starter went off and the drivers kicked into gear, speeding a quarter-mile down the length of the track in about 10 seconds. That would be more than a whisker behind the U.S. stock car record of 6.455 seconds, set last year, but it was plenty fast for these drivers.

Standing behind the fence, Sina Mustatab, 27, was sweating in his jumpsuit. A self-employed computer technician, he watched the races for several years before entering this one, his first.

He and a friend worked for nine months on his box-shaped Saipa compact, one of the few Iranian-made vehicles to enter. He poured $7,000 into parts and an engine from Dubai, and cut a hole in the hood to add another exhaust pipe.

Now the humble Saipa roared. Edging up to the track, Mustatab donned a helmet, though the driver alongside him chose not to wear one.

Youve seen the traffic in Tehran, he said, sliding behind the wheel. There is nowhere else in the city that you can drive this fast.

Mostaghim is a special correspondent.

shashank.bengali@latimes.com

Follow @SBengali on Twitter for news from South Asia.

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A suicide bomber struck a mosque in northwest Pakistans troubled tribal region where worshipers gathered for Friday prayers, leaving at least 23 people dead and many injured, officials said.

The suicide bomber blew himself up in Pai Khan, a village in the Mohmand tribal agency, near the border with Afghanistan.

At least 28 people were injured in the blast, according to a political official in Mohmand Agency who spoke to The Times by phone.

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The remote location of the blast was complicating emergency rescue efforts, said the official, who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

Some victims had been transported to the town of Khar, about two hours away by road in a neighboring tribal agency, he said.

The village is situated  on difficult terrain and it has been taking time to rescue the injured, he said.

Anwarullah Khan, a Khar-based journalist, reached the hospital where victims were being treated and said the small medical facility in Khar was overwhelmed. Doctors had begun referring cases to Peshawar, the nearest major city, about 50 miles to the south.

Most of the injured people seemed to be in serious condition, Khan said.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack. The tribal area along the Afghan border has long been home to Pakistani Taliban insurgents who attack mosques and other civilian targets as part of a long-running battle against the Pakistani government.

The Pakistani military has waged a two-year offensive that it says has routed militants from the rugged tribal belt. But analysts believe many fighters escaped over the border into Afghanistan and have been able to cross back into Pakistan.

Sahi is a special correspondent. Times staff writer Shashank Bengali reported from Kabul, Afghanistan.

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7:30 a.m.: This article was updated with Times reporting and a higher death toll.

This article originally was published at 4:45 a.m.
The cease-fire in Syria could change the country if it finally leads the government to halt mass killing of its citizens, starvation sieges and the continuing destruction of the civilian infrastructure, observers say.

But few in the opposition expect that outcome. Rebel commanders view the accord announced last week by the United States and Russia as propping up President Bashar Assad at a time his conscript army has practically lost its will to fight and he depends on the military intervention of Russia, Iran, and their allies for his own survival.

Assads opponents, an all-volunteer force, say they have little choice but to support any step that will ease the suffering of their families and all civilians.

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We will comply, but we have lost confidence in the international community, Col. Ahmad Saud, Commander of Division 13, based in Idlib province, said in an interview via Skype. During the last truce, the government dropped barrel bombs on civilians in Maarat al Numan as they went to markets, killing 60 and wounding 100. We worry that this is another ambush of the Syrian people.

These commanders are convinced Assad could be forced to the negotiating table if the U.S. reversed its refusal to provide them with anti-aircraft weaponry.

The regime has air superiority over us, said Saud. If it were not for the air force, the regime couldnt hold one square meter of land.

Four days into the cease-fire, violations are on the rise. At least six civilians died in government airstrikes in Idlib, Aleppo and Hama provinces Friday, local authorities said. Rebel forces said they killed 20 soldiers and destroyed a tank in repulsing government forces and foreign Shiite militias which stormed the Jobar neighborhood, for a loss of three opposition commanders.

Russia and Syria claim rebel fighters have caused dozens of cease-fire violations in the first four days with machine gun or mortar attacks on military and civilian targets. But the Syrian Network for Human Rights, a humanitarian watchdog often cited by the U.S. State Department, said Friday that there were 28 violations in the first 48 hours, all by government forces or their allies.

And although U.S. Secretary of State John F. Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov set a high priority for delivery of relief to besieged Aleppo, where there are 300,000 people, and over a million in other surrounded towns and cities, no aid has arrived anywhere since the cease-fire began Monday night.

The most biting criticism of the accord by opposition fighters is that it gives Russia, Assads main backer, equal weight to the United States in determining violations. Russia is a member of the oversight committee, but it also takes part in the bombing, Ahmad Qara Ali, the spokesman for Ahrar al Sham, an Islamist fighting group, said via Skype. Added to that, there are no sanctions for violations.

The accords are still secret, and its not known if they will require all participants to guarantee the protection of civilians  a central principle of international law.

Also rankling with the opposition is that if the cease-fire holds, the U.S. and Russia will set up a joint center to cooperate in targeting Fateh al Sham, formerly known as Jabhat al Nusra, which for three years was the Al Qaeda affiliate in Syria. In Idlib province, which is totally under rebel control, and to a much lesser extent in Aleppo, al Sham fighters operate in close proximity of U.S.-backed rebel forces.

Al Sham fighters are among us, that is true, Dawood Mahmud, a commander of rebel forces in east Aleppo, said in a statement. They are here because no one else is. They have kept our city open and have reopened it when it was besieged. Where was Russia and the U.S. then? Ill tell you where. The U.S. was nowhere and Russia was bombing us. And now they say trust us.

We oppose targeting any group that is fighting the regime, said Qari Ali. That will weaken the military power of the revolution and strengthen the regime.

Yet many close observers acknowledge that the cease-fire may be the best deal the U.S. could get in light of President Obamas policy of not challenging the Russia or Iranian interventions and not providing the opposition with the means to stop the governments air attacks on civilian targets.

Assad for his part seized on the cease-fire to renew his vow to re-conquer the entire country.

We have come here to give the message that the Syrian nation is determined to retake every piece of land from the terrorist, he said Monday, speaking in Daraya, the town that surrendered late last month after the government captured its farmlands and destroyed its crops.

But its not clear how laying siege to cities and dropping barrel bombs from high flying helicopters will accomplish that goal.

A Russian analyst in a report that got wide circulation within U.S. government circles, last week said Assads military cannot win and its time for Russian forces to go home.

Soldiers have no benefits, the food is poor and the morale low, wrote Mikhail Khodarenok, a retired Russian Air Force officer, in the Russian publication Gazeta. The general staff has no coherent short or mid-term strategic plans, and blames the high combat capabilities of the opposition, a lack of ammunition and fear of heavy losses in fighting.

Its unclear what should be done to the half-rotten structure of the Syrian army he said.On the one hand it would seem easy to completely demobilize (in other words, completely disband) the Syrian army and recruit a new oneOn the other hand, the main problem is that new men are nowhere to be found in modern Syria.

He said the war is being fought by foreign militias while more than half the Syrian army man fortified checkpoints and exact bribes from those trying to move past them. He said the morale and combat capabilities of the [opposition] militants are far above those of the Syrian army.

The commander of the U.S.-backed Izza Army in Hama said 75% of the Syrian army man checkpoints and are responsible for guarding government-held areas. The rest are in military barracks or guarding weapons depots, said Maj. Jamil al Salih. In rebel-intercepted radio communications, he said, Syrian officers would complain that the Russians are pushing us to our death, they are deaf to our suffering.

Meanwhile, the Pentagon has deployed about 40 special operations forces to assist Turkish ground troops as they plan an offensive against Islamic State militants in Dabiq, on Syrias northern border, according to U.S. officials who werent allowed to speak publicly on the matter.

Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr., chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, huddled Friday with a senior Turkish military official, Gen. Hulusi Akar, at a meeting of NATO generals in Split, Croatia. The two discussed the way forward in the fight against Islamic State, Capt. Greg Hicks, a military spokesman, told reporters.

Officials said Turkish forces plan to sweep along the Syrian border east to Dabiq, pushing Islamic State fighters from defensive positions along the way.

Last month, Turkish forces and U.S.-backed Syrian rebels defeated the militants in Jarabulus, a border town that had served as a critical way station for Islamic State to move weapons and fighters from Turkey.

Gutman is a special correspondent. Times staff writer W.J. Hennigan in Split, Croatia, contributed to this report.
All material is subject to strictly enforced copyright terms & conditions and cannot be repurposed or reproduced.  19882022 Latin American Financial Publications Inc.
NEW YORK CITY  Voto Latino teamed up with 400 organizations throughout the nation in an effort to register Latino voters as part of its Hispanic Heritage Month of Action social media campaign. NYC Votes and Dominicanos USA are some of the organizations that joined Voto Latino on Thursday Sept. 15 in Corona Plaza to push young Latinos to practice their right to vote.

I think its a right that a lot of people in our past have fought for in this country and other places and we should use it, Katherina Opazo, street team member for NYC Votes, told Latin Post. A lot of people are struggling. Getting out there to vote says Im an American and Im using my right to get to where I need to be.

Opazo, a 24-year-old college student with a Colombian and Chilean background, says she sees a lot of her peers comment on social media about the injustices of this world, but taking action is the only way they can make a change.

You can comment on Facebook all you want, she said. But until you get out there and vote, your concerns will go unnoticed.

Working with the NYC Votes division of New York City Campaign Finance Board is just one way that Opazo reaches out to her community. Engaging her peers on social media is another.

We do a lot of work on social media because that is where a lot of the Latino millennials are, Voto Latino Director of Development Maria Samaniego said.

#HHMA Hispanic Heritage Month of Action THERE IS POWER IN OUR VOTE Register and Vote .@votolatino @MiFamiliaVota pic.twitter.com/3wN3C0maLJ  Hispanic Citizen (@US_Latino) September 15, 2016



The organization started a social media campaign with the hash tag #HHMA for Hispanic Heritage Month of Action where they ask for people to spread the word about voter registration and to use a Facebook profile picture filter promoting the historical month from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15.

Not only do we ask people to get out there and vote, we also do leadership outreach programs because people should be involved in their communities year round, not just during election season, Samaniego said.

Voto Latino launched the Voter Pal App that makes it faster and easier when registering to vote in hopes of getting more millennials involved.

Voto Latino Nationwide

The organization launched #HHMA with voter drives in other parts of the U.S. as well. Sept. 15 started with voter registration drives in Los Angeles, CA, Las Vegas, NV, Chicago, IL, Phoenix, AZ, Fresno, CA and Orlando, TX.

Voto Latino will end Hispanic Heritage Month with a Power Summit Conference in L.A. on Saturday Oct. 15.
The emulation focus on organizing models and activities to attract and gather young people; creating a useful playing ground for young people in the city; promoting the implementation of key tasks in the Resolution of Vietnam Youth Federation Congress at all levels; carrying out movements and action programme launched by Hanoi city Youth Federation in 2016; and actively participating activities in celebration of the 60th anniversary of Vietnam Youth Federation.

Representatives and young people participating in the camp take a photo (Photo by Hoang Man)

On this occasion, the city Youth Federation organized a training camp from September 13th to 16th, drawing the participation of 70 camps from grassroots youth unions in the city and the Vietnam Youth Academy.

The training camp will provide participants theories and skills, contributing to improving cadres in the federation and meeting demands in the new situation. It will be a useful playing ground which will be widely carried out in grassroots federation in the city in the near future./.
Researchers say that sex and porn addiction is on the rise and could be compared to alcohol or gambling addiction, although spectators wont see it as an actual medical issue. The Rutland Centre in Dublin, Ireland, home to mainly alcohol addicted patients, has seen an increase in sex addiction in the past years.

We can expect to see an increase in sex addiction...In the U.S. they estimate two thirds of kids are looking at porn as they do their homework, Clinical Services Manager at the Rutland Centre in Dublin Erica Ruigrok told Irish Times. Id say we have a tsunami coming our way in terms of sex addiction.

Sex Addiction Increases

The Rutland Centre saw less than half percent of its clients affected by sex addiction in 2009. Now the research and rehabilitation facility highlights sex addiction as the main issue in six percent of its presentations.

Its a game-changer...With the internet you can find a sex partner within 15 minutes  as quickly as you can find a take-away (takeout food delivery), Ruigrok said.

Dr. John OConnor, medical director of the Rutland Centre, said sex addiction stems from a poor childhood and is one of the loneliest addictions.

Its all there. If people have bad childhoods, they are in trouble, Dr. OConnor said. They may have experienced trauma, abandonment issues, lack of boundaries, narcissistic parenting...In addiction people are self-medicating...They are using drink or sex or whatever it is to soothe and regulate emotions.

Sex Addiction a Clinical Diagnosis

Sex addiction  also known as hyper-sexuality  is now recognized by the American Psychiatric Association handbook as a clinical diagnosis. New York City Sex Addicts Anonymous holds weekly meetings for those who seek recovery from their own sexual addiction where there are also meetings tailored to Spanish speakers.

Rebecca Barker, a victim of sex addiction, tells The Sun UK that she had to see a psychiatrist to help cope with her sex addiction.

When I mentioned my sex addiction she upped my anti-depressants but it didnt stop me wanting sex, it just dimmed the physical sensations, she said. I left my partner in 2014 and had a couple of rebound relationships based on sex.

Barker, who lost her virginity when she was 15 years old, said she demanded sex from her former partner five times a day, causing a strain in their relationship.

Dating Sites Fuel Sex Addiction

Another sex addiction victim, Andrew Goodall, said he used the dating website Plenty of Fish to hook up with several sexual partners.

I have no idea how many people I have slept with, its well in the hundreds, he said. Its only in the last couple of years Ive started keeping count. This year its been about 20 so far.

He has one kid and has gotten a vasectomy to keep from having any more unplanned pregnancies.
This years Harvest Moon will rise tonight Friday Sept. 16, 2016. The full moon will be shaded by a lunar eclipse and visible to onlookers located in certain parts of Africa, Asia and Australia. In these regions, the full moon occurs tonight between 3:05 p.m. while the lunar eclipse had already begun at 12:45 p.m local times.

Live Stream Full Moon 2016

Onlookers can watch the live stream of the full moon and the lunar eclipse at Slooh.com.

Other people located where the full moon and solar eclipse are visible, can take their telescopes and watch as it happens right in front of them. Be sure to be in places with little to no street light and maybe go to a roof top for a better view.

Full Moon History

The Harvest Moon usually appears closest to the autumnal equinox and is most likely seen in the month of October. From 1970 to 2020, there should be a Harvest Moon appearance 12 different times. The next full moon is expected in 2017.

Although people may think so, the Harvest Moon does not stay in the sky longer than all the other full moons. But the Harvest Moon is different from all of the other full moons because it happens at the climax of the harvest season.

It is called the Harvest Moon because on this day, farmers are able to work late into the night because of the moons bright light shining down on them. It is also known as the Full Corn Moon or the Barley Moon depending on which farmers are harvesting what.

This years Harvest Moon will appear shaded at the very top because of the lunar eclipse happening at the same time.

Other Full Moons:

In January there is the Full Wolf Moon that got the name because of the time when wolves howl in hunger during its appearance. In February, it is dubbed the Full Snow Moon because that is the month of heavy snow. March is the Full Worm Moon, where the grown begins to soften and worms appear.

April is the Full Pink Moon where the moon appears to look pink and in May, during the Full Flower Moon, most of the flowers are sprouting because of spring. June brings the Full Strawberry Moon during strawberry picking season and in July, during the Full Buck Moon, bucks start to grow new antlers.
Photo: VNA

According to Professor Vladimir Kolotov, President of the institute, the institute was established as a joint project between Saint Petersburg University and the Ho Chi Minh National Academy of Politics (NPA) in 2010.

Throughout its development, the institute has worked with the NPA to organise a number of workshops on President Ho Chi Minh before their outcomes are printed as books in the Russian and Vietnamese languages. In addition, the institute has carried out scientific studies in terms of Vietnamese politics, economics, history and culture; trained students; and expanded cooperation with Vietnam in many areas, especially in culture.

The Russian professor added that the institute was coordinating with the NPA and Vietnamese partners to organise an exhibition on Vietnamese culture, especially the Dong Son, Sa Huynh and Oc Eo cultures, at the Hermitage Museum, one of the largest museums of the world, on May 19th, 2019.

For her part, Truong Thi Mai praised the efforts of Professor Kolotov in developing the Ho Chi Minh Institute, confirming that the institute was a bridge to reinforce the long-term traditional relationship between the two countries.

She pledged to promote the exhibition on Vietnamese culture at the Hermitage Museum in 2019.

On the same day, she met with representatives of the Vietnamese community in Russia, before paying a working visit to the Czech Republic./.
Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc is welcomed at Hong Kong International Airport (Photo: VNA)



That is the first official visit to China by PM Phuc and also the first trip to the country by a senior leader of Vietnams Party and State after the 12th National Party Congress in January.

In Beijing, the Vietnamese leader met with Chinese Party General Secretary and President Xi Jinping and had talks with Premier Li. He also had meetings with Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress Zhang Dejiang and Chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference Yu Zhengsheng.

He also met representatives of many Chinese organisations, families of Chinas former experts who assisted Vietnam during the resistance wars, local entrepreneurs, along with Vietnamese expatriates in the country.

During the talks and meetings, the Vietnamese and Chinese leaders reached broad common perceptions on intensifying the Vietnam-China comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership, and exchanged viewpoints on international and regional issues of shared concern.

They agreed that the two countries will persistently respect each other and increase strategic dialogue exchanges, political trust and win-win cooperation. They will control and satisfactorily handle existing disagreements and arising problems, while fostering the healthy and stable development of the comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership, thereby practically benefiting the two peoples and contributing to peace, stability and prosperity in the region.

The two sides agreed to seriously implement the bilateral agreement on basic principles guiding the settlement of sea-related issues, and, together with ASEAN countries, comprehensively and effectively carry out the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the East Sea (DOC), and resolve disputes by peaceful measures on the basis of international law, including the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

Vietnam and China pledged to respect diplomatic and legal processes, consult and negotiate to reach agreements, and soon build a Code of Conduct (COC) in the East Sea. They will control sea disputes well, avoid actions that complicate or expand disputes, not conduct militarisation, while keeping peace and stability in the East Sea.

During the visit, the two sides issued a joint communique and inked a number of important cooperation documents.

Before setting foot in Beijing, PM Phuc attended the 13th China-ASEAN Expo (CAEXPO) and China-ASEAN Business and Investment Summit (CABIS) in Nanning city of Guangxi province. He and Zhang Gaoli, a member of the standing board of Chinas Politburo and Vice Premier, chaired the opening ceremony of Vietnams national pavilion City of Charm at the CAEXPO.

He also met with Secretary of the Party Committee of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Peng Qinghua, chaired a roundtable conference with Chinese entrepreneurs, and visited Nanning Yucai School and the Bagui Tianyuan high-tech agriculture zone.

In Hong Kong, the PM met with Chief Executive of Hong Kong Leung Chun Ying and Chief Secretary for Administration of the special administrative region Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet - ngor.

At the meetings, PM Phuc stressed that Vietnam and Hong Kong need to continue to promote existing cooperation mechanisms, step up negotiations on an ASEAN-Hong Kong free trade agreement, and take effective measures to facilitate partnerships in economics, trade, investment and tourism.

He also took part in the Hong Kong-Vietnam business and investment forum and witnessed the signing of cooperation agreements and trade contracts with a total value of nearly USD10 billion.

He had working sessions with executives of global investment and financial investment consultation funds based in Hong Kong such as State Street, Morgan Stanley, and Capital Group.

PM Phucs official visit to China and his participation in the CAEXPO and CABIS are important to augmenting the Vietnam-China comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership.

The tours success also demonstrates Vietnam as an active and responsible member of ASEAN in bolstering the development of the ASEAN Community as well as ASEAN-China relations, for the sake of the two peoples as well as the region and the world./.




Students eagerly welcome the new school year (Photo: VNA)



At the ceremony, Rector Pham Xuan Phan said that this school year, the school has 1,897 students, 92 teachers, including 15 teachers teaching Vietnamese language.

In the 2016-2017 school year, Nguyen Du school continues to improve teaching and learning, and strives to become a high quality school.

Speaking at the event, Charge d'affaires of the Vietnamese Embassy in Laos Hoang Xuan Hai wished teachers and students a happy and successful new school year with full of enthusiasm.

The school has strong attachment with the development of the overseas Vietnamese community in Vientiane for over the past 50 years.

In order to implement the guideline of the two countries on building Nguyen Du to become a high quality school, and a symbol of the traditional friendship, special solidarity and effective cooperation in the field of education and human resources between Vietnam and Laos, Mr. Hoang Xuan Hai requested that the school continue to reinforce education managers; improving quality of teachers; and renovating teaching methods. He also desired Laos Ministry of Education and Sports, Vientianes Department of Education and Sports, and related agencies to continue to support the school so it would operate more effectively.

On this occasion, Mr. Hoang Xuan Hai presented a practical and significant gift from Mrs. Tran Nguyet Thu, spouse of Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc, to Nguyen Du school. The gift included two computer sets, 40 boxes of books, notebooks, school supplies and 60 boxes of milk on the occasion of the Prime Minister and his spouse attended the 28th and 29th ASEAN Summits and related Summits from September 6th - 8th./.
Neighbors of a proposed 80-bed behavioral health hospital on land by Bethlehem Catholic High School say that the planned hospital in no way fits the neighborhood.

On Sept. 22, the Bethlehem Planning Commission is set to review Acadia Healthcare's land development plans for the property at Center Street and Dewberry Avenue in Bethlehem. The site has previously been mired in controversy.

"We believe that putting a psychiatric hospital with diagnosed acute psychotic patients that are a danger to themselves and, possibly, others is really devoid of common sense," said Greg Zebrowski, of the North Bethlehem Action Committee. "It does not belong next to schools, playgrounds and a residential neighborhood."

The 5-acre site is owned by developer Abe Atiyeh, who in 2013 received Bethlehem Planning Commission approval to build a hospital on the property.

Planners restricted the facility from being a drug treatment center. Atiyeh has an agreement of sale with Acadia that hinges on city approval of the hospital.

Acadia's plans are almost identical to Atiyeh's, although they call for a three-story building instead of one story. Acadia's plans do not elaborate on how the facility would operate, and a representative did not return a message seeking comment.

Members of the North Bethlehem Action Committee and Bethlehem Catholic say they met with Acadia officials last week to discuss the project.

The action committee provided lehighvalleylive.com with renderings and details about the proposed hospital that Acadia gave them.

Bethlehem Behavioral Hospital would be an 80-bed inpatient hospital providing adults, seniors, children and teens with psychiatric care in 60 beds.

Twenty beds would be reserved for psychiatric patients that have underlying substance abuse problems. Staff would assist in detox and teach patients to learn coping mechanism to maintain their sobriety.

Resident Stewart Early, who is also a member of North Bethlehem Action Committee, said they were told the average patient stay would be seven days, so the hospital would process about 4,000 patients a year.

"Many of these patients will come from local hospital ERs where they were diagnosed in an acute psychiatric crisis -- one that endangers themselves and/or others," Early wrote in an email. "At (Bethlehem Behavioral Hospital), they will be further stabilized, diagnosed for their illness (and their insurance coverage) and referred to another facility for treatment of their illness. Some will be involuntarily admitted. The facility will be a lock down facility with appropriate security provisions."

The committee also met with Mayor Bob Donchez.

City Planning Director Darlene Heller has drafted a response letter on the plans' appropriateness, but she does not address whether the plans comply with city zoning.The land is zoned institutional and a hospital is allowed.

If the proposal gains planning commission approval, any zoning issues would be dealt with when permits were pulled for the project, she said.

The city wants the proposed 125 parking spots reduced, noting that the city only requires 58. If the spots are needed for peak shift changes, some pavement that permits groundwater seepage into the soil should be used.

The residents have long said that this is just another attempt to bring a drug treatment center into the neighborhood.

Both Lehigh Valley Health Network and St. Luke's University Hospital are equipped to meet those patients' needs, Zebrowski said.

"We feel we are meeting our needs as a community," he said. "Acadia has plenty of resources and money. If they are committed to this population, they should put it in an appropriate place."

It is a reality that patients escape from lock-down facilities and that's why homes, a school and playground shouldn't be nearby, Zebrowski said,

"We don't think it is appropriate to put a high-risk facility in a residential neighborhood," Zebrowski said.

The planning commission in 2008 approved Atiyeh's plans to build an assisted living facility at 1838 Center St. Then he pitched high-end apartments, but the city zoning board in 2010 rejected the plans because apartments aren't a permitted use on the property.

In 2011, the planning commission denied Atiyeh's plans for a detox center and psychiatric hospital on the site. Those plans garnered major objections from nearby residents, who earlier this summer expressed skepticism over Atiyeh's desire to subdivide an adjacent property.

Atiyeh has permission to build a drug treatment center on 12th Avenue in the city but he hasn't pursued those plans.

Sara K. Satullo may be reached at ssatullo@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @sarasatullo and Facebook. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.
A Palmer Township resident was duped Monday by someone who said they were from the IRS and insisted the resident owed taxes and must pay in iTunes gift cards or be arrested, township police said.

The resident was instructed to buy the cards and tell the male caller the card numbers, police said.

The resident bought $3,500 in iTunes gift cards and provided the numbers, police said.

The resident reported the scam on Tuesday, police said.

"The Internal Revenue Service will not call a taxpayer without first sending official notice by mail," police said in a news release. "Do not buy iTunes gift cards for payment of money requested from phone calls or email. Do not talk to scammers on the phone. They can be very convincing, become demanding and be threatening."

A similar scam was tried earlier this week to a Craigslist ad.

Tony Rhodin may be reached at arhodin@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @TonyRhodin. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.
Easton police announced the arrest Thursday evening of a rape suspect on South Side.

Courtney Thompson Jr., 19, was taken into custody about 6 p.m. in the 600 block of West Wilkes-Barre Street, city police Detective Darren Snyder said in a news release.

He is charged with two counts each of rape of a child and aggravated indecent assault of a child, in addition to four counts of possessing child pornography.

Thompson was taken into custody without incident and taken to Northampton County Prison, according to Snyder.

Police did not provide further details of the allegations.

Kurt Bresswein may be reached at kbresswein@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @KurtBresswein. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.
The target of a drug raid Thursday morning in Easton has at least three felony drug convictions in New Jersey, a district judge confirmed at his arraignment on two new felony counts.

Lewis Mobley, 34, moved to Pennsylvania four or five years ago from Passaic County, New Jersey, he told District Judge Antonia Grifo following his arrest at home at 414 Cattell St. on College Hill.

Mobley said he never got a high school diploma and described himself as between jobs at area restaurants. He has bounced around addresses in Easton, moving to Cattell street after a few months on West Wilkes-Barre Street and living more than a year before that on South Sixth Street.

He'd been living with his girlfriend and his two children, ages 14 and 9, he told Grifo.

At the time of his arrest Thursday, Mobley was serving a year's probation handed down in May for possession of drug paraphernalia. He is being held in Northampton County Prison on a probation-violation detainer, in addition to $75,000 bail set by Grifo at his arraignment on two new charges of drug possession with intent to deliver.

Wearing slides on his feet, shorts and a tank top saying "I like big blunts and I cannot lie," a reference to smoking marijuana, Mobley disputed claims by Easton police that at least one of his New Jersey drug arrests for heroin.

"This is the first time I've ever dealt with heroin," he said in Grifo's courtroom, saying previous arrests were for marijuana and crack cocaine. "I've never seen or touched it before."

Easton police say they recovered about $600 worth of heroin and $350 in cash from Mobley's house, and that he admitted the heroin was for distribution and that he'd been dealing the addictive opiate in the Easton area.

According to police, Mobley "was actively selling heroin in the 300, 400 and 500 (blocks) of Cattell" street.

He declined to comment to lehighvalleylive.com following his arraignment.

Grifo said that if it's approved by Northampton County Pretrial Services she would permit Mobley's release on 10 percent of $75,000 bail -- should the probation detainer be lifted. He would have to remain under pretrial supervision and be drug- and alcohol-free.

A preliminary hearing is tentatively scheduled Sept. 26 before Grifo on the new charges.

Kurt Bresswein may be reached at kbresswein@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @KurtBresswein. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.
Portlaoise train commuters are facing a loss of services under a draft timetable from Irish Rail.

A draft timetable up on their website for public consultation could, according to one commuter, add 25 minutes per journey.

The proposed new Phoenix Park Tunnel rail services which is open for public consultation, was published by Iarnrod Eireann last week.

The 5.25pm Dublin Heuston to Limerick service, which presently arrives at Portlaoise for 18.15pm is the main train affected.

One commuter estimates that the many local people face a substantial extra commute, from the changes proposed.

This creates an additional 25 minutes increase per journey, which is an additional 125 minutes a week (for this service amendment alone) commuting for a Portlaoise commuter.

From a quick glance it appears that its only the commuter services at peak morning and evening times have been increased in journey times, which makes commuting from and to a place of work for core business hours extremely challenging.

There is no additional services to or from Portlaoise in this draft timetable, if anything there is a decrease in services, which is vital for Portlaoise as a commuter hub town, said the commuter.

Irish Rail declined to comment but Laois TD and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Charlie Flanagan said that any changes to current train schedules proposed for Heuston Station Intercity and Commuter routes must not have an adverse effect on passengers and daily commuters.

While I welcome the announcement that the National Transport Authority (NTA) is funding a 13.7 million upgrade of the Phoenix Park Tunnel, it is vital that any proposed changes to current train timetables do not have an adverse impact on passengers, in particular those who rely on this service to travel to work on a daily basis.

Commuters from Laois are in a large part responsible for Iarnrod Eireanns successful growth in recent years and it is essential that the company caters for their needs.

I urge frequent users of railway services to engage with the public consultation process before the September 19th deadline and air their views on any schedule issues they want the company to address.

The closing date for submissions is by Monday 19th September ww.irishrail.ie/

news/phoenixparktunnelpublicconsultation
It was the end of the era, and the beginning of a new chapter in the history of Lumville House last weekend, as Michael Lambe handed the keys over to new owner, Tara Weston.

It was a bitter sweet moment for Michael, who has been a bar man for 59 years - 19 in Dublin and 45 at Lumville. He praised all the staff, customers, and neighbours at the renowned Curragh venue. He said he enjoyed his time there immensely and raised his family with his late wife Nuala.

I want to thank all the staff, who stayed with us for many years with generations of the same families taking up roles at Lumville such as the Lynches and the McDonalds. I want to also pay tribute to the customers, they werent just customers to us, they were friends. Anyone who had a family occasion with us returned again and again to celebrate their special moments with us, he said.

Thanks to all the wonderful neighbours. It was more than just a pub to us, it was a family home which gave us so many happy memories.

Michael said he was going to enjoy his retirement living in Monasterevin where he can overlook the canal, reminding him of his time working in Dublin. He is looking forward to spending time with his grandchildren and visiting family in America.

The Lambe family would like to wish Tara and her family the very best wishes for their future in Lumville House. We only hope that they will have as happy as family/business life as we had in Lumville, he said.
18-year-old student Ross Borton has been praised for his relentless dedication to hatching a baby ostrich at Kildare Farm Foods and open farm.

Ross from Newbridge has just finished his Leaving Cert and is going on to study Agriculture in Waterford IT.

He is gifted with animals and will still continue to be the little guy's main carer for the next while until he gets strong, according to Derville McLoughlin of Kildare Farm Foods.

We haven't named him or her yet as don't know if its a boy or girl said Derville speaking to the Leinster Leader.

So if its a boy we will call him Ross and a girl we will call her Rossa. It takes a while to know for sure if it is a boy or a girl so we have to wait. We have been trying to harch for a year or two its very difficult. It is very early stages and its really touch and go at this stage. We haven't open the baby ostrich up to the public yet.

Owner David Sexton said that not many ostrichs are born in Ireland due to the humidity of our climate.

He is in a pen with two turkey chicks and he is eating - his parents Fluffy and Duster are on the farm but we had to hatch the egg out.

Meanwhile the owners welcomed ITV Germany to Kildare Farm Foods last week to for a day's filming of Come Dine with Me.

A german TV crew filmed an episode of Come Dine With Me at the farm on Tuesday. They got in contact with us through Bord Failte.
I am writing to state my fundamental opposition to the re-introduction of grammar schools. I say this on the basis of my long career in education.

I was in teacher education for 20 years being a Head of Department at the Maria Grey College and Vice Chairman of the Standing Committee in Education at London University. I was Chair of Education in Devon.

At Maria Grey I lectured in the History of Education and The English Educational System, These are some of the points I made in my lectures:

Education in England is like a nubile Cinderella, sparsely dressed and much interfered with. (Spoken by the Headmaster in the film IF by Lindsay Anderson.

Social class has been the basis of English Education  see Newcastle Commission on The Great Schools (Public Schools) where they referred to schools in different categories for the sons of the aristocracy; sons of gentlemen; and the sons of traders.

In 1870, Forsters education act began to provide universal elementary education in order to give a supply of clerks for British Industry and Commerce. In due course this became compulsory. Up till 1870 we had had to import them from Germany which had a good elementary education system.

The 1926 Hadow report on the education of the adolescent anticipated a school leaving age of 15 with a least three years of post primary education with 11 to become the age for beginning secondary education. This had no bearing on childrens development.

The 1943 Norwood report on examinations and the curriculum was the basis for the Tripartite system by dividing young people into those who (A) liked abstract ideas, those who (B) liked working with their hands, and (C) the hewers of wood and carriers of water.

My current thoughts on education are:

All children should be provided with a good Kindergarten education from 3 to 7 including learning a foreign language since it has been shown that this improves ones own language which is especially beneficial to children from disadvantaged backgrounds.

From 7 to 14 children should attend a common school, continuing at 14 with the opportunity to choose an academic or vocational course.

I also believe very strongly that apart from the teaching of basic skills that schools have a duty to find out one thing that a child is good at and this may be the same as a consuming interest such that of people who for instance kept homing pigeons and had other hobbies which sustained them during the worst periods of unemployment in the 1930s.

In the North East this is being implemented at the present time.

* Margaret Rogers was a Liberal Democrat councillor in East Devon for 20 years. She is 87 years old and now lives in Harrogate.
The Strand, Bude, Cornwall

On Wednesday I was lucky enough to be in a choir leading the singing of Trelawny in an ancient Cornish church. Trelawny or The Song of Western Men is the unofficial Cornish national anthem written by Rev R.S. Hawker. The congregation joined in with the choruses  most enthusiastically  and rapturous applause from one and all followed the song. It was a magical moment and reinforced that great feeling of community which one feels amongst Cornish people. Theres a real passion and pride about the Cornish nation.

The Boundary Commissioners and Theresa May should have been present at that church. I have a hunch that witnessing such strength of feeling, they would think again about their proposals for a Devonwall seat. The church in question is just south of Bude and part of the proposed parliamentary constituency of Bideford, Bude and Launceston, straddling Devon and Cornwall  or, I should say, Cornwall and England.

Of course, sitting in London looking at a map, it all makes sense. You cant make the numbers work so you have to spill over into another county.

It all makes sense in a similar way to the proposal of the then chairman of Bude Stratton Urban District Council in the sixties, who said Bude should be part of a council area shared with parts of North Devon. The bin lorries would have less distance to travel and the water pipes would be shorter, blah blah blah. The chairman had the audacity to put the matter to a local referendum (it all seems incredible in retrospect but I promise you it happened). A public meeting was held at the Headland Pavilion on the cliffs at Bude. The chairman went on and on, as did a number of experts. Money saved, less distance travelled, much closer to Bideford than Truro, blah blah blah blah blah. After an hour of this stuff, a well known retired County Councillor stood up. He was a big man with a big voice. He simply said:

Youre missing the point. Were Cornish and we are proud to be Cornish!

The subsequent cheering, applause and stamping of feet brought the house down. The local feeling was made clear and the referendum was lost by about 600 votes against and a dozen or so in favour.

Such is the strength of feeling. Cornwall is not a simple county like other counties. A government announcement in 2014 said:

the proud history, unique culture, and distinctive language of Cornwall will be fully recognised under European rules for the protection of national minorities. The decision to recognise the unique identity of the Cornish, now affords them the same status under the European Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities as the UKs other Celtic people, the Scots, the Welsh and the Irish. For the first time the government has recognised the distinctive culture and history of the Cornish.

So, the Boundary Commissioners wouldnt propose a parliamentary constituency half in Wales and half in England, or half in Scotland and half in England  so why the hell are they proposing a constituency half in Cornwall and half in England?

Im delighted to say that Cornwall Liberal Democrats are strongly fighting this proposal, as written on their Facebook page:

Frances Tippett, Chair of Cornwall Liberal Democrats  and former Councillor for the northernmost parishes of Morwenstow, Kilkhampton and Launcells  said: We support the principle of equally sized constituencies, but only if flexibility is applied to take account of natural communities; and this vast rural constituency could hardly be seen as that. This boundary review was always flawed, based on a Tory calculation that it would gain them seats. The losers from their cynicism will be the poor and disadvantaged across Cornwall and beyond, those who feel so let down by the political system that they do not register to vote and therefore are not counted when these reviews are done; yet are the very people whose interests should be paramount in all that we do in the future. As the Electoral Reform Society point out, the real scandal here is that the poor and marginalised will be less not more represented in our democracy, and so I urge local people on both sides of the border to hold their Conservative MPs to account and to oppose these unnecessary and damaging proposals. Dan Rogerson, Liberal Democrat Parliamentary Candidate for North Cornwall, and former MP, added: In the last Parliament, Cornwalls Liberal Democrat MPs voted against similar proposals and blocked them. Now Cornwall has six Conservative MPs. The people of the Duchy will be watching to see whether the hapless six have the ear of the Prime Minister and can change her mind on this, or whether they are powerless lobby-fodder for this anti-Cornwall Government.

Ive got a feeling that Theresa May will soon realize she has made a mistake here, when she hears the strength of feeling in Cornwall about this. Perhaps she should just watch Poldark. Ross Poldark miraculously got off a charge of starting a riot and encouraging theft/smuggling in last weeks episode. Except it wasnt that miraculous when you consider that, as I understand it, no Cornish jury ever convicted any Cornish person of smuggling. There was such a sense of Cornish identity and feeling of the struggle against the powers of government and big business, that it never happened. And that sense of identity and struggle continues today. Theresa May messes with it at her peril.

* Paul Walter is a Liberal Democrat activist and member of the Liberal Democrat Voice team. He blogs at Liberal Burblings.
Nick Clegg talked earlier this week about the possibility of a second independence referendum in Scotland following the Brexit vote. This has been construed in some quarters as implied support of independence. He has written to Scottish Liberal Democrat Leader Willie Rennie to enthusiastically endorse the position he has taken  that the Liberal Democrats will campaign to keep Scotland in both the UK and the EU. Independence, he says, would only compound the problems of Brexit meaning that everybody loses.

Here is his letter in full:

Dear Willie

You will have read that I have been warning about the renewed risk of independence this week.

The warnings that we both made about the tension that would be generated in the different parts of the United Kingdom if there was a Brexit vote have turned into reality.

The Conservatives bungling on the European Union has encouraged the Nationalists to propose yet another independence referendum risking the future of the United Kingdom.

I have a life-long, unshakeable belief in our family of nations. I do not believe there is a compelling case for independence, though the SNP will of course use all of their efforts to present it as such. Compounding the problems of Brexit with the problems of independence is not my answer to the result of the EU referendum. That is why I reject independence. I want to keep Scotland in the UK and the U.K. in Europe.

It is surprising to me that neither the SNP nor the the Conservatives can see the inconsistency in their positions. Recognising the need for interdependence, unity and strength in todays world means working within and benefiting from both Unions  the United Kingdom and the EU. For the Nationalists to reject the former and the Tories to reject the latter means the same thing. Everyone loses.

You are making that positive, progressive, moderate case for those two unions and you have my full support.

Nick
This week I had the chance to talk to Caroline Lucas, newly elected co-Leader of the Green Party of England and Wales, about the book The Alternative. She co-edited the book with Labour MP Lisa Nandy and her erstwhile 2015 Liberal Democrat opponent Chris Bowers. The three will be taking part in a fringe meeting at Conference on Sunday at 1pm in the Buckingham suite in the Hilton Metropole. The event is organised by the Social Liberal Forum.

The first part of the book explores all sorts of ideas, from foreign affairs to social security and public services, where there is significant common ground between those of a progressive nature.The second explores how progressives could work together to beat the Tories. Its a progressive antidote to the Tory dystopia into which we are currently descending. Though the book sets a lot of hares running, it doesnt seek to outline a way forward. So, I asked Caroline, what happens next?

In the book there are all kinds of options discussed and explored and absolutely no blueprint not least because what might work in one constituency might not work in another.

What I valued about working on the book with Chris and Lisa was that sense that no one party has a monopoly of wisdom and it is just possible that by working together we can reach a wider number of people than we can individually and thats going to be crucial in the light of the likely entrenchment of Tory policies if were not careful, come the next election and the boundary changes announced today which are the latest nail in that coffin. Weve also got whats happened in Scotland and the loss of Labour seats there. The book was put together out of a sense of urgency. If we dont find ways of working together better, we really are consigning our constituents to years more Conservative domination. What comes next is a series of discussions at party conferences to see if there is sufficient interest even just in the most basic idea of some kind of co-operation towards electoral reform for the House of Commons. That is a red line in terms of any kind of co-operation. Whether that co-operation is at one end of the scale simply not putting so much money or resources into certain constituencies to at the other end of the scale full throttle open primaries with parties on the progressive side agreeing to put forward candidates and then the local community votes on who they think is best placed to defeat the Tories. There are different shades within all of that. The think tank Compass is also initiating a series of public meetings up and down the country and to gauge the amount of support for the ideas and if people are interested,whether they would want a narrow co-operation agreement or whether they would be interested in exploring the broader common ground that the book sets out.

Caroline had spent 11 years as an MEP and I wondered if our parties working together in the same collaborative manner as the European parties did could Westminster politics grow up.

Yes, The experience of working together in the European Parliament is such that people in Brussels find the idea of looking for common ground is a positive thing to be doing. Finding a compromise isnt selling out. Its about being very clear where your red lines are but beyond that seeing where we can work together for the common good. I do think that Westminster politics could learn a lot from that. The public get fed up with politicians who constantly find fault with each other when you know that they more or less agree with one another. Our electoral system and our political culture encourages politicians to be constantly oppositional. Lisa (Nandy) is particularly motivated by trying to get away from that kind of politics which is not constructive and not appealing either.

In Part 2, find out what she thinks about the Labour Party and the likelihood of electoral reform  and how we rid ourselves of the baggage we carry with us that might stop us working together.

The Alternative is available from Biteback Publishing here.

* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings
It was a great honour to be elected Leader of the Liberal Democrat Group in the Lords earlier this week. The challenge facing me and my colleagues is straightforward. How do we help the Party occupy as much as possible of the centre and centre left of British politics  ground which is currently vacant?

Obviously we can do our bit by trying to defeat or amend the worst of the Tory legislation. We face a Tory government unrestrained, Labour are not doing their job as the opposition. It is the Liberal Democrats who have to step up to the plate and be the real voice of opposition. We held the Government to account last session on tax credits, trade union reform and refugee children. We will seek to do so in coming months, for example on Investigatory Powers. And if we ever see any legislation promoting grammar schools, we can guarantee it a rough ride in the Lords.

Brexit gives us a huge new opportunity to engage with all sectors of society and all our spokespeople will be engaging with their stakeholder groups to discuss how the costs of Brexit for their sector might be mitigated. This Conservative Brexit government must be held to account. Most of what was promised in the referendum has already been scrapped and whatever they bring forward in future will need to be rigorously scrutinised. We will be expanding the team of people with specific portfolio responsibilities to help with this.

We are well aware that almost half the Party is new since the 2015 General Election. We will intensify the programme of visits by Peers to constituency parties to discuss what Liberal Democracy means and how campaigning works. Making sure we work both in the Westminster bubble and out on the streets and doorsteps up and down the country. We will continue to support local campaigning efforts by participating in local by-elections wherever we can.

And we will be extending an arm of friendship to liberal progressives currently in the Labour Party who cannot in all conscience remain in a Party led by Jeremy Corbyn.

I left the civil service in 1981 to join the SDP in the hope that we could break the mould of British politics. The opportunities for doing so now are, in my view greater than in 1981. But we have to persuade the country that we provide the leadership at all levels which they can trust and support. We have to fight to keep Britain open, tolerant and united. Tim is doing that for the party as a whole. Local campaigners are doing it each week in by-elections across the country. And I intend to do so for my terrific group of colleagues in the Lords.

* Dick Newby is the Leader of the Liberal Democrats in the House of Lords.
What would we remember of the Labour government, if Al-Qaedas terrorist attack fifteen years ago had never happened? If Labour had listened to the advice of Robin Cook and John Denham, and not engaged in the catastrophe of the Iraq war?

Many of us will remember Robin Cooks electrifying resignation speech. If only he were alive today. However, he was not the only Labour minister to step down from government office because of the Iraq war. In his prescient resignation speech, on the 18th March, 2003, John Denham said:

If we act in the wrong way, we will create more of the problems that we aim to tackle. For every cause of insecurity with which we try to deal, we shall create a new one.

This summer, I was an observer at the Fabian and Progress summer conferences. I didnt hear anyone try to defend the Iraq war, and a number agreed it had been a terrible mistake. In fact, if you substituted the word Labour for Liberal Democrat, almost everything that was said could have been said at a Liberal Democrat conference, and probably will be in this coming week.

Fifteen years on from Iraq, the challenges of the centre-left are very different from 2003. There have been three catastrophes: the election of Jeremy Corbyn and the long period of Conservative rule that will probably follow, the narrow vote in favour of leaving the EU last June, and the slow rise of nationalism and decline of social democracy across Europe. These are challenges for the Liberal Democrats as well as for Labour. If we are to meet them, I believe we will have to work together. And, if the legacy of both Iraq and the Coalition has poisoned our relations, the antidote must be to start talking again.

One of the striking lessons of the referendum is how those who see themselves as English feel that the political class does not speak for them. This is something John Denham noticed before most. A year ago, he called for an English Labour party. In the recent referendum, he said

England is the backbone that has made Britain great. Theres as much at stake for us as for any other part of the Union. A Leave vote will make England weaker and less important than we are today. Well be an England that gave up its influence for good in the world. All the big challenges  migration, wars, terrorism, climate change  will still be there; its just that we will have less say about them.

As well as the politics of identity, among the major underlying reasons for the Referendum vote were globalisation and the off-shoring of many jobs to East Asia and the rest of the world, and the jobs lost due to mechanisation and computerisation. These changes have cost the jobs of many of our natural supporters, and, for those who remain employed, have caused a major downward pressure on their wages.

The Social Democrat Group has invited John Denham, along with Hugo Dixon, Stephen Bush and Norman Lamb on Monday lunchtime, to discuss these issues in a fringe meeting: How can the centre-left reach the left behind?

However, one fringe meeting is not enough. If we are to influence the future of our country, well need to build better relations with social democrats outside the party, and talk much more about such shared challenges in the months ahead.

* George Kendall is the acting chair of the Social Democrat Group. He writes in a personal capacity.
Lib Dem Voice has polled our members-only forum to discover what Lib Dem members think of various political issues, the Coalition, and the performance of key party figures. Some 735 party members responded  thank you  and were publishing the full results.

LDV asked: How would you rate the performances of the following leading Liberal Democrats and government ministers?

Full results are published below, but heres two key lists for those who want to cut to the chase (with comparison to April 2013 ratings in brackets)

Top 5 Lib Dem performers in the Government:

Steve Webb +67%

Lynne Featherstone +63%

Vince Cable +60%

Norman Lamb +54%

Norman Baker +53%

For the second successive survey, its pensions minister Steve Webb who tops our poll as the most popular Lib Dem in government. And we have a new entry at number two: Lynne Featherstone knocks Vince Cable off the runner-up spot  to be fair to Vince, this is less due to a decline in his popularity and more to do with the kudos Steve and Lynne are getting for delivering pensions reform and same-sex marriage from their respective ministerial positions. Norman Lamb and Norman Baker remain perennial favourites of the party faithful. Among the rest, Simon Hughes is earning good reviews in his justice ministry post, up 15% to 43%.

Bottom 5 Lib Dem performers in the Government:

David Laws +21%

Danny Alexander +9%

Dan Rogerson +9%

Baroness (Jenny) Randerson +8%

Nick Clegg +7%

David Laws is recovering strongly from the miserly +2% his ratings stood at last December  hes now up at +21%, having spent much of the year differentiating himself from Michael Gove. Danny Alexanders ratings have taken a tumble, down 16% to +9% (hes certainly not feeling the benefit of the recovery yet). Both Dan Rogerson and Jenny Randerson suffer not so much from unpopularity as anonymity in their ministerial office: 71% and 81% respectively of party members rank them neither favourably nor unfavourably. The same cant be said of Nick Clegg  his performance as DPM polarises opinion among party members, with 48% satisfied, but 41% dissatisfied.

As I note each time: the list stands as a reminder to all our Lib Dem ministers of the value of communicating effectively with party members about the work theyre undertaking on behalf of the party, even if it isnt making the front pages.

As promised, here are the results in full 

Lib Dem cabinet ministers and government ministers:

Steve Webb: Minister, Department for Work and Pensions

43%  Very satisfied

30%  Satisfied

21%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

4%  Dissatisfied

2%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +67% (-3%)

Lynne Featherstone: Minister, Department for International Development

30%  Very satisfied

39%  Satisfied

25%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

4%  Dissatisfied

2%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +63% (=)

Vince Cable: Secretary of State, Business, Innovation and Skills

26%  Very satisfied

47%  Satisfied

13%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

9%  Dissatisfied

4%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +60% (-3%)

Norman Lamb: Minister, Department of Health

27%  Very satisfied

36%  Satisfied

28%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

6%  Dissatisfied

3%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +54% (+4%)

Norman Baker: Minister, Home Office

19%  Very satisfied

42%  Satisfied

31%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

6%  Dissatisfied

2%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +53% (+7%)

Edward Davey: Secretary of State, Energy and Climate Change

18%  Very satisfied

44%  Satisfied

23%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

10%  Dissatisfied

4%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +48% (+7%)

Jo Swinson: Minister, Business, Innovation and Skills

20%  Very satisfied

37%  Satisfied

32%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

7%  Dissatisfied

3%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +47% (-2% since December 2013 (we didnt include Jo while she was absent from office on maternity leave)

Simon Hughes: Minister, Ministry of Justice

13%  Very satisfied

41%  Satisfied

34%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

7%  Dissatisfied

4%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +43% (+15%)

Don Foster: Lib Dem Chief Whip

8%  Very satisfied

29%  Satisfied

54%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

6%  Dissatisfied

4%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +27% (+1%)

Alistair Carmichael: Secretary of State, Scotland

12%  Very satisfied

30%  Satisfied

42%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

11%  Dissatisfied

4%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +27% (-7%)

Lord (Jim) Wallace: Lib Dem Leader, House of Lords

8%  Very satisfied

25%  Satisfied

61%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

5%  Dissatisfied

2%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +26% (+4%)

Baroness (Susan) Kramer: Minister, Department of Transport

7%  Very satisfied

30%  Satisfied

52%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

10%  Dissatisfied

2%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +25% (-1%)

Stephen Williams: Minister, Department for Communities and Local Government

8%  Very satisfied

27%  Satisfied

55%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

6%  Dissatisfied

4%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +25% (+7%)

Tom Brake: Lib Dem Leader of the Commons

7%  Very satisfied

22%  Satisfied

66%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

4%  Dissatisfied

2%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +23% (=)

David Laws: Minister, Department for Education (jointly with the Cabinet Office)

12%  Very satisfied

35%  Satisfied

27%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

15%  Dissatisfied

11%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +21% (+8%)

Danny Alexander: Chief Secretary to the Treasury

13%  Very satisfied

34%  Satisfied

15%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

20%  Dissatisfied

18%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +9% (-16%)

Dan Rogerson: Minister, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

3%  Very satisfied

16%  Satisfied

71%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

7%  Dissatisfied

3%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +9% (+3%)

Baroness (Jenny) Randerson: Minister, Wales Office

3%  Very satisfied

12%  Satisfied

81%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

3%  Dissatisfied

1%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +8% (-3%)

Nick Clegg: Deputy Prime Minister

15%  Very satisfied

33%  Satisfied

10%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

20%  Dissatisfied

21%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +7% (-3%)

Other leading Lib Dems:

Tim Farron: Party President

35%  Very satisfied

37%  Satisfied

16%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

8%  Dissatisfied

4%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +60% (+3%)

Kirsty Williams: Leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats

23%  Very satisfied

28%  Satisfied

45%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

2%  Dissatisfied

2%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +47% (-5%)

Willie Rennie: Leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats

15%  Very satisfied

27%  Satisfied

49%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

6%  Dissatisfied

3%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +33% (-3%)

Caroline Pidgeon: Leader of the Liberal Democrat group on the London Assembly

11%  Very satisfied

25%  Satisfied

60%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

3%  Dissatisfied

1%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +33% (+1%)

Malcolm Bruce: Deputy Leader of the Parliamentary Party in the House of Commons

8%  Very satisfied

25%  Satisfied

56%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

8%  Dissatisfied

4%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +21% (+1%)

Tim Gordon: Lib Dem Chief Executive

8%  Very satisfied

22%  Satisfied

55%  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

10%  Dissatisfied

5%  Very dissatisfied

Net satisfaction +15% (-4%)
What on earth is going on with the world? Last week we gained back a Council seat in Sheffield. This week, we gain a seat in North East Derbyshire which is not, shall we say, an area of strength. Its been a while since we ran a campaign or even stood a candidate there.

Look at the, though:

Tupton (North East Derbyshire) result:

LDEM: 38.3% (+38.3)

LAB: 34.7% (-32.4)

CON: 17.5% (-15.4)

UKIP: 8.9% (+8.9)

BPP: 0.7% (+0.7)  Britain Elects (@britainelects) September 15, 2016

Im not going to lie. I did say a lot of very sweary words when I read this. In a good way, of course.

This just shows what the power of the Lib Dem Newbies can do. Ross Shipman, who joined last year, was key in the campaign to elect David Hancock.

I have had a lot of very happy Thursday nights recently as weve gained seat after seat. This one makes me happier than ever, though, because of the implications. This is a seat in an area where we didnt stand last time and hadnt really campaigned until recently. We went in there with a determined team and good messages and we smashed it. This should give every party member confidence that we can do it. Yes, its going to take a bit of time, but we are on the way up.

For the second week running, Im having all sorts of nostalgic thoughts about all those by-elections we won in Chesterfield, Sheffield and the surrounding areas. The crack Chesterfield team, led by Paul Holmes (who was the one who told me about our victory tonight) was very generous in going out across the region and helping with by-elections. In 1994, we had a particularly memorable win in Clowne and Barlborough in the heart of Dennis Skinners Bolsover constituency.

A massive well done to Ross and his team. No doubt hell be well feted at the Brighton LibDemPint tomorrow night.

Not for the first time, I wish I hadnt been quite so anxious to save money by travelling to Conference at stupid oclock on Saturday morning.

Another good result in Newcastle upon Tyne  up 19%.

Blakelaw (Newcastle upon Tyne) result:

LAB: 43.2% (-20.0)

LDEM: 28.1% (+19.0)

UKIP: 19.1% (+3.0)

CON: 5.1% (-2.4)

GRN: 4.5% (+0.5)  Britain Elects (@britainelects) September 15, 2016

Delight at a huge advance in East Hertfordshire is tempered by the realisation that UKIP gained even more. But look at the collapse in the Lobour and Tory vote

Puckeridge (East Hertfordshire) result:

CON: 42.9% (-24.6)

UKIP: 18.9% (+18.9)

LDEM: 18.0% (+18.0)

LAB: 11.0% (-8.9)

GRN: 9.1% (-3.5)  Britain Elects (@britainelects) September 15, 2016

And we held our own in Carlisle.

Castle (Carlisle) result:

LAB: 46.5% (+9.2)

CON: 26.7% (+7.7)

UKIP: 12.5% (-10.4)

LDEM: 10.3% (-0.6)

GRN: 4.0% (-3.5)  Britain Elects (@britainelects) September 15, 2016

UPDATE: 8:30 am: And the good news keeps on coming.

At the other end of the Ezst Midlands, in Kettering, Lib Dem Jenny Davies topped the poll in a by-election for two town council seats in Burton Latimer, which makes another rLib Dem GAIN from Independent. Heres the result and a picture of a very happy team:

Full result (for two seats)

Lib Dem Jenny Davies 597

Ind 564

Ind 328

Lab 289

And in Shropshire, we had a solid hold when Jonny Keeley held the Bishops Castle ward. Andy Boddington has the details:

A couple months ago, Charlotte Barnes unfortunately had to stand down as Shropshire Councillor for the Bishops Castle division triggering a by-election. Yesterday, a substantial majority of voters supported Jonny as her replacement. 48.83% turnout. 1,414 votes cast. Jonny Keeley, Lib Dem 862 Georgie Ellis, Conservative 420 Judith Payne, Labour 95 Steve Hale, Green 37 Congratulations to Jonny and the great Lib Dem team that backed his candidacy. He steps into the role held by two excellent predecessors, Peter Phillips and Charlotte Barnes.

* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings
A YOUNG man who is accused of exposing himself during an incident outside a city hotel has been ordered to stay away from the premises.

Jason Faulkner, aged 24, who has an address at Longpavement Halting Site, Watch House Cross appeared before Limerick District Court after he was charged with an offence which dates back almost 200 years.

He is charged under the provisions of Section 4 of the Public Vagrancy Act 1824 with wilfully, openly and lewdly exposing his person with intent to insult a female.

The offence is alleged to have happened near the Limerick City Hotel on the Dock Road at around 3.30pm on September 5, last.

Sergeant John Moloney said there was no objection to bail but he asked that the defendant be ordered to stay away from the hotel as a condition of his bail.

Faulkner faces a number of public order charges relating to the same date  including that he was so intoxicated that he represented a danger to himself and others.

He is also accused of engaging in threatening or abusive behaviour at a petrol station on the Dock Road after the alleged incident.

Judge Marian OLeary granted the defendant bail and she adjourned the case to November 7, next.
CULTURE night is back and it is bigger than ever.

The annual event, which sees cultural institutions throw open their doors for free and at later than usual opening times, has a huge following in Limerick and has consistently seen culture lovers and families out in their droves to sample the fare on offer.

Organisers have promised a feast for all the senses.

One hundred events will take place between 5pm and 11pm on Friday across the city and county, grouped thematically across heritage, children and family, art and design, theatre and film, poetry and writing and music and dance. It is a great way to get a flavour for the vibrant arts scene on offer across Limerick.

This is the eighth year Culture Night has taken place in Limerick and it has grown year by year. Arts officer Sheila Deegan said: I love the energy of Culture Night with friends and families seeking out events and happenings in usual and unusual spaces.

The 100 events being provided this year is a credit to individual cultural practitioners and organisations who throw open their doors for late night opening for one night only. Don't let the opportunity pass you by to hear music, watch a movie, listen to poetry and prose or just dance.

Dont be overwhelmed by the variety on offer, either choose specific events or stroll around and get caught up in the fun. We have chosen a sample of things to do from the 100 on offer.

Start the night with the Culture Night bus tours, which run from 5pm to 8pm and are a great way to get around. Pick up from the bus stop at Arthurs Quay.

At 5.30pm, members of the Brad Pitt Light Orchestra, performing as Gaeilge as Na Tograi Imram, perform the music of Leonard Cohen, Van Morrison and David Bowie in Mary Immaculate College.

Be sure to call to the Fab Lab on Patrick Street  5.30pm to 9pm  and the Limerick Printmakers in Johns Square  6pm  10pm  and see what both hotspots have to offer. The Printmakers, in particular, is popular with families and kids seeking printing fun.

Head to the Belltable at 7.30pm, for a showcase of works by five Limerick filmmakers, offering a vibrant slice of the burgeoning local film industry.

If that doesnt float your boat, check out the Pinch Pot Constructions or Ceramic Throwing, go on a Guided Tour of the Book of Kells or walk the medieval walls, take in an international cuisine exhibit, experience four markets in one or Park-up & Picnic.

Events are taking place at various locations across the city and the county. Check out limerick.ie or culturenight.ie for full details.
LIMERICK is expected to welcome another significant number of Syrian citizens, as part of a number of families efforts to reunite with loved ones left behind in the Lebanon.

As part of the resettlement programme, which came into effect in May this year, close to 100 Syrian refugees now live in Limerick.

It is understood that at least three refugee families across the city and county are seeking to avail of the Department of Justice and Equalitys family reunification programme. While the programme has positive results for some families, it will soon face barriers for future applicants, according to Doras Luimni.

According to a spokesperson for the Department of Justice and Equality, the current refugees can seek family reunification for their loved ones, under the Refugee Act 1996.

The current legislation only includes dependant family members, namely the husband, wife, children under 18; and where the applicant is a minor, family members can include parents and siblings. However, the legislation states that the brother or sister must be under 18 and single. The legislation also excludes in-laws from the programme.

Doras Luimni director, Leonie Kerins criticised new legislation coming into effect in a number of months which, she said, will make it much harder for refugees seeking permission for family members to join them in Ireland going forward.

The new and narrow definition of family members will exclude parents, adult children or grandchildren from the process. There will also be a time limit for submitting applications, which may particularly affect people who have been separated by conflict or those who family members have gone missing.

She added that the new restrictions will be of serious concern for people who have been awaiting an outcome on their asylum application for up to 10 years.

The majority of the people with whom we work have had to make the difficult decision to leave family members behind in their home countries.

These new restrictions will make it much more difficult for families separated by war and violence to rebuild their lives together in Ireland.

Given the current refugee crisis, these new restrictions are particularly regrettable and disappointing.

Though the application process can take up to 12 months, Ms Kerins said that, based on experience, locating a loved one can take a number of years.

At the moment, there are around 1.2m Syrians left behind refugee camps in the Lebanon, with many more in Jordan.

The Department spokesperson said: Where the the location of a family member is unknown then an application for family reunification should not be made.

The local inter-agency group that is working on the resettlement programme includes An Garda Siochana, HSE, Tusla, Department of Social Welfare, the Department of Justice, Limerick Childcare, Paul Partnership, Limerick and Clare ETB, West Limerick Resources, Doras Luimni, Jesuit Refugee Service, and Limerick City and County Council.

A spokesperson for the council said that the multi-agency partnership has led to the successful resettlement of the Syrian families.

If these families require assistance with an application for reunification to the Department of Justice and Equality, advice and assistance will be provided, as required.

Each refugee, under the 1951 Geneva Convention, has the same entitlements and rights as any Irish person, with equal access to mainstream services, such as health, education and housing.

Individuals arriving in Ireland, under the programme, will not have refugee status, but will be granted the same rights and entitlements as their family members.
THERE were unprecedented levels of overcrowding at University Hospital Limerick's emergency department this week, weekly union reports show.

According to Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation, there were 220 patients being treated on trolleys in the A&E and on additional trolleys or beds in the wards, between Monday morning and Friday morning.

On Thursday, there were 43 patients on trolleys; 52 on Wednesday; 43 on Tuesday; 37 on Monday; and 45 on Friday.

Following these high figures, the Minister for Health Simon Harris will "shortly" visit the A&E, at the request of his party colleague, Senator Kieran O'Donnell.

Earlier last week, as a response to consistently high levels of overcrowding over the past week, UL Hospitals Group issued a statement regarding the extremly busy department.

"University Hospital Limerick has been experiencing a high volume of patients attending the hospital over a number of days. This is leading to significant delays accessing beds through the Emergency Department, resulting in excessive wait times for patients.

"The public are reminded to keep the Emergency Department for emergencies only and to contact their GP or GP Out of Hours services in the first instance. Injury Units are open in Ennis and Nenagh Hospitals from 8am to 8pm, Monday to Sunday and 8am to 6pm at St. John's Hospital.

Injury Units treat a range of minor injuries including sprains, strains, broken bones, minor burns and dislocations and a GP referral is not required," the spokesperson stated.

According to monthly reports, UHL had the most overcrowded A&E in Ireland in August, with more than 600 patients being treated on trolleys.
MEMBERS of the Methodist community in West Limerick will be celebrating a milestone event this Saturday with the 250th anniversary of the building of the Embury Heck Church at Ballingrane, a few miles from Rathkeale.

And joining the local church members will be a group of people of Palatine descent from around the world who arrived in Rathkeale at the weekend for a ten-day tour exploring the sites and history of the Palatines in Ireland.

In 1709, 110 families arrived in Ireland, some of the many Protestant families who fled persecution from French military in the Palatinate in Southern Germany. Many of these families were eventually settled on the Southwell estate lands around Rathkeale, at Courtmatrix, Killeheen and Ballingrane.

But, instead of the free land promised, rents increased for the new settlers and many were forced to emigrate, among them Philip Embury and Barbara Heck, both of whom had converted to Methodism, along with many fellow Palatines.

Philip Embury was born in Ballingrane in 1729 and converted to Methodism following a religious experience in 1752. A carpenter by trade, he became a lay preacher at his local chapel and married Margaret Switzer from Rathkeale. They set sail from the Customs House Dock in Limerick in 1760.

Also on the same emigrant boat was his cousin Barbara Ruckle, born in 1734 and now married to Paul Heck. In New York, then a small city of just 14,000, Barbara was dismayed by its spiritual carelessness and pleaded with her cousin Philip to preach.

According to reports handed down, he maintained he could not preach as he had neither church nor congregation.

But Barbaras response was Preach in your own home and I will gather a congregation.

The first gathering at which Philip preached had only five people. But eventually the congregation grew, and the first Methodist chapel was established in 1768 on the site of the present John St church, right in the heart of the business district.

Philip later moved to Camden Valley, New York, where he continued to work at his trade during the week, and preached every Sunday.

He and several others had received a grant of 8,000 acres (32 km2) to develop for the manufacture of linen.

He organized among Irish emigrants at Ashgrove, near Camden Valley, the first Methodist society within the bounds of what became the flourishing and influential Troy Conference.

He died suddenly in 1775 as a result of a mowing accident.

Barbara and her husband, together with their five children, also left New York City for a farm in Camden but were forced off their land and moved to Montreal where Barbara again set about establishing a home for Methodism and founded the first congregation in Canada.

She died peacefully in 1804 with her bible in her lap.

Despite the fact that the woman from Ballingrane left no written record or letters of her missionary work, she is regarded today as one of the founders of Methodism in North America, along with Embury.

A pair of candlesticks which belonged to her are still lit every week in the John St church where they built the first Methodist church.

And of course, neither Philip nor Barbara has been forgotten in their home place where the church, built in 1766 bears their names.

This Saturday, at 3pm, Rev Ruth Watt will lead the special ceremony and Rev Bill Mullally, President of the Methodist Church in Ireland will preach.
HUP na Houra, the traditional show set in the old church of Ireland in Kilfinane, rivalled Riverdance for playing to sell-out crowds.

Put on by the recently established Ballyhoura Comhaltas, there wasnt a spare seat over its seven night run during the summer. It even sold out in three days for an additional night.

Sarah Gleeson, PRO, said it far exceeded their expectations. Over 1,300 attended, including 200 international guests. Hup na Houra featured some of Irelands finest performers including Liam Flanagan, Deirdre Scanlan, Derek Hickey, Caoimhin OFearghail and featuring guests Katie OSullivan, Tommy Fitzharris and Ryan ODonnell.

But in keeping with the Comhaltas Seisiun aims, it also showcased some local set dancers, dancers from three local dance schools, junior sean nos boys, the local drama group, Jimmy Ryan, local storyteller and many junior musicians of the Comhaltas branch. The show was a wonderful display of traditional music, song and dance in the old church with candle lit tables, cake stands, china, wild flowers and refreshments, said Sarah.

And to keep the buzz going and give a flavour to those who may have missed Hup na Houra they are hosting a trad seisiun filled with music, song and dance on Culture Night. The venue again is the old church of Ireland in Kilfinane at 7pm this Friday, September 16.

A selection of our younger and adult members will showcase their talents in music, song and dance including sean nos and brush dancing. After this the adults will be invited to join the branch in local musical pub, OCeallaghchairs, where an evening of storytelling, song and music around the fireside will take place, said Sarah. And it is free of charge.

Any profits from Hup na Houra will be put towards adding to an instrument bank started by Ballyhoura Comhaltas last year. Musical instruments such as fiddles, flutes and banjo have been available to hire starting at 15 per year to children and adults starting lessons with the branch. Over 100 signed up at enrolment.

The committee recognised the importance of this hire scheme as it ensures that learning traditional music has become accessible and affordable and they believe this has contributed to the high uptake in lessons last year. Ballyhoura Comhaltas had over 80 children learning music last year, a huge number for a start-up branch, said Sarah.

Returning to the spark  Hup na Houra  Sarah said it engaged the local community in the traditional art forms.

This was the first trad show that many of the visitors had attended and they were not let down! It highlighted the wealth of talent that exists in the branch and locality. Hup na Houra has been a great opportunity for some of the younger members to experience being part of a staged production. Many of the children only began learning music or dance this year, and to now be in a show like this in front of a packed house could only boost their confidence and encourage them to embrace their traditional culture.

To see busloads of people coming into the town was exciting and gave a sense of pride to all who live here. They came from all over Ireland and the USA, Spain, Italy, Finland, Belgium, France. They were highly complimentary of the town, venue and the hospitality that was afforded to them by the people of Kilfinane.
May 3, 2021, 11 PM

The popular children's book character Curious George was created by H.A. Rey, who was born in Germany on Sept. 16, 1898.

By Michael Baadke

H.A. Rey, who authored and illustrated the Curious George childrens books with his wife Margaret, was born Hans Augusto Reyersbach in Hamburg, Germany, on Sept. 16, 1898. He met Margaret in Hamburg and reunited with her in Brazil; they married in 1935 and moved to Paris.

Though he was primarily an illustrator, Rey published a story book in France titled Rafi et les 9 singes, later translated into English as Cecily G. and the Nine Monkeys.

One character in the story, a monkey named Curious George, stood out from the rest, and would become the lead character in a series of very popular childrens books that Hans and Margaret worked on together after moving to the United States.

The first Curious George book was published in 1941, so publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt is celebrating the characters 75th anniversary in 2016.

Curious George was commemorated on a 39 stamp on Jan. 10, 2006, as part of the Childrens Book Animals set of eight (Scott 3992).
Sep 15, 2016, 1 PM

The design of the 1950 3 Boy Scouts commemorative stamp was based on the poster shown as a cachet on this first-day cover. The Boy Scouts of America has not released the names of the boys who posed for the poster, but their faces on the stamp are not muc

A second 70th anniversary of the Boy Scouts of America card has been reported by Linns reader Frederick Oppliger. This card features the 3 stamp issued in 1950 for the 40th anniversary of the orgnization.

In lieu of a postage stamp to honor the 70th anniversary of the Boy Scouts, the Boy Scouts of America produced this souvenir card showing the United States 4 commemorative stamp from the 50th anniversary celebration.

John M. Hotchner

Frederick Oppliger is a serious Scouts on stamps collector. When he saw my write-up on the souvenir card for the 70th anniversary of Boy Scouts of America in the March 9, 2015, issue of Linns, he began to go through his 65-year accumulation of material to see if he had an example.

I had reported that my example of this card from 1980 was sequentially numbered 10,753. Oppliger found several examples in his collection, the highest number being 19,041. That suggests a print run of at least 20,000.

In addition, Oppliger located a companion piece, a card picturing the 1950 3 Boy Scout commemorative stamp (Scott 995). Of the three examples he has seen of this card, the high number is 4,423.

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Both cards have identical text around the outside, but the one showing the 3 stamp has the biography of William Dickson Boyce on the reverse, while the card showing the 4 stamp has a biography of Lord S.S. Baden-Powell.

Oppliger points out that the name is an error, because the proper rendering would be Lord Robert Stephenson Smyth Baden-Powell.

Boyce is less well-known, but holds an honored place in United States scouting history. He was a newspaper publisher who saw scouting first hand in England, and came back to the United States to get it started here.

The 1950 3 stamp reminds me of my continuing quest to identify living people shown on U.S. stamps. There can be little doubt that this stamp is based on the poster pictured on the cachet of the first-day cover shown nearby.

In an article about this stamp in the June 2015 issue of the American Philatelist, the magazine for members of the American Philatelic Society, author Charles M. Posner said about the origin of the design:

The original poster from which the likenesses of the three Scouts were taken apparently depicted real people. Given that [stamp designer Charles] Chickering respected fully the elements of the poster, there was some fear expressed that, contrary to rules and regulations, real people were to be shown on an American postage stamp. As with the similar case of the 1943 Navy commemorative stamp (Scott 935), the U.S. Post Office Department said that no one could be identified because the faces had been sufficiently altered.

There are two problems with this rendering. First, the limitation is actually in law dating back to the 1860s, and it prohibits the honoring of a living person. The Postal Service and its predecessor the Post Office Department have often taken this as license to allow portrayal of living people who they assert are incidental to what the stamp honors.

Secondly, contrary to the Post Office Departments statement, the sailors on the Navy stamp are easily identified from the original photograph, as has been documented by this column, and this was not the first time that living individuals were easily identified on U.S. stamps.

However, we are still left with the 3 Boy Scout stamp question because the Boy Scouts of America has not released the names of the Scouts, or perhaps models, who were the subjects of the original poster. I hope that one day someone who knows the history will speak out.

I maintain a list of U.S. stamps on which living people are portrayed. The list now includes more than 60 stamps. If you would like a copy of this list, write to me, John Hotchner, at Box 1125, Falls Church, VA 22041-0125, and enclose a stamped, addressed envelope and 30 in mint postage to cover the cost of photocopying.
Ukraine's Economic Development and Trade Ministry with amending the regulations of national joint-stock company Naftogaz Ukrainy under order dated September 7, 2016 has put under a threat the signing of a $500 million loan agreement between the holding and the World Bank.

"Changing the Naftogaz's regulations in the way as it happened last week is violation of OECD corporate management principles and liabilities taken by Ukraine. These events put under a threat the signing of the $500 million loan agreement between Naftogaz and the World Bank," the press service of the holding told Interfax-Ukraine.

Naftogaz recalled that the funds are required to buy gas for passing the 2016/17 heating season by Ukraine stably.

"This is also violation of the conditions of the EBRD loan agreement and a potential default on the government-secured debt. This could affect other issues with the involvement of Naftogaz," the press service said.

According to Interfax-Ukraine's information, the Economic Development and Trade Ministry has not notified top managers of Naftogaz and renewed the holding's regulations, transferring the functions to manage Ukrtransgaz to the ministry, while earlier it was managed by Naftogaz Board. In particular, paragraph 48 of the regulations was expanded. The general meeting of shareholders now has the right to reshuffle the board of directors and the supervisory board of Ukrtransgaz, amend the companys regulations and approve its financial plan and investment program.
Pressemitteilung: Silvia Kuhn startet YouTube-Kanal Clever Money mit Silvi Die Tochter der Honorarberater und Stiftung Warentest Autoren Stefanie und Markus Kuhn startete Mitte Mai mit ihrem neuen YouTube Kanal Clever Money mit Silvi. Ziel ist es, jungen Menschen alles Wissenswerte rund um Geld und Finanzen auf einfache Art und Weise nahe zu bringen. Die Idee zu einem YouTube Kanal ist aus einem Schulerpraktikum in 2019 entstanden. Silvia Kuhn hat

[mehr] Die Tochter der Honorarberater und Stiftung Warentest Autoren Stefanie und Markus Kuhn startete Mitte Mai mit ihrem neuen YouTube Kanal Clever Money mit Silvi. Ziel ist es, jungen Menschen alles Wissenswerte rund um Geld und Finanzen auf einfache Art und Weise nahe zu bringen. Die Idee zu einem YouTube Kanal ist aus einem Schulerpraktikum in 2019 entstanden. Silvia Kuhn hat

Pressemitteilung: Buntes Wachstum: Ceresana untersucht den Markt fur Farben Farben und Lacke verschonern nicht nur, sie konnen auch schutzen. Die Wande von Krankenhausern zum Beispiel werden zunehmend mit antibakteriellen Eigenschaften versehen. Hauchdunne, aber sehr haltbare Lackschichten bewahren Fahrzeuge vor Rost. Ceresana hat bereits zum vierten Mal den gesamten europaischen Markt fur Farben und Lacke untersucht: Im Jahr 2019 wurden 9,1 Millionen Tonnen dieser Beschichtungen verbraucht. Farbenfrohe Hauser und Autos Bautenfarben sind

[mehr] Farben und Lacke verschonern nicht nur, sie konnen auch schutzen. Die Wande von Krankenhausern zum Beispiel werden zunehmend mit antibakteriellen Eigenschaften versehen. Hauchdunne, aber sehr haltbare Lackschichten bewahren Fahrzeuge vor Rost. Ceresana hat bereits zum vierten Mal den gesamten europaischen Markt fur Farben und Lacke untersucht: Im Jahr 2019 wurden 9,1 Millionen Tonnen dieser Beschichtungen verbraucht. Farbenfrohe Hauser und Autos Bautenfarben sind

Pressemitteilung: Altlasten 2.067 Mrd. Euro - Krisensubvention 1.000 Mrd. Euro Die Welt leidet unter der Corona-Pandemie, deren Kosten viele Staaten an den Rand der Exixtens bringen konnte. Wie konnte es in Deutschland dazu kommen? Die Welt leidet unter der Corona-Pandemie, deren Kosten viele Staaten an den Rand der Exixtens bringen konnte. Wie konnte es in Deutschland dazu kommen? Lehrte 29.05.2020 In Deutschland wurden in den letzten 50 Jahren 25 Steuerarten

[mehr] Die Welt leidet unter der Corona-Pandemie, deren Kosten viele Staaten an den Rand der Exixtens bringen konnte. Wie konnte es in Deutschland dazu kommen? Die Welt leidet unter der Corona-Pandemie, deren Kosten viele Staaten an den Rand der Exixtens bringen konnte. Wie konnte es in Deutschland dazu kommen? Lehrte 29.05.2020 In Deutschland wurden in den letzten 50 Jahren 25 Steuerarten

Pressemitteilung: 16. Juni und 18. Juni um 15 Uhr CEST europaischer Zeit Real-Time Innovations (RTI) organisiert zwei neue Webinare speziell fur den europaischen Markt. Hier geht es um die Themen Konnektivitat von Elektrofahrzeugen sowie Landfahrzeugplattformen in Kombination mit Software-Systemen und DDS. Sie finden zu europaischer Zeit um 15 Uhr CEST statt und sind im Anschluss on Demand verfugbar. Sunnyvale (USA)/Munchen, Mai 2020 - Real-Time Innovations (RTI) organisiert zwei neue Webinare speziell fur

[mehr] Real-Time Innovations (RTI) organisiert zwei neue Webinare speziell fur den europaischen Markt. Hier geht es um die Themen Konnektivitat von Elektrofahrzeugen sowie Landfahrzeugplattformen in Kombination mit Software-Systemen und DDS. Sie finden zu europaischer Zeit um 15 Uhr CEST statt und sind im Anschluss on Demand verfugbar. Sunnyvale (USA)/Munchen, Mai 2020 - Real-Time Innovations (RTI) organisiert zwei neue Webinare speziell fur

Pressemitteilung:

[mehr] MCM Investor: Wohnen in Deutschland bis 2060 teuer Laut einer aktuellen Untersuchung der Universitat Freiburg wird das Wohnen bis 2060 vorrausichtlich. Magdeburg, 28.05.2020. In dieser Woche analysiert die MCM Investor Management AG aus Magdeburg eine aktuelle Untersuchung der Uni Freiburg uber die zukunftige Entwicklung des deutschen Immobilienmarktes. Demnach gehe die Bevolkerungszahl hierzulande zwar tendenziell zuruck, die Nachfrage nach Wohnraum steige aber weiter an. In der Studie geht

Pressemitteilung: Latest in Electronic Test & Measurement Equipment MICHIGAN - May, 2020 - An international provider of electronic test and measurement equipment, AAATesters has announced that it now offers the INNO View 500 SM Fiber Optic OTDR w/ V20 Fiberscope (https://www.aaatesters.com/Inno_View_500_OTDR_Model_View500_Inno_500_1.html). This new addition to AAATesters expanding inventory of electronic test and measurement equipment, will assist consumers save time and money with greater testing proficiency and success. AAA

[mehr] MICHIGAN - May, 2020 - An international provider of electronic test and measurement equipment, AAATesters has announced that it now offers the INNO View 500 SM Fiber Optic OTDR w/ V20 Fiberscope (https://www.aaatesters.com/Inno_View_500_OTDR_Model_View500_Inno_500_1.html). This new addition to AAATesters expanding inventory of electronic test and measurement equipment, will assist consumers save time and money with greater testing proficiency and success. AAA

Pressemitteilung: Thomas May ist neuer Chefredakteur fur Perfect Eagle Thomas May ubernimmt mit 1. Juni 2020 die redaktionelle Leitung der fuhrenden multimedialen Golf-Lifestyle-Plattform im deutschsprachigen Raum. Bilder zur Meldung in der Mediendatenbank:  Mato Johannik https://leisure-my.sharepoint.com/:f:/g/personal/office_leisure_at/Es4aLP2m5bhHtlEPowWj1SEB5hhgDDEv96D9i9Z_Ok9ajA?e=Xi0L1x Wien (LCG)  Perfect Eagle hat heuer allen Grund zum Feiern. Nachdem das Golf-Lifestyle-Magazin mit der Marz-Ausgabe seine erste Dekade feierte, begrut Herausgeber Thomas Wasserburger nun Thomas May als neuen Chefredakteur fur das multimediale Golf-

[mehr] Thomas May ubernimmt mit 1. Juni 2020 die redaktionelle Leitung der fuhrenden multimedialen Golf-Lifestyle-Plattform im deutschsprachigen Raum. Bilder zur Meldung in der Mediendatenbank:  Mato Johannik https://leisure-my.sharepoint.com/:f:/g/personal/office_leisure_at/Es4aLP2m5bhHtlEPowWj1SEB5hhgDDEv96D9i9Z_Ok9ajA?e=Xi0L1x Wien (LCG)  Perfect Eagle hat heuer allen Grund zum Feiern. Nachdem das Golf-Lifestyle-Magazin mit der Marz-Ausgabe seine erste Dekade feierte, begrut Herausgeber Thomas Wasserburger nun Thomas May als neuen Chefredakteur fur das multimediale Golf-

Pressemitteilung: Frische fur den Sommer mit UNIKA Kalksandstein Frische fur den Sommer mit UNIKA KalksandsteinFur die einen ist es eine Wohltat, fur die anderen eine Herausforderung: sommerliche Warme. Keine Frage, Menschen lieben die Sonne. Aber nicht jeder mag hohe Temperaturen, schon gar nicht in den eigenen vier Wanden. ... Fur die einen ist es eine Wohltat, fur die anderen eine Herausforderung: sommerliche Warme. Keine Frage, Menschen lieben die

[mehr] Frische fur den Sommer mit UNIKA KalksandsteinFur die einen ist es eine Wohltat, fur die anderen eine Herausforderung: sommerliche Warme. Keine Frage, Menschen lieben die Sonne. Aber nicht jeder mag hohe Temperaturen, schon gar nicht in den eigenen vier Wanden. ... Fur die einen ist es eine Wohltat, fur die anderen eine Herausforderung: sommerliche Warme. Keine Frage, Menschen lieben die

Pressemitteilung:

[mehr] Humor und Lachen - ein ernstes Thema Humor und Corona Rechtzeitig zu einer Zeit, in der vielen das Lachen vergangen ist, mit oder ohne Corona, erscheint das 14. Buch von Jurgen W. Goldfu. Wahrend sich die bisherigen Werke des Autors mit Themen der Fuhrung (von sich und anderen) sowie Wirtschaftsthemen beschaftigten, geht es nun ums Lachen, die Welt und sich selbst mit lachenden Augen zu betrachten. Auf

Pressemitteilung: ...einfach, schnell und effizient ...einfach, schnell und effizientUberall da verkaufen, wo die Kunden sind, ist das Ziel aller Handler. plentymarkets bietet als Softwarehersteller eine E-Commerce-Losung, die genau diese Philosophie im Markenkern tragt. ... Uberall da verkaufen, wo die Kunden sind, ist das Ziel aller Handler. plentymarkets bietet als Softwarehersteller eine E-Commerce-Losung, die genau diese Philosophie im Markenkern tragt. Eine, die alle relevanten Marktplatze unterstutzt

[mehr] ...einfach, schnell und effizientUberall da verkaufen, wo die Kunden sind, ist das Ziel aller Handler. plentymarkets bietet als Softwarehersteller eine E-Commerce-Losung, die genau diese Philosophie im Markenkern tragt. ... Uberall da verkaufen, wo die Kunden sind, ist das Ziel aller Handler. plentymarkets bietet als Softwarehersteller eine E-Commerce-Losung, die genau diese Philosophie im Markenkern tragt. Eine, die alle relevanten Marktplatze unterstutzt

Pressemitteilung:

[mehr] Neuer Corona-Mitarbeiterschutz - digitaler Abstandshalter Auch nach den Lockerungen beeinflusst die Corona-Pandemie die Weltwirtschaft tiefgreifend. Die Betriebe sollen wieder sicher anlaufen. Die Schlusselrolle spielen dabei die Einhaltung der Hygieneregeln und des Mindestabstands fur Mitarbeitende. Auch nach den Lockerungen beeinflusst die Corona-Pandemie die Weltwirtschaft tiefgreifend. Die Betriebe sollen wieder sicher anlaufen. Die Schlusselrolle spielen dabei die Einhaltung der Hygieneregeln und des Mindestabstands fur Mitarbeitende. Dazu

Pressemitteilung: HUP aktiviert neuen Geschaftsbereich ready2boxx my-buddy-app  die HUP Reminder App. Schutzt vor Verlust des iPhones. Mit den ersehnten Lockerungsmanahmen rund um die Coronavirus-Pandemie steigt ein ganz anderes Risiko: der Verlust des iPhones auf Geschaftsreise, beim Einkauf oder etwa dem Besuch von Oma und Opa. Einfach, weil man das mittlerweile nahezu unverzichtbare Device schlicht und einfach liegen lasst. Das Braunschweiger Software-Entwicklungsunternehmen HUP hat fur Apple

[mehr] my-buddy-app  die HUP Reminder App. Schutzt vor Verlust des iPhones. Mit den ersehnten Lockerungsmanahmen rund um die Coronavirus-Pandemie steigt ein ganz anderes Risiko: der Verlust des iPhones auf Geschaftsreise, beim Einkauf oder etwa dem Besuch von Oma und Opa. Einfach, weil man das mittlerweile nahezu unverzichtbare Device schlicht und einfach liegen lasst. Das Braunschweiger Software-Entwicklungsunternehmen HUP hat fur Apple

Pressemitteilung: Das Lernen, wie wir es kennen, andert sich immer mehr. Online ist die neue Ara der Weiterbildung, die Freude macht und die viel leichter in den eigenen Lebens-Zyklus integrierbar ist! Ayurveda-Seminare und Ayurveda-Ausbildungen fordern ein gesundes Leben und geben viel Sinn-Erfullung. Viele Menschen sind wissbegieriger geworden und wollen ihr volles Potenzial durch Bewusstseinsveranderungen ausschopfen. Durch die digitale Welt ist es einfacher und schneller denn je geworden an Informationen zu kommen. Ich stelle

[mehr] Online ist die neue Ara der Weiterbildung, die Freude macht und die viel leichter in den eigenen Lebens-Zyklus integrierbar ist! Ayurveda-Seminare und Ayurveda-Ausbildungen fordern ein gesundes Leben und geben viel Sinn-Erfullung. Viele Menschen sind wissbegieriger geworden und wollen ihr volles Potenzial durch Bewusstseinsveranderungen ausschopfen. Durch die digitale Welt ist es einfacher und schneller denn je geworden an Informationen zu kommen. Ich stelle

Pressemitteilung:

[mehr] Gasnetz Hamburg pruft monatlich 1.200 Hausanschlusse  Arbeiten unter umfassenden Schutzmanahmen  Haushalte erhalten detaillierte Informationen zum Corona-Schutz  Sichere Gasanschlusse stehen im Mittelpunkt Hamburg. Ab sofort klingelt an vielen Hamburger Hausturen wieder der Gasanlagen-Prufer. Die turnusgemae Inspektion der Anschlusse in Kellern oder Wirtschaftsraumen von Ein- und Mehrfamilienhausern ist alle zwolf Jahre vorgeschrieben. Seit Marz hatte Gasnetz Hamburg die Hausbesuche unterbrochen. Nun schickt das Unternehmen wieder seine Fachleute zu den Anschlusskunden

Pressemitteilung: Wie COVID-19 unsere Kommunikation verandert Sprachexpertin Tatjana Lackner von Die Schule des Sprechens analysiert, wie sich das Kommunikationsverhalten in der COVID-19-Zeit verandert und welche Kommunikations-Trends daraus entstehen. Bilder zur Meldung in der Mediendatenbank https://leisure-my.sharepoint.com/:f:/g/personal/office_leisure_at/EuP2VeRtjsdPpxlLUzBimIsB-GcG-m5aFr4de0hEQ_WCPw?e=s2GwN1 Wien (LCG)  Die Manahmen zur Eindammung der COVID-19-Verbreitung verandern durch Physical Distancing und zahlreiche neue Verhaltensregeln den personlichen Umgang miteinander. Korpersprache, Social Codes und Rituale bekommen eine wichtig Bedeutung in der neuen

[mehr] Sprachexpertin Tatjana Lackner von Die Schule des Sprechens analysiert, wie sich das Kommunikationsverhalten in der COVID-19-Zeit verandert und welche Kommunikations-Trends daraus entstehen. Bilder zur Meldung in der Mediendatenbank https://leisure-my.sharepoint.com/:f:/g/personal/office_leisure_at/EuP2VeRtjsdPpxlLUzBimIsB-GcG-m5aFr4de0hEQ_WCPw?e=s2GwN1 Wien (LCG)  Die Manahmen zur Eindammung der COVID-19-Verbreitung verandern durch Physical Distancing und zahlreiche neue Verhaltensregeln den personlichen Umgang miteinander. Korpersprache, Social Codes und Rituale bekommen eine wichtig Bedeutung in der neuen

Pressemitteilung: Facebook diskutiert Strategie in der COVID-19-Pandemie Beim Moving Forward-Round-Table sprechen Facebook-Manager uber die Zusammenarbeit mit der WHO, die Intensivnutzung in Italien und andere Strategien gegen Falschmeldungen. Bilder zur Meldung in der Mediendatenbank:  JMC https://leisure-my.sharepoint.com/:f:/g/personal/office_leisure_at/EsGAMdDUM2lNt4Jo2RfF_R4BhwzfZ8LXK305xeAAjGcAdw?e=EyC94A Video zur Meldung auf Facebook https://www.facebook.com/movingforwardconference/videos/973105823109354 Dublin/Wien (LCG)  Die Verbreitungsgeschwindigkeit der sozialen Medien war in den letzten Wochen essenziell, um Informationen zu COVID-19 zu streuen. Auch Fake News fanden in diesem Umfeld einen fruchtbaren

[mehr] Beim Moving Forward-Round-Table sprechen Facebook-Manager uber die Zusammenarbeit mit der WHO, die Intensivnutzung in Italien und andere Strategien gegen Falschmeldungen. Bilder zur Meldung in der Mediendatenbank:  JMC https://leisure-my.sharepoint.com/:f:/g/personal/office_leisure_at/EsGAMdDUM2lNt4Jo2RfF_R4BhwzfZ8LXK305xeAAjGcAdw?e=EyC94A Video zur Meldung auf Facebook https://www.facebook.com/movingforwardconference/videos/973105823109354 Dublin/Wien (LCG)  Die Verbreitungsgeschwindigkeit der sozialen Medien war in den letzten Wochen essenziell, um Informationen zu COVID-19 zu streuen. Auch Fake News fanden in diesem Umfeld einen fruchtbaren

Pressemitteilung: Musikfestival Steyr: Kulturgenuss trotz Pandemie Als kultureller Impulsgeber fur die Region ermoglicht das Musikfestival Steyr auch heuer Kulturgenuss und wartet mit einem neuen Programm auf. Bilder zur Meldung in der Mediendatenbank https://leisure-my.sharepoint.com/:f:/g/personal/office_leisure_at/EnbiYHVH3KNOg_ZakCqco3wBz529TPFExmEgRThtSEHHQA?e=fAzk1G Steyr (LCG)  In den vergangenen Wochen und Monaten haben die Manahmen der osterreichischen Bundesregierung zur Eindammung der COVID-19-Verbreitung die Kulturnation Osterreich in einen regelrechten Stillstand versetzt. Seit Anfang Mai 2020 setzt die neue Normalitat

[mehr] Als kultureller Impulsgeber fur die Region ermoglicht das Musikfestival Steyr auch heuer Kulturgenuss und wartet mit einem neuen Programm auf. Bilder zur Meldung in der Mediendatenbank https://leisure-my.sharepoint.com/:f:/g/personal/office_leisure_at/EnbiYHVH3KNOg_ZakCqco3wBz529TPFExmEgRThtSEHHQA?e=fAzk1G Steyr (LCG)  In den vergangenen Wochen und Monaten haben die Manahmen der osterreichischen Bundesregierung zur Eindammung der COVID-19-Verbreitung die Kulturnation Osterreich in einen regelrechten Stillstand versetzt. Seit Anfang Mai 2020 setzt die neue Normalitat

Pressemitteilung: OstseeResort Olpenitz bei Kappeln/ Schlei Private Vermietung von ausgefallenen Ferienobjekten an der Ostsee - "Nie mitten drin, aber immer ganz nah dran!" ist hierbei die Devise. Auch wenn die Corona-Pandemie Urlaub und Ferienvermietung weltweit lahm gelegt hat  das Leben im OstseeResort Olpenitz ist trotzdem weitergegangen, und Ferienobjekte in diesem neuen Ferienresort bei Kappeln/ Schlei verkaufen sich weiterhin gut. Oder aber jetzt erst Recht? Das

[mehr] Private Vermietung von ausgefallenen Ferienobjekten an der Ostsee - "Nie mitten drin, aber immer ganz nah dran!" ist hierbei die Devise. Auch wenn die Corona-Pandemie Urlaub und Ferienvermietung weltweit lahm gelegt hat  das Leben im OstseeResort Olpenitz ist trotzdem weitergegangen, und Ferienobjekte in diesem neuen Ferienresort bei Kappeln/ Schlei verkaufen sich weiterhin gut. Oder aber jetzt erst Recht? Das

Pressemitteilung: Gut vernetzt: Ceresana-Report zum Markt fur Kunststoff-Rohre Die Nachfrage nach Kunststoffrohren steigt in vielen europaischen Landern. Besonders in Ballungsraumen werden derzeit neue Wohnungen gebaut. Allerdings boomt die Bauwirtschaft nicht uberall: Ausgelastete Kapazitaten, steigende Preise, Fachkraftemangel, fehlendes Bauland und zunehmende wirtschaftliche Unsicherheit bremsen die Dynamik. Dabei konnen sich Hochbau, Tiefbau und Infrastrukturbau sehr unterschiedlich entwickeln: Die verschiedenen Bausegmente sind in hohem Mae von den offentlichen Investitionen im jeweiligen

[mehr] Die Nachfrage nach Kunststoffrohren steigt in vielen europaischen Landern. Besonders in Ballungsraumen werden derzeit neue Wohnungen gebaut. Allerdings boomt die Bauwirtschaft nicht uberall: Ausgelastete Kapazitaten, steigende Preise, Fachkraftemangel, fehlendes Bauland und zunehmende wirtschaftliche Unsicherheit bremsen die Dynamik. Dabei konnen sich Hochbau, Tiefbau und Infrastrukturbau sehr unterschiedlich entwickeln: Die verschiedenen Bausegmente sind in hohem Mae von den offentlichen Investitionen im jeweiligen
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Board Chairman of public joint-stock company Ukgazvydobuvannia Oleh Prokhorenko believes that the initiative of Ukraine's Energy and Coal Industry Ministry to separate the largest and best fields of the company for operation as part of the Product Sharing Agreements (PSA) is unviable.

"Statements of representatives of the ministry that they are considering Ukrgazvydobuvannia's largest fields make me uneasy This means that a certain operator will come, allegedly an investor who will take the asset in which the state has invested billions [of hryvnias] and then it will use cash flow generated by these fields within any investment," he said at a press conference in Kyiv on Thursday.

He said that today at a roundtable organized by the parliamentary committee for fuel and energy complex Energy and Coal Industry Minister Ihor Nasalyk said that they proposed to bring up to five large fields operated by Ukrgazvydobuvannia to PSA. In particular, earlier the following fields were announced: Shebelynske, Yablunivske, Tymofiyivske, Kotelevske and Kobzovske fields.

Prokhorenko said that the company does not oppose PSA. It is ready to attract investment under this or similar mechanisms (PEC, production enhancement contracts), but this must be not the best fields the development of which Ukrgazvydobuvannia can finance itself.

"We are mulling [the possibility of attracting investment via PSA] mainly for exhausted fields or fields where it is head to extract deposits," he said.

He said that the key requirement to PSA must be investment in basic exploration and development. This is a risky resource where the investor is ready to undertake geological risks.

He said that investors should be attracted at open tenders with approving the criteria for selecting fields and potential investors with Naftogaz Ukrainy's supervisory board.
Ukraine could place new U.S. secured $1 bln eurobonds by late Sept  source

Ukraine could place new U.S. secured $1 billion eurobonds by the end of this month, a source in the government has told Interfax-Ukraine.

As reported, the guarantee agreement between Ukraine and the United States is part of multilateral economic support of Ukraine, including the four-year Extended Fund Facility (EFF) program funded by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). This is a third similar agreement signed in the past two years.

After signing two previous agreements in 2014 and 2015 Ukraine raised $2 billion on foreign markets at low rates and sent the money to carry out reforms.
If Ukraine fulfills its liabilities, the European Union (EU) would provide a second tranche of EUR 600 million of macrofinancial aid to the country by the end ofthis year, European Commission Vice President the Euro and Social Dialogue Valdis Dombrovskis has said.

"We on behalf of the EU are also ready to move to the provision of our second tranche of macrofinancial aid to Ukraine in the amount of EUR 600 million if all modalities agreed on earlier are observed. The tranche could be provided this year," Dombrovskis said at a meeting with Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman in Kyiv on Friday.

Groysman, in turn, expressed hope that the Ukrainian parliament would approve all the required decisions and Ukraine would receive the tranche.
Indian Ambassador to Ukraine calling on Ukrainian farmers to export lentil to India

Indian Ambassador to Ukraine Manoj Kumar Bharti has called on Ukrainian farmers to export lentil to India.

"In 2015, Canada exported 500,000 tonnes of lentil to India. If Canada can export lentil, why not Ukraine export it?" he said at a roundtable in the Ukrainian parliament in Kyiv on Friday.

"India's population is mainly vegetarians, and lentil for them is the main source of protein," he said.

The ambassador also called on Ukrainian educational institutions to open their branches in India, as India needs skilled specialists.

He pointed out the potential of Ukrainian engineering in India.

"I recently returned from Lviv where I visited Elektronmash. This company has a huge potential in India where transport corridors are being actively developed," he said.

The ambassador mentioned traditional cooperation in the aviation and space sectors.

"I would like Ukraine attentively studies the opportunities for cooperation with India. We are ready to provide consultations and tell how develop business in India," he said.

He also focused on the potential of cooperation in the pharmaceutical and medical spheres.

"Complicated surgeries in India are cheaper than in Europe," he said
The White Cliffs of Dover, the steep, chalky cliffs that fringe England's southeastern coastline, formed about 100 million years ago thanks to a "Goldilocks" set of ocean conditions, new research suggests.

What's more, a massive new set of cliffs could be forming right now in the Southern Ocean near Antarctica as tiny algae shed their calcium-laden shells. However, depositing enough of that mineral, called calcite, to form similar cliffs could take millions of years.

"While we don't have the great cliffs of the Southern Ocean, there is solid evidence that the calcite is making it to the seafloor," William Balch, a biological oceanographer at Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences in East Boothbay, Maine, and lead author of the new study, said in a statement. [Photos: The Strangest Places on Earth]

White cliff formation

White Cliffs of Dover on the coast of England. (opens in new tab) via Shutterstock) (Image credit: White Cliffs of Dover image via Shutterstock)

The White Cliffs of Dover, which overlook the English Channel, formed from the chalky detritus of single-celled algae called coccolithopohores. Looked at under a microscope, coccolithopores form a kaleidoscope-like set of intricate, interlocking shapes, thanks to outer shells made up of overlapping wheel-like plates of calcite. When the coccolithophores die, their calcite plates sink to ocean depths, accumulating in heaps on the seafloor. Over millions of years, the shells were squashed as more shells accumulated, the heaps rose, and the cliffs of Dover eventually emerged from the sea.

While researchers already knew that England's iconic cliffs formed about 100 million years ago, they didn't know exactly what caused the prolonged coccolithophore bloom in the first place.

Shimmering belt of water

To answer that question, the team decided to analyze coccolithophores in their natural habitat. They traveled to the remote reaches of the Southern Ocean, where a ring of blinding-bright blue and green water pops out in satellite imagery. This shiny circle of water forms the Calcite Belt, and it gets its brilliant shimmer because the water is teeming with tiny coccolithophores whose chalky armor reflects sunlight, brightening the water's hue.

"If you take the Earth and look at it upside down, it looks like a bullseye," Marlon Lewis, an oceanographer at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia who was not involved with the study, said in a statement.

The team then did a detailed analysis of the water conditions that allow the Calcite Belt to thrive. It turned out that coccolithophores bloomed when conditions simultaneously allowed them to grow quickly, while starving out ecosystem competitors such as diatoms, another type of algae.

For instance, coccolithophores bloomed with high nitrate levels, while iron levels had to be too low for diatoms to bloom but high enough for coccolithophore needs. Since diatoms use silicate, the coccolithophores did best when silicate concentrations were low, preventing their competitors from thriving, the researchers reported Aug. 10 in the journal Global Biogeochemical Cycles.

The coccolithophores also seemed to do well at the nexus of ocean currents, where upwelling brings nutrients and minerals from the deep.

"These regions can be oases of fertilizer coming up to the surface for these plants," Balch said.

Original article on Live Science.
Ukraine International Airlines (UIA, Kyiv) that planned to launch flights to Canada in 2019 is mulling the possibility of shifting the terms and launch them one year earlier  in 2018, UIA President Yuriy Miroshnykov has said.

"We need additional long-haul places to fly to Canada. We need to increase the volume of our medium-haul code sharing to replenish this flight," he said in an interview with Interfax-Ukraine.

He said that the Canadian market is seasonal. It has a short summer season with large demand and then a long decline.

"We need to load the plane with code sharing passengers, in particular, from the East. There are not enough of them now to effectively exploit Canadian routes all year round. We repeat for Ukrainian authorities  open the East, do something that we can fly to Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Iran and other destinations with high frequency, to several destinations in each country," he said.
An 83-year-old man kept the symptoms of a genetic disease at bay  without even knowing he had it  thanks to his years of donating blood, according to a recent report of his case.

The disease, called hereditary haemochromatosis, causes the body to absorb too much iron from food, said Dr. Kohtaro Ooka, an internal medicine resident at Yale School of Medicine and the lead author of the case report.

Too much iron in the body, also called iron overload, can have wide-ranging effects, Ooka told Live Science. [Here's a Giant List of the Strangest Medical Cases We've Covered]

The liver, where iron is stored, is particularly vulnerable to the effects of excess iron, Ooka said. A buildup of iron in the liver can lead to damage and scarring, he said. When the organ is severely scarred, it's called cirrhosis. Too much iron can also lead to joint pain and problems with the pancreas, including diabetes, Ooka said.

But the man, who didn't find out he had the condition until he was 83, had none of these symptoms, Ooka added.

Men with hereditary haemochromatosis generally start to show symptoms in their 40s or 50s, said Dr. Tamar Taddei, an associate professor of digestive diseases at Yale and the senior author of the report, which was published in August in the journal BMJ Case Reports. The symptoms take a long time to show up because it takes many years for the level of iron in the body to rise to the point that it causes these symptoms, she said.

To treat the disease, doctors need to remove iron from the body. To do so, they draw blood, which is filled with iron, said Taddei, who is also a physician at the VA Connecticut Health System. In this case, it appears the man's decades of giving blood acted as a form of protection from the symptoms of the disease, Taddei said.

Hereditary haemochromatosis is one of the few diseases that doctors still treat with bloodletting, which people used for centuries to treat many maladies, Taddei told Live Science. [10 'Barbaric' Medical Treatments That Are Still Used Today]

Taddei added that women with hereditary haemochromatosis tend to develop symptoms much later than men do, normally in their 60s. Women are less likely to accumulate excess iron in their bodies, because of menstruation, which causes them to lose blood each month, she said.

But getting too much iron is rarely an issue for most people, she added. Normally, the amount of iron that's absorbed from food is highly regulated by the body, Taddei said. The body usually does not absorb more than 2 milligrams of the mineral a day, and anything extra is excreted from the body, she said.

Abnormal test results

The doctors discovered that the man had the condition when he came to doctors because of "vague abdominal pain," according to the report.

The pain turned out to be unrelated to the condition, but it led the doctors to run some tests, one of which revealed that the man had high levels of iron in his blood, Taddei said. Additional tests revealed that the man had a cancerous mass in his liver, and that his liver was filled with iron, Taddei said.

Liver cancer is common in people who have hereditary haemochromatosis, but only if they also have cirrhosis, Taddei said. The type of cancer that the man had is "almost unheard of" in a person without cirrhosis, she added.

The man told the doctors that starting in his 20s he donated blood regularly, and continued doing so for more than 20 years, according to the report.

Originally published on Live Science.
Neil deGrasse Tyson with his daughter Miranda Tyson, who is now much older than the skeptical kindergartener Tyson described her as, at the 2016 Primetime Creative Emmy Awards in Los Angeles, California.

It's A-OK to captivate your child with the story of the tooth fairy, right?

Nope, not if it entails telling a big, fat whopper, astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson told "The Late Late Show with James Corden" early Thursday morning (Sept. 15).

"We're not going to lie to them," Tyson said to Corden. "The universe is amazing enough that you don't have to invent stuff just to keep kids entertained." [Easy Answers to the Top 5 Science Questions Kids Ask]

But is that the right way to handle the tooth fairy story? Live Science asked three experts to share their views. Though these experts said they all admired the tack Tyson took, they also noted that there's no one way to address the famous fairy.

Fairy skeptic

During the show, Corden asked Tyson whether his scientific training ever found its way into his home life. Turns out it has: When the scientist's daughter, Miranda, lost her first tooth, in kindergarten, Tyson and his wife told the girl that they had heard that if you put a tooth under a pillow, the tooth fairy visits. Then, they surreptitiously swapped the tooth for money after Miranda went to sleep.

The next morning, Miranda excitedly showed them the prize. That's when they put on their skeptics' hats.

"We said, 'How do you know it was the tooth fairy?'" Tyson said. "She said, 'Oh no, I don't know. I just know that there's money here.'"

Miranda needed more proof, so she set up fairy booby traps, but they didn't work, Tyson said. Then Miranda told her friends, who suspected, as many little kids do, that the fairy was actually their parents. The children agreed that whoever lost a tooth at school next would neglect to tell her parents, but would still hide that tooth under her pillow to see whether the fairy would come.

When that day came, the kids waited with suspense. But the tooth stayed a tooth.

Tyson said his daughter's experiment made him proud, and he added that he wasn't concerned that his daughter was missing out on the tooth fairy experience.

Children use their imaginations all of the time  for instance, when they play make-believe with toys, Tyson said. "They can use their imagination for things where imagination belongs, but not [on] some hoax perpetrated by adults on children," Tyson said.

Critical thinking

There's no evidence that telling children that the tooth fairy exists is harmful, and many children have pleasant memories of the tale, said Gail Heyman, a professor of psychology at the University of California, San Diego. However, Tyson's approach is creative because it encourages critical thinking, Heyman said.

"I really like Tysons approach, and part of the reason I like it is because I am a researcher and I highly value critical thinking," Heyman said. "Based on what we know about developmental psychology, taking this kind of approach will help children learn to think for themselves." [11 Facts Every Parent Should Know About Their Baby's Brain]

She noted, however, that not all parents value critical thinking at this age. "It certainly can make parenting more challenging, because children who think critically are especially likely to question what their parents tell them," Heyman said.

Heyman said that when she had children, she told them "we were going to play tooth fairy and made it clear that it was a pretend game," she said. "I didn't want them to miss out on the fun, but I also didn't want to lie to them."

Likewise, Paul Harris, a professor of education at Harvard University, applauded Tyson for encouraging critical thought, but also found it "provocative."

"I wonder if he also encourages children to test out the efficacy of prayer in the same way  and how the audience would react if he did so," Harris said.

But most parents don't teach their kids to question the tooth fairy, the experts said. Instead, "in certain families, people go a good distance, meaning they really put in a good effort, to protect a child's misconception," said Melissa Koenig, an associate professor at the Institute of Child Development at the University of Minnesota.

However, there are actually myriad factors that influence a child's belief in mythical beings. In a 2004 study in the journal Developmental Science, researchers made up a new fantastical entity: "the candy witch."

Older preschoolers who were "visited" by the candy witch, meaning their parents stealthily swapped some of their Halloween candy for a toy, were more likely to believe in her than those who were not visited, the researchers found. Also, children who were more inclined toward fantasy, and who believed in other fantastical beings, such as Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny, were more likely to believe in the witch.

"If you've been perpetuating the Santa Claus myth since birth at Christmastime, that correlation [in the study] suggests that you're making the tooth fairy myth, which comes a little later, a little more believable," said Koenig, who was not involved in the study.

Original article on Live Science.
Valleys much younger than well-known ancient valley networks on Mars are evident near the informally named "Heart Lake" on Mars.

Mars may have been able to support life for much longer than scientists had thought.

Some Red Planet streams and lakes  including one bigger than several of North America's Great Lakes  formed just 2 billion to 3 billion years ago, a new study suggests. That's a surprise, because researchers think that, by that epoch, Mars had already lost most of its atmosphere, and therefore had likely become too cold to host liquid water on its surface.

"This paper presents evidence for episodes of water modifying the surface on early Mars for possibly several hundred million years later than previously thought, with some implication that the water was emplaced by snow, not rain," Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) project scientist Rich Zurek, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, said in a statement. [Water on Mars: Exploration & Evidence]

Zurek was not part of the study team, which was led by Sharon Wilson of the Smithsonian Institution and the University of Virginia. Wilson and her colleagues studied photos of Mars' northern Arabia Terra region taken by three orbiters  MRO, NASA's Mars Global Surveyor probe and Europe's Mars Express spacecraft.

Streamlined forms in this Martian valley resulted from the outflow of a lake hundreds of millions years more recently than an era of Martian lakes previously confirmed. (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS)

"We discovered valleys that carried water into lake basins," Wilson said in the same statement. "Several lake basins filled and overflowed, indicating there was a considerable amount of water on the landscape during this time."

"Considerable amount" indeed: One of the newly discovered lakes was about as big as Lake Tahoe, a body of water on the California-Nevada border that holds about 45 cubic miles (188 cubic kilometers) of water, Wilson said.

And this Martian lake overflowed into an enormous basin, dubbed Heart Lake, that held about 670 cubic miles (2,790 cubic km) of water  quite a bit more than Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, two of the five Great Lakes along the Canada-U.S. border, researchers added. (Lake Erie and Lake Ontario hold 116 cubic miles and 393 cubic miles, or 480 and 1,640 cubic km, respectively.

The study team arrived at their age estimate by looking at the valleys in the lake-and-stream system. Specifically, researchers checked if those valleys had carved into the aprons of debris surrounding 22 impact craters in the area whose rough ages were already known. (If a valley did cut into such an apron, water was flowing after the crater-creating impact occurred.)

Observations by MRO, NASA's Curiosity rover and other missions had already found strong evidence of lakes, streams and other bodies of liquid surface water in Mars' more ancient past  3.7 billion years or so ago.

Scientists think the majority of Mars' atmosphere was lost to space shortly thereafter, cooling the planet down considerably. The new results are consistent with a cold climate, Wilson said.

This map of an area within the Arabia Terra region on Mars shows where hydrologic modeling predicts locations of depressions that would have been lakes (black), overlaid with a map of the preserved valleys (blue lines, with width exaggerated for recognition) that would have been streams. (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Smithsonian)

The rate at which water flowed through these valleys is consistent with runoff from melting snow," she said, "These weren't rushing rivers. They have simple drainage patterns and did not form deep or complex systems like the ancient valley networks from early Mars."

But it's unclear how that snow heated up enough to melt, she said. One possibility is a shift in Mars' axial tilt, which resulted in greater illumination of the ice caps at the planet's poles, researchers said. (Valleys like those seen in Arabia Terra also occur in Mars' southern hemisphere, suggesting that lakes and streams existed over broad stretches of the planet, study team members said.)"

The new study has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Geophysical Research, Planets.

Follow Mike Wall on Twitter @michaeldwall and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook or Google+. Originally published on Space.com.
Doctors in Canada can now prescribe heroin to patients with particularly serious addictions to the drug, thanks to new rules that were recently approved by the country's government.

The rules, which went into effect last week, allow any doctor in Canada to apply to the country's national health department (known as Health Canada) for access to medical-grade heroin to prescribe to specific patients. The requests are approved on a case-by-case basis, by the government-run Special Access Programme, according to the new regulations.

However, the drug, known medically as diacetylmorphine, can be prescribed only to patients with severe heroin addictions who have tried to end their addiction multiple times with other methods but have failed, the government said.

"Having access to diacetylmorphine will provide health practitioners with an additional treatment option to treat patients with opioid dependence who have not responded to traditional treatments," the new regulations said. (Heroin belongs to the class of pain-relieving drugs known as opioids.) "Treatment with diacetylmorphine in a comprehensive setting can lead to improved treatment outcomes and health benefits for these patients." [10 Interesting Facts About Heroin]

The changes come at a time when opioid overdose deaths in Canada are on the rise. Not all provinces keep track of opioid deaths, but in British Columbia, there were 433 drug overdose deaths between January and July this year, a 75 percent increase over the number of deaths that occurred during that same period in 2015, according to a report from British Columbia Coroners Service. About 62 percent of all drug overdose deaths involved the opioid fentanyl, up from 30 percent of deaths in 2015.

A number of studies have shown that treatment with diacetylmorphine can help addicted patients who've previously failed other treatments. For example, a 2009 study in Canada found that patients with severe heroin addictions were more likely to stick with their addiction treatment and less likely to use illegal drugs if they received diacetylmorphine, compared to standard treatment with the drug methadone.

Prescriptions for diacetylmorphine are also available in some European countries, including Switzerland, Germany, the Netherlands and Denmark, to treat people with opioid dependence who have failed other therapies, the new regulations said.

Patients who get prescriptions for heroin will be supervised by medical staff when they are injecting the drug, according to CNN.

Original article on Live Science.
Ukraine must be at the heart of EU strategies and receive support on its path towards European integration, Danish Foreign Minister Kristian Jensen has said at the opening of the 13th Annual Meeting of the Yalta European Strategy (YES).

"Denmark and the EU stand in firm support of Ukraine's economic aspirations and against the Russian aggression in the east and in Crimea. I will ensure that we will keep Ukraine on top of the EU agenda despite a great number of conflicts in the world," he said.

Jensen stressed that each country has the right to determine its way to develop, and the European Union would not stay on the sidelines of the way Ukraine has chosen.

"It is time to make a stand between those who are willing to draw Ukraine back into a time when it was dominated by its neighbors, and to pull it forward to a time when Ukraine is able to choose its own path in the future. I believe that every country, large or small, should have the right to choose their own future. And right now for Ukraine the path toward Europe is open. It has never been easy, it has never been an easy, straightforward road, but the people of Ukraine people will be supported all the way," he said.
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The Council of the European Union's September 15 resolution to extend individual sanctions against 146 Russian and Ukrainian people and 37 legal entities by six months - until March 15, 2017 - was published in the Official Journal of the European Union on Friday.

These lists include people and organizations, who, the EU believes, are responsible for violating Ukraine's territorial integrity and damaging its sovereignty. The sanctions include a freeze on bank assets in EU countries and a ban on issuing visas for trips to EU countries.

The resolution came into effect immediately upon its publication in the EU's Official Journal.
Farming groups and local politicians have launched a stinging rebuke of the Office of Public Work's plans to develop a national flood risk management policy, saying the proposals don't go far enough.

A small batch of farmers staged a protest outside the Longford Arms Hotel last week ahead of a public consultation day.

The draft plans under the Catchment Flood Risk Assessment and Management (CFRAM) programme were made available for public consultation earlier this year.

The programme was tasked with producing flood hazard maps, flood risk maps and flood management plans required under a timeframe set out in the 2007 EU floods directive.

But for the likes of Longford Irish Farmers Association (IFA) chairman, Sean Conefrey the plans have left many of its members puzzled.

There's very little in it for farmers to be honest, he said.

In fact, there's very little in it for rural dwellers and agriculture in general.

We (IFA) have been a left a bit underwhelmed.

That feeling is one largely based on fears surrounding the River Shannon's present day water levels.

Figures released from the ESB towards the end of the summer showed levels along the Shannon Callows - downstream from Athlone to Portumna - were almost 16 inches higher than in July 2015.

Water levels in Lough Ree were also said to be a foot higher.

According to Mr Conefrey, the one possible solution to those concerns, namely dredging, has largely been overlooked in the plans.

There is no mention of dredging, it's not even a consideration, he added, as he also renewed calls for a single lead authority to manage Ireland's largest river.

They were sentiments local County Councillor Gerald Farrell was only too keen to extol.

The farmers and rural dwellers have been ignored in this report, totally ignored, he stormed.

It's plain to see what (dredging) needs to be done.

It (River Shannon) is a massive river and needs a single independent authority to look after it.

Further criticism came from Galway Roscommon TD Eugene Murphy.

The former radio DJ hit out at the CFRAM studies which were underway in Roscommon Town and Athleague this week as being completely out of touch with the views and knowledge of local people.

The millions of euro laid out for works in Roscommon Town and Athleague village in my view wont solve the problem of flooding and this money could be better spent by taking the views of the local people on board, he said.
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By Chris Boyle Published: September 16 2016

The controversial Republican and Democratic contenders for the Oval Office in November's elections set to square off for the first time on Long Island.

With the 2016 Presidential elections shaping up to be one of the most hotly-contested  and controversial  in U.S. history, its only natural that the first official public debate between the Republican and Democratic candidates vying for the White House  billionaire businessman and reality television star Donald Trump and former First Lady and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton  would be one of the biggest meetings in political history. And Long Islands very own Hofstra University has the huge honor and responsibility of hosting this event on September 26  fewer than two weeks away.

Hofstra is actually no stranger to political debates of this caliber, however; in the 2008 presidential race the Hempstead-based University hosted the third Presidential debate between candidates Barack Obama and Senator John McCain, and in 2012 they hosted of the Town Hall-style debate between President Obama and governor Mitt Romney.

For this years elections, Hofstra actually started out as an alternate debate site as designated by the Commission on Presidential Debates; however, they were quickly asked to take over as the site of the first meeting between Trump and Clinton after the initial host had backed out, according to Karla Schuster, Hofstras Assistant Vice-President for University Relations.

We applied, as we did in 2008 and 2012, to be a debate host, as did many other universities in the country. In 2008 and 2012, we were chosen to be debate sites, she said. In 2014 we applied again, and at the end of cycle we were originally chosen as an alternate, which means that if the other institution that was tapped to be a debate host was not able to do so for whatever reason, we would step in, and that is exactly what happened. Wright State University in Ohio had been chosen to host the first debate, and when they were unable to do it and the Commission on Presidential Debates came to us on July 19th of this year and told us that we were up.



President Barack Obama during his 2008 Presidential debate at Hofstra University with then-opponent John McCain.Photo Credit: Hofstra University

While most universities get at least a year's notice in advance of a presidential debate, the fact that they were initially chosen as an alternate left Hofstra with a mere six weeks to prepare for Trump vs. Clinton. However, Schuster said that their previous experience at hosting this caliber of event left Hofstra more than able to set things up at the very last minute.

We did have shorter notice than normal, but we had been designated as an alternate more than a year ago, so we certainly understood that this was possible, and we were prepared for it, she said. In addition, having hosted two presidential debates before, we had a good understanding of what was expected, and that made things a little less challenging than they would have been normally.



Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney and President Barack Obama participate in a Town Hall-style debate during the 2012 election at Hofstra University.Photo Credit: Hofstra University

Indeed, despite their readiness, Hofstra is slated to be the epicenter of a historical event; in recent U.S. history, there have never been two candidates for the Presidency who have split the voting public in half on nearly every conceivable issue. The hot-button topics this election cycle  including immigration, national security, combating terrorism, the economy, healthcare, and more  are threatened to be overshadowed by the larger-than life personalities of Trump and Clinton, with charges of corruption, bigotry, and more being levied by each opponent at one another. The American public, meanwhile, has been transfixed upon the proceedings as the two candidates are running practically neck-and-neck in current polls, with Trump and Clintons respective camps trading barbs and insults with each other on a daily basis.

The Commission on Presidential Debates is producer of the Trump/Clinton event  again, the very first fact-to-face public debate by this dynamic duo  and tickets are not available to the general public; current students at Hofstra entered a random lottery for a chance to attend. In addition, Hofstra itself institution gets a certain allotment of passes, which are only given to current students. The remaining tickets are distributed by the Commission on Presidential Debates, and are typically given to party officials as well as other individuals involved in the campaigns.



Presidential hopefuls Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton are set to go head-to-head in their first debate at Hofstra University on Sept. 26. Photo Credit: Original Photo by Gage Skidmore, derivative by Alexander Krassotkin, via WikiCommons. (CC-BY-SA 3.0)

Taking advantage of providing their students the opportunity to be at the ground floor of a history-making event, Schuster said that Hofstra is providing a number of programs leading up to the debate designed to enrich the experience for their student body in a number of different ways.

Leading up to the debate, we're going to have two weeks of events...at least 40 different events, comprised of major speakers and analysts who are addressing all of the key issues that are part of this election cycle, she said. We hope these discussions will help our students get more engaged in not only the fact that we're hosting a debate, but in the political process itself. For example, to enter the student ticket lottery, you must be registered to vote. So we design programming around the fact that the debate is a catalyst for getting our students to be more civically engaged, and we hope, better informed.

Obviously, Security on campus the day of the event will be a tight and complexly structured affair, with multiple levels of federal and local law enforcement quite active on the Hofstra campus, all of them working in close communication with one another, Schuster said.

Security that day is a joint effort, led by the U.S. Secret Service, she said. It's a joint effort between the Federal, State, local, and campus law enforcement, all working together.

Being chosen to host the first-ever Donald Trump/Hillary Clinton Presidential debate is a distinction that Schuster noted sets Hofstra apart from many other Universities in terms of the experiences that they can offer their student body; in addition, she said, it is a responsibility that will be taken extremely seriously considering the fact that the whole world will be watching that day.

We will be the first and only University to ever host three consecutive presidential debates, which is an extraordinary honor, she said. The reason why we do this is for our students, because we know from past experience the kind of transformative experience it is for students and anyone in our community. We know from talking to alumni that were here for the past two debates that these events have impacted their lives in amazing ways...many have gone on to work for advocacy groups, politicians, and government, as well as students that have gone on to become journalists and are actually coming back to this campus is to cover the debate as professionals. Its truly amazing.
Local News, Business & Finance, Health & Wellness, Press Releases

By Long Island News & PR Published: September 16 2016

Today the President and CEO of BMHMC signed the contract with Suffolk County for the purchase of the property of the former John J. Foley Nursing Home in Yaphank.

The $15 million purchase decision marks the end of the contract negotiations and due diligence process for BMHMC and Suffolk County, a dedicated undertaking for both parties.

Patchogue / Yaphank, NY - September 15, 2016 - Today the President and CEO of Brookhaven Memorial Hospital Medical Center (BMHMC) signed the contract with Suffolk County for the purchase of the property of the former John J. Foley Nursing Home in Yaphank, based upon the affirmative vote of the hospital's board of directors.

Richard T. Margulis, President and CEO of Brookhaven Memorial Hospital Medical Center, said in today's announcement: "We are taking a significant step forward in furthering our mission to serve our community with the care and services reflective of its diverse needs. I am excited for the growth of our services, for the revitalization of a recognized structure for its best purpose and for being able to help care for even more members of our community".

The 15 million dollar purchase decision marks the end of the contract negotiations and due diligence process for BMHMC and Suffolk County, a dedicated undertaking for both parties. Each step was given serious consideration and ultimately, a mutual understanding of a plan that will enhance the region's changing healthcare landscape.

"Brookhaven is a great community hospital and I am excited we could work together to put the Foley building back into productive use serving the community," Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone said. "I know Brookhaven is committed to offer expanded services and I look forward to completing this process and attending a grand reopening in the near future."

It is the intention of BMHMC to work with the County to close on the sale by the end of the year. BMHMC is preparing to file the necessary documents with the State and Town by the first quarter of 2017. If all proceeds on schedule, interior renovations may begin by mid-2017 and complete by 2018.

Margulis added: "We applaud the County for putting the healthcare needs of our community at the heart of their efforts. We are also thankful for the support of the Town of Brookhaven as a driving force in moving the project along."

Brookhaven Town Supervisor Ed Romaine reacted to the decision, saying, "This is good news. The Town is pleased that the County and Brookhaven Memorial Hospital Medical Center have been able to come to an agreement. It will good for the community to have BMHMC take over the former Foley building, renovate it, and provide much needed healthcare services."

Robert Calarco, Suffolk County 7th District Legislator, and an activist in keeping the process moving forward, stated: "I am excited that the County and Brookhaven Hospital have reached this point and that the sale is on. Brookhaven Hospital is perfectly suited to take over this valuable asset and ensure that it continues to serve its original intent - to provide quality medical care to our community. "

According to Suffolk County 3rd District Legislator, Kate M. Browning, there is appropriate historical context to this acquisition: "I was a big supporter of the former John J Foley Nursing Home, and with John J. Foley having been a past Brookhaven Memorial Hospital Medical Center board member, I think it is more than fitting that BMHMC takes this property over. I am confident BMHMC will provide excellent services to the community."

About Brookhaven Memorial Hospital Medical Center (BMHMC): Founded in 1956, Brookhaven Memorial Hospital Medical Center is a full-service, 306-bed, acute care, voluntary, not-for- profit community hospital located in Patchogue, New York. BMHMC delivers accessible, high-quality health services in a focused caring and teaching environment while providing health advocacy for the community and people served. For more information about Brookhaven Hospital, call (631) 654-7100 or visit www.BrookhavenHospital.org.
Local News, Community, Charity & Cause, Health & Wellness, Press Releases

By Long Island News & PR Published: September 16 2016

Ribbon cutting ceremony to unveil 8 new wrapped buses featuring images and messages encouraging healthy lifestyle choices at RIDES UNLIMITED in Islandia on Friday, 9/16.

Islandia, NY - September 15, 2016 - Long Islands Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program - Education/Eat Smart New York (SNAP-Ed/ESNY), Cornell Cooperative Extensions of Suffolk and Nassau County, Family Residences and Essential Enterprises, Inc. (FREE), and RIDES Unlimited of Nassau and Suffolk County are hosting a ribbon cutting ceremony to unveil eight (8) new wrapped buses featuring images and messages encouraging healthy lifestyle choices at RIDES UNLIMITED, 108 Hoffman Road, Islandia on Friday, September 16 at 11am. Event is Rain or Shine.

The buses will display core SNAP-Ed/ESNY program messages encouraging healthy food choices and physical activity as a part of a healthy daily routine. These core messages will also be included in the digital advertising and social media campaign. The goal of Eat Smart New York is to improve health and reduce obesity among low income families who receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits or are SNAP eligible.

Poor nutrition can lead to weight gain, obesity, and health problems. Some of these health problems can be very serious for adults and children, says Dr. Zahrine Bajwa, Project Director for SNAP-Ed/ESNY  Long Island. Be a role model. Practice healthy habits, and you can help prevent these problems, recommends Dr. Bajwa.

The USDA reports that more than 2 million New Yorkers, 12% of the state population, do not have enough money to meet their basic nutritional needs. Currently, there are 127,345 food assistance recipients in Suffolk and another 67,200 in Nassau plus a significant number of families who are eligible but do not receive assistance.

The SNAP-Ed/ESNY program is funded through a $6.5 million five year grant from the NYS Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance. The grant is part of a $14.7 million in federal funding provided to the state for nutritional education and assistance.

About CCE of Suffolk

Cornell Cooperative Extension of Suffolk County is a non-profit educational agency dedicated to strengthening families and communities, enhancing and protecting the environment, promoting sustainable agriculture, and fostering countywide economic development. Affiliated with Cornell University, and funded in part by Suffolk County government, Cornell Cooperative Extension of Suffolk County is part of the state and national extension system that includes the land-grant universities and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. CCEs sites and program areas include Agriculture, Marine, 4-H Youth Development, Family Health and Wellness, Suffolk County Farm and Education Center.

About CCE of Nassau

Cornell Cooperative Extension of Nassau County (CCE-NC) is committed to building healthy lifestyles and healthy communities by conducting educational programs that connect Cornell University resources to community needs for all people in the county. Extension staff and trained volunteers deliver education programs, conduct applied research, and encourage community collaborations. CCE-NC educators connect people with the information they need on home horticulture; food and nutrition; positive activities for youth and families; economic and community development; and sustainable natural resources. CCE-NC plays a vital role in the lives of individuals, families, businesses, and communities throughout Nassau County.

About Family Residences and Essential Enterprises, Inc. (FREE)

Family Residences and Essential Enterprises, Inc. (FREE), founded in 1977, benefits and proudly supports more than 4,000 individuals with intellectual/developmental disabilities, mental illness and traumatic brain injury. It is the mission of FREE to assist individuals of all abilities realize their full potential. FREE provides a diverse array of supports and services including: housing; recovery services; transition to work; employment; day, community and family services; respite; crisis services; education and after school support; specialty health services; and advocacy.

FREE also collaborates with a variety of diverse 501(c)(3) nonprofit partners on educational, vocational, rehabilitative and a myriad of other creative initiatives to enhance the local communities and the lives of more than 25,000 people that reside within them. Each of the valued partners of the Family of FREE Network have a unique mission, vision and strategic goals that are aligned in purpose, and embody the spirit of the meaningful work we do every day.

About Rides Unlimited of Nassau and Suffolk

Rides Unlimited of Nassau & Suffolk (RIDES) is a not for profit for-hire passenger transportation company whose primary purpose is the transportation of differently-abled individuals. Rides is authorized by the New York State Department of Transportation as a contract carrier between all points in the City of New York and the Counties of Nassau, Suffolk, and Westchester. With over 100 routes operating daily, Rides transports approximately 1500 passengers throughout its vast transportation system that includes both a fixed route and a demand responsive service.
Nature & Weather, Local News, Arts & Culture, Travel & Local Attractions, Press Releases

By Long Island News & PR Published: September 15 2016

Syosset, NY resident, Greg Gulbransen, has been selected as the grand prize winner of the 2016 The Weather Channel Its Amazing Photo Contest.

Syosset, NY - September 12, 2016 - Syosset, NY resident, Greg Gulbransen, has been selected as the grand prize winner of the 2016 The Weather Channel Its Amazing Photo Contest. His photo of a polar bear in the frozen Hudson Bay in Manitoba, Canada, titled Fire on Ice, has secured him the top spot in the contest with a prize of $15,000. For more of Gulbransen's photography, follow him on Instagram.



Gulbransen spent four years saving and planning for a photography trip to Manitoba, Canada where he captured this year's grand prize winning photo. In November, the Hudson Bay freezes and, if you time it just right, you can watch as the polar bears migrate onto the frozen waters.



"The weather turned that day," Gulbransen said. "It got really really cold and all of a sudden, we woke up and went outside and saw the sun was coming up. The temperature changed so rapidly that the water was evaporating like that. We had this amazing fire-and- ice situation. It didnt last very long, maybe 20 minutes. I just knew it was magical."



In the third annual Its Amazing Out There photo contest, sponsored by Toyota, The Weather Channel invited weather enthusiasts to submit photos that celebrate the amazing world out there in the categories of adventure, nature, and weather. The Weather Channel received nearly 70K impressive images from photographers  amateurs and professionals alike  for the contest and it was narrowed down to 64 finalists. Check out the photos from all the finalists here.



Other winners included:
Local News, National & World News, Press Releases

By Long Island News & PR Published: September 16 2016

Social Security and its future were posed questions to experts at an AARP Community Forum at Hofstra University.

Hempstead, NY - September 15, 2016 - Long Islanders said the 2016 presidential candidates and campaign need to focus more on Social Security and its future, and they posed questions to experts today at an AARP Community Forum at Hofstra University just 11 days before the university hosts the first presidential debate of the 2016 campaign.

Hofstra Executive Dean for Suburban Studies Lawrence Levy and AARPs Director of Financial Security & Consumer Affairs Cristina Martin-Firvida joined AARP New York State Director Beth Finkel in the community conversation with over 100 Long Islanders.

Social Security benefits will be cut by nearly 25% in 2034 if the program is not updated; such a cut to the popular program into which working Americans pay every day to earn their benefits would mean the loss of about $4,200 a year in todays dollars for the average New Yorker 65 and above, according to a recent AARP analysis.

Meantime, a recent survey of AARP members showed that those in New York rate having Social Security available to them in the future as their top economic concern, with 87 percent saying theyre extremely or very concerned about it.

Were looking at a 25 percent cut in less than 18 years unless our leaders in Washington act to update Social Security for the 21st Century, said Beth Finkel. Its important that our leaders address Social Securitys solvency  and soon.

The population of Long Island and many other suburbs is getting older and older, and most of these people are not now or will not be wealthy or anything close, said Lawrence Levy. They also may not have the pensions and other savings of prior generations. That means Social Security will be an ever more important part of maintaining quality of life for more and more people, and the economic vitality of the communities in which they live.

In fact, Social Security generated over $87 billion in economic activity in New York state in 2012, according to AARPs Public Policy Institute.

AARP launched our Take A Stand campaign this year to urge the presidential candidates to lay out their plans to update Social Security, to act if elected, and to urge congressional candidates to commit to work with the new administration to get it done, said Cristina Martin-Firvida. Options for heading off a 25 percent benefit cut become much more difficult the longer we wait. We need to hear what the candidates would do, and we need action next year during the all-important first year of what could be an eight-year administration.

AARP is a national sponsor of the presidential debates, and AARP is planning additional activities at Hofstra leading up to the initial faceoff including community listening posts to give students and residents the chance to weigh in on the importance of updating Social Security and an on-campus debate watch party.

Follow us on Twitter: @AARPNY and Facebook: AARP New York

AARP is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization, with a membership of nearly 38 million that helps people turn their goals and dreams into 'Real Possibilities' by changing the way America defines aging. With staffed offices in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands, AARP works to strengthen communities and promote the issues that matter most to families such as healthcare security, financial security and personal fulfillment. AARP also advocates for individuals in the marketplace by selecting products and services of high quality and value to carry the AARP name. As a trusted source for news and information, AARP produces the worlds largest circulation magazine, AARP The Magazine and AARP Bulletin. AARP does not endorse candidates for public office or make contributions to political campaigns or candidates. To learn more, visit www.aarp.org or follow @AARP and our CEO @JoAnn_Jenkins on Twitter.
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
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has called on the international community to impose new sectoral sanctions against Russia.

"It is necessary to introduce new sectoral sanctions, we won't achieve anything without sanctions," he said, speaking at the annual meeting of the Yalta European Strategy (YES) in Kyiv on Friday.

According to the president, it would be good to resume the Jackson-Vanik amendment in relation to Russia.

"I am the man who once asked the U.S. Congress to remove the Jackson-Vanik amendment as for Ukraine, and now it's time to impose it against Russia," Poroshenko said.
Poroshenko convinced of good prospects for Ukraine in hearing arbitration against Russia over breaches of Convention on the Law of the Sea

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko is convinced that there are good prospects for Ukraine in hearing the arbitration against the Russian Federation over breaches of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea.

"International legal mechanisms to stand up against must be applied in full. We have initiated many lawsuits against Russia, in particular, over violation of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. The aggressor must feel the whole force of international law. I am sure that we have very good prospects [in hearing the arbitration]," he said at the opening of the 13th Annual Meeting of the Yalta European Strategy (YES) on Friday in Kyiv.
Poroshenko: We need solidarity from Europe, not weapons and money

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has called on Europe to be aligned with Ukraine.

"Answering the question what we need, I can say: this is not money, weapons or advisors. We need your unity and solidarity with Ukraine," he said at the 13th Annual Meeting of the Yalta European Strategy (YES) on Friday in Kyiv.

The head of state urged European leaders to stand firmly protecting the interests of Europe.

"It is impossible to be president of the country being at war and not to be optimistic. One cannot win a fight, one cannot lead the nation. I want all European leaders to remain optimistic and continue playing their roles to protect Europe," he said.
Ukraine expects the UN General Assembly to adopt a resolution on human rights violations in Crimea occupied by Russia, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has stated.

"The UN General Assembly, which begins these days in New York, should also have its say in this regard and we in Ukraine count on support for the new Ukrainian initiative on the UN General Assembly's adopting a new resolution on human rights violations in Crimea, which is part of our policy of de-occupation, and we count on support from New York," he said, opening the 13th annual meeting of the Yalta European Strategy (YES) in Kyiv on Friday morning.
The number of former Guantanamo detainees confirmed or suspected of rejoining the jihad has grown to 208, according to statistics released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) this week.

More than 60 percent of the jihadists, 132 in total, are at-large. The remaining 76 ex-detainees have been killed, died of natural causes, or were re-captured.

The overwhelming majority of the ex-detainees on the ODNIs recidivist list, 188 out of 208 (90 percent), were transferred or released during the Bush administration. An additional 20 recidivists (9 confirmed, 11 suspected) were transferred from Guantanamo during President Obamas tenure.

The US governments list of ex-Guantanamo detainees who have rejoined the fight has grown significantly since 2008, when the first statistics were made public. [See LWJ report, ODNI: 204 former Guantanamo detainees are confirmed or suspected recidivists.]

In June 2008, the Department of Defense reported that 37 former detainees were confirmed or suspected of returning to the fight. On Jan. 13, 2009, a Pentagon spokesman said that number had climbed to 61. In April 2009, the Pentagon told the press that same metric had risen further to 74.

The estimated number of recidivists more than doubled between April 2009 and Oct. 2010, when the ODNI released an updated analysis saying that 150 former detainees were on the list. Since then, the ODNIs assessment has steadily climbed. In March, the ODNI counted 204 men who had returned to the fight, which is slightly lower than the current figure of 208.

In the past, the US government provided examples of the men included in its recidivist database, but it no longer publishes such lists. Therefore, while some can be identified via open source reporting or previous Defense Department reports, others on the list havent been publicly identified.

ODNIs methodology

The ODNI tracks former Guantanamo detainees who are involved in both terrorist and insurgent activities, including those thought to be planning terrorist operations, conducting a terrorist or insurgent attack against Coalition or host-nation forces or civilians, conducting a suicide bombing, financing terrorist operations, recruiting others for terrorist operations, and arranging for movement of individuals involved in terrorist operations.

The US intelligence communitys assessment does not include those jihadists who have communicated with other former detainees or past terrorist associates about non-nefarious activities. The production of anti-American propaganda is not enough to be considered recidivist either, according to the ODNI.

In order to be considered a confirmed recidivist, a preponderance of information must identify a specific former GTMO detainee as directly involved in terrorist or insurgent activities. The suspected category requires [p]lausible but unverified or single-source reporting that identifies a specific former GTMO detainee as being directly involved in terrorist or insurgent activities.

The current estimate includes 122 confirmed and 86 suspected recidivists, for a total of 208.

To date, 693 Guantanamo detainees have been transferred. Therefore, the reengagement rate is approximately 30 percent. However, US intelligence officials have told The Long War Journal that this figure may underestimate the true rate.

US intelligence does not track all of the jihadists who were once held at Guantanamo, so even more former detainees could have rejoined terrorist or insurgent groups without the ODNIs knowledge. There is also a lag time in the ODNIs reporting. A February 2010 review of GTMO detainees release dates compared to first reporting of confirmed or suspected reengagement shows about 2.5 years between leaving GTMO and the first identified reengagement reports, the ODNI previously noted.

Ex-Guantanamo detainees serve jihadist organizations in various roles

Former Guantanamo detainees have served jihadist groups in a variety of capacities, ranging from suicide bombers to leadership positions. Both al Qaeda and the Taliban have filled senior roles with alumni from the detention facility in Cuba. Some have also joined the Islamic State.

Former Guantanamo detainees helped found Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). Said al Shihri, who became AQAPs deputy leader, was transferred from Guantanamo to Saudi Arabia in 2007. He was killed in a US drone strike in 2013. Shihri was featured in the January 2009 video announcing AQAPs founding. He appeared alongside three others, including Abu Hareth Muhammad al Awfi, who was also once held in Cuba. Al Awfi was quickly apprehended, or turned himself in, and returned to Saudi Arabia.

Ibrahim Suleiman al Rubaish was transferred from Guantanamo to Saudi Arabia in 2006. He fled south for Yemen, where he became one of AQAPs most senior ideologues. Rubaish played a key role in the rivalry between al Qaeda and the Islamic State, often arguing that Abu Bakr al Baghdadis enterprise was illegitimate. Rubaish was killed in a drone strike in 2015.

Ibrahim al Qosi, who was transferred in 2012, is currently a senior AQAP leader. Qosi served Osama bin Laden for years prior to the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. He is now a fixture in AQAPs propaganda, which features Qosis discussions of his time with bin Laden and other issues.

Still other ex-Gitmo detainees have joined AQAPs ranks. For example, the State Department added Othman al Ghamdi, an AQAP military commander, to the US governments list of specially designated global terrorists in 2011. Ghamdi has appeared in AQAPs Inspire magazine in the past. It is not clear if he is still active, or has perished.

The Taliban has relied on ex-Guantanamo detainees to fill leadership positions as well. For instance, Mullah Zakir was sent from Cuba to Afghanistan in 2007, and quickly became one of the Talibans top military commanders. Zakir was later removed or resigned as the head of the Talibans military commission, but he appears to still be an influential figure.

In July, the State Department designated Ayrat Nasimovich Vakhitov as a terrorist. According to Voice of America, Vakhitov is among 30 people Turkish authorities say they have arrested in connection with the terrorist attack at Istanbuls Ataturk airport in June. No terrorist organization has claimed responsibility for the assault on the airport, which left dozens dead. But it is widely suspected to be the work of the Islamic State.

These are just some of the publicly-identifiable examples of ex-Guantanamo detainees who have become recidivists.

Thomas Joscelyn is a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the Senior Editor for 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.
The US military announced today that it killed the Islamic States Minister of Information and central shura member in an airstrike near Raqqah, the jihadist groups capital in Syria, ten days ago. Wail Adil Hasan Salman al-Fayad, the information minister who was also known as Dr. Wail, is the second top Islamic State leader killed by the US in the last three weeks.

Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook announced Dr. Wails death in a statement released by the Department of Defense . Wail was the target of a precision strike. The Islamic State has not officially announced the death of Wail.

He operated as the Minister of Information for the terror organization and was a prominent member of its Senior Shura Council  ISILs leadership group, Cook stated, using the outdated acronym ISIL to describe the Islamic State.

As information minister, Wail oversaw ISILs production of terrorist propaganda videos showing torture and executions. The Islamic States brutal execution videos, which include beheadings, burning people alive, drownings and crucifixions, have played a key role in recruiting violent fighters across the globe.

Wail was also a close associate of Abu Muhammad al Adnani, the Islamic States top spokesman who also served as the groups external operations chief and a senior recruiter.

Adnani was killed just nine days before Wail. Adnani was one of the Islamic States most prominent leaders. He announced the establishment of the caliphate and formation of the Islamic State in 2014, and has been at the forefront in calling for sectarian attacks inside of Iraq and Syria as well as attacks against the West.

The Islamic State announced Adnanis death on Aug. 30, and said he was killed along with other fighters while directing military operations in the Syrian town of Al Bab. The US military confirmed Adnanis death 14 days after the Islamic State announced he was killed. [See LWJ reports, Islamic State says senior official killed in Aleppo province and US confirms it killed Islamic States spokesman and external operations chief.]

The US military has targeted and killed several key Islamic State leaders over the past several months as the jihadist group has lost key terrain in both Iraq and Syria. Abu Omar al Shishani is one of the most important Islamic State commanders who have been killed by the US since it began launching airstrikes in Iraq and Syria in the summer of 2014. He was an ethnic Chechen from Georgia whom the US claimed was the groups overall military commander. The US killed Shishani in an airstrike near Mosul in July 2016.

Another important Islamic State leader who was killed by the US was Abu Wahib, the notorious military commander who was responsible for overrunning much of Anbar province in 2014. Abu Wahib waged jihad with al Qaeda during the US occupation and escaped from an Iraqi prison in 2012 to rejoin the fight. The US killed him in an airstrike in May 2016.

The US military has also scored successful kills against the Islamic States leadership outside of Iraq and Syria. The most prominent leader killed by the US outside of Iraq and Syria was Hafiz Saeed Khan, the Islamic States emir for Khorasan province, or Afghanistan and Pakistan. A former mid-level commander in the Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan, Khan was killed in a US airstrike in Afghanistans eastern province of Nangarhar in July 2016.

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.
The frequent consideration of the issue of extending sanctions against Russia by the European Union gives Moscow the chance to undermine the unity of Europe, President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko has stated.

"The European Union must change the schedule of considering the extension of sanctions against Russia and move from semi-annual to annual sanctions, as a frequent return to this issue leads to much debate in the European Union and gives Russia the chance to undermine its unity," he said at the 13th annual meeting of the Yalta European Strategy "The World, Europe and Ukraine: Storms of Change" in Kyiv on Friday.
Published in Lancet Infectious Diseases, the research was led by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, Fiocruz-Pernambuco, Federal University of Pernambuco, State University of Pernambuco, and the Pan American Health Organization.

The relationship between Zika virus and microcephaly is widely assumed to be causal because of strong evidence of an association. However, evidence so far comes from case reports, case series, modelling studies, and preliminary reports from cohort studies - none of which have included appropriate control groups.

The study was requested by the Brazilian Ministry of Health to investigate the causes of the microcephaly epidemic that was declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern in 2016.

It included all infants born with microcephaly delivered in eight public hospitals in Pernambuco State in North Eastern Brazil between 15 January and 2 May 2016. For each case, two controls were selected. Controls were the first two infants born the following morning without microcephaly in one of the eight hospitals. Controls and cases were matched for region of residence and expected date of delivery.

Blood samples from cases and controls were collected and samples of cerebrospinal fluid were collected from cases with microcephaly. Samples were tested for Zika virus and Zika virus antibodies. Blood samples were collected from mothers and analysed for Zika and dengue virus. Infants with microcephaly had their head circumference measured and most underwent brain imaging.

24 of 30 (80%) mothers of infants with microcephaly had Zika virus infection, compared with 39 of 61 (64%) mothers of controls. 13 of 32 cases (41%) tested positive for Zika virus infection in blood or cerebrospinal fluid samples, and none of the 62 controls tested positive for Zika virus infection in blood samples.

A high proportion of mothers also tested positive for dengue and other infections such as cytomegalovirus (a type of herpes), rubella, and toxoplasma but there was no significant difference between mothers of cases and controls. Additionally, only seven of the 27 cases with microcephaly who had a brain scan had brain abnormalities, suggesting that congenital Zika virus syndrome can be present in neonates with microcephaly and no brain abnormalities.

Laura Rodrigues, Professor of Infectious Disease Epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and an author on the study, said:

"Although there is a strong scientific consensus that Zika virus is a cause of microcephaly, the early findings from this case control study are the missing pieces in the jigsaw in terms of proving the link. Crucially, this paper also suggests testing newborns for anti-zika antibody, IgM, in blood or liquor as a good option for an agreed test to diagnose children with Congenital Zika Syndrome - something not currently available. It also clearly shows that even babies with normal brain image can have the condition."

The authors warn that preliminary analyses can overestimate the strength of an association, so the true size of the effect needs to be treated with caution. The full study, which will include 200 cases and 400 controls will help quantify the risk more precisely and shed light on the role of co-factors.

Professor Rodrigues added: "When complete, the study, along with other ongoing research, will provide vital information on any role cofactors might have in the epidemic. Cohort studies conducted by the School and other institutions will establish the level of risk for mothers infected with the virus, how babies with the condition develop and the impact and costs to families and society. This will enable health services to target resources effectively, and ensure families affected by this devastating condition receive the support they need."

The authors add that detecting the presence of Zika virus or antibodies in blood and cerebrospinal fluid is the only current method of testing for Zika virus in newborns but the reliability of this method, especially when infections occur early in pregnancy, is not fully understood. The authors say that these limitations might partly explain why 19 (59%) of microcephaly cases were not confirmed as positive for Zika virus.

Study author Dr Thalia Velho Barreto de AraAjo, Federal University of Pernambuco, Recife, Brazil, said:

"A high proportion of mothers of newborns with and without microcephaly had been infected with Zika virus, reflecting the rapid spread of Zika infection in this region. However, when we compared laboratory confirmed Zika virus infection in newborns with and without microcephaly, we found that about half of the cases with microcephaly had laboratory confirmed Zika virus infection, compared to none of the healthy controls.

"Our findings suggest that Zika virus should be officially added to the list of congenital infections alongside toxoplasmosis, syphilis, varicella-zoster, parvovirus B19, rubella, cytomegalovirus, and herpes. However, many questions still remain to be answered including the role of previous dengue infection."

The study was funded by the Brazilian Ministry of Health, Pan American Health Organization, and Enhancing Research Activity in Epidemic Situations.

Publication

Thalia Velho Barreto de AraAjo, Laura Cunha Rodrigues, Ricardo Arraes de Alencar Ximenes, DemAcrito de Barros Miranda-Filho, Ulisses Ramos Montarroyos, Ana Paula Lopes de Melo, Sandra Valongueiro, Maria de Fatima Pessoa MilitAo de Albuquerque, Wayner Vieira Souza, Cynthia Braga, Sinval Pinto BrandAo Filho, Marli TenArio Cordeiro, Enrique Vazquez, Danielle Di Cavalcanti Souza Cruz, Claudio Maierovitch Pessanha Henriques, Luciana Caroline Albuquerque Bezerra, Priscila Mayrelle da Silva Castanha, Rafael Dhalia, Ernesto Torres Azevedo Marques-JAnior, Celina Maria Turchi Martelli. Association between Zika virus infection and microcephaly in Brazil, January to May, 2016: preliminary report of a case-control study. The Lancet Infectious Diseases. DOI: 10.1016/S1473-3099(16)30318-8.

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Ukrainian president rules out giving up Crimea in exchange for settlement of situation in Donbas

The issue of Crimea status is not an object of trade for Kyiv and the option of exchanging the peninsula for the settlement of the situation in Donbas is unacceptable, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has said.

"We will never accept and we will not trade in Crimea for a good solution in Donbas. Crimea is the Ukrainian territory," Poroshenko said at an annual meeting of the Yalta European Strategy "The World, Europe and Ukraine: Storms of Change" in Kyiv on Friday.

"Such a dangerous precedent as the legalization of the annexation of Crimea by Russia should not take place in general," he said.
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.
The great Gold Rush Music Festival returns to the township of Waihi, with the first nuggets of gold dropping for the highly anticipated return of the 2023 festival.
Our Back Pages

Issue 96

Issue Date: Fall 1991

Editor: Constance Rooke

Pages: 112

Number of contributors: 20

Buy Issue 96: Print Edition

Issue ninety-six opens with an excerpt from Louise Youngs play Hungry Ghosts, which won the CBC Playwriting Competition in 1989. Young completed two BFAs at the University of Victoria (in creative writing and painting) and the influence of painting comes through in Hungry Ghosts, which can be described as ethereal, surreal, and dizzying: Im in a room filled with oppressive flowers and satin and Samuels waxen body sleeps before me. Images appear like brushstrokes: small yellow leaves catch in the blue sky like a dress caught in the barb of a fence.

The issue is brimming with a diversity of poetry, beginning with Brian Bartletts 1991 Malahat Long Poem Prize winner Underwater Carpentry, an eleven-page, five-part poem, later printed as a chapbook by Goose Lane Editions. Underwater Carpentry has currents of Howl moving through it as Bartlett experiments with emotion, humour, history, and the readers expectation. In the first half, the sense of place has a psychedelic ambience to it: Leftover pale light gets soaked up / from between buildings, the sponge / of night at work. The second half surprises, as it morphs into a fiction-like format.

Following Bartlett is the co-winner of the 1991 Malahat Long Poem Prize, Janice Kulyk Keefers Isle of Demons, a series of twelve extraordinary poems based on an account of a young French noblewoman banished to a small island with her forbidden lieutenant lover and a servant. Kulyk Keefer has twice been nominated for the Governor Generals Award. Isle of Demons reads as a lament, and the voice whispers off the page: Seal me with your white silence, / like the powdered roots / in the apothecarys jars; / the pale, cut tongues / of linden flowers.

A trio of poems by Governor Generals Award-nominated poet Richard Harrison explores a variety of relationships. But all love is divisible, war is the proof. Harrison says in Soldiers sleeping in one anothers arms, a poem in which the narrator tenderly imagines his father as a young soldier in war. Batman by Harrison creates a stark image of the hero, and reads like a poem version of a comic strip: He says only enough to fill a word balloon.

Poet Dorothy Brown (Howe) explores the absence of the father in her childs life in the poem A Gathering of Men  for Robert Bly. At first / his absence was a hole / in your chest. Elisabeth Harvors poem How Long Will it Last explores infertility: you stroked my hair for what seemed like hours / I could feel the father already in it. Margaret Almon, a poet as well as a mosaic artist, explores lust in her wonderfully titled poem Love at the Five and Dime for Nanci Griffith. April Bulmer holds a BA in English and Mass Communications, and an impressive total of three Masters Degrees: Creative Writing, Theology, and Religious Studies; her diverse education comes through in her three poems. There is something sacred and mystical feeling about Bulmers poetry, which in one poem describes the angels feathered arms rising like prayers through the stained ceiling.

Closing issue ninety-six is a little story by Bruce Grierson titled Sympathy, and a longer piece of fiction titled Missing you, written by Athena George, who studied writing at the David Thompson University Centre in Nelson, B.C. Griersons Sympathy has the narrator dangerously experiment with what it would feel like to be blind like his brother: I shut off the headlights and drive, squeezing the wheel fast in the dark cab, counting the seconds, seeing how long I can hold out. I found myself totally absorbed in Georges Missing You, a story drenched in quiet pathos as a woman develops a friendship with a stray cat and her litter: Your furis taffy, apricots, lilies, with streaks of ivory, buttermilk, pearls. All of those things, cat, and none of them

The reviews section includes notable praises of Rita Donovans first book of fiction, Dark Jewels, a dazzled Jay Ruzeskys review of Anne Michaels book of poetry, Miners Pond, as well as reviews of Patricia Youngs Those Were the Mermaid Days, and Issue 1 of Gatherings: The En owkin Journal of First North American Peoples.

 Celina Silva

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Those who will be elected to Russian Duma in Crimea are actually buying sanctions club membership tickets - Poroshenko

The reaction to the elections to the State Duma of the Russian Federation in the occupied Crimea should be sanctions, President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko considers.

"Those who will be elected to the Russian Duma in Crimea are actually buying a membership ticket to the sanctions club," Poroshenko said, opening the 13th annual meeting of the Yalta European Strategy (YES) in Kyiv on Friday morning.

The head of state expressed confidence that not individuals but the entire regime should be responsible for Russia's crimes against Ukrainian citizens.

"Moscow must understand that the price of such violations will only be growing. We are holding appropriate consultations with our partners. And one of the reasons for sanctions should be the so called Russian parliamentary elections held in the territory of Ukraine," Poroshenko said.

The president stressed Ukraine does not recognize the legitimacy of Russian elections in the occupied territory.
President Obama signs the America Invents Act on September 16 2011, one year before PTAB proceedings became available President Obama signs the America Invents Act on September 16 2011, one year before PTAB proceedings became available

On September 16 2012, new post-grant proceedings became available in the US. Exactly one year after the signing of the America Invents Act created the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (replacing the Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences), challengers to patents could file inter partes review, covered business method review and post-grant review petitions. The PTAB has proved more popular than many expected, with more than 5,500 petitions filed.

Managing IP has published hundreds of articles on the PTAB since it was created. You can see all our latest reporting on the Board on our dedicated page here.

To mark four years of PTAB proceedings, we have run a series of articles highlighting 10 big issues facing the Board today. Managing IP subscribers and triallists can read the 10 articles below.

A new norm for petition filing

PGRs ready for primetime

An inconsistent CBM clampdown

If you let me stay  district court and ITC trends

Is the Board too hard on motions to amend?

Rule changes  a declaration of intent

Dont Estop Me Now

Hedge funds and reverse patent trolls

Biotech/pharma's share of AIA trials increases

Federal Circuit appeal statistics and unresolved issues

PTAB Chief Judge David Ruschke PTAB Chief Judge David Ruschke

We also spoke to PTAB Chief Judge David Ruschke, who started in the role in May. Subscribers and triallists can read the interview here. Ruschke says the PTAB is entering a new phase. The PTABs early years were defined by explosive growth in filings and the big challenge of hiring enough judges to keep up and meet the tight statutory deadlines. Now with the hiring done and petition filing levelled off, the Board may be entering a more stable phase.

Four or five years from now I would like to say we are the premier post grant proceedings body in the world, he told me.

Hopelessly broken?

Others have also been taking stock of the first four years of PTAB proceedings. Some pro-patent observers are not fans.

The IPWatchdog blog has run an interesting series of articles marking the AIAs fifth anniversary. Patent attorney Gene Quinn described the Board as hopelessly broken, and complained that proceedings radically favour large multinational infringers by shifting the burden to the party least able to withstand that burden. He said the death squad tag given to the PTAB by then federal Circuit Chief Judge Randall Rader in 2013 is as appropriate today.

Johnson & Johnsons Phil Johnson said in a post: The current implementation of PTO post issuance proceedings is undermining confidence in our patent system, chilling innovation at its roots, and, in eyes of some, giving the AIA a bad name. IBMs Manny Schecter said the statistics reveal that IPRs are no more of a true alternative for litigation than the challenge proceeding which they replaced and supposedly improved upon  at least not yet".

More positively, Drinker Biddles Robert Stoll argued that new legislation is not needed to fix post grant procedures at the PTO, and rather the Board itself should provide for more liberal leave to amend.

Over on the Patents Post-Grant blog, Oblons Scott McKeown has also been taking stock of the PTABs progress. He noted some of the challenges the PTAB has faced in the past four years.

Since day one, critics have sought to unravel the PTAB or lessen its perceived anti-patent impact, he said. First came the legal challenges: district court suits, mandamus filings, Cuozzo, and even the very same constitutional challenges that were flung at patent reexamination in the 1980s. Not surprisingly, all failed (I give the pending cert petitions zero chance). Yet, that is not to say that the PTAB is perfect, or that an adjustment in practices is unwarranted. Indeed, the PTAB has evolved to a significant degree in its few short years of operation.

He noted the (in)ability to amend as one of the most controversial aspects of PTAB practice to date. But noted the Board has loosened amendment requirements repeatedly, through expanding page limits, adding available claim appendices, clarifying the Idle Free requirements and providing guidance on motions to amend. The Federal Circuit is likely to shift the burden of patentability away from patent holders in Aqua Products.

The board also brought in other rule changes this May, the most significant of which was allowing witness testimony in preliminary responses.

McKeown concluded: Like it or not, PTAB trials are here to stay. Happy Birthday!
Volodymyr Zhemchuhov, who was very badly injured and lost both hands and has been held as a hostage by militants of the so called Luhansk People's Republic (LPR) since autumn 2015, on Saturday, September 16, will return from captivity, President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko has said.

"We have a great hope that Zhemchuhov will return home tomorrow," Poroshenko said, when opening the 13th annual meeting of the Yalta European Strategy (YES) in Kyiv on Friday morning.

Ukraine's representative in the Trilateral Contact Group, the country's second president, Leonid Kuchma, in turn, said there is a chance to release a large number of hostages in Donbas in the near future.
Finlands first liquefied natural gas (LNG) import terminal at Pori on the west coast was officially opened, says Gasum.

Deliveries of LNG to customers began on the same day, the company said in its statement.

It enables LNG deliveries to industrial, maritime and heavy-duty road transport customers outside the gas pipeline network and diversifies the Finnish energy market.

Access to LNG in Finland will improve considerably following the opening of the terminal.

This is an important competitiveness factor for the M20 Industrial Park at the Port of Pori as well as current industrial operators in the area, of which the energy company Huntsman Pigments and Additives Oy, Kemira Oyj, Norilsk Nickel Harjavalta Oy and Porin Prosessivoima have already switched to LNG.

The opening of the Pori LNG terminal will develop and diversify the Finnish energy market. The option of LNG deliveries outside the gas pipeline network lowers the threshold for the utilization of gas throughout the country.

Its great that the terminal is now opened on schedule and without any accidents resulting in absence from work, says Johanna Lamminen, Chair of the Skangas Board of Directors and CEO of Gasum.

The projects total investment exceeds over 80 million. In 2014 energy support at 23 million was granted for the terminal project by the Finnish Ministry for Employment and the Economy.

The Gasum subsidiary and terminal operator Skangas supplied a total of 376,700 tonnes (5.2 TWh) of LNG in Finland, Sweden and Norway in 2015.

In addition to the Pori terminal now opened, Skangas has LNG production plants and terminals in Risavika, Norway, and Porvoo, Finland, and LNG terminals in ra, Norway, and Lysekil, Sweden.
ClassNK, Japans an international certification and classification society, will host a round table discussion about floating wind technologies on the sidelines of Wind Energy Hamburg (WEH) on September 26.



ClassNK is one of the leading classification societies, boasting over a century of technical experience in the maritime sector, says Hirofumi Takano, Director of Innovation Division at ClassNK.



Using our extensive technical experience in ship classification, ClassNK began offering classification and certification services for wind turbines in 2011 and since have played a key role in supporting the development of Japans nascent floating offshore wind industry in order to support a transition towards cleaner energy.



An exciting panel of leaders from this growing global market segment  including University of Tokyo Prof. Takeshi Ishihara, as well as Principle Power CEO Joao Metelo  will share their insights from industry projects such as Fukushima Forward, the worlds largest offshore floating wind project, as well as discussing solutions for cost optimization.



This unique event  to be held in cooperation with Recharge magazine  will also provide an opportunity for participants to learn about ClassNKs extensive expertise in the certification of wind turbines for offshore projects, particularly for installation in East Asia, where complex site and weather conditions present more technical challenges.



ClassNK has played a key role in ensuring the ongoing success of all offshore floating wind demonstration projects in Japan through its certification and classification services carried out in line with related technical standards and its own independently developed Guidelines for Offshore Floating Wind Turbine Structures. ClassNK released the Guidelines in 2012 to provide the industry with specific requirements to support the installation of wind turbines technically adapted to operate in more challenging meteorological conditions.



While offshore wind has the potential to generate substantial quantities of energy more cheaply than other renewable energies, the industry still faces challenges including cost optimization and the streamlining of offshore maintenance and repair operations.



The ClassNK Floating Offshore Wind Round Table in Hamburg will therefore provide a valuable opportunity for the global leaders of the floating wind industry to share their knowledge and insight on best practices and emerging challenges that will need to be overcome in the years ahead.

--

ClassNK Floating Offshore Wind Round Table

Date: Septembe 26, 2016

Time: 5pm - 8:30pm

Venue: Hafen-Klub in Hamburg, on the sidelines of Wind Energy Hamburg

Panel:

University of Tokyo Prof. Takeshi Ishihara, leader of the Fukushima Forward consortium

Principle Power CEO Joao Metelo

Masaharu Itoh, Director General of offshore wind and ocean energy at the New Energy Technology Department Organization (NEDO)

Stephan Mayer, team leader of hybrid-tower and foundation certification at TUV SUD

Dr. Akihiro Suzuki, director of the Japan Wind Power Association (JWPA)

Takashi Matsunobu, chief project manager at Hitachi

Darius Snieckus, editor-in-chief of Recharge magazine
French industrial group DCNS has delivered LHD (Landing Helicopter Dock) Anwar El Sadat, the second of two helicopter carriers acquired by the Arab Republic of Egypt.

The flag transfer ceremony took place September 16, 2016 in the presence of the two Chiefs of Staff of the Egyptian and French navies, Admiral Rabie and Admiral Prazuck, the chairman and CEO of DCNS, Herve Guillou, and the president of STX France, Laurent Castaing, together with senior French and Egyptian officials. By 2020, DCNS will have supplied seven combat vessels to Egypt, thus contributing to the modernization of the Arab Republic of Egypt's defense system.

On October 10, 2015, DCNS signed a contract with the Ministry of Defense of the Arab Republic of Egypt for the supply of two Mistral-class Landing Helicopter Dock vessels (LHDs), the first of which, LHD Gamal Abdel Nasser, was delivered June 2, 2016. The flag transfer for the two helicopter carriers forms an integral part of the continuity of the strategic partnership with the Egyptian Ministry of Defence formalized already in July 2014 through the signature of a contract for the sale of four Gowind corvettes, then in August 2015 through the delivery to the Egyptian Navy of the FREMM multimission frigate Tahya Misr. DCNS has also secured long term multiannual maintenance contracts for Egyptian Navy vessels, as well as a technology-transfer agreement allowing the Alexandria shipyards to build three of the four Gowind corvettes acquired in 2014.

The LHD Anwar El Sadat will leave Saint-Nazaire in the next few days to sail to its home port of Alexandria. On this occasion, the Egyptian and French navies will participate in a joint exercise. Since June, 180 Egyptian sailors have been receiving training in Saint-Nazaire on this LHD. In line with the Egyptian Navy's image of excellence, they completed a remarkable task in just a few months of work, with the support of the DCNS instructors and our partners STX France and Defense Conseil International. In all, close to 400 Egyptian sailors will have received training in this way.

Able to conduct a wide range of civil and military missions, the Mistral-class LHD is a vessel that responds to the needs of numerous navies thanks to its versatility. With a length of 199 meters, a displacement of 22,000 metric tons and a speed exceeding 18 knots, the Mistral-class LHD vessel is characterized by its high capacity for the transportation of troops, equipment, heavy helicopters and landing craft, which it is capable of projecting around the world. It is equipped with an electric propulsion system that uses pods. It also has an onboard hospital, and can carry out large-scale humanitarian missions. Its highly capable communication system makes it the ideal command vessel within a naval force.

The fruit of a close collaboration between DCNS and STX, the three first LHDs, Mistral, Tonnerre and Dixmude were delivered to the French Navy in 2006, 2007 and 2012.
An explosion on a speedboat carrying 35 foreign passengers and four crew members in Bali, Indonesia has left two people dead and 18 other tourists injured.

According to the local police, the boat was ferrying tourists from Bali to Lombok and exploded enroute, leaving two people dead and 13 others injured.

According to AFP, an Austrian woman was killed along with a second female foreigner, whose nationality was still being verified. Two German citizens were injured while nationals from Britain, France, Italy, Portugal, Ireland and Spain were also among the passengers.

It appeared to be an accident with the explosion occurring in the fuel tank. Indonesia has a poor maritime safety record and regularly suffers fatal boat accidents.

The bomb squad was initially deployed to the scene on an island that has suffered bloody Islamist militant attacks in the past, but authorities quickly ruled out an attack.

The explosion came from the fuel tanks in the engine room and was not caused by a bomb, said said police investigator, Karang Asem.

Indonesia has a poor maritime safety record and there have been similar incidents in the past where no foul play was detected.
Ukraine should study the possibility of exporting blood preparations to India, Deputy Minister of Economic Development and Trade, Trade Representative of Ukraine Natalia Mykolska has said.

"When we speak about cooperation in the pharmaceutical sphere, we always speak about imports of drugs from India. However, look at blood preparations: India does not have them. This is a possibility of supplying preparations to India," she said at the Ukraine-India roundtable in the Verkhovna Rada in Kyiv on Friday.

She also said that technologies could be also exported from Ukraine to India, in particular, IT products.

In turn, Deputy Agricultural Policy and Food Minister Olha Trofimtseva said that development of exports of from Ukraine to India leguminous crops would allow speaking not only about exports of raw materials, but also exports of finished products.
SES S.A. (Euronext Paris and Luxembourg Stock Exchange: SESG) today announced the launch of its global SES Maritime+ service that will deliver high-speed connectivity to vessels traversing oceans.



SES Maritime+ will enable maritime customers to have easy access to customisable bandwidth and coverage packages, ensuring satellite capacity is effectively utilised. Vessels traversing the oceans will be offered seamless roaming, leveraging SESs global fleet of over 50 satellites, extensive ground infrastructure of over 20 teleports and more than 6,000 points of presence.



The managed connectivity service combines SESs global network infrastructure and hybrid satellite capacity with the latest technology from VT iDirect, enabling SES customers to deliver a complete platform solution to maritime users on a worldwide basis. Commercial benefits include customised service level agreements and scalable throughput options, with standardised pricing regardless of region or season of operation.



The global SES Maritime+ product is part of SES's enhanced data network, SES Plus, which is offering customised products and solutions to tackle the evolving needs of the mobility and enterprise markets. In March of this year, a regional Ka-band maritime+ offering was unveiled specifically to target Europe.



SES Maritime+ gives our global customers the nimbleness and agility to customise their capacity demands whenever needed, and the peace of mind to focus on delivering the best customer service experience to the vessel owners, said Elias Zaccack, Head of Mobility Market Solutions Centre, at SES. We will continue to further improve and develop the throughput capabilities of SES Maritime+ to ensure that vessels can travel around the world with seamless roaming.



At VT iDirect, we support the strategic growth of key maritime providers like SES, innovating on our highly scalable platform so that our partners bring new services to market and differentiate their business, said Kevin Steen, Senior Vice President of Global Sales and Chief Operating Officer at VT iDirect. Demand for VSAT connectivity continues to grow and is generating significant value across the maritime sector through a range of business, crew and passenger applications. Today, a new wave of service innovations like SES Maritime+ is making VSAT networks more powerful, affordable and easier to use, which drives even greater return on investment for maritime operators.


The American Association of Port Authorities (AAPA) today lauded leaders of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works (EPW) and the Senates Transportation and Infrastructure (T&I) Subcommittee for their success in advancing S.2848, the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) of 2016. The Senate passed its version of the legislation today by a vote of 95 to 3.



AAPA commends EPW Committee Chairman James Inhofe (R-OK) and EPW Committee and T&I Subcommittee Ranking Member Barbara Boxer (D-CA), together with T&I Subcommittee Chairman David Vitter (R-LA), for their leadership in moving this crucial, bi-partisan legislation through the Senate, stated AAPA President and CEO Kurt Nagle. Americans needs this crucial legislation to pass in order to fortify our freight transportation infrastructure, create good-paying U.S. jobs, grow our economy and enhance our international competitiveness.



Mr. Nagle noted that Congress passed the last water resources reauthorization bill in 2014 after a seven-year hiatus. Passing it again this year would put it back, as intended, on an every-two-year cycle, which hasnt happened since 2000.



More than a quarter of Americas economy is based on the value of goods that transit in and out of our ports. In order to keep our economic recovery progressing, we must ensure these goods can move efficiently, without avoidable and costly delays caused by inadequate or poorly maintained infrastructure, he added.



The Senates WRDA bill maintains many AAPA requests, including modernizing the cost-share formula for channel deepening projects, from 45 feet to 50 feet, which hasnt been updated in 30 years, even though there have been seven generations of containerships deployed during this period (with ship sizes increasing from 3,000 to 18,000 twenty-foot equivalent units, or TEUs). Modernizing the channel deepening cost-share formula would make it similar to the maintenance cost-share formula.



The Senate bill also addresses another AAPA request to extend the authorization to provide funds to Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund donors and energy transfer ports, which Mr. Nagle cited as an important equity issue. Additionally, it includes revisions to streamline and expedite existing projects, as well as authorize eight new navigation developments for 21st century freight movement in the global marketplace.



By bringing WRDA to the Senate floor, Senate EPW Committee leaders Inhofe and Boxer, together with Senate T&I Subcommittee Chair Vitter, have demonstrated they recognize the significant benefits more modern, efficient seaport and waterway infrastructure will have on our nations economic vitality, job growth and international competitiveness, as well as the value in helping address federal fiscal realities through sizable tax revenues provided by the cargo and trade activity moving through these systems, Mr. Nagle said. Increased investments are needed to better maintain and improve the transportation infrastructure on our three coasts and the Great Lakes, linking America to the global marketplace.



He added, Americas public ports  which create jobs for more than 23 million U.S. residents and handle 99 percent of our nations overseas trade  together with their private-sector partners are investing about $31 billion annually in marine terminal infrastructure. We look forward to the House soon passing its version of WRDA, with a final bill to result in the federal government upholding its end of this partnership by authorizing badly needed investments to waterside connections with seaports.
[ Updated ] The Singapore-based Rickmers Maritime Trust has come to a sitatuation where the choice is between restructuring the securities in the company to less than half their current value or shutting down.

So it has warned the investors that if its proposed debt restructuring plan is not approved by its noteholders, it could be headed for a potential liquidation or judicial management.

The shipping trust, has asked for clemency from its creditors regarding $179.7 million of debt and a following $100 million of interest that it cannot pay, reported Bloomberg.

If Rickmers Maritime Trust is unable to restructure, it could be liquidated or placed in court receivership, which would likely result in a total loss for noteholders.

The company is requesting that to avoid liquidation similar to that of Hanjin bankruptcy, its debts be excused and in replacement $28 million for perpetual securities.

If the restructuring is approved, Rickmers Maritime would allow the company to continue to make coupon payments under the new securities, as well as share equity upside with and maximize value recovery for noteholders.
Austal USA said it was awarded a $326 million contract to built the 11th and 12th Expeditionary Fast Transport ships (EPF) for the U.S. Navy.

This new contract adds upon a 2008 fully-funded EPF 10-ship block-buy agreement and brings Austals current build to a 12 ship program valued at $1.9 billion, and thereby extending the shipbuilders production under contract into 2022.

Austal USAs EPF program has seen seven ships delivered so far, with three more under construction at its headquarters and ship manufacturing facility in Mobile, Ala.

The EPFs large, open-mission deck and large habitability spaces provide the opportunity to conduct a wide range of missions from engagement and humanitarian assistance to disaster relief, and from maritime security support operations, to intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.

With a draft of 13 feet and a unique propulsion system, its ability to access austere and degraded ports with minimal external assistance provides an overabundance of options to fleet and combatant commanders. Along with its draft, propulsion system, enormous mission bay and greater-than 40 knot speed, these ships have the potential to support future requirements in special operations, command and control, and medical support operations.

These ships were designed to be a force multiplier and to bring a unique capability to the fleet  theyre doing just that. The possible uses of the EPF are endless, said Austal USA President Craig Perciavalle.
Finlands ratification of the International Maritime Organizations (IMO) Ballast Water Management (BWM) Convention came just days before the 10-year anniversary of the launch of Alfa Lavals PureBallast.

On September 15, Alfa Laval marked the passage of 10 years since its PureBallast was released in 2006, when the global introduction of ballast water treatment requirements had then seemed imminent.

New exactly one decade later, that milestone has been passed. Meanwhile, PureBallast, now in its third generation, continues to offer good performance in fresh and brackish waters as well as marine. Likewise, it is suitable for low-clarity water, operating at full flow where UV transmittance is as low as 42 percent.

Sold and serviced by Alfa Laval, the chemical-free PureBallast was the first ballast water treatment system to become commercially available, according to its manufacturer. A key component of the system is the Enhanced UV Reactor, which was developed jointly by Alfa Laval and Wallenius Water based on Wallenius Water Technology.

We promised early on that customers would meet ballast water legislation with confidence, said Anders Lindmark, General Manager, Business Centre PureBallast. Not only does PureBallast 3.1 fulfill that promise, it does so with previously unthinkable efficiency.

With the ratification process complete, the BWM Convention will enter into force on September 8, 2017. This means the long-anticipated retrofit wave will now begin in earnest, which will put considerable pressure on ballast water treatment suppliers.

Alfa Laval is well prepared for whats ahead in terms of both knowledge and capacity, says Lindmark. Having sold over 1200 systems and installed more than 300 as retrofits, we have the necessary skills in place and a production infrastructure that is geared for ramp-up.
1814 - A squadron from the schooner USS Carolina attacks and raids the base of the pirate Jean Lafitte, at Barataria, La., capturing six schooners and other small craft while the pirates flee the attack.

1823 - Samuel Southard becomes the seventh Secretary of the Navy, serving until March 3, 1829. During his tenure, he enlarges the Navy, improves administration, purchases land for the first Naval Hospitals, begins construction of the first Navy dry docks, undertakes surveying U.S. coastal waters and promotes exploration in the Pacific Ocean.

1854 - Mare Island, Calif. becomes the first permanent U.S. naval installation on the west coast, with Cmdr. David G. Farragut as its first base commander.

1922 - Cmdr. Halsey Powell in USS Edsall (DD 219 becomes the senior officer directing the evacuation of 250,000 Greek refugees from Turkey after war between Greece and Turkey.

1944 - USS Barb (SS 220) sinks the Japanese 11,700-ton tanker, Azusa, and the 20,000-ton escort carrier, Unyo, 200 miles southeast of Hong Kong. Additionally, while off Yokosuka, Japan, USS Sea Devil (SS 400) sinks the Japanese submarine I-364.

1947 - The National Security Act becomes effective after the bill signed by President Harry S. Truman on July 26, 1947. The Act realigns and reorganizes the U.S. Armed Forces, foreign policy, and Intelligence Community apparatus in the aftermath of World War II. The Act merges the Department of War and the Department of the Navy into the National Military Establishment, headed by the Secretary of Defense, Adm. James Forrestal.

1958 - USS Grayback (SSG 574) fires the first operational launch of a Regulus II surface-to- surface guided missile, while off the coast of California.

1966 - USS Oriskany (CVA 34) helicopters rescue 44 men of British merchant ship, Aug. Moon, as she was breaking up in heavy seas on Pratas Reef 175 miles southeast of Hong Kong.

1994 - USS Charlotte (SSN 766) is commissioned at Naval Station Norfolk. The 16th of the Los Angeles-class(improved) attack submarines, the boat is the fourth Navy ship to be named for the North Carolina city. The submarine is homeported at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.

(Source: Naval History and Heritage Command, Communication and Outreach Division)
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Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko considers it necessary to sign bilateral agreements with the guarantor and signatory states of the Budapest Memorandum to ensure the security of Ukraine.

"We need to draw conclusions from the experience the Budapest Memorandum and compliance with it. We need bilateral agreements with our allies to ensure the security of Ukraine," he said at the 13th annual meeting of the Yalta European Strategy (YES) in Kyiv on Friday.

As reported, Kyiv, accusing Russia of annexing Crimea and further aggression in Donbas, says Moscow violates the Budapest Memorandum and notes no tough response on the part of other signatories.
Apple Tax Grab by EU Invades IRS Airspace

On August 30th, the European Union (EU) Commission ordered the Irish government to reclaim some $14.6 billion of so-called back taxes plus interest from Apple Inc. The order challenged sovereign tax authority within the EU and well-established international tax rules. The aggressive stance of the Commission set off a furor of high level political argument among taxing authorities and multinational companies accustomed to complex but legal international tax planning. Apple's case was big enough to place it at center stage in a simmering problem for governments in striking a balance between attracting businesses, creating jobs, generating taxes and deciding precisely what type of earnings can be taxed.

In a testament to how strange the taxing regimes have become, the Irish government has protested loudly and is reluctant to take the nearly 15 billion the EU says it is entitled. When small countries turn down such sums, it should be clear that the stakes are much higher.

With uncontrolled socialism and Keynesian monetary policies killing economic growth around the world, governments have ever greater need to wring revenue from the relatively stagnant pool of corporations and wealthy individuals. While the crackdown on personal tax havens, in Switzerland and the Channel Islands for instance, has been largely successful, corporations have become extremely adept using legal loopholes and creative international accounting to move revenues from high tax jurisdictions to countries where rates are lower. As of October, Reuters reported that U.S. based companies have some $2.1 trillion parked abroad in order to avoid high domestic taxes. Apparently Apple, the world's largest company by market capitalization, accounts for over $180 billion of this total.

The U.S. corporate tax rate of 35 percent is widely considered to be uncompetitive and even excessive when compared with Ireland's 12.5 percent rate (and even the 20 percent in the UK). It is an old adage that capital flows to where it is treated best. Ireland rolled out the red carpet for Apple, a decision that greatly benefited both.

Apple established a company in County Cork, Ireland in October 1980, sometime before Apple blossomed financially. Since then, Apple has become one of the largest taxpayers in the world and, according to its CEO, Tim Cook, the largest taxpayer in Ireland where it employs almost 6,000 people, mostly in high paying jobs, adding great benefit to the Irish economy both directly and by encouraging copycat corporations. (A Message to the Apple Community in Europe, 8/30/16)

In the last quarter, Apple paid nearly $3 billion in taxes or about $12 billion at an annual rate. Naturally, by using such mechanisms as licensing, pricing differentials and overhead allocations, profits, unlike sales revenues, are somewhat mobile. This is so especially since high value commerce evolved from trading physical goods to intellectual property.

The World Bank reports that in aggregate (2015) the EU is the world's second largest economy. However, despite its population of over 510 million, the EU has failed to spawn new technology giants such as Apple, Google, and Amazon. Many observers blame the socialist and over-regulated nature of the EU. Certainly these factors provided reasons for the Brexit vote in June 2016. Many feel that the Brexit vote may have persuaded EU officials to soften their regulatory aggression, out of fear of encouraging other countries to seek the exits. Regardless, for some two years, the unelected EU Commission has been investigating the theoretical tax liabilities of U.S. companies such as Apple, Google, Amazon, McDonald's and Starbucks.

Until August 30th, all EU member countries were free to establish their own tax regimes. The EU's order for Ireland to demand some $14.6 billion in 'back' taxes from Apple was an unexpected and unabashed power grab by unelected EU regulators over the democratic government of Ireland. The assessment did not result from the non-payment of an actual tax but on a theoretical tax that the EU Commission felt should have applied. This is a bold move.

EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager described the prior arrangements made between Apple and the Government of Ireland as an "inconsistency" or state aid, illegal under the EU rules. The Irish finance minister, Michael Noonan, said that his government would appeal the decision, adding that it was "...necessary to defend the integrity of our tax system; to provide tax certainty to business; and to challenge the encroachment of EU state aid rules into the sovereign Member State competence of taxation." (Lexology, Ronan Daly Jermyn, 8/31/16)

Understandably, the Irish government is balking at what it sees as EU overreach into Ireland's sovereign right to administer its own tax affairs. They maintain there was no 'special' or 'sweetheart' deal. Meanwhile, some UK government ministers, soon to negotiate their freedom from the EU, reportedly told The Daily Mail that they see the Commission's demand as representing a significant "opportunity" for the UK to attract more international companies.

The U.S. government is faced with somewhat of a conflict. Bloomberg reported a U.S. Treasury spokesman illustrating this point when he said, "We believe that retroactive tax assessments by the [EU] commission...call into question the tax rules of individual [EU] Member States. ..." That all sounded very fair and pro free enterprise. But then, in a stinging globalist sentence, the Treasury spokesman added, "...we will continue to work with the [EU] commission toward our shared objective of preventing the erosion of our corporate tax bases." (Nate Lanxon, 8/30/16)

The U.S. Treasury has described the EU ruling as "deeply troubling." The U.S. Congress is bringing pressure on Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew, urging him to consider retaliation including taxes on European companies and individuals. Meanwhile, Secretary Lew maintained in a speech at the Brookings Institution that the EU Commission "is using a theory to make tax law, is doing it in a way that is retroactive and that overrides national tax law authority." (Alan Rappeport, The NY Times, 8/31/16)

Apple is just one of the companies holding profits offshore to avoid paying U.S. taxes. According to Bloomberg, Apple has $232 billion in cash, of which about $214 billion is held outside the U.S. with its 35 percent corporate tax rate. The thought that the EU might grab some of the offshore money may reinvigorate Congress to revise the complex U.S. tax code. In other words, allow repatriation now to avoid the grasping claws of foreign governments later. It may even pressure Congress to bring the U.S. corporate tax rates down to more competitive levels.

It is conceivable that the litigation will continue over the next three or four years. Whatever the EU court decides ultimately, the ramifications for international commercial tax planning could be profound. It might lead to major changes in corporate structures. Investors should be aware that this issue could affect corporate profitability to an important degree.

Most importantly, the affair provides a clear example of how high taxes kill growth. Regrettably, those lessons appear to be lost on regulators on both sides of the Atlantic.

Read the original article at Euro Pacific Capital



Subscribe to Euro Pacific's Weekly Digest: Receive all commentaries by Peter Schiff, Michael Pento, and John Browne delivered to your inbox every Monday.

By John Browne

Euro Pacific Capital

http://www.europac.net/

More importantly make sure to protect your wealth and preserve your purchasing power before it's too late. Discover the best way to buy gold at www.goldyoucanfold.com , download my free research report on the powerful case for investing in foreign equities available at www.researchreportone.com , and subscribe to my free, on-line investment newsletter at http://www.europac.net/newsletter/newsletter.asp

John Browne is the Senior Market Strategist for Euro Pacific Capital, Inc. Mr. Brown is a distinguished former member of Britain's Parliament who served on the Treasury Select Committee, as Chairman of the Conservative Small Business Committee, and as a close associate of then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Among his many notable assignments, John served as a principal advisor to Mrs. Thatcher's government on issues related to the Soviet Union, and was the first to convince Thatcher of the growing stature of then Agriculture Minister Mikhail Gorbachev. As a partial result of Brown's advocacy, Thatcher famously pronounced that Gorbachev was a man the West "could do business with." A graduate of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, Britain's version of West Point and retired British army major, John served as a pilot, parachutist, and communications specialist in the elite Grenadiers of the Royal Guard.

 2005-2019 http://www.MarketOracle.co.uk - The Market Oracle is a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication.




US Election 2016 Fraud Probabilities

It is an election year and the media has obsessed over Trumps inflammatory statements and HRCs health. A recent Google search for Hillarys health showed 140 million hits. Parkinsons has been widely mentioned.

Both issues could affect the outcome of the Presidential election IF the election is honest and has not already been decided.

But are election fraud, vote miscounts, illegal voters, and buying the election probable? We all know the jokes about the Chicago cemetery vote, but what about election fraud in voting machines, punch cards, or manual systems?

Consider: In 59 Philadelphia voting divisions, Mitt Romney received zero votes. Very strange voting results were reported in the 2012 election  possible, but not likely 

Concerns:

Was the 2012 Presidential election count in Philadelphia accurate?

Yes, those divisions vote heavily democratic. One can easily imagine a 90% democratic vote, or maybe even 99% in some divisions.

But is it likely that 59 voting divisions voted 100.00% for Obama against Romney? Total votes 19,605 to zero.

Were votes miscounted or were voting machines programmed for an Obama result?

Is it reasonable to believe that not one person in 59 voting divisions voted for Romney out of choice, or as a vote against Obama, or even as the lesser evil?

Apply logic and probability math:

Assume those voting divisions were about 99% democratic and the voters would vote about 1% Republican. That suggests Romney should have received about 190 votes, yet he received zero.

Assume an honest election, no fraud, and statistical probability that only 1 person in 100 would vote for Romney. Math below:

CONCLUSIONS:

However, not one vote went for Romney. The odds against that result are staggeringly unlikely.

For the purposes of probability math, assume exactly 1 vote went to Romney and 19,604 went to Obama in what are normally 99% democratically voting divisions. The odds AGAINST that are 1.88 times ten to the 83 rd power, or a number with 83 zeros. See below and link for the math.

that are 1.88 times ten to the 83 power, or a number with 83 zeros. See below and link for the math. For comparison, there have been about 4 times ten to the 17 th power seconds in the age of the universe, about 14 billion years. The age of the universe measured in seconds is only a miniscule number compared to the odds AGAINST just 1 Romney vote in a 99% democratic division.

power seconds in the age of the universe, about 14 billion years. The age of the universe measured in seconds is only a miniscule number compared to the odds just 1 Romney vote in a 99% democratic division. Given that a 99% democratic bias creates an essentially impossible conclusion, what if we assume an extremely high 99.9% democratic bias?

Use the same probability math and ask what are the odds against receiving only 1 vote out of 19,605 when 999 out of 1,000 will vote democratic?

The odds are about 16.8 million to one AGAINST receiving only 1 vote, and much higher for receiving no votes.

receiving only 1 vote, and much higher for receiving no votes. Receiving only 1 republican vote in 59 divisions is only somewhat more likely than winning the Powerball Lottery, even assuming a heavily biased 99.9% probability of democratic votes.

Really? Voter fraud, miscounts, and programmed voting machines appear likely!

Given the above statistics, and assuming an extreme 99.9% democratic bias in those voting divisions, it looks effectively impossible for 19,605 votes to have been honestly cast for Obama while zero votes were cast for Romney.

How Easy Is It To Hack a Voting Machine?

How To Hack An Election In Seven Minutes

Americas Electronic Voting Machines Are Scarily Easy Targets

Voting Machine Password Hacks

Hacking An Election: Not Far-Fetched

GOING FORWARD:

The status quo heavily supports HRC, in spite of FBI investigations, top secret security failures, possible Parkinsons Disease, and a growing body count. But if her star is falling and massive wealth and power are at risk 

HRC must sell the story she is okay for about two months while depending upon considerable help from her friends. Or  Rig the voting results! It has happened before and it could happen again. Or  Create a crisis, cancel or delay the election, and keep status quo in power. Or  Trump is elected, in spite of the DNCs best efforts, and then a lone shooter  and you know the rest. It has happened before 

My hope and expectation is that votes are honestly cast and accurately counted and the people of the US elect the President they want in 2016. Yet the above possibilities are worth considering.

Probability Calculations:

If the probability of a democratic vote is 99%, the odds against receiving only 1 republican vote in 19,605 are:

1 / (19605 x (0.99^19604) x (0.01^1)) = 1.88486 E+83 to 1. Or,

One divided by (19605 times 0.99 to the 19604 power times 0.01)

Probability Calculations:

If the probability of a democratic vote is 99.9%, the odds against receiving only 1 republican vote in 19,605 are:

1 / (19605 x (0.999^19604) x (0.001^1)) = 16,819,069 to 1. Or,

One divided by (19605 times 0.999 to the 19604 power times 0.001)

Gary Christenson

GE Christenson aka Deviant Investor If you would like to be updated on new blog posts, please subscribe to my RSS Feed or e-mail

 2016 Copyright Deviant Investor - All Rights Reserved Disclaimer: The above is a matter of opinion provided for general information purposes only and is not intended as investment advice. Information and analysis above are derived from sources and utilising methods believed to be reliable, but we cannot accept responsibility for any losses you may incur as a result of this analysis. Individuals should consult with their personal financial advisors.

Deviant Investor Archive

 2005-2019 http://www.MarketOracle.co.uk - The Market Oracle is a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication.




US Election 2016 - Why Your Vote Doesnt Count

Dear Parade-Goers,

In our quest for perpetual summer, this week we are transitioning back to our Argentine home. As a result, I intend to be brief, though there are a couple of observations I want to share related to the pending US presidential election.

On the musical front, I am still mostly stuck on Dire Straits, a group I havent paid much attention to until recently. As the parade begins, I am teeing up the entire album of their greatest hits.

Sticker Shock

In preparing for our departure, we drove into the big city for some last-minute shopping. This being Vermont, the big city hereabouts is not very big: Burlingtons population is a meager 42,000.

While driving here and there between stores, I noticed something. Actually, I noticed something missing: there were zero bumper stickers in support of Hillary. Likewise, I didnt see a single lawn sign either.

In sharp contrast, in the last two elections the displays in favor of Obama were seemingly everywhere.

To be fair, there are no bumper stickers or signs for Trump either, but given Vermont is the most liberal of states, it is somewhat understandable though the complete absence of signage is still remarkable.

Now, I realize this is Bernie territory and so his subjugation by the Clinton Clan has been a bitter disappointment. But it seems to me theres more to it than that.

While I confess to previously believing Trump had no chance in this election, the monumental level of apathy for Hillary in Vermont leads me to believe he has a chance after all, something the polls are starting to reflect.

Thats because, come hell or high water, the pro-Trump crowdthough understandably reserved in displaying their affections publiclyare going to show up en force to pull the levers come election day.

I have witnessed no similar level of enthusiasm from those resigned to vote for Mrs. Clinton. Their only arguments at this point revolve around their fervent dislike of The Donald, and one hears nothing about how much they dream of the day when President Clinton takes the reins of world power.

The clear health challenges Mrs. Clinton facesand her once again demonstrated willingness to lie about those challengestip the scales for the popular vote further toward Trump.

However, for reasons Ill explain momentarily, that doesnt mean hell be the next US president.

Before moving on, Id be interested in hearing from any dear readers about the presence (or lack thereof) of bumper stickers and lawn signs in your neck of the woods. Drop me a line at david@garretgalland.com if you think of it.

Think Your Vote Will Decide the Election? Think Again.

This week I came across an article in which the author, Jason Brennan, explains how the Founding Fathers created the Electoral College specifically because they didnt trust we the people.

According to Brennan, the Founding Fathers thought the populace emotionally and intellectually incapable of handling the responsibility of selecting the president.

Based on the words of one of those Founding Fathers, Alexander Hamilton, Brennan is right.

It was equally desirable that the immediate election should be made by men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station and acting under circumstances favorable to deliberation, and to a judicious combination of all the reasons and inducements which were proper to govern their choice. A small number of persons, selected by their fellow citizens from the general mass, will be most likely to possess the information and discernment requisite to so complicated an investigation.

Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist, No. 68

The small number of persons Hamilton refers to is, of course, the Electoral College.

In fact, the US election process is structured so that when you pull the lever for your favorite presidential candidate this November, you are actually voting for electors selected by the Democratic and Republican party. For the most part, the electors are chosen from among influential state party officials.

And, for the record, in 21 states those electors have the legal right to vote for whomever they want, popular vote be damned.

Which is why, in three US presidential electionsthe latest being Bush/Gore in 2000the candidate who won the popular vote was not made president. In two other elections, a tie led to the president being selected in the House of Representatives. In other words, in 5 out of 43 or, rounded up, 12%, of US presidential elections, the victors have arrived in office in some fashion other than winning the popular vote.

Given the fact that the Democratic Party electors have their teeth set against Trump, and that they are joined in their distaste for him by a sizable percentage of Republican officials, this election could very well be one of those decided not by the popular vote, but by the electors.

In support of that idea, Jason Brennan doesnt try very hard to hide his view that if Trump does win the popular vote, the Electoral College should override that vote.

[Trumps] not the first candidate without policy experience or to use inflammatory rhetoric and lob classless insults at his opponents. Nevertheless, we should be glad the Electoral College is in place. Given how much power the U.S. president has, its comforting to know that if voters make a truly horrific choice come November, our elected representatives have the power to rescue us from their mistakes.

As the Electoral College is likely to become a lively topic of conversation over the next few months, you might want to read up on it.

While Im sure you can readily find alternative sources of information, to get you started, below are a couple of links to useful resources on the mechanics of the Electoral College.

How members of the Electoral College are selected

FAQs on the Electoral College

Drums of War

A longish but interesting video landed in my email box this week. Its a candid interview with Lawrence Wilkerson, a former national security advisor in the Reagan administration as well as a former assistant to Colin Powell.

In the interview, which you can watch by clicking here, Wilkerson pulls back the curtain on the cozy relationship between the Pentagon and war-mongering industrialists. Among other revelations, Wilkerson shares that upward of 70% of all retiring generals settle into high six-figure jobs in the defense industry.

That interview popped into my mind after I came across an article entitled US military: Iranian behavior getting worse in Persian Gulf.

In the article, the author quotes a number of military officers and politicians engaging in a bit of chest thumping about the swarms of small Iranian boats they claim have been harassing the US fleet stationed in the Persian Gulf. Which, for the record, is called the Gulf of Iran by the International Hydrographic Organizationthe organization charged with officially charting the worlds bodies of water.

A couple of relevant quotes from the article:

Military officials say there is no question that the behavior is getting worse.

We've seen an uptick in confrontations by Iranian vessels in the Arabian Gulf, Army Gen. Joseph Votel, the top U.S. commander in the region, said on Aug. 30. U.S. military officials refer to the Persian Gulf as the Arabian Gulf.

Votel also issued a rare warning to Iranian forces: Ultimately if they continue to test us we're going to respond and we're going to protect ourselves and our partners.

The last confrontation occurred just last Sunday, when seven Iranian fast attack boats confronted a U.S. Navy coastal patrol boat in international waters in the Persian Gulf.

When one of the Iranian vessels stopped directly in the path and within about 100 yards of the USS Firebolt, the U.S. vessel had to swerve to avoid a collision, defense officials said.

The confrontations are fueling anger on Capitol Hill and providing new arguments for lawmakers to enact anti-Iran legislation.

Of course, this game of naval chicken in the Persian Gulf has the potential to trigger yet another conflict in the Middle East. Particularly if General Votels response is to blow the Iranian boats out of the water.

Perhaps by using the Navys new Death Star weaponry. Quoting Reuters.

In 2014, the U.S. Navy fitted a new, large laser gun to the amphibious ship USS Ponce, which is permanently stationed in the Persian Gulf, where it acts as an at-sea base for helicopters, small boats and special operations forces. Big, slow and otherwise lightly armed, Ponce was uniquely vulnerable to the guard corps boat swarms.

The so-called Laser Weapon System, aimed by an operator holding a video-game-style controller, shoots a 30-kilowatt laser over a distance of several miles. As LaWS doesn't fire conventional missiles or bullets, instead drawing power from a generator, it essentially never runs out of ammunition. Perfect for wiping out a swarm.

Once the shooting begins, its anyones guess as to how the situation might unfold. Death Star lasers notwithstanding, given the relatively cramped quarters in the Gulf, there is the potential for significant loss of US lives to Iranian ground-to-sea missiles. Which, of course, would lead to retaliation and a bonanza for the US military-industrial-political establishment.

Speaking as someone who thinks the US military should only be deployed in defense of national borders, it concerns me that the US government continues to find reasons to patrol the Persian Gulf in the service of Middle Eastern dictators. At the top of that list, I would put Saudi Arabia.

But we need their oil! some dear readers might protest.

Nope. Thanks to the rise in US domestic production capabilities, as of 2013 the US has retaken the title of the worlds largest producer of petroleum and natural gas. Which helps explain why Saudi exports to the US have fallen by half since 2003.

Of all the oil imported by the US, just 14% originates from Saudi Arabia, with the vast majority coming from Canada, Mexico, and Venezuela. In the case of the latter, once the populace comes to its senses and hangs its current government officials by their heels from the nearest lamp posts, you can expect a jump in imports from Venezuela, which will reduce US reliance on the Middle East even further.

So, who receives the bulk of Saudi oil? That would be Asia with over 60%. In declining order of importance, its Japan, China, South Korea, and India, among others. Maybe they should be the ones playing chicken with the Iranians in Irans backyard?

One might wonder why the US continues to play bodyguard for the Saudi royal family. The graphic pasted here might provide a clue.

There is no shortage of potential flashpoints around the world, and one can never tell where the next serious flare-up will occur.

One thing is sure, the more the US military, hand-in-glove with the armament industries and the politicians purchased with their steady donations, rambles around the world looking for trouble, the more likely it is itll find it.

The September Sell-Off

For those of you unfamiliar with the approach we take in our Compelling Investments Quantified, Ill sum up by saying we pay almost no attention to market forecasts. Simply because no one knows what the markets will do in an hour, let alone a week, month, or year.

The latest example of the folly of paying attention to market forecasts occurred during and immediately after the September 9 sell-off when the MSFM (Main Street Financial Media) spilled over with expert commentary as to why the sell-off signaled the beginning of the end, with the arrival of the Four Horsemen of the Financial Apocalypse imminent.

Woe be to the woesayers, but Monday morning, September 12, Mr. Market woke up refreshed and feeling quite chipper, sending US stock markets soaring, with the DJIA up by 239 points.

Market action since then has been choppy, but I do hope none of you Parade-goers panicked and sold positions at a loss because of the predictions of modern-day Nostradamus-wannabes who draw deep conclusions based on short-term market action.

If so, I recommend you periodically look in the mirror and repeat the words, No one can predict the future. Including, for the record, Nostradamus.

That said, the market may well continue to stumble: that is a normal risk we all take by investing in stocks. But if you have invested in the right companies and at the right price, the inevitable correction is nothing but water off the proverbial ducks back. Or, better, the opportunity to add great positions to your portfolio at better prices.

As to the potential for a further decline, its a matter of record that September is the cruelest month of all when it comes to stock market setbacks.

On that topic, heres a snippet from a previous edition of this service, presented in the context that sell-offs should be used to buy already undervalued stocks, cheaper.

And I quote.

Speaking of October, it has an undeserved reputation as a month where crashes occur. In actual fact, September is more crash prone.

The key thing is to view any weakness over the summer, or significant corrections, as opportunities to pick up great stocks at bargain basement prices. Viewed that way, the May to November period becomes your annual Shopping Season.

If youre interested in discovering undervalued stocks to add to your portfolioin other words, if you are interested in becoming a serially successful investor by following the same blueprint Warren Buffett used to create his fortuneyou could do a lot worse than trying our Compelling Investments Quantified.

In the September edition, well provide all the details on the ultimate consumer staples stock, not a household name, even though many of you consume their products on a daily basis. The stock currently yields 4.28%, roughly twice that of the average S&P 500 stock.

Despite being financially sound, due to regulatory nonsense, it is (temporarily) selling close to its 52-week low. This is exactly the kind of stock you should load up on in corrections, confident that a year or so down the road, youll be sitting on market-beating profits.

Heres more on our fully-guaranteed, no-risk trial offer.

A Final Word (for This Week) on the Election

The following quote is from So Long and Thanks for All the Fish by Douglas Adams.

In it, Ford Prefect explains to Arthur Dent why a robot said, Take me to your lizards.

It comes from a very ancient democracy, you see...

You mean, it comes from a world of lizards?

No, said Ford, who by this time was a little more rational and coherent than he had been, having finally had the coffee forced down him, nothing so simple. Nothing anything like to straightforward. On its world, the people are people. The leaders are lizards. The people hate the lizards and the lizards rule the people.

Odd, said Arthur, I thought you said it was a democracy.

I did, said Ford. It is.

So, said Arthur, hoping he wasnt sounding ridiculously obtuse, why dont the people get rid of the lizards?

It honestly doesnt occur to them, said Ford. Theyve all got the vote, so they all pretty much assume that the government theyve voted in more or less approximates to the government they want.

You mean they actually vote for the lizards?

Oh yes, said Ford with a shrug, of course.

But, said Arthur, going for the big one again, why?

Because if they didnt vote for a lizard, said Ford, the wrong lizard might get in. Got any gin?

Here Come the Clowns

What Should I Call YOU? How about Moron? I am sure that in my formative youth, my parents would have regularly rolled their eyes at my longish hair and cavalier attitude toward life. Therefore, my grousing about certain aspects of those who aspire to political correctness may just be a sign of my inability to get in sync with the times.

To better understand todays grousings, I would urge you to click the link below to read a helpful poster the administration at Vanderbilt University put together to help faculty members navigate the new pronouns.

Heres one telling quote, with a helpful suggestion on how a faculty member should introduce themselves to new people they meet.

Offer your name and pronoun in faculty meetings, committees, and other spaces where students may not be present.

 Im Steve and I use he/him/his pronouns. What should I call you? (or)

 My pronouns are they/them/theirs. May I ask yours?

Heres the full slate of contrived constructs of politically correct claptrap.

Heres a Twist. You may have heard about David Seaman, the long-term Huffington Post writer who was fired a few weeks back for writing an article suggesting that Hillarys health was a legitimate concern.

Well, following Hillarys collapse at the 9/11 ceremony, he posted a surprisingly candid and honest commentary on how his fellow members of the media are pulling the oars hard to get Clinton elected.

Coincidentally, he also mentions the lack of Clinton bumper stickers. This video is definitely worth watch ing .

And with that, I will sign off for the week.

Until next time, when I will be writing you from beautiful La Estancia de Cafayate, thanks for reading!

David Galland

Managing Editor, The Passing Parade

http://www.garretgalland.com

Garret/Galland Research provides private investors and financial service professionals with original research on compelling investments uncovered by our team. Sign up for one or both of our free weekly e-letters. The Passing Parade offers fast-paced, entertaining, and always interesting observations on the global economy, markets, and more. Sign up now its free!

 2016 David Galland - All Rights Reserved



Disclaimer: The above is a matter of opinion provided for general information purposes only and is not intended as investment advice. Information and analysis above are derived from sources and utilising methods believed to be reliable, but we cannot accept responsibility for any losses you may incur as a result of this analysis. Individuals should consult with their personal financial advisors.

 2005-2019 http://www.MarketOracle.co.uk - The Market Oracle is a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication.




The federal commission evaluating the proposed Mountain Valley Pipeline issued Friday a draft environmental impact statement for the deeply controversial project  a major milestone in the review process.

The 781-page statement from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission was accompanied by appendices that totaled 2,671 pages.

An executive summary of the statement reports, under a section titled Major Conclusions, that FERC determined the construction and operation of the pipeline would result in limited adverse environmental impacts, with the exceptions of impacts on forest.

Pipeline opponents reported Friday that their review of the commission documents was just beginning. But there were strong expressions of dismay, alarm and skepticism about FERCs analysis.

FERCs conclusion that adverse environmental effects of the MVP would be limited and will be satisfactorily mitigated by the applicant is ludicrous, said Rick Shingles, a member of Preserve Giles County.

Bill Wolf of Preserve Craig County provided a statement from that group.

It is inconceivable that our government would issue a draft EIS for public comment when it has been thoroughly documented that there are massive errors, gaps and possible falsehoods in the information provided by the private corporation that filed this application, Wolf said.

This document seems to accept everything submitted by the company as fact, while ignoring thousands of pages of comments submitted by concerned citizens and knowledgeable professionals, he added.

And there was stiff criticism too about the commissions planned format for regional public meetings in November, when comments about the draft environmental impact statement will be collected in one-on-one conversations with a stenographer instead of in an open, public forum.

Roberta Bondurant, a resident of Bent Mountain in Roanoke County and one organizer there of stiff pipeline opposition, blasted the one-on-one format.

Its a farce to call the individual delivery of scientific, environmental, historic and cultural information [to stenographers] a public hearing, she said.

Richard Caywood, assistant county administrator for Roanoke County, has led the countys efforts to monitor the pipeline project.

The meeting format planned by FERC appears to be designed to limit, rather than facilitate, meaningful public dialogue regarding this project, Caywood said.

In turn, Natalie Cox, a spokeswoman for Mountain Valley Pipeline, said the draft environmental impact statement follows more than two years of project planning and development and collection of data from surveying activities.

It also reflects, Cox said, the comments, considerations and concerns of landowners, community members, government agencies and local elected officials along the proposed route.

She noted that Mountain Valley has made hundreds of route adjustments in response to landowner requests, efforts to avoid sensitive resources or engineering requirements.

As proposed, the 301-mile, 42-inch diameter Mountain Valley Pipeline would transport natural gas at high pressure from Wetzel County, West Virginia, to another natural gas transmission pipeline in Pittsylvania County.

The buried pipeline would travel from West Virginia through the Virginia counties of Giles, Montgomery, Craig, Roanoke and Franklin en route to terminating at the pipeline near Chatham. As an interstate pipeline, the project needs FERCs approval to proceed.

Rugged terrain

FERC acknowledged that the Mountain Valley Pipeline would travel through sections of steep, rugged terrain.

For example, FERC said, about 67 percent of the project would cross areas susceptible to landslides. In addition, the pipeline would traverse nearly 73 miles where slope grades would be greater than 30 percent and also cross about 51 miles of karst terrain, the commission said.

Pipeline opponents contend that karst terrain  characterized by sinkholes, caves, sinking streams and springs  cannot safely support a 42-inch diameter, buried pipeline transporting natural gas at high pressure.

The Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation also has cited concerns about the pipelines impact on sensitive karst features and water quality in Giles and Montgomery counties.

Pipeline foes warn that construction and operation of the pipeline on steep slopes will lead to erosion and the deposit of sediment in sensitive streams and drinking water sources.

The commission reported that it considered an impact to be significant if it would result in a substantial adverse change in the physical environment. Examples would be impacts to critical habitat for endangered species or direct construction impacts on historic properties, FERC said.

The commission suggests that the pipeline would not affect property values, an observation contradicted this year by at least two landowners in the region whose property values have been affected by the prospect of hosting the pipeline.

Fatally flawed

Mountain Valley applied to FERC in October for the certificate the joint venture needs to begin construction. Since then, FERC has peppered Mountain Valley with requests for more information, clarifications and corrections as the commission staff and a consultant prepared the draft environmental impact statement.

Throughout the draft statement issued Friday, FERC acknowledges that additional information is required from Mountain Valley before the commission can complete a final environmental impact statement  which FERC has said should be available in March.

Laurie Ardison, co-chair of the Protect Our Water, Heritage, Rights pipeline opposition group, described the draft environmental impact statement as fatally flawed for a variety of process and substance matters, not the least of which is MVPs insufficient, unsubstantiated foundational material.

Carolyn Reilly, a member of Preserve Franklin County, offered similar observations. Her family has resisted efforts by Mountain Valley crews to survey their farm for a possible pipeline route.

Considering that our family farm has not even been surveyed by MVP, we are aghast at how FERC has issued a draft environmental impact statement which doesnt include our property, as well as others that have not been surveyed by MVP, Reilly said.

Our familys land includes woods inhabited by many species, pristine pasture, wetlands and two creeks. How can they state that there is not a significant impact to land and property values when the survey data doesnt exist?

Opponents contend FERC has relied too heavily on Mountain Valleys data to assess whether the project meets a public need. Two studies commissioned by pipeline foes have concluded that the project isnt necessary to meet current and anticipated demand for natural gas from the Appalachian Basin.

FERC notes, however, that the pipeline, designed to transport about 2 billion cubic feet per day of natural gas, has shippers lined up to use the gas. Roanoke Gas is one of five shippers and has confirmed it might site a tap in Franklin County to take natural gas off the pipeline.

FERC is also considering a separate application from Dominion, Duke Energy and other partners for the similarly controversial Atlantic Coast Pipeline project. It would also transport natural gas from West Virginia into Virginia through a 42-inch diameter natural gas transmission pipeline.

Opponents to both pipelines have long held that FERC staff should have completed a programmatic environmental impact statement that considered the two projects together, examining whether they are necessary and weighing their cumulative impacts.

Joe Lovett, executive director of Appalachian Mountain Advocates, reacted to the release of the impact statement for the Mountain Valley project by slamming FERC for failing to do a more overarching, comprehensive analysis.

He said FERCs unwillingness to complete a programmatic study was shameful and lazy and set the stage for private companies to take peoples private property for corporate gain.

If the commission ultimately approves the project, Mountain Valley will be able to use eminent domain to acquire easements across private property if negotiations fail to yield a price acceptable to the landowner.

Proponents of the Mountain Valley Pipeline emphasize a belief that the project will enhance economic development, help move away from coal as a fuel for power generation and support the nations energy independence.

Pipeline foes suggest the project will do significant and lasting environmental harm, impact property rights and values, create a safety hazard and continue the nations dependence on fossil fuels.

Forest impacts

The commission reported that the Mountain Valley Pipeline would cross about 245 miles of forest, noting that the projects 50-foot-wide permanent right-of-way would be kept clear of trees, which would represent a permanent impact and lead to habitat fragmentation.

FERC said the 125-foot construction right-of-way would remove trees that would take years to grow back.

As currently routed, the pipeline would cross a total of about 3.4 miles of the Jefferson National Forest. The Forest Service has expressed concerns about Mountain Valleys current plans for crossing the Appalachian Trail and has criticized the companys proposed crossing of Craig Creek.

FERC confirmed it will double the comment period that follows the release of the draft statement to 90 days to accommodate the needs of the Forest Service and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, another federal agency involved in preparation of the draft environmental impact statement.

FERC also will host public meetings to solicit comment on the draft. FERC has scheduled two meetings in the region: Nov. 2 at Franklin County High School, and Nov. 3 in Roanoke, at the Sheraton Hotel on Hershberger Road.

Each will begin at 5 p.m. FERC said individual comments will be collected in one-on-one conversations with a stenographer. Pipeline opponents and regional politicians had asked FERC to also include a town hall-type meeting.

FERC also will accept comments electronically and through the mail through Dec. 22.
The state agency responsible for protecting caves, sinkholes and other features of karst terrain, as well as the rare creatures often dwelling within these sensitive habitats, wants Mountain Valley Pipeline to shift a portion of a pipeline route through Montgomery County.

Specifically, the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation recommends that Mountain Valley reroute the 42-inch-diameter natural gas transmission pipeline to avoid the Slussers Chapel Conservation Site and tributaries to a sinking creek that enters the Slussers Chapel Cave and Mill Creek.

In a letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission dated Sept. 9, the department suggested a route that would follow the ridgeline of Brush Mountain just outside the boundary of the Brush Mountain Wilderness Area in the Jefferson National Forest before descending toward Catawba Road and Lafayette.

The U.S. Forest Service has said the pipeline would travel through a total of about 3.4 miles in the Jefferson National Forest. The Department of Conservation and Recreations suggested alternative likely would add slightly to that total.

The controversial Mountain Valley project, as a proposed interstate natural gas pipeline, needs FERCs approval to proceed.

The departments letter alerted FERC that both the current pipeline route proposed by Mountain Valley and an alternative suggested in April by the company have the potential to seriously impact the Slussers Chapel Conservation Site.

The department says the site has high global biodiversity significance, supporting populations of rare invertebrate species, including the state endangered Ellett Valley Cave millipede.

Several of the rare invertebrate species in the cave live either in the cave stream, drip pools or underground riparian areas, so protection of water quality is essential to the long-term survival of these species, the departments letter reported.

It added that erosion during and after pipeline construction along either the proposed route or the alternative suggested by Mountain Valley could impact the tributaries to the sinking stream that enters Slussers Chapel Cave.

Mountain Valley wants to build and bury the pipeline along a 301-mile route to transport natural gas from Wetzel County, West Virginia to another transmission pipeline in Pittsylvania County. The proposed route of the $3.5 billion project would take it through the Virginia counties of Giles, Montgomery, Craig, Roanoke and Franklin en route to the pipeline near Chatham.

Bob Jones, a civil engineer and retired professor of engineering at Virginia Tech, has lived in the Mount Tabor area of Montgomery County for 33 years. Jones submitted a detailed filing to FERC opposing Mountain Valleys Mount Tabor alternative, which would impact Jones property and that of about 10 neighbors, he said.

A Sept. 7 filing by Jones noted that no pipeline route through the Mount Tabor area would be acceptable for a host of reasons, including that the karst-dominated area features an aquifer that hundreds of residents depend on as their sole source of water.

The term karst refers to a landscape principally formed by the dissolving of bedrock, including limestone and dolomite. Karst terrain often features sinkholes, sinking streams, springs, caves and complex underground aquifers vulnerable to pollution.

Jones declined this week to comment on the alternative proposed by the Department of Conservation and Recreation. He explained that shifting the pipeline route might keep it off his property but would still impact the property of others and, in his view, endanger the aquifer for all of Mount Tabor.

I am against any MVP route through the Mount Tabor area for all the reasons I expressed in my 9 September 16 filing to FERC, Jones wrote in an email Thursday.

Pat Tracy is a resident of nearby subdivision Preston Forest and a member of Preserve Montgomery County, an anti-pipeline group. After residents of Preston Forest objected strenuously to an early pipeline route, Mountain Valley moved the route to avoid the subdivision but did not avoid the areas karst topography.

Putting the route away from the middle of the watershed is a good idea, but putting it at the top of a hill where the same watershed starts is not a very good solution, since Ive heard that water runs downhill, and so would liquids from the pipeline if there is a leak, Tracy said.

The Mountain Valley Pipeline would transport natural gas at high pressure, but liquids sometimes accumulate in pipelines.

NaturalGas.org, a site maintained by the Natural Gas Supply Association, reports that although natural gas in pipelines is considered dry gas, it is not uncommon for a certain amount of water and hydrocarbons to condense out of the gas stream while in transit. Liquids are often separated at compressor stations along pipeline routes. Mountain Valley continues to say there will not be a compressor station in Virginia if the project moves forward.

Ultimately, Tracy said, given the karst topography in the region, there is no safe place for this pipeline anywhere in this part of the state.

Pipeline foes hired a geologist considered an authority on karst terrain to review the Mountain Valley project and its potential impacts. In a 60-page study released July 7, Ernst Kastning concluded that the pipeline could not be safely built and operated in sections of Monroe County, West Virginia, and in portions of the counties of Giles, Montgomery and Roanoke characterized by karst terrain and steep slopes.

At the time, Natalie Cox, a spokeswoman for Mountain Valley, noted that karst terrain is prevalent in the United States, especially east of the Mississippi River, where several thousand miles of pipeline have been constructed and continue to operate safely.

Cox said then that the pipelines current route avoids karst areas to the greatest extent possible. She said Mountain Valley is working with karst specialists and state and federal officials to develop construction and operation plans that are designed specifically for karst areas along the MVP route.

This week, Cox said Mountain Valley is reviewing the route suggested by the states Department of Conservation and Recreation and said the company appreciates the departments feedback as we work to identify the best possible route for this important project.

Jennifer Adams, a special project coordinator for the George Washington and Jefferson National Forests, said the Forest Service is reviewing the departments alternative route, noting, We have not yet completed our review. The Forest Service is participating in the preparation of a draft environmental impact statement for the pipeline project.

Shannon Johnson, a spokeswoman for the Department of Conservation and Recreation, said the department has been told its proposed alternative route will be considered within the draft environmental impact statement FERC has said will be released this month.

FERC recently confirmed it will double the comment period that follows the release of the draft statement to 90 days to accommodate the needs of the Forest Service and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, another federal agency involved in preparation of the draft environmental impact statement.

FERC also will host public meetings to solicit comment on the draft but has not yet announced what format the meetings will follow. If the commission ultimately approves the project, Mountain Valley will be able to use eminent domain to acquire easements across private property if negotiations fail to yield a price acceptable to the landowner.

Proponents of the Mountain Valley Pipeline emphasize a belief that the project will enhance economic development, help move away from coal as a fuel for power generation and support the nations energy independence.

Pipeline foes suggest the project will do significant and lasting environmental harm, impact property rights and values, create a safety hazard and continue the nations dependence on fossil fuels.
Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine Yevhen Yenin and Prosecutor General of Latvia Eriks Kalnmeiers, his first deputy and the head of the Latvian service for money laundering control have discussed the way of returning former Ukrainian officials' criminal assets, confiscated by Latvian authorities, to Ukraine.

According to the press service of the Prosecutor General's Office of Ukraine (PGO), a meeting of PGO representatives of the two countries was held within Yenin's visit to Latvia. The main topics for discussion during the meeting were international cooperation within criminal proceedings and the ways of returning to Ukraine the criminal assets of former Ukrainian officials, confiscated by the Latvian competent authorities.

"The parties agreed to coordinate further actions within the framework of the national legal systems necessary to return the criminal assets of Ukrainian ex-officials confiscated by Latvian agencies," the report reads.
COLLINSVILLE-A judge in Henry County Circuit Court found sufficient evidence to find a man guilty of two counts of embezzlement but deferred judgment until a presentence report is complete.

Glenwood Arnold Walker, 69, of 339 Dogwood Drive, Martinsville, allegedly was paid a total of about $28,000 for two mobile homes and related expenses but never provided the mobile homes to the buyers and did not give the money back, except for payment of a fraction of the money after a civil judgment was entered against him in one of the cases, according to court records and commonwealths evidence.

The alleged victims were Elia Yanet Devora of Axton and Jesse Watkins Jr. of Martinsville.

On Monday in Henry County Circuit Court., Judge David B. Carson strongly advised Walker to make the victims whole before the presentence report. Carson scheduled the next court hearing for Dec. 14 at 9 a.m. Carson also ordered no contact between the victims and Walker.

Carson, of the 23rd Judicial Circuit, heard the cases because judges in this judicial district (the 21st Judicial Circuit) recused themselves.

HENRY GENERAL DISTRICT COURT

In Henry General District Court on Thursday, Matthew Stephen Wimbish, 24, 1107 Douglas Avenue, Martinsville, pleaded guilty to reckless handling of a firearm. Judge Marcus Brinks sentenced Wimbish to 12 months in jail, suspended on condition of 12 months of good behavior and Wimbish completing an alcohol counseling program.

A criminal complaint alleged that on Aug. 21, 2015, Wimbish arrived at the hospital in Martinsville with a single gunshot wound to his pelvic area. During a police investigation, Wimbish said he accidentally shot himself when he pulled the firearm from his pants while he was a passenger in a vehicle that was traveling down a road in the Bassett area with multiple occupants. Wimbishs blood alcohol content was .091, according the complaint.

Judge Brinks said Thursday, I like firearms, but I am very, very cautious with them.

MARTINSVILLE CIRCUIT COURT

James McKinley Hairston, 42, of 2695 Chatham Road, Martinsville, pleaded guilty Monday in Martinsville Circuit Court to one count of distribute cocaine  second or subsequent offense and four counts of distribute cocaine  first offense. A judge ordered a presentence report and scheduled sentencing for Nov. 17 at 2 p.m.

Hairston allegedly distributed a total of about 9.8 grams of cocaine in June and July 2015.

MARTINSVILLE GENERAL DISTRICT COURT

On Wednesday in Martinsville General District Court, a judge appointed a public defender to represent Aaron William Smith, who is charged with unlawful wounding.

According to an arrest warrant and criminal complaint, Smith, 57, of 7 Sutherlin Street, Martinsville, allegedly stabbed Stephen Biggs, of 5 Sutherlin Street, in the neck on Sept. 10. Biggs told police that he was invited to the front porch of 7 Sutherlin Street by Gloria Giles (of 7 Sutherlin Street) and at some point, Smith came out with a small paring knife and allegedly chased Biggs to his house next door at 5 Sutherlin Street, where the assault allegedly occurred.

Biggs had a small puncture wound to his lower left jaw but did not wish to be transported to the emergency room, according to the complaint.

A judge scheduled a court hearing for Smith for Oct. 7 at 11 a.m.

Also Wednesday in Martinsville General District Court, a judge appointed a public defender to represent Demarcell Leigh Houp, who is charged with breaking and entering a dwelling during the daytime with intent to commit certain crime(s). The judge scheduled a court hearing for Oct. 28 at 3:15 p.m.

According to an arrest warrant and criminal complaint, Edward F. Hairston of Third Street, Martinsville, reported that sometime after he took a nap on Monday, he realized someone was in his home and he confronted the man, who left. The screen on the storm door had been cut and a pot pie from the kitchen had been eaten.

According the criminal complaint and a news release from the Martinsville Police Department, Investigator C.S. Boblett canvassed the neighborhood to develop a possible suspect, and Houp was identified through a photo lineup.
RIDGEWAY  If theres any hooting at Magna Vista High School, it likely comes from Robb Herbsts classroom. However, the sounds dont originate from the Warrior Tech Academy students  rather, Herbsts pet owl, Lennie.

A Master Falconer, a feat achieved over a seven-year minimum stretch in Virginia, Herbst enhances instructional time with the special guest. Having Lennie in the room puts a fun twist on Herbsts New Tech Network Government class.

We the People Too is a year-long hybrid course combining English 12 standards with Government standards. The class focuses on helping students become informed, responsible and active citizens with an implementation of citizenship and political culture.

With an owls image as a wise creature, it is only fitting that Lennie listens in on discussions concerning the current political happenings in America.

I look forward to the election this year. This is a great teaching opportunity for the NT Government classes, as well as my Psychology class, Herbst said.

With two unique presidential candidates, the classroom conversations are sure to be of interest in the coming weeks. Solid communication skills are powerful tools Warrior Tech teachers instill within their students.

Warrior Tech, which also places a strong emphasis on collaboration and teamwork, is a groundbreaking educational technique. It takes some weight off of standardized testing and places more significance on real-world problem solving skills.

The PBL (project-based learning) model of teaching in Warrior Tech is new to me, but I feel this style of teaching is a gateway to a new learning style. I feel this helps me prepare them for their post graduation world, Herbst said.

While Herbst believes in the importance of class instruction, the educator also encourages his students to look beyond their high school career.

It is not only about success in the classroom. It also includes preparing our students for the future, Herbst said.

Whether petting an owl or changing the world, students gain both fun and practical life experience in Herbsts class.
BASSETT  Dont be intimidated by math. Of all the subjects, its the only one that always has one right answer.

Thats one of the reasons behind Phillip Whipps passion for mathematics. Whipp just started as a teacher in the Bengal Tech Academy of Global Studies at Bassett High School, teaching geometry, precalculus and calculus.

Every other subject is either opinion based or our best guess given the information we have, he said. But 2 + 2 is always four (well, almost always).

And when two plus two comes out to something different than four, there was a particular reason for it, evident in the problem  and still just one right answer.

There are two other reasons hes crazy for math, he said. Firstly, I understand it; secondly, it gives me great joy and pleasure to hear people when they have that Ah ha! moment and claim they understand what I have been telling them.

Whipp, a native of Oxford, England, moved to Virginia in 1997. Teaching is one of a vast range of jobs he has held, across a wide range of occupations from purchasing to sales, he said.

Being in the classroom is much better than I expected. Yes, there are some days that appear less busy than others. But even these days are punctuated by those ah ha moments, when a student suddenly announces that he understands it.

The lessons dont stop at the textbook, or even at the required course material.

I am most looking forward to teaching the students all I can about mathematics, even if this may sometimes push them above and beyond the material in front of them, he said.

And challenges from the students are fair game, too.

As a student myself some time ago, I used to hate it when a teacher would say, That is beyond the scope of this course. I believe every student who asks a good question should get an answer, even if I have to get back to them the next day. This is important to me, because I have been given this mathematics to share.

Whipp has tremendous support in his teaching from both the students and the faculty, he said.

Sometimes students understand almost faster than I can teach, and other times they dont, but they come to see me before or after school for extra help.

Thanks to the faculty, I do not teach alone. I am surrounded by a huge support network of great teachers, administrators and staff, without whom nothing would be possible.

He is backed up in both his personal and professional involvement in math with a collection of math textbooks. Many of them were required reading material from classes he has taken. Others are about the many branches of higher math (that) have a beauty that only someone who enjoys math can see. So I collect to expand my knowledge beyond the minimum required for pleasure.

That collection of books also helps me to answer the rare student question that would usually be answered by That is beyond the scope of the material in the course, an answer I have promised never to give my students.

Another group of books he collects is science fiction. He started that collection when he was in fourth grade, after reading A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin.

In his spare time, he wrote on his profile page on the high schools website, my private research interests are Primitive Pythagorean Triples and Extensions to Pictorial Representing Applications of Euler Totient Functions.

Whipp has been in the field of math long enough to witness and experience intense changes brought about by technology, which he says has helped and hindered mathematics use.

On the good side, we no longer have to perform basic math for days on end to solve a problem, he said. But it also has led to an absence of number sense and basic math to whole generations. Many times I have seen students check one times one in their calculator.

I think that those who wish to get close to math can now get closer due to the technology. A good tool in the right hands is always a good tool.

Holly Kozelsky reports for the Martinsville Bulletin. She can be reached at holly.kozelsky@martinsvillebulletin.com.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko expects the European Union to make a positive decision on visa liberalization for Ukraine in early October this year.

"Ukraine has deserved it [visa liberalization], 144 criteria have been met. We have the report of the evaluation mission... I hope in the beginning of October the European Parliament will vote in favor of this, the European Commission decision will be adopted. This is the confirmation we have the common interest," he said at the 13th annual meeting of the Yalta European Strategy "The World, Europe and Ukraine: Storms of Change" in Kyiv on Friday morning.
Its hard to believe someones broke when theyre handing out raises. Say, for example, youre a state employee in Virginia, where Gov. McAuliffe just announced a projected $1.5 billion shortfall in tax revenue over the next two years. You were promised a pay increase that first got delayed to December, before being cancelled, all in the name of fiscal responsibility. Its hard to accept that, when at the same time, some departments are handing out bonuses. Either were broke or were not. Which is it?

The announcement came on Tuesday. The Virginia Retirement System Board of Trustees voted to give almost $6 million in incentives to 45 internal investment professionals. At the same time, they announced plans to give a bonus to the director of the $69.4 billion pension system. In normal circumstances, that makes sense. You want to motivate your investment staff, so you offer them incentives. If the director did his job, you want to reward that too. But when the state, from which your budget comes, is facing a shortfall, maybe now is not the time to take that step.

I understand what they did was perfectly legal and that the money is there for it. The VRS system is an independent department, operating with its own budget and a different set of rules. I look at the other state employees, the ones who didnt get a raise because their groups were ordered to trim back and I cant see how its fair.

The same goes for public colleges, named so because tax dollars help pay their bills. The University of Virginia plans to give out a 3 percent on average raise for university staff, administrative and professional faculty members on campus, with a 4.75 percent raise for teaching professors. Again, no its not illegal, but why, if were going through a shortfall, are we letting these groups that use our tax dollars increase their budgets? Instead, shouldnt they first reduce the amount of tax revenue they need? I mean its not like UVa really needs public taxes right now, with the $2.3 billion set aside in its Strategic Investment Fund.

Maybe its just me. Maybe Im the odd one. I grew up being taught that you dont spend more than you make, that you establish a budget and stick to it. And if less money comes in, fewer dollars have to go out. Why is it that public school teachers, sheriffs deputies, state police officers and others have their proposed raises cut out, but we simply nod and say its ok for other groups to keep their funding intact? Yes, these are for the most part independent groups, but each of them, to a point, relies on tax dollars to get by. Basically, were asking some departments to either freeze or cut back their budget, but not the independent agencies. That in turn allows them to use other funds, such as private donations or, in UVas case, tuition dollars, to increase wages for their staff members. Does that seem fair?

Its also worth pointing out that not all of the independent groups took the money and ran. Virginia Commonwealth University, for example, said through a spokeswoman Thursday that theyre not going through with a planned raise. Also the Virginia Lottery, which brought in a record $588 million in profits last year, announced its employees wouldnt get their planned 3 percent raise, because of the state budget issues.

I also understand the argument made by some of these groups that you have to provide these bonuses and incentives in order to attract top talent. But I argue the same is true of sheriffs deputies, state police and teachers. In order to get the best, you need to compete for them. Its hard to argue the state is doing all they can on that front by cutting their raises. The Virginia State Police Association released data this week saying that there are more than 100 vacancies for sworn officers, with nine quitting last week alone.

With the recent announcements, it seems that were valuing retirement system employees and college staff members over the people who keep us safe and those who help our kids learn to read and write. I have an issue with that.
Since July of this year, rumours have been circulating of a major Canadian Forces deployment in Africa. Those rumours have now been confirmed. As of late August, the Trudeau Liberals have pledged up to 600 troops in support of United Nations missions on the continent. This comes on the heels of an earlier commitment, made in late-June, to deploy 450 troops to Latvia in support of NATO missions in eastern Europe, as well as the addition in February of over 100 special forces to Canadas mission in Iraq. In total, the Liberals have pledged to deploy more than 1000 soldiers across the globe in the short span of just seven months. This is a far cry from what was supposed to be a departure from the Harper era. In many ways, it is far worse.

In no other department have the Liberals veered farther from their expectations than in foreign policy. Trudeau went to great lengths to distance himself from his predecessor during the campaign. Among other things, he promised he would end the combat mission in Iraq. Upon being elected, he said he would restore Canadas compassionate and constructive voice in the world. Many were led to believe that Harpers divisive foreign policy had come to an end. But it is unlikely that this was ever Trudeaus intention.

Moreover, Trudeaus tone elicited concern from Canadas senior allies, who were reluctant to have their junior partner withdraw from Iraq. As a result, pressure was brought to bear on the Liberal government from day one. This was demonstrated by the exclusion of Canada from a high-level meeting of contributors to the U.S.-led coalition against ISIS, held in Paris in January. At the time, this was likely meant to convey displeasure with Trudeaus decision to withdraw Canadas six CF-18 fighter jets from Iraq. Their point was further reinforced during U.S. President Barack Obamas visit to Parliament Hill in June. During his speech to Parliament, he said:

As your NATO ally and your friend, let me say, well be more secure when every NATO member, including Canada, contributes its full share to our common security. Because the Canadian Armed Forces are really good. And if I can borrow a phrase, the world needs more Canada. NATO needs more Canada. We need you.

At this point the message was clear: either fall in line or risk the consequences. But by that time, Trudeau had already long since agreed to comply.

Iraq

On February 8, shortly after the coalition meeting in Paris, the Liberal government unveiled its revamped non-combat mission to combat ISIS in Iraq. Despite going forward with the withdrawal of the CF-18s, the plan was welcomed by the U.S. and other members of the coalition. The reason for this is that although the fighter jets were removed, the ground mission itself had dramatically expanded. The number of special forces on the ground were almost tripled from 69 to just over 200, to say nothing of the increased support staff. In addition, Canada would provide an aerial refueling tanker and surveillance aircraft, helping to facilitate the ongoing bombing campaign of its senior allies. Of the campaign promise to end the combat mission, there was now nothing left.

But, Trudeau might say, This is a non-combat mission! When the Iraq mission was being overseen by the Harper Conservatives, it was also deceptively labeled as non-combat, despite the fact that special forces in Iraq are known to engage in combat on the front lines. At the time, Harper was denounced by Trudeau himself for knowingly misleading the Canadian public. But now that Trudeau is overseeing that same mission, it has mysteriously become a non-combat mission once more. George Orwell himself couldnt have written it better!

Latvia

The day following Obamas appeal to Parliament in June, Trudeau was already primed to unveil his next major troop deployment  this one much larger than the last. Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan announced that about 450 troops would be sent to Latvia as part of an enduring NATO presence in Eastern Europe. Ironically, exactly six CF-18s were also pledged for the mission. It was as if Canada were apologizing to NATO for having withdrawn that same number of fighter jets from Iraq.

Canadas deployment would serve as part of a high-readiness NATO battalion across the Baltic states and Poland, directed against Russia. The force of 4,000, directed also by the U.S., Germany and Britain, could be in place within the span of 48 hours, and would serve to bolster NATOs already existing rapid reaction force of 40,000. These troops, however, can only respond within a week to 10 days. Studies conducted by the Pentagon and the RAND corporation have revealed that Russia could overrun the Baltic states in less than three days, and that a force of 30,000  40,000 troops would be required to stave off such an invasion. In other words, a high-readiness force of 4,000 could be seen as a little threat in and of itself. NATO hopes its new force can act as a tripwire, which it believes will trigger a large-scale NATO intervention against a Russian invasion. The 4,000 troops thus occupy the role of cannon fodder, who can be used to prompt countries to mobilize larger forces. Trudeau has no problem playing this cynical game along with his allies in NATO.

Africa

Sometime in 2015, the French government requested Canada adopt a major role in Frances peacekeeping mission in the former French colony of Mali. The Conservatives managed to side step the request, knowing the mission was dangerous and would likely lead to Canadian deaths. Now with a new prime minister in office, French imperialism may yet have its day.

At the end of August, Sajjan finally confirmed that up to 600 troops would be committed to UN missions in the near future. The government is reportedly considering Mali, South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Central African Republic, for deployment, meaning it will be somewhere on the continent of Africa. As of April, Canada had only 79 personnel involved in UN operations, making this a dramatic increase in troops.

While officially a peacekeeping mission, even the Liberals are reluctant to use that term. The UN mission in Mali, for example, has already seen 19 peacekeepers killed this year, to say nothing of civilians and militants. Sajjan has acknowledged that The missions in Africa are risky, and has even gone so far as to admit that the terminology of peacekeeping is not valid at this time. Rather, Canada will be engaged in peace support operations. A Globe and Mail editorial explained:

Indeed, one of the peace supports in this evolving doctrine will be more forceful military action required to establish peaceful conditions, as some of its advocates put it. Call it peace imposition. Call it war.

The Liberals could just as well go forward with the slogan War is Peace, and have it mean the same thing. Ironically, it was this same doublespeak language used by Canada during the war in Afghanistan. In Kandahar, peace operations resulted in the deadliest war involving Canada since the Korean War. The Globe editorial also noted:

The ironic upshot may well turn out to be that the Trudeau government, having campaigned in 2015 on what sounded like traditional Pearsonian peacekeeping, will end up having a more muscular foreign policy than anything the ostensibly hardline Harper government ever aspired to.

A more muscular foreign policy than Harper, but still peacekeepers according to Trudeau! The deception could not be more glaring.

What is Peacekeeping?

In his speeches, Trudeau often hearkens to a golden age of Canadian diplomacy, where Pearsonian peacekeeping inside the UN prevailed. He is referring to Lester B. Pearson, who was prime minister from 1963 to 1968 and often considered the father of peacekeeping for his role in the Suez Crisis of 1956. For Trudeau, this fits cozily into his narrative of Canada as a compassionate and constructive voice in the world.

But who was Lester B. Pearson, the father of peacekeeping? Even a cursory glance at Pearsons peacekeeping shows it was marred by the same cynical interests as all bourgeois politicians before and after him. It is worth quoting at length a National Post article from January on this same topic:

Canadas affection for peacekeeping dates to 1957, when then-diplomat and later Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson won the Nobel Peace Prize for helping to facilitate the departure of Britain and France from Egypt during the Suez Crisis with the aid of a UN peacekeeping force. Though largely a face-saving measure to cover for French and British withdrawal, it drew accolades from which Canadians have never quite recovered.

Throughout the Cold War period, most peacekeeping efforts were failures. Further, far from acting as a neutral honest broker, Canada often took the side of Western interests, both political and economic. Even in this era, only 10 per cent of Canadas defence budget was funnelled into peacekeeping. The rest was diverted to NATO, NORAD and other more conventional military expenditures.

To quote Pearson himself, The UN reflects the world situation more often than it creates it.

This is correct. The UN in reality is a diplomatic den of thieves. It can only act in so far as the powers that be will it to act, and even then, it remains subordinated to the cynical interests of the imperialist countries. This was the case during the Suez Crisis (saving face for French and British imperialism), as well as during the UNs criminal interventions in the Republic of Congo and Haiti. Peacekeeping, by extension, also remains subordinated to the interests of the big players. It may be imperialism with a humanitarian varnish, but it remains imperialism just the same.

Under capitalism, foreign policy is not directed by abstract principles or virtues, but by naked self- interest. For the ruling capitalist elite, principles are subordinated to the expansion of their profits. Canada, which has never reached the heights of imperialist supremacy, must settle with occupying the position of junior partner to the major imperialist countries. Herein lies the motivation behind Canadian foreign policy, of which Trudeau is continuing.

In this article we have made repeated reference to George Orwells 1984. But that is only because Trudeaus particular brand of foreign policy could have been copied directly from that novel. Trudeau has ramped up troop deployment to a level that would have made Stephen Harper jealous, all the while heralding the end of the divisive Harper years and proclaiming an era of compassion and sunny ways. This doublespeak can only be sustained for so long. It is only a matter of time before people start to recognize this.
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Ukraine has officially returned five works by Dutch painters from the 17th and 18th centuries to the Netherlands. The works were stolen in 2005 from the Westfries Museum in the Dutch city of Hoorn.

Prosecutor General's Office of Ukraine (PGO) head Yuri Lutsenko took part in the transfer ceremony held in the Dutch embassy in Kyiv on Friday.

"We now see masterpieces of Dutch culture, which should bring pleasure to museum visitors the world over  not to the individuals who stole them," Lutsenko said.

He expressed thanks to Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) agents, who were able to find the works after 10 years.

The PGO head also told journalists that by giving back the paintings he was only carrying out the official act of transfer.

"This is occurring in the legal sense, as well, by means of the PGO, which is authorized to conduct international activities, including the return of stolen works of art to Holland," he said.

Deputy SBU head Hluhovsky said the paintings were indeed found in eastern Ukraine.

"Yes, several of them were in eastern Ukraine," he said without elaborating.

At the end of the ceremony Westfries Museum Director Ad Geerdink said that 10 years ago the paintings were taken at night from the museum after disabling the security system and rolled them up.

He said it was possible that the works were re-sold and the owners of the stolen paintings changed several times during the course of the decade. In his words, two of the works, including the painting, titled "Woman of High Society," are not in the museum frames, and only two of the works are in good condition. Girdnik said the value of the paintings had fallen.

"Paintings in bad condition lose their value. We said publicly that 24 paintings had been stolen so they would not be sold," Girdink said.

He said that presently five of the works are worth about EUR 200,000, adding the historical and artistic value of the paintings is what the museum values the most.

The museum director said the works would be exhibited in the museum about three weeks after the documents are received.

As earlier reported, in December 2015 a representative of the Westfries Museum said approximately 24 paintings stolen in 2005 was in the possession of the volunteer defense battalion, which was trying to sell them for EUR 50 million. The museum representative said the battalion was in touch "with top-level politicians [in Ukraine]," mentioning Svoboda Party Oleh Tiahnybok and former SBU chief Valentyn Nalyvaichenko, who heads an anti-corruption movement. Both men rejected the claims.

In mid April of this year SBU agents together with police from the Netherlands found several paintings stolen in 2005. According to SBU chief Vasyl Hrytsak, four paintings were found and Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin announced they would be returned after they were examined.

On May 30 an unidentified man brought a painting by Izaak Ouwater, titled Nieuwstraat in Hoorn, made in 1784, which is probably one of the paintings stolen from the Westfries Dutch museum. The man who brought the painting said that he had received it as a present several years ago. He said he decided to bring it to the embassy after he found out that it was part of a stolen collection. The returned painting is in very bad condition and requires restoration.
Kurt Russell

Actor Mark Wahlberg arrives on the red carpet for the premier of "Deepwater Horizon" during the 2016 Toronto International Film Festival in Toronto on Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2016. (Nathan Denette/The Canadian Press via AP)

(Nathan Denette)

Actor Mark Wahlberg has ended his bid for a pardon for assaults he committed 28 years ago.

In 1988, a 16-year-old Wahlberg hit a Vietnamese man in the head with a stick while trying to steal alcohol and punched another in the face while trying to avoid police.

Wahlberg's request before the Massachusetts Parole Board sparked outrage in some quarters.

Judith Beals, who prosecuted the case, stated in an op-ed piece that she saw "no reason why that history should be erased from the public record through a pardon."



"I'm glad Mark Wahlberg has turned his life around ... But a public pardon is an extraordinary public act, requiring extraordinary circumstances because it essentially eliminates all effects of having ever been convicted," Beales wrote.

Wahlberg, 45, told reporters at the Toronto Film Festival this week that he now regrets seeking the pardon.

"I didn't need that, I spent 28 years righting the wrong. I didn't need a piece of paper to acknowledge it. I was kind of pushed into doing it, I certainly didn't need to or want to relive that stuff over again," Wahlberg said of the 1988 crime for which he served 45 days in prison.

Wahlberg, who grew up in Dorchester, was accused of beating one man so badly that he lost sight in one of his eyes. The "Ted" star said he was grateful to learn that those injuries were sustained a decade before.

"I was relieved to find out that the injuries to his eye had occurred in the early '70s and not from the incident that happened that night," Wahlberg said. "But I was able to meet with him and his wife and his daughter and apologize for those horrific acts. Some good did come out of it."

A Massachusetts Parole Board spokesman told the Associated Press that Wahlberg did not respond to a letter asking if he wished to keep his petition open, so the matter has been closed.
SPRINGFIELD -- A crane loomed over the construction site, workers cut sheet metal and construction vehicles dotted 14.5 acres of dirt and concrete as MGM Springfield executives gave a site tour of their downtown casino project.

The casino is not scheduled to open until September 2018, following the completion of the Massachusetts Department of Transportation's I-91 viaduct project. But workers have transformed the site in recent months, and the company held a tour Friday to demonstrate the progress to local officials.

"We feel like spent the last few years laying the foundation of this opportunity," MGM Springfield President Michael Mathis said."For us, today represents a chance to show all of you the literal foundations of our building."

The project has been three years in the making, since MGM beat out Penn National Gaming to win approval to build a casino in downtown Springfield. The casino has survived local and state-wide referendum votes, and site work began in earnest last winter after lengthy negotiations with historical preservation agencies.

Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno said he was pleased by the progress made on the site and by design elements he said would fit the historical character of the city.

"MGM will continue to respect the history of the city of Springfield," Sarno said. "I think people are going to very proud."

Construction on the casino site has accelerated since the company won needed demolition approvals in December. The demolition of the former Alfred G. Zanetti School in January kicked off a wave of knock-downs, and the last of the casino's legal obstacles was overcome when the Massachusetts Gaming Commission approved the redesign in May.

In April, MGM Springfield relocated the First Spiritualist Church from 33-37 Bliss Street, where it stood for 129 years, to a new site 600 feet away on Union Street.

The last of the demolition work was wrapped up last month, and the casino's hotel and parking garage have begun to rise from the rubble.

The casino complex will occupy 14.5 acres of Springfield's downtown, on a plot of land that was devastated by the June 2011 tornado. The company has promised to create 2,000 construction jobs and hire 3,000 workers once the casino is open.

Mathis and MGM Springfield Executive Vice President Brian Packer led a crowd of state legislators, Springfield officials and media through the construction site, pointing out various sign of progress.

Concrete has been laid for the foundation of the casino's gaming floor. Construction of the 250 room, six story hotel that will run along the length of Main Street is underway. 14,000 cubic yards of concrete has already been poured. And the complex's parking garage is also under construction by the Springfield-based firm Fontaine Brothers.

"For the garage in particular we've partnered with Fontaine Brothers, which is a Western Mass-based company," Mathis said. "We want to make sure the economic development stays here in Western Mass."

Behind the historic State Armory, in which an all-women crew of workers is clearing demolition debris, Mathis touted the potential of what will become an outdoor plaza between the Armory and the relocated First Spiritualist Church.

"The sky's the limit for this space, as far as we're concerned," he said.

The $950 million project is on schedule for its September 2018 opening, Mathis said.
john hodgman

John Hodgman at the 2010 Brooklyn Book Festival.

(Wikimedia)

BOSTON -- Fans of the Judge John Hodgman podcast rejoice; the podcast's host has been honored by city officials.

Sunday, September 18, 2016 shall now be known as "Judge John Hodgman Day" in the city of Boston, by proclamation of Mayor Marty Walsh.

Judge John Hodgman is a weekly podcast hosted by Hodgman in which he adjudicates disputes between family and friends in his fictional courtroom with faux bailiff Jesse Thorn. Walsh is one of many guests who have appeared on the show. He was consulted as an expert regarding if space savers are acceptable during a snow storm.

Hodgman is best known for his standup, appearances on The Daily Show and as the human embodiment of a PC in the "Get a Mac" advertising campaign by Apple.

"Judge John Hodgman has overcome his disadvantaged background of having absolutely no legal training to become the nation's most popular champion of PODCAST JUSTICE," the Boston mayoral proclamation states.

Now a resident of Brooklyn with a second home in Western Massachusetts, Hodgman grew up in Brookline. In the proclamation, Walsh joked that Hodgman was from Boston "or at least he will be when we finally execute our plan to annex Brookline," he wrote in the official city document.

The weekly podcast will be brought to the stage in Massachusetts this weekend. Hodgman will hear cases live at the Shea Theater Arts Center in Turners Falls on Saturday, September 17.

He will be in Boston on "Judge John Hodgman Day" - Sunday, September 18 - at the Wilbur Theater.

In response to the proclamation, Hodgman thanked the mayor and added, " I look forward to free parking and swan boat rides all day."
RYEGATE, VT  Two people were arrested Friday after Vermont State Police raided a meth lab in Ryegate, Vermont.

Troopers were tipped off to the lab's location at 375 Boltonville Road in Ryegate early Wednesday morning.

They subsequently investigated the location before receiving a search warrant for the house and executing it on Friday, with the help of Vermont Hazmat, and a number of other agencies.

At the residence, Daniel Roy, 28, of Ryegate, and Jason Richarsdson, 32, of Woodville, New Hampshire, were both taken into custody.

Roy and Richardson now face charges related to the manufacturing of methamphetamine.
Monitors from the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) have not registered any ceasefire breaches in Donbas last night.

All 14 offices of the mission in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions confirm that last night was calm, OSCE Special Monitoring Mission Principal Deputy Chief Monitor Alexander Hug told a briefing in Kyiv on Friday.

The mission's observers last registered shots at 4:50 p.m. on Thursday in the Yasynuvata and Avdiyivka areas, he said.

According to earlier reports, the ceasefire took effect in Donbas in the early hours of September 15.
CHICOPEE - The City Council has approved a zone change, giving a Springfield company the final approval it needs to open the first medical marijuana clinic in Hampden County.

The Council agreed to rezone a 3,270 square foot piece of land on East Main Street from residential to industrial. While the property is owned by Eversource, the request was made by Thomas Murphy, lawyer for Mass Alternative Care Inc.

The company plans to convert the former Chicopee Engineering Associates building at 1247 East Main St. into a medical marijuana dispensary and grow facility. The building is located on the Springfield border.

The City Council had already voted in April to grant a special permit to allow Mass Alternative Care Inc. to open a dispensary and cultivation facility. In addition to receiving real estate taxes on the property, Chicopee will also receive a host agreement payment that will be a minimum of $50,000 a year and will increase depending on the earnings of the company.

There has been little controversy over the facility. The special permit was granted in a 9-0 vote and the zone change was approved 12-0 with one abstention.

But, the city's medical marijuana ordinance requires marijuana clinics to be located on commercial or industrial land and at least 300 feet from a residential zone. The business is located on industrial property but the business could not go forward without a zone change because the Eversource parcel was within 300 feet of the business.

"I see no reason not to grant this," City Councilor Shane Brooks said. "The majority of the property there was zoned industrial."

City Planner Lee Pouliot called the property a "spot zone" since the parcel did not match most of the surrounding property in the area which was zoned for industry.

The only other proposal for a medical marijuana clinic in Hampden County is in Springfield. The plan from Hampden Care Facility Inc., of Chicopee, to put a dispensary at 506 Cottage St., in on hold after the City Council rejected a host agreement.

Mass Alternative Care Inc., which changed its name from Baystate Compassion Center Inc., is headquartered at 1 Monarch Place, Suite 1900, Springfield. Its officers are President Kevin Collins of Springfield, Treasurer David Spannaus of Brookfield, Connecticut, Clerk Heather Andresen of Longmeadow, Director Ronald Paasch of Northampton, and Director Nicholas Tamborring of Fairfield, Connecticut, according to Secretary of the Commonwealth William Galvin's office.

It is not known when renovations will begin. Murphy, the company's lawyer, did not return calls for comment.
14292236_556192641233534_7687656372786730232_n.jpg

David Kremensky, of Northampton.

(Chicopee Police Department)

CHICOPEE -- As city police attempted to recover drugs taken during a pharmacy robbery, police say the suspect swallowed several of the stolen pills.

Chicopee police were called to the Walgreens on James Street at approximately 9:40 p.m. Thursday evening.

A caller reported a man at the pharmacy, telling employees that he would set off a bomb he allegedly had on his person unless he was given what he demanded.

Chicopee officer Mark Page, who was working an extra duty detail at the Knights of Columbus, was the first to arrive on scene.

Concerned the man was armed, Page drew his service weapon upon entering the store. After arriving at the in-store pharmacy, Page saw a man wearing a black hoodie standing at the counter, according to Chicopee police.

Noticing the officer, the man reportedly turned around with numerous pill bottles in hand. After being ordered to stop, put his hands up, the man fled the store with the prescription pills.

Chicopee officer Sean Livingstone arrived at the parking lot as the man ran out of the store. Following a short foot chase, 38-year-old David Kremensky was handcuffed. No explosive device was found on him.

The Northampton resident was arrested on the charges of armed robbery while masked, larceny of a drug, furnishing a false name to police officers and resisting arrest.

After determining Kremensky had swallows some of the stolen pills, he was transported to a nearby hospital before being taken to Chicopee police headquarters to be held overnight.

He will be arraigned in Chicopee District Court on Friday.
AMHERST -- Bill Kern came to Hampshire College as a student in the early days of the institution only after his father, Ralph W. Kern, gave him his blessing.

The New York real estate developer knew his son would thrive there, and he also knew about development. He told his son there was no need to reinvent the wheel when it came to building.

But Kern said, "Times are a changing. We have to reinvent the wheel."

That new wheel is embodied in the new structure at Hampshire College that bears his father's name. The family donated toward the $9 million construction of the R.W. Kern Center.

Bill Kern was one of nine people who spoke at the building's dedication Friday, a ceremony that was part of a daylong symposium titled "What Buildings Should Do."

The 17,000-square-foot Kern Center houses the offices of admissions and financial aid, classrooms, student social areas and a cafe. It was created to embody the college's mission to foster positive change in the world, and to meet the Living Building Challenge. That means it is designed to generate its own electricity, treat its own waste and collect its own water -- meeting a net-zero standard.

Bill Kern said the building "will be a prototype, a model" for other buildings to follow.

Hampshire College President Jonathan Lash said there is no reason to build any other type of building on a college campus. The questions he wanted to leave audience members with were, "Why not and how do we make this happen?"

Dayna Cunningham, a Hampshire parent and trustee, praised the college for providing a place for her son to thrive. Constructed out of non-toxic materials, she called the Kern Center "a love note to the environment."

"It's much more than a structure," said Gary Hirschberg, who created Stonyfield organic yogurt.

A Hampshire alum, Hirschberg said the building is an example "that challenges the myth that green means sacrifice." He said it shows that a building can use fewer resources and reduce its carbon footprint.

"It's a win-win-win," he said, referring to the building's economic, environmental and educational benefits. The building "is a living, breathing educational opportunity," he said.

Hundreds attended the dedication, including many Amherst officials. Lash praised the town for its help in working with the college to create the building.

Symposium speakers included Majora Carter, who founded the organizations Sustainable South Bronx and Green for All; Bill McKibben, an environmentalist, author and founder of the climate change advocacy organization 350.org; and Living Building Challenge creator Jason McLennan.

Carter spoke about the importance of self-gentrification, the concept of improving one's own community instead of leaving it for developers to gentrify. She talked about the coffee shop, tech company and park she helped create in her South Bronx neighborhood.

Of people living in poorer communities, she said, "We want healthy places, we want to feel beauty in nice places." She said she tries to "give people something to fight for, not something to fight against."

Carter said it's time "to stop arguing about the difference between equity and inequality. Let's just get busy and change the lives of people in need."
Exclusive interview with Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to Ukraine Ernst Reichel (Part 1)The visit of the two ministers is linked to the negotiation process in the framework of the Normandy format (Germany, Ukraine, France and the Russian Federation), so they are coming together. In addition, Federal Minister Steinmeier chairs the Organization for Cooperation and Security in Europe. Thus, the main issues involve implementation of the Minsk agreements, as well as the activities of the OSCE's Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) in Ukraine on ceasefire in Donbas.From my own working experience in Berlin, I can say that this perception does not match reality. The federal chancellor and the federal minister carefully coordinate their actions, as do their staff. Communication in the Normandy format is carried out at different levels, both at the heads of government level and at ministerial and various official levels. It would be impossible to reasonably work if there wasn't close cooperation.Germany expects from both sides, including Ukraine, constructive and intensive work on implementing the Minsk agreements. This means a full ceasefire, withdrawal of heavy weapons and ensuring a political settlement reached in Minsk. It means that in this conflict, which is regulated by the Minsk agreements, Ukraine cannot assert 100% of its interests but will have to make certain concessions. We are strongly convinced that it is more beneficial for Ukraine to have the Minsk agreements at its disposal and implement them rather than to be in a situation where there are no agreements with Russia. And I was glad Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko confirmed this during his speech in the Verkhovna Rada.We didn't talk about the conflict in detail, so I would not like to draw any conclusion, but Poroshenko's stance is to stand firmly for complete implementation of the Minsk agreements and that is good in our opinion. Of course, this does not negate the fact that much remains to be discussed and resolved in details, and there are difficulties in this regard.I know that Ukraine is attentively monitoring the discussions held among German economic associations and individual businessmen. I have an impression that maybe you pay too much attention to this issue. We have an open pluralistic discussion and everyone can present his or her opinion. There are different opinions. A broad consensus has been reached at the political level, maybe apart from "The Left Party," which used to be the Communist party of the GDR. At present there are no conditions for lifting sanctions. Ukraine should not provide any reasons to doubt that it fulfills the Minsk agreements. After all, this is exactly what Russia is trying to convey to our society, namely, that Ukraine is to blame for the non-fulfillment of the Minsk agreements.Indeed, many EU countries are now going through a phase of populism, a kind of "fatigue" from EU enlargement, but it didn't emerge yesterday. It has been going on for several years. Nevertheless, the EU has consistently pursued its enlargement policy. But if we follow the EU policy regarding enlargement or convergence of third countries during the last 10-20 years, it is becoming evident that the requirements have become higher. This is due both to the public mood, and the fact that during the previous rounds of enlargement, we clearly realized that we need to pay special attention to certain things. And it means, first of all, that the EU criteria are met not only in the laws and declarations of intent, but that they are effectively put into practice.Now this decision is legislatively processed in the EU. The European Commission, as you know, decided that Ukraine has fulfilled all the requirements necessary to obtain a visa-free regime, but with the caveat that further reforming steps must be executed. Thus, we can say that we are working in a parallel way - the European Union is working within the framework of its legislative process, and Ukraine must still take steps to create the appropriate conditions. I want to say that the process is progressing well. I wouldn't like to speculate about the specific period of time, as many steps have still to be taken. And I understand that Ukraine is impatient in its own way, as all countries that expect such decisions. But if you look at the history of this issue, then you understand that two or three months do not make that much of a difference.To have been the best of all (laughing). My actions should correspond to Germany's role in Ukraine at present time. That means focusing on two things. The first is the implementation of the Minsk agreements. The second is the continuation of the reforms dynamics. I am convinced that Ukraine's economic development is directly depends on the implementation of the reforms. There are good examples of Central and Eastern Europe countries, so I see no reasons why Ukraine can't go that way, if it is able to take the necessary decisions. In this context, I am not talking about the former German Democratic Republic, which was a very specific case, but rather of the Baltic States, Poland and others which have undergone an incredible way of development over the past 25 years. These are two key aspects. If Ukraine is able to make progress in these two aspects, its position will become much better.
Exclusive Interview with the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) President Pedro Agramunt.I went to Russia because Russia is a member state of the Council of Europe and my role as President of the Parliamentary Assembly is to ensure that parliamentary delegations of all member states of the Council of Europe participate in the work of the Assembly. The fact that the Russian Parliament decided not to appoint a delegation for the Assemblys 2016 session  and that the voice of parliamentarians of one of our member states is not present in the Assembly  is an exceptional situation. I have always worked to build bridges and to promote dialogue. I have always believed in the power of dialogue. When our relations are tense, we must keep talking. To be a true pan-European organisation, which seeks peaceful co-existence among all members, we should be able to keep a dialogue open between us. This is particularly important if we want to solve our differences. True, our relationship has been troubled, but it is not broken beyond repair  it can be fixed. By bringing members of the Assembly closer together, we will be able to build trust and a shared understanding that peaceful and prosperous societies can only be built on fundamental freedoms, democracy, human rights and the rule of law.I have always been very clear on this. Ukraine must be able to recover full control over its territory and borders. It is clear that there needs to be a complete ceasefire, withdrawal of heavy weapons and withdrawal of the militias. Moreover, I think a peace process should be based on the fundamental principles of democracy and the rule of law in all phases of the process. This includes free and fair local elections in the region.I agree that the Minsk agreements must be implemented, and there is no alternative to this. Alongside dialogue between Russia and Ukraine, there needs to be dialogue between Kiev, Donetsk and Luhansk, including on such issues as enhancing security and promoting the political process. This means agreement on issues such as local elections, an amnesty law, a special status for Donbas and the necessary constitutional reforms. It is true that the diplomatic efforts to find a political solution to the conflict in Ukraine have reached an impasse, however the path is clear: full implementation of the Minsk agreements. No more, no less. Ukraine and Russia share the responsibility to achieve this, and PACE should keep working with representatives from both sides so that their countries do their part of the job to implement Minsk fully.I highly value the efforts of President Hollande in attempting to solve this matter. If the Normandy format contributes to the process of peaceful settlement of the conflict in eastern Ukraine, it will be very welcome. Eastern Ukraine needs genuine and sincere reconciliation because confrontation is against our common European interests. This conflict, which has already taken almost 10,000 human lives and ruined hundreds of thousands of families, must stop, and it is our responsibility as Europeans to help achieve that. All sides have a crucial role to play in this process and must show respect for the values and standards we share. At the same time, all of us must shoulder our responsibilities too, be ready for dialogue, and seek solutions together.Populism is often a consequence of a rigid and stagnant democratic system that provokes public disillusionment in the difficult times of an economic crisis. During the Cold War, liberal democracy gained legitimacy by being better than totalitarianism in Europe. However since democracy has become the most prevalent form of government, it is held to tougher account, particularly among the young who have not lived under the yoke of Communism or Fascism. Populism, however, requires a realistic and genuinely European response. PACE has to be ready to respond through the protection of fundamental individual rights and the guarantee of free elections. These are the pillars of liberal democracy and should be defended as universal principles.
The Montana Building Industry Association (MBIA) Workers Compensation Group Program offered through Montana State Fund (MSF) http://www.montanastatefund.com has earned nearly $160,000 in group return premiums for qualifying policyholders. The returns are based on the groups overall premium & claim experience for the period of July 1, 2014 to July 1, 2015 and will be distributed in September to qualifying MBIA policyholders.

The MBIA program is comprised of construction companies in Montana that have committed to improve their safety programs and provide a safe working environment for their employees. A safe workplace reduces injuries and costs. And, if the overall experience of the Group Program is favorable, the participating policyholders with low injury costs can realize a return premium.
Several dozen attendees attended the Montana Data Users Conference on Wednesday in Helena.

The Census & Economic Information Center at the Montana Department of Commerce hosted the event where experts from various fields discussed how best to access and use the wealth of information available in todays world.

Federal and state agencies are generating large amounts of data on topics including demographics, economics, health, population, employment and graduation rates.

By Frances Lin  MTN News

Full Story and Video: http://www.kpax.com/story/33105013/data-users-conference-held-in-helena

***

Do you need an intern, an employee, or a project completed in the Data Science space? http://www.matr.net/article-73336.html
As nationally and internationally known leaders in the technology sector gathered in Jackson, Gov. Matt Mead reiterated his goal of making the tech industry Wyomings fourth-largest industry, behind energy, tourism and agriculture.

The governor recently led the third annual Wyoming Global Technology Summit, which is funded and hosted by the Jackson Hole Technology Partnership.

Matt Murphy Wyoming Tribune Eagle

Full Story: http://trib.com/business/wyoming-governor-reiterates-call-to-expand-state-s-tech-industry/article_1e0466cb-b8ba-5dad-9c63-96beaedcddae.html
The African Energy Chamber lauds the South African High Courts decision to allow multinational oil and gas company Shell to conduct seismic surveys offshore South Africa.

Following an 11th hour attempt by environmentalists to halt plans by Shell to conduct seismic surveys along the eastern coast of South Africa, the court ruled in favor of the oil supermajor, which is now free to proceed with its offshore survey, with the application to halt the operations having failed to produce evidence of irreparable harm to the marine environment in the region.

The seismic survey, which was meant to commence on 1 December, will involve the discharge of pressurized air to generate sound waves for the exploration of petroleum resources. Following 325 seismic surveys conducted by the oil giant, globally, there is no evidence to suggest that these forms of surveys cause irreparable harm to the environment, yielding no reports of death or harm to local ecosystems or marine life.

South Africa needs energy. Thats the bottom line. The courts refusal to stop Shells exploration activities on the basis that doing so will cause irreparable harm to the environment is seen as a victory for those who wish to see Africa pull itself out of energy poverty, states NJ Ayuk, Executive Chairman of the African Energy Chamber. Africa deserves the opportunity to capitalize on its own oil and gas resources, and we must be able to exploit these resources in order to benefit from our continents full potential, added Ayuk.

Recent discoveries of oil and gas in southern Africa have resulted in the potential to drastically improve the regions socio-economic prospects, powering industries and spurring economic development and growth. The oil and gas industry supports millions of jobs worldwide, and offers Africa the opportunity to industrialize and ensure energy security.

South Africa needs much more energy, and Shells investment in the country will help fix the countrys current energy crisis. South Africas population and its businesses need low-cost reliable energy that will enable millions of South Africans to benefit from the miracles of an industrialized economy that makes us productive and prosperous.

The court ruling is a strong recognition that skyrocketing energy prices are a failure of the radical green energy policies that will create volatility in the market and increase energy poverty, Ayuk notes.

South Africas post covid future will depend on Coal, Oil, Natural Gas and Green Hydrogen industries. This is the industry that powers every other industry in Africas most industrialized nation. The lower cost and more reliable our energy is, the more competitive every African company is and the lower the cost of living is for every South African and Shell investment is going to contribute to that.

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Interfax-Ukraine to host press conference "Exclusivity of Medical Care at Strazhesko Institute of Cardiology" as part of health reform 2016

On Monday, September 19, at 12.30 the Interfax-Ukraine News Agency's press center will host a press conference entitled "The Exclusivity of Medical Care at Strazhesko Institute of Cardiology" as part of the health reform in 2016. Participants: Director of Strazhesko Institute of Cardiology Volodymyr Kovalenko, Prof. Dr. med. Sciences Yuriy Sirenko, Prof. Dr. med. Sciences Oleh Sychev (8/5a Reitarska Street). Registration requires press accreditation. Additional information by phone (067) 321 7960, (050) 638 5178.
The 3rd Kyiv International Economic Forum (KIEF) under the slogan "Ukraine on the eve of the Fourth Industrial Revolution" will take place in Kyiv on October 6-7, 2016. As compared to the first two Forums, both the subject and scale of the event have been changed. The subject of KIEF 2016 will be maximally close to the practice of attracting investment to Ukraine and its participation in the Fourth Industrial Revolution, which has become the keynote of this year's World Economic Forum in Davos. At the next turn of the global development associated with the manifestation of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, countries of the world compete for a place among those who possess new technologies. Ukraine can't ignore this process, although a lot of opportunities missed over the past 25 years push our country to the periphery of the world processes. So, how can we take another chance given by history on the eve of the new industrial revolution? "We want a lively and fruitful discussion at KIEF 2016 to help improve national economic policy and propose effective strategies for businesses. It is extremely important for Ukraine to participate in the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Due to this, we have also changed the Forum's slogan "Ukraine: from the Third World to the First" for the new one, which underlines the fact that our country has got the potential to be among the players of the Industrial Revolution 4.0," says, the Executive Director of the Kyiv International Economic Forum. The keynote of KIEF 2016 will be the issue of attracting investment. Crisis traits of the Ukrainian economy can be considered positive when it comes to the opportunity of getting lower asset prices. The production infrastructure is largely outdated, but investments can bring high capitalization, considering the educated and inexpensive labor force, and developed transport channels of our country, which borders with four EU members and has easy access by sea to Turkey and the Middle East. During the second day of the Forum, the experts will discuss the opportunities that are opened to foreign investors in Ukraine, the investment attractiveness of various economic sectors and investment programs of Ukrainian regions. IEF 2016 will bring together several dozen leading foreign and Ukrainian economists, reformers, businessmen and government officials. Including experts from countries, whose experience of economic transformation can be useful for Ukraine. The first KIEF that was held in 2014 presented the overall vision for the modernization of Ukraine's economy. The tools to help Ukraine make an economic breakthrough were identified at the second KIEF, which brought together 67 experts from 20 countries, 150 media and more than 800 guests. World-renowned economists recommended Ukraine to purposefully manage the economy through the BusinessGovernmentSociety triangle, and not leave it to the mercy of the free market. To convey the ideas of the Forum to the politicians, business community and civil society, a communication platform was set up under the auspices of KIEF, with the series of thematic round tables. Follow the news on the Forum's website (http://forumkyiv.org/en/ ) and on the official Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/kyiveconomicforum).is a permanently operating venue for the formation of Ukrainian economic development strategy. It is aimed to set up a dialogue between experts, businesses and government, borrowing the best international practices, creating a road map for the development and promotion of the conversion of ideas into the real action.
NEW DELHI, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- China and Inida pledged on Thursday to further promote cooperation among the BRICS nations, and discussed issues such as cyber security, energy security and anti-terrorism.

When attending the 6th meeting of BRICS senior representatives on security issues, Chinese State Councilor Yang Jiechi said that leaders of BRICS nations reached consensus on furthering BRICS cooperation when they met on the sidelines of the G20 summit in China's eastern city of Hangzhou earlier this month.

China is ready to make joint efforts with other BRICS nations to make the upcoming BRICS summit in India's Goa a success and inject new dynamism into the BRICS cooperation, he added.

As the BRICS' chairman next year, China will make good preparations for the BRICS summit and meetings of senior representatives on security and foreign ministers of BRICS nations, said Yang.

When meeting representatives from BRICS nations for the security meeting, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said the BRICS nations are playing an increasingly constructive role in international affairs.

He expressed his belief that the BRICS summit in Goa could yield practical results and cement friendly relations among the BRICS nations so as to enhance the influence of developing countries and emerging economies.

The BRICS nations group Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

Also on Thursday, Chinese State Councilor Yang met with Indian National Security Advisor Ajit Doval.

The Chinese state councilor said development of bilateral ties between the two countries have maintained good momentum.

Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Modi held talks at the G20 summit in Hangzhou, setting the direction for the development of bilateral ties for the next phase, Yang said.

"China is willing to join hands with India to implement the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries, deepen mutual political trust, expand pragmatic cooperation and friendly exchanges, and properly handle sensitive issues in order to push forward the development of bilateral ties in the right direction and promote Asia's development and prosperity."

Yang said BRICS has witnessed 10 years of fruitful cooperation among its member states, and China will fully support India's efforts to host the BRICS summit in Goa successfully.

For his part, Doval said as neighbors and the largest developing countries in the world, India and China have great potential for cooperation.

India is willing to boost political communication, expand pragmatic cooperation and promote cooperation and coordination with China within the framework of G20 and BRICS so as to press ahead with common development and safeguard common interests of the two countries.
ARUSHA, Tanzania, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- The Chinese Embassy in Tanzania on Thursday handed over assorted food items, medicines and tents to Kagera earthquake victims.

"The donation came from various Chinese companies, the embassy and Chinese community," said Zhang Biao, political counselor from the Chinese Embassy in Dar es Salaam while handing over the donation.

Major General Salum Kijuu, Kagera Regional Commissioner, commended the Chinese government for the support, which, according to him, is a great relief to the affected families.

Kijuu said that all the donation received will be distributed to the affected people while begging for more support to rebuild the region.

He also called upon those who will be able to start reconstructing their houses to get advice from construction experts before doing so to avoid future quake damages.

"As per expert's reports, earthquake will continue to happen in Kagera even for the years to come because the region has been passed by the Rift Valley. What we need to do is to adhere to the geological expert advice especially in construction," Kijuu noted

An earthquake, measuring at a magnitude of 5.7 on the Richter scale, hit the Tanzania's Kagera region on Saturday. It left 17 people dead and over 200 injured, while thousands of houses were damaged.
WASHINGTON, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- China on Thursday took "another significant step" towards building a manned space station around 2020 with the successful launch of its second experimental space laboratory, U.S. space experts said.

"The launch of Tiangong-2 demonstrates China remains committed to human spaceflight and to the goal of building a space station in low earth orbit," Gregory Kulacki, senior analyst and China project manager at the U.S.-based Union of Concerned Scientists' Global Security Program, told Xinhua.

"The launch ... will help the Chinese space program further develop the technological capability to achieve that goal in the not too distant future," Kulacki said.

Former NASA astronaut Leroy Chiao, the first Chinese-American to be commander of the International Space Station, hailed Tiangong-2 as "another significant step" for China's human spaceflight program.

"I understand that Tiangong-2 is more advanced than Tiangong-1, and that the next crew (to be launched in October) will stay there for a month," said Chiao, also the first Chinese-American to perform a spacewalk.

"I anticipate that Tiangong-2 will test more advanced life support systems, as well as cargo ship docking and station refueling. This will set the stage for the launch of China's core space station module in 2018."

Chiao, who has visited China's space centers over the years, was impressed with the advances China has made, and revealed he has "good relationships" with several of the Chinese national astronauts.

"China is moving in a very deliberate and orderly fashion to advance their space capability," he said. "I think the technology is good, and they are moving to get more operational experience through Tiangong-2, before the beginning of space station construction."

Both Kulacki and Chiao highlighted the importance of international cooperation in space exploration.

"It is encouraging that China intends to solicit international participation in its space station project," Kulacki said.

"And my hope is that the United States and China will, at an appropriate time in the future, find a way to cooperate in the peaceful exploration of space instead of competing to turn it into a battlefield."

What Kulacki was referring to was a prohibition introduced in 2011 by the U.S. Congress that banned NASA, the country's space agency, from almost all direct interactions with China.

China was also barred from participating in the International Space Station, mainly due to objections from the United States.

Chiao stressed that international cooperation on human spaceflight is a common point of interest that helps improve overall relationships.

"The International Space Station is a great example of that," he said. "Many nations came together to build the amazing facility, and we are working together to further science. This helps to improve overall relations between the member countries."
CANBERRA, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- A large piece of airline debris found off the coast of Tanzania and examined in Australia has been determined to be from missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, authorities have confirmed.

A statement from the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) confirmed the piece, found on June 20 this year, was part of an outboard flap from the Boeing 777 jet.

"It was confirmed (the part) was the inboard section of a Boeing 777 right, outboard flap, originating from the Malaysian Airlines aircraft registered 9M-MRO," a statement released late on Thursday said.

"The part was preliminarily identified from photographs as an inboard section of a Boeing 777 outboard flap."

"On arrival at the ATSB, several part numbers were immediately located on the debris that confirmed the preliminary identification. This was consistent with the physical appearance, dimensions and construction of the part."

"A date stamp associated with one of the part numbers indicated manufacture on 23 January 2002, which was consistent with the 31 May 2002 delivery date for 9M-MRO."

The ATSB said now the part is confirmed to be from the missing Malaysia Airlines jet, work can begin to determine if the flap holds any clues as to how and where MH370 was brought down.

The Australian-led ocean search for MH370 is due to wrap up by the end of the year, as more than 110,000 square kilometers of a 120,000 square kilometer zone has been searched. Australian, Chinese and Malaysian authorities agreed that if no trace of the jet was found in the zone, the search would be suspended indefinitely.

MH370 was a scheduled passenger service from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. It disappeared on March 8, 2014 with 239 passengers and crew on board.
Chicken will be the best-positioned protein due to its low price position in times of pressure on consumer spending power but rises in production costs and the long-term impact of COVID-19 threaten to disrupt the sector, according to Rabobank.
by Sara Guaglione , September 16, 2016

The Village Voice this week announced its lineup of breweries for its 6th annual Brooklyn Pour Craft Beer Festival, the first year it is officially New York Citys largest one-day beer festival.

The event will take place September 24 at the Brooklyn Expo Center and will feature around 125 samples of seasonal, micro and reserve brews from over 65 regional and national breweries.

The Village Voice curates unique events for our readers to showcase the best of what New York has to offer. From food to music to art and beer The Village Voices Brooklyn Pour is designed for beer connoisseurs, enthusiasts and novice drinkers, Suzan Gursoy, publisher of The Village Voice, told Publishers Daily.

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The event will also help the publication's brand reach as it gears up for its extensive relaunch across its print and digital properties slated for 2017.

This year, tastings will also include mead, hard seltzer and root beer, ciders and liquor and will feature a game zone and dining hall hosted by The Astor Room, a supper club in the Kaufman Astoria Studios.

General admission tickets will go for $55 and VIP tickets are $85. All ticket holders will have access to unlimited tastings and a souvenir-tasting glass.

A portion of proceeds from Brooklyn Pour will be donated to the charity Badass Brooklyn Animal Rescue, a nonprofit that works to rescue adoptable dogs from high kill, rural shelters in southern USA.

Sponsors of the 2016 Brooklyn Pour include Blue Point Brewing, Cabot Creamery, Aberlour, Asahi Beer, Califia Farms, Green Mountain Energy, Guinness, Jameson Caskmates, Polar Beverages, Whole Foods Market, Wm. John Macys Cheesesticks, Verizon FIOS and Vita Coco.
by Tobi Elkin , Staff Writer @tobielkin, September 16, 2016

A research report from TUNE, a Seattle-based mobile marketing technology company, recently took a look at the differences between Americans and Europeans views regarding ad blocking.

Given that the world went upside down with this weeks news that Adblock Plus, the company whose software helps consumers block ads, is now in the ad sales business and will run an exchange, consumers views on ad blocking may become even more relevant.

TUNEs report assumed that Europeans would be far more concerned about privacy than Americans, and that Europeans would block ads at much higher frequencies than Americans. The report also assumed that Europeans would activate smartphone settings to limit the data that advertisers can track at a much higher rate.

But research findings revealed that this wasnt exactly the case. In fact, in spite of Europeans reputation for being more privacy conscious and ad-averse than Americans, it turns out that Americans and the English report blocking mobile ads at just about the same frequency, with the U.K. just a hair in the lead at 24% vs. 27%.

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Other findings:

-- Attitudes about what data advertisers should collect are almost identical, with many EU countries only being 4% to 6% higher than the U.S. when it comes to an interest in limiting ad tracking.

-- Americans are about twice as likely as Europeans to say theyll pay to not see adsat least at the $1 per year and $1 per month levels. TUNE also learned that while some consumers would pay to avoid ads in mobile apps, the amount theyre willing to give is actually less than 9% of the revenue that mobile publishers already take in from advertising.

-- Mobile ad blocking has jumped 3 x in just three months, and while some consumers would pay to avoid ads in mobile apps, the amount theyre willing to give is actually less than 9% of the revenue that mobile publishers already make from advertising.

-- As far as limit ad tracking (LAT) usage goes, U.S. and EU smartphone owners report nearly identical levels: 30.4% vs. 28%, respectively.

While citizens of the EU may have different ideas than those in the U.S. about privacy regulation, Europeans and Americans might not be quite as divergent as their governments. For example, self-reported use of ad blocking and the built-in Android and iOS privacy setting, to limit ad tracking, are both very similar across the U.S. and the U.K. Hard data from hundreds of millions of devices corroborate that statistic, according to TUNE, with just 4% to 6% of EU citizens in countries such as Germany, France, Spain, and Sweden more likely to turn on anti-ad tracking settings.

In case youre confused about what limit ad tracking usage means, its when the tracking setting on your phone is off, so you wont offer advertisers your location and they wont know the apps you use and topics you favor. Advertisers can use data from ad tracking for frequency capping and for conversion measurement that tells ad networks that you actually did click on an ad. Turning ad tracking off limits the amount of data advertisers can use to target, explained John Koetsier, Mobile Economist, TUNE.

TUNEs survey data found that ad blocking frequency is growing quickly, with downloads spiking 3x in the last three months. TUNE also analyzed data on 1.3 billion mobile app installs by about 150 million people globally, to find that global usage of the iOS and Android Limit Ad Tracking (LAT) privacy setting is significantly decreasing.

Where digital privacy is concerned, the EU has an overarching, general approach; in the U.S., its much more of an ad hoc and siloed approach, according to Koetsier. One of the things we wanted to learn from the survey portion of our research was what data people think advertisers should be allowed to collect from them while serving ads, Koestier explained.

Clearly, people on both sides of the pond are thinking alike, as most believed that advertisers should collect none at all [data] and very similar percentages of people selected each of the other answers. Slightly more Americans believe that advertisers should collect very little data, and a few more say that any data that is not personally identifiable is okay, but again, the differences are not statistically significant, the report stated.

Some surprising findings: When asked whether consumers would pay to block ads on all apps, the vast majority of consumers in the U.S. [65%] and Europe [nearly 80%] said theyll spend nothing to block advertising in all their apps, Koetsier said. Thats shockingly high in both cases. The reality is that on mobile, ad blocking is extremely ineffective. It doesnt work. Probably nearly 70% of apps will block ads but theyre all for the mobile web, not designed for mobile apps. People spend most of their time in apps, and those ad blockers dont work in apps, Koetsier explained.

TUNE surveyed nearly 4,000 smartphone owners and analyzed 1.3 billion mobile app installs by 150 million people in more than 200 countries. The research data was gathered in 2015 through January 2016 and the survey was fielded in the spring of 2016.
Forbes, Friday, September 16, 2016 8:03 AM

Soular Backpack is partnering with Disney for the Sept. 30 release of The Queen of Katwe, which is about a poor girl in Uganda who becomes a chess star despite having access only to lighting from kerosene lamps at home. Soular backpacks have a solar panel connected to a battery pack that can be charged by the sun and then used back at home.

Read the whole story at Forbes 
Koco.com, Friday, September 16, 2016 8:36 AM

The Oklahoma State Election Board has warned voters to beware of an email scam. A number of local residents have reported receiving an email that looks like it comes from the organization instructing the recipient that their voting information has been changed. The group said that voter data changes are made through the mail and not online and warned consumers not to click on the link.

Read the whole story at Koco.com 
PARIS, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Thursday pressed European partners to set an agenda of reforms to overcome difficulties that Brexit has triggered.

"What we want is to face the causes which had led UK leave. What we must have in mind is to give to the Europeans a clear view of what will be their future," Hollande said in a joint press meeting with Merkel.

With that aim, the French president called for a roadmap of reforms at the informal EU summit whose "first priority is security ... our border security, our security against external threats."

On the eve of the EU gathering in Bratislava, Merkel, on her visit to Paris, expressed "a real willingness to move forward."

"It is now about applying an agenda for Bratislava that makes clear we are determined to react together to the weaknesses, to the tasks we face," she added.

On Friday, European leaders will meet in the Slovak capital, the first meeting since Britain quit the European Union. They will discuss ways to better handle immigrants flows, boost growth and create more jobs for youth.
by Aaron Baar , September 16, 2016

Lenovo and Motorola are thinking that maybe seven isnt such a lucky number for consumers.

In an effort to combat the hype surrounding its competitors smartphones seventh iterations, Lenovo (under the Motorola brand) is encouraging consumers to Skip the Sevens in a new marketing campaign. The effort targets what Lenovo is calling incremental product improvements such as barely significant screen size increases and camera lens changes.

Instead, the campaign points to Lenovos latest Moto Z and Moto Mods products that employ a modular design that allows consumers to turn their phones into the devices they want, when they want them.

A video for the effort shows focus groups the brand hosted with iPhone fans on Sept. 12, asking them to describe their feelings of the iPhone 7s new features. Most of the responses were underwhelming. Its not much of a difference, says one. They are then introduced to some iPhone prototypes, that have modular components such as an interchangeable back that can accommodate a power pack and/or an external speaker. I think thats extremely innovative and makes it feel like theyre hearing what all of us consumers are saying, says one. The phones are revealed to be a Moto Mod, promoting the attendees to think differently about their technological allegiances. You can make announcements, or you can break new ground, reads on-screen text.

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The campaign also includes print and digital ads that acknowledge the iPhones revolutionary place in technological advances, but say that was nine years ago, and advances since then have been incremental. The ad concludes with a veiled reference to Apples previous brand positioning. Our industry was founded on thinking differently, it reads. Some have forgotten. So for now, well carry the torch. Different is better.

Lenovo officials did not respond to requests for comment about the campaign.
by Erik Sass , Staff Writer @eriksass1, September 16, 2016

It always seems to be two steps forward and one step back for publishers as they try to find a future with the big technology platforms.

In the latest progress-with-caveats, Apple is allowing publishers to sell digital subscriptions from inside the Apple News app, giving them access to a much larger potential subscriber base. But that's hedged around, as always, by constraints intended to maintain consumer privacy  and Apples control over access to them.

According to The Wall Street Journal, which first reported the news, a number of big publishers are already signed on to sell subs from within the News App, using the new feature available in iOS 10, which resurrects a capability from Apples old Newsstand.

The list includes the WSJ itself as well as The Washington Post, The Economist, National Geographic, Time Inc. publications including Time and People, Hearsts Cosmopolitan and Tribune Publishings Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times.

Like most of its other content sales arrangements, Apple will take 30% of the subscription sales revenue under the new program, then 15% of all subsequent renewals.

As always, Apples latest pitch to publishers is something of a mixed bag.

On one hand, it provides undeniable convenience. Before, publishers had to build their own apps with subscription paywalls to sell content on Apple, but the tech platform will now handle many of these technical details for them. The new capability should allow publishers to diversify their revenue streams in the Apple universe beyond advertising.

On the other, in classic fashion, handling the technical details also means Apple will maintain its tight control of publishers audiences, including limited access to subscribers personal data and payments  which are processed by iTunes. In short, publishers will always have to go to Apple to reach their subscribers, even in the long term.

This is the latest in a series of moves to give Apple more control over publishers on its platform. Last month, Apple began redirecting traffic from the popular news section of its Spotlight search screen to content hosted natively within the Apple News app, rather than on the publishers own sites, the WSJ reported.
by Wendy Davis , Staff Writer @wendyndavis, September 16, 2016

The Motion Picture Association of America and other Hollywood organizations have made clear that they oppose a Federal Communications Commission proposal that would require cable companies to make programs available through apps.

But not everyone who works in show business objects to the plan. The Writers Guild of America, West says it believes the proposal will benefit a diverse array of groups.

"It gives consumers real choice ... and promotes competition," the writers union says in a letter sent this week to the Senate Commerce Committee. "At the same time, it will protect copyright and the programming available to consumers."

The plan, unveiled last week by FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, would require cable and satellite providers to make TV programs available to subscribers through apps that would run on popular platforms, including Roku, Apple, iOS, Windows and Android.

Wheeler's plan also includes provisions for a "standard license governing the process for placing an app on a device or platform."

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Details remain vague, but the FCC said in a fact sheet that a standard license will enable device manufacturers to create new products. "Programmers will have a seat at the table to ensure that content remains protected ... The FCC will serve as a backstop to ensure that nothing in the standard license will harm the marketplace for competitive devices," the agency stated.

If the proposal passes, consumers will no longer have to pay an average of $231 a year in set-top-box rental fees to watch TV. Instead, most cable and satellite subscribers will be able to watch programs on smartphones, tablets and other devices.

The MPAA and other opponents of the proposal particularly object to the provisions surrounding licenses. The groups argue that the FCC is effectively proposing a "compulsory licensing regime."

But the Writers Guild says the FCC's licensing provisions will help guarantee that cable providers can't use licenses to harm competitors.

At this point, it's unclear whether the agency will pass the rules, given that Democratic commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel -- a critical swing vote -- appears undecided. During a Senate hearing yesterday, Rosenworcel said she wasn't sure whether the FCC was authorized to move forward with its licensing plan.

For his part, Wheeler said he remains open to revising the proposal, but hasn't yet spelled out how he would do so.

The FCC is scheduled to vote on the plan during its Sept. 29 meeting.
by Jess Nelson , September 16, 2016

Googles Gmail email applications will begin supporting responsive email design by the end of the month, the technology giant announced on Wednesday.

Designed emails will now render correctly on any device that email subscribers access their Gmail on, meaning that mobile users will now have the same experience that desktop users do.

Text, links, and even buttons will enlarge to make reading and tapping easier on a smaller screen, writes Pierce Vollucci, product manager at Gmail, on the companys blog. If youre on desktop, youll also see improvements, since emails designed for mobile can also adapt to fit larger screens.

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Googles announcement took stage front and center at The Email Design Conference (TEDC) in San Francisco, an email marketing and development conference hosted by email testing and analytics company Litmus.

This is the most ground-breaking development for email rendering ever in the industry, says Kevin Mandeville, content designer at Litmus.

Mandeville discussed the implications of the news on email design in a conversation with Email Marketing Daily.

Mandeville emphasizes how much time developers have now saved, and how that time can be expended on more creative designs and projects. Before, he says that designers would have needed to send several hours per every single email that had multiple columns.

When you stack testing and troubleshooting on top of that, it's self-evident that Gmail was becoming a big, time-consuming headache for email designers.

This allows us to focus more on the creative, creating a great experience for the end subscriber with out being bogged down in the design process, says Mandeville. It will make responsive design more accessible to more people building emails and give a better result for the end-user -- a nice, gorgeous, mobile-friendly design when they are in Gmail.

Justin Khoo, email developer at Email on Acid, also praised Googles decision to incorporate responsive design in its family of email products, which includes the mobile application Inbox. He says it will be a dramatic improvement to email design.

Googles email update, expected by the end of the month, is a critical addition for email marketers looking to engage with mobile users.

The ratio of mobile to desktop clicks over the past year has changed rapidly, with mobile growing by 15% since 2015 according to Yes Lifecycle Marketings latest email benchmark report.

Revenue driven by mobile emails also jumped 32% year-over-year and 80% over the past two years, according to the study.
by Erik Sass @eriksass1, September 16, 2016

Mode Media is no more. Once considered one of the most successful pure-play digital publishers, earning a $1 billion valuation, the content creation and advertising network announced Thursday that it will cease operations immediately, laying off hundreds of employees and leaving thousands of freelancers unpaid.

Founded in 2004, it began life as Glam Media, named for its flagship female lifestyle site, Glam. It pioneered the occasionally lucrative business of audience extension through its ad network, which allowed it to aggregate audiences from multiple publishers (including sites not its own) to offer advertisers massive scale, reaching 137 million unique visitors per month, per comScore.

In August 2013, the company received an investment that valued it at around $1 billion, earning it a spot in the pantheon of unicorns  companies with $1 billion valuations that are still privately held. Mode apparently considered going public later that year, but the stock-market debut never happened.

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Altogether, its various rounds of private funding came to $230 million, including an investment in January 2015 by Hubert Burda Media, a German company.

However, clouds first appeared on the horizon back in April, when its founding CEO Samir Arora left the companys board of directors, along with Internet investor Marc Andreessen, who joined Mode after its acquisition of social network Ning back in 2011.

The company also laid off some employees and launched a restructuring, which was supposed to put it on a more secure footing going forward.

According to an internal memo circulated to Modes employees on Thursday, the company has been seeking new investors or buyers for a potential acquisition, but the search turned up empty-handed.

In an unusual step for a company winding down operations, with all its concomitant financial liabilities, Mode executives admitted in a memo that they kept the companys woes secret from employees over the last few months. They believed letting them know might damage their chances of finding a buyer or lining up new financing.

As reports of Modes closing spread Thursday and Friday, it also became clear that many contractors have been left unpaid, including thousands of members of Modes 12,000-strong network of independent content creators. Some took to social media to complain of arrears reaching five figures.
Maternal health across the globe is the subject of discussion in a new series of papers published in The Lancet, and the authors raise concerns about health care services for expectant mothers and their babies, noting significant disparities between countries. Share on Pinterest The new series calls for immediate action to reduce global rates of maternal mortality. Over a total of six papers, the new series looks at quality of health care for women and babies worldwide, with a particular focus on the differences in care between high- and low- to middle-income countries. Additionally, the series points to a number of strategies to improve maternal health care services across the globe, in order to meet Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted by the United Nations (UN) in September last year. As part of these SDGs, the UN aim to reduce the global mortality rate to less than 70 per 100,000 live births by 2030, as well as ensure there is universal access to sexual and reproductive health care services. In the first paper of the series , Prof. Wendy Graham, of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine in the United Kingdom, and co-authors look at the burden of poor maternal health worldwide. They note that over the past 25 years, progress has been made in reducing maternal mortality rates worldwide, but much more needs to be done, since major disparities remain. In all countries, the burden of maternal mortality falls disproportionately on the most vulnerable groups of women, says Prof. Graham. This reality presents a challenge to the rapid catch-up required to achieve the underlying aim of the SDGs  to leave no one behind.'

Poor access to quality maternal health care services remains a problem According to the series authors, the burden of maternal mortality is primarily down to poor access to quality maternal health care services, which vary widely worldwide. In the third paper, co-author Prof. Oona Campbell  also of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine  and colleagues state that around 25 percent of newborns across the globe are delivered without the aid of a skilled birth attendant. The authors note that 90 percent of maternal deaths occur in 58 countries that have only 17 percent of the worlds midwives and doctors, highlighting the importance of skilled medical professionals. What is more, in regions where women do have access to birth facilities, there are large discrepancies in care quality. As an example, the authors point to a study that found 56 percent of birth facilities in Tanzania were conducting deliveries without basic needs, such as water and electricity. Additionally, individual patient care can be poor in low- and middle-income countries. This is largely due to poor staff training and lack of quality guidelines, according to the authors of the second paper, who conducted a systematic review of clinical-based practice guidelines for maternal care. We identified no high-quality maternal health guidelines from LICs [low-income countries], which was of great concern, although our review did not consider activities or efforts in adaption and implementation of international guidelines to local settings, say the authors. Prof. Campbell comments that it is unethical to encourage women to give birth in poor quality facilities with no skilled attendants. This failing should be remedied as a matter of priority, she adds.

Wide disparities in maternal mortality across high-income countries While maternal mortality rates are falling in high-income countries, the authors of the fourth paper say large disparities remain at national and international levels. In the United States, for example, maternal mortality is at 14 per 100,000 live births, compared with 4 per 100,000 live births in Sweden. Most births in high-income countries occur in hospitals, the authors report, with most accompanied by a skilled birth attendant. However, the authors stress that not all care provided in these countries is based on clinical evidence, and there needs to be more focus on care surveillance in order to better understand the causes of maternal deaths that do occur. Furthermore, the series authors say there are a number of barriers to high-quality maternal care that need to be addressed in high-income countries, such as increasing obesity rates and the rising age of pregnancy.

Key strategies to reduce maternal mortality The final paper of the series lays out a number of key priorities that need to be addressed immediately in order to meet the SDG maternal mortality target. Firstly, the authors say high-quality maternal health care services that address patients individual needs should be put in place across the globe. Each country needs a clear national statement of what care needs to be provided to pregnant women, what constitutes routine care for uncomplicated deliveries, and what mechanisms are required to respond on a timely basis to complicated deliveries, including referral linkages, they explain. Countries then need to carefully compare this national statement with their present situation using tools such as facility and population-based surveys, or routine information systems. There should also be universal access to high-quality maternal health services, as a way of ensuring all women and babies receive equal care, regardless of where they are in the world. The authors add: Every universal health coverage initiative should include a strong maternal health service core and ensure that it reaches every woman, everywhere with quality care, and without causing financial hardship and pushing families into poverty. Health systems worldwide also need to be strengthened, which incorporates better training of maternal health care providers and improvements in birth facilities. Additionally, the authors say there needs to be guaranteed sustainable financing for maternal health care before and after birth. They point to a study estimating that between 2013-2015, an extra $72.1 billion is needed to provide high global coverage of quality maternal and newborn health care services. These services can be expected to yield a triple benefit of reduced maternal deaths, stillbirths and newborn deaths, and gains for child health and development, the authors note.
PHE is strongly advising people to stop using the product and to seek medical help urgently if they are concerned they have an infection.

Public Health England (PHE) is warning people who have recently had body piercings about an unsafe cleansing spray provided by piercing studios across the country for aftercare use, which may cause severe infection.

The product, linked to cases of serious infection, has been provided by piercing studios in many parts of the country. It is a 100ml bottled aftercare saline spray and is manufactured by Lion Care Products Ltd.

However, there is no consistent brand or label being used on the product. Some labels, using only black and white lettering, will have the manufacturer's trading name, Body Art Supplies, or may carry the Lion Care name; other studios' labels will use neither, but possibly just their own studio name or brand on the label. If unsure, people should stop using the spray immediately and return it to their local studio.

The spray may be linked to 26 cases of a severe infection, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, across England. Investigations are ongoing and PHE continue to monitor for further cases.

To date all have been ear infections, with the majority of cases occurring in the East Midlands and South East of England. However, the product is known to have been distributed widely across England therefore more cases are likely. The product has also been distributed in Scotland but to a much lesser extent. The cases have occurred in people where piercings were undertaken between mid-July and late August 2016. However, there may be other more recent cases which have not yet been reported.

PHE advice on aftercare following body piercings is to follow the guidelines provided on the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health website which include:

when checking the pierced site hands should be clean

soaking the piercing for a few minutes by submerging the area of skin containing the piercing in a clean bowl containing a warm water solution (1/4 level teaspoon of preferably sea salt to an egg cup or shot glass of warm water

alternatively, wetting a clean cloth or gauze in the solution and applying as a warm compress; this will soften any discharge and allow you to clean the entry and exit points of the piercing with a cotton bud or gauze

using mild antibacterial solutions and soaps to wash the wound site of an ear piercing; ask your local pharmacist to advise you and always follow the manufacturers' instructions

if irritation, redness or drying occurs discontinue use; antibacterial wash is not suitable for piercings on the nostrils, septum or vertical lips due to the tissue's delicate nature

after cleansing, drying the piercing using only fresh disposable paper towel or kitchen roll; a communal hand or bath towel should never be used

It is expected that some swelling and soreness from new piercings may occur. However, signs of infection to be aware of include:

swelling and redness that increases around the wound

a severe burning or throbbing sensation round the site

increased tenderness and becoming increasingly painful to touch

an unusual discharge (yellow or green) with an offensive smell

raised temperature and fever

Dr Richard Puleston, Consultant at PHE said:

Infection is not uncommon following piercings, but the particular type of bacteria linked to this outbreak can cause severe infection.

It is important that people take extra care in ensuring any piercing is properly cleansed and to follow professional advice available from local environmental health teams. If people are concerned about possible infection they are strongly advised to seek medical attention urgently.

PHE is continuing to investigate, and is liaising with the appropriate authorities in the devolved administrations, to ensure that the contaminated product is removed from piercing studios and wherever possible clients are contacted by their studio and advised to stop using the product.
In a study published online by JAMA Ophthalmology, Changwen Ke, Ph.D., of the Guangdong Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Guangzhou, China and colleagues examined whether Zika virus (ZIKV) could be detected from conjunctival swab samples of laboratory-confirmed ZIKV cases.

The clinical symptoms of ZIKV infection are mostly a mild and self-limited rash, joint pain, and conjunctivitis (also known as pink eye). More than 80 percent of ZIKV infections are asymptomatic. Severe eye damage in infants with microcephaly was associated with ZIKV infection. However, it has not been clear whether the eye lesions are the result of microcephaly or directly ZIKV infection.

Since February 12, 2016, 11 ZIKV infection cases (Chinese travelers) were imported from Venezuela in Guangdong, China. All the cases were confirmed to be ZIKV infection by real-time reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction. Serum and conjunctival swab samples were taken from 6 of 11 cases. The ZIKV RNA was detectable in serum no more than 5 days after symptom onset, but it was detected in conjunctival swab samples until day 7 in case 5.

"Detection of ZIKV RNA is a gold standard of confirmation of ZIKV infection. In this study, we described the direct detection and isolation of ZIKV from conjunctival swab samples. Although isolation of ZIKV in cell culture from urine, semen, saliva, and breast milk has been described, to our knowledge, detection and isolation of ZIKV from conjunctiva has not been reported so far. These results, though, are not sufficient to recommend the use of conjunctival swabs as alternative samples for ZIKV diagnosis because of shorter persisting and shedding time of ZIKV in conjunctiva fluid (<7 days) compared with urine and saliva samples (<20 days)," the authors write.

"It may have implications for transmission of ZIKV, e.g., through corneal graft donors, although this report does not provide direct evidence to support that indication. Nevertheless, epidemiological data and experimental studies are needed to assess the further significance of this finding because of increasing complications caused by ZIKV infection in neonates."
Scientists part-funded by Breast Cancer Now have discovered that non-cancer cells that wrap around blood vessels - called 'pericytes' - are helping breast cancer cells enter the bloodstream and spread around the body through the production of a key molecule called endosialin.

The study - led by scientists at the Breast Cancer Now Toby Robins Research Centre at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, and the German Cancer Research Centre (DKFZ) in Heidelberg - represents an important step forward in researchers' understanding of how and why breast cancer spreads. Currently, once the disease spreads to another part of the body - known as secondary (or metastatic) breast cancer - it becomes incurable and is ultimately the reason that around 11,500 women and 80 men lose their lives to the disease each year in the UK.

Pericytes are large, spider-like cells that sit on the outside of blood vessels and support their growth and function. In a new study published today in the journal Cancer Research, scientists have identified the important role the production of endosialin on the pericyte cell surface plays in breast cancer spreading to other organs.

For breast tumours to grow, they need a blood supply and so they look to attract the growth of nearby blood vessels. As well as providing the cancer cells with the oxygen and nutrients they need, this blood supply also provides an escape route into the rest of the body - but it has not been clear up until now what mechanism could be helping tumour cells escape through the vessel wall into the blood.

Using a combination of studies in mice, cells grown in the lab and samples donated by breast cancer patients, the research team - led by Professor Clare Isacke in the Breast Cancer Now Research Centre at the Institute of Cancer Research (ICR) and Professor Hellmut Augustin at the DKFZ in Heidelberg - compared pericytes that produced endosialin with ones that couldn't, and investigated how this affected the process of cancer spread.

Having established in mice that a lack of endosialin prevented breast cancer cells from getting into the blood vessels, the researchers turned to lab experiments to understand how pericytes facilitated the invasion of cancer cells into blood vessels.

The researchers grew pericytes and endothelial cells - the cells that form blood vessels - in layers, to replicate the barrier that cancer cells have to cross to get into the bloodstream. They were able to show that far fewer breast cancer cells were able to migrate through these layers if the pericytes did not produce endosialin, and that the presence of endosialin was required for the pericytes to actively facilitate this mechanism.

Finally, the researchers investigated what clinical relevance endosialin could have. They split a set of 334 patient samples in half based on their levels of endosialin expression, finding that women with higher endosialin were significantly more likely to experience their cancer spreading to new sites than those with lower levels.

This research identifies endosialin as a potential biomarker in the future - testing patients' tumours for the level of endosialin in the surrounding non-cancer cells could predict their risk of their disease spreading. By identifying those at high risk of spread, patients could be offered more intensive treatment.

Furthermore, while this is early research, the scientists believe that endosialin could be a therapeutic target and that drugs that block its function might be useful to help prevent and contain the spread of breast cancer.

The next step for Professor Isacke's team will be to try to uncover the exact mechanism by which pericytes begin producing endosialin, and precisely how endosialin helps cancer cells squeeze through the vessel wall into the blood.

Study co-leader Professor Clare Isacke, Professor of Molecular Cell Biology at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, said:

"Our study sheds valuable light on the role of pericytes - a type of cell that wraps around blood vessels - in helping breast cancer cells escape into the bloodstream and spread round the body. We found that a molecule called endosialin, which is produced on the surface of pericytes, plays a key role in aiding the getaway of cancer cells.

"We believe that endosialin could be a useful marker of how likely a woman's breast cancer is to spread around the body. And it might even be possible to block cancer spread by targeting this molecule with new drugs - something we plan to explore in future studies."

Baroness Delyth Morgan, Chief Executive at Breast Cancer Now, said:

"This discovery paves the way for research that could help prevent and contain the spread of breast cancer.

"We're hopeful that this fundamental understanding could lead to new ways to identify patients at high risk of their breast cancer spreading, who could be offered more intensive treatment.

"That endosialin could also eventually be targeted by drugs to prevent and contain secondary breast cancer is a really exciting prospect.

"Secondary breast cancer, where the disease has spread, is ultimately the reason that around 11,500 women in the UK lose their lives to the disease each year. Uncovering the processes that allow tumours to spread is therefore one of the most crucial questions remaining in breast cancer research."

The study was funded by Breast Cancer Now and the Medical Research Council in the United Kingdom, and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft and the Helmholtz Alliance in Germany. Breast Cancer Now thanks Walk the Walk and Future Dreams for their generous support towards Professor Clare Isacke's research.

Article: Endosialin-Expressing Pericytes Promote Metastatic Dissemination, Carmen Viski, Courtney Konig, Magdalena Kijewska, Carolin Mogler, Clare M. Isacke and Hellmut G. Augustin, Cancer Research, doi: 10.1158/0008-5472.CAN-16-0932, published 15 September 2016.
Publication of documents "serve to correct the public record," says The BMJ's Editor in chief.

In light of "inaccurate statements" made last week in the Lancet by its editor Richard Horton, The BMJ has published documents relating to a complaint about two statins articles it published in 2013.

The complaint was made by Professor Rory Collins to the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) in October 2014. Last week, Richard Horton wrongly stated that COPE had "declined to act" on Collins' concerns.

COPE did not decline to act, says Dr Fiona Godlee, The BMJ's Editor in chief.

The documents published outline COPE's deliberations on the concerns raised and The BMJ's response, and come to a clear conclusion that The BMJ "acted appropriately" in its handling of the articles which questioned the use of statins in people at low risk of heart disease.

This conclusion confirms the unanimous decision of an independent expert panel in August 2014 that The BMJ should not retract the two articles.

"We hope that publication of the documents relating to the complaint will serve to correct the public record," says Dr Godlee.

Dr Godlee has also written to England's chief medical officer, Sally Davies, asking her to set up an inquiry into the statins saga and an independent review of the evidence on statins.

"Independent third party scrutiny of the statins trial data remains an essential next step if this increasingly bitter and unproductive dispute is to be resolved," she writes in her weekly column.

The authors of the Lancet review clearly consider it to be a definitive account of the evidence on statins that should, they say, bring an end to a dangerous debate.

But not everyone agrees.

Commenting in The BMJ this week, Harlan Krumholz, Professor of Medicine at Yale University, agrees on the strong case for the overall benefits of statins, but he wants more acknowledgment of the trials' limitations. These include the lack of good evidence in elderly people, the variation in how adverse event data were collected, and the ageing of the trials themselves.

And in a BMJ blog, Richard Lehman, retired GP and Senior advisory fellow in primary care at Cochrane UK, says that adverse effects are much more common than the trials suggest.

"Muscle pain and fatigability are not a figment of misattribution and public misinformation," he says. "They are too prevalent and recurrent in people who desperately want to stay on statins. Rather than discount a widely observed phenomenon, we should ask why there is such a mismatch with reporting in the trials."

We need an independent review of statins, says Godlee. As Krumholz concludes, sharing the individual patient level data from the statins trials would send "a strong message that no single person or group should have exclusive access to data" that are so important for public health.

For all The BMJ's content relating to the statins debate go to bmj.com/campaign/statins-open-data .
Then Amb. Zhao and then Foreign Min. Ngafuan signing the agreement (September 11, 2012/Foreign Affairs)

At long last, the Chinese-funded project to construct a ministerial complex in Liberia has commenced.

The complex will be the second largest building constructed by China in Africa after the African Union (AU) Headquarters in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. It will include several large buildings for government ministries, agencies and other multipurpose functions.

In response to President Ellen Johnson Sirleafs request to the Chinese government, the two countries signed the US$60 million agreement in 2012; but had been delayed due to reasons including the deadly Ebola virus that struck Liberia and other countries in the region.

Chinese and Liberian workers fencing the site

Commuters in Monrovia are said to be thrilled having seen Chinese and local engineers working on the site because the project has been long-awaited.

Mr. Amos Siebo, deputy head of Liberias presidential deliverable unit (PDU) said Chinas Hebei Engineering Group is the contractor. The construction firm, Siebo said, is employing hundreds of Liberians as well as training some local engineers for the complex and other projects.

Siebo also indicated that Liberias Ministry of Public Works is working alongside the Chinese team, considering constructing over path routes in order to avoid congested traffic in the area.

He said the project is in two phases, also including the expansion of the Capitol Building, the seat of the Liberian legislature. Kuangdu Construction Company, also a Chinese firm, is carrying on the project, Siebo noted.

Augustine Kpehe Ngafuan and Zhao Jianhua, then Liberias Foreign Minister and then Chinese Ambassador to Liberia respectively, formally penned the agreement on September 11, 2012 in Monrovia.

Speaking at the signing ceremony, Ambassador Zhao explained that the fund will be paid out of the gratuitous assistance stipulated in agreements on economic and technical corporation between the Chinese and Liberian governments signed respectively on September 27, 2011 and January 17, 2012. The building will be a lasting symbol of both nations friendship, he said.

For Ngafuan, China has been making tremendous contributions to Liberia following the restoration of diplomatic ties.

He named packages from the Chinese Government including contribution of its contingent to the peace process in 2003 and other investments including the 2009 signing of a US$2.6 billion Concession Agreement (the highest ever in Liberia) for the mining of iron ore, and the construction of the Jackson Fiah Doe Memorial Hospital (the second largest health facility in Liberia) and the modern Fendall Campus for the University of Liberia and other Chinese built high schools, among others as well the provision of hundreds of under- and post-graduate scholarships.

Also, China contributed in battling the deadly Ebola virus in Liberia and other affected countries in West Africa.

In 2015, China also turned over to the Liberian government a modern annex of the Monrovia Vocational Training Center (MVTC) as well as other projects.

Joe Wandah, spokesman of the Liberian Association of Chinese-Trained Scholars (LACTS), contributed to this story. LACTS is an organization of Liberians who have completed studies and other training opportunities in China.

Fredrick P. W. Gaye is the News Editor of In Profile Daily Newspaper in Liberia and a fellow at the China Africa Press Center (CAPC). He can be reached by: [email protected]
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Each additional 10 grams of alcohol consumed per day was associated with an estimated increase in left atrial dimension of 0.16 mm and a 5% risk of atrial fibrillation, lead author David McManus, MD, director of the Atrial Fibrillation Treatment Program at UMass Memorial Health Care in Massachusetts. and colleagues report in a study published online in the"Despite the widely held belief by the public that alcohol has a beneficial effect on general heart health, acute alcohol consumption has long been linked to the development of [atrial fibrillation]", said Dr. David McManus.Senior author Gregory Marcus, MD (University of California, San Francisco), said the fact that those relationships were seen even at consumption levels of only roughly one drink per day was a little bit surprising and suggests "the even the amounts of alcohol that are considered acceptable by the American Heart Association (AHA), for example, could be harmful to those prone to atrial fibrillation."The AHA recommends that for those who choose to drink alcohol, it should be done in moderation, defined as one to two drinks per day for men and one drink for women.Alcohol should not necessarily be considered heart healthy, Marcus said, noting that any protective effect likely involves coronary disease, with unknown effects on other types of disease.A relationship between alcohol consumption and A-fib has been observed in multiple studies, but the main unknown has been the mechanism. Heavy alcohol use has been shown to impair ventricular function, and it is possible that the atriawhich seem to be more prone to damage than the ventriclescould be enlarged with even small-to-moderate amounts of alcohol.To test whether that occurs and whether it could represent a possible mechanism to explain the link between drinking alcohol and A-fib, the investigators looked at data from 5,220 participants who were enrolled in the Framingham Heart Study or the children of those who participated in the study. They underwent echocardiographic measurements of left atrial size. Most were free from cardiovascular disease at baseline.At the beginning of the study, the average age of participants was 56 years and their mean left atrial dimension was 38.3. mm. Average alcohol consumption was 13.3 grams per day. Through a median follow-up of 6 years, the incidence of A-fib was 8.4 per 1,000 person-years.Over the study period, the researchers found that every additional 10 grams of alcohol (just less than one drink) consumed daily was linked to a 0.16-millimeter (0.006 inches) increase in the diameter of the left atrium.Although incrementally greater amounts of alcohol consumption were associated with larger left atrial sizes, there was no relationship between intake and the change in left atrial dimension over time.After adjustment for left atrial dimension, the link between alcohol intake and A-fib became nonsignificant. The authors estimated that 24% of the association could be explained between alcohol and left atrial enlargement."These data, although observational, are consistent with the notion that chronic alcohol consumption, even at moderate levels, can be cardiotoxic and lead to pathological atrial structural change that can, in turn, enhance vulnerability to [A-fib] later in life," the authors write.Further research is needed to identify genetic or environmental exposures that can identify at-risk patients."If you're completely healthy in every other way, have no hypertension, exercise, your cholesterol's perfect, and you don't smoke, is it alright to have moderate use of alcohol? Probably," said Mariell Jessup, MD (Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia), stressing that nobody should be drinking excess. "But if you're drinking more than moderately every day and you have other risk factors including hypertension or older age, I think alcohol may contribute to the development of atrial fibrillation. And the reason, of course, that that's so important is that atrial fibrillation leads to stroke."Source: Medindia
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The world health body said that surveillance for dengue and chikungunya in India presently captures only those patients who are "laboratory confirmed at government identified sentinel hospitals".As part of coordinated efforts to tackle the vector-borne diseases, the Delhi government informed that several religious institutions such as -- Gauri Shankar Temple, Tilak Nagar Gurudwara, Jama Masjid and Orthodox church among others -- will be making special appeals to the public and request their support to ensure that the vector borne diseases can be curtailed.ASSOCHAM said that tourism and aviation industries were heavily getting affected due to the outbreak of chiukungunya and dengue, and the rising deaths triggered by the disease. All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) on Thursday confirmed the death of nine of its patients suffering from dengue.Sir Ganga Ram Hospital and Shalimar Bagh Fortis also reported the death of one elderly patient each, who were admitted with chikungunya fever which aggravated their chronic problems of heart and other infections. Both tested positive for chikungunya through rapid PCR test.In a letter to Nadda, Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain said the Delhi government was making best efforts to coordinate with the union Health Ministry and its hospitals to tackle the outbreak of dengue and chikungunya.Jain, who has inspected over a dozen hospitals since returning from Goa, has stressed that patients from areas outlying Delhi were visiting Delhi hospitals, putting pressure on the medical infrastructure in the national capital, particularly in government hospitals."Many of the patients coming to Delhi hospitals are from neighbouring states in the NCR. They rush to Delhi hospitals apparently due to lack of proper healthcare facilities in their states," the minister said. Jain also praised doctors in Delhi government hospitals and said that many beds were vacant at many government hospitals even now.Delhi Tourism Minister Kapil Mishra, while addressing a press conference in Delhi said that the Delhi government has received a "phenomenal response" to its appeal requesting every one to fight vector borne diseases."The campaign has received support from founder of Art of Living Sri Sri Ravi Shankar and their volunteers will be visiting the household across Delhi to create awareness and help in the fogging drive," said Mishra, adding that prominent celebrities like Amjad Ali Khan, Birju Maharaj and Subha Mudgal have also pledged their support to the campaign.Source: IANS
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Based on the surveys, the researchers concluded that 50.2% of children lived in houses with guns and 36% of respondents said they had firearms in their homes while another 14% were regularly in houses of relatives or friends that had them.About 77% parents said their pediatricians did not ask them any questions about gun safety. Only 13% of parents reported their pediatricians asking them about firearm safety at homes. Less than 1 percent of respondents said their child's pediatrician was a significant source of firearm safety information.But, at least when it comes to safely storing guns, three-fourths of parents said the doctor should offer some advice. Parents who owned guns were less likely to want pediatricians discussing gun safety.The study also suggests there's room for improvement when it comes to firearm safety at home. Of parents who owned guns, 22%t reported keeping their firearms and ammunition in the same location, and about a quarter said they kept at least one firearm loaded inside the home."A lot of children die every year because of needless injuries, because of their curiosity. Pediatricians are not firearm safety experts for the most part, but they are experts on childhood development," said Jane Garbutt, a professor of medicine at Washington University in St. Louis and the paper's lead author. "Parents look to their pediatricians as their most trusted source of information about a lot of things."Firearm-related incidents continue to pose a significant threat to child and adolescent health. In 2013, more than 6,000 children were hospitalized due to firearm-related incidents and 2,465 died, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.The research comes while states debate what physicians can or should say to patients about firearms. A Florida law, which bans doctors' inquiries about guns, is currently facing a court challenge. Several other states  including Texas, North Dakota, Oklahoma and Virginia  have considered similar laws, though none passed.Such legislation, which is supported by the National Rifle Association, has attracted criticism from groups like the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Medical Association, which say such measures limit physicians' First Amendment rights and interfere with the appropriate practice of medicine."Unintentional injury is a real concern," said Judith Schaecter, chairwoman of pediatrics at the University of Miami, a member of the AAP's Council on Violence, Injury and Poison Prevention and one of the doctors challenging Florida's law. She was not involved in the study.The NRA did not immediately respond to requests for comment on this study, but the organization previously has argued that families visiting the doctor are looking for medical advice, and that physicians asking about guns intrudes on patient privacy. Lawyers defending the Florida law argue it is trying to "prevent harassment and discrimination."This study suggests the issue is more complicated, Garbutt said, and that there are ways pediatricians can inquire appropriately about gun safety without alienating patients. For instance, when a child starts to crawl, pediatricians want to ask about whether they are ever in contact with potentially hazardous materials, like prescription medication and toxic cleaning supplies. It would be easy, she said, to add firearms to that list  grouping them with materials that may be risky without explicitly asking parents about gun ownership."You don't have to ask directly about firearm ownership. You're just asking about a firearm as a hazard," she said.And the study finds such questioning could bring benefits. Of survey respondents, about one in five kept their guns and ammunition together. And a quarter stored firearms loaded, which increases the odds of injury if children find them while playing, Garbutt noted. More people are getting guns because they want them for protection, she said. That means they're more likely to keep them readily accessible, where children could also find them."You need to be sensitive to the needs of our patients," Fleegler said. "Yes, we are talking about something that some people may feel uncomfortable with, but then again, there are some patients who don't want to talk about immunizations. There are people who don't want to talk about domestic violence, who don't want to talk about sex, etc. It's up to the pediatrician to find out a way to balance this."Pediatricians, meanwhile, appear skittish. Anecdotally, Garbutt said, many said they didn't feel comfortable discussing gun safety. That may be because they are afraid of offending patients, or don't know how to approach the conversation, she said. And controversies like that over the Florida law may play a role, Fleegler noted."The presence of these laws really dampens people's willingness to have these conversations," he said.Meanwhile, there needs to be further investigation when it comes to how doctors should handle these conversations, said David Hemenway, a professor of health policy at the Harvard School of Public Health. He is also the director of the university's Injury Control Research Center, and was not involved in the study. Right now, he added, there isn't a general sense of how doctors should best approach discussing gun safety.That matters, Garbutt said. The absence of productive conversations keep children at serious risk."There are a lot of risks for children in terms of their chance to come across a loaded firearm. What we know from other studies is if they can find it, they will, and if they find it, they will play with it," she said. "Parents who have a gun in the home need to make absolutely sure it's not accessible to their children.">Source: Medindia
Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) is a retrovirus which is capable of causing AIDS (Acquired Immuno Deficiency Syndrome). HIV weakens the bodys immune system resulting in infections and cancer-related disorders. There is no effective cure for HIV but with proper medical care and treatment, the disease can be controlled.

Treatment of HIV with anti-viral medications is referred to as antiretroviral therapy (ART). Antiretroviral drugs lower the viral content of the bloodstream. They do not cure HIV infection but help to prevent viral replication. This therapy improves the patient s life and decreases the risk of HIV transmission.

Anti-retroviral therapy includes the following classes of drugs:

Nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors : These drugs prevent HIV replication by blocking the reverse transcriptase enzyme that converts RNA to DNA. They include lamivudine, zidovudine, didanosine, emtricitabine, tenofovir, stavudine and abacavir.

: These drugs prevent HIV replication by blocking the reverse transcriptase enzyme that converts RNA to DNA. They include lamivudine, zidovudine, didanosine, emtricitabine, tenofovir, stavudine and abacavir. Non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors : Non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors also inhibit the reverse transcriptase enzyme. They include drugs like efavirenz, nevirapine, delavirdine, etravirine and rilpivirine which are taken in combination with other drugs to treat HIV infections.

: Non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors also inhibit the reverse transcriptase enzyme. They include drugs like efavirenz, nevirapine, delavirdine, etravirine and rilpivirine which are taken in combination with other drugs to treat HIV infections. Protease inhibitors : Protease inhibitors are drugs which inhibit the protease enzyme of the HIV virus that is necessary for viral replication and infectivity. Drugs like saquinavir, ritonavir, nelfinavir, indinavir and amprenavir are some of the protease inhibitors.

: Protease inhibitors are drugs which inhibit the protease enzyme of the HIV virus that is necessary for viral replication and infectivity. Drugs like saquinavir, ritonavir, nelfinavir, indinavir and amprenavir are some of the protease inhibitors. Integrase inhibitor  The integrase inhibitors raltegravir, elvitegravir and dolutegravir prevent the replication of the HIV virus.

 The integrase inhibitors raltegravir, elvitegravir and dolutegravir prevent the replication of the HIV virus. CCR5 (Chemokine receptor type 5) antagonist  A CCR5 antagonist prevents the entry of the HIV virus into the CD4 cells. Maraviroc is an approved CCR5 antagonist, also called entry inhibitor.

 A CCR5 antagonist prevents the entry of the HIV virus into the CD4 cells. Maraviroc is an approved CCR5 antagonist, also called entry inhibitor. Fusion inhibitor A fusion inhibitor prevents the entry of the HIV virus into the CD4 cells. Enfuvirtide is an approved fusion inhibitor.

Other drugs like cobicistat are used along with anti-HIV drugs to improve their effectiveness.

Highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) is a combination of medications used to treat HIV infections. It was first introduced in 1996. The combination of drugs is mainly based on the virus strain, viral load (It is a measure of the number of HIV viruses present in the bloodstream), CD4 cell count and presence of other diseases. The combination reduces the chances of the virus developing resistance to treatment.

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Which Patients Should Receive ART?

All patients who are infected with the HIV virus should receive ART. The HIV-negative sexual partners of HIV positive individuals should also receive treatment. In particular, anti-HIV treatment should be started immediately in the following patients with HIV:

Patients who develop symptoms of AIDS. AIDS is defined as the presence of a CD4 count of less than 200 cells/mm3, or the presence of a life-threatening condition like cervical cancer or tuberculosis

Patients who have associated hepatitis or other infections or diseases

Patients who have been infected with HIV within the previous six months

As per the current United States Department of Health and Human Services Guidelines:

The antiretroviral therapy is recommended for HIV patients to reduce the risk of disease progression.

The antiretroviral therapy is used for the prevention of HIV transmission.

HIV patients who are taking ART should be able to commit to treatment. They must understand the importance of the therapy by knowing its benefits and risks. They have to understand that if they do not take the medications on a regular basis, the virus can develop resistance to the drug, and make treatment more difficult. They may want to postpone therapy and doctors may decide on treatment on a case-by-case basis based on clinical or psychosocial factors.

Pregnant women

HIV medications are chosen based on

Health conditions and diseases that HIV patients might have like cancer or other opportunistic infections

Drug resistance

Intake of other medications which might interact with the HAART drugs

Medication cost

Availability of a single combination pill which enhances the ease of taking the combination.

Some approved anti-HIV drug regimens

Zidovudine + Lamivudine + Abacavir

Elvitegravir + Cobicistate + Emtricitabine + Tenofovir

Tenofovir + Emtricitabine + Efavirenz

Helps to restore the functions of the immune system.

Improves the overall health and prolongs life span.

Suppresses the virus replication

Helps to reduce HIV transmission (even during pregnancy ART helps to reduce mother-to-child transmission)

Possibility of drug resistance

Adverse effects of the HIV medication

Drug toxicity which may even harm the fetus.

Each class of drug in the antiretroviral therapy will have its side effects

Nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors  High cholesterol levels, lactic acidosis, lipodystrophy (redistribution of fat)

Non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors - Rash, liver damage, lipid abnormalities

Protease inhibitors - Gastrointestinal intolerance, high blood glucose levels and lipid abnormalities

Other complications may include osteoporosis, osteonecrosis (bone death), inflammation of the muscle, rhabdomyolysis (breakdown of skeletal muscle), liver disorders and coronary heart diseases.

Some Antiretroviral Drug Combinations that Should be Avoided:
The following are some of this week's reports from the MEMRI Jihad and Terrorism Threat Monitor (JTTM) Project, which translates and analyzes content from sources monitored around the clock, among them the most important jihadi websites and blogs. (To view these reports in full, you must be a paying member of the JTTM; for membership information, send an email to [email protected] with "Membership" in the subject line.)

Note to media and government: For a full copy of these reports, send an email with the title of the report in the subject line to [email protected]. Please include your name, title, and organization in your email.

Al-Qaeda Leader Al-Zawahiri In 9/11 Anniversary Message: As Long As Your Crimes Continue, The Events Of 9/11 Will Be Repeated Thousands Of Times

On September 9, 2016, Al-Qaeda's media wing Al-Sahab released a video message by the group's leader, Ayman Al-Zawahiri, marking the 15th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. Al-Zawahiri reiterates the reasons behind the attacks and their impact on the U.S., and urges the mujahideen to focus on targeting the U.S. and its allies and to bring the battle onto Western soil. "As long as your crimes continue, the events of 9/11 will be repeated thousands of times, Allah willing," he says. Appealing to non-Muslim African-Americans, he blames their woes on the U.S. and calls to them to convert to Islam.

JTTM subscribers click here to view this clip on MEMRI TV

Islamic State Supporters: Al-'Adnani's Death Will Not Stop Us From Targeting West

Following the reports, on August 30, 2016, on the death of Abu Muhammad Al-'Adnani, who was the spokesman of the Islamic State (ISIS) and one of its top commanders, ISIS mouthpieces, and supporters of the organization, began posting articles, poems and videos that eulogized him, praised his career, and encouraged others to follow his example and fight the enemies more fiercely than ever.

ISIS Suicide Attacker In Video: We Will Kill The Shi'ite Enemies In Iraq, America Can Not Save Them

On September 12, 2016, the information office of the Islamic State (ISIS) in Al-Furat Province, Iraq, posted a 14-minute video titled "The Frightening Lightning." The video, which was posted on pro-ISIS Telegram channels, shows ISIS fighters engaged in combat against Iraqi soldiers and Shi'ite militia members throughout Al-Furat Province. It also shows a large quantity of weapons taken as loot during the fighting, as well as numerous enemy bodies. The video also praises the ISIS fighters for their courage and shows images of fighters who fell in combat, adding that jihad is the only path to defeat the enemies wherever they are.

Pro-ISIS Hacking Group Calls For Recruits On 'ZeroNet' Website

A site belonging to the "Cyber Kahilafah," a pro-Islamic State (ISIS) hacking group, has appeared on ZeroNet, a serverless peer-to-peer (P2P) network utilizing crowd-sourcing to host websites. The decentralized web platform uses Bitcoin cryptography and the BitTorrent network.

Pro-ISIS Websites Emerge On 'ZeroNet,' Possibly Signaling A Trend

In the last month, several pro-Islamic State (ISIS) websites have emerged on ZeroNet, a decentralized peer-to-peer (P2P) network that uses the BitTorrent network and Bitcoin cryptography. ZeroNet says that it is an "uncensorable" network whose websites are "impossible to shut down."

On Facebook, British ISIS Recruiter Shares Handwritten Letter Allegedly Written By Three Female Perpetrators Of ISIS Attack In Mombasa, Kenya

On September 12, 2016, a British ISIS fighter and recruiter on Facebook, shared a photo of a handwritten letter allegedly written by the women who carried out an attack on a police station in Mombasa, Kenya on September 11, 2016. On September 13, ISIS's official news agency A'maq claimed responsibility for the attack.

In Snapchat Video, Jabhat Fath Al-Sham (JFS) Fighter Thanks Followers For Donations, Shows Off New Ak-47s, Other Equipment They Funded

On September 14, 2015, a Jabhat Fath Al-Sham (JFS) fighter shared a video and still images from it via the Snapchat app in which he thanked his followers for their donations. In the video, he shows off a few AK-47s that he says he bought thanks to this funding, noting that each had cost $2,000. The funding also went towards acquiring night vision goggles which cost $6,000 for each pair. The Venice, California-based Snapchat allows users to private-message others and to broadcast public content.

Jabhat Fath Al-Sham Condemns Recent Russia-U.S. Ceasefire Agreement, Calls It 'New Conspiracy' Against Jihad In Syria

On September 13, 2016, Jabhat Fath Al-Sham (JFS), the Syria-based jihadi group formerly known as Jabhat Al-Nusrah (JN), released a statement condemning the recent Russia-U.S. ceasefire agreement, calling it a "new conspiracy" aimed at "dividing the ranks of the jihadi groups in Syria and preserving the Assad regime and its institutions." In the statement, which was posted on the JFS official Twitter account, the group praised the jihadi groups in Syria that had released statements condemning and rejecting the agreement, and commended them for "committing to the principle of brotherhood based on religion and to [pledging] loyalty to the believers."

AQAP Reacts To Arrest Of Women In France On Terrorism Charges, Forbids Women From Participating In Jihad Operations In The West

On September 14, 2016, Al-Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula (AQAP) media team, which publishes the group's English- language magazine Inspire, distributed a two-page document in reaction to the arrest of several women in France on suspicions of preparing a terrorist attack in the name of the Islamic State (ISIS).

The document, titled "Comment on arresting our Muslim sisters in France", accuses the French government of committing crimes against Muslim women in France under the guise of its "war against Islam and the Muslims." The authors call upon jihadis in the West to not allow women to participate in "lone jihad operations," instead urging Muslim men in France to carry out attacks.

Turkestan Islamic Party (TIP) Eid Al-Adha Nasheed Celebrates Holiday, Promises To Continue Making Sacrifices, Fighting Enemies

On the occasion of Eid Al-Adha, the Syrian branch of the Turkestan Islamic Party (TIP) released a video for a nasheed in the Uyghur language titled "Today Is Our Eid Al-Adha," which celebrates the Muslim holiday, praises fighters who have been killed for the cause, and promises to continue fighting the enemies.

Syrian Sheikh 'Abd Al-Razaq Al-Mahdi Calls On Muslims In East Turkestan To Hold Onto Their Religion, Accuses China Of Attempting To Hinder Islam

On September 12, 2016, Sawt Al-Islam ("The Voice of Islam"), the official media arm of the Turkestan Islamic Party (TIP), published a 9-minute video in which Sheikh 'Abd Al-Razaq Al-Mahdi, a Syria-based cleric associated with Jabhat Fath Al-Sham (JFS, formerly Jabhat Al-Nusra), calls on Muslims living in East Turkestan to hold onto their religion firmly. In the video, which was posted on the GIMF Telegram channel, Al-Mahdi accused the Chinese government, which he called "infidel and atheist," of attempting to hinder Muslims from adhering to their religion.

Turkestan Islamic Party (TIP) Releases Part 23 In Its 'Call From The Frontlines Of Jihad' Video Series

On September 11, 2016, the Syrian branch of the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Turkestan Islamic Party (TIP) released Part 23 in its "Call from the Frontlines of Jihad" video series, which features fighters urging Muslims living in Turkestan to make hijra and join them in Syria. The series is presented entirely in the Uyghur language and does not include subtitles.
The following clip is now a complimentary offering from MEMRI's Jihad and Terrorism Threat Monitor (JTTM). For JTTM subscription information, click here.

An Islamic State (ISIS) video released online on September 6, 2016 showcased a shari'a school that it operates in its Al-Khayr Province, featuring its young pupils - "the cubs of the Caliphate" - discussing their aspirations of martyrdom, instructing citizens on approved clothing and grooming, and fighting on the front lines. The video states that these children will "become the vanguard of the army of the Caliphate, Allah willing, and... the generation that will conquer Damascus, Baghdad, Jerusalem, Mecca, Al-Madina, Dabiq, Rome, and Andalusia."

To view this video, click here or below.

The following is the transcript of the video:

Narrator: "The Caliphate's Generation

"In the lands of the tyrants, the children are asked, from a very early age: 'What would you like to be when you grow up?' If a child says that he wants to be a mujahid, or a student of religion, or an imam, or to work in the field of da'wa, his words are frowned upon and he is held in disdain. But if a child says that he wants to be a minister or an MP, a judge, a pilot, a soldier, or a policeman, they rejoice, laugh, and praise him. This way, the secular education system instills these aspirations in the souls of Muslim children from a very early age, so that they are raised on heresy and on fighting Islam and the Muslims, and they view things in a distorted way, using misnomers. The child who wanted to become a fighter pilot realizes his dream, thanks to the secular education he received in the education systems of the tyrants. He sees nothing wrong with receiving orders from the American Crusaders, or with honoring them with a military salute. He is not ashamed to fly over Muslim cities, and to rain rockets and bombs down upon them, killing vulnerable women and children.

"On our tour of a shari'a institution, run by the Islamic State in the Al-Khayr Province, we asked the cubs of the Caliphate about their dreams and aspirations."

Child 1: "I want to be a martyrdom-seeker for the sake of Allah, thus heeding the words of the Prophet Muhammad: 'The martyrs that Allah loves most are the ones who fight in the front lines, and do not turn their backs until they are killed.'"

Child 2: "I want to be a martyrdom-seeking religious scholar, like my brother was."

Narrator: "Parents undoubtedly play a role in their children's deviation from the right path. You see some of them hastening to enroll their children in Western schools, artistic groups and clubs, and singing competitions. They do not care about the harm these cause to the faith of their children. You see them elated with happiness if their sons win a song or dance competition.

"On the other hand, in the Islamic State, parents take their children to shari'a institutions. They urge their children to study the Quran and religion. You see them happy if their children learn part of the Quran or a religious text by heart. How great is the difference between those raised on monotheism and the Quran and those raised on listening to songs and music."

Child 3: "My brother, Allah bless you, you are not allowed to swim in these clothes, because your private parts can be seen. If a woman passes you by, would you like her to see you this way? Put your shirt on."

Child 4: "Assalaam alaykum."

Man: "Assalaam alaykum."

Child 4: "How are you?"

Man: "Fine, Allah be praised."

Child 4: "Uncle, you need to grow your beard, in order to comply with the words of the Prophet Muhammad: 'Trim your mustaches and grow your beards.'"

Narrator: "The cubs do not engage only in activities in the field of shari'a. They join their brothers fighting on the front lines. Just as they are humble towards Muslims, they are harsh towards the infidels. From a very young age, they are raised on harshness, hatred, and animosity toward the infidels.

"The tyrants strive to make the sons of Muslims deviate from their religion, to open the gates of apostasy for them, to obstruct the fountains of goodness and promote Satan's merchandise, so that these children will become soldiers of the Crusaders, and will fight Islam and the Muslims, or so that they will become humiliated and subjugated, steeped in secularism and its values, like respect for the infidel 'other,' and rejecting the 'violence' that Allah called 'Jihad.' It reached the point that when the tyrants closed in on them, killed thousands of them and raped their women, all they did was say: 'Our peaceful [protests] are stronger than bullets!'

"At the same time, the Caliphate is teaching its cubs about their religion, so that they become the vanguard of the army of the Caliphate, Allah willing, and so that they will become the generation that will conquer Damascus, Baghdad, Jerusalem, Mecca, Al-Madina, Dabiq, Rome, and Andalusia, Allah willing.

"The Islamic State is proud to have planted true Islam within these cubs, who will be in the midst of the battles in a few years, Allah willing. Even if we are all eradicated and no one survives, these cubs will carry the banner of jihad and will complete the journey. By Allah, with these young men, we will make the infidels forget the whispers of Satan."
Four parties are expected to secure again their representation in the Duma: the ruling United Russia (UR), the Liberal-Democratic Russian party (LDPR), led by Vladimir Zhirinovsky, Just Russia, led by Sergei Mironov, and the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (KPRF), led by Gennadi Zyuganov.[1] In contrast, the democratic opposition has fewer chances of being represented. The opposition Russian Democratic Party ("Yabloko") and People's Party of Freedom (RPR-PARNAS), cofounded by murdered opposition politician Boris Nemtsov (October 9, 1959-February 27, 2015), will contest the elections separately - a suicidal tactic that mathematically further reduces their already slim chances to enter the Duma and further reduces the credibility of Russian liberalism. The democratic opposition is represented in the elections by yet another independent nominee -Maria Baronova, running with the support of Open Russia movement, founded by former oil tycoon-turned-activist Mikhail Khodorkovsky, residing out of Russia after his release from long term jail.

According to Aleksander Ryklin, editor-in-chief of the Russian independent media outlet Everyday Journal, the opposition should not participate in the legislative elections, since mere participation in the electoral process legitimizes the current system. "The whole political system is built in order to prevent the change of powers," he said.[2] Nikolai Polozov wrote in his column in Everyday Journal that "even if a couple of decent men enter the parliament, they should have not given their voters the false image of legitimacy to the legislative branch."[3]

Georgi Satarov, an adviser to Russian president Boris Yeltsin from 1992 to 1997, argued that even a small group of opposition candidates in the Duma will create ground for discussion aiming to oppose the automatic approval of all current governmental actions. He also argued that the emergence of a legitimate real opposition in the parliament encourages the growth of grass-roots "street" oppositional activities.[4]

Political expert Dmitri Oreshkin argued that while the elections have predetermined results, they represent "internal vibration" in Russia's authorities. He explained that if United Russia gets more than 40% of the vote, the system of power will preserve its shape, but if it gets less than 35%, the policy vector will change, leading to the reshaping of the government, including the resignation of Russian Prime Minister and UR Chairman Dmitri Medvedev. Thus, he suggested that the opposition should indeed go out to vote, not boycott the elections, since low voter turnout plays in favor of the ruling party.[5]

However, according to the Russian media outlet Gazeta.ru, Putin's and Medvedev's recent fishing trip to Lipno Island, on Ilmen Lake in the Novgorod region, demonstrates that no matter the percentage of the vote that UR gets, Medvedev will remain in the government. Moreover, since the next political goal is the 2018 presidential elections, Gazeta.ru assessed that Putin might be thinking of presenting Medvedev for another term as Russia's president. Meanwhile, Mikhail Khodorkovsky has launched the "Replacing Putin" project for the 2018 election campaign. Gazetta.ru defined this project as "naive and utopian," but at the same time, as "a perfectly intelligible attempt to demonstrate, at least on the level of political gesture, that a non-Kremlin-endorsed presidential candidate (a candidate, no more!) is a possibility in Russia."[6]

Below is a review of Gazeta.ru's article:[7]



(Source: Novayagazeta.ru, September 9, 2016)

"Medvedev Remains Closer To Putin Than Any Other Public Politician"

"An unexpected Putin-Medvedev fishing trip [on September 10, 2016] - by no means their first - has coincided with the launch of Mikhail Khodorkovsky's 'Replacing Putin' project, designed to identify an alternative presidential candidate in time for the 2018 election. Even if Putin seeks a new term - an assumption both Russian and global elites are currently operating on - the problem of handing over the reins of power in Russia isn't simply going to disappear; indeed, it is a problem that can only deepen with every year that the current status quo remains in place.

"As Putin and Medvedev have already demonstrated to the political elite, their fishing trips tend to be far from innocuous - and at least one such outing has played a determining role in the fate of the country. On August 17, 2011, the duo, who were vacationing in the southwestern city of Astrakhan (and doing a spot of fishing on the Volga), decided that Medvedev wouldn't seek a second term, but that Putin, for his part, would seek a third. Although the tandem's latest jaunt would appear to be a PR stunt ahead of the Duma elections on September 18, it still provides ample food for thought - and not only with regard to the narrow context of the elections.



Source: Themoscowtimes.com, September 16, 2016.

"Namely, it demonstrates, or was at least intended to demonstrate, that Medvedev remains closer to Putin than any other public politician; that Medvedev is unlikely to be dismissed from government prior to the presidential elections (or, indeed, relegated to a role with a title like Special Ecology Representative); and that, in all likelihood, Medvedev can continue to be regarded as a potential successor to Putin if, for whatever reason, the latter decides not to stand for election in 2018, or to stand down midway through the six-year term.

"Medvedev is a known quantity for Putin and the elites - not least because he has already served as president. And, during his time in the top office, he didn't touch a hair on anyone's head (well, apart from that of then Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov - a dismissal that had clearly been green-lighted by Putin), and took no action that would have somehow weakened the standing of Putin's elite. Furthermore, in what was an unprecedented move in Russian political history, he meekly relinquished power to his predecessor; never before had anyone done anything remotely comparable. Generally speaking, Medvedev must be regarded as virtually the sole politician with a genuine shot at picking up the reins of power in Russia, a country still lacking any proper democratic mechanisms - political competition, transparent elections, real parties - for handing them over.

"In the absence of these mechanisms, Khodorkovsky's 'Replacing Putin' project appears naive and utopian; in purely human terms, however, it also represents a perfectly intelligible attempt to demonstrate, at least on the level of political gesture that a non-Kremlin-endorsed presidential candidate (a candidate, no more!) is a possibility in Russia. At the same time, it's clear that Khodorkovsky will be able neither to run himself (the law forbids individuals with previous convictions from doing so), nor to bring a favored candidate to power. [anti-corruption activist Alexei] Navalny, the most famous opposition leader in today's Russia, cannot run for the same reasons as Khodorkovsky. The list of alternative candidates has a peculiar, somewhat ridiculous air about it; on the other hand, though, no one expected Putin to become president of Russia in 1999...



Source: Themoscowtimes.com, September 16, 2016.

"The issue of Putin's successor was raised by the president himself in a recent interview with Bloomberg.[8] Putin admitted the possibility of a successor's emergence, noting that whoever comes to replace him must be a 'young yet mature individual.' Going by this logic - that of Putin and the Kremlin at large - Medvedev would appear to fit the bill nicely... Speaking of the Russian agenda, one of the most pressing political issues facing our country today is that it's not overly dissimilar from the post-Soviet Central Asian republics, what with their lifelong presidents and such. Take Uzbekistan, for example. Immediately following the death of [Uzbeki president Islam] Karimov, the constitution, which requires that the head of parliament be appointed interim president during transitional periods, was violated: the Uzbek parliament handed this role to incumbent Prime Minister Shavkat Mirziyoyev, who will subsequently go on to become head of state. In Russia, too, the authorities are still wont to resolve the 'presidential question' prior to any elections, and in private (during a fishing jaunt, for example); the elections themselves serve merely to rubber-stamp a behind-the-scenes decision.

"Given this context, Khodorkovsky's project may prove not-so-naive: it may simply become an attempt to instill into the public consciousness the logical idea that, sooner or later, the country will have a head of state other than Putin. That there may be more than one - and, indeed, more than two - candidates for the post of president. That these candidates need not have any links to the Kremlin. That a change of head of state, if the state is politically sustainable never entails the automatic destruction of the country. And, finally, that the future of a nuclear power with a population of some 145 million people need not be decided over the course of a high-profile fishing trip."



Source: Themoscowtimes.com, September 16, 2016.

Endnotes:
BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- China on Thursday hurled its first Tiangong-2 lab into space, marking another step forward in the country's plans to establish a permanent station by the early 2020s.

China's rapid development in space exploration within the past decade has impressed the world. Martin Barstow, director of Leicester Institute of Space & Earth Observation at the University of Leicester, told Xinhua in a recent interview that China's developing space program is another major milestone towards establishing a permanent presence in space.

"The earlier success of the first space station (Tiangong-1) shows how the program is developing and the new space laboratory will continue to add to China's status as a major space power," the professor said.

Former NASA astronaut Leroy Chiao, the first Chinese-American to be commander of the International Space Station, hailed Tiangong-2 as "another significant step for China's human spaceflight program."

"China is moving in a very deliberate and orderly fashion to advance their space capability," Chiao said. "I think the technology is good, and they are moving to get more operational experience through TG-2, before the beginning of space station construction."

Barstow also spoke highly of China's space capability, saying "China is already a key player in the international space industry," and Tiangong-2 will "enhance" its well-developed space capability.

Gao Yang, director of Surrey Technology for Autonomous Systems and Robotics (STAR) Lab, said manned spaceflight is of indicative significance in space technology, and China's rapid development in this area is well-known.

British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) said in an article published on Thursday that "Beijing has made space exploration a national priority and is the third country, after the Soviet Union and the U.S., to put astronauts into space."

INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION NEEDED

In different interviews Xinhua carried with space experts, all mentioned the need for international cooperation in space exploration. Space station programs have always been a cradle for countries to work together, Gao said.

Such collaboration has been vividly reflected in the Tiangong-2 mission, which carries, among a number of scientific experiments, an astrophysics detector that is the first space-science experiment built jointly by China with European countries.

POLAR, dedicated to establishing whether the photons from Gama ray bursts (GRBs) -- thought to be a particularly energetic type of stellar explosion -- are polarized, was built largely with Swiss funding, and with the collaboration of Swiss, China and Polish scientists and support from the European Space Agency (ESA), according to the British journal Nature.

POLAR project manager Nicolas Produit, who spoke to Nature, said U.S. law bars NASA from doing joint projects with China's space agencies, but the Chinese Academy of Sciences is discussing a number of other collaborative space projects with the ESA.

Gregory Kulacki, senior analyst and China project manager at the U.S.-based Union of Concerned Scientists' Global Security Program, said that it is encouraging that China intends to solicit international participation in its space station project.

"My hope is that the United States and China will, at an appropriate time in the future, find a way to cooperate in the peaceful exploration of space instead of competing to turn it into a battlefield, as they are now," he said.

Chiao said international coperation is "a common point of interest that helps improve overall relationships. The International Space Station is a great example of that. Many nations came together to build the amazing facility, and we are working together to further science. This helps to improve overall relations between the member countries."

Barstow believed that more and more countries are seeing the importance of space activity but this will not turn into a race. He said that to benefit smaller economies, a growth of space activity across the world will need to be nurtured by the major agencies like ESA, NASA, the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscomos) and China National Space Administration (CNSA).

CHINA'S AMBITIOUS SPACE PROGRAM

China has been actively developing a three-step manned space program since the first decade of the 21st century.

The program's first mission took place in 1999 with the launch of the Shenzhou-1 to examine the performance and reliability of the launcher and verify key technologies relating to capsule connection and separation, heat prevention, control and landing.

The first step, to send an astronaut into space and return safely, was fulfilled by Yang Liwei in the Shenzhou-5 mission in 2003.

The second step was developing advanced space flight techniques and technologies including extra-vehicular activity and orbital docking. This phase also includes the launch of two space laboratories -- effectively mini space-stations that can be manned on a temporary basis.

The next step will be to assemble and operate a permanent manned space station.

China will begin building a space station that is more economically efficient and uses more data than the current International Space Station (ISS), starting as early as 2017, chief engineer of China's manned space program Zhou Jianping told Xinhua on Thursday.

With the ISS set to retire in 2024, the Chinese space station will offer a promising alternative, and it will make China the only country to have a permanent space station after the ISS.
iPhone 7 on sale in China, 7 plus pre-orders sold out

BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Apple's iPhone 7 and 7 Plus models entered the Chinese market on Friday with pre-orders of the 7 Plus, and the iPhone 7 in jet-black color, already sold out.

Customers lined up outside the Apple store in Beijing's Sanlitun shopping area early in the morning, waiting to collect their pre-ordered mobile phones.

One customer who declined to be named said, the most attractive parts of the new iPhone are the double lenses and the water-proof funtion.

"Many of my friends are Apple enthusiasts who like to be the first to try new products. Others are turning from the iPhone to cheaper domestic smart phones," he said.

Starting on September 14, Chinese customers can download Apple's new iOS 10 operating system, featuring an anti-crank calls function based on data provided by Internet companies.

Apple's Q3 Greater China revenue was 8.85 billion U.S. dollars, down 33 percent year on year.

The company's stock has surged 11 percent over the past four trading sessions, since the release of the new iPhone models.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 16

Trend:

A delegation of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), headed by Bruno Balvanera, director for the South Caucasus, Moldova and Belarus, arrived in Baku.

Balvanera introduced Ivana Duarte, new head of the banks Baku office, to the Azerbaijani government.

The EBRD delegation was received by Shahin Mustafayev, Azerbaijani economy minister, as part of the visit.

During the meeting, the minister informed the guests about the ongoing large-scale reforms in Azerbaijan with the aim of further improving the business and investment sphere, entrepreneurship development.

Mustafayev added that the support for the private sector remains one of the governments priorities.

Mustafayev said that Azerbaijan is interested in increasing the transit traffic through its territory.

For this purpose, the projects of developing the North-South and East-West transport corridors are being implemented, he added.

The minister emphasized the Southern Gas Corridor project, the creation of a free trade zone in Azerbaijani Alat settlement by attracting a consulting company from the UAE.

The minister also stressed the importance of the EBRDs support for business development and implementation of infrastructure projects.

Balvanera expressed appreciation and support for the reforms which are being carried out in Azerbaijan in the economic sphere, as well as in the area of developing entrepreneurship, customs, privatization and others.

Duarte said that the beginning of her activity in Azerbaijan coincided with the country's major reforms in the economy and the intention to continue the activity towards the development of EBRD-Azerbaijan cooperation.

EBRD has allocated 2.5 billion euros to Azerbaijan for implementation of around 159 projects since 1992.

One of the main tasks of EBRD is to ensure a stable development of Azerbaijan's non-oil sector by investing in the small and medium-sized private enterprises.

Azerbaijan is the largest recipient of EBRD funds in the South Caucasus, as well as one of the largest recipients of this organization's funds in the CIS and Eastern Europe.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept.16

By Seba Aghayeva - Trend:

Azerbaijans embassy in Iran will express Bakus position to Tehran over the participation of representatives of the unrecognized regime created on Azerbaijans occupied lands in the Olympiad in Tehran, Hikmet Hajiyev, spokesman for Azerbaijans Foreign Ministry, told Trend Sept.16.

Tehran hosted the opening of the 48th Armenian Olympiad and representatives of the unrecognized regime created on Azerbaijani lands occupied by Armenia, have also participated in this event.

Azerbaijans Foreign Ministry has been informed about that and Azerbaijans embassy in Iran will express the ministrys position to this countrys relevant structures, Hajiyev added.

I would like to note that Iran has always supported Azerbaijans territorial integrity and sovereignty and stood for the settlement of the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in line with the UN Security Councils resolutions, he said.

The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts.

The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations. Armenia has not yet implemented four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding districts.

---

Follow the author on Twitter: @Asebaa
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 16

Trend:

The US Ambassador to Azerbaijan Robert Cekuta and Azerbaijans Defense Industry Minister Yavar Jamalov discussed the cooperation in defense industry, the US Embassy in Baku said on Twitter.

Cekuta learned about the Ministry of Defense Industry during the meeting with Minister Jamalov.

The US and Azerbaijan established diplomatic relations in 1992.

The two countries work together to promote the European energy security, expand trade and investment, and combat terrorism and transnational threats.
Alternate Foreign Minister for European Affairs Nikos Xydakis upon the end of his meeting with German Deputy Minister in charge of European Affairs Michael Roth pointed out his concern since the demagogues of the far-right, who easily make promises, unfortunately have so far spoken in more political terms than democratic statespersons and the need for real political discourse which can turn into direct results in practice as hopefully this will be a first point of convergence and a new start for a more political debate in Bratislava.



I fully agree with Nikos Xydakis. The biggest challenge for us is our fight against nationalism and populism, Michael Roth replied. I believe that countries such as Greece, Germany or France cannot stand alone and solve global contemporary problems on their own. This is why we need to stand united. Nationalists and populists are not just a challenge for Mediterranean countries. They are an equally huge challenge for Germany and many other countries. And here we need a clear answer, so I am glad we agree, the German Deputy Minister underlined.



The meeting Nikos Xydakis and Michael Roth had today, on the occasion of the latters working visit to Greece, was held in a particularly amicable ambiance, at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, just a few hours prior to Mr. Xydakis leaving for Bratislava, where he is accompanying the Prime Minister to the informal EU Summit.



During the meeting, both sides agreed on the need to preserve European unity which cannot but be based on the notions of cohesion and solidarity. As to the upcoming informal Summit in Bratislava, Alternate FM Xydakis expressed his conviction that it can be the starting point for a more political debate to potentially get tangible results by March 2017, at the celebratory Summit in Rome marking the 60-year anniversary since the signing of the Founding Treaty.



We have agreed between us even more than ever before, for we are building on our relations, that both Greece and Germany have many points on which they converge and concur. Wherever our assessments may differ, there is still scope for constructive and intense debate as well as further convergence. As to our wider policies on Europe, I can say our views coincide. We have to stay united in solidarity, to care in the utmost about consolidating and deepening democracy and the social welfare state. We do jointly recognize the need to make Europe and its vision appealing to its citizens again, was the characteristic comment the Greek Alternate Minister made.



Mr. Roth underlined for his part the need for tangible results to address the concerns of European citizens such as youth unemployment, while improving the economy and promoting a common defense policy. Both Michael Roth and Nikos Xydakis agreed on the enhanced geopolitical importance of the Mediterranean for Europe and highlighted the need for a common European policy to tackle the real causes of the refugee issue.



We absolutely agree we ought to communicate a clear message of unity, convergence and solidarity to the citizens of the EU. To clarify that the statespersons of Europe understand we have to produce tangible results. We need to concentrate our efforts on combating very high youth unemployment, focus on migrants and refugees and, on all those issues, Greece and Germany are very close partners. And we must strengthen the capacity of Europe in terms of its foreign, defense and security policy. Bratislava is not an invitation for conflict, it is an invitation for us to stand together, M. Roth said.



There were also converging views on the need to strengthen European institutions. The meeting of the two statespersons concluded with them reiterating their shared commitment to a united Europe for the benefit of all its members.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Nikos Kotzias, accompanying Prime Minister, Alexis Tsipras, will participate in the proceedings of the 71st Session and the high-level Week of the UN General Assembly, which will take place between Friday September 16 and Saturday September 24, in New York City.



In the framework of this Session, Minister Kotzias will have a series of meetings with counterparts and representatives of international and regional organizations. He will also be attending the meeting of EU Foreign Ministers, as well as the EU-NATO Foreign Ministers conference. Lastly, he will take part in events on issues of regional and global interest where he will have the opportunity to present the positions of Greece.



The Minister's program also includes a bilateral meeting with the Secretary General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, as well as various contacts with Greek and Jewish organizations representing the Diaspora in the US.



On the margins of the General Assembly, a quadrilateral ministerial meeting will be held between Greece, Bulgaria, Croatia and Romania. A trilateral meeting of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of Greece, Cyprus and Egypt has also been scheduled. Moreover, a trilateral ministerial meeting will be held for the first time at the level of Foreign Ministers between Greece, Cyprus and Palestine.



Finally, Foreign Minister Kotzias will attend a number of events regarding issues of regional and global concern, including, among others, the opening of the Plenary of the UN Summit for Refugees and Migrants (high-level meeting to address large movements of refugees and migrants) and the annual event on the Middle East.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 16

Trend:

A regular meeting of the CIS Council of Heads of State kicked off in Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan.

President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev attended the meeting, which marked the 25th anniversary of the founding of CIS.

Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev welcomed President Aliyev.

The heads of state posed for photographs.

Atambayev then welcomed other guests who attended the meeting of the CIS Council of Heads of State. The presidents posed together for photographs.

The CIS Council of Heads of State met in a limited format.

President Ilham Aliyev addressed the meeting.

Then the meeting continued its work in the extended format.

The meeting honored the memory of the late Uzbek President Islam Karimov observing a minute of silence.

Then it was noted that a number of documents on political and humanitarian cooperation, and ensuring security was considered and adopted at the meeting of the CIS Council of Heads of State.

Officials of the member countries approved a statement by the heads of state on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the CIS and discussed the issues of bringing the commonwealth into conformity with modern realities in the context of improving effectiveness of activity of statutory and branch bodies of the CIS.

Draft decisions on declaring 2017 the Year of Family, 2018 the Year of Culture in the CIS, as well as implementation of the interstate program titled Cultural Capitals of the CIS in Azerbaijan in 2017 were discussed at the meeting as part of further expansion of humanitarian cooperation.

The meeting also discussed holding a population census in 2020 in the CIS states with an aim to intensify and expand economic cooperation, and develop the interregional cooperation.

Some of the important documents submitted to the CIS Council of Heads of State are aimed at ensuring security and fighting new challenges and threats. For instance, a program was adopted to cooperate in the fight against terrorism and other manifestations of violence in the CIS for 2017-2019.

The heads of state made a decision that the next meeting of the CIS Council of Heads of State will be held in 2017 in Russia.

Then a ceremony of signing the documents took place.
Admitted in the academic year 2016/2017 to study at Baku Higher Oil School (BHOS) twin brothers Nurlan Nazaraliyev and Ravan Nazaraliyev have got the right to receive the presidential scholarship which is granted to students in accordance with the Decree of the President of Azerbaijan Republic on the Presidential scholarship for the students admitted to the higher educational institutions in the academic year 2016/2017.

BHOS Rector Elmar Gasimov congratulated twin brothers and wished them every success.

During the ceremony held at BHOS on the occasion of September 15  Knowledge Day, SOCAR President, member of the National Parliament Rovnag Abdullayev congratulated the said Nazaraliyev brothers for becoming BHOS students and for winning the honorary title of presidential scholars.

It should be reminded that during the entrance examination held this year two brothers Nurlan Nazaraliyev and Ravan Nazaraliyev scored 685 and 700 points respectively. Both of them selected process automation engineering specialization of BHOS. It should be underlined that brother of twins Rashad Nazaraliyev is four-year student of BHOS studying in petroleum engineering programme. Rashad Nazaraliyev scored 677 points. Thus, three brothers from the same family are studying at BHOS. All three studied at the secondary school 5 of Khirdalan district.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 16

Trend:

Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of Mexico to the Republic of Azerbaijan Rodrigo Labardini has received Caspian Energys delegation headed by President and Editor-in-Chief of the Caspian Energy International Media Group Natalya Aliyeva.

During the meeting the sides discussed possibilities of expansion of contacts at the informational level within the Caspian European Club (Caspian Business Club) and Caspian Energy International Media Group, as well as possibilities of participation of the Mexican companies in the international Caspian Energy Forum to be held in Baku on December 7.

Labardini expressed interest in promoting recognition of the Mexican companies within the events arranged by the Caspian European Club (Caspian Business Club).

The ambassador noted that the transportation facilities and advantageous geographic location helped Mexico to develop an export-oriented economy. Likewise, as an important transportation hub, Azerbaijan possesses a big potential to develop an economy that would be competitive on the world markets.

He added that Mexico recognized Azerbaijan in 1991 and established formal relations on January 14, 1992. Azerbaijan opened its Embassy in Mexico in 2007, but it was a little more than 2 years until 2009, when the first resident ambassador arrived in Mexico.

Mexicos embassy in Azerbaijan opened a little later in 2014, and the first Mexican resident ambassador, myself, I arrived last year, he added. This points to the importance we have for Azerbaijan.

We know this is the most important country in the Caucasus and the region, ambassador noted.

In one year we have been able to do lots of things and there is still a lot more to do, he said. We have tried simply to make people aware that Mexico exists and making Mexicans aware that Azerbaijan exists. And we moved even beyond.

Touching trade relations, the ambassador stressed that the most significant increase in exports from Mexico was during 2014-2015, which was impulse by the opening of the Embassy of Mexico in Azerbaijan and its constant work to promote commerce between the two countries.

The data from Azerbaijan demonstrate a 211.72 percent increase in Mexican exports (from 7.1 million dollars in 2014 to $22.2 million in 2015). The data from Mexico show an exponential increase of 107.4 percent (from $877,000 in 2014 to $10.2 million in 2015) in only one year, the ambassador said.

We are both oil-gas producers and we can share experience and knowledge how to do this, he said while speaking about cooperation in the oil-gas industry. Both countries have an experience in deepwater drilling. A Mexican oil delegation came here in July and they were able to speak with several oil institutions here. They met and they started to talk in their own languages: upstream, corrosion, downstream, etc. Thus, we are sure that there will be some kind of cooperation between these institutions.

There are also other areas in which we can exchange experience, he emphasized.

The ambassador brought tourism as an example.

Mexico is one of the most visited country in the world, he said. We had over 32 mln visitors in 2015. The tourism is about 9 percent of Mexican GDP. Mexico is also the first destination of the world in terms of luxury tourism. Azerbaijan is now trying to develop tourism as well and we can share and learn experience in this area.

At the end of the meeting the ambassador gave an exclusive interview to Caspian Energy. In the course of the interview he touched the possibilities of development of bilateral relations, expansion of the economic and investment cooperation, spoke about prospects of development of the energy market, also touched the issues of development of the tourism sector and energy cooperation.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 15



By Aygun Badalova - Trend:



The chances of oil production frezze agreement still remain slim, according to the analysts of the US JP Morgan bank.



However, they raised the likelihood of a deal to 20 percent given the comments from several government officials from oil exporting nations that a deal makes sense, albeit with reservations.



The informal OPEC meeting is expected in late September in Algeria. It is expected that the talks on oil production freeze will be held between OPEC and non-OPEC countries.



The meeting will be held at the fringe of the International Energy Forum in Algiers from 26-28 September.



We noted in mid-August (when we assessed the risk of a deal being reached at 35 percent), that the attitude of key participants, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Russia, will likely determine the ultimate success or failure of any agreement. The week started with talk of an important agreement between that latter two, pushing futures markets $3 a barrel higher in short order, JP Morgans analysts said in their weekly Oil Market report.



When it transpired that the deal was to set up a task force to monitor market developments, prices retraced more than 80 percent of their gains. However, negotiations continue and if a suitable form of agreement can be reached then it would be taken positively, they said.



Analysts believe that the bigger picture issue for these governments remains that of establishing mutual trust and building relationships that allow for further agreements in the future that can be relied upon, if they require more discipline from all participating nations and that do not buckle under additional pressure.



Petroleum exporting nations face a difficult choice at this juncture, analysts said.



Any deal that boosts prices to between $55-60 a barrel could trigger another race for production growth from US shale producers, most of whom see prices north of $55/bbl  and arguably more importantly the opportunity to hedge 2017/2018 production at above $60 a barrel  as sufficiently attractive to ramp up activity levels, they said.



The announcement this week of additional reserves in the Permian confirms analysts expectation that technological progress will lift US crude production in late 2017, if prices recover back to the mid-$50 a barrel range.
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CASEVILLE  On Saturday, Sept. 24, from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m., the streets surrounding the Caseville Historical Society Museum will be teaming with shiny chrome and various shades of applied-with-love paint. It will be a chance for visitors to get a close-up look at the classic vehicles Michigan is famous for.

Car shows are not a new idea, but the Caseville Classic Car Show will have a twist: Not only will there be cars on the street, there will be an extensive display of historically-related car memorabilia inside the museum.

Caseville Historical Society Trustee Dave Vizard of Sand Point came up with the idea for the Caseville Classic Car Show. It will provide the opportunity to not only see immaculately restored automobiles on the street, but visitors will be able to look over the old parts and other paraphernalia that make up the rich history of the automobile industry in Michigan.

We are delighted to have been able to partner with Moore Shoreline to put on the car show, Vizard said. It will be a featured event during the Pumpkin Festival. A lot of communities put on good car shows, but we decided to add the museum display to give our event an interesting, provocative touch. This is what will make our car show extra special.

The automotive display will be available to the public inside the museum from Sept. 19 to Oct. 1. The streets surrounding the museum, located at 6733 Prospect St. in Caseville, will be closed to traffic during the car show.

Were looking for all makes and models, Vizard said, the beauties hidden and tucked away in garages, to make this an exciting show.

Registration for the car show begins at 11 a.m. on the day of the show, with an entry fee of $10.

The Caseville Public School Class of 2021 will have a concession stand, while a DJ plays classic rock from the 50s, 60s, and 70s. Museum volunteers will conduct 50/50 drawings and plaques and prizes will be awarded to selected car owners; visitors will have the opportunity to vote for their favorites.

The Caseville Historical Society is presently seeking exhibits to be added to their auto-related collection. Donated items will be returned following the two-week display.

We know people throughout the Thumb have garages filled with all kinds of auto history, Vizard said. Were hoping folks will loan those treasures  especially the items that have a personal story behind them.

For more information on the show or the museum exhibits, contact Vizard at 989-553-4804, Joyce Bouck Miller at 989-550-2133, or Rich Bass at 989-551-2277.
ELKTON  After paying to train five people for its new planning commission, the Elkton Village Council learned that it needs to advertise the positions before anyone is appointed.

As soon as village President Phyllis Podlaskowski announced their names at this weeks village council meeting, a resident reminded the council that advertising is necessary.

You cant appoint people without putting the word out to the people, resident Terry Heck interjected.

Podlaskowski said that the village would contact its attorney to clarify the issue.

Village Clerk Lonna Fisher told the Tribune on Thursday that the positions will be advertised in October, as required by the ordinance.

Council adopted a planning commission ordinance at the meeting, and is forming the commission to comply with state law.

The village already has a zoning board of appeals.

The village spent $1,500 to train the withdrawn appointees last month.

The council also passed a motion to cancel its contract with MPX Racing Motocross for: lack of payment; electrical not up to code; no notifications of number of races, and nonpayment of profit.

MPX owner Craig MacPhee could not be reached for comment.

In other business, the council:

 Paid off its sweeper loan debt, which will save the village $9,000 in interest.

 Made a payment on the principal of the Drinking Water Revolving Fund

 Put out farm bids for its lagoon property and York Street extension

 Discussed the issue of residents placing trash at the curb too early. It was sent to the ordinance committee because Elkton currently has no ordinance governing that.

 Approved the Police Department going back to eight hours per shift, instead of 12 hours.
Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, Sept. 16

By Huseyn Hasanov  Trend:

The International Oil and Gas Conference (OGT) will be held in Ashgabat on Nov. 15-17, 2016, the Turkmen Oil and Gas Complex said in a message Sept. 16.

The Energy Exchange of the UK is a co-organizer of the forum.

The conference is important for those who work or want to work in the field of oil, gas and oil processing in Turkmenistan.

The events agenda will include the discussion of such issues as development in hydrocarbon transportation and infrastructure distribution, investment opportunities in the oil and gas industry, understanding the current legal framework, development of potential of onshore and offshore sites, new gas processing technologies, modernization of oil and gas processing facilities.

Turkmenistan ranks the second in terms of natural gas reserve in the CIS after Russia.

Turkmenistan supplies its gas to Iran and China.

According to a program of development of the oil and gas industry, Turkmenistan plans to increase annual natural gas production to 250 billion cubic meters and oil production to 110 million tons in 2030.
ALLETE, Inc. operates as an energy company. The company operates through Regulated Operations, ALLETE Clean Energy, and Corporate and Other segments. It generates electricity from coal-fired, biomass co-fired / natural gas, hydroelectric, wind, and solar. The company provides regulated utility electric services in northwestern Wisconsin to approximately 15,000 electric customers, 13,000 natural gas customers, and 10,000 water customers, as well as regulated utility electric services in northeastern Minnesota to approximately 145,000 retail customers and 15 non-affiliated municipal customers. It also owns and maintains electric transmission assets in Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, and Illinois. In addition, the company focuses on developing, acquiring, and operating clean and renewable energy projects; and owns and operates approximately 1,000 megawatts of wind energy generation facility. Further, it is involved in the coal mining operations in North Dakota; and real estate investment activities in Florida. The company owns and operates 158 substations with a total capacity of 10,066 megavolt amperes. It serves taconite mining, paper, pulp and secondary wood products, pipeline, and other industries. The company was formerly known as Minnesota Power, Inc. and changed its name to ALLETE, Inc. in May 2001. ALLETE, Inc. was incorporated in 1906 and is headquartered in Duluth, Minnesota.
The following companies are subsidiares of Bayer Aktiengesellschaft: AB Seeds Ltd, AB Seeds Sales (2006) Ltd, AO Bayer, Adverio Pharma GmbH, AgrEvo Verwaltungsgesellschaft mbH, AgraQuest Inc., Alcafleu Management GmbH & Co. KG, Algeta, Artificial Muscle Inc, Asklepios BioPharmaceutical, Athenix Corp., Atlantic Breeders S. A. R. L., BUS C.V., Bayer (Proprietary) Limited, Bayer (Schweiz) AG, Bayer 04 Immobilien GmbH, Bayer 04 Leverkusen Fuball GmbH, Bayer A / S, Bayer AB, Bayer AS, Bayer Agriculture BVBA, Bayer Agriculture Limited, Bayer Algerie S. P. A., Bayer Altersversorgung GmbH, Bayer Animal Health GmbH, Bayer Austria Gesellschaft m.b.H., Bayer B.V., Bayer Beteiligungsverwaltung Goslar GmbH, Bayer Beteiligungsverwaltungsgesellschaft mbH & Co. OHG, Bayer Bitterfeld GmbH, Bayer Bulgaria EOOD, Bayer Business Services GmbH, Bayer Canadian Holdings Inc., Bayer Capital Corporation B.V., Bayer Chemicals GmbH, Bayer Consumer Care AG, Bayer Consumer Care Holdings LLC, Bayer Corporation, Bayer CropScience, Bayer CropScience (Portugal)-Produtos para a Agricultura Lda, Bayer CropScience Beteiligungsgesellschaft mit beschrankter Haftung, Bayer CropScience Biologics GmbH, Bayer CropScience Deutschland GmbH, Bayer CropScience Holding Inc., Bayer CropScience Holding SA, Bayer CropScience Holdings Inc., Bayer CropScience Inc., Bayer CropScience LLC, Bayer CropScience LP, Bayer CropScience Limited, Bayer CropScience NV, Bayer CropScience S. L., Bayer CropScience S. r. l., Bayer CropScience Schweiz AG, Bayer CropScience Vermogensverwaltungsgesellschaft mbH, Bayer East Coast LLC, Bayer Essure Inc., Bayer HealthCare Animal Health Inc., Bayer HealthCare Holdings LLC, Bayer HealthCare LLC, Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals Inc., Bayer HealthCare US Funding II LLC, Bayer HealthCare US Funding LLC, Bayer Inc., Bayer International Trade Services Corporation, Bayer Medical Care Inc., Bayer New AU M1059 USD LLC, Bayer New AU M3650 LLC, Bayer New BE M3155 LLC, Bayer New CA M5015 LLC, Bayer New CH M3868 LLC, Bayer New CZ M3204 LLC, Bayer New DE M3385 LLC, Bayer New Gewas I M3640 LLC, Bayer New Gewas II M3640 LLC, Bayer New HU M3440 LLC, Bayer New MA M3130 LLC, Bayer New MX M3640 LLC, Bayer New MY M1455 LLC, Bayer New NL M3644 LLC, Bayer New Oogst M3648 LLC, Bayer New PL M3655 LLC, Bayer New RO M3695 LLC, Bayer New RU M3708 LLC, Bayer New TH M1763 LLC, Bayer New TK M3970 LLC, Bayer New UA M3702 LLC, Bayer New UK M3939 LLC, Bayer New Veggie M3617 M5157 LLC, Bayer New Veggie Mig M3617 M5157 LLC, Bayer New ZA M3743 LLC, Bayer Overseas Trade Services Corporation, Bayer Puerto Rico Inc., Bayer U.S. LLC, Bayer US Finance II LLC, Bayer US Finance LLC, Bayer US Holding LP, Bayer West Coast Corporation, Bayer World Investments B.V., Bayer d. o. o., Bayer spol. sr. o., Bayer-Handelsgesellschaft mit beschrankter Haftung, Beeologics Admin LLC, Beeologics Holdings Limited, Beeologics LLC, Beeologics USA Inc, Berlimed S. A., Berlipharm B.V., Berlis AG, Biogenetic Technologies B.V., BlueRock Therapeutics, Care/of, Channel Bio LLC, Chemion Logistik GmbH, Collateral Therapeutics Inc., Conceptus SAS La Garenne, Cooper Land Company of New Jersey Inc., Coppertone LLC, Corn States LLC, Dihon Pharmaceutical, Dr. Scholls LLC, Dritte Bayer Real Estate VV GmbH & Co. KG, Erste Bayer Real Estate VV GmbH & Co. KG, Erste K-W-A Beteiligungsgesellschaft mbH, EuroServices Bayer S. L., Funfte Bayer Real Estate VV GmbH & Co., GP Grenzach Produktions GmbH, Grass Roots Biotechnology LLC, Hornbeck Seed Company Inc., Icon Genetics, Intendis GmbH, Intraserv GmbH & Co., Jenapharm GmbH & Co. KG, KVP Pharma+Veterinar Produkte GmbH, KWA Investment II LLC Research, KWA Investment III LLC, KWA Investment IV LLC, KaNDy Therapeutics, MENADIER Heilmittel GmbH, MNL Luxembourg S. a. r. l., MONSANTO Hungaria Kft., MONSANTO Saaten GmbH, Merck-Consumer Care (MCC), MiraLAX LLC, Monsanto ACUA MHC LLC, Monsanto AG Netherlands I C.V., Monsanto AG Netherlands II C.V., Monsanto AGN Holding LLC, Monsanto Ag B.V., Monsanto Agrar Deutschland GmbH, Monsanto Agricultura Espana S. L., Monsanto Agricultura Italia S.p.A., Monsanto Agriculture Nigeria Limited, Monsanto Burkina Faso SARL, Monsanto CR s. r. o., Monsanto Canada ULC, Monsanto Caribe LLC, Monsanto Company, Monsanto Crop B.V., Monsanto Crop Sciences Denmark A/S, Monsanto Crop Sciences Norway A/S, Monsanto Crop Sciences Sweden A.B., Monsanto Finance SA, Monsanto Gesellschaft m. b. H., Monsanto Gida Ve Tarim Ticaret Ltd, Monsanto Grain B.V., Monsanto Great Lakes Production Co LLC, Monsanto Hawaii Production Co LLC, Monsanto Hellas Agriculturals Ltd, Monsanto Holding I C.V., Monsanto Holding II C.V., Monsanto Holding III C.V., Monsanto Holding Ukraine Ltd, Monsanto Holland B.V., Monsanto II Lda, Monsanto Illinois Production Co LLC, Monsanto Inter-America Company, Monsanto International Sarl, Monsanto Invest B.V., Monsanto Iowa Production Co LLC, Monsanto Ireland Limited, Monsanto Jordan LLC, Monsanto Kenya Ltd, Monsanto Kool BV, Monsanto LA Holdings II Co LLC, Monsanto Latin America Holdings Co LLC, Monsanto MGCV MHC LLC, Monsanto MSCV Holding LLC, Monsanto MYCV MHC LLC, Monsanto Malawi Ltd, Monsanto Missouri Production Co LLC, Monsanto NL BV, Monsanto Northern Production Co LLC, Monsanto Oogst B.V., Monsanto Operations B.V., Monsanto Polska Sp. z o. o., Monsanto Production Supply LLC, Monsanto Romania SRL, Monsanto Rus LLC, Monsanto S.A.S., Monsanto Seed Supply LLC, Monsanto Seeds LLC, Monsanto Serbia D. O. O., Monsanto Slovakia S. R. O., Monsanto South Africa (PTY) Ltd, Monsanto Southern Production Co LLC, Monsanto Tanzania Limited, Monsanto Technology International LLC, Monsanto Technology LLC, Monsanto Treasury Services SARL, Monsanto UK Limited Cambridge U. K., Monsanto Vegetable Holding LLC, Monsanto Vegetable IP Holding C.V., Monsanto Vegetable IP Management BV, Monsanto Vegetable Seed Holding LLC, Monsanto Western Production Co LLC, Monsanto Zaad B.V., Monsanto Zambia Ltd, Monsanto d. o. o., Pallas Versicherung, Pandias Re AG, Pianosa B.V., Relay Limited, SC Bayer SRL, SCEA De Ruiter Zonen Selection, Sechste Bayer Real Estate VV GmbH & Co., Seminis Vegetable Seeds U. K. Ltd, Siebte Bayer VV GmbH, Steigerwald Arzneimittelwerk GmbH, TECTRION GmbH, TOO Bayer KAZ, The Climate Corporation International SA, TravelBoard GmbH, UAB Bayer, Vierte Bayer Real Estate VV GmbH & Co., WeatherMe OU, Zeptosens, Zoner.ag, Zweite Bayer Real Estate VV GmbH & Co., and Zweite K-W-A Beteiligungsgesellschaft mbH.

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Bancolombia S.A. provides banking products and services in Colombia, Panama, Puerto Rico, El Salvador, Costa Rica, and Guatemala. The company operates through nine segments: Banking Colombia, Banking Panama, Banking El Salvador, Banking Guatemala, Trust, Investment Banking, Brokerage, International Banking, and All Other. It offers checking and savings accounts, fixed term deposits, and investment products; trade financing, loans funded by domestic development banks, working capital loans, credit cards, personal and vehicle loans, payroll loans, and overdrafts; financial support to real estate developers and mortgages for individuals and companies; factoring; and financial and operating leasing services. The company also provides hedging instruments, including futures, forwards, options, and swaps; and brokerage, investment advisory, and private banking services, including selling and distributing equities, futures, foreign currencies, fixed income securities, mutual funds, and structured products. In addition, it offers cash management services; foreign currency transaction services; life, auto, commercial, and homeowner's insurance products; and online and computer banking services. Further, the company provides project and acquisition finance, debt and equity capital markets, principal investments, M&A, hedging strategies, restructurings, and structured financing; money market accounts, mutual and pension funds, private equity funds, payment and corporate trust, and custody; internet-based trading platform; inter-bank lending and repurchase agreements; managing escrow accounts, and investment and real estate funds; and transportation, securities brokerage, maintenance and remodeling, and outsourcing services. As of December 31, 2021, it operated 1,015 branches; 28,676 banking correspondents; 529 PAMs; 210 kiosks in El Salvador and 187 in Colombia; and 6,094 ATMs. Bancolombia S.A. was incorporated in 1945 and is headquartered in Medellin, Colombia.
Cardinal Health, Inc. operates as an integrated healthcare services and products company in the United States, Canada, Europe, Asia, and internationally. It provides customized solutions for hospitals, healthcare systems, pharmacies, ambulatory surgery centers, clinical laboratories, physician offices, and patients in the home. The company operates in two segments, Pharmaceutical and Medical. The Pharmaceutical segment distributes branded and generic pharmaceutical, specialty pharmaceutical, and over-the-counter healthcare and consumer products. The segment also provides services to pharmaceutical manufacturers and healthcare providers for specialty pharmaceutical products; operates nuclear pharmacies and radiopharmaceutical manufacturing facilities; repackages generic pharmaceuticals and over-the-counter healthcare products; and offers medication therapy management and patient outcomes services to hospitals, other healthcare providers, and payers, as well as provides pharmacy management services to hospitals. The Medical segment manufactures, sources, and distributes Cardinal Health branded medical, surgical, and laboratory products and devices that include exam and surgical gloves; needles, syringe, and sharps disposals; compressions; incontinences; nutritional delivery products; wound care products; single-use surgical drapes, gowns, and apparels; fluid suction and collection systems; urology products; operating room supply products; and electrode product lines. The segment also distributes a range of national brand products, including medical, surgical, and laboratory products; provides supply chain services and solutions to hospitals, ambulatory surgery centers, clinical laboratories, and other healthcare providers; and assembles and sells sterile, and non-sterile procedure kits. The company was incorporated in 1979 and is headquartered in Dublin, Ohio.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 16

By Maksim Tsurkov  Trend:

The Azerbaijani state oil company SOCAR plans to sign a new contract on the development of the Umid-Babek block of gas fields in the Caspian Sea by late 2016 to raise funds from international institutions and companies, Rovnag Abdullayev, SOCAR head, told reporters in Baku Sept. 16.

In general, the work is underway at the Umid field, he said. Drilling of the 14th well is under completion.

"There is a long-term program of development of the Umid-Babek block, he said. We will be able to annually receive up to five billion cubic meters of gas only from the Umid field through this program.

The drilling operations are planned to be carried out at Babek field, he said. It is necessary to raise funds to develop these fields.

To do this, we will combine the two projects into one, bring it to the level of the PSA (Production Sharing Agreement), create a new structure that will handle its development, Abdullayev said.

He said that SOCAR is currently preparing a new contract on the project.

This contract will be ready before late 2016 and approved by the Parliament of Azerbaijan, Abdullayev said. This contract will be submitted to financial institutions and companies, which then will be able to join financing of the project. This type of contract will be signed for the first time in Azerbaijan.

It was earlier reported that SOCAR will sign a risk-service-contract on the Umid-Babek block of fields.

SOCAR reported the discovery of the Umid field in 2010. The field's reserves are more than 200 billion cubic meters of gas and 40 million tons of condensate, according to SOCAR's estimates.



Reserves of the perspective Babek field may be 400 billion cubic meters of gas and 80 million tons of condensate.

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Follow the author on Twitter: @MaksimTsurkov
The following companies are subsidiares of International Flavors & Fragrances: 1456111 Ontario Limited, A. Boake Roberts And Company (Holding) Limited, ASA Ventures Inc., Agtech Products Inc., Alpris Ltd., Amco SP Z.O.O, ApS Syntetic, Aroma S.A., Aromatics Holdings Limited, Aromco Ltd., Aromor, Arvin Company, Asian Investments Inc., Atelier du Parfumeur IFF Grasse SAS, BKF Vision Ltd, BSA India Food Ingr. P. Ltd., Belden Company, Branch office of DuPont Protein Technologies International Sales LLC, Bremil Industria e Comercio de Ingredientes Alimenticos Ltda. , Bremil S/A Industria De Produtos Alimenticos , Bush Boake Allen (New Zealand) Limited, Bush Boake Allen (Pension Trustees) Limited, Bush Boake Allen Australia Pty Ltd, Bush Boake Allen Benelux B.V., Bush Boake Allen Chile S.A., Bush Boake Allen Controladora S.A. de C.V., Bush Boake Allen Enterprises Limited, Bush Boake Allen Holdings (U.K.) Limited, Bush Boake Allen Inc., Bush Boake Allen Inc., Bush Boake Allen Limited, Bush Boake Allen Zimbabwe (Private) Limited, Bush Boake Allen do Brasil Industria e Comercio Ltda., Butamax Advanced Biofuels LLC, Chemical Process Materials and Equipment S.A., CitraSource Holdings L.L.C., Columbia PhytoTechnology LLC, Columbia Phytotechnology LLC, Cometra ApS, Crestmont Investment Co., Cultor Oy, DDP Specialty Products Germany GmbH & Co. KG, DDP Specialty Products Poland Sp. z.o.o., DSP Germany N&B Real Estate GmbH & Co KG, Daivd Michael Netherlands B.V., Dandy Lions Limited, Danisco (China) Co. Ltd., Danisco (China) Holding Co. Ltd., Danisco (India) Private Limited, Danisco (Zhangjiagang) Textural Ingredients Co. Ltd., Danisco Argentina S.A., Danisco Australia Pty Limited, Danisco Austria GmbH, Danisco B.V., Danisco Biosciences (Shanghai) Co. Ltd, Danisco Brasil Ltda., Danisco Canada Inc., Danisco Chile S.A., Danisco Colombia Ltda., Danisco Cultor (Switzerland) AG, Danisco Cultor Sweden AB, Danisco Cultor Trading Ltda., Danisco Czech Republic a.s., Danisco Deutschland GmbH, Danisco Dis Ticaret Limited Sirketi, Danisco Egypt Trading LLC, Danisco Flexible Brasil Ltda, Danisco France SAS, Danisco Guatemala S.A., Danisco Holding USA Inc., Danisco Holdings (UK) Ltd., Danisco Holland B.V., Danisco Ingredients Belgium N.V., Danisco Italia S.p.A., Danisco Japan Limited, Danisco Malaysia Sdn. Bhd., Danisco Mexicana S.A. de C.V., Danisco Mexico S.A. de C.V., Danisco New Zealand Limited, Danisco Nutrition & Bioscience Greece Ltd., Danisco Nutrition & Biosciences Korea Ltd., Danisco Nutrition & Biosciences Malaysia SDN. BHD., Danisco Nutrition & Biosciences Taiwan Limited, Danisco Nutrition and Biosciences India Private Ltd, Danisco Peru S.A.C., Danisco Poland Sp. z.o.o, Danisco Singapore Pte. Ltd., Danisco South Africa (Pty) Ltd., Danisco Sweeteners Oy, Danisco Switzerland AG, Danisco UK Ltd., Danisco US Inc., Danisco USA Inc., Danisco Ukraine LLC, Danisco Zaandam BV, David Michael & Company (Canada) 1986 Ltd., David Michael Europe S.A.S., Du Pont de Nemours Nigeria Limited, DuPont (Shanghai) Enterprise Co. Ltd., DuPont Acquisition LLC, DuPont Danisco Cellulosic Ethanol LLC, DuPont Denmark Holding ApS, DuPont Electronics Holding LLC, DuPont LA Holding 1 BV, DuPont Lanka (Private) Limited, DuPont Nutrition (Thailand) Ltd, DuPont Nutrition Biosciences ApS, DuPont Nutrition Dis Ticaret Limited Sirketi, DuPont Nutrition Food Ingredients (Beijing) Co. Ltd., DuPont Nutrition Ingredientes BRASIL LTDA, DuPont Nutrition International, DuPont Nutrition Ireland, DuPont Nutrition Italy SRL (f/k/a FMC Chemical Italy SrL), DuPont Nutrition Manufacturing UK Limited, DuPont Nutrition Mexicana S.A de C.V., DuPont Nutrition Mexico S.A de C.V., DuPont Nutrition Norge AS, DuPont Nutrition Philippines Inc., DuPont Nutrition USA Inc, DuPont Nutrition and Biosciences Iberica S.L., DuPont Protein Technologies International Sales LLC, DuPont S&C Holding LLC, DuPont Shineway Luohe Food Company Limited , DuPont Shineway Luohe Protein Company Limited , DuPont US Holding LLC, DuPont de Nemours Kenya Limited, ERELEM, ETOL SK s.r.o., ETOL-RUS Ltd., Eden Essentials Inc., Envoltec Industria de Embalagens Ltda. , Enzymotec Australia PTY LTD, Enzymotec Singapore Pte. Ltd., Enzymotec USA Inc., Etol Aroma Ve Baharat Gida Urunleri San.Ve Tic.a.s., Etol JVE d.o.o., Etol Proizvodnja Arom D.O.O, Etol Skopje DRUSTVO ZA TRGOVIJA ETOL UVOZ-IZVOZ DOOEL, FYMSA Real Estate LLC (23), FYMSA del Caribe S.R.L , Fangchen International Trading Ltd. (6), Finnfeeds Finland Oy, Finnfeeds Oy, Finnsugar Bioproducts Inc., Flavor Systems International Inc., Flavors and Essences UK Limited, FoodBlenders Limited, Foreign Trade Representative of Danisco Singapore Pte. Ltd., Fragrance Resources, Fragrance Resources (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Fragrance Resources Asia Pacific Ltd., Frutarom (Asia Pacific) Limited, Frutarom (Marketing) S.R.L., Frutarom (UK) Holdings Limited, Frutarom (UK) Ltd., Frutarom - Etol (UK) Limited, Frutarom Belgium N.V., Frutarom Chile S.A., Frutarom Czech Republic S.r.o, Frutarom Do Brazil Industria E Comercio Ltda., Frutarom Etol RO SRL, Frutarom Etol Ukraine LLC., Frutarom F&F Trading (Shanghai) Co., Frutarom Finance EUR AG, Frutarom Flavors (Kushan) Co Ltd., Frutarom Flavors Mexico S.A. de C.V., Frutarom Flavours (India) Private Limited (14), Frutarom France S.A.R.L, Frutarom Germany GmbH, Frutarom Gida Urunleri Sanayi Ve Ticaret Limited Sirketi, Frutarom Global Ltd., Frutarom GmbH, Frutarom Industries Ld, Frutarom Industries Ltd., Frutarom Italy S.r.l, Frutarom Kenya Limited, Frutarom Ltd., Frutarom Netherlands B.V., Frutarom Nigeria Limited, Frutarom Nordic A/S Flachsmann Scandinavia A/S Aksel Holm-Essensfabrik A / S, Frutarom Norway A.S, Frutarom Peru S.A. (Montana Food activity), Frutarom Production GmbH, Frutarom Savory Solutions Austria GmbH, Frutarom Savory Solutions Germany GmbH, Frutarom Savory Solutions Switzerland AG, Frutarom Savory Solutions Ukraine, Frutarom Switzerland Finance CHF AG, Frutarom Switzerland Finance GBP AG, Frutarom Switzerland Finance MXN AG, Frutarom Switzerland Finance USD AG, Frutarom Switzerland Ltd., Frutarom Trade & Marketing (1990) Ltd., Frutarom UK Investments Limited, Frutarom USA Holding Inc., Frutarom USA Inc., Frutarom do Brasil GRU Industria e Comercio Ltda., Genencor (China) Bio-Products Co. Ltd., Genencor International B.V., Genencor International BVBA, Genencor International Holding BV, Genencor International Indiana Inc., Genencor International Oy, Genencor International Wisconsin Inc., Genencor Mauritius Ltd., Genentech Ventures Inc., Grow Company Inc., Hagelin Flv (UK) Ltd., Hexachem Sociedad Anonima, IB EMEA Holding 2 B.V., IFF (BVI) Limited, IFF (Korea) Inc., IFF Aroma Esans Sanayi Ve Ticaret Anonim Sirketi, IFF Augusta Holdings LLC, IFF Australia Holdings Pty Ltd, IFF Benicarlo S.L., IFF Bio-Technology (Nanjing) Co. Ltd., IFF Capital Services, IFF Chemical Holdings Inc., IFF Delaware Holdings LLC, IFF Essencias e Fragrancias Ltda., IFF Flavors & Fragrances (Hangzhou) Trading Co. Ltd., IFF Fragrance GmbH, IFF Hungary Global Kft, IFF International Inc., IFF Latin American Holdings (Espana) S.L., IFF Mexico Manufactura S.A. de C.V., IFF Murcia Natural Ingredients S.L., IFF Sabores y Fragancias de Chile Ltda., IFF Turkey Aroma Ve Esans Urunleri Satis Ticaret Anonim Sirketi, IFF West Africa Limited, IFF Worldwide LLC, Ingrediants dooel Skopje, Institut Europeen de Biologie Cellulaire, International Aroma Group, International Flavors & Fragrances (Canada) Ltd., International Flavors & Fragrances (Caribe) Inc., International Flavors & Fragrances (China) Ltd., International Flavors & Fragrances (Greater Asia) Pte. Ltd, International Flavors & Fragrances (Hangzhou) Co. Ltd., International Flavors & Fragrances (Hong Kong) Limited, International Flavors & Fragrances (Japan) Ltd., International Flavors & Fragrances (Luxembourg) S.a r.l., International Flavors & Fragrances (Malaysia) Sdn. Bhd., International Flavors & Fragrances (Mexico) S. de R.L. de C.V., International Flavors & Fragrances (Middle East) FZ-LLC, International Flavors & Fragrances (Myanmar) Limited, International Flavors & Fragrances (Nederland) Holding B.V., International Flavors & Fragrances (Philippines) Inc., International Flavors & Fragrances (Poland) Sp. z o.o., International Flavors & Fragrances (Vietnam) Limited Liability Company, International Flavors & Fragrances (ZhangJiagang) Co. Ltd., International Flavors & Fragrances (Zhejiang) Co. Ltd., International Flavors & Fragrances (Zimbabwe) (Private) Ltd., International Flavors & Fragrances Ardenne S.a r.l., International Flavors & Fragrances France Holding I SAS, International Flavors & Fragrances France Holding II SAS, International Flavors & Fragrances France Holding III SAS, International Flavors & Fragrances Holdings LLC, International Flavors & Fragrances I.F.F. (Chile) Limitada, International Flavors & Fragrances I.F.F. (Espana) S.A., International Flavors & Fragrances I.F.F. (Hungary) Kft, International Flavors & Fragrances I.F.F. (Nederland) B.V., International Flavors & Fragrances I.F.F. (Norden) AB, International Flavors & Fragrances I.F.F. (Rus), International Flavors & Fragrances IFF (Deutschland) GmbH, International Flavors & Fragrances IFF (France) SAS, International Flavors & Fragrances Irish Acquisition Company Limited, International Flavors and Fragrances Colombia S.A.S., International Flavors and Fragrances I.F.F. (Israel) Ltd., International Flavors and Fragrances IFF (South Africa), International Flavors and Fragrances Ingredients Ltd, International Flavors e Fragrances IFF (Italia) S.r.l., International Flavours & Fragrances (Australia) Pty Ltd, International Flavours & Fragrances (CIL) Limited, International Flavours & Fragrances (GB) Holdings Limited, International Flavours & Fragrances (Mauritius) Ltd, International Flavours & Fragrances (NZ) Limited, International Flavours & Fragrances (Pension Trustees) Limited, International Flavours & Fragrances (Thailand) Limited, International Flavours & Fragrances I.F.F. (Great Britain) Limited, International Flavours & Fragrances India Private Limited (13), International Frutarom Corporation, Inventive Food Technology (ZQ) Ltd., Inventive Technology Ltd., Irish Flavours and Fragrances Limited, K-Vision Consulting and Investments Ltd, Kelp Industries Pty. Ltd, Leagel GmbH (11), Leagel S.r.l. (19), Les Ingredients Alimentaires BSA Inc., Les Laboratories Bio ForeXtra Inc., Lucas Meyer Cosmetics, Lucas Meyer Cosmetics Australia Pty Ltd, Lucas Meyer Cosmetics Canada Inc., Lucas Meyer Cosmetics S.A.S., M.P. Equity Holdings Ltd, MISR Company for Aromatic products, Manseg S.A., Mark Services Holdings Inc., N&B Chemicals Germany GmbH, N&B EMEA Holding B.V., N&B Germany Verwaltungs-GmbH, N&B International Holding B.V., N&B NL BV - Saudi Branch, N&B Real Estate Verwaltungs-GmbH, N&B Services BV, N&B Switzerland  UAE Branch, N&H EMEA Holding 1 BV, N&H EMEA Holding 2 BV, N&H EMEA Holding B.V., N&H International Holding 1 B.V., N&H International Holding 3 BV, N&H Switzerland Holding Sarl, Nardi Armoas Ltda., Neptune Merger Sub I Inc., Neptune Merger Sub II LLC, New Asia Holdco B.V., Nutra-Lease Ltd. (16), Nutrition & Bioscience (Luxembourg) S.a r.l., Nutrition & Bioscience (Switzerland) GmbH, Nutrition & Bioscience (Thailand) Co. Ltd., Nutrition & Bioscience Pakistan (Private) Ltd, Nutrition & Biosciences (Finland) Oy, Nutrition & Biosciences (France) SAS, Nutrition & Biosciences (Sweden) AB, Nutrition & Biosciences (UK) Ltd, Nutrition & Biosciences Argentina S.A.U., Nutrition & Biosciences Australia Pty Ltd., Nutrition & Biosciences Brasil Ingredientes Ltda., Nutrition & Biosciences Canada Company, Nutrition & Biosciences Chile SpA, Nutrition & Biosciences Colombia S.A.S, Nutrition & Biosciences Hong Kong Limited, Nutrition & Biosciences Hungary Limited Liability Company, Nutrition & Biosciences Inc., Nutrition & Biosciences Italy S.r.l., Nutrition & Biosciences Japan K.K., Nutrition & Biosciences Korea Ltd., Nutrition & Biosciences Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., Nutrition & Biosciences Netherlands B.V., Nutrition & Biosciences New Zealand Limited, Nutrition & Biosciences Singapore Pte. Ltd., Nutrition & Biosciences USA 1 LLC, Nutrition & Biosciences USA 2 LLC, Nutrition & Biosciences USA 3 LLC, Nutrition & Biosciences Vietnam Company Limited, Nutrition Biosciences USA 4 Inc, Nutrition and Biosciences South Africa (Pty) Ltd, Nutrition and Biosciences Spain S.L., OOO WIBERG Rus, P.T. Essence Indonesia, PARMA FA, PIASA USA (24), PM Taiwan Inc., PT Blue Cube Indonesia, PTI Astana LLC, PTI CA LLC, PTI Center LLC, PTI Group of Companies LLC (GK PTI), PTI-BEL TUE, PTI-MOL LLC, PTI-NN LLC, PTI-Ukraine LLC, Platinum Absolut LLC, Pointer Specialty Chemicals LLC, Protein Technologies Do Brasil Ltda., Protein Technologies International Asia Pacific LLC, Protein Technologies International Development LLC, Protein Technologies International Europe LLC, Proveedores de Ingenieria Alimentaria S.A. de C.V. ("PIASA") (17), Prowin International Ltd., Pucheng Yongfang Fragrance Technology Co. Ltd. , Redbrook (UK) Limited, Redbrook Blentech Limited, Redbrook Ingredient Services Limited, Rene Laurent SAS, Representaciones FYMSA S.A. de C.V (FYMSA) (18), Rohm and Haas Wood Treatment LLC, SP EMEA Holding 8 BV, SP Holding IB Inc., SP Nutrition and Health (Singapore) Inc., Sabormax Industria de Alimentos e Representacao Ltda., Savoury Flavours (Holding) Limited, Savoury Flavours Ltd., Solae (UK) Limited, Solae Argentina S.A., Solae Australia Pty Limited, Solae Belgium N.V., Solae Company India Private Limited, Solae Denmark ApS, Solae Deutschland GmbH (f/k/a CSY Agri-Processing (Deutschland) GmbH), Solae Do Brasil Industria E Comercio De Alimentos Ltda., Solae Europe S.A., Solae Holdings LLC, Solae Investimentos LTDA, Solae LLC (SMLLC of Solae Holdings), Solae Overseas B.V., Solae Trading (Shanghai) Company Ltd., Solae de Mexico S.A. de C.V. (formerly PTI Mexico), Solae do Brasil Holdings Ltda., Sonarome Private Limited (15), Southern Cross Botanicals Pty Ltd, Specialty Products Balkans d.o.o., Specialty Products FZE, Specialty Products N&H Inc, Specialty Products US LLC, Speximo AB, TNI Investments NV, Tastepoint Flavors (Shanghai) Co. Ltd, Tastepoint Inc., Tastepoint OOO, Tastepoint Polska Sp.z o.o, Tastepoint SA (Pty) Ltd., Tastepoint Tovarna arom in etericnih olj d.o.o., Taura Natural Ingredients (Australia) Pty Limited, Taura Natural Ingredients (North America) Inc., Taura Natural Ingredients Holdings Pty Limited, Taura Natural Ingredients Ltd., Taura Natural Ingredients NV, Tekhnomol Soya Products LLC, The Additive Advantage LLC, The Additive Advantage LLC, The Foote & Jenks Corporation, The Mighty Company Limited (21), Thorungaverksmidjan HF (12), UFC America Inc., Unique Flavors Proprietary Limited, Unique Food Solutions Proprietary Limited, Unique Ingredients Limited, VAYA PHARMA HONKG LTD, VITIVA proizvodnja in storitve d.d., Vantodio Holdings Limited, Vaya Pharma Inc., Vaya Pharma Pte Ltd. (20), Venezuela Protein Technologies Internationla -PTI C.A., W.W. Holdings Inc., WIBERG Italia S.r.l., Wiberg Baharat San.Tic.A.S, Wiberg Canada Inc., Wiberg Corporation of California, Wiberg Corporation., Yderns 1 ApS, ZAO Danisco, extrakt chemie Dr. Bruno Stellmach GmbH, iDrug Delivery Inc.(Delaware) (22), nternational Flavors & Fragrances S.R.L., van Ameringen-Haebler Inc., and world wide WIBERG GmbH.

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Community Bank System, Inc. operates as the bank holding company for Community Bank, N.A. that provides various banking and other financial services to retail, commercial, and municipal customers. It operates through three segments: Banking, Employee Benefit Services, and All Other. The company offers various deposits products, such as checking, savings, and money market deposit accounts, as well as time deposits. It also provides loans, including consumer mortgages; general purpose commercial and industrial loans, and mortgages on commercial properties; paycheck protection program loans; installment loans that are originated through selected dealerships and are secured by automobiles, marine, and other recreational vehicles; personal installment loans and lines of credit for consumers; and home equity products. In addition, the company offers broker-dealer and investment advisory; cash management, investment, and treasury services; asset management; and employee benefit services, as well as operates as a full-service insurance agency that offers personal and commercial lines of insurance, and other risk management products and services. Further, it provides contribution plan administration, employee benefit trust, collective investment fund, retirement plan administration, fund administration, transfer agency, actuarial and benefit consulting, VEBA/HRA, and health and welfare consulting services. Additionally, the company offers wealth management, retirement planning, higher educational planning, fiduciary, risk management, trust, and personal financial planning services; and investment alternatives, including stocks, bonds, mutual funds, and advisory products, as well as master recordkeeping services. As of January 24, 2022, it operated approximately 215 customer facilities across Upstate New York, Northeastern Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Western Massachusetts. Community Bank System, Inc. was founded in 1866 and is headquartered in DeWitt, New York.
The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation provides a range of financial products and services in the United States and internationally. The company operates through Securities Services, Market and Wealth Services, Investment and Wealth Management, and Other segments. The Securities Services segment offers custody, trust and depositary, accounting, exchange-traded funds, middle-office solutions, transfer agency, services for private equity and real estate funds, foreign exchange, securities lending, liquidity/lending services, prime brokerage, and data analytics. This segment also provides trustee, paying agency, fiduciary, escrow and other financial, issuer, and support services for brokers and investors. The Market and Wealth Services segment offers clearing and custody, investment, wealth and retirement solutions, technology and enterprise data management, trading, and prime brokerage services; and clearance and collateral management services. This segment also provides integrated cash management solutions, including payments, foreign exchange, liquidity management, receivables processing and payables management, and trade finance and processing services. The Investment and Wealth Management segment offers investment management strategies and distribution of investment products, investment management, custody, wealth and estate planning, private banking, investment, and information management services. The Other segment engages in the provision of leasing, corporate treasury, derivative and other trading, corporate and bank-owned life insurance, renewable energy investment, and business exit services. It serves central banks and sovereigns, financial institutions, asset managers, insurance companies, corporations, local authorities and high net-worth individuals, and family offices. The company was founded in 1784 and is headquartered in New York, New York.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 16

By Elena Kosolapova  Trend:

The government reshuffle in Kazakhstan for the last week follows the resignation of the countrys Prime Minister Karim Massimov.

Massimov's resignation, to some extent, was unexpected. In general, he has headed the government for seven years. Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev was pleased with Massimov's activity. The attempt of appointing Serik Akhmetov to that post in 2012 was futile.

On the other hand, it was not worth excluding Massimovs moving out given that the new appointments in the Kazakh government are often unexpected, even for specialists in the region, as well as the difficult economic situation in that oil-producing country, as a result of falling oil prices and the economic slowdown in the main partner countries.

Formally, this is Massimovs demotion. He was appointed to the post of head of the countrys National Security Committee. But in reality, Massimov can be still important in the country. The Kazakh president himself explained the appointment of Massimov as the need to improve the security level.

Today the security is considered one of the most problematic issues in Kazakhstan.

According to the National Security Committee, eight radical groups have been neutralized in the country since early 2016. Some of them had relations with militants of international terrorist organizations and they were instructed from abroad. Extremists were preparing terrorist attacks in crowded places in Kazakhstan and Russia by the example of Paris events.

One of the terrorist groups was even planning aircraft hijacking from one of the airports in Kazakhstan in order to commit a terrorist attack similar to the Sept.11, 2001 attack in the US. Extremists were actively propagating radical ideas, planning to send Kazakhs to participate in military operations in Syria. Firearms, ammunition, a large number of homemade explosive device components and "martyr belts" were found in caches of terrorists.

Two terrorist attacks were committed in Kazakhstan in summer of 2016. Seventeen people, including 11 terrorists were killed in Aktobe, while eight people, including one attacker were killed in Almaty as a result of the terrorist attacks. Following the terrorist attack in Aktobe, a moderate "yellow level" of terrorist threat was declared in Kazakhstan and after the terrorist attack in Almaty, it was changed to the highest, red level threat.

As distinct from its neighbors, Kazakhstan hasnt faced terrorism for many years.

The first suicide bomb attack in Kazakhstan was committed in Aktobe in 2011. This was followed by terrorist attacks in Atyrau, Taraz and Almaty in 2011 and 2012.

Commenting on those events, Kazakhstans then prosecutor general Askhat Daulbaev admitted the lack of readiness of law enforcement forces to counteract terrorist and extremist threats in the country.

The terrorist attacks committed over the last year in Turkey, France and Belgium increased the urgency of the security issue in Kazakhstan.

The need for a joint struggle against terrorism increasingly runs like a golden thread through the speeches of President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev at international events.

In early September 2016, speaking at the G20 Hangzhou summit, Nazarbayev said that uniting the efforts of all the G20 members and other interested countries would be a good start for complete victory over terrorism.

The fact that Kazakhstan plans a significant tightening of laws for the fight against extremism and terrorism, as well as the empowerment of law enforcement bodies in the fight against terrorism also speaks of serious attention paid to the issue of terrorism in Kazakhstan. The work in this direction is already underway.

Thus, in this situation, the importance of the National Security Committee of Kazakhstan will grow.

Therefore, Massimovs transfer to this structure from the post of prime minister should not be considered as his falling into disgrace. Perhaps, on the contrary, it is the recognition of his works productivity at the former post and hope that his work wont be less effective at the new post.

Nazarbayev often practices such a tactic, when an energetic, experienced, well-established leader is transferred to restore order in a troubled area.

In addition, changing prime minister to some extent will help to remove the burden of peoples discontent from the Kazakh government, which has accumulated due to the significant drop in tenge and considerable deterioration of economic situation in the country against the backdrop of falling oil prices and the global financial crisis.

The Kazakh government headed by the new prime minister will be able to start the work with a clean slate.

---

Elena Kosolapova is Trend Agencys staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @E_Kosolapova
VMware, Inc. provides software solutions in the areas of modern applications, cloud management and infrastructure, networking, security, and digital workspaces in the United States and internationally. It offers VMware multi-cloud solutions, including VMware vSphere, a data center infrastructure that provides the fundamental compute layer; vSAN and VxRail, which offers holistic data storage and protection options to applications running on vSphere; and vRealize Cloud Management solutions that manages hybrid and multi-cloud environments running in virtual machines and containers, as well as VMware Cloud Foundation, a cloud platform that combines its vSphere, vSAN, and NSX with vRealize Cloud Management into an integrated stack and delivers enterprise-ready cloud infrastructure for private and public clouds. The company also provides networking solutions, such as VMware NSX, NSX Distributed and Gateway Firewalls, NSX Network Detection and Response Engine, NSX Advanced Load Balancer, Tanzu Service Mesh, and VMware SASE; security solutions consisting of VMware Carbon Black Endpoint, Workload, and Container; and digital workspace solutions comprising Workspace ONE Unified Endpoint Management, Access, Intelligent Hub, and Horizon. In addition, it offers application modernization solutions, such as Tanzu Application and Operations Platform, Tanzu Application Service Platform, Tanzu Observability, Tanzu Community Edition, and Tanzu Labs; and cloud management solutions, including vRealize Cloud Management, vCloud Suite, and CloudHealth by VMware Suite. The company sells its products through distributors, resellers, system vendors, and systems integrators. VMware, Inc. has a strategic alliance with Amazon Web Services to build and deliver an integrated hybrid solution. The company was incorporated in 1998 and is headquartered in Palo Alto, California.
Despite Flipping in Surf 4 Times in a Year, Marines Say New ACV Is the Future of Amphibious Warfare

Some Marine veterans familiar with the vehicle and its operations have worried about the reliability of the ACV.
Retired Navy Capt. Gerald L. "Jerry" Coffee used a lectern on the Pentagon's parade ground Friday to tap out the code U.S. prisoners of war in North Vietnam used in their cells every night to shore up their morale and resilience.

With the fingers of his right hand, Coffee tapped several times."That's a 'G,' " he said. Then came an "N" and a "G," a "B," and an "A" -- the letters distinguished by the number of taps.

The 82-year-old Coffee translated for the audience at the Pentagon's annual POW/MIA Recognition Day ceremony, attended by Defense Secretary Ashton Carter; Air Force Gen. Paul Selva, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; and families of the missing.

The message he tapped out was "Good Night. God Bless America." Coffee said, "At the end of every day, we'd sign off and say, 'Good Night. God Bless America' -- every single night."

The Pentagon ceremony was one of many across the country on the third Friday of September, the annual observance of National POW/MIA Recognition Day.

In his official proclamation, President Obama said, "The hardship experienced by prisoners of war and by the family members of those who have gone missing in action is unimaginable to most Americans.

"It is our country's solemn obligation to bring these heroes back to the land they served to defend, and to support the families who, each day, carry on without knowing the peace of being reunited with their loved ones," he said.

The Pentagon's Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency lists more than 82,600 Americans as "unaccounted for from past conflicts," including 73,121 from World War II; 7,795 from Korea; 1,618 from Vietnam; and 126 from the Cold War.

In his remarks, Carter said the national day of recognition was an opportunity "to recommit ourselves to fulfilling our solemn pledge -- to make every effort to bring all of them, all of them, our men and women, home to their families."

"Since we came together last year on POW/MIA Recognition Day, we've accounted for over 135 missing service members. Missing personnel like Navy Lt. Julian Jordan, who served on the USS Oklahoma at Pearl Harbor that fateful December day 75 years ago," Carter said. "We won't stop -- I won't stop -- until we achieve the fullest possible accounting for our missing."

For Coffee, the tap code messages symbolized the unique POW fellowship that enabled them to survive. "We POWs looked at our time then in the prisons of Vietnam as another form of combat. We never ever gave up, we never ever gave in, we never lost faith in our country," he said.

Coffee was flying an RA-5C Vigilante as part of Reconnaissance Squadron 13 off the carrier Kitty Hawk when he was shot down in February 1966. "I was finally released from the Communist dungeons of Hanoi in February 1973 -- seven years and nine days," he said.

"The tap code was very important in giving comfort and solace to one another -- when you know that the man in the next cell was down and hurting, his feet locked in the ankle cuffs at the foot of a concrete slab, his hands cuffed tightly behind him," Coffee said.

Those few taps on a wall told a fellow prisoner that there was someone on the other side saying, "Be tough, babe. I'm praying for you," Coffee said.

-- Richard Sisk can be reached at Richard.Sisk@Military.com.
Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, Sept. 16

By Huseyn Hasanov Trend:

A two-day media forum kicked off in Ashgabat September 16.

The media forum is dedicated to the first Global Sustainable Transport Conference, which, according to the UN resolution, will be held in Ashgabat on November 26-27, 2016.

The forum has brought together the representatives of ten international organizations and more than 65 media outlets from almost 30 countries, the Turkmen Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a message.

According to the message, the representatives of UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), Economic Commission for Europe (ECE), the International Road Transport Union (IRU), International Maritime Organization (IMO) and the Organization for Cooperation of Railways (OCJD) delivered reports during the first sessions of the forum.

The upcoming Global Sustainable Transport Conference will be held in accordance with the UN resolution Toward comprehensive cooperation among all modes of transport for promoting sustainable multimodal transit corridors adopted at the 70th session of the UN General Assembly in December 2015, the message said.

According to the message, the agenda will include a wide range of topical issues.

Among those issues are sustainable transport and environmental change, energy and transport, urban transport system, the investment in the transport sector and its financing, international cooperation in the transport sector and its legal basis, the development of multimodal transport corridors and their infrastructure, traffic safety, the message said.

Ashgabat is involved in several large-scale projects. Kazakhstan-Turkmenistan-Iran and Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Tajikistan railways, road and rail bridges over the Amu Darya river, airports, motorways, the Turkmenbashi international sea port are designed to be important components of the international network of transport communications in the region.
Depending on your PT test, the order of swimming may best be determined by where it is in the order of events of that test.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept.16

Trend:

The meeting of the CIS Council of Foreign Ministers is being held in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, RIA Novosti reported Sept.16.

Earlier, Russias Foreign Ministry said that the meetings agenda includes 16 issues related to the areas of multilateral cooperation within CIS.

The foreign ministers will discuss the practical measures for further expanding the multifaceted cooperation between the CIS countries and exchange views on the relevant international issues.

The ministers will review the draft joint statements of the heads of states on the 25th anniversary of CIS, combating international terrorism, on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of completion of Nuremberg Tribunal and the world drug problem. Further steps to optimize the activities of CIS will be among key issues.

The next meeting of the CIS Council of Foreign Ministers will be held Apr.7, 2017 in Tashkent, Chairman of Executive Committee  CIS Executive Secretary Sergei Lebedev said Sept.16 during the expanded meeting of CIS foreign ministers in Bishkek.
littlemissflintnew.jpg

A diptych shows the difference in 9-year-old Amariyanna Copeny's reactions after meeting President Obama in May 2016 and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on Sept. 14, 2016.

(Jake May | MLive.com)

FLINT, MI -- The Internet remains intact, but a photo of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and Little Miss Flint revolving around the World Wide Web may have bogged down some traffic.

Amariyanna Copeny, 9, had her photo taken with Trump during his Sept. 14 visit to Bethel United Methodist Church in Flint during his visit to Flint where he toured the water plant on the city's north side.

Several people have shown the photo of a timid-looking Amariyanna with Trump, flashing a large smile as he held her by the wrist, side-by-side with a shot of the young girl hugging President Obama during their meeting earlier this year.

It was her letter that led Obama to visit Flint in May, during which he drank a glass of water during a stop at the Food Bank of Eastern Michigan and gave a lengthy speech at Flint Northwestern High School.

Among the millions sharing the photos of Little Miss Flint on social media include hip-hop artist T.I. or TIP, actor/entertainer D.L. Hughley, and English actor Amanda Abbington.

Listen to the kids bro!!!!!-Yeezy voice pic.twitter.com/IixFX678Dl  T.I. (@Tip) September 16, 2016

Lulu Brezzell, Amariyanna's mother, has done her best to try and dispel those saying her daughter was traumatized by the experience of meeting Trump and simply wanted to ask him a question amid a chaotic scene at the church.

"We had to get through the crowd twice to get his attention since he walked out the opposite way he came in (which had her a bit overwhelmed), then with people yelling at him, and add the secret service to the mix, well think how you would feel?" she said in a Facebook post, adding Amariyanna had asked to meeting Trump "and was all smile before hand but she feeds off the energy of people around her.

Brezzell also posted a photo of Amariyanna around an hour later smiling at the Showers For Flint event held by FOX reporter Charlie LeDuff outside First Trinity Missionary Baptist Church in downtown Flint, noting the photo of her daughter with Trump had been blown out of proportion.
Tashkent, Uzbekistan, Sept. 16

By Demir Azizov  Trend:

Movement of Entrepreneurs and Businessmen  the Liberal Democratic Party of Uzbekistan has proposed to nominate Shavkat Mirziyoyev as a presidential candidate, the countrys Central Election Commission said on its Facebook page.

It was proposed to nominate Mirziyoyevs candidacy during the meeting of the partys political council, according to the CEC.

Currently, Shavkat Mirziyoyev is the acting president of Uzbekistan.

Uzbekistan will hold an early presidential election Dec. 4. The election will be held in accordance with the countrys constitution due to the death of President Islam Karimov.

Election campaigns started Sept. 9. Registration of presidential candidates will be held from Sept. 30 until Oct. 20 in accordance with the action plan for preparations and holding the presidential election.

Uzbekistans President Islam Karimov passed away Sept. 2 after suffering a stroke.

The president of Uzbekistan is elected for a period of five years.

Four political parties in the country have the right to nominate a presidential candidate.

They are the Movement of Entrepreneurs and Businessmen  the Liberal Democratic Party of Uzbekistan, Democratic Party Milly Tiklanish (National Revival), People's Democratic Party of Uzbekistan and Social Democratic Party Adolat (Justice).
hooker.JPG

Tom Hooker receives a hug from his granddaughter (from left) Sydney Hooker, 15, Hayley Oberst, 11, and Ashley Oberst, 8, after winning the Byron Township supervisor primary election with his family in Byron Center on Tuesday, Aug. 2, 2016. (Cory Morse | MLive.com)

(Cory Morse)

State Rep. Tom Hooker thinks the chance of his

beer tax bill

getting traction in the Michigan House is "probably nil and none." But when the lame-duck lawmaker transitions to a new role later this year as head of a Grand Rapids-area township, he might have a bit more influence.

Hooker is being term-limited out of the House and running instead for supervisor of Byron Township, a growing community that just three years ago decided to lift a ban on Sunday sales of booze in a 4-3 board vote that Hooker opposed. The incoming supervisor stopped short Thursday of saying that he'd push to re-enact that ban when he takes office, but he did vow to tow the line on alcohol policy that he called a "non-negotiable" issue for him.

"I don't even know how easy or how realistic a rescission (of the board's 2013 vote) is. It's always easier to go forward in that area than it is to go back," said Hooker, who won the Republican primary in August and is unopposed on the Nov. 8 ballot.

"I will be consistent in my opposition of expansion of (liquor) licenses and things like that, that I have any control over. Even though you're a representative of the people, you have a responsibility, I think, to also be true to yourself. There are certain issues that are non-negotiable and that, for me, would be one."

Hooker this week proposed a 244-percent hike in the state's beer tax, adding about 5 cents per 12-ounce can. The tax since 1966 has held steady at about 2 cents per can.

Hooker wants to put the additional revenue into alcohol recovery programs, drug treatment courts and police enforcement of underage drinking laws.

"I know as a health teacher the poison that is in there and the addictiveness," said Hooker, who said his mother grew up in an orphanage with eight siblings because her parents suffered problems with alcohol use.

"The costs of an item need to be borne by the producers and the users, and the damage that they do should be repaired by them.

The Michigan Alcohol Policy Promoting Health and Safety supports the bill, while the state's brewing industry says the tax increase would be "devastating." Wyoming restaurateur Tommy Brann, who is the GOP nominee to succeed Hooker in the Republican-leaning 77th state House district, said he contacted Hooker to share his displeasure with the bill.

"There is nothing wrong with having a beer in today's stressful life," Brann said. "I do not want to see that taxed away, and I do not want to hear the argument that this is a sin tax."

Hooker plans to resign from the House in late December, then be sworn-in as supervisor of the township that straddles M-6 south of Grand Rapids. He'll be joined on the 7-member Township Board by fellow Republican nominees including his chief of staff, Drew Jones.

Two other GOP nominees, incumbent Treasurer Carol Houseman and incumbent trustee Louise Evans, voted in the minority in the 4-3 board vote that OK'd Sunday sales of alcohol in January 2013. Trustee nominee Tim Slot and Clerk nominee Joel Hondorp each voted in favor of Sunday sales.

Elsewhere in Kent County, only Solon and Sparta townships prohibit Sunday sales of alcohol. Grandville, Oakfield Township and neighboring Gaines Township prohibit Sunday sales of alcohol before noon, according to the Michigan Liquor Control Commission.

Byron Township has issued 10 of the 14 on-premise liquor licenses allocated to it based on population.

"I had a call this morning from one of my constituents who said 'I am so proud of you.' He said 'I was an alcoholic and I agree with your wholeheartedly,'" Hooker said.

"So not everybody hates me, for this (bill)."
TOLEDO, OHIO -- The presidential campaign trail is rolling through Toledo next week as Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump will stop in town on Wednesday Sept. 21, 2016 according to his campaign website.

Trump will be giving a speech at the Stranahan Theater at approximately 12:30 p.m. with tickets available on Trump's website. Doors for the event will open at 9:30 a.m.

This will mark Trump's second visit to Toledo since winning the Republican nomination last month.

The following day, Chelsea Clinton, the daughter of Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, will also visit Toledo. Details for that event have not yet been released, but those interested can visit Clinton's website to get more information on the stop.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 14

By Fatih Karimov  Trend:

Venezuela is gradually losing Spains oil market, as the European country has increased its crude oil import from Iran, the Spanish El Mundo newspaper reported.

Despite having the largest proven hydrocarbon reserves in the world, the Venezuelan government is not able to contain the drop in local production and the country has accumulated nine years of consecutive declines in oil extraction, according to the latest BP Statistics.

As a result, the South American country is losing its customers across the world, including Spain.

Spain has reduced its crude purchase from Venezuela by 63.1 percent to 697,000 tons during the first seven months of 2016, which is equal to 1.8 percent of the countrys total crude import, according to the Spanish newspaper.

On the other hand, Irans return to oil market following the removal of international sanctions last January has been a hard blow to the countries that export oil to Spain.

The Spanish oil firms such as Repsol and Cepsa have rushed to sign contracts with the Islamic Republic to import crude of high quality and very accessible by the proximity of this market.

Spain has imported 1.1 million tons of crude oil from Iran during the first seven months of 2016, which is almost two times more compared to imports from Venezuela.

Iran has raised its share from Spain's oil market to 3 percent, although it is still kept away from other major producers such as Mexico, Russia and Saudi Arabia.

Before the latest sanctions were imposed in 2012, Iran was exporting about 600,000 b/d of crude to countries in the European Union, with Italy, Spain and Greece its biggest buyers.

According to International Energy Agency, Iran exported around 150,000 b/d of oil to Spain in 2011.
A Yangon City Development Committee proposal to establish a business district in Yankin township has been met with mixed responses from local developers, with one firm suggesting the area is already too densely populated and would be better suited to residential development.





As part of a Yangon city master plan drafted in partnership with the Japan International Cooperation Agency, YCDC are targeting a business districts in five of the citys townships in a bid to ease traffic congestion in downtown Yangon.

The long-term plan includes business zones at Mindhama secondary CBD in the citys north, an area located in South Dagon township, one beside the Bago River, a commercial zone attached to Thilawa special economic zone and a business branch in Yankin township, said U Toe Aung, urban expert and deputy head of the City Planning and Land Administration Department of YCDC.

We have planned Yankin township as a branch of the central business area of the city because it is in central Yangon, not too far from the downtown area and the outskirts of the city, he said. Transportation is also better than in other townships.

Different from the tender approach undertaken at the US$350 million Mindhama project, Yankin has infrastructure in place, so the city would be promoting the area to potential business to take advantage of existing facilities while encouraging investment in upgrades, he said.

U Yan Aung, general manager of Asia Construction Company, said that Yankin township provided little room for development as it was already quite built up. He said, however, that promoting more businesses in the area could relieve traffic congestion.

Yankin doesnt have enough area to develop a CBD but the place is good to be commercial centre because it is in the center of the city that not so far from downtown and the edge of town, he said.





But one developer, who declined to give his name due to the sensitivities of the subject, said the township was too small and overcrowded.

Yankin has already been under development and there are traffic jams there now, he said.

He said since the Myanmar Plaza opened late last year, traffic has been at a standstill in the area.

Yankin has already developed and there are many people staying there. It should be developmed as a residential area so more people come and live there, he said.
Myanmars business sector has welcomed US plans to lift almost all remaining sanctions against the country and reinstitute special trade preferences, but some industries could find it hard to take advantage of the new environment.





US President Barack Obama announced this week that he intends to lift the state of emergency the US declared against Myanmar in 1997, which forms the basis for almost all remaining sanctions.

The US has steadily chipped away at the sanctions regime in recent months, issuing general licences allowing trade to pass through blacklisted ports, permitting transactions with military-owned banks and removing state-owned lenders from a list of Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) with whom business dealings are illegal.

But despite the gradual easing, the presence of the SDN list and the fact that the state of emergency remained in place has made life difficult for Myanmars business community. US banks have refused to transfer money out of Myanmar  even for US firms  and very few are willing to provide transfers into the country.

The sanctions regime has often made lenders from other countries similarly wary of providing transaction services on behalf of Myanmar banks, all of which has hurt their ability to provide trade financing for local firms.

When the state of emergency is lifted, the SDN list, along with prohibitions on new investment and financial services, will disappear. The US has also announced that in November Myanmar will be made eligible for the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP), which will allow Myanmar to export thousands of products to the US at reduced tariff rates, like many other developing countries.

Senior business officials are hoping this will usher in a new era of trade and closer cooperation with US banks and companies.





Even though some sanctions were lifted, US banks stayed reluctant [to engage with Myanmar], said U Mya Tha, chair of Myanmar Oriental Bank. Now with the GSP there will be more and more trade with the US, and US banks can be involved [in trade transactions]. Hopefully institutions in other countries will become more comfortable [with Myanmar] too.

But whether the potential to ship goods to the US at lower tariffs will prompt a sharp rise in exports is far from clear. The European Union made Myanmar eligible for its own GSP system in 2013. That everything-but-arms initiative allows companies to enjoy duty-free and quota-free exports to the EU market for all products except arms and ammunition.

EU-Myanmar trade increased rapidly in the following years, with the EU importing garments, rice, fishery products and beans. But some sectors struggled to take advantage of the new market. Daw Toe Nandar Tin from Myanmar Fishery Products Processors and Exporters Association said the impact of the EUs GSP had been modest because Myanmar does not produce many fishery products suitable for the EU market.

Myanmars garment sector was the biggest beneficiary of the EU GSP  accounting for 62pc of the 675 million euro (US$ 758.5 million) in Myanmar exports to the EU in 2015. U Aung Win, deputy chair of Myanmar Garment Manufacturers Association said he hoped the US GSP system would be similarly positive for the sector.

But unlike the EU, the US has strict rules on which textiles qualify for GSP.

There are relatively few textile and apparel products eligible for [US] GSP, said Eric Rose, lead director at Herzfeld Rubin Meyer & Rose in Yangon.

But overall, exports of Myanmar textiles to the US reached $500 million annually about 15 years ago, he said, adding that the industry has the potential to return to its heyday prior to 2003 when it was a major employer in the country before it suffered under sanctions.

Myanmar exports to the US have grown from $38,000 in 2012 to $142 million in 2015, according to a spokesperson from the US embassy in Yangon. He noted that the 2015 figure included several GSP-eligible goods including dried peas, rattan products and wood products.

Economist U Khin Maung Nyo welcomed the sanctions relief and GSP reentry, but said that Myanmar will have to improve the quality of its commodity exports in order to take full advantage of the US market.

One of the countrys biggest agricultural exports is beans and pulses. Myanmar exports mostly raw produce to India, which is then put through Indian mills before being sold. But developed markets like the US are less interested in the raw produce that makes up most of Myanmar exports, said Sunil Seth, chair of the Overseas Agro Traders Association of Myanmar (OATAM).

They want the finished product and in small packages - [for example] ready-to-eat lentils, he said. Mr Seth has been looking at exporting Myanmar pluses to the Canadian market, but found that Myanmar mills often need to improve quality standards to meet the requirements of North American markets. This is in addition to improving production facilities and logistics chains, he added.

Myanmar is also hoping to boost rice exports, and is in negotiations with countries like Indonesia and China. But some 25 percent of the rice produced in Myanmar is un-milled or rough rice, whereas developed markets will typically want finished milled rice for import, said Mr Seth.

If tariffs come down there will be the possibility to do more value-added agricultural exports, he said, but the countrys agricultural industry needs investment and development to produce the necessary products at the required standards.

Other industries in Myanmar could also find it hard to make use of the US GSP. The majority of natural gas and mineral exports go to China, and if there is an increase in exports to the US it is likely to be negligible, said Alexander Jaggard, country representative for Mekong Economics.

It acts as a signal that the US is interested in establishing solid bi-lateral ties, he said of the GSP. But in terms of real economic impact Id be very surprised if it had any substantial effect.

Additional reporting by Myat Noe Oo and Daniel de Carteret
French novelist Gustave Flaubert once said that anything becomes interesting if you look at it long enough.





Thats the idea behind an exhibition titled The Details opening at the Yangon Gallery on September 16, featuring photorealist and hyperrealist paintings by eight local artists.

The participating artists include Myoe Thant Oung, Aye Nyein Myint, Aung Thiha, Aung Myin Baw, Tin Aung Kyaw, Aung Htoo, Khine Minn Soe and Myo Min Latt.

All of their art is about ordinary objects and scenery that we see on a daily basis, curator Lynn Whut Hmone told The Myanmar Times. But they focus on the details and they show it in a way that weve never seen before, which makes us appreciate the little things around us.

As an example, she cited Aung Htoo, who makes paintings of household objects made of steel.

Aung Htoos paintings are so detailed that you can see the little scratch marks on the steel utensils he paints. You dont notice them even when youre eating, but it looks beautiful in the paintings, she said.

Lynn Whut Hmone made a distinction between photorealism  which simply seeks to re-create an image in the way it would be seen in a photograph  and hyperrealism, in which artists use photorealism as a reference but inject additional emotion into the artwork.

There is more to hyperrealism. The artist puts more feeling into it and tries to show something beyond just representing the reality, she said.





One painting in the exhibition that treads the line between these two types of art is Tin Aung Kyaws The Silver Set, an extremely meticulous painting that took the artist about 200 hours to complete. While the silver objects are rendered in photorealist detail, the semi-abstract background gives the artwork a sombre, almost gothic, feel.

It took me a while to figure out about the background because I wanted something that wouldnt disturb the silver set yet was interesting in its own way, Tin Aung Kyaw said. I wanted the viewers to feel something when they looked at the painting.

Artist Aye Nyein Myint also focuses on inanimate objects, and her painting The Shape depicts a baroquely complex mushroom half-submerged in a glass of water.

I decided to paint this because I really like the shape of the mushroom. If you look long enough, it looks like a dancing lady wearing a skirt. But viewers can look at the shape and think of something else, Aye Nyein Myint said, adding that her paintings are not intended to show how her subjects would look in a photograph.

I paint objects the way I feel in terms of colour and texture. Some of my paintings are very detailed because I feel like its necessary to show that, and sometimes theyre not, she said.

Myoe Thant Oung, who at 52 is the elder of the exhibition  some of his students are taking part in the show  paints natural scenery with the aim of conveying particular ideas to those who see his artwork.

His contribution to The Details includes a series of paintings titled Strength of Life, one of which depicts flowers growing from a dead tree stump, while another shows a small plant sprouting among weathered stones.

I want to show concepts in my paintings. For example, people would easily cut up a tree and not notice the beauty of nature, but even if you cut up a tree it doesnt die  it grows again, Myoe Thant Oung said. I want to show the strength of nature, and I want people who see this painting to get the feeling of strength and hope for themselves as well.

Aung Thiha, meanwhile, is showing a series three portrait paintings  of his youngest daughter, his eldest daughter and his wife  titled Reflection of My Heart.

Each of these artworks is unusual in its own way: The wife, for example, is shown from behind and drenched with water, while the youngest daughter is seen through a window which is dripping with soapy water, her head cocked and her face bearing an ambiguous, almost sad, expression.

For the painting of my young daughter, I wanted to show the beautiful reflections on the window and also the texture and transparency of the soapy water, Aung Thiha said. For her face, this is what my daughter looks like when one of her parents is away. Even when her mother goes to the market, she will be waiting for her, like she is longing for someone or missing someone. I tried to capture that expression.

Curator Lynn Whut Hmone said she hoped visitors to the exhibition would enjoy the chance to see photorealist and hyperrealist paintings, which are not as common in Myanmar as more traditional types of realism.

I want people to look at the art and see the details of the things around them, and learn to notice and appreciate them more, she said.

All these things around us have their own beauty, textures and colours. Even when looking at a simple white teacup, we dont notice that there are so many colours reflected there. Artists can see this clearly and show it in their work.

The Details is showing from August 16 to 20 at the Yangon Gallery, located in Peoples Park near the Planetarium Museum off Ahlone Road. The gallery is open daily from 10am to 6pm.
Guesthouse owners have criticised a government decision they say will stop them taking in foreign tourists. Under the law, owners who let rooms to foreign guests without a licence could be jailed for three years.





U Myint Htwe, director of the tourism ministry, told The Myanmar Times that the law would be applied to guesthouse owners even if they had an operating licence issued by their local township if they failed to comply with other provisions of the law. Hotels and guesthouses catering to foreign tourists have to meet certain standards, including providing en suite bathrooms.

If the guesthouses have good enough facilities to serve tourists, they can apply for a hotel licence. If not, they cant accept foreign visitors, he said.

The ministry also banned local guesthouses that lack such facilities from putting up English-language signs.

If the guesthouse can take in only Myanmar guests and not foreigners, their signboard has to be in the Myanmar language only, he said, adding that guesthouse owners faced three years imprisonment or a K50,000 fine for taking in foreign guests without a licence.

But the governments stance has been attacked as unreasonable.

What happens in major tourist attractions like Bagan at peak season, when there are not enough rooms? And maybe some foreigners are on a tight budget. Will the ministry put them up if they cant afford a hotel? said guesthouse owner U Khin Maung Myint, who lives in Nyaung-U.

Guesthouses offered tourists more security than a monastery or sleeping rough, he said.





Ministry director U Myint Htwe also said no more hotel rooms were allowed in major locations, including Yangon, Mandalay, Inle lake and Taunggyi because hotel accommodation was already in surplus there.

We need more hotel rooms in other locations, where there is still demand, he said.

The tourism ministry has issued 1371 hotel licences, and there are 53,000 hotel rooms nationwide.
Thunderstorms and isolated heavy rain should be expected until the end of the month due to unstable atmospheric conditions caused by the monsoon withdrawal period, said U Kyaw Lwin Oo, director of the Department of Meteorology and Hydrology.





The department announced yesterday that the monsoon will withdraw from northern Myanmar over the next two days. It is expected to withdraw from central Myanmar from September 18 to 22, from the delta region over the September 24 to 28 period, and from all regions in the country by October 4.

Normally, the monsoon withdrawal takes five or seven days in a region. Sometimes it will be faster or slower, for example due to the formation of a low-pressure system in the Bay of Bengal, said U Kyaw Lwin Oo. Currently, we believe the monsoon will withdraw normally from all regions.

As a result of the unstable atmosphere, the withdrawal in northern and central Myanmar will bring cumulonimbus clouds with the potential to cause strong winds, isolated heavy rain and thunderstorms over the coming weeks, especially in the evening.

During the withdrawal period, lower Myanmar should also expect downpours as a weather system moves over that part of the country from the Bay of Bengal. At this point, U Kyaw Lwin Oo said, the strength of the monsoon in lower Myanmar should only be moderate.

The department forecast more rain in Mon, Kayin and Kayah states, and Bago Region. Strong winds of 30 to 35 miles per hour should also be expected in Myanmars coastal regions.
In the wake of devastating flooding caused by deforestation, the government has pledged to double down on enforcing a ban on private logging companies, using the army and police to block timber exports to China and to seize illegal logs.





Union Minister for Natural Resources and Conservation U Ohn Win told the Pyithu Hluttaw on September 14 that all relevant government entities would act together to stop illegal logging.

We will accelerate our efforts to prevent illegal logging by collaborating with the forestry department and the police on forest security, he said.

Military units would enforce a border clampdown, and would arrest people suspected of smuggling logs.

The minister was responding to a question from U Aung Kyaw Kyaw Oo (NLD; Hlaing), who asked about illegal logging, and blamed the 2015 flooding, in part, on deforestation. The country was losing its natural resources, but was deriving no benefit because private logging companies were exceeding their quotas, failing to pay rent on the land they were exploiting, failed to pay dividends, and dodged their taxes.

In 2014, more than 1 million cubic tonnes of timber was illegally exported to Chinas Yunnan Province from the far north of Myanmar, he said. That accounts for 95 percent of all timber export.

The export of raw timber logs was banned starting from April 2014, to preserve forest resources and to reduce illegal logging.





In May, the government announced that teak and hardwood logging would be suspended in 2016-17, and logging would be reduced to an amount to be decided by the Myanmar Timber Enterprise, the minister said.

Private companies are not allowed to do logging. Only Myanmar Timber Enterprise will do logging, he said.

He added that the ministry was adopting a policy of allowing agricultural activities on land where logging was not carried out, but not allowing it on lands where logging was conducted, as logging had been suspended.

U Ohn Win told parliament that the government would blockade smuggling routes.

Illegal trading is being conducted in Kachin State, on the border with China, a remote region marked by unrest. We will blockade the route and seize the illegal timber that is bound for Yunnan province, he said.

Overall, law enforcement has seized 630,999 tons of illegal timber, arrested 100,943 suspects and confiscated 13,956 vehicles over the past 15 years. In 2005, 1.5 million tons of timber, valued at US$350 million, were exported to China.

Translation by Thiri Min Htun and Win Thaw Tar
More than 50 Kachin civil society organisations will submit a letter tomorrow demanding that a commission evaluating hydropower projects on the Ayeyarwady River recommend cancelling the Myitsone dam in Kachin State.





The commission for reviewing and scrutinising hydropower projects on the Ayeyarwady River arrived at the Kachin State capital Myitkyina yesterday and its members will visit the site of the controversial Myitsone dam today, according to a commissioner who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The civil society organisations intend to give the letter to the commission during a meeting it has scheduled with local residents at Myitkyinas City Hall tomorrow. Members of the CSOs are also seeking a separate meeting with the commission.

Daw Nan Pu of the Htoi Gender Foundation told The Myanmar Times yesterday that the commission had not yet contacted the CSOs regarding their request for a sit-down.

Local people dont want the dam project to continue and the people wont change their desires. The commission should know it. Thats why we decided to give the letter to the commission, she said.

The general secretary of the Kachin Baptist Convention, Reverend Samson Hkalam, said yesterday that the KBC had been a consistent opponent of hydropower projects along the Ayeyarwady River and that the commission should listen to the voices of the people.

We will monitor the commissions activities and report, he said.

Under its mandate, the commission must review hydropower projects and recommend whether implementation should continue or not, in part by weighing potential costs and benefits to citizens. The commission must submit an initial report to the president on November 11, though members indicated last week that no major recommendations would be included in the document, citing a short timetable for the reports release.





Commission members have been given the opportunity to review contracts for hydropower projects, with the aim of finding win-win proposals for both impacted populations and foreign investors with stakes. The views of average citizens and civil society are also to be collected.

Chinas CPI Yunnan International Power Investment Company entered into an agreement to develop the US$3.6 billion Myitsone dam with a military-owned conglomerate and the government in 2006.

Then-president U Thein Sein suspended the project in 2011 amid widespread public outcry.
As the 71st Regular Session of the UN General Assembly gets underway this week in New York, the European Union delegation to Myanmar told The Myanmar Times today that it will abandon a time-honoured tradition there: the submission of a UN resolution criticising Myanmars human rights record.





The European Union had put forward a resolution calling attention to human rights shortcomings in Myanmar at every UN General Assembly (UNGA) dating back to 1991, but mounting speculation that business would not be as usual this year was confirmed by the Yangon-based delegation.

The EU took the decision not to table a human rights resolution in the UN General Assembly Third Committee this year as a recognition of Myanmar's progress on democratic transition, the reinvigoration of the peace process and the positive steps taken by the new government to improve human rights, read a statement from the EU delegation to The Myanmar Times.

The annual UN General Assembly Regular Session brings together scores of world leaders including, this year, Myanmars de facto head of state Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. Given the peaceful transfer of power to the Nobel laureates elected government at the end of March, a coalition of rights groups had correctly surmised  and fretted over  the possibility of a break with a quarter-century precedent.

Ahead of State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyis visit to the United States, the coalition released a statement urging the EU to keep up the pressure on Myanmar by again introducing the blocs resolution. Failing to do so would be premature, the groups said.

We have seen encouraging changes as Myanmar eases out from under the shadow of military rule. But there is still a lot more to do to ensure a decisive break with the countrys ugly past of human rights violations, Rafendi Djamin, Amnesty Internationals director for Southeast Asia and the Pacific, was quoted as saying in a September 14 press release from the coalition of six groups.

The gains made so far have to be consolidated and built upon, not left incomplete or eroded, he added.

In laying out its case, Article 19, a member of the pro-resolution coalition, offered a detailed analysis of how Myanmar had fared in meeting the points addressed in last years UNGA resolution.





Its largely unflattering critique noted that among other areas left wanting, a four-year-old pledge to open a country office for the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights is unfulfilled; that bleak conditions persist for the Rohingya Muslim minority in Rakhine State; and that impunity for human rights violations by state officials  both past and present  remains endemic with the vast majority of reported cases of human rights abuses committed by Myanmar Army soldiers going unpunished.

In response to The Myanmar Times inquiry, the EUs Yangon delegation said, The EU remains strongly committed to working with Myanmar to address remaining human rights concerns, including at the UN Human Rights Council.

The 71st UN General Assembly convened on September 13 and will conclude on September 26.

Daw Aung San Suu Kyi met earlier this week with President Barack Obama, who ahead of her visit faced similar pressure from rights groups not to lift remaining US sanctions against Myanmar. The president ultimately said after consulting with Daw Suu, that the United State is now prepared to lift sanctions, calling it recognition in part ... of the progress weve seen over the last several months.

The move effectively conceded limits to the state counsellors ability to meet some human rights benchmarks early in her administration. The Tatmadaw remains unaccountable to civilian oversight  conflicts between its forces and ethnic armed groups have continued in recent months  and the militarys constitutionally enshrined role in politics includes 25 percent of seats in parliament and control of three key security ministries.

Those ministries will be crucial in resolving persisting discrimination and rights abuses against the Rohingya. Daw Aung San Suu Kyis initial foray into addressing Rakhine States problems has involved the creation of an advisory commission, praised abroad but criticised by nationalists at home for its inclusion of foreigners, reflecting another governing quandary that has at times forced her to balance domestic politics against international expectations.

Prior to the EUs disclosure today, Mark Farmaner, director of Burma Campaign UK, joined calls for maintaining a tough line on human rights at the UN General Assembly.

Discontinuing the resolution will encourage the military to believe they can continue to commit human rights violations and block constitutional reform without any consequences, he told The Myanmar Times yesterday via email.

The UNGA resolution on Myanmar has grown in length over the years, from a 264-word text in 1991 expressing concern for the countrys grave human rights situation to last years resolution, which clocked in at roughly 2300 words. Addendums to the original range from a Rohingya rights defence in recent years to 2015s criticism of specific legislation  the race and religion protection laws  passed by parliament last year.

The 2015 resolutions veiled criticism of the Tatmadaw and its call for the Government to take necessary measures to ensure accountability and end impunity remain unaddressed, Mr Farmaner insisted.

Earlier this year, for the first time, the UN said war crimes and crimes against humanity are being committed against ethnic people in the country, so dropping the resolution ignores the facts on the ground, Mr Farmaner said, adding, If the EU drops the resolution on top of the US lifting sanctions, there will be champagne corks popping in the military headquarters.

This story is an updated version of a story published in the September 16 print version of The Myanmar Times to reflect comments made by EU delegation to Myanmar after press time.
Iran's August crude oil exports jumped 15 percent from July to more than 2 million barrels per day (bpd), Reuters reported Sep 16.

According to a source with knowledge of its tanker loading schedule, the volume is close to Tehran's pre-sanctions shipment levels in 2011.

The No. 3 OPEC producer has more than doubled its crude exports, excluding the ultra light oil condensate, since December. Economic sanctions targeting Iran's disputed nuclear programme were lifted in January, and it has been battling since then to regain market share lost to other Middle East producers over the previous four years.

The strong demand for Iran's crude in Asia and Europe has enabled it to raise its oil output to just over 3.8 million bpd as of this month, still shy of the 4 million bpd level Tehran says is a precondition for discussing output limits with Saudi Arabia and Russia.

Members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and Russia are expected to meet during the International Energy Forum in Algeria over Sept. 26-28 to discuss a possible output freeze to stabilize oil prices that are still down around 60 percent since mid-2014.

"The only way for producers to maximise their revenues in a low oil price environment to meet budget requirements is to raise production," said Victor Shum, an oil analyst at consultancy IHS. "So there is unlikely to be any supply deal ... in late September," he said.

"We can expect Iran to continue to raise production."

August crude exports from Iran excluding condensate roughly doubled from a year ago to 2.11 million bpd, the source said, based on data compiled from tanker loading schedules.

The crude exports have climbed from 1.9 million bpd in June and 1.83 million bpd in July, the schedules showed.

Iran's August exports are the highest since January 2012, boosted by record purchases from the world's third-largest oil importer India and a 48 percent jump that brought European sales to 630,000 bpd, tanker loadings for last month also showed.

Other sources who track Iran's shipping data or who are familiar with its tanker loadings have slightly different figures for Iran's crude exports in August, but still show a near doubling since January.

For countries like Iran that do not report official trade data, counting tankers is the primary means of estimating their oil trade, although counts may vary from tracker to tracker.

Details on condensate loadings for August remain unclear. But if shipments of the ultra light oil were steady with this year's average of nearly 310,000 bpd, the total crude and condensate exports last month would be this year's highest at 2.41 million bpd, still short of average pre-sanctions exports of 2.5 million to 2.6 million bpd in 2011, according to figures from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Iran's crude exports excluding condensate to Asia in August were 1.48 million bpd, up from 1.40 million bpd in July and roughly steady to this year's previous peak in April.

Loadings headed for India reached a likely record of nearly 600,000 bpd last month, according to data stretching back at least 15 years, up 150,000 bpd from July, and topping 564,000 bpd loaded for China.

Japanese loadings were nearly 230,000 bpd, compared with about 92,000 bpd for South Korea.

Iranian oil was also loaded for Turkey, Greece, and Spain, and exports to Italy more than doubled from the previous month to 87,000 bpd, according to the schedules.

To further boost its exports, Iran expects to complete the building of a terminal by year-end for a new grade.
Ko Tun Tun Win and his co-workers from Myanmar thought life was fine at the Thammakaset chicken farm in central Thailand, where they reared hundreds of thousands of birds for export to the European Union.





The migrants clocked 20 hours a day for 40 days straight, shovelling litter and culling the sick among the birds as they grew from chicks to poultry for slaughter.

Then 10-hour days for three weeks cleaning the warehouse-sized coops at the Thammakaset chicken farm in Lopburi province.

And finally they got three days off.

All that work for what they figured was a fair wage: nearly US$7 a day, with free rent and electricity.

We thought our employer was a nice guy because he gave us rooms, and we didnt have to pay rent, Ko Tun Tun Win said. We stayed for free, and we got our money.

More than 3 million migrants work in Thailand, the vast majority from neighbouring Myanmar, according to the International Organization for Migration.





Many are exploited on farms and in factories across the country, facing an uphill battle for compensation and justice against multi-tiered corporate supply chains, rights groups say.

Thats if they even know theyre being exploited in the first place.

It was a smartphone and a Facebook post that opened Ko Tun Tun Wins eyes to the severity of his work conditions  and led to a landmark lawsuit pitting migrant workers against a corporation at the top of the food chain.

The case highlights widespread ignorance among both workers and employers about labour rights, and workplace norms seen as violations in the closely scrutinised global supply chain.

It all began last year after Ko Tun Tun Win bought a new phone, and a chicken doctor, one of the farms veterinarians, introduced him to social media.

Lying in bed next to his wife one night, he saw a post about tuna plant workers from Myanmar who had been overworked and underpaid. They had received more than $1 million in an unprecedented settlement in March.

The Facebook post by the local non-profit Migrant Worker Rights Network (MWRN) inspired Ko Tun Tun Win and 13 co-workers to take action.

In a lawsuit filed at a labour court earlier this month following unsuccessful negotiations with the company and local authorities, they are demanding $1.3 million in compensation and civil damages.

The suit alleges forced overtime, unlawful salary deductions, passport confiscation and limited freedom of movement.

Crucially, the action is against both Thammakaset and the buyer of the farms poultry  agricultural giant Betagro, which exports food worldwide.

Test case

Andy Hall, a prominent British human rights activist in Thailand who has consulted on several cases involving migrants, said the litigation was an important test case.

Were trying to hold Betagro responsible for the system of contract farming, he said. If we can, it will have huge implications for contract farming and the responsibility of corporate supply chains across Thailand.

Part of the workers evidence includes pictures snapped on Ko Tun Tun Wins phone and shared on Facebook, including time-stamped cards  one showing a worker clocking in on May 24 at 6:54, out at 17:00, in again at 19:02, then out at 5:37.

Thats a total of 20 hours and 41 minutes.

In an interview, Thammakaset owner Chanchai Pheamphon said he had not fully understood the requirements under Thai law and agreed he had underpaid staff as well as illegally deducted rent and utilities from their daily wages.

But he denied charges of forced labour or limiting employees freedom of movement, and said he planned to file a counter defamation suit against the workers and MWRN.

Im now facing bankruptcy, he told Thomson Reuters Foundation, adding that a decision by Betagro to halt business with Thammakaset amid the controversy had forced him to shut his 1.6-million-chicken, three-farm operation and lay off nearly 100 employees.

This NGO [MWRN] wants more money for these 14 workers, but what about the 100 others? he said. The world has already found me guilty, and they have stopped buying my goods. Theyve already sentenced me to death.

Betagro, one of Thailands largest meat producers and exporters, also denied the workers allegations.

There were no violations of human rights or anything resembling forced labour, as defined by the law on prevention and suppression of human trafficking, it said in a statement.

Other than the statement, Betagro did not respond to email and phone requests for an interview.

Abuse and ignorance

Supply chains for goods such as food, clothing and electronics usually begin in countries with the cheapest labour.

Thailand has been at the centre of scores of reports of slavery and human trafficking, with migrants from Myanmar suffering the worst exploitation.

In the face of mounting scrutiny of supply chains, Thailand has strengthened laws to crack down on labour exploitation, while other countries have passed legislation to address abuses abroad.

Britains 2015 Modern Slavery Bill requires businesses to disclose actions taken to ensure their supply chains are free of slave labour.

In February, US President Barack Obama signed the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act, banning imports of goods made with forced labour into the United States.

Yet at the lowest rungs of supply chains, rights groups say many businesses such as Thammakaset fall short of global standards  even if owners like Chanchai defend working practices.

He said staff voluntarily worked nights to rack up bonuses.

We paid them to work during the day, but we didnt forbid them from working at night, he said, adding that they chose to sleep in hammocks in the room next to the chicken warehouse.

They play on the Wi-Fi, then go and look at their chickens. They dont have to work, but they just might think that if they raise the chickens well, they will get more money.

Flipping through a bound file of documents, Chanchai showed photos of the workers drinking at a restaurant and swimming, and of the low fence around his farm that he said proved they were free to come and go as they pleased.

He said he deducted $2 from their $8.60 legal minimum daily wage for rent, drinking water and electricity, and made cuts such as a 14-cent fine for not picking up dead chickens.

With the fines collected, he would buy a gold necklace for a raffle at the workers year-end party, he said.

Interview: Andy Hall talks migration policy upgrades

Mr Hall, the rights activist, said the workers were told if they did not work overnight, they would face salary deductions  a charge Chanchai denies.

Commenting on the 14-cent deduction for not picking up dead chickens, Mr Hall said, That is illegal. Any deduction from the salary is illegal. He has acknowledged that he has unlawfully deducted money from them.

Mr Hall added that it was common for employers and officials to rationalise violations, revealing a mindset in which only the most extreme conditions or acts  such as putting workers in chains  constituted crimes.

These people just dont understand that what theyre doing is abuse, he said. They dont think of it as forced labour or modern-day slavery. They dont understand how people could level such allegations against them.

 Thomson Reuters Foundation
In a move derided by human rights groups, Washington has pledged to fete the progress made by Myanmars new government by lifting nearly all remaining economic sanctions.





With a fatigued-looking Daw Aung San Suu Kyi at his side, US President Barack Obama yesterday lauded the good-news story that has unfolded in the wake of last Novembers elections and the National League for Democracy taking up the reins of administration.

In part because of the progress that weve seen over the last several months, I indicated, after consulting with Daw Suu, that the United States is now prepared to lift sanctions that we have imposed on Burma for quite some time, Mr Obama said.

The US sanctions regime has remained intact in some form or another for nearly 20 years. The Obama administration began to unravel bits and pieces of the embargoes starting in 2012.

While the sanctions scheme has been labelled anachronistic by its detractors, the US had lobbied as recently as May for their continued applicability to counter tycoons and companies thwarting democratic reforms in Myanmar. Mr Obama just four months ago renewed the executive order underpinning the sanctions, in a move diplomats had signalled was made in consultation with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.

But from the seat of the Oval Office, where she was welcomed as Myanmars de facto leader, the state counsellor was a far cry from pressing her ally to retain the leverage against military conglomerates.

We think that the time has now come to remove all the sanctions that hurt us economically because our country is in a position to open up to those who are interested in taking part in our economic enterprises, said Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.





According to the US State Department, the sanctions will be lifted through termination of the national emergency declaration, which defines Myanmar an extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States. The executive order has been renewed annually since 1997.

Lifting the order will release 111 individuals and entities that remain on a targeted blacklist, including Steven Laws Asia World, which the US Treasury Office had adopted additional measures against in May. The removal of the executive order will also scrub US prohibitions on importing and exporting jade and rubies. Mr Obama said Myanmar was ready for these measures, along with renewed eligibility for preferential trade tariffs, as the allies sought new ways of doing business together.

According to the State Department, several restrictions will remain in place, however, including some visa ineligibilities, an embargo on arms sales and sanctions against 21 individuals and 10 companies related to narcotics kingpin regulations and two individuals for dealings with North Korea.

When pressed about a timeline for the removal of sanctions, Mr Obama said the order would be made soon. Mr Obamas administration will have until the end of his term in January to make good on the pledge, but sources told The Myanmar Times it could occur in as little as a week.

While analysts have long suggested one of the biggest challenges for Daw Aung San Suu Kyi would be the balancing act of maintaining favourable military relations while further pushing liberal reforms, many were blindsided by her willingness to compromise before constitutional change was achieved. The state counsellor has previously lobbied for retaining sanctions as long as the 2008 constitution and the political role it enshrines for the military remains in place.

We have a constitution which is not entirely democratic because it gives the military a special place in politics, the state counsellor said from the White House.

So we will continue with our efforts to amend our constitution, to make our country a truly democratic Union that our founding fathers dreamt of, she added.

But rights groups criticised the decision as a premature prioritisation of economic development at the expense of human rights progress.

Sanctions provided an important leverage point, and the premature lift weakens the hand of reformers. The question is who benefits from this move  it certainly isnt Myanmars people, said Juman Kubba of the natural resources governance watchdog Global Witness.

She added that of particular concern is how the lifting of sanctions will impact Myanmars notoriously opaque and destructive jade industry.

Global Witness last year revealed that the value of illegal jade in 2014 equated to almost half of Myanmars GDP, which the World Bank says was US$64.33 billion. In addition to the vast sums of illicit wealth, the deleterious sector is also deadly, annually claiming the lives of hundreds of itinerant workers.

The US has said that it will develop new policies to help address challenges including the role of the military in the economy and supporting responsible business in key industries including jade and gems. Sanctions provided an important tool to help achieve these goals  without them the job is going to be much harder, Ms Kubba said.

But others suggested that retaining the sanctions regime would do more harm than good to military-government interactions.

As state counsellor and undisputed leader of the parliamentary NLD, Suu Kyi has many more effective levers over the military than blunt sanctions that do real damage to Myanmars economy and stifle job creation, said Richard Horsey, a Myanmar-based independent analyst.

The real risk I think would have been if the sanctions werent lifted: That would have sent a signal to the military that it was receiving no recognition for stepping back from power, allowing the transition to go ahead and cooperating with the new government.

Political analyst U Yan Myo Thein cautioned that the sanctions lift could serve to embolden the military at a delicate time politically and for the peace process.

The military is still imposing a dark shadow on the domestic politics as in the government and in parliament, he said. The current state of reforms in the military are not enough. Under such circumstances, lifting the sanctions will only benefit the military establishment and its closed business entities and its cronies.

Additional reporting by Lun Min Mang
After only eight days of canvassing, more than 70 signs posted by Mandalay City Development Committee candidates have been torn down. The vandalism appears to be increasing day by day, an election committee member who spoke on condition of anonymity said on September 14.





The candidates informed us, the committee member said. It may be happening at night. More than 10 sigboards disappeared in one day. We will inform the authorities and perform inquiries. Candidates should inform the commission if their boards are being taken down.

Canvassing is allowed from September 7 to 23. Most of the signage disappearances have occurred in Maha Aung Myay township.

It could be drunk men taking down the boards, said resident U Soe Thein. They should put themselves in the place of candidates: The candidates campaign with their own money. This should not be happening.

During the same period, complaints to the election committee have increased, as residents accuse the canvassing candidates of public disturbances. The onslaught of complaints prompted the Mandalay Region chief minister to issue a directive this week in an attempt to rein in overzealous campaigning.

The election, to determine representatives from six townships  Aung Myay Tharzan, Chan Aye Tharzan, Maha Aung Myay, Chan Mya Tharsi, Pyigyitagun and Amarapura  will be held on September 25. There are 34 candidate contesting the six spots. In addition to the six elected MCDC members, the Mandalay mayor and joint secretary are joined by five members appointed to the committee by the regional government.

Translation by Khine Thazin Han
Local residents and about 50 monks demonstrated in support of allocating land for a 16-bed hospital in Mandalay Regions Kyaukpadaung township yesterday. Ownership of the land is being contested by farmers.





In 2014, the Union government claimed control of 3 acres of land in Popa village assumed to be vacant. In June 2015, permission was granted for the construction of a hospital.

But construction never started because landowners came forward, claiming that five plots of the supposedly vacant land were actually theirs. The township administrator had sold those plots before the Union government started considering them for a hospital, according to residents accounts.

Protesters yesterday demanded that relevant officials re-evaluate the situation as soon as possible, claiming that there is dire need for a hospital in the area.

So many visitors come to our region, including tourists, said secretary of the Building Cottage Hospital Committee U Kyaw Hein, who led the protest. As we are in the highlands, there are lots of car accidents. It is important to have a hospital in case of an emergency.

The township administrator was able to reclaim three of the five plots and he is in negotiations for the remaining two.

Popa has no more empty land, said a resident protestor. It is the only empty land. When we applied to build a cottage hospital, the Land Records Department surveyed the area correctly. The Union government also approved the plan because the land is big enough to build a hospital. Now the area they designated, more than 3 acres, has decreased by more than an acre.





Translation by Win Thaw Tar
After more than 550 tonnes of illegal timber were seized from locations throughout a military research forest in Pyin Oo Lwin township, cooperating witnesses say their homes were raided by police. The residents alleged the raids were a form of intimidation.





Timber searches on the military research compound on July 4, August 26 and September 1 turned up illegal wood piles near a defunct saw mill.

A local resident named U Htay Hlaing had a permit to collect about 60 tonnes a year for kitchen fuel at a forestry school. But both the July and August raids far exceed the number of logs allotted, and the second cache was hidden, and included luxury hardwood varieties such as Shorea obtusa and ironwood, according to residents. The military is suing U Htay Hlaing, holding him responsible for the wood found in August.

Ko Myint Naing of Ho Late village testified in the case, but then found police turned their inspection on him.

My house was searched for drugs on September 8, he told The Myanmar Times on September 10. I have never heard of something like this happening before. This disgraced my family name.

Local police, anti-drug forces and officials from the Department of Forestry made surprise visits to six Ho Late villagers involved in the timber arrests.

This is a plan to humiliate us among the villages community, Ko Myint Naing said. I think it is related to the timber case and a threat for us to stop our involvement with the case.

Police Sergeant U Maung Maung of the Wat Won Police Station said that the searches were the result of information from a tipster who identified himself as U Toe.





Nothing related to drugs were found there, he said on September 12. Then we investigated the informant and we found that they had given incorrect personal data. So we determined that this is false information.

Ho Late Village Tract Administrator U Tun Win speculates that the bogus tip was related to the timber case.

I know negative consequences will happen later, he said on September 12. They did not inform me in advance of the raid. I have informed the township administration office about the false information related to the drug trade and stockpiling timber.

This kind of raid has not happened in the village before, said Pyin Gyi Village Administrator Pyi Soe, and the delay in arresting the man who made the false claim shows the weakness of the law.

Authorities should verify the veracity of the information before conducting a search, he said.

Translation by Zar Zar Soe
The Central Arbitration Council altered a ruling from the Yangon Regional Arbitration Council on September 14, upholding a requirement that the Sakura garment factory in Hlaing Tharyar townships No 3 industrial zone rehire all 316 striking workers but reversing the stipulation that the owner pay them for the month-and-a-half they spent protesting.





Meanwhile, a new daily production quota, which went into effect on August 1 and was the impetus for the strikes, was struck down by the regional council but the central council ruled that it should be ironed out by the factorys Conciliation Committee, which is made up of two worker representatives and two employer representatives.

The councils ruling is not clear for the new daily production, Ma Thu Zar Win, who has worked at the factory for four years, said yesterday. If the daily production quota remains at the original rate, we can go back to work happily, even if we do not get compensation for the striking period.

The workers got wind of the new daily quota in late July and, claiming that the requirements were nearly impossible to meet with the current number of employees and the quality of the equipment, began protesting in the factory canteen on July 29. Under the regional councils ruling, the new quotas could not have been put into place without increased staff and new sewing machines.

The regional council made its ruling on August 31 but the Japanese factory owner, Ito Kiyokazu, refused to rehire the workers and appealed the decision to the central council.

The central council ruled that the protesters were in violation of labour laws because they began striking without permission of the appropriate township officials.

Late yesterday, factory officials announced that striking labourers would have until tomorrow to return to work, workers said. If they do not show, they will be fired, they said.

Now there is no one standing by our side, Ma Thu Zar Win said. We are helpless.





The Myanmar Times went to the factory yesterday in an attempt to meet with factory officials but they replied, via their security team, that they have no comment for the media because the disputes are settled. The Myanmar Times has attempted to discuss the matter with factory officials, via phone and visits to the factory, numerous times throughout the labour dispute but they have never responded.

We are not demanding more money, said Ma Wai Wai Aung, an operator with 10 years of service at the factory. We are asking that they retain the original daily production quota because factory officials forced us to produce more clothes and it is absolutely impossible for us.

Some striking workers said they are facing financial woes and do not know what to do. Some strikers lost cellphones, as they were robbed twice while picketing.

The Sakura garment factory opened in 2006 and the owner runs five other garment factories in Myanmar.
One of the most controversial policies in Thailands new constitution surrounds religion.





Section 67 of the 2016 draft constitution mandated the state to protect and promote the dissemination of Theravada Buddhist teaching to uplift the spiritual well-being of Thai people. Though unexpected, the official recognition of Theravada Buddhism is not a surprise. It confirms the trend that Thailand has been gradually sliding into religious intolerance.

Since 1932, all constitutions have guaranteed religious freedom. But Thailands 1997 constitution was the first that assigned the government the duty to support Buddhism and other religions. This was a compromise with the nationalist Buddhist front for not declaring Buddhism the state religion.

The 2007 constitution employed more elaborate language, emphasising the special status of Buddhism due to its historical and demographical importance. These changes coincided with attempts to reform Thai politics by appointing courts and independent watchdog agencies to scrutinise elected politicians accused of corruption. Members of these agencies were not elected but nominated based on their personal qualifications including moral standards.

In the 2016 constitution, the language is even more protective of Buddhism and even specifies which sect of Buddhism to uphold. Despite warning of possible religious tension, the Constitution Drafting Committee (CDC) insisted on, the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) approved, and the majority of Thai public endorsed this clause in the national referendum on August 7.

The 2016 draft constitution is further evidence of Thailands mistakes when it comes to religious policy. Decades of indoctrination in the public education system have convinced Thais that Buddhism is the only true belief and an integral part of being Thai. It has bred the Buddhist nationalist movement  a band of monks and followers who leverage the power of the state to maintain Buddhisms superior status over other faiths.

Governments also rely heavily on Buddhism for legitimacy to rule. As a result, the Buddhist nationalist movement easily asserts its influence over a government  one that it finds difficult to resist for fear of losing support. This is particularly apparent for a government that cannot claim majority support, like the NCPO.





In addition to constitutional changes, the Buddhist nationalist movement has proposed a series of policies that benefit their religion. It has asked the state to create the Buddhist Fund to support the dissemination of Buddhism. A monk who passes the Pali language exam can also receive a title and recognition equivalent to a PhD.

Moreover, some Buddhists have demanded a law on pilgrimage. According to this, the state must regulate and facilitate Buddhists who travel to India and Nepal to visit the birthplace and nirvana site of Lord Buddha.

These policies reflect a fear of Islam, which across the Muslim world enjoys government-operated Islamic banking and support for the Hajj pilgrimage. This fear is unfounded, but the government dares not ignore the wishes of Buddhist nationalists.

Although the majority of Thais voted to accept the 2016 draft constitution, the deep south provinces rejected it. The other region to reject the new charter was the northeast, the stronghold of the anti-coup Redshirt movement.

Residents of the deep south were concerned that the new constitution would enable the Buddhist-Siamese government to overlook the demand to preserve their Muslim-Malay identity. The region has always been restive, witnessing years of insurgency that has claimed thousands of lives on both sides. Adding insult to the injury, the NCPO blamed the high disapproval rate for the draft constitution on Muslim Malays ignorance, and their failure to understand the true content of the proposed constitution.

A week after the referendum, small bombs went off in several southern provinces, including the tourist attraction of Hua Hin, leaving one dead and several injured. The NCPO quickly blamed former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and arrested Redshirt sympathisers. Reluctantly, it later admitted that the southern insurgency was more likely behind these bombings.

The attacks represented a rare operation by insurgents outside of the deep south. For many, this was a message from Muslim Malays expressing their dissatisfaction with the new policy on religion. General Prayuth Chan-ocha, the head of the NCPO, responded by invoking Section 44 of the Interim Charter, which gave him absolute and uncontrolled power to issue Order 49/2559 to promote religious harmony.

However, doubts remain if Order 49/2559 can alleviate religious tension.

Despite a lengthy preamble ensuring that the government recognises the importance of all religions, the order simply confirms the governments usual stance. Other sects of Buddhism and other religions may enjoy the freedom of belief and practice, but Theravada Buddhism deserves the states special attention since it has been practiced by the majority of Thais since time immemorial.

Worse, the order mandates all relevant state agencies to monitor that only the right teaching is taught, claiming that there have been attempts to distort religious teaching to undermine social harmony. Moreover, the order explains that the right teaching should complement ideas such as sufficiency economy, good governance, national unity and honesty.

Not only does the NCPO understand nothing about the root of the problem but it also takes advantage of tragic incidents. Under the pretext of the right teaching, the government is now authorised to revoke personal freedoms to ensure that people do not deviate from the NCPOs ideologies. Unsurprisingly, the violence in the deep south has continued. Most recently, an explosion blew up a train, halting the whole southbound service. Another explosion in front of a kindergarten killed a father and his five-year-old daughter.

Playing the Buddhist card is naive and dangerous. Making an alliance with radical Buddhists is short-sighted. In the long run, this pact could cause more harm than good. The CDC and the NCPO are ignoring the fact that modern Thailand is a multi-faith and multi-ethnic community. They underestimate the impact of the Theravada Buddhism clause.

This constitution will alienate more and more people. It has fuelled the insurgency and could claim thousands of more lives. Even moderate Buddhists have become uneasy about this move toward a greater extreme. Buddhism could become a tool to suppress those who disagree with the state. Thailand could become more religiously intolerant. Religious freedom could diminish.

 New Mandala

Khemthong Tonsakulrungruang is a Thai constitution law scholar. He joined the faculty of law, Chulalongkorn University, Thailand, in 2009. Currently he is a PhD candidate at University of Bristol School of Law, UK.
While walking along Bogyoke Road one evening last week, my partner and I noticed something odd.





People had started to gather up ahead. A few of them pointed while others jostled for a look.

As we moved closer, the focus of their attention became clear  a man was beating a woman.

Hit after hit connected but the crowd did nothing. They watched. They discussed.

My partner ran forward yelling at him to stop.

The man looked up, surprised.

Its ok, shes my wife, he said.

Incredibly, there is no national data available on the incident rate for violence against women in Myanmar. This is one of only a handful of countries in the Asia Pacific region to have not collected numbers on this.





Sporadic and anecdotal evidence paints a grim picture. Information from women and girls centres around the country show levels of domestic violence in excess of 70 percent among those who access the facilities.

And a report prepared by the Department of Social Welfare and a group of NGOS found that almost 20pc of female respondents in Yangon experience domestic violence every day.

Equally disturbing is the fact that there is no comprehensive law in Myanmar to prevent violence against women.

There have been discussions about some sort of bill for several years. Discussions continue as the years roll by.

But experts seem to agree that the biggest roadblock to curbing domestic violence in Myanmar is just how normal it has become.

Entrenched gender inequality means that domestic violence is not only prevalent, but is considered a private matter which is acceptable, said Alexandra Robinson, a gender-based violence specialist from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) Myanmar office.

This sentiment goes some way toward explaining why bystanders  both young and old  did nothing that night on Bogyoke Road.

Domestic violence has become a normal part of our society, said Daw Htar Htar, director of Akhaya Women Myanmar. In fact, theres not even really a word for it in Burmese. Husbands think they are allowed to discipline their wives.

More often than not, blame for violent outbursts is placed on the woman.

Families of victims usually ask these women to be patient and to be a better woman, saying not to make your husband angry, Daw Htar Htar said.

This was echoed by director of Gender Equality Network May Sabe Phyu. Victims are blamed for not fulfilling the expected role of a good housewife or good mother. When people see domestic violence, they will blame the women for being bold, disobedient or not listening to her husband. Basically  that she deserved it, she said.

Womens rights groups have also found authorities treat domestic violence cases with similar attitudes, and groups relayed stories of domestic violence victims going to the police only to be told to be more patient. Some police demand to see video records that violence occurred.

In more extreme cases of violence, men are occasionally brought to the police station where they must sign a form promising not to do it again.

And with the few women who do initiate some form of legal redress, often the complaint is withdrawn, said Melanie Hilton, womens rights advisor at Action Aid Myanmar.

[This is] due to fears of being a single parent, with little economic and social support, as well as their desire to avoid triggering an adverse community reaction, she said.

These cycles of violence are likely to go unbroken in Myanmar until community perceptions shift.

What makes the difference between a woman running away from an abuser and passively letting the abuse happen to her is the perception of how supportive and responsive the environment around her will be, said a 2015 report by the Gender Equality Network.

Experts agreed that Myanmar has a long way to go before it becomes either supportive or responsive to women experiencing domestic violence.

Reflecting on the abuse we witnessed on Bogyoke Road, my partner drew a sad conclusion  our intervention would likely mean nothing at all in the long term.

This was a man who had no reservations about a very public display of violence against his wife. So what more happens each day behind closed doors?
Initial analysis of the gender balance at the recent 21st-century Panglong Conference offers some fascinating insights into attitudes toward women among different sectors of those involved in the countrys peace process.





Overall, only 14 percent of official participants in the high-profile event were women, and just 9pc of those sent to represent the government, according to an analysis of figures provided to The Myanmar Times by the Myanmar Alliance for Gender Inclusion in the Peace Process (AGIPP).

The numbers  97 women out of 663 official representatives, according to the AGIPP  apparently mark a step forward from a pre-Panglong meeting held in January, when only 7pc of those at the table were women. But the huge imbalance remains disheartening.

A 30pc minimum quota of female delegates has been recommended by experts, including UN special rapporteur on Myanmar Yanghee Lee, if the country is to meet international conventions on women, peace and security.

An AGIPP spokesperson cautioned that the true number of women who took a place at the peace table might even be slightly lower than 14pc, as the alliance is still seeking clarification over whether some ethnic armed organisations may have included a small number female technical and support staff in their women representative tallies in addition to officially invited participants.

However, she said any change to the final numbers would be minor.

According to the AGIPPs figures, 20pc of official representatives sent by ethnic armed organisations (36 out of 175) were women. That compares to the 6pc of the Tatmadaw delegation who were women  although it is worth noting that the Myanmar militarys 10 female representatives (out of 150) at the latest peace talks were 10 more than in January, when not a single woman was included among their numbers.





The parliamentary contingent included 15 women, 20pc out of a total of 75 MPs participating.

That the government managed to send just seven women among its 75 official participants illustrates the contempt the National League for Democracy-led administration has for women and for its obligations under UN Security Council resolution 1325 on women, peace and security to ensure their representation in peace talks.

Numerous studies show the importance of womens involvement in negotiations if peace agreements are to last. However, it is not just folly but also arrogance of the highest level that allows senior politicians and other leaders in society to act as if the views of more than 50pc of the population do not matter.

It is also concerning that the government is so readily willing to avoid its duties under UN resolution 1325  an issue that was highlighted at the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW).

The military elements in the current government were unlikely to ever champion womens rights or pay much heed to the international conventions that seek to protect them.

But the fact that Daw Aung San Suu Kyis civilian-led administration also chooses to ignore internationally defined obligations to uphold womens rights highlights concerning questions about the state counsellors commitment to rights conventions in general when she considers them irrelevant or inconvenient to achieving her goals.

Of course it is not just the government that continues to marginalise women from the peace process. The AGIPP figures show just 16pc of those representing political parties  and only 11pc of civilian ethnic representatives  were women.

According to the AGIPP, its relatively successful achievement in persuading the ethnic armed organisations to include more women representatives was the result of intense advocacy efforts. Members said that while it was often hard to persuade the men to listen, it was comparatively easy for individuals from ethnic womens rights organisations to access the ethnic armed leaders to advocate for their inclusion.

Reaching senior government figures has been much more difficult, womens advocates report. Yet when they are given an opportunity to speak to ministers, they have seen positive results  as was the case with an official from the Ministry of Social Welfare who, after meeting them, raised the issue of womens participation in his Panglong Conference speech to cheers from female audience members.

With the recent peace conference tipped to be just the start of a long-running series of negotiations, the AGIPP is calling on the media and international actors to put more pressure on the government to do its duty when it comes to ensuring womens inclusion in the peace process.

As Myanmars progress toward democratic reform comes under international scrutiny during Daw Aung San Suu Kyis visit to the United States, the continued failure of the government to protect and uphold the specific rights of women in all aspects of life, including these crucial peace talks, should be raised as a matter of utmost concern.
[September 16, 2016] WISeKey to Launch a Blockchain Center of Excellence in Mauritius to Develop a Blockchain Platform

WISeKey International Holding Ltd ("WISeKey")(SIX:WIHN), a leading cybersecurity company, during its participation at the Mauritius Investment Board Blockchain event, announced its intention to establish a BlockChain Centre of Excellence in Mauritius to deploy a Trusted Blockchain as a Service platform, to assist the Mauritius Government to create a Blockchain Ecosystem. WISeKey will work with experts from industry, government, and academia to address businesses' most relevant blockchain developments with practical, standards-based solutions using available blockchain technologies. This dedicated center of excellence will conduct research, rapid pilot prototyping, co-creation of use cases and IP creation on blockchain technology and platforms. The Mauritius BlockChain Centre of Excellence will recommend a National Blockchain Platform to facilitate enterprises to swiftly adopt and on-board blockchain based solutions and services. The Mauritius Blockchain Center of Excellence will help position the country as a key and active player in the blockchain space. It will provide access to both policy, technical and business expertise around blockchain. WISeKey will be cooperating with local companies participating at the center on building points of view, proof of concepts, policies, educational materials including addressing all the distributed ledger capabilities across different blockchain schemes (public, consortium and private), with industry verticalization and domain specialization (IoT, transactions, messaging, etc.), underpinned by the best underlying technologies from startups, our key partners and from the community. Carlos Moreira, Founder and CEO WISeKey said: "We strongly believe that the Blockchain Center of Excellence will disrupt business flows and processes across different industries in Mauritius and will position the country as one of the Blockchain Platforms and Hubs." WISeKey will be localizing in Mauritius at the development of the WISeID Blockchain which is constantly growing as new blocks are added to it with a new set of recordings. Each WISeID node gets a copy of the WISeID Blockchain and gets downloaded automatically upon joining the WISeID network. Through the WISeID BlockChain app users are always in control of their digital identity stored on their mobile, IoT sensor and or computer and is only the user who determines which identification attributes are shared with social media, credit cards, merchant sites etc. never disclosing the Personal Identifiable Information (PII) if not required or necessary. WISeID uses BlockChain as a public, immutable ledger that allows third parties to validate that the original Identity or Attribute certifications provided by a Third Trusted Party has not been changed or misrepresented. Keeping control of Digital Identity is key to protecting user's personal data. The Mauritius Event: The next Blockchain Valley Organized by Board of Investment (BOI) of Mauritius The Board of Investment (BOI) is the national investment promotion agency of the Government of Mauritius with the mandate to promote and facilitate investment in the country. It is the first point of contact for investors exploring business opportunites in Mauritius and the region. BOI also assists investors in the growth, nurturing and diversification of their business.



BOI Announcement: BMPL Ebene Cybercity has today been the scene of a historical landmark in the shaping of our digital economy.

The very first seminar on Blockchain exceeded our expectations with overwhelming appreciation from the audience. More than 200 stakeholders across various sectors, including Banks, Assets Management, Insurance, Tourism, ICT and entrepreneurs from over the world attended the seminar. As an indication, investments in bitcoin and Blockchain infrastructure have already topped USD 1 billion, and every major bank in the world is increasingly paying attention to this technology. The seminar saw the participation of renowned international speakers who intervened on diverse themes, namely demystifying Blockchain, developing its ecosystem, its regulatory framework and the potential applications of Blockchain in today's innovation-driven economy. Mr. Carlos Creus Moreira, Chairman, CEO & Founder of WISeKey made a clear presentation of Blockchain technology. He highlighted the differences between Blockchain and other technologies such as cloud computing, and expanded on the potential in creating revolutionary solutions which do not exist in the marketplace today. Mr. Sebastien Couture, co-founder of Stratumn, demonstrated how Blockchain builds consensus around multiple institutions, enterprises and individuals working together by eliminating the role of the middleman and improving efficiency while at the same time improving trust between all the parties. His colleague, Mr. Anuj Das Gupta, Head of Research at Stratumn, elaborated further on the subject by discussing the potential applications of Blockchain, including in KYC systems and Smart cities. He also suggested that Blockchain technology could be used in diverse sectors such as energy and healthcare. We also had the pleasure of listening to Ms. Primavera de Fillippi, Researcher at Centre National de Recherche Scientifique, who elaborated on the need for a shift in the regulatory mindset, moving from a bureaucracy base, friction and permission (permission-based rules) to one based on accountability, transparency and innovation (information-based rules) in a bid to reconcile the objectives of providing comfort and security to users while ensuring that regulations do not stifle innovation. Finally, Mr. Larry Christopher Bates, Chief Security Officer and President of Bitland Global, suggested that Mauritius can become the "Blockchain Valley" through the advent of a cyber-security Hague for international data-houses. He maintained that this will inevitably contribute to economic growth. Blockchain as a technology is here to stay. The onus remains on us to harness its advantages and leverage them for the benefit of Mauritian businesses, consumers and the Government. In addition, Blockchain KYC's efficiencies and cryptographic protocols deliver stronger security and faster compliance with reduced operating costs. The seminar has set the scene for this technological revolution. We now have to develop the Blockchain ecosystem, including devising an appropriate regulatory framework, build the local manpower and encourage both public and private sectors to integrate the technology in their structures to trigger a new phase of efficiency led by the growth of their ventures. A small country, Mauritius has the potential to rapidly implement Blockchain in day-to-day business. Far from being the end, this is rather the dawn of a new beginning. We will follow up on this seminar with another one in a few months. The objective is to maintain the momentum, attract more global players and position Mauritius as a trusted and secure platform in the region for the deployment of Blockchain technology. Already, WISeKey and Bitland have indicated that they are considering setting up operations in Mauritius. This can only bode a bright future for the next 'Blockchain Valley.' About WISeKey WISeKey (SIX Swiss Exchange:WIHN) is a leading cybersecurity company and selected as a World Economic Forum Global Growth Company. WISeKey is currently deploying large scale Internet of Things ("IoT") digital identity ecosystems and has become a pioneer of the "4th Industrial Revolution (News - Alert)" movement launched this year at the World Economic Forum in Davos. WISeKey's Swiss based cryptographic Root of Trust ("RoT") integrates wearable technology with secure authentication and identification, in both physical and virtual environments, and empowers IoT and wearable devices to become secure transactional devices. The RoT serves as a common trust anchor, which is recognized by the operating system and applications, to ensure the authenticity, confidentiality and integrity of on-line transactions. With the cryptographic RoT embedded on the device, the IoT product manufacturers can use code-signing certificates and a cloud-based signature as a service to secure interactions among objects and between objects and people. WISeKey has patented this process in the USA as it is currently used by many IoT providers. Disclaimer: This communication expressly or implicitly contains certain forward-looking statements concerning WISeKey International Holding Ltd and its business. Such statements involve certain known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which could cause the actual results, financial condition, performance or achievements of WISeKey International Holding Ltd to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. WISeKey International Holding Ltd is providing this communication as of this date and does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements contained herein as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. This press release does not constitute an offer to sell, or a solicitation of an offer to buy, any securities, and it does not constitute an offering prospectus within the meaning of article 652a or article 1156 of the Swiss Code of Obligations or a listing prospectus within the meaning of the listing rules of the SIX Swiss Exchange. Investors must rely on their own evaluation of WISeKey and its securities, including the merits and risks involved. Nothing contained herein is, or shall be relied on as, a promise or representation as to the future performance of WISeKey. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160916005594/en/

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Austria's OMV said on Friday it received 1 million barrels of crude oil from Iran in a spot delivery at the Italian port of Trieste which the energy group will send to its two refineries in Austria and Romania.

The delivery was Iran's first to OMV since 2012, when sanctions were imposed on the country. OMV is in talks with Iran about future deliveries, although no such contract has been signed yet, a spokesman told Reuters.

Friday's delivery included Iranian heavy and light crude, he added.
16.09.2016 LISTEN

For the second year running, EchoHouse has rolled out Freshafair an event set to welcome freshmen to the tertiary system. The event which is taking place in the 3 main universities promises to be a one-stop shop which makes it ideal for all students both freshmen and continuing. With brands, Vodafone, VodafoneX, Access bank, BBNZLive, Jodel, Lucozade, Guinness, L'Oreal among others on board to give students mainly freshmen that ultimate campus life experience for the very first time, the bus makes the first stop in Cape Coast.

The university of Cape Coast will play host for the Freshafair train this weekend and comes with more than enough for every student. From the 15th to 17th September, the University of Cape Coast will have a series of activities from old inter-school games to movie night, discount fair to a finale concert.

The first day will have Old School games where students get to play for a GHC 1,000 from Lucozade. And there is the 10 Cedis shop experience where students get to buy everything on offer for just GHC 10 with Vodafone Cash.

The experience on campus will however not be complete without a direction or sense of fashion show. Hence, fashion will play a center stage on the second day. Designers, established and students, will get the opportunity to showcase their various designs.

And then on the final day, VGMAs Artiste of the year, the BAR, EL will turn up the heat in Cape Coast with the first of its kind, BAR ON CAMPUS. The show will feature the best of campus students as well as the entire BBNZLive crew and a host of other artistes. BAR III will be on display and the main feature on the night.

But the fun doesnt end in Cape Coast, the train will move to KNUST the following week 22nd- 24th September 2016 and University of Ghana the next for the grand fair on the 30th September -1st October.
Not many are of the know that gentle Nollywood actor, Henry James Ejike Asiegbu, was on some occasion imprisoned by the Babangida led military administration which saw him being taken from one prison to another across the country.

The talented actor, who is rarely seen at public events, has gone through a lot during his time as one of the student union leaders and his activeness was a threat to the government of the day which kept hunting him for long.

Ejike, who has spent about 26 months in prison, has disclosed that his ugly exposure to hard life in the prison has sharpen him that if he becomes a governor or president of Nigeria, he will know how to lead and direct the country.

He suggested that anybody that wants to rule the country right, such fellow needs to go through what people in the prisons were going through as that will help change the negative mindset of many.

In his words, while speaking with Yes Magazine, Well, in the words of Ikemba Nnewi, I will say: I saw war and war saw me. But today when I reflect, I still thank the Almighty God for making me experience something special and another aspect of life which any person that intends to lead this country should experience because I know that if by tomorrow I find myself in a position of strength, maybe as a Governor, Minister, an Ambassador or even the President, I will be able to cut across, reach out to the poor and the rich, the haves and the have nots because Ive been to the last bus stop. I have been through the darkest tunnels. Obasanjo can testify. Although, mine was worse because theirs was the VIP while ours was the ghetto. Its true.
Grime star Skepta has beaten the likes of David Bowie, Radiohead and The 1975 to win the Mercury Prize.

He won the 25,000 award for self-released album Konnichiwa, which covers topics including police harassment and his anger at British politics.

The record, described by the NME as a "landmark in British street music", went to number two earlier this year.

"I'm just so thankful. I've been trying to do this music stuff and work it out for so long," Skepta said of his win.

Speaking to the BBC backstage, he said he would use the prize money to help the disadvantaged.

"Something positive, something to help other people feel as happy and as free as me," he said.

"We're doing a project right now, actually, building a studio in my old estate to help the young kids do music."

Pop group The 1975 won a fan vote, allowing their album to progress to the final round of jury deliberations

Skepta's victory meant that bookmakers' favourite David Bowie missed out after receiving a posthumous nomination for his swansong album, Blackstar.

Judge Jarvis Cocker said the jury had faced a tough decision deciding between the two records, which had been whittled down from a longlist of 12.

"In the end, the winner came down to a contest between two black stars," he said.

"And we, as a jury, decided that if Bowie was looking down on the Hammersmith Apollo tonight, he would want the 2016 Hyundai Mercury Music Prize to go to Skepta."

Other albums shortlisted for the 2016 prize included Michael Kiwanuka's Love & Hate, and Bat For Lashes' The Bride - a concept record about a woman whose fiance is killed in a car crash while driving to their wedding.

Radiohead received a record fifth nomination for their record A Moon Shaped Pool but went home empty-handed again.

Albums that beat Radiohead to the Mercury Prize Year Radiohead album Eventual prize-winner 1997 OK Computer Roni Size - New Forms 2001 Amnesiac PJ Harvey - Stories From The City... 2003 Hail To The Thief Dizzee Rascal - Boy In Da Corner 2008 In Rainbows Elbow - The Seldom Seen Kid 2016 A Moon Shaped Pool Skepta - Konnichiwa

Perhaps sensing that the odds were stacked against them, the band were absent from the ceremony, instead sending a video for the ballad Present Tense.

All of the other acts performed on the night, with actor Michael C Hall performing David Bowie's song Lazarus, which opens with the lyrics: "Look up here, I'm in heaven."

The star of Dexter and Six Feet Under will soon be seen in London in the lead role in Bowie's musical - also called Lazarus - which premiered in New York shortly before his death.

Hall said it was a great responsibility to be representing the musician on the stage where he had famously "killed" his Ziggy Stardust character.

"I'm trying not to spend too much time dwelling on the reality of the situation for fear that it will overwhelm me. It's beyond anything I ever anticipated but I'm really humbled and honoured to be asked to do it."

Skepta has been called the "godfather of grime" Who is Skepta?

Skepta was born Joseph Junior Adenuga 33 years ago in Tottenham, London, and started making music in the early 2000s.

He rode the first wave of grime to a contract with Universal Records, but his sound was watered down and they soon parted ways.

Konnichiwa was the result of a major shift in the star's life.

"I had friends that died, and I had to realise that I don't care about certain things I used to care about before". 'We all won today'

It prompted him to return to the music he loved, reaching out directly to fans via social media.

In 2014, he released That's Not Me, a rapid-fire freestyle that atoned for losing sight of his roots: "I used to wear Gucci / I put it all in the bin cause that's not me."

Accompanied by a video that cost 80, it went on to win a MOBO award and showed the star he could make it on his own terms.

Accepting the Mercury Prize, he said: "I was like' let's do it for ourselves'.

"All these songs, we've travelled the world - no record label, nothing. We just did this for us but the love is very appreciated.

"We all won today. Konnichiwa!" Dizzee Heights

Skepta is the second grime artist to win the Mercury, following Dizzee Rascal's victory in 2003.

His win marks the commercial resurgence of the genre, with Skepta key in helping recalibrate the sound back towards its inner city roots.

Fellow grime artist Kano was also nominated for the Mercury Prize, and Skepta made sure to recognise him during his awards speech.

"Kane - for life, bro - we did it!"
Following his achievements in the radio industry within the Kumasi Metropolis, a prominent gospel radio presenter on Kumasi-based Kessben FM, Sammy Adu Boakye, aka SAB, has been honoured for his immense contributions in promoting Gods work through radio.

The Full Gospel Business Mens Fellowship International (FGBMFI), made up of prominent personalities who propagate the gospel through their life testimonies, honoured SAB at a colourful ceremony in Kumasi.

As the host of Streams of Life and Church Bells, all on Kessben FM, SAB was honoured with a citation and FGBMFIs Life Member Pin of Gold, for using radio to win souls for Christ for more than one decade.

The owner of Kessben FM, Kwabena Kesse, who is a business mogul and a staunch Christian, was also honoured with a citation and a Life Member Pin of Gold from FGBMFI, for allowing his radio station to be used to promote the work of God.

SAB in a chat with BEATWAVES thanked Mr Kwabena Kesse, his family, listeners of his programmes and his numerous supporters for helping him to reach his current status in radio.

The top gospel personality who is a product of Adisadel College and the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science &Technology (KNUST) also thanked FGBMFI, notably its President, Dr George Prah, for the great honour done to him, assuring to sustain his hard work.

FROM I.F. Joe Awuah Jnr., Kumasi
With just a few months to Ghana's general elections, one of Ghana's leading television stations, United Television (UTV), will soon air programmes to educate Ghanaians about the effects of election violence.

The programme aims at enhancing the credibility of the electoral processes and securing a peaceful environment to accelerate Ghana's growth and development regardless of the elections.

It involves a mix of programmes on voter awareness, pro-peace, gender, among others, which are expected to contribute to achieving credible, peaceful, inclusive and transparent elections.

The airing of the yet-to-be introduced programme would remind Ghanaians of the need to stay united as one country with a common destiny rather than get divided along political and ethnic differences.

One of the core objectives of the station is to transmit high quality programmes on education, development, culture and current affairs to its viewers.

We want to give Ghanaians a local content television station that is handled with the professionalism that meets international standards. We want to be unique in our own way and endear ourselves to the hearts and minds of our viewers, a source close to management stated.

UTV has its long-term objective to play an effective role in the development of communications as a major instrument for nation building and a vital element in the socio-economic development process.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 16

By Emil Ilgar  Trend:

Iran lifted the ban on wheat export and the first cargoes could be transited to Turkey and Italy, Ali Qanbari, managing director of Governmental Trading Corporation, told ISNA Sept. 16.

He added that some 11.6 million tons of wheat has been purchased by government from farmers during the current fiscal year (started March 21), of which 800,000 tons is durum wheat, for the export of which the government issued a permit.

Iran produced 3 million tons of wheat more than in the last fiscal year.

Almost 7.5 million tons of wheat is used by bakery units and Irans food industry also needs 2.5 million tons of wheat every year.

Irans wheat demand stands at over 13 million tons annually.
Legendary highlife and reggae artist,Ekow Micah has described his colleague musician Lucky Mensahs switch from the national Democratic Congress(NDC} to the New Patriotic Party(NPP) as a stomach change.

The popular highlife/reggae music star was answering a question with regards to how he perceives Lucky Mensahs severed ties with the governing National Democratic Congress after releasing a series of songs to canvass votes for them (NDC) during the 2008/2012 general elections.

Lucky mensah had said that he regrets campaigning for the NDC since he is now seen as a liar for following a party that has failed citizens and now campaigning for the opposition New Patriotic Party ahead of this years elections

Expressing his candid opinion on the matter which has created elephantine controversies within the showbiz fraternity, and in the general public at large, the Aba hitmaker, Ekow Micah indicated that,Lucky mensahs switch is not dignified.

Lucky Mensah has proven that he is selfish and a joker.Oh Yes,he is a funny guy.Because when he released Uncle Attah a song he produced to malign the governing party, the government gave him some money and he immediately redrew the song and campaigned for them instead.

Because he has squandered the money they gave him, he is now saying things are not going on well and has switched back to NPP-This shows that the change he is pursuing is never a dignified change but a stomach change, Ekow Micah said in an inspiring interview with Dr Who on Accra-based Hot Fm .

He added that, change is the best thing that happens to every mans life, but it could be positive and it could also be negative: it all depends on you the individual.

When asked whether he will also endorse any political party,Ekow Micah disclosed that he is nonpolitical.According to him rasta men dont buy divisiveness.

However,though he wouldnt endorse any political party,it is his right as a good citizen to express his franchise by voting but wouldnt come in broad day light to declare his support for any political party for everyone to know.

Ekow Micah is currently working on his yet to be released song titled political malaria

Kindly Watch the Full interview Below!


Award-winning Nigerian musician Davido is Africas new king on Instagram with 2.9 million followers which makes him unseat Tanzanian hitmaker Diamond Platnumz, Naseeb Abdul Juma, who commands 2.7 million supporters.

Nigerias Wizkid, Ayodeji Ibrahim Balogun, comes on strongly on the heels of Diamond Platinums with 2.5 Million followers to boot.

Another Nigerian vocalist, lyricist, entertainer, and performer Tiwa Savage, Tiwatope Savage-Balogun, swoops into case a clean 2.3 million instagram devotees.

Closing the Top 5 list, Nigerian multi-award winning producer, Don Jazzy, Michael Collins Ajereh, has a cool 2.2 million adherents monitoring him on Instagram.
Sensational Ghanaian worshiper, Brother Sammy has called on radio DJs accross the country to help freely promote his peace song, 'Oman Ba Pa' released this year since the song is meant to promote peace.

According to Sammy, some DJs are requesting for 'Payola'(money) before they start playing the song on air but he believes because the song stands for peace, DJs should help promote it freely as part of their share to promote peace especially ahead of this year's general elections.

His song, 'Oman Ba Pa' since its release in August this year has received commendations from the public.

The song touches on ones responsibility as a citizen of Ghana in ensuring a peaceful and a sound nation to live, especially ahead of this year's general elections slated for December 7.
Nairobi (AFP) - The number of refugees from South Sudan has passed the one million mark after a renewed bout of fierce fighting in July sent nearly 200,000 people fleeing the war-scarred nation, the UN said Friday.

The latest United Nations refugee agency figures see the world's youngest nation join the ranks of Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia, where conflict similarly has driven massive numbers fleeing to safety across national borders.

The large majority of South Sudanese refugees registered since it won its independence in 2011 have fled since the outbreak of a particularly brutal civil war in December 2013.

Tens of thousands of people have died and more than 2.5 million been driven from their homes.

Countless villages have been burnt to the ground, almost half the population relies on food assistance to survive, and human rights organisations say government and rebel forces have frequently used rape as a weapon of war.

"The number of South Sudanese refugees sheltering in neighbouring countries has this week passed the one million mark," UNHCR said in a statement.

Map of South Sudan region with figures for those who have fled to neighbouring countries, internally displaced persons and refugees from other countries in South Sudan

Another 1.61 million people are displaced inside the country, it said.

"Five years after independence, this is a very sad milestone," spokesman Leo Dobbs told reporters in Geneva.

Neighbouring Uganda, which already shelters 375,000 South Sudanese, warned it was running out of resources and asked for support.

"The international community ... must act very fast to end this violence," Disaster and Refugees Minister Musa Ecweru told AFP. "We have maintained an open door policy ... but the resources we have cannot cope with the surging numbers."

"We appeal to donors to step up funding," he added.

Hopes of ending the three-year conflict rose in April when former rebel leader Riek Machar returned to Juba to take up the job of vice-president in a national unity government headed by President Salva Kiir.

No end in sight

But fierce clashes erupted in Juba on July 8 between Kiir's guards and troops loyal to Machar, who is currently in Khartoum receiving medical treatment.

Since then, more than 185,000 people have fled, most of them women and children, according to the UNHCR.

"They include survivors of violent attacks, sexual assault, children (who) have been separated from their parents ... and people in need of urgent medical care," the UN agency said.

The South Sudanese government has agreed to the deployment of a 4,000-strong UN protection force to beef up the UN's peacekeeping mission of 12,000 troops

On September 4, the South Sudanese government first reluctantly agreed to the deployment of a 4,000-strong UN protection force to beef up the UN's peacekeeping mission of 12,000 troops.

But then it asked to re-negotiate the size of the force, irritating the international community.

On Thursday the United States threatened to push for an arms embargo against the Juba government should it block the formation of the force.

Meanwhile several civil society activists who met with a UN Security Council team last week have fled a government crackdown.

The UNHCR said refugees arriving in neighbouring countries were reporting heavy fighting across the southern Greater Equatoria region, where armed groups were killing civilians, sexually assaulting women and girls and recruiting young boys.

"Many refugees arrive exhausted after days walking in the bush and going without food or water," UNHCR said.

Most of those recently uprooted have crossed into Uganda, which counts 143,164 recent arrivals, bringing the total number of South Sudanese refugees in the country to nearly 375,000.

And there is no end in sight: over the past week alone, more than 20,000 new arrivals were registered in Uganda.

A surge of people has meanwhile also entered western Ethiopia's Gambella region in the past week, while others have headed to Kenya, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Central African Republic.

"These countries have commendably kept their doors open to the new arrivals," UNHCR said.
Geneva (AFP) - Renewed fierce fighting has pushed more than 185,000 people to flee South Sudan since July, sending the number of refugees from the impoverished nation past one million, the UN said Friday.

"The number of South Sudanese refugees sheltering in neighbouring countries has this week passed the one million mark," the United Nations refugee agency said in a statement, pointing out that another 1.61 million people are displaced inside the country.
Ouagadougou (AFP) - Luc Adolphe Tiao, the last prime minister of former Burkinabe president Blaise Compaore, has been detained and charged with murder over unrest that saw the latter unseated in 2014, the supreme court prosecutor general said Friday.

Compaore lost power after 27 years following a popular uprising in October 2014 against his attempts to change the constitution to remain in office and last year the country's transitional council indicted him and senior members of his government on charges of high treason.

The supreme court prosecutor told AFP Tiao had been detained and charged as part of its mandate to investigate the "popular insurrection" which accompanied the collapse of the Compaore regime.

"Former prime minister Luc Adolphe Tiao has been placed in detention and was taken to a prison facility at Ouagadougou this morning," Armand Ouedraogo told AFP.

"He has been charged with murder, beating and deliberate wounding and complicity" in violence in connection with military attempts to put down the uprising.

Ouagadougou prosecutor Maiza Sereme last week decried the "difficulties" encountered in pursuing the case against Tiao and former regime leaders citing a lack of "cooperation" from state authorities.

Tiao spent a year-and-a-half in exile in Ivory Coast but returned to Burkina Faso last weekend after questioning of several members of his former cabinet who remain in the country

Several sources have told AFP that former journalist Tiao is accused of having signed an order for the army to use force in putting down the popular uprising.
On September 14, a ceremony took place in Conakry, through the active assistance of the Russian Embassy in the Republic of Guinea, to deliver 5,000 doses of a Russian anti-cholera vaccine, provided by the Russian Federal Service for Supervision of Consumer Rights Protection and Human Well-Being (Rospotrebnadzor) as part of efforts to curb the spread of this disease among the population.

General Director of Guineas National Agency for Health Security at the Guinean Healthcare Ministry Dr Sakoba Keita expressed profound gratitude to Russia for this considerable humanitarian aid.

The RUSAL company that runs a number of projects in Guinea assisted in delivering the vaccine.
The BRICS High Representatives responsible for security held their sixth meeting at New Delhi on Thursday, 15 September 2016. Shri Ajit Doval, National Security Adviser, Government of the Republic of India presided over the meeting.





The delegation from Brazil was led by H.E. General Sergio Westphalen Etchegoyen, Minister of State, Head of the Cabinet for Institutional Security of the Presidency of the Republic of Brazil, Russia by H.E. Mr. Nikolai P. Patrushev, Secretary of the Security Council of the Russian Federation, China by H.E. Mr. Yang Jiechi, State Councilor, Peoples Republic of China, and South Africa by H.E. Mr. Mbangiseni David Mahlobo, Minister of State Security.

Acknowledging the positive contribution of the BRICS grouping on important global issues, they deliberated on security issues such as Counter Terrorism, Cyber Security and Energy Security. They also exchanged assessments of recent developments in the West Asia and North Africa (WANA) region.

In the area of Cyber Security/Information Security they agreed to strengthen joint efforts on enhancing cyber security by sharing of information and best practices, combating cyber-crimes, improving cooperation between technical and law enforcement agencies including joint cyber security R&D and capacity building.

The High Representatives encouraged cooperation and exchanging of best practices, expertise, information and knowledge on Counter Terrorism issues. In this context, they welcomed the first meeting of the BRICS Working Group on Counter Terrorism that was held a day before. They also agreed to expand BRICS Counter Terrorism cooperation further to include measures for denying terrorists access to finance and terror-hardware such as equipment, arms and ammunition. They underscored the need for a global legal regime to deal with the global menace of terrorism.

They also agreed to explore regular energy dialogue between BRICS countries in order to discuss long-term and medium-term energy security issues.

While highlighting the need for resolution of outstanding disputes in the WANA region through dialogue peaceful means and in accordance with international law and the principles of the UN charter, BRICS High Representatives also agreed to pool BRICS efforts to counter terrorism and violent extremism emanating from the region.

The High Representatives concurred on a BRICS Forum to progressively consolidate cooperation and exchanges among respective agencies in security related fields.

NSA Shri Ajit Doval expressed his gratitude to his counterparts from BRICS countries for their active participation and contributions in making the meeting successful.
A Chartered Insurance Practitioner and Deputy Managing Director of Activa International Insurance Company has said that Africa critically needs systems like proper National Identification systems, Street Naming and Home Numbers for planning purposes; procedures and orderliness in the modern globalized business space.

Mr. Solomon Lartey said this in his address when he chaired the launching of Nubianbiz.com a newly established online hub at the Airport West Hotel, Accra on Wednesday, 7th September, 2016.

Systematic procedures and orderliness, for example, National Identification Systems, Street Names and Home Numbers are critical for planning purposes. Access to and provision of products and services require knowing who, why and where your customers can be found. Providers of goods and services need to know how many people there are at a place and where each one is. Customers also need to know what products are available and for which benefit. These would thrive in an environment where good legal and regulatory frameworks exist, Mr. Lartey said.

He said governments and institutions must adopt systematic strategizing, technological systems as well as clearly defined procedural frameworks and orderliness in their everyday activities.

This is what is needed as Africa positions itself as the new frontier of economic power.

He explained that in a modern globalized business space, the rule of thumb is to see and be seen. Nubianbiz.com intends to make this a reality not only for Ghanaian businesses and consumers but also for all of Africa and beyond through ICT.

Speaking under the theme: Africas Quest for Development - The Way Forward, the Chief Executive Officer of NubianBiz.com, Jules Nartey-Tokoli said, his online company is strategically formed to serve as business opportunity hub for people in Ghana and the whole of Africa in areas of Trading, Management and Entrepreneurship.

Presentations and addresses were made by Dr. Lloyd Amoah of Ashesi University, Ms. Mavis Nee-Okpey, Director of Administration of Soleil Groupe, Mr. Hector Wulff, Executive Director-Organization for Customer Service Excellence Ghana and other speakers.

Story by Ghana | Myjoyonline.com
Parent company of Guinness Ghana Breweries Limited (GGBL), Diageo Plc has launched its annual report which shows progress made in the areas of social investment.

The company began a new chapter in their approach to sustainability and responsibility when they launched their 2020 Sustainability and Responsibility targets.

The targets align with 12 of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

Building on a long tradition of contributing to society as a company with strong governance and ethics, their new 2020 targets focuses on the issues that are central to the business creating a positive role for alcohol in society; building thriving communities; and reducing environmental impact.

Creating a positive role for alcohol in society

Diageo, which operates in 180 markets across the world, shares the goal set by the World Health Organization (WHO) of reducing harmful drinking by 10% across the world by 2025 in an effort to reduce non-communicable diseases.

To achieve the reduction, alcohol producers are measured on implementing the Global Beer, Wine and Spirits Producers Commitments to reduce Harmful Drinking, including actions on reducing underage drinking, strengthening and expanding marketing codes of practice, providing consumer information and responsible product innovation, reducing drink driving and enlisting the support of retailers to reduce harmful drinking.

The worlds leading premium drinks business increased the number of underage education initiatives by 50% in 86 countries, compared with 57 in 2014.84% of the top 19 countries assessed the effectiveness of their programmes, measuring increases in awareness or shifts in attitudes or behaviour.

This year they reached 380,622 people, through training programmes.

Francis Agbonlahor, Managing Director of GGBL said the companys commitment to achieving the Diageo 2020 sustainability targets supports our ambition to be the best performing, most trusted and respected business in Ghana.

We are committed to ensuring the responsible enjoyment of alcohol. Like many others, we know this product can be misused hence our strategic partnerships to promote responsible drinking. Over the years GGBL has partnered with the National Road Safety Commission, Motor and Traffic Transport Department of the Ghana Police Service, Total Petroleum Ghana Limited University of Ghana School of Medicine and Dentistry and various commercial drivers unions. This allows us to gain important insights and to positively impact more people with our programmes and campaigns on responsible use of alcohol, he said.

On underage drinking, the pilot campaign Hit the Books, reached more than 800 Senior High students in Accra. About 580 bar tenders and 33 retail shops were reached with responsible drinking and serving programmes, namely Master Bar Academy (MBA) and Think Twice Drink Wise campaigns. On drink driving over 4,000 commercial drivers in 11 transport terminals were imparted with knowledge under the bespoke TwaKwanoMmom programme.

These initiatives aimed at inching closer to Diageos resolve to reach 1 million adults with training materials that will enable them to become responsible drinking (RD) ambassadors. The signing of the Code of Commercial Communications to regulate the conduct of alcohol manufacturers also fulfilled Diageos Ghana business resolve to work with industry to market responsibly and provide consumers with the right responsible drinking information.

Building Thriving Communities

In the 2016 financial year, Diageo invested 16.3 million of operating profit to charitable projects that help serve critical local need. The Water of Life programme has reached more than 10 million people in 18 countries in Africa since 2006.

It is focused on access to water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) in line with UN Global Goal 6: Clean water and sanitation, and is increasingly active in rural areas that supply raw materials to our business. Globally, Diageo provided access to safe water and sanitation to 351,700 more beneficiaries year on year.

In its Ghana market, the business provided4 communities in the Awutu Senya district, in addition to the 8 communities of 2015 with access to safe clean drinking water, totaling 69,727 beneficiaries. These were all in cassava growing communities.

As part of the work on Sustainable Agriculture Strategy, Diageo aims to source 80% of their agricultural raw materials locally in Africa by 2020.In 2016 Diageo sourced 73% of agricultural materials locally within Africa for use by the African markets, compared to 70% in 2015. Guinness Ghana increased local sourcing to 48% this year and is well on track to deliver 80% local sourcing by the targeted year.

Alogboshie before and after  Before and after; the impact of GGBLs Water of Life programme in the Alogboshie community, Achimota

Reducing Environmental Impact

On Reducing Environmental Impact, water efficiency improved by 12.5% against a 2020 target of 50% improvement. The Ghanaian brewery giant also saw a 30% improvement in water. Biological Oxygen Demand (BOD) which is the amount of oxygen needed by aquatic life to survive is measured in milligrams of waste per litre of water.

Globally, Diageo ensured waste water discharged into water bodies were safer by 37.7% as compared to last year. GGBL went further to a 41.7% improvement in BOD as against the 2020 Global target of 100% safe return of waste water. Green House Gas (GHG) emissions in Diageos direct operationsreduced by 7.7% against a 50% reduction target of 2020 with GGBL improving this reduction by 18%. Lastly, Diageo aims to ensure zero waste to landfill by 2020. The company currently stands at 41.4% reduction in waste to landfill compared to last year. GGBL had however achieved this feat as at 2015 and is in continuing effect.

Gabriel Opoku-Asare, Corporate Relations Director reiterated GGBLs commitment to achieving the targets.

We are working to ensure that we meet all the set targets. As a callout we will continue to ensure sustainable sourcing of our raw materials locally and to show our thought leadership in promoting responsible drinking. We look forward to more innovative ways of reducing our environmental impact. The 2020 Sustainability and Responsibility targets afford us the opportunity to give back because we believe doing good is good for business.

Story by Ghana | Myjoyonline.com
At least 18 civilians have been killed in Saudi Arabias multiple aerial strikes across war-torn Yemen during the past 24 hours, Press TV reported.

Saudi fighter jets bombarded Khawlan al-Tayyal district in the western Yemeni province of Sana'a on Friday, killing at least 11 people, including women and children, and injuring a number of others, including two children.

The victims were all travelling in a vehicle when it came under Saudi fire, Yemen's al-Masirah television channel reported on Friday.

The Saudi warplanes also launched several airstrikes on different localities in the northwestern province of Sa'ada. Initial reports said at least two people were killed in the province's Ghamar district as a result of the airstrikes.

Elsewhere in the west-central province of Ma'rib, at least five other Yemenis lost their lives when Saudi jets pounded Sirwah district.

Saudi warplanes also bombarded areas in the northern province of Jawf and in the western provinces of Amran and Hajjah, but there have been no immediate reports about the possible casualties.
16.09.2016 LISTEN

The Ghana Railway Workers Union has told Citi Business News it will soon hit the streets to press on government pay salary arrears owed to its workers.

The union declared a strike yesterday after a meeting with the National Labour Commission (NLC),and the Ministry of Transport proved unproductive.

The union, last week threatened to embark on a strike on Monday, September 12, 2016 but was subpoenaed by the NLC to attend a meeting with the Ministry of Finance, and Ministry of Transport.

According to union, the Ministry of Finance failed to turn up, hence no conclusion was reached.

Speaking to Citi Business News, the General Secretary of the Railway Workers Union, Godwill Ntarmah warned that the union will demonstrate if government fails to positively respond to the strike.

This is the first phase, maybe in the next phase we will get out and go on the street, because we are determined this time to make sure we get our release, he said.

He stated that all efforts aimed at getting government to release the funds have proved futile, hence the union's decision to use every legitimate means available to demand for the money.

So far we have stopped only the passenger trains. Still we are hauling manganese in the Western region, but the passenger trains in Accra; Accra to Nsawam, and Accra to Tema are the ones that we have halted, he disclosed.

Railway workers announce strike

The union declared an indefinite strike after a meeting with National Labour Commission (NLC) and the Ministry of Transport proved unproductive.

According to union, the absence of the Ministry of Finance at the meeting showed that government was not ready to address the issue since the ministry is the only organization that can release the funds.

The Minister of Transport even though he didn't come, he was represented by the Chief Director and two other officials. At the end of the day without the Finance Chief Director it was difficult to come to an appreciable agreement, Mr. Ntarmah told Citi Business News earlier.



By: Lawrence Segbefia/citibusinessnews.com/Ghana
As Morocco readies to host this years Climate Change Conference COP22, the country continues to demonstrate its highest commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions with major renewable energy interventions.

The African continent is one of the most severely impacted by climate change. Water scarcity, intensifying extreme weather (floods, droughts, etc), the consequences are numerous and already visible.

Africa currently represents a meager 3 % of greenhouse gas emissions and only receives 4% of global climate finance.

The 22nd Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will be held in Marrakech, Morocco from November 7-18, 2016.

The main focus of COP22 is to implement actions in order to achieve the priorities of the Paris Agreement.

The agenda will include: the development of National Adaptation Plans to lower greenhouse gas emissions; the funding, capacity building and transfer of technology to help developing countries mitigate the impact of climate change; and transparency during the implementation process.

The Moroccan Government has in this direction set an objective of installing 6,000MW from renewables (hydro, wind and solar by the year 2020.

In recent years Morocco has imported 95% of its energy as fossil fuels, providing subsidies on these fuels at a cost between US$1-4 billion per year. With a growing population, rising living standards and increasing power demand from cities and energy intensive industry, key priorities are to increase and diversify the energy supply, and manage public costs (Nabil, 2013).

The Moroccan Agency for Solar Energy (MASEN), a public-private venture has thus been established to lead the solar plan to commission a target 2,000MW of installed solar by 2020.

MASEN has made major progress in implementing its target 500MW Ouarzazate Noor I, NoorII and III projects.

MASEN is set to follow up by releasing a series of PV tenders; Masen has recently released the Noor IV PV phase of 170MW capacity across 3 sites for expected delivery in 2016.

With natural resources for wind, hydro and solar, renewables are recognized as offering the opportunity to reduce dependence on imports while generating employment and cutting greenhouse gas emission, with the potential for future green electricity exports to Europe (Dominguez, 2013). Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) is seen as a particularly important opportunity because of its ability for storage and the chance build up a local supply industry in an emerging industry (African Development Bank, 2013).

The government set a goal of reaching 42% of installed capacity (or 6,000 MW) from renewable energy (hydro, wind and solar) by 2020, whilst doubling overall capacity (Norton Rose Fulbright, 2012). Through the Morocco Solar Plan (MSP) it aims to install 2,000 MW of solar capacity by 2020, contributing around 14% of the energy mix in the countrys electricity supply. The plan calls for the construction of 5 solar complexes in requiring an estimated investment of $9 billion. (African Development Bank, 2012) .

A number of donors were already active or had indicated their interest to support a catalytic large scale renewables program in Morocco, for example through policy based lending for reforms, concessional finance to buy down incremental costs, carbon finance, advisory services and infrastructure finance (CTF, 2011), however this created a challenge of coordination, and additional complexity for private investors.

A new financing architecture was therefore needed to be developed which would blend domestic public funding with funding from international financial instruments (IFIs) whilst effectively aligning risks between the public and private sector partners.

In the longer term it is hoped that such early publicly supported projects will enable the technology to mature so that projects can be financed by investors and local banks, as has been experience with the longer established wind industry in Morocco (Nabil, 2013).

The government established The Moroccan Agency for Solar Energy (MASEN) in 2010 as the vehicle for mobilizing and blending resources and allocating risks to key players. It is a limited company which is 25% owned by the Government of Morocco, ONE, the Hassan II Fund1 for economic and social development, and the Societe d'Investissements Energetiques (SIE)2 (Moroccan Agency For Solar Energy). The public investment is recorded as equity capital and equipment subsidies in the General State Budget, while MASEN itself is an extra-budget entity. (Ministere de l'Economie et des Finances, 2013)

MASEN is responsible for feasibility assessment, design, development, and financing of solar projects in Morocco, along with contributing to expertise and research in the solar industry (Moroccan Agency For Solar Energy). Its aims are both to develop energy but also to support the development of a new industrial sector in Morocco through training, capacity building, and research and development (R&D) (Nabil, 2013) .

The first project to be developed using this model was Ouarzazate 1. Bids were invited to develop a Solar Power Company (SPC) to operate the plant on a build, own, operate and transfer basis, supported by a 25 year fixed term Power Purchasing Agreement (PPA) between MASEN and the SPC. ONE is required to buy all energy from MASEN at grid price through a second PPA. The Moroccan government pays MASEN the difference between the two contracts. This arrangement guarantees a revenue stream for the SPC that is shielded from the volatility of energy prices. It is underpinned by a US$200 million contingency loan facility from the World Bank to the Moroccan government, which mitigates against public funding shortfall risk.

MASEN plays the role both of contract holder in the two power purchase agreements and as an equity partner in the SPC along with the winning bidders. This is governed by a shareholder agreement which includes a put option which allows MASEN to sell back its share if the private partner defaults on specified construction or performance obligations.

MASEN also acts as a consolidator of concessional loans provided by the Clean Technology Fund (CTF), African Development Bank (AfDB), the World Bank (WB), and the European Investment Bank (EIB) which reduce the cost of capital for the SPC, and lower the overall cost of energy generated. MASEN blends the terms of the IFI loans and offers a single financing package as part of the development and bidding process. (Falconer & Frisari, 2012a).

Critically this ensures adequate financing as part of the tender offer to the SPC, giving potential private investors clear information on the debt package of the project, and ensuring that the lower cost of capital is reflected in the bid price (Falconer & Frisari, 2012a).

These combined measures are designed to allocate risks across investors as shown below in order to make the deal viable, while incentivizing performance (see Figure 2).

The first project under the MSP (Ouarzazate 1) has gone from idea to financial close between 2009-2013, which compares well with average timeframe for projects of this capacity of 6 years (Falconer & Frisari, 2012a). Multiple companies bid for the project, and a Spanish Saudi consortium won.

At US$0.184 the tariff offered by the winning bidder was 25% lower than initial cost projections, and even accounting for public capital subsidies the plant will be one of the least expensive contracted to date. This reduces the required revenue subsidy for the Moroccan Government from the forecast US$60 million to US$20 million (Falconer & Frisari 2012b).

While the private sector members of the consortium provide critical mitigation of performance and construction 85% of investment finance was provided by public investors, including both the Moroccan government and its partners in MASEN, and the IFIs.

The Moroccan governments investment amounts to 9 million per MW. This is a significant level of domestic public investment, and it remains to be seen if the Moroccan government has the capacity to provide the same level of support for the balance of the CSP installations planned under the MSP.

It will be important to understand if this level of public support will be able to be scaled up across the balance of the 2,000 MW foreseen under the MSP, or if over time less support will be needed due to falling costs of technology costs as a result of breakthroughs in R&D and/or more widespread deployment and uptake of CSP at a global scale.
The overbearing impact of climate change on farming actitivies in Ghana,old methods of farming and the lack of investment in the sector, have combined to literally cripple the once vibrant sector.

President John Mahama during his presentation of the highlights of the National Democratic Congress 2016 manifesto said, if he is re-elected in the December 7 general elections, he will invest massively in the sector.

The infographic below highlights some of the Presidents major plans to revive the sector.



By: Nana Boakye-Yiadom/Vivian Kai Lokko
The Unemployed Registered Graduate Nurses Association has threatened to picket at the premises of the Ministry of Health next week to press home their demands for immediate posting.

The association, which is made up of over 1,200 professionally trained nurses from various public and private universities across the country said the Ministry has been lackadaisical in responding positively to its letters and calls for posting to work in health facilities in the country.

Speaking to Citi News, a leader of the Association, Halidu Mustapha said their members were fed up with being treated unfairly.

We feel that we are being treated as non-Ghanaians. We are Ghanaians, our parents are taxpayers and we need to drum home what is due us, he said.

He noted that the Association has given the Ministry a week's ultimatum to come out favorably to address its concerns, otherwise the Association will be forced to picket at the premises of the Ministry next week to demand their postings.

When we step here, we are not leaving the premises of this Ministry until and unless we are posted.

Halidu Mustapha lamented some members of the Association who had not been posted since 2011 after completing their studies have become a burden to their families due to their long-term unemployment.

He further called on the general public to join in their campaign to demand postings from the ministry since their continuous unemployment painted a gloomy picture of the fate of the thousands of other nursing trainees in some of Ghana's tertiary institutions.



By: Jonas Nyabor/citifmonline.com/Ghana
The head pastor of the Faith Word Ministry in Accra, alleged to have kissed and fondled the breast of his female church member, has been granted bail by an Accra circuit court.

The accused, Pastor Edmund Karikari Adjei, 40, is reported to have committed the act under the pretext of praying for the victim  one Angela Nartey, 18  at Nii-Boi Town in Accra.

According to the prosecutor, Detective Inspector Kofi Atimbire, pastor Edmund told Angela that he had a revelation about her hence, the meeting for the prayers.

In a court presided over by Mrs. Ruby Naa Adjeley Quayson, the accused denied the offence and was granted bail in the sum of GH10,000 with two sureties, one to be a public servant earning not less than GH1,000.

This was after Andrew Vortia, lawyer for the accused, had disputed the assertions of the prosecution.

He had argued that according to the police own facts, his client allegedly applied oil on the navel of Angela who had complained of some issue, and not her vagina.

The case has been adjourned until September 26, 2016.

The facts of the case are that Angela is a student living with her mother and siblings at Chantan, Accra, and are members of the church headed by pastor Edmund.

On July 26, 2016 after the close of a prayer meeting the accused told the complainant's mother that he had a revelation about the complainant (her daughter) and requested to meet her.

According to the prosecutor, on August 30, the pastor called Angela and her mother on phone about the matter and that at 4pm the same day, the complainant went to see the accused on the instruction of her mother.

While conversing in the room with pastor Edmund, he told Angela that he had another revelation about her having pains in her lower abdomen.

Pastor Edmund as a result, brought anointing oil, ordered Angela to sit in the three-in-one sofa, and she obliged.

The accused then folded the sweater of the complainant upwards, pulled the pair of trousers Angela was wearing a bit downwards and administered the oil on her navel and abdomen.

The prosecutor said after that he raised Angela from the sofa and held her tightly, fondled her breast and kissed her.

A report was lodged at the police station, leading to the arrest of pastor Edmund who in his caution statement, admitted the offence.

By Jeffrey De-Graft Johnson

[email protected]


The executives of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) in the Abirem Constituency of the Eastern Region have sounded a strong warning to the Regional Minister, Mavis Ama Frimpong to stop bussing people from different constituencies to the area to transfer their votes.

A press statement issued and signed by the Constituency Communications Officer, Brako Emmanuel, said members of the public, especially electorate in Abirem constituency, have uncovered some diabolical steps being taken by Ms Frimpong, who doubles as the parliamentary candidate of the National Democratic Congress (NDC).

According to the NPP, the Regional Minister and her cohorts in the Abirem NDC have planned to bus foreigners to the EC office at Abirem to transfer their votes and pick proxy forms on behalf of dead persons.

They claimed the Minister had also deployed stout men and security personnel to the NPP strongholds with the view to intimidating supporters of the party.

The Abirem branch of the NPP, which condemned the Minister's action stated that we of the NPP are awake and shall not allow any of these diabolical moves to materialise. We shall resist fiercely to ensure absolute transparency in this exercise. What is more instructive is the strict adherence to the public election regulation 2016.

The party further admonished the electorate to avoid any electoral malpractices.

All electorate are advised never to give their voter's ID cards to anyone in order not to be disenfranchised in the upcoming elections. The NDC, realizing the defeat ahead, are using all foul means to lure the electorate to its side.

They sternly warned the general public, particularly those who would be bused to the centre that they would be treated as thieves when caught.

The NPP warned parents and guardians to caution their children and relatives to shun malpractices and fraudulent activities.

The party said in its determination to police the ballot boxes before, during and after the December polls, it would continue to work hard for Nana Addo and parliamentary candidates across the country, especially John Osei Frimpong of Abirem Constituency.

From Daniel Bampoe, Abirem
A news report about the assault of New Patriotic Party (NPP) supporters by their National Democratic Congress (NDC) counterparts at Kukuom in the Asunafo South District of the Brong Ahafo Region made disturbing headlines in the media.

Even more worrying is the fact that this is not the first time that the scenario is being played out.

For four or so times, the area has made worrying headlines as a result of political violence.

Sadly nobody is doing time in jail for being accessories to the smelly political violence, now a feature of this part of the country.

So-called machomen have been allegedly nurtured by the Brong Ahafo Regional Minister Eric Poku to do his dirty bidding of visiting mayhem on those who do not belong to his political persuasion.

There is credible evidence about the brother of a Minister in Accra who leads a gang of miscreants to assault non-NDC persons, especially in the run-up to the general election.

It breaks our hearts when these acts of unruliness and hooliganism take place simultaneously as so-called peace seekers and envoys disturb our ears with cacophonous messages and marches and avoid the root causes of the violence.

The Peace Council has neither pondered over the Asunafo South bad stories nor queried the Police Service for their indifference.

Indeed Asunafo South area is a bedlam of violence and we ignore the reality at the peril of the lives and properties of innocent persons.

The situation in the area under review is one which over time has been overlooked after disturbing replays.

The recent incident saw the destruction of state properties when so-called machomen descended upon the district office of the Electoral Commission (EC) to destroy properties. They had been instructed by their paymasters to disperse those who had gone to go through a voter transfer process at the local EC office.

What kind of a country are we in where hoodlums are allowed to do as they please simply because they belong to a ruling party? It is mind-boggling the level of hypocrisy and impunity we are witnessing. It is as if there is total breakdown of law and order in some parts of the hinterland. For how long shall we allow this nonsense to continue?

Once more we berate the Ghana Peace Council for being impotent in addressing some of these challenges which have started rearing their heads some three months before elections. Won't we be justified when we snub the many peace sermons of the council and others who have become serial peace envoys overnight?

The hoodlums have been emboldened because they are never arraigned, regardless of the quantum of their criminality.

Police officers have been rendered impotent by politicians whose parties are in power. When these cops try to do their work professionally ample evidence shows they are victimized.

It is commonplace now for cases to be described as political so they can be disposed of quickly without any entry, let alone prosecution.

As a result, hoodlums in Kokuom can boldly go to the police station and order the arrest of party supporters outside the ruling political grouping. What a country!
Joseph Bediako, Convener of Movement of Truth, addressing the media in Kumasi

Outspoken politician Joseph Bediako has disclosed that the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) has adopted diabolical plans to foment trouble in the country during the December polls.

He said that the NDC had mismanaged Ghana's economy over the past eight years through the implementation of ineffective policies and programmes, adding that the ruling political party is afraid of its imminent defeat in the elections.

According to him, the NDC would engage the services of some energetic young boys to disrupt the upcoming elections and quickly blame the New Patriotic Party (NPP) to impugn its image.

He said he would soon lodge a formal complaint with the various embassies in the country on the fiendish plans of the NDC so that the ruling political party cannot blame the NPP.

Mr. Bediako, a former influential member of FONKAR disclosed this while speaking at the official launch of the 'Movement of Truth and Accountability,' a pressure group that has declared its support for the NPP in Kumasi on Tuesday.

He stated that Deputy Communications Director of the NDC, Kwaku Boahen had already highlighted the diabolical plans of the NDC on television, stressing that the dangerous NDC members were poised to spill the blood of innocent people.

According to him, Kwaku Boahen, on a television programme two months ago, stated that the NDC would not allow some eligible voters to come out and exercise their franchise on the election day.

Kwaku Boahene said this 2016 elections, some will queue, some will vote half, some will queue but cannot vote and if care is not taken, some cannot even come out of their houses to vote, he added.

According to him, another NDC communicator in Kumasi, Robert Owusu, also declared the wicked intentions of the NDC about spilling blood and destroying properties during the elections on radio.

He said the NDC has wicked people and nation wreckers, whose threats of violence should not be taken for granted.

Mr. Bediako, who is the Convener for Movement of Truth and Accountability, stated that all stakeholders, including the various embassies, should call the NDC to order so as to prevent violence in the country.



NPP support

He disclosed that he had left the National Democratic Party (NDP), founded by former First Lady, Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings, saying I will now campaign for the NPP even though I am not card-bearing member of the party.

Mr. Bediako said the NPP has knowledgeable men, who have the skills and vision to effectively develop the country and alleviate poverty.

From I.F. Joe Awuah Jnr., Kumasi
The rising tension at the GCB Bank, stemming from unsecured loans running into several millions of Ghana cedis, has been blamed on the Board Chairman of the bank, Daniel Owiredu.

Some board members and other top management officials of GCB Bank said the chairman had single-handedly been taking unilateral decisions with dire implications for the bank.

Mr Owiredu is said to be chairing the bank's credit sub-committee that approves loans after which the reports are submitted to the board chaired by the same person, raising the issue of credibility.

This action is increasing the bank's risk of bad debts since several millions of the loans approved have little security or 'uncollateralized.'

The bank has dismissed the media report as complete fabrication.

A statement from the bank says the publications are 'malicious' and are without a basis, asking the public to treat them with the contempt that they deserve.

The statement added, It should be noted that GCB Bank has some of the most stringent rules and procedures in the banking industry for granting of loans.

It said under the leadership of Dan Owiredu, the bank has continued on its growth path and put in place robust risk management systems.

But inside sources at the bank said the chairman's chairing of the Credit Sub-Committee violates modern corporate practices since he sits on his own decision at the Sub-Committee level.

Curiously, while the chairman sits on the Credit Risk Sub-Committee, the Credit Risk Manager of the bank has also been empowered to approve loans up to GH1 million while other senior management members have been capped.

How can a whole board chairman chair a Credit Subcommittee of a bank? What's his interest? This thing has been going on for so long and something must be done about it, an angry top manager voiced out.

Mr. Owiredu was President of the Ghana Chamber of Mines and the Executive Vice-President and Chief Operating Officer of Golden Star Resources Limited, before he was appointed to the GCB Board.
SpaceX on Thursday said efforts to develop and certify a space taxi for NASA are not being slowed by an investigation into a launch pad fire that destroyed its rocket and a $200 million Israeli communications satellite, Reuters reported.

Boeing Co and SpaceX, owned and operated by technology entrepreneur Elon Musk, are building spaceships to fly NASA astronauts to the International Space Station, a $100 billion laboratory that flies 250 miles (400 km) above Earth.

NASA, or the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, is looking to turn over crew transport to SpaceX and Boeing before the end of 2018, breaking a Russian monopoly. SpaceX is aiming for its first test flight to the station in 2017.

Were full-steam head for certification. Were still trying to remain on schedule, Abhishek Tripathi, director of certification for SpaceX, said during a webcast panel discussion at an American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics conference in Long Beach, California.

I know what I need to do in the next day and in the next month, Tripathi said, adding that his work is not being affected by the accident investigation. SpaceX, with oversight from the Federal Aviation Administration, is working to figure out why one of its Falcon 9 rockets burst into flames on Sept. 1 as it was being fueled for a routine pre launch test at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. The blaze destroyed the communications satellite, owned by Israels Space Communication Ltd, which was scheduled to be carried into orbit two days later.

SpaceX has not yet disclosed how much damage was done at its primary launch site.

SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said on Wednesday the company was hoping to resume flights in November at a second, nearly complete launch pad at NASAs Kennedy Space Center, adjacent to the Air Force base.

The company, which has a backlog of 70 missions for NASA and commercial customers, worth more than $10 billion, also flies from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.
More gathers at the Seventh-Day Congregation of Theocracy at the Homedakrom mission station, Otiakrom in Akuapim South District of the Eastern Region to celebrate the feast of Tabernacles.

The festival brought together members of the church from Kumasi, Nsawam, Accra, Tema and some parts of the country to celebrate a week long packed activities of the feast of tabernacle which means the end of the world.

The Missionary In-charge of the Seventh-Day Congregation of Theocracy, Apostle Kadmiel E.H Agbalenyoh said the feast of tabernacle which was established in Mount Sinai commemorates the 40years wandering of the Israelites in the wilderness.

He added that they are therefore commanded (in Leviticus 23:39-43) to celebrate Tabernacle so that current generation would acknowledge that Israelites had dwelled in shelters when delivered from the land of Egypt in the promised kingdom.

Apostle Agbalenyoh noted that this years celebration is under the theme Called, Chosen and Faithful, to establish that those who are called must be confirmed (Chosen) and should remain faithful at all circumstances on earth.

The saints could not reach faithfulness status without passing through difficult moments but unfortunately, according to him, the three historical feast of Yahweh have not been celebrated at their appointed periods since AD359.

He indicated that in the fourth century the leadership of Jews adopted a 19year astronomical calendrical year that displaces the biblical established festivals.

Apostle Agbalenyoh posited that they are Hebrews gentiles who believe in the biblical calendrical year which comprises the 7year calendar and the 19year calendar.

He said however, they are celebrating the 7year biblical calendar which was established by God himself which is christened the Feast of the Holy Spirit.

Apostle Agbalenyoh noted that according to the end time prophecy, all nations for that matter, all Religio-political organizations that have attacked Gods kingdom shall keep the feast of tabernacle and worship Yahweh the king and God of physical and spiritual Hebrews.

It continues that there would be no rain for those Religio-political entities that would not celebrate the feast of Tabernacles but shall be plagued as predicted by servants of God Almighty.

In order to escape Gods wrath upon us, he said God has chosen him to restore the feast of Passover, the feast of harvest and the feast of ingathering and to fulfill at this last day.

Apostle Agbalenyoh used the occasion to pray for the peace of this country as we gradually approach the December 7 general elections.

He urges political parties to avoid any act that will jeopardize the peace we all enjoy and that which may also plunge the entire nation into chaos and civil war.

According to him, the church pray the Electoral Commission to save Ghana from election violence by instituting and promoting transparent measures that will maintain the peace of this country before, during and after the general elections.

The week-long festival which took place on the 15th September started with a presentation of flowers for the feast amidst drumming and dancing to mark the opening of the festival.

The ceremony continues with a youth day which involves health screening and lectures on healthy living.

The last day which is on the 22nd September will be a talk held by the District Education Director of the Ghana Education Service to educate parents on the importance of education.
By Caroline Pomeyie, GNA

Accra, Sept. 15, GNA - The Association for the Development of Education in Africa (ADEA) Working Group on Higher Education (WGHE) under the auspices of the Association of African Universities (AAU), has rolled out series of webinars.

Dr Elisabeth N. Mimiafo epse Ayuk-Etang, Gender Advocate, and Senior Lecturer at the University of Buea, Cameroon would facilitate the second webinar session on the topic: 'The Role of Women in Fighting Climate Change.'

The upcoming session to commence on Thursday aims at addressing pertinent issues pertaining to higher education in Africa.

The presentations are geared towards achieving the major interventions and aspirations enshrined in international and continental agenda such as the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals(SDG's), the Continental Educaton Strategy (CESA 2016-2025), African Union's Agenda 2063 and the Science Technology and Innovation Strategy for Africa (STISA-2024).

Reach for change team says that the climate has been changing and is rapidly changing with disruptive impact, such as rising sea levels; melting snow and ice; more extreme heat events, fires and drought; and more extreme storms, desertification, rainfalls and floods.

This change could be attributed to natural as well as anthropogenic causes.

AAU is an international non-governmental organisation set up by universities in Africa to promote co-operation among themselves and with the international academic community.

WGHE was established to strengthen collaboration among African governments, development partners, and tertiary education institutions to improve the effectiveness of development assistance.

WGHE draws on its extensive knowledge of the education sector to help tertiary institutions in Africa devise creative responses to challenges and promote consensus among governments and development partners around the revitalization of policies and strategies.

TEDxAccra is a social impact organisation where thinkers and doers of our community gather to create and share ideas.

It focuses on social impact initiatives across Ghana, at a community level, bringing together innovative thinkers to connect and discuss great ideas.

GNA
16.09.2016 LISTEN

Apparently, the meaning of propaganda traces its roots to the Sacra Congregatio de Propaganda Fide- a committee of Cardinals founded in 1622 by Pope Gregory XV to oversee the spread of Catholicism abroad, by any means necessary.

Consequently, the word propaganda came to mean the concerted effort to spread any belief the communist Propagandists are associated with. Therefore propaganda is regarded as "a deliberate attempt to alter or maintain a balance of power that is advantageous to the communists.

Propaganda may also be defined in its most neutral and simple sense as the persuasive dissemination of particular ideas or material disseminated by the advocates or opponents of a doctrine or cause.

In other words, propagandism is the systematic propagation of a doctrine or information reflecting the views and interests of those propagating such information or doctrine.

Moreover, the experts contend that a message can be classified as propaganda if it suggests something negative and dishonest.

So, it should never be a surprise to see a party whose founder has an inborn proclivity for communist ideals to hoodwink unsuspecting electorates with their often non-existent infrastructural achievements via a symbolic communist green book.

The NDC Party has dishonestly delineated some phantom infrastructural projects in its green book of communism to the disgust of discerning Ghanaians.

In fact, the NDCs infrastructural propaganda underscores Hitlers observation on propaganda. Hitler asserted: "With the help of a skilful and continuous application of propaganda, it is possible to make the people conceive even of heaven as hell (Adolf Hitler).

Let us also point out that the founder of the NDC Party J. J. Rawlings is a communist enthusiast who burst into the scene through a series of coup detats.

It would be recalled that after successfully deposing General Akuffo and his Supreme Military Council (SMC) government, J. J. Rawlings and some mutinous officers went ahead and formed their own government which they named as the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC) and appointed Flt. Rawlings as their chairman in 1979.

Ironically, Rawlings and his conspiratorial plotters vowed to lustrate the country of the rampant sleaze, corruption and social injustices which instigated their coup detat.

So in their attempt to purge the country of the perceived injustices, they carried out what they termed house cleaning exercise,--they dealt with perceived offenders capriciously.

The villainous cabals went ahead with their intentions and savagely murdered prominent people including General Fred Akufo, General Kutu Acheampong, General Akwasi Afrifa and many others.

In fact, after annihilating those they perceived to be a threat to their hidden agenda, they decided to organise general elections for political parties in the same year-1979.

Subsequent to the successful conduction of general elections, Dr Hilla Limann and his Peoples National Party (PNP) emerged victorious in 1979.

Regrettably, however, Rawlings and his cohorts did not give Dr Liman the breathing space to carry out his mandated responsibility.

Unfortunately, Rawlings and his conspiratorial plotters unfairly kept criticising Dr Limanns administration for what they perceived as economic mismanagement, until he, Rawlings, decided to overthrow Dr Limann.

And to fulfil his lifetime ambition of becoming the head of state through the back door, J. J. Rawlings and some obstreperous army officers took arms and succeeded in overthrowing the constitutionally elected government of Dr Hilla Limann on 31st December 1981.

Rawlings subsequently formed a government which he called the Provisional national Defence Council (PNDC) and enstooled himself as the chairman.

In his fiendish attempt to get rid of sleaze and corruption, many Ghanaians were unjustifiably murdered or tortured mercilessly for apparent infinitesimal offences.

Rawlings rather chose communist approach to ensuring sanity into the system, hence exterminating innocent people without any provocation whatsoever.

Revolutions, like trees, must be judged by their fruit (Stephane Courtois).

A school of thought, however, contends that coup makers take their inspirations from communism.

As a matter of fact, Ghanas revolution days could be likened to: in the China of the Great Helmsman, Kim Il Sungs Korea, Vietnam under Uncle Ho and Cuba under Castro, Ethiopia under Mengistu, Angola under Neto, and Afghanistan under Najibullah.

Communist regimes turned mass crime into full-blown system of governance (Stephane Courtois).

Interestingly, Courtois claims that Communist regimes were responsible for a greater number of humiliations and inexplicable murders than any other political ideal or movement, including Nazism.

Regrettably, however, many innocent people suffered humiliations and death under Rawlingss despotic regime. Market women were stripped naked in the public and whipped mercilessly for either hauling their products or selling on high prices.

While their male counterparts were barbarically shaved with broken bottles and whipped for offences that would not even warrant a Police caution in a civilized society.

As if that was not enough, three eminent high court judges and a prominent retired army officer were barbarically murdered by PNDC henchmen on 30th June 1982 for carrying out their constitutionally mandated duties.

Apparently, the PNDC apologists savagely murdered the three eminent high court judges because their judgement did not go in their favour. How cruel some people could be?

Even though Rawlings supplanted power under the pretext of acting as a peripheral Panacea, he cunningly spent a little over eleven years and bettered his life and that of his family before lifting the ban on political parties in 1992.

Although the term "communism" can be referred to specific political parties, communism is an ideology of economic equality through the elimination of private property.

Unsurprisingly, therefore, when the chivalrous communist enthusiast Rawlings burst into the scene, he tempestuously murdered people with more than two cars.

Moreover, Rawlings boldly exhibited his communist ideals by going into war with business men and women in the country.

Ironically, Rawlings replaced our educational system with that of a communist model. Deceitfully, however, he turned round and sent his children abroad to study in what he saw as a superior educational system.

Rawlings however succumbed to the internal and external political pressures for him to step down and allow multi-party democracy.

Subsequently, he lifted the ban on political parties in 1992 and resigned from the military simultaneously and put himself forward for election.

Following his retirement from the military, Rawlings went ahead and formed a political party, which he named as the National Democratic Congress (NDC), a progeny of PNDC.

Yes, NDC Party was founded on communist ideals. Thus the party thrives on vile propaganda.

Besides, due to its communist ideals, the NDC Party is anti-business, hence burdening entrepreneurs with stiff taxes and deliberately causing dumsor to cripple the hitherto thriving business environment.

K. Badu, UK.

*Please visit my blog at: alljoycom.wordpress.com
It is normally worthy having Peace Councillors but in the present day Ghana and by the actions of our current National Peace Councillors, one will find themselves in a dilemma answering the posed question, Is it worth having a National Peace Council at all?

The role of the Peace Councillors comes into conspicuous play when there is a conflict. When all is well without any conflict in place, Peace Councillors become somehow dormant if not irrelevant. This just expressed contention of mine is buttressed by the following quote, The Peace Councillors meet annually, preferably in a place of conflict where they can contribute to a peace process. They review progress and set programs for the next year

In Ghana, we hear of the members of the National Peace Council becoming vociferous only when national election is approaching. In the few months leading on to election, one could hear our National Peace Councillors asserting loudly that the country and people therein need peace.

It really annoys me to hear them talk peace, peace and peace when there is no conflict. They go on further to suggest that God loves us so much that we surely need to aggressively protect the peace we have been enjoying in the midst of other war-prone African countries.

From a well-established view, Peace Councillors become relevant and play significant role when there is conflict. They will expertly intervene to bring two or more warring factions together to broker peace among them hence their name Peace Councillors. While playing the role of peace brokers, they additionally ensure that structures are put in place to maintain justice among the factions with the aim of preventing any reoccurrence of the causes that culminated in the conflict that put the warring factions asunder.

From the above, how do we see, and evaluate, the so-called Ghana Peace Council that only becomes vocal in election years, always preaching that the country needs peace without first ensuring that justice prevails?

Even though the current government headed by President Mahama is unprecedentedly corrupt; mismanaging the affairs of the country to the detriment of most of the Ghanaian citizens, we have the National Peace Council always coming out to request the citizens to ensure that the peace the country is enjoying is maintained intact.

Is there any group of people or political parties fighting the other in Ghana? If no one is fighting, why then should the Peace Council come out to disturb our ears with the let-peace-prevail messages without ever admonishing that we should let justice prevail to avoid any disturbance to the peace the nation is proudly claimed to be enjoying?

Should all Ghanaians be seen in the sense of a man must be a fool to be called darling by a woman, thus, remain mute and take whatever is thrown at them by the government and her agents and assigns? In the name of peace, should all discerning and economically suffering Ghanaians keep mute, have their arms folded around the chest and watch while a few hardened criminals without heart toy with their lives?

I quite remember, during the statements of declaration of the Supreme Court verdict on election 2012 petition, Vida Akoto-Bamfo (Mrs), JSC or probably Sophia. O. Adinyira (Mrs), JSC said, she would not be obliged by the credibility of any facts presented, or evidence adduced during the trial, to render a verdict that may disturb the peace that Ghana and she have been enjoying since her childhood. With her mind focused on the dictates of her stomach and what she stood to gain, one could clearly see her submit a verdict statement that was in vast contrast to the truth seen on live telecast of the Election 2016 petition hearing.

For the Supreme Courts lack of deciding truthfully, based on the judges own hidden agenda and personal interests, they could not accord any attention to the credible facts and evidence presented before them.

Following that unethical attitude by them, they created a monster that vey instance. The devil they created in 2013 recently came to haunt them through the monstrous behave by the Montie trio, the NDCs paid agents.

This is how some well-placed Ghanaian citizens and institutions behave. They do not give a toss about whether the majority of Ghanaians are suffering, or will suffer, following their momentary selfish decisions or madness.

Our National Peace Council must cease helping the incumbents, either directly or indirectly, to continue to oppress the poor and the innocent by their preaching of peace, peace and peace without ever bothering to preach justice, justice, justice and peace.

Why is the Ghana National Peace Council only heard of when general election is impending? Do they have a role to play to ensure that the abuse of power by the government, doing whatever it wants with Ghanas money, dishing it out corruptly to a few cronies and criminals supportive of her lawless actions, is ceased?

The mismanagement of the affairs of Ghana by the current government is the greatest cause of concern and the brutal war in the lives of many a discerning and a suffering Ghanaian. This is the conflict I call on the Peace Council to help address rather than coming out to scream we need peace, we need peace, when election is drawing near, to give undue advantage to the lawless NDC faithful to have a field day to rig the election.

The National Peace Council must be seen to be relevant but not to be seen to be irrelevant, indirectly conniving with the government to inflict untold hardships on Ghanaians.

I do not prefer to hear people talk derogatorily about them saying, as the Council of State is, so is the Peace Council, because of their biased attitudes that may give the government the leverage to do whatever it likes to even the point of rigging general elections in her favour.

We want to see our national institutions being more responsible than irresponsible!

Rockson Adofo


Tigo has introduced another unique service onto the Ghanaian market dubbed 'Tigo Cash International Buy Airtime,' the first of its kind in the countrys telecom industry.

The service allows Tigo customers, who are registered on Tigo Cash to buy airtime for anyone on any network in Ghana and over 100 countries across the world.

Additionally, customers roaming on the Tigo network can purchase airtime for themselves on other international networks at no extra cost.

Tara Squire, Chief Commercial Officer of Tigo, who was addressing the press at the launch in Accra yesterday, said the service is to allow customers to load credit on their mobile phones wherever they find themselves.

He said, Customers have to just dial *501*2 and select International Buy Airtime. Enter country code, select network you are buying for, enter amount and recipients number, confirm purchase with your PIN and recipient will be credited instantly.

Mr Squire said, As a digital lifestyle brand, our aim is to further drive our cashless agenda by helping customers see and experience the clear tangible benefits of digital payments.

He said Tigo has the best Mobile Financial Service solution in Ghana tailored to suit the needs of Ghanaians.

Mr Squire said the company was happy to be at the forefront of financial inclusion in Ghana, stating that we will continue to invest in product enhancement and empowerment of agents to educate customers.

A Business Desk report
Ethiopian Airlines, the fastest growing and most profitable African airline, has announced that it will add a thrice weekly service in addition to its daily flights to Guangzhou beginning October 8, 2016.

Per the arrangement, Ethiopian Airlines will operate 11 weekly flights to and from Guangzhou.

Group CEO Ethiopian Airlines, Tewolde GebreMariam said, We are pleased to launch more frequency to Guangzhou, one of the largest Chinese cities.

He said Ethiopian Airlines has become the airline of choice for travelers between China, Africa and Brazil.

We offer the best and fastest connectivity options with a total of 31 weekly flights, operated with the latest and most comfortable B787 and B777 aircraft, to four gateways in China; Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Hong Kong, and with an immediate connection to 52 destinations in Africa and Sao Paulo in Brazil.

For sure, this move will play a significant role in the growing economic and people-to-people ties between Africa and China, the CEO said.

Ethiopian is a Pan-African global carrier, operating the youngest fleet with an average of less than five years and currently serving 93 international destinations across five continents with over 240 daily departures.

Ethiopian Airlines



Ethiopian Airlines is the fastest growing airline in Africa.

In its seven decades of operation, Ethiopian has become one of the continent's leading carriers, unrivalled in efficiency and operational success.

Its fleet includes ultramodern and environmentally friendly aircraft such as Airbus A350, Boeing 787, Boeing 777 300ER, Boeing 777-200LR, Boeing 777-200 Freighter, Bombardier Q-400 double cabin with an average fleet age of five years.
Solomon Lartey, Deputy Managing Director of Activa International Insurance Company, has called for proper National Identification systems for planning purposes and orderliness.

He said, Africa critically needs systems like proper National Identification systems, Street Naming and Home Numbers for planning purposes, procedures and orderliness in the modern globalized business space.

Mr Lartey made the call when he chaired the launch of NUBIANBIZ.COM, a newly established online hub at the Airport West Hotel in Accra yesterday.

Systematic procedures and orderliness, for example, National Identification Systems, Street Names and Home Numbers, are critical for planning purposes. Access to and provision of products and services require knowing who, why and where your customers can be found.

Providers of goods and services need to know how many people there are at a place and where each one is. Customers also need to know what products are available and for which benefit. These would thrive in an environment where good legal and regulatory frameworks exist, Mr. Lartey said.

He said governments and institutions must adopt technological systems, as well as clearly defined procedural frameworks and orderliness in their everyday activities, stating this is what is needed as Africa positions itself as the new frontier of economic power.

Speaking under the theme: Africa's Quest for Development  The Way Forward, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of NubianBiz.com, Jules Nartey-Tokoli, said his online company is strategically formed to serve as business opportunity hub for people in Ghana and the whole of Africa in the areas of trading, management and entrepreneurship.

A Business Desk report
Abraham Lincoln stipulated that " democracy is the government of the people, for the people and by the people". Countries like Ghana who adopted this system of governance must place the ordinary citizen at the center stage of any act. The ordinary individual is paramount because power emanates from them. Equality is a key ingredient in democratic governance and every effort must be ensured to protect it jealously.

In a multi party democracy like ours therefore, people must have equal right for any political activity whilst political parties have a level playing field to seek for political power. The situation in Ghana deserves a critical attention and I write to express my abhorrence to certain acts I personally consider inimical to the progress and growth of our very young democratic dispensation.

First and foremost, it is a common knowledge that democracy is expensive but inasmuch as we accept to practice it, we should not engage in certain actions and inactions to disadvantage any citizen who has an equal right in absolute participation in the democratic process. We are in an election year and I expect that we all recognize the need to involve every citizen in the election process.

It is for this reason, I was terrifically flabbergasted when I read and heard about the filling fees of the parliamentary and presidential elections. According to the Electoral commission, the presidential candidate's filling fees stand at GH50000 whilst that of parliamentary is GH 10000.

I consider the amount, outrageous and humongous to pay by a poor determined citizen who wants to contest in the impending elections. Does it means that if you are not rich, you cannot contest election in Ghana? Does it not also create a situation where only the rich will continue to rule the country and hence creating a sectional democracy between the rich and poor?

For me, the ramifications of paying such a draconian amount to contest elections are enormously adverse. This is the more reason why political players when capture political power try to squander our national cake in the expense of the ordinary Ghanaian because elections are now the biggest investment by people who can afford. The dire consequences are the quagmire of poverty and underdevelopment precipitated by corruption.

My understanding is that every activity by the Electoral body of Ghana is funded by the state. The EC presented a budget to the national house of Parliament which was approved. I have heard from government that money has been released to the EC covering about 90% of its budget for the December polls. I therefore find it difficult to comprehend how filling fees could be purged at such a gargantuan amount.

We have reached a stage where we should be thinking of considering state funded campaign by all political parties and those who seeks to contest elections. I have heard others argue that the said amount is not much as compared to nomination and filling fees for presidential and parliamentary hopefuls in the various political parties internal elections.

That argument does not make sense to me at all. Let me crave the indulgence of those proponents that the operation cost of those elections are fully taken care of by the political parties. The same cannot be mentioned of this impending election which is national in character and fully funded by the national budget.

We must rethink as a nation. The smaller political parties may not be in a good financial disposition to meet such outrageous charges and that can collapse their political ambitions.

Political parties have also contributed to this uncharitable situation of doing business with our democracy. The major political parties( NPP & NDC) have accused each others of vote buying. Vote buying must not be accepted. The dirty plan is to buy the conscience of the electorates. That aside, where do the political parties get their resources for such? Business men sponsor these evil acts and in the event that such parties win political power, the sponsors get their returns by way of contracts.

In fact, vote buying is fueling corruption in Africa particularly in Ghana.

Is that the democracy we choose to practise? If the ordinary Ghanaian who is capable of leading his people cannot afford to win elections, then certainly democracy is for sale and belongs to only the rich. The disregard for some of these avoidable actions has the propensity to inciting the lower class against the ruling class in the near future ( am not a prophet of doom though). This is because, there is a seemingly widening gab between the poor and the rich and this is very evident in the recent happenings in our sociopolitical terrain.

Stakeholders and policy makers must carefully examine some of these things and save our democracy. Let's not wait for the worse to happen before we cry over spilled milk. It is better late than never.

Denis Andaban

[email protected]
There is no gainsaying the fact that the Parliament of the Fourth Republic has been a complete failure except for the period when the late Peter Ala Adejetey presided over the affairs of Parliament as the Speaker. As a Speaker, Peter Ala Adejetey displayed enormous sense of fairness, independence, professionalism while also making sure that his party from which he derived his powers was not short-changed. Today, Parliament under the present leadership has become an apology of fairness, a place of highly partisan crucible which lacks all the ingredients where intellectual debates can be articulated and the fashioning out of critical national policies to move the nation forward. Narrow, myopic and selfishness and greed have taken the center stage of the affairs of Parliament. Parliament which should as a matter of constitutional norm act as a check on the enormous powers of the Executive has unfortunately become a useless appendage of our democratic dispensation, sort of a human appendix waiting to rapture to cause discomfort to its carrier.

In the advanced democracies, parliamentarians are given very close marking by their constituencies watching with rapt attention, the way they cast their votes and the arguments they provide in debates. Parliamentarians are expected to consult their constituencies on issues before opening their mouths and casting their votes. In this country, what our democracy has developed are parliamentarian stomach contractors behaving and dancing to the tune of the Executive like puppets. Our democracy has created a power base where all the powers of Parliament reside in the bosom of the Speaker, the majority leader and the majority chief whip. All others in Parliament are irrelevant where at best the minority can have its say but the majority can always have its way. Even this marginal phenomenon, of course, depends on the magnanimity of the Speaker and the way and manner he chooses to act objectively and independently. The reason for this sordid state of affairs is not difficult to suspect. These three people, the Speaker, the majority leader and the majority chief whip all owe their existence and relevance to the Executive in situations where the President's party also holds majority of seats in Parliament as we have witnessed since the onset of the Fourth Republic.

The situation has created one disaster after the other where debates are conducted and bills passed under the watchful gaze and direction of Big Brother President. The recent disgraceful and unacceptable ruling by the Speaker of Parliament to prevent parliamentarians from debating the issue of Ford Expedition gift to President John Dramani Mahama brought to the climax the disgraceful partisan posture which has characterised the performance so far of the Fourth Republic Parliament. The ruling was a purely partisan effort by the Speaker to save the office of his mentor, John Dramani Mahama. It destroyed the very bastion upon which Parliament and the fabric with which Parliament is built, rendering its existence irrelevant, attacking the constitutional basis for the existence of Parliament. To relegate the powers of Parliament to conduct investigation of national importance to a subordinate body was gross abuse of office, intellectual bankruptcy and crass professional incompetence which should never ever be repeated. The ruling should have been followed immediately with the Speaker tendering his resignation letter from Parliament and the august Speaker's seat since it destroyed completely the necessity, the rationale and the constitutional basis for the existence of Parliament and by extension, his own position as a parliamentarian and Speaker. The ruling was a clear breach of the 1992 Republican Constitution.

Article 93, clause 1 of the 1992 Republican Constitution states as follows: There shall be a Parliament of Ghana which shall consist of not less than one hundred and forty elected members. Parliament is one leg of the tripod established by our Constitution to sustain our democracy. The Legislature, as Parliament is referred to in the Constitution, together with the Presidency and Judiciary are the kingpins in our democratic culture. The three are expected to work in harmony with each other as well as provide an internal check to the democratic system. Unfortunately the Legislature, and for that matter Parliament, (and parliamentarians) is one institution which in practical terms was not given the necessary recognition by the Constitution in order to perform effectively and efficiently.

Parliament is an expensive institution and it is therefore important that it is made as effective and efficient as possible. Parliamentarians need a lot of resources to function effectively and efficiently. Among such resources are personal research assistants, office and residential accommodation and means of transport. The lack of such resources has often been articulated with no solution apparently in sight. One reason why appropriate solution has not been found is the large number of parliamentarians, some of whom might only be adding up parliamentary overheads without visible benefits to the nation. It is for this reason that I found it unacceptable when the number of parliamentarians was first increased to 230 in January 2005 and later to 275. During the Second Republic, Parliament consisted of only 140 members, and yet it is on record that the Second Republican Parliament was the most vibrant, the most productive and qualitative with the most excellent intellectual debates this country had ever witnessed.

The number of parliamentarians has been increased from the original 200 to the present unwieldy and wasteful figure of 275, thanks to the idiotic use of the almighty powers given to the Electoral Commission by the Constitution and the sheepish acquiescence by Parliament itself. The act constituted an unnecessary cost incurrence exercise which added no value to Parliament, considering all the physical, financial and human constraints facing parliamentarians. In my own considered opinion, the number of parliamentarian seats can be reduced to an effective number of 168. Half of 168 is 84, a whole number, while two-thirds of 168 is 112, another whole number. Almost invariably parliamentarian decisions are taken based on simple majority or two-thirds voting rights. So 168 is a very neat figure to work with thus avoiding the almighty half two thirds issue which bedeviled Nigeria some years back.

BY

KWAME GYASI

E-mail: [email protected]


The Roman Ridge School (TRRS) has dwarfed all schools which participated in the recent Queen's Commonwealth Essay Competition in the country.

The school has been awarded nineteen medals, the highest for any school in Ghana in 2016.

The school was the lone one to be awarded Gold Medals in the entire country.

During a Special Awards Ceremony held at TRRS recently, Mrs. Valerie Mainoo, Principal of the school congratulated the winning students and their teachers on another outstanding performance in

the 2016 competition.

Special messages of congratulations from Dr. Frank B. Adu, Jr. (Chairman of Board of

Directors) and Rev. Dr. Joyce R. Aryee (Chair of the Academic Board of Governors, TRRS) were also extended to the medal winners, their teachers and families  proclaiming it as a triumph for the Roman Ridge School and an achievement for the youth of Ghana.

Founded in 1883, this competition has inspired thousands of young writers from all over the world for 133 years.

It is administered by the Royal Commonwealth Society (UK), this international essay writing contest stands as the worlds oldest and largest, according to a release on the subject. In 2016, over 13,500 young people from almost every Commonwealth country and territory took part, making it their most successful and competitive contest to date. One hundred and thirty judges scrutinised entries

around the theme, An Inclusive Commonwealth, which is also the 2016 Commonwealth Year theme,

and a topical theme for today's youth. Essay topics focused on: the significance of community; the importance of diversity and difference; the question of belonging; the values of tolerance, respect and understanding; and the sense of shared responsibility that exists within the Commonwealth today.

In 2015, pupils of TRRS broke records winning 23 medals (7 Bronze, 7 Silver & 9 Gold), the most of any school in Ghana for that year. In 2016, TRRS has once again won the most medals of any school in the country, with pupils being awarded a total of 19 medals (5 Bronze, 6 Silver & 8 Gold), also making TRRS the only school in Ghana to be awarded Gold medals this year.

The Roman Ridge School (TRRS) was founded in 2002 and is a private co-educational institution of approximately 550 students, from ages 4

to 18. Education at the school is based on the British Preparatory & Independent School system,

whilst being firmly rooted in Ghanaian life and culture.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept.16

By Rufiz Hafizoglu - Trend:

A military unit came under attack in Turkeys Agri province, Milliyet newspaper reported Sept.16.

Nine Turkish servicemen were killed as a result of the incident.

Reportedly, the attack was committed by militants of Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) terrorist group.

Large-scale anti-PKK operations have been launched in the province following the attack, said the newspaper.

The conflict between Turkey and the PKK, which demands the creation of an independent Kurdish state, has continued for over 33 years and has claimed more than 40,000 lives.



The UN and the European Union list the PKK as a terrorist organization.

---

Follow the author on Twitter: @rhafizoglu
THE MUNICIPAL Chief Executive (MCE) of the Ga East Municipal Assembly within the Greater Accra Region has urged the adoption of what he termed as the inter-sectoral approach to waste management in Ghana.

John Kwao Sackey made the call in an interview with journalists on the sidelines of a fumigation exercise undertaken by Waste Landfill Company Limited on Thursday at Abokobi, within the municipality.

The exercise was intended to control houseflies and stench that had engulfed the community as a result of a landfill site within the area that is managed by the Waste Landfills Company, an entity under the Zoom Group of Companies.

The 6.5 acre size land dumping site, DAILY GUIDE learnt, presently receives only a sizable amount of waste generated in homes and smaller markets, while majority of the waste is sent to places such as Tema. 15 trucks or 300 tons of waste are allowed onto the site daily.

According to the MCE, it was about time the various state agencies, departments and ministries collaborated in the management of waste in Ghana.

That, he said, is the best way to go in managing the poor sanitation situation in the country.

The sanitation issue is a national problem and we should all get on board, the MCE said.

He observed that the Ministries of Petroleum and Energy; Tourism, Culture and Creative Arts could benefit immensely from the sanitation subsector.

The Ministry of Petroleum and Energy, for instance, he said, could invest in generating energy from waste being produced in the country.

New Site

Mr. Sackey disclosed that the Assembly had found a new 43 acres of land at La  Nkwantanang within the Municipality for dumping refuse.

He said the company (name withheld) that is expected to manage the new site is waiting for certification from the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) as, he claimed, the company intends to turn the wastes into energy.

.On his part, the Municipal Environmental Health Officer of Ga East Municipal Assembly, Derick Tata Anku explained that waste management is capital intensive and the assemblies alone cannot manage it.

He appealed to residents to support the assemblies by adopting positive attitude to sanitation and the environment.

Meanwhile, Operations Manager of Waste Landfills Company Limited, Omane Mensah Richard told journalists that once a week, his outfit sprays the Abokobi landfill site as well as the entire Abokoki community after every three months.

With calls from residents and the Assembly to increase the number of times the company sprays the community, Mr. Mensah Richard said the company shall do all it takes to meet the needs of residents in Abokobi and its environs whose health is at risk due to the stench being generated from the dumping site.

Some residents speaking to the press expressed their frustrations at the continuous presence of the landfill site in the town; calling on government to shut it down.

BY Melvin Tarlue
16.09.2016 LISTEN

The Tamale Circuit Court presided by William Appiah Twumasi has sentenced Salim Alhassan to 10 years in prison for robbery.

The convict was sentenced by the court on his own plea for snatching a tricycle from his victim Osman Iddrisu at Zanjirigu on the Tamale-Salaga road in the Northern Region.

Salim Alhassan, 20 was arrested by residents of Zanjirigu for snatching a tricycle from Osman Iddrisu at knife point.

DAILY GUIDE gathered that the suspect and one Hafiz hired the services of Osman to transport them from Tamale to a particular destination. Midway through, one of them pulled a knife and ordered the driver to step out of the tricycle. They subsequently sped off with the tricycle towards Salaga.

According to reports, the driver then saw a motor-rider and told him about the incident.

The motor-rider then made a call to the nearby village to ensure the arrest of the suspects when they got there.

DAILY GUIDE gathered that when the robbers got to the village and saw the mob on the main road they sensed danger and abandoned the tricycle and took to their heels.

Suspect Salim Alhassan was however arrested after he jumped into a nearby river but realized it was too deep and came out.

Hafiz who also jumped into the river could not be found.

The Northern Regional Public Relations Officer, ASP Ebenezer Tetteh who confirmed the information to DAILY GUIDE said suspect Hafiz cannot be confirmed dead because his body had not been found adding that the police have asked the residents to inform them should they get him dead or alive.

FROM Eric Kombat, Tamale
Dr. Ransford Gyampo and a hearty handshake with the EU Boss,William Hanna

The Head of the European Union (EU) Delegation to Ghana, Ambassador William Hanna, has stated that the European Partnership Agreement (EPA) will improve the fortunes of West African countries.

Ambassador Hanna said this while speaking on the topic, 'Ghana and the European Union: A New Partnership during the University of Ghana College of Humanities maiden Dialogue series held at the School of Law Auditorium last Wednesday.

He said although the EPA has caused anxiety among trade partners, it would give them the opportunity to improve their gains.

Mr Hanna indicated that EPA is based on security and democracy.

He indicated that EU over the last 40 years has focused on universities and youth dialogues, migration and mobility of people, good governance, trade, construction, health and human rights in Ghana.

He was happy that the EU investment in Ghana had surpassed $500 million.

In the current context of globalization and trade liberalization, there are huge opportunities for developing countries to integrate into global markets to benefit from the increasing global trade flows through local product value additions, he disclosed.

Speaking on the topic, 'An overview of the European Union and the Economic Partnership Agreement,' Dr. Ransford Gyampo, Director, Centre for European Studies, called on both the EU and government to be active players in helping to sensitize the public, especially the trading community.

It is in the interest of the people that government must improve its export trade by laying greater emphasis on improving standards to meet those of the EU.

Dr. Gyampo said that in Ghana and other developing countries, issues over governance take precedence in media to the detriment of trade, health and other issues.

Chairperson for the event, Prof. Henrietta Mensa-Bonsu, Director of the Legon Centre for International Affairs and Diplomacy, in her closing remarks, mentioned that critics must accept the EPA and take advantage of the many opportunities the agreement holds for the country.

Whether we like it or not, the EPA, which can be likened to an instrument that can serve the dual functions of positive or negative, has come to stay but for us our role is to take steps to protect our interests, Ms Mensa-Bonsu added.

She reiterated the need for public education at all levels to ensure that people understand the concept.

By Solomon Ofori
16.09.2016 LISTEN

The Ghana Insurance Association (GIA) has chosen the Managing Director the Ghana Union Assurance, Aretha Duku as its new President.

She takes over from Ivan Averireh who is expected to step down in next few days. The decision was formally announced at its Annual General Meeting on Thursday.

Mrs Duku serves as a Director of Adehyeman Savings and Loans Company Ltd.

She has a diverse international exposure having worked with Hannover Re (South Africa); consulting for Media Block Consultancy (Emea) on assigned projects for the consultancy's clients in Europe.

She serves on the board of Ghana Union Assurance Company Limited and the Ghana Union Life Assurance Company.

She holds an LLB and Masters Degree from the City University Seatle in the USA.

Story by Ghana| Myjoyonline.com | Joy Business
Libreville (AFP) - An internet curfew and social media blackout has sparked outrage and wreaked havoc on businesses in oil-rich Gabon, as citizens keenly await a pivotal ruling challenging President Ali Bongo's contested re-election.

"We are losing a lot of money," fumed Steeve Ndong, who oversees the website of a mobile telephone company.

"The figures of the page I look after are in the red. We are now down to 600 hits a day against between 6,000 and 10,000 normally," he said.

"It has lasted for 15 days," added Raoul, a doctor in the seaside capital Libreville, adding "(and) we speak of democracy."

Internet connections were partially restored on Thursday between six in the morning until 8 at night and then cut off later. Social media such as Twitter, Facebook and WhatsApp remain blocked.

Gabon, which has been ruled by the Bongo family for nearly 50 years, has been wracked by violent protests after the sitting president was declared the winner of the August 27 polls.

Bongo's rival Jean Ping, a veteran diplomat, took his challenge of the result -- which gave Bongo a winning margin of a mere 6,000 votes -- to the country's top court.

Days of riots in Gabon's capital of Libreville followed the August 31 announcement handing incumbent Ali Bongo a narrow victory

Riots broke out following the August 31 announcement of the results, the National Assembly was torched and there were attacks on Ping's headquarters. Bongo meanwhile claimed that Ping had instigated the violence.

Ping has asked for a recount in the ruling family's stronghold of Haut-Ogooue province, where Bongo won more than 95 percent of votes on a reported turnout of more than 99 percent.

Ping says more than 50 people were killed in post-electoral violence, but the interior ministry says the toll was three dead.

Meanwhile, anxious Gabonese awaiting news of the Constitutional Court's decision on Ping's appeal now only have recourse to the country's tightly-controlled state media and television.

"To know what's really happening we have to wait for the evening news on international TV channels," said a student who identified herself as only Marie.

'We are all victims'

Another young woman, Laure, said she had "anticipated" the crackdown and installed a virtual private network or VPN on her smartphone to avoid "censorship."

"We have access to Facebook," said the 23-year-old Ping supporter.

Gabon's opposition leader Jean Ping has declared himself "president elect" and has appealed to challenge the results

Communications Minister Alain-Claude Bilie-By-Nze told AFP that the erratic services were due to "disruptions" in the network and nothing more.

"We are all victims," he said. "Like everybody else, we too cannot work normally and we hope that the links will be re-established quickly," he said.

But this line fails to convince many.

"The government is trying to make us believe that business is back to normal but that's rubbish," exclaimed Paul, who works in a Libreville bank.

Shops and businesses, shuttered for days after the post-poll violence broke out, have re-opened but close well before normal hours.

Parents are also worried about the new school term, which begins at the start of October.

In the incredibly tangled web that makes up Gabon's political elite, the Constitutional Court is headed by Marie-Madeleine Mborantsuo, a former beauty queen whose affair with the leader's father produced two children.

For over 20 years the glamorous 61-year-old has headed the nine-member Constitutional Court and many question her impartiality.

The African Union on Friday said it was putting together a high-level legal team to send to Gabon "as soon as possible" to help ensure the court delivers a fair and transparent ruling.

"We wish to guarantee proper transparency as well as the credibility and legitimacy of Jean Ping's challenge," the spokesman for the AU Commission, Jacob Enoh Eben, told AFP.

"Consultations are under way to establish this team of jurists, experts in French administrative law," in coordination with the Gabon Constitutional Court, he said.

The AU was seeking "former Supreme Court chiefs and university professors."

France, Gabon's former colonial ruler, has called for a fair ruling with Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault underscoring the need "to examine the objections transparently and impartially."
A total of 300 police prosecutors across the country have been trained over a one year project aimed at building the capacity of prosecutors which is expected to increase their expectise in the criminal justice system in the country.

The participants were drawn from the 11 police administrative regions across the country.

The training was organised by the Law and Development Associations (LADA) Institute, with funding support from the United States through the International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, to improve the competence and confidence ofg police prosecutors.

It is the final part of a $1-million project to train 300 Ghanaian police prosecutors over a year. The project is also expected to increase the confidence of the public in the criminal justice system.

At the closing ceremony last Thursday, some of the participants who spoke on behalf of the regions they represented commended the organisers and the Police Administration for the programme.

Chief Inspector Victor Dosoo of the Accra Regional Police Command described the programme as an eye opener which would help prosecutors not to lose sight of evidence which would aid them in the prosecution of cases.

A participant from the Upper East Region, Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Isaac Kojo Forson, said the practical aspect of the training, which included exercises such as mock prosecution and court visits, made it easy for the prosecutors to grasp some concepts related to the work of police prosecution.

He said the programme enabled the participants to better appreciate the impact of prolonged detention of suspects or accused persons which, among others, was an indictment on suspects human rights.

Impact

The Director of the Legal and Prosecution Unit of the Ghana Police Service, Chief Superintendent of Police Mr Benjamin Osei Addae, urged the participants to put the knowledge gained from the training to good use.

The Chief Director of the Ministry of Justice and Attorney-Generals Department, Mr Suleiman Ahmed, who was the guest speaker, said currently there were 34 state criminal prosecutors in the Greater Accra Region and 44 in the other regions who, unlike their colleagues in Accra, handled both criminal and civil cases, hence the need to train more police prosecutors to ensure efficiency in the justice delivery system.

He urged the prosecutors to endeavour to detach their emotions from cases they handled and abide by the law in the prosecution of cases.

In his remarks, the Managing Director of the LADA Institute, Mr Mark Ofori-Amanfo, said due to the success chalked up, the institute had received close to $1.5 million to expand the project for another one year.

Under the second phase, he said, 150 more police prosecutors would be trained from January 2017, after which the institute would undertake a monitoring exercise to find out how the training was impacting their work.

He hinted that there were plans to expand the programme and incorporate it into the Ghana Police College programme.

The last batch of prosecutors drawn from the Ghana Police Service ended a four-week training, aimed at sharpening their skills in the dispensation of

Topics discussed at the training included, criminal prosecution, law of evidence, criminal trial and advocacy, constitution and constitutional principles on crime and punishment and the Ghana Legal system.

The representative of the US Embassy, Ms. Prislla Sylva, urged the prosecutors to liase with their colleagues to ensure effective justice delivery.

She urged them to continue improving themselves in order to be abreast of procedures and regulations in the countrys judicial system.

The Deputy Director, Legal ad Prosecution of the Ghana Police Service, Chief Superintendent Benjamin Osei Addae, urged the participants to be agents of change and not be afraid of defence counsels.
Energy Bank has welcomed 30 National Service personnel posted to the Bank for the 2016/17 service year with a call on them to inculcate the values of integrity and excellence during their stay with the bank.

In an orientation program/reception organized at the Banks Spintex Head Office Annex, Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Christiana Olaoye, advised the National Service staff to prepare themselves for their new assignment by being honest at all times and exhibit hard work as well as apply themselves with all due diligence.

You must have a vision and passion for the work, develop skills and competence along the way, remain committed to the task, and ensure completion of set assignments, she explained.

Mrs. Olaoye noted that traditional banking had evolved over the years, and that financial institutions were innovating with digital solutions and products and services to suit the needs of consumers. We are, so far, satisfied with our business in Ghana. We believe banking is all about creating satisfaction for all stakeholders, contributing to the growth of the economy and impacting on the larger society.

Commenting further, she said We are evolving and creating compelling value propositions for our banking public, and we will not relent in our efforts to be a service-oriented and customer-centric institution.

On his part, Executive Director, Operations, Isaac Shedowo, urged the service personnel to adapt quickly, learn fast and strive to become great leaders in the future. He cautioned them to be truthful, reliable and committed in whatever they do.

Some Heads of Department, including Corporate Banking, Treasury, Commercial Banking, Retail Banking, Private Banking, Collections & E-Banking, Foreign Operations and Information Technology took turns to school the new personnel on their business processes and procedures.

Energy Bank Ghana presently has 11 branches and one agency situated in four regions of the country. The banks vision is to build a strong bank based on the timeless principles of loyalty and efficient customer service.
16.09.2016 LISTEN

Whenever I hear people talk of power, they use it as a child will play with the toy. Power to them means nothing other just occupying political offices or positions. How much about power we know nothing about. Power is one of the most notoriously ambiguous concepts in political science to define yet the most ubiquitous!

Power is often about control (of resources). People who understand power know how to be better managers than those who think they have the wealth. When I hear people criticize North Korea testing its nuclear weapons, I immediately know a people who lack basic understanding of what power means. People who understand power do not ask why a sovereign nation will develop such weapon in the face of ubiquitous enemies. That also reminds me, US is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty which gives it the right to use the weapons for defensive and strategic purposes. No one questions the right of the US to amass such weapons for defensive purposes because it has the power or ability to do so. If this is not power, then I do not know the meaning of the word!

About a month ago, I was in a University Hall of Residence to see a colleague. I approached the security officer on duty to direct me on how to get to the specific location I am going to. Apart from the terrible attitude of this man, the porter on duty did not help matters. Instead of replying my query, I was simply told I am in charge here and I wont allow you to go in. He had to keep me waiting for over 30 minutes before my friend came out to meet me. Before parting, I made him understand he cannot treat everyone the way he liked.

I identified myself by showing him my ID card. After putting a call through to the Chief Security Officer (CSO)s office, I made him realize how he could lose his job in days. At that point, this hitherto powerful man soon started begging me to save his job. He is the bread winner of his family; he is only doing his job; if he gets sacked, he cannot find another job and so on and so forth. This was the same man who was the boss a while ago begging like a baby in need of breast milk!

I was in the same Hall about a week ago, I saw the security man but the porter was not on duty that day. I walked pass the porters lodge after brief greeting and without asking to be directed, the old man who was part of the shakara the other day did not raise a muscle to stop me from entering the Hall. I guess jobs are scarcer to find these days so no one wants to lose his job!

The war in South-Sudan, even after 21 continuous years of war (of independence) before its eventual independence in 2012, is instructive. A careful look at the situation in Africas youngest independent nation will reveal the extent men will go to get power and in the end do nothing with it. Whoever has studied the psychology of the leaders of the two main factions in the conflict- Riek Machar and Salva Kiir- will know that both are engaged in struggle for power as defined by self-interest, having little to do with peoples welfare they both fought against under a united Sudan. This thing we call power!

When I hear people talk of restructuring Nigeria, I simply ask: What are we restructuring, if not power? My problem with people who only try to simplify the solutions to Nigerians challenges as restructuring are simply not serious. I am aware I may have offended some people with my last statement but no problem. Restructuring without adequate power arrangement will simply be an effort in futility. Many of our politicians only know they are in positions, but they do not appear to know the power that come with such positions. That also reminds me, the most powerful people often do not hold governmental positions. As in sane as this sounds, that is how the world runs. Ahmadu Bello does not need to be the Prime Minister to rule Nigeria from Kaduna. Awolowo needs not be in Ibadan to be accepted as leader of the Yorubas in the Western Region. There is a reason we have positions like Father of the Party or National Leader of the Party even though they are not established by any written law!

Any restructuring that says the President must equitably appoint political office holders without proper definition of the offices can at best be a circular argument. Let us say the Constitution says there equitable distribution of political positions among all three main ethnic groups, for instance. One region chose to control the economy by lobbying for Ministers of: Commerce, Labour and Productivity, Petroleum and the likes. Another region lobbied for control of the administration and got appointed into all key administrative positions in Government. The region that understands power knows what to do to keep the other two under its perpetual serfdom by controlling only a few ministries: Defence, Internal affairs and Agriculture. With these three, it can determine the direction of policies and politics of the administration and by extension, the economy.

Another thing I have come to know about power is that is not based on emotions. Power is often gotten by dinning with the devil, if you know what I mean. I may not like Mr. A for being a sadist, but he has the key to something I need urgently. I must look for a way to get Mr. A to give me what I need, even though he was the one who killed my father. If I refused to dine with him because of the wrong he once did to my family, I lose future opportunities. Hence, I lose twice!

A friend of mine got a job in Policy Bureau of a state Governor. Back then in Kwara Polytechnic, this guy was always agitating. He hates injustice. He will fight for the rights of anyone he knows or does not know. I watched him led a protest to the Scholarship Board in Ilorin to demand the payment of our Bursary arrears. He was given a heroic welcome when the Governor immediately approved the disbursement of the Bursary.

After my National Diploma, I chose to further my education at Obafemi Awolowo University while he continued with his Higher National Diploma. I was told this young man later became an influential member of the Polytechnic Students Union while I was away. He graduated, and all I heard of him what that he has gotten a job with a Governor. I ran into my good friend while I was still in Ife, his countenance have changed understandably. My very open friend was now singing a new song. He would not even help me do a follow-up on a project proposal on Students Work-Study program I was putting together to help students with financial disabilities on Campus. They wont approve this thing, Adigun. He told me frankly. How fast things change. This thing we call power!

I can hear some deep breaths now. This is understandable. Power is not given out freely. It is demanded. One either gets it by concession or by force!

Olalekan Waheed ADIGUN is a political risk analyst and independent political strategist for wide range of individuals, organisations and campaigns. He is based in Lagos, Nigeria. His write-ups can be viewed on his website http://olalekanadigun.com/ Tel: +2348136502040, +2347081901080

Email: [email protected], [email protected]

Follow me on Twitter @adgorwell
Members of the Government and Hospital Pharmacists Association (GHOSPA) have been on strike for the past two weeks demanding payment of market premium. GHOSPA has accused the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission (FWSC) of unfairly treating its members.

Patients in dire need of some medications have been left to their fate due to the strike. Even though GHOSPA has said it will go back to work when government is ready to meeting their demands, the National Labour Commission (NLC) has described its strike as illegal.

New developments

In the meeting that ensued between GHOSPA and National Labour commission turned into a fiasco as no agreement was made after several hours of deliberations. This means that effect from today, the Government and Hospital Pharmacists Association will withdraw all emergency services to emergency units in all government hospitals across the country.

Fued

NLC has filed a suit at the Accra High Court - Industrial and Labour Division in support of Motion Ex-Parte for an "Order of Substituted Service." The notices, the court said, "shall remain posted for a period of 7 days."

GHOSPA National Chairman, Agyeman Badu, has called the bluff of NLC saying they are unfazed by the court summon. He says this reminds them of their belief that the NLC cannot be trusted. We will meet the NLC in court, he said.

This fight has gone on for so many years and still not resolved and this is where it has got to as the issue is still lingering with patients live played with.

Plea

Worried that GHOSPA's strike could drag on, the Minister for Health Hon. Alex Segbefia has pleaded and begged GHOSPA to return to their post to attend to the needs of patients. He said he is well aware of the issues. According to him " i know NLC has taken the issue to court and this is an issue that needs to be dealt with at the table. It does not have to go this far"

Before

At the beginning of the strike, we went to visit some hospitals to see how the strike is affecting the hospitals and how the patients are faring especially those coming for drugs from the pharmacy. Although we were refused visit to some places, the ones we visited which includes La General Hospital saw the place deserted with no one at post to tend to the needs of patients. This was pathetic as desperation, confusion and was seen all over among the patients and on their faces.

Now

It has been two weeks since the strike began and still Government and Pharmacist Hospital Association across the length and breadth of the country have still not reported to their working posts and this is causing a great stir of panic among Ghanaians and others working at emergency units of the various hospitals.

There is a bone of contention as some are saying it is the Minister of Health who is behind this whole brouhaha but as to when it will come to an end, time will tell as GHOSPA are still waiting for to get a fair deal out of any negotiations.
On Tuesday 13th September H.E John Dramani Mahama shared with the nation, highlights of the National Democratic Congress Manifesto, on four thematic areas, just like they did in 2012.

His vision into 2016 indeed comes as the magic wand to somewhat resurrect Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, the first president of our beloved Ghana.

There was jubilation when he mentioned that all of Kwame Nkrumahs master plans for industry would be reviewed for feasibility and revival where feasible. Indeed, the development agenda has taken a turn for the better.

We are seeing a new era in leadership where the President himself is giving the Ghanaian people, the power to have high expectations and expect results.

Never again will the citizens accept blatant lies, or leadership without a track record.

We are tempted to dream of what Ghana would be today if each and every president that came after Kwame Nkrumah, had continued with a bit of what was started by the predecessor.

President Mahama masterfully brushed through the four thematic areas highlighted in NDCs 2016 Manifesto. He assured that details would be available after the formal launch in Sunyani.

Putting people first: This thematic area will focus on Education, Health, Sports and Social protection considering the enormous achievements chucked over the last four years of his government as well as that of his predecessor. Putting people first expresses his relentless effort to empower the Ghanaian through the already started progressive educational development considering the achievement in the last four years as indicated in the Accounting to the People progress report.(Popularly referred to as Greenbook) To provide a dependable and efficient healthcare after the building and expansion of many hospitals, polyclinics, Clinics and over thousand CHPS compounds. Also to make sport development an integral part of our development just like most of the developing nations have done. In this regard all the other remaining regions like Volta, Brong Ahafo, Eastern Region, Upper East and West Regions Building a strong economy for job creation: Adressing un-employment would be at the core of the NDC deliverables in the coming term. Already, 300,000 jobs are lined up based on the infrastructural projects to be embarked on. The Ghana Cedi is the most stable currency in West Africa sub-region (barring Francophone). This is a result of prudent measures to curtail the free fall of the cedi. All economic indices also point in the positive direction going into 2017. The local content act will be expanded to mining, construction and other areas to make sure a lot of Ghanaians can invest in these areas and the monetary benefits remain in Ghana. Our IMF models have been fitted into home-grown policies to make sure institutional and structural reforms are enforced. The rippling effect is seen in the over subscription of the current Eurobond to the tune of 4billion euros, signaling extreme confidence in Ghanas economic outlook. The president is poised to make sure cash transaction is barely minimized by 2021 with the usage of electronic means and others. $24 million will be injected into support for sugar cane farmers allowing them to produce for the Komenda Sugar factory. Major discussions with banking institutions will also seek to ensure affordable credit for private sector and the establishment of a Rent Advancement Scheme for Ghanaians with known revenue. A much needed relief due to high pressure to pay rent in lumpsum. Expanding infrastructure for accelerated development: It is on record that, the government led by His Excellency John Dramani Mahama has undertaken the most audacious infrastructural steps, second only to Kwame Nkrumah. Urban water coverage was 58.5% in 2008 now at 76% in 2015, Rural water coverage increased from 56.8% in 2008 to 76% in 2015. As at the end of 2014, a total of 77.5million gallons of water per day have been added to the national water supply system. This will increase to 109.7million gallons of water per day by close of 2016. Energy security to the point where we can export to the West African sub-region is soon becoming a reality with a forecasted surplus of about 3,000MW of power. Free distribution of 200,000 rooftop solar panels for small scale businesses will continue. Ghana will have the best road network in Africa by 2021 with sustained roads development under the NDC. The motorway will see two bridges at the flower pot junction on the spintex road and one at Klagon to Ashiaman. President Mahama is poised to revive the black star shipping line to be managed by GPHA. He will make sure the National ID is centralized to into a single card for smooth operation of our age technological advancement. Advancing transparent and accountable governance. It is under the government of H.E John Dramani Mahama that we have seen exposes on corruption because of his strong will to fight the canker. To enhance this fight, he will have all MMDCES elected, modernize birth and death register, Independent bodies and media will be strengthened, there will also be a new headquarters for Media Commission so they can exercise their mandate to its best efficient level. He will make sure the fight on narcotourism and drug trafficking is enforced by retooling and providing advance international standard of training for the bodies in-charge.

This thematic areas actually encapsulate the structures our nation needs to catapult it into the Ghana that Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah foresaw through his strategic seven-year development plan.

Indeed the highlights covered a lot of areas which this article can not exhaust.

The foundation laid so far is clear evidence of what the President stipulates to do in his second term.

Health infrastructure and retooling is ongoing, educational infrastructural development and logistics provision is ongoing, prudent economic management and policies are being implemented like remodeling of IMF and World Bank frame works into home grown policies.

Transport and road networks are on the increase to facilitate smooth movement of goods and services via sea, air and land hence the expansion of the Takoradi and Tema Ports, as well as the upgrading and renovation of Kotoka International Airport, Kumasi Airport and Tamale airport  recently used for airlifting this years hajj pilgrims to mecca.

What H.E promised in 2012 has been delivered.

In the words of 92 year old, Obrempong Nii Kojo Ababio, the Chief of Jamestown Mantse;

Dr Kwame Nkrumah was my contemporary, I saw what he did for Ghana. I am tempted to say you have surpassed Nkrumah. My son, I admire greatly what you are doing in infrastructure. As you can see I am flipping through the pages of the green book. Dont worry, it is well with you. He expressed this in his native Ga language.

The Ghana we desire lies in the re-election of His Excellency, John Dramani Mahama. #JMTOASO
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept.16

By Rufiz Hafizoglu - Trend:

Four members of the Islamic State (IS, aka ISIS, ISIL or Daesh) terrorist group have been detained in Turkey, Milliyet newspaper reported Sept.16.

Reportedly, the detainees were planning to commit terrorist attacks near foreign diplomatic missions in the country.

The testimony of the detainees revealed that the IS was planning terrorist attacks near German and UK embassies Sept.17.

It was earlier reported that the UK embassy in Ankara will be closed Sept.16 for security reasons.

Previously, Germany closed its diplomatic missions in Turkey.

---

Follow the author on Twitter: @rhafizoglu
As the Millennium Development Authority (MiDA) plans to fast track the process to announce a concessionaire of Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) in the shortest possible time, there have been a number of efforts by workers of the company to obstruct the process.

The Journey to the concession deal for the power company has been marked by vehement opposition from ECG Staff who are insecure about their jobs and the future of the company.

These has resulted in a number of strike actions and demonstration against the government and senior managers of the company.

Again, to this is a court case filed against the deal by a concern Ghanaian. But, MiDA described the suit as lacking merit.

Ing. Owura Sarfo admitted that the authority has been served with the suit, but sees it as incompetent.

We have been served a copy of the suit. I will not go into the merits of the case because the case is in court. But all I will say is that that suit is incompetent, that suit is of no merit and that suit is totally false, he said to Economy Times.

According to him, the allegations set in the suit are false, since MiDA has undergone all the necessary requirements and legal procedures needed to bring the Ghana Power Compact II into force.

However, the Authority, fortnight ago declared that, Ghana has qualified after going through all vigorous scrutiny and standard criteria for assessing the countrys qualification for the second Millennium Challenge Compact.

MiDA in a statement last week stated, The MCC has confirmed that the Government of Ghana has met all requirements and the Compact entered into force as of Tuesday, September 6, 2016

I am happy to advise that yesterday we met all the conditions precedent to Entry into Force of the Compact and submitted all the required documentation in that respect, Ing Owura Sarfo, Chief Executive Officer of MiDA said.

He added that the Government of Ghana now has five years to implement the Compact Program.

The MiDA boss explained that there is nothing to fear about government's plan to concession ECG stressing that some aspects of the power distributors operations are already in private hands. Plans to find a private company to invest in ECG received a boost on Wednesday, September 7, after Government satisfied the conditions required to access US$498 million.

The Economy Times, has also gathered that, the Selection Team of Experts working to select a company to be the concessionaire of the management of the ECG will declare the very luckiest company from among the over 60 companies that expressed interest in the Private Sector Participation (PSP) deal.

Information available indicates that, the Millennium Development Authority (MiDA) has shortlisted six, out of which one will eventually be selected as the concessionaire.

The information further indicated that, two of the companies are consortiums while the remaining four are bidding individually.

The two consortiums have Ghanaian addresses, an indication that they are registered in Ghana and probably have Ghanaian interests.

The companies are Manila Electric Company from the Philippines; Ch Group/Edf Sa/Lmi Holdings/Veolia Sa with Ghanaian address; Engie Energie Services, SA; from France, Bxc Company Ghana Ltd /Xiaocheng Technology Stock Company Limited, registered and operating in Ghana; Enel S.P.A.from Italy; and Tata Power Company Limited from India.

Ing. Owura Kwaku Sarfo, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of MIDA stated in a document posted on MiDA website.

The document is titled Concession for the management of, operation of, and investments in the electricity distribution business of the Electricity Company of Ghana, Pre-qualification of applicants and release of RFP.

According to the document, the request for proposals document was issued to the shortlisted entities on Tuesday, August 30, 2016.

But, MiDA requires that the acceptable PSP should have local participation at both ownership and management levels. It explained that the shortlist was arrived at after the completion of Evaluation of Pre-Qualification Applications.

In all, 11 companies took part in the Request for Qualification for Concession for the Management of, Operation of, and Investments in the Electricity Distribution Business of the Electricity Company of Ghana, for which submissions closed on May 9, 2016.

It is believed that, the concession should take off in January 2017 barring any unforeseen circumstances.

On the employment security of the worker, the Authority has insisted that the concession of the ECG under the Power Compact II will not lead to a retrenchment exercise.

According to MiDA, the agreement has a clause that bars the concessionaire from undertaking a retrenchment exercise in the next five years.

The Public Utility Workers Union (PUWU) has kicked against the concession, stating that ECG workers will be laid off once the process is completed.

The Chief Executive of MiDA, Ingineer Owura Safo stated that the concession agreement will rather create more jobs and not result in a retrenchment.

Unlike Ghana Telecom it was determined right from the very beginning that ECG was not over staffed. They didnt have more people than they needed and the bases of that decision was made that there shall be no retrenchment, he said.

Mr. Safo maintained that the new managers will inject efficiency and turn around the operations of ECG to make it profitable. The concessionaire is coming to reduce inefficiency.

There will be improved performance and reduction in the current losses of ECG leading to a progressive lowering of tariffs, he said, adding that government will also continue to purse rural electrification under the concession He stated that extensive consultation has been undertaken to allay the fears of the workers but some of them have reacted negatively due to misinformation.

Under the Power Compact, six projects will be implemented to address the root causes of the unavailability and unreliability of power in Ghana The project include ECG Financial and Operational Turnaround Project, NEDCo Financial and Operational Turnaround Project, Regulatory Strengthening and Capacity Building Project, and Access Project. The rest are Power Generation Sector Improvement Project and Energy Efficiency, and Demand Side Management Project.
President John Mahama has endorsed the candidature of Obuobia Darko-Opoku as the National Democratic Congress parliamentary aspirant for the Weija-Gbawe constituency.

Mahama described the philanthropist as industrious and the best person who can spearhead development in the constituency as well as champion their interest in the House.

The former broadcaster has been conspicuous on the ground with developmental projects and donations through her Obuobia Foundation ever since she launched her bid for the second time to stand on the ticket of the governing party.

Mahama and Obuobia Darko-Opoku in a warm embrace after the launch

Last month, she donated an ambulance to the Ga South Municipal Hospital, after giving the same health facility a water storage system to aid in child delivery as well as the construction of bridges, boreholes and connecting some communities in the constituency to the national water pipelines among others.

Introducing Obuobia, who is the deputy Executive Secretary of the Ghana Freezones Board to a teeming crowd of NDC supporters at Mallam Junction, Mahama said he has been impressed with her dedication and passion to help humanity and has no doubt she will be a fine lawmaker.

Mahama, who is seeking a second term in office come the December 7 elections, opined he is convinced the electorate in Weija-Gbawe will vote massively for the NDC judging from how Obuobia has proven herself.

I believe that with what we have done, we deserve a second term. We are taking the Weija-Gbawe constituency, the president said about the ever-smiling MP-aspirant.

Your parliamentary candidate has done a lot to win your votes. Look at the developmental projects she is fronting. What she has done are more than enough. I have no doubt she will over perform when she becomes an MP. Lets give her our support because shell do things double, double. I have no doubt this year Weija-Gbawe will fall to the NDC party.

Who wouldnt be proud to have this beautiful woman as his MP? When you vote on December 7 for me, make sure you cast your ballot for Obuobia Darko-Opoku, Mahama appealed.

Obuobia took to Facebook to express her gratitude to Mahama for gracing her campaign launch during his Greater Accra regional tour.

"I'm indeed grateful to him for making the Weija-Gbawe constituency a port of call on his campaign tour of the Greater Accra Region. I promise to live up to this trust in me to represent the NDC in my constituency," she wrote.
Based on the experience of the Single Window implementations in other West African countries, West Blue estimated that the NSW project would reduce the cost and time of international trade (import, export and transit) in Ghana by 50 per cent and 25 per cent respectively over the next five years.

With Ghana as a case study, the significant impact on the international competitiveness of Ghanaian business accompanying the introduction of the National Single Window, has resulted in a strong growth in the countrys international trade performance.

It is expected that the new system will significantly increase the global ranking of Ghana in the World Banks Trading Across Borders Report from the rank of 171 in 2016 to 121 by 2021. Similarly, the ranking within the Sub-Saharan African regions could increase from 36 to 16.

Also, it is believed that, another potential benefit of the NSW is the likely positive impact on the countrys foreign direct investment prospects.

The Chief Executive Officer of the West Blue Consulting (the implementing entity of Ghanas National Single Window), Madam Valentina Mintah, has therefore advised members of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) that are implementing the single window systems to abide by international standards to enable them to operate effectively and efficiently in the sub-region.

According to her, the uniformity of the systems would allow customs authorities to share critical data on trade and other related activities in line with the harmonisation of customs operations in the ECOWAS sub-region.

Madam Mintah said this at the just ended African Ports Evolution West Africa Edition 2016 forum held in Accra.

She noted that after some months of the implementation of the trade facilitation system, it had reduced the cost of doing business at the Tema and Takoradi ports.

Since the introduction of the GNSWs PAARS last year, traders are able to access Customs Classification and Valuation Report (CCVR) within 48 hours, Madam Mintah revealed.

In some cases, within an hour - that is substantial improvement from the previous situation whereby it used to take traders more than a week or two weeks just to get their CCVR, the CEO stated.

Madam Mintah was quick to add that the system had brought some efficiency at the ports, reduced time, reduced corruption and cost of doing business.

The Customs Division of GRA took over the processing of the CCRV from the destination companies in September last year. The CCRV replaced the destination inspection report also known as the Final Classification and Valuation Report (FCVR). In spite of the successes chalked up so far through the implementation of the PAARS, she said there was still more room for improvement.

Trade efficiency is a key determinant of investment decisions by international business and the positioning of Ghana as a trade-efficient and trade-friendly country will greatly enhance its attractiveness to such investors.

Furthermore, she believes that the GNSW is expected to boost economic growth of the country, adding that the Single Window would enhance institutional and nation building, improved and effective collection of government revenues, simpler, faster processes for clearance and release, reduced costs of compliance, reduced corruption, and reduction in bureaucratic processes, among others.

As part of capacity building for the Ghanaian implementing officials, Officers from the Customs Division of the Ghana Revenue Authority, with its Technical Partner, West Blue Consulting attended the 5th edition of the International Single Window Conference in Morocco.

The conference which was under the theme: "Virtual Single Window for foreign trade the requirement for an inclusive cooperation", took place between the 5th and 7th September, this year.

The invitation was in recognition of the success stories recorded so far in the operations of Single Window project in Ghana. Since the inception of PAARS, there has been a very significant improvement in doing business in Ghana.

The Ghana Revenue Authority, Customs Division team was led by the Deputy Commissioner, Operations, Mr. Fred Gavor.
The Ministry of Finance has a rejoinder to debunk a publication in newspaper which the Ministry said the "publication lacks credibility and facts as it created the impression that either government was wrong in transferring funds from its own accounts as part of its cash management strategies."

The ministry in a press release issued last week stated that, "The facts of the case are that the Ministry of Finance on August 24, 2016, through the Controller and Accountant Generals Department (CAGD) authorized the Bank of Ghana to transfer funds from the accounts of some selected MDAs/MMDAs under governments Treasury Single Accounts (TSA) policy."

The statement read as follows, The attention of the Ministry of Finance has been drawn to a publication in the Daily Guide of September 14, 2016, issue No. 216/16 which created a wrong impression that Government does not have money to pay salaries of its workers for September 2016.

The publication went further to state that the financial position of government has reached a crisis point and in apparent reaction to the situation the Controller and Accountant General had instructed the Bank of Ghana to transfer an amount of GHS 469,176, 900 from some MDAs accounts for payment of salaries for August 2016.

The statement further stated, The Ministry wishes to state categorically that the publication lacks credibility and facts as it created the impression that either government was wrong in transferring funds from its own accounts as part of its cash management strategies.

Laying the facts bare, the Ministry of Finance noted that, on August 24, 2016, through the Controller and Accountant Generals Department (CAGD) authorized the Bank of Ghana to transfer funds from the accounts of some selected MDAs/MMDAs under governments Treasury Single Accounts (TSA) policy.

The statement signed by Patrick Nomo, Atg. Chief Director said, under the TSA and the Bank of Ghana zero financing policy of government business, the Ministry considers the consolidated bank balances of government to determine government cash position and through that identifies any idle funds to utilize before going to the market to borrow money at an interest cost. It would have cost government about GCH 9.2 Million at Treasury bill rate of 22% for one month if the Ministry were to borrow GH500 million from the market while this cash is idle.

Governments position based on the TSA on the said date shows that some accounts of MDAs/MMDAs had some balances and therefore decided to utilize such funds as the first option instead of borrowing funds from the market at an interest cost.

The Ministry further stated that the monies were not used for only salaries as government through its prudent cash management policies has opened a Compensation of Employees accounts at Bank of Ghana into which funds are transferred consistently throughout the month to meet salary obligations at the end of the month. It is therefore not true that government was in dire need of money and therefore had to transfer monies from the accounts of MDAs to pay salaries.

The ministry again noted that, the CAGD has since reimbursed those accounts which needed the funds as a result of the transfers. It is therefore not true that the decision of government has affected the operations of the MDAs/MMDAs.

The Ministry assured MDAs/MMDAs, stakeholders and the general public that government is committed to prudent financial management through sound cash management and cost-effective policies with the overall goal of preserving the public purse.
By Laudia Sawer

Kpone, Sept 16, GNA - The Kpone-Katamanso District Interparty Dialogue Committee (DIPDC) has called on politicians to unite the electorate with their actions and words instead of inciting them to violence.

Mr Mohammed A. Yakubu, Chairman of the DIPDC said dividing the Ghanaians on party lines would eventually result in an ungovernable society for whoever emerged winner of the December elections.

He gave the advice on Thursday during a meeting of the DIPDC and the District Election Taskforce Committee at Kpone on the Greater Accra Region.

He reiterated that going for an election should not be seen as preparing to go to war stressing that "election is not a war".

Mr Yakubu, who is also the Kpone-Katamanso District Coordinating Director, reminded politicians that voters would only choose a leader to rule the people therefore campaigns geared towards creating confusion and divisions among the people must not be encouraged.

He asked; who would the politicians govern after they have plunged the country into chaos because of their quest to win at all cost?

He commended political activists in the District for organising their activities in a peaceful manner and encouraged them to educate their supporters to eschew all forms of violence and acts that could fuel confusion.

The DIPDC chairman stated that the Committee which was formed by the National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) and the Assembly had representatives from all stakeholders in the district.

He noted that the Committee would be meeting forthrightly, would identify and discuss possible issues that could escalate into violence and misunderstanding.

Mr Oliver Agbenyo, Kpone-Katamanso District NCCE Director, urged Ghanaian voters to maintain their dignity by voting peacefully as they did during the previous elections.

Mr Agbenyo also appealed to political parties to portray themselves as law abiding in order for their followers to do so.

Mr Isaac Kwame Antwi, Tema Metropolitan NCCE Director, appealed to the Electoral Commission to reduce the filling fee for women and the disabled.

Mr Antwi said the NCCE's engagement with vulnerable groups revealed that they want the amount slashed as an incentive to get more women and disable persons to participate fully in the elections.

GNA
16.09.2016 LISTEN

By Isaac Arkoh, GNA

Kumasi, Sept 16, GNA - The World Food Programme (WFP) has given upbeat assessment of its US$5 million project, piloted in the Ashanti and Northern Regions, over the past five years to address constraints facing low income farmers.

The over 1,500 beneficiary farmers have increased the per hectare yield of maize from 2.2 metric tonnes to 2.8 metric tonnes and rice to 2.5 metric tonnes from 1.5 metric tonnes.

They were able to sell a total of 5,000 metric tonnes of quality maize valued at US$2 million to the WFP between 2010 and 2016.

The 'Purchase for Progress (P4P)' project was launched to assist tackle low productivity and high post-harvest losses, poor market infrastructure and promote the development of agricultural markets in such a way that smallholder farmers would produce food surpluses and sell at fair prices.

Deputy Country Director of the WFP, Ms. Magdelena Owusu Moshi, speaking at a workshop on the project in Kumasi said there had been positive outcomes - helped to build the production and post-harvesting handling capacities of the farmers, exposed them to good agricultural practices, the use of appropriate agricultural equipment and the opportunity to learn how to engage in formal quality market.

'For most of us in WFP Ghana, the flagship success story of the P4P initiative has been the impact of the weighing scales on the eventual adoption and standardization of the size 4 bag in the Ejura-Sekyedumasi area.

This measure has more or less eliminated the traditional bush weight system in which farmers were compelled to heap large bags to between 130 kilograms and 170 kilograms, only to be paid the value of a 100 kilograms bag of maize, thus depriving them of all that extra kilograms per bag.'

She indicated that the WFP's supply of weighing scales in the area marked the beginning of a new phase in the farmers' lives - culminating in the passage of a bye-law by the municipal assembly on the use of standardized bags.

Ms. Moshi also spoke of the establishment of linkages between the farmer-based organizations with institutional markets including senior high schools and colleges of education as well as the private sector.

The P4P pilot project was funded by Global Affairs, Canada formerly CIDA with the aim to support sustainable development by improving the income of the smallholder/low income farmers, especially women farmers by leveraging the demand from WFP and the farmer's capacity by working with the government and key partners to provide technical assistance, agricultural inputs, post-harvest equipment and market development activities.

Participants at the workshop drawn from farmer-based organizations in the beneficiary regions appealed for the extension of the project to lift more farmers from poverty.

GNA
RIDGEFIELD PARK, ACCRA, N.J., Sept. 16 - (UPI/GNA) - Owners of Samsung Galaxy Note7 smartphones covered by a new U.S. recall can get a replacement device beginning next week, the electronics giant said Thursday.

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission issued the voluntary recall Thursday, which covers about 1 million devices.

The recall is due to a battery defect that can result in a fire, Samsung said, which is linked to several incidents worldwide.

The affected phones were sold between August and Thursday and feature a 5.7-inch screen in the following colors: black onyx, blue coral, gold platinum and silver titanium. Samsung is printed on the top front of the phone and Galaxy Note7 is printed on the back of the phone.

Replacement devices will be available starting next Wednesday.

"Consumer safety is always our highest priority," Tim Baxter, president of Samsung Electronics America, said in a statement Thursday. "We are asking owners to act now by powering down their Note7 devices and receive a replacement devices or a refund through our exchange program."

Samsung encourages customers to visit their website to determine if their phone is among those recalled.

Customers can also get a refund for the phone. The company said customers who exchange their device for another Samsung product will also receive a $25 gift card.

GNA
WASHINGTON, ACCRA, Sept. 16 - (UPI/GNA) - House Speaker Paul Ryan on Thursday said Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump should release his tax returns, a bipartisan tradition in political campaigns over the last three-plus decades.

Trump has thus far declined to release his taxes, citing an ongoing multi-year audit by the IRS. Trump said his lawyers have advised him to wait until after the audit, which has been ongoing for years, is completed before making the documents public.

"I did release my returns," Ryan said of his 2012 candidacy as the GOP's vice presidential nominee. "I'll defer to Donald Trump as to when he thinks the appropriate time to release his returns. I know he is under audit, and he has an opinion on when to release those and I'll defer to him on that.

"I released mine. I think he should release his. I'll leave it to him when to do it," Ryan said.

There is no law requiring presidential candidates to release their tax returns, though every major party nominee has done so for at least the last 30 years. Trump's opponent, Hillary Clinton, has posted the past seven years of her taxes on her campaign website and her family's taxes have been made public for the past 30 years, including the eight years her husband Bill Clinton was president.

GNA
Largest indigenous bank GCB bank has dismissed reports that the banks board has been approving several huge loans without the requisite collateral needed.

Reports making the rounds in some section of the media have it that, the Board led by Daniel Owiredu together with two other officials from the bank, the Credit/ Risk Manager Sam Aquah and George Fuachie, Head of Corporate have been giving out 'uncollateralized' loans to cronies, thereby putting the bank's finances in awkward positions.

But a press statement from the bank copied to Citi Business News on the matter said the allegations were false and malicious and should be treated with contempt.

According to the bank it has in place stringent procedures that clients must go through, before they are granted loans.

it should be noted that GCB has the most stringent rules and procedures in the banking industry for the granting of the loans and under the leadership of its Board Chairman the bank has continued on its growth path and put in place robust risk management systems.



By: Vivian Kai Lokko/citibusinessnews.com/Ghana
United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) in collaboration with the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) would organize a five-day training workshop in Accra for Trade Facilitation stakeholders.

The workshop, sponsored by West Blue Consulting under the Ghana National Single Window (GNSW) Programme, would take place from Monday September 19-23, 2016.

The workshop aims to train participants on how to use the UN Trade Facilitation Implementation Guide for Trade Facilitation (TF) reform efforts and to stimulate the sharing of best practices and the discussion of opportunities for inter-agency cooperation in the TF. Areas covered in the Guide include Process simplification, Cross border management, Consultation and cooperation for TF, Single Window implementation, Documents simplification, etc.

The UN Trade Facilitation Implementation Guide is a web-based interactive tool to help countries better understand the key elements and instruments of trade facilitation. A set of case stories on how countries have succeeded in facilitating trade complements the Guide.

Trade facilitation has become a key policy issue for both governments and business as it cuts the costs of doing trade, reduces delays at the border, and makes public agencies dealing with trade more efficient. It is at the heart of the World Trade Organization (WTO) Doha Round of negotiations.

By the end of the course participants will have: Gained an enhanced understanding of TF and the approaches and methodologies that underpin TF efforts, including how TF is discussed at the WTO.

Participants also would have discussed and analyzed paths for dealing with key TF issues, including: How to rationalize trade documents and information requirements, how to establish a SW; How to reduce delays at the border.

Participants would also learn how the Guide works and how to design and conduct training with the Guide based on capacity building needs in own context. Also exchanged views and be expose to diverse experiences and best  practices and forged networks with other professionals.

The participants are mainly policy makers and implementers involved in reform programs and experts in charge of capacity building activities for TF. Typical participants are from National Trade and Transport Facilitation Bodies, Ministries of Trade, Customs, other inspection bodies, businesses and technical assistance agencies.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept.16

By Rufiz Hafizoglu - Trend:

Deputy co-chair of Turkish opposition Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) Alp Altinors has been detained, Aksam newspaper reported Sept.16.

Altinors has been detained on charges of conducting propaganda in favor of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) terrorist group.

Moreover, eight HDP members have been detained on similar charges.

The conflict between Turkey and the PKK, which demands the creation of an independent Kurdish state, has continued for over 33 years and has claimed more than 40,000 lives.



The UN and the European Union list the PKK as a terrorist organization.

---

Follow the author on Twitter:@rhafizoglu
Farmers at Assin South district of the Central region are appealing to government to step in to save their farms from destruction by stray elephants from the Kakum National Park.

The farmers explain that attempts to get the district assembly and the Wild life division in the area to help stop the rampant invasion and destruction of their farms by the elephants have proven futile leaving them perplexed in their farming activities.

According to the farmers, large acreage of their crop especially cocoa farms have been destroyed by the elephants with some farmers suffering injuries in their attempt to escape attacks by the elephants as they tried to drive away the elephants from destroying their farms.

The elephant invasion and subsequent destruction of their farms, according to the farmers , has rendered them poor as the destruction of their farms has left them with little to live on.

The farmers who are from communities such as Nsupanim , Kyekyewere and its environs are therefore appealing to government to roll out measures to stop the elephants from destroying their farms or risk their indifference towards the upcoming elections.

One of the opinion leaders in the community Kwabena Kumi told Starr News Kwaku Baah -Acheamfour that there is no point going to queue to vote if government cannot solve their basic problems.
Members of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan, established by the Human Rights Council in March this year, concluded its first mission to the east-central African country yesterday after having met with a wide range of actors.

During their one-week mission (8 to 15 September), the three Commission members travelled throughout the country holding exchanges with government officials, the judiciary, the legislative Assembly, the diplomatic corps, United Nations actors, civil society organizations and internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) Protection of Civilians sites (PoC).

Speaking to the press in Juba, Commission Chairperson Yasmin Sooka said: We travelled to Bentiu and made a stop in Malakal. The visit proved to be extremely useful as we were able to visit the Malakal UNMISS PoC site housing IDPs and obtained an extensive briefing on the human rights situation there.

While meeting with government officials, the Commissioners touched on critical issues of accountability, particularly in respect of previous and current investigations and inquiries that the government has either conducted, instituted or committed to. These issues included the establishment of the Hybrid Court for South Sudan, the Bill amending the Penal Code to incorporate international crimes and the establishment of the Commission for Truth, Reconciliation and Healing.

The Commission observed the deplorable conditions under which IDPs live. Unfortunately, it could not visit the PoC site in Juba for security reasons but held a meeting with the PoC leadership on the human rights situation and the violations and abuses reportedly committed in Juba.

We are deeply concerned at the slow progress on the implementation of the provisions of the Peace Agreement which is fundamental to ending the conflict, human rights violations and normalization of the lives of South Sudanese, Sooka added.

The Commission members also held two meetings with women in the POC sites where they were able to hear directly from women on the human rights situation and the human rights violations and abuses they had suffered, including gang rape by armed men in uniform.

Overall, we remain concerned by the diminishing space for journalists and civil society members who are subject to intimidation and harassment; by the lack of access for UNMISS and humanitarian actors to reach the most vulnerable; the escalation of sexual violence against women and girls, said Commission member Kenneth Scott.

Above all, we are concerned about the ongoing impunity and lack of accountability for serious crimes and human rights violations in South Sudan, without which lasting peace cannot be achieved, added Scott.

The Commission thanks the Government of South Sudan for its cooperation during its inaugural visit to the country. The three members are currently in Addis Ababa where they are holding additional meetings with high-level officials from the African Union, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development, the Joint Monitoring and Evaluation Commission, etc. and will later travel to Uganda to interact with South Sudanese refugees and for further meetings in connection with their mandate**.

The Commission plans to return to South Sudan later this year before reporting to the Human Rights Council in March 2017.
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Environment Minister Mahama Ayariga has vowed to put pressure on law enforcement agencies to clamp down on illegal mining (galamsey), which is responsible for causing an irreparable damage to the environment.

The Minister was confident that no matter how widespread the problem is, galamsey can be tackled through simple law enforcement.

Government was at the end of angry reactions on Joy FM Super Morning Show Friday after regional correspondents reported a brazen destruction of natural resources, especially water bodies.

In the Western region, Kwaku Owusu Peprah revealed his frustrations at what he has observed as governments weak-willed response to reports of the illegality.

I am getting tired of reporting about galamsey, he said and pointed to destruction on the Ankobra and Pra rivers in the full glare of the public.

Everywhere you go, there is galamsey, he said.

According to him, soldiers who were stationed in the gold-rich Wassa area were recalled to base by highly placed persons in the corridors of power.

The reporter recounted his tour to areas affected by galamsey with the then Environment Minister Oteng Adjei three years ago, which ended with Minister describing the menace as an organised crime.

He referred to comments by President John Mahama who told District Chief Executives that their performance targets included fighting the menace.

Three years after government set up an inter-ministerial taskforce to tackle the problem, Mr Peprah believes government has not demonstrated enough discipline to push through the fight.

The situation is no different in the Upper East Region where Joy Newss Albert Sore reported of an ensuing struggle in Nabdam between the locals and persons believed to be Chinese over a mining concession.

He said the foreigners are fighting off the locals for unauthorized mining activities within their concessions. In areas like Talensi, children skip school to join adults mine gold he said.

According to him, an NGO had to intervene by opting to pay school fees so children can focus on their education.

Callers into the show expressed frustration at what they believe is governments inability to deal with the menace with one of them close to tears.

I understand the anger people are expressing, Mahama Ayariga said and admitted that more needs to be done about the problem. He suggested that governments resort to using brute military force has not solved the problem.

When a problem is so widespread the way this one is, you have to find systematic approaches in dealing with it, he noted.

Mr Ayarigah explained licensing illegal miners to operate lawfully could help curb the destruction of natural resources.

The Minister noted that some leaders in communities that have discovered mineral deposits are resisting the Forestry Commission and Minerals Commission directive not to mine.

He noted that mining cannot be done in forest reserves without a license and cannot be done under any circumstance in water bodies.

But community leaders sometimes disregard this regulation claiming that once they have discovered minerals they must have the right to mine it.

It becomes a simple question of a crime being committed by sometimes the whole communityand it is a matter of law enforcement he stressed.

Everyone who is angry about the situation must help us to exert the pressures on law enforcement on the ground to disregard these authorities at the lower levels and simply enforce the law.

We have some case where the law enforcement officers go and they themselves become complicit. You send them to go and enforce the law and they go and the temptation of getting gold forces them to become complicit, the minister expressed frustration.

Story by Ghana|myjoyonline.com|Edwin Appiah|[email protected]
A total of 447 young men and women have successfully passed out under the Youth Employment Agency [YEA] programme as Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) officers to help the Agency manage the serious and complex environmental challenges confronting this country.

Speaking at the ceremony, the Acting Executive Director of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), John A. Pwamang, said, he is very impressed about the course structure and the relevant topics that were introduced during the training sessions to equip these personnel to perform their duties creditably.

According to him, environmental issues are emerging trends that occure as a result of the discriminatory acts of people in the communities thereby affecting lives and properties.

He noted that the Agency deemed it very important to equip these young men and women with the necessary skills, knowledge and techniques to act as watchdogs in the communities and around the country.

Mr. Pwamang indicated that personnel shall be responsible for the collection of data on projects that do not have the official EPA permit to operate.

He added that they shall be tasked with the responsibility of promoting community mobilization and create awareness on the need to protect the environment.

They will also help the communities to promote the Green Ghana campaign by planting more trees to conserve the environment and the land from degradation, he stated.

Mr. Pwamang urges the graduands to instill more discipline as they meet more challenging situations in the task ahead of them on the field and adopt measures and conducts that will promote the image of the service in the country.

The Commanding Officer of the National Police Training School, Assistant Commissioner of Police ACP/Ms. Deborah Addison-Campbell, indicated that positive youth leadership development provides youths with the ability to guide or direct others on a course of action, influencing behaviours of others and serve as role models.

She added that bearing in mind the nature of the impending tasks ahead of the recruits, in collaboration with the facilitators from the EPA they have been sensitized on Ethics and Fundamental Human Rights, Rights of detained persons, Overview of Criminal Investigation, Criminal Law and Criminal Procedures, Arrest, Officer Survival Skill, Turnout, Communication Skills and Client Care and Local Knowledge.

Ms. Addison-Campbell noted that the graduands have also benefited from drill and physical training for fitness, mental alertness and discipline.

She added that the graduands have been given the basic tools and the skills needed to work effectively and efficiently.

According to her, it is essential that in the near future another opportunity is created for the graduants to come back for a top up programme as there are still areas in which they need to enhance their skills and training.

She appeals to corporate organizations to support them with the means in improving the ageing infrastructure of the National Police Training School which is 86 years old.

The Chief Executive Officer of Youth Enterprise Agency (YEA), Mr. Ebo Beecham urges the youth to take advantage of this new opportunity which has been redesigned by government to create job for the people.

He added that passing out of these recruits form part of the programme under the new Youth Employment Agency [YEA] which was established by Act 2015 [Act 887].

The YEA which runs the programme yearly has a legal backing with sources of funding to strongly sustain the project under any government regime.

The 447 graduants which were drawn from the Greater Accra and Central Region are made up of 331 males and 115 females.
Deputy Executive Director of Africa Centre for Energy Policy (ACEP), Benjamin Boakye, says authorities in charge of checking fuel exported to Ghana must regulate the sector to save lives.

This follows a report Thursday which said the fuel imported into Ghana mainly diesel is seriously toxic sometimes to the extent it is over 2000 times worse than the standards accepted in the EU and the USA.

The toxic fuel has been linked with several respiratory illnesses and car malfunctioning.

Speaking on Joy FM's Newsnite programme on Thursday, he said If we want to save the environment and the danger this poses to our health then as quickly as possible we need to all jump in and make sure that there is a regulation."

A recent World Bank report says air pollution kills about 17,500 people annually in Ghana, Mr Boakye said is alarming enough to call for concerns.

We cant wait for that to exacerbate and the trend clearly shows that in the next 10-15 years the traffic situation in our cities is going to quadruple and that would have a serious implication on our health if we continue to use the kind of products that come on our market, he said.

He added that Ghana is getting close to what Beijing has in terms of air pollution where people have to wear a mask to breath clean air.

He says t he Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Chamber of Bulk Oil Distributors, Senyo Hosi's argument that Ghana is providing 500-ppm fuel as a matter of cost is contestable because Kenya is currently doing 50-ppm and they are selling it cheaper than Ghana is.

We should be able to dictate the price on the market and look at what the trend is and be able to get a fair price. It is just that some people are making an exorbitant profit out of the poor standards we have, he said.

He conceded the burden is on Ghanaian authorities to regulate the sector and make sure that the systems work.

According to him, the law on exporting fuel allows the foreign companies to supply Ghana with dirty fuel as they tailor their products to suit every market.

If your regulation allows certain limits, they [suppliers] blend to suit that quality and sell on that market for you. So the results of the research show they supply something close to the 3000-ppm to Ghana and other African countries, he noted.

Mali, for instance, he explained, are still using the 1990 regulations which allow the supply of 10,000-pmm fuel although they settle for 5000-ppm which is the worst kind of fuel anyone can have.

He juxtaposed that with the decision of Kenyans who told their supplies they want 50-ppm and were accordingly supplied that.

For his part, the CEO of Ghana Chamber of Petroleum Consumers, Duncan Amoah was bemused with the argument put across by Mr Senyo Hosi who said Ghanaians must be able to get premium fuel.

Unfortunately, the black will continue to lag behind in terms of human development index as far as the EU and the USA are concerned, he lamented.

He said the blame couldnt be put on the suppliers in Europe and elsewhere because the challenge is not with Vitol, Glycol, and the others but what Ghana goes asking for.

We [Ghana Chamber of Petroleum Consumers] would have taken these suppliers on legally to an extent that they were supplying us with a cheap and inferior product than we bargained for, he said, but for the fact that the regulators are comfortable and not working in the interest of Ghanaians.

Comparing the price per litre in Canada which currently is $0.75 per litre and the USA selling at US$0.62, Mr Duncan said it is unacceptable for Ghana to buy at a flat rate and still have over 3000-ppm fuel.

He called on all Ghanaians to act although he said they will continue to engage and push because they can't look on as people are dying.

Story by Ghana | Myjoyonline.com | Abubakar Ibrahim | Email: [email protected]
The Advertising Association of Ghana (AAG) has retained the Chief Executive of Innova DDB Ghana, Joel Edmund Nettey as President of the Association for the next two years.

Also retained are Mansa Amowuah and Mr Martin Osei as Vice President and Treasurer respectively.

Ten other individuals and companies were also elected as members into the Executive Council.

In his acceptance speech, Mr. Nettey pledged the commitment of the newly-elected leaders to ensure that the needs of all interest groups in the Association, including media agencies, outdoor companies, production houses, creative agencies and individual members, are met.

He thanked members for the confidence reposed in them to steer the affairs of the company.

Mr Nettey urged corporate and individual members of the AAG, to share with the executive and council, concerns, observations, advice and especially ideas, on how to move the industry forward.

We will call on and count on each of you  morning, noon and night. There are various committees to serve on, and it is time to see a good blend of experience and new ideas, he said.

Mr Nettey also urged members to endeavours to be part of the International Advertising Association Africa to broaden their scope and learn from others across Africa.

Story by Ghana/Myjoyonline.com
US Special Operation forces are accompanying Turkish troops and Free Syrian Army fighters along the Turkish border near Jarabulus and Cobanbey in Syria, the Pentagon told Anadolu Agency on Friday.

The move came at the request of the government of Turkey, according to agency spokesman Capt. Jeff Davis.

U.S. personnel operating with Turkish forces and Syrian opposition forces will provide the same train, advise and assist support they have been providing to other local partners in Syria fighting ISIL, Davis wrote in an email using an alternative name for Daesh.

The new development comes as the Free Syrian Army, backed by Turkish artillery earlier in the day, began to move toward Daeshs stronghold al-Bab, nearly 30 kilometers (20 miles) south of Cobanbey as a part of Operation Euphrates Shield.

Operation Euphrates Shield was launched Aug. 24 by Turkey and aims at improving security, supporting coalition forces and eliminating the terror threat along Turkeys border using Free Syrian Army fighters backed by Turkish armor, artillery and jets.

The Syrian town of Cobanbey and Jarabulus city were recently cleared of Daesh terrorists as part of the operation.

Davis said the U.S. would continue to support the counter-Daesh fight in northern Syria because access to the Syria Turkey border region is strategically important to ISIL's operations in Syria and Iraq as well as the group's attempts to export terror to Turkey, the wider region, Europe and the United States.

Denying ISIL access to this critical border cuts off critical supply routes in and out of Iraq and Syria and further isolates ISIL's so-called 'capital' in Raqqa, he added.
Executive Chairman of the Dubai Multi Commodities Centre (DMCC), Ahmed Bin Sulayem, and other stakeholders, who participated in DMCC's second Africa Dubai Precious Metals Forum ('ADPMF') in Accra, have agreed among a number of things that, the global air transport industry enacts a plan to ban the hand-held personal carriage of gold in favour of adopting a cargo only policy, which requires proof of responsible sourcing.

Over 130 industry delegates attended the forum at the Kempinski Hotel on September 7th, to attend the forum.

Government ministers, regulators, mining industry professionals, security experts, airlines, logistics facilitators and representatives from the OECD, were drawn to the two-day event, which took its theme from an integrated 'Special Workshop' entitled: 'Legitimizing the Global Gold Trade.'

During his welcome speech, Ahmed Bin Sulayem, DMCC Executive Chairman, said: Through the Africa Dubai Precious Metals Forum, we seek to strengthen relationships between all market participants, along the Africa-Dubai trade corridor, while creating a theatre of dialogue to better understand the challenges facing Africa's gold mining and exporting countries, including how the gold trade is conducted.

The forum's theme was developed to discuss ways to combat what has become an unacceptable level of 'unofficial gold trading, according to participants, which is not only costing governments' billions of dollars a year in lost revenues, but is impacting severely on the lives of thousands of miners and the supply chain operators through questionable employment, exploitation and transportation practices.

The sessions, presentations and panel discussions of the two-day forum, covering topics ranging from government policy to employment practices and trading mechanisms, resulted in a clear consensus that whilst various models of government legislation go some way to addressing the complex issues, its industries within the supply chain, both upstream and downstream, could and should do more to help rectify the global problem of questionable practices in the mining, trading and transportation of gold.

Forum participants also concluded that, in the absence of more robust legislation, airlines and their associations should be asked to do more, as arguably they are the most important component of the supply chain, to help curb the global transportation of gold.

By banning the shipment of gold via hand-held carry-on baggage, airlines and associations would be protecting passengers on-board from potential security issues, while playing a positive and significant role in reducing the incidence of illicit gold distribution.

Conference delegates agreed that responsible sourcing is a key factor in determining which path the gold might take to get to its eventual market. Government participants were open about the ineffectiveness of some legislation, or an inability to properly enforce it.

DMCC Executive Chairman,Bin Sulayem, with Ghanas Minister for Mines and Natural Resources, Nii Osah-Mills.

The Minister of Lands and Natural Resources for Ghana, H.E. Hon, Nii Osah Mills, in a meeting with Mr. Bin Sulayem, explained that Ghana had developed a robust, two-tiered mining and export legislative framework, using a secure and traceable bank payment system which, for the most part was successful with licensed medium and large mining and export companies.

The Minister pointed out that Ghana does not have an 'Artisanal Mining Sector'  but his country thus recognizes that unlicensed operators exist and pose a threat to legitimate mining and trade practices.

Delegates and experts in the 'Legitimizing Global Gold Trade' workshop remarked that, most gold mining and trading countries in Africa suffer from the questionable practices of small mining concerns, many of which trade and export gold as a 'personal item' thus avoiding taxes and fees in the country of origin.

In an earlier meeting with Mr. Bin Sulayem, the Minister of Mines for Burkina Faso, HE Hon. Alpha Omar Dissa, confirmed that his country was losing about eighty percent (80%) of their mined gold, through illicit means.

Alpha Omar Dissa, Burkina Fasos Mines Minister with DMCCs Executive Chairman, Ahmed Bin Sulayem.

We appreciate your visit to discuss this subject because we need your support to improve our legislation and stop the bad practice said the minister.

In the end, delegates agreed that a number of points could be taken forward  and that an immediate call to action should be made, to the global air transport industry, and urge IATA and ICAO, to enact a plan to ban the hand-held personal carriage of gold in favour of adopting a cargo only policy, which requires proof of responsible sourcing.

As a result, Mr. Bin Sulayem said: It is my hope that affirmative action will ensure a positive outcome to this debate. The next step is to continue our firm working relationship with OECD and pursue dialogue with IATA and ICAO.



By: citifmonline.com/Ghana
Some deposit taking institutions have initiated partnerships with telecommunication companies to provide mobile money services following the increased demand for the service in the country.

One of such is the Pan African savings and loans. According to the company, this innovation will allow customers gain quick access to their monies via their mobile phones.

Customers will also be able to access short term loans, make deposits as well as purchase airtime via the platform.

Pan African savings and loans which has dubbed its new mobile banking product 'QUICK says the product allows customers make use of their mobile phones conveniently after dialing*777#.

The Group Executive for consumer banking at Ecobank which is the mother company for Pan African savings and loans Patrick Akinwuntan tells Citi Business News the new product also places the company ahead of their competitors.

We love competition but we are known to be very innovative and we are pioneers. Today we are pioneering micro finance services on the mobile phone so we love competition, it makes it exciting and gives choice to the customer. This service enables us to widen the gap between us and our competitors. But we welcome competition. It is healthy for the market.

We are doing it with all the major Telcos, thus MTN, Vodafon, Airtel and Tigo. It is open and available to all Ghanaians.

Meanwhile Head of Payment Systems Department at the Bank of Ghana (BOG), Dr Settor Amediku, commended the management of the Pan-African Savings and Loans for their innovation.

Dr Amediku emphasized the BOG set up the Payment System Department, and introduced the Electronic Money Issuers Guidelines with the sole purpose of fostering financial inclusion through the use of digital technology in the form of mobile phones and other electronic platforms for cashless transactions.

The total float balances from the various electronic money platforms held by banks as at July 2016 was GHC703.64 million compared to GHC363.65 million in July 2015.

Mobile money agents as by the end of July 2016 were 113,728 as against July 2015 which saw a record of 56,922.

Dr Amediku called on other financial institutions to consider providing innovative financial services to help drive the cashless society agenda.



By: Jessica Ayorkor Aryee/citibusinessnews.com/Ghana
Mogadishu (AFP) - Heavily-armed Shabaab fighters seized control of a Somali town near the Kenyan border on Friday after an attack on an army base that left several soldiers dead, local officials and residents said.

At least a dozen people, most of them soldiers, were killed in the fighting that began in late afternoon and lasted more than an hour in the town of Elwak.

Defeated Somali troops retreated towards the border some three kilometres away, leaving the jihadists in control, the sources said.

'There was heavy fighting in Elwak this afternoon. Shabaab militants attacked the military base of the Somali national army in the suburbs," said Somali military official Abdukadir Elmi. "We don't have the details yet but there were casualties'.

Witnesses said fighting lasted into the evening when the militants took full control of the town.

'Shabaab fighters took control of Elwak town after storming the military base," said resident Omar Adan.

"More than 10 soldiers were killed in the fighting including the commander of the camp'.

He said Shabaab fighters entered the town disguised as Kenyan soldiers and riding in military vehicles they had captured from the Kenyan army.

A statement on the jihadists' Andalus radio telegram account claimed control of the town and said dozens of troops had been killed.

The Shabaab, which quit the capital five years ago, continue to launch attacks against government, military, civilian and foreign targets in its fight to overthrow the internationally-backed government.

The group is expected to try and violently disrupt elections due to be held in September and October.
By Prosper K. Kuorsoh, GNA

Jirapa (U/W), Sept. 16, GNA - Pupils in 18 basic schools in the Jirapa District of the Upper West Region have received new uniforms and refreshments as they arrived at school on their first day in school.

In all, 16,753 new school uniforms which were provided by the government have been distributed to pupils in the region out of which the Jirapa District received 1,600 for distribution.

Dr Musheibu Mohammed Alfa, Deputy Upper West Regional Minister who was accompanied by Mr Cletus Seidu Dapilah, Jirapa District Chief Executive (DCE), and Madam Patricia Ayiko, the Regional Director of Education as well as Madam Rachael Dery, Jirapa District Director of Education distributed the uniforms to the pupils.

At the Saint Anthony Model Primary School, the Deputy Regional Minister made presentation to 31 new comers comprising 18 boys and 13 girls and urged them to take their studies seriously.

Dr Alfa also urged the continuing students especially the girls to guard themselves against teenage pregnancies adding that a better future awaits them after a successful completion of their studies.

Madam Ayiko thanked the government for the gesture saying it would help motivate the children to continue coming to school.

Madam Dery said all the first comers came without uniforms and noted that the uniform and the refreshment would boost their moral to stay in school.

GNA
16.09.2016 LISTEN

By Afedzi Abdullah, GNA

Cape Coast, Sept. 16, GNA - Dr Ekwow Spio - Garbrah, the Minister of Trade and Industry, has admonished Old Student Associations to channel their support towards improving the content and quality of the education at their respective schools.

'Creating funds to support educational infrastructure is good but one of the most important aspects of education that needs much attention is the body of knowledge,' he said.

Dr Spio-Garbrah gave the advice at a youth colloquium in Cape Coast on the theme: 'Falling Standards of Education in the Cape Coast Metropolis, the stakeholders' responsibility'.

The colloquium, which was organised by the Cape Coast Youth Association, in collaboration with the National Youth Authority, was aimed at bringing stakeholders together to deliberate and find solutions to the falling standards of education in the Cape Coast Metropolis.

He acknowledged the immense contributions of old students in the area of infrastructural development in their respective schools, but said the focus should be shifted towards deepening the curriculum content.

He said it was about time Ghana made a paradigm shift from the content of the educational system to focus on production and manufacturing.

Dr Spio-Garbrah is an old student of the Achimota School and a Former Minister of Education.

Professor Nyarko Simpson, a Senior lecturer at the University of Cape Coast (UCC), said the provision of a sustainable education could only be achieved if stakeholders played their respective roles effectively and efficiently.

He urged parents to endeavor to sustain their children in school with their little incomes.

He entreated parents to educate their wards with purpose and provide all their necessary needs to enable them to stay in school.

Prof Simpson urged the Ghana Education Service (GES) to intensify its supervision in public schools, particularly, at the basic school level to improve the academic performance of pupils.

He advised parents not to shirk their responsibilities towards their children, adding that the process of teaching and learning should be a shared responsibility for the desired results to be achieved.

Mr Robert Awonor Williams, the Head of Human Resource Development at the Cape Coast Metropolitan Directorate of GES, expressed worry that some parents in the Metropolis found private basic schools more enticing than public schools.

As a result, he said, enrolment figures at the kindergarten level had reduced and warned of a drastic reduction in enrolment at that level in future if measures were not put in place to address the underlining factors.

He urged parents and other stakeholders to take profound interest in the education of children in both private and public schools to bring back the glory of the Metropolis as the citadel of education in Ghana.

Mr Williams said the Metropolis had since 2012 consistently recorded poor results at Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) level but was hopeful this year would see a significant improvement in performance.

GNA
By A.B. Kafui Kanyi

Ho, Sept. 16, GNA - Togbe Afede, the Agbogbomefia of Asogli and President of the Volta Region House of Chiefs, has presented 15 multi-purpose printers to the traditional councils in the Region.

The presentation is in fulfillment of a promise by Togbe Afede to equip the secretariats of the Councils.

Togbe Afede earlier gave desktop computers to the councils and promised to provide them with furniture before the end of the year.

He also gave a heavy duty copier to the Regional House of Chiefs.

Nana Soglo Alloh IV, the Paramount Chief of Likpe, received the items on behalf of the House, and commended Togbe Afede for supporting them.

GNA
16.09.2016 LISTEN

Kumasi, Sept 16, GNA - A Nigerian is being held by the police in connection with the diversion of fertilizers meant for distribution to cocoa farmers.

Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Yussif Tanko of the Ashanti Regional Police Public Affairs Unit, gave the name of the suspect as Yekini Adejuma.

He told journalists that the fertilizers had been concealed on a Kumasi-Aflao bound VIP bus and this was intercepted by the police during routine check.

He called for the public to remain vigilant and be bold to report anybody found engaged in the sale of agricultural inputs for farmers.

Separately, the police have arrested and detained Abubakar Sadiq, 19, over the murder of another teenager.

He is reported to have stabbed one Mustapha Osman to death at Aboabo in Kumasi during a quarrel.

ASP Tanko said they were also keeping four other men for offences including robbery and impersonation.

They were identified as Augustine Kyeremeh, Simon Dwumfuor, Stephen Akple and Kwame Richard.

The suspects would be arraigned as soon as the police were done with their investigations, he added.

GNA
16.09.2016 LISTEN

Accra, Sept. 16, GNA - After a keenly contested competition, Team Tripod, a group of three final year university students, was crowned the winner of the 2016 Unilever Ghana Ideatrophy Competition, in Accra.

It beat the three other groups that were in the finals.

Each member of the team was presented with an iphone 6s, while the team would also represent Ghana at the Africa rounds in South Africa, with Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa being their contestants.

The continental winners would then move to the next level at the global Future Leaders' League Competition in London, in 2017.

This is the fourth year running that Unilever Ghana has held the competition and rewarded winners as a confirmation of the company's commitment to improve youth employability in the country.

The Challenge is Unilever's development initiative designed to create an out-of-class learning experience that focuses on the development of personal and entrepreneurial competencies among undergraduates, using real brands.

Speaking at the national finals, Mr Luc Olivier Marquet, the Vice President of Unilever West Africa, said over the four months, the teams had been given professional guidance and training on business plans development, brand management and consumer understanding, among others.

'Indeed, the Unilever IdeaTrophy Challenge is a confirmation of Unilever's three-pronged commitment to the UN Global goals for development, Ghana's national development and the community as we improve the quality of future graduates,' he said.

The Human Resources Director at Unilever, Michael Otchere Duah, said the company would continue to organise innovative and educative programmes to develop the nation's future leaders, and ultimately contribute to national development.

'As profitable growth can only be achieved with the right people working in an organisation, so does the nation need well educated people to aid development and ensure national growth,' he said.

'This is the reason we are continuously committed to developing talents.'

The IdeaTrophy business challenge was created by Unilever Turkey in 2001 to create a challenging and creative experience for university students as well as to introduce young people to the realities of the business world.

Every year, a leading Unilever brand is selected as the sole focus of the competition where the students have to design a business strategy for the brand in question.

The teams were tasked with the responsibility of developing creative ideas to market Unilever's leading brand, Close Up. GNA
Sunyani (B/A), Sept.16, GNA - The Electoral Commission would refund the nomination fees of presidential candidates who obtain at least 25 per cent of the total valid votes cast, whilst parliamentary candidates must reap at least 12.5 per cent to qualify.

Mr. Yaw Poku, the Sunyani Municipal Electoral Officer, said at a meeting organised by the Municipal Directorate of the National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) on Tuesday, in Sunyani.

The programme on the theme: 'Empowering the Youth to Stand up for Ghana for a Peaceful Election 2016', was attended by 40 youth activists from five political parties in the Sunyani East and Berekum East Constituencies.

They represented the National Democratic Congress (NDC), New Patriotic Party (NPP), People's National Congress (PNC), Progressive People's Party (PPP), and Convention People's Party (CPP).

Mr Poku explained that the nomination fees of the candidates who would not meet the Commission's threshold mark would be paid into the Consolidated Fund.

Mr. Poku debunked the notion held by some people that the Commission had increased nomination fees from GHC10,000.00 for the presidential and GHC1000.00 for the parliamentary in the previous general election to GHC50,000.00 and GHC10,000,00 respectively, in the Election 2016 just to help the government to gain advantage over the opposition.

The decision, he said, was rather was to ensure that more qualified persons offered themselves to give credibility to the electoral process for national interest, he explained.

Mr. Poku who addressed the workshop on the topic: 'The Electoral Process (Electoral offences and sanctions and Overview of Public Elections Regulations, CI 94)' briefly explained some of the functions of the Commission's Chairman pertaining to the process.

He mentioned double registration, preventing a qualified voter from registering or voting, a returning officer failing to sign 'pink' sheet, and selling alcoholic drinks within 500 metres radius of a polling station as some of the offences.

Others are destroying or forging a nomination paper, possession of another voter's voting card or copying particulars on another voter's card.

Mr. Poku expressed worry that the leaders of some political parties appeared to lack trust in the EC, saying that 'globally it is only Ghana that the constitutional provision permits the EC to print ballot papers with the presence of political party representatives and also seal ballot boxes in their presence'.

He said the Commission started the voter transfer exercise on September 9 and would end it on October 7, 2016.

He, however, cautioned that the Commission would not entertain intra-constituency mass transfer of voters, saying that was an administrative decision by the EC to check manipulation of the process to favour a particular political party.

GNA
16.09.2016 LISTEN

By Iddi Yire, GNA

Accra, Sept. 16, GNA - Nana Oye Lithur, Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection, has urged women not to allow themselves to be intimidated by anyone in their quest to participate in a governance role.

She urged women to make themselves visible and be heard, and that they should not let anyone intimidate them in whatever role they want to play as they seek to contribute positively to the growth and development of the country.

She urged women to join voices with women groups seeking for the general well-being of all Ghanaian women.

Nana Oye Lithur said this in Accra during a day's summit on "What Young Women and Girls Want in 2016 Ghana Elections".

The event was organised by Moremi Initiative for Women's Leadership in Africa in partnership with United Nations Women Central and West Africa and with support from the United States Embassy in Accra.

The summit is a non-partisan dialogue to articulate and ensure that the interests, voices and desires of young Ghanaian women and girls matter in the 2016 electioneering period.

Nana Oye Lithur urged women to start building their capacities to be able to stand for or to be appointed to higher positions in government and business.

"Don't be apathetic at all about the upcoming elections. Participate by voting the right government that has proven to have your interest at heart into government," she said.

"Preach and lead the peace process, because experience has proven that the most affected people in times of war and conflict are women and children," she said.

She said: "I want peace before, during and after the 2016 general election. No matter my political or partisan interest, I want to be in a country where my children can go to school peacefully and come home in one piece.

"I want to be able to leave home and know that there is no one threatening my life and that of my loved ones."

Nana Oye Lithur also urged women to take advantage of opportunities of platforms created to negotiate for more spaces for women in decision-making roles in all levels of leadership.

The Gender Minister announced that the Affirmative Action (AA) Bill had been approved by cabinet, and that she was confident that it would be passed by Parliament by the end of the year.

She said the purpose of the AA Bill is to promote the full and active participation of women in public life by providing a more equitable system of representation in electoral politics and government structures.

Mr Daniel Fennel, the Public Affairs Consular of the US Embassy in Accra, said the US Government is committed to ensuring that Ghana witnesses another peaceful, free, fair and transparent general election on December 7.

He said the US had interest in seeing to it that young people rise to leadership position in Africa.

He said President Barack Obama's Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI) is a signature effort to invest in the next generation of African leaders.

Mr Mawuli Dake, the Co-Founder, Moremi, said young women constitute one of the most powerful demographics in Ghana today- in numbers and in collective potential.

He said the choices this generation of young women make would not only shape their lives, but that of a whole new generation of boys and girls in Ghana.

He said the 2016 general election is a critical opportunity for girls and young women to contribute to the agenda setting and public policy process in Ghana.

The mission of Moremi Initiative is to engage, inspire and equip young women and girls to become the next generation of leading politicians, activists, social entrepreneurs and change agents.

Moremi is based in the US and Ghana and operating throughout Africa.

GNA
China seeks to produce 50 rockets and 140 satellites by the end of 2020. (Photo : Getty Images)

China's latest generation of homegrown quick response rockets is scheduled to enter commercial use next year, a scientist with a state-owned aerospace firm disclosed on Sunday.



The first launch of the Kuaizhou-11, developed by the Fourth Academy of China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp. (CASIC), is planned for 2017, Zhang Di, head of the company's space projects department, said in an interview with the Global Times newspaper.



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The Kuaizhou series of rockets were first developed in 2013 by China Sanjiang Space Group (CSSG), which is located in the city of Wuhan in central China's Hubei province, according to an earlier report from the state-owned Xinhua News Agency.



CASIC, which specializes in commercial rocket development and launch operations, was registered and established in February in to promote the commercial use of the Kuaizhou rockets. Kuaizhou-1 and Kuaizhou-2, which were developed in 2013 and 2014 respectively, have been signed to the newly established company with plans to develop more than 10 units of rockets designed to transport low-orbit small satellites in the future.



China aims to launch Jilin-1, the country's first domestically developed remote sensing satellite for commercial use, via a Kuaizhou-1 rocket by the end of 2016, according to local media reports.



The announcement comes on the heels of the recent approval of the Wuhan National Aerospace Industrial Base from the Development and Research Committee. The new base is expected to manufacture 50 rockets and 140 satellites by the end of 2020.



China's aerospace sector is facing stiff competition from India and other Asian countries, which are lately spending billions of dollars on their respective space exploration projects. In June, the Indian Space Research Organisation that it had successfully launched 20 satellites in a single rocket. It was the biggest single launch by India, trailing Russia's 33 satellites in 2014 and NASA's 29 the year before.


By Edna A. Quansah, / Kwamina Tandoh GNA

Accra, Sept. 16, GNA - Mr Anis Haffar, Board Chairman of the Tema International School, has appealed to teachers to adopt the 'Problem Posing Approach', a more interactive method of teaching, to enable students take active parts in teaching and learning.

He said the method was proposed by Mr Paulo Freire, a Brazilian educationist, in his book titled 'Pedagogy of the Oppressed in Modern Education'.

Mr Haffar said this at the maiden edition of the Mfantsipim Old Boys Association (MOBA) annual engagement series on the topic: 'Advancing Ghana's Progress Through Effective Professionalism Thinking and Looking Ahead- Dwen Hwe Kan'', in Accra.

He urged teachers not to consider themselves as the repository of knowledge and to allow students to contribute to teaching and to study to gain the expected results.

The MOBA Annual Engagement Series forms part of activities earmarked to mark Mfantispim's 140th Anniversary and also contribute to the public discourse on issues of national interest.

The MOBA Annual Engagement Series addressed saw resourced persons addressing issues concerning Education, Industry, Infrastructure and Finance in the country.

Mr Haffar said by adopting the 'Problem Solving Approach'' students tended to be innovative, skilful and knowledgeable problem solvers in the society.

He said students must move away from the rote learning 'chew, pour, pass and forget' syndrome to the application of scientific and mathematical principles to solve societal challenges.

Mr Haffar said rote learning is the bane of innovative, critical thinking and the application of scientific and technological principles to solve problems.

He called for an educational restructure where students would be oriented to contribute to national development by solving societal problems and create a jobs for themselves.

Mr Kweku Awotwi, the Chairman of Stanbic Bank- Ghana, said the country need a strong government to help improve industries to create wealth with the needed experience and exposure.

Professor Bernard Kofi Baiden, Dean of KNUST School of Business, called for the need to have a national policy and a framework on funding.

He said 'we lack concentration on Agriculture industry. Agriculture is the bedrock of our economy. If we don't support the Agric sector, we will always import. We have what it takes, but we are not financing that sector.'

GNA
Rather than accusing each other of stealing ideas in manifestos, IMANI, one of the leading think tanks in Ghana is challenging political parties to make informed promises and policies.

Isidore Kpotufe, Project Lead, at IMANI believes the parties lack capacity to make informed promises that can stand the test of global scrutiny.

Speaking on Joy FM's Ghana Connect program Friday, on the ongoing manifesto war between the two leading political parties, the New Patriotic Party, National Democratic Congress, Kpotufe stated that it is not enough for the presidential candidates to tell the electorate their vision, "they must demonstrate how these visions will be executed."

According to Kpotufe some of the parties could not even tell the number of promises contained in their manifestos, something he found strange.

His comments come at a time when the parties are at each other's throats accusing each other of plagiarizing ideas in the manifesto

The New Patriotic Party was the first to throw the salvo at the NDC shortly after the president presented his manifesto highlight.

Director of Communications of the party Nana Akomea said majority of the president's highlights were stolen ideas that the NPP leader had been trumpeting on his campaign tour.

The president hit back at the NPP wondering how a party yet to make its manifesto public will accuse another party of stealing the content of a yet to be launched manifesto.

He said the NPP has more time to plagiarize the content of the NDC manifesto.

With the ensuing drama, questions have been asked whether the manifesto means anything at all, first to the electorates and then to political parties themselves.

On Ghana Connect the panelists largely agreed that manifestos are important in Ghana's politics as they are in other countries.

A representative of the governing National Democratic Congress Israel Vernunye said a manifesto is a "guiding principle" a "vehicle" through which a party will implement its policies.

He said the NDC is focused on its mandate, which will form the basis on which it will be retained in power.

He mocked at the NPP's one constituency, one million dollars promise, describing it as a "small vision" that will not take Ghana anywhere.

Abu Jinapor, aide to the New Patriotic Party flagbearer said his boss, Nana Akufo-Addo does not only have the big vision but has the credibility to seal that vision and the competence to execute it.

He said the NPP will adopt the bottom up approach, a policy that worked in Japan and other "latter day developed countries" to ensure that prosperity trickles to every Ghanaian in every corner of the country.

Story by Ghana|Myjoyonline.com|Nathan Gadugah
business 800 acres of land not to go to demerged entity: Orient Paper Orient Paper is going to undertake a rights issue worth Rs 50 crore, says company Managing Director ML Pachisia. It also plans to demerge its electrical consumer business into a separate entity.
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business Prefer India over China on a long-term basis: Manulife AMC According to Geoff Lewis of Manulife Asset Management, risk-reward ratio is in favour of emerging markets (EMs) against developed markets. Among the developing nations, he prefers manufacturing based markets over commodity producers of Latin America and US equities over European, in the developed markets, he added.
Chinese tech firm introduces first full screen smartphone with VR and 3D technology. (Photo : Getty Images)

Chinese tech firm SuperD Technology unveiled the first ever full display handset that integrates 2D, 3D, and virtual reality in a single device dubbed as SuperD D1.



The new device which was introduced during a conference hosted by SuperD Technology in Beijing boasts the never-before-seen swift switching between 2D, 3D, and VR modes.



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Citing the Shenzhen-based company, China Daily explained that the innovation was made possible by a SuperD VR motion-sensing vision chip which was added to the configured GPU of a traditional smartphone.



Because of this, the rendering speed of the device in switching between different visual modes was enhanced, reduced image latency and creation of corresponding body sensation. This allows the device to establish clear and precise images.



The device is available for purchase starting September 12 in JD.com as well as the company's official website, SuperD.cn .



SuperD's chief executive officer Michael Hsu also revealed the company's goal to boost China's VR market.



"We've been speeding up interactive content building, and by introducing the SuperD VR content and Meidou live TV platform, we're able to provide huge storage of 3D and VR resources, including a massive number of 3D movies, hundreds of 3D/VR games, thousands of VR videos and numerous 3D/VR applications," Hsu explained.



An official press release from SuperD published in Market Wired revealed some of the company's other ventures including the SuperD VR ONE, a micro display digital light mapping VR helmet.



This product showcases SuperD's "unique approach to the application of optics" which features "unparalleled visual effect within a substantially lighter and thinner device."



Aside from that, SuperD VR ONE is equipped with an ultra HD LCD screen which has a single eye PPI over 600.



During the conference that introduces these technologies, Olympic Men's Dual badminton champions Fu Haifeng and Zhang Nan also had the privilege of introducing the SuperD technologies.



"Today I have the honor of seeing the SuperD full display mobile phone and it is amazing! It is an incredible amount of fun! I never knew cell phones could be used in this way!" Fu said of the SuperD products.


Im keeping on with the animal theme in Money Morning this week. It comes as I finalise a special report Ive put together which Ill release tomorrow.

Ill introduce you to another special kind of creature. One that can do extraordinary things. This little guy, who youll meet tomorrow, has many of the same abilities that I look for in small-cap stocks. When these stocks perform like this super-creature, they can also do extraordinary things  and hopefully provide multi-bagger returns to investors.

But youll find out much more tomorrow.

Today Im exploring the world of sharks.

Wobbegongs

I was talking to a friend who recently bought a house. It was his first time, so he was kind of new to it all. He couldnt believe how the utterly useless the agents were in the process.

He had seen a place early on. He had a look at it and left. Three days passed before the agent called to ask what he thought. He didnt end up liking it. So the agent said, fair enough and promptly hung up.

He found another place he wanted to see with the same agent. He called to arrange a viewing. The agent for the property was busy. They would call him back. Three days later he gets a call back.

In the meantime hed seen another property, which he bought. Imagine the seller of the second house if they ever found out how lazy their agent was?

I call agents like this Wobbegongs.

Wobbegongs are bottom-dwelling sharks. They spend almost all their time just relaxing on the sea floor, doing nothing. The way they hunt and eat is to simply catch smaller fish that just happen to swim too close. They dont actively do anything.

Lazy real estate agents doing nothing wont kill you. But they might slow you down so much that its almost like a slow death. They care about nothing, not buyers or sellers  theyre the worst kind of shark.

Makos

On the other hand I was talking to another friends Dad at a BBQ recently. We got chatting about property purchases in Spain. As youd expect, Spanish property is a bargain at the moment. It has been for about eight years.

He was looking at getting a holiday house over there. Why not I say? Cheap property, good weather, great food and drink.

Anyway he went over to an area called Javea. He was there for a week-long trip to go house hunting. Hed arranged to meet with an agent that specialises in Spanish property for British. He arrived at their office, a beautiful Spanish Villa. They gave him the big spiel about being trustworthy, reputable and looking after their clients.

Red flags galore if you ask me. Anyone that has to preface their corporate spiel with we are trustworthy usually isnt. This is even more relevant when you remember that agents work both sides of the transaction.

The agents drove him around for the day, showed him five properties based on his must haves. The explained some of the prices, 190,000, 240,000, 320,000  the buyers max budget was 350,000.

On every property he asked if the price was negotiable. Every time the agent said not really, maybe 5% if they were lucky, as the prices had already been reduced.

The next day he was walking along the Arenal beach in Javea. He stuck his head in the window of a couple of real estate agents along the way. He noticed two properties that hed seen the day before.

Except these two properties were listed in the window at 210,000 and 280,000. That cant be right  yesterday they were 240,000 and 320,000.

He asked inside about the properties. He said are those prices correct. The agent looked at him for a moment and said, Youve been on a trip with another agent, havent you?

A 20 minute conversation later he found out some of the agents that operate in the area will sucker in buyers with the nice office, the luxury treatment, and then sting them 10%  20% more than what the buyers are really willing to sell for.

Agents like this I call Makos.

These kinds of agents arent the most deadly sharks in the world. But they can be found all over the place  hot and cold temperatures. While not the biggest, when they attack they are the most aggressive shark there is.

They are also the fastest sharks in existence.

Agents like this move quick to strike. They try to get the deal done with aggression and cunning. They care little for anything that isnt their prey. They are Makos.

Whales

The good news is theres a kind of shark in real estate waters that you want to come across. The Whale Shark.

The Whale Shark is huge. Its docile, almost robotic in its nature. Its not aggressive. Its also patient and kind to divers. It will go the extra mile when it needs to. Its the kind of shark you want to come across.

But in the real world where can you find the whale shark?

Ever heard of Purplebricks? They just set up shop in Australia. Theyre well established here in the UK. They help to match sellers with the perfect local expert. They then help manage the whole process through a user friendly web portal.

It allows the seller control over the whole process. They do it far cheaper than other real estate sharks. It also helps the buyer to communicate directly with the seller. This eliminates confusion, delays and dishonesty from aggressive sharks.

Purplebricks is the kind of company that leverages technology to benefit the end user. They use the online world to make buying and selling houses easier for everyone.

Purplebricks is an example of a good shark. The one you want to come across. Its one of the major disruptors in the Aussie real estate market.

The good news is more sharks are likely to follow.

Buymyplace.com.au [ASX:BMP] is another recent entry. You can sell your place using their online platform. You can do it all yourself. No shark gets a slice of your asset in commission. This is the kind of company that is changing an industry well overdue for change.

Buymyplace.com.au is listed on the ASX. Its not really small-cap. More like a microcap, with just a $10 million market capitalisation. But its the kind of company that has the potential to go from micro, to small, to maybe even one day a large-cap company.

Regards,

Sam

From the Port Phillip Publishing Library

Special Report: Central banks are losing control. Their efforts to prop up asset markets are failing. Were now entering the endgame. What will the endgame look like? What are the short and long term investment implications? And how can you navigate this period of hyper central banking interventionand emerge from the other side with a healthy portfolio? Vern Gowdie is one of the few minds in Australia with clear answers to these questions[more]
Its been nearly three months since Brexit. Three months since the Brits decision to leave the EU hit share markets around the world. European equities plunged. The British pound dropped dramatically.

Compared to the US dollar the British pound lost 11.2% of its value. The uncertainty of the decision made its way to Australia too, though not as dramatically. The ASX200 fell by 3.2% on the day of the decision.

But what seemed like an economic catastrophe quickly blew over. Instead of triggering a global economic collapse, the fear of Brexit fizzled out.

Alan Jones, the talk back radio presenter, summarised the situation as just a vote. And hes right. All that has happened so far is a vote.

Now that markets are over their initial shock, all eyes are on the opportunity that Brexit presents. Britain needs trading partners, and will need to negotiate new trade deals. This spells potentially lucrative trade agreements for various nations.

Australia hasnt wasted any time jockeying to hasten a British free trade agreement (FTA) either. Ill get back to that in a moment. But first

Why will Britain need new trading partners?

Brexit wont be a reality until the government enacts article 50. Once Britain officially splits from the EU, they will be giving up free borderless trade with other EU members. Future FTAs with the EU or other European nations will surely top the governments agenda.

However, these kind of agreements take time. Just have a look at the FTA Australia signed with China last year. At 45,277 pages, its not exactly light reading! That agreement was 10 years in the making.

The Financial Times explained the obvious impact of Brexit:

Britains vote to leave the EU has thrown the countrys trading relationship with Europe into doubt. That in turn opens up big questions about the future of the British economy, with almost half of all exports going to the bloc.

Eight of Britains top 10 trading partners are members of the EU. With so much at stake, the UK ministers are all aiming to maximise access to the EUs massive market. Yet they remain steadfast on seeing Brexit through.

Once out of the EU, the UK should be able to negotiate a FTA with the EU for goods. The UK already complies with current regulations and there are no tariffs in force at present.

But an FTA for Britains service sector might be a different story. Trade deals usually exclude services. Why? Free movement of individuals is usually restricted between countries.unless youre an EU member, of course.

This could cause problems as Britains service sector accounts for 80% of their economy. And it could put one in 10 British jobs in jeopardy according to Pro Europa.

For the immediate future, Britain needs friends, both inside and outside of Europe.

Looking beyond its immediate neighbours, it could well be Aussie winemakers reaping the rewards from Britains exit.

The best deal is the deal thats done most quickly

From 4 to 5 September, the 2016 G20 took place in Hangzhou, China.

During the meetings, Malcom Turnbull said he would negotiate a very strong FTA with Britain after it leaves the EU.

Days later Australias trade minister, Steven Ciobo, was making headlines.

On 6 September, Ciobo met the UKs secretary of state for international trade, Liam Fox. It was Dr Foxs second day on the job. But talks so far have been extremely positive. Ciobo stated that Australia would be an ideal partner while Britain navigates its new economic freedom.

He also remarked, The best deal is the deal thats done most quickly. After talking with Ciobo, Dr Fox announced the formation of a working group of senior officials to start mapping out negotiations on the deal.

An FTA cannot begin until Brexit is a reality. Though this hasnt stopped EU members from excluding the UK from informal policy meetings.

But regardless of timelines and political shenanigans, its positive news for Australia. In particular Aussie winemakers.

Ciobo suggested that access to cheap Australian wine could be a good fringe benefit of any FTA between the UK and Australia.

As it stands, duties are place on Australian wines sold in the EU, and hence in the UK. This duty doesnt apply to competitors like France, Italy and Spain. They save around $110 million per year as a result.

As you can imagine, an FTA would likely see more Australian wines shipped to the UK. According to the Express, ending the EU import duty on wine could slash up to 15 pence off the cost of a litre.

But even if duties arent dropped for Aussie wine heading into the UK, Brexit could still benefit the Australian wine industry. This is because duties on wine may well apply to Australias EU competitors as well.

According to the World Trade Organisation, existing rules prevent the UK from favouring one country over another unless specifically worked out in new free trade agreements.

With or without an advantageous FTA with the UK, this all boils down to Brexit offering a great opportunity for Aussie winemakers like Australian Vintage [ASX:AVG] and Treasury Wine Estates [ASX:TWE]. Either the playing field is levelled between them and their major competitors in France, Italy and Spainor the playing field gets tipped in their direction with a UKAussie FTA.

Either way, these are two stocks to keep an eye on.

Regards,

Harje Ronngard,

Contributing Editor, Money Morning

From the Port Phillip Publishing Library

Special Report: Central banks are losing control. Their efforts to prop up asset markets are failing. Were now entering the endgame. What will the endgame look like? What are the short and long term investment implications? And how can you navigate this period of hyper central banking interventionand emerge from the other side with a healthy portfolio? Vern Gowdie is one of the few minds in Australia with clear answers to these questions[more]
Indian Prime Minister Modi arrives at the G20 Summit. (Photo : Getty Images)

India is trying hard to convince China to be part of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG). The group is composed of countries such as the U.S., Russia, and France.



Prime Minister Modi is seeking approval to be part of the NSG because the country would like to convert to use of nuclear power and withdraw from fossil fuel use.



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Amandeep Singh Gill, India's chief negotiator, hosted a meeting with a delegation from China led by The Director General Wang Qun of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.



Discussions between Gill and Wang covered issues on mutual interest in the areas of disarmament and non-proliferation, India's intention to join the NSG.



"The discussions were candid, pragmatic and substantive," the foreign ministry said, adding that further talks would be held.



The Chinese foreign ministry said that they will study the case of India. This is the first time that the NSG is going to be joined by a country that is not part of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.



He explained, "China is willing to hold talks on the issue, but does not yet have a position on the joining of the group by any specific country that has not signed the treaty."



India is showing interest in revitalizing India-China relations. This was also clear during the G20 Summit in Hangzhou.



According to foreign relations expert Ashok Sajjanhar, "In his bilateral conversation with Xi, Modi also underlined that both India and China need to be sensitive to each other's strategic interests, concerns, and aspirations to realize the full potential of their bilateral partnership."



He added, "The G20 Summit's significance has continued to grow because of the opportunity it provides to world leaders to meet bilaterally with their major partners to discuss and resolve urgent issues of concern and interest."


Bible Baptist Church in Morganton will be reaching out to area youth with a special event planned to inspire spiritual transformation.

The churchs inaugural youth rally will feature multiple services from Friday, Sept. 23 to Sunday, Sept. 25. Each service will have guest preachers and worship music.

I went to a church and saw a youth rally, and God just put it on my heart to have a youth rally for our young people, said Nathan Lowman, Bible Baptist Churchs youth pastor. A lot of people out here are hurting, and I just want to be an encouragement to them, and to young people, so they can live for the Lord and be saved.

Senior pastor the Rev. Ricky Watkins spoke about the positive impact he hopes the rally will have on youth who attend.

Its oriented around youth, to try and reach out and help them and encourage them to get in church and live right, Watkins said. I believe they can do right and live right if they choose to. We want to deter them from a lot of the things that are in the world, like drugs, alcohol and negative influences, which can lure them out there and get them in trouble. The greatest objective is to get their lives changed and for them to get a new focus on life.

The Rev. Dr. Sam Vallini from Freedom Baptist Church in Hiddenite and Rev. Rick Da-vis from Straight Way Baptist Church in Statesville will speak at next Friday nights ser-vice at 7 p.m. The Freedom Baptist choir will perform.

Vallinis biography said he stars in a daily radio broadcast called, The Voice of Free-dom. He earned both a Master and Doctorate of Theology from Slidell Baptist Seminary in Slidell, Louisiana. He has pastored Freedom Baptist Church since 1992.

The rally will continue Saturday at 6 p.m. with messages from the Rev. Brandon Fries from Bright Light Baptist Church in Gastonia and the Rev. Jeff Kaylor from Thus Saith the Lord Baptist Church in Reidsville, Virginia. The Bright Light Baptist Church choir and the Kaylor Boys group will sing.

The rally will conclude Sunday morning at 10 a.m. with preachers that had not been an-nounced by press time. The Bible Baptist Church youth will perform during the service. Afterwards, the church will provide soup and sandwiches to attendees and offer games for children.

Lowman said he was looking for old-fashioned, King James version style preachers when choosing the speakers for the rally. The rally will be held outside in a pavilion, much like an old-time tent revival.

Well have some good old singing and some good old preaching and the Lord will be there with them, Lowman said.

He said the event is open to those of all ages, not just youth.

We want to see God move in the meetings so all the families and the young people get closer to God and see lives changed. Lowman said. I want people, if theyre not saved, to get saved, and see homes get back together, young people serving the Lord, and people standing up for the Lord. I want to see a movement of revival for our young people.

He encouraged all members of the community to consider attending the rally.

If you miss out, youll miss out on a blessing, Lowman said.

Tammie Gercken can be reached at tgercken@morganton.com.
The Catawba River Baptist Association is offering a special opportunity for church and community members alike to experience spiritual renewal.

On Thursday, the association will welcome Dr. J. Chris Schofield, the director of the office of prayer for the North Carolina Baptist State Convention, at 7 p.m. at First Baptist Church in Valdese.

Schofield will lead attendees to a renewed commitment to God through preaching, prayer and Bible study, according to the Rev. Billy Cooper, director of missions for the CRBA.

Right now in our country we need a spiritual renewal, Cooper said. As a nation, were just floundering. We need to call on God and ask for his help and direction in our lives. We need to have direction for our churches, county, state and nation. We need to call ourselves back to prayer. I think the time for this is crucial.

Schofield agreed with Coopers assessment.

Were in desperate need of the Lord to come in revival and spiritual awakening, Schofield said. I think God is burdening his people to return to him in godliness and holiness and seek him for revival. Its got to start with the people of God, with the church.

The church has become apathetic and complacent, blending with the culture and taking its eyes off the Lord. Weve depended on methods and strategies in our own strength to do the spiritual work, but it doesnt work. We have to depend on God. And thats what prayer is all about, depending on the Lord.

A native of Bessemer City, North Carolina, Schofield has been in ministry since 1984, first as a Baptist pastor. He went on to serve on the North American Mission Board as manager of the Prayer Evangelism Unit before coming to the BSC, according to his biography. He said he has been the director of the office of prayer for the past 12 years.

I had a real sense of Gods call to mobilize, encourage, inspire and equip Gods people to pray toward spiritual revival, awakening and the great commission, Schofield said.

He said his message on Thursday will focus on the theme of returning to the Lord.

(We need to) set our hearts on him afresh in repentance and revival, crying out to him together for his mercy and grace. Schofield said. (We need) him to revive and restore us in relationship and spiritual awakening.

Lostness is increasing in America at a tremendous rate, and the church is not having an impact on the culture. Were in a moral and spiritual freefall in America. The only one that can turn that around is the Lord. We need him to change hearts, change lives and turn peoples hearts away from darkness and to the truth of Jesus Christ. The church must return to him so that might take place.

He recalled past times in history, such as the First and Second Great Awakenings, which inspired people to have a greater focus on God in their everyday lives.

The church has responded to these times by crying out to the Lord for his mercy, returning to him in revival and seeking him for what only he can do, Schofield said. Its been over 100 years since thats happened.

Cooper said the summit will be conducted much like a Bible study, with attendees being led by Schofield in studying scripture that relates to his message. Schofield added that he will lead directed prayer times as well.

Im praying it will be an encounter with God (for those who attend), that Gods people will encounter him, and that our hearts will be refocused on him. Schofield said. I pray that it would be a time of great introspection and prayer to seek the Lord and ask for his mercy and grace. And I pray that they will leave with a greater burden to do that in our local churches, to come together a body of churches to cry out for spiritual awakening.

Schofield said the prayer summit will be a good introduction to the BSCs initiative called Pray for 30 Days, in which Christians throughout the state are asked to cultivate a greater focus on prayer in their personal lives during the month of October. He invited those interested to visit www.prayfor30days.org to learn more. They can download devotional materials and sign up for text and email reminders to pray on the site.

Cooper emphasized that revival has to start in individual believers lives.

Revival is, first of all, an individual thing, Cooper said. You have to have that surge of Gods strength and power and sense of calling to a task. One has to be filled with the Holy Spirit and called to action to fulfill the great commission (Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations) found in Matthew 28.

Calling to action means, go and do. Its a directive from our Lord Jesus Christ. All were doing is following these directives Christ gave us. This falls into what were trying to do in this summit, to motivate, inspire and challenge, first personally, so people can take that into their families, their communities, and finally, the world.

Tammie Gercken can be reached at tgercken@morganton.com.
For many people in Burke County, substance abuse recovery is just three words that are spoken and heard, but for others, they mean much more.

Burke Recovery and Burke Substance Abuse Network are teaming together to give those words more meaning to all by holding the first Burke Rally for Recovery on Sunday from 2-6 p.m. at the Old Burke County Courthouse lawn.

Mental and substance abuse disorders and the societal benefits of recovery for Burke County must be addressed immediately, according to county and city officials, who recognized September as Recovery Month for all citizens of Burke County, said a press release from Burke Recovery.

The rally will highlight how individuals in recovery and their supports systems can be change agents in the community, said Joe Marks , executive director of Burke Recovery.

The rally will include speakers, music, food and games for kids as an effort to support people in recovery and draw attention to critical prevention, treatment and recovery support services, the release said.

A wall of recovery will be displayed giving people a chance to voice their thoughts through writing.

It is wall with paper wrapped around it and people are going to have the opportunity to either sign their name or a few words of why they are grateful for recovery, Marks said.

They plan on keeping the recovery wall and posting it at their BSAN meetings and possibly in the local hospital.

Participants also will be given a chance to share their personal stories with recovery if they feel led to do so, Marks said.

(I want it) to be a shining light of attraction to people who may be out on the fringe and maybe people still who have an addiction that are walking around downtown that may see a bunch of people in recovery who are having a bunch of fun.

There will be information available about steps that can be taken for recovery at the rally.

It is critical that people experiencing mental and/or substance use disorders receive the support they need, he said. The reality is that behavioral health is essential to health, prevention works, treatment is effective and people recover.

Last year, Burke County had the seventh highest drug poisoning mortality rate in the state of North Carolina. Currently, Burke holds the second highest drug poisoning mortality rate for 2016, the release said.

I also believe it is important that people get together in recovery  to help break the stigma around addiction, Marks said. Most people think that addiction is a moral failing and that there is something wrong with that person or that their morale fiber has been subjected to something evil and that is not the case  addiction is a disease.

According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, 43.6 million people aged 18 or older (18.1 percent of adults) have a mental illness at any given time, the release said.

It is important that the momentum well establish at this event is carried over to tomorrow, and the next day, week and year, said Marks. We all have the potential to make a difference and be visible, vocal and valuable to help spread the message that recovery is real.

The event would not be possible without the support of local businesses and organizations that recognize the value of seeking treatment and overcoming mental and substance use disorders , Marks said. The presenting sponsor for the event is the Burke Adult Collaborative. Other sponsors include Partners Behavioral Health Management, Breathe Yoga and Wellness, VanNoppen Marketing, the Blue Ridge HealthCare Foundation, Burke Recovery, the Good Samaritan Clinic, Montreat College, A Caring Alternative, members of the Burke Substance Abuse Network, and Easter Seals.

Staff Writer Jonelle Bobak can be reached at jbobak@morganton.com or 828-432-8907.
North Carolina Potter Molly Lithgo will demonstrate pottery techniques as well as discuss her personal experiences as a full time studio potter from 11:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Friday, Sept. 23 in Western Piedmont Community Colleges Professional Crafts Pottery Studio. A reception of Lithgos work will be held from 5:30-7:30 p.m. at the Hamilton Williams Gallery located in downtown Morganton. The public is invited to attend both events.

Lithgo received her Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree in Drawing and Painting from the Atlanta College of Art and a Master of Fine Art in Drawing and Painting at UNC-Greensboro. In 1997, she established Earthworks Pottery located in Greensboro, N.C. which specializes in highly decorative but functional earthenware bowls, cups, mugs, platters, tea pots, vases, butter dishes, pitchers, boxes and more. Lithgos academic training in art history and painting inspired her surface decorations.

My body of work represents a meeting of these two worlds, capturing pottery from a different point of view, said Lithgo. I have always been moved by the work of Impressionist painters Cezanne, Renoir, Van Gogh, and Degas, whose use of color and mark-making inspire my own work, again and again.

Lithgo is represented by several North Carolina galleries including Tyler White OBrien in Greensboro and the Grovewood in Asheville. Her artwork has been featured at several institutions such as the North Carolina Pottery Center, Baltimore Clayworks, and private collections nationally, as well as Japan, Russia, Spain, and Greece.

Lithgo has more than 15 years experience as an instructor, lecturer, juror, curator and demonstrator teaching courses at John C. Campbell Folk School and several community colleges. Lithgos work has been featured twice for publication in Lark Books, and she has placed or received honorable mention in 10 craft shows.

On Friday, Sept. 23, examples of Lithgos work will be on display in conjunction with her pottery demonstration in Western Piedmont Community Colleges Professional Crafts Clay Studio, Rostan Building from 11:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. To view her work, visit Hamilton Williams Gallery located in downtown Morganton. The pottery demonstration is open and free to the public. For more information about this event or pottery classes, contact Professional Crafts Coordinator, Courtney Long, 828-448-3552.

For more information about WPCC, visit www.wpcc.edu, or to provide feedback, visit www.wpcc.edu/feedback.
This weekend there will be plenty of opportunities available to find a forever four-legged friend a s PetSmart Charities National Adoption Weekend this Saturday.

Two local animal rescues, A Better Life Animal Rescue and Cats Cradle, will be present from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. with dogs and cats available for adoption.

A Better Life Animal Rescue does not do on-the-spot adoptions, but they will still have animals present to see, said Gwen Hood, founder of A Better Life Animal Rescue.

Four times a year PetSmart Charities sponsors this national adoptathon and it is to create awareness of the fact that all the PetSmart stores let all rescue groups and humane organizations show their animals for adoption in their stores, said Lynda Garibaldi, founder and director of The Cats Cradle.

Through the power of adoption, more than 7 million pet parents have made a difference in pets' lives, according to the PetSmart website.

On average, more than 15,000 pets find homes every time PetSmart Charities hosts a National Adoption Weekend, the website said. Held four times a year, these events showcase adoptable pets in every PetSmart store in the United States and Canada, usually featuring several adoption organizations at each store.

Garibaldi hopes that this event sheds light on what kind of work the rescues in Burke County do for animals that sometimes come from bad backgrounds.

PetSmart Charities provides grants that bring together many local adoption groups to feature a wide variety of adoptable pets all in one place. These events help save the lives of thousands of pets each year, the website said.

It all depends on if a person walks through the doors at PetSmart wanting a specific kind of dog or cat as to how many adoptions they may have, Garibaldi said.

Hopefully, it (the National Adoption Weekend) will find homes for more cats and dogs, she said.

For more information about a Better Life Animals Rescue, visit www.abetterlifeanimalrescue.com or call 828-584-6767.

For more information about Cats Cradle, visit www.thecatscradle.org or call 828-461-0178

Staff Writer Jonelle Bobak can be reached at jbobak@morganton.com or 828-432-8907.
Zhou Yahui (Photo : PR Newswire)

In mid-August, the divorce of Chinese celebrity couple Wang Baoqiang and Ma Rong was the talk of social media in China because of the wifes affair with Wangs manager Song Zhe.



The scandal has been replaced by reports of one of the most expensive divorce settlements in China involving Zhou Yahui, the owner of online gaming company Beijing Kunlun Tech. Forbes reported that Zhou Yahui ordered the transfer of 7.3 billion yuan or $1.1 billion to his wife Li Qiong whom he just divorced.



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A Beijing court ordered Zhou to turn over some of his Kunlun shares to Li Qiong on Tuesday, reported Time. The two met in elementary school and spent most of the time in the U.S. since their marriage. The reasons for their divorce are unknown.



The amount is equivalent to 278 million shares in Kunlun, based on the companys closing price of 26.4 yuan on Thursday. Zhou still hold a 34.5 percent stake in Kunlun valued at 10.1 billion, or $1.5 billion. Despite the divorce settlement, he still maintains control of the online gaming firm, while Li will follow the original share lock-up period which ends on January 2018, according to Kunluns filing with the Chinese regulator.



Zhou became rich by the distribution of Chinese online games overseas which accounted for 74 percent of the companys 1.78-billion yuan revenue in 2015.



Besides investing in LendInvest, a lending startup in UK, Zhou also acquired a controlling stake in Grindr, a gay-dating app, in early 2016.



Kunlun said the divorce would not affect the companys operations. The ex-couple is now part of the 2.8 percent of Chinas population who are now divorced, up from 1.7 percent in 2008, said the Ministry of Civil Affairs.






China Carries On Anti-piracy Campaign (Photo : Getty Images)

The Haidian District Peoples Court in Beijing sentenced up to three and a half years prison term the former CEO of Shenzhen QVOD Technology and three other executives for spreading pornography for profit.



Wang Xin was sentenced on Tuesday and fined 1 million yuan, or $149,254. The three executives  Zhang Kedong, Wu Ming and Niu Wenju  were also given the same length of prison sentence and fines of up to 500,000 yuan each. Shenzhen QVOD was also penalized 10 million yuan, reported Global Times.



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The company is a peer-to-peer video streaming site with 300 million users. Xinhua reported that 21,521 of the 29,841 files that police got from the three QVOD servers in 2013 were pornographic. Most of the files were also pirated content. The firm charged users and advertisers which allowed it to generate revenue of more than 140 million yuan in 2013.



In January, at the first trial, the four initially denied the accusations. But on Friday, Zhang admitted QVOD earned revenues based on user numbers. Wang said that he opted to choose company interest over social responsibility. He admitted that spreading pornography harmed others, especially adolescents. Wang acknowledged he broke the law and neglected his duty.



It was not the first sanction against QVOD which was punished in August 2013 by Shenzhen broadcast and media authorities. However, despite the punishment, the firm continued with spreading graphic content because of the huge income it brought the company, reported Xinhua News Agency.






Tiziana Cantone is an Italian woman who killed herself due to online humiliation after a sex tape leak. (Photo : YouTube/ Euro News)

Tiziana Cantone has committed suicide. The controversial Italian lady was subjected to online humiliation after explicit images and a sex tape of her leaked online.



Cantone's footage drew attention to her acts of performing a sex act on a man and was uploaded online in spring 2015. According to The Independent, she had uploaded six different videos to five of her friends, whom she trusted.



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However, the clips soon went viral online and even appeared on porn sites and social media. Jeering comments, cruel video parodies, and edited screenshots, many of which mentioned her full name, turned her sexual act into a viral meme. Online ridicule mostly highlighted one of Ms. Cantone's throwaway phrase, "You are making a video? Nice one."



Several rumors posted online about the 32-year-old were later reported by the media. Examples include the claims that Cantone was attempting to become a professional porn star.



Tormented by mimicry, Cantone moved to another house and changed her name. This year, she won a legal case, which forced Facebook to take down the abusive posts that targeted her, Repubblica reported.



However, following two suicide attempts, Cantone's family revealed that she had taken her own life in her mother's home. In court, her mother asserted that her daughter had been unable to untangle herself from the previous events.



Cantone had been unhappy, suffering from everything she witnessed both through the internet and word of mouth, according to her mother. She also said that her daughter had not been satisfied by the results of the lawsuit as justice had not been done.



Public Prosecutor Francesco Greco has now opened an investigation pertaining her death, which will possibly dig deeper into the impact that the online humiliation affected her. According to her friend, Teresa Petrosino, Cantone was "distraught" by the online ridicule and the events.



Petrosino was shocked by how online audience had fiercely raged against an innocent girl. According to her, all those who hauled insults online should have been mortified by their acts as they still secretly watched the images.



In 2015, Cantone succeeded in having the videos removed from online search engines but the videos still went on appearing after that. The continuous online stream of insults and abuse is what led her into committing suicide.



Watch a video highlight of Cantone's story:


Panos Panay, General Manger of Surface, holds the tablet Surface by Microsoft during a news conference at Milk Studios in Los Angeles, California.The new Surface tablet has a 10.6 inch screen complete with cover that contains a full multitouch keyboard. (Photo : Getty Images/ Kevork Djansezian)

Microsoft is expected to announce some details about its high-anticipated devices Microsoft Surface Pro 5 and Microsoft Surface Book 2. This will clear the air if the devices are coming any time soon or not.



During its October 2016 event, certain rumors that have been making rounds for a while will be clarified by Microsoft. Such rumors include the existence of a Surface Phone and cancellation of its Lumia Windows Phone series. Fans are restless about any official statements from Microsoft regarding Microsoft Surface Pro 5, Microsoft Blog noted.



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For now, it is impossible to say what the company will reveal during the October event, but it should announce some of its devices that are lined up for release. Fans have nearly given up hope for a 2016 release of the new Surface devices, including Microsoft Surface Book 2 and Microsoft Surface Pro 5.



The excitement surrounding the gadgets is still alive and kicking despite Microsoft reportedly deciding to refresh Surface Book and Surface Pro 4 instead. An insider source has revealed that Microsoft will be using the October event to launch better processors for the two gadgets, which include Microsoft Surface Book 2 and Microsoft Surface Pro 5.



According to The Verge, Microsoft is planning to release a new Surface device this year and in 2017, it would release three more. This was hinted about two months ago by the company. As per the tradition, fans expectation of a Microsoft Surface Pro 5 or a Microsoft Surface Book 2 release as the All-In-One Surface PC was not on anyone's radar.



It seems Microsoft Surface Pro 5 fans will have to wait a little bit longer for their favorite gadget to be even announced. For now, all they are getting are revamped previous variants. The Surface All-In-One Surface PC, also known as Cardinal, may be revealed during the October event.



As Microsoft allegedly including the Intel Kaby Lake processor in the Microsoft Surface Pro 5 model, the release does not seem like now but maybe in 2017. The Kaby Lake processors are set to be released later this year.



Watch a video of Microsoft Surface Pro 5 features here:






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The Canada Revenue Agency has been tasked to probe rampant tax evasion in the countrys most active real estate markets, in the wake of a recent investigative report by The Globe and Mail that recounted the tale of a Vancouver speculator who did not pay any taxes on millions of dollars worth of profits from a series of home flips.Like all Canadians, I am very concerned over allegations that some wealthy Canadians are not paying their fair share of taxes, Minister of National Revenue Diane Lebouthillier noted in a statement, as quoted by CBC News.That is unacceptable and I've since asked Canada Revenue Agency officials to look into the specifics of the case, Lebouthillier said, adding that the CRA had completed 2,500 real estate audits in Ontario and British Columbia, which has led to around $11.6 million in fines to consumers who have committed gross negligence in failing to report their tax obligations correctly.Canadians expect and deserve a fair tax system and that is what we are committed to delivering.In a Tuesday (September 13) press conference, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said that this is just one of the interventions that the federal government is contemplating to help cool down the countrys overheated housing markets.One of the issues that we highlighted recently is the need for continued enforcement of the tax code and making sure that we're cracking down on people who are avoiding paying their fair share of taxes, the PM stated.Trudeau added that he has allocated an extra $444 million for the CRA in this years budget to ensure that there is better enforcement [so that] everyone pays their fair share of taxes.
Spooky sites Fall is the season of holiday spectacle in Moorpark. In December, of course, Pinedale Road transforms into Candy Cane Lane and dazzles visitors with Santa splendor. But for those who...

Local hula group inspires global connections When the pandemic ushered everyone indoors, Moorpark resident and longtime dancer Lisa Rauschenberger decided to get people back outsidesocially distanced, of course. She began to hold weekly hula lessons at...

Teens face high stakes in the Oval Office A press room befitting Americas commander in chief was set up inside the Reagan Library in Simi Valley. Journalists and others gathered inside. Ladies and gentlemen, I need you all...
We like developing things, Bruce Kaiser, chairman and chief executive officer of Lightning Master, told a visitor as the company celebrated its new Midland office.

Indeed, the companys technology is used thousands of feet in the air on broadcast towers and cellphone towers and hundreds of feet below ground in mines.

The Clearwater, Florida-based company has found its way to the Permian Basin, providing lightning protection, static solutions and surge protection throughout area oil fields.

Lightning Master dates back to 1984 when Kaiser bought a company that provided lightning protection for broadcast towers. The concept was good. I bought the concept, the patents, he said.

He said that in the late 1980s cellphone towers consisted of towers built next to small buildings that held expensive equipment and a lightning rod next to it.

From there, the company found its way into other industries, including coal mines.

The fun part is, you get to see how companies work that no one else ever gets to see, Kaiser said.

The companys entrance into the oil industry began with an operator who was having problems with a saltwater disposal site.

If you pump fluids into a tank, it generates static, Kaiser said.

Whether its brine water, produced water, flowback fluids or crude oil, if those storage tanks hold flammable mixtures, there is a source of ignition and the static charge builds to an incendiary level with enough arc and energy in that arc, they can ignite, he said.

Even frac tanks can erupt because of the rush of the water, he said.

We cant control the mixture at the site, but we can control static buildup and source of ignition, he said.

Lightning Master has spent a number of years working with Permian Basin operators to develop systems to protect storage tanks and disposal sites from static, surges and lightning strikes. But that required sending field personnel out from Clearwater.

From our point of view, that got expensive. It required a lot of airfare, hotels, and our people were never here when they needed to be.

Gregg Thompson was hired as general manager, Permian operations, and he began hiring local crews to help design, install and service systems.

The decision was made to consolidate the companys operations into one facility -- located at 2904 S. County Road 1255 -- that would allow for parts storage, offer room for trucks to come in and pick up parts, as well as offices and even facilities for field crew to rest, Kaiser said.

Every morning I read the Wall Street Journal, and it says this is the area thats expected to come back first, he said of the Permian Basin.

Showing off the new facility, Thompson held up an In-Tank Static Drain, stainless steel cable with stainless steel electrodes inserted into the wind of the cable, which are custom made to the length of the tank.

This is the backbone of Lightning Masters Permian operations, Thompson said.

Surveying the growing inventory of parts at the new Midland facility, Thompson said all parts are made in the United States and are designed specifically for the oil and gas industry.

This is a harsh environment for parts, he said. Using parts designed specifically for here gives you more longevity.

The company worked with a major operator on developing a new alloy for the drain, he said.

The company is seeing demand for protection for saltwater disposal sites, central ban batteries as well as crude pumping stations and floating roof tanks, he said.

For these external floating roof tanks, Lightning Master has developed the Movable Arm Grounding System, a patented bypass conductor system. The company said that these tanks are particularly vulnerable to lightning because of the isolated floating roof. A direct or nearby lightning strike will cause a difference in potential between the floating roof and the tank shell, which, if not properly bonded, can be an ignition source.

Thompson said all of the companys systems are tailor-made for a specific facility.

Kaiser said the company has not seen a decline in business amid the oil industry downturn, but more of a delay.

What we offer is a cost item. It doesnt make the site work any better, it just protects it. People put this off as long as they can, but when you have a site blow up, its too late, he said.

Bigger companies are sophisticated enough to understand they have to do this. Theyre better off keeping a site from being blown up in the first place, Kaiser said.
Charger Shale Oil Co. is charging out of the gate as the new venture begins to develop its Delaware Basin holdings.

The new $900 million joint venture, based in Midland, was formed with $600 million in an initial equity commitment from Oaktree Capital Management LP in addition to an additional $300 million runway commitment.

Charger is unique in that it has pledged to begin a two-rig drilling program within a month of receiving the funding, said Joseph Magoto, chief executive officer and president.

Were building locations, rigs are contracted and drilling should begin in October, he said.

Not only did we close on receiving capital but we simultaneously closed on our project, which is 28,000 acres and an option to take an additional 40,000 acres, Magoto said.

He declined to be more specific about the companys holdings, saying its acreage is on the western side of the Delaware. The companys development plans include expanding to more than 85,000 acres, and when in full swing will target more than 100 horizontal well locations across multiple horizons, particularly the Wolfcamp and the Bone Spring.

The way we intend to complete those wells and frac those wells, at todays oil prices, we should have 50 to 100 percent initial rate of return. We expect robust wells, he said.

According to Magoto, Charger has high-graded its targets. In addition to that, he said, the company is taking a high-tech approach to completing its wells.

Were drilling the highest recovery wells as opposed to the lowest cost wells, he said.

Delaware Basin wells produce as much oil as Midland Basin wells, but they also make more gas, cost less to drill and flow instead of needing artificial lift.

There may be opportunities in the Midland Basin later, he said.

Whats shocking is the price per acre is going up despite current oil price levels. Large companies are allocating increasing amounts to the Permian Basin because other basins arent as economic. More money is chasing opportunities in the Permian Basin; its coming from the Eagle Ford, the Bakken, gas areas. The Permian Basin is one of the few basins where you can still drill wells that are highly attractive.

Chargers investment bank, Jefferies, did a wonderful job introducing the company to 22 private equity companies. That was narrowed to 12 companies that Charger was interested in.

We ended up with a smorgasbord of choices before choosing Oaktree, he said.

Magoto served as president of Tall City Exploration, which acquired and developed more than 34,500 acres, plus another 48,000 prospective acres, utilizing $245 million in capital. Tall City sold those assets for $1.2 billion in two transactions in 2014 and 2015.

Magoto said it was Tall Citys successful track record that gave Charger access to private equity companies.

He is joined by former Tall City executives, including Darryl James, vice president, geology; Doug Scott, chief petrophysicist, and John Stewart, geology computer specialist. Other Charger executives include Chuck Lundeen, vice president, land and legal and former head landman at Devon Energy; Craig Young, vice president, drilling and operations and former head of drilling in the Permian Basin and Eagle Ford for EOG Resources; Bob Bintliff, chief accounting officer; Jeffrey Wilson, vice president, engineering, and former managing senior vice president of Ryder Scott; and Tom Barr, former reserve engineer at Cawley Gillespie.

Magoto said Chargers ultimate goal is to build an enterprise of more than 100,000 acres and drill sufficient horizontal wells to prove up 1,500 locations.
A 21-year-old Fort Bliss soldier was arrested and charged with murder this week after police say he killed a transgender woman in El Paso last month.

Anthony Bowden was arrested Tuesday and charged in the death of Erykah Tijerina, 36, formerly Eric, whose body was found with obvious signs of foul play, Aug. 8, according to an El Paso Police Department news release. Bowden is being held in El Paso County Jail on a $750,000 bond, according to online county records.

Tijerina was a transgender woman who went by Erykah, her family memberstold KFOX14, adding that they believe the homicide was a result of a hate crime.

Police are not ruling out Tijerina's murder being a hate crime, which is defined by the FBI as being a "criminal offense against a person or property motivated in whole or in part by an offender's bias against a race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender, or gender identity."

"We are looking into that (hate crime) aspect," Keith A. Byers, assistant special agent in charge of the FBI in El Paso, told the El Paso Times.

The El Paso Police Department did not immediately respond for comment.

Tijerinas body was found at the 200 block of Lisbon Street in El Paso and forensic evidence later led to Bowdens arrest, according to the release. Tijerinas cause of death has not yet been released.

LTC Patrick Husted, spokesman for Fort Bliss, confirmed in an email Bowden entered the Army in July 2013 and was assigned to Fort Bliss in January 2014.

Bowden is a Patriot Launching Station crewman assigned to Fort Bliss' 5th Battalion and the 52nd Air Defense Artillery.

"On September 13, 2016, a Fort Bliss Solider, SPC Anthony M. Bowden, assigned to the 11th Air Defense Artillery Brigade, was arrested by the El Paso Police Department as part of an ongoing murder investigation. This incident occurred off-post, and as such, we are cooperating with local authorities, who are exercising jurisdiction in this matter. As this is an ongoing criminal investigation, we cannot provide any further comment," Husted said.

The Human Rights Campaign listed Tijerina as one of the 18 known transgender people who have been fatally shot, stabbed and killed by other violent means, so far this year. Her family set up a GoFundMe page to help with the funeral expenses for Tijerina.

For all the ones she loved and she helped we asked you find in your heart to help us with this for her, Kathleen Tijerina Gonzales, Tijerinas sister, wrote on the page. This is so important to us because we unexpectedly had to receive this news so soon. Its hard for us to accept it let alone be able to arrange her funeral arrangement.

So far, $1,747 has been raised.

Were still in shock about it. It was unexpected, Pearl Tijerina told the Fox TV station, describing her sister as funny, giving and unapologetic. Shes the one that told me to stay strong and not care.

Tijerina is the third known transgender woman to have been killed in Texas this year, according to the Human Rights Campaign. Monica Loera, 43, was a transgender woman who was fatally shot in Austin Jan. 22. Shante Thompson, 34, was a transgender woman from Houston who was beaten and shot April 11.

In 2015, the Human Rights Campaign recorded 21 known transgender people who were victims of fatal violence. Two were killed in Texas.

kbradshaw@express-news.net

Twitter: @kbrad5
AUSTIN, Texas (AP)  A review finds Texas agencies since 2014 have granted at least $430,000 in emergency leave to employees who already left their jobs.

Details were released Thursday by the State Auditor's Office, The Dallas Morning News (http://bit.ly/2cOCFOG) reports. The audit was put together at the request of the House Committee on General Investigating and Ethics.

Severance pay is not allowed in Texas government. State law gives the heads of agencies unrestricted authority to give emergency leave for any reason and however long they choose.

Seven agencies were asked to detail packages they offered to Texas employees since September 2014. Committee members asked the state to provide information on the agencies because they had been the subject of recent media reports. The auditor's office said it didn't verify the information provided by the agencies.

The newspaper reported that the review's results are similar to finding from the newspaper's analysis conducted in May.

Six agencies reported paying ex-employees emergency leave for weeks and sometimes months after they left. Auditors found that more than $432,000 in taxpayer money was paid to 44 ex-employees. The money was paid out by the Teachers Retirement System and Office of the Attorney General.

According to the report, one former assistant attorney general had the single largest payout, netting 456 hours of emergency leave plus a lump sum payment of $99,000 for a severance arrangement totaling more than $116,000. The report also said the attorney general's office gave emergency leave to the highest number of ex-staffers, with 27 people getting more than 3,200 of paid leave in the last two years.

Some Texas legislators have criticized giving ex-state workers emergency leave pay in place of severance pay or as settlements.

Gov. Greg Abbott and Comptroller Glenn Hegar asked state agencies to stop giving out money for emergency leave soon after news broke that dozens of agencies may be misusing their discretion.

___

Information from: The Dallas Morning News, http://www.dallasnews.com
We won't be seeing the Dance of the Dragons for quite a while. After that epic season one finale, HBO is making sure viewers don't expect a sequel to House of the Dragon in the new year. "Don't expect it in 23, but I think sometime in
We have been cursed with leaders ...
El-Sisi is set to attend a number of meetings, including the Security Councils summit on Syria and Libya, a meeting on migrants and asylum seekers, and an African leaders meeting on fighting climate change.

Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi is set to present Egypts vision on efforts being made to settle regional crises in front of the UNs General Assembly, Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry has said.

In an interview with MENA agency, Shoukry said that El-Sisi is also going to present current political and economic developments in Egypt in front of the UNGA, which will be held next week in New York.

He said that El-Sisis participation in the General Assembly's meetings this year held special importance in the light of Egypts membership of the Security Council, pointing out that El-Sisis participation in the Security Council Summit would be a first for an Egyptian president.

El-Sisi is set to attend a number of meetings, including the Security Councils summit on Syria and Libya, held on 21 September, a meeting on migrants and asylum seekers, and an African leaders meeting on fighting climate change.

Shoukry stressed Egypt's keenness on Syrian unity, and supporting all exerted efforts to reach a peaceful resolution to the Syrian crisis.

He added that Egypt will highlight the necessity of the return of stability in Libya and accomplishing a national consensus through implementing the Skhirat agreement, adding that Egypt supports the National Libyan Army which holds legitimacy.

He stressed Egypts backing of the Libyan army's move to restore stability and security in Libya and secure the country's oil wealth.

On Sunday, troops loyal to Libyan general Khalifa Haftar said they had seized two major oil export terminals as the Tripoli-based Government of National Accord (GNA), backed by the UN, struggles to assert its authority over the oil-rich country.

Shortly following the take-over, the US and several European countries condemned the act by the Libyan general, calling on Haftars forces to withdraw immediately, without preconditions, according to an official statement.

Shoukry described the statement as overhasty and said it didn't take into considerations the domestic conditions in Libya.

Meetings with US presidential candidates

The Egyptian foreign minister also reacted to news related to an expected meeting between Egypts El-Sisi and the US presidential candidates.

On Wednesday, Democratic US presidential candidate Hillary Clintons campaign announced she would meet with El-Sisi next week during the General Assembly.

Shoukry said that El-Sisi would hold important meetings with leading figures in the USs Democratic and Republication parties, elaborating that no decision has been made yet on meeting with the two candidates.

According to MENA, El-Sisi is expected to hold meetings with several world leaders, as well as being interviewed by a group of American media outlets to shed light on Egyptian efforts to attract investments for projects in Egypt and efforts to maintain unity in countries that face crisis in the Middle East.

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This is the second carrier that Egypt has officially received this year

The commander-in-chief of Egypt's navy raised the Egyptian flag Friday on board the Mistral-class Landing Helicopter Dock which Cairo bought from France in 2015, state-owned MENA agency reported.

The carrier--which is named after late president Anwar El-Sadat--was received by Vice Admiral Osama Rabie during an inauguration ceremony at Saint-Nazaire harbor in western France.

This is the second carrier that Egypt has officially received this year; in June it received the first Mistral helicopter dock -- named after late president Gamal Abdel-Nasser -- in Alexandria coming from the French city of Toulouse.

The contract for the two Mistral carriers, which was finalised in September last year, was valued at 950 million Euros, according to AFP.

The Mistral deal is part of several defence contracts Egypt has signed with France, with the European country now topping the list of countries to have signed military supply agreements with Egypt during the term of President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi.

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Old Fire Map View Photos

Update at 4:50 p.m.: Forest Fire officials report containment on the Old Fire has grown to 70 percent with the acreage remain at 150. Additionally, the expected full containment date has been pushed up two days to Sunday, September 18. For details on the injured firefighter please read below.

Original post at 3:55 p.m.: Stanislaus National Forest, CA  The Old Fires size and containment is holding steady but one firefighter was hurt battling the blaze Thursday morning.

The fire remains at 150 acres with 50 percent containment and 287 firefighters on the job. Regarding the injury Forest Service spokesperson Clare Long discloses, It is a soft tissue injury. It is not life threatening. He was out on the fire linewalking through the vegetation and sustained this minor injury.

Long reports crews are pretty confident that they have a good handle on getting hose line around the perimeter of the fire, however, she indicates, There is a lot of spot fire happening. Some of them are actually going a quarter mile to a half mile out. We have three hot shot crews still out there trying to make sure we catch all these spot fires before they start to growing into anything that we really need to be concerned about.

With the temperatures dropping in the evening, the overnight plan of attack is to make progress on the fuels inside the fires perimeter while patrolling around the outside looking for the hot spots and working on the containment line.

Investigators are still trying to determine what sparked the blaze. Forest fire officials expect full containment by next Tuesday, September 20.

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Egypt supports the Libyan armys move to secure the countrys oil wealth and preserve stability and security, Egypts Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry told state-owned MENA agency.

The statement by Shoukry comes days after troops loyal to Libyan General Khalifa Haftar said on Sunday they had seized two major oil export terminals as the Tripoli-based Government of National Accord (GNA), backed by the UN, struggles to assert its authority over the oil-rich country.

Haftar said in statements on Sunday that the ports would be secured to "return operational responsibility to the National Oil Corporation with a guarantee of non-interference by armed forces in operational activities and exports."

Shortly following the take-over by Haftars forces, the US and several European countries condemned the act by the Libyan general, calling on Haftars forces to withdraw immediately, without preconditions, according to an official statement.

In statements to Egypts MENA, Shoukry said Egypt supports the National Libyan Armys act as it holds legitimacy, stressing also the necessity of the return of stability in Libya and accomplishing a national consensus through implementing the Skhirat agreement.

The Libyan general opposes the UN-sponsored GNA, and backs the Bayda-based parliament which refuses to grant the GNA a vote of confidence.

Shoukry described the statement by Western countries as overhasty and said it didn't take into consideration domestic conditions in Libya.

The Egyptian president has continually expressed his support for a Libya, while stating that Egypt would not intervene militarily in turmoil-stricken Libya, describing the neighbouring country as a "sovereign state.

In an August interview, El-Sisi said Egypt supported Libyas national army as well its elected parliament because they represented the will of the Libyan people.

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A Pasco County man is on the run after being accused of starting a house fire following a kitchen explosion from the marijuana wax he was concocting.

After the flames broke out, deputies say he also left his two dogs for dead.

Authorities are searching for Steven Brown, 24, of Port Richey

They say he burned down his house making marijuana wax, and left two dogs for dead

He was last seen fleeing from a traffic stop on Sept. 9



The sheriffs office has been searching for Steven Brown, 24, since the Sept. 3 incident in Port Richey. The agency considers him armed and dangerous.

"It was loud. Im talking about like somebody just dropped a bomb," neighbor Cynthia Bryant said of the explosion.

According to authorities, as soon as the fire began, Brown grabbed his drugs and ran  leaving two caged dogs and a 1-year-old in the house. Other adults who were at the property rescued the child, but the dogs died in the flames.

Investigators say Brown was manufacturing a drug called marijuana wax or butane hash oil.

"It is very dangerous because like a lot of organic solvents its very flammable, and using propane or butane, its also explosive," said Alfred Aleguas with the Florida Poison Information Center.

Aleguas says propane from a grill or butane from a lighter is used to extract the THC, if there's a spark it could lead to an explosion.

On Sept. 9, multiple warrants were issued for Brown, and deputies were able to make contact during a traffic stop. They said he fled, though, adding to his long list of active warrants.

He was last seen driving a white 2016 Kia Optima EX, with four doors, and a Florida license plate of GXSY18.

A few of his charges include arson in the first degree, felonious possession of a firearm and aggravated cruelty to animals.

Authorities said if you see Brown  dont make contact. Call 9-1-1 immediately.

Officials said other charges could be pending. The PCSO had no comment regarding any other individuals who may be charged in the case.
The Orlando City Council passed an ordinance banning after-hours clubs Thursday.

Clubs that allow patrons to bring their own alcohol after 2 a.m. banned

City also debated measure to compell buildings to track energy usage

In December, Orlando passed a temporary moratorium on the establishments, which allow patrons to bring in their own alcohol after bars 2 a.m. last call. At the time, there was only one after-hours club, Club Nocturnal, which has since closed.

After months of studying the issue, the city took up a second reading on the Orlando Police Department-proposed ordinance, which leaders passed Thursday.

In addition, city leaders debated the first reading of a policy which would force large buildings in Orlando to track their energy usage or be fined, up to $2,000.

Commercial buildings would have to benchmark their energy usage, tracking use over time or compared to other, similar buildings.

In the presentation, Chris Castro, the Citys Director of Sustainability, said that buildings have the biggest impact on public health, due to the high amounts of energy they draw.

Theyre the biggest use of energy, so the more energy they use, it could increase our costs as homeowners and residents for utility costs and water usage, said Eric Rollings, Soil and Water Conservation District Chair for Orange County. I love Orlando and I love the environment. I think that every time everybody can do just a little bit, and try to watch out for each other, then its a great thing and everybody wins.

Castro said that theme parks cannot be accurately scored with energy ratings, so they would be exempt from the policy.

While the business community would be directed impacted by the policy  which has been enacted in other major cities, like New York City, Atlanta and Portland  advocates say homeowners would see a positive impact..

Orlando boasts ambitious goals: They hope to reduce air pollution by 25 percent from 2007 levels by 2018. Their long-term goal for 2040 is reducing air pollution by 90 percent, and having 100 percent of new construction classified as green.
The third party president candidates for this year's election will have to sit out the first debate.

Johnson, Stein not invited to first presidential debate

Running mates not invited to vice presidential debate

CPD will take another look at polls before 2 other debates



FLORIDA DECIDES COVERAGE: Latest headlines | How to vote in Florida

The Commission on Presidential Debates announced Friday that Libertarian Gary Johnson and Green Party candidate Jill Stein will not be invited to the first official presidential debate on Sept. 26.

Their running mates will also not be invited to the vice presidential debate on Oct. 4.

The CPD says a presidential candidate must achieve 15 percent support in national polls in order to take part. The polling average is based off five polls, all tied to the major TV networks: ABC-Washington Post; CBS-New York Times; CNN-Opinion Research; Fox News; and NBC-Wall Street Journal.

The group says while Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump each received 43 percent and 40.4 percent in the polls, respectively, Johnson only got 8.4 percent and Stein got 3.2 percent.

Johnson said Friday in a statement that Americans were tired of rigged systems, and the CPD had created a monopoly on debates.

"The CPD may scoff at a ticket that enjoys only 9 or 10% in their hand-selected polls, but even 9% represents 13 million voters, more than the total population of Ohio and most other states. Yet, the Republicans and Democrats are choosing to silence the candidate preferred by those millions of Americans."



Stein tweeted the following:

Corporate political & media establishment is trying to manufacture consent for the least liked/trusted candidates ever. Stand up & say no!  Dr. Jill Stein (@DrJillStein) September 16, 2016

Last month the CPD did tell the networks to prepare for the chance a third candidate did reach the 15 percent threshhold, most likely Johnson.

The CPD says it will take another look at the polling before the second and third presidential debates, on Oct. 9 and Oct. 19.


All 41 died of natural causes, according to health ministry official

The number of Egyptian pilgrims who have died during this year's hajj in Saudi Arabia has reached 41 cases, MENA agency quoted an official from Egypt's health ministry as saying on Friday afternoon.

In media statements, the deputy health minister and head of Egypts official medical delegation to the hajj Ali Hegazy said that all the deaths were from natural causes.

He added that the clinics of the official delegation had treated 62,845 Egyptian pilgrims whereas 346 pilgrims were admitted to Saudi hospitals.

Twenty-six Egyptian pilgrims are still being treated in Saudi hospitals.

Over 80,000 Egyptian pilgrims are performing the hajj this year.

One of the five pillars of Islam, the hajj pilgrimage is considered an obligation by all Muslims who can afford the costly and difficult trip at least once in a lifetime.

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LUBBOCK  The National Sorghum Foundation and BASF announce a new joint scholarship program for the 2017-18 school year.

We are excited to offer the next generation of sorghum support for their education -- both inside the classroom and out in the industry, said Tim Lust, National Sorghum Producers CEO. Partnering with BASF offers these students the chance to attend the nations largest gathering of farmers and learn about the top issues and opportunities in agriculture.

The jointly offered scholarships will include an award for tuition as well as cover recipients participation in the 2017 Commodity Classic in San Antonio on March 2-4, 2017. Applicants must be the child or grandchild of a NSP member and be pursuing an undergraduate or graduate degree in an agriculturally related curriculum. Undergraduate applicants must be entering at least their second year of study for the 2017-2018 school year.

Interested students can apply for the scholarships at sorghumgrowers.com/sorghum-foundation. Applications are due by Dec. 1, 2016. For questions or to submit application materials, contact Debra Lloyd at debral@sorghumgrowers.com or 806-749-3478.

For information about the National Sorghum Foundation or these scholarship programs, visit sorghumgrowers.com/sorghum-foundation. For more information on Commodity Classic, visit http://www.commodityclassic.com/.
Congratulations to Buddy McGehee, volunteer of the month for RSVP. A native of Lampasas, he grew up and attended school in Lampasas. After graduation he attended Texas Tech University in Lubbock. He received his bachelors degree in Crop Science and graduated in May 1956. He is also a veteran having served in the U.S. Air Force as a pilot.

While he was attending Texas Tech he met the love of his life, Mary Ann. They married in December 1955. I was reminded that I helped plan their 50th anniversary celebration while I was the booking agent for the Plainview Civic Center and Country Club office manager. Now going on 60 1/2 years of marriage, I congratulate and commend them.

Buddy and Mary Ann had two daughters, Catherine Dolen of Dallas, who is an interior designer, and Celia Brown of Kingwood, an attorney. Together they cherish the time spent with their two great-grandchildren and five grandchildren -- three girls and two boys.

Buddy continued his education by enrolling in graduate school at Oklahoma State University and accomplishing his Ph.D. in genetics and plant breeding. Since graduating, Buddy has made a career and spent many years as a plant breeder with seed companies. Even though Buddy is now retired, he continues plant breeding in his nursery and does consulting on a part-time bases.

Buddy has been a longtime member of First Baptist Church. He has served Plainview Community Concerts, keeping the membership records, the Appraisal District Board, the City Council for eight years and is a committed Rotarian. Due to recent health issues, Buddy has had to make some changes, but he remains active.

When I asked about why and how he feels about volunteering I could tell instantly that he has a special place in his heart and appreciation for giving back to our community. Serving over 20 years for Meals on Wheels, Buddy has been loyal and often found coaxing fellow Rotarians to help deliver meals. Buddy enjoys staying in touch with old friends and making new ones. Volunteering gives him a different view of segments throughout our community. He feels a sense of being appreciated and needed while giving back.

In closing, I salute you sir for serving our country and thank you for all the services you provide in making our community a better place for all of us.

RSVP is a Ready To Serve Volunteer Program. We link volunteers aged 55 and over with community needs in Floyd, Hale, and Lamb counties for the past 42 years. To join or get more information about RSVP call 291-1223 or drop by our office located in the basement of Unger Memorial Library.

Irma Shackelford is director of Runningwater Draw RSVP. Phone 806-291-1223
Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service will offer the Professional Food Manager Certification Training Course on Oct. 5-7, with registration due Sept. 21.

Statistics indicate that foodborne illness continues to be a health issue in the United States. Each year, 1 in 6 Americans will become sick, 128,000 will become hospitalized, and 3,000 will die due to a foodborne illness.

Under the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) jurisdiction each food establishment is required to have one certified food manger employed by that establishment.

Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service, Lubbock County, is offering a professional food manager certification training course. This program will be offered for $1,250 on Oct. 5 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. (Day 1) Oct. 6 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. (Day 2) and Oct. 7 from 9 a.m. to noon for review and exam day (Day 3) at the Lubbock County Extension Office, 916 Main, Suite 201, Lubbock, TX 79401 . Cost includes training, materials and a national food manager certification examination. The food managers certification will be valid anywhere in the state of Texas for five years. Registration deadline is Sept. 21.

Additional Professional Food Manager Certification Training Course program dates include:

Nov. 30 and Dec. 1-2 in Hale County -- Nov. 30 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. (Day 1), Dec. 1 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. (Day 2) and Dec. 2 from 9 a.m. to noon, review and exam day (Day 3). Registration deadline is Nov.15.

This program is designed to not only prepare foodservice managers to pass the certification examination; it will provide valuable education regarding the safe handling of food. Almost 50 cents of every dollar Americans spend on food is spent on meals prepared away from home. Therefore, careful attention to food safety will help keep customers safe and satisfied.

Food borne illnesses are estimated to cost thousands of dollars in lost wages, insurance, and medical bills. With these statistics, knowledge of how to prevent foodborne illness is essential. The benefits of improved food safety include:

--Increased customer satisfaction

--Improved relationships with health officials

-Prevention of bad publicity and law suits due to foodborne illness

By attending the course, foodservice managers will learn about:

--identifying potentially hazardous foods and common errors in food handling

preventing contamination and cross-contamination of food

teaching and encouraging personal hygiene for employees

--complying with government regulations

--maintaining clean utensils, equipment and surroundings

--controlling pests

Food borne illnesses can be prevented by following simple food safety practices. For more information about the Professional Food Manager Certification Training course of Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service, called Food Safety: Its Our Business, call Deana Sageser, CEA-FCS at 806-291-5270 or email DLSageser@ag.tamu.edu or come by 225 Broadway Suite 6 in Plainview.
Plainview High School senior Austin Powell attended the Congress of Future Medical Leaders in June at Boston.

The congress is an honors-only program for high school students interested in becoming physicians or pursuing a career in medical research.

Students are nominated based on three criteria - they aspire to become physicians, scientists, or technologists; they demonstrate leadership potential; and they have a GPA of 3.5 or above, either current or cumulative.

The objective of the Congress is to offer attendees the opportunity to engage in meaningful, life-changing academic experiences that provide a head start toward achieving their dreams in the medical field.

At the congress, Powell heard Nobel laureates and National Medal of Science winners speak on leading medical research, witnessed stories told by patients who are living medical miracles, learned what to expect in medical school, and learned about cutting-edge advances and the future in medicine and medical technology. He had the opportunity to watch live surgery and question the surgeon in real-time.

Following the close of the congress, participants remain members of the National Academy of Future Physicians and Medical Scientists. The academy offers free services and programs to students who want to be physicians or go into medical science. As part of his attendance, he also will be participating in two Harvard courses online.

Austin is the son of Larry Powell and Delma Sanders. He has not yet selected a college for undergraduate studies, but plans to major in medicine.
The Rafah crossing will be open starting from Wednesday

Egypt will open the Rafah border crossing with Gaza on Wednesday for three days to allow the return of Palestinian pilgrims from Saudi Arabia, Egyptian state television announced Friday afternoon.

The Rafah border crossing was opened in late August and early September in both directions to allow the crossing of 3,500 Palestinians heading for Saudi Arabia to carry out the hajj.

The Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Sinai is the only way for the 1.8 million Palestinians in Gaza who have been living under Israeli siege since 2006 to enter and exit the strip.

The Egyptian government decided to close the crossing in October 2014 when an attack by Islamist militants in North Sinai left dozens of security personnel dead.

It opens the borders from time to time for short periods, often including major Islamic holidays.

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Gov. Jerry Brown signed legislation Thursday to increase state regulation of construction companies with troubled histories, a year after a deadly balcony collapse killed six students and injured seven others in Berkeley.

The new law, sponsored by Sens. Loni Hancock, D-Oakland, and Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo, requires licensed contractors to disclose any convictions or felonies related to their work to the Contractors State License Board within 90 days. It also mandates that Californias Department of Industrial Relations and Division of Occupational Safety and Health report any actions taken against contractors licenses.

This bill is an important step toward preventing another tragedy, Brown said in a statement, after signing the bill in a private ceremony with Irish dignitaries and the family of Rohnert Parks Ashley Donohoe, who fell to her death when the rotted fifth-floor balcony gave way from an apartment building at 2020 Kittredge St.

Two companies that worked on the building, Segue Construction Inc. of Pleasanton and its hired waterproofing outfit, R. Bros. Inc. of San Jose, had already come under scrutiny for alleged construction defects.

More for you Man charged with stalking Black Rifle Coffee employee

They were sued by the owners of a Millbrae condominium complex who claimed that mold and rot destroyed their balconies just three years after the buildings were completed.

That was just one in a slew of past lawsuits against Segue, which had paid $26.5 million in past construction settlements by the time the Berkeley balcony fell in June 2015.

It is my fervent hope that this measure brings at least some comfort to the families of the young people killed when this balcony collapsed, Hancock said in a statement, noting that the bereaved families might find solace knowing that this law will prevent similar catastrophes.

Rachel Swan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: rswan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @rachelswan
Buoyed by the success of its pioneering program to help African American boys succeed in school, the Oakland Unified School District is creating one for girls, officials announced.

The African American Girls and Young Women Achievement Program aims to give female students a place where they can find support and encouragement. It follows the highly regarded African American Male Achievement Program started in 2010.

That program was created to counteract the reality that in the previous decade, the number of African American men killed on the streets of Oakland nearly matched the number of black students who graduated from public high schools in the city and were ready to attend a state university.

Oakland Unified was the first school district in the nation to create a department with the sole focus of helping African American males while sponsoring a charter school specifically for black boys, though the school closed after 18 months.

More for you Man charged with stalking Black Rifle Coffee employee

Since then, districts nationwide have followed suit. The effort has been noticed by the Obama administration and its initiative to boost the academic performance of African Americans. Indications show the districts program is increasing attendance and reducing suspensions.

Chris Chatmon, deputy chief of equity for the district, wants to offer similar support for girls.

Ultimately, we want to create an extraordinary learning environment that helps girls of color meet the goals of graduating and being college-ready or community-ready, he said. We have work to do.

The district has hired Nzingha Dugas, formerly director of UC Berkeleys African American Student Development Office, to head the program. She started work Wednesday and will spend the first 100 days interviewing girls and their families, along with teachers, principals and community members, to decide what the school district needs to change, Chatmon said.

We want to follow the same scope of actions as in the male program, he said, but knowing they may not lead to the same strategies.

Michael Cabanatuan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: mcabanatuan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @ctuan

Even Odds

The Chronicle spent a year documenting the issues facing black students in Oakland, and the citys efforts to address the staggering odds against them, in a 2013 three-part series called Even Odds. To read the series, go to www.sfchronicle.com/evenodds.
A Palestinian tried to stab a police officer at the entrance to the Old City in occupied east Jerusalem on Friday and was shot dead, Israeli police claimed.

"The terrorist was shot dead by a police officer after he had tried to stab her," a police statement said.

No police officers or civilians were injured.

Police said the alleged attacker was 28 and held a Jordanian passport, having crossed the border between the two countries on Thursday afternoon.

Many Palestinians also hold Jordanian passports.

The attack took place at the Damascus Gate entrance to Jerusalem's tourist-heavy Old City, the main entrance for Palestinians.

Since the start of October, Israeli occupation forces have killed at least 226 Palestinians. Meanwhile, almost daily stabbings, shootings and car-ramming attacks by frustrated and unarmed Palestinians have killed 34 Israelis and a US citizen.

The current wave of protests by Palestinians and repression by Israeli occupation forces started in July 2015 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.

Settlement-building, racial discrimination, confiscation of identity cards, long queues at checkpoints, as well as daily clashes and the desecration of Al-Aqsa mosque, describe Palestinians' daily suffering.

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.

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 was edited by Ahram Online.

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Four affordable housing projects scattered among San Francisco neighborhoods will receive city money to jump-start development, the first allocation of $310 million in affordable housing funds city voters approved in November.

The projects will create 529 housing units in the Excelsior, the Mission, Forest Hills and the Western Addition. The target audience is varied as well  the projects have units for seniors, families and formerly homeless persons. The funding  aimed at predevelopment costs  comes in at just under $11 million.

We were excited to see sites in places like the Excelsior and Forest Hill, said Jeff Buckley, senior adviser to Mayor Ed Lee on housing issues. Equity in terms of where we are creating affordable housing is a big issue for the mayor.

In April, the Mayors Office of Housing and Community Development issued a notice of funding availability for affordable housing builders in need of predevelopment money, which covers areas like community outreach, design and environmental review. Six development teams responded with requests for a total of $17.5 million of Proposition A money.

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In the end, four were picked, including one in the Mission:

 Bridge Housing, proposing 114 units at 4840 Mission St. in the Excelsior, will receive $3 million to redevelop the site of a funeral home.

 Christian Church Homes, looking to build 150 apartments at 250 Laguna Honda Blvd., will get just under $2 million to build on a lot next to the Forest Hills Christian Church.

 The Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corp. will receive $3 million for 122 units at 500 Turk St., a former tire and auto repair shop.

 Mission Economic Development Agency and TNDC will receive $3 million for 1990 Folsom St., a former baked goods manufacturing plant.

The Excelsior project will be the first major new development along that stretch of Mission Street in decades and will pump life into a commercial district that has struggled during the current economic boom, said Supervisor John Avalos, who represents the area.

Its the first big shot at bringing back a corridor that hasnt been rebuilt since the 1950s, Avalos said. We worked hard to build community support for this. Im thrilled.

All of the projects include apartments that will accommodate formerly homeless people through the citys local operating subsidy program. In total, about 110 of the 529 units are part of that program.

While the predevelopment money wont pay for steel or concrete, it allows the nonprofit builders to take an initial design and turn it into a buildable project with architectural drawings and engineering and real-cost estimates. It also helps the developers go after other sources of money, whether affordable housing tax credits or bank loans. All four projects are likely to receive additional city funding.

The award gives Bridge Housing the confidence to dive into the application process, said Kevin Griffith, the builders director of development.

We are going to go as fast as we can toward getting approvals, he said. This site has everything we look for. It has vibrant shopping, access to public transit. We think its a very good place to add some more housing.

The two projects that did not receive money in this round were a proposal for the Bridge Motel site on Lombard Street in the Marina and a project proposed for a lot next to the Martin Luther King Towers on Cathedral Hill.

Affordable housing sources said that both projects could eventually receive financial support from the city but that both have challenges.

The residents in the Bridge Motel would have to be relocated and the site may require a portion of Lombard Street, which is Highway 101, to be blocked during construction.

The city would like to see the Cathedral Hill project redesigned to create more separation between an abutting residential building.

J.K. Dineen is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jdineen

@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @sfjkdineen
Two men accused of killing a 66-year-old Oakland woman because they believed she was filming them were convicted of murder Thursday in the 2013 slaying.

Mario Floyd, 24, of Oakland and Stephon Lee, 25, of Richmond were found guilty of killing Judy Salamon, a beloved neighborhood dog sitter and anticrime activist, after an Alameda County Superior Court jury deliberated for about a day following two weeks of testimony.

Floyd and Lee each face life in prison without the possibility of parole because the murder happened in the commission of robbery. Though Salamons phone was never recovered, witnesses told police that Floyd complained to Lee about a woman recording and following them before the shooting unfolded, just blocks away from Salamons home.

For Judy Salamon, this is the full extent of the law, Alameda County Deputy District Attorney Butch Ford, who prosecuted the case, said outside court. It is the maximum amount of punishment these two young men could suffer, and I dont have a problem with them being subject to that punishment because of what they did. And I hope the people who love Judy Salamon, who mourn her loss, are satisfied with the justice system.

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Investigators have said Salamon was filming Floyd and Lee because she believed they were burglarizing homes in the neighborhood, though prosecutors didnt find enough evidence of that notion to present in court.

Ford said he was relieved about the outcome given the difficulty he faced in getting reluctant witnesses to testify over fears of the defendants and their association with a neighborhood gang. Some called to testify have refused to take the oath to tell the truth, while others have skipped town to avoid coming to court.

Annie Beles, Floyds attorney, declined to comment on the outcome, but said in court that she will file a motion for a new trial ahead of Floyds sentencing. Darryl Stallworth, who represented Lee, the alleged shooter, said he was still weighing whether to file the same motion.

There was no physical evidence  no DNA, no footprints, no fingerprints, no weapon recovered. So that was the first leg, Stallworth said outside court. Then witnesses that were inconsistent, and I believed not to be credible. The combination of those things, I thought, were not enough to find an abiding conviction of the truth of the charges.

According to prosecutors, Floyd and Lee, who goes by the street name Feenie, were upset on the afternoon of July 24, 2013, believing that Salamon had been following them and filming them with her phone.

Floyd got out of a car on Fern Street near Fairfax Avenue, argued with Salamon and threw a trash bin at her, Ford said. Lee then allegedly fired three shots from a Glock pistol, one of which struck Salamon in the head, and got into the passengers seat of the mens car. Salamons car rolled backward and crashed into a parked vehicle.

The suspects made a U-turn at the top of a hill, prosecutors said, and returned to Salamon, who investigators believe was still alive and may have struggled with Floyd as he allegedly stole her phone. Floyds DNA was found on the victims fingernails, according to testimony from an expert witness.

Police seized Lees phone and discovered a pair of photos in it that appeared to show Salamons phone, one of which reflected Lees face. The photos may have been taken as Lee tried to sell the device, Ford said.

Though authorities dont believe Floyd was the shooter, jurors held him responsible for Salamons slaying under the states felony-murder rule, which allows people who didnt kill anyone to be charged with murder if they participated in a crime that led to a death  in this case, the robbery of Salamons phone.

Judy Salamons family is never going to be made whole, Ford said. These two young men  their families arent going to be made whole. There are no winners in this.

Friends of Salamon have mostly agreed with the sentiment. Theres no happiness to be found here, said longtime friend Eric, who only gave his first name. A 76-year-old woman who also only gave her first name, Joyce, said the punishment for Lee and Floyd  especially since the latter didnt pull the trigger  didnt sit completely well with her.

I guess I wanted them to be convicted of something, but the magnitude of this is so great, she said. Two people are going to be in prison for the rest of their lives.

Joyce said she met Salamon two years before her death at a Berkeley dog park, and they quickly became good friends, with Salamon dog-sitting for Joyce on multiple occasions.

I was just looking forward to having many more meetings with her, she said. And I guess I felt cheated when she died.

Lee is scheduled to be sentenced Oct. 14, and Floyd on Nov. 18.

Kimberly Veklerov is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kveklerov@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kveklerov
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Albany

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump on Thursday likened upstate to "a death zone" as he trashed Democrat Hillary Clinton's Senate record on bringing jobs upstate, and continued to insist that New York is in play in November.

"When we go up there, we get these massive crowds of people that are looking for change and they're looking for hope," Trump said on Talk 1300's "Live from the State Capitol." "And I said, 'Why can't we win, as an example, New York?' And, by the way, if we won New York, the race is over. But why can't we win New York? And it polls well."

In fact, Trump does not poll very well in New York.

Siena College's August poll showed that Clinton had increased her lead to 30 percent in the Empire State, and another Siena poll released days later shows that New York voters believe Trump actually hurts state Senate Republicans in their bid to maintain their grip on the chamber's majority.

Quinnipiac's July New York poll showed a closer race, though a lead for Clinton (47-35 percent statewide).

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Trump does poll better upstate. Though Siena's August poll still had Clinton up 48-37 percent, the Q poll had Trump leading 48-36 percent north of the New York City suburbs in a head-to-head matchup.

Nevertheless, "I'm going to play New York very heavy," Trump said. "Look, it's my place. This is where I live. I love the people. I think they love me. Based on the primaries, it was one of the biggest margins ever won by that number. So ... maybe something can happen.

The candidate danced around a question about whether Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat and Clinton surrogate, secretly wants Trump to win so he could run for president in 2020. But Trump did say he and the governor get along "very well."

"We had a long talk. We were actually talking to each other for a long while," Trump said of his interaction with Cuomo at the 9/11 Memorial in Manhattan on Sunday.

What did they talk about?

"Just the weather," Trump said. "We were just talking about how nice and cool it was. It was actually a beautiful day."

Cuomo spokesman John Kelly said the event was "not a time for politics. The governor welcomes all well-wishers to New York to remember this solemn occasion."

mhamilton@timesunion.com  518-454-5449  @matt_hamilton10
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Troy

When Daniel Bornhorst was sworn in Friday morning as one of the city's five new recruits for the fire department, he knew his appointment was part of a swirling social media conversation and telephone calls in and outside the city.

On the night of his 21st birthday, Bornhorst, now 34, pleaded guilty to killing a Schenectady man in a drunken driving accident. Bornhorst was sentenced to a maximum of four years in prison for vehicular manslaughter, vehicular assault and driving while intoxicated.

Bornhorst said the "unfortunate decision" he made to drive after drinking that night is the "talk of the town." He said he has to deal with it and work on it for the rest of his life.

After visiting several bars on Oct. 19, 2002, Bornhorst was dropped off by a limousine, authorities said. He drove his 1998 GMC Sierra truck along Route 4 and crossed into the oncoming lane, colliding with a 1998 Nissan Maxima. Driver Sewdat Poonai, 37, was killed and his two passengers were injured.

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Bornhorst didn't hide his background during the interview process. He obtained the necessary permission from the state Health Department to work as a paramedic. He has a certificate of relief from the state Department of Corrections and Community Services that permits him to work in jobs that a felony conviction would prevent him from obtaining.

At his 2003 sentencing, Bornhorst said, "Even on the sunniest day, there will be a dark cloud hanging over me. I will live with this for the rest of my life. I can't ask you to forgive me. I can only say I'm sorry."

Bornhorst has worked for the last three years as a firefighter in the Rensselaer Fire Department and as a volunteer in the North Greenbush ambulance service, he and Troy officials confirmed.

"We vetted everybody," Mayor Patrick Madden said.

The mayor said he was confident of the background checks.

"I would hope he has not only straightened himself out, but gotten help," City Council President Carmella Mantello said.

Bornhorst and the other four new firefighters  Thane Reilly, Noah Cipperly, Devvan Farina and Kyle Molesky  all have their paramedic certificates.

The city still has two openings in the fire department.

Fire Chief Thomas Garrett said the department is dealing with not being able to find qualified candidates with paramedic certifications.

Each certified recruit saves the city $120,000 that would be spent for the recruit to obtain the certification, the chief said. The city is counting on a new training program with Hudson Valley Community College to get potential firefighters trained as paramedics and certified before they are hired. The city hopes this will help minority recruiting and diversify the fire department's ranks.

kcrowe@timesunion.com  518-454-5084
It was the second violent incident on Friday, after a 28-year-old man was shot dead in Jerusalem while allegedly attempting to stab police officers.

Two Palestinians rammed a car into a bus stop used by Israelis in the occupied West Bank on Friday, causing injuries before troops killed one of the assailants, the occupation army claimed.

The attack came shortly after Israeli occupation police said they shot dead a Palestinian who tried to stab police officers in annexed east Jerusalem.

"Two assailants rammed a vehicle into a civilian bus stop at the Elias junction near the community of Kiryat Arba," the Israeli military said in a statement.

It said three people were wounded.

"Forces at the scene fired at the vehicle resulting in the death of one of the assailants while the other was wounded," the army said.

The Palestinian health ministry identified the dead suspect as Fares Khadour.

Kiryat Arba is an Israeli settlement in the southern West Bank close to the flashpoint Palestinian city of Hebron.

It was the second violent incident on Friday, after a 28-year-old man was shot dead in Jerusalem while allegedly attempting to stab police officers.

That attack came at the Damascus Gate entrance to east Jerusalem's tourist-heavy Old City, the main entrance for Palestinians.

Since the start of October, Israeli occupation forces have killed at least 226 Palestinians. Meanwhile, almost daily stabbings, shootings and car-ramming attacks by frustrated and unarmed Palestinians have killed 34 Israelis and a US citizen.

The current wave of protests by Palestinians and repression by Israeli occupation forces started in July 2015 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.

Settlement-building, racial discrimination, confiscation of identity cards, long queues at checkpoints, as well as daily clashes and the desecration of Al-Aqsa mosque, describe Palestinians' daily suffering.

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.

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.

*This article was edited by Ahram Online.

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This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate 5 1 of 5 The Arthur Szyk Society / Contributed photo Show More Show Less 2 of 5 The Arthur Szyk Society / Contributed photo Show More Show Less 3 of 5 4 of 5 The Arthur Szyk Society / Contributed photo Show More Show Less 5 of 5









Born into a prosperous, middle-class Jewish family in Poland in 1894, Arthur Szyk, above, would go on to live in France and the United Kingdom before moving to America and eventually settling in New Canaan.

A book illustrator and political artist, Szyk is best known for his World War II anti-Nazi political art and his depiction of the Haggadah, the story of the departure of the Israelites from ancient Egypt traditionally told every year during the Passover Seder dinner. From 1934 to 1936, Szyk illustrated the Haggadah in 48 miniature paintings, including references to Germanys anti-Semitic policies.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov urged U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Friday to deliver on his promise to separate moderate Syrian opposition from the Nusra Front and other "terrorist groups", Russia's Foreign Ministry said.

Lavrov, in a telephone conversation with Kerry, also reiterated the need to publish "the entire package" of the Syria ceasefire agreement, the ministry said.

The Nusra Front, associated with the al-Qaeda network, has been renamed Jabhat Fatah al Sham.

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The U.S. State Department said on Friday it had designated the leader of a group of French foreign fighters in Syria and a senior Hamas official as specially designated global terrorists, a move that freezes their U.S. assets.

The department described the first man, Omar Diaby, as the leader of a group of about 50 foreign fighters in Syria that has taken part in terrorist operations with Nusra Front, an insurgent group that has renamed itself Jabhat Fateh al- Sham.

The second man, named as Fathi Ahmad Mohammad Hammad, is a former Hamas interior minister, a position he used to coordinate terrorist cells, the department said in a separate statement.

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Egyptian comedian Fouad El-Mohandes was born on 6 September 1924 and began acting in his school years, taking part in school plays and then in university theatre while a student at the Faculty of Commerce, Cairo University.



The first significant step in the acting career was when, in 1953, he joined the radio programme Saa Li-Qalbak (An Hour for Your Heart) and in 1955, he co-founded a theatre troupe with the same name.

The troupe gave several well-known performances, such as Kan Min Al-Awal (It Was About Time).



El-Mohandes then embarked on a career in a television theatre, with roles in plays such as Ana Wa Huwa Wa Hiyya (I, He and She, 1962) and Al-Sekerteir Al-Fanni (The Technical Secretary, 1963) bringing him to the attention of a large and appreciative audience.

Later in the 1960s, he acted in Ana Wa Huwa Wa Sumuwwuh (I, He and his Highness, 1966) and Sayyidati Al-Gamila (an Egyptian adaptation of My Fair Lady, 1968) staged by the United Artists' Troupe which he cofounded.El-Mohandes formed a famed comedy duo with his wife Shweikar and they were especially known for acting in the Egyptian Comedy Troupe. The plays staged by the troupe include Hello, Dolly (1971), Leih, Leih (Why, Oh Why?; 1976) and Innaha Haqan Aaila Muhtarama (It's Quite a Respectable Family; 1978), among others.El-Mohandes' film career thrived in parallel, and he acted in dozens of movies, often opposite Shweikar. Among his famous appearances are in films such as Ghaltat Umr (The Mistake of a Lifetime, 1953), Bint Al-Geiran (The Neighbours' Daughter, 1954), Shanabou Fil- Masyada (Shanabou in the Trap), Inta Illi Qatalt Babaya (It Was You Who Killed My Father) and Mutarada Gharamiyya (Amorous Chase).His roles in the soap operas include Uyun (Eyes), Azwag Lakin Ghurba (Married but Estranged) and El-Zair El-Maghoul (The Unknown Visitor) and several unforgettable Ramadan programmes.

Not only was El-Mohandes one of the most famous Egyptian actors and comedians, he was also praised for his impeccable diction, which is believed he owed to his father, Egyptian linguist and scholar Zaki Mohandes, a university dean.El-Mohandes garnered numerous local awards including the State Merit Award, which was offered to him in 2005.Most recently, on 6 September, Google marked what would have been the 92nd birthday of the late actor with a Google Doodle featuring the star.El-Mohandes passed away on 16 September 2006.Following his death, in 2006, Al-Ahram Weekly published an obituary which concludes that: "Alongside this substantial, multi-faceted artistic legacy, El-Mohandes will be remembered for his sense of decorum and for a devotion to comedy that never descended into cheap farce, while his faith in team spirit and the support he extended to younger comedians, such as Adel Imam, served to underline his generosity as a performer."

For more arts and culture news and updates, follow Ahram Online Arts and Culture on Twitter at @AhramOnlineArts and on Facebook at Ahram Online: Arts & Culture

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Last October marked David Molak's 16th birthday and the onset of months-long alleged bullying his family said was committed at the hands of some fellow Alamo Heights High School students.

His family believes that bullying led to Molak's January suicide that shook Alamo Heights, San Antonio and the nation.

A year later, a local teen is working to promote the kindness David Molak's family said he did not always receive from his peers. Abigail Dickson, 18, has coordinated a benefit concert honoring the late teen's 17th birthday on Oct. 10 at Christ Episcopal Church at 510 Belknap Place.

RELATED: Alamo Heights student was a victim of bullying before committing suicide, family says

"As a community, is is important that we support the Molak family, and we continue to show honor and respect the life of David,"Dickson, who did not know David Molak personally but says the issue is important to her, told mySA.com.

The event, from 6 to 8 p.m., will feature Musicians of the San Antonio Symphony who will play classical music as well as "a few of David's favorites" starting at 7 p.m. in the church's sanctuary.

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"Help us put an end to bullying as well as raise awareness of cyberbullying in honor of David on this significant day," details on a Facebook event page said.

In addition to live music, there will be refreshments, an "instrument petting zoo" where children can get hands-on with equipment and a raffle benefiting David's Legacy Foundation, an organization dedicated to raising awareness of cyberbullying and its effects as well as aiding the passage and implementation of David's Law, according to DavidsLegacy.org.

RELATED: Exclusive: Fellow students threatened violence, insulted David Molak online before his suicide

David Molak's story garnered statewide, then national exposure, when his brother, Cliff Molak, authored a viral Facebook post announcing David Molak's death.

"He just felt that people hated him," Cliff Molak told mySA.com last year, when he also supplied screenshots of the alleged social media abuse in which his brother was called an "ape" along with a list of threats.

Cliff Molak told mySA.com he's "beyond grateful" for Dickson.

"I can't imagine a better way to honor his life on his birthday," he added. "The support has been demonstrated and continues to show in the wake of tragedy is a testament to the community's solidarity and commitment to David's Law as well as the health and well-being of today's young people."

In August, state Sen. Jose Menendez requested the Senate Criminal Justice Committee to consider regulating cyber bullying with David Molak's story as an example of its gut-wrenching implications.

RELATED: S.A. senator looking to combat cyberbullying with 'David's Law'

Menendez's proposal, "David's Law," would give police and school districts more authority to "crack down on those perpetrating anonymous online attacks," according to a mySA.com report.

My goal, our hope, is that Davids Law will empower school administrators and law enforcement to go after and reprimand the bullies who prey on the students, Menendez said at the August news conference, according to the report.

RELATED: Bird Bakery, owned by Armie Hammer, honors David Molak with special cupcake benefiting family

The legislature will convene in January.

"(The Molaks) have raised awareness of the realities of cyber bullying, and have helped to give a voice to the victims who have no voice," Dickson said. "Most importantly, they have honored their precious son's life."

mmendoza@mysa.com

Twitter: @MaddySkye
Mary Duhart-Toppen, who has been the principal at Kirby Middle School the last two years, has been selected to take lead Wagner High School. The move fills the vacancy left by Donald Stewart, who served as Wagners principal for the last two years before taking the assistant superintendent job at Natalia ISD.

Duhart-Toppen has been with JISD since 2001, serving as assistant principal at Wagner and Judson high schools before moving to Kirby Middle School. While at Kirby she brought the school out of an improvement required status to meeting state academic standards.

As Duhart-Toppen assumes leadership at Wagner, Jerome Johnson will move from Candlewood Elementary School to Kirby Middle School. Candlewood will be led by Interim Principal Stephanie Mihleder until a permanent decision is made.

Kirby

City sets community garage sale

The City of Kirby will have a community-wide garage sale Sept. 16-18, from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily. This is an opportunity to sell any unwanted items.

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Residents who participate can place one homemade sign on their property. The addresses of participants will be posted on the citys website (www.kirbytx.org) and a flyer with a list of participants will be available at Kirby City Hall. Call 210-661-3198 to be placed on the list of participants.

Deadline nearing for Fiesta poster contest

The Fiesta Commission is asking area artists to participate in a new poster contest for Fiesta Fiesta, the official kickoff to the Party with a Purpose.

The design and elements will be used in official Fiesta merchandise and be adapted to an Official Fiesta Fiesta Medal and T-shirt.

Deadline for submission is noon Sept. 30. Entries must be submitted before the deadline to the Fiesta Commission Office, 2611 Broadway. Office hours are Monday through Thursday 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., and 8:30 a.m. to noon on Fridays.

The winning artist will receive $2,000 and 5 percent of net profit on merchandise inspired by the poster.

For more information call 210-227-5191, ext. 101, or email mari@fiesta-sa.org.

Gervin-Hawkins gets surprise challenger for state House seat

Laura Thompson, the interim state representative in Texas House District 120, has gathered enough signatures to qualify as an independent candidate on the Nov. 8 ballot, providing a late challenge to Democratic nominee Barbara Gervin-Hawkins.

The Texas Secretary of State notified Thompson on Sept. 8 that she had met the requirements of the Texas Election Code to be added to the ballot as an independent.

The ruling negated a previous determination that she failed to meet a July 1 deadline to gather at least 500 valid signatures.

Thompson, a certified mediator, said the reversal came after she provided information to validate signatures that had been disqualified previously.

In an August special election, Thompson won the seat vacated in January by former state Rep. Ruth Jones McClendon, D-San Antonio. Thompson prevailed by 50 votes over special election candidate Lou Miller in the district that encompasses parts of the East and Northeast Sides, Windcrest, Kirby and Converse.

Thompsons term will end in January when the 85th Legislature convenes. In the meantime, shell be able to say shes running for re-election.

Thompsons win in August was a rare feat for any independent running for the Legislature. Researchers said it was the first time since 1961 that an unaffiliated candidate had prevailed.

Gervin-Hawkins earned her spot on the Nov. 8 ballot by winning the six-candidate Democratic party primary, which required a runoff. With no Republican candidates, some Democrats began referring to Gervin-Hawkins as state representative-elect, but that title was premature.

Universal City

Veterans Park group selling pavers

The Veterans Park Committee is selling pavers that will be placed around the flag at the city park. Standard-size pavers cost $75. Pavers measuring 12x12 are also available. Order forms can be picked up at VFW Post 4676 at 202 W. Aviation in Universal City and at American Legion Post 667, 504 Bowie, Universal City.

Police department hosts National Night out kickoff

The Universal City Police Department will host the 2016 National Night Out kickoff event at Universal City Park on Saturday, Oct. 1 from 3-6 p.m.

Organizers said the free event will include public safety demonstrations. Police, fire, emergency vehicles and an Air Life helicopter will be at the family-oriented event. McGruff the Crime Dog will make an appearance.

From staff reports
SAN ANTONIO  A 23-year-old man died Thursday after being shot in a Northwest Side home invasion earlier that morning, according to police and the medical examiners office.

Tony Alexis died at 12:12 p.m. Thursday at University Hospital after being shot at about 5:15 a.m. the same day.
A third grade teacher was arrested Thursday in Round Rock for allegedly placing a video camera in a womens restroom at school, according to the Williamson County Sheriffs Office.

Robert Lance Bradley, a 36-year-old teacher at Fern Bluff Elementary School, is charged with a state jail felony of invasive visual recording. His bond is set at $11,000, according to jail records.

RELATED: APD: Woman sexually assaulted boy in church bathroom on Mother's Day

The camera was found on Sept. 14 stashed in a Styrofoam cup and was pointed toward the bathroom stall, according to a news release.

Bradley is seen setting up the camera and leaving the restroom on a video on the device, police said.

An adult female later entered the restroom, used the facilities and then left the restroom. Bradley then returned to the bathroom and retrieved the camera, police said.

RELATED: Former Texas Wal-Mart employee accused of secretly recording nearly 20 women at the store

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Bradley has been working for the school since 2007.

Round Rock Independent School District did not immediately return requests for comment regarding the current status of Bradleys employment.

KXAN reports Bradley was immediately removed from campus after they were notified of the incident. The district told the TV station the no students were recorded by the camera.

RELATED: Police: Texas woman took photos of passed out, naked roommate, sent to family

If convicted, Bradley faces up to two years in prison for the felony charge.

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twhite@mysa.com

Twitter: @tylerlwhite
BOERNE  A retired San Antonio physician is appealing her conviction on three counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, which stemmed from an altercation last year with tubers she accused of trespassing on her business property in Sisterdale.

Kathleen Daniel had been ordered to report to the Kendall County Jail on Wednesday to begin serving a 30-day stint state District Judge Keith Williams imposed as a condition of the two years probation a jury recommended.
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WASHINGTON  Houston Democrat Sheila Jackson Lee and other members of the Congressional Black Caucus blasted Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump Friday for his belated admission that President Barack Obama was born in America.

The black lawmakers, who have long viewed Trump's "birther" charge as an attempt to discredit the nation's first African-American president, denounced Trump's sudden reversal as a transparent attempt to make himself more palatable to mainstream voters in the midst of a skin-tight race with Democrat Hillary Clinton.

"If you view America as a land of value and equality and justice, this man cannot be elected," Jackson Lee said. "We as African Americans have had enough. He has debased this election, but more importantly, he has disgraced himself in his lack of respect for the president of the United States."

Trump did not explain what caused him to change his mind or offer any apology for his leading role over many years in pushing the false narrative of a foreign-born president ineligible to serve in the Oval Office.

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After declining several opportunities in recent weeks to set the record straight  Obama was born in Hawaii in 1961 of a Kenyan father and American mother  Trump announced his new position at the end of an appearance to mark the opening of his new hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue, a few blocks from the White House.

"President Barack Obama was born in the United States. Period," Trump said. "Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again."

Trump took no questions from reporters. But his campaign sought to shift the blame to Clinton, falsely accusing her of having started the birther controversy. The claim, made in a statement Thursday night from Trump spokesman Jason Miller, is sometimes based on a 2008 interview in which Clinton was pressed on whether she believed Obama  then her rival for the Democratic nomination  was a Muslim.

"No. Why would I? There is nothing to base that on, as far as I know," Clinton said. The question, however, was not about Obama's birthplace.

Miller's statement linked to a 2007 Clinton campaign policy memo that questioned Obama's international background and "lack of American roots," but not his birthplace.

Clinton said Trump's final acknowledgement of Obama's birthplace was not enough. "For five years, he has led the birther movement to delegitimize our first black president," Clinton said Friday at the Black Women's Agenda Symposium in Washington. "His campaign was founded on this outrageous lie."

Obama poked fun at Trump's birther theory, telling reporters at the White House Friday that "I was pretty confident about where I was born."

As recently as Wednesday, Trump said in an interview with the Washington Post that he was not prepared to say that Obama was born in the United States, fueling a controversy that many black leaders see as sign of racism.

"Mr. Trump could not bring himself to do so because he has lived a life of bigotry," Jackson Lee said.
Tarik Akan, an acclaimed Turkish actor who earned accolades for the controversial 1982 film "Yol," has died after a brief battle with cancer. He was 66.



The Nazim Hikmet Culture and Arts Foundation, of which Akan was a board member, said the actor died early Friday. Turkey's state-run Anadolu news agency said Akan had been receiving treatment for lung cancer at a private hospital in Istanbul.



Akan starred in over 100 films and directed documentaries and television series in a career spanning more than four decades. He was among the country's leading actors in the 1970s and 1980s and earned an Honorable Mention at the 35th Berlin International Film Festival in 1985 for the film "Pehlivan."

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Five smugglers and 52 immigrants from various countries suspected of being in the country illegally were apprehended from a stash house Wednesday in Edinburg.

RELATED: South Texas 'stash house' discovered, 34 undocumented immigrants found inside

In a joint investigation, the Edinburg Police Department and Hidalgo County officials found 57 people crammed in deplorable conditions after obtaining consent to search a home where they saw suspicious activity, according to a U.S. Customs and Border Protection news release.

RELATED: Traffic stop leads to discovery of 25 migrants in South Texas stash house

Five of the 57 were identified as caretakers and smugglers from Mexico, and were arrested. Their cases were referred to the RGV Sector Prosecutions Office to face charges, according to the release.

RELATED: More than 30 people from Mexico, Central America rescued from 'stash house' on South Texas border

Officials said the undocumented immigrants are from Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua.

kbradshaw@express-news.net

Twitter: @kbrad5
Total Wine & More: Winery Direct Partner of the Week

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Meli Melo is a French word that means hodgepodge. It's fabulous Cabernet blended with other Bordeaux varietals that has deep flavors of blackberries, figs, plums and spice. It finishes long with fine-grained tannins. A down-to-earth Cabernet from master winemaker Philippe Melka. Winemaker Philippe Melka honed his skills by working at some of the world's most prestigious estates, including Chateau Haut Brion, Dominus, and Chateau Petrus. Philippe Melka was named one of the top 9 wine consultants in the world by wine critic Robert Parker. Melka specializes in producing high quality Bordeaux blends that express the terroir of their vineyards.

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VILLAGERS in Muchesu, Binga who were given a three months notice to vacate their ancestral land to pave way for a Chinese coal mining project, have been promised pieces of land to the East of Binga.

This was revealed during a consultative meeting held between the villagers and management from the Chinese company, Monaf last week.

But local Ward 12 councillor Matthias Mwinde told Sunday Southern Eye that the villagers would only relocate after their compensation demands have been met.

We discussed this with the company (on Tuesday) and the villagers laid down their demands and concerns. People demanded good shelter, roads and clean water. The company has found a place where we are going to be placed and its in the East of Muchesu village, Binga East site, Mwinde said.

This was in preparation for the resettlement and we assume that the company will meet the demands of the people because if they dont, we are going to have problems with them. People agreed that they will stay put until Monaf constructs the houses.

Mwinde said villagers wanted big fields for communal farming activities.

Our biggest challenge is that the company said no one will be provided with the big fields. We have big fields and we are used to farming, and the promised 200 square metres of land is not enough. he said.

We do livestock farming and the company wont provide any space for us to keep our livestock. We are so worried about our future right now because the majority of people are too old to start looking for jobs. The elders are used to farming. This will be a challenge for them to adapt into a new life at their ages.

He also cast doubt that the company would build new schools as promised.

But in the meantime they will be providing transport for students. We are also not sure if this is true because schools will be more than five kilometers to where we are moving to. We dont know if they will fulfill their promises, said Mwinde.

The eviction of the Binga villagers has raised concern in other parts of the district that they may also be relocated to pave way for other mining projects.

Reports of relocation reportedly bring sad memories among the Tonga people who are still angry following their forced relocation from their ancestoral lands in the 1950s from the banks of the Zambezi River where they used to reside.

Thousands of Tonga people in the Zambezi Valley were forcibly removed from their lands in the Zambezi River in the 1950s to pave way for the construction of the Kariba dam.

 The Standard

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The new president of parent group Seven & i Holdings Co. has big plans on how to turn the convenience store chain around.

TOKYO  The new boss of 7-Elevens parent company, Seven & i Holdings Co., promised to unveil a plan to bolster the convenience store chains success around the world within 100 days of taking office. However, President Ryuichi Isaka has been in office for nearly four months without delivering anything specific, Bloomberg reports.

Since Isakas installation, Seven & i Holdings shares dropped 8%, with the decrease so far in 2016 reaching 22%. The retailer has also seen its market value plummet more than $10 billion, as domestic customers have pulled back on spending and international competition has heated up.

However, Seven & i Holdings has said a strategic growth plan, along with its second-quarter earnings statement, will be announced on October 6. While specific details have not been released, Isaka has said he wants to add to the number of U.S. 7-Eleven locations and change up their menus to include burritos and Mediterranean pasta. That could be a nice frontier for the company if things go well, said Naoki Fujiwara, chief fund manager at Shinkin Asset Management Co.

By being late on the first promise, Isaka might risk being seen as a weak leader, said Howard Yu with the International Institute for Management Development. For a CEO, not only colleagues but the investor community are forming opinions based on limited information, and those opinions [can be] long-lasting.

Industry analysts have speculated that Isaka will focus on regaining prominence in the Japanese market, where it has the most stores. Competitors Lawson and FamilyMart have made serious inroads into 7-Eleven Japans primacy.
Yves here. Since at least the early 2000s, the Department of Defense has identified flooding as a major geopolitical risk, since it will produce destabiilzing mass migrations. In the US, we tend to underestimate the impact of floods, since the main impact has been damage to property, and (at least so far) there has been a propensity to rebuild in the flooded areas rather than condemn then and force relocation (except of course for poor people in places like New Orleans). But as floods become more severe and frequent, rebuilding will become a less viable option. And failing to manage these disasters and their aftermaths will be destabilizing.

By Sunita Narain, the Director of Centre for Science and Environment and the Editor of Down To Earth, an environment fortnightly magazine. Originally published at Triple Crisis

Bihar chief minister, Nitish Kumar, whose state is submerged under water reportedly told the prime minister that he wants to cry. We should add our tears to his. This years floods not only have the imprint of our gross and near criminal mismanagement, but also mark the beginning of the world risked because of climate change. This should worry us. In fact, scare us. We need to realise that we do not have the luxury of delayed action and petty party politics. In this climate-risked world, where we are hit by a double whammy, we need to ensure that not only do we get development right, but we also need to do this at a scale and speed we have never done before.

The 2016 floods are huge in its scalevirtually all parts of the country have been hit by devastation. And remember, it is not just about some water that enters homes. Floods claim lives, destroy property and crops. In this way, all the years of developmental efforts are lost in one stroke. It is also clear that we worry about floods only when it affects the urban population. Even during the deadly 2013 Uttarakhand floods, the tragedy reached our television screens only because of the large numbers of people who died or were trapped in the swirling waters. Floods do not, otherwise, get serious media coverage. We do not know how bad the situation is or how it is getting worse. Floods then have become part of the cycle of boredom; they will come every year. So, what is new?

What is new is that each year the intensity and size of floods are increasing. What is also new is that this year, floods are happening in the time of drought. What is also new is that this year, it is evident that floods are not because of normal or even excess rainfall, but because of extreme and horrific rain eventsrain that gushes down from the sky in record time to take over land and property.

In this issue of Down To Earth, my colleagues have carefully investigated this newness in floods. So, on the one hand, floods are destroying vast parts of the country because of how we have mismanaged our floodplainswillfully allowing encroachments on riverbeds, drains and storage lakes. Then we have built embankments and dams for flood protection that are making things worse. This is because by building embankmentswalls to hold river water from spillingthe silt accumulates and raises the riverbed. Today when the river has water, it spreads over land, causing floods.

But on the other hand, there is also something new afoot. Extreme rain events. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) divides extreme rainfall events into two categoriesrainfall of 124.5-244.4 mm in 24 hours is very heavy and rainfall more than that is extremely heavy. In July alone, Assam recorded six very heavy rainfall days. In Madhya Pradeshs Burhanpur and Betul districts, in one dayon July 12it rained to ruin completely. This is because rainfall was 1,000-1,200 per cent higher than normal. On August 20, Bihars 12 districts recorded very heavy or extreme rain events. In drought-hit Rajasthan, in just one dayon August 11rainfall was 100 per cent above normal. In Pali and Sikar districts of the otherwise dry state, on that day, it rained so much that it broke all records1,000 per cent above normal. The list goes on and on.

In each case what this has meant is as follows. One, the same region, in one stroke (literally) has gone from extreme and back-breaking drought to extreme and back-breaking flood. Two, in many cases, even when there is extreme flood in the state, the total rainfall received is below normal. In Assam, even when 90 per cent of the state is under water, the rainfall received was 25 per cent below normal. It is important to understand the newness in the growing numbers of very heavy rain events. The fact is that scientists have long warned that as the planet warms, not only will it rain more, but this rain will become more variable and more extreme. This is what we are beginning to see more and more.

My colleagues have also studied what scientists understand about the nature of clouds, and this points to yet another worrying discovery. It is possible that the air pollution that is choking us in our cities, is also disrupting the nature of cloud formation and leading to extreme rain events (On clouds, Down To Earth, 16-31 August). The interaction between human-made aerosolstiny organic and inorganic particlesand clouds is changing the nature of monsoon, say scientists. They find that these microscopic pollutants act as sites where water vapour condenses to form cloud droplets. The greater the number of aerosols, the higher the droplets. But then as natures interactions also show, the result is not linear or simple. This interaction between aerosols and droplets that form clouds could lead to less rain; it could lead to extreme rain and it could lead to lightening that, in turn, kills and maims on the ground. Despite the uncertainties that exist, what is certain is that change is happening; fast and deadly. It is time we took note of this new extreme reality of floods.
Resonator with nanoscale features detects dangerous chemicals in the environment (Nanowerk News) Inspired by the anatomy of insects, an interdisciplinary research team at the University of Alberta has come up with a novel way to quickly and accurately detect dangerous airborne chemicals.

The work started with Arindam Phani, a graduate student in U of As Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering, who observed that most insects have tiny hairs on their body surfaces, and it is not clear what the hairs are for. Trying to make sense of what these hairs may be capable of, Phani designed experiments involving a forest of tiny hairs on a thin vibrating crystal chip, under the guidance of his academic advisor Thomas Thundat, the Canada Research Chair in Oil Sands Molecular Engineering. The two joined forces with Vakhtang Putkaradze, Centennial Professor in the University of Albertas Department of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences.

The experiments and subsequent theoretical explanation formed the crux of a new study published in the September 6 issue of Scientific Reports ("A nanostructured surface increases friction exponentially at the solid-gas interface").

Vakhtang Putkaradze and Arindam Phani (seated), along with Thomas Thundat, have created a resonator with nanoscale features to detect dangerous chemicals in the environment.

We wanted to do something that nobody else does, says Putkaradze, a mathematician who is also a renowned expert in the field of mechanics. When using resonators as sensors, most people want to get rid of dissipation or friction because its considered highly undesirable, it tends to obscure what you are trying to measure. We have taken that undesirable thing and made it useful.

Sensing chemicals without chemical receptors has been a challenge in normal conditions, says Thundat, a world-leading expert in the field of sensing. We realized that there is a wealth of information contained in the frictional loss of a mechanical resonator in motion and is more pronounced at the nanoscale.

The idea is that any object moving rapidly through the air can probe the properties of the surrounding environment. Imagine having a wand in your hand and moving it back and forth, andeven with your eyes closedyou can feel whether the wand is moving through air, water, or honey, just by feeling the resistance. Now, picture this wand with billions of tiny hairs on it, moving back and forth several million times per second, and just imagine the sensing possibilities.

With the nanostructures, we can feel tiny changes in the air surrounding the resonator, says Putkaradze. This sensitivity makes the device useful for detecting a wide variety of chemicals.

Phani, who is the first author on the publication, believes similar mechanisms involving motions of nano-hairs may be used for sensing by living organisms. Because the friction is changing dramatically with minute changes in the environment and is easy to measure, it may be possible to eventually produce a gadget of the size similar to or slightly larger than a Rubiks cube and designed to plug into a wall.

At present, the groups device is geared primarily to sensing chemical vapors in air.

We are thinking that this device can work like a smaller and cheaper spectrometer, measuring chemicals in the parts-per-million range, says Putkaradze.

Putkaradze explains that, apart from size and reasonable cost, what sets the device apart from larger and more expensive equipment is its versatility. Because our sensor is not directed to detect any specific chemical, it can interpret a broad range, and it doesnt require that we actually attach the molecules to anything to create a mechanical response, meaning that its also reusable.

The team adds that the most immediate and obvious use will be for environmental air quality monitoring. Says Putkaradze, we would like to work with applications like law enforcement and scientific laboratories, but the most obvious use is for environmental observation of chemical air pollution in cities and the resource industry.
Deep insight into interfaces (Nanowerk News) Interfaces between different materials and their properties are of key importance for modern technology. Together with an international team, physicists of Wurzburg University have developed a new method, which allows them to have an extremely precise glance at these interfaces and to model their properties.

In his Nobel Lecture on December 8, 2000, Herbert Kroemer coined the saying the interface is the device. Kroemer referred to the mature field of semiconductor heterostructures, which form the basis of all modern electronics.

However, now, in the advent of novel, powerful devices based on the more complex and versatile topological and correlated materials, the statement is timelier than ever. Such materials are at the focus of research in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Wurzburg University: Currently, 16 groups are working in this field, and a Collaborative Research Center (CRC 1170) was established in 2015, which is funded by the German Science Foundation (DFG) with nearly 10 Million euro.

This thin film of lanthanum cobalt oxide shows a sequence of positively and negatively charged atomic layers, stacked to a 15 nanometer thin film. Without electronic reconstruction an enormous electrostatic field would form between the layers. (Image: J.E. Hamann-Borrero & Vladimir Hinkov)

Publication in Nature Quantum Materials

In the recent years physicists from Wurzburg University and coworkers from Germany, Canada, the U.S.A. and Korea developed a new method to uncover important charge properties of correlated oxide interfaces with unprecedented atomic scale resolution. The team of Professor Vladimir Hinkov and his coworkers report about this experimental method in the current issue of Nature Quantum Materials ("Valence-state reflectometry of complex oxide heterointerfaces").

Conventional electronic chips are based on networks of so-called p-n junctions, interfaces between semiconductors carrying positive and negative charges, respectively, says Vladimir Hinkov, describing the background of this research. There are several drawbacks to such a setup: First, the junctions are thick, often of the order of hundreds of interatomic spacings. Second, operating the network requires the movement of many electrons, which costs a lot of energy due to electrical resistance. Third, semiconductors do not intrinsically have magnetic properties and their electron configuration is very basic. This dramatically limits the ways to build functional junctions and to realize magnetic applications, Hinkov reports.

Versatile properties require sophisticated methods

Transition-metal oxides, on the other hand, exhibit many different properties: Some of them are ferromagnetic, others are antiferromagnetic, and others in turn are high-temperature superconductors with very unconventional properties. Forming interfaces between such materials yields a plethora of phenomena, which hold promise for novel applications such as different sensors, lossless computer memory and ultrafast processors. The price one has to pay is that more sophisticated tools are necessary to study them: This is due to the variety of phenomena and due to the much shorter length scale, over which the properties of oxides change at such heterointerfaces, which is often just a few atomic spacings.

Of crucial importance is the behavior of electrons at the interface: Do they tend to accumulate? Which orbitals do they occupy, i.e. how do the electron clouds arrange around the atoms? Is there magnetic order, i.e. do the tiny magnetic moments of the electrons called spins align relative to each other, establishing magnetic order? Physicists around the world are seeking for answers to these questions.

Measurements on an atomic scale

Hinkov and coworkers developed a new method and analysis software, and it provides answers. It is based on resonant x-ray reflectometry, a technique exploiting x-ray light created at a synchrotron, with the atomic-scale resolution of less than one nanometer. The physicists apply the technique on thin films of lanthanum cobalt oxide, a material that has interesting magnetic properties.

In their present work, however, the scientists have concentrated on another aspect: "Before we can delve in the rich magnetic phenomena of this material, we first have to solve a fundamental, very wide spread problem," says Professor Hinkov. "Like many other materials, such as simple table salt and many semiconductors, lanthanum cobalt oxide consists of charged particles. These so-called ions form a sequence of positively and negatively charged atomic layers, stacked to a 15 nanometer thin film. One can show that enormous electrostatic fields form between the layers, which is a problem, since they cost a lot of energy, as Vladimir Hinkov explains.

Nature is economical and avoids these field energy costs: It brings positive and negative charges to the opposite faces of the film, respectively, just like between the plates of a capacitor. A new field is formed, which is opposite to the original one and which cancels it."

Corrugated interfaces constitute a problem

This accumulation of pure electronic charge at the film faces is called electronic reconstruction. According to the physicists, this is a very elegant solution, since it preserves the film face smoothness. For materials, in which electronic reconstruction is not possible, the compensating charge is provided by comparatively large ions, which results in corrugated film faces. As Hinkov explains, such corrugations are detrimental for devices based on film interfaces, especially when, like in transition-metal oxides, the material properties change on an atomic scale at the interface.

Exploiting the new method, the present work shows microscopic evidence that electronic reconstruction is indeed realized at transition-metal oxide interfaces. The method also provides a possibility to study the microscopic properties of such interfaces, which are not limited to electronic reconstruction, but encompass the arrangement of chemical elements, the electronic occupation of atomic orbitals and the spin orientation.

Successful by close, international collaboration
Find the newest releases to watch from National Geographic on Disney+, including favourite documentary series and films Free Solo, The Rescue, Shark Beach with Chris Hemsworth and The World According to Jeff Goldblum.
The gesture of solidarity and support that Clonmel firemen made with firefighters in New York in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre was recognised on the 15th anniversary of 9/11.

Former Mayor of Clonmel Niall Dennehy was joined by his first cousin, current District Mayor Andy Moloney, when he presented a copy of The Faces of The Brave portrait to Stephen McEvoy and fellow firefighters at Clonmel fire station.

Stephen was one of the local firemen who travelled to Manhattan to help their counterparts in New York following the terrorist attacks in 2001, which claimed the lives of almost 3,000 people.

The victims included 450 members of the emergency services and they are remembered in The Faces of The Brave artwork, a photo mosaic comprised of individual portraits of each of the fallen heroes.

Many of the images in the print, which was created by Las Vegas artist Randy Soard, are from private family collections and had never been viewed in public.

Niall Dennehy was presented with the portrait on a visit to New York some years ago. Sixteen of the firemen who perished in the disaster were based at the Engine 40/Ladder 35 station in Amsterdam Avenue and were regulars in the nearby pub owned by Niall's first cousin, Paul Dennehy Hurley.

Paul is originally from Finglas, Dublin and his mother is Clonmel woman Phyllis Dennehy, who is Niall's aunt.

On a visit made in a private capacity to New York a year after 9/11 Niall Dennehy, then Mayor of Clonmel, expressed the condolences of the people of the town to the firefighters and the families of all those killed in the tragedy.

He was presented with the portrait on another visit to New York some years later.

Pictured are - Former Mayor of Clonmel Niall Dennehy presenting a copy of the Faces of The Brave portrait to members of Clonmel Fire Station. From left, Andrew Laste, District Mayor Andy Moloney, Stephen McEvoy, Niall Dennehy, Garret McLoughlin and Oliver O'Brien.
Deutsche Bank said the U.S. Justice Department is seeking $14 billion to settle a probe tied to residential mortgage-backed securities, more money than it's willing to pay.

"Deutsche Bank has no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited," the company said early Friday in Frankfurt. "The negotiations are only just beginning. The bank expects that they will lead to an outcome similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts."

Chief Executive Officer John Cryan, 55, has struggled to boost profitability by selling risky assets and eliminating jobs as unresolved legal probes and claims add to concerns that the lender will be forced to raise capital. Reaching a mortgage deal would clear a major hurdle for Deutsche Bank, which has paid more than $9 billion in fines and settlements since the start of 2008, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

"While this number seems very large, it's obviously a first negotiation point," Chris Wheeler, an analyst at Atlantic Equities, told Francine Lacqua on Bloomberg Television. "There's going to be an awful lot of management time spent on it to get to a sensible number."

Deutsche Bank fell as much as 8.2%, the biggest intraday drop since June 27, and was down 7.6% at 12.10 euros at 12:36 p.m. in Frankfurt. Other European lenders probed in relation to residential mortgage-backed securities also declined, with UBS Group AG down 2.9% and Credit Suisse Group slipping 5.2%. Royal Bank of Scotland Group slumped 4.5%, while Barclays fell 2.8%.

The bank's 1.75 billion euros ($2 billion) of 6% additional Tier 1 bonds, the first notes to take losses, fell 5 cents to 78 cents on the euro, the biggest drop since the U.K. voted to leave the European Union. Deutsche Bank's 650 million pounds of 7.125% notes fell 5 pence to 81 pence on the pound, also a record fall.

"They are dropping like a stone," said Tomas Kinmonth, a credit strategist at ABN Amro Bank in Amsterdam. "The fine, even if reduced, could surpass all provisions held by the bank."

Germany's government expects a "fair outcome" in the U.S. probe, a spokeswoman for the Finance Ministry in Berlin said on Friday.

Germany's largest lender confirmed that it had started negotiations with the Justice Department to settle civil claims the U.S. may consider over the bank's issuing and underwriting of residential mortgage-backed securities from 2005 to 2007. The Wall Street Journal reported the $14 billion claim on Thursday.

Bank of America Corp. paid $17 billion to reach a settlement in a similar case in 2014, the biggest such accord to date. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. agreed to a $5.1 billion settlement with the U.S. earlier this year, including a $2.4 billion civil penalty and $875 million in cash payments, to resolve U.S. allegations that it failed to properly vet mortgage-backed securities before selling them to investors as high-quality debt. The settlement included an admission of wrongdoing.

The Justice Department, in concluding previous investigations into the sale of mortgage-backed securities that soured during the financial crisis, typically has presented initial penalties higher than what banks ultimately paid, people familiar with those negotiations have said. The sides may negotiate over the final tab, as well as what conduct the bank will acknowledge and whether individuals will be sanctioned.

Justice Department spokesman Peter Carr declined to comment on the negotiations.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. analysts wrote in a note to clients earlier Thursday that a settlement of about $2.4 billion "would be taken very positively," and that an agreement exceeding $4 billion would pose questions about Deutsche Bank's capital positions and force it to "build additional litigation reserves." The lender's common equity Tier 1 ratio, a key measure of financial strength, was at 10.8% at the end of June.

"In defense of protecting its shareholders' money, Cryan is well within his rights in negotiating a more equitable and just settlement with the U.S. government, and calling this one a punishment that's several orders of magnitude greater than the crime," said Tony Plath, a finance professor at the University of North Carolina. Plath expects a final settlement of about $4 billion to $5 billion.

Cryan has said that he aims to settle major outstanding legal issues as soon as possible as part of his wider overhaul. Deutsche Bank had 5.5 billion euros set aside for settlements and fines at the end of June, with Chief Financial Officer Marcus Schenck saying in July that the lender will probably face "material" litigation charges in the second half.

In addition to the U.S. mortgage investigation, Deutsche Bank faces litigation and regulatory probes relating to issues such as foreign-currency rate manipulation and precious metals trading. The German bank is a party to 47 civil actions concerning the setting of interbank lending benchmarks, according to its 2015 annual report published in March.

"Obviously I don't like this amount, it's too high and it seems that with every settlement, the DOJ wants to get more from European companies," said Andreas Domke, a portfolio manager at Allianz Global Investors, which owns shares in the lender. "It's good that Deutsche Bank is pushing back."
WASHINGTON  When the House Financial Services Committee scheduled a vote this week for a 500-page financial reform bill that touched on a host of critical issues to the banking industry, it was supposed to last at least two days.

Instead, it lasted less than two hours.

That's because rather than offer amendments and foster debate on topics like a cap on debit interchange fees or the structure of the consumer protection regulator, Democrats opted to essentially sit on their hands.

Though Chairman Jeb Hensarling accused Democrats of rolling over on the bill, analysts said it was a shrewd political move. It essentially made an anticlimactic finish to a bill that had been touted by Hensarling since the beginning of the summer.

"I'm not surprised that the Democrats sat it out," said Ian Katz, a policy analyst at Capital Alpha Partners. "If you disagree with pretty much everything in a bill, it seems illogical to offer specific changes."

Yet it was an unusual decision. Although Democrats often disagree with bills put forward by Hensarling, there is usually at least some effort to force a discussion on certain topics. Instead, Rep. Maxine Waters, the top Democrat on the committee, said the bill "simply cannot be fixed."

By not offering amendments, Democrats were able to spare members some tough votes on specific issues and not tip their hand on potential compromises further down the road.

"A cop-out, but perhaps a smart one given the position they are in" said Mark Calabria, director of financial regulation studies at the Cato Institute, and a former top aide to the Senate Banking Committee.

Katz said the move allowed Democrats to appear "to be taking a principled stand without much downside risk."

One provision, for example, would have scrapped the so-called Durbin Amendment, a cap on debit interchange fees that was part of the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010. But lawmakers on both sides of the aisle were uncomfortable taking a vote on that measure, as it pits them between two deep-pocketed constituencies: retailers and banks. Most were happy to avoid bringing up the issue.

"There is nothing to be gained by voting on controversial measures on legislation that is not going to pass," said Brian Gardner, an analyst at Keefe, Bruyette & Woods of the amendment that puts two powerful industries at odds.

The Democrats were also emboldened by a recent enforcement action levied against Wells Fargo by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the Los Angeles City Attorney and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.

The $190 million in fines and restitution against the bank exposed misconduct that included employees creating unwanted bank and credit card accounts for customers to meet sales incentives. Though Hensarling's bill would have increased financial penalties for firms caught in wrongdoing, it also would have made structural changes to the CFPB. Democrats saw those provisions as a way to gut the young agency.

"If there was an internal debate before the markup" of whether to offer amendments and debate the bill, "I think Wells' solidified their position" to not to engage, said Oliver Ireland, a partner at Morrison and Foerster.

The bill, which was titled the Financial Choice Act included language that would have replaced the CFPB's single director with a five-member commission and subjected it to the Congressional appropriations process, which progressive Democrats staunchly oppose. The Wells enforcement action gave the bureau more political capital at exactly the right time. It also is likely to impact the debate next year, when the Choice Act is likely to resurface in some form.

"It was an uphill to path to make any changes to Dodd-Frank and among those, changes to the CFPB were the least likely to pass," said Gardner. "If a bill were to move in 2017, prospects that it would include any kind of changes [to the CFPB] have been greatly diminished."

However, Congress is still in the process of debating how to fund the government past September and leaders have indicated that they would like to vote on a stopgap measure soon so members can get back to their districts ahead of the November elections.

A shorter-term budget band aid would present an opportunity for another debate before the next Congress and administration take office.

"Maybe there is a small item that could get stuffed into an appropriations bill," said Gardner. "It is possible, but I think that would be a one-off and would be a very targeted piece of legislation."

An example could be legislation that would grant "qualified mortgage" status to mortgages held on balance sheet, thus providing more protection for institutions from potential lawsuits.

The House has already passed a bill that would do so, while Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton has endorsed a similar measure for financial institutions with less than $10 billion in assets.
More than 600,000 people die each year from various diseases caused by secondhand cigarette smoke, according to a recent report by the World Health Organization.

"Some 30 percent of lung cancer patients in Korea are non-smokers, and passive smoking is being blamed," said Paek Yu-jin of Hallym University Medical Center.

"Passive smoking causes not only lung cancer but heart attacks, asthma and many more diseases."
"Because of the damage caused by the collision, the car was physically incapable of transmitting log data to our servers," Tesla said.

But it said it has "no way of knowing" the question at the center of the controversy - whether the driver was using the semi-automated autopilot system at the time of the crash.

Tesla Motors is investigating a fatal crash involving one of its vehicles in China in January, the company announced Wednesday.

23-year-old Gao Yaning was killed while driving a Tesla vehicle in January that hit the back of a road sweeping vehicle on a Chinese highway, China's CCTV news channel reported. An official interviewed in the report said the Autopilot feature was turned on at the time of the crash.

Gao's family filed a lawsuit in a Beijing court against both Tesla and the local dealer that sold Gao the car in July. But Tesla said in the statement that the family had not cooperated with the company's investigation.

"We have tried repeatedly to work with our customer to investigate the cause of the crash, but he has not provided us with any additional information that would allow us to do so," the statement read.

Tesla's driver assist feature continues to come under scrutiny, particularly after a crash in the southeastern U.S. state of Florida killed a 40-year-old occupant in May when Autopilot equipment failed to distinguish the white siding on a tractor-trailer from a brightly lit sky.
(NaturalNews) The Huffington Post has sensationally censored an article pertaining to questions about Hillary Clinton's health and banned the journalist who wrote it from posting on their website altogether.(Article by Paul Joseph Watson, republished from www.infowars.com David Seaman penned a commentary piece discussing questions surrounding Hillary's health problems on Sunday. The story included a link to my viral video about the subject, which now has over 3.5 million views.The post, which had been trending at number 3 on the website, was deleted within hours and Seaman's posting rights were completely revoked.The link now just contains an editor's note stating, "This post is no longer available on the Huffington Post."The Huff Post deleted the article despite the fact that pieces questioning John McCain's health were heavily featured on the website in 2008.The left-wing news outlet also posted an article today speculating on Donald Trump contracting cancer, but its author was not banned. The double standard is brazen.Other leftist news outlets, most recently the Guardian, have also featured my video without the article immediately being deleted.It appears as though the main reason for the article being deleted was the fact that Seaman didn't automatically dismiss the entire issue as a "conspiracy theory" in line with the rest of the pro-Hillary media.In a YouTube video posted in response to the deletion of the article, Seaman described the censorship as "chilling" and "Orwellian"."Both of my articles have been pulled without notice of any kind, just completely deleted from the Internet, and both of those articles mentioned Hillary's health," states Seaman."That video that Paul Watson put up has been viewed more than 3.5 million times, so it was a very newsworthy thing for me to link out to," noted Seaman, adding that he should have been able to link to it without having his account revoked."I've filed hundreds of stories over the years as a journalist and I've never had anything like this happen....I've never experienced this," remarked Seaman, adding that he was now seeking legal counsel."This is spooky, to me this is extremely spooky  I don't like it," he added, pointing to how the media has dispensed with any notion of balance to jump on Trump while giving Hillary a free pass."They're deleting and censoring commentary on her health  why is that?" asked Seaman. "Do they not want more people to watch that video on YouTube, is that what's going on here?"In a related development, Donald Trump officially challenged Hillary Clinton to release her full medical records, but the Clinton campaign almost immediately refused to do so.The video that Seaman linked to in his now deleted article is embedded below.Read more at Infowars.com
Undetected cloned meat slyly making its way to Europe, where it's banned

China pumping out hundreds of thousands of cloned cows for worldwide beef production

(NaturalNews) On July 5, 1996, scientists at an Edinburgh laboratory in Scotland announced the birth of the world's first cloned mammal. Dolly the sheep instantly made headline news, opening up a new frontier in genetic research. Replicating mammalian life in this way opened up new business avenues for the mass production of " genetically superior " meats.Just two decades later, the genetic experiment that was Dolly has become a niche market. In the U.S., commercial livestock cloning is big business at Cyagra, based in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania, and at ViaGen in Austin, Texas. Together, these geneticists pump a few thousand cloned animals out into the marketplace each year.The consensus in Europe is to keep cloned animals out of the marketplace. The European Union forbids cloning in animal husbandry practices. However, in the U.S., the Food and Drug Administration permits the practice. In 2008, the FDA actually concluded that "food from cattle, swine and goat clones is as safe to eat as food from any other cattle, swine or goat."Since scientists cannot differentiate between conventionally bred animals and their clones, it's impossible for regulatory agencies to make a distinction. For this reason there are no labeling requirements for cloned animals or their offspring. This means that an animal cloned in the U.S. could be sold to Europe without any oversight or public knowledge.At this point, there's a strong chance you've eaten cloned meat and known nothing about it. Even though cloning is banned in Europe, there's a significant possibility that cloned meat has made its way onto people's plates there too.Pauline Constant, spokeswoman for the European Office of Consumer Associations, noted: "Without knowing it, Europeans are probably eating meat from the descendants of clones that cannot be traced."Other countries which allow the cloning of meat are Argentina, Brazil, Canada and Australia.Since the birth of Dolly, the duplication of prized breeding animals has only become more popular and streamlined. Even though the success rate is often low, the industry is able to pump out thousands of cloned animals per year.While it costs nearly $11,000 to clone one animal, the industry isn't aiming to clone each and every animal for mass production. Instead, the industry invests money on the animals with the most outstanding genetics.According to Aaron Levine, an expert in bioethics and cloning at Georgia Tech, cloned livestock are often introduced into the food supply indirectly by introducing them into breeding stock. In other words, the offspring of the cloned animals may be the meat making its way to your plate.In China, cloning for food production is even bigger business. Boyalife Group's new factory in Tianjin aims to produce 100,000 cloned cows annually. The business is projected to pump out a million cloned cows per year by 2020.Boyalife is also experimenting with the replication of genetically superior primates, which can be sold to research groups for more consistent and accurate disease research, and for the production of new vaccines. Boyalife's lead scientist, Xu Xiaochun, has even mentioned his desire to clone humans for research purposes. Upcoming projects also include cloning thoroughbred racehorses and top notch police sniffer dogs.
Consumers warned about choking and cutting hazard from food laced with pieces of plastic

Product recalls affect all types of food

Listeria outbreak threatens pregnant woman and her child

(NaturalNews) Consumers in 30 U.S. states may have been exposed to potentially dangerous pieces of plastic found in a variety of junk food products made by Bimbo Bakeries, the American corporate arm of the Mexican multinational bakery product manufacturing company Grupo Bimbo.The company issued a vast recall Wednesday of nearly 50,000 boxes of Little Bites fudge brownies, chocolate chip muffins and variety packs.The announcement was made after customers began complaining about small pieces of plastic they found while eating the junk food. At least one injury has been reported.Bimbo Bakeries is warning customers that the small pieces of plastic in the products may cause a "choking and/or cutting hazard," according to CNN Money.Brownies and chocolate chip muffin packages with a "best by" date of October 8 are reportedly affected. Variety packs with a "best by" date of September 24 are also affected.The contaminated food products were shipped to retailers in 30 U.S. states over the last two weeks. The company believes the contamination occurred as a result of a problem with manufacturing equipment.The mistake originated during a "manufacturing failure at a contract manufacturer's bakery in Illinois," reports confirm.Headquartered in Horsham Township, Pennsylvania, Bimbo Bakeries is the largest bakery company in the U.S.Consumers may find a list of the recalled products and their UPC codes here If you were unlucky enough to purchase one of the recalled products, you can get your money back by returning to merchant you bought it from. More information is available by calling 1-800-984-0989.It's important to note food recalls aren't always limited to processed foods. For example, Country Fresh recently recalled 30,000 cases of fresh vegetable products as a result of listeria contamination.The products include sliced mushrooms, onions and pico de gallo sold at Walmart and other retailers. The products in question include ones that have a "best by" date ranging between August 7 and 19."The recall affects vegetable products wrapped in clear plastic under the Country Fresh label or store-branded label and shipped to Walmart, Harris Teeter, Winn Dixie, Publix, QuikTrip, Bi-Lo, Fresh Point and The Spinx Company stores in nine states (Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia),"y reports.Listeria is a food-borne disease caused by bacteria that live in soil and water and is transported by animals that don't appear ill, contaminating meat and dairy products, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).The bacteria are particularly harmful to pregnant women and those with a weak immune system. A listeria outbreak that originated from contaminated cantaloupes grown at Jensen Farm in Holly, Colorado nearly cost one mother her child.Michelle Wakley-Paciorek never thought she would be harming her unborn child by snacking on healthy fruits and vegetables. However, unsafe operations at Jensen Farms caused her to give birth prematurely to her infant daughter.One day while she and her 4-year-old daughter were getting pedicures, Wakley-Paciorek suddenly went into labor, giving birth to Kendall three months prematurely,"reported."[T]he doctors warned her parents about all sorts of dire medical complications that she could develop: blindness, deafness, mental retardation, cerebral palsy, and others."The infant, struggling to survive, was one of three newborns diagnosed with listeriosis during the time of the outbreak."A week before she was born, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced a voluntary recall of the entire crop of fresh, whole cantaloupe from Jensen Farms," reportsFortunately her daughter recovered, and though smaller than other children her age, is functioning normally.To prevent food-borne illness, be sure to thoroughly wash raw fruits and veggies. If pregnant, it's best to avoid under-cooked meat, raw fish and unpasteurized juices.
(NaturalNews) Another day, another made-up "illness" attributed to Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton In recent days, you may recall that several news agencies reported, then downplayed, a episode of near-collapse and fainting Clinton suffered after having to leave a commemoration ceremony for the victims of the 9/11 attacks in New York City. As Natural News editor Mike Adams, the Health Ranger and author of the new book "Food Forensics," noted this week, Clinton resembled "the walking dead." So out of it was she that she had to be helped into a waiting SUV by Secret Service personnel who, no doubt, are getting tired of medically babysitting a grown woman.The story that the campaign put out  and most Left-leaning "mainstream" media outlets lapped up  was that Clinton was suffering from "pneumonia" and was dehydrated. Only, that makes no sense for one reason in particular: Clinton, if she really had walking pneumonia, would have been contagious. So, as has recently pointed out , why would she be hugging children, as evidenced in news videos?As thevideo posted onsite shows, Clinton  as she left the apartment of her daughter, Chelsea Clinton, where she "recovered" after her "medical incident" - exclaimed, "I'm feeling great!" and was seen embracing a child on the street in what many believe was a staged event, the Mirror reported.In addition, daughter Chelsea has two small children in her apartment as well.According to health experts, "walking pneumonia" is the least serious strain of the bacterial infection, but it can nevertheless be contagious, and children can be particularly vulnerable. So it makes you wonder why a candidate with a contagious disease would so nonchalantly expose a child to the infection if in fact that's what was wrong with Clinton.But again, this is just the latest "illness excuse" being given for Clinton's erratic and medically questionable behavior. As reported recently , Clinton has had to be helped by Secret Service and other aides in the past. Plus, she has told the FBI during interviews this past year that she couldn't remember details surrounding her use of a private email server while serving as secretary of state (due to her previous head injury), and has blamed all of her coughing fits on "allergies."As to the unsteadiness on her feet, Adams made observations about why she had to be helped up a short flight of steps by aides and US Secret Service agents:In addition, these facts make it clear the woman has problems:A Secret Service agent has confirmed Clinton's major medical issues, including that she has Parkinson's disease, according to a video report by Dr. Ted Noel, a medical doctor, forWhile stating that he's not her treating physician, Noel nonetheless agrees with the observation that she appears to be dealing with Parkinson's. Other trained medical observers have opined that she may be suffering from Subcortical Vascular Dementia which usually gives patients just a 3-5 year life expectancy.It's undeniable that Clinton is suffering from major medical issues that, frankly, make her unfit to serve as our next president. If she is so sensitive to various allergens, cannot campaign without getting pneumonia, can't walk up a flight of steps and has trouble remembering details, she obviously cannot stand up to the rigors of the Oval Office.
Dicamba more toxic and drift-prone than Roundup

EPA refuses to take action against illegal spraying of dicamba

Pesticide applicators don't read labels, report finds

(NaturalNews) Farmers in 10 states have now reported damage to their crops as result of other farmers illegally spraying dicamba on newly approved genetically modified organisms (GMOs). The new GMO cotton and soybeans are able to withstand application of a chemical cocktail made from dicamba and glyphosate, the ingredient in Monsanto's Roundup. Monsanto designed the seeds for use alongside the dicamba/glyphosate combo, however, while the GMOs have been approved, the new herbicide has not.(NPR) reports that in essence, Monsanto "gave farmers a new weed-killing tool that they couldn't legally use."But farmers are using it, and it's destroying the crops of other farmers who aren't growing the newly approved GMOs . Not only is dicamba more toxic than Roundup, but it's also more prone to drifting reports that one of the reasons dicamba is much more volatile is because it "easily becomes airborne and drifts away from where it is applied."The herbicide was previously used in agriculture as a pre-emergent, meaning it was applied to the soil to kill weeds before planting."But this spring farmers began planting Monsanto's new soybeans on about 1 million acres in the US, and have been spraying their fields with dicamba (to kill an especially pernicious strain of glyphosate-resistant pigweed)which then drifts on the wind, damaging soybeans on other farmers' fields that are not resistant to the herbicide ."The resulting drift has damaged crops in Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Kentucky, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, Tennessee and Texas.More than 100 farmers in Missouri say that their cops have been damaged by dicamba . So far, the following have been affected: peaches, tomatoes, cantaloupes, watermelons, rice, cotton, peas, peanuts, alfalfa and soybeans.While the damage has been reported to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the government is not taking action."The EPA has done very little in response to the complaints, and some states are beginning to take matters into their own hands to protect their farmers and prevent further crop loss," reportsThe state of Arkansas does seem to be taking action, however. A proposal by the state's Pesticide Committee could prevent farmers from spraying certain dicamba formulations during the growing season, from mid-April to mid-September.Other states are urging farmers to hire attorneys and take legal action. "When states and lawyers are forced to take action to protect farmers from pesticides, it's clear that the federal pesticide law is broken," reportsRecently, an advisory notice was issued by the EPA reminding farmers that spraying dicamba on the new GMOs is not yet legal. It also instructed farmers to follow directions listed on chemical labels.In July, a survey conducted by the University of Missouri found that only 43 percent of pesticide applicators in the state read the label each time before mixing and spraying chemicals.The failure to follow proper protocol has contributed to a significant increase in pesticide pollution in the state, resulting in some 70 investigations involving 40,000 acres of farmland.Normally, the state averages somewhere between 75 and 80 complaints regarding the misuse of pesticides per calendar year. However, 115 complaints were reported in the month of July alone, said Judy Grundler, division director for plant industries with the Missouri Department of Agriculture.Farmers in Arkansas, Tennessee and Missouri say that drifting dicamba has in some cases destroyed up to 30 percent of yields.The continual spraying of the herbicide is certain to cause more superweeds and more pesticide pollution. An estimated 15 million acres of dicamba-resistant seeds are expected to be planted in the United States next year.
Celebrities are raising awareness regarding the rapid decline of honeybee populations in the U.S.

Morgan Freeman blames Monsanto for mass bee die-offs

"Years ago, prior to today's advanced mining technology, canaries were used to detect harmful gases such as methane. They were caged, placed in mines, and then monitored. As the amount of gas reached deadly levels, the canaries would either get sick, begin to sing louder, and/or in most cases, die, indicating that the workers needed to exit the mine. This is a clear representation of our pattern of abusing animals and the environment, which still exists in animal agriculture, mining, and many other industries."



Actor transforms 124-acre ranch into bee sanctuary

(NaturalNews) Monsanto or "Monsatan," as some like to call the company, has certainly earned the reputation of being the world's most hated corporation. They have effectively attracted negative attention from various individuals and groups from around the world.Not only has enormous seed giant monopolized the world's food supply, but also its products have caused devastation among humans, wildlife and the environment in general.Genetically modified organisms (GMOs), the company's bread and butter, are particularly harming honeybees, which are responsible for pollinating many of the crops humans depend on for food.Hoping to raise awareness, numerous celebrities have gotten involved and spoken out about their concerns regarding the risk GMOs and their associated pesticides  including glyphosate , the primary ingredient in Monsanto's Roundup  pose to wildlife and the environment.So far, Alec Baldwin, Leonardo DiCaprio and Mark Ruffalo are among the celebs that have gotten involved.Now a new, highly famous individual has joined the fight: Morgan Freeman, an American actor, producer and narrator known for a variety of high-profile films including The "Shawshank Redemption," "Million Dollar Baby" "Bruce Almighty" and "Batman Begins."Through his actions, Freeman has made clear his love and compassion for wildlife and the environment. The celebrity appeared on an episode ofearlier this year where he highlighted the responsibility humans have in the rapid decline of honeybee populations.During the appearance, King asked Freeman, "Would you blame Monsanto for making RoundUp or the government for their lax rules on pesticides?"Freeman replied, "Both  there's been a frightening loss of bee colonies, particularly in this country... to such an extent that scientists are now saying it's dangerous."The actor compared the mass die-offs of honeybees to human's role in killing canaries in coal mines.reports:The implications of wiping out honeybees are incredibly more severe than most people realize.The Natural Resources Defense Council explains that honeybees are responsible for pollinating more than $15 billion worth of food crops each year in the U.S. Without bees, we wouldn't have foods like carrots, apples, avocados, broccoli, onions and many others.Albert Einstein once said: "If the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would have only four years of life left. No more bees, no more pollination, no more plants, no more animals, no more man."Recognizing the severity of the situation, Freeman transformed his 124-acre ranch into a bee sanctuary. The actor explains during his appearance onthat one type of species is forced into extinction, it has a chain-like affect around the world.More and more studies continue to raise alarm regarding data showing that wildlife is disappearing at an accelerated rate.Scientists have warned that Earth is entering an era of mass extinction similar to one when the dinosaurs were killed off. Unless something changes, three of four species could be extinct within two human lifetimes, say researchers.Sources:
Press Release

AIC announced its latest partnership with Sanat Products Ltd., which is a producer of plant extracts, phytochemicals, spirulina, and food supplements. As an NACD and ISO registered sales and marketing company, AIC is looking forward to expanding Sanats presence in the North American market.

Sanat Products Limited is headquartered in New Delhi, India. Sanat has advanced manufacturing units, clinically proven ingredients, and well equipped R&D labs that are run by their qualified team of scientists. Since 1984, Sanat has become an innovative, and customer focused company that has gained incredible recognition for quality.

Sanat and AIC share the same responsibility for providing quality products in the North American market. Mark Robertson, executive vice president of marketing at AIC Inc. said "In partnering with Sanat Products Ltd., we recognize them as a well-respected and responsible manufacturer of natural ingredients, which will have excellent synergy with AIC's existing product portfolio. Sanat provides the quality and technical expertise our customers, and the market demand".

Amit Sharma, business head of Sanat said, We foresee a collaborative partnership with AIC, and will assist in managing and optimizing customers requirements. This partnership supports the idea of capitalizing rightly on Sanats intellectual property assets, and AICs access to the market. This strategic partnership with AIC is a testimony of our commitment to provide innovative solutions to our customers at their doorstep."

For more information, visit AICs website.
There is hope for the Galapagos giant tortoise in the form of Diego, a giant tortoise whose sexual activities helped rebuild his species' population in the famed Galapagos archipelago.

Diego--who was found in San Diego Zoo, hence his name--is over 100 years old. But his old age did not stop the Galapagos giant tortoise from rebuilding his population and saving it from extinction.

Scientists have recently discovered that he has fathered almost 800 young tortoises, or 40 percent of the total population released on their native island of Espanola, the southernmost part in the Galapagos.

"He's a very sexually active male reproducer," said tortoise preservation specialist Washington Tapia, as per Phys.org. "He's contributed enormously to repopulating the island."

Despite his old age, Diego is still very active, as evidenced by the boom of his species, the Chelonoidis hoodensis, which is found only in the wild in Espanola island, one of the oldest in the archipelago.

The IUCN Red List puts Diego the Tortoise's species at critically endangered, but hopefully Diego can help change that.

Diego the Tortoise (and his partners) to save the day

Around half a century ago, there were only two males and 12 females of the Galapagos giant tortoise of their species on the island. Unfortunately, they were too far from each other to reproduce.

Enter Diego, who was returned to Espanola in 1976 to be part of a captive breeding program. To this day, Diego lives at a tortoise breeding center on Santa Cruz Island, with six assigned females to do the tough job of having sex to save their kind.

Weighing about 80 kilograms (175 pounds), Diego is nearly 90 centimeters (35 inches) long and 1.5 meters (five feet) tall if he stretches himself out.

No one is exactly certain how he arrived in the United States, but experts think Diego must have been part of a scientific expedition.

A genetic study revealed that Diego is the happy father of almost 40 percent of the 2,000 young Galapagos giant tortoises released into the wild on the island.

Tapia said the population is in pretty good shape and continues to grow. "I wouldn't say (the species) is in perfect health because historical records show there probably used to be more than 5,000 tortoises on the island," he said.

Three of 15 species of Galapagos giant tortoises have gone extinct due to pirates who plundered the Galapagos Islands.

Conservationists are happy for Diego's sexual exploits, as other attempts have not been successful. The last known survivor of the Chelonodis abingdoni, named Lonesome George, refused to breed in captivity until his death in 2012.
A team of researchers have discovered a rare fossilized skull of a mammoth that is believed to belong to a transitional species of the extinct mammal.

According to the report from The Orange County Register, the complete mammoth skull was found in an eroding stream bank on Santa Rosa Island within Channel Islands National Park. The researchers noted that the skull is too small to be a Colombian mammoth and too large to be pygmy mammoth, suggesting that the skull may belong to a transitional species between the two.

"This mammoth find is extremely rare and of high scientific importance. It appears to have been on the Channel Islands at the nearly same time as humans," Justin Wilkins, a paleontologist at The Mammoth Site and one of the researchers who found the skull, said in a statement. "I have seen a lot of mammoth skulls and this is one of the best preserved I have ever seen."

Charcoal samples adjacent to the specimen suggest that the skull is approximately 13,000 years old, which coincides with the age of the Arlington Man, the oldest human skeletal remains found in North America.

While the size of the newly discovered mammoth skull suggests that it belongs to a species between the Columbian and pygmy mammoth, scientists speculate the downsizing process of the Columbian mammoth to pygmy mammoth only took about several thousand years.

Due to the relatively short time span between the two, USGS Geologist Dan Muhs believe it would be less likely for the newly discovered skull to belong a new transitional species. Instead, Muhs suggested that the skull increases the probability that there were at least two migration of Columbian mammoths to the island.

The first migration event would have occurred in the previous glacial period about 150,000 years ago, followed by the second migration during the most recent ice age 10,000 to 30,000 years ago.

The skull of the mammoth, alongside its teeth and other part, will be transported to the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, where it would be cleaned, preserved, studied and curated for future public display.

Read More:

Scientists to Resurrect Woolly Mammoths, Other Extinct Animals Amidst Ethical Controversy

Thirsty, Lonely Woolly: Earth's Last Mammoth Went Extinct Due to Water Scarcity
SpaceX is anticipating a return-to-flight launch in November of this year. After a catastrophic launch pad explosion on Sept. 1, which destroyed a Falcon 9 rocket and an Amos-6 communications satellite, the company is already planning to get back to business.

"We're anticipating getting back to flight, being down for about three months, so getting back to flight in November, the November timeframe," Gwynne Shotwell, president of SpaceX, said during the World Satellite Business Week Conference held in Paris, France on Sept. 13.

The spaceflight company led by billionaire and entrepreneur Elon Musk had suspended Falcon 9 flights while investigating the incident. During its routine fuel test for a supposed launch of the Amos-6 communications satellite on Sept. 3, which was commissioned by social media behemoth Facebook for its free Internet project, the Falcon 9 rocket exploded on its launch pad at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. Both the $60-million rocket and the $200-million Israeli satellite had been destroyed.

SpaceX is still investigating the root cause of the explosion, which was said to be "the most difficult and complex failure" in the company's history, as expressed by Musk in a series of Tweets. Moreover, he sought the help of the public in providing photos, videos or audio recordings of the incident to aid investigators.

The failure began somewhere in the upper stage of the rocket near the liquid oxygen tank during the prelaunch test operations at the SpaceX launch pad. Launch engineers were at the last stages of loading liquid oxygen and RP-1 kerosene propellants when the "anomaly" happened about 8 minutes before the engine ignition, Universe Today reports.

Shotwell, however, did not elaborate about what repairs will be needed for the return-to-flight launch. She also mentioned in the conference that the said launch would occur from Pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center, which was formerly used by NASA's space shuttles.

"We're confident that SpaceX will understand and recover from what happened," Tom Engler, KSC deputy director of Center Planning and Development, told Reuters. "From our perspective, (the accident) changed nothing as far as our planning and implementation activities are concerned."
The Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM) is one of NASA's most ambitious projects to date, and it will play an important role in the agency's Mars journey.

The five-year mission is composed of two parts: the first one will be a robotic spacecraft that will be sent to an asteroid to retrieve a giant boulder and bring it to an orbit near the moon, and another will be an astronaut crew to be launched aboard NASA's Orion spacecraft and Space Launch System rocket to visit the boulder to collect a pristine asteroid sample.

Scientists believe asteroids contain remnants of the early solar system, and these space fragments could provide clues about the origin and formation of Earth. But more importantly, ARM will also serve as a test run for technologies that will be used for a manned mission to Mars.

During a briefing on ARM updates at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland on Sept. 14, NASA administrator Charles Bolden discussed how the mission could contribute to the Journey to Mars program and the protection of the planet.

According to NASA, ARM will demonstrate Mars-level capabilities for future nearby explorations and fly missions with the technologies and operational constraints NASA will encounter en route to the Red Planet. Likewise, the mission will test techniques that could be used in diverting an asteroid that might impact the Earth in the future.

Rehearsal for Mars Journey

What role does ARM play in the Journey to Mars?

According to Bolden, ARM will require human operations in cislunar space, which is the region of space between the Earth and the moon's orbit. Unlike current missions that are Earth-based and are therefore easy to troubleshoot, resupply and rescue, ARM and future Mars mission will stretch NASA's capabilities.

Also, the mission will also enable astronauts to practice being far away from Earth--the farthest so far even in the Apollo days. According to Bolden, NASA will have to figure out how to resupply crew and test technologies. Proving their capability of carrying out human operations in cislunar orbit is the "most important step on the mission to Mars," Bolden said.

The cislunar operations are expected to begin by 2020s, Inverse reports. Bolden also expects that NASA would work in conjunction with private ventures, such as SpaceX and Blue Origin, as well as academic institutions to address the challenges involved in the mission.
North American eagles are now highly trained to take down hostile drones. These eagles were trained by the Dutch National Police to help them take down drones that are possible threats.

According to Live Science, the eagles learned not only taking it down, but also taking the drone far away from crowds. In a statement issued by the dutch police last Sept. 13, training eagles and taking them in as part of its roster for drone defense is a first in the world. It is the only police force in the world that made this initiative.

News agency Agence France-Presse released a video report about the inception of including eagles as part of counter-measures against hostile drones.

Michel Baeten, an operational manager for the DNP remarked that aside from using electromagnetic pulses and laser technology as methods to combat drones, birds of prey is one of the most effective counter-measures. He also mentioned that when they first gave this idea of training eagles to be part of the police force, they got a lot of reactions from all over the world. Most of them are fascinated with the idea.

The eagles that are "recruited" are still young, with wingspans that measure about 3.3 feet (1 meter) long. It is expected that when they are fully grown, their wings will be between 5.9 and 7.5 feet (1.8 and 2.3 m), and the young recruits will be ready to fly for action for about six months.

To make eagles highly-trained raptors, DNP collaborated with Guard from Above, a private company that are skilled in training raptors to take down drones. DNP already tested the eagles' abilities against flying drones and they were successful with it. The eagles, together with agents, will work as a team. Agents will need to have gloves though, as eagle talons are "extremely sharp."
An 11-year-old boy whose mother faces charges of murder and child abuse weighed only 34 pounds when he was found dead in a closet at his home in Echo Park late last month, it was reported Thursday.

Details about the condition of the body of Yonatan Daniel Aguilar when it was found were disclosed in more than 100 pages of heavily redacted case records and police reports released to the Los Angeles Times by the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services this week.

The records show that Yonatan's risk of abuse at home had been marked as "high"' four times from 2009 to 2012 by a county program intended to guide social workers' level of intervention, The Times reported. But he was never removed from the home.

In the most recent report four years ago in March 2012, files indicate Yonatan arrived at school with a black eye. Four days later, he was seen hoarding food at school, records show. But DCFS officials say that each incident was thoroughly investigated by social workers and as bad as those incidents sound, they did not meet the "legal standard" to open an abuse case.

When police officers removed the mirrored doors behind which the boy had died hours earlier, they found a crumpled blanket on the ground, obscuring his emaciated body  pale and stiff, curled in a fetal position, with cuts on his face, according to The Times.

One officer lifted a corner of the blanket and two cockroaches crawled out. The child was so tiny that officers thought he was 6 years old or so  not 11, the newspaper reported.

His mother, Veronica Aguilar, 39, pleaded not guilty last week to charges of murder and child abuse resulting in Yonatans death. She's being held in lieu of $2 million bail, with her next court appearance set for Oct. 20.

Officials with the Los Angeles Police Departments Juvenile Division told The Times last month that although allegations of physical abuse regarding Yonatan were reported to both the Department of Children and Family Services and police, no police investigation was launched. They declined to provide details.

Yonatans autopsy report has been put on a security hold by law enforcement, and the cause of death could not be released, Ed Winter of the L.A. county coroners office told The Times.
A San Diego woman was found dead, shot seven times, after going out partying with friends in Tijuana last week, officials told NBC 7 San Diego.

The victim, who has been identified as 18-year-old Desteny Memory Hernandez, was found dead last week, according to the Baja California Attorney General's office.

Hernandez was an Imperial Beach resident with a kind and loving heart, her brother, Francisco Hernandez, told NBC San Diego.

Student registration systems show Hernandez was not currently enrolled at Mar Vista High School, despite previous reports.

The details of what happened and what lead to her death were not immediately clear. Her brother said she was out partying at a nightclub with friends on Tijuana's popular Avenida Revolucion on Wednesday, Sept. 7, the night he last heard from her.

He said he immediately knew something was wrong when he didn't hear from Desteny ecause she always stayed in touch with her family.

Text messages that are part of evidence in the case show Hernandez texted friends, saying she had just met some handsome guys and she was going to one of their houses in the El Florido neighborhood of Tijuana, La Frontera newspaper in Tijuana reported.

The Tijuana medical examiner's office received the body Thursday, Sept. 8. Her cause of death was determined to be gunshot wounds to the thorax, abdomen and head, Dr. Cesar Gonzalez Vaca said. She was shot seven times. Officials said there was no signs of sexual assault.

Her body was identified by the family and released to on Tuesday, according to the medical examiner's office.

"Were aware of the case, and we have offered our sincere condolences to the family. Were providing all appropriate assistance and services," the U.S. Consulate in Tijuana said in a statement.

Francisco Hernandez said his sister was a fun-loving, sweet and outgoing 18-year-old senior. He remembered her as someone who always cheered everyone up, and who loved being with her family and friends. Before her body was identified, fliers had been posted on social media asking for her whereabouts.

Mexican homicide investigators are investigating the shooting, though Desteny's brother said his family does not feel comfortable talking with Tijuana police about the killing.
When it comes to money and politics, Hollywood has long been a generous piggy bank. But this election season, the Bay Area emerged as the preeminent financial political power in the Golden State.

The NBC Bay Area Investigative Unit teamed with NBC stations across the country to follow the campaign money this political season. We discovered that Silicon Valleys tech and venture capital industries have eclipsed nearly every other industry in campaign spending this cycle.

Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison tops the list as Californias biggest donor. Federal election records show Ellison contributed north of $5 million to various conservative causes, including Florida Sen. Marco Rubios presidential run.

Daniel Newman tracks and monitors campaign financing as co-founder of the Berkeley nonprofit Maplight. Newman believes as wealth in Silicon Valley continues to grow, so too will the regions political spending.

It's not so much about geography as it is about where are the wealthy people and the wealthy groups. Certainly, Hollywood is the center of that, Silicon Valley, New York, Texas, the big states and the wealthiest areas. It's a tiny fraction of the population that funds those politicians, Newman told NBC Bay Area.

Maplight has teamed with NBC stations, including NBC Bay Area, to create Voters Edge, a non-partisan, online tool to give voters in various states, including California, information about this years election. Click here to access Voters Edge

Federal Election Commission records show Bay Area residents spent a total of $215,791,439 through July 31, 2016, this campaign season. Thats $37 million more than the $177,934,242 spent by residents in the greater Los Angeles area, despite Southern Californias larger population.

The Nations Piggy Bank

An NBC analysis found that two-thirds of the money raised by Californians went to out of state or presidential candidates. Beneficiaries include candidates running for U.S. Senate in nine states currently considered up for grabs.

CLICK ON A STATE BELOW TO SEE HOW MUCH CALIFORNIANS CONTRIBUTED TO 2016 SENATE CANDIDATES

What the national government does affects all of us. Right now the control of the Senate is up for grabs. Whether it's Republican or Democratic control has a big effect on everyone in the country, including the wealthy groups that are finding these campaigns, Newman said.

Matthew Mahood is president and CEO of the Silicon Valley Chamber of Commerce. The group represents many of the companies and corporate officers giving these large sums of money.

There are issues that any elected official, whether theyre in Florida or Ohio or New York, they're going to be key decision-makers on issues that affect immigration reform, that affect trade, affect taxes, affect intellectual property, Mahood said. Those are all issues that Silicon Valley businesses, business leaders, innovators, [and] entrepreneurs, care about because ultimately the policies that are made in Washington, D.C., do affect our businesses here in San Jose.

Most Giving Silicon Valley Companies

Company Number of Contributions Amount Given Oracle 957 $5,286,750.00 Not Stated $3,448,329.00 Kleiner Perkins 153 $2,401,039.00 Angel Investors 86 $2,164,326.00 Google 3,450 $1,571,058.00 Sequoia Capital 40 $1,201,763.00 Apple 2,438 $617,057.00 Cisco 759 $603,361.00 Salesforce.com 470 $458,685.00 Kongregate 22 $431,447.00 Hewlett-Packard 259 $426,191.00 Facebook 595 $411,161.00 Singer 151 $259,082.00 Integrated Archive Systems 85 $251,402.00 Lauder Partners 70 $236,250.00 Intuit 268 $210,295.00 Certain Software Inc 40 $208,728.00 SV Angel 53 $201,252.00 eBay 250 $191,634.00 Sherpa Ventures 12 $160,000.00

Source: Open Secrets

Critics of the current campaign financing system fear that it opens the door for donors to lean on politicians for favors in exchange. Newman believes this is a problem that can also result in the average citizens voice being drowned out.

Again, weve teamed with Maplight on a special website called Voters Edge to give you non-partisan information about elections here in California. Click here to go to Voters Edge

If you have a tip for the Investigative Unit, give us a call at 1-888-996-8477, or you can reach us via email at TheUnit@nbcbayarea.com
Big tobacco is putting up millions to fight a new cigarette tax: the $2-per-pack proposal will be on Californians November ballot as Proposition 56.

The measures supporters say deceptive ads are flooding the airwaves, while opponents say its the other side that is really being untruthful.

Thursday, anti-smoking advocates showed up at a rally in front of San Francisco City Hall with vaporizers in the shapes of Minions and Poke Balls to again accuse tobacco makers of targeting kids.

It is not cool. It is addictive and it is dangerous, said Dr. John Maa, a thoracic surgeon affiliated with Marin General Hospital and who supports Prop 56.

Some proponents of Prop 56 include: The American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network, American Lung Association in California, American Heart Association, California Democratic Party, and various lawmakers.

It was a shock  ash tray full of cigarette butts hidden in a drawer, San Francisco Supervisor Eric Mar said of when he caught his 16-year-old daughter smoking. It makes me scared because I talk about health all the time, but yet shes impacted by this predatory marketing.

Currently, the state tobacco tax is 87 cents, and has not been raised since 1999. Proponents of Prop 56 want to make this $2.87, to dent smokers wallets enough to quit. In the first year, the tax is expected to bring in $1 to 1.4 billion.

And, for the first time, the tobacco tax would apply to e-cigarettes that contain nicotine.

Opponents of the proposition, such as the California Republican Party and Philip Morris, take issue with the constitutional amendment. They say only 13 percent will go towards education and the amendment is a way to bypass Proposition 98, which requires at least 43 percent of any tax increase to go to school funding.

Were opposed to it because its deceptive. Its not going to help the children like new taxes are supposed to do, its mainly going to help large insurance companies, California RNC national committeewoman Harmeet Dhillon said.

The Yes on 56 campaign says this is statement is both false and reckless, and Prop 56 will add $20 million in new funding for classroom instruction and dollars not earmarked for education will go towards offsetting a portion of the $3.58 billion-per-year taxpayers spend to cover tobacco-related illnesses through Medi-Cal.

Dhillon, an attorney, says the devil is in the details, or fine print, of the proposition. Shes all for smoking cessation, she says, but not like this.

I think if 100 percent of this money was to go to stop people from smoking, that would be okay, but plain English of the measure isnt that way, Dhillon said.

Mar says taxes have been proven way to curb smoking.

I know that for passing policies like this that we have good transparency in ensuring that the money is spent wisely so that every penny is going to community based efforts to reduce smoking addiction, Mar said.
A 9-month-old dog described as having a friendly temperament was shot in early September, and lost his leg as a result of the injury, prompting police to comb through East Bay neighborhoods looking for leads.

The injured pooch, a German Shepherd mix, was brought into the Contra Costa Animal Services Department's Martinez shelter last Tuesday with a wound to its right hind leg.

"He came in limping, basically trying to cuddle up with somebody," said Dr. Bella Kisamov, a veterinarian with Contra Costa County Animal Services.

After further investigation, veterinarians determined that the pup had been shot, resulting in a shattered femur.

"The bullet had shot fragments into the muscle," said Kisamov, who performed a four-hour surgery to remove the bullet that was lodged in the dog's leg.

However, she was unable to save the leg.

"I had follow the track of the bullet because I needed to retrieve it," Kisamov said.

Despite the amputation, the pup is recovering and will be up for adoption in about one week's time.

"His name is Bullet," Kisamov said. "He is very sweet."

The person who dropped off the injured dog declined to provide his name and didn't explain how Bullet was hurt.

According to Steve Burdo with Contra Costa County Animal Services, Bullet had been "clearly shot in the back." But the person who dropped him off at the shelter said only that they "found this dog running on Monument Boulevard."

Investigators say the bullet is the key to tracking down the suspected shooter.

The bullet's caliber will help officials learn "more about the distance it was shot" and "what kind of gun it could have come from," Burdo said.

Whoever hurt Bullet could face animal cruelty charges, if found.

NBC Bay Area's Brendan Weber contribued to this report.
A woman arrested in an alleged drunk driving crash that killed a 3-year-old boy on a highway in San Ramon last Friday had been arrested earlier this year for a DUI in Pleasanton that involved endangering her own child, according to Pleasanton police.

Yarenit Malihan, the wife of an Alameda County sheriff's deputy, is accused of killing Elijah Dunn in a crash on Interstate 680 near Bollinger Canyon Road around 6:20 p.m. Friday when she crashed into a black 2007 Toyota Camry that was parked on the side of the road, according to the California Highway Patrol.

The crash injured several people inside the vehicle, including an 11-year-old boy and 1-year-old girl, and ultimately killed Elijah.

The tragic case came months after Malihan was arrested on suspicion of DUI at her home in the 400 block of Mission Drive shortly after 7 p.m. on June 7, Pleasanton police spokesman Sgt. Larry Cox said.

A citizen had called police stating that Malihan was standing behind a grocery and appeared to be under the influence of an unknown substance, according to Cox.

Cox said when officers went to her home, they made contact with Malihan and noticed that she showed visible signs of intoxication. An investigation determined she had been driving under the influence of alcohol with her 10-year-old daughter in the vehicle prior to the officers' arrival.

Malihan was arrested, and booked at the Santa Rita jail on suspicion of driving under the influence as well as child endangerment.

Following Friday's crash, Malihan was treated for minor injuries at San Ramon Regional Medical Center and was later booked into the county jail. She has since posted bail.

Cox said several people had reached out on social media criticizing the Police Department for not suspending Malihan's license after her first DUI, and that perhaps if they had, Friday's tragedy wouldn't have occurred.

"Police do not suspend licenses, and that night we went through the correct process, which is to refer the case to the Department of Motor Vehicles," Cox said.

According to police, officers filled out a DMV form the night of her first arrest, which would become Malihan's temporary license until she attended a formal hearing to determine the status of her license.

Cox said he doesn't know what the status of Malihan's license would have been after the hearing, but that a license being suspended is not always the outcome for driving under the influence.

"It depends on the circumstances of each case, but the police do not have the authority to suspend licenses," he said.

Alameda County District Attorney's Office spokeswoman Teresa Drenick said Malihan's attorney appeared in court on Aug. 31 for the DUI incident in Pleasanton, but she did not know what happened at the hearing.

Malihan has not yet been charged in Contra Costa County for the second alleged DUI.

A GoFundMe page set up to raise money for Elijah's family has raised more than $82,000 as of Thursday.
Less than a day after being fired, Stan Data Dobbs defended his work as superintendent of the Hayward Unified School District.

My integrity has never been in question until this school board, he said.

Overnight, the school board decided to terminate Dobbs. The Board of Trustees voted 3-0, with two members abstaining.

But the man in question believes he behaved in a transparent manner as superintendent, and did right by the district and its students.

The board loves my outcomes and results, he said. They just never could adopt the vision that I brought forward because they didnt understand how to follow a visionary person.

On Thursday, school board members explained their move by accusing ex-Superintendent Stan Dobbs of having an explosive temper, lying, and bullying others.

Dobbs is "inherently dishonest about his guilt when he makes mistakes," private investigator Steve Hummel said.

Dobbs had been suspended after the completion of a three-month-long investigation, which sifted through apparent wrongdoings committed during his tenure. Along with immoral conduct, trustees said, the investigation also revealed that Dobbs allowed a board member to make personal use of a print shop. It remains unclear who that board member is.

In June, Dobbs came under fire for inviting former San Francisco 49ers defensive tackle Ray McDonald, who was previously accused of domestic violence and sexual assault, to speak to students at Tennyson High School in Hayward about self-discipline. The students were not made aware of McDonald's criminal history before his motivational speech.

"My personal opinion was all I wanted him to do was break his pattern of blaming others when it came to the Ray McDonald thing," said board President Lisa Brunner.

The board's decision, however, was not unanimous.

If I had known a vote was going to take place, I would have stayed and voted, and I would have voted, 'No,'" said Annette Walker, the board's vice president.

Dobbs' run of controversial behavior began back in September 2015 when he allegedly got tangled up in a physical confrontation with two school board trustees during a closed-door meeting. During the tirade, the board members also claimed that Dobbs fired a profanity-laden rant toward the other board members during that meeting.

Dobbs, who denies any misconduct, started his stint with Hayward Unified in 2013 before being placed on paid administrative leave in June.

After attending Wednesday's meeting in droves, parents, too, were displeased by the board's decision.

"He treats us fairly and we think this is a big mistake that they have let him go," said parent Jacqui Dixon.

A Change.org petition has grabbed 540 supporters as of late Thursday, and credits Dobbs for increased test scores and higher graduation rates in the district.
About 150 people in San Francisco's Pacific Heights neighborhood gathered Thursday night to learn more about a woman's brutal beating captured on surveillance video.

Police were on hand to answer questions from concerned neighbors after twice seeing suspect leads fall through. They handed out more fliers of the suspect sketch, hoping for new leads.

On Aug. 20, a woman, who was not identified, was taking a walk in Lafayette Park area, near the intersection of Washington and Gough streets about 7:45 p.m.when a man approached her and started punching her in the head and face. She was knocked to the ground, and the man continued to punch her about 20 more times before walking off.

Raw surveillance video of a woman who was viciously beaten for no apparent reason by a stranger she passed on the sidewalk in San Francisco last weekend, according to San Francisco police.

At the community meeting Thursday night, everyone was concerned that the suspect is still on the loose.

"It was devastating to watch," neighbor Ming Chapin said.

Chapin has lived in Pacific Heights for more than 25 years and says this aggressive behavior has gotten worse in the park.

"Since the renovation, police can't drive through the park because walkways aren't wide enough," Chapin said. "They only come when they're called."

Police said the victim in the beating is doing OK and has visited the police station a few times to provide more information about the suspect.

Officers have taken the crime personally, carrying the suspect sketch in their pockets, searching the area.

Meanwhile, Supervisor Mark Farrell, who organized the meeting, said he'll try to secure funding for better lighting in the neighborhood park. And neighbors said they hope police will address the growing problem of aggressive behavior by mentally ill and homeless people in the neighborhood.

"Frankly, when I have this baby, I'm not sure what I'm going to do when I don't feel safe," resident Guenevere Courtney said.
Dozens flocked to a candlelight vigil filled with songs and prayers Friday, in solidarity with an 88-year-old San Jose woman who was brutalized during a home invasion robbery earlier this week.

Speaking in front of Flo Douglas' Cragmont Avenue home in the Alum Rock district, her family shared the good news with well-wishers that she had opened her eyes and spoken for the first time since Monday's attack.

Douglas' neice Angela Culp told attendees, "You can't keep a good woman down."

An hour before the vigil, a car parked directly across the road from Douglas' house was towed away, and sheriff's deputies went door to door, interviewing neighbors. Deputies declined to comment, saying only that they were following all leads.

The elderly woman sustained severe trauma to her head and face on Monday in her home. Although Douglas is still in critical condition, and unlikely to leave hospital anytime soon, her responses Friday gave her family hope.

"My grandmother is a peaceful, loving woman who has lived there since 1964," Jocelyn Wallace Lewis, the victim's granddaughter, said earlier this week.

At the vigil, family members and friends said Douglas, lovingly known as Ms. Flo, changed lives. Having owned Sisters Salon for 40 years, she gave hundreds of young stylists their first break.

"It was like an eagle's nest," said Michael Wallace, Douglas' nephew. "They learned from her, then left and started their own business, which she was elated about."

In church, Douglas volunteers non-stop, some said, commended her for never slowing down, even though she is a senior citizen.

"She was always on the go," Culp said. "Even at 88."

Others said Douglas is full of life and appreciated her sense of humor.

"She has a wonderful spirit, a kind heart, and she would do anything for you," Douglas' friend Diane Lowe-Epps said.

On Wednesday night, deputies arrested 19-year-old Zachary Cuen in connection with the home invasion during which he is accused of repeatedly assaulting Douglas. He is expected to be charged on Sept. 19. Efforts to reach him or his attorney have not been successful.

Undersheriff Carl Neusel in a news conference this week called Douglas a "beloved and cherished" community member, and thanked her "wonderful neighbors" who sensed "something was amiss" and acted on it.

Neighbors told NBC Bay Area that surveillance footage turned over to investigators included what sounded like threatening shouts coming from Douglas' house. However, the sheriff's office declined to comment on whether that led to Cuen's arrest.

Cuen was on probation in connection with a February vehicle theft and hit-and-run. Sources say he also attempted to burglarize an 85-year-old woman, who lives in the same neighborhood as Douglas.

"It's unthinkable, but I really suspected it was someone in the neighborhood, only because they left and then came back," said neighbor Laurie Martinez-Baja.

Douglas told police that two men broke into her residence using a side door, before beating her and ransacking her home.

Neusel assured the San Jose community that they are safe, now that Cuen is in custody. But he added that investigators are still looking into whether he had an accomplice.

Neighbors, meanwhile, are keeping Cuen's arrest in perspective.

"I don't think it has put all the fear at ease because a lot of people do believe there's still a second suspect," said Darlene Tenes.

Douglas' family has created a GoFundMe page to help raise funds for her.
A man is dead and more than 30 people have been displaced after a rapid string of garage fires set overnight on the citys South Side, police said.

Seven suspicious fires were started within an hour of one another, according to police, and all in the same area of the citys Heart of Chicago neighborhood.

Garbage cans were reported to have been set on fire first, with the fires quickly spreading to garages, fire officials said.

One of the fires, in the 2200 block of South Blue Island, left 32 people without a home after spreading to two apartment buildings.

Possibly as many as 7 garage fires deliberately set at the same time overnight. One spread to 2 homes. pic.twitter.com/1ClZsM2mOX  ReginaWaldroupNBC5 (@ReginaWaldroup) September 16, 2016

Blocks away, firefighters pulled an unidentified man out of a blazing garage set at a home in the 2100 block of West 21st Street. He was pronounced dead the scene, police said.

The police Bomb and Arson Unit were investigating the scenes. Many of the garages only suffered minor damage, police said.

Officials said they hope surveillance video from cameras set up in many of the areas will aid in the ongoing investigation.
Chicago police executed a search warrant above a children's daycare center that yielded a gun, ammo, drugs and one person in custody, authorities announced Thursday night.

The raid took place about 6 p.m. Thursday in the 500 block of West 103rd Street.

Police said in a Facebook post they recovered a 9mm pistol with more than 50 rounds of ammo, 375 grams of marijuana estimated at $2,050 street value and 63 grams of raw rock cocaine estimated at $7,056 street value.

Chargers against the person brought into custody were pending as of Thursday night, police said.
Cook County Sheriffs deputies serving an eviction notice to a South Side man walked in on him having sex with a 15-year-old girl he met on the SayHi app, prosecutors said Thursday.

Solomon Muhammad-Ali met the girl Sept. 9 and exchanged sexually explicit pictures with her; she has the cognitive functioning age of a 6-year-old, Assistant Cook County States Attorney Becky Walters told Judge Peggy Chiampas, the Chicago Sun-Times is reporting.

She initially told Muhammad-Ali she was 18, but then admitted she was 15.

Still, 34-year-old Muhammad-Ali spoke to her over the phone and the girl stayed with him last weekend, Walters said.

Tuesday, when sheriffs deputies went to serve Muhammad-Ali an eviction notice, they found him and the girl naked in the apartment in the 1600 block of West 83rd, authorities said.

The girl was performing a sex act on Muhammad-Ali, Walters said.

The girl told deputies she had had sex with Muhammad-Ali before and that she was 15, Walters said.

Evidence technicians recovered a condom wrapper, a condom wrapper with a open condom inside, two cell phones and a pair of the girls underwear that was placed in a backpack at Muhammad-Alis residence, Walters said.

The girl was taken to University of Chicago Comer Childrens Hospital, where a rape kit was taken.

Muhammad-Ali allegedly told police the girl told him she was 15 and he asked her to leave but they had sex anyway.

I messaged her hi and she messaged me back, and I asked her to call me and she did, Muhammad-Ali told officers, according to his police report.

Muhammad-Ali had been out on bond for a 2013 aggravated domestic battery and strangulation case involving his ex-girlfriend, Walters said.

He has three previous misdemeanor domestic battery convictions and one misdemeanor battery conviction, Walters said.

An assistant public defender said Muhammad-Ali is a cook at an area fast-food chain.

Chiampas ordered him held without bond.
An elderly man who was shot in an attempted robbery returned home from the hospital Thursday, as authorities continue to search for the men who shot him.

Federico Laguardia, 71, was watering the lawn at his home in the 7000 block of South California Avenue in Chicago's Marquette Park neighborhood on Tuesday, Sept. 6 around 12:10 p.m. when the incident occurred, according to police.

Two men on bikes approached, demanding his wallet. When Laguardia refused, they shot him in the stomach, police said, in a robbery attempt caught on a neighbor's surveillance camera.

"After this trauma, my once open-hearted father told me that he will now have to be suspicious of everyone who passes by," his son Fred Laguardia said, choking back tears as he talked about his father's ordeal.

Laguardia said his father is a decent man, who has lived in their neighborhood for nearly 30 years, and that he's determined to show his father that there are still good people in the city.

"There are as-of-yet the nameless park district workers who rushed my dad to hospital. There is the Mount Sinai surgical ICU team that helped saved his life," he said.

Neighbor Loisteen Walker is among the many community members standing with the Laguardia family as they try to stem the rising tide in violence across their neighborhood.

"I believe today Dr. King would be ashamed about violence on one another," she said. "We have shamed God," she added.

A $10,000 reward is offered for information leading to an arrest, and authorities are urging anyone with information on Laguardia's shooters to come forward and contact the police.
Police are searching for a suspect they believed tried to carjack one woman and kidnapped another in a suburban parking lot within minutes.

The incidents both happened Tuesday night in a large Hickory Hills parking lot in the 9600 block of Roberts Road.

In the first encounter, a woman said she was sitting in her vehicle when someone approached, showed her a black handgun and ordered her to unlock her car. The victim refused and drove away from the area before calling police.

At the same location, a suspect matching the same description, walked up to another woman who was sitting in her vehicle, authorities said. The suspect entered her unlocked car, pointed a gun at her and told her to drive away from the area. The victim drove a short distance before she was ordered to pull into a parking lot of a closed business. She was ordered to get into the back seat of the vehicle, but fought with the suspect, causing him to flee, police said.

Officers responded to the scene but were unable to find the suspect. They did recover an airsoft pistol they say was used in the incidents.

The attacks are believed to be connected with a third similar encounter reported in Palos Hills last Friday, police said.

In that case, a woman who was returning home from work and left her car near 99th Terrace and 84th Avenue when she was accosted, police said. The woman left the area around 5 a.m., after the attack, and drove to 103rd and Harlem, where she met with officers. The suspect fled with her purse, wallet and cell phone, police said.

The suspect is described as African-American, between the ages of 16 and 18 years old, with a small build, about 5 feet, 6 inches tall and weighing about 120 pounds. In both attacks he was wearing a dark hooded sweatshirt.

Anyone with information on the incidents is being asked to call (708) 598-4900.
Six inmates gained their freedom today because of a man who not long ago ran for mayor of Chicago and president of the United States.

This is not a black thing, its a human thing, said former mayoral candidate Willie Wilson Thursday.

With the support of local clergy, politicians and the Cook County Sheriffs Department, Wilson spent $15,000 of his own money to bond out six inmates who had been thrown into jail on low-level misdemeanor offenses.

Some of these kids were just picked up on the street and doing nothing, Wilson said. Some of these kids just had a little ounce of marijuana on them and (got) locked in jail for two, three weeks or a month or years, that dont make sense.

Paying the inmates bond is part of Wilsons Bond Payment Project which he said was born out of his push for prison reform from his time as a mayoral candidate.

Jane Gubser, of the Cook County Sheriffs Office says the department is thankful for Wilsons efforts.

Dr. Wilson is supporting the sheriffs mission that we dont want low-level offenders sitting in our jails when they can be out in the community receiving access to resources, Gubser said.

The inmates who posted bond due to Wilsons generosity, like Russell Miller, thanked him.

I am going to go back to my job and keep working, Miller said. I am not going to criminal trespass anymore.
The grandmother who was pictured in police photos passed out in an SUV from an apparent heroin overdose while her 4-year-old grandson sat in the back seatwas sentenced to 180 days in jail Wednesday, NBC News reported.

Rhonda Pasek pleaded no contest to charges of endangering a child, public intoxication and a seat belt violation. She was sent back to the Columbiana County jail, according to Gisele Stevenson, a deputy municipal court clerk in East Liverpool.

It was the latest setback for 50-year-old Pasek, who lives in West Virginia, across the Ohio River from East Liverpool. According to her sister, she has struggled with substance abuse addiction for many years.

Several days after Pasek was arrested on Sept. 7, custody of the boy was awarded to his great aunt and great uncle, who live in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, officials said.
What to Know A man attacked an off-duty detective with a meat cleaver near Penn Station on Thursday afternoon.

The suspect had been fleeing cops with a cleaver in his hand after they caught him trying to remove a boot from his car.

Police fired 18 shots, hitting the suspect several times, after he gashed the off-duty officer with the cleaver.

UPDATE: Exclusive video shows chaos breaking out near Penn Station as officers sprint after suspect; wounded detective released from hospital

A man attacked an off-duty NYPD officer with a cleaver near Penn Station at the height of the evening rush hour Thursday, wounding the cop in the face before being shot at 18 times by police, officials say.

Police initially confronted 32-year-old Akram Joudeh near West 31st Street and Broadway as they caught him trying to remove a boot from his car, NYPD Chief of Department and incoming police commissioner Jimmy O'Neill said at a briefing Thursday evening.

Video obtained exclusively by NBC 4 New York shows a frustrated Joudeh trying to remove the boot, pulling tools from his packed car.

When police arrived, Joudeh pulled out an 11-inch cleaver from his waistband and began running toward Sixth Avenue, officials said. Officers chased after him, with others joining the pursuit along the way, and one uniformed sergeant deployed a stun gun to no effect.

The suspect continued running westbound on West 32nd Street toward Seventh Avenue, and in the middle of the block, mounted the front grill of a marked NYPD car, O'Neill said.

That's when an off-duty detective, who was walking to Penn Station to catch a Long Island Rail Road train home after work, saw the chase coming toward him, law enforcement officials told NBC 4 New York. He decided to engage and went to tackle the suspect.

The two struggled, and Joudeh hit him in the head with the cleaver, leaving a six-inch gash from the temple to the jaw, said O'Neill.

Three uniformed NYPD officers fired a total of 18 gunshots at Joudeh, striking him several times.

"I heard police from behind me screaming, 'Get down, get down, get down!'" said witness Jonathan Schneier. "I saw a deranged individual with a very large meat cleaver... Probably six to eight suspects engaged the suspect verbally, told him to drop his weapon."

O'Neill told reporters, "Keep in mind he had just attacked an off-duty officer who's got a six-inch gash on his face. He's got an 11-inch cleaver. They shot until the threat was stopped."

The off-duty detective, identified by sources as 16-year veteran Det. Brian O'Donnell, was taken to Bellevue Hospital, where he's listed in serious condition, officials said. Doctors are assessing the damage, and surgeons have said reconstructive surgery will be needed.

O'Donnell has spent most of his time on the force in the 19th Precinct, and became a detective in March 2015.

Two other officers were taken to the hospital with non-life threatening injuries from the encounter, though it's not clear how they got hurt.

Both Mayor Bill de Blasio and Police Commissioner Bill Bratton, who is finishing his last week on the job, visited the officers at the hospital. Bratton said the wounded detective was in good spirits despite the "significant injury."

Joudeh was also taken to Bellevue Hospital, and he's in critical but stable condition, said O'Neill. He has been moved to the operating room.

The attack happened near the busy Midtown commuter hub at the height of the evening rush hour. Bratton said the officers acted bravely in subduing the suspect in the crowded shopping and transit district, and that "sufficient shots" were fired to stop the "character running down the street waving a cleaver."

Witness Steven Coyle, who recorded video of officers shooting at the suspect, agreed.

"He was a threat to the officers and anyone in the area," he said.

Michael Palladino, president of the Detectives Endowment Association, said in a statement, "An incident like this proves that you are really never off duty. Our detective engaged the perpetrator because the suspect was carrying a meat cleaver and the detective was worried about the crowded conditions on the street given that it was rush hour full of residents, tourists and commuters."

Joudeh has 15 prior arrests, including one on July 27 after he was found carrying knives near a synagogue in the Manhattan Beach neighborhood of Brooklyn. His last known address was in Queens, though police say he may have been living in his car.

The other arrests stretching back to 2009 include charges for driving while impaired by drugs, criminal possession of a weapon, menacing with a weapon and criminal trespassing, sources said.

Two years ago, a hatchet-wielding man ambushed a group of NYPD officers in Jamaica, Queens, gashing a rookie cop in the head with the 18-inch ax. Two other officers shot and killed the suspect, Zale Thompson, on the street.

Thompson was a self-radicalized "lone wolf terrorist," police officials said after the attack.

In Thursday's incident, a federal official told NBC News "based on what we know of how this started, and on his priors, we don't currently think this was an act of terrorism."

Another law enforcement source told NBC 4 that investigators actively looked into whether Joudeh had any interest in or connection to terror planning after he was caught outside the synagogue in July with the knives. But they did not find any evidence of any radicalization.

Joudeh's former neighbors in Elmhurst described him as troubled, constantly fighting with his two roommates and sometimes getting visits from police. One woman who asked not to be identified said he once got into an altercation with a family member, and during the fight, broke the front glass door of the building's entrance.
A 57-year-old former Clinton man who was accused of trying to hire someone to murder his former wife and was convicted of murder-for-hire has been sentenced to 10 years in prison.

James Erik Godiksen was charged after an AFT undercover agent revealed his murder-for-hire scheme, prosecutors said.

Godiksen and the undercover agent exchanged multiple phone calls over four days and state prosecutors said Godiksen offered to pay the undercover agent $5,000 to murder his ex-wife and offered extra compensation for killing her new boyfriend.

On Sept. 14, 2016, Godiksen was arrested after providing the undercover agent with a $80 "down payment" to buy a knife, along with his former wife's physical description, her phone number, her home address, her place of work and the route she takes to drive home, the U.S. attorney's office said.

After appearing in court, Godiksen was detained.

A federal jury found him guilty on July 20, 2018, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

Godiksen was sentenced on Thursday to 120 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release.
One of two Coast Guard cadets accused of sexual assault has been found guilty and has been dismissed from service and sentenced to a year in prison.

Cadet Michael Shermot was charged on Dec, 28, accused of sex assault and violating the Uniform Code of Military Justice, and suspended the next day.

He appeared for court-martial in Norfolk, Virginia on Thursday, according to the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, and was found guilty of violating the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

Cadet Anthony Livingstone was also charged with sexual assault and extortion. Livingstone will appear at the court-martial in Norfolk on Oct. 26, the academy said.
A civil liberties group filed a lawsuit against three Connecticut state troopers and said they illegally retaliated against a protester at a drunken driving checkpoint by arresting him on bogus criminal charges.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Connecticut filed a lawsuit Thursday against troopers John Barone, Patrick Torneo and John Jacobi for alleged civil rights violations.

The lawsuit says Barone confiscated Michael Picard's legally carried pistol, pistol permit and camera at a sobriety checkpoint in West Hartford on Sept. 11, 2015, on the pretext of public complaints.

The ACLU says the troopers then got together and fabricated charges, not knowing that they were still being recorded by Picard's camera.

The charges against Picard were later dismissed in court.

A state police spokeswoman and the three troopers didn't immediately return messages Thursday and the state attorney general's office declined to comment.

The state police union, however, released a statement on Friday, calling the lawsuit "frivilous" and said the video was "deceptively edited." They went on to say that the fact that the charges against Picard were dropped does not mean he is innocent.

"The Troopers in this case  and all State Troopers -- respect the rights of every citizen while putting their own lives on the line to keep the public safe and snsure the law is enforced," a statement from the union says.

"While some use their free time to harass and provoke law enforcement officers who are trying to save lives by identifying drunk (sic) drivers, the men and women of the Connecticut State Police Union appreciate that the vast majority of people understand the dangerous work our Troopers do to keep us all safe," the statement says.
Nearly 69 percent of Connecticut is facing a severe drought after being upgraded on Thursday from a moderate drought.

Cities and towns are having to impose water restrictions until the state receives a soaking rain.

The town of Manchester has upgraded its water conservation advisory, placed in mid-August, to what's known as voluntary conservation.

"Before it was an advisory just to let people know that were getting into this now that were below 70 percent were looking for people to actually voluntarily conserve the water," said Patrick Kearney with the town of Manchester Water and Sewer Department.

In mid-August, the advisory told residents the town faced an 80 percent water level in its reservoir system. On Thursday, Kearney told NBC Connecticut it is at about a 68 percent capacity.

Manchesters Water and Sewer Department is asking residents for their help to conserve water.

"They could stop watering their lawn, stop washing their cars," said Kearney.

"Basically try not to use water outside as much as possible and to utilze the water inside very good."

Residents are advised to run full loads of dishes or laundry, as well.

As of Thursday night all cities and towsn provided water by Aquarion Water, Connecticut Water Company have been placed on a voluntary conservation.

Water departments in Bristol, East Lyme, Hazardville, Manchester, Norwich and Montville are also on a voluntary conservation.

Southington has a mandatory water restriction for its residents and UConn has a Stage III Water Supply Watch.
The last thing you want to see gushing out of a faucet is brown, dirty water that - once drained - leaves your white tub covered in black residue. Residents at Cedar Ridge Townhomes in Willington, including UConn students who live off-campus, say it's a common sight.

"Since move-in day, we have had straight yellow water," resident Alexandra Valenta said.

"It seems like a nightmare at this point to have to keep dealing with it," resident Cheyenne Allen said.

Allen, along with many other UConn students, moved in a month ago and said the filthy water sometimes brings an awful stench.

She displayed glasses filled with various shades of yellow water and some contained a layer of sediment on the bottom.

"Not able to drink with it, cook with it, bathe in it," Allen said.

Instead, Allen and others said they have been purchasing bottled water and showering elsewhere. To wash clothes, Allen and Valenta said they've been going back home to New Jersey.

Allen said the complex gave them three jugs of water and her roommate said the complex gave them each a Subway gift card for $10.

"It's frustrating, especially paying the rent we do over here," Steve Nilla, another resident, said.

Lutz Management Company, which runs Cedar Ridge, said they're working to fix the problem by employing a water specialist, monitoring and testing the water weekly and flushing the system.

An email to residents from the complex says, in part, "We are currently in the process of draining all of our hot water storage tanks, in hopes to drain the settlement (sic) out. We are hopeful that this will eliminate the discoloration issue at hand."

The email also says, "At this time, the water is safe to drink."

"I came home earlier today and ran the water, and it was brown and then started coughing out this black stuff," Nilla said.

"We're still gathering information on this, can't say for sure what's going on," Robert Miller, director of health for Eastern Highlands Health District, said.

Miller said the agency received a complaint on Wednesday regarding the issue and is working with the State Department of Public Health to clear up the problem with the water. He said there are several reasons the water could look and smell the way it does.

"There are many reasons water could be discolored or have a bad odor, but some of the common ones we come across are high iron content, high manganese content, and also there could be sulfur bacteria in the water," Miller said. "If you see water that doesn't look or doesn't taste right, prudent avoidance is probably the way to go until you feel comfortable about the water you're drinking."

Officials from the Department of Public Health believe that maintenance activities have caused iron and manganese to go into solution and discolor that water, but it's still under investigation.
"Snowden" is a talky, fascinating film that spends as much time swirling around the mind-set of the man who stole and revealed NSA secrets as it does exploring the relationship between the self proclaimed whistle blower and his longtime girlfriend.

Joseph Gorden Levitt gives one of his best performances as Edward Snowden playing him both in speech patterns and mannerisms.

It's an uncanny impersonation because Levitt is a deep thinking actor playing a deep thinking individual.

Shailene Woodley is also terrific as his patient, fun loving girlfriend in a movie that questions authority and paints Snowden as a patriot.

Writer, director Oliver Stone has made of a film of surprising restraint by asking more questions than providing answers, and I found the film helpful in my own attempt to wrap my head around such complicated issues of privacy vs. security, even patriotism and freedom.

I like to be challenged in my thinking and good, smart, films usually help me in seeking a clearer picture.

As the film, "Snowden" opens in local theaters, the real Edward Snowden and his girlfriend find themselves living in Russia, unable to return to America without federal prosecution.

At one point in Oliver Stone's film the real Snowden shows up and it's a bit creepy to watch. Another complication in a complicated story that has a long road yet to travel.
Dallas-Fire Rescue officials say a fire at an apartment complex on the southeast side was intentionally set Thursday evening.[[393639941,R]]

Firefighters arrived at the Solana Ridge Apartments on the 8000 block of Rothington Road just after 7 p.m. to find an advanced fire burning through a multi-story building.

Fire department spokesman Jason Evans said firefighters were forced to take a defensive stance outside in order to prevent the fire from spreading to neighboring buildings.

A total of eight units were rendered uninhabitable by the fire, smoke and water, Evans said, but the total number of residents displaced was not yet known.

Evans said Friday morning the fire was intentionally set outiside of the building, spread up a wall and into the attic where it spread throughout the building. Evans declined to reveal further information in the arson investigation.

The American Red Cross is assisting those who were displaced by the fire.

This is the second fire at the complex this year. On Aug. 17, Fabian Pena, 7, died after a fire at a different building at Solana Ridge. His mother and her infant son were treated for minor injuries.

Pena's mother told investigators she could smell the odor of gas inside her apartment before the fire started.
The number of officers retiring from the Dallas Police Department continued this week to far outpace the projections made by the department over the summer.

This week alone, 10 veteran Dallas officers retired. They'll be able to start drawing from their pension at the start of the new fiscal year in October.

Through the first two weeks of September, there have been 21 Dallas police officers who retired.

Multiple sources told NBC 5 that commanders are bracing for many more retirements over the next two weeks as well.

The Dallas Police Department did not foresee the volume of retirements this month.

In early August, Deputy Chiefs told city council members in a presentation that they projected 14 retirements between Aug. 9 and Oct. 1.

The number is significantly higher than that.

Police sources told NBC 5 there are new promotions and transfers being worked out at headquarters to deal with these retirements, though those promotions havent been formally announced yet.

There are major concerns about Dallas police paychecks and pensions. Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings told NBC 5 Friday hes worried about officers retiring or leaving for other departments.

"We need to pay our police officers. We were underpaid, vis-a-vis, other cities in the Metroplex. We can't have that. We can't lose those officers. So the plan the city manager put in place. In the short term was the right thing to do. It kept taxes down," he said.

In an e-mail to police officers on Friday, Sam Friar, the head of the Pension Board wrote:

The pension system board of trustees is currently confronted with a number of thorny issues. Among them are severe under-funding, very anxious and worried members, and increasing DROP withdrawals ... retiring now versus later should not have any bearing on how benefit changes will ultimately affect you such as changes to the annual adjustment.

DROP refers to a pension-deferment plan that hundreds of Dallas police officers are enrolled in. DROP is a program to earn interest on a deferred monthly pension check, so long as police officers keep wearing the badge even after they've reached retirement eligibility at 20 years of service.

The retirement board doesnt meet again for another three weeks, until Oct. 13. The Board said it is still evaluating several options.
Bar owners and restaurants in the Oak Lawn-Cedar Springs neighborhood are gearing up for their busiest weekend of the year.

An estimated crowd of 45,000 is expected to take in the festivities for Dallas PRIDE Sunday.

The Heineken Alan Ross Texas Freedom Parade will step off at 2 p.m. along Cedar Springs Road to Turtle Creek Boulevard.

The Miller Lite Festival in the Park will run from noon to 7 p.m. at Reverchon Park.

Many LGBT-friendly nightclubs and restaurants in the neighborhood were busy all afternoon Friday unloading shipments of water, food, beer and liquor.

Kathy Jack, who runs Sue Ellen's bar off Cedar Springs Road, says every year she sees more out-of-towners coming to Dallas specifically for this weekend.

"I've seen it change in that there are a lot more straight people that come down here with their families," she said. "And we've had more out-of-towners the last two years alone than we've ever had before."

She says it's a sign of progress, and growing acceptance.

"Everybody parties together now, which is the way it should have been a long time ago. But in the last few years, I've noticed a big difference," she said, unloading vodka bottles in the back storage room.

The parade's history stretches back to 1972  three years after the Stonewall Riots  and the LGBTQ community in Dallas was subject to harassment and acts of violence. Infighting within the community sidelined the event for eight years after the inaugural celebration.

In 1983, the Dallas Tavern Guild, an organization made up of gay and lesbian bar owners, took over organizing duties. The group's current executive director, Michael Doughman, said that parade was part celebration part political rally.

"A couple of community organizations wanted to be there to handout, mostly, human rights materials and, in those days, a lot of AIDS and HIV information," said Doughman. "Most of the people that were in the parade were activists, people with a message and a voice about AIDS and HIV and about equality."

By the 1990s, when the world had come to grips with the HIV/AIDS epidemic, the parade's focus shifted to breaking down the barriers of inequality.

"It was a very different time, and this was almost a defiant way, if you will, of pushing back against the heterosexual norms," said Rafael McDonnell, communications and advocacy manager for Resource Center. "I was participating in Pride parades before I told my family I was gay and it was very empowering, very liberating."

Jeremy Liebbe, who is the security director for the 33rd annual event, said this week there are some stepped up security measures this year in light of the shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, as well as lingering concerns about a string of attacks on members of the LGBT community in Oak Lawn.

Liebbe emphasized, though, that increased police patrols  paid for by Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban  along with the addition of multiple police security cameras in the area and a general increased level of communication, have helped to smooth over many fears.

The community has been much more alert and much more prone to call 911, and I believe we are getting a much stronger relationship between the LGBT Community and the Dallas Police Department overall, Liebbe said.

Liebbe said there will be at least 87 off-duty Dallas police officers working security during the parade and the festival, and that an additional 30-plus on-duty officers will be assigned to the days events.

"We've been working on this plan for more than a month. We have two different divisions involved," said Dallas Police Maj. Jimmy Vaughan. "Our plan for this year is that we've put a lot more muscle into this than last year. We recognize the events of Orlando and we want to make sure that people feel safe when they're out here."

Police noted that there's been a big change in PRIDE attendance in recent years.

"You see more families, more kids. More strollers especially," Vaughan said. "When you see strollers here, it puts a smile on your face, because you know people are bringing their families here. That is a positive thing. We encourage that."

Historically, Dallas PRIDE has been a safe event, according to Liebbe, who noted that there have consistently been an exceedingly low number of arrests, which typically range from zero to four.

This is a good event. This is a safe event, Liebbe said. It is hard to get a gathering of 40,000 people, especially where many of them are drinking, and have zero to four arrests at the entire event.

Police noted that violent crime  attacks, robberies and assaults  has seen a dramatic drop in recent weeks thanks to an increase in late-night foot patrols and new surveillance cameras.

"We will have many officers here, all night long," Maj. Vaughan said. "And really, if someone leaving the bar is worried about walking home or walking to a friend's house, given some of the attacks that happened last year, we really encourage them to ask an officer for help, to walk with them."

This year's grand marshal is Burke Burnett, a legally married gay man with two kids.d



"We've made such awesome strides, I'm really looking forward to what the next 10 years have to bring," said Burnett.

New for this year, Dallas PRIDE has instituted a clear bag policy for the festival, meaning purses and backpacks will not be allowed. The policy mirrors that of venues like AT&T Stadium.

NBC 5's Ben Russell, Jeff Smith and Cory Smith contributed to this report.
Outgoing Dallas Police Chief David Brown has moved up his retirement date to Oct. 4, he says, "to take advantage of some time sensitive opportunities that have been presented."

A source told NBC 5 that Brown would not get an October pension check if he retired after an Oct. 13 board meeting.

Brown has not confirmed the "time sensitive opportunity" is related to his pension payment.

On Thursday afternoon, Brown released the following statement:

I have moved my retirement date up to October 4, 2016 in order to take advantage of some time sensitive opportunities that have been presented. I am confident that a strong leadership succession plan is already in place for the department and I feel comfortable in accelerating my departure date. Again, I want to thank all of the officers of the Dallas Police Department for your hard work and sacrifice that has made my job easier throughout the years. Thank you and God bless!

On Sept. 1 Brown announced he was retiring Oct. 22, his 56th birthday, after more than three decades with the Dallas Police Department, ending a six-year tenure leading the country's seventh-largest municipal police force.

Retirements are a growing problem for the Dallas Police Department.

Dallas Police Chief David Brown has moved up his retirement date to Oct. 4 due to time sensitive opportunities.

The issue of "baby boomer" retirements came up before city council at the end of August, when police leaders pressed on City Council members to raise the starting pay for new officers so they could draw in more applicants.

Statistics provided to City Council, current through the first week of August, revealed more that more than 20 percent of DPD's sworn force is retirement-eligible.

Nearly 40 percent of the Dallas officers who've retired this fiscal year have more than 20 years of experience on the force, just like Chief Brown, who retires with 33 years of experience.

Another 32 percent of Dallas police officers who retired or resigned this year had between five and 20 years on the force.

Already more than 250 officers have retired or resigned this fiscal year. Projections show as many as 50 more could retire or leave by the end of the year.

The issue of baby boomer retirements came up before city council at the end of August, when police leaders pressed on City Council members to raise the starting pay for new officers so they could draw in more applicants. Statistics provided to City Council, current through the first week of August, revealed more that more than 20 percent of DPDs...

The numbers of retirements and resignations has grown 18 percent in the last two years, while the number of applicants to DPD has dropped about 20 percent.

Sam Friar, chairman of the Dallas Police and Fire Pension Board, admitted the fund is in trouble long-term but cautioned against anyone rushing to retire.

"There's a Chicken Little effect happening now," he said. "We're OK right now."

He said unfounded rumors are sweeping the police and fire departments.

"There's really no reason to panic right now," he said.

Sam Friar, chairman of the Dallas Police and Fire Pension Board, cautioned Thursday against anyone in uniform rushing to retire.

Interim Chief Already Named



The interim chief will be Assistant Chief David Pughes. He'll now begin in the first week of October. It's a position he's likely to hold for many months, given that the national search for a permanent replacement won't even begin until early 2017.

Dealing with low starting pay and growing retirements is certainly to be among the interim chief's biggest challenges. A police department spokeswoman said "out of respect for Chief Brown" Chief Pughes won't be answering questions from the media until after Brown's retirement in three weeks.

Chief Brown's History With the Dallas Police

In his six years as chief, Brown has been a fierce supporter of his officers while facing backlash from unions over the city's low pay. While supporting the rank-and-file, he's fought tirelessly to reduce officer-involved shootings and reports of police brutality.

Following the ambush in July that killed five police officers, four from Dallas and one from DART, Brown defended the plan to kill the gunman using an explosive device on a robot, saying it was the only way to protect officers from further harm since the gunman, claimed to have planted bombs around the area and threatened to hurt more people. Brown said that he would make the same decision again.

Brown has historically been quick to credit his officers for 11 straight years of a declining crime rate. When the trend in violent crime was reversed earlier this year, friction developed between Brown and officers on how to staff and combat the issue. Meanwhile, violent crime remains up 10.4 percent year to date, despite an eight-week partnership with state and county officers earlier in 2016 to help round-up suspects. Homicide is up 24.7 percent so far in 2016. Overall crime is up 2.5 percent.

Brown said he joined the force in 1983 because of the crack cocaine epidemic's impact on his neighborhood in Oak Cliff.

NBC 5's Scott Gordon, Frank Heinz and Jeff Smith contributed to this report.
A Fort Worth man condemned for smothering an 89-year-old man and robbing him of some $6,000 in 2004 has received an execution date.

Texas Department of Criminal Justice spokesman Jason Clark said Friday the agency has received notice that a judge in Tarrant County set Feb. 7 for 36-year-old Tilon Lashon Carter's lethal injection.

The U.S. Supreme Court earlier this year refused an appeal for Carter. He was condemned for the robbery and slaying of James Tomlin. Evidence showed Tomlin, a retired Bell Helicopter worker, kept cash in containers scattered around his Fort Worth home.

Prosecutors portrayed Carter as a longtime criminal. They also tied him to a fatal shooting at a drug house.

Carter's among at least five Texas death row inmates with execution dates in the coming months.
A Watauga woman inherited a family heirloom, but the movers she hired to pack it up dropped it while she watched.

So she called NBC 5 Responds to find out her options.

Cindy Hearne said the heirloom  a piano  had been in her family for decades.

"This piano was my great grandmothers," she said. '"I spent a lot of my childhood taking piano lessons and playing on this piano."

Hearne learned the third-generation piano would be hers, so she called a moving company to deliver it to her home safely. The family treasure was in the hands of two movers, but not for long.

"The piano fell down on the street," she said. "In the middle of the street face down."

In Texas, moving companies registered with the Texas Department of Transportation are only liable for $0.60 for every pound the damaged item weighs. For Hearne's piano, which could weigh anywhere from 500 to 800 pounds, the company is only liable for $300 to $480.

The company agreed to fix the piano and actually exceeded the required amount. Hearne said they paid about $700, but her antique doesnt look the same.

"There are nicks and bangs and broken pieces all over it," she said.

She said shell be paying for further repairs to restore it.

"It's priceless," she said. "Maybe they don't see it as priceless, but it's priceless to me."

If you are moving something valuable, you can ask your moving company if they have a higher liability. Sometimes you can pay them for more coverage.

Before you even pay a dime, make sure you check to see if the company has a license on TxDOT's website.

If you're planning on moving in Texas, check out the resources and other tips offered by the Better Business Bureau.
The White Helmets, a new Netflix original documentary, follows the first responders in Syria who are unlikely heroes, NBC News reported.

About 3,000 Syrians make up the Syrian Civil Defense group, comprised of shopkeepers, bakers and teachers put their lives on the line each day to help during the countrys war.

The Netflix documentary follows three men to Turkey, where they receive training before returning to Aleppo to work in the same rescue unit. The filmmakers' hope was to bring international attention to this civilian group and the work that they do.

The volunteers' work gained international attention in August when the group helped save Omran Daqneesh, the little boy covered in dust and blood.

White Helmets is now available on Netflix in 190 countries in 21 languages.
It's been more than a quarter of a century since a Republican presidential candidate won California. And polls show that the Democratic winning streak is likely to continue. With the outcome almost certain, presidential candidates rarely campaign for votes in California. But they do turn to the state's wealthiest for something they consider just as valuable: campaign cash.

"Most of the money in presidential campaigns comes from millionaires and billionaires and special interest groups," said Daniel Newman, CEO of MapLight, a nonpartisan group that studies the influence of money in politics.

The NBC4 I-Team examined thousands of donations  contributions made by Californians to federal races from January 2015 through June 2016  and found that a fraction of California's richest residents are donating nearly half the money to candidates and political action committees. Digging deeper into the numbers, we found just 62 people out of the state's 38 million residents have given more than a quarter of the $500,000,000 donated in the state, making California "the ATM of American politics."

"You have a tiny fraction of the population giving more of the money, meaning everyone else doesn't matter so much when it comes to political funding," explains Newman.

Some of those names come from Hollywood including George Clooney, Steven Spielberg, and former DreamWorks co-founder Jeffrey Katzenberg. And a chunk of the money they're donating is going out of state. Katzenberg and his wife Marilyn have given directly to Democratic senate candidates in four swing states; races that are still too close to call.

"Right now the control of the senate is up for grabs," said Newman. "Whether it's Republican or Democratic control will have a big effect on everyone in the country."

Other Hollywood power players have also donated to out of state senate campaigns including director and producer JJ Abrams. He gave to Democratic senate candidates in Illinois, Nevada, New Hampshire, Ohio and Wisconsin.

But not all of the cash is going to Democrats. Southern California real estate developer Geoffrey Palmer, whose apartment complexes dot the local landscape, donated more than $2 million to help elect Donald Trump. And some contributors, like Sean Parker, founder of Napster and the former president of Facebook, are giving to both Democrats and Republicans. The I-Team found nearly $2 million worth of Parker donations going to a combination of candidates and committees.

"For your billionaire, it's really not that much money but it buys incredible access," said Newman.

Los Angeles media mogul Haim Saban and his wife Cheryl have given nearly $13 million in contributions this election cycle, to Democratic candidates and causes. By far the state's biggest donor doesn't come from Hollywood, but from the Silicon Valley. Former hedge fund manager and environmental activist, Tom Steyer, has given $38 million so far. Most of that money went to an organization called NextGen Climate Action who among other activities is running commercials on local televisions pushing for stronger environmental laws.

"Ultimately, the policies that are made in Washington D.C. do affect our businesses here in San Jose, Silicon Valley," said Matthew Mahood, president of the Silicon Valley Chamber of Commerce.

Most of California's biggest donors are backing Democrats in the upcoming election. But Donald Trump has raised more money in Los Angeles than any other metro area so far. All told, over 60 percent of the state's donations go to Democrats. Political party aside, nearly half of California's campaign contributions come from megadonors; people who've donated at least $20,000 towards this election.

"I think Americans as a whole should be outraged at this broken system where money comes from millionaires, billionaires and special-interest," said Newman. "We all pay a price for the system where the people that make our laws are responsive to donors instead of voters."
A Chicago police officer has been indicted on federal civil rights charges after dashcam video captured him firing in to a car packed with teenagers, wounding two, as it backed away from him.

Marco Proano, 41, was charged with two counts of deprivation of rights under color of law, according to U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois Zach Fardon.

Proano is accused of using unreasonable force with a dangerous weapon while on duty in Chicago on Dec. 22, 2013.

The incident was captured on the officer's dashcam video and the footage first released to the Chicago Reporter last year by a retired Cook County judge who called it disturbing on a whole different level.

In the nearly three minute video, Proano arrives at 95th and South LaSalle streets where a vehicle had been stopped by two other officers and is seen approaching the vehicle with his gun pointed sideways. When the driver of the vehicle backs away from the officers, Proano raises his gun and opens fire.

Six black teens were inside the vehicle, and two of the teens were wounded in the shooting.

"When a police officer uses unreasonable force, it has a harmful effect on not only the victims, but also the public, who lose faith and confidence in law enforcement, Fardon said in a statement. Our office will continue to independently and vigorously pursue civil rights prosecutions to hold officers accountable and strengthen trust in the police.

At the time of the videos release, Chicago police said the officer involved in the shooting was moved off the street and assigned to desk duty. The investigation was then referred to state and federal authorities.

"The charges announced today are serious and the Chicago Police Department will have zero tolerance for proven misconduct," CPD said in a statement Friday. "Mr. Proano was relieved of his police powers last year during the course of IPRA's investigation and CPD is fully cooperating with the US Attorney's Office."

A lawsuit filed by the mothers of three teens injured in the incident, including the two who were shot, alleges Proano fired more than a dozen rounds into the vehicle, striking one teen in the shoulder and another in the hip and heel.

The suit claims the teens did not show a weapon or pose any apparent threat, and alleges police removed the injured teens from hospitals without authorization to take them to a police station for questioning.

In a separate court filing, Proano reportedly admitted to the shooting, but denies claims that the teens did not show a weapon.

The Independent Police Review Authority said last year it referred the case to prosecutors shortly after the shooting took place.

At the time of the incident, Officer Proano was removed from his District of assignment and placed on desk duty at Public Safety Headquarters, the organization said in a statement. The incident remains under investigation by federal authorities and IPRA.

Chicago police also said that early last year, former police Supt. Garry McCarthy changed the departments policy to clarify that officers are prevented from firing at or into a moving vehicle when the vehicle is the only force used against the sworn member or another person.

Each count of the indictment carries a sentence of up to 10 years in prison.
First lady Michelle Obama said Friday there is only one candidate for president who is ready to face "the hottest, harshest light there is," and that's Hillary Clinton.

Speaking before a crowd at George Mason University, she urged Americans to go out and vote for Clinton, a candidate who inspires her and is "truly ready for this job," and held Clinton in contrast with Donald Trump, though she didn't mention Trump by name.

"Hillary has the resilience that it takes to do this job, because when she gets knocked down, she doesnt complain or cry foul."

"Who in this election is truly ready for this job? Who do we pick? Well for me, Im just saying, it is excruciatingly clear," Obama said, adding that Clinton "has the resilience that it takes to do this job."

It was Obama's first campaign event for the Democratic nominee since she appeared at the Democratic National Convention. When Clinton returned to the campaign trail this week after a brief illness, she promised a more aspirational finish to her White House bid. And she used Michelle Obama as a guidepost.

"As Michelle Obama said in her fabulous speech at the Democratic Convention, when we go to the polls this November, the real choice isn't between Democrat or Republican. It's about who will have the power to shape our children for the next four years of their lives," Clinton said Thursday during a campaign stop in Greensboro, North Carolina.

It's a message Clinton aides wanted Mrs. Obama herself delivering in battleground states as much as possible between now and Election Day. So far, the first lady has publicly committed only to Friday's event  a rally Friday afternoon in northern Virginia, less than an hour drive from the White House  though the campaign expects her to make additional appearances.

Mrs. Obama's rally Friday was aimed in part at encouraging Virginia voters to register ahead of the state's Oct. 17 deadline. But her broader mission is to rally the groups who were so crucial to her husband's two White House wins: young people, many of whom are skeptical of Clinton, and black voters, who overwhelmingly back Clinton over Republican Donald Trump, but need to show up to vote in big numbers.

"On November 8, you will decide whether we have a president who believes in science and will fight climate change or not," Obama said.

Mrs. Obama's speech at the Democratic convention this summer was widely praised. Her primetime address ran just about 10 minutes, yet it was perhaps the most powerful of the four-day gathering.

She delivered a searing indictment of Trump, also without ever mentioning his name, yet wrapped her critique in the hopeful optimism of a mother trying to protect her daughters' futures. She spoke of telling her daughters that "the hateful language they hear from public figures on TV does not represent the true spirit of this country" and said the Obama family motto is "when they go low, we go high."

In the midst of a heated campaign, with two candidates who are viewed negatively by so many Americans, the first lady provided a striking contrast.

"Part of what makes her so appealing and effective as a surrogate is that she's relentlessly positive, even when things on the campaign trail get negative," said Olivia Alair Dalton, Mrs. Obama's former spokeswoman. "It was a breath of fresh air."

Mrs. Obama has carefully cultivated her image as a devoted mother who prefers to stay out of the political fray. She sets limits on how often she's willing to campaign, even for her husband's White House races, and largely steers clear of controversial topics. And she's embraced her role as a pop culture fixture far more willingly than her role as one of the most popular figures in Democratic politics.

Unlike her husband, who forged a strong bond with Clinton during her four years as his secretary of state, Mrs. Obama does not have a particularly close relationship with the Democratic nominee, though the two are said to be friendly.

Yet the first lady is fiercely protective of her husband's legacy and has been a major player in discussions about his presidential library and other post-White House projects. And there's perhaps nothing more crucial to preserving Obama's legacy than a Clinton victory.
As historic commercial flights have begun between the United States and Cuba in the past weeks, those pilots and other crew members on those flights who are Cuban-Americans are finding that the welcome mat is not being rolled out for them.

Authorities within the Cuban government are telling all airlines that will be flying from American cities to the island nation that those who do not have a Cuban passport  a requirement for anyone born there who left the country after 1970  will not be allowed entry.

Since rules require overnight rest stops for those who fly 12 hours in a day, airlines such as American, JetBlue and Spirit are going through their crew lists and removing anyone born in Cuba from assigned flights to the country.

"Thats a Cuban government demand. Thats not something were saying, said American Airlines spokeswoman Alexis Aran Coello to the Miami Herald. We are abiding by the laws of the Cuban government."

The first flight in over 50 years took place in late August, taking off from Fort Lauderdale / Hollywood International Airport on JetBlue Airlines. American had their first flight take off from Miami International Airport the following week.

"The Cuban government requires all Cuban-born individuals to have a valid Cuban passport when entering the country. American Airlines abides by the laws and regulations in all of the countries and territories where we operate," American said in a statement Friday. "American continues to work diligently with Cuban authorities to secure accommodation that will impose no additional documentation requirements on our employees."
Federal authorities are seeking the publics help in identifying a man impersonating a U.S. Marshal in Ft. Myers.

Authorities say a white or Hispanic male entered the Suncoast Credit Union Tuesday, located at 4491 Underwood Drive in Fort Myers.

According to the U.S. Marshals Service, the man was wearing a bulletproof vest, badge, and had a holstered firearm on his hip. He identified himself as a U.S. Marshal and asked the staff a series of strange questions. The suspect spoke with a New York accent.

Authorities say the man may be from the Miami, Ft. Lauderdale or West Palm Beach area.

The male was also reported to have been inside the Check Cashing Store located at 4901 Palm Beach Boulevard in Fort Myers.

Anyone who can help identify the man is urged to contact Southwest Florida Crime Stoppers at 1-800-780-TIPS(8477) or the Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers office at (305) 471-TIPS.
If you are planning on being in Downtown Miami on Friday evening, be sure to bring your patience  three major events are being held at roughly the same time that will bring thousands of fans each and plenty of traffic.

At 6 PM, GOP Presidential nominee Donald Trump will hold a rally inside the James L. Knight Center. One hour later, Grammy Award winner Meghan Trainor will take the to stage at Bayfront Park.

Finally, international music star Kanye West will hit the stage at the AmericanAirlines Arena for the first of two shows, with that concert set to start at 8 PM.

Stay with NBC 6 throughout the day for updates on any road closures or delays.
Florida Governor Rick Scott is authorizing an additional $10 million in state funds for Zika response.

According to a statement Friday from Gov. Scott's office, the money will go to mosquito control and surveillance, enhanced laboratory capacity and Zika kits from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Scott used his emergency powers in June to authorize $26.2 million for Zika response. He met with top Republicans this week on Zika funding from Washington, but he said Friday that Florida ``cannot wait on federal action any longer.''

The total amount of state funds authorized for Zika is now at $36.2 million.

Congressional aides told The Associated Press on Thursday that an impasse over Zika funding for clinics affiliated with Planned Parenthood was nearing an end, but the measure won't be unveiled until next week.

Scott was in Fort Myers to discuss the state's latest unemployment figures.
A massive sinkhole at a Central Florida plant is causing concern as over 200 million gallons of contaminated water are now going into an aquifer.

Officials discovered the 45 foot wide hole after draining a lake in late August at the New Wales Mosaic facility in Mulberry, located about 10 mile south of Lakeland.

The hole seems to have no bottom and officials from the plant say that 215 million gallons of water used to process fertilizer has drained into it. The plant has a recovery well that can capture the water and return it to the plant, but the process can take months.

The plant says they have been in contact with state officials and are monitoring the groundwater for contamination. So far, none has been found and they say surrounding areas arent at risk, but have around the clock surveillance until the process is done.
A citywide ban that prohibits restaurants or stores from using or selling styrofoam goes into effect in Miami Beach Friday.

The ban covers expanded polystyrene items like cups, plates and containers. An ordinance carries fines ranging from $50 to $500 for repeated offenses.

Lawmakers said it was a decision that had to do with public health and the health of animals.

"Our ordinance is geared toward eliminating the presence of this pollutant in the city's waterways, parks and streets," Miami Beach Director of Environment & Sustainability Elizabeth Wheaton said in a statement. "We are proud to be first city in Florida to enact such a comprehensive prohibition and urge others to follow suit."
Crews from U.S. Border Patrol and the Coast Guard responded to nearly a dozen migrants that landed on Fisher Island early Friday morning.

Agents were alerted to a possible smuggling operation and got to the scene around 8:20 a.m. as the boat the migrants were on capsized in the waters near the area. Miami-Dade Police and Fire Rescue crews were called to assist in locating all potential migrants, as was the Fisher Island Police Department.

A total of nine people - six men and three women - were arrested, with some of them being treated for injuries. Officials were reportedly searching for at least one more person that was still unaccounted for from the original group that landed, but now believe everyone has been accounted for.

All the persons captured are from Brazil and China.
Miami-Dade Schools Police are asking for the publics help as the search continues for a missing 13-year-old teen that hasnt been seen since Wednesday afternoon.

Melanie Meraz was last seen leaving McMillian Middle School in Kendale Lakes around 4 PM. Witnesses say she got into a black Ford Mustang with a dark skinned man with curly hair.

Meraz is 53 and weighs 120 pounds. She has red hair and brown eyes and was wearing a grey shirt and white pants when last seen.

Anyone with information is asked to call Miami-Dade Schools Police at 305-995-COPS or Miami Dade CrimeStoppers at 305-471-TIPS.
The mainland United States's first official outbreak of Zika virus may be declared over by early next week, NBC News reported.

But another, in Miami Beach, is going strong, and on Thursday Florida health officials reported seven more Zika cases acquired locally, one of which involves a visitor from out of state.

It's been almost 45 days since Zika first started spreading locally, in Miami's Wynwood district, and "the clock is ticking" on that outbreak, Lillian Rivera, of the Florida Department of Health, told a Miami Beach City Council meeting Wednesday.

If no one new is infected in Wynwood by Monday, after the 45-day period that represents three full incubation periods for Zika virus, it can be declared free of active Zika transmission. Dr. Anne Schuchat of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed that countdown Thursday.
Donald Trump acknowledged at an event in Washington, D.C., Friday that President Obama was born in the United States, following a renewed controversy over the so-called "birther" movement that questioned the president's American citizenship.

"Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it, I finished it," Trump said. "You know what I mean. President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period. Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again."

Trump's claim that Clinton launched the birther movement during her unsuccessful primary run against Obama in 2008 is unsubstantiated and long denied by Clinton.

"What Trump just did is a disgrace," Clinton's campaign responded on Twitter.

"Trump has spent years peddling a racist conspiracy aimed at undermining the first African American president. He can't just take it back," the campaign shot back in a series of tweets.

Trump's statement came hours after Clinton assailed her opponent for refusing to answer whether Obama was born in the U.S., saying Trump owes Obama "and the American people an apology" for his role in the "birther" movement.

"We know who Donald is. For five years, he has led the 'birther' movement to de-legitimize our first black president," Clinton said in a speech at the Black Women's Agenda Symposium Workshop in Washington, D.C.

As recently as Thursday, Trump would not acknowledge Obama's birthplace, declining to address the matter when asked by The Washington Post.

"I'll answer that question at the right time," Trump told the paper. "I just don't want to answer it yet."

After Friday's statement, he refused to take questions from reporters.

The statement provoked fury from members of the Congressional Black Caucus, who gathered for a press conference, called Trump a "disgusting fraud," demanded that he apologize to President Obama and urged voters to speed to the polls to defeat him in November.

Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., called Trump a "two-bit racial arsonist" who has fanned the flames of bigotry and hatred. Rep. G.K. Butterfield, D-N.C., called Trump a "disgusting fraud" who had no proof of his false claims. Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif., said Trump is a liar.

Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller issued a statement that suggested the question had been settled five years ago  by Trump.

"In 2011, Mr. Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate," Miller said.

"Mr. Trump did a great service to the president and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised," he added. "Inarguably, Donald J. Trump is a closer. Having successfully obtained President Obama's birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States."

Clinton said Friday Trump's campaign was "founded on this outrageous lie" and "there is no erasing it."

She said Trump is feeding into the "worst impulses, the bigotry and bias" that lurks in the nation.

"Donald Trump is unfit to be president," Clinton said. "We just cant accept this. We've got to stand up to this. If we don't, it won't stop."

FactCheck.org, a project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center, wrote of Clinton and the "birther" movement last year, "While it's true that some of her ardent supporters pushed the theory, there is no evidence that Clinton or her campaign had anything to do with it."

When asked about Trump's interview with the paper, Obama told reporters: "I'm shocked that a question like that would come up when we have so many other things to do, well, I'm not that shocked, actually. It's fairly typical. I was pretty confident about where I was born. I think most people were as well and my hope would be that the presidential election reflects more serious issues than that."

Ohio Gov. John Kasich, at the the White House to discuss the Trans-Pacific Partnership with Obama, was also asked about the latest Trump controversy.

What I was really thinking is that Bruce Springsteen has to be really happy because 'Born in the U.S.A.' is probably going to sell a lot more albums, said Kasich, who was among the Republicans who challenged Trump for the GOP nomination. That's as far as I would go. I mean, what am I thinking about it? I'm here for TPP and what's happening in the world. Not talking about where somebody was born."

In reaction in to Trump's admission, House Minority Leader Harry Reid said, "Trump is an exaggerator. I believe Donald Trump is a liar. I believe he's a bully.

Reid added that what Trump said about where Obama "was born means noting because any reasonable person knew that Barack Obama was an American born in Hawaii and Donald Trump has generated a lot of controversy and been so harmful to our country."
After critically-acclaimed runs in San Diego, Seattle, Washington, D.C. and Toronto, "Come From Away" will finally land on Broadway this spring -- with performances beginning at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre Feb. 18, 2017 ahead of a March 12-opening.

The news puts Stephen Karam's "The Humans" in an odd place. The 2016 Tony winning Best Musical will play its final performance at the Schoenfeld on Jan. 15 -- but a source close to the production hints to NBC New York that an end of its run is not necessarily in sight.

It wouldn't be the first time the family ensemble drama switched things up. "The Humans" was originally commissioned by the nonprofit Roundabout Theatre Company, opening at its off-Broadway Laura Pels Theatre in the fall of 2015.

The rights of the show were then sold to producer Scott Rudin, who opened the play at the 597-seat Helen Hayes Theatre.

After winning four Tony Awards, Rudin moved "The Humans" to the bigger Schoenfeld in August -- adding 450 more seats to a night to its weekly grosses. The question now will be whether Rudin waits for another Broadway house to become available or decides to transfer the production off-Broadway.

"Come From Away," meanwhile, will be the first Broadway musical set against the backdrop of the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

It tells the story of the small town of Gander, Newfoundland -- where 38 planes were forced to make emergency landings following the 2001 attacks. The 6,579 passengers doubled the population of the small town for a week.

The show ultimately explores how those people found humanity and hope during our nations dark crisis.

Canadians Irene Sankoff and David Hein wrote the book and score, while Tony nominee Christopher Ashley (Memphis) directs.

For more information, visit comefromawaythemusical.com.
Six of the eight Rikers Island correction officers found guilty of crimes relating to the beating of an inmate who stared down a jail official were sentenced to prison terms on Friday.

It comes more than four years after the beating of Jamal Lightfoot, who suffered broken teeth and eye sockets and a nose fracture while being held at the beleauguered jail complex.

Chief Elsio Perez received the harshest sentence; he'll spend the next 6 1/2 years behind bars. Captain Gerald Vaughn received a 5 1/2-year prison sentence, and four other guards will serve 4 1/2 years in prison. The remaining two correction officers found guilty in the 2012 beating were released, but must complete 500 hours of community service for official misconduct.

The guards were found guilty in the attack in June. Prosecutors said the attack started after officers responding to two slashings at the sprawling complex began searching inmates, tossing over mattresses and rifling around cells for contraband.

During the search, Lightfoot made eye contact with the jail's assistant chief of security. Angered by the stare-down, the assistant chief shouted to a captain and five officers Lightfoot "thinks he's tough" and should be attacked, Bronx prosecutors said.

The assistant chief, a captain and eight other officers were later charged in a 53-count indictment that includes attempted gang assault, evidence tampering and other charges.

Prosecutors had alleged that the officers cooked up a plan on how to explain Lightfoot's injuries and wrote false use-of-force reports and witnesses statements that claimed Lightfoot had slashed an officer with a sharpened piece of metal. Three of the officers were accused of aiding in a cover-up.

The group was suspended from the force after they were arrested but the Daily News reported that seven of the officers were reinstated with pay on Feb. 8.

New York City Correction Commissioner Joseph Ponte said he had "zero tolerance for any illegal behavior on the part of staff" and that officers convicted of felonies would be terminated. He said he's confident the department is taking the right step toward reforming Rikers.

The trial came amid ever-increasing scrutiny on the city's jail system. NBC 4 New York's I-Team uncovered accounts from visitors who were strip-searched, and it was recently reported that a woman who was later acquitted of charges was forced to spend two years in solitary confinement. Politicians had also suggested closing the jail complex earlier this year.
What to Know SPCA workers acting on a tip raided a Long Island home and found nearly 350 pigeons flying around inside, with feet of droppings all over

The 64-year-old homeowner was taken to the hospital

Neighbors called him "the bird man" and say he was a nice, quiet man who slowly turned into a recluse

A Long Island man dubbed "bird man" by neighbors was taken to the hospital and his home condemned after authorities found nearly 350 pigeons flying around inside.

SPCA workers went to the house Thursday, acting on a tip from the Hempstead buildings department. When they discovered the birds and the conditions inside the home, they had to go in wearing hazmat suits to retrieve crate after crate of pigeons.

Authorities believe the 64-year-old homeowner has been living for years in more than two feet of bird droppings across all the floors inside the North Merrick home, an SPCA official said at the scene.

"It was a literally a pigeon coop in there that was never cleaned," said Gary Rogers of the Nassau County SPCA. "There was no running water. The occupant, we don't know how he got around because he couldn't open the door more than six to eight inches because of the droppings on the floor."

"The refrigerator could not be opened. There was no way he had food in there," Rogers added. "And he had medical issues."

Workers spent the day carrying out crates of pigeons, eggs and a newborn. Most were in good condition and well-fed.

The homeowner was taken to a local hospital by police. One SPCA officer was also taken to a local hospital after he fell through weak floorboards and into the basement, according to officials. He had a head injury but is expected to be OK.

Neighbors said the man is a bird lover who was rarely seen. They called him the "bird man" and say he was a nice, quiet man who slowly turned into a recluse.

"He used to fish and he used to take the Jeep that you see in the back -- but that looks pretty dilapidated now," said a neighbor named Laurie. "I would imagine a good 10 years that he's been a recluse in that house."

But neighbors never thought to call.

"There was one day where me and my brother found this injured bird, and we brought him over to the guy and he took it in, and we never saw it again," said Matt Lamonas. "I think we just kind of got accustomed to it because he was so quiet."

Nassau SPCA urges neighbors to be more alert. They've rescued over 850 animals just this summer.

"Every time I say I've seen it all, I see something else," said Rogers. "I've never seen a house that became a pigeon coop."
New Jersey's highest court has ruled that a township can't ban digital billboards because it would violate the First Amendment.

The state Supreme Court ruling Thursday reversed a lower court's decision. The high court says billboards are a method to communicate and that any restrictions can't infringe on the U.S. Constitution or the New Jersey State Constitution.

Franklin Township in Somerset County allows non-electronic billboards but voted in 2010 to ban digital billboards.

The township had said electronic billboards can distract drivers, harm the aesthetics of the area, and could create a safety hazard.

Township attorney Louis Rainone says they are disappointed.

The attorney for the company that had requested to install at least one electronic billboard in the township didn't return a call seeking comment.
What to Know The suspect had been fleeing cops near Penn Station after they caught him trying to remove a boot from his car.

The off-duty detective say police chasing the weapon-wielding man and tackled the suspect, who slashed him

Police fired 18 shots, hitting the suspect several times

The off-duty detective who was gashed from his temple to his jaw when he tackled a man fleeing police with an 11-inch cleaver in a chaotic attack near Penn Station at the height of Thursday's evening rush left the hospital Friday afternoon.

A small army of NYPD officers and union representatives, along with the father of detective Brian O'Donnell, cheered on the 16-year veteran officer as he was wheeled out of the lobby of Bellevue Hospital. O'Donnell, who appeared to be wearing a cast on his left arm and had an apparent cut running down his face waved to cops and doctors as he exited the hospital.

His fellow officers clapped, hollered and cheered as the officer was loaded into a sedan to head home. An NYPD regiment of bagpipe players and drummers also played as he left the lobby. Surgeons had said O'Donnell would likely need reconstructive surgery to repair the 6-inch gash to his face.

O'Donnell was walking to Penn Station shortly after 5 p.m. Thursday to catch a Long Island Rail Road train home after work when he saw the suspect, 32-year-old Akram Joudeh, running from police, the weapon in his hand, law enforcement officials told NBC 4 New York. He went to tackle the suspect.

The two struggled, and Joudeh hit him in the head with the cleaver, leaving a large laceration, police officials said.

Surveillance video obtained exclusively by NBC 4 New York showed the chaos on the street as officers sprinted after Joudeh, who ran through the packed street with the cleaver in his hand.

Three uniformed NYPD officers fired a total of 18 gunshots at Joudeh, striking him several times. He was in stable condition at the hospital Friday.

"Keep in mind he had just attacked an off-duty officer who has got a 6-inch gash on his face. He's got an 11-inch cleaver," NYPD Chief of Department and incoming police commissioner Jimmy O'Neill said. "They shot until the threat was stopped."

Police initially confronted Joudeh near West 31st Street and Broadway as they caught him trying to remove a boot from his car, O'Neill said.

Video obtained exclusively by NBC 4 New York shows a frustrated Joudeh trying to remove the boot, pulling tools from his packed car.

When police arrived, Joudeh pulled an 11-inch cleaver from his waistband and began running toward Sixth Avenue, officials said. Officers chased him, with others joining the pursuit along the way, and one uniformed sergeant deployed a stun gun to no effect.

The suspect continued running westbound on West 32nd Street toward Seventh Avenue, and in the middle of the block, mounted the front grill of a marked NYPD car, O'Neill said. Then he ran into O'Donnell.

O'Donnell has spent most of his time on the force in the 19th Precinct, and became a detective in March 2015.

Two other officers were taken to the hospital with non-life threatening injuries from the encounter, though it's not clear how they got hurt.

Both Mayor de Blasio and Police Commissioner Bill Bratton, who is finishing his last week on the job, visited the officers at the hospital. Bratton said the wounded detective was in good spirits despite the "significant injury."

The attack happened near the busy midtown commuter hub at the height of the evening rush hour. Bratton said the officers acted bravely in subduing the suspect in the crowded shopping and transit district, and that "sufficient shots" were fired to stop the "character running down the street waving a cleaver."

Witness Steven Coyle, who recorded video of officers shooting at the suspect, agreed.

"He was a threat to the officers and anyone in the area," he said.

Michael Palladino, president of the Detectives Endowment Association, said in a statement, "An incident like this proves that you are really never off duty. Our detective engaged the perpetrator because the suspect was carrying a meat cleaver and the detective was worried about the crowded conditions on the street given that it was rush hour full of residents, tourists and commuters."

Joudeh has 15 prior arrests, including one on July 27 after he was found carrying knives near a synagogue in the Manhattan Beach neighborhood of Brooklyn. His last known address was in Queens, though police say he may have been living in his car.

The other arrests stretching back to 2009 include charges for driving while impaired by drugs, criminal possession of a weapon, menacing with a weapon and criminal trespassing, sources said.

The attack drew comparisons to an ambush two years ago, when a hatchet-wielding man attacked a group of NYPD officers in Jamaica, Queens, gashing a rookie cop in the head with the 18-inch ax. Two other officers shot and killed the suspect, Zale Thompson, on the street.

Thompson was a self-radicalized "lone wolf terrorist," police officials said after the attack.

A federal official told NBC News it doesn't appear Joudeh had terroristic motivations.



"Based on what we know of how this started, and on his priors, we don't currently think this was an act of terrorism," the officials said.

Another law enforcement source told NBC 4 New York that investigators actively looked into whether Joudeh had any interest in or connection to terror planning after he was caught outside the synagogue in July with the knives. But they did not find any evidence of any radicalization.

Joudeh's former neighbors in Elmhurst described him as troubled, constantly fighting with his two roommates and sometimes getting visits from police. One woman who asked not to be identified said he once got into an altercation with a family member, and during the fight, broke the front glass door of the building's entrance.
What to Know At least four women were attacked by a group of teens in midtown last weekend, police say

Police released new images of teens wanted in connection with the attacks Friday

Although one of the women was dressed in Muslim attire, sources say it appears this is a gender bias case more than a religious hate crime

Police say they've arrested a 14-year-old boy in one of the fire attacks targeting women in midtown Manhattan last weekend.

The boy was part of a group of three teenage boys and three teenage girls who set fire to the clothing of six women in five different incidents Saturday night, police say. Authorities are still searching for the other five suspects.

Police believe the group stalked midtown for two hours Saturday night, trying to light women on fire. Six women were attacked from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. on Saturday, according to police.

The first attack was on 42nd Street near Bryant Park, when the teens approached a teenage tourist from California, sources said. They tried to burn her shirt from behind and the girl turned around when she felt something. When her mother turned to confront them, they ran away.

That's the incident in which the 14-year-old boy is facing charges of hate crime attempted assault, hate crime aggravated harassment and hate crime harassment, police say. It's not clear why the incident was considered a hate crime.

Then, about a mile away near Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue, a woman was window shopping when one teen tried to light her clothing on fire, sources said. She turned around and the boy fled back to the group.

Shortly afterward, the Muslim woman's clothing was set on fire. The 35-year-old tourist from Scotland was window-shopping near East 54th Street at the time.

Just one minute later, the group of teens walked past a woman at the intersection of East 54th Street and Fifth Avenue, and she suddenly began patting her skirt to put out the flame, sources said.

And finally, they targeted two women walking side by side into the Bryant Park subway station, trying to set fire to their sleeves.

Law enforcement sources said of all six victims, only one was wearing Muslim attire.

Police have released surveillance video of at least one of the suspects. They're asking anyone with information to contact Crime Stoppers at 800-577-TIPS.
Attorneys defending Indiana Gov. Mike Pence's order to bar agencies from helping Syrian refugees resettle in his state faced unusually fierce questioning before a federal appeals court Wednesday, suggesting the panel might side with a lower court that found the order discriminatory.

A three-judge panel for the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago zeroed in on the intelligence and intent behind the Republican vice presidential candidate's order, which a federal judge said in February "clearly discriminates" against refugees from the war-torn nation. Judges suggested that Indiana could've had a stronger argument for entirely opting out of the refugee program  for which states disperse federal money to resettlement organizations  instead of excluding Syrians.

"If you're in, you play by the government's rules," Judge Frank Easterbrook said.

The oral arguments came the same day the White House announced that the refugee program will be expanded in the next year as concern continues about the refugee crisis stemming from Syria's civil war and conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Following November's Paris attacks, Pence was among dozens of governors from mostly GOP states who attempted to block Syrian refugees, saying there were questions about the federal government's screening process. The suspects in the attack were primarily from France and Belgium; GOP leaders, including Pence, noted that a Syrian passport, now believed to be fake, was found near one of the suicide bombers.

Pence sought to withhold federal funds for groups, including Indianapolis-based Exodus Refugee Immigration, that help Syrian refugees with medical and social services and job training.

The governor had the authority "due to terrorism concerns," Indiana's attorney general said in a Wednesday statement. But the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana, which is representing Exodus, said in previously filed legal briefs that the order violates the U.S. Constitution and the Civil Rights Act and discriminates because states in the federal program must assist without regard to nationality. The ACLU said arguments by Indiana state officials were "built on fear."

Courts have knocked down other states' efforts to block Syrian refugees, most recently in June, when a federal judge threw out the state of Texas' lawsuit because it had no authority over resettlements handled by the federal government.

Indiana Solicitor General Thomas Fisher repeatedly cited in court FBI directors' past comments about less information available on Syrian refugees compared to those from other countries.

The judges, in sharp exchanges at times, were skeptical.

When Fisher interrupted a judge, another on the bench issued a rebuke. Later, when Judge Richard Posner launched into queries about how Indiana had determined Syrians were more dangerous than other refugees, he appeared unsatisfied with Fisher's response.

"Honestly, you are so out of it," Posner said.

Questions directed at ACLU attorney Kenneth Falk, were less intense and largely focused on constitutional arguments.

It's unknown when the three-judge panel will issue a written ruling on whether to uphold or overturn the lower court's decision.

Since February, more than 100 refugees from Syria have resettled in Indiana, according to Exodus. And the Obama administration said Wednesday that the U.S. will strive to take in 30 percent more refugees  110,000  than allowed in the previous year, saying the program doesn't impose a national security threat.
A police officer who was shot in the head responding to a robbery at an Atlantic City casino garage left the hospital Thursday to cheers and applause from dozens of officers and emergency workers.

Joshlee Vadell gave the well-wishers a thumbs-up from his stretcher as he was wheeled out of AtlantiCare Regional Medical Center to a waiting ambulance. He was taken to a rehabilitation center.

The 29-year-old officer underwent surgery after being critically hurt in the Sept. 3 shooting.

Vadell had a gunshot wound on the right side of his brain but "has come a long way very quickly," said Dr. Jorge Eller, a neurosurgeon at the hospital.

"He improved faster than we would expect for something like this," Eller said, adding his doctors are optimistic for a full recovery.

Vadell, a nine-year veteran of the police force, and another officer saw the robbery being committed, authorities have said. Vadell was shot as he exited his vehicle. [[392361291, C]]

The second officer returned fire and struck a robbery suspect, Jerome Damon. The 25-year-old Damon, of Camden, later was found dead a short distance away.

Two other men arrested in the shooting remain jailed on $750,000 bail each on charges including attempted murder and robbery.

Vadell's wife, Laura Vadell, and his family issued a statement thanking "everyone who played a role in helping us through this extremely difficult time," including her husband's colleagues and the doctors, nurses and other staffers at the hospital where he's being treated.

The statement also cites the efforts of the officer who was with Vadell when the shooting occurred.

"Without him, Josh may not have made it and those responsible may never have been brought to justice," it said.
A law firm associated with longtime consumer advocate Erin Brockovich has filed a water contamination lawsuit against a firefighting foam manufacturer and five other defendants in a case involving potentially hundreds of former and current residents of Montgomery and Bucks counties.

The suit filed Friday claims the foam used on military bases, including the shuttered Willow Grove Naval Air Station and current day Horsham Air Guard Station, led to contamination of surrounding water supplies for residents.

For years, residents living near military bases in eastern Pennsylvania were unknowingly exposed to dangerous chemicals in their drinking water, said Robin Greenwald, head of the Environmental and Consumer Protection Unit at Weitz & Luxenberg. With this lawsuit, we are fighting to ensure that the companies who manufactured and marketed products containing these chemicals  and put their profits ahead of public health in the process  are brought to justice for their wrongdoing. [[382186341, C]]

Concerns about the drinking water first went mainstream in May after the EPA issued new guidelines showing elevated levels of the cancer-causing chemicals PFOA or PFOS in Horsham, Warrington and Warminster.

U.S. Rep. Brendan Boyle, D-Phila., at the time called for a congressional hearing into allegations of contaminated groundwater.

The defendants named in the lawsuit are: 3M; Angus Fire, The Ansul Company, Buckeye Fire Protection Company, Chemguard and National Foam.

The suit claims that the six defendants, as manufacturers of the firefighting foam, knew or should have known that the inclusion of PFOs and other similar chemicals in the foam would present a risk to human health and the environment. And yet, the suit alleges, none of the companies issued any warnings.

According to Weitz & Luxenberg, testing for PFOs conducted in 2014 and 2015 detected levels as high as 1,600 parts per trillion (PPT). The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says an acceptable limit for PFOs in a water supply is 70 PPT or less.

In Pennsylvania, big business once again disregarded public health in favor of boosting their bottom line, said Brockovich in a release Friday. We need to send the message that these corporations cannot put profits ahead of peoples health; this lawsuit is intended to remedy that wrong.

When Weitz & Luxenberg first started investigating claims of people who once lived or currently live in the area of the Willow Grove and Horsham military installations, some residents like Valeria Secrease took immediate solace in knowing a search for answers was finally under way.

It feels like we won, just a small thing, Secrease said earlier this summer.

Secrease helps run a private Facebook group of people who worked at Willow Grove Naval Air Station and want to know if their cancer or life-threatening ailments are connected to the water on the base.

Valerie Colonna Secrease leads a growing group of people  enlisted and civilians  who worked at Willow Grove NAS, and family members of people whove since died. Many question if their cancers are connected to contaminated groundwater on the base.

The group has swelled to more than 1,600, many of whom have either suffered health issues themselves or lost a loved one. Secrease worked on the base for more than 25 years and has been living with malignant melanoma for the last two decades.

"There are nights I dont sleep and it goes over and over in my mind about the people who have passed and the people who have suffered and the women who are still crying over losing their husbands, Secrease told NBC10.com. The joy I feel is not for myself, but for all the rest of the people who have been suffering. Maybe, just maybe, theyll get some kind of closure.

Weitz & Luxenberg has conducted similar investigations in New York, Vermont and New Hampshire. Recently, the firm filed a federal class action lawsuit against a plastics company for its role in PFOA water contamination in Hoosick Falls, NY.

"Communities across our country are realizing that the source of life  water  could in fact be making them seriously ill, Brockovich said when Weitz & Luxenberg first began looking at the Willow Grove and Horsham case in June. "It is time to give this community a voice and make sure those responsible are held accountable for this issue.

Tim McNees for eleven years has struggled with a rare and disabling blood disorder. He wonders if his health problems are connected to his work at Willow Grove NAS.
Delaware State Police say a man driving the wrong way on State Route 1 was killed when he crashed head on with a trooper's cruiser.

The agency said in a news release that the crash occurred just before 6 p.m. Thursday in Dover. Troopers say 77-year-old Daniel J. Gates of Millsboro was driving a subcompact car north in the southbound lanes of State Route 1.

Investigators say Gates crashed head on into a fully marked state police cruiser traveling south in the southbound lane.

Troopers say Gates was pronounced dead at the scene. A family dog in the car was also killed.

The 22-year-old trooper was flown to a hospital and was released on Friday.

The crash is under investigation.
A man was sentenced to 24 to 70 years in prison after he was convicted of crawling into a 6-year-old girl's bed and raping her during a break-in at her family's Hatfield Village apartment in Hatfield Township in suburban Philadelphia.

Oscar Herrera was convicted in June of charges including rape of a child, burglary and indecent assault. He was sentenced on Thursday. [[345731442, C]]

Prosecutors said the girl's older brother awoke in November 2015 to sounds coming from his sister's bunk at their Montgomery County home. He alerted his parents after hearing a man's voice.

The girl's mother testified the 29-year-old Herrera was naked in bed with their daughter.

Herrera, who entered the country unlawfully, says he must pay for his mistake. His attorney has said Herrera had been drinking that night. [[345459802, C]]
A man driving the wrong way died after crashing head-on into a Delaware State Trooper patrol car Thursday evening, according to police.

Police said a 77-year-old Millsboro man was traveling north in the southbound lanes of Route 1 in Dover when he hit the patrol car head-on near the North Little Creek Road exit just before 6 p.m.

Police said the man, who was not wearing his seatbelt, died at the scene. A dog in the car also died.

The 22-year-old State Trooper driving the patrol car suffered non-life-threatening injuries, but was airlifted to Christiana Hospital.

A heavily damaged Delaware State Police Car could be seen as SkyForce10 hovered above. A silver car, identified as a 2010 Chevrolet Aveo was also seen flipped over in the median.

An investigation into the crash continued.

Originally, police had said the driver of the vehicle was a woman.
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In the last 10-months, more than 3,000 Haitian refugees have entered the U.S. through Southern California border crossings.

According to the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), 3508 Haitians have crossed through port of entry located in San Ysidro, Otay Mesa, Tecate, Calexico East and West and Andrade.

Many of those refugees have ended up in Tijuana, where in recent days, hundreds have gathered at shelters waiting to cross through San Ysidro.

Mexico allows a 30 day grace period to stay in the country, but its gotten so crowded that local officials have resorted to passing out numbers for the right to get into another line.

According to an immigration attorney, right now, there are more than 1,000 people in Tijuana waiting to seek asylum. The port of entry can only process about 100 cases a day, so they are backlogged for 7-10 days.

The refugees will eventually meet with CBP officials to explain their reasons for seeking asylum.

If they make it into the U.S., they are then monitored by ICE officials. Some of the refugees will be monitored via GPS and ankle bracelets.

Enrique Morones with the humanitarian group Border Angels says hes taken food to the refugees in Tijuana.

What weve been doing is bringing food to the shelters where theyre staying at. Were talking about thousands of people in Tijuana. Its a new community, but its the same desperation, said Morones.

While immigration experts say theyre not exactly sure why so many Haitians are making their way to the U.S., Morones has a theory.

Most of them went down to Brazil to work for the Olympics. The Olympics are over and they have no more work, so now theyre working their way up to the United States, because in Mexico, you get a 30-day pass to cross into the country, said Morones.

But even if the refugees make it into the U.S., its still a long journey to stay here.

Immigration attorney Lilia Velasquez says immigration courts are facing a huge backlog of cases and it could be months before these cases will go before a judge.

As difficult it is for our system to welcome them and hear their stories, to see if we can protect them and let them stay, we need to do it. Its the law, said Velasquez.
A little Chihuahua pup found herself in a ruff situation nearly 6-feet-below on Thursday.

Another dog first found the pup, who was trapped at the bottom of a six-foot-deep drain pipe off Euclid Avenue near San Diego's Valencia Park neighborhood.

A Good Samaritan noticed another dog looking down the eight-inch diameter pipe Thursday morning. When they peeped down, they noticed a puppy looking up at them.

County Animal Services officials responded to the Imperial Fish Market back parking lot, where they found the pooch waiting at the bottom.

Animal Control Officer Angela Jones used her rescue equipment to pull the Chihuahua out safely. The dog was found with a red child's jacket.

The dog was scared, but appeared to be okay.

Officials don't know how the small dog got into the pipe, but they are now searching for the dog's owner.

We dont know how this little dog got into her predicament, but had she been microchipped, shed probably be back home with her family now, said County Animal Services Director Dawn Danielson in a statement.

County Animal Services

The 4-year-old female dog was not wearing a license or any identification and was not microchipped.

The dog will be held at the Gaines Street shelter for three working days in hopes the owner will pick her up.

If the owner does not turn up, the Chihuahua will be available for adoption on Wednesday, Sept. 21. The adoption would cost $69; the price includes vaccinations, spaying if necessary, a microchip and a dog license.
A San Diego judge denied Donald Trump and his attorney's request to move a Trump University trial date to 2017, according to a federal court document filed Thursday.

Earlier this week, Donald Trump and his attorneys requested the trial date in the Low v. Trump class-action lawsuit be moved to a later date due to a scheduling conflict with one of his lead attorneys, Daniel Petrocelli.

U.S District Judge Gonzalo Curiel denied the request and in a court document said Trump and his attorneys failed to prove an actual or potential conflict exists between the Low case and the other trial Petrocelli is assigned to.

Click here to read more of the judge's decision.

In his ruling, Judge Curiel said the trial will begin on its previously scheduled date, November 28. He also moved up a hearing on jury instruction to November 10, the same day a motion hearing was already scheduled.

In asking for the date change, Petrocelli discussed how he is the lead trial attorney in another case set to begin on November 15. The current schedule would prevent Mr. Petrocelli from conducting the necessary pretrial work and preparation in this case, and defendants will suffer substantial prejudice, the court document filed earlier this week detailed.

Click here to read the complete court document.

In court documents filed Wednesday, Jason Forge writing for the plaintiffs, said he opposed any more delays. Four months ago the court chose a trial date that wouldnt conflict with the presidential campaign or the holidays, he wrote in the court documents.

"We have waited six and half years to get this case to trial, Forge wrote. "There is no mystery about what happened here....a possible Trump victory (in the presidential election) would spawn a host of potential new excuses to postpone trial for years.

Click here to read the complete opposition filed by the plaintiffs.

The Trump University lawsuits allege the former university, which took in over $40 million, was fraudulent and deceptive. Two class-action lawsuits against the now-closed Trump University are being heard in San Diego courtrooms; another lawsuit is based in a New York court.

The San Diego cases include: Cohen v. Trump, a nationwide class action lawsuit and Low v. Trump, a class action in California, Florida and New York. Trump denies the allegations in the lawsuits.
When thousands of Haitian refugees cross into the U.S., they cross the border with basically nothing.

They are in need of food and housing right away, and one Normal Heights church has become a hub for these refugees. Christ United Methodist is trying to cope with the sudden influx of refugees.

Since May, the church has helped more than 3,000 Haitian refugees. Not all have stayed at the church, but those 3,000 have received food, supplies and health care.

The church is at capacity, and officials are working with the county and state to find other places for these refugees to stay.

One of the pastors tells NBC 7 San Diego that sometimes, the refugees are dropped off by the bus loads from the border.

At times, 20 to 30 new refugees come without notice. Church officials say they usually only stay for a short period of time, as many have family in the country.

The refugees are here through humanitarian permission. At the border they give the names of family members in the United States. Eighty to 90 percent leave San Diego, and that's why this temporary housing is so necessary.

Ten to 20 percent are looking to stay in San Diego and the Haitian community is helps them find longer term housing.

Most are granted a three year permit to stay in the United States. The hope is that Haiti's economy will be stronger three years down the line, and they can return. The tumultuous situation stems from Haiti's devastating earthquake in 2010 that forced many out of the country.

They've been living and working in other countries and are now facing some instability in those countries and are coming to the United States to reunite with friends and family here in the states because we do have a large Haitian community in the U.S, especially along the East Coast," said Ginger Jacobs with San Diego Immigrant Rights Consortium.

The church is always asking for donations. To donate, click here. All of the donations go directly to the Haitian Ministry.
Two former executives of a Singapore-based contractor were charged on Thursday for their involvement in a multi-million dollar Navy bribery scheme. More than a dozen U.S. Navy Officers and Pentagon employees have also been charged in the case.

Neil Peterson, 38, and Linda Raja, 43, former executives of Glenn Defense Marine Asia were arrested and are currently being held in Singapore. Both worked for Malaysian businessman Leonard Glenn Francis, known by his nickname Fat Leonard." Peterson served as the Vice President of the company and Raja was as General Manager for Singapore, Australia and the Pacific Isles.

According to the indictment, Peterson and Raja submitted false claims and invoices amounting to more than $5 million dollars to the U.S. Navy, and attempted to cover up their fraud by submitting false price quotes on letterheads from companies that did not exist. Both allegedly cut and pasted images from the internet onto letterheads to make the companies appear legitimate.

[GALLERY] Criminal Probe Alleges Secrets Swapped for Prostitutes, Travel

NBC 7 has been following this investigation since September 2013.

Fat Leonard plead guilty in January 2015 to bribing senior navy officials in exchange for specific U.S. Navy warship movements so his company could overbill the Pentagon.

A total of 16 defendants have been charged in connection to the investigation against the Malaysian businessmans company, including Patterson and Raja.

In June, Rear Admiral Robert Gilbeau became the first highest-ranking U.S. Navy officer to be charged in the case. He pleaded guilty to one felony charge in connection to the years-long corruption and fraud scheme.

Former civilian Defense Department Officer Paul Simpkins also entered a guilty plea in a federal court in San Diego.

Retired Navy Lt. Cmdr. Edmond A. Aruffo, U.S. Navy Capt. Daniel Dusek, U.S. Navy Captain (Select) Michael Misiewicz, Lieutenant Commander Todd Malaki, NCIS Special Agent John Beliveau, Commander Jose Luis Sanchez and U.S. Navy Petty Officer First Class Dan Layug have also pleaded guilty. Layug, Malaki, Dusek, and Misiwicz have all been sentenced while Gilbeau, Beliveau, and Sanchez, among others, await their sentencing.

Lt. Commander Gentry Debord, Captain (ret.) Michael Brooks and Commander Bobby Pitts were charged in May of this year. Their cases are still pending.

Peterson and Raja are each charged with one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States with respect to claims; one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud; and multiple counts of making false claims. Both are being held in custody in Singapore before they are extradited to the United States.
Aya Hijazi grew up in the U.S., but after college she returned to her native Egypt to start a foundation dedicated to helping children. That, her family says, made her a target of Egypt's authoritarian regime and has landed her in jail on trumped up charges for the last two years.

On Thursday, Hijazi's family and two northern Virginia congressmen called for her release at a Capitol Hill press conference. They spotlighted Hijazi's plight and sought to pressure Egyptian authorities.

``The Egyptian government mistakes American resolve,'' said Democrat Gerry Connolly, who acknowledged the important strategic partnership between the U.S. and Egypt in confronting terrorists. ``They think that because we care about the broader, 30,000-foot relationship, we won't get into the nitty-gritty about individual human rights. Wrong. This case will continue to be elevated.''

Hijazi, 29, grew up in Falls Church, Virginia, and is a dual citizen of the U.S. and Egypt. She received a degree in conflict resolution from George Mason University in 2009, and then returned to her native Egypt.

She was running a foundation there called Belady dedicated to helping street children when she and her husband, Mohammed Hassanein, were arrested in May 2014.

Egyptian authorities accuse Hijazi of abusing children in her care and engaging in human trafficking, kidnapping, sexual exploitation and torture. But the trial has been delayed multiple times on what human rights groups say are absurd pretexts, like inability to turn on a computer at a court hearing.

Human rights groups have said the charges are fabricated and part of a crackdown by Egypt's government on civil society.

Rep. Don Beyer, D-Virginia, who counts Hijazi as a constituent, said no evidence has been produced to support the allegations. He said the prolonged detention violates Egypt's own laws guaranteeing a speedy trial.

``Aya should be praised as a hero, someone who has championed the neglected,'' Beyer said.

Hijazi's sister, Alaa Hijazi, said Thursday that her sister has generally been in good spirits during her detention, but she couldn't say how long that will last.

``We're worried that Aya's resolve is beginning to crack,'' Alaa Hijazi said.

She called the charges against her sister ``absolutely absurd and unfounded.'' They only make sense, she said, in the context of the Egyptian government's campaign against intellectuals, academics and others that it deems a threat to its authority.

Wade McMullen, a lawyer with Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights, has assisted Hijazi. He said she has been banned from seeing her husband or conversing with other inmates during her detention.

Calls and emails to the Egyptian embassy seeking comment on Hijazi's case were not returned.

Beyer said the State Department has been doing what it normally does to provide support in situations when U.S. citizens face charges abroad, but the time has come to do more.

``There's been a lot of jawboning going on, but so far it hasn't freed Aya,'' he said.

Another hearing in the case is scheduled for November.
Residents packed a meeting in Bethesda, Maryland, Thursday night to express their frustration over the Federal Aviation Administration's plan to alter flight paths, which will likely create more aircraft noise above their heads.

The FAA has proposed to change the flight patterns for planes departing Ronald Reagan National Airport, which would bring the planes closer to homes in Bethesda neighborhoods near the Potomac River.

These flight path changes are part of NextGen, or the Next Generation Air Transportation System, which will transform America's air traffic control system from a radar-based system to a satellite-based system that uses GPS technology to shorten routes and increase capacity.

Residents in the area said aircraft noise has already been exacerbated by NextGen flight path changes implemented in December 2015.

"It's constant all day long. Literally, if you stand out in our yard, you'll see three planes in five minutes," said Patrick Nevins, who lives beneath the flight path.

Resident Deborah Schuman bought a decibal meter to measure the aircraft noise.

"It wakes me up in the morning. I wake up early, but before 6 o'clock I hear planes zooming over my neighborhood," Schuman said.

"We don't feel that Maryland had input in the workgroup that set this route. So, we're here to express our voice in this," said Maryland State Sen. Susan Lee.

Officials with the FAA said the agency will implement NextGen across the country in stages until 2025.

"There's actually two goals here: Increase our time over the river; there also is the need to increase separation from the prohibited airspace...over the White House," said FAA spokeswoman Elizabeth Ray.

The proposal is currently in its earliest stage.

Residents can submit their comments to the FAA by visiting this website.
What to Know Witnesses say a motorcyclist fatally shot by a D.C. police officer did not intentionally drive into the officer's cruiser as police said.

Police said the officer was trying to get out of the passenger side of the cruiser when he shot the man, but witnesses say he was inside.

The officer didn't have his body camera on at the time and, as a result, the Metropolitan Police Department has changed its body cam policy.

A man who D.C. police say was fatally shot by an officer after he rammed his motorcycle into a police vehicle did not intentionally hit the cruiser, according to witnesses.

Police said the motorcyclist, 31-year-old Terrence Sterling, of Fort Washington, Maryland, purposely drove his bike into the passenger side of a police cruiser early Sunday morning as an officer was trying to get out of that side of the car.

The officer fired his service weapon, hitting Sterling, police said. Sterling was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

However, witnesses told police a different account of the crash.

Several witnesses said the collision was unavoidable and Sterling did not intentionally strike the cruiser. They also said the officer was not trying to get out of his car, but instead rolled his window down and shot Sterling from inside the car after the crash.

Police have acknowledged the officer who fired the fatal shot did not turn his body camera on until after he fired his weapon. He and the officer who was driving the cruiser have been place on administrative leave.

Thursday, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser announced a change to the city's body camera policy in response to the shooting.

"We have immediately implemented procedures to ensure that body worn cameras are being activated properly and as intended by the body worn camera protocol," Bowser said. "Dispatchers began reminding officers to turn on their body worn cameras when they are dispatched to calls for service."

The Metropolitan Police Department said the shooting is still under investigation.

"This is an investigation. You have to get all the evidence. You have to get all the witness testimony," said Interim Police Chief Peter Newsham.
A Maryland couple went through a financial nightmare after trading in a car on which they still owed money.

Frank Katende wanted to do something special for his wife, Mary, so on June 20, he bought her a Mercedes by trading in his older model vehicle at Chase Auto Group in Dumfries, Virginia.

The balance owed on his trade-in, according to the sales contract, was $8,400.

But shortly after trading in his car, Katende got a call from Flagship Credit, the loan company that financed it. Flagship was looking for his payment on the car.

I was frank with him, I said, Hey, I traded the car. I don't have it," Katende said.

The phone calls from the loan company kept coming, and according to Katende, they were getting impatient.

They were calling me at work, my phone like three to four times, he said.

Then he received a notice of intent to repossess the car, which was posted for sale on the dealer's website.

The dealership told NBC4 Responds it sent Flagship a check July 29.

But Flagship said it had no record of receiving a payoff from the dealership and in a statement said, "In an attempt to assist Frank in resolving the balance due, Flagship participated in a three-way conference call with Mr. Katende and Chase Auto Group on July 19."

Flagship said during that conversation the dealer was provided with a payoff quote, "however, as of Sept. 1, 2016, no payment has been received by flagship."

The statement went onto say, "Unfortunately, since flagship had no involvement in the transaction with the dealer, Mr. Katende remains responsible for the outstanding balance."

I did not want to put my family through what they went through, Katende said.

Chase Auto Groups general manager said they initially held off paying the loan because the couple owed the dealership a balance of $500 for the deposit, which the couple disputes.

After NBC4 Responds got involved, the dealer and flagship connected once again. On the evening of Sept. 1, Chase Auto Group paid off the car loan.

In addition, Flagship is reversing any negative marks on Katende's credit as a result of the delay in the loan being paid off.

Chase Auto Group told NBC4 Responds it believes Flagship eventually found the check the dealer said was sent July 29 based on their bank statements. NBC4 Responds requested a copy of those documents but hasn't received them.

There is no law on how long a dealer has to pay off a loan on a trade-in, according to the National Independent Automobile Dealers Association, to which this dealer belong, however it's encouraged that it be no more than 10 days.
Does your speedometer ever hit 80 mph in Virginia? You could face a hefty fine or even jail time.

The Virginia Department of Transportation is posting signs reminding drivers that they can be charged with reckless driving if they speed at 80 mph or faster in a 70 mph zone.

The signs will be posted on I-95 and I-81 in areas where VDOT traffic sensors found that higher percentages of drivers speed and crashes are more frequent.

Virginia State Police cited more than 2,700 people with reckless driving over Labor Day weekend.

Penalties for reckless driving, which is a criminal misdemeanor, vary but can range from a $250 fine to jail time.

Driver Stephanie Harden was stunned the penalty was so high.

"I didn't realize it was that much," she said.

Going 20 mph over any speed limit in Virginia also is considered reckless.
The commission that oversees presidential debates has invited only Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump to the first presidential debate. It excluded two third-party candidates who had hoped the event could help them talk directly to an electorate unhappy with the two front-runners.

The Commission on Presidential Debates said in a statement Friday that Libertarian nominee Gary Johnson and Green Party nominee Jill Stein were polling too low to qualify for the Sept. 26 event. Since 2000, the commission has invited only candidates polling at 15 percent or above in an average of five polls. Johnson was at 8.4 percent and Stein at 3.2 percent.

Johnson, a former New Mexico governor and ex-Republican who is running with former Massachusetts governor Bill Weld, has been pushing aggressively to get into the debate. He and Stein could still qualify for the two remaining ones in October if their poll numbers hit 15 percent, but that will be challenging without the national exposure of the debate.

In a statement, Johnson slammed the commission as a tool of the Democratic and Republican parties and vowed to make the October contests.

"The CPD may scoff at a ticket that enjoys 'only' 9 or 10% in their hand-selected polls, but even 9% represents 13 million voters, more than the total population of Ohio and most other states," Johnson said.

In addition, only the major party candidates, Republican Mike Pence and Democrat Tim Kaine, have qualified for the vice-presidential debate to take place on Oct. 4 at Longwood University in Farmville, Virginia.
A Swedish appeals court on Friday upheld a detention order for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, dismissing the latest attempt by the 45-year-old Australian to make prosecutors drop a rape investigation from 2010.

The decision by the Svea Court of Appeal means that the arrest warrant stands for the 45-year-old computer hacker, who has avoided extradition to Sweden by seeking shelter at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since 2012.

Assange, who denies the rape allegation, has challenged the detention order several times. He says he fears he will be extradited to the United States to face espionage charges if he leaves the embassy.

His Swedish defense lawyer, Per Samuelsson, said he would appeal the decision to the Supreme Court.

"We are naturally disappointed that Swedish courts yet again choose to ignore Julian Assange's difficult life situation," Samuelsson told The Associated Press. "They ignore the risk that he will be extradited to the United States."

Swedish prosecutors say they are not in contact with counterparts in the U.S. and that they would also need Britain's permission should a third country seek his extradition.

Upholding a lower court ruling, the appeals court said Swedish prosecutors are actively trying to move the investigation forward and set up an interrogation of Assange at the embassy. Acting on behalf of Swedish investigators, an Ecuadorian prosecutor is set to question Assange on Oct. 17.

"This means that there is at present no reason to set aside the detention order. Julian Assange's claim to that effect shall therefore be refused," the court said.

It also brushed aside the findings of a U.N. working group, which described his stay at the London embassy as "arbitrary detention." The court noted that the panel's finding wasn't binding on Swedish courts and that Assange's stay at the embassy "is not to be regarded as an unlawful deprivation of liberty."

The investigation stems from Assange's brief relationship with two women he met during a visit to Sweden six years ago. Allegations of sexual molestation and unlawful coercion were dropped last year when the statute of limitations expired. The rape allegation, which involves one of the women, will expire in 2020 if Assange hasn't been indicted by then.

Marianne Ny, the top prosecutor in the case, welcomed the court's decision and said the interrogation with Assange would go ahead as planned.

"I have handled many rape and sex crimes cases," she told AP. "I have never experienced before that someone sought shelter at an embassy. So this situation is really unusual."
Pratt & Whitney announced that it will hire thousands of workers in Connecticut over the next few years.

The figure stems from the jet engine maker's push to hire approximately 25,000 employees worldwide in the next 10 years.

Since 2015, about one-third or 1,500 jobs of the company's worldwide hiring has occurred in Connecticut, it said.

The state represents the largest number of employees by location for Pratt & Whitney with 9,500 in-state workers.
Maine's Congressional Delegation has strong words for Sweden: "Don't pick on our lobsters."

That was the message from Rep. Bruce Poliquin, speaking at a joint press conference with Senator Angus King and Rep. Chellie Pingree Friday. They're speaking out against Sweden's proposal to ban imports of American lobster, jeopardizing a $200 million European market.

"We cannot let bad trade deals impact our jobs in Maine," said Rep. Poliquin.

This fight started when Sweden claimed it found 32 American lobsters in its waters over the span of about eight years. Swedish officials worried the lobsters could cross-breed with European lobsters and hurt the ecosystem. They are asking the European Union to label American lobsters an "invasive species" and halt imports from Maine and other regions.

"We thought it was a joke," said John Ready, owner of Ready Seafood in Portland, Maine. He said Europe is a major market for their shipments.

But a lobster ban became one step closer to reality earlier this month, when a European Union panel decided to give the Swedish proposal a closer look.

The EU's scientific forum will have a full review by this spring.

Maine's Congressional Delegation is putting pressure on U.S. and European authorities to oppose the ban, sending a letter to EU officials Friday explaining that the science does not back up the Swedish concerns.

"There's no known reproducing of lobsters outside of its native range," said Professor Bob Steneck, who researchers Marine Ecology at the University of Maine.
It's rare that drug dealers are charged in connection to overdose deaths  it's often hard to gather enough evidence to connect the dealer and the user  but in one case, Massachusetts State Police say the victim's cell phone gave them a direct path to the suspect.

Authorities say they traced a batch of potent heroin laced with fentanyl to 22-year-old Scott Reynolds.

That batch, police believe, killed 24-year-old Marc Esperanca of Berkley.

Friday, Reynolds pleaded not guilty to a charge of involuntary manslaughter.

Through Esperanca's phone, police say they found text messages they traced to Reynolds detailing the alleged drug deal.

"On a serious note brother please be careful for real this is the best [expletive] I have had yet so don't do to much at once," Reynolds allegedly texted Esperanca. "For real man."

Police believe Reynolds was dealing out of the Norton home of his girlfriend, Katelyn Keough, who was arraigned on drug charges Friday and released with a GPS monitor.

Investigators say they used GPS data on Esperanca's phone to find Keoguh's house.

Reynolds agreed to be held without bail. His family tells necn there's more to the story and evidence will come out, but they were unwilling to explain as they left court.

Reynolds will return to court Oct. 20 for a pre trial hearing.
Police are investigating after a woman reported that she was kicked from behind and possibly sexually assaulted while walking her dog in Easton, Massachusetts.

Easton Police said the alleged assault occurred around 6 a.m. Thursday in the area of 41 Foundry St.

No suspect description is known. There are no suspects at this time and no other witnesses.

The incident remains under investigation.

Anyone with information can call Easton Police at 508-230-3322 or email them at detectives@easton.ma.us.
A man accused of sparking an hours-long standoff with police outside a Massachusetts convenience store will be arraigned in court Friday.

Rehoboth police said that the man, 38-year-old Benjamin Kimball, was taken into custody at about 11:30 a.m. Thursday.

State police said the suspect threatened police officers and SWAT team members and stated he had a bomb and a gun in the vehicle.

Ultimately, Kimball tried to flee after using his vehicle to ram into police vehicles. He then took off on foot. Police took him into custody with a flash-bang, bean bag and K-9.

Police say he did not have any explosives and the gun in question was an Xbox controller.

Several roads in the area were blocked for hours while police attempted to resolve the situation.

The Cumberland Farms store was re-opened around 2:30 p.m.

No employees or customers were inside the store during the standoff and the gas pumps were turned off.

It's unclear what charges Kimball faces or if he has an attorney.


Ex-newspaper man is new Norwich URC minister Ex-newspaper man is new Norwich URC minister

A former press photographer has recently moved to Norwich to help lead the Norwich Area URC group of churches. Mike Wiltshire reports.

John Potters career as a press photographer and picture editor was inspired in his boyhood by a talented uncle, Vaughan, who had an antique glass-plate camera, used in the First World War.



His uncle was a skilled artist who also hand-tinted his historic black-and-white pictures.



After John left school, he also became a gifted photographer and, in his work for the regional and national press, took many pictures of pop culture as well the royal family.



Today, John, now 55, has a very different role from the hectic world of photo-journalism, and was inducted as a minister with the Norwich area United Reformed Church team at a service at a packed Ipswich Road URC on July 30.



As a press photographer in his late 20s, John sensed a very different calling on his life. He had grown up in a God-fearing family and, in younger years had made a firm Christian commitment. It had not been an easy path because John, in his early years, had many questions about the debate between science and the Biblical world view.



While working in the Midlands, John attended the well-known Carrs Lane Church in Birmingham where he met Pauline, an English teacher, who is now his wife. They were both involved in leading services and, after their marriage, Pauline went on to train for the ministry with the United Reformed Church (URC) which has around 1,400 congregations in the UK.



John says he had the privilege of sitting in on some of the lectures at Westminster College in Cambridge, where Pauline trained. In the year 2000, the family moved to Gloucester where Pauline was ordained.



By then John also recognised his own calling into full-time Christian ministry, so in 2002 he began a four-year course at Queens Theological College, Birmingham.



In 2007, John was called to an ecumenical team ministry in Thamesmead, in south-east London and then, in 2011, John and Pauline began a shared ministry with a group of churches in Leicester. Following the merger of congregations in 2015, John continued to serve that pastorate as sole minister.



In July, John was inducted as a minister within the Norwich Area URC team. He said: I am very excited about being here. I am looking forward to supporting Ipswich Road URC's involvement in the community on Eaton Rise and Tuckswood. Im also looking forward to helping the Princes Street URC congregation develop a vibrant ministry based in the redeveloped building in the city centre.



John says his son, Daniel, now 18, is also an extremely good photographer he is also a keen classicist with a love of Roman history and science-fiction.



John also retains a keen interest in photography and supplies pictures for the Bible Societys devotional resources. John also enjoys cinema, music and playing the djembe, the West African hand-drum  he was once part of Rhythms of Worship, a Christian drumming group.



The Norwich Area URC churches also include Trinity and St Peters Jessopp Road (URC/Methodist), as well as Wymondham, Wroxham, Hoveton and Mattishall.



Pictured above is new Norwich area URC minister Rev John Potter at his induction service.


In an attempt to claw more Internet of Things (IoT) data market share, mobile network operator T-Mobile, in the U.S., is offering 50 MB of free 2G data service, per machine to machine (M2M) device, per month until the end of this year.

The pitch is aimed at current AT&T 2G GSM customers who will be without service when AT&T shuts down its IoT-popular 2G network at the end of the year.

+ Also on Network World: 2016 technology industry graveyard +

Many M2M devices still use 2G-specific radios rather than faster networks, and even some new, low-cost modems support only 2G. Hobbyist, IoT development prototyping and older modems are particularly prone.

Migration plans are available from manufacturers for some of those aging 2G modems to be upgraded to the faster HSPA and LTE networks, among other standards, but often its simpler and cheaper just to leave the modem in place. Much M2M data traffic doesnt require any more bandwidth than 2G provides, and embedded modems can be awkward and expensive to service in the field. They can be remotely located, requiring a truck roll, among other issues.

Thats why its simpler to just to swap out a SIM card if you can. And if the radios modem isnt locked to a specific carrier, some are doing that.

Those who remain on AT&Ts 2G networks as the end of the year gets closer will be left with non-working modems when AT&Ts closedown takes place.

We are shutting down our 2G network by the end of 2016, AT&T says on its website. AT&T wireless customers using this network will need to upgrade their devices, as they will be unable to make or receive calls, including emergency calls, send or receive text messages, or use data services after 12/31/2016.

Turning off GSM 2G to make room for new technologies

Globally, GSM 2G is being switched off to free up capacity for newer technologies. Vodafone in New Zealand, for example, said in March that it would soon set a date for turning off its 2G voice services.

T-Mobile says it isnt worried about making space for other, newer radio technologies because it uses new spectrum-efficient 2G GSM optimization. It says it tunes the 2G M2M connections spectrum, thus letting older GSM equipment work alongside more advanced LTE devices.

Of the free 2G offer, free SIMs are provided as well to enable a smooth transition to T-Mobile, the company says in a press release.

T-Mobile would, of course, rather you buy a subscription for higher-speed LTE for your IoT. Telit, an IoT modem maker earlier this month released LTE CAT-1 and CAT-4 IoT modules, which it says in a recent media release are available to deploy on T-Mobiles nationwide 4G LTE network. The modules can drop in as LTE replacements for existing Telit earlier-technology, too.

Sequans Communications also provides a newly launched T-Mobile-certified CAT-1 2G to LTE transition solution.

But if 4G is not in your budget, or you dont need the speeds LTE provides, T-Mobile says it will support 2G nationally until 2020 and will give AT&Ts stranded IoT customers a better path forward.

T-Mobile provides a form on its website for catching the attention of a salesperson.
The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CSPC) late Thursday issued an official recall of 1 million Samsung Galaxy Note 7 smartphones.

Samsung had issued its own recall Sept. 2, but there was no formal recall in cooperation with the CPSC until now.

The recall is necessary because the Note 7 "presents such a fire hazard," Elliot Kaye, the CPSC chairman, said in a news conference.

Kaye said customers subject to the recall have two options: either to seek a replacement or a refund, "which is the choice of the customer and the customer alone."

The CPSC indicated on its website that when a customer receives a new Galaxy Note 7, it will come with a different battery than those suspected of causing fires. Some replacement batteries in Note 7 phones have reportedly worked safely in other countries.

Samsung's own recall discussed only the possibility of an exchange for another Note 7 or a Galaxy S 7 or Galaxy S 7 Edge.

The CPSC last week urged Note 7 customers to power down their devices over the fires. "This week's message is to refund or replace," Kaye said.

Based on videos and photos of the damage that the fires can cause, he urged consumers to "take advantage of the recall right away, as we've seen these phones can present a fire hazard."

WMBF News Authorities in Horry County, South Caroline suspect the Galaxy Note 7 may be the cause of a devastating house fire.

He said consumers wouldn't be able to swap out the battery in the Note 7 to prevent the fire hazard. "It's in the phone and that requires a new phone or a refund."

He said Samsung's decision to issue its own recall before reaching out to the CPSC was "not a recipe for success," but didn't elaborate about whether the agency planned any action against Samsung.

Kaye also didn't elaborate on whether Samsung has provided safe replacement units of Note 7 devices. Some customers have complained about not being able to get replacements. Kaye mentioned that 1 million phones are subject to the recall, while reports have indicated that 2.5 million Note 7 devices have been sold.

Customers should seek a refund or replacement from their carrier or Samsung directly, Kaye said. Samsung previously listed phone numbers and emails for five major carriers in its Sept. 10 statement, which urged customers to power down and not charge the phones.

Samsung listed how to find the IMEI or serial number on the affected Note 7 phones and how to check it online. The serial number is located at Apps>Settings>About Phone or General Management> Status>IMEI Information or Serial Number. Kaye said customers should also check the back of the phone for the serial number.

Samsung can be reached at 1-844-365-6197 if customers bought the phone from Samsung or if they have other questions.

A Canadian government agency issued an official recall earlier this week.

Jack Narcotta, an analyst at Technology Business Research, said the refund option provided by the CPSC recall order would be among the worst-case scenarios for Samsung."

This story, "U.S. consumer agency issues official Samsung Galaxy Note 7 recall" was originally published by Computerworld .
Families react with anger branding decision "shocking"

WEST Berkshire councillors have once again voted to slash funding to short breaks for disabled children.

The controversial decision, voted through by Conservative councillors at a meeting last, was taken just weeks after a High Court judge ruled the council's previous decision to cut funding was 'unlawful'.

The move will see funding provided to local voluntary organisations for short breaks reduced from 386,575 to 163,432.

The decision prompted angry reactions from families affected by the cuts who called the move "short sighted".

"It's a shocking decision," said the mother of one child, a regular user of the short breaks service.

"I think the information they based it on was incorrect.

"They gave an idea that the service they are providing is good, but it's not going to be suitable for a lot children, they didn't make that clear.

"I don't think they've got a clue what the realities are."

West Berkshire Council initially made the decision to reduce funding to the service as part of the swingeing cuts to public services in March as the council attempted to make a total of 17.5million worth of savings.

The short break funding cuts were then ratified by council members at a meeting in May.

However in July a High Court judge quashed both decision following a legal challenge by two Newbury families with disabled children.

In the Judicial Review ruling Mrs Justice Laing said the council did not properly consider its legal duties, and the decision was flawed because councillors were essentially misdirected about the council's legal obligations, meaning the local authority had to consider the issue afresh.

During last night's meeting, which at one point was plunged into darkness through a power cut resulting from the raging storm outside, the council's executive portfolio for Children and Young People Lynne Doherty (Con, Northcroft) told members that the local authority's provisions compared favourably with other parts of the country, listing a range of services which would still be accessible to families.

Pointing to the financial constraints West Berkshire Council has had to operate under she said: "It's our role to decide if it is proportionate and justifiable in light of other savings being made [to make the cuts]."

She added: "We are not stopping, we are reducing the funding stream of some of those providers.

"When you look around there some really good community groups coming out."

Responding to suggestions the council use its financial reserves to boost funding to the service executive portfolio holder for Finance and Transformation, Anthony Chadley (Con, Birch Copse) explained that reserve levels were close to the minimum and any further reduction may leave the cash-strapped council unable to respond to any urgent financial demand.

Councillors voted in favour of the cuts with just the three Liberal Democrat councillors present, Alan Macro, Lee Dillon and Mollie Lock, voting against.
The Kerala High Court last week stayed the appointment of Dr Priya Varghese as an associate professor at Kannur University.
What if one blood test could screen for more than 50 types of cancer?
Champaign, IL (61820)

Today

Rain showers early will evolve into a more steady rain for the afternoon. High 58F. Winds E at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%..

Tonight

Steady light rain this evening. Showers continuing overnight. Low 54F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%.
Epilepsy.com Publishes New Expert Consensus Report Identifying Four Key Actions to Help Reduce Risk of Seizures

In response to the urgent need to raise awareness of Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy (SUDEP) among people with epilepsy and their caregivers, the Epilepsy Foundations SUDEP Institute today issued a special expert consensus report, #AimForZero: Striving Toward a Future Free from Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy. The new epilepsy.com report is the centerpiece of a multi-channel campaign to motivate people with epilepsy to strive for their best possible seizure control to reduce their risk of SUDEP, speak with their health care team about SUDEP, and use the dedicated #AimForZero hashtag to drive discussions of SUDEP.

SUDEP occurs when a person with epilepsy in their usual state of health dies unexpectedly; it is the most common cause of death from epilepsy. An estimated 1 in 1,000 adults in the U.S. with epilepsy dies from SUDEP each year; however, if seizures are uncontrolled the risk increases to 1 in 150.

The SUDEP Institute developed the special report in collaboration with leading epilepsy specialists and by reviewing research studies and conducting an online survey of more than 1,000 people with epilepsy and caregivers. It highlights four actions people with epilepsy can take to reduce their risk of SUDEP: take epilepsy medication as prescribed; get enough sleep; limit alcohol; and strive to stop seizures.

Tragically, deaths from SUDEP continue to occur because physicians and patients arent having conversations about how even a single seizure can put a person with epilepsy at risk for SUDEP and about why it is so vitally important to strive for zero seizures, said Orrin Devinsky, MD, advisor to the Epilepsy Foundation SUDEP Institute, professor of neurology at the New York University (NYU) School of Medicine, and director of the NYU Langone Comprehensive Epilepsy Center and North American SUDEP Registry. Thats why we are focusing on these four steps that people with epilepsy can take  starting today  to help achieve seizure control and protect themselves from this deadly yet preventable outcome.

John Popovich of Potomac Falls, Virginia, lost his 19-year-old son John Paul to SUDEP. Even though John Paul was first diagnosed with epilepsy at 6 years old, it wasnt until a week after his funeral 13 years later that I heard the term SUDEP for the first time, he said. John Paul experienced only three seizures in all the years since his diagnosis, so his mother and I didn't know about the importance of preventing seizures, and John Paul's doctor didn't discuss it with us. If we had known about the risk of SUDEP and its triggers, John Paul might still be with us. If your child, loved one, or someone you know has had seizures, I urge you to be proactive and learn what you can about SUDEP.

Neuroscience eBook Compilation of the top interviews, articles, and news in the last year. Download a copy today

Four Critical Actions May Save Lives

Nearly 30 percent of people living with epilepsy today have seizures that resist all current treatment options. The Epilepsy Foundation supports a wide-range of research studies and the development of new therapies to help change lives.

The Foundation also believes education is key for people living with epilepsy who can achieve greater seizure control. People with treatable epilepsy and their health care teams mistakenly believe that seizures are controlled if the person has them rarely or in a predictable manner. However, they are still at risk for SUDEP; true seizure control means having no seizures at all. Learning self-management of epilepsy is crucial to help reduce the risk of seizures. Proper self-management is achieved through dedicated partnership between the person with epilepsy, their caregiver, and their health-care team. Managing seizures involves many steps  preventing triggers or situations that a person can easily modify are key steps along the way. The #AimForZero campaign urges people with epilepsy to adopt four key self-management actions to help avoid SUDEP.
The 3rd European Iron Academy (EIA) took place on the 12th and 13th September 2016 in Berlin, Germany, and brought together over 450 clinicians with an interest in iron deficiency.

Iron deficiency is the most common nutritional disorder in the world and is the leading cause of anaemia. The condition occurs frequently across multiple therapeutic areas e.g. in patients with chronic diseases such as inflammatory bowel disease, heart failure and chronic kidney disease. In such conditions, inadequately managed iron deficiency has been associated with poor patient outcomes, including increased hospitalisations, reduced quality of life and even higher mortality rates.

The 3rd EIA had the goal of further raising awareness of iron deficiency and stimulating discussion amongst peers, helping them to better understand the causes, the need for improved diagnosis and the current treatment options for their patients.

The 2016 programme offered delegates the opportunity to tailor the sessions to their own clinical interests/areas of expertise; engage in interactive patient case scenarios and breakout sessions; and discuss current standards in iron deficiency management with experts in Q&A-style sessions.

The 3rd EIA is accredited by the European Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (EACCME) to provide participants with CME credits, and is supported by an educational grant from Vifor Pharma.

We are delighted to be running the 3rd EIA this year, which specifically addresses the need for continuing medical education on iron deficiency, said Professor Stefan Anker (Germany), EIA 2016 co-Chair and Professor of Innovative Clinical Trials (Cardiology & Cachexia Research) at the University Medical Center Gottingen, Germany.

This years programme will review the latest data relating to the diagnosis and treatment of iron deficiency within a number of key therapy areas, including cardiology, gastroenterology, nephrology and haematology, and showcases the EIAs all-encompassing approach to education and improving patient outcomes in many disease areas.
Malaria is one of the leading causes of mortality in developing countries  last year killing more than 400,000 people. Researchers worldwide have found the solution for drug discovery could lie in open, crowd-sourced science.

An inclusive open source research mechanism allowed dozens of scientists around the world to collaborate on malaria drug development in real time. Credit: Merinda Ramage, CC-BY

The current gold standard antimalarial treatments are based on artemisinin  a compound developed in the 1970s in China, combined with a partner drug. Resistance to artemisinin and its partners has already emerged in some parts of the world where there are concerns that if the resistance spreads, there will be no viable replacements.

Given the lack of commercial incentive for industry to develop drugs for neglected diseases  and because academic researchers often lack resources to move compounds forward - there is a need for new approaches.

In response, Associate Professor Matthew Todd from the University of Sydneys School of Chemistry, together with the not-for-profit research and development organisation Medicines for Malaria Venture, proposed a solution akin to the open source concept used in software development.

Open source drug discovery is an area Associate Professor Todd has been leading, launching and developing the project in Sydney with support from two Australian Research Council Linkage grants. Through this innovative work, Associate Professor Todd has demonstrated that open source research mechanisms work in the discovery of new medicines.

Last night in ACS Central Science, an international consortium of researchers unveiled its findings for the project that has been five years in the making.

The University of Sydneys Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research), Professor Duncan Ivison, said the implications for this unique research were far-reaching: This is thought-provoking research, Professor Ivison said.

Can an open-source mechanism be used to break the deadlock of discovery in other areas, such as antimicrobials or Zika? How do we marry the efficiency of openness with the often legitimate need to protect intellectual property? Does the open-source research mechanism provide a genuine alternative to the traditional way of doing things, in the way in which open-source products compete with proprietary products in software? We need to be constantly testing and trying new models for enabling our research to be translated in ways that benefit our community.

Drug Discovery eBook Compilation of the top interviews, articles, and news in the last year. Download a copy today

Associate Professor Todd said the openness of the research stimulated inputs from around the world that were of high value.

"A thrill of doing this research was showing that an open source approach to drug discovery actually works: talented and committed people spontaneously worked together to accelerate the science, Associate Professor Todd said. The diversity of the paper's author list is clear testament to the community that has come together to advance this project.

More than 50 researchers from 21 organisations in nine countries added their research to the project, which started with a large set of potential drug molecules made public by the company GlaxoSmithKline.

First author on the paper, Dr Alice Williamson from the University of Sydney, said it was a big job coordinating the inputs the consortium received but was well worth the effort to create a legacy of research for use by anyone for any purpose and which allowed contributors to influence directly the course of the project in real time.

"Scientists love to share their results but all too often we only share the positive outcomes and at the end of the research process, Dr Williamson said. Under the traditional model, vast amounts of publicly funded research is lost.

Medicines for Malaria Venture chief scientific officer Dr Timothy Wells said there was a huge amount of goodwill and intellectual input and this publication was just the start. We look forward to working with partners like Mat to continue to develop this new open approach to drug discovery, with the ultimate goal of identifying a new drug candidate, Dr Wells said.
Approximately one in nine people sent to Florida emergency rooms (ERs) for injuries caused by acts of intentional violence - including shootings, stabbings, assaults, etc. - in 2010 ended up being violently injured again within two years. The findings come from the most comprehensive study to date on recurrent violent injury, its costs and risk factors. Risk factors for recurrent violent injury included homelessness, residence in low income neighborhoods, and other ER visits for psychiatric emergencies or alcohol abuse. The nearly 70,000 ER visits for initial and recurring injuries included in the study generated almost $600 million in medical charges. The study is co-led by researchers at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, and appears this month in the American Journal of Emergency Medicine.

"As physicians, when we take care of injured people in the emergency room, we have a critical opportunity to assess their health and safety, and to prevent future injuries," said lead author Elinore Kaufman, MD, a resident in General Surgery at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center in New York, who conducted the study while earning a Master of Science in Health Policy at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. "While violence prevention programs in trauma centers have been shown to be effective, recurrent violent injury is still very common and very costly. We need to be doing more to make sure every patient has the resources they need to stay safe."

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that interpersonal violence led to 16,671 deaths, 140,343 hospitalizations, and 1,615,995 ER visits in 2010, and generated an estimated $8.5 billion in medical costs - a figure that exceeds the annual GDP of many countries.

Violent injury is therefore widely regarded as a public health issue, and some hospitals have started intervention programs to prevent recurrences among victims. But studies of violent injuries and their recurrence have generally been very limited in scope - often limited to one city or hospital center - and have not done much to identify risk factors that could enable better targeting of interventions.

In the new study, the team collaborated with colleagues at the University of Florida College of Medicine to examine ER-reported injuries from interpersonal violence for the entire state of Florida, including all initial visits during 2010 and any recurrent visits within two years. Of 53,908 people who visited Florida ERs for violent injuries - excluding intentional injuries - in 2010, 11 percent were returned with a new violent injury at least once within two years. A significant number of these patients - 1,192 (20 percent) - had two or more recurrences, and 336 had recurrent injuries that were classified as severe.

In total, their ER visits - both initial and recurrent - generated $596 million in medical charges. Recurring injuries accounted for 11,110 ER visits, 1,244 of which led to hospital admissions.

Other findings of the study include:

Patients using Medicaid or who were uninsured had recurrent injuries at about twice the rate of other patients.

Homeless patients, who made up a vastly disproportionate percentage of initial injury victims (1.3 percent) compared to the percentage of homeless (< 0.01 percent) in the overall population, were 60 percent more likely to experience recurrent injuries, compared to non-homeless.

African Americans also made up a disproportionately high percentage of initial injury victims, and were 10 percent more likely to have a recurrent injury compared to whites, and 40 percent more likely to have a severe recurrent injury.

Female victims were as likely as men to have recurring injuries, but were 70 percent less likely to have a recurrent severe injury.

Patients who visited ERs for mental illness, alcohol abuse, or unintentional injury at any time during the study period also had much higher rates of violent injury recurrence, compared to those who didn't make such visits.

The analysis also revealed that only about a third of all violently injured patients, and half with severe injuries, were sent to specialized trauma centers, the rest being treated community non-trauma center ERs. In addition, more than half of patients were treated at a different hospital than where they were treated for their prior injury. The authors say this finding also points to the need for the delivery of effective violence prevention resources across both trauma center and non-trauma center hospitals. Referring victims of violence treated at non-trauma centers to existing violence intervention programs based at local trauma centers may be one way to do this.

"These findings can serve as a baseline for interventions aimed at reducing recurrence," said senior author M. Kit Delgado, MD, MS, an assistant professor of Emergency Medicine and Biostatistics & Epidemiology at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. Targeting interventions to those treated in non-trauma center ERs, where surprisingly most victims are treated, could greatly expand the public health impact. Such interventions, he suggests, could be targeted especially at patients considered to be at high risk for recurrence based on criteria revealed in the study. "Our findings also highlight the potential for housing stability, behavioral health and substance abuse programs to break cycles of violence," Delgado said.
When Shivpal Singh Yadav drove down to CM Akhilesh Yadav's residence on Vikramaditya Marg in Lucknow, he did expect his nephew to concede some ground.It was a short 20-minute rendezvous with both decorum and due courtesies extended. Shivpal sought to know from his nephew why he thought that there were conspiracies being hatched within. He asked for proof. On Amar Singh he said clearly, that the reinduction of the MP was cleared by Mulayam Singh himself.The recent acrimony notwithstanding, Shivpal was however expecting that some leeway would be extended by the nephew. At the end of the meeting, Akhilesh did come out to see off the uncle. But extended no olive branch.Sources close to Shivpal indicated a detente would have been possible had all departments been restored to the aggrieved uncle. But with no signs of Akhilesh conceding anything, Shivpal returned home to his Kalidas Marg residence. At 9pm, Shivpal wrote his resignation , from the ministry and as Samajwadi Party state president, and asked one of his aides to personally deliver it to Mulayam and Akhilesh."If he had resigned only from the government, that would have given an impression that Shivpal was willing to continue as state president. Now he has put the ball in Mulayam's court", said a source close to Shivpal.By midnight the family feud had spilled on to the streets of Lucknow. Shivpal supporters gathered outside Kalidas Marg in their show of solidarity. With both sides unrelenting, Shivpal, his aides say, may move out of his ministerial house by Friday evening.With elections round the corner, Mulayam has a tough task ahead of him to placate warring factions. He cannot completely isolate his brother who is seen to be an organisation man. On the other hand, the party cannot in public perception give an impression that a patch-up of any kind has weakened the CM's position.For now, Mulayam Junior seems to be attempting to settle unresolved leadership issues before the end of his term in office.Tipu (Akhilesh's nickname), as someone said, is closing in to emerge as the sultan of SP.
Beijing: China is willing to join hands with India to implement the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries and properly handle "sensitive issues" to push forward bilateral ties, State Councillor Yang Jiechi has said.



Yang who met National Security Advisor Ajit Doval in New Delhi on the sidelines of the BRICS National Security Advisors meeting said development of bilateral ties between the two countries have maintained good momentum.



China and India pledged on Thursday to further promote cooperation among the BRICS nations and discussed issues such as cyber security, energy security and anti-terrorism, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.



This is the first meeting between Doval and Yang after Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping met at Hangzhou on the sidelines of the G20 summit on September 4.



"China is willing to join hands with India to implement the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries, deepen mutual political trust, expand pragmatic cooperation and friendly exchanges, and properly handle sensitive issues in order to push forward the development of bilateral ties in the right direction and promote Asia's development and prosperity," Yang said.



In his meeting with Xi, Modi said both countries have to be sensitive to strategic interests and promote positive convergences and prevent growth of negative perceptions.



Xi said,"China is willing to work with India to maintain their hard-won sound relations and further advance their cooperation".



Both the leaders set the direction for the development of bilateral ties for the next phase, Yang said in his meeting with Doval.
Dhar (MP): Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar was on Friday shown black flags by farmers in Kalghat area of the district as he was heading to neighbouring Barwani district to express solidarity with Medha Patkar and flag off a rally against liquor abuse.



The farmers against the Narmada Bachao Andolan leader Patkar had announced that they will show black flags to Kumar, following which heavy police security was deployed at the spot.



But, the protesters still managed to appear on the sides of the road and showed black flags to the Janta Dal (U) president when his cavalcade was passing.



Vishnu Maladari, protesters' leader, said Patkar had invited Kumar to draw political mileage.



"Farmers have got compensation for their lands which were acquired to lay canals off Narmada river in Barwani and Dhar districts, he said.



But Patkar opposed the Sardar Sarovar Project and Madhya Pradesh was unable to reap its benefits whereas farmers in Gujarat and Rajasthan had been benefited by the project, he said.
India is all set to grant political asylum to the Baloch leaders who are fighting for independence from Pakistan, top sources in the government told CNN-News18 on Friday.



Sources said they wanted the Baloch leaders to formally apply for asylum and that this would be granted in a matter of a few weeks.



Brahmagadh Bugti, the most prominent Baloch leader, told CNN-News18 he welcomed the move and called it "historic". The last time India granted political asylum was to the Dalai Lama in 1959.



Bugti says the biggest difficulty for him and other Baloch leaders who are living in exile is the lack of travel documents. When granted asylum, Bugti would get an Indian passport which would enable him to travel to other countries.



He has thanked Prime Minister Modi for raising this issue in his Independence Day speech, after which the Baloch issue has gained international momentum.



Two days ago at the United Nations General Assembly Baloch leaders, protested outside the Broken Chair statue highlighting their sufferings at the hands of Pakistan's Army.



This comes on a day Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is expected to speak to Kashmiri leaders in PoK.



He is expected to highlight the ongoing Kashmir unrest at the UN General Assembly next week. India is hoping to blunt this Pakistan strategy by highlighting the plight of the Baloch people when Sushma Swaraj speaks at the UNGA next week.


Geneva: Stepping up its offencive against Pakistan on the Balochistan issue at the UN Human Rights Council, India on Friday said Pakistan is a nation that practises terrorism on its own people and the sufferings of the people of Balochistan are a telling testimony in this regard.



Exercising its right of reply, India, raising the Balochistan issue second time in three days at the UNHRC, said the irony of a nation that has established a well-earned reputation of being the global epicentre of terrorism holding forth on human rights.



"It surely is the height of hypocrisy for a Government that preaches, practises, encourages and nurtures terrorism to venture into the subject of human rights," India said.



In the last two decades, the most wanted terrorists of the world have found succour and sustenance in Pakistan. This tradition unfortunately continues even today, not surprising when its Government employs terrorism as an instrument of state policy, India said.



The current disturbances in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir have their origins in the death in police action of a self-proclaimed terrorist commander of Hizbul Mujahideen with links to the 'deep state' across the border, it added.



India also said it has seen continuous flow of terrorists trained and armed by our neighbour and convincing proof that they have been tasked with creating incidents that would lead to casualties in the civilian population.



"There cannot be a more cynical policy that targets the very people for whom such deep concern is professed... The pervasive practice of terrorism is not targeting India alone.



Many of our neighbours have suffered as grievously from cross-border terrorism and interference in their internal affairs," it said.



Pakistan keeps referring to UN Security Council Resolutions on Jammu and Kashmir. However, it very conveniently forgets its own obligation under these resolutions to first vacate the illegal occupation of Pakistan Occupied Kashmir.



"It was stated that Jammu and Kashmir is under foreign occupation. Yes, a part of it is, and the occupier in question is Pakistan," India said.



Asserting that the foremost challenge to stability in Kashmir is the scourge of terrorism, which receives sustenance from Pakistan and the territories under Pakistan's control, it said Pakistan's attempt, seeking to mask its activities as though an outcome of domestic discontent, carries no credibility with the world.



India said that concrete evidence about cross-border encouragement and support for the protests in Kashmir has been handed over to Pakistan. But, "instead of working with a sense of purpose to address this issue, Pakistan resorts to short-sighted tactics to divert attention, as we have once again seen today".



India has a robust institutional framework in place to ensure adherence to rule of law and respect for fundamental rights of the people. It includes independent judiciary, National Human Rights Commission, vibrant civil society and free and vocal media, it said.



The people of Jammu and Kashmir have chosen and reaffirmed their destiny repeatedly through India's well-established democratic processes. Free, fair and open elections are regularly held there at all levels. Pakistan, on the other hand, has witnessed continuous degradation and weakening of its institutions.



Pakistan-occupied Kashmir is administered by a 'deep state' and has become an epicenter of terrorism.



Pakistan's human rights record in Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir and Balochistan is deplorable. It has had no hesitation in using air power and artillery against its own people, not once but repeatedly over the years, India said, adding that it is high time for Pakistan to do some deep introspection.



"We would once again urge Pakistan to focus its energies on improving human rights situation and dismantling the terrorism infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir. This would go a long way in bringing peace and stability to the region and beyond," India added.
New Delhi: Asserting that Nuclear Suppliers Group membership is a priority, India on Thursday said there should not be any differences between it and China on issues such as development and clean energy, a day after Beijing said it is yet to take a position on the accession of a non-NPT country into the nuclear club.



Meanwhile, sources said that the second round of talks between the top nuclear officials of India and China is likely to be held in Beijing in October.



The two sides had held the first round of talks in the national capital on Tuesday with a focus on India's admission into 48-nation NSG, which controls global nuclear commerce.



"The two sides have had a substantive and pragmatic exchange on the issue of NSG membership, which is a priority for India because of our plans for civil nuclear energy.



"On certain issues such as development and clean energy, there should not be differences between the two sides," MEA spokesperson Vikas Swarup said at his weekly briefing here. China and India this week discussed issues of mutual interest in the area of disarmament and non-proliferation with a focus on India's entry into NSG.



Swarup said the two countries have agreed that both sides should approach these issues with mutual sensitivity to each other's concerns and priorities.



"The exchange was useful in enhancing understanding of each other's perspective and will be continued," he said.



He said the two sides were also of the view that a process has been set in motion after the Seoul NSG plenary on the issue of membership and they should support this process.



"This can demonstrate to the whole world that India and China approach such issues with strategic maturity and are working together to narrow and resolve any difference of view. This is urgent and timely," he said.



Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Hua Chunying told the media in Beijing on Wednesday that India and China are "yet to agree on accession of any specific member into the group".



The talks came nearly two-and-a-half months after China scuttled India's NSG membership bid.



Asked about China's argument that energy issue is no longer a bilateral matter between it and India, Swarup said on issues such as development and clean energy or terrorism for that matter, given the positions that have been taken, there is a strong bilateral dimension.



"That is why we had this dialogue. The understanding of the two sides is that this is both a bilateral and a multilateral issue. There is no contradiction," he said.



In the June Plenary of NSG in Seoul, despite strong American support, China stonewalled India's bid to join the grouping on the ground that it was a not a signatory to NPT.
Director: Vikram Bhatt



Cast: Emraan Hashmi, Kriti Kharbanda, Gaurav Arora



You don't expect much while entering a theatre when the film concerned is the fourth installment of an already juiced out franchise. Raaz Reboot was promoted as the improvised version of all the previous films, but it turned out to be exact opposite.



Directed by Vikram Bhatt, the film's story revolves around a newlywed couple who return to Romania only to experience tension in their relationship. The wife starts getting strange feelings in the house while the husband ignores to pay heed to any of her concerns. Finally, an evil spirit enters the scene and same old drama of possession and dark past comes into play.



The plot of the story is predictable to the core and the director fails to play on the emotions of the character. Not much time has been

given to characterization of any actor. The film was supposed to be a horror but it fails to evoke chills even at the supposed eerie moments. The story feels stretched even before the interval, so much so, that you feel to either get up or sleep on the comfortable seat munching popcorn.



The horror scenes are redundant and feels like rip off from Bhatt's own film 1920. Exorcism and after-exorcism scenes are done to the core in Bhatt camp and the same have been repeated in Raaz Reboot.







The actors Kriti Kharbanda and Gaurav Arora fail to evoke any kind of emotions. A stone would've acted better than Mr Gupta here. Emraan Hashmi is a waste of space and people's mind. It's sad to see him pick films that fail to justify his talent. The entire climax of the story is surrounding Hashmi's character which could've done so well, provided the writer's interest. But looks like the makers lost interest halfway through and their boredom resulted in this disaster.



Raaz Reboot has nothing new to offer, even the old offerings have been executed badly. The entire setup in Romania, Dracula's own country, could've been exploited more but the makers didn't even cash in the scenic beauty of the place. The music is the only average thing in this poorly made film.



The lazy installment of Raaz franchise does not deserve your time.



Looks like the makers lost their own spirit while making the film and ended up making one of the most boring films of the year. Now Bhatts should understand that time has come to get out of past and make films with more vigour, vision and new story.



Rating: 0.5 out of 5
Mumbai: He is been there, done that, and hence no one would think there's any role left to challenge megastar Amitabh Bahchan, but he says even today the actor in him gets anxious before a shot the way he did four decades ago.



The 73-year-old star, in fact, enjoys the 'self-pressure' and anxiety, and he says he would never want it any other way. "Every film is a test, an examination for me. Pink (his next) is no different. It gives me sleepless nights and anxiety before each shot that needs to be taken. That is the way I would like it to be. Nothing comes easy in life. Certainly not a hard hitting film," Bachchan told PTI in an interview.



The National Award-winner will be seen playing a lawyer in Pink, which is about three young women fighting a apathetic society. From having the film revolve around his character, to now getting roles, which lend support to the stories, Bachchan is in a really interesting phase in his career. Filmmakers like Shoojit Sircar, who directed him Piku, an adorable slice-of-the-life drama about a father-daughter relationship, and has produced Pink are coming up with meaty, layered characters for the megastar.



Asked whether the transition from being the leading man to a character star has been difficult for him, Bachchan says he does not look at it that way. "It's a state of mind that needs to be understood. Each artist has his or her own conception of it. I need to work and I am fortunate to get it, so I work, character role or not."



Coming to Pink, which releases tomorrow, Bachchan says he agreed to the movie within minutes as he found the concept of courtroom thriller very appealing. "It story was first narrated to me by Shoojit Sircar and it took me minutes to agree. I did not ask what role I was going to play or what the story or screenplay would be," he says.



Pink is his third release of the year after Wazir and Te3n. Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury, best known for his Bengali dramas Aparajita Tumi, Antaheen and Anuranan, is making his Hindi directorial debut with the movie, which besides Big B, stars Taapsee Pannu, Kriti Kulhari, Andrea Tariang and Angad Bedi.



The actor says it was not difficult for him to slip into the role of a lawyer as Sircar and his team did extensive research on the plot of Pink. "Shoojit and his team went through a very rigorous research before formulating the screenplay and dialogue. Real life cases were studied, lawyers and court room protocol was looked into, and we always had a lawyer on set in an advisory capacity."



With respect to the film's story, Bachchan says he is hopeful that there will be a time when women will not feel apprehensive about such issues.

"Laws and attitudes are changing. It may not be put across as a 'difficult time for women' but there is apprehension in their minds. I hope soon we can address those reasons and live in a world free from some of the most heinous crimes committed towards them."



Recently, he wrote an open letter for his two granddaughters -- Navya Naveli and Aaradhya and while many appreciated it, Bachchan received some flak for allegedy promoting the movie through the letter. "During the course of our interviews the repeated question being asked was 'What is the story of Pink?' and 'What does the film mean to you?'. Shoojit suggested that writing a letter to my grandchildren would be a unique way of

answering what the essence of the film entailed," he says.



Bachchan says he thought the letter would share the emotion of the film, without divulging the story. "'Promotional activity' is a debatable terminology. Making a film or indeed cinema itself is an act of promotion. Media, whether print or electronic, is by itself a promotional

act, as is this very interview. "The many positives we received on the release of the letter, gave us strength. There were negatives too and I am

open to debate or discuss those issues, for, nobody is perfect neither the writer or the reader," he says.
: Jaume Collet-Serra: Blake Lively, Oscar Jaenada, Brett CullenThe prospect of spending 90 minutes with Blake Lively and a shark might not be everyones idea of a perfect movie night. But as guilty pleasures go, youve got to admit The Shallows has a promising set up  beautiful young woman is trapped on a rock in the middle of a bay while a Great White circles ominously.As it turns out, Spanish director Jaume Collet-Serra delivers a nicely paced, well-crafted thriller that keeps you on the edge of your seat for the most part. Its never as realistic or creepy as Open Water, but it does pack some genuine scares.Gossip Girl star Lively plays Nancy, a medical student from Texas, still mourning her mothers death when she arrives at the isolated Mexican beach that meant so much to her. The golden sand and perfect waves are a surfers paradise, until a shark decides to show up. Bleeding from a deep cut to her leg, and clinging on for dear life to a small rock, she must figure out how to avoid becoming the creatures dinner.To be fair, The Shallows feels closer in spirit to harrowing survival tales like 127 Hours or Buried over Jaws. Because frankly, the shark is incidental to the story. Its really about this young womans indefatigable spirit to overcome her fate. And Lively, who is in virtually every frame of the film, rises to the challenge with a committed performance.Doffing his hat to Spielberg, the films director shows us the shark only sparingly, and cranks up the tension using music and wide shots of the water in a foreboding fashion. There are logical loopholes aplenty, but it wont matter after a point, once youre invested in the protagonist and her unwillingness to play the victim here.Im going with three out of five for The Shallows. Its a smart, crisp thriller that works despite its contrivances. Give it a chance.Rating: 3 / 5What is your reaction to The Shallows?Write your review here:
Itanagar: Congress has now lost another state in the North East. 42 Congress and 2 independent MLAs have now merged with the People's Party of Arunachal (PPA).



PPA is a regional party of Arunachal Pradesh and is part of the North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA) , a BJP led alliance of non congress parties.



Sources in the Chief Minister's office say that this shift is because Arunachal Pradesh is completely dependent on the central government for funds and thus being in Congress wasn't helping them much.



Defending the move MoS Home and BJP MP from Arunachal Pradesh Kiran Rijiju told CNN-NEWS18 that 'judiciary can interpret the way it wants but reality is MLAs did not want to be with Congress.







It is important to mention here that NEDA led by its convenor Himanta Biswasarma wanted the rebel Congress MLAs led by Kalikho Pul to join merge with the BJP before the Supreme Court order reinstated Congress's Nabam Tuki govrrnment.



The state has seen 8 different governments in last 10 years, and three ,this year alone.



While PPA hasn't officially made it clear whether it will align with BJP or not . Sources say support of the 11 BJP MLAs in the House would surely be there with this government.



In the Assembly of 60, Congress had 47 MLAs, BJP 11 and two independent. Status of two Congress MLAs are yet to be decided as they put in their papers before the recent series of political developments that led to first Tuki government falling in January 2016, imposition of President's rule and installation of the late Kalikho Pul government for a short span.



Pul, a Congress MLA and had committed suicide last month, was forced to resign in July following a Supreme Court judgement.
Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh today evaded questions on the ongoing feud in the party in Uttar Pradesh and said he would hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil.



"As per a pre-decided schedule, I am here to attend a programme. I would say hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil," the Rajya Sabha MP told reporters here at a function.



He refused to comment on the ongoing tussle in the party.



Singh who is considered to be the reason behind the disagreements was in the eye of the storm ever since senior Samajwadi Party leaders including UP Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav had blamed him for the feud in the first family of the state.






New Delhi: Lt Governor Najeeb Jung on Friday asked Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia to return immediately from Finland to deal with the chikungunya outbreak in the national capital, a source in his office said.



"Yes, the Lt Governor has asked Sisodia to immediately call off his tour and return to the city to deal with the outbreak," the official told IANS.



Earlier in the day Sisodia had clarified that he was not holidaying in Finland and had said India needed to learn a "lot from their education system, the best in the world".



A long-time associate of AAP leader and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Sisodia presides over Delhi's education department and is widely credited with bringing about major changes in government schools.



Delhi has so far witnessed deaths of 32 patients suffering from vector-borne diseases like Dengue and Chikungunya.


LUCKNOW  After Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadavs stern warning to both the warring factions that he is the leader and he would decide everything, both Akhilesh Yadav and Shivpal Yadav seem to have softened their stand.

Addressing party leaders at SP office Mulayam Singh Yadav once again declared that he is in control and all differences would be sorted out. Sending out a strong signal he revoked the suspension of sacked minister Gayatri Prajapati and said that there would be no action against him.

Attacking some of his own party men he said Till I am here there cant be any internal dispute. Dont worry and there is no dispute in the party. Someone has given an opportunity to media to say all these. Our own people have given an opportunity to the media.

He said that some of his own people are fueling the media.

Assuring party leaders he said this election is very crucial. We have worked very hard in the past five years. Everyone has worked together. Till the time I am there, there will be no division in the party. This is our Samajwadi Party family and minor differences exist everywhere.

Before that Akhilesh Yadav also declared that his fathers words are final and there is no question of going against him. He said Netaji and me have decided that we will not let outsiders come between us. He also said that he would be meeting his upset uncle Shivpal Yadav at his house.

Sources said that Akhilesh wants to settle the leadership issue once and for all. The CM might agree to return the portfolios, but Shivpal is now asking for much more.

Shivpal had resigned on Thursday evening and submitted his resignation to Mulayam and Akhilesh. Shivpals wife Sarla too resigned from her post at the Etawah District Co-operative Bank.

Read all the Latest News , Breaking News , watch Top Videos and Live TV here.
Lucknow: Breaking his silence over the factional feud in Samajwadi Party, its supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav on Friday said there can be no division in the party till he is there, a day after the dramatic resignation from Cabinet and party posts by his brother Shivpal.



Addressing party men in Lucknow, Mulayam said his son and Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav will not defy his words and announced that sacked mining minister Gayatri Prajapati will be taken back in the UP Cabinet, considered a bone of contention between Shivpal and Akhilesh.



"There can be no division in the party, till I am there," said Mulayam, who has been attempting to broker a truce between his son and brother.



"We have a big family, differences may occur... There is no fight between Shivpal Yadav and Akhilesh," the SP supremo asserted while addressing party men, adding that Akhilesh will meet Shivpal at his residence.



The SP supremo said it was election time and all should come together to work unitedly. "There is no fight among Ramgopal, Akhilesh and Shivpal," he told reporters as slogans in favour of Shivpal drowned his remarks.



As the crisis threatened to cast a shadow over the SP's prospects in the upcoming Assembly elections, Mulayam sought to downplay the developments saying, "Every father and son faces issues....There is no rift."



Mulayam, however, said that there is "fault of our people as well who spoke to media" and added that some people created confusion that there was rift in the party.



"Samajwadi Party is a family. There are no differences in the party," he said.



Mulayam also defended Prajapati who was dropped by Akhilesh as mining minister, saying "the order of his sacking will be rescinded".



His remarks came hours after Shivpal told agitated supporters who had gathered outside his residence that he was with Mulayam.



"We all have to strengthen Samajwadi Party. We are with Netaji (Mulayam). His message is an order for us. We will not let the party be weakened. In every situation, we are with Netaji," Shivpal said addressing slogan-shouting party-men outside his 7 Kalidas Marg residence.



"You have to go to the party office. We have to calmly convey our views to Netaji," he said.



The party men had gathered in his support since Thursday night after he submitted his resignation to Mulayam as ruling SP's Uttar Pradesh unit head and as a minister in the cabinet of nephew Akhilesh.



However, Mulayam reportedly refused to accept the resignations, they said. Shivpal's resignation as minister has also not been accepted by the chief minister.



The ruling party circles witnessed hectic confabulations right from the morning with a number of legislators and ministers meeting Shivpal. Prajapati was among those who went to Shivpal's residence.



Assembly Speaker Mata Prasad Pandey also met Shivpal in an apparent bid to resolve the situation.



After his meeting with Mulayam, which lasted hardly for about 15 minutes, Shivpal left for his residence after which Akhilesh Yadav returned home to meet Mulayam and they discussed the situation.



Mulayam had rushed to Lucknow from Delhi on Thursday evening after the public feud between Akhilesh and Shivpal deepened.
American movie star Leonardo DiCaprio unveiled a new, free technology that allows users to spy on global fishing practices, in a bid to curb illegal activity in the oceans.The technology, known as Global Fishing Watch, was officially released to the public during the Our Oceans Conference hosted by US Secretary of State John Kerry in Washington on Thursday and Friday.It aims to offer a crowd sourced solution to the problem of illegal fishing, which accounts for up to 35 per cent of the global wild marine catch and causes yearly losses of $23.5 billion, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization.Overfishing is also a growing problem worldwide, with about two-thirds of fish stocks in the high seas either over exploited or depleted, said the FAO. Some of the planet's largest fish, including tuna and swordfish, are below 10 per cent of their historical level.Using satellite technology combined with radar aboard boats, the site GlobalFishingWatch.org allows people to zero in on areas of interest around the world and trace the paths of 35,000 commercial fishing vessels."It gives the public an opportunity to see what is happening, even out in the middle of the ocean," said John Amos, president and founder of SkyTruth, one of three partners in the project along with Google and Oceana."We need the public to be engaged to convince governments and convince the seafood industry that they need to solve the problems of overfishing," Amos told AFP."If you can't see it and can't measure it, you are not going to care about it and it is not going to get solved."The project has cost $10.3 million over the past three years to build, with $6 million of those funds contributed by the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation in January.Other funders include the Marisla Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, The Wyss Foundation, The Waterloo Foundation and Adessium Foundation.DiCaprio, well known for his commitment to the environment, is scheduled to highlight Global Fishing Watch and a series of other solutions for oceans at 1:30 pm (1730 GMT) Thursday, in a presentation viewable online at www.ourocean2016.org.In order the make the data available for free, Oceana and its partners negotiated a deal with the satellite company Orbcomm to use its three-day old data, which is described as "near real-time," along with historical records.Although the delay means that any criminals won't be nabbed instantaneously, advocates say the technology will open the world's waters to public watchdogs in a way that has never been done before."We think it is going to have a lot of impact, first of all just the deterrent effect of vessels knowing that we could see them if they are doing something they are not supposed to be doing," Savitz said."You can look at an area you are interested in, zoom in and see what data we have."For instance, users could zero in on a marine protected area and see if any boat tracks have crossed into waters where they should not have been.One could scan the map for any evidence that large vessels are fishing in areas that are reserved for small-scale fishermen.Vessels can be tracked by name or by country, or by traffic inside exclusive economic zones.The paths of ships are visible, including zigzag paths that could indicate vessels are avoiding shore to offload their catch on to other ships undetected, or that other illegal operations or human rights abuses may be under way.Savitz said some capacities may be beyond the ability of the average Internet user, but that experts are available via the website to help with specific questions.Future versions of the technology may even include tagging data for marine animals, so that the paths of whales and sharks and other fish might be visible alongside the vessel activity, she said.Currently, Global Fishing Watch does not include every vessel, only those that broadcast data from the Automatic Identification System, collected by satellite and terrestrial receivers and meant mainly as a safety mechanism to avoid collisions.Many of the world's largest fishing vessels are required by the International Maritime Organization to use AIS.AIS can be turned off if the boat operator is doing something illegal, but Savitz said that such an on-off action would likely be apparent by tracing the boat's appearing and disappearing tracks.Already, the government of Kiribati has used Global Fishing Watch data to unmask illegal fishing in the Phoenix Islands Protected Area, declared off-limits to commercial fishing on January 1, 2015.The owners of the vessel had to pay a $1 million fine and also made a "goodwill" donation of another $1 million grant, Oceana said.
Samsung VP Jay Y Lee and Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Underscoring importance of India as a strategic partner for Samsung, the South Korean giant's vice chairman Jay Y Lee met Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi on September 16 and reiterated Samsungs long-term commitment to the people of India as a strategic partner.Lee apprised Modi of Samsung's business operations and citizenship activities in the country and explained the company's active participation in the Make in India and Digital India initiatives proposed by the prime minister.As Samsung continues to view India as its strategic partner, the ultimate goal for the company, as explained by Lee, is to be not just a foreign investor but extend its role as a local business in the country where it will work with local communities.Other than initiatives of local manufacturing in India, Samsung also reiterated its commitment to Make for India - an initiative to create local innovations for Indian consumers.The meeting took place amidst the global controversy over Samsung's explosion-prone Galaxy Note 7 phones, which also face a ban in India
Islamabad: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Friday met Hurriyat leaders from Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) and assured them that he would "emphatically highlight" the Kashmir issue at the 71st session of the UN General Assembly next week.



Sharif met with the leaders of All Parties Hurriyat Conference PoK chapter at Muzaffarabad.



PoK 'President' Sardar Masood Khan and 'Prime Minister' Raja Farooq Haider were also present at the meeting.



"Pakistan will continue to extend moral, diplomatic and political support to Kashmiris," Sharif said, alleging that atrocities in Kashmir had touched extremes.



"Oppression is destined to end, and truth will prevail," he said in reference to the ongoing violence in Kashmir.



He said the Kashmiris' demand for their right to self-determination was just, which had also been acknowledged by international community.



Callingupon the UN to fulfill its obligation in accordance with its own resolutions, he said: "The movement of Kashmiris will ultimately succeed as the history has precedents that such movements could not be suppressed with oppression. Pakistan willraise voice for the resolution of Kashmir dispute at all fora."



Hurriyat leaders thanked Shariffor taking them into confidence before his visit to UNGA. Sharif is likely to deliver a speech at the UN General Assembly session on September 21.
Peshawar: At least 25 people, including five children, were killed and 30 others injured when a Taliban suicide bomber shouting 'Allahu Akbar' blew himself up inside a mosque packed with worshipers for Friday prayers in Mohmand Agency in Pakistan's restive northwest tribal region.



The attacker blew himself when the prayers were in progress at the mosque in the Anbar tehsil of the agency bordering Afghanistan.



"A suicide bomber was in the mosque. He shouted 'Allahu Akbar' and blew himself up," Assistant Political Agent Naveed Akbar told reporters.



He said that Friday prayers were being offered around 2 PM when the powerful blast took place.



At least 25 people were killed in the attack and 29 others injured, Pakistani media reported, citing officials.



"Many people were gathered inside the mosque when a suicide bomber blew himself up," an eyewitness said. Rescue teams and police rushed to the spot.



The bodies and the injured are being shifted to local hospitals for medical treatment.



Injured were also taken to hospitals in Bajaur Agency, Charsadda and Peshawar for treatment.



There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban routinely targets courts, schools and mosques.



Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has expressed his grief over the loss of lives in the blast.



The attack came on a day when Sharif vowed to continue the war against militancy and terrorism till elimination of the last terrorist.



During a meeting with Army chief General Raheel Sharif on Friday, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy.



The army had launched operation 'Zarb-e-Azb' in June 2014 to flush out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas.


A report of a fight near 12th Street in Downtown Lynchburg led to a lockdown for area schools Friday.

Lynchburg Police Lt. Malcolm Booker said Robert S. Payne Elementary and P.L. Dunbar Middle School for Innovation were put on lockdown as a precaution as police searched the area.

Booker said reports indicated a fight in the area of 12th Street and Kemper Street. A caller said one of the subjects was possibly armed.

One of the parties was located and was uncooperative with police, but did not have a weapon Booker said. The other party involved was not located.

The lockdown was lifted after officers searched the area.
Confederate veterans have a new monument in their honor in Campbell County.

Reggie Bennett, commander of the Campbell Guards Camp #2117  a branch of the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV)  said discussions for a monument began in 1905 when veterans of the Confederacy were at a reunion for the 40th anniversary of the surrender at Appomattox Court House.

The veterans met at the old Campbell County courthouse in Rustburg to discuss a possible monument, but disagreements among the veterans killed the idea, he said.

When Camp #2117 was chartered in 2007, Bennett said one of their first priorities was to raise money for a monument honoring Confederate veterans.

Its going to be history in the making because Campbell is the only county [in Virginia] that did not have a monument or memorial to Confederate veterans, he said.

A dedication ceremony for the monument will be at 1 p.m. Saturday at 2196 Red House Road, Rustburg. The public is invited.

Ernest Hines donated a portion of his property on Red House Road for the monument. Hines has three ancestors who fought in the Civil War. Bennett said, He has a blood connection to it.

Hines great-grandfather was Confederate Capt. Henry Douglas Puckett, who fought and died in the Civil War.

The camp spent several years raising money to build the monument, about $10,000, and this year raised enough for it.

At the monument, three stones surround an obelisk. The stones represent people with Confederate ancestors the group wanted to honor, another stone for people who donated and a third in honor of Hines wife, Sadie Hines.

The group, now 47 members strong, continues to raise money for the monument to cover maintenance costs and a future concrete walkway.

Teresa Roane, one of several speakers at todays event, will discuss black Confederate veterans. Roane is an archivist at the Museum of the Confederacy and a member of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, in honor of her own black ancestor.

She said by phone Thursday men of color did participate in the Confederate Army and often made more money in the Army compared to their fellow soldiers because they would be cooks or blacksmiths, and people tended to earn more money with skilled jobs than they would as regular soldiers.

Saturdays event coincides with the 154th anniversary of the Battle of Antietam in Sharpsburg, Maryland, otherwise known as the bloodiest battle in American history.

Campbell County Confederate soldiers were some of the nearly 22,000 killed in the battle.
Centra Health has plans to open a new urgent care clinic in Forest in the old Steeger Creek Building on Forest Road in the first three months of 2017.

Centra obtained a building permit for $600,000 to renovate the previous gift shop into a medical facility where serious injuries and immediate care can be treated. Renovations include adding several walls to create a waiting room and private examination rooms along with additional sinks.

Centra will rent the building.

Some construction already has begun, but projections for how many clients would be served still are unknown at this early stage, Centra Medical Group Vice President Beth Bankston said Thursday.

At lot of details are up in the air, she said.

Bankston said Forest was chosen because it is an area that meets the needs Centra is looking for as far as increasing growth in population, businesses and traffic count.

This is the market we have identified with the most growth and need, she said. Thats how we identified Forest. We are always looking for areas of growth.

Curry Martin, Bedford County supervisor and owner of Glenwood Oil & Gas in Huddleston, argued other areas in the county have a greater need for physicians. Huddleston residents, for example, must drive 15 miles either to the town of Bedford or Moneta for health care.

Huddleston briefly had a physicians office, from 2006 to 2014, until that physician joined Centras Bedford Memorial Hospital and closed the clinic.

Curry has offered up that vacant building, which he owns along with all of the medical equipment inside, free to any physician willing to open a clinic there. He is looking for a family physician or nurse practitioner who can write prescriptions.

Im offering the building to anyone who will come, rent free, and see if they can make a go of it, he said. The minute it opened, it would be slammed.

The space has been remodeled just recently, he said.

I dont think youre gonna find a better deal with everything set up, he said. If someone wants to start in life with a good rural area with good rural people, this is the best place in Virginia to be.

Every day, people look to me to keep things going for them, so they say, Have you found a doctor yet, is anyone coming? he said. Im totally frustrated by it. There are never enough medical services.

Bankston aims to have at least three physicians at the urgent care facility in Forest, along with some nurse practitioners and possibly some physician assistants along the way.

The clinic will be open seven days per week, 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Friday and 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. on the weekends. Because it is for urgent care, appointments wont be needed.

Bankston said the facility will have a digital X-ray, lab services on site and a telemedicine link back to emergency rooms where physicians can be in direct contact with the ER.

This facility will have a higher level of care than what is given at other facilities, she said.

The facility will be located at 16890 Forest Road.
Hawk Claus spreads Christmas cheer in DC's Grifter Got Run Over By a Reindeer first look

Take a look at two stories from the DC holiday special including the titular chapter and a Hawkwoman and Hawkman tale
GamesRadar+ is supported by its audience. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Heres why you can trust us.
Bazodee brings TT films into world view

The re-engineered film, Bazodee, was opened at Digicel IMAX, One Woodbrook place, Port-of-Spain last Tuesday. Montano told those specially invited to its opening that the movie was not his but rather TT s.

He said at the opening that the world wanted the countrys soca, its mas, the countrys beautiful women. He called upon the Government to invest in the countrys talent, calling the local cast members the countrys stars of tomorrow.

Montanos Bazodee has upped the head-turn value of TT , giving current to the idea that the country is ably capable of producing content that sits right with the best of them. Montanos plays the role of Lee in the film.

Many of Montanos local co-stars in Bazodee said the movie held its own when released alongside the major film Suicide Squad and, in some cases, performed even better.

The movie garnered generally mixed reviews, for example the Film Journal in its August 3 review said, Machel Montanos spirited sounds happily inform this sunny rom-com featuring a lot of blessedly brown people, for a change. Hardly world-shaking, but a nice, very smoothly executed summer refreshment. The Varietys August 5 review said, Comedic diversions involving Lees perpetually eye-rolling friends, as well as Anita playing matchmaker for her cousin and soon-tobe- brother-in-law, do little to energise Bazodee, which fails to capture either the freewheeling, joyous spirit of the Caribbean or the heady euphoria of blossoming romance. Instead, it succeeds only at proving Rams belief that sometimes, disasters just happen the movie illustrates that TT is replete with stories to be told.

This is something that the movies local casting director, Penelope Spencer, wants the countrys Government to understand.

She said, As the casting director I got a synopsis of the characters.

I got what the writer wanted.

Older man, vendor...I got that list and then being in this business for years I know a lot of the actors that are around and we had two or three casting calls.

After that we had a second call back and a third call back. Sometimes you recommend an actor for a role and the actor cannot do it, for whatever reason.

That was kind of the process in this film. The extras in this movie were the best. They carried the movie. At one point the director said to me the extras in the movie make the movie.

Sometimes the extras had to stay on set for 12 hours. Spencer who spent many years in the theatre industry said Bazodee has given both the local film and theatre industry hope.

This film has given our creative industry hope. I am hoping that the Government could see the work that we put in and the results of the work. I am hoping that actors feel hope. Actors feel hopeful. When Trinidad looks at this film everyone would feel so hopeful, she said.

Many of the local actors in the movie transitioned from theatre to film. Although, for some, there were challenges, they were never insurmountable. There was a lot of wondering if we could do it. The actors in this movie, who were stage actors pulled it off, Spencer added.

Similarly, for actor Ryan Martinez who plays Sanjay said Bazodee has opened his eyes and career to the possibility of film.

I am established in the stage aspect of TT s theatre industry.

I am versed and known in local Indian theatre. I got involved in some minor films.

I met Penelope at an offchance at the movies and she mentioned they were going to have an audition and invited me to come. I got called back and that is how I got involved in the filming of Bazodee originally called Scandalous. Martinez described the experience as eye-opening.

He added that the transition from the stage to film was not easy as stage required greater expression but his few minor roles in film gave him some experience yet it was still jarring for him.

For Martinez, the countrys unique culture makes it very fertile ground for story-telling.

Once the right techniques are used there is no stopping us.

We could become the cultural capital of the Caribbean, he said. It was a matter of building on the countrys historical inheritance.

Chris Smith, who plays Bud, Montanos manager in Bazodee, said it was one of the best starts he could have be it local or international. Smith described Bazodee as being uber positive.

It might even border on cheesy but it works, never compromising on quality. Montano he said wanted to make the movie, about Caribbean, about us. Smith said since the release in the US on August 5 his Instagram account has grown considerably.

Teneille Newallo who plays Poorvi became involved with Bazodee after having an audition with Penelope Spencer. She originally auditioned for two roles and found out she was pregnant shortly after getting the part. Her pregnancy, however, was no impediment to her.

They called me and said they really, really, wanted me to do it, she said. In fact, Newallo whose only dream was being an actress from as early as six or seven years was pampered on set by other cast members and the Bazodee team. The graduate of Florida Atlantic University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Theatre Performance said while that was her genesis, she always saw herself as getting into the film industry. When I came back to Trinidad that is when I started to focus again on film, she said. The actress has a number of projects under her belt among them bmobile Dance off and some short films.

For Newallo, it was one of the most professional sets she has ever worked on, locally. With her own film, Cutlass, premiering at the Trinidad and Tobago Film festival this month, she said, Bazodee has opened a lot of doors for films to come afterwards.

I am grateful for that. It is also the first time a local film has been released internationally on that scale. Machel, being the big star that he is, drew audiences to it and I think we needed that to get people interested in local films.
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(Newser)  Days after Samsung recalled its Galaxy Note 7 smartphones because they were catching fire, some stores in the US were still selling them, the New York Times reports. According to the Wall Street Journal, the US Consumer Product Safety Commission didn't even issue a statement on the hazardous phones until Sept. 9one week after Samsung's recalland didn't issue its own official recall notice until Thursday. Experts say that in its haste to recall the Note 7, which was being called the "most impressive smartphone ever" when it was released last month, Samsung botched the execution, especially in the US where it failed to coordinate with the CPSC

The recall of 2.5 million phones in 10 countriesthe largest recall in smartphone historyhas already cost Samsung up to $14 billion in market value and could set it back years in the credibility department. Samsung cannot afford to lose an inch of competitive ground to Apple in its home US market," one expert says. The official CPSC recall comes just one day before the Apple iPhone 7 is being released, CNN reports. The CPSC is asking that all 1 million Note 7s sold in the US be turned off immediately. There have been 26 reports of burns and 55 reports of property damage from the exploding phones in the US alone. And thanks to Samsung's questionable execution of its recall, delivery of safer replacement phones to US customers could be delayed. (Read more Samsung stories.)
(Newser)  The most tireless and passionate proponent of saving the Galapagos tortoise from extinction is ancient, lecherous, and not particularly attractive, but those attributes are apparently a big hit with the ladies. Gentle reader, meet Diego, the lusty 100-plus-year-old tortoise who has helped bring his kind back from the brink of extinctionby having copious amounts of sex with any female in sight, reports the AFP. "Hes a very sexually active male reproducer," says Washington Tapia, an actual tortoise preservation specialist at Galapagos National Park. "Hes contributing enormously to repopulating the island." How enormously? Diego is babydaddy to an estimated 800 offspring, or to better put it, a genetic test four years ago showed "that he was the father of nearly 40% of the offspring released into the wild on Espanola," the tortoises' native island.

Diego is a globe-trotting charmer, taking his name from the San Diego Zoo, where Tapia says he was taken "sometime between 1900 and 1959 by a scientific expedition." He was returned to the Galapagos Islands in 1976 to get down to work in a captive breeding program, as his kind had at one point dwindled to two males and 12 females on Espanola. Diego, it turns out, takes his job seriously. "Tough work, but some tortoise has to do it," the AFP snarks, while the Houston Chronicle runs through a primer on tortoise mating that includes the tidbit that "female giant tortoises are silent while the males make a sound similar to that of a cow's 'moo.'" Today, at least 2,000 tortoises have been released into the wild. Its a population thats in pretty good shape, and growing, which is the most important, Tapia says. (More on the Galapagos tortoises' fight back from the brink here.)
(Newser)  Natalie Hampton felt "completely ostracized by all of my classmates" at her middle school and dreaded lunch period every day because she knew she'd be sitting alone. She ended up switching schools for high school and making friends, and she didn't want to be "as bad as the people who watched me eat alone"so the California 16-year-old created Sit With Us. The app allows students to post open lunch tables, and other users can then find those tables and know they won't be turned away. Users must agree to be friendly to whomever sits with them before signing up as an "ambassador," the Washington Post reports.

At her old school, "I tried many times to reach out to someone, but I was rejected many times," Natalie explains to NPR. The experience left her feeling branded, very publicly, as an "outcast." With the app, "it's very private. It's through the phone. No one else has to know." And there also shouldn't be any risk of rejection. The app just launched last week, and people at her school are using it after Natalie introduced it at a school assembly Monday. She says the feedback so far has been "very, very positive." She's been invited to speak about it at the Girls Can Do conference in Washington in November. (Read more uplifting news stories.)
(Newser)  A House intelligence committee report issued Thursday condemned Edward Snowden, saying the NSA leaker is not a whistleblower and that the vast majority of the documents he stole were defense secrets that had nothing to do with privacy, the AP reports. The Republican-led committee released a three-page unclassified summary of its examination of how Snowden was able to remove more than 1.5 million classified documents from secure NSA networks, what the documents contained, and the damage their removal caused to US national security. "He put our service members and the American people at risk after perceived slights by his superiors," says Rep. Devin Nunes, chairman of the committee.

Snowden is seeking a presidential pardon because he says he helped his country by revealing secret domestic surveillance programs. All members of the committee sent a letter to President Obama urging him not to pardon Snowden. "The vast majority of what he took has nothing to do with American privacy," said Rep. Adam Schiff. The committee report says that he was a "disgruntled employee who had frequent conflicts with his managers." According to the committee, Snowden began mass downloads of classified material two weeks after he was reprimanded for engaging in a spat with NSA managers. The committee also described Snowden as a "serial exaggerator and fabricator." The report was released one day ahead of Friday's opening of director Oliver Stone's film Snowden. (Read more Edward Snowden stories.)
(Newser)  Hillary Clinton returned to the campaign trail Thursday, portraying her doctor-ordered rest to recover from pneumonia as a campaign reboot. "It's great to be back on the campaign trail," she said as she took the stage at a rally in Greensboro, NC, while James Brown's "I Feel Good" played. "I recently had a cold that turned out to be pneumonia. I tried to power through it, but even I had to admit that maybe a few days' rest would be good," she said, per the Washington Post. Clinton told the crowd that she had reflected on the issues during her time offincluding the fact that sickness can be "catastrophic" for families she has met who are "one paycheck away from losing their home."

Clinton promised a new focus for her campaign and was unusually open about her own personality. "Like a lot of women, I have a tendency to overprepare. I sweat the details," said Clinton. "I'll never be the showman my opponent is and that's OK with me," she added. But Clinton was as prickly as ever during a rare news conference after the speech, Politico reports. She took just six questions, including one about whether she had told running mate Tim Kaine she had pneumonia. "We communicated, but I'm not going to go into our personal conversations," she said. "I feel comfortable and confident about our relationship." (A new poll has Clinton neck-and-neck with Trump nationally.)
(Newser)  Donald Trump covered a lot of groundincluding his wife's immigration statusduring a Washington Post interview published Thursday, but the part that made headlines was his refusal to admit that the president of the United States is an American. "I'll answer that question at the right time," Trump said when asked if he believed President Obama was born in Hawaii. "I just don't want to answer it yet." He was asked if campaign manager Kellyanne Conway was right when she said he now believes Obama was born in the US, and he responded: "She's allowed to speak what she thinks." Trump's campaign later released a statement saying Trump believes Obama was born in the USand accusing Hillary Clinton of being the first to raise doubts. A roundup of coverage:



"Having successfully obtained President Obama's birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States," Trump adviser Jason Miller said, per CNN, which notes that Trump has passed up several opportunities in recent weeks to publicly retract his "birther" beliefs of the past.

Despite the Trump campaign's claims, there's no evidence that Hillary Clinton was the original birther, or that her campaign had anything to do with rumors in 2008 that Obama was born in Kenya instead of Hawaii, the BBC notes. The rumors may, however, have been circulated by Clinton supporters before being revived later that year by supporters of John McCain.

During the Post interview, Trump slammed upcoming debate moderator Anderson Cooper, denied having "embraced" Vladimir Putin, and said that although disgraced former Fox News chief Roger Ailes is a friend, he has no plans to form a media company with him. "I want to win the presidency, and I want to make America great again," Trump said. "It's very simple. I have no interest in a media company. False rumor."

Clinton targeted Trump's refusal to say Obama was born in the US in a speech to the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute Thursday night, where she spoke after Obama, the AP reports. "He was asked one more time where was President Obama born and he still wouldn't say Hawaii. He still wouldn't say America," Clinton said. "This man wants to be our next president? When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?"

Another Washington Post story takes a close look at the Trump campaign statementwhich accuses Clinton of "vicious and conniving" behaviorand at the many claims Trump has made over the years about Obama's birth certificate. In 2011, Obama zinged Trump about the issue at the White House Correspondents' Dinner.

Politico spoke to its caucus of Republican insiders in 11 swing states and discovered that for the first time since he clinched the nomination, a majority of them believe he might actually win in November.

Trump appeared on the Tonight Show Thursday night, where Fallon asked for and received permission to ruffle his famous hair, which appeared to stay firmly attached to his head.

(Read more Donald Trump stories.)
(Newser)  Julian Assange says he's willing to leave the Ecuadorean Embassy in London for an American prison cellas long as President Obama frees Chelsea Manning first. "If Obama grants Manning clemency, Assange will agree to US prison in exchangedespite its clear unlawfulness," WikiLeaks tweeted on Thursday, hours after urging Obama to pardon Edward Snowden. Manning, who recently ended a hunger strike, is serving time in a military prison for passing more than 750,000 pages of classified information to WikiLeaks. Assange is still being investigated in the US for alleged espionage, and his lawyer says he has asked US authorities to release information on the probe, CNN reports.

There has been no comment yet from the Justice Department or the White House, which has the power to commute Manning's 35-year sentence, the Daily Dot reports. Engadget notes that even if Assange does leave the embassy where he has been holed up since 2012, Sweden, which wants to question him on sex crime allegations, will still have first dibs. "Julian Assange, Edward Snowden, and I have one thing in common: The same US prosecutor," tweeted Kim Dotcom after Assange made his offer. (Vladimir Putin says it wasn't Russia that provided WikiLeaks with hacked DNC emails.)
(Newser)  There have been more than 160 drug-related deaths in Milwaukee County, Wis., this year, 70 of them in the last seven weeks, and that is more than just a grim statistic for Chief Medical Examiner Brian Peterson. His own son, Adam Peterson, a 29-year-old with a history of drug use, was found on the floor of a friend's apartment Monday and was pronounced dead after failing to respond to anti-overdose drug Narcan, WISN reports. Brian Peterson, who has asked for privacy, told a conference earlier this month that his office was dealing with more overdose deaths than murders, car accident deaths, and sleep-related infant deaths combined, the Journal Sentinel reports.

"We had a 1-year-old found dead on a mattress of methadone poisoning," Peterson told the round table. "Unfortunately, that's not uncommon either." He described medical examiners as "kind of the last responders," whose job it is "to help with clean data to help everybody understand." "I was sitting at the same table as Brian two weeks ago in Milwaukee discussing the trail of tragedies and heartbreak that addiction leaves in its wake," Sen. Ron Johnson tells the Journal Sentinel. "No family is immune. My prayers go out to Brian and his family at this time. I will continue to fight this fight for all those who have lost loved ones." (This small city in West Virginia had to deal with 27 overdoses in less than five hours.)
(Newser)  Brazil is mourning beloved actor Domingos Montagner, whose death strongly resembles a plot twist from the soap opera he starred in. The BBC reports that the 54-year-old drowned after going for a swim in the Sao Francisco River with co-star Camila Pitanga following a day of filming in the area. She cried for help as the strong current dragged him away, but witnesses were slow to help, apparently believing that the situation was part of the show. Montagner, who started out as a circus clown, starred in Velho Chico, Brazil's most popular soap opera, which dramatizes life around the northeastern river he died in.

Authorities say that even if witnesses had acted faster, they probably couldn't have saved Montagner from the current. "They thought they had chosen a safe spot to swim, but that is one of the most dangerous areas in the town of Caninde and usually avoided by locals," the local police chief says. Forbes notes that just a month ago, Montagner's body was depicted floating in the Sao Francisco at the end of a cliffhanger episode in which he had been shot at and chased into the river. (Read more soap operas stories.)
(Newser)  It's long been known Vincent van Gogh had issues: He sliced off his ear during an 1888 breakdown, which was followed by his apparent suicide in 1890. Now a group of experts has concluded the Dutch artist was plagued by short psychotic episodes during his last 18 months of life, the BBC reports. But while those episodes may have been caused by medical conditions such as bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, or syphilis, all of which were scrutinized by the researchers, the panel is leaning more toward everyday stresses as pushing him over the edge, per the Telegraph. "Before December 23, 1888, it is not really possible to say he had a disease or an illness," says Arko Oderwald, the moderator of the Amsterdam scientific gathering.

And per a University of Amsterdam art history professor who spoke with the New York Times, it was a "fierce" debate among the three dozen or so international mental health professionals, medical doctors, and art historians who tried to figure out van Gogh's deal. The Kokomo Herald reports the attacks in van Gogh's final years included "terrifying hallucinations," vertigo, unconsciousness, and amnesia. The group examined materials the Van Gogh Museum had gathered, including personal letters, medical records, and other data. Says Oderwald, the psychosis "could [have] come from alcohol intoxication, lack of sleep, work stress and troubles with [roommate Paul] Gauguin, who was going to leave." (A 1930 sketch may reveal the truth of van Gogh's mutilated ear.)
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'The Game Will be Slightly in Favour of...': Gavaskar's Major Prediction for IND vs SA Tie in Perth
(Newser)  La Repubblica and the Telegraph say it's a "donation in memory," not compensation, but whatever the term, the US government has agreed to pay around $1.3 million to the family of an Italian aid worker killed by a drone strike in Pakistan, the BBC reports. Giovanni Lo Porto, 37, was an al-Qaeda hostage in January 2015 in the border region of Afghanistan and Pakistan when the drone struck, accidentally killing Lo Porto and American aid worker Warren Weinstein, 73, the Guardian reports.

The US acknowledged their deaths in April of that year, with President Obama saying that he took "full responsibility" for the counterterrorism effort and that the US believed there were no civilians at the attack site, per the BBC. It's believed to be the first time an offer for such a payment has been revealed in detail. It was confirmed by the US Embassy in Rome and Lo Porto's brother and made to Lo Porto's family in July, per a legal document obtained by La Repubblica. (The US released over the summer its first estimate of civilian drone-strike deaths.)
(Newser)  You know that feeling when you realize your husband is actually married to another woman in another state? No? Well, two women in New York and Pennsylvania apparently do. Authorities have charged Arturo R. Reid, 65, with bigamy after they say Annette Reid, 70, whom Reid married in New York City in 2004, found a February 2015 receipt showing her hubby had paid for a license to marry another woman, identified in police documents as "IR-T," in Allentown, Pa. Police say there's no documentation to show Reid divorced his first wife before his March 13, 2015, wedding because, well, there never was a divorce.

Police say Reid had been living a double life with two wives at two addresses. He's a deacon at the First Baptist Church of Crown Heights, which he attends with Annette in Brooklyn, neighbors tell the New York Post. But photos on what is believed to be Reid's Facebook page show him with another woman described as "my wife," "my love," and "the most beautiful woman in the world." The Morning Call notes Reid was charged Wednesday by the same Lehigh County judge who apparently presided over his wedding last year. He faces up to two years in prison and a $5,000 fine if convicted, per Lehigh Valley Live. (Cops say this man led a double life for decades.)
(Newser)  After five years of promoting the idea that President Obama wasn't born in the United States, Donald Trump reversed course on Friday. "President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period," Trump said in televised remarks, per the AP. "Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again." But as Trump sought to put that conspiracy theory to rest, he stoked another, claiming that the "birther movement" was started by Hillary Clinton. Clinton herself said Friday that Trump owes Obama and the American people an apology for his role as a leading "birther" questioning the president's citizenship.

"Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy," Trump said, without offering evidence. "I finished it." Trump spoke against a backdrop of veterans in a sprawling ballroom at his new Washington hotel. His statement of a few seconds came only after a lengthy campaign event featuring military officers and award winners who have endorsed him. Trump did not address the issue until the end of the event, turning it into a de facto commercial, as the major cable TV networks aired the full event live in anticipation of comments Trump had hyped hours before. As late as Wednesday, he would not acknowledge that Obama was born in Hawaii, declining to address the matter in a Washington Post interview. (Read more Donald Trump stories.)
Chennai:

MK leaders M K Stalin and Kanimozhi were among several leaders detained today while staging protests in support of a shutdown called in Tamil Nadu over the Cauvery row as the dawn to dusk bandh called by farmers, traders and supported by the opposition over the issue evoked a mixed response in the state.

A dawn-to-dusk bandh called by several farmers and traders bodies over the raging Cauvery dispute began on Friday across Tamil Nadu amid tight security with Opposition parties, including the DMK, supporting it.A As those who had given the bandh call have said a series of protests, including aroad and rail rokoa, will be held, thousands of police personnel have been deployed across the state to maintain law and order.

As it happened:

DMK & VCK party workers' 'Rail Roko' protest against #CauveryIssue in Hosur, Tamil Nadu. pic.twitter.com/4EAg0jr8r5 a ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

#DMK leader MK Stalin detained in Chennai while MDMK Chief Vaiko detained in Tiruchirappalli during protest ovr Cauvery issue

#DMK leader Kanimozhi, who was protesting along with other party workers over #Cauvery water dispute row, detained by police.

#Chennai: TN farmers' association stage 'Rail Roko' protest at Saidapet railway station over Cauvery issue

#Chennai: DMK workers stage protest over #Cauvery water dispute row, DMK leader Kanimozhi also present

#Thanjavur (TN): Tamil Nadu Bandh over Cauvery issue disrupts normal life, shops and schools remain closed

#Pudukkottai (TN): DMK workers hold 'Rail Roko' protest over Kalasa Banduri Canal issue detained by policeA

#Kanchipuram: Tamil Nadu Bandh over Cauvery issue disrupts normal life



Chennai: Koyambedu market closed today as farmers' organisations and Opposition parties call for #TamilNaduBandh pic.twitter.com/EMEd6l5lwh a ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

Attibele: Commuters forced to walk across the border after K'taka Police stops vehicular movement to TN #TNBandh pic.twitter.com/esXZIxAJr1 a ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

Police said tight vigil was being maintained and no attempts to mar public peace or disruption of free movement of transportationaon road or railawould be allowed. Several local grocery shops, which usually open by daybreak, remained shut in view of the protests.



State transport corporation-run buses besides trains are being operated as usual though autos, taxis and commercial freight operators remained off the roads.



The bandh has been called in protest against the violence targeting Tamils in Karnataka and also to seek Cauvery water for the state.



Barring the ruling AIADMK, its allies and trade unions affiliated, all other Opposition parties, including the DMK, Tamil Nadu Congress, DMDK, MDMK, Left parties and the PMK, are supporting the bandh.



Thousands of police personnel, including armed reserve forces, have been deployed in Tamil Nadu and in Chennai over 15,000 policemen are on duty.



Protection was being provided for Karnataka-related business establishments, schools, institutions and areas where Kannada speaking people live, including Krishnagiri district.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
Islamabad:

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif will hold consultations with Hurriyat and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) leaders on Friday before leaving for the US to address the UN General Assembly where he is likely to raise the Kashmir issue.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif will come here in Muzaffarabad on Friday before leaving for New York. He will consult the Kashmiri leadership regarding his speech at the UN session, PoK Prime Minister Raja Farooq Haider said.

He said the premier will hold separate meetings with PoK legislators and a delegation of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference, PoK chapter.

The prime minister wants to take the Kashmiri leadership into confidence over the content of his speech to be delivered at the UN General Assembly session on September 21, the DawnNews quoted him as saying.

Haider said the gesture would send a positive message across the Line of Control (LoC). Sharif is likely to leave for the US on September 17.

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New Delhi:

The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear on Monday a plea seeking cancellation of bail to controversial RJD leader Shahabuddin.

Chandrakeshwar Prasad of Siwan had filed an appeal in the Supreme Court challenging Patna High Court's order granting bail to the former RJD MP Shahabuddin. The petition has been been filed through lawyer Prashant Bhushan.

Senior advocate Prashant Bhushan said, "Today the appeal has been filed from the side of the children of whose murder Shahbuddin is accused."



"The SC has said that the hearing will be done on Monday," he added.



"In minimum two cases Shahbuddin has been sentenced to life imprisonment. It was wrong to give bail to Shahbuddin when so many cases are filed against him," he also said.

Chandrakeshwar's three sons were allegedly murdered on the behest of gangster-turned-politician Mohammad Shahabuddin.



Earlier, Siwan Police had provided additional security to 20 people who face a threat to their lives after the release of former RJD MP Mohd Shahabuddin from jail. The witnesses whose security cover was enhanced included Chandrakeshwar Prasad.

Here is what Chandrakeshwar Prasad said after filing the appeal:



#I didn't ask for 'chanda' as Shahbuddin is saying, I am asking for govt help. We have given affidavit and have also signed on the documents



#You should either keep such a person out of Bihar or give him the capital punishment



#We would request CBI too



#We are old and surviving on medicine



#Our family has been ruined



#We live while waiting to die, however we are still scared



#We want compensation; we want govt to help us



The return of former politician and murder accused Mohammad Shahabuddin to Bihar's Siwan has struck fear in the hearts of the family of those he allegedly killed. Chandrakeshwar Prasad had said earlier that terror had returned to Siwan.



"People are now living in terror. Where will we go leaving Siwan? Somehow we are eking out a living. We don't have any support. If God wants we will live, otherwise we will die. Shahabuddin can attack me as well. We never thought that he will kill my third son also, after killing my other two sons," he said.



Mr Prasad's two sons, Satish and Girish, were killed in an alleged acid attack in 2004. Their brother Rajiv, who was an eyewitness in the case, was killed in 2014 just days before he was set to depose against Shahabuddin.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
New Delhi`:

After his dramatic resignation from party and cabinet posts, SP leader Shivpal Yadav on Friday told his supporters that he was with party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav, whose efforts to broker peace between his warring brother and son Akhilesh have proved futile till now.

1) Watch video: Mulayam says, there can't be a rift in the party, rejects Shivpal's resignation

After his dramatic resignation from party and cabinet posts, SP leader Shivpal Yadav on Friday told his supporters that he was with party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav, whose efforts to broker peace between his warring brother and son Akhilesh have proved futile till now.

2) Watch Live Tamil Nadu bandh: DMK leaders MK Stalin and Kanimozhi, MDMK Chief Vaiko detained during protest over

A dawn-to-dusk bandh called by several farmers and traders bodies over the raging Cauvery dispute began on Friday across Tamil Nadu amid tight security with Opposition parties, including the DMK, supporting it.

3) Chandrakeshwar Prasad challenges Shahabuddin's bail in Supreme Court

Chandrakeshwar Prasad of Siwan has filed an appeal in the Supreme Court challenging Patna High Court's order granting bail to the former RJD MP Shahabuddin. The petition has been been filed through lawyer Prashant Bhushan.

4) Amitabh Bachchan regrets not fulfilling promises he made as a politician

Megastar Amitabh Bachchan may have had a short tryst with politics but the actor says he is still not able to get over the times as he regrets not fulfilling the promises he made to the people of his constituency-Allahabad.

5) Chandra Grahan 2016: Penumbral lunar eclipse coincides with September's full moon today; watch when it happens

Moon will pass over September's full moon directly behind the Earth into its umbra (shadow) resulting in lunar eclipse on Friday.





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Bulandshahr:

A cattle merchant was robbed of Rs 20 lakh by motorcycle-borne persons at Meerpur village, about 25 km from here, police said on Friday.

According to SP (Rural) Pankaj Pandey, the merchant, Akram, was on his way to a cattle fair at Etmadpur of Agra with a bag containing Rs 20 lakh for purchasing cattle.

He was intercepted in an alley of the village by six bandits riding on two motorcycles, who snatched the bag from him at gunpoint. A case has been registered in this regard and police is combing the area, the SP said.

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New Delhi:

Union Minister Kiren Rijiju on Friday blamed internal dissent in Congress for the political turmoil in Arunachal Pradesh, where Chief Minister Pema Khandu and 42 MLAs have joined a regional outfit PPA.

Rijiju, who hails from Arunachal Pradesh, said his party BJP has no role in the latest political development in the state and the Congress MLAs were "angry with their own leadership" leading to their joining of People's Party of Arunachal Pradesh. It is the second time this year that the Congress has been hit hard by rebellion.



"Congress MLAs including the Chief Minister in Arunachal are angry with their own central leadership. They have to wait in Delhi for 4-5 days to meet their own leaders. This has eventually led to MLAs joining a regional party. There is no more Congress government in Arunachal Pradesh," the minister told reporters here. The Minister of State for Home said "if the MLAs don't want to stay with Congress, what can the others do".



"The Supreme Court also reinstated the Congress government but ultimately the MLAs' decision is final. Congress tried to blame BJP unnecessarily," he said.



In a shocker for Congress, all but one of its MLAs, including the Chief Minister, on Friday joined the PPA and the party faces the prospect of losing its government. Sources said Khandu, who two months ago became chief minister in a development that restored the Congress government, along with 42 Congress MLAs joined the PPA and virtually converted it into a PPA government.

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New Delhi:

At least 25 people, including five children, were killed and 30 others injured when a suicide bomber shouting Allahu Akbar blew himself up inside a mosque packed with worshippers for Friday prayers in Mohmand Agency in Pakistans restive northwest tribal region.



The attacker blew himself when the prayers were in progress at the mosque in the Anbar tehsil of the agency bordering Afghanistan.



A suicide bomber was in the mosque. He shouted Allahu Akbar and blew himself up, Assistant Political Agent Naveed Akbar told reporters.



He said that Friday prayers were being offered around 2 PM when the powerful blast took place.



At least 25 people, including five children, were killed in the attack and 30 others injured, Pakistani media reported, citing officials.



Many people were gathered inside the mosque when a suicide bomber blew himself up, an eyewitness said.



Rescue teams and police rushed to the spot. The bodies and the injured are being shifted to local hospitals for medical treatment.



Injured were also taken to hospitals in Bajaur Agency, Charsadda and Peshawar for treatment.



There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban routinely targets courts, schools and mosques.



Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has expressed his grief over the loss of lives in the blast.



The cowardly attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the governments resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country, he said in a statement.



The attack came on a day when Sharif vowed to continue the war against militancy and terrorism till elimination of the last terrorist.



During a meeting with Army chief General Raheel Sharif today, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy.



The army had launched operation Zarb-e-Azb in June 2014 to flush out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas.

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New Delhi:

Former Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) MP Mohd Shahabuddin on Friday said that he is not worried about the plea filed in Supreme Court by the Bihar Governnment against bail granted to him by Patna High Court.



He said: "I haven't received any notice yet, but I am not worried about anything at all."



Earlier on the day, the Bihar government moved the apex court for cancellation of the bail granted to Shahabuddin by the Patna High Court.



A Siwan native, Chandrakeshwar Prasad, has also filed a plea in the Supreme Court, challenging bail given to Shahabuddin.

Also read: SC agrees to hear plea challenging bail to Shahabuddin on Sept 19



He has alleged that three of his sons were murdered by the RJD strongman.



Later, the apex court agreed to hear on Monday a plea seeking cancellation of bail to Shahabuddin.



The former RJD MP was released on bail earlier this week by the Patna High Court.



The bail granted to murder convict Shahabuddin by the Patna High Court has prompted the BJP-led opposition to accuse the Nitish government of deliberately putting up a weak case to facilitate his bail.



Asserting the government's supremacy in the Shahabuddin issue, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar said on Thursday that law will take its course in the matter.



"There is a process of law. All I will tell you is that the law will continue to take its course," he told reporters in Delhi on Thursday.





BJP doesnt love Rajdeo Ranjan or Chandrakeshwar, they are just against me being out on bail: Mohd Shahabuddin pic.twitter.com/xAJkqP1Bcv  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

Where did my name come in from in Rajdeo Ranjan case? Does police FIR have my name, or the chargesheet?: Mohd Shahabuddin  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

Mohd Kaif had a fight in his "mohalla" & now he is called shooter?: Mohd Shahabuddin  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

Mohd Kaif has pictures with a lot of people, why should one not be in a picture with him?: Mohd Shahabuddin pic.twitter.com/wGvzshfLMe  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

Whatever Court decides we will follow it: Mohd Shahabuddin on Bihar Govts appeal in SC challenging Shahabuddins bail pic.twitter.com/0JS7zpNU42  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

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New Delhi:

Building on gains for the third straight session, the benchmark Sensex surged over 258 points and the NSE Nifty recaptured the 8,800-mark in early trade on Friday on sustained buying by participants and foreign fund inflows amid positive global cues.

The 30-share index, which had gained 59.35 points in the previous two sessions, was up 258.59 points or 0.91 per cent at 28,671.48 with all sectoral indices led by auto and banking trading in green, rising by up to 1.64 per cent.

Also Read: India down to 112th spot on World Economic Freedom Index

New Delhi :

India has slipped by 10 positions to 112th, out of 159 countries and territories, as it fared badly across categories including legal system and regulation, according to the Economic Freedom of the World: 2016 Annual Report.

Although China, Bangladesh and Pakistan lagged behind India at 113th, 121st and 133th ranks respectively, Bhutan (78), Nepal (108) and Sri Lanka (111) were better placed on the World Economic Freedom Index.

Also Read: TATA AIG, Paytm to offer health insurance to cab and auto drivers

New Delhi :

Tata AIG General Insurance and mobile payments firm Paytm have entered into an agreement to provide cab and auto drivers health insurance plans. This tie-up will enable cab and auto drivers, who are using Paytms digital wallet, to avail cashless health insurance through Tata AIG General Insurance, the private insurer said in a release issued.

Tata AIG General Insurance has designed cashless insurance scheme, as required by Paytm, to provide drivers, quality medical care as per their need and budget.









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Bhubaneswar:

Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Friday vowed to fight for the rights of the people at the tripartite meeting scheduled to be held in New Delhi on Saturday on the Mahanadi water issue.



During his visit to Delhi, the Chief Minister would meet his Chhattisgarh counterpart Raman Singh at the meeting convened by Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti.



Patnaik, who was given a ceremonial send off at the airport by ruling BJD ministers, MPs, MLAs and party workers, said Mahanadi was the lifeline for crores of people living in 15 districts of the state and he would strongly fight for the rights of the people.



"I assure each one of you I will put my best efforts forward and leave no stone unturned in the fight for the people of our state," Patnaik said. "I am going with a lot of hope that the Centre will listen to the voice of Odisha and do justice to the people of our state on the sensitive Mahanadi issue," he said, adding his government had already lodged protest against neighbouring Chhattisgarh's act of constructing projects on the upstream of river Mahanadi.



The Chief Minister, who met the members from the public and political parties for three days, thanked those who came forward with valuable suggestions in the larger interest of the state.



"I am extremely grateful to our people who have come from all over the state to voice their concern and give their suggestions on this very important issue," he said. Stating that he would like to personally thank everyone who came and met him, Patnaik said "I also express my deepest gratitude to the four and half crore people of our state who are concerned about this issue and continue to support me for the interest of the state."





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New Delhi:

A special NIA court on Friday granted bail to Swami Aseemanand, the main accused in the 2007 Samjhauta Express blast case.

The bail was granted to Assemanand by the National Investigation Agency court on a personal bond of Rs 1 lakh and two surety bonds of Rs 1 lakh each.



The case refers to multiple blasts that had occurred in the Samjhauta Express near Dewana station in Panipat, killing 68 people, mostly from Pakistan.



The blasts had occurred on the intervening night of February 18 and 19, 2007.



A number of NIA witnesses have turned hostile in the case, including one of the three witnesses presented on Friday before the court.

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New Delhi:

The results of UPSC IAS Prelims Results 2016 was declared on Friday by the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC). UPSC IAS result announcement was made at their official website upsc.gov.in

The civil services examination is conducted annually by the UPSC in three stages preliminary, main and interview to select officers for Indian Administrative Service (IAS), Indian Foreign Service (IFS) and Indian Police Service (IPS), among others.

Thousands of candidates had taken the test held on August 7.

The candidates who have been declared successful have to first get themselves registered on the relevant page of the website before filling up the online detailed examination form, the UPSC said.

Also read: UPSC IAS Prelims Results 2016 likely to be declared by September 26; check upsc.gov.in

The e-admit card, along with the time table of the main examination, will be uploaded on the Commissions websitewww.upsc.gov.into the eligible candidates around two weeks before the commencement of the examination.

Successful candidates have been asked to fill a detailed application form, which will be available on the website of the Commission from October 7 to 20, till 6.00 PM, for the civil services main examination.

Candidates are also informed that marks, cut-off marks and answer keys of screening test will be uploaded on the Commission website only after the declaration of final result of Civil Services Examination, 2016, the Commission said.

The Commission has a facilitation counter near the examination hall building on its campus at Dholpur House, Shahjahan Road, New Delhi.

Candidates may obtain any information or clarification regarding their result on all working days between 10 AM and 5 PM, in person or calling on telephone numbers 011-23385271, 011-23098543 or 011-23381125 from the facilitation counter.

They can also obtain information regarding their result by accessing to the UPSCs website upsc.gov.in.

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New Delhi:

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Friday said that his uncle Shivpal Yadav will be given back all his portfolios. Shivpal had resigned from the cabinet after falling out with his nephew over party politics in the view of upcoming UP assembly elections in 2017.



Announcing the latest twist in Yadav family rift on Twitter, UP CM also said that ousted leader Gayatri Prajapati will be also re-inducted in his cabinet.



Speaking to media about the latest development, Samajwadi Partys senior leader Shivpal Yadav on Friday said, Netaji (Mulayam Singh Yadav) and Akhilesh didnt accept my resignation, I left it to Netaji and whatever he will decide we will follow.



If I get departments I will work on that, if I become Party Chief I will fulfill that responsibility, Yadav said. The former SP state chief said that the work resume as usual from Saturday, indicating an end to the ongoing family feud between the Yadavs.



Here are the live updates:





Portfolios will be given back to Mr. Shivpal Singh Yadav.  CM Office, GoUP (@CMOfficeUP) September 16, 2016

Mr. Gayatri Prajapati will be inducted in the cabinet.  CM Office, GoUP (@CMOfficeUP) September 16, 2016

And if someone says negative things they should be advised against it. Final decisions should be made by Netaji: Shivpal Yadav  ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) September 16, 2016

There are people with everyone, me, Netaji, CM. But we all should talk positive things, not negative: Shivpal Yadav  ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) September 16, 2016

We have to work in a way so that SP wins 2017 polls and Akhilesh Yadav becomes CM again: Shivpal Yadav pic.twitter.com/FszIgroNVX  ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) September 16, 2016

Naya vibhaag mujhe nahi chahiye, koi vibhaag nahi mile to laalsa nahin. Jo vibhaag the wo mil jaye to acha, na miley to acha: Shivpal Yadav  ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) September 16, 2016

If I get departments I will work on that, if I become Party Chief I will fulfill that responsibility: Shivpal Yadav  ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) September 16, 2016

Netaji & Akhilesh didn't accept my resignation. I left it to Netaji and whatever he will decide we will follow: Shivpal Yadav  ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) September 16, 2016

All that was to be discussed was discussed in front of Netaji. Tomorrow everything will start working: Shivpal Yadav  ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) September 16, 2016

Kal se sab apne apne kaam mei lag jaenge, parivar ek hai aur ek rahega: Shivpal Yadav pic.twitter.com/L1UDqB6r73  ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) September 16, 2016

Netaji bade hai, mukhiya hai. Unki baat jo hogi wahi maani jaegi, uspe comment karne ka adhikaar nahi: Shivpal Yadav pic.twitter.com/81SHnzezqd  ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) September 16, 2016



After his dramatic resignation from party and cabinet posts, SP leader Shivpal Yadav on Friday said that he will accept any decision made by party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav, "If Netaji tells me to stay on my post, I will," he told his supporters.



Earlier in the day, Yadav had said that he was with party supremo Mulayam, whose efforts to broker peace between his warring brother and son Akhilesh have proved futile till now.



Addressing the gathering of supporters outside Mulayam's house in Lucknow, Shivpal thanked his party workers for support and warned that conspirators would be punished.



Supporters gathered outside his residence on Friday and demanded that the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister should touch the feet of his uncle Shivpal and apologise.

Also read:

Will accept whatever Mulayam says, Shivpal Yadav on his resignation from govt

I did not ignite any feud in Samajwadi Party, says Akhilesh Yadav

Yadav PariWar escalates as Shivpal Yadav resigns from all posts: Who said what



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New Delhi:

As Nepal grapples with a fractious political transition, India today conveyed to its new Prime Minister that its Constitution should be implemented by accommodating aspirations of all sections and also pledged support to rebuild its infrastructure.

After wide-ranging talks between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal, the two sides inked three pacts including one on India extending USD 750 million for Nepals post-quake reconstruction and another on laying of roads by India in Terai region. Nepals economy was wrecked by last years devastating quake.

The decisions assume significance amidst Chinas growing efforts to expand its influence over Kathmandu.

Modi and Dahal, who is popularly known as Prachanda, had extensive discussions on the political situation in Nepal and decided to ramp up trade, improve rail and road connectivity and ensure speedy completion of major infrastructure projects being implemented by India in Nepal.

Dahal, who is here on his first visit abroad after becoming Prime Minister for the second time, said his government was trying to bring everyone on board in implementing the new Constitution some provisions of which have been strongly opposed by the Madhesi community, mostly of Indian-origin.

The Madhesis have been saying that certain provisions in the Constitution will politically marginalise it. The prolonged protests and economic blockade by Madhesis few months back had triggered tensions between Nepal and India.

You have been a catalytic force of peace in Nepal. I am confident that under your wise leadership, Nepal will successfully implement the Constitution through inclusive dialogue accommodating the aspirations of all sections of your diverse society, Modi told Dahal during a joint media interaction after the talks.

Nepal has been battling uneasy political transition in the last few months. KP Sharma Oli had to quit the post of Prime Minister in July following fresh political turmoil due to protest of Madheshi community against the new Constitution.

On his part, Dahal said, You are aware that my government has made serious efforts to bring everyone on board as we enter the phase of implementation of the Constitution in the interest of all segments of Nepalese society.

Modi said as immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability and economic prosperity (Shanti, Sthirta aur Samrudhi) of Nepal is our shared objective.

He further said, We share our burden during difficult times, just as we celebrate each others achievements. Indeed, our friendship is time-tested and unique.

As immediate neighbours and close friendly nations, peace, stability, and economic prosperity of Nepal is our shared objective. At every step of Nepals development journey and economic progress, we have been privileged to be your partner.

Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar said India has agreed on what would constitute next line of credit and heeded to a request by Nepal to increase granting Rs 3 lakh instead of Rs 2 lakh in building 50,000 houses in quake devastated regions of the Himalayan nation.

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New Delhi:

A Central government appointed Committee on Friday came down heavily on AAP government in Delhi, saying it had splurging exchequers money on advertisements projecting Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and his party in violation of Supreme Court guidelines and asked the ruling party to reimburse it.



The three-member committee, headed by former Chief Election Commissioner B B Tandon, had been constituted by the I&B ministry on directions of Supreme Court to address issues related to Content Regulation in Government Advertising.



The committee had received a complaint from Congress leader Ajay Maken accusing the AAP government in Delhi of splurging public money on advertisements.

Also read: Delhi LG asks Sisodia to come back from Finland, handle health crisis



In its order issued on Friday, the Committee came to the conclusion that the Government of NCT of Delhi has violated guidelines issued by the Honble Supreme Court of India in six of the nine areas listed by the complainant.



The violations include outstation advertisements, false/misleading advertisements, advertisements for self-glorification and to target political opponents, advertisements against media, advertisements mentioning the party in power by name and also advertisements issued on incidents occurring in other states.



In its order, the panel which also comprised adman Piyush Pandey and journalist Rajat Sharma, has said that AAP should be made to reimburse the expenditure since the violation of the Supreme Court order of May 13, 2015, has taken place.



The assessment of the expenditure should be made by the Delhi government, it said.

Meanwhile, amidst another controversy, Delhi Lt Governor Najeeb Jung has asked Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia to return to Delhi as soon as possible to handle the ongoing health crisis in the national capital region. Sisodia is in Finland on an educational tour.

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Washington:

The US on Friday claimed victory over India at the WTO wherein it had challenged the local content requirement in solar panels by the Indian government.



The US Trade Representative (USTR) Michael Froman said the World Trade Organisation (WTO) Appellate Body has issued a report finding in favour of the Obama Administrations challenge to Indias domestic content requirements under its National Solar Mission.



Since India enacted these requirements in 2011, which requires solar power developers to use Indian-manufactured cells and modules, American solar exports to India have fallen by more than 90 per cent, he said.



The Appellate Body affirmed an earlier WTO panel report agreeing with the US that Indias domestic content requirements discriminated against American-made and other imported solar products, in breach of international trade rules.



The decisive finding rejected all of Indias defensive arguments, USTR said.



This report is a clear victory for American solar manufacturers and workers, and another step forward in the fight against climate change, Froman said.



The Obama administration, he said, strongly support rapid deployment of solar energy worldwide, including in India.But local content requirements are not only contrary to WTO rules, but actually undermine our efforts to promote clean energy by requiring the use of more expensive and less efficient equipment, making it more difficult for clean energy sources to be cost-competitive, Froman alleged.



The National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) in a statement welcomed WTOs rejection of Indias appeal and urged the Indian government to move quickly to dismantle its discriminatory domestic content requirements that have blocked access for US solar cell modules.



As each and every previous ruling in this case has shown, Indias domestic content requirements are a clear violation of core WTO rules and todays victory will give an important boost to US manufacturing, NAM said.



This decision also demonstrates why the strong rules-based WTO system and trade agreements with binding and strong enforcement rules are critical to open markets and eliminate unfair barriers overseas, it said.



Earlier in February this year, USTR said the WTO panel found in favour of the US in a dispute challenging Indias localization rules discriminating against imported solar cells and modules under Indias National Solar Mission.

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New Delhi:

Delhi Lieutenant Governor Najeeb Jung on Friday asked Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia to return to Delhi as soon as possible to handle the ongoing health crisis in the national capital region.



According to report, LG's office sent fax to sisodia asking him to return immediately to Delhi in the wake of dengue outbreak.



Sisodia, who is in Finland on an educational tour, came under fire after he and his government colleagues were unavailable to handle the dengue and chikungunya outbreak in Delhi.

Reacting on LG Jung's order, AAP leader Somnath Bharti tweeted, "LG is behaving with @msisodia as if he is 1 of his bureaucrats like health secretary whose leave ws sanctioned by LG n now cancelled by him."

LG is behaving with @msisodia as if he is 1 of his bureaucrats like health secretary whose leave ws sanctioned by LG n now cancelled by him.  Adv. Somnath Bharti (@attorneybharti) September 16, 2016



However, Delhi deputy CM refuted the allegation of the Opposition that he is holidaying in Finland, saying that it was not a sin to study the schooling system of other countries to fix the problems in Delhis education system.

In pics: Delhi deputy CM Manish Sisodia on educational tour in Finland

Sisodia, who also holds the education portfolio, said he has worked hard to improve the education system in the national capital and that he was in Finland to see what more needs to be done.



Learning from across the world is not a sin. Its a sin to defame an educational tour as a holiday. Im in Finland. We need to learn a lot from their education system, the best in the world (sic), he said in a series of tweets.



Earlier in the day, Congress activists observed Bhagoda Divas in Delhi to protest against the alleged absence of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Sisodia and other ministers from the national capital which is at present reeling under chikungunya and dengue outbreak.

Also read: Central committee asks Kejriwal govt to reimburse public funds used for advts



AAP leader Dilip Pandey also attacked Congress, and in a series of tweets, he said AAP bringing all onboard to fight Delhis real enemies Dengue & Chikungunya, while #InsensitiveCongress busy making fun of unwell DelhiCM(sic).Few people have set an agenda that they will target only AAP and spare the BJP-ruled civic bodies that are responsible for preventing the outbreak of vector-borne diseases, Pandey told reporters.



AAP leader Sisodias Finland trip came under fire after Delhi government came under pressure during ongoing chikungunya and dengue outbreak. Especially since deputy CMs trip coincided with state chief minister Arvind Kejiwals sick leave for throat surgery in Bengaluru.

(With PTI Inputs)
Every smart entrepreneur knows that you need to use social media to effectively market your business and your brand.

I realized that back in 2008, when I opened my camera store in New Jersey and had to compete against the largest camera store in the world - B&H Photo -- and the biggest competitor of them all - Amazon. I had to acquire customers, and build our brand with little time and even less money. Social media turned out to be the fastest way to do that. But one of the problems I immediately faced was how to get engagement on our posts, when we didnt have a big following on any of the social platforms.

Related: Your Employee Advocacy Program: Measuring the Right KPIs

This is a problem that many entrepreneurs face today.

In many cases, your social media accounts do not have very many followers, connections or interactions. So, if for example, you post on Facebook, your relatively small number of followers will mean Facebooks algorithm will keep engagement very low. But is there a way to increase your engagement without investing a lot of money boosting posts?

The tactic I discovered back in 2008, and one that I have honed with great success today, is employee social advocacy. Here are the 10 steps I've used to implement and run an employee-driven, post-boosting program, which you can start doing today.

1. At the next staff meeting, it should be announced that you are looking for all team members to promote posts on their personal social media accounts - Facebook, LinkedIn, beBee, Twitter and Instagram -- on a regular basis.

2. There should be an email sent to All@YourCompany.com with an explanation of what employee advocacy is, why it is done and what will be accomplished for the company. Ask staff to reply with their willingness to participate. I would not require any staff member to do it that doesn't want to, but let them know there will be rewards for the people who do it the most.

3. In a follow up email, ask everyone to follow and like all of your YourCompany pages on Facebook, LinkedIn, beBee, Twitter and Instagram from their personal social media pages.

4.There needs to be a social leader in the company. It works best if its the owner, president or stakeholder. He or she will lead the charge on the personal posting side. Let everyone know who that will be. There can be more than one leader.

5. All participating members need to connect with the social leader. It's ok if someone is not on every social platform. Let them participate where they can.

Related: Let's Get Social: Craft a Strategy to Create Powerful Brand Advocates

6. The social leader then creates a post on their personal social media accounts. Use all the social networks if it makes sense for the posts content. The post needs to be interesting and engaging and include no direct selling. That post should be shared on all company pages by the company page owner.

7. Send an email to All@YourCompany.com with all of the links to the leaders posts asking everyone to share on their accounts with a personal comment added that relates to their friends, fans or followers.

8. When you start this advocacy program, do one post per week until your staff gets use to it. Then do up to three per week, but that is the maximum you should do. The staff will get tired of it and so will your followers.

9. To jump start the program, give everyone who follows No. 2, No. 3, No. 5 and No. 7 a $20 giftcard or something similar. Many, who agreed to do it, won't - especially the first time. A personal note or visit from the social leader asking them to participate again is the way to go here.

10. Create contests, and publicly hand out prizes. The top employees with the most engagement, receives a money prize, extended lunch, day off or something else intriguing. You should post a leaderboard and hand out prizes for the top performers for each month and for the year.

Related: 4 Ways to Boost Customer Advocacy -- Fast

Employee social advocacy is an incredibly cost-effective way to build your brand and business. It also builds employee morale and creates a corporate culture where staff feels like they have directly contributed to the success of the company.

You now have the formula to turn your staff into an engagement engine. Ladies and gentlemen, start your engines now.

Related:

5 Content Strategy Lessons Pokemon Go Can Teach You.

How to Run an Effective Social Media Employee Advocacy Program

You Can't Achieve Big-League Success With a Minor-League Social Media Strategy



Copyright 2016 Entrepreneur.com Inc., All rights reserved
You may have heard people urging you to switch your website to the HTTPS security encryption. They cite Googles announcement that HTTPS is a ranking signal and that failure to switch could mean your ranking will take a hit.

Related: 5 Growing Cyber-Security Epicenters Around the World

And that would mean less traffic and less business.

But, can a product that costs around $100 per year really make that much of a difference? And if so, how straightforward is it to make the switch?

Lets face it, until recently, HTTPS was really used only by ecommerce sites for their payment pages. Things can get confusing, and the question many business owners face is whether or not the hassle of switching to HTTPS is worth it.

So, lets look at the arguments for and against. But first of all, what exactly is HTTPS?

What is HTTPS, and why do you need it?

HTTP stands for hypertext transfer protocol. Its a protocol that allows communication between different systems. Most commonly, it is used for transferring data from a web server to a browser to view web pages.

The problem is that HTTP (note: no "s" on the end) data is not encrypted, and it can be intercepted by third parties to gather data being passed between the two systems.

This can be addressed by using a secure version called HTTPS, where the "S" stands for secure.

This involves the use of an SSL certificate -- "SSL" stands for secure sockets layer -- which creates a secure encrypted connection between the web server and the web browser.

Without HTTPS, any data passed is insecure. This is especially important for sites where sensitive data is passed across the connection, such as ecommerce sites that accept online card payments, or login areas that require users to enter their credentials.

Whats the process for switching to HTTPS?

If you are familiar with the backend of a website, then switching to HTTPS is fairly straightforward in practice. The basic steps are as follows.

Purchase an SSL certificate and a dedicated IP address from your hosting company. Install and configure the SSL certificate. Perform a full back-up of your site in case you need to revert back. Configure any hard internal links within your website, from HTTP to HTTPS. Update any code libraries, such as JavaScript, Ajax and any third-party plugins. Redirect any external links you control to HTTPS, such as directory listings. Update htaccess applications, such as Apache Web Server, LiteSpeed, NGinx Config and your internet services manager function (such as Windows Web Server), to redirect HTTP traffic to HTTPS. If you are using a content delivery network (CDN), update your CDN's SSL settings. Implement 301 redirects on a page-by-page basis. Update any links you use in marketing automation tools, such as email links. Update any landing pages and paid search links. Set up an HTTPS site in Google Search Console and Google Analytics.

In terms of the setup of the SSL certificate -- points one and two above -- this is fairly straightforward, and your hosting company will be able to assist you.

Also bear in mind that for a small website this will be fairly straightforward, as some of the above points wont apply in scenarios such as code libraries and CDNs. However, for a larger site, this is hardly a non-trivial event and should be managed by an experienced webmaster.

Up until this point, the only decision youll make is whether you want to use an SSL that has a green "secure" browser bar. These types of SSL usually require some form of identity verification before they're issued. This is one of the reasons they tend to cost more. Besides that difference, SSL certificates work under the same principle.

If you are not technically adept, you will probably need assistance with the above steps.

Its worth pointing out that, for a small site, say less than 50 pages, this process wont take too long. However, for larger sites, the full update of links and page redirects should be performed by an experienced developer.

The case for switching to HTTPS

Simply put, the strongest case for switching to HTTPS is that you are making your website more secure.

Sure, there are limits to this. HTTPS is not like a web application firewall. Its not going to prevent your website from getting hacked. Its not going to stop phishing emails getting sent, either.

If youre using a content management system (CMS), like WordPress, or you have any other login where you host any kind of sensitive data, then setting up a secure HTTPS login is the absolute minimum precaution you should take.

In reality, HTTPS is the basic price of security these days. Its the very minimum you can offer your visitors.

Aside from security, HTTPS also improves trust.

Related: 6 Reasons Smart Small Business Owners Invest In Security

According to research performed by GlobalSign, more than 80 percent of respondents would abandon a purchase if there was no HTTPS in use.

Thats fine for ecommerce merchants, but does HTTPS improve conversion and trust for businesses which dont take online payments? There is evidence that the use of security seals can improve lead generation by over 40 percent.

Not only do your visitors pay attention to your site's security, but so does Google. Security is at the heart of what Google does these days. Thats why the company has listed HTTPS as a ranking factor.

So the biggest reason to switch to HTTPS is to future-proof your website. Sooner or later, youre just going to have to bite the bullet, and make the switch.

The case against switching to HTTPS.

Recent research has shown that for smaller B2B websites, the uptake of HTTPS is low.

Reasons include a lack of awareness of the growing importance of SSL or the perceived complexity of switching to HTTPS, and in particular, the potential negative SEO impact.

And SEO is one of the most important considerations, especially for websites that have a good ranking. As the saying goes, "If it aint broke, dont fix it."

It's easy to empathize with this point. In fact, research that we conducted on more than 540 UK B2B businesses showed that the uptake of switching to HTTPS was in the 2 to 3 percent range. There was not a strong correlation between using SSL and getting a higher ranking, though.

Other factors, such as on page optimization, number of Google reviews, total number of pages and the number of backlinks, had far more bearing on a high ranking than switching to HTTPS.

In short, we concluded that HTTPS as a ranking factor is of low importance right now.

My personal view is that if your website is not seeing any significant impact from not using HTTPS, then you will not experience any significant negatives if you do not switch now or in the immediate future.

However, this comes with an extreme health warning. Failure to make the switch could leave you open to a sudden algorithm change. A worst-case scenario would be to see your rankings disintegrate overnight.

Google's notice of mobile friendliness gives some reassurance that this wouldn't happen overnight.

A contingency would be to engage with a skilled developer to plan everything and document it so that you can move quickly in the event that Google were to start to give significantly more weight to HTTPS signals with short notice.

This is an especially good idea for larger sites. As mentioned above, the SEO changes required, such as updating internal links, are not trivial matters, and in the case of updating htaccess, these should not be performed by a non-technical person. If they were to be performed in a rush, or by a less skilled developer, you could experience a hit to your rankings.

Also bear in mind that in the unlikely event that there were to be an overnight algorithm update which penalized non-HTTPS sites, skilled developers would be in demand and would have the whip hand in terms of dictating the costs. Planning to switch now would be a prudent move regardless of whether you implement the change immediately or later.

But it's worth reiterating that failure to switch is just postponing the inevitable.

HTTPS offers the base level of website security. Whether or not you should switch to HTTPS is a decision increasingly being driven by Googles search algorithm.

Switching to HTTPS is fairly straightforward for smaller websites. For larger websites, its more complicated, from an SEO perspective and requires skilled technical staff to make the changes.

Related: Here's How to Build a Strong Security Team to Keep Your Company Safe and Sound

However, the direction of travel is clear. Using HTTPS will increasingly be the norm rather than the exception, and you should plan to migrate sooner rather than later.

Related:

HTTP vs. HTTPs: What's the Difference and Why Should You Care?

5 Types of Employees Often Targeted By Phishing Attacks

How To Develop Security Policy For Your Company



Copyright 2016 Entrepreneur.com Inc., All rights reserved
It is exceedingly disappointing that the states Attorney General is appealing a Superior Court judges sweeping indictment of Connecticuts public education system. This is disappointing most of all for Connecticuts children, who deserve the opportunity for a fair and equal education no matter where they live.

As Judge Thomas Moukawsher noted in his Sept. 7 decision, that is not the case now. Rich school districts flourish while poor school districts flounder, Moukawsher wrote in his eloquent ruling. Adherence to the status quo has left Connecticut education in a state of paralysis, he charged.

Attorney General George Jepsens response is that the trial court exceeded its authority. For shame. Someone in power had to stand up for students education and face squarely the need for reform; we appreciate that the judge had the courage and clarity to do so.

For nearly 40 years the state has given money to local school districts  using a byzantine formula called the Education Cost Sharing grant, but recently abandoning even that  without clear accountability. First, the judge said, state legislators must develop across-the-board measurable standards for elementary and secondary education, then determine the cost to achieve those standards.

As he wrote: Requiring at least a substantially rational plan for education is a problem in this state because many of our most important policies are so befuddled or misdirected as to be irrational. This is not to be ignored nor delayed.

Part of Jepsens appeal to the state Supreme Court in the case of Connecticut Coalition for Justice in Education Funding v. Rell is that the judges decision would wrest educational policy from state government. Not so. Legislators have the responsibility to fix the education system and the judge gave them 180 days to do so, though the appeal requests a stay of that deadline. Accountability to the court is the mechanism for ensuring the complaints in the lawsuit are addressed properly.

Were wasting more resources on the appeal instead of putting them toward fixing the problem. The judge merely stood up. Jepsen should stand down.

Gov. Dannel P. Malloy is right, however, that the appeal does not negate the urgency to take action for our students. It should not delay the quest for solutions.

That process should begin immediately, and not wait for the start of the next General Assembly session in January. With every state House and Senate seat up for votes on Nov. 8, though, this election becomes even more crucial.

Ask your candidates what they would do. Do they agree with the judge that children have a right to first principles governing our schools that are reasoned, substantial, and verifiably connected to teaching.

The future of public education in Connecticut should be a question of utmost importance in this election. Fifteen years have passed since the lawsuit was filed by the coalition of cities including Danbury, Bridgeport, Stamford and Norwalk. The children cannot  and must not  wait any longer for the opportunity to receive a quality education anywhere in the state.
OTTAWA, Sept. 16, 2016 /CNW/ - The Honourable Jean-Yves Duclos, Minister of Children, Families and Social Development, today announced the appointment of six new members to the Social Security Tribunal.

Ms. Leila Handanovic and Mr. Christopher Pike were appointed as full-time members, while Mr. Paul Dusome, Ms. Kirsten Goodwin, Ms. Maria Marchese and Ms. Amanda Pezzutto were appointed as part-time members of the Employment Insurance (EI) section of the Tribunal's General Division.

These appointments are part of the rigorous new approach to Governor in Council appointmentsone where an open, transparent and merit-based selection process supports ministers in making appointment recommendations for positions within their portfolio. The Tribunal renders fair and impartial decisions on appeals regarding the Canada Pension Plan (CPP), Old Age Security (OAS) and EI claims for benefits.

Quote





"I am pleased to announce the appointment of these new members to the Tribunal. They are diverse and talented candidates who will work hard to serve the public interest."

 The Honourable Jean-Yves Duclos, Minister of Families, Children and Social Development

Quick Facts

Full-time members are appointed for terms up to five years and part-time members for up to two years.

As an administrative tribunal with quasi-judicial powers, the Social Security Tribunal of Canada has the responsibility of making decisions on appeals from Employment and Social Development Canada relating to the CPP, OAS and decisions of the Canada Employment Insurance Commission on EI matters.

has the responsibility of making decisions on appeals from Employment and Social Development Canada relating to the CPP, OAS and decisions of the Canada Employment Insurance Commission on EI matters. The Tribunal comprises two levels of appeal. The General Division, the first level, includes two sections: an EI section for EI appeals and an Income Security section for CPP and OAS appeals. The Appeal Division is the second level and hears appeals from both sections of the General Division.

Further Information

Biographies of newly appointed Social Security Tribunal members

Associated Links

Follow us on Twitter

Biographies

Paul W. Dusome  Barrie, Ontario

Mr. Dusome is a Deputy Judge for the Small Claims Court of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, responsible for conducting settlement conferences, motions, trials and judgement-debtor examinations. In addition, Mr. Dusome is a sole practitioner in family, criminal, residential tenancy and wills and estates law. Mr. Dusome holds a Master of Laws in criminal law and procedure from the Osgoode Hall Law School and has been a member of the Law Society of Upper Canada since 1979.

Mr. Dusome will become a part-time member of the Employment Insurance section of the Tribunal's General Division. His appointment came into effect on September 12, 2016.

Kirsten M. Goodwin  Gatineau, Quebec



Ms. Goodwin has practiced trade law in the public and private sectors for over 20 years. She is currently an international trade and regulatory affairs consultant and sole practitioner in international trade law. Ms. Goodwin holds a Bachelor of Laws from the University of British Columbia. She has been a member of the Law Society of Upper Canada since 2004 and was previously a member of the Law Society of British Columbia from 1993 to 2004.

Ms. Goodwin will become a part-time member of the Employment Insurance section of the Tribunal's General Division. Her appointment came into effect on September 12, 2016.

Leila Handanovic  Hamilton, Ontario

Ms. Handanovic is highly effective and skillful in conflict resolution. Before being appointed to the SST, Ms. Handanovic worked as a Labour Affairs Officer for the Labour Program within Employment and Social Development Canada. She holds a Master of Business Administration from the Schulich School of Business at York University.

Ms. Handanovic will become a full-time member of the Employment Insurance section of the Tribunal's General Division. Her appointment will come into effect on October 11, 2016.

Maria Marchese  Woodbridge, Ontario

Ms. Marchese is an elected Trustee with the York Catholic District School Board and is also the Director for the Workplace Safety and Compensation Policy for Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters Association. She also served as a member on the Employment Insurance Board of Referees for over seven years. She is a member of the Law Commission of Ontario's Community Council and holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from the University of Toronto.

Ms. Marchese will become a part-time member of the Employment Insurance section of the Tribunal's General Division. Her appointment came into effect on September 12, 2016.

Amanda M. Pezzutto  Vancouver, British Columbia

Ms. Pezzutto has several years of experience working for the Government of Canada with Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, as well as with Service Canada, where she gained experience with the Employment Insurance file. She holds a Bachelor of Education and a Bachelor of Arts from the University of British Columbia. She is a member of the Chippewas of Nawash First Nation and volunteers with the Urban Native Youth Association in Vancouver.

Ms. Pezzutto will become a part-time member of the Employment Insurance section of the Tribunal's General Division. Her appointment came into effect on September 12, 2016.

Christopher D.G. Pike  St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador

Mr. Pike has over 25 years of experience in law and is currently working for the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador as a Workplace Health, Safety and Compensation Review Commissioner. Over the years, Mr. Pike has been a committee member for the Law Society of Newfoundland and Labrador and the Canadian Bar Association. He has received many awards and honours for his contributions and achievements within the community and has authored several publications. Mr. Pike holds a Bachelor of Laws from the University of New Brunswick.

Mr. Pike will become a full-time member of the Employment Insurance section of the Tribunal's General Division. His appointment will come into effect on October 11, 2016.

SOURCE Employment and Social Development Canada

For further information: Media Relations Office, Employment and Social Development Canada, 819-994-5559, [email protected]
Here is the press release and videos of supercontroversial Brilliant Light Power aka Blacklight Power. They are like the energy catalyzer. They claim new power. Brilliant Light power claims hydrinos exist. Hydrinos are a new form of hydrogen theoretically predicted by Dr. Mills and produced and characterized by BLP. Hydrinos are produced during the BlackLight Process as energy is released from the hydrogen atom as the electron transitions to a lower-energy state resulting in a smaller radius hydrogen atom. Brilliant Light has solved the theory, confirmed Hydrino reaction products by many analytical techniques, and identified Hydrino as the pervasive dark matter of the universe. Mills claims that Hydronos are fractional orbital hydrogen. This goes against the quantum nature of hydrogen for standard physics.

The SunCell was invented and engineered to harness the clean energy source from the reaction the hydrogen atoms of water molecules to form a non-polluting product, lower-energy state hydrogen called Hydrino wherein the energy release of H2O fuel is 100 times that of an equivalent amount of high-octane gasoline at an unprecedented high power density. The compact power is manifest as tens of thousands of Sun equivalents that can be directly converted to electrical output using commercial photovoltaic cells.

Brilliant Light Power, Inc. (BrLP) announced today that it has continuously generated over a million watts of power from a new primary source until the cell vaporized from the intense heat. The power released by the conversion of hydrogen atoms from water molecules in to a lower energy form called Hydrino or dark matter is manifest as brilliant-light emitting plasma wherein the light is uniquely and extraordinarily essentially all high-energy light in the extreme ultraviolet. Using four cross-confirming methodologies, five validators have confirmed over a million watts of plasma power developed by BrLPs so-called SunCell at power gains of over 100 times the power to ignite the Hydrino reaction, and at power densities higher than any previously known energy source. Dr. Randy Booker, physics professor and former Physics Department Chairman at University of North Carolina-Ashville said, The power was measured using two optical power measurements involving three sophisticated spectrometers calibrated against a National Institute of Science and Technology traceable standard and two thermal methods involving a commercial calorimeter and the rate of the rise of the water coolant temperature of the SunCell. All four methodologies cross-confirmed the production of megawatt scale power that was continuous in the case of the SunCell with spectacular commercial potential. Moreover, the unique and characteristic spectrum from the optical tests of essentially purely high energy light emission over a predicted range confirms the hydrino reaction as the source of the power.

BrLP subsequently held an invitation demonstration event on June 28, 2016 for about 50 guests from industry and academia wherein BrLP presented live demonstrations of the enormous power density and power gain by multiple methods. BrLP also presented an engineered SunCell prototype having no moving parts that it believes is capable of producing 125 kW of electricity. BrLP anticipates having field trials in 2017 supported by several current engineering firm and manufacturer partners. It comprises refractory materials capable of the intense heat wherein the SunCells enormous power density heats a blackbody radiator to incandescent temperatures to produce the effect of thousands of halogen light bulbs, and the light is converted to electricity with so-called concentrator photovoltaic cells that receive the light from the blackbody radiator and operate at incident light intensities of over one thousand times that of sunlight. Details of the SunCell, the BlackLight Process, the video and slide presentation from the June 28, 2016 demonstrations, background theory, journal publications, and other support materials are available on the BrLP webpage (http://brilliantlightpower.com).

BrLP presented live demonstrations of the enormous power density and power gain by multiple methods. BrLP also presented an engineered SunCell prototype having no moving parts that it believes is capable of producing 125 kW of electricity and is planned to be launched for initial commercialization in 2017.

The power is in bursts of millions of watts in a volume of a coffee cup. Cell meltdown including the thick tungsten electrodes can occur in seconds as shown in the above photo. Five independent validators using four cross confirming methodologies, two absolute spectroscopic and two thermal techniques using a commercial calorimeter and a heat exchanger on the SunCell, have established that the power demonstrated in this video is megawatt level with about 8 kW total input. The vapor is boiled off silver metal having a boiling point temperature of 3924 F.

BrLPs safe, non-polluting power-producing system catalytically converts the hydrogen of the H2O-based solid fuel into a non-polluting product, Hydrino, by allowing the electrons to fall to smaller radii around the nucleus. The energy release is over 200 times that of burning the equivalent amount of hydrogen with oxygen. Due to this extraordinary energy release, H2O may serve as the source of hydrogen fuel to form Hydrinos and oxygen. Moreover, the SunCell is compact, light-weight and autonomous with a projected capital cost of 1% to 10% that of any other form of power. The anticipated cost is so low that BrLP intends to provide autonomous individual power for essentially all stationary and motive applications untethered to the grid or any fuels infrastructure. Dr. Mills announced, This is the end of the age of fire, the internal combustion engine, and centralized power and fuels.

The commercial potential for SunCell technology is enormous. The promise of a cheap, clean and unlimited source of electric power is on the verge of commercialization. SunCell components are based on well-known technologies from electrical lighting, photovoltaic, semiconductor, refractory and aerospace industries, and use widely available materials. What is new is Brilliant Light Powers theoretical and experimental breakthroughs, protected by patents and proprietary know-how. Albert Einstein is looking down, smiling: I told you so, He does not play dice, said Former World Bank manager Gerhard Pohl. Dr. Joseph Renick, former Chief Scientist at Applied Research Associates added, It is understandable why even the best of scientists have difficulty taking seriously that which has been accomplished by Dr. Mills and his team at Brilliant Light Power because of how completely it transforms our understanding of atomic and molecular structure, dispels of all the strangeness associated with quantum theory so cherished by quantum physicists and chemists and then to boot delivers to mankind a new source of essentially unlimited inexpensive clean energy. The novel techniques, materials and processes developed by BrLP in the last few years are making this new source of energy a reality for all of mankind. The rest, however painful it will be for many in the natural sciences, will follow.

One of the validators, Bucknell Professor Dr. Peter Mark Jansson PE remarked, An objective review of the progress BrLP has made over the past decade in the development of their proprietary hydrogen-based technology indicates that they have achieved an understanding of the fundamental parameters that must be controlled to create a sustainable and energetic reaction of their atomic hydrogen fuel and catalysts. They have made landmark progress in creating demonstration devices that prove the concept of their generation technology with promise of becoming continuously operating prototypes in the near future. The creation of these consistently replicable experiments where input power is multiplied by 65 to 150 times is a remarkable achievement. The input power for these respective experiments was 8.02 kW and 10.45 kW with corresponding output power peaks reaching as high as 521 kW and 1.56 MW. Although these energy bursts were on the order of 1 to 3 minutes in duration I was able to observe a more continuous, sustainable reaction experiment that lasted over 7 minutes, other validators were able to observe operating SunCells for over 30 minutes in duration. Dr. K.V. Ramanujachary, Rowan University Meritorious Professor of Chemistry and Material Science, added that from his independent tests he finds the developments truly impressive and extremely important. I believe that the technology is amenable for making large-scale devices as easily as a portable one. This is what makes it very attractive.

SOURCE  Blacklight power
China has launched its second space lab, taking one step further in Beijings plan to establish a permanent space station.

A Long March 2F rocket blasted off successfully at 10:04 p.m. local time Thursday (10:04 a.m. ET) from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the Gobi Desert carrying the lab known as Tiangong-2, which translates to heavenly vessel, according to state media China Central Television.

A spacecraft will ferry a two-man crew to the lab in October  Chinas first manned mission since 2013. The astronauts will remain in the lab for a month, where they will be carrying out experiments related to medicine, physics and biology. Its Chinas longest mission yet.

The Tiangong-2 and its predecessor, Tiangong-1, are prototypes for Chinas ultimate goal  a permanent 20-ton space station, which is expected to launch after 2020.

The advanced Chinese space lab is capable of monitoring physics in outer space, studying the behavior of microgravity and observing gamma rays. Reports say that the new Chinese space lab can observe and analyze a total of 10 gamma rays per year.

To become the next super space giant, the Chinese Space Agency are launching one project after the other to prove their capability to dominate the space flight industry. The agency is all set to launch the second space lab Tiangong-2. The Long Mars 2F rocket will send Tiangong-2 to space. Both the space lab and the rocket have been positioned at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center and are ready to take flight. The docking of the rocket and the space lab aired live on China. Tiangong-2 is scheduled for launch sometime between Sept. 15 and 20, according to CCTV News.

The Chinese space station will habituate an orbit of 393 kilometers above the Earth. Tiangong-2 is a 60-ton space station and will be a testing ground for life support systems and refueling processes

Tiangong-2 has the capability to observe gamma ray using its gamma-ray detector POLAR. POLAR is a joint project developed by the collaboration between China, Switzerland and Poland.

But Chinas ambitious plans dont stop there. The agency plans a rendezvous with the new space station and Tianzhou-1, the first cargo and refueling spacecraft of China.

SOURCES  CNN, xinhua, Space.com
Former president of Nigeria, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo has faulted incumbent President Buhari for claiming he received nothing from the prev...

Former president of Nigeria, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo has faulted incumbent President Buhari for claiming he received nothing from the previous administrations.In an Interview with Frisky Larr, Obasanjo said, When I assumed office in 1999, I inherited $3.7 billion in reserve, while Buhari met $30 billion, almost 10 times of what I met then, and the price of oil then was $9. When it got to $20, I was dancing.I know the price is down now and with time, it will jump up again. What Buhari is doing currently is preparing ground for Nigeria to take advantage when it goes up again, he maintained.Several media reports had previously quoted President Buhari saying he inherited an empty treasury.
Mr. Gbenga Daniel, former governor of Ogun State, has disclosed why he pulled out of the Senatorial race last year.

Mr. Gbenga Daniel, former governor of Ogun State, has disclosed why he pulled out of the Senatorial race last year.Daniel, at a social media forum known as PenPushing Platform, revealed that he opted out of the race because the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, offered him the ticket with a price tag.The former governor stated that he considered the price tag the PDP placed on the senatorial ticket as immoral, adding that he became discouraged when the party told him that the slot will go to the highest bidder.Daniel said, I was offered the ticket at a price but I rejected it because I could not come to terms morally and in good conscience with purchasing a ticket to contest election to serve.Some people even tried to pay the price but I stopped them. Insiders are fully aware of these details. Just setting records straight with respects.Alleging that a presidential delegation of PDP, led by Tony Anenih came to his house in Sagamu to offer him the ticket, Daniel said, I voluntarily declined, as I was engaged to coordinate President Jonathans campaign in the SouthWest for PDP, while supporting most of our cheated candidates who went to PPN at that time.There were insinuations in the build up to the 2015 general elections, that Daniel, who was the then state governor was interested in picking the senatorial ticket for the Ogun East senatorial district on the platform of PDP.However, an alleged financier of the party, Buruji Kashamu, also registered interest for the seat and he eventually won the election on the platform of the PDP.But Kashamus victory was challenged by the candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Dapo Abiodun, in the election, who filed a petition before the states National Assembly Election Petitions Tribunal.Following Dapos claim that Kashamu and his party manipulated the election, the Tribunal had sacked him, Kashamu.In a related development, an Appeal Court in Ibadan, Oyo State on December 7, 2015 overturned the tribunals ruling, saying Kashamu was validly elected to represent his constituency at the National Assembly.
The traditional ruler of Nri in Anaocha Local Government Area of Anambra, Eze Obidiegwu Onyesoh, has urged Nigerians to stop blaming Pres...

The traditional ruler of Nri in Anaocha Local Government Area of Anambra, Eze Obidiegwu Onyesoh, has urged Nigerians to stop blaming President Muhammad Buhari for the challenges facing the country.Onyesoh made the call on Friday while addressing newsmen ahead of Saturdays celebration of 2016 new yam festival in the kingdom.He stated that all Nigerians, especially the past leaders, contributed to the countrys problem.Buhari is not our headache; corruption and looting of national assets were there before he came in.Corruption was institutionalised in the country and everybody acted with impunity.There was no discipline anywhere. So, we should stop blaming Buhari; rather, we should blame ourselves and do some self-examination, he said.Onyesoh urged the people to allow Buhari to reconstruct the country which was already in shambles before his election.On the festival, the monarch explained that Nri was regarded as the ancestral home of the Igbos, and that there were myths surrounding new yam festivals.Igbo mythology has it that when Nri became hungry and needed something to eat, he found yam sprouting from his sons grave and when he uprooted it, cooked it and ate it, it tasted good.This is why yam is venerated among the Igbos and anyone who deliberately damage yam crops is treated as a murderer, the monarch said.According to him, new yam festivals followed an injunction by God to the people of Israel to offer their first crop on the seventh month of the lunar calendar.
The Nigeria Union of Journalists, NUJ in the South East zone, Friday condemned the unlawful and unwarranted arrest and detention of Journa...





The Nigeria Union of Journalists, NUJ in the South East zone, Friday condemned the unlawful and unwarranted arrest and detention of Journalists by members of the Ebonyi State Police Command.Recall that the Ebonyi State correspondent of New Telegraph Newspaper, Mr. Uchenna Inya was unlawfully detained by the Command, following a tip-off that he was doing a report on the 17th anniversary of the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra, MASSOB in the state.The said report was not be published anywhere, yet he was allegedly detained by 4:25pm with his phone and working tools confiscated and later released at 9:35pm even as the state PPRO while speaking with Vanguard in a telephone chat denied the incident.Reacting to the incident, the National Vice President, South East zone, Comrade Chris Isiguzo stressed that the arrest and detention of the journalists was alien to the norms and practice of true democracy in the country. He called on the police not to see Journalists as social competitors but partners in progress in the fight against criminality and other social vices in society.The South East President of the NUJ appealed to his colleagues to ensure that their operations were within the armbit of the law and report accurately and objectively incidents that occurs in the state. According to him, Journalists should avoid sensational reports and avoid in fighting among themselves so as not to give those outside the scope of journalism the leverage to molest their colleagues.Meantime, another Journalist, Mr. Emmanuel Igwe of National Issue Newspapers in the state who was allegedly arrested and detained by the Police said he has petitioned the Inspector-General of Police over the infringement of his fundamental human rights by the Police in the State.This ugly development in the state has triggered off bitter and suspicious relationship between the Police and the Press as the Correspondent Chapel of the NUJ has threatened to boycott reportage of all activities of the Command.
Alarmed by the dwindling fortunes of Nigeria, President Muhammadu Buhari, yesterday, brainstormed with his key ministers and financial e...

Alarmed by the dwindling fortunes of Nigeria, President Muhammadu Buhari, yesterday, brainstormed with his key ministers and financial experts from the public and private sectors, to find ways of fixing the troubled economy. The President, who has repeatedly assured Nigerians of his resolve to turn around the economy, has come under immense pressure to take far-reaching measures to quicken the recovery of the economy.The retreat, which was packaged by the Budget and National Planning Ministry, in conjunction with the Finance Ministry, is seen as one of the early steps to proffer solutions to the beleaguered economy and prioritise areas for the 2017 budget.The retreat had as its theme: Building Inter-ministerial Synergy for Effective Planning and Budgeting in Nigeria. Declaring open the retreat, President Buhari said the nation required what he called out-of-the-box thinking to get out of the economic doldrums. Buhari said: The challenges we face in the current recession require out-of-the-box thinking, to deploy strategies that involve engaging meaningfully with the private sector to raise the level of private sector investment in the economy as a whole.We are confident that the level of private investment will grow as we are determined to make it easier to do business in Nigeria by the reforms we are introducing under the auspices of the Presidential Committee on Ease of Doing Business.He stressed the determination of the government to explore possible ways of turning the current challenges into opportunities for the country, especially the nations vibrant youths on whose shoulders lie the future of the nation.This is why we have embarked on measures and actions that will open up the opportunities we have seen in the power, housing, agriculture, mining, trade and investment; Information Communication Technology, ICT, tourism, transport and other sectors.I wish to reassure the teeming youths that this government would remain steadfast in its effort to ensure greater progress and prosperity for you. While government is taking the lead in the task of repositioning our economy for change, we cannot achieve this completely by ourselves.We will need, and we ask for the support and cooperation of the private sector, domestic and foreign, state and local governments, the National Assembly and the Judiciary as well as all well-meaning Nigerians in this important task. We are confident that working together, we shall succeed, Buhari assured.Budget and National Planning Minister, Senator Udoma Udo Udoma, explained that the retreat was timely as it was deliberately arranged as part of governments preparations for the 2017 budget, apparently to avoid the problems noticed in the previous budgets.Udoma said: We want to make sure that as a cabinet, we have synergy and we look at the priorities for the government for the 2017 budget and make sure that in the light of the current economic situation, the budget is well structured to take us back on the path of growth.The minister said with proper synergy between the ministers and their respective agencies, it would be possible for the cabinet to speak with one voice regarding the 2017 budget. Finance Minister, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, expressed governments sympathy with Nigerians over the down turn in the economy but was quick to add that the administration was more serious in its intention and resolve to turn it around. Adeosun said it was obvious, from the beginning, that the nation would run into economic crisis due to plummeting revenue.She said: We sympathise with the people of Nigeria but what is more serious is our intentions, our resolve and plans to turn it around. We had said it before that we knew we were going to go into a very difficult period. We have not anticipated the impact of the much awaited crisis, which of course is built on our revenue that is down significantly.We have a credible plan and that plan is based on the need to invest in our infrastructure and each of the experts spoke on that, saying clearly that it was the only solution for Nigeria to take us out of this situation and we are working on that.The retreat later broke into six syndicate groups, with ministers and permanent secretaries divided among the groups to examine the economy and suggest the way forward.Papers presented at the retreat include: Weaning the Nigerian economy out of oil dependence, by Dr Obadiah Mailafia; Fiscal and Trade Policy options to get the economy out of recession, by Dr Ayo Teriba; Monetary and Exchange Rate Policy options to get the economy out of recession, by Mr. Bismarck Rewane and How to grow output and productivity in the real sector, by Mr. Bode Agusto.According to documents from the Budget Ministry, the key expectations of the 2017 budget will focus on reviving the economy and will emphasise on actions to return the country to sustainable growth, keep a cap on recurrent expenditure and focus on capital expenditure, especially infrastructure.According to the document, the ultimate target is the attainment of strong, inclusive growth.
President Muhammadu Buhari will from Monday in New York, United States, participate in the five-day 71st session United Nations General As...

President Muhammadu Buhari will from Monday in New York, United States, participate in the five-day 71st session United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) beginning on Monday.This is contained in a statement issued in Abuja on Friday by the presidents Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Mr Femi Adesina.The statement said that the president would deliver Nigerias statement at the opening of the General Debate of the Assembly on The Sustainable Development Goals: A Universal Push to Transform Our World.Adesina revealed that the president would also attend a high-level summit to be hosted by the UN, on Large Movements of Refugees and Migrants.The summit, which is the first of its kind organised by the General Assembly at the Heads of State and Government level, is expected to come up with a blueprint for a better international response to enhance protection of migrants and refugees.He also said that Buhari would deliver a keynote address on Taking Climate Action toward Sustainable Development in Nigeria and the Lake Chad Basin.The presidents aide disclosed that leaders of member-countries of Lake Chad Basin would attend the summit, organised by Nigerian government, to highlight the urgent need to mobilise international response to the situation in the Chad Basin.Over nine million people are in need of humanitarian assistance in the Lake Chad Basin.He said that while in New York for the annual gathering of world leaders, the president would attend series of meetings as well as side events, which were of significant interest to Nigeria.Adesina said that the president would equally participate in an event hosted by the UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon, on Ending Need in the Lake Chad.On the margins of the 71st UNGA, President Buhari will sign the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, and participate in activities commemorating the 30th anniversary of the Declaration of the Right to Development.He said that the Nigerian leader would attend the Clinton Global Initiative as well as the United Nations Private Sector Forum on Business and Global Goals organised by the Secretary General.According to Adesina, the president will lead discussions at the United States-Africa Business Forum devoted to investing in Nigeria.
I arrived in the forest. I met the forest lord He offers me bush meat I am not here to hunt for bush meat I journey deep down the o...

I arrived in the forest. I met the forest lord

He offers me bush meat

I am not here to hunt for bush meat





I journey deep down the ocean

I met the queen of the coast

She offers me fish to eat

I am not here to fish either





On my way back home

I met the palm wine tapper

He gave me some wine to drink

Sozzled and blotto I got home

And then I forget my sorrow

- David Adeyemo 

Nigeria is a country blessed with so many natural and agricultural resources. We are so much blessed that we seem to have these resources in excess as compared to almost all the countries in the African continent. Whether were using these resources to our advantage or not is a different ball game entirely. I recently stumbled on United Nation World Tourism Organisations (UNWTO) website to check out some of the programmes it has lined up for the last quarter of the year. In the coming months, the apex tourism body will be organizing a wine tourism conference in collaboration with the Georgian National Tourism Administration. The press release on its website stated: Georgias unique winemaking traditions date back 8,000 years and are considered by UNESCO as intangible heritage, making the country an ideal host for the Global Conference on Wine Tourism. The countrys recent success in attracting a growing number of tourists and its development of tourism products, branding and marketing, combine to present an excellent platform for sharing best practices, experience and knowledge. Wine tourism, did you say?What wine is better than our locally tapped palm wine? If you have ever been served palm wine in any part of Nigeria especially the west and the east regions, you would be able to testify that nothing beats the taste of our freshly tapped unadulterated palm wine. On the other hand, what beats my imagination is the fact that were not doing anything grand with this quintessential alcoholic beverage beyond just consuming it locally and may be a few exportations. We can still do so much more. And surprisingly, there is a huge market for this natural product abroad. The revenue generated every year locally is nothing compared to what we can earn as a country if we intensify exportation of this product. The product has the potential of generating millions of dollars every year if done properly and supported with the necessary marketing efforts.Palm wine has many names it is known by depending on the region. For instance, in Nigeria it is called emu, oguro, nkwu enu, nkwu ocha, palmy, or tombo liquor. Palm wine is indeed indispensable in many ceremonies in some parts of Nigeria especially among the Ibo people. Guests at weddings, birthday celebrations and funeral wakes are usually served charitably. For instance, a young man who is going for his first introduction at his in-laws place is required to go with palm wine. Depending on the customs of various towns, there are specific gallons of palm wine required for such an event.Sometimes, it can also be used as a healing agent. It is often mixed with medicinal herbs to cure a wide variety of physical illnesses. Many drinking sessions will often begin with a small amount of palm wine spilled on the ground as a token of respect to deceased ancestors. Women as well as men enjoy drinking palm wine. Although the former consumes it less often in public.Palm wine tapping is both an art and a science. Ask our Ibo brothers in the East and the Yoruba farmers in the West. It takes certain specialized skills that are learnt over a course of time to be able to master the art and perfect it. It commands more respect than any other alcoholic beverage among the rural and urban dwellers in Nigeria. There are also other alcoholic beverages that are derivatives from fermented palm wine while some others such as Ogogoro (dry gin), Burukutu are locally brewed drinks made from guinea corn or wheat. There are different types of palm wine but the type thats sourced from either Raffia palm or palm oil tree are the original palm wine. Although, they are a bit more expensive and considered the king of all local wines.Here are a number of fun facts about palm wine in Nigeria: (1) Palm wine is usually the official drink for all traditional marriages. In fact, its in most times included in the bride price list (a list of items to be procured by the groom to-be before a woman is given out in marriage by her family). (2) Getting unadulterated palm wine is indeed very difficult; most are mixed with other drinks by greedy sellers to maximize profit. (3) In the rural areas, palm wine often accompanies (and usually the best drink) pepper soup, Ugba, Nkwobi and Isi Ewu (goat head).Having looked at the great potentials palm wine wields and the inherent implication on our culture as a country, it is a course of wisdom to create festivals or conferences that will bring tourists from other countries to come into our country, considering the fact that were at a point where growing our hospitality and tourism industry is especially important. Organizing an annual Palm Wine Festival, or something of that sort will boost the inflow of tourists into our country which will directly contribute to the economy. For instance, more jobs will be created, more hotels, including those on travel platforms, will experience increase in patronage, airlines will make more sales and several other attendant benefits. A typical festival will need about three to six months to plan and will gulp between N4m  N10m. But the ROI will likely triple the expenditure and once this becomes a yearly event, an additional source of income will definitely emerge.Beyond hosting a palm wine festival or conference or whatever nomenclature we eventually come up with, I think its also important for public-private partnership to promote, on a large scale, the exportation of unadulterated palm wine to neighbouring countries and major European countries. We stand to benefit immensely from its export. We only need to get the packaging right and voila, the orders will start coming in. However, before we start intensifying commercialization of this product, local promoters should make conscious effort to get as many Nigerians as possible to start making demands. Thankfully, e-commerce has changed the way everything is done. Its not improbable for a seller to open a platform on any of the online marketplaces and support it with appropriate publicity. We will go beyond local consumption to selling to other continents. But first, we need to grow local demands for the product.The journey to building our country to Africas number one tourist destination is filled with many road bumps. But every step we take should always be in the right direction. Else, things might just fall apart.
HADDONFIELD -- There's no sign of Little Bo Peep, but someone has lost a sheep. And it's not a little lamb.

"We're told it's 150 pounds. He's a big boy... or girl," Borough Clerk Deanna Bennett said Friday.

The slippery sheep was reported missing from a pen in Cherry Hill earlier this week, and has been spotted running around in Haddonfield near the Cherry Hill line.

"He's extremely hard to catch," said Animal Control Officer Rob Chabot, who since Monday or Tuesday has been getting calls every time someone reports a sighting to Haddonfield police. Most have been in the area of Cooper River Park, he said.

"A lot of times when we get there, he's gone," Chabot said. Or, the sheep makes a run for it.

The borough warned residents in a post on its Facebook page not to try to catch the skittish farm animal as it may "take it baaadly."

UPDATE on Reggie the Runaway Sheep!!! ... Posted by Borough of Haddonfield on Wednesday, September 14, 2016

On the post, several residents said it had been seen near the Beechwood School.

Chabot said the sheep's owner is looking for it too, but they have almost no chance of catching it in the park.

"The best case scenario is it wanders into a fenced-in yard," he said.

Until then, the sheep will likely be fine with grass to eat and water to drink in the park.

Chabot has been in animal control for about 10 years.

"Every year you get some chickens, maybe a goat, the rare horse here and there," he said. But trying to catch a sheep is a new challenge.

"That thing's quick," he said.

Anyone who spots the sheep is asked to call the Haddonfield Police Dept. at (856) 429-3000.

Rebecca Everett may be reached at reverett@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @rebeccajeverett. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
Barack Obama

It looks like Jersey City's School 34 will be named for President Obama after all. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

(Charles Dharapak)

JERSEY CITY -- Facing a crowd of about 100 people in support of renaming School 34 in honor of President Obama, the Jersey City school board last night reversed its opposition to the move and advanced a measure approving of the name change.

"We did it and we did it TOGETHER!" Assemblywoman Angela McKnight, who led the effort to name the Kennedy Boulevard school after the president, wrote on Facebook last night after the vote.

If the renaming is formalized next month as expected, Obama would be the second president whose name graces a Jersey City school. Lincoln High School is named for the nation's 16th president.

The board's unanimous action comes less than a month after it rejected a measure to name School 34 for Obama. Board of Education President Vidya Gangadin said the board reconsidered its earlier vote after hearing last night from the school's staff and students who spoke out in favor of naming their school Barack Obama Elementary School.

"It was really, really compelling," Gangadin said. "That's what they wanted."

The board will likely vote to finalize the name change at its Oct. 20 meeting.

McKnight, who joined the state Assembly in January, first proposed naming the new School 20 for the nation's first black president, but a school naming committee opted for Maya Angelou instead.

McKnight then turned her sights on School 34, a pre-k through eight school in the city's Greenville section. A separate naming committee sided with McKnight but at its August meeting, the school board voted down the recommendation, with some members saying the preferred to name the school after someone with local ties.

Terrence T. McDonald may be reached at tmcdonald@jjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @terrencemcd. Find The Jersey Journal on Facebook.
jccopcar.jpg

A 28-year-old man has died from his injuries after he was shot in the neck on Martin Luther King Drive on Sept. 6, 2016. (Journal file photo)

(JOURNAL FILE PHOTO)

A man who died a week after being found shot on Martin Luther King Drive has been identified as a 28-year-old Jersey City man.

Jensen Purnell died Tuesday night at Jersey City Medical Center-Barnabas Health, where he was being treated for his wounds since the shooting, which has been ruled a homicide, Hudson County Prosecutor Esther Suarez announced tonight.

Purnell was one of two people shot on Martin Luther King Drive between Stegman and Dwight streets at 10:20 p.m. on Sept. 6. A 37-year-old was shot in the thigh and was treated and released from the Jersey City Medical Center.

The shooting death is the 17th homicide in Jersey City this year.

No arrests have been made in connection with the shooting. The investigation is ongoing.

Anyone with information can contact the Hudson County Prosecutor's Office at 201-915-1345 or to leave an anonymous tip on the Hudson County Prosecutor's Office official website at www.hudsoncountyprosecutorsofficenj.org/homicide-tip/.

All information will be kept confidential.
JERSEY CITY - The Secaucus attorney being retried on charges he tried to stab his girlfriend to death in 2011 is again expected to take the stand in his own defense, perhaps as early as Tuesday.

Todd Gorman, 51, took the stand in his first attempted murder trial over the winter and spoke of the depression, suicidal ideations and alcoholism that both he and his former girlfriend, Stephanie Schwartz, dealt with.

He described her as "warm, loving, supportive, generous, kind person."

Gorman's first trial on charges he tried to kill Schwartz on Sept. 29, 2011 ended in a hung jury. Schwartz committed suicide prior to that trial.

When Gorman testified that he said he loved Schwartz and still did but also said she could be chaotic and had attacked him and hurt him in the past.

The pair met in an online forum that provided information on ways to commit suicide and where to get the materials needed. Eventually they met in person and started a relationship, living in Schwartz's Secaucus home.

Also expected to testify for the defense is former Jersey City Police Det. Calvin Hart, Gorman's sister and a doctor. All three testified during the first trial.

During the trial and retrial, the defense has asserted that on the night of the incident, Schwartz was trying to hurt herself and when Gorman intervened, she attacked him and he merely defended himself.

There has been testimony that Gorman suffered scrapes and bruises that night, and that Schwartz suffered seven lacerations. Both were treated at hospitals but neither was admitted. Schwartz required stitches. Police recovered a large serrated kitchen knife under a throw rug and believe it was used in the incident.

Gorman went to college on a full ROTC scholarship and earned a degree in aero engineering. He then entered to Air force and retired as a captain before getting a law degree. He also has a masters degree in international affairs.

During the first trial, the prosecutor described Gorman as a person who at one point in his life showed promise. She said at the time of the incident, Schwartz had given him a credit card and phone and was supporting him while he was unemployed and doing community service following a DWI arrest.

The prosecutor said Gorman attacked Schwartz with a kitchen knife that night because she told him he was no longer welcome in her home and had called his sister asking her to come get him.

The trial will resume on Tuesday at 9 a.m. before Hudson County Superior Court Judge Mark Nelson in the Hudson County Administration Building in Jersey City.
ANNANDALE - The Hunterdon County YMCA is holding a Family Mud Run at its Camp Carr, 517 Hamden Road, on Sept. 25.

The first wave sets off at 11 a.m. This 1.5-mile obstacle course challenge is suitable for the entire family, according to a news release.

Cost is $10 for members ($15 for non-members) for those over the age of 12 and $5 ($10 for non-members) for those ages 3-11. All participants under the age of 12 must be accompanied by an adult.

Dogs and strollers are not permitted on the course.

Those interest can register online. For additional information, contact Teri Saccal at 908-483-4933 or tsaccal@hcymca.org.
-- Four Edison police officers pleaded guilty Friday for their roles in a

a North Brunswick police officer who cited one of the officer's relatives on a drunk driving charge, prosecutors announced.

Officer Michael A. Dotro, 39, of Manalapan, Officer Brian Favretto, 41, of Brick, Officer Victor E. Aravena, 45, and Sgt. William H. Gesell, 48, both of Edison, reached plea agreements as jury selection was underway to try the four, according to the Middlesex County Prosecutor's Office.

Each officer faces probation, must give up their government jobs and be barred from future public employment after sentencing scheduled for Jan. 13 in New Brunswick, prosecutors said.

All four officers resigned from the force, according to a township spokesman.

"This is a sad day for the Edison Police Department because of the tarnish it brings to the reputations of our many other upstanding and hard-working police officers," Edison Business Administrator Maureen Ruane said in a statement. "We are glad to see these men chose to resign their positions, bringing an end to their tenure here."

"We must also commend the Middlesex County Prosecutors Office for its diligent investigation and prosecution of this matter," Ruane added.

Dotro pleaded guilty to conspiracy and admitted he planned to retaliate against the North Brunswick officer, who ticketed one of his relatives. The officer also faces separate charges, including attempted murder, for allegedly setting an Edison police captain's home on fire while the captain and his wife were asleep inside.

The officer allegedly torched his supervisor's home after the captain reportedly ordered him to undergo a psychological evaluation following his 11th excessive force complaint. Dotro pleaded not guilty in that case.

In another case against the officer, prosecutors allege Dotro slashed the tires on an Edison woman's car and had brass knuckles, an imitation weapon, a black jack, a small amount of marijuana and a device used to smoke the drug in his police duty bag on May 23, 2013.

Favretto pleaded guilty to obstruction of the administration of law for trying to intervene in the DUI case. Gesell admitted he accessed computer records on the North Brunswick officer and pleaded guilty to tampering with public records.

For his part, Aravena admitted he gave the computer records to Dotro to help in the retaliation scheme. Aravena pleaded guilty to obstruction of the administration of law.

The prosecutor's office, however, said its investigation found the four never actually carried out the retaliation scheme against the North Brunswick officer.

The charges against the four Edison officers was among a series of embarrassments for the department, which has included lawsuits and criminal probes.
North Korea may be plotting nuclear blackmail but don't expect the press to ask Clinton or Trump about it
WASHINGTON (AP)  The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol has issued a subpoena to Donald Trump. The nine-member panel sent a letter to the former president's lawyers on Friday, demanding his testimony under oath by mid-November and outlining a series of corresponding documents. The decision by lawmakers to exercise their subpoena power comes a week after the committee made its final case against the former president, who they say is the "central cause" of the multi-part effort to overturn the results of the 2020 election. It remains unclear how Trump and his legal team will respond to the subpoena, if at all.
Welcome to nonleaguedaily.coms news provision, your go-to source for all non league updates, rumours, interviews, and much more besides.

Founded by a team with a genuine passion for the world of non league football, nonleaguedaily.com understands exactly what supporters of the so-called lower leagues are looking for. You want the high-quality reporting, in-depth analysis, and match reporting that matches that is more commonly found in the journalism for the top flights, but with the focus firmly fixed on the national leagues.

We understand that your passion, interest, and dedication is constant, and we believe you need a news service that matches that commitment with its own dedication and thoroughness  so thats what you can expect from our site.

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For us, this slow spread may be fairly organic in nature, but it simply isnt compatible with the modern football environment. Its also not conducive to the current fast-paced, always-available media landscape, nor the way that people tend to consume news nowadays. Thats why we have put together a non league news source that fans can turn to for the latest updates, as and when they happen, and as and when you want to read them. Non-league news now is the only acceptable speed at Betting.co.uk.

We update our non-league football news coverage constantly, bringing you all the latest developments and seeking to spread the word as quickly and accurately as possible. So if youre wondering whats happening both with your local team and with the lower leagues as a whole, you can visit us for non league news now, and be confident the stories you find are completely up to date.

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However, everyone who writes for us also shares our readers enthusiasm for non league football. Were not just churning out content in the hopes of cashing in on a professional dream; were here because we want to be, and will always be dedicated and committed to non league football as an entity and thriving in the experience of being able to talk about our favourite subject whenever we can. We create non-league news now that is written by genuine fans and enthusiasts, for fans. We know what you want to know and what matters most to an ardent non league supporter, and we always ensure that focusing on these elements is our guiding principle as we seek to solidify our status as an online non league paper fans can always rely on.

When compiling non league news, we think with the mind of a fan first and foremost. We cover the angles and stories that we find compelling and that we know our fellow non league enthusiasts also care about. News doesnt have to be dry and formulaic, in our opinion. When its written by people who are genuinely as fascinated by the stories they are reporting on as their readership will be, we believe news can be interesting, compelling, and even have a sense of personality and humour.

News content written with passion and expertise

We believe that thanks to our dedication, insightfulness, and commitment to our subject matter of non league today, we are offering the best of both worlds to those searching for an online non league paper. We give you the professional approach we feel is appropriate for news about one of the most intriguing aspects of UK football; an aspect that we genuinely feel does not receive the interest and plaudits that it should be generating. Nevertheless, we dont let that professionalism take over everything we do: we remain committed fans, nurturing our own personal interest in non league football and ensuring every word we compose is infused with a sense of passion and dedication that enhances the posts we create.

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The Board of the Manly Warringah Sea Eagles has today announced that Tim Cleary will be appointed as Chief Executive Officer following the resignation of Joe Kelly.

Mr Cleary is the current Principal of St Augustines College in Brookvale.

Sea Eagles Club Chairman Scott Penn said the appointment will be effective in December.

"Tim will join the Club at the end of the year when he concludes his term as Headmaster. During his 15-year tenure, St Augustines College has grown to be the largest school on the Northern Beaches, Mr Penn said.

"He has strong commercial experience, is an outstanding communicator, and is an expert at stakeholder management. Tim is well known in the community as a Manly local and has been a passionate supporter of the Sea Eagles for many years.

"Tim has tremendous development experience with the expansion of the St Augustine campus and will bring that experience to the fore through our Brookvale Oval redevelopment and Centre of Excellence plans."

Mr Cleary said he was delighted to have the opportunity to lead the Sea Eagles in 2017.

"Having the privilege of guiding 1,200 young men across the road from Brookvale Oval for the past 15 years, I have had nothing but admiration for the Sea Eagles and their winning culture, Mr Cleary said.

"There is an exciting future at Manly with the redevelopment of Brookvale Oval and the opportunity to create a Centre of Excellence at Narrabeen.

"We also have an amazing amount of emerging talent in the NRL team. I am looking forward to helping the Sea Eagles grow and prosper."

Read more at seaeagles.com.au
MICHIGAN CITY  Two traffic stops this week yielded three arrests, two handguns, large amounts of cocaine, drug paraphernalia and synthetic marijuana, police announced Thursday.

As the gun violence continues to increase across the nation so will the patrol of the Michigan City Police Department, along with specialized units such as the Street Crimes Unit and the Fugitive Apprehension Street Team, Michigan City Police Chief Mark Swistek said in a news release.

Members of the departments Street Crimes Unit on Wednesday were in the area of East Eighth and Pine streets when they observed a white Mercury sedan. The sedan was followed to the 600 block of Donnelly Street where the driver was confirmed not to possess a valid drivers license, according to police.

The front seat passenger, Tristan Smith, 21, of Michigan City, attempted to discard a fully loaded Smith & Wesson handgun under the carriage of the vehicle, according to the release. Police retrieved the weapon and a search of Smith yielded a large amount of suspected cocaine in his groin area. A vehicle search revealed drug paraphernalia, according to the release.

Probable cause was established Thursday to charge Smith with dealing in cocaine or narcotics, a class 2 felony; and carrying a handgun without a license, a class A misdemeanor. A penalty for the use of firearm in a controlled substance offense also was filed.

On Wednesday, a routine traffic stop by members of the Street Crimes Unit in the area of East Ninth Street yielded two arrests. Deonte Miller, 19, of Michigan City, was arrested on charges of not having a valid license, a class B misdemeanor, and possession of a synthetic drug after he was searched.

A 15-year-old boy who was a passenger in Millers car was searched. A fully loaded Beretta handgun was found on him. He was placed under arrest and charged with dangerous possession of a firearm, a class A misdemeanor, and carrying a handgun without a license, a class A misdemeanor.

Miller is at the LaPorte County Jail without bond. The 15-year-old was transported to the Juvenile Services Center. Smith is currently being held at the LaPorte County Jail with a $50,00 cash-only bond.

Routine traffic stops, such as the ones that occurred in these incidents, prove to be very beneficial within the community by taking guns off subjects who illegally possess them and potentially maybe a threat to others, Swistek said in the release.
VALPARAISO  Hammond resident Julius Garza unexpectedly pleaded guilty Friday afternoon to killing two people just outside of Valparaiso in 2012 while attempting to steal marijuana.

Garza, 23, said little while pleading guilty to two counts of murder for the April 7, 2012, shooting deaths of Jeffery Trinka, 40, of Valparaiso, and Jennifer Guinn, 31, of Hammond, at a house in the 1500 block of Lincolnway.

Garza faces a 45-year sentence if the proposed plea agreement is accepted by Porter Circuit Court Judge Mary Harper during a sentencing hearing Nov. 9. He is eligible to complete the sentence in half the time or less with good behavior and participation in various prison programs.

He was facing between 90 and 130 years behind bars if found guilty on the two counts, which was part of his motivation for pleading guilty rather than going ahead with his trial as scheduled on Monday, said defense attorney Larry Rogers.

Garza decided to plead guilty Thursday after being allowed additional phone privileges at the jail to talk it over with family members, said Rogers, who has spent the past six weeks preparing for trial.

Porter County Deputy Prosecutor Cheryl Polarek, who has also been in preparations with Chief Deputy Prosecutor Matt Frost, said of her offices motivation in striking the deal: It was important to us he take responsibility for both murders.

Garza told the court Friday that he and others went to the house in the early morning hours of April 7, 2012, to relieve the resident, Trinka, of marijuana.

He said he shot Trinka and Guinn during the visit.

A co-defendant in the case, Alejandro Sanchez, who has since pleaded guilty to a reduced count of burglary for his role, has said Garza went into the house alone, came back out angry, grabbed a rifle from the rear of his SUV and reportedly fired the gun through the rear door of the house and went inside. Sanchez said he followed in hope of stealing money and/or drugs, and left after seeing a man on the floor.

A woman who traveled to the house with Sanchez, Garza and a third man has said the group took an AK-47 firearm purchased by Garza, and it was used to shoot through the front door killing Trinka, the woman said.

She said Garza and Sanchez then entered the house and Sanchez came back a short time later to the car saying two people were dead. Three of the people reportedly fled and police said they found Garza attempting to drive away when they arrived.
No two educational journeys are alike, and for many students a transfer from one school to another is a necessary part of the college experience.

In some cases, a transfer is part of the plan from the beginning. For example, a common financially minded strategy for many students is to begin their college career at a smaller and/or nearby school or community college in order to save money on some of their general education courses before moving to a larger, more expensive campus to complete their major.

For students that are planning to complete their degree at an institution that is more expensive, such as a private institution or an out-of-state institution, it is a huge benefit if they are able to save on their general education or prerequisite courses by taking them at a local institution before they transfer, says Linda Atkinson-Pettee, interim director of Student Success and Transition in the Academic Center for Excellence at Purdue University Northwest in Hammond.

Ivy Tech director of admissions Darryl Williams says many of the students at the Gary school take advantage of this path in order to get a more affordable start to their college careers. Ivy Tech offers more than 100 transfer programs with schools both within Indiana and out of state, so that really opens up a lot of possibilities for our students, Williams explains. We actively seek articulation agreements with many four-year institutions so our students have a broad array of opportunities from which to choose when they seek to transfer.

Some transfers come about more unexpectedly, often as the result of a change of heart regarding academic focus, struggles with grades, a change in financial conditions or simply a misalignment between the students expectations going in and his or her actual experience. Regardless of the reason behind it, however, its important for students to approach the decision to transfer with a full understanding of both the advantages and disadvantages of switching schools.

If a student is highly motivated to transfer for one specific reason, the transition can certainly bring fulfillment in that area, explains Heather Whaley, a transfer admissions counselor at Indiana Wesleyan University in Marion. For example, if a student is transferring for financial reasons, the change will likely save the student money. But if the student has not planned ahead with transferring, his or her degree may take an extended amount of time to achieve, and some of the classes may not transfer in a way that benefits the student. In this case, it may take an extra semester or year to graduate, resulting in the decision to transfer costing the student more.

Once a student has weighed all of the potential advantages and disadvantages of a transfer, he or she should clearly identify the goals for the switch and determine which credits will transfer to the new school.

The biggest tip I would offer for students considering a transfer is to have constant communication with the academic advisers at both their current institution and their transfer institution, says Purdues Atkinson-Pettee. There are many degree requirements specific to each institution that an academic adviser can guide the student through, such as which courses can be transferred in versus which must be taken at the transfer institution or how many credits they allow to transfer in.
CROWN POINT  The first two sessions in his new courtroom went well and hes getting office space for his clerks soon, but, with the city moving ahead with plans to build a new police station and city court, City Court Judge Kent Jeffirs isnt making any long-range plans for the location.

Jeffirs got approval from the citys Board of Public Works and Safety on Wednesday to rent office space across the street from the Hall of Justice building, 220 S. Main St., where the court moved after its lease was terminated at the historic Lake County Courthouse at the end of August by the Lake Court House Foundation. Jeffirs said the first court date Sept. 6 was light to give everyone a chance to adjust to the new location. This Tuesdays court call went until about 8 p.m., he said.

He said the citys technical staff was working almost to the last minute to get the court computers up and running for the inaugural session. The board of works had to approve an emergency contract for about $85 with NITCO retroactive to last week for providing the broadband service for the court.

We had to get all hooked up to the citys computer system, and now we have to do it for the new clerks office, Jeffirs said.

The lease for clerks space is in the building that houses lawyer Michael Lambert. It starts Oct. 1 and will cost $500 a month, which brings the total cost for the new court to $1,200 a month. He had paid $1,000 a month at the old courthouse, which included space for the clerks. It had been thought the clerks would be moved to space the city rents on Broadway and which became available when the engineering department was moved to the new public works campus, but it was decided the space wasnt big enough.

Jeffirs said the new site is much more convenient, but the lease is only for 15 months. The court revenues will cover the rent for the rest of this year and next year will be paid from the citys share of the countys Local Option Income Tax, or LOIT. Mayor David Uran said LOIT funds are expected to be used in the future when the new police station is built that also will house the court.

Uran said the police station project is expected to be facilitated by the councils approval of a resolution at its budget workshop meeting Tuesday. The resolution will allow the city to take advantage of state law provisions for the purchase of property and buildings. He said the law will give the city more flexibility in financing the project.

We know from the needs assessment that the current police station is too small for the officers and the community, Uran said. The court is a vital part of the community, and at the end of the day, we want to do whatever we can do to meet the needs for all.

Not only must the new station be big enough for the current 45-person force, it also must meet the needs as the department grows as well as having space for the court and for the public to access the police. If the resolution is approved, Uran said the city will seek proposals for the project. He said the options will be left up to the developers to be creative and could involve buying a building, buying land and building the station or a combination of the two.

The proposals will be due in 45 to 60 days and well see what comes back, he said.

Jeffirs said hes planning an open house from 4 to 7 p.m. Tuesday in the new court. Even if it is only a temporary site.
WASHINGTON  The U.S. military will have to shift surveillance aircraft from other regions and increase the number of intelligence analysts to coordinate attacks with Russia under the Syria cease-fire deal partly in order to target militants the U.S. has largely spared, senior officials say.

Senior defense and military officials told The Associated Press that they are sorting out how the U.S.-Russia military partnership will take shape and how that will change where U.S. equipment and people will be deployed. They said, however, that they will need to take assets from other parts of the world, because U.S. military leaders dont want to erode the current U.S.-led coalition campaign against the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria.

More military planners and targeting experts will be needed to identify and approve airstrikes against the al-Qaida-linked Jabhat Fatah al-Sham. The U.S. has rarely bombed the group, previously known as the Nusra Front, and the targeting is trickier because the militants are often intermingled with other U.S.-backed Syrian rebels.

Making matters more complicated are U.S. military concerns about Russian targeting. Unlike the U.S., which uses precision-guided munitions, Moscow has predominantly used so-called dumb bombs in its airstrikes over Syria.

The Syria cease-fire deal struck by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov is designed to pause the civil war so that the superpowers militaries can be jointly concentrated against the Islamic extremist groups operating within the chaos on the ground. The concerns reflect the U.S. militarys broader skepticism about partnering with Russia, which it says it distrusts.

Senior U.S. defense and military officials familiar with the planning spoke on condition of anonymity because they werent authorized to talk about the matter publicly.

Under the deal, if the cease-fire holds for seven days and humanitarian deliveries are allowed into areas besieged by the Syrian army, the U.S. and Russia would set up a so-called Joint Implementation Center to focus on the militants and share basic targeting data.

State Department spokesman Mark Toner acknowledged the skepticism.

I dont think that anyone in the U.S. government is necessarily taking at face value Russias or certainly not the Syrian regimes commitment to this arrangement, Toner said. I also think some of the comments from the Department of Defense were just about speaking to the fact that theres logistical challenges of setting up the JIC (joint center) and coordinating these airstrikes and thats going to require additional effort and additional time.

He added, however, What really matters here is that the president of the United States supports this agreement, and our system of government works in such a way that everyone follows what the president says.

U.S. defense officials said they have begun working out some of the details, even though they are hamstrung by existing U.S. law that prohibits any military-to-military relations with Russia, as a result of Moscows annexation of the Crimea region of Ukraine.

Defense Secretary Ash Carter must submit a waiver to Congress along with a report detailing why military cooperation with Russia is necessary. U.S. officials said Carter hasnt done that yet, and he likely wont until the required cease-fire and humanitarian aid conditions are met for the seven days.

Until then, officials said the U.S. military team setting up the JIC will not be able to meet with their Russian counterparts. The U.S. officials laid out a number of questions that must be resolved before any targeting could start, including how much control either country may have over strikes taken by the other, how will the review process unfold, do either have a veto over any target, and who would be the final arbiter in any disagreements.

Other officials have said they believe there is no veto authority on either side, and that the U.S. would bear no responsibility if a Russian strike kills civilians. And they have made it clear that the U.S. would end the cooperation if Russia violates the agreement and kills civilians or U.S. allies.

A key question will be where the military will get the additional surveillance aircraft needed. Drones, in particular, are in high demand around the world, and commanders in volatile regions including Asia and the Middle East, wont be eager to give up theirs.

The U.S. hasnt targeted much in some portions of Syria, including around Aleppo and regions where al-Qaida-linked militants are centered. The additional surveillance and analysis will be needed to identify and vet those targets to ensure friendly forces and innocent people arent mixed in.

Military officials said that even once the center is set up, airstrikes wont start happening immediately. They said it will take time to share and analyze the recommended target data and make certain that innocent civilians or allies arent hit.

It can take weeks for a particular enemy target to get approved and added to the air tasking order that the U.S.-led coalition uses to assign airstrikes in Iraq and Syria.
Were within the final two months of the 2016 presidential campaign, and civility, or the lack thereof, appears to remain front and center.

As this campaign races to the homestretch, we all should remind our federal, state and local officials just how much we value candidates who remain civil with one another, despite political differences.

Weve seen signs of both hope and discouragement in recent weeks.

Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton recently provided a poor example of civil decorum in her blanket statement about supporters of her GOP opponent, Donald Trump.

Referring to a portion of Trumps supporters as a basket of deplorables was hardly civil or presidential.

Most of us braced for Trump, whos slung plenty of his own uncivil rhetoric during the campaign, to retaliate.

Instead, he recently wished good health to Clinton, who has been diagnosed with pneumonia that reportedly caused her premature exit from a 9/11 ceremony this past weekend.

Trump said he wants a healthy Clinton to face him in the upcoming presidential debates, the first of which is slated for Sept. 26.

Lets hope for more well wishes and fewer deplorable comments in the coming weeks. We must demand this of our current and prospective leaders at all levels of government.

Let all voices be heard

As we approach the Sept. 26 presidential debate, organizers should create a forum in which all voices of the campaign can be heard.

That means setting up a third podium for Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson.

Lack of choice has been a regular refrain from an electorate not happy with the track records or demeanor of either the leading Democratic or Republican contenders.

Pollsters would have us believe Johnson, former governor of New Mexico, hasnt a snowballs chance in the desert of becoming the next president.

But his name will be on the November ballot in all 50 states, and his voice and ideas should be heard by the American people who must choose our next president.

Americans like to comparison shop, even if they have a good idea about the product they intend to buy. Debate organizers owe it to us all to provide an all-inclusive forum of candidates.

Your opinion, please: Are you concerned about the often uncivil tone of the presidential campaign? Activate your digital subscription and cast your vote at nwi.com/opinion.
As a former employee of Inland Steel Company and a third-generation steelworker, I am very concerned that the USW members will support Hillary Clinton, thus voting their industry and livelihoods out of existence.

Despite her publicly vowing to put the coal and steel industries out of business, USW leadership is still supporting the Democrat presidential candidate. The past two terms of Democratic leadership in the White House have been a disaster for the steel industry and minorities.

I hope all steelworkers look at the experience of West Virginia and other coal states, which supported the Democrats only to be regulated and taxed to the brink of extinction. President Obama has promised to bury the coal industry, and Hillary Clinton will continue his agenda. Voting Democrat for president is equivalent to voluntarily destroying the economic engine of Northwest Indiana.

Michael Haluska, Crown Point
The NYPD says a man was shot by police in Midtown Thursday afternoon after he attacked an officer with a meat cleaver.

First responders were called to West 32nd Street and Broadway just before 5 p.m. for reports of a shooting.

Chief of Department James O'Neill says two uniformed officers from the Midtown South precinct responded to a call at West 31st Street and Broadway and encountered the suspect, identified as 32-year-old Akram Joudeh, trying to remove a parking boot from a car (seen at left).

According to O'Neill, Joudeh pulled out an 11-inch meat cleaver and fled westbound.

Several other officers from the Midtown South precinct, as well as officers from the Transit Bureau, joined the two original officers in the foot pursuit, according to O'Neill.

O'Neill says an on-duty sergeant tried to taser the suspect on West 32nd Street, but it had no effect.

According to O'Neill, Joudeh then jumped on top of the front of a police car on West 32nd Street between Sixth and Seventh avenues. According to O'Neill, an off-duty detective in plainclothes then tried to subdue the suspect and was struck in the head by the meat cleaver, causing a six-inch gash from his temple to his jaw.

O'Neill says police officers then fired at the suspect, striking him several times. Police Commissioner William Bratton said three officers fired approximately 18 times at the suspect.

The detective who was struck by the meat cleaver was transported to Bellevue Hospital, as was the suspect. The detective is in serious condition. The suspect is in critical but stable condition.

O'Neill said two other officers suffered non-life-threatening injuries in the incident. It is unclear how those injuries were sustained.

Mayor Bill de Blasio visited the wounded detective and the two other officers that suffered minor injuries.

O'Neill said the suspect has "a number of arrests," but did not get into specifics.

Police recovered a cleaver at the scene. It can be seen at left.

Back in 2014, a group of officers were attacked by a man wielding a hatchet in Queens.

Officer Kenneth Healey was hit in the head, but survived.

Another officer and a bystander were also injured.
Three busloads of Maspeth, Queens residents took their protest against a homeless shelter in their neighborhood directly to the front door of a top city official. NY1's Ruschell Boone filed the following report.

After weeks of protesting in Queens, they got on a bus and took the fight to Brooklyn, right to the doorstep of the head of the Human Resources Administration.

More than 150 Maspeth residents and their supporters chanted for an hour in front of Commissioner Steven Banks' Windsor Terrace home to protest the city's plan to turn the Holiday Inn Express on 55th Road into a 115-bed homeless shelter.

"There are plenty of shelters already," said one resident. "We have done our share."

"Now he wants to do it in Maspeth?" said another. "It's not going to happen."

The group has been protesting the proposal since August. Last week, they celebrated when the hotel owner said he no longer had plans to convert it into a shelter, but the city angered the residents when it said it was still pushing forward.

"We are going to continue to protest until we know this is going to be a done deal. And you can take that to the bank," said one resident.

It's not clear if the commissioner was home at the time of the protest, but the group was loud as they marched through the streets. They were even louder in front of his home.

As they protested, there were a lot of residents on this block who were upset. One woman got into a shouting match with the protesters, but they quickly shouted her down.

"Take it to City Hall. Don't bring it to a private block," said one resident.

In response to the protest, the city issued a statement, saying, "Intimidation and threats are not how we resolve problems in New York City. The City will continue to engage with community members regarding this proposal, but New York City will not stand for the harassment of a government official and his family at their home."

The residents put out their own statement, saying, "Since when are peaceful protests equivalent to 'intimidation and threats?' As I recall, it was Mayor de Blasio who made sure he got arrested protesting the closure of Long Island College Hospital while chanting, 'No hospital, no peace.'"

As for the fight over the shelter, these Maspeth residents say the city can expect to see more of these types of protests.
NEW YORK - Bill Bratton walked out of 1 Police Plaza one last time as police commissioner Friday afternoon after he submitted his formal resignation to Mayor Bill de Blasio.

Bratton walked alongside his wife to heavy applause and cheers from hundreds of officers.

In his resignation, Bratton strongly praised de Blasio, saying, in part, "In leading six different police departments across the country in the past 35 years, I have never been resourced or more fully supported by any mayor."

I will never forget or fail to honor the achievements of @CommissBratton. Thank you for your friendship and service. pic.twitter.com/P8ai0fG5l0  Bill de Blasio (@BilldeBlasio) September 16, 2016

De Blasio hired Bratton to keep crime low and improve police-community relations. Bratton's newly sworn-in replacement, James O'Neill, says that will continue with an emphasis on neighborhood policing.

"I'm going to make sure it is fully implemented and we do our best to get to know the people that we took that oath to protect and serve," O'Neill said.

Let's do this together #NYC. All communities have to feel they're understood by #NYPD & know they're treated fairly. pic.twitter.com/4PGN7F8Vli  Commissioner O'Neill (@NYPDONeill) September 16, 2016

The 68-year-old has been police commissioner since 2014, and previously served in the same role under former Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. He also previously served as chief of transit police.

Honored & privileged to have led the Finest police department in the world. Thanks to all the members for all you do pic.twitter.com/zHiS2gDmV4  Bill Bratton (@CommissBratton) September 16, 2016

Bratton is taking a job with the advisory firm Teneo once he leaves the NYPD.
Governor Andrew Cuomo is allocating more state money to help the city's homeless, but those funds require the approvals of both the Assembly speaker and the Senate majority leader, and neither has signed off on Cuomo's plan. Zack Fink filed the following report.

An agreement among state leaders calls for the release of $2 billion in state funds, the bulk of which would be used for supportive housing with services for the homeless. That memo requires the signatures of the Assembly speaker and the Senate majority leader. But this week, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced that he alone had signed it, bypassing a negotiated agreement.

"What the governor did, in my opinion, was try to negotiate, try to get there that way, which is always the best way to start. Hasn't been successful yet," said Christine Quinn, CEO of Win. "He is now trying a newer and more aggressive route, which often works for Andrew Cuomo."

The deal came about during the negotiations for the state budget in March. The funds were agreed to, but wouldn't be released until all three leaders could work out the final points. As the end of session approached, it became clear that negotiations on this issue were not taking place, and that made some lawmakers like Assemblyman Andrew Hevesi very concerned.

"Technically, it can get negotiated later. The practicalities? There is no shot," Hevesi said. "Everybody goes back to their district in an election year. Nobody's going to be focused. Nobody's going to want to cut a deal."

There is still no deal, although Cuomo appears to be trying to force one. Meantime, the Manhattan Institute is out with a new report that says supportive housing should be prioritized for homeless individuals who are mentally ill, even though advocates say 70 percent of those in shelters are families with kids.

"We are spending a lot of money on homelessness," said Stephen Eid of the Manhattan Institute. "There is no end in sight to homelessness. There is no end in sight to the untreated problem of mental illness. Let's make sure that we are putting these resources to the highest and best use."

"I agree we need to have a priority for the mentally ill. But we cannot also leave behind folks who are recovering from substance abuse issues, domestic violence," Quinn said.

A spokesman for Hevesi says they have referred the matter the Ways and Means Committee for an opinion. Once they receive that opinion, they will be more likely to comment publicly.
But the decision for a remote memorial didnt directly resolve the problem of the site itself. Newtown decided to reorient the driveway to the school, the place where parents and emergency medical workers lived out the horror of that day. The community also decided to avoid building on the footprint of the site of the shooting: the two first-grade classrooms, lobby and hallway near the schools entrance. By defining the sacred ground of Sandy Hook as this smaller footprint, instead of the entire site, the people of Newtown could return to the old site but avoid violating its sacredness.

Here again, Columbine offers a useful point of comparison. There, the community did not demolish the school but redesigned it specifically to address the problem of endlessly seeing murder at the site. The renovated Columbine, centered on a giant mural suspended from the ceiling of the cafeteria, was an attempt to pull the gaze away from the violence of that day in the past. We wanted heads to be lifted, not hung, wondering: Where did that child die? said Dawn Anna Townsend, whose daughter was murdered in the schools library, at the ceremony that inaugurated the new space. In order to transform their gaze, the community decided that they had to re-enter the traumatized space itself and find a new way to look. But in Newtown, they didnt feel they could look again, and so they eradicated it and built a fence.

I happened to discover it only by accident, in early photos of the construction site. Late in 2013, the site had been wiped clean; not a shred of the former Sandy Hook building existed. During that first phase of construction, the site was basically a big empty clearing in the woods and two fences: the perimeter fence for the entire site, and inscribed within it, a green square fence. It really did resemble a kind of temple space, with nested zones of inviolability: Within the perimeter fence, only those who had signed the solemn oath (of nondisclosure) could enter, and into the inner space, nobody was permitted. Through that first winter, the fence remained there, and the snow that collected within it sat soft and untouched. And a fence remained there, protecting the ground, late into the construction project, even after the new building was nearly complete.

This small enclosed piece of land marked the spot where the sacrilege of murder and the sacredness of memory lived in perpetual unhappy paradox, the place where an event whose meaning, if there is one, is so appalling and inaccessible to us, all we can do is put a fence around where it happened and declare it taboo. This fence, a literal emotional barrier, seemed to be the ritual object that allowed Newtown to preserve its most delicately unresolved past, while the rest of site was thrown into the upheaval of construction for the future.

But maybe I was wrong. Perhaps it was just a regular old fence. When I mentioned it to the powers that be, the reactions I encountered seemed to confirm that the fence held a powerful significance to its builders. The architects refused to reply to my questions and directed me to the first selectmans office. Llodras answer was even more telling. She would not confirm or deny the meaning of the fence. And she told me that if I planned to even mention the existence of the fence in this story, she would cease to cooperate with me.

This could be regarded as a sign of denial. I dont think it is. I dont believe the efforts at nondisclosure, for example, were part of an attempt to not see, but rather an effort to see with eyes closed. During that initial meeting in January 2013, First Selectman Llodra reported to the assembled parents on conversations shed had with state and federal agencies. Based on these discussions, she assured her constituents that Newtown would receive a great deal of financial support for any construction project they might propose. The question Llodra had posed to the state powers was, in her words, How big can our dream be? It struck me as an odd way to describe a project with such a horrific impetus. But maybe the new Sandy Hook really was a kind of dream, the playing out of a fantasy that preoccupies survivors of violence: the painful desire for a redo, so that, this time, trauma might be prevented.

By July of this year, when I visited the school on media day, the fence was gone, and the ground it once contained was now a mound of earth, a memorial in everything but name. I discovered that day that Newtowns official policy of silence has almost entirely succeeded. I didnt see any of the dozens of photographers take pictures of the mound. I watched, and winced, as one photographer set up his tripod directly on top of it, to get a better angle of the new building. The reporter at the news conference who asked about memorials apparently didnt realize that a special plot of land was visible through a window only a few feet behind her.

This official silence prevailed until a man named Neil Heslin made a pilgrimage to the site. His son, Jesse Lewis, was murdered at Sandy Hook, somewhere on that plot, in what used to be his first-grade classroom. Heslin told a reporter that he had opposed the project to rebuild at the site, and, having been overruled, decided he wanted the ground clearly marked. He had brought Jesses backpack with him, and, holding it aloft, he knelt down on the mound for a photo.
TORONTO  The face-off begins Friday. At the north end of the Toronto Eaton Centre, a sprawling downtown mall, Nordstrom will open its first store in Canadas largest city. At its south end, an iconic redbrick building houses the newly renovated flagship store of Canadas department store giant, the Hudsons Bay Company, and the first Canadian outlet of its subsidiary, Saks Fifth Avenue.

In the United States, department stores are retrenching. Macys, the countrys largest, recently announced that it was closing 100 stores.

But not so in Canada. Instead, the industry is expanding.

Hudsons Bay, founded in 1670 as a fur trader, has spent $1 billion to renovate many of its 90 stores across the country. With the Eaton Centre location, Nordstrom will have four Canadian stores, and two more are planned. The luxury department store Holt Renfrew has paid $300 million to remake its nine outlets. And La Maison Simons is extending its reach across much of the country, after 175 years of operating only in Quebec.

Several factors are driving the plans. Far fewer department stores compete for shoppers in Canada than in the United States on a per-capita basis. High shipping costs have limited the growth of online shopping in Canada relative to the United States. And, for American retailers, Canada offers an opportunity to grow in a stable and seemingly similar market.
In one of his last acts as New York City police commissioner, William J. Bratton appeared on Thursday with Carmen Farina, the schools chancellor, to announce that the 2015-16 school year was the safest on record for the citys public schools.

The announcement was made at Leadership and Public Service High School in Lower Manhattan as a way of calling attention to the Education Departments effort to change its approach to discipline. Leadership and Public Service has reduced its number of student suspensions by over 70 percent since the 2012-13 school year by putting in place an approach called restorative justice, which emphasizes the discussion of issues rather than punishment.

Ms. Farina has promoted that approach as a model for the entire public school system as it tries to reduce suspensions and arrests in schools.

Mr. Bratton, whose last day as commissioner is Friday, described 2015-16 as the safest year weve had since 1998, the year the Police Department began tracking data on major crimes in public schools. The number of such crimes  including rape, felony assault, robbery, burglary and grand larceny  was 532 last year, a 13 percent decline from the year before and a 35 percent decline from the 2011-12 school year, said Assistant Chief Brian J. Conroy, the commanding officer of the school safety division.
Because hes being graded on a doofus curve that is unprecedented in presidential politics, Donald Trump said more than a dozen outrageous, scary or untrue things in the last 10 days and got away with all of them. But with at least one statement, marking a profound shift in how the United States would interact with the rest of the world, Trump should be shamed back to his golden throne.

He wants the United States to become a nation that steals from its enemies. Hes already called for war crimes  killing family members of terrorists, torturing suspects. He would further violate the Geneva Conventions by making thieves out of a first-class military.

It used to be to the victor belong the spoils, Trump complained to the compliant Matt Lauer in the now infamous commander-in-chief forum. Oh, for the days when Goths, Vandals and Nazis were free to rape, pillage and plunder. So unfair, as Trump said on an earlier occasion, that we have all sorts of rules and regulations, so the soldiers are afraid to fight.

As with everything in Trumps world, his solution is simple: loot and pilfer. Take the oil, said Trump. He was referring to Iraq, post-invasion. And how would he do this? There would be an open-ended occupation, as a sovereign nations oil was stolen from it. Of course, youd leave a certain group behind, he said, to protect the petro thieves.
It was a good idea, but in 2000, it didnt work. Word didnt spread fast enough, and the internet was still in its infancy. But its worth revisiting.

First, consider the size of the #NeverTrump Republican vote. In 2012 Ohio Republicans went 94 percent for Mitt Romney; President Obama received 5 percent of their votes and 1 percent went to other. This year, because of Mr. Trumps candidacy, the percentage of Republicans who have indicated they are voting for Mrs. Clinton or Mr. Johnson or are unsure is 18.2 percent.

The problem is that in many close states, the number of Republicans who say they will vote for Mr. Johnson or stay at home is larger than the difference in support for Mr. Trump and Mrs. Clinton. Again, in Ohio, if the election were held today, polls predict that Mrs. Clinton would win 6.1 percent of the Republican vote and Mr. Johnson would win 6.2 percent (the additional 5.9 percent is undecided). This could decide the election: The latest Quinnipiac University poll in Ohio has Mr. Trump up by a point, 46 to 45.

Gary Johnson won less than 1 percent of the vote in Ohio in 2012. Has he done anything in four years to improve his lot with Republicans, other than forgetting (or never knowing) about Aleppo, Syria? The only reason for his rise is that so many Republicans back him as a protest vote against Mr. Trump.

At the same time, we hear from many Republican friends in our home states of Louisiana and California, as well as former colleagues here in Washington, that they would vote for Mrs. Clinton if their vote mattered. Too bad they are in deep red or deep blue states, in a system where a handful of states will decide the fate for the country.
A guy walks into a TV studio. His name is Marco Gutierrez, founder of Latinos for Trump, and he is there to defend Donald Trumps merciless immigrant-expulsion plan as tough but necessary, given what he knows about Mexicans.

My culture is a very dominant culture, he says on MSNBC, the day after Mr. Trumps Aug. 31 immigration speech in Phoenix, and its imposing and its causing problems. If you dont do something about it, youre going to have taco trucks on every corner.

Drugs, rape, murder, tacos: Leave it to the Trump crowd to frame the presidential race as a cultural death match. And leave it to Phoenix  border-state capital and overheated epicenter of the great American immigration freakout  to have gone down this road already, years ago.

Mr. Gutierrez, meet Salvador Reza.

Mr. Reza is an American of Mexican ancestry, a day-laborer organizer, military veteran and teacher, who has spent years in Phoenix being a thorn in the side of racist bureaucrats and law enforcement officials, especially Sheriff Joe Arpaio, the countys Trump-supporting, serial immigrant abuser.
My grandfather immigrated to the United States from China almost 100 years ago  on Nov. 16, 1916. Because of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and subsequent similar legislation, there was no open door to the American dream for him. He was able to enter only by buying a piece of paper representing that he was the son of a United States citizen.

My grandfather worked as a waiter in Chinese restaurants in New York for many years. He returned to China only twice  once in the 1920s, when he married my grandmother, and once in the 1930s, when my father was born. Both times he left his family in China to return to the United States. He could not bring his wife or son with him, because of the immigration laws, but he could better support them here in America. He shared a railroad apartment in Chinatown with other Chinese men, and every month, like them, he would buy a money order at the post office and send it home to his family in China.

In 1947, something remarkable happened: My grandfather became an American citizen.

Today I see his journey from a special perspective. I am a federal judge, and like many of my judicial colleagues, I have been able to play a personal role in the process as immigrants from all around the world have become American citizens.

On Sept. 16, the federal courts and many Americans celebrate Constitution Day, which marks the signing of the United States Constitution in Philadelphia in 1787, and Citizenship Day, which celebrates the rights of all Americans. All across the country federal judges are swearing in new Americans.
In an alarming victory for the gun lobby, Missouris Republican-controlled Legislature voted Wednesday to override Gov. Jay Nixons veto and enact a wholesale retreat from gun safety in the state.

The law will let citizens carry concealed weapons in public without a state gun permit, criminal background check or firearms training. It strips local law enforcement of its current authority to deny firearms to those guilty of domestic violence and to other high-risk individuals. And it establishes a dangerous stand your ground standard that will allow gun owners to shoot and claim self-defense based on their own sense of feeling threatened.

The measure has drawn no great national attention, but it certainly provides further evidence that gun safety cannot be left to state lawmakers beholden to the gun lobby. Democrats opposed to the Missouri bill called it a perfect storm of lowered standards for the use of deadly force and an invitation for people to be armed without responsible controls. The measure was enacted by the Republicans, despite strong public opposition and warnings about the threat to public safety from the state Police Chiefs Association. Everytown for Gun Safety, one of the groups fighting the gun lobby, noted that stand your ground laws result in disproportionate harm to communities of color.

Mr. Nixon, a Democrat, vetoed the measure in June, saying it would allow individuals with a criminal record to legally carry a concealed firearm even though they had been, or would have been, denied a permit under the old laws background check. Mayors Sly James of Kansas City and Francis Slay of St. Louis warned against restricting the power of the local police to deny guns to those who commit domestic violence. They cited sharp spikes in domestic violence homicides in their cities, and they noted that the police would be left at greater risk by this bill.
Now there is evidence that these override cases involve a disproportionate number of wrongful convictions. Three of the six Alabama death-row inmates who have been freed from prison since 1981 were condemned by a judge after the jury voted for life, according to a paper published last month in The Yale Law Journal.

The papers authors, Patrick Mulvaney and Katherine Chamblee, both capital-crime defense lawyers, call this discrepancy unsurprising. They attribute it to the phenomenon of residual doubt among capital jurors, who must decide on guilt and punishment in separate phases of a trial. When jurors are faced with a life-or-death decision, they may be confident enough to convict, but not so confident to vote for execution. Beyond a reasonable doubt, in other words, doesnt always mean no doubt at all.

Studies have found that residual doubt of guilt is the most important factor in capital jurors decision to spare someones life  even more than other mitigating factors like childhood trauma  and it may well explain why half of the exonerations in Alabama were cases in which jurors initially voted against death. In each case, prosecutors were found to have withheld exculpatory evidence from the defense. A juror in the trial of Daniel Wade Moore, who was sentenced to death by a judge in 2003 and exonerated in 2009, told the papers authors that even after voting to convict Mr. Moore, he voted for life in prison because he was still unsure about Mr. Moores guilt. In 2010, the trial judge, Glenn Thompson, said he didnt think the state had proven its case, but overrode the jurys vote and sentenced Mr. Moore to death anyway. His explanation? The jury said that he did it.

Judge Thompson, like all Alabama jurists, was elected to his seat, which only increases the pressure to act tough on crime  as judges themselves openly admit. In 2013, Justice Sonia Sotomayor pointed to this problem in her dissent from the Supreme Courts refusal to consider a challenge to Alabamas law. The states judges, she wrote, who are elected in partisan proceedings, appear to have succumbed to electoral pressures.
FRONT PAGE

An article on Aug. 16 about British Jews who have applied for German citizenship since Britain voted to leave the European Union, using information from the German Embassy in London, omitted an eligibility requirement for those seeking citizenship under a 1949 law. German citizenship passes down only through fathers for people born before April 1, 1953, and to a limited degree through mothers for people born through 1973, so it is not the case that all descendants are eligible for citizenship. The article also referred imprecisely to British suspicions about the Jews who arrived in Britain from Germany and Austria before 1939. They were seen as potential enemies and were held in internment camps because they were from enemy states, not because they were Jewish.



An article on Thursday about workers who have been left behind despite the economic recovery misstated in one instance, and in some copies, the surname of a Colorado telecommunications analyst. As the article correctly noted elsewhere, he is David Pilot, not Platt.

NATIONAL

An article on Thursday comparing child-care plans put forth by Donald J. Trump and Hillary Clinton described incorrectly one aspect of the Trump proposal to allow pretax savings accounts for the care of a child. A match of $500 from the government would be available to low-income families, not to all families.



The Interpreter column on Aug. 17, about Donald J. Trumps portrayal of outsiders as a threat to womens safety  a tactic that has long been a mainstay of strongmen and sectarian provocateurs  referred imprecisely to an early example of the phenomenon, a World War I poster encouraging Americans to enlist. The giant ape it featured, carrying a swooning woman in one arm and a club in the other, was not King Kong; that character first appeared in the movie of the same name in 1933, well after the end of the war.
We also speak with the doctor who, more than anyone else, is responsible for our modern expectation that candidates give detailed disclosures about their health: Lawrence K. Altman, a reporter at The New York Times who was the first to interview candidates about their medical histories.

Mr. Altman recalls his tough and sadly prescient question to Ronald Reagan when he was a candidate in 1980 about a potential condition that would later haunt him.

We also hear from voters in Times Square about whether they even care about candidates health. Short answer: not particularly. One voter told us hed be going with Mrs. Clinton over Mr. Trump. Was there anything about her health that might change that? Im pretty sure hes crazy, the man said, and thats more dangerous than her dying in office.

How do I listen? Two ways.

From a desktop or laptop, you can listen by pressing play on the button above.

Or if youre on a mobile device, the instructions below will help you find and subscribe to the series.
Walk into Marianna Kennedys low-lit, generously proportioned house and you are at once seduced by the smell of wood smoke from the many fireplaces and by the distinctive patina of wax that gives the wide board flooring its mellow glow. Colorful resin on the windowpanes lends a stained-glass effect. The decoration is spare, the better to highlight the elegant dentil moldings and the canvases hanging throughout the house, hand-lettered with words and phrases from a 17th-century book of alchemical devices: Dites-Moi, Perseverez, The Marvelous Seed of Love, A Restless Life. These are the artist and designers emblem paintings  elliptical, cheerful, hard to characterize.

Long before Spitalfields had gentrified into a hipsters playground, the Canadian-born Kennedy, in her 50s now, was a fixture on this quaint East London street lined with 18th-century brick houses: a distinctive, bustling figure in her uniform of pleated skirt, mens shirting and stout brogues. As a student at the Slade School of Fine Art, she became involved with the movement to protect and restore the historic area, and for the past 15 years she has lived and worked in the same Georgian house, with a mullioned ground-floor shopfront. This neighborhood has always been my muse, she says. I think the buildings on this street are particularly well suited to being used as we do  as working houses. After all, its how they were intended!
In just over a year, Dilara Findikoglu has established herself as one of Londons most rebellious designers. While studying at Central Saint Martins, the Istanbul-born metalhead organized a guerrilla fashion show for the students who failed to make the shortlist for the press show. (She staged it, intentionally, at the exit of the official one.)

The collection featured violently slashed, heavily embroidered red-black-and-white garments, which have become her signature. This led to a capsule collection that caught the attention of the buyers at Selfridges. Most designers would take that as a cue to make an immediate splash at London Fashion Week and apply for support from the British Fashion Council. But Findikoglu saw it as an opportunity to release a capsule collection of standout pieces by way of a look book she produced herself, and to quickly get to work on a new collection. It will be shown this Sunday  but, in keeping with her anti-establishment ethos, it isnt part of the official London Fashion Week schedule.

Findikoglus aesthetic is unmistakable: she combines 70s tailoring with embroidered motifs borrowed from rock n roll iconography, religious symbols, tattoo mythology and the femme fetish art of the midcentury illustrator John Willie. It started with the idea of girl rock stars with male groupies, she explains in her studio in Hackney, East London. I love metal and glam rock but when you look at how all those straight male stars treated women, its disgusting. I wanted my girls to be the bosses and the boys to be in the band T-shirts. Much like the illustrated motifs on her clothes, Findikoglu is covered in tattoos. Theres a detail from an Ottoman tile on her wrist, a crown on her forearm, song lyrics trailing around her hand and several more inked all over her body.

Its a far cry from her conservative Islamic upbringing. The daughter of a businessman father and a traditional mother, Findikoglu grew up watching once-secular Turkey veer toward religious ideology. She sees her work as an evolving criticism of her countrys government. It has really affected me, she says. Religion is something personal  it shouldnt be used to create wars or exclude people that dont fit into it. The political situation has gotten so bad and its getting worse. She subverts traditional national symbols: A Turkish carpet has been remastered as an overcoat with silver leather sleeves and embroidered badges, sitting alongside rock band T-shirts that have been repaneled into form-fitting styles with conical busts.
The enforcement guidelines give the immigrants rights groups that sued the state over S.B. 1070 the ammunition to go after local law enforcement agencies that flout the law.

The legislators who passed S.B. 1070 were envisioning an Arizona where every police officer would be able to detain people based on their immigration status, and the opinion by the attorney general recognizes for the first time that this is illegal, Cecillia Wang, the director of the A.C.L.U.s Immigrants Rights Project, said in an interview.

While thats a victory, were not done yet, she said. Well be watching every police officer, every sheriffs office in the state to make sure they comply with the constitution.

Mr. Brnovichs enforcement guidelines were part of a settlement of a lawsuit filed in 2010 by the A.C.L.U., the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Education Fund and other advocacy groups soon after Jan Brewer, then the governor of Arizona, signed S.B. 1070 into law.

The lawsuit did not stop lawmakers in two dozen states from introducing similar bills. Five states  Alabama, Georgia, Indiana, South Carolina and Utah  passed laws, but most have been limited by the courts.

In Arizona, Ms. Brewer and Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who built a name for himself as an unapologetic pursuer of undocumented immigrants, became villains to immigration advocates and heroes to those who believed in the need for strong immigration enforcement.

But the law was costly to Arizona, resulting in boycotts and loss of concerts, conventions and business.
WASHINGTON  Donald J. Trump has refused again to acknowledge that President Obama was born in the United States, reviving the so-called birther issue that the Republican presidential nominee has played down since announcing his campaign last year.

The resurfacing of Mr. Trumps doubts about Mr. Obamas birthplace  in an interview with The Washington Post that was published on Thursday  comes less than two months before the general election and as he has been working more aggressively to court minority voters.

Late Thursday, in an effort at damage control, a Trump spokesman issued a statement saying that Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.

But the statement, by Jason Miller, a senior communications adviser, goes on to falsely blame Hillary Clinton for starting rumors about Mr. Obamas birth in the 2008 campaign, and it then called her weak for not getting the question answered.
WASHINGTON  Lawmakers on the House Intelligence Committee unanimously signed a letter to President Obama on Thursday asking him not to pardon Edward J. Snowden, the former intelligence contractor who leaked troves of information about National Security Agency surveillance and data collection in 2013.

We urge you not to pardon Edward Snowden, who perpetrated the largest and most damaging public disclosure of classified information in our nations history, the bipartisan letter said. If Mr. Snowden returns from Russia, where he fled in 2013, the U.S. government must hold him accountable for his actions.

The committee also said it had completed a 36-page report summarizing the results of its multiyear investigation into the leaks and their effect. The report was classified, but the panel released a three-page executive summary that portrayed Mr. Snowden as a serial exaggerator and fabricator who is not a whistle-blower.

Snowden caused tremendous damage to national security, and the vast majority of the documents he stole have nothing to do with programs impacting individual privacy interests  they instead pertain to military, defense and intelligence programs of great interest to Americas adversaries, the report said.
Well be launching a multimillion-dollar digital campaign that talks about whats at stake and how a vote for a third-party candidate is a vote for Donald Trump, who is against everything these voters stand for, said Justin Barasky, a strategist for Priorities USA.

Mrs. Clinton may also get an assist from one Democrat who has been largely quiet about the race, but can testify to the importance of resisting the third-party temptation: former Vice President Al Gore. Her staff has had conversations with aides to Mr. Gore about bringing him onto the campaign trail to emphasize the importance of supporting Mrs. Clinton if they want to make progress on combating climate change.

I can assure you from personal experience that every vote counts, Mr. Gore wrote in an email to The New York Times on Thursday, after a new CBS/New York Times poll showed Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Trump virtually tied. The stakes are high for so many Americans. So I will vote for Hillary Clinton and I strongly encourage others to vote for her as well.

More immediately, the Clinton campaign on Saturday will dispatch two political figures who enjoy a passionate following among young liberals, Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, to Ohio, where public polls show Mrs. Clinton has slipped into a statistical dead heat with Mr. Trump. And Mrs. Clinton will deliver a speech aimed at millennial voters on Monday in Philadelphia before campaigning and giving an economic address in Florida later in the week.

Democrats say that if the race is close in its final stretch, some of the voters who do not want to see Mr. Trump elected may shift on their own accord to Mrs. Clinton to prevent a Trump presidency. But after spending much of the summer hammering Mr. Trump, through both ads and stump speeches, it appears Mrs. Clinton has convinced many voters that Mr. Trump is not qualified to be president but has failed to win them over to her own candidacy.
WASHINGTON  Senator Ted Cruz, who once led a government shutdown in his efforts to defund President Obamas health care law, has turned his sights on a more obscure target: the federal governments plan to end its oversight of the internets master directory of website addresses.

The Republican from Texas does not appear to have the ability to inspire another insurgency so close to an election that will determine control of the Senate. He may not have the interest either. His technical theories about the registration of domain names  the .net and .world suffixes of internet addresses  have been discredited by engineers.

But his move to block the Obama administration through a short-term spending bill needed to keep the government open past Sept. 30 demonstrates that the former Republican presidential candidate remains eager to keep his name in lights, even at the expense of his colleagues efforts to get back to the campaign trail.

I am hopeful and optimistic that leadership will follow through and protect the internet, Mr. Cruz said on Thursday, when asked if he would prevent the short-term spending measure from moving forward without his internet provision.
OTTAWA  A Canadian man who worked with a charity that provided food to North Koreans returned to Canada on Thursday after being held in China on espionage charges for just over two years.

The family of the man, Kevin Garratt, who is from Vancouver, British Columbia, said in a brief statement that he was deported after a court hearing in Dandong, China, on Tuesday.

The Garratt family thanks everyone for their thoughts and prayers, and also thanks the many individuals who worked to secure Kevins release, the statement said.

Mr. Garratts detention dampened relations between Canada and China, particularly under the previous Conservative government. Early this month, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau raised Mr. Garratts case during a visit to China.
MEXICO CITY  As President Enrique Pena Nieto prepared for the beginning of Mexicos Independence Day celebrations, protesters took to the streets of capital on Thursday to demand his resignation.

Chanting Pena out, several thousand mostly young demonstrators marched peacefully past the glass towers of the citys main boulevard, Paseo de la Reforma, in the waning afternoon light, hours before the president, whose government has been buffeted by a series of scandals and a weakening economy, was to formally start the long Independence Day weekend by ringing a bell on the balcony of the National Palace.

I am here because I want my country to have a political system that holds an official accountable for bad performance, said Alberto Serdan, 37, a public policy researcher and blogger. With each crisis, Mr. Serdan added, the government simply loses any notion of dignity and capacity to rule.

Mr. Pena Nieto has become Mexicos most unpopular president in a quarter-century, opinion polls show, as frustrations mount over entrenched corruption and anxiety rises over economic stagnation and an increase in murders to the highest level since he took office.
LONDON  A Russian whistle-blower seeking refuge in Britain dies in bizarre circumstances. There is talk of arcane poison and organized crime. British intelligence services stonewall, citing the imperative of national security without saying why.

Those spy-thriller ingredients might recall the case of Alexander V. Litvinenko, a onetime K.G.B. officer who died after ingesting green tea laced with radioactive polonium 210 in November 2006. The murder, a British judge ruled in January, had probably been approved by President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.

Now, though, there is in an eerily similar drama. This month, a coroner in Woking, England, postponed an inquest into the death of another Russian emigre, Alexander Perepilichnyy, after the British authorities sought to prevent the disclosure of material deemed to be sensitive.

As in the Litvinenko case, the government argued that transparency would jeopardize national security or Britains relationship with foreign countries.
WASHINGTON  President Obama is delaying a planned veto of a bill that would allow the families of victims of the Sept. 11 attacks to sue Saudi Arabia for any role in the plot, hoping to tap into an unusual well of buyers remorse among senators who passed the measure unanimously in the spring.

The measure sailed through the House last week after a surprise last-minute vote, raising the prospect of the first veto showdown between Mr. Obama and a bipartisan coalition in Congress. But an intense lobbying campaign by the White House and Saudi Arabia, among others, has cast doubt on what had appeared to be an inevitable override of the presidents long-expected veto.

Officials have refused to say when Mr. Obama would veto the bill, and he has until next Friday to do so. His advisers are considering whether he should wait until then, after Congress is expected to recess on Thursday for the November elections, which could give him weeks to persuade lawmakers to drop their support for the measure before they return and consider the veto override.

Already, cracks are showing, even among Republicans who generally would love to exercise the first veto override against Mr. Obama.
The Turkish Muslim cleric accused by Turkey of plotting a failed coup two months ago denounced the repression of his supporters on Thursday, calling the crackdown dark pages in world history.

The cleric, Fethullah Gulen, who lives in self-imposed exile in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania, said the arrests, purges and dismissals undertaken by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, a former ally, reflected the behavior of a man seeking to acquire sovereignty unconditionally for himself.

Mr. Gulen accused the government of subjecting his followers to oppression and tyranny.

My heart is aching, he said.

Mr. Erdogan and his subordinates have blamed Mr. Gulen for the coup attempt, which left at least 271 people dead. Mr. Gulen is the overseer of a religious movement that runs schools, charities and other enterprises in a number of countries, but that the Turkish government considers a terrorist organization.
Were not used to computing the scale of a 100,000-year-old piece of ice the size of California thats going to break off from an ice sheet, said the artist and photojournalist Justin Guariglia. Last year, he talked his way on board a NASA mission in Greenland and shot pictures of melting glaciers and sea ices through the drop window of the military transport plane flying very low in the troposphere.

Now, the artist and geoscientists at NASA are formally collaborating to figure out fresh ways to present the effects of climate change to the public. On Friday, at the Global Exchange summit on art and science at Lincoln Center, Mr. Guariglia was announced as the first artist to be embedded on a NASA Greenland mission  joining more low-altitude flights through 2020.

While artists from Robert Rauschenberg to Tom Sachs have worked informally with NASA, Laurie Anderson held the last official residency, terminated more than a decade ago after Congress balked at paying the artist in this context. The new collaboration will be funded with private grants.

The first of Mr. Guariglias monumentally sized images of dying glaciers  digitally printed with more than 140 strata of ink to create a three-dimensional surface in a process pioneered by the artist  go on view next September in Earth Works: Mapping the Anthropocene at the Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach, Fla.
Legislation to safeguard international art loans will be taken up by the full Senate after years of criticism and complaints that the bill amounts to protection for plundered works.

On Thursday the Senate Judiciary Committee, with bipartisan support, approved the Foreign Cultural Exchange Jurisdictional Immunity Clarification Act. It would extend added protections to shield works from seizure while on loan for exhibitions in the United States.

American museum directors and their professional association have argued that foreign museums in countries like Russia are more reluctant to make loans because of costly ownership battles that could entangle foreign powers.

It will help ensure that foreign governments are not discouraged from loaning works, said Christine Anagnos, the executive director of the Association of Art Museum Directors, which supports the bill. Those art exchanges, she said, enable Americans to experience works that they otherwise might not have a chance to see.
AMSTERDAM  Marc Dreesmann remembers well how his father, Anton, a third-generation department-store owner and art collector, hung a particular artwork in pride of place in the entryway of their home in Amsterdam.

The landscape painting of a river view, which Anton bought in 1987 from a Dutch art dealer, had been attributed for years to a little-known, but highly esteemed, Dutch 17th-century printmaker and painter, Hercules Segers. But it had been discredited in the 1970s by a top Segers scholar who said he was uncertain about its authenticity.

Still, Mr. Dreesmann recalled recently, his father was very adamant that everyone had to see the picture and ohhh and ahhh and say how very Segers it was. He added: We were always believers. In 2002, two years after his father died, Marc and his siblings sold their fathers art collection at Christies auction house in London, and Marc bought back the landscape for 94,000 pounds, or $135,000 at the time.

His belief in the work has now been corroborated. New research has led the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam to conclude that six new works  all of them in private collections, like Mr. Dreesmanns  should be part of the Segers canon.
HONG KONG  After a customer canceled a large order at the last minute, shares in Aixtron, a German high-tech company, sank fast. Months later, with the stock still reeling, a Chinese investor agreed to buy the company.

If only it were as simple as smart deal-making.

Financial filings and public statements indicate a web of relationships among the customer, the buyer and the Chinese state. The links highlight the blurred lines between increasingly acquisitive Chinese companies and Beijings long-term industrial policy.

The Aixtron case makes it very clear: It is not regular investment that is at work here, said Sebastian Heilmann, president of the Mercator Institute for China Studies, a think tank based in Berlin. Instead, we see governmental-program capital working behind the scenes.

Chinese leaders have made clear their intention of using state funds to acquire technological capabilities overseas and bring them home, and a series of purchases in recent years have highlighted that strategy.
Mutual funds that mimic the strategies of hedge funds  the so-called liquid alternatives sector  were the hottest investments a few years ago. And, despite lagging returns and setbacks at several funds, retail investors have continued to stick with them.

This could all be about to change, though.

In the last five months, investors have pulled $5.1 billion from liquid alts. Even the market leader has been unable to shake off lackluster performance.

Why then, after sticking with them for so long, are investors finally turning around?

Because painting with a broad brush, performance has really been underwhelming, and fees are probably still too high, according to Jason Kephart, an alternative investments analyst at Morningstar.

The other issue is that they are sold as an alternative to risky and richly-priced stocks and bonds.
But like Wall Street firms, Wells Fargo had an incentive system that rewarded cross-selling, which is banking lingo for selling more and more products to the same customer. So, a checking account customer would be offered a Wells Fargo credit card, or a home-equity loan, or a mortgage. You get the idea.

Wells Fargo employees got big bonuses for cross-selling. That is typical on Wall Street of course, which is not to say it is a good thing. (In fact, the Wall Street compensation system remains deeply flawed.) But somehow, 5,300 of these Wells employees thought it was perfectly fine to open deposit and credit card accounts for millions of customers at the bank without their permission or authorization. They then could claim a new account had been opened, satisfy their sales quotas and collect a bigger bonus. Nice work if you can get it  and entirely illegal, unethical and unacceptable. It is also a symptom of the wider cultural cancer that has pervaded Wall Street for decades. (Three separate United States attorneys have issued subpoenas to the bank seeking more information about the wrongdoing.)

Carrie Tolstedt, the divisional senior vice president for community banking, was the person responsible for Wellss 6,000 branches where the infractions took place. When she retired, quietly, in July, the bank knew that her operation had been under scrutiny for sales tactics for more than a year. Ms. Tolstedt spent 27 years at Wells Fargo, and was no doubt steeped in the banks culture. In the last three years, she was paid a total of $27 million. She remains employed at the bank until the end of the year. When she leaves, she will probably be able to take with her nearly $125 million in stock and options, her reward for longevity and seniority. But wheres the accountability?

That is basically the question that Jim Cramer put to John G. Stumpf, Wells Fargos chairman and chief executive, in an interview on CNBC on Tuesday. He asked Mr. Stumpf why Wells Fargo did not claw back Ms. Tolstedts compensation and accrued stock. It is the right question and the bank should do exactly that, because this is the precise situation where such clawback provisions are relevant. But Mr. Stumpf deflected. Jim, to the extent thats a consideration, theres a board process, Mr. Stumpf said.
In an online discussion on Reddit this week, former Wells employees swapped grim stories about the dichotomy between their ethics training  where they were formally told not to do anything inappropriate  and the on-the-job reality of a relentless push to meet sales goals that many considered unrealistic.

Mr. Kellogg said he was constantly being hounded by his supervisor to increase his sales, or solutions, as they were known.

I was always getting written up for failing to bump my solutions numbers up, he said.

Some of his co-workers, facing the same pressure, bent the rules, said Mr. Kellogg, who was making $11.75 an hour when he left the bank in 2012. They would ask local business owners whom they knew well to open additional accounts as favors, saying they could close them later.

It seems as though youd have to be willfully ignorant to believe that these goals are achievable through any other means, Mr. Kellogg said.

During our training we go through SO much training about ethics and how you CANNOT do that, another former Wells teller wrote in the Reddit forum. I got threatened to be fired as a teller with them because I wasnt meeting my numbers. I told them I didnt believe in trying to convince someone to spend money they dont have, get what they dont need.

Bank employees were expected to hit sales goals as part of their regular duties. If they hit the goals, it also factored into their yearly bonus. The bank said the goals were only one of several factors used to evaluate an employees job performance. But some former employees said they worried that they would lose their jobs if they did not meet them.

Other former Wells employees have vented their frustrations in a series of cartoon videos on YouTube that spoof on the banks hard-driving culture  and the fact that they were hardly getting rich from hitting their bosses targets. In one video, a cartoon banker drones on: If tellers and bankers make those sales numbers each day, at the end of the month everybody in the branch will get a $5 gift card to McDonalds. The district manager will get a $10,000 cash bonus.
LOS ANGELES  The Disney ABC Television Group, grappling with industrywide upheaval in viewing and delivery, on Friday moved to reinforce its senior management team.

Bruce Rosenblum, who formerly served as the No. 1 television executive at Warner Bros., will join the Disney ABC Television Group as president of business operations. Disney said in a news release that Mr. Rosenblum would oversee global distribution, digital media, strategy and other departments for networks that include ABC, Disney Channel, Freeform and Disney XD. (ESPN will not be part of his portfolio.)

Mr. Rosenblum, 58, who left Warner in 2013 after being publicly passed over for the chairman job at that studio, will report to Ben Sherwood, 52, president of the Disney ABC Television Group. Mr. Sherwood, who helped produce the movie Charlie St. Cloud before joining Disney, said in an interview that he would spend more time on creative matters, which is Hollywood shorthand for series conception and execution.
Also looming over The Times is the question of who will take over as publisher when Arthur Sulzberger Jr. steps aside. At the companys annual meeting in May, Mr. Sulzberger said succession planning had begun and that by next May the company will have named a deputy publisher, a position that traditionally precedes an appointment to publisher. Mr. Baquet said a decision on the deputy publisher would come soon.

In the newsroom, Mr. Kahns promotion was less of a surprise than Ms. Chiras decision to leave her role as the main masthead editor overseeing daily news coverage. Ms. Chira said the move was her decision and that this was her next chapter at The Times.

Dean would have loved for me to stay on the masthead, but I decided that this change was an opportunity for me, Ms. Chira said in an interview. She said she had loved working with Mr. Baquet and the other deputy executive editors, but as the situation changed, I thought, you know I have been basically on the treadmill of breaking news for 13 years and she wanted to focus more on gender issues and writing.

In her new role, Ms. Chira, who was previously the foreign editor for The Times for eight years and has helped oversee coverage that has won multiple Pulitzer Prizes, will cover gender for both the Opinion section and the newsroom. She will also help the editor of a new unit focused on gender issues that The Times plans to create. Ms. Chira has long been a champion of women in the newsroom.

The other two deputy executive editors, Matthew Purdy and Janet Elder, will become deputy managing editors. Mr. Purdy, 60, will continue to oversee investigations and enterprise, while taking on additional responsibilities involving daily news coverage. Ms. Elder, 60, will continue her role running newsroom operations and personnel.

In a note to the staff on Friday, Mr. Baquet said Mr. Kahns primary responsibility in the next year would be to lead our efforts to build The Times of the future, and to grapple with questions of what we cover going forward, and what our desks should look like. In his new role, Mr. Kahn will be in charge of putting into effect changes proposed by a group that is working to prepare and transform the newsroom for a digital future.

Mr. Kahn said in an interview that while he will be more focused on strategy in his role, he will also have a hand in the daily newsroom report. He expects to attend news meetings, he said, and will be involved with big stories. I dont think its going to be 80 percent of my time, Mr. Kahn said about his day-to-day coverage responsibilities. But its going to be a lot bigger than zero.
It is fair to say that the majority of Londons fashion industry were not in favor of Brexit, Caroline Rush, chief executive of the British Fashion Council, said in an interview. So the priority for us since has been to meet with as many people here as possible to hear concerns and give them access to advice around potential challenges like intellectual property regulations, trading tariffs and visas.

The council, Ms. Rush added, has joined forces with other arts-based industry bodies to communicate with the government in a unified voice.

Lulu Kennedy, the founder of the fashion incubator Fashion East, suggested that while her organizations criteria traditionally required a candidate to have a business based in Britain, she now would be willing to consider nonresidents.

And Ms. Katrantzou, a Greek who started her business in London after graduating from the Central Saint Martins masters program in 2009, and who was scheduled to show her latest collection on Sunday, noted that Only 15 percent of the employees in my company are British  that says a lot about the type of people we can attract by being in London.

They all have diverse upbringings and perspectives, and came to the city to be part of and inspired by its vibrant arts scene, she said. I chose to live and work in London precisely because it is such a cultural magnet for creatives, and in proximity to the schools and established brands. Will future designers get that now?

Leaders of the citys art and design schools emphasize that the answer to Ms. Katrantzous question is yes  and say that they are working closely with the office of the London mayor, Sadiq Khan, to secure the best possible outcome from a Brexit. Nigel Carrington, the vice chancellor of University of the Arts London, which includes Central Saint Martins, said that the schools had told current students they would be able to stay in the country, and that they have been evaluating the potential impact on foreign students fees and the flow of graduate talent. (Historically, students from European Union members have paid the same fees as British students.)
Mr. Lightfoot, who was released from state prison in 2014, was in the courtroom as one former officer after another was sentenced during a proceeding that lasted nearly three hours. Afterward, he declined through his lawyer to comment.

Lawrence Piergrossi, a prosecutor, praised Mr. Lightfoot in court for coming forward to report the beating by the officers, which occurred in a cell used for searching inmates. What was supposed to be left in that search pen  because of Jahmal Lightfoots courage  has been brought to light, Mr. Piergrossi said.

The former officers, none of whom testified at trial, were portrayed by their lawyers as devoted family men and dedicated public servants without criminal records. Mr. Perez, his lawyer said, had helped with rescue efforts after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Mr. Rodriguezs youngest child was born during the trial. Others were described by their lawyers as caring for aging or sick parents, and serving in their churches.

Several of the defense lawyers said their clients were appealing the guilty verdicts.

Nine former and current correction officers were tried together last spring in connection with the beating of Mr. Lightfoot and subsequent effort to cover it up. Five were found guilty by a jury; three, who chose a bench trial, were found guilty by Justice Barrett.

The verdicts were a major victory for the Bronx district attorney, Darcel D. Clark, a Democrat, who has made prosecuting crimes committed by anyone at Rikers a priority. Law enforcement officials in New York and elsewhere have struggled to successfully prosecute correction officers accused of brutality, in part because of negative perceptions of, and credibility problems with, victims accused or convicted of crimes.

Mr. Lightfoot testified during the trial that it was open season for the officers to pummel him mercilessly with their fists and boots even as he curled into a fetal position on the floor. The attack left him with injuries that included two fractured eye sockets.

Defense lawyers, who rested their case without calling any witnesses, argued that their clients had committed no wrongdoing. They said Mr. Lightfoot had been found with a sharp metal object during a routine search of inmates, and had then disregarded the officers repeated orders to drop the object. Mr. Lightfoot, the defense lawyers said, was injured while being forcibly restrained by officers who were simply doing their jobs.
William J. Bratton marked his final day as New York City police commissioner on Friday by strolling through a receiving line of hundreds of officers, a joyful smile on his face as he exited Police Headquarters to applause and the wail of bagpipes, which all but drowned out a small number of protesters.

The officers, assembled in their dress uniforms for the Police Departments traditional send-off, known as a walkout, were joined by a host of other well-wishers, among them Mayor Bill de Blasio.

The event signaled the end of Mr. Brattons second stint running the department, and a changing of the guard for the nations largest municipal police force. It also was the conclusion of a law enforcement career spanning more than four decades, during which Mr. Bratton also led agencies in Los Angeles and Boston, and became one of the most influential figures in American policing.

Recruited to return to New York after Mr. de Blasio was elected mayor in 2013, Mr. Bratton boasted of continued efforts to drive down crime, as the city became far safer than it was when he first took over the Police Department, in 1994.
SOFIA, Bulgaria  As I was boarding a Turkish Airlines flight to Ankara some days ago, a flight attendant handed me a slickly produced brochure telling the story of the failed coup attempt of July 15. It praised the Turkish people and their spirited defense of democracy, and it blamed the Gulen movement that allegedly organized the coup, portraying it as the sort of dark religious conspiracy that youd expect to find in a Dan Brown novel.

The patriotic brochure foreshadowed much of what I was to hear from government ministers, independent journalists and opposition leaders during my visit in the country. These very different individuals, often coming from opposite political camps, were in lock step on one thing: The July 15 coup attempt was completely unexpected (in a country that had endured four coups in recent decades), and for that reason deeply traumatic. And to a person, they blamed the Gulenists.

That sense of surprise helps to explain how an ill-managed coup that seemed to end as soon as it began could nevertheless send shock waves through the country. For a brief frightening moment, Turks confronted the possibility of being drawn into a bloody civil war. Whats more, the West responded with a combination of halfhearted condemnation of the coup plotters and a wait-and-see realpolitik.

But while Turks have reason to be angry with the Western reaction, Ankaras official narrative suffers from its own tendentious blinders. It has blamed the malicious influence of the religious leader Fethullah Gulen, although support for the coup was much broader. To hear the ruling Justice and Development Party tell it, the Gulenists are to blame for the governments crackdown on protesters in Gezi Park in Istanbul in 2013 and the shooting down of a Russian plane on the Turkish-Syrian border last fall. Some even accuse them of masterminding Turkeys resistance to a joint American-Turkey military operation against the Islamic State in Syria.
To the Editor:

Re Rid the World of Wahabbism (Op-Ed, Sept. 14):

Mohammad Javad Zarif, Irans foreign minister, raises a number of concerns about Wahabbism and the role it has played, particularly as an ideology that some in the Muslim world blame for inspiring terrorism.

Unfortunately, in making these important points, Mr. Zarif ignores the Iranian regimes own role in generating, supporting and inspiring international terrorism.

Whether it is the destruction of the Jewish community building in Argentina in 1994, or the creation of the international terrorist group Hezbollah, or the execution of uncounted innocent Iranian citizens, Iran has well earned the sobriquet as the worlds leading state sponsor of terrorism.

Yes, the Saudis need to listen to those who raise concerns about the effect of Wahabbism on Islamic extremism. Still, it is laughable for Mr. Zarif to lay all the blame on the Saudis when it is the Iranian regime that long ago set in motion the nihilist culture of international terrorism that plagues the world today.
To the Editor:

How to Stop North Korea, by Joel S. Wit (Op-Ed, Sept. 13), rightly notes that North Korea has considerably advanced its nuclear and missile programs by conducting 17 missile tests and two nuclear tests in 2016. It also calls for a new diplomatic initiative to halt Pyongyangs nuclear and missile advances.

A starting point could be the 2012 Leap Day accord, which required North Korea to suspend nuclear and missile tests in exchange for economic assistance.

The revival of this initiative would prevent North Korea from conducting any more nuclear tests and from perfecting two new missiles it tested in 2016: a solid-fuel, submarine-launched missile and a mobile intermediate-range missile that is the building block for an intercontinental missile.

This could be followed by accords that borrow from the 2007, 2005 and 1994 nuclear agreements, and the unfinalized 2000 missile deal, which froze and rolled back North Koreas nuclear and missile programs.
Looking to become a homesteader these days? As of May 2, a new Russian law provides for a free land grant of 2.5 acres to any citizen willing to move to a vast territory along Russias Pacific Coast and Chinas border. This is Russias Wild Far East, at 2.4 million square miles almost three times the size of Alaska, Washington State and Oregon combined, but populated by merely 6.3 million people.

Still, many Russians are suspicious of the governments offer. For good reason. During Russias privatization phase in the 1990s, each citizen was issued a voucher for shares in government-owned enterprises. Very quickly, most of these shares ended up in the hands of a few people who became billionaires. Some suspect that this may be another such scheme to enrich a few well-connected Russians, who would buy up the land and bring in Chinese laborers.

Indeed, a large and increasing number of Chinese workers are already in Russia, and this is a delicate issue in itself  a case in point of a fundamental challenge to Russias future from a convergence of stresses: a weak and corruption-riddled economy, declining population, vast distances and a great diversity of ethnic minorities craving more autonomy.

Take the Far East as an example:

Russia urgently needs Chinese investments. In return, in the Far Easts southeast corner, China has made Russian land along the Amur River border a virtual colony, having secured the right for Chinese people to work there. In the last decade, huge tracts have been leased to China at rock- bottom prices. Nearly two million acres with gigantic pig farms and fields of soybean and corn are being worked by Chinese agribusinesses. Most recently, Moscow leased out about 300,000 acres in the Trans-Baikal region for 49 years. The price: $2 an acre and $368 million in promised investments.
To answer your question directly, I am not compelled to buy or sell Clinton contracts (that pay off $1 if she wins) at $0.70 . Of course, that is because I trust my model.

No More Waiting for Results on Election Day

Q. What is your impression of the wisdom and fairness of doing live forecasting on Nov. 8? What if people hear results and decide to stay home? The Times reported recently on a plan that could permanently change the way Americans experience Election Day.

The company spearheading the effort, VoteCastr, plans real-time projections of presidential and Senate races in Colorado, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. It plans to publish a map and tables of its projected results on Slate, the online newsmagazine.

A. PredictWise will have a lot of Election Day predictions that will approach 0 and 100 percent as the day unfolds. That is the nature of real-time updating market data that powers predictions. And I was happy to call the election for Obama well before 11 p.m. Eastern in 2012.

I am not concerned about how the Slate-Votecastr plan will affect voting. Voting is a major cost for many Americans with hourly wage jobs. Those people who choose to get registered and vote are pretty committed to voting. They are more likely going to fixate on any projection that rationalizes voting than a particular projection that unmotivates them.

If Slate reports the election is tight, people will use that to rationalize their decision to vote. If Slate reports that Clinton is winning, Clinton supporters will use that to rationalize winning big. And Trumps supporters will turn to Fox News to confirm that Trump still has a strong chance and needs them more than ever. That is why Karl Rove was still predicting a Romney victory to the very end; he knew that some people just needed someone to convince them that it was worth the investment to stay in line to vote.

The Ground Game

Q. You have said that you expect prediction markets and polling averages to converge in the weeks leading up to the election, as they typically would, but with a possible exception this time around: the influence of the ground game. If the Trump campaigns organization is poor and the prediction markets pick up on that, there could be a rare divergence, you said in one of your live Facebook chats. You gave an example earlier of how this could affect Pennsylvania. But how could markets discern something like poor campaign organization?

A. The average of the polls near Election Day, for any given race, are off by two-three points on average, but we do not know which direction that will be. The error occurs because polls systemically undercount or overcount some groups of likely voters. On average, there is no bias for either the Democratic or Republican candidates.

As a researcher, it has been very difficult to determine the effect of the campaigns, because all we get to witness is the net effect of both campaigns spending a fortune. But we are poised to witness the greatest imbalance ever in advertising and ground game spending. Clinton raised $143 million to Trumps $90 million in August.
An Iowa teenager who was accused of sexually assaulting a 1-year-old girl while the act was recorded will not serve further jail time after he pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of engaging in a lascivious act with a child.

A judge this week gave the teenager, Kraigen Grooms, 19, a 10-year suspended sentence and five years of supervised release, according to KTVO, a local television station. He must also register as a sex offender.

He was released after 2 years and four months in jail when he pleaded guilty in July.

Some public reaction to the sentencing this week centered on whether the sentence was strong enough. A man whose Facebook page about missing children and fugitives helped investigators identify the defendant was particularly disappointed.

He needs to be locked up and have some intensive sex offender treatment, Tim Caya, who runs the Locate the Missing page, said in an interview.
Donald J. Trump publicly retreated from his birther campaign on Friday, tersely acknowledging that President Obama was born in the United States  and effectively conceding that the conspiracy theory he had promoted for years was baseless.

Mr. Trump made no apology for and took no questions about what had amounted to a five-year-long smear of the nations first black president. Instead, he claimed, falsely, that questions about Mr. Obamas citizenship were initially stirred by the Democratic presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton, in her unsuccessful primary contest against Mr. Obama in 2008.

Still, Mr. Trumps brief remarks, tacked on to the end of a campaign appearance with military veterans at his new hotel in downtown Washington, represented a sharp reversal from a position he had publicly maintained, over howls of outrage from all but the far-right extreme of the political spectrum, since 2011.

President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period, Mr. Trump said. Now, we all want to get back to making America strong and great again.
The first presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald J. Trump this month will exclude two leading third-party nominees  Gary Johnson of the Libertarian Party and the Green Partys Jill Stein  the Commission on Presidential Debates announced on Friday.

The failure to be invited to the Sept. 26 debate at Hofstra University deals a significant blow to Mr. Johnson and Ms. Stein, who are desperate for national exposure to promote their long-shot bids for the White House. Their running mates will also not be allowed to participate in the vice-presidential debate on Oct. 4, the commission said.

Mr. Johnson and Ms. Stein were excluded because they did not reach an average of 15 percent support in the five national polls that the commission used as a benchmark. Mr. Johnson, a former Republican governor of New Mexico who is polling in double-digits in many state polls, reached 8.4 percent and Ms. Stein reached 3.2 percent.

Candidates from smaller parties have complained to the commission, arguing that the threshold is too high for candidates who lack vast resources or name recognition. Mr. Johnson, who has acknowledged that he has little chance of becoming president if he is not allowed to debate, has started a petition that collected more than 800,000 signatures urging the commission to include him.
Mrs. Clinton became sick. Several polls tightened to the margin of panic, with Mr. Trump overtaking her in surveys in Ohio and Florida. And even as Democrats hoped on Friday that Mr. Trumps latest gambit  seeking to distance himself from his long history of birtherism  would backfire, there is a fear that no scandal can sink him.

A cartoon in The New Yorker captured it best: A woman sits in her psychiatrists office, perspiring in distress. The doctor scribbles on a pad. Im giving you something for Hillarys pneumonia, the caption reads.

Supporters of Mrs. Clinton have greeted the moment with varying degrees of alarm, according to interviews with dozens of them across the country.

They read warily about the health of her lungs and her swing-state field operations. They reassure one another by reminding themselves of President Obamas two winning campaigns, which encountered similar fits of concern after Labor Day.

But even some zealous Clinton defenders have grown frustrated with their candidate, marveling at the prospect of her snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, for which some say they would never forgive her. The campaigns decision last week not to acknowledge Mrs. Clintons pneumonia until two days after a diagnosis, once video surfaced of her stumbling out of a Sept. 11 memorial service on Sunday, has especially rankled.

They kept it from us, said Sonia Ascher, 74, a former campaign volunteer, sitting with her husband and son at a coffee shop in Portsmouth, N.H. It was just another thing again, another mistake, which she really cant afford right now.
Mr. Trumps problems with women are significant: 55 percent of female respondents say he does not respect women and about half think a Trump presidency would be bad for women. Only 11 percent think electing him would be good for women, while 45 percent of women say Mrs. Clintons election would benefit them.

Mrs. Clintons nomination has done little to reverse womens perceptions of gender discrimination in America, and in many cases, their views differ sharply from mens.

Image Cheers at the Democratic National Convention in July as Hillary Clinton was nominated as the partys presidential nominee. Credit... Damon Winter/The New York Times

Forty-eight percent of women  but just 35 percent of men  think there are more advantages in being a man than in being a woman in society today. Majorities of women with a college degree, those who identify as Democrats, those younger than 30, those with household incomes of at least $100,000, and black women all say men hold an advantage.

Asked to name the most important problem facing women today, women cited issues related to gender inequality in the workplace, primarily pay, more than any other. Gender divisions were particularly pronounced on issues related to the workplace. Three-quarters of women said women in the United States are paid less than men doing similar work, while 55 percent of men held the same opinion.
WASHINGTON  A major criminal-justice overhaul bill seemed destined to be the bipartisan success story of the year, consensus legislation that showed lawmakers could still rise above politics.

Then the election, Donald J. Trumps demand for law and order and a series of other political calculations got in the way.

Senate Republicans divided on the wisdom of reducing federal mandatory minimum sentences. Other Republicans, unhappy that President Obama was reducing hundreds of federal prison sentences on his own, did not want to give him a legacy victory. A surge in crime in some urban areas gave opponents of the legislation a new argument.

Now, the Senate authors of the legislation say it is effectively dead.

I do believe it is over, said Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate, who put considerable effort into difficult negotiations with Republicans to strike a compromise. We missed an opportunity.
WASHINGTON  A few hours after Donald J. Trump publicly backed away from a $1 trillion tax cut for small businesses, campaign aides on Thursday privately assured a leading small-business group that Mr. Trump in fact remained committed to the proposal  winning the groups endorsement.

The campaign then told the Tax Foundation, a conservative-leaning Washington think tank it asked to price the plan, that Mr. Trump had indeed decided to eliminate the tax cut.

Call it the trillion-dollar lie: Both assertions cannot be true.

At issue is whether Mr. Trumps plan would tax small businesses, partnerships and other passthrough entities at the same 15 percent rate as large corporations, as he proposed last year, or whether they would continue to pay individual income taxes, at rates as high as 33 percent.

The campaigns conflicting accounts of its own proposal are particularly remarkable because Mr. Trump and his advisers have taken months to refine the details, which Mr. Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, unveiled in an economic policy speech on Thursday in New York.
Simmering tension between Donald J. Trump and the television networks that cover him entered an extraordinary new phase on Friday, as a consortium of news executives refused to participate in a media session with Mr. Trump after his aides barred a producer from attending.

In a quickly arranged conference call, the network bureau chiefs who oversee the pooled television coverage of Mr. Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, agreed to forgo coverage of a tour of his new luxury hotel in Washington, declining the access because the Trump campaign would allow in only a cameraman, and not a reporter or producer who could ask questions of the candidate.

It was an unusual show of solidarity by a television news industry that has profited handsomely from Mr. Trumps success, even as its journalists have been routinely taunted and confounded by a candidate with a penchant for lies and bullying.

But Friday also brought perhaps the news medias most ignominious moment yet.

Mr. Trump extracted nearly an hour of uninterrupted airtime from the cable news networks to promote his hotel, after promising a major revelation and a news conference about his views on President Obamas birthplace. In a break from typical practice, the networks televised the speeches of supporters who were introducing Mr. Trump, a privilege rarely granted during appearances by the Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton.
You simply cannot have a large concentration of people living in a city without a properly functioning water and sewer system, said Marc Edwards, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Virginia Tech University, who is credited with uncovering the cause of the water crisis in Flint, Mich.

Many of the weakening systems in the nation are not just old. In some cities, pipes were made of lead, commonly used before its dangers were known. Two years ago, Flint became a symbol of what can happen when a neglected water system fails its community.

Some cities, though, have taken action.

Boston recently completed a 30-year project to clean the citys harbor. It built the Deer Island Sewage Treatment Plant, and has replaced much of the citys sewer pipes at a total cost of $4 billion.

Chicago committed $1.4 billion in 2012 to repair portions of its 4,300-mile network of pipelines and water treatment systems. The city of Tampa, Fla., which discharged 1.7 million gallons of waste because of Hermine, approved a $250 million plan to fix its storm-water system over 30 years, said Harry Cohen, the chairman of the Tampa City Council. Mr. Cohen said city officials hoped to complete the project sooner, within 10 years.

Here in St. Petersburg, the city has a plan to spend $100 million over the next five years to overhaul its pipes. To some here, though, its not soon enough.

Hermine, a Category 1 hurricane, left cities and counties across Florida and the Eastern Seaboard soaked. Florida suffered roughly $1 billion in economic damage, according to the risk-management group Karen Clark & Company, which is headquartered in Boston.

Floridas Department of Environmental Protection said that according to its calculations, roughly 240 million gallons of waste were discharged in a four-county jurisdiction that includes the cities of St. Petersburg, Tampa and Clearwater  home to more than three million people. The discharge amount may grow, officials said, as more analysis is done.
As one prominent and much beloved Republican once said  actually, repeatedly said  There you go again.

Deep in a trove of leaked documents made public this week was the latest example of Republican candor over voter ID laws  this time in Wisconsin.

There, as a tight race for election to the states Supreme Court came to a close in April 2011, conservative leaders wondered aloud how to respond should Justice David Prosser Jr.  a reliable opponent of legal challenges to the agenda of Gov. Scott Walker, a Republican  go down in defeat.

A senior vice president of the Metropolitan Milwaukee Chamber of Commerce, Steve Baas, had a thought. Do we need to start messaging widespread reports of election fraud so we are positively set up for the recount regardless of the final number? he wrote in an email on April 6 to conservative strategists. I obviously think we should.
NEW DELHI  A Kashmiri human rights activist was taken into police custody early Friday shortly after he was prevented from boarding a plane to Geneva to address a session of the United Nations Human Rights Council.

The activist, Khurram Parvez, is under preventive custody on orders from a magistrate who is interrogating him, said Sheikh Faisal, the superintendent of police in East Srinagar.

Mr. Parvez, who leads the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society, planned to submit a civil society stakeholders report to the rights council on the situation in Kashmir. The death of a separatist group commander in July has ignited some of the most serious instability in the contested area in years, with a series of clashes between stone-throwing protesters and Indian security forces.
The attack was claimed by Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a splinter group of the Pakistani Taliban, saying it was targeting local residents who supported the government.

Pakistans military has claimed major successes against the militants in the countrys northwestern regions, but the militants have continued to target government installations and allies.

Afrasiab Khattak, a former senator, said the continuing attacks posed a major challenge for the military. The militants are giving a signal that they are still around, he said.

The specific form of the bomb was not yet clear, Mr. Akbar said. Some people say it was suicide bombing, he said. Others say the device was already planted in the mosque.
Were trying something new: Canada Today, a weekly roundup for Canadian readers and anyone else interested in the True North. Tell us what you think and what youd like to see, at CanadaToday@nytimes.com. And please subscribe to the email newsletter version, which is coming soon.

Hes too modest to speak with reporters, but Sammy Kogvik from Gjoa Haven, Nunavut, became a national celebrity this week. It was a tip from Mr. Kogvik, an Inuit hunter, that led finally to the discovery of the Terror, a British ship that disappeared 168 years ago along with 129 crew members while trying to map the Northwest Passage.

Critics in the past had grumbled about how former Prime Minister Stephen Harper made a priority of finding the Terror and its sister ship, the Erebus, while his government was otherwise cutting funding for science and research. But as was the case when the Erebus was discovered two years ago, all that was forgotten when the Terrors remains emerged this week.

Underwater videos showed the ship in good shape thanks to the chill of arctic waters. Everyone I interviewed said there was plenty more to learn about the doomed expedition. Among other things, the crew of the Terror may have sealed diaries and even glass photographic plates in waterproof containers.
LONDON  Diane James, a businesswoman and staunch critic of the European Union, on Friday was elected leader of the U.K. Independence Party, a far-right, anti-immigrant party that was a driving force for Britains exit from the bloc.

Ms. James, 56, takes over from Nigel Farage, the brash, combative and divisive former commodities broker who resigned as leader in July, shortly after Britain voted to leave the European Union. He and the party have also been criticized for fanning racism and xenophobia by scapegoating immigrants.

As he handed over the mantle on Friday, Mr. Farage said that he planned to travel across the Continent this fall and help democracy movements that want to leave the European Union. Over the summer, he highlighted polls in the Czech Republic, Denmark, Italy and the Netherlands that showed backing for referendums, and said Britain had become a beacon.

Mr. Farage, who spent his political career pushing for Britain to quit the European Union, said that the Brexit vote was a fairy tale come true, and credited UKIP with causing an earthquake in British politics.
ATHENS  Edward J. Snowden, the former American intelligence contractor who leaked documents about surveillance programs, said on Friday that his disclosures had improved privacy for individuals in the United States, and he declared that being patriotic doesnt mean simply agreeing with your government.

Mr. Snowden also said he was grateful for a campaign, led by human rights and civil liberties groups, calling on President Obama to pardon him, a move that would allow him to return to the United States without facing the prospect of many years in prison.

In 2013, after The Guardian and The Washington Post published articles about widespread, secret National Security Agency surveillance and data collection programs, Mr. Snowden identified himself as the source of the information. He had fled to Hong Kong, with the aim of escaping to Latin America via Moscow, but his passport was annulled and he was left stranded in at a Moscow airport.

If he is not pardoned, he could face charges on two counts under the 1917 Espionage Act, which does not allow for a public interest or whistle-blower defense, making it almost impossible for him to explain his motivations or present a proper defense, Mr. Snowden said.
At a joint news conference on Friday evening, Ms. Merkel and Mr. Hollande underscored the importance of their initiative to enhance military cooperation to Europes future. Ms. Merkel said much more needs to be done in the area of defense and expressed optimism that progress would be made in the coming months.

The tension over the military proposals reflects a broader debate within the European Union about how to respond to the anti-Brussels sentiment behind Britains vote to leave the bloc and a general rise in nationalism and populism across the Continent.

The instinct of many national leaders and much of the blocs leadership in Brussels is to continue pushing ahead with cross-border integration on any number of fronts. But there are high levels of anti-European Union sentiment in countries like Hungary and Poland, and France and Germany are hurtling toward national elections next year in which far-right parties and populist forces could upend politics. On both the left and the right, some candidates for office in European capitals are edging away from support for further integration and emphasizing national sovereignty.

The military discussion allows leaders to show that the E.U. is not dead in the water and that it remains resilient after the Brexit vote, said Nick Witney, a senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations and a former chief executive of the European Defense Agency, a forum for European Union member states to cooperate on defense initiatives.

In the past, he said, the European Union might have talked about deepening trade ties to show it had purpose, but in the sour protectionist mood those agendas dont work and so defense should be relatively uncontroversial flag to fly.

Deeper security cooperation is also seen by some European leaders as a way to respond to concern about mass migration from the Middle East and the threat of terrorism. Donald Tusk, the president of the European Council, the umbrella group for the blocs leaders, said at a news conference on Friday evening that a number of the leaders meeting in Bratislava had decided on the immediate deployment of security personnel and equipment to Bulgaria in order to protect against another influx of refugees across its border with Turkey.

Europe has made many false starts trying to unify its militaries to project power quickly and efficiently beyond its borders. An effort at creating fighting battalions is widely regarded as an abject failure as the troops were never deployed because of a lack of political will.
EDINBURGH  Like many Holocaust survivors, his grandfather said little about the past.

Philippe Sands knew that his grandfather, Leon Buchholz, had been born in Lemberg, now Lviv, in Ukraine, and somehow had made his way to Vienna, where his daughter Ruth, Philippes mother, was born, and then to Paris. And he knew that his mother was only a year old when she was brought to Paris and was hidden by Christians for five years, until August 1944, when she was reunited with her family.

All Leon would say was: Its complicated, its the past, not important, which Mr. Sands understood to mean: Dont pry.

But it was not until Mr. Sands, an international lawyer and university professor, was invited to Lviv in 2010 to lecture at the university there that he began to dig into his suppressed past. His discoveries, some deeply unpleasant, some simply bizarre, became the core of an extraordinary book about his family, Lviv, the Holocaust, the Nuremberg trials and the drafting of the charges brought there  of crimes against humanity and of genocide, conceived by rival lawyers, both of whom studied law at what is now Lviv University.

Both of those men were, like Mr. Sandss grandfather, the only survivors of their extended Jewish families, murdered by the Nazis under the administration of Hans Frank, Hitlers personal lawyer, who became governor-general of occupied Poland and who was convicted and executed at Nuremberg.
The death last month of a Polish immigrant, Arkadiusz Jozwik, 40, a worker at a sausage factory, and the subsequent beating of two other Poles in front of a pub after a night out probably would not have made headlines a year ago, given that brawls and bar fights are not exactly uncommon in Britain.

Image Mr. Jozwik, 40, who died from his injuries after he was attacked last month in Harlow, in a photograph provided by the police. Credit... Essex Police

But now, residents of Harlow are split over the meaning of the violence and what it says about their town and their country. And the attacks have shaken Poles in the area so much that Warsaw deployed two Polish police officers to Harlow this week to patrol the streets in cooperation with the local authorities.

Its got me round the twist, said Martin Herglotz, 59, using an idiom for crazy in referring to the assault on Mr. Jozwik, whom he had met at a barbecue last year. The atmosphere here is tense, Mr. Herglotz said. Harlow, 30 miles north of London, voted overwhelmingly to leave the European Union. I hope it was just a drunken brawl, he said, but I dont think it was.

The latest police figures show that nationally hate crimes rose by 32 percent in England, Wales and Northern Ireland in the eight weeks after the referendum, compared with the same period a year earlier. The police attributed the increase partly to higher awareness of hate crimes.

Among those most affected are immigrants from Central and Eastern Europe, including substantial numbers who came to Britain under European Union rules that allow citizens of member nations to live and work in other member countries without a visa. In Leeds, in northern England, a 28-year-old Polish man was kicked and punched last week by a group of up to 20 teenagers wearing hoodies, the police in West Yorkshire said on Monday. The attack was being investigated as racially aggravated due to comments made to the victim and his friend, the police said in a statement, adding that the man required stitches for a head wound.
The sounds of explosions are very strong  explosions, gun clashes and ambulances, said Abu Yaman, 50, who lives in a government-held district of Damascus.

Also, aid deliveries promised under the agreement were still being held up at the border.

At a meeting of his National Security Council in Washington on Friday to discuss the campaign against the Islamic State, President Obama told top advisers that he was deeply concerned that the Syrian government was continuing to block the flow of humanitarian aid, the White House said in an official account of the discussion.

Mr. Obama emphasized that the United States will not proceed with the next steps in the arrangement with Russia until we see seven continuous days of reduced violence and sustained humanitarian access, the statement said.

Below, Syrians in government controlled cities and rebel-held areas share their thoughts, experiences, videos and photos  and their doubts  as the cease-fire entered its fourth full day on Friday.
WASHINGTON  American Special Operations forces have arrived in northern Syria to work alongside Turkish troops fighting the Islamic State, the Pentagon said on Friday, stressing that the approximately three dozen Americans would serve in an advise and assist capacity.

Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, said in an email that the American Special Operations forces are accompanying Turkish and vetted Syrian opposition forces as they continue to clear territory from the Islamic State near Jarabulus and al-Rai.

The decision to send the American forces into northern Syria with the Turkish military came last week, one American official said, shortly after a meeting between Turkeys president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and President Obama during the G-20 summit meeting in China.

American officials described details of the deployment on the condition of anonymity because of the diplomatic and national security sensitivities of the mission.
Which was how I found myself behind the wheel of a rental van a few nights later with a case manager from Sanctuary for Families, driving to a neighborhood in Queens that the organization asked me not to identify. We hauled the mattress up a narrow flight of stairs and dropped it off for the grateful recipient. I will be able to sleep happy for once, she said.

That was a heartwarming and unexpected ending to what was supposed to be a virtual shopping experience, but I need not have left my own apartment. Daehee Park, a co-founder of Tuft & Needle, said that if I had spoken up about the van rental bill and the time-consuming nature of the potential donation, the company might have hired a errand runner from Taskrabbit to handle it. We try to do what we can, he said.

Like Mr. Wolfe at Leesa, however, he does worry about people abusing their in-home testing privileges (though he declined The New York Timess offer to pay in full after all, as did the other companies). He and his competitors deserve enormous credit for trying to make free, in-home trials the price of admission for participating in the mattress industry, and all of us should demand the same deal from brick-and-mortar retailers.

So now that the mattress start-ups have proved that theyre serious about real-world sleep tests, please dont take undue advantage of them. You can never prevent people from gaming a system, Mr. Park said.
The two-floor, 35-year retrospective of a great American painter, Kerry James Marshall: Mastry, at the Metropolitan Museum of Arts Met Breuer outpost (Oct. 6 to Jan. 29), should prove equally eye-opening and also very much of the moment. That is not only because Mr. Marshalls beautiful and biting figurative paintings have been picturing black life in America with such aplomb for so long. But its also because Mr. Marshall has never set anything off limits  not narrative, not fierce decorative punch, not politics, not tradition or skill, not gravity or wit. The exhibition is a very smart move for the Met and will hopefully prove that the museum has not overreached in opening the Met Breuer. But it also suggests  more emphatically than the recent exhibitions devoted to Nasreen Mohamedi and Diane Arbus  that the museum might dial back its frantic involvement with the new and the now, and concentrate, as it once did, on giving retrospectives to living or recently living artists. It is one of the worlds great encyclopedic museums; its primary focus is the past. Let other museums tend to the messiness of the immediate present.

Some of that messiness has definitely been perpetrated by Mark Leckey, the British artist, multimedia maverick and 2008 Turner Prize winner, who will have the largest exhibition of his career at MoMA PS1 in Queens (Oct. 23 to March 5). Mr. Leckey is an oddball connoisseur of culture both high and low. Among his better-known videos are Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore (1999), which uses found footage to explore British club culture, and Made in Eaven (2004) which centers on the spatial conundrums of Jeff Koonss highly reflective Bunny sculpture set in what looks like a small room in an 18th-century house in London. More recently, in the film Dream English Kid 1964-1999 (2015), he returns to found footage to recount his autobiography. The new show, Mark Leckey: Containers and Their Drivers, which will occupy two floors, will also include sound installations and videos of Mr. Leckeys alternately hilarious and arcane lecture-performances.
Giving a tour of her art-filled apartment off Central Park, the dealer Virginia Dwan is all diffidence and grace. Dressed in elegant gray-on-gray, she speaks softly of her black-on-black abstraction by Ad Reinhardt, most meditative of Abstract Expressionists. She waxes quietly enthusiastic about a grid of copper floor tiles by the Minimalist Carl Andre. She shows off a series of clear plastic boxes by Charles Ross, a pioneer of Land Art whose work with prisms, she says, never got him the attention he deserves.

Ms. Dwan settles down in a plush armchair; Mitsou the cat climbs aboard; a voice recorder is turned on  and the reticence disappears. Ms. Dwan has issues she wants on the table: what she calls the new commodities market for art where great objects arent appreciated individually as works, and the roster of great female dealers  she doesnt mention herself  whose contributions have been overshadowed by their male counterparts. They should all get more attention than they do, she says.
THE GOOD PLACE (NBC, Sept. 19) A woman (Kristen Bell) wakes up in heaven, which looks like a cross between a Disney theme park, a planned community and a politically correct college campus, and realizes shes not supposed to be there. Ted Danson stars as her bow-tied angel in this satire from Michael Schur, a producer on Parks and Recreation and Master of None.

EASY (Netflix, Sept. 22) The indie director Joe Swanberg attracted an interesting cast for his loosely interwoven, eight-episode anthology about love and sex in contemporary Chicago, including Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Raul Castillo, Malin Akerman, Orlando Bloom, Hannibal Buress and Jane Adams.

CRISIS IN SIX SCENES (Amazon, Sept. 30) Not a lot is known about Woody Allens first series, a six-episode, stand-alone story. According to Amazon, its set in the 1960s and is about a suburban family and its house guest. From the trailer, we know Mr. Allen plays a novelist, but we dont know if hes the guest.
The Pew Research Center recently released a survey showing that Americans still have a preference for reading old-fashioned paper-based, spine-having, space-occupying books. Those readers will be happy to see Keith Houstons The Book, a lovingly designed and illustrated deep history of the book  or, as Houstons subtitle has it, the most powerful object of our time.

And by deep, I mean deep: We start in ancient Egypt with the painstaking transformation of the papyrus plant into writing material; one chapter is titled Stroke of Genius: The Arrival of Writing. By the last chapter of The Book, were still several hundred years in the past, when the Italian scholar Aldus Manutius revolutionized the manufacture of books, making them more affordable.

In the beginning, papyrus scrolls gave way to bound pages of parchment. According to Houston, historians cant date the exact origins of the book as we know it. But the Roman poet Martial, who lived in the first century, was an early promoter of the format. In a foreword to a collection of his epigrams, he wrote something that sounds remarkably like modern marketing copy for the latest technology: You who long for my little books to be with you everywhere and want to have companions for a long journey, he wrote, buy these ones which parchment confines within small pages: Give your scroll-cases to the great authors  one hand can hold me.
WHISTLESTOP

My Favorite Stories From Presidential Campaign History

By John Dickerson

Illustrated. 439 pp. Twelve. $30.

It is the dirty little secret of the 2016 campaign that most political reporters are having the time of their lives. Yes, one candidate insults the press while the other avoids it; yes, a major party is in the process of shattering to pieces at the hands of a possibly unstable demagogue. And yes, the consequences of voters seeming masochism in nominating two historically dislikable individuals are, if not dire for democracy, at least a bit weird. But theres nothing better than a good story, and 2016 is, as political stories go, one for the ages.

The stories that make up Whistlestop are of the historical kind, but running under the surface is a sense of relish for the unexpected, the unusual, the novel and exciting. If there is a constant to the American campaign story, it is that elites cant predict the future very well, John Dickerson, the political director of CBS News and the host of Face the Nation, writes. News is what surprises us, which is why the political press always has news: Voters are always undoing our certainties.

It is true this year, of course. But it was also true in 1980, when Ronald Reagan  a B-list actor with simple views  was counted out; in 1948, when Harry Truman was a gone goose; and in 1824, when Andrew Jackson was not a serious contender. Even in the Republics early days, the powers that be were sure that there was a pattern to how these things went, but the voters scotched their theories.
As London Fashion Week picks up steam this weekend, with all its traffic, sharp elbows and celebrities, one woman is going to come in for unusually serious scrutiny: her every facial twitch parsed, outfits obsessively chronicled, show schedule observed.

Tanned and lithe, with a close crop of mahogany curls, she is Yasmin Sewell, the 40-year-old Australian-born, London-based fashion director of Style.com, Conde Nasts multimillion-dollar foray into e-commerce.

You couldnt have picked a better poster girl if youd Photoshopped her from Vogue.

The former wife of a movie star (her last name is thanks to a brief marriage to the British actor Rufus Sewell in the 1990s), she has more than 100,000 followers on Instagram and a social circle of fellow street-style stars like the editors Caroline Issa and Laura Brown, not to mention the designers Roksanda Ilincic and Jonathan Saunders.

Ms. Sewell lives in the London Fields section of Hackney with her husband, Kyle Robinson, and their young sons, Knox and Renzo; fits in the odd yoga and Pilates session when she can; and says her favorite hobby is getting people together, cooking and hosting big dinners.
Few people are excited by the idea of starting a job search. But Id say anybody in the situation you describe should get over that, right away. If business doesnt pick up, it certainly sounds like being downsized  whether you ask for it or not  is a distinct possibility.

That said, I dont see much upside in basically volunteering to lose your job. I understand that youve been proactive in asking for work, but some managers will just respond to that as another problem to solve; its easier for them to brush you off than to think up ways to keep you busy. So maybe shift that strategy. Instead of inquiring, propose. If you present work or useful tasks that you could do  especially anything that solves a problem or otherwise lightens a managers load  you are making Sure, go for it the simplest answer.

You can also sound out colleagues (without announcing that youre passing your days killing time with online courses, which some might not appreciate) about what theyre working on and what help they could use. Be a team player and dont convert this into anything that may seem like stealing credit, but keep your manager in the loop about what youre up to. Even casually asking around might give you ideas. In particular, think about skills youd like to pick up. That may help you find opportunities to get busy again.

But prepare for the possibility that this paid vacation could end abruptly. The only thing worse than wading back into the job market is being suddenly plunged back into the job market. See whats out there, and maybe instead of saying downsize me, you can just say, I found a better job; I quit.

Leaving Stock on the Table

Ive been employed at my company for 15 years and have received regular stock grants, on a long-term vesting schedule, each year. The stock has performed very well. But I sense we have a downsizing coming later this year, and I may be offered a package to leave  probably 30 weeks salary and a years benefits. Its tempting.
I grew up in Sierra Leone, on the campus of Fourah Bay College, the oldest university in West Africa. My father was an engineering professor, my mother an accountant and together they agreed that someday I would become a doctor. They wholeheartedly encouraged me to study the sciences. My father, in particular, embraced the impartiality of science and math. Wherever you go, two plus two will always equal four, my father routinely told me. I could be a small African girl who spoke English with a heavy accent, but calculus and physics would not care: They would display my abilities objectively, unequivocally and unapologetically.

It was my mothers voice that I heard first every morning before school. Mom woke up early, got ready for work, then started making the meal that would be the foundation of our day. It could be a chicken stew and fried plantains or boiled yams. As soon as she entered the kitchen, she started her wake-up chant: Come eat or youll miss your bus! By the time breakfast was at the table, so was her family.

Then one day my mother fell ill with what seemed to be malaria. This was the first time I saw her sick. Her chest heaved, she vomited violently, and she fell to the ground so hard that I feared she would not get up again. I was crying. My father was never good with uncertainty or illness, but that day he was very good. He made food and cleaned up, and his calmness reassured me.

That evening, my Uncle Moi, who was a university student, brought five of his Bible study friends to pray for Mom.
RE: PROFESSOR NEGAS WAR

Joshua Hammer profiled Berhanu Nega, a Bucknell economics professor who ended up leading an Ethiopian rebel army based in Eritrea.

This is not just a story about a brave and beleaguered man: It also depicts the paradox and tragedy of nations besieged by dictatorship, repression, bitter ethnic rivalry, democratic aspirations and, worst of all, the toxic stew of violence and war. It depicts the greatest single challenge facing nations like Ethiopia and Syria.



The question that Joshua Hammer never asks Berhanu Nega is why he believes violent revolution against a stubborn, unyielding dictatorship will produce a just and democratic society when it has failed repeatedly in the Horn of Africa and everywhere else. This is the question that Nega, by all appearances a deeply thoughtful and insightful man, must ask himself. Robert Waxman, Albany, Calif.

We in Ethiopia have been under oppression for a quarter of a century by a very dangerous, ethnically organized group called the Tigrayan Peoples Liberation Front. The T.P.L.F. is like a colonial power whose only goal is to stay in power as long as possible and loot its own people and the country. You need to have a great understanding of Ethiopian politics to understand why Nega did what he did. There is really no way out of this unless the T.P.L.F. is gone: Either we have a country or not. He fights to keep Ethiopia as one nation, avoid ethnic clashes and bring about real democracy and the rule of law. He is an honest public figure known by many during the stolen 2005 election in which millions of people voted for him.


NANTUCKET, Mass.  Kenneth Lonergan is possibly the best filmmaker most people have never heard of. His first movie, You Can Count on Me, shared the grand jury prize at Sundance in 2000, won an Academy Award nomination for Laura Linney and helped boost the career of Mark Ruffalo. But his next film, Margaret, though now considered a true masterpiece by many critics, got tangled in a nightmarish feud over who controlled the final cut. After six years and three lawsuits, a compromise version was finally released  or dumped, really  into just a handful of theaters in 2011, and hardly anyone went to see it. Margaret now exists (on streaming services and on DVD) in the longer version Mr. Lonergan wanted all along, but he still cant talk about the whole experience without wincing and sighing a lot.

Mr. Lonergan, who was already a successful playwright before wandering into the movie business, could have been forgiven for just walking away from it. But he agreed to write his new film, Manchester by the Sea (due Nov. 18), on the understanding that his friend Matt Damon would direct. When Mr. Damon became unavailable, he found himself behind the camera again, dealing with difficulties of his own making. When youre writing for somebody else, you can just write, They get in the car and drive off, he explained recently. You dont have to worry about what it looks like  thats somebody elses problem. The movie also has a lot of flashbacks, he added, and he thought the same thing about them: If the sequences dont work in the order I have them, the editor can fix them.

But this time, Mr. Lonergan, 53, knew he had the trust of his producers, and his finished version of Manchester by the Sea, which stars Casey Affleck, is likely to make him a household name. It was a huge, tearjerking hit at Sundance last winter, and Amazon, which paid $10 million for the domestic distribution rights, is already mapping out an Oscar campaign, which may not be entirely to Mr. Lonergans liking. Shy and a little cranky sometimes, he hates talking about himself. I guess there are worse things, he said in late July over lunch here on the island, where he was the guest of the Screenwriters Colony. But then he had to pause for a moment to think what those things might be.

Manchester by the Sea, which gets its title from the Massachusetts coastal town of the same name, is the story of a solitary, troubled janitor (Mr. Affleck) who, after the death of his lobsterman brother, finds himself the reluctant guardian of the brothers teenage son. The Affleck character, we gradually learn, used to be married to a woman played by Michelle Williams, with whom he shares a heartbreaking burden. A scene they have together near the end is almost shattering. It was a hard, hard movie to make, Mr. Affleck recalled recently. Though the character seems sort of shut down and muted, it never felt that way. It felt like living in a terrible, painful place. But he added that as soon as he read the script, he knew he wanted the part. Im usually pretty tortured about choosing projects, he said, and usually when I read a script I like to think about it for a while. But when I read this, there was no question.
Greenwich Villages bohemian landscape eroded long ago, but a succinctly named cash-only Spanish restaurant that opened in 1966 on West 13th Street called Spain has stayed the same.

The Basque-style establishments dusty awning still extends to the curb. Reviews in a glass display case are 30 years old. A gray-haired bartender wears a red jacket and seems to scrutinize unfamiliar customers until they have paid their bills. A pay phone near the restroom actually rings when people call the restaurant; its instructions include: Get Gods Blessings/Daily Prayer  Press *10. A recent attempt still connected to a Christian ministry.

Spain is a holdout now, but it was once part of a small enclave  largely forgotten  called Little Spain. The streets of the neighborhood were lined with Spanish businesses then, but they vanished in the 1980s.
AFTERNOON STROLL Around 2-ish, Susie and I take Gracie out for a walk. We stroll the entire neighborhood. There is a new store or restaurant in Williamsburg every week, and we stop along the way to check out whats opened. Gracie gets her exercise, and we get to explore.

SUSHI AND SALAD After the walk, we head to this Japanese place near us called Ako to get some sushi. Im half-Japanese and can never eat enough Asian food. We get rolls  spicy salmon, eel avocado and salmon avocado  and the green salad with ginger dressing. Whole Foods just opened in the neighborhood, and as another option, weve been grabbing food from the salad bar.
It was a lovely evening for a drink and a dog on the front patio of a Park Slope bar one recent Thursday.

Beneath a table at Mission Dolores sat Finn, a 5-month-old pit bull pup with expressively floppy ears, curled at the feet of his master and mistress. He has a little separation anxiety, said Finns grateful owner Jason Miller, 30. So we look for places we can bring him.

It has been a great summer for bar-going dogs, thanks to a new state law that allows them into some outdoor areas of bars or restaurants.

Already, though, the nights grow cool. Soon the outdoor tables will be abandoned, and the dogs and their best friends will have to part ways at the saloon door.
So its no surprise that nearly half of working-age families have no retirement savings at all  and for individuals between 56 and 61, the median retirement account holds only $17,000. Here again, many Democrats and Republicans agree that the answer is to detach retirement security from particular employers, though it should still depend on how much you work. A number of states have considered creating state-sponsored retirement savings plans for private sector workers without employer-provided retirement savings plans. California, Illinois, Oregon and Massachusetts have already established such programs. Californias new Secure Choice plan will require employers that do not provide 401(k)s to automatically enroll their workers in an individual retirement account.

From the 1970s to the present, then, mostly with bipartisan support (the glaring exception was Obamacare), American policy makers have responded to the decline of high-wage jobs and generous employer-based benefits by gradually expanding the role of the government in ensuring that Americans have adequate income and adequate benefits. Most of this expansion has taken place in what the political scientist Christopher Howard calls the hidden welfare state and the political scientist Suzanne Mettler describes as the submerged state.

This huge government sector is made up of tax credits, federal grants-in-aid to the states and low-interest loan programs like student loans. Many of these indirect programs, like entitlements and tax breaks for health care, retirement and housing, are not counted as part of the conventional federal budget. This allows Congress to stealthily expand the size of government while pretending not to. The individual mandate of the Affordable Care Act, for example, is a tax, though an unusual one, as the Supreme Court found when upholding its legitimacy in 2012.

In terms of direct spending on social welfare, the United States seems miserly compared with many other developed nations. But according to a recent study for the Peterson Institute for International Economics by Jacob Funk Kirkegaard, this is an illusion. When tax-favored private social spending is combined with public spending, American public expenditures at 20.8 percent of G.D.P. are only a little lower than the average in 21 states of the European Union. Mr. Kirkegaard concludes, Taking the full effects of tax systems and social spending from both private and public sources into account, the United States is seen to be devoting more resources toward social purposes than is generally acknowledged.

Preserving the fiction of a small federal government by relying on the hidden welfare state to deliver benefits sometimes comes at a cost. For example, unemployment insurance is not a simple, straightforward, uniform federal program, but a hodgepodge of separate state programs financed partly by the federal government and partly by the states. During economic downturns, this design often creates crises, because the federal government can more easily borrow money in recessions than state governments bound by balanced budget provisions in their state constitutions. And as Suzanne Mettler has pointed out, the importance of indirect benefits in America creates political problems, too. Middle-class American voters often underestimate how many government benefits they receive, while overestimating the cost of means-tested welfare for the poor. Unfortunately, the preference of American policy makers for what the political scientist Steven Teles calls kludgeocracy  indirect, complex, off-budget mechanisms rather than simple public programs financed through higher taxes  seems likely to persist.

Looking back over the last half-century, we can discern a long-term trend in which the United States government at all levels has been gradually responding to the decline of high-wage, high-benefit jobs, by methods such as gradually socializing benefits (state-run retirement plans) and partly subsidizing wages (the earned-income tax credit). Is this a trend to be welcomed or feared?
If youve been keeping an eye on the ground beneath your feet, you may have noticed an explosion of pattern. It can be seen in public spaces like the Manhattan restaurant LAmico, designed by Creme; and the Hotel Van Zandt in Austin, Tex., designed by Mark Zeff. And in private spaces, too, like the New York apartment of the actors Naomi Watts and Liev Schreiber, designed by Ashe & Leandro and featured earlier this year in Architectural Digest.

What all these spaces have in common is flooring made from encaustic cement tile, a material that has been produced in a multitude of colors and patterns since the 19th century, but which was relatively uncommon in the United States until a few years ago. Now its striking look and chalky matte texture are catching on, and a growing number of manufacturers are giving the product a contemporary update.

Caitlin and Samuel Dowe-Sandes, an American couple who founded the cement tile company Popham Design in 2007, recalled the moment they discovered the material after moving to Morocco. We were instantly taken with the medium and the possibilities, Ms. Dowe-Sandes said. The U.S. doesnt have the same history with the product that Europe does, where you sometimes see 150-year-old cement tile floors.
When Hurricane Sandy lashed the New York coastline and drowned neighborhoods like Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, there was some chatter about retreating from the waterfront.

But four years later, volatile weather and the ever-present threat of another storm surge has not deterred developers in this former fishing village, where a 28-story condominium is rising on a street once deluged by floodwater. A few blocks away, on a restaurant-lined avenue facing the waterfront, a seven-story commercial and residential development, with a rooftop deck and pool, is also under construction.

The projects are hallmarks of a building boom in Sheepshead Bay, an oft-overlooked neighborhood on Brooklyns southern shore. Now home to many emigres from the former Soviet Union, as well as growing Turkish and Chinese populations, the neighborhood offers numerous dining options and convenient beach access, at prices below those of Brooklyns brownstone and hipster belt.

Youre seeing a really dramatic transformation, said Krishna Rao, an economist for the listing website StreetEasy.com.
Location

About an hours drive from Brittanys capital city of Rennes in western France, the hotel is easy to miss from the road since its stone walls blend in with the sea walls of Dinard, a longtime vacation spot for Bretons and an old-time international elite such as Lawrence of Arabia, Jules Verne, Pablo Picasso and more. Private parking is available for a fee.

The Room

Our basic room had personality, and space, to spare. Striped curtains in orange, olive and eggplant set the color scheme, while the king bed had two night tables  one with an alarm clock/iPod dock, the other with a cordless phone. There were lamps aplenty, including one on the wooden desk that looked like a stapler and proved difficult to turn on and off. Additional contemporary touches like woven bowls from the brand Asiatides added to the quirky modern decor. The room had a flat-screen TV, ample hangers and drawers in the huge closet, a handful of outlets and a full-length mirror by the door. Some higher-level rooms have a balcony or a terrace. The minibar provided free Nespresso coffee and beverages, including local Breizh tea and cola.
Support staff angered by lost pay

School support staff have reacted with anger to the Ministry of Educations decision to not pay up to 6000 annualised support staff for a fortnight at the end of the annual payment cycle.The Employment Court upheld the earlier ruling of the Employment Relations Authority that the ministry could not unilaterally reduce the pay of 6,000 annualised* school support staff by 3.7% for all of 2016 because of a payroll anomaly that sees an extra fortnight in the payroll every 11 years.Hamilton teacher aide Carol Webb was one of many disgusted with the ministrys response to the ruling  the ministry has announced it will reimburse the back pay then not pay support staff for the first fortnight next February.The ministry claims to offer choice with all of its funding decisions. But this is not a choice  its an ultimatum. We can have our pay docked throughout the year or cut at the end of the year. Support staff make up a third of the education workforce and it just shows the low value the ministry puts on us and our work, said Ms Webb.About 36% of us have our support staff income as the only or primary income in our households. Were not well paid and have to budget carefully, so this treatment by the ministry is disgusting.Christchurch school administrator Kay Addei said, Reimbursing the back pay then taking it back in one chunk at the end of the financial year is just insulting.The ministry has just done what they want to do, and too bad for support staff. The Minister of Education would no doubt cope just fine if she missed a fortnights pay, but most of us are struggling to support our families from week to week.Ms Addei also felt the ministry was trying to divide support staff by offering non-union support staff the option of continuing on reduced pay and not missing a pay day at the end of the year, or receiving the back pay, slightly higher pay for the rest of the year and missing the final fortnights pay. Staff remaining on the collective agreement will receive the latter option.NZEI General Manager for operations, Andrew Casidy, said support staff should not feel rushed into any decision, as NZEI would be taking the matter back to court to argue the ministry should still be paying on the pay day in February next year.Our basic position is if you have chosen annualisation and are paid fortnightly then you should receive a payment every fortnight. Support staff shouldnt pay the price for the latest Novopay debacle and the Ministrys inability to manage payroll correctly and legally, he said.NZEI is publically calling on the Minister of Education to forfeit a fortnights pay to highlight the injustice the Ministry is imposing on support staff, said Mr Casidy.Weve offered a number of options during negotiations that would have allowed support staff to be paid on 1 February as they should, but to no avail.*Annualisation: Many school support staff work for only 40 weeks of the year. Annualisation allows them to spread their expected income into 26 even fortnightly payments throughout the year. However, there are 365 or 366 days in a year, rather than the 364 days of 26 fortnightly payments. Every 11 years, this adds up to one extra payment that annualised staff receive. The ministry decided to claw back that extra payment during 2016 by reducing wage payments by 3.7% throughout the year.
#Seoul mayor Seoul mayor cuts short visit to Europe after Itaewon stampede Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon arrived back home Sunday after cutting short his trip to Europe in the wake of the deadly crush in Seoul's Itaewon district that killed over 150 people. ...

#parties Ruling, opposition parties vow measures to handle aftermath of Itaewon stampede The ruling and opposition parties held emergency response meetings on Sunday to discuss ways to investigate the cause of a deadly stampede in Seoul's Itaewon district and handle th...
Irvine-based Data Integration Systems has been ordered to pay $11 million for making unauthorized charges on telephone bills and using deceptive marketing, the Federal Communications Commission said Thursday.

The company runs Central Telecom Long Distance, Consumer Telcom, and U.S. Telecom Long Distance. The FCC statement said DIS also switched phone carriers without authorization and violated truth-in-billing rules.

This isnt rocket science: no consumer should be charged for phone services that they canceled or never requested in the first place, said FCC Enforcement Bureau Chief Travis LeBlanc in a statement. Todays fines make clear that we will aggressively prosecute those who slam, cram, or otherwise abuse consumers by unlawfully charging them for services they didnt want or request.

The FCC reviewed more than 260 consumer complaints about the companies.

The company, the FCC said, falsely claimed to be calling on behalf of a consumers real telephone carrier about a change for existing service. The company then switched their long distance carriers. When a customer switched back to their carrier, they were still charged a monthly fee.

A telephone number listed online for Data Integration Systems was not working when a reporter attempted to make contact Thursday.

Contact the writer: hmadans@ocregister.com or Twitter: @HannahMadans
WASHINGTON  A panicked network anchor went home and deleted his entire personal Gmail account. A Democratic senator began rethinking the virtues of a flip phone. And a former national security official gave silent thanks that he is now living on the West Coast.

The digital queasiness has settled heavily on the nations capital and its secretive political combatants this week as yet another victim, former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, fell prey to the embarrassment of seeing his personal musings distributed on the internet and highlighted in news reports.

There but for the grace of God go all of us, said Tommy Vietor, a former National Security Council spokesman for President Barack Obama who now works in San Francisco. He said thinking about his own email exchanges in Washington made him cringe, even now.

Sometimes were snarky, sometimes we are rude, Vietor said, recalling a few such moments during his time at the White House. The volume of hacking is a moment we all have to do a little soul searching.

The Powell hack, which may have been conducted by a group with ties to the Russian government, echoed the awkwardness of previous leaks of emails from Democratic National Committee officials and the CIA director, John O. Brennan. The messages exposed this week revealed that Powell considered Donald Trump a national disgrace, Hillary Clinton greedy and former Vice President Dick Cheney an idiot.

The latest hack could well spur a new rash of email deletions across the country as millions of people scan their sent mail for anything compromising, humiliating or career-destroying. It adds to the sense that everyone is vulnerable.

The soul searching is happening with a special urgency in Washington, where email accounts burst with strategies, delicate political proposals, gossipy whispers and banal details of girlfriends, husbands, bank accounts and shopping lists.

On Capitol Hill, Sen. Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the chambers No. 2 Democrat, said the news of Powells hacked emails had him thinking that New York Sen. Charles Schumers never-ending use of an old-fashioned flip phone makes more sense than ever.

I think more and more people are realizing that there isnt a thing you can say in an email that isnt likely to be hackable or discoverable at some later point, Durbin said, lamenting his own complacency.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., shrugged off the news. I havent worried about an email being hacked since Ive never sent one, Graham said. Im, like, ahead of my time.

But for another network anchor in Washington, who declined to be named for fear of becoming an even more prominent hacking target, the Powell disclosures led to a long night Wednesday that involved saving a few personal emails and then deleting his entire account. Everyone, he said, has sent emails they would not want released, including innocent messages that could be misinterpreted.

Washington may be behind other big cities in learning that lesson. Bankers on Wall Street have favored very brief emails since their conversations were splashed across front pages because of lawsuits filed after the financial crisis. In 2010, Goldman Sachs executives used the acronym LDL, for lets discuss live, when a conversation turned at all sensitive.

Hank Paulson, a former Goldman Sachs chief executive, refuses to use email. Ben S. Bernanke, a former chairman of the Federal Reserve, once set up an email account under the pseudonym Edward Quince in the hopes of greater privacy.

Similar precautions have been common in Silicon Valley since a 2009 Chinese state cyberattack on servers at Google and other tech companies. In Hollywood, a breach at Sony Pictures in 2014 spilled out gossipy secrets and persuaded film crews, actors and executives alike to adopt security measures they once considered paranoid. Studios have turned to a new class of companies with names like WatchDox that wrap screenplays with encryption, passwords and monitoring systems that can track who has access to confidential files.

In some countries outside the United States, there has long been a more cautious approach to electronic communications. In Pakistan, politicians often agree to speak to reporters in person only after removing phone batteries or covering the microphones with a pillow. Many in the Middle East have migrated to more secure services like Telegraph or Signal.

Many Americans have learned the hard way. Aaron E. Carroll, a pediatrician and research professor at Indiana University, discovered the dangers after writing a newspaper article defending artificial sweeteners that prompted health groups to demand his university emails. The groups hoped to prove links between Carroll and companies that make sugary drinks and snacks.

It totally devastated me, Carroll said on Thursday. I was freaking out, not because I did anything wrong  all of a sudden, I was panicked about what have I said that was inappropriate or that could be taken out of context.

Carroll, who said he had no connection to any food companies, engaged in a scorched earth policy in the weeks after his emails were handed over to the health groups. He deleted just about everything off his university email account and now clears out the account regularly.

Im a little more careful now. Ill just walk down the hall instead of sending a long email, he said, though he added that he still sent personal and work messages on the same account for convenience. It has not changed my daily habits of email as much as you might think.
An Irvine man convicted of conspiring to defraud more than 30,000 Americans out of about $31 million was sentenced on Thursday in New York to 16 years in prison by a judge who called his mortgage scheme callous and heartless.

Dionysius Fiumano also was ordered to pay $11.9 million in forfeiture and restitution by U.S. District Judge John F. Keenan, who presided over a spring trial.

The judge recalled that a Manhattan jury returned its verdict in less than an hour, demonstrating that proof of guilt was overwhelming. He said Fiumano and others at a company that operated under multiple names carried out a callous and heartless mortgage modification scheme from November 2011 through May 2014, causing more than 60 homeowners to lose their homes.

Fiumano oversaw about 65 telemarketers and managers in his role as general manager of sales at the company, Vortex Financial Management Inc., which also was known as Professional Marketing Group and Professional Legal Network.

Prosecutors said the Irvine-based company persuaded homeowners in dire financial shape that it could modify the terms of their mortgages to make them more affordable. They said Fiumano and his staff fooled thousands of homeowners to pay thousands of dollars in up-front fees for little or no mortgage modification.

The government said Fiumano and his staff routinely lied to homeowners, saying the company would retain a law firm and negotiate aggressively on the homeowners behalf with banks to lower the cost of their mortgages.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Edward Imperatore told the judge that homeowners suffered psychological and financial harm that will last some of them the rest of their lives.

These stories are sad in a way I really cant capture, Imperatore said, blaming Fiumanos crime on greed.

Before the sentence was announced, Fiumano told the judge he meant well when he joined the company because he had lost his own home after the 2008 financial collapse.

I personally knew all too well the pain, he said.

Fiumano, whos 45 years old, said he felt immeasurable grief and shame that I contributed to the hardship of these families.

U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said Fiumano and his co-conspirators claimed to be a lifeline when homeowners needed one most but instead they preyed on and victimized the desperate homeowners, taking their money and doing nothing to actually help.

Four other people convicted in the scheme are awaiting sentencing.
c.2016 New York Times News Service

Ayesha Venkataraman contributed reporting.

(Mumbai Journal)

MUMBAI  The couple approached the 14-foot statue of the god Ganesh on Wednesday, hands folded, believing with all their hearts in his powers as the one who removes obstacles.

They had seen proof of this two years ago, they said, when they prayed during the Ganesh festival for their daughter to become pregnant. The daughter, who lives in Britain, now has a child.

Perhaps not all that miraculous, but enough to convince the couple, Farida and Jimmy Balsara, who are not even Hindu. Every year, along with tens of millions in street festivals across India, they celebrate the power of Ganesh, the elephant-headed God who has been adopted by some of the countrys other faiths. The festival is particularly popular in Mumbai, the megalopolis of 20 million that is Indias industrial and film capital, where it got started in the 19th century as a protest against colonialism.

And so the Balsaras, who, as Parsees, are followers of the Iranian prophet Zoroaster, are among the crowds who pray for Ganeshs blessing. The giant plaster-of-paris statue of Ganesh before them is the most famous in Khetwadi, one of Mumbais oldest, densest neighborhoods, near where the festival was first celebrated.

Almost every alley features yet another wildly decorated, ardently worshipped Ganesh. But this one, Khetwadi Cha Ganraj, or the Ganesh of Khetwadi, often wins awards as the most beautiful. That fame drew the Balsaras and thousands of others on Wednesday, the last day before the deity would join about 50,000 other statues across the city in a procession of dancing crowds to the ocean, where the idols will be gently lowered into the water.

More than 160,000 Ganesh statues had already been dropped in the citys waterways, some just a foot tall and worshipped in peoples homes, others close to 30 feet high, paid for by politicians and business people as centers for worship and merriment during the festival.

(BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM.)

Worship of an elephant in the Indian subcontinent can be traced to about 325 B.C., with Ganesh becoming part of the Hindu pantheon around the fifth century, and then absorbed into Buddhism and Jainism in the ensuing centuries.

In the 17th century, Shivaji, a ruler after whom Mumbais train station and airport are named, spread worship of Ganesh to the wider population in his kingdom in western India. In the late 19th century, after the British banned political gatherings, a leader of Indias independence movement got the idea of spreading nationalist sentiment by organizing a street festival around Ganesh.

Two followers of that leader, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, lived in Keshavji Naik Chawl, a housing complex in Mumbai of tiny three-room apartments along open-air corridors, a common housing design for middle-class residents at the time, and one still in use today. The Ganesh festival was started in that chawl in the 1890s.

The objective was to create an awakening among the people against British rule, said Madhukar Keshav Dhavalikar, a former archaeology professor and former director of Deccan College Post-Graduate and Research Institute in Pune, India.

The festival spread across the country, although Mumbai remains its heart and soul. In the same chawl where it all began in the late 19th century, residents, some of whose families have lived there for three generations, keep the tradition alive.

They have succeeded in holding onto the traditions low-key origins, centered on cultural activities, even as the festival has evolved into an ever-noisier competition for the largest, most beautiful statue.

(END OPTIONAL TRIM.)

Despite the surrounding city, the community has maintained its village feel. On Wednesday, the courtyard in the chawl was an oasis of calm in the midst of all the urban hustle. Children ran in and out of the apartments, most of which had their doors wide open; women wearing saris cooked dinner; and men in shorts napped and watched TV.

You can just enter anyones room, said Vinod Satpute, a 58-year-old flight attendant with Air India, whose parents moved to the chawl decades ago. It doesnt matter if hes eating or sleeping. Thats his problem.

A few streets down, vast crowds gathered around the Khetwadi Cha Ganraj. The first statue went up here in the neighborhoods Lane No. 12 in 1959, and this years celebration cost close to $75,000, financed in large part by corporate donations.

The costs cover not just the giant, elaborately painted and dressed Ganesh, but also the themed room that holds the deity  this year, a Rome and Rajasthan palace. Two huge chandeliers hang overhead as 12 speakers boom temple music at a deafening volume. A crane holds a video camera that beams live footage to a smartphone app and to a YouTube site.

In addition to many flower garlands, this Ganesh wears a 33-pound necklace of pure gold, the gift of an anonymous donor in 2008, said Ganesh Mathur, who was among those in charge of the Khetwadi Cha Ganraj this year.

Along the street, almost every alley has been transformed into a tent with an enormous Ganesh inside. Crowds throng, buying cotton candy, toys, tea and watermelon slices, as couples and families make a day of visiting the idols. Long lines snake around almost every tent, inside of which crowds gape at the latest iteration of the revered God.

At the Khetwadi Cha Ganraj it was time for the evening prayers. As they finished, workers on ladders used peacock feathers to dust Ganeshs massive arms and pink fingernails. Then they began replacing the deitys many flower garlands with fresh ones.

At that, the Balsaras, until now engaged in deep prayer at the back of the room, rushed forward and shouted to the attendants over the temple music that they wanted to take the discarded garlands home.

Jimmy Balsara, 77, and Farida Balsara, 64, said they had not been able to think of any major family or business problem that needed overcoming, so this year they offered more general prayers, wishing happiness for everyone.

In minutes, they were weaving their way through the motorcycles and street vendors outside, arms buried in red and white flowers, convinced that another great year lay in store for them and for everyone else.
SANTA ANA  A 40-year-old man who raped and impregnated a preteen girl was sentenced Friday to life in state prison without the possibility of parole.

A jury in June found Demetrio Rojas Perez, of Santa Ana, guilty of four felony counts of aggravated sexual assault with a child under 14, a felony count of forcible lewd acts on a victim under 14 years of age and sentencing enhancements for inflicting bodily harm on the girl.

According to the prosecutors, Perez is the first person in Orange County to receive a sentence of life without parole for a sexual assault case. He was also sentenced to an additional 60 years to life behind bars.

The young age of the victim and the allegations of bodily injury were major factors in determining the sentence, an Orange County District Attorneys Office statement says.

Given the defendants heinous and violent sexual abuse of (the girl) in this case that resulted in (her) becoming pregnant and having to have an abortion at the age of 13, the punishment determined by statute is quite fitting, Deputy District Attorney Mena Guirguis wrote to Orange County Superior Court Judge Cheri Pham in a sentencing brief.

Prosecutors described Perez as being in a position of trust with access to the victim. They allege the sexual assaults began in December 2013, when the girl was 12.

Perez forcibly raped the girl numerous times, prosecutors said. The girl tried to fight back and scream, but Perez covered her mouth and told her he would kill her if she told her family what had happened, prosecutors said.

Authorities said the sexual assaults took place over seven months.

In mid-2014, police learned of the sexual assaults after the girl discovered she was pregnant. A DNA test confirmed Perez had impregnated the girl, the DAs office said.

Contact the writer: semery@ocregister.com
DANA POINT  For DJ Mansfield, Saturdays final harbor dive will be bittersweet. Its the conclusion of a seven-year project that has helped improve water quality in the Dana Point Harbor.

When he dives off Dock F, the last dock on the harbors north end, Mansfield, 38, will have scoured the ocean floor beneath 2,409 boats over seven years, helping remove tens of thousands of pounds of trash and debris.

As humans you want to make the world a better place, said Mansfield, who retired from the Marine Corps in 2015. On an environmental note, nothing is more disturbing than looking at beautiful fish and knowing that something as cliche as a simple six-pack plastic soda holder can badly affect sea life.

The director of operations for five Beach Cities Scuba shops in Orange County will be among more than 100 divers who will descend 15 feet to scour the murky water and gooey harbor bottom along 170 boat slips at the dock.

The cleanup  the 15th semi-annual event  is part of Dana Point Harbors effort to improve water quality. Divers will search search for treasures, trash and oddities lost or discarded into the harbor.

Marine debris degrades ocean habitats, endangers marine and coastal wildlife, causes navigation hazards and threatens human health and safety, said Kelly Rinderknecht, from Dana West Marina, who with OC Parks is organizing the cleanup.

In past years divers have come from Orange County and neighboring Riverside and Los Angeles counties, Rinderknecht said.

Saturdays event coincides with California Coastal Cleanup Day  the states largest volunteer coastal cleanup event. Dana Point Harbor will also host a cigarette butt roundup on the harbors island side.

Since 2009 when the first cleanup was held, divers have recovered more than 60,000 pounds of lost items and debris. The odd findings have included chairs, televisions, laptops, marine toilets, outboard motors, bicycles, shopping carts and even a parking meter.

Mansfield discovered the parking meter complete with attached cement. It was at a dock near the Wind & Sea Restaurant on the east side of the harbor.

I felt what seemed like a shaft, Mansfield recalled. I started to pick it up. It was really heavy so I hooked up a float line. When we brought it up it was covered in barnacles.

Mansfield and other divers used crow bars to chip away the barnacles. They finally broke the encrusted barnacles open with a sledge hammer.

I just started laughing, Mansfield said. I couldnt believe it was a parking meter. We wondered what the story was on how it got there.

Another year, Mansfield was among a group who pulled up a kayak  intact. They couldnt figure out how it sank.

Weve pulled out tool boxes and expensive watches, he said. Anything you can think of a human dropping, its in the drink in the harbor.

Mansfield, who oversees dive shops in Dana Point, Laguna Beach, Newport Beach, Huntington Beach and Cypress, said he has recruited 53 divers so far to join the cleanup. At least 40 more divers have signed up with Rinderknecht.

Diving has become a passion for the retired master sergeant. He first discovered it in 2000 while based at Camp Pendleton and has since done nearly 3,000 dives. Hes taken advantage of exotic dive spots all over the world, including the Seychelles and Thailand, and hopped aboard Navy ships when he could.

When he found out about the cleanup, it became his mission to help. He started in 2009 and participated between deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan.

I learned about caring for the community in the Marine Corps, Mansfield said. You end up in a foreign country and theres a good deal of compassion. You learn quickly how you can help people. When youre back here and off work and off base, you help the community youre in. Thats what the harbor cleanup has done for me.

Contact the writer: 714-796-2254 or eritchie@ocregister.com
CHICAGO  Six-time NASCAR Sprint Cup champion Jimmie Johnson remembers vividly the first time he rode in an off-road desert car with Baja Bob Gordon about 25 years ago.

Johnson retold the story Thursday while saying he was in complete and utter shock to learn Gordon, father of former NASCAR and open-wheel driver Robby Gordon, had been found dead with his wife in their Southern California home. Police said it appeared that 68-year-old Robert Gordon strangled 57-year-old wife Sharon Gordon and then fatally shot himself in their gated house in Orange.

I had a motion sickness problem, riding in a car. And I rode in the Baja 500 and puked, literally, for 499 miles, Johnson said. My dad was in one of the pitstops and we stopped and Im just covered in vomit. And hes trying to pull me out. But I wanted to race so bad I didnt care how bad I felt. I said, Im staying in this race car. Im not getting out. I made the race, but it wasnt pretty.

His motion sickness problem taken care of, Johnson later drove his own car in the off-road Baja race. Johnson and the elder Gordon remained in contact and Johnson on Thursday tweeted a picture of them once talking in the pits at a NASCAR race.

Bob Gordon was a well-known and successful off-road racer that Johnson admired. He said he talked to Robby Gordon briefly Thursday after learning the news.

He said, My Dad was so proud of you. He used to brag that he rode with you in desert cars. Johnson said. But he didnt go into anything emotionally. He just said that his dad was a big fan. It made me smile a little bit, but its still just complete and utter shock.
If you probe why the polls show a majority of California voters support a statewide effort to legalize recreational marijuana, increased tax revenue inevitably comes up.

UC Irvine student Giovanni Chavez, like many backers of legalized pot, says hes primarily concerned about personal liberty and studies showing disproportionate prosecution of minorities for drug offenses.

But after watching state and local governments struggle through recurring budget crises, the aspiring political consultant said state-regulated marijuana sales would provide a new and needed stream of tax dollars.

We could use the extra revenue, said Chavez, 21. And the fact that we would be able to interfere with the black market is huge.

Supporters of legal recreational marijuana use point to Colorado, which legalized cannabis for adults in 2012. There, taxes and fees on weed are helping to build schools, repair roads and stabilize city budgets.

But critics of Proposition 64, Californias legalization initiative on the November ballot, point out tax revenue from legal weed would be dispersed much differently here.

Letitia Pepper, a Riverside attorney who uses medical marijuana to treat multiple sclerosis but is a vocal opponent of the measure, noted none of it would be dedicated to the general operations of local governments or schools.

Proponents acknowledge Californias measure includes key differences in how pot funds could be used. But they add that local governments and students still can benefit from the measure.

An estimated $1 billion in new tax revenue would be directed toward specific new or expanded programs such as drug use prevention and treatment, helping at-risk youth, law enforcement, environmental clean-up and research.

Jason Kinney, spokesman for the Yes on Prop. 64 campaign, said the restrictions on public use of the new tax monies was intentional. If public agencies were allowed to balance their general spending budgets with marijuana taxes, he said, it could create an incentive for them to encourage a bigger marijuana industry.

The state of California shouldnt be forced to rely on increased marijuana usage to address future K-12 education, infrastructure and other ongoing budget obligations, he said.

Instead, Diane Goldstein of North Tustin  a retired police officer whos campaigning for Prop. 64  argued that tax revenue from the measure would be wisely used to offset some financial and social harms of the failed war on drugs via increased investment in education, research and treatment.

REVENUE PREDICTIONS

Right now, hundreds of pot businesses operating in California  some with local permits and many without  are paying state sales tax of close to 8 percent.

In 2015, the state took in $58 million in sales tax revenue from some 974 registered dispensaries, including nearly 400 in Los Angeles County and 70 to 80 each in Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties, according to Board of Equalization data.

That revenue is on track to nearly double this year.

Under Prop. 64, all marijuana sales would be taxed an additional 15 percent starting Jan. 1, 2018, on top of levies on regulated growers of $9.25 per ounce for dry flowers or $2.75 per ounce for leaves. Medical cannabis patients would be exempt from the state sales tax.

The independent Legislative Analysts Office predicts Prop. 64 state tax revenues would total from the high hundreds of millions of dollars to more than $1 billion each year.

Thats less than 1 percent of the states annual budget, or about what California brings in annually now from taxes on tobacco products.

Keith Humphreys, a Stanford University professor who served on a state commission that studied approaches for legalizing marijuana, summed up the financial impact of Prop. 64 this way: Its not going to make us if we do, and its not going to break us if we dont.

Tax revenue from legalized weed would first be used to cover all reasonable costs incurred by the state to administer and enforce the recreational cannabis regulations, according to the ballot measure.

The Department of Consumer Affairs, which would oversee the new marijuana marketplace if Prop. 64 passes, doesnt have an estimate yet of those administrative costs, according to spokeswoman Veronica Harms.

The much smaller states of Oregon and Washington spend about $6 million and $8 million a year, respectively, on their medical and recreational programs.

Colorado, which has the oldest and most robust recreational marijuana market in the nation, is budgeted to spend $16.3 million regulating legal marijuana this fiscal year, according to Robert Goulding, spokesman for the Colorado Department of Revenue.

The program pays it own way, Goulding noted, with industry taxes, licenses and fees covering administrative costs while helping fund such things as school construction, youth education programs and poison control centers.

Still, Prop. 64 opponents, including Orange County Sheriff Sandra Hutchens, say theyre concerned that tax revenue from legal marijuana sales wont cover harder-to-quantify effects on public safety and health issues.

WHAT ABOUT LOCAL BENEFITS?

One statewide Colorado levy on pot provides cities with money to use as they choose. That allowed Denver to add $29 million to its general fund budget in 2015, the Denver Post reports.

While Prop. 64 doesnt provide new, dedicated revenue directly to cities and counties, proponents say there are still ways local governments can benefit from the measure.

California cities that permit recreational marijuana businesses could increase income from sales taxes.

There also would be opportunities for governments, schools, public safety agencies and nonprofits in cities that welcome the cannabis industry to compete for hundreds of millions a year in grants that will fund substance abuse programs, offset enforcement costs and more.

Opponents of legalized pot argue all law enforcement agencies should be eligible for such grants, because the ballot measure would permit cultivation and personal consumption of marijuana at residences across the state.

Theyre still going to have to deal with the problems of home grows and use, but theres no money available to them, said Andrew Acosta, spokesman for the No on 64 campaign.

Kinney called such criticisms disingenuous. He pointed to a Legislative Analysts Office estimate that the state will save tens of millions of dollars each year in criminal justice costs if marijuana is legal.

The measure also says cities and counties can ask voters to approve extra local taxes on cannabis.

At least 18 California cities have already approved such levies on medical marijuana shops and farms. Among those is Santa Ana, which expects to collect $1.5 million in pot dispensary fees and taxes this year.

Another 37 local measures appearing on ballots in the state in November call for new taxes on marijuana sales or cultivation. Officials predict those levies could generate up to $22 million a year in revenue for cities and counties.

Contact the writer: 714-796-7963 or bstaggs@ocregister.comTwitter: @JournoBrooke
The Great Depression was notorious for its ill-conceived government interventions to prop up prices and create jobs through unnecessary and unproductive make-work programs, which only served to prevent needed corrections in the economy and ended up prolonging the depression. Yet, many of these policies persist to this day. A Michigan cherry farmer recently illustrated the fallacy of one such example: agricultural marketing orders.

Under a marketing order, growers of certain agricultural commodities form what is, essentially, a cartel and turn over crop supply decisions to boards overseen by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (or a similar agency at the state level), which are empowered to try to stabilize markets. During bumper years, the government sets restrictive quotas to artificially suppress the supply of crops, thereby raising prices higher than the free-market rate.

Such arrangements were authorized by the Agricultural Marketing Act of 1937. Today there are marketing orders for roughly three dozen agricultural products, including milk, fruits, vegetables, nuts and specialty crops. One of those marketing orders, the Cherry Industry Administrative Board, covers tart cherries grown in seven states  Michigan, New York, Pennsylvania, Oregon, Utah, Washington and Wisconsin.

The CIAB recently directed farmers to prevent a portion of their crops from making it to the market in an attempt to bump up prices. For cherry farmer Marc Santucci, owner of Santucci Farm in Traverse City, Mich., this order, which came just four days before his harvest, meant that he had to dump 40,000 pounds of his tart cherries  14 percent of his crop. The CIAB even sends people out to ensure that farmers have dumped their crops on the ground, where they are left to rot.

Santucci decided to protest the order in a very public way by posting a photo of the dumped cherries on Facebook. The image went viral, and has been shared nearly 67,000 times.

I posted it because I want people to know that we sometimes do stupid things in this country in [an] attempt to do the right thing  we end up doing the wrong thing, Santucci told UpNorthLive.com, the website of a local NBC affiliate in Traverse City.

The move is particularly foolish, Santucci said in a separate Facebook post last month, because of the global nature of agricultural markets. [I]t is a shame that we had to drop 14 percent of our cherries while at the same time [the United States was] importing the equivalent of 200 million pounds of cherries, or 40 percent of U.S. consumption, he asserted. The only way we are going to stop the continued growth in imports is to compete head-to-head, not with one arm tied behind our back.

Such food waste and artificially-high prices would not happen in a truly free market. Agricultural commodities should be subject to the same laws of supply and demand as other goods, which would provide consumers with more food at lower prices, allow for greater competition and encourage a more efficient allocation of farmland for growing various crops. It is the marketing orders themselves which should be allowed to wither and rot.
SAN DIEGO  Two former executives of a Singapore company that supplies ships have been indicted in a wide-spanning bribery scandal involving its CEO nicknamed Fat Leonard and high-ranking US Navy officials.

Former Glenn Defense Marine Asia executives Neil Peterson and Linda Raja in an indictment unsealed Wednesday are accused of submitting false claims totaling more than $5 million to the Navy.

The companys CEO Leonard Fat Leonard Francis is awaiting sentencing after pleading guilty to bribing Navy officials. Prosecutors say the scheme bilked the Navy out of $34 million.

Peterson was the companys vice president for global operations and Raja was its general manager for Singapore, Australia, and the Pacific Isles. The defendants were arrested in Singapore and are awaiting extradition to the United States. They could not be reached for comment.
Ever since Outlets at San Clemente opened last November, theres one high-demand service the Newport Beach retail developer didnt count on: dining.

Theres a really big appetite for more food there, said Steve Craig, chief executive of Craig Realty Group, which owns several premium outlet malls across the country.

Craig Realty plans to satisfy shoppers food fix by adding three more restaurants: Rubys Diner, Slapfish and Rockwells Cafe & Bakery. Two will open by the end of the year.

With the retail portion of the Outlets roughly 75 percent occupied, Craig said the the response to the food has been overwhelming. On Labor Day, the main restaurants at the site, fast-casual brands Panera Bread and Blaze Pizza, were slammed with hungry shoppers.

It surprised everybody, Craig said in a phone interview Friday.

Two of the three new restaurants, Rubys Diner and Rockwells, will be the first two full-service restaurants to open with partial ocean views. They are among more than 12 restaurants planned for the 52-acre bluff-top retail center off the 5 at Avenida Vista Hermosa.

Four to five more food venues with panoramic ocean views are still to come. The white tablecloth concepts have yet to be named, Craig said.

For Rockwells, nabbing a spot at the Outlets marks the beginning of an expansion plan for the mom-and-pop bakery.

Rockwells has been a fixture in the Orange and Villa Park community since 1987. It started off as a bakery, but over the years has expanded as a casual dining cafe with a bar.

Bill and Laurie Skeffington bought and renovated the bakery in 2012. Bill Skeffington, reached by phone on Friday, said adding a south Orange County location was necessary to better serve clients who order cakes from as far away as Oceanside.

We are trying to be more convenient, he said.

Skeffington, a Villa Park resident who owns an asphalt company, also operates Watsons Soda Fountain & Cafe in Old Towne Orange. He made headlines last year when he bought the institution, promising to bring the diner back to its former glory.

Watsons opened in 1899 as a drugstore in downtown Orange. It is considered one of the countys oldest businesses. But over the years, the diner (the pharmacy shut down several years ago) had fallen into disrepair.

Skeffington spent months and thousands of dollars restoring the diner, reopening it in March to overwhelming crowds. (He ran out of ice cream on opening weekend.) The new Watsons menu includes a more sophisticated casual dining menu and alcohol-infused shakes, cocktails and craft beer.

Watsons also houses a satellite Rockwells bakery stand.

At Rockwells in San Clemente, Skeffington said the cafes food and drink offerings will be a twist of both Watsons and Rockwells menus. The 4,000-square foot restaurant and bakery, expected to open in early 2017, will sell sandwiches, scones, shakes and beer and wine.

Skeffington said he also plans to serve adult shakes and beer floats.

But, by far, the biggest draw at Rockwells is its signature chocolate curl cakes.

The elegantly designed tiered cakes have been the centerpiece of hundreds of Orange County wedding receptions for years. The bakery is also known for designing custom fondant cakes.

Skeffington is hoping to strike a deal with Craig to open another bakery at Citadel Outlets, the developers Los Angeles retail center. Over the last 20 years, Craig Realty has tapped Skeffingtons Santa Ana concrete company, Bens Asphalt, for work on several outlet projects including San Clemente.

Craig said Rubys Diner and Slapfish, a fast-casual seafood shack, will open in October and December, respectively.

After years of planning, the first 35 stores at the Outlets at San Clemente opened in November. It now has more than 50 shops open. The center will be close to 500,000 square feet when completed and have 120 stores and more than 12 dining options.

Recent store openings include Kitchen Collection, Le Creuset, LOFT Outlet, Grayse, Bowlology, AT&T, Nautica Factory Store, Flip Flop Shops, Zales Outlet, Pearl Izumi Factory Store, 2XU, Starbucks, Auntie Annes Pretzels, Blaze Pizza and Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory.

The center is part of the 248-acre Marblehead Coastal development approved in 2003 by the California Coastal Commission for 313 homes, the outlets, hiking trails, parks and a habitat preserve.

Besides The Outlets in San Clemente, Craig Realty Group owns and operates a dozen outlet centers in seven states including Outlets at Barstow, Cabazon Outlets near Palm Springs and the Citadel Outlets in Los Angeles.

Contact the writer: nluna@scng.com
The garage door flips up at Virgil Pletchers house and its time to get down with one of the coolest cars ever made.

Two clues about this honey of a machine: Wilson Pickett recorded what song in what year about a man who buys a car for his girlfriend?

OK, one more hint: That girls name was Sally.

Thats right, Im looking at a half-century-old Mustang that is almost exactly like it was the day Pletcher and his wife drove from Santa Ana to Michigan to buy it hot off the assembly line.

I open the maroon door, settle into the black bucket seat, shift the four-on-the-floor stick into neutral, turn the ignition key and squash the gas pedal.

Oh, Lord, as Pickett sings, what I say now.

PLOWBOY AT HEART

At 92, Pletcher is nearly twice as old as his favorite car. He has several.

But dont think Pletcher has a fancy garage. Far from it. Though he has a few classic cars, including a 1965 VW Beetle in need of tender love, Pletcher stays close to his roots.

Pletcher, born in 1923, grew up on an Indiana farm. By age 7, he fed chickens, gathered eggs and milked cows by hand.

By age 11, he hitched up the familys four horses and maneuvered a monster mower to cut hay in the back swath of the 118-acre farm.

Im an Indiana plowboy, Pletcher says during a visit at his Lake Forest home.

It was in high school when Pletcher discovered his first love  cars.

Pletcher went from a one-room schoolhouse to a regular high school  graduating class 50  but there were no buses to ferry students. Sixteen years old and armed with a drivers license, Pletcher asked his father if he could borrow the familys 1935 Ford flathead V-8 to bus kids to school.

Oh, the job paid $1 per student per week.

Pop said you bet, and before long Pletcher was making $9 a week.

Yes, the school was just fine squeezing nine teenagers into a car, stacking kids on one anothers laps. And, yes, times have changed.

When World War II broke out, Pletcher and his brother received farm deferments. But by 1944, the deferments expired and Pletcher found himself at the draft office. The clerk asked what military branch he wanted. Army, the plowboy said, anything but the Navy because he didnt know how to swim.

He was handed a document stamped with a big N. Soon, three months of Navy boot camp were squeezed into five weeks and Pletcher found himself on a train to San Francisco.

Next stop: Guadalcanal.

Ive lived in two worlds, Pletcher says. The farm before I was drafted, and everything after.

CALIFORNIA-BOUND

Pletcher spent his tour in the Navy working as a clerk and bouncing around various Pacific islands. Eventually, he wound up at the Lighter-Than-Air Station, as it was known then; today its known as the Tustin blimp base.

But what really interested him was roller skating, a mighty big pastime in the 1940s. And  not incidentally  a mighty fine way to meet mighty fine girls.

Pletcher hitched up his courage and made his way to the Santa Ana Roller Rink on East First Street. The rink is long gone, but the Navy veteran has no trouble remembering the building or recalling the months he courted his future wife, Marcheta Teter.

Eventually, Mrs. and Mr. Teter invited the young sailor over for dinner, a landmark event.

But after Pletcher was discharged, he felt duty-bound to head back to the farm to help with the heavy lifting. Soon, though, it was clear there were enough Pletchers to work the land.

The young man borrowed his brothers Pontiac and drove straight to Santa Ana.

Pletcher found a job mixing and maintaining wet plaster. It was a job he held for 42 years. The couple married and bought a home near Bristol and Warner in Santa Ana. Three daughters followed, and today all are married and remain in Orange County.

Pletcher and his wife shared a passion for singing, he as a baritone in barbershop quartets and she as a Sweet Adeline.

But all the while, Pletcher remained a car guy at heart.

He bought a Studebaker Champion nearly straight from the factory in South Bend, Ind. It cost him $1,500, and he figures the Studebaker worker he got it from paid half that.

After arriving in California, Pletcher and his wife cruised in a 1949 Ford convertible.

Later, Pletcher bought a 1954 Studebaker for its sloped racing hood.

But when the 1966 Ford Mustang came out, well, as Pickett sings, Huh, oh, yeah.

MUSTANG PLETCHER

As luck would have it, Pletchers brother knew a car dealer in Dowagiac, Mich., that offered rock-bottom prices.

More luck: Pletchers brother was a trucker for a company that shipped cars. That allowed him to haul his Pontiac to California so Pletcher and his wife could drive east.

That suited Pletcher. After all, he was the kind of man who understood the value of a dollar. Likewise, he had no need for power steering, power brakes or air conditioning.

But on the way back to California, his wife sweated in the humid, 100-degree Nebraska heat. Nearly faint, she asked to turn on the air conditioner.

Pletcher explained there was no A/C. It just clutters up the engine compartment, he said, and hurts performance.

His wife didnt buy it.

Oh, Pletcher remembers, she was all steamed up.

Still, both husband and wife loved the Mustang so much they drove it at least four times to visit relatives in Indiana.

Later, Pletcher spotted a 1984 Camaro Z28. He couldnt resist.

Lets just say  hypothetically, of course  that husband and wife decided on a little race. Husband climbed in the Mustang. Wife climbed in the Camaro. For a few seconds, it was a dead heat.

But, gradually, the Mustang, with its 289 cubic-inch V8 engine packing 225 horses, pulled ahead.

From the very start, Pletcher says of the model, the Mustang was a winner.

Today, the Camaro is gone. But the Mustang, original parts intact and chrome gleaming, still hums  just as it has for 50 years.

Though Pletchers wife has been hit by age, her husband remains nimble and drives a minivan to barbershop quartet practices.

But every once in awhile, the plowboy slides into the maroon cocoon, turns the key, punches the clutch and the engine comes to life with a rumble and a roar.

Ride, Sally, ride.

Contact the writer: dwhiting@scng.com
As the madness of the election season begins to come to a head, rap and rock supergroup Prophets of Rage  featuring Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello, drummer Brad Wilk and bassist Tim Commerford along with Cypress Hill frontman B-Real and Public Enemy leader Chuck D and DJ Lord  continue on their Make America Rage Again Tour, which stopped back in the bands home county at the Forum in Inglewood on Thursday night.

After the group played a couple of intimate warm-up gigs at the Whisky A Go Go and the Hollywood Palladium in late May and early June, the jaunt officially kicked-off at a gig just down the street from where the Republican National Convention was being held in Cleveland, Ohio in July. Since then, the band has been playing set lists filled with the politically charged anthems of all three acts and spreading the word that theres no better time than now to stand up to the government.

The world is not going to change itself, Morello reminded the crowd. That is up to you.

Prophets of Rage were introduced by Mary Morello, the guitarista 92-year-old mother and fellow activist who founded the anti-censorship group Parents for Rock and Rap nearly three decades ago. The band came out blazing with its namesake track and updated version of Public Enemys Prophets of Rage. The energy was steady throughout the evening as members fed off of the audience that absolutely packed the sold-out floor space.

Obvious kinks that occurred during the first couple of local shows had been ironed out nicely and the sextet was even stronger this time around, with B-Real being the most improved as he really upped his game vocally on Rage cuts such as Bombtrack and Bulls on Parade. Its still a different style than the familiar ferocious growl of Rage frontman Zack de la Rocha, but the sentiment of these iconic songs remains the same.

Mixing in Public Enemys She Watch Channel Zero, Miuzi Weighs a Ton and Rages People of the Sun, which had B-Real and Chuck D on point sharing vocal duty, the Cypress Hill frontman took a moment to let crowd know that his group was celebrating its 25th anniversary and he gave a shout out to his partner Sen Dog who was in the audience before playing How I Could Just Kill a Man.

The mid-set medley of Cypress Hill and Public Enemy songs was a fun moment with B-Real and Chuck D getting down and into the crowd, crunching up against the barrier and delivering songs like Cant Truss It, Insane in the Brain, Welcome to the Terrordome and Jump Around. Caught up in the excitement, the guys leaped into the audience and began to crowd surf, which went all right for the 46-year-old B-Real, but for 56-year-old Chuck D, things went awry as he was rapidly swallowed up by a the sea of hands and bodies. Despite landing flat on his back and getting lost in the chaos, he didnt skip a beat when the medley transitioned into Bring the Noise.

The rest of the group returned to the stage and got the mosh pits going again with Sleep Now in the Fire and Bullet in the Head. It played its original song, The Partys Over, and then mashed-up a cover of the Beastie Boys No Sleep Till Brooklyn with Public Enemys Fight the Power.

With only two songs left in the set, the band surprised its hometown audience by bringing out Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl for a mighty cover of MC5s Kick Out the Jams that presented the opportunity to witness two stellar guitar players battle it out as Grohl and Morello did not hold back. It was as exciting as it was exhausting to experience live as each member gave every last bit of energy either playing, singing or dancing along through the finish. Prophets of Rage closed out with Rages Killing in the Name and turned up the house lights for the perfect view of the passionate and rowdy crowd response.

Contact the writer: 714-796-3570 or kfadroski@ocregister.com
On YouTube, the 44-year-old Coto de Caza man says he can help homeowners in danger of losing their homes.

If youre in need of foreclosure proceedings to be stopped, payments to be more affordable, and interest-rate reductions to be done, Im your man, he says.

But prosecutors allege that Kevin Frank Rasher, who goes by Kevin Carter in the video, actually was running a loan-modification scam that bilked more than 400 troubled homeowners out of $2.2 million.

Rasher was arrested at his home in May and charged in July with more than 50 felony counts including grand theft and burglary.

On Thursday, he was charged with more than 70 new felony counts including money laundering, grand theft, and financial exploitation of an elder, the Orange County District Attorneys Office said.

Prosecutors said Rasher, from 2011 to this April, falsely represented himself as a Housing and Urban Development attorney even though he never has had a law license in California.

Prosecutors said he had a $10,200-a-month rental home in Coto de Caza, only some homeowners ultimately got loan modifications, and the alleged scam left at least three victims without their homes.

If convicted, Rasher faces up to 98 years in prison. He was being held in lieu of $2 million. Before posting bond, he must prove that the money is from a legal source.

Contact the writer: kpuente@ocregister.com, 714-834-3773
Before taking on roles in Snowden, neither Joseph Gordon-Levitt nor Shailene Woodley knew much about the subject of the new Oliver Stone film, which opened in wide release Friday.

Gordon-Levitt plays Edward Snowden, the former CIA computer programmer who in 2013 revealed the widespread nature of the National Security Agencys electronic surveillance program on American citizens. Charged with espionage, the now 33-year-old fugitive lives in Moscow, having been granted asylum in Russia through August 2017.

Woodley portrays Snowdens longtime girlfriend, Lindsay Mills, who had been kept in the dark about what Snowden planned to do. She has since chosen to live with him in Russia.

Mention Snowden and peoples responses can range from anywhere between traitor or hero. How much the films rather sympathetic portrait of him affects peoples opinions remains to be seen, but views are likely to change as we learn more.

Woodley says Snowden and Mills are still processing their lives.

Actually, the world is still processing Snowdens actions. Few were likely surprised that the U.S. was spying on people in other countries, but news that a government program snooped on American citizens shocked many.

Woodley, 24, and Gordon-Levitt, 35, know that questions about technology and privacy are just beginning to be raised and understood, and it is something they and the rest of their generation will likely face all their lives.

Gordon-Levitt says he didnt really think about it until he became involved in Snowden.

Not just privacy. Privacy is one tree in the forest, he says. Ive put more thought into how does the Internet work  not only how the government uses it but how private companies make use of it.

The actor says he has even started reading all those electronic-user agreements we all readily agree to. While he admits that the legal language is daunting, he tries to get the gist of it.

I try to understand what this company is after, how are they making money, how they making use of my participation, he says. I think the more of us that do that, then the more we can make sure the Internet evolves into something that benefits us rather than takes advantage of us.

Gordon-Levitt became so involved with the topic that he donated most of his salary from the film to the American Civil Liberties Union and the rest to produce a series of videos about democracy in conjunction with the civil-liberties group. The videos explore the connection between technology and democracy. They are being made through HitRecord, an open-collaborative production company and website he founded.

Like everything on the site, Gordon-Levitt asked for contributions from people for the project, called, Are you there, democracy? Its me, the Internet.

Its really interesting, because were getting a lot of different answers and perspectives, he says.

Woodley isnt sure if there is even a way now to lead a private life because of all the technology we have.

The actress, who had been a Bernie Sanders supporter, says it would be easy to become fearful but it doesnt accomplish anything. Were fortunate enough to live in a country where we can make a difference in our government.

The question, she says, is whether as technology unfolds will people take necessary measures to ensure that privacy is something we can hold onto.

Coming from Stone (Platoon and Wall Street), who doesnt hide his left-leaning politics, the film presents Snowden as being not the only one inside the system who had qualms about the governments surveillance of private U.S. citizens.

I think Oliver is the only one who could have made this film properly, says Gordon-Levitt. If you look at large-scale Hollywood films, he is the only filmmaker who is willing to stand up and say, I love my country but this thing that the government is doing is not right and we should be talking about it.

Before releasing thousands of classified documents, Snowden had led a life of anonymity. Laura Poitras Citizenfour (2014) chronicled how he did it. The documentary won the 2015 Oscar, and that was Mills onstage with Poitras and Glenn Greenwald, one of the journalists who broke the story, to accept the award.

Stone begins his film with Poitras (Melissa Leo) and Greenwald (Zachary Quinto) in a Hong Kong hotel room with Snowden. He had invited them there to tell his story before releasing the rest of the documents to the Guardian newspaper and the Washington Post and revealing his identity on June 9, 2013.

He only told Mills that he was going on a business trip when he left their home in Hawaii where he was working on a top-secret project.

Much of the underpinning of Stones movie is about Snowdens relationship with Mills, which had begun when they were in their early 20s. They had been living together some four or five years when Snowden took off. During their time together, the computer programmer  who had high-security clearance  never talked about his work.

Woodley and Gordon-Levitt got to meet their real-life counterparts. The actress had dinner with Mills in Washington, D.C.

As an actor, I wanted to know who she is in her physical mannerisms in order to aid the character that were creating, but as a woman I was sensitive to her life story, says Woodley, who adds like everyone else she had a million questions.

This wasnt an easy situation for her to experience, notes the actress. At least Ed knew what he was doing. He knew the whole world would be watching him, but she didnt know that overnight everyone would be watching her as well.

In Stones film, Snowden is seen wanting to protect Mills by keeping his intentions secret. Woodley says that even after talking with her she wont conjecture why Mills has stuck by Snowden.

I do know that when youre in love with someone you do things that sometimes dont make sense, says Woodley, like staying with someone for 10 years and them not being able to tell you anything about their job.

Gordon-Levitt had to go to Moscow to meet Snowden, who contributed a segment to one of the HitRecord films. The actor compares him to Daniel Ellsberg, the former military analyst, who in 1971 released the Pentagon Papers, a top-secret Pentagon study about the Vietnam War.

While doing research for the films, Gordon-Levitt says he read accounts about Ellsberg that echoed what some people said about Snowden.

They called Ellsberg a USSR sympathizer, says the actor. I think if you look at the history of whistleblowers like him, it takes a while but we generally come around to recognize the service they do.

What will happen to Snowden remains a thorny question. Though Ellsberg was charged under the 1917 Espionage Act, the government ultimately dropped the charges.

Recently, Snowden has been criticizing his Russian hosts over their human-rights record and insinuating that the government has been involved in hacks on U.S. security networks.

I know he doesnt want to live in Russia the rest of his life, says Gordon-Levitt.

I think he remains optimistic about the future in general, and I think he cares more about the future of humanity and the United States than about the future of his own self.
BOSTON (AP)  Actor Mark Wahlberg has ended his bid for a pardon for assaults he committed as a teenager in Massachusetts.

In 1988, a 16-year-old Wahlberg hit a Vietnamese man in the head with a stick while trying to steal alcohol and punched another in the face while trying to avoid police.

Wahlberg said he was high at the time. He served about 45 days in jail.

Wahlberg apologized and said he has dedicated himself to becoming a better person so he could be a role model and raised millions of dollars for charity.

His 2014 pardon application was met with sharp criticism.

A Massachusetts Parole Board spokesman said Thursday that Wahlberg didnt respond to a letter asking if he wished to keep his petition open, so the matter has been closed.

Wahlberg, now 45, told reporters at the Toronto Film Festival this week that he regrets asking for the pardon, but hes grateful that the process allowed him to meet and apologize to one of his victims.

Some good did come out of it, he said.

Walhberg, who grew up in the Dorchester section of Boston, started out as rapper Marky Mark and went on to star in movies such as Boogie Nights, The Departed, The Fighter and Ted.
Everybody remembers the Declaration of Independence. But the Constitution? The legal pact we all love and argue about and, in some cases, die to defend? Saturday marks the 229th anniversary of the day the framers signed the document and sent it to the states for ratification. It took another three years before all the states signed on to the Constitution.

Fireworks and a parade?

The U.S. Constitution was a compromise that didnt come together easily. Many of the framers werent thrilled with the various ideas, and they argued about it for four months. On signing day, even Benjamin Franklin offered only mixed approval, saying there are several parts of this Constitution which I do not at present approve However, before signing Franklin added this: But Im not sure I shall never approve them. Today, the U.S. Constitution is the worlds longest surviving written charter of government, and it remains a model for democratic nations around the world.

Test your knowledge

What was our countrys first Constitution called?

A) The Articles of Confederation

B) The Federalist Paper

C) The Emancipation Proclamation

Answer: A

The longest possible time a person can now serve as president is:

A) 4

B) 8

C) 10

D) 12

Answer: C. Based upon the 22nd amendment to the Constitution, no person can be elected to the office of president more than twice or serve more than one term after serving more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected.

The bill of rights is:

A) The first 10 amendments

B) The fifteenth amendment

C) The entire Constitution

D) All of the amendments

Answer: A. There was a concern when the Constitution was written, in 1787, that the federal government would be too powerful. The Bill of Rights was added in 1791 to put a check on the power of the national government and to protect the individual rights of all Americans.

Which of these founding fathers did not attend the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia?

Answer: D.

Jefferson was serving as minister to France, Adams was minister to Great Britain and Hancock turned down the invitation.

Which amendment took the longest to be ratified after it was proposed to Congress?

A) 18th

B) 21st

C) 22nd

D) 27th

Answer: D. The text was proposed on Sept. 25, 1789, and was ratified in 1992. Its a law concerning the adjustment of salaries of members of Congress

Jacob Shallus was the penman who, after the text of the Constitution had been agreed on, engrossed it prior to the signing. How many sheets are in the original Constitution?

A) One

B) Four

C) Six

Answer: 4. Shallus copied the Constitution on four sheets of vellum parchment with a quill. The only other person known to have written on the documents was Alexander Hamilton, who wrote a list of the states at the end.

Which of the following is not an enumerated power given to the federal government?

A) Establish post offices and post roads

B) Establish a national bank

C) Regulate commerce with foreign nations

D) Constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court

Answer: B

Who wrote the preamble?

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

A) John Updike

B) Benjamin Franklin

C) Gouverneur Morris
The Emmy Awards will be presented Sunday in what is TVs own Game of Thrones  minus the beheadings and bloodshed.

Last year, HBO pulled off a royal double play, reigning in both the drama (Thrones) and comedy (Veep) races. Can the cable titan do it again?

Of course, predicting what will go down on Emmy night is always an iffy deal. Just when you think voters are stuck in a rerun rut, they surprise you by showering their love on a newbie or two.

Nevertheless, were making like Jon Snow and boldly charging ahead, no matter how steep the odds are. Here we go:

Outstanding drama

The Americans (FX); Better Call Saul (AMC); Downton Abbey (PBS); Game of Thrones (HBO); Homeland (Showtime); House of Cards (Netflix); Mr. Robot (USA)

Should win: The Americans

Will win: Game of Thrones

First of all, props to the Emmy voters for getting a clue. After dissing The Americans three straight years, they have finally embraced the marvelous Cold War spy saga.

But the pick is Thrones, which simply has too much momentum (23 nominations) and buzz behind it. Besides, if we didnt favor the fantasy juggernaut, we fear that Daenerys would sic her dragons on us.

Outstanding comedy

Black-ish (ABC); Master of None (Netflix); Modern Family (ABC); Silicon Valley (HBO); Transparent (Amazon); Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt (Netflix); Veep (HBO)

Should win: Veep

Will win: Veep

We have a soft spot for Silicon Valley, which keeps getting better. And we admired how Black-ish confronted hot-button issues while still managing to be bust-a-gut funny.

Still, Veep didnt lose any zip off its fastball, even after a change of showrunners. The political satire was as sharp, acerbic and viciously hilarious as ever. In this weird election year, it has our vote.

Best actor, drama

Kyle Chandler (Bloodline, Netflix); Rami Malek (Mr Robot, USA); Bob Odenkirk (Better Call Saul, AMC); Matthew Rhys (The Americans, FX); Liev Schreiber (Ray Donovan, Showtime); Kevin Spacey (House of Cards, Netflix)

Should win: Rami Malek

Will win: Kevin Spacey

Its hard to believe that Spacey, one of our top actors, has never won an Emmy. Now that Bryan Cranston and Jon Hamm have departed the premises, this just might be his year.

Then again, theres not a slouch in this race, and perhaps many voters will be swayed by Malek, an exciting newcomer whose intense and moody performance was absolutely riveting.

Best actress, drama

Viola Davis (How to Get Away With Murder, ABC); Claire Danes (Homeland, Showtime), Taraji P. Henson (Empire, Fox), Tatiana Maslany (Orphan Black, BBC America); Keri Russell (The Americans, FX); Robin Wright (House of Cards, Netflix)

Should win: Tatiana Maslany

Will win: Robin Wright

Were still beaming over Davis historic victory last year  and her awesome acceptance speech. Our gut tells us that the voters will now turn their attention to Wright, who was oh so deliciously fierce and glorious as the power-hungry Claire Underwood.

But our heart remains with the virtuosic Maslany, who has to shape-shift into a variety of characters. Shes the hardest working woman in prime time.

Best actor, comedy

Anthony Anderson (Black-ish, ABC); Aziz Ansari (Master of None, Netflix); Will Forte (The Last Man on Earth, Fox); William H. Macy (Shameless, Showtime); Thomas Middleditch (Silicon Valley, HBO); Jeffrey Tambor (Transparent, Amazon)

Should win: Jeffrey Tambor

Will win: Jeffrey Tambor

Tambor captured the prize last year, when he was considered a lock, and there has been no falloff in his thoughtful, nuanced performance.

The only contenders who might pose a threat are Anderson, who plays his role to charismatic perfection, or Ansari, who charmed the heck out of us with his revelatory work.

Best actress, comedy

Ellie Kemper (Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, Netflix); Julia Louis-Dreyfus (Veep, HBO); Laurie Metcalf (Getting On, HBO); Tracee Ellis Ross (Black-ish, ABC); Amy Schumer (Inside Amy Schumer, Comedy Central); Lily Tomlin (Grace and Frankie, Netflix)

Should win: Julia Louis-Dreyfus

Will win: Julia Louis-Dreyfus

Imagine being in the same category as Louis-Dreyfus. You get all dressed up and arrive at TVs biggest bash realizing youve got no shot. Louis-Dreyfus is going for her fifth straight Emmy win and seventh overall. Shes the Michael Phelps of comedy.

Seeing someone else win (like Kemper or Ross) would be refreshing, but its not like Louis-Dreyfus is undeserving. Her performance as the tightly wound, foul-mouthed Selina Meyer continues to be TV gold.

And the Emmy should also go to 

Lead actress, limited series or movie: Sarah Paulson (The People v. O.J. Simpson)

Lead actor, limited series or movie: Courtney B. Vance (The People v. O.J. Simpson)

Supporting actress, drama: Maura Tierney (The Affair, Showtime)

Supporting actor, drama: Kit Harington (Game of Thrones)

Supporting actress, comedy: Kate McKinnon (Saturday Night Live, NBC)

Supporting actor, comedy: Louie Anderson (Baskets, FX)

Television movie: All the Way (HBO)

Variety, talk show: Last Week Tonight With John Oliver (HBO)
ANAHEIM  A 20-year-old woman managed to escape from her attacker during a kidnapping attempt Thursday night, police said.

The woman was walking in the 10000 block of Gilbert Street, in an unincorporated area of Anaheim, when a man approached from behind, placed his hand over he mouth and told her in Spanish to, Come with me, said Lt. John Roche of the Orange County Sheriffs Department.

She struggled and managed to get away from him, Roche said.

During the struggle, the woman said she was struck with a hard, blunt object, Roche said. She was examined by paramedics, but didnt want to go to the hospital, Roche said.

Police found a man a short distance from where the attack occurred who matched the physical description and clothes the woman described. Pedro Molina, 21, was taken into custody and booked on suspicion of attempted kidnapping and assault.

We dont believe there are other victims, but investigators are looking into that, Roche said. I dont think weve had any similar cases like this recently.

Anyone with information on the incident can contact The Orange County Sheriffs Department at 714-628-7170. Anyone who wants to remain anonymous can call Orange County Crime Stoppers at 855-TIP-OCCS (855-847-6227).

Contact the writer: 714-796-7802 or jsudock@ocregister.com
Japan Pom Pom is a unique cheerleading troupe made up of 28 vivacious members whose ages range from 55 to late 80s. These energetic grandmas have been engaging in their glamorous hobby for the last two decades and show no sign of stopping anytime soon.

84-year-old Fumie Tanako is the founder of Japan Pom Pom and an active member of the group. She says that she would not have had the confidence to pick up cheerleading in her youth, but became emboldened by major life changes that occurred during middle age. When she was 53, Fumie decided to travel to Texas to study. It was against her dying mothers wishes, but her children supported her decision. Then, in her early 60s, her relationship with her husband began to fall apart, and ultimately ended. It was around this time that she found her calling in life  cheerleading. Mesmerized by the impressive array of moves performed by professional American cheerleaders, she immediately rounded up five elderly girlfriends and started practicing. Two decades later, their troupe is still going strong.

Photo: Amebo

Japan is known for its high life expectancy, with women living for an average of 87 years and men to 80, but the healthy life span average is 10 years lower for both sexes, with many suffering physical and mental ailments in the last years of their lives. But Fumie Tanako and her 27 fellow granny cheerleaders are challenging statistics with their energy and agility. In fact, the 84-year-old credits cheerleading for helping her push back the clock and keeping her in great physical and mental shape. Even though some members of Japan Pom Pom have had to retire due to health problems or to take care of their aging husbands, Fumie has been leading the group since 1996 and has no plans to retire.

The cheerleaders of Japan Pom Pom still get together every week to put on their brightly colored leotards, grab their pom-poms and practice new moves. Even though they try not to overdo the acrobatics to avoid serious injuries, they are very serious about their routine, even watching and analyzing videos of themselves to improve. Given the intense nature of cheerleading and the average age of the troupe members  70 years old  some girls do retire from time to time, but Fumie says new recruits are easy to find. The only requirement to join the group is a minimum age limit of 55.

This year, Japan Pom Pom celebrated its 20th anniversary by performing as guests at Japans annual United Spirit Association (USA) Nationals competition, where mostly high school and university teams compete.

The next time you feel you cant do something, or that its too late for you, just watch a video of these elderly ladies engaging in their favorite hobby. That should give you a new outlook on life.

Sources: ABC News/AFP, Japan Times
Gylve Nagell, a member of a Norwegian rock band, only agreed to run for local councilor in his hometown of Kolbotn only as a backup, thinking it would help boost voter turnout. He never wanted to win, and to make sure he didnt, Nagells campaign posters showed him holding his pet cat, with the caption Please Dont Vote for Me. It didnt work the way he had planned.

Gylve, better known as Fenriz, half of Norwegian heavy metal band Darkthrone, will be required to attend important council meetings and listen to his constituents complaints, after winning a seat on the Kolbotn local council. The news came as a huge surprise to the young musician, as he claims he only agreed to run after officials in Kolbotn asked him to do it in an effort to boost voter numbers. Basically, they called and asked if I wanted to be on the list [of backup representatives]. I said yeah, thinking I would be like 18th on the list and I wouldnt really have to do anything, he told music site Clrvynt.

He never made any effort to win, but as the actual election approached, Fenriz says he started to get a feeling that he might actually end up a councilor against his will. So he tried to very openly sabotage his own campaign by using a photo of himself holding his pet cat with the caption Please Dont Vote for Me as a poster. But his hometown was apparently so impressed by his lack of interest for the official position that they voted for him overwhelmingly. People just went nuts, as he puts it.

Photo: Metal Sucks

After the election, the boss called me and told me I was a representative. I wasnt too pleased, and Im not too pleased about it. Its boring. Theres not a lot of money in that, either, I can tell you, the Darkthrone member said. Basically, I have to step in when the usual people who go to the big meetings are sick or something. Then I have to go sit there and feel stupid among the straight people.

Youre probably thinking why didnt he just decline the position? Thats because he cant. Nagell says that according to Norwegian law, if you get voted in, you have to stay in that position for four years. And then you can pull out.

Kolbotn is a suburb of Oslo with around 9,000 inhabitants.
The Big wolf has torn out of the bag, as Can-Am is now rolling in the newest untouched section of our industry with the highest horsepower and longest reach for any UTV in the market. The hype behind the new Maverick X3  born in the companys Valcourt, Canada, facility  has officially hit the market and we headed to the wild terrain of Baja California, Mexico, to get an up-close-and-personal view of it. This two-day adventure would give us a chance to ride in these individual, yet similar, machines over terrain that could wreck the mind of many hard-core enthusiasts. We were excited to finally slip into the seat of the 2017 Can-Am Maverick X3 tres hermanos and its brethren.

Baja is a mystical place where the wild inner man can be unleashed provided the correct machine and safety are kept close at hand. This land takes you back to a simpler time and makes most yearn for that kind of peace in a world that is constantly on the gas. This landscape has recorded many notable heroes and race wins, but it has also made legends of those who found the terrain as well as its inhabitants unpredictable, making this fierce terrain their final resting place. Some consider the Baja 1000 to be the toughest race on the North American continent, and with my experience in the area I would say they are not far from correct.

As the sun rose over the San Nicholas hotel in Ensenada, we were briefed on the ins and outs of the Maverick X3s we would be riding. Our goal was to not only pay close attention to the instructions of Bruce and his GoBajaRiding.com crew, but we knew there was some preparation for our mind to get every detail of our experience in order. We watched as the Can-Am Mavericks pulled out of the San Nicholas paddock, as the ride would actually start for us just a bit down Highway 1 in the sleepy little town of Santo Tomas. My goal was to sprint from the bus to the first Maverick X3 X rs Turbo R that I found available.

The flagship Maverick X3 X rs just commands attention. Our first ride was the triple black X rs, which was stealthy and looked good but the appearance of the version with gold and Can-Am Red just got stuck in my head, yet unfortunately we were not introduced on this ride. The X3 X rs is very menacing from front or rear. It has a reach in its suspension unlike any other, with 22 inches out front and 24 in the back. An overall width of 72 inches means the stability of this beast is also increased for cornering. It is also a very long vehicle at 102 inches for its wheelbase that places it well over the length of any competition. What really complements this rig is the hefty shock package that cushions the blows for the driver and passenger. The Fox bypass shocks are enormous, as the 3.0 Podium RC2 shocks in the rear command in extreme terrain, and from the very first real gap in the trail it was apparent that the fun had just began. Up front Can-Am equipped the X rs with FOX 2.5 Podium RC2s with piggyback and bypass along with plenty of adjustment as well.

We know you have read the stats so on to the ride. Sitting in the Maverick X3 X rs and pressing the gas the car loves to set the back end down, point the nose into the clouds and ramp up into a sudden power surge as if it is gently asking if you are really ready for this. The triple cylinder comes on steadily at first, but the big 154 hp Rotax engine begins to rage not long after its introduction. From that point on it is anyones guess as to just how far the power can be found in this mill. Can-Am has developed their QRS-X CVT transmission to take on delivery of power-to-wheel duties, and without hesitation the linear engagement is smooth and worked well throughout our ride of over 250 combined miles. Whether cruising at 55 to 60 mph and pressing the pedal down further, or even at what would seem to be the limit of the pedal, there is always a vivid response from the power plant. After getting a little more familiar with the power output and its attitude we were able to trust it to be able to lift the nose of the car for the sudden and frequent harsh terrain we encountered. A few really intense moments with sudden, high-speed deep whoops or massive g-outs and the suspension was more than sufficient for us as well.

It is hard to explain in any other way, but this Maverick X rs makes you feel like a bad ass almost instantly when you drop into the cab. The comfortable high-back seating for the driver can be adjusted not only forward and back but also down into the bellows for larger, taller drivers. I found that I actually liked the upper seat mount position more for my height, as I felt it allowed me to see over the hood better. The tilt steering with gauges that move up and down with the wheel makes seeing the information on the screen pretty easy. These seats are also equipped with cutouts for four- or five-point harnesses should you decide to get really serious about racing this vehicle. The harness seat hole for installation is in the molding of the front of the seat but is covered by material until you are ready to install the extra links.



If there was anything that got my attention about this machine in a less satisfying way it would have to be the initial egress education into the drivers seat, as I found my shin connecting with the angled edge where the door latches several times. It was just a matter of adjusting my entrance but a memorable lesson at that. Once inside the cab it was roomy and felt very comfortable. The big air box for the intake and CVT is also located right behind the drivers head, and that too makes hearing any conversation (whether in your own mind or with a passenger) a bit difficult.

As the day ran on I was able to get seat time in the X ds version of this Maverick X3 as well, and I would have to say this could be the real sleeping beauty of the bunch for the guy who loves to trail ride in tighter woods or terrain. It is not priced much lower than the big car (around $2,000 less, give or take, at $24,999 vs. $26,699) but on the East Coast it would obviously be much more trail friendly. Using the very same powerful Rotax ACE turbocharged engine with the 64-inch wide stance, the available power seemed to intensify and you could feel it even more in the foot feed. This X ds also looses a little weight as well, with 29-inch Maxxis Bighorn 2.0 tires verses the 30-inch meats on the X rs so that also helps magnify the available power.

Our time in the Maverick X ds was split between two versions, with the only real difference being accessories, color and a spare tire on the rear of the car during the second half of our seat time. Taking into consideration the extra weight on the Maverick X ds with the spare tire, this is one item that was immediately apparent with the change in the shock package, as this machine uses the FOX 2.5 Podium RC2 piggyback shocks on all four corners. Combined with the width reduction, these shocks are still very impressive and took most of the beating we dished out without talking back over the harsh terrain. At first ride we noticed the rear of the (spare-tire equipped) X ds would bump the trail in big humps but after just a slight adjustment, and I do mean slight, the entire attitude of the machine changed. There was a bit more positive feel in the steering, especially when in 4WD, and if memory serves me correctly there were no more late transition hits in the back end for the remainder of the ride.

Steering in this machine is literally handled by Can-Ams DPS or Dynamic Power Steering, and feeling the trail is easy without that feeling of a loose steering wheel. This was even more apparent as we crawled our way up into the Goat Trail outside of Valle La Trinidad. This rocky section was slow going and technical, but the confidence you get while driving this Maverick X ds is inspiring with the front and rear sway bars adding to the suspension control. I do wish I had been given the chance to run that small section of narrow, rut-filled rocks again in the Mav X rs, as I imagine it was easier when crossing the deep ruts and transitioning through the rocks.

Once the trail widened and we were able to open the throttle body a bit more the Maverick X ds was a real trooper. It put a smile on our face many times when cornering under power or simply running the needle up into the 75 mph+ mark, and it still had a little pedal in reserve. This Maverick is a lot more nimble and responds to steering input seemingly more quickly, which can make it a blast to drive in the twisty stuff.

The base model Maverick X3 was available yet we had little mileage in this machine. However, this unit is also 64 inches wide and the main differences is the use of a more simplified FOX QS3 shock with a highly visible clicker that is easy to tune and adjust for the novice tuner. It also features slightly smaller Maxxis Big Horn 2.0 tires that are 28 inches tall. The suspension travel is set just like its Xd s brethren at 20-inches both front and rear. This car weighs 1470 lbs. dry, and you can just imagine how that extra 20 lbs. off of the XDS to the X3 Maverick base just pumps up the fun in the throttle.

Overall, we had what could be considered the most amazing off-road experience yet for a press introduction. The Maverick X3s surely added the fun factor and with the beautiful mystic Baja terrain adding the excitement for not only our eyes but for the true testing of three incredible machines. It was an honor and a privilege to be apart of what seems to be the beginning of the next floor in our industry. If you are brave and have a choice, do yourself a favor and get into the Maverick X3 X rs TurboR, as it is well worth the hype.
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You think the year can't get any worse and then the moon falls from the sky and goes on a rampage through city streets.

Ok so it's an inflatable moon rather than the actual one but we're still taking it as a sign that the end is nigh.

Needless to say people who were actually present in Fuzhou, China for the event were quite hysterical about the rampaging moon.

Huge moon balloon blown away in Fuzhou, E China, as #TyphoonMeranti approaches. Moonless #MidAutumnFestival? pic.twitter.com/5YqrYAuRdk  China Xinhua News (@XHNews) September 14, 2016

The inflatable moon was meant to be part of today's Mid Autumn Moon Festival but broke free from its restraints when workers were attempting to deflate it in anticipation of an oncoming typhoon.

A local newsreporter said that "Powerlong workers and security took measures immediately. The balloon did not cause any injuries to pedestrians nor any traffic incidents so far."

It was last seen heading for a building site.

Via Metro
Agricultural News

Senate Passes WRDA- Oklahoma Senator Inhofe Hails Bipartisan Passage of the Measure

U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, praised the Senate passage of the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) of 2016, which passed with a strong bipartisan vote of 95 to 3 and includes a number of provisions supporting Oklahoma's priorities.





"With strong bipartisan support, the Republican-led Senate has once again moved an economy-boosting infrastructure bill with the passage of WRDA 2016," Inhofe said. "Many provisions in this year's WRDA bill will benefit Oklahoma residents and job creators, and I am committed to seeing that these provisions and WRDA 2016 are signed into law before the end of this year. WRDA 2016 ensures that Corps projects in Oklahoma, including the McClellan-Kerr Arkansas River Navigation System and the Tulsa and West Tulsa Levee System, continue to receive support and prioritization. Our ports, like the Port of Catoosa and the Port of Muskogee, will benefit by gaining the ability to provide funds, materials, or services to the Corps to prevent project failures and address the backlog of maintenance. WRDA 2016 will also empower the Oklahoma Water Resources Board to work with the Corps to change water storage policies to help the state, such as southwest Oklahoma, prepare for future droughts by increasing water storage and managing access to water. Since the introduction of the bill, I was able to secure additional Oklahoma provisions, to include language that gives the required Congressional approval for the water settlement recently reached by the state of Oklahoma, city of Oklahoma City, and the Chickasaw and Choctaw Nations.





"When it comes to water and wastewater infrastructure, WRDA 2016 will serve Oklahoma's rural and small communities by providing a grant program to assist with compliance under the Safe Drinking Water Act. Cities and local municipalities will also be able to prioritize which unfunded federal mandates are most critical so that their resources can address the greatest needs first. I am proud of the bipartisan work that allowed for WRDA 2016 to move efficiently through the Senate and will continue working with my colleagues in the House to ensure that we are able to get another infrastructure bill signed into law to grow our economy and support water access across the country."





"I commend Congress for recognizing in 2014 that tackling the nation's woefully inadequate water infrastructure requires a bipartisan commitment to frequent, every-other-year funding directives and policy reforms," said J.D. Strong, executive director of the Oklahoma Water Resources Board in support of Senate passage of WRDA 2016. "Senator Inhofe and his Senate colleagues followed through on this pledge with passage of WRDA 2016, and I know many other water managers join me in urging the House to do the same. Nothing could be more important to our nation's economy and safety than passage of WRDA 2016 and its comprehensive package of water supply, navigation, and other water infrastructure improvements, including Oklahoma's recently negotiated Indian water rights settlement."





Oklahoma provisions are as follows:





ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEER PROVISIONS





Oklahoma, Chickasaw, and Choctaw Water Agreement





On Aug. 11, the state of Oklahoma, city of Oklahoma City, and the Chickasaw and Choctaw Nations reached a settlement to end a water rights and tribal sovereignty dispute stemming back to the 19th century. The settlement acknowledges tribal sovereignty and meets the tribes' conservation guidelines for an area that spans over approximately 22 counties in south-central and southeastern Oklahoma while the state of Oklahoma would continue to manage the state's natural water supply. The deal also guarantees Oklahoma City's long-term access to Southeast Oklahoma as a drinking water source and sets lake limits at levels that meet tribes' recreational, cultural and water use claims. A provision in WRDA 2016 provides for the Congressional approval required for the settlement since it involves the Department of Interior and the Army Corps of Engineers.





"I'm glad the Senate passed this legislation and appreciate Senator Inhofe's efforts to get this matter taken up so quickly. Having a sufficient, reliable supply of water is essential for life, economic development, manufacturing, recreational activities, and important industry sectors like energy and agriculture to name a few. Under the agreement, the state will continue to exercise its authority to manage and protect water resources in Oklahoma. This way, existing uses of water remain secure, and it provides certainty for future development. And the Choctaw and Chickasaw nations will have a voice in specific proceedings addressing water resources within their treaty territories," said Governor Mary Fallin





"Oklahomans should be proud of the efforts of all parties involved in forging this historic water settlement. My office was privileged to work with the Governor, Chickasaw and Choctaw Nations and the City of Oklahoma City and their excellent legal teams to reach an agreement that is of profound benefit to all Oklahomans. I commend Senator Inhofe for his leadership and swift action in getting the agreement in front of Congress. This final step will provide certainty for the management and use of water resources in our state," said Oklahoma Attorney Gen. Scott Pruitt.





"We appreciate the quick action taken by Senator Inhofe to secure Senate approval of the historic water rights agreement between the Chickasaw and Choctaw Nations, the State of Oklahoma and the City of Oklahoma City. His diligent effort on this issue underscores his commitment to serve all Oklahomans. We look forward to working with the House to finalize passage of this historic act this year," said Bill Anoatubby, governor, the Chickasaw Nation.





"We have confidence the water agreement is a good compromise that protects our natural resources in Southeast Oklahoma while addressing the needs of people living in Oklahoma City," said Chief Gary Batton of the Choctaw Nation.





"Oklahoma City's growth will be propelled by our ability to manage our water and land use. This agreement ensures we have access to water through a clearly defined and orderly process for decades ahead. We are pleased to be part of this agreement and the opportunities it creates for even greater collaboration in the future," said Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett.







Tulsa and West Tulsa Levee System





WRDA 2016 authorizes the Corps to develop a plan for modifying the Tulsa and West Tulsa Levee System. The Corps must provide recommendations for modifying the original levee system to address deficiencies identified in the recent levee risk assessment. The bill also requires expedited budget consideration for any parts of the system that are classified as a Class I or Class II (i.e. very high risk) under the Levee Safety Action Classification tool developed by the Corps.





"Tulsa's levee system protects more than 10,000 citizens and some $2 billion dollars of infrastructure including two refineries. The Corps of Engineers has determined that our levees are no longer viable. With help from this WRDA resolution we can begin the process of rehabilitating this aging levee system. A levee failure could have catastrophic environmental and economic impacts for the region. I am grateful to Senator Inhofe and his staff for their help in addressing this critical issue," said Karen Keith, Tulsa County Commissioner, District 2







Providing Better Protection After a Flooding Disaster





WRDA 2016 gives the Corps authority to increase the level of protection when rebuilding a levee after a disaster if the Corps determines it is in the public interest, including consideration of whether the same levee has had to be rebuilt multiple times and whether there is an opportunity to reduce risk of loss of life and property.







McClellen-Kerr (MKARNS)





WRDA 2016 gives the Corps authority to establish partnerships with local entities to ensure safe, functional operation of projects along the waterway. These partnerships allow the Corps to accept and use of funds, materials and services donated by non-federal interests to help address the backlog of maintenance at Corps projects. WRDA 2016 also makes sure the project to deepen the MKARNS to support increased commerce will not be deauthorized while it is waiting for funding from the Inland Waterways Trust Fund.





"WRDA 2016 will help non-federal public and private entities to assist the Army Corps of Engineers repair and maintain projects on a timely basis. This will help ensure the viability and sustainability of our Nation's Inland Waterway System of which the MKARNS is an integral part! Special thanks are due to our Oklahoma Senior Senator Jim Inhofe, Chairman of EPW, and his committee colleagues, for this invaluable legislation," said Bob Portiss, port director for the Tulsa Port of Catoosa.







Grand River Dam Authority





WRDA 2016 conveys the Army Corps of Engineers easements on Grand Lake to GRDA. Due to multiple authorities overseeing the shoreline of Grand Lake, confusion over the maintenance of easements has led to encroachments. This provision will provide certainty and efficiency for landowners and GRDA when it comes to these easements.







Oklahoma Electric Coops





Electric cooperatives in Oklahoma have been trying to renew easement agreements with the Corps for their lines that cross Corps property. Despite not having to pay for the easements initially, the Corps is charging upwards of hundreds of thousands of dollars to renew these easements. In WRDA 2016, easement fees will be waived for rural electric co-ops, allowing these non-profits to continue operating without costly fees, the need for new infrastructure, and without raising rates on their customers.





"Oklahoma's electric cooperatives are grateful for Senator Inhofe's leadership in the passage of the Water Resources Development Act. By providing relief from costly easement renewal fees on Corps property, WRDA 2016 ensures electric cooperatives can continue to provide safe, affordable and reliable electricity to member-owners. It is our hope that the House will now take up the Senate bill and get this much needed legislation to the President's desk," said Chris Myers, general manager, Oklahoma Association of Electric Cooperatives.







Leveraging Federal Assets to Increase Water Supply





WRDA 2016 gives the Corps authority to review proposals made by the non-Federal interests to increase water supplies by increasing storage capacity, modifying project management, or accessing water that has been released. The non-Federal interest can contribute funds to the Corps to facilitate the review of a proposal.







Support for Reducing Chlorides in the Red River





Senator Inhofe has been a champion for reducing excessive chlorides in the Red River. WRDA 2016 contains several provisions to address this issue, including authorizing the Corps to facilitate transfer of desalination technologies from other countries with academic and institutional knowledge to reduce chlorides.





WRDA 2016 also clarifies the WIFIA program established by WRDA 2014 to make sure chloride control is eligible for low cost loans from this program and that funds already expended on reducing chlorides in the Red River count towards the calculation of project costs. The bill provides startup money for the WIFIA program that will support over $4 billion in low cost loans for projects in Oklahoma and across the U.S.





WRDA 2016 also establishes a program to provide assistance for the development of innovative technologies to address water supply issues, including chloride control, and reauthorizes the Water Resources Research Act and the Water Desalination Act of 1996.







Expediting Permit Reviews





WRDA 2016 expands the current authority for the Corps to accept funds from non-Federal interests to expedite permits for rail transportation projects.







Promotion of Recreational Development Along Corps Projects





WRDA 2016 transfers Corps property along the shore of Lake Eufaula to the Department of Interior to hold in trust for use by the Muscogee (Creek) Nation to facilitate access to the lake for recreational purposes from land they already own. Furthermore, WRDA 2016 continues a demonstration program to promote and enhance recreational experiences on Oklahoma Corps of Engineers lakes. The development on and around lakes provides an important boost to the economy of surrounding communities by bringing visitors and jobs and provides taxpayers that have built these lakes with an additional benefit. WRDA 2016 also includes a provision that allows service providers to keep recreation fees they collect at Corps lakes, encouraging the development of more recreational facilities.







EPA WATER AND WASTEWATER ASSISTANCE PROVISIONS



Assistance for Small and Disadvantaged Communities





In the U.S. we still have underserved communities that lack basic services. WRDA 2016 authorizes a grant program to assist small and disadvantaged communities in complying with the requirements of the Safe Drinking Water Act. A priority is given to underserved communities. This section authorizes a total of $1.4 billion over five years and provides $20 million right now, to get this program started.







Water Supply Cost Savings



Some community water systems are so small that hooking up to a centralized system is cost-prohibitive. WRDA 2016 establishes a drinking water technology clearinghouse to provide information on cost-effective, innovative, and alternative drinking water delivery systems, including systems that are supported by wells.







Small Treatment Works Technical Assistance



WRDA 2016 establishes a technical assistance program for small treatment works, to be carried out by qualified nonprofit technical service providers. WRDA also includes a similar program for water systems on tribal lands.







Affordability





Under WRDA 2016, instead of being ordered to do everything at once, under this bill, communities can combine their regulatory requirements into a single plan and then prioritize their investments so that the greatest risks are addressed first.



The bill establishes an Office of Municipal Ombudsman within EPA to help communities deal with aggressive EPA enforcement officials.



WRDA 2016 defines affordability and financial capability, prohibits the use of median household income as the sole indicator of affordability for a residential household, and requires EPA to update its Financial Capability guidance.









WebReadyTM Powered by WireReady NSI

Top Agricultural News
Weak farm income is affecting loans in the rural Midwest, according to a survey of bankers in the region, as the rural economy declined for the 13th straight month and the outlook leading into 2017 remains dreary.

With grain prices slumping, Creighton University economist Ernie Goss said, farm income is slated to drop by 12 percent from 2015, prompting an intense pessimistic outlook among bankers.

He said an expected 25 percent increase in government support payments this year wont be enough to offset the reduced income.

Of 173 bankers in 10 states who responded to Goss September survey, four out of five reported restructuring more farm loans to adjust to borrowers slimmer cash flow, and 1 out of 5 reported they are rejecting more ag loan applications.

The result was a Rural Mainstreet Index of 37.3 on a scale of 0 to 100, well below the growth-neutral level of 50. The index was 41.1 in August and 49 in September 2015. The survey includes non-urban bankers in Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming.

The bankers confidence index showed a lack thereof for the coming six months, hitting 21.5. Thats down from 27.2 in the August survey and 43.8 in September 2015.

The surveys index of farmland prices was 30.3, the 34th consecutive month of decline. Farm equipment sales remained a casualty of low farm income, registering an index of 14.3.

Farm equipment dealers and manufacturers are cutting back, in turn affecting the rural job market in some areas, Goss said. But overall hiring in the region is up briskly, the report said, with an index of 54.8, up from 47.9 in August.

Goss said loan defaults have changed little over the past year and loan volume remained strong, with an index of 72.1. Economists have said the nations farmers generally have avoided high debt levels in recent years.

Home sales are growing and overall retail sales are slumping, Goss said, as they are in urban areas.

Nebraskas overall index was 61.2, down slightly from 64.5 in August. Its farmland price index was 46.9, up from 43.5 in August, and the states hiring index was 64.9, up from 59.2. Rural Nebraska jobs have grown by 2 percent over the past year.

Iowas index was 56.2, down from 58.3 in August. Its farmland price index was 47.2, up from 40.5 in August. The hiring index was 65.1, up from 58.1 in August, as the states rural areas have seen employment grow by 1.9 percent over the past year.
The Treasury Department sought Thursday to limit the benefits that U.S. companies can claim when they pay taxes overseas, an effort to cushion the blow from Europes demand that Apple pony up $14.5 billion in unpaid taxes.

In new guidance, the department tightened regulations requiring American businesses to bring foreign profits back home  a process known as repatriation  if they want to get credit for taxes paid in that country. Treasury issued the rule last year to prevent companies from enjoying a foreign tax credit when the related profits remained offshore. But businesses circumvented it by shifting money within their foreign subsidiaries, and Thursdays guidance aimed to end that practice.

The department said it hoped the new notice would reduce corporate Americas incentive to take advantage of our broken international tax system. Washington is worried that mounting international tax obligations will eat away at whats left for Uncle Sam.

Today, we are closing another tax loophole that contributes to the erosion of our tax base, said Mark Mazur, assistant secretary for tax policy at Treasury.

The move is the latest effort by President Barack Obamas administration to pin down the more than $2 trillion in profits that U.S. companies hold overseas. Unlike most developed countries, the United States taxes businesses on profits generated anywhere in the world  and the bill comes due once the money returns to American shores. That has encouraged many companies to keep their international profits overseas to avoid the hefty 35 percent tax rate at home.

For years, partisan gridlock has stalled attempts to encourage businesses to repatriate that income and fix the corporate tax code. Meanwhile, Apple has amassed a cash stockpile of more than $200 billion, most of it offshore. That Brussels could get to it first is salt in the wound for Washington.

Treasury Secretary Jack Lew has accused European officials of singling out American companies for investigation. The European Commission ruled last month that Apples ultra-low tax rate on its operations in Ireland ran afoul of European Union rules that prevent member countries from offering excessive incentives to businesses. Officials have also investigated other big names such as Starbucks and Amazon for possible tax avoidance.
DETROIT (AP)  Truckers are warning that a government plan to electronically limit the speed of semitrailers will lead to highway traffic jams and possibly an increase in deadly run-ins with cars.

More than 150 people, most identifying themselves as independent truckers, have filed comments with the government about the proposed rule, unveiled last month by two federal agencies. There were only a few comments in favor.

The government has proposed requiring electronic speed limiters on all trucks and buses over 26,000 pounds manufactured after the regulation goes into effect. Speeds could be limited to 60, 65 or 68 miles per hour when the rule is finalized after a comment period that ends Nov. 7.

Regulators and others favoring speed limiters say the rule is supported by simple physics: If trucks travel slower, the impact of a crash will be less severe and fewer people will be injured or killed. But truckers say the government is creating conditions for more collisions by focusing on the severity of the crash while ignoring the dynamic of trucks and cars traveling at different speeds.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration analyzed data from 2004 through 2013 and found that on average 1,044 people died per year in crashes involving heavy trucks on roads with speed limits of at least 55 mph.

The agency also found that if trucks speeds were limited to 60 mph, 162 to 498 lives per year would be saved because the impact of a crash would be less severe. At 65 mph, up to 214 lives would be saved, and as many as 96 would be saved with a 68 mph limit.

But truckers say slowing them down increases the chances of trucks being hit from behind by cars allowed to go 70 mph or more. Todd Spencer, executive vice president of the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association, the largest group of independent truckers, says most car-truck crashes on freeways where traffic is going the same direction involves a car rear-ending a truck.

The net effect of their rule means that the truck will be running slower still, Spencer said. Thats a crash scenario thats more severe.

Doug Kruzan, a driver from Simpsonville, South Carolina, said hes seen cars hit the back of slower trucks many times as the rigs move into the left lane to pass. A cars coming up behind him at 70, 75. They cant slow down that quick. Hes going to run into the back of that truck every time, Kruzan said.

NHTSA statistics show that of all the fatal crashes  not limited to freeway driving  between big trucks and passenger vehicles in 2014, the latest year available, about 15 percent involved cars rear-ending large trucks. The Motor Carrier Safety Administration has reported that of 438,000 crashes involving large trucks in 2014, the front of the truck was the impact point in 38 percent of them. The rear of the truck was hit in 24 percent.

Many truckers say all vehicles should be limited to the same speed, but an NHTSA spokesman said thats not being considered. He would not comment on Spencers allegation that the government ignored the impact of varied speeds.

Truckers also say if the rule is adopted, semitrailers will try to pass each other at similar speeds, causing blockades that will clog traffic and frustrate car drivers. Whats more, they say, because the rule isnt retroactive some truckers will try to prolong the lives of older trucks that otherwise would be replaced by newer models.

Steve Owings, an Atlanta financial planner, whose 2006 petition helped bring about the proposed regulation, says predictions of highway logjams are exaggerated.

Owings noted that a 2007 survey by the American Trucking Associations found that 69 percent of all trucking companies used speed limiters on at least some rigs. The average limit was 69 mph.

Owings said he thinks the number of trucks with speed limiters has grown.

We dont have a national traffic jam now because of them trying to pass each other, said Owings, whose son was killed by a speeding truck in 2002.

Copyright 2016 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
A newly launched program aims to fight both sex trafficking and labor trafficking by organizing existing services across Nebraska.

SAFE-T, or Salvation Army Fight to End Human Trafficking, officially began Thursday. It offers a 24-hour hotline for trafficking victims and improved case management services.

The program comes as a result of a $1.5 million federal grant to the Salvation Army and the Nebraska Attorney Generals Office to support victim-centered approaches to address trafficking.

The grant will be distributed over three years. The Salvation Army has pledged to raise a 30 percent match of the federal funds.

Most people dont think of human trafficking when they think of the Salvation Army, said Linda Burkle, divisional director of the Salvation Armys social services. The organization has, however, been helping victims of trafficking since its inception in 1865, she said.

For the last 25 years, the Salvation Army of Nebraska has offered services for men, women and transgender victims of prostitution through a program called Wellspring.

SAFE-T expands those services to a wider range of trafficking victims, Burkle said. The Salvation Army has hired three new employees to work with the program, with plans to hire more. These specialists will work with law enforcement officials and service providers across the state to build a network of support agencies to provide a range of services for each victim.

Program leaders hope to change the stigma associated with sex trafficking by helping the public understand the distinction between trafficking and prostitution. Trafficking, they say, is not a choice.

This is allowed to exist because we are burying our head in the sand, said Meghan Malik, trafficking response coordinator with the Womens Fund of Omaha. This really is on us, and its going to take a real cultural change.

Stephen Patrick OMeara, the human trafficking coordinator with the Nebraska Attorney Generals Office, said he hopes the network will help bring the issue to light.

This is a hidden issue, he said.

In a 30-day period, 600 individual online postings advertising sex services in the Omaha area go up on one online classified ad website, Malik said. Of those postings, she said, 75 percent show indicators of trafficking.

As a community, we need to come together to do something about this problem, OMeara said.

SAFE-T officials hope to design a network that truly wraps around the survivors and provides them with support, services and a feeling of safety as they navigate the emotional, medical and sometimes legal aspects of escaping their trafficker.

We are really here to listen and support, said Alicia Webber, the programs manager. Launching the program is definitely not an end, she said. But this is a start.

The new hotline number is 888-373-7888.
When Druid Hill Elementary in Omaha was designated one of the states lowest-performing schools, Omaha Public Schools Superintendent Mark Evans delivered the unpleasant news to teachers and staff.

The designation last December was like one more punch to the stomach, Evans said.

That was a hard one. They were already trying to figure this all out, and we were helping them, he said. It was like, Oh man, are you kidding me? 

Now, OPS officials say test scores released Friday show that things are moving in the right direction at Druid Hill and many of the other low-performing schools targeted for intervention.

Its a fun thing for me to go over there and see all the smiles, cause I can tell you two or three years ago it wasnt filled with smiles, Evans said.

On the Nebraska State Accountability tests, the states largest district saw reading proficiency rise in all seven grades tested  third through eighth and 11th.

In math, OPS students improved in five of the seven grades; third and seventh grades were down.

In science, OPS gained in two of the three grades tested: fifth and 11th.

Druid Hill saw third-grade math proficiency jump 25 percentage points. Fourth-grade math was up 8 points and fifth grade 7 points. Math proficiency at the school still lags way behind the state and district averages.

For example, just four in 10 of Druid Hills third-graders were proficient in math. Thats half the state average and well below the 65 percent proficiency for OPS third-graders.

Reading proficiency increased at Druid Hill in fourth, fifth and sixth grades, dipping in third.

OPSs gains generally reflected the statewide score trend.

Eighty-two percent of the states public school students were proficient in reading, up from 80 percent in 2015. Math proficiency rose from 72 percent to 73 percent.

For a third consecutive year, science remained at 72 percent.

It doesnt surprise me we see growth in reading and math, Nebraska Commissioner of Education Matt Blomstedt said. I actually think were improving how we instruct in reading and math, and our expectations continue to go up.

The stall in science scores could add urgency to state efforts to rewrite Nebraska science standards. A writing team will produce proposed standards for approval by the State Board of Education next year.

As we rewrite science standards, we will also have to think about instruction and how to embed science in other curriculum areas, such as reading, math and writing, Blomstedt said.

About 160,000 students take the Nebraska State Accountability tests each year. The tests measure how well students are mastering state academic standards.

[ Full results: School and district test results ]

Writing scores were not available Friday. State officials postponed their release, citing errors in the data.

Blomstedt said the errors were not in the test administration, which in previous years invalidated some writing test results.

After some local districts questioned the scores, Blomstedt said, his department is confirming the accuracy of the writing test data before releasing it.

Evans said the gains reflect, in part, OPS efforts to turn around struggling schools where test scores have been hard to budge.

Evans said the districts REACH schools  labeled by the state as persistently low achieving and enrolling high percentages of students from low-income families  are showing tremendous gains.

For schools that have not always shown the growth, we showed more growth with them this year than ever, he said. And so it kind of pulls up everybody.

Math and reading proficiency increased last school year at 14 of the 17 REACH schools, OPS officials said.

One of the REACH schools where OPS has been focusing resources is Druid Hill, which the State Board of Education designated as one of the states three priority schools requiring state intervention.

Evans said the district implemented various strategies last year before the priority school designation.

Evans said the school now has a clear and compelling vision and direction. Im definitely confident that were going to see growth next year, he said. In fact, I wouldnt be surprised if the growth next year is better than this year.

OPS officials said the gains at Druid Hill show that some of the pieces that staff have been working on since the start of the last school year may be paying off. Those include laying out clear rules and routines for students, fostering a positive culture, aligning lesson plans with state and district standards, and analyzing data for weak points.

Teachers and students are taking on leadership roles, creating a sense of pride at Druid Hill, said Melissa Comine, an OPS executive director who supervises and works with the school.

Theres more ownership, more positive culture and climate, and a sense of belief, she said. Were very realistic. We know, yes, we had gains and thats great, but theres still a long ways to go. And we need to get there.

The scores for reading are still low compared to other schools. But the percentage of students who scored proficient in reading in some grades is the highest its been since the state started using the NeSA tests, Comine said. We really need to stay focused and monitor and continue those gains, she said.

Another milestone: For the first time, Druid Hill won a silver award. Given out by OPS, the award celebrates schools that show 5 percent growth on state tests in two subjects.

Principal Cherice Williams and staff are not shy about showing off the plaque  Williams may have danced a little when she first received the schools test results showing some growth, Comine said.

That recognition with that plaque has been just a great reward and celebration for the entire school, Comine said.

The states designated priority schools  the others are Santee Middle in Niobrara and Loup County Elementary in Taylor  must follow state improvement plans imposed by the state board this year.

To remove the priority designation, the schools will have to show sustained improvement over time.

Bryan High School, a REACH school, improved in reading, math and science. Still, just half of Bryan students were proficient in reading, and about one in four could tackle the state math standards.

Evans said high school math scores pose a big challenge, and officials are looking at strategies to spur improvement.

Those strategies could include additional professional development for teachers and a new math class to prepare kids for Algebra I, he said.

World-Herald staff writer Erin Duffy contributed to this report.

* * * * *

Statewide scores

2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 Reading 69% 72% 74% 77% 77% 80% 82% Mathematics  63% 67% 69% 71% 72% 73% Science   67% 70% 72% 72% 72%

* * * * *

* * *

OPS Reach Schools

The Omaha Public Schools REACH schools showed improvement on the Nebraska State Accountability tests but struggled in some areas.

 OPS has designated 17 REACH schools  the name stands for resources employed accordingly creating hope  to receive extra focus and support. They have been labeled persistently low achieving by the state and face issues such as poverty and misbehavior. Howard Kennedy and Wakonda Elementary Schools are turnaround schools with revamped staff and curriculum.

 REACH schools are Belvedere Elementary, Benson High, Bryan High, Conestoga Magnet, Druid Hill Elementary, Franklin Elementary, Highland Elementary, Howard Kennedy Elementary, Jackson Elementary, King Elementary, Lothrop Magnet, Minne Lusa Elementary, Monroe Middle, Norris Middle, Skinner Magnet, South High and Wakonda Elementary.

 At King Elementary, just 22 percent of sixth-graders scored proficient in math, compared to 61 percent of OPS students and 73 percent of students statewide. At Monroe Middle, only 17 percent of eighth-graders scored proficient in math.

 Minne Lusa Elementary saw double-digit gains in third- and fourth-grade reading proficiency and in fourth- and sixth-grade math. Sixty percent of fourth-graders were proficient in reading, up from 32 percent in 2014-15.

 In 2014-15, only 9 percent of fourth-graders at Jackson Elementary were deemed proficient in math. This year, thats up to 32 percent  still below state and OPS averages, but a big leap for one year. Highland Elementary also saw big gains in most grades in math, reading and science.

 Results were mixed for Kennedy and Wakonda. Kennedys third-grade reading score plunged 32 points to 23 percent proficiency, but the number of fourth-graders proficient in math was up 10 percentage points.

 Wakonda, in its second year of a $1.6 million school improvement grant, saw students score slightly lower on science. But some grades achieved big bumps in reading  the percentage of fourth-graders scoring proficient in reading was up 12 points, and 63 percent of sixth-graders were proficient, up from 43 percent in 2014-15. Math proficiency for sixth-graders was up 22 percentage points, with 45 percent scoring proficient.

 Erin Duffy
After nine years of delay, the European Union has finalized The Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) with six developing African economies (Namibia, Mozambique, Botswana, Swaziland, South Africa and Lesotho). The EPA was originally due to be completed by 2007 but due to protracted negotiations that lasted till 2014, it had taken another 2 years after the Parliament finally ratified it on Wednesday (14 September). During the process, Angola dropped out and is not a signatory country.

According to Alexander Graf Lambsdorff, chief rapporteur for the talks, EPA places a lot of emphasis on human rights and development  the language on human rights and sustainable development is one of the strongest that you will find in any EU agreement, Mr Lambsdorff said. While the EU has always included human rights, this policy has recently been reinforced again under the Trade for All banner and the promise of Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom to make human rights a factor in all future trade talks.

Mr Lambsdorff further added that this agreement will help our African partner states to reduce poverty and can also facilitate their smooth and gradual integration into the world economy as there are also many safeguards in the deal to ensure that local people truly benefit from this cooperation. The EPA will in effect positively discriminate against the six African states by an immediate duty-free and quota-free access for their exports to the EU.

The deal covers development cooperation and trade but omits intellectual property, public procurement and investment, which has been criticized in the past as the worlds poorest countries often have very little to export to the EU single market and only open their borders to EU corporations. In order to avoid this problem, the EU has decided not to subsidize its agricultural exports to the countries of the deal.
OTTUMWA, Iowa (AP)  A prosecutor in the case of an Iowa teen who was given a suspended 10-year prison sentence for molesting a 1-year-old girl said Thursday that the teen was duped into the act by child pornographers posing online as a teenage girl.

The suspended sentence for Kraigen Grooms, 19, issued Monday, has stirred outrage on social media and led to an online petition calling for an Iowa judges removal.

But Wapellow County Attorney Gary Oldenburger said Grooms sentence was part of a plea agreement based on a bevy of factors, including that the victims parents refused to participate in prosecuting Grooms.

My original intent was to send him to prison for a long time, Oldenburger said. The girls parents didnt want Grooms to go to prison; they wanted him to go to rehab.

Court records show that Grooms  who was 16 when the crime occurred  received the suspended sentence and five years of supervised release. He was given credit for nearly 2 years spent in a juvenile detention center and, later, adult county jail while he awaited trial. He must register as a sex offender and faces prison time if he reoffends.

Oldenburger said that the toddler was not raped or physically harmed and that Grooms did not know the abuse was being recorded by pornographers.

The pornographers tried to persuade Grooms to commit additional abuse, Oldenburger said, but Grooms didnt. A psychologist found that Grooms was unlikely to commit sexual abuse in the future.

Grooms actions came to light after federal authorities tracked down the pornographers  one in New Orleans and the other in Ireland, Oldenburger said. The abuse was committed at the behest of two men who had, over a long period of time, perfected the technique for duping children into committing sexual acts that they would not have otherwise engaged in.

While District Judge Randy DeGeest presided over Mondays sentencing, another judge, Myron Gookin, accepted the plea agreement in July. Either had discretion to reject the plea deal and sentence him to prison, Oldenburger said.

A court spokesman said Thursday that neither judge could comment on the case.

Copyright 2016 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
About 60 people demonstrated Thursday outside the City-County Building, asking the Omaha City Council to oppose the Dakota Access pipeline.

They are concerned that the pipeline could contaminate the Missouri River and that the contamination could affect Omaha, said Dale Gutierrez of Omaha, one of the demonstration organizers.

Also, if the City of Omaha were to issue a proclamation supporting the Standing Rock Sioux Tribes stance against the pipeline  joining with similar resolutions from other cities  it would demonstrate widespread opposition to it, Gutierrez said.

Governments in Seattle and Bellingham, Washington; Portland, Oregon; St. Louis; Lawrence, Kansas; and St. Paul and Minneapolis, Minnesota, have offered support to the Standing Rock Sioux, the Bismarck Tribune has reported.

In Omaha Thursday, Maria Regalado of Omaha led the demonstrators in chants of We stand with Standing Rock.

Construction has begun on the 1,172-mile oil pipeline that would run from North Dakota, through South Dakota and Iowa into oil storage facilities in Patoka, Illinois.

The pipeline would pass under the Missouri River south of Bismarck, North Dakota, near Lake Oahe.

A federal judge ruled last week against the Standing Rock Siouxs lawsuit to halt construction. But the Army and the Departments of Interior and Justice asked Energy Transfer Partners to pause construction bordering or under Lake Oahe, and 20 miles to the east and west of the lake.
LINCOLN  The retired military man challenging State Sen. Ernie Chambers is a long shot for winning the north Omaha legislative seat.

John Sciara acknowledges as much when talking about his first bid for public office.

But he said his candidacy offers voters the chance to send Nebraskas longest-serving  and most controversial  lawmaker into retirement.

Im providing a choice to whats been going on for 46 years, Sciara said. Several people would prefer somebody besides Ernie Chambers.

Voters in District 11 will decide Nov. 8 whether to re-elect Chambers or go in a new direction with Sciara.

Most voters in the May primary stuck with the veteran senator. Chambers garnered 73 percent of the vote.

The winner in November will represent a district that differs from most other parts of Nebraska.

It is urban, with residents who are younger, poorer and less educated than the average Nebraskan. In contrast with most of the state, half are African-American and three of every four are nonwhite.

The legislative campaign is different, too. Neither candidate has raised or spent $5,000.

Sciara, a registered Republican who now works in tech support for Cox Communications, is door-knocking and setting up phone trees to get his message out.

Chambers, a registered independent who has represented the district almost continuously since 1970, is not doing any campaign activities.

Sciara names economic development as his key issue. He said the years with Chambers as state senator have been marked by rising unemployment and business closures in north Omaha.

He believes that the district needs someone who would be more cooperative with other state, county and city leaders and could build coalitions to bring jobs and development to the area.

With the title of state senator, he said he would have the leverage to talk with businesses and private developers about locating in north Omaha.

Chambers said that, if re-elected, he would continue on the same path as he has been.

He said he would continue fighting bad bills as the self-proclaimed garbage man of the Legislature. He also would continue as the defender of the downtrodden, whether they live in north Omaha or not.

As a state senator, Chambers has focused on issues of poverty, education and criminal justice.

He fought for years to repeal Nebraskas death penalty. He finally prevailed last year, when lawmakers overrode a gubernatorial veto to do away with capital punishment.

But the issue could return. A referendum petition launched by death penalty supporters put the question of repeal on the November ballot.

Sciara said he is happy that voters will get to weigh in on the death penalty. He said he supports the repeal as long as first-degree murderers are sentenced to life in prison and can never get out.

But he and Chambers have opposite views on many other issues.

Chambers has opposed proposals that would require people to show photo identification before voting.

Sciara would favor a voter ID law, if it were paired with a law allowing people to register and vote on the same day.

Chambers supports Medicaid expansion, as allowed under the federal health care law, so more low-income people can get coverage.

Sciara opposes it, saying the expansion costs too much and that he believes people without insurance have opportunities for treatment.

Chambers has opposed bills that would loosen gun restrictions and has repeatedly called for authorities to shut off the flow of guns into north Omaha.

Sciara has been endorsed by the Nebraska Firearms Owners Association. He favors having state gun laws pre-empt local restrictions but would have concerns about allowing guns in schools.

Chambers supports abortion rights for women. Sciara said he would ban abortion except in cases of rape, incest or to preserve the life of the woman.

***********

Ernie Chambers

Age: 79

Party: Not affiliated

Home: Omaha

Occupation: State senator

Public offices held: Nebraska Legislature, 1970-2009, 2013-present; Learning Community Coordinating Council, 2009-13

Education: Bachelors degree, Creighton University; law degree, Creighton University School of Law

Family: Divorced, four children

Faith: Algebra

Website: None

John Sciara

Age: 60

Party: Republican

Home: Omaha

Occupation: Retired Air Force and Army Reserve

Public offices held: None

Education: Associate degree, Community College of the Air Force; expected graduation from Creighton University in December 2017

Family: Married, three sons

Faith: Christian
WASHINGTON (AP)  After five years as the chief promoter of the false idea that President Barack Obama wasn't born in the United States, Donald Trump admitted on Friday that the president was  and claimed credit for putting the issue to rest.

"President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period," Trump said in brief televised remarks. "Now we all want to get back to making America strong and great again."

But as Trump sought to put that false conspiracy theory to rest, he stoked another, claiming that the "birther movement" was started by rival Hillary Clinton. There is no evidence that is true.

"Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it," Trump said. "I finished it, you know what I mean."

Trump spoke against a backdrop of veterans in a sprawling ballroom at his new Washington hotel. His statement of a few seconds came only after a lengthy campaign event featuring military officers and award winners who have endorsed him. Trump did not address the issue until the end of the event, turning it into a de facto commercial for the GOP candidate, as the major cable TV networks aired the full event live in anticipation of comments Trump had hyped hours before.

"I'm going to be making a major statement on this whole thing and what Hillary did," he told the Fox Business Network. "We have to keep the suspense going, OK?"

Clinton herself said Friday that Trump owes Obama and the American people an apology for his role as a leading "birther" questioning the president's citizenship.

Speaking at an event with black women, Clinton said that Trump's campaign was "founded on this outrageous lie. There is no erasing it in history."

She said Trump is "feeding into the worst impulses, the bigotry and bias that lurks in our country."

The birther idea, which he now denies, provided Trump with his entry into Republican politics and for years has defined his status as an "outsider" who is willing to challenge convention.

As late as Wednesday, he would not acknowledge that Obama was born in Hawaii, declining to address the matter in a Washington Post interview published late Thursday night.

"I'll answer that question at the right time," Trump said. "I just don't want to answer it yet."

Clinton seized on Trump's refusal during a speech Thursday night before the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute.

"He was asked one more time where was President Obama born and he still wouldn't say Hawaii. He still wouldn't say America," Clinton said. "This man wants to be our next president? When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?"

Hours later, campaign spokesman Jason Miller issued a statement that suggested the question had been settled five years ago  by Trump.

"In 2011, Mr. Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate," Miller said.

"Mr. Trump did a great service to the president and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised," he added. "Inarguably, Donald J. Trump is a closer. Having successfully obtained President Obama's birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States."

The facts of Trump's actions do not match Miller's description. Trump repeatedly questioned Obama's birth in the years after Obama released his birth certificate. In August 2012, for example, he was pushing the issue on Twitter.

"An 'extremely credible source' has called my office and told me that @BarackObama's birth certificate is a fraud," he wrote.

Trump's comments speculating on Obama's birthplace have been seen by many as an attempt to delegitimize the nation's first black president, and have turned off many of the African-American voters he is now courting in his bid for the White House.

On Friday, Obama jabbed at Trump, saying "We're not going to be able to solve our problems if we get distracted by sideshows and carnival barkers."

"I was pretty confident about where I was born. I think most people were as well," Obama said during a meeting about his trade agenda.

Miller's claim that Clinton launched the birther movement during her unsuccessful primary run against Obama in 2008 is unsubstantiated and long denied by Clinton. The theory was pushed by some bloggers who backed Clinton's primary campaign eight years ago, but Clinton has said Trump "promoted the racist lie" that sought to "delegitimize America's first black president."
WASHINGTON  The Senate on Thursday overwhelmingly approved a water projects bill that split Nebraskas two Republican senators.

The measure includes emergency funding for Flint, Michigan, nearly a year after officials declared a public health emergency because of lead-contaminated water.

Senators approved the bill 95-3. The measure now goes to the House, where approval of a similar bill  minus the Flint provision  is expected as soon as next week.

The Senate measure would authorize 29 projects in 18 states for dredging, flood control and other projects overseen by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Sen. Deb Fischer voted in favor of the legislation, which would cost $10.6 billion over 10 years if Congress approves all of the spending authorized by the measure.

Fischer said it would bring benefits to Nebraska, in particular by providing greater flexibility to local communities over how they handle their water resources.

For example, in Nebraska our 23 natural resources districts will be allowed to fund feasibility studies and receive reimbursement during project construction instead of waiting until that project is completed, Fischer said.

Fischer also noted that the bill includes an amendment she offered to provide farmers and ranchers limited exemptions from Environmental Protection Agency regulations related to fuel storage. It includes a full exemption for animal feed storage tanks.

Sens. Joni Ernst and Chuck Grassley, both Iowa Republicans, supported the legislation.

Sen. Ben Sasse was one of the three senators to vote against the legislation. The other two were Mike Lee, R-Utah, and Jeff Flake, R-Ariz.

In a press release, Sasse praised Fischers amendment and touted his own that would require the Government Accountability Office to conduct an audit of the environmental infrastructure program  a program he said has been a slush fund for earmarks.

At the end of the day, I opposed the final bill for expanding the EPAs reach and spending too much but, thanks to Nebraska reforms, were on the right path, Sasse said. Nebraskans shouldnt pay for Washingtons pork and thats what my amendment is all about.

Asked about Sasses critique of the bill as an expensive expansion of EPAs reach, Fischer said that the federal governments No. 1 priority should be national defense but that infrastructure spending comes right behind that.

That includes funding roads, bridges, ports and other infrastructure, she said.

Water infrastructure is very important for commerce, Fischer said. Its very important for our citizens.

As for the EPA regulations, she pointed to her own amendment on fuel storage and other efforts in the bill to pull back on the EPA, including the elimination of its formula for determining the affordability of mandated sewer upgrades.

This report contains material from the Associated Press.
LINCOLN  The Nebraska Supreme Court on Friday upheld the second-degree murder conviction of Michael E. Harris of Omaha.

Harris, now 46, shot and killed Isice Jones, 28, on July 5, 2004, outside of Harris home near 24th and Spencer Streets.

Prosecutors had argued that Harris resented Jones because of the attention Jones paid to Harris future wife, Valerie Johnson, and her 7-year-old daughter, according to court documents.

Jones was a friend of the girls father and had promised that he would look after the girl following his friends death.

Defense attorneys had argued that Harris was afraid of Jones and shot in self-defense.

At trial, a jury convicted Harris of second-degree murder and use of a deadly weapon to commit a felony. He previously pleaded guilty to being a felon in possession of a deadly weapon.

He was sentenced to 60 years to life in prison.

Harris unsuccessfully appealed his conviction in 2005. The new appeal alleged several failures by the attorneys who handled his original defense as well as the first appeal.

The state high court rejected those allegations, including a claim that his attorneys should have called two additional witnesses.

The court said testimony from those witnesses would not have altered the outcome of the trial.
Donald Trump finally, definitively allowed that President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period. But his terse statement on the matter included two falsehoods.

Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it, Trump said in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 16. Neither of those things is true.

As we have written before, theres no evidence that Clinton or her campaign had anything to do with bogus claims that Obama wasnt born in the United States and thus was ineligible to be president.

What we do know, as we wrote in November 2008, is that some diehard Clinton supporters pushed that theory during that years presidential campaign. But again, there is no evidence that either Clinton herself or anyone on her campaign staff was involved in that.

On March 19, 2007, then Clinton adviser Mark Penn wrote a strategy memo to Clinton that identified Obamas lack of American roots as something that could hold him back. That memo, which was part of campaign documents featured in a September 2008 article in The Atlantic, cited Obamas boyhood in Indonesia and his life in Hawaii as life experiences that made his basic American values  at best limited. But Penns memo did not question Obamas birthplace or his birth certificate. It advised Clinton to contrast her life experiences in middle America without turning negative.

We are never going to say anything about his background, Penn wrote.

Again, if there is evidence that Clinton or her campaign had something to do with the origins of the so-called birther movement, weve yet to see it. And Trump has never offered any proof.

Trump is also wrong to say he finished what he called the birther controversy. The issue was long settled, as we wrote repeatedly, even before Trump prominently injected himself into the birther movement in April 2011, as he was mulling a presidential run.

Back in 2008, the Obama campaign had made public the official birth certificate issued by the state of Hawaii. FactCheck.org staffers touched, examined and photographed that document, as we wrote in our Born in the U.S.A. article. Trump claimed in 2011 that the official Certification of Live Birth that Obama produced in 2008 was not a birth certificate, but we noted then that he was wrong. The U.S. Department of State uses birth certificate as a generic term to include the official Hawaii document, which satisfies legal requirements for proving citizenship and obtaining a passport.

And there was more evidence than that.

There also were public announcements of Obamas birth published in Hawaii newspapers shortly after his birth in 1961 (placed there not by his family, as Trump suggested, but based on official state records). And the states top vital records official, Dr. Chiyome Leinaala Fukino, director of the Hawaii Department of Health, issued a statement in 2009 stating that she had seen the original vital records maintained on file and that those records, which are confidential under state law, verified that Barack Hussein Obama was born in Hawaii and is a natural-born American citizen.

On April 27, 2011, just a few weeks after Trump began floating some of his bogus conspiracy theories about Obamas birthplace, President Obama released the long-form version of his birth certificate. At the time, Obama said he sought release of the confidential long-form birth certificate from the Hawaii Department of Health so that the nation could focus on more serious matters. We do not have time for this kind of silliness, he said.

So while Trump may have an argument that he played a role in getting Obama to release his long-form birth certificate, hes wrong to say that he finished the debate. It was already finished, at least to our satisfaction.

And if Trump had finished it by pressuring Obama to release a long-form birth certificate, at least one person was apparently unconvinced: Trump.

As Buzzfeed noted, Trump tweeted in August 2012 that An extremely credible source has called my office and told me that Barack Obamas birth certificate is a fraud. In September of that year, Trump shared via Twitter an article claiming the birth certificate was fake. In a June 2014 tweet, Trump boasted, I was the one who got Obama to release his birth certificate, or whatever that was! And in 2013 he retweeted someone who alleged the long-form birth certificate was a computer generated forgery.

Were glad to hear that Trump is now convinced Obama was born in the U.S. But his claims about the issue continue to stray from the facts. Theres no evidence that either Clinton or anyone on her campaign staff started it. Nor did Trump finish it. If anything, Trump continued to perpetuate the issue long after it was settled.
WASHINGTON  When it comes to national security, Rep. Brad Ashford likes to cite his continuing support for keeping the Guantanamo Bay terror suspect detention facility open.

Its a position that has put the Omaha congressman at odds with many of his fellow Democrats, including President Barack Obama, who want to shutter the facility.

In fact, he was one of only a dozen House Democrats to vote Thursday in favor of blocking the Obama administration from transferring any detainees out of the facility.

But Republicans recently have gone after Ashford on the issue, saying his past votes on detainee transfers show a lack of consistency and describing Thursdays vote as a nakedly political reversal.

A TV ad from the National Republican Congressional Committee describes Ashford as a master at speaking politician and highlights his statements supporting the detention facility.

But when he votes, he votes to empty the prison at Gitmo  sending the terrorist suspects back to the battlefield, according to the voiceover. See that? Now that Brad Ashford is up for re-election, he only tells you half the story. Thats how you speak politician.

The ad cites several 2015 votes in which Ashford sided with fellow Democrats and opposed GOP proposals to restrict the Obama administrations ability to transfer detainees.

Ashfords campaign manager, Sam Barrett, criticized the Republican ad as shameful and noted that Ashford has consistently opposed closing the facility in statements and votes.

Barrett suggested that the previous Republican proposals Ashford opposed went too far.

In an interview, Ashford also said both his thinking and the circumstances surrounding the issue have evolved over time.

He said he doesnt regret his previous votes but that he also said he cant support the transfer of any more detainees. He said that position is based on classified briefings he has received and conversations with leaders in countries that would receive the transferred detainees  conversations that have caused him to doubt the transfers could be done safely.

The number of detainees at Gitmo is now down to 61. The administration has suggested that while not all of those individuals could be safely transferred, some are still eligible.

Ashford said he disagrees.

Theyve gotten down to a point where they cant transfer anybody out, he said.

Ashfords opponent, retired Brig. Gen. Don Bacon, has made national security a central plank of his campaign against Ashford. The Republican opposes closing Gitmo and has described the remaining detainees as the worst of the worst who cannot be allowed out.

Obama has pushed for years to make good on his campaign promise to close the facility. Democrats say the facility is a propaganda tool terrorist groups use to help recruit new fighters and that its wrong to hold individuals who were picked up in error and pose no threat.

Republicans have pointed to those instances where released detainees have returned to the battlefield.

The bill approved by the House on Thursday passed 244 to 174. All GOP congressmen from Nebraska and Iowa supported the legislation.

There is essentially no chance that it would pass the Senate, however, and the White House has threatened to veto it.
From Buenos Aires to Hiroshima, President Barack Obama has spoken of the harm done abroad as a result of his predecessors foreign policy decisions.

The most recent instance occurred during his visit last week to tiny Laos, where he reviewed the destruction wrought by U.S. bombing of that country during the wars in Southeast Asia nearly half a century ago. Countless civilians were killed, he lamented.

Republican critics in this country have derided these trips as apology tours, but thats not fair. Obama has generally stuck to passive-voice formulations, as he did in Laos, and avoided explicit apology.

Still, the moralizing comes through, which raises a question: Just how different is Obamas conduct from that of the past presidents whose judgments he reviews today?

Obama said the U.S. air campaign in Laos  aimed at North Vietnamese communists who were illegally using the neutral country as a supply route to South Vietnam  not only caused massive collateral damage, it was also a secret war, whose full scope is not widely known even now.

Adjusted for the greater precision of modern weaponry, you could say something similar about the nontransparent U.S. campaign of drone strikes against suspected terrorists that Obama is conducting around the Middle East today, at the cost  minimized but unavoidable, the administration says  of many innocent civilian lives.

In March in Argentina, Obama noted the anniversary of a 1973 military coup, calling the Nixon and Ford administrations initial acceptance of the junta a case of betrayed American ideals, in which the United States was slow to speak out for human rights. He offered disclosures of U.S. classified documents about the period as a form of penance.

One wonders what archives will eventually reveal about Obamas own tolerance of the brutal military regime in contemporary Egypt, which took power in a 2013 coup, and which the United States, after a brief suspension, supplied with more than a billion dollars in military aid  made possible by an administration waiver of human rights conditions in U.S. law.

The New York Times analysis of Obamas Laos speech appeared on page A8 of its Sept. 8 edition. On page A9, a headline read: Pressing his Asia agenda, Obama treads lightly on human rights. The accompanying article explained how, in dealing with the dictators of China, Vietnam and, indeed, Laos, Obama played down their repressive rule for the sake of other diplomatic goals.

Page A10 carried the claim by Turkeys authoritarian president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, that Turkey and the United States were readying joint military action against the Islamic State in Syria. Erdogan had just met with Obama, after which the latter praised Turkish cooperation against the Islamic State, said the two leaders had discussed ways in which we can further cooperate in that regard  and glossed over Erdogans nationwide crackdown on political opponents in the wake of a failed July coup against him.

Obama must believe that U.S. national security requires him to make these trade-offs, or that his course will minimize civilian deaths, and maximize human rights, over the long run. Or all of the above.

In other words, he must be telling himself exactly what his predecessors during the Cold War (and Harry Truman at Hiroshima) told themselves.

Susan Rice, the presidents national security adviser, framed the presidents retrospective comments as an effort to face and acknowledge our history, by noting points of departure from the United States overwhelmingly positive global role.

Perhaps, but the clear implication of Obamas expressions is that the U.S. effort to stop the Soviets from accumulating global power and influence was often unjustified in view of the costs.

When discussing the bombing of Laos, for example, the president was evaluating part of a wider struggle, Vietnam, that he had already publicly labeled a quagmire that ultimately ... weakened us.

Fair enough. Still, at the time of Vietnam  and the Argentine coup and the revolution in Cuba  U.S. presidents considered the nuclear-armed Soviet Union, not implausibly, as a mortal threat to us and our allies. Well never know what, say, Latin America would be like today if the United States had done nothing to stop Cuban attempts to spread revolution during the Cold War, though the current chaos in Venezuela suggests a possible outcome.

Today, Obama seeks to work with the likes of Erdogan against the Islamic State even though he believes the terrorists do not threaten our national existence, as he put it in his January State of the Union address.

Obamas policy is one of many moral compromises during his tenure, including his fateful decision not to intervene militarily in Syria.

Someday Obama, too, will face historys judgment. Meanwhile, he ruminates on the doleful impact of his predecessors choices, seeking to communicate a certain humility about his country.

Less intentionally, he communicates a certain lack of humility about himself.
As bank customers across the country continued to fume this week over news of Wells Fargos fraudulent accounts scandal, a House committee attacked the very law that guards against that kind of scheme.

Talk about embarrassingly bad timing.

On second thought, maybe it was good timing, in that it highlights how wrongheaded Republicans in Congress are to keep trying to dismantle the Dodd-Frank Act banking reforms passed in the wake of the financial crisis.

Dodd-Frank created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the federal agency that fined Wells Fargo a record $100 million for opening millions of fraudulent accounts, often without customers knowledge.

Republicans say Dodd-Frank brings too much confusing red tape, stifles private-sector growth and isnt necessary.

Quite the contrary, if the Wells Fargo scandal is any indication. It went on for years, apparently. Some 5,300 employees have been fired. When politicians talk about Wall Street as a criminal enterprise,  New York Times business columnist Andrew Ross Sorkin noted, this is exactly what they are talking about.

CEO John Stumpf, in an interview with the Wall Street Journal, defended the banks culture and blamed the now-dismissed employees. They wouldnt honor the banks customer-first culture, he said.

There was no incentive to do bad things, he told the Journal.

Few people seem willing to take him at his word, nor should they, given this egregious abuse of the publics trust.

E. Scott Rekard, the retired Los Angeles Times business writer who broke the story, told Columbia Journalism Review his reporting started with one Wells Fargo employee.

The worker said hed talked people into signing up for accounts and services they didnt need. Why? He described incredible pressures to make sales numbers, Rekard said.

Sounds more like a failure of corporate culture than a problem of rogue employees.

Given the potential for similar abuses in other banks, the public deserves answers. The Senate Banking Committee has called for a hearing, and Stumpf has been asked to testify.

All told, Wells Fargo paid a total of $185 million in fines but didnt admit any wrongdoing. The bank did the right thing in announcing that it will halt sales goals for retail bankers. (It has also reimbursed $2.6 million to customers.)

The fines sting Wells Fargos corporate image far more painfully than they do the banks bottom line, given the $22.8 billion in profits it earned last year.

Still, Wells Fargos public relations debacle should serve as a warning to other banks.

We hope it helps Congress understand that we need to fine-tune Dodd-Frank, not gut it, and that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau must be strengthened, not killed.
Karnataka to survey all Arabic schools to check if on same page as state board

Bengaluru assassination plot: 13 get five years in jail

Bengaluru

oi-Vicky

Bengaluru, Sept 16: A special court on Friday sentenced 13 people to five years in jail in connection with the assassination plot or the Lashkar-e-Taiba conspiracy case.

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) had chargesheeted these people in this case after it was found that they were involved in a plot that aimed at killing prominent Hindu leaders from Karnataka, Telangana and Maharashtra. All the 13 people had on Sept 1 pleaded guilty. All of them have already completed a jail term of 4 years during trial.

Assassination of Hindus plot: 13 Lashkar men convicted

Those sentenced are Shoaib Ahmed Mirza, 27, a computer applications degree holder, Abdul Hakeem Jamadar, 30, Riyaz Ahmed Byahatti, 32, Mohammad Akram, 27, Ubedullah Bahadur, 28, Waheed Hussain, 31, an MBA, Dr Zafar Iqbal Sholapur, 31, Mohammad Sadiq Lashkar, 33, Mehboob Bagalkote, 32, Obaid-ur-Rehman, 26, an undergraduate student, Dr Nayeem Siddique, 32, Dr Imran Ahmed, 30 and Syed Tanzeem Ahmed, 27.

All people were convicted under the provisions of the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act and the Indian Penal Code. The case was first registered by the City Crime Branch, Bengaluru.

It was stated that the banned terrorist organisation, Lashkar-e-Taiba had hatched a conspiracy and target important personalities from the Hindu community in Bengaluru and Hubbali. During the course of the probe the ambit widened and the police found that several leaders from Maharashtra and Telangana too were on the radar of the accused persons.

The probe also found that these people were also planning to target a well known columnist of a newspaper. Investigations also revealed that they were in touch with several persons from Saudi Arabia and Pakistan and the intention was to wage a war against the government of India.

The NIA states that the conspiracy was originally hatched in Riyadh and it was decided that Hindu leaders, journalists, politicians and police personnel from Bengaluru, Hubbali, Nanded and Hyderabad would be targeted.

OneIndia News
CPI(M) wants joint meeting of states on Polavaram project

Bhubaneswar

oi-PTI

Bhubaneswar, Sep 16: Seeking a halt to the construction of the controversial Polavaram project in Andhra Pradesh, the CPI(M) today urged Odisha Governor S C Jamir to take up the matter with the Centre and ensure a joint meeting among the affected states.

The CPI(M)'s suggestion to the Governor came in the backdrop of a tripartite meeting being convened by the Centre on September 17 over the Mahanadi water dispute between Odisha and Chhattisgarh. "A joint discussion with affected states like Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh be initiated by the Government of India," the CPI(M) said in a memorandum to the Odisha government.

A delegation of the CPI(M), led by its state secretary Ali Kishore Patnaik and senior member Janardan Pati, met the Governor here, a day after the ruling BJD submitted a memorandum addressed to the President.

The BJD also staged a dharna opposing the Polavaram project. Besides suggesting the Governor to seek expert opinion to change the design of the Polavaram Dam, the CPI(M) said the height of dam should be reduced to 150 ft, instead of 182 ft as proposed now.

"The excess height of the Polavaram dam will cause huge loss for the people of Odisha," it said. "We are not against taming of river Godavari in Andhra Pradesh. But, under no circumstances it should go against the interest of Odisha," the party said in the memorandum.

The party said lack of water for Polavaram project would cause displacement of several tribal families who have got little benefit under the Forest Rights Act. This apart, the height of the Polavaram project would also cause water-logging in Malkangiri and Koraput districts of Odisha, it said.

PTI

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Friday, September 16, 2016, 13:05 [IST]
China sets up council to promote investments with India

Business

oi-PTI

Beijing, Sept 16: China has permitted setting up of a new trade body to promote and coordinate Chinese investments and businesses with India, a first such official initiative taken by the Communist trading giant.

The council was set up by China Council for the Promotion of International Trade (CCPIT) and will be based in China's Hunan province. CCPIT has approved the formation of the Council under its Hunan provincial unit for a period of two years.

Announcing formation of the council, He Jian, Chairman of Hunan Sub-Council of CCPIT in a communication to the media said "My first important job on arriving at my new post is to establish China India Business Council".

The Council will be based in the office of the CCPIT in Changsha, provincial capital of the Hunan province, he said.

The Council also plans to open offices in New Delhi and Hyderabad to promote and coordinate Chinese investments in India which are on the rise in recent years. The bilateral trade between India and China stood at USD 70,71 billion in 2015-16. The total import and export volume of China, the world's biggest trader, stood at 24.59 trillion yuan in 2015.

Chinese Vice Minister for Finance Shi Yaobin said during India-China Financial Dialogue last month that Chinese investments in India amounted to USD 4.07 billion till last year. More Chinese firms have evinced interest to invest in India.

For its part the Indian government in coordination with the various state governments is also conducting campaigns to attract Chinese investments. In view of the growing trade deficit, India has been asking China to promote investments.

PTI
In a first, two inmates of Institute of Mental Health tie the knot

TN bandh over Cauvery: DMK leaders detained, industries shut

Chennai

oi-PTI

Chennai, Sept 16: DMK leaders M K Stalin and Kanimozhi were among several leaders detained today while staging protests in support of a shutdown called in Tamil Nadu over the Cauvery row as the dawn to dusk bandh called by farmers, traders and supported by the opposition over the issue evoked a mixed response in the state.

Meanwhile, a youth who had set himself on fire over the Cauvery issue yesterday, succumbed to injuries, police said.

The activist belonging to Naam Tamizhar Katchi had suffered over 90 per cent burns and died this morning.

"We were giving him all possible treatment. However, he suffered a cardiac arrest and despite our best efforts, he could not be revived," a senior hospital official told PTI.

Several establishments remained shut in Coimbatore, Tirupur and Nilgiris districts, affecting normal life, in response to the bandh call.

[Read: Shutdown in Tamil Nadu evokes mixed response]

About 20,000 small and medium scale units in and around the city and over 30,000 garment factories in the textile hub of Tirupur also extended support to the bandh and downed shutters, according to reports.

In Chennai, DMK treasurer Stalin led a rally from Rajarathinam stadium to Egmore Railway station. He then squatted in front of the railway terminal along with hundreds of party workers after his attempt to stage a rail roko was foiled by police, who detained him along with his protesters.

DMK Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi, who staged a road roko on arterial Anna Salai along with DMK supporters, was later detained by police in a marriage hall. She has sought convening of an all-party meeting over the Cauvery issue.

In Coimbatore, senior leaders of various political parties, including DMK and MDMK and farmers associations were arrested while trying to stage rail roko near railway stations and road blockade.

[Read: Another bandh over Cauvery, this time in Tamil Nadu]

The bandh did not affect functioning of state and central government offices in Tamil Nadu, which remained open.

While state transport corporation-run buses besides trains are operating as usual, some autorickshaws, taxis and commercial freight operators stayed off the roads.

PTI
Alliance on the rocks, Kashmir may be heading for Governor's Rule

India

oi-IANS

By Ians English

Srinagar, Sept 16: With the Peoples Democratic Party's Srinagar MP Tariq Hameed Karra quitting the party as well as his Lok Sabha seat, the countdown may well have begun for the PDP-BJP alliance in Jammu and Kashmir.

The coming together of the PDP-BJP in February last year was like an inter-community, inter-caste and inter-religious marriage which was not exactly fawned upon by the elders and hardliners on either side, but compulsions of realpolitik and an element of romantic optimism solemnised a union of opposites amidst much hype and fanfare.

Eighteen months later, the marriage is on the rocks and heading for a messy divorce. Both sides no longer seem to be making any effort to keep the spark alive in the relationship. They appear resigned to fate, going through the motions, quite like a couple -- thoroughly bored and disgusted with each other -- staying in the same house but sleeping in different rooms.

And just as in a classic break-up situation, both the BJP and the PDP seem to be waiting for the right moment that will ensure they get the maximum mileage and sympathy while exiting the relationship. And the other side, maximum flak.

But there appears little time left now for such structured finesse and timing. The resignation of PDP MP Karra has the potential to trigger a chain of events which will gather its own momentum, causing the BJP-PDP alliance to implode.

Karra's emotive statements equating the alliance government with the Nazi regime and accusing Prime Minister Modi of pushing an agenda of intolerance and Hinduisation, will have an impact on the PDP cadre. By exhorting fellow PDP lawmakers to follow his example he has made chief minister Mehbooba Mufti's already difficult position more precarious.

Mehbooba Mufti has nobody but herself to blame for this situation. After her father's death she vacillated too long and tried too hard to get a good bargain. In the end, all that posturing yielded little for her. Only her goodwill -- both with her cadre as well as the BJP -- suffered. And the vacuum of over two months after Mufti saheb's passing away and the public dilly-dallying and bargaining robbed the PDP-BJP alliance of whatever little lustre and allure it had during her father's tenure.

Now Mehbooba is getting marginalised on both fronts. Delhi views her as a weak leader and a not fully trustworthy ally. Her supporters in the valley see her as someone who has deserted them and the cause of Kashmir for power. For her political survival, Mehbooba has little choice but to walk out of this alliance.

She may just be waiting for the right time to exit. Any big event, incident and tragedy can offer her that opportunity.

For the BJP too, the romance and optimism of last year looks like a flashback from an old black-and-white era film. The party had forged the alliance viewing it as an historic opportunity to make inroads in the valley. In hindsight, the idea itself was not based on ground realities. Across the valley people had voted with one purpose in mind: to the keep BJP out.

But the experiment still had a chance till Mufti Mohammad Sayeed was the Chief Minister who was so much more politically savvy than Mehbooba.

A quick aside here.

It's remarkable how the older generation leaders have behaved with such maturity in Kashmir. From a Delhi perspective, Omar Abdullah has been too short-sighted these past couple of months, stoking separatist sentiment in the valley by his provocative statements.

His stand may have gained Omar some brownie points vis-a-vis Mehbooba (who was no different when Omar was in the saddle) but his trust quotient in Delhi has gone down several notches. It would have been so much wiser on Omar's part if he had learnt a few lessons from his father.

For all the colour and controversy in his personal life, Dr Farooq Abdullah was always so much more mature and restrained when doing politics in and on Kashmir.

Coming back to the BJP and the Centre, they seem to be running out of options. The situation in the valley is slippery and shows no signs of improvement. Sticking on with Mehbooba and the PDP is bringing diminishing returns with each passing day.

In this scenario, the option of imposing Governor's Rule is increasingly being discussed in Delhi with the government weighing the pros and cons of such a move. Those favouring Governor's Rule have many arguments, but weather seems to be one factor weighing on the minds of Centre.

With winter and snowfall approaching, there are some who argue that cross-border infiltration and support to separatists will come down in the next few months, giving Delhi an extra few months to make up its mind. And give a final chance to the PDP-BJP alliance to retrieve the situation.

The question, keeping in mind the present situation in the valley, is: Does Delhi have the luxury of time on its side?

(Sanjeev Srivastava is founder-editor of EditPlatter.com and former India Editor of BBC. The views expressed are personal. He can be contacted at sanjeevs59@hotmail.com)

IANS
Compromise formula to bring truce in faction-ridden Yadav clan

India

oi-PTI

Lucknow, Sep 16: In a bid to end the raging feud in the family, Mulayam Singh Yadav was today working on a compromise formula even as both his brother Shivpal Yadav and son Akhilesh Yadav said they would comply with whatever Samajwadi Party supremo says.

SP insiders said that as part of the compromise formula, disgruntled Shivpal is likely to get back the three key ministries that his nephew Chief Minister Akhilesh took away from him earlier this week, which had brought the war out in the open.

Besides, sacked Mines minister Gayatri Prajapati could be accommodated in the ministry, but with a different portfolio. Setting in motion the reconciliation process, Mulayam Singh as well as Akhilesh rejected Shivpal's resignation from the Cabinet as well as the head of state party unit, to which he was appointed two days ago replacing Akhilesh.

"Netaji (Mulayam) has heard all of us. He will talk to to some others if he wants and will take decision by tomorrow," Shivpal said, indicating a truce was on the anvil. Akhilesh said at a function that he has rejected the resignation of Shivpal and he will comply with whatever his father directs.

"Netaji (Mulayam) will find a solution (to the current crisis) and everyone will accept it," he said. Shivpal, who resigned last night as a minister and as state party unit head, today said he continues as UP party chief and is preparing for electoral challenge ahead but was evasive whether he will go back to the government.

Mulayam rushes to Lucknow, meets brother Shivpal, son Akhilesh

"That (resignation from party post) has not been accepted. When I have said that for me, Netaji's hint is an order...Akhilesh has also said so. So where is the feud anymore," he said. At the same time, he indicated that he may not return to the government.

"Look, I have resigned only recently. I have got a bigger responsibility. Elections are near and I have to work for the polls. Who is bothered about portfolios? I had only one portfolio, so I said why only one. I will work for the party."

Earlier this morning, Mulayam also broke his silence over the five-day no holds barred family war, saying, "There can be no division in the party, till I am there." The party supremo, who rushed here last evening from Delhi to douse the raging flames of feud, said, "We have a big family, differences may occur...There is no fight between Shivpal Yadav and Akhilesh."

He has met Shivpal and Akhilesh separately and then together to ensure that the crisis was resolved. Mulayam said his son and Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav will not defy his words and announced that sacked mining minister Gayatri Prajapati will be taken back in the UP Cabinet, considered a bone of contention between Shivpal and Akhilesh.

Akhilesh, on his part, told a news channel, "I have two duties, as Chief Minister and as son. I will honour the word of the party president and I will do everything to make my father happy,"

PTI
Bank holidays in November 2022: Here is the full list of non-working days

Cong protests against 'absence' of CM, ministers from Delhi

India

oi-PTI

New Delhi, Sep 16: Congress activists today observed 'Bhagoda Divas' in the national capital, protesting against the alleged absence of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and his ministers from Delhi which is currently reeling under chikungunya and dengue outbreak.

Leading the protests which were held in all the 70 Assembly constituencies of the national capital, Delhi Congress President Ajay Maken attacked Kejriwal and Lt Governor Najeeb Jung for being out of the city instead of helping people at a time of crisis.

"It is extremely unfortunate that while Delhiites are facing an epidemic-like situation, the Chief Minister was campaigning in Punjab and later went to Bangalore.

Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia is holidaying in Finland and even the Lt Governor was in the United States. One of the BJP mayors is also on a foreign jaunt," Maken said.

The party also issued a "charge-sheet" on the "failures" of the AAP government in Delhi and BJP-ruled MCDs in providing help to the people suffering from the mosquito-borne diseases.

Maken demanded that Kejriwal and Sisodia should return to Delhi and call an all-party meeting to fight the diseases.

He also urged the central government to immediately deploy doctors and paramedical staff of army and paramilitary forces at Delhi hospitals and dispensaries, and provide free check up and treatment facilities to people suffering from these diseases. Kejriwal had recently undergone a throat surgery in Bengaluru to cure his persistent cough.

PTI
Two arrested for making objectionable remarks against Mulayam Singh on social media

Fresh twist in Yadav family feud; Shivpal Yadav quits as Minister, shuns party post

India

oi-PTI

Lucknow, Sep 15 In a fresh twist to the deepening feud in Mulayam Singh Yadav's family, his brother Shivpal Yadav tonight submitted his resignation as ruling Samajwadi Party's state unit head and as a minister in the cabinet of newphew Akhilesh Yadav with whom he is at loggerheads.

Shivpal submitted his resignation from the two posts to Mulayam who rushed here from Delhi this evening to douse the flames that threaten to hurt the ruling party in the Assembly polls due early next year, sources said.

Shivpal's wife Sarla also gave resignation from the post of District Cooperative Bank Chairperson, Etawah, and son Aditya gave resignation as Chairman of Pradeshik Cooperative Federation, the sources added.

However, Mulayam reportedly refused to accept the resignations, they said.

PTI
5-year-old dies after being attacked by pack of dogs in MP

Madhya Pradesh: Govt employee seen riding on villager's back goes viral

India

oi-PTI

Bhopal, Sep 16: A photograph showing a Sub Engineer, posted with a rural civic body in Panna district in Madhya Pradesh, being carried across a flooded nullah by a villager on his back has gone viral on social media.

Sub Engineer Arvind Tripathi, who works at Pawai Janpad Panchayat, had posted the picture on Facebook. The incident had taken place two days back.

The picture showed Tripathi being carried across Mahad nullah in Pawai locality, around 10 kms from the district headquarters, by a villager on his back.

Tripathi, who is seen wearing a brown-coloured shirt and white trousers, was on his way to meet villagers to urge them to construct toilets as part of the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.

Under the drive, government staffers offer flowers to villagers and appeal them to build toilets at their places. When contacted, Tripathi told PTI that he regretted his act of riding on the back of the villager as well as uploading the picture on the social networking site.

Tattoo inking Modi, Chouhan costs youth Army job

Panna Collector J P Irene Cynthia said she was not aware of the development. "I will check it," she said when contacted.

Last month, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan had drawn flak and ridicule for a photograph which showed him being lifted by security personnel to cross a swollen nullah at Panna district to meet the flood-hit people.

Chouhan's picture, which appeared in newspapers, was issued by the State Public Relations department after his visit to the rain-ravaged district. However, it was later withdrawn.

PTI
32-year-old critical after being shot at in Gurugram

Haryana to take out rath yatra as part of Golden Jubilee celebrations

India

oi-PTI

Chandigarh, Sep 15 Haryana government will take out a 'rath yatra' as part of the celebrations of the state's golden jubilee from November 1.

The yatra will comprise five tableaus depicting art, culture, heritage, history, progress and development of the state, this was informed in the first meeting of the executive committee of swarna jayanti celebrations Authority chaired by Chief Secretary, D S Dhesi here today.

The yatra, which would conclude on October 31, 2017, would pass through all villages and towns falling between district headquarters.

About 100 to 200 artistes would also be engaged to perform on the tableaus and create a festive environment from wherever this Yatra passes.

The Yatra will also perform a cultural programme at every district headquarters.

The Haryana government intends to showcase history, economic prowess and achievements of the state over the last 50 years since it was carved out as a separate state, an official release said here.

A grand opening ceremony of the Haryana swaran jayanti celebrations will be organised at Tau Devi Lal Stadium, Gurgaon on November 1, the release said.

PTI
Meghalaya opposition withdraws censure motion against government

India

oi-IANS

By Ians English

Shillong, Sep 16: The Mukul Sangma-led Congress government on Thursday got a breather as opposition parties withdrew a no-confidence motion without a vote on it, a first in the state assembly's history.

No-confidence motions moved in the past by opposition benches have always been put to vote, but Thursday's motion was an exception. The opposition legislators withdrew it after the Chief Minister's reply.

Interestingly, Independent legislators Rophul Marak and Lamboklang Mylliem (North East Democratic Socialist Party) from the treasury benches and two Independent legislators Saleng Sangma and John Leslee K. Sangma from the opposition benches were conspicuous by their absence.

Assembly Speaker Abu Taher Mondal said the "no-confidence motion is withdrawn" with the leave of the House after Hill State People 's Democratic Party legislator Ardent Miller Basaiawmoit, who moved the motion, withdrew it.

Opposition seeks no-confidence motion against Meghalaya government

"It is the first time that the no-confidence motion was withdrawn without being put to vote," Mondal told the members.

"We don't have any plans to topple the government, but we only wanted the attention of the government on various issues concerning the state's people. The no-confidence motion is not a game of numbers but rather a wake-up call for the state government," Basaiawmoit said.

Supporting the no-confidence motion, opposition leader Donkupar Roy, Paul Lyngdoh, Jemino Mawthoh of the United Democratic Party besides James K. Sangma and Nihim D. Shira of the National People's Party highlighted the government "failure" on all fronts ranging from tackling crime against women and children to financial crisis in the state.

However, Congress ministers Ronnie V. Lyngdoh, Prestone Tynosng, Zenith Sangma and Ampareen Lyngdoh, besides veteran Congress legislator D.D. Lapang, defended the Chief Minister.

Moreover, Chief Minister Mukul Sangma also brushed aside the opposition accusations.

"It is not correct to say that this government is not responsive on various issues. We are taking care of the public grievances and developmental issues," he said.

IANS


UP: SP leader's car hit by truck, dragged for more than 500 meters in Mainpuri | VIDEO

Mulayam Singh Yadav tears off Shivpal's resignation, but truce not in sight

India

oi-IANS

By Ians English

Lucknow, Sep 16 Samajwadi party (SP) chief Mulayam Singh Yadav on Friday rejected the resignation of younger brother and former PWD minister Shivpal Singh Yadav as the state party chief.

Sources told IANS that in the 15-minute one-on-one meeting at Mulayam Singh's 5, Vikramaditya Marg residence, the SP chief tore off Shivpal's resignation letter.

What transpired thereafter is not known and the two are likely to meet once again at the party headquarters, the sources said.

According to the sources, the SP chief, who has so far not been able to broker peace between the warring "chacha-bhatija", has made up his mind "for some tough decisions" which, an aide said "opened all possibilities".

Meanwhile, a large crowd of supporters thronged the residence of Shivpal Yadav and demanded that the "mantra ji" be reinstated with full dignity and that Akhilesh Yadav apologise to him.

"Shivpal ji has brought up Akhilesh Yadav as his son, would pedal for miles to take him to school as netaji was busy with politics. Is this the way you treat a person like him," asked an angry supporter.

Supporters, wearing t-shirts with images of Shivpal, also demanded action against party general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav, who had on Thursday termed Rajya Sabha member Amar Singh as the villain behind all the party's troubles.

Supporters of Shivpal who were shouting anti-Akhilesh slogans and threatened to go on fast and even indulge in self-immolation, said that it was, in fact, Ram Gopal Yadav who was behind the conspiracy to upstage the former minister.

Meanwhile, a string of legislators and some ministers, including former Mining Minister Gayatri Prajapati, met Shivpal at his official residence earlier in the day.

Assembly speaker Mata Prasad Pandey also drove up to Shivpal's house and spent some time behind closed doors with him. While it was rumoured that the SP parliamentary board will meet on Friday, there was no word on this as yet.

Akhilesh Yadav has already rejected Shivpal's resignation from the state cabinet. There was a brief meeting between the two on Thursday night at which both apparently remained dangers drawn.

An hour later, Shivpal, his wife Sarla and son Aditya Yadav faxed their resignation to Akhilesh Yadav and Mulayam Singh Yadav.

Aditya is an elected chairman of the Uttar Pradesh Cooperative Federation while Sarla Yadav is chairperson of the Etawah Cooperative Federation.

The move also explicitly proves that the theories of "sarkari ladai" and not a family feud were misplaced and something is terribly wrong within the first family of Uttar Pradesh.

IANS
People of J&K hate corruption, I always felt their pain: PM Modi

How Statue of Unity is becoming a major tourist destination with PM Modis vision

Narendra Modi receives Nepal PM

News

oi-Oneindia

By Oneindia

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday received his Nepalese counterpart Pushpa Kamal Dahal "Prachanda" here ahead of bilateral talks.

PM Modi meets Nepalese Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal '#Prachanda' pic.twitter.com/upYz4z0vVa  Doordarshan News (@DDNewsLive) September 16, 2016

Reviewing the full spectrum of #IndiaNepal relations.

Both PMs lead delegation level talks at Hyderabad House pic.twitter.com/shvn67t40V  Vikas Swarup (@MEAIndia) September 16, 2016

"Infusing fresh energy into a special relationship. PM @narendramodi receives Nepal PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal 'Prachanda'," External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup tweeted along with pictures of the two leaders at Hyderabad House here.

Infusing fresh energy into a special relationship. PM @narendramodi receives Nepal PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda pic.twitter.com/GNDGPjXPGw  Vikas Swarup (@MEAIndia) September 16, 2016

Following the bilateral talks, some agreements are expected to be signed between the two sides.

Prachanda arrived here on Thursday on a four-day visit to India.

Welcoming the new Prime Minister of Nepal

EAM @SushmaSwaraj receives HE Pushpa Kamal Dahal 'Prachanda' in New Delhi pic.twitter.com/60e27UU0AX  Vikas Swarup (@MEAIndia) September 15, 2016

The new Maoist-led government in Nepal assumed power early last month after the ouster of K.P. Sharma Oli as Prime Minister.

Earlier on Friday, Prachanda was accorded a ceremonial welcome at the Rashtrapati Bhavan here.

Following this, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj called on him at the Rashtrapati Bhavan here.

Namaskar Nepal. EAM @SushmaSwaraj calls on PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda at Rashtrapati Bhawan pic.twitter.com/tYXtEOE2bQ  Vikas Swarup (@MEAIndia) September 16, 2016

Apart from Sushma Swaraj, Prachanda is scheduled to meet Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Minister of State for Power Piyush Goyal later in the day before calling on President Pranab Mukherjee.

He will also attend a joint business event organised by Assocham in the evening.

In an interview with state broadcaster Doordarshan, Prachanda said that the Nepal-India relationship was a unique one and that his visit was aimed at building "trust and confidence" between the two sides.
Woman, her two children mowed down by train; Suicide not ruled out

Suspicious bird with rings on its legs caught near India-Pakistan border

Rajasthan ACB raids offices of Public Health

India

oi-PTI

Jaipur, Sep 15 Rajasthan Anti-Corruption Bureau today raided the offices of Public Health and Engineering department following complaints of irregularities in purchase of submersible pump sets and wires.

Ten ACB teams conducted raids at the various offices of the departments in Jaipur, Sikar, Jhunjhunu, Sawaimadhopur and Nagaur and seized a number of documents, which are being examined, Additional SP ACB Bajrang Singh said.

The raid was conducted following a complaint about procurement of substandard materials by the department, he said.

PTI
UP: Man films wife committing suicide, does nothing to stop her

UP: 5, including a child, killed and 5 seriously hurt as car hits electric pole

Azam Khan disqualified as UP MLA after conviction in hate speech

FIR against nine people over forced religious conversions in UP

Samajwadi Party feud: Shivpal's portfolios restored

India

oi-IANS

By Ians English

Lucknow, Sep 17: Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Friday restored the portfolios he snatched from his uncle and party leader Shivpal Yadav after days of bitter power struggle in the party.

After party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav played the peacemaker, Akhilesh Yadav also took back Mining Minister Gayatri Prajapati, a Shivpal protege whom he had earlier sacked, sparking the crisis in the Samajwadi Party.

The Chief Minister's Office tweeted that all the departments like Public Works Department, Irrigation, Cooperatives and Revenue were once again back with Shivpal Yadav, younger brother of Mulayam Singh.

Mulayam Singh had already announced the decisions at a meeting of party workers, hundreds of who massed outside Shivpal Yadav's residence earlier in the day shouting slogans against the Chief Minister.

Mulayam Singh finally mediated in the war of supremacy within the party and asked Akhilesh Yadav to roll back his decisions against Shivpal Yadav and Prajapati, party sources said.

Read More: In UP, Mulayam smooths over rift with Akhilesh, says party 'amar' as long as he's alive

Shivpal Yadav also remains the state party chief. It was Mulayam Singh's decision on Tuesday to give him this post after taking it from Akhilesh Yadav that brought about the worst-ever crisis in the Samajwadi Party out in the open.

While the curtains seem to have come down on the four-day-old drama that shook the Samajwadi Party ahead of critical assembly polls next year, many felt that the coldness between the "chacha-bhatija" had not abated.

"The patch up is superficial. The two are set to clash again as Shivpal has won this round though the Chief Minister was adamant on not retreating from his decisions," a senior party leader said.

A visibly satisfied Shivpal Yadav remarked that Akhilesh Yadav still had a lot to learn in politics.

"I have a longer experience with Netaji (Mulayam Singh Yadav), I have been with Netaji since the age of 15. Everybody can't be the same. Everybody can't become Akhilesh or Netaji or for that matter, Shivpal," Shivpal said at the India TV Conclave here.

He took exception to Akhilesh Yadav's assertion that the "role of outsiders won't be tolerated" and alleged many ministers in the cabinet of Akhilesh Yadav do not do any work.

Shivpal Yadav said his resignation as the state party chief had been rejected by Mulayam Singh. "Where is the feud any more?" he asked.

Asked why Akhilesh Yadav took away his portfolios if he thought his performance was good, Shivpal Yadav said: "Everybody accepts that I have performed better."

Mulayam Singh earlier told party activists that the Samajwadi Party would remain united as long as he was around.

Akhilesh Yadav earlier told India TV: "I am ready to return party posts and even portfolios but I must have the power to distribute tickets because the forthcoming poll is after all a test for me and my party."

Many in the Samajwadi Party appeared to feel that Akhilesh Yadav had been forced to backtrack vis-a-vis Shivpal Yadav by Mulayam Singh.

Earlier, Shivpal Yadav supporters accused Akhilesh Yadav of humiliating Shivpal Yadav and insisted that the Chief Minister should apologize to his uncle by touching his feet.

More than two dozen Samajwadi Party legislators and Uttar Pradesh assembly Speaker Mata Prasad Pandey met Shivpal Yadav.

Some Shivpal supporters also demanded action against party General Secretary Ram Gopal Yadav, who on Thursday termed Rajya Sabha member Amar Singh as the villain in the entire sordid episode.

Akhilesh said: "It is my responsibility as a son to accept Netaji's decision. I accept Netaji's decision to bring Gayatri Prajapati back into cabinet.

"It is election time. We should all come together and work. There is no fight between Ramgopal Yadav, Akhilesh and Shivpal."

--IANS

md-mr/vd
Hundreds head to UP's Saifai village to pay tributes to Mulayam Singh Yadav

Mulayam Singh Yadav's final rites today; mortal remains kept at Saifai village

Two arrested for making objectionable remarks against Mulayam Singh on social media

10-year-old heads alone on a 500-km journey to attend Mulayam Singh's funeral

News flash: It was a unanimous decision to merge with PPA: Pema Khandu

India

oi-Oneindia

By Oneindia Staff Writer

Sept 16: Nepal's Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal to be accorded a ceremonial reception at Rashtrapati Bhavan, today. Meanwhile, farmers' organisations and Opposition parties call for a statewide bandh in Tamil Nadu over Cauvery row.

Get all the latest news updates of the day:

12.10 am: Some party men believe that RSS is behind the violence in the state. We'll ensure action is taken once the investigation finishes: Karnataka HM

11:40 pm: Merkel, Hollande vow to work together for 'success' of Europe.

11:15 pm: Police constable Prakash Barange stoned down by drunk & drive accused in Nagpur.

10:50 pm: I want to see wrestling as one of the major sport to be played in India: Sakshi Malik.

10:20 pm: Rio Bronze medalist Sakshi Malik was felicitated by Bank of Maharashtra in Delhi.

9:50 pm: Prime Minister Narendra Modi really helped us in highlighting our cause in an international arena: Brahumdagh Bugti

9:40 pm: If I ever get a chance to move to India, i will definitely go there for my people: Brahumdagh Bugti on asylum issue.

9:30 pm: Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrives in Ahmedabad, Gujarat.

9:00 pm: Chhattisgarh: Three Naxals arrested in Narayanpur.

8:35 pm: Gayatri Prajapati will be inducted in the cabinet: UP CM Office

8:25 pm: Portfolios will be given back to Shivpal Singh Yadav: UP CM Office

8:15 pm: We have to work in a way so that SP wins 2017 polls and Akhilesh Yadav becomes CM again: Shivpal Yadav

8.10 pm: Netaji & Akhilesh didn't accept my resignation. I left it to Netaji and whatever he will decide we will follow: Shivpal Yadav

8:00 pm: I can not comment on Mulayam Singh Yadav: Shivpal Yadav.

7:50 pm: President Pranab Mukherjee meets Nepal's PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda

7:40 pm: It was a unanimous decision of all the Congress Legislators to merge with the regional political party - PPA: Pema Khandu

7:26 pm: Person travelling from Dubai caught at Mumbai Airport with 350 gm gold sheets concealed within aluminium foil.

7:10 pm: HRD Ministry plans to introduce quota for faculty at IIMs.

6:42 pm: It is so brazen that Delhi Health Minister says panic is created by the media: Shobha Oza, Congress.

6:32 pm: Who has authority to convert that mandate by engineering defection of an entire govt? Obviously the PM and BJP Pres: Surjewala.

6:25 pm: People of Arunachal Pradesh voted for Cong to power, these MLAs were chosen with Cong symbol: RS Surjewala.

6:20 pm: Jet Airways flight 9W272 Delhi to Dhaka returns after finding an unclaimed baggage on board.

6:10 pm: People's Party of Arunachal is part of NEDA, so automatically Pema Khandu has become constituent of NEDA: Himanta Sarma.

6:05 pm: Wrestler Narsingh Yadav's dope case referred to CBI.

6.00 pm: Its a good time for this service: AS Prakash (Chairman, Prasar Bharti) launched Balochi multimedia website & mobile app.

5.59 pm: All India Radio launches multi media website and mobile app for Balochi Service.

5.51 pm: Hopeful that Nepal will successfully implement Constitution accomodating aspirations of all sections of society: FS.

5.45 pm: 5 injured and 2 critical as a security escort car of AAP minister Gopal Rai turned turtle in Bhanupratappur (Chhattisgarh).

5.24 pm: BJP doesnt love Rajdeo Ranjan or Chandrakeshwar, they are just against me being out on bail, says Mohammad Shahabuddin.

5.22 pm: Where did my name come in from in Rajdeo Ranjan case? Does police FIR have my name, or the chargesheet?: Mohammad Shahabuddin.

5.21 pm: Mohammad Kaif had a fight in his "mohalla" & now he is called shooter?, says Mohammad Shahabuddin.

5.13 pm: WFI President Brijbhushan Sharan Singh confirms that the case of Narsingh Yadav is forwarded to CBI for further investigation.

5.12 pm: Whatever Court decides we will follow it: Mohd Shahabuddin on Bihar Govts appeal in SC challenging Shahabuddins bail.

5.02 pm: I have not applied for any asylum in India, Brahamdagh Bugti (Baloch Republican Party).

4.53 pm: I haven't received any notice yet but I am not worried about anything at all: Mohammad Shahabuddin on Bihar Govt's appeal in SC.

4.47 pm: Police arrest 2 Naxals carrying reward of Rs 1 lakh each on their head during routine patrolling in Narayanpur.

4.46 pm: Suicide bomber kills 16 at mosque in NW Pakistan: Officials (AFP).

4.45 pm: 1 soldier injured in an encounter b/w CoBRA jawans & naxals in Sukma district of Chhattisgarh. Search ops underway.

4.35 pm: School kids celebrate PM Narendra Modi's birthday in Siliguri.

4.31 pm: We recommend MSP of Rs 40/kg for rabi gram for 2016 season and Rs 60/kg for urad and tur for kharif season 2017: Arvind Subramanian, CEA.

4.20 pm: Vital to ensure that prices do not drop below MSP else next season farmers might switch back away from pulse, says Arvind Subramanian, CEA.

4.19 pm: Wanted shooter Mohd Kaif's properties being attached by police in Bihar.

4.08 pm: Demonstration involving members of Uyghur and Tibetan communities in Europe taking place in Geneva, Switzerland.

3.51 pm: Delhi govt orders all mohalla clinics, poly clinics and dispensaries to remain open on Sundays as well due to rise in Chikungunya cases.

3.37 pm: Police ask women to take selfies with Thana Incharge and use it as profile pictures to deter stalkers in Hoshingabad (MP).

3.25 pm: I think CBI and Govt for taking necessary steps to provide me justice, says Asha Ranjan (Rajdev Ranjan's widow) in Bihar (Siwan).

3.23 pm: SC extended parole after Sahara deposited Rs 352 crore with SEBI as per Apex court direction.

3.21 pm: Supreme Court extends Sahara Chief Subrata Roy's parole till Sep 23.

3.12 pm: We are very proud of our Jawans who fought courageously in both Poonch and Rajouri: MoS PMO Jitendra Singh

3.03 pm: 'Sahkarita Vibhag' has launched a File tracking system to monitor all the Govt files: Shivraj Singh Chouhan, MP CM.

2.46 pm: Swedish appeals court upholds detention order for Julian Assange. (Source: AP)

2.38 pm: Bihar Govt files an appeal in the Supreme Court challenging Patna High Court's order granting bail to the Former RJD MP Shahabuddin.

2.37 pm: Brahumdagh Bugti hasnt filed papers related to asylum in India. Geo News report incorrect. Baloch Republican Party to decide on it: BRP

2.34 pm: SC commutes death penalty of a convict in a rape & murder case of a 7 year old girl (in Jabalpur, 2011). SC clarifies that the convict will not be released before 25 years behind bars.

2.30 pm: UP DGP Javeed Ahmad also reaches Mulayam Singh Yadav's residence in Lucknow where SP Chief, UP CM & Shivpal Yadav's meet is underway.

2.20 pm: If the CM and ministers have to wait for days to meet their own leadership in Delhi. How can they stay in such party?: Kiren Rijiju, MoS Home

2.18 pm: Congress shouldn't blame BJP for its own failure: Kiren Rijiju, MoS Home on Arunachal Pradesh crisis

2.16 pm: The (Arunachal Pradesh)CM & MLAs have consciously decided to merge with regional party,BJP has nothing to do with this

2.12 pm: MP CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan speaking at the 'Sahkarita Manthan' programme in Bhopal

2.10 pm: UP CM Akhilesh Yadav reaches Mulayam Singh Yadav's residence in Lucknow for meeting with SP Chief and Shivpal Yadav.

1.58 pm: Discussed issues including NPAs, credit growth and financial inclusion with PSU banks' heads: FM Arun Jaitley

1.51 pm: Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa orders to release water from Mettur Dam from 20th September for Samba cultivation.

1.50 pm: 42 Cong MLAs in Arunachal Pradesh, including CM Pema Khandu,resign from the party, will join Peoples Party of Arunachal: Sources

1.36 pm: SC to hear Chandrakeshwar Prasad's plea, challenging Patna High Court's order granting bail to the Former RJD MP Shahabuddin, on Sept 19.

1.31 pm: Confident tht our discussion today would further cement our centuries old relations and write a glorious chapter of our partnership: PM Modi

1.28 pm: Continued co-operation between our defence & security agencies is important to guard our open borders: PM Modi

1.28 pm: Our friendship is time-tested & unique.We share our burden during difficult times,just as we celebrate each other's achievements: PM Modi

1.25 pm: Today is a significant day in history of our friendship: PM Modi at the joint press statement.

1.24 pm: Exchange of agreements between India and Nepal in Delhi.

1.15 pm: PM Modi and Nepal's PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda issue a joint statement.

1.04 pm: Health Ministry seeks report of death history & full case history from Delhi Govt, says JP Nadda on Chikungunya and dengue row.

1.00 pm: Samajwadi Party is a family, there can be no rift in it says supremo, Mulayam Singh Yadav. There are no differences, Yadav also says.

12.59 pm: The Congress government in Arunachal Pradesh is in trouble again as majority of its lawmakers have joined the People's Party of Arunachal Pradesh.

12.58 pm: CBI team leaves for Bihar to probe Journalist Rajdev Ranjan's murder case.

12.46 pm: Will Akhilesh say no to me. He will not say no to me, Mulayam Singh Yadav says.

12.45 pm: Akhilesh Yadav will go meet Shivpal Yadav at his residence: Mulayam Singh Yadav.

12.24 pm: Bengaluru: KRV protest against release of Cauvery water, protesters detained by police

Bengaluru: KRV protest against release of Cauvery water, protesters detained by police #CauveryProtests pic.twitter.com/AV0FdlyRGd  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

12.15 pm: Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain reaches Nirman Bhavan to meet Union Health Minister JP Nadda.

12.02 pm: SC stays NGT order mandating environment clearance for Delhi metro Noida line construction.

11.40 am: Nepal Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal meets PM Narendra Modi at Hyderabad House

Delhi: Nepal Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal meets PM Narendra Modi at Hyderabad House pic.twitter.com/IbQkoiCQBd  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

11.30 am: Chandrakeshwar Prasad of Siwan files appeal in SC challenging Patna High Court's order granting bail to the former RJD MP Shahabuddin.

11.23 am: Supreme Court rejects petition questioning sacrifice of animals on Bakrid.

11.20 am: All India Radio to launch multi media website and mobile app for Ballochi Service, at 4 pm today.

11.12 am: Nepal Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal's ceremonial welcome at Rashtrapati Bhawan in Delhi

Nepal Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal's ceremonial welcome at Rashtrapati Bhawan in Delhi pic.twitter.com/sHXZloykGu  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

11.05 am: Sahara deposits Rs 352 crore with SEBI as per SC directive. Seeks continuance of bail for Subrata Roy.

11.00 am: MDMK Chief Vaiko detained in Tiruchirappalli during protest over Cauvery issue.

10.55 am: Not everyone who have died due to dengue are from Delhi, there are many from neighbouring states too, we need to segregate data: S Jain

10.54 am: Politics can wait, urge everyone to co-operate with State Govt to deal with situation: Satyendra Jain on rise in dengue & chikungunya cases

10.49 am: Chhattisgarh- Police arrest 4 men who carried out loot at various places, posed as Naxals from Narayanpur.2 pistols, naxal uniform recovered

10.43 am: Bidar (Karnataka): 3-year-old dead, 3 injured after a bus carrying 36 passengers caught fire in Humnabad.

10.40 am: While withdrawing the petition, petitioner sought liberty to approach HC, SC grants the petitioner the liberty.

10.39 am: SC refuses to entertain PIL questioning sacrifice of animals on Bakra-Eid & validity of a provision of Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act

10.28 am: Maharashtra: 3 drown in Warda and 2 in Amravati during Ganpati Visarjan

10.20 am: Chennai: TN farmers' association stage 'Rail Roko' protest at Saidapet railway station over Cauvery Issue

10.18 am: Chennai: DMK leader Kanimozhi, who was protesting along with other party workers over Cauvery water dispute row, detained by police.

10.15 am: Chennai: DMK workers stage protest over Cauvery water dispute row, DMK leader Kanimozhi also present

Chennai: DMK workers stage protest over #Cauvery water dispute row, DMK leader Kanimozhi also present pic.twitter.com/8B4qNYE2Fh  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

10.10 am: Tight security in place as Puducherry observes day-long shutdown over Cauvery issue.

Puducherry: Tight security in place as Tamil Nadu observes day-long shutdown over #CauveryIssue. pic.twitter.com/osjEevIIR3  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

10.05 am: Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, J Jayalalithaa must meet Prime Minister, Narendra Modi on Cauvery issue. Writing letters alone will not help says M K Stalin, DMK leader.

9.50 am: Shivpal Yadav addresses his supporters outside his residence in Lucknow (UP)

Shivpal Yadav addresses his supporters outside his residence in Lucknow (UP) pic.twitter.com/RVk3TmA9Iq  ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) September 16, 2016

9.40 am: The bandh in Tamil Nadu has been peaceful so far. Attempts of a rail roko programme by the DMK and the Viduthalai Siruthaigal party cadres have been foiled by the police who have carried out a spate of arrests.



9.20 am: Leader of the opposition and DMK leader, M K Stalin leads rally against Karnataka at the Eggmore railway station.

8.45 am: Government and aided schools in Chennai remain open. Some private schools have declared holiday in Chennai.

8.12 am: Heavy security deployment at Karnataka-Tamil Nadu checkpost border near Attibele

#TamilNaduBandh Heavy security deployment at Karnataka-Tamil Nadu checkpost border near Attibele pic.twitter.com/eXZ5IF2K38  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

8.00 am: A fire broke out at an electric goods shop in the Chickpet area of Bengaluru. Nine fire tenders were rushed to the spot.

7.55 am: Karnataka police step up security as Tamil Nadu observes bandh over Cauvery issue. Vehicle to TN have been stopped as a precautionary measure.

Chennai: Koyambedu market closed today as farmers' organisations and Opposition parties call for #TamilNaduBandh pic.twitter.com/EMEd6l5lwh  ANI (@ANI_news) September 16, 2016

OneIndia News
Tamil Nadu bandh over Cauvery issue today: All you need to know

TN braces for Cauvery bandh tomorrow, man sets himself on fire

India

oi-PTI

Chennai, Sep 15: Tamil Nadu is bracing for a dawn-to- dusk bandh supported by Opposition parties tomorrow on the Cauvery with police deploying thousands of personnel across the state to ensure peace even as a youth set himself on fire here today over the water sharing row.

The bandh call given by several farmers and traders bodies, including Tamil Nadu All Farmers' Federations and Tamil Nadu Vanigar Sangangalin Peramaippu (a traders' collective) is supported by main Opposition party DMK, Tamil Nadu Congress Committee, MDMK, PMK, TMC, CPI(M), and CPI.

Protesters have also called for rail and road 'rokos'. Primarily to protest the violence targeted against the Tamils in Karnataka, the bandh is also aimed at seeking Cauvery water for the state and a final solution to the problem.

Ruling AIADMK and trade unions affiliated to it have been non-committal on their participation in the bandh. After Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah wrote to his Tamil Nadu counterpart Jayalalithaa, urging her to ensure protection of Kannada speaking people, police said all measures have been taken to ensure peace.

Cauvery issue: None can protest against court verdicts, SC tells Karnataka, TN

Thousands of police personnel, including armed reserves will be deployed in Chennai and other parts of the state. Over 15,000 police personnel will be on duty. Protection was being provided to Karnataka-related business establishments, schools, institutions and areas where Kannada speaking people live, including Krishnagiri district.

Commercial firms, including over 35,000 jewellery and fuel outlets are expected to remaine closed. However 'Company Owned and Company Operated Fuel Outlets' of Indian Oil, Bharat Petroleum and Indian Oil will operate, officials said.

While sporadic demonstrations were held today too, a 24-year-old man set himself on fire at a rally held by Nam Tamizhar Katchi (NTK) here for "retrieving Tamil Nadu's rights in Cauvery," and to condemn attacks on the Tamils in Karnataka.

An official of the Kilpauk Government Medical College Hospital, where he has been admitted, told PTI the "man has sustained 93 per cent burns, his chances of survival are dim." "It is a painful act. We do not support it. No one should do such a thing," NTK leader Seeman said.

Before he set himself afire, he threw pamphlets urging people to fight for rights of Tamil Nadu people on Cauvery and other issues. Blaming the Centre on Cauvery, unidentified persons pelted stones at an office of Indian Oil Corporation Limited and some glass panes were damaged, police said.

Tamil outfits in Union Territory of Puducherry have called for a similar bandh tomorrow.

PTI
TRS MP meets Ramdev, seeks support to set up Turmeric Board

India

oi-PTI

Hyderabad, Sept 17: Telangana Rashtra Samiti MP Kalvakuntla Kavitha met Yoga Guru Baba Ramdev in Delhi seeking his support to Prime Minister Narendra Modi for setting up a Turmeric Board on Friday.

The TRS leader, who represents Nizamabad Lok Sabha seat in Telangana, met Baba Ramdev and requested for letter of support to Prime Minister and active intervention for the setting up of Turmeric Board for the welfare of turmeric farmers and also for the provision of a Minimum Support Price (MSP) to be given to turmeric crop.

"I have already met the Prime Minister twice in the last two years apart from Chief Ministers of Maharashtra and Kerala for their support toward this initiative," Kavitha said in a letter addressed to Baba Ramdev, a copy of which was released to media here.

"India accounts for about 80 per cent of world's turmeric production with about 1.5 lakh hectares under cultivation, with Telangana occupying almost 40 per cent of area coverage and 63 per cent in production share in which my constitutency of Nizamabad has one of the largest trading centres in the country," she said.

Yoga textbook created by Patanjali to be taught in Goa schools

The separation of turmeric from other spices and creating a separate board to significantly improve the prospects of this crop is imperative, she said.

Kavitha also urged Baba Ramdev to consider setting up of a spice plant under the initiative of Patanjali group in Nizamabad to procure turmeric directly from the farmers and also other spices that are predominantly available in South India not only for consumption and sale in India, but also targetting the export market.

She assured all possible support and assistance from Telangana government to see the first Patanjali unit in South India to be established at Nizamabad and also invited him to visit Nizamabad.

PTI
Former Himachal CM Virbhadra Singh to be cremated at Rampur on July 10 at 3 pm

Virbhadra Singh calls for promoting Sanskrit

India

oi-PTI

Shimla, Sept 15 Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh today called for promoting Sanskrit language saying it is not only the mother of all languages but also the of our culture.

"Sanskrit is known as 'Dev Vani' (language of lords) and all the Vedas, Puranas, Epics and Granths has been scripted in Sanskrit and it should be promoted," Singh said while presiding over a three-day National Sanskrit Seminar on the 'Role of Sanskrit in Development of Nation and Society' at Solan today.

"Sanskrit enables us to understand the evolution of ancient Indian civilisation which has helped immensely in making India 'Vishwa Guru'," he added.

He said the need of the hour was to preserve the ancient language along with our traditions and culture.

"Sanskrit is being studied as foreign language even in the west, and Indian epics and Mahakavyas in Sanskrit had been translated in other languages also but original texts have their own charge," Singh said.

He expressed concern over the declining interest of youth in the language and exhorted them to study and do more research in the Indian customary languages.

The Chief Minister said the government would provide financial assistance to anyone who wants to pursue higher education in Sanskrit and lauded the efforts of the scholars who have promoted the language in the state.

PTI
Sonia chose Manmohan Singh as he posed no threat to her, Rahul Gandhi: Obama

Barack Obama met Hillary Clinton briefly in Washington DC

International

oi-PTI

Washington, Sept 16: US President Barack Obama has met his former secretary of state Hillary Clinton who is now the Democratic presidential nominee.

Obama met Clinton backstage for "about 15 minutes" on Thursday night before he delivered his remarks to the 39th annual Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute Gala here, a Clinton Campaign official said.

The White House also confirmed the meeting, but no details were given about it. This was the first meeting between the two leaders after 68-year-old Clinton fell ill over the weekend and had to take a few days' off from the gruelling campaign schedule.

PTI
Pope, Trump wish Peres well as condition stable: spokesman

International

oi-PTI

Jerusalem, Sep 16: Former Israeli president Shimon Peres remained stable today morning three days after a major stroke, a spokesman for the 93-year-old said, after the Pope and Donald Trump offered their best wishes.

Israelis have been watching closely since their elder statesman and last remaining founding father was hospitalised on Tuesday feeling unwell and then suffered a stroke and internal bleeding. His condition has improved since, but he remained sedated on Friday morning.

"There is no change at the moment," a spokesman for Peres said. "His condition is obviously still serious but at the moment he is stable." Doctors are hoping it will be possible to take Peres out of sedation in the coming days, though they are monitoring his condition hourly.

Yesterday his personal physician and son-in-law Rafi Walden told AFP that during times when they had taken him out of sedation, he had been able to squeeze his hand. He has not been able to speak due to being intubated, Walden said.

Peres has held nearly every major office in Israel, serving twice as prime minister. He was president, a mostly ceremonial role, from 2007 to 2014. He won the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize jointly with prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat for his role in negotiating the Oslo Accords, which envisioned an independent Palestinian state.

The former hawk turned dove is widely respected both in Israel and abroad, regularly meeting world leaders and celebrities. Pope Francis wrote to Peres yesterday saying he had "prayed for strength for the family and for a full recovery."

The letter said the Pope held a special prayer for Peres alongside Rabbi Abraham Skorka of Argentina. Peres and the Pope last met two months ago when Peres visited the Vatican, while in 2014 they made a joint prayer for peace alongside Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.

US Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump also wrote to wish Peres a "swift recovery." "You are among the last of a generation of leaders who fought for the right of the Jewish people to shape their own destiny," Trump wrote.

Trump's Democrat rival Hillary Clinton, former British prime minister Tony Blair and Russian President Vladimir Putin have also inquired about his condition.

PTI
Sri Lanka vs Pakistan: When and where to watch Asia Cup 2022 Final Match live online?

India to stop providing further financial aid to crisis-hit Sri Lanka? Indian embassy reacts

Sri Lanka to build power plant in Trincomalee

International

oi-PTI

Colombo, Sep 16: Sri Lanka has said it will build a power plant at eastern Trincomalee district, days after it ended a joint venture with India's National Thermal Power corporation (NTPC) to develop a coal power plant at the same site.

The government conveyed the decision to the Supreme Court on Thursday in response to a complaint filed by an environmentalist organisation.

Sri Lanka's Minister of Power and Energy Ranjith Siyambalapitiya told reporters that the decision to stop the joint venture with India was taken to reduce the use of coal as a power generating source.

"The decision is limited to doing away with using coal as a power generating source. It doesn't mean that a power plant would not be built in Sampur," Siyambalapitiya said.

He said the government was trying to strike a balance between coal power and other sources in building generating plants in the future.

The government, however, has not said who will assist in building the power plant.

"There is a strong school of thought that coal fire would be a cheaper source for power generation as opposed to other sources," Siyambalapitiya said.

The decision to stop the coal fired plant at Sampur town in Trincomalee was due to environmental concerns, he said.

"The government has taken a policy decision to minimise the use of coal for power generation," he added.

PTI

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Friday, September 16, 2016, 16:15 [IST]
UN chief slams Netanyahu over 'ethnic cleansing' remark

International

oi-PTI

United Nations, Sep 16: UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Thursaday took a swipe at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying it was "unacceptable and outrageous" to claim that opposition to settlements was tantamount to ethnic cleansing.

Netanyahu has accused the Palestinians of seeking a state with "no Jews" and declared in a video released last week that this could be described as "ethnic cleansing."

"I am disturbed by a recent statement by Israel's prime minister portraying those who oppose settlement expansion as supporters of ethnic cleansing," Ban told the Security Council during a meeting on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

"This is unacceptable and outrageous." Ban asserted that Israel's policy of building housing on land earmarked for a future Palestinian state was illegal and called for an end to Israeli rule over Palestinian territories. "Let me be absolutely clear: settlements are illegal under international law. The occupation, stifling and oppressive, must end," he said.

More than half a million Israelis have settled in Palestinian territories under a policy that Ban said was "diametrically opposed to the creation of a Palestinian state." Over the past two weeks, Israel has advanced plans for another 463 housing units to be built in four settlements of the West Bank.

Ban quoted Israeli data as showing that since April, there had been the highest number of construction starts in three years, confirming the Israeli push on settlements. Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, hit back at Ban, saying he should direct his criticism at the Palestinians.

"Instead of directly condemning Hamas and its building of terror tunnels, and instead of investing time and resources in ensuring that the Palestinians end their incitement, the secretary general chooses to condemn Israel on a regular basis," he said in a statement.

The council meeting was held amid reports that Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman had ordered ministry employees and military officials to boycott UN envoy Nickolay Mladenov over his criticism of Israel's settlement policies.

Mladenov last month told the council that Israel had launched a "surge" in settlement activity, ignoring the recommendations of the diplomatic quartet that called for a halt to settlements.

The quartet is comprised of the United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations.

New Zealand's Foreign Minister Murray McCully, who holds the council presidency this month, said Lieberman's decision was "deeply counter-productive" and that Mladenov was "doing the job we all asked him to do."

The United Nations has been struggling to find a way to re-start the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, which has been comatose since a US-led diplomatic effort collapsed in April 2014.

PTI
'Pan-India tea auction more suitable after GST'

Kolkata

oi-PTI

Kolkata, Sep 15: The Indian Tea Association (ITA) on Thursday said that the pan-India e-auction would be more 'suited' for the traders if it was introduced after the roll-out of Goods and Services Tax (GST).

"Ideally, pan-India auctions could have been more suited with the GST regime. Presently, there are some concerns over interstate transportation of teas," the association's Vice Chairman Azam Monem said.

Currently, there are different taxes on the brew in different states and traders are facing difficulties in interstate transport of their tea stocks.

"After the rollout of GST, there will be a uniform indirect tax rate on the commodity and it would help traders in interstate transport of their stocks. Traders will then find it much easier to participate in the pan-India auctions," said the tea lobby group's Secretary Sujit Patra.

Despite efforts being made by the Tea Board of India, pan-India auction which was rolled out in June so far has not been able to generate competition for a fair price discovery for the tea makers.

"The tea prices for Indian producers for the last ten years have grown at around CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate) of 6 per cent, trailing the rise in input costs which have increased at a CAGR of over 10 per cent during the same period," a statement said.

Prices have not been picking up with increasing costs of production, which has soared by around 9.5 per cent in the last four years.

Many producers were forced to sell teas well below the cost of production and it would have serious consequences in the future on the sustainability of the industry.

The Tea Board has mandated that 50 per cent of the teas manufactured must be routed through public auctions.

The industry in India, the world's second largest producer of tea after China, is reeling under subdued prices due to oversupply in the world market on the back of higher production in north India and Kenya.

"Total tea consumption is around 4.5 billion kgs world-wide. But in the last sixth months, there has been an additional supply of around 90 million kgs. It is putting pressure on domestic prices," said Monem.

The modest annual consumption growth at 3 per cent is also a major challenge.

"We are worried as per capita consumption of the brew in our country is low compared to the neighbouring countries. Fifty per cent of people in the age group of 15-24 are taking only one cup of tea a day," he said.

"We should promote tea consumption among the young people on an urgent basis. We are promoting consumption of generic teas for this purpose," he said.

IANS

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Story first published: Friday, September 16, 2016, 15:45 [IST]
Behind the scenes in UP: What triggered the Yadav feud that threatens to split Samajwadi Party?

Lucknow

oi-Vicky

"You are my uncle, you take everything". As the 'Yadav Mahabharat' unfolded in Uttar Pradesh, with a cast of characters almost wholly of the Mulayam Singh Yadav clan, this plea by Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav to his uncle Shivpal Yadav failed to mollify the latter. Shivpal Yadav resigned from the Cabinet and as UP party chief, a position to which 'Netaji', his elder brother Mulayam Singh Yadav, had just appointed him.

Uttar Pradesh: Why Mulayam cannot afford to lose Shivpal Yadav?

With elections to the state assembly just six months away, the Samajwadi Party is being roiled by an unseemly family drama that even has people pointing at a 'Shakuni' as being behind what has become a multi-sided rift -- between father and son, Mulayam and Akhilesh, between uncle Shivpal and nephew Akhilesh, and between the many uncles -- Mulayam's brothers.

Amar Singh, Mulayam's old buddy who only returned to the party recently after years in exile, is the focus of Akhilesh's anger. Akhilesh, after all, had strongly opposed Amar Singh's return to the party, but had been overruled by Mulayam.

What started the fire?

It all began with an order of the Allahabad High Court ordering a probe into illegal mining in Uttar Pradesh. Senior officials of the state advised Mulayam Singh Yadav that the state mines minister Gayatri Prasad Prajapati would prove a liability if the probe got underway and therefore should be sacked before he causes political damage ahead of the elections.

Mulayam directed Akhilesh to sack Prajapati forthwith. But this did not go down well with Shivpal Yadav, who is close to Prajapati. Shivpal hit back by making out a case against RajkishoreSingh, the Panchayat Raj minister, saying he, too, was involved in corruption and must be sacked.

In a bid to strike a balance between son and brother, Mulayam directed Akhilesh to sack both Prajapati and Rajkishore Singh, which the chief minister did promptly.

But the drama had just begun. Prajapati then complained to Mulayam that it was Chief Secretary Deepak Singhal who had directed UP officials to make affidavits on illegal mining and so he must be sacked, before he causes any more damage to the party. Mulayam agreed with this,too, and called up son Akhilesh to tell him to sack Singhal. Akhilesh complied with this, too.

I am with neta ji, bound by his orders: Shivpal Yadav

It was then that 'outsider' Amar Singh came into the picture, and what was apparently an exercise to clean up their stables ahead of elections in which corruption is likely to be a big issue, spun out of control into a Yadav family feud. Singhal rushed to Amar Singh and asked him to impress upon him that the party and the government would not look good if they sacked the chief secretary so close to elections.

Akhilesh snaps

Mulayam was convinced of Amar Singh's argument, too. He promptly called up Akhilesh and asked him to reinstate Singhal as chief secretary. This time, though, Akhilesh snapped. Fully aware that Amar Singh was the man behind Mulayam's U-turn, Akhilesh yelled back at his father that the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh could not change his own order that he had issued only a few hours earlier and cut the conversation.

While Mulayam was fuming at the tone in which his son had spoken to him, sources said, Amar Singh aggravated the father-son rift by suggesting to Mulayam that he show his son his place. Mulayam is said to have done this by stripping Akhilesh of the party chief's post and appointing brother Shivpal Yadav in his place.

Akhilesh, desperate to ensure that he remained in control, retaliated by stripping Shivpal of the portfolios he held in the ministry. It was meant to be a message to both his father Mulayam and to Amar Singh.

Except, Shivpal, feeling humiliated, decided to flex his own muscles, resigning from all posts himself as well as getting his son and wife, too, to quit their party posts.

As the party stares at the possibility of a vertical split, Akhilesh has written to uncle Shivpal refusing to accept his resignation and asking him to carry on his ministerial duties. But clearly, this drama is far from over.

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Story first published: Friday, September 16, 2016, 12:42 [IST]
Uttar Pradesh: Why Mulayam cannot afford to lose Shivpal Yadav?

Lucknow

oi-Vicky

Lucknow, Sept 16: All eyes will be on Shivpal Yadav, the brother of Mulayam Singh Yadav. After truce attempts failed, Shivpal Yadav tendered his resignation. While Shivpal said that he would remain a foot soldier for the party, there are questions being asked whether he would float his own political outfit.

If Shivpal Yadav walks out of the party, then it would be a very big set back for the Samajwadi Party. If anyone realises his importance it is Mulayam Singh who had recently said in the presence of his son at a rally that if Shivpal quits then the SP would split.

Samajwadi Party feud: Shivpal quits Akhilesh cabinet, and as state unit chief

Why is Shivpal important?

Those close to Mulayam Singh say that if Shivpal quits, then winning the elections in UP is next to impossible. In Uttar Pradesh, he is seen as an integral part of the SP and political experts say that he is only second to Mulayam in the party. While Mulayam focused on the big picture, it was Shivpal who dealt with the party workers on the ground.

Shivpal is not part of the party only because he is Mulayam's brother. Time and again he has proven his importance. Each time the SP has won in UP, Shivpal has played a very big role especially in mobilising votes from the remotest areas of the state.

Shivpal is cool, calm and gets the job done. He is a favourite with the party workers who are ready to go that extra mile to get the job done for him. With him in the party, Mulayam has hardly anything to worry about when it came to his party workers.

Party workers would approach Shivpal directly in case of a problem and none have complained about indifference as he was all ears each time.

The other important aspect is that Shivpal has managed to balance both the Yadav and Muslim workers in the party. Both communities are very crucial in UP.

To manage both communities well and ensure that they vote for the SP was always a job handled by Shivpal. While Akhilesh would be the face of the party in the forthcoming polls, there is a big question mark on his ability to mobilise the party workers.

When Akhilesh focused on the state capital, it was Shivpal who toured the state and interacted at the grassroot level. There is no doubt that Shivpal is far more popular than Akhilesh in the party.

Mulayam would be equally worried about his cadres losing interest in the absence of Shivpal who has been the go to man in the Samajwadi Party.

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Story first published: Friday, September 16, 2016, 11:12 [IST]
Amitabh Bachchan denies rift with the Gandhis, says 'we are friends'

New Delhi

oi-PTI

New Delhi, Sept 16: Megastar Amitabh Bachchan may have had a short tryst with politics but the actor says he is still not able to get over the times as he "regrets not fulfilling the promises" he made to the people of his constituency- Allahabad.

The 73-year-old National award-winning actor took a break from acting in 1984 to enter politics in support of long-time family friend, Rajiv Gandhi.

He contested Allahabad's seat and won by a huge margin. His political career, however, was short-lived as he resigned after three years.

"I mostly think of it because there are many promises that one makes during an election campaign, when you seek votes from people. My inability to keep those promises hurts. If there is anything that I regret then it is that," he said.

"I made a lot of promises to the city of Allahabad and to its people but I wasn't able to fulfill them," he said

"I try to do whatever I can in any social capacity but I know it is something that people of Allahabad will always hold against me," Mr Bachchan said during a discussion with Shekhar Gupta and Barkha Dutt at a show "Off The Cuff".

Bachchan said his decision to join politics was emotional but when he got into it he realised that emotions had no place there.

"I think my decision was emotional. I wanted to go and help a friend, but when I went there and got into it. I realised that it has nothing to do with emotions. I realised that I am incapable of doing it and so, I left," the veteran actor said.

When asked if his decision to quit politics cost him his friendship with the Gandhi family, Bachchan said, "I don't think it cost me at all. Friendship is not lost at all."

When further asked why he does not talk about that friendship, the actor said, "How do you talk about (a) friendship? We are friends."

Indian actors have been known to be hesitant to share their political opinion as opposed to the Hollywood stars in the US who take political position during elections.

Asked if the fear of backlash and controversy prevents Indian actors from sharing their views on the political scenario of the country, Bachchan said, "You become an artiste and there are people who love you and there is a desire to reciprocate that. If it happens to be a politician who loves you then also you reciprocate that.

"So what does that mean? Just because I am reciprocating it does not mean I am going to love their politics. I don't think so," he added.

"When you do not do something like that then we fear of a repercussion. Politicians are very powerful people. I don't know if they can damage or harm to what extent because there is the court of law. But the process of going to law and battle politics is not my job. My job is to be on camera and deliver my good. I don't want to divert my attention," asserted the septuagenarian.

Bachcan said that in the US, the audience is "more mature" than in India and that may be the reason why their stars are upfront about their political views. "Hollywood has a lot mature audience. Here it is still a little bit limited. When I was electioneering for Congress in Assam, my helicopter landed at a location of the opposition. Soon, the police asked us to leave. There were youngsters in the crowd and one of them ran up to the helicopter and smashed the window glass and put a paper on my hand."

"In it, he wrote that he is my big fan but I was dividing his attention and so I should leave. It is something that artistes have to face. We spend our lifetime into getting people to love us and we suddenly ask them that you love me so love my politics I don't think it is right," he said.

Bachchan's upcoming film 'Pink', a courtroom drama-thriller, sees him play a lawyer of three young women who face assault charges after being molested by a group of men.

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Story first published: Friday, September 16, 2016, 14:30 [IST]
Indian citizenship for exiled Baloch leaders soon a reality

New Delhi

oi-Vicky

New Delhi, Sept 16: In a move that will put Pakistan on the backfoot further, exiled Baloch leader Brahumdagh Bugti and his two aides are likely to get asylum in India. Negotiations are also on to ensure that the leaders get an Indian passport. The process is currently under process and a meeting of the Baloch Republican Party is being convened in Geneva.

Bugti and his aides are likely to get Indian passports so that they can move around freely around the world.

India rakes up Balochistan in diplomatic slugfest with Pakistan over Kashmir

India in principle has agreed to grant citizenship to Bugti and his key aides. The Baloch Republican Party is thrilled with the developments.

India feels that granting passports to Bugti and his aides will further help highlight the cause of Baloch people.

As part of the strategy, India wants to highlight the Baloch cause across the world. The government is already working on the issue and will make sure that issue is raised on the world stage.

The Modi government will get in touch with all Baloch leaders across the world and highlight the issue in a big way. The main talking point would be freedom for the Baloch people from Pakistan. Apart from this the brutalities committed by Pakistan would also be highlighted.

Apart from Bugti, his aides Sher Muhammad Bugti and Azizullah Bugti will also be issued Indian passports.

On September 18, a key meeting of the BRP will be held in Geneva in which the issue pertaining to asylum for Bugti will be discussed. Bugti had fled from Balochistan in 2006 after the assassination of his grandfather Akbar Bugti.

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Story first published: Friday, September 16, 2016, 12:23 [IST]
All steps taken to avoid hardship during bandh: Pudu govt

Puducherry

oi-PTI

Puducherry, Sept 16: All necessary steps have been taken to ensure law and order and avoid any inconvenience to the public during the dawn-to-dusk bandh called by various Tamil outfits in the Union Territory tomorrow, the government said today.

"The government is keen that public do not face any inconvenience because of bandh and necessary steps have been evolved. All necessary steps have been taken to ensure that law and order does not face any setback," Puducherry Chief Secretary Manoj Parida told reporters here.

More than 30 Tamil fringe outfits have announced the 12-hour bandh in the Union Territory, condemning the violence against Tamils in Karnataka in the wake of Cauvery water row. Local unit of DMK today announced its support to the bandh while Puducherry Traders Federation said all business establishments will remain closed tomorrow.

Convenor of DMK S P Sivakumar said the party pledged support for the bandh in line with the decision taken by the party high command in neighbouring Tamil Nadu, where also a dawn-to-dusk shutdown is being observed tomorrow.

On Cauvery water for Karaikal, in the tail end of the river system, Parida said with Supreme Court ordering release of 12,000 cusecs by Karnataka, Puducherry should get 270 cusecs of water. He hoped that the water would be available in Karaikal in the next couple of days.

The Chief Secretary said he would participate again in the deliberations of the Cauvery Supervisory authority on Sept 19 and ensure the interests of Karaikal farmers were fully protected.

PTI
Naxal carrying Rs 1 lakh reward on him held in Chhattisgarh

Raipur

oi-PTI

Raipur, Sep 15: A Naxal, carrying a reward of Rs one lakh on his head, was arrested today from Chhattisgarh's insurgency-hit Bijapur district, police said.

Midiam Raja (28), was nabbed by a joint team of security forces during a search operation in the forest under Basaguda police station limits, Bijapur Additional Superintendent of Police Mohit Garg said.

Security personnel had launched the operation in Basguda region, around 450 km from here, since yesterday. While cordoning-off the forest close to Polampally village, they nabbed the rebel who was trying to escape, he said.

Active as the head of Dandakaranya Adivasi Kisan Majdoor Sangthan - a frontal outfit of the Maoists, in the area, Raja was allegedly involved in cases of attempt to murder.

He was carrying a reward of Rs one lakh on his head, the ASP said, adding the rebel is being interrogated.

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Story first published: Friday, September 16, 2016, 12:57 [IST]
Two explosives planted by Naxals recovered in chhattisgarh

Raipur

oi-PTI

Raipur, Sep 15: Two powerful explosives allegedly planted by Naxals, were today recovered by security forces in separate actions in two Maoist-hit districts of Chhattisgarh.

While a 10-kg pipe bomb was recovered from Rajnandgaon district, an improvised explosive device (IED), weighing five kg, was detected in the adjoining Kanker district, a senior police official said.

A joint team of Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) and district police had launched a combing operation in the interiors of Khadgaon police station area of Rajnandgaon.

"The pipe bomb was spotted in Godavari mines area on Dorba village route, which averted a major mishap," the official said.

Similarly, a joint team of Border Security Force and District Police unearthed the IED from Tadoki-Padbeda kuchha track under Taodki police station area.

A 25-meter wire was also recovered from the spot, he said.

The explosives were meant to harm security personnel during their operations in the region, the official said, adding the Bomb Disposal Squad immediately defused the bombs.

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Story first published: Friday, September 16, 2016, 15:50 [IST]
Stones turn to bullets- a new worry in Jammu and Kashmir

Srinagar

oi-Vicky

Srinagar, Sept 16: There is a big worry ahead for the security forces in Jammu and Kashmir. With the number of people joining the Hizbul Mujahideen and the Lashkar-e-Taiba, there is a worry that the stones will be replaced by the bullets.

OneIndia had reported on Thursday that nearly 85 youth had gone missing in Jammu and Kashmir and it is suspected that they may joined the Hizbul Mujahideen and the Lashkar-e-Taiba [85 and counting: Several Kashmiri youth make a beeline for the Hizbul Mujahideen]

What intelligence bureau officials fear is that more youth are likely to join these outfits. There is credible intelligence that suggests that the Hizbul Mujahideen and the Lashkar-e-Taiba will try and launch attacks in the Valley.

Stones may turn into bullets

Intelligence Bureau officials have reported several times about the number of terrorists who have infiltrated into Kashmir since the unrest began on July 9. There have been a number of encounters that have taken place in the past month. In each of these cases it was found that the terrorists had infiltrated sometime back.

While the security forces were engaged dealing with the protestors, terrorists took advantage of the situation and managed to recruit as well as infiltrate especially in parts of Southern Kashmir. Security forces were unable to focus on all areas as majority of their work was restricted to the protest hit areas.

Intelligence Bureau officials warn that with incidents of stone pelting dropping now, the Hizbul Mujahideen is likely to launch a fresh wave of attacks.

There is already a lot of propaganda being spread about unleashing attacks on security personnel. Further the Lashkar-e-Taiba also released a kill list in which it warned against siding with the Indian establishment.

All these factors cannot be taken lightly, says a police official from the state. "These are clear warnings and is part of the larger agenda to keep the Valley on the boil," the official also noted.

Officials also say that there was relatively less violence due to Eid, but looking at the messages that the terrorist groups are putting up, it is clear that they will look to attack.

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Story first published: Friday, September 16, 2016, 15:08 [IST]
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by  Graham Pierrepoint



Its quickly become quintessential British TV and one of the best-loved shows on the BBC  but this past week has seen considerable change loom on the horizon for The Great British Bake-Off, the award-winning culinary challenge show that scored more viewers than any other in 2015 thanks to a truly show-stopping finale. The show has been running since 2010 and has quickly picked up steam as essential viewing for foodies and amateur bakers alike  but the exact nature of the programmes future is in doubt after its production company, Love Productions, sold the franchise to rival broadcaster Channel 4 for 25 million ($33 million).

The reception to the buy-out has been fairly tumultuous, and has even led to original hosts Mel Giedroyc and Sue Perkins announcing that they would not be moving to Channel 4 when the show returns next year. This initial blow was big news for Bake-Off fans who have grown to enjoy the duos chemistry and presenting over the past seven years  but rumors state that even more changes could be on the horizon.

The shows resident experts  home baking legend Mary Berry and bread maestro Paul Hollywood  are rumored to have been approached with considerable pay increases to stay with the show upon its move to its new home. However, discussion behind the scenes and online hint that the bakers may follow Mel and Sue by choosing to bow out of the Bake-Off before the next series airs. Such departures for the show will come at a heavy cost for Channel 4, who have invested considerable money in bringing the midweek juggernaut to their own line-up  which has long been bolstered by cooking challenge show Come Dine With Me.

More details on Channel 4s adoption of the series and whether or not Berry and Hollywood will move with Bake-Off remain thin on the ground, meaning that fans will likely have to wait with baited breath to see whether or not the show is headed by a completely new team of hosts and judges from 2017 onwards. It is not the first major franchise that the BBC has passed on, and certainly not the only ratings and award winner that will undergo heavy changes in recent months. With Top Gear having changed appearance and format for good, will the Bake-Off follow suit, and will it retain the strong viewership core it continues to enjoy?
China medical aesthetics booms Updated: 2016-09-16 10:47 By Wang Zhuoqiong(China Daily)

A man receives injection during cosmetic surgery in a hospital in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province. [Photo provided to China Daily]

Many more women opting for Botox or hyaluronic acid facial injections

Aesthetics care has become the new luxury bag for many women in urban China.

For example, Wang Qianqian, a mother of a three-year-old, is increasingly aware that her school friends are getting prettier despite their age.

She found that their secret "fountain of youth" is injections of hyaluronic acid treatment and Botox. So, she decided to apply hyaluronic acid under the skin of her face and around her eyes. She also used laser treatment that removed spots on her cheeks. The combined treatments cost 50,000 yuan ($7,575) and she has to take it regularly to keep her current looks.

"It is the most valuable investment I've ever made," said Wang, a senior executive of an internet and culture company in Beijing. "I am more confident since my face skin looks tighter and brighter."

Wang is among thousands of Chinese women who have contributed to the 500 billion yuan market, according to an estimate by the Chinese Association of Plastics and Aesthetics in 2015. It is expected to become the world's second largest market, rising to one trillion yuan by 2019.

The industry is growing at 20 percent annually. In some specific categories, the growth rate exceeds 50 percent. According to the association, the number of people employed in the medical skin care industry has grown to about 500,000.

Chinese women have strong interests in investing in their facial appearance. According to Mintel Group Ltd's report on Facial Skincare released in August 2016, the facial skincare market was worth more than 91 billion yuan by the end of 2015 with a year-on-year growth rate of 11.5 percent.

The market will continue to see strong growth supported by the demand for anti-aging and antipollution products, said the report. In addition, the hydration segment will continue to see strong growth as well.

Corporate employees, government civil servants and businesswomen accounted for more than 70 percent of the number of people using medical beauty services in 2015, suggesting the advantages and benefits brought by good looks. But, the newcomers participating in such treatment are getting younger each year.

Sadie Zhang, a manager at Ladyjoy, a Beijing-based institution focusing on medical skincare, said that the plastic surgery and medical skin care industry has been emerging during the last five years. "Good appearance helps relationships and work," she said. "Even teenagers have come to us for a better look. It is no longer a treatment only for celebrities."

Twenty to forty year-olds demand entry level or skin enhancement, while those who are in their 40s choose more anti-aging treatment, said Zhang.

Investors and venture capitals have also rushed to the medical skin care sector, where barriers to entry are relatively low and policy restrictions are loose. Sino-KirPlastic and Aesthetic Co Ltd, Lidu Plastic and Aesthetic, and GuizhouLimacon Hospital are publicly traded. Many medical skin care applications also have attracted investment.

Wu Jianying, CEO and general manger of Shanghai Haohai Biological Technology Co Ltd, said China's medical skin care market has taken about 20 percent of the global market, thanks to the demand for high quality of life as incomes have risen. According to the company's first half-year report, sales have risen 25.1 percent, mostly due to its product Matrifilla cross-linked sodium hyaluronate gel, which has increased 148.7 percent year-on-year.
Build a nest to attract the phoenix Updated: 2016-09-16 07:09 By Lucie Morangi(China Daily Europe)

Stability, services and favorable policies encourage foreign investment, says manager of Zambia-China economic zone

Industrial parks in Africa are facing myriad challenges. Key among them are the serious infrastructure deficit and industrial zone policies that inadequately respond to market dynamism and political shocks, experts say.

These handicaps are holding back the potential of industrial parks in Africa according to the general manager of the Zambia-China Economic and Trade Cooperation Zone Ltd.

Lusaka East special economic zone in Zambia will provide 13,300 jobs. Lucie Morangi / China Daily

Zan Baosen manages the nine-year-old firm established under the framework of the Forum for China-Africa Cooperation. It is China's first multifacility economic zone in Africa. ZCCZ manages the 11.58 square kilometer Chambishi industrial park and 5.7 sq km Lusaka East park that is adjacent to the airport in Zambia's capital. The zones were inaugurated in February 2007 and January 2009, respectively. Chambishi Zone has 6,658 employees while Lusaka East is expected to create 13,300 jobs.

ZCCZ Development Ltd, is registered under the Non-Ferrous Metals Corporation Africa. The NFCA is the Zambian subsidiary of China Non-Ferrous Metal Mining Group Co and has been exploring Chambishi copper mine in Zambia's Copperbelt region since 1998. The firm has successfully attracted at least 40 foreign firms in Chambishi park and 10 in Lusaka East. ZCCZ has spent about $1.5 billion in infrastructure development in both parks.

Since the enactment of the Zambia Development Agency Act No. 11 of 2006, the legal and regulatory framework overseen by the government agency, ZCCZ has been heavily engaged in developing infrastructure and basic utilities in the zones.

Unfortunately, years of inadequate investment in the transport and energy sectors has seen the landlocked country face a huge deficit. According to a 2010 report on Zambia's infrastructure by the World Bank, the country's infrastructure funding gap stood at $500 million a year (6.5 percent of GDP) with power leading as the biggest constraint responsible for about 50 percent of the productivity handicap faced by Zambian firms.

In Lusaka East zone, demand for power far outstrips supply. "We cannot meet the industrial demand, thus limiting the number of investors we can accommodate here. We are, however, happy to see the government looking into ways of boosting power supplies within two years," says Zan.

Zambia's total power capacity is 2,347 megawatts, with demand growing at an average of about 3 percent, or between 150 and 200 mW annually. There has been no major addition to the country's generation capacity in the past 20 to 30 years.

Investors look for land with adequate services to avoid unnecessary spending, says Zan. "They want to minimize their initial costs, thus avoiding hurdles such as buying land, which is difficult and expensive in Africa. Well-planned zones loosen the purse strings of foreigners interested in relocating to Africa," he adds.

While accentuating the need for better industrial policies and regulations, Zan says it was only recently that the government announced the establishment of a one-stop shop for investor services.

By borrowing approved and improved blueprints of Chinese economic zones, he had already prepared a service center to host government officials. It will be the first point of contact for investors. "The service center is key in improving the business climate as investors will be issued work permits and all necessary business licenses here. This is good news because it has worked in Chinese zones," Zan says.

His chagrin, however, is raised by levies imposed by local authorities without considering the return on investment for such project models. According to the government officials, the property where the industrial parks sits needs to be assessed for taxes. "Although the costs cannot be compared to financing the cost of a new road, it is a cost burden on us," says Zan.

The project harbors long-term benefits and the rent-seeking behavior is disheartening, he says. Zan says he cannot pass the costs to the tenants since it will immediately inflate their operational costs, making their products uncompetitive. "A responsive policy, therefore, should be able to overlook the need for short-term gains such as raising taxes from property that's undergoing development and patiently look at the gains to be found once it is complete and more, affluent tenants reside here."

In addition, strong institutions and policies will cushion the program from shocks occasioned by frequent government transitions. This year saw Zambia, one of the most politically stable African countries, hold its presidential elections. "Zone development and success outlives governments. Political processes should not interfere with this development," he says.

To strengthen local ownership, the Chinese firm has invited professionals such as lawyers to view the progress made so far and their enthusiasm and positive comments, indicative that he is on the right path, has buoyed the manager's confidence.

Despite the challenges, Zan thinks strong government support will boost the success of the zones. "This is the best way to diversify the economy from copper market dependency and attract investors not only in mining but also in agriculture. Zambia can thrive in agro processing since we consume drinks and food from other countries. We have enough maize, and fruits and we can add value to them," he says.

China is the third biggest investor in Zambia and by 2013 had set up more than 280 business enterprises, mainly in mining, manufacturing, agriculture, infrastructure development and resource extraction, according to government data.

lucymorangi@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 09/16/2016 page8)
Eurasia Review 29 Oct 2022

By Alexander Brotman



The 44-day tenure of Liz Truss and the arrival of Rishi Sunak to 10 Downing Street comes at a..
Daily Record 18 Aug 2022

He was waiting to pick up children when David Mathewson and Brandon Robertson threatened him with a meat cleaver and a knife.
Eurasia Review 25 Sep 2022

By Luke Lischin*



After six years of uncertainty under former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte, the election of..
A nationally owned and operated coffee exporting company based in the Jiwaka Province has successfully made its first shipment to South Korea. For Kosem Limited this is its first overseas consignment. Kosem Ltd is one of the lead partners selected for the Highlands region which has taken the initiative to ship out green beans on behalf of local small holder coffee farmers. A total of 320 green beans bags weighing 60kg each were shipped out last weekend. This is the first time for local farmers in Jiwaka to ship their green beans direct to an overseas market and all credit goes to Kosem for sacrificing and taking the initiative.





The local farmers gave their parchments to Kosem which in turn processes them into green beans packed and shipped. Kosem Ltd is working closely in partnership with Productive Partnership in Agriculture Project funded by the World Bank and the Government of PNG to improve the livelihoods of small coffee farmers in villages to increase direct income. It helps increase production and produce better quality coffee for the farmers. At the launch of the first shipment held at Banz last weekend Kosem managing director John Munnul said Jiwaka was a coffee province and urged the people to grow more because of its economic potential. Mr Munnul said coffee was unique because it earned money for people at the village level.





He said most coffee was wasted because people wanted fast money and sold their cherries on the streets which was a total waste. Mr Munnul said they were centralising production at the village level to ensure farmers improved to grow more coffee and provide quality. He said group marketing was a very good concept because it guaranteed collective earnings. CIC chief executive officer Charles Dambui praised Kosem saying it put Jiwaka on the map. Mr Dambui said Jiwaka was the first province in the Highlands region to ship green beans out to overseas markets, adding Jiwaka would also host a coffee forum at a later date. Post Courier/ ONE PNG
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Live Gaming 2016 Kicks off the Good Life Online from Barcelona

Published September 16, 2016 by Lee R

A long list of representatives, experts, and providers will be on hand.

The first Live Gaming Summit ever has put together an action checklist for the reasons to attend the inaugural 2016 on September 27th in Barcelonas five star Hotel Miramar.

Live Power

First off, lest we forget, there is nothing better than real time: shared experiences with real people are simply more fun, something that is often lost on this mobile generation that forgets the pleasure of going to a live concert or having a dinner with family and friends at home.

Live Dealer Play

The benefits of live play translate to iGaming to make special features such as live dealer games and TV gaming an extremely fast growing segment of the remote gaming industry as well. The fact is that currently 29.6% of online casino revenues come from live gaming, which is emerging as the most effective method for keeping high rollers on board.

Live Industry Expertise

Another great reason that Live Gaming Summit will be better live is that it will empower all attendees to effectively keep up with current market developments. Industry experts discuss what players want now and in the future, as well as what the market will look like in five years, and how big the market is and will become.

Latest Live Technology

Another major plus of Live Gaming 2016 is the chance to keep abreast of the Latest Technology in live and television gaming, including 4k technology, multi-camera, and blue screen support, including for mobile.

Dual Mobile Advantage

The most exciting feature of mobile play includes dual play, in which action on a table in an existing casino is streamed over the internet, offering operators the chance to provide their customers with the glamour and fun of a casino experience right from home!

Attending Providers and Speakers

The Live Gaming Summit will also offer the chance to meet with prominent live gaming providers such as Ezugi, Playtech, Authentic Gaming, Evolution, NetEnt, and Medialive; as well as confirmed speakers including NetEnt Live Head Sam Brown and Authentic Gaming Managing Director Kevin Kilminster in the magical setting of Barcelona provides.

Forecast

Barcelona is the iGaming capital of Europe: against stunning views and an opulent pool party, come learn what live play is all about!
Reliving the lives and times of Chinese immigrants Updated: 2016-09-16 07:09 By Zhao Xu(China Daily Europe)

For Sophia Soon, a Singapore-born museum guide, a black-and-white picture of a Chinese man - probably a first-generation immigrant - that hangs on the wall of the Chinese Heritage Center at Singapore's Nanyang Technological University, speaks volumes.

"Look at his shoes - so small he could barely squeeze his feet in," she says.

"They were actually props borrowed from a photo studio - just like the jacket and the hat."

Despite doing hard labor, an early Chinese immigrant to Singapore preferred to be photographed as a man of learning. Photos by Zeng Yu/ For China Daily

According to Soon, despite looking urbane, even scholarly, the man is most likely to have been a coolie, someone who did manual labor, presumably along the banks of the Singapore River.

"However, he was adamant about having this picture taken, where he was portrayed as a man of learning, evidenced by the book in his hand. Why? Because traditional Chinese culture valued literary achievements above all else," the 60-year-old says.

For those familiar with history, the picture holds up a mirror to generations of Chinese immigrants who traveled to Singapore, the reality of their existence, and the stubbornness with which they tried to hold on to their identity, while being constantly washed by the cultural tides flooding Singapore's shores.

"The Chinese first arrived in Singapore around the early 15th century. But the biggest inflow of Chinese immigrants in Singapore's contemporary history took place between the late 19th and early 20th century, when China was facing foreign invasion and political unrest," says Soon.

"The story of these immigrants progressed on two parallel narrative lines: one was about settling down; and the other was about reaching back."

Chu Kin Fong, a licensed tour guide and third-generation Chinese immigrant, has made it her job to take visitors - especially from the Chinese mainland - to Chinatown in Singapore.

The area, in the southern part of the island, is where Chinese immigrants once congregated, on both sides of the Singapore River.

"The majority worked as porters. But some ran restaurants or barbershops," says Chu.

Life was never easy, she says. In fact, Chinatown is also known locally as niucheshui, meaning "ox-driven water cart".

In the old days, Chinese immigrants, with no freshwater to drink, used ox carts to ferry water from other parts of the island.

However, according to Chu, the hardships endured were in a way mitigated with the formation of associations, which were essentially mutual-help groups based on the area in China where the immigrants hailed from.

"The heads of these associations were also community leaders who took under their wings men from their hometowns," she says, pointing to the two-story buildings in Chinatown that used to house these associations.

"These days, they have largely turned into venues for the study of traditional Chinese art and culture, and opera and instrument-playing, for example," she says.

From the late 19th to the mid-20th century, Chinese immigrants in Singapore, especially affluent businessmen, concerned themselves with the fate of their "motherland".

They offered financial support first to topple the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), China's last feudal rulers, and then to the Chinese fighting the invading Japanese between 1937 and 1945.

After the end of World War II and the founding of the People's Republic of China, the focus shifted. Starting in the 1950s, some local Chinese community leaders advocated the setting up of a Chinese university.

Prominent among the leaders was Tan Lark Sye, a rubber tycoon.

The university that came into being in 1955 was called Nanyang University, with nanyang, or the South Sea, referring to Southeast Asia, including today's Singapore and Malaysia.

Speaking of the project, Soon says: "We have black-and-white pictures showing people from all walks of life - from tricycle-pullers to dance girls - donating to 'our university'.

"Nanyang was the pride of all Chinese in Singapore."

Today, Nanyang University, or Nantah as it's known in Cantonese, is the site of Singapore's Nanyang Technological University.

Nantah was merged with the University of Singapore to form the National University of Singapore in 1980.

English is now the official language of all universities in Singapore.

The Chinese Heritage Center is housed in the former administration building of Nanyang University.

The center, with a permanent display showcasing the history of Chinese immigrants to Singapore, is the only university research center outside China that specializes in the study of overseas Chinese.

That status is enhanced by a collection of 30,000 books donated by Professor Wang Gungwu, a renowned historian and now the chairman of the East Asian Institute at the National University of Singapore.

The books, many on Chinese immigration, formed the core of the Wang Gungwu Library, located on the ground floor of the Heritage Center.

According to librarian Luo Biming, many books from the collection are very precious as they can no longer be found on the Chinese mainland.

"Many were first published during China's republican era (1912-1949) but the copies were destroyed during the 'cultural revolution'," he says, referring to the ideology-centered political movement that threw China into tumult between 1966 and 1976.

"In many cases, what we have is the only remaining copy."

Meanwhile, reflecting on the metamorphosis Chinese immigrants in Singapore underwent, both mentally and culturally, Soon points to a group of three pictures of the same family taken over a period of 20 years.

In the first picture, everyone, from the matriarch, who sits in the middle of the front row, to the younger members of the family, and even the toddlers, are dressed in traditional Chinese attire. The adults have long bead necklaces, then considered a part of court regalia.

Then changes gradually take place: The boys from the first picture appear in the second one as teenagers, and are dressed in Western-style suits that are too big for them.

If the second picture shows any sense of unease, the third picture portrays confidence, projected by the young men and women who have grown up.

Here, even the matriarch's son, the breadwinner of the family, had traded his heavily embroidered Chinese official's gown for a sharply tailored suit.

His hair has turned white - thanks mostly to years of hard work to keep the family afloat.

One thing, however, remains unchanged. The matriarch and her daughter-in-law are still dressed in traditional style, years after their arrival in their adopted home.

"The women tended to be more conservative," says Soon.

"But even they had, in time, to yield to the need to localize."

The Republic of Singapore was founded in 1965.

According to Luo the librarian, there were then efforts by the central government at "de-sinicization", in order to mint new a national identity, and to enhance social inclusion in a society that was - and still is, predominantly - ethnic Chinese, with Malays and Indians.

According to Luo, one can get a sense of the profound changes that took place in Singapore by comparing the textbooks used by school students before and after 1965.

"The notion of Singapore was stressed, as the emphasis shifted from Chinese history to local Singapore history," he says.

Given this background, the picture of an early local cemetery for Chinese immigrants at the Heritage Center serves as a reminder of the country's contemporary history.

Inscribed on the gravestones are not only the names of the deceased, but also their place of origin, from the province to the county and the village.

"In the back of their minds, they still wanted to go home," says Soon.

Born in Singapore, Soon is a second-generation immigrant.

"My father died in 1991, at the age of 79 and about 63 years after he took the life-threatening boat ride from the southern Chinese coast to Singapore," she says.

"Like most Chinese immigrants of his generation, dad, for many years, sent every penny he had earned and saved to China. In fact, he always longed to go back, but never did."

Weeks before the death of the old man, his son, Soon's brother, visited the family's home in China's Guangdong Province and managed to locate their father's elder sister.

"My brother took a picture of the old woman, our aunt, who was almost blind by then. Then, he returned to Singapore to show that picture to dad, who cried," says Soon.

"My father passed away a few days later, on Oct 1, China's National Day."

Contact the writer at zhaoxu@chinadaily.com.cn

This group of pictures, taken of the same family over more than two decades, show the gradual yet impossible-to-ignore changes undergone by early Chinese immigrants.

(China Daily European Weekly 09/16/2016 page1)
Opalesque Industry Update - ASIC has banned Mr Geoffrey Woodcock of Auckland, New Zealand, from providing financial services for a period of four years. Between November 2011 and October 2013, Mr Woodcock was the founder and manager of Capital Alternatives Pty Ltd and a director of Velvet Assets Pty Ltd. Both of those companies promoted alternative investments in Australia. However, Capital Alternatives, Velvet Assets and Mr Woodcock were not holders of Australian financial services (AFS) licences. They were also not authorised representatives of a licensee. Following an investigation, ASIC found: a number of the alternative investments promoted by Capital Alternatives and Velvet Assets were financial products and as such the companies were required to hold an AFS licence;

as a consequence, Capital Alternatives and Velvet Assets carried on a financial services business without holding an AFS licence and so contravened s911A of the Corporations Act;

Mr Woodcock was involved in this contravention by the companies; and

Mr Woodcock personally induced clients to invest by failing to disclose that around 40-45 per cent of the money invested would be retained as commission. Commissioner Greg Tanzer said, "The Australian financial services licensing regime provides safeguards. Consumers should not invest with a person or entity in Australia unless they are authorised by, or hold, an AFS licence." Mr Woodcock has the right to appeal to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) for a review of ASIC's decision. Article source - Opalesque is not responsible for the content of external internet sites
Reprinted from Reader Supported News



UFW President Arturo Rodriguez

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There was jubilation in farmworker country on Monday, as California governor Jerry Brown signed AB 1066, ending the 78 years of exclusion from overtime for farmworkers. United Farm Workers president Arturo S. Rodriguez was celebrating the victory with farmworkers from one end of the state to the other.

"For 78 years, a Jim Crow-era law discriminated against farmworkers by denying us the same overtime rights that other workers benefit from," Rodriguez stated, directly following the signing. "Here in the U.S. today, Governor Brown corrected a historic wrong and set an example for other states to follow."

I spoke with President Rodriguez directly following the passage of the landmark legislation. We spoke about the significance of the legislation, as well as the nuts and bolts of its implementation.

Dennis Bernstein: Welcome, President Rodriguez. It is very good to speak with you again. The governor of California finally signed the bill for extended overtime. Can you believe it? Farm workers finally getting extended overtime.

Arturo Rodriguez: Well, thank you very much for having us here today. We're very appreciative.

DB: It's good to have you with us. Tell us about the good news. It's few and far between days that we get to celebrate.

Rodriguez: You know what, this is an exciting day for farmworkers. It's historic. For the first time in the history of the United States, farmworkers are going to be treated just like any other worker, having the right to be paid overtime after eight hours of work. We're so thankful to the legislators, especially our author, Lorena Gonzalez, and all those other legislators who stood up to be counted in support of doing the right thing for farmworkers, and of course to Governor Jerry Brown, for his actions. And to both leaders of the House and the Senate: President Kevin de Leon, Senate president, and the Assembly speaker, Anthony Rendon. They worked hard to make this come about, and we're thankful to all of them.

DB: All right, explain the details. We know that this is implemented over over a four-year period. Explain what is new and why it's significant, in specific terms.

Rodriguez: Well, farmworkers, first of all, have always been excluded from overtime pay. The only state where we had some provision for overtime pay was here in California. But they had to work 10 hours a day, and a 60-hour week, before they could achieve any overtime pay. Now it will be implemented, begin to be implemented, in 2019. There will be a phase-in period for the next four years. Eventually, after eight hours they will get access to overtime pay for their work.

And for smaller employers, 25 and under, they'll have an additional three years to determine how they can implement this effectively within their particular companies and operations. We tried to take into account what we heard as the needs of the employers. We heard from many legislators that this was important to them, so this legislation would not become an economic burden to employers. Phased in, in a way that they can actually deal with the issue and prepare for it. And ensure that they made whatever necessary adjustments were needed, to be able to accommodate this legislation.

DB: But Arturo, we have to make sure ... it's important not only to pass such legislation, but how will it be enforced? What are the structures that have been built into the law so that this really happens?

Rodriguez: I don't know all the details of the law in terms of the enforcement mechanisms, but we always know, and we've learned throughout our history, that we have to be vigilant. We have to go straight to the workers, and we have to ask them, to make sure that they are the ones that are ... enforcing whatever laws take place, whether it's a law around heat, whether it's a law governing how much water they get, or other types of protections like bathrooms in the fields, and drinking water and things of that nature.

We're also prepared to do the same thing here, and once the law goes actually into effect we'll be going out there and visiting all the farms throughout the state, and advising workers of changes that are relevant. We'll utilize the appropriate medias as well, to make sure that people understand what their rights are. In the event that the employer is violating their rights, [we'll let them know] how to get in contact with us so that we can make sure that proper action is taken with that particular company, to ensure the workers get the overtime pay they are entitled to.

DB: Do you think this will have reverberations across the country? Will other farmworkers, other workers across the country be ... Will this be an important precedent?

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At one point during World War II, Josef Stalin famously asked his then allies, Churchill and Roosevelt, "How many divisions does the Pope have?", underlining the crucial role of brute force in world affairs. Military might has still not taken a back seat to negotiation, however, there is a growing conviction across the world and across political lines, that morality must play a role in public life.

Notwithstanding Secretary of State John Kerry's recent posturing in front of the Hiroshima monument to the atomic victims of World World II, nuclear stockpiling continues unabated, while climate change competes as the ultimate threat of annihilation. Any hope of maintaining a human presence on earth can only come from a psychological turnaround.

The nineteen-sixties call by the American counter-culture for a spiritual transformation was not heard, but since Donald Trump entered the presidential fray, and refugees from US wars in the Middle East stormed Europe, progressive warnings about the rise of fascism are. In Europe, everybody knows what fascism is so they don't use the innocent sounding word Alt or 'alternative' to designate the militant far right.

In addition, Europe has a New Right, that backs the National Front's Marine Le Pen, who has tried hard to shed her father's anti-Semitic rhetoric. (The nationalist part of her platform also finds favor with the Russian President, who is more of a social democrat than either a cowboy capitalist or a communist, and about whom more later.)

The US's 'alt right' is not easy to define. It's nationalist, but so are most religious groups. On the other hand, to say it's misogynous barely scratches the surface of its attitude toward women, which tends toward disparage-ment, as opposed to the religious right's 'respect'. Ultimately, it's the alt right's demonization of 'the Other' that separates it from the new right. For Hitler's Nazis, the main 'Others' were Jews, but their xenophobia included Slavs, Communists and brown people across the board. The Alt right is against everyone who opposes its gun-toting, flag waving 'patriotism', putting it at odds with the New Right.

While both the European and the American left are reduced to desperate cries for 'equality', the new right has appropriated the left's major memes, from individual flourishing to decentralization, anti-globalization and anti-consumerism, while abandoning the old right's militarism and racism.

Its program is spelled out in a Manifesto published in 2000 by GRECE, a French think tank founded by the philosopher Alain de Benoist. http://www.arktos.com/alain-de-benoist-and-charles-champetier-manifesto-for-a-european-renaissance.htm l This 14,000 word text could have been written by a leftist were it not for its opposition to multiculturalism, which by the way dovetails with Vladimir Putin's opposition to the immigration of non-Europeans into 'Caucasian' societies. In response to what has hitherto been considered the most progressive view of human relations, the manifesto states:

The French New Right upholds the cause of peoples, because o ne is only justified in defending one's difference from others if one is also able to defend the difference of others. This means that the right to difference cannot be used to exclude others who are different. The French New Right respects ethnic groups, languages, and regional cultures, as well as native religions. It supports peoples struggling against Western imperialism. The diversity of the human species is a treasure, and 'universal', does not oppose difference, but recognizes it. For the New Right, the struggle against racism is not won by negating the concept of race, nor by blending all races into an undifferentiated whole, but by refusing both exclusion and assimilation: neither apartheid nor the melting pot, but acceptance of the other as Other in a perspective of mutual enrichment."

Many leftists will agree that this argument makes sense.But they will wonder what a right-wing party could have against Western Imperialism. It's that imperialism is the flip side of modernity, that generates alienation: While the contemporary left in the developed world has endorsed imperialism in a laudable commitment to equality, for the new right:

A couple of decades ago, that was a typical left-wing argument, but Neo-liberalism has traded ideals for efficiency, thought to guarantee the greatest good for the greatest number: "The 'free' market is an exacerbation of rationalization in which standardization is confused with superiority and equality implies conforming to a host country's customs and standards of behavior."

France has recently revealed the degree to which conformity can become absurd: freedom to dress as one pleases, which enabled western women to abandon stays and long skirts for shorts, is now an obligation to uncover one's body, turning so-called freedom into conformity. Progressives may argue that this is a convenient excuse for maintaining the bulk of humanity in an inferior condition, yet the abandonment of traditional social memes in the competition for 'more', seen as an intrinsic good, also leads to crime, drugs and alienation.

Referring to Russia, Vladimir Putin affirms that "It is clearly impossible to identify oneself only through one's ethnicity or religion in such a large nation with a multi-ethnic population. " People must develop a civic identity on the basis of shared values, a patriotic consciousness, civic responsibility and solidarity, respect for the law and a sense of responsibility for their homeland's fate, without losing touch with their ethnic or religious roots."

According to the Arab website Al Monitor, file:///Users/deen/Documents/PUTIN/Putin's Muslim family values.webarchive when Putin emphasizes Russians' shared moral values, he connects them to the "traditional" values of Middle Eastern, Asian and other non-Western societies. "We can see how many Euro-Atlantic countries are actually rejecting their roots, including the Christian values that constitute the basis of Western civilization " People are aggressively trying to export this model all over the world. I am convinced that this opens the door to degradation and primitivism, resulting in a profound demographic and moral crisis, so we consider it natural and right to defend these values." While clearly identifying Russia as a largely Christian country, Putin draws a line between religious values and those of a decadent, secular West.

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Thinking of taking a trip abroad? Or maybe relocating for good? Americans would do well, even 150 years hence, to attend to Mark Twains satirical account of U.S. travelers journeying through Europe and Palestine, The Innocents Abroad. The Americans who are painted to peculiar advantage by Mr. Clements (sic), as fellow American satirist William Dean Howells wrote at the time, still roam the Earth-including travelers like one who told the English officers that a couple of our gunboats could come and knock Gibraltar into the Mediterranean Sea. The tactlessness and belligerence Twain skewered do not feel historically so far from home.

Twains portraitssomewhat caricatured or carefully and exactly doneproved so popular with readers that he followed up with an unofficial sequel, 1880s A Tramp Abroad, a somewhat more serious fictionalized travelogue of Americans journeying through Europe; this time but two, Twain and his friend Harris. In the previous book, complained Howells, the reader learns next to nothing about the population of the cities and the character of the rocks in the different localities. Here, without his comedy troupe of traveling companions, Twain directs his focus outward with minute descriptions of his surroundings. He is, as usual, supremely curious, often perplexed, but mostly delighted by his experiences. Except when it comes to the food.









Growing increasingly tired of an abundance of what he described as fair-to-middling food, writes Lists of Note, Twain comments: The number of dishes is sufficient; but then it is such a monotonous variety of UNSTRIKING dishes [] Three or four months of this weary sameness will kill the robustest appetite. Having never spent so long a time away, I cannot speak to Twains gustatory ennui, but I can relate, as no doubt can you, reader, to missing one or two familiar comfort foods (as well as sincere and capable ice water). Twain, perhaps not as adventurous an eater as he was a travelerand in that sense also very much a modern Americanmade an enormous list of the foods hed missed the most, of which were to be consumed when he arrived home.

The list, below, is itself a kind of travelogue, through the varieties of 19th century American cuisine, East, West, North, and South, including such delicacies as Possum Canvas-back-duck from Baltimore, Virginia bacon, broiled, Prairie liens, from Illinois, and Brook trout, from Sierra Nevadas. While we might pine for a regional delicacy or favorite processed food, Twain conjured up in his minds gut a whole continent of food to come home to. What kinds of food do you find yourself missing when you travel? And how long a list might you find yourself making after several months tramping around in foreign lands? Tell us in the comments section below. For now, heres is Twains list:

Radishes. Baked apples, with cream

Fried oysters; stewed oysters. Frogs.

American coffee, with real cream.

American butter.

Fried chicken, Southern style.

Porter-house steak.

Saratoga potatoes.

Broiled chicken, American style.

Hot biscuits, Southern style.

Hot wheat-bread, Southern style.

Hot buckwheat cakes.

American toast. Clear maple syrup.

Virginia bacon, broiled.

Blue points, on the half shell.

Cherry-stone clams.

San Francisco mussels, steamed.

Oyster soup. Clam Soup.

Philadelphia Terapin soup.

Oysters roasted in shell-Northern style.

Soft-shell crabs. Connecticut shad.

Baltimore perch.

Brook trout, from Sierra Nevadas.

Lake trout, from Tahoe.

Sheep-head and croakers, from New Orleans.

Black bass from the Mississippi.

American roast beef.

Roast turkey, Thanksgiving style.

Cranberry sauce. Celery.

Roast wild turkey. Woodcock.

Canvas-back-duck, from Baltimore.

Prairie liens, from Illinois.

Missouri partridges, broiled.

Possum. Coon.

Boston bacon and beans.

Bacon and greens, Southern style.

Hominy. Boiled onions. Turnips.

Pumpkin. Squash. Asparagus.

Butter beans. Sweet potatoes.

Lettuce. Succotash. String beans.

Mashed potatoes. Catsup.

Boiled potatoes, in their skins.

New potatoes, minus the skins.

Early rose potatoes, roasted in the ashes, Southern style, served hot.

Sliced tomatoes, with sugar or vinegar. Stewed tomatoes.

Green corn, cut from the ear and served with butter and pepper.

Green corn, on the ear.

Hot corn-pone, with chitlings, Southern style.

Hot hoe-cake, Southern style.

Hot egg-bread, Southern style.

Hot light-bread, Southern style.

Buttermilk. Iced sweet milk.

Apple dumplings, with real cream.

Apple pie. Apple fritters.

Apple puffs, Southern style.

Peach cobbler, Southern style

Peach pie. American mince pie.

Pumpkin pie. Squash pie.

All sorts of American pastry.

Fresh American fruits of all sorts, including strawberries which are not to be doled out as if they were jewelry, but in a more liberal way.

Ice-waternot prepared in the ineffectual goblet, but in the sincere and capable refrigerator.

via Lists of Note

Related Content:

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Mark Twain Creates a List of His Favorite Books For Adults & Kids (1887)

Foodie Alert: New York Public Library Presents an Archive of 17,000 Restaurant Menus (1851-2008)

Josh Jones is a writer and musician based in Durham, NC. Follow him at @jdmagness
Global Point Of Sale (POS) Terminal Market To Benefit From Increasing Use Of Debit And Credit Cards

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MarketResearchReports.biz has announced the addition of a report, titled Global Point Of Sale (POS) Terminal Market: Trends & Opportunities (2016 Edition), to its online repository. According to the report, the global point of sale (POS) terminal market is expected to expand swiftly during the period between 2016 and 2020 due to the increasing use of debit cards and credit cards and technological advancements. The growth of the retail e-commerce and healthcare industries is also predicted to propel the global point of sale (POS) terminal market in the years to come.Point of sale (POS) equipment is used for capturing of customer payment information and other data when goods and services are purchased or sold at any location. Various devices are used to capture point of sale transactions. Point of sale transactions are captured by using devices such as personal computers, magnetic card readers, optical scanners, barcode scanners, or a combination of these devices. In the recent past, point of sale terminals have received a lot of momentum due to its ease of use and improved ROI. The increasing application of POS software and hardware across various industry verticals is expected to propel the global point of sale (POS) terminal market in the years to come. At present, POS terminals is used in millions of supermarkets, retail, education, and hospitality businesses.POS terminals are primarily used to calculate cash dues and to record the relevant information of repeat customers. Point of sale terminals keep a track of available cash. POS systems calculate labor and payroll data and also records daily check averages for workers. In the years to come, the global point of sale (POS) terminals market is expected to register considerable growth due to the increasing use of POS terminals in the hospitality industry.For Sample Copy, click here:The global point of sale (POS) terminal market is segmented on the basis of region, component, product, and application. By geography, the global point of sale (POS) terminal market is divided into APAC, Latin America, Europe, and the Middle East and Africa. Over the past few years, the global point of sale (POS) terminal market has been experiencing changing trends in competition due to the entry of new players. Some of the players dominant in the global point of sale (POS) terminal market are Ingenico, Toshiba TEC Corporation, PAX Global, and Verifone.By component, the global point of sale (POS) terminal market is classified into software POS terminals and software POS terminals. Even though the global point of sale (POS) terminals market is set for significant growth, it is expected to face certain challenges such as the risks associated with mPOS and connectivity problems. Furthermore, the growing need for data security and data accuracy is predicted to hamper the growth of the global point of sale (POS) terminal market in the years to come.Based on product type, the global point of sale (POS) terminal market is classified into wireless/mobile POS terminals and fixed POS terminals.To order report Call Toll Free: 866-997-4948 or send an email on sales@marketresearchreports.bizMarketresearchreports.biz is the most comprehensive collection of market research reports. Marketresearchreports.biz services are especially designed to save time and money of our clients.State Tower90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207United StatesToll Free: 866-997-4948(USA-CANADA)Tel: +1-518-621-2074E: sales@marketresearchreports.biz
Poultry Pharmaceuticals Market: Growing Need for Vaccinations Strengthens Role of Poultry Pharmaceuticals in Animal Healthcare, reports TMR

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The poultry pharmaceuticals market is dominated by Merck Animal Health and Zoetis Inc. and the two companies together accounted for over half the market in 2015. The rest of the market is, however, fragmented and is characterized by the presence of several large and small players.Download Free Exclusive Sample of this Report:Transparency Market Research notes that the rivalry within the animal healthcare industry is quite high due to the existence of a large number of players and this trend is also reflected in the global poultry pharmaceutical market. The high degree of competition ensures that poultry pharmaceutical companies maintain regular interaction and collaborations with drug retailers, governments, and poultry farmers, the author of the study states.Product innovation has also proven to be a successful strategy adopted by players in the poultry pharmaceutical market, TMR finds. For instance, in September 2015, Merial Animal Health globally launched its innovation in poultry vaccination technology, known as Merial Avinew. This move has strengthened Merials position in the market.The revenue generated by the global poultry pharmaceuticals market was pegged at US$3.7 bn in 2015 and is projected to reach US$7.8 bn by 2024, registering a healthy CAGR of 8.5% during the forecast period.North America and Latin America Emerge as Most Promising Markets for Poultry PharmaceuticalsBy type of product, vaccines held the leading share in the global poultry pharmaceuticals market in terms of revenue, accounting for just over 41% in 2016. Feed additive medications, on the other hand, will register an 8.8% CAGR during the forecast period, emerging as a highly lucrative product segment.Based on type of animal, chicken is the key contributor to the overall market and is likely to remain so through 2024. The segment will also register a higher growth rate than any other category. Geographically, while North America dominates the global poultry pharmaceutical market, accounting for just short of 36% in 2016, Latin America is forecast to clock in the highest CAGR of 9.2% from 2016 to 2024.Rising Poultry Franchises in Emerging Nations a Key Growth DriverThe Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in the U.S states that the demand for food is expected to double due to the increase in global population, which is projected to be around 9.1 billion by 2050. In order to cater to this ever-rising demand for food, the number of poultry farming operations and franchises has increased significantly in recent years. China, Brazil, Mexico, India, Russia, and Argentina are among the leading countries with a high growth rate in terms of poultry animal ownership. This has benefited the poultry pharmaceutical market.Apart from this, the poultry pharmaceuticals market is fueled by the growing emphasis on wellness and preventive care by veterinarians and poultry animal owners, the rising consumption of animal protein, the increasing incidence of poultry diseases, and the support from government and private organizations in the form of vaccination initiatives.In contrast, the poultry pharmaceutical market is hampered by stringent regulations, lengthy product approval periods, and limited vaccination production. The growing concerns regarding the use of antibiotics and growth promoters in animal feed are also hindering the growth of the global market.Browse Research Report:This review is based on the findings of a TMR report titled Poultry Pharmaceuticals Market - (By Product - Drugs, Vaccines, Feed Additive, and Medication; By Animal Type - Chicken, Turkey, Duck, Goose, and Others) - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends, and Forecast 2016 - 2024.About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.TMRs data repository is continuously updated and revised by a team of research experts so that it always reflects the latest trends and information. With extensive research and analysis capabilities, Transparency Market Research employs rigorous primary and secondary research techniques to develop distinctive data sets and research material for business reports.Contact UsTransparency Market ResearchState Tower,90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207United StatesTel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:
North America Next-Generation Antibody Therapeutics Market is Expected to Witness the Fastest Growth Of CAGR 46.2% Globally, During the Period 2015  2020

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The global next-generation antibody therapeutics market was valued at $1,328.3 million in 2014 and it is expected to grow at a CAGR of about 44% during the period 2015 - 2020. The global next-generation antibody therapeutics market is growing due to increasing popularity of antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) and increasing number of collaborations for R&D in next-generation antibody therapeutics. In addition, growing prevalence of chronic diseases and increase in research and development investments by various organizations for production of improved products further encourages the growth of global next-generation antibody therapeutics market. Furthermore, increase in healthcare expenditure and technological advancements in antibody therapeutics have led to the development of more efficient antibody therapeutics, which is resulting in increased demand for next-generation antibody therapeutics.Explore Report Description with Detailed ToC on Global Next-Generation Antibody Therapeutics Market at:Based on technology, the Fc Engineered Antibodies market is expected to witness the highest growth (CAGR of 11%) during the forecast period. Among the therapeutic areas, the oncology segment led the global next-generation antibody therapeutics market in 2014, with the largest market size, but the autoimmune/inflammatory is expected to see the fastest growth of 46.4% CAGR, during the period 2015  2020.Download Sample Pages:Governments of various countries are involved in taking initiatives for improving healthcare facilities, and making next-generation antibody therapeutics affordable. This is increasing the demand for next-generation antibody therapeutics. The increasing global gross domestic product (GDP) and growing healthcare expenditure have created a positive impact on the growth of the next-generation antibody therapeutics market. Also, in comparison to traditional antibodies, the next-generation antibody therapeutics is more effective in the treatment of various diseases, such as cancer, autoimmune disorders, and inflammatory diseases. This is attracting various pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies to increase their investment in the R&D of next-generation antibody therapeutics.Browse Related Research at:The key companies operating in the global next-generation antibody therapeutics market include Seattle Genetics Inc., F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd, ImmunoGen Inc., Pfizer Inc., Amgen Inc., Biogen, Kyowa Hakko Kirin Co. Ltd., Bristol-Myers Squibb Company, Xencor Inc., AstraZeneca PLC., Dyax Corp., Takeda Pharmaceuticals Company Limited and Bayer AG.NEXT-GENERATION ANTIBODY THERAPEUTICS MARKET SEGMENTATIONNext-Generation antibody therapeutics market by therapeutic area Oncology Autoimmune/InflammatoryNext-Generation antibody therapeutics market by technology Antibody Drug Conjugates (ADCs) Bispecific Antibodies (BsAbs) Fc Engineered Antibodies Antibody Fragments and Antibody-like Proteins (AF & ALPs) Biosimilar Antibody (Ab) productsNEXT-GENERATION ANTIBODY THERAPEUTICS MARKET BREAKDOWN BY GEOGRAPHY North America  U.S., and Rest of North America Europe  Germany, France, U.K., and Rest of Europe Asia-Pacific  Japan, and Rest of Asia-Pacific Rest of the World (RoW)About P&S Market ResearchP&S Market Research is a market research company, which offers market research and consulting services for various geographies around the globe. We provide market research reports, industry forecasting reports, business intelligence, and research based consulting services across different industry/business verticals.As one of the top growing market research agency, were keen upon providing market landscape and accurate forecasting. Our analysts and consultants are proficient with business intelligence and market analysis, through their interaction with leading companies of the concerned domain. We help our clients with B2B market research and assist them in identifying various windows of opportunity, and framing informed and customized business expansion strategies in different regions.Contact:DeepAssistant  Client Partner347, 5th Ave. #1402New York City, NY - 10016Toll-free: +1-888-778-7886 (USA/Canada)Email: enquiry@psmarketresearch.comWeb:347 5th Ave. #1402- 210New York CityUnited States
Global Cell Based Assays Market Outlook 2016: Reagents and Assay Kits, Consumables, Microplates

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Cell based assays make use of live cells for different experiments or assays that measure toxicity, motility, cell proliferation, production of a measurable product, and morphology. Cell based assays provide precise representation of the real-life model and advantage of a dynamic experiment through monitoring the behavior of the live cells. Cell based assays are highly used in drug discovery and toxicity testing.Cell based assays market is in an emerging state mainly due to increase in activities like drug discovery, government expenditure and technological advancement.In addition, the market is driven by the rising public and private investments, grants and funds for the development of more advanced technologies in the field of research and development. Conversely, high cost associated with the instruments and process, lack of skilled professionals and rigid intellectual property rights are major factors restraining the market growth.The market is segmented based on product, application, end user, and geography. Based on product, the market is segmented into reagents and assay kits, cell lines, consumables, microplates, instruments, services, software and others.Access Full Report:Based on application, market is segmented into drug discovery, ADME process, predictive toxicology and others. Based on end user, it is bifurcated into pharmaceutical & biotechnology companies, government & academic institutes, research organizations and others. The market is analyzed on the basis of four regions, namely, North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and LAMEA.Product launch, collaboration & merger, and acquisition are the key strategies adopted by market players. Healthcare giant such as Argos Soditic has acquired Cisbio Bioassays in November 2013 creating a high growth in cell based assays market.The report provides a comprehensive analysis of the key players operating in the world cell based assays market such as Becton, Dickinson and Company, Cisbio Bioassays, Cell Signaling Technology, Inc., Danaher Corporation, Qingdao Haier Co., Ltd., Discoverx Corporation, Merck & Co., Inc., Promega Corporation, Perkinelmer, Inc. and Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc.Request a Brochure of This Report, here:About Intense ResearchIntense Research provides a range of marketing and business research solutions designed for our clients specific needs based on our expert resources. The business scopes of Intense Research cover more than 30 industries includsing energy, new materials, transportation, daily consumer goods, chemicals, etc. We provide our clients with one-stop solution for all the research requirements.Contact Us:Joel John3422 SW 15 Street, Suit #8138,Deerfield Beach, Florida 33442,United StatesTel: +1-386-310-3803GMT Tel: +49-322 210 92714USA/Canada Toll Free No. 1-855-465-4651Email: sales@intenseresearch.comWeb:
Death of celebrity tiger sparks old memories Updated: 2016-09-16 07:10 By Chris Peterson(China Daily Europe)

Esso's Tango, like the chimps used by PG Tips, raise questions over treatment of wild animals

British media reported the sad news recently that Tango, a male tiger, has died at the age of 22 at a wildlife park in Britain.

That's relatively old for a tiger. Tango had lived a varied life, even by big cat standards.

So why am I writing the ultimate cat story? Well, Tango was part of my youth, starring in a wildly successful series of ads for Esso, a brand of automobile fuel, which carried the slogan "Put a tiger in your tank" and featured photographs of Tango bounding toward the camera.

Not content with using Tango as the main force behind the advertising campaign, the marketing department of Esso went one stage further: Buy a certain amount of fuel and you got a free synthetic tiger tail to tie to your car aerial. Very cutting-edge.

After his days as an advertising star were done, as is often the case in the world of celebrity, Tango and his mate, Julia, fell on hard times.

They were sold to a German circus, which according to media reports treated them abominably. They somehow ended up in Belgium, where they faced being euthanized, but Woodside Wildlife Park in Lincoln, eastern England, stepped in and raised the 250,000 pounds ($333,000; 296,000 euros) needed to bring them to safety.

That was in 2014, and Tango and Julia lived out their lives in comparative comfort. I say comparative, because I am uneasy about such majestic animals being kept in captivity, even in a wildlife park with acres of space.

Tigers usually die at about age 16, although the oldest known tiger died at 24.

That brings to mind another famous group of animals that found stardom in the world of advertising.

PG Tips is a brand of tea most Britons are familiar with, and in the 1970s its TV ads featured a family of chimpanzees dressed in human clothes, holding a tea party, albeit a messy one. The animals were trained and looked after by Twycross Zoo in Leicestershire.

Twycross eventually reversed its policy of providing animals in such circumstances, and the chimpanzees were "retired" and continued to live at the zoo.

The last of them, Choppers, died this year at the ripe old age of 48, and her story is perhaps an example of how attitudes toward animals in captivity have changed. She'd been rescued as a baby by an English couple in Liberia after being captured by poachers.

After her "retirement" from dressing up in human clothes and playing with teacups, Choppers had difficulty in adapting to life as a chimpanzee, and only after her partner, Louis, died, was she reintroduced to the zoo's family of chimpanzees.

There, finally, she learned how to integrate with fellow chimpanzees, grooming other apes and even acting as a peacemaker when family squabbles broke out.

So is it OK to try and integrate wild animals into everyday human life? Are zoos the answer?

I remember as a child being upset at the sight of lions and tigers being kept in cages at the zoo, as they paced up and down, obviously pining for wide-open spaces. Don't even get me started on lions in the circus.

Now, thankfully, things have changed. No more small cages, and no more circus acts.

On the tiger front, I believe on balance that to protect the species from poachers and traditional medicine practitioners, there is little choice than keeping them on game reserves.

And it's not just poachers in China and India - big cats and other large animals are at risk, particularly in Africa, from amateur big-game hunters, mainly from the US. It disgusts me to this day.

So, RIP Tango. I've still got a tattered old tiger's tail somewhere. It's just that my cars no longer have an aerial to hang it on.

The author is managing editor of China Daily Europe Bureau. Contact the writer at chris@mail.chinadailyuk.com

(China Daily European Weekly 09/16/2016 page12)
The Brazilian Card Market Grew at a CAGR of 6.5% During the Period 2012 to 2014

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The research report provides in depth analysis and insights into the Brazil Cards and Payments Market including, strategies deployed by banks to market debit and credit cards and competitive landscape (card issuers in the country) for both debit cards and credit cards. The study includes 3 years historical market size and 6 years market forecast in terms of number of cards, value and volume of transactions processed through these cards, and other key metrics. The report also provides information on the key industry trends, major schemes, banks and detailed segmentation of card and payment industry. The research report is a new offering from the companys Financial Services domain, and leveraged from the companys existing cards and payments database of 50+ countries.Explore Report with Detailed TOC at:In terms of number of cards in circulation, the Brazilian payment cards market grew at a CAGR of 6.5% during the period 2012-2014 and it is expected to further grow over the forecast period, but at a slower pace. The growth of the Brazilian card payments market will be driven by growing disposable income, growth of retail sector, an increasing market for mobile commerce and greater acceptance of payment cards in the country. Brazil population grew from 199.2 million in 2012 to 202.7 million in 2014, and is expected to reach 210.8 million by 2020. This increase in population is expected to encourage card spending over the forecast period.The debit cards dominated the Brazilian card payments market in terms of number of cards in circulation. Average debit card transaction value increased from BRL 159.8 in 2012 to BRL 170.2 in 2014, at a CAGR of 3.2%. The average transaction value is anticipated to grow at a CAGR of 0.9% during the period 2015-2020. Some of the key players in the debit cards market include Banco do Brasil, Caixa Economica Federal, Banco Bradesco, Banco Santander, and Itau Unibanco. Caixa Economica Federal was the leading bank in terms of number of debit cards issued in 2014.Credit cards are primarily used by consumers at POS terminals for retail purchases, rather than for cash withdrawals at ATMs. The average credit card transaction value in Brazil grew from BRL 118.4 in 2012 to BRL 126.6 in 2014, at a CAGR of 3%. The average transaction value is anticipated to increase at a CAGR of 2.0% during the forecast period of 2015-2020. Credit cards dominate e-commerce market because of attractive promotional offers such as discounts and free shipping. With increased number of retailers moving their business operations online, to increase market share and to expand their customer base, the e-commerce growth is expected to continue in Brazil. Some of the key players in the credit card market of Brazil include Banco do Brasil, Caixa Economica Federal, Banco Bradesco, Banco Santander, Itau Unibanco, Citi and HSBC.Other Related Reports at:In December 2015, Morpho announced the production of smart card modules for Elo, a 100% Brazilian payment association set up by Bradesco, Banco do Brasil and CAIXA. Morpho created a smart card operating system for the Brazilian company, allowing every smart card to be used for banking applications as well as for shopping with credit and debit functions, accepted at more than 1.7 million point of sales terminals and establishments.Reasons to buy Access the historical and forecast data of cards and payments market in Brazil. Understand the key trends, drivers and growth opportunities in Brazils cards and payments market. Frame informed and customized strategies for market expansion by identifying the strategies adopted by the key players. Access to banks and card issuers competitive intelligence.About P&S Market ResearchP&S Market Research is a market research company, which offers market research and consulting services for various geographies around the globe. We provide market research reports, industry forecasting reports, business intelligence, and research based consulting services across different industry/business verticals.As one of the top growing market research agency, were keen upon providing market landscape and accurate forecasting. Our analysts and consultants are proficient with business intelligence and market analysis, through their interaction with leading companies of the concerned domain. We help our clients with B2B market research and assist them in identifying various windows of opportunity, and framing informed and customized business expansion strategies in different regions.Contact:DeepAssistant  Client Partner347, 5th Ave. #1402New York City, NY - 10016Toll-free: +1-888-778-7886 (USA/Canada)Email: enquiry@psmarketresearch.comWeb:347 5th Ave. #1402- 210New York CityUnited States
Global Dental Implants Examined in New Market Research Report to 2020

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"The Report Global Dental Implants Market Research Report to 2020 provides information on pricing, market analysis, shares, forecast, and company profiles for key industry participants. - MarketResearchReports.biz"This report studies Dental Implants in Global market, especially in USA, EU, China, Japan, Southeast Asia and India, focuses on top players in these countries, with production, price, revenue and market share in Global market, likeDanaherDENTSPLY ImplantsHenry ScheinOSSTEM IMPLANTStraumannZimmer Biomet3M3ShapeBiotech DentalAlign TechnologyCortex DentalSweden & MartinaTRI Dental ImplantsNDI Dental ImplantsDownload Sample copy of this Report @Market Segment by Regions, this report splits Global into several key countries, with production, consumption, revenue, market share and growth rate of Dental Implants in these countries, from 2011 to 2020 (forecast), likeUSAChinaEUJapanSoutheast AsiaIndiaRest of GlobalSplit by product types, with production, revenue, price, market share and growth rate of each type, can be divided intoTitanium dental implantsZirconia dental implantsSplit by applications, this report focuses on consumption, market share and growth rate of Dental Implants in each application, can be divided intoDentistryTable of Content :Global Dental Implants Market Research Report to 20201 Dental Implants Overview1.1 Product Overview and Scope of Dental Implants1.2 Dental Implants Segment by Type1.2.1 Titanium dental implants and Production Growth Rate 2011-20201.2.2 Zirconia dental implants and Production Growth Rate 2011-20201.3 Dental Implants Segment by Applications1.3.1 Dental Implants Consumption Market Share by Applications in 2015 and 20161.3.2 Dentistry and Key Clients (Buyers) List1.4 Dental Implants Market by Regions1.4.1 USA Status and Prospect 2011-20201.4.2 China Status and Prospect 2011-20201.4.3 EU Status and Prospect 2011-20201.4.4 Japan Status and Prospect 2011-20201.4.5 Southeast Asia Status and Prospect 2011-20201.4.6 India Status and Prospect 2011-20201.5 Global Market Size (Value and Volume) of Dental Implants 2011-20201.5.1 Global Dental Implants Capacity, Production and Growth Rate 2011-20201.5.2 Global Dental Implants Revenue and Growth Rate 2011-20202 Global Dental Implants Market Competition by Manufacturers2.1 Global Dental Implants Production and Share by Manufacturers (2015 and 2016)2.2 Global Dental Implants Revenue and Share by Manufacturers (2015 and 2016)2.3 Global Dental Implants Average Price by Manufacturers (2015 and 2016)2.4 Manufacturers Dental Implants Manufacturing Base Distribution and Product Type3 Global Dental Implants Market Analysis by Type and Applications3.1 Global Dental Implants Production, Market Share and Growth Rate by Type (2011-2020)3.2 Global Dental Implants Revenue, Market Share and Growth Rate by Type (2011-2020)3.3 Dental Implants Average Price by Type in 20153.4 Global Dental Implants Consumption, Market Share and Growth Rate by Applications 2011-20204 Global Dental Implants Manufacturers Analysis4.1 Danaher4.1.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base and Competitors4.1.2 Type and Technology4.1.2.1 Gendex? Price and Specification4.1.2.2 Radiometer ? Price and Specification4.1.2.3 Fluke? Price and Specification4.1.3 Dental Implants Capacity, Production, Revenue, Price of Danaher 2015 to 20164.2 DENTSPLY Implants4.2.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base and Competitors4.2.2 Product Type and TechnologyFollow us on LinkedIn:MarketResearchReports.biz is the most comprehensive collection of market research reports. MarketResearchReports.Biz services are specially designed to save time and money for our clients. We are a one stop solution for all your research needs, our main offerings are syndicated research reports, custom research, subscription access and consulting services. We serve all sizes and types of companies spanning across various industries.State Tower90 Sate Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA: Canada Toll Free: 866-997-4948Website:E : sales@marketresearchreports.biz
Argentina Cards and Payments Market: Total Card Market Grew at a CAGR of 9.6% During 2012 to 2014

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P&S Market Research releases a new research report on cards and payments market:Argentina Cards and Payments Market - Size, Share, Development, Growth and Forecast to 2020The research report provides in depth analysis and insights into the Argentina Cards and Payments Market including, strategies deployed by banks to market debit and credit cards and competitive landscape (card issuers in the country) for both debit cards and credit cards. The study includes 3 years historical market size and 6 years market forecast in terms of number of cards, value and volume of transactions processed through these cards, and other key metrics. The report also provides information on the key industry trends, major schemes, banks and detailed segmentation of card and payment industry. The research report is a new offering from the companys Financial Services domain, and leveraged from the companys existing cards and payments database of 50+ countries.Explore Report with Detailed TOC on Argentina Cards and Payments Market at:The card payments market in Argentina grew at a healthy pace during the period 20122014, both in terms of value and volume. In terms of number of cards in circulation, the payment cards market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 3.8% over the period 2015-2020. The growth of the card payments market will be driven by the growth of e-commerce, higher disposable income per capita, new product offerings and growth in retail.The percentage of the urban population in total population grew from 91.2% in 2012 to 91.6% in 2014 and is expected to grow further over the forecast period, to reach 92.6% in 2020. Increase in urbanization will be leading to increase in the scope for payment cards use.The number of debit cards in circulation in Argentina increased at a CAGR of 9.6% during the period 20122014. In terms of transaction volume, the debit cards had 57% share in the Argentina payment card market in 2014. During the same year, the credit cards had 43% share in the Argentina cards market, in terms of transaction volume. The debit cards dominant share in terms of transaction volume is likely to remain stable over the forecast period of 2015-2020. The average debit card transaction value increased from ARS 235.8 in 2012 to ARS 243.3 in 2014, at a CAGR of 1.6%. The average transaction value is expected to grow at a CAGR of 0.9% during the period 2015-2020. Some of the key players in the debit cards market include Banco de la Nacion Argentina, Banco de la provincia de Buenos Aires, Banco Santander Rio, Banco Galicia and Banco Supervielle.The total number of credit cards in Argentina grew at a CAGR of 9.4% during the period 2012-2014. However during the forecast period, the growth is expected to slow down to a CAGR of 3.8%. The average credit card transaction value in Argentina increased from ARS 309.5 in 2012 to ARS 323.6 in 2014, at a CAGR of 2.3%. The average transaction value is expected to grow at a CAGR of 1.2% during the forecast period 2015-2020. Some of the key players in the credit cards market include Banco Galicia, Banco Santander Rio, BBVA Banco Frances and Banco Macro.Browse Other Related Report at:Charge cards segment represents a small portion of the Argentina pay later card market, but is expected to gain momentum due to expected growth in the volume of high net worth individuals (HNIs) during the forecast period.The number of charge cards in circulation increased at a CAGR of 19.0% during the period 2012-2014. The volume of charge card transactions at POS terminals accounted for 98.4% of the total charge card transaction volume in 2014. American Express is the leading charge card issuer in Argentina and targets high-income and business customers. The frequency of charge card use grew at a CAGR of 3.8% during 2012-2014. The frequency of transaction is expected to reach up to 38.6 times by 2020.Reasons to buy Access the historical and forecast data of cards and payments market in Chile. Understand the key trends, drivers and growth opportunities in Chilescards and payments market. Frame informed and customized strategies for market expansion by identifying the strategies adopted by the key players. Access to banks and card issuers competitive intelligence.About P&S Market ResearchP&S Market Research is a market research company, which offers market research and consulting services for various geographies around the globe. We provide market research reports, industry forecasting reports, business intelligence, and research based consulting services across different industry/business verticals.As one of the top growing market research agency, were keen upon providing market landscape and accurate forecasting. Our analysts and consultants are proficient with business intelligence and market analysis, through their interaction with leading companies of the concerned domain. We help our clients with B2B market research and assist them in identifying various windows of opportunity, and framing informed and customized business expansion strategies in different regions.Contact:DeepAssistant  Client Partner347, 5th Ave. #1402New York City, NY - 10016Toll-free: +1-888-778-7886 (USA/Canada)Email: enquiry@psmarketresearch.comWeb:347 5th Ave. #1402- 210New York CityUnited States
Global Analog ICs Market Drivers and challenges By 2015-2021

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Integrated circuits are set of electronic circuits in which all the active and passive electronic components are fabricated on a single chip. Different active components include operational amplifiers (op-amp) and batteries among others. Passive components are capacitors, resistors and inductors. Continuous development of production processes and design of ICs lead to cost reduction of electronic equipments.. Additionally, these ICs increase the reliability as different components are fabricated on a single silicon chip and thus reducing the size of circuit board.Integrated circuits can be classified on the basis of circuit technology, design style, circuit size and design type. Technologies used in manufacturing ICs are complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS), n-type metal oxide semiconductor (NMOS), bi-polar junction transistor (BJT) and BiCMOS among others. Different design styles are standard cell, field programmable gate array (FPGA) and gate array. On the basis of size ICS can be categorized as circuit size includes very large scale integration (VLSI), large scale integration (LSI), medium scale integration (MSI), small scale integration (SSI), and giga scale integration (GSI). The design types available are analog, digital and mixed-signal.Download Sample @Analog integrated circuits are those ICs which performs functions of amplification, demodulation and active filtering. In an analog IC current and voltage vary continuously with time. These ICs are consists of electronic components that allows them to communicate and connect with the microprocessor. They are widely deployed in most of the electronic products as these ICs consume less power while maintaining their functionality. Integrated circuits have widespread applications in computers, mobile phones and electronic digital home appliances such as digital camera. These circuits offer various advantages such as low power consumption and low cost for implementation. They reduce the size and complexity of an electronic circuit and provide high speed of operation. Due to these advantages ICs are used in televisions, portable devices such as laptops, microwaves, play stations, cameras, computers and cell phones. Additionally, they are used in data processing and switching telephone circuits. Analog ICs are used in LED Lighting systems due to their less power consumption capability.Need of power management in electronic product and increasing demand of ICs in automotive sector is supporting the growth of market. However, imbalance in demand and supply of analog IC is affecting the market growth. Moreover, rapid technological advancement and increasing applications of analog ICs in LED lighting system offers potential opportunity for the market.Analog integrated circuit market can be segmented on the basis of category, type of analog ICs and end-users. Analog ICs are categorized into radio frequency IC and linear ICs. Different types of analog ICs available are operational amplifiers, sensors and power management circuits. Analog ICs have widespread application across various industries such as electronic industry, automotive sector, telecommunication industry, healthcare and semiconductor industry among others.Request TOC (desk of content material), Figures and Tables of the report:Some of the key players in analog ICs market are Analog Devices Inc., Qualcomm Inc., STMicroelectronics NV, Infineon Technologies AG, Caterpillar Inc., Texas Instruments Inc, EPOS Development Ltd., Linear Technology Corp., Intel Corp., LG Electronics, NXP Semiconductors, Maxim Integrated products, ON Semiconductor, Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., Renesas Electronics Corp., Cummins Inc., Kohler Co. and Skyworks Solutions Inc among others.About UsPersistence Market Research (PMR) is a U.S.-based full-service market intelligence firm specializing in syndicated research, custom research, and consulting services. PMR boasts market research expertise across the Healthcare, Chemicals and Materials, Technology and Media, Energy and Mining, Food and Beverages, Semiconductor and Electronics, Consumer Goods, and Shipping and Transportation industries. The company draws from its multi-disciplinary capabilities and high-pedigree team of analysts to share data that precisely corresponds to clients business needs.PMR stands committed to bringing more accuracy and speed to clients business decisions. From ready-to-purchase market research reports to customized research solutions, PMRs engagement models are highly flexible without compromising on its deep-seated research values.ContactPersistence Market Research Pvt. Ltd305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.com
Malaysia Cards and Payments Market: Total Card Market grew at a CAGR of 3.5% for the period 2012 to 2014

www.psmarketresearch.com/market-analysis/malaysia-cards-and-payments-market

www.psmarketresearch.com/industry-report/financial-services

www.psmarketresearch.com

The research report provides in depth analysis and insights into the Malaysia Cards and Payments Market including, strategies deployed by banks to market debit and credit cards and competitive landscape (card issuers in the country) for both debit cards and credit cards. The study includes 3 years historical market size and 6 years market forecast in terms of number of cards, value and volume of transactions processed through these cards, and other key metrics. The report also provides information on the key industry trends, major schemes, banks and detailed segmentation of card and payment industry. The research report is a new offering from the companys Financial Services domain, and leveraged from the companys existing cards and payments database of 50+ countries.Explore Report with Detailed TOC on Malaysia Cards and Payments Market at:In Malaysia, debit cards dominate the payment card market in terms of number of cards in circulation. In 2014, the debit cards accounted for 83.3% of the total number of cards in circulation. Debit card penetration per 100 inhabitants reached from 129 in 2012 to 135 in 2014. Key players in the debit cards market include Maybank, Bank Simpanan Nasional, Public bank Berhad, CIMB, Hong Leong Bank etc. Maybank was the leading bank in terms of number of debit cards issued in 2014.Some of the key players in the credit card market in the Malaysian card payments include Citibank, Maybank, Hong Leong Bank, HSBC, CIMB and AmBank.The use of non-cash retail payments continued to grow with the average number of non-cash transactions per capita increasing to 88 in 2015, compared to 55 transactions in 2011. The most common non-cash payments were e-money transactions, mainly transit payments using prepaid cards. This was followed by credit transfers and payment card transactions. In contrast, the use of cheques continued to decline, with the number of cheques issued per capita falling from 7 cheques in 2012 to 5 cheques in 2015.In January 2016, Visa partnered with Maybank to launch the first contactless wearable in Malaysia- Maybank Visa Payband. Mr. Ng Kong Boon, Visa Country Manager for Malaysia, said, Visa is pleased to partner with Maybank to launch Malaysias first contactless payment wearable. We believe that the adoption of a contactless payment wearable will be well received by Malaysians and be used to displace cash particularly at events, concerts and theme parks, making it easier and more convenient for consumers. To be able to drive Malaysia to become a cashless society, it is important that we take steps to displace cash at places that are traditionally heavy on cash, particularly at events and theme parks, where payment such as entrance fees and drinks are small ticket payments.Browse Other Related Report at:In April 2015, Bank Negara Malaysia launched a national electronic bill payment platform JomPAY. It allows customers of a participating bank to make payments to the registered billers of all JomPAY participating banks. This platform eliminates the need for a biller to maintain banking relationships with multiple banks in order to accept payments from its customers. As of 2015, JomPAY is offered by 29 banks through online banking and 4 banks via ATMs, with 472 registered billers accepting payments through the platform. Bank Negara Malaysia plans to include new small and medium enterprises and micro enterprises, with a target of 5,000 registered billers by the year 2020.About P&S Market ResearchP&S Market Research is a market research company, which offers market research and consulting services for various geographies around the globe. We provide market research reports, industry forecasting reports, business intelligence, and research based consulting services across different industry/business verticals.As one of the top growing market research agency, were keen upon providing market landscape and accurate forecasting. Our analysts and consultants are proficient with business intelligence and market analysis, through their interaction with leading companies of the concerned domain. We help our clients with B2B market research and assist them in identifying various windows of opportunity, and framing informed and customized business expansion strategies in different regions.Contact:DeepAssistant  Client Partner347, 5th Ave. #1402New York City, NY - 10016Toll-free: +1-888-778-7886 (USA/Canada)Email: enquiry@psmarketresearch.comWeb:347 5th Ave. #1402- 210New York CityUnited States
Mica Market for Paints & Coatings, Electronics, Construction, Cosmetics, and Other End-users - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends, and Forecast 2016 - 2024

http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=S&rep_id=1920

http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/mica-market.html

http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/

Fluctuating costs due to high dependence on production through mining activities, presence of vast growth opportunities across some of the worlds most prominently expanding industries, and rising applications across promising sectors such as robotics outline the present state of the global mica market, observes Transparency Market Research in a recent report. The market is dominated by companies such as The Premier Mica Company, Mica Manufacturing Co. Pvt. Ltd., and Ashville-Schoonmaker Mica Company. These large-scale manufacturers with integrated operations have a competitive advantage over other companies in the market chiefly due to an easy access to raw materials.Get Free PDF Brochure for more Professional and Technical industry insights:Along with the several stringent regulations related to mining-related issues, the threat of a constantly rising set of reliable substitutes is keeping a check on the markets overall development. Nevertheless, the crucial role played by mica in certain industries will allow the market to tread along a healthy growth path in the coming years. TMR states that the market will expand at a 3.8% CAGR from 2016 through 2024 in terms of revenue. Expanding at this pace, the market, which valued US$478.1 mn in 2015, is expected to rise to US$669.3 mn by 2024.Asia Pacific is presently the leading regional market for mica, holding a share of nearly 40% in the global market in 2015. The region is also expected to remain the leading producer as well as the leading consumer of mica in the near future, thanks to the flourishing electronics and construction industries. The market for mica in developed economies such as North America and Europe will witness moderate to sluggish growth; preference to substitutes will play a key role in the trend. Of the key mica grades utilized, the segment of ground mica is presently the dominant, accounting for a share of over 50% of the global market in 2015.Rising Demand across Electronics Industry to Prove Catalytic for Markets GrowthMica is known to provide thermal and electric insulation and exhibit stability after exposure to extreme heat, light, and moisture. Owing to this, it finds extensive usage across the electronics industry. Among the key end-users of mica, the electronics industry is the leading consumer of mica, accounting for the dominant share in the global market in 2015.The excellent future growth prospects of the global electronics industry are also expected to prove beneficial for the growth of the global mica market over the period between 2016 and 2024, states a TMR analyst. Micas use across industries such as paints and coatings, construction, and cosmetics, which are all treading along healthy growth path globally, will also bring vast traction for the global mica market in the near future.Stringent Government Regulations to Restrain Market GrowthOwing to the potential health hazards that mining activities can cause to people employed on mining sites and the environment in general, several governments across the globe have imposed strict regulations pertaining to mining. As mining is the single most important source of raw mica, such impositions can have a severe negative impact on the overall development of the global mica market in the next few years. This factor could also lead to a significant rise in prices of raw mica in the near term globally.Nevertheless, the mica market holds immense potential of growth owing to the substances indispensable role across industries such as electronics, paints and coatings, and cosmetics. Rising applications of mica in the robotics industry could also lead to vast growth opportunities for the market in the near future.Browse Industry Research Report with free Analysis:This review of the market is based on a recent market research report published by Transparency Market Research, titled Mica Market for Paints & Coatings, Electronics, Construction, Cosmetics, and Other End-users - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends, and Forecast 2016 - 2024.For this study, the global mica market is segmented as follows:Mica Market  Form AnalysisNatural MicaSynthetic MicaMica Market  Grade AnalysisGround MicaSheet MicaBuilt-up MicaMica Market  End-user AnalysisPaints & CoatingsElectronicsConstructionCosmeticsOthers (Rubber, Plastics, etc.)About UsTransparency Market Research is a global market intelligence company, providing global business information reports and services. Our exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trends analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. We are privileged with highly experienced team of Analysts, Researchers, and Consultants, who use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather, and analyze information.Our data repository is continuously updated and revised by a team of research experts, so that it always reflects the latest trends and information. With a broad research and analysis capability, Transparency Market Research employs rigorous primary and secondary research techniques in developing distinctive data sets and research material for business reports.Transparency Market Research90 State Street,Suite 700Albany NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453E-mail: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:
Telecom Expense Management Market, Asia Pacific and MEA to Emerge as Most Attractive Investment Hubs

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http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com

Once limited only to a few large companies with vast internal telecom networks and a huge fleet of mobile devices, telecom expense management (TEM) has presently become a necessary practice for enterprises of all sizes, operating across any industry/business domain. Driving the need for effective telecom expense management practices are some revolutionizing trends and the sheer development observed in corporate telecom infrastructures in the past few years.Free PDF for Technical Insights:The trend of allowing integration of personal mobile devices such as smartphones, laptops, and tablets under mobility policies such as bring-your-own-devices and choose-your-own-device (CYOD), for one, has revolutionized the global TEM market in the past few years. The increased integration of mobile devices in internal telecom networks has highlighting the need for presence of a holistic system for monitoring and managing usage and costs of telecom resources being exhausted. Speaking of developments, corporate telecom infrastructures now boast a vast number of communication channels connecting companies to their clients, customers, and employees. The volume of information being exchanged across these channels has also exponentially increased over the years.TMR findings suggest that these factors will enable the global TEM market expand at a 13.5% CAGR from 2016 to 2024, allowing the market to rise to a valuation of US$4.92 bn by 2024.TEM Market to Benefit Most from Emerging MarketsNorth America is presently the leading regional market for telecom expense management and is expected to record the highest revenue generation for the global market over the period between 2016 and 2024. In this relatively mature market, factors such as the extensive usage of mobile devices within enterprises, technologically advanced and thus extremely complex telecom infrastructures, and presence of a large number of TEM providers will favor the future growth of North America TEM market.However, the global TEM market will witness the most promising growth in emerging regional markets such as Asia Pacific and Middle East and Africa (MEA) in the coming years. In Asia Pacific, presence of a large number of IT services and product companies, rising popularity of BYOD and CYOD policies, and improving telecom and IT infrastructures will drive the need for effective TEM products and services. In Middle East and Africa, the TEM market will gain hold owing to rising digitization of oil and gas industry and heavy investments in the IT and telecom sectors in the past few years.The TEM market in Asia Pacific is expected to witness an exponential 18.3% CAGR while the MEA market is expected to exhibit an 18.7% CAGR from 2016 to 2024. North America, the current leader in the market, will exhibit a relatively modest 8.9% CAGR over the same period. It is evident that TEM companies will have to align their focus towards MEA and Asia Pacific so as to exploit the enormous growth opportunities these regions promise for the TEM market.Cost-effective and Flexible Cloud-based Products and Services Gain ProminenceHaving offered excellent efficiency, cost benefits, flexibility, and several other benefits to many operational activities so far, cloud-based TEM products and services are also a huge hit among small-, mid-, and large-scale enterprises. Cloud has grabbed the largest share in terms of mode of deployment, accounting for 45.98% of the market in 2015. However, it is expected to witness a slight decline, accounting for 39.86% in the global market by 2024.The rising popularity of complete outsourcing will be central to the declining market share of cloud services. TMR findings suggest that businesses will offload their TEM operations so as to increase focus on core business processes and put internal resources to effective use for other purposes.Complete outsourcing is expected to register a CAGR of 15.4% from 2016 to 2024.The market is highly fragmented and features several companies operating amid intense competition. Some of the most prominent vendors in the vendors in the market are Asentinel LLC, Anatole SAS, Ezwim B.V, Calero Software LLC, Valicom Corporation, Tangoe, Inc., WidePoint Solutions Corporation, Inc., and Avotus Corporation.About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:
Global Optical Transceivers Market Estimates and Forecasts(2015 -2021)

http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/4798

http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/4798

Transceiver is a device that performs both transmission and reception of signals with a common circuitry over a network. An optical transceiver, also called as fiber optic transmitter and receiver, completes the operation of transmission by converting the electrical signal in light pulse and vice versa at the receiving end. In case of fiber optics, the information is sent in the form of light pulses. The light pulses need to be converted into electrical signals in order to be used by an electronic device. This photoelectric conversion is carried by the optical module equipped at the end terminals of the network. The light from the end of connecting cable is coupled to the receiver, where a detector carries the conversion of the light signal back into an equivalent electrical signal. A laser diode or a light emitting diode (LED) is used as the light source for transmission of information. There are numerous optical transceiver modules available in the market differing in the type of data transmission speed, connections and packing forms. Some of the types of optical transceivers available in the market include SFP, SFP+, X2, XFP, Xenpak, GBIC and others. Furthermore, as per the type of connection, there are single mode (SM), multi-mode (MM) and Wavelength Division Multiplexing (WDM) modules.Download Sample @Optical transceivers are the modernized components for the efficient use of network. The major factor bolstering the adoption of optical transceiver components is their low cost transport of information over the network. Additionally, optical transceivers are preferred over conventional transceiver devices as they require low maintenance cost as compared to conventional devices. Optical transceivers support large bandwidth and hence, are widely used in high speed network infrastructure such as broadband internet connections. These are used as both carriers and data centers. Optical transceivers are deployed to update the communication networks and data center networks for efficient traffic management with higher speeds. Optical networks are the backbone for mobile communication network. With growing demand for reliable and high speed mobile communication, optical transceivers are increasingly being used for the communication network infrastructure.Geographically, North America is seen as highly attractive market for the optical transceivers due to increasing demand for sophisticated communication network. In addition, the rising deployment of 100G transceivers for high speed networks is another factor contributing to high demand for optical transceivers. Europe is equally fast in adoption of 100G transceivers and follows North America in terms of demand for optical transceivers. Moreover, the combined use of 40G and 100G modules in Europe and North America is expected to show steady growth in demand for optical transceivers in near future. In Asia-Pacific, China is expected to be the fastest growing market for optical transceivers owing to its increasing demand for deployment of 100G equipment. The updating of the existing communication networks in this region is another factor which is expected to boost the growth of optical transceivers market in near future.Request TOC (desk of content material), Figures and Tables of the report:In North America, JDS Uniphase Corporation, Oclaro Inc., Finisar Corporation, Cisco Systems, Alcatel-Lucent and others are the manufacturers of optical transceivers. In Asia-Pacific, Avago Technologies and Wuhan Telecommunications Devices Co. Ltd. are some of the leading manufacturers of optical transceivers.About UsPersistence Market Research (PMR) is a U.S.-based full-service market intelligence firm specializing in syndicated research, custom research, and consulting services. PMR boasts market research expertise across the Healthcare, Chemicals and Materials, Technology and Media, Energy and Mining, Food and Beverages, Semiconductor and Electronics, Consumer Goods, and Shipping and Transportation industries. The company draws from its multi-disciplinary capabilities and high-pedigree team of analysts to share data that precisely corresponds to clients business needs.PMR stands committed to bringing more accuracy and speed to clients business decisions. From ready-to-purchase market research reports to customized research solutions, PMRs engagement models are highly flexible without compromising on its deep-seated research values.ContactPersistence Market Research Pvt. Ltd305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.com
Global School and Campus Security Market Competitive landscape By 2015  2021

http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/4793

http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/4793

The global school and campus security market is expected to show a remarkable growth rate by coming years. One of the major factors contributing the growth of the global school and campus security market are the increasing criminal cases and the increasing security concerns. Monitoring activities to detect intrusion, theft or vandalism and traffic surveillance and the government regulations demanding increased security levels are also driving the demand for the global school and campus security market.The report contains the global scenario of school and campus security market discussing detailed overview and market figures. The research report analyses the industry growth rate, industry capacity, and industry structure. The report analyses the historical data and forecasts the school and campus security market size, production forecasts along with key factors driving and restraining the market.Download Sample @The global school and campus security market is segmented by type, components and geography. On the basis of type the global school and campus security market is segmented into analog video surveillance and IP based video surveillance. Based on components the market is segmented into hardware (cameras, monitors, encoders, recorders and storage), software (video analytics, video management systems (VMS), services (hosted managed and hybrid). Further the global school and campus security market is segmented into North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific and RoW. The market is dominated by the North America and Europe. Among the regions, Asia-Pacific registered the fastest growth rate from 2013 to 2019. Asia-Pacific is expected to be the fastest growing segment due to the increasing criminal activities and security concerns in this region. The Middle-East and some countries from Latin America are also expected to drive the growth of the global school and campus security market.The global school and campus security market is driven by factors such as the increasing security concerns and the continued investments in infrastructure. Other factors fuelling the growth of the global school and campus security market are the growing monitoring activities to detect theft or vandalism, intrusion, and traffic surveillance and the advancements in high definition (HD) and megapixels.Some of the factors inhibiting the growth of the global school and campus security market are the privacy concerns for public surveillance. The high cost of IP video surveillance systems is also restraining the growth of the global school and campus security market. The increasing Hospitality and casinos and rising demand for mobile video surveillance are serving the opportunities fuelling the growth of the global school and campus security market.Request TOC (desk of content material), Figures and Tables of the report:Some of the key players dominating the global school and campus security market are HikVision Digital Technology Co., Ltd, Agent Video Intelligence, Bosch Security Systems Inc., Honeywell Security Group, Pelco Inc., Cisco Systems Inc., Genetec Inc., and Axis Communications AB, among others. Earlier the global school and campus security market was dominated by few players with relatively low brand products. However, after the rapidly increase in the number of crimes and the rising demand for security, the demand for school and campus security has increased among the schools and campuses.About UsPersistence Market Research (PMR) is a U.S.-based full-service market intelligence firm specializing in syndicated research, custom research, and consulting services. PMR boasts market research expertise across the Healthcare, Chemicals and Materials, Technology and Media, Energy and Mining, Food and Beverages, Semiconductor and Electronics, Consumer Goods, and Shipping and Transportation industries. The company draws from its multi-disciplinary capabilities and high-pedigree team of analysts to share data that precisely corresponds to clients business needs.PMR stands committed to bringing more accuracy and speed to clients business decisions. From ready-to-purchase market research reports to customized research solutions, PMRs engagement models are highly flexible without compromising on its deep-seated research values.ContactPersistence Market Research Pvt. Ltd305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.com
Global and China Hydrochloric Acid Industry

Market Research HUB

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http://www.marketresearchhub.com/report/global-and-chinese-hydrochloric-acid-industry-2016-market-research-report-report.html

http://www.marketresearchhub.com/

Albany, New York, September 16, 2016:According to a new research report added recently to the expanding market research catalog of Market Research Hub (MRH), hydrochloric acid is a crucial industrial chemical and is used in a variety of applications. The global hydrochloric acid industry has flourished in the last few years due to the rapid expansion of the industrial sector, and is showing no signs of slowing down in the coming years. The report, titled Gobal and Chinese Hydrochloric Acid Industry, 2016 Market Research Report, is available for sale on the official website of Market Research Hub.Request for Free Sample Report:The report opens with a brief summary of the global and China hydrochloric acid markets development in the past few years. The many industrial uses of hydrochloric acid are also described in brief in this section. Tracking the markets historical development, the report then presents an overview of the global and China hydrochloric acid industrys current figures. This provides the readers with a concise summation of the markets historical development, which is crucial in understanding the markets future behavior.The manufacturing technology employed in the industrial-scale manufacture of hydrochloric acid is described next in the report. The historical progression of the industrial manufacturing method of hydrochloric acid is described in the report. The technical specifications of the manufacturing process of hydrochloric acid are described in detail in the report, to acquaint the readers with the nuances of the process. Following this, recent trends influencing the development of hydrochloric acid manufacture are described in the report.The competitive landscape of the global hydrochloric acid industry is then analyzed in the report by profiling the leading manufacturers operating in the market. Company profiles of key companies are given in the report, along with information on their product catalog. This is a crucial part of the report, as its helps provide actionable insights into the development of the competitive dynamics of the global and China hydrochloric acid market.The 2011-2016 development trajectory of the global and China hydrochloric acid industry is analyzed in terms of key figures, including industrial capacity, production figures, and production value. The costs and the resultant profit margin in the global and China hydrochloric acid industry are also described in the report. Chinas role in the global hydrochloric acid industry is elaborated upon in detail in the report, which provides the supply, consumption, import, and export figures of the China hydrochloric acid market between 2011 and 2016.Browse Full Report with TOC @Further, 2016-2021 forecasts for the global and China hydrochloric acid industry are provided based on the same parameters. This, in combination with the markets historical analysis, gives the readers a smooth extrapolative analysis of the factors that drive the development of the global and China hydrochloric acid industry. The key development opportunities and challenges in the global and China hydrochloric acid market are also described in detail in the report.About Market Research HUBMarket Research HUB (MRH) is a next-generation reseller of research reports and analysis. MRHs expansive collection of market research reports has been carefully curated to help key personnel and decision makers across industry verticals to clearly visualize their operating environment and take strategic steps.MRH functions as an integrated platform for the following products and services: Objective and sound market forecasts, qualitative and quantitative analysis, incisive insight into defining industry trends, and market share estimates. Our reputation lies in delivering value and world-class capabilities to our clients.Contact Us90 State Street,Albany, NY 12207,United StatesToll Free : 866-997-4948 (US-Canada)Tel : +1-518-621-2074Email : sales@marketresearchhub.comWebsite :
Commercial space base to be built in Wuhan Updated: 2016-09-16 07:11 By Zhao Lei(China Daily Europe)

China's first commercial space industry base will be built in Wuhan, capital of Hubei province, according to an agreement signed on Sept 12.

The base will focus on the development of carrier rockets and satellites, commercial launch services and applications of satellite data.

Zhang Di, deputy director of the Fourth Academy of China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp, says the base plans to have an annual production capacity of 50 carrier rockets and 140 commercial satellites by 2020.

The deal was signed at the Second China Commercial Aerospace Forum, which was attended by more than 700 government officials, military officers and experts.

In mid-February, the Fourth Academy set up China's second commercial launch provider, Expace Technology Co, as the backbone of the Wuhan space base.

The company, which has registered capital of 300 million yuan ($44.8 million; 39.9 million euros), has signed a 100 million yuan launch contract with several domestic clients, says Zhang, who is also the company's chairman. He declined to give names due to business confidentiality.

He adds that Expace has received orders for more than 10 launches using the academy's solid-fuel Kuaizhou rockets.

"In fact, orders have been continuing to swarm into our company, but we have to reject some of them because we must guarantee a good service quality," Zhang says. "We don't worry about orders because our rate, around $10,000 for each kilogram of payload, is much lower than the average charge in the international market, which ranges from $25,000 to $30,000."

In China, a commercial launch generally refers to a space launch activity paid for by an entity other than a Chinese government department or military agency.

China has launched 53 Long March rockets to carry 61 satellites into space for 24 foreign clients.

However, all of these commercial missions were undertaken by Long March rockets, which were developed by China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp, another major contractor.

Because of different mission requirements, the Long March series, which mainly uses liquid propellant, has heavier launch capacities and longer flight ranges.

China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp began to develop Kuaizhou rockets in 2009, intending to form a low-cost, quick-response rocket family for the commercial launch market.

The first flight of a Kuaizhou rocket was in September 2013, when the company launched Kuaizhou 1 from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Gansu province to put an Earth observation satellite into orbit.

In November 2014, Kuaizhou 2 sent another satellite into space from the same launch center.

The Fourth Academy is now making Kuaizhou 11 and plans to launch it in 2017, according to Liang Jiqiu, chief designer of the program.

Liang says the Kuaizhou 11 has a liftoff weight of 78 metric tons and will be capable of placing a 1- ton payload into a sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of 700 kilometers, or a 1.5-ton payload into a low Earth orbit at an altitude of 400 km.

He says the road-mobile rocket's prelaunch preparations will take little time, and the launch can be conducted on rough terrain.

Gao Hongwei, chairman of China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp, says the Kuaizhou rockets have a high level of strategic importance and a huge market potential. He said investments in the commercial launch sector bring a return of up to 14 times the original input.

Hu Shengyun, a senior rocket engineer at the Fourth Academy, estimates that by 2020, the market value of commercial space activities in China will reach 30 billion yuan a year.

zhaolei@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 09/16/2016 page14)
Global Sapphire Technology Market Supply & Demand By 2015 2021

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http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/4785

Sapphire is basically aluminum oxide in its pure from which has no porosity or boundaries, and hence dense in nature. Low dislocation and high purity have led to adoption of sapphire as an ideal material to be used in wide range of electronic substrates. Thin sapphire wafers are used as an insulating substrate in high-frequency and high-power CMOS integrated circuits. These integrated circuits are known as silicon on sapphire (SOS) chip. These chips are primarily used for high-power radio-frequency (RF) applications which include satellite communication systems, cellular telephones, and others. In SOS chip both analog and digital circuitry integration takes place. Since, sapphire has higher conductivity for heat and lower for electricity; sapphire provides good insulation and even balances the generated heat in the circuit.Download Sample @Owing to these advantages, sapphire has evolved as a versatile material that is used specifically in semiconductor industry, which is characterized by requirement for cost effective, time saving, and efficient operational solutions. Incorporation of sapphire technology for fabrication of components for use in end-use products across industries such as consumer electronics, aerospace and defense, power, and other sectors can help device manufacturers, achieve efficient performance. There is huge potential for sapphire technology in different devices and applications required across different end-use industries. Thus, demand for sapphire technology is directly influenced by trend across these industries. For instance, a Silicon-on-Sapphire chip, which is formed by depositing a very thin layer of silicon in a sapphire wafer at high temperature, has profound use in consumer electronics sector majorly for LED technology market. There are primarily two ways to make SOS wafer which include epitaxial SOS semiconductor technology and bonded SOS technology. .Factors such as high cost effectiveness as compared to other substrate materials, increased demand for LED technology are expected to drive demand for sapphire technology in future. Moreover, improved manufacturing processes resulting in use of silicon on sapphire for wafer processing is further expected to fuel demand for sapphire technology.. n addition, manufactures are also keen on developing solutions using sapphire technology, which would result in less operational cost and maximize profits. This is due to the benefits of insulating substrate, which includes low power consumption, low parasitic capacitance resulting in increased speed, and better isolation, and high linearity as compared to bulk silicon. Furthermore, there are low entry barriers for players to invest in this market resulting is high degree of competition.The sapphire technology market is segmented on the basis of various parameters which include technology, substrate wafer and orientation type, and by application. Sapphire technology comprises of sapphire substrate technology and process, different production methods, and other growth methods for sapphire. The sapphire technology process is further classified as slicing, die polishing, lapping, and chemical-mechanical planarization (CMP). Different production methods for the same include kyropoulos method, Heat Exchanger Method (HEM), Czochralski Crystal Pulling Method, and Edge-Defined Film-Fed Growth (EFG) Method, among others. The market is further classified on the basis of silicon substrate wafer and orientation type which includes different sapphire types such as Silicon Carbide on Sapphire, Gallium Nitride on Sapphire, Silicon on Sapphire (SOS), and others. Based on the wafer size, classification includes 12 inch, 24 inch, 36 inch, and others. Moreover, varied plane orientations such as a-plane, c-plane, r-plane, and others are used to define orientation of sapphire substrates. Sapphire technology market classified on the basis of devices comprises of power semiconductor market and opto-semiconductors. The power semiconductor segment includes market for power discrete devices such as diodes, switches, Radio frequency integrated circuit (RFIC), Monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC), and others. Sapphire technology has wide applications across consumer electronics, power, aerospace and defense, industrial, automotive, and others.Request TOC (desk of content material), Figures and Tables of the report:The prominent players of this market include ACME Electronics Corporation, Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, Monocrystal Inc., Kyocera Corporation, Rubicon Technology Inc., DK Aztec Co., Ltd., GT Advanced Technologies Inc., Sapphire Technology Co., Ltd., Namiki Precision Jewel Co., Ltd, Tera Xtal Technology Corporation, Sumitomo Chemical Co., Ltd. among others.About UsPersistence Market Research (PMR) is a U.S.-based full-service market intelligence firm specializing in syndicated research, custom research, and consulting services. PMR boasts market research expertise across the Healthcare, Chemicals and Materials, Technology and Media, Energy and Mining, Food and Beverages, Semiconductor and Electronics, Consumer Goods, and Shipping and Transportation industries. The company draws from its multi-disciplinary capabilities and high-pedigree team of analysts to share data that precisely corresponds to clients business needs.PMR stands committed to bringing more accuracy and speed to clients business decisions. From ready-to-purchase market research reports to customized research solutions, PMRs engagement models are highly flexible without compromising on its deep-seated research values.ContactPersistence Market Research Pvt. Ltd305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.com
Global WiFi Enabled LTE Small Cell Gateway Market Competitive landscape By 2015  2021

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WiFi enabled LTE small cell gateway is a type of a base station. Base station uses cellular wireless network for communicating with mobile phones or terminals. Base station connects mobile phones to a wireless carrier network and offers local coverage for a wireless network. The area of coverage varies from several miles to few city blocks. Each base station is typically owned by one carrier or wireless company and gives coverage only for that company's network. It may also offer roaming coverage for other networks in case carriers have agreement for roaming and technology is compatible. Base station comprises of an electronic cabinet which connected by means of cables to a group of antennas. The antennas may be mounted on an existing structure or on dedicated tower structure including top of a building, church steeple or smoke-stack and water tower.In radio communications, base station refers to wireless communications station implemented at a fixed location and used to communicate as wireless telephone system including cellular GSM or CDMA cell site, part push-to-talk two-way radio system, terrestrial trunked radio and two-way radio. A single location often operates several base stations owned by a different carrier. Smaller types of base stations or small cells include picocells, femtocells and microcells. WiFi enabled LTE small cell gateway is promising network element. A wide variety of base station deployments are in a small cell configuration. It has WiFi interface at end-use device and LTE interface at the carrier network.Download Sample @Small cell is low-powered radio access nodes (operator-controlled) that operate in carrier-grade Wi-Fi (unlicensed) and licensed spectrum. Small cells normally have a range from 10 to numerous hundred meters. Small cell base stations are expected to play vital role in expanding the capacity of wireless networks due to increasing mobile data traffic. Mobile operators are increasingly looking forward to this technology in order to meet the rising demands for data, video and application access generated due to smart phones and other devices. Small cells aid mobile service that detect presence, interact wand connect with existing networks. Small cells offer increased quality of service and flexibility at an affordable cost. Small cell infrastructure implantation is an environmentally friendly approach as it reduces the number of cell towers and offers a cleaner signal using less power.Rising numbers of wireless carriers or companies are taking dedicated interest in this industry owing to the proliferation of embedded WiFi features in fixed and mobile devices. Growing demand for more advanced handheld devices such as smart-phones and tablets is expected to create demand for technologies with high internet speed. This in turn, is expected to drive the growth of WiFi enabled LTE small cell gateways.Request TOC (desk of content material), Figures and Tables of the report:Some of the major participants in WiFi enabled LTE small cell gateway industry include wireless network infrastructure vendors, technology providers, WiFi network providers, chipset, software and component vendors, small cell backhaul solution providers among others. Some of the small cell backhaul solution providers are Athena Wireless Communications, BLiNQ Networks, DragonWave, BluWan, Ceragon, FastBack Networks, Intracom Telecom, Cambium Networks, LightPoint Communications, Siklu, BridgeWave Communications, Tarana Wireless and others. WiFi Network Providers are Quadriga Worldwide, Devicescape Software, Boingo Wireless, AlwaysOn, BSkyB (The Cloud), Fon Wireless and Towerstream Corporation among others.About UsPersistence Market Research (PMR) is a U.S.-based full-service market intelligence firm specializing in syndicated research, custom research, and consulting services. PMR boasts market research expertise across the Healthcare, Chemicals and Materials, Technology and Media, Energy and Mining, Food and Beverages, Semiconductor and Electronics, Consumer Goods, and Shipping and Transportation industries. The company draws from its multi-disciplinary capabilities and high-pedigree team of analysts to share data that precisely corresponds to clients business needs.PMR stands committed to bringing more accuracy and speed to clients business decisions. From ready-to-purchase market research reports to customized research solutions, PMRs engagement models are highly flexible without compromising on its deep-seated research values.ContactPersistence Market Research Pvt. Ltd305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.com
Global Advanced Wound Care Market is Driven by Growth in Increased Incidence Cases of Diabetes, Obesity, and Increasing Awareness

www.psmarketresearch.com/market-analysis/advanced-wound-care-market

www.psmarketresearch.com/market-analysis/advanced-wound-care-market/report-sample

www.psmarketresearch.com/industry-report/healthcare

www.psmarketresearch.com

The global advanced wound care market was valued at $10,659.6 million in 2015, and it is expected to grow at a CAGR of 7.0% during the period 2016-2022. The advanced wound care market is growing due to increasing geriatric population and increasing awareness about these products combined with its increasing adoption. Increasing incidences cases of obesity and diabetes are also leading to increased demand for advanced wound care products. Among the different types of advanced wound care, the advanced wound dressing segment is expected to witness the fastest growth during the forecast period.Explore Report with Detailed TOC at:Advanced wound care products have better therapeutic efficacy as compared to the traditional wound care products, such as gauge, bandage, sponge and others. The utilization of advanced wound care products promote the wound healing process and reduces the recovery time. As a result, demand for advanced wound dressing, wound therapy devices and active wound care products is expected to increase. These are used in both inpatient facilities and outpatient facilities to provide better treatment to patients suffering from burns, ulcers, surgical wounds and chronic wounds. Advanced wound dressing include foam dressing, hydrocolloid dressing, alginate dressing, film dressing, hydrogel dressing, collagen dressing and others. Wound therapy devices include negative pressure wound therapy (NPWT) devices, oxygen and hyperbaric oxygen equipment, electrical stimulation devices, and others to promote wound healing. Active wound care products include artificial skin and skin substitutes and topical agents.Request for Sample Pages:Some of the key companies operating in the global advanced wound care market include 3M Company, Coloplast Corporation, ConvaTec Inc., Medtronic plc, Smith and Nephew plc, Integra Life Sciences Corporation, Molyncke Health Care, Mo-Sci Corporation, Organogenesis Inc., Acelity L.P. Inc., DeRoyal Industries Inc., DermaRite Industries LLC., Derma Sciences Inc., Hollister Incorporated and CONMED Corporation.Explore Related Report at:GLOBAL ADVANCED WOUND CARE MARKET SEGMENTATIONBy Type Advanced Wound Dressingo Foam Dressingo Hydrocolloid Dressingo Film Dressingo Alginate Dressingo Hydrogel Dressingo Collagen Dressingo Others Wound Therapy Deviceso Negative Pressure Wound Therapy (NPWT) Deviceso Oxygen and Hyperbaric Oxygen Equipmento Electrical Stimulation Deviceso Others Active Wound Care Productso Artificial Skin and Skin Substituteso Topical AgentsBy Application Surgical and Chronic Wounds Ulcers BurnsBy End-User Inpatient Facilities Outpatient FacilitiesBy Geography North America- U.S. and Rest of North America Europe- U.K., Germany, France and Rest of Europe Asia-Pacific - China, Japan, India and Rest of Asia-Pacific Rest of the World (RoW)- Brazil and Rest of Rest of the WorldAbout P&S Market ResearchP&S Market Research is a market research company, which offers market research and consulting services for various geographies around the globe. We provide market research reports, industry forecasting reports, business intelligence, and research based consulting services across different industry/business verticals.As one of the top growing market research agency, were keen upon providing market landscape and accurate forecasting. Our analysts and consultants are proficient with business intelligence and market analysis, through their interaction with leading companies of the concerned domain. We help our clients with B2B market research and assist them in identifying various windows of opportunity, and framing informed and customized business expansion strategies in different regions.Contact:DeepAssistant  Client Partner347, 5th Ave. #1402New York City, NY - 10016Toll-free: +1-888-778-7886 (USA/Canada)Email: enquiry@psmarketresearch.comWeb:347 5th Ave. #1402- 210New York CityUnited States
Global Digital Crosspoint Switches Market Competitive landscape By 2015  2021

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Digital crosspoint switch is significantly considered as the next generation high speed packet switch. Digital crosspoint switches is used to transfer data at faster rate and are basically used in packet switching and telephony. Additionally, digital crosspoint switches are used in applications which include mechanical, medical, video and military among others. This is because digital crosspoint switches can handle several protocols, clock sources and data streams. Over past few years, semiconductor companies have developed chip-to-chip serial links that were deployed in various commercial routers and switches. Crosspoint switch enables high performance for two reasons, first faster data transfer and high speed data. Due to fast innovation pace coupled with changing market conditions in telecommunication industry and proliferation of standards, the digital crosspoint switch market provides opportunity for various integrated circuit manufacturers.Download Sample @Digital crosspoint switches are commonly used as multiplexer in communication and networking infrastructure. Digital crosspoint switches are expected to achieve significant growth with increasing demand of less expensive, smaller and powerful crosspoint switches. Additionally, increasing demand of 3G wireless service, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and wireless web devices have augmented the need for wide bandwidth communication systems. As digital crosspoint switches are intended to reduce the cost when implementing new systems, migration of broadcasting services such as multimedia-on-demand and cable TV to packet oriented networks is expected to provide major opportunity for this market. The telecommunication industry is rapidly changing. In the past, telecommunication market was driven by technology involved in voice service. Today, digital crosspoint switches are acting as building blocks for telecom systems by providing high flexibility and performance. The continuous adoption of broadband technology have created significant opportunity for IC suppliers that can create cost effective solutions for transport and processing of data. Additionally, increasing adoption of next generation wireless devices which include features such as video recorders, cameras, internet browsing in addition to capabilities such blogging, instant messaging and e-mail, the digital crosspoint switch market is poised to grow.Request TOC (desk of content material), Figures and Tables of the report:Crosspoint switches vary in terms of performance and configuration. Some digital crosspoint switches are designed for data acquisition applications, computers, commercial, avionics, automotive, and audio applications. Whereas other crosspoint switches are designed for video, military, medical and industrial applications. With respect to features, digital crosspoint switches may include on-chip electrostatic discharge protection, thermal, fault tolerance and short circuit protection. Digital crosspoint switches provides key interconnect technology and signal integrity that helps to solve the issues posed with high speed networking. The major challenge for manufacturers of digital crosspoint switches is increasing the aggregate data rate and number of ports. The key players of the market include LSI Corporation, Texas Instruments Inc., Alcatel-Lucent, Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd., Mindspeed Technologies Inc., Vitesse Semiconductor Corporation, Cisco Systems Inc. and Juniper Networks among others.About UsPersistence Market Research (PMR) is a U.S.-based full-service market intelligence firm specializing in syndicated research, custom research, and consulting services. PMR boasts market research expertise across the Healthcare, Chemicals and Materials, Technology and Media, Energy and Mining, Food and Beverages, Semiconductor and Electronics, Consumer Goods, and Shipping and Transportation industries. The company draws from its multi-disciplinary capabilities and high-pedigree team of analysts to share data that precisely corresponds to clients business needs.PMR stands committed to bringing more accuracy and speed to clients business decisions. From ready-to-purchase market research reports to customized research solutions, PMRs engagement models are highly flexible without compromising on its deep-seated research values.ContactPersistence Market Research Pvt. Ltd305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.com
Data Center on Demand (DCoD) market to reach approximately US$10 billion in 2021

Data Center On Demand Market | Beige Market Intelligence

http://www.beigemarketintelligence.com/reports/research-report-ict-market/data-centre-demand-market-report/

Beige Market Intelligence has published a new market research report Strategic Assessment of Worldwide Data Center on Demand (DCoD) Market  Forecast Till 2021Data Center on Demand (DCoD) Market market research report was recently published by Beige Market intelligence with a worldwide coverage as well as a segmentation by Product (facility containers, IT containers, All-in-One) by Container size (20 feet, 40 feet, customized) by Geography (APAC, Europe, Latin America, Middle East and Africa, and North America) by End-users (BFSI, Defence, Energy, Oil and Gas, IT, Retail, Telecommunication & CSP and Others) and by company share within each product category. The market research report provides growth trends, analysis and forecasts for the period 2016  2021 and predicts the market to record a total revenue generation of approximately US$10 billion by 2021.There is a demand for cloud-based services which is evident from the increasing traffic volume on the internet. With high volume of search, there is slight latency in information being retrieved from a data center. This of course depends on where the request was put in and where the data center is located. In order to reduce the latency, a new set of data centers have emerged i.e., an edge data center. These are small data centers in close within a particular locality which is responsible for addressing the traffic of the local users. This reduces the latency issue and also ensures low TCO. Edge data centers are expected to have a positive impact on the overall Data Center on Demand (DCoD) market in the coming years.All-in-one containers approximately 3 times more expensive than facility containers as of 2015The ASP of facility containers is expected decline during the forecast period. One of the key reasons for this is that the demand for facility containers in the market will reduce considerably by 2020. Furthermore, the shipment of facility containers is expected to be much lower in comparison to IT and All-in-one containers which are already proving to have more advantages than a facility container.North America contributing to more than 30 percent of the Demand for Data Center on Demand as of 2015The vast majority of deployment of Data Center on Demand (DCoD) in North America was primarily from the US. The demand for Data Center on Demand in the US will remain high during the forecast period due to the requirement for additional capacity to the existing data centers within the country and also due to the deployment of edge data centers. Most enterprises and CSPs in the region are contemplating the adoption of containerized data centers to add more capacity to their existing data centers. With business data and computing usage growing at a significant rate, most of the Tier 4 data centers will require additional capacity to power new business applications thereby creating the demand for Data Center on Demand.All-in-one containers expected to account for 65 % in revenue of demand for DCoD by 2021All-in-one containers account for the major share of the market as of 2015 primarily due to their high ASP. In terms of unit shipments however, all-in-one containers are not leading the demand for Data Center on Demand (DCoD) as of 2015. The number of all-in-one containers in the US is expected to reach more than 50 by 2019.Competition among vendors in the DCoD marketCompanies operating in the Data Center on Demand (DCoD) market include BladeRoom, Bull, Cirrascale, Commscope, Cisco Systems, Dell, Elliptical, Emerson Network Power, HP, Huawei, IBM, MDC Stockholm, Rittal, Schneider Electric, SGI and ZTE.To know more about the Data Center on Demand (DCoD) report, please check the linkAbout Beige Market IntelligenceBeige Market Intelligence is a provider of competitive business intelligence, working across various industry verticals. Our expertise and knowledge ensures that the market analysis Beige provides is comprehensive, detailed and complete. The analysis helps our client organizations become aware and to make educated decisions, as far as investing or devising a marketing strategy is concerned. The actionable insights delivered through our market research provide a comprehensive market analysis for every level of market segmentation in an industry.Our team of experts ensure the analysis you receive is not just analyzed and presented, but can also be customized based on the clients requirement. Our deliverables guarantee our current global client base do not look beyond Beige when it comes to competitive intelligence.Beige has an employee base present across the globe. Our analysts come with numerous years of industry experience, which ensures we not only understand our clients but deliver high quality reports as well.Beige Market IntelligenceChinnapanahalli Main Road, Doddanekundi, Bangalore-560037Contact uscontactus@beigemarketintelligence.comUS: +1 347 903 9949UK: +44 20 323 99499APAC: +91 99 012 75473
Omnex Announces Next Phase In ISO 26262 Functional Safety Consortium

https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/7479319373276141825

http://www.omnex.com

http://www.omnex.com/training/webinars/iso-26262-functional-safety-consortium.aspx

Omnex, Inc., the leading innovator of product launch and engineering software solutions, announced today the next phase of their newly developed ISO 26262 Functional Safety Consortium. After speaking with over 100 potential consortium members, the needs and expectations of consortium members are becoming much clearer. Antony John, Vice President of Omnex Systems, succinctly put it, The response has shown us that companies need the consortium to have more of a focus on automated processes with software and less of a focus on training and process development. If we work on process development or training, they would like us to do it for them outside the consortium.The discussions with the consortium members have been invaluable to the development of the consortium because they have shown Omnex what the industry perceives as the critical issues in Functional Safety. Understanding these issues and needs of consortium members has helped direct the consortium goals and deliverables to focus on the critical needs of the automotive industry regarding ISO 26262 Functional Safety. Chad Kymal, the CTO of Omnex, Inc., said, The goal of the consortium is to develop solutions that solve the critical Functional Safety issues in the industry. The consortium will also focus on the specific issues of consortium members allowing them to use this solution as a competitive advantage in winning customer contracts.Want to learn more? Join the Omnex webinar Key Challenges of ISO 26262 in Automotive Organizations where the top critical issues in Functional Safety and potential solutions will be discussed. These are the problems and solutions top executives need to understand and solve in their organizations. This webinar will be presented on Friday, September 16th @ 11:30 AM Eastern. Click here to register:. Existing customers should contact their Omnex account representative; others should contact info@omnex.com.About OmnexOmnex Inc. is a global business consulting solution provider with headquarters in Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA, serving the automotive, aerospace, semiconductor, high technology, manufacturing, and service industries. Omnex provides implementation, consulting, training, software, and staffing in subject areas ranging from ISO 26262 Functional Safety, New Product Development (APQP) to Lean / Six Sigma from its numerous global offices. Omnex is dedicated to bringing together world-class talent with local presence to deliver high impact expertise in today's global business environment.For more information visit:Omnex World Headquarters | 315 E. Eisenhower Parkway, Suite 214 | Ann Arbor | Michigan | 48108 | USA
Image Sensors - Global Market Outlook (2015-2022)

According to Stratistics MRC, the Global Image Sensors Market is accounted for $10.17 billion in 2015 and expected to grow at a CAGR of 11.4% to reach $21.74 billion by 2022. Factors such as camera enabled mobile phones, increased use of image sensors in biometric applications and rising usage of these sensors in automobile industry are driving the market growth. High speed and low cost CMOS for holographic storage market as well as, optical molecular imaging techniques in healthcare will provide opportunities for image sensors market. However, declining sales of single reflex cameras, higher pricing pressure and high power consumption in CCD image sensors will hinder the market.CCD and CIS technologies are expected to witness significant CAGR during the forecast period. Consumer electronics was accounted for the largest share in the market followed by medical applications which is expected to be the fastest growing segment. Asia Pacific is the largest and fastest growing market due to proliferation of smartphones. North America is the second largest market followed by Europe in terms of revenue.Some of the key players in global image sensors market are Canon Inc., Thermo Fisher Scientific, Fujifilm, Galaxycore Inc., Hitachi Ltd., Karl Storz GmbH & Co. KG, On Semiconductor Corporation, Panasonic Corporation, Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, Sharp Corporation, Sony Corporation, Teledyne Technologies, Inc., Toshiba Corporation and Nikon.Technologies Covered: CCD CMOSo FSI Technologyo BSI Technologyo 3D Stacking Technology CISSpecifications Covered: Array Typeo Linear Image Sensoro Area Image Sensor Processing Typeo 3D Image Sensorso 2D Image Sensors Spectrumo Visible Spectrumo X-Ray Lighto Non Visible SpectrumApplications Covered: Defence & Aerospace Automotive Industrial Consumer Electronics Medical and Surgical Surveillance Other ApplicationsRegions Covered: North Americao USo Canadao Mexico Europeo Germanyo Franceo Italyo UKo Spaino Rest of Europe Asia Pacifico Japano Chinao Indiao Australiao New Zealando Rest of Asia Pacific Rest of the Worldo Middle Easto Brazilo Argentinao South Africao EgyptWhat our report offers:- Market share assessments for the regional and country level segments- Market share analysis of the top industry players- Strategic recommendations for the new entrants- Market forecasts for a minimum of 7 years of all the mentioned segments, sub segments and the regional markets- Market Trends (Drivers, Constraints, Opportunities, Threats, Challenges, Investment Opportunities, and recommendations)- Strategic recommendations in key business segments based on the market estimations- Competitive landscaping mapping the key common trends- Company profiling with detailed strategies, financials, and recent developments- Supply chain trends mapping the latest technological advancementsWe offer wide spectrum of research and consulting services with in-depth knowledge of different industries. We are known for customized research services, consulting services and Full Time Equivalent services in the research world. We explore the market trends and draw our insights with valid assessments and analytical views. We use advanced techniques and tools among the quantitative and qualitative methodologies to identify the market trends. Our research reports and publications are routed to help our clients to design their business models and enhance their business growth in the competitive market scenario. We have a strong team with hand-picked consultants including project managers, implementers, industry experts, researchers, research evaluators and analysts with years of experience in delivering the complex projects.17049 King James Way, Gaithersburg,MD, 20877, USA
Demand For Small-Scale LNG Onshore Liquefaction Terminals will Shift to High Gear, States TMR

http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=S&rep_id=4687

The small scale LNG terminals market is poised to be proliferated by top hydrocarbon companies. In addition, a number of bunkering companies such as Skangass AS, etc. have also been actively investing in this market. Top upstream companies such as Royal Dutch Shell plc. coupled with energy infrastructure development players are taking efforts for the construction of small-scale LNG terminals in the coming years. Furthermore, large players having physical assets are gaining more advantage in the market as compared to those lacking the same, Transparency Market Research (TMR) finds in the new study.The global small scale LNG terminals market was valued at 50.47 MMTPA in 2015 and is predicted to touch 102.44 MMTPA by 2022. In terms of type, primary development is being witnessed by the segment of onshore only. However, owing to the increasing deployment of a number of small gas fields by numerous hydrocarbon companies, the offshore segments may also gain demand in the coming years.Small-Scale Onshore Liquefaction Terminals to Gain Huge DemandThe small-scale onshore liquefaction terminals led the market in the past, however this segment is expected to lose a small amount of its share by 2022. Nevertheless, this segment will gain the maximum demand all through the forecast period. This is owing to the increasing deployment of these terminals in the supply of LNG bunkering facilities and urban transportation networks. On the other hand, the segment of offshore small-scale regasification terminals has gained immense impetus in 2015 and is predicted to take a share of 9.70% by 2022.Get free research PDF for more Professional and Technical insights :Asia Pacific is poised to gain a dominant share in the market for small scale LNG terminals by 2022 and will be trailed by North America, constituting the second-largest share in the market. Asia Pacific is predicted to touch 24.42 MMTPA by 2022. On the other hand, a meagre market share will be taken by both the Middle East and Africa and South America regions.Increasing Requirement for Natural Gas to Fuel Demand for Small Scale LNG TerminalsThere is an increasing demand for LNG owing to eco-friendly nature of natural gas in comparison with other fossil fuel sources. This will fuel the growth of the overall small scale LNG terminals market. The rising investments in the manufacturing of small gas fields will also provide impetus to the growth of this market, says a TMR analyst. Hence, a number of owners of large long haul vehicle fleet have adopted LNG as a substitute fuel source, thus boosting the growth of the overall small scale LNF terminals.On the other hand, factors such as absence of continuous demand from end-use segments and issues in infrastructure development may impede the growth of the overall market. In addition, the count of companies involved in the small scale LNG terminals construction is low, thus posing a negative impact on the development of this market, states a TMR analyst. Furthermore, the demand for LNG in the segment of land transit, particularly trucks, is wavering in Asia Pacific, which is a key LNG importer globally. This will also negatively impact the development of the overall small scale LNG terminals market in the coming years.Nevertheless, , the concept of small-scale LNG terminals has come up as an apt solution in order to make natural gas easily available to a number of end-use segments, which arent presently joint to pipeline networks. This has emerged as a key opportunity in the overall market.The small scale LNG terminals market is segmented as follows:TypeLiquefaction Terminals, typeOnshoreOffshoreRegasification Terminals, typeOnshoreOffshoreAbout UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a market intelligence company, providing global business information reports and services. Our exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trends analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMR's experienced team of Analysts, Researchers, and Consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.Our data repository is continuously updated and revised by a team of research experts, so that it always reflects the latest trends and information. With a broad research and analysis capability, Transparency Market Research employs rigorous primary and secondary research techniques in developing distinctive data sets and research material for business reports.90 Sate Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207
Cell Culture Market Research Study For Forecast 2022, Challenges, Demand, Woldwide Overview

http://www.mrrse.com/cell-culture-market

http://www.mrrse.com/checkdiscount/1502

http://www.mrrse.com/sample/1502

The global cell culture market has grown significantly in the last ten years. The demand for artificial organs and biopharmaceuticals has boosted this market extensively in past and is likely to fuel its growth further in the coming years. Additionally, the rising usage of cell culture models in drug discoveries is expected to present an opportunity-rich market for major cell culture market players.The global market for cell culture is mainly divided into the markets for cell culture consumables and cell culture instruments. Media, reagents, and sera are the key products of the global cell culture consumables market. Incubators, culture systems, pipetting instruments, biosafety cabinets, roller bottle equipment, and cryostorage equipment are the key segments of the global cell culture instruments market.Read Complete Report @The media segment is further classified into chemically-defined media, lysogeny broth, classical media, protein-free media, specialty media, and serum-free media. The sera segment includes fetal bovine serum and other animal sera. Albumin, attachment factors, amino acids, cytokines and growth factors, thrombin, and protease inhibitors are the key products of the reagents segment.Apart from this, the global cell culture market is also categorized on the basis of its regional distribution into North America, Asia Pacific, Europe, and the Rest of the World.Inquiry for Check discount @This research report aims at providing a clear picture of the global market for cell culture. It also assists the market participants in making crucial strategies rewarding decisions to gain a competitive edge over peers.Overview of the Global Cell Culture marketThe global cell culture market stood at US$6.1 bn in 2013. Analysts project this market to report a healthy rise between 2014 and 2022 at a CAGR of 7.10% and reach US$11.3 bn by the end of 2022.The market for cell culture instruments is driven by technical advancement in designs and operations of various instruments available in this market. On the other hand, the rising application of cell culture media in developing research model systems and to study cellular structures and operations, genetic engineering, and stem cell research is stimulating the cell culture consumables market. The media segment has been leading the cell culture consumables market and is expected to maintain its dominance, posting the fastest growth over the forecast period.Get a Free Sample Copy of the Report @The cell culture market in North America led the global market in 2013. However, the Asia Pacific market for cell culture is likely to report the fastest growth during the forecast period, primarily due to the improvement in the economic condition of developing nations in this region.On the whole, the global cell culture market is poised to experience a healthy rise between 2014 and 2022. However, the ethical concerns over the usage of animal sources, coupled with the need for advanced production capabilities in order to meet the standards set by regulatory bodies, are anticipated to hamper the growth of this market in the coming years.Companies mentioned in the research reportThermo Fisher Scientific Inc., VWR International LLC, Lonza Group Ltd., GE Healthcare, Becton, Dickinson & Co., EMD Millipore, Corning Life Sciences B.V., PromoCell GmbH, Sigma-Aldrich Co. LLC., and Wheaton Industries Inc. are the key companies operating in the global cell culture market.MRRSE stands for Market Research Reports Search Engine, the largest online catalog of latest market research reports based on industries, companies, and countries. MRRSE sources thousands of industry reports, market statistics, and company profiles from trusted entities and makes them available at a click. Besides well-known private publishers, the reports featured on MRRSE typically come from national statistics agencies, investment agencies, leading media houses, trade unions, governments, and embassies.Corporate OfficeState Tower,90 State Street,Suite 700,Albany NY - 12207United States
Automotive Battery Market : share and size up to 2015  2021

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http://www.zionmarketresearch.com/prebook/su/automotive-battery-market

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Automotive battery is a battery that supplies electric energy to automobiles. It is also widely known as rechargeable battery. Automotive batteries are mainly used for SLI (starting, lighting, and ignition) systems and their main purpose is to start the system. Apart from starting the engine, automotive batteries supply the extra power required when the vehicle's electrical requirements exceed the supply from the charging system. Moreover, it is a stabilizer that balances potentially damaging voltage spikes.Get a copy of free Sample Report @The global automotive battery market is proving its dominance in the vehicle market owing to its increasing demand for batteries. These batteries serve numerous automotive applications. Rising demand for hybrid, semi-hybrid, and fully electric vehicles will the growth of automotive vehicles market in a positive way in the near future. In addition, the new trend of providing latest vehicles with startstop batteries will further boost the growth of the global market. Owing to the developments in the automotive batteries, the adoption rate of these batteries is increasing in passenger and commercial vehicles. All the above-mentioned factors are setting up the market for electric vehicles, which in turn results in growth of the global automotive battery market.On the basis of battery type, the automotive battery market is segmented as lead acid batteries, lithium ion batteries, nickel metal hybrid batteries, and others. Further the market is segmented based on the vehicle type as electric bikes, hybrid cars, electric cars, and others. On the basis of application, the market can be segmented as two/three wheelers battery, car and light vans battery, heavy motor vehicles battery, and others.Know more before buying this report @North America dominates the global market followed by Europe and Asia Pacific. Automotive battery market is anticipated to witness moderate but steady growth in the near future. The highest growth rate is observed in Asia Pacific and is expected to rise in the coming years. China on the other hand ranks as the fastest growing automotive battery market owing to the high demand for commercial and passenger vehicles in the region. In addition, the new trend of vehicles with latest features will be largely observed in Europe along with the U.S. and China. Increasing demands from other Asian countries such as India, Malaysia, Thailand, and the Philippines further impacts the global market growth in a positive way.Key players in the global automotive battery market include East Penn Manufacturing Co., Inc., Camel Group Co., Ltd., Exide Technologies, FIAMM S.p.A., Fengfan Co., Ltd., Douglas Battery, Zhejiang Narada Power Source Co. Ltd., Johnson Controls Inc., The Furukawa Battery Co., Ltd., and Shandong Sacred Sun Power Sources Co., Ltd., Some other major players in the market are Zhejiang Haijiu Battery Co., Ltd., Chaowei Power Holdings Ltd., Hitachi Ltd., Shandong Sacred Sun Power Sources Co., Ltd., and GS Yuasa Corporation.Browse detail report with in-depth TOC @Automotive Battery Market: Regional Segment AnalysisNorth AmericaU.S.EuropeUKFranceGermanyAsia PacificChinaJapanIndiaLatin AmericaBrazilMiddle East & AfricaPurchase a direct copy of report with TOC @About Us:Zion Market Research is a single destination for all the industry, company and country reports. We feature large repository of latest industry reports, leading and niche company profiles, and market statistics released by reputed private publishers and public organizations. Zion Market Research is the comprehensive collection of market intelligence products and services available on air. We have market research reports from number of leading industry and update our collection daily to provide our clients with the instant online access to our database. With access to this database, our clients will be able to benefit from expert insights on global industries, products, and market trends.Contact Us:Zion Market Research4283, Express Lane,Suite 634-143,Sarasota, Florida 34249, United StatesTel: +49-322 210 92714USA/Canada Toll Free No.1-855-465-4651Email: sales@zionmarketresearch.comWebsite:
'Sky rivers' may divert weather Updated: 2016-09-16 07:11 By Zheng Jinran(China Daily Europe)

Who says you can't do anything about the weather?

Initial research has begun on a way to modify weather patterns to divert massive amounts of water vapor from a place where it's wet to another that's dry.

Scientists are planning to accomplish the goal using weather modification techniques, according to the Xinhua News Agency.

Scientists may soon be able to move clouds. Huang Xiaobing / For China Daily

The Tianhe Project (the name means "sky river") aims to guide air that's saturated with water vapor above the Yangtze River basin northward to the Yellow River basin, where it would become rainfall, says Wang Guangqian, president of Qinghai University and an academician at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

In theory, the project could eventually divert 5 billion cubic meters of water annually across regions - an amount equivalent to 350 Hangzhou West Lakes - to alleviate water shortages in the Yellow River basin and other inland rivers, Wang says.

Wang has been leading a research team of many top scientists looking into the underlying principles for years, including Wei Jiahua, deputy head of Water Resources and Electrical Engineering at Qinghai University.

"By the end of June 2017, we expect to have made some progress toward a certain level of capacity to conduct tests," says Wei, a water resources researcher at Tsinghua University.

Wei says the team has conducted some initial experiments using satellites and ground stations to monitor results, and it will continue to deepen its work with more institutes.

Current research has found stable and orderly passageways that can transport water vapor at the boundary of the troposphere. These passages could be called tianhe, or sky rivers.

Following basic physical laws to transform liquid water on the land to vapor in the air, and then learning how to transport it accurately, the scientists believe they can use rockets to trigger rainfall.

The concept of the sky corridor will maximize the ecological effects of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, boosting the economic and social development for the whole country, especially in the northern areas, says Bao Weimin, an academician at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

"The project has wide and promising prospects for applications," Bao says.

It's not the first time that scholars have considered the feasibility of delivering atmospheric water resources to drought-stricken regions. Discussions have been underway at various levels for decades.

Around 2000, a plan emerged to shift precipitation from the Yarlung Zangbo River area to China's dry northern region.

But scholars never got on board with the concept because of the problem of complex and variable weather conditions, along with geological influences.

In 2007, Gao Dengyi, a researcher at the Institute of Atmosphere Physics, which is part of the science academy, concluded the idea wasn't feasible.

zhengjinran@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 09/16/2016 page15)
Hybrid Power Systems Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends, and Forecast 2016 - 2024

Hybrid Power Systems Market

http://bit.ly/2d2GDlZ

http://www.mrrse.com/hybrid-power-systems-market

The research study is designed to analyze the global hybrid power systems market. The market is calculated in terms of revenue (US$ Mn) based on the annual sales of hybrid power systems. The market for hybrid power systems has been segmented on the basis of type, end-use, and country/region. The global hybrid power systems market, based on type, has been segmented into wind-solar-diesel-hybrid, PV-diesel-hybrid, and others. On the basis of end-use, the hybrid power systems market has been segmented into residential, rural facility electrification, and others.Request A Free Sample Report :The regional segments included in this study are North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa (MEA), and South and Central America (SCA). These regional segments are further divided into country-wise segments. The report provides a detailed growth forecast for the 20162024 period, considering 2015 as the baseline year. Projections have been provided for revenue (US$ Mn) through the annual sales of hybrid power systems.The report includes the key market dynamics affecting the demand for hybrid power systems. As a part of our market dynamics analysis, we have analyzed the market drivers, market restraints, and market opportunities. A comprehensive competitive landscape, which includes company market share analysis and market attractiveness analysis, has also been provided in this report. The report also provides a detailed industry analysis of the global hybrid power systems market with the help of Porters Five Forces model. The Porters Five Forces analysis aids in understanding the five major forces that affect the industry structure and profitability of the global hybrid power systems market. The forces analyzed are the bargaining power of buyers, bargaining power of suppliers, threat of new entrants, threat of substitutes, and degree of competition.The study also includes the value chain of the global hybrid power systems market which provides a glimpse of key suppliers, manufacturers, and distribution channel as well as interaction of suppliers and buyers with end-users. The company market share analysis has been done considering the revenue and global penetration of key market players in the hybrid power systems industry. The market attractiveness involves benchmarking and ranking each technology and region on the basis of numerous parameters. The parameters selected are likely to have a pronounced effect on the demand for each technology in the current scenario as well as in the near future.Browse Full Report With Technical Analysis :Key participants in the global hybrid power systems market include Bergey WindPower Co., BORG Inc., Guangzhou HY Energy Technology Limited Corp., Kestrel Renewable Energy, KYOCERA Corporation, Panasonic Corporation, Schneider Electric SE, Sharp Electronics, Siemens AG, and Suzlon Group. This report provides an overview of these companies, followed by their financial revenues, business strategies, technical information, and recent developments.Global Hybrid Power Systems Market: Type AnalysisWind-Solar-Diesel-HybridPV-Diesel-HybridOthersGlobal Hybrid Power Systems Market: End-Use AnalysisResidentialRural Facility ElectrificationOthersGlobal Hybrid Power Systems Market: Regional Segment AnalysisNorth AmericaU.S.CanadaMexicoEuropeTurkeyKazakhstanRussiaRest of EuropeAsia PacificChinaJapanAustraliaIndonesiaRest of Asia PacificMiddle East and Africa (MEA)South AfricaTanzaniaEgyptUAERest of MEASouth and Central America (SCA)BrazilChileRest of SCAAbout UsMarket Research Reports Search Engine (MRRSE) is an industry-leading database of market intelligence reports. MRRSE is driven by a stellar team of research experts and advisors trained to offer objective advice. Our sophisticated search algorithm returns results based on the report title, geographical region, publisher, or other keywords.MRRSE partners exclusively with leading global publishers to provide clients single-point access to top-of-the-line market research. MRRSEs repository is updated every day to keep its clients ahead of the next new trend in market research, be it competitive intelligence, product or service trends or strategic consulting.ContactState Tower90, State StreetSuite 700Albany, NY - 12207United StatesTelephone: +1-518-730-0559Email: sales@mrrse.com
The engines are warming up for of the fourth edition of the Chianti Star Festival: the meeting between art and science enriched by the presence of classic cars

strade bianche vino rosso

www.chiantistarfestival.org

http://www.studioabba.com

The fourth edition of the Chianti Star Festival will take place from 18 September to 4 October 2016 at Palazzo Malaspina in San Donato in Poggio. 18 international artists will be exhibiting paintings, sculpture, photography and digital art and will participate in the collateral: meetings, tastings and stargazing at the Chianti Observatory (Osservatorio Polifunzionale del Chianti).The exciting novelty of the 2016 edition is Strade Bianche, Vino Rosso, an elegant classic car rally organized in collaboration with ACI Florence and the Scuderia Biondetti. Strade Bianche, Vino Rosso, a sporting and cultural event that follows both tradition and innovation, fits perfectly with the theme of the Festival dedicated to the meeting between art and science. The technology and design of the best manufacturers have created cars considered by many as works of art (as recent record sale results of classic cars demonstrate).The Strade Bianche, Vino Rosso rally will take place on Sunday 18th September 2016 to coincide with the inauguration of the Chianti Star Festival. The participation of the Scuderia Biondetti at this event Strade Bianche, Vino Rosso provides an added value with the presence of these extremely important classic cars. The route will take the classic car enthusiasts through the heart of Chianti, starting from Panzano in Chianti to the Badia a Passignano, the new Cantina Antinori at Bargino, to arrive at 6pm at Palazzo Malaspina in San Donato in Poggio.The Chianti Star Festival is organized by Studio Abba in Florence, in collaboration with Giada Rodani, the Chianti Observatory (Osservatorio polifunzionale del Chianti), the Pro Loco of San Donato, the Anemic Association and the Giuseppe Verdi Philharmonic Association. The Festival is held under the patronage of the Region of Tuscany and the local town council, Unione Comunale dei Chianti Fiorentino.Since the first edition held in 2013, the Festival has brought protagonists of the contemporary art world and science to the Florentine Chianti region, for an exciting series of meetings, conferences, concerts and shows. Each year, the exhibition is judged by a jury and one artist is awarded with the Chianti Star Festival prize. Jury members are: Roberto Casalbuoni, theoretical physicist; Anchise Tempestini, art historian; Giada Rodani, curator of contemporary art exhibitions; Gabriele Rizza, journalist, expert in cinema and theatre; Massimo Ricci, architect, member of the UNESCO Central Forum; David Baroncelli, Mayor of Tavarnelle Val di Pesa. The award and symbol of the Chianti star Festival is a terracotta sculpture created by Eugenio Riotto at the Montecchio furnaces and in this way, the material par excellence of the Chianti region has been used. Another star of the Festival, together with international contemporary artists who exhibit at Palazzo Malaspina, are the stars in the literal sense, which can be observed from the Observatory of Chianti, as well as typical products of the region, including olive oil and wine.The Chianti Star Festival award is also presented to an individual who, for various reasons has helped to promote the area or the Festival itself. Among the past recipients of this award are: the astronaut Paolo Nespoli (who will return into space for the third time in 2017), the architect Marco Casamonti who designed the new Cantina Antinori at Bargino and Albiera Antinori representing the family who commissioned the building; actors Ennio Fantastichini (Enrico Fermi I ragazzi di via Panisperna by Gianni Amelio) and Giorgio Colangeli (who before becoming an actor was trained as a physicist); and Maestro Bruno Canino.Artists participating in the 2016 editionLawrence ArmstrongTrond Are BergeStefania Bertini CaveltiWilliam BraemerMary BrilliJoan CriscioneBeatrice de DomenicoMaiada El KhalifaSylvie HamouDavid HarrySumio InoueMichael KatzFiorella NociTereza OrdyanChris ReichenbaumSusanne SjogrenEnzo TrapaniMax WernerCHIANTI STAR FESTIVALSan Donato in Poggio and other locations from 18 September to 4 October 2016Opening: 18 September 6.30pmLocation: Palazzo Malaspina, Via del Giglio 31, San Donato in PoggioOpening hours at Palazzo Malaspina: 9.30-12.30 | 4-8pm | closed WednesdaysFree entranceFor information on the exhibition and collateral events:Studio Abba +39 055292082 info@studioabba.comStudio Abba organizes contemporary art exhibitions in Italy and abroad. The services offered include: brain storming and elaboration of ideas with the client, programming the event, contact with artists and critics, mounting the exhibition, catalogue design and promotion of the exhibition. Artists from all over the world participate in both personal and collective exhibitions organized by Studio Abba in locations such as Paris, Barcelona, Monaco, London, Miami. In Tuscany, Studio Abba organizes exhibitions in Florence, Lucca, Volterra and Chianti area. Studio Abba organizes the contemporary art exhibition World Art Vision, The first edition took place in 2008 at the Cancun Center, Mexico, located in the heart of Cancuns prestigious zona hotelera (hotel zone). The second edition was held in the heart of the historical centre of Barcelona, Spain at the Real Circulo Artistico.Via di Santa Maria a Marignolle 30 b50124 FlorenceItaly+39 055292082info@studioabba.com
Growing Concerns of Infertility and Childlessness to Drive Human Reproductive Technologies Market to USD 25.7 Billion by 2020

http://www.ihealthcareanalyst.com/report/human-reproductive-technologies-market/

http://www.ihealthcareanalyst.com

According to a market research report Human Reproductive Technologies Market 2013-2020 published by iHealthcareAnalyst, Inc., the global human reproductive technologies market is estimated to reach USD 25.7 Billion in 2020, expanding at a CAGR of 5.5% from 2016 to 2020.Visit the Human Reproductive Technologies Market 2013-2020 report atHuman reproductive technology encompasses all current and anticipated uses of technology, including assisted reproductive technology, contraception and others. Assisted reproductive technology (ART) is used to achieve pregnancy in procedures such as fertility medication, artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization and surrogacy, and it is primarily used for infertility treatments. It mainly belongs to the field of reproductive endocrinology and infertility, and may also include intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) and cryopreservation.The global human reproductive technologies market report provides market size (Revenue USD Million 2013 to 2020), market share and forecasts growth trends (CAGR%, 2016 to 2020).The global human reproductive technologies market segmentation is based on product types such as Infertility Drugs - Gonal-F (Recombinant Follitropin Alfa), Follistim AQ (Follitropin Beta), Androgel (Testosterone), Testim (Testosterone), Viagra (Sildenafil Citrate), Cialis (Tadalafil), Levitra/Staxyn (Vardenafil), Infertility Procedure Types - In Vitro Fertilization (IVF), Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection (ICSI), Zygote Intrafallopian Transfer (ZIFT), Gamete Intrafallopian Transfer (GIFT), Intrauterine Insemination (IUI), Contraceptive Technology, Drugs - Oral Contraceptive Pills, Contraceptive Injectables, Topical Contraceptives, and Devices - Male Contraceptive Devices (Male Condoms), and Female Contraceptive Devices. The global human reproductive technologies market report also provides the detailed market landscape (market drivers, restraints, opportunities), market attractiveness analysis and profiles of major competitors in the global market including company overview, financial snapshot, key products, technologies and services offered, and recent developments. The global human reproductive technologies market research report is divided by geography (regional and country based) into North America (U.S., Canada), Latin America (Brazil, Mexico, Rest of LA), Europe (U.K., Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Rest of EU), Asia Pacific (Japan, China, India, Rest of APAC), and Rest of the World.1. Infertility Drugs1.1. Gonal-F (Recombinant Follitropin Alfa)1.2. Follistim AQ (Follitropin Beta)1.3. Androgel (Testosterone)1.4. Testim (Testosterone)1.5. Viagra (Sildenafil Citrate)1.6. Cialis (Tadalafil)1.7. Levitra/Staxyn (Vardenafil)2. Infertility Procedure Type2.1. In Vitro Fertilization (IVF)2.2. Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection (ICSI)2.3. Zygote Intrafallopian Transfer (ZIFT)2.4. Gamete Intrafallopian Transfer (GIFT)2.5. Intrauterine Insemination (IUI)2.6. Contraceptive Technology3. Contraceptive Drugs3.1. Oral Contraceptive Pills3.2. Contraceptive Injectables3.3. Topical Contraceptives4. Contraceptive Devices4.1. Male Contraceptive Devices (Male Condoms)4.2. Female Contraceptive Devices5. Geography (Region, Country)5.1. North America (U.S., Canada)5.2. Latin America (Brazil, Mexico, Rest of LA)5.3. Europe (U.K., Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Rest of EU)5.4. Asia Pacific (Japan, China, India, Rest of APAC)5.5. Rest of the World6. Company Profiles6.1. Abbott Laboratories, Inc.6.2. Actavis, Inc.6.3. Bayer AG6.4. Church & Dwight, Co. Inc.6.5. Cook Medical, Inc.6.6. Ferring International Center S.A.6.7. Johnson & Johnson6.8. Merck & Co., Inc.6.9. Merck Serono6.10. Pfizer, Inc.6.11. Reckitt Benckiser Group plc6.12. Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd.6.13. Warner Chilcott plciHealthcareAnalyst, Inc. is a global health care market research and consulting company providing market analysis, and competitive intelligence services to global clients. The Company publishes syndicate, custom and consulting grade healthcare reports covering animal healthcare, biotechnology, clinical diagnostics, healthcare informatics, healthcare services, medical devices, medical equipment, and pharmaceuticals.iHealthcareAnalyst, Inc. provides industry participants and stakeholders with strategically analyzed, unbiased view of market dynamics and business opportunities within its coverage areas.Ana AitawaiHealthcareAnalyst, Inc.2109, Mckelvey Hill Drive,Maryland Heights, MO 63043United StatesPhone: (314) 736-9294.Email: sales@ihealthcareanalyst.com
Global Polyamide (Nylon) Market 2016 Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Supply Revenue and Forecast 2021

Polyamide (Nylon)

https://goo.gl/bzeS3F

https://goo.gl/cGqa9W

Global Polyamide (Nylon) Industry is an accurate and quality research study on the Global Polyamide (Nylon) market. This report is based on the briefings and interviews conducted with product manufacturers and their consumers, with demand-side research. This research is based on the interviews with end-users and their service providers. The blend of checks and balances combined with involving the players in the industry offers a clear and accurate picture of the entire Global Polyamide (Nylon) market.Furthermore, the research data in the report after working closely with the investment bankers and financial analyst presents a clear idea of the investment scenario in the Global Polyamide (Nylon) market. The report assess the market outlook for public companies, evaluates business cases of several private companies, and discusses investment trends in the Global Polyamide (Nylon) market. The report on the Global Polyamide (Nylon) market covers the present and future trends of consumer preferences that will shape the industry. The report assess the buying trends along with the purchase process, technology preference, expenditures, and manufacturers and service provider preferences of end-users in the Global Polyamide (Nylon) market.Browse Complete Report with TOC @The report dwells deeper by providing the region-wise consumer preferences and their impact on the market revenue and growth. The report also presents the current regulatory scenario of individual regional sectors in the Global Polyamide (Nylon) market. Furthermore, the current regulatory scenario along with the upcoming regulations that will come in effect in the coming few years have also been mentioned in this report. Several key players operating in the Global Polyamide (Nylon) market have been profiled in this report. The key players business overview, product offering, revenue share, business strategies, and latest innovations have been included in this report. The in-depth competitive framework of the Global Polyamide (Nylon) market will help clients to formulate the better strategies for a desired business outcome.Table of Contents1 Industry Overview1.1 Definition and Specifications of Polyamide (Nylon)1.2 Classification of Polyamide (Nylon)1.3 Applications of Polyamide (Nylon)1.4 Industry Chain Structure of Polyamide (Nylon)1.5 Industry Regional Overview of Polyamide (Nylon)1.6 Industry Policy Analysis of Polyamide (Nylon)1.7 Industry News Analysis of Polyamide (Nylon)2 Manufacturing Cost Structure Analysis of Polyamide (Nylon)2.1 Raw Material Suppliers and Price Analysis of Polyamide (Nylon)2.2 Equipment Suppliers and Price Analysis of Polyamide (Nylon)2.3 Labor Cost Analysis of Polyamide (Nylon)2.4 Other Costs Analysis of Polyamide (Nylon)2.5 Manufacturing Cost Structure Analysis of Polyamide (Nylon)2.6 Manufacturing Process Analysis of Polyamide (Nylon)Get Sample Copy Report @About Us:MarketResearchStore.com is a single destination for all the industry, company and country reports. We feature large repository of latest industry reports, leading and niche company profiles, and market statistics released by reputed private publishers and public organizations.Contact US:Joel JohnSuite #8138, 3422 SW 15 Street,Deerfield Beach, Florida 33442United StatesToll Free: +1-855-465-4651 (USA-CANADA)Tel: +1-386-310-3803
Dot Com Infoway to Host Webinar On Mobile App User Acquisition

http://www.dotcominfoway.com/webinars/Effective-Tactics-to-Grow-Loyal-Users-for-your-App-Organic-and-Paid-User-Acquisition

Dot Com Infoway (DCI), a leading mobile app marketing company in the world, is organizing a webinar, Effective Tactics to Grow Loyal Users For Your App (Organic and Paid User Acquisition) on 21st September 2016.With the number of mobile users expected to cross the 5 billion mark by the year 2019, it is not a coincidence that apps are the only way forward. Mobile apps have taken the world over by storm with consumers depending on apps for everything from grocery shopping to buying an apartment to even hiring a mechanic or a hair stylist.In the highly competitive scenario of today, creating an app is just not enough. The app stores are getting flooded with more and more apps every single day, obscuring your winning app from users in the hundreds that are launched every single day. Indeed, then, it is essential to plan and strategize to ensure an app is not only seen by the target audience, but is also capable of retaining its users.The solution lies in learning and employing effective user acquisition tactics to expand user base, increase user retention and even re-target users without annoying them.DCI, a global award-winning design and mobile app marketing firm has years of experience in Internet and Mobile app marketing and invaluable insights into consumer behaviour. The team at DCI has been optimally leveraging this expertise to strategically position, market and promote winning apps for app developers across the globe. Over the years, the company has contributed several insightful infographics, white papers, e-books and webinars addressing the unique issues faced by app developers and app owners. This insightful webinar will focus on techniques and tactics that will help app developers build and retain a loyal client base for their app.Contrary to popular opinion, creating a useful app is no longer a measure of success. As the users become increasingly demanding, they are also turning harder to please. With the engagement time of a user measuring at few meagre seconds, app developers need to leverage the right analytics and tools to create a winning user acquisition strategy to back their app. The webinar will drive home these points and focus on the following:1) Improve the Visibility of Your Mobile App Through ASO / PR2) Performance Advertising (Incent & Non Incent) for Driving Installs3) Build Userbase with Social Media Advertising4) Referral Marketing to grow the Virality of your App5) Driving a Quick Spike of Downloads Through Search Advertising6) Advertise Outside the Web Using Traditional Channels7) Calculate LTV to Strategize the Long Term Success of Your App8) App Re-targeting  Non-Intrusive Way of Alerting UsersTop of FormPresented by Raja Manoharan, Head of Mobile Marketing at Dot Com Infoway, the webinar will help app developers and app owners develop a thoughtful customer acquisition strategy by throwing light on most effective means of user acquisition  both organic and paid. Raja has over 9 years of experience in Internet and Mobile marketing having successfully strategized marketing plans for hundreds of apps globally. Participants will benefit from Rajas extensive experience and insights, as he shares the most effective techniques including referral marketing, marketing outside the web, app re-targeting, social media advertising, using LTV and much more to expand, build and retain a loyal user base for your app.According to Mr. Venkatesh, CEO of Dot Com Infoway, The webinar will cover the most effective user acquisition techniques that all app developers and owners must be aware of and integrate in their user acquisition strategy to drive installs and increase the user base for their apps.For more information and to register for the free webinar, visitAbout Dot Com InfowayDot Com Infoway, a CMMI Level 3 multinational information technology company, is a pioneer in delivering software development, mobile application and internet marketing solutions and technologies to business.With offices in India, the United States and Germany, DCI is positioned to become a leader in delivering advanced IT services for your business. DCI provides enterprise solutions that include software solutions, web solutions, mobile application solutions, Internet marketing and a whole gamut of IT solutions and products to clients.Leveraging the innate offshore value advantage of our development centers in India, we provide customized, scalable and cost effective solutions to businesses. With well-structured development methodologies, Global Delivery Model and rigid QA systems, we deliver business-critical solutions on-time, within budgets and within desired levels of performance.189, Aarthy chamber, Mount road,Opposite to Raj Video Vision Building,Chennai  600 006
Global Soybean Derivatives Market reports,2015  2021

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http://bit.ly/2ccdAup

http://bit.ly/2cvCWGk

http://www.syndicatemarketresearch.com/market-analysis/soybean-derivatives-market.html

http://www.syndicatemarketresearch.com

Soybean derivatives have numerous applications such as food, feed and automotive among others. Residual fibers remained after extraction of soybeans oil from soybean is used as feedstock for animals. Soybean derivatives in the food industry are excised especially in snacks, breads, baked products, salad dressings, mayonnaise, potato chips and sauces. The market size and forecasts in terms of revenue (USD million) for the period 2015 to 2020, considering 2014 as the base year, have been provided for this segment of the report. The report also provides the compounded annual growth rate (% CAGR) for the forecast period 2015 to 2020.Get a copy of free Sample Report @Soybean derivatives market is primarily driven by intense demand from food and beverage industry on account of growing protein consumption. Another major driving factor is high penetration from animal feed industry owing to rising meat production and increasing demand for animal protein products. Industries like paints, coatings, bio-plastics and bio-diesels are also augmenting applications that expected to have strong growth over the forecast period. However, substitute from wood pulp and bagasse is a major restraint of global soybean derivatives market.In order to give the users of this report a comprehensive view on the soybean derivatives market, we have included a detailed value chain analysis. To understand the competitive landscape in the market, an analysis of Porters Five Forces model for the soybean derivatives market has also been included. The study encompasses a market attractiveness analysis, wherein product segments and application segments are benchmarked based on their market size, growth rate and general attractiveness.Get in-depth TOC (Table of Contents) with Tables and Figures @The soybean derivatives market is segmented on the basis of its applications into feed, food, and others (biodiesel, soy-based wood adhesives, soy ink, soy crayons, soy-based lubricants). Based on type, the soybean derivatives market is segmented into soybean, soy meal, and soy oil. Soy meal is further segmented into soy milk and soy protein concentrate. Similarly, soy oil is also further segmented into soy lecithin. Based on lecithin processing market is also segmented as water, acid, and enzyme. The soy meal was dominating segment, and is also anticipated to grow at significant share owing to increasing demand from the food industries.Inquire more before buying this report @The report forecasts value of the global soybean derivatives market and its various applications with respect to main regions namely, North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, Latin America and Middle East & Africa with its further bifurcation into major countries including U.S., Germany, France, UK, China, Japan, India, and Brazil. This segmentation includes demand for soybean derivatives market based on individual application and types in all the regions and countries.Some of the key players operating in the global soybean derivatives market are Bunge Limited, Archer Daniels Midland Company, Wilmar International Company, Louis Dreyfus Commodities, Cargill Inc and Noble Group Ltd among others.Browse detail report @This report segments the global soybean derivatives market as follows:Global Soybean Derivatives Market: Type of Soybean Segment AnalysisSoybeanSoy meal (soy milk and soy protein concentrate)Soy oil (soy lecithin)Global Soybean Derivatives Market: Application Segment AnalysisFeedFoodOthers (biodiesel, soy-based wood adhesives, soy ink, soy crayons, soy-based lubricants and etc)Global Soybean Derivatives Market: Lecithin Processing Segment AnalysisWaterAcidEnzymeGlobal Soybean Derivatives Market: Regional Segment AnalysisNorth AmericaU.S.EuropeUKFranceGermanyAsia-PacificChinaJapanIndiaLatin AmericaBrazilMiddle East & AfricaAbout UsSyndicate Market Research provides a range of marketing and business research solutions designed for our clients specific needs based on our expert resources. The business scopes of Syndicate Market Research cover more than 30 industries includsing energy, new materials, transportation, daily consumer goods, chemicals, etc. We provide our clients with one-stop solution for all the research requirements.Contact US:Joel John3422 SW 15 Street,Suit #8138Deerfield Beach,Florida 33442United StatesToll Free: +1-855-465-4651 (USA-CANADA)Tel: +1-386-310-3803Email: sales@SyndicateMarketResearch.comWebsite:
Global and Egypt Glass Tableware Market Battles Saturation with Designer Products

http://www.mrrse.com/glass-tableware-market

http://www.mrrse.com/checkdiscount/1101

http://www.mrrse.com/sample/1101

The global glass tableware market is expected to grow at a healthy rate during the period 2011  2017, with growth largely contributed by Asia Pacific and EMEA (Europe, Middle East, and Africa) regions. The market was estimated to be worth USD 6,200 million in 2011. Despite the approaching saturation in Western markets for regular glassware products, development of designer glass tableware and multipurpose glass tableware has created new opportunities, and the market is expected to sustain the growth trends.Complete Report with TOC @The report analyzes the global glass tableware market based on the major product types, such as  dinnerware, flatware, and beverage-ware. The beverage-ware market segment holds the highest market share followed by dinnerware. The beverage-ware market is further segmented into barware, stemware, and others, for in-depth analysis. It is estimated that more than fifty percent of the total growth in the global glass tableware market during 2011  2017 is expected to be contributed by the beverage-ware segment alone, which makes it the best segment to invest in.The beverage-ware market in North America and Eastern Europe is expected to see moderate growth due to changing preference for crystal beverage glassware, which looks more elegant and attractive. For the same reason, it is preferred in the hotel industry, which is a potential end customer for the global glass tableware market, especially glassware. However, with the fast economic growth in Eastern markets such as Asia Pacific and Latin America, and the resultant rise in consumerism, the global glass tableware market is expected to see a moderate to high growth across various geographies.Among the geographical markets, Latin America and Asia Pacific are the fastest growing regions, but EMEA holds the largest market share as in 2011. However, Asia Pacific is expected to surpass the EMEA glass tableware market by 2017 due to fast economic growth, growing tourism industry, and the rising middle class population. The maximum growth in the global glass tableware market is forecasted in the Asia Pacific region, which is estimated to account for approximately fifty percent of the total market growth during 2011  2017. The glass tableware market growth in Egypt is relatively slow as compared to European regions, largely due to low demand for glass beverage-ware. Cultural barriers towards alcohol consumption have negative effect on the beverage-ware market, especially stemware and barware markets.Ask for Discount on this report @Globally, the glass tableware market growth is supported by many social, economic and demographic factors. The major contributors are  economic development in emerging countries, development of new and novel glass tableware products, improvement in manufacturing and packaging technologies, and growing disposable household income.Consumers now prefer to dine out and travel frequently, which is driving the growth of the hotel industry, and in turn the growth of the glass tableware market. Rise in disposable income has augmented the use of glass tableware at home, which is further driving the market growth.Request a Free Sample Copy of the Report @Leading players in the global glass tableware industry includes renowned names such as Arc International, Libbey Inc., Bormioli Rocco group, WMF, and Lenox Corporation. Arc International is the global leader with the highest market share, and is closely followed by Libbey Inc. The Egyptian glass tableware market is dominated by companies such as Egyptian Glass co., and El Nasr Glass & Crystal Co.About MRRSEMRRSE stands for Market Research Reports Search Engine, the largest online catalog of latest market research reports based on industries, companies, and countries. MRRSE sources thousands of industry reports, market statistics, and company profiles from trusted entities and makes them available at a click. Besides well-known private publishers, the reports featured on MRRSE typically come from national statistics agencies, investment agencies, leading media houses, trade unions, governments, and embassies.Corporate OfficeState Tower,90 State Street,Suite 700,Albany NY - 12207United StatesTel: +1-518-730-0559Email: sales@mrrse.com
Kombucha Market Size,share,Industry Analysis, 2015 - 2021

http://www.syndicatemarketresearch.com/request-for-sample.html?flag=S&repid=61106

http://bit.ly/2cvEroj

http://bit.ly/2ciIR1V

http://www.syndicatemarketresearch.com/market-analysis/kombucha-market-global-industry-perspective-comprehensive-analysis-and.html

http://www.syndicatemarketresearch.com

Kombucha is fermented tea which is produce using sugar with the microbial culture like yeast, bacteria, mold and sometimes fruit juice and other flavors. After fermentation, kombucha is carbonated and integrated with amino acids, vinegar, antioxidants and vitamins. It can be added with numerous essences to add different tastes to the drink. Citrus, herb and spice, berries, apple, coconut, mangoes, flowers and others are the different essence of kombucha. Kombucha is used in medicine and drugs.Get a copy of free Sample Report @The kombucha market is mainly driven by the rising health awareness, increasing consumer disposable income and changing lifestyle. Increasing demand for natural, fortified and healthy food & beverages and rising consumption of alcoholic beverages are some of the factors that support the demand for kombucha. Increasing incidences of chronic diseases like diabetes, high blood pressure, cancer, and osteoporosis are another key factor to drive the kombucha market. Kombucha is a health drink and of the fastest-growing segments in the efficient beverages market., Thus, the market for this beverage is expected to witness high growth in the next few years. Microbial sourcing and nonsterile packaging of the product are expected to be major restraints of kombucha market.This report provides detailed analysis and forecast of the kombucha market on a global and regional level. The report includes detailed competitive landscape of the global kombucha market and an analysis of Porters five forces model for the kombucha market has also been included. It includes company market share analysis, product portfolio of the major industry participants. The report provides detailed segmentation of the kombucha market based on type, flavor and region segment.Get in-depth TOC (Table of Contents) with Tables and Figures @Based on different type, kombucha market is segmented as yeast, bacteria and mold. Major flavor covered in this report include herbs & spices, berries, apple, coconut & mangoes, citrus, flowers and others.Key regional segments analyzed in this study include North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America, and Middle East and Africa with its further bifurcation into major countries including U.S., Germany, France, UK, China, Japan, India, and Brazil. This segmentation includes demand for kombocha based on individual applications in all the regions and countries. In 2014, North America was dominated Kombucha market in terms of revenue.Inquire more before buying this report @Asia Pacific and Europe are growing at a moderate rate due to increasing health awareness among people and increasing initiatives undertaken by the government.The report covers detailed competitive outlook including company profiles of the key participants operating in the global market. Key players profiled in the report include Live Soda Kombucha, Makana Beverages Inc., Nesalla Kombucha, Red Bull Gmbh, Kosmic Kombucha, Kevita, Inc., Millennium Products, Inc., Reeds, Inc. and Gts Kombucha.Browse detail report @This report segments the global kombucha market as follows:Kombucha Market: Type Segment AnalysisYeastBacteriaMoldOthersKombucha Market: Flavor Segment AnalysisHerbs & SpicesBerriesAppleCoconut & MangoesCitrusFlowersOthersKombucha Market: Regional Segment AnalysisNorth AmericaU.S.EuropeUKFranceGermanyAsia PacificChinaJapanIndiaLatin AmericaBrazilMiddle East And AfricaAbout UsSyndicate Market Research provides a range of marketing and business research solutions designed for our clients specific needs based on our expert resources. The business scopes of Syndicate Market Research cover more than 30 industries includsing energy, new materials, transportation, daily consumer goods, chemicals, etc. We provide our clients with one-stop solution for all the research requirements.Contact US:Joel John3422 SW 15 Street,Suit #8138Deerfield Beach,Florida 33442United StatesToll Free: +1-855-465-4651 (USA-CANADA)Tel: +1-386-310-3803Email: sales@SyndicateMarketResearch.comWebsite:
Prolong the Life of Your Handmade Mattress

You own an old mattress or you have recently bought a new handmade mattress  regardless, any mattress requires special and regular care to ensure its longer use. When buying a new mattress, the manufacturer provides advice and recommendations on how to properly use and maintain the mattress. As expected, the best advice you can get is directly from the manufacturer. As advice number 1 the manufacturer will give you is 
Processed meat Market byvalue chain, 2016 - 2024

http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/10861

http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/10861

Processed meat refers to meat which is enriched with various additives/preservatives such as salts, acidifiers, minerals and other seasoning & flavoring agents. Meat is chiefly processed to improve its quality, preserve it from decay and to add flavors to its original composition. It can be either red meat or white meat from poultry, swine, cattle or sea animal meat.Download TOC (desk of content material), Figures and Tables of the report:The processed meat market can be segmented into six major categories on the basis of its usage as fresh processed meat products, raw-cooked meat products, raw-fermented sausages, cured meat cuts, precooked-cooked meat products and dried meat products. The market can also be segmented geographically into North America, APAC, Europe and RoW regions.The global processed meat market is expected to witness a substantial growth with a single digit increase in CAGR from 2013 to 2019. There is a significant increase in the consumption of processed meat with higher disposable income in emerging countries and large number of working women globally.The key drivers of this market are large varieties of processed meat available in the market place at lower prices. Furthermore growth in retail market and greater purchasing power of consumers in emerging countries are driving the growth of processed meat market. Some of the restraining factors could be government regulations on manufacturing of such products (licensing among others), process of treating meat and rising health concerns among consumers.The value chain consists of raising animals, transporting, slaughtering, dressing and cutting, conditioning and final processing. There is a significant backward and forward integration in this sector.Request Sample Report@Some of the key players in processed meat market are ConAgra, Tyson Foods Inc., Advance Food Company Inc., Pilgrims Pride Corporation, Cargill Inc., and other private labels.About UsPersistence Market Research (PMR) is a third-platform research firm. Our research model is a unique collaboration of data analytics and market research methodology to help businesses achieve optimal performance.To support companies in overcoming complex business challenges, we follow a multi-disciplinary approach. At PMR, we unite various data streams from multi-dimensional sources. By deploying real-time data collection, big data, and customer experience analytics, we deliver business intelligence for organizations of all sizes.ContactPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA - Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.com
Public picks name of a giant panda cub Updated: 2016-09-16 07:11 By Fu Jing in Brussels(China Daily Europe)

Pairi Daiza wildlife park in Belgium to announce result of online vote on cub's 100-day celebrations

The first giant panda cub born in Belgium was to be officially named on Sept 15 as part of celebrations to mark its 100th day.

VIPs including Chinese first lady Peng Liyuan and Queen Mathilde of Belgium as well as thousands of citizens sent messages of congratulations for the big day.

Tania Stroobant, Belgian handler, and Wang Daifu, midwife, pose with the baby panda on Sept 9, on the 100th day since its birth. Fu Jing / China Daily

Celebrating a child's 100th day is a Chinese custom, while the event coincides with the traditional Mid-Autumn Festival.

"We're going to finalize his name on that day," says Tania Stroobant, one of the panda handlers at Pairi Daiza wildlife park in Brugelette, about 50 kilometers west of Brussels.

The zoo listed five potential names on its website and has been asking members of the public to choose their favorite.

The cub is housed with his parents, Hao Hao and Xing Hui, in the zoo's panda enclosure, which was unveiled by President Xi Jinping and King Philippe of Belgium in 2014.

Stroobant, who has worked at the zoo for 16 years, joined its panda team when the two adults arrived in 2014.

She says the team shares daily online updates about the cub, in French, English and Dutch, so fans can keep track of his progress. Highlights include his first public appearance on Aug 6.

"He's so lovely, and he's growing extremely well," says Wang Daifu, an experienced panda handler who helped deliver the cub.

The cub weighed 171 grams at birth on June 2, but today weighs 6 kg.

Wang from the China Conservation and Research Center for the Giant Panda in Sichuan province escorted Hao Hao and Xing Hui to Belgium in 2014 and returned early this year to prepare for the birth.

He says the animals still recognize the instructions he gives in Chinese in his native Sichuan accent.

Behind the panda enclosure, which is kept permanently at 18 C, is an office with a bank of monitors that handlers use to watch the family 24/7.

Wang says the only hiccup has been the supply of bamboo shoots, which grow in Europe only between April and June. Female pandas eat shoots to produce breast milk.

To supplement supplies, the zoo makes a bread of apple and honey for the cub, he says. "When the mother's milk is insufficient, we also give him powdered formula."

After arriving in Belgium, the two adults struggled to mate naturally, so the cub was conceived through artificial insemination.

As this was also Hao Hao's first cub, Wang and Stroobant have been helping the baby during the breast feeding period, which usually lasts 18 months.

The loan agreement with China states that the cub will remain at Pairi Daiza until he is 4. The parents will return to Sichuan in 2029.

"Once the cub permanently leaves his mother, we can arrange further mating for Hao Hao," Wang says.

He says the cub is separated from his mother every day at 9 am, when he is weighed and fed. He is then returned to the cave, giving zoo visitors the chance to see him.

The family of pandas attracts many visitors to the wildlife park, with waiting time to enter the viewing area usually about an hour.

"It's so wonderful that I saw them today. It has fulfilled my dream," says Slameuldre Eliadine, who has traveled 20 km with friends to visit the wildlife park.

She has been keeping a close watch on the family through videos and updates post on the zoo's website. "For sure, I will come again."

This year, giant panda cubs were also been born in Spain and Austria, while another is expected this month at Edinburgh Zoo in Scotland.

Yao Yueyang contributed to this story.

fujing@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 09/16/2016 page21)
Hydrolyzed Vegetable Protein Market by Technology 2016 - 2026

http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/10975

http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/10975

Hydrolyzed vegetable protein is derived from boiling cereals or legumes in hydrochloric acid and then neutralizing the solution with sodium hydroxide. The acid breaks down, the protein present in vegetables into their component amino acids. The resulting liquid is further known as hydrolyzed vegetable protein. Hydrolyzed vegetable protein is widely used as a flavor enhancer in many processed foods such as soups, sauces, stews, seasoned snack foods, gravies, hot dogs, dips and dressings. It is also blended with other spices to make seasonings that are used in or on foods.Download TOC (desk of content material), Figures and Tables of the report:Hydrolyzed vegetable protein market has been segmented on the basis of raw-material, application and form. The raw material segment can be divided in view of the kind of raw material i.e. soy, rapeseed, corn, rice, pea and wheat utilized for producing hydrolyzed vegetable protein. Among all these segments hydrolyzed soy protein is relied upon to possess biggest offer regarding revenue contribution.Hydrolyzed vegetable protein is further segmented on the basis of application, includes food industry where in hydrolyzed vegetable is used as flavor enhancer. Furthermore food industry can be sub-segmented into noodles, pastas, prepared soups, sauces, ready meals, dips and dressings, meat, fish, seasoning mixes and others. Application can also segmented based on the beverages where hydrolyzed protein is used to complement the amino acid and enhance the flavor in functional beverages. Wide application and increased usage as a flavor enhancer in food and beverages industry is expected to drive the market demand. Moreover, Hydrolyzed vegetable protein is widely accepted by the various nations regarding its usage in various industry which is further expected to fuel the market growth during the forecast period. Hydrolyzed vegetable protein application segment can also be divided into cosmetics where it is used as film-forming agents in face cream and hair care products.Hydrolyzed vegetable protein is further segmented on the basis of form which includes dry powder, paste and liquid. Among both of these segments powder segment is expected to contribute major share in terms of revenue. Easy water solubility coupled with wide applications in various food product is expected to support the segment growth during the forecast period.Geographically Asia Pacific is the largest market in terms of consumption of Hydrolyzed vegetable protein followed by North America and is expected to account for the major market share in the forecast period. Among North American region U.S. is expected to be the major contributor in terms of revenue followed by Canada. In Asia pacific region China and India is expected to account for the substantial growth due to increased demand for nutritional food among the consumers. Moreover in Latin America Brazil is expected to be the major contributor in terms of revenue followed by Mexico.Factors such as increase in demand of clean-label and natural ingredients, increasing consumer awareness pertaining to the ill effects related to savory ingredients, and demand for healthy and nutrition products are acting as major restraints for the market. Increasing demand for convenience food, changing lifestyle, and untapped potential in the developing Asia-Pacific countries act as major drivers for the market.As it is helpful in enhancing flavor of the processed food, so it is also considered as the most sustainable protein ingredients which is favoring its growth in alternate way. However, availability of Monosodium Glutamate (MSG) in Hydrolyzed vegetable protein is expected to restrain the market growth over the forecast period.Request Sample Report@Some of the major key players operating in flavonoid market includes Ajinomoto, Kerry Group, Tate & Lyle, Jones-Hamilton Co., DSM, Diana Group, Givaudan, Brolite Products Co. Inc., Kerry Group, Caremoli Group, Astron Chemicals S.A., McRitz International Corporation, Good Food, Inc., Michimoto Foods Products Co., Ltd, Dien Inc., Innova Flavors, Unitechem Co., Ltd. among others.About UsPersistence Market Research (PMR) is a third-platform research firm. Our research model is a unique collaboration of data analytics and market research methodology to help businesses achieve optimal performance.To support companies in overcoming complex business challenges, we follow a multi-disciplinary approach. At PMR, we unite various data streams from multi-dimensional sources. By deploying real-time data collection, big data, and customer experience analytics, we deliver business intelligence for organizations of all sizes.ContactPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA - Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.com
Cage Free Eggs Market by Supply & Demand Value Chain, 2016 - 2026

http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/11086

http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/11086

Cage free eggs or eggs labeled as cage free are those eggs which are laid by hens that are allowed to roam in a room or in an open area. Except to the feed products provided to them, they are also allowed to eat wild plants and insects. These hens are free to engage in some of their natural behaviors which may include walking and nesting. Cage free eggs are gaining importance as the hens which are in cage are given high antibiotics while cage free hens lay eggs naturally. Thus naturally laid eggs are protein rich and healthy option which is expected to drive the market growth over the forecast period.Download TOC (desk of content material), Figures and Tables of the report:Cage free eggs market has been segmented on the basis of size which includes medium size and jumbo size. Among both of these segment medium size is expected to contribute major share in terms of value as it is more economical. However, jumbo size is expected to show a favorable growth over the forecast period.Cage free eggs market is also segmented on the basis of type which includes cage free white and cage free brown. Cage free white egg is expected to contribute major share in terms of revenue during the forecast period. However, cage free white is expected to show a robust growth over the forecast period. In food industry consumers are getting more inclined towards brown, as such brown bread, brown sugar and others. Thus this trend may support the demand of cage free brown egg over the forecast period.Consumption of cage free eggs are considered to be safer option as that of caged hens. This is because caged hens have a high chances of being infected by salmonella. Consumption of these types of eggs has become a most common cause of hospitalization and deaths in the North America. This has also led the people to opt for cage free eggs driving the market growth in North America region. In the U.S. consumers are concerned for what they are eating and from where it has been come from. This is expected to be a driving factor for the market growth in the country. In Canada there is a high demand coming from restaurants and even household consumers which is further expected to fuel the market growth in the country.Many companies in the region has decided to use cage free eggs in manufacturing their products which is expected to support the demand of cage free eggs in the country. For instance major food and retail chains such as McDonald's, Costco Wholesale Corporation and others has been declaring a shift to buying only cage free eggs. In addition McDonalds has decided switch completely to cage free eggs in the U.S. and Canada over the next decade. Moreover, recently other companies such as DENNYS CORP a major franchised full-service restaurant chains , in January 2016 announced that they will source and serve hundred percent cage-free eggs in all of its U.S. restaurants by 2026. In January 2016 Quiznos another quick service restaurant announced that they are planning to complete the transition to 100 percent cage-free eggs by 2025 in all of their restaurants present in North America.The growing sensitivity among customers to animal welfare issues in the region is expected to drive the market growth over the forecast period. Rising demand from various quick service restaurants, confectionery manufacturers and retail chains is further expected to support the demand of cage free eggs in the near future. Moreover increased government intervention such as in California, a law has been passed according to which egg-laying hens should be given enough space to stretch, turn around and flap their wings, is further expected to support market demand during the forecast period.Request Sample Report@Some of the key players operating in cage free egg market includes Eggland's Best, LLC, Rabbit River Farms, Herbruck's Poultry Ranch, Inc., Rembrandt Enterprises, NESTFRESH EGGS, INC. Hillandale Farms among others.About UsPersistence Market Research (PMR) is a third-platform research firm. Our research model is a unique collaboration of data analytics and market research methodology to help businesses achieve optimal performance.To support companies in overcoming complex business challenges, we follow a multi-disciplinary approach. At PMR, we unite various data streams from multi-dimensional sources. By deploying real-time data collection, big data, and customer experience analytics, we deliver business intelligence for organizations of all sizes.ContactPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA - Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.com
Beet Sugar Market by Segments, 2016 - 2026

http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/11131

http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/11131

Sugar has been the most widely used sweetener in the world, with its closest substitute being high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS). Tropical beet sugar is a biennial sugar producing tuber crop developed in temperate countries. It constitutes around 30% of the total world production as well as distributed in more than 45 countries. Sugar beet is efficient converter of solar energy to a form that can be used by animals and men. The top ten sugar beet producing countries include Russia, France, U.S., Germany, Ukraine, Turkey, Poland, China, U.K. and Egypt. Beet sugar is an industrial crop utilized in food processing as well as in production of ethanol and biogas. In tropical countries, the sugar beet crop offers precious alternative to sugarcane. The beet sugar market growth in terms of production and consumption has showcased an upliftment over the past few years and is likely to intensify at a rapid pace during the forecast period.Download TOC (desk of content material), Figures and Tables of the report:The Global Beet Sugar market is segmented on the basis of consumption in industry such as cereal, bakery, ice-cream, confectionery, beverage and dairy industry. Over the next few years, beverage segment is anticipated to grab highest market attractiveness in the global beet sugar market till 2026. The global beet sugar market is also segmented on the basis of function such as regular and medical conditions. The global beet sugar market is also segmented on the basis of organizational structure such as unorganized and organized market. The share of former is anticipated to be more over the forecast period.Rising population and personal disposable income is anticipated to bolster the growth of global Beet Sugar market. Apart from this, changing lifestyle along with urbanization and increasing health related disorders are expected to drive the global Beet Sugar market during the forecast period as the consumption will rise. The advent of new class of customers as well as the entry of various new global players is expected to intensify the growth of Beet Sugar market all across the globe during the forecast period.Geographically, the Global Beet Sugar industry can be divided by major regions which include North America, Latin America, Western and Eastern Europe, Asia-Pacific region, Japan, Middle East and Africa. North America contributed the highest share in the global Beet Sugar market in 2015. The size of America has been doubled over the past few years in production of beet sugar. For growers in Western and Central Europe, it is already a high value crop. But in Eastern Europe, while acreage and volumes are maximum, there is significant scope to increase quality of seed. Over the next few years, Asia Pacific is expected to expand at a higher pace during the forecast period. India is expected to be the worlds fastest growing market, driven by increasing standard of living. Apart from this, gains in developing regions such as Middle-east and Africa will also be strengthened by changing standard of living. Advances in Western Europe is expected to benefit from strong incline in number of new housing units.Request Sample Report@Some of the key vendors identified across the value chain of the global Beet Sugar market include syngenta, Renuka beet sugar, Spreckals Sugar Company, Michigan Sugar Company, Amalgamated Sugar Company. Various players are anticipated to appear in the industry with the manufacturing of new and innovative products in the industry. The companies are anticipated to invest in research and development in order to expand the business and to maintain the market share in the global beet sugar market.About UsPersistence Market Research (PMR) is a third-platform research firm. Our research model is a unique collaboration of data analytics and market research methodology to help businesses achieve optimal performance.To support companies in overcoming complex business challenges, we follow a multi-disciplinary approach. At PMR, we unite various data streams from multi-dimensional sources. By deploying real-time data collection, big data, and customer experience analytics, we deliver business intelligence for organizations of all sizes.ContactPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA - Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.com
Reloading AEG

The new AEG: The corporate group Electrolux presents the new visual identity of its premium brand AEG.

www.d-art-design.de

Dart Presents New Visual Identity at IFAThe new AEG: The corporate group Electrolux presents the new visual identity of its premium brand AEG at the international fair for consumer electronics and home appliances IFA in Berlin. Dart Design Gruppe has been secretly refining the corporate architecture for more than a year and has created the visionary pioneer brands new tridimensional identity for the IFA from 2 to 7 September 2016.AEG likes defying conventions and has been as symbol for ground-breaking innovations, premium design and first-class taste for more than 125 years. The pioneer of visions surprises visitors at the IFA not only with the introduction of two new product lines  the AEG Mastery Range and the AEG New Laundry Range  but also with the new AEG itself.The traditional brand AEG presents itself with great self-confidence at the IFA 2016. Dart as the lead agency for Brand Architecture has translated the strategic realignment of the brand into a strong and extraordinary brand experience that convinces with its appealing and electrifying story-telling.Modern premium aesthetics for the new AEGThe temporary architecture adopts the new logos prominence and the brands new colour setting as the basis for its design. Dark-grey wall elements divide the whole hall area vertically. Their staggered arrangement in the hall magically draws visitors into the space. Radiating bright light walls flank the brand space at both sides along the whole length of the hall and dramaturgically highlight the dark colour hues of the brand presentation.The red AEG logo in its new corporate design already welcomes visitors in the central lobby area: partitioned over three oversized LED panels the trademark is brightly displayed in the entrance area. It emotionally welcomes visitors in the brand world of the new AEG.Hero arrangement for Taste and CareFrom here, visitors wander through the openly designed product worlds Taste and Care with their overall ten hero arrangements and the two newly launched product lines, the AEG Mastery Range as well as the AEG New Laundry Range. An oven that speaks to its user just like a waiter in a restaurant, or a dishwasher, in which racks slide up ergonomically  these are just some of the experiences of the new Mastery Range. All these products are arranged in a clear and coherent design language that expresses modernity and aesthetics. Typographic elements, aesthetic images and stylised graphics paired with real objects like fresh produce, kitchen devices or garments represent the design-frame for the hero arrangements.AEG  Always an idea aheadAEG has a record of innovations and our promise is to be always a bit ahead  especially, when it is about anticipating consumers needs, says Britta Amara, head of marketing for Electrolux Germany and Austria. The new look, combined with the launch of our new kitchen and laundry product line redefines the manner, in which consumers experience our products  following our vision: AEG  Always an idea ahead.The Dart Design Gruppe is one of the leading agencies for spatial communication in Germany, in which creative design skills are merged with interdisciplinary expertise. A recipient of numerous international design awards, the Dart Design Gruppe designs brand experience and adventure spaces for clients such as 3M, adidas, Amtico, Britax, C.H. Beck, Electrolux, Gabor, Grafe und Unzer, Grundig, Kanzan, Lloyd, MFI, Norske Skog, Panasonic, Parador, Philips, Reebok, RWE, Schuco, Turck, Wurth und Zaha Hadid.Dart Design Gruppe GmbHInge Bruck-Seynstahl (Director Corporate Communications)Haus am Pegel | Am Zollhafen 5 | 41460 NeussFon: 02131 - 40 30 7 - 37pr@d-art-design.de |
Global Cosmetic Implants Market 2016 - Industry Trends and Forecast to 2021

Cosmetic Implants

http://www.marketresearchstore.com/report/global-card-reader-market-research-report-2016-73665

http://bit.ly/2cKHrOE

Global Cosmetic Implants Industry 2016The report provides a basic overview of Cosmetic Implants industry including definitions, applications and industry chain structure. Global market analysis and Chinese domestic market analysis are provided with a focus on history, developments, trends and competitive landscape of the market. A comparison between the international and Chinese situation is also offered.Global Cosmetic Implants Industry Research Report 2016 also focuses on development policies and plans for the industry as well as a consideration of a cost structure analysis. Capacity production, market share analysis, import and export consumption and price cost production value gross margins are discussed.Browse Complete Report With TOC@A key feature of this report is it focus on major industry players, providing an overview, product specification, product capacity, production price and contact information for Global Top15 companies. This enables end users to gain a comprehensive insight into the structure of the international and Chinese Cosmetic Implants industry. Development proposals and the feasibility of new investments are also analyzed. Companies and individuals interested in the structure and value of the Cosmetic Implants industry should consult this report for guidance and direction.The report begins with a brief overview of the Global Cosmetic Implants market and then moves on to evaluate the key trends of the market. The key trends shaping the dynamics of the Global Cosmetic Implants market have been scrutinized along with the related current events, which is impacting the market. Drivers, restraints, opportunities, and threats of the Global Cosmetic Implants market have been analyzed in the report. Moreover, the key segments and the sub-segments that constitutes the market is also explained in the report.Get Free Sample @Table of ContentsChapter One Cosmetic Implants Industry Overview1.1 Cosmetic Implants Definition(Product Picture and Specifications)1.2 Cosmetic Implants Classification and Application1.3 Cosmetic Implants Industry Chain Structure1.4 Cosmetic Implants Industry Overview1.5 Cosmetic Implants Industry History1.6 Cosmetic Implants Industry Competitive Landscape1.7 Cosmetic Implants Industry International and China Development ComparisonChapter Two Cosmetic Implants Market Data Analysis2.1 2016 Global Key Manufacturers Cosmetic Implants Price List2.2 2016 Global Key Manufacturers Cosmetic Implants Gross Margin List2.3 2016 Global Key Manufacturers Cosmetic Implants Capacity and Market Share List2.4 2016 Global Key Manufacturers Cosmetic Implants Production and Market Share List2.5 2016 Global Key Manufacturers Cosmetic Implants Production Value and Market Share ListChapter Three Cosmetic Implants Technical Data Analysis3.1 2016 Global Key Manufacturers Cosmetic Implants Product Quality List3.2 2016 Global Key Manufacturers Cosmetic Implants Product Line Capacity and Commercial Production Date3.3 2016 Manufacturing Base(Factory) Global Regional Distribution3.4 2016 Global Key Manufacturers Cosmetic Implants R&D Status and Technology Sources3.5 2016 Global Key Manufacturers Cosmetic Implants Equipment Investment and Performance3.6 2016 Global Key Manufacturers Cosmetic Implants Raw Materials Sources AnalysisChapter Four Cosmetic Implants Government Policy and News4.1 Government Related Policy Analysis4.2 Industry News Analysis4.3 Cosmetic Implants Industry Development TrendAbout Us:MarketResearchStore.com is a single destination for all the industry, company and country reports. We feature large repository of latest industry reports, leading and niche company profiles, and market statistics released by reputed private publishers and public organizations.Contact US:Joel JohnSuite #8138, 3422 SW 15 Street,Deerfield Beach, Florida 33442United StatesToll Free: +1-855-465-4651 (USA-CANADA)Tel: +1-386-310-3803
Cyber security market in Europe to grow at a CAGR of 12.64% over the period 2014-2019

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http://www.marketresearchreports.biz/sample/sample/283697

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Cyber threats are internet-based attempts that disrupt or damage IT systems and hack critical information using spyware, malware, and phishing. Cyber security solutions help organizations detect, monitor, report, and counter cyber threats and maintain the confidentiality of IT systems. Increased internet penetration has led an exponential rise in sophisticated attacks on IT business infrastructure. Organizations are increasingly adopting cyber security solutions to protect critical data or any digital asset stored in a computer or any digital memory device. Cyber threats are becoming the major concern with the increase in usage of mobile devices and applications.View Full Report at:Technavio's analysts forecast the cyber security market in Europe to grow at a CAGR of 12.64% over the period 2014-2019.Covered in this reportIn this report, the Technavio analyst covers the present scenario and growth prospects of the cyber security market in Europe for the period 2015-2019.To calculate the market size, the analyst considers the revenue generated from the sales of cyber security solutions in Europe. The report also includes market insights, market description, end-user segmentation, and market landscape in Europe.In addition, it provides forecast and an analysis of the four key leading countries in the cyber security market in Europe:RussiaGermanyFranceUKTechNavio's report, Cyber Security Market in Europe 2015-2019, has been prepared based on an in-depth market analysis with inputs from industry experts. The report covers the market landscape and its growth prospects in the coming years. The report includes a discussion of the key vendors operating in this market.Key VendorsBAE SystemsCisco SystemsFortinetNorthrop GrummanRaytheonSymantecOther Prominent VendorsBrocade Communications SystemsCSCEmcFireEyeF-SecureHewlett-PackardIBMKaspersky LabL-3 CommunicationsMcAfeeMicrosoftPalo Alto NetworksSkybox SecurityTripWireTrustwaveDownload Sample Copy of This Report at:Market DriverIncreased Use of Mobile DevicesFor a full, detailed list, view our reportMarket ChallengeHigh Cost of DeploymentFor a full, detailed list, view our reportMarket TrendDemand for Cloud-based Security SolutionsFor a full, detailed list, view our reportKey Questions Answered in this ReportWhat will the market size be in 2019 and what will the growth rate be?What are the key market trends?What is driving this market?What are the challenges to market growth?Who are the key vendors in this market space?What are the market opportunities and threats faced by the key vendors?What are the strengths and weaknesses of the key vendors?Browse Latest Industry Press Release at:MarketResearchReports.biz is the most comprehensive collection of market research reports.MarketResearchReports.Biz services are specially designed to save time and money for our clients.We are a one stop solution for all your research needs, our main offerings are syndicated researchreports, custom research, subscription access and consulting services. We serve all sizes and typesof companies spanning across various industries.State Tower90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207United StatesTel: +1-518-621-2074Website:E: sales@marketresearchreports.bizFollow us on LinkedIn:
North America Car Air Fresheners market to be worth US$952.01 mn by 2020

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Car fresheners in North America have become a staple in personal cars and commercial vehicles segments. These include paper car air fresheners, vent clips and sticks, gels/cans, aerosols, and novelty car air fresheners. Organic car air fresheners and innovative packaging and designs will boost sale of these products in North America over the next six years. Increased spending on discretionary products due to economic recovery 2011 onwards supports the growth in this market over the forecast period. Furthermore, longer time spent in cars due to traffic snarls will drive the demand for organic/natural car fresheners in the U.S. and Canada during the forecast period. Car fresheners have become an important part of the car care industry in North America. Moreover, increasing number of car owners in Mexico will further escalate the consumption of car fresheners in the Mexican market.Widening distribution channels such as supermarkets/hypermarkets and departmental stores, fuel stations, car wash stations, and automotive shops will drive sales of car fresheners over the next six years. Strategic positioning of car fresheners in retail channels, coupled with strategic advertisements by leading brands across North America, will drive consumption of these products. However, concerns about allergens and stringent regulations imposed by regulatory authorities can act as potential hurdles for the car fresheners market.Get More Information:Innovations in novelty car air fresheners, gels, and cans will ensure introduction of new products in this market over the forecast period. Furthermore, vents and clips are likely to show highest growth over the next six years in North America, as these fresheners can be easily installed in vehicles and eliminate car odor instantly. Moreover, vent clips are easy to fit and last for over 30 days.The car fresheners market in North America was valued at USD 744.5 million in 2013 and is expected to reach USD 952.01 million in 2020, growing at a CAGR of 3.65% from 2014 to 2020. Canada is likely to grow at the fastest rate, followed by the U.S. Mexico however, is anticipated to experience sluggish growth over the forecast period.The car fresheners market is segmented according to product types such as gels and cans, sprays/aerosols, papers, vents and clips, and others. Paper car fresheners accounted for majority of the market share in 2013, followed by vents clips. The U.S. presents a large consumer base for car fresheners and is thus the largest market for these products.Demand for organic/natural car fresheners products is anticipated to increase over the next six years due to rising awareness about the side effects of synthetic chemicals in car fresheners. Higher number of organic products is likely to be launched in categories such as gels and cans, sprays/aerosols and vents, and clips over the forecast period.View exclusive Global strategic Business report:Mass-retailing channels such as supermarkets and hypermarkets are the most preferred distribution channels by key market players as they accounted for the largest market share in 2013. Mass retailing channels are likely to hold strategic importance in the distribution strategies of the market players, as they would dominate the North American market over the forecast period. Furthermore, automotive shops and car wash shops are expected to contribute significantly to the revenue in this market. Online retailers will attract large volume of consumers over the next six years through data mining techniques.The car fresheners market in North America is concentrated with the top five players accounting for over 60% of the global market share in 2013. Key players in this market include Procter & Gamble Co., S.C. Johnson & Son, Inc., Reckitt Benckiser Group Plc, Handstands, and CAR-FRESHNERS Corporation. Furthermore, the number of private label brands is expected to rise in the U.S. and Canada over the next six years with the expansion of auto after-market category through mass merchandisers, online stores, and other retail channels.About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a market intelligence company, providing global business information reports and services. Our exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trends analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather, and analyze information. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.US Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:
Luxury Vehicles Market: By Brands, Type, Industry Share and Segment Analysis to 2021

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The term luxury vehicle suggests a vehicle with higher quality equipment, explicit construction, comfort, better performance, higher design, and is technologically modern and featured. It is a perceptual, conditional, and subjective attribute that may be apprehended differently by different people. Luxury vehicles are a symbol of an image, brand, prestige, or status that is offered at premium prices. These vehicles provide emphasized comfort and the higher degree of safety compared to mainstream vehicles.Request free Sample Report @The past of automobile industry shows that there has been a point where it had a group of car models that were expensive to purchase owing to the so-called superiority of their design and engineering. Wealthy buyers and the high-standard group of people give importance to their society status and prestige. Hence, these automobiles specifically focus on such wealthy buyers and are generically termed as luxury vehicles. By providing various models, manufacturers of these luxury vehicles target particular socio-economic classes taking into account their income and standard of living in the society.On the basis of type, luxury vehicles are classified as sedan, station wagon, hatchback, coupe, and convertible body styles. Further, they are segmented into minivans, crossovers, sport utility vehicles, and others. Luxury vehicles are available in any size vehicle, from small to large, and in any price range. Based on the size and features provided by luxury vehicles, others segment is further sub-segmented as premium compact vehicles, entry-level luxury or compact executive vehicles, mid-size luxury or executive vehicles, high-end luxury or full-size luxury vehicles, and ultra-luxury vehicles. Geographically, the market is segmented as North America, Europe, Asia, and RoW.Request in-depth TOC (Table of Contents) @The U.S., China, Japan, Canada, India, and other European countries are the major markets for luxury vehicles. The global luxury vehicles market is forecasted to have positive growth in the near future. Increasing disposable income is the key factor for the market growth globally. In addition, automobile manufacturers and other financial institutions provide various loan schemes which make it easy for the customers to maintain their status in the society. This is one of the factors increasing the demand of luxury vehicles in the developing nations which positively impacts the growth of global luxury vehicles market. On the other hand, rising fuel prices in developing countries such as India may act as market restraints, hindering growth of the global market.Key players of the global luxury market are BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Jaguar, Audi, Volvo, Ferrari, and Land Rover. Other major players in the market include Rolls-Royce, Bentley, Lamborghini, Lexus, and Cadillac. Some of the manufacturers may be either stand-alone companies such as BMW and Mercedes, while others may be a division or a subsidiary of a mass market automaker such as Lexus, which is a part of Toyota.Browse detail report @About Us:Zion Market Research is a single destination for all the industry, company and country reports. We feature large repository of latest industry reports, leading and niche company profiles, and market statistics released by reputed private publishers and public organizations. Zion Market Research is the comprehensive collection of market intelligence products and services available on air. We have market research reports from number of leading industry and update our collection daily to provide our clients with the instant online access to our database. With access to this database, our clients will be able to benefit from expert insights on global industries, products, and market trends.Contact Us:Zion Market Research4283, Express Lane,Suite 634-143,Sarasota, Florida 34249, United StatesTel: +49-322 210 92714USA/Canada Toll Free No.1-855-465-4651Email: sales@zionmarketresearch.comWebsite:
Market Forecast Report on LED Lighting 2015-2025

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LED light is a light-emitting diode product which is accumulated into the utilization in lighting fixtures. It is basically a semiconductor lighting source operate in different applications such as automotive lighting, general as well as backlighting. It has been noticed that LEDs are smaller and have a lengthier operating life as well as lower cost of ownership as compared to previous technologies in the similar area. The prices of LEDs have reduced to a point where such type of lighting is becoming the economic choice in every application. The acceptance of LED lighting is escalating in almost all major end uses such as industrial buildings, residential and commercial buildings, as well as outdoor application areas. The LED lighting systems provide more energy efficiency and longer life span. The LED light provides a lifetime of nearly 50,000 hours of brightness and work effectively by using only a fraction of energy as is utilized by traditional bulbs and CFLs. The LED lights compete with old and traditional bulbs on various parameters which include longer lifetime, energy efficiency, enhanced environmental friendliness, better durability, lower heat and smaller size. The Global LED lighting market has showcased rapid growth over the past few years. The Global LED lighting market is anticipated to grow at a stupendous CAGR over the period 2015-2025 with a substantial revenue in 2025. Thus, the revolution in LED is gaining traction in terms of market dynamics.Global LED Lighting: Market SegmentationThe Global LED lighting market is segmented on the basis of organizational structure such as organized and unorganized. The Global LED lighting market is further bifurcated by application areas such as automotive, general and backlighting. The LED lighting market in automobile industry is rising as LEDs are initiating to be used in mass market automobiles. The Global LED lighting market is also divided on the basis of end-user segment such as commercial, general, residential, industrial, outdoor and architectural. The Global LED lighting market is further segmented by technology which includes ultraviolet LEDs, basic LEDs, high brightness LEDs, polymer LEDs and organic LEDs.Request Free Report Sample@Global LED Lighting Market: Growth DriversThe global LED lighting market is influenced by various factors such as macroeconomic conditions which is impacting the new construction and subsequently new lighting installations. Less replacement, less heat as well as the lower price are fostering the demand for LED lights across the globe and strengthening the market of global LEDs. Such factors along with inclining demand for cost efficient lighting systems from communities and buildings will intensify the market for global LED lighting from 2015-2025. Besides this, innovation and change in technology along with different product designs by LED light manufacturers are anticipated to bolster the global LED lighting market. The rising government initiatives for conservation of energy is also fostering the growth of global LED lighting market.Global LED Lighting Market: Regional OutlookGeographically, the Global LED Lighting industry can be divided by major regions which include North America, Latin America, Western and Eastern Europe, Asia-Pacific region, Japan, Middle East and Africa. In 2014, Asia Pacific captured the highest share in the global LED lighting market due to significant population growth, huge private sector LED lighting projects as well as the suitable government policies. The LED lighting has become popular in Japans educational institutions, retail stores and hospitals. Followed by it, Europe stood at second position in the revenue of global LED lighting market as the demand for LED lights are gaining traction especially for architectural and commercial lighting functions. Apart from this, U.S. holds third position in the global LED lighting market.Visit For TOC@Global LED Lighting Market: PlayersSome of the top vendors identified across the value chain of the global LED lighting market include Cree Corporation, International Light technologies, American Bright Optoelectronics Corporation, Philips Lumileds Lighting company, Samsung Electronics Limited and OSRAM Licht AG. It has been noticed that new companies from consumer electronics as well as from semiconductor segments are entering the LED lighting. Thus, the LEDs showcases a higher opportunity for service providers as well as the component manufacturers to enhance their activities in the areas of LED lighting.About Us:Future Market Insights is the premier provider of market intelligence and consulting services, serving clients in over 150 countries. FMI is headquartered in London, the global financial capital, and has delivery centres in the U.S. and India.Contact Us:Future Market Insights616 Corporate Way,Suite 2-9018,Valley Cottage,New York 10989,United StatesTel: +1-347-918-3531Fax: +1-845-579-5705Email: sales@futuremarketinsights.comWebsite:
Macadamia Market Analysis, Trends, Forecast, 2016-2026

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Macadamia nut was introduced in the early 1960s to the Kenyan highlands from Australia. Macadamia is a member of the family Proteaceae, native to Australia. Australia and Hawaii are the major producing areas of macadamia with others including eastern and southern Africa, and Central and Latin America. Several species of macadamia exist in Australia but only two species such as M. tetraphylla and Macadamia integrifolia and their hybrids are grown commercially. Production of macadamia nuts in Australia is mainly in eastern shore of Australia (northern New South Wales and south-eastern Queensland). Currently, Hawaii is the largest producer of global macadamia, accounting for around 70 percent of total macadamia production worldwide followed by Australia, around 22 percent, rest is produced by other countries including Malawi, South Africa, Kenya, Guatemala, Mexico, California, Costa Rica, Brazil, New Zealand and China.Tree nuts include almond, cashew, hazelnut, pistachio, walnut, macadamia, and pecan. Currently, macadamia accounts for around only one percent among all the tree nuts available across the globe. Almond nut dominates the nut segment, accounting for around 34 percent. Increasing health claims for macadamia have witnessed a surge in recent years, which if succeeded is expected to increase the consumption of macadamia nuts among consumers.Global Macadamia Market Segmentation:On the basis of application the global macadamia market is broadly segmented into food industry, and cosmetics industry. In food industry macadamia is widely used in confectionaries including chocolate bar, chocolate covered candy, ice cream and other baking products. In cosmetics industry it is used in shampoos, sunscreens, soaps and others.Request Free Report Sample@Geographically, global macadamia market is segmented into North America, Latin America, Eastern Europe, Western Europe, Asia Pacific excluding Japan, Japan and Middle East & Africa. Currently, North America and Western Europe account for major market share for macadamia however, Asia Pacific excluding Japan is expected to grow significantly in the forecasted years.Global Macadamia Market Dynamics:Owing to increasing variety of applications of macadamia, various workshop are taking places in order to increase the international trade for macadamia and since capitalise the growing demand for macadamia. Adoption of macadamia in chocolate and ice cream among consumers is expected to drive the demand for global macadamia in the near future. The biggest restraint for macadamia market is increasing crop losses due to immature nuts and moldy / rotten nuts. The crop losses due to these type of nuts accounts for around 50 percent of the total macadamia wastage globally. Thereby, reducing inclination of crop growers for macadamia and thus, hampering the market growth.There is a high opportunity to increase the market share of macadamia in terms of revenue across countries such as Mexico, China, South Africa and others. Companies are investing in these countries through promotional activities in order to increase the footprint of macadamia worldwide.Visit For TOC@Global Macadamia Market Key Players:Some of the key players operating in the global macadamia market are Mauna Loa Macadamia Nut Corp., Hamakua Macadamia Nut Company, MacFarms, Wondaree Macadamias, NAMBUCCA MACNUTS Pty Ltd, Golden Macadamias, Royal Macadamia (Pty) Ltd., Kenya Nut Company Ltd. and MWT Foods Australia.About Us:Future Market Insights is the premier provider of market intelligence and consulting services, serving clients in over 150 countries. FMI is headquartered in London, the global financial capital, and has delivery centres in the U.S. and India.Contact Us:Future Market Insights616 Corporate Way,Suite 2-9018,Valley Cottage,New York 10989,United StatesTel: +1-347-918-3531Fax: +1-845-579-5705Email: sales@futuremarketinsights.comWebsite:
Da Vinci's designs Updated: 2016-09-16 07:11 By Lin Qi(China Daily Europe)

Tsinghua University Art Museum in Beijing opens with an exhibition featuring the Renaissance man's scientific sketches

Leonardo da Vinci is revered not only for works as the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper, but also for his work in engineering, optics, architecture, geometry and astronomy.

The scope and depth of the Renaissance man's interests is celebrated in the Codex Atlanticus, a 1,119-page, 12-volume collection of his drawings and notes on various scientific disciplines.

The Tsinghua University Art Museum on the campus of Tsinghua in Beijing opened on Sept 11 with 11 shows. Photos Provided to China Daily Top left and right: Pages from Codex Atlanticus are among the exhibits of Dialog with Leonardo da Vinci to mark the opening of the Tsinghua University Art Museum; Top center: A painting by contemporary Chinese artist Pang Xunqin; Above: A Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) bowl with a high stem is among the displays.

The book is kept at the Biblioteca Ambrosiana in Milan, but 60 original pages are now on show at Tsinghua University Art Museum in Beijing.

The exhibition, Dialog with Leonardo da Vinci, is the largest exhibition on the Codex Atlanticus outside Italy. It is one of 11 shows arranged to mark the museum's official opening on Sept 11 and will run until March 19.

Along with the pages, it also has a dozen TV screens showing 3-D displays of the artist's aircraft designs and other inventions.

This is not the first time pages from the encyclopedia have been sent abroad. An earlier exhibition in Singapore featured 26 pages, while an event in Japan had 20 pages, according to Yang Dongjiang, deputy director of Tsinghua University Art Museum.

Designed by Swiss architect Mario Botta, the Beijing museum covers 5,000 square meters in the east corner of the Tsinghua University campus, making it the biggest college museum in China.

Previously, the university, founded in 1911, had a room to exhibit archaeological relics, which was opened in 1926. It was not until 1999 when the college was merged with the Central Academy of Arts and Design that a museum was proposed to house the academy's collection of fine art and antiques, which it had been assembling since 1956.

The plan received a boost in 2013 when Huang Rulun, a real estate tycoon, donated 200 million yuan ($29.9 million; 26.6 million euros) to the project.

The museum has more than 13,000 Chinese paintings, calligraphy works, textiles, porcelain pieces, bronze ware, Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) furniture and other works of art, mainly from the academy's collection and public donations.

Feng Yuan, director of the museum, describes the building's architecture as like a "palace" and says one of his goals is to ensure it remains attractive to visitors in the long run.

Speaking at media event in August, Feng, who ran the National Art Museum of China from 2004 to 2005, adds that many museums gradually lose visitors because they do not rotate their displays and lack sustainable financial support or employees experienced in museum management.

"Of course, we can't rival the Palace Museum (commonly known as the Forbidden City) or the Capital Museum in terms of collections," he says, "but we can exchange items with them."

Tsinghua University Art Museum's upcoming exhibitions will feature bronze ware from the Shang (c.16th century-11th century BC) and Zhou (c.11th century-256 BC) dynasties on loan from the National Museum of China, and paintings from the National Art Museum.

Feng says the new museum is also reaching out to college museums abroad to arrange academic cooperation and exhibitions.

"The museum should not only be an alternative classroom for students, but must also be a landmark in Beijing that people from across the country come and visit," he adds.

To this end, he says, the museum will display a variety of artwork - from ancient to modern, from home and abroad - to engage a varied audience.

As for other events marking the official opening, there will be an exhibition of multimedia installations in which international artists use digital technology to create visual effects. An area will also be devoted to contemporary art.

The museum's academic committee comprises curators, professors and artists, including Chen Lyusheng, deputy director of the National Museum of China, and Xu Bing, a professor at the Central Academy of Fine Arts.

Despite the buzz surrounding the Tsinghua University Art Museum, such museums are not a common sight in China.

The only comparable institution is Peking University's Museum of Art and Archaeology, which was named after its sponsor, Arthur M. Sackler, an American entrepreneur and philanthropist. It has a collection of drawings and prints by Western masters such as Raphael and Picasso donated by visiting US professor Donald Stone.

"Every major university in the US has an art museum. ... Students can just go over, enjoy the beautiful art and then go back to their studies," Stone says.

Things could be going that way in China, too.

Last year saw the opening of the Wanlin Art Museum at Wuhan University in the central province of Hubei.

The museum was set up thanks to Chen Dongsheng, president of Taikang Life Insurance Corp and China Guardian Auctions, who donated 120 million yuan for the project.

linqi@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 09/16/2016 page19)
Market Size of Greek Yogurt, Forecast Report 2016-2026

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Currently, greek yogurt is one of the most popular dairy products across the globe. Since greek yogurt is prepared through the straining process in order to separate the yogurt from the excess watery whey, it is also known as strained yogurt. The straining process makes the yogurt much thicker and creamier as compared to the regular or traditional yogurt. Greek yogurt contributes significantly to the growth of the global yogurt market. This is mainly attributed to its benefits such as higher protein and lower carbohydrates value as compare to traditional yogurt. Presently, greek yogurt is the highest growing product category among others including regular yogurt and yogurt drinks and second holds largest market share in terms of revenue, after traditional yogurt in the overall yogurt market. Demand for greek yogurt market is expected to increase in the next five to six forecast years owing to increasing lunch of new product with variety of flavours such as blueberry, vanilla, honey, chocolate and others.Global Greek Yogurt Market Segmentation:On the basis of product type, the global greek yogurt market is segmented into regular greek yogurt and non-fat greek yogurt, which is made from skim milk. Owing to increase the consumption of fat free and healthy products, non-fat greek yogurt products are gaining increasing popularity among the consumers.On the basis of distribution channel, the global greek yogurt market is segmented into supermarket/ hypermarket, grocery stores, convenience stores, and online retailing. In terms of revenue contribution, supermarket / hypermarket is expected to hold the highest share among all the other segments. However, online retail for global greek yogurt market witnesses steady growth in the forecasted years. This is attributed to increasing visibility of greek yogurt especially through online retailing.Request Free Report Sample@Geographically, global greek yogurt market is segmented into North America, Latin America, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Japan, Asia-Pacific excluding Japan, and Middle East and Africa (MEA). North America and Western Europe are the two most lucrative market for greek yogurt in the world. In North America around half of the yogurt sold is greek yogurt.Global Greek Yogurt Market Dynamics:Increase in health consciousness among consumer has led to shift in eating preference towards healthy and nutrition food products. Availability of high nutritional value, which includes high protein, probiotics, vitamin such as vitamin D, B12, minerals such as potassium, iodine and calcium in greek yogurt is key factor that has led to increased adoption of greek yogurt among consumers and thus, fuelling the global greek yogurt market growth.Increasing application of greek yogurt is another growth driver for greek yogurt market since it is used for various medium in different countries. For instance, in Mediterranean region greek yogurt is mainly used as savoury but in the US, Mexico and Canada it is used as sweet snack with added fruits and flavours. Greek yogurt is also used in making many sauces for instance beef and lamb sauces. Greek yogurt is also used as a substitute products, for instance it is used as a substitute product for sour cream, cream cheese and butter. Thus, increasing its application among food products.Visit For TOC@Among dairy products, greek yogurt is a good option for the consumers who have slight lactose intolerance, since in the production process much of the lactose is removed from the greek yogurt. This leads to drive the scope of greek yogurt among such consumers globally. However, high lactose intolerance is restrain for adoption of greek yogurt, thus restricting the market growth. There is a high opportunity to expand and increase the revenue for greek yogurt in the Asia Pacific excluding japan and Middle East countries.Global Greek Yogurt Market Key Players:Some of the key players operating in the global greek yogurt market are Chobani LLC, Stonyfield Farm, Inc, FAGE International S.A., GROUPE DANONE, and General Mills, Inc. Owing to have strong distribution and marketing strategies companies are able to meet the increasing demand for global greek yogurt.About Us:Future Market Insights is the premier provider of market intelligence and consulting services, serving clients in over 150 countries. FMI is headquartered in London, the global financial capital, and has delivery centres in the U.S. and India.Contact Us:Future Market Insights616 Corporate Way,Suite 2-9018,Valley Cottage,New York 10989,United StatesTel: +1-347-918-3531Fax: +1-845-579-5705Email: sales@futuremarketinsights.comWebsite:
Market Intelligence Report Automotive Soft Trim Interior Materials, 2016-2026

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Automotive Soft Trim Interior popularly known as Soft Trims belongs to automotive interiors segment being a part of the automotive ancillaries sector. The nomenclature is derived from the nature of the product application compared to the hard exterior body & spare parts of the vehicle. It is used in seats, doors, floor liners, pillar covers, cockpit, headliners, etc. of the vehicle. The material used is primarily of 3 types: Leather, Textile/Fabric & Chemical Polymers. Leather is used in Premium automobile models, whereas the latter two cater to Mid & Base Level models in exterior furnishing/covering as well fabrication of core interior body parts. The product has a blend of critical traits more than just the aesthetics aspect; such as Acoustic Control, Durability & Ergonomics, and Feather Weight Capability.Automotive Soft Trim Interior Market SegmentationThe Automotive Soft Trim Interior market is segmented on the basis of the materials involved. The major materials types can be classified as:Leather which can be further classified as per Texture & Finish, Heat Absorption CapacityFoams which can be also classified such as Backed & Unbacked Types, Texture e.g. Poker Rail, Sew foam & Grade e.g. Residential or Commercial grade on durability basisCoated Fabrics which can be classified as per coating material such as Polymer Coated, Rubber Coated & Other Substrate Coated for having properties like fire, & water resistance and wash proofRequest Free Report Sample@Textiles & Acoustic Barriers-which can be classified as per area of furnishing whether seating, safety belts, flooring, lining on doors, roof, shelves etc. & also the grade/quality of material used such ethylene vinyl acetate (EVA), styrene-butadiene-styrene (SBS), Polyurethane reactive (PUR) for properties similar to coated fabrics & noise and sound proofing as well .Automotive Soft Trim Interior Market Dynamics & TrendsThe entire 4 wheeler-Automotive vehicle segments such as Light Motor Vehicles, Heavy Commercial Vehicles etc. are major consumers whom the product caters to. It has both OEM & Aftermarket channel sales market. Leather, Coated Fabrics & Textiles is used for seats, door-side handles, head rests, arm-rests, seat belts, fasteners & cockpit sections. The premium/luxury model of the vehicle employ leather type whereas the standard models employ the latter types owing to the material quality & its associated cost. Foams & Acoustic Barriers are used in auxiliary interior body parts. The product is thus driven both by the automotive OEM for their varied models as well as by end user as per his budget. It can be noted that the existing manufacturers of this material already have a sound access to procurement chemicals & related raw materials. The companies can be a registered to a particular or multiple automotive OEMS which is a determining factor of the companys standing in the market. These companies are also focusing on different strategies such customized design in order to maintain the market share in the market. Continuous emphasis on new product innovation development by automotive OEMs exists to maintain the competitive advantage by providing more efficient & economic options in the market during the forecast period.Automotive Soft Trim Interior Market: Regional OutlookGeographically, the Automotive Soft Trim Interior industry can be divided by major regions which include North America, Western & Eastern Europe, Asia-Pacific region, Japan, Middle East and Africa. America, Germany, China and Japan are the major producing nations. In terms of raw materials, Middle East & African countries are major suppliers of Leather; Chemicals by North America, Europe & Asia Pacific including Japan. The market is projected to grow at a steady growth rate. The market would be volume driven across all regions & vehicle segments. Market coverage in existing & untapped regions with OEM order bank would be critical to the companys business.Visit For TOC@The market does not sees any immediate or external threat at present, only material substitution by advanced types may cannibalize the existing material types.Automotive Soft Trim Interior Market PlayersThe major players identified across the value chain of The Haartz Corporation, Benecke Kaliko, Polyone Corporation, Recticel, Classic Soft Trim, and Auto Trim Inc. in terms of manufacturing apart from regional /Medium & Small-scale companies, Material Suppliers & Distributors etc.About Us:Future Market Insights is the premier provider of market intelligence and consulting services, serving clients in over 150 countries. FMI is headquartered in London, the global financial capital, and has delivery centres in the U.S. and India.Contact Us:Future Market Insights616 Corporate Way,Suite 2-9018,Valley Cottage,New York 10989,United StatesTel: +1-347-918-3531Fax: +1-845-579-5705Email: sales@futuremarketinsights.comWebsite:
Complex Regional Pain Syndrome Market Intelligence Report Offers Growth Prospects

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Complex Regional Pain syndrome (CRPS), which is also known as reflex sympathetic dystrophy syndrome is an uncommon kind of chronic pain condition characterized by severe pain and inflammation. CRPS develops after an injury, stroke or surgery and the pain is associated with the severity of the initial injury. CRPS is most common in people of age group 20-35 and more common in women than men. CRPS is also observed in children due to their injuries. Excluding the severe pain the other symptoms for CRPS include swelling and stiffness in joints, changes in the growth of nails, burning sensation and skin changes in appearance and temperature. Emotional stress can also trigger CRPS and heighten the pain sensations in an individual.The complex regional pain syndrome is basically of two types according to the National Health Service (NHS) U.K, CRPS 1 also called reflex sympathetic dystrophy, it is an unknown condition resulting from the injury of limb which can also be related to genetics hence, likely to be a hereditary disorder. CRPS 2 is an extreme severe painful response to peripheral nerve injury but the pain does not migrate from the original site of injury unlike CRPS 1. Diagnosis of CRPS depends upon the individuals medical history and symptoms as there is no single diagnostic test for it. The incidence rates reveal that female are three times more affected than male and occurs in the age over 60. According to a study conducted in U.K, 1 in 3,800 people develop CRPS each year.Request Free Report Sample@The global market for CRPS is segmented on basis of treatment and distribution channel:Segmentation by treatment therapies of complex regional pain syndromePhysical TherapyDrugsAnalgesicsAntidepressantsCorticosteroidsOthersSurgical sympathectomyIntrathecal drug pumpsSpinal cord stimulationSegmentation by distribution channel of complex regional pain syndromePharmaciesHospitalsClinicsResearch OrganizationsAs CRPS can begin at any age including children, 90% of CRPS occurs if enough care is not taken by an individual after any serious injury such as fractures, soft tissue injury, limb immobilization, sprains and surgical procedures. National Institutes of Health (NIH) is supporting research for CRPS on the brain and CNS by focusing on studying new approaches in treating CRPS.Visit For TOC@On the basis of region prevalence, CRPS is segmented into five key regions: North America, Latin America, Europe, Asia Pacific, and Middle East & Africa.As it is one of the rare condition there is limited data available for regional market share for CRPS but there are 50% chances of multiple sclerosis (MS) patients to develop CRPS and currently North America is one of the leading region in terms of market share followed by Europe and Asia pacific.Some of the key market players of the complex regional pain syndrome market include Mallinckrodt Pharmaceutical, GlaxoSmithKline plc., Mylan N.V., Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd., AbbVie, ACTAVIS, Zydus Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Sandoz, and Janssen Global Services, LLC..About Us:Future Market Insights is the premier provider of market intelligence and consulting services, serving clients in over 150 countries. FMI is headquartered in London, the global financial capital, and has delivery centres in the U.S. and India.Contact Us:Future Market Insights616 Corporate Way,Suite 2-9018,Valley Cottage,New York 10989,United StatesTel: +1-347-918-3531Fax: +1-845-579-5705Email: sales@futuremarketinsights.comWebsite:
IQ4I Research & Consultancy published a new report on Pharmaceutical Excipients Global Market  Forecast To 2022

Pharmaceutical Excipients Global Market estimated to be worth $7,716 million by 2022

Excipients are a broad range of non-active components combined with active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) during formulation to form a desired finished drug product and perform a wide range of functions. It is usually identified as a substance that aid to function API with better functionality such as bioavailability, stability, good taste, texture and patient acceptability with safety and efficacy of pharmaceuticals to improve the quality-of-life of the patient at a lower cost. In fact, a few decades ago, excipients were not considered important due to their inactive nature, but now they are considered as one of the essential components in the production of tablets, liquid orals, powders, semi-solids and parenteral as excipients impact the stabilization of drug product in various conditions such as change in pressure, temperature, pH etc. Oral (tablets and capsule) dosage forms are mostly preferred due to ease of manufacturing and patient compliance and the development of these oral dosage forms involves direct compression and granulation process. The majority of vertically integrated companies develop in-house excipients and small formulators often rely on external suppliers to outsource specialised co-processed functionality excipients.Presently, there is demand for the development of novel excipients with technological advancements like new chemical entity excipients, new chemically modified grade excipients, existing excipients with the various route of administration and co-processed excipients. These novel excipients increase the scope for the development of new formulations and drug delivery system which is a major gain for the industry, but high cost and lengthy developmental process along with the safety and quality issues are delaying the excipients approval. Combination excipients are mostly preferred by the manufacturers as the single excipients do not meet all the functional requirements such as high solubility, stability and bioavailability. As estimated by IQ4I Research, the global pharmaceutical excipients market is expected to grow at mid range single digit CAGR to reach $7,716 million by 2022.Development of highly soluble excipients for sustained and controlled release formulations, global pharmaceutical excipient outsourcing, manufacturing of co-processed excipients using nano- and liposome-mediated technologies, strategic partnership/alliance among excipient manufacturers are some of the factors driving pharmaceutical excipient market whereas less interest in developing novel excipients, contamination issues in formulations, and delay in approval of novel excipients are the factors restraining market growth. Recently in 2015, IPEC-Americas calls FDA to review process for novel excipients and create new regulations to relieve the uncertainties around the use of new excipients. The most commonly used excipients in the small molecule are carbohydrates, oleochemicals, petrochemicals, metallic oxides, silicates etc whereas in large molecules sodium salts, solvents, emulsifiers and amino acids etc are used.The pharmaceutical excipients market is mainly classified into source/origin, material type, manufacturing process, functionality, application, finished products and geography. The pharmaceutical excipient source/origin market includes animal-, plant-, mineral- and synthetic-based excipients. By material type the pharmaceutical excipient is classified into inorganic chemicals, organic chemicals and others. Inorganic chemical segment divided into calcium salts, halites, metallic oxides, silicates and others. Likewise, organic chemicals are further divided into carbohydrates including sugar (actual sugar, sugar alcohol, artificial sweetener), starch (modified, converted, dried) and cellulose (cellulose ether, cellulose ester, croscarmellose sodium, microcrystalline cellulose), petrochemicals including glycol (polyethylene, propylene glycol), povidone, mineral hydrocarbons (petrolatum, mineral waxes, mineral oils), acrylic polymers, others (antimicrobials, antioxidants, dyes & lakes), oleochemicals including fatty alcohol, mineral stearate, glycerin and others (alcohol, citric acid, lactic acid, polysaccharide gums, Shellac), proteins including gelatin and others including water for injection and purified water.The pharmaceutical excipients manufacturing process market includes granulation and direct compression. The pharmaceutical excipient by functionality is segmented into fillers & diluents, binders & adhesives, suspension & viscosity agents, coatings, colorants, flavoring agents & sweeteners, disintegrants, lubricants & glidants, preservatives, solvents, solubilizers and others (anti-adherents, buffering agents, chelating agents, compression aids, foam control agents, sorbents, antioxidants, gelling agents, emulsifiers, emollients & humectants and plasticizers).The pharmaceutical excipients by the application is divided into oral formulations (tablets, capsules & liquids), topical, parenteral and advanced delivery system. By finished products, the excipient market is classified into prescription and over-the-counter.Geographical wise, North America is the largest market followed by Europe, Asia and Rest of the World. The Asia Pacific region is the fastest growing region with a highest single digit CAGR from 2015 to 2022 suggesting an array of opportunities for growth and likely to be getting into the eyes of new investors in the pharmaceutical excipients market.The pharmaceutical excipients global market is a highly fragmented market and all the existing players in this market are involved in developing new and advanced products to maintain their market shares. Some of the key players of the pharmaceutical excipient market are Ashland, Inc (U.S.), Associated British Foods Plc (U.K.), Avantor Performance Materials, Inc (U.S.), BASF SE (Germany), Croda International Plc (U.K.), Dow Chemical Company (U.S.), Evonik Industries AG (Germany), FMC Corporation (U.S.), Lubrizol Corporation (U.S.) and Roquette (France).IQ4I (Intelligence Quotient for Innovation) Research and Consultancy Pvt. Ltd. is a global strategy, consulting and a leading market research company. Our clients include leading businesses, investment banks, researchers and government agencies.We are a team of highly qualified consultants and market researchers, committed to help clients make strategic decisions by providing relevant and firmly reliable Intelligence support. We enable our clients to identify the market opportunities with best-in-class market intelligence reports.IQ4I Research and Consultancy Pvt. Ltd.No- 11, Industrial Suburb, 1st Stage, West of Chord Road,RajajiNagar, Bangalore- 560010Call Us: +91 80 60500229
Industrial Protective Footwear Market: Segment and Analysis up to 2015  2021

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Industrial protective footwear provides protection for a variety of hazards. Workers exposed to hazards like falling objects, electrical contact, moving machinery and similar other incidences may be at risk of a foot injury. In order to give your best while working, it is necessary to have the protective footwear. Protective footwear are available in many types and styles and protection levels to service the needs of most any workplace along with quality, durability and long time industrial safety footwear. The major driving factor for the industrial protective footwear is increasing construction and oil & gas industry. Stringent rules regarding workers protection and safety expected to propel the industrial protective footwear market. However, Lack of technological awareness is expected to major restraint the market over the forecast period.Request Sample Report:The market for industrial protective footwear is segmented on the basis of product, type and geography. Based on the product, the industrial protective footwear market is segmented into leather footwear, waterproof footwear, rubber footwear and plastic footwear. Leather footwear dominates the overall industrial protective footwear and is expected to experience significant growth in the years to come. The application segment consists of construction, manufacturing, mining, oil &gas, pharmaceuticals and others. Construction was the leading application segment for industrial protective footwear market. However, oil & gas is expected to be fastest growing segment for industrial protective footwear market.Get in-depth TOC (Table of Contents) with Tables and Figures @The regional segmentation includes the current and forecast demand for North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America and Middle East and Africa with its further bifurcation into major countries including U.S. Germany, France, UK, China, Japan, India and Brazil. North America was the leading region with largest share of overall market for industrial protective footwear. North America closely followed by Europe. With increased demand from construction and oil & gas industry, Europe is expected to rapid pace growth during the forecast period.Inquire more before buying this report @In order to give the users of this report a comprehensive view on the industrial protective footwear market, we have included a detailed competitive scenario and product portfolio of key vendors. To understand the competitive landscape in the market, an analysis of Porters Five Forces model for the industrial protective footwear market has also been included. The study encompasses a market attractiveness analysis, wherein type segments and product segments are benchmarked based on their market size, growth rate and general attractiveness.The report covers detailed competitive scenario including the company overviews, financial revenues of the key participants to develop their positions in the global market. Some of the major key players include in market such as UVEX Safety Group, ELTEN GmbH, VF Corporation, Honeywell Safety Products, Jal Group, Rahman Group, COFRA Holding AG, Oftenrich Holdings Co. Ltd. and Rock Fall Ltd.Browse report at:Industrial Protective Footwear Market: Product Segment AnalysisLeather footwearWaterproof footwearRubber footwearPlastic footwearIndustrial Protective Footwear Market: Type Segment AnalysisConstructionManufacturingMiningOil &gasPharmaceuticalsIndustrial Protective Footwear Market: Regional Segment AnalysisNorth AmericaU.S.EuropeUKFranceGermanyAsia PacificChinaJapanIndiaLatin AmericaBrazilMiddle East & AfricaAbout US:Syndicate Market Research provides a range of marketing and business research solutions designed for our clients specific needs based on our expert resources. The business scopes of Syndicate Market Research cover more than 30 industries includsing energy, new materials, transportation, daily consumer goods, chemicals, etc. We provide our clients with one-stop solution for all the research requirements.Contact US:Joel John3422 SW 15 Street,Suit #8138Deerfield Beach,Florida 33442United StatesToll Free: +1-855-465-4651 (USA-CANADA)Tel: +1-386-310-3803Email: sales@SyndicateMarketResearch.comWebsite:
Top Vendors in Mobility Scooter Market  What has been their key strategies and what are their key opportunities

Mobility Scooter Market | Beige Market Intelligence

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A recent research report Global Mobility Scooter Market  Strategic Assessment and Forecast till 2021 published by Beige Market Intelligence provides an in depth analysis of the worldwide mobility scooter market. The report outlines the market size and growth aspect of major product segment by design, by wheels and by geographic segmentation.The report provides a detailed strategy and product portfolio of the major vendors in the Mobility Scooter Market.Drive Medical Design and ManufacturingDrive Medical founded in 2000, based in New York, US is a manufacturer of durable medical equipment. It is a private company focused on innovation and design of durable medical equipment for a broad spectrum of healthcare needs. The company provides a wide product portfolio of durable medical equipment, which include mobility products, bariatric products, beds, wheelchairs, respiratory equipment, sleep surfaces and pressure prevention products, self-assist products, power scooters, power wheelchairs, paediatric products, rehabilitation products, patient room equipment, electrotherapy devices, and personal care productsKey Strength, Strategy and Key OpportunitiesThe company has a diverse geographical presence with corporate offices and distributor locations spread across the US, the UK, Canada, Germany, Romania, China, and Taiwan. The strategic location of these distributor offices ensures that the company has the widest market reach across key markets.The company adopts a unique sales channel approach wherein it emphasizes on selling its product range to wholesalers and retailers rather than directly to consumers.Penetration into the global market, is one of the key opportunities. As certain areas are yet not being invaded by the company.For More Details, order a report.Order here:Golden Technologies Inc.Golden Technologies founded in 1985, headquartered in Old Forge, Pennsylvania, US is a privately-owned manufacturer of lift chairs, power wheelchairs, and scooters. It has the largest factory in the world, which is solely dedicated to manufacture lift chairs. It provides a wide range of product portfolio from portability to luxurious to heavy duty scooters. The companys skilled designers blend the superior designs with the most technically advanced components to provide the quality, style, comfort, and performance.Key Strength, Strategy and Key OpportunitiesIt is among the worlds largest manufacturer of powered lift and recline charges with clear ambitions to expand its global presence. The company emphasizes on creating contemporary and user-desirable designs that not only are unique but also are customizable.Despite having a significant presence in the US, the company has limited reach across the boundary. The company can work on enhancing its brand reach through other channels.For more Information, Order a report NowOrder here:Pride MobilityPride Mobility Products Corp. founded in 1986, headquartered in Exeter, Pennsylvania is a designer and manufacturer of mobility products. It has manufacturing facilities in North-eastern Pennsylvania and distribution centers throughout the US and subsidiaries around the world, including the UK, Canada, Australia, the Netherlands, Italy, and New Zealand. The company includes Jazzy Power Chairs, Go  Go Travel Mobility, Pride Mobility Scooters, and Pride Lift Chairs and Ramps. The Jazzy product line has revolutionized the industry in manoeuvrability and style.Key Strength, Strategy and OpportunitiesThe company has a broad range of mobility products that include lift chairs, ramps, power chairs, and mobility scooters with a decent product depth.It owns some of the strongest mobility products brands such as Jazzy Chairs, Go-Go Travel mobility, and Pride Mobility scooters. The company adopts a multi-pronged strategy to further its interests in the mobility equipment space. It constantly focuses on innovation by enhancing the capabilities of its products and sufficiently safeguarding them through patenting.The company could build partnership and work more towards keeping its reputation high in order to penetrate the market till 2021.For More Information, Order a reportOrder here:The report also covers the key strength, strategies and opportunities for other vendors such as Sunrise Medical, and Electric Mobility.Some of the other prominent vendors featured in the report are Amigo Mobility International, Invacare, Afikim Electric Vehicles, Van Os Medical, Hoveround Corp., Roma Medical, Merits Health Products, Kymco, TGA Mobility, and Vermeiren International.About Beige Market Intelligence:Beige Market Intelligence is new-age provider of competitive business intelligence, working across various industry verticals. Our expertise and knowledge ensures that the market analysis Beige provides is comprehensive, detailed and complete. The analysis helps our client organizations become aware and make educated decisions, as far as investing or devising a marketing strategy is concerned. The actionable insights delivered through our market research provide a comprehensive market analysis for every level of market segmentation in an industry. Beige Market Intelligence is a quality driven high end Market Research organization. Our team of experts ensure the analysis you receive is not just analysed and smartly presented, but is completely customized based on the clients requirement. Our deliverables guarantee our current global client base does not look beyond Beige when it comes to any kind of industry and market analysis.Beige Market Intelligencechinnapannahalli Main Road, Doddanekundi, Bangalore- 560037Mail: contactus@beigemarketintelligence.comUS: +1 347 903 9949UK: +44 20 323 99499APAC: +91 99 012 75473
Industrial valves Marke: size, Share, research, 2015  2021

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Valves are vital components used in both domestic and industrial perspective. The valves particularly control the volume, pressure, rate and direction of fluids. valves are mostly used in heavy industries and are available in various kinds. The industrial valves include standard valves that offer leak-proof and low-maintenance ability. However, they are manual operated. Further, industrial valves also include automatic valves which are more efficient than standard valves.Get a copy of free Sample Report @Industrial valves market is mainly driven by growing demand of petrochemical products such as paints, polymers, plastics, and fuel additives. Another major factor to drive demand for industrial valves is growing oil & gas and power application industry in Africa and Middle East regions. However, fading demand from mining industry is major restraints that could hinder the growth of the industrial valves market.Get in-depth TOC (Table of Contents) with Tables and Figures @Value chain analysis and Porters Five Forces Model have been presented to provide a comprehensive view of the market. These would also help understand specifics of the industry structure apart from giving an overview of degree of competitiveness. The market was segmented on the basis of type, and end-use application industry in terms of value. The market segments by end-use application industry include oil & gas, chemical, municipal, power, and others. The valve type segmentation includes market size of ball valves, globe valves, gate valves, butterfly valves, and others.The study segments the global industrial valves market on the basis of applications such as oil & gas, chemical, municipal, power and others. It provides forecasts and estimates for each application segment in terms of revenue and volume during the forecast period for each region, including countries as well. The study also analyzes market attractiveness for all applications of industrial valves with the help of the market attractiveness tool.Inquire more before buying this report @In terms of geography, global industrial valves market has been segmented into the following regions: North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America, and the Middle East and Africa (MEA). Each region has been further divided into countries that are found to be key markets for industrial valves.Asia Pacific is the fastest growing market for industrial valves among other regions. China and India are emerging economies that exhibits increased rate of industrialization and commercialization which is expected to trigger the growth of industrial valves demand. Middle East and Northern Africa are likely to become the second fastest growing market.Some of the key manufacturers of industrial valves market include Pentair plc, Emerson Electric Co., KITZ Corporation, AVK Holding A/S, Emerson Electric, General Electric, Cameron International, and Curtiss-Wright Corporation.This report segments the global industrial valves market as follows:Browse detail report @Global Industrial Valves Market: Valve Type Segment AnalysisBall valveGlobe valveGate valveButterfly valveOthersGlobal Industrial Valves Market: Application Segment AnalysisOil & gasChemicalMunicipalPowerOthersGlobal Industrial Valves Market: Regional Segment AnalysisNorth AmericaU.S.EuropeUKFranceGermanyAsia-PacificChinaJapanIndiaLatin AmericaBrazilMiddle East & AfricaAbout US:Syndicate Market Research provides a range of marketing and business research solutions designed for our clients specific needs based on our expert resources. The business scopes of Syndicate Market Research cover more than 30 industries includsing energy, new materials, transportation, daily consumer goods, chemicals, etc. We provide our clients with one-stop solution for all the research requirements.Contact US:Joel John3422 SW 15 Street,Suit #8138Deerfield Beach,Florida 33442United StatesToll Free: +1-855-465-4651 (USA-CANADA)Tel: +1-386-310-3803Email: sales@SyndicateMarketResearch.comWebsite:
ROK | BDG Mobile Plan Goes Beyond Talk & Text to Incorporate Music & Lifestyle Benefits ATLANTA (Sept. 15, 2016)  Mobile provider ROK Mobile and non-profit organization

Bridge DA Gap have joined forces to introduce the ROK | BDG Mobile plan to consumers nationwide. The no-contract plan provides unlimited talk & text, 4GB of 4G LTE data and the ROK Music app with 20 million tracks for only $50 a month. What separates ROK Mobile is the companys inclusion of a number of lifestyle benefits and applications designed to help middle-and-lower income families.



ROK Mobile co-founders John Paul DeJoria and Jonathan Kendrick have dubbed the concept compassionate capitalism and partnered with Bridge DA Gap founder Kevin Khao Cates to bring this mobile plan to consumers.



The plan provides customers a number of benefits at no additional cost. The affordable phone plan helps fund community initiatives and supplies a bundle of life enhancing benefits that some consumers might not be able to afford otherwise, such as:



 $100,000 of Accidental Death Insurance  Provides a cash benefit to the consumers beneficiary(ies) in the event the covered individual is killed in a sudden, unforeseeable, external accident.

 $20,000 of Burial Insurance  Provides a cash benefit to cover burial expenses.

 Roadside Assistance  Anytime dispatch throughout the US & Canada if you get a flat tire, need a jump-start or are broken down. We help you get on your way.

 Telemedicine  Connect with a board certified doctor anytime you need a consult. The majority of minor ailments such as fever, abrasions and nausea can be handled over the phone or through smart phone video.

 Pharmacy Discount Program  Save 44-75% on everything pharmacy related. With more that 62,000 pharmacies participating in the network, you can find the lowest prices near you.

 Music Library  20 Million Tracks that are 100% ad free with unlimited skips and the ability to download and listen offline, in addition to streaming radio stations.

 Built in Wi-Fi  Seamlessly connects to more than 20 million Wi-Fi hotspots at places like Target, Starbucks, 24 Hour Fitness so consumers can utilize as much data as needed without using the allotted high speed data.



Bridge DA Gap, a 501c3 non-profit organization that engages todays youth by incorporating hip-hop music with education to enhance social-emotional development, receives a percentage of every activated phone plan.



Partnering with ROK Mobile allows the Bridge DA Gap Foundation the ability to have a bigger impact for school children across the country due to the partnership with ROK Mobile, said Cates. But it doesnt end there. The lifestyle benefits, included at no extra cost, will impact so many underserved individuals and families with items they might not otherwise be able to afford.



Bridge Da Gap was established in 2008 by renowned hip-hop music producer Cates, and focuses on mentoring and educating students by teaching life skills which are applicable in todays socially challenged environment. Bridge DA Gap has led to dramatic behavior improvement and continues making a positive impact on our youth and communities. As a music producer, entrepreneur and philanthropist, Cates recognizes the difference between being successful and being significant. BDG Mobile is an extension and example of how he is bettering the community, one phone at a time.



For more information, please visit www.rokbdg.com .



Bridge Da Gap was established in 2008 by renowned hip-hop music producer Cates, and focuses on mentoring and educating students by teaching life skills which are applicable in todays socially challenged environment. Bridge DA Gap has led to dramatic behavior improvement and continues making a positive impact on our youth and communities. As a music producer, entrepreneur and philanthropist, Cates recognizes the difference between being successful and being significant. BDG Mobile is an extension and example of how he is bettering the community, one phone at a time.



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Arbro Launches Nanotechnology Based Bioavailable Curcumin

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New Delhi : Arbro Pharmaceuticals has launched SNEC30, a patented highly bioavailable Self Nano Emulsifying Curcumin formulation in 30 mg dose.Curcumin is the active ingredient of turmeric/Haldi which has been widely used in traditional medicine and home remedies in India for hundreds of years.Clinical research conducted over the last 25 years has shown curcumin to be effective in various diseases like cancer, pain, inflammation, arthritis, ulcers, psoriasis, arteriosclerosis, diabetes and many more pro-inflammatory conditions.Despite of its effectiveness against so many conditions, scientists have believed that curcumins true potential has been limited by its poor bioavailability which is caused by its poor solubility and extensive pre-systemic metabolism.Arbro Pharmaceuticals partnered with Jamia Hamdard to carry out research to develop a novel formulation which can overcome curcumins poor bioavailability. The development project was jointly funded by Arbro and the Department of Science and Technology Government of India under its DPRP scheme.SNEC30 is the outcome of this joint development and is based on a novel self nano emulsifying drug delivery system for which patents have been filed and the US patent has been granted."There has been tremendous interest in the therapeutic potential of curcumin but its poor bioavailability was a limiting factor, our research group together with Arbro took the challenge and applied nanotechnology to overcome this limitation and achieve highest ever bioavailability for curcumin said Dr. Kanchan Kohli, Asst. Prof Faculty of Pharmacy, Jamia Hamdard who is one of the main inventors of the technology."Just 30 mg of curcumin in one capsule of SNEC30 has shown higher blood levels than what can be achieved by consuming the curcumin content of 1 kg of raw haldi/turmeric said Mr. Vijay Kumar Arora, Managing Director, Arbro Pharmaceuticals.Arbro pharmaceuticals is a 30-year-old research oriented company with its own research and development, testing and manufacturing facilities. Arbro has been manufacturing and exporting more than hundred formulations under its own brand name to more than 10 countries.ARBRO PHARMACEUTICALS PRIVATE LIMITEDDSM 129 1st Floor DLF Commercial Tower Shivaji Marg,Moti Nagar, New Delhi 110015, Indiacontact number : 011-42880806Email address : marketing@snec30.comWebsite :
Failure Analysis Equipment Finds Cause Of The Failure To Prevent Similar Failures In The Future

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Global failure analysis equipment market was valued at USD 4.08 billion in 2012, growing at a CAGR of 8.8% from 2013 to 2019. Rapid growth in nanotechnology coupled with growth in medical applications in the Asia Pacific region has fueled the growth of failure analysis equipment market. In addition, increased investments in research and education infrastructure are also propelling the growth of failure analysis equipment market. However, high cost of failure analysis equipment leads to low adoption rate of these, especially in the cost sensitive countries of Asia Pacific region. Thereby, hinders the growth of failure analysis equipment to an extent. On the other hand, growing innovative techniques such as super-resolution microscopy and correlative light and electron microscopy (CLEM) are excellent opportunities for the market which are expected to bolster the failure analysis equipment market in the years to come.In 2012, Asia Pacific was the largest revenue generator for the failure analysis equipment market. The dominance by Asia Pacific is due to large number of countries such as China, India, Japan, Taiwan and Australia among others investing heavily in research and development infrastructure, nanotechnology as well as medical technologies. Similarly, North America and Europe collectively accounted for over one-third of the market share, as these have been continually focusing on research and development and have been using failure analysis equipment for R&D purpose.Free PDF For Latest Advancements with Technological breakthroughs is @Focused Ion Beam system (FIB) and Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM) accounted for majority market share in 2012, owing to rapid usage of these equipments. However, Dual Beams systems (FIB/SEM) are expected to grow at the fastest pace in the years to come owing to the several advantages over a single-beam FIB system, especially for sample preparation and microscopy applications. Thus, Dual Beam systems (FIB/SEM) are expected to grow over the forecast period.Secondary ion mass spectroscopy (SIMS) accounted for majority market share in the year 2012 owing to several advantages such as the ability to identify elements present in very low concentration levels and the ability to identify all elements such as helium and hydrogen. Focused Ion Beam (FIB) techniques are used in applications such as die surface milling or cross-sectioning, high magnification microscopy and even material deposition. Thus, the usage in wide array of applications is expected to drive the FIB technology over the forecasted period from 2013 to 2019.The global failure analysis equipment market has been segmented by equipment into Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM), Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM), Focused Ion Beam Systems (FIB) and Dual Beam (FIB/SEM) Systems. The key industry participants include FEI Company, Hitachi High-Technologies Europe GmbH, Carl Zeiss SMT GmbH and JEOL, Ltd. among others.Market Insight can be Viewed @Transparency Market Research (TMR) is a global market intelligence company, providing global business information reports and services. Our exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trends analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of Analysts, Researchers, and Consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.Transparency Market Research90 Sate Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:
Woman finds purpose in Nairobi Updated: 2016-09-16 07:11 By Fiona Xiaojun Guo and Pan Zhongming(China Daily Europe)

Chinese student changed by summer trip has joined with former classmate to help improve schools in Kenya

Nairobi stole a Chinese woman's heart when she was in the Kenyan capital for summer vacation in 2013. It turned out that her visit would play an important role in her life and the lives of many Kenyan families.

Yuan Xiaoyi, 20, born in Hubei province in Central China, was at the time a prospective student at New York University in the United States. She visited Kenya as a student volunteer.

Yuan Xiaoyi dresses a girl at the Compassion Children Centre in Nairobi. Photos by Fiona Xiaojun Guo / For China Daily The outer wall of the Compassion Children Centre is decorated with cartoon characters painted by Yuan.

She began her stay helping at a private school where teacher Serah Mucheke was caring for young children. During speeches by school staff members, only Mucheke was interrupted by effusive applause from students. Yuan grew curious and decided to sit in on her class.

She found Mucheke mending the children's torn textbooks and sharpening their pencils. Some of her charges were too excited to nap at midday, so she asked a shy girl to tell a story, and the entire class fell asleep listening to her serene voice.

Impressed, Yuan talked to the teacher and learned she taught at the school only to help subsidize her own kindergarten at Mwiki, a poor area of Nairobi. The Compassion Children Centre, with about 15 students, was small and poorly equipped.

Mucheke had rented five rooms in Mwiki, three for the school and two for her family, including her husband and two children, a boy now 15 and a girl, 12. The metal roof leaked copiously when it rained.

There was no electricity and the small window in each classroom provided scant light.

The center is one of many "informal schools" in Kenya providing kindergarten and preschool classes, as well as primary school, from the first to eighth year, but which are neither public nor private schools.

While education by law is free in Kenya, many parents can't afford to pay for uniforms, lunches, supplies and activity fees at public schools. There also aren't enough public schools or teachers. Private schools are expensive. All other children - some estimates say 50 percent or more - attend informal schools run by individuals and communities, usually with no government help, and not all the teachers are qualified.

Yuan decided to do what she could to help, first whitewashing the building's outer wall then painting cartoon characters on it. Parents began to ask what was going on. By the end of Yuan's stay, twice as many kids were enrolled.

Even though Mucheke has an education certificate, she was charging only 200 Kenyan shillings ($2) a month for tuition to make it more affordable for the neighborhood than the typical tuition of 500 to 1,000 shillings. She spent her 8,000 shilling salary from her part-time job at the private school on her kindergarten. Mucheke, now 41, told Yuan she would love to devote herself full time to her kindergarten.

After Yuan left for college in the United States, she told her friends about the kindergarten via WeChat, the Chinese messaging app.

In the US, she talked about the school whenever she could, and many people would write her a check of $10, $20, or $50.

When she went back to China for a visit, the Smartinn Cosmetics Corp let her make a presentation and hold an auction at the company's annual gala. Twice she held fundraisers through WeChat among family, friends and classmates. She has raised $15,168 for the center and sent it $8,497, with the rest to be disbursed as needed.

Contributions were used for scholarships for the poorer children, and to purchase classroom facilities, and to pay rent and teachers' salaries, and to add a nursery. Mucheke was able to quit her job and devote all her time to her kindergarten.

Last year, Huang Zhaoyi, who had been a classmate of Yuan's at the Affiliated High School of South China Normal University in Guangzhou, decided to help Yuan with the project. Huang, 20, an economics student at Capital University of Economics and Business in Beijing, decided to spend her sophomore year at the University of California at San Diego.

The two women have set up a charity, Care for All Kids, and are in the process of registering it as a tax-exempt nonprofit under US law, a process expected to take five to eight months. Their website is careforallkids.org, and they also are working to set up a charity in Kenya.

Yuan's summer in Kenya led her not only to work for other nonprofits, but to make the field her chosen profession. She was been accepted into NYU's fast-track master of public administration program.

Huang also has studied efficient ways of mobilizing resources, as well as having an internship with the International Rescue Committee, a global humanitarian NGO, working on microloans for refugees.

"That's why we shifted from simply donating money to designing programs with teachers and school managers, and to try to scale our impact from working with one school to many such informal schools in slums," Yuan says.

They have turned Care for All Kids into an organization of growing importance that is working through partnerships in Kenya to effect real change. Yuan, who goes by the English name Kate, is the development director, and Joany Huang is program manager.

Recently, they have focused on a community project to help informal school staff acquire teaching certificates. High costs make it virtually impossible for many teachers in slums to obtain training, and schools can't afford certified teachers. They decided to help provide low-cost training while helping school managers retain those teachers.

In Kenya, schoolteachers need to acquire a national certificate through examinations. First they need two years of college training.

Through Mucheke, they got in touch with the Complementary Schools Association of Kenya, an NGO with 900 member informal schools.

Charles Ouma, national chairman of the association, worked with the government to create the Alternative Provision of Basic Education and Training program, unveiled in March, which allows informal schools to get government funding if 30 percent of teachers have certificates and the rest get in-service training leading to certification in three years.

"Some of our teachers have served up to 15 years with no training and the government urges all informal schoolteachers to be certified within three years, but no one can afford public college training," he says.

Ouma found a university program willing to lower the cost of a three-year training program to 80,000 shillings, but it was still too much for teachers whose average monthly salary is only around 6,000 shillings.

Yuan and Huang got an idea: Why couldn't they bring the teachers together for training in the community at minimal cost?

The women's charity and the association decided on a pilot program to test four school learning centers to train 200 teachers from informal schools for five days in late August.

The program has received a lot of support and the two women hope it will lead to better things.

"This is a very important initiative, and I am truly thrilled that the city and county of Nairobi have embraced this initiative at the very highest levels," says Koki Muli Grignon, ambassador and deputy permanent representative of Kenya to the United Nations.

At the closing ceremony of the training, Irene Ayiemba from Mathare, also a poor area in Nairobi, said: "We have learned a lot through this program and our plea is for the organization to continue training us to attain higher grades."

Meanwhile, Mucheke, with the charity's help, has expanded her kindergarten to 150 children.

They have built three more classrooms and six more toilets. The school has also received support for a playground. The school now has eight teachers and one assistant.

Yuan says the experience has not only helped Kenyans, but given her a direction in life. "I have learned how international development should be innovative, effective and results-driven, while respecting local people's dignity and creativity."

Contact the writers at panzhongming@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 09/16/2016 page20)
Industry leaders from Bunge, Dupont and more to speak at Women in Agribusiness Summit

www.womeninag.com

www.highquestgroup.com

www.highquestgroup.com

CONTACT: Michelle Pelletier Marshall+1.978.887.8800, x117mmarshall@highquestpartners.comIndustry leaders from Bunge, Dupont and more to speak at Women in Agribusiness SummitCHICAGO, September 12, 2016  From sustainability to strategic planning to diversity in ag, the fifth annual Women in Agribusiness Summit will bring top talent from across the ag value chain, including Martha Scott Poindexter of Bunge and Krysta Harden of Dupont, to speak on these critical issues in the sector. The Summit will take place here this month at the Hyatt Regency Chicago, September 27-29.For discussions on diversity, the Summit welcomes back Harden, former deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and now Duponts vice president of public policy and chief sustainability officer. She will present The Future Faces of Farming: Embracing the Importance of Diversity, which will examine the critical role that women play in the agri-food markets, what diversity in U.S. agriculture looks like, and how embracing this diversity can move the sector forward.Poindexter, vice president, government and industry affairs for Bunge, who will be the first of two keynote speakers, will present Too Early to Declare Victory, which will address the evolution of agricultural policy and the role that women have played over the past three decades.On the professional development side, author and accomplished human resource and talent executive, Grace Killelea, will present The Confidence Effect, highlighting the steps that her company Half The Sky Leadership espouses in achieving confidence in business. Killelea has an outstanding network of women at every level and in diverse industries that support and promote womens advancement and achievement. Her book The Confidence Effect: Every Womans Guide to the Attitude That Attracts Success, published in January 2016, was named one of the seven most important new books by Inc.com.Other key topics and presenters at the Women in Agribusiness Summit include: The Race for the White House and What It Means for Agriculture by John Gilliland, consultant to Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld Addressing Food Waste in the Agri-Food Supply Chain, by Blythe Chorn, manager of sustainability for Deloitte Consulting, LLP The Challenges and Opportunity of Co-Existence (of Organic/Non-GMO/GMO), by Lisa Spicka, founder and CEO of Maracuja Solutions Food Safety Modernization Act: A Case Study, by Rachael Dettmann Spiegel, associate with Faegre Baker Daniels LLP, and Donna Taylor, senior advisory counsel at ValeroWith skill workshops that include Leading Through Change, Things you can do TODAY to Take Back Your Life and Engaging in Fierce Conversations, this is a perfectly balanced professional and personal development event, attended by some 550-plus in the industry. A full third of the attendees are at the executive level, and the overall audience in 2015 included representation from 39 U.S. states and more than 200 ag companies.Visitfor more info, and join the conversation @Womeninagri, on Facebook and LinkedIn.HighQuest Group, headquartered in Danvers, Mass., is a global consulting, events and media firm serving the agribusiness and food sectors. One of its key events is the annual Women in Agribusiness Summit that welcomes attendees to engage in discussions paramount to developing leaders, inspiring action and increasing industry knowledge. This years Summit sponsors include: Cargill, Dow AgroSciences, Farm Credit Inc., Land O Lakes, MetLife Agricultural Finance, Monsanto, Nationwide, Simplot and US Bank.HighQuest Group, headquartered in Danvers, Mass., is a global consulting, events and media firm serving the agribusiness and food sectors. One of its key events is the annual Women in Agribusiness Summit that welcomes attendees to engage in discussions paramount to developing leaders, inspiring action and increasing industry knowledge. This years Summit sponsors include: Cargill, Dow AgroSciences, Farm Credit Inc., Land O Lakes, MetLife Agricultural Finance, Monsanto, Nationwide, Simplot and US Bank.300 Rosewood DriveSuite 260Danvers, MA 01923
The next group art exhibition Passion for Life will be held from November 21-30, 2008 at the Grand Palais in Paris, in support of the Institut Curie. Following several art exhibitions in Italy, Mexico and the Principality of Monaco, Passion for Life has been offered the opportunity to exhibit in Paris, France, under the banner of the prestigious Societe des Artistes Independants. Following the invitation of the President of the 
Welcome to Best Bets, a weekly column in which The Oregonian's arts desk separates the wheat from the chaff of upcoming theater, classical music and dance performances and visual arts events. Here are our picks for Sept. 16-22.

Fetes Galantes: A Baroque Celebration

Go back in time with this concert featuring three antique instruments: the 18th-century pardessus de viole, the 16th- and 17th-century bass de viole and the 16th- through 18th-century harpsichord. Presented by Cascadia Viols, the Versailles-inspired program features the nationally acclaimed musicians Tina Chancey, John Mark Rozendaal and Webb Wiggins. 8 p.m. Friday, Sept. 16, First Christian Church, 1314 S.W. Park Ave. $15-$20, cascadiaviols.org.

"OPERAPalooza"

Portland Opera presents an open house at its eastside Hampton Opera Center. Take in live performances including a rehearsal of the touring production "Hansel and Gretel," tour the costume shop and learn about the 2017 season. 12:30-5 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 18, Hampton Opera Center, 211 S.E. Caruthers St. Free, portlandopera.org or 503-241-1802.

"Break the Silence, Break the Stigma"

Playback Theater Portland collaborated with Cascadia Behavioral Healthcare and NAMI Multnomah for this production blending theater and Oregonians' stories of their mental health challenges. The goal: To start a dialogue toward healing. 7 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 21, Curious Comedy Theater, 5225 N.E. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. $15-$20, Eventbrite or 503-719-6328.

"The Bridge, 1910"

The drivers, cyclists and pedestrians who use the Hawthorne Bridge daily owe their crossing to work crews who built the bridge more than a century ago. Now the artists known as Benz and Chang have created an art installation honoring the workers, whom they call "the agents of change." Artists reception, 4 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 22; on view, 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday, Sept. 19-Oct. 14, Portland Building, 1120 S.W. Fifth Ave. Free.

"Macbeth"

With its themes of murderous ambition, corruption of a virtuous soul, and soul-shattering guilt and regret, Shakespeare's bloody tragedy remains an audience favorite more than 400 years after it was written. 7:30 p.m. Friday-Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday through Sept. 25, Hillsboro Artists Regional Theatre, 185 S.E. Washington St., Hillsboro. $12-$16, hart-theatre.org or 503-693-7815.

"The Gun Show"

Oregon playwright E.M. Lewis premiered this play in 2014 in Chicago, where roughly 2,500 people have been shot every year since 2011. Her approach to the issue of guns is to encourage conversation: Listen to five American gun stories, then tell yours. 7:30 p.m. Thursday-Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday through Oct. 1, CoHo Theatre, 2257 N.W. Raleigh St. $20-$28, cohoproductions.org or 503-220-2646.

The Gun Show Trailer The Gun Show at CoHo Productions, by EM Lewis, Directed and co-produced by Shawn Lee, Performed and co-produced by Vin Shambry, Production design by Kristeen Willis Crosser, Costume design by Gregory Pulver, Music and Sound design by Rodolfo Ortega. Posted by The Gun Show on Monday, September 5, 2016

Samantha Wall

The Portland artist's current exhibit, "See Me See You," features drawings and prints that explore the social status of women of color. The winner of the 2016 Contemporary Northwest Arts Awards' Arlene Schnitzer Prize writes that her work "reflects familiar sensations from unfamiliar perspectives to position female bodies of color as the norm rather than a deviation." On view 11 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tuesday-Friday, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday through Oct. 1, Laura Russo Gallery, 805 N.W. 21st Ave., Portland. Free; laurarusso.com.

If you would like your event to be considered for inclusion in Best Bets, email the details to fineartsbestbets@oregonian.com. Finportland more arts coverage at oregonlive.com/art.

The Oregon Shakespeare Festival is not producing "Macbeth" this season, as an earlier version of this post stated incorrectly.
By Elliot Njus & Luke Hammill |

The Oregonian/OregonLive

Michael Thorne remembers the Port of Portland's container terminal as a high-maintenance money-loser.

As the Port's executive director from 1991 to 2001, Thorne made hurried trips to Asia to maintain relationships with shipping companies. He lunched with Oregon importers to rustle up business for the carriers, giving ships a reason to stop in Portland. The Port built up other lines of business to prop up the container terminal's losses.

All that was OK, Thorne said. Leaders at the Port, a public agency funded in part by taxpayers, saw the container terminal's export business as a service to farmers and other export-dependent businesses across the Northwest -- one important enough to justify the cost.

"We have to export," he said. "The containers were a critical service."

By 2010, that philosophy had changed. The port's new director, Bill Wyatt, still saw the container terminal as an important part of the port's mission, but he also saw it as a major financial liability. The port, hoping to dodge the risk while continuing to provide the service, turned to a private operator.

That decision laid the groundwork for what's become a long-running story in Oregon: the labor standoff that has idled the terminal, leaving the state's farmers scrambling for other ways to get their goods to the world market.

Much has changed in the international shipping world. Cargo ships have gotten bigger, and shipping industry consolidation has reduced the number of players in the market. That's made it tough for a small port like Portland to succeed in the container business.

Meanwhile, global demand has stagnated, sending the shipping industry into upheaval. South Korean carrier Hanjin Shipping, one of the world's largest carriers and once the Portland container terminal's biggest customer by volume, filed for bankruptcy last month.

The future of the state's only deepwater container terminal remains murky as legal issues continue to play out in court. And a well-known Republican is trying to convince legislators a state agency should take over the terminal to get container service running again.

Container shipping

The standardized container was revolutionizing shipping in the 1970s as the Port of Portland started construction on its container terminal. Containerized shipping allowed more efficient transfer of cargo from truck to train to ship, and it dramatically sped up the rate of global trade.

The Port spent $17 million in airport funds to build the 66-acre Terminal 6, which opened in 1974. In part because of the high cost of equipment, the terminal turned a profit only twice under the Port's management. It nonetheless grew to 192 acres, with three ship berths and nine enormous gantry cranes, one of which was subsidized by $7.5 million in state lottery money.

The terminal, 102 miles upriver from the ocean, never seriously competed with major West Coast container ports. In 2008, Portland accounted for just 1.3 percent of container movement along the coast, according to the Pacific Maritime Association.

Nonetheless, its idling has cost Oregon exporters about $15 million a year in the cost of trucking goods to other ports, according to a 2016 study. It's been especially costly for producers of products with small profit margins, such as compressed hay shipped to feed dairy or livestock animals overseas.

"Terminal 6, in its heyday, was fantastic," said Shelly Boshart Davis, vice president of international sales and marketing at Bossco Trading, an exporter of straw, alfalfa and hay based in Linn County.

Key dates

1974:

Terminal 6 opens.

1991:

Michael Thorne becomes executive director of the Port of Portland.

2001:

Bill Wyatt becomes executive director.

2004:

Two major carriers stopped service to Terminal 6, taking with them more than 50 percent of the port's container volume.

2011:

International Container Terminal Services Inc. takes over operation of Terminal 6.

2012:

The longshore union claims jurisdiction over refrigerated container jobs that had traditionally belonged to Port electricians. Work slows down at the port.

2013:

The port offer Hanjin financial incentives to keep calling at Terminal 6. Longshoremen are given the reefer jobs.

2014:

Port gives reefer jobs back to the electricians.

2015:

Hanjin leaves Terminal 6.

2016:

Westwood Shipping Lines makes its final call at Terminal 6, leaving it idle.

-- Compiled by Kelly Yan

Oregon's agrarian economy depends heavily on exporting goods, but its smaller population means it's not a natural destination for imported goods.

That's a problem for a container terminal, a place where success depends on a tenuous balance of imports and exports.

"In container shipping, a perfect balance would be one container coming inbound, one container going outbound," said Robert Hrdlicka, who served as the Port's marine director from 1990 to 2003. "Shipping companies do not make money moving air."

So Thorne and Hrdlicka would travel the state meeting with importers large and small, trying to establish more inbound freight to balance out the exports.

They also met frequently with exporters, of which there were hundreds. And they made frequent trips to Asia to talk with carriers, trying to maintain the frequency of service and perhaps lure more.

In between, they had to keep up labor relations with the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, which was known for bargaining hard and being fiercely protective of its interests.

For both Hrdlicka and Thorne, the container terminal easily consumed the majority of their working hours.

"We looked at the container business as a business line that was mission-critical," Hrdlicka said. "In terms of the number of companies that needed market access, the container business creates the most market access for the most number of people."

Port officials pursued a shipping company that would offer "first port of call" service, meaning a ship from Asia would come directly to Portland, then head directly back, maximizing the amount of space dedicated to moving Oregon goods. The goal always seemed just over the horizon, Thorne said.

They also considered offloading the work of running the container terminal to a private operator.

"I can be sympathetic with wanting to lease the terminal," Thorne said, remembering that the hard and long work required by the container business didn't always yield great results. But they had a condition: The operator would have to bring new business, including "first port of call" service, to Oregon.

"We even talked about it," Thorne added. "We'd never do it unless the operator would bring more business to Portland."

Decision to privatize

By 2007, though, the Port was again seriously considering privatizing the container terminal. Thorne was gone. Wyatt, who today remains the Port's executive director, had taken over.

The publicly operated terminal was an outlier at a time when most major container terminals on the West Coast were operated by private businesses. The Port's 2007 strategic plan makes clear that Wyatt and other administrators were tired of the ups and downs of the container business.

"The volatility of the container business line ... is a major strategic issue for the Port," the report reads.

In 2004, two major carriers had stopped service, taking with them more than 50 percent of the Port's container volume. Business eventually rebounded, but the sudden shock necessitated the layoff of 30 percent of the port's administrative staff.

The port also saw the end of what had been a stabilizing stream of funding -- the sale of industrial land at the Rivergate Industrial District -- and the looming cost of the Portland Harbor Superfund site cleanup, currently estimated at $746 million.

"We were on a one-way road where the costs were going to kill us," Wyatt said.

The Port soon launched an international search for a private container terminal operator. But then the recession hit, interest dried up and the Port suspended the search. In 2009, the container terminal lost $17 million.

But one of the companies that expressed interest during the earlier search -- Philippine firm International Container Terminal Services Inc., or ICTSI -- quietly came back to the negotiating table, and in 2010 the two sides came to a deal: a 25-year lease of Terminal 6 under which the company would pay the Port $4.5 million annually after an initial rent payment of $8 million.

The longshore union, which did not respond to numerous interview requests, testified in favor of the deal. ICTSI, which hadn't previously operated any American ports, did not bring any new shipping business of its own but promised it would double container volume within five years.

The task of keeping the terminal financially viable was now the company's problem, not the Port's. ICTSI, which took over terminal operations in 2011, declined comment for this story.

Things went as planned for about a year, until the longshore union claimed jurisdiction over jobs plugging and unplugging refrigerated containers that had traditionally belonged to union electricians who worked for the Port.

The dispute led to court battles, slowdowns at the terminal and the expiration of the longshore union's West Coast contract with the Pacific Maritime Association. The result was that all three container shipping lines that called at the Port left town.

Terminal 6 remains idle, and tension between the union, ICTSI and the Port persists to this day.

But even now, Wyatt describes ICTSI's arrival as a timely lifeline for the Port's container business.

"Not only would we have gone out of business, but it would have been ugly," Wyatt said. As it stands, he said, "we still have a container terminal that could operate under the right conditions."

David Doeringsfeld, who has managed the Port of Lewiston in Idaho for 23 years, said his port and the Port of Portland are "connected at the hip." Transportation costs have doubled for some farmers, who now have to get their product to Tacoma or Seattle, he said.

"Absolutely there's a need for container service again at the Port of Portland," Doeringsfeld said.

The Port of Portland did help set up a barge-to-rail system whereby containers can unload at the Port of Morrow in Boardman and be shipped by rail to Puget Sound. Doeringsfeld's counterpart in Boardman, Gary Neal, praised the Port's efforts in that regard.

But the lack of container service in Portland has made things harder in Eastern Oregon, too.

"We have quite a bit of trucking that had gone to Portland to get on the steamship line," Neal said. "And that's the most reliable and cost-effective place to ship for export, if we can use the services at the Port of Portland. And we have many industries in this region that export overseas, all over the world."

Neal suggested the blame for the loss of service lies with the union: "I think it'll come back when we have productive workers who want to work," he said.

Thorne said he believes it comes down to working with the union. The longshore union has always been difficult to work with, he said, but it's ultimately the only option for a workforce at the terminal.

"Picking a fight with them isn't going to do you any good," he said. "That plays almost to their benefit."

He added: "It's not the first time there's been these kind of disputes."

A new plan

Kevin Mannix, the longtime political activist and onetime Republican candidate for governor, calls the Port's handling of Terminal 6 an "absolute failure."

The Port has accomplished wonderful things in other areas, Mannix said, but as far as the container business, "the solution was not to walk away."

"The solution was to become more engaged and to make that terminal work," he said.

Backed by a coalition of exporters, importers and transportation companies, Mannix is pushing state legislation that would create a public corporation called the Oregon Shipping Authority to assume control of the container terminal.

He has piqued the interest of Republicans at the statehouse, including Sen. Brian Boquist of Dallas, who said in an email such an idea "may be good" in the short-term. Over the long term, he prefers developing the Port of Coos Bay, a goal shared by Mannix and his would-be shipping authority.

Mannix also said state Sen. Bill Hansell of Athena would sponsor the legislation, but Hansell backed away from it in a phone interview.

"The likelihood of success is pretty small, and you'd likely do more damage than good," Hansell said.

The Oregon Shipping Authority, Mannix has said, could consider renegotiating the Port's contract with ICTSI. Mannix has also floated the idea of using public workers at the docks rather than the longshore union, and the idea that the state could even create its own shipping line.

Wyatt insists such an idea would never work. Any shipping company that called at a terminal staffed with non-union dock workers would surely be boycotted along the rest of the coast.

Unwinding the ICTSI deal would likely cost millions, between buying out the company's lease and replacing equipment the company owns and uses to operate the port.

And the state would be stuck with the costs of maintaining and operating the port, the situation Wyatt tried to avoid through privatizing its operations.

Regardless, Mannix said, somebody needs to try something.

"The present situation is unacceptable," he said. "You can't do any worse than zero."

Duane Olson, sales and warehouse manager at Northwest Onion Co. northeast of Salem, agrees. He's not sure who to blame, but he just wants container service back in Portland. He thinks perhaps Port officials "didn't look at the long-term of how important" Terminal 6 is to Oregon exporters.

"You'd try to write a congressman, or a senator, and everybody kind of said they couldn't get involved. ... Hopefully they can get somebody back in there soon," Olson said. "We'd love to see it."

-- Elliot Njus and Luke Hammill

enjus@oregonian.com

503-294-5034

@enjus

lucas.hammill@gmail.com

@lucashammill
A former Gladstone police sergeant on trial for the killing of his wife routinely visited one of his co-defendants while on duty, disappearing from his post without notification, a former colleague testified Thursday.

Lynn Edward Benton's patrol car was seen weekly outside Susan Campbell's home in Gladstone, and he gave no indication to dispatchers that he was responding to an emergency call there, said Gladstone Police Officer Anthony Fich. He didn't know why Benton, who at the time was his supervisor, frequented Campbell's home while on duty.

"There were times when I didn't know where he was," Fich said.

Nearly 10 police officers who responded to the salon where Debbie Higbee Benton was found dead on May 28, 2011, and assisted with the subsequent investigation testified Thursday in Clackamas County Circuit Court. They spoke of their involvement with the case and other observations. Some testified that they followed Campbell a few days after the slaying and took photos when she met Benton at a restaurant parking lot near Clackamas Town Center where Benton appeared to give her a box of checks.

Opening statements began Wednesday in the murder trial, which could last at least two months. Benton, 54, is accused of aggravated murder and other charges in connection with his wife's death. A conviction could mean the death penalty.

Prosecutors say Benton offered $2,000 to Campbell, 58, and her 36-year-old son, Jason Jaynes, to kill Higbee Benton. They say Benton was trying to protect his career by preventing his wife from making domestic abuse allegations, guard his assets against divorce and gain financially from her death.

Benton was the first to call for emergency responders when he, an off-duty firefighter and one of his wife's friends found Higbee Benton dead in a back storage room of the salon she'd owned for at least 20 years.

Benton spent the majority of his more than 20-year police career as a woman and married Higbee Benton in 2010. That same year, he began transitioning to male and prosecutors say it caused a deep rift between the couple. Benton had moved out of their Gladstone home a month before her death.

Jaynes goes to trial for charges including aggravated murder in March 2017. Campbell, who also is accused of aggravated murder, does not have a trial date set.

Prosecutors claim Campbell shot Higbee Benton, then Jaynes later beat and strangled her as Benton watched. The defense says the case lacks credible and trustworthy evidence and questioned investigators Thursday about their tactics during the death investigation.

Stacie Bernert, then a Clackamas County Deputy Medical Examiner who initially concluded that Higbee Benton died of a heart attack, admitted during cross examination that she missed evidence of gunpowder on Higbee Benton's blouse due to her inexperience at the time. It was her second month as a deputy medical examiner and the salon was the first homicide scene she'd evaluated on her own.

Milwaukie Police Detective Larry Giddings said he also missed the dark residue on the blouse even though he took a picture of it. He testified that although he went along with Bernert's initial assessment, he wasn't entirely convinced at the time.

"I had some concerns," Giddings said. "I don't know why I didn't act on them or mention them."

Giddings testified that he helped serve several search warrants in the case, including May 29 at the beauty salon, where a .25 caliber shell casing was found in the storage room, and on June 2 at Campbell's house, where an old jacket Benton wore as homicide investigator was among the items seized.

On the day of Higbee Benton's death, Fich testified that he arrived for his 9 p.m. shift 30 minutes early. Soon after, a fellow officer heard Benton's voice calling for assistance over a portable radio.

"The tone in his voice was unlike anything I had heard from him," Fich said. "There was a sense of urgency, I knew something was wrong."

He and several other officers ran or drove the block to the salon and soon found Benton. Several officers testified that Benton was sitting near the front of the salon, crying.

Andrew Miller, a former Gladstone reserve officer, said he had gone on several patrol shifts Benton. Once, the sergeant told him that he was in a mentally abusive relationship and that he had moved out of the home he shared with Higbee Benton and might have to move in with his parents.

On the night of the killing, Miller testified, he took Benton back to the police department. He drove Benton to his brother-in-law's home at the sergeant's request so he could notify his wife's family of her death.

Miller said they were there for 15 to 20 minutes and then drove back to the salon. They spotted the brother there as they pulled up. He wanted to see his sister, but wasn't allowed in.

Miller said the brother, Tony Stephens, later yelled at Benton while outside the salon.

"Lynn, this is your fault, she died of a broken heart," Stephens yelled according to Miller. Benton then burst into tears.

-- Everton Bailey Jr.

ebailey@oregonian.com

503-221-8343; @EvertonBailey
Over a mere four years, Hillary Clinton swung dramatically from the far right of the political spectrum to the far left. The only thing she was consistent about was her attraction to losers -- electorally speaking, that is.

Back in her teens and early college years, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee was a Republican. This is not a skeleton Clinton keeps hidden in her closet with her real medical records and her cache of classified emails. She talked openly about her Young Republican days in her 2003 autobiography, "Living History."

She was a proud "Goldwater girl, right down to my cowgirl outfit and straw cowboy hat emblazoned with the slogan 'AuH20,'" she wrote. Goldwater, of course, being Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater, the iconic conservative who stormed to the GOP presidential nomination in 1964, when Hillary was 16 years old.

Instead of walking around with a battered copy of "The Catcher in the Rye" in her back pocket, Hillary Rodham carried a copy of Goldwater's "The Conscience of a Conservative."

"I liked Senator Goldwater because he was a rugged individualist who swam against the political tide," she wrote.

Her viewpoint would soon change, however. In 1965, she enrolled at Massachusetts' Wellesley College, far from Park Ridge, Illinois, her conservative hometown. Her transformation was underway.

During the next presidential campaign, Hillary found herself drawn to anti-Vietnam War Democrat Eugene McCarthy, who knocked President Lyndon Johnson out of the presidential race but failed to win the Democratic nomination. She also liked moderate Republican Nelson Rockefeller, whose bid for the GOP nomination failed.

"I think she struggled through this period between these two poles," Clinton biographer Carl Bernstein told the New York Times.

The struggle actually began when she was still in high school. In "A Woman in Charge: The Life of Hillary Rodham Clinton," Bernstein wrote that during the 1964 campaign, Hillary was sent to Chicago's south side to "check for voter registration fraud in minority neighborhoods ... knocking on doors in the slums to find out the registration status of voters whom the Goldwater campaign might be able to disqualify."

Goldwater opposed civil-rights legislation; the fewer African-Americans at the polls the better his chances of winning the election. But for Hillary, seeing "how thousands of poor black people lived" radically changed her perspective.

When she landed at Wellesley the following year, she joined the campus Young Republicans, but she was already moving to the left, questioning some of the beliefs she grew up with. The GOP's foot-dragging on civil rights ultimately alienated her from her parents' political party.

Hillary didn't have much success in politics during her high school and college years, picking candidates who came up short (Goldwater, McCarthy, Rockefeller) and coming up short herself. As a senior in high school she ran for class president and was easily defeated. In a personal letter from that time, she wrote that she ran "against several boys and lost, which did not surprise me but still hurt, especially because one of my opponents told me I was 'really stupid' if I thought a girl could be elected president."

By the time she graduated from Wellesley and moved on to law school at Yale, the whip-smart, ambitious young woman was identifying herself as a Democrat. Meeting Bill Clinton, a southern Democrat committed to civil rights, further convinced her that she was now with the party of the future.

"How did a nice Republican girl from Park Ridge go wrong?" she joked in 1992 when Bill ran for president.

But did she go wrong? Some lifelong Republicans consider her more Republican than this year's GOP nominee. On policy matters, Donald Trump is inconsistent and all over the map -- leftish on trade and to the right on taxes, for example. Stuart Stevens, a former strategist for George W. Bush and Mitt Romney, said in May that Trump "is a moron with no demonstrated ability to acquire information."

But Stevens said he still can't bring himself to vote for Clinton.

Worse yet for her, Republican partisans aren't the only ones who feel this way. One of the problems Hillary Clinton faces is that, to hard-core ideologues on both the right and the left, she's suspect.

"Her stint as a 'Goldwater Girl' wasn't just a young girl's desire to be with an 'in' crowd and have the cutest outfits," wrote a backer of progressive firebrand Bernie Sanders in February. She is fundamentally conservative, the Bernie Girl insisted, citing Clinton's support for NAFTA and her husband Bill's role in the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, the Depression-era law that separated commercial banking and investment banking.

Conservatives, on the other hand, might believe Hillary is more Republican than Trump on foreign affairs and a few other issues, but they still view her as fundamentally liberal, her Goldwater Girl background notwithstanding. After all, she has been a dedicated Democrat for more than 40 years now and has consistently advocated for core Democratic ideals, such as health insurance for all.

"I would rather not have to vote for her," Republican former Secretary of State Colin Powell wrote in a private 2014 email, "although she is a friend I respect."

But however partisan Clinton's record and worldview are, she has never viewed herself as explicitly partisan. And she believes that's part of what makes her presidential timber. There was a time when national political leaders rejected the ideological extremes and sought common ground. Hillary's husband and even conservative hero Ronald Reagan successfully worked across the political aisle during their presidencies. Hillary Clinton wants to follow their lead.

The times, however, have changed.

-- Douglas Perry
Grave No. 6.

A name finally replaced the impersonal label last week, during a ceremony that drew to a close the life and journey of Bill Porter, one of Portland's treasures.

On Sept. 10, one day after what would have been his 84th birthday, nearly 50 people gathered on a hillside at Mount Calvary Catholic Cemetery in Portland's west hills. Porter, the legendary door-to-door salesman, had been buried in plain, unadorned grave -- Section W, Lot 3260, grave No. 6 -- since he died in 2013.

Now, because of the generosity of strangers, the man's final resting place has a simple, but elegant, granite gravestone that notes the salesman was "an inspiration to all."

And he was.

But why?

I met Bill Porter in 1995 when he was 63 and living in Northeast Portland. His birth had been difficult, forcing the doctor to use an instrument that crushed a portion of his brain, causing cerebral palsy, a nervous disorder that affected his speech, hands and gait. People thought he was mentally disabled.

Bill Porter's gravestone.

He was placed in special education classes at Lincoln High School. When he graduated, the state considered him unemployable and suggested he collect disability payments.

His mother, a strong-willed woman, was certain he could rise above his limitations. She encouraged and challenged him. For more than 40 years, he earned a living selling products door-to-door for J.R. Watkins, a company based in Minnesota. He was given the worst territory in the city. He rose above it, growing a business that took him across the city and to Portland's west-side neighborhoods.

At night, he'd return to his small house. He used an old manual typewriter, typing orders with one finger and one hand.

Although he treasured his anonymous life, he reluctantly allowed me to write about him. Perhaps the salesman in Bill saw a kindred spirit in a feature writer who sensed a story in a man most people knew of only as the odd man shuffling along the transit mall early in the morning. The story was a hit. I received letters from across the country. I still do. Bill Porter's story was featured in Reader's Digest, ABC's "20/20" and "CBS This Morning."

Why?

On Saturday, standing at his grave, I remembered what I wrote about Bill after I learned he'd died in an assisted living center. He'd had health problems from decades of walking:

Bill touches us so profoundly, apparently, because he reminds us of who we all set out to be. And where we would like to go. He is, first of all, someone from our own branch of the human family. Almost none of us has the God-given talent or spiritual purity to become one of the remote, larger-than-life heroes who loom over our world. Who are we to measure ourselves against the great athlete, the skilled surgeon or the religious saint?

But Bill is a salesman. Each day, he puts his infirmities aside, screws up his courage, goes out into the world and asks others to accept what he has to offer.

So do we all.

Bill reminds us of what we were when we set out in life. He fights the war we call life every day, without complaining. Whatever the internal truth of Bill Porter, we perceive him, in his perseverance, as pure, untouched by the ills of society. He isn't greedy. He doesn't take handouts. He -- of all of us -- could produce a hundred excuses. But he never makes excuses.

His determination challenges us. When we see past Bill's disabilities, we see the disabilities in ourselves.

That raises questions. Am I working hard enough in my life? Do I have that kind of integrity?

Those qualities were what drew people to Bill's grave.

"I wanted to be here today," said Ray Barbee. "I had to be here. Bill epitomized the American spirit."

I knew exactly what Barbee meant.

I've been hearing it for decades when people want to talk to me about Bill. But I wanted Barbee to explain it, because it reveals the difference between being famous - Kim Kardashian - and being admired - Bill Porter.

'I can't think of anyone I admire more than Bill Porter," Barbee said. "He had determination and drive. He worked every day. He wasn't looking for a handout. All he wanted was a chance. He did hard work, day after day. Sales. Rain or shine."

If Bill heard a "no," he'd smile, say thanks and be on his way. But he'd be back the next week. Perhaps another item? And the week after that, too. When a customer did buy from Bill, she had to write out the paperwork because his hands were so twisted.

"I'm crying," said Katy Qualman, after looking at Bill's grave. "We go way back. I'm 72. I first met Bill when I was 15."

Qualman's family lived in Portland Heights, and Bill came to the house one day to peddle his wares.

"I was home alone," she said. "I wasn't sure what to think about him when I opened the door. I said no thanks. But I talked with neighbors. I found he was a great man. We became customers."

In 1962, Lincoln High School selected Qualman as the school's Rose Festival princess, and the news made the papers and television stations. She came home one afternoon that week and found a package by the door.

A gift, from Bill. Special soap from Watkins.

"That's why I'm here today," she said. "He was a good man."

Even though Bill was Watkins' top retail salesman in all of Oregon, Idaho, Washington and California, he lived a frugal life. He supported his mother and had financial difficulties. When his mother died, he didn't have money for her headstone. And when he died, he had no money left for his own.

Bill had no girlfriend, no wife, no brothers and sisters. But he did have Shelly Brady. They met when she was a Grant High School student and he hired her to be his assistant. They were linked for the rest of his life. She married and had six children, who considered Bill their grandfather.

Over the years, Brady had collected all of Bill's memorabilia and stored it in her Gresham home. This summer, she decided to sell it to attempt to get Bill and his mother headstones.

Bill always refused financial help. If he couldn't pay for it, he'd refuse it. Brady decided that Bill, in a sense, would pay for the gravestones himself. She called around and learned two stones would cost about $2,500 for engraving and placement. She started a GoFundMe account. When word got out, Brady raised more than $14,000.

Angie Pope, co-owner of Affordable Family Memorials, donated and engraved the two headstones.

"My brother has cerebral palsy," she said. "Bill's story is close to my heart. That's why I'm here."

After the short ceremony, Brady donated a $10,000 oversized check to United Cerebral Palsy of Oregon & Southwest Washington, where Bill's mother had served on the board.

"We have more," Brady said, "and you will get it, but $10,000 was a nice round number for today."

Jerry Pattee, a senior board member, accepted the check. Pattee, who has cerebral palsy and uses a wheelchair, said Bill grew up in an era of so-called sheltered workshops where people like Bill performed small and routine tasks, busy work.

"Bill was the first person to say that sheltered workshops were not for him," Pattee said. "He wanted to be part of the community."

And so he was.

--Tom Hallman Jr.

thallman@oregonian.com; 503-221-8224

@thallmanjr
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Sixty-one percent of voters think the legalization of recreational marijuana has had a positive impact on Oregon, according to a new poll. Fewer than one-third see it negatively, according to polling by DHM Research, a non-partisan opinion research firm with an office in Portland. Sales of recreational marijuana generated an estimated $25.5 million in tax revenue for the state through the end of July. Pictured: a transaction at a marijuana dispensary in Portland.

(Oregonian file photo)

Two years after voting for recreational marijuana, a majority of Oregon voters view the policy as a success, according to a new poll.

Sixty-one percent of voters think the legalization of recreational marijuana has had a positive impact on the state, while fewer than one-third see it negatively, according to polling by DHM Research, a nonpartisan opinion research firm with an office in Portland.

In 2014, 56 percent of Oregon voters said yes to legalizing marijuana for recreational use.

DHM Research paid for the poll. John Horvick, the firm's vice president and political director, said his firm decided to conduct the poll because the topic comes up frequently in the cities and counties where the company works, and it made sense to gain "more insight about what the mood was."

The poll found that while most voters see legalization as a positive, older voters are more skeptical than younger ones. Fifty-three percent of voters 65 and older, for instance, think the new law has been negative, while 24 percent of people younger than 65 see it that way.

Republicans, too, were less positive, with 52 percent viewing legal cannabis negatively.

Meanwhile, Democrats and non-affiliated voters or voters in another party overwhelmingly think legal cannabis has been positive.

"Big picture, I think Oregonians are relatively satisfied," Horvick said. "I don't think a lot of minds have changed, but the general acceptance of marijuana continues apace. There hasn't been a backlash."

The poll also found that most voters oppose bans on recreational marijuana sales (The poll did not address medical marijuana). Fifty communities from Lake Oswego to Pendleton will vote in November on a range of questions that, in essence, boil down to whether they should allow legal marijuana businesses within their borders.

Sixty percent of voters statewide oppose bans on recreational marijuana sales, the poll found.

Opposition to bans is strongest in the Portland area, while a smaller majority of voters outside of the metro area oppose them. In the Portland area, 67 percent oppose bans; outside of the region, 54 percent are opposed.

Oregon voters also favor local sales taxes on recreational marijuana, the poll found. Sixty-nine percent of voters approve of local taxes on cannabis.

Local governments may impose a sales tax of as much as 3 percent on recreational marijuana, but the tax must be approved by voters. The local tax is on top of the 17 percent tax the state will impose on recreational sales starting when the Oregon Liquor Control Commission begins regulating the market later this year.

According to the Oregon Department of Revenue, a local tax is on the November ballot in 106 communities, including Portland, where officials conservatively estimated it will generate $3 million to $5 million a year.

"Though some may not view legalization positively in the abstract, an overwhelming majority believe their communities should seek benefits in the form of increased tax revenues," Horvick said.

The poll found a high level of support that was "nearly universal" across demographic groups, including party and geography.

"Taken as a whole, these results reveal that revenue may reign supreme when it comes to recreational marijuana in Oregon," the firm said in a summary of its poll results.

-- Noelle Crombie

503-276-7184; @noellecrombie
Baidu ventures $200m bet on AI Updated: 2016-09-16 07:12 By Meng Jing(China Daily Europe)

Baidu Inc has launched its first venture capital firm focusing on artificial intelligence, becoming the Chinese internet company's latest effort to stake a spot in the burgeoning technology field.

Baidu Venture will focus on early-stage projects in AI and other next-generation technologies, such as augmented reality and virtual reality, according to a company statement on Sept 13.

The firm has been equipped with an initial investment fund of $200 million.

Baidu says the company is an independent entity, separate from its existing investment and acquisition team, so that it can "use an innovative evaluation mechanism to speed up the decision-making process and make investments more efficient".

Industry observers have seen the move as Baidu's latest effort to grow its AI expertise, to jump-start a slowing search and advertising business, which is constrained by tighter government control on online advertising.

Lu Zhenwang, an internet expert and CEO of Wanqing Consultancy in Shanghai, says Baidu urgently needs to find a new engine to cope with the slowing momentum of its traditional search business.

Baidu's net income for the quarter ending June 30 was 2.4 billion yuan ($359 million; 319 million euros; 272 million), down 34.1 percent year-on-year, as the company faced heightened regulation in the healthcare sector and on internet advertising.

Zhao Ziming, an analyst at internet constancy Analysys in Beijing, says by setting up a venture capital firm Baidu could more quickly absorb startups into its AI business and expand its presence in the entire industrial chain.

"The move is expected to enable Baidu to gain some strong advantage in the AI competition," he adds.

Robin Li, CEO of Baidu and chairman of the venture capital firm, has on previous occasions pledged to shift the internet company's business from a search-oriented model to one based on AI. At the recent Baidu World Conference, the company's annual event to showcase its latest technology, Li again stressed the importance of AI.

"AI is the next big development in the internet industry, which is the core of Baidu. We have made a great effort in developing this technology over the past five to six years," he says.

Many of the areas Baidu is betting on, such as driverless cars and Duer, a Siri-like voice assistant, all depend on the development of AI.

mengjing@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 09/16/2016 page24)
A certified nursing assistant from Providence St. Vincent Medical Center has been charged with raping an elderly patient, and investigators believe there could be at least one other victim, according to the Washington County Sheriff's Office.

Adeladilew A. Mekonen, 34, of Portland, is charged with first-degree rape and first-degree unlawful sexual penetration. He was arrested Wednesday and is being held in the Washington County Jail with bail set at $250,000.

The sheriff's office first received a complaint about Mekonen from a 94-year-old woman in June but couldn't substantiate it at the time, said Sgt. Bob Ray, a sheriff's office spokesman. Hospital staff had placed Mekonen on administrative leave after learning of the allegations, Ray said, but he was allowed to return to work after they couldn't be proved.

Last week, an 87-year-old woman came forward with new accusations against Mekonen, Ray said, and the hospital again placed him on leave. Mekonen is charged in that case.

The 87-year-old woman was receiving treatment at St. Vincent for a heart condition, said Greg Kafoury, a Portland attorney representing her.

"Other victims should now feel free to emerge from the shadows," Kafoury said in a statement to The Oregonian/OregonLive.

Ray said Mekonen could face charges tied to the June report after prosecutors review it. He also said that investigators worry there could be additional victims. Mekonen had been working at the hospital since May.

Ray said Mekonen worked as a caregiver for the women, tending to their hygiene.

According to state records, Mekonen was licensed as a certified nursing assistant in February 2015 and has no history of discipline. He graduated from the Caregiver Training Institute in October last year, according to records.

Mekonen was terminated Wednesday following his arrest, said Gary Walker, a Providence spokesman.

In a statement released Thursday afternoon, Nancy Roberts, chief operating officer at Providence St. Vincent, said the hospital continues to work closely with the sheriff's office.

"Caring for patients -- and keeping them safe -- is a privilege and a responsibility that we take very seriously," Roberts said.

Authorities ask anyone with information to contact Detective Robert Rookhuyzen at 503-846-2673.

-- Rebecca Woolington

503-294-4049; @rwoolington

The following clarification was published Sept. 15: A press release from the Washington County Sheriff's Office said Adeladilew A. Mekonen was accused of sex crimes involving two women. Mekonen is charged in Washington County Circuit Court with abusing one woman.
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The winning candidate of the 2014 race for the Multnomah County commission chair spent $466,000. That doesn't bode well, say supporters of a county ballot measure that aims to limit campaign contributions.

(The Associated Press)

By Juan Carlos Ordonez, Moses Ross and Liz Trojan

There is a value that unites people in our nation -- the yearning for a government that is truly of, by and for the people. We believe in democracy.

Even in our current polarized political environment, people of all political persuasions and party affiliations agree that big money in politics squelches the voices of ordinary people, while conferring undue power to the rich and corporations.

Voters in Multnomah County have an opportunity in November to get big money out of politics here at home -- a chance to strike a blow for democracy. That opportunity is called Measure 26-184.

This measure comes as a result of the work of a commission made up of volunteers hailing from all corners of Multnomah County. We had the honor of serving in the Multnomah County Charter Review Committee, convening every six years to refer amendments to the county charter. We put Measure 26-184 on the ballot to give our neighbors the chance to enact meaningful campaign finance reform.

Money floods our political system. While the worst excesses occur at the national level, Multnomah County is not impervious to the rising tide of big money. In 2014, the race for county commission chair set a record, with the winning candidate spending $466,000. The future does not bode well, as Oregon is one of six states to place no limits on campaign contributions.

Measure 26-184 accomplishes three things.

First, it limits contributions to any candidate from individuals and political action committees to $500.

Second, it limits the amount of money that can be spent independently supporting or opposing a candidate.

Neither of these limits affect small donors. To the contrary, Measure 26-184 boosts the voices of ordinary voters. It allows the formation of "small donor committees" that have no spending limits, so long as all the money comes from donations of $100 of less.

Third, Measure 26-184 requires that political advertisements disclose the real identity of the principal funders of the ad. This shines the light on who is directly bankrolling a candidate's campaign or spending heavy sums to make sure that their preferred candidate wins.

These reforms will empower ordinary voters and candidates not beholden to big money. Imagine a system where candidates spend more time listening to the concerns of voters, rather than those of a few wealthy individuals or special interests. Imagine a system where a candidate with good ideas and a strong message can run a viable campaign, even if they aren't rich or well-connected.

Share your opinion

Submit your essay of 700 words or less to commentary@oregonlive.com. Please include your email and phone number for verification.

By getting big money out of politics, Measure 26-184 can re-instill confidence in our political system. While serving in the Multnomah County Charter Review Committee, we heard testimony from the public as to their disillusionment with a political system so heavily influenced by money. By eliminating the ability to give unlimited funds to candidates, the proposal reduces the appearance of corruption and the opportunity for outright bribery.

Here in Multnomah County, we have a choice. We can wait for Congress or the Oregon Legislature to act to get big money out of politics -- and a long wait it could be. Or, we can act now.

It's only fitting that the fight to reclaim democracy should begin at home, and Measure 26-184 is how we strike the first blow.

*

-- Juan Carlos Ordonez, Moses Ross and Liz Trojan are residents of Multnomah County, former members of the Multnomah County Charter Review Committee and members of Honest Elections Multnomah County.
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No homework all year for students at Cherry Park Elementary. The school is extremely diverse, and families are not able to provide an equal level of homework support, so doing all work at school is best, the principal says.

(Beth Nakamura/Staff)

Cherry Park bans homework: I went to Cherry Park Elementary from 1966 to 1972 and occasionally drive by to see the old school. The population makeup has changed, but unless the sky has truly fallen, the school's faculty no doubt still teaches the kids to read, write and do math.

In fourth grade, I took band, and the director, Mr. Morrell, required at least 15 minutes practice a day at home. Is that now out?

The real problem in elementary schools is how political correctness has taken hold of the system. When I went to Cherry Park, our nickname was the Bombers. It has been changed to the Chargers, and as educational research proves, a grade school's nickname has a direct impact on the children's societal outlook. Once a Bomber always a bomber -- and we can't have any of that. Sadly, the name change hasn't seemed to improve test scores or at least make the school community more inclusive.

Mr. Harold Edwards, my principal at the time, no doubt encouraged the teachers to assign appropriate homework. He also, as my old photographs show, required male teachers to come to work in a suit and tie and the women instructors to wear dresses.

But I digress.

Matt Janes

Astoria
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Wood scraps and debris are piled next to a biomass burner at the D.R. Johnson Company's Prairie City power plant in this file photo from 2009.

(Matthew Preusch/Staff)

Biomass' environmental cost: It is unfortunate that a potentially useful piece of policy is buried in a terrible section of Congressional legislation. It is also unfortunate that Dylan Kruse and Bill Kluting ("Oregon's congressional delegation must push for policies that promote biomass projects," Sept. 1) are confusing the energy-generation potential of Oregon's residual wood waste with a loophole that would encourage industrial-scale tree burning. The latter is what the language in pending legislation would allow. Congress is considering language that pretends carbon emissions from biomass don't exist and is so broad that it violates the laws of physics. It also has drawn a veto threat from the president. Our Oregon delegation should be on the right side of science and oppose this egregious biomass loophole that will lead to high environmental costs.

Jim Edelson

Northeast Portland
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Engineers attending a Tokyo earthquake briefing shake in their seats during a quake on April 11, 2011. Steven Kramer, a University of Washington civil engineering professor, shot the photo during a meeting at the Tokyo Institute of Industrial Science.

(Steven Kramer)

'ShakeAlert' system: Oregon Sens. Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley recently announced a U.S. Geological Survey award of $3.7 million to six universities, including the University of Oregon, which received $237,000, to help improve the "ShakeAlert" system for early earthquake warning to save lives. It's a drop in the bucket!

The early warning "ShakeAlert" system could help save some lives; however scores of lives could be saved by upgrading buildings, bridges, public schools, hospitals, major airports and a nuclear power plant located in Tri-Cities, over the Columbia River in Washington state. Lives could also be saved by upgrading infrastructure, such as oil storage facilities and natural gas pipelines in Oregon and Washington that could create havoc all over the Northwest, disrupting millions of lives and businesses. It could take weeks, months or maybe years to bring things back to normalcy, depending upon the magnitude, duration, time of the event and the distance of the center of the earthquake from the urban populations of the ensuing seismic event.

What's really needed is billions of dollars of federal funding for seismic upgrades of these infrastructures so they can withstand 9.0-magnitude earthquakes and to help prevent an economic disaster that would take many more billions of dollars to fix. The money could also be used to replace fallen or broken structures -- including the Oregon State Capitol building, which also needs an upgrade -- for which state coffers do not have adequate funds.

Infrastructure renovation funding would not only help prevent major destruction from the expected natural disaster, it would also boost the local economy and bring unemployment to a virtual zero.

Shantu Shah

Southwest Portland
Organic trend grows demand for crop Updated: 2016-09-16 07:12 By Lucie Morangi(China Daily Europe)

Chinese investor finds opportunity in the blossoming of Kenya's revived pyrethrum sector

Production of a valuable flower crop is blooming again in Kenya after years of wilting sales.

Chrysanthemums, aside from being attractive, are prized as a source of organic pesticides, called pyrethrum, which are increasingly in demand as the world shuns synthetic agricultural chemicals.

After years of slow sales, Kenyan farmers are enthusiastically looking forward to re-entering the booming global pyrethrum market. The sector, which once ranked highly among Kenya's cash crops, has in recent past nosedived, leaving thousands of farmers in financial ruin.

But the tide is slowly changing after a strong government initiative to revive the sector. New regulations have liberalized the once closed market and spurred the interest of private players such as Li Changhong, who plans to export to China.

The 41-year-old director and founder of Eshine Agriculture Planting Co Ltd hails from Hubei province in Central China. He is a licensed producer and processor of pyrethrum, which means he can grow, buy mature and dried flowers from farmers in a given region and export them. He has invested about $3.3 million in the venture.

He is among other players who are jostling for market position in the lucrative market that has experienced hard times over the past decade. According to the Pyrethrum Growers Association of Kenya, a farmers' lobby group, Kenya's production sharply declined from 10,000 metric tons in 2003 to 250 tons in 2011, triggered by a market glut of synthetic versions of pyrethrins. In addition, mismanagement in the Pyrethrum Board of Kenya and outdated regulations saw farmers receive no payments for their deliveries. Currently, some 20,000 farmers are owed $520,000, according to the board.

It is in this landscape that Li is operating. The uptake by farmers to plant the crop is slow, since only 30,000 farmers are growing the flower compared with more than 220,000 in the '90s. To instill confidence, the Chinese entrepreneur is buying and distributing farm essentials such as seeds. His firm has so far distributed about 3,000 packets to more than 4,000 farmers who have inked contractual deals to deliver sun-dried flowers to his company. He promises to pay $1.4 for every kilogram delivered, depending on the quality.

On a gloomy Wednesday at the end of August, Li meets with around 30 farmers in Koinange village, Nyandarua county in the Rift Valley. This is about one and a half hours' drive from downtown Nairobi and the county is among 12 that previously depended on the crop. Heavy clouds hang menacingly over the sky as his field operation officer, Zipporah Mugo, demonstrates how to transplant four-week green shoots from nurseries to the vast farms.

She instructs that the seedlings must be spaced 30 centimeters by 60 cm to give room for the plant to spread and bloom in six weeks.

"We are doing this all over again because many farmers have scant knowledge of how to maximize yields from this plant. Crowding reduces productivity," says Mugo, who has worked in the sector for more than a decade.

She advises the farmers to use fork-jembe tools to weed while warning them against applying pesticides. Mugo explains that inadequate funding has previously denied farmers extension services as money from the government goes into clearing previous debts. But Li is investing in these services to ensure the farmers and his company benefit from both quality and quantity. On maturity, farmers pluck flowers every two weeks. An acre can produce 70 kg of dried flowers.

But this is not only a demonstration exercise but also meant to build farmers' confidence in him. "From experience the farmers are wary. Shrewd, unlicensed brokers are also lurking in the sector, promising to buy the flowers at better prices but eventually never show up," says Li.

Samson Ndia Mueni, one of the farmers, recalls with nostalgia the days when the crop was their mainstay. It not only enabled him to feed and school his children but also fund his acquisition of more farming land. After the decline of the market, he turned to dairy and subsistence farming.

"But maize and potatoes are not flourishing in the low temperatures and heavy rainfall. We are therefore eager to return to pyrethrum farming," Mueni says.

lucymorangi@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 09/16/2016 page29)
Innovation center to boost robot parts business Updated: 2016-09-16 07:12 By Ma Si and Jing Shuiyu(China Daily Europe)

China plans to set up an innovation center this year to boost the capacity of domestic companies to produce key robot components, Miao Wei, minister of industry and information technology, said on Sept 9.

The move is part of a broader plan to tackle technological bottlenecks in key industries.

The aim is to build about 40 state-level innovation centers by 2025, to make the manufacturing industry smarter, safer and more flexible.

A technician programs a robot at an industry expo in Xiamen, Fujian province. Jiang Kehong / Xinhua

Miao says the center will focus on developing speed reducers, drive and control devices, and other key robot components that China currently imports.

"The center will be established by leading robotics firms and research institutes, and it's designed to reduce repetitive investments by pooling resources," the minister says.

A source at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology also told China Daily that funding for the center will come from companies and governments. "But the investment size has not been decided yet," the source said.

The move comes shortly after China set up its first innovation center in June to advance research and development in batteries used in electric vehicles.

So far, that center has attracted first-phase capital of more than 1.2 billion yuan ($179 million; 159 million euros) from automakers and local governments. It aims to help China to catch up with Japan and South Korea in battery technology by 2020.

Vice-Premier Ma Kai said on Sept 9 that when cranking up the automation of factories, "it's important to ensure that domestic firms master core technologies".

China is targeting an annual output of 100,000 industrial robots by 2020. Fueled by rising labor costs and a declining labor pool, the country became the world's biggest buyer of industrial robots in 2013, data from the International Federation of Robotics show.

Wang Bin, product director at Cloud Minds, a startup in Beijing, says a robot arm can be worth several million yuan and most of that cost comes from foreign components, such as speed reducers and servomotors.

"The state-level innovation center will lower the entry barrier for startups and inspire mass innovation in the cash-intensive robot industry," he says.

He Dongdong, senior vice-president at machinery maker Sanyi Group Co Ltd, says the government's plan for 40 innovation centers values the role of enterprises in driving innovation.

Contact the writers at masi@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 09/16/2016 page26)
Innovative plans map path for developing nations Updated: 2016-09-16 07:12 By Lucie Morangi(China Daily Europe)

China's success in the green economy will help to shape a new global growth model

China's efforts to balance sustainable, innovative economic growth with environmental protection is drawing a road map for other developing nations to follow, according to Indian consultant Pavan Sukhdev.

"By championing the green economy, China has embarked on an unenviable and rarely trodden path, the results of which will be the foundation of future growth models," says Sukhdev, the founder of GIST Advisory in Mumbai.

PAVAN SUKHDEV, founder of GIST Advisory, believes China is on the right path toward balancing economic growth and environmental conservation. Lucie Morangi / China Daily

He believes the efforts and support from the Chinese government show the confidence it has in devising innovative strategies that promote sustainable economic growth.

GIST Advisory, an offshoot the Green Indian States Trust, an NGO promoting sustainable development, helps governments and corporations to evaluate their impact on humans and the natural environment.

Sukhdev says China has taken up its responsibility as the world's second-largest economy by setting the right tone for future development, as evidenced in its 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-20), which puts environmental conservation ahead of economic growth.

The plan comes at a time when there is a strong push to jump-start the global economy. However, he says several United Nations reports have used China as an example to show that this growth model can be achieved with the right political will.

"China has a big population and is seen as the world's factory, which comes with a whole range of environmental and ecological challenges," says Sukhdev, a goodwill ambassador for the UN Environment Programme. "But we can see that the country is well informed about the consequences of the 'brown economy' and is building a resources saving and environmentally friendly society using well-researched concepts. And it is working."

The 13th Five-Year Plan includes policies targeting renewable energy, energy efficiency and industrial production. Reports also indicate the country has met, or even surpassed, carbon emissions reduction goals in the 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-15), and that the nation's renewable energy industry is already booming.

"China has about 60 percent of the world's solar heaters. Its solar energy industry is ahead and will probably dominate the global market," Sukhdev says. "The green economy is opening up opportunities for Chinese entrepreneurs."

Subsequently, he says, China is at the forefront of promoting capacity building to support the green economy, an area in which many countries are failing as they focus on fears of job losses and a small global market, rather than taking note of consumer trends.

"The millennial generation is interested in a cleaner and sustainable system. This means one cannot continue investing in the brown economy. China is preparing for this new era."

There are challenges, of course. China's coal industry, for example, employs more than 5 million people, so the transition to green energy needs to generate sufficient alternative jobs.

Nevertheless, China has a leg up compared with other advanced developing nations, such as India, Sukhdev says.

"There are many examples, but the one I like best is solar technology. Five years ago, I led a UNEP study (that found) one success story was solar heating in China, with about 40 million households using solar panels to heat water rather than coal.

"The green method is definitely cheaper and friendlier to the growing elderly population affected by rheumatoid arthritis and in need of viable, cheap heating solutions."

Such technologies could easily be deployed in Africa, he says, adding that the continent presents a big market for this industry and that Chinese companies are uniquely positioned to catalyze a green revolution there.

Africa's edge comes from its ability to start from scratch with minimal disruptions, he says. "Countries can start anew and decide on a new direction, away from the brown economy."

Despite the growing appetite recently among African leaders to invest in coal power, Sukhdev says China's renewable technologies, and its own trajectory toward the green economy, could prove invaluable.

"The brown economy offers visible benefits, but the costs are hidden. In the green economy, the results and costs are visible. This is what leaders need to weigh when making decisions."

Sukhdev is a board member of the Global Reporting Initiative, a network that helps developing nations to evaluate the risks of foreign investment in the extraction of natural resources. About 25,000 corporations and nations follow its guidelines, including some Chinese companies.

The guidelines are applicable for African states preparing for industrial takeoff, he says. "Governments have to recognize that investment is not a gift, but a means to an end, which should not inflict extra costs on a nation with national resources."

While the numbers of international funds and green projects are on the upswing, Sukhdev says regional institutions such as the African Development Bank are surpassing their goals, an indication of positive momentum toward the green economy in Africa.

He says a positive economic and social revolution is waiting to happen on the continent, and partnerships can make it happen faster. As part of the UNEP's Partnership For Action on Green Economy initiative, countries can draw lessons and find models that work, he adds.

"It creates learning opportunities. No one country has achieved complete success, but everyone is moving forward."

One member of the initiative is Jiangsu province in eastern China. Nestled in the Yangtze River Delta, the province enjoyed an economic boom that took a heavy toll on its environment. It has since introduced stringent measures to reverse the trend and has turned to the UNEP for support.

"I believe the success that will be recorded (in Jiangsu) will be replicated in other provinces, which will also join the program."

Sukhdev is optimistic of the initiative's success as it is based on partnerships and modeled on achieving economic transformation. "It's finally all about the economy," he adds.

lucymorangi@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 09/16/2016 page32)
EU restates position on Brexit talks Updated: 2016-09-15 18:24 (China Daily UK)

Unlimited access to the internal market is dependent on free access for persons and goods

European Union chief executive Jean-Claude Juncker warned London again on Wednesday that the UK will not get access to Europe's single market if it bars some EU citizens from working in Britain after Brexit.

"There can be no a la carte access to the single market," the European Commission president told the European Parliament during his annual State of the Union address. "Only those can have unlimited access to the internal market who accept that there will be free access for persons and goods."

The point has been made repeatedly by Brussels as it waits for British Prime Minister Theresa May to launch the formal process of negotiation for the UK to leave the European Union.

The British government wants to retain trade access on the best terms with the EU but, following the June referendum, says free immigration from the EU must end.

On Tuesday, the same point was made by Guy Verhofstadt, the parliament's Brexit negotiator. He said the four European freedomsfreedom of movement for goods, services, capital and laborwere indivisible and Britain could not have one without the others.

During Wednesday's debate, Verhofstadt said the European Union should treat the negotiations with Britain as an occasion to make progress, rather than take retribution.

"Brexit is not a liability. I see it more as an opportunity," he said. "Our duty, our responsibility is to make Brexit a success for Europe, for all citizens of Europe."

Verhofstadt addressed British eurosceptic members of the European parliament who described him as an anti-British "fanatic" in his pursuit of a more closely integrated EU, saying: "Brexit is not a matter of punishment, it's not a matter of revenge."

Junker said in his speech that the EU must do more in the field of defense, starting with the creation of an EU military headquarters and start working toward establishing a common military force. He insisted the bloc's economic and cultural influence was not enough to safeguard its place in today's uncertain world and said the 28-nation organization "should be stronger" militarily.

"Together, we have to make sure that we protect our interests," Juncker explained.

He stressed that the bloc's actions should take place in concert with the US-led NATO defense alliance, to which 22 EU member states also belong.

"More European defense in Europe doesn't mean less trans-Atlantic solidarity," Juncker added.
BLOOMINGTON  McLean Countys corn yield is expected to be well above the five-year average and may be very close to 2014s record.

Ross Perkins, a farm manager with Soy Capital Ag Services in Bloomington, estimates the average yield at 219 bushels of corn per acre. USDA estimated the 2014 McLean County crop at 217 bushels, compared to Soy's estimate of 222.6 bushels.

This year's estimate is based on 1,550 samples taken from 155 locations covering every township in McLean County. It's the second highest estimate since Soy began estimating average yields in 2007.

We had some pretty incredible weather this season, Perkins said. There were a few large rains in June and July where we had a little more than we wanted, but the crop seemed to handle it well.

USDA recorded 2015 corn yield in McLean County at 199 bushels per acre. The five-year average is 174.7 bushels.

As of Sept. 11, 3 percent of the corn had been harvested in Illinois, compared to 5 percent in 2015 and an overall average of 7 percent from 2011 through 2015, according to USDA.

We are getting close to harvest, but the ground conditions are still a little too muddy, said Gridley farmer Dave Meiss. I think we will see a lot of people trying to get into the fields this week, though. We are still a couple of weeks away for the soybeans.

Perkins said the average corn planting date was April 21, but 67 percent of the crop was planted in cool, dry soil between April 15 and April 20. Rains seemed to fall in a timely manner and conditions were favorable during pollination, he added.

The thing that we are really noticing this year is the consistency, Perkins said. Last year, there was a lot of inconsistency, even from field to field. This year, everything is much more stable. Also, last year, we had a lot of drowned-out spots, but this year, there were very few of those.

The Soy survey predicted McLean County ranges of 140 to 268 bushels per acre, with 86 percent with more than 200 bushels per acre.

The number of kernels per row, and the number of rows per ear, were nearly identical to 2014.

The estimate indicates the crops werent affected by disease and the plants appeared healthy, despite a few heavy thunderstorms, particularly to the north.
PONTIAC  Pontiacs Caterpillar plant has reached the halfway point of its promise to hire 160 employees by next summer.

We have hired 80 new employees since the January announcement and have plans to hire at least 80 more employees by early 2017, Senior Public Affairs Manager Jamie Fox said.

In January, Caterpillar announced plans to add about 160 jobs to its existing Pontiac plant as a result of company restructuring. The announcement came following an economic incentive agreement with the company and Livingston County taxing bodies, which abated property taxes as incentive for the plant to stay in the county and add jobs.

The fuel systems facility in Pontiac marked its 38th year in operation this year, but new operations will be added as part of the restructuring, said Susan Toher, product manager for the Pontiac facility.

Our plant looks totally different than it did in January, she said. Weve done a lot of construction and a lot of preparation to bring some jobs here. If you walked through the facility last year, you would not have thought we would have room. But we relocated 114 machines and we found the room.

The Pontiac plant is about 1 million square feet, she said. The new positions include the manufacturing of subcomponents for engines for some of Caterpillars bigger machines.

In announcing the restructuring in January, the Peoria-based manufacturer announced that five other plants would close, resulting in a net loss of 670 jobs. However, the Pontiac plant was given a vote of confidence with the announcement that some work would be transferred in.

Our employees are really excited and as a company, we are all working hard to be competitive, and improve our safety, overall performance, and efficiency goals, she said. The company sent a positive message to us and its great to see our employees and the community stay behind us.

About 700 employees now work at the Pontiac plant.

With different types of work, come more opportunities and we have seen a lot of long-time employees applying for new positions in an effort to gain some new skills, Fox said.

Each job has a different pay structure but the current posted positions pay a base wage between $17.06 and $21.15 per hour, she said.

Some of the positions have been filled by employee transfers from Thomasville, Ga. and Santa Fe, N.M., Fox said.

Adam Dontz, CEO of the Livingston County Economic Development Council, said he is pleased with the progress Caterpillar has been making on bringing new jobs to the area.
BLOOMINGTON  Imagine being cast for a play that hasn't been written yet, a play that has no characters yet because that depends on who is cast.

Imagine working with the winner of an Obie Award  given to Off-Broadway productions  while you're still an undergraduate theater student and the winner is a graduate of your school.

Six students at Illinois Wesleyan University don't have to imagine it. They have spent the last two weeks working with Obie award winner Andrew Schneider of the Class of 2003 on a performance with the working title, Nervous/System.

It will be presented at 8 p.m. Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday at IWU's Kirkpatrick Laboratory Theatre.

Going into it, none of new what to expect, said sophomore Jean Muza of Boston. We're being ourselves. We're being each other. We're being different versions of ourselves.

Schneider didn't know what to expect, either.

I'm not trained as an educator, so that's intimidating to me, he said. It's making the best show possible and giving students the best experience possible.

Schneider said he is trying to introduce the students to learning a different way of making things, summing it up by saying, The best way to learn is to do  even if you don't know what you're doing.

Senior Evan Rumler of Jacksonville said he's always been a little turned off by what he called weird theater, but now that he has been in an unorthodox piece, he has a better understanding and I'm not going to look at it cynically.

The piece began with what the students described as big conversations about life, death, the after life. Using what the students said, Schneider began work on the script  which was still a work in progress as students rehearsed earlier this week.

Sophomore Will Mueller of Denver was fascinated by how eloquently he was able to put my thoughts into the script.

He was able to really get at where I am at mentally with myself, said Mueller. I don't know how he does it.

Megan Lai, a sophomore from Algonquin, said, Everyone takes away something different from it.  It's supposed to make us think about things.

Schneider said he has made shows with a lot of people before but not in this amount of time, just three weeks.

The way he works, he said, is to develop a first draft and then build on that like a sculpture  or a petri dish.

It's the process he used for the one-man production for which he won the Obie. That show somewhat defies description and even pronunciation.

Called, Youarenowhere, the title could be read as you are now here or you are nowhere. But when you ask Schneider how he says it, he replies, I try not to say it out loud.

An interplay between light, sound and text, Youarenowhere has met with critical success and Schneider has performed it around the world. After his visit to IWU, the Brooklyn-based performer will be taking Youarenowhere to Paris and Prague.

Schneider describes himself on his website  andrewjs.com  as a performer, writer and interactive-electronics artist.

I learned stagecraft at IWU, said Schneider, who also has a master's degree in interactive communications from New York University. He credits one of his former IWU professors, Roger Bechtel, with introducing him to theater that was not just straight plays.  I enjoyed that so much.

The students appear to be enjoying working with Schneider, too. There was a relaxed atmosphere and a lot of laughter during a recent rehearsal session.

I've learned so much about what it means to be brave as an artist, said junior Cadence Lamb of Phoenix.

This show really made me understand vulnerability on stage, added Paola Lehman, a sophomore from Chicago. Andrew just strips you down to your true self in front of the audience.

Muza said it's been wonderful working with an alumnus who understands our world here and is willing to use their ideas.

He has a lot of knowledge about what works and doesn't work in devised theater, she said, yet, he never just shuts us down. We always try something at least once.
The sight of a passenger plane along the skyline of New York is an image that has been seared in the global collective consciousness. Its a memory that Sully, Clint Eastwoods new film, acknowledges, but also attempts to redefine.

What if a plane skimming skyscrapers could conjure an image not just of unimaginable terror, but one of incredible heroism and skill?

Thats what Sully might accomplish, in committing to film the heartwarming story of The Miracle on the Hudson, when Captain Chesley Sully Sullenberger made a forced water landing on the Hudson River with 155 passengers aboard a U.S. Airways flight to Charlotte.

Eastwood is an efficient, restrained and methodical filmmaker, an approach that lends well to the temperament and character of Sully, as he is portrayed by Tom Hanks.

Whats remarkable about the incident as we see it on screen is just how calm everyone remains throughout the 208-second ordeal. Perhaps because they didnt know just how amazing this feat would be, but also because everyone is just doing their jobs very, very well.

From the air traffic controller to the ferry captains to Sully himself, along with his First Officer Jeff Skiles (Aaron Eckhart) and the flight attendants, every player is professional, motivated and exceedingly helpful.

Helpfulness is a simple concept, but a powerful one, and Sully captures the essence of what made the Miracle on the Hudson so grippingly inspiring.

Its a wonderful New York story, and Eastwood takes care to make it a story about the many people who made it a miracle. That is the emotional core of the film, a celebration of the simple act of reaching out a helping hand without a second thought.

Eastwood populates the cast with a host of New York character actors, from recognizable faces such as Michael Rapaport and Holt McCallany and Mike OMalley, along with other less recognizable but no less authentic faces.

Theres a special kind of magic about a New York story where the big city suddenly becomes a small town over some strange or freak or serendipitous event, and Eastwood captures that.

The conflict of Sully is not the heartwarming story splashed across the cover of the New York Post, its the investigation and hearing by the National Transportation Safety Board, out to detect any human error in the 208 seconds, on behalf of the airlines and their insurance companies.

It proves difficult for reluctant hero Sully to embrace his own heroism when behind closed doors hes being grilled about his personal life, confronted with computer simulations and data that demonstrate he could have made a landing at an airport.

Coupled with his own traumatic memories and nightmares of the event, its hard for him to accept the hero label.

During the hearing, Sully urges the board to consider the human element  the humans making decisions under duress, not computer simulations. Sully is about a hero, and a story that enthralled a nation desperate for good news, but its more about that intangible human element.

Good people doing their jobs thoughtfully and at the height of their abilities, working together under unprecedented and extraordinary circumstances. Sometimes all of those things come together to create a miracle, and Sully is a warm reminder of that.
Pediatricians around the country are asked almost daily about delaying routine childhood vaccines -- or refusing them entirely, according to a new study co-authored by a University of Washington expert.

Nearly 90 percent of pediatricians encountered parents who opted out of vaccinations entirely in 2013, up from about 75 percent in 2006. And almost one in five parents asked to delay some or all of the potentially lifesaving shots.

"I was a little bit surprised at the percentage of the general population that were delaying vaccines," said Dr. Jon Almquist, a longtime Seattle-area pediatrician and clinical professor emeritus at UW.

He is co-author of a study published in the journal Pediatrics that examined results from two surveys given to more than 600 members of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) in 2006 and again seven years later.

It also found a rise in the top reason doctors say parents reject immunizations: They just don't think they're necessary.

That's worrisome, said Almquist, 76, who is nearly retired but still fills in for area colleagues.

"I've been here long enough that I've seen the diseases," he said. "We've seen the lines when people were dying of flu or polio and when parents had to worry about meningitis."

Public health officials recommend vaccinations at specific intervals for most kids to prevent diseases that were once the scourge of childhood, including measles, mumps, rubella, pertussis and chickenpox. People who don't follow the scientifically validated schedules for immunizations have been a growing source of worry for experts.

Modern parents often have not been exposed to illness or possible complications caused by vaccine-preventable diseases, which might account for rising refusal rates, Almquist said.

The study didn't include input from parents themselves, just the doctors' perceptions, Almquist noted.

Still, what researchers found confirmed the experience of pediatricians across the United States, said Dr. Catherine Hough-Telford, who was affiliated with the University of Alabama at Birmingham for the study but now has a private practice in Tampa, Fla.

"Definitely, pediatricians are seeing vaccine refusals and delays every day," she said. "I talk about it in practice on a daily basis. The data reflects that. It's pretty much ubiquitous."

Reports of vaccine refusals were highest in the West, with 94 percent of doctors saying they had parents opt out in 2013, up from 85 percent in 2006.

Interestingly, the reasons parents refused vaccines shifted slightly during the study period. In 2013, about 64 percent opted out because of concerns about the disproved link between vaccines and autism, down from 74 percent in 2006. Nearly 67 percent of parents in 2013 refused shots because of worries about safety, also down from nearly 74 percent.

At the same time, those who refused shots because they thought they were unnecessary jumped from about 63 percent in 2006 to 73 percent in 2013.

"The reasons for vaccine refusals do change over time," Hough-Telford said. "I think we hit on that."

In response, growing numbers of pediatricians reacted to vaccine refusals by dismissing such patients from their practices. In 2006, about 6 percent of pediatricians said they "always" dismissed patients for refusing vaccines. By 2013, that figure had jumped to nearly 12 percent, almost double.
BLOOMINGTON  Mary Sloss was reclining in her hospital bed at OSF St. Joseph Medical Center, thinking about her physical therapy later that afternoon, when she invited into her room a hospital volunteer who promptly jumped up to greet her.

"He likes to give you five," Michelle Smith said of her volunteer partner.

"He's pretty," Sloss said as she took the paw of the volunteer and shook it. The volunteer edged closer to Sloss as she petted him.

The volunteer is Max, a golden retriever, and one of St. Joseph's certified therapy dogs.

A few minutes later, another therapy dog, Sissy, a Shih Tzu, with Sloss' permission, curled up beside the patient. As Sloss petted her, Sloss talked with Sissy's volunteer partner, Mary Lindsey, about a dog that Sloss had years ago and her son's dog.

"When you're over here or in a nursing home, you get a little lonely," said Sloss, 91, of Bloomington, who was recovering from a fall.

"To see a dog helps," she said. "I think it (the hospital's dog therapy program) is a good idea."

Later, Sadie, a golden retriever, and her volunteer partner, Gail Scoates, and Sophie, a Havanese, and her volunteer partner, Ruth Davidson, visited with Shelly Huber in her hospital room.

Huber, 42, of Fairbury, who underwent a cardiac catheterization with a stent after suffering a heart attack, smiled as she petted the dogs and talked about her dog.

"It always brings a smile to your face to see a puppy," Huber said.

St. Joseph's therapy dogs' program, called Karing Partners, is growing, as is Advocate BroMenn Medical Center's therapy dog's program, called Hound Rounds. Meanwhile, more long-term care facilities are allowing staff to bring in pets for residents and employees to enjoy.

What's happening? To Huber, the answer is simple.

"People are realizing how calming animals are," she said.

"Therapy dogs provide a diversion and stress relief," said Sue Seibring, Advocate BroMenn manager of volunteer services. Studies have shown that therapy dogs can decrease loneliness, calm and boost morale of patients and staff, which can result in lower blood pressure, cardiovascular improvement and less pain medication.

At a time when everyone is concerned about the cost of health care and judicious use of pain medicine, therapy dog provide good complementary health care.

"You can see it as soon as the dog handler and dog walk into the hospital," Seibring said. "The staff and visitors stop them in their tracks. It diverts attention from everyone's pain. It totally gets their minds in a happy place."

St. Joseph's program started informally in 2002 when Gail Scoates, regulatory and standards coordinator, began volunteering to visit patients in the Transitional Care Unit with her golden retriever.

Karing Partners became a formal hospital program in 2010 at the urging of Michelle Smith of Towanda, Max's owner and a St. Joseph nurse. It has expanded to most hospital units, with a few exceptions, such as intensive care.

BroMenn's program started at Adult Day Services in 2008 and expanded into the hospital in 2010. Therapy dogs are allowed in most areas. Exceptions are where there is food, medication preparation areas, sterile areas, intensive care unit, labor and delivery, operating rooms and patient isolation rooms, Seibring said.

At both hospitals, dog owners must be trained and approved as hospital volunteers. Dogs must be of a calm disposition, up to date with their vaccinations and graduates of obedience training and certified as therapy dogs through Therapy Dogs International, the Alliance of Therapy Dogs or Pet Partners.

Trained and approved dog owners and dogs must work as a team.

Dogs must be bathed within 24 hours before their hospital visit and can visit only patients who have agreed to a visit.

During the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, 2015, Karing Partners did more than 3,400 visits, said Scoates, of El Paso. There have been no patient safety incidents as a result of the program.

St. Joseph has had as many as 12 Karing Partners but some older dogs have died and the program is down to seven dogs, said Scoates, adding that the growing program welcomes more dogs.

BroMenn has 18 therapy dogs  with two pending  and 12 handlers, Seibring said.

"We have daily rounding in the afternoons," Seibring said. Designated unit rounding includes addiction recovery on Monday nights, mental health on Tuesday nights and acute rehabilitation on Fridays, she said.

Cat Nevin, who does Hound Rounds with her Westies, Molly and Lance, at BroMenn and at the Community Cancer Center in Normal, recalls Molly helping to calm down a sexual assault survivor.

"Everyone speaks dog," Nevin said.

Seibring recalled a moment in BroMenn acute rehab when a patient who had a neurological problem and hadn't spoken a word since he'd been in the hospital said "dog" when a therapy dog came into the unit.

Davidson, of Clinton, said a mother whose daughter was being resuscitated at St. Joseph requested an immediate visit with Sophie.

"She told Sophie everything going on," Davidson recalled. "Sophie jumped up beside her, looked her in the eye, sat and listened."

Hana Mueller, community relations coordinator for Evergreen Senior Living, which includes Evergreen Village and Evergreen Place in Normal, recalls that a resident with dementia was having an agitated outburst several months ago.

"She couldn't stop talking," Mueller said. "She was talking in loops and wasn't making sense. I tried to derail her for 40 minutes but I couldn't.

"Then I asked her, 'Do you like dogs?' and I got Holly (Mueller's dog) to put her head on the resident's lap. The change in the resident was instant. The resident told me about her dog and her family and she was petting Holly the whole time she was talking. After a while she said 'I don't know why I'm telling you all this, I'm going to take a nap now.'

"Holly took her out of the spin cycle," Mueller said. "It was an incredible thing to witness."

"These dogs don't come to judge," Davidson said. "They just love."
NORMAL  A school bus driver charged in connection with a three-vehicle crash on Tuesday has been fired, according to a spokesman for First Student.

The bus system, under a contract with McLean County Unit 5, provides transportation for the district's students.

The driver, whose name has not been released by Bloomington police or by First Student, was issued a citation for failure to reduce speed to avoid an accident. The bus he was driving collided with a utility trailer pulled by an SUV at Veterans and Commerce Parkway shortly after 4 p.m. Tuesday, according to BPD.

On Friday, a company spokesman said the driver, who worked for First Student for more than two years, "has been terminated for not following company policy."

The district earlier had told First Student it did not want the driver back on the job, said Unit 5 spokeswoman Dayna Brown. In its contract, the district is allowed to request removal of a driver.

The junior high and high school students on the bus were released to parents or sent home on another bus after the crash. Unit 5 Superintendent Mark Daniel said several students complained of headaches and were seen by emergency medical personnel on the scene.

First Student and the district have been embroiled in controversy since the start of school by a breakdown in the system that gets students to and from school. First Student is placing much of the blame on a bus driver shortage that it says is nationwide.

There have been persistent problems with buses forced to run extra routes, resulting in overcrowded and late buses.

The Pantagraph has filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the city for the driver's name. Under state law, the city must provide the information within five business days.
BLOOMINGTON  Bloomington Mayor Tari Renner is not ready to support a city policy to require a Freedom of Information Act request from the media before releasing the names of drivers involved in certain traffic accidents.

The Bloomington Police Department refused Wednesday to release the name of the school bus driver involved in a three-vehicle accident Tuesday afternoon on Veterans Parkway near Commerce Parkway.

The driver for First Student failed to stop at a red light and rear-ended a trailer pulled by a sport utility vehicle, according to police reports. The SUV then collided with a car ahead of it.

The junior high and high school students were released to their parents or taken home on another bus, according to McLean County Unit 5 officials.

Bloomington police spokeswoman Sara Mayer refused to provide the name of the bus driver, who was issued a ticket for failure to reduce speed to avoid an accident. Citing a state law related to release of arrest records and reports to the media, Mayer said in an email response that a Freedom of Information Act request could be filed for the driver's name.

Renner said the issue of the missing information came up Thursday morning during a meeting on another matter with City Manager David Hales and two City Council members. He said the consensus at the meeting was that a FOIA request should be submitted for a driver's name in a traffic accident.

"On the face of it, I don't support such a policy," said Renner, adding that he is willing to discuss the matter further with city staff members.

The release of information without a written request "is certainly less bureaucratic and burdensome," he added.

The city staff is making a distinction between the issuance of a traffic citation that allows a driver to leave the scene and a more serious incident in which a driver is taken into custody. Only the latter is an arrest, Mayer argued.

The Pantagraph has filed a FOIA request for the accident report.

Unit 5 Superintendent Mark Daniel said the district also wants to know more about the bus driver.

"We'd like to know if there were other incidents with this driver," said Daniel, adding that a report from First Student also did not contain the driver's name.

Daniel did not know if the driver is still working for First Student, the district's Cincinnati-based transportation contractor. The district's legal counsel will follow up with the company, and a decision will be made on whether Unit 5 will ask that the driver be removed, said Daniel.

First Student could not be reached for comment.

Mayer did not respond to questions from The Pantagraph on why all information on the accident was released except the driver's name.

Both the McLean County Sheriff's Department and the Normal Police Department routinely release information from accidents to the media without a FOIA requirement.

Sheriff Jon Sandage said accident reports, including the names of drivers, are posted daily on the media activity board at the department.

"Any time a FOIA is involved, it creates extra work," said Sandage, noting that an ongoing investigation and the involvement of juveniles could cause delays or redactions in the reports.

On the question as to whether a traffic citation is an arrest, the sheriff said, "I've always felt like a traffic citation is an arrest."
Republican congressional leaders ardently want conservative members of the House to not force a vote on impeaching the IRS commissioner. The public does not care about John Koskinens many misdeeds. And impeachment will distract attention from issues that interest the public. And because Democrats are not ingrates, the required two-thirds of the Senate will never vote to convict Koskinen, whose behavior continues the pattern of doing what Democrats desire with the most intrusive and potentially punitive government agency.

These Republican leaders reasons are cumulatively unpersuasive. Resuscitating the impeachment power would contribute to revitalizing Congress Article I powers. Impeachments are rare  no appointed official of the executive branch has been impeached in 140 years. But what James Madison called the indispensable power to impeach should not be allowed to atrophy, as has Congress power to declare war.

Here are a few pertinent facts. At the IRS, Exempt Organizations Director Lois Lerner participated in delaying for up to five years  effectively denying  tax-exempt status for, and hence suppressing political advocacy by, conservative groups. She retired after refusing to testify to congressional committees, invoking the Fifth Amendments protection against self-incrimination.

Koskinen, who became commissioner after Lerner left, failed to disclose the disappearance of emails germane to a congressional investigation of IRS misbehavior. Under his leadership, the IRS failed to comply with a preservation order pertaining to an investigation. He did not testify accurately or keep promises made to Congress. Subpoenaed documents, including 422 tapes potentially containing 24,000 Lerner emails, were destroyed. He falsely testified that the Government Accountability Offices report on IRS practices found no examples of anyone who was improperly selected for an audit.

In June testimony to the House Judiciary Committee, Jonathan Turley of the George Washington University Law School noted that the Obama administration stands accused of effectively weaponizing the IRS. And the Koskinen controversy comes as Congress is facing an unprecedented erosion of its authority vis-a-vis the executive branch. The increasing obstruction and contempt displayed by federal agencies in congressional investigations reflects the loss of any credible threat of congressional action. Congress has become a paper tiger within our tripartite system  a branch that often expresses outrage, yet fails to enforce its constitutional authority.

The Koskinen controversy, Turley said, falls at the very crossroads of expanding executive power, diminishing congressional authority, and the rise of the Fourth Branch, which consists of federal agencies that exercise increasingly unilateral and independent powers. As Turley noted (and as Hillary Clinton can ruefully attest), private litigants like Judicial Watch are nowadays more successful than Congress in prying information from the executive branch. And (as the Lerner case illustrates) the administration has effectively foreclosed avenues like the referral of criminal contempt and other sanctions that should be imposed for providing misleading statements to Congress.

As a means of controlling the executive, the power of the purse has become something of a constitutional myth. This is particularly true now that Congress, inept at producing 12 appropriations bills, forfeits its leverage by funding the government indiscriminately with omnibus bills and continuing resolutions. So, Congress is left with impeachment as the only functional deterrence for executive overreach.

The Constitution authorizes impeachment for high crimes and misdemeanors. Madison favored this language and interpreted it to include maladministration, which surely encompasses perjury and obstruction of Congress. The idea that an IRS commissioner is not a high enough official for impeachment ignores, Turley says, the realities of the modern regulatory state. Commissioners have authority over 90,000 employees collecting $2.5 trillion in revenues annually.

Andrew C. McCarthy, former federal prosecutor and Justice Department official, reminded the Judiciary Committee that the point of the Constitutions vesting of all executive power in a single official, the president, is precisely to make the president accountable for all executive branch conduct. And impeachment of a subordinate official, far from being a radical remedy, is much less drastic than impeaching the president or defunding the officials agency.

One of the articles of impeachment filed by the House against Richard Nixon was that he, acting personally and through his subordinates, had endeavored to use the IRS to violate Americans rights, causing IRS actions to be initiated or conducted in a discriminatory manner. If presidents are, as McCarthy says, derivatively responsible for misconduct by executive branch subordinates, surely those officials are responsible for their own misconduct and that of underlings. Refusing to impeach Koskinen would continue the passivity by which members of Congress have become, in Turleys words, agents of their own obsolescence.
Certain people who are not supporters of Donald Trump have criticized those who are by saying I am an American first, Republican second. The two are not mutually exclusive and an individual that supports Donald Trump is not any less of an American for doing so.

Others have criticized those supporting Donald Trump by stating they are deplorable people. Have we as a country not moved past such rhetoric? I am as much as a decent American now as I was before Trumps candidacy.

I supported Scott Walker, then ran as an alternate delegate for Marco Rubio, then supported Ted Cruz, but when Donald Trump fairly won the Republican nomination, I supported him. I do not believe he is an 'ist' this or 'phobic' that. If I did, I would not support him. I would encourage all Republicans and others to support Donald Trump. The alternative is simply not better.

Chuck Erickson, Bloomington

The writer is McLean County Republican Party chairman.
With the recent scandal Samsung had to go through having to recall 2.5 million of Galaxy Note 7 just two weeks after it was released to the market, Galaxy fans may find renewed excitement from the new leaks and rumors about the probable next flagship device from Samsung, the Galaxy S8.

Samsung has recently recalled its Galaxy Note 7 over reports of exploding batteries. But perhaps in a bid to keep its customers, new specs details and features of Galaxy S8 are surfacing online. According to BGR, the next device in the S series would be powered by a new Samsung Exynos 8895 processor. The new chipset will be clocked at 3.0GHz, but it was designed to be more energy-efficient than its processors. The upgraded chipset would also be able to improve image processing by as much as 80% compared to the recent Exynos model in the market.

Previous leaks said that Galaxy S8 will come in two sizes, a 5.1-inch model and a 5.5-inch version; both will feature curved displays. The S8 series are also rumored to be among the first smartphones to feature 4K ultra HD displays. TechBuffalo said that Galaxy S8 may also come with dual camera system to remain competitive with Apple's iPhone 7 Plus. It is also rumored to be doing away with the 3.5mm headphone jack, just like what Apple did with its iPhone 7.

Given the fiasco brought about by the Galaxy Note 7 recall, which gave a hit to the Korean tech giant's financial, speculations are running around that Samsung is rushing the Galaxy S8, and it may be released sooner than expected. Normally, Samsung holds an Unpacked event in February or March, at most two days before the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain. If it is taking things a bit faster so it can put the Galaxy Note 7 phablet disaster, the company might release the Galaxy S8 in January.
Could "The Defenders" on Netflix be appearing in the upcoming "Avengers" movie, "Infinity War"? It's been said that the Marvel Cinematic Universe, where "Avengers" belongs, is separate and independent from Marvel Television, where "The Defenders" is. However, the Russo brothers, who are helming "Avengers: Infinity War," are apparently not completely shutting down the possibility of these worlds merging.

Speaking with the Toronto Sun, the Russo brothers said that they have been considering every Marvel hero for "Avengers: Infinity War." In particular, the report cited the characters of Daredevil and Jessica Jones, who are members of "The Defenders."

"We don't want to get too specific about what's going to happen with these movies," said Anthony Russo. "We want these movies to be a surprise for audiences."

Joe Russo joked that when they were doing "Captain America: Civil War," they had at least 67 Marvel superheroes to consider adding in the cast. "We've actually narrowed it down to 66 at this point, so we're making progress on that front," he told the press.

"Avengers: Infinity War" will center on the Marvel superheroes' battle with the villain Thanos, which was already hinted in the earlier movies. The Russo brothers are in the middle of filming scenes with Josh Brolin, who plays the villain, per an update on the brothers' Facebook page.

Meanwhile, filming for "The Defenders" will begin at the end of 2016, according to "Daredevil" actor Charlie Cox, per Independent. "The Defenders" is the coming together of four separate Marvel superheroes shows on Netflix, with "Iron Fist" and "Luke Cage" joining "Daredevil" and "Jessica Jones."

Charlie Cox stated that he's looking forward to seeing how all these four TV worlds mash up to form one new show. "The Defenders" isn't going to be made available on Netflix at least until the later part of 2017. However, the show has already released a teaser during the Netflix's Comic Con presentation in June. Watch it below.
Samsung Galaxy Note 7 released their latest gadget earlier this week, but it didn't manage to impress consumers as it was recalled. Samsung Galaxy Note 7 was recalled after it wears discovered that the device can cause an explosion due to the battery's flaw.

Samsung left their consumers disappointed as their much awaited Samsung Galaxy Note 7 didn't meet their expectations. There are several reports that the device explodes after being charged, while some experienced explosions while using it.

Samsung immediately took action to address the issue, they then announced that they would recall the units. They then announced that they will address the flaws as soon as possible to keep consumers satisfied with their service.

"With battery cell defects in some of our Note 7 phones, we did not meet the standard of excellence that you expect and deserve. For that, we apologize, especially to those of you who were personally affected by this," Tim Baxter, president of Samsung Electronics America, said in a statement as published in CNBC. "To those of you who love the Note - the most loyal customers in our Samsung family - we appreciate your passion and your patience ... we will work every day to earn back your trust through a series of unprecedented actions."

After the announcement, there are several facts that Samsung consumers need to understand. It was mentioned that 10 countries were affected by the battery flaw. CNN announced that the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Puerto Rico, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Taiwan, the UAE, and Korea were the countries that are included in the recall.

One of the precautions that consumers should take note of is bringing the device into an airplane as it was announced that the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 should be powered off while boarding the aircraft to avoid accidents.
After its premiere night on Wednesday, "American Horror Story" has finally revealed the theme for Season 6. The show has managed to keep the details under perfect wraps by releasing 24 "misdirect" promos, with only one of them true. Now, the "American Horror Story" Season is revealed to be called "American Horror Story: Roanoke."

As reported by TVLine, the theme was revealed in the first episode, curiously called "Chapter 1," which opened with confessional interviews of people who took part in a documentary titled "My Roanoke Nightmare." The first episode focused on a couple who had a traumatic experience, having lost a baby, which is why they moved to North Carolina.

CEO John Landgraf explained to reporters that his marketing team "went out and created many more trailers than you've actually seen for hypothetical seasons of American Horror Story, in different genres, different places. One of them is accurate, and the others are all misdirects. ... We think it will be fun for the audience to have the surprise this year."

According to TIME, "American Horror Story" Season 6 is based on a true story of the lost colonists of Roanoke. A group of Englishmen, including women and children, led by Captain John White created a settlement at Roanoke Island, now called North Carolina. Captain White returned to England for supplies, but when he sailed back to the colony after four years, he found that something is very much different in a disturbing way.

"American Horror Story" cast members reportedly include Lady Gaga, Evan Peters, Denis O'Hare, Kathy Bates, Angela Bassett, Finn Wittrock, Wes Bentley, Matt Bomer, Cheyenne Jackson and Leslie Jordan, per Deadline. "Glee" alum Jacob Artist recently teased about his casting in the AHS, but his social media post about it was immediately taken down. The full cast has not been revealed as part of the AHS campaign. But showrunner Ryan Murphy said that after the premiere episode, they will release the cast gallery.

"American Horror Story" Season 6 airs every Wednesday at 10/9c on FX.
Rumors are swirling once again that "Hunter X Hunter" chapter 361 will be released next year, specifically in February. Accordingly, the health of Yoshihiro Togashi has improved and aside from the Chapter 361, more chapters will also be released by 2017.

The last chapter, 360, was released on June 30, 2016 and due to the health issues of Togashi, fans have been asking about "Hunter X Hunter" Chapter 361, Movie News Guide reported. Accordingly, Togashi has been suffering from lower back pains that is why the Chapter 361 has not been on air yet. The latest rumors are saying that the health of Togashi is slowly getting better that is why the Chapter 361 of "Hunter X Hunter" will be released sometime in the first quarter of the year.

Yibada also reported that Chapter 361 of "Hunter X Hunter" will be the start of the third season of the manga series. Season 3 will reportedly revolve around "Dar Continent Arc."

Other reports are saying, however, that instead of waiting for Togashi to get better, Viz Media might no longer want to work with him. They are reportedly looking for other writers so they can continue publishing the extremely popular series so as not to keep fans waiting and guessing when the next chapters of "Hunter X Hunter" will be out.

Viz Media is also reportedly concerned about Togashi as they want him to devote all his time to improving his health rather than letting the worries about the publication of the next chapters of "Hunter X Hunter" get the better of him. They are rumored to be planning to assign another project to Togashi that will not be time-consuming or will wear him out.

More on what to expect in "Hunter X Hunter" Chapter 361, it is believed that there will be a fight scene between the Nen Beast and Kurapika. In Chapter 360, Kurapika wanted to solve the mystery related to the deaths in Black Whale and wanted to find the culprits.

These reports about "Hunter X Hunter" Chapter 361 are yet to be confirmed.
Back into the time when having a child out of wedlock in Hollywood was a career-ending scandal, celebrities became a part of the increasing trend of women who were hastily subjected to marriages and abortions. But in 2006, the image of unwed pregnancies drastically changed - thanks to one of Hollywood's power couple, Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt.

It is an undeniable fact that the society had a strict and standardized concept when it comes to marriage and procreation, where women were normally banned to get pregnant before marriage. This ideology exists 50 years ago or in the '70s and '80s in which women who got pregnant out of wedlock were often scorned and stigmatized.

As time went by, the ideologies on the institution of marriage and procreation transformed. As a matter of fact, studies showed that the idea of marrying to procreate has long been considered quaint and obsolete.

In 2009, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) revealed 41 percent of births in America were out of wedlock. The stats also rang true in Hollywood, where several celebrities like Halle Berry, Selma Blair, Kourtney Kardashian, Natalie Portman and many others proudly proclaimed their statuses as unwed moms.

It wasn't until Angeline Jolie, however, who changed the way the society viewed unwed pregnancy (aka non-marital fertility in technical terms). According to New York's Buffalo State University sociology assistant professor and study researcher Hanna Grol-Prokopczyk, Jolie and Brad Pitt's 2006 pregnancy revelation changed the way People magazine covers pregnancy announcements without either an engagement or marriage.

Based on Grol-Prokopczyk's study presented at the American Sociological Association's annual meeting in Seattle a month ago, People's coverage on Brangelina's pregnancy made the concept of unwed pregnancy more acceptable even without the promise of marriage. Grol-Prokopczyk even pointed out that Brangelina's baby bump coverage contributed to the destigmatization of non-marital fertility.

Even though pop culture used to slam unwed but expectant couples, many celebrities were getting pregnant out of wedlock. Thanks to Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, the dynamic in unwed pregnancy was significantly altered and marriage was no longer assumed as the next step for unwed, expectant couples, Live Science noted.

Aside from Brangelina, a few of Hollywood's power couples including ex-couple Tom Cruise and Katie Homes had also challenged the somewhat obsolete norm when it comes to marriage and procreation. However, it was the Pitts who really made a turning point, especially when they decided to get married eight years after the birth of the couple's first biological child in 2014.

Grol-Prokopczyk's findings also echoed the observation of Ohio's Drake University law, politics and society professor and "Pregnant with the Stars: Watching and Wanting the Celebrity Baby Bump" author Renee Cramer, who said that People's coverage of unwed celebrity pregnancies had normalized the perceptions on often stigmatized behaviors. As per Stanford University Press, Cramer also stressed how women are categorized and defined by their pregnancies.

In addition, People has also changed its coverage on pregnant gay celebrity couples. Meanwhile, Grol-Prokopczyk's findings have yet to be published in a peer-reviewed journal.

So, what are your thoughts on the burgeoning cases of unwed pregnancies? Sound off below and follow Parent Herald for more news and updates.
We have a lot of misconceptions in Paganism, and I am not talking about what non-Pagans believe about us, I am talking about what we believe about Paganism. I am talking about things like millions of people died in the Inquisition, or when we say those killed in the Inquisition were witches and Pagans. When we say that every Pagan follows the rule of harm none, or the threefold return or even just karma  and then there is the whole thing where karma is, what goes around comes around in a few days time, rather than it being a force that controls reincarnation.

So many misconceptions, I cant possibly list them all here (but I may make a post about them another day, because, fun). They are pretty much my biggest pet peeve  and I have a few pet peeves, but when it comes to people spouting misconceptions, it takes a lot of effort on my part to not charge in with a, Well actually! I fail most of the time to be honest.

But why? Beyond the obvious, they are misconceptions and as such are stupid and need to be destroyed, why do I hate them so very much?

All Real Pagans

I have spoken of this one before of course, though a bit tongue in cheek and self-deprecatingly. A lot of the misconceptions within Paganism are used to perpetuate some kind of grand unified Paganism, where if you dont fit the prescribed misconception, then you obviously arent a Real Pagan. Harm none is the most common of these, of course. I have been attacked, online, many a time and viciously, because I am no follower of the idea of harming none. Good thing my feelings arent easily hurt, else I would have to point out that those attackers are breaking their own rule and are so not Real Pagans either!

The misconceptions that lead to the All Real Pagans fallacy are mostly amusing, I have to be honest. But they are also damaging to people who dont have the same odd sense of humour that I have. And they are damaging to the Pagan community in general, online and offline. On a personal level it can lead to the seemingly basic hurt feelings, anxiety and religious doubt in a big way (which isnt fun). It can also lead to people forcing themselves to do things and believe things that actually make them extremely uncomfortable.

On the community level, well one only need look at the kerfuffles in the blogosphere for an example and they can get pretty nasty. This can translate into real life where some people avoid certain gatherings for fear of being attacked as not a Real Pagan. It can create some pretty bad problems within smaller groups, covens and the like when one person has a very different idea of Real Paganism than everyone else.

Liars Cant Be Trusted

When our misconceptions get exposed for the lies that they are, we then become untrustworthy as a whole. When people realise how much shit we have created with lies about the Inquisition and how every society was matriarchal, the truths we want to reveal become suspect. Who is going to believe what we say when some of our most shocking revelations were actually bullshit?

Yeh, no one.

Paganism is a Joke

Following on from liars not being trustworthy, we also become objects of ridicule and our religions just cant be taken seriously. All we really are is a bunch of disgruntled Christianity haters, everything we say is stupid. And so is everything we believe.

This may not seem like a problem  after all, who cares what other people think of us, right? But in truth it is a problem when we have governing bodies ready and waiting to make laws that may not go in our favour. We want to be taken seriously so that our voices in the world can make a difference.

I personally dont care what people think of me or how they feel about me, however I also do recognise that I am a representative of Paganism as a whole, also of Polytheism and Hellenism. We are all representatives of the religions, traditions and labels that we follow and take upon ourselves. As representatives we have to consider what effect our actions and words will have on the greater Pagan and related communities.

Personally, I do sometimes feel embarrassed that I am counted as being somehow the same as all other Pagans, when I see so many of them spreading ridiculous misconceptions, lies, ignorance and outright bullshit. I dont care what people think of me, so long I am the reason they think that way about me. I do not want people judging me based on the actions of some Pagan in the UK or US.

Your actions do affect me, and I am bloody sick and tired of people assuming I am Wiccan because I am a witch and a Pagan. Its actually a worse assumption than the devil worship one that outsiders accuse us of. Not because Wicca is comparable to devil worship, but because its actually easier to convince people I dont worship the devil than it is to explain how I am a witch but not Wiccan.

So please. Before you share that meme, that enlightening revelation article or status, check the truth first. Check if it is real, if it is true, if it is backed up by anything resembling integrity. Realise that just because another Pagan said it, that doesnt make it true.
A Review Series of Anonymous Tip, by Michael Farris

Pp. 381-387

As you remember, Peter is in the wilderness skipping work. Gwen is grieving Gordon.

Gwen was awakened by a ringing telephone at 9:30 Friday morning.

What is this magic?! Gwen must be taking the week off of work due to her exs death, and her parents must be smuggling Casey out of the house before 7:00 each morning and taking her for donuts and then to the park, because I cannot for the life of me think of any other way Gwen could possibly sleep this long with a four-year-old. I have a four-year-old. They dont let you sleep like that!

Anyway, its the Washington State Patrol calling about the autopsy report. They want to know where they should send it, since she and Gordon were divorced. Gwen tells them to send it to his mother. Im really confused as to why this hasnt been established by now. Gwen asks what the report says and the officer tells heris that standard? Is the autopsy report public?

The officer tells her that the official cause of death was drowning but that we also found a blood alcohol rating of .23. Gwen asks about the brakes, and the officer tells her that while the car was old, everything in the car seemed mechanically OK and the breaks should have worked. He says theve ruled it an alcohol-related fatality and that no foul play is expected. Gwens reaction is predictable.

Tears of shame and sorrow flowed down Gwens cheeks as she gave the officer the address of Gordons mother over the phone.

Gwen calls Peters office, but Sally tells him hes someplace in Montana. She wants to know if she can call his car phone but Sally says she would have to know the specific roaming code for the cellular system in Montana and that shes not sure where in Montana he is and hes probably out or range of the cell sites anyway. Gwen tells Sally to leave a message for Peter for him to call her.

Tell him its urgent that I talk with him. Night or day, he is to call me.

Sally wants to know whats wrong but Gwen wont say anything.

At this point, Farris switches to Peter.

On Friday morning, Peter found a place to rent a canoe and went for a two hour glide across a small corner of Flathead Lake. As he paddled across the pristine lake, eh decided that he had managed to live for thirty-one years without Gwen Landis, and that he had prepared to give her up two days ago. He should simply get on with his life.

Peter really should have decided this a long time ago. For one thing, it would be inappropriate for him to date a client, so he shouldnt have initiated anything at all while the case was ongoing. For another thing, his religious beliefs dictated against marrying a divorced woman, so he never should have started anything or let Gwen know in any way that he was interested in her. But all this we knew.

Peter spends the night at the motel, and then wakes early, drives back to his home in Spokane, showers and dresses, and heads to Gordons funeral. He knows the time and location because Stan gave it to Sally, remember, and Sally told him on the phone.

Gwen was sitting in the front row next to Gordons mother. Casey was next to her. Peter could hear her crying softly. He had steeled his heart toward Gwen, but he desperately wanted to go and hold Casey and comfort her. Stan and June were on the other side of Casey.

Im glad Peter could tell who was crying in the above paragraph, because I couldnt. But seriously. Casey doesnt even know him. Casey has the people she would actually be comforted by with her already.

Im also really unsure of how to best write a grieving four-year-old. I have a four-year-old, and the very idea of him losing a parent, and the grief he would experience, is making me want to turn the page and skip past this. One thing I can say is that children that age are unpredictable in how they express their emotions. I could see one child sitting stony faced, aware of what has happened holding everything in. I could see another child confused and oblivious to what is happening. I could see a third child losing it complete, crying, screaming, wailing until theyre exhausted and sleep claims them. And so, I suppose, a fourth child might sit through the funeral crying softly. While the characters have played lip service to Caseys loss, I dont think the book as a whole is giving enough attention to the enormity of her loss.

After the sad, hopeless funeral, Stan sees Peter and lets him know that Gwen has been trying to contact him. Peter shrugs out of it and leaves. He says to tell Gwen hell be in his office on Monday. Does this mean he wont be at church on Sunday? You know, the church he invited Gwen to? The church Gwen now attends? Awkward.

Gwen was crushed when her father told her that Peter and come and gone. But on later reflection, it gave her some hope. At least he came. Her heart banked on that fact as Peter continued to roam and walk and do his best to use the majestic scenery of the Pacific Northwest to erase her from his heart.

Were not given details about where he goes or what he does, but as best as I can tell Peter doesnt return home again until Sunday night after eleven. He checks his answering machine.

Hi, Peter. Its Gwen. I need to talk with you right away. Five such messages. On the last two, she had added, Peter, Im really sorry. He had anticipated the messages, and had prepared himself to ignore them. He walked into his living room and fell on the couch exhausted. The books Pastor Lind and given him about divorce were still on the coffee table. Peter laughed, a loud sarcastic laugh, and wished the books were his so he could throw them against the wall. He swept them off the coffee table with his foot. He liked the feeling.

Okay, Ive been holding back from getting into this, but lets just do this. Gwen was wrong about Peter messing with Gordons brakes, but she wasnt wrong about Peter wishing Gordon dead. She wasnt wrong that Peter had courted her while simultaneously believing that he was not permitted by God to marry divorced women (as opposed to widows). And she wasnt wrong that someone (in this case, the author) had killed Gordon off just so that she could marry Peter. But of course all that is going to disappear and Gwen is going to be oh so apologetic and oh so ready to jump in bed (or rather, in marriage) with Peter. Because of course she is.

This would actually be a really good moment for Gwen to notice that some of the beliefs of the new religion shes gotten herself into are incredibly problematic and downright dangerous. That would be an interesting work of fan fiction right thereGwen realizing how fucked up it is that Peters beliefs led him to wish Gordon dead. She might also think about the fact that Gordons death frees Peter up to marry her, and how wrong it is that their path to marriage would be predicated on Caseys losing a parent. This could be a catalyst for Gwen to take a step back, look at this belief system in the sunlight, and realize how close she got to being pulled in irrevocably.

Do you know what Gwen needs? She needs some friends, and maybe some hobbies or interests. She needs her own social circle. And yes, she should be meeting guys, and ultimately dating again if she wants, but the way this book is written youd think Peters the only other person in her age demographic in Spokane.

Also? I really really do not like Peter. I get that what Farris is doing here is setting up a bitterness that Peter is going to have to repent of, but this Peter is just plain scary.

Peter arrives in the office on Monday ready to get back to his regular cases. He says he wont have to work the Landis case for at least a few weeks. But Sallys trying to mime something, with lots of pointing and gestures, because it turns out Gwen is waiting in Peters office. Yes. Yes she is. At 8:35 on a Monday morning. Peter rolls his eyesnot even kiddingand then walks into his office.

Hi Gwen, Peter said, closing the door. Youre here bright and early. I didnt know you had an appointment this morning. Peter, please dont play games with me. Play games with you? All right, Miss Client, how can your lawyer be of assistance to you this morning? I dont want to talk with my lawyer. I want to talk with Peter. Just Peter. Im not sure that just Peters in.

I dont think Farris realizes that this book is making Christians look like complete jerks. Like, reallyall of them.

I didnt think you would make it this hard. Please, Peter. Im trying to apologize to you. Please let me talk. All right. Talk. Peter, I was completely wrong. I listened to thoughts I should never have believed. The autopsy came in. Gordon died from drowning, yes. But it also showed he was drunk. Very drunk. Point-two-three or something. You probably know what that means. There was nothing wrong with his brakes. Peter, I accused you unfairly. In light of the way you have treated me, I have behaved wrongly beyond explanation. Peter, more than anything in the world, I want you to forgive me. He was silent a long time. Drunk, huh? One might have thought that explanation of events might have occurred to you a little earlier. What makes more sense? Peter murders Gordon? Or, Gordon gets drunk and crashes? He waited. His voice was intensely bitter.

Peter had wondered earlier, based on Gwens response to Gordons death, would happen if he and Gwen were married and he made a genuine mistake. But now Im wondering what would happen if he and Gwen were married and Gwen were to push a point he wasnt happy with, or challenge a decision hed made. Because frankly, Peters not handling this well at all. There are so many red flags here youd think it was Communist Russia. Its Peter who is showing her true colors here, not Gwen.

But of course, Gwen goes on being sweetly apologetic. I dont know what came over me, she says. Are you going to forgive me? she asks.

I guess it is my duty to forgive you. But, my trust in you is shot. If you are so quick to condemn me for something I didnt do, what would you do if I ever really did something wrong when we were Married, Gwen said finishing the sentence he was unwilling to complete. I understand, Peter. I understand that this was not a minor accusation. I accused you of murder. You have a right to be bitter. But I wish you would forgive me anyway. I said I forgave you. I know. But I wish you would really forgive me.

And at this point Gwen leaves. Peter is sick to his stomach.

Married? Really? Do people not date in Spokane? I mean good grief, how are they so sure they want to be married?! They havent dated. They have spent barely any time alone together. Do they even know each others hobbies, interests, likes and dislikes? I mean my friends though I moved fast, and it was a year before my husband and I got engageda year of spending time together, conversing about every topic in the world together, eating dorm food together, studying together, and hanging out with mutual friends together. Gwen has known Peter for something like five months now, yes, but they spent very little actual time together, and theyve never been to the point where they could let their guards down around each other and just be together. And already theyre talking marriage? Really?

Anyway, Gwen doesnt tell her parents any of thisabout what Peter said, or how hes acted, etc. Instead, she reads the Bible and prayed. This is also where having friends she could talk to would be helpful. We really need some fan fiction here, because Im pretty sure her friends would set her straight on Peters behavior.

At dinner break on Wednesday, while at work, she finally calls Lynn, and they arrange to meet on Thursday morning. But youre going to have to wait until next week to learn how Lynn responds.
The old farmhouse at the Metcalf-Franklin Farm, an early 1800's historic farm at 142 Abbot Run Valley Road in Cumberland.
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The Rialto City Council voted 4-0 Tuesday to approve a policy prohibiting smoking in city parks, recreation facilities and city buildings.

In so doing, Rialto joined eight other San Bernardino County communities that have adopted smoke-free park ordinances.

Prior to the vote, several children associated with Community Coalitions for Change presented the council with three glass containers containing a total of some 3,000 cigarette butts collected in three city parks.

The remnants of cigarette smoking were collected in just one hour in each park, Sarah Urbieta, 12, told the council.

The Rialto ordinance also bans smoking e-cigarettes from parks and other city-owned properties.

This is disgusting, Mayor Deborah Robertson said of the three glass jars with their various sized butts collected from Rialto, Fergusson and Birdsall parks.

Councilman Joe Baca Jr. said the jar contents from parks were just wrong.

He thanked the children volunteers for their engagement and service to Rialto for spending the time to show the city council the extent of the smoking problem in city parks.

You kids can make a difference, Baca said.

Robertson said the ordinance does not go far enough and asked city staff to come up with another ordinance  banning chewing tobacco from city parks.

Echoing a desire to toughen Rialtos tobacco policies, Councilman Ed Scott said the staff should come up with an ordinance revision that would allow San Bernardino County health department inspectors to cite bar and restaurant owners for allowing smoking on their premises  a prohibition few other cities have.

There was a strong applause from most of the nearly 50 people in council chambers after the smoking ban measure passed.

Surveys collected at farmers market, health fairs, local parks and community meetings from March 1 through Aug. 6, showed 96 percent of residents favored making all city parks smoke free, according to materials passed out by American Lung Association representatives prior to the start of Tuesdays meeting.

The eight other San Bernardino County communities to pass smoke-free park ordinances are Adelanto, Apple Valley, Colton, Loma Linda, Rancho Cucamonga, Redlands, Victorville and Yucaipa, according to the American Lung Association in California.

Community Coalitions for Change is a non-profit formed to reduce underage drinking and other drug use. It serves the communities of Bloomington, Colton, Devore, Grand Terrace, Muscoy, Rialto and San Bernardino.

Contact the writer: jsteinberg@scng.com; @JamesDSteinberg on Twitter
The judge overseeing the complex felony corruption case involving former Beaumont city officials appointed a receiver to manage the frozen assets of four of seven defendants in a court hearing Friday.

Judge Mac Fisher last month told the defendants he wanted to name someone with the expertise to manage the assets and that the expense would be borne by them based on the need to monitor their individual assets.

Attorneys for former City Manager Alan Kapanicas and former Public Works Director Deepak Moorjani filed written objections to the receiver appointment, saying it was premature and an unnecessary expense given the nature of their clients assets.

Fisher appointed the law firm of Gresham Savage Nolan & Tilden as the receiver and attorney Nicholas Firetag as the representative. Firetag will make reports about every five months.

The Riverside County District Attorneys Office sought the appointment and in court papers noted that state law, sometimes called the freeze and seize law, authorizes such an appointment to preserve and maintain assets pending trial.

A different judge in May granted the district attorneys requests to freeze the defendants financial assets and property holdings to protect monies that might be tapped for restitution if the defendants ultimately are convicted.

By law, defendants may seek court orders to withdraw funds to post bail, pay legal fees and for living expenses.

The criminal complaint filed in May is alleging conflicts of interest, embezzlement and misappropriation of city bonds and transportation fee funds that added up to more than $43 million. All pleaded not guilty to the charges last month.

In addition to Kapanicas and Moorjani, the defendants subject to the receiver order are former Planning Director Ernest A. Egger and former Economic Development Director David W. Dillon.

Other defendants are former Finance Director William K. Aylward; former Police Chief Francis Dennis Frank Coe; and former City Attorney Joseph Aklufi.

Kapanicas, 64, of Palm Desert and Aylward, 53, of Cherry Valley both are charged with six counts of embezzlement, 24 counts of misappropriation of funds and two counts of conspiracy.

Dillon, 62, of Temecula; Moorjani, 69, of Yorba Linda; and Egger, 59, of Mendocino each are charged with one count of conflict of interest and six counts of embezzlement. Aklufi of Riverside is facing six counts of embezzlement.

Coe, 52, of Redlands was charged with two counts of misappropriation of funds and one count of conspiracy stemming from interest-free loans of city funds.
Greenhouse gases trapped in the upper atmosphere are acting like natural climatic forces that made some ancient droughts last for 1,000 years, UCLA researchers say.

Global warming created by these gases could be making a more arid climate, like what California has seen in its current five-year drought, the new normal, said UCLA geography professor Glen MacDonald, the studys lead author.

Released Thursday, Sept. 15, the study in Scientific Reports  part of the Nature Publishing Group  found that carbon dioxide and methane emitted from the burning of fossil fuels may be mimicking the effects of some catastrophic environmental phenomena the planet has previously experienced.

The consequences of the buildup of greenhouse gases in the Earths atmosphere look a lot like the effects of storms on the surface of the sun, decreases in volcanic activity or wobbles in the Earths orbit.

Events such as those precipitated 60-year periods of drought in the 12th century, MacDonald wrote. Some prehistoric droughts created by those phenomena lasted as long as 1,000 years.

Man-made activity causing the Earths temperature to rise may take the place of these natural phenomena  known as radiative forcing  in creating what scientists identify as extended arid periods.

Radiative forcing in the past appears to have had catastrophic effects in extending droughts, said MacDonald, an international expert on drought and climate change, in a statement.

When you have arid periods that persist for 60 years, as we did in the 12th century, or for millennia, as we did from 6,000 to 1,000 B.C., thats not really a drought,? MacDonald said. That aridity is the new normal.

While many scientists suspected that California had experienced extended dry periods in the ancient past, MacDonalds study found new, decisive evidence of mega-droughts occurring before recorded history.

Much like how researchers can use tree rings to understand what happened to an ancient tree over the course of its life, MacDonald used sediment samples from Kirman Lake in central-eastern California to document previous droughts. He concluded that these dry periods related to sea surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean.

Ocean temperatures help climatologists predict weather patterns like El Nino and La Nina.

Californians awaiting this years El Nino knew they could anticipate months of wetter weather. That didnt happen, with scientists saying a dome of high pressure kept the storm track of the most recent El Nino confined to the northern part of the state.

If the current La Nina period, which usually means drier weather, combines with radiative forcing of global warming, this double-whammy could produce drought-like conditions that may extend indefinitely, the study says.

If levels of greenhouse gases continue to rise, the resulting effects could wither the states forest preserves and decrease snowfall and rainfall, the studys authors concluded.

The U.S. Forest Service in June said a combination of drought, a bark beetle infestation and hotter temperatures killed an estimated 66 million trees in Californias forests of the Sierra Nevada over the last six years. The mass of dead trees raised concerns that there would be more fuel for wildfires in the state this summer.

The costs of fighting wildfires during the states 2015-16 fiscal year, which ended June 30, jumped to $366 million, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. Thats compared to $209 million for the previous fiscal year.

Dry brush as a result of the drought also quickened fires in Southern California, like the Blue Cut fire that raged in the San Bernardino Mountains in August.

When we go out to hike in the Sierra Nevada mountains or the Santa Monica mountains, I worry that we will see very different wildlands by the end of this century, MacDonald said in his statement.

Contact the writer: sscauzillo@scng.com or @stevscaz on Twitter
Thursdays Mexican Independence Day festivities at Cal State San Bernardino included live music; cultural performances; the historic Cry for Freedom, El Grito; and a special honor for college President Tomas D. Morales. A statement from the college said Morales received the Ohtli Award, Mexicos highest honor presented to a civilian outside the country, for his work on behalf of Mexican nationals in the Inland area.
A loophole in immigration law has allowed more than 22,000 undocumented immigrants to receive permission to leave the United States and return legally, making some of them eligible for permanent legal residency.

Using a provision of the law known as advance parole, 3,000 of them have been able to adjust their immigration status, but its not clear how many became permanent legal residents through advance parole or qualified through other criteria.

The Homeland Security Departments office of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services said it could not determine how many of the 2,994 became legal residents through advance parole without separately reviewing each case, said Leon Rodriguez, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services director in a June 2016 letter addressed to Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa.

Undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. for a number of years are not allowed to return if they left the country. But using advance parole, immigrants who have been allowed to stay in the United States through President Barack Obamas DACA program  Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals  have been able to travel outside the U.S. and then return.

Advance parole for DACA recipients is granted for humanitarian, educational, or employment reasons. And when those using it come back, they have legally entered the country, allowing some to apply for legal U.S. residency. Five years later, or three, if they are married to a U.S. citizen, they can apply for citizenship.

Advance parole is not new. Its been used to authorize travel for recipients of temporary protected status, which can be granted to people whose countries are experiencing conditions that make it dangerous for them to be there, such as an armed conflict or environmental disaster. However, DACA opened up opportunities for other young immigrants to use advance parole.

Immigrant rights advocates are encouraging those under DACA to use advance parole, but those who oppose illegal immigration have urged the government to close the loophole.

Emilio Amaya, executive director of San Bernardino Community Service Center, a nonprofit organization that provides immigration services to Riverside and San Bernardino county residents, said advance parole, for those who qualify, takes care of their whole immigration process.

Theres a lack of knowledge in the community on the fact that this process even exists, Amaya said.

Some federal lawmakers have called it an attempt by the Obama administration to circumvent U.S. immigration law.

Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, sent a letter in February 2015 asking the Department of Homeland Security to direct the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services to stop accepting applications for advance parole from DACA recipients.

He particularly took offense with Obamas comment that DACA is not a path to citizenship because he said advance parole helps those here illegally adjust their immigration status.

LIFE CHANGING OPPORTUNITY

Italia Garcia, 26, of Riverside, was largely unaware about advance parole when she was first granted DACA in 2013. Now, after traveling to Mexico for work purposes, she has returned legally to the United States.

Entering legally, makes her eligible to be sponsored for permanent residency by an immediate relative who is a U.S. citizen.

She also recently took advantage of a Supreme Court ruling permitting same-sex marriage. Now, Garcia is planning on having her wife, Denisse Lopez, sponsor her for permanent residency.

Garcia, though, recognized the risks of using advance parole.

Its a fairly new process through DACA, and theres a possibility of being denied re-entry into the U.S. if someone comes back after their scheduled return date.

But she couldnt pass up the opportunity to apply earlier this year in February, when Pope Francis wrapped up his trip to Mexico by stopping at the border town of Ciudad Juarez.

As then-regional coordinator for Mi Familia Vota, an immigrant advocacy organization in Riverside, Garcia was tasked to represent the organization during the popes visit in Juarez.

She filled out an application for travel document, three weeks before the trip, with the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, and received her letter of approval the day before she was to leave. She bought her plane ticket, and was in and out of the country in three days.

There was a lot of fear on whether I would be able to return (but) it was worth the risk, said Garcia, a native of Mexico City, who came here with her family as a 10-year-old. Its a life-changing opportunity because it meant I would be able to adjust my status to become a legal permanent resident.

I have to take it, she said.

Just a few years ago Garcia wouldnt have had this opportunity.

In 2012, Obama enacted DACA through an executive order. It allows people who arrived in the United States before age 16, and who meet certain other criteria, to defer deportation. They can get work permits, continue their education, and apply for advance parole.

And, in 2013, when the United States Supreme Court declared the Defense of Marriage Act was unconstitutional and that legally married same-sex couples were entitled to federal benefits, it opened up the eligibility for Garcias wife to sponsor her for legal residency.

Its an unbelievable experience that Im going through right now, said Garcia.

Garcia has been active in the undocumented student rights movement. She rallied for the California Dream Act, which passed in 2011, and gives undocumented students access to state college aid. When DACA was enacted, she helped organize workshops to provide free services for applicants.

This week, she planned to submit her paperwork to adjust her status.

And now, she has plans of buying a house, and maybe adopting a child in the future.

Garcia said four years ago, she still had goals and aspirations, But they were really dreams  Now, they can actually become a reality.

ANOTHER LIE

Critics are calling for the government to shut down the advance-parole program for DACA recipients.

This is another lie the president has told the American people about what DACA is all about, said Ira Mehlman, a spokesman with the Federation for American Immigration Reform, a Washington, D.C.-based group that advocates better border security and stopping illegal immigration.

Mehlman said the Obama administration is abusing advance parole by allowing undocumented immigrants to circumvent provisions in the law that would normally bar their admission back into the U.S.

Generally, immigrants who have been in the U.S. illegally for years, cannot simply return to the country if they leave. For example, a person who has lived illegally in the U.S. for more than a year is banned from returning for 10 years.

However, these re-entry bars do not apply to a person traveling with advance parole.

This program should be shut down and Congress should exercise its oversight authority to make sure its not being further abused, Mehlman added.

In a March 2016 letter to the Department of Homeland Security, Grassley said the Obama administration is abusing its immigration parole authority.

He noted that the federal government requires that advance parole be granted only for urgent humanitarian reasons or in cases of significant public benefit, and criticized the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services for extending advance parole to DACA recipients.

METHOD CAN BE EASY

Hadley Bajramovic, the designated immigration attorney for the San Bernardino Mexican Consulate, said her office has so far assisted nine DACA recipients adjust their immigration status through advance parole.

And shes currently helping ten others.

Many have doubts and fear that if they leave the country, even with advance parole, they could be denied entry, Bajramovic said. We have seen enough cases and we know  that this is not the intent of the U.S. government.

For those who are eligible, adjusting their status through advance parole is not difficult, barring criminal and other immigration problems, Bajramovic said.

Amaya, with San Bernardino Community Service Center, said his organization hosts advance parole forums to educate the community about this little-known provision.

But, he remains wary of a backlash.

He urges people to be honest when filing advance parole requests, warning them not to lie about having a family emergency back home, to get permission to travel and re-enter in order to be able to apply for legal residency.

If that happens, its going to be used by anti-immigrant groups to try to get the government to place additional restrictions to get rid of advance parole, he said.

Contact the writer: amolina@scng.com, 951-368-9462, or on Twitter @alemolina
The Air Force Village West Foundation was created by residents for residents of Altavita, a Riverside retirement community. Raising and distributing the funds has brought residents together for a common purpose and enhanced their golden years with facility improvements, programs and services.

Previously known as Air Force Village West, Altavita sits on 221 acres across I-215 from March Air Reserve Base. It serves people 60 and older regardless of military affiliation.

The nonprofit community has a well-managed and generous budget, but residents felt there was a need to obtain services and activities not provided by the normal funding. The foundation was formed in 2005 by a board of residents that was committed to the cause.

We started with nothing and no conception of what the community might be able to provide, but they have been outstanding over the years, said Don Curtis, past board president, financial consultant and World War II veteran. Residents selected what they would want to improve and augment their lives in the village, and they did it with their own contributions.

Today, AFVW Foundation programs and projects still are developed to support causes proposed by and important to Altavita residents. Any resident can apply for funds or suggest how funds are used.

And all that money is returned to the residents in a way that they feel helps them. It has helped build a sense of community, Curtis said.

Many of the improvements enhance living conditions, such as the installation of automatic doors, which provide easier access for entry and exit for residents; electronics upgrades; and grounds improvements. There are cultural enhancements as well. Curtis spoke proudly of a series of classical music concerts featuring professional musicians that the foundation is able to fund four times a year for residents.

Funds for the AFVW Foundation are provided mainly through tax-free donations from Altavita residents, families and friends. Also, the foundation raises money through resident estate sales, of which 20 percent goes directly into the AFVW Foundation endowment fund at The Community Foundation.

The fund was created in 2010 for broad charitable purposes at Altavita and is also used to help residents who need financial assistance to afford living expenses at Altavita. According to Curtis, it is not uncommon for a resident who has lost a spouse to struggle with the cost of living.

Although fundraising is resident-driven, others in the Inland Empire can support the efforts of the AFVW Foundation by attending estate sales at the community and buying items.

Information: 951-697-2000 or livealtavita.org

The Community Foundations mission

is to strengthen Inland Southern

California through philanthropy.

Contact the writer: community@pressenterprise.com
Swiss firms have been criticised in a report for their links to the African trade in diesel with toxin levels that are illegal in Europe. Campaign group Public Eye says retailers are exploiting weak regulatory standards. Vitol, Trafigura, Addax & Oryx and Lynx Energy have been named because they are shareholders of the fuel retailers.



Trafigura and Vitol say the report is misconceived and retailers work within legal limits enforced in the countries. Three of the distribution companies mentioned in the report have responded by saying that they meet the regulatory requirements of the market and have no vested interest in keeping sulphur levels higher than they need to be.



Although this is within the limits set by national governments, the sulphur contained in the fumes from the diesel fuel could increase respiratory illnesses like asthma and bronchitis in affected countries, health experts say.

Source: BBC









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

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The wife of the Vice President, Mrs Matilda Amissah-Arthur has urged Ghanaians to be inspired by the life and contributions of Rev. Father Campbell to humanity.



She made this statement when she joined Rev. Father Andrew Campbell to inaugurate and open a 30-bed ward and a theatre facility for the St. Andrews clinic to serve Kordiabe and adjoining communities.



Mrs. Amissah-Arthur used the occasion to present some medical items and equipment to the St. Andrews Clinic.



Dalex Finance also presented a cheque of 50,000 Ghc to support the church. Some individuals and organizations also made donations to the clinic.



Father Campbell and Mrs. Amissah-Arthur used the occasion to call on philanthropists to come in and support the worthy cause for better health care delivery for the St. Andrews Clinic in Kordibe.



The St. Andrews Clinic was established 13 years ago by the Catholic Church to provide quality health care to the people of Kordiabe and neighboring communities.



As the years went by and the population increased, the Catholic Church realized the need to expand the facility to meet the growing demand.



So in March 2015 when the Christ the King Catholic Church celebrated its 65th Anniversary, the Parish priest Rev. Father Andrews Campbell, inspired the church to put up a modern health facility to support the clinic. The facility consists of a 30-bed ward and a theatre.



On his part Father Campbell a celebrated philanthropist in Ghana was grateful to individuals and organizations who contributed in diverse ways to make the project a reality.









Brief History on Father Campbell



Father Campbell, an executive member of the Leprosy Aid Committee formed some years ago, was born in Dublin, Ireland, on 27 March, 1946 and attended kindergarten at the Sisters of Charity School and de la Salle Primary School, both in Dublin.



He studied philosophy and theology and through hard work and dedication, obtained his bachelor of Divinity degree from St. Patricks College in the United Kingdom in October 1970 and December 1970, he was ordained into the Catholic Priesthood.



Father Campbell arrived in Ghana in October 1971 as a Missionary Priest in the Society of the Divine Word and has worked in several parishes  Osu, Holy Spirit Cathedral, Sacred Heart, all in Accra.



In 1978, he opened the sacred Heart Paris Middle School in Accra and two years later, founded and opened the Sacred Heart Vocational Institute for poor and needy students in Accra Central.



His work is also serving the ageing, as he is a founding member of Help Age Ghana, an NGO that cares for old people, Pricess Marie Hospital Known As Childrens Hospital and other philanthropist organizations for the needy.



Father Campbell has worked tirelessly, through the Lepers Aid Committee to bring happiness to lepers. Every year, he holds an awards night where individuals and organizations that have helped the committee are honored.

Source: Maxwell Okamafo Addo/ email: [email protected]









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The Ghana Police Service has issued an alert cautioning the general public to be wary of the latest scam being perpetrated by criminals in the country.



A statement released by the Police Administration and signed by the Public Affairs Director of the Ghana police Service, Supt. Cephas Arthur said scammers now operate under the guise of the Police to hoodwink and dupe unsuspecting members of the public.



Explaining the modus operandi of such criminals, the statement said: Victims receive unexpected calls indicating that some supposed relations of theirs have hit a rear of Police vehicles and that the occupant Police officer[s] is /are demanding money instantly through a given mobile money transfer line to drop the matter, the failure of which they threaten to process the suspect for court.



But the statement has advised the public to refrain from paying monies to unknown persons through such dubious means in an attempt to save ones relation in that manner.

Source: kasapafmonline









Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority.

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The European Union is in a critical situation, the German chancellor has said, as leaders meet in Slovakia to discuss ways to regain trust after the UKs vote to leave the bloc. Angela Merkel said they needed to show they could improve on security, defence co-operation and the economy.

But EU countries are deeply divided over how to bolster growth and respond to the influx of migrants. Meeting in Bratislava without the UK, they will not discuss Brexit talks. We need solutions for Europe and we are in a critical situation, Mrs Merkel said as she arrived at the gathering. You cant solve all Europes problems in one summit.

What we have to do is show in our deeds we can do things better in the realms of security and fighting terrorism, and in the field of defence. Brutally honest Even though Britains referendum result is not on the agenda, and British Prime Minister Theresa May is not attending the summit, there is little doubt that Brexit will overshadow the meeting. French President Francois Hollande said: Either we move in the direction of disintegration, of dilution, or we work together to inject new momentum, we relaunch the European project. Heavy on symbolism, light on results: By Katya Adler, BBC Europe editor Donald Tusk is hoping for a public show of unity among the 27 nations of the EU following Britains vote to leave in June. Mr Tusk wants to restore EU stability and credibility with the bloc in the face of a migrant crisis and issues with the euro currency. But European leaders are divided, their voters sceptical. Central and Eastern Europe want powers back from Brussels. Northern nations view the south as a eurozone liability. Mediterranean countries balk at German austerity edicts.

So on Friday they will stick to subjects they agree on and those they feel are relevant to voters concerns: migration, security and globalisation. The hard stuff, such as a future trade deal with Britain and how to save the single currency, will be left for another day. Katya Adler: The EUs Bratislava blues Earlier, Donald Tusk, the European Council President, called on EU leaders to assure citizens they had learned lessons from Brexit and were able to bring back stability and a sense of security. He urged them to take a sober and brutally honest look at the blocs problems.

The EU response to the influx of migrants is one of the most contentious points among members. The summit host, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, is one of a group of central and eastern European leaders who object to the EU quota system which distributes 160,000 refugees across the EU. The scheme, for refugees from Iraq, Syria and Eritrea, is aimed at easing the burden on Italy and Greece.

Mr Fico has said Slovakia will not accept one single Muslim migrant and has mounted a legal challenge to the scheme. On Tuesday, Luxembourgs Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn called for Hungary to be suspended or even expelled from the EU because of its massive violation of fundamental values, specifically the governments treatment of refugees.

For France, the priority is border security in the wake of a number of Islamic extremist attacks in the country. France and Germany have outlined plans to deepen European military co-operation, which were reinforced in the State of the Union address by European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker on Wednesday, in which he called for a European military headquarters. The UKs departure from the EU removes one of the biggest obstacles to stronger EU defence in tandem with Nato. The one-day Bratislava meeting is set to be the first in a number of confidence-building meetings where a roadmap should be set up to culminate in a summit in March in the Italian capital Rome, when the 60th anniversary of the EUs founding Treaty of Rome will be celebrated. 

Source: BBC









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Sons and their mothers, are said to be the best of friends, but the story appears different in the home of ex-President Jerry John Rawlings, where former First Lady, Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings, has been deserted by her only son, Kimathi Rawlings, as the political campaign gradually heats up.



Nana Konadu, is the Presidential Candidate of the National Democratic Party (NDP), her son, has joined his father, who is the founder of the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC), as well as his eldest sister; Zenator Rawlings, who is vying for the Klottey Korle Parliamentary seat on the ticket of the NDC.



A picture sighted by The Herald, shows the only son of the Rawlingses; proudly wearing a green NDC t-shirt with portrait pictures of both Dr. Zenator Rawlings, and the President, John Dramani Mahama, boldly engraved in it.



The picture confirms claim from The Heralds insiders in the Rawlings household that, the four children of Mr. and Mrs. Rawlings, are equally divided along parental lines.



While, Zenator and Kimathi, are umbilically tied to their father, the middle ones; Yaa Asantewaa and Amina, are tied to the aprons of their powerful mother.



But insiders tell The Herald that, while Yaa Asantewaa is a carbon copy of her mother in form, shape and character, Amina Rawlings, is mentioned to be at the mercy of the wind; easily swayed by whose voice is louder at a particular time  it is mostly Nana Konadus voice, which vibrates in her ears and that is what she often times obey.



Meanwhile, Kimathis picture which is making the rounds on many social media platforms, especially Facebook and WhatsApp, has two other NDC supporters, posing for the cameras with him wearing Zenator-Mahama t-shirt.



The 37-year old and mother of three  Zenator  became the NDC parliamentary candidate under controversial circumstances, which culminated in the incumbent MP, Nii Armah Ashitey, sending her and the party to court over the nationwide NDC Constituency primaries in November 2015.



Mr. Rawlings, founded the governing NDC and was president for 8 years, after his 11 years of uninterrupted military rule.



His wife, Konadu Agyeman Rawlings, in an attempt to equalize her husbands feat, hurriedly formed the NDP in 2012, to contest that national elections after she was resoundingly defeated at Sunyani by the late president, John Evans Atta Mills at the NDC Presidential Primary.



Though, Mrs. Rawlings, was unsuccessful in that election, because her NDP, was unable to meet the requirement of the Electoral Commission (EC), then headed by Dr. Kwadwo Afari Gyan, she is making frantic effort to be counted on the ballot paper in this years elections.



Months ago, the NDP, held it national congress in Accra and was briefly attended by Mr. Rawlings and his two other children, Yaa Asantewa and Amina.



Kimathi, who this paper cannot independently say, was in the country then, was never seen at that congress held at the Ghana International Trade Fair Centre (GITFC).



Similarly, few weeks ago, when the NDC, also held it national campaign launch in the Central regional capital; Cape Coast, it was attended by Mr. Rawlings and daughter, Zenator, the young man was not spotted there either.



But in recent times, Kimathi, has been seen at the Klottey Korle Constituency, supporting his senior most sister to become a legislator and also for President Mahama, to win a second term in office.





Source: The Herald









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The suspended General Secretary of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), Kwabena Agyei Agyepong has extended his felicitations to Muslims in the country and around the world, especially, those in the elephant family as they celebrate Eid al-Adha.



Agyepong together with his wife, Lawrencia in a statement issued on Monday which has gone viral on social media platforms reminded the country about the significance of Eid al-Adha and urged that the occasion must reawaken our sense of sacrifice, selflessness and service to our families, nation and mankind.



As we approach this crucial period leading to the 2016 General Election may Almighty Allah out of his abundant Grace continue to guide and hold us together, he stated.



Eid al-Adha (Id ul-Adha) is a four-day Islamic festival starting on the 10th day of the month of Dhul Hijja (Thou al-Hijja) to commemorate the willingness of Ibrahim (Abraham) to sacrifice his son.



The occasion is also called the Sacrifice Feast or Bakr-Eid and is the second of two Muslim holidays celebrated worldwide each year. It considered the holier of the two.

Source: kasapafmonline









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The Northern Regional Campaign Team of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) has declared an Operation Win All Seats in the Northern Region.



To achieve this feat, the team is calling for a united front and a coordinated effort to canvass for massive votes to ensure a resounding victory for the party.



The team also revealed it will win 60 per cent of the total votes in the Region for President John Dramani Mahama. The Northern Region has 31 parliamentary seats. The NDC currently occupies 20 seats while the New Patriotic Party (NPP) occupies nine seats.



The Convention Peoples Party (CPP) occupies one seat and there is one independent candidate.



NDC on Wednesday indicated that it will recapture all the lost seats. The Northern Regional Campaign Coordinator, Alhaji Limuna Muniru, blamed the loss of some seven seats that hitherto belonged to the National Democratic Congress to disunity, lack of coordination and inadequate resources.



He has therefore charged team members and supporters to desist from allowing themselves to be manipulated by the falsehood from the NPP and win back the seven seats with an additional four that have been for the largest opposition party.



By our actions, we relinquished seven seats to the New Patriotic Party in 2012 with some internal wrangling but we are more united now and we will take back those seats in 2016, he said. There have been some reconciliation and each member now is more involved than before.



Speaking at the inauguration of the Constituency Campaign Task Force Team by the Regional Campaign Team in Tamale, Alhaji Mohammed Muniru indicated that he is no failure and his task as the campaign coordinator will not witness any failure.



I have never failed in life and I am going to deliver all thirty-one seats in the region to the National Democratic Congress and ensure sixty per cent for John Dramani Mahama, Alhaji Limuna Muniru added.



The NPP has declared winning twenty-five seats in the Northern Region. But the NDC has cautioned its arch-rivals it is aware of disunity being the cause of those seats slipping from their hands and will not negotiate with the NPP on those seats.



We have realized our mistakes, worked to resolve it and we are coming back stronger than before so the New Patriotic Party should rethink on their targeted twenty seats.



The National Campaign Coordinator, Kofi Adams, who was present at the inauguration, urged parliamentary candidates and party executives to have sober reflections and devise means to win back the lost seats.



Mr Adams cautioned the team to guard against the skirt-and-blouse voting pattern which he says can hinder passage of bills in parliament in the future and stated the New Patriotic Party is never an alternative government for Ghana.



Winning more parliamentary seats will ensure a smooth passage of bills by the president in future and implementing policies will not face challenges since he has the bigger representation.



The Parliamentary Candidate for the Walewale Constituency and the Northern Regional Minister, Abdulah Abubakar, encouraged team members to be strategic in communicating to electorates by showing them the differences between the NDC and the NPP which he says when the NDC is strategizing on how to move Ghana forward, the NPP is busily organizing demonstrations and press conference to channel falsehood to electorates.



He added that their opponents are sleeping and the NDC cannot afford to join in the slumber. He therefore called on members swear to deliver the eleven seats currently occupied by the NPP to the NDC in 2016 elections. The campaign team will not assume the role of the regional campaign team but to complement the efforts of the executives towards achieving one goal.

Source: 3news.com









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Vice President Kwesi Amissah- Arthur, this afternoon made a whistle stop at the Yamoransa Junction in the Abura Asabu Kwamankese District of the Central Region.



The Vice President Kwesi Amissah-Arthur, who was on his way to inaugurate the University of Cape Coast Language Laboratory, said The whistle stop was to afford him the opportunity to interact with the traders there and also share ideas with them.



His motive is to see the way forward for their industry and also know their concerns in the area.









Interacting with some of the Fante Kenkey sellers, he revealed to them that he is also a consumer of their Kenkey and could testify that it tastes good.



He took the opportunity to buy some balls of Fante Kenkey and promised that he would be communicating with them from time to time.



The Yamoransa junction is well-known for the selling of one of the best Fante kenkeys in Ghana. The kenkey is mostly purchased by travelers along the Trans ECOWAS Trade Route.

Source: Maxwell Okamafo Addo/ email: [email protected]









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President John Mahama has endorsed the candidature of Obuobia Darko-Opoku as the National Democratic Congress parliamentary aspirant for the Weija-Gbawe constituency.



Mahama described the philanthropist as industrious and the best person who can spearhead development in the constituency as well as champion their interest in the House.



The former broadcaster has been conspicuous on the ground with developmental projects and donations through her Obuobia Foundation ever since she launched her bid for the second time to stand on the ticket of the governing party.



Last month, she donated an ambulance to the Ga South Municipal Hospital, after giving the same health facility a water storage system to aid in child delivery as well as the construction of bridges, boreholes and connecting some communities in the constituency to the national water pipelines among others.



Introducing Obuobia, who is the deputy Executive Secretary of the Ghana Freezones Board to a teeming crowd of NDC supporters at Mallam Junction, Mahama said he has been impressed with her dedication and passion to help humanity and has no doubt she will be a fine lawmaker.



Mahama, who is seeking a second term in office come the December 7 elections, opined he is convinced the electorate in Weija-Gbawe will vote massively for the NDC judging from how Obuobia has proven herself.



I believe that with what we have done, we deserve a second term. We are taking the Weija-Gbawe constituency, the president said about the ever-smiling MP-aspirant.



Your parliamentary candidate has done a lot to win your votes. Look at the developmental projects she is fronting. What she has done are more than enough. I have no doubt she will over perform when she becomes an MP. Lets give her our support because shell do things double, double. I have no doubt this year Weija-Gbawe will fall to the NDC party.



Who wouldnt be proud to have this beautiful woman as his MP? When you vote on December 7 for me, make sure you cast your ballot for Obuobia Darko-Opoku, Mahama appealed.



Obuobia took to Facebook to express her gratitude to Mahama for gracing her campaign launch during his Greater Accra regional tour.



"I'm indeed grateful to him for making the Weija-Gbawe constituency a port of call on his campaign tour of the Greater Accra Region. I promise to live up to this trust in me to represent the NDC in my constituency," she wrote.

Source: King Edward Ambrose Washman Addo/Peacefmonline.com/ Twitter: @Washman5/ Instagram: Washman007









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Ghanas first president - Dr Kwame Nkrumah is said to be the greatest politician to have walked the soil of Ghana. His achievements include leading Ghana to Independence and steering the early wheel of a tremendous nationwide development.



Despite Nkrumahs unique position on the Ghanaian political landscape as a hero, Jamestown Mantse, Obrempong Nii Kojo Ababio has said President John Dramani Mahama is a greater than him.



The 92-year-old chief is reported as having said: Dr Kwame Nkrumah was my contemporary. I saw what he did for Ghana. I am tempted to say you have surpassed Nkrumah. My son, I admire greatly what you are doing in infrastructure. As you can see I am flipping through the pages of the green book. Dont worry, it is well with you, he added.



Obrempong Nii Kojo Ababio made the above comment when President Mahama visited him as part of his Greater Accra Region tour.

Source: ghanacelebrities.com









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Music producer and Hitz 103.9 FMs manager, Mark Okraku Mantey, on Kwaku Sintim Misahs show The KSM Show last Friday on Metro TV has mentioned that Sarkodie tops all hiplife artistes at present.



When asked to list his top artistes in Ghana, he chose Kwabena Kwabena, Bisa K Dei, Ebo Taylor and Amakye Dede. Commercially, I think Sarkodie is the top artiste when it comes to hip life and hip hop, high life will be Kwabena Kwabena and Bisa K Dei when it comes to releases but on stage Kwabena Kwabena is untouchable. When it comes to timeless songs, Amakye Dede still competes with the young ones as if he is still young and to those who dont live here in Ghana and are still surviving and making it like the young people, is Ebo Taylor, he told KSM.



Speaking about the artistes he has worked with, he mentioned: Oheneba Kissi, Nana Tuffour, George Jahraa, Lord Kenya, Daasebre Gyamenah, Slim Busterr, Nana Yaw Asare, Rev. Mensah Bonsu, Kumi Guitar, OD4, Ewura Esi and more.



Some of the artistes that I worked with made the job easy but an artiste like Lord Kenya was the craziest artiste I ever worked with and I am not surprised God called him into gospel ministry. I wasnt surprised when he said he was on drugs, Mark said.



Organic music will come back and we will come back. I am not gone totally, I am still around. The organic ones dont get airplay because DJs are playing songs of their friends. Amakye Dede still plays shows because of the kind of songs he releases, he added.



Adducing as his reason for his hope in comeback of timeless music is the fact that Bisa K Dei could pick an old highlife rhythm, use it on Brother Brother to be accepted by all manner of people. He urged radio DJs to pay attention to quality and timeless songs and promote them too.

Source: Flexgh.com









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In a way, right-wing politicians from minor parties worldwide are doing it tough because of Donald Trump.

Its certainly easy to make comparisons between the likes of Pauline Hanson and the Republican nominee for President of the United States, but simple links between their oddball characters and blase xenophobic remarks betray the nuance that separates the American political landscape from our own.

With that being said, Hansons One Nation Party has certainly made it a little bit harder to deny those similarities, because theyve actually headhunted an economist from Trumps campaign to boost their fiscal expertise. Really. Its actually happened.

Speaking at a forum in Rockhampton, QLD, Senator Hansons chief of staff James Ashby revealed we have just hired  and theyve just landed in the country yesterday  one of the worlds leading economists we have just taken him from the Trump camp.



Ashby also said One Nations procurement of one of Trumps best people  whose identity hasnt yet been revealed, FYI  is pretty exciting.



We need to build credibility on the economic front, so thats why weve hired somebody with that credibility.

We dont claim to be economic masterminds ourselves, but a cursory glance at Trumps most recent economic plan somehow doesnt scream credibility to One Nations core constituency.

As it stands, he wants to reduce the U.S corporate tax rate from 35% to 15%  because trickle down economics will work any moment now, guys  and he wants to cut 7% from the top individual tax bracket, leaving untold millions firmly in the clutches of the 1%.

This economic roadmap, revealed yesterday, is the also the third hes released during his campaign; even though his campaign admits this tax-less, spend-more approach would cost US $4.4 trillion (!) over ten years in a volatile world economy, its somehow still the most conservative plan hes hatched to date.

And thats not even mentioning The Wall, or the costs of his on-again, off-again mass deportation program, none of which align with Hansons take that Australia is in the clutches of out of control debt.

So, uh, yeah Credibility. Right up there with ONP Senator Malcolm Roberts take on climate science, hey.





Source: ABC.

Photo: Australian Parliament House.
Weve partnered up with the innovative folk at Bank of Melbourne to celebrate their Everyday Banking account. They reckon everyday banking should be everyday easy, and this nifty lil account offers quick ways to manage your savings and daily expenses, with electronic banking and debit card options galore. Find out more HERE.

Last night, PEDESTRIAN.TV headed down to Melbournes iconic National Gallery of Victoria.

Why?

Apart from wanting to check out the vast array of international artworks on display  including an incredible, spherically mooshed-up Volkswagen Beetle  we came to have a squizz at the moats outside.

Might sound silly, but what went on inside those grand waterholes was magic  with the help of Bank of Melbourne, we flicked a digital coin into the pond and kablammo, 3D versions of the amphibious creatures features in the gallerys historic Asian Artworks came to life:

Despite that fact that it was as cold as Satans heart outside, a tonne of Melburnians came out of hibernation to check out the spectacle.

You can check it out every night, 6:30pm  11:00pm, September 16  17, at the National Gallery of Victoria, 180 St Kilda Rd, Melbourne VIC 3006.
Pete Buttigieg visits Charlevoix to support Democratic candidates

In a show of support for the local slate of Democratic candidates, Pete Buttigieg made an appearance at the Charlevoix Public Library on Saturday.


U.S. the major hurdle for OPEC oil output freeze

LONDON

Petroleumworld.com 09 16 2016

The price of oil has been caught in one of its most volatile couple of weeks in months after OPEC and rival Russia hinted they may discuss a possible output freeze, as demand slows and a global surplus becomes more entrenched.

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and Russia meet on the sidelines of the International Energy Forum in Algiers in two weeks' time. The pressure is mounting on both sides to not only freeze output, but possibly even cut it.

Whatever the rival factions decide, one producer has managed to top them all in terms of production growth over the last five years and will never be likely to join in any group efforts to control supply. And that is the United States.

Since 2010, thanks to the boom in shale oil production, the United States has witnessed more growth in daily output than any other major producer.

U.S. oil output is around 2.87 million barrels per day higher now than it was six years ago, compared with an increase of 2.47 million bpd from Saudi Arabia and a rise of 1.9 million bpd from Iraq.

In fact, the increase in U.S. production is only just above the collective increase for the whole of OPEC, which comes in at around 3.15 million bpd.

"If OPEC were to cut its production in Algiers, or really freeze its production, then prices would rise, and what producer would benefit the most rapidly from those high prices? It would be the U.S.. We would be back soon enough in a situation where the U.S. will move toward its previous boom-rate of growth and therefore start absorbing market share again," Wood Mackenzie analyst Ann-Louise Hittle said.

"It's another reason why it's difficult for OPEC to agree to a freeze" she said. "The U.S., especially now that it can export crude, is a global threat to market share, it's not just a threat indirectly through product exports any more."

In November 2014, OPEC ditched its policy of restraining supply to support the price of oil, which has fallen by more than 40 percent since then to around $46 a barrel LCOc1.

Increases in the likes of Saudi Arabia or Iraq have been countered by losses in Libya and Nigeria or Venezuela, while Iran is just about approaching output levels registered prior to the introduction of Western sanctions in response to Tehran's nuclear program that were lifted in January 2016.

Russia, the world's largest producer, has managed to add around 550,000 bpd to its daily output in this time and although Energy Minister Alexander Novak has said a freeze would "help markets", enforcing such a limit could prove tricky.

"The structure of the U.S. oil industry and the high number of players involved in U.S. crude production would simply not allow for a freeze," JBC Energy senior analyst Alexander Poegl said.

"How would you limit production growth, as there is no provision for the government to enforce this?" Poegl said. "This is the same argument Russia has used in the past, to a certain extent, although in Russia, where you have a limited amount of players that are highly connected to politics, it is potentially still easier than in the U.S."








Amsterdam, the Netherlands  Royal Philips (NYSE: PHG, AEX: PHIA) today reported the transaction details related to the repurchases of its own common shares made in the period from September 9, 2016 up to and including September 15, 2016.

These repurchases were made under the EUR 1.5 billion share repurchase program for capital reduction purposes and the repurchase program to cover long term incentive and employee share purchase plans. Further details can be found in the table below and via this link.
Today's guest blogger is Thomas G. Lengel, head of school, Holy Child School at Rosemont. Holy Child School at Rosemont is an independent, coeducational, Catholic school, early childhood through 8th grade that is accredited by the Pennsylvania Association of Independent Schools.

In a recent column, Katherine Dahlsgaard made a strong case that schools should drop all homework assignments. Her argument is based on several research studies which prove that homework does not equate to school success. She correctly notes from her experience as lead psychologist of The Anxiety Behaviors Clinic at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia that homework often leads to added stress and anxiety among children and their families.

Respectfully however, I think she paints this issue with too broad a stroke. This debate, which is popping up around the country, is not and should not be framed as a binary choice between lots of homework that adds to sleep deprivation and student and family stress, or no homework at all. It seems to me that labeling any and all homework as ineffective or unproductive is akin to claiming that we should ban all planes when a single one crashes. Let's consider the "pilot error" involved when homework assignments become problematic and deal with that, rather than blaming system error and thus try to ground all the planes.

We did precisely that last year at Holy Child. We established a task force that reviewed current research about homework. We polled our parents and students about the homework students were assigned and how long it took them to complete, and we consulted with our teachers as well.

What we found is that the issue is more about the quality of an assignment (in our Middle School especially) and that if the quantity is managed carefully, then homework assignments can be effective and worthwhile.

A general rule of thumb we use is 10-15 minutes per grade level, meaning that first graders should be assigned 10-15 minutes of work, second graders 20-30, up to eighth graders doing about 1-2 hours of homework per night. That seems an age-appropriate quantity, not an onerous one.

As important is the quality of homework we ask students to do. If the assignments are busywork or are given without enough thought to their purpose, then almost any amount of homework is too much. But our first graders, for example, practice letter formation and spelling, along with basic addition. That reinforces the learning they do in the classroom and saves classroom time for introducing new concepts like place value or the silent "e." Middle school math homework serves as an assessment for the teachers; they can tell which concepts most of the class has mastered, and which need reinforcement.

As Rita Smith, our Director of Early Childhood explains, purposeful homework helps "make a connection between the home and school. Parents who work with their young children on homework can then build on their child's knowledge or practice something that they might be having trouble with. Story reading is homework for many young children. We ask the parents to read to the children and consequently children might begin to read simple things to their parents. This is invaluable as you go through kindergarten."

Ben Franklin famously advised that we should do "everything in moderation." That is great advice for educators to ponder as they assign homework this new school year!

Have a question for the Healthy Kids panel? Ask it here. Read more from the Healthy Kids blog 
Were you trying to get tickets to see Bruce Springsteen at his meet-and-greet at the Free Library of Philadelphia's Central Branch near the Benjamin Franklin Parkway Sept. 29?

Well, you're out of luck. Tickets, which went on sale at 10 a.m. Friday on the Free Library's website (through the events page), sold out in nine minutes, said library spokeswoman Sandy Horrocks.

Springsteen is holding a meet-and-greet with fans to promote his new memoir, Born to Run, at the Central Branch at noon Sept. 29 (the line will open at 10:30 a.m.). Tickets were $33 and include a pre-signed copy of the book, which will officially hit shelves Sept. 27.

Springsteen and his E Street Band just came off two shows last week at Citizens Bank Park (read Dan DeLuca's review of the first night), the first of which broke Springsteen's record for his longest show ever on U.S. soil, clocking in at about 4 hours and 4 minutes.

Numerous people had problems trying to get tickets online Friday. If you clicked on the Free Library's events link and got a message that read "Service Temporarily Unavailable!," you weren't the only one.

Horrocks admitted the libary's events website crashed Friday morning and the library system's phone lines were tied up because of people trying to get Springsteen tickets.

"We hoped it wouldn't," she said. "This was the first time this has happened."

The library knew there would be high demand, but didn't expect the website-crashing onslaught.

"We don't do rock concerts," said Horrocks. "I gather this happens with mega stars. The volume so quickly is not so normal for us. ... I don't think we knew it would sell out that quickly."

The library offered 1,200 tickets for Springsteen's meet-and-greet. Those people will get wristbands when they enter the library, at 1901 Vine St., and will then stand in line to meet Springsteen. The musician will not deliver a talk, though he is expected to shake hands with his fans.

"People can take a selfie with him," Horrocks said.

The library said Springsteen will not be signing any kind of memorabilia.



Even before the sell-out, a storm about the demand was brewing on social media.

Horrocks said Springsteen is expected to be on the first floor of the library, in the back room where government publications used to be housed.



"We're just delighted he chose the Free Library to come to in Philadelphia," said Horrocks. "It says a lot about him and literacy and reading. We've had some major personalities in the past."



The library will still be open to other patrons, but if you don't have a ticket and get a wristband, you won't be able to see Springsteen, Horrocks said.

Since Springsteen will be in a back room of the library, might fans be able to sneak a peek of him from Wood Street, behind the facility?

"I guess they could do that," Horrocks said. But, she said, there "will be extra security."
Amazon.com Inc.'s AMZN founder, chairman, chief executive and president, Jeff Bezos, has again hit the headlines. According to Forbes, he is now worth $65.8 billion, which makes him the third richest person in the world and the second richest in America.



What Drove Bezos Fortunes?



On Tuesday, Warren Buffett, CEO and Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (BRK.B) lost $1.3 billion as the fallout of Wells Fargo's fake account scandal. The bank has been fined a combined $190 million by the California and federal regulators as it was alleged of illegally opening millions of unauthorized accounts to meet their aggressive internal sales goals. As a result, the banks stock dropped 3% in the trading session.



The scandal dealt a huge blow to Buffett, who owns two million shares of Wells Fargo. Also, Berkshire Hathaway owns 10% of Wells Fargo, making up the bulk of Buffetts wealth. Moreover, Buffett has been donating generously recently, decreasing his net worth. Currently, Buffett has a net worth of $65.5 billion, which is down by $300 million from Bezos.



Secondly, an 8% rise in Amazons share price over the past week also earned Bezos the third place on the esteemed list. Its second annual Prime Day earlier this month aimed at boosting off-season sales and rake in more Prime members became the best sales day ever for the online retailer, leading to a solid surge in the share price.



The wealthiest person in the world continues to be Microsoft founder Bill Gates, with a net worth of $78 billion, followed by Zara founder, Amancio Ortega, who holds a net worth of $73.1.



Conclusion



While Buffett has been sitting atop the list of the richest in America for long, Bezos rise is more recent. Bezos entered the celebrated list in 1998 with a net worth of $1.6 billion, while Buffett found his way into it way back in 1982, with a net worth of $250 million.



Last May, Jeff Bezos was on the list of the worlds top 10 richest people, with a net worth of $40 billion.



Amazon continues to see revenue growth and generate robust cash flow quarter upon quarter (discounting seasonal variations). Investors continue to believe in Amazons prospects, especially its cloud computing business, Amazon Web Services and Amazon Prime, which have been increasingly adding subscribers.



But uncertainty regarding its investment plans and the probability of continuing losses still prevail.



So, it will be interesting to see whether Amazons continued success pushes Jeff Bezos further up the list of the worlds wealthiest.



Amazon currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

Story continues

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A MONTGOMERY County man convicted of breaking into a Hatfield Township apartment and raping a 6-year-old girl while she slept in her bed was sentenced Thursday to 24 to 70 years in prison.

In June, a Montgomery County Court jury found Oscar Herrera, 29, guilty of six of the seven charges against him - including rape and burglary.

"I know I made a mistake, and I need to pay for that," Herrera said before the sentencing, speaking through a translator. But, he said later, "I want to continue with my life because I have reason to live . . . my family, my son."

In a nearly 90-minute proceeding, during which the mother of Herrera's young son spoke of the man's "responsible" nature and his ability to be "a very good father," the parents of the victim sat in silence, her father wiping away tears.

Herrera's attorney, Brendan Campbell, argued to Judge Steven T. O'Neill that his client's behavior was akin to that of "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," describing him as a responsible father to his own child at times, while still capable of raping a 6-year-old girl. Saying Herrera, who entered the country illegally, was under the influence of alcohol that night, Campbell maintained that people who struggle with addiction often live dual lives.

During the June trial, prosecutors said the girl was "living her worst nightmare" on that November 2015 night when Herrera broke into her apartment and raped her as her 11-year-old brother slept in the bunk bed above her. The boy awoke to alert his parents, and Herrera was arrested that night.

At trial, Campbell did not dispute that his client had broken into the apartment and climbed into the girl's bed. But, he argued at the time, what was in dispute was "what transpired during that short time he was in bed with her."

O'Neill said he could not "fathom a more egregious crime" than Herrera's."You raped a child, you will be punished. In this life, and the next."

After the sentencing, Assistant District Attorney Stewart Ryan said the victim was doing "as well as one might hope."

He added that it was unclear what will happen with Herrera's immigration status. It's likely, however, Ryan said, that Herrera would serve his time here and deal with his immigration issues afterward.

cmccabe@philly.com

610-313-8113
By William James and Kate Holton LONDON (Reuters) - Britain gave the go-ahead for a $24 billion nuclear power plant on Thursday, ending weeks of uncertainty that had strained ties with China, which will help pay for it, and France, which will build it. Prime Minister Theresa May's government signalled it would take a more cautious approach in future over foreign investment in big infrastructure projects than her predecessor David Cameron. But ultimately, after stunning Paris and Beijing by putting the deal on hold in July after May took office, it agreed to go ahead with the Hinkley Point C project in southwest England. Britain's first new nuclear power plant in decades will be built by French state-controlled utility firm EDF, backed by $8 billion of Chinese cash. The deal is part of a recovery of the global nuclear power industry following a slump caused by the 2011 Fukushima disaster in Japan. The government drew fire for approving it without renegotiating the price British consumers will pay for electricity. The opposition Labour Party supports the project in principle but says its guarantee to pay a minimum of roughly double the current market price for electricity for 35 years is a rip-off. May's government said a new investment policy would give it greater control over future deals when foreign states are involved in "critical infrastructure", a departure from the more open approach pursued by Cameron. May inherited the deal from Cameron, who quit as prime minister after losing Britain's referendum to stay in the EU. In one of her first acts, she put the project on hold, hours before a contract was due to be signed, saying she needed time to assess it. "The government has decided to proceed with the first new nuclear power stations for a generation," business minister Greg Clark told parliament on Thursday, setting out changes to the deal and British policy on foreign infrastructure investment. "These changes mean that while the UK will remain one of the most open economies in the world, the public can be confident that foreign direct investment works always in the public interest," he said. Supporters of the project said Britain needed to protect its relations with major economies after voting to leave the European Union, and show it was open for business. The Chinese Foreign Ministry said it welcomed the decision while Britain's finance minister Philip Hammond said it continued the strategic partnership between the two countries. VERY HAPPY Under the new plan, the government will be able to block the sale of EDF's controlling stake before or after completion of the project - a proviso it said it would apply to significant stakes in all future nuclear projects. EDF said it had agreed with the government to retain control of the project and would sign the deal "in the coming days". China General Nuclear Power Corporation (CGN) - the project's Chinese state-backed investor - and business lobby groups also welcomed the decision on Hinkley. "We are very happy the British government has approved the project," CGN said in a statement. The two new reactors at Hinkley Point are scheduled to be running by the middle of next decade and provide around 7 percent of Britain's electricity, helping to fill a supply gap as the country's coal plants are set to close by 2025. Critics have focussed on the guaranteed price for electricity, which they say does not reflect falling energy prices since the deal was drawn up, or anticipated declines in the costs of rival clean technologies like wind and solar power. "It is extraordinary that they have not reviewed the price per unit of power," said Barry Gardiner, the opposition Labour Party's energy spokesman. The deal also affirmed the government's commitment to replace its old nuclear power stations. Nearly all of Britain's eight functioning nuclear plants will have to shut down by 2030. Environmental lobby groups, some opposition political parties, and a former board member at EDF said that was a mistake. "The decision to go ahead with Hinkley Point is a bad choice for both France and the UK," former EDF board member Gerard Magnin told Reuters. Magnin resigned from the board in protest at the company's nuclear strategy before a vote that narrowly approved the project. "By concentrating technical and financial means in this investment on both sides of the channel, the respective governments and EDF will deprive their citizens and small companies of the opportunities for jobs and innovation that would come from inventing the 21st-century energy world." INVESTMENT POLICY The decision to go ahead with Hinkley goes some way to respond to concern that May, a former interior minister, was less receptive to foreign investment, particularly from China which has plans to invest billions in British infrastructure. According to a former colleague, ex-business minister Vince Cable, May had expressed wariness at the "gung-ho" attitude that Cameron took towards courting Chinese investment. Addressing those concerns, the government said it would take a "special share" in future nuclear projects to ensure that significant stakes could not be sold without its consent. Simon Taylor, academic director of the Master of Finance Programme at Cambridge University, said he thought the policy was largely cosmetic. "The UK really needs investment in infrastructure. There are very few nuclear operators around the world. Most are already seeking to invest in the UK and so it's not clear who they would regard as unwelcome, beyond Russia," he said. CGN plans to make a number of investments in British nuclear power including the building and operating of a new station with EDF at Bradwell-on-Sea, southeast England. Bradwell would be a Chinese-led project, using Chinese reactor technology. The government also said it was introducing broader rules to increase scrutiny of the national security implications of foreign ownership and control of critical infrastructure, including the need for continuous government approval of foreign owners and a review of takeover rules. It did not specify what sort of projects would be included. A source close to CGN said it was not concerned by the new ownership rules and planned to move ahead with Bradwell project and another minority investment, in the development of a new power station at Sizewell, in eastern England. Horizon, a nuclear new build group in Britain owned by Japan's Hitachi's, said it too was "entirely comfortable" with the new approach. China's Xinhua news agency, which offers a reflection of official thinking, welcomed the decision albeit with a thinly-veiled criticism of the delay. "Let us hope that London quits its China-phobia and works with Beijing to ensure the project's smooth development," it said in an editorial published on Thursday. (Additional reporting by Kate Holton, Karolin Schaps, Ben Blanchard in Beijing, Geert De Clercq and Richard Lough in Paris; Writing by Elizabeth Piper and William James; Editing by Pravin Char and Peter Graff)
MONTREAL, QB--(Marketwired - September 16, 2016) - As food culture diversifies, making world cuisines more popular and accessible, people's tastes evolve as they continue to search for new flavors. Expert in fresh produce imports and founder of CDS Foods, Cesare Della Santina explains that culinary traditions help people connect to their national or ethnic group through similar food patterns to retain their cultural identity or build new connections in both formal and informal settings. In view of ever-growing demand for farm-planted crops in Canada, CDS Foods is pleased to announce the expansion of their business as they moved to a brand new warehouse located at the following address: 775 Boul. Lebeau, Montreal, QC, H4N 1S5 Canada.

The new facility offers a state-of-the-art refrigeration system and advanced storage capacity as well as more control and traceability on the products the company imports and sells. The new warehouse is fully compliant with Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI) standards and their Global G.A.P. requirements, ensuring confidence in the delivery of high quality food to consumers, while continuing to improve food safety throughout the company's supply chain. Responding to the undersupply of garlic and onion production in Canada in the late 1990-s, Cesare Della Santina initially started as broker of three main produces -- garlic, shallot, and ginger. Imported garlic and shallot products are of a greater demand in the country since their domestically planted alternatives are higher in price and more difficult to grow, mainly due to climate threats and fluctuating weather, as these crops are sensitive to moisture and cold. CDS Foods currently imports from regions that have no shortage in supply, including China, Spain, USA, Mexico, Argentina, and is now focusing on new origins, with India, Peru, and Chili at the forefront of agricultural production upsurge. For comparison, 68 percent of Canada's garlic is imported from China.

Story continues

Recent decades have seen a steady increase in popularity of garlic and shallot, among other fresh vegetables of the onion genus, as well as ginger produce both for their culinary consumption and medicinal purposes. Health benefits of garlics are mainly attributed to its antibiotic and antioxidant effects, while also proved effective in the reduction of cholesterol and blood pressure levels. Ginger is widely used for improved digestion and absorption of food, along with its antiseptic properties. Today, the company's assortment of products has grown considerably, as have their geographic origins, growers, and partners. Having started with just three signature products, the company's product range has expanded to include pomelo, dragon fruit, Asian pears, peeled garlic, taro, and City Snacks, amongst others.

Cesare Della Santina launched his career in the food industry from humble beginnings in the late 80's. He has developed an unmatched professional expertise in the produce business through years of work with retail stores, customer service and wholesale, with passion for delivering naturally grown and farm-planted fruits and vegetables. With inception of his own company in 2000, he rapidly expanded its client base and a variety of agricultural goods, successfully shaping the firm as an importer with a full line of specialty products. Rebranded in 2013, CDS Foods continues to serve their customers with excellence, offering top quality products at an utmost competitive price.

Cesare Della Santina -- Produce Importer and Executive: http://cesaredellasantinanews.com

Cesare Della Santina -- Supports Charities at Sami Fruits Foundation Gala: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/cesare-della-santina----supports-charities-at-sami-fruits-foundation-gala-2016-08-10

Cesare Della Santina -- Attends Benefit for Charles-Bruneau Cancer Centre Foundation: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/cesare-della-santina-attends-benefit-031352722.html

Image Available: http://www.marketwire.com/library/MwGo/2016/9/16/11G114482/Images/Cesare_Della_Santina_-_Leads_the_Expansion_of_CDS_-f5b68932b8d4b77693b143fa7a94cb05.jpg


Unilateral sanctions will not help resolve issues on the Korean Peninsula, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told his Japanese counterpart over the phone in the aftermath of a fresh round of nuclear testing in North Korea last week.

The call also came after the U.S. State Department's special representative for North Korea met Japanese officials on Sunday and said the U.S. may launch unilateral sanctions against the reclusive state.

China is North Korea's most important ally and has come under intense criticism for not doing enough to curb Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions.

In the call on Wednesday, Wang said China opposed "unhelpful" unilateral sanctions on North Korea even as he reiterated China's opposition to Pyongyang's nuclear testing. The East Asian giant was willing to work with other permanent members of United Nations Security Council to formulate a "necessarily response" to new developments on the Korean Peninsula, he added.

He told his counterpart Fumio Kishida that efforts for talks should not be forsaken under any circumstances and that the current situation warranted an even more urgent need for dialogue.

The content of the call was released by the Chinese foreign affairs minister on its website late Wednesday.

China has expressed anger with North Korea for conducting its fifth and largest nuclear test last week but has not said if it would commit to further sanctions on its neighbor. Earlier this week, a Chinese foreign affairs spokesperson also said that sanctions were not the only answer to managing the delicate situation on the Korean Peninsula.



Japan 's foreign affairs ministry also released a statement on its website regarding the call.

In the call, Kishida said Pyongyang's nuclear test was unacceptable and a direct and serious threat to Japan's security. He also sought a constructive response from China, which is a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council.

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During a press conference in North Carolina, Hillary Clinton defended Flint African-American pastor Faith Green Timmons after she was attacked by GOP nominee Donald Trump.

Video:

Clinton on Flint pastor: Donald Trump "called her a nervous mess. That's not only insulting, it's dead wrong." https://t.co/t293KLFTz0  CNN (@CNN) September 15, 2016

Clinton said, His latest target is a pastor in Flint, Michigan who respectfully asked him not to use her pulpit for political attacks. He called her a nervous mess. Thats not only insulting. Its dead wrong. Reverend Faith Green Timmons is not a nervous mess; she is a rock for her community in trying times. She deserves better than that. And Flint deserves better. In fact, so does America. So Im going to keep working as hard as I can to lift up our country, not tear it apart.

The recent polls have been a godsend for Hillary Clinton in numerous ways. The polls showing the election tightening are waking up some Democratic voters who may have gotten complacent due to the recent success of Barack Obama in presidential elections.

An added benefit of the polls is that they have brought about the return of Trumps personality. Donald Trump really believes all of the public polls and thinks that he is winning the election. When Trump thinks hes winning, his real personality comes out, and that personality does things like attack African-American pastors who will not allow their pulpit to be exploited for political attacks.

If Clintons time away from the campaign trail has taught Democrats anything, it is that the party needs her voice out front and center. Trump is going to be Trump, and that means attacking innocent people over perceived slights. Hillary Clinton took Trump to task and delivered the message about the GOP nominees character that voters need to be reminded of through Election Day.
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As I wrote yesterday, a whole bunch of recently released polling shows that the race is undeniably tightening. Nationally, Hillary Clinton continues to hold a slim lead over Trump, and there are many battleground state polls that show an increasingly close race.

There are many factors behind that, one of the major ones being that these recent surveys were conducted during what was probably the worst weekend to date for the Clinton campaign as she battled fallout from the basket of deplorables comment and her pneumonia diagnosis.

But another factor, evidenced by the recent polling, is that young people are at least partly the reason why the race is so close  not because they support Trump, obviously, but because they are entertaining the idea of voting for third-party candidates Gary Johnson or Jill Stein.

According to a national Quinnipiac University poll released just yesterday, Clinton leads Trump by five points in a head-to-head matchup  a respectable margin. But, when respondents were given the choice of choosing either Johnson or Stein, her lead shrunk to just two points.

The same applies to a New York Times/CBS News poll released today that shows her with a head-to-head lead over Trump but tied in a four-way race.

Thats because, as the Quinnipiac polling results show, Clintons margin over Trump with voters age 18-34 goes from 21 points in a two-way race to five points in a contest including the third-party candidates. In the expanded field, Gary Johnson gets the support of a whopping 29 percent of voters in this age group (more than Trumps 26 percent) and Jill Stein pulls in a pretty sizable 15 percent.

My question to young voters who favor Clinton in a head-to-head contest against Trump but abandon her in a race that includes the third-party candidates: What in the world are you thinking?

Set aside the fact that Jill Stein is, like Trump, cozy with Russian president Vladimir Putin, and she cant even reserve a seat on the correct flight. Disregard the fact that Gary Johnson doesnt even know what Aleppo is, even though its Syrias largest city and central to the refugee crisis.

Despite all of that, one indisputable fact remains: Neither of them will be elected on Nov. 8.

Let me repeat that for every young person out there throwing a fit about the terrible major party candidates on the ballot this year: Regardless of your potential vote for Johnson or Stein, they will lose. There will not be a President Johnson or President Stein on January 20, 2017.

Whether you like it or not, the next presidents name will either be Hillary or Donald. Once you accept this obvious reality, the choice is clear.

Abandoning Clinton because she is imperfect and opting for a candidate you know will lose only makes it more likely that Donald Trump will become the next president. If young people care about the future, as most do, then that is an outcome they should flatly reject.
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The Washington Posts David Fahrenthold is demanding the $5 million Donald Trump promised to give if he was assured that President Obama was born in the United States.

Sent this to @realDonaldTrump spox, to ask how he will fulfill promise to give $5M if assured Pres. Obama born in US pic.twitter.com/Uc751PeGrl  David Fahrenthold (@Fahrenthold) September 16, 2016

After President Obama released his long form birth certificate or whatever it was, as Donald Trump put it, Trump refused to accept that Obama had proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that he was born here. Which makes Donald Trump pretty crazy and desperate.

So Trump stoked the medias interest by claiming he had something very, very big concerning the President of the United States  something that would change the course of the 2012 election.

When Trump released his very, very big something, it was more of a bust (sound familiar yet? LOL this guy). The very, very big something was nothing more than Donald Trumps racism, which was hardly news.

You see, Trump didnt believe the long form birth certificate so he would now require additional information to accept that President Obama was born here. That was his big announcement. As if his beliefs were of any concern to a nation who used to laugh at him. (The good old days)

Trump announced that if President Obama would meet Donald Trumps demands and assure the conspiracy artist that Obama was indeed born here, Donald Trump would give a $5 million check to the charity of Obamas choosing. That was his big something.

Heres Donald Trump in October of 2012 promising to give a $5 million check within one hour once hes assured that Obama is born here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=di0xTIUxQLc

Trump made a deal with the president, that if Obama could assure Trump he was born here, Trump would donate money to charity. Now, I have a deal for the President.  If Barack Obama opens up and gives his college records and applications, and if he gives his passport applications and records, I will give to a charity of his choice  inner city children in Chicago, American Cancer Society, AIDS research, anything he wants, a check, immediately, for $5 million.

If youre strapped in to your irony chair, in this video, Trump claims Obama is the least transparent president ever- this is coming from the man who now wont even release his tax returns.

Wheres the $5 million Mr. Trump?

Dont worry, were not holding our breath. We know, thanks to David Farenthold, that Donald Trump has lied about almost all of his donations to various charities. What we dont know is where the money actually went, since his foundation claimed on its tax forms to have given thousands to organizations that say they have never received said money.

Donald Trumps very, very big something that would change the 2012 presidential election turned out to be nothing but yet another Donald Trump scam.

Getting it yet, America? The ending never changes in a Donald Trump story.
Deutsche Bank shares slide after it was asked to pay $14 billion to DOJ

The Justice Department has suggested that Deutsche Bank (XETRA:DBK-DE) pay $14 billion to settle a number of investigations related to mortgage securities, the bank confirmed on Thursday.



Deutsche said in a statement it "has no intent to settle these potential civil claims anywhere near the number cited." The bank emphasized that negotiations have just started and that it expects the outcome to be "similar to those of peer banks which have settled at materially lower amounts."



The Wall Street Journal first reported the figure, citing sources familiar with the situation.

The bank's Frankfurt-listed shares were among the worst-performers on the Stoxx600 Friday morning, down 9.3 percent.



The company previously thought that a settlement between $2 billion and $3 billion would be fair, as it had already paid $1.9 billion in 2013 to resolve similar claims, the Journal said.

Reuters reported that, in January, Goldman Sachs said it would pay more than $5 billion to settle claims it misled mortgage bond investors during the financial crisis. The following month, Reuters reported that Wells Fargo reached a $1.2 billion settlement over mortgage fraud allegations. The news service also reported that Bank of America came to a $16.65 billion settlement in 2014 and that JPMorgan settled for $13 billion in 2013.

The Justice Department declined to comment to CNBC.





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This is what personal responsibility looks like now from the leader of the Republican Party. Devoted birther Donald Trump tried to duck responsibility for leading charge of the birther movement against President Obama by blaming Hillary Clinton.

Trump did that by relying on yet another debunked Republican conspiracy theory that most helpfully blames Clinton for a movement stoked by Republicans since 2008.

Watch here:

Here's video of Donald Trump's brief comment about the "birther controversy" just now: https://t.co/2XbuKNvs1X  Jenna Johnson (@wpjenna) September 16, 2016

Speaking at his new Trump International Hotel (more free publicity!), Trump falsely accused Hillary Clinton of having first raised questions about Mr. Obamas birthplace during the 2008 Democratic primary.

Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy, Mr. Trump said. I finished it.

President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period. Now, we all want to get back to making America strong and great again, Trump said.

Trump started off his accountability with blaming Hillary Clinton for starting the birther movement in 2008. However, this is a lie. Hillary Clinton never suggested that Barack Obama didnt have a valid birth certificate.

Hillary Clinton is not and never has been a birther, so says FactCheck.Org, though FactCheck says some of her supporters certainly stoked the fires that he might be a Muslim.

He doesnt have a birth certificate. He may have one, but theres something on that, maybe religion, maybe it says he is a Muslim. I dont know. Maybe he doesnt want that, Donald Trump said in a 2011 interview with Fox News, long after Obama had released his birth certificate.

Trump is wrong. Hillary Clinton is not to blame for his birtherism, Hillary Clinton didnt start the birther movement and she certainly didnt force Donald Trump to run around making a fool of himself trying to delegitimize the first black president by claiming the birth certificate Obama released wasnt valid.

Trump was still asking questions about this in 2012, by the way.

In June of 2016, while running for President, Trump told CNNs Brian Stelter that while he would love to keep talking about where Obama was born, he refrains because its distracting. Trump suggested the reason why he doesnt engage in birther speculation anymore is because it gets too much attention, crowding out other issues. These are not the words of a statesman.

Just Thursday night, Donald Trump refused to say that Barack Obama was born in the United States.

The bottom line is that Donald Trump has been peddling birtherism to stoke racial resentment, playing the Republican Southern Strategy game of conning white people into voting against their own best interest by pointing fingers at black people.

Donald Trump has fed the horrible beast of the Republican birther game for years. He has stoked racial animus and tried to delegitimize the president of the United States.

Instead of taking personal responsibility for it, instead of apologizing to President Obama and the public for the ugly racism he helped inflame over years, Donald Trump blamed his opponent  who has never once suggested that Barack Obama wasnt born here.

Donald Trump called this a press conference, but once again took no questions from the media.

Donald Trump just fed the public a debunked conspiracy as a Get Out of Jail free card for his own behavior, and while this has worked in the past, the media is not buying it today. There are some places decent people do not go, and the birther conspiracy is one of them. Another is the conspiracy that blames Clinton for it. Has Donald Trump ever been held accountable for his actions in his entire adult life? Does he even know how to be a semi-decent person?

Enough with the relentless lies.

Donald Trump isnt fit to wipe President Obamas shoes. Donald Trump is an embarrassment to this country and to our values. He should not be running for president on a major partys ticket. He must be shut down hard in November.
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Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton hammered Republican nominee Donald Trumps lack of accountability and transparency Friday morning.

Team Clinton released a statement Friday morning citing 20 Questions Trump Is Avoiding By Not Holding A Press Conference, based on the revelations of Donald Trumps troubling foreign business interests and the ramifications for our national security.

The Clinton camp said its more urgent than ever that Trump release his tax returns, citing revelations in Newsweek by Kurt Eichenwald about the conflicts of interest inherent in the Trump organizations business dealings in more than a dozen countries on five continents  including Russia, Ukraine, Libya, Turkey, China, and Brazil.

The twenty questions are based on a tweet storm of Clintons on Wednesday.

Clinton is doing the press job for them, showing them where the bodies are buried in a way that she is uniquely qualified to do on this matter of foreign conflicts of interest based on her vast knowledge gleaned from her time as Secretary of State.

Of course no one can ask Trump anything right now, and his surrogates are busy making the usual empty non-statements that mean nothing, especially given that Donald Trump himself has said no one should listen to what the media reports his own campaign says. So there is no point in interviewing Trump surrogates.

Trump surrogates are also found of telling the press Trump wont answer if he doesnt want to, and how dare they ask questions with negativity. Just last night Katrina Pierson said, Mr. Trump is going to be Mr. Trump. He will respond when he feels like it.

So thats a Trump middle finger to the press and the American public.

Just as there is no point in interviewing Trump unless you come prepared to hold on to the facts with a death grip, lest you make a fool of yourself by letting Donald Trump use you as propaganda fodder.

Donald Trump is the master magician who can distract the media with a big show while he gets away with saying and revealing absolutely nothing. (See his medical records show on Dr. Oz.)

After Trump joked that he would release his medical records because they were good, and he wouldnt if they werent, Hillary for America chair John Podesta asked the logical question, If Trump is only willing to release information that makes him look good, what else is he hiding?

The twenty questions are a reminder of why Trumps utter lack of transparency and disclosure have become an urgent concern with just over 50 days left in this election, the Clinton team explains.

This is yet another reason why I took the position that Hillary Clinton needed to do press conferences. She is running against a man who demands that the media take him at his word and as long as Clinton refused to do a presser, it was hard to push back on Trumps refusal to be accountable and transparent. Now that shes taking questions from the press, Clinton is able to point to Trumps lack of transparency on almost every issue, from his tax returns to his medical records.

Hillary Clinton is taking the lead with the media and is using her position to set narratives. It shouldnt be lost on anyone that the reason Clinton can ask narrowly pointed questions on this specific matter is because she has actually been there, done that.

Hillary Clinton is not a reality TV personality running a slick flimflam scam on the American public. Hillary Clinton is a lifelong public servant who has lived her entire adult life in the public eye. Weve even read 30,000 of her emails.

Yet we know almost nothing about Donald Trump that hasnt gone through his publicity teams propaganda machine, protected by vicious lawsuits and non-disclosure agreements for even the phone bankers.

The press needs to get on it ASAP because the countdown to race for the White House is on. Time to stop chasing what Trump says like a dog chasing its tail.

Tick tock, media.
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We have seen that the Trump campaign, if not Trump himself, has said President Obama was born in the United States. At the same time, Trump spokesperson Katrina Pierson was defending the candidates own refusal to answer.

Megyn Kelly took to her show, Fox News The Kelly File, sitting down with Trump spokesperson Katrina Pierson and Clinton supporters DNC member Robert Zimmerman, to talk about Trumps birtherism, specifically, his statement to The Washington Post, that,

Ill answer that question at the right time. I just dont want to answer it yet.

Kelly, and this is not the first time she has had to school the Trump spox, asked Pierson,

Why, for the love of God, wont he just say that Barack Obama was born in the United States?

Pierson equated answering questions directly with the expectation that Donald Trump is some robotic politician, and that after 15 months, journalists are unreasonable to think Trump is going to actually answer any direct questions.

Hes not going to let the media determine what he talks about, Pierson instructed Kelly. Mr. Trump is going to be Mr. Trump. He will respond when he feels like it. According to Pierson, asking Trump questions are diversionary tactics, and she singled out CNN.

In response, Kelly played the tape of both Kellyanne Conway and Rudy Giuliani saying Trump believes Obama was born in the US.

Watch courtesy of Media Matters for America:

MEGYN KELLY: Why wouldnt he say it when asked tonight?



KATRINA PIERSON: Well, simply because he has said that he does not talk about that anymore. First thing is, Barack Obama is not on the ballot, and not even relevant to this election cycle.



KELLY: Katrina, no. Thats not gonna fly.



PIERSON: No, Megyn, this is going to fly.



KELLY: No, thats not gonna fly, does he believe it or not?



PIERSON: This is completely irrelevant  This is completely irrelevant to the election cycle.



KELLY: Its not completely irrelevant. You have a lot of people in this country, in particular, African-Americans, who feel that that position was a racist position meant to delegitimize the president. Im taking no position on this, Im relaying to you what theyve said, and his own campaign manager came out and said he has shifted his belief on this, and now when asked directly he refuses to confirm that. Why?



PIERSON: And you also have a poll in South Carolina that shows that Mr. Trump is pushing on 30 percent African-American support, and Hillary Clinton 



KELLY: Thats a dodge.



PIERSON: And Hillary Clinton has insulted half of the country.



KELLY: Thats a dodge.



PIERSON: This is not 



KELLY: Why wont you answer that question?



PIERSON: No, its not, Megyn. Im telling you, Mr. Trump has said hes not going to talk about it. Ive given you the answer.



KELLY: He said yet 



PIERSON: You want to know why?



KELLY: He said yet. Theres like, a tease baked into it, I just dont want to answer it yet. Robert, what do you think?



PIERSON: The media is not going to force Mr. Trump to say anything that he is not ready to say.

A clearly exasperated Kelly at this point almost shouted at Pierson:

The media didnt force him to come out and take a position being a birther, but he did!

Kelly then explained why it is relevant:

And now were following up because he wants to be commander in chief.

Zimmermans answer to the charge that expecting Trump to answer questions is expecting him to be robotic was tweeted by Kelly:

.@ZimmermanRob: Its not about asking Donald Trump to be robotic. Its about asking him to have honor and decency, and respect for the truth  Megyn Kelly (@megynkelly) September 16, 2016

The interview went downhill from there, as Kelly seemed to team with Pierson (whom she called Kat) against Zimmerman, showing a smug amusement at every point he tried to raise. But then, Fox News has never given a liberal viewpoint a fair shake.

It is amusing to note that while Pierson insists President Obama is not relevant to the election cycle, Donald Trump is more than willing to launch attacks against Obama. When Trump is making up lies about the US economy he is saying Obama is very much relevant to the discussion. After all, hes claiming hes going to fix the economy Obama already fixed, and create the jobs Obama already created.

And in fact, Kellyanne Conway has publicly said this election has everything to do with Obama, telling CNNs Chris Cuomo, Theres no question to me he was born in the United States, but hes not been a particularly successful President, and thats what this campaign is about.

To her credit, the Kelly that stood up to Pierson was the occasional journalist we sometimes see, and she hammered Pierson with questions which, to no ones surprise, Pierson refused to answer.

To be fair, any answer Pierson gave would have been nonsensical based on past answers. Who can forget her classic defense of Trumps flip-flop on immigration: Theres not a different message. Hes using different words to give that message.
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While campaigning for Hillary Clinton in Virginia, First Lady Michelle Obama reduced Trump to a pile of orange rubble, by unloading on the character of the Republican nominee.

Video:

https://youtu.be/QiF8dziYXuk?t=50m2s

The First Lady said:

See, at the end of the day, as Ive said before, the presidency doesnt change who you are. It reveals who you are. And the same thing is true of a presidential campaign. So if a candidate is erratic and threatening, if a candidate traffics in prejudice, fears, and lies on the trail. If a candidate has no clear plans to implement their goals. If they disrespect their fellow citizens, including folks, who made extraordinary sacrifices for our country. Let me tell you that is who they are. That is the kind of president they will be. Trust me. A candidate is not going to suddenly change once they get into office. Just the opposite, in fact, because the minute that individual takes the oath they are under the hottest harshest light there is, and there is no way to hide who they really are.

First Lady Obamas words carry extra weight in light of Donald Trumps growing birther spectacle. Trumps attempt to whitewash history and blame his years of birtherism on Hillary Clinton provides insight into the kind of president that he will be.

By Trumps own admission, he lied to his supporters for five years when he claimed that President Obama was not born in the United States. A man who is a pathological liar on the campaign trail is not going to begin to tell the truth if he wins the White House.

Trumps birtherism is an enduring symbol of his platform of bigotry and division, but as the First Lady pointed out, Trumps willingness to lie when it suits him showcases the character of a man who can not be trusted with the most powerful job on the planet.

Michelle Obama destroyed Donald Trump without ever mentioning his name, and in the process reminded voters of the stakes in this election.
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The Trump campaign has issued a statement on Trumps position regarding President Barack Obamas birth:

Hillary Clintons campaign first raised this issue to smear then-candidate Barack Obama in her very nasty, failed 2008 campaign for President. This type of vicious and conniving behavior is straight from the Clinton Playbook. As usual, however, Hillary Clinton was too weak to get an answer. Even the MSNBC show Morning Joe admits that it was Clintons henchmen who first raised this issue, not Donald J. Trump.



In 2011, Mr. Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate. Mr. Trump did a great service to the President and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised. Inarguably, Donald J. Trump is a closer. Having successfully obtained President Obamas birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.



Mr. Trump is now totally focused on bringing jobs back to America, defeating radical Islamic terrorism, taking care of our veterans, introducing school choice opportunities and rebuilding and making our inner cities safe again.  Jason Miller, Senior Communications Advisor

Hillary Clinton did not say that. The facts are, if the origins of birtherism are to be found in the 2008 political campaign, it is clear that neither Hillary Clinton nor any member of her campaign can be identified as spreading or endorsing that rumor.

And it cannot be denied that it was Donald Trump himself who, in 2011, made birtherism a thing.

In other words, this new Trump statement is, like everything else issuing from his campaign, a lie. A complete fabrication. Obama had already released his birth certificate  in 2008  and Trump, far from forcing Obama to produce it, was busily claiming it wasnt real.

Despite Millers claim made here that the issue of Obamas birth was settled in 2011, in 2012 Trump used his tried and true people tell me/thats what I hear routine to disregard the validity of that birth certificate:

An 'extremely credible source' has called my office and told me that @BarackObama's birth certificate is a fraud.  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 6, 2012

And just this past August, Corey Lewandowski asked, did he get in as a U.S. citizen, or was he brought into Harvard University as a citizen who wasnt from this country?

This statement is just another example of how Trump has done his level best to keep the issue of birtherism alive, by very judiciously talking about what he says he refuses to talk about.

As has been pointed out by The Boston Globes James Pindell, this is not a statement from Trump but from his communications director. Trump has already warned us to beware false Trump prophets, proclaiming in a tweet this past May,

Dont believe the biased and phony media quoting people who work for my campaign. The only quote that matters is a quote from me!

Needless to say, if you check Trumps twitter feed, you will find complete silence on the subject of Obamas birth.

So there you have it: like Trumps medical history, a huge non-event that asks more questions than it answers, and which tells you absolutely nothing about Donald Trump.
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Donald Trump is dodging reporters after he refused to answer twice when asked if he is going to apologize to President Obama for his birther attacks.

Trump was asked twice by ABCs Tom Llamas if he will apologize to President Obama:

Just asked @realDonaldTrump if he was going to now apologize to @POTUS. He dodged my question twice. @ABCPolitics pic.twitter.com/5nIxcfmefh  Tom Llamas (@TomLlamasABC) September 16, 2016

The Republican nominee dodged the question both times.

The idea that Trump should apologize to Obama came from Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton who said, Trump, again refused to say with his own words that the president was born in the United States. Now Donalds advisors had the temerity to say hes doing the country a service by pushing these lies. No, he isnt. He is feeding into the worst impulses, the bigotry and bias that lurks in our country. Barack Obama was born in America, plain and simple. And Donald Trump owes him and the American people an apology.

It seems like it was just three days ago when polls were being released showing the presidential race tightening, Democrats were worried, and the media was saying that Trump could actually win this thing.

Donald Trump has put an end to all of that by being Donald Trump. Trump attacked an African-American pastor in Flint, Michigan after she wouldnt let him use her pulpit for political attacks. He got cocky when new polls showed him gaining ground, and refused to say whether or not President Obama an American citizen, and then he tried to play the media by promising to hold a press conference and then refusing to take questions.

Trump single-handedly turned what could have been a week of good news for his campaign into more voter alienating behavior simply by being himself.

The birther issue is not going away. It will almost certainly come up at the first presidential debate in two weeks, and Donald Trump is back to stumbling through the presidential campaign.
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You gotta love Deutsche Bank DB. The US Justice Department proposed the bank pay $14 billion to settle a high-profile mortgage-backed securities case stemming from their involvement in the financial crisis. Deutsches response. Nein.

Not nine, like the number, but Nein, for No in German. Deutsche pushed back strongly against the proposal. But its not like they didnt expect to write a check. The Deutsche bag has $6.2 billion in it right now. Behind closed doors, its rumored lawyers for the bank were expecting somewhere between two and three billion. After all, the bank has already paid out nearly two million to settle an earlier case in 2013.

The $14 billion is close to the $16.65 billion Bank of America BAC paid in 2014. If you look at JPMorgan Chase JPM, Citigroup C, and Morgan Stanley MS have already dished out more than $23 billion combined. Often times the Justice Department starts with a high number then negotiates a lower penalty.

Its like when you go out to buy a car and the salesman throws out $600 a month for that 2013 C-class youre looking at, when you were only trying to spend like $400. Eventually, you end up walking out of there for $550 and somehow youre happy about it.

Deutsches not the last European bank thats going to catch a fine. Barclays, Credit Suisse, UBS and Royal Bank of Scotland are all in the crosshairs.

Let this be a lesson to all you bankers out there! If you commit fraud, fleece homeowners, throw people out on the street and tank the economy all in the name of corporate profits, a few election years later after youve retired with your golden parachute, your bank is going to have a pay a small fraction of those profits back. So you think about that.

Deutsche is down 10% on the news. Personally, Ive been bearish on the bank since digging finding out they were cu-cu for CoCos a few months ago. It was a good video, you should check it out. The bank is the only Zacks Rank #5 (Strong Sell) in the foreign bank industry which ranks in the Top 21% of our Zacks Industry Rank.

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Charlie now is cooking in northwest Rochester.

While the official launch is slated for next week, the popular Charlie's Eatery & Pubhas fired up the grill in its new location for a "soft opening."

Charlie Brannonran his bar and grill for decades in the shadow of Saint Marys Hospital on Rochester's Second Street. Now he's operating in his new location in the Elks Lodge No. 1091at 1652 U.S. Highway 52 North in the Hillcrest Shopping Center.

He moved into the space previously occupied by Wong's Cafeas well as the Elks bar and dining room area. Wong's moved out in July.

While the lodge will not control the bar as in the past, Brannon is offering discounts and specials for Elks members.

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"I've been an Elk member for 25 years. The lodge is important to me," Brannon said previously. "We'll still take care of them."

He hopes to expand the bar's food menu to improve the experience for the club.

The Elks will retain use of the large space the service club uses on Tuesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays for popular bingo games.

Part of the forces driving the change are the membership and financial challenges that classic service clubs, such as the Elks, are facing these days. This deal allowed the Rochester lodge to sign a new five-year lease with the owners of Hillcrest Shopping Center, according to the Elks' latest newsletter. -- Jeff
Mayo Clinic likes how Shantanu Nigam thinks.

Nigam, the founder of Georgia-based Jvion, presented his idea on how to pair Mayo Clinic's Bedside Patient Rescue with his company's artificial intelligence-driven health-care technology system called RevEgis.

Five judges chose Nigam's business proposal over four other finalists in Mayo Clinic's Think Big Challenge, a "Shark Tank"-like startup competition. Nigam gave his final pitch to a laid-back, tech-connected crowd gathered in the Mayo Civic Center for Mayo Clinic's Transform 2016 conference.

He won a $50,000 cash prize plus the right to license Mayo Clinic's Bedside Patient Rescue technology.

Standing by himself on the stage, Nigam fielded questions from the judges seated on a nearby couch. The judges included Gary Smith, president of Rochester Area Economic Development Inc.; Timmeko Love, of Mayo Clinic Ventures; Dr. Mustaqeem Siddiqui, of Mayo Clinic Global; as well as two venture capitalists.

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Jvion's system already is used in 300 hospitals to predict patient outcomes so doctors and nurses can better treat them. Nigam said it has helped save lives, reduced re-admissions and prevented hospital-acquired infections. He said pairing with Mayo Clinic will result in a system that will be able to do much more to improve patients' lives.

He admitted to the crowd that Jvion wasn't an overnight success. In the early days, the system saved lives when tested in the controlled environment of his office. However, it didn't fare so well in the real world. They quickly realized hospitals are not perfect settings and there are a lot of variables.

Nigam said his company weathered three years of failures and dozens of revamps of RevEgis before it was successful in unpredictable hospital settings.

"Now, it doesn't require everything to be pristine to work," he said.

While the judges deliberated the contestants' fates, Mayo Clinic Ventures chairman Jim Rogers told the crowd projects such as Think Big are important for Mayo Clinic's future.

"Why does Mayo engage in these activities?" he asked, and said the answer would have been that it doesn't.

"Mayo's at a crossroads, in a lot of ways," Rogers said. "There are a lot of issues we have to solve  We need to partner effectively."

His department works with Mayo Clinic doctors, researchers and others to find concepts for new businesses as well as technology and treatments that existing companies would be interested in buying or licensing.

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"We tend the garden very carefully," he said.

Mayo Clinic Ventures also needs to look beyond its own people for opportunities, like it did with Jvion, said Rogers, who compared finding compatible projects to finding a date.

Beside benefiting Mayo Clinic, this increased interest in entrepreneurship is strengthening the Rochester community, he said.

"With the Destination Medical Center initiative, a critical mass (of entrepreneurs) is starting to form locally," Rogers said. "More and more creative people in the area are starting to diversify the local economy."
My parents built our family home from the ground up in 1978. As they were designing the house and making all the decisions that come with building, they decided the house would be heated with wood.

And so began our weekends spent combing the woods of our aunts, uncles and friends who had an abundance of fallen trees. My sister, age 7 at the time, my brothe,r age 2 and I, age 9, contributed when we could by picking up logs, throwing them in the truck and stacking once we got home.

As we got older, our responsibilities with woodcutting, loading and stacking continued to grow. By the time I was 16 or 17, we had depleted our connections of wood, and my dad began ordering bundles of slab wood. He built racks that neatly held several slabs at a time, and using a chainsaw, we would get through bundles rather quickly.

About the age of 19, I took this job over with the help of friends, or my dad, or whomever I could finagle a day of help from. The weather always was cool and perfect to be working outside.

Fast-forward to now, my dad is no longer with us, my mom remains in the family home, and she still heats the house with wood. This year, the usual bundles of slab wood were ordered, and with the help of friends, we made our way through it, so she would be prepared for the cold weather.

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Two weeks ago, I attended a meeting, and a meeting attendee told me, "I heard you keep the guys busy and work really hard." Then he added, "I think it is pretty sexy that a woman knows how to run a chainsaw."

I thought to myself, "Huh, after all these years running a chainsaw, I have never been told that nor have I ever thought it." I just smiled and took the compliment.

This conversation got me thinking, are there other jobs that men find sexy and not in the normal realm of what women typically do? Or just what is it that makes a job sexy? Is it a uniform such as what nurses or flight attendants wear? Is it a big paycheck? I had to find out.

Coming from a business owner of a petroleum company whose wife is very involved with the family farm, "Any woman can drive a truck, but when she climbs up in the combine and heads to the field, wow!"

Another gentleman told me there was no particular job that he found sexy in a woman, but stated, "I like to date or hang out with women who are happy with their job and perform it with passion. There is nothing worse than women who go to a job day in and day out without thought or cares."

Not all men would agree with these next thoughts, but it was shared with me that, "I find those in the hair styling business sexy." Although maybe not the most glamorous job, he found the confidence they exude by carrying on conversations, asking questions and being friendly quite sexy.

To clarify how the word "sexy" is being used for this column, it is "interesting, appealing or intriguing," not all the other words that could be tied to "sexy."

For many of the guys I spoke with, they agreed that any woman who shows confidence, passion, work ethic, who can work hard to get the job done is sexy. It doesn't matter what they're doing!
Would you believe that vintage punch bowls and snack sets are hot items now? I doubt that you would even consider these items when you walk by them at an antique or thrift shop, flea market or garage sale. Remember, everything vintage and retro is becoming very popular again, and so are these items. Antique dealers, online stores and auctions are becoming aware of this as well, as they are pulling more out of hiding and displaying them.

The scoop on bowls

As you begin your search, you will find a variety of options, including colorful and whimsical Holt Howard designs, bowls made from sterling silver, silver-plated, stainless steel, glass, porcelain, and more. Some bowls are very simple and others very ornate with a pedestal design to elevate the bowl.

There was a bowl for everyone's budget. When you see a vintage punch bowl, you think Christmas and New Year's, but that is not what folks think today  they're used for chips without the cups, potpourri, fruit, goldfish and colorful vintage holiday ornaments.

I found my first punch bowl at the S&H Redemption Store, Rochester, in the late 1960s to use as a display piece on my dining room built-in hutch in our first home. Many were available in the local dime stores and mail-order catalogs. Elegant bowls were made of cut glass in the 1850s to the early 1900s, and found in high-end department and jewelry stores. They were common wedding gifts.

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What to look for, and where

Look for sets that are complete and may include the punch bowl, matching cups, cup hooks and ladle. Carefully examine the set. Are all the cups original to the set? When examining glass or ceramics, look for chips, cracks and imperfections. An excellent article about how to identify antique punch bowls can be found at tinyurl.com/hvzhvfa .

Ann Collins, of Churn Dash Antiques, Rochester, said, "We have several punch bowl sets that include clear pattern glass, selling from $55 to $85 per set."

Joan Thilges, of New Generations of Harmony, said, "We have a few punch bowls in the mall right now, but typically have more during the holiday season. They're always fun for serving Tom and Jerrys and other more slushy drinks. A lovely clear glass set is $50 and a green glass set is $75."

Brenda Jannsen, owner of Treasures Under Sugar Loaf, Winona, said, "We have a set that has a pattern of lines and arches, cups and is priced at $25, a bubble design with cups at $8 and a bowl with narrow ribs, 11 cups is at $9."

Snack sets

Every manufacturer that made kitchen, dining and entertaining products had their own pattern, style and signature pieces. Many of the common vintage snack sets sold from $25 to $150. Checking condition and style is a factor on value. I got my first set as a hostess-type gift at a home party.

In the 1950s, the Federal Glass company put out an eight-piece Homestead Snack Set (four plates, four cups). The Federal Glass company started in the 1900s and was a major producer of Depression Glass in the 1930s and 40s. What makes the snack sets such a collectible is the fact that at the same time these sets were coming out, so were plastic sets that could be placed in picnic sets. But it is the collector who appreciates the the quality of work that was apparent in the glass and pottery sets. As lifestyles changed, the snack sets vanished, until recently.

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Sarah Kieffer, of Sarah's Uniques & Jim's "Man"tiques, St. Charles, said, "I have snack sets in prices from $8 to $20, some depending on the type and the style. I am finding a lot of girls are using the sets for showers and parties. People are bringing them out of hiding and using them again in their displays. My vintage sets are usually the Federal Glass Company, Anchor Hocking Fire King and more. The grapes used to be the most popular pattern, but I'm finding the wheat pattern in the fall is selling as well as the clear glass."

Karen Reilly, of the Occasional Market, Rochester, said, "I have sold about four sets of milk glass plates/cups this year. One lady was using it for a bridal shower and one was using for an 'Alice in Wonderland' photo shoot. I think more and more young people are doing theme parties and looking for special dishware. I have four sets of dishes that I like to rotate. Good memories of family gatherings when I was little."

Wanda Patzner, of Simple Country, St. Charles said, "I just put out on display two Halloween sets and three different everyday sets, selling from $2 on up."
Almost a year to the day after he was sentenced on child pornography charges, a former chemistry professor at the University of Minnesota Rochester was arrested for violating the terms of his probation.

Christopher Blake Dezutter, 49, was arrested Wednesday on an apprehension order from his probation agent, court documents say, and detained for violation of probation. The violation is not specified; his hearing is set for Tuesday.

Dezutter pleaded guilty in May 2015 in Olmsted County District Court to four counts of felony possession of pornographic work. In exchange, six identical counts and one count of felony dissemination of pornographic work were dismissed.

On Sept. 16, 2015, Dezutter was sentenced to five years of probation and ordered to serve 120 days in jail, with credit for 10 days served. Terms of his probation including registering as a predatory offender and successful completion of sex offender education/treatment or other programming and 100 hours of community work service.

Dezutter and six other men were arrested in February 2015 after a months-long investigation by national and local authorities.

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All of the cases were brought to the attention of local authorities by investigators with the national Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, which saw the activity during its own undercover investigations.

The suspects were not connected in any way, authorities said. According to the criminal complaints, the youngest victims in each case ranged from infancy to about 10 years old. Also assisting Rochester police were officials from the Olmsted County Sheriff's Office, the Minnesota Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
STEWARTVILLE  A 34-year-old man is behind bars while authorities search for one of his burglary victims, officials said Friday.

The case began about 11:30 a.m. Wednesday, when deputies with the Olmsted County Sheriff's Office were called to the 700 block of Reichels Circle Northeast, Stewartville, for a report of a suspicious person.

The caller said the person seemed "out of it," and was sitting in her front yard.

At the scene was Sean Francis Jacobson, 34, who admitted he had a large number of coins in his backpack, said Capt. Scott Behrns. The report described Jacobson as "shaking, nervous and extremely talkative," but officers had no reason to detain him. He told them he was staying at a Stewartville hotel, and left on foot.

Something about the story  specifically, the fact that the man was carrying several pounds of coins  didn't sit right with the deputies, Behrns said, so they began to knock on doors in the area.

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They spoke with a homeowner in the 500 block of Seventh Street Northeast who, after hearing the deputies' explanation, realized his containers of loose change  almost $1,000 worth  were empty.

Deputies went to the hotel and confronted Jacobson. He allegedly admitted to burglarizing two homes, including the one with the loose change.

In addition to the coins, deputies recovered several pieces of jewelry, Behrns said; Jacobson couldn't remember which houses he'd entered, but agreed it was in the area where he was first spotted.

"The patrol guys did a really good job to follow up," Behrns said. "We just need to take it a step further and get this jewelry back to its owner."

Jacobson was charged Friday morning in Olmsted County District Court with two felony counts of second-degree burglary. Conditional bond was set at $10,000; he's due back in court Sept. 28.
Christopher Holloway, the former owner of a downtown coffee shop, was sentenced this morning to eight months in jail  considerably longer than the prosecution asked for  after his attorney asked for no jail time.

An Olmsted County District Court jury in June found Holloway guilty of one count each of third- and fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct, with aggravating factors. Judge Joseph Chase handed down stayed prison terms of 60 months and 15 months, respectively, and ordered Holloway to spend 240 days in jail.

He was immediately handcuffed and taken into custody by deputies.

In addition to the jail time, Holloway must register as a predatory offender, successfully complete sex offender treatment and 100 hours of community work service, among other conditions.

After representing himself during the trial, Holloway retained attorney Max Keller, who filed a motion late Thursday to stay the sentencing and any incarceration, pending his planned appeal of the case.

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The appeal, Keller said, will be based on the court's denial of the defendant's use of the "mistaken age" defense. Keller called the denial "unconstitutional and unfair."

Judge Joseph Chase denied Keller's motion.

Holloway and the boy met Dec. 19, 2014, on a social media site frequented by homosexual males. Holloway went to the victim's house early Dec. 20 and went into the boy's bedroom, where the sexual contact took place.

Holloway left a few hours later, and the two continued chatting throughout the day Dec. 20, the records show. He went to the boy's house about 2:30 a.m. Dec. 21, when more sexual contact occurred. The victim's mother discovered the two in the bedroom, prompting Holloway to flee.

When police stopped his vehicle a few minutes after the boy's mother called law enforcement, Holloway's shoes were untied and he wasn't wearing underwear.

The 14-year-old told authorities he admitted his actual age to Holloway before both meetings.

Holloway disputed that fact during the trial, and provided transcripts that he argued indicate the boy consented to the encounters and was a willing participant.

Despite the presence of DNA from both the victim and Holloway on a condom in his vehicle, as well as other physical evidence, James Haase, a senior assistant county attorney for Olmsted County, told jurors that consent by the victim is not a defense, nor was Holloway's alleged ignorance of the boy's age.

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Chase agreed today, reminding Holloway that he'd presided over the trial, where the victim testified.

"I saw this young man," Chase said, "and I saw him at (age) 16. He looked 14 at 16  I don't buy it; I thought he looked very young. I don't see how that could be a defense.

"You were a 44-year-old man who snuck into a residence to have sex with a 14-year-old boy," Chase continued, "and you did it twice.  When it comes to sex  especially casual sex  adults are required by our law to look out for kids.

"We decided long ago that kids don't always make the best decisions," he said. "They don't fully understand what they're getting into and how it'll affect them. There's no doubt he's been negatively affected by this: He's a child."

Haase asked for an 80-month stayed sentence on the third-degree charge, and 180 days in jail.

"There needs to be a meaningful incentive for the defendant to take seriously" his actions, Haase said. "He's confident he'll win an appeal of his case; these aren't the actions of a person who appreciates the harm he's done."

Holloway apologized "for everything (the victim's family) has gone through; no doubt it's been very traumatic. I'm truly sorry for my role in that," he said. "Even if (the victim) had been 18, it was still stupid. Even if there'd been no criminal element, it was dumb."

Holloway called the victim impact statements from the boy and his parents "hurtful," adding "a lot of what they said was untrue, but I understand if they need to direct their pain at me."

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He repeated Keller's request for no jail time.

Chase wasn't swayed.

"Mr. Holloway, I am going to put you in jail, and it's going to be for a significant amount of time," he said, before pronouncing the 240-day term, with credit for two days served.
AUSTIN  A man on probation for possessing a gun as a convicted felon is accused of following a woman from a bar, punching her and stealing cash and a phone.

Morgan Dwayne Pratt, 22, of Austin, has been charged in Mower County District Court with one count each of aggravated robbery and simple robbery, both felonies, and one count of misdemeanor fifth-degree assault.

He made his first appearance Wednesday and remains in custody in lieu of $20,000 conditional bail. His next court date is Sept. 21.

The investigation began about 2 a.m. Sept. 6, when Austin police responded to a reported robbery in the 1400 block of First Place Southeast. A woman there said she'd been at a bar earlier; a man she didn't know was sitting next to her.

As she was walking home, she noted the man  later identified as Pratt  was following her, so she told him several times to leave her alone.

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Pratt ran up behind her, shoved her to the ground and tried to take her bag, the complaint says, leaving the woman with injuries to her arm and knee. Pratt also punched her in the face, court documents say, and the bag she was carrying ripped. He allegedly stole her cell phone, $400 in cash, a phone charger and her ID card.

A man at the bar identified Pratt as the man the woman described; another man told officers he'd been on a corner near the bar and saw Pratt following the victim. That witness reportedly said he heard the woman tell Pratt to leave her alone, but he continued following.

Video surveillance from the bar shows Pratt interacting with the woman; at one point, she left her chair to use the bathroom and Pratt allegedly digs through the bag, but doesn't appear to take anything.

The woman identified the man in the surveillance footage as the man who attacked her, the complaint says.

Pratt was found a week later and arrested. He admitted he sat with the woman at the bar, but denied stealing anything.

He was charged in 2014 after Austin police on patrol about 3 a.m. saw a vehicle parked with its lights on. As the squad car approached, the headlights were turned off, the report says. As the officers drove past again, it appeared two occupants were "ducking" to avoid being seen.

A subsequent search of Pratt, who exited the car from the driver's side, allegedly turned up a .22 caliber handgun from his front pants pocket.

According to the criminal complaint, an officer then saw a 9 mm handgun on the driver's side floorboard of the vehicle and a glass bong on the front passenger floorboard. A 16-year-old female passenger told the officers they'd smoked marijuana.

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Pratt told officers there was no magazine for the 9 mm, and that he got both guns from the residence of a 48-year-old man. The man confirmed Pratt had taken the two handguns without his permission, the complaint says.

He was sentenced in December 2014 to 60 months in prison, stayed for 15 years. He was given credit for 144 days spent in jail.

Pratt also has a juvenile adjudication for second-degree burglary in 2012.
A Dodge Center woman who crashed her car in front of a deputy made her initial appearance Wednesday in Olmsted County District Court.

Kasee Margareet Walker, 26, has been charged with one count each of first-degree drug sale and second-degree drug possession, both felonies, and DWI, a misdemeanor. She's been released in lieu of $5,000 conditional bail and is due back in court Nov. 22.

The case began shortly after 8 p.m. Sept. 1, when an Olmsted County Sheriff's deputy watched as a vehicle crossed over the center line several times, drove in the oncoming traffic lane and nearly went into the ditch before crashing in the 9000 block of Olmsted County Road 8 Southwest.

When the officer spoke to the driver  who identified herself as Walker  she appeared drowsy and sluggish, the complaint says, and her speech was "slow, deliberate and slightly slurred." Field sobriety tests allegedly resulted in multiple indicators of impairment, but a preliminary breath test had a reading of zero.

The deputy suspected Walker was driving under the influence of a narcotic, court documents say, so she was arrested and a blood draw was taken.

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A search of her purse prior to be in storage reportedly turned up 45.3 grams of methamphetamine, a scale, a glass pipe with white residue and a small notebook containing names and what appeared to be associated dollar amounts.

Walker had 5.3 grams of marijuana in her possession, the report says.
MANTORVILLE  School's back in session, and the county is making sure that it stays that way for students.

Dodge County has changed the way truancy cases will be addressed. In collaboration with the county attorney's office, school districts throughout the county, the Minnesota Prairie County Alliance , and the sheriff's office, the entities will be making sure that students stay in school.

"We want to catch students before it's too late to do anything," said Assistant County Attorney Crysta Parkin. "We want to keep them in school."

An attendance review board was created with the intention of meeting with students who have been reported truant from school. These discussions take place monthly after students have three unexcused absences, with a letter being sent home to set up a time where parents, school administrators, and the student can have a conversation.

If the problem continues, then after seven unexcused absences, then the attendance review board will be notified. The parents and the student will have to meet with the board at the county courthouse in Mantorville.

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The efforts of having such a board overseeing these cases is to avoid taking up court time and other resources for addressing truancies. If the truancy continues even after the board review, then the attorney's office may file an Education Neglect CHIPS petition or Truancy petition with the court, which can give a citation to the parents for allowing truancy to keep happening.

Even taking a step further, the court can suspend the student's driver's license, put the student on electric home monitoring or place the student in an out-of-home placement.

Most of the time, students who end up skipping school is most likely struggling with transportation issues, having to take care of their younger siblings because day care is not affordable, mental health issues or even chemical dependency, Parkin said. Often, if the children are truant, it means a need isn't being met.

So far this year, six petitions were filed for truancy cases. At the end of the previous school year, students were caught too late for truancy. Parkin recalled a senior student who had between 20 to 30 unexcused absences, which was "really too late to catch."

"I think schools will hold people accountable on their excused absences," Parkin said. "Calling them in to get excused from school, doesn't mean it's an actual excuse under the law. Kids shouldn't be missing school because of that. We want to get them in a good place."
A first of its kind homeless prevention and family supportive housing project in Rochester has welcomed its first residents.

Gage East Apartments has 55 housing units and on-site case managers to assist families and young people in addressing barriers that had resulted in homelessness. The $11 million project was led by Center City Housing Corp. with financial support from The Minnesota Housing Finance Agency, private partners and a service agreement with Olmsted County.

A grand opening at the facility is scheduled for Oct. 13 but residents are already moving in. The apartments fill a needed niche in Rochester, particularly for the 16- to 21-year old youth who will stay there, said Nancy Cashman, Center City's supportive housing development director.

"There is a big need for emergency housing of some sort for youth because we don't have any," Cashman said.

A look inside:

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The apartment complex is split into two sides, essentially two buildings under one roof, Cashman said. On the family side, there are 10 three-bedroom units and 20 two-bedroom units. The youth side of the building features 25 efficiency-style apartments for people 16 to 21 years old.

The apartment is referred to as permanent supportive housing, and in terms of the family side, permanent really does mean permanent, Cashman said. Families have as much time as they need to overcome challenges to finding independent housing. On the youth side, case managers will work with clients to find independent housing by the time clients are 22 years old, at oldest.

Residents have the same responsibility as any other rental: abide by the rules of the building and pay rent on time. Rent is set at 30 percent of the residents' income.

Each apartment is furnished and stocked with essentials for everyday life, like dishes, utensils, small appliances, cleaning supplies and linens. Center City Housing created a Target registry and community donations paid for many of the furnishings. A local group, Random Acts of Kindness, put welcome baskets in each room.

Four full-time case managers work on site to help break down the barriers families and young people have experienced, to help transition them to employment and independent housing. A service agreement with Olmsted County provided two of the on-site case managers. Two case managers work with youth, and the other two with families.

The building has a locked external entrance with a 24-hour staffed front desk attendant.

Center City Housing is continuing a capital campaign, hoping to raise $2.5 million to renovate the next-door building, Gage Elementary, to become the Empowerment Center , where residents would have further access to education, workforce development and health services.

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Outside the fences of the Federal Medical Center in Rochester on Thursday, Republican 1st District candidate Jim Hagedorn lashed out against Democratic policies on terrorism and refugees.

Hagedorn accused Rep. Tim Walz of seeking to bring terrorists to Southeast Minnesota and endangering its people. The Blue Earth Republican said that the congressman voted to close the Guantanamo Bay detention camp and supported the transferring of "the worst radical Islamic terrorists" into the United States, specifically, the FMC.

Hagedorn is running against Walz, a Democrat from Mankato, for the 1st District congressional seat. Walz beat Hagedorn with 54 percent of the vote two years ago.

Stating that Minnesota is a "hot spot" for terrorist recruitment, Hagedorn said he hopes to put a timeout on the Refugee Resettlement Program, saying there is the potential of extremists entering the region by taking advantage of the refugee crisis.

Stressing the need to secure the country's borders and fight against "radical Islamists and jihadists," Hagedorn said he wants to block new refugees from entering the United States and criticized Walz's apparent amnesty toward them.

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"What's to stop them from coming here?" Hagedorn asked. "Politically correct statements backfired on (Walz)."

The Guantanamo Bay reference stems from President Obama's plan to close the detention facility by executive order. Obama has called the detention camp a "recruitment tool for extremists" and suggested that it undermined U.S. security.

In 2009, Walz said he supported having Guantanamo detainees housed in Rochester as long as significant safeguards were met. Hagedorn condemned Walz for that stance and support of the Obama administration.

Pete Hegseth, former executive director of Vets for Freedom, joined Hagedorn on Thursday. Hegseth shared his experience of serving as an infantry platoon leader at Guantanamo Bay. He insisted that re-electing Walz would have a detrimental effect on security in Minnesota.

"Why would we want to go back to pre-9/11?" Hegseth asked. "There's no room for jihadists or terrorists in Rochester."

Hegseth said that the policies and proposals Hagedorn supports don't make him Islamophobic, racist, or bigoted.

"We are welcoming of people from all backgrounds," Hegseth said.

In response to Hagedorn's criticisms, the Walz campaign issued a statement that said Walz has long been a strong voice on national security.

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"In the latest defense bill, Tim Walz stopped the draw-down of Army troops, demanded accountability on our national security strategy, and worked to expand the authority of U.S. commanders in Afghanistan to track down and take out terrorists," the statement said.
DULUTH  Three shipwreck hunters' six-year search of Lake Superior for a 1800s schooner barge has ended successfully.

Jerry Eliason, Ken Merryman and Kraig Smith found the ship, called the Antelope, resting 300 feet below in the waters near the Apostle Islands earlier this month.

Eliason said the find is remarkable because it's one of the only wooden schooners found at the bottom of the lake with its masts still standing.

The trio teamed up about 25 years ago.

"I had worn out all my other shipwreck hunting friends," Merryman said. "Shipwreck hunting is boring. You spend a lot of time doing what we call mowing the lawn  going back and forth, back and forth in a search pattern. It's good to have friends you can joke and laugh with, otherwise it would be very painful."

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They began their search for the Antelope in 2010 partly because they'd already found another shipwreck, the Marquette, near where the Antelope reportedly sank while en route to Duluth from Ashland, Wisconsin, in 1897. The ship's entire crew was taken to safety on the Hiram W. Sibley steamer, which had been towing it.

Merryman was below deck aboard his 33-foot Owens cruiser on Sept. 2 when Eliason saw a black shadow on the sonar.

"I knew it was an intact wreck," Eliason said.

The waves and wind became calm enough on Sept. 6 for the men to send a camera down to the depths of the lake.

Merryman, a member of the Great Lakes Shipwreck Preservation Society, said the organization will do what it can to preserve the ship. There's a wonder in seeing something that no one else has in a century, he added.

"It's a puzzle that's been solved," Merryman said.
Why does Mike Pence keep getting himself into such deplorable situations?

Donald Trump's vice-presidential nominee went on CNN on Monday evening, trying to make hay from Hillary Clinton's calling half of Trump's backers racists and other "deplorables." But the appearance backfired when Pence declined to label former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke "deplorable," saying, "I'm not in the name-calling business."

Duke expressed satisfaction with Pence's appearance. Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway, in an exquisite Freudian slip, said Tuesday morning on CNN that Pence should call Duke deplorable, "so that he doesn't get headlines saying, 'Mike Pence will not say Donald Trump [sic] is deplorable.' "

Later Tuesday, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) issued a statement urging Republicans to call Duke the D-word.

But Pence, appearing before the cameras with House GOP leaders at Republican National Committee headquarters, said he had no wish to amend his description of Duke.

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Pence allowed that the white nationalist is a "bad man" whose support "we do not want." But, he repeated, "I'm not in the name-calling business," he said, because "civility is essential" and "I'm also not going to validate the language that Hillary Clinton used."

House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and the other leaders nodded as Pence said these words. Perhaps they understand why a white supremacist is deserving of "civility" at a time when Trump has dispensed with such niceties for everybody else -- and why it's name-calling to identify Duke as "deplorable" but not to call him a "bad man."

Such awkward positions have become routine for Pence since joining Trump on the ticket. I've always thought him an honorable and amiable man, and I accept his friends' assessment that he took the job in hopes of changing Trump. Instead, it seems that Trump has changed him.

There was Pence, once a hawkish conservative, joining Trump last week in praise of Vladimir Putin, calling him "a stronger leader in his country than Barack Obama has been in this country." (Maybe that has something to do with Putin being a dictator?)

There was Pence last month joining Trump in spreading conspiracy theories, declaring on talk radio that "we've got to get to the bottom" of whether an Iranian scientist was killed because of "the revelations in Hillary Clinton's email." The executed scientist, Shahram Amiri, had outed himself.

There was Pence in July, retreating from his support of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, embracing Trump's border wall and saying Mexico will "absolutely" pay for it. That same month, Pence, who once called Trump's proposed ban on Muslims entering the country "offensive and unconstitutional," declared himself "very supportive" of suspending immigration from countries with terrorist influences.

The vice-presidential nominee has picked his battles with Trump. He declined to join Trump in asking Russia to hack Clinton's email, or in raising doubts that President Obama was born in the United States. Pence endorsed both Ryan and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) in their primaries when Trump wouldn't.

In this, he is very much like the man he stood with at the RNC on Tuesday, Ryan, who has condemned Trump for his "textbook" racism, for an "anti-Semitic" and "ridiculous" tweet, and for his praise of Putin.

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But as polls show Trump cutting Clinton's lead, Ryan swallowed any misgivings Tuesday morning and embraced the ticket almost as enthusiastically as Pence had. "We feel the wind at our backs," said Ryan, introducing Pence, his former congressional colleague, as "the next vice president."

Indeed, Pence and the House leaders made it plain at their joint session Tuesday that they were wholly and unreservedly embracing Trump.

Reporters crowded into a stifling RNC lobby where the party displays memorabilia of party greats and not-so-greats (a portrait of Abraham Lincoln shares equal billing with a photo of RNC Chairman Reince Priebus) and listened to GOP leaders recite Trump's slogan:

Steve Scalise (La.), the majority whip, saw "people all around the country excited about this optimism that their ticket, the Trump-Pence ticket, is giving to making America great again."

Kevin McCarthy (Calif.), the tongue-tied majority leader, detected "a lot of excitement as [Pence] travels across the country with a number of members joining him in the future of making America great again."

Pence accepted their accolades and thanked House Republicans for "rallying to the cause to make America great again."

A reporter asked Pence about Ryan's earlier criticism of Trump. Pence dismissed the occasional "differences of opinion," saying "our goals are identical."

That's increasingly true  because Pence and other Republicans have embraced Trump's goals.

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Dana Milbank is a columnist for the Washington Post.
WASHINGTON  She didn't want to say she was sick.

Hillary Clinton, that is, who recently has suffered coughing fits followed Sunday by a near collapse during New York's 9/11 memorial ceremony. She left the ceremony early, claiming over-heatedness, and appeared to weave, lose her footing and pitch forward as she approached her car, as captured on a mobile phone video.

Later in the day, Clinton's campaign announced that the Democratic candidate has pneumonia.

Most by now are familiar with the fallout  speculation about her health, concerns about her "transparency" in not reporting her illness sooner  all amid the furor over Clinton's weird comment at a fundraiser about half of Donald Trump's followers belonging in a "basket of deplorables."

Say what?

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Other than being one of the strangest combination of words ever uttered, where did Clinton come up with such verbiage? Here's the partial quote in question: "You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump's supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right? The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic -- you name it."

Since when does she like to use such words, which don't sound at all like Clinton? She's too studied and cautious to randomly toss out a phrase that, in addition to being offensive and inevitably problematic, has a somewhat poetic edge. A tisket, a tasket, are those deplorables in your basket?

Perhaps, the phrase, certain to become a campaign metaphor for "Uh-oh," evolved during a brainstorming session with folks who wouldn't dare censor their boss: Basket of deplorables, hilarious! OMG, you should use that!

Clinton's basket may as well have been delivered to Trump with a bottle of champagne and a bow. As she began apologizing for speaking too broadly about too many Americans  suffering the inevitable comparison to Mitt Romney's 47 percent  Trump glided along the unfamiliar terrain of the high road.

Rather than harp on the already popular trope that Clinton isn't physically strong enough to be president, he said he hopes she recovers soon so that they can meet in debate. About this, Trump didn't have to feign sincerity, figuring he'll have a better shot at defeating Clinton than he would Joe Biden, Tim Kaine, or some other sudden substitute. But mainly, he calculates  or has been instructed  that attacking a woman when she's literally down would get him nowhere.

Then again, it's hardly necessary to point out Clinton's physical frailties, temporary though they are, when the woman is so plainly suffering. Replay after replay shows the coughing fit and then the weave-and-bob of her 9/11 episode. Anchors and commentators hit auto-pundit to produce the question du jour: Can this woman handle the presidency? Please. This woman has a bad cold. She needs a rest. She'll be fine.

Another question also arose, at least in many women's minds: Would anyone ask the same question about a man under similar circumstances? Here's the more pertinent question: Why do women feel they can't admit to being sick? You know the answer. It's because women fear showing any sign of weakness lest others presume the worst -- that she's not as good as a man.

As the weaker sex, which is only true as concerns upper body muscle mass (about 40 percent less) and significantly less testosterone (hence less invading, marauding and pillaging), women tend to hide anything that might suggest "weaker sex." This is absurd on its face, but it also happens to be true.

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Thus, Clinton soldiered on, trying to keep to schedule despite feeling awful, and paid a high price for denial. Her silence about the pneumonia wasn't so much a lack of transparency, as news gazers have extrapolated, as it was a valiant attempt to stay the course and preclude exactly what happened. People began to wonder about her health. Critics found it easy to conclude: She's weak; she's frail; she's a woman, after all.

When did it become a liability to be sick, which all of us are from time to time? For women, it began when they entered the male-dominated workplace en masse a generation ago and worked twice as hard to be as good as a man. This likely is why Clinton would rather suffer in silence than endure further scrutiny about her ability to serve -- a deplorable reality deserving of its own basket.

Kathleen Parker is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for the Washington Post.
A Sept. 3 Post-Bulletin article reported the closing of Catholic Charities of St. Cloud's pregnancy and adoption program. While we are saddened by this news, I want to remind your readers that our Catholic Charities office in Rochester and in six other offices across southern Minnesota provided pregnancy, parenting and adoption services to more than 1,000 people last year.

Pregnancy and adoption services have been at the core of our mission since Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Winona was incorporated in 1947.

Our pregnancy, parenting and adoption program provides supportive, professional and compassionate pregnancy counseling to women experiencing an unplanned pregnancy so that they can thoughtfully decide between either parenting or adoption and confidently pursue the best plan for themselves and their babies.

Social workers are available 24/7/365 on our pregnancy line at 800-222-5859. We also work with couples looking to adopt an infant and grow their family. While there has been a national decrease in the number of birthparents choosing to place a child for adoption over the years, adoption continues to be a loving and positive option for many.

Catholic Charities serves people of all faiths. We continue to see a need for compassionate, timely help and we are committed to meeting this need for women and their unborn children.

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Sarah Vetter

Director of Pregnancy, Parenting and Adoption, Catholic Charities Diocese of Winona

Winona
Congressional candidate Jim Moylan will not let truth or distortions stop him from saying anything to get elected. It is up to political analy Read morePolitical ploys at the last part of election?
Sometimes you really have to hand it to Donald Trump. The press has been after him recently about whether he believes the Hillary Clinton campaigns claim that Barack Obama was not born in the U.S. For years, the press has obsessed on birtherism, considering it to be a major issue on a par, at least, with a lousy economy and pitiful defense policy. Last night the Trump campaign released a statement to the effect that Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.

This morning, Trump himself tweeted:

I am now going to the brand new Trump International, Hotel D.C. for a major statement.

Reporters assumed the statement would be about Obamas birthplace, and, sensing an opportunity to halt Hilarys decline in the polls, hurried to the Trump International en masse, with camera crews in tow. The cable news networks cleared time to broadcast the anticipated Trump humiliation live.

Instead, they were treated to 20 minutes of military figures endorsing Trump. Live, on CNN and MSNBC! Reporters responded in typically classy fashion. E.g, Glenn Thrush of Politico (author yesterday of 5 reasons Trump might fall in autumn):

18 months into this cable networks are still letting Trump hijack them for free airtime  ad time  by promising a "major announcement'  Glenn Thrush (@GlennThrush) September 16, 2016

This is a fking disgrace https://t.co/YtSjlt57Os  Glenn Thrush (@GlennThrush) September 16, 2016

Networks going to stick with Trump as he tries to cloak his racist birtherism in the herosim and service of these vets?  Eli Stokols (@EliStokols) September 16, 2016

Once again, the American news media gets totally played by Trump. Wall-to-wall coverage. Were all guilty.  Jim Roberts (@nycjim) September 16, 2016

Whats funny about this is that reporters were done in by their own partisan obsession with birtherism, the now-discredited suspicion that Obama was telling the truth when he claimed for many years to have been born in Kenya. Trumps tweet said not a word about it, but reporters let wishful thinking get the better of them.

To be fair, it isnt difficult to outsmart most reporters. But it is still fun to see it done in such epic fashion.

Via Drudge, who is riding high these days.
British-Nigerian rapper, Joseph Adenuga, better known as Skepta, was awarded the UKs prestigious Mercury Prize on Thursday for his album Konnichiwa, in recognition of a resurgent homegrown genre.

Skepta muscled out late rock legend, David Bowie, to clinch to top prize.

The award ceremony, which held at Londons Eventim Apollo, saw Skepta win the 25,000 award price for self-released album Konnichiwa, which covers topics including police harassment and his anger at British politics.

Skepta, who featured in Wizkids Ojuelegba remix, belongs to a Hip-hop genre called the Grime, a genre of music that emerged in England in the late 90s to early 2000s.

It is primarily a development of UK garage and jungle, accustomed with heavy instruments and is mostly homemade.

The internet has given a lot of opportunities to people who are not built for big corporations, he told the BBC after winning the award. It allows you to speak to fans directly. To make things from your bedroom and give it to them.
The Nigerian Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) on Wednesday accused politicians and top government officials of frustrating efforts to expose the real owners of companies in Nigerias extractive industry.

Beneficial ownership is the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) principle requiring persons who, directly or indirectly, ultimately owns or controls the corporate entity and assets in extractive industry to disclose their full identity to the public.

Although Nigerian laws do not convey specific obligations for beneficial ownership disclosure, the NEITI multi-stakeholder group (MSG) in 2013 volunteered to join 11 other EITI-implementing countries to pilot reporting in the oil, gas and mining sectors.

NEITI said it was convinced beneficial ownership disclosure would push the frontiers of transparency and accountability in the extractive industry along with other benefits to the country.

But, NEITI Executive Secretary, Waziri Adio, said efforts to enforce the principle in the industry has largely been frustrated by operators through long delays and outright refusal to complete the required documents.

When government officials and politically connected individuals seek to profit from a countrys mineral assets, they do so using fronts and ownership structures that do not provide sufficient information about the true identities of the natural persons behind the title, Mr. Adio said.

The lack of transparency allows influential officials to use their positions to extract maximum rent from a countrys mineral resources with minimum or no benefit to the citizens, he stated.

Mr. Adio was speaking through the director of communications, NEITI, Ogbonnaya Orji, at the Round-table on Oil Industry Reforms organised by the Africa Network for Environment and Economic Justice (ANEEJ).

To frustrate the benefits of beneficial ownership disclosure, the NEITI scribe said owners of some of the companies refuse outright to complete and return templates provided for personal details, while politically exposed persons and senior government officials use surrogates as fronts.

Besides, he said most owners of corporate entities fail to produce information on other companies they own, since they perceived beneficial ownership as attempt to witch-hunt.

Where information on such companies are provided, Mr. Adio said there were discrepancies with information filed in the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC).

Other challenges include violation of the confidential agreements with companies in publishing names of beneficial owners; difficulty reaching owners of the companies for updated contact details and absence of statutory obligation to disclose the identity of business owners.

NEITI said an update on compliance with the principle showed 40 out of the 44 companies covered by the 2012 oil and gas audit report returned the completed beneficial ownership templates they were issued.

Out of the number, 10 of the companies were wholly-owned subsidiaries of publicly listed international oil companies (IOCs), while 30 others were firms affiliated to Nigerians requiring cross checking of their owners details with the CAC for accuracy and reliability.

Under the solid minerals sector, the transparency agency said out of 65 companies covered by the report, three were publicly listed companies, with 22 either not reporting at all or made very scanty disclosures about their owners identities.

To check abuses, NEITI said government should establish a legal framework on ownership disclosure in the country, and ensure beneficial ownership reporting started with the extractive sector, based on NEITIs reports.

Ownership disclosure should be incorporated in the Petroleum Industry Governance Bill before the Senate, NEITI said. The executive should engage the National Assembly and civil society to put pressure on beneficial ownership disclosure.

Other remedial measures include better automation of records, while bidders for extractive industries operating licenses and contracts concessions, production arrangements and other agreements should be required to declare the beneficial ownership of the shares in the bidding companies.

Executive director, ANEEJ, David Ugolor, noted NEITIs commitment to the pursuit of beneficial ownership in the extractive industry.

He said the round-table was an attempt to see how civil society groups could contribute to actualize the idea, to avoid the mistakes of the past.

We are also interested in how to take the issues usually generated by NEITI audit reports forward. We are aware that the attempt by successive administrations to pull through with the PIB has been unsuccessful, Mr. Ugolor said.
Concerned about the fate of the kidnapped Chibok girls, President Muhammadu Buhari approved a prisoner swap with the Boko Haram, barely two months after he was sworn in, an official has said.

The Minister of Information, Lai Mohammed, said on Friday during a press conference that the prisoner swap was agreed to in July 2015, two months after Mr. Buhari was sworn-in on May 29, 2015.

Precisely on 17th July, 2015, the DSS opened negotiations process with the group holding the Chibok girls, the minister said.

However, in return for the release of some of these girls, the group also made some demands. These included the release of some of their fighters arrested including some involved in major terrorist actions, resulting in several fatalities, and others who were experts in manufacture of locally assembled explosives.

Mr. Mohammed added that, This was difficult to accept, but appropriate security agencies had to again inform Mr. President of these demands, and its viewed implications.

Again Mr. President gave his assent believing that the overall release of these girls remains paramount and sacrosanct.

In his speech distributed to the media, Mr. Mohammed said the swap did not work because the terror group reneged on the agreement and made more demands.

Mr. Mohammeds statement on Friday is the first detailed explanation by any government official on concrete steps being taken to free the over 200 girls kidnapped from the secondary school in Chibok in April 2014.

The Buhari administration has faced heavy criticisms for its handling of the kidnap as well as its handling of protests asking it to do more to free the girls.

On Friday, Mr. Mohammed reiterated the administrations commitment to ensure the kidnapped girls are freed.

The Government and its security agencies remain committed to ensuring that the Chibok girls are safely released in fulfillment of the Presidential mandate, he said.

Read Mr. Mohammeds full speech below:

Good afternoon, gentlemen of the press.

2. Members of the public may recall that when the present administration came on board, Mr. President pledged to Nigerians to ensure the security of lives and property of every Nigerian, provide employment for the nations teeming youths and fight corruption. Since that time, the security agencies have been saddled with the responsibility of dealing with the threat of terrorism which has ravaged most parts of the Northern region.

3. You will also recall that from the physical destruction of communities and strategic institutions, the terrorist elements also engaged in abduction of women and children in the affected parts. Most painful was the abduction of the School girls in Chibok at the twilight of the past administration in 2014. When Mr. President assumed leadership of this country, he immediately directed security agencies to urgently fashion out strategies to trace, locate and ensure the safe and successful release of the Chibok girls. This was the mandate given to security agencies.

4. Gentlemen, it was consequent upon this directive that the security agencies, comprising of the Nigerian Army, Air Force, Navy, Police and the DSS, commenced action in June 2015. To this effect also, the DSS established a special tactical unit to review the gamut of actions so far carried out to secure the release of the Chibok girls, establish why the action has recorded no success as it were and to present a roadmap for possible success.

5. In this process, the DSS and the other security agencies observed the following:

a. Many persons or groups posing as negotiators actually had no veritable intelligence nor the reach to facilitate the release of the Chibok girls;

b. The efforts were clouded by persons with very partisan interests and whose main objective was solely to score cheap political points. It was obvious their approach had no relevance to the release of the girls;

c. Some informants or persons volunteering to be negotiators or facilitators saw and treated the girls fate and indeed the situation as a conduit to enrich themselves, thus making the whole thing a pecuniary venture; and

d. As a result of the conflicting and partisan interests, issues were muddled up to the extent that reasonable and fruitful leads either failed or simply came too late for any useful action.

6. It was therefore found that in the midst of these strong competing interests and unnecessary rivalries, nothing was achieved before the 2015 handover date. It was based on these that the security agencies set out to work for the release of the girls.

7. First, there was the need to identify those with relevant intelligence on the groups holding the girls, as well as establish sources of contact in touch with the group. This exercise was found not to be an easy task. On those holding the Chibok girls, there was also a high level of mistrust, as they too found many approaches or groups claiming to be in touch with them as false or unreliable.

8. In this new bid, many offers ranging from credible, not credible to outright off-mark information came to the Government. Some international bodies and countries also provided leads. It was out of this that relevant security agencies were able to strike a chord. By the third week of July 2015, a contact group was in touch with credible assets who had the reach, and who attested to the fact that some of the Chibok girls were alive. Mr. President was then briefed of these assets and intelligence and he gave his assent for further negotiations on the Chibok girls.

9. Precisely on 17th July, 2015, the DSS opened negotiations process with the group holding the Chibok girls. However, in return for the release of some of these girls, the group also made some demands. These included the release of some of their fighters arrested including some involved in major terrorist actions, resulting in several fatalities, and others who were experts in manufacture of locally assembled explosives. This was difficult to accept, but appropriate security agencies had to again inform Mr. President of these demands, and its viewed implications. Again Mr. President gave his assent believing that the overall release of these girls remains paramount and sacrosanct.

10. Meanwhile, following the above development, Government and the security agencies had sufficient leverage to work out the modalities of the swap. These included creating the safe haven, or necessary place of swap and working out the logistic details. Based on this, the DSS availed other critical sister agencies of this new situation. Immediately, the Nigerian Army and the Air Force sent some specialists to commence a detailed arrangement for the swap. This was during the last week of July 2015 and 1st week of August 2015. The officers representing the various agencies worked out the logistic details, such as the number of persons to be swapped i.e. number of girls and detainees to be exchanged, the vehicles and aircraft, as well as safeguards, i.e. safety of the persons, including the location of the swap.

11. When it was finally agreed by all parties, Mr. President was again informed that the preparations were concluded, and the first step for the swap would commence on 1st August, 2015. Mr. President robustly gave his approval.

12. On 4th August, 2015, the persons who were to be part of the swap arrangements and all others involved in the operation were transported to Maiduguri, Borno State. This team, with the lead facilitator, continued the contact with the group holding the Chibok girls. The Service was able to further prove to the group its sincerity, as it established communication contact between it and its detained members. All things were in place for the swap which was mutually agreed. Expectations were high. Unfortunately, after more than two (2) weeks of negotiation and bargains, the group, just at the dying moments, issued new set of demands, never bargained for or discussed by the group before the movement to Maiduguri. All this while, the security agencies waited patiently. This development stalled what would have been the first release process of the Chibok girls.

13. It may be important to note that in spite of this setback, the government and the security agencies have not relented in the bid to ensure that the Chibok girls are released safely. By the month of November, precisely 13th November, 2015, another fresh negotiation process with the group was initiated. This time, there was the need to discuss a fresh component in other to avoid issues that had stalled the former arrangement. There were however some problems that many may not discern, but should be expected in this kind of situation. Some critical persons within the group who played such vital role in August, 2015 were discovered to be dead during combat action or as a result of the emerging rift amongst members of the group then. These two factors delayed the process. In spite of these, negotiation continued on new modalities.

14. By 30th November, 2015 it was becoming glaring that the division amongst the group was more profound. This affected the swap process. By 10th December, 2015, another negotiation process was in place, but this failed to achieve results because of the varying demands by the group.

15. Gentlemen of the press, the security agencies since the beginning of 2016 have not only remained committed but have also taken the lead to resolve the Chibok girls issue. In spite of the current division amongst members of the terrorist group, which has seriously affected efforts to release the girls, renewed efforts have commenced using our trusted assets and facilitators. However, this job requires diligence and ability to deal with a group that can easily change its demands without notice.

16. Officers and men have sacrificed their time and energy, and some have already paid the supreme price since the abduction of the Chibok girls, fighting for the safe release of the girls. Many friendly countries and organizations have equally been very forthcoming in providing their human and technological resources to assist in the process. They are still doing so. We cannot as a nation ignore these sacrifices.

17. The Government and its security agencies remain committed to ensuring that the Chibok girls are safely released in fulfillment of the Presidential mandate. Let me emphasise that Government appreciates the resilience of Nigerians in the fight against insurgency and terrorism, and will continue to call on fellow Nigerians to hold that much is ahead and therefore support Mr. Presidents resolve on this matter. I cannot end this without appealing to the parents and relatives of the Chibok girls. We are with you; we feel your pains and shall not relent until we succeed in bringing home our girls and every other citizen abducted by the group. It is important to appeal to all those who have shown concern in resolving this matter to continue to trust the efforts of Government to deal with the situation.
Former First Lady, Patience Jonathan, on Thursday said the decision by four companies linked to her to plead guilty in a corruption trial on Monday, was a conspiracy to confiscate her money and humiliate her.

Mrs. Jonathan said the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission plotted with unknown persons to carry out the desperate act.

The allegations were contained in a statement released by her lawyers shortly after four companies pleaded guilty before the Lagos Division of the Federal High Court.

The four companies are Pluto Property and Investment Company Limited, Sea Gate Property Development and Investment Company Limited; Trans Ocean Property and Investment Company Limited; and Avalon Global Property Development Company Limited.

Chima Osuji, a counsel to Mrs. Jonathan, said her client was the one who first took issues with the EFCC for allegedly freezing her account without following due process.

This is a clear evidence of the desperation of the prosecution to pull down the former First Lady and confiscate her hard-earned money, Mr. Osuji said.

It is an irony: it was the former First Lady who went to court for the repatriation of her confiscated money when she realised that the EFCC and its co-travellers were playing politics with this issue after she had come out publicly to say that the money belongs to her and that she has all evidence to prove the sources of her money.

Up till this very moment, EFCC has refused to interrogate or invite her for questioning, Mr. Osuji said.

Mr. Osuji said the law demands that appropriate identification must be verified before anyone could stand as representative of a firm, a procedure he said the EFCC failed to follow when the agency brought four individuals to enter pleas before a court.

Mrs. Jonathan slammed the EFCC for tissues of lies being churned out by the agency in respect of her case.

Mrs. Jonathan said she was not a director, shareholder, promoter and/or participant in any of the four companies now under trial, adding that shes only interest in the case because she was the sole signatory to all the said accounts, contrary to the fabrication that she used her driver and cook as proxies.

EFCC spokesman, Wilson Uwujiaren, said Mrs. Jonathan should approach the courts if he felt agrieved about the agencys actions.

If she is unhappy about proceedings in court, she has the right to seek redress, Mr. Uwujiaren said.
The Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN, has said that the countrys power generation has increased from 3,810 megawatts recorded on September 8, 2016 to 4,285.90 megawatts on Friday.

The News Agency of Nigeria reports that the power generation record was reported in the website of Nigerian Electricity System Operator on Friday.

The TCN said that 4,285.90 megawatts was the total output by power generation companies, and had been transferred to the 11 distribution companies across the country.

Electricity generation in the country has been stable in the last two months, rising from about 2, 983 megawatts to over 4, 000 megawatts.

Although power has improved, many parts of the country have remained with poor supply owing to problems with the distribution companies, including provision of pre-payment meters.

The Acting Chairman of Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC, Anthony Akah, recently disclosed that no fewer than four million electricity consumers in the country were awaiting supply of the meters.

Mr. Akah said that although the commission had improved on metering system, unavailability of meter manufacturing companies was hindering the maximum provision of the product to Nigerians.

He said the commission would sanction any distribution company which failed to comply with directives relating to the distribution of meters.

(NAN)
President Muhammadu Buhari will on Monday hold talks with world leaders at the United Nations General Assembly in New York on security issues and restructuring of Nigerias economy.

The president is expected to discuss with the leaders steps to improve the rehabilitation of Internally Displaced Persons within the country, as well as returning in north-eastern Nigeria and the Niger-Delta.

Also, the increase in the activities of militants within oil-rich Niger Delta region has had its effects on the nations economy, in addition to the prolonged terrorism in North East of the country.

A statement by Mr. Buharis special assistant on Media and publicity, Femi Adesina, said the president will be attending the UNGA meeting from Monday, September 19 to Friday September 23, to address cogent matters affecting the nations polity.

On the margins of the 71st UNGA, President Buhari will sign the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, and participate in activities commemorating the 30th anniversary of the Declaration of the Right to Development.

The Nigerian leader will attend the Clinton Global Initiative as well as the United Nations Private Sector Forum on Business and Global Goals organised by the Secretary General.

He will lead discussions at the United States-Africa Business Forum devoted to investing in Nigeria, the statement said.

The president will also deliver a talk on climate change: Taking Climate Action Towards Sustainable Development in Nigeria and the Lake Chad Basin.
The National Union of Air Transport Employees, NUATE, has urged the Federal Government to immediately halt its plan to concession the four major airports in the country.

The union made this known in an eight-point communique issued at its National Executive Council, NEC, meeting held in Ilorin, Kwara.

A copy of the communique, which was signed by NUATEs General Secretary, Olayinka Abioye, was made available to journalists in Lagos on Thursday.

The Minister of State for Aviation, Hadi Sirika, had on September 6, told journalists that there was no going back on the concession of the Lagos, Abuja, Kano and Port Harcourt Airports.

Mr. Sirika had argued that the move would ensure that the airports were properly managed, while the government would still retain their ownership.

Mr. Abioyes communique faulted the plan to concession the four airports which it described as the cash-cow out of the 22 airports owned by the Federal Government.

The NEC in-session therefore calls for immediate stoppage of the concession of Nigerian airports to avoid industrial crisis that may arise as the government has failed to carry along stakeholders on this germane matter, he said.

He urged the aviation agencies, including the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority and the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA), to improve the welfare of their workers.

Mr. Abioye also advised government to appoint a substantive managing director for NAMA and restructure its directorates in consonance with the provisions of the International Civil Aviation Organisation.

On the state of the economy, the communique advised the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration to take more concrete steps toward alleviating poverty across the nation.

The NEC in-session sympathises with the government over the continued slide to recession of the nations economy but encourages it to remain focused in its quest for nation building.

This can be achieved by engaging more in social dialogue with critical stakeholders in the country and setting the machinery in motion to deploy experts into freeing our economy from the jaws of economic recession, he added.

(NAN)
AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), an NGO, says no fewer than 3.4 million people are living with HIV and AIDS in the country and only 700,000 persons have access to treatment.

Adetayo Towolawi, the Countrys Programme Manager, made this known in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria(NAN) on Friday, in Abuja.

He said the figure was worrisome as Nigerias population was about 170 million people with the second highest burden of HIV in Africa after South Africa.

Towolawi said there were still a huge number of persons who do not have access to treatment further urging the Federal Government to scale up funding in HIV response.

Funding is still a huge challenge, there is a requirement by UNAIDS for Nigeria to contribute into the global funds of 13 billion dollar target.

If our funding continues the way it is now, over 20 million people will die between now and 2030.

This tells us that about 20 million people are yet to have access to treatment, he said.

Towolawi said in eliminating HIV and AIDS by 2030, there was need for the government to fulfill its promise of funding, testing and treatment in order to put the virus under control.

He advised the government not to be dependent on donor partners, adding that South African government funds 80 per cent of its domestic programmes.

The programme manager further said that South Africa presently runs the biggest Anti-retroviral (ARV) treatment programme in the world.

The Nigeria government needs to express the political will and step up domestic funding.

Today the world is getting complacent and we are beginning to see HIV and AIDS like any other diseases, if those tested positive are not placed on drugs, they will certainly die.

 Nigeria is more donor dependent, and the government needs to invest in HIV to achieve a wealthy economy through a healthy population, he added.

Towolawi expressed concern over the countrys low HIV testing uptake, saying that about 60 per cent of Nigerians do not still know their HIV status.

He said for a country targeting 50 per cent testing coverage, a robust community testing drive was needed to bridge the yawning gap.

According to him, a lot of progress has been made, however, achieving an AIDS-free generation was possible if more people knew their status and those found positive placed on treatment.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that AIDS Healthcare Foundation is the largest non-profit HIV and AIDS organisation in the world providing health care to over 650,000 patients in 36 countries.

AHF Nigeria has been operating in Nigeria since 2011 and present in six states across the country. (NAN)
Students from Ekiti State who sat for the 2016 June/July Senior School Certificate Examination trumped their counterparts in the exam, the newly released results by the National Examination Council showed.

The result was announced on Friday by Charles Uwakwe, NECO Registrar.

The exams body said Edo State came second while Abia and Kogi States occupied the third place.

An analysis of the result across the 36 states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory indicated that Ekiti State topped all others with 96.485 of its candidates that sat for the examination coming out victorious, Mr. Uwakwe said. Edo state was second with 96.31% while Abia and Kogi were joint third, the Registrar said.

This years results also showed that 88.51 per cent of the overall candidates had five credits in English and Mathematics, marking a one per cent improvement in the overall performance of candidates over 2015 results.

Mr. Uwakwe said the 88.51 per cent (905, 011) had credits in the exam out of a total 1, 022, 474 candidates from Nigeria and other countries.

About 84.54 per cent of the candidates scored credit pass and above in English Language and 80.16 per cent obtained credit pass and above in Mathematics, Mr. Uwakwe said.

Mr. Uwakwe said NECO detect exam malpractices in about 194 centers, while 14 schools have been deregistered for similar offences.

Mr. Uwakwe said the improvement in this years results showed that his predecessors efforts have now started yielding good outcome, and promised to improve the current standards.

I want to solicit for support from all our stakeholders. NECO should be seen as a Nigerian baby that requires the care and support of all to enable her attain that first class international status, Mr. Uwakwe said. We are working hard to ensure NECO makes her mark in the global assessment industry.

Mr. Uwakwe urged candidates who sat for the exam to check their results on NECO website.
The Lagos Division of the Federal High Court, Friday, held that it lacked jurisdiction to entertain a suit challenging President Muhammadu Buharis appointment of Hameed Ali as Nigeria Customs Comptroller-General.

Judge Muslim Hassan said the applicant, Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa, lacks the locus standi to initiate the suit.

The appropriate thing to do is to decline jurisdiction and strike out the suit on the grounds of jurisdiction, said Mr. Hassan.

Mr. Adegboruwa, a human rights lawyer, filed the suit in November last year challenging the appointment of Mr. Ali as head of the Customs.

Mr. Ali, a retired colonel, was appointed Comptroller-General of Customs in August last year.

According to the lawyer, the appointment failed to comply with Section 3 of the Official Gazette of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 2002, and therefore should be nullified.

The gazette stipulates that only those within the rank of Deputy Comptroller-General of Customs can be elevated as substantive Comptroller-General.

In response to Mr. Adegboruwa, the Nigeria Customs had argued that the lawyer lacked the locus standi to file the suit.

The agency described the suit as a mere academic exercise since Mr. Adegboruwa was neither a Customs officer nor did he disclose he had suffered injuries by Mr. Alis appointment.

On Friday, the judge largely agreed with the government agency adding that Mr. Adegboruwa also failed to show he was among those qualified to hold the Comptroller-General position.

The judge also said the presidents power of appointment is not subject to any official gazette.

A careful reading of the provisions of Sections 5 and 171 of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria clearly shows that the president is clearly vested with the power to appoint the Comptroller-General, said Mr. Hassan.

The judge, however, commended Mr. Adegboruwa for his efforts at keeping the government on its toes.

Speaking to journalists outside the court room, Mr. Adegboruwa said the court failed to address the main issue raised in the suit, but struck it out based on technicality.

With all due respect, I believe that as a Nigerian, as a tax payer, as an activist, and as a lawyer, I have an interest and stake in who is appointed to any public office in Nigeria, as to whether the president has by-passed any law, Mr. Adegboruwa said.

When we get a copy of the judgement, next week, well study it and compare the reasonings and conclusions contained in the judgment and decide whether indeed theres going to be an opportunity to challenge it in an upper court.

The message we are sending to the president is that we must follow due process, the rule of law, and once theres a provision established by law, we must follow that provision.
The Minister of Finance, Kemi Adeosun, on Friday explained why President Muhammadu Buhari is seeking the National Assemblys approval for some emergency economic powers.

The minister, who was briefing the media on efforts by the federal government to navigate the countrys economy out of recession, said unusual times need unusual measures.

With the economy in recession, analysts say the country can ill-afford the luxury of time in search solutions to bring the economy out of the woods.

Mrs. Adeosun, who said the government was aware of the pain Nigerians were experiencing, said President Buhari was in a hurry to get the economy out of the recession as soon as possible.

It is a tough time. But, there is hope for Nigerians, she said. Government is doing everything to ensure the country comes out in a sustainable way, so we never get back here again by addressing the infrastructure challenges.

The government has a very credible plan. Its going to result in an economy not dependent on oil, and not subject to the boom and burst of oil price. When oil price is high, we are happy, and when low we are sad.

To address the challenge of infrastructure, which the minister identified as the governments biggest problem, Mrs. Adeosun said the long procurement process must be cut down drastically to speed contract awards.

The procurement process was put in place for normal times  advertise, give three months, send in bids, evaluate bids and so on and so forth.

There are some provisions in the procurement process for emergency situations. That emergency process means you would not necessarily have to advertise and wait.

So, what government is asking for, which is why there is discussion about seeking emergency powers, are some of these things we have to look at now, she said.

In view of the peculiar situation of the economy and the need to get basic infrastructure in place to drive economic recovery, she said the government could hardly afford advertising for jobs for 12 weeks.

Thats what government is seeking for. But, we need legislative approval to do so. Given where we are, thats one thing the National Assembly would happily grant us the ability to do.

Its still important we should have open procurement. Open procurement would give the best pricing and the best opportunities to Nigerians who do not know anybody in government.

What we need is speed. That is why we want the National Assembly to help us with. We dont have the powers to truncate the law. These are unusual times, which need unusual measures, the minister said.
Members of the Akwa Ibom State House of Assembly have renewed the call for financial autonomy for state legislature in Nigeria.

The lawmakers, who spoke after a three-day retreat in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, asked their colleagues in other houses of assembly in the country to take advantage of the ongoing constitutional amendment by the national assembly, to advocate for financial autonomy for state legislatures.

Such autonomy would give distinct identity to state legislature, and also provide it with the independence to discharge its functions effectively, said a communique issued, Thursday, in Port Harcourt by the lawmakers.

The communique, which was read to journalists by the Chairman, House Committee on Information, Ime Okon, said there was need for the legislature to be properly recognized as a lawmaking body, and be better funded.

The role of the legislature, in the consideration of appropriation bills, should be holistic to include sectoral increase, reduction, and inclusion of projects and programmes of felt public needs not captured in the budget by the executive, the communique said.

The lawmakers asked that laws passed by state assemblies and assented to by state governors be enrolled at the state judiciaries for ease of reference and other judicial purposes.

They suggested the creation of a special forum where select members of the leadership of each arm could meet and exchange ideas on the effectiveness or otherwise of some legislations.

The Speaker of the state House of Assembly, Onofiok Luke, said the retreat, which had the assembly staff also in attendance, was for capacity building that would aide in better legislation.

The retreat was organized by the assembly in collaboration with the National Institute of Legislative Studies.

The 36 state houses of assembly in the country, in 2014, submitted to the then senate president, David Mark, their resolutions in favour of financial autonomy to state legislature, for consideration in the amendment of the 1999 Constitution.
The Lagos State Government on Thursday said it had paid N740 million as outstanding compensation to communities within the Lekki Free Zone and Lekki-Epe International Airport site.

The states Commissioner for Commerce, Industry and Cooperatives, Rotimi Ogunleye, disclosed this at a news conference in Ikeja.

He said the communities were that of Parcel B of the zone, comprising Yegunda and Abomiti zones.

Before these parcels of land were acquired, they were being used for farming mostly by various families within those projects sites.

With the acquisition, there is bound to be compensation of the land-owning families after a comprehensive enumeration and valuation, Mr. Ogunleye said.

He said already, modalities were being put in place to ensure hitch-free payment, adding that the payment would be effected immediately.

He said the government had continued to engage the communities to convince them on the multiplier effects of the project in terms of employment generation and the socio-economic value on the lives of the people.

Mr. Ogunleye said the compensation was a continuous process, adding that N65 million was paid early this year for land owners affected by the ongoing Dangote projects in the zone.

He said before now, the host communities of the 3,000 hectares of land housing the zone, a company jointly owned by the state government and a consortium of Chinese investors, were heavily compensated.

Mr. Ogunleye said more land owners would be compensated in due course at the end of verification and valuation.

He assured both local and foreign investors that all projects in the zone were fully on course and urged more investors to come on board.

Within the free zone corridor, the government also conceptualised a deep seaport and an international airport as complementary project that will leverage on the massive production activities in the zone, with the added facilities for air and sea transportation.

He said the land acquired for the airport was about 4,000 hectares, while that of the deep seaport was about 590 hectares.

(NAN)
SAN FRANCISCO  U.S. safety regulators announced a formal recall of Samsungs Galaxy Note 7 smartphone Thursday after a spate of fires led to injuries and property damage and created a global marketing headache.

Samsung already had begun a voluntary recall, but the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission stepped in to coordinate. Commission Chairman Elliot Kaye blasted Samsung for trying to do the recall on its own, saying anyone who believes a unilateral effort would be sufficient needs to have more than their phone checked.

Stockton University bans use of Samsung Galaxy Note 7 after recall Stockton University issued an immediate campus ban on all Samsung Galaxy note 7 phones after

Samsung sold about 2.5 million of its top-line smartphone, including about 1 million in the United States. Kaye said the South Korean company has agreed to offer consumers the choice of a full refund or a replacement device. Before, Samsung was offering replacements only.

The recall comes as Samsung is locked in a fierce battle with Apple for the attentions of high-end smartphone purchasers. Apple just introduced the latest versions of its iPhone, which go on sale Friday.

Samsung had beaten Apple to market with the Note 7 by several weeks, and it was drawing favorable reviews before consumers began reporting problems with the battery overheating, resulting in fires and explosions.

One family in St. Petersburg, Florida, reported a Galaxy Note 7 left charging in their Jeep had caught fire, destroying the vehicle.

Samsung has received 92 reports of the batteries overheating in the U.S., including 26 reports of burns and 55 reports of property damage, said a statement on the U.S. commissions website. The statement said property damage included fires in cars and a garage.

Samsung pledged to expedite the recall. Consumer safety is always our highest priority, Tim Baxter, president of Samsung Electronics America, said Thursday.

The company has been criticized for its response over the past two weeks. Samsung announced on Sept. 2 that it had stopped selling the phone and would replace any that had been sold. But Samsung didnt tell consumers at the time to stop using the device. The company also did not immediately coordinate its recall with the U.S. consumer safety agency.

Since then, the Consumer Product Safety Commission has not only stepped in, but U.S. aviation safety officials have also taken the unusual step of warning airline passengers not to turn on or charge the phone during flights, or put them in checked bags.

Gartner analyst Tuong Nguyen said Samsungs statements left many customers confused.

Because it took a while, the messages were confusing, and that might have an impact on overall consumer confidence, especially since were talking about a high-end device, their flagship phone, Nguyen said.

People who bought the phone did so to get the best possible quality and service, he said, and how the recall came about kind of seems like a strike on both counts.

Samsung said Note 7 purchasers will be offered the choice of a refund or a replacement. For a replacement, customers can choose a new Note 7 when it is available again in the U.S. by Wednesday, or the smaller and cheaper Galaxy S7 or S7 Edge right away  with a refund of the price difference.

Speaking with reporters on Thursday, Kaye at the consumer safety commission said Note 7 purchasers should check the back of their device for an identifying number, and visit Samsungs recall website or call a hotline at 1-844-365-6197 to find out if the device needs to be turned in. If so, consumers can take the device back to Samsung or to the phone carrier that sold it. About 97 percent of phones sold in the U.S. are being recalled.

We want the recall to be simple and straightforward, Kaye said. Speaking of consumers, he added, We really do want them to take advantage of it right away. As weve seen from videos ... the phones really do present a serious fire hazard.
The General Electric logo is seen in a Sears store in Schaumburg, Illinois, September 8, 2014. REUTERS/Jim Young

By Alwyn Scott

NEW YORK (Reuters) - General Electric Co (GE.N) said it will receive $1.9 billion for a contract to supply steam turbines, generators and other equipment to the Hinkley Point C project, the United Kingdom's first new nuclear power plant in decades.

By approving Hinkley Point on Thursday, the UK government cleared the way for GE to begin building two 1,770-megawatt Arabelle steam turbines and generators capable of powering six million homes and supplying about 7 percent of the UK's power generation needs for 60 years, GE said. They will replace older coal-fired plants, GE said.

The government of British Prime Minister Theresa May approved the controversial 24 billion (18.17 billion pounds)project on Thursday, after putting it on hold in July.

GE had already been doing early engineering work on the project to build one of the largest nuclear plants in the world.

The U.S. industrial company acquired the contract and capability when it purchased the power assets of France's Alstom (ALSO.PA) last year. Alstom won the competition a few years ago, GE said.

The UK decision "confirms our technology leadership and it also confirms that it was not such a bad decision to buy Alstom," Andreas Lusch, chief executive officer of steam power systems at GE Power, said in an interview on Thursday.

New nuclear projects are slowly recovering after a steep drop following the 2011 Fukushima accident in Japan. GE is also bidding on nuclear competitions in Finland, South Africa, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, India and China, Lusch said.

"We are involved in all of those projects in the tendering phase," he said.

The UK government's agreement to move ahead with Hinkley Point also established a new UK investment policy aimed at giving the country greater control when foreign states are involved in buying stakes in "critical infrastructure" in the future.

The project, being built by French state-controlled utility company EDF (EDF.PA), includes an $8 billion investment from Chinese state-backed firm China General Nuclear Power Corporation (IPO-CGNP.HK).

EDF said it had agreed with the UK government that it would not sell its controlling stake in the project, raising concern among some analysts about EDF's risk profile.

(Reporting by Alwyn Scott; Editing by Bernard Orr)
In a move that would gut the historic Abbott vs. Burke decision on funding public schools, Gov. Chris Christie is asking the state Supreme Court to waive its previous decisions and give the Education Commissioner the authority to bypass teacher contracts.

But the attorney who has defended children in the Abbott districts called the appeal without merit and said the court has previously rejected similar requests.

In a lawsuit announced Thursday, the state Attorney Generals office says that lesson learned from the Abbott decisions is that more money does not equal more achievement. It says that the current approach to funding must be reconsidered, especially as it concerns recruiting and retaining the best teachers.

The proposal would allow the state to overrule last in, first out and other provisions in teacher contracts that the complaint says allows less effective teachers to remain simply because they have more tenure.

The affected districts, now called School Development Authority, or SDA districts, include Pleasantville, Vineland, Millville and Bridgeton.

The lawsuit calls for the court to maintain funding at currently levels while the legislature and governor develop a new system that is fair and constitutionally sound for the 2017-18 school year.

Christie has proposed a funding formula that would provide the same amount of state aid, about $6,500 per student, to every child in the state regardless where they live. Local Abbott districts could lose about half of their state aid under that proposal, while wealthier districts that currently get little state aid would benefit.

On Thursday the state Senate approved a proposal by Senate president Steve Sweeney, D-Gloucester, Salem, Cumberland, to establish a State School Aid Funding Fairness Commission to review the current formula and recommend changes.

David Sciarra of the Education Law Center, which has defended the Abbott districts, said in a statement that the governor is trying to do an end-run around the state Legislature.

The Supreme Court has already rejected the exact request the Governor is putting before them today, Sciarra said citing a 2011 decision on the case. He said the ELC will vigorously oppose the appeal and ask for its immediate dismissal.

If the Governor wants further changes to teacher tenure, evaluation and layoff rules, he must first take them to the Legislature for consideration and adoption, Sciarra said.

The New Jersey Education Association president Wendell Steinhauer called the appeal frivolous and an attempt to distract the public from the Bridgegate scandal.

Christie wants to gut the best public schools in the nation to advance a partisan agenda that puts politicians ahead of children, Steinhauer said in a a statement. He wants to strip funding from New Jerseys most economically challenged communities to give tax breaks to his wealthy neighbors in Mendham and other communities like it.

Millville superintendent David Gentile said the Abbott decision was a small step in the right direction to level the playing field for the states impoverished students.

Any action against that is dangerous, he said. It is not a coincidence that state tests scores directly correlate with the socioeconomic status of a childs zip code. The former Abbott districts need more resources not less.

Vineland superintendent Mary Gruccio said the district is blessed with rich diversity and students who possess amazing potential.

 Any repeal of Abbott funding shall only serve to curtail the growth and development of bright and deserving children who only seek the same opportunities for career and life success as young people in other New Jersey communities, she said.

Contact: 609-272-7241

Twitter @ACPressDamico
Renee Zellweger is charming as ever in "Bridget Jones's Baby," a lively return to form for the unlikely trilogy about an ordinary woman and her professional and romantic woes. It turns out a little break is just what this series needed to find its footing after the manic missteps of "Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason," which fell into some of the all-too-common traps of sequels looking to up the stakes (hello, Thailand prison sequence).

That's likely due to the fact Sharon Maguire, who directed the practically perfect "Bridget Jones's Diary," is back (Beeban Kidron directed the second), working from a script from author Helen Fielding, Emma Thompson (very funny as an unamused doctor) and Dan Mazer.

Let's get over the silly fact that this movie essentially had to press reboot on the happy ending of the second, when Bridget said how even at 33 she was able to find love and happiness with one Mark Darcy (Colin Firth). Cut to 12 years later (between movies), Bridget is in her 40s and Darcy has gone off and married someone else.

But this is an evolved Bridget.

Sure, she might be eating dessert alone in that same flat on that same couch listening to the same Celine Dion song, but it's not tragic. It just is. Her friends flaked on her, so she has a night by herself. The sense is "whatever," not "woe is me."

Indeed, her life looks pretty good. She's now a high-profile TV news producer who seems happy at work - gone are the fireman's pole humiliations of on-camera life. She's also fitter (and quite happy about it) and has gotten a fancier wardrobe befitting of her success.

When her younger friend and co-worker Miranda (a terrific Sarah Solemani) invites her to a weekend getaway, Bridget arrives at the airport looking like a Nancy Meyers leading lady in cream and white. Of course, she doesn't realize they're going to an outdoor music festival. So, she falls in some mud, but she also gets the attention of Jack (Patrick Dempsey). He's a single, not sleazy relationship guru who is immediately smitten with Bridget.

She has a good time with Jack and goes on her way. A few weeks later, she finds herself having an unexpectedly romantic night with a now-separated Darcy. She walks away from that, too, and continues on with life until she gets the news that she's pregnant. It could be either Darcy's or Jack's.

Both men hop to the challenge, trying to out-partner one another at every turn. Is this a fantasy, or is this just men being kind to the woman who is possibly carrying their child? Does it really matter?

Much of the original cast is back and wonderful (Jim Broadbent, Gemma Jones, Sally Phillips and Shirley Henderson), save for a sorely missed Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant). You'll find out what happened to him.

There is still a madcap, slapstick jitteriness to Bridget, but calmness has emerged - that of a woman who has finally grown into her own skin. She is messy in that way that women in other romcoms "say" they are but never are. And she is certainly not the other single gal of her time, Carrie Bradshaw, who seemed to become less relatable as the years went by.

Though the premise of "Bridget Jones's Baby" makes it all seem like it's all about the guy again, it's never felt so much like Bridget's story. The man is just gravy. This movie, for all its comedic ridiculousness and wild circumstance of the paternity crisis, is a jubilant celebration of women.

If we're lucky, we'll get to check in with her again in another few years.
People will have different reactions to the new "Blair Witch Project" sequel, but one thing we all probably can agree on is this: We need to hurry up and clear-cut that haunted forest in Maryland, once and for all.

Even environmentalists would agree - what about a nice big parking lot? - after sitting through the harrowing "Blair Witch," which takes place in the same creepy woods where three student filmmakers disappeared in the original.

Why either a new batch of kids or a new clutch of filmmakers have suited up to tramp around the Black Hills in search of the same angry witch is puzzling. There's an old saying that you can never go home again. It is advice neither team took - and so they're doomed.

"Blair Witch" borrows most of the skeleton of the original 1999 film but ups the scariness at the cost of coherency. Director Adam Wingard also strays from the found-footage conceit and sometimes doesn't even pretend that what we're seeing was shot by anyone in the group. That suspension of disbelief is important or why try a direct sequel at all? (By the way, we're totally ignoring the quickie 2000 sequel "Book Of Shadows: Blair Witch 2".)

First a primer, in case you just wandered out of a haunted forest: "The Blair Witch Project" was a cultural sensation. Shot for an initial budget of less than $50,000, it grossed just shy of $248 million, sparking trends in both found-footage horror and shaky-camera confessionals.

Its faux-documentary premise was that it was just stitched-together footage taken by three student filmmakers who went missing while witch hunting. Directors Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Snchez did such a good job that audiences initially really believed three souls had been lost.

The original was quaint horror by today's standard, more psychologically traumatizing and not at all gory. The three students gradually turn on each other in the face of escalating hysteria - really just piles of rocks and weird stick figures.

It ended with a snot-nosed, half-faced apology by one victim. In the sequel, her brother (James Allen McCune) is determined to find out what happened 20 years ago. So he and three friends (Callie Hernandez, Brandon Scott, Corbin Reid), incredibly, suit up to tramp in the same creepy woods. By this time it should be clear that no one should ever wander off alone, even to relieve themselves. Do these kids listen?

This time, our heroes are joined by some locals (Wes Robinson and Valorie Curry) who know the woods - but may have their own agenda - and writer Simon Barrett has weaved in a sly lesson about our confidence in high-tech gizmos. The group seems invincible with their GPS, digital walkie-talkies, memory cards and earpieces. (They even brought a drone.) Good luck with that, guys.

This sequel gets progressively messy while "The Blair Witch Project" grew progressively taut. In this movie, the filmmakers throw out a lot of elements that are dead ends - double-crossing, infections and time shifts. The film really only rights itself in the final, breathtaking sequences when the title character applies her special brand of pressure.

So, for those keeping score, it's: Nosey Kids, 0; Blair Witch, 2.

It's time to bulldoze, right?
CAPE MAY  Frank Bowker walked through the entrance to Historic Cold Spring Village this week dressed in complete Civil War attire: a cotton bummer hat, wool overcoat and pants, a leather belt and gold-plated badge pinned over his chest.

He had a rifle slung over his back and an ax resting in a holster. He was playing a concertina.

It was just like 1864  except that Bowker had arrived in a Hyundai SUV.

Bowker participates in Civil War re-enactments and will take part in Civil War Weekend on Saturday and Sunday at Cold Spring Village. Bowker, of the Steelmantown section of Upper Township, has studied the Civil War for 26 years.

For me, re-enacting is understanding (a soldiers) motivation, Bowker said as he talked about his favorite compilations of war letters. Why was it important for them to talk about these things was what really interested him.

That kind of understanding helps Bowker stay in character when hes in uniform. As he walked through the historic village, he explained the soldier he portrays with his re-enactment group. He was a pioneer whose job was to cut down trees to clear paths. Hence the ax on his back.

He spoke in the first person of a soldiers experience roasting coffee beans in either a frying pan or part of a canteen.

Cape May will take part in worldwide photowalk For those in South Jersey who are looking for the right place to showcase their photography 

But on this day, Bowkers son, Owen, held onto Bowkers canteen while he played with the chickens and pigs at the village. Bowker said Owen is more accustomed to the Civil War era than the present day.

He could drink from a canteen before he could drink from a straw, Bowker said of his 2-year-old boy. Owen has mostly seen Bowkers re-enactment buddies in their period dress. (They do not like the term costume.) In fact, Owen seems to find it strange when he sees his dads friends out of uniform.

Owen loves the re-enactments.

He knows that Daddy goes out and gets shot and then comes back, Bowker said.

This weekend, Bowker will cook a historically accurate supper for himself and his crew. They will line up, put on their gear and then go to battle for 20 minutes in front of a crowd. Cannons and rifles will be fired (shooting blanks), and, as the participants are killed, they will lie dead until the battles end. Bowker likes to crawl to a shaded patch under a tree to avoid the sun.

And when spectators go home after a battle, the re-enactment will continue for Bowker and his friends. No flashlights are used for the rest of Saturday night  lanterns only. No iPods or record players will be playing  only guitars, mandolins and accordions for live music.

Cape May Stage a tiny theater powerhouse It may be small, but Cape May Stage isnt afraid to be bold.

If people need to contact their families, they have to leave the camp. Bowker will even put his phone in his hat and press it against his ear when hes making a call  pretending that hes injured.

Its all about creating as authentic an environment as possible.

When you see the campfires and the tents as you walk through camp, it looks, best as we can reference, to the 1800s, Bowker said.

After the staged battle, a cease-fire is called. Northern and Southern soldiers will help each other up. Bowker said that type of camaraderie occurred during the Civil War, when men sometimes fought neighbors or people they knew.

At the end of the battle, there is always an appreciative roar from the crowd.

At this point, Bowker admits, he expects to break character.

I will thank them and tell them that Ill be here all weekend, he said.
Are you a feminist?

That was a question Beverly Gilbert, co-founder and executive director of Atlantic Countys Womens Center, often asked applicants in job interviews. She didnt care about the answer. She just wanted candidates to think about it.

You didnt have to answer yes to get hired; you didnt have to answer no to get hired. You just had to think about it, said Claudia Ratzlaff, chief executive officer of the Womens Centers offices in Linwood. Thats who Bev was. She wanted people who thought about who they were, who they wanted to be, and how they were going to deliver services and how they were going to embrace people to be who they are, because thats really what social work is about.

Gilbert died last month at age 74. The Womens Center she helped found began in 1975 as a haven for sexual assault victims and for women and children escaping violence. It has since expanded services to fathers, sex trafficking victims, displaced homemakers and others.

Gilberts death has people connected with the Womens Center thinking about its past. But they are also thinking about its future.

Were coming on a new journey because were changing our name, Ratzlaff said. It will be a few months until the name is finalized. The idea is to have the name reflect the more inclusive nature of the work the center does now.

When you market yourself as the Womens Center and have all these important victims services  are we kind of isolating male victims? she asked. Are we isolating individuals from the LGBT community? Are we holding onto something that needs to evolve? And thats where we are.

In 1975, a group of five founding mothers, including Gilbert, formed a 24-hour rape and sexual assault counseling hotline out of their homes. Soon, volunteers began offering up their homes as safe houses or emergency shelters to women and children escaping domestic violence.

It was that time when people sat down, and feminism was abloom and they were kind of asking, what do women in our community need? Ratzlaff said. What they found (was) the majority of their calls were in regard to sexual assault, and there birthed their purpose.

A few years later, Gilbert helped secure a grant of $115,000 to establish The Abuse Center. It opened in a confidential location in 1978 and served women in Atlantic, Cape May, Cumberland, Salem, Gloucester, Camden and Burlington counties. In its first year, more than 300 South Jersey women and their families sought the centers help.

Again, youre talking about an era when separation and divorce became a thing that was taboo to something that was becoming more frequent as women realized they didnt have to live in violent situations, Ratzlaff said.

Gilbert knew women needed to be able to work on their own and sustain themselves if they were going to escape domestic violence.

We see Beverly as our founding mother because she is the one that took that start and stayed with it, then really grew that, Ratzlaff said. Under Bev, it grew to consider the needs of women in the community. When a new program was embraced, it had to make sense based on our mission, our philosophy, our goals, what the community really needed.

Although the center now primarily focuses on Atlantic County, the agencys Grow NJ Kids South Technical Assistance Center program operates in seven counties, and its human trafficking program, Dream Catcher, is statewide.

Ratzlaff, who joined the Womens Center 30 years ago, said that in the beginning, staff members didnt always get their checks on time. But it only took one call from Gilbert to then-Sen. Bill Gormley (R-Atlantic County), and he would hand-deliver the checks himself.

She would go up against anybody, she said. She was a tough cookie. I think a lot of people, including myself, were intimidated at times.

Percy Figueroa, the centers director of bilingual services and outreach, has been with the agency for 25 years. She started as a bilingual staff member and worked for the Child Care Network, later becoming its director.

She also remembered being intimidated by Gilbert at first.

In the beginning, I shied away from her because she was intimidating. But I learned later on that everything she did for us, she did for the agency, she said. She was so in tuned with everything that was going on, and she just supported us, supported the Child Care Network. She was right in the forefront when it came to any of our fundings for our providers.

Last year, the Child Care Network lost its $1.9 million Child Care Resource and Referral state grant. Figueroa said it was devastating for us as an agency.

Ratzlaff said losing the grant and the program, which had been operating for 25 years, rocked the Womens Center.

Our view of our history is weve been very successful, and that didnt feel like a success, Ratzlaff said. It was difficult to tell Gilbert, who had retired from the agency by that time.

With evolution, this is sometimes how it happens. Its not always your choice, Ratzlaff said. When handed lemons, how do you make lemonade?

The Womens Center was no stranger to challenges, having helped people through a downturn in the economy, the struggles of the Atlantic City casino industry and Hurricane Sandy.

Really, nonprofits are used to dealing with issues on an individual level. So when it happens at a systemic level, its really a part of our DNA, Ratzlaff said.

When the grant ended, Ratzlaff said, the agency became eligible for another grant for more money which spurred the Grow NJ Kids South Technical Assistance Center.The program works to provide technical assistance and support to early childhood care centers enrolled in NJ Kids across seven different counties.

Dana Hicks, chief operating officer and primary director of TAC, said the agency is constantly evolving.

I dont think people would necessarily know how hard we look at where we need to build ourselves up, where were falling short, said Hicks, who has been with the agency since starting as an intern in 1997.

Although the center has always worked with families, working with providers to help increase childcare standards is new to them. Hicks said another big change has been the Women Centers Dream Catcher program, which aims to help sex-trafficking victims.

Those two things have me excited for what is to come from the Womens Center, she said. I think its time; I think our communities are ready for it.

Hicks said Gilbert instilled in staffers what it meant to be an advocate and that her job was more than just meeting her clients at the door.

I think thats a legacy she continues, she said.

Contact: 609-272-7217

ATLANTIC COUNTY WOMENS CENTER

For more information about the center or to learn about services, call 609-646-6767 or visit www.acwc.org.

If you or someone you know is a victim of domestic violence, sexual violence or human trafficking, call the 24-Hour Crisis Hotline at 800-286-4184.
ATLANTIC CITY  For last 17 years, Anna Swierczewski of Ocean County has been a table games dealer at the Trump Taj Mahal Casino Resort, come Oct. 10 that career will come to an end as the property closes.

The 52-year-old resident of the Manahawkin section of Stafford Township spent part of her Thursday afternoon at a job fair put on by the states Department of Labor and Workforce Development at Atlantic Cape Community College City Division. The event was geared toward Taj Mahal employees who are set to be laid off in early October.

I dont know what is going to happen after it closes, I hope to come here and find something, said Swierczewski, who is originally from Poland. This is a great opportunity to get face-to-face time with people that are hiring, that is the best way to build relationships.

Approximately 30 businesses, ranging from casinos to health care employers, attended the event, state officials said.

In earlier August, Taj Mahal management blamed striking Unite Here Local 54 workers for preventing a path to profitability and forcing the closure of the property.

On Aug. 5, employees of the casino were given state-mandated layoff notices that the property would close Oct. 10. They include the more than 1,000 Local 54 members  cooks, housekeepers, bellmen, bartenders, cocktail servers and other service workers  who have been on strike since July 1.

The state has been working with union and Taj Mahal representatives to ensure that soon to be unemployed workers would have access to unemployment insurance and re-employment services, said Catherine Starghill, executive Director of the Workforce Operations and Business Services for the state Department of Labor and Workforce Development.

The department is no stranger to working with laid off casino workers. In 2014 following the shuttering of four casinos the agency hosted a variety of events including a job fair. Taj would be the city's fifth casino to close since 2014, costing more than 10,000 jobs in total.

When we receive the WARN ( Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification) notices, we then provide rapid response, Starghill said. We hold activities like job fairs, resume writing workshops, also have information sessions on how to apply for unemployment. Our goal is to get these people to a job before they are actually laid off so they never have to collect unemployment.

For Michael Abelson, 38, of Mays Landing, the job fair offered him a chance to look at different careers outside of the casino industry.

I really dont know what I want to do, Abelson said. There a bunch of different careers here to look at.

For more information on the Department of Labor and Workforce Development visit: http://lwd.dol.state.nj.us/

Contact: 609-272-7046

Twitter @ACPressHuba
Federal prosecutors asked the court to take possession of six dogs that were confiscated from one of 10 suspects charged in an interstate dog-fighting ring.

The U.S. Attorney said the dogs were taken June 1 during a court-ordered search of a home in Westville, Gloucester County, at the home of a relative to Justin Love, 36, of Glassboro, who was charged with violating the Animal Welfare Act.

In seeking the forfeiture, prosecutors are hoping the animals can be adopted.

The dogs are currently in the care of the Humane Society of the United States.

Investigators in court papers said the dogs, including a female named Momba, had scars and behaved aggressively toward each other consistent with being trained for fighting. They also found the remains of several dogs in the yard.

Investigators also found a car battery beside one of the dog kennels.

"Electrocution is one of the means used by dog-fighters to kill dogs that lose fights, fail to show gameness or otherwise have outlived their usefulness to the dog-fighting venture," the U.S. Attorney said in its forfeiture application this week.

Authorities also seized evidence of alleged dog-fighting such as flirt poles used to condition a dog and spring poles used to strengthen a dogs neck and jaw muscles. And they found veterinary medicines, topical and oral antibiotics and syringes associated with treating dogs that are injured in fights.

Love faces up to five years in prison for each violation of the Animal Welfare Act, which makes the possession, training, buying, selling or transporting of dogs for the purposes of fighting them a crime.

The U.S. Attorney also could seek costs for the animals care from the defendant.

Loves attorney, Wayne Powell of Cherry Hill, could not be reached for comment Thursday.

Love is among seven defendants from New Jersey charged with operating a dog-fighting ring. Suspects in New Mexico, Illinois and Indiana also were charged. The investigation was named Operation Grand Champion, the term for a dog that wins five fights.

Investigators used aerial surveillance and wiretaps to infiltrate the alleged ring.
If you are a white, Christian, employed gun owner, it is fair for you to ask your Democratic representative or senator - or any Democratic candidate - if they consider you to be in the "basket of deplorables."

There is no doubt in my mind that when Hillary Clinton said "half of Trump's supporters" could be put into the "basket of deplorables," she was referencing the same group of people then-Sen. Barack Obama dismissed in April 2008, while speaking at a San Francisco-area fundraiser, as bitter people who "cling to guns or religion."

The Democratic contempt for what used to be salt of the earth, bedrock, middle-class citizens is a matter-of-fact part of today's political equation. This may sound a little harsh, but it is the natural conclusion to draw after analyzing the Democrats' campaign message over the past few campaign cycles.

According to the latest Post/ABC News poll, core Donald Trump supporters tend to be white Americans who have not graduated from college. And as the editorial board wrote in a piece in Monday's Wall Street Journal, Clinton's comments really reflect what "today's elite progressives believe about America's great unwashed." After her comments caught fire, Clinton tried to walk part of what she said back. She's counting on the gullibility of the electorate to believe she didn't mean what she said - a Clinton trademark.

Anyway, I'm reminded of a scene from the classic movie, "The Man Who Would be King," starring Michael Caine and Sean Connery as Peachy Carnehan and Daniel Dravot respectively; two British soldiers who decide to venture into unexplored territory and make themselves kings. In this particular scene, Carnehan and Dravot appear before the very proper district commissioner of the British administration in India, who accuses them of malfeasance and strikes the perfect tone as a stereotypical Clinton supporter, saying he will write a letter referring to them as "political undesirables, detriments to the dignity of the Empire."

Carnehan immediately responds, saying, "Detriments you call us? Detriments? Well, I want to remind you it was 'detriments' like us that built this bloody Empire." Substitute "deplorables" for "detriments" and "the United States of America" for "this bloody Empire" and his indignant response is befitting of today's political circumstances.

I wonder if Clinton would be willing to label any of the illegal immigrants harbored by sanctuary cities as "deplorables." I wonder what she thinks of the political enablers in Chicago who have created an environment where more than 3,000 homicides have taken place since 2009. Are any of them deplorables? I doubt she would say so.

The Democrats should not think Clinton's recent remarks and Obama's "clingers" statement don't have any consequences. The president's remark is still vividly remembered by those he was referring to, and likely has widened the divide between middle-class voters and Democrats everywhere. Clinton's comments will serve as a reminder to those voters that they should be skeptical of Democrats who still claim to identify with the core of working class America.

Ed Rogers is a Washington Post contributing writer, political consultant and veteran of the White House and several national campaigns.
Unaligned media needed to check government

Thomas Jefferson once said, "were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate to prefer the latter."

Today, it is extremely difficult to find a pundit who freely chastises political figures unless they are in the opposing party. Whether the cause of this polarization is a reflection of society or is the result of a biased journalism education or other reason is anyone's guess.

But paying attention to news publications and TV or radio news, it is abundantly clear that bias and partisanship are the norm and many have lost their objectivity and have ceased to be arbiters of truth. In the print media, The New York Times and USA Today are staunch advocates of almost any Democratic cause (e.g. Obama, Clinton etc.) and The Wall Street Journal and Washington Times are aligned with Republicans. Unfortunately, this partisanship is not restricted to just the editorials but has also saturated the day-to-day news reporting.

The giants of journalism, Horace Greeley, H.L. Mencken, Walter Lippmann, Walter Cronkite, Edward R. Murrow etc. are gone. President Lyndon B. Johnson stated that once he lost Cronkite's support for the Vietnam conflict, he had lost America's support - and CBS and Cronkite had been LBJ (and Democratic) advocates.

We need a free press that is unafraid and not restricted in critiques of all government and political officials and entities.

Ron Smith

Brigantine

Clinton financial advice

After Hillary Clinton's husband left office in 2000, she indicated that she and her husband were "dead broke." Can she explain how she and Bill Clinton were able to amass a personal wealth over $100 million on civil servant salaries? The general public would like to get in on her financial expertise.

Ed Cella

Little Egg Harbor Township

Solar subsidies worth it

Regarding the Aug. 31 letter, "Big subsidies behind ACUA's 'solar success'":

The writer makes a valid point on the level of subsidies on the ACUA solar investment. However, given the total cost of $7,278,103 of the project to all stakeholders and annual electricity savings benefits to ACUA of $750,960 per year, the project payback on that public investment is roughly 10 years without considering time value of money and associated revenue streams.

Based on these numbers, the public subsidies reduced the payback period for ACUA and Atlantic County ratepayers to about two years, making the solar project a much more attractive investment.

Solar costs for new projects have dropped substantially since the ACUA project was built. The intent of the solar subsidies is both to help N.J. ratepayers save money, but also help accelerate the market for solar via manufacturing economies of scale to drive down the costs and reward associated innovation, benefiting all N.J. electric consumers as well as achievement of state and national renewable energy goals.

George Hay

Somers Point

State keeps costing more

I doubt many people believe that Gov. Christie was not involved in Bridge-gate. Now we have bridge-road-tunnel-gate. Soon driving a car or doing anything in New Jersey will be so expensive it may make economic sense to give all possessions to Trenton.

I wonder if the people of the state will ever stand up and say they've had enough.

Dan Histon

Egg Harbor City

Supports death penalty

I fully support Assemblyman David Rible, R-Monmouth, on his bill to restore capital punishment, and I urge all fair minded citizens to do the same. This is not "revenge." Revenge is when a person takes matters into his own hands. When the state punishes criminal behavior it is not revenge, but "justice" for the victim.

I hope that the Democrats and Republicans work together to pass this bill. This is an issue of great importance to the citizens who seek justice for the victims of murder.

Louis Lordi

Waretown
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.




ALBANY, New York, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

The rising awareness regarding the use of biomass as a suitable low-carbon and sustainable alternative to fossil fuels such as coal for the generation of power and heat is the key driver of the global biomass boiler market. Developed as well as developing economies across the globe have ramped up their efforts for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, of which finding ways of minimizing reliance on fossil fuels and switching to carbon-neutral fuels such as biomass is an important step. This trend has led to an increased adoption of small- and large-scale biomass boilers across the globe, chiefly for the generation of heat and power across businesses, households, and communities.

Transparency Market Research estimates that the global biomass boiler market will expand at a remarkable 18.1% CAGR from 2016 to 2024. The market had a valuation of US$2,426.5 mn in 2015 and is expected to rise to US$10,752.4 mn in 2024.

In the highly fragmented competitive landscape of the global biomass boilers market, none of the leading companies accounted for a share of over 10% in the overall market in 2014, observes Transparency Market Research in a recent report. The top six companies in the market, including Baxi Group Limited, ETA Heiztechnik GmbH, Polytechnik Group, and Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises, Inc., collectively accounted for a relatively moderate 40% share in the global market in the said year. The remaining 59% share was held by a fragmented chain of suppliers across the globe.

Browse Research Report with ToC: http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/global-biomass-boiler-market.html

Europe to Remain Most Promising Regional Market

The global biomass boilers market, which valued US$2,426.5 mn in 2015, is expected to rise to US$10,752.4 mn by 2024. Europe is presently the dominant regional market for biomass boilers, accounting for a share of over 67% in the overall revenues of the global market in 2015. The regional market is expected to expand at a nearly 18% CAGR from 2016 to 2024 and retain its dominant position in the global market over the next few years as well. In terms of the key varieties of feedstock used to fuel biomass boilers, the segment of woody biomass leads, holding a share of nearly 77% of the overall market in 2015.

Encouraging Regulatory Framework to Bolster Adoption of Biomass Boilers Globally

Over the years of their use across the industrial and domestic sectors, it has been found that biomass boilers can provide an array of economic and environmental benefits. The renewable and low carbon nature of biomass has compelled the increased installation of biomass boilers across developed as well as developing countries across the globe. Several government policies that aim at increasing the share of renewables in their individual energy mixes, as a step ahead in achieving the carbon emission regulation targets, are playing a key role in fortifying this trend.

Get Latest Industry Research PDF for more Professional and Technical Industry Insights: http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=14657

Encouraging regulatory frameworks and government grants and incentive programs that provide investment subsidies and tax benefits to industries using renewables are also playing a key role in encouraging biomass heating companies and utilities to switch to biomass on an increased level. Furthermore, the propositions of granting feed-in tariffs (FIT) and tax incentives across countries such as India, Scotland, Japan, and Australia are also expected to encourage an increased number of investors to enter into the biomass boilers market in the next few years.

Challenges Associated with Handling, Storing, and Supplying Biomass to Hamper Market Growth

The key challenges for the growth of the global biomass boilers market are the several issues associated with the supply, handling, transport, and storage of biomass. Additionally, decrease in the overall efficiency of biomass with time, emission of pollutants, ash deposition, and impacts of carbon burnout are some of the key technical issues related to biomass boilers. The high moisture content of certain biomass feedstock also poses many challenges related to their transport and storage on a larger level. The high costs incurred in transportation and storage of biomass with high moisture content can outweigh the value of biomass to a significant level as biomass fuels have low-energy densities compared to fossil fuels.

Browse Research PR: http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/pressrelease/global-biomass-boiler-market.htm

These factors are expected to refrain the large-scale adoption of biomass for energy and heat production to the certain level in the next few years. Nevertheless, programmes such as the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI), which provides financial support to non-domestic generators of renewable heat across several European countries, are expected to provide long-term support for the biomass boilers market in the future.

This review of the market is based on a recent market research report published by Transparency Market Research, titled "Biomass Boiler Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends and Forecast, 2016 - 2024."

For the study, the global biomass boiler market is segmented as follows:

Global Biomass Boiler Market: Feedstock Type Analysis

Woody Biomass

Agriculture & Forest Residues

Biogas & Energy Crops

Urban Residues

Others

Global Biomass Boiler Market: Product Type Analysis

Stoker Boilers

Bubbling Fluidized Bed (BFB) Boilers

Circulating Fluidized Bed (CFB) Boilers

Global Biomass Boiler Market: End-user Analysis

Residential

Commercial

Industrial

Global Biomass Boiler Market: Application Analysis

Heating

Power Generation

Global Biomass Boiler Market: Regional Segment Analysis

North America

U.S.

Canada

Mexico

Europe

Sweden

Finland

U.K.

Germany

Rest of Europe

Asia Pacific

Japan

China

India

Rest of Asia Pacific

Middle East and Africa (MEA)

South Africa

Rest of MEA

Latin America

Brazil

Rest of Latin America

Browse Other Research Reports:

Biomass Boiler Market - Global & U.K. Industry Analysis: http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/biomass-boiler-market.html

Industrial Biomass Boiler Market: http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/industrial-biomass-boiler-market.html

About TMR

Transparency Market Research (TMR) is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The company's exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMR's experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.

TMR's data repository is continuously updated and revised by a team of research experts so that it always reflects the latest trends and information. With extensive research and analysis capabilities, Transparency Market Research employs rigorous primary and secondary research techniques to develop distinctive data sets and research material for business reports.

Contact

Transparency Market Research

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Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.com



Website: http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com

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SOURCE Transparency Market Research
Veteran financial services innovation executive takes helm of London-based client solutions incubator

LONDON, Sept. 15, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- BNY Mellon has named Niamh De Niese Director and Head of its EMEA Innovation Centre, based in London. As head of the centre, De Niese will expand the innovative solutions delivered via BNY Mellon's NEXEN digital platform, driving client engagement and building relationships with the region's burgeoning fintech community.

BNY Mellon's EMEA Innovation Centre provides a collaborative environment for cross-business client experience delivery and technology teams to partner with client companies and fintechs to explore and rapidly prototype new solutions to help clients solve their most complex problems and create value.

"Our network of global innovation centres is a core part of BNY Mellon's NEXEN digital transformation strategy," said Lucille Mayer, Global Head of Innovation and Client Experience Delivery at BNY Mellon. "Our EMEA Innovation Centre is ideally located to be a catalyst centre for new solutions that we can envision and develop alongside our clients and fintechs. Under Niamh's leadership, we anticipate a step-wise increase in collaborative innovation in financial services."

De Niese has held a number of senior technology and innovation leadership positions in the financial services and consulting industries. Most recently, she was Head of Visa's European innovation labs in London, Berlin and Tel Aviv where she set the innovation strategy and delivery methodology for all digital innovation client co-creation and thought leadership projects across the company. She holds a Bachelor's of Science degree in Computer Science and Business from University College Cork.

One of BNY Mellon's six innovation centres based around the world, the EMEA Innovation Centre opened in October 2015. In addition to the EMEA centre, BNY Mellon operates innovation centres in Pune and Chennai in India, and in Jersey City, N.J., Silicon Valley (Palo Alto), Calif. and Pittsburgh, Pa. in the United States. Additional centres will soon open in Oriskany, N.Y. and Singapore.

BNY Mellon is a global investments company dedicated to helping its clients manage and service their financial assets throughout the investment lifecycle. Whether providing financial services for institutions, corporations or individual investors, BNY Mellon delivers informed investment management and investment services in 35 countries and more than 100 markets. As of June 30, 2016, BNY Mellon had $29.5 trillion in assets under custody and/or administration, and $1.7 trillion in assets under management. BNY Mellon can act as a single point of contact for clients looking to create, trade, hold, manage, service, distribute or restructure investments. BNY Mellon is the corporate brand of The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation (NYSE: BK). Additional information is available on www.bnymellon.com. Follow us on Twitter @BNYMellon or visit our newsroom at www.bnymellon.com/newsroom for the latest company news.

Additional information is available on www.bnymellon.com/newsroom.

Contact:

Rachel Moody

+1 412 234 3667

Rachel.Moody@bnymellon.com

Malcolm Borthwick

+44 207 163 4109

Malcolm.Borthwick@bnymellon.com

Related Links

http://www.bnymellon.com



SOURCE BNY Mellon
DUBLIN, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

You're in command with the Swiftflo Commander!

As farms are getting larger there is less time for individual animal attention. During milking having access to the right information at the right time is essential. The Swiftflo Commander is the new brain of the milking parlour, controlling everything to do with milking, feeding and animal health. It offers a new level of intelligence that takes command of each milking unit within the parlour. Last night, Dairymaster impressed the judging panel at the Farm Business Cream Awards at the National Birmingham Motor Cycle Museum in the UK for the 2nd year running, this time with its Swiftflo Commander, winning the "Overall Product Innovation Award".

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160914/407737LOGO )



(Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160915/408482 )



The Swiftflo Commander gives the farmer a lot more information when and where it's needed - at the cow milking point. Putting this information in people's hands means major impacts on dairy farms.

"We are overjoyed to win an innovation award for the Swiftflo Commander. This product allows farmers to clearly see how each cow is performing during milking which allows the farmer to make immediate decisions. We already have a huge number of farms experiencing the benefits of this product across the UK" comments Ted McGrath, Sales Manager UK.

Next generation touchpad technology means it is extremely robust, easy to clean and fully water resistant. Described as being similar to an iPad for cows the Swiftflo Commander displays important information such as milk yield, milking time, and somatic cell count data on each cow and much more. One touch allows you to control feed effortlessly at each milking unit, it can also display if the cow is in heat and draft that cow with a single touch for AI or further inspection.

Imagine a system that can identify what each cow is contributing to herd SCC. The Swiftflo Commander can display a cow's percentage SCC of the entire herd. The advantage of having this information about each individual cow at the right time in the parlour is that you can act on it. It will also prompt the farmer to do a California Milk Test (CMT) when high SCC information is received so diagnosis and treatment is much sooner. The farmer can enter information directly from the milking point, for example, treatment dates. The smart technology then automatically retains milk until the withdrawal period is up and it is then safe for it to enter the milk tank again. You can also divert milk effortlessly.

It also indicates freshly calved cows that enter the parlour and allows colostrum to be diverted. With more emphasis on hygiene and ever increasing milk quality standards the cleaning performance of each unit is also individually monitored.

The Swiftflo Commander gives the farmer the capability and functionality of doing herd management at every single milking point in a very easy manner.

When a farmer invests in the Swiftflo Commander they are making the right investment for the future. It uses smart technology that allows all units to be updated within a few minutes. Dairymaster uses this smart technology to ensure that farmers have the latest features and capability into the future.

VIDEO LINK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DC2yB1gpqE4

Lisa Herlihy

Marketing Manager

lherlihy@dairymaster.com



Mary Mulvihill

Marketing Executive

mmulvihill@dairymaster.com





SOURCE Dairymaster
IRVING, Texas, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Darling Ingredients Inc. (NYSE: DAR) (the "Company") today announced that management will present at the Credit Suisse 2016 Global Credit Products Conference to be held at the Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami Beach, Florida, on September 21-23, 2016. Randall C. Stuewe, Darling's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, is scheduled to present on Thursday, September 22nd, at 9:20 a.m. EDT, and will hold one-on-one meetings throughout the day.

The investor presentation will be webcast and accessible via the Investor Relations section of the Company's website at http://www.darlingii.com.

About Darling

Darling Ingredients Inc. is the world's largest publicly-traded developer and producer of sustainable natural ingredients from edible and inedible bio-nutrients, creating a wide range of ingredients and customized specialty solutions for customers in the pharmaceutical, food, pet food, feed, technical, fuel, bioenergy and fertilizer industries. With operations on five continents, the Company collects and transforms all aspects of animal by-product streams into useable and specialty ingredients, such as gelatin, edible fats, feed-grade fats, animal proteins and meals, plasma, pet food ingredients, organic fertilizers, yellow grease, fuel feedstocks, green energy, natural casings and hides. The Company also recovers and converts used cooking oil and commercial bakery residuals into valuable feed and fuel ingredients. In addition, the Company provides grease trap services to food service establishments, environmental services to food processors and sells restaurant cooking oil delivery and collection equipment. For additional information, visit the Company's website at http://www.darlingii.com.

Safe Harbor Statement

Some of the statements made in this press release are forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are based upon our current expectations and projections about future events and generally relate to our plans, objectives and expectations for the development of our business. Although management believes that the plans and objectives reflected in or suggested by these forward-looking statements are reasonable, all forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties and actual future results may be materially different from the plans, objectives and expectations expressed in this press release. Many of these risks and uncertainties are described in Darling's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ending January 2, 2016 and our other filings with the SEC.

For More Information, contact:

Melissa A. Gaither, V.P. Investor Relations and Global Communications

251 O'Connor Ridge Blvd., Suite 300 Email: mgaither@darlingii.com Irving, Texas 75038 Phone: 972-717-0300

Related Links

http://www.darlingii.com



SOURCE Darling Ingredients Inc.
Sprint, LG, and MediaTek collaborate to offer the first smartphone on Sprint's network using MediaTek's premium chipset

HSINCHU, Taiwan, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- The first MediaTek-enabled smartphone for Sprint launched today, breaking new ground for MediaTek in the U.S. market. This marks MediaTek's first premium chipset offered in a device on a major U.S. carrier network.

Sprint introduced the LG X power which features the MediaTek helio P10 chipset for its high-performance, power efficiency and compact size to allow for a slim, stylish device design.

"Collaborating with Sprint and LG to enable a WorldMode smartphone based on our MediaTek helio series chipset is an important milestone for MediaTek," said Mohit Bhushan, MediaTek Vice President and General Manager of U.S. Business Development. "We are actively investing in advanced modem feature development for Sprint's networks and look forward to many more devices in 2017 and beyond."

MediaTek helio P10 offers high-performance 4G LTE octa-core processors as well as the older modems, such as, CDMA2000, WCDMA, HSPA+ and GSM. MediaTek spent significant time and effort to optimize its LTE carrier aggregation feature for Sprint's LTE+ network to deliver super-fast data speeds, increased capacity and markedly improved data service for its customers.

"The LG X power is the first adoption of a MediaTek chipset for the Sprint network and the MediaTek helio P10 brings to our customers the power of the Sprint LTE+ network at an affordable price point," said Ryan Sullivan, Sprint's Vice President of Product Development.

The MediaTek helio P10 series integrates a suite of multimedia features including gaming-quality graphics and HD screen support for the LG X power's 5.3-inch HD touchscreen display. MediaTek's premium chipsets also include technology for superior hi-fidelity, hi-clarity audio and dual-camera features for increased light capture and enhanced color resolution for an uncompromised user experience.

The LG X power is available today for Boost Mobile customers, and comes next week to Sprint. The smartphone features include an 8MP rear-facing camera, 5MP front-facing camera, 1.8GHz Octa-Core processor, Android 6.0 Marshmallow OS, and long lasting battery power.

Consumers are more aware than ever about the true cost of smart devices. Competition in the smartphone market and the array of consumer choices drives demand for super-mid market devices with advanced technologies like the LG X power.

"Our work with Sprint allows us to spotlight MediaTek's innovative chipset technology to a new market and continue our commitment to bring advanced, affordable technology to mainstream consumers," said MediaTek's Bhushan.

About MediaTek

Since 1997, MediaTek has been a pioneering fabless semiconductor company and a market leader in cutting-edge systems-on-chip (SoC) for mobile devices, wireless networking, HDTV, DVD and Blu-ray. Our tightly-integrated, innovative chip designs help manufacturers optimize supply chains, reduce the development time of new products, and extend a competitive edge in crowded markets. Through MediaTek Labs, the company is also building a developer hub that will support device creation, application development, and services for the Internet of Things era. By building technologies that help connect individuals to the world around them, MediaTek is enabling people to expand their horizons and more easily achieve their goals. We believe anyone can achieve something amazing. And we believe they can do it every single day. We call this idea Everyday Genius and it drives everything we do. Visit mediatek.com for more information.

MediaTek Press Office:

PR@mediatek.com

Kevin Keating, MediaTek

+1- 206-321-7295

10188 Telesis Ct #500, San Diego, CA 92121, USA

Joey Lee, MediaTek

+886 3-567-0766 # 31602

No. 1, Dusing 1st Rd., Hsinchu Science Park, Hsinchu City 30078, Taiwan

Related Links

http://www.mediatek.com



SOURCE MediaTek Inc.
LONDON, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

Abingworth, the international investment group dedicated to life sciences, today announced that it has seeded GammaDelta Therapeutics Ltd, a new immunotherapy company. GammaDelta Therapeutics also received support from three organisations, Cancer Research Technology (CRT), King's College London and the Francis Crick Institute. The company is being incubated at Abingworth's London office.

GammaDelta Therapeutics has been founded on pioneering research by Professor Adrian Hayday and Dr Oliver Nussbaumer at King's College London and the Francis Crick Institute, funded in part by Cancer Research UK, into gamma delta () T cells. These are a unique and conserved population of lymphocytes that contribute to many types of immune responses and immunopathologies. The new company is focused on exploiting this work to develop improved immunotherapies for cancer and potentially other diseases.

Peter Goodfellow, an advisor to Abingworth and formerly Senior Vice President for Discovery Research at GlaxoSmithKline, is Chairman of the board, which also includes, Prof. Hayday; Raj Mehta of CRT; Stephen Parker, Institutes Director; Mike Owen, formerly Senior Vice President for Biopharmaceuticals Research at GlaxoSmithKline; and Tim Haines, Managing Partner of Abingworth.

Raj Mehta, Founder and Interim CEO, said: "We are delighted to have attracted the support of Abingworth to the founding and development of GammaDelta Therapeutics and will use the proceeds to help us advance our innovative programmes into the clinic."

"GammaDelta's technology is differentiated from other approaches to immunotherapy being pursued and has the potential to make a significant impact on the treatment of cancer," said Abingworth's Tim Haines. "We look forward to working with the team to advance the discovery and development of novel therapeutic candidates based on this exciting approach."

About GammaDelta Therapeutics

Founded in 2016, GammaDelta Therapeutics is developing the potential of gamma delta () cells to create improved immunotherapy of cancer and other serious diseases. The company plans to exploit unique properties of tissue resident  T cells for effective immunotherapy.

About Abingworth

Abingworth is an international investment group dedicated to collaborating with life sciences entrepreneurs to develop their ideas into products that have a dramatic impact on health. With over $1 billion under management, Abingworth invests at all stages of development, from start-ups to publicly traded companies, and across all life science sectors.

Supporting its portfolio companies with a team of 27 at offices in London, Menlo Park (California) and Boston, Abingworth has invested in 142 life science companies, leading to 63 IPOs and 40 mergers and acquisitions. http://www.abingworth.com

SOURCE Abingworth
PUNE, India, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

The hazmat suit market is projected to reach $7.97 Billion by 2021 pushed by infection control & biohazard segment while factors like Ebola outbreak, increasing healthcare budgets and significant growth trends in the global chemical industry in different countries are also driving the growth of the global market.

Complete report on hazmat suits market spread across 145 pages, profiling 11 companies and supported with 71 tables and 92 figures is now available at http://www.marketreportshub.com/hazmat-suits-industry-research-marketsandmarkets.html .

Hazmat suits are used at major hazardous material sites for material handling, processing and transporting and across all regions of the world for healthcare, oil and gas, mining and metallurgy waste handling and also for other applications such as the insulation, isolation for example firefighting. The suits used for the infection control, and handling of biohazards material are covered in the healthcare segment. The spread of diseases like Ebola has resulted into a large scale procurement of hazmat suits by various medical organization and government. This has resulted into the large scale demand for the hazmat suits in this segment.

Asia-Pacific is one of the fastest-growing markets for hazmat suits considering the increase in the end-use applications in this region. The usage of effective protective equipment for the handling of hazardous waste is still not a standard practice in some of the countries in the region.

The major companies profiled in the report include Lakel and Industries Inc. (U.S.), DuPont Inc. (U.S.) Kimberly Clark Corporation (U.S.), and Alpha Pro Tech (Canada), among others. Order a copy of Hazmat Suits Market by Application (Chemical Waste, Infection Control & Bio-Hazard, and Hazardous Material), End-Use (Oil & Gas, Mining & Metallurgy, Construction, Manufacturing, Transportation, Utilities, and Healthcare), Safety Standards - Global Forecast to 2021 research report at http://www.marketreportshub.com/purchase?rpid=4235 .

In the process of determining and verifying, the global hazmat suits market size for several segments and sub segments gathered through secondary research, extensive primary interviews were conducted with key people. In Tier 1 (45%), Tier 2 (35%) and Tier 3 (20%) companies were contacted for primary interviews. The interviews were conducted with various key people such as C-level (50%) and Director Level (35%) and others (15) from various key organizations operating in the global hazmat suits market. The primary interviews were conducted worldwide covering regions such as North Americas (44%), Europe (35%), APAC (15%), and Middle East (6%).

On a related note, another research on Protective Fabrics Market Global Trends & Forecast to 2021 says increasing need for security & protective measures to drive the protective fabrics market. Healthcare is the fastest-growing market for protective fabrics. Asia-Pacific is to dominate the market during the forecast period. The overall market is projected to reach USD 4.0 billion by 2021, registering a CAGR of 4.2% between 2016 and 2021. Companies like 3M Company, Koninklijke Ten Cate NV, Teijin Ltd, E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company, Kolon Industries Inc., Lakeland Industries, Inc. Milliken & Company, W. L. Gore & Associates, Inc., Klopman International, Glen Raven, Inc. and Cetriko, SL have been profiled in this 152 pages research report available at http://www.marketreportshub.com/protective-fabrics-industry-research-marketsandmarkets.html .

Explore more reports on consumer goods market at http://www.marketreportshub.com/categories/consumer-goods .

About Us:

Market Reports Hub is your one-stop online shop for syndicated industry research reports on 25+ categories and their sub-sectors. We bring to you to the latest in market research across multiple industries and geographies from leading research publishers across the globe.



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SOURCE Market Reports Hub
LONDON, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

GSK has today announced the launch of the Tackle Meningitis campaign in partnership with former England Rugby player, Matt Dawson, an initiative aimed at raising awareness of meningitis, which is a rare but potentially fatal disease. The campaign is also backed by UK charities Meningitis Research Foundation and Meningitis Now.

Tackle Meningitis aims to increase understanding of the disease, its symptoms and the fact that there are different strains of meningitis that can affect both children and young people, using the influence of sport and teamwork to reach as many people as possible.

With the peak season for meningitis just around the corner,[1] the campaign will raise awareness of existing information and materials that can be used to help spot suspected cases of meningitis, as well as undertaking a nationwide survey to assess how much people know about the disease and to highlight any information gaps. The results of the survey, which will be announced later in the year, will be used to guide the direction of the Tackle Meningitis campaign throughout 2017 engaging with schools, rugby clubs and community organisations.

Matt Dawson has first-hand experience of meningitis after his two-year old son, Sami, contracted meningitis in February this year and remained critically ill on a life-support machine for two weeks afterwards. Sami subsequently recovered from the disease and Matt now wants parents and families to receive the knowledge and education that he feels he lacked.

Matt said: "I wish I had known more about meningitis and what to look out for. People only think of the glass test, but there are other lesser known symptoms that it's very important to be aware of. In truth, I was fairly ignorant about how dangerous it can be, but thankfully we turned out to be incredibly lucky. With this disease, even a matter of minutes can make a huge difference to the outcome.

"I feel passionate about standing behind a campaign which uses the power and influence of sport and its ability to reach people of all ages. Together we can tackle meningitis to give families the best fighting chance against this devastating disease."

Vinny Smith, Meningitis Research Foundation Chief Executive, said: "Meningitis is a devastating disease that can kill or cause disability in a matter of hours. Amongst those most at risk are babies, children and young people, but anyone can be affected.

"Knowing the signs, symptoms and steps to take is crucial in order to act fast and improve outcomes, and this is what we will be working towards during next week's Meningitis Awareness Week. Our hope is that campaigns like Tackle Meningitis will generate a real shift in the way parents and families think about and act towards meningitis and septicaemia."

Liz Brown, Chief Executive at Meningitis Now commented: "We welcome GSK's efforts to drive up levels of awareness of meningitis and applaud Matt Dawson's courage in using his experience of the disease to help save lives.

With 30 years' experience of fighting this disease, we know how important the awareness message is, having shared 1.3 million free signs and symptoms cards last year alone and provided clear and accurate information for more people than ever before. As parents like Matt Dawson have found, early symptoms of the disease can be overlooked, with in some cases, devastating consequences. We are particularly excited to see how 'Tackle Meningitis' utilises sport to reach those who still don't know about the disease."

Symptoms of meningitis can develop rapidly. The first symptoms are usually fever, vomiting, headache and feeling unwell. Limb pain, pale skin, and cold hands and feet often appear earlier than the rash (which doesn't fade when a glass is rolled over it), neck stiffness, dislike of bright lights and confusion. Although a rash is often the most well-known symptom, it is often a sign that the disease is advancing rapidly and it is therefore crucial not to wait to for it to appear before seeking medical attention.

Notes to editors

About meningitis and septicaemia

Meningitis is the inflammation of the lining around the brain and spinal cord (meninges).[2] It can be very serious if not treated quickly, with the potential to cause life-threatening blood poisoning (septicaemia), permanent damage to the brain or nerves, loss of limbs and in some cases, death.[1] In the early stages of the disease it can be very difficult to tell meningitis and septicaemia apart from milder diseases, as they often resemble common viral illnesses.[3]

There are several types, or strains, of meningococcal bacteria with the main groups being A, B, C, W, X, and Y[4] and although group B meningococcal causes the majority of disease in the UK,[5] all of the meningococcal bacteria strains can be fatal. Vaccines are available to protect against some of the strains,[1] however, no single vaccine protects against all strains.[6] Meningitis and septicaemia can kill in hours, making it vital to be aware of the symptoms and act accordingly.[7] If you suspect someone may have meningitis or septicaemia you need to trust your instincts and seek the nearest medical help immediately.[3]

About Meningitis Research Foundation

Meningitis Research Foundation (MRF) is a UK-based charity that aims to raise awareness of meningitis and septicaemia and provide support to all those affected by the two diseases. A key aspect of their work involves funding research into the prevention, detection and treatment of meningitis and septicaemia and sharing the knowledge gained by research so everyone can benefit. The charity currently funds 16 research projects throughout the world, and since its foundation in 1989, it has awarded 147 research grants, leading to many advances in the prevention, detection and treatment of meningitis and septicaemia.

About Meningitis Now

Meningitis Now is a charity with almost 30 years' experience. The charity was formed in 2013 by bringing together Meningitis UK and Meningitis Trust, founders of the meningitis movement in the UK. They fund research into vaccines and prevention and aim to reduce the impact of the disease by raising awareness and providing people with the knowledge and information they need to get urgent medical attention if they suspect meningitis. A large part of their work also goes into rebuilding futures by providing dedicated support to people living with the impact of meningitis.

Both Meningitis Research Foundation and Meningitis Now back the Tackle Meningitis campaign, but will continue to run their own campaigns separately.

GSK - one of the world's leading research-based pharmaceutical and healthcare companies - is committed to improving the quality of human life by enabling people to do more, feel better and live longer. For further information please visit http://www.gsk.com.

Cautionary statement regarding forward-looking statements

GSK cautions investors that any forward-looking statements or projections made by GSK, including those made in this announcement, are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from those projected. Such factors include, but are not limited to, those described under Item 3.D 'Risk factors' in the company's Annual Report on Form 20-F for 2015.

References

1. Meningitis Research Foundation. Meningitis and septicaemia: UK facts and figures, http://www.meningitis.org/facts Last accessed September 2016

2. Meningitis Now. What is meningitis. https://www.meningitisnow.org/meningitis-explained/what-meningitis/

3. Meningitis Research Foundation. Frequently asked questions. http://www.meningitis.org/disease-info/faqs Last accessed August 2016

4. NHS Choices. Causes of meningitis. http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Meningitis/Pages/Causes.aspx Last accessed August 2016

5. Meningitis Now. Meningococcal disease https://www.meningitisnow.org/meningitis-explained/what-meningitis/types-and-causes/meningococcal-disease/ Last accessed August 2016

6. Meningitis Now. Bacterial meningitis https://www.meningitisnow.org/meningitis-explained/what-meningitis/types-and-causes/bacterial-meningitis/ Last accessed August 2016

7. Meningitis Research Foundation. Meningitis symptoms http://www.meningitis.org/symptoms Last accessed August 2016

SOURCE GSK
AMSTERDAM, Sept. 15, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- At IBC 2016, Huawei and its partners jointly demonstrated their latest ICT solutions. Some of the showcased products included the converged media cloud architecture developed using innovative ICT technology, IP-based ingest and broadcasting solution that supports flexible service scaling, and the 4K program production and broadcasting system with superb audio and video experience. During IBC, Huawei successfully hosted the 3rd Global Media Industry Forum that attracted hundreds of customers, partners, and analysts from all over the world, including UK, France, Spain and Indonesia. Industry leaders and experts shared their opinions on how to develop new media architectures in the digital era and how to foster media business innovation using ICT technology.

New Trends: Cloud and IP have Become Industry Trends, and Innovative ICT Enables Digital Transformation

The global media industry is undergoing a complete digital transformation, and this evolution has accelerated over the last few years. Media companies are looking for effective methods and innovative ICT technologies to improve information service quality. Joe So, CTO Industry Solutions, EBG Marketing & Solution Sales Department, Huawei, said: "During this digital transformation, ICT technology has changed from a mere business supporter to a key measure that drives business development. To continue their success, media groups must coordinate 'Cloud-Pipe-Device' and use innovative ICT technology to build open media information services platforms that support real-time data sharing and full-time connection."

New Solution: Successful Commercial Use of the Desktop Cloud that Supports HD, 8-Track, and Dual-Screen Video Editing

The business of radio and TV involves massive processing time of high-quality audio and video data. Traditional networks and cloud architectures cannot cope with the strict service requirements. Huawei leverages its latest desktop cloud that supports HD, 8-track, and dual-screen video editing to attract customers from the UK, France, and Italy. As an example, the Huawei desktop protocol (HDP+) intelligently identifies video, texts, windows, and lines used in non-linear editing applications, and compresses these contents (with or without loss) based on service requirements to ensure VM transmission efficiency and VDI quality. The dual-screen editing and voice ingest features offer physical workstation-level editing experiences. This desktop cloud has been successfully implemented in multiple world-class media institutions, such as TF1.

The evolution of 4K, SDN, and 40GE IP switching technologies enables TV stations to upgrade their existing systems to all-IP architectures. During IBC 2016, Huawei and Sony jointly demonstrated the IP production system, attracting the attention of many. Peter Sykes, Strategic Technology Development Manager, Sony Professional Solutions Europe, said: "Sony uses the AIMS Alliance to regulate business operations and develop IP-based, real-time onsite production solutions. To ensure project success, Sony must work with partners, such as Huawei, to enhance interoperability and robustness."

New Ecosystem: Working with Industry-Leading ISVs to Jointly Promote Digital Industry Transformation

Over the last few years, the media industry has gone through significant changes. Both media institutions and industry ISVs are looking for strong technological support, so that they can focus on the strategic upper-level business operations. Huawei leverages its accrued experiences in technologies and excellent capabilities in innovation to contribute to industry development. Based on customers' business needs, Huawei conducts open cooperation and joint innovation with industry-renowned ISVs, such as Sony, Dalet, and VSN. To date, Huawei has enabled more than 1,000 media groups reshape and improve ICT architectures, including TF1 of France, RAI of Italy, Mediaset, SKY of UK, KBS of South Korea, Phoenix TV of Hong Kong, CCTV of China Mainland and many more.

For more information, please visit http://enterprise.huawei.com/topic/ibc2016-en/index.html

SOURCE Huawei
TRIPOLI, Libya, Sept. 17, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- The Republic of Ivory Coast's Ministry of Digital Economy announced the selection of the Libyan Post & Telecommunications Holding Company (LPTIC) as the fourth operator by awarding it the new universal license.

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160916/408902

Libyan, Post & Telecoms Holding Company (LPTIC) Has Been Awarded the Fourth Universal License in the Republic of Ivory Coast (PRNewsFoto/LPTIC)

LPTIC's management held a series of extended meetings with the Ivorian Government from January to June of 2016, during which they presented a proposal for a comprehensive strategic plan to acquire the new universal license in the Ivory Coast. The technical and commercial aspects were taken into consideration, both in terms of assessing the targeted market's competitive environment and the size of the telecommunications sector in the Ivorian economy.

This important step comes as part of the restructuring of Libya's investments in the telecommunications sector in Africa that were previously managed by LAP GreenN. LPTIC is undertaking a vital role in restructuring the ICT sector in Libya in order to enhance its efficiency and contribute to the diversification of the Libyan economy.

Dr. Faisal Gergab, Chairman of LPTIC said, "We are pleased that LPTIC has been awarded the fourth universal license in Ivory Coast, the Ivorian market is one of the largest and fastest-growing in Africa. Furthermore, this license will allow LPTIC to broaden its horizons by entering fast-growing emerging markets. It will also provide LPTIC with a solid foundation to strengthen its presence and expertise in order to improve services and achieve commercial benefits. Consequently, LPTIC is well positioned to play an instrumental role in the socio-economic reform of Libya.

About LPTIC

LPTIC was established in accordance with the decision of the Prime Minister's number (63) for the year 2005 to a holding company to owner of major communications companies, Libyana, Madar, Libya Telecom and Technology (LTT), Aljeel aljadeed for Technology, International Communications Company, and Hatef Libya where these companies play significant role in the development of mobile phones and telephone communications internet connection has raised the efficiency of communications in Libya and to enable the largest possible number of citizens to get online service, whether by phone companies phones such as Libyana and Almadar or through the main internet services provider such as Libya Telecom & Technology LTT or Hatef Libya company that provides phone wired and wireless, as well as internet services.

Media Contact:

media@lptic.net

Connect with LPTIC on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/LPTIC

This content was issued through the press release distribution service at Newswire.com. For more info visit: http://www.newswire.com

SOURCE LPTIC
DANVERS, Massachusetts and HELSINKI, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

Neutron Therapeutics, Inc (NT) and Helsinki University Hospital (HUH) have entered into an arrangement whereby HUH Cancer Center acquires a nuBeam suite for boron-neutron capture therapy (BNCT). nuBeam is a compact accelerator based neutron source which can be installed in a hospital environment. Under the arrangement NT and HUH will collaborate in developing BNCT towards clinical use in a number of cancer indications. A biologically targeted form of radiation therapy, BNCT has previously been applied by the HUH in the treatment of severe cancer cases using a research nuclear reactor as the neutron source.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160915/408249LOGO )



(Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160915/408248 )

BNCT is a biologically targeted form of radiation therapy. The patient is infused with a tumor-localizing drug containing boron. The tumor tissue is then irradiated with epithermal neutrons, which are captured by boron. This neutron capture reaction results in the emission of high-energy charged particles, thereby resulting in biologically destructive radiation which is intended to selectively destroy cancer cells while sparing surrounding normal tissue. Particularly in Finland and Japan, BNCT has successfully been used to treat cancer patients in cases where other treatment options have been exhausted.

The lack of neutron sources suitable for hospital environment has limited the adoption of BNCT. NT's nuBeam suite is the first accelerator-based neutron source of its kind to operate in the world. NT's accelerator-based nuBeam neutron source has unparalleled efficiency and neutron beam quality and its revolutionary design is the result of several years of development effort by NT's technology team. nuBeam has a unique, electrostatic accelerator design and proprietary rotating solid lithium target technology, which result in a system with unprecedented value and reliability.

A pioneer in the use of BNCT and the only Comprehensive Cancer Center in Northern Europe, the HUH has successfully applied BNCT in the treatment of recurring head and neck cancer. Over 100 patients with locally recurrent in-operable head and neck cancer and a short estimated life expectancy were treated with BNCT using a research nuclear reactor as the source of neutrons with exceptional results.

HUH and NT have entered into an agreement whereby NT will deliver to HUH a nuBeam BNCT suite consisting of an accelerator based neutron source and ancillary systems and NT and HUH will engage in a collaboration to further develop BNCT in a number of cancer indications.

Dr. Petri Bono, Medical Director of HUH: "BNCT holds the promise of changing the landscape of cancer treatment and it is a key focus area for HUH. We aim to start treatments in 2018. NT's nuBeam suite represents the cutting edge of accelerator based neutron sources. We were particularly impressed by its unparalleled efficiency, durability and neutron beam quality."

Ted Smick, CEO of NT: "We are very pleased with HUH interest in applying and further developing BNCT and that HUH has selected NT as its partner. We were impressed and attracted by HUH's position amongst the leading cancer hospitals in Europe and its leading expertise in practicing BNCT. NT's nuBeam suite has raised considerable interest with cancer hospitals globally and we are in a number of discussions with hospitals interested in offering BNCT to their patients."

Neutron Therapeutics in brief

Neutron Therapeutics is a medical equipment company founded in the US in November 2015. It is working to bring Boron Neutron Capture Therapy (BNCT) out of the realm of medical research and transform it into a widely available first-line cancer therapy. Neutron Therapeutics Finland Oy is responsible for the supply of BNCT accelerator and collaboration with Helsinki University Hospital.

Additional information:

Ted Smick, CEO, Neutron Therapeutics, inquiries@nt-bnct.com

Petri Bono, Medical Director, HUH, petri.bono@hus.fi



SOURCE Neutron Therapeutics
HAGEN, Germany, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

Readers of the German trade magazine PROFI Werkstatt choose EUROPART as ' Best brand 2016 ' in the categories ' Commercial V ehicle Parts D istributor ' and ' Cleaning and C are '

High availability sustained by EUROPART through use of sophisticated logistics and maintenance of a large stock of more than 400,000 spare parts

EUROPART own brand range: 500 new positions per year

EUROPART has been awarded twice with the prize "Best brand 2016": After the last readers' choice of PROFI Werkstatt (issued by the HUSS publishing house) in 2014, the readers have again put Europe's leading distributor of commercial vehicle parts and workshop supplies in first place in the category 'Commercial Vehicle Parts Distributor'. For the first time, EUROPART was also awarded first place in the category 'Cleaning and Care'. The celebration of the award took place in the setting and with cooperation of the Automechanika international trade fair at the Frankfurt exhibition site.

(Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160916/408615 )



During the award ceremony, EUROPART CEO Pierre Fleck said: "We are very proud and grateful for the confidence that the readers of PROFI Werkstatt have shown in us. This award shows that customers value our know-how, the individual service and the close contact with customers. In this context I would especially like to thank all the employees who give total engagement every day to ensure the satisfaction of our customers."

EUROPART is represented at the IAA Commercial Vehicles Hanover 2016 trade fair from 22nd to 29th of September in Hall 26, Stand E40.

Stefanie Schmidt

Martinstrae 13

58135 Hagen

st.schmidt@europart.net

+49(0)2331-3564-4101



SOURCE EUROPART Holding GmbH
Britain's government gave the green light to the controversial Chinese-backed Hinkley Point nuclear power plant on September 15, 2016 (AFP Photo/Justin Tallis)

Paris (AFP) - The British government's long-awaited green light for the Hinkley Point nuclear power station in England on Thursday is of vital importance to France and its state-backed energy industry.

French nuclear power giant EDF is piloting the A18 billion (21 billion euro, $24 billion) project with investment from China.

Here are the stakes for France:

Nuclear power key to French economy

Nuclear power is crucial to the French economy, and state-controlled French power company EDF will be relieved that the project has finally got the go-ahead.

EDF, which is nearly 37 billion euros ($41.5 billion) in debt, hopes it will lead other European countries to rethink their nuclear strategy -- and green-light projects for which it can provide the technology.

"I think the British government's decision will lead many other European countries who have not really decided how they will cover their long-term energy needs to have a rethink," said EDF chief executive Jean-Bernard Levy.

EDF is already planning to build two more nuclear reactors at Sizewell in eastern England. The firm will also help China, the world's biggest producer of nuclear energy, to build its own reactor at another British plant in Bradwell, southeast England.

Boost for new technology

Crucially, the go-ahead is also a vote of confidence for the third-generation EPR reactors developed by EDF that will be used at Hinkley Point.

Another plant in France featuring the new technology, Flamanville on the Normandy coast, will be the world's largest nuclear reactor when it goes into operation in late 2018.

But this project, as well as another in Finland, has been plagued by delays and cost overruns which have discouraged other investors from opting for EPR reactors.

Francois Pouzeratte, an energy specialist at Eurogroup Consulting, said the go-ahead Thursday "will allow know-how to be retained (because) without Hinkley Point there would have been a hole in the French capacity to build power plants."

Story continues

Project carries huge risk

The enormous cost has led French unions and even a former EDF board member to warn that it could bankrupt the heavily indebted company.

Paul Marty of Moody's said the "scale and complexity" were likely to add significant business and financial risks to EDF's balance sheet.

He warned it will "have to shoulder the financial implications of a very long construction phase during which the investment will not generate any cash flow."

EDF had to take a 66.5 percent share in the project when it was unable to find other partners to join it and China's CGN in the financing.

Gerard Magnin quit the EDF board this year because he could no longer support the strategy of the company and the French government to push nuclear energy at the expense of other options.

"As a board member backed by the shareholding government I no longer wish to support a strategy with which I disagree," Magnin said in the letter.

France needs EDF to succeed. The French state has already poured in billions to keep its competitor Areva afloat and thousands of French workers on the payroll.
MUNICH, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

This material is intended for global medical media only.

For journalistic assessment and preparation before publication.

Novo Nordisk today announced that semaglutide, an investigational glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) analogue administered once-weekly, significantly reduced the risk of the primary composite endpoint of time to first occurrence of either cardiovascular (CV) death, non-fatal myocardial infarction (heart attack) or non-fatal stroke by 26% vs placebo, when added to standard of care in 3,297 adults with type 2 diabetes at high CV risk.[1] These results were based on an accumulation of first major adverse CV events (MACE) in 254 people.[1]

The main results from SUSTAIN 6 were presented today at the 52nd Annual Meeting of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD) 2016[2] and also published in the New England Journal of Medicine.[1]

Furthermore, there was a significant 39% decrease in non-fatal stroke and a non-significant 26% decrease in non-fatal myocardial infarction and a neutral outcome (2% decrease) in CV death after only two years of treatment.[1]

"The reduction in cardiovascular events observed with semaglutide in SUSTAIN 6 is notable given the small study population and the short trial duration," said Dr Steven Marso, SUSTAIN 6 investigator and the lead author for the New England Journal of Medicine publication of SUSTAIN 6. "These findings are clinically relevant, as cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death in people with type 2 diabetes and new treatment options that can also reduce the risk of cardiovascular events are needed."

In this outcomes trial, from an overall mean baseline of 8.7%, semaglutide 0.5 mg and 1.0 mg significantly reduced HbA 1c by -1.1% and -1.4% vs -0.4% for both placebo 0.5 mg and 1.0 mg at 104 weeks, when added to standard of care. In addition, from a mean baseline of 92.1 kg, adults treated with semaglutide 0.5 mg and 1.0 mg experienced superior and sustained weight loss of -3.6 kg and -4.9 kg, vs -0.7 kg for placebo 0.5 mg and -0.5 kg for placebo 1.0 mg.[1]

Fewer serious adverse events were seen with semaglutide vs placebo; however, treatment discontinuation due to adverse events was more frequent with semaglutide, mainly due to gastrointestinal events. The incidence of pancreatitis was lower with semaglutide vs placebo. In terms of microvascular complications, significantly fewer people treated with semaglutide (62 [3.8%]) vs placebo (100 [6.1%]) had new onset or worsening nephropathy while significantly more people treated with semaglutide (50 [3.0%]) vs placebo (29 [1.8%]) experienced diabetic retinopathy complications.[1]

"The results of SUSTAIN 6 support the strong potential of once-weekly semaglutide in type 2 diabetes treatment and we look forward to regulatory submission later this year," said Mads Krogsgaard Thomsen, executive vice president and chief science officer of Novo Nordisk. "The SUSTAIN 6 results further strengthen the clinical evidence for the Novo Nordisk GLP-1 receptor agonist portfolio with the finding of additional benefits beyond glycaemic control and weight loss in adults with type 2 diabetes at high cardiovascular risk."

About semaglutide

Semaglutide is a once-weekly investigational analogue of human glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) that stimulates insulin and suppresses glucagon secretion in a glucose-dependent manner, while decreasing appetite and food intake.[3] With SUSTAIN 6, semaglutide, administered subcutaneously once-weekly, has completed six phase 3a clinical trials for the treatment of adults with type 2 diabetes.

About SUSTAIN 6

SUSTAIN 6 was a multicentre, international, randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled pre-marketing CV outcomes trial (CVOT) investigating the long-term effects of semaglutide (0.5 mg and 1.0 mg) administered once-weekly, compared to placebo, when added to standard of care, in adults with type 2 diabetes at high risk of CV events. Standard of care included lifestyle modifications, glucose-lowering treatments and CV medications. The trial was initiated in February 2013 and randomised 3,297 adults with type 2 diabetes from 20 countries that were treated for 104 weeks.[1]

SUSTAIN 6 is the first dedicated pre-marketing CVOT in a type 2 diabetes population to report data. SUSTAIN 6 was designed to assess non-inferiority, i.e. demonstrate no increased risk of major CV events vs placebo, when added to standard of care. Superiority testing was not part of the pre-specified analysis. The primary endpoint was the first occurrence of a composite CV outcome comprising CV death, non-fatal myocardial infarction or non-fatal stroke.[1]

About the SUSTAIN clinical programme

SUSTAIN (Semaglutide Unabated Sustainability in Treatment of Type 2 Diabetes) is a clinical programme for semaglutide, administered once-weekly, that comprises six phase 3a global clinical trials encompassing more than 7,000 adults with type 2 diabetes as well as two Japanese trials encompassing around 1,000 adults with type 2 diabetes.

About Novo Nordisk

Novo Nordisk is a global healthcare company with more than 90 years of innovation and leadership in diabetes care. This heritage has given us experience and capabilities that also enable us to help people defeat other serious chronic conditions: haemophilia, growth disorders and obesity. Headquartered in Denmark, Novo Nordisk employs approximately 42,300 people in 75 countries and markets its products in more than 180 countries. For more information, visit novonordisk.com, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube.

Further information

Media:

Katrine Sperling

+45-4442-6718

krsp@novonordisk.com

Asa Josefsson

+45-3079-7708

aajf@novonordisk.com

Investors:

Peter Hugreffe Ankersen

+45-3075-9085

phak@novonordisk.com

Melanie Raouzeos

+45-3075-3479

mrz@novonordisk.com

Hanna Ogren

+45-3079-8519

haoe@novonordisk.com

Kasper Veje (US)

+1-609-235-8567

kpvj@novonordisk.com

_______________________

References

Marso SP, Bain S, Consoli A, et al. Semaglutide and cardiovascular outcomes, efficacy and safety in type 2 diabetes. New England Journal of Medicine. 2016; In Press. Results of the SUSTAIN 6 trial. Scientific Sessions at the 52nd Annual Meeting of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD 2016). 16 September 2016 . Nauck MA, Petrie JR, Sesti G, et al. A phase 2, randomized, dose-finding study of the novel once-weekly human GLP-1 analog, semaglutide, compared with placebo and open-label liraglutide in patients with type 2 diabetes. Diabetes Care. 2015; 39:231-241.

SOURCE Novo Nordisk
Other findings from the report include:

68% of customers of rival wireless networks indicated either strong or moderate interest unmetered video streaming over the mobile network in exchange for streaming limited to DVD quality.

A significant 14% of users in our panel claimed to be either very interested or extremely interested in switching to T-Mobile to get zero-rated video, versus 32% indicating a moderate interest.

20% of Binge On users claiming to have upgraded their tariff in order to get zero-rated video, Exhibit 9.

Nitesh Patel, Director of Wireless Media Strategies, Strategy Analytics, noted "Many operators are rightly focused on building high quality networks to support the best video experiences for their customers. However, T-Mobile's Binge On has proved that not only are users prepared to accept limited quality video streaming in exchange for unmetered use, but that satisfaction can also remain high. Given our findings it is not surprising T-Mobile is including limited streaming in its"

David Kerr, Vice President, Strategy Analytics, noted "The survey results prove that Binge On has been a success for T-Mobile, helping to raise its ARPU, increase mobile video usage and to give US smartphone owners another reason to consider switching to T-Mobile. Binge On has proved an important stage in the evolution from Simple Choice tariffs to T-Mobile One."

About Strategy Analytics

Strategy Analytics, Inc. provides the competitive edge with advisory services, consulting and actionable market intelligence for emerging technology, mobile and wireless, digital consumer and automotive electronics companies. With offices in North America, Europe and Asia, Strategy Analytics delivers insights for enterprise success. www.StrategyAnalytics.com

US Contact: David Kerr, +1 617 614 0720, dkerr@strategyanalytics.com

European Contact: Nitesh Patel, +44(0) 1908 423 621, npatel@strategyanalytics.com

Logo- http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20130207/NE56457LOGO-b

Related Links

http://www.strategyanalytics.com



SOURCE Strategy Analytics
BELLAGHY, Northern Ireland, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

Seamus Heaney HomePlace, a new arts and literary centre dedicated to the Nobel Laureate Seamus Heaney (1939-2013) opens on Friday, 30th September 2016.

A Mid Ulster District Council project, HomePlace is located in the Northern Ireland village of Bellaghy, where Seamus Heaney was raised, and where he drew much of the inspiration for his poetry.

HomePlace has been designed in close collaboration with Seamus Heaney's family, including his wife Marie and three children Michael, Christopher and Catherine Ann who have donated a significant part of his personal library, desk, photographs and artefacts.

His daughter Catherine Ann said:

"It has been rewarding for our family to see this project take shape, from its early stages through to the launch. We hope that HomePlace will become a hub for the local community and a destination for visitors from further afield, and that, for everyone, it will illuminate the poems and bring them to life."

Seamus Heaney's nephew, Brian McCormick, will manage HomePlace. Fellow poets and friends Paul Muldoon, Peter Fallon, Michael Longley, Sinead Morrisey and Tom Paulin are all supporting the project and taking part in events.

Councillor Trevor Wilson, Chair of Mid Ulster District Council said:

"Throughout the process we have endeavored to be sensitive to Seamus Heaney and the people closest to him. We have consulted closely with his family on all areas of the development of our permanent exhibition of his life story. As a result, we believe that a very special and authentic experience has been created."

Purpose-built on the site of a former RUC police station, at a cost of 4.25 million, HomePlace is an exciting addition within its village setting. The core feature is a permanent exhibition about the life and literature of Seamus Heaney, arranged over two floors and filled with personal stories, dozens of photographs, video recordings from friends, neighbours, world leaders, cultural figures, and the voice of the poet himself.

The centre also boasts a 191-seater performing arts space, education and learning spaces, a cafe, shop and an annex for community use. A full cultural programme has been developed by renowned artistic directors Sean Doran and Liam Browne.

Poet and friend of Seamus Heaney, Michael Longley said: "This building, the HomePlace, will become an echo chamber for the poet's beautiful lines."

homeplace@artsinform.co.uk

http://www.seamusheaneyhome.com/

SOURCE Mid Ulster District Council
VALLEY COTTAGE, New York, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

The global traditional wound management market is expected to be valued at US$ 5,746.0 Mn by the end of 2026, expanding at a CAGR of 3.1% during the forecast period (2016-2026). In a new report titled "Traditional Wound Management Market: Global Industry Analysis and Opportunity Assessment 2016-2026", Future Market Insights studies the global traditional wound management market and provides in-depth analysis of the key factors and trends impacting the market over the forecasted 10-year period.

Wound care is a billion dollar market accounting for a massive proportion of healthcare expenses globally. Traditional wound management products are intended for managing non-severe as well as acute wounds. There is a steady demand for traditional wound managing first aid products globally in home care settings as well as in hospitals. Products such as gauze bandages and adhesive bandages enjoy sustainable demand for small cuts, bruises, etc. and are widely in use. The worldwide market for traditional wound management is expected to witness a moderate growth rate in terms of value owing to a rising geriatric population and increasing cases of burns and trauma across the globe.

Request a Free Sample Report: http://www.futuremarketinsights.com/reports/sample/rep-gb-857

Growing incidence of diabetic ulcers, an increasing geriatric population, sustainable demand for first aid and versatility of products, higher procurement by hospitals, and limited reimbursement for advanced wound management products are some of the key factors driving the growth of the global traditional wound management market. However, decreasing popularity of traditional wound management products due to adoption of alternative therapies such as advanced wound care, negative pressure wound therapy, and active wound management is likely to slow down the growth of the global traditional wound management market over the forecast period. A high demand for low-frequency dressing change in acute care settings, high economic costs associated with wound care, and inconsistent research findings regarding the efficacy of traditional wound management products are some of the other major restraints likely to hamper market growth over the forecast period.

Greater access to primary healthcare services owing to a growing disposable income per capita, joint efforts by supply chain executives to increase efficiency (higher reimbursement for hospital supplies facilitated through cost sharing between key stakeholders across the value chain), and rising governmental support in the form of deeper collaborative research in developed economies is creating high potential growth opportunities for players operating in the global traditional wound management market. Rising popularity of non-woven gauzes in wound care and wound management activities owing to its virtually non-adherent and faster wicking ability; increasing focus by payers on patient care; growing consumption of wound care products due to a rise in the occurrence of diabetic ulcers and other chronic diseases; rapidly expanding outpatient wound care practices in ambulatory care centres; and the utilisation of traditional wound management products with innovative solutions are some of the key trends likely to shape the global traditional wound management market during the forecast period.

Preview Analysis on Global Traditional Wound Management Market by Region: http://www.futuremarketinsights.com/reports/traditional-wound-management-market

Market projections based on segmentation

By Product Type (Bandages, Gauzes, Gauze Sponges, Sponges): The Gauzes segment is estimated to account for 39.3% revenue share of the global traditional wound management market by 2016. The Bandages segment is estimated to account for 16.7% revenue share by 2016. Cotton gauzes find extensive usage in medical dressings, bandages, and production of wound adhesions due to their non-adherent nature. The Gauzes segment is expected to expand at the highest CAGR of 3.3% in terms of value over the forecast period owing to an increasing usage of non-woven gauzes due to the high absorbent nature of non-woven material.

By Application (Skin and diabetic ulcers, Burns, Surgeries, Trauma, Others (skin cuts, primary dressings, etc.)): The Skin and diabetic ulcers segment is estimated to account for 16.7% revenue share by 2016 and is expected to expand at a CAGR of 2.8% in terms of value over the forecast period. The Burns segment is anticipated to be valued at US$ 353.6 Mn by 2026, expanding at a CAGR of 2.4% over the forecast period. The Surgeries segment is likely to witness increased growth over the forecast period owing to an increasing number of surgical procedures carried out across the globe - a direct offshoot of the rising global expenditure on healthcare facilities and treatment options. The Surgeries segment is expected to be the most lucrative segment in the global traditional wound management market with an attractiveness index of 2.9.

By End User (Hospitals, Clinics, Diagnostic Centres, Homecare Settings, Ambulatory Surgical Centres): The Hospitals end user segment is expected to be the most lucrative in the global traditional wound management market and is estimated to account for 48.3% revenue share by the end of 2016. The Ambulatory surgical centres segment is expected to expand at a CAGR of 3.0% in terms of value over the forecast period. The Clinics segment is anticipated to be valued at US$ 674.7 Mn by 2026, expanding at a CAGR of 2.7% over the forecast period.

Request for Table of Contents with Figures: http://www.futuremarketinsights.com/toc/rep-gb-857

Market forecast by region

Sales of traditional wound management products have remained quite robust in the U.S. in the recent past, making North America the most lucrative market globally. In terms of value, North America is expected to be the dominant regional market in 2016 and is estimated to account for 48.3% revenue share by the end of 2016. The North America market is expected to expand at a CAGR of 3.4% over the forecast period. Traditional wound management sales are also growing steadily in the Japan, MEA, and APEJ markets. Revenues in APEJ are anticipated to increase at a CAGR of 3.6% while the MEA market is anticipated to increase at a CAGR of 3.2% and the Japan market is anticipated to increase at a CAGR of 3% over the forecast period.

Lenzing AG, Smith and Nephew Plc., B. Braun Melsungen AG, Johnson & Johnson Consumer Inc., Medtronic Plc., Cardinal Health Inc., Derma Sciences Inc., Paul Hartmann AG, Molnlycke Health Care, Medline Industries, Inc., DUKAL Corporation, and BSN Medical are some of the leading players operating in the global traditional wound management market.

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Global Pharmacovigilance Market Segmentation By Phase Of Drug Development (Preclinical Studies, Phase I, Phase II, Phase III, Phase IV); By Methods (Spontaneous Reporting, Intensified ADR Reporting, Targeted Spontaneous Reporting, Cohort Event Monitoring, EHR Mining); By Type Service Provider (In-House, Contract Outsourcing): http://www.futuremarketinsights.com/reports/pharmacovigilance-market

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SOURCE Future Market Insights
DENVER, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, University of Colorado Hospital, Penrose Hospital, McKee Medical Center and Avista Adventist Hospital were recognized with Ending the Wait awards for their outstanding achievements in facilitating the gift of life through organ and tissue donation in Colorado. The awards, now in their eighth year, are presented annually by Donor Alliance, the federally-designated organ procurement organization serving Colorado, and the Colorado Hospital Association (CHA).

The organizations created the awards to recognize the commitment of Colorado hospitals, medical centers and healthcare professionals to saving lives through organ and tissue donation. The selections are based on hospital size, trauma center designation, total number of donors and organs transplanted and are awarded annually to hospitals that demonstrate extraordinary efforts in organ and tissue donation.

Last year, organ donors from Penrose Hospital donated more than four organs per donor, which resulted in 30 lives saved through organ transplantation in 2015. University of Colorado Hospital (UCH) has long been a leader in organ and tissue donation and transplantation. UCH led the way in tissue donation for a facility of its size with 96 tissue donors in 2015, a 48 percent increase over the previous year. McKee Medical Center is being honored for its hand in helping 22 tissue donors fulfill their wishes to help others. Avista Adventist Hospital also earned recognition for its dedication to fulfilling family wishes surrounding organ and tissue donation.

"These exemplary Colorado hospitals provide a profound service to our community by helping to advance our mission of saving lives through organ and tissue donation," said Sue Dunn, president and CEO of Donor Alliance. "We are honored to partner with and publically recognize the achievements of these healthcare organizations who are helping to save and improve the lives of countless individuals across the state through their tireless efforts."

Each donor has the potential to save up to eight lives through organ donation and save and heal more than 50 through the gift of tissue donation. Last year, 428 people received lifesaving organ transplants thanks to 134 selfless organ donors from our area. A record 1,674 tissue donors provided healing tissue to thousands in need. Also, at the close of 2015, nearly 68 percent of Colorado's licensed drivers and ID card holders had joined the Donate Life Colorado Organ and Tissue Donor Registry. However, there are still currently nearly 2,700 people in Colorado waiting for a lifesaving organ transplant, so Donor Alliance and CHA know their efforts are not complete.

"The coordinated efforts of Donor Alliance and Colorado hospitals result in saved and improved lives for countless patients and their families," said Steven J. Summer, president and CEO of the Colorado Hospital Association. "CHA is proud to once again partner with Donor Alliance to recognize those hospital leaders and clinicians whose actions improve the well-being of our patients and communities."

For more information about organ and tissue donation, please visit DonorAlliance.org. To register to be an organ and tissue donor, please visit DonateLifeColorado.org or call 303-329-4747 for more information.

About the Colorado Hospital Association

The Colorado Hospital Association (CHA) represents more than 100 member hospitals and health systems throughout Colorado. CHA partners with its members to work towards health reform, clinical excellence and performance improvement, and provides advocacy and representation at the state and federal level. Colorado hospitals and health systems are committed to providing coverage and access to safe, high-quality and affordable health care. In addition, Colorado hospitals have a tremendous impact on the state's economic stability and growth, contributing to nearly every community across the state with 75,000 employees statewide. For more information, visit www.cha.com.

About Donor Alliance

Donor Alliance is a non-profit organization dedicated to saving lives through organ and tissue donation and transplantation. As the organ and tissue procurement agency for Colorado and most of Wyoming, Donor Alliance serves more than 5.8 million residents and more than 100 hospitals.

Donor Alliance adheres to the highest medical and ethical standards: respectfully working with the families of organ and tissue donors, maintaining partnerships with hospitals and educating residents on the life-saving benefits of donation and inspiring them to sign up on the state's donor registry. Colorado and Wyoming boast some of the highest rates of donor registration in the country, which directly translates to more lives saved and healed through organ and tissue transplantation. Donor Alliance is one of 58 federally designated organizations of its kind in the United States. For more information visit DonorAlliance.org or the Donate Life Colorado or Donate Life Wyoming Facebook pages.

Media Contacts:

Courtney Brunkow Andrea Smith The Fletcher Group Donor Alliance 303.717.9575 303.370.5683 [email protected] [email protected]

SOURCE Donor Alliance

Related Links

http://www.DonorAlliance.org


"We are honored to accept this Ruedas ESPN Best Luxury Sedan Award for the 2017 Genesis G90, as we recognize Latino car buyers' influence in the marketplace and how the U.S. Hispanic market is fundamental to our ongoing success," said Erwin Raphael, general manager of Genesis in the U.S. "We will continuously strive to deliver the highest levels of refinement in all Genesis vehicles with a dedicated focus on performance, satisfaction and service as we welcome owners into the Genesis family."

The annual Ruedas ESPN Awards are judged by a panel of automotive experts that form the editorial team of the national radio show. Vehicles are nominated in ten categories each year. A selection of the factors that weigh heavily in winning the highly coveted award include: Vehicles must be available in the marketplace or by the end of the current year, must meet high quality standards, generate popular interest among Hispanic automotive consumers, and offer a strong value for the money.

"The 2017 Genesis G90 is a true game changer in the automotive luxury market, the brand's flagship sedan has redefined modern luxury with unparalleled consumer-centric programs with time savings conveniences," said Jaime Florez, founder and host of Ruedas ESPN on ESPN Deportes Radio Network. "The 2017 G90 wins the Ruedas ESPN Best Luxury Sedan Award because it delivers on refinement, convenience and dynamic performance, combined with a strong value factor that resounded unanimously among the panel of jurors." Mr. Florez continues, "the Genesis G90 provides segment-leading standardized safety and a comprehensive suite of cutting-edge technologies, important factors for Hispanic car buyers."

The Genesis G90, along with all Genesis vehicles, launch with exclusive consumer-centric programs to elevate the luxury ownership experience. From valet service appointments scheduled using the Genesis mobile app to complimentary maintenance and Genesis Connected Services, the Genesis Experience is designed to provide time-saving conveniences.

All Genesis vehicles offer Genesis Connected Services to bring seamless connectivity directly into the car with technology like Remote Start with Climate Control, Destination Search powered by Google, Remote Door Lock/Unlock, Car Finder, Enhanced Roadside Assistance, and Stolen Vehicle Recovery. Genesis Connected Services can be easily accessed from the buttons on the rearview mirror and center stack, the web or via an exclusive Genesis owners' smartphone app.

Ruedas ESPN is a two-hour radio show focused on the auto industry and the world of motorsports, designed to deliver useful and timely information for US Hispanics in an entertaining manner. Broadcast on the ESPN Deportes Radio network of more than 50 AM & FM stations all over the U.S. and Puerto Rico, and on Channel 157 of both the SIRIUS and XM Satellite Radio systems, every Sunday at 11 AM (EST) it brings outstanding content to enrich a compelling listening experience. The sections include recommendations on how to best purchase a vehicle; interviews, reviews about cars; suggestions regarding insurance and financing, and coverage of the most important events in the automobile industry and the world of motorsports.

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160916/408751

Logo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160808/396494LOGO

SOURCE Genesis
ABBOTT PARK, Ill., Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Abbott (NYSE: ABT) announced today that it will sell Abbott Medical Optics, its vision care business, to Johnson & Johnson for $4.325 billion in cash.

"We've been actively and strategically shaping our portfolio, which has recently focused on developing leadership positions in cardiovascular devices and expanding diagnostics," said Miles D. White, chairman and chief executive officer, Abbott. "Our vision care business will be well-positioned for continued success and advancement with Johnson & Johnson, and I'd like to thank our employees for building a successful business."

Abbott's vision business has products in areas including cataract surgery, laser vision correction (LASIK) and corneal care products (contact solution, eye drops, etc.).

The net impact of this transaction is not expected to impact Abbott's overall targeted ongoing earnings per share in 2017. This targeted earnings per share excludes the expected gain on this transaction and any costs related to the transaction. The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2017 and is subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory approvals.

About Abbott:

Abbott is a global healthcare company devoted to improving life through the development of products and technologies that span the breadth of healthcare. With a portfolio of leading, science-based offerings in diagnostics, medical devices, nutritionals and branded generic pharmaceuticals, Abbott serves people in more than 150 countries and employs approximately 74,000 people.

Visit Abbott at www.abbott.com and connect with us on Twitter at @AbbottNews.

Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995

Abbott Caution Concerning Forward-Looking Statements

Some statements in this document may be forward-looking statements for purposes of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Abbott cautions that these forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated in the forward-looking statements, including but not limited to the ability of the parties to consummate the proposed transaction on a timely basis or at all and the ability of the parties to satisfy the conditions precedent to consummation of the proposed transaction, including the ability to secure the required regulatory approvals on the terms expected, on a timely basis or at all. Economic, competitive, governmental, technological and other factors that may affect Abbott's operations are discussed in Item 1A, "Risk Factors," in Abbott's Annual Report on Securities and Exchange Commission Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2015, and Abbott's Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the period ended June 30, 2016, and are incorporated herein by reference. Abbott undertakes no obligation to revise any forward-looking statements as a result of subsequent events or developments, except as required by law.

Logo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20150928/271488LOGO

SOURCE Abbott

Related Links

http://www.abbott.com


NEW YORK, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Following a meeting in New York this week with AJC and other Jewish organizations, Hungarian State Secretary Levente Magyar claimed that we concurred with his view that U.S. Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power's remarks about anti-Semitism in Hungary at a recent UN Conference were "exaggerated," "intentionally mistranslated sentences" based on "distorted information."

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Ambassador Power correctly described the disturbing developments in Hungary, a country to which we have long attached importance. Anti-Semitism and xenophobia are a serious concern, as has been widely reported. We support Ambassador Power's remarks and share her criticism of the Hungarian state honor awarded to the journalist Zsolt Bayer, a notorious figure known for his anti-Semitic and anti-Roma invective. We have, in fact, shared our outrage at this act directly with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

SOURCE American Jewish Committee

Related Links

http://www.ajc.org


FRANKLIN LAKES, N.J., Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- BD (Becton, Dickinson and Company) (NYSE: BDX) and Vancive Medical Technologies, an Avery Dennison (NYSE: AVY) business, today launched a line of transparent vascular dressings with chlorhexidine gluconate (CHG) antimicrobial preservative that are designed to enhance patient care and be easy for clinicians to apply and remove.

The new BD ChloraShield dressings, which feature BeneHold CHG, an innovative adhesive technology from Vancive Medical Technologies, comfortably secure the dressing to the skin, absorb fluids and protect the site from external contaminants. The CHG incorporated within the adhesive preserves the dressing from microbial growth, making them well-suited for catheter insertion sites. The Infusion Nurses Society recently released guidelines recommending the use of CHG dressings.1 BD is the exclusive distributor of the dressings worldwide.

"The combination of vascular access expertise from BD, infection prevention expertise from the CareFusion acquisition and CHG adhesive technology from Vancive Medical Technologies creates a powerful combination for a new vascular access product," said Stephen Hartley, global vice president of Infection Prevention for BD. "The new ChloraShield IV dressings complete BD's portfolio to offer a comprehensive set of products for vascular access procedures, including skin prep, catheters, connectors and flush products."

BD ChloraShield dressings are available in a variety of designs including bordered and non-bordered as well as sizes commonly used for peripheral IVs and PICCs.

"BeneHold CHG adhesive technology is well-suited for vascular access dressings," said Kirsten Newquist general manager for Vancive Medical Technologies. "The collaboration with BD brings together complementary expertise from both companies and we look forward to expanding the product offerings in the future."

BD and Vancive Medical Technologies will showcase the new BD ChloraShield dressings in booth #423 at the 30th annual Association for Vascular Access Conference, being held Sept. 16-19 in Orlando, Fla. To learn more about ChloraShield IV dressings with CHG antimicrobial visit, www.bd.com/ChloraShieldIV.

About BD

BD is a global medical technology company that is advancing the world of health by improving medical discovery, diagnostics and the delivery of care. BD leads in patient and health care worker safety and the technologies that enable medical research and clinical laboratories. The company provides innovative solutions that help advance medical research and genomics, enhance the diagnosis of infectious disease and cancer, improve medication management, promote infection prevention, equip surgical and interventional procedures, optimize respiratory care and support the management of diabetes. The company partners with organizations around the world to address some of the most challenging global health issues. BD has more than 45,000 associates across 50 countries who work in close collaboration with customers and partners to help enhance outcomes, lower health care delivery costs, increase efficiencies, improve health care safety and expand access to health. For more information on BD, please visit bd.com.

About Vancive Medical Technologies

Vancive Medical Technologies is a medical technology company with more than three decades of expertise in adhesive chemistries and material technologies for medical applications using pressure sensitive adhesives. The company's applications and technologies are an integral part of products that are in daily use in medical facilities throughout the world. Through long-term relationships with original equipment manufacturers, industry-specific converters and leading universities, Vancive Medical Technologies continually finds new ways to develop products that can improve patient care. Vancive Medical Technologies is an Avery Dennison business headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. To learn more about Vancive Medical Technologies, visit www.vancive.averydennison.com.

About Avery Dennison

Avery Dennison (NYSE:AVY) is a global leader in labeling and packaging materials and solutions. The company's applications and technologies are an integral part of products used in every major market and industry. With operations in more than 50 countries and more than 25,000 employees worldwide, Avery Dennison serves customers with insights and innovations that help make brands more inspiring and the world more intelligent. Headquartered in Glendale, California, the company reported sales of $6 billion in 2015. Learn more at www.averydennison.com.

1Journal of Infusion Nursing, Volume 39, pgs. S82-83, January/February 2016.

BD Contacts: Vancive Contacts:



Troy Kirkpatrick Andrew Deckert BD Public Relations Global Marketing Communications Manager 858.617.2361 +1 224 374 2109 [email protected] [email protected]



Monique N. Dolecki BD Investor Relations 201.847.5378 [email protected] Barbara Van Rymenam Global Director, CHG Program +32 (0)497 103233 [email protected]

SOURCE BD (Becton, Dickinson and Company)

Related Links

http://www.bd.com


MISSISSAUGA, Ontario, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- We are disappointed and surprised at the recent call for boycotts of our drywall products by some Canadian customers and certain Western Canadian Associations, and through commentary in the Canadian media, related to our Anti-Dumping Complaint and the subsequent Provisional Duties announced by the Canadian Border Services Agency on September 6.

We would like to put this issue into clear context: This is about Canadian law and Canadian jobs.

We filed an Anti-Dumping Complaint because drywall manufacturers based in the US were exporting large and growing volumes of products into Western Canada in the last few years at prices materially lower than those at which they are sold in the US.

Such dumping creates material injury to domestic manufacturers in the form of share loss and price and margin suppression. Under Canadian law, this is considered an unfair trade practice sanctioned through an offsetting duty or tariff. The magnitude of the Provisional Duty announced is indicative of the very large price difference between the US and Canada and the enormous margin of dumping, which is having a devastating impact on the value of gypsum board in Western Canada.

To give some context as to the seriousness of the current situation, there was a historical antidumping case involving gypsum board that was filed in Canada in 1992. The current dumping situation is significantly worse than what Canadian producers faced back in 1992. The market share of US imports in the 1992 case was in the range of 8 to 9 percent, while in the current case US imports account for over half of the market in Western Canada. The dumping margins determined by the Canadian government in the 1992 case were around 27 percent, whereas the preliminary margins in this case range from just over 100 percent to 276 percent.

Our actions are meant to stop this practice and bring a level playing field and fair competition to the Western Canadian marketplace by having all manufacturers conform to regulatory and legal requirements as prescribed under Canadian law. Faced with increasing injury from dumping, we had to terminate Western Canadian employees, reduce investment in our manufacturing plants, mine operations and business, and put in jeopardy the continued viability of our plants. We could not allow our business and the jobs of our Canadian employees to be further harmed, and the viability and survival of our plants to be put at risk due to unfair dumping, without seeking the legal redress which is available under Canadian Trade Law.

We have maintained our commitment to Canada over many decades, and since the financial crisis in 2008, are the only manufacturer to have kept all of our Western Canadian plants and operations open, while US companies closed theirs. We have gypsum board plants in Vancouver, Calgary and Winnipeg and mines in Windermere, BC and Amaranth Manitoba supplying those plants. Across Canada we employ over 1,000 people and are proudly committed to manufacturing building materials in Canada and servicing and supplying Canadian customers coast to coast.

The Provisional Duty will not have any direct impact on supply, however, it seems with the resulting market uncertainty, Canadian drywall manufacturers are seeing an increase in demand for products. We are now rehiring employees we had to terminate due to the dumping injury and restarting shifts at our plants in Western Canada to increase supply to help meet the increased needs of our customers.

We understand the concern and uncertainty regarding the potential price consequences of gypsum board post the Duty. Very shortly after we filed the Complaint, we informed all our customers in early May of this year that the Complaint had been filed in order to give as much notice and time possible to prepare and react. We will continue to work closely with those customers to keep them informed and assist them where we can during this time of transition and change with the Anti-Dumping Complaint process.

- Matthew Walker, General Manager, CertainTeed Gypsum Canada

About CertainTeed

Through the responsible development of innovative and sustainable building products, CertainTeed, headquartered in Malvern, Pennsylvania, has helped shape the building products industry for more than 110 years. Founded in 1904 as General Roofing Manufacturing Company, the firm's slogan "Quality Made Certain, Satisfaction Guaranteed," quickly inspired the name CertainTeed. Today, CertainTeed is a leading brand of North American exterior and interior building products, including roofing, siding, fence, decking, railing, trim, insulation, gypsum and ceilings.

A subsidiary of Saint-Gobain, one of the world's largest and oldest building products companies, CertainTeed and its affiliates have more than 5,700 employees and more than 60 manufacturing facilities throughout the United States and Canada. The group had total sales of approximately $3.3 billion in 2015. www.certainteed.com

SOURCE CertainTeed Gypsum Canada

Related Links

http://www.certainteed.com


john kasich

Ohio Gov. John Kasich, a popular Republican, said on Friday that it was unlikely he would cast his ballot in November for Donald Trump, the Republican presidential nominee.

"Is it still possible that you could support Donald Trump?" CNN correspondent Dana Bash asked in an interview.

"It's very unlikely," Kasich replied. "Too much water under the bridge."

Kasich ruled out voting for Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, and said that he hasn't even considered Libertarian party candidate Gary Johnson.

"I haven't even gone there yet," Kasich said of possibly supporting the former New Mexico governor.

Trump and his allies have expressed frustration that Kasich has refused to endorse the real-estate mogul.

At the Republican National Convention in July, Trump's staff placed Ohio's delegates toward the back of the room, an intentional slight intended as a message to the former governor for withholding support.

On the campaign trail, Trump mocked Kasich, pointing out that Kasich was barely picking up delegates, and even criticizing his eating habits.

NOW WATCH: 'Taco Trucks on every corner': Watch the stunning comments made by the leader of 'Latinos for Trump'





More From Business Insider


HARRISBURG, Pa., Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- During the month of October, the Department of Banking and Securities will be emphasizing the need to help our senior citizens protect themselves from improper and illegal financial transactions. The department's outreach staff will be meeting with senior citizens and members of the general public across Pennsylvania during the month of October to discuss financial topics of interest to senior citizens as part of Governor Tom Wolf's Consumer Financial Protection Initiative.

Department staff will be participating in several senior citizen's expos sponsored by members of the General Assembly, including:

Rep. Sue Helms' Senior Expo at the Halifax Area Ambulance Social Hall in Halifax ( Dauphin County ) on October 6 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM

Senior Expo at the Halifax Area Ambulance Social Hall in ( ) on from Senator John P. Sabatina, Jr. Senior Expo at the PA National Guard Armory at 2700 Southampton in Philadelphia on October 7 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM

Senior Expo at the PA National Guard Armory at 2700 Southampton in on from Senators John T. Yudichak and Lisa Baker and Rep. Aaron Kaufer's Senior Expo at the Kingston Armory in Kingston ( Luzerne County ) on October 13 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM

and and Rep. Senior Expo at the Kingston Armory in ( ) on from Rep. Jim Marshall's Senior Expo at the United Methodist Church's Community Life Center of Chippewa in Beaver Falls ( Beaver County ) on October 14 from 9:00 AM to 12:00 PM

Senior Expo at the United Methodist Church's Community Life Center of Chippewa in ( ) on from Senator Don White and Rep. Dave Reed and Rep. Chris Dush's Senior Expo at S&T Bank Area, White Township Recreation Complex in Indiana ( Indiana County ) on October 20 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM

and Rep. and Rep. Senior Expo at S&T Bank Area, White Township Recreation Complex in ( ) on from Senator Tom Killion's Senior Expo at the Penn State-Brandywine Campus in Media ( Delaware County ) on October 21 from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM

Department staff will be presenting "Understanding Reverse Mortgages," which helps senior citizens and their families have a better understanding of this complicated mortgage product. The presentation will be at the Schuylkill Township Hall in Phoenixville (Chester County) on October 27 at 7:00 PM.

Department staff will also be visiting private senior communities and presenting "Avoiding Scams and ID Theft," which takes a look at ways people's identities are stolen or compromised, what people can do if they find their identities have been stolen, and how to stop theft from occurring. (Note: attendance at these events is limited to residents of the communities and their guests) Location for these presentations:

Lodge Run Apartments in Portage ( Cambria County ) on October 12 at 11:00 AM

( ) on at Spring Manor Apartments in Hollidaysburg ( Blair County ) on October 13 at 11:00 AM

( ) on at Apartments at Cliveden in Philadelphia on October 27 at 4:00 PM

The Department of Banking and Securities offers a number of education presentations designed to help senior citizens and consumers of all ages learn protect and grow their own money. The department's outreach Calendar of Events can be found online: http://bit.ly/1KIscBZ. Consumers and community groups can call 1-800-PA-BANKS or email [email protected] for more information, or learn more online: http://bit.ly/2bjKrTa.

Media contact: Ed Novak, 717-783-4721

SOURCE Pennsylvania Department of Banking and Securities
"After spending over three years in Alaska, it'll be rewarding to share all of the valuable things I learned in Anchorage to my beloved home state," Garcia said. "I am extremely excited to work with such an amazing staff, committed to bringing a comfortable, enjoyable experience to Golden State visitors."

Garcia entered the hospitality field in 2006 at Remington Hotels. For over four years, he climbed his way up by in serving multiple roles, including night auditor, PBX operator and front desk supervisor. He then took over as front office supervisor at Evan Hotels for a little over a year. In 2011, Garcia accepted his first general manager position at Holiday Inn Express. During the beginning of 2013, he headed up to Alaska to undertake a few managerial roles, most recently at Hampton Inn Anchorage.

Only a 90-minute drive from Garcia's hometown, Courtyard Cypress provides California visitors spacious and innovative accommodations designed with the modern traveler in mind. Complimentary high-speed Wi-Fi, ergonomic workspaces, comfortable couches and luxurious bedding are just a few of the many amenities that leave a lasting impression on guests.

When away from their rooms, families and leisure travelers alike will appreciate the hotel's convenient location near world-renowned theme parks such as Disneyland and Knott's Berry Farm. The Bistro  Eat. Drink. Connect., Courtyard's on-site restaurant, serves delectable American cuisine for breakfast and dinner, as well as Starbucks coffee and evening cocktails. If guests are coming to town for business, the Cypress hotel offers five impressive meeting spaces to accommodate everything from intimate boardroom sessions to mid-size conferences. During downtime, travelers can soak up the year-round sunshine at the hotel's outdoor pool, or get the adrenaline pumping at the well-equipped fitness center.

About Courtyard Cypress Anaheim/Orange County

Courtyard Cypress Anaheim/Orange County at 5865 Katella Avenue in Cypress, CA is within close proximity to Knott's Berry Farm, Disneyland Park and Huntington Beach. The hotel features 7 floors with 156 rooms and 24 suites featuring complimentary high-speed internet, as well as an outdoor pool, fitness center, on-site dining and 5 meeting rooms with 3,940 square feet of total event space. For information, visit www.marriott.com/LGBCP or call 1-714-827-1010.

About Dimension Development

Since 1988, the award-winning Dimension Development Company has developed, acquired and managed full-service, all-suite and select service hotels. The company has gained exponential success for years by carefully selecting its business affiliates, recruiting and retaining a talented staff and striving to constantly improve and progress. Its current portfolio consists of more than 53 hotels in 12 states from the following leading brands: Marriott International, Inc., Hilton Worldwide, Hyatt Global and Resorts and InterContinental Hotel Group. For information, visit www.dimdev.com.

Sign up now for Marriott Rewards and get on the fast track to earn points for free hotel stays, room upgrades, flights, credit card purchases and deals with Marriott partners.

Learn more about Courtyard and Marriott International Inc.

PRESS CONTACT

Samual Cueva

318-356-4907

[email protected]

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160915/408511

SOURCE Courtyard Cypress Anaheim/Orange County
For many, it is Shadow's 1996 debut album, Endtroducing , that they keep returning to, widely regarded as a groundbreaking release that paved the way for experimental hip hop and changed the shape of electronic music from that point on. Upon its release, The Guardian gave it a 5-star review and called it "One of the most daring and original albums of recent times," continuing, "This is genius," while SPIN wrote that the album "practically folds you into its symphonic fantasia, the coming-of-age story of a 24-year-old bunk-bed dreamer." Almost a decade later Pitchfork awarded Endtroducing a perfect 10 in their review of the 2005 Deluxe Edition, calling the record "deeply spiritual."

Endtroducing was included in many critical lists of the best albums of 1996, and more recently has been ranked as one of the best albums of the 1990s by the likes of Q, SPIN, Pitchfork and Rolling Stone, who wrote, "The dystopian New Age of Endtroducing sounds like an alien spacecraft touching down on the autobahn late at night, probably to check out Earth's used-vinyl bins," adding, "This is DJ culture at its boldest: steeped in the past but zooming into the Space Age future." TIME magazine went one step further, hailing it as one of the "100 greatest albums of all time."

This year marks 20 years since that pivotal release, and to mark the occasion the San Francisco-based producer has announced a special deluxe CD/LP 20th Anniversary Endtrospective Edition (Island) featuring the original album, a collection of demos, alternate takes and live versions titled Excessive Ephemera, and Endtroducing Re-Imagined, featuring 12 specially commissioned remixes from some of contemporary electronic music's leading lights including Hudson Mohawke, Clams Casino, Salva, Prince Paul, Bondax & Karma Kid and more. Stream the Clams Casino remix here: http://vevo.ly/OcN4bj.

LP pre-order: https://UMe.lnk.to/Endtroducing6LP

CD pre-order: https://UMe.lnk.to/Endtroducing3CD

A seminal, incredibly influential hip hop release (also regarded as pretty much the last word in instrumental 'trip hop,' a term used a lot at the time), Endtroducing is simply one of the defining albums of the '90s. It is famously also the first record ever made entirely from samples of other people's records  with a particularly broad array of sources used, many mined from the catacomb-like basement under Davis's favorite record store in Sacramento, Calif., which has long-since closed its doors. This is the store pictured by photographer B+ on the album cover and in many other shots included in the package.

The CD/LP package will include expanded liner notes from a new interview conducted by Eliot Wilder (author of the lauded 33 1/3 book on the album) and some never-before-published photographs by B+ and Phil Knott to create the 20th anniversary release as Deluxe 3 CD and 6 LP (3 x double LP) sets. The new remixes will also be issued as a standalone digital album.

Speaking about the anniversary edition, DJ Shadow commented, "I've had to sort of concede that there is something about the record that took on a life of its own, that probably has very little to do with me. Nobody can plan these sorts of things. I think that everyone aspires to their music being loved and heard and appreciated on some level, but there are a lot of intangibles, and there are a lot of things that even the original artists couldn't have planned or fully understood at the time. I feel that way about Endtroducing. And I think that's the main difference between Endtroducing and all the other records I've madeit was the first time and it was a kind of a flag in the ground, at least within my body of work.

As a music lover, my favorite records always have some hallmarks of an era, but also sound as if they could have been made almost any time within a 20 year time span. I've always felt that as someone who buys a lot of records and sits there and studies them and kind of vibes off them, I also feel like once you put something out into the world, it can be discovered later. That happened so much with Endtroducing  10 or 15 years down the road, people were discovering it."

From the liner notes by Eliot Wilder:

When it was released 20 years ago, Endtroducing sounded like nothing that had come before  an album of beats, beauty, and chaos. Looking back, no other popular record better summarizes the end of the 20th century. Josh Davis, alias DJ Shadow, took elements of hip-hop, funk, rock, ambient, and psychedelia, as well as found sounds, oddball spoken-word clips, and cut-out-bin nuggets  a trove of mostly forgotten or obscure recorded sounds  and then wrote the ultimate lesson.

It's an album that sits with you and lingers. It's an album you can return to and discover whole new areas you hadn't been aware of, like finding a room in your house you never knew was there. There is something about Endtroducing which often ranks high on critics' best albums-of-all-time lists, that always brings me back to it. It never fails to deliver emotionally on so many levels. Despite its melancholic atmosphere, there is something uplifting at its core. "If I were to find one word that resonates more than anything within Endtroducing, it would be 'hope,'" Josh has said.

ENDTROSPECTIVE EDITION TRACK LISTING:

CD 1 / LP 1&2  ENDTRODUCING

1. Best Foot Forward

2. Building Steam With A Grain Of Salt

3. The Number Song

4. Changeling

**Transmission 1

5. What Does Your Soul Look Like Part 4

6. Untitled

7. Stem / Long Stem

**Transmission 2

8. Mutual Slump

9. Organ Donor

10. Why Hip Hop Sucks in '96

11. Midnight In A Perfect World

12. Napalm Brain / Scatter Brain

13. What Does Your Soul Look Like Part 1  Blue Sky Revisit

**Transmission 3

CD2 / LP 3&4  EXCESSIVE EPHEMERA

1. Best Foot Forward  Alternate Version

2. Building Steam With A Grain Of Salt  Alternate Take Without Overdubs

3. The Number Song  Cut Chemist Party Mix

4. Changeling  Original Demo Excerpt

5. Stem  Cops 'N' Robbers Mix

6. Soup

7. Red Bus Needs To Leave!

8. Mutual Slump  Alternate Take Without Overdubs

9. Organ Donor  Extended Overhaul

10. Why Hip Hop Sucks In '96  Alternate Take

11. Midnight In A Perfect World  Gab Mix

12. Napalm Brain  Original Demo Beat

13. What Does Your Soul Look Like  Peshay Remix

14. DJ Shadow Live In Oxford, England, October 30, 1997

CD3 / LP 5&6  ENDTRODUCING RE-EMAGINED

1. Best Foot Forward  Teeko Remix

2. Building Steam With A Grain Of Salt  Salva Remix

3. The Number Song  Lee Bannon Remix

4. Transmissions  Kuedo Remix

5. Changeling II  Adrian Younge Remix

6. What Does Your Soul Look Like Part 4  Teklife Remix

7. Stem / Long Stem  Clams Casino Remix

8. Mutual Slump  Daedelus Remix

9. Organ Donor  UZ Remix

10. Midnight In A Perfect World  Hudson Mohawke Remix

11. What Does Your Soul Look Like Part 1  Prince Paul Remix

12. Building Steam With A Grain Of Salt  Bondax & Karma Kid Remix

DJ SHADOW ON TOUR

September 27  San Diego, CA @ House Of Blues

September 28  Los Angeles, CA @ Teragram Ballroom

September 29  Los Angeles, CA @ Teragram Ballroom

September 30  San Francisco, CA @ 1015 Folsom

October 1  Portland, OR @ Roseland Theater

October 2  Vancouver, BC @ Commodore Ballroom

October 3  Seattle, WA @ Showbox at The Market

October 6  Minneapolis, MN @ Varsity Theater

October 7  Chicago, IL @ Metro

October 8  Toronto, ON @ Phoenix Concert Theatre

October 9  Montreal, QC @ Club Soda

October 10  Philadelphia, PA @ TLA

October 11  Boston, MA @ Paradise Rock Hall

October 13  Washington, DC @ 9:30 Club

October 14  Brooklyn, NY @ Music Hall Of Williamsburg

October 15  Brooklyn, NY @ Music Hall Of Williamsburg

October 26  La Rochelle, FR @ La Sirene

October 27  Paris, FR @ Pitchfork Music Festival Paris

October 28  Brussels, BE @ Festival Des Libertes

October 29  Nancy, FR @ L'Autre Canal

October 31  Montpellier, FR @ Rockstore

November 2  Manchester, UK @ Warehouse Project

November 5  Turin, IT @ Club To Club Festival

djshadow.com

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160915/408595

Logo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20150324/184009LOGO



SOURCE Universal Music Enterprises

Related Links

http://www.universalmusicenterprises.com/


CHICAGO, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Thousands of Americans with diabetes are taking insulin shots and don't need to. What they and their physicians need to know is - they have the wrong diagnosis and are on the wrong treatment. Until recently, doctors only knew to diagnose patients with type 1 or type 2 diabetes. Science has now proven that there are different, genetic forms that affect up to 500,000 Americans  and most have been misdiagnosed. These newly understood types are called monogenic diabetes and remarkably the best treatment is an inexpensive pill, not insulin.

The award-winning documentary Journey to a Miracle: Freedom from Insulin is bringing the story of this game-changing medical breakthrough to audiences nationwide. The heartwarming film weaves together life-changing stories of brilliant scientists with grateful families who hoped and prayed for a diabetes cure, but never in their wildest dreams imagined it would come in the form of a simple pill.

Journey to a Miracle will have its Texas premiere Tuesday, September 20 at 8:05 pm on Austin PBS station KLRU (Check local listings.) Trailer

Journey to a Miracle executive producers Laurie and Michael Jaffe (formerly of Austin), made the documentary after their daughter Lilly, who was diagnosed with diabetes at one month old, was able to switch her treatment from insulin shots to pills when she was six. Michael Jaffe is a Chicago- based commercial real estate executive who developed the Arboretum retail center in the 1980s for Trammell Crow.

"It was incredible to watch our daughter disconnect her insulin pump forever and surreal when she handed me her lifeline to store in a closet. We were grateful that she was free from shots, but wondered 'why us, why now?' We concluded that we had to tell the story and bring hope to others. Every time the movie airs, someone is helped," says Laurie Jaffe.

"This documentary is a giant step forward in raising awareness for monogenic diabetes. It will help reach the public in a way that lectures and published studies in medical journals never could," says Dr. Louis Philipson, Lilly's doctor and director of the University of Chicago Kovler Diabetes Center.

Journey to a Miracle made its television debut last year on Chicago public television WTTW-11 and is now available to public television stations nationwide. The documentary has also has been featured in film festivals throughout the world.

www.Journeytoamiraclemovie.com

www.Facebook.com/Journeytoamiracle

SOURCE Journey to a Miracle

Related Links

http://www.Journeytoamiraclemovie.com


TORONTO, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ - Foresters Financial, an international financial services provider, has maintained its A.M. Best financial strength1 ratings across the organization.

The independent rating agency A.M. Best Company2 has given The Independent Order of Foresters (IOF) an "A" (Excellent) Financial Strength Rating (FSR). The IOF has maintained an "A" rating for 16 consecutive years. A.M. Best also affirmed the IOF issuer credit rating (ICR) of "a+".

In addition, A.M. Best maintained the "A" (Excellent) FSR rating for two of Foresters subsidiaries, Foresters Life Insurance Company (FLIC) and Foresters Life Insurance and Annuity Company (FLIAC). The ICR for both subsidiaries also held its "a+" rating.

This independent rating is an important measure of the organization's financial strength3 and stability, reflecting the ability of Foresters Financial to fulfill its ongoing insurance obligations to policyholders.

"I'm extremely proud of Foresters and its subsidiaries," says Tony Garcia, President and CEO, Foresters Financial. "Maintaining an A rating is a testament to our continued focus on financial stability and we look forward to building on this success in the years to come."

Foresters has shared its financial strength with its members4 and their communities for over 140 years and is today in a strong financial position with total funds under management of almost $34 billion (CDN) and total assets of $13.6 billion (CDN) as of December 31, 2015. Foresters gross premium income increased by 17% in 2015 and at the end of the year, it had more than three million certificates under management and over one million members in Canada, the US and the UK.

Foresters conservative investment strategy has resulted in a surplus of $2.29 billion CDN5, helping it to withstand adverse business and market conditions. With a Minimum Continuing Capital and Surplus Requirements (MCCSR) ratio of 428% as of December 31, 2015, Foresters solvency ratios6 are well above local regulatory requirements and industry averages in all three countries in which it operates - Canada, the US and the UK.

For more information about A.M. Best Company's ratings, visit ambest.com.

About Foresters Financial

Foresters Financial is an international financial services provider with more than three million clients and members in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, and total funds under management of almost $34 billion. With a history of more than 140 years, we provide life insurance, savings, retirement and investment solutions that help families achieve their financial goals, protect their families and improve their communities. For more information, visit foresters.com.

Foresters Financial and Foresters are trade names and trademarks of The Independent Order of Foresters (a fraternal benefit society, 789 Don Mills Road, Toronto, Canada M3C 1T9) and its subsidiaries.

Products offered vary by country. Not all products are available for distribution in all jurisdictions. In the United States, products are offered by The Independent Order of Foresters and its subsidiaries, including Foresters Financial Services, Inc. a registered broker-dealer. Securities, life insurance and annuity products are offered through Foresters Financial Services, Inc. or independent producers. Insurance products are issued by Foresters Life Insurance and Annuity Company, New York, or The Independent Order of Foresters. Investment advisory products and services are offered through Foresters Advisory Services, LLC, a registered investment adviser.

In Canada, products are offered by The Independent Order of Foresters and its subsidiary Foresters Life Insurance Company.

1Financial strength refers to the overall financial health of The Independent Order of Foresters. It does not refer to nor represent the performance of any particular investment or insurance product. All investing involves risk, including the risk that you can lose money.

2The A.M. Best ratings assigned on August 18, 2016 reflect overall strength and claims-paying ability of The Independent Order of Foresters, Foresters Life Insurance Company and Foresters Life Insurance and Annuity Company (formerly First Investors Life Insurance Company) but does not apply to the performance of any non IOF or FLIAC issued product. An "A" (Excellent) rating is assigned to companies that have a strong ability to meet their ongoing obligations to policyholders and have, on balance, excellent balance sheet strength, operating performance and business profile when compared to the standards established by A.M. Best Company. A.M. Best assigns ratings from A++ to F, A++ and A+ being superior ratings and A and A- being excellent ratings. See ambest.com for our latest ratings. In assigning the ratings for The Independent of Order Foresters, Foresters Life Insurance Company and Foresters Life Insurance and Annuity Company, A.M. Best stated that the rating outlook is "stable", which means it is unlikely to change in the near future.

3Financial strength refers to the overall financial health of The Independent Order of Foresters. It does not refer to nor represent the performance of any particular investment or insurance product. All investing involves risk, including the risk that you can lose money.

4Description of member benefits that you may receive assumes you are a Foresters member. In the United States members may currently only be anyone insured under a life or health insurance certificate, or an annuitant under an annuity certificate, issued by The Independent Order of Foresters. If you are not an insured under a life or health insurance certificate, or an annuitant under an annuity certificate, issued by The Independent Order of Foresters, or are not a social fraternal member, then you are not a member. Foresters member benefits are non-contractual, subject to benefit specific eligibility requirements, definitions and limitations and may be changed or cancelled without notice.

5This surplus, comprising approximate assets of $13.6 billion and liabilities of $11.4 billion, represents excess funds above the amount required as legal reserves for insurance and annuity certificates in force and provides additional assurances to our members for our long term financial strength.

6Solvency ratios indicate that Foresters ability to meet long-term obligations is above and beyond what is required.

All figures in Canadian dollars as of December 31, 2015

SOURCE Foresters

Related Links

www.foresters.com


PHILADELPHIA, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- General Counsel Greg Boss of global biotherapeutics leader CSL Limited today accepted the World Recognition of Distinguished General Counsel from the Directors Roundtable in recognition of his professional accomplishments and passion for ethical leadership.

"The General Counsel is more important today than ever in history. Boards of Directors increasingly look to the General Counsel to enhance financial and business strategy, compliance, and integrity of corporate operations, so we are pleased to gather some of the leading corporate advisors on the East Coast to recognize Greg with this distinguished honor," said Jack Friedman, Chairman, Directors Roundtable.

At an awards event in Philadelphia, Boss shared insights on how his position can help a global company like CSL deliver on its promises:

"The role of the General Counsel is to help advise and counsel the organization through a challenging environment, while staying true to our values and delivering on our promises to patients, partners, and shareholders," Boss said. "I'm very proud to say that the legal team at CSL plays a pivotal role in helping to create a culture where people are encouraged and empowered to live our values."

The General Counsel's office helps CSL navigate regulatory changes in more than 60 countries, private and public payer austerity measures, intellectual property challenges, advances in digital health and countless other issues.

Boss noted that, as CSL marks its 100th anniversary in 2016, the company's 16,000-plus employees work every day as if someone's life depends on it.

"No matter where someone sits within the CSL organization, our work is driven by our passion in making a difference in the lives of people who we treat," he said. "When we say we're going to do something, we do it."

Leaders from area companies attended the event, as well as partners from Philadelphia-area law firms, who provided their perspectives on the challenges and opportunities that General Counsel and their advisors must navigate in today's business climate.

CSL is a leading global biotherapeutics company with a dynamic portfolio of life-saving innovations, including those that treat haemophilia and immune deficiencies, as well as vaccines to prevent influenza. Since our start in 1916, we have been driven by our promise to save lives using the latest technologies. Today, CSL  including our two businesses CSL Behring (based in King of Prussia, PA) and Seqirus  conducts business in over 60 countries with more than 16,000 employees. Our unique combination of commercial strength, R&D focus and operational excellence enables us to identify, develop and deliver innovations so our patients can live life to the fullest.

The Directors Roundtable organizes the preeminent worldwide programming for corporate directors and their advisors. It has created the leading forum for Directors to discuss their concerns with peers and distinguished experts. The challenging topics focus on key developments, regulations, and pragmatic solutions directly impacting their company and their roles. Since 1991, it has organized more than 600 events worldwide.

Media Contacts:









Natalie de Vane

Laura Woodin CSL Behring

Boardwalk Public Relations 610-999-8756

610-764-1301 [email protected]

[email protected]

Logo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20100914/PH63692LOGO

SOURCE CSL Limited; Directors Roundtable

Related Links

http://www.cslbehring.com


GREENSBORO, N.C., Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Cone Health has apologized to the last living plaintiff and others involved in a lawsuit that desegregated hospitals nationwide. The establishment of a scholarship fund came during a Sept. 15 ceremony before the start of the annual medical and dental staff meeting.

Dr. Alvin Blount

Cone Health honored Dr. Alvin Blount. Blount was one of nine African-American physicians and dentists who, along with two patients, sued The Moses H. Cone Memorial Hospital and Wesley Long Hospital in Greensboro. The plaintiffs, led by Dr. George Simkins Jr., wanted black medical professionals to be able to care for black patients in the facilities. In the landmark 1962 Simkins vs. Moses H. Cone Memorial Hospital case, the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals held that "separate but equal" racial segregation in publicly funded hospitals was a violation of equal protection under the U.S. Constitution. The U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal, thus letting the decision stand. Hospitals across the country were soon opened to African-American doctors and their patients.

Today, Blount is the only surviving plaintiff. "It seemed to me, and to our medical and dental staff, that we needed to take an opportunity to apologize for our role in this chapter of our history and to honor these individuals for challenging us to be our best selves and for their foresight and courage in changing America," says Cone Health CEO Terry Akin.

Cone Health is contributing $250,000 toward a scholarship honoring Blount and the other plaintiffs. The Greensboro Medical Society will use the funds to award scholarships to students pursuing careers in health care.

"This was a pivotal event in the annals of health care," says Cone Health Medical and Dental Staff President James Wyatt, MD. "Even though Dr. Blount will tell you he did this for his patientsand it was, partlythis helped lead to the legitimization of the black physician in this community and throughout the country."

Multimedia assets:

A video providing historical context is available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Fm4B72vbyE&feature=youtu.be

Photos of the event are available at: https://conehealthmarketing.imagerelay.com/sb/7d6d5f20-002f-42bb-976e-778f7466da4f

Cone Health is committed to being a national leader in quality, service and cost. The integrated health care network consists of Alamance Regional Medical Center, Annie Penn Hospital, Cone Health Behavioral Health Hospital, The Moses H. Cone Memorial Hospital, Wesley Long Hospital, Women's Hospital, Cone Health Medical Group, MedCenter High Point, MedCenter Kernersville, MedCenter Mebane, Triad HealthCare Network and various outpatient clinics and programs. More than 11,000 exceptional people provide exceptional care to the people of Guilford, Alamance, Rockingham, Forsyth, Caswell and Randolph counties.

Contact: Doug Allred, APR

External Communications Manager

(336) 832-8659

[email protected]

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160916/408746

SOURCE Cone Health

Related Links

http://www.conehealth.com


ATLANTA, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Imagine taking time and expense to paint or stain your deck or concrete with a product that is supposed to beautify and protect the surface, only to find after one season that the surface is cracking, peeling and deteriorating into a condition worse than before you applied it. This is exactly what plaintiffs in a class action lawsuit against PPG Industries have alleged happened to them when using Olympic "Rescue It!" products.

PPG markets Olympic "Rescue It!" as a high-quality product that creates "a durable coating for wood and concrete splits and cracks up to 1/4 inch deep," providing an "ideal" protective coating for decks and concrete surfaces. It claims a "fine texture helps to hide surface imperfections" when applied to decks and concrete surfaces. Unfortunately, the Plaintiffs soon found out that these claims of durability and protection were false and that these products invariably crack and peel soon after application, causing significant damage to the surfaces on which they are applied.

The class action lawsuit, filed on September 12, 2016, seeks relief nationally for all customers who bought and applied the Olympic "Rescue It!" products to their deck and concrete surfaces and discovered that, after as little as one season, the products start peeling, cracking, and worsening the original condition of the surfaces. It alleges that PPG knew the Olympic "Rescue It!" products quickly peel, crack, and damage the surfaces on which they were applied, and despite knowing the products were defective, PPG continued to manufacture and sell the products (and still sell the products) even after receiving continued consumer complaints.

PPG is accused of breach of warranty, violating the unfair and deceptive trade practices acts of multiple states, among others. HGD is notifying the public that relief is available from damage caused by using Olympic "Rescue It!" products. If you have purchased Olympic "Rescue It!" let us know your experience and contact us for a free review of your legal options at http://www.hgdlawfirm.com/blog/practice_area/rescue-it-lawsuit.

Hoover, et al. v. PPG Industries, Inc., et al., Civil Action No. 1:16-cv-03415, U.S. District Court Northern District of Georgia.

Heninger Garrison Davis, LLC, is a national law firm recognized as one of the nation's leading class action trial firms.

SOURCE Heninger Garrison Davis, LLC

Related Links

http://www.hgdlawfirm.com


HOUSTON, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Hyperdynamics Corporation (OTCQX: HDYN) announced today that Ray Leonard, President and Chief Executive Officer, will present at the Oil Capital Conference in London, England on Wednesday, September 21, 2016 and at the IPAA's Oil & Gas Investment Symposium in San Francisco on Monday, September 26, 2016.

Hyperdynamics' presentation at the Oil Capital Conference is scheduled to begin at 10:00 a.m. London Time (5:00 a.m Eastern Time). Accompanying presentation materials will be available at the Investor Relations section of Hyperdynamics' website at www.hyperdynamics.com.

Hyperdynamics' presentation at the IPAA's Oil and Gas Investment Symposium will be webcast live at 2:30 p.m. Pacific Time (5:30 p.m. Eastern Time). To listen to the audio webcast and view accompanying presentation materials, visit the Investor Relations section of Hyperdynamics' website at www.hyperdynamics.com. A replay of the webcast will be archived on the site shortly after the presentation concludes.

About Hyperdynamics

Hyperdynamics is an emerging independent oil and gas exploration company that is exploring for oil and gas offshore the Republic of Guinea in West Africa. To find out more, visit our website at www.hyperdynamics.com.

SOURCE Hyperdynamics Corporation

Related Links

http://www.hyperdynamics.com


ALBUQUERQUE, N.M., Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- The founders of Keypoint Solutions, one of the top home buyers in New Mexico, are proud to announce that the company has achieved an impressive milestone. So far this year, the group of real estate investors from Keypoint Solutions has purchased 157 homes, with 45 of those homes being in New Mexico.

To learn more about Keypoint Solutions and their fast, easy and low-stress way of buying homes, please visit http://newmexicohousebuyers.com/.

The 45 clients in New Mexico who worked with Keypoint Solutions during the first part of 2016 will not be surprised that the company is having a banner year. Since the company first opened, it has earned a well-deserved reputation for being exceptionally easy to work with.

To watch an informative video that explains how Keypoint Solutions buys NM houses fast for cash, please check out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crK2cAUJdr8.

As a company spokesperson for http://newmexicohousebuyers.com/ noted, there are numerous benefits to selling a home through Keypoint Solutions. In addition to not having to pay any fees or commissions, the company pays all of the closing costs that are associated with the transaction. This alone can help save clients a great deal of money.

"We're a local Albuquerque company that can buy your house in any condition, regardless of what you owe or if you're in foreclosure. We can sincerely help," the spokesperson said, adding that most people will get cash in their hands within a few days or even a few hours after contacting the company.

"You can sell fast with no rush to move. You don't have to move out right away, you can stay in your home for awhile until you locate another house."

Keypoint Solutions is also accredited with the Better Business Bureau, where it has earned an A+ rating.

About Keypoint Solutions:

Keypoint Solutions is the largest home buyer in New Mexico. They have been offering real estate solutions to home sellers for over ten years. Their services allow local home sellers to avoid many of the traditional transaction fees associated with selling a home. For more information, pleases visit http://newmexicohousebuyers.com/.

Keypoint Solutions

9808 Cody Court

Albuquerque, NM 87114

Contact:

Laura LaFond

[email protected]

(505) 227-8865

SOURCE Keypoint Solutions
Hillary Clinton

Hillary Clinton said in an interview which aired Thursday that she has "a lot of sympathy" for any individual whose private emails are hacked, when asked by CNN anchor Don Lemon about Colin Powell's recently leaked emails.

In an interview with The Tom Joyner Show, Lemon asked Clinton about Powell's emails where the former secretary of state ripped the Democratic nominee for her and her "minions" trying to drag him into her email server controversy.

Lemon added that Powell alleged "everything" Clinton touches gets "screwed up with hubris."

"I have a great deal of respect for Colin Powell," Clinton said. "And I have a lot of sympathy for anyone whose emails become public. Im not going to start discussing someones private emails. Ive already spent a lot of time talking about mine, as you know."

"What I think is really important about these emails is the chilling fact is that the Russians are continuing to interfere with our elections," she continued. "I have to say, Im increasingly concerned about Donald Trumps alarming closeness with the Kremlin over the course of this campaign. Its deeply concerning and theres a lot that Trump should answer for. Because these attempts by Russia to interfere in the election go hand in hand with his closeness to the Kremlin and his flattery of Putin."

The hack into Powell's email account is the latest work of suspected Russia-backed hackers, following leaks from a number of prominent Democratic organizations throughout the summer.

Powell's emails showed that he considered Trump a "national disgrace" and "international pariah." Powell wrote in 2014 that he "would rather not have to vote" for Clinton.

Trump, the Republican nominee, didn't hold back in his response to Powell's emails, saying he "was never a fan of Colin Powell after his weak understanding of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq = disaster."

"We can do much better!" he tweeted.

NOW WATCH: Why you won't find a garbage can near the 9/11 memorial





More From Business Insider


KOTOR, Montenegro, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- In the days prior to the Jewish New Year, the Israeli Foreign Ministry has entered into a unique partnership with the Montenegrin NGO Dukley European Arts Community (DEAC). This comes on the heels of a June reception in Jerusalem celebrating the 10th anniversary of Montenegrin independence and a successful summer tourism season of direct flights shuttling Israeli tourists to the Adriatic Riviera.

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160916/408667

At the historic Jugooceanija Building in Kotor, over 100 dignitaries from around the world gathered tonight to welcome two award-winning Israeli artists  Shirley Siegel and Shuruq Egbariah. One Jewish and one Arab, these two "citizen ambassadors" are tasked by the Israeli government with the same unique mission  demonstrating the power of art to bring people and cultures together. The night marks the first time in history that Israeli food was served in Montenegro and signals rapidly deepening ties.

Before Ministers, Ambassadors, civic, religious and business leaders, Neil Emilfarb, founder of the Dukley European Arts Community opened the reception, "Art is the universal language and it plays a unique role in bringing peoples and cultures together. Montenegro is a short flight from Israel and has never had an incident of Anti-Semitism."

Emilfarb was one of the first Jewish emigres from the USSR to New England leaving Tashkent, USSR in 1979 to settle in Hartford. Having lived the American dream, he has spent the last eight years splitting his time between New England and Montenegro. In Budva, Montenegro, Neil has been active in the tourism industry constructing multi-million euro seaside resorts. Rising to be the largest American investor in the region, he has been the leading advocate of Montenegrin NATO integration. In October 2014, for example, he coordinated with the US Embassy to host Senator Chris Murphy for high level discussions centered on NATO enlargement and the power of commercial diplomacy.

In less than two years, the Dukley European Arts Community (DEAC) has begun to positively transform the cultural infrastructure of Montenegro. Utilizing artists from across Europe, DEAC has enhanced Montenegrin theaters, universities, galleries and municipalities. Additionally, DEAC has prolonged the tourism season  critical for the Montenegrin economy - with innovative cultural programming and arts festivals in the spring and autumn. Gallery and studio space for visiting international artists comprise the heart of DEAC and are located in the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Kotor.

DEAC was launched by Emilfarb as a way for his company, Stratex Group, to give back to the people of Montenegro and to push the limits of 21st Century cultural diplomacy.

Similar to Montenegro, Israel is blessed with incredible natural beauty and has always been situated at the crossroads of cultures and civilizations. It is from this diversity and this history that these artists will find their muse. Through innovative cultural diplomacy over an intense two week residency, these dynamic artists aim to bring the people of Montenegro and Israel closer together.

To Coordinate Interviews in Montenegrin, Hebrew or English with the Artists or Neil Emilfarb:

Milena Spahic, +382 69 170007, [email protected]

Ari Mittleman, +1-202-744-7170, [email protected]

Related Images

image1.jpg

image2.png

image3.png

Related Links

Dukley European Art Community (DEAC)

Stratex

This content was issued through the press release distribution service at Newswire.com. For more info visit: http://www.newswire.com.

SOURCE Dukley European Arts Community (DEAC)

Related Links

http://dukleyart.me


SPARKS, Md., Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- McCormick & Company, Incorporated (NYSE: MKC) will conduct a conference call and webcast of its Third Quarter 2016 financial results on Friday, September 30, 2016, at 8:00 a.m. Eastern time. Lawrence Kurzius, President & CEO; Mike Smith, Executive Vice President & CFO; and Joyce Brooks, Vice President Investor Relations, will be hosting the call.

What: McCormick & Company presentation of Third Quarter Fiscal 2016 Results

When: September 30, 2016, at 8:00 a.m. Eastern Time

Where: ir.mccormick.com

How: Live over the Internet: Log onto the Web at ir.mccormick.com , click on "Webcast" and follow the directions to listen to the call.

If you are unable to attend the live webcast, the presentation will be archived on our web site at ir.mccormick.com. To listen to an audio replay, call 877-660-6853 in the United States or 201-612-7415 internationally. When prompted, enter the conference ID number 13643896. The replay will be available until 12:00 midnight Eastern time on October 21, 2016.

About McCormick

McCormick & Company, Incorporated is a global leader in flavor. With $4.3 billion in annual sales, the company manufactures, markets and distributes spices, seasoning mixes, condiments and other flavorful products to the entire food industry  retail outlets, food manufacturers and foodservice businesses. Every day, no matter where or what you eat, you can enjoy food flavored by McCormick. McCormick Brings Passion to Flavor.

For more information, visit www.mccormickcorporation.com.

For information contact:



Investor Relations:

Joyce Brooks (410-771-7244 or [email protected])

Corporate Communications:

Lori Robinson (410-527-6004 or [email protected])

SOURCE McCormick & Company, Incorporated

Related Links

http://www.mccormickcorporation.com


PUNE, India, September 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

According to a new market research report "Medical Holography Market by Product (Holographic Display, Microscope, Print, Software), Application (Medical Imaging, Medical Education, Biomedical Research), End User (Medical Schools, Pharmaceutical Companies, Hospitals) - Global Forecast to 2021" published by MarketsandMarkets, The Global Medical Holography Market Is Projected to Reach USD 953.9 Million by 2021, at a CAGR of 33.7% from 2016 to 2021.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160303/792302 )



Browse 76 market data Tables and 26 Figures spread through 126 Pages and in-depth TOC on "Medical Holography Market"

http://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Market-Reports/medical-holography-market-183930222.html

Early buyers will receive 10% customization on this report.

The growth in this market can be mainly attributed to the growing clinical applications of holography in the healthcare sector, rising adoption of holography products in biomedical research and medical education, and emergence of holography as a promising technology in representing complex 3D structures. In this report, the global Medical Holography Market is segmented on the basis of product type, application, end user, and region. Based on product type, the market is segmented into holographic displays, holography microscopes, holographic prints, holography software and holoscopes. On the basis of application, the Medical Holography Market is segmented into three segments namely medical imaging, medical education, and biomedical research. While on the basis of end user, the Medical Holography Market is segmented into research laboratories, academic medical centers, pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, and hospitals and clinics.

In 2015, the holographic displays product segment accounted for the largest share of the Medical Holography Market. This market is primarily driven by the increasing adoption of holographic displays in diagnostic imaging and for medical teaching and training as these displays provide high-quality real-time 3D images which attracts the user effectively

In 2015, North America represented the largest regional market, followed by Europe, Asia-Pacific, and the RoW. North America represents the fastest-growing region for the Medical Holography Market, primarily due to increasing research initiatives in holography technology, adoption of holographic products by research laboratories and academic centers, and increasing healthcare expenditure in the U.S.

Speak to our research experts:

http://www.marketsandmarkets.com/speaktoanalyst.asp?id=183930222

Major players in the global Medical Holography Market are EchoPixel, Inc. (U.S.), Realview Imaging Ltd. (Israel), Mach7 Technologies Pte. Ltd. (Australia), Ovizio Imaging systems (Belgium), Holoxica Ltd. (U.K.), zSpace, Inc. (U.S.), Lyncee Tec (Switzerland), Eon Reality (U.S.), Zebra Imaging (U.S.), and NanoLive SA (Switzerland).

Browse Related Reports:

Diagnostic Imaging Market by Product (X-ray Imaging Systems, CT Scanners (High-end, Mid-end & Low-end Slice CT), MRI Systems, Ultrasound Imaging Systems, Nuclear Imaging Systems), Region (North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, RoW) - Global Forecast to 2020

http://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Market-Reports/diagnostic-imaging-market-411.html



Optical Imaging Market by Technique (OCT, NIRS, HSI, PAT) by Product (Imaging System, Camera, Lens, Software) by Therapeutic Area (Ophthalmology, Oncology, Neurology, Dermatology), by Application (Pathological, Intra-operative) - Global Forecast to 2020

http://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Market-Reports/optical-imaging-technologies-market-894.html



About MarketsandMarkets:

MarketsandMarkets is the largest market research firm worldwide in terms of annually published premium market research reports. Serving 1700 global fortune enterprises with more than 1200 premium studies in a year, M&M is catering to a multitude of clients across 8 different industrial verticals. We specialize in consulting assignments and business research across high growth markets, cutting edge technologies and newer applications. Our 850 fulltime analyst and SMEs at MarketsandMarkets are tracking global high growth markets following the "Growth Engagement Model - GEM". The GEM aims at proactive collaboration with the clients to identify new opportunities, identify most important customers, write "Attack, avoid and defend" strategies, identify sources of incremental revenues for both the company and its competitors.

M&M's flagship competitive intelligence and market research platform, "RT" connects over 200,000 markets and entire value chains for deeper understanding of the unmet insights along with market sizing and forecasts of niche markets. The new included chapters on Methodology and Benchmarking presented with high quality analytical infographics in our reports gives complete visibility of how the numbers have been arrived and defend the accuracy of the numbers.

We at MarketsandMarkets are inspired to help our clients grow by providing apt business insight with our huge market intelligence repository.



Contact:

Mr. Rohan

MarketsandMarkets

701 Pike Street,

Suite 2175, Seattle,

WA 98101, United States

1-888-600-6441

Email: [email protected]

Visit MarketsandMarkets Blog @ http://mnmblog.org/market-research/healthcare/medical-devices

Connect with us on LinkedIn @ http://www.linkedin.com/company/marketsandmarkets



SOURCE MarketsandMarkets
CHICAGO, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Out of 643 nominees, Neighborhoods.com has been selected as one of the Top 100 Finalists still in the running for the 15th annual Chicago Innovation Awards. The awards celebrate the most innovative new products and services in the Chicago region across all organization sizes, sectors, and industries. 1500 business and civic leaders will come together to honor the winners when they are announced on October 25th at Chicago's Harris Theater.

Neighborhoods.com is an easy-to-use online real estate resource that helps people find the perfect home as well as the ideal neighborhood. Neighborhoods.com operates on the belief that that the neighborhood you live in is just as important as the home you live in, and the people, places, schools, and amenities that surround your home have an enormous impact on your quality of life. Home shoppers can use the Neighborhoods.com search platform to learn everything there is to know about a neighborhood, from nearby school district ratings to where people like to eat and shop.

"When you're picking out a new home, you're not just choosing a house  your neighborhood influences so many aspects of your life," says Neighborhoods.com CEO Bill Ness. "Your neighborhood decides who your kids play with, who you become friends with, and what your day-to-day life is like. We're helping people make a more educated decision."

As one of the Top 100 Finalists in the Chicago Innovation Awards, Neighborhoods.com will receive a $2,500 scholarship to attend The Practical Innovator, a day-long executive education course on September 29th led by top faculty who teach innovation at Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management.

"What I love about Chicago is its breadth of innovation," said Tom Kuczmarski, co-founder of the awards. "This year's nominees prove that innovation is taking place in both large companies and small, across industries, for-profit and non-profit, high tech and low tech. These risk-takers and visionaries are at the forefront of solving all kinds of unmet needs in the marketplace."

Each of the Top 100 Finalists is also in the running for the annual "People's Choice Award," selected through online balloting at http://www.chicagoinnovationawards.com/2016-peoples-choice-award-2/.

Contact:

Samantha Reid

Communications Manager

[email protected]

773-278-5500

SOURCE Neighborhoods.com

Related Links

http://www.chicagoinnovationawards.com


NEW YORK, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Dr. Bobby Buka has just launched a collection of eye-catching and provocative advertisements in the subway trains throughout New York City to promote his five Dermatology locations (Greenwich Village, Front Street, Upper West Side, Williamsburg & Crown Heights), his Practice's focus on medical conditions, as well as cosmetic, and his unique and differentiated brand aesthetic.

With the retirement of renowned NYC dermatologist Dr. Jonathan Zizmor, Dr. Buka has seized the opportunity to fill the space left by his departure with a set of his own creative and provocative advertisements; complete with witty taglines and eye-catching graphics. The advertisements have been designed to appeal to all individuals, of any age and with any skin condition. However, the designs are not the ordinary bland adverts typically associated with dermatology practices. The adverts are emblematic of a dermatology practice that truly understands its patients and is in tune with the New York mindset. In the same way that Dr. Buka's offices have a unique aesthetic; these adverts are also consistent with his differentiated brand. In addition, rather than focusing solely on cosmetic procedures, Dr. Buka has also chosen to incorporate advertisements that focus on medical conditions, such as melanoma. The adverts are now on a large proportion of New York City's subway trains.

Consistent with the familial and engaged approach of the Bobby Buka Dermatology Practice, the Practice is set to launch a scavenger hunt through its Instagram account for the adverts on the subway (@bobbybukamd) with the use of the hashtag #TrainYourSkin.

"We are grateful to the MTA for giving us an opportunity to expand the city's awareness about skin cancer and chronic skin illness. We want to bring dermatology out of Beverly Hills and back to New Yorkers, like you and me," said Dr. Bobby Buka.

Bobby Buka Dermatology Background

Having recently opened a fifth location in Crown Heights in July 2016, Bobby Buka Dermatology continues to foster a loyal patient base through its convenient locations throughout New York City. Please refer to the website (bobbybukamd.com) for information on each of the locations. Bobby Buka Dermatology offers beauty and medical treatments for patients who want to perfect and maintain their overall skin heath. Whether it's treating teenage acne to a life-long skin condition or opting for age-defying treatments, Dr. Buka and his team provide high quality care in dermatology services.

Bobby Buka Dermatology's most popular beautifying services include Botox Cosmetic injections, dermal fillers, such as Radiesse, Restylane, Sculptra, and Juvederm, and the non-surgical ultrasound treatment, Ultherapy. If patients are looking for medical services, Dr. Buka also offers skin cancer prevention and treatments, and treatments for various skin conditions, including psoriasis, eczema, acne, and rosacea. A full list and details of services is provided on his website (bobbybukamd.com).

After graduating from the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University in Chicago, Dr. Buka spent his internship in internal medicine at the acclaimed Saint Vincent's Hospital in New York City. Dr. Buka also completed a dermatology residency at the University of California and a fellowship in pediatric dermatology at Children's Hospital in San Diego, making him a qualified and experienced dermatologist for all ages. He is also a member of the American Academy of Dermatology with hospital affiliations at Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan.

Dr. Buka encourages readers to visit his website to learn more about his excellence in the field of dermatology, as well as schedule and register for appointments, read recent online articles, as well as learn more in the patient education section. See why NBC NonStop described Dr. Bobby Buka as, "New York City's most sought-after dermatologist."

For more information about Dr. Buka and his practice or to book your consultation at his several locations, please visit www.bobbybukamd.com or call at (212) 385-3700.

Press Contact:

Amanda Torres

Aide-de-Camp/Patient Advocate

Bobby Buka MD Dermatology

[email protected]

347-889-6827

Logo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160915/408500LOGO

SOURCE Bobby Buka MD

Related Links

http://www.bobbybukamd.com


SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- ORACLE OPENWORLD -- This weekend, Oracle welcomes thousands of customers, hundreds of partners, and millions of online attendees from more than 141 countries to Oracle OpenWorld 2016. This year's ultimate cloud experience, which runs through September 22, brings together top technologists, world leaders, and innovators to share ideas about the future of technology and its impact on the way we live and work. A dynamic line-up of visionaries headline the event, spanning today's brightest thinkers like best-selling author and educator Adam Grant; renowned economists including Moody's Mark Zandi; and key political strategists Stephanie Cutter and Mike Murphy. At Oracle's Customer Appreciation event, record-breaking performance artists Gwen Stefani and Sting take the stage at AT&T Park for an exclusive concert. Top-charting band American Authors kick off Oracle OpenWorld in a special performance at Oracle Cloud Plaza on Howard Street.

On Sunday night, Oracle Executive Chairman of the Board and Chief Technology Officer Larry Ellison opens main stage conversations in a keynote about how Oracle innovations are transforming enterprise cloud computing and outlines his vision for the future of IT. Throughout the week, Ellison, Oracle CEO Safra Catz, Oracle CEO Mark Hurd and Oracle President of Product Development Thomas Kurian, will discuss today's most critical topics, alongside some of the most powerful names in the world of technology and business.

"Oracle OpenWorld 2016 focuses on the success of our customers," said Judy Sim, Oracle's Chief Marketing Officer. "Our approach is always to put our attendees first, and in doing so, we ensure that every aspect of the conference sparks learning, fosters networking, promotes innovation, and unites our customers and partners."

To Learn and Explore:

Sessions: choose from 2,240 sessions presented by 2,054 customer and partner speakers, 400 Oracle demos, as well as hundreds of partner and customer exhibitions.

Oracle Keynotes: Sunday, 5:00 p.m .  Oracle Executive Chairman and Chief Technology Officer Larry Ellison leads with the future of Oracle Cloud. Monday, 9:15 a.m.  Oracle CEO Mark Hurd shares his perspective on the future of technology and the world ahead, and speaks with leaders from top Oracle customers including Joanna Fielding , Chief Financial Officer, HSBC Technology and Services and Patrick Benson , Chief Information Officer, ClubCorp Tuesday, 8:30 a.m.  Oracle President of Product Development Thomas Kurian showcases new innovations across Oracle infrastructure, platform, applications and data. Tuesday, 1:30 p.m.  Larry Ellison returns to the mainstage to discuss the future of cloud database and infrastructure. Wednesday, 9:15 a.m.  John Fowler , Oracle Executive Vice President of Systems, leads an engaging session on database platforms of the future, featuring Juan Loaiza , Senior Vice President, Oracle Systems Technology, and Oracle Executive Vice President David Donatelli .

Oracle Partner Keynotes: Sunday, 5:15 p.m.  6:00 p.m.  Diane Bryant , Executive Vice President and General Manager of Intel's Data Center Group, shares the technology innovations that Intel, Oracle, and Oracle partners are creating to deliver the next wave of enterprise opportunity. Tuesday, 8:30 a.m.  9:15 a.m .  Bhanu Murthy B.M ., President and Chief Operating Officer, Wipro, outlines how cloud-powered enterprises are creating value and gaining competitive advantage in the new digital economy. Tuesday, 1:30 p.m.  2:15 p.m.  Dr. Vishal Sikka , Chief Executive Officer, Infosys, offers his thoughts on how business leaders can leverage artificial intelligence to drive agility and deliver new kinds of value for their companies and stakeholders.

Oracle Leader's Circle: Learn from today's top educators, economists, political scientists and industry thought leaders at this empowering two-day executive program hosted by Oracle CEOs Safra Catz and Mark Hurd .

and . Inclusive Leadership Summit: Hear from executives and thought leaders on the cutting edge, including social justice pioneer Billie Jean King , as they connect and share personal perspectives on how inclusive leadership advances employee engagement and increases innovation.

, as they connect and share personal perspectives on how inclusive leadership advances employee engagement and increases innovation. Collective Learning Pilot: Experience interactive sessions redesigned by Harvard Graduate School of Education's Project Zero, which uses discussion, personal reflection and information sharing to solve attendees' business challenges as a community.

Project Zero, which uses discussion, personal reflection and information sharing to solve attendees' business challenges as a community. Oracle Education Foundation's Design Realization Garage: Get creative in hands-on, student-led innovation sessions and watch Design Tech High School (d.tech) students demo their technology prototypes created in Oracle Education Foundation workshops.

To Support the Community and Environment:

Sustainability and Giving: Uncover a fresh take on food and beverage while enjoying local, organic, healthy food options. Eighty percent of the food at Oracle OpenWorld is sustainably sourced and prepared within 100 miles of Howard Street. Throughout the week of the event, Oracle will donate 7,275 meals to charities in San Francisco .

. Plant a Billion Trees: Learn how The Nature Conservancy and Oracle save forests through donations to plant trees in the United States , Brazil and China that will sequester 290K metric tons of carbon. Oracle will donate $1 million over the next four years.

, and that will sequester 290K metric tons of carbon. Oracle will donate over the next four years. JavaOne4Kids: Take part in a one-of-a-kind children's workshop to inspire the next generation of coders and developers, hosted by Oracle Academy.

Education: Participate in one of the many education-themed attractions and activities happening at the event. Learn more about Oracle's $4 billion annual commitment to education and its positive impact on more than 3 million students in 110 countries annually through Oracle Academy, Oracle Giving, and Oracle Education Foundation.

To Connect and Play:

ORACLE TEAM USA: Meet the America's Cup champion sailors at Oracle Cloud Plaza on Howard Street and learn how Oracle technology is helping the team defend its title for a second time at the 35 th America's Cup in Bermuda .

America's Cup in . The Cafe on Howard: Reserve seats for meetings, relaxation, networking and reflection.

Concerts: See best-selling recording artists, Gwen Stefani and Sting, and celebrate with Oracle customers and partners at the Oracle Appreciation Event in AT&T Park. Also, watch American Authors kick off Oracle OpenWorld in a special performance at the welcome reception on Howard Street.

Following Oracle OpenWorld, Oracle Cloud Days will launch a three-month, 60-city tour showcasing the power of data-driven innovation and digital transformation.

Supporting Resources

Download Oracle OpenWorld and JavaOne mobile applications

Live Stream keynotes live from Oracle OpenWorld

Like Oracle OpenWorld on Facebook

Follow @OracleOpenWorld on Twitter for the latest #oow16

About Oracle

Oracle offers a comprehensive and fully integrated stack of cloud applications and platform services. For more information about Oracle (NYSE:ORCL), visit oracle.com.

About Oracle OpenWorld

Oracle OpenWorld, the industry's most important business and technology conference for the past 20 years, hosts tens of thousands of in-person attendees as well as millions online. Dedicated to helping businesses leverage Cloud for their innovation and growth, the conference delivers deep insight into industry trends and breakthroughs driven by technology. Designed for attendees who want to connect, learn, explore and be inspired, Oracle OpenWorld offers more than 2,200 educational sessions led by more than 2,000 customers and partners sharing their experiences, first hand. With hundreds of demos and hands-on labs, plus exhibitions from more than 400 partners and customers from around the world, Oracle OpenWorld has become a showcase for leading cloud technologies, from Cloud Applications to Cloud Platform and Infrastructure. Oracle OpenWorld 2016 is being held September 18  September 22 at Moscone Center in San Francisco. For more information; to register; or to watch Oracle OpenWorld keynotes, sessions, and more, visit www.oracle.com/openworld. Join the Oracle OpenWorld discussion on Twitter.

About JavaOne

The JavaOne conference brings together Java experts and enthusiasts for an extraordinary week of learning and networking focused entirely on all things Java. With more than 440 sessions covering topics that span the breadth of the Java universe, keynotes from foremost Java visionaries, tutorials, and expert-led hands-on learning opportunities, JavaOne is the world's most important event for the Java community. Join the JavaOne discussion on Twitter.

Trademarks

Oracle and Java are registered trademarks of Oracle and/or its affiliates. Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners.

SOURCE Oracle Corporation

Related Links

https://www.oracle.com


VILLANOVA, Pa., Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Pennsylvania Physician General Dr. Rachel Levine and Department of Corrections Secretary John Wetzel today discussed the opioid crisis in Pennsylvania as part of the annual Matthew J. Ryan Law and Public Policy Forum at the Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law.

"The opioid epidemic in Pennsylvania affects us all," said Dr. Levine. "It indiscriminately devastates every race, class, sex, and community. Forums like this hold so much importance because battling the opioid epidemic will take collaboration between government, private, and academic communities."

Dr. Levine spoke on behalf of Governor Wolf and addressed the scope of the opioid problem in the commonwealth. She delivered her comments as part of a panel that included experts from the Pennsylvania Medical Society and the Drug Policy Alliance.

The forum's theme was "Understanding the Opioid Epidemic." Speakers at this event explored the medical, legal, policy, and sociological dimensions of this issue. The conference also featured an excerpted screening of NBC 10's "Generation Addicted" with commentary by the documentarians.

Last fall, as part of Governor Tom Wolf's effort to address the opioid abuse crisis in the commonwealth, Dr. Levine signed a standing order that serves as a prescription for all Pennsylvanians to access naloxone at their local pharmacies.

Naloxone rapidly reverses heroin and other opioid overdoses. Heroin and opioid overdoses are the leading cause of accidental death in Pennsylvania, killing more individuals each year than motor vehicle accidents.

Participating in the "Responding to the Crisis: Policy" forum, Department of Corrections (DOC) Secretary John Wetzel spoke of how the epidemic crisis is affecting the state prison system and steps that should be taken to help individuals who suffer from addiction to opioids.

"The opioid epidemic is rampant not only in our communities, but also in our prisons," Secretary Wetzel said. "The DOC has seen an increase in the number of individuals entering the system who are addicted to opiates from 6 percent to 12 percent."

Wetzel said that expensive prison space should be saved for those individuals who, based upon the seriousness of their crimes, need to be removed and separated from society.

"Many of our inmates are in prison because they committed crimes in order to feed their addictions. These people need treatment more than incarceration. This is where getting these individuals into treatment programs through Centers of Excellence in their communities is really the best course of action for these individuals," Wetzel said. "We can address their addictions and help them to become drug free, which will eliminate their criminal behavior. If we do nothing more than send them to prison, these individuals typically learn to become better criminals based upon their associations with other inmates."

Wetzel spoke about the DOC's use of medication-assisted treatment (MAT), which provides regularly scheduled injections of drugs that reduce the craving that addicts experience. The first injection is provided while the individual is still in prison. Subsequent injections are provided in the community, are paid for by medical assistance and are combined with out-patient drug treatment for an entire year. This is important because the first year post-incarceration is the time individuals are most likely to experience difficulties, including relapse. The use of MAT helps to eliminate at least one hurdle  drug craving  that often can lead them back to prison.

"Our goal is to set these individuals on a path to success and a path that reduces future crime," Wetzel said. "For addicted individuals, treatment is the key to a sober and crime-free life."

Fighting the opioid epidemic is a top priority for the Wolf Administration. Some of the administration's initiatives in the fight against heroin include equipping the Pennsylvania State Police with naloxone, partnering with Adapt Pharma to make Narcan available to public high schools across the state at no cost, and developing the ABC-MAP prescription drug monitoring program to detect and prevent prescription fraud and abuse, which contribute to addiction.

For more information on the fight against opioid abuse in Pennsylvania, visit www.health.pa.gov.

To learn about the DOC's Medication Assisted Treatment, visit www.cor.pa.gov

MEDIA CONTACT: April Hutcheson, DOH, 717-787-1783

Susan McNaughton, DOC, 717-728-4025

SOURCE Pennsylvania Department of Health; Pennsylvania Department of Corrections

Related Links

http://www.state.pa.us


WASHINGTON, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Two Phillips & Cohen whistleblower attorneys received the first ever "Public-Private Partnership Award" Thursday night from Taxpayers Against Fraud Education Fund (TAFEF) for their exceptional work on a complex Medicare fraud whistleblower case while at the Department of Justice.

Jeffrey Dickstein, a Phillips & Cohen attorney in Miami, and Amy Easton, a Phillips & Cohen attorney in Washington, DC, were the lead government attorneys in the whistleblower case that resulted in more than 500 hospitals settling Medicare fraud allegations for a total of $280 million.

The "qui tam" lawsuit, joined by the government, alleged the hospitals had implanted cardiac devices known as implantable cardioverter defibrillators too soon after heart attacks or heart surgery in violation of established Medicare protocols and billed Medicare for the procedures.

"The strategies of these two attorneys were brilliant in judgment and execution," said Bryan Vroon, the attorney and TAF member who worked with them on the case and nominated them for the award. He said "their extraordinary talents and energy" were the key reasons for the case's successful outcome.

"It was never about the numbers for these attorneys," Vroon said. "Their focus was the patients."

He noted that Dickstein and Easton faced 44 "aggressive defense firms" that were representing the various hospitals to work out over 80 settlement agreements.

Dickstein is a former Assistant US Attorney for DOJ in Miami who has more than 30 years of experience in healthcare litigation. Easton was a Senior Trial Attorney at DOJ's headquarters in Washington who had a strong record as a prosecutor in significant healthcare fraud cases.

Congress created the False Claims Act to encourage a partnership between the government and private citizens to stop fraud against the government. Dickstein and Easton's "groundbreaking" investigation and work on the cardiac device case with the two whistleblowers who exposed the Medicare fraud and Vroon exemplified that partnership.

TAFEF is a nonprofit organization that works to advance the effectiveness of government whistleblower reward programs, including the federal and state False Claims Acts and the federal tax, securities, and commodity futures trading laws.

About Phillips & Cohen LLP

Phillips & Cohen is the most successful law firm representing whistleblowers under government reward programs, with more than $12.1 billion recovered as a result of its whistleblower cases. The law firm represents US and international whistleblowers in cases under the False Claims Act and similar state whistleblower laws as well as whistleblower claims filed with the SEC, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and the Internal Revenue Service. For more information, see www.phillipsandcohen.com.

SOURCE Phillips & Cohen LLP

Related Links

http://www.phillipsandcohen.com


While at the lounge, celebrities and Emmy award nominees will have the opportunity to experience the Pilot G2, the no. 1 selling pen in America that is also being highlighted through the ongoing G2 Overachievers Grant initiative. The $50,000 grant will reward overachievers for the incredible things they do to improve others' lives every day.

"The written word has always played a key role in the success of great writers, directors and actors," said Ariann Langsam, Director of Marketing. "At Pilot, we all know that the pen is mightier than the sword, and we are delighted to celebrate the industry's top overachievers, the words through which they connect with audiences and in many ways, change the world."

Pilot's collection of performance-ready pens are ideal of overachievers:

The G2 gel ink pen is perfect for overachievers that possess a passion for performance and strive to be the best in everything they do. As America's No. 1 selling and longest writing gel ink pen, G2 is the ultimate pen for the everyday overachiever.

gel ink pen is perfect for overachievers that possess a passion for performance and strive to be the best in everything they do. As America's No. 1 selling and longest writing gel ink pen, G2 is the ultimate pen for the everyday overachiever. The G2 Limited is Pilot's premium incarnation of G2, combining the unsurpassed smooth writing of G2 gel ink with a sophisticated metal barrel in rich matte color, premium metal accents and a comfortable color coordinated rubber grip.

is Pilot's premium incarnation of G2, combining the unsurpassed smooth writing of G2 gel ink with a sophisticated metal barrel in rich matte color, premium metal accents and a comfortable color coordinated rubber grip. The epitome of timeless quality and performance, Pilot's Ageless line features striking colors and finishes, each with a unique, patented double-twist mechanism that retracts the entire tip of the pen to create a clean, polished look.

GBK attendees will also have the opportunity to overachieve for their favorite charities by participating in Pilot's philanthropic social media campaign, 'Pilot Purpose.' Guests will be invited to share what overachieving mantra helped them script their own success, along with the name of their charity of choice, and share it on their personal social media pages using #PilotPurpose. The celebrity with the most follower engagement, including likes, shares, and comments, will receive a $5,000 donation to their charity on behalf of Pilot.

ABOUT PILOT CORPORATION OF AMERICA

Pilot Pen offers superlative writing instruments renowned for quality, performance, cutting-edge technology and consumer satisfaction. Widely acknowledged as innovators, Pilot was first to introduce Americans to fine-point writing, currently maintaining the top share position in the gel and rolling ball pen categories. Pilot's line also includes the acclaimed Dr. Grip family of products featuring an ergonomic, wide comfort grip that reduces writing fatigue, as well as the notable Precise V5 and G2 lines. Pilot Pen manufactures and distributes from its state-of-the-art facility in Jacksonville, Florida; its parent company is the oldest and largest manufacturer of writing instruments in Japan. For more: www.pilotpen.us.

For More Media Information:

Emily Oliver / Morgan Jantzen

Bright red  850.668.6824

[email protected]

[email protected]

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160916/408812

SOURCE Pilot Corporation of America

Related Links

https://pilotpen.us


Three natural stone producers are joining forces

CITY OF QUEBEC, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ - Polycor inc., a Quebec-based natural stone producer, is announcing the acquisition of Swenson Granite and Rock of Ages, two of the top players in the granite and memorial monument industry. The merging of these three large companies makes them the biggest marble and granite production group in North America and one of the biggest worldwide. The headquarters of the business will remain in Canada, specifically in the City of Quebec.

These acquisitions will spotlight Polycor's expertise in new North American and international markets. "Swenson Granite and Rock of Ages are brands known for the superior quality of their products in the markets where they have a presence. We wish to maintain their brand identity and image. They enjoy an enviable reputation, which will secure immediate growth for us," explains Patrick Perus, CEO of Polycor. Polycor's management is also aiming to acquire better knowledge of the customer base in these markets and strengthen their expertise in working natural stone quarries.

More than 800 employees will now work in Polycor's numerous divisions. "Our intent is to create more jobs in the communities involved. We're thrilled to welcome 400 new members into Polycor's big family and we're confident they will integrate seamlessly, as the three groups are complementary to each other and share similar fundamental values," adds Mr. Perus.

TorQuest Partners and its co-investors, in conjunction with PNC Mezzanine Capital, are partnering with key members of Polycor, Swenson Granite and Rock of Ages management teams to capitalize the combined company. Though the transaction amount remains confidential, Polycor's management estimates that by the end of this acquisition, revenues will exceed $150 million (USD) per year.

Polycor numbers in Canada and in the United States

800 employees

30 quarries

12 factories

7 stores

6 offices

About Polycor

Founded in 1987 in the City of Quebec, Polycor distributes natural stone products across North America. The company transforms granite, marble and limestone into slabs, tiles, mosaics and landscaping items. Now employing over 800 people, it has 30 quarries and 12 factories in Canada and the United States. For more information, go to: www.polycor.com.

About TorQuest

Founded in 2002, TorQuest Partners, is a Canadian-based manager of private equity funds. With more than $2 billion (CAD) of equity capital under management, TorQuest invests in middle market companies, and works in close partnership with management to build value. To learn more about TorQuest Partners, visit www.torquest.com.

About PNC Mezzanine Capital

PNC Mezzanine Capital, located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, has been providing financial support to companies since 1989, helping them achieve their strategic objectives. They provide subordinated debt as well as junior capital. They are renowned for their flexibility and their confidence in growing businesses.

SOURCE Polycor
The New York Chapter of the Public Relations Society of America and the New York Institute of Technology are partnering to present a special panel discussion and Meet the Media reception on "Ethics and the 2016 Presidential Election."

This special edition Meet the Media session will feature journalists from The Economist, Yahoo News, The Wall Street Journal, NBC and PR Week and will be moderated by John Maynard, Director of Programs, Newseum (Washington, D.C.). More details online at http://www.prsany.org/events/EventDetails.aspx?id=841895 .

The 2016 Presidential Election has become the He Said, She Said exchange that trumps all others. Sure, the key ethical principles  fairness, integrity and transparency  will be upheld in the polling place. But what happens outside the voting booth? How are voters being influenced during the countdown to November 8 th ?




WALTHAM, Mass., Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Rocket Software (www.rocketsoftware.com) today announced that its global team of mainframe computing experts will be at IBM Edge in Las Vegas September 18-22 to showcase the company's latest big iron computing tools. Rocket personnel will be on hand to discuss a number of products, including tools that let anyone program mainframes in any language.

WHO: Rocket Software WHERE: IBM Edge, Las Vegas

MGM Grand

Booth 400 WHAT: Presentations on Mainframe Technologies and Solutions WHEN: September 18-22

The scheduled list of presentations includes:

TITLE SPEAKER ICF Catalog Best Practices Janet Sun, Senior Manager, Software Engineering at Rocket Software Establishing a Cloud Storage Tier on IBM z Systems Janet Sun, Senior Manager, Software Engineering at Rocket Software Gain Insight into Your Entire Spectrum Assets, and More Amedee Potier, Senior Director R&D at Rocket Software Securing IMS Data and Robust IMS Application Development on z Systems Ron Bisceglia, Software Engineer at Rocket Software Cloud Connector for IBM Elizabeth Hudson (IBM) and Dan Magid, VP, Applications Development and DevOps & Chief Technologist, IBM i Solutions Power SC (for AIX) Elizabeth Hudson (IBM) and Tim Hill, Solutions Architect at Rocket Software iCluster & PowerHA for IBM i Joint Demo Elizabeth Hudson (IBM) and Mark Watts, Software Engineer at Rocket Software

In addition, the company will host two receptions offering networking opportunities for IBM z Systems and Power Systems users on Monday, September 19.

About Rocket Software

Rocket Software (www.rocketsoftware.com) is a technology company that helps organizations in the IBM ecosystem build solutions that meet today's needs while extending the value of their technology investments for the future. Thousands of companies depend on Rocket to solve their most challenging business problems by helping them run their critical infrastructure, business processes, and data, as well as extend those assets to take advantage of cloud, mobile, analytics, and other future innovations. Founded in 1990, Rocket is based in Waltham, Massachusetts with locations in Europe, Asia, and Australia.

CONTACT: Richard Berman

PHONE & EMAIL: [email protected]; 415 359 4906

SOURCE Rocket Software

Related Links

http://www.rocketsoftware.com


WASHINGTON, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Thirty-seven community-based organizations across the United States that provide assistance to disadvantaged entrepreneurs are set to receive $5 million in grants from the U.S. Small Business Administration's (SBA) Program for Investment in Micro-Entrepreneurs (PRIME). These organizations help low-income entrepreneurs gain access to capital to establish and expand their small businesses.

"By training low-income and disadvantaged micro-entrepreneurs on how to grow their businesses, the PRIME Program provides tremendous opportunity to strengthen and revitalize communities," said SBA Administrator Maria Contreras-Sweet. "I am proud that this year's PRIME program provides entrepreneurship pathways to individuals who have struggled to find employment after incarceration and helps them rebuild families and whole communities. PRIME complements the nearly $160 million approved this year through SBA's mission-based lending programs."

This year's 37 recipients come from 24 states, and the District of Columbia. The grants range from $75,000 to $230,000 and typically require at least 50 percent in matching funds or in-kind contributions. In total, 135 organizations applied for PRIME awards.

SBA placed special emphasis in this year's competition on projects that will offer training and technical assistance to strengthen cooperative forms of business, particularly those that service economically disadvantaged entrepreneurs. Five organizations received funding to specifically target cooperative small businesses.

SBA also prioritized projects that support entrepreneurship among ex-offenders in the criminal justice system. SBA recently changed the rules in its Microloan Program to allow loans to entrepreneurs on parole or probation. Of 37 PRIME grantees this year, 15 will carry out projects that support entrepreneurship among ex-offenders.

This year's PRIME awards also focused on organizations participating in SBA's Community Advantage Program. This program provides mission-oriented, non-profit lenders access to SBA's 7(a) loan guarantees to help small businesses that have outgrown microlending but are not able to access more traditional financing, including funding from SBA commercial lending partners. Eight Community Advantage Lenders were selected for PRIME awards.

PRIME was created by Congress as part of the Program for Investment in Microentrepreneurs Act of 1999. Funds become available on September 30 and the grant is for one year.

GRANTEE CITY STATE Communities Unlimited, Inc. Fayetteville Ark. Anewamerica Community Corporation Berkeley Calif. California Association For Microenterprise Opportunity San Francisco Calif. Grameen America Los Angeles Calif. Main Street Launch Oakland Calif. Pacific Asian Consortium In Employment Los Angeles Calif. Pacific Coast Regional Corporation Los Angeles Calif. HEDCO, Inc. Hartford Conn. Credit Builders Alliance, Inc. Washington D.C. National Community Reinvestment Coalition, Inc. Washington D.C. Federation Of Southern Cooperatives/Land Assistance Fund East Point Ga. Georgia Micro Enterprise Network Atlanta Ga. Chicago Neighborhood Initiative Micro Finance Group Chicago Ill. Business Ownership Initiative Indianapolis Ind. Riley Area Development Corporation Indianapolis Ind. Local Enterprises Assistance Fund, Inc. Brookline Mass. Harbor Bank CDC Baltimore Md. Mainestream Finance Bangor Maine Metro Community Development Flint Mich. Justine Petersen Housing & Reinvestment Corporation Saint Louis Mo. Center For Economic Empowerment And Development Fayetteville N.C. Central Plains Foundation, Inc. Holbrook Neb. Rising Tide Capital Inc. Jersey City N.J. Capacity Builders, Inc. Farmington N.M. Brooklyn Cooperative Federal Credit Union Brooklyn N.Y. CAMBA, Inc. Brooklyn N.Y. New York Women's Chamber Of Commerce New York N.Y. Trufund Financial Services, Inc. New York N.Y. Finance Fund Capital Corporation Columbus Ohio Cherokee Nation Tahlequah Okla. Rural Enterprises Of Oklahoma, Inc. Durant Okla. Micro Enterprise Services Of Oregon Portland Ore. Community Capital Works, Inc. Philadelphia Pa. Southeast Community Capital Corporation Nashville Tenn. Peoplefund Austin Texas People Incorporated Financial Services Abingdon Va. Wisconsin Women's Business Initiative Corporation Milwaukee Wis.

For more information on PRIME grants, visit http://www.sba.gov/content/prime-grantees.

ABOUT THE U.S. SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION (SBA)

The U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) was created in 1953 and since January 13, 2012 has served as a Cabinet-level agency of the federal government to aid, counsel, assist and protect the interests of small business concerns, to preserve free competitive enterprise and to maintain and strengthen the overall economy of our nation. The SBA helps Americans start, build and grow businesses. Through an extensive network of field offices and partnerships with public and private organizations, the SBA delivers its services to people throughout the United States, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Guam. www.sba.gov

Release Number: 16 68

Contact: David Hall, (202) 205-6697

Internet Address: http://www.sba.gov/news

Follow us on Twitter, Facebook & Blogs

Logo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20110909/DC65875LOGO

SOURCE U.S. Small Business Administration

Related Links

http://www.sba.gov


NORFOLK, Va., Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A U.S. Coast Guard rescue swimmer, U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary member, a cruise ship crew and the crew of a maritime academy training ship will be formally recognized at the annual Association for Rescue at Sea (AFRAS) awards ceremony and reception in Washington D.C.

Petty Officer Benjamin Cournia, a helicopter rescue swimmer who will receive the Vice Admiral Thomas Sargent III Gold Medal, saved 12 lives after the crew of a commercial ship had to abandon their sinking vessel during a hurricane in the Caribbean. Auxiliarist Patrick Porter saved two lives during a regatta that included more than 35,000 people on a six-mile stretch of the Colorado River. The crew of the Holland America cruise ship Veendam saved the life of a civilian pilot who ditched his aircraft hundreds of miles from Hawaii. The crew of the Maine Maritime Academy training ship State of Maine saved a mariner whose boat was taking on water more than 500 miles from the coast of Halifax, Canada.

Congressmen Duncan Hunter and John Garamendi will host the Capitol Hill event on Sep. 21, 2016, at the Rayburn House Office Building. Members of Congress, senior Coast Guard, MARAD and industry leaders, including Vice Commandant of the Coast Guard Adm. Charles D. Michel, will join the AFRAS Board of Directors to bestow medals and awards to these heroes who went above and beyond the call of duty to save lives at sea in 2015.

AFRAS helps protect mariners from the perils of the sea by providing monetary and in-kind donations to world volunteer maritime search and rescue organizations. The charity also recognizes and honors extraordinary maritime rescues through an awards program and annual ceremony. AFRAS is a 501(c)3 non-profit charity. Visit afras.org to learn more about the organization, or make a charitable donation.

Media are invited to attend the event and should contact Brandon Brewer ([email protected]) for more information. Still photographs of the ceremony will be made available after the event.

SOURCE Association for Rescue at Sea

Related Links

http://afras.org


Mr. Imperato immediately offered the family assistance through the Guns for Great Causes branch of Henry Repeating Arms. 33 special edition rifles will be auctioned off and sold across the country to generate funds to help Brayden's family cover the cost of the anti-rejection drugs that are required for a successful transplant operation of this severity.

The theme of the rifle is summed up with the brave warrior mouse and inspirational text found on the buttstock. The book on the stock reads, "And though he is small he is fierce, for love, hope and courage make Brayden a WARRIOR." For nearly 3 years now Brayden has fought to stay alive showing bravery and strength miles beyond his age and size. He has been on a feeding tube for his entire life, and half his time since birth at Riley Children's Hospital in Indianapolis or traveling to and from it.

The American Walnut buttstock is laser-engraved and hand painted with the image of an open, fairytale-style book with the inspirational text for Brayden on the left page and a brave warrior mouse on the right. The book has a brick-red cover, with off-white antique pages. The warrior mouse stares danger in the face as two arrows fly over his head, just as Brayden does when presented with a new challenge due to complications. He is armed with a sword fit for Excalibur in his right hand and a green-colored shield in his left, which is adorned with a stylized "B" for Brayden. Some American leafy-vine scrollwork painted in copper provides a backdrop for the book.

Only 33 of these rifles will be made starting with serial number "BRAYDEN01" and going through "BRAYDEN33." The first rifle is available for auction on Gunbroker.com, item #584484452. The remaining 32 rifles will be sold directly through Henry Repeating Arms for $750. Every cent raised will be donated to Brayden's family to help with the exorbitant costs associated with organ transplants. To order please email [email protected] with a name, phone number, and home address. Payment can be made by credit card and the rifle will ship to a local Henry dealer. Henry Repeating Arms will recognize everyone who purchased one of these rifles as thanks for participating in this special fundraiser.

For information about the company and its products visit www.henryrifles.com or call 866-200-2354.

About Henry Repeating Arms

Henry Repeating Arms is one of the country's leading rifle manufacturers. Their legendary name dates back to 1860 when Benjamin Tyler Henry invented and patented the first practical repeating rifle during the Civil War. It became known as the "gun you could load on Sunday and shoot all week long." Henry rifles went on to play a significant role in the frontier days of the American West and soon became one of the most legendary, respected and sought after rifles in the history of firearms. President Lincoln's Henry hangs in The Smithsonian and has become a national treasure. The company's manufacturing facilities are in Bayonne, NJ and Rice Lake, WI.

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160916/408778

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160916/408777

SOURCE Henry Repeating Arms

Related Links

http://www.henryrifles.com


NEW YORK, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Sony Classical proudly announces the release of The Magnificent Seven (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack), featuring music by James Horner and Simon Franglen. The soundtrack will be available on CD and digital formats on September 16th 2016. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures' and Columbia Pictures' in association with LStar Capital and Village Roadshow Pictures' upcoming film The Magnificent Seven will arrive in theatres nationwide on Friday, September 23rd 2016.

ABOUT JAMES HORNER

Having composed the music for more than 130 film and television productions, including dozens of the most memorable and successful films of the past three decades, James Horner was one of the world's most prolific and celebrated film composers. Horner earned two Academy Awards and two Golden Globe Awards for his music for James Cameron's Titanic (Best Original Score and the Best Original Song "My Heart Will Go On"), eight Academy Award nominations, five Golden Globe nominations, and won six Grammy awards. Known for his stylistic diversity, his film credits included Titanic (the largest selling instrumental score album in history, having sold more than 27 million copies worldwide), Avatar, A Beautiful Mind, Apollo 13, Braveheart, Legends of the Fall, Glory, Field of Dreams and Star Treks II and III. The Magnificent Seven was Horner's final film project.

ABOUT SIMON FRANGLEN

Grammy-winning and Golden Globe-nominated Simon Franglen is a composer most recognized for his collaborations on the scores for four of the top grossing films of all time. He worked on the multiple award-winning James Cameron films Avatar and Titanic and the critically acclaimed James Bond thrillers Skyfall and Spectre. Franglen also contributed music to the score for Terrence Malick's Voyage of Time, starring Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett, premiering at the 2016 Venice Film Festival. In addition to composing music for film, Simon has over four hundred music credits working with pop, classical, and R&B artists, such as Whitney Houston, Michael Jackson, Quincy Jones, Celine Dion, Luciano Pavarotti and Madonna. Franglen was also commissioned to compose a sky-breaking, 3-dimensional immersive symphonic suite for the Shanghai Tower, which is the tallest building in Asia. Simon has an impressive career, working with Hollywood's most renowned composers, including John Barry, Howard Shore, Thomas Newman, Alan Silvestri, and most notably James Horner. Franglen and Horner had a very close working relationship, having collaborated on major films such as Titanic, Avatar, The Amazing Spider-Man, Karate Kid and Southpaw. Simon won a Grammy Award for Record of the Year for the smash hit "My Heart Will Go On" from Titanic, and received Golden Globe, Grammy Award and World Soundtrack Award nominations for co-writing and producing the theme song "I See You" from Avatar. Franglen is a visiting professor at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music. Simon resides in England and Los Angeles.



About his work on The Magnificent Seven, Franglen says: "Composer James Horner was a close friend and music hero of mine. I was fortunate to work on at least a dozen of his films, including the monumental Titanic and Avatar. In the Spring of 2015, as we finished the score to Southpaw, director Antoine Fuqua and James were engaged in discussions about The Magnificent Seven, which was to be their next collaboration. In approaching The Magnificent Seven, James knew he'd have to write a score that related to Elmer Bernstein's much-loved theme for the 1960 original, but he also knew that the film scoring language of that older film was not going to work in this modern retelling of Akira Kurosawa's masterpiece Seven Samurai. The challenges energized James; we met in London and he excitedly started working on themes while Antoine was beginning to film with his remarkable cast in Louisiana. A week later tragedy struck. James died in a private plane accident.

We were devastated. In the aftermath, I couldn't stop thinking about the powerful themes that were James' final compositions. It seemed inconceivable that this music would never be heard. I was not alone with those thoughts. James' trusted group of collaborators (including music editors Jim Henrikson and Joe E. Rand, and orchestrator J.A.C. Redford) were unanimous in encouraging [James' longtime music scoring engineer] Simon Rhodes and me to finish prepping the London themes so they could be presented to Antoine. A couple weeks later I was on the set of The Magnificent Seven playing the music to the astonished director, who was overwhelmed by this unexpected gift from his departed friend, a gift that so perfectly 'got' the essence of the movie that Antoine was making, without having ever seen a frame of it.

From there, it was a nine-month process of finishing the film and the score, with all the filmmakers and musicians coming from a place of love and respect for James' music. I hope you can hear the outpouring of goodwill that everyone involved has shown, from the passion that the orchestra put into every note, to the support that Antoine, Roger Birnbaum and MGM have shown throughout the process. I believe that the music as it has been completed reflects James Horner's spirit. As you listen, remember James, and as he would have always insisted, hear the soul of the film in the score."

The track list of The Magnificent Seven (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) is as follows:

1. Rose Creek Oppression 2. Seven Angels of Vengeance 3. Lighting the Fuse 4. Volcano Springs 5. Street Slaughter 6. Devil in the Church 7. Chisolm Enrolled 8. Magic Trick 9. Robicheaux Reunion 10. A Bear in People's Clothes 11. Red Harvest 12. Takedown 13. Town Exodus - Knife Training 14. 7 Days, that's all You Got 15. So Far So Good 16. Sheriff Demoted 17. Pacing the Town 18. The Deserter 19. Bell Hangers 20. Army Invades Town 21. Faraday's Ride 22. Horne Sacrifice 23. The Darkest Hour 24. House of Judgment 25. Seven Riders 26. The Magnificent 7  Elmer Bernstein (on digital version only)

Sony Music Masterworks comprises Masterworks, Sony Classical, OKeh, Portrait, Masterworks Broadway and Flying Buddha imprints. For email updates and information please visit www.sonymusicmasterworks.com/.

ABOUT THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN

Director Antoine Fuqua brings his modern vision to a classic story in The Magnificent Seven, presented by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and Columbia Pictures in association with LStar Capital and Village Roadshow Pictures. With the town of Rose Creek under the deadly control of industrialist Bartholomew Bogue (Peter Sarsgaard), the desperate townspeople, led by Emma Cullen (Haley Bennett), employ protection from seven outlaws, bounty hunters, gamblers and hired guns  Sam Chisolm (Denzel Washington), Josh Faraday (Chris Pratt), Goodnight Robicheaux (Ethan Hawke), Jack Horne (Vincent D'Onofrio), Billy Rocks (Byung-Hun Lee), Vasquez (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo), and Red Harvest (Martin Sensmeier). As they prepare the town for the violent showdown that they know is coming, these seven mercenaries find themselves fighting for more than money. The screenplay is by Nic Pizzolatto and Richard Wenk. The film is produced by Roger Birnbaum and Todd Black.

On September 23, 2016, justice has a number. #Mag7

This film is not yet rated by the Motion Picture Association of America.

For updates, please visit https://www.facebook.com/Mag7Movie/.

Media Contacts:

Beth Krakower | The Krakower Group | [email protected]

Angela Barkan | Larissa Slezak | Sony Music Masterworks

212.833.8575 / 6075 / [email protected] / [email protected]

SOURCE Sony Classical
"Dr. Salgado-Morales and Ms. Schick each have many years of leadership experience in the business of health care, and have helped guide the March of Dimes in their local areas," says Gary Dixon, chairman of the Board. "We're honored to have them join the national Board and lend their expertise to our efforts to prevent birth defects and preterm birth, the #1 killer of babies in the United States."

Ms. Schick's service to the March of Dimes spans over two decades, including being a member of the Board of the Pennsylvania March of Dimes since 2011, and acting as the Board's co-chair of the Pennsylvania Committee to End Premature Birth for Mid-Atlantic Region. Currently, Sue is the Chief Growth Officer for UnitedHealthcare, a diversified Fortune 50 health and well-being company. In her current role, she develops innovative strategies and programming to support state government customers serving more than five million Medicaid members in 24 states, plus Washington, D.C. Prior to that, she was the CEO of UnitedHealthcare of Pennsylvania. With over 30 years of leadership experience in the health and employee benefits industry, Sue is a national speaker on the topics of health care reform, business leadership and philanthropy. In 2012, she was appointed chairperson of The Pennsylvania Commission for Women by Governor Tom Corbett. She has also served on the Governor's Innovation and Privatization Task Force and Vice Chair for the Pennsylvania Business Council. In recognition of her community service, the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce awarded her its Paradigm Women's Leadership Award in 2014.

She graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa with a B.S. in Economics/Business Administration from Randolph-Macon College and will receive her master's degree in Healthcare Delivery Science from Dartmouth College in 2017. Sue and her husband live in the greater Philadelphia area and have three sons.

Dr. Salgado-Morales, who serves as chair of the Puerto Rico March of Dimes, is a board-certified obstetrician-gynecologist, an international speaker in endometriosis and laparoscopy, and an Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Medical Society Member. In 2014-2015, he chaired the March of Dimes signature fundraising event, March for Babies, in Puerto Rico. Before joining Vita Healthcare, Inc., he founded Minimally Invasive Gynecologic Surgery and Endometriosis Center, for which he is currently the Medical Director. He is Associate Professor in the Department of OB-GYN at Universidad Central de Caribe, School of Medicine in Bayamon, Puerto Rico and Assistant Professor in the Department of Surgery at the University of PR Medical Science Campus. He is also President and Co-Founder of Maternal Fetal Medicine & Gynecology Center, PSC. He graduated from the Universidad Central del Caribe School of Medicine in 1985 and completed his residency in OB-GYN at the Caguas Regional Hospital.

He and his wife, Dr. Marie Rosa Aviles, a dentist, live in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and are parents of two sons and one daughter who are currently pursuing medical careers.

The March of Dimes is the leading nonprofit organization for pregnancy and baby health. For more than 75 years, moms and babies have benefited from March of Dimes research, education, vaccines and breakthroughs. For the latest resources and health information, visit our websites marchofdimes.org and nacersano.org . Find us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.

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CINCINNATI, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Vinimaya, Inc., an Oracle Gold Partner and leader in industry-leading B2B marketplace and supplier relationship management solutions, showcases its new, real-time eProcurement software solution Aquiire at Oracle Open World, September 19-22, 2016 at the Moscone Center in San Franciscobooth #3447. Vinimaya's B2B e-commerce software solution is the only real-time eProcurement suite in the industry and complements and extends the capabilities of Oracle ERP and procurement systems.

Aquiire provides the most innovative and intelligent real-time B2B e-commerce shopping, guided buying, business intelligence and supplier management tools in the industry. We look forward to demonstrating how the Aquiire solution seamlessly integrates with Oracle systems to dramatically enhance the procurement shopping and supplier relationship management experience.

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"Vinimaya has partnered with Oracle for more than 11 years to provide advanced eProcurement marketplace and catalog management solutions for their PeopleSoft, E-Business Suite and ERP Cloud customers," said Mike Palackdharry, President and CEO. "We are excited to showcase our next-generation solution, Aquiire, at Oracle OpenWorld this year. Aquiire provides the most innovative and intelligent real-time B2B e-commerce shopping, guided buying, business intelligence and supplier management tools in the industry. We look forward to demonstrating how the Aquiire solution seamlessly integrates with Oracle systems to dramatically enhance the procurement shopping and supplier relationship management experience."

According to Palackdharry, Aquiire's patented search technologies have an exclusive ability to perform a universal search across all procurement content local catalogs, non-catalog items and real-time supplier web contentand aggregate all the information into a modern and intuitive user interface (UI) that brings procurement to Oracle users with a true consumer-like shopping experience.

"Aquiire's advanced integration with Oracle ERP and procurement systems allows Oracle customers to greatly enhance user adoption, compliance and savings, while maximizing their investment in their Oracle solutions," said Palackdharry. "Aquiire is a reflection of our vision, passion and thought leadership. We deliver unparalleled real-time data solutions that matter to our customers and partners."

More information about Aquiire's advanced Oracle integrations can be found at: www.Aquiire.com/Oracle-Integration.

About Oracle PartnerNetwork

Oracle PartnerNetwork (OPN) is Oracle's partner program that offers resources to train and support specialized knowledge of Oracle's products and solutions and has evolved to recognize Oracle's growing product portfolio, partner base and business opportunity. Key to the latest enhancements to OPN is the ability for partners to be recognized and rewarded for their investment in Oracle Cloud. Partners engaging with Oracle will be able to differentiate their Oracle Cloud expertise and success with customers through the OPN Cloud program  an innovative program that complements existing OPN program levels with tiers of recognition and progressive benefits for partners working with Oracle Cloud. To find out more visit: http://www.oracle.com/partners.

About Vinimaya

Vinimaya is a MBE-certified technology company and a thought leader and innovator of real-time B2B eCommerce solutions for some of the largest organizations in the world. The company is dedicated to a solutions-focused, collaborative approach in working with their global customers. Since 2000, Vinimaya has been developing personalized, cloud-based technology solutions designed to solve their customers' unique business challenges.

Vinimaya is one of several portfolio companies of Vora Ventures, which was named the 2015 Technology Company of the Year in Cincinnati. More information at www.Aquiire.com. Twitter: @Aquiire.

Contact: Paulie Anthony, Director of Marketing

Email | 513/285.8385

SOURCE Vinimaya

Related Links

http://www.aquiire.com


NEW YORK, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Voya Financial, Inc. (NYSE: VOYA), announced today several appointments and expanded leadership roles that will increase and diversify the experience and talent on the company's Executive Committee as well as position Voya well to achieve its broader strategic and financial goals.

Carolyn M. Johnson has been named chief executive officer of Insurance Solutions, which now includes Voya's Annuities business. Voya's Insurance Solutions business also encompasses Individual Life and Employee Benefits.

Johnson most recently served as president of Annuities, a role she has held since she joined the company in April 2014. In this role, she was responsible for all aspects of the Annuities business, including product, distribution, financial management and operational performance. In addition, she oversaw Voya's Tax-Exempt Market Retirement business from September 2014 through May 2016. Prior to joining Voya, she was executive vice president and chief operating officer of Protective Life Corporation, where she led the life insurance and annuities businesses.

Johnson will continue to report to Alain M. Karaoglan, chief operating officer of Voya Financial.

Michael S. Smith will continue to manage the company's Employee Benefits business over the next six to nine months, reporting to Voya Financial Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Rodney O. Martin, Jr. Smith will work closely with Karaoglan to determine an appropriate management-transition strategy for Employee Benefits. Voya's Closed Block Variable Annuity segment will now be overseen by Ewout L. Steenbergen, chief financial officer of Voya Financial.

To help ensure Voya truly operates as a customer-centric organization, Karaoglan now oversees all of Voya's Ongoing Business  Retirement, Investment Management, Annuities, Individual Life and Employee Benefits.

"Our Annuities and Individual Life businesses have achieved higher returns; introduced more profitable and less capital-intensive product portfolios; and secured strong relationships with our distribution partners," said Karaoglan. "As we look to best leverage the strengths of both businesses  while best allocating Voya's overall capital so that we can focus on the areas of highest return and customer value  the sharing of resources among these businesses will provide us with greater agility and flexibility. Bringing Annuities and Individual Life  in particular  more closely together also reflects the growing convergence of distribution for these products. We remain committed to the profitable growth of Annuities and Individual Life, and we are very fortunate to have Carolyn now leading Insurance Solutions."

Maggie Parent will join Voya on Oct. 3, 2016, as executive vice president, Technology, Innovation and Operations, and will report to Martin. Parent joins Voya from Deutsche Bank AG, where she most recently served as managing director, Americas head of Corporate Technology, since 2015. In her newly created position at Voya, Parent will drive a focus on innovation throughout the company as well as align Voya's Technology and Operations teams to meet customer needs.

Prior to her role at Deutsche Bank, Parent served as a managing director at Credit Suisse AG after holding a number of leadership roles at Morgan Stanley. From 2011 to 2013, she held the roles of managing director and chief operating officer, Global Operations, Technology and Data as well as chief information officer, Americas, at Morgan Stanley. Among other accomplishments at Morgan Stanley, Parent developed and consolidated technology strategy with regard to innovation, application architecture, decommissioning programs, infrastructure investment and data center strategy.

Nan Ferrara has been promoted to executive vice president, Operations and Continuous Improvement (CI), and will report to Parent. Ferrara oversees the overall growth strategy and performance of Voya's Operations organization, as well as the company's CI efforts, a key driver of Voya's strategic transformation that she has led since joining the company in April 2012. Under Ferrara's leadership, the CI management system is being integrated across the company and creating a high-performance culture that has led to improved business results.

Previously, Ferrara held the title of senior managing director of Operations for Voya, providing oversight of the Operations strategy. Ferrara's more than 20 years of experience in the financial services industry also includes leading the divestiture separation team at AIG before joining Voya. She served as operations executive of AIG's Financial Services Division earlier in her career, providing leadership and working directly with operations leaders to improve the customer experience and enhance efficiency by leveraging process improvement practices and technology. Ferrara also has served in a number of senior leadership roles at J.P. Morgan Chase, where she focused on customer service and engagement.

"The appointments we're announcing today demonstrate our commitment to ensuring we have outstanding and talented leaders who can help us execute our strategy, achieve our financial targets and  equally important  realize our vision to be America's Retirement Company," said Martin. "Building on our financial, cultural and operational success over the past few years, we continue to raise the bar in terms of achieving higher levels of performance, anticipating and meeting our customers' needs, and delivering greater shareholder value. Having Carolyn, Maggie and Nan join our Executive Committee brings additional backgrounds, experiences and knowledge to the team, and this benefits all of our stakeholders.

"I also want to acknowledge the many and significant contributions Mike Smith has made since he joined Voya in 2009," added Martin. "He has provided strong leadership in several roles, including for our Annuities business as well as ensuring  as Voya's chief risk officer  that our CBVA segment was well positioned leading up to and following our initial public offering in 2013. He also led our Individual Life and Employee Benefits businesses to achieve higher returns on capital, introduce new technologies and provide tremendous value to our customers and our shareholders. We are fortunate to have his continued guidance and support."

"Voya has strong businesses that are offering tremendous value to our customers, our distribution partners and our shareholders," added Karaoglan. "Carolyn, Maggie and Nan share in our commitment to execution, which has enabled us to achieve a number of positive results and will be a key driver of our continued success. We have an outstanding team of leaders working across the company to create great experiences for our customers and strong returns for our shareholders. I am confident that these additions to our Executive Committee will enable us to continue our momentum."

In addition to Martin, Ferrara, Johnson, Karaoglan, Parent, Smith and Steenbergen, Voya's Executive Committee continues to include Christine Hurtsellers, chief executive officer of Voya Investment Management; Charles Nelson, chief executive officer, Retirement; Chet Ragavan, chief risk officer; Kevin Silva, chief human resources officer; and Trish Walsh, chief legal officer.

About Voya Financial

Voya Financial, Inc. (NYSE: VOYA), helps Americans plan, invest and protect their savings  to get ready to retire better. Serving the financial needs of approximately 13 million individual and institutional customers in the United States, Voya is a Fortune 500 company that had $11 billion in revenue in 2015. The company had $466 billion in total assets under management and administration as of June 30, 2016. With a clear mission to make a secure financial future possible  one person, one family, one institution at a time  Voya's vision is to be America's Retirement Company. The company is equally committed to conducting business in a way that is socially, environmentally, economically and ethically responsible  Voya has been recognized as one of the 2016 World's Most Ethical Companies by the Ethisphere Institute, and as one of the Top Green Companies in the U.S., by Newsweek magazine. For more information, visit voya.com. Follow Voya Financial on Facebook and Twitter @Voya.

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SOURCE Voya Financial, Inc.

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AUSTIN, Texas, Sept. 16, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- In five years, WGU Texas has changed the face of higher education in Texas, introducing competency-based education that fits the needs of today's new majority of nontraditional students. Since the non-profit university launched in Texas in 2011, more than 5,300 graduates have obtained their undergraduate or graduate degrees, helping to address the state's critical workforce needs in high demand fields like IT, health care and education.

And, on Saturday, Sept. 17th, during the university's annual commencement exercise at the Frank Erwin Center in Austin, another 1,305 Texans join the ranks of alumni of WGU Texas.

"We know today's college students look a lot different than they did 10, 15, or 20 years ago. Today, nontraditional students are the new majority, not just in Texas but across the U.S. They are college students who juggle full-time jobs, family responsibilities and limited budgets," said Veronica Vargas Stidvent, Chancellor of WGU Texas. "At the five-year mark, WGU Texas is proud of our track record of delivering high-quality higher education solutions that are designed specifically with these non-traditional students. We're especially proud of this year's class of graduates, who will no doubt make their own significant contributions to their workplaces and communities."

WGU Texas graduates represent the diversity of our state:

Thirty-nine percent of the 2015 WGU Texas graduates are first-generation college graduates;

The average age of this year's WGU Texas graduate is 40 years old;

The oldest WGU Texas graduate this year is 73 years old and the youngest, 21;

Ninety-three percent of WGU Texas' 2016 graduates are 27 years of age or older.

Graduates at this year's WGU Texas Commencement earned bachelor's and master's degrees in the fields of information technology (IT), business, K-12 teacher education and health professions, including nursing. The average time for this year's graduate to complete a bachelor's degree is 2 years, 5 months, while a graduate program averages 1 year, 11 months.

"The face of higher education is changing, and innovators like WGU Texas are helping to reshape what a high-quality university education can be, both for students and the employers who are looking for skilled workers" said Manny Flores, CEO and Managing Partner of LatinWorks, who will deliver the WGU Texas Commencement keynote address. "These professionals are now ready for the jobs and promotions that await them, the opportunities that lie ahead are truly boundless for these bright, committed students."

Follow the 2016 Commencement online using hashtag, #WGUTX16.

For more information about the WGU Texas programs, please visit http://texas.wgu.edu.

About WGU Texas

WGU Texas is an online, nonprofit, competency-based university established to expand Texans' access to higher education throughout the state. Formed through a partnership between the state of Texas and nationally-recognized Western Governors University, WGU Texas is open to all qualified Texas residents. The university offers more than 50 undergraduate and graduate degree programs in the high-demand career fields of business, K-12 teacher education, information technology, and health professions, including nursing.

Degrees are granted under the accreditation of Western Governors University, which is accredited through the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities (NWCCU). Teachers College programs are accredited by the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE), and nursing programs are accredited by the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education (CCNE).*

Learn more at texas.wgu.edu or call 1-877-214-7011.

*Western Governors University offers nursing programs that are accredited by the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education (One Dupont Circle, NW, Suite 5380, Washington, DC 20036, 202-877-6791).

Follow WGU:

http://www.facebook.com/wgu.edu

http://www.linkedin.com/companies/western-governors-university

http://twitter.com/wgu

http://www.youtube.com/WesternGovernorsUniv

http://google.com/+wgu

http://news.wgu.edu/news/news.xml

WGU Texas News

Contact for media inquiries: Contact for enrollment information: Margaret Justus 877.214.7011 281-250-8253 texas.wgu.edu [email protected]



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SOURCE WGU Texas

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Srinagar, Sep 15 : Senior PDP leader Tariq Karra on Thursday announced his resignation from the party and Parliament, accusing the PDP of being a collaborator with the RSS.

"The PDP has become a collaborator for fascist RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh)-governed BJP," Karra told reporters here.

Elected to the Lok Sabha in 2014, Karra was a close aide of the late Chief Minister Mufti Mohammed Sayeed and was one of the founding members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

He had always opposed the idea of a PDP-BJP alliance and made his dissent known earlier also.

The resignation comes as the Kashmir Valley is battling months of the deadliest unrest it has suffered in six years. Over 80 people have been killed and thousands injured in clashes with security forces.
New Delhi, Sep 15 : The Supreme Court on Thursday rapped the Tamil Nadu and Karnataka governments for their failure to stop the largescale violence that erupted after its order on sharing of Cauvery river waters.

On being told that there was bandh and Rail Roko in Karnataka on Thursday and there would be a bandh on Friday in Tamil Nadu, the bench of Justice Dipak Misra and Justice Uday Umesh Lalit said, "People can't be a law to themselves. It is obligatory on the part of the State of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu to prevent such actions."

"We are compelled and constrained to say it is the duty of the State that no such agitation, damages and destruction to public and private property takes place," the bench said in its order.

The bench also said that bandhs and agitations could not be allowed in pursuant to the orders of the court.

"We sincerely hope that wisdom will prevail over the competent authority of the State to maintain peace," said the bench.

The court said this in the course of the hearing of a PIL by a social activist hailing from Kanyakumari seeking directions to both Karnataka and Tamil Nadu governments to take preventive steps to curb violence and agitations, assess the damage to public and private property and make those responsible to account for it.

The court issued notice to both the states and directed its hearing on September 20, when it would take up the main matter.

Having made its displeasure known, Justice Misra said, "We hope and trust that wisdom would prevail on both the States to maintain peace, harmony, order and calm and above all dignity and respect for law."

The top court by its September 12 order had asked Karnataka government to release 12,000 cusecs of Cauvery river water to Tamil Nadu every day till September 20, after modifying its earlier order of September 5 directing the release of 15,000 cusecs every day for next 10 days.

"There should not be any violence and agitation when it relates to the order of this court. Any aggrieved party can take legal recourse or legal remedies available," the bench said in its order.

The court said this while referring to its earlier judgment wherein it had laid down guidelines on the conduct and handling of the agitations and fixing responsibility and accountability for damage and destruction to public and private property.
Kolkata, Sep 15 : The Indian Tea Association (ITA) on Thursday said that the pan-India e-auction would be more 'suited' for the traders if it was introduced after the roll-out of Goods and Services Tax (GST).

"Ideally, pan-India auctions could have been more suited with the GST regime. Presently, there are some concerns over interstate transportation of teas," the association's Vice Chairman Azam Monem said.

Currently, there are different taxes on the brew in different states and traders are facing difficulties in interstate transport of their tea stocks.

"After the rollout of GST, there will be a uniform indirect tax rate on the commodity and it would help traders in interstate transport of their stocks. Traders will then find it much easier to participate in the pan-India auctions," said the tea lobby group's Secretary Sujit Patra.

Despite efforts being made by the Tea Board of India, pan-India auction which was rolled out in June so far has not been able to generate competition for a fair price discovery for the tea makers.

"The tea prices for Indian producers for the last ten years have grown at around CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate) of 6 per cent, trailing the rise in input costs which have increased at a CAGR of over 10 per cent during the same period," a statement said.

Prices have not been picking up with increasing costs of production, which has soared by around 9.5 per cent in the last four years.

Many producers were forced to sell teas well below the cost of production and it would have serious consequences in the future on the sustainability of the industry.

The Tea Board has mandated that 50 per cent of the teas manufactured must be routed through public auctions.

The industry in India, the world's second largest producer of tea after China, is reeling under subdued prices due to oversupply in the world market on the back of higher production in north India and Kenya.

"Total tea consumption is around 4.5 billion kgs world-wide. But in the last sixth months, there has been an additional supply of around 90 million kgs. It is putting pressure on domestic prices," said Monem.

The modest annual consumption growth at 3 per cent is also a major challenge.

"We are worried as per capita consumption of the brew in our country is low compared to the neighbouring countries. Fifty per cent of people in the age group of 15-24 are taking only one cup of tea a day," he said.

"We should promote tea consumption among the young people on an urgent basis. We are promoting consumption of generic teas for this purpose," he said.
Lucknow, Sep 16 : A sense of unease prevailed in the Uttar Pradesh capital on Friday, hours after Samajwadi Party (SP) leader Shivpal Singh Yadav, his son Aditya Yadav and wife Sarla Yadav quit important party posts.

Party Chief Mulayam Singh Yadav has reportedly convened a meeting at the party headquarters here to thrash out a solution on the ongoing power struggle between his son as well as Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav and his younger brother Shivpal Singh Yadav.

Meanwhile, hundreds of Shivpal Singh's supporters camped outside the 7, Kalidas Marg residence of the former minister, raised anti-Akhilesh Yadav slogans demanding that all departments be restored to their leader.

The protesting supporters said Shivpal should be retained as the state president and that he was humiliated by the Chief Minister.

They demanded that Akhilesh should touch Shivpal's feet as a nephew and say sorry.

Many leaders wept openly and threatened to immolate themselves if their demands were not met.

More than two dozen legislators also met Shivpal Singh Yadav on Friday. Sacked minister Gayatri Prajapati also had a meeting with Shivpal here.

While Shivpal quit both party post as well as the state cabinet's, his wife Sarla stepped down as chairperson of the Etawah Cooperative Bank, and son Aditya resigned as Chairman of PCF (Uttar Pradesh Cooperative Federation Ltd.) on Thursday.

The developments were seen as a family feud, as majority of the Yadav clan felt Akhilesh had not only humiliated his uncle and the former PWD minister by stripping him of important portfolios, but also viewed it as a direct challenge to the family patriarch -- the SP chief.
Mumbai/Nagpur, Sep 16 : The immersion of thousands of idols of the elephant-headed Lord Ganesha ended in most parts of Maharashtra on a tragic note with at least 16 visarjan-related deaths in the 24 hours to Friday morning, officials said. Two people are missing At least seven deaths took place in Nashik during immersion ceremonies in the district lashed by rains since Thursday.

An army soldier, Sandeep Shirsat, and another local, S. Rameshwar, drowned in a pond in Musalgaon, while Nilesh Patil, Bhushan Kasbe, Sumit Pawar, Amol Patil and Roshan Salve died in different villages in the district.

Three students drowned in a river while clicking selfies with idols of Lord Ganesh in Wardha district, and one of their friends was rescued from the swirling waters by locals.

A school teacher Parmeshwar Shengule from Waluj drowned during immersion ceremonies in Godavari river while a civic worker lost his life in Nanded.

Two youths were washed away in the Kaang river in Jalgaon. One body was found while another was missing.

Two youths are reported missing during an immersion ceremony in Pune, details of which are not available.

In Nagpur, a 27-year-old woman Manisha K. Masaram lost her life after she intervened in a brawl over preparing 'prasad' in the Hanuman Temple Ganeshotsav Mandal on Wednesday night.

Manisha's brother Lokesh and another person Darshan were fighting when she attempted to stop them abd Darshan pushed her due to which she fell and lost her life.

On Tuesday, a five-year-old girl Priya S. Mahule fell into a boiling cauldron of 'daal' being prepared as part of 'MahaPrasad' during the ganeshotsav at Buddha Nagar in Pachpoli area of the city.

According to the police, Priya was playing near the pandal when she decided to take a peek into the unattended cauldron, suddenly slipped and fell into boiling 'daal' preparation.

The tragedy occurred during the evening aarti when everybody, including the cooks, were busy inside the pandal.

On hearing her screams, the devotees rushed out to see the girl struggling in the steaming 'daal', somehow fished her out and took her to a nearby hospital.

Priya, who sustained over 80 per cent burns, succumbed to her injuries on Wednesday morning.

Meanwhile, after more than 24 hours, the immersion ceremonies of thousands of big and small idols of Lord Ganesha finally drew to an end on Friday morning across the state, marking the end of the 11-day Ganeshotsav.
Wellington, Sep 16 : Sri Lanka Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe will visit New Zealand from October 1 to 3, New Zealand Prime Minister John Key said on Friday.

"This will be the first time a Sri Lankan Prime Minister has undertaken a bilateral visit to New Zealand, and is an important step in the growing relationship between our countries," Xinhua news agency cited Key's statement.

"Under Wickremesinghe's leadership, Sri Lanka has entered a new phase in its post-civil war development. New Zealand is keen to support the important steps the country is making towards reconciliation and rebuilding through increased political and economic contact," Key said.

Key, who visited Sri Lanka in February, said he was struck by the range of exciting opportunities for New Zealand, and an increasing number of businesses were recognising the potential.

Wickremesinghe would be accompanied by four ministers and a business as well as a media delegation.
Chennai, Sep 16 : Actress Anupama Kumar, who is making a comeback to Telugu filmdom after seven years, will play a business tycoon in an upcoming yet-untitled Gopichand-starrer.

She was last seen in the 2009 Telugu film "Aa Okkadu".

"It's a very interesting role. I play a business tycoon, and will be required to undergo complete makeover," Anupama, popular for her work in Tamil films such as "Neer Paravai", "Vallinam" and "Meagamann", told IANS.

In the film, she will be paired with Sachin Khedekar, and she's looking forward to work with the National Award-winning actor.

"I've worked with him in an advertisement. Having always been in awe of his performance, I'm quite excited to be sharing screen space with him," she said.

To be directed by Sampath Nandi, the project will be predominantly shot in Bangkok.

The film also stars Hansika Motwani, Catherine Tresa and Prakash Raj.
New Delhi, Sep 16 : Carrying the 'asthi kalash' -- pots containing the ashes of the cremated -- of 160 Pakistani Hindus, Ramnath Maharaj, a Karachi temple priest, is in India to immerse the ashes in the holy Ganga river at Haridwar.

Maharaj, head priest of Panchmukhi Hanuman Temple, said to be 1,500 years old, is accompanied by his nephew Kabir Kumar. The two crossed over into India through the Wagha border on Thursday evening.

The ashes of these Pakistani Hindus will be immersed in the Ganga at Haridwar on September 24, the seventh day of Pitru Paksha, the day Hindus pay homage to their deceased and forefathers.

"The 160 asthi kalash was all that we could carry from Karachi. There are more than 40 other asthi kalash waiting at Sondari Shamshan (the cremation ground in Karachi). We could not carry them all because just two of us -- out of 10 other priests and sewaks (helpers) -- were granted visas," Maharaj told IANS.

Pakistani immigration officials asked him for affidavits for the asthi kalash at the Wagah border due to which he had to stay back and arrange the papers, he said.

After he crossed over on Thursday evening, he was received by volunteers of a Delhi-based organisation, Shri Devodhan Sewa Samiti (SDSS).

Since he was not granted permission to travel to Delhi, Ramnath said he went directly towards Haridwar from Punjab.

Ramnath said most of the ashes were three to four years old and were waiting to be immersed in the Ganga.

"Our visa applications were rejected by the Indian High Commission three times. The visas of eight others is still pending. If they are also granted visa by the Pitru Paksha, then they will arrive with 40 more asthi kalash from the Karachi shamshan," the priest said.

Speaking to IANS, Ramnath recalled his last visit to India in 2011 when he arrived with 135 asthi kalash, some as old as 30 years.

The tedious visa process, a by-product of the tense bilateral ties, adds to the delay in immersing the ashes of Pakistani Hindus in the Ganga.

"Due to religious value of the Panchmukhi Hanuman Temple, many people approach us and express their desire of immersing the ashes of their relatives in the Ganga. The ashes are kept at the 400-year-old Sondari Shamshan or Asthi Ashram in Karachi, which is near the temple," he said.

The priest said that recently both the temple and cremation ground were renovated with the help of the Pakistan government.

The Panchmukhi Hanuman Temple is one of the few in the world to have a "natural" idol of Hanuman.

(Kushagra Dixit can be contacted at kushagra.d@ians.in)
Ahmedabad, Sep 16 : With Prime Minister Narendra Modi set for a two-day visit to Gujarat from Friday evening, the ruling BJP leadership is busy promoting a mobile app to enable supporters to connect with him to wish him on his birthday on September 17.

The ruling party aims to rope in at least five lakh people to upload the app.

The aggressive promotion of the app comes in the backdrop of a flop BJP programme in Surat recently when Patel youngsters disrupted a show of strength in the presence of party president Amit Shah amid the simmering Patidar and Dalit agitations.

With leaders of both the agitations -- Hardik Patel of the Patidars and Jignesh Mewani of the Dalits -- in their twenties, the task of promoting the mobile app has been assigned to the state Bharatiya Janata Party's youth wing.

A special booth has been set up at the state BJP headquarters 'Shree Kamalam' on the outskirts of state capital Gandhinagar.

Party sources said trained volunteers will also meet youngsters in different educational institutes and encourage them to connect with Modi.

Modi, who will stay at his home on his 66th birthday, is visiting the state for the second time in less than a month.

Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani has said that the app will be a great opportunity for the people to connect and greet the Prime Minister through the 'Narendra Modi App' on his birthday.

Modi is slated to reach Ahmedabad after 9 p.m. on Friday and will be greeted at the airport by hundreds of party workers.

His convoy will then drive to Raj Bhavan where he is to make a night halt. The Prime Minister will visit his nonagenarian mother Hira Ba on Saturday in Gandhinagar to seek her blessings.

Afterwards, Modi is expected to return to the Raj Bhavan and hold a meeting with state BJP functionaries, including the Chief Minister, ministers and important office-bearers.

The Prime Minister will leave for Limkheda in the tribal district of Dahod to inaugurate the government's water and irrigation schemes entailing an expenditure of Rs 1,755 crore. Here, he will also address a huge tribal rally.

Thereafter, Modi will fly to south Gujarat's Navsari town to address 'Samajik Adhikarita Shibir' for specially abled children. He will then leave for Surat and fly back to Delhi by an Indian Air Force aircraft.

Sources in the Gujarat Administrative Department (GAD) said that Modi will use road routes from Ahmedabad to Gandhinagar on Friday and to reach his brother's house on Saturday morning.

For Limkheda in central Gujarat and Navsari functions, the Prime Minister will travel by a helicopter, said an official source.
New Delhi, Sep 16 : Nepal is determined to forge an enduring partnership with India for its own development and prosperity, Nepalese Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal 'Prachanda' said on Friday.

Nepal, Prachanda told a joint press conference with his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi, had exchanged views on taking concrete steps to elevate ties with India to new heights in all spheres.

He said he had held useful exchanges on the various projects and programmes that have the potential to bring about tangible results to the people of Nepal and India.

Prachanda and Modi addressed the media after holding bilateral talks at Hyderabad House. Prachanda arrived here on Thursday.

"We exchanged views on our respective 'neighbourhood first' policies and agreed that this common orientation in our policies should lead to a greater and mutually beneficial partnership for 21st century based on trust and open dialogue," Prachanda said.

While stressing Nepal's friendly ties with India, he said he expressed the view that trust and confidence were the pre-requisites of strong and sustainable friendly relations.

And to ensure this, "we should respect each other's sensitivities and concerns in a spirit of good neighbourliness.

"We shared the view that given our deep and extensive relationship, a meaningful partnership between our two countries is crucial to unlock huge potentials that we have for our mutual benefits.

"I am convinced that without economic prosperity, political transformation cannot be sustainable."

Prachanda added that "a peaceful, stable, democratic and prosperous Nepal contributes to peace and stability in the neighbourhood and beyond".

He said Nepal and India were friends and bound to remain so.

"Our friendship and fraternity stand on the solid foundation of the historical ties of shared culture and civilizational linkage and the time-honoured principles of Panchsheel and the UN Charter.

"As close neighbours, our destinies are interlinked. I shared with Prime Minister Modiji how inspired we are by India's growth and prosperity under his strong and bold leadership."

Prachanda told Modi that the promulgation of the Constitution last year by a popularly elected Constituent Assembly was a historic achievement for the people of Nepal.

"You are aware that my government has made serious efforts to bring everyone on board as we enter the phase of implementation of the Constitution in the interest of all segments of Nepali society," he said.

According to Prachanda, trade, transit and connectivity were other important agendas that were discussed besides Nepal's concern over growing trade deficit.

Both the leaders discussed Nepal's request for additional three air entry routes.
Damascus, Sep 16 : The Islamic State arrested seven women in northeast Syria on suspicion of spying for the US-led coalition and publicly flogged them, local news site ARA News reported on Friday.

The women were flogged before a large crowd in the IS stronghold of Raqqa after being held for allegedly leaking security information on the group's movements in the city to the US-led coalition, the report said.

The women were among more than 10 people arrested by Islamic State's al-Hisbah police force during raids on several houses in Raqqa, ARA News said.

"Among those arrested were seven women who were flogged in front of hundreds of people in central Raqqa on Thursday evening," media activist Aiman al-Issawi was quoted as telling ARA News.

"The Sharia Court accused them of cooperating with the US-led coalition and rival groups," he added.

"At least four other civilians were detained by IS militants but the group has not yet revealed what their charges were," al-Issawi said.

The Islamic State has recently arrested and beheaded dozens of civilians who allegedly collaborated with coalition forces against IS, according to ARA News.
Islamabad, Sep 16 : Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif will raise the issue of alleged violation of human rights in Kashmir at the 71st UN General Assembly (UNGA) session on September 19 in New York, an official statement said here on Friday.

Sharif will interact with the international community and the UN and discuss the right to self-determination of the people of Jammu and Kashmir in accordance with the relevant UN Security Council resolutions, a Foreign Office statement said.

Pakistan will also participate in a meeting of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) Contact Group on Jammu and Kashmir.

"The Prime Minister will also participate in the High-Level Meeting of the General Assembly to address Large Movements of Refugees and Migrants on September 19 and the Leaders' Summit on Refugees convened by US President Obama September 20," the statement said.

"Pakistan will ... urge the international community to devote adequate political attention and support for the voluntary repatriation of Afghan refugees from Pakistan and their sustainable reintegration in Afghanistan," the statement added.

On the sidelines of the UNGA, Sharif will hold bilateral meetings with a number of world leaders, including the UN Secretary-General. The Annual Session of the General Assembly will be attended by a large number of Heads of State and Government.
New Delhi, Sep 16 : Amid speculation that Baloch leader Brahumdagh Bugti may seek asylum in India, his party will meet in Geneva on September 18 and 19 to take a decision on the issue.

Baloch Republican Party (BRP) spokesman Sher Mohammad Bugti, who is in Geneva, told IANS over telephone that the Central Committee will discuss many issues including those pertaining to Balochs outside Balochistan.

"In the meeting we will also take a decision on how and when to apply for asylum," Sher Mohammad Bugti told IANS.

He said he was not aware of reports that BRP leader Brahumdagh Bugti may seek asylum in India. "Till now he has not applied officially for asylum in India," he said.

Brahumdagh Bugti is the grandson of Baloch nationalist leader Akbar Bugti, who died in a military operation in Balochistan in 2006.

Earlier, Brahumdagh Bugti told CNN News 18 that people of Balochistan were living in "very terrible conditions" and that the Baloch issue got more attention after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi referred to the rights abuses there.

"After Modi's speech (on India's Independence Day) people have started talking about Balochistan," Brahumdagh Bugti said.
Ahmedabad, Sep 16 : Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrived here on Friday evening to a warm welcome on a two-day visit on the occasion of his 66th birthday on Saturday.

Modi, who flew down by an Indian Air Force aircraft, was received at the Ahmedabad airport by Governor O.P. Kohli, Chief Minister Vijay Rupani, all state ministers and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders.

Scores of BJP volunteers and people thronged the airport to cheer him.

Modi thanked everyone from a podium at a brief function and recalled the September 16 evening of last year when he had similarly landed here for his birthday.

The Prime Minister will make a night halt at the Raj Bhawan in Gandhinagar and seek the blessings of his mother Hira Ba on his birthday on Saturday.

After that, he will fly to the tribal district of Limkheda to inaugurate water and irrigation schemes worth over Rs 1,700 crore.

Modi will also address a public rally at Limkheda before leaving for Navsari in south Gujarat where he will address Samajik Adhikarita Shibir (workshop) for disabled children.

The Prime Minister would leave for Surat on his way to New Delhi on Saturday evening.
Lucknow, Sep 16 : Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President Amit Shah on Friday said that the government would facilitate talks on the Ram Temple if both sides agree to come to the table.

Responding to a question on when the proposed Ram Temple will be built in Ayodhya, Shah said it depends on the court verdict.

"However if both sides agree to start talks on the dispute, the government would surely facilitate," Shah said at an India TV conclave here.

Speaking on his party's prospects in the upcoming Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections, Shah said that the BJP is set to win a two-third majority in the polls, adding that this time the main fight is between the BJP and the ruling Samajwadi Party.

"The Congress is nowhere in the picture. It is mainly cutting into the votes of Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party," he said.

Asked whether the entry of Priyanka Vadra can change equations, the BJP President said: "It is for the Congress to decide, but her entry would not have much impact."

Asked why his party has not projected its chief ministerial candidate in Uttar Pradesh, Shah said, "The party has not yet decided on this. We will decide at an appropriate time. We do have a dozen leaders with potential of becoming a Chief Minister."

On BSP supremo Mayawati's apprehension that the BJP at the Centre may go in for more violence in Kashmir or a war with Pakistan to win the crucial Uttar Pradesh elections, Shah said: "Kashmir is not a political issue, and it should not be. All the main political parties have backed the government on Kashmir."

"Mayawati should remember that her party failed to win a single Lok Sabha seat in 2014 without a bullet having been fired," he added.
Mumbai, Sep 16 : Veteran filmmaker Subhash Ghai expressed his willingness to work with actor Nawazuddin Siddiqui but after creating a challenging role for him.

"I always want to work with Nawaz. In 2008, we've worked together in 'Black & White'. And who doesn't want to work with a brilliant actor like Nawazuddin?

"But also it raises the responsibility towards his talent. The kind of capacity he has forces me to create a role which suits him. I want to write a character for him, which I never did. That will be challenging for both of us," said Ghai speaking to the media while attending a seminar at the Whistling Wood International Institute along with Nawazuddin.

Asked his success mantra, Nawazuddin replied: "My mantra is working relentlessly with full honesty and hard work. Whatever role I get, I do it wholeheartedly. There are two things in my hand, sincerity and hard work. Other than this let's see how things go on."

The actor also said that he is quite impressed with the performances of the future actors there which reminded him of his old times while he was studying in National School of Drama.

Nawazuddin Siddiqui will be next seen in Rahul Dholakia's "Raees" along with Shahrukh Khan. The film is scheduled to be released on January 26, 2017.
Geneva, Sep 16 : The World Trade Organisation appellate body has upheld an earlier ruling against India's domestic content requirements for manufacturing solar cells and modules, the WTO said on Friday.

The solar dispute arose from a complaint lodged by the US against India in 2013 for violation of global trading rules. Earlier this year, a WTO dispute settlement panel had ruled that India's domestic content requirement (DCR) for the solar sector is inconsistent with its treaty obligations.

Summarising the key findings of the appellate body report that was circulated to members on Friday, WTO said: "The Panel sustained the United States' claims that India's DCR measures are inconsistent with WTO non-discrimination obligations under Article III:4 of the GATT 1994 and Article 2.1 of the TRIMs Agreement.

"The Panel also found that the measures are not covered by the government procurement exemption under Article III:8(a) of the GATT 1994, because the product being procured (electricity) was not in a 'competitive relationship' with the product discriminated against (solar cells and modules)."

The national treatment obligations required India to treat imported solar cells and modules on par with domestically produced products without any discrimination under Article III:4 of the GATT 1994.

The highest adjudicating body for global trade disputes agreed with the panel that India's domestic content requirements for solar cells and modules under the Jawaharlal Nehru Solar Mission amounted to trade-related investment measures as they favour domestic products over imported products.

The domestic content requirement clause under India's national solar programme, launched in 2010, is aimed to protect and encourage local industry.

It mandates that a solar power producer compulsorily source a certain percentage of solar cells and modules from local manufacturers in order to be able to benefit from the government guarantee to purchase the energy produced.

America and the European Union themselves have taken anti-dumping measures against cheaper Chinese solar panels in order to protect their own industries.

Earlier this month, India lodged a complaint against the US at the WTO alleging that the latter's domestic content requirements and subsidies of eight American states - Washington, California, Montana, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Michigan, Delaware and Minnesota - for renewable energy violated core provisions of global trade rules.

India expects to add around 5.5 GW of solar capacity in 2016, making it the fourth-largest solar market globally.
Ahmedabad, Sep 17 : Gujarat Dalit rights leader Jignesh Mevani was "picked up" by Gujarat police from Ahmedabad airport on Friday evening, hours before Prime Minister Narendra Modi landed for a two-day state visit as part of his birthday celebrations.

Mevani's brother Viral Mevani confirmed on social media that "some 15 to 20 policemen just whisked him away".

"Jignesh arrived from Delhi by an Indigo flight. We also waved at each other as he was walking down to the exit."

When Jignesh was closing in he suddenly he was picked up, Viral said.

"It is illegal to round up someone like this," Viral said. Police sources said Jignesh was to be let off around midnight.

Jignesh Mevani returned from Delhi after attending the Dalit Swabhiman Sangharsh rally, which was addressed by Prakash Ambedkar, grandson of B. R. Ambedkar, founder of the Indian constitution, and several Left leaders, including CPI-M general secretary Sitaram Yechury.

At the rally, Mevani gave a call to Dalits to organize rail roko and mass chain pulling programme across the country, starting from the former constituency of Modi as Gujarat chief minister, Maninagar in Ahmedabad. The programme has been proposed for October 1, a day before the Gandhi Jayanti day.

Meanwhile, Mevani has declared, there would be a series of other mass meetings across Gujarat ahead of the "big" rail roko plan, including mass meetings and mohalla sabhas.
By Barani Krishnan NEW YORK (Reuters) - Crude oil prices fell 2 percent on Friday to multi-week lows as swelling Iranian exports reinforced fears of a global glut, while gasoline rallied on refinery and pipeline outages. Falling U.S. equity markets <.SPX> and a rising dollar <.DXY> also weighed on crude futures and other commodities denominated in the greenback. [.N] [FRX/] Gasoline rose 2 percent after outages on Colonial Pipeline's main gasoline line and in a key unit of BP Plc's refinery in Whiting, Indiana. The profit for turning crude into gasoline <1RBc1-Clc1> hit three-month highs and pump prices for the fuel rose as well. Brent crude futures settled down 82 cents, or 1.8 percent, at $45.77 a barrel, hitting a two-week bottom of $45.48. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures fell 88 cents, or 2 percent, to settle at $43.03 a barrel. WTI hit a five-week low of $42.74. For the week, Brent fell 5 percent, while WTI lost 6 percent. "Crude futures are taking on an increasingly bearish appearance," said Jim Ritterbusch of Chicago-based oil markets consultancy Ritterbusch & Associates. For WTI, "this can potentially expedite our expected trip south to the $39 area," he said. Oil slumped after a source familiar with Iran's tanker loading schedules said the third-biggest OPEC producer raised crude exports to more than 2 million barrels per day (bpd) in August, nearing pre-sanctions levels. Iran and OPEC kingpin Saudi Arabia have been raising exports despite the approaching Sept. 26-28 meeting in Algeria, where the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and other major producers are set to discuss an oil production freeze. Most market participants are skeptical a deal will be reached. There are also signs of returning output from Nigeria and Libya, where crude exports have been hampered by conflict and unrest. U.S. oil output, meanwhile, has grown more than that of any producer since 2010, data shows. A weekly reading on the U.S. oil rig count showed a rise for the 11th out of the last 12 weeks. [RIG/U] The rally in gasoline picked up on news BP Plc plans to shut for up to 10 days the large crude distillation unit at its 413,500-bpd Whiting, Indiana refinery. That would add to closure of the refinery's gasoline-producing fluidic catalytic cracking unit. Analysts expect gasoline pump prices to continue rising in the coming days after Colonial Pipeline Co [COLPI.UL] said it was aiming for a restart by Thursday of its key line that brings gasoline to the East Coast. (Additional reporting by Karolin Schaps in LONDON and Mark Tay in SINGAPORE; Editing by Paul Simao and Will Dunham)
Remembering the Trail of Tears

The enduring legacy of Indian removal policies in the U.S.

The enduring legacy of Indian removal policies in the U.S.

In recent weeks, the state has militarized my reservation...It's a familiar story in Indian Country. This is the third time that the Sioux Nation's lands and resources have been taken without regard for tribal interests. The Sioux peoples signed treaties in 1851 and 1868. The government broke them before the ink was dry.

David Archambault II, New York Times, Taking a Stand at Standing Rock August 24, 2016

September 16 commemorates the forced migration of nearly 125,000 Native American people in the 1830s. From the millions of acres of their ancestral land in the southeastern U.S., Choctaw, Chickasaw, Seminole, Creek and Cherokee tribes (known as the Five Civilized Tribes as they adopted attributes of the white settlers culture)  were driven from their homes and sent west of the Mississippi to Indian territory in present day Oklahoma.

The Trail of Tears refers to the journey endured by these Five Tribes, most specifically to the treacherous journey traveled by the Cherokees.

Reading the recent New York Times editorial by Standing Rock Sioux Chairman David Archambault II regarding protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline, his account of events calls to mind a familiar story of Native Americans struggling with broken promises, lawsuits and militant force over 180 years ago.

Indian Removal Act of 1830

By the turn of the 19th century, the U.S. governments attitude toward Native Americans was to encourage their assimilation to Anglo-European culture. The Five Civilized Tribes inhabiting Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, North Carolina and Florida were generally allowed to remain in their homelands. They were also expected to convert to Christianity, speak and read English, become landowners and participate in an agriculture-based economy.

But even then, many white settlers werent comfortable co-existing with Natives. Plus, the Natives held land desirable for growing cotton, and the discovery of gold led to the Georgia Gold Rush in 1829. These events contributed to interest in enacting a law for Indian removal from the southeastern states.

Andrew Jackson signed such an act in 1830 after overcoming fierce congressional debate. There was significant opposition to the law, which some considered unconstitutional and a renege on the promise of Native sovereignty. The Indian Removal Act* gave the federal government power to exchange Native-held land east of the Mississippi for land to the west.

In theory, migration was supposed to be voluntary, but there wasnt really a choice. Native leaders who previously resisted such policies acquiesced under pressure to sign removal treaties.* Of course, the case was made that migration would be to their advantage  Jackson believed resettlement would protect the Five Tribes from extinction.

Plus, he promised this Indian territory would be theirs for keeps.

The territory eventually became known as Oklahoma, Choctaw for red people and opened up to white settlers under the Indian Appropriations Act of 1889.*

The Treaty of New Echota

One of the staunchest opponents to Indian removal was the Rev. Samuel Worcester, missionary to the Cherokee people. He took his case to the Supreme Court, and Worcester v. Georgia (1932)* became one of the most influential decisions in Indian law. The court affirmed sovereignty for the Cherokee people and found the Indian Removal Act to be invalid, illegal and unconstitutional.

But President Jackson flouted the courts decision and the government negotiated a removal treaty with the Cherokee Nation. A vicious rift erupted among the Cherokee people. The Treaty of New Echota* was not approved by the Cherokee National Council, nor by Principal Chief John Ross, but signed by representatives of a minor Cherokee political faction and U.S. officials in 1835. It became law, despite protests, in 1836.

One of the terms of the agreement required the Cherokee to depart for Indian Territory within two years.

Martin Van Buren, elected president in 1837, was determined to carry out his predecessors removal policy. On May 23, 1838, when the deadline for voluntary migration expired, he ordered General Winfield Scott to head about 7,000 soldiers from the U.S. Army and state militia to forcefully remove the Cherokee people from their homes.

The New Yorkers take on these events in July, 1938, reflected the bitter disappointment many Americans felt toward the governments handling of this conflict:

[The Cherokee] have generally refused to move until the soldiers were upon them  idly clinging to the hope that no such monstrous violation of our National faith as well as their most precious rights could be really perpetrated by the United States, and regarding all that had been done merely as intended to frighten them into an acknowledgement as valid of that black falsehood and planned fraud, the Treaty of New Echota, with a mere handful of renegades. Up to the last hour they have hoped against hope that our Government could not seriously mean to enforce against them by the bayonet the conditions of that notorious instrument, which that Governments own agents have time and again reported as no more a treaty than a counterfeit note is a true bill.

The displaced Cherokees were put into crowded internment camps for the summer, until cooler weather would make the journey west less hazardous. By November, 12 groups of about 1,000 people each had set off on a Trail of Tears, the 1000+-mile march through Tennessee, Kentucky, Illinois, Missouri and Arkansas into Indian Territory.

Its estimated that over 4,000 people died on the journey as a consequence of brutal weather conditions, dangerous terrain, hunger and sickness.

Fast Forward to 2016

A protest of a four-state, $3.8 billion oil pipeline turned violent Saturday after tribal officials say construction crews destroyed American Indian burial and cultural sites on private land in southern North Dakota, the New York Times reported on September 3, 2016.

The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe has been fighting against the Dakota Access Pipeline which is set to cross the nearby Missouri River. Environmentalists and other activists have joined the tribe in protest out of concern that the project will contaminate drinking water for the thousands of people living on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, and millions of other people downstream.

Tribe members are also concerned that the proposed pipeline interferes with several sacred cultural sites. According to the New York Times, Archambault said construction crews have already removed topsoil from a 2-mile stretch of land.

"This demolition is devastating," Archambault said. "These grounds are the resting places of our ancestors. The ancient cairns and stone prayer rings there cannot be replaced. In one day, our sacred land has been turned into hollow ground."

On September 9, 2016, a federal judge ruled against the Standing Rock Sioux tribes request for a preliminary injunction to halt construction on the pipeline. And once again, the government acted in defiance of the court.

Only this time, its on the side of the Native Americans. For now.

The U.S. Departments of Justice, the Interior and the Army issued a joint statement announcing that the Corps is halting authorization for construction of the pipeline while it reviews its decisions regarding the large reservoir.

In addition, the federal government also stated that this case highlights a need for "nationwide reform with respect to considering tribes' views on these types of infrastructure projects."

*Replicas of removal treaties, along with the Indian Removal Act of 1830 and the Indian Appropriations Act, as well as documents related to Supreme Court rulings on the political standing of Indian nations, are available in the ProQuest Indian Claims Insight database.

Historical and contemporary issues of the New York Times, along with historical issues of the New Yorker magazine, are available on the ProQuest platform.

In addition, ProQuests History Vault includes a number of collections on the interactions between Native Americans and the U.S. government in the 19th century in the module entitled American Indians and the American West, 1809-1971. This module includes as section called Indian Removal to the West, which contains letters by Indian agents and other government employees regarding the removal process, as well as letters from individual Indians and other citizens related to the removals.

And, discover information from the Indian Claims Commission in ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global:

McMillen, C. W. (2004). Rewriting history and proving property rights: Hualapai Indian activism and the law of land

claims in the 20th century .

Pinkoski, M. (2007). Julian steward and American anthropology: The science of colonialism.

Rosenthal, H. D. (1976). Their day in court: A history of the Indian claims commission.

Learn more at www.proquest.com by searching Indian Claims, History Vault, Executive Orders and Presidential Proclamations and Historical Newspapers. Plus, see the Libguides for these resources.

The enduring legacy of Indian removal policies in the U.S.

In recent weeks, the state has militarized my reservation...It's a familiar story in Indian Country. This is the third time that the Sioux Nation's lands and resources have been taken without regard for tribal interests. The Sioux peoples signed treaties in 1851 and 1868. The government broke them before the ink was dry.

David Archambault II, The New York Times,Taking a Stand at Standing Rock August 24, 2016

September 16 commemorates the forced migration of nearly 125,000 Native American people in the 1830s. From the millions of acres of their ancestral land in the southeastern U.S., Choctaw, Chickasaw, Seminole, Creek and Cherokee tribes (known as the Five Civilized Tribes as they adopted attributes of the white settlers culture)  were driven from their homes and sent west of the Mississippi to Indian Territory in present day Oklahoma.

The Trail of Tears refers to the journey endured by these Five Tribes, most specifically to the treacherous journey traveled by the Cherokees.

Reading the recent New York Times editorial by Standing Rock Sioux Chairman David Archambault II regarding protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline, his account of events calls to mind a familiar story of Native Americans struggling with broken promises, lawsuits and militant force over 180 years ago.

Indian Removal Act of 1830

By the turn of the 19th century, the U.S. governments attitude toward Native Americans was to encourage their assimilation to Anglo-European culture. The Five Civilized Tribes inhabiting Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, North Carolina and Florida were generally allowed to remain in their homelands. They were also expected to convert to Christianity, speak and read English, become landowners and participate in an agriculture-based economy.

But even then, many white settlers werent comfortable co-existing with Natives. Plus, the Natives held land desirable for growing cotton, and the discovery of gold led to the Georgia Gold Rush in 1829. These events contributed to interest in enacting a law for Indian removal from the southeastern states.

Andrew Jackson signed such an act in 1830 after overcoming fierce congressional debate. There was significant opposition to the law, which some considered unconstitutional and a renege on the promise of Native sovereignty. The Indian Removal Act* gave the federal government power to exchange Native-held land east of the Mississippi for land to the west.

In theory, migration was supposed to be voluntary, but there wasnt really a choice. Native leaders who previously resisted such policies acquiesced under pressure to sign removal treaties.* Of course, the case was made that migration would be to their advantage  Jackson believed resettlement would protect the Five Tribes from extinction.

Plus, he promised this Indian Territory would be theirs for keeps.

The territory eventually became known as Oklahoma, Choctaw for red people and opened up to white settlers under the Indian Appropriations Act of 1889.*

The Treaty of New Echota

One of the staunchest opponents to Indian removal was the Rev. Samuel Worcester, missionary to the Cherokee people. He took his case to the Supreme Court, and Worcester v. Georgia (1832)* became one of the most influential decisions in Indian law. The court affirmed sovereignty for the Cherokee people and found the Indian Removal Act to be invalid, illegal and unconstitutional.

But President Jackson flouted the courts decision and the government negotiated a removal treaty with the Cherokee Nation. A vicious rift erupted among the Cherokee people. The Treaty of New Echota* was not approved by the Cherokee National Council, nor by Principal Chief John Ross, but signed by representatives of a minor Cherokee political faction and U.S. officials in 1835. It became law, despite protests, in 1836.

One of the terms of the agreement required the Cherokee to depart for Indian Territory within two years.

Martin Van Buren, elected president in 1837, was determined to carry out his predecessors removal policy. On May 23, 1838, when the deadline for voluntary migration expired, he ordered General Winfield Scott to head about 7,000 soldiers from the U.S. Army and state militia to forcefully remove the Cherokee people from their homes.

The New Yorkers take on these events in July 1838, reflected the bitter disappointment many Americans felt toward the governments handling of this conflict:

[The Cherokee] have generally refused to move until the soldiers were upon them  idly clinging to the hope that no such monstrous violation of our National faith as well as their most precious rights could be really perpetrated by the United States, and regarding all that had been done merely as intended to frighten them into an acknowledgement as valid of that black falsehood and planned fraud, the Treaty of New Echota, with a mere handful of renegades. Up to the last hour they have hoped against hope that our Government could not seriously mean to enforce against them by the bayonet the conditions of that notorious instrument, which that Governments own agents have time and again reported as no more a treaty than a counterfeit note is a true bill.

The displaced Cherokees were put into crowded internment camps for the summer until cooler weather would make the journey west less hazardous. By November, 12 groups of about 1,000 people each had set off on a Trail of Tears, the 1000-mile+ march through Tennessee, Kentucky, Illinois, Missouri and Arkansas into Indian Territory.

Its estimated that over 4,000 people died on the journey as a consequence of brutal weather conditions, dangerous terrain, hunger, and sickness.

Fast Forward to 2016

A protest of a four-state, $3.8 billion oil pipeline turned violent Saturday after tribal officials say construction crews destroyed American Indian burial and cultural sites on private land in southern North Dakota, The New York Times reported on September 3, 2016.

The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe has been fighting against the Dakota Access Pipeline which is set to cross the nearby Missouri River. Environmentalists and other activists have joined the tribe in protest out of concern that the project will contaminate drinking water for the thousands of people living on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, and millions of other people downstream.

Tribe members are also concerned that the proposed pipeline interferes with several sacred cultural sites. According to The New York Times, Archambault said construction crews have already removed topsoil from a 2-mile stretch of land.

"This demolition is devastating," Archambault said. "These grounds are the resting places of our ancestors. The ancient cairns and stone prayer rings there cannot be replaced. In one day, our sacred land has been turned into hollow ground."

On September 9, 2016, a federal judge ruled against the Standing Rock Sioux tribes request for a preliminary injunction to halt construction on the pipeline. And once again, the government acted in defiance of the court.

Only this time, its on the side of the Native Americans. For now.

The U.S. Departments of Justice, the Interior and the Army issued a joint statement announcing that the Corps is halting authorization for construction of the pipeline while it reviews its decisions regarding the large reservoir.

In addition, the federal government also stated that this case highlights a need for "nationwide reform with respect to considering tribes' views on these types of infrastructure projects."

*Replicas of removal treaties, along with the Indian Removal Act of 1830 and the Indian Appropriations Act, as well as documents related to Supreme Court rulings on the political standing of Indian nations, are available in the ProQuest Indian Claims Insight database.

Historical and contemporary issues of The New York Times, along with historical issues of the New Yorker magazine, are available on the ProQuest platform.

In addition, ProQuests History Vault includes a number of collections on the interactions between Native Americans and the U.S. government in the 19th century in the module entitled American Indians and the American West, 1809-1971. This module includes a section called Indian Removal to the West, which contains letters by Indian agents and other government employees regarding the removal process, as well as letters from individual Indians and other citizens related to the removals.

And, discover information from the Indian Claims Commission in ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global:

McMillen, C. W. (2004). Rewriting history and proving property rights: Hualapai Indian activism and the law of land claims in the 20th century.

Pinkoski, M. (2007). Julian steward and American anthropology: The science of colonialism.

Rosenthal, H. D. (1976). Their day in court: A history of the Indian claims commission.

Learn more at www.proquest.com by searching Indian Claims, History Vault, Executive Orders and Presidential Proclamations and Historical Newspapers.

Plus, see the Libguides for these resources.
Premiers expertise in blending graphics and technology provides unique opportunities for me to help brands tell their story in many different ways.

Premier Press, an award winning provider of marketing services, has appointed Matthew Castor as their new Creative Director.

Castor brings over 20 years of creative leadership and build experience that includes work with top agencies, production houses, and brands such as Nike, Adidas, Columbia Sportswear, Danner, Dr. Martens, Tommy Hilfiger, Rockwell Group, Jeffrey Beers International, Wilson Associates, and MGM Mirage Design Group.

According to Michael Hecht, Premier Press VP of Sales and Marketing: Matthews creative drive, unique talents, and leadership abilities made him an obvious choice to expand the creative capabilities we provide our clients. His ability to create memorable customer experiences spans across environmental, retail, digital and printing is a great fit for Premier Press.

Castor has a long history of creating innovative ideas that helps brands connect with consumers and build long lasting relationships. He joins Premier Press to lead the companys growing creative team. Im excited to be part of Premier Press as it expands its footprint in the regions environmental and retail graphics space. The companys passion to help clients grow is is a great fit for me, says Castor. Premiers expertise in blending graphics and technology provides unique opportunities for me to help brands tell their story in many different ways.

As Creative Director, Castor will utilize his diverse background to lead Premiers design team as it continues to expand the capabilities delivered to clients. He will also provide brand vision and support to the companys executives and sales team members. Matthew brings a fresh perspective to redefining the creative support and partnership capabilities that clients can expect from the company.

About Premier Press

Premier Press has been a reliable provider of marketing solutions since 1974. The companys services include digital and offset printing, retail graphics production and distribution, data management, personalized direct mail, packaging, design and fulfillment services. Premier Press has won many awards, including the 2015 Oregon Manufacturer of the Year. Located in Portland, Oregon, the family owned business SGP and FSC certifications ensure high quality and environmentally friendly products and services. Learn more at http://www.premierpress.com.

Contact

Juli Cordill, Co-Owner

503.223.4984

pr(at)premierpress(dot)com
Residents views on student access to local arts programs and events divided by key social and economic factors

As the school year gets underway, New Jersey residents deem more than just reading and writing and rithmetic valuable to a childs education. Ninety-five percent believe an education in the arts  which can include dance, media arts, music, theater, visual arts, and other forms of active creative learning  is very (72 percent) or somewhat (23 percent) important for K-12 students, according to the latest Rutgers-Eagleton Poll. Just 5 percent say the opposite.

Yet despite overwhelming agreement that the arts are essential, sizable numbers of New Jerseyans do not participate in related activities that help to promote and increase arts education. More than half have not taken a child to a program or event, donated or raised money, volunteered, or shared something on social media related to the arts either at their local school or in their community within the past year. Almost half have not discussed arts programs or events with others, and four in 10 have not encouraged a child to participate in any way. Few have brought up the issue with figures like teachers, school administrators and elected officials or in settings like school or town meetings or on social media.

Residents views on student access to arts programs and events in their local area are mixed. In terms of their local school, 28 percent of New Jerseyans strongly agree that students have enough arts opportunities, and another 26 percent somewhat agree; a combined 34 percent either somewhat or strongly disagree. In terms of their local community, 56 percent of New Jerseyans likewise agree that students have enough arts opportunities (29 percent strongly, 27 percent somewhat), whereas 31 percent feel just the opposite.

New Jerseyans overwhelmingly believe that our students need arts education, and a number of residents believe more needs to be done. We want to build upon this support and create strong local ambassadors with the help of the Arts Ed Now campaign, stated Bob Morrison, director of the New Jersey Arts Education Partnership. This is a statewide call to action for all residents to help increase arts education in schools and communities all across New Jersey.

Results are from a statewide poll of 802 adults contacted by live callers on both landlines and cell phones from Sept. 6 to 10, 2016. The sample has a margin of error of +/-3.9 percentage points. Interviews were done in English and, when requested, Spanish.

Widespread belief in importance, but participation limited to certain groups

Majorities across the board say that the arts are very important, though there is some difference in degree. Women are more likely than men to feel this way (80 percent to 64 percent), as are those residents who have completed some type of graduate school work (83 percent versus 70 percent of college graduates and 68 percent of those with some college or less). Urbanites are most likely to believe an education in the arts is very important (at 87 percent), while shore residents are least likely to do so (at 62 percent).

Actively participating in arts-supporting activities is limited to particular groups, however.

Twenty-two percent of New Jerseyans have not participated in any of the asked-about activities either at a local school or in their community; at the other extreme, just 8 percent have participated in all six activities in the past year.

Being a parent or guardian has a big impact on participation. Most parents have encouraged a child to participate in or have taken a child to attend an arts program or event in the past twelve months, either at school or in their local community; most residents without children in the household have not. Those with children are also more likely than those without to have volunteered or raised money for an arts program in their local school or community, yet even a majority of this group has not participated in either activity. They are likewise much more likely to bring up the issue of arts education with school officials and at school meetings, but are no different from those without children when it comes to town meetings or talking to elected officials. Discussion with others and communication through social media about arts education is also more prevalent among parents.

Age, income, education, and race all have a strong influence on participation. Younger and middle-aged residents who are near child-rearing age are more likely than others to participate in a variety of activities, both in school and in their local community; a majority of senior citizens consistently do not participate in arts-supporting activities. Participation also increases with income and level of education. Overall, those who are of prime parenting age, more affluent, and more highly educated tend to participate in not just one, but several of the asked about activities.

While white and non-white residents have participated in comparable numbers of activities, they differ in the nature of their participation: non-white residents are less likely than white residents to say they have taken their child to a program or event, discussed arts programs and events with others, or brought up the issue of arts education at school meetings.

Women are slightly more likely than men to say they have brought up the issue of arts education at a school meeting, while men are slightly more likely to say they have brought up the issue with an elected official.

The classification of ones local school district (commonly referred to as District Factor Groups, or DFGs) and the state school aid ones district has received also have some impact on participation, yet only when it comes to speaking up about the arts within the past year, either to school officials or in school or town meetings. For the most part, residents are similar in their participation habits  and the number of activities in which they partake  across school district types.

Student access to arts depends on who you ask

Whether or not New Jerseyans believe students in their area have enough opportunities to attend arts programs and events varies across key demographics. Democrats, women, non-white residents, those in lower-income households, those with less education, and those in urban and southern areas of the state are all less likely to agree that students have enough access to arts programs in their local school. Virtually the same pattern holds when it comes to arts access within the local community. Age is also a factor for both areas.

Belief that students do not have enough opportunities sharply increases with amount of state school aid funding and district classification. Residents who live in the poorest school districts (classified on the DFG scale as A or B) are less than half as likely as those who live in the wealthiest districts (classified as I or J) to believe students in their area have enough arts opportunities in schools (38 percent agree versus 78 percent agree); they are similarly much less likely to feel the same about their community (43 percent agree versus 71 percent agree). Likewise, less than half of those in school districts who receive the highest levels of state funding (which tend to be the poorest districts) agree that there are enough opportunities either through school or the surrounding community.

Socioeconomic factors like wealth create significant barriers for students when it comes to accessing arts education and opportunities, said Ashley Koning, interim director of the Eagleton Center for Public Interest Polling at Rutgers University. While New Jerseyans see the arts as fundamental to education and participate at similar rates, children in some of the most disadvantaged areas of the state have the fewest chances to benefit.

About the Arts Ed Now Campaign

Arts Ed Now is a statewide campaign to increase active participation in arts education in all schools in New Jersey. Studies show that students who participate in arts education do better in school and in life. Unfortunately, not all NJ students have the access or information to increase their participation in arts education. The Arts Ed Now campaign identifies ways to increase participation in arts education and garner public support to put a spotlight on the issue - and is designed to be customized at a local grassroots level for more impact. The Campaign Central website http://www.ArtsEdNow.org features stories, tools and ways for citizens to become better ambassadors - together. Arts Ed Now was initiated by New Jersey Arts Education Partnership (NJAEP), NJ State Council on the Arts, the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, and Americans for the Arts and now includes hundreds of organizations and individuals across New Jersey.

About the New Jersey Arts Education Partnership

The New Jersey Arts Education Partnership (NJAEP) is the unified voice for arts education in New Jersey. NJAEP was originally founded in 2007 as a cosponsored program of the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, with additional support from the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, New Jersey Department of Education and Music for All Foundation. Additional support has been provided by the Prudential Foundation, and ArtPride New Jersey Foundation. The mission of the NJAEP is to provide a unified voice for a diverse group of constituents who agree on the educational benefits and impact of the arts, specifically the contribution they make to student achievement and a civilized, sustainable society. Additional information is available at http://www.artsednj.org.

# # #

Ashley Koning, Interim Poll Director

Eagleton Polling Institute

Office: 848-932-8940

Cell: 908-872-1186

akoning(at)rutgers.edu

Bob Morrison, Director

NJ Arts Education Partnership

908-542-9396

bob(at)artsedresearch.org

Questions and tables are available at:

http://eagletonpoll.rutgers.edu/rutgers-eagleton-NJ-arts-education-partnership-arts-ed-now-Sept2016.

Find all releases at http://eagletonpoll.rutgers.edu, and visit our blog at http://eagletonpollblog.wordpress.com for additional commentary. Follow the Rutgers-Eagleton Poll on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/RutgersEagletonPoll and Twitter @EagletonPoll.
In their bones they already knew how to make cigars that had the same attributes people loved in Cuban cigars, and they quickly understood what we were trying to achieve

PuroExpress.com built their business on delivering the best cigars from Cuba and beyond to customers around the world since 1997. They recently took their service a step further by creating their own brand of premium cigars based on decades of feedback from their customers who were increasingly frustrated by the inconsistent quality of Cuban cigars. Theyre calling Merchant Cigars the ultimate premium cigars, born in Cuba and handcrafted to perfection in Nicaragua with premium tobacco leaves from the fields of Esteli.

Weve always listened intently to feedback and paid close attention to the cigars our customers were coming back for year after year. That was the basis of our search for the perfect smoke that would take us around the world and end up in a tiny town in Nicaragua more than two decades later, says Rolf Bjork the General Manager of Merchant Cigars.

Rumours of a Cuban Cigar Renaissance happening in Nicaragua has been building since Castros revolution started pushing the best cigar makers out of Cuba in 1959. Nicaraguas part in the history of cigars is a fascinating story of rebirth, passion, devotion to preserving a craft and ultimately the resilience required to persevere against tremendous odds. Despite Nicaraguas own political struggles and weather disasters over the years, the local cigar industry has a long held tradition of crafting luxury cigars with admirable consistency.

Naturally we were intrigued and eventually we made our way to Esteli to see for ourselves if the goods could live up to the hype, said Bjork. What they found were ideal growing conditions that were very similar to those that initially drew tobacco growers to Cuba in the early 1900s.

As much attention is paid to terroir in wine making, the soil and general growing conditions also has a profound impact on the characteristics of tobacco. The tobacco grown in Esteli, Nicaragua, is prized for its bold flavours accompanied by an unmatched smoothness, which lends it its premium status.

It was love at first puff, says Bjork, but says he knew they had found the home of their new venture when he met the passionate craftsmen who would be making each cigar by hand. Since the subtleties of the craft of cigar making is still very much kept in families and passed down from one generation to the next, what excited Bjork was the craftsmens strong Cuban roots and ties to the great cigar dynasties. In their bones they already knew how to make cigars that had the same attributes people loved in Cuban cigars, and they quickly understood what we were trying to achieve, says Bjork.

This select range of cigars is a tribute to following your curiosity wherever it may lead you. They're elegant and modern with a dose of rebellion, just like those who smoke them, says Bjork. Merchant Cigars are currently available in three sizes (Belicosos, Big Robusto and Double Corona) and are available for sale on PuroExpress.com, Cigarexport.com, and now Merchantcigars.com
The International Consortium of Minority Cybersecurity Professionals (ICMCP) today announced the appointment of former NSA Director of Information Assurance Directorate Debora Plunkett to its Strategic Advisory Board. As a member of the Strategic Advisory Board, Plunkett will play a critical role in shaping the strategic objectives and direction of the organization.

Plunkett is a sought after cybersecurity leader with more than 30 years of experience in the U.S. intelligence community. Launching her own consulting firm, Plunkett Associates LLC, she culminated a career of federal service in 2016. In addition to providing organizations expert council on cybersecurity, she serves as an Adjunct Professor at the University of Maryland University College Graduate School, teaching cybersecurity management and policy.

While cybersecurity has been identified as one of todays most serious economic and national security challenges, the industry faces a significant shortage of skilled practitioners, expected to reach 1.5 million open and unfilled positions by 2020. This growing skills shortage is compounded by a lack of diversity within the cybersecurity workforce, with a significant underrepresentation of women, African Americans, and Hispanics.

Women currently represent only 10% of the cybersecurity workforce, despite an overall 48 percent workforce representation in the U.S. Further, African Americans, Asians and Hispanics represent less than 12 percent of information security analyst positions in the U.S.

In accepting her appointment, Plunkett said: Cybersecurity deserves the rich environment of ideas and collaboration that come from having a truly diverse workforce. I look forward to the time when its no longer news to have women or minorities in key positions, because that is when our cybersecurity efforts can really soar  when we have learned to value everyone.

We are honored that someone of Deboras caliber and experience will be a strategic voice in shaping the ICMPC as we move forward in our mission to close the cybersecurity minority gap, said Devon Bryan, ICMCP's President and Co-founder.

About ICMCP

Obtaining official approval by the United States Department of the Treasury Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to be recognized as a Tax Exempt Non-Profit Public Charity organization operating under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code in July of 2014, the International Consortium of Minority Cybersecurity Professionals (ICMCP) began official operations in September of 2014 and is organized exclusively for charitable educational purposes, more specifically to provide our members educational/technical scholarships, mentoring opportunities, professional development and networking.
The International Consortium of Minority Cybersecurity Professionals (ICMCP) today announced several thought-leading Chief Information Security Officers (CISOs) of industry-leading companies, among the premier cybersecurity diversity summit being co-hosted by Symantec Corporation to be held on October 6th during National Cybersecurity Awareness Month at the Symantec headquarters in Mountain View, CA.

The ICMCP West Coast Summit will bring together technology and security leaders in Silicon Valley. The summit builds on the success of the inaugural ICMCP National Conference held in Washington D.C. in March and the earlier D.C. town hall meeting hosted by Congresswoman Sheila Jackson. It will provide greater opportunity to expand the dialogue across the nation and foster meaningful discussion and thoughtful engagement on the necessary strategic, tactical and operational imperatives needed to attract and develop minority cybersecurity practitioners. Further, through breakout sessions, audience members will participate in choosing measurable action plans that will be translated into formal policies and programs.

Emily Heath, Global Chief Information Security Officer at AECOM shares why she accepted the honor of Keynote Speaker for the Summit. I am extremely honored to speak at the West Coast ICMCP Summit and share my story about what led me to the cyber security field. Diversity is an essential part of what makes a team and an organization thrive. Diversity strengthens our work and our field by offering different perspectives, challenging the status quo and enabling independent thinking and creativity. ICMCP addresses the need for diversity in this challenging and rapidly growing field where we need all the creative muscle we can get. The future of cyber security will be stronger as a result of ICMCPs great work.

The Summit, hosted by Symantec, has received tremendous interest across the information security industry, but response from Senior-Level executives at companies that lead in innovation, has been swift. Each of the CISOs below have agreed to share their personal stories and lend their unique perspective on the power of diversity and inclusion within information security:



Franklin Donahoe, Chief Information Security Officer (CISO), Mylan Pharmaceuticals

Sara Hall, Chief Information Security and Privacy Officer (CISO), Human Longevity, Inc.

Emily Heath, Global Chief Information Security and Officer, (CISO), AECOM

John Popolizio, Managing Partner and Chief Information Security & Risk Officer, Riverdale Group, LLC.

Franklin Donahoe, CISO of Mylan Pharmaceuticals, highlights the importance of this type of event and the ongoing discussion of diversity and inclusion within the cyber security industry, Information security is not only about managing risk, but solving complex business and technical challenges. The evolving nature of the threats create constantly shifting demands for different people, from different walks of life, to contribute their unique experiences and points of view to new challenges as they arise. Over time, stale or repetitive approaches to problem-solving will only hinder the InfoSec community's ability to adapt to new and emerging global problems.

During the full-day summit, information security and diversity thought leaders will hold a series of expert panel and audience-driven discussions and examine ways to further the inclusion of underrepresented minorities in cyber security.

For more information and to register for the event please visit http://icmcp.org/icmcpwest2016

###

About ICMCP

The International Consortium of Minority Cybersecurity Professionals (ICMCP) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. It began official operations in September 2014 and is organized exclusively for charitable purposes, to provide members with educational/technical scholarships, mentoring opportunities, professional development and networking.

About Symantec

Symantec Corporation is the global leader in cybersecurity. Operating one of the worlds largest cyber intelligence networks, we see more threats, and protect more customers from the next generation of attacks. We help companies, governments and individuals secure their most important data wherever it lives.
Denise Christine Simon Gormans new book, Free to Walk in Faith, ($12.99, paperback, 9781498482547; $6.99, e-book, 9781498482554) focuses on the authors amazing spiritual journey in drawing strength from her faith in God while dealing with many hardships, including her dads battle with alcoholism and the tragic loss of her childhood friend. Her experiences are at times heartbreaking and will touch many readers. Although difficult to write about, she shares the details frankly and sincerely  in a writing voice that is both casual and conversational  making this book easy and enjoyable to read. Her relatable challenges, as well as her short visit to heaven complete with a conversation with Jesus, makes this a thought provoking and inspiring book for all readers. Now at peace with herself and those shes encountered throughout her life, the authors journey has ultimately led her to discern that she is on this Earth to teach forgiveness.

I want readers to be happy now, states the author. They need to understand that God loves us. Forgiveness needs to happen. Heaven is for everyone. You can't have anything with out forgiveness.

Denise Christine Simon Gorman is a first time author  this book is her first endeavor in the world of inspirational writing. A native of Youngstown, Ohio, she and her husband have made their home in Dayton since 1980, where they raised their three sons to adulthood. Denise spent 13 years working in dining services at the University of Dayton, serving as a second mom to the thousands of students she checked out at her cash register, empathetically listening to their stories and occasionally offering gentle, encouraging advice. Raised in the rich tradition of Maronite Catholicism, she now worships in the Roman Rite. Denise is a long-time member of the St Vincent DePaul Society. She volunteers in her parishs bereavement ministry and the Corner Cupboard Thrift Store, and she is a member of the Dayton Catholic Womens Club. Denise plans to continue her work in faith-inspired writing.

Xulon Press, a division of Salem Media Group, is the worlds largest Christian self-publisher, with more than 15,000 titles published to date. Retailers may order Free to Walk in Faith through Ingram Book Company and/or Spring Arbor Book Distributors. The book is available online through xulonpress.com/bookstore, amazon.com, and barnesandnoble.com.

Media Contact: Denise Christine Simon Gorman

Email: denisesimongorman(at)yahoo.com
Within the pages of Samuel A. Oghenejabors new book, Legalization Of Same-Sex Marriage In America: - What The Word Of God Says!, ($16.99, paperback, 9781498474818; $8.99, e-book, 9781498479813) readers will be presented with the authors powerful opinion on same-sex marriage. This book was written by his inspiration to pass a message to the American people and government. Oghenejabor aimed his writing at warning readers of the high level of moral decadence, by way of same-sex relationship that has become what he calls a plague in society, thereby threatening the sanctity of traditional marriage. He points out the consequences of direct disobedience to the Word of God and examples of Kings and rulers who were victims of these consequences. Oghenejabor believes that it will do people good to avoid the wrath to come if one heeds the warnings in the book  to amend their ways and be humbled before God. It is the belief of the author that we the people and the government will shelve their pride, look inward and amend their ways before the Lord of Host for He will abundantly pardon.

Legalization same sex marriage in America is a direct violation and confrontation to the ordinance of the Word of God, states the author. The consequences upon the nation as a result, will be grievous if our people including the government fail to retrace their ways and make amendment before God.

Samuel A. Oghenejabor holds a Master of Science degree in Psychology with an Emphasis in Industrial and Organizational Psychology from Grand Canyon University, Phoenix Arizona. He has passion for the less privileged in our society. He currently works with mentally ill and substance use/abuse individuals in a behavioral health setting. He was the Director and CEO of Desmale Social Services, providing care for developmentally disabled population. He is a devout Christian and an ardent believer in the undiluted Word of God. He currently worships with the Redeemed Christian Church of God, Jubilee parish, solution center where he is a Sunday school teacher among other Gods vineyard assignments. He is married to the love of his life, Favour and blessed with four beautiful children.

Xulon Press, a division of Salem Media Group, is the worlds largest Christian self-publisher, with more than 15,000 titles published to date. Retailers may order Legalization Of Same-Sex Marriage In America: - What The Word Of God Says! through Ingram Book Company and/or Spring Arbor Book Distributors. The book is available online through xulonpress.com/bookstore, amazon.com, and barnesandnoble.com.

Media Contact: Samuel A. Oghenejabor

Email: SSMarriage.WordofGod(at)outlook.com
The International Society of Nurses in Cancer Care (ISNCC) welcomed nearly 400 participants from 30 countries at the 20th International Conference on Cancer Nursing (ICCN), held September 4 - 7, 2016 at the Sheraton Hotel & Towers in Hong Kong, China.

ICCN is the premier event in international cancer nursing  with the top cancer nursing leaders from all over the world in one place at one time. This year ICCN celebrated its 20th Conference  a landmark event within the field of cancer nursing.

The theme of the ICCN 2016 was Embracing globalization through leadership and partnership in cancer care  and included preconference workshops, plenary sessions, oral abstract presentations, corporate symposia, an exhibit hall, and networking receptions. All presented abstracts will be available in an Abstract Supplement in the ISNCC Official Journal, Cancer Nursing, available via a link on the ISNCC website (http://www.isncc.org). Watch for the launch of the November/December issue.

ICCN 2016 featured many fantastic presentations. One highlight was the Robert Tiffany Lectureship and Keynote Address from Myrna McLaughlin de Anderson from Panama presentation, Building Capacity for Cancer Care, While Facing Global Challenges and Transferring Knowledge. Sanchia Aranda, a Past President of ISNCC and ICCN 2016s Distinguished Merit Award Recipient, provided the fascinating and inspiring presentation, Reflections Across 4 Decades in Cancer Nursing  A Journey from Human to Population Perspectives. Finally, ISNCC was thrilled to present the ISNCC Past Presidents Award to Naomi Oyoe Ohene Oti in honor of her leading role of initiating and sustaining a program of cancer care in Ghana.

The ICCN 2016 was planned in partnership with the Asian Oncology Nursing Society (AONS), Chinese Nurses Association, European Oncology Nursing Society (EONS), Hong Kong Oncology Nursing Group, International Psycho-Oncology Society (IPOS), and the Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer (MASCC). The Chinese Nurses Association and the Hong Kong Oncology Nursing Group were the Regional Conference Partners and AONS, EONS, IPOS and MASCC were International Conference Partners.

ISNCC looks forward to continued success with the ICCN 2017, to be held July 9  12 at the Sheraton Park Hotel at the Anaheim Resort in Anaheim, California. Similar to ICCN 2015, ICCN 2017 will be a research-focused conference. We hope to see you there.
The DetaSynQ solution has given me the tools I needed and allowed me to put tighter controls on ordering and inventory across many stores at one time.

GeniusCentral, Inc. announces today the launch of DetaSynQ (pronounced data-sink), a new data integration service that delivers daily updates of store-specific data to store buyers in the aisle. Derived from the Japanese word for data, DetaSynQ integrates proprietary, store-level inventory, pricing, and product movement data with GeniusCentrals natural product vendor catalogs and pricing database, the largest in the industry, and feeds the integrated data to buyers instantly. It offers the ability to order from all vendors, including the smallest, local vendor whose orders are typically received via phone, fax or email. DetaSynQs service pairs with the functionality of BUYiQ, GeniusCentrals mobile in-aisle ordering software, to equip managers with control over ordering, and buyers with relevant inventory data in-aisle to allow for informed ordering decisions.

After extensive conversations with retailers who had been searching for affordable ways to utilize their own data to encourage better buying decisions, GeniusCentral began collaborating with Luckys Market on the first DetaSynQ pilot project. During the pilot, Luckys buyers experienced a dramatic drop in ordering time: down from 20 hours to 3 hours in a typical vendor order cycle. It also assisted store managers with the improved control over inventory. The DetaSynQ solution has given me the tools I needed and allowed me to put tighter controls on ordering and inventory across many stores at one time, remarked Sindy Wise, Apothecary Director of Luckys Market. It has allowed us to use the significant number of hours saved from ordering and reallocate that time to customer service and better merchandising, which has greatly benefitted our customers.

DetaSynQ provides retailers access to GeniusCentrals expansive product database, along with store-specific wholesale pricing, approved product lists, preferred vendor selection at the SKU level, deal details, store order history and item movement data. These data feeds are combined for daily updates that give buyers the ability to make smart buying decisions. While this service is built around retailer-approved product lists and quantity controls at the chain or individual store level, buyers also have the flexibility to change vendors for out-of-stock and deal management purposes, as well as add items for customers special orders. The result is less overstocked or out-of-stock items, increased cost savings and better inventory turns that pays back the cost for a years service in the first few months of use.

One of the most in-demand features of DetaSynQ is the ability to send orders electronically to the stores local vendors. Prior to DetaSynQ, retailers were limited by catalog availability and vendor participation in the network. Retailers traditionally submit orders to local or smaller vendors via outdated and error prone phone, fax, or individual emails. Now, retailers will be able to submit their order electronically to any vendor of their choice using the same system with the same benefits as the largest national suppliers. This feature saves retailers time, reduces errors, and provides a permanent digital tracking trail, with built-in historical data for future analytics.

We are excited to be working with Luckys Market and other rapidly growing stores on features that will deliver proven benefits to many independent retailers across the industry. DetaSynQ gives buyers the ability to order the right quantities at the right price at the right time, regardless of the POS system they use, at a more affordable price than other inventory control systems in the market, said Linda Sheehan, President and Founder of Genius Central. As a result, these forward thinking stores are reaping the returns in the form of labor savings, more time for customer service and increased profits from tighter inventory controls.

For more information on DetaSynQ, please contact GeniusCentral at 800.360.2231 or sales(at)geniuscentral(dot)com

For media inquiries, please contact Angie Jula at ajula(at)geniuscentral(dot)com

About GeniusCentral Founded in 1999, GeniusCentral is a leading provider of enterprise software platforms in the natural product industry. The company's mission is to be an independent, industry leading order processing partner providing improved ordering efficiency and inventory velocity while lower costs for retailers and suppliers. GeniusCentrals centralized network encompasses more than 2,000+ retail customers, 700+ industry suppliers and currently processes more than $3 billion in commerce annually.
A new generation of new leaders is coming aboard in America's workplace served by younger Markerplace Chaplains using new innovative methods Our Marketplace Chaplains have demonstrated high value for our team members. The service they provide is such a help to us, Jimmy Huang. VHA Corporation

With millennials continuing their demographic surge in the American workplace, Marketplace Chaplains, Americas largest and original workplace chaplaincy organization, is introducing new programs and familiar work/life balance methods to meet the needs of the younger working generation.

A recent PriceWaterhouse survey1 titled, Millennials at work: Reshaping the workplace, states todays younger workers are looking for work/life balance over increasing pay, something many companies are addressing by adding Marketplace Chaplains to their roster of employee services.

This generation are committed to their personal learning and development and this remains their first choice benefit from employers. In second place they want flexible working hours. Cash bonuses come in at a surprising third place,1 the report released early this year states as one of its key findings.

Thats exactly one of the reasons millennial-dominated VHA Corporation in California chose to partner with Marketplace Chaplains more than five years ago. Visionary CEO Vincent Huang and his brother Jimmy Huang were looking for ways to help their employees, mainly in the age range of 22 to 35. Our Marketplace Chaplains have demonstrated high value for our team members. The service they provide is such a help to us, Jimmy Huang said.

The reseller of wireless communications says, Having the voluntary, confidential, on-site chaplain program has been a big help to our employees. Our company was voted The best place to work for, by L.A. Business Journal for four years straight and our Chaplain care team plays a major part of it, Huang added.

Taylor Bledsoe, 32, poised to oversee family metal bleacher business, Sturdisteel, in the near future values having chaplains who are capable of dealing with a younger workforce.

Millennials communicate in different ways and may have different issues than employees of the past, so you always have to be flexible to address them, which is one thing I think our chaplains do very well.

One recent adaptation from Marketplace Chaplains is the new mobile app MyChap which allows employers and employees to message their workplace chaplains for any issue or request a visit. It is a very cool way to call your chaplain whenever you need them, Bledsoe said. Additional resources pertaining to a myriad of life issues are also available by category for users of the exclusive app.

Larry Neilson of Neilson Marketing, another California millennial company, noted that plugged-in chaplains are a perfect fit for his plugged-in company.

According to the PwC Study, some millennials dont feel the promises of employers are being met which is why they are looking for new places to work. Millennials are looking for a good work/life balance and strong diversity policies but feel that their employers have failed to deliver on their expectations. 28% said that the work/life balance was worse than they had expected before joining,1 the PwC report stated.

Employees of all ages, will always need help from time-time-to-time to process and deal with lifes ups and downs, whether issues at home, or on the job. Marketplace Chaplains will be there to offer hope and help with resources they need. Visionary leaders implement this level of care as a cultural, strategic initiative for their diverse, multi-generational staff, said Marketplace Chaplains Executive President and CEO Doug Fagerstrom.

Marketplace Chaplains currently serves more than 630,000 company employees and their family members in 46 states, 9 provinces, 1,232 cities, 4 international countries and 1 commonwealth.

For more information on this unique employee benefit which has been featured in Marketplace Chaplains on CNN, NBC Nightly News, and in the Washington Post, the New York Times and Bloomberg BusinessWeek, visit http://www.mchapusa.com.

About Marketplace Chaplains

To arrange an interview with a Marketplace Chaplain contact Art Stricklin, Vice President Public Relations, at artstricklin(at)mchapusa(dot)com or call 1-800-775-7657

References:

1 https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/managing-tomorrows-people/future-of-work/assets/reshaping-the-workplace.pdf
Cane Bay Partners VI Co-Founder David A. Johnson sits for an interview with representatives from the University of West Georgia. "Im proud to be able to contribute to the university building a world class facility so future business leaders can come to West Georgia and learn the skills necessary to achieve great things for themselves and the communities they live in.

Cane Bay Partners VI, LLLP Co-Founder David A. Johnson, this month, committed to helping fund construction of a state-of-the-art Richards College of Business building at the University of West Georgia, his alma mater.

Johnson is making a substantial donation to the university to facilitate the construction of a new building to house the entire college under one roof. The goal is for this to be a lead gift with other major contributions following.

This is the first big step, said Richards College of Business Dean and Sewell Chair of Private Enterprise Dr. Faye McIntyre. I cant express how much I appreciate Davids generosity. The fact that he is making this donation to Richards College of Business shows he believes in what we are doing, and he wants our students to succeed.

Administrators hope the new building will foster greater collaboration and community engagement. They plan to build more business partnerships that can be facilitated through the building and attract more students. It will house the Small Business Development Center, the Center for Economic Education, flexible learning spaces, expanded administrative and faculty spaces, student learning labs and conference rooms.

"A new home for the Richards College of Business continues to be a major goal of UWG's New West Campaign, UWG President Dr. Kyle Marrero said. With David's very generous gift, we are able to start planning for the new building that will serve generations to come. We are thankful to alumni like David, who invest in our plans to become America's top comprehensive university.

Johnson credits much of his business success to his education at UWG and he is happy to support the college so it can continue to provide exceptional opportunities to bright business majors.

My experience at West Georgia helped me to become the business leader I am today. UWG gave me a foundation I was able to build my career on, Johnson said. It has always been important for me to give back. I was fortunate enough to receive some scholarships and I am committed to contribute much more so others can have the same opportunities and more. Im proud to be able to contribute to the university building a world class facility so future business leaders can come to West Georgia and learn the skills necessary to achieve great things for themselves and the communities they live in.

Watch Johnson talk about the donation in this video produced by UWG: https://youtu.be/Tgw_L55Lm6I

In addition to this latest initiative, Johnson made a significant donation to the school and established the David A. Johnson Applied Econometrics and Analytics Fund to support a dedicated professorship within UWGs Richards College of Business. He also participates in the schools annual SAS Analytics Summit to offer his mentorship and expertise.

About David Johnson: David Johnson got his start in business upon earning a BBA in Management and MIS from the University of West Georgia. From there, he continued his education, earning an MBA in Computer Information Systems from Georgia State University. He has held a variety of positions in the business world, and founded several companies, including his current business Cane Bay Partners VI, LLLP, one of the most well-known consulting and management companies in St. Croix. Johnson is skilled in many areas of business, with specialties including: call center operations, risk management, information technology, and marketing. In addition to his professional work, Johnson continues to give back. For a headshot of David Johnson, go to http://www.canebayvi.com/david-johnson-cane-bay-partners/

About Cane Bay Partners VI, LLLP: Cane Bay Partners VI, LLLP was formed in June 2009 and founded by internationally experienced business executives with many years of experience in the financial services industry. Focusing our efforts primarily in the financial services industry, our management consulting practice specializes in providing services to clients in need of sophisticated risk management models, debt collections organizations which require liquidation models and analytics, and portfolio management companies desiring a variety of services. More specifically, our practice has elected to specialize in three areas where we believe our core competencies reside: (1) management consulting (2) risk management/scorecard development and (3) service provider analysis.

For more information on Cane Bay Partners VI, go to http://www.canebayvi.com or contact Director of Content & PR Perry Sheraw at 678-279-2931.
We are very pleased to add Josatulum.com to our growing family of women-centric fashion, beauty and mommy brands.

Josa Tulum, (http://www.josatulum.com), a high end womens boutique from Tulum Mexico , has launched a performance based Affiliate marketing program to increase its online sales and website traffic. BroadBase Media, LLC, (http://www.broadbasemedia.com) will be the exclusive manager of the program.

Josa Tulum is a beautiful lifestyle fashion brand born from the beaches of the Riviera Maya in Tulum Mexico. This chic vintage inspired collection of easy and elegant Kaftans, Resort Wear and Ready to Wear dresses became an instant favorite amongst celebrities, socialites and fashionistas around the world who discovered the brand while visiting Tulum. Josa Tulum is the perfect fusion of boho-chic meets high end glamour. Josa Tulum offers a collection that fits women of all shapes and sizes and looks beautiful on everyone.

BroadBase Media is a leading provider of managed marketing services to clients such as RachelZoe.com, SkynIceland.com, Ergobaby.com and Orbitbaby.com. BroadBase uses its proprietary tracking platform, Sage Track (http://www.sagetrack.com) to recruit, track and pay Affiliates who drive sales, as well as providing various analytics to determine traffic sources and patterns.

We are so excited to be launching our Affiliate marketing program with BroadBase Media and joining their family of premium brands, says Josa Tulum founder Joanne Salt. We look forward to a wonderful and prosperous relationship.

We are very pleased to add Josatulum.com to our growing family of women-centric fashion, beauty and mommy brands., says Marc Allen Rona, a Managing Partner at BBM. Their beautiful line of apparel is a perfect fit for our growing network of Affiliates, which includes some of the top websites, networks, bloggers, and Social Media influencers.

This is Josatulum.coms first entry into performance based marketing and is part of their overall strategy to grow their online sales channel. For more information, or to become an Affiliate, please contact publishers(at)broadbasemedia(dot)com.

About Josatulum.com:

JOSA tulum is a lifestyle clothing brand that is inspired by the white sand beaches of Tulum, Mexico, and the sophisticated, chic style of bohemian travel.

In 2009, Joanne Salt bid farewell to the hectic New York photography industry and headed down south to Tulum, Mexico, to start a new chapter with her newborn son, Luca. It was there in Tulum that Joanne met her friend and trusted business partner, Ana Cabello, a transplant from Monterrey, Mexico. Together they collaborated to form JOSA. Their idea was simple: to take their favorite vintage kaftans and transform them into contemporary, sexy dresses for the beach that were chic enough for the evening as well. The first boutique, located on the Tulum beach road, was officially opened in 2009.

The JOSA dress reflects the simple, carefree Tulum lifestyle, yet also possesses the fashionable sophistication of the New York scene. The line mainly consists of several dress styles, all of which are wrinkle-resistant and one size. With styles and shapes that are complementary to all body types, everyone will find a JOSA dress that fits to perfection. The goal and concept of JOSA is to provide women with dresses that can be tossed into a beach bag in the morning and are there on hand throughout the day as a cover-up, yet are stylish and sexy enough to take you into the evening hours for a late cocktail or a glamorous dinner  the perfect go-to dress for all occasions.

About BroadBase Media:

Broadbase Media, LLC is a leading provider of managed multi-channel marketing services. 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. Its clients include Rachelzoe.com, SkynIceland.com, Ergobaby.com and Orbitbaby.com.

Contact:

Marc Allen Rona

marc(at)broadbasemedia(dot)com

http://www.broadbasemedia.com

Phone: 310.439.2824
The Colorado Association of Litigation Support Professionals (COALSP) is holding its 10TH Annual Electronic Discovery Conference at The Brown Palace on Friday, October 7TH, 2016. This one day educational conference and legal industry vendor fair focuses on topics relevant to electronically stored information (ESI) and electronic discovery in litigation. The Keynote Speaker will be the Hon. David Waxse, U.S. Magistrate Judge, United States District of Kansas who will discuss Computer-Assisted Review as it relates to Federal Rule of Evidence 702. Other speakers include Andrea DAmbra Sr. Counsel for Norton Rose Fulbright; Matthew Clark, Litigation Support Project Manager for Hogan Lovells; Joy Woller, Partner for Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie; Jared Sutton, Associate for Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie; and Niloy Ray, eDiscovery Counsel for Littler. COALSP is a Rocky Mountain region non-profit professional organization that aims to educate and increase awareness of issues relating to legal technology and electronic discovery in litigation. To get more information about the sessions and to sign up visit http://www.COALSP.org. Colorado CLE credit certification is pending.
We want the entire community to come over and savor a delicious cup of coffee from all of our brands, walk through our beautiful cafe, enjoy some lunch and enter to win great prizes like coffee for a year. There is nothing to lose!

Boyers Coffee is celebrating more than 50 years of serving the community by hosting a FREE COFFEE BASH on Thursday, September 29, which is also #NationalCoffeeDay. The open house-style party, held from 7 a.m.  3 p.m. at the Boyers Coffee Cafe at 73rd & Washington in Denver, will feature free coffee stations, 50% off specialty beverages, lunchtime food trucks, contests, music and more. In addition, the company will host a press conference at 2 p.m. to announce new products now entering supermarkets.

Boyer's Coffee and the iconic historical Schoolhouse Cafe are celebrating more than 50 years of coffee excellence in the Colorado Community. Boyer's Coffee is family-owned and operated, and proudly part of Luna Gourmet Coffee & Tea Company family of brands. Luna Gourmet is dedicated to great coffee, serving our coffee communities and making a positive impact globally through coffee.

With a heart for philanthropy, the company has donated more than $800,000 worth of medical supplies and relief directly into coffee farming communities in conjunction with Project C.U.R.E., raised and delivered over 8.4 million cups of coffee to the U.S. Military in partnership with the USO, and has donated thousands of pounds of coffee to the Denver Rescue Mission for decades.

With more than 50 years of the coffee expertise under Boyers Coffees belt, what better day to party than on National Coffee Day? said Jason Barrow, co-founder of Luna Gourmet, Boyers Coffee parent company, which purchased the company in 2014. We want the entire community to come over and savor a delicious cup of coffee from all of our brands, walk through our beautiful cafe, enjoy some lunch and enter to win great prizes like coffee for a year. There is nothing to lose!

Schedule (with music, contests and other happenings all day long):

7:00 a.m.  OPEN for free coffee!

10 a.m.  Noon  The Clarkson St. Band

11:00 a.m.  1:00 p.m.  Lunch is served by food trucks Mikes2Kitchen (@mikes2kitchen) and Knock on Wood (@KnockOnWoodBBQ)

1:00 p.m.  3:00 p.m.  The Funky McGroovingtons (band)

2:00 p.m.  Press conference/welcome from Luna Gourmet Founders Jason and Douglass Barrow

3:00 p.m.  Event ends

Boyers Coffee is proudly served on Frontier Airlines and is available across the country at over 400 Taco Johns restaurants. Boyers Coffee is also in Colorado-area King Soopers, City Market, Albertsons/Safeway, Sams Club and Wal-Mart Stores; the brand is also in participating Texas H-E-B locations. Our Roastery coffee shop is at 73rd & Washington in Denver. Visit Boyer's Coffee to locate the nearest retailer or purchase directly from our online store.

About Boyers Brand Coffees

Since 1965, the Boyer's Coffee brand has been built on flavorful coffees using the best 100 percent Arabica coffee beans from around the world. It has pioneered and perfected roasting coffee at high altitude to deliver a smooth, fresh and extraordinary experience. Learn more at Boyer's Coffee.

About Luna Gourmet Coffee & Tea Company

For 20 years, Luna Gourmet Coffee & Tea Company has been committed to great coffee, tea and cocoa while remaining socially responsible throughout the process. As the largest family-owned roaster in Colorado, our brands include Boulder Organic Coffee, Luna Roasters, Boca Java and the Boyers Coffee brand. We are sold in grocery stores, restaurants, cafes and online. Luna Gourmets diverse line-up of products includes proprietary blended roasts, flavored coffee, and imported coffee beans from more than 40 different origins around the globe. Luna Gourmet also offers extra fancy loose leaf teas and fine sipping cocoas. Visit Luna Gourmet and click shop.

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FirstHand is helping high school students explore their interest in STEM at a critical juncture in their lives  when college and career choices loom."

FirstHand is going to high school! Beginning this October, FirstHand, the University City Science Centers youth engagement program, will pilot Project Inquiry, a 10-month curriculum designed specifically for high school students. FirstHand will also continue to offer Polymer Play and DNA Selfie programs to middle school students.

Designed to give high school students a more in-depth and focused experience with STEM learning, Project Inquiry will allow students to pursue individual interests through longer-term projects matched with more focused mentoring experiences. A staple of all FirstHand programming, mentoring will be a key component of Project Inquiry, with more frequent one-on-one interactions with Science Center-based professionals. Participants will also learn about and employ skills in design thinking, entrepreneurship, and hands-on creative problem solving.

FirstHand is helping high school students explore their interest in STEM at a critical juncture in their lives  when college and career choices loom, says Science Center President & CEO Stephen S. Tang, Ph.D., MBA. We hope that the access, experience, resources and positive role models that Project Inquiry offers will inspire these students to pursue a future in STEM.

Up to 12 students from West Philadelphia high schools will participate in the year-long program, which is designed to encourage the students to think about future career paths. Students will be selected for Project Inquiry based on applications and teacher recommendations.

Returning for 5th- 8th graders this month is FirstHands Polymer Play and DNA Selfie programs. Polymer Play puts an emphasis on materials science through project-based learning. Using technology such as laser cutters, power tools and soldering irons, students apply science and math to design real projects. In Polymer Play, students from six local middle schools will experiment with bio-plastic and recycle plastics into new materials.

DNA Selfie is a girl-focused workshop where participants create a new kind of self-portrait by examining their cells using photo-microscopy. Working alongside female scientists and designers, the students learn how to use laser cutters and vinyl cutters and creativity to design a genetic selfie.

With guidance from scientists, designers and entrepreneurs, students from both Polymer Play and DNA Selfie will team up to design and build final group projects that are exhibited to the community. Both programs will run from September through December.

Serving Philadelphia youth from under-resourced schools and the teachers, professionals and families in their communities, FirstHand aims to spark an interest in the STEAM disciplines of Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math that students can explore and cultivate throughout their lives. By giving students the opportunity to explore, ask more questions, and create new solutions, FirstHand is opening the doors for the minds of tomorrow.

The FirstHand programs take place in the Science Centers dedicated FirstHand Lab, which is located among the early-stage emerging technology companies working out of the Science Centers Port business incubator.

Supporters of FirstHand include AstraZeneca, Cognizant Making the Future, The Dow Chemical Company, Lenfest Foundation, OHAUS, Rainin Instruments LLC, TD Bank Charitable Foundation, Thermo Fisher Scientific, Troemner, LLC, and William Penn Foundation.

About the Science Center

Located in the heart of uCity Square, the University City Science Center is a dynamic hub for innovation, and entrepreneurship and technology development in the Greater Philadelphia region. Founded in 1963 as the nations first urban research park, it provides business incubation, programming, lab and office facilities, and support services for entrepreneurs, start-ups, and growing and established companies. Graduate firms and current residents of the Science Centers business incubator support one out of every 100 jobs in Greater Philadelphia and drive $12.9 billion in economic activity in the region annually. For more information about the Science Center, go to http://www.sciencecenter.org.
The Contractor of the Year nomination is a testament to the hard work, talent, and dedication of each of our employees and the core values they represent every day serving our customers.

NT Concepts was selected as a finalist for both the Contractor of the Year ($75-300 million) and the Executive of the Year ($75-300 million) categories for the 14th Annual Greater Washington Government Contractor Awards presented by the Northern Virginia Chamber of Commerce and the Professional Services Council.

NT Concepts is also in the running for Program of the Year for its extraordinary efforts providing investigative support services to the Office of Personnel Management (OPM).

The GovCon Awards honor the leadership, innovation, and commitment to excellence in the government contracting community. NT Concepts and Founder/CEO Michele Bolos were selected respectively from a large pool of distinguished corporate and executive nominees by a panel of industry and government professionals.

"It's a great honor to be selected as one of the top government contracting companies in the Greater Washington region, and we're thrilled to be included with such an impressive list of finalists. The Contractor of the Year nomination is a testament to the hard work, talent, and dedication of each of our employees and the core values they represent every day serving our customers," said Craig Reed, NT Concepts President and COO.

"I'm equally excited for the nomination of Michele Bolos for Executive of the Year," Reed continued. "Michele created and perpetuates the positive NT Concepts culture, and leads by example through our core values and her service to the community. Her personality and leadership style are the foundation for our success."

This is the second consecutive finalist selection for the companyin 2015, NT Concepts was a finalist in the GovCon Awards Contractor of the Year ($25-75 million) category.

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Presented by the Northern Virginia Chamber of Commerce and the Professional Services Council, the Greater Washington Government Contractor Awards is the premier awards event for the Washington, DC area government contracting community. Presented annually, the awards recognize outstanding achievement by companies and executives during the past year. The winners will be named at a November 1, 2016, gala dinner at the Ritz-Carlton Tysons Corner. Complete information about the Awards can be found at http://www.novachamber.org/northern-virginia-chamber-psc-announce-2016-greater-washington-government-contractor-awardstrade-finalists.html.

###

NT Concepts is an IT and business operations innovator focused on supporting a high-performance Government. We deliver the leadership, staff, technology, and processes to run and maintain complex government investigative service operations, helping our clients accomplish their missions with the highest degree of accuracy while reducing costs. We develop technical solutions such as business intelligence dashboards, web portals, and geoanalytic tools in secure enterprise, cloud, and mobile environments, providing powerful visualization and 360 situational awareness. Founded in 1998 and headquartered in the Washington DC metro area, NT Concepts is a privately held mid-tier company with customers spanning the Federal Civilian, DoD, and Intelligence Community markets.

Visit us at ntconcepts.com and follow us @NTConceptsInc.
Building Better Narratives in Black Education Building a better narrative means privileging African American voices and perspectives as central drivers of successful urban school reform, as these conversations have largely excluded communities of color, Dr. Michael Lomax, UNCF President & CEO

UNCF, the National Urban League, and Education Post today released Building Better Narratives in Black Education, a joint report published by UNCFs Frederick D. Patterson Research Institute, providing tangible approaches to shift the narrative concerning Black educational reform. The findings of the report aim to better engage communities around K-12 education and drive substantive policy changes for Black students. The three organizations will gather national and local education advocates, policy-makers, and community leaders today for a public launch event and reception at UNCFs headquarters, featuring special guests Dr. Michael L. Lomax, UNCF president and CEO, and Marc H. Morial, president and CEO of the National Urban League. The launch event also includes a panel of education leaders who will discuss accountability, improving educational outcomes, and improving college completion for African American students.

Building a better narrative means privileging African American voices and perspectives as central drivers of successful urban school reform, as these conversations have largely excluded communities of color, said Dr. Lomax. Were excited about engaging with our partners in this important work, which we believe will encourage substantive dialogue and drive meaningful changes to the way Black education reform is viewed, promoting an urgency of now in ed reform.

At a time when only seven percent of Black 12th graders are performing at proficient or above on national math assessments, compared with 32 percent of white students, we know weve got lots of work to do, said Morial. As education is the pathway to economic prosperity, were glad to work together with UNCF and Education Post to engage local communities in taking critical steps to address education achievement gaps.

WHAT: Building Better Narratives in Black Education report release, panel discussion, and reception

WHEN: 4:45 p.m.  7:30 p.m. EST Thursday, Sept. 15, 2016

WHERE: UNCF, 1805 7th Street, NW, Washington, DC, 20001, located at Shaw-Howard Metro station

WHO:



Jonathan Atkins, Community Engagement Manager, K-12 Advocacy, UNCF

Dr. Meredith B. L. Anderson, Senior Research Associate (Patterson and K-12 Advocacy), UNCF

Sekou Biddle, Vice President, K-12 Advocacy, UNCF

Dr. Michael L. Lomax, President and CEO, UNCF

Marc H. Morial, President and CEO, National Urban League

Eugene Pinkard, Deputy Chief of School Turnaround and Performance, DC Public Schools

Susie Saavedra, Senior Director for Policy and Legislative Affairs, National Urban League Washington Bureau

Naomi Shelton, Director, K-12 Advocacy, UNCF

Hal Smith, Vice President, Education, Youth Development and Health, National Urban League

Christopher Stewart, Director of Outreach and External Affairs, Education Post

Shantelle Wright, Founder and CEO, Achievement Prep

WATCH: Live Stream begins at 5 p.m. EST on UNCFs Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/uncf

Follow the discussion on Twitter: @uncf @Edu_Post @NatUrbanLeague #BBNBlackEd

About UNCF

UNCF (United Negro College Fund) is the nations largest and most effective minority education organization. To serve youth, the community, and the nation, UNCF supports students education and development through scholarships and other programs, strengthens its 37 member colleges and universities, and advocates for the importance of minority education and college readiness. UNCF institutions and other historically black colleges and universities are highly effective, awarding 20 percent of African American baccalaureate degrees. UNCF annually awards $100 million in scholarships and administers more than 400 programs, including scholarship, internship and fellowship, mentoring, summer enrichment, and curriculum and faculty development programs. Today, UNCF supports more than 60,000 students at more than 1,100 colleges and universities across the country. Its logo features the UNCF torch of leadership in education and its widely recognized trademark, A mind is a terrible thing to waste. Learn more at UNCF.org, or for continuous news and updates, follow UNCF on Twitter at @UNCF.

About Education Post

Education Post is a non-partisan communications organization dedicated to building support for student-focused improvements in public education from preschool to high school graduation. The organization advocates world-class schools that support children to love learning, to be challenged and supported in the classroom, to have access to a range of enrichment activities, to be socially and emotionally strong and healthy, and to graduate from high school with everything they need to pursue the future they see for themselves. Learn more at educationpost.org.

About The National Urban League

The National Urban League is a historic civil rights and advocacy organization dedicated to economic empowerment in African American and other underserved urban communities. Founded in 1910 and headquartered in New York City, the National Urban League impacts and improves the lives of more than 2 million young people and adults annually through direct service programs, which are implemented locally by 94 Urban League affiliates, serving 300 communities in 36 states and the District of Columbia. Learn more at nul.iamempowered.com.
African Travel, Inc. 2017 Brochure The brochure is meant to serve as inspiration, as all itineraries can be personalized to satisfy each guests budget and bucket list.

African Travel, Inc. is proud to announce the release of its new 2017 brochure, building upon its award-winning collection with a variety of new itineraries. The brochure debuts a fresh new look and features an exciting combination of novel safaris and perennial agent and guest favorites.

As the saying goes, a leopard never changes its spots, said Sherwin Banda, president of African Travel, Inc. Despite our exciting new look, like the majestic leopard, African Travel still consistently hand-crafts the most extraordinary safari vacations, pursuing the most exquisite luxury lodges, remarkable experiences and authentic cultural encounters throughout the continent and has been doing so for the past 40 years.

The brochure is meant to serve as inspiration, as all itineraries can be personalized to satisfy each guests budget and bucket list. Journeys are grouped into three different travel styles: Tailor-Made Safaris, Safari Vacation Packages, and Custom Group Safaris. Regardless of each guests preferences, African Travels knowledgeable safari specialists are available to answer every question and offer expert recommendations along the way.

Tailor-Made Safaris are completely hand-crafted for each guest, resulting in the most distinctive and unforgettable journeys possible. Safari Vacation Packages provide the ultimate in value, with affordable options to fit every guests dream of Africa. Guests choose from set departure dates and enjoy the savings of small group travel and the same fine caliber of accommodations as custom journeys. Finally, Custom Group Safaris are ideal for travelers looking to share camaraderie and fun with like-minded travelers. These journeys operate much like a tailor-made safari but are designed for groups traveling with 10 or more travelers.

New itineraries for 2017 include unique angles like Under Kenyan Skies, an immersive eight-day journey delving deeper into the culture of the Maasai and Samburu tribes while exploring their homeland, and more traditional safaris like Best of Botswana , offering nine days of exploration from the Moremi Game Reserve to the Okavango Delta and Victoria Falls.

To view the 2017 e-brochure, please visit: https://issuu.com/ttcafrica/docs/ati_2017_brochure?e=26279028/38796877

For more information and to book the safari of your dreams, contact your favorite Travel Professional, call African Travel, Inc. at (800) 727-7207, or visit africantravelinc.com. CST 2071444-20
September 26th is the deadline for The Center for Education Reforms (CER) Hey John Oliver! Back Off My Charter School Video Contest. The contest was born after HBOs Last Week Tonights host, John Oliver, did an "unfair and unwarranted segment, tearing apart charter schools and minimizing their impact," said CER founder & CEO Jeanne Allen. The Center responded by creating this contest in order to set the record straight and showcase the powerful stories of how charter schools are providing an important option to students across the country.

Parents, students or school leaders, as well as students who are not currently in charter schools but would like to be, are encouraged to shoot informal videos on their mobile devices and send those in for a chance to win $100,000 for their schools!

Videos from charter schools are flowing in, and CER is reviewing entries. A panel of independent judges, including some celebrities, will select the best video that demonstrates the most distinguishing feature of the charter school experience.

Important details and further instructions are available at https://www.edreform.com/cer-video-contest/.
FieldWorkMobility / MySalesDialer What a great sales tool. I have been looking for an app like this that is priced right and this one is. Thank you for creating this app!!! John Rhine Regional Marketing Director

CBS Information Systems Inc, a leading Mobile Inside Sales CRM provider releases FieldWorkMobility (http://www.fieldworkmobility.com) its Android version with 10 new languages. The 10 new languages added areSpanish, Russian, Portuguese, Dutch, French, Arabic, Chinese, Korean, Japanese and Vietnamese. The company also offers iOS version and Salesforce version of the app as well as a dashboard on the cloud for managers to manage remote sales executives around the globe.

According to John Rhine Regional Marketing Director at Nerium International This app allows me to keep track of the people I am calling, take notes about my conversation, export them into a CSV file and much more. What a great sales tool. I have been looking for an app like this that is priced right and this one is. Thank you for creating this app!!!

The company CEO Mr. Anjul Katare says that this release will fulfill the demand of worldwide non-English speaking users. He said that the users from non-English speaking region have been requesting the language support, since locally they have to deal with clients in native language, so having an app in the same language tremendously help! Mr. Katare also says that with the new release, we now cover 70-80% of languages used by the sales executive population. His vision is to see this app in every inside sales executives smart phone! .

Why there is a need for such a mobile centric solution? Mobile devices are increasingly becoming the first go-to device for communications. Gartner, Inc estimates that today, 45% of workers in the United States are out of the traditional office for a minimum of eight hours per week. Also the study reveals that 70% of mobile professionals conducts their work on personal smart devices.

Sales executives are constantly on the go, whether they're meeting with clients, flying out to give a presentation, or running to team trainings. With this in mind, mobile access to sales systems aren't just a nice to have -- they're a necessity. Fieldworkmobility is specifically designed to meet the requirements and to manage the day-to-day activities of sales executives. This app has been enclosed with all the latest and up to the date system of the technology that empowers the sales executives and increases the sales revenue of the organization. It offers Powerful Mobile CRM with a ton of features, Powerful Auto-Dialer (with various modes), templates covering delivery of SMS, MMS, email, audio, video and document during call prospecting, Geo-Tracking, Intuitive Reporting with automatic capturing of every action as well as Financial and Accounting module. The app is fully integrated with salesforce.com and fieldworkmobility.com dashboards for sales executives and managers.

About CBS Information Systems Inc: CBS Information Systems Inc is based in Newark, CA founded in 2008. CBS Information Systems Inc has developed FieldWorkMobility, MySalesDialer, Mjobforce app on Android, iOS and Salesforce Platform. CBS Information Systems Inc also offer other IT Products and Services to businesses. Please visit us online at http://www.cbsinfosys.com/ .

Contact:

Pat Uniyal

Public Relations Manager

Phone: 1-800-205-8587 x 704

support(at)fieldworkmobility(dot)com
Lion Street "Indaba is the most valuable meeting of the year where Owners experience a growing Lion Street culture that values collective expansion through openness and idea sharing." -Bob Carter

Lion Street will be hosting its sixth annual Indaba, September 18  20, in Dallas. The meeting is exclusively for Lion Street Owners to come together to share ideas and success stories from the past year.

Indaba is a Southern African word describing the gathering of tribal leaders to share ideas about what is best for the community. Lion Street, by tradition, gathers each year in the spirit of an Indaba to inspire each other with ideas and best practices.

Indaba will feature 30 Lion Street Owners revealing the strategies and products that are working in their target markets. Presentation topics will range from wealth transfer to corporate and business planning. Each presentation stimulates the other Owners to implement the same ideas to mutually benefit and grow their practices. Also discussed will be the latest on DOL proposals. Lion Street Financial, Lion Streets Broker Dealer, was just named Division One Broker-Dealer of the Year by Investment Advisor magazine.

Keynote speakers include Dr. Quincy Krosby, Chuck Hollander, Jay Judas, and Executives from Human Longevity. Also on the agenda is a Company update by Lion Streets Founder and CEO, Bob Carter and an Owners-only breakfast with Jim Cahill, the Companys CFO.

Collaboration between financial professionals is the key to successful client outcomes. Indaba is the most valuable meeting of the year where Owners experience a growing Lion Street culture that values collective expansion through openness and idea sharing, Bob Carter stated.

Lion Street consists of 125 Owner-Firms nationwide in 40 states. A primary differentiator in Lion Streets structure is that every affiliated financial advisor is an Owner of Lion Street. Together, Lion Streets Advisor-Owners are strongly committed to building a fiercely independent, yet highly collaborative network of professionals dedicated to serving their high-net-worth and corporate clients.

Ron Rubin, a Lion Street Owner and Board Member, stated, Indaba allows us to hear what the best and brightest Owner-Firms are doing, and we take those ideas and turn them into meaningful revenue in our own practices. I am amazed by the humility of everyone in the spirit of growing our business, both individually and collectively.

The Indaba will be at the Four Seasons Resort and Club at Las Colinas, and Lion Street expects over 250 attendees. Senior executives from several major carriers are attending including Pacific Life, Prudential, John Hancock, Voya, Lincoln, and Symetra.

About Lion Street

Lion Street is a leading financial services company based in Austin, Texas. Lion Street provides elite independent life insurance producers and financial advisors access to the financial products, intellectual capital, and specialized resources they need to meet the sophisticated needs of their high-net-worth and corporate clients. Lion Street Financial, its Broker-Dealer was named the 2016 Division One Broker-Dealer of the Year by Investment Advisor. To learn more about Lion Street, please visit http://www.lionstreet.com.

Lion Street Media Contact:

Cami Gueguen, Director of Marketing and Communications

cgueguen(at)lionstreet(dot)com

512-776-8466
Hall Albright Garison "JAMIS PRIME will help our clients increase the efficiency and effectiveness of their growing organizations, while maintaining the internal controls that they need to remain compliant and ensure that all costs are recorded and billed properly,

JAMIS Software Corporation, a leading provider of cloud ERP software used by government contractors and other project-focused organizations, announces their partnership with Hall Albright Garrison & Associates (HAGA).

HAGA, headquartered in Huntsville, AL is a full service public accounting firm. The firm has proudly served the greater Huntsville area for over 25 years. Their government contracting practice consists of the following:



Government Cost Proposals

Incurred Cost Submissions

Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR)

Internal Accounting System Setup and Support

Business Operations Support

The strategic partnership allows HAGA to leverage the JAMIS Prime software to provide their government contracting clients with a top-quality innovative, and modern ERP system to assist them in growing their businesses. JAMIS PRIME will help our clients increase the efficiency and effectiveness of their growing organizations, while maintaining the internal controls that they need to remain compliant and ensure that all costs are recorded and billed properly, said HAGA, CPA, Fallon Cornett. We are enthusiastic to be able to offer such an intuitive and modern system to our clients.

HAGA stated that in addition to Primes built in dashboards and real-time metrics they were impressed with the customer service that was provided. The company culture of JAMIS sets them apart from the competition. From the support staff, to the top management, everyone is helpful, professional and willing to proactively assist if needed, said Karen Farlow, CPA at HAGA.

Through a rigorous vetting process, HAGA decided that JAMIS Prime would be an excellent solution to support the ongoing needs of their clients.  We called many extremely credible JAMIS references, both partners and clients and the positive feedback we received back on Prime and on the company in general was extraordinary said Karen Farlow, CPA at HAGA.

We are excited to see many positive things from our partnership with JAMIS. The software is cost-effective, intuitive and easy to work with, said Cornett.

JAMIS is excited to work closely with HAGA to jointly offer their Huntsville Government Contractor Clients the finest ERP system and technology available today. says Steve Brander Vice President of Sales and Business Development for JAMIS Software

About JAMIS Software Corporation

JAMIS Software Corporation is a leading provider of ERP software solutions designed specifically for government contractors and other project-focused organizations. JAMIS delivers comprehensive, intuitive, innovative and cost-effective solutions for the most respected names in government contracting. Companies large and small rely on JAMIS to provide detailed visibility into all of their projects, as well as provide the foundation for DCAA and other regulatory compliance. JAMIS helps companies connect with customers, partners and employees in entirely new ways to foster new levels of collaboration and drive profitability and growth.

To learn more about JAMIS, visit JAMIS.com.

About Hall Albright Garrison & Associates, P.C.

Hall Albright Garrison & Associates, P.C. (HAGA) is a leading public accounting and consulting firm in North Alabama providing tax, attestation, small business accounting, and federal government contractor consulting services. HAGAs ownership group has a combined experience of over 130 years of serving clients in the greater Huntsville area. HAGAs core objectives are built upon building strong client relationships, offering personalized client service, and creating a culture where employees love to come to work.

The firm serves closely held companies from start-up to middle market in a wide range of industries, high-net-worth individuals, as well as specializing in full service operations support for federal government defense contractors. For more information about HAGA, visit the firm's website at http://www.hagacpas.com.
Robert J. Scott, Managing Partner, Scott & Scott, LLP Software audits have become routine as publishers have proven that compliance claims get customers' attention more than sales proposals.

Software audits have become routine as publishers have proven that compliance claims get customers attention more than sales proposals. Most software license disputes are settled out of court, but what happens when you cannot negotiate a settlement with the publisher or one of its trade associations (BSA | The Software Alliance, The Software & Information Industry Association) because the settlement demands are too high? Software attorney Robert J. Scott will give real world examples of what happens when software audits wind up in court in his presentation Audit Defense, the Legal Perspective on September 20, at the ITAM Review Annual Conference in Gainesville, Florida.

Rob will cover:



Use of declaratory judgment actions

Venue rules for copyright cases

Choice of law issues

Calculation of damages under copyright laws

Individual liability for copyright infringement

Burden shifting in copyright cases

Electronic discovery issues

Mediation strategy

The ITAM Review Conference is attended by CIOs, Senior IT Decision Makers, IT Asset Managers, Software Asset Managers, Software Licensing Specialists and IT Procurement Professionals.

For additional details and registration: http://www.itassetmanagement.net/event/itam-review-annual-conference-us.

The ITAM Review is an online community for worldwide ITAM professionals. Its mission is to provide independent industry news, reviews, resources and networking opportunities to Vendors, Partners, Consultants and End Users working in the areas of IT Asset Management, Software Asset Management or Software Licensing.

About the presenter:

Robert represents mid-market and large enterprise companies in software license transactions and disputes with major software publishers such as Adobe, IBM, Microsoft, Oracle and SAP. He has defended over 225 software audit matters initiated by software piracy trade groups such as the BSA and SIIA. He is counsel to some of the worlds largest corporations on information technology matters including intellectual property licensing, risk management, data privacy, and outsourcing. He is regularly called upon by his peers and the media to share his expertise.

About Scott & Scott, LLP

Scott & Scott, LLP (https://youtu.be/hhSwkKU0tq0) is counsel to some of the worlds largest corporations including PepsiCo, American Express, and Xerox. The firm has achieved go-to status for software licensing transactions and disputes involving the major software publishers including Microsoft, Adobe, Oracle and Autodesk.

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Its been great to have the chance to work with a brand that has this level of bravery and isnt afraid to step outside of what is typical for its category.

Australian wine brand 19 Crimes is launching a nationwide campaign, building on the brands unique visual identity and bold voice to increase awareness among millennial males.

Created by J. Walter Thompson San Francisco, the campaign brings the brands visual identity Out of Home by exposing the same 19th-century mugshots of the famous criminals that appear on the recognizable 19 Crimes wine label.

This unique imagery is underscored by irreverent headlines such as Perfect for serving 5 to 10, playing on the brands signature mix of wit and grit. It also makes the most of wild postings to catch the publics attention at street level.

Samantha Collins, 19 Crimes Marketing Director, said: 19 Crimes is a dynamic brand in which the label and story continues to resonate with customers. We are thrilled to be working with JWT on this campaign launch that remains true to the brand essence.

Ryan Lincks, J. Walter Thompson San Franciscos General Manager and the offices lead on the Treasury Wine Estates (TWE) account, said: Its been great to have the chance to work with a brand that has this level of bravery and isnt afraid to step outside of what is typical for its category.

The campaign will run from September through the end of October and will appear in cities across the country including Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Nashville,New York City and Washington, D.C.

Supporting the OOH campaign is a retail activation titled Find the Royal Pardons, which launched on 9/1. Check it out here: 19crimesroyalpardon.com.

ABOUT J. WALTER THOMPSON WORLDWIDE

J. Walter Thompson Worldwide, the worlds best-known marketing communications brand, has been creating pioneering solutions that build enduring brands and business for more than 150 years. Headquartered in New York, J. Walter Thompson is a true global network with more than 200 offices in over 90 countries, employing nearly 10,000 marketing professionals. The agency consistently ranks among the top networks in the world and continues to be a dominant presence in the industry by staying on the leading edgefrom hiring the industrys first female copywriter to developing award-winning branded content today. For more information, please visit http://www.jwt.com and follow us @JWT_Worldwide.

CREATIVE CREDITS

J. Walter Thompson Office: J. Walter Thompson San Francisco

Client: Treasury Wine Estates  19 Crimes

Creative Director: Ken Hall

Art Directors: Andy Kim, Angelina Springer

Copywriters: Malcolm Bailey

Planner: Adrian Barrow

Senior Producers: Madeline Belliveau

Project Manager: Max Niu

Art Buyer: Suzanna Shields

General Manager: Ryan Lincks

Account Supervisor: Remy Wainfeld

Production Company: DMAX
KWizCom, a leading developer of SharePoint Forms & Mobile Solution, as well as multiple other turn-key SharePoint web parts and add-ons designed to expand Microsoft SharePoint, is pleased to announce that Binary Republik is the newest member of KWizComs Global Partner Network. Binary Republik is now part of the prestigious group of System Integrators, VARs, Distributors and Consulting Firms with proven expertise in Microsoft Technologies that have joined KWizCom's partner program.

Binary Republik, is a top-notch SharePoint consulting company based in India. The companys history with SharePoint, combined with years of experience and product knowledge that Binary Republiks SharePoint Consultants bring to the table, will ensure that users have an intuitive as well as an efficient system for all the Enterprise Content and collaboration requirements. Thus making certain they have the right information at the right time for efficient decision making.

Binary Republik is excited and curious to become a partner with KWizCom, which is one of the most globally accepted developers of third party SharePoint Products. We are looking forward to leverage each others strength globally , advises Navin Jampala, the Sales Associate at Binary Republik.

Binary Republik and KWizCom will work closely to deliver Microsoft SharePoint based top-notch add-ons and apps for Office 365 for joint customers. We are excited about this partnership with our new Indian partner, Binary Republik and the opportunities that lie ahead, says Nimrod Geva, the Product Group Manager of KWizCom Corporation. As the two companies join forces, I am confident we will optimize our delivery capabilities to delight with greater efficiency the business needs of our mutual clients.

Partnership with KWizCom facilitates reaching new customers with innovative leading edge products achieving increased sales and profits for both companies. KWizCom Partners benefit from joint activities, a special discount program arrangement with sales incentives, training, licenses to KWizCom add-ons for internal use, technical support, sales and marketing support, and much more. KWizCom has a standing partnership invitation and any interested parties are encouraged to inquire further by visiting the KWizCom website.

About Binary Republik

Binary Republik is amongst the best SharePoint Consulting companies based out of India. With a strong subject matter expertise and a vast hands-on experience, we have been helping our clients spread across United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Norway, South Korea, Singapore, South Africa, Middle East and India.

Our SharePoint Consulting service portfolio includes Strategic Consulting and SharePoint implementations, SharePoint farm configurations, Health Checks, Social Networks, UX & Branding, SharePoint customization, Workflow implementations, SharePoint BI Dashboards, Public Facing Site, Intranet/ Extranet Portals, Enterprise Search, 3rd Party product Integration with SharePoint, SharePoint upgrades, Migration to SharePoint (earlier versions/ legacy application), SharePoint Maintenance & Support.

Being focused on SharePoint Consulting services has helped us develop unique methodologies specific to this platform to ensure quick turnaround and rapid implementations.

To learn more check out www(dot)BinaryRepublik(dot)com

About KWizCom Corporation

Since 2005, KWizCom has provided innovative solutions and services to make SharePoint even better for over 5,000 companies worldwide. KWizCom's solutions and services expand Microsoft SharePoint out-of-the-box capabilities, streamline workflow, maximize efficiency and enhance over-all productivity for hundreds of thousands of users. KWizCom, a Gold Certified Microsoft Partner, is headquartered in Toronto, Canada. Please visit www(dot)kwizcom(dot)com to find out more about KWizCom's clients, people, partners and solutions.

Follow KWizCom on Twitter @KWizCom

Join KWizCom on LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/company/kwizcom

Become a fan of KWizCom on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KWizCom

Contact a KWizCom Account Specialist at +1-905-370-0333/+1-855-KWIZCOM or info(at)kwizcom(dot)com
Her experience in customer service and training will be a huge asset to our already talented team of sales professionals.

Wayne Homes, an Ohio-based custom home builder that specializes in on-your-lot homes, has announced the hire of Rhonda Cooper as the new Sales Manager for the Pittsburgh Model Center.

Cooper joins Wayne Homes from YellowPages.com where she was involved in digital advertising, and had been recognized in the top 10 percent of all Digital Sales Executives.

We are looking forward to working with Rhonda, Erin Collins, Regional Vice President of Sales, said. Her experience in customer service and training will be a huge asset to our already talented team of sales professionals.

Cooper graduated from Youngstown State University with a degree in Business Administration and currently resides in New Kensington, PA. She is excited to use her skills and previous experience in new construction sales.

Im most excited to join a company that places such high value on its employees and customers, and of course, helping people design their dream home, Cooper said. I am proud to work for a company that has the ability to bring someones dream home to life, and also having a reputation for being the best quality builders around.

For more information about Wayne Homes, or to inquire about job opportunities, visit WayneHomes.com.

About Wayne Homes

Wayne Homes is a custom home builder in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Indiana, Michigan, and West Virginia (see all Model Home Centers). We offer 40 fully customizable floor plans and a team dedicated to providing the best experience in the home building industry. For more information, Ask Julie by Live Chat or call us at (866) 253-6807.Chat or call us at (866) 253-6807.
Barkily Dog App Barkily will become the digital wallet, ID card, day planner and life dashboard for your dog

Barkily recently launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds for its innovative, all-inclusive app for dog parents, dog care service providers and vendors. The inventive app got featured in The Huffington Post article soon after its launch.

The brainchild of a proud dog parent, Barkily is an app by the dog people, for the dog people, which brings dog parents, dog care service providers and other vendors on the same platform.

Because dogs are not merely pets but just like a family member, they need special care and attention. Apart from the routine activities like eating, sleeping, walks and rides, there are several things, which ensure that every dog gets to live a healthy and happy life. For this purpose, Barkily app has a number of features and functionalities, using which, dog parents can provide the best care to their beloved pooches.

For instance, some of the best features of the app include but are not limited to the following:



Barkily ID  When dog parents enter all the details about their pets such as  the breed, age, color, vaccinations etc. using the app, they are given a unique Barkily Login ID. This ID can be used to access various dog care services and products without having to enter the same details time and again.

Share Schedule - The app can be used to share a dogs vaccination schedule with vets, kennels and other dog care service providers.

Timely Medications  The app provides timely reminders to dog parents and caretakers at dog boarding facilities, so that they can administer the right medication at the right time and in the right dosage.

Schedule Visits  The app comes in handy for scheduling upcoming visits to the vet, dog boarding facilities, groomers etc. This makes sure that dog parents dont miss any appointment and can regularly maintain the health and hygiene of the pooches.

Guess The Breed  It is difficult to determine the breed of a mixed-breed dog. But not anymore. The Barkily app has an exclusive feature that lets dog parents guess the correct breed of their mixed-breed dog.

Book Dog Boarding Facilities  Barkily is the go-to app for selecting and booking the best dog kennels, dog-friendly hotels and other accommodation for pet pooches anywhere in the world.

Get Suggestions  The app provides a number of suggestions about food and supplements based on the dogs breed.

Dog Tracking  Tracking a dog when it gets lost becomes easier and less time-consuming with the detailed information stored by dog parents in the app.

With all these unique features, Barkily aims to become the next big thing in dog care.

The Kickstarter campaign for the project begins with the initial pledge of $1. The campaign with a $20,000 goal, will run from September 13, 2016 to October 28, 2016.

Get the complete details of the campaign on Kickstarter.

Barkily can be downloaded for free on both Google Play and the App Store. For more details, get in touch with the representatives or visit the website.

Barkily is a San Diego-based startup. It was founded by a proud dog parent with the aim to make the world a better place for dogs and to make the lives of fellow dog parents easier. It is an all-inclusive app for dogs, which can be considered as a Doggy Day Planner.
Author and illustrator Kathleen Quinn once again celebrates the Irish tradition of storytelling in her new storybook, Hawk Star By The Sea (published by Xlibris). This new book is a beautifully illustrated story of a mynah bird named Sky who goes on an adventure. A follow-up to Quinns first story, Cupcakes By The Sea, this new book raises awareness on topical issues like bullying and identity while capturing the wonder of her Irish storytelling heritage.

Hawk Star By The Sea introduces readers to a rapping mynah bird named Sky who struggles with his identity and experiences bullying. He embarks on a journey of curiosity and self-discovery in order to find acceptance and belongingness. Along the way, Sky meets a host of magical and enchanting characters, all of which will teach him valuable lessons. Will Sky find what he is looking for?

An exciting and riveting narrator, Quinn not only entertains but also offers eye-opening insights on self-confidence, courage and the importance of being kind. With its adorable animal characters, beautiful imagery and captivating rhyming narrative, Hawk Star By The Sea will keep readers engaged from beginning to end.

Hawk Star By The Sea

By Kathleen Quinn

Hardcover | 8.5 x 8.5in | 44 pages | ISBN 9781524534196

Softcover | 8.5 x 8.5in | 44 pages | ISBN 9781524534202

E-Book | 44 pages | ISBN 9781524534219

Available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble

About the Author

Kathleen Quinn is an American author of Irish descent. She has been drawing, painting and writing since she was a small child. At the age of 20, she moved to New York City to pursue a career as an artist and press photographer. After relocating with her husband and son to the Gold Coast beaches of Miami, Quinn continues to write and illustrate childrens picture books, poetry, short stories and fictional novels.

Xlibris Publishing, an Author Solutions, LLC imprint, is a self-publishing services provider created in 1997 by authors, for authors. By focusing on the needs of creative writers and artists and adopting the latest print-on-demand publishing technology and strategies, we provide expert publishing services with direct and personal access to quality publication in hardcover, trade paperback, custom leather-bound and full-color formats. To date, Xlibris has helped to publish more than 60,000 titles. For more information, visit xlibris.com or call 1-888-795-4274 to receive a free publishing guide. Follow us @XlibrisPub on Twitter for the latest news.

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If you are new to iQ you can schedule a demo and learn more about this opportunity.

PSFK iQ - Where Innovators Turn for Research. Our professional-grade research platform is designed specifically for Retail and CX leaders who want to know whats next. Whether youre staying current on trends or need a real-time research partner to help you get ahead, count on PSFK iQ to deliver the info you need to make your next move.
Dozens of collaborations between behavioral scientists and government agencies are on display in two new reports emanating from Washington, D.C. and the United Kingdom.

Annual reports from the White Houses nascent Social and Behavioral Sciences Team (SBST) and the UKs Behavioural Insights Team (BIT) are now available online, and reflect a rise in governments and businesses across the globe applying behavioral science to their operations.

The White House created the SBST in 2014, and in 2015 President Obama signed an executive order directing federal agencies to incorporate more behavioral science into their activities and services. As noted in the just-released 2015-16 annual report, SBSTs scope of work expanded significantly within the past year to include 40 different collaborations with federal agency partners.

Among these new programs, SBST collaborations showed that:

developing an interactive Community Action Deck provided communities with evidence-based steps that help them to meet specific goals for improving policing, in alignment with recommendations from the Presidents Task Force on 21 st Century Policing;

Century Policing; scheduling a call for a specific appointment time to discuss a student loan default increased the call-in rate by 61% compared to an email emphasizing consequences of inaction; and

sending urban HIV patients in Mozambique an SMS reminder to take medications and attend doctors appointments increased their likelihood of staying on the treatment and living longer, as part of a collaboration with USAID.

In a September 15 summit held in conjunction with the 2015-16 reports release, White House officials lauded the teams work.

Great policy only matters if it actually reaches people, said Cecilia Munoz, Assistant to the President and Director of the Domestic Policy Council. Work from this group is where the policy rubber meets the road. The application of this set of ideas and this expertise can improve the lives of all Americans.

The US governments intensified emphasis on behavioral science was significantly influenced by a 2013 White House workshop, Psychological Science and Behavioral Economics in the Service of Public Policy, which brought together psychological scientists, behavioral economists, and government leaders to discuss how to incorporate behavioral empiricism into policymaking. APS was an organizer of the event, along with the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), the National Institute on Aging, and the White House Council of Economic Advisers.

The workshop included presentations from some of the leading figures in psychological science, including APS Fellow and Nobel Laureate Daniel Kahneman, APS Past Presidents Walter Mischel, Susan T. Fiske, John T. Cacioppo, and Elizabeth Phelps, APS Past Board Members Barbara Frederickson and Elke Weber, and APS Fellows Laura Carstensen, Robert Cialdini, Jennifer Lerner, Eldar Shafir, and Stephen Suomi.

The SBST was inspired in part by the UKs BIT, which former Prime Minister David Cameron commissioned in 2010 to test public policy interventions through randomized control trials. The BIT is now a company jointly owned by its employees, the UK government, and the London-based charity Nesta.

Among the highlights in the companys latest report are results from a set of trials conducted in collaboration with renowned academics such as psychological scientists Geoffrey Cohen of Stanford University, Angela Duckworth of University of Pennsylvania, and Todd Rogers of Harvard University. Those control trials, involving 10,000 students across 19 colleges, test the efficacy of interventions designed to foster perseverance and persistence. Early results show the intervention has boosted attendance rates by nearly 4 percentage points. More details on achievement, attitudes, and other outcomes will be reported next year.

BIT projects also demonstrated that:

informing doctors that they are prescribing more antibiotics relative to 80% of their medical peers resulted in 73,000 fewer unnecessary prescriptions, helping to address the threat of antimicrobial resistance.

getting police dispatchers to pause slightly before answering calls led to a significant drop in inappropriate calls (i.e., those that were more appropriate for a different government service agency); and

sending text-message reminders to citizens who in previous years had been late paying their taxes increased on-time payment rates by nearly 50%.

Over the past year, the BIT has expanded its presence globally, setting up offices in Singapore and New York City and providing support for behavioral trials in Costa Rica, Poland, Australia, and most recently Mexico and Moldova.

Whats more, the companys interventions are growing in both scale and complexity, involving an escalating number of citizens, BIT Chief Executive and psychological scientist David Halpern and Managing Director Owain Service report.

The typical sample size of our trials is now often in the tens of thousands, and sometimes bigger, Halpern and Service write in the reports executive summary. And the interventions reported often involve more complex psychological ideas, or more involved partnerships to deliver them.
MILTON, ON / ACCESSWIRE / September 15, 2016 / Caseo, an SEO company in Milton, Ontario, Canada, has been in business for two years now. They are proud to announce that, since updating their website, they have experienced exponential growth. In fact, in January 2015, they had just five clients, which has now grown to 60. As such, in the two years since they have started, they have experienced 1600% growth.

Todd Foster from Caseo says: "The growth we have experienced is nothing short of unprecedented. Even we could not have hoped to do this well. We really want to thank all our clients for their continued trust and support, and we look forward to many more years of positive business relationships."

Caseo offers SEO (search engine optimization) services across the Ontario region, including Toronto. Besides SEO, they also work with their clients on a range of other issues. These include web development, pay per click management, conversion rate optimization, social media marketing services, and even promotional materials. As such, they offer a full service to those who want to boost their online presence. Full details about the work that they do can be found at https://caseo.ca/ontario/seo-toronto/.

One of the areas they specifically focus on right now is social media marketing. In fact, as part of their own website redesign, they have included their own social media channels in an effort to demonstrate the strength of this type of marketing. "Social media is one of the most important tools available for businesses today," adds Todd Foster. "It offers them a way to promote their business, grow their brand, sell their products, and engage their customers. Social media is also a very strong crowd sourcing tool, enabling a business to get direct input from customers and build greater brand loyalty."

More details about the social media marketing services offered by Caseo are available through https://caseo.ca/our-services/social-media-marketing/. Specifically, they enable businesses to engage in relationship marketing, backed by excellent stats to allow for monitoring. They encourage any business to use the contact form provided on their website to find out what they can do for them. A representative from Caseo will reply to any email within two business days.

Story continues

Contact Caseo:



Todd Foster

2898784798

todd@caseo.ca

192 Main St East

SOURCE: Caseo
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In May, Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls, an illustrated childrens book by Elena Favilli and Francesca Cavallo, co-founders of Timbuktu Labs and creators of the first iPad magazine for children, made crowdfunding history by attracting more dollars than any other childrens book.

This month the book for ages 5 to 8, with stories about 100 famous women from Elizabeth I to Serena Williams and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and 100 original pieces of art by artists around the world, broke another crowdfunding record. It has raised over $1 million from 20,000 backers through its Kickstarter campaign and Indiegogo InDemand book-ordering campaign. It is the most funded original book to be crowdfunded. Only a reprint of the Bible and the reissue of a comic book have raised more money. But Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls is closing in on those records, too. Not bad for a project that originally started with the goal of raising $40,000 to print 1,000 books.

Elena Favilli told PW, We knew it was going to be successful. When we launched in April, we had been working on every aspect of the campaign for the past eight months. [But] even for us its like rowing into something much bigger than we thought.

She attributes part of the projects outsized success to the name, Rebel Girls, and to the fact that she and Cavallo worked closely with their audience. They began testing their approach last October through Timbuktus newsletter, in which they sent samples of some of the stories and the art. At the launch of their Kickstarter campaign they had 4,000 people on their newsletter list. Now they have almost 25,000.

We are filling a vacuum, Favilli said. We are responding to a clear need. When we started Timbuktu four years ago and became entrepreneurs, we could see how much female stereotypes were still around.

With 60,000 books scheduled to be printed in Canada and mailed in the first two weeks of November, Favilli and Cavallo have no regrets about choosing to self-publish their book. As they noted in their Kickstarter video, Our dream is to get Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls on the nightstand of every young girl.

We didnt want to go with a publisher, said Favilli. We really thought this title could have a broad appeal, [and] we had a better shot at launching it ourselves. In fact, she thinks that publishers have much to learn about the way they launched the book by responding to their audience.

Over the past few months Favilli and Cavallo have been approached by a number of publishers and agents, including requests to translate the book and publish it in Italy, Mexico, France, Eastern Europe, and China, among others. They havent decided yet if thats the way they will go for future editions of this book or other Rebel Girl titles.

Favilli and Cavallo plan to continue to sell the book on Indiegogo InDemand, an e-commerce website that theyre in the midst of setting up, and on Amazon and other online retailers. Beginning next year, they will consider other options, including making the book available to brick-and-mortar retailers.

As for whats next, Favilli responded, We see Good Night Stories of Rebel Girls as an umbrella brand, not just for books. Although she declined to say what those additional products might be, Favilli said that they will begin releasing one or some next year. In the meantime, Favilli and Cavallo are preparing for a trip to Rwanda for seven days of workshops on female leadership, one of their stretch goals for going beyond their original Kickstarter goal, which they reached in 30 hours.

Correction: An earlier version noted that the book is for middle grade. The target audience is ages 5 to 8.
Hitting shelves next week are a new work from actor/childrens author Jamie Lee Curtis; a middle grade novel from a Newbery Medalist about contemporary families; and a retelling of a classic Russian fairy tale with a Brooklyn milieu.

Kids of Appetite by David Arnold. Viking, $18.99; ISBN 978-0-451-47078-2. Arnold (Mosquitoland) again showcases a memorable cast of outsiders carving out space for themselves, in his latest YA novel. The book earned a starred review from PW.

This Is Me: A Story of Who We Are and Where We Came From by Jamie Lee Curtis, illus. by Laura Cornell. Workman, $16.95; ISBN 978-0-7611-8011-1. In this picture book, frequent collaborators Curtis and Cornell ask kids to contemplate what they would bring if they had to move to another country.

In Plain Sight: A Game 978-1-62672-255-2 by Richard Jackson, illus. by Jerry Pinkney. Roaring Brook/Porter, $17.99; ISBN 978-1-62672-255-2. Caldecott medalist Pinkney teams up with veteran editor Jackson for this gentle picture book about the bond between generations.

Elephant & Piggie Like Reading! We Are Growing! by Laurie Keller and Mo Willems. Hyperion, $9.99; ISBN 978-1-4847-2635-8. Willemss early reader characters spin off their own series in which they frame stories as their favorites  in this volume, blades of grass compare the different rates at which they grow.

I Dissent: Ruth Bader Ginsburg Makes Her Mark by Debbie Levy, illus. by Elizabeth Baddeley. Simon & Schuster, $17.99; ISBN 978-1-4814-6559-5. Ruth Bader Ginsburg had ample experience dissenting and objecting long before she reached the U.S. Supreme Court, according to Levys spirited picture book biography of the second woman to sit on the high court.

A Well-Mannered Young Wolf by Jean Leroy, illus. by Matthieu Maudet. Eerdmans, $16; ISBN 978-0-8028-5479-7. Originally published in France, this wicked gem of a story from Leroy (Superfab Saves the Day) and Maudet (A Mammoth in the Fridge) proves that manners matter, even when one isnt doing something terribly polite, such as hunting prey. The book earned a starred review from PW.

Stalking Jack the Ripper by Kerri Maniscalco. Jimmy Patterson, $18.99; ISBN 978-0-316-27349-7. Maniscalcos debut isnt for the squeamish: it starts with 17-year-old Audrey Rose Wadsworth immersed in opening up and analyzing a corpse under the supervision of her Uncle Jonathan, with no detail or scalpel cut spared.

The Female of the Species by Mindy McGinnis. HarperCollins/Tegen, $17.99; ISBN 978-0-06-232089-6. Three high school seniors come together in McGinniss harrowing rumination on the nature of violence and the power of friendship in a small town. The book earned a starred review from PW.

Stealing Snow by Danielle Paige. Bloomsbury, $18.99; ISBN 978-1-68119-076-1. Paige (Dorothy Must Die) pivots from Oz to fairy tales in this YA retelling of The Snow Queen.

The Best Man by Richard Peck. Dial, $16.99; ISBN 978-0-803-73839-3. The coming-of-age story traces milestones in Archer Magills life from first to sixth grade while deftly addressing a variety of social issues, including the gay marriage of his uncle. The book earned a starred review from PW.

Vassa in the Night by Sarah Porter. Tor Teen, $17.99; ISBN 978-0-7653-8054-8. Porter (the Lost Voices trilogy) reinvents the Russian fairy tale Vasilisa the Beautiful, setting the story in a darkly magical version of present-day Brooklyn.

Creation by Cynthia Rylant. Beach Lane, $17.99; ISBN 978-1-4814-7039-1. Rylants illustrations for a simplified version of the Genesis creation story, adapted from the King James Bible, recall those from her Dog Heaven and Cat Heaven: wet, thickly painted acrylics in which childlike forms appear against milky backgrounds.

Elephant & Piggie Like Reading! The Cookie Fiasco by Dan Santat and Mo Willems. Hyperion, $9.99; ISBN 978-1-4847-2636-5. In this early reader, a group of animals want to share a cookie, but their odd number proves a challenge in evenly dividing the snack.

For more childrens and YA titles on sale throughout the month of September, check out PWs full On-Sale Calendar.
Who hasnt fantasized about becoming a character in their favorite book? Author James Riley has turned that idea into a bit of wish fulfillment by creating the briskly selling Story Thieves series (S&S/Aladdin), whose first two books have sold more than 170,000 copies combined since the publication of book #1, Story Thieves, in January 2015. The paperback edition of Story Thieves has been on the New York Times bestseller list for 20 straight weeks to date.

In the first volume, regular kid Owen sees his classmate Bethany climb out of a book in the library. He soon learns that shes a half-fictional girl (her mother human, her father fictional) in search of her missing dad, and insists on joining her quest, by traveling into one of his favorite fantasy series to procure some help. By book #2, The Stolen Chapters (Jan. 2016), Owen needs to team up with boy magician Kiel (the hero of his beloved series), solve a real-world mystery, and rescue Bethany from disaster. But at that books end, the author leaps into the action, too, adding a whole new level of complexity.

I used to get so drawn in to stories like the Chronicles of Prydain [by Lloyd Alexander] and other fantasy stories, Riley said of what sparked his Story Thieves idea. I wanted to write about characters who were jumping into stories and wondered how much I could do on a meta level. How could I write the characters while self-examining the book? There were lots of fun things for me to play with. I started out in the vein of The Phantom Tollbooth, but then moved away from that and kind of insinuated that I was the villain of the story  named Nobody  as well as the author. I wanted the books characters to meet their author, because the author is their worst enemy. I wanted to be sure and let them have some sort of confrontation.

That confrontation is the setup for book #3, Secret Origins, due out in January, and according to Riley, is a superhero story. He explained his master outline for the scope of the series: I planned it out as five books from the beginning, he said. I wanted each one to be a different type of book. So far, hes delivered a fantasy-adventure tale in book #1 and a mystery for book #2. Ive just finished book #3, which is a superhero story, said Riley. Book #4 is a play on a choose-your-own-adventure style of book, and the fifth book wraps it all up. So far, Ive followed out my plan.

But Riley is excited about a small tweak in the plan for book #3, inspired by his fans. The kids really go off in their own direction, asking if they could jump into this or that story, he said of the questions readers pose during his appearances. They really seem to get into it. In fact, Ive been playing with the idea of crossing over into another authors series, he added. Brandon Mull is working on a new sequel to his Fablehaven series [Dragonwatch, spring 2017]. He and I were touring together [in 2015] and we came up with an idea for my characters Owen and Bethany to jump into one of his Fablehaven books. There is a spot that works without disrupting his book. Its a bonus story that will be in my third book. It will tie in with the stolen chapters I write about in my second book, and it will help introduce what is coming up in Bandons new series.

And the series-jumping departure is not the only change ahead for the series. Theyve ramped up the frequency of the books, said Riley, meaning that book #4 is scheduled to be published six months after book #3. This is the first time I will have written a book in six months! he said, noting that he still maintains his day job as an editor at USA Today as well.

Rileys success so far is the result of a steady climb that began with his debut, the fractured-fairytale-flavored Half Upon a Time trilogy. And, according to his editor, Liesa Abrams, v-p and editorial director of Simon Pulse and associate editorial director of Aladdin, Riley is right on track. He provides a shining example that the traditional publishing model can still work in todays world of overnight blockbusters, she explained. Every year, James has sold more books than the previous year, and it was his fourth book  in paperback!  [Story Thieves, the first volume in the series] that landed on the bestseller list.

Riley had hoped, of course, that the scenario would play out this way, but wasnt sure. My first book came out in 2010 and my editor told me that if I came in at a moderate advance I could grow, and slowly build an audience with each book, he recalled. Its hard to see all that at the beginning, but its actually happening. One of the great things about success is proving her right, and also seeing kids who know my books. Oh, and getting into the Scholastic Book Club catalog! That was huge for me for lots of reasons, but mostly because I remembered how much I loved that catalog when I was a kid. Its been so fun.

Abrams said she knew she wanted to work with Riley because of the qualities she saw in his writing. When I acquired Half Upon a Time, back in 2009, his humor captured me instantly, she said. Nothing works in middle grade like humor does! Pair that with his innate sense for great adventure storytelling, and I knew we had something special. In Abramss view, Rileys own passion for books expresses itself in the ways that both of his series feature characters merging from the real world with a fictional one. With these blurred lines and a meta approach, she added, readers can see themselves so easily in these stories. He strikes the perfect balance between playful jokes that gently mock familiar tropes and clear respect for why those archetypes work.

Marketing and publicity for the books has grown along the way, too. This past January Riley went on a seven-city tour, including an appearance at the ABA Winter Institute. Story Thieves was one of the prizes of the Boys Life annual Say Yes to Reading contest (sponsored by S&S) in the magazines summer reading program, and was the featured title of a Reading Arcade Takeover on funbrain.com. Riley is comfortable engaging with his fans online, too. As one example, he makes time whenever possible to respond to email questions on his website. Not long ago, he said, he received a letter from a mother about her son who has dyslexia. When she read him the Half Upon a Time, he told her he wanted to read the other books on his own, Riley recounted. I dont know how to handle that. It seems impossible that a kid would want to read something of mine so much that he would overcome a difficulty just to find out how the story goes. To get that kind of response warms my heart.

But paramount for now is Rileys work on the next Story Thieves title, the pick-the-plot volume scheduled for summer 2017. And thats fine by him. Its always been my dream to be a fulltime writer, he said. My mom used to let us stay up late if we were reading, but not if we were doing anything else, so we learned early on that it was a good thing to do. I loved it. And now I love that something I do could be a springboard for kids imaginations.
This week, Raina Telgemeiers Ghosts is in the house (of worship); Dog Man hits the road; Mac Barnett and Adam Rex show how their book was made; members of a unique orchestra visit New York; cosplayers get into character at Salt Lake City Comic Con; and Elizabeth Eulberg solves the case of a missing dog.

Holy Ghosts!

Green Apple Books hosted a packed launch event for Raina Telgemeiers Ghosts on September 13 at St. Anne Catholic Church in San Francisco. The event marked the start of Telgemeiers nationwide tour for her new middle grade graphic novel, which will take the SF resident to more than 20 cities.

Its a Man! Its a Dog! Its Dog Man!

Dav Pilkey kicked off his Dog-gone Spectacular Superhero Tour for the first book in his new series, Dog Man, with stops in Cleveland (Pilkeys hometown) and Atlanta. Pilkey was the Kidnote speaker at the Decatur Book Festival, held at the Decatur High School Performing Arts Center, where local kids got to meet the eponymous superhero, as well as the one and only Captain Underpants.

Got It Made

Adam Rex (l.) and Mac Barnett recently concluded their multi-city tour for How This Book Was Made (Disney-Hyperion), which began with their visit to the Decatur Book Festival on September 3, and included stops in Nashville, Wichita, Houston, Salt Lake City, Phoenix, and Raleigh, N.C., where (seen here) they met readers and signed books at Quail Ridge Books.

Beautiful Music

Members of the Recycled Orchestra, which features instruments created from materials mined from a landfill in Paraguay, traveled from the South American country to New York City for the premiere of Landfill Harmonic, a documentary about the orchestra. In addition to performing at the premiere in Manhattan on September 9, the kids also visited local schools, along with author Susan Hood, who wrote Adas Violin, a picture book based on the orchestra and one of its first members, Ada Rios, who is seen here with Favio Chavez, the orchestras conductor. Simon & Schuster also donated signed copies of Adas Violin to each member of the orchestra who came to New York.

Under Attack!

Author Matthew J. Kirby defended his life after being attacked by a cosplayer dressed as a character from his new series based on the Assassins Creed franchise, during Salt Lake City Comic Con. During the convention, Kirby kicked off the launch of the first book in the Assassins Creed novel series, Last Descendants, and spoke on three panels.

The Case of the Missing Bookstore Dog

On tour for The Great Shelby Holmes, the first in a middle grade series, Elizabeth Eulberg met with fans at Copperfields Books in Petaluma, Calif., on September 13. Attendees took part in a scavenger hunt arranged by the bookstore. In keeping with the books story about a dog-napping, Eulberg led attendees on a scavenger hunt to locate a dog that went missing in the store. The pug, Arya, is actually the unofficial store dog, who belongs to manager Matt Brown.
Youve probably noticed the headlines in recent weeks: No, the Internet Has Not Killed the Printed Book. Most People Still Prefer Them, declared the New York Times. Nope, Printed Books Arent Going Out of Style, proclaimed the Verge. And my favorite, Luddites Rejoice! Americans Still Prefer Printed Books, noted the PBS NewsHour.

Such was the takeaway from the Pew Research Centers most recent survey on American book readership, released earlier this month: not only are print books hanging on, they remain significantly more popular then e-books.

I think if you looked back a decade ago, certainly five or six years ago when e-books were taking off, there were folks who thought the days of the printed book were numbered, Pews Lee Rainie told the Times, and its just not so in our data.

But even for hardcore book lovers, the persistence of print isnt exactly the feel-good story of the year. Beyond the stories about format preference that it spurred, Pews research, along with a recent update from the National Endowment for the Arts, suggests that reading is in decline.

Overall, Pew found that the share of Americans who have read a book in any format in the last year held steady at 73%, largely unchanged since 2012. But thats down from 79% in 2011, the first year Pew began researching peoples reading habits. Pew also found that the average number of books read per year has also remained steady since 2012, at 12. But again, that number is also down, from 14 in 2011.

Meanwhile, in another survey released last month, the National Endowment for the Arts reported that just 43% of adults read at least one work of literature for pleasure in the previous yearthe lowest share since the NEA started tracking reading habits in the early 1980s. The recent figure is down from a high of 57% in 1982. Trade publishers will be most concerned by the NEA stat, because the NEA survey specifically covers novels, plays, short stories, and poetry, excluding nonfiction and reading for school or work.

Behind the Numbers

Neither the Pew nor NEA surveys dive deeply into the bigger story: why book readership seems to be declining. But its no surprise that reading is increasingly challenged in the age of electronic media, and such concerns are not new. Back in 2004, in an NEA report titled Reading at Risk, then NEA chairman Dana Gioia pointed out that reading is, well, kind of hard compared to other media.

Reading a book requires a degree of active attention and engagement, Gioia explained. Indeed, reading itself is a progressive skill that depends on years of education and practice. By contrast, most electronic media such as television, recordings, and radio make fewer demands on their audiences, and often require no more than passive participation.

Its certainly true that reading is a different beast compared to other media. Nevertheless, in the tablet and smartphone era, as virtually all content now competes for user attention on the same screen (much of that content free, or cheap), its also fair to say that the publishing industry hasnt exactly made accessing books on screen easy.

In fact, it should surprise no one that Pew found that print books are hanging on with readersafter all, just as the e-book market started to boom, the major publishers put a collective thumb on the scales to tip readers back toward print, with efforts that included a scheme with Apple to raise e-book prices, and burdensome restrictions on library e-books.

Libraries are another area of research for Pew, and this month Pew also released their latest survey on Americans experience with their public libraries. Among the more interesting findings in that survey is that even as libraries continue to roll out more digital services, patrons still overwhelmingly associate the library with books. Some 64% of library users reported checking out a book in the last 12 months, well above those who used a library computer (29%).

 It should surprise no one that Pew found that print books are hanging on with readersafter all, just as the e-book market started to boom, the major publishers put a collective thumb on the scales to tip readers back toward print. 

But in an eye-opening finding, just 44% of those surveyed were aware that their local public libraries even offered e-books, though nearly all public libraries now offer e-book lending. Thats clearly a vestige of the major publishers reluctance to embrace e-book lending in libraries until very recently. Though all of the major publishers now allow library e-book lending, high prices and other restrictions (such as expiration dates and lend limits) have kept the growth of library e-book lending in check.

Of course, its hard to say for certain what effect traditional publishers efforts to protect their legacy print businesses may be having on book reading overall. But industry observers largely agree that higher e-book prices have almost certainly played a role in depressing e-book sales at the Big Five houses, all of which have reported declines over the last year. And Pews most recent findings suggest that e-book readership has stalled, too. After growing 11% from 2011 to 2013, Pew found that the share of Americans who read an e-book in the last year has remained at 28% for the last two years.

That e-books appear to have hit a plateau is astonishing, especially because we are in the midst of a historic boom in digital self-publishing, in which more books are being produced than ever before, and more Americans are becoming authors. In addition, despite more than half of the public apparently unaware of the service, e-book lending in public libraries has also expanded significantly since 2013. Leading library e-book vendor OverDrive has has reported double-digit increases in library e-book circulation for years now, with 33 library systems each reporting one million e-book circulations or more in 2015, up from 10 in 2014.

Perhaps most alarming, however, is that the dip in book reading runs counter to trends in virtually every other mediamusic, TV, movies, games, even newswhere digital has led to a sharp increases in consumption, even as some sectors (like the newspaper and music industries) have struggled with the change.

No question, there are any number of cultural factors driving the decline in book reading, including many factors outside the control of the publishing industry. As Gioia suggested in 2004, reading is not truly comparable to other media. But what all media, including books, have in common, is that they compete for a users limited time. And on that score, its reasonable to question whether the industrys cautious approach to digital reading has led them to miss the forest (which is reading, whatever the format) for the trees (legacy print sales).

Reverse Course?

For the most part, publishers seem not to be terribly concerned with the dip in e-book sales, and delighted with the resurgence of print. Pews research over the last few years suggests that publishers' efforts to boost print may, at the very least, represent a lost opportunity to create more engaged readers.

In a 2012 survey report titled The Rise of Digital Reading, Pew researchers concluded that those who have taken the plunge into reading e-books stand out in almost every way from other kinds of readers.

Foremost, they are relatively avid readers of books in all formats: 88% of those who read e-books in the past 12 months also read printed books." the report noted. "Compared with other book readers, they read more books. They read more frequently for a host of reasons: for pleasure, for research, for current events, and for work and school. They are also more likely than others to have bought their most recent book, rather than borrowed it, and they are more likely than others to say they prefer to purchase books in general.

That book reading is under pressure in an age of such keen competition for peoples time and attention is not surprising. But a further decline in book reading is not inevitable. Among the encouraging findings in Pews research, readers today says they are increasingly comfortable reading on their phones, and most are happy to read in multiple formats, toggling from pages to screens.

Readers want books to be available wherever they are, Rainie told the Times. Theyll read an e-book on a crowded bus, curl up with a printed book when they feel like that, and go to bed with a tablet. That certainly sounds like an opportunity to grow readership, and to reach new readers.

The question is, how do todays book publishers and authors seize it?
Andrew Harwell, senior editor at HarperCollins Childrens Books, was named PW Star Watch Superstar at a party at New York's Dream Downtown hotel on September 15.

"I genuinely believe that if publishing is going to have a healthy future, it has to start with people of marginalized identities being given the same job opportunities and incredible mentors that I have had the privilege to receive," Harwell said in his acceptance address, after thanking former and current mentors including HarperCollins Children's Books v-p and editorial director Rosemary Brosnan, who nominated him for the award. "Diversity is not a trend, it is the future, and it is one that publishing will have to work very hard to be sure we are a part of."

The event was well attended, with roughly 200 members of the publishing community turning out, according to PW marketing and events director Bryan Kinney. The event marked the second anniversary of the PW Star Watch program.

During his tenure at HarperCollins, Harwell has had a number of successes, including signing author Madeleine Roux, who went on to write the bestselling Asylum series. Another successful acquisition is Noelle Stevenson's Nimona, an Eisner Awardwinning graphic novel that was also nominated for the National Book Award. The four colleagues who nominated HarwellBrosnan among thempraised "his blend of creativity, smarts, and ability to inspire others.

As part of winning the award, Harwell will travel to the Frankfurt Book Fair in October.

"I'm absolutely thrilled to be going to Frankfurt this year," Harwell told PW. "I studied German in college, I've been dying to get back to Germany, and this is a huge honor for me."
When 29-year-old Stephanie Appell, who works at Parnassus Books in Nashville, Tenn., was diagnosed with breast cancer last April, the staff wanted to do something to help her focus on healing. The store's co-owner, novelist Ann Patchett, suggested asking authors appearing at the store to decorate ceramic piggy banks that could then be sold to raise money for Appells medical expenses.

We thought we would get 20 authors, said the store's social media director Mary Laura Philpott, who is also the author of Penguins with People Problems. We had no idea it would grow into a movement.

But once the word got out more than 100 authors and illustrators volunteered, including John Green, Jeff Kinney, Sandra Boynton, Paula Hawkins, and Lane Smith, the project grew.

Instead of just selling a few piggy banks at the store for Appell, who manages books for young readers, Parnassus set up an online auction with part of the proceeds also going to Binc, the Book Industry Charitable Foundation.

Whether youre one of ours or youre a bookseller somewhere else, we think its our place to help, said Patchett, who is serving with James Patterson as an ambassador to Binc this year.

The auction will take place over a number of days at Bidding Owl; it starts at 6:30 p.m. CT on September 25 and ends at 8 p.m. CT on September 30.

The piggies will also be on display at the store on the evening of September 25; a $10 donation is requested at the door.
The Silly Walk off a Cliff cover that appeared on the July 4 issue of the New Yorker following Britains Brexit vote reminded me that it was high time I got to John Cleeses autobiography So, Anyway... Cleese writes in a winning, self-effacing way about the first half of his life: his parents, his childhood, his schooling, and his early career as a stage performer, up until the formation of Monty Pythons Flying Circus. Like any Englishman of his generation, hes acutely sensitive to class. Where George Orwell once described himself as belonging to the lower-upper-middle class, Cleese indicates that his own background is upper-upper-lower-middle class.

Cleese is as funny on the page as he is, say, in the role of Basil Fawlty, the irascible hotel keeper of the BBC series Fawlty Towers. I laughed aloud more than once. As a P.G. Wodehouse fan, I delighted in an anecdote about one of Wodehouses brothers, whom Cleeses father met in India. Besides displaying incredible sexual naivety, this Wodehouse was without a sense of humor. As a rule, Cleese speaks generously of others, such as the comedian Peter Sellers, whom he much admired. But he cant resist taking a swipe at the late Graham Chapman, his fellow Python, who, evidently jealous of Cleeses talent, could be petty and mean. Cleese denies that he was shocked, as Chapman claimed, when his long-time friend came out as gay, though he admits that I was very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very surprised.

Toward the end, he gives a wonderful catalogue of the demands one must put up with on becoming a celebrity. I hope Cleese is currently hard at work on a sequel that will cover the second half of his life.
Americans were first invited to attend the Moscow International Book Fair in 1977, but U.S. interest has steadily waned since then, and at this years fair, held September 711, there were no American publishers in attendance. Among European publishers there, only the German and Greek ones had stands (Greece was the guest of honor).

A modest-size event, taking up a single hall on the grounds of the colossal VDNH Exhibition Center, the fair officially had 400 exhibitors and is reported to attract 120,000 visitors annually, though traffic seemed sparser than that. Among those exhibiting, the stand of Eksmo-AST, the dominant publishing house in Russia, was the largest, followed by the collective Chinese stand.

In an effort to revive international interest in the fair, the MIBF invited a coterie of foreign journalists to see the revamped event and to spread a message: Russia wants you back. Now in its second year under the new leadership of Sergey Kaykin, the MIBF has added extensive professional programming and is looking to spark more rights sales of Russian books abroad. A seminar on the topic on the first day of the fair revealed one of the problems in selling rights: Russian publishing contracts traditionally last just three years, and then the rights revert back to an author. This has not only nearly eliminated the backlist for publishers, but it also means that almost any foreign rights or translation deal needs to be struck almost immediately after publication in Russia. Authors also tend to jump frequently between publishers who lure them away from competitors with promises of bringing older titles back into print as part of deals for new books.

A half-dozen literary agencies that are active in the country offer some points of contact for foreign publishers. Among the best known of these are the AK Agency, Andrew Nurnberg and Associates, Elkost, and Banke, Goumen & Smirnova. At this years fairs, the MIBF had no traditional rights center, though the idea of establishing one is being considered.

These underlying issues aside, efforts to promote translations of Russian works through programs such as Read Russia, which offers sample translations and subsidies, have resulted in 640 translations from the Russian that have been published with state assistance over the last five years.

Going the other way, Russian publishers have been eager to acquire translation rights. Readers are still very curious about American culture, both high and low, said Shashi Martynova, a prominent translator who also runs the Dodo Bookstore, which specializes in translations. Sometimes, the weirder the book, the betteras we are living a little like Alice in Through the Looking Glass here.

Among the latest rights deals reported prior to the fair was Alpinas acquisition of the Russian rights to astronaut Mark Kellys Enduranceunderscoring that the two nations do still have some shared interests.

It can be difficult to quantify Russian publishing, however. For example, LitRes, the countrys top e-bookseller, claims as much as 99% of Russian e-books are pirated; others say this is exaggerated to scare foreign publishers into only working with LitRes.

But some things are obvious: Russia is, for example, 90% a hardcover market, a legacy dating back to Soviet times. And readingthough on the declineis still valued, something that was confirmed by Denis Kotov, CEO of St. Petersburg-based Bookvoed (Alphabet Eater), one of the countrys largest bookstore chains: People like to read in Russia very much, but as booksellers we are competing with television, the Internet, and alcohol.

At the MIBF, alcohol did appear, but only in the occasional glass of Georgian sparkling wine to mark the presentation of various book prizes. Initially, the tone of the fair was all very serious, as a crowd composed mostly of professionals and students listened to lectures and panel discussions (in which there was no discussion, just position statements) about various aspects of the book market, but as the weekendand members of the buying public arrivedthe focus shifted to bookselling and author readings.

For American publishers looking for opportunities, all this might suggest that the Moscow International Book Fair is worth a lookbut you will have to put in plenty of work. There are cultural and linguistic barriers to cross, as well as a marketplace that can be something of a black box to outsiders. Internal contacts are a must, not only to conduct business, but just to get into the countryU.S. visitors still need a visa to visit Russia, and one must be invited in the first place to apply. Until the visa requirement changes, the MIBF is not for the casually curious.
Created in response to the Arab oil embargo of 1973-74, the U.S. government created the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR). Deep inside underground caverns at four storage facilities along the Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coasts, the SPR has a max capacity of 727 million barrels of crude oil. Its purpose  to serve as an emergency stockpile of crude oil to help blunt the impact of disruptions to the flow of crude oil to the American marketplace. In theory, the SPR would prevent the use of crude oil as a potential weapon, as with the 1973-74 Arab embargo, and to mitigate the impact of global crises on the U.S. economy.
PEORIA -- Kevin Schoeplein, Chief Executive Officer of OSF Healthcare System and Vice-Chairperson for the Boards of OSF, has announced plans to retire at the end of 2017.

Bob Sehring, Chief Executive Officer, Central Region, will assume the role of Chief Operating Officer of OSF HealthCare on Jan. 1, 2017, and become Chief Executive Officer of OSF Healthcare System.

OSF HealthCare operates OSF Saint Luke Medical Center in Kewanee and 10 other hospitals in Illinois. Based in Peoria, it has 11 acute care facilities, two colleges of nursing and more than 100 office sites.

Mr. Schoeplein began his career with The Sisters of the Third Order of St. Francis in 1978 as an Assistant Administrator at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center in Peoria. In 1983 he was named Administrator/CEO of OSF Saint Anthony Medical Center in Rockford. In 1988, he returned to Peoria as President of OSF Saint Francis, Inc., which included the formation and development of OSF Medical Group.

He was named the first President of the OSF Healthcare Foundation and was CEO of the Northern Illinois/Michigan Region before being named President and CEO of OSF HealthPlans in 1999. In 2003, he was named Executive Vice President of OSF Healthcare System. He became CEO in 2012.

Mr. Sehring joined OSF in 2002 as Vice President for Business Support Services for OSF HealthPlans, Inc. and was named CEO of that organization in 2004. He later was CEO of Ambulatory and Accountable Care for OSF and, in 2013, was appointed Chief Ministry Services Officer before being named Chief Executive Officer, Central Region, in February 2015.
OMAHA, Neb.  Midwest bankers are seeing increasing signs of financial stress for farmers, according to the Creighton University Rural Mainstreet Index.

In the latest monthly survey of bank CEOs in rural areas of Illinois, Iowa and eight other states dependent on agriculture and/or energy, almost 4 of 5 bank CEOs indicated they were restructuring farm loans due to weak farm income. Nearly one-fifth reported increasing rejection rates on agricultural loans due to weak farm income.

Overall the index, which ranges between 0 and 100, fell to 37.3 in September from 41.1 in August. In September 2015, the index was at 49.0.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture projects 2016 net farm income will decline by almost 12 percent, said Ernie Goss, Jack A. MacAllister Chair in Regional Economics at Creighton University's Heider College of Business. Although loan defaults have changed little over the past year, downturns in farm income over the past three years are pushing bankers to change the terms of farm loans, he said.

Jim Eckert, president of Anchor State Bank near Bloomington, said he expects lower agriculture commodity prices to cause all but the best capitalized producers to lose money or only break even this year. Fritz Kuhlmeier, CEO of Citizens State Bank in Lena 80 miles northeast of the Quad-Cities, said exceptional crop yields this fall will make cash flows positive, even with lower commodity prices.

"(But) 2017 looks to be a real challenge on average crop yields without a reduction in cash rents," he said.

In Illinois, the September Rural Mainstreet Index rose to 32.1 from 21.2 in August. The farmland price index also rose, to 26.3 from Augusts 17.5, and the states new hiring index climbed to 50.7 from last months 44.2.

Regionwide, the farmland and ranchland-price index in September rose to 30.3 from 25.6 in August, marking the 34th straight month the index has been below growth neutral 50.0. The September farm equipment-sales index dropped in September to 14.3 from Augusts 14.8.

Weakness in farm income and low agricultural commodity prices continue to restrain the sale of agriculture equipment across the region," said Mr. Goss. "This is having a significant and negative impact on both farm equipment dealers and agricultural equipment manufacturers across the region."

Bankers reported that borrowing by farmers remains strong and the checking-deposit index climbed to 50.0 in September from 41.3 in August. The index for certificates of deposit and other savings instruments improved to 51.5 from 44.5 for the same period.

The Rural Mainstreet hiring index advanced to 54.8 for September, up from Augusts 47.9 and Julys 49.0. For the region, Rural Mainstreet employment is down by 0.9 percent over the past 12 months.

The confidence index reflecting economic expectations for the next six months dropped to 21.5 in September from Augusts 27.2. Mr. Goss said the drop indicated an intense pessimistic outlook among bankers.

In Iowa, the September Rural Main Street Index fell to 56.2 from Augusts 58.3. Iowas farmland price index increased to 47.2 from 40.5 in August, and its new hiring index rose to 65.1 from Augusts 58.1.

Other states included in the monthly survey are Colorado, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming.
For the first time in 20 years, voters will find a third option for president on their Nov. 8 ballot in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. As important as that milestone is, however, it is only a preliminary victory in a long campaign for legitimacy and viability.

This week Gary Johnson and Bill Weld, the Libertarian Party candidates for president and vice president, are campaigning to take another crucial step: To be included when the two major party presidential candidates meet Sept. 26 in the first in a series of presidential debated.

The former governors have been working for months to convince enough voters to support them to clear the 15 percent polling threshold the Presidential Debates Commission has set for deciding which candidates to include. Not only is that figure arbitrary, polls the commission relies upon to make that assessment are stacked in favor of the major party candidates since they are calculated primarily on the head-to-had battle between Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump.

How is Johnson supposed to break through the 15 percent barrier when his name isnt an option? his campaign manager Ron Neilson wrote in a piece Los Angeles Times op-ed. How indeed.

Those polls also dont tell the whole story or even the most important parts. In a full-page ad in the New York Times, the Libertarian Party ticket pointed to others which tell a different story, including an Aug. 25 Quinnipiac University poll in which 62 percent of voters said they wanted Gov. Johnson included in the debates. That poll, along with others showing similar results, must be taken into consideration, they argue. That includes a Washington Post poll which shows support for their ticket at double digits in 42 states, at more than 15 percent in 15 states, including Iowa, Minnesota and Nebraska, and 19 percent or more in four other states.

In an election year when vast numbers of Americans say they are unhappy with both major party candidates, its essential the electorate has the opportunity to hear from all the candidates before making a choice.

Please note, we are not advocating that the debates become free-for-alls, crowded with minor party candidates who get on the ballot in one or a handful of states. Leaving the Green Party presidential candidate off the stage on Sept. 26 makes sense, for example, because she failed to win a ballot spot in six states.

And we recognize the importance of rules and standards. But we also know that every election is different, and as the Libertarian candidates said in the New York Times letter, The conditions of the presidential election of 2016 are extraordinary and without precedent.

On the other hand, there is precedent for the commission to respond to unusual conditions such as these.

In 1992, Mr. Nielson wrote, H. Ross Perot polled well through early summer when matched up against then-President George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. After he temporarily dropped out of the race, his numbers plummeted, and by the time he got back in he was only at 7 percent to 9 percent in national polls. (Thats lower than Johnson by most accounts.)

Nevertheless, he was invited to participate in the debates, and he went on to win 18.9 percent of the popular vote. If voters had not been given the opportunity to see him go head-to-head with the standard-bearers of the obsolete two-party system, he would never have gone so far.

No doubt hes right. And its not as though Libertarians are asking for a free ride throughout the debate schedule. For now, the ticket is focused on getting the commission to add a third podium to that Sept. 26 stage.

Allow us to make our case to the American people, they plead. If, in the polls that follow, we fail to meet that 15 percent standard, well make no further efforts for inclusion in the subsequent debates.

How can commissioners who care about fairness and democracy refuse such a reasonable request?
What a treat it is to dive back into the cozy world of Bridget Jones, who is the kind of old friend you can pick up with right where it left off, no matter how long it's been.

"Bridget Jones's Baby" opens with a familiar scene for our pal: Bridget (Renee Zellweger) celebrating her birthday alone to the tune of "All By Myself," blowing out a candle on a single cupcake, guzzling white wine in her jammies. The pity party's over soon enough though, as she skips the song and boogies instead to "Jump Around." Has Bridget Jones gotten her groove back?

She does, in fact, have a groove, perhaps for the first time. She's a producer on the television program "Hard News," still has her great group of friends, even though they're now all saddled with kids, and has achieved her ideal weight. But Bridget's always been one for self-improvement, so when it comes to her love life, she's is determined to make new mistakes, not old ones.

Jack Quant (Patrick Dempsey), an American tech billionaire who has leveraged his match-making algorithm into a successful dating app, is the perfect new mistake, as opposed to old mistake Mark Darcy (Colin Firth), the fussbudget workaholic lawyer with whom things never worked out. Good thing Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant) isn't in the picture this time around.

Bridget has a tendency to self-sabotage her romances, but biology doesn't let her off the hook this time, and at 43, she finds herself with child. Just who else is also with child in this scenario -- Jack or Mark -- is the question that's up for debate in the film.

While the neuroses of "Bridget Jones" have always been about bodies, "Baby" releases her from this anxiety and flips the script, letting Bridget reclaim the power of her own body. "Weight: who cares?" she types in her ubiquitous diary around Christmastime, when she's rounding the bend on nine months pregnant. She grew a human with that body.

Part of what's so refreshing about "Bridget Jones's Baby" is that at 43, Bridget is effortlessly desirable, sexy, adventurous, and yes, adorable. The film just assumes this as fact, balancing Bridget's wryly self-deprecating inner monologue alongside the external perspective that sees her for the fetching beauty that she is.

Zellweger plays Bridget just as charmingly as she always has -- flawed but endearing; just right in her own idiosyncratic way.

This relatable (if somewhat aspirational) character comes not just from Zellweger's performance, but also from the assured direction of Sharon Maguire, who helmed "Bridget Jones's Diary" in 2001, as well as the fast, fresh, and very funny screenplay.

"Jones" author Helen Fielding collaborated with Dan Mazer and British national treasure Emma Thompson (who also plays Bridget's ob-gyn) on the script. The jokes reference beloved scenes from the first film, but it never feels like a re-hash of old material (they even manage to draw laughs from a dated reference to "Gangnam Style").

Yet it feels current because they've allowed the character to grow. She's still awkward and prone to embarrassing foibles, but is older, wiser, comfortable in her own skin. Shockingly, it seems as though Bridget has learned to live in the moment. As Bridget Jones discovers her own kind of zen, it makes for a third installment that proves to be v.v. satisfying.
Sally A. Claassen, 57, of Roscoe was sentenced Thursday in Rockford after pleading guilty in June to federal counts of embezzlement.

"I accept full responsibility for my actions," she said in court. "My parents raised me to know right from wrong. This was a very bad mistake."

Assistant U.S. Attorney Margaret Schneider told the judge that Claassen "committed a very serious offense when she betrayed a position of trust in Winnebago County."

The judge also ordered Claassen to pay restitution to the Winnebago County treasurer and a $5,000 fine, perform 100 hours of community service and serve one year of supervised release. Claassen has two weeks to pay the fine and restitution.

Prosecutors had asked for 30 to 37 months in prison. Claassen's attorney asked for a maximum five years of probation.

"There's no way to sugar coat what she did," attorney Chuck Prorok said, calling his client's behavior "reprehensible."

Claassen's husband, Kevin Claassen, testified that her time in prison "would probably take everything we've got. The house ... all that we've saved is already gone."

Claassen ran the county's purchasing department from 1997 until she was placed on administrative leave and then resigned. County administrators accused her of using her county-issued credit card to buy personal items, including Florida vacations, kitchen cabinets and appliances for her home.

Claassen earned $96,000 a year.
The (LaSalle) News Tribune reports the Putnam County state's attorney Thursday charged 66-year-old Clifford Andersen of Standard with Class 3 felony concealment of a homicidal death. Authorities previously said Andersen would face a similar Class 4 felony in the death of 62-year-old Deborah Dewey.

Police found Dewey's body in a shallow grave in Standard earlier this week. She had been missing since Aug. 22.

Prosecutors accuse Andersen of taking Dewey's body from a vacant home, wrapping it in a blue blanket, covering it in a tarp and then roping and taping it before burying it.

Andersen asked the court for time to find a lawyer. He is held on $750,000 bond.
Ben Baker was freed earlier this year after he petitioned for a new trial and Cook County prosecutors dropped the charges against him. The case was dismissed because the primary witness in the case, former Chicago police Sgt. Ronald Watts, was convicted in 2013 of extorting protection payoffs from drug dealers.

"This case is going to be about exploring the code of silence, how it happens and how it continues to happen to this day," Baker's attorney, Joshua Tepfer of the Exoneration Project at the University of Chicago Law School, said. "It is very much alive and well."

"We have not yet received the lawsuit and cannot comment," said city law department spokesman Bill McCaffrey.

Baker, 44, alleges in his lawsuit  which names Watts and his partner Kallatt Mohammed and others still working for the department  that he was targeted because he refused to pay Watts a protection payoff of $1,000 in order to deal drugs at a public housing complex.

Baker claims in retaliation, Watts and his crew tried to tie Baker to heroin found in a mailbox at the Ida B. Wells public housing complex. Baker was found not guilty in that case, and months later was arrested by Watts' crew after the officers claimed he was found inside a building at the housing complex with heroin in his pocket packaged for sale.

Baker was out on bond in that case when he complained to Chicago police internal affairs about Watts' corruption.

The lawsuit contends that after learning of Baker's complaint, members of Watts' crew framed him and his fiancee in a separate drug case months later.

In his petition earlier this year for a new trial, Baker and fiancee, Clarissa Glenn, contended Watts had planted a plastic bag filled with heroin in their vehicle after it was stopped by the sergeant and another officer. In the petition, the couple said they decided to plead guilty due the possibility of a 30-year prison sentence and fears their children would be left alone.

Baker, who had previous criminal convictions on his record, was sentenced to 14-years in prison. Glenn, who had no criminal record, was given probation.

At the time of Baker's arrests, an investigation of Watts and his crew was "well underway" by the FBI, with the knowledge of the police department's Internal Affairs Department, according to the lawsuit.

It was in 2011 that Watts and Mohammed were caught in an FBI sting attempting to steal from an FBI informant $5,200 of what they believed was drug money. Mohammed was convicted of theft and sentenced to 18 months in prison.

The case against Watts was built in part on the undercover work of two whistleblower officers, Shannon Spalding and Daniel Echeverria. The pair later filed a lawsuit of their own alleging they were blackballed by police brass and moved to do-nothing jobs in retaliation for their undercover work. The lawsuit was settled on the eve of trial in May for $2 million.
MOLINE -- Eric Sanders spent four of his 10 years with the Air Force in places such as Iraq, Turkey and Kuwait.

"After all that, I'd rather not be killed or hurt -- or see anyone else get hurt or killed -- walking across a street to get to college or to get home from college," the 34-year-old Colona resident said Thursday.

Mr. Sanders is a student at Western Illinois University's Quad Cities campus pursuing a master's degree in law enforcement and justice administration. He said he and other WIU students often use free public parking spaces on River Drive across from WIU rather than pay $56 per year for campus parking permits.

However, he said, trying to cross River Drive at WIU is similar to the old video game Frogger.

"Western Illinois University and city of Moline has invested millions of dollars and has expanded (the area) to include housing, more classroom space, offices and restaurants," Mr. Sanders said. "So they should want to do everything they can to protect their investment.

"Sooner or later, though, someone's going to get hurt or killed there," he said.

Mr. Sanders said he and two friends were nearly struck by a car last month while trying to cross River Drive from WIU to the riverside parking spots. A car pulled around another vehicle stopped at a crosswalk, he said, and had to lock its brakes to narrowly avoid hitting him and his friends who all had to jump out of the way.

Mr. Sanders said he emailed a list of concerns and suggestions to Moline's engineering division, including an offer to personally pay for additional safety signage.

"The city agrees that safety is a concern there," said Moline City Engineer Scott Hinton. He said he understood and, for the most part, agreed with the concerns of Mr. Sanders.

A main issue was a request the city fix a yellow warning light at the crosswalk that had been destroyed by a drunk driver, Mr. Hinton said. Work crews have replaced the pole that was wiped out, he said, and the ordered replacement parts are expected to arrive soon.

Mr. Sanders suggested Moline add center-lane warning signs at the crosswalk and offered to buy or raise money for them. Mr. Hinton said city officials had discussed similar devices and "ordered them just the other day.

"But the city can afford a few hundred bucks on something like that," Mr. Hinton said, "and we agree it will help."

The city, however, does not plan to lower the speed limit on River Drive near WIU, according to Heather Hurley with the city engineering division. The current speed limit is 35 miles per hour; Mr. Sanders suggested lowering it to 25 mph.

Mr. Hinton also said Moline park board members are studying parking along the riverfront near WIU.

"We have so many Western Illinois University students use the free parking on the pathway -- rather than student parking on campus -- that we get complaints from the general public that they can't find enough parking," he said.

"We've also heard that some students have yelled at members of the general public to find another place to park, because 'this is our place,'" Mr. Hinton said. "But it doesn't make sense to talk about parking suggestions there until the park board has a chance to review recommendations for the park board director to consider."

Mr. Hinton said he expects those recommendations to be made soon.

Mr. Sanders also suggested more crosswalks on River Drive at WIU, including one near a wheelchair ramp/curb cut-out. Mr. Hinton said discussions continue about adding more crosswalks in the area.

"We may get to the point where more crosswalks are added," Mr. Hinton said. "But mid-block crossings are inherently dangerous, because drivers don't expect people to cross if there's not a traffic signal there.

"The city and Western have a history of working well together," he said. "Yet the safest thing students can do is park on the university's property."

Mr. Hinton said the safest place for people at WIU to cross River Drive is at its intersection with 34th Street where there are both traffic and pedestrian lights.

"Have you met a college student?" Mr. Sanders replied.

WIU students use the riverside parking to save money and be by the river, he said, and students want to be able to cross River Drive as soon as they can. Some students eat their lunch in the parking lot, he said; others in environmental study classes meet by the river to conduct experiments.

Mr. Sanders said some WIU classes run until 8:30 p.m., with darkness making it more difficult to cross River Drive. Only one side of River Drive is lit, he said, and because the LED lighting tends to shine straight down, students walk between sudden patches of light and darkness.

Mr. Hinton said he had not heard those concerns and would have them checked out.
CAMBRIDGE  The direction for economic development work in Henry County remains uncertain.

No action was taken at Thursdays county board meeting on a three-year economic development/tourism position.

Executive committee chairman Kippy Breeden withdrew a motion on the plan, explaining discussion was ongoing at the committee level.

Board chairman Roger Gradert said some good ideas were tossed around at the executive committee, so it will continue.

He described bringing community representatives together as the best way to get an answer if communities are interested in economic development, noting just three of 13 or 14 communities were not represented. A second meeting was held with just the mayors and city administrators from Geneseo, Kewanee, Galva and Cambridge. He said the concept of a $1 per person community contribution was pursued and also the question of whether tourism work should be included.

He said people wanted to know whether the county was committed. I said I cant speak for Henry County, and thats when we brought it to the board, he said.

He compared the situation to the original discussions for a courthouse expansion when he was new, where a big discussion involved walkways between but the preference emerged to have three buildings under one roof.

Board member Jake Waller criticized leadership for meeting with community leaders and not residents. He said with the countys deficit, no banker would go along with it, and the county is using other peoples money.

If we put this on a referendum right now it would never pass, he said.

Board member Ann DeSmith noted the county is $275,000 short in income tax revenue. You cant sit around and do nothing, because if you do, youre going to dwindle down to nothing.

She pointed out the news of a possible new business. Lynn Sutton, chairman of the Henry County Economic Development Partnership (HCEDP) had earlier in the meeting mentioned a prospective company that would mean significant jobs, saying he will meet with them face-to-face in October.

They need one person to talk to, not 10 people, said Ms. DeSmith.

Board member Karen Urick said she felt slight disappointment that the plan was not at that point we can act on it.

Mr. Sutton said the intention was to go to the communities and pursue a full-time director. He said HCEDP would support the plan.

To do it right is defined as a full-time director, someone with experience, and that person really shouldnt report to a part-time board of volunteers, he said.

Instead, a full-time person would report to the county executive committee through county administrator Colleen Gillaspie, according to Mr. Sutton.

As a result, he said, board chairman Roger Gradert called and chaired meetings to review plans.

The county also is looking at reducing the number of county board committees -- purportedly to streamline and save money. Revisions may be presented in October and acted on in November to apply to the newly elected board.

A resolution declaring a vacancy on the board was approved because of the Sept. 8 death of Dennis Anderson, of Galva. A black-bordered photograph of him  and a nameplate in reverse print occupied the table at his empty seat. A replacement will be named within 60 days. Mr. Gradert said there would be a presentation to remember Mr. Anderson at a future meeting. Ted Sturtevant was appointed to replace Mr. Anderson as chairman of the administration committee following a vote to suspend county board rules and take immediate action.
The announcement Thursday came as part of a settlement with the National Immigration Law Center and other immigrants rights groups that sued six years ago just after passage of the measure, referred to by its legislative shorthand, SB 1070.

The 2010 bill angered immigration activists, business leaders and the governments of more liberal cities, which announced boycotts of Arizona. A boycott from the Los Angeles City Council led Arizona Corporation Commissioner Gary Pierce to threaten to renegotiate your power agreements so that Los Angeles no longer receives any power from Arizona-based generation.

The state of Arizona will also pay $1.4 million in attorneys fees to the plaintiffs.

Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich issued an informal opinion as part of the settlement that instructs police officers to ignore the provision in the law that requires them to investigate a reasonable suspicion that a person is in the country illegally  an element of the law that immigrants rights groups warned would lead to racial profiling.

Officers shall not prolong a stop, detention or arrest solely for the purpose of verifying immigration status, Brnovich wrote. Officers shall not contact, stop, detain or arrest an individual based on race, color, or national origin, except when it is part of a suspect description.

If officers suspects that a person is in the country illegally, they may contact U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement unless doing so would prolong the stop or detention, Brnovich wrote.

Furthermore, officers are no longer required to ask for papers, but now may do so at their own discretion, and Brnovich outlined multiple reasons to drop such an inquiry, such as a heavy call load, inadequate staffing, lack of an available backup or a response from ICE that they are unavailable to assist.

For the very first time since May 2010, there will be clarity to every law enforcement officer in the state that the only way to follow SB 1070 is to make sure no one is detained on their immigration status alone, said Karen Tumlin, legal director of the National Immigration Law Center.

Senate Bill 1070, formally titled the Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act, was signed by then-Gov. Jan Brewer on April 23, 2010. It contained elements of previous, failed attempts in Arizona at curbing the rights of people in the country illegally, such as a 2004 bill that would have restricted their use of social services.

SB 1070 was an omnibus of Arizona anti-immigration measures, collecting a decades worth of fears of Mexican drug cartels, competition for jobs and the states rapidly expanding Latino population into one piece of legislation. It passed the Arizona House, 35-21, and the state Senate, 17-11.

The law contained four major elements aimed at lessening the number of immigrants in the state illegally through attrition. It compelled police to ask for papers and allowed officers to arrest a person without a warrant if the officer believed the person has committed an offense that makes them deportable.

The law also made it a crime to fail to carry registration papers and for people in the country illegally to solicit work.

Multiple parties attempted to block its implementation, including the U.S. Department of Justice. Just a day before the law was to take effect, a federal judge issued a preliminary injunction that held back its most aggressive elements while lawsuits against the bill played out. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the judges decision, and the case went to the Supreme Court.

In 2012, the Supreme Court, in a 5-3 ruling, blocked three provisions of the Arizona law, but upheld the provision that required officers to demand papers from individuals, a situation that even the conservative dissenters among the justices acknowledged could lead to improper detentions and arrests.

Despite the potential for problems, the Supreme Court ruled that the 9th Circuit had improperly blocked the provision without some showing that enforcement of the provision in fact conflicts with federal immigration law.

The court also warned of the potential constitutional problems with prolonging or extending a police stop, a clause which formed the crux of Brnovichs opinion. Brnovich also wrote that officers may decline to investigate an individuals immigration status if such an inquiry would hinder or obstruct an investigation.

The question now is: How will local police forces respond? How will they train themselves going forward? Tumlin said.

Arizonas immigration law inspired five states to enact similar legislation  Georgia, Utah, Alabama, South Carolina and Indiana. Those states laws have all been significantly rolled back by courts, including a similar show me your papers provision in Alabama.
MOLINE -- They've been building faith and values behind the altar for 110 years.

Members of Moline's Sacred Heart Catholic Church's Altar and Rosary Society will celebrate its anniversary during an annual September Fest from noon to 3 p.m. Sept. 11. A 1 p.m. style show, sponsored by society members, will highlight fashions from each decade.

Ten models, wearing costumes borrowed from the Quad City Music Guild, "will strut their stuff" at the style show in Culeman's Hall, 1400 16th Ave., Moline, church and society member Pami Triebel said. Costumes include one featuring plenty of Belgian lace to represent the society's 1906 founding year and a Jackie Kennedy outfit symbolizing the 1960s, she said.

Fashions change but the society's values haven't, colleague Kathy Schneider said.

"We have the same mission statement," she said. "Our mission is to develop a deep Catholic spirit among our members in their home life and personal life, as well as in their social life, and to assist the parish in providing financial support for various liturgical needs," according to materials provided by Ms. Schneider and Ms. Triebel

Members contribute to the costs of altar wine, breads and linens, and for vestments and candles. Other duties include making baptismal gowns and stoles, providing a monthly Mass for living and deceased society members, praying a group rosary for deceased people the day before a funeral and an annual Mother Teresa collection on Holy Thursday.

They also send greeting cards to people celebrating anniversaries and birthdays and sponsor special activities through the year.

They have two fundraisers per year to pay for supplies they provide Sacred Heart. A traditional bake sale was replaced by a "No-Bake" sale at which members are just asked to donate without the lure of baked goods. It raised about $2,000 last year, Ms. Triebel said.

The other major fundraiser is an annual card party and salad luncheon, she said.

The 200-member society has changed its organizational style, creating more of a "committee-of-the-whole approach, than an officers and board members style," Ms. Schneider said.

It also has begun a book club to reach younger members on Saturdays, "when husbands are available to baby-sit," she said.

The group's oldest member is 105.

"We're perceived as a group of little old women," Ms. Triebel said. "But we're getting a lot of young women in in their early to mid-30s."

The younger generation thinks the advice they get from women in their 80s and 90s is wonderful, she said. "After all, they once were in their 30s, too," she added.

Ms. Triebel said she has pored over church record books to gather a variety of fun facts. She shared how society members once collected 1,176 books of Green Stamps to buy a car for the nuns, at their request. The nuns wanted a red car but had to settle for a black one, per the priest's request, Ms. Triebel said.

She added she couldn't glean anything from the first 20 years of church records, because they were written in Flemish.
Almost 50 Illinois counties have filed lawsuits against Democratic Governor, JB Pritzker, and the ill crafted SAFE-T Act. Introduced in the General Assembly by the Illinois Black Caucus, the Act passed the Democratic-led General Assembly in the wee hours of Jan. 13, 2021. Amongst many of its weaknesses and deficiencies, the Act eliminates cash bail, emboldens criminals, and makes it even more difficult for law enforcement to keep offenders off our streets. Public Safety personnel and States Attorneys across our great State have decried the legislation, noting that it was drafted and written with very little constructive input from Public Safety leadership, from either party; potentially impacting every Illinois community with dangerous consequences. Allowing perpetrators to bail out of jail, based on their good word that they will be glad to return to court is laughable, at best, and both ludicrous and dangerous, at worst. Soon after the SAFE-T Act was passed at the State level, the Republican-led Henry County Board drafted a resolution, requesting that the General Assembly repeal and replace the SAFE-T Act with a new criminal justice bill, this time with input from professional law enforcement, States Attorneys from across the State, and other Public Safety officials. We unanimously passed our resolution on May 19, 2022, and encourage all County Boards in Illinois to follow our lead. Our Republican-led Board in Henry County believes we all, Democrats, Independents, and Republicans, deserve effective and fair law enforcement in our communities.
"In the walls of the cubicle there were three orifices. ... Similar slits existed in thousands or tens of thousands throughout the building. ... For some reason they were nicknamed memory holes." -- George Orwell, "1984"

Documents inconvenient to the regime went into the Ministry of Truth's slits and down to "enormous furnaces." Modern tyrannies depend on state control of national memories -- retroactive truths established by government fiat. Which is why Russia's Supreme Court recently upheld the conviction of a blogger for violating Article 354.1 of Russia's criminal code.

This May 2014 provision criminalizes the "Rehabilitation of Nazism." The blogger's crime was to write: "The communists and Germany jointly invaded Poland, sparking off the Second World War." The secret protocols of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact have gone down one of Vladimir Putin's memory holes.

The pact was signed Aug. 23, 1939. On Sept. 1, Germany invaded Poland. Sixteen days later, the Soviet Union invaded from the east. Poland was carved up in accordance with the secret protocols, and about six months later Soviet occupiers were conducting the Katyn Forest Massacre of 25,700 Polish military officers, officials, priests and intellectuals.

Although in 2009 Putin denounced the pact as "collusion to solve one's problems at others' expense," in 2015 he defended it as Stalin's means of buying time to prepare for the Nazi onslaught. This fable is refuted by, among other facts, this: Stalin did not prepare. When Germany's ambassador in Moscow informed Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov that their nations were now at war, a stunned Molotov asked, "What have we done to deserve this?"

The Russian Supreme Court's Orwellian ruling was that the blogger denied facts established by the Nuremberg war crimes tribunal. It convicted leading Nazis of waging aggressive war against, among others, Poland, but, in an act of victors' justice, made no judgment against the Soviet regime, representatives of which sat on the tribunal. This accommodation to postwar political reality was necessary to enable the tribunal to function, which was necessary for civilizing vengeance. The tribunal ignored, but did not deny, the patent fact of Soviet aggression.

The Russian court's ruling is a window into the sinister continuity of Putin's Russia and the Soviet system that incubated him. So, if the former secretary of state who aspires to the American presidency has time to read a book before Jan. 20, she should make it "The New Tsar: The Rise and Reign of Vladimir Putin" by Steven Lee Myers of The New York Times. It is a study of the volatile nostalgia of a man seething with resentments acquired as a KGB operative -- a "devoted officer of a dying empire" -- during the Soviet Union's final years. It is a pointillist portrait painted with telling details that should cause sobriety to supplant dreams of happy policy "resets" with Russia:

As a senior security official in post-Soviet Russia, Putin kept on his desk a bronze statue of "Iron Felix" Dzerzhinsky, founder of the Soviet secret police and terror apparatus. At Putin's May 7, 2000, presidential inauguration, a choir sang a composition "written in 1836 to celebrate a soldier's death in the war against Poland and rewritten in Soviet times ... to remove the homage to the tsar. For Putin, the choir sang the Soviet verses." There was the 2006 assassination in Moscow, on Putin's 54th birthday, of the troublesome journalist Anna Politkovskaya. (Asked about the frequent deaths of anti-Putin journalists, Donald Trump breezily said, "I think our country does plenty of killing.") And the 2006 poisoning in London of Putin's antagonist Alexander Litvinenko using radioactive polonium-210.

Domestically, Putin's "managed democracy" is Stalinism leavened by kleptomania, as in the looting of the energy giant Yukos. In foreign policy, Putin's Russia is unambiguously and unapologetically revanchist. The Soviet Union was likened to a burglar creeping down a hotel corridor until he finds an unlocked door. Putin, who found Crimea unlocked (when he honeymooned there in 1983, it seemed "a magical, sacred place to him," writes Myers), is pushing on the door of what remains of Ukraine.

The Democratic presidential nominee fundamentally misread Putin's thugocracy, and her opponent admires the thug because "at least he's a leader." As the Russian blogger's fate demonstrates, Putin practices what Orwell wrote: "'Who controls the past,' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.'"

Back in the day, some analysts prophesied a "convergence" between the Soviet Union and the United States, two industrial societies becoming more alike. In our day, there is indeed a growing similarity: In both places, post-factual politics are normal.
The other day, outraged about the early release of Brock Turner, who sexually assaulted a woman, I posted on my Facebook page the general outlines of my own rape, which occurred when I was 19 years old and on my first solo trip abroad. And I wondered, in the post, how many of my friends also had been raped.

Several women posted their own stories in the comments; others contacted me privately. Some had been raped more than once, and a few stories were horrifyingly violent, even beyond the violence of the sexual act itself. Mine, thankfully, was not; my rapist used threats rather than actual blows. (Youre having evil thoughts, he said when I struggled, and I kill evil things.) Just two women said they reported their rapes.

Friends who had been spared the experience expressed surprise and dismay over how common and close-to-home the crime was. And more than one person praised me for my courage in sharing my story.

Im still puzzling over this.

What is courageous about saying that I was the victim of a crime?

Before I continue, heres the dont-get-me-wrong disclaimer: I fully support every womans right to choose what she reveals about herself. Your life, your privacy, your choice. (Because women are raped in far greater numbers than men, one in five women as compared to one in 71 men according to the National Sexual Violence Resource Center, I am focusing on women.) As a friend pointed out, for some women privacy aids the healing process. Of course. I dont suggest that women who reveal are stronger or more whole than women who dont. (Is that what compliments about my courage imply?)

But I do wonder why women are so reluctant to reveal this all-too-common experience.

I dont share details of my private life on Facebook, said one woman. Understood. But I hardly think of my rape as part of my private life. Rape is a crime, an epidemic, a scourge of society. It is not my life. It is ours.

Granted, I made mistakes that day. I was young, naive, in a different culture for the first time and hungry for life. In retrospect, I shouldnt have trusted that nice man to show me a beautiful beach. I learned something -- which was the reaction of my therapist at the time. Well, she said, with a slight shrug. You learned something. And we never mentioned it again.

For years, I was ashamed of my naivete. But these days, I am proud, because the experience did not stop me from traveling alone.

Many of my friends stories contained an undercurrent of self-blame. One woman blamed herself outright -- she shouldnt have been hanging out with the friend who raped her -- and said she found comfort in that. She didnt want to blame someone else, to be perceived as a victim.

But none of the women came across as a victim to me. They all came across as Wonder Women. Strong. Angry. Unbroken. Not only that, but they are joyous, loving people.

Im bothered by the tradition of news outlets declining to name people who have been raped. Again, I dont suggest rape victims should be outed without permission. But doesnt protecting them also perpetuate the idea that they have something to hide, to be ashamed of? Were not squeamish about revealing the names of people who have been assaulted in other ways.

Alice Brine, a comedian from New Zealand, explained consent in a Facebook post that went viral. In it, she compares rape to robbery. Im gunna start going home with random very drunk guys and stealing all of their s---, the post started. Everything they own. It wont be my fault though ... they were drunk. They should have known better.

Its a terrific post, a brilliant analogy. But it raises the question: If we want the world to start viewing rape as it does any other crime, isnt it time we all -- including we victims -- start treating it that way? I was raped. Im not ashamed. My rapist should be.
Diamonique & Three Stone Simulated Apatite Ring, Sterling is rated 4.7 out of 5 by 53 .

Rated 5 out of 5 by shoppin_girl from Like looking into the Caribbean Sea LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the Caribbean blue/green color of these apatite stones! This is a beautiful blue/green, almost teal colored apatite ring. I was a little concerned about the size and cttw of the apatite & diamonique stones, but this is believable. I don't like gaudy, fake looking jewelry and I do not get that vibe from this ring. The ring runs true to size, and I ordered a size 9 to wear on my middle finger. It's a bigger, bolder piece than I would usually wear for everyday, but I think it'll look gorgeous with a dressy outfit or little black dress. Please bring us more simulated (or real) apatite pieces...I would love earrings or a pendant to match!

Rated 5 out of 5 by Edie C from STUNNING I recently received this ring, and to tell the truth I was very surprised at the sparkle that this ring gives off. If you are looking for a ring that will get noticed, then this is the one. I'm very happy with my purchase and you will be too if you order this ring.

Rated 5 out of 5 by Panda01 from Beautiful Thus and every ring I've bought on qvc are of good quality will continue to get my egg ings here

Rated 5 out of 5 by mitze from Very Beautiful I bought a real apatite bracelet maybe five or more years ago on the Q and this ring will go very nice with it. The stones in the ring are just the right size. I was afraid the middle stone would be too big but it was just the right size. I went on wait list and happy I got it. The price was right.

Rated 5 out of 5 by moon5 from Gorgeous ! Beautiful ring. Very pleased with purchase. Love the blue color. The ring sparkles and is just gorgeous !

Rated 3 out of 5 by Anonymous from It's okay I'm not super pleased but the ring is okay. It is a pretty color and fits great but it's very apparent this is costume jewelry. I am keeping because it's not worth it to send back and I will probably wear this.....just not that thrilled with it. I took a chance, I guess.

Rated 5 out of 5 by SC Lady from Beautiful ring I love this ring! When I first received it I couldn't believe how beautiful is is and how much it sparkles! I can't stop staring at it. Size is perfect. Highly recommend this ring.
G'day! It's Murray here. I've put together a little quiz to test your musical knowledge. Think you can score top marks in Murray's Magic Music Quiz? Give it a go now!
The project - a joint venture between Transnet Freight Rail and RailRunner- will see a test train of lorry trailers on rail bogies begin running on the Cape Corridor between Johannesburg and Cape Town in the first half of next year.

The RailRunner system - a container trailer chassis with conventional wheels for running on road and a dedicated bogie for rail operation - will enable road hauliers to focus on the last mile part of the logistics chain where rail cannot operate.

As well as helping Transnet in its stated aim to attract more traffic from road to rail, the deal could also clear the way for private-sector businesses to get involved in rail transport. While the tractor units and trailers are already privately owned, private operators would also own the RailRunner bogies.

Transnet will supply the locomotives and operate the trains as part of its general freight service. A typical RailRunner train would consist of 40 trailers although overseas experience has shown that consists could operate with up to 200 trailers.

Transnet says a bimodal service would offer its customers a complete logistics solution that combines the strength of both road and rail transport.

Local industry is also expected to score on the deal as the RailRunner bogies would be manufactured in South Africa, in line with Transnets localisation requirements.
The logo of Intel is seen during the annual Computex computer exhibition in Taipei, Taiwan June 1, 2016. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu/Files

REUTERS - Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd said on Thursday it was collaborating with Intel Corp to develop a wearable technology platform to track the progression of disease in patients with Huntington's, a fatal degenerative disorder.

The inherited condition causes the progressive breakdown of nerve cells in the brain, resulting in a gradual decline in motor control, cognition and mental stability.

There are no approved drugs to alter the course of Huntington's, although there are medicines that help with symptoms. Patients typically succumb to the disease within 1525 years of diagnosis.

Teva, with Intel, will deploy the technology as part of an ongoing mid-stage Huntington's study, the Israeli company said on Thursday.

Patients will use a smartphone and wear a smartwatch equipped with sensing technology that will continuously measure functioning and movement.

The data from the devices will then be wirelessly streamed to a cloud-based platform, developed by Intel, that will translate it, in near real-time, into scores to assess motor symptom severity.

The line between pharmaceuticals and technology is blurring as companies join forces to tackle chronic diseases using high-tech devices that combine biology, software and hardware.

Accurate monitoring using wearables is expected to dovetail with a drive to offer so-called value-based healthcare.

The aim is to prove that medicines can keep large groups of patients healthy, thereby improving their appeal to cost-conscious insurers. That gives drugmakers a major incentive to offer services that go beyond routine drug prescriptions.

Businesses such as Apple, Samsung Electronics and Alphabet, are all trying to find health-related applications for a new wave of wearable products.

Earlier this month, Sanofi and Verily, the life sciences unit of Google parent Alphabet Inc, announced a joint venture combining devices with services to improve diabetes care.

In August, GlaxoSmithKline and Verily created a new company focused on fighting diseases by targeting electrical signals in the body, a novel field of medicine called bioelectronics.

Story continues

Verily is also working on development of a smart contact lens in partnership with Swiss drugmaker Novartis that has an embedded glucose sensor to help monitor diabetes.

Sanofi also has a diabetes deal with Alphabet, while Biogen is working with the tech giant to study the progression of multiple sclerosis.

Teva, last year, announced it would partner with IBM's Watson Health.

(Reporting by Natalie Grover in Bengaluru and Steven Scheer in Jerusalam; Editing by Susan Thomas and Saumyadeb Chakrabarty)
Amid the significant media buzz and scrutiny over the arbitral tribunal's July ruling ( PDF ) before the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) regarding disputed maritime rights in the South China Sea, which sided with the Philippines on most counts and resulted in a major legal and diplomatic defeat for China, an important but less conspicuous ruling within the PCA award document on Chinese coast guard behavior was largely overlooked by the press. The ruling, entitled Operation of Law Enforcement Vessels in a Dangerous Manner, sought to assess whether or not China, by the actions of its maritime law enforcement (MLE) vessels, had breached its obligations under the United Nations Law of the Sea Convention (UNCLOS ( PDF )) by operating in a dangerous manner causing serious risk of collision to Philippine vessels navigating in the vicinity of Scarborough Shoal, otherwise known as the Philippines' Submission No. 13.

In one of the most sweeping rulings on the actions of maritime law enforcement in disputed waters on legal record, the tribunal found that China's coast guard had breached several UNCLOS articles governing safety and navigation at sea.

The Context

The court examined two incidents reported by Philippines officials as dangerous actions conducted by Chinese law enforcement vessels near Scarborough Shoal. The first incident occurred between a Chinese Fisheries Law Enforcement Command (FLEC) vessel and a Philippines Coast Guard (PCG) ship on April 28, 2012; the second between Philippines Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources and PCG vessels and Chinese FLEC and China Marine Surveillance (CMS) vessels on May 26, 2012. In both cases, the Philippines side claimed that near collisions occurred with Philippines MLE vessels due to intentionally dangerous or unprofessional maneuvers performed by Chinese MLE vessels that put Philippine lives and property at risk.

The first threshold the court sought to overcome was whether it had jurisdiction to rule on the Philippines' Submission No. 13. In its October 29, 2015 Award on Jurisdiction and Admissibility, the court ruled that Submission No. 13 fell under Articles 21, 24, and 94 of UNCLOS, and therefore it had jurisdiction to rule on the merits of the submission. In particular, there were three thresholds the court had to consider in order to decide whether it had jurisdiction over the submission. First, the tribunal found that the submission did not concern sovereignty or maritime delimitation. Second, the court determined that Article 298(1)(b) of the Convention, which excludes certain disputes concerning law enforcement activities from the procedures, was inapplicable because that exception applies only in the context of the exclusive economic zone. The present dispute, the court found, relates principally to events that occurred in the territorial sea of Scarborough Shoal. Finally, the court considered its jurisdiction was not dependent on a prior determination of sovereignty over Scarborough Shoal.

In rendering its judgment on whether Chinese actions broke international conventions regulating safe maneuvers at sea, the court relied upon the guidelines under the Convention on International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea, 1972, or COLREGS, of which both China and the Philippines are members, as the one of the generally accepted international regulations to which flag States are required to conform regarding rules of navigation, avoidance of accidents at sea, and good seamanship. The court found that COLREGS represented the most appropriate convention for application of Article 94 of UNCLOS. The court also relied upon two independent expert examinations of the merits of the Philippine claims  one conducted by retired United States Coast Guard officer and current Professor of Law at the University of Washington, Craig H. Allen (known as the Allen Report); and another by Captain Gurpreet S. Singhota, an official of the International Maritime Organization's Maritime Safety Division, who was appointed by the court in accordance with the Rules of Procedure section of Article 24 in order to obtain an independent expert assessment of the Philippines claims  to guide and inform the court's judgment on the case.

The Findings

In unambiguous terms, the tribunal found that Chinese actions had violated rules 2, 6, 7, 8, 15, and 16 of the COLREGS, thus breaching Article 94 of UNCLOS. The tribunal concluded that Chinese vessels in both instances failed to respect fundamental rules of COLREGS; namely, that vessels have a responsibility to operate at speeds and undertake maneuvers in such a manner as to avoid risk of collision, accidents at sea, and not imperil the life or property of other seafarers when operating in close proximity.

First, the court found that Chinese MLE vessels violated Rule 2 of COLREGS, concluding that Chinese conduct was irreconcilable with an obligation of responsible navigation. In this regard, the court accepted Captain Singhota's characterization of the Chinese vessels' conduct being in total disregard of good seamanship and neglect of any precaution. Further, when considering an exception within Rule 2(b) in COLREGS that permits departure from the COLREGS where necessary to avoid immediate danger, the court finds no evidence for such an exemption. In fact, the court found,

If anything, the record suggests that the Chinese maneuvers themselves created an immediate danger, rather than having been undertaken in response to a pre-existing threat. Additionally, while the Tribunal is aware that China's statements suggest that its actions were justified as part of general law enforcement activities in the vicinity of a feature which China considers to comprise part of its sovereign territory, the Tribunal also recognizes that, where the operational requirements of law enforcement ships stand in tension with the COLREGS, the latter must prevail.

The court also sided with the Philippines' claim that China violated Rule 6 of COLREGS, which requires vessels to undertake measures to avoid collision where possible by operating at safe speeds at sea. While noting that COLREGS does not define what constitutes safe speed, the court issued the following ruling:

In this instance, however, both Professor Allen and Captain Singhota consider the incidents described above to have occurred at unsafe speeds. The Tribunal concurs with that view and determines that the Chinese vessels' actions breached Rule 6.

Regarding rules 7 and 8 of COLREGS, which concerns first identifying whether a risk of collision is present, and, if so, the appropriate measures for mariners to take to avoid a collision at sea from occurring, the court found:

Indeed, far from avoiding a collision, the actions of the Chinese ships made the possibility of a collision substantially more likely. That fact aloneindependent of any question as to whether a collision, whether through the crew's effort or by good fortune, was ultimately avertedsuffices to demonstrate a violation of the COLREGS. For the same reasons as those underlying its conclusion with respect to Rule 2(a), the Tribunal considers the other requirement imposed by Rule 8, namely due regard to the observance of good seamanship, also to have been violated.

Finally, the tribunal found China to have breached Rules 15 and 16 of COLREGS relating to right-of-way for ships at sea. Rule 15 states that when two vessels are crossing so as to involve a risk of collision, the vessel which has the other on her own starboard side shall keep out of the way and shall, if the circumstances of the case admit, avoid crossing ahead of the other vessel. Rule 16 requires that every vessel which is directed to keep out of the way of another vessel shall, so far as possible, take early and substantial action to keep well clear.

The court found that Chinese MLE vessels violated both rules in both instances under consideration, ruling:

On April 28, 2012, FLEC 310 approached BRP Pampanga to within 600 yards; fifteen minutes later, it passed BRP Edsa II from the starboard quarter to the port side at a distance of barely 200 yards. In other words, rather than abiding by the applicable regulations by keep[ing] out of the way and avoiding the other ship, FLEC 310 did the opposite. The attempt by CMS 71, on 26 May 2012, to cut across the bow of MCS 3008 from the port (left) side at a distance of merely 100 yards admits of the same error. Accordingly, both incidents constituted a breach of the Rules of the COLREGS in this respect.

The court summarized its findings of Chinese violations by issuing the following damning indictment of Chinese MLE behavior towards the Philippines:

In light of the foregoing analysis, the Tribunal considers China to have repeatedly violated the Rules of the COLREGS over the course of the interactions described by the crew of the Philippine vessels and as credibly assessed in the two expert reports. Where Chinese vessels were under an obligation to yield, they persisted; where the regulations called for a safe distance, they infringed it. The actions are not suggestive of occasional negligence in failing to adhere to the COLREGS, but rather point to a conscious disregard of what the regulations require.

Why the Ruling Matters

The court's sweeping condemnation of Chinese MLE behavior is important for several reasons. First, the court struck down the Chinese argument that its actions were simply a defensive measure undertaken in response to a perceived threat by Filipino MLE actions. Rather, the court found that the Chinese maneuvers themselves created an immediate danger and demonstrated a serious and intentional breach of fundamental rules under COLREGS that ships take precautions for safe transit at sea.

Second, the court's ruling thrust into the spotlight the crucial but underappreciated value of COLREGS as a convention governing basic responsibilities of navigation and safety at sea. By employing the rules of COLREGS as a key maritime convention with applicability to the broader principles within UNCLOS, namely Article 94, the tribunal offered important thresholds of MLE violations and a legal precedence upon which analysts and international maritime legal prosecutors alike can rely upon in future cases of coercion by MLE actors at sea.

Finally, China's decision to deploy its coast guard as a coercive arm of its state policy to consolidate and protect its maritime interests in the South China Sea has been a cause for concern in the region. China's policy of might makes right and numerical superiority of coast guard vessels ensures continued dominance and bullying tactics towards smaller claimants in the South China Sea. While China can easily write off the PCA ruling on its coast guard behavior as just another piece of paper it can ignore, the hope is that this and future rulings will over time build a legal case that abiding by basic maritime principles of safety at sea is in the interest of all countries, including China.

Lyle J. Morris is a senior project associate at the nonprofit, nonpartisan RAND Corporation.

This commentary originally appeared on The Diplomat on September 9, 2016. Commentary gives RAND researchers a platform to convey insights based on their professional expertise and often on their peer-reviewed research and analysis.
Convicted member of notorious Russian gang to face new trial

MOSCOW, September 16 (RAPSI) - Member of notorious criminal syndicate, Orekhovo gang, Alexander Pustovalov, who has been earlier sentenced to 23 years in prison, will go on trial on murder charges, the Moscow prosecutors office announced on its website on Friday.

According to investigation, between 1995 and 1996, Pustovalov participated in killing six members of various criminal groups by order of the Orekhovo gang leaders. He stands charged with aggravated murder committed for selfish motives and in collusion with a group of people.

In 2005, Pustovalov was sentenced to 23 years in prison for gang activity and commitment of five counts of murder and one attempted assassination.

Investigators believe that the Orekhovo gang committed no less than 50 murders and murder attempts in Moscow city, Moscow and Vladimir regions, Greece and Ukraine. The most notorious hits include the murder of the head of Foundation for Social Support to Athletes, Otari Kvantrishvili, in 1994; the murder in Greece of infamous hitman Alexander Solonik and his friend Svetlana Kotova; and the murder of major crimes police investigator Yury Kerez in 1998.
At this years Insurtech Connect conference, Insider Engage spoke to Pranav Pasricha, Swiss Re's global head property and casualty solutions, Reinsurance, to discuss why the protection gap is the biggest challenge the reinsurance industry faces today and how Swiss Re is using technology to support clients to respond to new and emerging threats.
Alaskas state motto, North to the Future, represents our state as a land of promise. Alaskans believe in that promise, and in an overwhelming response to the Department of Interiors Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) proposed 2017-2022 Oil and Gas Lease Program, groups representing thousands of Alaska Natives, and other concerned citizens said the future should include exploration of offshore oil and gas. Over the three-month public comment period ending June 16, Alaskans underscored the significant economic opportunities and national energy security benefits which rest solely on the Arctic outer continental shelf (OCS) land leases included in the proposal.

Now, all eyes are on the Obama Administration to heed these Alaskan voices. Overwhelming support exists for Arctic OCS development, and Alaska leasing should stay in the five-year plan. Unfortunately, the curtailment of promising OCS development in the United States is not a novel concept. More than 42 million acres of Alaskan waters have already been eliminated from potential leasing. We have already witnessed the elimination of all lease sales in the Atlantic region in BOEMS plan. As a result, the proposed plan reflects only three potential sales in the Chukchi Sea, Beaufort Sea, and Cook Inlet planning areas.

The economic impact of banning offshore oil and gas development will be most acutely felt here in Alaska. The essential role that energy production plays in this state is well-acknowledged. Last year, the industry provided 90 percent of Alaskas total revenue, revenue for schools, roads, public safety, and welfare. It is responsible for one-third of all jobs and generated the $53.9 billion Alaska Permanent Fund, which pays a yearly dividend to Alaskan residents. Further, recent analysis confirmed offshore development could create up to 55,000 jobs annually and deliver an estimated payroll of $145 billion over the next 50 years.

The administrations ultimate decision will impact the nation, not just Alaska. Development of this regions offshore oil and gas resources will prove critical to American energy security, in part, through bolstering the Trans Alaska Pipeline System which remains a key energy conduit that has supplied domestic energy to the U.S. for almost 40 years.

The 800-mile pipeline, or TAPS as it is known, has played a valuable role in transporting oil produced on the North Slope of Alaska south to the Continental U.S. At its peak, TAPS moved more than 2 million barrels daily. Today, it flows at just a quarter of that rate.

This decline in production represents a problem for the pipelines long-term viability, as lower flow levels slow the movement of crude oil and allow for ice formation and other low-flow complications throughout the system. Without new sources of oil, operations will become challenged to keep the system functioning year-round, potentially jeopardizing all North Slope oil and gas production. But with Alaskas vast offshore oil resources, we can ensure the long-term viability of TAPS  and U.S. energy security.

The ramifications of excluding Arctic locations from the OCS leasing program would have a substantial impact on U.S. medium and long-term energy security. But the limited number of proposed lease areas in the plan is cause for equal concern for the nation.

The Energy Information Administration (EIA) expects oil and gas production from the Lower 48 states to decline starting in 2030. Prevention of Arctic OCS development now would mean eliminating future opportunity and risk a return to the 1970s energy price volatility that first prompted the construction of TAPS.

Oil and gas production is not new to Alaska and fair access to the states resources is essential to our economy and Americas energy security. The Obama Administrations Interior Department must take these realities into consideration and retain the Beaufort, Cook Inlet and Chukchi Seas leases when it announces the final program. Blessed with abundant natural resources, Alaska is indeed a land of promise; lets not allow that promise to go unfulfilled.
It turns out that food poisoning for the sake of ideological purity doesnt appeal to Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump after all. Trump on Thursday delivered the latest iteration of his economic policy platform in a speech before the Economic Club of New York. But he had barely finished speaking before his campaign took down a fact sheet describing the plan from its website, replacing it hours later with a vastly different plan.

Among the things that appeared in the first description of the plan was a vow to eliminate what the campaign referred to as the Food Police of the Food and Drug Administration.

Related: Trump Has a New Economic Plan, but the Numbers Still Dont Add Up

The FDA Food Police, which dictate how the federal government expects farmers to produce fruits and vegetables and even dictates the nutritional content of dog food. The rules govern the soil farmers use, farm and food production hygiene, food packaging, food temperatures, and even what animals may roam which fields and when. It also greatly increased inspections of food facilities, and levies new taxes to pay for this inspection overkill.

Maybe the Trump campaign realized that over the past century, Americans have come to expect a certain degree of, well, hygiene when it comes to the preparation of their food. Or perhaps Trump himself decided that hes more comfortable picking up buckets of Kentucky Fried Chicken from franchises that have to meet at least minimal health standards.

In any case, when a new version of the fact sheet appeared on the Trump campaign website Thursday afternoon, the Food Police language had been stripped out, along with quite a bit more of what the campaign originally proposed.

The major overhaul of his just-proposed economic platform was especially remarkable because yesterday wasnt Trumps first bite at this particular apple. The plan he released yesterday was a retooled version of an earlier economic policy platform that had been pilloried by economists and other experts as irresponsible and unrealistic.

Story continues

Related: Is the Race Tied? Why Trump Isnt Really That Close to Winning

Also gone from the Trump proposal, as Politico reported last night, was a proposal to eliminate and obscure Environmental Protection Agency mandate, the Renewable Identification Number (RIN) program that governs ethanol blending requirements. The change would have greatly benefited Trumps friend, the investor Carl Icahn.

Among the other changes to the plan:

-- Added a statement claiming that the 3.5 percent economic growth rate Trump promised has the potential to reach 4 percent.

-- Eliminated a claim that Trumps proposed 10 percent tax on repatriated business income would instantly bring trillions of dollars back into the US economy.

-- Eliminated a promise to provide a lower income tax rate for high-income individuals and small businesses.

-- Modified a proposal for a blanket halt to new regulations in favor of blocking only those not compelled by Congress or public safety.

-- Eliminated a plan to scrap new EPA rules addressing ground-level ozone emissions.

Related: With Clinton Campaigning Again, Trump Renews Attacks on Her Health

Traditionally, a presidential campaign planning to make a major policy announcement takes great pains to get the details right the first time. But just as Trump has flouted most other norms of conventional presidential politics, the campaign apparently thought nothing of consigning its first iteration of yesterdays plan to the electronic memory hole without notice or explanation.

How long the most recent set of proposals will remain operative is, at this point, anybodys guess. And there doesnt appear to be any reason to expect that Team Trump will notify the public when the candidate changes his mind again.

Top Reads from The Fiscal Times:
The foreign policy positions of third-party candidates haven't received a great deal of media attention in the 2016 presidential election, but that could change in the weeks ahead as polls continue to tighten in crucial battleground states.

[M]ost voters think/assume that Clinton is going to win. That can de-motivate turnout, or shift votes to [third] parties, tweeted elections analyst Nate Silver.

RealClearWorld had the opportunity this week to discuss a variety of foreign policy issues with Green Party presidential nominee Jill Stein. This email interview has been edited for clarity and length.

RCW: Dr. Stein, you have proposed freezing the bank accounts of officials in the Saudi government -- which Saudi accounts would you target as president?

JILL STEIN: We would freeze the bank accounts of the Saudi government until they freeze the funding for terrorist groups that is coming from their country.

RCW: Congress just recently passed a bill that would allow the families of victims of the 9/11 attacks to sue Saudi Arabia in a U.S. court. President Obama is likely to veto the measure. Where do you stand on this?

JILL STEIN: I would sign the bill to allow the families of 9/11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia. It would be a positive step forward not only for the families of 9/11 victims, but also for international law to allow victims of criminal violence to hold the perpetrators accountable regardless of international borders.

RCW: You recently called for a new investigation into the Sept. 11 attacks. As president, how would you pursue that effort? What do you expect to do differently, and what new information do you expect to discover?

JILL STEIN: The co-chairs of the original 9/11 Commission published a book rjust two years after their own final report, concluding that the Commission was set up to fail." That is why we would create a truly independent 9/11 commission.

We dont know what we would discover, but we would ask the independent commission to investigate the ties with Saudi intelligence as revealed in the recently declassified 28 pages of the 2002 Congressional report.

RCW: Various human rights organizations have accused the Syrian government of using incendiary weapons and cluster bombs, and the United Nations has reported on the use of chlorine bombs in the war-torn country. Considering Russias support for the Bashar Assad government, would these human rights violations at all complicate your calls for principled collaboration in the region?

JILL STEIN: The situation in Syria is complicated and disastrous, with an all-out civil war in Syria, and a proxy war among many powers seeking influence in the region. U.S. pursuit of regime change in Libya and Iraq created the chaos that promotes power grabs by extremist militias. Many of the weapons we are sending into Syria to arm anti-government militias end up in the hands of ISIS. In Syria its extremely difficult to sort out this complicated web of resistance fighters, religious extremists, and warlords with backing from regional and world powers.

The one thing that is clear is that U.S. meddling in the Middle East is throwing fuel on the fire.

I call for principled collaboration in bringing a weapons embargo to the region, freezing the bank accounts of countries that continue to fund terrorist groups, promoting a cease-fire, and supporting inclusive peace talks. The region is extremely complicated.

The best thing we can do for Syria, the Middle East, and the world is to de-escalate this conflict, and involve as many of the players as we can in that de-escalation.

RCW: The United States has several military bases across the Mideast, and thousands of troops stationed in the region. U.S. agencies also engage in counterterrorism efforts with host countries there, and sponsor troop and police training programs in countries like Jordan and Bahrain, just to name a couple. Would you, if elected president, close these bases and end these programs?

JILL STEIN: Yes. The project of U.S. military and economic domination of the Middle East has been a disaster, and we need to send a clear signal that our foreign policy is shifting to one based on diplomacy, international law, and human rights. Bahrain is one of many examples of U.S. support for repressive regimes in the Middle East.

RCW: The United States agreed this week to provide the government of Israel with $38 billion in military aid over the course of ten years -- what is your position on this, and as president would you honor this agreement or work to overturn it?

JILL STEIN: We would put our allies on notice that we will not continue to provide funding or weapons to countries that are flagrantly and systematically violating international law and human rights. This applies not only to Israel, but also to Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain, and others.

The United States government has encouraged the worst tendencies of the Israeli government as it pursues policies of occupation, apartheid, assassination, illegal settlements, demolitions, blockades, building of nuclear bombs, indefinite detention, collective punishment, and defiance of international law. Instead of allying with the courageous proponents of peace and human rights within Palestine and Israel, our government has rewarded consistent abusers of human rights.

RCW: How would you handle enforcement of the Iran nuclear agreement? Would you seek better ties with the Iranian government, or work to further isolate the government in Tehran?



We support the Iran nuclear agreement as a step toward nuclear disarmament. We would seek better ties with the Iranian government, and take advantage of the moderate Rouhani administrations openness to greater diplomatic engagement. By engaging the Rouhani administration, we seek to reduce the influence of Irans right-wing hardliners, and improve the prospects for human rights in Iran. We have no desire to obliterate Iran (as called for by Secretary Clinton), nor would we engage in belligerent rhetoric toward Iran, as Mr. Trump has done.

[Editors note: RCW followed up with the Stein campaign on Secretary Clintons 2008 remarks regarding a hypothetical Iranian nuclear attack on Israel, but the campaign declined to comment further.]

RCW: The civil war in Syria has displaced millions. How would the Stein administration handle the Syrian refugee crisis?

JILL STEIN: We would stop creating more Syrian refugees by ending the airstrikes and working intensively to establish and maintain a cease-fire. We would send humanitarian aid to Syria, and welcome Syrian families fleeing the civil war as refugees. This is the ethical and moral thing to do, and would signal a paradigm shift in our engagement with the Arab world.
realclearworld Newsletters: Mideast Memo

Sitting in for an interview last week on MSNBCs Morning Joe, Libertarian Party presidential candidate Gary Johnson found himself stumped and stumbling during this unfortunate exchange with journalist Mike Barnicle:

BARNICLE: What would you do if you were elected about Aleppo?

JOHNSON: About?

BARNICLE: Aleppo.

JOHNSON: And what is Aleppo?

BARNICLE: Youre kidding.

JOHNSON: No.

BARNICLE: Aleppo is in Syria. Its the epicenter of the refugee crisis

JOHNSON: OK. Got it. Got it.

It was the kind of TV gaffe that serves as a handy and amusing anecdote in the Amtrak cafe car and is shared over and over again across multiple social media platforms -- as indeed it was. The former Republican two-term governor of New Mexico was left deservedly chastened, and he would spend the following days atoning for the error during his media rounds.

The media frenzy over Johnsons Aleppo flap died down rather quickly in this election cycle of serial gaffes and short attention spans. Johnson insists that the embarrassing episode has actually aided his campaign efforts, and survey data post-gaffe suggests that the brief affair has had little effect on his poll numbers.

Interestingly overlooked during the hullabaloo over the governors remarks was the fact that his own proposals for dealing with Syria -- in which for instance he suggests joining hands with Russia to help bring an end to hostilities in the country -- sound strikingly similar to current U.S. policy there. (To make no mention of their similarity to the suggested policies of Republican presidential nominee Donald J. Trump.)

Green Party presidential nominee Jill Stein found herself at the center of a similar albeit smaller storm last week, when the physician and longtime activist called for a new inquiry into the Sept. 11 attacks. Judging the original 9/11 Commission to be too compromised and caught up in politics, Stein told RealClearWorld that as president she would ask the new commission to investigate any possible ties to Saudi intelligence in the attacks carried out 15 years ago this month.

Stein -- who has not shied away from targeting longtime U.S. ally Saudi Arabia -- has proposed freezing Saudi government bank accounts if any officials in Riyadh were determined to be complicit in the funding of terrorism, and she has also pledged, if elected, to sign a bill that would allow the families of 9/11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia in U.S. courts. President Barack Obama has vowed to veto the bill, which passed unanimously in the House last week.

It would be a positive step forward not only for the families of 9/11 victims, but also for international law to allow victims of criminal violence to hold the perpetrators accountable regardless of international borders, Stein said via email.

Analysts have panned the proposed legislation, arguing that it would open American servicemen and women up to similar litigation abroad. Additionally, alleged links between Saudi officials and the 9/11 attackers remain murky and conjectural at best, and the U.S.-Saudi relationship has become incredibly valuable in the fight against terrorism. Any reassessment or severing of those ties could bring negative consequences for U.S. policymaking in the future, but these are tradeoffs that the Stein campaign is willing to make.

The project of U.S. military and economic domination of the Middle East has been a disaster, and we need to send a clear signal that our foreign policy is shifting to one based on diplomacy, international law, and human rights.

It is undeniable that there has been a noticeable shift in American thinking on traditional Arab allies like those in Riyadh. Johnson and Stein -- much like Mr. Trump -- are tapping into a palpable sense among the American public that there is something terribly awry about U.S. policy in the Middle East. While American public opinion has indeed turned against the Iraq War and the wisdom of its prosecution, so too has opinion of President Obamas handling of the regional chaos that has ensued since the United States ended major combat operations in Iraq. The rise of the Islamic State group, coupled with state collapse and war in Syria, have called into question the Obama administrations handling of the war on terror, and the apolicies of both administrations have left Americans looking for answers and assurances.

Johnson and Stein have made their missteps, and critics have pointed in particular to Steins political dalliances with Russia -- and her appearances on Russian television -- as an example of just how out of step the Green candidate is with the conventional foreign policy wisdom. But if the chosen candidate of the party of Reagan can criticize the sitting U.S. president on Russian television, why cant Stein dine with Vladimir? In this unorthodox, upsidedown election year, all bets appear to be off.

Neither third-party candidate is going to be elected president this fall, nor are they likely to have too significant of an impact on the nationwide popular vote (Johnson and Stein finished with 1 percent and 0.4 percent of the vote, respectively, in their 2012 presidential bids). Both, however, draw much of their support from millennial voters, and as my RCP colleague David Byler notes, this will likely hurt Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton the most. This could prove particularly relevant as polls tighten up in the so-called battleground states, and as a percentage point here or there becomes more consequential.

Johnson takes from both major-party candidates, but slightly more from Clinton than Trump. When you add Stein into the mix, Clinton still often loses more supporters to third parties than Trump does, said Byler, who covers elections and polling data for our Politics sister-site.

Green activists and social libertarians believe that time has vindicated their positions on social issues such as gay marriage and marijuana legalization, even if the ballot box has not. Could the same prove true of foreign policy? Its a question that Hillary Clinton, the undisputed flag-bearer of the foreign policy establishment, will need to answer, and fast.

The Johnson campaign could not be reached for comment at time of publication.

More on this:

Green Party Presidential Nominee Jill Stein on Middle East Policy

RCP Poll Average: Trump vs. Clinton vs. Johnson vs. Stein

Don't Blame Gary Johnson For Not Knowing About Aleppo



***

Questions, comments, or complaints? Feel free to send us an email, or reach out on Twitter @kevinbsullivan.

Eager for more Mideast news and analysis? Check out our new site, Real Clear Middle East.

The Mideast Memo will be on break next week.
If you go to the World Banks country overview page for China, you will find a striking comment in the first paragraph: Since initiating market reforms in 1978, Chinahas lifted more than 800 million people out of poverty. Speaking at the G-20 summit in Hangzhou at the beginning of this month, Chinese President Xi Jinping said that China has lifted more than 700 million people out of poverty and improved the living standards for 1.3 billion people overall. So China and the World Bank agree, give or take a hundred million people.

Xi also noted in his remarks that this success is unprecedented in human history. He happens to be correct about that  no country has ever made the sort of developmental leaps that China has made in the last 38 years since opening up its economy, or in the last 67 years since the Communist Party came to power. The problem is that the World Banks definition of poverty in this case is extremely narrow, and the 800 million figure obscures, rather than reveals, that poverty is still a significant problem in China and one of the most important drivers of our forecast for the country.

The World Bank began tracking poverty in China in 1981. In that year, 88.3 percent of Chinas population lived on less than $1.90 a day (roughly 870 million people). Push the threshold up a little bit and poverty in China was even more striking: 99.1 percent of Chinas population lived on less than $3.10 a day (over 980 million people). The last year for which the World Bank has official data is 2010, and the transformation, as you can see in the line graph above, is extraordinary. In 2010, only 11.2 percent (almost 150 million people) lived on less than $1.90 a day. Not shown above is that 27.2 percent (almost 360 million people) lived on less than $3.10 a day.

However, the problem with these data sets should already be clear. If you factor in population growth, you can make the claim that China has lifted 800 million people out of poverty if you define poverty as living on less than $1.90 or $3.10 a day. This doesnt say anything about how well those lifted out of poverty are doing. A rural household living on $1.91 a day by this standard wouldnt be counted as suffering from extreme poverty, even though by any objective measure a household earning that much on an annual basis would be cripplingly poor.

Another less obvious problem is in some ways more serious. The average annual per capita disposal income by household in China in 2014 was about 20,071 yuan  about $3,000, or $8.22 a day. On the face of it that seems a somewhat promising figure. It wouldnt make any of these households rich, or even lower-middle class by American standards, but it would be quite a leap forward from where they started. The average figure, however, is skewed by the huge disparity between urban and rural incomes. Urban households per capita income was 29,831 yuan  almost $4,500 a year. Rural households have a per capita income of only 9,892 yuan  about $4 dollars a day.

The rejoinder to this is that far more Chinese citizens work in the cities than in the countryside compared to any other period in Chinese history. And this is true, to an extent. One of the most remarkable things about Chinas transformation is how it has urbanized. When the Communists came to power, 80 percent of the people lived in the countryside. There was no proletariat in China  the revolution was carried out by a massive agricultural peasant class. In 1978, only about 23 percent of people employed in China were urban workers  the country was still predominantly rural. As of 2014, over half of Chinas roughly 770 million employed workers were urban workers. The problem is that the other half  almost 380 million people  are employed in rural areas. The urban households arent exactly raking it in, but the rural households have not progressed far enough beyond the World Banks arbitrary $3.10 to say they have escaped much of anything, and certainly not poverty.

There is another divide that also skews the data upwards: the division between the coastal and interior provinces.

The above maps strikingly show how relevant this dichotomy remains in Chinese society today. Urban households in coastal cities like Beijing or Shanghai are faring quite well. An urban households per capita disposable income in Beijing is 48,531 yuan and in Shanghai it is 48,841 yuan. McKinsey & Company released a report in 2013 that predicted that 75 percent of Chinas urban consumers would be middle class by 2022  a whopping 270 million people. Thats a middle class almost the size of the entire population of the United States. McKinsey expects these urban households in the most successful Chinese cities to make between 60,000 and 229,000 yuan a year within the next eight years.

The problem is that the advancement is not being enjoyed evenly. Even the urban households in many of the interior Chinese provinces are earning far less than the per capita average. Meanwhile, cities like Beijing and Shanghai are doing over 43 percent better than the mean, and urban households in coastal provinces like Zhejiang or Guangdong are also doing extremely well. The contrast is even starker when you look at the map of urban household income beside a map of per capita disposable income by rural household. The rural workers in the coastal provinces are doing far better than their peers in the interior provinces, many of whose per capita incomes per household remain dangerously close to the World Banks poverty cut-off.

None of these facts should detract from recognizing that the era of growth and transformation ushered in by Deng Xiaoping has been nothing short of extraordinary. Despite the challenges outlined above, China is the worlds second largest economy, and even minor fluctuations in China can send ripples throughout the global economy. Both urban and rural households, on the coast and in the interior, have seen their incomes steadily increase. But it hasnt been enough, and China is running out of steam. The high growth rates it depended on to drive its industrialization and urbanization have begun to slow down, and those growth rates arent going to go back up. By the World Banks standards, China has lifted hundreds of millions of Chinese citizens out of poverty. There are hundreds of millions, perhaps even half a billion more, who have not been lifted out of poverty, who look around and see that they have not participated in Chinas rise and that their prospects for joining look more like the central government telling them to tighten their belts for yet another generation.

For decades now, generations of Chinese poor have done just that. The question is whether there are limits to their patience. It is this question that drives many of the items on our watch lists, like yesterdays reports that 45 National Peoples Congress fat cats were expelled for corruption and that a violent crackdown was under way on protests against central government authority in Wukan. Or the news on Monday that the government had to censor information after Chinese social media became enraged about a Peoples Armed Police Force officer using his position to travel first class. The Chinese economy has accomplished a great many things, but solving poverty is not one of them. It looms behind every step Beijing takes, no matter what the World Bank or Xi say on the matter.
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By Elizabeth Kwiatkowski, 09/15/2016



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Elizabeth Kwiatkowski is Associate Editor of Reality TV World and has been covering the reality TV genre for more than a decade.
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As you might be aware, a bunch of our editorial team is down at a media event on Apache land down in Arizona's Dragoon Mountains. We're doing some tracking  something Jim Grasky of Trails Found is known for internationally  but more than that we're working on and around horses. Grasky's program, called to our attention by Breach-Bang-Clear, is called A Horse is a Village. He uses it to teach horse handling skills to SOF troops who may never have seen a horse anywhere but in a movie before. These soldiers, usually Special Forces troops, are typically preparing to deploy to a remote and austere location where mobility comes not on four wheels but on four legs. He does so by equating it to the classic Special Forces counter-insurgency/FID (Foreign Internal Defense) mission. Grasky, now approaching 80, was a Green Beret with 8th SFG during he Vietnam era  but he wasn't in Vietnam. He was riding and tracking across South America helping run down Che Guevara. He is a cowboy in the literal sense of the word  he's been a horseman his entire life; an SME in every sense of the word, he's a superlative rider, an excellent shot, and an outstanding communicator.

You just have to keep up with him.

Photo by Matt Stagliano.

Some other SMEs are here as well, including Rene Noriega. Noriega is a seasoned (one might say crusty) former training agent/instructor for the local USBP mounted unit. He now runs EquiStride Integrative Therapy. Check social media for the hashtag #trailsfound16. Keep an eye on our Instagram (@recoilmagazine) and Facebook as well  we'll publish imagery and videos as the opportunity presents itself. It's not the first tracking we've done (if you recall the recent Maryland trip) but it is the first time we've done anything tactical while perched on top of a half ton + animal.

Cover photo by David Merrill.

Trails Found: Saddle Up With Jim Grasky

[instagram-feed includewords="#trailsfound16,#jimgrasky,#ahorseisavillage" instagram-feed showlikes=true instagram-feed disablemobile=true]
The Republican Party took home a wave of victories after Tuesday's midterm election, including a gain of seven seats in the U.S. Senate and 13 seats in the House of Representatives for a majority representation in Congress, as of press time.
Ashley Block could run circles around anyone before most even got their day started, friends and family said. She was a warm and selfless go-getter who left her classmates and friends wondering how she had the time in a day to do it all.
FILE - In this Aug. 2, 2011 file photo, Cristina Alfaro Mejia, whose husband and daughter were killed by soldiers during a massacre in the community of Dos Erres in 1982, holds a rose while waiting for the sentencing of soldiers in Guatemala City. The court sentenced three former special forces soldiers to 6,060 years in prison each for the massacre of more than 200 men, women and children during Guatemala's 36-year civil war which ended in 1996. The story of the massacre is told in Finding Oscar, a documentary executive-produced by Steven Spielberg that premieres in Sept. 2016 at the Telluride Film Festival in Colorado. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)

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By SONIA PEREZ D., Associated Press

GUATEMALA CITY (AP)  Ramiro Osorio still has vivid memories of the day that death came to his village of Las Dos Erres over 30 years ago at the height of Guatemala's decades-long civil war.

Soldiers massacred more than 200 people at the town in the remote northern region of Peten. The 5-year-old Osorio's life was spared, but he was abducted by a soldier who he says kept him as a slave for years, tortured him and even tried to kill him.

"He always told me that if I thought of running away from the house there was no way, that he could find me even five meters below ground," Osorio said. "I was very afraid."

Now the story of the massacre at Las Dos Erres is being brought to the big screen in "Finding Oscar," a documentary executive-produced by Steven Spielberg that premieres this weekend at the Telluride Film Festival in Colorado.

"Finding Oscar" recounts the events of Dec. 6-7, 1982, which began when Guatemalan soldiers went to the village looking for weapons that guerrillas had stolen from them. Troops tortured and raped female villagers, interrogated and executed men and, to cover up the abuses, tossed the living and the dead into a well. Years later forensic workers recovered the remains of 162 adults and 67 children.

It also tells the stories of Osorio and Oscar Ramirez, who was 3 years old when he was abducted from Las Dos Erres. The film's title refers to the years-long search by an activist and a prosecutor for Ramirez, who migrated to the United States at age 17. Genetic testing ultimately matched him to his father, who also survived the massacre and has visited him in the United States.

Osorio lived with Santos Lopez Alonzo, the soldier accused of kidnapping him, until he joined the Guatemalan army at age 18. Last month Lopez was deported from the United States, where he had lived since 2001, and charged by Guatemalan prosecutors with murder, kidnapping of a minor and crimes against humanity. He denies the accusations.

"With the documentary what one hopes is for justice to be done and for what happened in Las Dos Erres to never happen again," Osorio said.

Ramirez and Osorio have been granted political asylum in the United States and Canada. They met for the first time last December, 33 years after the massacre.

"Meeting Oscar and knowing what his backstory was, I was completely surprised," filmmaker Ryan Suffern said. "He was nothing (like) what I thought I probably expect from somebody who had experienced that. He's incredibly kind. He's an amazing father, husband, hard worker, and very gracious and a very warm human being."

Suffern added that he found Ramirez's story "a really interesting point of access into a larger conversation on quite a few different issues, issues of not only genocide but U.S. foreign policy ... and immigration."

During the 1980s, the Reagan administration had direct contact with Guatemala's then-dictator Efrain Rios Montt. A month after the massacre  when the army's atrocities were already known, according to declassified U.S. diplomatic cables  the Reagan administration asked Congress for more economic support for the Guatemalan military.

At least 245,000 people were killed or disappeared during Guatemala's 1960-1996 conflict, according to the United Nations. Other Central American nations also went through bloody civil wars and today are suffering from high homicide rates as hyper-violent gangs terrorize large parts of the population.

"We will use this film to educate more people about what happened," said producer Scott Greathead, who is also a lawyer and helped Ramirez normalize his migratory status. "We hope Americans understand why Guatemalans, Hondurans and others are here (in the U.S.), why they come and what they are fleeing."
Greg Barnette/Record Searchlight

Firefighters are battling a 3-acre blaze that broke out at about 4:15 p.m. Thursday north of the Pit River Bridge.

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Firefighters successfully battled a vegetation fire that broke out Thursday afternoon north of the Pit River Bridge in Shasta County.

Crews kept the fire to about 3 acres. The fire started about 4:15 p.m. off Interstate 5 near the Gilman Road off-ramp some 30 miles north of Redding.

The fire burned upslope near power lines but did not threaten any structures, according to initial dispatch reports.

Firefighters got help from air tankers that dropped retardant on the flames.

About one mile of the slow lane of northbound I-5 was temporarily closed at the OBrien exit due to the fire activity, the California Department of Transportation said.
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By Damon Arthur of the Redding Record Searchlight

A proposed land deal to create a community park in Fall River Mills could take another step forward next week, but the project will have to get in line with a dozen other pending land transfers in Shasta County.

Collectively, the transfers aim to create a small windfall for park, agriculture and conservation advocates, but have been moving at the plodding pace of government for more than a decade.

The Stewardship Council of San Mateo is set to vote on transferring ownership of 34 acres from Pacific Gas and Electric Co. to the Fall River Valley Community Services District.

While 12 other Shasta County projects dating back at least 10 years are still going through the land transfer process, Allene Zanger, executive director of the Stewardship Council, said the Fall River park project could be completed by next year.

The Stewardship Council was established in 2004 after the utility declared bankruptcy. It is to facilitate transfer of some 140,000 acres of PG&E land in California for public uses as part of the settlement. The council is working with public agencies and private nonprofit groups to establish conservation easements on the parcels.

The council is facilitating transfer of 47,405 acres of PG&E land in Shasta County and 1,774 acres in Tehama County. There are still some 25,000 acres pending on 13 projects in Shasta County, Zanger said. All of the donations in Tehama County are complete, she said.

The process of transferring ownership of the land and setting up conservation easements on some 100 projects statewide is complex, Zanger said. Conservation easements are property title restrictions that limit development and are typically used to preserve open space or protect wildlife habitat.

Even after negotiations between the land owners, PG&E and council are complete, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and California Public Utilities Commission have to sign off on the proposals, she said.

Zanger said the agency has a deadline to complete its work by 2019.

The bankruptcy agreement requires the council to set aside the PG&E properties for outdoor recreation, sustainable forestry, agriculture, natural resource protection, open space preservation and protection of historic and cultural resources.

Areas in Shasta County being transferred include parcels in the Pit River, Fall River Valley, Hat Creek, Iron Canyon Reservoir, Burney, Battle Creek and Cow Creek watershed areas. Parcels in Tehama County are in the Deer Creek area.

In addition to the park property, the council board is also expected to vote on a proposal to create a conservation easement on another 18 acres and transfer title to the land to the Fall River Resource Conservation District.

The 18 acres will be combined with another 523 acres already set to be transferred to the conservation district. It will be used for agriculture and livestock grazing, as well as preserving open space, Zanger said.

If the plan is approved, the council, district and PG&E would then need to negotiate terms of the transaction. Final terms would have to be approved by the board later.

After the board's action on the park property next week, the proposal does not come back for additional approval, Zanger said.

The district wants to transform the oblong strip of land west of River Street into a passive park near where the Fall River cascades into the Pit River.

"It was the hope of the district to take a piece of land that wasn't exactly an eyesore, but wasn't living up to its potential and help it live up to its potential," General Manager Bill Johnson said.

If you go

What: Stewardship Council meeting to consider a plan to transfer title of 18 acres from PG&E to the Fall River Valley Community Services District.

When: 1-3 p.m. Wednesday.

Where: West Room of the Tsakopoulos Library Galleria, 828 I St., Sacramento.
Jim Schultz/Record Searchlight

Sharon Turman, shown Thursday in Shasta County Superior Court, was sentenced to two years, eight months in prison.

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By Jim Schultz of the Redding Record Searchlight

Scooby Doo van driver sentenced to prison

A judge on Thursday sentenced the Redding woman who pleaded guilty to leading law enforcement officers on a high-speed chase in a "Scooby Doo" Mystery Machine van to two years, eight months in prison.

Sharon Kay Turman, 51, asked Superior Court Judge Cara Beatty to place her on probation instead of sending her to prison.

"I am not the same person," Turman said, admitting she was high on methamphetamine at the time of the chase.

But, she vowed, she will lead a sober and law-abiding life from now on and also apologized for the conduct that got her arrested.

"I am really sorry for my actions," she said. "I am going to stay sober and accountable."

While Beatty commended her for wanting to turn her life around, she said she could not grant Turman probation due to the nature of her crime.

"It was horrifying," she said, noting that Turman put many people at risk.

And, she said, Turman needs to continue to battle her methamphetamine addiction.

"Methamphetamine opened the door to your soul and let the devil out," she said.

Turman, who admitted Thursday that she was an everyday methamphetamine user until her arrest, pleaded guilty in May to felony flight from officers.

She did so under a plea bargain that stipulated she would not serve more than two years, eight months in prison.

Although she later sought to withdraw her plea because she was apparently confused about its terms, she recently dropped that effort.

Police have said Turman was on supervised release for theft and suspected of violating her probation in the deactivation of her ankle monitor when officers spotted her March 6 in her colorfully decorated 1994 Town and Country minivan at California and Shasta streets in downtown Redding.

She reportedly took off in the van when officers tried to pull her over. Turman reportedly later told officers she did not stop out of fear they would hurt her.

Officers said she sped down South Market Street without any concern for motorists and nearly hit four other vehicles before she abandoned the van, which had run out of gas, on Highway 36 off Bowman Road in northwestern Tehama County.

Turman got away, but turned herself in at the Shasta County Jail on March 16.

She must serve 50 percent of her sentence before being eligible for parole.
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By Alayna Shulman of the Redding Record Searchlight

Some Hmong Siskiyou County residents are suing the sheriff and elections clerk over alleged discrimination, saying the officials tried to keep members of the Asian ethnic minority group from voting and "tainted" the June election. But Sheriff Jon Lopey adamantly denies the accusations in the suit, saying it's veiled retaliation for his efforts to quash illegal commercial marijuana grows in the county.

"It's all about the marijuana; it's all about the money," Lopey said. "I think that's why I'm targeted and my county's being targeted and my department. I'm doing my job; I'm enforcing the law, and my co-workers are doing the same thing fairly and impartially."

Attorneys who filed the suit reject that.

"I don't see what he's talking about," attorney Brian Ford said. "There's nothing out there."

The suit served to the county Thursday also names Siskiyou County Elections Clerk Colleen Setzer, Secretary of State employee Alex Nishimura, Siskiyou County and the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection as defendants.

According to the suit, at least 360 Hmong residents tried to vote in the June election, but over 200 of them were not listed on the voter rolls in time and another 50 gave up out of fear. It alleges several of those Hornbrook-area residents were traumatized, with one having "continuous nightmares since the incident" and another going to the hospital with a stress-aggravated heart condition after visits from state and county investigators "armed with assault rifles and wearing commando-style body armor and uniforms."

The interactions were "very friendly and amicable," Lopey said, and his department would never discriminate. The deputies only wore guns and gear during the visits because there are many marijuana grows in the area, he said.

Lopey also noted that he didn't initiate the investigation, but was simply asked to provide navigation and protection for state employees.

In an email to the Record Searchlight this week, a spokesman for Secretary of State Alex Padilla acknowledged publicly for the first time that the office had sent investigators.

"During the course of a recent investigation, the Siskiyou County Sheriff's Department advised that locations we intended to visit posed potential security risks," press secretary Sam Mahood wrote. "They recommended that their deputies accompany our investigators."

Mahood said the department later received complaints of voter intimidation, "and deployed election monitors to polling places throughout the county on Election Day to protect the voting rights of local citizens."

Since then, the Secretary of State's Office tried to protect its image while letting Lopey and his department take all the criticism, Lopey said.

"I'm being sued for enforcing the law," he said.

The plaintiffs paint a different picture, though.

It all started, Ford said, when Setzer flagged the residents' voter applications as suspicious for dubious reasons. He and attorneys Kyndra Miller and Randolph Daar are representing 10 Hmong Siskiyou County residents they call victims of the ensuing "de facto gerrymandering."

Ford said Setzer's justification for the suspicious flags was "a high level of property transactions and the fact that they did not have physical addresses on a lot of these parcel numbers, neither of which is any requirement to do with voting." Ford noted that homeless people are legally allowed to vote.

"The only commonality is that they have Hmong names," he said of the applications flagged for potential voter fraud, noting that the few who did end up registering had to use provisional ballots.

But Lopey called Setzer "probably one of the most professional and upstanding (county clerks) that I've ever seen in the whole state, and doesn't deserve this scrutiny."

The suit also alleges discrimination over-enforcement of the county's outdoor-marijuana growth ban, though Ford said that's a symptom of an overall problem in the county and not directly related to the voting issue.

"I wouldn't go so far as to say no white people are being prosecuted; it's just very apparent that the Hmong community is being targeted here," Ford said. "We're alleging a conspiracy to systemically disenfranchise Hmong voters, and really, the marijuana is just evidence of a pattern of ongoing practices of racism."

But to Lopey, it's the crux of the issue.

"I'm going to continue to do the job," he said. "My citizens ... they're under siege when it comes to this illegal marijuana."

He also pointed out that code-enforcement is mostly driven by complaints from residents.

The suit seeks an unspecified amount of damages over $50,000, temporary restraining orders and permanent injunctions, as well as punitive damages and attorneys' fees. The county has three weeks from Thursday to respond.
If you are the status quo candidate in a change election in which the national mood is sour and two-thirds of the electorate think the country is on the wrong track, what do you do? Attack. Relentlessly. Paint your opponent as extremist, volatile, clueless, unfit, dangerous. Indeed, Hillary Clinton's latest national ad, featuring major Republican politicians echoing that indictment of Donald Trump, ends thus: "Unfit. Dangerous. Even for Republicans."

That was the theme of Clinton's famous open "alt-right" speech and of much of her $100 million worth of ads.

Problem is, it's not working.

Over the last month, Trump's new team, led by Kellyanne Conway, has worked single-mindedly to blunt that line of attack on the theory that if he can just cross the threshold of acceptability, he wins. In an act of brazen rebranding, they set out to endow him with stature and empathy.

Stature was acquired in Mexico whose president inexplicably gave Trump the opportunity to stand on the world stage with a national leader and more than hold his own. It's the same stature booster Sen. Barack Obama pulled off when he stood with the French president at a news conference in Paris in 2008.

That was part one: Trump the statesman. Part two: the kinder gentler Trump.

Nervy. Can you really repackage the boasting, bullying, bombastic, insulting, insensitive Trump into a mellow and caring version? With two months to go? In a digital age in which every past outrage is preserved on imperishable video?

Turns out, yes. Where are they now  the birtherism, the deportation force, the scorn for teleprompters, the mocking of candidates who take outside money? Down the memory hole.

Orwell was wrong. You don't need repression. You need only the sensory overload of an age of numbingly ephemeral social media. In this surreal election season, there is no past.

Clinton ads keep showing actual Trump sound bites meant to shock. Yet her numbers are dropping, his rising.

How? Trump never goes on the defensive. He merely creates new Trumps. Hence:

(1) The African-American blitz. It's a new pose and the novelty shows. Trump is not very familiar with the language. He occasionally slips, for example, into referring to "the blacks." And his argument that African-Americans inhabit a living hell and therefore have nothing to lose by voting for him hovers somewhere between condescension and insult.

But, as every living commentator has noted, the foray into African-American precincts was not aimed at winning black votes but at countering Trump's general image as the bigoted candidate of white people.

Result? A curious dynamic in which Clinton keeps upping the accusatory ante just as Trump keeps softening his tone  until she finds herself way over the top, landing in a basket of deplorables, a phrase that will haunt her until Election Day. (Politics 101: Never attack the voter.)

(2) The immigration wobble. A week of nonstop word salad about illegal immigration left everyone confused about what Trump really believes. Genius. The only message to emerge from the rhetorical fog is that he is done talking about deportation and/or legalization. The very discussion is off the table until years down the road.

Case closed. Toxic issue detoxified.

Again, that's not going to win him the Hispanic vote. But that wasn't the point. The point was to soften his image in the Philadelphia suburbs, pundit shorthand for white college-educated women that Republicans have to win. Which brings us to:

(3) The blockbuster child care proposal. Unveiled Tuesday, it is liberalism at its best, Big Government at its biggest: tax deductions, tax rebates, and a federal mandate of six weeks of paid maternity leave. The biggest entitlement since, well, Obamacare.

But wait. Didn't Trump's acolytes assure us that he spoke for those betrayed by the sold-out, elitist, GOP establishment that for years refused to stand up to Obama's overweening mandates, Big Government profligacy and budget-busting entitlements?

No matter. That was yesterday. There is no past. Nor a future  at least for Ivanka-care. It would never get through the GOP House.

Nor is it meant to. It is meant to signal what George H.W. Bush once memorably read off a cue card. "Message: I care."

And where do you think Trump gave this dish-the-Whigs cradle-to-college entitlement speech? Why, the Philadelphia suburbs!

Can't get more transparent than that. Or shameless. Or brilliant.

And it's working.

Charles Krauthammer's email address is letters@charleskrauthammer.com. He writes for The Washington Post Writers Group.
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Bank regulations that were toughened after the 2008 financial crisis have made it "impossible for bankers to function," Donald Trump likes to insist.

Tell that to the Wells Fargo & Co. customers who were stuck with nearly $2.5 million in fees after thousands of bank employees, without customers' knowledge or permission, opened more than 2 million unauthorized checking, savings and credit card accounts.

The epic rip-off  apparently prompted by aggressive sales targets  went on for years before authorities were able to stop it. According to federal regulators, bank employees  told they would lose their jobs if they failed to make gargantuan sales quotas  forged signatures and used fake email addresses to sign up bank customers for extra products without informing them.

Customers often didn't find out until a check bounced or an odd fee showed up on a statement. When they tried to sue, mandatory arbitration agreements signed with their original accounts prompted judges to dismiss their cases.

It wasn't until 2013 that reporting by Los Angeles Times business writer E. Scott Reckard  now retired, as his newspaper fights the good fight amid yet more ownership struggles  brought the mess to light, prompting a 2015 lawsuit against the bank by the Los Angeles City Attorney's Office. That suit, in turn, got the attention of the federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which last week fined San Francisco-based Wells Fargo $185 million for its sales practices.

It's the largest fine issued yet by the CFPB, which banks have been trying to kill since 2010, when it was created as part of those toughened bank regulations. But it's less than a drop in the bucket compared with Wells Fargo's $237 billion market capitalization.

Like the lame apology mailed to customers by Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf ("Last week's news did not reflect Wells Fargo at its best ..."), and Stumpf's attempt this week to pin blame solely on the 5,300 minions he fired  not the bank, and never the chief executive, mind you  the response isn't good enough.

This Wells Fargo scandal wasn't some freak coincidence in which 5,300 underlings suddenly got greedy. "Cross-selling" has been a staple of the banking industry since the recession; this is what happens when people are pressured to cross-sell until they cheat.

It's why banks handling hundreds of billions of dollars need to be regulated, even more strenuously than they are now. And it's why the much-maligned "mainstream media" actually matters. Good watchdogs may annoy bankers, but without them, it's impossible for society to function.

This editorial previously ran in The Sacramento Bee
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The wildfires raging across the state, together with an epidemic of dead trees from drought, insects and disease, have created a crisis of catastrophic proportions in California's forests.

Fortunately, we need not stand idly by. This crisis has galvanized a broad range of interests to launch the California Forest Watershed Alliance (CAFWA), an urban-rural coalition representing water interests, local government, the conservation community, agriculture and the forestry sector, aligned to seek new solutions to promote proactive, science-based and ecologically sound forest management practices.

Ecologically based forest management, which includes careful thinning of overly dense forests and use of controlled burns to reduce excess forest fuels, are proven and cost-effective tools to promote healthier forests that are more resilient to drought and wildfire. Rather than "fiddling while Rome burns," we need to increase the pace and scale of ecologically based forest management.

Five years of record drought have led to a year-round wildfire season in California, with wildfires increasing in both size and severity. At the same time, dead trees from insects and disease have increased exponentially, a function of the drought and unhealthy forest conditions. The tree mortality epidemic led Gov. Brown to issue an emergency proclamation in October 2015.

Despite this effort, the U.S. Forest Service recently reported that an additional 26 million trees have died in the southern Sierra from insects and disease since last October, bringing the total tree mortality to 66 million.

Without significant change in how we manage our forests, we will continue to lose vast swaths of our forests and the many benefits that healthy forests provide. CAFWA supports common-sense reforms that promote healthy forests that are more resilient to drought, wildfire and climate change.

First, we need to increase the pace of ecologically based forest management, including, where appropriate, thinning and controlled burning. These practices can reduce the impacts of uncontrolled wildfires and promote healthier forest conditions. Implementing the Sierra Nevada Conservancy's Watershed Improvement Program is an important step in this direction.

Second, we need to increase funding for ecologically based forest management. CAFWA supports federal budget reform, such as the Wildfire Disaster Funding Act, which would set aside federal funds for fighting wildfires, leaving more funding available for proactive forest management.

CAFWA also supports a significant increase in state funding for forest thinning and controlled burning, including use of the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund where such activities have GHG benefits.

Third, we need to increase the geographic scope of forest management to address problems at a landscape scale. CAFWA supports projects like the Forest Service's South Fork American River Cohesive Strategy, which aims to promote more resilient forest conditions over more than 400,000 acres using a collaborative process. Legislation pending in Congress would encourage such an approach by authorizing the Forest Service to prepare landscape-scale environmental analyses and decisions to promote forest restoration at a large scale.

Finally, we need to make economic use of the byproducts of ecologically based forest thinning in order to fund restoration at scale. Unfortunately, biomass facilities, which produce electricity and heat from forest and agricultural byproducts in an environmentally sound manner, are closing throughout the state because they cannot compete with low-priced natural gas. Of the remaining 22 facilities, seven are likely to close in the coming months. Given the multiple benefits of ecologically based forest thinning, CAFWA supports use of state funds to support and expand forest biomass facilities.

While the threats posed to our forests by megafires and insect and disease epidemics are serious, thoughtful, proactive management can reduce these risks and increase the chance that our children and grandchildren will be able to enjoy healthy, thriving forests.

Patricia Megason is the executive vice president of the Rural County Representatives of California and chair of the California Forest Watershed Alliance.
Remakes and reboots and sequels are an epidemic in Hollywood, which seems to be losing creative steam by the minute. With that in mind, it's easy to look at something like "Bridget Jones's Baby," the third installment in a franchise that's been wrapped for 12 years, and roll your eyes, sure it'll be a mess. Luckily, that's kind of Bridget's (Renee Zellweger) thing, and the messiness of "Bridget Jones's Baby" feels warm and comforting, like a blanket you forgot was in the back of the closet.

What happens?

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Bridget Jones is 43. Her old love Mark Darcy (Colin Firth) is married. Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant) died in a plane crash, and his death "seems to have hit the Eastern European modeling community particularly hard." Bridget is a successful, if scattered, TV producer, and she seems resigned to making the most of eternal singleness. But then she has sex with a stranger, American billionaire Jack (Patrick Dempsey), and her recently separated ex within a week of each other and finds out she's pregnant. Who's the dad? And a separate question: Who does Bridget actually want to be with?

What's good?

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All the stars are charming with well-honed comedic timing. Zellweger and Firth slip into their old roles effortlessly, but even Dempsey pulls laughs out of his over-the-top, control-freak character. The real gem, as always, is Emma Thompson, who also co-wrote the script. As Bridget's gynecologist, she turns every line, even the word "Pringle," into a masterpiece of comedy. We should get three more movies about her adventures as a doctor.

Eat. Watch. Do. Weekly What to eat. What to watch. What you need to live your best life ... now. >

There's also something strangely fitting about seeing Bridget and Mark in their 40s, where their trademark quirks and anxieties feel more at home. When Bridget's co-worker tries to call her a MILF, she protests, "I'm not even a mum. I'm a spinster. I'm a SPILF." Seeing her struggle with societal expectations as a 43-year-old makes more sense and is more gratifying than it was in her 30s because there's always been something old-fashioned about Bridget.

What's bad?

All my issues with Bridget Jones are problems that should have been caught in the first or second round. The fact that weight jokes still get made even when she's pregnant seems cruel. Her inconsistency at work is unrealistically laughed off. The awkward scenarios she manages to get herself into feel completely contrived at every turn. But none of this is unexpected.

Final verdict

Uneven at times, "Bridget Jones's Baby" will please fans and gives the old girl a warm wrap-up.

3 stars (out of four)

@lchval | laurenchval@redeyechicago.com
While members are bound to listen to ASCI, the self-regulator has frequently faced resistance from non-members, whove challenged its authority to redress grievances of complainants

After indicating in July that it would take legal action against the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI), the countrys apex regulatory body for advertising, Patanjali Ayurved, founded by Baba Ramdev and his deputy Balkrishna, has petitioned the high court in Mumbai.

On August 19, the Haridwar-based company filed a defamation suit and a notice of a motion seeking interim relief against ASCI. The suit and gave a notice of motion are before judge S J Kathawala.

The basis of the legal action, according to Patanjali Ayurveds managing director, Balkrishna, was the series of notices they were getting from ASCI in recent months.

They are a self-regulatory body, consisting of a group of members, mostly multinational companies (MNCs). What is the legal basis for their (ASCI) actions? We have received a barrage of notices from ASCI; our legal team is studying all of this. There was an order last year by the HC, where they (ASCI) were flayed for their highhandedness, despite them not being a regulator, he said when contacted earlier.

ASCI vs Patanjali Patanjali Ayurved has moved the Bombay high court against ASCI for defamation and interim relief It has been receiving a string of notices from ASCI pertaining to ad violations Patanjali says ASCI is a self-regulatory body and has no basis to do that ASCI, which is defendant in the matter, is fighting it out The government is contemplating empowering ASCI based on recommendations of a parliamentary committee

Ramdev had reiterated a similar view at a press conference last month, saying this was a conspiracy by MNCs.

The order Ramdev and Balkrishna were referring to pertains to a verdict by judge G S Patel last year against ASCI in a matter filed by Teleshop Teleshopping.

In that order dated May 8, 2015, the judge had said ASCI could not arrogate judicial or quasi-judicial powers to itself in the absence of a statutory basis to do so and, therefore, could not restrict ads of the plaintiff.

Shweta Purandare, secretary-general, ASCI, declined to comment on the issue, saying the matter was in court.

A tussle between ASCI and Patanjali would in many respects determine the amount of influence the self-regulator can wield with advertisers in general, say experts.

While members are bound to listen to ASCI, the self-regulator has frequently faced resistance from non-members, whove challenged its authority to redress grievances.

ASCI has the legal backstop available to it in the case of television ads found violating its code - the ASCI Code is part of The Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act. However, the body cannot do so in the case of any other category such as print, digital or outdoor ads.

The government, in fact, is contemplating empowering ASCI, based on recommendations of a parliamentary committee, set up to look into the proposed Consumer Protection Bill, 2016.

The proposed changes include making ASCI a partner of the Consumer Protection Authority, a nodal body, giving it the power to look into misleading ads across categories and segments. In the event advertisers dont comply, the CPA will step in to take further action.

Photograph: PTI Photo.
Top corporates have paid more advance tax in second quarter this year.

Bogged down by rising non-performing assets, State Bank of India (SBI), the country's largest lender, on Thursday reported a 25.9 per cent decline in its advance tax payment for Q2 FY17.

The bank paid Rs 1,200 crore (Rs 12 billion) as advance tax, compared with Rs 1,620 crore (Rs 16.20 billion) in the corresponding period last year.

Private lender ICICI Bank has also reported a decline in advance tax outgo for the September quarter. It has paid Rs 1,200 crore (Rs 12 billion), 20 per cent lower than the same period a year ago.

In contrast, HDFC Bank's Q2 advance tax outgo jumped 20 per cent year-on-year to Rs 2,400 crore (Rs 24 billion).



HDFC Ltd's advance tax payment also increased 7.5 per cent to Rs 860 crore (Rs 8.6 billion).

Top corporates have paid more advance tax in second quarter this year.



Tata Steel's advance tax payment was up 100 per cent y-o-y, followed by a 26.5 per cent jump in Reliance Industries' (RIL) outgo at Rs 2,667 crore (Rs 26.67 billion).



Software services major Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) paid Rs 1,550 crore (Rs 15.50 billion), compared with Rs 1,750 crore (Rs 17.50 billion) last year.

Advance tax is a system of staggered payment of income tax in four quarterly instalments. It is considered a barometer of a company's performance in a particular quarter.

"Advance tax collections from top banks are disappointing as they contribute a major part of the government revenues," said an income tax department official.

Cement major UltraTech paid Rs 180 crore (Rs 1.8 billion) as advance tax, up 20 per cent from the year-ago quarter. Some PSBs have posted good numbers.

For instance, Bank of Baroda and Bank of India's advance tax outgo was up 25 per cent, respectively. However, Central Bank's outgo was down 29.7 per cent.

YES Bank's advance tax outgo was Rs 400 crore (Rs 4 billion), compared with Rs 285 crore (Rs 2.85 billion) in the year-ago period.

Foreign banks posted mixed numbers. Citi Bank and Standard Chartered Bank paid Rs 700 crore (Rs 7 billion) and Rs 560 crore (Rs 5.6 billion), respectively as advance tax.

Consumer major Hindustan Unilever paid Rs 500 crore (Rs 5 billion), against Rs 460 crore (Rs 4.6 billion) in Q2 FY16.

Auto companies have shown mixed numbers. While Mahindra & Mahindra paid 11.1 per cent more tax than Q2 FY16, Bajaj Auto paid Rs 390 crore (Rs 3.9 billion), compared with Rs 450 crore (Rs 4.5 billion) last year.

Similarly, pharma major Lupin's advance tax outgo was up 24 per cent.
Advertisement on mygov.in gets 8,000 applications and counting; govt to maintain bank of CVs for future use

In a row of non-descript rooms along the third floor corridor at Electronics Niketan in the national capital, which houses the information technology department, people are busy sorting thousands of resumes these days.

More than 8,000 professionals, most highly qualified and skilled, have responded within 15 days of an online call by the National Democratic Alliance government, seeking talent from across the globe.

Earlier this month, mygov.in, the portal that acts as an online interface between the people and ministries, flashed a question on its screen at the beginning of this month: Want to work for government?

It gave an instant solution, too: Apply here, with the caveat that submission of resumes did not guarantee engagement or employment.

The official website of the Prime Ministers Office (PMO) did the same.

The caveat hardly inhibited Indians, not only from within the country but overseas as well, from trying their luck.

A mygov.in official, at the centre of it all, told Business Standard that applicants include professors at Ivy League universities such as Columbia, Cornell and Yale, software engineers working with Silicon Valley companies (Apple, Google, Facebook and the like, though names were not confirmed); top health care researchers; and data scientists from the West.

Back home, recently retired army officers, former bureaucrats, Indian Institutes Management professors, and journalists have offered their services.

Another 15 days are left for the job window to close, and officials believe resumes will keep pouring in. The total number might be close to 20,000.

People are not applying for perks or status, they just want to contribute to nation building, is how an official described the response to the governments job invitation.

He also pointed out that the openings will be for work on contract, mostly for three years.

The number of jobs on offer is not clear though.

Applicants have been invited to apply for roles across 12 categories - editorial writers, researchers, software developers, data scientists, graphic designers, video editors, digital content script writers, advertising professionals, senior management, academic experts, social media experts, and app developers.

The mygov.in official that this newspaper spoke to laid out a road map of how things would roll out.

To begin with, the urban development ministry is learnt to have already raised its demand for talented people to work for the Smart Cities project. Engineers to designers, app developers to data scientists - they are all in demand for Smart City projects.

Short-term interns have been hired from outside the government for long, especially in the finance ministry and the Planning Commission (now NITI Aayog). The latest job invitation is being seen as a new initiative for the scale and the profile of the work involved.

The idea of keeping a large list of talent as a bank across diverse fields, like in an employment exchange, has not been tried before either.

As the mygov.in team, of about 45 (spanning content and backend technology) employees, sifts through the CVs to put them in separate buckets, there are plans to grow the numbers - of both staff and number of users.

Made popular through inputs on Prime Minister Narendra Modis Mann ki Baat programme, mygov.in is looking to have 10 million registered users by next March, from 3.7 million now.

In the first phase, 100-odd applicants would be selected from this list for placement in various government ministries and departments. That will follow levels of filtering including a final round of interviews - either in person, on Skype or phone.

The second phase would be more innovative - new roles would be created, depending on the quality of CVs that the government receives.

Finally, the government was aiming to build a large talent pool and circulate it among ministries, departments and think tanks for future use.

Photograph: Brandon Malone/Reuters
The current crisis Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah is facing is a cumulative effect of inattention to water management and the fiscal burden of populist promises, says Aditi Phadnis.

Has Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah bitten off more than he can chew?

With newspaper headlines screaming that Karnataka was on fire because of the Supreme Court-mandated award of Cauvery waters to Tamil Nadu (it wasnt, only the Old Mysore, Bengaluru-Mandya-Hassan regions were), one could almost feel sorry for the beleaguered chief minister. Hes had to battle so much.

Since the Congress-led government came to office in 2013, it has been fighting off challenges. The manifesto promises were extravagant: one kg rice at 1 with a maximum of 30 kg to below poverty line ration card holders, interest-free loans to farmers, free laptops to pre-university students, an eight-lane expressway between Bidar in the north and Chamarajanagar in the south to promote industrial development; connectivity with major ports and airports, industrial townships; promotion of garments, textiles, engineering, automobile industries and creation of five million jobs. But the state was facing a slowdown in agricultural growth and battling a huge power deficit.

During its tenure (2008-2013), the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government took one step that must be appreciated. It set up a large number of thermal power projects in the state.

These, in Raichur, Bellary and elsewhere, were expected to add as much as 5,000 MW to the state kitty, making it power surplus. But there was no coal linkage.

Unending drought

When Siddaramaiah took over, Karnataka had had a drought two years in a row. It reported a stupendous agricultural growth, powered largely by south Karnatakas cotton and sugarcane-rich fields, of 13 per cent in 2010-11.

But 2011-12 growth in agriculture was minus 2.9 per cent. This was because of the lack of water; most of Karnataka has no water two months in a year - and power. So farmers cant operate borewells.

Scanty rainfall continued to be a fact of life in the state. A careful analysis suggests Siddaramaiahs current problems stem from this: as data journalism site IndiaSpend reports, while Karnataka was 17 per cent short of normal rainfall between June 1, 2016, and September 9, 2016 (the meteorological department classifies this as a normal deficit, but rainfall was intermittent and uncertain through the monsoons), Tamil Nadu recorded normal rainfall, according to data from the Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre (KSNDMC) and the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD), respectively.

Farmers from Mandya and Hassan - who are wealthy and articulate - are asking how a situation has arisen where the state needs to give water to Tamil Nadu which is better off than Karnataka.

That may be a simplistic explanation, but the crumbling of the cookie is actually quite a simple process. The current crisis the chief minister is facing is a cumulative effect of inattention to water management and the fiscal burden of the other promises.

Take the 1 rice scheme, for example. An additional 107,000 tonnes of food grain annually was needed to implement the programme which was expected to cost the exchequer Rs 4,200 to 4,300 crore annually by way of subsidy.

Karnataka planned to buy the rice from Chhattisgarh at 23 a quintal. But massive misappropriation has been reported by Right to Information activist Marilingegowda Mali Patil.

He says,The state government spent 22.60 per kg of rice. But, it is saying it spent 25. If we calculate, considering the documents from Chhattisgarh, there is a difference of 36 crore. Not much, but it does dent the chief ministers credibility.

The promise of waiver of loans to farmers, subject to an upper limit, was initially welcomed. The state did carry out its promise. But each year rainfall has been less than expected.

So the gesture meant little. Road building has been on but the Chamarajnagar-Bidar road is yet to be completed. K J George, the minister in charge of infrastructure, had to quit after he was named in a First Information Report filed following the suicide of an Indian Police Services officer who named him as the reason for his suicide.

Farm connection

The claims of SM Krishna, Mallikarjuna Kharge, and others who were in contention for the chief ministership of Karnataka were turned down and Siddaramiah was made the chief minister, despite being a relatively recent entrant into the party, because of his connect with rural Karnataka.

In fact, 70 out of 121 seats the congress won were from the urban areas that rejected the BJP. But Siddaramaiah has an exaggerated anti-urban bias he does not bother to hide, a hallmark of his younger days under the tutelage of strong farmer lobbies which had leaders like MD Nanjundaswamy of the Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha.

Ironically, it is rural Karnataka that is reacting most strongly now, seeking justice and parity with urban areas.

Siddaramaiah has had his share of political problems. The first few years were lost in a war of attrition between his supporters and those of Dalit leader Parameshwara.

Named the state Congress chief, Parameshwara was his closest rival. He contested the assembly elections and lost - and it was alleged that that the Kuruba community in his constituency sabotaged his election. Siddaramaiah is from the Kuruba community.

Then he had to sack many colleagues for corruption and mismanagement. And, of course, recently he suffered a numbing personal setback: losing his son.

So frankly, it doesnt look good for Siddaramaiah. If the BJP can get its act together, we could be looking at a change in Karnataka in 2018.

Photographs: PTI Photo.
Ujjwal Priyank, Aman Nasim, Subham Raj, Aditya Prakash and Sidhant Mohan would travel to Japan between November 6 and 13.

Five meritorious students of the famed 'Super 30' academy of mathematician Anand Kumar have been selected for a tour of Japan to know more about science and technology.

"This academy for talented underprivileged students is well known in Japan and this is the reason we have decided to fully sponsor the visit of the five meritorious students of Super 30," Yoji Nishikawa, a senior official of Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST) said after handing over invitation letter to the five selected students.

The five students from the academy have been selected for a special one-week programme in November this year during which they would visit some top educational institutions of Japan and also attend a lecture of Nobel Prize winner Shirakawa, Nishikawa said.

Elaborating further, the Japanese official said that under the special programme from November 6 to 13, the shortlisted students would visit Tokyo University and also interact with students of Super Science High School of the country.

He said they would also be lectured by 2000 Nobel Prize winner in Chemistry including Shirakawa.

Last year, Tokyo University had announced its decision to provide full scholarship to two students of Super 30 for higher studies in the famed university every year.

Mathematician Anand Kumar said that the five students have been selected through a screening test for the Japanese educational trip.

Super 30 academy run by Anand Kumar since 2002 in Patna has facilitated selection of more than 350 students hailing from underprivileged section of the society in the IITs.

The five selected students Ujjwal Priyank, Aman Nasim, Subham Raj, Aditya Prakash and Sidhant Mohan expressed excitement going to Japan where they would learn more about science and technology.

Lead image used for representational purposes only. Image: Kind courtesy Anand Kumar/Facebook
'Normalcy does not mean an absence of violence.'

'It aims to re-establish the writ of the State and resume governance.'

'To do that, frayed tempers in the streets and in the media need to be calmed.'

'People need to reflect what has been gained and lost during this period,' says Lieutenant General Syed Ata Hasnain (retd).

IMAGE: Strict curfew was imposed in all 10 districts in the Kashmir valley for Eid on September 13, 2016 to prevent an outbreak of violence. Photograph: Umar Ganie

In one of the longest stand-offs on the streets in the Kashmir Valley, the police and the youth have been through a dance of death and destruction.

It has led to enhanced mistrust, utter discomfort to a majority of the population, economic paralysis of the region and scores of casualties.

Rabble rousing through Pakistan's paid mouthpieces has multiplied the negative effect and the political community has been rendered ineffective due to its inability to move freely in the valley.

In the midst of it, sincere efforts by the home minister and chief minister have been visible to all with the latter assuming a strong position against allowing the streets to be ruled by the lumpens.

Yet the control of decisions to continue the turbulence does not lie in the hands of the senior Hurriyat leaders, but rather in a non-descript and diffused leadership which the intelligence agencies would surely know by now.

It has morphed well with the people and is manipulated by Pakistan's Deep State which has pulled out all the stops this time.

The difference from the past has been the presence of terrorists among the ranks of the protestors, focused targeting of J&K police personnel, emphasis on stone throwing in rural areas in south Kashmir in particular and the displayed propensity to last it out with full stamina.

In an attempted last resort the Indian Army has been asked to redeploy in greater strength in South Kashmir and restore normalcy.

It needs to be understood that 'normalcy' does not mean an absence of violence. It aims to re-establish the writ of the State and resume governance which has taken a back seat for the last few weeks.

To do that, the streets need to cool down, frayed tempers, both in the streets and in the media, need to be calmed and people need to reflect what has been gained and lost during this period.

In order to cool the environment and simultaneously commence a modicum of effective governance, a few measures could be suggested on the basis of past experience and known best practices from around the world.

In suggesting these I know I am opening a line for severe criticism as well as agreement. This is not something to be afraid of.

As long as ideas are within the ambit of the Indian Constitution there is ample scope to be proactive.

Ten measures are being outlined by me not as just benign ways of cooling the streets but also with the intent of regaining full control to establish the writ of the State towards governance.

There is no inter se priority accorded to these and almost all of them have to be executed simultaneously.

While doing the above I am also acutely mindful of the fact that the army has moved into South Kashmir to reinforce the existing Rashtriya Rifles formations and units. Just for public information it should be known that the Rashtriya Rifles is a group from within the army, with permanent presence in J&K; its officers and men are turned over but institutionally it provides continuity.

IMAGE: Troops, drones and other security measures were taken to ensure that peace was maintained in the valley on Eid, September 13, 2016. Photograph: Umar Ganie

First, control of the public order situation must be attempted in strength, but no attempt to arrest should be made at the time of demonstrations. This will prevent the chasing of protestors and the consequent disadvantage that the policemen put themselves to.

Arrests should only be of identified bad hats and of known leaders in the smaller towns and villages. The Rashtriya Rifles knows them as do the intelligence agencies and the J&K police.

The detention should be done in a professional manner and the detainees transported immediately to areas south of Pir Panjal.

Second, getting the J&K police on track and ensuring it gets back to the police stations with full confidence.

A slight pre-requisite here is necessary; personnel unwilling to deploy in their own villages or even tehsils should be deployed elsewhere. Local content is required, but it can be pruned to lesser levels.

Third, the pellet gun must be sheathed and its ammunition withdrawn to avoid usage even under duress.

The police will have resort to the age-old methods of mob control by firing below the knees under extreme circumstances.

Police personnel must never allow themselves to be surrounded while in small parties as it forces them to fire in self defence.

Fourth, there should be no retribution by police personnel against private homes and property.

It has been a usual practice of the police to break window panes or destroy private property as retribution against an entire street. I am aware of this from experience. It does not pay dividends.

Fifth, a full control over infiltration must be established by the army to prevent a terrorist leadership re-emerging.

This is crucial because a level of desperation is being witnessed on the other side.

The Deep State in Pakistan appears to perceive that this is the moment; their tipping point. Their weakness lies in the weak strength of terrorist cadres and leadership.

There will be an attempt to reinforce the local cadre. It is a major challenge for the army, police and intelligence agencies on which they must concentrate.

Sixth, restore the public distribution system, ensure medical assistance to the needy through roving medical teams and have all essential items such as milk and vegetables to reach the public.

It is surprising how quickly supplies run out in Kashmir causing misery. People in misery support those who they consider underdogs.

The ability to choke the system and the inability to overcome that by the establishment must be reversed with greater energy.

Seventh, reach out to the clergy to stop any rabble rousing from microphones of mosques.

A delegation of Muslim clerics from the rest of India should go to Kashmir and tour the areas to speak to the people and hold prayer meetings.

Eight, severe medical cases arising from pellet injuries or otherwise must be seen to being airlifted to larger cities in India at government expense.

The outstanding work of Dr Natarajan and other high profile eye surgeons who have spent much time and energy in the valley must be publicised.

Ninth, is the information domain, our weakest area as a nation. Its time some professional consultants were brought in to handle information the right way.

Information handling cannot be done by practitioners of operations or administrators. The negative tinge emerging from television channels in Delhi is perceived as anti-Kashmiri and not anti-Pakistan.

The media in India is open, but can rein itself in if voluntarily with a little more positive focus on the people and their misery.

The cause and effect must not lead to the adversary's advantage.

Proactive information campaigns will need to be sponsored to message the Kashmiris, promote amity with the Kashmiri Pandits and thwart Pakistan's continuous rants and malicious projection.

In the long term a full Information Policy will need to be evolved.

Tenth and last, the political community and the administrators must be able to move about in their areas without fear.

I am aware that the local politicians aren't exactly popular at this time, but still they remain the elected representatives. It is best to allow them to speak to their people.

The local administration too must reach out and be available to listen to local problems. The combined might of the army, J&K police and CRPF should be able to do this.

In all the above there is one issue which will remain the bone of contention: How to deal with the persistent and errant stone thrower. He cannot be shot dead under any circumstances and he does not seem to be afraid of getting injured. A mix of hard and soft measures is the only answer.

I am aware that this time the stone throwers are even younger than before and under nobody's control. However, at a tipping point, societal pressure gets the better of such miscreants. Elders have a limit of tolerance after which they too lose their patience against their own flesh and blood.

The suggested measures may be standalone, but the cumulative effect will be much higher if there is convergence. The Unified Command is the appropriate forum to discuss concepts, take stock and reappraise.

Lieutenant General Syed Ata Hasnain (retd), a former General Officer Commanding of the Srinagar-based 15 Corps, is now associated as a senior analyst with the Vivekanand International Foundation and the Delhi Policy Group.
IMAGE: Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, left, with his uncle Shivpal Yadav.

'If you interpret Akhilesh's statement, he is clearly saying Shivpal wants to become chief minister.'

What is the problem between Uttar Pradesh Chief Minsiter Akhilesh Yadav and his uncle Shivpal Yadav?

If you are pondering this question, then Dr A K Verma, director, Centre for the Study of Society and Politics, Kanpur, has the answers.

He spoke to Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf about the crisis in Uttar Pradesh's Samajwadi Party and how it can benefit the Congress.

How do you see this family crisis in the Samajwadi Party and the tussle between Akhilesh and Shivpal Yadav?

The crisis was brewing for long and it was only a matter of time before it erupted.

Shivpal could never digest this fact that Akhilesh was made chief minister.

Shivpal was always considered the de facto chief minister. So when Akhilesh was elevated, Shivpal felt marginalised.

It was said in Lucknow that Akhilesh was a half chief minister (the other half being Shivpal). Basically meaning that Shivpal was demonstrating his supremacy in government and Akhilesh somehow tolerated his dominance because of family consideration.

Now probably he (Akhilesh) has developed some kind of courage to say 'no.'

The moment he did so, then there was a head on (fight) with Shivpal.

Did people vote for Akhilesh Yadav in 2012 or for the Samajwadi Party?

That was not the issue. The election was run and fought by Mulayam Singh Yadav.

Akhilesh was not the chief ministerial candidate in the 2012 assembly elections. Therefore, it was a surprise when Mulayam propped him up as chief minister.

Had he been the chief ministerial candidate, probably Shivpal would have not been angry about this decision.

The Samajwadi Party fought the elections of 2012 with the face of Mulayam Singh Yadav as the chief minister. After forming the government he suddenly took a U turn and brought in Akhilesh.

This was so sudden that Shivpal could not react to this arrangement. Internally, it was never decided that Akhilesh would be the chief minister.

Why was Akhilesh made chief minister?

I would say Mulayam felt and understood that he had played his innings. He first became chief minister in 1989. He had experience in running the state. His passing on the post to his son is natural in an Indian setting because so many politicians do the same.

The interaction I had with top Samajwadi Party leaders on this issue gave me an idea that the top leadership were worried about the criminal tag to the party.

They wanted to bring in some person who had a clean image and therefore they got in Akhilesh Yadav.

He was young, Western educated and polished. He was a novice and A different persona from others in the party.

People also had lot of hopes when he was brought in. Mulayam thought by bringing in Akhilesh he would take the SP to a different trajectory which will be clean, governance-oriented and developmental-centric.

He also understood his younger brother Shivpal was in UP politics for long, but also knew that Shivpal will not win elections for the party.

He knew Shivpal might have a hold on the heart and mind of party cadres, but unless you have a hold on the hearts and mind of the people you cannot win elections.

That is why Mulayam brought in Akhilesh.

Do you feel that Akhilesh now wants to assert himself by taking control of the party? He did not allow the entry of the controversial Mukhtar Ansari (who was backed by Shivpal Yadav) into the Samajwadi Party.

I would look at this move as a little late. Had this courage been demonstrated a little earlier Akhilesh would have the time to mould public opinion.

By this time public opinion has almost been formed and it is the only floating voters of 7 to 8 per cent who normally decide the fate of an election.

Can Shivpal split the Samajwadi Party?

Splitting a party is one thing and being a strong leader is another.

Many people in the past thought that they were strong enough to split the party. In 1969, many leaders split the Congress to form the Congress-O and you know what happened to them. They all got marginalised.

Right now, Shivpal has a huge hold on the cadres. Therefore, Akhilesh has been dropped as UP president of the party and Shivpal has replaced him.

The issue here is that even if Shivpal has a hold over the party ranks is he popular in the public domain? Are the people with you or not?

In the event if there is a comparison between Akhilesh and Shivpal, I would say people would side with Akhilesh.

What is the reason for the tension between Akhilesh and Shivpal Yadav?

Most people say it is a family issue, but Akhilesh has denied it. He clearly said this is not a family issue, but a feud in the government.

If you interpret Akhilesh's statement, he is clearly saying Shivpal wants to become chief minister. That is the indication and the signals are very clear.

IMAGE: Mulayam Singh Yadav with his elder son Akhilesh.

Where does Mulayam Singh Yadav stand in this rift? Akhilesh refused to go to New Delhi when his father summoned him.

Mulayam is the supremo of the party. He is called Netaji by his cadres.

The issue is that Mulayam is now an outdated ticket in the Samajwadi Party. He might be Akhilesh's father, but so far as the politics of the state is concerned, Mulayam is slowly becoming outdated for one simple reason.

Mulayam is himself responsible for the dilution of the ideological aspect of the party.

There is only one mentor of the party and it is on the party's Web site. He is Dr Ram Manohar Lohia and nobody else.

Now look at the policies that the Samajwadi Party has followed over the years. You will find there is hardly any samajwadi left in its policy or ideology. They have hardly followed Dr Lohia's policy.

It is a very sad commentary on Mulayam Singh that he did not take care of the ideological moorings of Dr Lohia.

Secondly, the Samajwadi Party has always been looked upon as a party monopolising the votes of the OBCs (Other Backward Classes) in alliance with the Muslims. Mulayam was always considered the protector of OBCs and he has completely failed to do so.

OBCs are divided into three categories in Uttar Pradesh. One category are the Yadavs, the second category are the more backward in which you have Kurmis, Koeris, Patels, Lodhs etc. There are eight such types. The third is the most backward in the OBCs and they have 70 castes in this category.

Now if you look at the OBC population in UP, you will find that 20 per cent are Yadavs, 19 per cent are more backward and 61 per cent are most backward. This is a very huge number in terms of population of the state.

The OBC population is 41 per cent in UP. Had Mulayam tried to focus on the homogenisation of OBCs in UP, then things would have been very different from what they are right now.

He chose 'Yadavisation,' rather than the homogenisation of OBCs.

This was Mulayam's second blunder. He did not mobilise the OBCs into a dominate group.

Thirdly, he allowed the party to be hijacked by criminal elements so the people of UP are very angry with the Samajwadi Party. Whatever development the party might have done is fine, but law and order is a problem.

Is Amar Singh responsible in any way for this crisis in the family?

He has come quite late into the Samajwadi Party. One can say with his established brand and nature that he is the facilitator to this crisis, but he is not the creator.

Which party benefits most because of this crisis

The Samajwadi Party will be a great loser. I think the Congress stands to gain a lot.

Not the Bahujan Samaj Party?

No. The support group of the Samajwadi Party are Yadavs and Muslims. The Yadavs will probably continue to be with the Samajwadi Party irrespective of the family feud, but the Muslims will certainly like to migrate here and there.

One very important component would be the Congress because it has drawn a certain strategy and it is a strong contender in 80 assembly constituencies.

PK (Prashant Kishore) has adopted a strategy where he is persuading Congress MP candidates in the 2014 parliamentary elections to come and contest the assembly elections.

An MP normally contests five assembly constituencies and if that MP comes and contests one of the assembly constituencies, then that would be very easy for them to win.

Should they all agree to this proposal of PK, then the Congress would certainly be a contender in 80 constituencies.

Should that happen, then the Muslims will feel the Congress is coming back and may migrate to the party.
The European Union's top officials have denied a rift after they gave conflicting visions over how the bloc should combat euroskepticism and the risk of a break-up.

On the eve of an EU summit in Bratislava on Friday, European Council President Donald Tusk said that he and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker were like "one fist" and that was "no problem" between them  despite the two leaders offering diverging views of whether there should be, in Juncker's view, "more Europe" and "more unity" or, as Tusk said, an honest look at the direction the EU is taking and the danger of alienating its citizens further.

In Juncker's annual "State of the Union" address on Wednesday, he said that European integration had to come before the interests of national states amid a tide of "galloping populism." Europe is facing increasing euroskepticism among its citizens and member states increasingly critical of the leaning towards more political integration and a "supranational" EU.





Meanwhile, on the eve of an EU summit in Bratislava on Friday , which is being attended by 27 EU leaders  apart from U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May  Donald Tusk told reporters that leaders could not start discussions with "this kind of blissful conviction that nothing is wrong and everything is ok."

He insisted that he and Juncker's visions for Europe were the same, however.

"I'm absolutely sure that we have the same vision because what we need first of all in Europe today is good cooperation, solidarity and this political will to cooperate among member states. But at the same time we need very effective institutions and believe me, me and Jean-Claude Juncker we are like one fist."

Discussions in Bratislava are not specifically about Brexit or the exit process (which has yet to formally begin) but will focus on the future of the EU in the wake of the U.K.'s vote to leave, the root causes of dissatisfaction and fragmentation between member states over controversial issues like the migration crisis. Tusk told reporters that complacency over the future of the EU was not an option.

Story continues

"I'm absolutely sure that, after Bratislava, we have to assure our citizens that we have learned the lesson from Brexit," Tusk said.

Follow CNBC International on Twitter and Facebook.



EU leaders and ministers were determined to put on a united front as the arrived in Bratislava, for the summit.

Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven told CNBC that the Brexit vote was regrettable and was "a loss for the whole EU but we have to work from that and show that we can unite."



He said that Juncker's call for a "stronger" EU was correct and said the bloc needed to coordinate on security.

Austrian Chancellor Christian Kern told CNBC as he arrived at the summit that it was "time to achieve some progress on the real issues (facing Europe) which are migration, security and social welfare and I'm quite optimistic that we'll have good progress today," he said.

Luxembourg's Prime Minister, Xavier Bettel, also said that the EU had to stick together - despite different stances on issues such as the migrant crisis. Those differences came to a fore last week when Luxembourg's foreign minister called for Hungary to be kicked out of the EU for its authoritarian stance towards migrants who have arrived on the continent, many fleeing war in the Middle East.

"We are in a family. We are together in the family. If we have some problems in the family we have to discuss it in the family and not kick someone out," Bettel told CNBC as he arrived for the meeting.

- CNBC's Nancy Hungerford contributed reporting to this story.
IMAGE: Amit Shah's controversial tweet.

'These people want to create fissures among Hindus and they have been trying to do this for quite sometime.'

It was an eventful Onam for the Bharatiya Janata Party's Kerala unit. BJP President Amit Shah was trolled on social media for wishing Malayalees 'Vaaman Jayanti' on the eve of Onam. Though he wished Malayalees a 'Happy Onam' the next day, the Vaaman Jayanti greetings did not go down well.

Had the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh not published a cover story in its magazine Kesari hailing Onam as Vaamana Jayanti and not celebrating the Asura king Mahabali'a annual visit, Malayalees would not have cared about Amit Shah's message.

In this exclusive interview to Rediff.com's Shobha Warrier, Kerala BJP president Kummanam Rajasekharan explains where the BJP stands on the Vaamana versus Mahabali issue.

Did you not start on a wrong foot by publishing a cover story in Kesari, arguing that Onam was Vamana Jayanti and not the celebration of Mahabali's visit?

You should understand first that Kesari is an independent magazine and it has nothing to do with the BJP. Second, what you are referring to is an article written by a person and it was his opinion.

How can you say that the opinion of the writer is the opinion of a party or the RSS?

You also should understand that many people write articles in the magazine, and they include Communists and independent thinkers.

But it angered many Malayalees. The accusation was that the RSS and BJP were trying to impose a Brahminical angle on Onam. You hailed Vaamana when Kerala has been fondly remembering King Mahabali.

Is this not the propaganda unleashed by the Communists?

The people of Kerala never accused us of doing so. You have a Communist chief minister who didn't want the people of Kerala to celebrate Onam with pookalam.

It is the Communists who speak and act against the ideals behind Onam, not us. The RSS nor the BJP would talk against Onam like the Communists.

As the state party president, I wished all people a happy Onam. Not only me, the national president also greeted people on Onam. The prime minister also wished people of Kerala on Onam.

Amit Shah wishing Vaman Jayanti on the eve of Onam after the article in Kesari angered many Malayalees...

The article in Kesari has no connection with the work the Sangh has been doing in Kerala.

It is not that Vaamana Jayanthi is not celebrated in Kerala; it is celebrated in certain parts of Kerala like the way the other avatarams of Lord Vishnu are celebrated.

This has been going on for a very long time all over India, and the party president's wishes were to all those who celebrate Vaamana Jayanthi. For example, we celebrate Parashurama Jayanthi as he is the creator of Keralam.

Shah wished the people of Kerala on Thiruvonam also. There is nothing contradictory in these greetings.

Do you agree with what the article in Kesari said -- that Onam should be celebrated as Vaamana Jayanthi and not a celebration for Mahabali?

What was written in Kesari was the writer's opinion, and not ours.

Onam celebrates the arrival of Mahabali to Kerala and people celebrate the festival welcoming the king.

This is how all Malayalees celebrate Onam. There is no second opinion about that.

We strongly believe that that's how it should be, and it should continue to be like that too.

But you should also understand that just because you celebrate Mahabali, you need not condemn or insult Vamanan; vice versa too.

Keralites respect Mahabali and worship Vaamanan, and this has been going on for many, many years.

Now some people are trying to divide the Hindus, giving it a Brahmin and Dalit colour.

Some people are hell bent on categorising the rituals into two; as that of savarna Hindu and asavarna Hindu.

These people want to create fissures among the Hindus and they have been trying to do this for quite sometime.

We will not let them divide us as we do not believe in dividing Hindus as savarna and asavarna.

Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan wants to divide Hindus. Kerala Congress leaders V M Sudheeran and Ramesh Chennithala are also doing the same thing.

From their statements, it is quite evident that they want to divide the Hindu community on these lines.

Somehow all the happenings during Onam gave the BJP the image as the party of the upper castes or savarna Hindus...

On what basis are these people labelling the BJP as a savarna party?

That's only an image created by some. The reality is different.

We stand with the people of Kerala in celebrating Onam as the festival of the visit of Mahabali.

That has been the history of the BJP and that's the reality. We are not bothered about the false image propagated by others.

Who said Mahabali was a Dalit and Vaamana, a Brahmin? Nowhere does it say so.

You mean to say, only the so-called savarnas from the Hindu community pray at the Trikakara kshetram where the deity is Trikakara Appan who is none other than Vaamana Murthy.

During Onam, thousands and thousands of Malayalees go to the temple. There are other Vaamana kshetrams also in Kerala. Do you call those who pray there as anti-Dalit?

Some people want to divide the Hindus, that's why all these accusations.

Will such a division happen in Kerala?

The BJP will never let it happen.

Those who are trying to denigrate us should understand that we live here and we will continue to live here.

And we will face the people of Kerala as we are sure that no force can divide the Hindu community through such attacks and utterances.
The 44 legislators, including Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu, who deserted the Congress party on Friday and joined the People's Party of Arunachal, are set to form a new government with the support of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led North East Democratic Alliance.

The PPA, a regional party, is part of the BJP-led alliance.

State BJP president Tapir Gao announced in Itanagar that his party will provide outside support to the PPA government.

Meanwhile, Union Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju, who is from Arunachal Pradesh, denied the allegation that the BJP had a role to play in engineering the collapse of the Congress government.

"The Congress shouldn't blame BJP for its own failure. If the chief minister and ministers have to wait for days to meet their own leadership in Delhi, how can they stay in such a party?" he said.

"The (Arunachal Pradesh) CM and the MLAs have consciously decided to merge with the regional party; the BJP has nothing to do with this," he added.

The 44 MLAs, who left the party on Friday, were closeted in a legislature party meeting in Itanagar all morning to discuss their plan to join the PPA, paving the way for another dramatic change of government in the frontier hill state.

The only Congress MLA who has remained with the Congress is former chief minister Nabam Tuki, who was replaced as chief minister when the Congress, in an effort to control the rebellion in its ranks, replaced him with Khandu in July.

Tuki did not attend Friday's legislature party meeting as he was reportedly touring his constituency.

Arunachal Pradesh has seen eight different governments in the last decade, and three this year alone.

In an assembly of 60 members, the Congress had 47 lawmakers while 11 were from the BJP. Two independent lawmakers who supported the Congress have also joined the People's Party. The status of two Congress MLAs is yet to be decided as they put in their papers before the recent series of political developments that led to the Tuki government falling in January 2016, imposition of President's rule and installation of the late Kalikho Pul government for a short span.

Photograph: PTI Photo
Stoking yet another controversy, the Bharatiya Janata Party in Kerala on Friday described social reformer and Dalit icon Sree Narayana Guru, who belonged to the backward Ezhava caste, as the greatest "Hindu sanyasi" the state has ever seen.

"Kerala's biggest contribution to the world is the great Hindu sanyasi 'Sree Narayana guru' and his teachings," BJP's Kerala unit said in a Facebook post as the state celebrates the birth anniversary of the 19th century spiritual guru.

The controversial view of BJP comes close on the heels of the row triggered by RSS, which claimed that the Onam festival marked the celebration of 'Vamana Jayanthi' and not the home coming of demon king Mahabali.

Describing the guru as the "greatest revolutionary" that Kerala has ever seen, the BJP post said the late leader had reformed the Hindu religion by denouncing various age-old practises.

"On seeing the growing acceptability of his thoughts, those who had ridiculed him earlier were singing paeans now." it said.

The guru's teachings were "lessons" to the "pseudo progressive" activists who have criticised and mocked at their own country and its culture, it said.

The guru was a Hindu saint who worked towards reforming Hinduism staying within the frames of the religion, the post said.

Sree Narayana Guru had led a reform movement in Kerala by rejecting casteism and promoting new values of spiritual freedom, social equality and upliftment of the downtrodden, it added.

KPCC President, V M Sudheeran, slammed the BJP's description of the revered social reformer as a "Hindu saint" and said it was an "insult" to the guru.

Opposition leader Ramesh Chennithala said by describing the guru as a "Hindu saint", the saffron party was promoting its communal agenda.

The guru, who was beyond any religion, had been described as just a "Hindu sanyasi", he said, adding this was an attempt to bring him into the sangh parivar fold.

Last week as Kerala celebrated 'Onam', BJP's fountainhead RSS had triggered a controversy by questioning the legends behind the festival saying it was the celebration of birth of Vamana, an incarnation of Lord Vishnu, and not the homecoming of demon king Mahabali.

RSS' stand had evoked protests from various quarters, including ruling CPI-M.

As BJP President Amit Shah greeted the people on 'Vamana Jayanthi", Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan had objected to it and demanded an apology.

Image: A screen grab of BJP Kerala unit's Facebook post late Thursday night calling Narayana Guru a 'Hindu sanyasi'
Apparently hinting at Amar Singh, UP CM says 'we will not let outsiders drive a wedge between us'.

Locked in a turf battle with his uncle Shivpal Yadav, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Friday laid bare his angst, saying he felt bad after being removed as Samajwadi Party state president and demanded that he be given a say in ticket distribution for the 2017 assembly election.

Akhilesh said he has rejected the resignation of Shivpal and he will comply with his father and party supremo Mulayam Singhs Yadav direction to re-induct sacked Mining Minister Gayatri Prajapati, adding that netaji will find a solution (to the current crisis) and everyone will accept it.

Everyone understands who is this outsider, even you know that. I have told netaji that if an outsider comes between us, he will be thrown out.

The feud in the Yadav family had spilled into the open after the Chief Minister stripped Shivpal of key ministerial portfolios on September 13, hours after he was replaced with Shivpal as the party's state unit chief by Mulayam. In a dramatic development, Shivpal resigned from all party and cabinet posts on Thursday night.

I felt bad and you saw its effect. Im coming here after a discussion with netaji (Mulayam). Samajwadi Party is a family and there are no differences in the party, Akhilesh said at India TVs 'Chunav Manch' conclave in Lucknow.

The chief minister rubbished reports that he is behind the feud in the family saying, Its a fight for the chair. If a good person asks for the CMs post, I am ready to give it up.

Making it clear that he wanted a say in the distribution of tickets in the upcoming state elections, Akhilesh said, I say I will give back everything but then I will say I should have the authority to distribute tickets. It will be my pariskha (test) in elections.

Apparently attacking SP Rajya Sabha member Amar Singh for fuelling feud in the family, he said, Everyone understands who is this outsider, even you know that. I have told netaji that if an outsider comes between us, he will be thrown out.

"Netaji and I have decided that we will not let outsiders drive a wedge between us, he said.

"If there is some issue, Netaji will find a solution and everyone will accept it. Netaji is my father and also his (Shivpals) brother, he will find a solution to this issue, he said.

"I have said that I take some decisions on instructions of Netaji, I take some decisions on my own," he said.

On Mulayam's announcement of taking back controversial minister Prajapati, Akhilesh said, It is my responsibility as a son to accept netajis decision. I accept netajis decision to bring Gayatri Prajapati back into Cabinet.

On removal of Chief Secretary Deepak Singhal, the chief minister said, Uncle knows why he was removed, he should tell this to people.

In reply to a question, Akhilesh said, The one who is at the top is all alone, is always lonely.

The removal of Singhal and Prajapati was seen as a bone of contention between Shivpal and Akhilesh.

Uncle knows why he (Chief Secretary Deepak Singhal) was removed, he should tell this to people.

On the stalled merger of gangster-politician Mukhtar Ansaris Quami Ekta Dal with the SP, he said, We wouldve merged QED with the SP but then media would have blamed us.

Shivpal was said to have shepherded the merger of QED with the Samajwadi Party. When Akhilesh nixed the merger, Shivpal reportedly felt that he was publicly humiliated by his nephew.

Akhilesh was adamant that the merger be called off as he wanted to maintain the clean image he had once sought to establish by opposing former MP D P Yadav in the party before the 2012 state assembly polls.

His stand had won the party political mileage after it had lost power in 2007 over law and order which is a major poll issue this time as well.

QED, an eastern UP-based political party, is headed by former SP MP Afzal Ansari, who is elder brother of Mukhtar, now in jail in connection with the murder of a Bharatiya Janata Party MLA.

On Congress vice president Rahul Gandhis oft repeated remark that SPs cycle (its poll symbol) was punctured, Akhilesh said, He is fooling farmers. He knows bicycles now come with tubeless tyres. People now trust us that whatever promise we make, we fulfil it.

If Rahul Gandhi had said that Akhilesh is a good leader then I would have also said he (Rahul) is a good leader. We have also waived loans of farmers, he said.

Attacking the BJP, which had recent held protests over the law and order issue in the state, he said, The BJP protested at police stations, met the governor but did not inform me. I will take prompt action if complaints reach me.

IMAGE: Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav in Lucknow. Photograph: PTI Photo
The Congress party just lost power in Arunachal Pradesh once again!

The Congress on Friday lost its government in Arunachal Pradesh when 43 of its MLAs led by Chief Minister Pema Khandu defected wholesale and merged with the People's Party of Arunachal, just two months after it had regained power.

Khandu, who had replaced Nabam Tuki following a dissident campaign in July, paraded 42 MLAs before Speaker Tenzing Norbu Thongdok, who accepted their joining the PPA, assembly sources said.

The merger would be notified in the assembly bulletin, formalising the political development that leaves Congress with governments only in Manipur, Meghalaya and Mizoram in the northeast.

The dramatic development in Arunachal Pradesh brought back memories of the famous 'aya ram, gaya ram' episode involving Bhajan Lal who was heading a Janata Party government in Haryana and defected lock, stock, and barrel with all the party MLAs to the Congress after Indira Gandhi came back to power in 1980.

Tuki was the only Congress MLA who did not join PPA, a constituent of the North East Democratic Alliance which was formed on May 24 in Guwahati.

Khandu on July 16 had become the chief minister after months of political turmoil that unseated Tuki, who himself was reinstated as chief minister by the apex court only two days before.

In a House of 60, the Congress had 44 MLAs with one seat falling vacant after former chief minister Kalikho Pul committed suicide on August 9, while the BJP has 11 members including two Independents.

The status of two Congress MLAs is yet to be decided as they put in their papers before the recent series of political developments that led to first Tuki government falling in January this year, imposition of President's rule and installation of the late Kalikho Pul government on February 19 for a short span.

Pul was forced to resign in July 13 following a Supreme Court judgement. On March 3 last, Pul along with 29 Congress MLAs joined the PPA.

PPA CWC chairman Kameng Ringu termed the development as a "homecoming" after a short temporary self exile of the party.

Asked for the reasons behind the development, Deputy Chief Minister Chowna Mein said that for a resource-starved state like Arunachal, it is necessary to be with a bigger party to get more development funds from the Centre.

However, Tuki, who was out of the station, could not be contacted for his comments.

The PPA had ruled the state for a brief period from March 3 to July 13 this year under late Pul. Earlier the PPA had

formed the government in 1979 when Tomo Riba was the chief minister.

Riba, who took oath on September 18, 1979, ruled the state for 46 days before being deposed on November 3, the same year.

Meanwhile, state BJP President Tapir Gao, while welcoming Khandu's move, stated that the decision should have been taken earlier.

"We are happy that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's dream of a 'Congress-mukt Bharat' is becoming a reality now," Gao said.

While blaming the Congress high command for the mess in the party, Gao said party president Sonia Gandhi and Vice President Rahul Gandhi should have taken care of this.

Asked about the possibility of PPA MLAs merging with the BJP, Gao said the party's door was open.

IMAGE: Arunachal Chief Minister Pema Khandu with state Education Minister Honchun Ngandam. PHOTOGRAPH: Pema Khandu/Facebook
Lieutenant Governor Najeeb Jung on Friday asked Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, who is currently in Finland on a study tour, to return to Delhi immediately in the wake of sudden spurt in dengue and chikungunya cases in the national capital.

"The deputy CM has been asked to come back to Delhi immediately as the city is witnessing spurt in dengue and chikungunya cases," a top source said.

Sisodia, who also hold the education portfolio, along with his officers are in Finland to study the education system of that country.

Source said, besides Sisodia, all officers including Education Secretary have been directed to return to Delhi immediately.

Earlier in the day, Congress activists observed 'Bhagoda Divas' in Delhi to protest against the alleged absence of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Sisodia and other ministers from the national capital which is at present reeling under chikungunya and dengue outbreak.

Refuting the allegation of the Opposition that he is "holidaying" in Finland, Sisodia said it was not a "sin" to study the schooling system of other countries to fix the problems in Delhi's education system.

He said he had worked hard to improve the education system in the national capital and he was in Finland to see what more needs to be done.

"Learning from across the world is not a sin. It's a sin to defame an educational tour as a 'holiday'. I'm in Finland. We need to learn a lot from their education system, the best in the world (sic)," he said in a series of tweets.
Mulayam said Akhilesh will not defy his words and announced that sacked minister Gayatri Prajapati will be taken back in the UP cabinet.

Speaking out over the factional feud in the Samajwadi Party, its supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav on Friday said there can be no division in the party till he is there, a day after the dramatic resignation from cabinet and party posts by his brother Shivpal.

Addressing party men in Lucknow, Mulayam said his son and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav will not defy his words and announced that sacked mining minister Gayatri Prajapati will be taken back in the UP cabinet, considered a bone of contention between Shivpal and Akhilesh.

"There can be no division in the party, till I am there," said Mulayam, who has been attempting to broker a truce between his son and brother.

"We have a big family, differences may occur... There is no fight between Shivpal Yadav and Akhilesh," the SP supremo asserted while addressing party men, adding that Akhilesh will meet Shivpal at his residence.

The SP supremo said it was election time and all should come together to work united. "There is no fight among Ramgopal, Akhilesh and Shivpal," he told reporters as slogans in favour of Shivpal drowned his remarks.

As the crisis threatened to cast a shadow over the SPs prospects in the upcoming assembly elections, Mulayam sought to downplay the developments saying, "Every father and son faces issues....There is no rift."

Mulayam, however, said that there is 'fault of our people as well who spoke to media' and added that some people created confusion that there was rift in the party.

"Samajwadi Party is a family. There are no differences in the party," he said.

Mulayam also defended Prajapati who was dropped by Akhilesh as mining minister, saying 'the order of his sacking will be rescinded'.

His remarks came hours after Shivpal told agitated supporters who had gathered outside his residence that he was with Mulayam.

"We all have to strengthen Samajwadi Party. We are with netaji (Mulayam). His message is an order for us. We will not let the party be weakened. In every situation, we are with Netaji," Shivpal said addressing slogan-shouting party-men outside his 7 Kalidas Marg residence in Lucknow.

"You have to go to the party office. We have to calmly convey our views to netaji," he said.

The partymen had gathered in his support since Thursday night after he submitted his resignation to Mulayam as ruling Samajwadi Partys Uttar Pradesh unit head and as a minister in the cabinet of nephew Akhilesh.

However, Mulayam reportedly refused to accept the resignations, they said. Shivpal's resignation as minister has also not been accepted by the chief minister.

The ruling party circles witnessed hectic confabulations right from the morning with a number of legislators and ministers meeting Shivpal. Prajapati was among those who went to Shivpal's residence.

Assembly Speaker Mata Prasad Pandey also met Shivpal in an apparent bid to resolve the situation.

After his meeting with Mulayam, which lasted hardly for about 15 minutes, Shivpal left for his residence after which Akhilesh Yadav returned home to meet Mulayam and they discussed the situation.

Meanwhile in Etawah, hundreds of Shivpals supporters gathered at Shastri crossing and sat on dharna demanding that all portfolios be restored to him.

One of his supporters also tried to immolate himself demanding sacking of Mulayams cousin Ramgopal Yadav.

In his constituency Jaswant Nagar, shops were shut down by supporters, who also blocked traffic on the national highway.

The supporters were shouting slogans Shivpal tum sangharsh karo, hum tumhare saath hain (In your struggle, we are with you).

The feud in the Yadav family had spilled into the open after the chief minister stripped Shivpal of key ministerial portfolios on September 13, hours after he was replaced with Shivpal as the partys state unit chief by Mulayam.

IMAGE: SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav in Lucknow on Thursday. Photograph: Nand Kuamr/ PTI Photo
Here's a recap of moments captured in India in the past 24 hours.

RAF personnel deployed at City Railway Station following pro-Kannada activists rail roko call in protest over Cauvery water issue in Bengaluru. Photograph: PTI Photo

Police stop Left students and Youth organisation activists who were staging a protest march against State Government in Kolkata on Thursday for their various demands. Photograph: Swapan Mahapatra/PTI Photo

Cadets jubilate after their passing out parade at CRPF Academy Kadarpur in Gurgaon. Photograph: PTI Photo

Revelers take to the streets to immerse Lord Ganesha. Photograph: PTI Photo

The first images of earth taken by the advanced weather satellite INSAT-3DR which was recently launched by GSLV-F05 from Sriharikota as released by Indian Space Research Organisation. Photograph: PTI Photo

Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi at a road sabha during Kisan Yatra in Allahabad. Photograph: PTI Photo
At least 28 people, including five children, were killed and 30 others injured when a suicide bomber shouting 'Allahu Akbar' blew himself up inside a mosque packed with worshippers for Friday prayers in Mohmand Agency in Pakistan's restive northwest tribal region.

The attacker blew himself when the prayers were in progress at the mosque in the Anbar tehsil of the agency bordering Afghanistan.

"A suicide bomber was in the mosque. He shouted 'Allahu Akbar' and blew himself up," Assistant Political Agent Naveed Akbar told media persons.

He said that Friday prayers were being offered around 2pm when the powerful blast took place.

At least 28 people, including five children, were killed in the attack and 30 others injured, Pakistani media reported, citing officials.

"Many people were gathered inside the mosque when a suicide bomber blew himself up," an eyewitness said.

Rescue teams and police rushed to the spot. The bodies and the injured are being shifted to local hospitals for medical treatment.

Injured were also taken to hospitals in Bajaur Agency, Charsadda and Peshawar for treatment.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistani Taliban routinely targets courts, schools and mosques.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has expressed his grief over the loss of lives in the blast.

"The cowardly attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the government's resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country," he said in a statement.

The attack came on a day when Sharif vowed to continue the war against militancy and terrorism till elimination of the last terrorist.

During a meeting with Army chief General Raheel Sharif on Friday, the prime minister expressed the resolve to continue the war against terrorism and militancy.

The army had launched operation 'Zarb-e-Azb' in June 2014 to flush out militant bases in the northwestern tribal areas.

Representative Image: Reuters
A yoga training textbook prepared by Baba Ramdev's Patanjali Yog Peeth would be taught in the primary schools in Goa, a senior official said on Thursday.

"The (yoga training) scheme would be implemented by Goa Educational Development Corporation for a period of six years commencing from the ongoing academic year," Director of Education G P Bhat told reporters.

The government also intends to constitute a state-level 'yoga cell' of yoga experts.

"A healthy approach towards education and life can be developed right from a young age via the most powerful yogic practises. Yoga at primary level will definitely help develop an effective system to create healthy citizens for the nation," Bhat said.

'Khel-Khel Me', a yoga training book based on NCERT syllabus and prepared by Patanjali Yog Peeth will be taught from std I to std IV.

The problems which school children face, such as stress, depression, lack of concentration, exam phobia, behavioural problems, relationship issues and drug addiction can be tackled through this course, Bhat said.

As per the scheme, 15 government primary schools in each tehsil will be selected for introducing yoga education. A teacher from each school will be selected as a trainer.
Turkey: Erdogan claims success at clearing stretch of Syrian border

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 2 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Turkey: Erdogan claims success at clearing stretch of Syrian border, 2 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a81c.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 02, 2016

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey's incursion into northern Syria has been successful, with a 400-square-kilometer area cleared of Islamic State and Kurdish YPG militia forces.

Erdogan stressed on September 1 that he views both groups as equally threatening to Turkey, although the Kurdish group has been a top U.S. ally in fighting IS.

Erdogan said the Syrian Kurdish militia has failed to abide by its agreement to retreat to east of the Euphrates River. He repeated his charge that the Syrian Kurds, who he says are allied with Kurdish separatist militants who have staged bomb attacks in Turkey, are "terrorists."

"Nobody can expect us to allow a terror corridor on our southern border," he said.

Erdogan also said Turkey wants to establish a "safe zone" on the Syrian border, though other world powers have not backed the idea.

While taking issue with Erdogan on the Syrian Kurds, the Pentagon agreed with Erdogan's claim of progress at clearing the border on September 1.

A Pentagon spokesman said IS now retains control of only about 25 kilometers of border with Turkey near the Syrian town of Al-Rai, and that stretch is likely to be closed soon.

Based on reporting by Reuters and AFP

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

Copyright notice: Copyright (c) 2007-2009. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036
EU: Mogherini says truce holding in east Ukraine

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 2 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, EU: Mogherini says truce holding in east Ukraine, 2 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a82a.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 02, 2016

By RFE/RL

EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini (file photo)

European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini says a cease-fire is holding in eastern Ukraine, where fighting between government forces and Russia-backed separatists has killed more than 9,500 people since April 2014.

"We hope that this can constitute a good basis not only for the restart of the school year but also for a continuation of the situation in this respect," Mogherini said on September 2 after meeting the EU's 28 foreign ministers in Bratislava, Slovakia.

The trilateral contact group on Ukraine, which comprises representatives from Ukraine, Russia, and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), struck a deal last week for a cease-fire to coincide with the new school year starting on September 1.

A similar 2015 cease-fire held for less than a week.

Mogherini also said the ministers agreed that the bloc would look into supporting a planned police mission by the OSCE to help the stalled peace process in Ukraine's east.

She added that the lifting of the sanctions against Russia "is going to be linked to the full implementation of the Minsk agreements" aimed at resolving the conflict.

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

Copyright notice: Copyright (c) 2007-2009. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036
Turkish tanks cross into Syria in new front

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 3 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Turkish tanks cross into Syria in new front, 3 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a831f.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 03, 2016

Turkish tanks crossed into northern Syria from the Kilis Province to fight Islamic State (IS) extremists, opening a new front after Turkey's intervention last month against the group, state media reported.

The tanks entered the Syrian village of Al-Rai on September 3, the Anadolu and Dogan news agencies said.

The move is aimed at providing military support to Syrian opposition fighters, according to state-run Anadolu.

Turkey launched a cross-border operation on August 24 along with Free Syrian Army units to clear IS militants from the village of Jarablus.

Syrian rebels have since been seizing villages along the Turkish border near Jarablus and the western Cobanbey district from IS, Anadolu reported.

Based on reporting by AP, Reuters, and AFP

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

Copyright notice: Copyright (c) 2007-2009. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036
Pakistan charges ex-husband, father with British woman's murder

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 3 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Pakistan charges ex-husband, father with British woman's murder, 3 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a833.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 03, 2016

Pakistani police say they have charged the former husband and the father of a British-Pakistani woman  suspected to have been the victim of a so-called honor killing  with her murder.

The announcement was made by the regional police in the northern Punjab Province on September 3.

Samia Shahid, 28, died in July in Punjab, where she was visiting relatives. Police say she died as a result of being strangled.

Her husband, Mukhtar Kazam, says she was murdered because she married him against the family's wishes.

Shahid's first husband, Muhammad Shakeel, has been arrested on suspicion of her murder while her father, Chaudhry Muhammad, has been held as an accessory to murder.

"The ex-husband has also been charged with raping her," Abubakar Buksh, a high-ranking police official, told AFP.

Hundreds of Pakistani women are killed each year by relatives who accuse them of violating conservative social or religious norms.

Based on reporting by AFP and dawn.com

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

Copyright notice: Copyright (c) 2007-2009. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036
Turkey promises to uphold migration deal with EU

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 3 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Turkey promises to uphold migration deal with EU, 3 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a8413.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 03, 2016

A senior Turkish official said on September 3 that his country would fully implement a deal between the European Union and Turkey aimed at stopping the flow of migrants, but will not take further steps to control migration flows unless the EU lifts visa requirements for Turkish visitors.

Europe Minister Omar Celik's comments came after talks with EU foreign ministers in Bratislava.

Celik said the meeting ended with "very strong consensus about focusing on the positive agenda and to further enhance the cooperation between Turkey and EU."

There was no other indication that the talks improved tensions between the EU and Turkey, which have worsened after the July coup attempt against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Celik said that the migration scheme will continue to be implemented but without visa liberalization "Turkey will not be very positive about taking new steps to set up new mechanisms."

European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said that would happen only if Ankara met the existing EU "benchmarks" on human rights.

Celik reiterated that the government would not roll back its expansive terror laws as long as it remained under a serious terror threat following the coup.

The EU insists that visa-free travel is tied to Turkey rolling back its crackdown.

Based on reporting by dpa and AP

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EU: Hahn confident on Ukraine, Georgia visa liberalization in 2016

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 3 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, EU: Hahn confident on Ukraine, Georgia visa liberalization in 2016, 3 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a8513.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 03, 2016

EU enlargement commissioner Johannes Hahn (file photo)

BRATISLAVA  EU enlargement commissioner Johannes Hahn said on September 3 that there will be a decision in both the European Parliament and among EU member states to grant visa liberalization to Ukraine and Georgia later this year.

Speaking to RFE/RL at a meeting among EU foreign ministers in Bratislava on September 2 and September 3, Hahn noted that "among member states there was a clear indication and by many of the member states a clear expectation that both countries should get it."

Both the European Parliament and the council must give green light to visa liberalization and EU sources that RFE/RL has spoken to believe that this will happen with both countries in October or November and that citizens will be able to travel to the EU's Schengen zone without visas later this winter.

Earlier in the summer, Germany blocked a decision to grant Georgia visa liberalization, with reports claiming that Berlin feared a spike of crimes committed by Georgians in Germany.

Hahn however believes that the creation later this autumn of a beefed up EU mechanism suspending visas in case of problems "should remove all concerns."

On visa liberalization for Kosovo, the commissioner was less confident stating that the "timing was unclear" and was dependent on finding solutions to a border dispute with Montenegro and building up a track record in fighting organized crime.

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

Copyright notice: Copyright (c) 2007-2009. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036
Russia, U.S. say close to reaching cease-fire deal on Syria

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 4 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Russia, U.S. say close to reaching cease-fire deal on Syria, 4 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a86a.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 04, 2016

By RFE/RL

U.S. President Barack Obama said in Hangzhou that talks with Russia will be key in reaching any deal to end hostilities in Syria but negotiations are difficult.

Both Moscow and Washington say they are close to reaching a cease-fire deal on Syria but still require more time.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said on September 4 that "We are close to the deal.... But the art of diplomacy requires time to implementation."

He added, "I think we have no reason to expect that talks will collapse."

He was speaking to media on the sidelines of the Group of 20 economic summit in the Chinese city of Hangzhou.

Earlier in the day, U.S. President Barack Obama said in Hangzhou that talks with Russia will be key in reaching any deal to end hostilities in Syria but negotiations are difficult.

"We have grave differences with the Russians in terms of both the parties we support but also the process that is required to bring about peace in Syria," Obama said.

"We're not there yet," he added. "I think it's premature for us to say there's a clear path forward, but there's the possibility at least for us to make some progress."

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov have been deep in talks for weeks over a deal to boost U.S. and Russian military cooperation to fight the Islamic State group and other extremists in Syria.

Speaking to reporters on September 4 after meeting with Lavrov, Kerry said a couple of tough issues still remained, adding that the two sides would meet again on September 5.

"It's fair to say that out of the review I think there are a couple of tough issues that we talked about today," Kerry said, declining to give details.

"We will meet tomorrow morning and see whether or not it is possible to bridge the gap and come to a conclusion on these couple of issues," Kerry added.

He added that the United States will not rush into a deal with Russia to end the civil war in Syria.

A possible deal could include provisions to ensure aid can reach besieged areas of Syria and steps to prevent Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government from bombing areas where U.S.-backed rebels are operating.

Washington's Syria envoy, Michael Ratney, has said the deal would also require the withdrawal of Damascus's forces from a key supply route north of Aleppo, according to a letter from Ratney to the Syrian armed opposition seen by Reuters and dated September. 3.

In return, the United States would coordinate with Russia against Al-Qaeda, the letter said, without elaborating.

The civil war has killed more than 250,000 people and displaced 11 million, causing a refugee crisis in the Middle East and Europe, and contributing to a rise in militant Islamist groups.

Russia has backed Assad, but the United States has worked with moderate opposition forces fighting Assad.

With reporting by AFP, AP, and Reuters

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

Copyright notice: Copyright (c) 2007-2009. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036
Crimean Tatar activist says psychiatric detainment endangers health

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 4 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Crimean Tatar activist says psychiatric detainment endangers health, 4 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a8721.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 04, 2016

Ilmi Umerov was charged with separatism in May after he made public statements opposing Moscow's seizure of the peninsula from Ukraine.

A noted Crimean Tatar activist who has been forced into a psychiatric hospital in Russian-occupied Crimea says the conditions he's facing are a threat to his physical health.

Ilmi Umerov, the former deputy chairman of the Crimean Tatars' self-governing body, the Mejlis, was charged with separatism in May after he made public statements opposing Moscow's seizure of the peninsula from Ukraine.

In August, he was forcibly admitted to a psychiatric clinic for a month of assessment tests.

Umerov, 59, spoke to a Reuters reporter who gained access to the hospital in Simferopol, where he's being held.

Umerov, whose relatives and lawyers say he suffers from diabetes, Parkinson's disease, and heart problems, said he had been forced to live in squalid, crowded conditions that endangered his health.

"With this bouquet [of ailments], to be in such conditions is of course dangerous," he was quoted as saying by Reuters.

He added that on his fourth day at the clinic he collapsed and lost consciousness.

He also said that he had been barred from speaking to journalists.

Human Rights Watch has urged the Russian-backed authorities in Crimea to drop the charges against Umerov and provide him with necessary medical treatment.

The Moscow-based Memorial Human Rights Center has called the case against Umerov "illegal and politically motivated."

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin has compared Umerov's detention to the Soviet-era practice of holding dissidents in psychiatric hospitals.

Based on reporting by Reuters and AFP

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Libyan government forces say on verge of regaining city from IS

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 4 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Libyan government forces say on verge of regaining city from IS, 4 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a873.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 04, 2016

Libyan pro-government forces say they are facing fierce resistance from fighters of the Islamic State (IS) extremist group in the coastal city of Sirte but should gain full control of it in a few more days.

Reda Issa, a spokesman for loyalist forces, said September 4 that "IS is putting up fierce resistance in their last neighborhoods."

Backed by weeks of U.S. air strikes, forces loyal to Libya's government of national accord (GNA) have recaptured nearly all of what had been the jihadists' main stronghold in North Africa.

IS took control of Sirte last year.

At least 10 pro-GNA fighters were killed and 60 wounded in a renewed offensive on September 3, with most of the deaths caused by car bombs and suicide attacks.

Based on reporting by AFP and Reuters

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Prominent activist freed in Iran

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 4 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Prominent activist freed in Iran, 4 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a8813.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 04, 2016

By RFE/RL

Bahareh Hedayat (right) and her husband Amin Ahmadian pose for a photograph from 2012.

Prominent student activist and women's rights advocate Bahareh Hedayat has been released in Iran after spending more than six years in jail, her husband says.

Amin Ahmadian,announced Hedayat's release in a post on Instagram where he said he couldn't believe that she was finally free.

Hedayat was among scores of activists, intellectuals, and reformist figures who were arrested and sentenced to prison during the state crackdown that followed the disputed 2009 reelection of Iran's former President Mahmud Ahmadinejad.

She was sentenced to 7 1/2 years in prison after being convicted of charges that included "acting against national security," "insulting the leader," and "insulting the president."

While in jail, she had been reportedly sentenced to an additional six months for writing a letter, with fellow jailed student activist Majid Tavakoli, calling on students to continue their peaceful struggle for more rights.

Rights groups had repeatedly called for her release.

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Turkey says Syrian border completely cleared of IS

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 4 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Turkey says Syrian border completely cleared of IS, 4 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a89c.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 04, 2016

By RFE/RL

Turkish military tanks are seen during clashes between Turkish soldiers and Islamic State fighters 20 kilometer west of the Turkish-Syrian border town of Karkamis, in the southern region of Gaziantep, on September 3.

Turkey's Prime Minister Binali Yildirim says government forces and Syrian rebels have completely expelled Islamic State (IS) extremists from the Syrian-Turkish border.

"From Azaz to Jarablus, our 91-kilometer border has been completely secured. All terrorist organizations have been repulsed and they have gone," Yildirim said on September 4 during a televised speech while visiting the southeastern city of Diyarbakir.

The Turkish military said in a statement that the rebels, mainly Syrian Arabs and Turkomans fighting under the banner of the Free Syrian Army, took charge of the frontier between Azaz and Jarablus after seizing 20 villages from IS fighters.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said IS "has lost its link with the outside world after losing all border areas" with Turkey.

The London-based monitoring group said "rebels and Islamist factions backed by Turkish tanks and warplanes" had taken villages on the border "after IS withdrew from them, ending IS's presence...on the border."

The advance comes after Turkey launched an operation on August 24 designed to drive IS away from the border and also prevent the advance of Kurdish fighters.

Yildirim on September 4 defended his country's intervention in Syria, pointing to their long shared border. "We are there to protect our borders, ensure the safety of our citizens' lives and property, and to protect the territorial integrity of Syria," he said.

"We will never allow the formation of an artificial state in the north of Syria," Yildirim said.

Turkey and allied Syrian rebels have been fighting U.S.-backed Kurdish forces known as the People's Protection Units (YPG) to prevent the Syrian Kurdish militias from taking more territory in northern Syria.

Turkey views the YPG as an extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), an armed group which it considers a terrorist organization.

However, the U.S. sees the YPG militia as an important strategic part of the U.S.-led anti-IS coalition and has provided them with extensive aid and air strikes.

With reporting by Reuters, AP, and AFP

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Russia starts military drills on Ukraine's border, in annexed Crimea

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Russia starts military drills on Ukraine's border, in annexed Crimea, 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a8a22.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 05, 2016

Moscow has launched large-scale military drills on Ukraine's eastern border and around Ukraine's Russia-annexed Crimean Peninsula.

The Russian Defense Ministry said September 5 that 12,500 servicemen are taking part in the drills across its southern military region. It said the Russian Navy in the Black Sea and Caspian Sea are participating in the exercises and that planes also are being used.

The six-day exercises will test the army's ability to "plan, prepare, and carry out military actions," the ministry said in a statement.

Russia last month conducted a large-scale snap drill, putting its troops on full combat readiness in military districts bordering Ukraine and the Baltic states.

Tensions between Russia and Ukraine spiked over the summer after Moscow accused Kyiv of attempting armed incursions into Russia-annexed Crimea.

Ukraine and its Western allies have been locked in a confrontation with Russia since Moscow forcibly seized the region from Kyiv in March 2014.

Based on reporting by AFP and Reuters

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Bombings in Syria kill dozens, mostly in government-controlled areas

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Bombings in Syria kill dozens, mostly in government-controlled areas, 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a8a4.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

Last updated (GMT/UTC): 05.09.2016 11:39

Bombings in Syria have killed at least 44 people, mostly in government-controlled areas.

Syrian state media reports that at least 35 people were killed in two simultaneous blasts that hit the Arzouna bridge area at the entrance to the northwestern coastal city of Tartous.

Syrian state television said the first explosion was a car bomb and the second was a suicide belt detonated as rescue workers came to the scene of the first incident.

Another three people died when a car bomb struck the city of Homs at the entrance to the Bab Tadmur neighborhood.

Syrian state television also reported that one person died in an explosion near the town of Al-Saboura, along a road which leads onto the Beirut-Damascus highway.

Meanwhile, a bomber also struck in the northeastern city of Hasakeh, which is mostly controlled by Kurdish forces, killing at least five more people.

Based on reports by Reuters, AFP, and AP

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Kazakh journalist union chief's trial postponed again due to poor health

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Kazakh journalist union chief's trial postponed again due to poor health, 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a8b13.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 05, 2016

By RFE/RL's Kazakh Service

The head of the Kazakh Journalists' Union and chairman of the National Press Club has been rushed to a hospital for the third time since the start of his trial in August for alleged fraud and tax evasion.

Seitqazy Mataev felt sick on his way from his home, where he is under house arrest, to the courtroom on September 5 in Astana and was hospitalized with high blood pressure.

Mataev's lawyer says the trial was postponed to September 13.

Mataev was taken to hospital with high blood pressure twice before, on August 23 and August 29.

Mataev went on trial on August 23 with his son, Aset, the director of the KazTAG news agency, who also faces fraud charges.

The Mataevs were detained in February. Both deny the charges against them and rights groups have denounced the charges as politically motivated.

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

Copyright notice: Copyright (c) 2007-2009. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036
Two alleged militants, security officer killed in Russia's Daghestan

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Two alleged militants, security officer killed in Russia's Daghestan, 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a8c13.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 05, 2016

Russia's National Antiterrorist Committee (NAK) says two militants who were involved in a series of terrorist attacks have been killed in the North Caucasus region of Daghestan.

According to the NAK, one security officer was killed as well in the special operation held in Daghestan's southern district of Magaramkent on September 5.

Another security officer was wounded during the operation, the NAK said.

Daghestan has been at the epicenter of a wave of violence by armed criminal groups and by militants seeking to establish an Islamic caliphate in the North Caucasus.

Organized crime, business turf wars, political disputes, and clan rivalry also contribute to the bloodshed in the region.

Based on reporting by TASS and Interfax

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Afghanistan: Twin suicide attacks in Kabul kill at least 24

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Afghanistan: Twin suicide attacks in Kabul kill at least 24, 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a8d1e.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 05, 2016

By RFE/RL

Afghan officials transport a victim after a suicide attack in Kabul on September 5.

Two suicide bombers have struck a busy area near the Afghan Defense Ministry in Kabul, killing at least 24 people.

Interior Ministry spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said on September 5 that both the suicide bombers were on foot and blew themselves up one after the other, killing policemen and civilians nearby.

Mohammad Ismail Kawosi, a spokesman for the Health Ministry, told RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan that at least 24 people were killed and 90 others injured in the blasts in the Afghan capital.

The dead included an army general and two senior police commanders, and Kawosi suggested it could increase as more information becomes available.

Late on September 5, a third massive explosion shook central Kabul, with police saying a suicide car bombing appeared to have targeted a guest house for foreigners and diplomats in the Shar-e Now (New City) neighborhood.

Attackers appear to have entered the building and exchange gunfire with police. There was no immediate word on casualties.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said on Twitter that the ministry was the target of the first attack, while police were targeted in the second.

A Taliban attack on the Defense Ministry in February killed at least 15 people and wounded more than 30.

With reporting by RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan, Reuters, and AFP

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Date set for extremism trial of Kazakh businessman

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Date set for extremism trial of Kazakh businessman, 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a8da.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 05, 2016

The date has been set for the trial of a Kazakh businessman charged with attempting to overthrow the government, extremism, and illegal weapon possession.

The Kazakh Military Court said on September 5 that the trial in the high-profile case will start on September 14.

Tokhtar Toleshov, chief executive of one of Kazakhstan's largest breweries, was detained in January along with 24 other suspects, including the ex-deputy prosecutor-general and the former chief of the South Kazakhstan regional police.

Toleshov's detention followed a crackdown by Astana on both pro-Russian and nationalist activists.

He had run the Kazakh office of a Russia-based organization called the Center for the Analysis of Terrorist Threats. He had also advised Russia's parliament on matters of economic cooperation and religion.

Based on reporting by inform.kz and nur.kz

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Kazakh authorities say Islamic radicals planned '9/11-like' attack

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Kazakh authorities say Islamic radicals planned '9/11-like' attack, 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a8e13.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 05, 2016

Kazakhstan's National Security Committee (KNB) says a group of radical Islamists that was arrested in recent weeks in the southern region of Almaty planned to hijack a plane and conduct "a 9/11-like" attack.

The KNB said on September 5 that another group apprehended in the central Qaraghandy region in June planned terrorist attacks against local infrastructure and a Russian military base near the lake of Balkhash.

According to the KNB, three more groups arrested on August 12-30 in the regions of Western Kazakhstan and Aqtobe planned a series of terrorist attacks against police and civilians.

In general, the KNB says, eight radical Islamist groups have been apprehended in the country since January.

In June, Kazakh authorities said a group of 25 alleged Islamic militants carried out a series of attacks that killed five civilians and three members of Kazakhstan's security forces in the northwestern city of Aqtobe.

Security forces who confronted the group killed 18 gunmen and arrested seven others.

Based on reporting by Tengrinews and KazTAG

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Turkey: Erdogan urges 'safe zone' in Syria

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Turkey: Erdogan urges 'safe zone' in Syria, 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a8f13.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 05, 2016

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says he has urged world leaders attending the G20 summit in China to set up a "safe zone" in Syria that would be free from fighting and help stem the flow of refugees from the country.

Speaking in Hangzhou on September 5, he said he had called specifically for a "no-fly zone" in talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Barack Obama.

He also said the Turkish offensive in Syria was aimed at driving the Islamic State (IS) extremist organization away from Turkey's border and ensure the Syrian Kurdish YPG militia did not expand in the area.

Turkey says both IS and the YPG are terrorist organizations.

Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on September 4 that government forces and Syrian rebels have completely expelled IS extremists from the Syrian-Turkish border.

"From Azaz to Jarabulus, our 91-kilometer border has been completely secured. All terrorist organizations have been repulsed and they have gone," Yildirim said on September 4 during a televised speech while visiting the southeastern city of Diyarbakir.

Based on reporting by Reuters and AP

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

Copyright notice: Copyright (c) 2007-2009. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036
IS claims responsibility for deadly bombings across Syria

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, IS claims responsibility for deadly bombings across Syria, 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a9024.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 05, 2016

The Islamic State (IS) extremist group has claimed responsibility for several attacks across Syria that killed at least 48 people in mostly government-held areas.

The IS-run Aamaq news agency said the group was behind the "simultaneous" attacks on September 5 in Damascus, coastal Tartus, central Homs, and Hasakeh in the northeast.

Syrian state media reported that at least 35 people were killed and 43 others wounded in two simultaneous blasts that hit the Arzouna bridge area at the entrance to the northwestern coastal city of Tartus.

Syrian state television said the first explosion was a car bomb and the second was a suicide belt detonated as rescue workers came to the scene of the first incident.

Another three people died when a car bomb struck the city of Homs at the entrance to the Bab Tadmur neighborhood.

Syrian state television also reported that one person died in an explosion near the town of Al-Saboura, along a road that leads onto the Beirut-Damascus highway.

Meanwhile, a bomber also struck in the northeastern city of Hasakeh, which is mostly controlled by Kurdish forces, killing at least eight more people.

Based on reporting by AFP, Reuters, and AP

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

Copyright notice: Copyright (c) 2007-2009. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036
Tajik authorities look into reports of top IS post for fugitive officer

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Tajik authorities look into reports of top IS post for fugitive officer, 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a906.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 05, 2016

By RFE/RL's Tajik Service

Gulmurod Halimov, a former commander of the Tajik Interior Ministry's special forces, joined IS in April 2015.

Tajik authorities say they are looking into reports suggesting fugitive Tajik Colonel Gulmurod Halimov, who joined the extremist group Islamic State (IS) last year, has been appointed IS's top military commander.

Iraqi media reported on September 3 that Halimov had replaced Umar al-Shishani, who was reportedly killed in July in northern Iraq.

Muhammadrizo Halifazoda, a spokesman for the Tajik Prosecutor-General's Office, told RFE/RL on September 5 that "measures to prevent Halimov's possible plans to destabilize Tajikistan" were being taken. He did not elaborate.

On August 30, the U.S. State Department called Halimov a key member of IS and offered a reward of $3 million for information on his whereabouts.

Halimov, the former commander of the Tajik Interior Ministry's special forces, known as OMON, joined IS in April 2015.

Tajik authorities say he has been seriously injured twice in Syria.

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

Copyright notice: Copyright (c) 2007-2009. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036
EU parliament committee oks Georgia visa deal, Kosovo deal in limbo

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, EU parliament committee oks Georgia visa deal, Kosovo deal in limbo, 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a9113.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Comments All reference to Kosovo should be understood in full compliance with United Nations Security Council Resolution 1244. Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 05, 2016

By RFE/RL

BRUSSELS  The European Parliament's civil liberties committee voted on September 5 for visa liberalization for Georgia to the EU's Schengen zone.

It also voted in favor of similar move for Kosovo but against the proposal to let the European Parliament negotiate this visa-liberalization deal with other EU institutions, leaving the deal for Pristina in limbo.

The entire European Parliament plenary is now likely to endorse the committee vote on Georgia at a vote during a full plenary, possibly in October.

EU member states must also give green light for the necessary legislation to enter into place.

Germany refused to support the measures before the summer, citing a spike in crimes allegedly committed by Georgians in Germany but according to RFE/RL sources, EU ambassadors might approve this time when they meet in Brussels on September 14.

EU ministers will then give a final approval. According to council sources, this is likely to happen after the parliamentary elections in Georgia on October 8.

For Kosovo, the path looks less clear. Members of the civil liberties committee voted in favor of the report proposing visa liberalization for Kosovo by one vote, 25-24, but against the proposal to let the author of the report, Slovenian MEP Tanja Fajon, start negotiating with the Council and the European Commission, also by one vote, 25-24.

The full plenary must now give Fajon a mandate to negotiate but Fajon told RFE/RL that she will only take it to the floor once Kosovo has fulfilled two outstanding issues: settling a border dispute with Montenegro and showing progress in fighting organized crime.

Kosovo also currently lacks support among several EU member states.

A vote in the same committee on visa liberalization for Ukraine is expected at the end of September.

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Iran: Khamenei says Saudis should not be in charge of hajj

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Iran: Khamenei says Saudis should not be in charge of hajj, 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a9213.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 05, 2016

Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has blasted Saudi Arabia over its management of the hajj, suggesting Muslim countries should challenge Riyadh's control of the annual Muslim pilgrimage.

"Because of these [Saudi] rulers' oppressive behavior towards God's guests, the world of Islam must fundamentally reconsider the management of the two holy places and the issue of hajj," Khamenei said in a September 5 message posted on his website.

Khamenei also criticized the Saudi response following last year's stampede in Mecca that killed hundreds of pilgrims, including 460 Iranians.

"Instead of apology and remorse and judicial prosecution of those who were directly at fault in that horrifying event, Saudi rulers  with utmost shamelessness and insolence  refused to allow the formation of an international Islamic fact-finding committee," he said.

Saudi authorities have published few details of the official investigation into the incident. Authorities suggested at the time that some pilgrims ignored crowd control rules.

Tensions have been on the rise in recent months between the two regional rivals that are at odd over a number of issues, notably the conflicts in Syria and Yemen.

Saudi Arabia severed diplomatic ties with Iran earlier this year after Iranian protesters ransacked Saudi diplomatic offices there to protest the execution of a prominent Saudi Shi'ite cleric.

Based on reporting by Reuters, AP and the BBC

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Russia declares respected pollster 'foreign agent'

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Russia declares respected pollster 'foreign agent', 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a9324.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 05, 2016

By RFE/RL

The Levada Center is one of the largest Russian nongovernmental polling and sociological research organizations, and has conducted surveys that may have irked the Russian authorities.

Russia's Justice Ministry has placed the independent national pollster Levada Center on its official register of organizations "operating as foreign agents," potentially threatening the widely respected research group's existence.

The move was announced on the ministry's website on September 5, adding that the circumstances were disclosed in an "unscheduled" inspection of the group's documentation.

It comes just two weeks ahead of state and local elections, with the economy sputtering under low oil revenues and foreign sanctions and scattered signs of discontent as President Vladimir Putin mounts an effort to reassert Russia on the international stage.

Levada Center's director, Lev Gudkov, told TV Dozhd after the announcement that the determination could force the closure of his organization.

"That is a very bad thing for us," Gudkov said. "If we are really recognized as [foreign agents] and the decision is not changed, that will mean the end of Levada Center's activities  because with such a label it is just impossible to hold any social polls [in Russia]."

Levada is one of Russia's largest nongovernmental polling and sociological-research groups, and conducts high-profile surveys in a range of topics from the popularity of politicians to Russians' views on Moscow's bombing campaign in Syria or the severity of the country's current economic crisis.

Levada joins a growing list of well over 100 organizations and individuals targeted by the four-year-old law and its gradual tightening, including the Memorial Human Rights Center, Moscow's Sakharov Center, and a number of human rights activists.

Russian and international human rights organizations have said the law was introduced to silence independent voices.

The Russian law adopted in 2012 requires any nongovernmental organization that receives funding from abroad and engages in political activity to formally register itself as a "foreign agent."

Amendments introduced to the law in 2014 allow the Justice Ministry to forcefully add NGOs to the list of "foreign agents." Failure to comply can result in heavy fines and/or jail time.

The Russian law's influence is also thought to have extended beyond Russia's borders, with free-media and democracy campaigners like U.S.-based Freedom House noting the legislation has spawned similar laws elsewhere in Eurasia.

The public perception of the phrase "foreign agent" has an especially negative connotation in post-Soviet Russia.

Gudkov said the Levada Center's offices in Moscow were searched from August 12 to August 31 after an activist of the pro-Kremlin Antimaidan movement, Dmitry Sablin, formally accused the group of "conducting intelligence activities" and demanded that law enforcement bodies inspect the group's operations.

Gudkov declined to link the Justice Ministry's decision to upcoming State Duma and local elections, scheduled for September 18.

But he added that Levada's offices were searched after it noted a decline in the popularity of the ruling United Russia party.

The Justice Ministry said the Levada Center, founded in 2003, was the 141st organization on its list of "foreign agents."

With reporting by TVrain.ru, TASS, and The Moscow Times

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Tajikistan's Islamic party leader added to Interpol wanted list

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 5 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Tajikistan's Islamic party leader added to Interpol wanted list, 5 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a936.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 05, 2016

By RFE/RL

Muhiddin Kabiri, leader of Tajikistan's banned opposition Islamic Renaissance Party (IRPT), has been added to Interpol's wanted list on Dushanbe's request.

The Interpol website says Kabiri is wanted by Tajik authorities for alleged terrorism, fraud and organization of a criminal group.

In June, a court in Dushanbe sentenced the IRPT's deputy heads to life imprisonment and 12 other leading members of the party to prison terms of between two and 28 years on charges of conspiring with former Defense Minister Abduhalim Nazarzoda in a supposed armed bid to seize power in early September 2015.

Later that month, Tajikistan's Supreme Court added the party to a black list of extremist and terrorist organizations and banned it.

Kabiri, 51, who now lives in exile in an undisclosed country, has called charges against him and his associates politically motivated.

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Iraq: IS car bomb kills at least seven in Baghdad

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 6 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Iraq: IS car bomb kills at least seven in Baghdad, 6 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a9413.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 06, 2016

At least seven people were killed late on September 5 in a car bomb attack claimed by the Islamic State (IS) extremist group near a hospital in a central district of Baghdad, police and hospital sources said.

The suicide bomber targeted a gathering of Shi'ite Muslims near the Abd al-Majid hospital in the Karrada district, according to the militant group's Amaaq news agency.

The police and hospital sources said at least 15 people were also wounded in the blast and they expect the death toll to rise.

The blast was not far from the site of an IS suicide attack in July that killed 324 people in the worst single bomb attack ever to hit the Iraqi capital.

The fight against IS has aggravated a long-running sectarian conflict in Iraq between the Shi'ite majority and the Sunni minority.

The militants have lost ground in the past year to U.S.-backed government forces and Iranian-backed Shi'ite militias, but such bombings show they can still strike outside the territory they control in northern and western Iraq.

Based on reporting by Reuters and AFP

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Iranian police shut down 800 stores selling 'inappropriate' clothing

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 6 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Iranian police shut down 800 stores selling 'inappropriate' clothing, 6 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a9511.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 06, 2016

Iranian media reported that police have shut down more than 800 clothing stores across the country for selling "unconventional and inappropriate" attire  believed to mean Western-style outfits and women's clothing that doesn't meet strict Islamic requirements.

The reports on September 5 said the raids took place over a 10-day span after authorities first sent official warnings to merchants in more than 3,600 shops.

Iranian police and state TV have in recent weeks campaigned against selling secondhand clothes, which are considered "unhygienic," as well as clothes with English-language print on them.

Since the 1979 Islamic Revolution brought Islamists to power in Iran, women are required to cover from head-to-toe in loose-fitting simple overcoats that hide the feminine shape. They are also required to cover their head with a scarf.

Based on reporting by AP and AFP

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Tajikistan frees only woman among arrested Islamic party leaders

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 6 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Tajikistan frees only woman among arrested Islamic party leaders, 6 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a9621.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 06, 2016

By RFE/RL's Tajik Service

Tajikistan has released from prison the only woman among several high-ranking officials of the banned Islamic Renaissance Party (HNIT), her family says.

Zurafo Rahmoni, who had been serving a two-year sentence, was released on September 5 according to a mass amnesty, the family said on September 6.

Rahmoni, an adviser to the HNIT leadership, was arrested along with 13 other party leaders last year.

The group was accused of conspiring with former Defense Minister Abduhalim Nazarzoda in a supposed armed bid to seize power in early September 2015.

Tajik officials said Nazarzoda led attacks on a police station and an arsenal that killed at least 26 people. He was reportedly killed in an operation by government forces.

The authorities blamed the HNIT for organizing the mutiny and banned the party as an "extremist and terrorist organization."

Two deputy heads of the party were sentenced to life in prison, while 11 other high-ranking party officials were sentenced to terms ranging from 14 to 28 years.

Party leader Muhiddin Kabiri, who now lives in exile, has denied the accusation.

The mass amnesty, which affects more than 12,000 people, was not extended to the other jailed party leaders, who remain in prison.

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Antiterror law forces Mormon church to cut missionaries in Russia

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 6 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Antiterror law forces Mormon church to cut missionaries in Russia, 6 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a963.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 06, 2016

Mormon church officials have cut the number of missionaries being sent to Russia, saying the adjustment was forced by Russia's new antiterrorism law.

Church spokesman Eric Hawkins said on September 5 that 30 missionaries in training in the U.S. state of Utah will instead go to other Russian-speaking missions in Eastern Europe. Forty-seven will still go to Russia as planned.

The move marks the latest change made by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints since Russian President Vladimir Putin signed the law earlier this summer that puts restrictions on religious practices.

Previously, the church announced that its missionaries in Russia would be known as "volunteers" and would refrain from proselytizing publicly to comply with the law.

Hawkins said there were about 22,000 Mormons worshiping in 100 different congregations in Russia.

In early August, six missionaries were detained for several hours by local Russian police over visa issues. Three were deported to other countries.

Based on reporting by AP and Deseret News

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Kyrgyzstan says member of international terrorist group killed

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 6 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Kyrgyzstan says member of international terrorist group killed, 6 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a9713.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 06, 2016

Kyrgyz officials say a member of an international terrorist group has been "liquidated' near Bishkek.

Kyrgyzstan's State Committee for National Security said on September 6 that the 39-year-old perpetrator was killed in a shoot-out with law enforcement officers on August 29.

The man's identity and the group he allegedly belonged to was not disclosed.

Investigators found a rifle, an improvised explosive device, and a significant amount of ammunition in the slain man's possession.

Investigations have been launched into the incident.

Kyrgyz authorities say that hundreds of Kyrgyz men and women have joined the Islamic State extremist group in Syria and Iraq in recent years.

Based on reporting by Akipress and Interfax

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Tajikistan probes IS 'threats' purportedly made by fugitive police commander

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 6 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Tajikistan probes IS 'threats' purportedly made by fugitive police commander, 6 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a98c.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 06, 2016

Gulmurod Halimov

Tajik authorities are reportedly investigating threats purportedly made by a former Tajik police colonel who joined the Islamic State (IS) extremist group in Syria.

The Reuters news agency quoted two Tajik security service sources as saying on September 6 that some Tajik servicemen received text messages on their mobile phones in fugitive police commander Gulmurod Halimov's name.

In the messages  allegedly received this week  he promised to "congratulate" the servicemen on Tajikistan's Independence Day on September 9, the sources told Reuters.

According to Iraqi media reports on September 3, Halimov had recently been appointed a high-ranking IS commander.

Iraqi media said Halimov replaced IS commander Umar al-Shishani, who was reportedly killed in July in northern Iraq.

On August 30, the U.S. State Department called Halimov a key member of IS and offered a reward of $3 million for information on his whereabouts.

Tajik authorities said on September 5 that they are taking measures to prevent any destabilization attempts in Tajikistan by Halimov and his supporters.

Halimov, the former commander of the Tajik Interior Ministry's special forces, known as OMON, joined IS in April 2015.

Tajik authorities say he has been seriously injured twice in Syria.

Based on reporting by Reuters and RFE/RL's Tajik Service

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Russia: Moscow says Levada Center listed as 'foreign agent' due to U.S. funding

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 6 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Russia: Moscow says Levada Center listed as 'foreign agent' due to U.S. funding, 6 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a99a.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

September 06, 2016

Russia's Justice Ministry says its decision to place the independent national pollster the Levada Center on its official register of organizations "operating as foreign agents" was made due to financial support the pollster received from the United States.

TASS news agency quoted the ministry as saying on September 6 that "the major part of financial support the Levada Center has received is from the United States, including the University of Wisconsin in Madison, and therefore it was added to the list of 'foreign agents.'"

The Russian Justice Ministry announced on September 5 that it had placed the Levada Center on its official register of organizations "operating as foreign agents," potentially threatening the existence of the widely respected research group.

The group is one of the largest Russian nongovernmental polling and sociological research organizations and has conducted surveys that might have irked Russian authorities.

A law adopted in 2012 requires any nongovernmental organization that receives funding from abroad and engages in political activity to formally register as a "foreign agent."

Russian and international human rights organizations have said the law was introduced to silence independent voices.

Amendments introduced to the law in 2014 allow the Justice Ministry to forcefully add NGOs to the list of "foreign agents." Failure to comply can result in heavy fines and/or jail time.

Based on reporting by TASS and The Moscow Times

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Kyrgyz authorities identify alleged attackers of Chinese embassy in Bishkek

Publisher Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Publication Date 6 September 2016 Cite as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Kyrgyz authorities identify alleged attackers of Chinese embassy in Bishkek, 6 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57db9a9a3.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

Last updated (GMT/UTC): 06.09.2016 15:21

Kyrgyz authorities have identified a man they say carried out the bombing attack against the Chinese Embassy in Bishkek last month.

The Kyrgyz State Committee for National Security (UKMK) said on September 6 that the alleged attacker was a 33-year-old ethnic Uyghur with a Tajik passport, Zoir Halilov, who was a member of the Islamic Movement of Eastern Turkestan.

A suicide car bomber rammed the gates of the Chinese Embassy compound in Bishkek on August 30 before detonating an explosive device inside the car, killing himself and injuring three Kyrgyz employees of the embassy.

The UKMK also said five Kyrgyz and Uzbek nationals suspected of involvement in the preparation of the attack have been apprehended.

Another four Kyrgyz nationals were added to the international wanted list, the UKMK said.

According to the UKMK, the terrorist attack was "instigated" by several Uyghur terrorist groups fighting alongside Islamic militants in Syria.

Uyghurs are Turkic-speaking native Muslim people of China's northwestern province of Xinjiang, which Uyghurs traditionally call Eastern Turkestan.

Based on reporting by Akipress and KyrTAG

Link to original story on RFE/RL website

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Syria: Turkish Strikes on SDF Fighters Kill 24 Civilians

Publisher Human Rights Watch Publication Date 15 September 2016 Cite as Human Rights Watch, Syria: Turkish Strikes on SDF Fighters Kill 24 Civilians, 15 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbe16d4.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

A Turkish attack on US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighters in northern Syria on August 28, 2016, killed 24 civilians, including 6 children. Between 10 and 15 fighters deployed among the civilians were also killed.

Available information suggests that both sides could have done more to minimize civilian loss of life, as required by the laws of war. Two local residents told Human Rights Watch that before sunrise on August 28, Turkish aircraft struck SDF forces who had just disembarked from military vehicles among residential buildings in which about four dozen civilians had sought shelter from nearby fighting. Artillery shelling soon after resulted in additional casualties.

"The deaths of 24 civilians could have been avoided if the SDF fighters hadn't positioned themselves among buildings filled with civilians and Turkish forces had made a better effort to determine whether civilians were there," said Ole Solvang, deputy emergencies director at Human Rights Watch. "It's unlawful to put civilians at unnecessary risk, and even an attack on a military target can be unlawful if the likely harm to civilians isn't taken into account."

Four days earlier, on August 24, Turkish forces and the Free Syrian Army opened military operations in northern Syria against the Islamic State (also known as ISIS) and Kurdish forces from the People's Protection Units (YPG), the main fighting force within the SDF, an alliance that also includes Arab and other forces. The United States and other Western countries have actively supported and armed the SDF in the fight against ISIS.

The Turkish-Free Syrian Army alliance captured Jarablus, a town near the Turkish border previously held by ISIS, and then moved south of the town where they clashed with the SDF.

The two local residents said that on the evening of August 27, SDF troops asked them to evacuate their house near the village of Suraysat, about 12 kilometers south of Jarablus, because of nearby fighting. The troops told them that they would be safe in their cousin's house, a kilometer away.

A few days earlier, the troops had wanted to take over their cousin's two houses, which sit on a hill, the residents said, but had eventually allowed the civilians to stay and moved to other houses further north. Eventually about 50 to 55 civilians moved into the houses on the hill.

At about 4 a.m. on August 28, the SDF troops returned to the cousin's houses, parked vehicles, including some with heavy machine guns mounted on the back, near the houses, and positioned fighters on the roof of the buildings, the two residents said. One person asked the fighters to leave, they said, but the fighters refused.

Less than 30 minutes after the fighters arrived, the Turkish aircraft struck the houses.

"It was as if we were inside a dormant volcano that suddenly erupted," one of the residents said. "I woke up in shock. The smell of explosives, the smell of the death  it was everywhere. My brother was seriously injured. His son was sitting in his lap so I pulled him away so that he couldn't see what had happened. It was an awful sight. I then tried to pull my brother away, but another bomb fell and threw me away."

The two residents said that they counted seven bomb impacts, after which there was intensive artillery fire, which killed and injured people who came to assist the wounded. They did not know which forces had fired the artillery.

The two residents provided Human Rights Watch with the names of 13 relatives who died during the attack. Mohammad Othman, a relative who was not there, published on his Facebook page the names of 24 people killed in the attack, including 6 children and 6 women.

One resident provided Human Rights Watch with a photograph that he had taken showing a destroyed SDF pickup truck with reinforced cardboard packaging tubes commonly used for ground-fired ammunition.

Satellite imagery from August 30 shows that the two buildings were almost completely destroyed sometime between August 27 and 30. A third building a kilometer away was also damaged. At least four impact craters are visible in the surrounding fields.

Photographs of remnants of the weapon used indicate that Paveway-series laser-guided bombs were used in the airstrikes.

On August 28, as reported by the state-run Anadolu news agency, the Turkish Armed Forces said that they had carried out airstrikes against armed groups that had attacked Turkish forces in Jarablus. Anadolu said that the armed forces had reported that the attack had neutralized 25 "terrorists" and destroyed five buildings they were using.

Under the laws of war applicable to the armed conflict in Syria, warring parties must take all feasible precautions to protect civilians under their control against the effects of attacks. They must seek to remove civilians from the vicinity of their military forces. The Syrian Democratic Forces should not have positioned their forces in the compound without having first relocated the civilians to another area, Human Rights Watch said.

Attacking forces must take all feasible precautions to minimize loss of civilian life. This includes taking necessary steps to assess whether an attack may be expected to cause civilian loss that would be disproportionate compared to the anticipated military advantage of the attack, and suspend such attacks.

The office of the Turkish prime minister, in a statement on August 28, said that the "Turkish Armed Forces has taken all necessary measures to prevent any harm to the civilian population," referring to, among others, the military operations south of Jarablus. However, because the attack took place in darkness and soon after the arrival of the SDF at the residential compound, it is not clear that the Turkish military took adequate steps to determine the extent to which civilians might be at risk in the attack, Human Rights Watch said.

"With another party joining the conflict in Syria, if the armed forces continue to pay inadequate attention to civilian protection, many more civilians are going to be casualties," Solvang said.

Copyright notice:  Copyright, Human Rights Watch
Pakistan: Coerced Refugee Return Endangers Thousands

Publisher Human Rights Watch Publication Date 14 September 2016 Cite as Human Rights Watch, Pakistan: Coerced Refugee Return Endangers Thousands, 14 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbe2754.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

Pakistani authorities should cease coercive measures and other abuses that are driving tens of thousands of Afghan refugees from Pakistan. The Pakistani government should extend legal residency status to Afghan refugees until at least December 31, 2017.

Since July 2016, Pakistani police and provincial authorities have stepped up pressure against Afghans living in Pakistan in what the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has called "a concerted push" to repatriate a large number of Afghan refugees before the end of 2016. This followed increasing tensions between Pakistan and Afghanistan. By September, nearly 90,000 Afghan refugees, out of an estimated total of 1.5 million, had returned in 2016.

Returning Afghan refugees  some of whom have lived 30 or more years in Pakistan  have told UNHCR that they returned home due to "economic hardship in Pakistan (linked to loss of access to job markets due to a deteriorated freedom of movement), harassment, and intimidation, arbitrary arrest, extortions, and bribery." Returnees have alleged that Pakistani police harassed and detained them; that landlords cancelled their rental agreements, and that they were denied access to schools and medical care. Such complaints were already common in 2015, when Human Rights Watch documented abuses against Afghans in Pakistan, and appear to have worsened substantially since June.

Pakistan is not a party to the 1951 Refugee Convention, but customary international law prohibits refoulement, the return of a refugee "in any manner whatsoever" to a place where they face a serious risk of persecution or threats to their lives and safety. Refoulement occurs not only when a refugee is directly rejected or expelled, but also where indirect pressure on individuals is so intense that it leads them to believe that they have no practical option but to return to a country where they face serious risk of persecution or threats to their lives and safety. Pakistan's refoulement of Afghan refugees is taking place as world leaders are gathering in New York on September 19 and 20 to discuss how they can better support front-line countries like Pakistan that are host to large influxes of refugees and migrants.

On June 29, Pakistan had extended the validity of Afghans' Proof of Registration (PoR) cards until the end of December. On September 9, in apparent response to criticism of abuses against refugees and undocumented migrants, Pakistan granted a 10-week extension, until March 17, 2017. Since few returnees make the journey during the winter months, the extension is not likely to make a difference in returns through 2016.

When announcing the extension, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif stated that "Afghan refugees living in Pakistan... are our guests and their return plans [would] be decided in a way that does not create any negative impression in the minds of people living on both sides of the border."

Also on June 29, as Pakistan announced the six-month extension, UNHCR doubled its grant to refugees "voluntarily repatriating," from US$200 to $400. But Afghan authorities have cautioned that they are unable to assist such large numbers returning in a short period of time. The massive increase in returns has raised concerns among aid agencies in Afghanistan, whose limited resources are already strained. They warn that many returnees lack accommodation and access to clean water and sanitation.

The security situation in much of Afghanistan remains precarious, with serious fighting in more than half the country's provinces.

In August, the number of returnees increased dramatically to 60,743, compared with 11,416 in July and 2,342 in May. The July 19 meeting in Islamabad between Pakistan, Afghanistan and UNHCR on their Tripartite Agreement on the Solutions Strategy for Afghan Refugees (SSAR), which commits all parties to "voluntary repatriation in safety and dignity," has done nothing to curtail refugee returns, Human Rights Watch said.

As Human Rights Watch documented in 2015, many returnees to Afghanistan end up joining the ranks of the internally displaced in settlements in urban areas where assistance is minimal. In response to the massive influx, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) issued a flash-appeal for emergency funds on September 7 to assist an anticipated 220,000 returning Afghan refugees and 400,000 returning undocumented migrants by year's end. Some 40 percent of the people returning are considered "highly vulnerable."

"Pakistan's forced return of Afghan refugees should remind world leaders gathering in New York that long-time frontline host states like Pakistan, Jordan, Turkey, and Kenya are now pushing refugees back," Gossman said. "Demands to respect refugee protection principles will carry much more weight if accompanied by significantly higher levels of support from countries that can afford it."

Copyright notice:  Copyright, Human Rights Watch
Kenya: Involuntary Refugee Returns to Somalia

Publisher Human Rights Watch Publication Date 14 September 2016 Cite as Human Rights Watch, Kenya: Involuntary Refugee Returns to Somalia, 14 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbe3304.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

Kenya's repatriation program for Somali refugees, fueled by fear and misinformation, does not meet international standards for voluntary refugee return. Many refugees living in Kenya's sprawling Dadaab camp, home to at least 263,000 Somalis, say they have agreed to return home because they fear Kenya will force them out if they stay.

In May 2016, the Kenyan government announced plans to speed up the repatriation of Somali refugees and close the Dadaab camp in northeastern Kenya by November. Kenyan authorities, with officials from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), then stepped up a 2013 "voluntary" repatriation program

During an August 2016 visit to Dadaab by Human Rights Watch, refugees described intimidation by the Kenyan government, silence over alternative options that would allow them to remain in Kenya, inadequate information on conditions in Somalia, and a US$400 UN cash grant they would forfeit if they were deported later this year. The refugees said that these factors were prompting many camp residents to return now to Somalia, where they face danger, persecution, and hunger.

"The Kenyan authorities are not giving Somali refugees a real choice between staying and leaving, and the UN refugee agency isn't giving people accurate information about security conditions in Somalia," said Bill Frelick, refugee rights director at Human Rights Watch. "There is no way these returns can be considered voluntary."

The 1951 Refugee Convention prohibits refoulement, the return of a refugee "in any manner whatsoever" to a place where their life or freedom would be threatened. Refoulement occurs not only when a refugee is directly rejected or expelled, but also where indirect pressure on individuals is so intense that it leads them to believe that they have no practical option but to return to a country where they face serious risk of persecution or threats to their lives and safety.

Under international refugee practice, repatriation is only considered voluntary if refugees have a genuinely free choice about whether to return and are fully informed about conditions in their home country. Human Rights Watch interviewed about 100 refugees and asylum seekers at the Dadaab camp and found that neither condition is being met under the current voluntary repatriation program.

Until the Kenyan government publicly declares that Somali refugees fearing return will be allowed to remain, and UNHCR and its partners fully and accurately inform refugees about security conditions in Somalia, returns under the ongoing program amount to refoulement, Human Rights Watch said.

Refugees said the government's decision to close the Dadaab camp had left them feeling trapped. They are afraid to return to Somalia, but also afraid of being arrested and deported if they stay in Dadaab until the November deadline. Many have therefore chosen to take US$400 in cash as part of a UNHCR-returns assistance package because they believe that if they don't, they will be summarily deported later this year with nothing.

"We fled Somalia because of specific problems and those problems are still there," said "Sahra," a 42-year-old woman from Hiraan region who has signed up to return to Somalia. "It's not the right time for us to go back. But every day the Kenyan government is telling us that we have to go, and UNHCR is not giving us any different information I said I will go back as we have no other option."

Human Rights Watch repeatedly asked a Kenyan government official in Dadaab, the deputy county commissioner, what would happen to refugees who don't leave after Dadaab closes and whether they will be able to stay in Kenya. He answered: "The choice is theirs to go home."

Some Somalis who agreed to return to Somalia after spending years as refugees in Dadaab have fled back to Kenya a second time because of ongoing violence and lack of basic services in Somalia. Human Rights Watch found that newly arrived Somali asylum seekers and refugees who were not able to re-establish themselves in Somalia are being denied access to refugee registration or asylum procedures in Dadaab. This leaves them without legal status and food rations.

Many of the estimated 335,000 Somali refugees in Kenya's camps and cities fled the conflict in their home country in the 1990s, or are their children or grandchildren. Over the past decade, a new wave of refugees fled a combination of drought, ongoing violence, and abuse including by the armed Islamist group Al-Shabab, which is at war with the Somali government.

Hostility and abuse of Kenya's Somali refugee population has increased significantly since Kenyan troops entered Somalia in 2011, and after a series of deadly Al-Shabab attacks on Kenyan territory between 2011 and 2015. The government's formal announcement on May 6, 2016, that Dadaab would close said that because of its "national security interests, [the government] has decided that hosting of refugees has to come to an end" and called for closure "within the shortest time possible."

In November 2013, Kenya, Somalia, and UNHCR signed an agreement for the "voluntary" repatriation of Somali refugees that says both countries and UNHCR will make sure Somalis return voluntarily in safety and dignity. The current experiences of many Somali refugees in Dadaab stands in sharp contrast to those commitments, Human Rights Watch said.

UNHCR-Somalia officials acknowledged to Human Rights Watch that their assessments indicate that conditions in south-central Somalia are not conducive to mass refugee returns in safety and dignity. UNHCR's latest assessment in May found: "Civilians continue to be severely affected by the conflict, with reports of civilians being killed and injured in conflict-related violence, widespread sexual and gender-based violence against women and children, forced recruitment of children, and large-scale displacement."

The information that UNHCR provides to refugees in Dadaab seeking to make an informed choice about returning, however, is mostly superficial and out of date, and sometimes misleading, Human Rights Watch said.

As a party to the 2013 "voluntary" repatriation agreement, UNHCR has been actively engaged in facilitating the repatriations of thousands from Dadaab to Somalia. UNHCR says it is not promoting repatriation, but that it will facilitate repatriation for Somalis who freely choose to return home, a distinction it makes for assisted returns to places it does not consider to be safe for most refugees to return.

The Kenyan government and UNHCR are conducting a verification exercise to reduce the number of refugees counted as living in Dadaab by determining whether people living in the camp are entitled to be there. It excludes formerly registered camp residents with inactive ration cards and asylum seekers who have not been allowed to register as refugees, as well as residents found to be Kenyan citizens. During the exercise, all verified Somali refugees are asked whether they want to return to Somalia and whether they are willing to do so this year. As of August, according to UNHCR, there were 263,000 Somali refugees in Dadaab, a 75,000 reduction from the 338,000 count at the end of July.

As of mid-August, more than 24,000 Somalia refugees had returned to Somalia from Dadaab since the start of the repatriation process in December 2014. Of that total, 18,110 returned in 2016, 10,000 after the camp closure announcement in May. Kenyan authorities told Human Rights Watch in mid-August that they were assisting about 1,000 refugees a day to return. On August 29, returns were suspended because local authorities in Jubaland, an interim regional administration in Somalia bordering Kenya to which many of the refugees are returning, said they could not sufficiently assist returning refugees. Negotiations to resume the repatriations are ongoing.

"UNHCR is aware that south-central Somalia is in no way conducive to large-scale refugee returns," Frelick said. "UNHCR should not facilitate any returns until Kenya says those afraid to go home can stay in Kenya and UNHCR provides refugees with accurate information about what they will face when they go home."

Methodology

Human Rights Watch researchers visited Dadaab, Kenya, between August 17 and 24 and conducted private interviews with 69 individual refugees and unregistered asylum seekers. Human Rights Watch also interviewed 31 refugees and unregistered asylum seekers in Dadaab in April, shortly before the camp closure announcement. All interviewees were advised of the purpose of the research and how the information would be used. Human Rights Watch explained the voluntary nature of the interview and that the person could refuse to be interviewed, refuse to answer any question, and terminate the interview at any point. Interviewees did not receive any compensation. The team also visited one "help desk" center in the Hagadera settlement in the Dadaab camp on August 23. The names of those quoted in this report have been changed for their protection.

Human Rights Watch also met with Kenyan government officials, including the deputy county commissioner and the leaders of the new Operation Refugees Repatriation Team in Dadaab, UNHCR staff in Dadaab and Nairobi, and a dozen staff of international and Kenyan non-governmental organizations involved in refugee protection and assistance in Kenya.

Kenya's and UNHCR's Failure to Meet Conditions for Voluntary Return

The principle that refugee repatriation must be voluntary is explicit in both the 2013 Tripartite Agreement Governing the Voluntary Repatriation of Somali Refugees Living in Kenya and the 1969 African Refugee Convention, to which Kenya is a state party.

Ensuring that refugee repatriation is voluntary involves more than ticking off a box on a form. UNHCR's Handbook on Voluntary Repatriation sets out two clear conditions for repatriation to be considered voluntary. First, whether a return is voluntary "must be viewed in relation to  condition in the country of origin (calling for an informed decision)." An informed decision on return conditions must be based on information that is "objective, accurate, and neutral," must "not [be] propaganda" and "care must be taken not to paint an overly rosy picture of the return." Refugees should also be fully informed of the limits of UNHCR's protection and assistance following return.

Second, whether a return is voluntary "must be viewed in relation to  the situation in the country of asylum (permitting a free choice)." Refugees "need to know about what will happen in the event they decide not to volunteer for repatriation" and that "repatriation is not voluntary when host country authorities deprive refugees of any real freedom of choice."

Neither of these two conditions are being met in Dadaab, Human Rights Watch found.

Fear of Deportation After Threatened Camp Closure

The Kenyan government is not offering refugees a real choice between staying in Kenya or returning safely to Somalia. Anxious refugees interviewed by Human Rights Watch who are opting to return referred time and again to the government announcement of the camp closure and radio broadcasts telling them to go home as the main factors influencing their decision.

Others said they were worried about losing out on help to go home if they refused now, only to be forced out in a few months. UNHCR and its partners have been providing Somali refugees who opt to return with an assistance package, which was increased in July 2016 to include an average cash grant of US$200 in Kenya per person and then again another US$200 upon arrival, as well as non-food items and vouchers for limited food assistance. However, it is unclear whether the food assistance in particular is systematically available in any of the return areas other than Mogadishu.

"We have no clarity on what the future holds," said a 70-year-old grandfather living in the Ifo 2 settlement in Dadaab. "What will happen if we don't voluntarily return? Will we be forced back in a few months? We are feeling a lot of pressure. If we will be forced back anyway, it would be better to take the benefits now rather than just get kicked back later."

A 69-year-old man originally from Qansahdheere, Somalia said:

Nobody said that food and security will be guaranteed, but they just asked if I would be willing to go back and of course, what can I say but yes. My children want to stay, but I worry they will suffer if they stay.

Nuur, a 33-year-old teacher and father-of-three, from Kismayo, Somalia said:

The government has said that the camp will close, I am not waiting around to see what happens. I have heard this several times on the radio. During the refugee verification exercise, [in which officials count refugees and verify their identifications] they asked me if I was willing to go back, I said yes, if there is peace in Somalia. But the main reason I am going back is because of what the government has said. We haven't seen force yet, but if force will begin to be used, I would worry for my children.

Nasra, who recently fled from the Al-Shabab-controlled town of Sakoow in Somalia said:

Everyone is rushing as we heard that the camp would be closed by November, I haven't heard anyone saying that we can stay, just that we have to go.

A mother-of-five from a village near the Al-Shabab controlled town of Buale in Somalia said:

Since our future is unclear, I do not want to be put on a lorry and sent back, so I will take the money.

A number of aid workers in Dadaab also raised concerns. A senior representative of an international aid group said:

I think the options are very clear: there are no real options right now. If it was not the government position, the refugees would have stayed, but they are tired of being told to leave. Refugees are in a dilemma as their only option right now is insecure returns.

None of the refugees interviewed said that any officials had given them assurances that they would be allowed to stay if they refused to go now.

UNHCR has been silent on what will happen to refugees still in the camp come November, including regarding service provision. An outreach worker for an international aid group said:

UNHCR is treading very carefully with giving information. As UNHCR is not communicating, refugees are not receiving information on what happens after November. The attitude seems to be we will cross that bridge when we reach it. If that many people have left by then, they might not need to close the camp. Most of the refugees I speak to say that they are "willing" because they fear. But people are also worried whether they will still get camp services after November. UNHCR has not been communicating on this either.

Intimidation by Kenyan Government Officials

Refugees and asylum seekers consistently told Human Rights Watch that the Kenyan government officials are putting direct and indirect pressure on them to return to Somalia.

"We hear rumors of forced returns on the radio," said Nuh, a 53-year-old man disabled by multiple gunshot wounds who has been living in Dadaab's Hagadera settlement since 1998. He said he heard the regional coordinator for northeastern Kenya, Mohamud Ali Saleh, say on the radio that Kenya is not our country and that we will have to go back.

Print media quoted Mohamud Ali Saleh saying, "Somalia is safe and the refugees should join their brothers and sisters," and telling local residents that the government would take "stern action" against any who would harbor refugees escaping the camps. A video shows him saying, "Refugees stayed here in Kenya for 25 years and that is enough. It is time for them to go back home and build their country."

Overt pressure by Kenyan officials in the camps has been directed to the camps' refugee community leaders. Six leaders told Human Rights Watch that, in late July, they attended a meeting at which the deputy county commissioner (DCC), Harun Kamau, intimidated them to get them to agree to return before November.

One elder said:

When I tried to tell the DCC that people can't go back, that it is not as safe as he suggests, he pointed his finger at me and told me to sit down. He told me to pick up a gun and defend my country. We were never told directly this would happen but after that meeting, people began to really worry that we would be put into lorries come November.

A community leader from Dabaab's Kambios settlement described a meeting of Interior Ministry officials and community leaders:

They say, 'Why are your people not going back to Somalia?' I am an experienced man. I know institutions. I understand what they mean when they ask that question. The message to us is: you must go back. There is more and more pressure on the few who remain. We fear we will be harmed. The message we hear is that the government will send some military to harm those who remain. I can't say that people will be harmed, but that is the fear.

The lack of clear information about the situation after the November deadline has prompted confusion. A 42-year-old woman in the Hagadera settlement said:

I have not heard it myself, but the block leaders met with government officials who gave them the message that in November the government will close the camp. There will be no food or benefits after November. That is why people are going back now.

Human Rights Watch did not document recent incidents of police violence but refugees said they were aware of past abusive operations. During Kenya's Operation Usalama Watch in 2014, authorities engaged in heavy-handed efforts to coerce Somalis to go home, including police harassment, arbitrary detention, forced relocation to refugee camps, and summary deportations.

Limited information on country of origin

Informed consent  fully understanding the conditions in the country to which one agrees to return  is key to a voluntary decision to repatriate. Through partners from nongovernmental agencies, UNHCR is tasked with providing each returnee with information about nine areas of possible return in Somalia at "help desks" in Dadaab's five settlements. While UNHCR is not promoting repatriation, under the terms of the November 2013 tripartite agreement it has undertaken responsibility to ensure that refugees have access to accurate and objective information on the situation in Somalia. However, Human Rights Watch found that information provided to refugees in Dadaab is mostly superficial and out of date, and sometimes misleading.

During an August 23 visit to a help desk, where refugees go to register with UNHCR for repatriation, the situation was chaotic and information was severely limited. Outside the disorganized, crowded, and overwhelmed office, hundreds of refugees were pushing and shoving to get near the doorway. Human Rights Watch witnessed a number of private security guards, and at least one police officer, hitting refugees with wooden sticks to control the crowd.

"The registration process is a mess," said Nuur, the 33-year-old teacher. "There are many people in the office, people have to stand outside in the scorching sun, there are soldiers with guns, sometimes they beat people in the queues."

Inside the help desk office, the officer in charge of providing information said that the maximum time spent with each refugee family both for registration and information sharing was five minutes. At most, the official has enough time to present them with a pamphlet describing conditions in their place of return. But many refugees don't even receive the pamphlet. Only one of the 32 refugees Human Rights Watch interviewed who had signed up to return had received a pamphlet.

Information presented in the pamphlets, particularly on security conditions, is inadequate, Human Rights Watch found. The pamphlets had not been updated since December 2015, despite Somalia's volatile and changing security and political landscape. The sparse information on the security situation inaccurately describes what returnees will face.

For example, the pamphlet on Mogadishu, Afgooye, and Jowhar, repeats the same one-sentence boilerplate description of security conditions in all three locations: "The town is secured with established administration and with uniformed police conducting regular patrols." The entry on security conditions in Mogadishu adds only one more sentence, stating there are "neighborhood watches" in eight districts. The entry on Jowhar adds, "The police have a police station and conduct patrols." One has to look carefully to notice that the word "regular" does not appear before "patrols," as it does for the other entries.

In contrast to the perfunctory two sentences about security conditions in Mogadishu, UNHCR's May 2016 assessment of conditions in Somalia available on its web page says this about the effectiveness of those same police patrols in Mogadishu:

In and around Mogadishu, members of government forces, allied militias, AMISOM [peace support] troops, and persons referred to as "men wearing uniforms" have been reported to subject civilians to sexual violence, including rape. The police and security forces are reportedly able to commit abuses in a climate of impunity. Law enforcement agencies are also reported to fail to prevent, or to respond to or investigate incidents of violence. The civilian judicial system is reported to be largely non-functional across the country. General crime rates have reportedly increased significantly in 2015.

Limitations on information, monitoring capacity

The 2013 tripartite agreement includes extensive language outlining the responsibilities of UNHCR to monitor returns and reintegration. For UNHCR to monitor the situation for returning refugees and to feedback its conclusions to refugees in Kenya considering repatriation, UNHCR needs to have a significant presence in Somalia.

Yet, UNHCR and its international implementing partners have limited access in Somalia. On August 25, UNHCR-Somalia told Human Rights Watch that it faces restrictions in its capacity to gather information, particularly in areas of military offensives and border areas. In April, a UNHCR spokesperson told the media: "It has proven difficult to establish a picture of how returnees are faring for a number of reasons. Often, returnees move on from areas where we have access, to areas where we are unable or have difficulty in accessing due to UN and other security constraints. However, we do endeavor to monitor through partners and our monitoring networks."

The UN protection cluster, the body that coordinates protection activities in Somalia, produced its first analytical report in June 2016, but that information has yet to be transmitted to refugees in Dadaab.

Other factors undermining voluntary return

Several people, most of them women, said that they felt increasingly unsafe as their fellow community members left Dadaab. Deka, a 45-year-old woman from Mogadishu, said this made her decide to sign-up to return:

We used to have a normal life in Kenya, but then the radio started saying, 'Refugees go back to your country,' and I started seeing my neighbors leave. I got very scared, I felt lonely. I was worried about my security.

Sahra, a 35-year-old woman from Beletweyn, said:

I am worried because my neighbors are going back and I am under pressure to return, but I know it's not the right time to return for me.

Increasingly harsh living conditions in Dadaab have also influenced people's decisions. The World Food Program, which provides food rations to Dadaab's population, has repeatedly cut rations, due to funding shortfalls. The most recent cut was in June 2015, when the program cut rations by 30 percent. Refugees Human Rights Watch interviewed in April 2016 who had signed up to return to Somalia all cited the ration cuts as the main factor influencing their decision. The June 2015 cut has been compensated somewhat since January 2016 by cash distribution.

"The food situation has been bad for two years now," said a community leader in the Kambios settlement. "But it's worse since the repatriations started as now we can't buy on credit as a lot of shops are closing up. If all the refugees leave, I will have to. I will have to go back to my village where I am not sure I can be safe."

In addition, unregistered refugees and asylum seekers who do not have ration cards said they are finding it more difficult to survive and share rations with relatives or neighbors because many of those with ration cards have left.

Ruun is a 36-year-old mother-of-nine children whose ration card was deactivated after she returned to Kismayo, Somalia in August 2014 to care for her sick mother. She returned to Dadaab because she was worried her 14-year-old son would be recruited as a fighter if she remained, and she couldn't afford to take her children to school. "I came back here to be safe and secure and for my children to go to school," she said. Despite her fears, she was turned away during the joint government-UNHCR verification exercise, and does not have food rations to feed her children:

Neighbors share their rations with me and I wash clothes and clean people's houses. It is difficult to live in Dadaab without a ration card. If I would get back my refugee status, I would stay here. But I can't live without rations, so I may have to go back.

Access to Asylum for Somali Refugees

In May, the Kenyan government also closed its Department of Refugee Affairs, which was in charge of registering refugees, and announced that Somali asylum seekers would no longer automatically receive refugee status. Asylum seeker registration in Dadaab has been sporadic since 2011. UNHCR said that the last registration took place in the summer of 2015.

Government officials in Dadaab made clear to Human Rights Watch that new arrivals are not being registered. The deputy county commissioner said: "If we repatriate 1,000 but then 1,000 new arrivals come, we would not be getting the job done." The same official said: "We have instructed UNHCR not to register new arrivals." The new government refugee entity, Refugee Affairs Secretariat, is not authorized to register people in Dadaab. UNHCR officials told Human Rights Watch that they know of 4,000 unregistered asylum seekers in the camp, though this number is unlikely to include new arrivals since the Department of Refugee Affairs was disbanded.

Human Rights Watch spoke to 23 unregistered new arrivals, including people who are registered refugees with inactivated ration cards and thus are not able to take part in the verification exercise, people who had returned under the repatriation program but have fled back to Dadaab, and new asylum seekers. None had been able to take part in the verification exercise and are therefore unlikely to be included in the final camp census.

Unregistered people said they feel particularly vulnerable both because of their lack of access to food aid and due to their lack of legal status. Farhan, a 23-year-old from Mogadishu, who arrived in Dadaab nine months ago, said: "Unless the government announces that that they will register unregistered people I will not step forward. I am afraid they would arrest me."

Bare, a refugee whose ration card is inactivate, said:

I feel very much pressure. I am unregistered and living in the camp. I face a lot of problems. They have not arrested me yet, but it could happen any time. The police sometimes stop people. If you show your refugee card, they let you go, but if not, they arrest you. I am feeling they will ultimately force me back to Somalia against my will. I should have the rights of a refugee, but I can't get documents from UNHCR. For the past four months, I go to UNHCR every day, but every day they tell me they can't help me.

Conditions in Somalia

The success or failure of repatriation hinges on what happens to refugees once they have returned home. In May, UNHCR released an updated position on returns to south-central Somalia, which said, "Civilians continue to be severely affected by the conflict, with reports of civilians being killed and injured in conflict-related violence, widespread sexual and gender-based violence against women and children, forced recruitment of children, and large-scale displacement."

Human Rights Watch spoke to refugees caught up in fighting and insecurity in many of the current or planned areas of return. A number of refugees from Belet Hawa have recently arrived in Dadaab. A 42-year-old woman who returned to Belet Hawa in January said:

I had received information that Belet Hawa was safe, but when I returned, I saw that nothing had changed. There the young and the old carry guns, there is no peace There were three bouts of fighting between two sub-clans of the MarehanMy husband who has a mental health condition was very affected by the fighting. It's hard to know how to protect yourself.

According to the UNHCR, 68 percent of returnees to Somalia in 2016 as of August were children. According to the UN, recruitment of children, primarily by Al-Shabab but also by the Somalia National Army and clan militia, had increased significantly in 2015. Human Rights Watch spoke to several young men and boys who had returned with their families to Al-Shabab-controlled areas, including Buale and Sakoow, and who were approached by Al-Shabab. Human Rights Watch also spoke to parents who said they came back to Kenya out of fear that their children would be recruited if they remained in Somalia.

Refugees who had returned to Al-Shabab-controlled or government-controlled areas said that lack of food, as well as lack of basic services, primarily education, made it impossible for them to survive or to re-establish themselves. Moulid had returned without assistance to a village in Qansahdheere district in 2015, but Al-Shabab restrictions on movement severely affected his survival:

There was no way we could travel to the market in Dinsoor. I was not able to get food for my children. When I returned to Dadaab, my children were admitted to a hospital because of malnutrition.

Access to services, land, and protection from abuse often go hand in hand. An elderly man from Luuq returned to Somalia in September 2015 with his 10 children because the ration cuts in Dadaab were making it impossible for him to survive:

When I arrived in Luuq I found that people had built on my property. We spent three months living under a tree. I complained to the authorities, but I knew it would take time. But we didn't have time, my children were without shelter and hungry.

He walked back to Dadaab with his children.

UNHCR has steadily increased the number of areas designated as areas of return, and will shortly be expanding them to 12. UNHCR told Human Rights Watch that the expansion was based on the access aid agencies have to the designated areas and, for the more recent expansion, on an assessment that significant numbers of refugees were returning to specific areas. Although UNHCR is careful not to refer to the areas of return as "safe," Kenyan authorities have no such reticence. The deputy county commissioner told Human Rights Watch, "UNHCR is not taking people to unsafe areas. They are only being taken back to safe areas. They can continue to enjoy education and health care in their home country."

Ongoing abuses against displaced people in Somalia

It is of particular concern that returning refugees, especially those unable to return to their areas of origin or those who have been gone for many years, will end up among the 1.1 million people already internally displaced in Somalia and living in dangerous internal displacement camps. The exact number who have faced new displacement within Somalia after returning is unknown.

In an August 25 meeting, UNHCR told Human Rights Watch that at least 10 percent of people who returned in June and July are believed to have ended up internally displaced.

Some people who had been unable to return to their areas of origin told Human Rights Watch that they ended up in unsafe displacement camps. Amina, a 38-year-old single mother returned to her village, Bula Gudud, as part of the assisted returns in January 2015 with her five children. When fighting erupted in this town she fled to Kismayo and ended up in an informal displacement camp. She barely survived there, for nine months carrying water to sell in the market. After a man in a government uniform raped her, a common occurrence in the unprotected and poverty stricken camps across the country, Amina gave up and 10 months ago begged her way back to Dadaab, where she is no longer a registered refugee.

Others who have signed up to return are aware they are likely to wind up as internally displaced people. The 69-year-old man with a disability from an Al-Shabab-controlled village near Qansahdheere said: "I know neighbors from Dadaab who have returned to Baidoa. They told me they haven't found any housing. I heard we won't get any shelter on the local radio. We will join them and other IDPs."

Recommendations

The Kenyan authorities should:

Publicly assure all Somali refugees and asylum seekers still fearing return that they will be allowed to stay in dignity in Kenya;

Reinstate procedures recognizing Somali refugees on a prima facie basis or establish fair, transparent, and effective asylum procedures across the country; and

Continue to recognize as refugees those who were unable to reestablish themselves in Somalia after repatriating and coming back to Kenya.

UNHCR should:

Not facilitate any refugee returns to Somalia until Kenya confirms that all refugees have a genuinely free choice to stay in Kenya or return to Somalia;

Ensure that refugees are provided with accurate and up-to-date information about conditions in Somalia, including security conditions, consistent with UNHCR's most current Position on Returns to Southern and Central Somalia;

Ensure that this information is made readily available to Somali refugees, including through meaningful counseling and the radio; and

Resume "go-and-see" visits by camp leaders to enable them to assess conditions in return areas and report back to camp residents.

Donors, notably the US, EU and UK, the three leading donors for Dadaab, should:
Philippines: Independent Investigation of Duterte Needed

Publisher Human Rights Watch Publication Date 16 September 2016 Cite as Human Rights Watch, Philippines: Independent Investigation of Duterte Needed, 16 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbe3c84.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

The Philippine government should invite an independent investigation involving the United Nations into allegations of direct involvement by President Rodrigo Duterte in extrajudicial killings, Human Rights Watch said today. On September 15, 2016, an admitted former "hit man," Edgar Matobato, testified at a Philippine Senate hearing about the alleged killings of about 1,000 people in Davao City involving Duterte, who was the city's mayor for more than two decades.

"The detailed testimony from a 'death squad' member that then-Mayor Duterte was personally involved in killings and ordered others are very serious allegations that require an independent investigation," said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. "President Duterte can't be expected to investigate himself, so it is crucial that the United Nations is called in to lead such an effort. Otherwise, Filipinos may never know if the president was directly responsible for extrajudicial killings."

Matobato, a member of the Davao City "death squad" from 1988 to 2003, said he himself killed about 50 people under direct orders from then-Mayor Duterte. "Our job was to kill criminals, rapists, [drug] pushers and snatchers," Matobato testified. "We killed people almost on a daily basis." He also described witnessing Duterte "[empty] two Uzi magazines" on a National Bureau of Investigation official in 1993.

Since Duterte took office on June 30, more than 2,000 people have been killed in his self-proclaimed "war on drugs." The most recent Philippine National Police data shows that from July 1 to September 4, police killed an estimated 1,011 suspected "drug pushers and users," more than 14 times the 68 such police killings recorded between January 1 and June 15. Police blame the killings on suspects who "resisted arrest and shot at police officers," but refuse to launch an investigation into the deaths.

In 2009, Human Rights Watch published "'You Can Die Any Time': Death Squad Killings in Mindanao," which details the involvement of police and local government officials in targeted death squad killings in Davao City during Duterte's time as mayor. Another Human Rights Watch report from 2014, "'One Shot to the Head': Death Squad Killings in Tagum City, Philippines," documents police involvement in what appeared to be a copycat policy of extrajudicial killings in a city close to Davao City.

Copyright notice:  Copyright, Human Rights Watch
UN relief chief allocates $10 million in emergency funds to bolster aid response in southern Chad

Publisher UN News Service Publication Date 15 September 2016 Cite as UN News Service, UN relief chief allocates $10 million in emergency funds to bolster aid response in southern Chad, 15 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbe52840c.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

15 September 2016 - The United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator, Stephen O'Brien, has approved the allocation of $10 million from the UN Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF) to bolster humanitarian operations in Chad.

According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), which Mr. O'Brien heads up, the funds will provide vital assistance in four regions of the country's south, to meet the needs of 210,000 returnees and refugees from the Central African Republic (CAR) and their host communities.

According to the humanitarian community, OCHA said, the situation in the regions of Moyen-Chari, Mandoul, Logone Oriental and Logone Occidental, in southern Chad, on the border with CAR, is of deep concern and notably marked by deteriorating food security in a context of gradual withdrawal of aid partners due to a lagging resources.

"While the UN and humanitarian partners are working tirelessly alongside the Chadian Government and host communities to help the most vulnerable, the humanitarian funding gap is growing every year, especially for forgotten crises like those in southern or the eastern Chad, where the situation remains worrying, "said the Humanitarian Coordinator in Chad, Stephen Tull.

Moreover, in a context where the Chad's own limited resources do not allow it to ensure widespread access to essential services, the CERF allocation is crucial to meet the urgent needs of refugees, Chadian returnees and vulnerable host populations, while continuing to work on strengthening national capacities, he added.

In total, seven projects funded by the CERF allocation will improve the living conditions of the most vulnerable populations, said OCHA. These projects will provide emergency assistance across various sectors in strengthening food security through cash transfers, nutrition services and access to health care, maintenance and improvement of water infrastructure and sanitation, rehabilitation of shelters destroyed, and access to education. Part of the funds will be allocated to UNHAS air service to maintain aid access throughout the country.

Florent Mehaule, the head of OCHA in Chad said: "It is essential that other donors pledge, because CERF funding will only cover a fraction of the needs. Chad is one of the countries where the humanitarian response plan is the least funded. In addition, it is necessary to draw the attention of development agencies, to think about sustainable solutions and encourage projects that strengthen the resilience of affected populations."
Belarus: Smooth-looking polls 'lipstick measures on face of violations,' says UN rights expert

Publisher UN News Service Publication Date 15 September 2016 Cite as UN News Service, Belarus: Smooth-looking polls 'lipstick measures on face of violations,' says UN rights expert, 15 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbe55f40d.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

15 September 2016 - A United Nations expert on the human rights situation in Belarus said today that Sunday's parliamentary elections were no different from all the previous ones because citizens' right to a free and fair election continued to be abused in the grip of entrenched repressive laws and institutions.

"The smooth-looking conduct of parliamentary elections in Belarus on 11 September 2016 should not eclipse the underlying systemic violations. The elections proved a clear lack of political will to promote and protect human rights in Belarus," the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Belarus, Miklos Haraszti, said in a news release issued by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).

He commended the absence of violence so far, and welcomed the elections of one member of an opposition party and one independent cultural activist, after two decades of total absence of any opposition in parliament.

"However, citizens' right to a free and fair election continued to be abused in the grip of entrenched repressive laws and institutions, just as in previous parliamentary or presidential elections," he said.

He said he has heard reports of intimidation, fraud, manipulation and opacity. Especially egregious is the growth in fictitiously claimed turnout during the non-transparent early voting, a four-day process based on coercion of army conscripts, students, and State clerks.

According to the news release, the election observation mission sent by the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights of the Organisation for the Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE-ODIHR) had to state that "the composition of election commissions was not pluralistic, which undermined confidence in their independence."

UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. UN Photo/Jean-Marc Ferre

In preliminary conclusions, the European observers noted that "early voting, counting and tabulation procedures were still marred by a significant number of procedural irregularities and a lack of transparency."

Even the election of the opposition candidate exhibited the fully guided character of the electoral process, the news release said. The welcome entry to parliament of the UCB party candidate Hanna Kanapatskaya made her a victim of a cynical ploy at the same time, given that her admittance defeated the country's most visible opposition politician, Tatyana Korotkevich of the 'Tell the Truth' movement. Korotkevich had made her fame by running against the incumbent in the presidential election in 2015.

Well documented reports allege post-factum adjustments of the results of the two opposition politicians, using the leeway provided by a threefold magnification of the turnout, the release said.

The Special Rapporteur pointed out that the 'victory' of Kanapatskaya came at a moment when, for foreign policy reasons, some concessions to the voters' will seem inevitable. The manoeuvre served to show that the system of Government-decided results has not changed, despite the allowance granted for an opposition candidate. The move also aimed at sowing discord among the opposition parties, he added.

"It is regrettable that Belarus did not take into account real changes towards equal media access, verifiable turnout, honest vote count, and a pluralistic parliament," the expert said. "These changes have been recommended for many years by the OSCE, and my own reports."

Special Rapporteurs and independent experts are appointed by the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council to examine and report back on a specific human rights theme or a country situation. The positions are honorary and the experts are not UN staff, nor are they paid for their work.
Syria: UN says aid convoys unable to reach besieged areas despite US-Russia deal on ceasefire

Publisher UN News Service Publication Date 15 September 2016 Cite as UN News Service, Syria: UN says aid convoys unable to reach besieged areas despite US-Russia deal on ceasefire, 15 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbe5ae40c.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

15 September 2016 - The United Nations Special Envoy for Syria today said the ceasefire following last Friday's Russia-United States agreement is largely holding but that desperately-awaited humanitarian convoys are unable to move due to a delay in getting permits from the Syrian Government.

"It is particularly regrettable because [] we are losing time," Staffan de Mistura told a press briefing in Geneva. "These are days which we should have used for convoys to move with the permit to go because there is no fighting," he stressed.

According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Syria is one of the most complex and dynamic humanitarian crises in the world today. Since March 2011, more than a quarter of a million Syrians have been killed and over one million have been injured. 4.8 million Syrians have been forced to leave the country, and 6.5 million are internally displaced, making Syria the largest displacement crisis globally.

In 2016, an estimated 13.5 million people, including six million children, are in need of humanitarian assistance. Of these 5.47 million people are in hard-to-reach areas, including close to 600,000 people in 18 besieged areas.

The US and Russia are the co-chairs of the diplomatic grouping known as the International Syria Support Group (ISSG), which comprises the UN, the Arab League, the European Union and 16 other countries. In Geneva, the taskforces on humanitarian aid delivery and a ceasefire - created by the ISSG - have been meeting separately since early this year on a way forward in the crisis.

At today's briefing, Mr. de Mistura said that the agreement between the US and Russia on the cessation of hostilities in Syria last Friday was a "game-changer" because violence has been reduced substantially.

Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura briefs the press in Geneva. UN Photo/Daniel Johnson

"The reduction of violence, and you will be having further reports we will get after we verify today, is by and large [] holding; in fact it has been substantial," he said.

The "second dividend" of the Russian-American agreement has been humanitarian access, he said. Apart from seeing no more bombs or mortar shelling taking place, the agreement allows for humanitarian access.

But the Syrian Government has not issued permits for the five areas the UN is ready to reach. "We cannot let days of this reduction of violence to be wasted by not moving forward on that," Mr. de Mistura stated.

Meanwhile, Jan Egeland, the Advisor to the Special Envoy, reiterated "the good news is that our people on the ground confirmed that the cessation of hostilities is largely holding, the killing has been greatly reduced, in fact no reports on civilian killings the last 24 hours. Attacks on schools, attacks on hospitals have stopped."

"The bad news is that we are not using this window of opportunity so far to reach all of these places with humanitarian assistance, like we did when this humanitarian task force was born out of the February agreement on the cessation of hostilities," he said.

In addition to eastern Aleppo, UN convoys, if they receive permits, are ready to go to places like Moadameya, to Al-Waer, to Talbiseh to Douma, to all of the besieged areas close to Damascus, close to Homs, and elsewhere, he explained.

The deal is "simple," said Mr. Egeland: "Well-fed grown men, please stop putting political, bureaucratic, and procedural roadblocks [before] brave humanitarian workers that are willing to go to serve women, children, wounded civilians in besieged and crossfire areas."

The convoys have been waiting and sleeping at the border now for 48 hours so they could go on a minute's notice, he underscored.
New UN report reveals millions of refugee children 'missing out' on education

Publisher UN News Service Publication Date 15 September 2016 Related Document(s) Missing Out: Refugee Education in Crisis Cite as UN News Service, New UN report reveals millions of refugee children 'missing out' on education, 15 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbe61c40e.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

15 September 2016 - In a new report, the United Nations refugee agency said that more than some six million school-age children under its mandate have no school go to and that refugees are five times more likely to be out of school than the global average.

"This represents a crisis for millions of refugee children," UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said in a news release issued by his Office (UNHCR).

"Refugee education is sorely neglected, when it is one of the few opportunities we have to transform and build the next generation so they can change the fortunes of the tens of millions of forcibly displaced people globally," he added.

According to the agency's new report, Missing Out: Refugee Education in Crisis, only half of refugee children have access to primary education, compared with a global average of more than 90 per cent. And as these children become older, the gap further widens: only 22 per cent of refugee adolescents attend secondary school compared to a global average of 84 per cent.

At the higher education level, just one per cent of refugees attend university, compared to a global average of 34 per cent.

These findings are particularly pertinent as next week, global leaders will be gathering in new York for two major relevant meetings: the UN General Assembly's Summit for Refugees and Migrants on 19 September, and, the very next day, a Leaders' Summit on the Global Refugee Crisis, hosted by United States President Barack Obama.

In the release today, UNCHR said that at both summits, it will call on governments, donors, humanitarian agencies and development partners, as well as private-sector partners, to strengthen their commitment to ensuring that every child receives a quality education.

"Underlining the discussions will be the target of Sustainable Development Goal 4, [to] 'ensure inclusive and quality education for all and promote lifelong learning,' an aim that will not be realized by 2030 without meeting the education needs of vulnerable populations, including refugees and other forcibly displaced people," the UN agency stressed.

Sheer gravity of the challenges

The report also revealed that the global school-age refugee population remained relatively stable at 3.5 million between 2001 and 2010, but since then, it has grown on average by 600,000 children and adolescents annually. In 2014 alone, this population grew by 30 per cent.

While noting that governments, UNHCR and its partners have made progress in enrolling more numbers of refugees in school, the agency said that the sheer increase in the number new refugees makes actual progress a daunting task.

Given the recent numbers, UNHCR estimates that an average of at least 12,000 additional classrooms and 20,000 additional teachers are needed on an annual basis.

Furthermore, the agency highlighted that refugees often live in regions where governments are already struggling to educate their own children. They face the additional task of finding places for schools, trained teachers and learning materials for tens or even hundreds of thousands of newcomers, who often do not speak the language of instruction and have frequently missed out on three to four years of schooling.

For instance, in Kakuma refugee camp in northern Kenya, the report profiles the remarkable story of a young South Sudanese girl, Esther, who has caught up on multiple years of missed education to reach the last year of secondary school. Only three per cent of children in Kakuma camp are enrolled in secondary school, and less than one per cent make it to higher education.

Given the fact that the average length of displacement for a refugee in a protracted situation currently stands at 20 years, the report calls for donors to transition from a system of emergency to multi-year and predictable funding that allows for sustainable planning, quality programming and sound monitoring of education for refugees and national children and adolescents.

Story of a young refugee who is now a volunteer teacher

The report concludes with the inspiring story of Nawa, a Somali refugee who only started her education aged 16 at a community learning centre in Malaysia. Under four years later, she is due to start a foundation course at university while giving back to her school as a volunteer teacher.

"Nawa's story proves it is never too late to invest in refugee education, and investment in one refugee's education means the entire community benefits," said High Commissioner Grandi.
Two-state solution to Israel-Palestine conflict at risk of giving way to 'one-state reality,' warns Ban

Publisher UN News Service Publication Date 15 September 2016 Cite as UN News Service, Two-state solution to Israel-Palestine conflict at risk of giving way to 'one-state reality,' warns Ban, 15 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbe65340e.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

15 September 2016 - United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today called for intensified efforts to encourage Israelis and Palestinians to take the difficult steps required to change the current destructive trajectory of the conflict, which is heading towards a "one-state reality" rather than a peaceful resolution.

"Twenty-three years ago, almost to the day, the first Oslo Accord was signed between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organisation," the Secretary-General told the Security Council in Let me be absolutely clear: settlements are illegal under international law. The occupation, stifling and oppressive, must end.a briefing on the situation in the Middle East.

"Unfortunately, we are further than ever from its goals. The two-state solution is at risk of being replaced by a one-state reality of perpetual violence and occupation," he warned.

Despite warnings by the international community and the wider region, leaders on both sides have failed to take the difficult steps needed for peace, the UN chief said.

Just yesterday, militants in the Gaza Strip fired yet another rocket into Israel, and in response, Israel fired four missiles at targets in Gaza. "Such attacks, and the response they elicit, do not serve the cause of peace," he warned.

Turning to Israel's settlement activities, Mr. Ban said that in the past two weeks alone, plans were advanced for yet another 463 housing units in four settlements in Area C of the West Bank. Official Israeli data shows that the second quarter of 2016 had the highest number of construction starts in three years.

"The decades-long policy that has settled more than 500,000 Israelis in Palestinian territory is diametrically opposed to the creation of a Palestinian state," he said.

Turning to Gaza, he noted that there has been progress in rebuilding the enclave in the two years since the ceasefire in the 2014 conflict. But 65,000 people remain displaced, he said, underscoring the need for more assistance to rebuild nearly 5,000 destroyed houses.

Apart from reconstruction, Gaza's humanitarian needs "run deep." More than 1.3 million of its 1.9 million people need assistance, explained the UN chief, and he encouraged Member States to provide in a predictable manner financial support to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East UNRWA.

Looking at the broader situation, Gaza remains under closures and is a "ticking time bomb." Indeed, lasting progress in Gaza can only be realized on the basis of Palestinian unity, an end to the illicit arms build-up and militant activities, and a full lifting of movement and access restrictions.

On the situation in the Golan Heights, Mr. Ban said he remains concerned by the continued breaches of the ceasefire line, and by fighting in the areas of separation and limitation. These developments undermine the 1974 Disengagement of Forces Agreement, and jeopardize the ceasefire between Israel and Syria.

In particular, recent fire from the Syrian Arab Armed Forces impacted the Israeli-occupied Golan. On both occasions, Israeli Defense Forces had responded with an airstrike. "I call on Israel and Syria to abide by the terms of the Disengagement Agreement and exercise maximum restraint," Mr. Ban said.
Displaced three times, but retired Ukraine teacher stays upbeat

Publisher UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Author Nina Sorokopud Publication Date 15 September 2016 Cite as UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Displaced three times, but retired Ukraine teacher stays upbeat, 15 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbe8414.html [accessed 30 October 2022]

When heavy shelling drove retired teacher Vira, 85, from her home town on the frontlines of the conflict in eastern Ukraine, her flight had an awful familiarity. It was the third time in her long life that she has been driven from home.

"Who thought that I would be on the move and without home in the end of my lifetime? But how can I complain?" she says, remaining defiantly upbeat. "We need to look on the bright side. Many people are having more difficult life than I have''

Uprooted in early 2015 from her home in Stanitsa Luhanska to a temporary refuge in a small town near the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, she is among hundreds of thousands of vulnerable elderly people bearing the brunt of internal displacement from the conflict in eastern Ukraine.

The ongoing conflict there has uprooted more than two million people both within Ukraine and across the country's borders. Another two million remain in the conflict zone, where they live with sporadic fighting, broken infrastructure and lack of access to basic services. A disproportionate number of the holdouts are elderly people like Vira.

Speaking without regret, she recalls a life marked by upheavals that began during the famine and economic hardship of the early 1930s, when her father was deported to Siberia by the Soviet regime. The family was later allowed to return to a small town near Moscow, although her settled life ended with the outbreak of World War Two.

"We lost our house then, it was destroyed by shelling," Vira recalls in an interview with UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency. Together with her mother, she had to move in with relatives to the Donetsk region, where they lived in a cob house, with clay-built walls.

Settling into life as a primary school teacher in Stanitsa Luhanska after the war, she raised a son - Sasha - and looked forward to a peaceful retirement. However, two years ago, as clashes erupted in eastern Ukraine, she was once again forced to flee.

As shells began pounding her hometown, she first sought refuge in a bomb shelter. But when gun and artillery fire closed in on the town, Vira knew she had to run. During a lull in the shelling, she gathered a few vital documents and precious family photos in a plastic bag and fled in a car with a group of friends, hoping to join Sasha, who had gone ahead.

While the car broke down soon after, she remembers the day they fled as one of the happiest in her life. "It took more than a week to fix it," she says. "But we were so glad to be in a safe haven and finally away from the shooting."

In fewer than 18 months since then, Vira and Sasha have lived in five different locations. They are temporarily renting a tiny old house, which is now for sale. She occasionally calls her neighbours to find out what is happening back home in Stanitsa Luhanska.

"I miss my apartment so much. It was always clean, spacious and light. They told me last autumn that the windows were smashed," she says.

According to official government statistics, more than 60 per cent of those registered as internally displaced in Ukraine are elderly people like Vera, who has high blood pressure and heart trouble. Highly vulnerable, their plight is of particular concern to UNHCR.

The economic downturn in the conflict-torn country has had a devastating impact on the most vulnerable groups, especially if their income is limited to social benefits and pensions.

"With my pension, I can barely afford food. When I had a heart attack, I went to see a doctor and she gave me a prescription for an expensive medication. I could not pay so much. I am now taking some cheap pills but they are not helping to ease my blood pressure," she explains.

Vira is grateful for the generosity of the local community in Kyiv. "I left with no belongings. All my clothes are from the Red Cross. Each month we also receive some food packages. It really helps," she says.

As part of her limited daily routine, Vira often visits the community centre in Irpin, which was opened with UNHCR support this spring. Managed by a volunteer group, the centre seeks to promote a dialogue between displaced and local residents by organizing a number of cultural events and educational workshops.

"I won a medal in the dancing competition three years ago, back home. But I do not dance anymore," says Vira. She comes to the centre for aerobics, cooking master classes and group discussions with psychologists, often seeking the simple pleasure of socializing with others.

"What is happiness?" Vira asks, as she pours tea for guests in her temporary home. "To be happy with small things."
Bahrain: 'Call for Nabeel Rajab's release', rights groups urge 50 governments

Publisher Reporters Without Borders Publication Date 15 September 2016 Cite as Reporters Without Borders, Bahrain: 'Call for Nabeel Rajab's release', rights groups urge 50 governments, 15 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbea614.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

15 September 2016 - Rights groups yesterday wrote to the governments of 50 states urging them to publicly call for the release of Bahraini human rights defender Nabeel Rajab, who faces up to 15 years' imprisonment for comments he made on Twitter. Last week, Bahrain brought the new charge of "defaming the state" against him, after an op-ed was published under his name in The New York Times.

The letter from 22 NGOs, including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, urges the 50 governments to "speak out on Bahrain's continued misuse of the judicial system to harass and silence human rights defenders, through charges that violate freedom of expression."

Among those addressed are the governments of France, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States. While the US State Department called for Nabeel Rajab's release on 6 September, other governments have not done so. The 50 states addressed in the letter are all previous signatories of statements at the United Nations criticizing Bahrain's ongoing human rights violations and calling for progress.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Prince Zeid bin Ra'ad Al-Hussein, used his opening statement at the 33rd Human Rights Council this week to raise concern over Bahrain's harassing and arresting human rights defenders. He cautioned Bahrain: "The past decade has demonstrated repeatedly and with punishing clarity exactly how disastrous the outcomes can be when a Government attempts to smash the voices of its people, instead of serving them."

Nabeel Rajab, the President of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, has been held in pre-trial detention since 13 June. During this time he has been held largely in solitary confinement, and his health has deteriorated as a result. Since 2011, Nabeel Rajab has faced multiple prosecutions and prison sentences for his vocal activism. He was subjected to a travel ban in 2014 and has been unable to leave the country.

In his current trial, Nabeel Rajab faces charges including "insulting a statutory body", "insulting a neighbouring country", and "disseminating false rumours in time of war". These are in relation to remarks he tweeted and retweeted on Twitter in 2015 relating to torture in Bahrain's Jaw prison and the role of the Saudi Arabian-led coalition in causing a humanitarian crisis in Yemen.

Nabeel Rajab's next court session has been set for 6 October, when he is expected to be sentenced.

Background

NGOs and others have been urging action on Nabeel Rajab's case since he was imprisoned in pre-trial detention in June. The Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy wrote to British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson on 7 September urging public action on Nabeel Rajab. On 2 September, 34 NGOs wrote a letter to the King of Bahrain calling for Nabeel Rajab's release.

In August, as part of an initiative organised by Index on Censorship, leading writers wrote a letter to British Prime Minister Theresa May asking the UK government to call on Bahrain, their ally, to release Nabeel Rajab. They included playwright David Hare, author Monica Ali, comedian Shazia Mirza, MP Keir Starmer and Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka.
The hidden failure of Europe's migration policy billions

Publisher IRIN Author Kristy Siegfried Publication Date 16 September 2016 Cite as IRIN, The hidden failure of Europe's migration policy billions, 16 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbec604.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

It's tempting to think that Europe's migrant and refugee "crisis" is largely behind us, that the EU's desperate deal with Turkey has had the desired effect  images of dozens of boats depositing refugees on Greek shores and trekking through the Balkans have largely disappeared from our TV screens.

Sure, boats are still arriving in Italy, but overall figures for arrivals in 2016 are way down from the same period last year  nearly 300,000 sea arrivals so far compared to 1.1 million during the whole of 2015.

But sea arrivals only tell part of the story, the most visible part. A new report released today by the Overseas Development Institute shines a light on the less visible channels that asylum seekers are using to reach Europe and finds that the billions of euros governments are spending on fences and cooperation agreements with third countries are having little impact.

The report's authors looked at registered arrivals of migrants and refugees to Italy and Greece over the last two years  what they call the 'overt' arrivals who are tracked and quantified by organisations like the UN's refugee agency, UNHCR, and the International Organization for Migration. They then compared those figures to the total number of asylum claims lodged throughout the EU during the same period and found a huge discrepancy, even when they accounted for backlogs of claims some countries are dealing with.

In 2015, UNHCR and IOM registered about 1.1 million new arrivals and yet 1.7 million asylum claims were lodged, suggesting that 600,000 people found their way into Europe through covert means.

In 2016, the discrepancy between registered arrivals and asylum claims is much larger. Based on current rates, the authors predict that by the end of the year 890,000 asylum claims will have been made while only about 330,000 new arrivals will be registered.

So while 'covert' arrivals accounted for 38 percent of new asylum seekers in Europe in 2015, they will account for an estimated 63 percent in 2016.

In fact, 2015 was the anomaly. The report shows that for at least the past seven years, the majority of asylum seekers arriving in Europe have used covert means. These typically include traveling overland concealed in vehicles, flying into the EU using false documents or arriving on a legitimate visa and then applying for asylum.

These clandestine routes don't come cheap. They often involve paying for forged documents or bribing border officials. A breakdown of the nationalities of covert arrivals in 2015 show that they were much more likely to be from upper-middle income countries than overt arrivals and that less than a third were from the Middle East, of which only 33 percent were from Syria.

The findings should sound an alarm bell for policy makers, said one of the report's authors: ODI's interim executive director Marta Foresti. "The number of people we know about is going down and the ones we don't know about are increasing," she told IRIN.

"This crisis isn't going away," she added. "Even if the Syria crisis was resolved, everything we see in these numbers in terms of overall trends suggests a steady increase [in asylum applications]."

Big spending

It's tempting to think that Europe's migrant and refugee "crisis" is largely behind us, that the EU's desperate deal with Turkey has had the desired effect  images of dozens of boats depositing refugees on Greek shores and trekking through the Balkans have largely disappeared from our TV screens.

Sure, boats are still arriving in Italy, but overall figures for arrivals in 2016 are way down from the same period last year  nearly 300,000 sea arrivals so far compared to 1.1 million during the whole of 2015.

But sea arrivals only tell part of the story, the most visible part. A new report released today by the Overseas Development Institute shines a light on the less visible channels that asylum seekers are using to reach Europe and finds that the billions of euros governments are spending on fences and cooperation agreements with third countries are having little impact.

The report's authors looked at registered arrivals of migrants and refugees to Italy and Greece over the last two years  what they call the 'overt' arrivals who are tracked and quantified by organisations like the UN's refugee agency, UNHCR, and the International Organization for Migration. They then compared those figures to the total number of asylum claims lodged throughout the EU during the same period and found a huge discrepancy, even when they accounted for backlogs of claims some countries are dealing with.

In 2015, UNHCR and IOM registered about 1.1 million new arrivals and yet 1.7 million asylum claims were lodged, suggesting that 600,000 people found their way into Europe through covert means.

In 2016, the discrepancy between registered arrivals and asylum claims is much larger. Based on current rates, the authors predict that by the end of the year 890,000 asylum claims will have been made while only about 330,000 new arrivals will be registered.

So while 'covert' arrivals accounted for 38 percent of new asylum seekers in Europe in 2015, they will account for an estimated 63 percent in 2016.

In fact, 2015 was the anomaly. The report shows that for at least the past seven years, the majority of asylum seekers arriving in Europe have used covert means. These typically include traveling overland concealed in vehicles, flying into the EU using false documents or arriving on a legitimate visa and then applying for asylum.

These clandestine routes don't come cheap. They often involve paying for forged documents or bribing border officials. A breakdown of the nationalities of covert arrivals in 2015 show that they were much more likely to be from upper-middle income countries than overt arrivals and that less than a third were from the Middle East, of which only 33 percent were from Syria.

The findings should sound an alarm bell for policy makers, said one of the report's authors: ODI's interim executive director Marta Foresti. "The number of people we know about is going down and the ones we don't know about are increasing," she told IRIN.

"This crisis isn't going away," she added. "Even if the Syria crisis was resolved, everything we see in these numbers in terms of overall trends suggests a steady increase [in asylum applications]."

Big spending

The second part of the ODI report looks at the costs of deterrence measures both within Europe  in the form of fences, border policing and surveillance  and outside Europe, through funding for external migration controls and for programmes aimed at addressing root causes of migration such as lack of jobs and development.

Inside Europe, fences have been going up at a rapid rate over the past year. During the latter half of 2015 and early 2016, five fences were erected at a cost of 238 million. In total, Europe spent 1.7 billion on fences and other border control measures between 2014 and 2016, according to ODI's "conservative" estimate.

"What we found particularly on border control is a very clear domino effect," said Foresti. "If a country erects a wall, it's only a matter of time before their neighbours do the same."

The result, notes the report, is millions of euros "poured into shifting burdens across individual countries in Europe, with little progress made on actually reducing the numbers arriving as a whole."

Europe's uneven approach not only to border controls, but to receiving and processing asylum applications has led to the majority of recent asylum seekers gravitating towards a handful of member states that are now shouldering a disproportionate share of the financial burden for hosting them.

In Sweden, for example  the country that has the highest number of asylum seekers as a proportion of the local population  ODI estimates that the cost per citizen in 2016 was 245. In the UK, which has taken in a relatively small number of refugees, the cost was just 16 (see map).

Meanwhile, European governments are spending vast sums trying to deter migrants and asylum seekers from ever reaching Europe's borders. Over the past year, the EU has committed 300 million to strengthening security and border controls in non-European countries and promised billions of euros to support economic development through bilateral agreements and trust funds aimed at discouraging would-be migrants from leaving home.

Most recently, the EU announced the Partnership Framework on Migration, which could see 9 billion in aid distributed over the next four years to countries that cooperate with the EU's goals on reducing migration.

'A bottomless pit'

Considering the amounts of money involved, there's a surprising lack of evidence that this approach actually works to reduce migration flows. In fact, all the evidence suggests that, in the short term at least, migration actually increases when poor countries experience development and people have more resources and aspirations to travel.

The failures of Europe's unilateral and short-term responses to the refugee "crisis" have highlighted the urgent need for multilateral action, argue the authors, and the timing of this report just ahead of the high-level summits in New York next week is no coincidence. One of the major goals of those summits is to achieve greater consensus and responsibility-sharing when it comes to dealing with large movements of refugees and migrants.

"Without international and regional cooperation, investing in isolated border controls and security is a bottomless pit," notes the report.

Even more worrying are the wider, ripple effects as other countries are encouraged to emulate Europe's approach with their own deterrence policies.

"It's highly risky because if others join this race to the bottom, it could result in even greater flows to Europe," said Foresti.

The forced closure of Kenya's camps in Dadaab, hosting more than 300,000 Somali refugees, for example, could see some of those refugees making their way towards Europe.

"One key thing we're trying to get across in the call for multilateralism is not just on grounds of solidarity and protecting the rights of refugees, but that it's actually in the self-interest of countries themselves," said Foresti.

The second part of the ODI report looks at the costs of deterrence measures both within Europe  in the form of fences, border policing and surveillance  and outside Europe, through funding for external migration controls and for programmes aimed at addressing root causes of migration such as lack of jobs and development.

Inside Europe, fences have been going up at a rapid rate over the past year. During the latter half of 2015 and early 2016, five fences were erected at a cost of 238 million. In total, Europe spent 1.7 billion on fences and other border control measures between 2014 and 2016, according to ODI's "conservative" estimate.

"What we found particularly on border control is a very clear domino effect," said Foresti. "If a country erects a wall, it's only a matter of time before their neighbours do the same."

The result, notes the report, is millions of euros "poured into shifting burdens across individual countries in Europe, with little progress made on actually reducing the numbers arriving as a whole."

Europe's uneven approach not only to border controls, but to receiving and processing asylum applications has led to the majority of recent asylum seekers gravitating towards a handful of member states that are now shouldering a disproportionate share of the financial burden for hosting them.

In Sweden, for example  the country that has the highest number of asylum seekers as a proportion of the local population  ODI estimates that the cost per citizen in 2016 was 245. In the UK, which has taken in a relatively small number of refugees, the cost was just 16 (see map).

Meanwhile, European governments are spending vast sums trying to deter migrants and asylum seekers from ever reaching Europe's borders. Over the past year, the EU has committed 300 million to strengthening security and border controls in non-European countries and promised billions of euros to support economic development through bilateral agreements and trust funds aimed at discouraging would-be migrants from leaving home.

Most recently, the EU announced the Partnership Framework on Migration, which could see 9 billion in aid distributed over the next four years to countries that cooperate with the EU's goals on reducing migration.

'A bottomless pit'

Considering the amounts of money involved, there's a surprising lack of evidence that this approach actually works to reduce migration flows. In fact, all the evidence suggests that, in the short term at least, migration actually increases when poor countries experience development and people have more resources and aspirations to travel.

The failures of Europe's unilateral and short-term responses to the refugee "crisis" have highlighted the urgent need for multilateral action, argue the authors, and the timing of this report just ahead of the high-level summits in New York next week is no coincidence. One of the major goals of those summits is to achieve greater consensus and responsibility-sharing when it comes to dealing with large movements of refugees and migrants.

"Without international and regional cooperation, investing in isolated border controls and security is a bottomless pit," notes the report.

Even more worrying are the wider, ripple effects as other countries are encouraged to emulate Europe's approach with their own deterrence policies.

"It's highly risky because if others join this race to the bottom, it could result in even greater flows to Europe," said Foresti.

The forced closure of Kenya's camps in Dadaab, hosting more than 300,000 Somali refugees, for example, could see some of those refugees making their way towards Europe.

"One key thing we're trying to get across in the call for multilateralism is not just on grounds of solidarity and protecting the rights of refugees, but that it's actually in the self-interest of countries themselves," said Foresti.
Disclaimer

This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.
A Day of Terror and Loss

Publisher Institute for War and Peace Reporting Publication Date 10 September 2016 Cite as Institute for War and Peace Reporting, A Day of Terror and Loss, 10 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbf1034.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

Night was almost over, and I was counting the minutes until daybreak. I hadn't slept due to unbearable stomach pain and wanted to see my doctor as soon as possible.

I got out of bed shortly after eight o'clock and called for an appointment. I got one for two hours later. To pass the time, I kept myself busy with some light chores and prepared breakfast for my family.

My husband and I left home half an hour before my appointment. Just as I was about to get into our car, a thick cloud of dust enveloped the neighbourhood. People around us began screaming.

My husband asked a man running towards us what had happened.

"The government army has reached the city centre. Leave quickly!" the man said.

We ran back into our house, gathered our children and went down to the building's basement. Some neighbours joined us, as well as a few strangers who had been passing through the area and couldn't make it home due to the heavy gunfire.

The basement was our sanctuary. We had prepared it for this kind of emergency, as our city of Saraqib had been the target of numerous government attacks. It had a telephone line, was stocked with supplies as well as water and electricity.

Around two hours later, another man joined us. He told us the army had executed nine people and arrested a large number of men aged between 19 and 40. He also said that soldiers were setting fire to vacant houses.

A few of my neighbours rushed back to their homes, but my family and I decided to take our chances and stay in the basement until nightfall.

When we finally crept back upstairs, the street outside was deserted, with many buildings in ruins. Some had been ransacked and looted, others had been burned down. The local marketplace had also been destroyed.

The whole neighbourhood was shrouded in darkness as government tanks had knocked down the electricity pylons.

We settled down for the evening.

A short while later, the deathly silence was pierced by the ringing of our phone. Trembling, I reached out to answer it.

It was my sister. She had called to tell me that my only brother had not come home.

He had been at his shop in the local marketplace earlier that evening, and spoke to my father over the phone telling him he would be home in less than an hour. Five hours had passed and he had still not returned.

I hung up the phone and frantically called his friends. One of them told me he had heard that a young man whose description matched my brother had suffered minor injuries and had been transported to a field hospital.

I called my father and siblings to tell them what I had found out. I had calmed down a little, but I still felt that something was wrong. Why hadn't he contacted us if he had only suffered minor injuries?

Two days passed by, during which we were unable to locate my brother.

On the third day of his absence, we received a phone call asking us to go to a local hospital to identify the body of a martyr that could possibly be him.

We rushed to the hospital. It was just ten minutes away, but the drive took us two hours as most of the roads were either under fire or blocked by rubble.

When I arrived at the hospital, I was told that my father had already been there.

He had identified the martyr. It was my brother.

My father had taken him home, so we headed there immediately.

"Is it really him?" I cried out as soon as I set foot in my parents house.

My cousin who had opened the door looked away, his head drooping.

I was distraught.

I walked into my brother's room. He was lying on his bed.

I sat next to him and held his hand. Despite the hot weather, it was freezing cold.

I put my head on his chest hoping to hear a heartbeat, but I heard nothing.

His body was sticky with the blood that had poured from his wounds. He had not been bathed, as martyrs are buried the way they are found.

We later found out that my only brother was one of 23 young men who had been executed in public.

He had been shot five times.

Eman Mohammed is the pseudonym of a Damascus Bureau contributor living in Idlib's countryside. The mother-of-three runs a vocational and educational project for women, and has also worked as a volunteer in a polio vaccination campaign.

Read the Arabic version of this article her

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Housing Syria's Displaced and Vulnerable

Publisher Institute for War and Peace Reporting Author Ahmad al-Salim Publication Date 12 September 2016 Cite as Institute for War and Peace Reporting, Housing Syria's Displaced and Vulnerable, 12 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbf17cbbc.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

Abu Abdalla and his family decided it was time to flee their home town of Kfar Nabuda after it was bombed by government aircraft. Scores of civilians were killed and wounded in a relentless series of attacks.

"The fierce raids waged by Russian and government air forces on Hama's northern countryside forced us to abandon our houses so as to keep our children safe," he said.

"We made our way to the Syrian-Turkish border and took refuge in a camp, living in a small tent. However conditions were extremely harsh, especially during winter, so we didn't stay there for long," the 45 year-old said.

Abu Abdallah heard that housing units for internally displaced people (IDPs) were being built in Idlib's southern countryside, so decided to head in that direction.

As soon as he arrived at the village of Has and signed a declaration that his family was homeless, he was allocated a flat in the Rahma residential project.

This newly-built village will house 250 families in seven three-storey housing units, each containing eight flats. Abu Abdalla's new home consisted of one room, a kitchen and a bathroom.

Project director Omar al-Dani told Damascus Bureau that the buildings were being built for IDPs from Hama and Latakia's countryside. The project was being implemented by the Al-Wafa Relief Association under the supervision of the Rahma International organisation.

"Upon completion, the project will have cost an excess of 400,000 US dollars," said 51 year-old al-Dani.

"Hundreds of IDPs have already submitted applications to be housed. Those most in need will be selected."

According to Abdalla al-Kanjo, a builder on the site, the allocated plot of land is not big enough for parks or playgrounds, but trees have been planted on the streets.

"There are no shops or local markets in the village, but these can be found in the nearby villages of Has and Kafruma," he continued.

"The project has been highly beneficial to our local community as it created more than 100 jobs, which were quickly filled by those who had suffered extended periods of unemployment."

The Rahma village is relatively safe due to the lack of any military presence in the area.

Nevertheless, according to Abbas al-Kamel, head of the Has local council, government forces have targeted such sites in the past.

Al Kamel noted that an attack on = the Mud village built by the Qatar Red Crescent in Idlib's countryside had killed eight people and wounded scores; a large section of the village was also damaged.

"It is the responsibility of the humanitarian agencies we cooperate with to condemn the shelling of these sites," he said.

"Government forces target them to make sure that civilians do not have safe havens to settle down in, thereby forcing them into successive displacement."

Umm Yasin, 39, has experienced repeated displacement.

"My husband fought in the Free Syria Army. He was killed in a battle and I was forced to flee my home due to the heavy fighting," she said.

"My children and I settled in the Obeen camp in Latakia's countryside. When the camp was bombed we were forced to flee yet again," she continued.

This time Umm Yasin fled to Has. She applied for a flat in the Rahmah village where she now lives along with her four children.

Ahmad al-Salim is the pseudonym of a Damascus Bureau contributor from Idlib, Syria.

Read the Arabic version of this article here

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A New Generation of Medics

Publisher Institute for War and Peace Reporting Publication Date 12 September 2016 Cite as Institute for War and Peace Reporting, A New Generation of Medics, 12 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbf1bd4.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

Ruaa had just completed a three-month nursing course at a women's centre in Kfar Nabel and was working at a private clinic when she heard about a new medical institute in Kfar Nabel.

The 20-year old jumped at the opportunity to further develop her skills and is now studying physiotherapy.

"The need for a job, and the desire to help those attempting to save the lives of the victims of this vicious war, led me towards a career in nursing," Ruaa told the Damascus Bureau.

Kfar Nabel's medical institute was founded in early 2016 by a group of activists and doctors. When it proved successful, its founders expanded the project and recruited a large team of doctors with various specialties.

"The institute was founded to deliver scientific and academic education to those interested in providing medical relief," said its director, Manaf al-Humaidi.

"When we first launched it, we offered six-month academic courses. After obtaining recognition from the Free Idlib health department, our academic courses were extended to two years, thereby giving our graduates the chance to find employment at medical facilities and field hospitals in liberated areas."

Tuition combines academic and practical elements. The academic part comprises of seven subjects including first aid, physiotherapy, anatomy and pharmacology, all which are taught on site at the institute. The practical element is taught in medical centres and field hospitals across Idlib's countryside.

Students applying to study at the institute must be under 30 years of age, and must be secondary school graduates.

One student enrolled at the institute is 21 year-old Salim.

"I could not go to university after I graduated from school, as all universities are located in government held areas," he said.

When the medical institute opened in his city of Kfar Nabel, Salim did not hesitate to enrol. The added bonus is that he does not need to commute.

The institute's workforce consists of seven specialist doctors, a team of pharmacists, nurses and experienced trainers.

Doctors are responsible for teaching students medical science, human anatomy and the treatment and prevention of diseases.

Pharmacists teach students about the different types and formulas of medicines, recommended dosages and side effects.

Meanwhile, nurses train students on the principles of first aid, how to make plaster casts and how to administer IV drips.

"We teach students everything they need to know in order to tend to the wounded," said Khalid Katuf, a senior nurse at the institute.

"Ambulances and paramedics are overwhelmed by the numbers of casualties they tend to, which is why

we need more qualified staff."

The institute also hosts a variety of medical seminars for its lecturers and visiting professors.

Louay, a 19-year-old student at the institute, said that he hopes to become a nurse so as to save lives.

"I have great respect for all the medics who have been killed while on duty," he said. "I hope to follow in their footsteps and help my fellow countrymen who fall victim to the crimes of the regime."

Hadia Mansour is the pseudonym of a Damascus Bureau contributor from Idlib, Syria.

Read the Arabic version of this article here

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Rewarding Idlibs Brightest Students

Publisher Institute for War and Peace Reporting Author Amina al-Yousef Publication Date 15 September 2016 Cite as Institute for War and Peace Reporting, Rewarding Idlibs Brightest Students , 15 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbf2384.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

An Idlib awards ceremony has honoured students who had achieved outstanding exam results in maths, physics, chemistry, Arabic and English.

More than 700 male and female students from secondary schools in Idlib participated in a knowledge challenge held under the slogan "Armed with education we shall rebuild [our country]."

One student who took part in the compeititon, Suaad, praised the initiative.

"We worked hard throughout the academic year, and our hard work did not go to waste," she said.

The challenge was sponsored by a number of charitable organisations including the Shabakit Aman organisation, the Amal Youth organisation and the Namaa organisation, in cooperation with the education bureaus of Kansafra, Jabal al-Zawiya, Kfar Nabel and Khan Shaykhun.

The top prize was 18,000 Syrian Pounds (80 US Dollars), with five runner-up prizes of 5,000 pounds (20 dollars).

According to its sponsors, the initiative aimed at encouraging healthy competition and motivating students.

"The main objective of this event is to push the wheel of education a step further by boosting morale, encouraging students to pursue education, and recognising top achievers," Ahmad al-Ahmad, coordinator at Shabakit Aman, told Damascus Bureau.

Event organisers also hoped to draw attention to the dangers of youth migration and its ramifications on future local communities.

"One of the purposes of the challenge is to draw the world's attention to Idlib, which the government describes as a terrorism hub," said Radwan al-Atrash, a member of the educational bureau in Khan Shaykhun.

"The government claims that education is lacking in the governorate of Idlib, and that our schools operate under the shadow of terror.

"To this we say, look at Idlib's students, they are busy with their studies inside their classrooms."

A committee of teachers representing the local cities, towns and villages, supervised the knowledge challenge. The committee set the exam questions, oversaw the tests and marked the papers.

"This challenge is proof that despite the shelling and destruction, we will continue to educate our youth," said Abdel Nasir al-Zeidan, a member of the supervising committee.

"No matter what happens, a future generation of distinguished individuals will be here to rebuild our country."

Ahmad Qasum, head of Idlib's local council, told Damascus Bureau that such initiatives enriched the process of education and boosted student morale.

"We will do our best to rebuild our demolished schools and ensure that this generation is educated," Qasum said.

Salma, a student who competed in the challenge, said, "I came all the way from the village of Maarat Hurma to take part in this competition so that I could prove that I am committed to my studies.

"Despite the bombings and destruction we are resilient," she added. "We are a new generation and we will rebuild a new Syria."

Amina al-Yousef is the pseudonym of a Damascus Bureau contributor who lives in Idlib. The 21 year-old is a law-school graduate and has been displaced along with her family numerous times over the past four years.

Read the Arabic version of this article here

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Misusing Hate Speech Laws in Central Asia

Publisher Institute for War and Peace Reporting Publication Date 16 September 2016 Citation / Document Symbol RCA 796 Cite as Institute for War and Peace Reporting, Misusing Hate Speech Laws in Central Asia, 16 September 2016, RCA 796, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbf2a74.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

A series of incidents in both Kazakstan and Tajikistan in which citizens have been prosecuted on apparently jumped-up charges of hate speech is a worrying sign of things to come.

The Kazak and Tajik governments seem to have noted global trends promoting anti-incitement legislation in Europe and the USA, in particular in relation to refugees and migrants.

But the Central Asian states appear to be exploiting such legislation for their own highly undemocratic ends.

Both counties have been accused of using their loosely-worded legislation on inciting hatred and hostility to silence political dissent rather than to respond to genuine cases of intolerance.

Their legal systems are also often gauged to serve those in power rather than public need, making makes catch-all laws on hatred and hostility even more dangerous.

In Kazakstan, activists say that criminal code article 174, which prohibits "inciting social, national, tribal, racial or religious hatred or hostility", has been used to pursue critics of the state.

The international community has called for article 174 to be amended and for the terms under which citizens may be charged to be clarified.

See Kazakstan Shrugs Off Human Rights Concerns

According to the Astana-based Kazakstan Legal Media Centre, 88 criminal cases for inciting hatred or hostility were registered in 2015.

Most of these charges were regarding public statements made by activists or journalists.

In January, activists Serikzhan Mambetalin and Yermek Narymbaev were sentenced for inciting hatred to two and three years of imprisonment respectively after they criticised state affairs on Facebook.

Mambetalin publicly recanted and was released after signing a pledge not to leave the country.

Narymbaev, on the other hand, told the court he had done nothing to apologise for. His sentence was later changed to house arrest and Narymbaev is now asking for political asylum in Ukraine, Kazak RFE/RL Azattyq reported in July.

In May, Lukpan Akhmedyarov, the head of the Abyroi NGO, was detained for 15 days after speaking out against controversial changes to the land law.

(See more on land protests: Kazak State Cracks Down on Dissent).

He was again taken in for questioning in August, along with Tamara Yeslyamova, the editor-in-chief of local newspaper Uralskaya Nedelya.

The pair was questioned by department of internal affairs crime investigators about supposedly inciting ethnic and social hatred through their newspaper publications and Facebook posts. Both were later released.

This phenomenon has been ongoing for some time in Kazakstan.

In 2011, labour union lawyer Natalia Sokolova was sentenced to six years of imprisonment for actions that were deemed to be "inciting hatred". Sokolova had publically compared salaries paid to Kazak oil industry workers to their counterparts in other countries. A Kazak court considered that this had served to provoke protests among local workers.

She served nine months before being released on parole.

Tajikistan has its own version of anti-incitement legislation - article 189 of the Criminal Code.

Most recently, in July, a Tajik court sentenced 60-year-old businessman Abubakr Azizkhodzhaev to two-and-a-half years in prison.

He was charged with incitement of national, racial, regional or religious hatred under article 189.

Azizkhodzhaev was detained after announcing that the state had terminated a contract with his company for producing car number plates in favour of a deal with a company co-owned by the president's son-in-law Shamsullo Sokhibov.

The businessman wrote an open letter to the president and made public comments to journalists and human rights activists about alleged corruption in the country.

The prosecution has yet to point to activities or actions to support charges of incitement to hatred apart from Azizkhodzhaev's public statements about his business.

According to Human Rights Watch, the charges against him were politically motivated, and the ongoing suppression of freedom of speech in Tajikistan gives weight to this argument.

(See alsoTough Times for Tajik Lawyers).

State media discourse in these countries also promotes a distorted concept of hate speech.

Under international antidiscrimination legislation, hatred is defined as a public act likely to offend, insult, humiliate or intimidate an ethnic, racial, religious or social group.

Supposedly inciting hatred towards government officials or police officers does not meet that definition.

When the authorities exploit such misconceptions to declare that politically motivated arrests and lawsuits come in response to incitement, it has a chilling effect on freedom of speech.

Continuing down this path will only undermine human rights and civil societies in these Central Asian countries.

Inga Sikorskaya heads the School of Peacemaking and Media Technology in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.

This article was produced under an IWPR project called Strengthening Capacities, Bridging Divides in Central Asia, funded by the Foreign Ministry of Norway.

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Nigeria: Police Offers Forced to Buy Their Own Uniforms

Publisher Institute for War and Peace Reporting Author Nura Faggo Publication Date 15 September 2016 Cite as Institute for War and Peace Reporting, Nigeria: Police Offers Forced to Buy Their Own Uniforms, 15 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbf2fd4.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

Police officers in Nigeria say that they are being forced to buy uniforms and basic items of kit from uniforms to handcuffs out of their own salaries.

Although all policemen and women should receive at least two sets of uniform for free each year, interviews with serving officers across three districts revealed that not a single one had been given new kit since graduating from training college.

As well as uniforms, officers also have to buy accoutrements such as tear gas, torches, whistles, handcuffs and batons from official police stores or on the open market.

All officers interviewed stated that at least three sets of uniform were needed during the rainy season and during the harmattan, the period in which a hot dry wind blows across West Africa.

They said a further five sets were needed for the rest of the year in order to appear neat.

Buying material for each uniform comes to around 1,600 Naira, while paying for a tailor to make it up can cost up to 2,000 Naira. Boots are upwards of 3,000 Naira and even a regulation beret can cost more than 1,000 Naira.

This amounts to an enormous expense for officers whose salaries range from 41,000 Naira for a constable to 80,000 Naira for an inspector.

Sergeant Duniya Yakasai (not his real name) joined the force in 2003 as a police constable and has taken part in four campaigns against Boko Haram insurgents in the northeast of the country.

He currently owns six uniforms, all bought out of his own money, to ensure that he looks presentable for work.

But Yakasai said that in 13 years of service he had only received one set of kit, during his training at the police college.

"I can assure you anywhere you see a police officer in this country fully kitted, the Nigeria police force has not given to him anything out of it," he said. "The only thing the Nigeria police does is giving us our monthly salaries which those at the top cannot deny us."

Yakasai, now stationed in Kano, takes home 51,000 Naira each month. A set of quality kit, which should last for a year, costs at least 15,000 Naira.

"Not many of us can buy a set of kit at one time. So what we do normally is to be acquiring items of the kits in pieces until everything is complete before we give tailors to sew the uniform, which is the final stage."

IWPR spoke to officers from Gona, GRA and Pantami divisions in Gombe metropolis, Dutsen Tanshi, Yelwa, Abubakar Tafawa Balewa Housing estate and Township in Bauchi Metropolis as well as Panshekara Kumbotso and Noman's Land in Kano city.

Not a single officer reported receiving a full set of kit from the police force from the date he joined up, with the exception of the uniform provided in training college.

Corporal Ilya of GRA Division in Bauchi city said that even these first uniforms were of poor quality and quickly wore out.

"No responsible police officer will use that kit for duty after passing out because the uniform and the boots got faded and broken during training," he continued. "That is why today whenever there is training of new recruits, go to any of our police training schools, you will see items of kits on display for sale. So, we all bought new kits with our little training allowance in order to be appealing to our family members and the society we would be serving."

EASILY AVAILABLE

Officers told IWPR that they were outraged that kits were on sale in police stores, apparently with the full knowledge of the senior officers.

In Gombe State, the kits can be purchased at a shop in the premises of the area command, close to Tashan Dukku opposite Government Pilot Secondary School.

In Bauchi, Zone 12 headquarters, the area command opposite the Yandoka police headquarters and the training school Yelwa are the main sales outlets.

In Kano, police command Bompai is the main sales outlet, along with individual police officers who have the capital to engage in the business.

Tailors employed by the police also take advantage of the demand for uniforms. They travel to the central police stores in Lagos and Abuja to buy kits so as to sell them on to colleagues in their various duty posts.

Two sergeant tailors in Gombe state are particularly known for their ability to procure essential items of kit, while in Bauchi's metropolitan divisions, it is policewomen who have cornered the market.

IWPR accompanied officers to one of the centres in Bauchi and Gombe to witness transactions in which items of kit including belts, buttons, shoulder badges and metal crests were bought.

Paul Lambala, an officer serving with the Pantami division, said, "Everything is on sale in the Nigeria police, including working materials like tear gas and batons."

He recalled an incident in which he gave a senior sergeant recently promoted to inspector 600 Naira so that he could buy the insignia signifying his new rank.

Less than an hour later, the inspector, attached to Gombe's Pantami division, was back to show him the badge that he had bought at the Tashan Dukku area police stores.

Police officers are fully aware that they are entitled to receive two sets of kit each year.

"You cannot even complain, and even where you have the guts to complain the usual cliche in Nigeria police circle in any matter you are shortchanged is 'wait for your time,'" said Kurungu of the mobile police zone Panshekara, Kano who joined the force in 2008.

The situation is further complicated by the fact that sales of kits are not restricted to official police shops. They can easily be found on sale in ordinary markets.

An interviewee in Bauchi pointed out a shop in the popular Wunti Market where police boots and belts as well as those of military and paramilitary organisations, were openly displayed for sale.

Junior police officers on general duties stay in uniform for between 12 to 16 hours a day depending on their beat.

Musa, serving with Yelwa division said, "As a junior sergeant now my salary is just 49,000 Naira monthly and I cannot at once use about 10,000 Naira or above out of it to kit myself because of family responsibilities and other daily needs."

In 2013 and 2014 the force introduced new kits featuring a sky blue shirt over black trousers or skirts and sky-blue camouflage.

However, officers told IWPR that only ten sets of each kit were distributed to each divisional police station- leaving the DPOs to adopt various techniques in the distribution.

"When the sky blue shirt over a black trouser or skirt was introduced in 2013, I was serving at Bali in Taraba state," said Corporal Daniel Manzo, now serving with Gona division within Gombe city. "Ten sets were brought to my station and we were 70 at that time."

He said that the kits were distributed by lottery. All Manzo received at the end of the process was a lanyard.

A traffic warden in Bauchi township police station said that the same had happened in his area.

He too ended up getting a lanyard, while a colleague got a single boot.

OFFICIAL RESPONSE

Police spokesman Donald Awunah told IWPR that the force only provided free kits to ranks from constable to inspector.

ASPs up to the inspector general bought their own kits. This was subject to the availability of government funds, he cautioned, adding, "There is no department in the government that can say, 'hey we have it all'."

As to how often free kits were distributed, Awunah said, "As frequently as the funds [allow] us."

He said that the police force had recently entered in to a partnership with a foreign firm to supply kits to officers.

However, he denied that uniforms and accouterments could be bought freely from police stories.

"Uniform is [just] a fabric, but the police kits are restricted," he said, adding that everyone had to make do with what was available.

"You see, nothing can be enough. Even in our home we ration foods."

The Nigerian police have received huge sums of money from the government in recent years.

According to records from the Federation's Budget Office, they were allocated 302,901,812,085 Naira as recurrent and capital expenditure, 321,622,224,611 Naira in 2015 for recurrent and capital expenditure as well as 308,919,046,437 Naira this year for the same purpose.

A Freedom of Information request was sent to the federal ministry of finance asking for information on the total amount of money released to the police force for the purchase of kits and accoutrements in 2015.

Three weeks later, the ministry responded and directed all enquiries to the ministry of budget and economic planning. As of the time of publication, no response had been received.

Nigerian journalist Nura Faggo produced this report with support from PartnersGlobal and the Institute for War & Peace Reporting. It is one of a series of investigative reports produced under the Access Nigeria/Sierra Leone Programme funded by the United States Department's Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement.

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(Bangkok-Dhaka-Geneva-Madurai-Paris-Quezon City) We condemn the arbitrary travel ban imposed on Kashmiri human rights defender Mr. Khurram Parvez, who was prohibited from leaving India as he was about to travel to Geneva, Switzerland to participate in the 33rd session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), stated The Observatory, AFAD, FORUM-ASIA, AHRC, HRDA, ICAED, and Odhikar.

At 1:30 a.m. on September 14, 2016, Mr. Khurram Parvez was stopped by immigration officials at the Indira Gandhi International airport in Delhi and prevented from leaving the country to attend the current UNHRC session. Mr. Parvez was detained for one and a half hours at the airport, and subsequently told that the Intelligence Bureau of India had ordered that he was not allowed to travel, despite having an invitation letter and a valid visa to travel to Geneva. Mr. Parvez repeatedly asked for an explanation for why he was being denied the right to travel and asked to see written proof of the orders from the Intelligence Bureau, but the authorities refused to provide him with either. Immigration officers simply told Mr. Parvez that they had instructions that he was not to be 'arrested' but that he should not be allowed to leave the country.

Mr. Parvez is the Chairperson of the Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances (AFAD) and Program Coordinator of the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS). He was slated to be part of the AFAD & JKCCS delegation visiting Geneva from 14th to 24th September to attend the UNHRC session. While in Geneva, the Kashmiri members of the delegation are scheduled to brief UN bodies including the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights regarding the concerning situation in Jammu and Kashmir.

In his work with AFAD and JKCCS, Mr. Parvez has consistently highlighted violations of human rights taking place in India, notably in Jammu and Kashmir. In addition to their planned advocacy work at the current UNHRC session, JKCCS has also recently submitted a report to the UN on the role of the Indian authorities in gross human rights violations taking place in Jammu and Kashmir.

By denying Mr. Parvez the right to travel to Geneva to participate at the UNHRC session, the Indian Government is disregarding its obligation to uphold international human rights principles, notably the right of civil society members to be represented and engage with UN mechanisms, as enshrined in the 1998 UN Declaration of human rights defenders and several resolutions adopted by the UN General Assembly [1].

It is especially concerning that India is engaging in such repression in the wake of a statement made yesterday by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, wherein he expressed regret at India's lack of cooperation with international human rights mechanisms, particularly with respect to Kashmir. The Government of India continues to out-rightly refuse to give the UN permission to conduct a fact-finding mission in Kashmir, despite widespread accusations of serious human rights violations by security personnel in the region [2].

The travel ban imposed on Khurram Parvez is the latest attempt by the Indian Government to censor the human rights situation in Kashmir and to isolate the Kashmiri people, notably human rights defenders working on this important issue. Especially given that India is presently a member of the UN Human Rights Council, the international community cannot stay silent in the face of such disregard of its human rights obligations.

Our organisations condemn the travel ban against Mr. Parvez, and call on the Indian authorities to respect his personal liberty, his right to travel freely, notably to participate in meetings at the UN. Additionally, we demand an end to the harassment of human rights defenders and that the Indian government remove all legal and administrative barriers that impede their legitimate work on human rights. We also call on the international community, notably the other members of the UN Human Rights Council, to insist that India comply with its human rights obligations, including by allowing Indian human rights defenders to freely engage in their work, and by fully cooperating with the UN requests for access to Kashmir and elsewhere in the country.

For more information, please contact:

AFAD: Mary Aileen D. Bacalso: +63 2 456 6434

AHRC: Md. Ashrafuzzaman: +41 766 382 659 / +852 607 32 807

FIDH: Arthur Manet / Audrey Couprie: + 33143552518

FORUM-ASIA: Anjuman Ara Begum: +977 982 381 5517

HRDA: Mathew Jacob: +91 886 011 0520

ICAED: Mary Aileen D. Bacalso: +63 917 792 4058

Odhikar: Adilur Rahman Khan: + 880 29 88 85 87

OMCT: Delphine Reculeau: +41 22 809 49 34
Bahrain: 'Call for Nabeel Rajab's release', rights groups urge 50 governments

Publisher International Federation for Human Rights Publication Date 16 September 2016 Cite as International Federation for Human Rights, Bahrain: 'Call for Nabeel Rajab's release', rights groups urge 50 governments, 16 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbf72010.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

Rights groups yesterday wrote to the governments of 50 states urging them to publicly call for the release of Bahraini human rights defender Nabeel Rajab, who faces up to 15 years' imprisonment for comments he made on Twitter. Last week, Bahrain brought the new charge of "defaming the state" against him, after an op-ed was published under his name in The New York Times.

The letter from 22 NGOs, including The Observatory (FIDH/OMCT), Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, urges the 50 governments to "speak out on Bahrain's continued misuse of the judicial system to harass and silence human rights defenders, through charges that violate freedom of expression."

Among those addressed are the governments of France, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States. While the US State Department called for Nabeel Rajab's release on 6 September, other governments have not done so. The 50 states addressed in the letter are all previous signatories of statements at the United Nations criticizing Bahrain's ongoing human rights violations and calling for progress.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Prince Zeid bin Ra'ad Al-Hussein, used his opening statement at the 33rd Human Rights Council this week to raise concern over Bahrain's harassing and arresting human rights defenders. He cautioned Bahrain: "The past decade has demonstrated repeatedly and with punishing clarity exactly how disastrous the outcomes can be when a Government attempts to smash the voices of its people, instead of serving them."

Nabeel Rajab, the President of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, has been held in pre-trial detention since 13 June. During this time he has been held largely in solitary confinement, and his health has deteriorated as a result. Since 2011, Nabeel Rajab has faced multiple prosecutions and prison sentences for his vocal activism. He was subjected to a travel ban in 2014 and has been unable to leave the country.

In his current trial, Nabeel Rajab faces charges including "insulting a statutory body", "insulting a neighbouring country", and "disseminating false rumours in time of war". These are in relation to remarks he tweeted and retweeted on Twitter in 2015 relating to torture in Bahrain's Jaw prison and the role of the Saudi Arabian-led coalition in causing a humanitarian crisis in Yemen.

Nabeel Rajab's next court session has been set for 6 October, when he is expected to be sentenced.

Background

NGOs and others have been urging action on Nabeel Rajab's case since he was imprisoned in pre-trial detention in June. The Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy wrote to British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson on 7 September urging public action on Nabeel Rajab. On 2 September, 34 NGOs wrote a letter to the King of Bahrain calling for Nabeel Rajab's release.

In August, as part of an initiative organised by Index on Censorship, leading writers wrote a letter to British Prime Minister Theresa May asking the UK government to call on Bahrain, their ally, to release Nabeel Rajab. They included playwright David Hare, author Monica Ali, comedian Shazia Mirza, MP Keir Starmer and Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka.
(New York, Paris) FIDH welcomes the unprecedented initiative by the United Nations General Assembly to hold a world summit on Refugees and Migrants on 19 September to discuss a "more humane and coordinated approach" to migration. It urges Heads of State and government to use this opportunity to take concrete actions to protect the rights of refugees and migrant persons.

Wars, daily persecutions, poverty, environmental factors push more and more people to flee their countries. Global forced migration is on the rise. In 2015, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), 65.3 million people were displaced because of conflict, persecution and human rights violations [1]. It is 5.8 million more than in 2014. As of September 2016, it is estimated that 4.8 million people had fled the conflict in Syria.

In 2015, only about one million people sought protection in Europe. But so far, the European response to increased flows of migrants, asylum seekers and refugees has been completely inadequate at best, shameful most of the time. It included the construction of walls and fences, push-backs, denial of the right to asylum, systematic administrative detention, confiscation of valuables, xenophobia, stigmatisation and, in some cases, criminalisation. The EU and member States' approach remains security centred and aimed at sealing off and militarize borders, with the help of the newly created European Border and Coast Guard which is set to replace the European Union Agency for the Management of Operational Cooperation at the External Borders of the European Union, Frontex [2].

EU member states have also overall failed to meet their already unambitious commitments regarding resettlement and relocation [3]. The Dublin III regulation leading to an unequal distribution of asylum-seekers within the EU still puts a disproportionate burden on frontline member States. In parallel, the EU and its member States continue to outsource their responsibilities for managing migration to non-EU countries with poor human rights records [4]. Turkey - which already hosts 2.7 million Syrians, living in appalling conditions - has seen its responsibilities increase following the adoption of a shameful deal with the EU in March 2016 providing for fast-track expulsions of all "new irregular migrants" reaching the Greek islands back to Turkey and an infamous "Syrians swap". In other parts of the world, similar shameful agreements are concluded to push migrants away. Australia is pursuing its policy of preventing boatloads of migrants from reaching Australian soil by transferring the passengers to Manus Island in Papua New Guinea or to Nauru. Here, they are detained in overcrowded, squalid centres, while awaiting a decision on their refugee status and possible resettlement in another country.

In the absence of safe and legal channels of migration into Europe, more and more refugees, asylum seekers and migrants are forced to risk their lives by taking increasingly dangerous routes. According to the International Organisation for Migration, since the beginning of 2016, almost 300.000 people risked their lives at sea in their attempt to reach Europe and more than 3.200 drowned or went missing out of the 4.320 migrant deaths registered worldwide in 2016 [5]. 64% of arrivals came from the worlds top 10 "refugee-producing countries" and almost half were women and children [6].

FIDH urges world leaders to take concrete actions aiming at developing more ambitious migration and asylum policies, putting the human rights of migrants, asylum-seekers and refugees, particularly the right to asylum and non-refoulement at their heart. Preventing further loss of lives at sea, while opening safe and legal migration channels including for labour migration, including by granting visas, increasing resettlement capacity, facilitating family reunification and repealing airport transit visas, should also be prioritised. World leaders should also commit to a fair share of responsibilities for the reception of refugees and asylum-seekers, ensure that cooperation in the field of migration with countries of origin and transit respects human rights and do not contribute to human rights violations, address the root causes of the violence that force people to flee their country of origin and fighting populist rhetoric and "anti-migrant" discourses and measures, which violate the dignity and the rights of migrants, asylum seekers and refugees. Only through these measures will world leaders succeed in creating "a more responsible, predictable system for responding to large movements of refugees and migrants".
Kampala  Sudanese authorities should drop all charges against 10 activists affiliated with Tracks for Training and Development (TRACKs), a Khartoum-based training organisation, and immediately and unconditionally release three men who have been detained since May 2016 solely for the peaceful exercise of their rights, the African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies, Amnesty International, DefendDefenders, the International Federation for Human Rights and the International Refugee Rights Initiative said today.

The activists affiliated with TRACKs  which provides training on a range of issues from IT to human rights - are facing two overlapping criminal cases, one opened following a raid on the organisation in March 2015 and another following a second raid in February 2016. They have been charged with a number of offences including crimes against the state that carry the death penalty. The two cases were scheduled to be heard on 24 August 2016, but were postponed to 30 August.

Three of the accused are held in detention at Al Huda Prison in Omdurman North, Khartoum. TRACKS director Khalafalla al Afif Mukhtar, TRACKS trainer Midhat Afif al-Deen Hamdan, and the director of Alzarqaa Organisation for Rural Development, Mustafa Adam, who happened to be visiting TRACKS at the time of the February raid, were detained on 22 May together with six others who were released within two weeks. The group of eight was charged on 15 August and the three men were transferred to Al Huda prison on the same day. They had spent 86 days without charge at the Office of the Prosecutor for State Security in Khartoum in inhumane conditions, in a cell that was overcrowded, with poor ventilation and restricted access to sanitation. Khalafalla al Afif Mukhtar, who suffers from a heart condition, was denied medical treatment on a number of occasions at the Prosecutor's office and fainted twice due to the heat.

Also on 22 May 2016, Sudan's National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) reactivated an earlier criminal case, number 56/2015, brought against TRACKS director Khalafalla al Afif Mukhtar and Adil Bakheit, a well-known independent human rights trainer who had delivered trainings for TRACKS, following a raid on the organisation in March 2015. The men were charged in April and May 2015 with seven offences including three under the category of crimes against the state that carry the death penalty. However, they heard nothing further about the case until they were summoned to court on 22 May and informed that two other members of TRACKS staff, administration manager Arwa Al-Rabie and accountant Nudaina Kamal, were also accused in the case. The hearing has been adjourned five times because the investigator failed to attend.

The charges appear to be part of an on-going pattern of harassment and intimidation against TRACKS and other civil society groups by the NISS.

During the two raids on TRACKS in March 2015 and February 2016, NISS officers confiscated laptops, mobiles, and documents and repeatedly summoned staff for interrogation afterwards. On 11 June 2016, NISS officials searched the home of TRACKS director Khalafalla al Afif Mukhtar and the homes of three of his relatives. Officials seized printed materials and the family's cash savings and briefly detained his brother, Jamal Mukhtar.

The Sudanese authorities have unduly restricted the rights to freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and association, including by shutting down newspapers, using excessive force to break up protests, and placing arbitrary restrictions on civil society organisations. The Confederation of Sudanese Civil Society Organisations reported thatin the last quarter of 2015 three organisations faced undue restrictions in the renewal of their licences, one local organisation was denied registration and another was forcibly closed without reasons being given. In March this year, the NISS stopped four civil society representatives from travelling to Switzerland for a high level meeting with diplomats in preparation for a UN-led human rights review of Sudan and confiscated their passports.

Human rights organisations have long called on Sudan to reform repressive laws, including the National Security Act of 2010 which vests the security agency with wide powers of arrest and detention for up to four and a half months without judicial review in addition to powers of search and seizure. Sudan also continues to use the death penalty, implemented by hanging, for a range of offences. These laws have been used to crack down on civil society and human rights defenders.
(Addis-Abeba) A group of civil society organizations are calling for an independent and impartial international investigation into human rights violations in Ethiopia, including the unlawful killing of peaceful protesters and a recent spate of arrests of civil society members documenting this crackdown.

DefendDefenders (East and Horn of African Human Rights Defenders Project), the Association for Human Rights in Ethiopia (AHRE), Amnesty International, the Ethiopia Human Rights Project (EHRP), Front Line Defenders, and FIDH are concerned about the levels of persecution and detention of civil society members in the country. Since last month, four members of one of Ethiopia's most prominent human rights organizations, the Human Rights Council (HRCO), were arrested and detained in the Amhara and Oromia regions. HRCO believes these arrests are related to the members' monitoring and documentation of the crackdown of on-going protests in these regions.

On 14 August, authorities arrested Tesfa Burayu, Chairperson of HRCO's West Ethiopian Regional Executive Committee at his home in Nekemte, Oromia. Tesfa, who had been monitoring the protests for the organization, was denied access to his family and his lawyer, and released on 16 August without charge. Two days earlier on 12 August, Abebe Wakene, also a member of HRCO, was arrested and taken to the Diga district police station in Oromia. Abebe Wakene remains in detention with no formal charges against him. In addition, on 13 August, Tesfaye Takele, a human rights monitor in the Amhara region, was arrested in the North Wollo zone and is still detained without charge.

On 8 July, Bulti Tesema - another active member of HRCO - was arrested in Nejo, Oromia. He had been working with HRCO to monitor and document violent repression of the protests. Sources told DefendDefenders that his whereabouts remained unknown for several weeks after his arrest, until they found out that he had been transferred to the capital's Kilinto prison and charged with terrorist offences. He has not been given access to either his family or his lawyer. The court has adjourned the hearing to 12 October.

HRCO's human rights monitors were arrested for attempting to document the large-scale pro-democracy protests and the following violent crackdown by the authorities in the Oromia and Amhara regions, as well as in the capital Addis Ababa on 6 and 7 August. Amnesty International reported that close to 100 protesters were killed and scores more arrested during the largely peaceful protests.

Three journalists were also arrested and detained by Ethiopian security officials for 24 hours on 8 August 2016 in the Shashemene area of the Oromo region. According to the Foreign Correspondents' Association of Ethiopia, Hadra Ahmed, a correspondent with Africa News Agency, was arrested along with Public Broadcasting Services (PBS) reporters Fred de Sam Lazaro and Thomas Adair, despite having proper accreditation. They were reporting on the government's response to the drought in the Oromia region, where protests have been ongoing since November 2015. Their passports and equipment were confiscated and they were forced to return to Addis Ababa.

In response to the on-going crackdown, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, has called for "access for independent observers to the country to assess the human rights situation". Ethiopia's government, however, has rejected the call and promised to launch its own investigation.

Ethiopia's National Human Rights Commission, which has the mandate to investigate rights violations in Ethiopia, has failed to make public its own June report on the Oromo protests, while concluding in its oral report to Parliament that the lethal force used by security forces in Oromia was proportionate to the risk they faced from the protesters. Since November 2015, at least 500 demonstrators have been killed and thousands of others arrested in largely peaceful protests in the Oromia and Amhara regions and other locations across the country.

DefendDefenders, AHRE, Amnesty International, EHRP, Front Line Defenders, and FIDH urge the Ethiopian authorities to (i) immediately and unconditionally release civil society members targeted for their work and (ii) facilitate access for international human rights monitoring bodies including the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) to conduct thorough, independent, impartial and transparent investigations into the ongoing human rights violations in the Oromia, Amhara and Addis Ababa areas.
UN Secretary-General must press gov't on political prisoners, enforced disappearances

Publisher International Federation for Human Rights Publication Date 3 September 2016 Cite as International Federation for Human Rights, UN Secretary-General must press gov't on political prisoners, enforced disappearances, 3 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbfcaf4.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

(Paris) United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon must demand that the Lao government free all political prisoners and investigate unresolved cases of enforced disappearances during his upcoming official visit to Vientiane, FIDH and its member organization Lao Movement for Human Rights (LMHR) said today.

In connection with this call, FIDH and LMHR have jointly published two briefing papers that document the severe restrictions on the right to freedom of expression in Laos and show that the country ranks near the bottom of many international indexes that measure respect for democratic principles and key civil and political rights.

At least seven people remain behind bars for their criticism of the Lao government. They include two men, Somphone Phimmasone and Soukan Chaithad, and a woman, Lodkham Thammavong, who are detained incommunicado in Vientiane's Phonethanh Prison. Authorities arrested the three in March 2016 for posting numerous messages on Facebook that criticized the government in relation to alleged corruption, deforestation, and human rights violations.

Pro-democracy activist Bounthanh Khammavong remains detained in Vientiane's Phonetong Prison since his arrest in June 2015. On 18 September 2015, Bounthanh was sentenced to four years and nine months in prison under Article 65 of the Criminal Code for criticizing the Lao government on Facebook.

Two members of the Lao Students Movement for Democracy (LSMD), Thongpaseuth Keuakoun and Sengaloun Phengphanh, arrested on 26 October 1999, remain in solitary confinement in Vientiane's Samkhe Prison. They are serving 20-year prison sentences for "generating social turmoil and endangering national security" in connection with their plans to hold peaceful demonstrations that were to call for democracy, social justice, and respect for human rights.

FIDH and LMH also urge Ban Ki-moon to demand that the Lao government conduct swift, thorough, and impartial investigations into all cases of enforced disappearances in the country and hold those responsible accountable. To date, the fate or whereabouts of at least 12 victims of enforced disappearances remain unknown.

They include prominent civil society leader Sombath Somphone, who 'disappeared' at a police checkpoint on a busy street in Vientiane on 15 December 2012. The Lao authorities have failed to provide any specific information on the status and progress of the investigation into Sombath's disappearance since 7 June 2013. The Laos government has also failed to determine the fate and whereabouts of nine activists - two women, Kingkeo and Somchit, and seven men, Soubinh, Souane, Sinpasong, Khamsone, Nou, Somkhit, and Sourigna - who were detained in November 2009 for planning pro-democracy demonstrations in Vientiane. Two other LSMD members arrested on 26 October 1999 in Vientiane, Bouavanh Chanhmanivong and Keochay, also remain missing. In addition to the above-mentioned cases, there are many other cases of enforced disappearances, which are believed to have gone unreported in Laos.

Ban Ki-moon will visit Vientiane from 7-8 September 2016 to attend the 8th Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-UN Summit and the 11th East Asia Summit. He is scheduled to meet with Lao President Bounnhang Vorachit and Prime Minister Thongloun Sisoulith. This will be Ban Ki-moon's second visit to Laos, after a previous trip in April 2009.
Russian Federation: Caucasian Knot journalist sentenced to three years' in prison

Publisher International Federation for Human Rights Publication Date 9 September 2016 Cite as International Federation for Human Rights, Russian Federation: Caucasian Knot journalist sentenced to three years' in prison, 9 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbfda24.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

(Oslo-Paris-Geneva) The Norwegian Helsinki Committee (NHC) and the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders (an FIDH-OMCT partnership) condemn the sentencing of Mr. Zhalaudi Geriev, a journalist of the Russian independent news portal Caucasian Knot on September 5, 2016. A Court in Chechnya's town Shali sentenced Mr. Geriev to three years in prison for possession of drugs, a charge Mr. Geriev vehemently denied during the court proceedings. Mr. Geriev claims he was tortured until confession, but the confession was accepted as evidence during the trial. This and several other procedural violations during the court proceedings have been pointed out by Mr. Geriev's lawyer.

Mr. Zhalaudi Geriev was kidnapped by three unknown assailants from a minibus on April 16, 2016, while traveling to Chechnya's capital Grozny. "I was hit on the head and pushed into a black Lada Priora. My phones, a backpack with my passport, notebook and other private belongings were taken from me. I was taken to a forest not far from the Tsotsin-Yurt village", he declared. There, he was questioned about his occupation and whether he was "going to Syria", something he denied. A bag was put on his head and fastened tight until he was suffocating; his arms tied up with wire. Afterwards he was driven to a graveyard, where, according to the investigation, he would have reportedly confessed having committed a crime.

We consider the criminal prosecution and sentencing of Mr. Zhalaudi Guriev to be connected with his professional journalistic work, and remind that the case adds to a string of attacks against the freedom of expression in the region.

On September 3, the journalists Elena Kostyuchenko from Novaya Gazeta and Diana Khachatryan from the web-portal Takie Dela were prevented from covering of commemoration of the Beslan tragedy and later attacked by unknown people in Beslan, North Ossetia.

On March 9, 2016, several journalists and human rights activists, including Swedish and Norwegian journalists, were brutally attacked at the border between Ingushetia and Chechnya. They were on a press tour in North Caucasus.

According to Glasnost Defense Foundation, 211 journalists have been murdered in Russia over the last 15 years, many of whom were from North Caucasus or wrote about Chechnya. Anna Politkovskaya, Natalia Estimirova, and Boris Nemtsov are the most famous names in the West, and were persons who openly criticised Russian policy in Chechnya. Besides, hundreds of journalists are being threatened and beaten each year. The United Nations Human Rights Committee has expressed concern at the limited progress in investigating serious past and ongoing human rights violations, including physical attacks against journalists, in the region.

Accordingly, the NHC and the Observatory urge the Russian authorities to:

 Immediately and unconditionally release journalist Zhalaudi Geriev and to overturn his conviction since it only aims at sanctioning his human rights activities;

 Order an immediate, thorough, effective and transparent investigation into the allegations of abduction and torture against Mr. Geriev, in order to identify all those responsible and bring them to justice;

 Take immediate and effective steps to ensure safety for journalists working in the North Caucasus.

The NHC and the Observatory also urge the international community to carefully follow the situation of journalists and human rights defenders in Chechnya and the North Caucasus, and to demand an investigation into each case of violation against freedom of expression.
Gabon: Transparency must be guaranteed for the country to emerge from the present political deadlock and for peace to be preserved

Publisher International Federation for Human Rights Publication Date 9 September 2016 Cite as International Federation for Human Rights, Gabon: Transparency must be guaranteed for the country to emerge from the present political deadlock and for peace to be preserved, 9 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbfe254.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

(Paris - Douala) FIDH, REDHAC and member organisations of the #MyVoteMustCount coalition condemn the post-electoral violence in Gabon following the announcement of Ali Bongo Ondimba's victory in the presidential election. The violence have led to the death of at least 7 persons and injured many person. From 800 to 1100 persons were arrested by security forces, and are still in detention.

In order to safeguard peace and to put an end to the political deadlock, our organisations call upon all stakeholders in Gabon to show responsibility and restraint. They demand the publication of votes cast in each polling station, and if necessary the recounting of votes, orany other measuresable to safeguard. They urge the international community, and in particular the African Union and the Economic and Monetary Union of Central African Countries (CEMAC) to take immediate steps to support the settlement of the electoral dispute, so that the democratic choice of the electors be respected.

Following the announcement, on 31 August, 2016, by the electoral commission (Cenap) that the outgoing president, Ali Bongo, had been re-elected with 49.80 % of the vote, against 48.23 % for his main opponent, Jean Ping, violence broke out in several neighborhood of the capital, Libreville, and in other parts of the country, in particular in Port Gentil, Lambarene, Oyem and Bitam.

"Political actors in Gabon must call for calm to be restored and must guarantee the transparency of the results of the presidential election. The population's vote must be respected, and the international community must assist in the process. Variable-interest democracy is no longer acceptable in Africa, or anywhere in the world", declared Dimitris Christopoulos, newly elected FIDH president.

In the middle of the afternoon of Wednesday, 31 August, several hundred people attempted to demonstrate to contest the results proclaimed by the Cenap. At the same time road blocks were improvised in several districts of the capital by unidentified elements, and looting was observed; several buildings were set on fire, including the National Assembly. Considerable forces were deployed in the capital, comprising the Garde republicaine, the army, the Gendarmerie and the antiriot police. Demonstrators were dispersed with tear gas, stun grenades and hot water cannons. Live bullets were also reported to have been fired. During the night of 31 August, Mr Jean Ping's electoral headquarters were violently raided by the Garde republicaine. For several days Mr Ping had been claiming victory. 26 members of his staff were confined to the premises for 36 hours before being released. After five days of violence and repression, there were many wounded and at least 7 deaths; and according to the Minister of the Interior, from 800 to 1000 persons had been arrested and detained by the police. On September 3, the president of the Gabon Law Society, Mr Jean-Pierre Akumbu M'Oluna, stated that in Libreville alone in 3 days 800 persons had been arrested and detained by the police, and that they were detained in "degrading and unbearable conditions". Furthermore, according to information obtained by our organisations, several human rights defenders now fear reprisals for having spoken in favour of democratic change.

"Political actors in Gabon must immediately measure the importance of what is at stake in the present events, and call for restraint on the part of their respective followers. The authorities, on their part, must release all persons arbitrarily detained, investigate the alleged disproportionate use of force by security forces and ensure the protection of human rights defenders. They must also guarantee the independence and impartiality of the bodies in charge of settling the electoral disputes", declared Maximilienne C. Ngo Mbe, REDHAC Executive Director.

The opposition's contestation of the results mainly focuses on the narrow margin between votes for Ali Bongo and Jean Ping - 5,594 votes out of a total of 627,805 names on the electoral register. The results in Upper Ogoue, a province in the southeast of the country that is a stronghold of the Bongo family, came in for special criticism: participation is said to have reached 99.93 %, as against the national figure of 54.4 %, with 95.46 % of votes in favour of Ali Bongo, according to the official figures. Jean Ping's followers immediately contested the results, denounced electoral fraud and declared that their candidate had won. In a speech on September 2, Jean Ping proclaimed himself President of Gabon and called for all votes to be recounted, in all polling stations, one by one.

"The right of the people to choose freely their representatives must be respected. The lack of transparency, and electoral fraud, in order to remain in power are the vectors of political violence in Africa. The international community must guarantee that the President who will be recognised is the one for whom the Gabonese voted, and this will prevent the country from plunging into political and security chaos" declared Drissa Traore, FIDH Vice-president.

Our organisations call upon the international community, the African Union and CEMAC in particular, to organise as a matter of urgency, an extraordinary summit on the situation in Gabon, extended to include partners such as the United States, the European Union and France, who have already spoken out in favour of measures designed to ease tension and achieve transparency, thereby contributing to the settlement of the electoral disputes. The aim in particular should be to bring the Gabonese authorities to publish the results for each individual polling station, and if necessary to recount the votes in the presence of international representatives. Gabon's international partners should also enjoin the Gabonese State to respect its international obligations to promote governance and human rights guaranteed in particular by the Constitutive Act of the African Union, the African Charter of Human and Peoples' Rights and the African Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance (ACDEG) that emphasises the importance of consolidating a continental culture of political change-over based on regularly held elections that are transparent, free and fair, conducted by national electoral bodies that are independent, competent and impartial.

CONTEXT:

The pre-electoral context in Gabon was characterised by a deterioration of the political and security situation. There was political tension due to the numerous appeals by the opposition challenging the validity of Ali Bongo's candidature, which were thrown out by the Constitutional Court on July 25th last. There were many allegations of fraud and corruption in connexion with the drawing up of the electoral register for the election to be held on August 27, 2016. In addition, the security forces repressed violently the peaceful demonstration organised by the opposition on July 23, 2016, when dozens of demonstrators were wounded, including bullet wounds, and a dozen other arrested. With the resumption of violence since the announcement of the result, widespread troubles in the whole country are to be feared.

Gabon has had only three presidents since the end of French colonisation on August 17, 1960, the second being Omar Bongo Ondima from 1967 to 2009, a reign of 42 years. In 2009 his son, Ali Bongo Ondima became president after an election marred by a number of irregularities and which was followed by several days of violence, leading to the death of three persons, and tens of persons injured. If Ali Bongo remains president after the present elections, by 2023 the Bongo family will have been in power for 56 years.

#MyVoteMustCount

Between 2015 and 2018, there will be 61 elections, including 30 presidential elections, in 32 African countries. To avoid manipulations, fraud and violence due to flawed elections, FIDH has gathered together in the #MyVoteMustCount coalition a hundred-odd African and international civil society and citizens' movements organisations. Together we demand that those in power respect the legitimate right of people to choose freely their representatives through regular, free, transparent and peaceful elections.

To that end, on July 18 and 19, 2016 FIDH and the OIF INGO conference invited 30 civil society and citizens' movements organisations to meet in Dakar to discuss electoral processes in Africa. They adopted a road map for change through elections, and reasserted their commitment to the #MyVoteMustCount campaign as framework for international mobilisation.
Turkey: 'Academics for Peace' suffer purge

Publisher International Federation for Human Rights Publication Date 12 September 2016 Cite as International Federation for Human Rights, Turkey: 'Academics for Peace' suffer purge, 12 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dbfe724.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

(Brussels, Paris, Ankara) FIDH and its member organisations in Turkey, IHD and Human Rights Foundation of Turkey (HRFT) strongly condemn the dismissal of the 'Academics for Peace', including Prof Dr Umit Bicer, Member of the HRFT Directors Board, from their positions in public higher education, by a decree having force of law within the scope of the State of Emergency. They express their solidarity with these academics and urge the Turkish government to reintegrate them in their previous positions.

On Thursday, September 1, 2016, the Turkish Government issued a decree, in the context of the State of Emergency rules, that foresees persons "identified to adhered or to be related to the formations or groups or terror organizations determined to pose a threat to the national security", to be removed from their positions in the related public institutions and agencies, without the need to any further acts. Dismissed under the conditions of state of emergency, the concerned persons will neither be able to appeal the decision nor work in public sector for a lifetime; their passports will also be revoked.

On Thursday, September 1, 2016, the Turkish Government issued a decree, in the context of the State of Emergency rules, that foresees persons "identified to adhere or be related to the formations or groups or terror organizations determined to pose a threat to the national security", to be removed from their positions in the related public institutions and agencies, without the need to any further acts. Dismissed under the conditions of state of emergency, the concerned persons will neither be able to appeal the decision nor work in public sector for a lifetime; their passports will also be revoked.

This decree permanently removed from office more than 50.000 civil servants employees, including 2.346 academics. Among the academics that were removed there are 44  Academics for Peace  scholars who signed, in January 2016, a petition titled  We will not be a party to this crime , also known as Peace Petition. Their removal is the climax of a series of criminal and disciplinary investigations, custody, imprisonment, or violent threats, that the almost 2,000 signatories of the Peace Petition have faced in the latest months. Prof Dr Umit Bicer, Member of the Board of Directors of the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey and faculty Member of the Forensic Medicine Department at the Kocaeli University has also been affected by the purge. .

Our organizations jointly affirm that the Government decree, leading to the removal of Academics for Peace, represents a serious violation of basic human right to defense, to fair trial and due process and an attempt to threaten to the independence of the academic community.

We also reiterates our deep concerns about the general and rapid escalation of violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms in Turkey. Since the failed coup on July 15, the Turkish Government has repeatedly used the State of Emergency extra-constitutional powers justified by the pretext of the failed coup attempt, to cleanse all critical voices, both political opponents and human rights defenders.

Finally, we call upon the European Union, the Council of Europe and the United Nations to act to ensure Turkey respects its international human rights commitments.
Paris-Geneva, September 12, 2016 On September 7, 2016, the lawsuit brought against the President of Kyrgyzstan for his slanderous statements against two Kyrgyz human rights activists, Tolekan Ismailova and Aziza Abdirasulova, was dismissed by the Bishkek City Court. Both defenders intend to appeal the decision before the Supreme Court.

After a two-day trial held on September 6 and 7, the Bishkek City Court dismissed the lawsuit brought in appeal by Ms. Tolekan Ismailova, President of Bir Duino Kyrgyzstan and FIDH Vice-President, and Ms. Aziza Abdirasulova, President of Kylym Shamy, against the Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev, in relation to a public speech he gave on May 14, 2016, in which he mentioned their names next to those of alleged organisers of a political upheaval, promising to ruthlessly suppress any attempts to destabilise the country. In his speech, the President also resorted to the "foreign agents" terminology, presenting Ms. Ismailova and Ms. Abdirasulova as heads of NGOs "faithfully serving their financial donors". Both defenders announced their intention to bring the case before the Supreme Court.

The Observatory deplores that several irregularities occurred during the trial in appeal, as had already been the case in first instance [1]. On the one hand, although Ms. Tolekan Ismailova and Ms. Aziza Abdirasulova requested several times that documents be added to the case file, the court has systematically refused to allow them to do so. On the other hand, the court also refused several motions filed by Ms. Tolekan Ismailovas and Ms. Aziza Abdirasulovas lawyers, such as those summoning the president to court, requesting video recording of the hearings, and requesting the removal of the judge from the case for alleged lack of impartiality.

The Observatory calls upon the Kyrgyz authorities to comply with fair trial standards and equality of arms principles in all circumstances, including for the upcoming proceedings before the Supreme Court. The Observatory more generally urges the Kyrgyz authorities to ensure an enabling environment to all human rights defenders in the country so they are able to carry out their work without hindrances, and to comply with the recommendations outlined in the report published on June 8, 2016, which is available at:

https://www.fidh.org/IMG/pdf/kyrgyzstanobsang2016web.pdf

http://www.omct.org/files/2016/06/23793/kyrgyzstan_mission_report_2016_english.pdf
To Permanent Representatives of Members and Observer States of theUN Human Rights Council

Geneva, 8 September 2016

RE: Addressing the escalating human rights crisis in Ethiopia

Your Excellency,

The undersigned civil society organisations write to draw your attention to grave violations of human rights in Ethiopia, including the recent crackdown on largely peaceful protests in the Oromia and Amhara regions.

As the UN Human Rights Council prepares to convene for its 33rd session between 13  30 September 2016, we urge your delegation to prioritise and address through joint and individual statements the escalating human rights crisis in Ethiopia.

An escalating human rights crisis in Oromia and Amhara Regions

The situation in Ethiopia has become increasingly unstable since security forces repeatedly fired upon protests in the Amhara and Oromia regions in August 2016. On 6 and 7 August alone, Amnesty International reported at least 100 killings and scores of arrests during protests that took place across multiple towns in both regions. Protesters had taken to the streets throughout the Amhara and Oromia regions to express discontent over the ruling party's dominance in government affairs, the lack of rule of law, and grave human rights violations for which there has been no accountability.

Protests in the Amhara region began peacefully in Gondar a month ago and spread to other towns in the region. A protest in Bahir Dar, the region's capital, on 7 August turned violent when security forces shot and killed at least 30 people. Recently, on 30 August, stay-at-home strikers took to the streets of Bahir Dar again and were violently dispersed by security forces. According to the Association for Human Rights in Ethiopia (AHRE), in the week of 29 August alone, security forces killedmore than 70 protesters and injured many more in cities and towns across Northern Amhara region.

Since November 2015, Ethiopian security forces have routinely used excessive and unnecessary lethal force to disperse and suppress the largely peaceful protests in the Oromia region. The protesters, who originally advocated against the dispossession of land without adequate compensation under the government's Addis Ababa Integrated Development Master Plan, have been subjected to widespread rights violations. According to international and national human rights groups, at least 500 demonstrators have been killed and hundreds have suffered bullet wounds and beatings by police and military during the protests.

Authorities have also arbitrarily arrested thousands of people throughout Oromia and Amhara during and after protests, including journalists and human rights defenders. Many of those detained are being held without charge and without access to family members or legal representation. Many of those who have been released report torture in detention. The continued use of unlawful force to repress the movement has broadened the grievances of the protesters to human rights and rule of law issues.

The need for international, independent, thorough, impartial and transparent investigations

Following the attacks by security forces on protesters in Oromia earlier this year, five UN Special Procedures issued a joint statement noting that "the sheer number of people killed and arrested suggests that the Government of Ethiopia views the citizens as a hindrance, rather than a partner", and underlining that "Impunity  only perpetuates distrust, violence and more oppression".

In response to the recent crackdown, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, has called for "access for independent observers to the country to assess the human rights situation". Ethiopia's government, however, has rejected the call, instead indicating it would launch its own investigation. On 2 September, in a public media statement, the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights reiterated the UN High Commissioner's call to allow a prompt and impartial investigation led by regional or international human rights bodies into the crackdown.

There are no effective avenues to pursue accountability for abuses given the lack of independence of the judiciary and legislative constraints. During the May 2015 general elections, the ruling EPRDF party won all 547 seats in the Ethiopian Parliament.

Ethiopia's National Human Rights Commission, which has a mandate to investigate rights violations, has failed to make public its June report on the Oromia protests, while concluding in its oral report to Parliament that the lethal force used by security forces in Oromia was proportionate to the risk they faced from the protesters. The Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions has rated the Ethiopian National Human Rights Commission as B, meaning the latter has failed to meet fully the Paris Principles.

The High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs, Federica Mogherini, who met with Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn at the margins of the European Development Days in June 2016, has called on all parties to refrain from the use of force and for a constructive dialogue and engagement to take place without delay. On 28 August, after the EPRDF party's general assembly, Prime Minister Hailemariam reportedly ordered the country's military to take any appropriate measures to quell the protests, which he described as illegal and aimed at destabilising the nation. Following a similar call regarding the Oromia protests, security forces intensified the use of excessive force against protesters.

A highly restrictive environment for dialogue

Numerous human rights activists, journalists, opposition political party leaders and supporters have been arbitrarily arrested and detained. Since August 2016, four members of one of Ethiopia's most prominent human rights organisations, the Human Rights Council (HRCO), were arrested and detained in the Amhara and Oromia regions. HRCO believes these arrests are related to the members' monitoring and documentation of the crackdown of on-going protests in these regions.

Among those arrested since the protests began and still in detention are Colonel Demeke Zewdu (Member, Wolkait Identity Committee (WIC)), Getachew Ademe (Chairperson, WIC), Atalay Zafe (Member, WIC), Mebratu Getahun (Member, WIC), Alene Shama (Member, WIC), Addisu Serebe (Member, WIC), Bekele Gerba (Deputy Chair, Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC)), Dejene Tufa (Deputy General Secretary, OFC), Getachew Shiferaw (Editor-in-Chief of the online newspaper Negere Ethiopia), Yonathan Teressa (human rights defender) and Fikadu Mirkana (reporter with the state-owned Oromia Radio and TV).

Prominent human rights experts and groups, including the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, have repeatedly condemned the highly restrictive legal framework in Ethiopia. The deliberate misuse of the Anti-Terrorism Proclamation's overbroad and vague provisions to target journalists and activists has increased as protests have intensified. The law permits up to four months of pre-trial detention and prescribes long prison sentences for a range of activities protected under international human rights law. Dozens of human rights defenders as well as journalists, bloggers, peaceful demonstrators and opposition party members have been subjected to harassment and politically motivated prosecution under the Anti-Terrorism Proclamation, making Ethiopia one of the leading jailers of journalists in the world.

In addition, domestic civil society organisations are severely hindered by one of the most restrictive NGO laws in the world. Specifically, under the 2009 Charities and Societies Proclamation, the vast majority of Ethiopian organisations have been forced to stop working on human rights and governance issues, a matter of great concern that has been repeatedly raised in international forums including at Ethiopia's Universal Periodic Review (UPR).

This restrictive and worsening environment underscores the limited avenues available for dialogue and accountability in the country. It is essential that the UN Human Rights Council take a strong position urging the Ethiopian government to immediately allow an international, thorough, independent, transparent and impartial investigation into alleged human rights abuses committed in the context of the government's response to the largely peaceful protests.

As a member  and Vice-President  of the Human Rights Council, Ethiopia has an obligation to "uphold the highest standards" of human rights, and "fully cooperate" with the Council and its mechanisms (GA Resolution 60/251, OP 9). Yet for the past ten years, it has consistently failed to accept country visit requests by numerous Special Procedures.

During the upcoming 33rd session of the Human Rights Council, we urge your delegation to make joint and individual statements reinforcing and building upon the expressions of concern by the High Commissioner, UN Special Procedures, and others.

Specifically, the undersigned organisations request your delegation to urge Ethiopia to:

immediately cease the use of excessive and unnecessary lethal force by security forces against protesters in Oromia and Amhara regions and elsewhere in Ethiopia;

immediately and unconditionally release journalists, human rights defenders, political opposition leaders and members as well as protesters arbitrarily detained during and in the aftermath of the protests;

respond favourably to country visit requests by UN Special Procedures;

urgently allow access to an international, thorough, independent, impartial and transparent investigation into all of the deaths resulting from alleged excessive use of force by the security forces, and other violations of human rights in the context of the protests;

ensure that those responsible for human rights violations are prosecuted in proceedings which comply with international law and standards on fair trials and without resort to the death penalty; and

fully comply with its international legal obligations and commitments including under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights, and its own Constitution.

Amnesty International

Association for Human Rights in Ethiopia

CIVICUS: World Alliance for Citizen Participation

Civil Rights Defenders

DefendDefenders (East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders Project)

Ethiopian Human Rights Project

FIDH (International Federation for Human Rights)

Foundation for Human Rights Initiative

Freedom House

Front Line Defenders

Global Center for the Responsibility to Protect

Human Rights Watch

International Service for Human Rights

Reporters Without Borders

World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT)
Kabardino-Balkarian Jamaat Suffers Serious Losses in Fight With Government Forces

Publisher Jamestown Foundation Author Mairbek Vatchagaev Publication Date 15 September 2016 Citation / Document Symbol Eurasia Daily Monitor Volume: 13 Issue: 149 Cite as Jamestown Foundation, Kabardino-Balkarian Jamaat Suffers Serious Losses in Fight With Government Forces, 15 September 2016, Eurasia Daily Monitor Volume: 13 Issue: 149, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dc07844.html [accessed 30 October 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.

Link to original story on Jamestown website

Starting in 2014, the jamaats of the armed Islamist underground movement in the North Caucasus began, one by one, to pledge allegiance to the so-called Islamic State (IS). Kabardino-Balkarian insurgents split into those who became part of the Islamic State and those who remained loyal to the Caucasus Emirate. Robert Zankishiev (a.k.a. amir Abdullah) led the group associated with the IS, while Zalim Shebzukhov (a.k.a. amir Salim) was the head of the group associated with the Caucasus Emirate. In November 2015, the Russian government's security forces killed amir Abdullah in Nalchik during a special operation (see EDM, December 3, 2015). Since then, no one has claimed leadership of the Kabardino-Balkarian IS camp.

Amir Salim remained connected with the insurgent group supporting the resurrection of the Caucasus Emirate (Graniru.org, January 4). Zalim Shebzukhov is a classic example of an individual being inadvertently radicalized by unmotivated pressure from government authorities. Shebzukhov spent two and a half years behind bars after he was arrested on December 7, 2007. On June 24, 2009, the jury and the Supreme Court of Kabardino-Balkaria acquitted Shebzukhov "due to the absence of evidence of a crime" and decreed that he should be released in the court room (Onkavkaz.com, August 18). Following his discharge, however, Shebzukhov joined the insurgency, according to the police (Caucasreview.com, January 21). Shebzukhov was put on the Russian federal wanted list for multiple incidents of armed attacks and killings. On April 16, 2015, the Russian National Anti-Terrorist Committee (NAK) announced that the security services killed amir Salim during a special operation in Nalchik, but that report later turned out to be false.

Special operations against members of the insurgency have been quite routine in Kabardino-Balkaria. However, the most surprising news has come from St. Petersburg, as the police launched a special operation against Kabardino-Balkarian rebels in Russia's "northern capital," which is 3,000 kilometers away from the republic. On August 17, the Federal Security Service (FSB) of Russia told the media that government forces started a special operation against the North Caucasus rebels in an apartment block located at 92/3 Leninsky Prospect, in St. Petersburg (Fontanka.ru, August 17). According to the FSB's department in the city, Kabardino-Balkarian authorities tipped them off about the rebels' whereabouts. Most likely, the police monitored the rebels' transit to St. Petersburg or was even prompted specifically to intercept and kill them. The security services killed four people in the apartment in St. Petersburg and announced all of them to be members of the Islamist underground movement of Kabardino-Balkaria. Thirty-year-old amir Salim (Zelim Shebzukhov) unexpectedly turned out to be among the killed suspects. Other killed individuals included Astemir Sheriev (25), who was the leader of the Northern Sector of the Caucasus Emirate's Velayat Kabardino-Balkaria and Karachay; ethnic Russian Vyacheslav Nyrov (34), who led the Northwestern Sector of rebels in Kabardino-Balkaria; as well as Aslan Kurashinov (39) (Kavkazsky Uzel, August 17).

The main reason for why observers paid attention to the special operation in St. Petersburg was that amir Salim was killed there. Why did the leader of Kabardino-Balkarian rebels travel so far north? It is unlikely that he tried to leave the country, because the central authorities are more vigilant in and around Moscow than in the North Caucasus. If he wanted to escape the country, he would have kept away from Moscow and St. Petersburg. If amir Salim was attempting to organize a terrorist attack there, it is unclear why he participated in it himself instead of dispatching his subordinates. It is plausible that amir Salim had plans to follow the example of his idol, the late Chechen militant Shamil Basaev (d. 2006), and take hostages in the city. Russian experts think that the story of amir Salim indicates that the North Caucasus rebels are spreading across Russia (Kavkazsky Uzel, August 18).

The troubles of the Kabardino-Balkarian jamaat did not end there. According to the authorities, government forces killed two insurgents on August 27, during a special operation near the village of Nartan. The killed rebels were identified as Alim Bitokov and Ibragim Gugov (Kavkazsky Uzel, August 27).

Indeed, August 2016 was quite volatile in Kabardino-Balkaria. At about 1 AM, on August 14, a police patrol on the Kavkaz federal highway shot and killed 25-year-old Khizir Likhov after he made an attempt on the lives of the police officers. The suspect was put on the Russian federal wanted list in October 2014. Twice, in 2015 and 2016, the police mistakenly declared that Likhov was dead (Gazeta.ru, August 14).

On September 3, speaking at a public event dedicated to the solidarity with people who combat terrorism, the deputy minister of the Ministry of Interior of Kabardino-Balkaria, Kazbek Tatuev, said that the authorities are looking for 34 people in connection with terrorist activities in the republic. Apparently, the official did not count the one hundred people from the republic who are fighting in Syria. Tatuev made a bold statement that "on the territory of Kabardino-Balkaria, currently there are no members of the underground bandit movement" (Kavkazsky Uzel, September 2). This statement is exceedingly difficult to verify. Time will tell if the "unregistered" rebels will launch attacks. The structure of the rebel jamaats does not require formal membership. They are highly flexible organizations. Their flexibility allows them to replace the killed rebels with their helpers, who maintain ties to the militants by supplying food, supplies and ammunition for them. Hence, the death of leaders rarely results in the end of jamaats. On the contrary, decapitated jamaats routinely regroup and return to their activities.

The leadership of the jamaat of Kabardino-Balkaria and Karachay has been decimated as its leaders, including the sectoral commanders, have been killed. But in the nearest future, the remaining members of the jamaat will be regrouping and restoring the linkages within the organization normally only accessible to its top commanders.

Copyright notice:  2010 The Jamestown Foundation
Refugees fleeing South Sudan pass one million mark

Publisher UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Publication Date 16 September 2016 Cite as UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Refugees fleeing South Sudan pass one million mark, 16 September 2016, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/57dc087c7.html [accessed 30 October 2022]

The number of South Sudanese refugees sheltering in neighbouring countries has this week passed the one million mark, including more than 185,000 people who have fled since fresh violence erupted in the country in Juba on July 8, UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, said today.

With this milestone, South Sudan joins Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia as countries which have produced more than a million refugees, UNHCR spokesperson Leo Dobbs told a news briefing in Geneva on Friday (September 16).

"Most of those fleeing South Sudan are women and children. They include survivors of violent attacks, sexual assault, children that have been separated from their parents or travelled alone, the disabled, the elderly and people in need of urgent medical care," Dobbs said.

He noted that more than three quarters - 143,164 - of the recent arrivals have crossed into Uganda, but a growing number of people have entered Ethiopia's western Gambella region in the past week and others have been heading to Kenya, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Central African Republic (CAR).

"These countries have commendably kept their doors open to the new arrivals," Dobbs told reporters at the Palais des Nations.

The violence in July came as a major setback to peace efforts in South Sudan, coming as the fledgling country prepared to celebrate its fifth anniversary and amid a short-lived peace deal between supporters of President Salva Kiir and former First Vice President Riek Machar.

"The fighting has shattered hopes for a real breakthrough and triggered new waves of displacement and suffering, while humanitarian organizations are finding it very difficult for logistical, security and funding reasons to provide urgent protection and assistance to the hundreds of thousands in need, including 1.61 million internally displaced people," Dobbs said.

Uganda is hosting the lion's share of South Sudanese refugees, with 373,626, more than a third of them arriving since early July. They keep coming; over the past week more than 20,000 new arrivals were recorded, primarily through the Oraba crossing in the northwest.

New arrivals report increased fighting across the Greater Equatoria region and attacks by armed groups that kill civilians, loot villages, sexually assault women and girls, and recruit young boys.

"Many refugees arrive exhausted after days walking in the bush and going without food or water. Many children have lost one or both of their parents, some forced to become primary caregivers to younger siblings," Dobbs said.

A surge of people, more than 11,000, many of them from the Nuer tribe, have crossed into Gambella during the past week, bringing the number of South Sudanese refugees in that country to more than 292,000. The majority were women and children, including some 500 children travelling alone.

Most had fled from Nasser, Maban, Mathiang and Maiwut in Upper Nile and cited insecurity and fears of renewed conflict after seeing significant troop movements. New arrivals from Jonglei talked of food shortages as one reason for fleeing.

Neighbouring Sudan hosts the third largest number of South Sudanese refugees, 247,317, and people continue to come to the country's East Darfur, South Darfur and White Nile states. Those in the two Darfurs cite growing unrest and heightened food insecurity, especially in the north-western states of Northern Bahr El Ghazal and Warrap, as their reasons for flight.

Smaller numbers have been fleeing to Kenya, DRC and CAR since the return to conflict in July. About 300 people a week have been crossing into Kenya, citing insecurity, economic instability and drought and reporting that the flight corridor between Torit and Kapoeta remains dangerous due to armed bandits. Kenya has over 90,000 South Sudanese refugees.

DRC is experiencing an influx into Ituri province close to the border with South Sudan and Uganda. An estimated 40,000 South Sudanese refugees are said to be in the country.

UNHCR field staff report that new arrivals are camped in schools and churches, while the less fortunate sleep in the open. Refugees lack food and basic household items.

An estimated five per cent of the children are unaccompanied, and many women and girls said they were sexually assaulted during their flight. Early this month, refugees near the city of Doruma (Haut-Uele province) were attacked, their food rations stolen, and a health centre looted by unknown attackers.

Insecurity in South Sudan's Central Equatoria has also significantly affected UNHCR's ability to access and assist thousands of refugees inside South Sudan itself. In Lasu settlement, some 40 kilometres south of Yei, nearly 10,000 refugees from DRC, CAR and Sudan have not received their monthly food rations since late June this year.

Without further funding and support, we and our partners will struggle to assist the needy with even the most basic assistance. UNHCR is calling on donors to provide US$701 million for South Sudan refugee operations, of which 20 per cent has been funded.
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia -- (ReleaseWire) -- 09/15/2016 --A group of university research students is seeking support from the IndieGoGo community for their project, AIOR (All in One Robot). It's the first wireless, multifunctional robot, so small that it fits into the palm of a person's hand. A campaign was launched to raise $75,000. Funds received will be used to produce this revolutionary full-featured compact product.



Originally, the AIOR platform was successfully developed with wires and delivered back in March 2015 as a learning tool for students. However, after several months of use, the wires either became loose, are sometimes misplaced by users, or the whole circuit is burned. Also, there were limitations on the Arduino pins and the number of shields in use. This is when the creators set out to develop a wireless low maintenance solution for their robot.



The newly designed AIOR is easy to assemble and contains no wires. Users are provided with the option to create and submit their own CAD files as modifications. It's easy to upgrade and programmable via USB and Bluetooth. The main board called AIORC (All In One Robot Controller), is a microcontroller board based on Atmel's ATmega2560 with 16 MHz crystal oscillator.



In fact, it's a combination of different boards that contain the following:



- Arduino MEGA

- MOTOR Shield

- Lipo Charger

- Solar Charger

- Arduino Bluetooth Programmer

- PS2 Shield

- Power Shield



To learn more about this innovative product, visit the IndieGoGo campaign. Click here to make a contribution and choose from a number of attractive rewards. Perks will be delivered by November 2016.



This is an incredible opportunity to be a part of a special project! Help the campaign reach its goal by sharing this on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and other social networks. The more people know about this, the more support the campaign will receive.
Sydney, New South Wales -- (ReleaseWire) -- 09/16/2016 --Nile Magazine, launched by editor Jeff Burzacott has quickly become a popular digital and hard copy publication with those wanting to learn more about Ancient Egypt. To celebrate the success of the magazine, Jeff Burzacott has decided to share some important facts that people may not know about Ancient Egypt.



According to Jeff, many people believe that the camel was always the main form of transport in Ancient Egypt. However, it was donkeys and boats that were mainly used to transport people and goods. It was in 525 B.C. when Egyptians started to see camels on a regular basis as this was the time when the Persians who occupied Egypt at the time brought camels with them.



Another important fact that Jeff wanted to share with people who are interested in Ancient Egypt is that women had equal rights with men. According to the editor of Nile Magazine (www.nilemagazine.com.au/about-nile/), which is available to purchase online from around the world, men and women had the same social standing and were treated as equals. In terms of the world standing in equal rights, Ancient Egypt was far more advanced than most of the other countries around the world. Women could earn their own money; they could also inherit property, and they dealt with family business matters when the husband was absent.



One surprising fact that was shared by the editor of Nile Magazine regards make-up. According to Jeff, men and women both wore make-up, which they believed gave them the protection of the gods Horus and Ra.



Jeff Burzacott from Nile Magazine said: "There are a lot of false facts that appear on the Internet and by reading our magazine, we not only bring you great articles and wonderful pictures, we also bring you facts about Ancient Egypt."



Nile Magazine has been described as one of the most interesting magazines of 2016, as well as being one of the most colorful. The publication, which comes out each month, is available on subscription.



To learn more about one of the most exciting magazines on Egypt, please visit http://www.nilemagazine.com.au



About Nile Magazine

Nile Magazine is a stunning magazine that looks at ancient Egypt and the powerful sites it provides. Nile Magazine A Premium Ancient Egypt Magazine Is Now Available On Subscription.
Shania Twain coming to Indianapolis on first tour in nearly five years
Cisco

The inaugural Big Dam Cook-off will take place Friday and Saturday at the Conrad Hilton Center, 309 Conrad Hilton Blvd. Cooks will check in at 6 p.m. Friday, followed by live music. Judging will be at noon Saturday. Call the Chamber of Commerce for information at 254-442-2537.

Ballinger

The Mexican Independence Day Tamale Cook-off will begin at 5 p.m. Saturday at the Ballinger Community Center, 200 Crosson Ave. Judging of table decor and costumes will be first. A dinner of tamales, soft tacos, rice and beans will be served from 5:30-7:30, followed by a dance until 11 p.m. Cost of the meal is $8; meal and dance are $15 advance and $20 at the door. Tickets are available at the Carnegie Library, Adelita's Restaurant or Cositas Mexican Imports. Call Yolanda Lara for information at 325-718-9153.

De Leon

The De Leon Rodeo will be Friday and Saturday at the fairgrounds east of town on State Highway 6. Both days will start with mutton bustin' at 7 p.m.; sign-ups are from 6-6:40 p.m. Grand Entry is at 8. Saturday's event is themed 'Thank a Police Officer Day' and will honor law enforcement personnel and their families with a free admission to the rodeo.
Some things get easier with practice. But saying goodbye just keeps getting harder.

I've been saying goodbye all my life. I'm pretty good at it. And fast, too. Sometimes I'm out the door and gone before anybody knows I'm leaving.

But I've never liked doing it. Unless I couldn't wait to leave. If you're eager to leave, it's not a goodbye; it's a 'good riddance.' A real goodbye is one you say to someone you love, or a place you want to stay, or to a time in your life when you are happy.

I've said my share of those kinds of goodbyes. I suspect you have said your share, too. Why do they keep getting harder?

As a child, after my parents divorced, I hated having to say goodbye to my daddy. He hated it as much as I did. So he came up with a plan to make it easier. Instead of saying 'goodbye,' he said, we'd say, 'See you soon.'

Grown-ups like to think they are clever. I didn't want to disappoint him, so I went along with it. It didn't make me miss him less. But it reminded me that we'd be together again. And that helped me feel less sad.

We said those words countless times when I was growing up: At the end of every visit. When I went off to college. When he walked me down the aisle at my wedding. When I saw him in the hospital after he had a stroke. And when he called me the last time, before he took his life.

The day he was buried, I stood by his grave and whispered, 'See you soon, Daddy.'

It didn't make me miss him less. But it reminded me that we would be together again. And I sorely needed to be reminded.

The hope of reunion is a small dose of comfort, but sometimes it's enough to help you get by.

When my three children were babies, I tried my best to make goodbyes easier for them.

I'd swear to them that I'd be back soon and that nothing  no power in heaven or earth  could ever separate them from my love. Then I'd say, with a big goofy grin, 'See you soon!'

It never worked. They'd cling to me like drowning cats, sinking their claws into my skin and howling hysterically.

Sometimes I miss those days. But the kids outgrew them and so, I guess, did I. By the time my oldest left home for college, we were taking goodbyes in stride. One long hug (when my boys hug you, you know you've been hugged) and a quick 'I love you' and finally, 'See you soon!'

I waved, dry-eyed and smiling, as he drove away. Then I sat on the curb and bawled like a calf.

That's my version of a refined goodbye. What's yours?

These days, it's especially hard to say goodbye to my grandkids. They aren't old enough to understand that goodbye doesn't mean forever. Actually, I don't quite understand it myself, but I'm trying. To make our goodbyes a little easier, I ask them three questions:

'How much do I love you?' I say, and they shout, 'All!'

Then, 'Where is your nana when you can't see her?'

'In my heart!'

Finally, I ask, 'And where are you forever and always?'

'In your heart!' they say.

They know grown-ups like to feel clever, so they go along with it. But this morning, Randy, who is 6, had another question.

I'd just spent three days with him and his family in their new home in Montana of all places. We'd had a grand time, but it was ending, as usual, with my heading back to Las Vegas.

'Nana?' he said, his green eyes and copper lashes fighting back tears. 'How many days until I see you again?'

I held his face in my hands and told him the truth.

'I don't know exactly how many days. But I promise it will be just as soon as possible.'

He studied me for a moment, then nodded and smiled. One last hug, one last 'I love you,' and finally, 'See you soon.'

If only soon were sooner.

Sharon Randall can be reached at P.O. Box 77394, Henderson NV 89077, or at her website: www.sharonrandall.com.
Who would have guessed that an upcoming movie based on a Japanese novel about the persecution of two Jesuit priests in 17th-century Japan, directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Liam Neeson, would have an Abilene connection?

Darryl Tippens, Abilene Christian University distinguished scholar and former English professor, didn't have to guess. He got it straight from a man directly involved in the movie.

Tippens and that man, Midland oilman Dale Brown, will host a panel discussion on the movie, 'Silence,' at 9 a.m. Wednesday in Room 117 of ACU's Biblical Studies Building. The discussion, which is part of ACU's annual Summit, is free and open to the public.

'I was quite surprised to learn about Scorsese's interest in making the movie,' Tippens said.

The novel, also titled 'Silence,' was written by Shusaku Endo and was published in Japanese in 1966. An English translation was issued in 1969 and is pretty much unknown, Tippens said, except to college literature professors and their students.

Backing up a bit, Tippens was an English professor at ACU before leaving to serve as provost of Pepperdine University in Malibu, California, which like ACU, is affiliated with the Churches of Christ. He returned to ACU in 2014 to take on the role of distinguished scholar, working through the ACU provost's office.

At Pepperdine, Tippens got to know Dale Brown, who was on the board of regents. Brown's son, Tod, is on ACU's board of trustees, which is similar to a board of regents. Tippens learned that the Browns were interested in a project that would bring the Japanese novel to the big screen.

The novel and movie tell the story of an actual event involving the persecution of two Jesuit priests in 17th-century Japan. The Browns connected with Scorsese, who they learned had been interested in the same idea for 30 years. The Browns are contributing to the movie's financing, Tippens said, but their interest goes much deeper.

'Dale and Tod are both interested in being faithful to the novel,' Tippens said.

Dale Brown has actually been on location, consulting with Scorsese about the content. The movie is expected to be released in selected markets in November, according to online movie sources.

Scriptwriter for the movie is Jay Cocks, who also scripted the movies 'Gangs of New York' and 'Age of Innocence.' Tippens has read the script and liked it because it follows the novel, which he has taught. It's not surprising that the novel is not well read outside of Japan, he said.

'It's like other great literature that never became a best-seller,' Tippens said.

IF YOU GO

What: The Silence of God and Human Suffering, a panel discussion of an upcoming film, Silence, directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Liam Neeson.

When: 9 a.m. Wednesday

Where: Onstead-Packer Biblical Studies Building Room 117, Abilene Christian University campus

Admission: Free, open to public




Working as a team, Abilene weathered challenges better than most cities

Texas fared well but Abilene actually worked toward its future rather than just trying to stay afloat
Western Texas College was locked down for a short time Thursday morning, according to a news release from the Snyder Police Department.

Police said at 8:52 a.m. Thursday, a caller reported a suspicious man wearing a bulletproof vest in the area of the school's library.

The campus was put on lockdown, the release said, but the man was determined to be on campus for a business-related purpose and there was no threat to the campus or its students.

Police said it was joined in investigating the incident by the Western Texas College security, the Scurry County Sheriff's Department, Texas Department of Public Safety and Texas Rangers.
The author of a book that inspired the movie 'Mean Girls' addressed the realities of being a girl in today's world during her talk Thursday at the fall fundraiser luncheon for the Alliance for Women & Children.

Rosalind Wiseman, whose works include 'Queen Bees & Wannabes: Helping Your Daughter Survive Cliques, Gossip, Boyfriends, and the New Realities of Girl World,' was the keynote speaker at the event at the Abilene Civic Center.

Wiseman said her effort to foster better communication between parents and adolescents comes from being on both sides of so-called 'Girl World.'

'I was terribly mean to a girl,' she said. 'I was also the girl in a group that the other girls made fun of. I went to a highly academic school in Washington, D.C., where athletes got away with horrible stuff, other athletes collapsed under the weight of their parents, and there were many instances where adults abused power.'

Wiseman said that led to the desire to become a bridge between teenagers, their parents and other influencing adults. Many children are learning from adults who behave badly, she said. These adults often assume the worst about people, gossip about children, and spread terrible and sometimes debilitating rumors.

'Parents should instead encourage their children to not be afraid to speak the truth, but also help their children to understand that other people's truths are as equally important,' she said.

Wiseman said children are desperate for meaningful relationships with adults, but that often adults' responses to shared information causes children and teens to shut down.

'If your child tells you something that happened at school and you want to go and get somebody fired, now you're that crazy parent. You've broken a trust and your child will stop talking to you.'

Wiseman's other works include the self-help book 'Queen Bee Moms and Kingpin Dads'; the young adult novel 'Boys, Girls & Other Hazardous Materials'; and books for boys, including 'Masterminds & Wingmen: Helping Our Boys Cope With Schoolyard Power, Locker-Room Tests, Girlfriends, and the New Rules of Boy World.'

'We have a language for girls that we do not have for boys,' she said. 'Society says girls are hard (to raise), boys are easy. Like girls, boys have deep feelings, are often hurt by friends, and feel betrayed. Boys' feelings are often ignored or put down. People will say to them, 'Stop acting like a girl,' which sends yet another really bad message.'

Children often have to wear some kind of armor at school, Wiseman said, so when they get home they want to decompress. Questions from parents about their day can be really annoying.

She said she advises giving youngsters space. Just say something to indicate you are really glad to see them, she said. If they are upset, let them know they can talk to you.

Don't pretend, however, to know it all just because you are an adult, she cautioned.

Wiseman said parents shouldn't be afraid to apologize to their children. Show them what apologies look like, she said, and remember that apologies can be transforming.

Ashley Simpson, director of the Alliance for Women & Children's A-Teen program, which focuses on girls in middle school, said Wiseman's message is a perfect fit.

'We strive to support girls in all stages of life. We give them a place to call their own and a way to impact their community. A-Teen is about creating the next generation of leaders,' Simpson said.

The Alliance for Women & Children also offers an after-school care program, which serves an average of 550 children in Abilene and surrounding communities.

'The Alliance for Women & Children is worthy of your support and it's an honor to reflect what they are already doing,' Wiseman said.

Simpson said Wiseman will write a curriculum for the A-Teen program that will be shared with local school districts.

Wiseman also is the author of the 'Owning Up Curriculum,' a comprehensive social justice program for grades 6-12, and writes the monthly 'Ask Rosalind' column in Family Circle magazine.
Happy Independence Day!

Mexican Independence Day, that is. Friday, Diez y Seis de Septiembre (the 16th of September), celebrates Mexico's declaration of independence from Spain in 1810.

Several events are planned in Abilene to mark the occasion.

The holiday in Mexico comes on Day 2 of National Hispanic Heritage Month in the United States. In 1968, President Lyndon Johnson declared a Hispanic Heritage Week, which was expanded to a month in 1988 under President Ronald Reagan.

To Bill Enriquez, president of Abilene's Hispanic Leadership Council, 'freedom' is the key word when celebrating the holiday and the month.

'We celebrate Mexico's independence because, as Americans, we value freedom,' he said. 'If not, we wouldn't be fighting all over the world for freedom for others.'

He recalls two-day celebrations during his youth and has heard stories of three- or four-day celebrations in earlier years. He said he believes the holiday means more to those newly arrived in the United States than it does for third- or fourth-generation individuals.

Every year, the Reporter-News offers short items featuring Hispanic history or personalities on Page 2A during the month, which runs through Oct. 15. Enriquez said he looks forward to seeing them each year.

'Some are the same, but there are always two or three different,' he said. 'Everyone has something to learn from that.'

Some events occurring in Abilene Friday will be in observance of Diez y Seis de Septiembre.

A celebration at Sears Park will begin at 7 p.m., featuring performances by the choirs from Ortiz and Martinez elementary schools, as well as Elizabeth Dena, Crystal Perdue, Alma de Nuestra Raices and the Ballet Folklorico dancers.

The plan is for many events to be held outside, but if the weather does not cooperate they will be moved into the building at Sears Park. A Loteria game will be available beginning at 6 p.m., weather permitting; it cannot be moved inside due to preparations for other activities for the evening.

A holiday dance will be at Audio M, 1082 S. 2nd St., with doors opening at 7 p.m.

In 1810, Father Miguel Hidalgo y Castilla read the 'Gritto de Hidalgo' ('Call of Hidalgo') seeking independence from Spain. Fueling the uprising was the uneven treatment of Mexican citizens. Those born in the New World with Spanish ancestry were not granted the same status as those born in Europe. After Mexico gained its independence, those born in Europe were expelled from the country.

Cinco de Mayo, on the other hand, is celebrated May 5. It commemorates the Mexican Army's victory over the French at the Battle of Puebla in 1862.
For military personnel on deployment, the separation from home and family can seem interminable. A program by The Grace Museum may help make it a little more bearable.

In conjunction with the 69th birthday of U.S. Air Force on Thursday, the museum launched the Military Journal Exchange, a program that allows deployed troops to keep a journal at the same time a family member or friend is keeping a journal. A series of podcasts will provide the theme for the journaling.

'This gives them a connection to back home,' said Marianne Nassef, a chaplain at Dyess Air Force Base, who has been deployed three times. 'This reminds them that their deployment is temporary. For those at home, it gives them something to focus on.'

Nassef helped Kathryn Mitchell, director of education at The Grace Museum, and Kaye Price-Hawkins, a board member of The Grace and the founder of Priceless Literacy, develop the program. The theme for the journal will change every six weeks. Mitchell said six podcasts have been prepared.

Nassef said the time between podcasts was not an arbitrary figure.

'When you're deployed, you're looking for things to fill the time,' she said. 'Six weeks is a pretty good figure.'

Deployed personnel and their designated friend or family member will receive a journal, pencils and  thanks to Nassef  a pencil sharpener.

'This was my contribution,' she joked. 'You can't get sharpeners when you're deployed. I'm proud of this.'

Besides writing, the participants will be asked to sketch things in their everyday life. The first theme is about home. The participants are asked to list the things for which they're most thankful and the things they'll miss most. They also are tasked with writing 50 things they'll miss about the other person and about special times and places, and a single event they'll always remember. Also, they're asked to draw a picture of what home is to them.

Other themes include places and people.

Mitchell said the idea came from a museum board member from Dyess, Ben Bailey, who was deployed and expressed a desire to journal but didn't know how to go about it.

'He said, 'I'd love to have somebody tell me how to start,'' Mitchell said. 'We went from there.'

For Price-Hawkins, who conducts clinics for students about how to express themselves in writing, the program gave her a chance to reach a new audience.

'I just enjoyed this process so much,' she said. 'I got a chance to reach new people with what I've been doing.'

The benefit could well extend beyond the people who are journaling.

Jay Moore, a history teacher at Abilene High School who chronicles the history of Abilene, said that years from now, the journals will provide insight into a specific time of American history from a first-person point of view.

'So much of history is secondhand,' he said. 'To have a firsthand account is very helpful.'
'Today we announce an arrangement that we think has the capability of sticking.'

That is how U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, standing with Russia Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, announced the Sept. 9 agreement to pursue a cease fire and longer-term stability in Syria. The civil war has been utterly devastating to the population of the nation, and threatens the stability of the entire region.

The collaboration ironically is a result of the forceful direct military intervention in Syria of the Russian military approximately one year ago. Over the short term, Russia's air force has greatly secured the staying power of the regime of President Bashar al-Assad. A constellation of rebel groups, which includes the Islamic State, had been slowly gaining the offensive. Syria has grown increasingly isolated in the international community.

Russia has a long history of involvement in the Middle East, including with Syria. The 1950s were an especially turbulent time, with new nationalist regimes appearing to succeed European colonies and clients. The profoundly serious Suez Crisis of 1956 resulted in sharp rupture among western allies, as the Eisenhower administration refused to support a combined military assault by Britain, France and Israel to retake the Suez Canal and seize the Sinai Peninsula from nationalist Egypt.

From that time until the end of the Cold War, Moscow exploited opportunities to expand influence in the region. Hafez al-Assad, father of the current president, was part of a 1963 coup bringing his faction of the nationalist Ba'ath Party to power. By 1970, after extensive internal struggle, he consolidated power and ruled until 2000. Ironically given developments today, he was generally regarded as relatively moderate and an economic modernizer, though in the context of harsh dictatorship.

Syria developed close military partnership with Egypt, and the two nations went to war together against Israel in 1973. President Jimmy Carter brokered a durable peace treaty between Egypt and Israel in 1978-79. Jordan later reached a treaty with Israel. Syria remained hostile.

Historically, Moscow has been preoccupied with secure national borders, especially in Eastern Europe, and has generally abstained from sending military forces long distances overseas. President Vladimir Putin has abandoned this cautious approach.

President Barack Obama declared that use of poison gas by Damascus would be a 'red line,' and implied military retaliation. When poison gas was used, he did nothing beyond rhetoric that Congress must authorize force.

The Yom Kippur War between Arab states and Israel in October 1973 brought American-Soviet nuclear confrontation, though largely outside public view. Rivalries and the Watergate crisis color recollections among the officials involved. Nevertheless, reasonable conclusions can be drawn.

First, President Richard Nixon aggressively secured essential military aid to Israel. Simultaneously, Israel was pressured successfully to show restraint regarding encircled Egyptian forces. In short, vital U.S. interests in the region were recognized clearly and protected.

Second, visible actions were taken to demonstrate U.S. military resolve: B-52 bombers were moved from Guam to the U.S., and the Army's 82nd Airborne Division was placed on alert.

Third, the U.S. declined a proposed joint 'condominium' with the Soviet Union. Interests were too divergent on both sides. Today, absence of the Cold War permits limited cooperation.

The Yom Kippur confrontation arguably was as serious as the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962. In today's post-Cold War world, such stark Russia-U.S. collision is less likely.

Negotiating skill and drive is essential to progress. So far, John Kerry is proving equal to the task.

Email Arthur I. Cyr, Clausen Distinguished Professor at Carthage College, acyr@carthage.edu.
Consider two quotations, the first engraved in modern history and the other less than a week old, and ask yourself what they have in common:

'This morning I had another talk with the German Chancellor, Herr Hitler, and here is the paper which bears his name upon it as well as mine. ... I believe it is peace for our time.'

And then: 'I think I'd be able to get along with him.  If he says great things about me, I'm gonna say great things about him. I've already said he is really very much of a leader.'

The first quotation, of course, is from Neville Chamberlain in September 1938, at the time of the Munich Agreement that sought a peaceful accommodation with Germany, allowing annexation of the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia. The second is Donald Trump's encomium in last week's NBC forum for Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has been attacking the U.S. and its allies in Ukraine, Syria and cyberspace.

The name given to Chamberlain's policy was 'appeasement,' and it's come to be seen as one of the catastrophic mistakes of history. But it's easy to understand why accommodation with the German dictator seemed sensible at the time. The nightmare of war was still fresh for the British public. People were worried about jobs. Britain was exhausted and demoralized; Chamberlain judged that his country wasn't ready for another war.

Political analogies are often unfair, especially ones that invoke the overused Munich parallel. But this one is worth considering: The problem with Trump isn't (as some critics have argued) that he's a reckless and potentially genocidal aggressor. No, the danger is that he's precisely what he says he is  a dealmaker who thinks he could craft agreements with despots that could bring peace and security.

Trump seems to see commitments made to smaller states as expendable in the process of making deals with the big guys. When he linked U.S. willingness to defend the Baltic States and other NATO allies to what they pay into the alliance, it was a Chamberlain-like emphasis on national self-interest, as opposed to sticking your neck out for possibly undeserving little guys.

This idea of reaching agreements with Putin's Russia isn't crazy, any more than was Chamberlain's desire to escape war in 1938. And Trump actually deserves credit for raising this issue early in the Republican primary debates. But any such negotiation must be done carefully and unsentimentally, without the mutual self-congratulation that has characterized Trump's comments about Putin. Secretary of State John Kerry is pursuing his own version of a deal with Putin, in the Syria agreement announced Friday night. Kerry has concluded that there's no way to reduce the violence in Syria without working with Moscow. But Kerry has negotiated very cautiously, with the Pentagon looking over his shoulder at each detail before he signs off. He has specified what the Russians will have to deliver, in terms of calm on the battlefield and grounding the Syrian regime's air power, for this deal to work.

When U.S. leaders think about negotiating with Russia, they need to be sure their model is John F. Kennedy in the Cuban Missile Crisis, rather than Chamberlain at Munich. Appeasement happens when other nations are treated as sacrificial pawns, and when the adversary is sentimentalized. These are precisely the areas where Trump's comments have been worrying.

One of the most useful cautions about dealing with Putin's Russia was offered by Hillary Clinton in a memo she sent President Obama in January 2013, just before she left office as secretary of State. In her memoir, 'Hard Choices,' she recalled: 'In stark terms, I advised the president that difficult days lay ahead and that our relationship with Moscow would likely get worse before it got better. ... Putin was under the mistaken impression that we needed Russia more than Russia needed us.'

Russia has been pushing the envelope of power at all its seams. The U.S. needs to establish clear limits  by negotiations, where that's possible, and also by showing that it's willing to use military power, if necessary. That's precisely the tightrope that Kerry has been trying to walk  seeking more military leverage against Moscow, even as he negotiates. The test of Kerry's seriousness will be his willingness to walk away from the Syria deal if Russia doesn't deliver.

We're not in Neville Chamberlain territory, not even close. But this is a slippery slope, not just for Trump, but for the United States.

Email David Ignatius, a member of The Washington Post Writers Group, at davidignatius@washpost.com.
Today in history: On Sept. 16, 1908, William Crapo Durant spends $2,000 to start General Motors in New Jersey. Durant, a high school dropout, had built Buick Motor Company. There was an effort to consolidate car companies, which appealed to Durant, who wanted to sell a variety of vehicles as he had carriages and carts. Durant thought it was better to keep companies in parts of a whole, and GM became a rival to Henry Ford's company. GM soon would offer Oldsmobile, Cadillac and Oakland (later Pontiac).
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This just in...
Thai authorities are making good on their promise to crack down on illegal immigrants as each day they are sending thousands of migrant workers back to Cambodia and Vietnam, RFA has learned.

Sim Namm Yung, a provincial official in Cambodias Banteay Meanchey province, told RFA on Thursday that Thailand deported more than 4,000 Cambodian workers back to their homeland in August alone.

At least 300 Cambodians are being sent back home each day, Sim Namm Yung told RFA.

They are from different parts of Cambodia, she said. Some went to Thailand by themselves to look for a job, but some were illegally cheated by the brokers.

While Sim Namm Yung said most of the Cambodians worked in construction and resided in Thailand from three months to a year, some of them were also recently released from jail.

Most of those who were in jail and were sent back home mostly to the Sras Keo province (Sakaeo in Thai), she said.

Sum Chankea, an official with the Cambodian human rights organization ADHOC, told RFA that the repatriated Cambodians were packed like pigs into vans with metal bars over the windows.

After arriving at the Poipet International Checkpoint in Banteay Meanchey province the Cambodian authorities educate them about the illegal immigration for about 15 to 20 minutes, before allowing them to return to their home villages.

Cambodian authorities in charge of workers along the border seem to pay no attention to the problem, Sum Chankea said. The authorities also are not making any attempts to arrest and punished the brokers who have taken workers to Thailand illegally.

Human traffickers charge Cambodians as much as U.S. $100 per person to illegally transport them across the border in the northwestern part of the country, human rights groups told RFA in April.

Workers, who do not have passports, pay 300,000 to 400,000 riel (U.S. $75 to U.S. $100) each to help them cross over the border in Banteay Meanchey and Battambang provinces, Sum Chankea told RFA at the time.

Workers have traveled to Thailand like ants, Sum Chankea said in April.

Vietnamese are also sent home

Cambodia is not the only country that is suddenly seeing an influx in repatriations as the Thai government is also sending people back to Vietnam.

Most of the Vietnamese appear to be street vendors who set up business in Thailand under a memorandum of understanding reached in 2015 allowing Vietnamese to work in Thailand.

While the MOU allows Vietnamese to work in Thailand, it restricts their employment to serving as manual laborers or service providers.

A vendor in Rangsit district in Thailands Pathum Thani province told RFA the governments crackdown has convinced him to go back to Vietnam

I have been here for five or six or years, and I know that I could be jailed anytime, he said. So, I am thinking about going back home. I told my fellow vendors in Rangsit that we should not go out too much because we might get picked up.

Thailands immigration problem spans decades if not centuries as the country is an important destination for migrant workers and asylum seekers from across the Greater Mekong Delta region as well other parts of Asia.

Speaking via video conference on Sept. 9, Thai immigration chief Nathathorn Phrosunthorn announced a nationwide crackdown designed to flush out foreigners, Thaivisa.com reported.

The job debate

According to the report, he singled out immigrants who are taking Thai jobs in the restaurant business and selling wares on the move.

The country has been criticized for its treatment of migrant workers who are often at the mercy of unscrupulous employers and labor brokers.

Thailand is a source, destination, and transit country for men, women, and children subjected to forced labor and sex trafficking, the U.S. State Department wrote in its 2016 Trafficking in Persons Report.

While migrant workers are at risk, they are still drawn to the country as Thailand is a wealthy nation compared to its neighbors.

Thailands economy grew at an average annual rate of 7.5 percent in the late 1980s and early 1990s, creating millions of jobs that helped pull millions of people out of poverty, according to the World Bank.

That growth has slowed in recent years, with the World Bank reporting a modest 2.8 percent increase in 2015 after a sluggish 0.9 percent in 2014. The outlook for 2016 is for 2.5 percent growth.

According to the Office of the Social and Economic Development Board, workers from Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, China and ethnic minorities from Southeast Asian countries, have cut into businesses reserved for Thais.

Search and arrest

The way to solve these problems is search and arrest, Arak Prommanee, director-general of the Department of Employment, told BenarNews. Vendor and retail selling jobs are reserved for Thais.

The junta that took power in 2014 from a civilian government widely perceived as being corrupt, issued a pair of executive orders to clean up the illegal migrant workers in the capital and nationwide in 2015 and 2016, he said.

Arak described three types of offenders: illegal migrants, documented workers who have jobs for which they are not approved and immigrants who overstay their visas.

But employment issues arent the only reason the Thais are deporting immigrant workers, Arak said.

We started tackling the issue when we learnt from news reports that there are illegal workers selling products, which are fake or are contaminated, Arak told BenarNews.

In May, Police in Muak Lek district of Sara Buri that lies about 100 miles north of Bangkok arrested a Vietnamese couple for selling artificial orange juice mixed with dirty water after a photo and story about them was shared on social media and reported in the local newspapers.

This group of workers came here to sell all sorts of snacks like meat balls, fruit juices and pickled fruits, he said. That made us aware of how we need to ensure hygiene and food safety for consumers.

Reported and translated by RFA's Khmer and Vietnamese Services. Written in English by Brooks Boliek.
Myanmar State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi tells U.S. business leaders to invest in Myanmar at an event in Washington, Sept. 15, 2016.

Myanmar State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi told U.S. business leaders on Thursday that the countrys pro-democracy government has undertaken several measures to create a more welcoming business environment, and that their investments will help the Southeast Asia nation with its transition to full democracy.

One of Aung San Suu Kyis goals during her first official trip to the United States in her capacity as state counselor was to address the business community to promote trade with and investment in Myanmar, along with greater economic ties with the U.S.

Aung San Suu Kyi, who is Myanmars de facto national leader, also stressed that certain political issues have to be worked out by her National League for Democracy (NLD) government to achieve economic success

In order to make the political transition work, we have to have the economic expectations of our people fulfilled as well, she told businesspeople, diplomats, and government officials.

Our economy can succeed only if our political system succeeds, she said.

Aung San Suu Kyi is leading renewed efforts to bring armed ethnic groups to the negotiating table to end decades of separatist fighting against the Myanmar military. She also is pushing for constitutional reform to reduce the role of the military in politics.

To woo investors, the Myanmar government has undertaken labor reforms and put in place economic policies that promote a better investment climate.

Myanmar lawmakers are reviewing a new bill on investment in Myanmar that has been introduced to simplify and speed up the procedures that investors must follow, she said.

The economic policy of the new government, which came to power in April, includes the improvement of public financial management through greater transparency, privatization of certain state-owned enterprises, promotion of the role of small- and medium-sized enterprises, expansion of vocational training opportunities, and creation of a credible dispute resolution system, she said.

Economic success is one of the ways that we can persuade everyone in our country, including the military, that democracy is the best way forward for our union, Aung San Suu Kyi said.

She also urged investors to bring their best practices to ensure Myanmars economy develops in a right way.

The role of business is not a small one, Aung San Suu Kyi said. If you can help us improve the condition of our people, it will help increase their confidence in the democratic process, and because their confidence in the democratic process is strong, they will be that more inclined to find ways of agreeing on a negotiated settlement that will allow us to construct the union of which our founding fathers dreamt, but which we have not yet seen.

She also encouraged U.S. business leaders to notify relevant Myanmar government ministers or her office about any signs of corruption when they do business in the country.

So when you try to invest in Burma, please dont think you have to go with a suitcase bursting with dollar notes, she said.

Former United Nations secretary-general Kofi Annan (4th L) holds a press conference with other members of an advisory commission on Myanmar's Rakhine State in Yangon, Sept. 8, 2016. Credit: AFP The Rohingya issue

Before ending her speech, Aung San Suu Kyi mentioned that another one of the political problems that the new government is tackling at home is the plight of the stateless Muslim minority Rohingya in western Myanmars Rakhine state who have been denied citizenship and other basic rights in the predominantly Buddhist country.

Aung San Suu Kyi told U.S. business leaders that the Rohingya issue has done great damage to the image of Myanmar, and important to resolve because it threatens social harmony.

And that is something we have to address as quickly and as effectively as possible, she said.

In late August, Aung San Suu Kyi formed a nine-member Rakhine advisory commission headed by former United Nations chief Kofi Annan that will examine conflict resolution, humanitarian assistance, development issues, and the strengthening of local institutions in the restive state.

The appointment of Annan and two other foreigners to the commission has prompted protests in Rakhine by the dominant political party and ethnic Rakhine Buddhists who argue that the panel will automatically side with the Rohingya.

On Wednesday, Rakhine state legislators approved a proposal to dismiss the commission. Lawmakers from the Arakan National Party (ANP), the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), and the military supported the nonbinding measure.

The USDP and 11 other political parties took their objections a step further on Friday by calling the commission illegitimate following a meeting in the commercial capital Yangon to discuss the issue.

The National Unity Party, New National Democracy Party, National Democratic Force, National Democratic Party for Development, Kayin State Democracy and Development Party, and Wa Democratic Party are among those that signed the statement.

They parties issued a statement saying they support the Rakhine state parliaments decision to reject the commission and expressed concern as to whether Annan had already made an agreement with the Rohingya.

We are concerned about whether Kofi Annan agreed to recognize the Rohingya as an ethnic group and give them their own state in the country, said USDP spokesman Khin Ye. It shouldnt be like this. If it is, then who will take the responsibility [of seeing this through] and how will they take it?

Leaders from the Democratic Party (Myanmar) and Shan National Democratic Party attended the meeting, but did not sign the statement.

Annan and the other eight commission members paid an initial two-day visit to Rakhines capital Sittwe last week to meet with monks, lawmakers, politicians, and other community members and to visit the displace persons camps where 120,000 of Rohingya have resided following communal violence with Buddhists four years ago.

Following Obamas lead

Aung San Suu Kyis remarks to the U.S. business community came a day after U.S. President Barack Obama lifted economic sanctions against Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, and restored the country to the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program.

The preferential trade program for developing countries eliminates duties on imports in roughly 5,000 product categories. The U.S. removed Myanmar from the GSP in 1989, a year after a brutal military crackdown on pro-democracy protesters.

A European Union delegation to Myanmar has now decided to follow Obamas lead by stopping its submission of a United Nations resolution criticizing Myanmars human rights shortcomingsa practice it has done at every U.N. General Assembly since 1991, the Myanmar Times reported.

The E.U. undertook the action in recognition of the countrys progress with it democratic transition and renewed efforts to restart its peace process, and the governments positive steps to improve human rights, the report said.

The 71st U.N. General Assembly opened on Sept. 13 and runs until Sept. 26.

Reported by Myo Zaw Ko and Kyaw Lwin Oo for RFAs Myanmar Service. Translated by Khet Mar. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.
The European Parliament has named jailed Uyghur scholar Ilham Tohti as a finalist for a key human rights award in 2016, for "exceptional individuals and organisations defending human rights and fundamental freedoms."



Tohti, a former professor at the Central University for Nationalities in Beijing, was sentenced to life in prison following his conviction on a charge of separatism by the Urumqi Intermediate People's Court in Xinjiang on Sept. 23, 2014.



He was nominated for the Sakharov Prize by EU lawmaker Ilhan Kyuchyuk and 42 colleagues, the Parliament said in a statement on its official website.



Beijing rights activist Hu Jia said Ilham Tohti, a member of the mostly Muslim, Turkic-speaking Uyghur ethnic group, was a clear contender for the award.



"He is the enlightened voice of the Uyghur people and a thorn in the side of the [ruling] Chinese Communist Party," said Hu, who won the Sakharov Prize in 2008. "He also received the heaviest sentence [of recent activists]."



"The ethnic group that he represents has been enslaved, suppressed, and excluded, which has resulted in a lot of hate and violence," he said.



Pressure on China



Hu said the value of the Sakharov Prize for Chinese dissidents lies in the fact that potential winners are nominated by directly elected lawmakers who represent "European values."



"This will put a huge amount of pressure on the Chinese government," he said.



World Uyghur Congress spokesman Dilxat Raxit welcomed the nomination, saying that it sent a clear message that Ilham Tohti is a prisoner of conscience, and not guilty of the charges against him.



"Ilham Tohti was handed a harsh prison sentence for his advocacy of mutual understanding, tolerance, and dialogue between the Uyghurs and the Han Chinese," Raxit told RFA.



"That's why 43 MEPs entered his name as the last of the nominees to make the shortlist," he said.

"This shows that the European Union and the international community have recognized the direct connection between violent incidents in Uyghur lands ... and the discriminatory and aggressive policies implemented by the Chinese government," Raxit said.

A better understanding



Speaking to RFA's Uyghur Service following the announcement, Ilham Tohti Initiative members Enwer Jan and Marie Holzman welcomed the Parliament's decision, saying the nomination shines a light on the Uyghur people's suffering under Chinese rule.



"Although he is now in jail, I congratulate Ilham Tohti on his nomination," Jan, a Uyghur activist, said.



"I see this nomination as a recognition by the international community of the Uyghur people's suffering and the justice of their cause, and I congratulate the Uyghur people as well."



"We do not see this nomination as the final victory," Holzman said, adding, "[A decision] will be revealed at the end of this month."



"But honestly speaking, we consider the nomination a success as well."



"What makes us happy is that, because of Ilham Tohti's nomination for this prize, the members of the European Parliament have begun to promote an understanding of who Ilham Tohti is, what he did, and who the Uyghurs are," she said.



"A tremendous amount of work lies ahead of us."



'Scapegoat'



Associate professor Elliot Sperling of Bloomington University's department of Central Eurasian Studies said Ilham Tohti's nomination recognized that he had been made a "scapegoat" by the Chinese government for tensions in the troubled northwestern region of Xinjiang.



Amid a growing climate of arrests and "disappearances" in the wake of violent unrest in the Xinjiang capital Urumqi in 2009, Ilham Tohti had planned to spend time as a visiting scholar in Sperling's department at Bloomington, Indiana.



But he was detained as he tried to leave China to take up the post in early 2013, and was formally arrested on Jan. 15, 2014 and charged with separatism. His subsequent trial and sentence prompted a wave of international protests and petitions for his release.



China has been keen to portray its Uyghur population as potential terrorists after a wave of violent incidents hit Xinjiang following a police crackdown on a peaceful demonstration in the regional capital, Urumqi, in July 2009.



Fellow nominees for the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought include Turkish journalist Can Dundar and colleagues, the Crimean Tatar leader Mustafa Dzemilev, and Yazidi ISIS survivors and public advocates Nadia Murad Basee and Lamiya Aji Bashar.



The winner will be selected on Oct. 6 after the nominees are presented to committees dealing with foreign affairs, development, and human rights, with the prize announced on Oct. 27, it said.



Reported by Ng Yik-tung and Sing Man for RFA's Cantonese Service, by Xi Wang for the Mandarin Service, and by Ekram Hazim for the Uyghur Service. Translated by Luisetta Mudie and Mamatjan Juma, and written in English by Luisetta Mudie.




Police in the northern Chinese city of Nanyang have issued an all-points bulletin seeking the arrest of three Uyghurs suspected of being members of the East Turkestan Islamic Movement that China claims is a terrorist organization, RFAs Uyghur Service has learned.

A directive issued on Aug. 31 by the Nanyang municipal police department tells all police in its jurisdiction to be on the lookout for Ayjamal Rozi, Abdunur Nurulla and Ayshem Ekrem, all of whom hail from the Sang village of Besheriq in Aksu (in Chinese, Akesu) prefecture.

According to the directive, the police department in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region listed Ayjamal Rozi as a wanted person in 2012, and the Chinese Ministry of Public Security has placed Ayshem Ekrem on its list of key terrorists.

Sources tell RFA that Ayjamal Rozi and Abdunur Nurulla are a couple who have had three children together.

The family left from Aksu around 2010 after selling their land, and moved to Urumqi to do business, but they were called back to their home village and authorities forced Ayjamal Rozi to abort their fourth child, a local woman told RFA.

We heard that her husband disappeared while doing business in Urumqi in 2010, and after that, his wife disappeared in 2011 or 2012, the woman told RFA on condition of anonymity. Her husband was a party member in this village, but he sold his land and house and opened a cooking oil and rice store in Urumqi.

The woman told RFA that police periodically question the couples relatives, but that people in Aksu know nothing of their fate.

The local police station is always checking with their relatives here to see if they have any information on them, but they just disappeared, she said.

We have heard that she was staying in Urumqi, but later we were told that she too disappeared, leaving her two children behind, the woman added. Right now those children are with their grandparents here in our village. We do not know the whereabouts of the other child.

The East Turkestan Islamic Movement, also known as the Turkestan Islamic Party or Turkestan Islamic Movement, is an Islamic separatist organization founded by Uyghurs in western China. Its stated goal is the independence of what they refer to as East Turkestan from China, which calls the region Xinjiang.

According to the Chinese government, it is a violent separatist movement and is often responsible for terrorist attacks in Xinjiang.

While the U.S. State Department has listed the East Turkestan Islamic Movement as one of the more extreme separatist groups, its capabilities and membership are unclear.

China has vowed to crack down on what it calls religious extremism in Xinjiang, and regularly conducts strike hard campaigns including police raids on Uyghur households, restrictions on Islamic practices, and curbs on the culture and language of the Uyghur people, including videos and other material.

While China blamed Uyghur extremists for terrorist attacks, experts outside China say Beijing has exaggerated the threat from the Uyghurs and that repressive domestic policies are responsible for an upsurge in violence there that has left hundreds dead since 2012.

Reported by by Jelil Kashgary for RFA's Uyghur Service. Translated by Mamatjan Juma. Written in English by Brooks Boliek.
U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has applauded a Syrian cease-fire deal brokered by the United States and Russia, but said its success is "up to the Russians."

The deal hammered out last week by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is designed to pause the Syrian civil war long enough for the two powers to ensure the delivery of humanitarian aid, restart long-stalled peace talks, and focus their air strikes on Islamic extremists taking advantage of the chaos created by the war.

The deal calls for Russia to persuade Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to stop shelling rebel-held areas and allow humanitarian aid to go in.

"Whether or not this works is really up to the Russians," Clinton told reporters in North Carolina.

"It is up to whether or not Vladimir Putin decides that it's time to do what the Russians can do to bring this conflict into a period where there can be the beginning of political discussions, a hoped-for protective zone for people who are under relentless assault from the air, and a commitment to going after the terrorist groups that pose a threat to everyone."

Based on reporting by AP and Reuters
In a system of "managed" democracy such as Russia's, the importance of elections is not necessarily in their results but in how they are managed.

We are talking about a test for the entire system that manages the elections, Moscow political analyst Tatyana Stanovaya tells RFE/RL.

That system, Stanovaya says, includes the department of the presidential administration that handles domestic politics, President Vladimir Putins All-Russia Popular Front (ONF) project, the ruling United Russia party, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, the so-called systemic opposition parties, and more.

In a nutshell, we are talking about all the institutions that are activated to conduct elections, Stanovaya says. In such a case, the result is secondary. What is important is how the entire system works, how effective it can be considering the declining incomes of the population, low global energy prices, and many other varied risks.

To understand Russia's September 18 national and local legislative elections, it is necessary to read between the lines.

The Kremlin clearly feels that the last round of Duma elections, in December 2011, and the presidential election in May 2012 were badly mismanaged, both producing credible claims of mass falsification and bringing thousands of protesters into the streets.

This time, the country is mired in an economic crisis stemming largely from low global energy prices and a sanctions standoff with the West over Moscows forcible annexation of Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula and its support for separatists in eastern Ukraine. While generally apathetic, would-be voters are also showing less tolerance for United Russias alleged corruption, and the partys popularity rating has declined steadily in recent months.

Five Things To Watch In Russia's State Duma Elections FIVE THINGS TO WATCH IN RUSSIA'S STATE DUMA ELECTIONS Dmitry Gudkov Gudkov is running for a seat from a Moscow single-mandate district and is also on the Yabloko party list. He is one of the few State Duma deputies of the current Duma who didn't vote for the 2014 Crimea annexation and is the son of expelled Duma deputy and Kremlin critic Gennady Gudkov. The younger Gudkov was kicked out of the Duma faction of the Kremlin-friendly A Just Russia in March 2013 after participating in protests against the falsification of earlier elections. He is running against former chief health inspector Gennady Onishchenko and has faced considerable harassment. Voters in his district recently were given copies of a newspaper claiming Gudkov is turning the district into "a boot camp for Maidan," referring to the Ukrainian protests that ousted then-President Viktor Yanukovych. Will this outspoken young politician be allowed to return to the Duma? Petrozavodsk In the capital of Karelia, liberal former Mayor Galina Shirshina was heading the Yabloko party list for the regional legislature -- the same body that ousted her as mayor last December. But at the request of the nationalist Rodina party, a municipal court disqualified the entire Yabloko list. On September 12, the Karelia Supreme Court upheld that ruling. The party is asking the Russian Supreme Court to overrule the decisions, but two days before the elections the disqualifications stood. Yabloko The liberal Yabloko party has the best chance -- albeit a slim one -- of any party that is not currently in the Duma to overcome the 5 percent hurdle and gain party-list seats. If it does, it could mean that liberal politician Lev Shlosberg could enter the Duma, as he is No. 4 on the national party list. The outspoken Shlosberg was a member of the Pskov Oblast legislature until fellow deputies expelled him in September 2015. He was noted for releasing information about two locally based paratroopers who he believed were killed fighting in Ukraine. At the vote to strip him of his mandate, United Russia deputy Aleksei Sevatsyanov called him "a tool of the [U.S.] State Department." Samara Oblast The ruling United Russia party has traditionally polled poorly in Samara Oblast, southeast of Moscow. In 2011, the party got just 39.1 percent there. So the Kremlin, in 2012, brought over the head of the Republic of Mordovia, Nikolai Merkushkin, to bring the oblast into line. In Mordovia, Merkushkin managed to produce a 91.6 percent result for United Russia in 2011. In Samara, he has been actively campaigning, claiming that the CIA backs the opposition and is trying to destabilize the region in order to break up Russia. He has also told voters that if they don't vote "97 percent" for United Russia, it will be their fault if he is unable to ask the Kremlin for any federal assistance. Turnout By moving the voting from December to September, the Kremlin seems to be trying to lower the turnout, thereby increasing the voting power of its most reliable constituents -- state-sector workers, pensioners, and the military. The elections this year have also sparked deep divisions among the opposition over whether to participate at all. It could be interesting to see how the turnout this year compares to the 60 percent turnout officially recorded in 2011 or the 63 percent recorded in 2007. -- Robert Coalson

As a result, the task of managing elections that outwardly appear as democratic as possible -- to weaken Western resolve on sanctions and to reduce social tensions at home -- is a challenging one.

We know what instructions the presidential administration gave the governors across Russia: 'No scandals. Nothing that would render the elections unlawful, at least in the big cities, exiled opposition activist and former oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who spent a decade in a Russian prison and whose Open Russia movement is backing a handful of candidates, wrote on his website.

Putin has certainly not become a democrat. His new strategy of making these quasi-elections look like real ones is a deferred reaction to the 2011-12 protests, the result of a desire to avoid additional complications in relations with the West.

The Kremlin has taken a number of steps that seem designed to make this round of elections appear more democratic. Putin replaced former Central Election Commission head Vladimir Churov -- who was sullied by presiding over previous, compromised votes and endorsing flawed elections in other former Soviet countries -- with Ella Pamfilova, a former liberal Duma deputy and minister in the cabinet of President Boris Yeltsin.

In addition, one-half of the 450 deputies this time will be elected from single-mandate districts, with the other half elected from party candidate lists. Moreover, parties need to poll just 5 percent in order to win party-list mandates, down from 7 percent in the previous election. These are reforms that were proposed under then-President Medvedev following the protests of December 2011.

I would like to say that I have listened to those who have been speaking about the need for changes and I understand them, Medvedev said at the time. We need to give all active citizens the legal chance to participate in political life.

A total of 14 parties -- including a smattering of genuine opposition parties and Kremlin-manipulated spoiler parties ranging from the far right to the far left -- have been cleared to participate. The Communist Party, the A Just Russia party, and the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia -- all of which are represented in the current Duma -- are considered Kremlin-friendly parties that further the appearance of pluralism but regularly vote with the ruling United Russia party.

At the same time, other developments bolster the Kremlins control over the process and the outcome. The charismatic leaders of the 2011-12 opposition are no longer a factor: Boris Nemtsov was gunned down near the Kremlin in February 2015, and former world chess champion Garry Kasparov has fled the country after receiving death threats.

The respected independent election monitor Golos and the independent Levada Center polling agency have been officially labeled foreign agents, seriously hampering their work, some of which pointed to a recent decline in the popularity of United Russia.

This weekend's vote was also brought forward from December, a move that opposition figures fear will suppress turnout as many voters may choose to spend one of the last weekends of the summer at their dachas. New election legislation significantly shortens the campaign season, too. Even the usually loyal Communist Party voted in the Duma against these changes.

The legally mandated televised debates were shown on state television at 5:50 p.m., which considerably reduced their audience.

It is 100 percent certain that the authorities dont want many people to show up, political analyst and former Duma deputy Igor Yakovenko tells RFE/RL, and it is clear why. Because if more people show up, it will be more difficult to produce the desired result.

Even many of the measures that might first appear to increase democracy actually play into the Kremlins hands, critics say.

The large number of parties means that even if 20 percent of the vote or more goes to anti-Kremlin parties, it remains likely that none of them will pass the 5 percent hurdle.

The small parties will play the role of a collective spoiler, gathering about 15 percent altogether but none of them getting more than 1.5 percent individually, political commentator Aleksandr Morozov tells RFE/RL. Not one of those parties will get into the Duma, and all their mandates will be distributed among the four parties that do. This is an extremely likely scenario."

Although the restoration of the single-mandate districts offers the best hope for genuine opposition voices to appear in the new Duma, it also presents a powerful opportunity for Putin's former party.

The single-mandate districts give United Russia a perfect chance to compensate for its falling party-list results, analyst Stanovaya says. Many of the ruling partys single-mandate candidates are local officials with close ties to their respective governors, raising the specter of some using administrative resources to secure victories. Stanovaya estimates that even if United Russia polled as low as 40 percent in the party-list voting, it would be able to secure an outright majority of seats by means of the single-mandate districts.

This mixed picture has prompted a sharp debate among Russias liberal opposition about a perennial question: whether or not to participate in the process at all.

Oppositionist Khodorkovsky says his Open Russia foundation is participating because the sensible way forward for the real opposition is to make use of all possible opportunities to demonstrate to society that there is an alternative.

But self-exiled opposition figure Kasparov argued earlier this month that any participation helps Putins government boost its appearance of legitimacy and, by extension, helps legitimize the Kremlins claim to the annexed Ukrainian region of Crimea.

Those who go into the elections with the argument that we have to at least do something are giving a priceless gift to the Kremlin and its agents in the West, Kasparov wrote.

For these elections, I dont see any good strategy, analyst Morozov says. If you go and vote, you wont get anything. If you dont vote, you wont get anything either and you wont lose anything. Everyone must simply choose for themselves.

With reporting by RFE/RL Russian Service correspondents Mikhail Solokov and Yaroslav Shimov
Russian President Vladimir Putin says the world faces the most dangerous decade since World War II and predicted that the historical period of the West's "undivided dominance over world affairs" is coming to an end.

Speaking on October 27 at a conference of international policy experts in Moscow, Putin said the decade ahead is "probably the most dangerous, unpredictable and, at the same time, important...since the end of World War II."

Live Briefing: Russia's Invasion Of Ukraine RFE/RL's Live Briefing gives you all of the latest developments on Russia's ongoing invasion, Kyiv's counteroffensive, Western military aid, global reaction, Russian protests, and the plight of civilians. For all of RFE/RL's coverage of the war, click here.

Putin laid the blame for the situation at the feet of Western countries, which he said have cast aside the norms of international affairs in order to maintain dominance and hold down countries they see as "second-class civilizations."

The Russian leader also said he had no regrets about sending troops into Ukraine and sought to explain the conflict as part of the efforts by Western countries to secure their global domination.

Putin claimed in his speech to the Valdai Discussion Club, a think tank, that the West had helped incite the conflict and also seeks to stoke a crisis over Taiwan in an attempt to enforce global dominance.

Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine on February 24, triggering the biggest military conflict in Europe since World War II and driving relations with Western countries that back Ukraine and its drive to be part of the European Union and NATO to their lowest depths since the Cold War.

Putin cast the conflict in Ukraine as a battle between the West and Russia for the fate of the second-largest Eastern Slav country. It is partly a "civil war," he said, as Russians and Ukrainians are one people. Kyiv has flatly rejected both of those ideas.

The goal of what Russia refers to as a "special military operation" is to take the eastern Donbas region, Putin said, adding that in his view the region would "not have survived" on its own had Russia not intervened militarily in Ukraine.

WATCH: A local official told Russian conscripts "You are not cannon fodder" in a video published online recently. The men responded by angrily shouting that, actually, that's exactly what they are.

But the war has gone far beyond the Donbas region, with Russian attacks on civilian infrastructure, residential buildings, and other nonmilitary structures, killing tens of thousands of Ukrainians across the country.

Putin used the speech largely to rail against the West, saying it has nothing to offer to the world "except its own domination," and the goal of globalization "is neocolonialism to dominate the world." He said Russia is only trying to defend its right to exist in the face these Western efforts.

Putin also asserted that more and more nations refuse to follow Washington's demands and Russia will never accept the West's attempts to dominate the world.

Citing gay pride parades and the acceptance of transgender people in Western countries, Putin also defended "traditional values" and said "nobody can dictate to our people how to develop and what society we should build."

He also said Russia has never considered the West an enemy and has many things in common with it but will continue to oppose the diktat of Western neoliberal elites.

U.S. National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Putin's speech presented no new ideas.

"We don't believe that Mr. Putin's strategic goals have changed here. He doesn't want Ukraine to exist as a sovereign, independent nation state," Kirby said.

Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said Putin's speech can be described as "for Freud," referring to psychoanalysis founder Sigmund Freud.



"The person who invaded a foreign country, annexed its land, and committed genocide accuses others of violating international law and the sovereignty of other countries? One truth: The person who started a wind will get a storm. The storm is coming," he said on Twitter.

Answering questions from journalists after his speech, Putin reiterated the Kremlin's assertion that Ukraine plans to use a so-called dirty bomb on its own territory. The claim has been dismissed as false by Ukraine and its allies, who say Russia may have raised the matter because it plans to use such a bomb in Ukraine as a pretext for escalation.

"It was me who ordered [Defense Minister Sergei] Shoigu to inform by phone all his colleagues about it," Putin said, adding that Russia does not need to use dirty bombs in Ukraine.

Putin also said he supported plans by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to visit Ukraine's nuclear power plants for inspections.

"It must be done as soon and as openly as possible because we know that Kyiv authorities are now working to cover up such [dirty-bomb attack] preparations," Putin said, without giving any exact information proving the claim.

Ukraine invited IAEA inspectors to visit its nuclear facilities after the Kremlin made its unsubstantiated claim about the preparation of a dirty bomb -- which would use the explosion of a conventional warhead to spread radioactive material or chemicals over a wide area.

Ukraine said it would welcome inspections because it had "nothing to hide."

According to Putin, Russia has never talked about the use of nuclear weapons in the war with Ukraine despite his own promise to defend Russian territory with any means at our disposal" and saying his words were "not a bluff."

"We see no need for [using nuclear weapons in Ukraine]," Putin told reporters. "There is no sense for that, neither political, nor military."
FIVE THINGS TO WATCH IN RUSSIA'S STATE DUMA ELECTIONS

Dmitry Gudkov

Gudkov is running for a seat from a Moscow single-mandate district and is also on the Yabloko party list. He is one of the few State Duma deputies of the current Duma who didn't vote for the 2014 Crimea annexation and is the son of expelled Duma deputy and Kremlin critic Gennady Gudkov. The younger Gudkov was kicked out of the Duma faction of the Kremlin-friendly A Just Russia in March 2013 after participating in protests against the falsification of earlier elections. He is running against former chief health inspector Gennady Onishchenko and has faced considerable harassment. Voters in his district recently were given copies of a newspaper claiming Gudkov is turning the district into "a boot camp for Maidan," referring to the Ukrainian protests that ousted then-President Viktor Yanukovych. Will this outspoken young politician be allowed to return to the Duma?

Petrozavodsk

In the capital of Karelia, liberal former Mayor Galina Shirshina was heading the Yabloko party list for the regional legislature -- the same body that ousted her as mayor last December. But at the request of the nationalist Rodina party, a municipal court disqualified the entire Yabloko list. On September 12, the Karelia Supreme Court upheld that ruling. The party is asking the Russian Supreme Court to overrule the decisions, but two days before the elections the disqualifications stood.

Yabloko

The liberal Yabloko party has the best chance -- albeit a slim one -- of any party that is not currently in the Duma to overcome the 5 percent hurdle and gain party-list seats. If it does, it could mean that liberal politician Lev Shlosberg could enter the Duma, as he is No. 4 on the national party list. The outspoken Shlosberg was a member of the Pskov Oblast legislature until fellow deputies expelled him in September 2015. He was noted for releasing information about two locally based paratroopers who he believed were killed fighting in Ukraine. At the vote to strip him of his mandate, United Russia deputy Aleksei Sevatsyanov called him "a tool of the [U.S.] State Department."

Samara Oblast

The ruling United Russia party has traditionally polled poorly in Samara Oblast, southeast of Moscow. In 2011, the party got just 39.1 percent there. So the Kremlin, in 2012, brought over the head of the Republic of Mordovia, Nikolai Merkushkin, to bring the oblast into line. In Mordovia, Merkushkin managed to produce a 91.6 percent result for United Russia in 2011. In Samara, he has been actively campaigning, claiming that the CIA backs the opposition and is trying to destabilize the region in order to break up Russia. He has also told voters that if they don't vote "97 percent" for United Russia, it will be their fault if he is unable to ask the Kremlin for any federal assistance.

Turnout

By moving the voting from December to September, the Kremlin seems to be trying to lower the turnout, thereby increasing the voting power of its most reliable constituents -- state-sector workers, pensioners, and the military. The elections this year have also sparked deep divisions among the opposition over whether to participate at all. It could be interesting to see how the turnout this year compares to the 60 percent turnout officially recorded in 2011 or the 63 percent recorded in 2007.

-- Robert Coalson
A suicide bomber has detonated his explosives in a crowded mosque in Pakistan's lawless tribal areas, killing at least 24 people, including four children.

The attack occurred on September 16 during Friday Prayers at a mosque in the Mohmand tribal district, one of seven tribal districts along the porous border with Afghanistan.

At least 28 people were wounded in the village of Pai Khan. About 200 worshippers were inside the mosque at the time of attack.

The wounded were transported to a hospital in neighboring Bajaur tribal district.

Spokesmen for Jamaat-ul-Ahrar  a breakaway Taliban faction  claimed responsibility for the attack in e-mailed statements. They claimed the attacker, who shouted "God is Great" as he entered the mosque, targeted members of a vigilante force that killed 13 of its members in 2009.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif condemned the bombing, saying the government would remain steadfast in its fight against extremists.

"The cowardly attacks by terrorists cannot shatter the government's resolve to eliminate terrorism from the country," he said.

The White House condemned the attack, saying it is an "appalling reminder that terrorism threatens all countries in the region," and said the United States would continue to work with Islamabad to fight terrorism.

With reporting by Reuters, AP, AFP, and Dawn
Pakistan continues to be a "tremendously duplicitous partner," according to Bob Corker, chairman of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Corker, a Republican, said during a Senate hearing on U.S. policy in Afghanistan on September 15 that Pakistan was the "greatest threat to American soldiers [in Afghanistan] and certainly the greatest threat to the Afghan military and civilians."

Corker said Islamabad was "working against" U.S. interests by supporting the Haqqani Network, a Pakistani-based militant group that has been blamed for some of the deadliest attacks against U.S. and Afghan forces in Afghanistan.

Richard Olson, the U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, said Islamabad had not done enough to tackle the Haqqani Network and the Taliban.

"We continue to urge Pakistan to take robust action against the Haqqani and against the Taliban and I think there are indications that they have taken some action, but I don't think it will be fair to say those actions were definitive," Olson told the Senate hearing on September 15.

Afghan and U.S. officials have long blamed Pakistan for supporting the Afghan insurgency, a charge rejected by Islamabad.


A new Polish commission reinvestigating the 2010 plane crash that killed President Lech Kaczynski and 95 others has accused its predecessors of doctoring evidence and manipulating facts.

The crash near Smolensk airport in Russia was one of Poland's worst tragedies since World War II. Among the dead were military commanders, state officials, lawmakers, and public figures, and it further strained relations with Moscow.

The previous investigation team was appointed by Donald Tusk, then Poland's prime minister and now the head of the European Council. In 2011, that team declared the crash a result of Polish pilots' errors, poor guidance by Russian controllers in dense fog, and very poor visibility at the rudimentary military airport.

A separate report by Russian experts blamed the Polish crew and the alleged presence of a Polish Air Force commander in the cockpit, suggesting he might have pressed for a landing in spite of bad weather conditions. Kaczynski and the others were traveling to ceremonies to honor Polish officers killed by Soviet secret security during the war.

The new probe was sought by the current nationalist ruling party led by Kaczynski's twin brother, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, who has blamed the crash on Tusk and Russia.

The new team, announcing preliminary findings on September 15, said the 2011 Polish report was the result of "falsifying, manipulating, avoiding, and hiding" the truth.

"Some of the elements were tampered with," commission head Waclaw Berczynski said.

His colleague Kazimierz Nowaczyk alleged that three seconds had been cut from one of the black-box recordings, while five seconds were deleted from the other.

As proof they showed secret footage in which the previous commission's head, then-Interior Minister Jerzy Miller, suggested to his team that their report should be in line with the Russian one to avoid any questions about inconsistencies and "conspiracy theories."

Moreover, they said Russian authorities blocked or limited Polish investigators' access to the crash site and to evidence.

Berczynski said some of the evidence provided by Russia was "manipulated." The commission pointed to the fact that Russia delayed handing over the flight recorders.

Russia also has refused to return the wreckage, saying it still needs the evidence for its own criminal investigation.

Polish Defense Minister Antoni Macierewicz, who appointed the commission and is overseeing its work, said the goal was to reveal the circumstances of the crash and not assign blame.

But the new investigation's findings were dismissed by an expert who worked on the original report.

"These are just words," Maciej Lasek, head of the Committee for Investigation of National Aviation Accidents, told TVN24, while he told TASS that no one deleted anything from the black-box recordings.

The accusations of rigging results are due to "an absolute lack of understanding of the principles of the black boxes and the synchronization of data," he said.

"The main problem of this group is none of its members have ever investigated air accidents," Lasek said, noting that "none of the new investigators visited the accident site" in Smolensk.

With reporting by AP, AFP, and TASS
WASHINGTON -- Witnesses testifying at a U.S. congressional hearing on September 15 voiced deep concern about rising Russian influence and instability in Azerbaijan, as well as the continued forced closure of RFE/RLs bureau in Azerbaijans capital, Baku.

The hearing, entitled Azerbaijan: Do Human Rights Matter? was organized by the bipartisan Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, chaired by U.S. Representative James McGovern (D-MA), and took place just two weeks before a planned constitutional referendum that panelists and human rights groups have criticized for being held in the absence of independent media, opposing campaigning, and international monitors.

Investigative journalist, former political prisoner, and RFE/RL contributor Khadija Ismayilova told the hearing of the harsh conditions faced by journalists like herself who report on high-level corruption, pointing out that no [Azerbaijani] laws say that journalism is a crimeBut where critical journalism is concerned, it is really difficult to enforce the rule of law in Azerbaijan. Ismayilova addressed the hearing by video conference from her home in Baku, as she is currently barred by the government from traveling outside Azerbaijan.

In response to a question from Rep. McGovern about how the international community can help Azerbaijanis access accurate and factual news, Ismayilova noted that Radio Free Europe is the best America has done in Azerbaijan.

Ismayilova, who said 138 political prisoners are currently being held in Azerbaijani prisons, testified that repression inside the country has targeted pro-Western journalists, bloggers, politicians and civil society activists, as well as religious moderates. At the same time, she said, Russian media has its bureaus in Baku, while RFE/RL's Baku bureau is closed and its equipment has been confiscated illegally. Ismayilova also noted in her testimony that RFE/RL has been banned by the government from Azerbaijans domestic airwaves since 2009 -- a restriction that is not shared by Russias Sputnik radio station.

Richard Kauzlarich, who served as U.S. ambassador to Azerbaijan in the 1990s, declared that "quiet diplomacy has not worked as a means of persuading the government to tolerate greater freedoms. He urged Washington to consider recalling its ambassador in Baku, and imposing asset freezes and visa bans for officials involved in repressing journalists and activists.

Ismayilova was released from prison in May this year after being arrested in December, 2014 on charges that are widely believed to have been brought in retaliation for her reporting about corruption linked to family members and friends of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev. That same month, RFE/RLs Baku bureau was raided and sealed by government agents in connection with tax-related claims that RFE/RL has called baseless.
Russia wants the United Nations Security Council next week to endorse the Syrian cease-fire agreement that it brokered with the United States.

The truce went into effect on September 12 and has been mostly holding across the war-torn country despite minor violations.

Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said on September 15 that he hopes the Security Council will adopt a resolution endorsing the agreement at a summit-level Security Council meeting on Syria on September 21.

The cease-fire is intended to pave the way for a resumption of humanitarian aid and peace talks to end the six-year civil war. Several previous negotiated cease-fires have unraveled and efforts to hold the peace talks have repeatedly stalled.

Meanwhile, the Russian military said Syrian government forces had pulled back from a key highway to the besieged city of Aleppo to allow for aid deliveries, but opposition fighters had failed to do the same as required under the deal.

Lieutenant General Vladimir Savchenko said the Syrian Army withdrew its armor, artillery, and other weapons north of the Castello road early on September 15, but may reverse the move unless rebel groups follow suit.

Based on reporting by AP and AFP
The chief of the Russian military's General Staff has visited Turkey for talks with his counterpart about the situation in Syria.

Turkey's state-run Anadolu news agency said General Valery Gerasimov, chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Russia, and Turkish General Hulusi Akar met at the Turkish General Staff headquarters in Ankara on September 15.

The Russian Defense Ministry said that the negotiations allowed the two military leaders "to bring the parties' assessments of the current situation in Syria and the measures necessary for upholding the cease-fire closer."

The ministry said Gerasimov and Akar reaffirmed a "shared desire to develop a dialogue and further cooperation between the two countries' militaries."

Russia and the United States brokered a cease-fire that took effect in Syria on September 12 and is meant to halt fighting between the U.S.-backed opposition and Syria's Russian-supported government.

Turkey and Russia experienced a roughly seven-month rupture in relations after Turkey shot down a Russian bomber in November. The rift was repaired soon after July's failed coup in Turkey.

Based on reporting by AP and TASS
ON MY MIND

Russian elections aren't elections. They're theater. They're a legitimization ritual. And they need to be evaluated as such. On today's Power Vertical Podcast, we'll discuss why Sunday's vote matters and what to look for.

Will the Kremlin be able to control the narrative and get the result they want without resorting to crude and obvious forms of falsification? Or will they lose control of the narrative and walk straight into a disaster, as was the case in 2011?

The elections will also be held in Crimea, which is not legally recognized as part of Russia. How will international organizations like the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly and the Council of Europe's Interparliamentary Assembly handle this? Will they shun the new Duma? Or will they de facto recognize Russia's forceful annexation of the peninsula by accepting members from the Russian parliament?

Joining me will be co-host Mark Galeotti of the Institute of International Relations in Prague and guest Anna Arutunayn, author of the book The Putin Mystique.

It will be posted later today, so be sure to tune in!

IN THE NEWS

The White House is trying to build a legal case against Russian hackers it believes are behind recent leaks aimed at disrupting the U.S. presidential election, while Congress is eyeing sanctions as a remedy, media reports says.

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has applauded a Syrian cease-fire deal brokered by the United States and Russia but said its success is "up to the Russians."

The chief of the Russian military's General Staff has visited Turkey for talks with his counterpart about the situation in Syria.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has inspected construction work on a bridge aimed at linking the annexed Crimean Peninsula to Russia.

President Vladimir Putin has called on Russians to go to the polls on September 18 to elect a new State Duma, the lower house of parliament.

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier says a new cease-fire declared in eastern Ukraine appears to be holding.

Ukraine has filed a complaint at the World Trade Organization (WTO) to challenge Russia over restrictions on freight transit.

A European court has partially upheld sanctions imposed on Ukraine's ousted former president, Viktor Yanukovych, his son Oleksandr, and the former head of the presidential administration, Andriy Klyuyev.

LATEST POWER VERTICAL BLOG

Sure, they're fixed and they're falsified. Of course, they're a far cry from free and fair. And yeah, their results are always painfully predictable. But elections to the Russian State Duma still matter. On the latest Power Vertical blog, I explain why.

WHAT I'M READING

An Important Election That Doesn't Matter

Slon.ru has published a debate between the prominent opposition journalist Oleg Kashin and former Kremlin insider Gleb Pavlovsky on whether it makes sense for Russians who want change to vote in Sunday's State Duma elections.

In a commentary for the Moscow Carnegie Center, political analyst Tatyana Stanovaya looks at the "hidden agenda" behind the elections.

"The elections serve one important purpose for the elite. They are a testing ground for the future contenders in top positions in the pyramid of power that will be formed after the 2018 presidential election," Stanovaya writes.

And Anna Arutunayn, author of the book The Putin Mystique, argues that the elections offer the Russian opposition the opportunity to lay the groundwork for the future.

What's Up With Bastrykin?

Wondering what is going on with Investigative Committee head Aleksandr Bastrykin? Is he really on his way out, as Russian media reports suggest? Mark Galeotti, a senior research fellow at the Institute of International Relations in Prague and a visiting fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, has a piece in OpenDemocracy that provides useful context and insight.

Medvedev Slept Here

Don't look now, but anticorruption blogger and opposition leader Aleksei Navalny has just flown a drone over a luxury estate used by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev and posted the video on his blog. Navalny also outlines the opaque transactions that allowed Medvedev to gain access to the property, which he does not formally own.

The Hacker File

Washington Post columnist David Ignatius argues that the Cold War with Russia may be over, but the cyberwar has just begun.

The Washington Post reports that the website that leaked former Secretary of State Colin Powell's e-mails is linked to Russia.

Reuters, meanwhile, is citing U.S. law-enforcement and intelligence officials as saying that "the Federal Bureau of Investigation is intensifying efforts to find enough evidence to enable the Justice Department to indict some of the Russians that U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded are hacking into American political parties and figures."

Spy Wars

The Washington Post is reporting that "U.S. intelligence agencies are expanding spying operations against Russia on a greater scale than at any time since the end of the Cold War."

Imperial Overstretch

Writing in The American Interest, former U.S. State Department official Kirk Bennett asks whether Russia is risking overstretching itself in its foreign adventures.

"The near abroad presents at least as much risk and vulnerability as opportunity for Russia. Lured by the siren song of Eurasia and the Russian World, the Kremlin risks dashing an already battered Russian ship of state against the rocks of imperial overstretch," Bennett writes.
European Parliament President Martin Schulz says he hopes the bloc will vote on visa liberalization for Ukraine in October.

Schulz, speaking at an EU summit in Bratislava on September 16, said that before the European Parliament can vote on the issue, it must be approved by the parliamentary civil-liberties committee in a vote scheduled for September 29.

Ukraine, Georgia, Kosovo, and Turkey are all seeking visa liberalization to the EU's Schengen zone this year.

Earlier this month, the civil-liberties committee voted for visa liberalization for Georgia.

Berlin had refused to support the measures before the summer, citing a spike of crimes allegedly committed by Georgians in Germany.

The committee also voted in favor of similar move for Kosovo but it opted against opening negotiations with the EU member states until Pristina has fulfilled all criteria, including solving a border dispute with Montenegro and fight organized crime.
KYIV -- Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has accused Russia of transforming Crimea in to a "concentration camp" and urged Western states to impose new sanctions on Moscow.

Speaking at the annual Yalta European Strategy (YES) forum in Kyiv, Poroshenko said Russia had pursued a "repressive policy" against Ukrainian citizens in Crimea, including Crimean Tatars, since it seized control of the peninsula in March 2014.

He said the United States, European Union, and others should maintain existing sanctions on Russia over its interference in Ukraine and impose new sanctions targeting specific industries.

"It is necessary to introduce new sectoral sanctions, we won't achieve anything without sanctions," Poroshenko said.

Poroshenko has long sought lethal weapons for the conflict with Russia-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine, but he said "unity and solidarity" are more important than Western arms.

He suggested implementation of the Minsk peace accord hinges on Russia, saying, "Not a single step forward will be taken until Russia withdraws its troops to a safe distance and carries out measures in the sphere of security."

Addressing reforms, Poroshenko promised 200 new judges would be appointed, calling Ukraine's judiciary "the last bastion of corruption."
U.S. senators have warned the Obama administration that failure to address problems with corruption in Afghanistan could lead to a pullback in the embattled country's $5 billion in yearly aid.

"I don't know what the political will here in the United States will be to continue to support the Afghans in light of what is going on there," said Democratic Senator Robert Menendez, a senior member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Menendez said he supported the U.S. intervention in Afghanistan in the past, but he could "have a totally different view" if the government in Kabul does not move more forcefully against corruption.

His comments came after a U.S. inspector-general report on September 14 strongly criticized Washington for pouring billions of dollars into Afghanistan with so little oversight that it fueled a culture of "rampant corruption" and undermined the U.S. mission.



The United States gives Afghanistan about $5 billion per year, including about $4 billion in military aid and another $1 billion in civilian assistance, administration officials said. Beyond that, it also spends many billions more supporting U.S. troops in the country.

The inspector-general found that in fiscal year 2012, the United States spent $19 billion on services for troops in Afghanistan such as transportation, base construction, and translation -- nearly as much as Afghanistan's entire gross domestic product of $20.5 billion that year.

It said the lure of such huge sums of money in impoverished Afghanistan had attracted "entrenched criminal patronage networks" that after 15 years of U.S. intervention have become very difficult to root out.

The report quotes former U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Ryan Crocker as saying: "The ultimate failure of our efforts...wasn't an insurgency. It was the weight of endemic corruption."

Beyond the problem with corruption, Senator Bob Corker, the committee's chairman, expressed concern that public support for spending in Afghanistan is eroding because the American people can see little evidence that it is bearing fruit.

Richard Olson, the State Department's special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, agreed that corruption can undermine governance. But he called Afghan President Ashraf Ghani "a committed partner" in fighting corruption.

Ghani, Olson said, had taken steps including addressing the Kabul Bank scandal, canceling a fuel contract, and setting up a monitoring committee with experts on anticorruption.

"It is a dramatically different situation from what it was prior to 2014," Olson told the committee.

USAID administrator for Afghanistan Donald Sampler told the committee that "ungoverned spaces are the worst" security threats for the United States around the world.

"So supporting the government of Afghanistan and supporting their ability to govern their own space and doing that proactively to prevent insurgencies rather than having to counter them is in my opinion a good investment."

With reporting by Reuters, ABC, and Voice of America
The White House is trying to build a legal case against Russian hackers it believes are behind recent leaks aimed at disrupting the U.S. presidential election, while Congress is eyeing sanctions as a remedy, media reports says.

Reuters reported on September 15 that the Federal Bureau of Investigation is trying to put together enough evidence to indict some of the Russian hackers, but doing this has proved difficult as some of the best evidence the administration has is highly classified.

U.S. State Department officials think legal action is the best way to respond to what they believe are increasing Russian attempts to disrupt and discredit the November elections, without sparking an open confrontation with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Reuters said.

Reuters said the administration believes that two Russian intelligence agencies -- the military's GRU and the civilian intelligence agency -- are behind recent cyberattacks, which have become more frequent and brazen.

Though the Kremlin vehemently denies it, some officials believe the Russian government has set up a competition between its military and civilian intelligence agencies to see which can steal and distribute the most damaging material.

With hacking targets as diverse and the Democratic National Committee and former top Republican diplomats, U.S. officials have come to the conclusion that Russia's goal is not simply to promote one candidate over another but to discredit the elections and democracy as it is practiced in the United States, Reuters said.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest acknowledged the administration faces a difficult task formulating an appropriate response to Russian hacking.

"We're in unexplored territory here, and the president is quite interested in trying to establish international norms," he said.

The U.S. Justice Department has previously filed legal cases against Chinese hackers who compromised U.S. government and corporate systems, and would like to take the same approach to Russia.

"I'll let the FBI speak to what evidence they have amassed," Earnest said, "but I think they're also cognizant of the fact that as soon as they make a declaration like that, most people are going to understandably be interested in seeing that evidence. And some of that evidence may not be something we want to show."

While the White House pursues legal avenues, The Washington Post reports that members of Congress are eyeing additional sanctions as the best option for dealing with Russia.

The top Democrats on the House and Senate intelligence committees are working on a response to Russia that might include sanctions, the newspaper reported.

Representative Adam Schiff said President Barack Obama needs to start "naming and shaming" Russia.

"Theres now an executive order that allows the president to administer sanctions as a result of cyber intrusions," Schiff told reporters, noting that if Russia persisted in breaching U.S. political groups, Obama ought "to look at a series of escalating responses, which might begin with economic sanctions."

With reporting by Reuters, NBC, and The Washington Post
In many ways, the Vladimir Putin era began with a State Duma election.

Back in late 1999, when Putin was just a couple months into his job as Russia's prime minister, he was asked whom he favored in the upcoming State Duma elections.

Putin said that "as a citizen," he would support a newly formed party called Unity, which at the time was running behind the Communists and the opposition Fatherland-All Russia.

Putin had been cultivating a tough-guy image by prosecuting a war against Chechen insurgents, whom he vowed to "wipe out in the outhouse." And as the ailing Boris Yeltsin's designated successor, he was trying to raise hopes that he could end the chaos and deprivation of the 1990s.

The elections would be the first test of his political clout with the public.

And when Unity finished in second place, less than a percentage point behind the Communists and well ahead of Fatherland-All Russia, it looked like the new prime minister had the magic touch.

Less than two weeks after that election, Putin would become Russia's acting president following Yeltsin's New Year's Eve resignation. And Unity -- which was later christened as United Russia -- became Putin's party.

Every State Duma election since has been a watershed moment in Putin's long rule.

Theater And Rituals

Sure, they're fixed and they're falsified. Of course they're a far cry from free and fair. And yeah, their results are always painfully predictable.

But even though the fix is in, and even though the legislature they elect is largely a rubber stamp for Kremlin policies, Duma elections are actually quite important.

Just as Russian presidential elections under Putin have been turned into coronations, Duma elections have become the regime's principal legitimization ritual.

They're an important barometer of the Kremlin's mastery -- or lack thereof -- of the political process. And they also tend to be watershed moments, signaling coming changes in the political environment.

Which is why it makes sense to pay close attention to Russia's September 18 State Duma elections, less for the final result than for the political theater -- and how skillfully the Kremlin is able to choreograph it.

"The regime in Russia aspires to be viewed as broadly legitimate while keeping political pluralism highly constrained," Max Bader of Leiden University wrote in New Eastern Europe.

When the Putin regime has been able to embed the elections in a compelling narrative, use its media dominance to shape the information environment, and mobilize the population with the administrative resources at its disposal, the legitimization ritual has been successful.

In 2003, Putin used the first Duma elections of his presidency to decisively consolidate his power, marginalize liberal pro-Western parties, and signal a turn to a more authoritarian form of rule.

United Russia won 223 of the Duma's 450 seats and most of the others were taken by the housebroken "opposition parties" like the Communists and Vladimir Zhirinovsky's nationalist LDPR.

The elections came just months after the October 2003 arrest of oil oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who had been financing liberal opposition parties. This allowed Putin to eliminate meaningful opposition while at the same time create the illusion that he was battling the Yeltsin-era oligarchs.

The elections also came less than a year before Putin eliminated popular elections for Russia's governors.

"By presenting the picture of a country that is united, happy, and supportive of the government, it helps marginalize and silence those who are disaffected," Mark Galeotti, a senior research fellow at the Institute of International Relations in Prague and a visiting fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, wrote in BNEIntellinews.

But when the Kremlin has had to resort to the cruder and more obvious methods of falsification like ballot stuffing and carousel voting on election day, the ritual has been a failure.

Good And Bad Shows

Russia's last two Duma elections -- in 2007 and 2011 -- provide textbook examples of these opposite outcomes.

The 2007 elections took place in a time of political uncertainty.

Putin's second term was ending. Part of the elite clearly wanted him to ignore the constitution and stay for a third consecutive term. And part of the elite wanted him to stick to the constitution and name a successor.

As we all know, Putin endorsed Dmitry Medvedev as his successor. But at the same time Putin turned the Duma elections -- which came just months before the presidential election -- into a referendum on...Vladimir Putin.

Putin led the United Russia party list and the vote was preceded by a massive propaganda campaign celebrating him as Russia's "national leader." Mass rallies were held in cities across Russia and state-controlled media touted "Putin's Plan," suggesting he had a long-term strategy for ruling Russia even after leaving office.

And it worked. United Russia won a super-majority without having to resort to the most obvious forms of crude falsification, Putin became prime minister and remained the country's de facto ruler.

The political theater and the legitimization ritual was a success.

The contrast with 2011 couldn't have been sharper.

Those Duma elections took place in the political uncertainty accompanying the end of Medvedev's term as president. And when Putin and Medvedev announced that they would be swapping jobs -- the infamous "castling" -- a meaningful part of both the elite and the public was unhappy with the move.

With the elite divided, the Kremlin was unable to construct a compelling narrative around the elections. And the opposition, led by anticorruption blogger Aleksei Navalny, successfully branded United Russia as "the party of swindlers and thieves."

To even secure the barest majority for the ruling party, the regime was forced to resort to open and blatant falsification -- videos of which were widely circulated online.

The result was the largest anti-Kremlin demonstrations since the breakup of the Soviet Union and the biggest threat to the regime during Putin's rule.

Like past State Duma elections of the Putin era, the September 18 vote also promises to be a watershed.

It's taking place as the Kremlin leader is changing his governing model, purging former cronies from his inner circle and bringing in younger officials who owe their careers to Putin alone.

It is also taking place with the economy reeling from Western sanctions and low oil prices and social protests on the rise.

The result, of course is predictable. United Russia and the usual fake opposition parties -- the Communists, the Liberal Democrats, and A Just Russia -- will surely win seats. There might even be a few surprises to create the illusion of greater pluralism.

But the result will be less important than the success of the ritual and the political theater.
8 A sheep's head marks a shamanic site along the Yenisei River. Shamanic belief holds that, just as people are nourished by eating the flesh of animals, so the spirits of wild animals are nourished by the death of humans in the wilderness. "If a person is lost in the forest or drowns in a river, then the hunters think that the spirits will have been reimbursed for game or fish taken."


The U.S. Department of Justice has assigned an attorney to review inmate deaths at Hampton Roads Regional Jail and decide whether to pursue an investigation, according to an email obtained by the Richmond Times-Dispatch.

Steven H. Rosenbaum, chief of the DOJs special litigation section, responded last week to an urgent investigation request sent by seven mental health and civil rights advocates in June.

Its the first indication that the DOJ is considering conducting an investigation after the highly publicized deaths of Jamycheal Mitchell in August 2015 and Henry Stewart last month.

Thank you for the information you have provided regarding the Hampton Roads Regional Jail, Rosenbaum wrote Sept. 7 to Mira Signer, executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness in Virginia. We are reviewing the information to determine what, if any, action by the Department of Justice would be appropriate.

Signer led efforts in June to ask Rosenbaum to investigate the jail. She and others from NAMI were joined by advocates from the Portsmouth NAACP, the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia, the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law and Mental Health America of Virginia.

Virginia Attorney General Mark R. Herring and Gov. Terry McAuliffe have joined advocates calls for a federal civil rights investigation, with Herring sending a written request for an investigation to the Department of Justice this month following the news of Stewarts death.

On Sept. 2, Signer wrote Rosenbaum a follow-up email, again urging him to look into Mitchells death.

More than one year later, Virginia has still not come clean with what happened and how this young man died while psychotic and in jail, she wrote.

In his reply, Rosenbaum said the special litigation section attorney assigned to the matter is Kristin Hucek, who could not immediately be reached for comment on Friday.

Hucek, a graduate of the University of Virginia and Harvard Law, has worked for the DOJ since May 2015, according to her LinkedIn profile. Last month, she transferred to the special litigation section where she is charged with investigating claims of systemic violations of constitutional rights.

The Virginia State Police began investigating Mitchells death in June and presented their preliminary findings with Stephanie N. Morales, the Portsmouth Commonwealth Attorney, in August. Morales asked the agency to continue investigating.

Previously, Christina Pullen, a spokeswoman for the FBI, said the agency is prepared to investigate should Virginia State Police uncover evidence of a potential civil rights violation. The FBI operates under the DOJs jurisdiction.

A state medical examiner found that Mitchell, who had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, died of heart problems and wasting syndrome after losing 46 pounds over 101 days in custody. The 24-year-old had been jailed for allegedly stealing $5 in snacks from a 7-Eleven store.

Stewart, 60, died Aug. 6, two days after an emergency medical grievance he filed with corrections officers was denied. In the written request for emergency medical care he submitted Aug. 4, he told guards he blacked out twice in less than 24 hours and that he could not hold down food or water.
For the moment, a 12-acre, panel-packed field near Philip Morris USAs Park 500 facility in Chesterfield County is the largest solar array in Virginia.

But it wont be for long, said Dominion Virginia Power officials, who on Friday gave media members a tour of the 8,000-panel, $4.9 million site. It is one of 10 facilities built as part of the utilitys Solar Partnership Program, which leases ground space at commercial, industrial and public facilities for solar panels.

The partnerships are designed to allow Dominion to experiment with the effects of solar energy on the existing grid.

Grid reliability is one of the big tenets of our culture, said Mike Gurganus, a project manager for new technology with Dominion. We need to make sure that we can blend that electricity into our grid.

The 2-megawatt facility, which opened in March, was built over about six months after Dominion approached Philip Morris about leasing the land near the companys tobacco processing facility on Bermuda Hundred Road.

The tobacco plant has increasingly focused on more sustainable and environmentally friendly practices, such as converting its onsite power plant to natural gas and building an engineered wetland system to help reduce nitrogen, phosphorus and other constituents in its wastewater before it is discharged into the James River.

Right off the bat, we thought it was a good fit for us, said Greg Ray, a senior vice president for manufacturing at Philip Morris, a subsidiary of Henrico County-based Altria Group.

At peak production, the solar array produces enough electricity to power 500 homes.

Were really proud of what weve done here and how we can learn from it, said Nathan Frost, a Dominion manager for new technology. What is the impact of a variable, intermittent resource on our customers?

Dominion has three other solar facilities under construction in Isle of Wight, Powhatan and Louisa counties that are projected to produce a total of 56 megawatts.

The Louisa facility will use 83,000 solar panels to produce 20 megawatts, enough to power 5,000 homes. The Powhatan site will have 77,000 panels producing 17 megawatts, and Isle of Wight will produce 19 megawatts from 80,000 panels.

Dominion also is in the process of developing a 260,000-panel facility near the Remington Power Plant in Fauquier County in a partnership with the state and Microsoft that is expected to come on line by next fall.

Its all part of the companys pledge to develop 400 megawatts of solar capacity by 2020.

However, according to report released in July by the Environment Virginia Research and Policy Center, Virginia still lags behind other states in solar capacity, ranking 39th of 50 states through 2015.
The Science Museum of Virginia has found a new home for a dozen of the historic planes that were on display at the Virginia Aviation Museum at Richmond International Airport, which closed at the end of June.

The museum announced Friday that the planes, which originally were part of the collection of Spotsylvania County aviation enthusiast Sidney L. Shannon Jr., will return to Shannon Airport near Fredericksburg, where they will be displayed in the New Shannon Air Museum.

The original Shannon museum was open between 1976 and 1985, when it closed to the public and the planes later came to the Virginia Aviation Museum. The New Shannon Air Museum is scheduled to open in spring 2017.

To have the collection move back to its home where it originated will be a great thing for the aviation community, said Luke Curtas, owner of Shannon Airport, in a statement. Our goal at the New Shannon Air Museum is to promote aviation history where people can enjoy and possibly become a part of it.

In an interview, Curtas said he and his wife purchased the airport 2 years ago and have been looking to get the aircraft back ever since. The airport has undergone about $3 million in renovations and features its own restaurant, the Robins Nest Cafe, which takes its name from one of Shannons planes.

I was around the airport when Mr. Shannon was still alive. I was 18, Curtas said. I remembered the collection in the museum still being here.

Among the planes returning to Fredericksburg are rare aircraft that include the only known surviving Vultee V-1A, a SPAD VII, a World War I fighter, a Pitcairn PA-5 Mailwing and a Bellanca CH-400 Skyrocket. The complete collection will be displayed in a recently renovated hangar that originally housed the planes.

Theyre from the airport, theyre from the community. Theyre from Mr. Shannon, so to have them come back is a great thing, Curtas said. They were a collection that Mr. Shannon himself loved, and (he) flew each one of them until they were dispersed ... The collection as a whole coming back is really whats exciting. The Vultee is probably the last one in the world thats still in one piece.

Rich Conti, director of the Science Museum of Virginia, said he and his staff are working to place the rest of the collection of 24 aircraft, artifacts and models at the now-shuttered Henrico museum. Six military aircraft must be returned to their service branches and several already have found new homes, including the museums F-14 Tomcat and A-4 Skyhawk.

The museum also is working to return donated items, including flight suits and helmets.

The Science Museum, citing concerns with the building the Aviation Museum was housed in and low attendance, announced in June that it would close the museum and parcel out its collection.

The rare SR-71 Blackbird spy plane that sat for the past 15 years on the front lawn of the aviation museum has become the marquee piece of the museums Speed exhibit, suspended in air near the rear of the museums rotunda.

The Smithsonians National Air and Space Museum has agreed to take another major piece of the Richmond collection: The Stars and Stripes, the first American aircraft to fly over the Antarctic, was piloted by Adm. Richard E. Byrd, a descendant of one Virginias first families and the onetime namesake of the Richmond International Airport.

While he welcomed the news that the Shannon collection has found a new home, Tim McSwain, chairman of the Virginia Aeronautical and Historical Society, which opened the Virginia Aviation Museum in 1987 before turning it over to the Science Museum of Virginia a few years later, called it a mixed blessing.

Im very happy that Luke Curtas has been willing to step up and do something with those airplanes and that collection. At the same, time, were very disappointed that the Science Museum has taken the action to break up this collection, McSwain said.

The society had tried unsuccessfully to broker a new lease with the Capital Region Airport Commission to keep the museum open and remains committed to finding a new location. For McSwain, the question is whether there will be any aircraft left to display if they succeed.

He said he and other longtime devotees and volunteers of the aviation museum have questioned the Science Museums decision to use about $1.5 million donated for the museums operation to help pay for its closure and the parceling out of the collection.

Weve had interest from several locations, airports, in having the museum. But it is obviously going to take some time to get agreements made, McSwain said. They have moved with remarkable speed to do this. ... If theyd shown half the enthusiasm for supporting the museum as they have for dismantling it, we probably wouldnt be here.
The Louisa County Sheriff's Office on Friday said a woman abducted at gunpoint Thursday has been located safely in Spotsylvania County.

In a post on the sheriff's office web page, authorities said Lisa Crane, 47, was found on state Route 208 in Spotsylvania.

"More details to come," the posting said.

In announcing Crane's abduction Thursday, the sheriff's office said she was believed to be in immediate danger.

Authorities said they responded at 8:37 a.m. Thursday to a call from Jonnie Hall Road in Mineral. The caller told officers that a woman, who was identified as Crane, was abducted from her vehicle at gunpoint by a man, the Sheriff's Office said.

The suspect was identified as Russell Jefferies, 43, a former boyfriend. There were two other males with Jefferies at the time of the abduction, the Sheriff's Office said.
Jonathan T. Baliles suggested Levar Stoney wouldnt treat the mayors office as a full-time job.

Lawrence Williams accused Joseph D. Morrissey of exploiting the citys black community.

Stoney asked Jack Berry how Berry could assure voters he wouldnt continue to pursue unpopular projects such as the stadium in Shockoe Bottom.

At the Richmond Times-Dispatchs mayoral debate, the newspapers 66th Public Square, the candidates were offered the opportunity to pose a single question to an opponent of their choice.

Many seized the opportunity to needle their rivals.

Morrissey, a former state delegate and city commonwealths attorney, opened his question by acknowledging that he found Stoney to be a very pleasant, professional young man.

But then he went down the line of his fellow mayoral candidates, describing why he thought each would be more qualified. He concluded by asking why a man who has spent his career working as a political operative should be elected mayor.

Stoney responded with a rundown of leadership experience in the political arena: secretary of the commonwealth and executive director of the state Democratic Party.

Ive hired, I fired, I inspired from the top down, Stoney said, before pivoting to a critique of Morrissey. Regardless, we deserve a mayor we can be proud of. One who wont embarrass us on the front page of the newspaper.

In turn, Morrissey faced aggressive questioning from Williams, an architect: My question to you is very precise: What would you say to many of the voters who would say youve exploited the Afro-American community?

Morrissey, who is white but whose support comes largely from black voters, according to a recent poll, said he disagreed with Williams premise and defended himself by describing free legal services he has provided for various black groups, including the local NAACP.

Stoney chose to question Berry, the former executive director of Venture Richmond, zeroing in on his work advocating for Mayor Dwight C. Jones ultimately unpopular and unsuccessful proposal to build a baseball stadium in Shockoe Bottom. How can voters trust youll listen? Stoney asked.

Berry said he learned his lesson, and acknowledged that although he supported the project, he eventually realized the public spoke, and they didnt want it there. He said that as mayor, he would focus on the basics, such as schools and city infrastructure.

Baliles, who serves on the City Council, addressed Stoney, questioning Stoneys pledge after winning the Richmond City Democratic Committees endorsement to be a party leader as well as a mayor. He said Jones signed on to serve as chairman of the state Democratic Party at a time when the city was struggling, and the city suffered as a result.

Doesnt the city deserve a full-time mayor? he said.

Stoney defended his loyalty to the party. I think the city deserves a progressive leader, and thats what the city of Richmond will get, he said. Someone who believes in giving a voice to the voiceless and someone who believes in righting wrongs. ... Im a Democrat; I dont shy away from that.

City Council President Michelle R. Mosby addressed her council colleague Baliles, reminding him that he voted for her to be the bodys leader and asking if he knew at the time that meant she would become mayor if Jones were to step down for any reason.

Baliles offered a concise response. Yes, I did, and you would be an improvement, he said.

***

The debate before a full house at the Library of Virginia was moderated by Times-Dispatch President and Publisher Thomas A. Silvestri. Questions were posed by RTD politics editor Andrew Cain and veteran state government reporter Michael Martz.

In a departure from the series of forums that have taken place so far, debate organizers opted to begin with a tailored question for each candidate.

Cain and Martz asked Baliles what he has done to prove himself politically  as a councilman hes only finishing his first term.

Baliles said his work as a city employee in the economic development office, in then-Mayor L. Douglas Wilders press office and as a councilman more than qualifies him.

Ive seen it all, he said.

Cain and Martz asked Morrissey to address his personal life: Youve made what some would call some questionable decisions in your personal life, Cain said. Why should voters expect anything different if youre elected mayor?

Morrissey, who served jail time both while serving as commonwealths attorney and in the House of Delegates, acknowledged missteps.

Theres no question I have had some trials and tribulations and stubbed my toe on more than one occasion, he said. But he asked voters to consider both his years of business experience and of political experience.

He also said that, despite his Fighting Joe moniker, he has mellowed recently. I think perhaps Ive tempered things a little bit being a father and a husband.

Mosby faced questions about her record of supporting Jones and his policies even as city government has appeared to become increasingly dysfunctional under his leadership. She said things are now back on the right track with a new executive leadership team, and regardless, she had to work with the mayor the city has, no matter whether she likes him.

I cant wake up and say, Im not really feeling Mayor Jones today; Im not going to work with him, and think that were going to get things done, she said.

The moderators called on former City Councilman Bruce W. Tyler to explain his vote in favor of the citys decision to build the Redskins training camp, a project that has emerged as perhaps the least popular economic development venture pursued under Jones.

Tyler said he and his fellow council members worked to improve the deal over what was presented by Jones and pledged that it is not as bad as portrayed.

Bobby B.J. Junes, a retired real estate consultant whose governmental experience is limited to time on the Henrico County Parks and Recreation Advisory Board, also faced questions about his governmental experience. Junes responded by describing his role resolving a dispute in the Maymont neighborhood.

And Williams  who has run for mayor twice before but never captured a meaningful percentage of the vote  was asked why he keeps running.

He responded cheerfully, explaining his view that politics focuses too much on patronage and seniority and that so far, that hasnt gotten the city very far.
Students at Virginia Commonwealth University say they are concerned about a recent spate of four alleged sexual assaults and a report of sexual battery that have occurred on or around the schools Monroe Park and MCV campuses since students arrived in late August.

During the first week of classes, which began Aug. 25, VCU police fielded reports about three alleged sexual assaults. All three of those incidents occurred around the Monroe Park campus, but the two most recent reports were both on campus.

Last Saturday, a woman reportedly held a door open for a man at the University Student Commons near Main Street. As she walked past, the man forcefully grabbed her buttocks, said police, who classified the incident as sexual battery.

And Thursday, another sexual assault was reported to university police. An alert that went out at 6:47 p.m. Thursday stated VCU police were notified of an alleged sexual assault that took place earlier that day in an on-campus residential housing facility on the MCV-downtown campus. The alert did not specify which facility.

As a woman, its definitely a concern to me, said VCU senior Laura Mertz, of Richmond.

While sexual assaults werent as much of a personal safety issue for men on campus Friday, many said they did worry for their female peers.

I just dont understand any of it, Lennon Hu, a freshman from Fredericksburg, said of everything from cat-calling to more aggressive behavior such as rape. The fact that its still an issue on campuses is an issue. One sexual assault is too many.

Students agreed VCU was no better or worse in terms of the number of sexual assaults reported or how the university handles them than any other college.

The University of Richmond made national headlines last week when a pair of students wrote separate essays for the Huffington Post about URs mishandling of their reported rapes. They each have asked the U.S. Department of Educations Office for Civil Rights to investigate.

Then earlier this week, Richmond suspended the Kappa Alpha fraternity chapter after two members sent an email to nearly 100 students that contained grossly offensive language, the school said Monday.

Tonights the type of night that makes fathers afraid to send their daughters away to school, the email sent last week said. Lets get it.

Thats a prime example of rape culture that is now, unfortunately, part of some campus life, said Samantha Rosen, a VCU junior from Northern Virginia.

Its a different culture now, said Rosen, who was hoop dancing in Monroe Park with friends Friday afternoon after classes were over for the week. No one courts anymore. Theres hardly real dating.

We live in hook-up culture, said Mertz, the senior, who added that alcohol and drugs, whether legally or illegally consumed, can turn an already precarious situation potentially more dangerous by lowering inhibitions. I think it can contribute, but its not to blame.

Every student mentioned a Title IX survey and video series that VCU requires students take before registering for classes, but most said it did little to deter crime.

Most of the students referenced the recent sexual battery incident that occurred on campus in the middle of the day  it was also the only incident VCU police publicized to local media. But few had heard of the four sexual assaults reported to campus police.

Corey Byers, a VCU public information officer, said VCU police issued mass e-mails and posted incident information online in each case.

These emails were sent to all students, faculty and staff members on both of VCUs campuses, Byers said.

More than what school administrators or campus police can do  most students said school officials do what they can, but its hard to modify behavior with surveys or school-sponsored events  female students said theyd like to see societal changes away from preventive actions females can take and toward focusing more on inappropriate male behavior.

Too much stress is put on girls to watch their backs, and not on boys when they act like pigs, said Erin Discordia, a senior from Baltimore. I think its really unfair that I have to limit the amount of fun I have in college because Im worried about what might be done to me.

In all four of the reported sexual assaults, the victims knew their assailants, according to police.

Authorities encourage students to call VCU Police at (804) 828-1234 immediately if they feel unsafe and to download and use the free LiveSafe app.

If you witness a situation that appears unsafe or makes you uncomfortable, intervene if its safe to do so or go to a safe area and call for help, the alert said. Bystander intervention is a known tool to help to prevent campus sexual assault.
Within miles of the quiet Hanover County neighborhood where deputies found the bloodied body of Reena Jadav this month, the apparent murder weapon, wrapped in clothing, was discovered in someones yard, according to a prosecutor in the case.

Jadav, 30, was found lying dead in a neighborhood lawn in the predawn hours of Sept. 5  a street away from the home where she lived with her husband, Harshadkumar Jadav, 33, who has been charged with first-degree murder.

An object believed to be the instrument used in the murder was found wrapped in clothes, Hanover Commonwealths Attorney R.E. Trip Chalkley III said Friday.

Chalkley referred to Jadavs death as horrific and said many potential pieces of evidence are being examined. Evidence in the case also suggests Harshadkumar Jadav had been wearing those very clothes the night before Reenas body was found. And when police arrested him, he was in possession of his passport and more than $10,000 in cash, Chalkley said.

Those details and the charge of first-degree murder were enough for prosecutors to persuade the judge Thursday to deny bond for Harshadkumar Jadav, who is due back in Hanover Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court at 1:30 p.m. on Dec. 15.

Officials have not disclosed what type of weapon was used to kill Reena Jadav. The medical examiners office has determined she died of blunt force trauma.

Our family is extremely happy to hear that bond was denied, Reena Jadavs brother, Gaurav G Shrestha, wrote in an email.

Given the brutality of Reenas death, this has been tough on all of us, and I imagine it will continue to be tough given the trial in the months ahead, Shrestha wrote. We are extremely grateful for all the love and support we continue to receive from family, friends, colleagues and the community. We are hopeful that Reena will get the full justice she deserves.

To preserve the integrity of the case, the Hanover Sheriffs Office, which has not disclosed a motive for the alleged murder, has released limited information about the investigation. Search warrants in the case, which include the couples home, have been sealed.

Officials have not said when the alleged murder weapon was turned over to authorities. But Chalkley said Friday that it was found within a few miles of the murder scene but not in the same neighborhood where Jadavs body was found.

On Sept. 4, the night before the body was found, residents in her Honey Meadows neighborhood said they heard a loud scream about 11 p.m.

Her body was located about 5:45 a.m. the next day in the 10000 block of Colony Bee Place, several hundred feet from her home, within walking distance of Cool Spring Elementary School.

While we cannot bring back Reenas cheerful spirit and infectious laughter, we have the memories we shared over the past 30 years. She will always stay within our hearts and in our memory. No one can take that away from us and those whose lives she has touched, Shrestha said.

Reena was a smart, loving, kindhearted, creative and artistically talented young lady. Anyone who met Reena was lifted by her sweet, genuine soul. Even though our family lost a cherished daughter, sister and aunt, God received an angel.
An inmate of the Riverside Regional Jail died on Thursday afternoon after being in custody for 24 hours.

About 12:30 p.m., staff discovered Raven Marie Darr-Morse, 47, of Chester, unresponsive in her cell in medical housing, according to a news release. Staff began CPR and Prince George rescue personnel arrived and continued CPR.

Riverside Regional Jail has started an internal investigation into the death, as is required by policy. Prince George police also responded to the scene and are conducting a death investigation.

Jail officials said the cause of death is unknown but that Darr-Morse appears to have died from natural causes. The state medical examiner's office will determine the cause of her death.

Darr-Morse entered the facility at 12:09 p.m. Wednesday for violating her probation, jail officials said. She was being held without bond. In mid-February, Darr-Morse was arrested on two felony counts of possession of a controlled substance. She had received a suspended sentence.
A charge of first-degree murder was dropped Thursday against a Richmond man who was then sentenced to seven years of previously suspended time based on evidence that would have been heard at the homicide trial.

Milvon L. Witcher, 30, of the 1300 block of Coalter Street was facing charges including first-degree murder, malicious wounding and several firearm counts in the fatal shooting of 22-year-old RaKeem Adkins.

Adkins was shot multiple times May 7, 2015, in the 1900 block of Redd Street in the Mosby Court public housing complex in Richmonds East End. Two others were hurt in the altercation.

A jury trial was set for Thursday, but that morning, all counts except for one gun charge were dropped.

Instead, Richmond Commonwealths Attorney Michael N. Herring and Deputy Commonwealths Attorney Tanya Powell moved forward with a revocation hearing of suspended time from a 2010 conviction in a drug case, saying Witcher had violated his parole by being involved in Adkins killing.

In 2010, Witcher pleaded guilty to a charge of possession of cocaine with intent to sell, for which he served three years of a 10-year sentence.

Prosecutors used a legal precedent allowing them to read transcripts of witness testimony from an earlier trial in which Witchers brother, Dominique Walker, was acquitted of Adkins murder. None of the three eyewitnesses, all of whom are related to Adkins, testified in court Thursday.

In the earlier testimony, one witness said he saw Witcher, who was frequently referred to as Millie, Walker, and a third brother with guns just before the first of two volleys of gunfire rang out in Mosby Court that night. Two other witnesses said they saw the shot fired that killed Adkins, though they differed on who fired it.

Witchers attorney, David Lassiter Jr., said the witnesses were unreliable and gave inconsistent statements to police.

But all were consistent that Witcher was there  a point that Herring reiterated often throughout the hearing.

Adkins was shot four times: once in the head, once in the left neck and once in each thigh. Walker was shot in the back during the altercation, and Raquel Neal, who is related to Adkins, also was shot.

Forensic detectives recovered 21 cartridge casings, all of which were fired from one of two guns: a 9 mm and a .40-caliber.

Lassiter said there was evidence that there might have been a third shooter there that night, citing a Crime Stoppers tip.

Cartridge casings matching one of the guns were found at the scene of another Richmond homicide and a traffic stop in Henrico County after both Witcher and Walker had been arrested.

Does that also open up the possibility that there was a third shooter? Lassiter asked homicide detective David Bert.

It does, Bert testified, though he noted that police frequently do not recover the guns used in homicides.

Herring said whether or not Witcher fired the fatal shot or he was just there, it was a violation of his parole.

The real question here is whether a reasonable person would believe that you were involved in the murder of RaKeem Adkins? Circuit Judge Joi Jeter Taylor said just before siding with the commonwealth. She imposed the entirety of the suspended seven-year sentence.

This is hardly justice, Herring said after the hearing. We got seven years, but we lost.

Herring fears that lingering animosity between the two families will erupt in more violence in Mosby Court.

During a lunch break Thursday, there was a verbal altercation between the two groups in front of the John Marshall Courthouse. All of those involved were ordered to leave the area, which they did, according to Tony H. Pham, general counsel for the Richmond Sheriffs Office.

The one exception was Ms. Christine Parham-Miller, who refused the continual directives of a deputy sheriff to leave the premise and was issued a summons for disorderly conduct, Pham said.
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Just a month before the case goes to trial, a federal judge made several key rulings Thursday in the multimillion-dollar defamation lawsuit filed by former University of Virginia administrator Nicole Eramo.

In May 2015, Eramo sued writer Sabrina Rubin Erdely, Rolling Stone magazine and its publisher for $7.85 million, claiming she was unduly maligned by the publishing of A Rape on Campus in November 2014.

The articles centerpiece was the story of Jackie, a former U.Va. student who said she was gang-raped at a fraternity party during her first year, and offered details of how the university supposedly suppressed her claims. Eramo, the school administrator in charge of aiding survivors of sexual assault, was mentioned several times.

The article created a firestorm of controversy but quickly unraveled under scrutiny  particularly Jackies story. An investigation by Charlottesville police turned over no evidence that could support her claims, and a review by the Columbia Journalism School dubbed the article a journalistic failure.

In her lawsuit, Eramo derides the magazine and Erdely for portraying her as callous and indifferent to Jackies claims, and says the fallout from the article damaged her reputation, her career and her health.

Since her original filing, attorneys for Eramo, Rolling Stone and Jackie, who has been named as a third party in the case, have fiercely battled over a variety of issues in the case, but Judge Glen Conrad on Thursday resolved some key differences.

Conrad sided with the magazine in classifying Eramo as a limited-purpose public figure, meaning that she was involved in a public controversy within a narrow area of interest.

Because the article in question dealt with sexual assault, Eramo could be viewed as having a public position within that controversy as the chair of U.Va.s Sexual Misconduct Board.

Eramos attorneys had previously argued that their client would not fit this classification, because she never attempted to bring the controversy into the public spotlight.

In a hearing that took place a month ago, attorneys for Rolling Stone further argued that the article and Erdelys process of writing it did not constitute actual malice, or a reckless disregard for the truth.

In previous hearings and filings, Eramo alleged that Erdely had a preconceived notion of what her article was going to say long before she began investigating Jackies claims.

Eramo has also pointed to an email from Dec. 5, 2014, in which Erdely told her editors that she no longer had trust in Jackies story. Despite Erdely asking for the article to be retracted, the magazine instead republished the article, this time with an editors note acknowledging the inconsistencies in Jackies story.

According to Eramo, this constituted a disregard for the truth.

Erdely and Rolling Stones attorneys have rebuked that notion several times, and stated that Eramo had mischaracterized facts in the court record regarding the reporting process and Erdelys trust in Jackie.

Ultimately, Conrad said he was unsure whether the altered Dec. 5 version of the article could truly constitute actual malice as a republishing, but he ruled that the overall actual malice question in the case should be addressed by a jury, rather than the court.
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No group of parents pays closer attention to comparisons of state public school systems than the men and women who serve in our armed forces. I know this from personal experience, having served as a principal just off post from Fort Lee; as the superintendent of a school division bordering Camp Perry, the Yorktown Naval Weapons Station and Langley Air Force Base on the Peninsula; and now as Virginias chief school officer.

My experience also has convinced me that the commonwealth has a special obligation to the estimated 72,000 military-connected children enrolled in its public schools. This responsibility includes military-friendly rules for enrollment and the transfer of credits and high expectations for learning and achievement.

Earlier this year, a study was published by Achieve  a national education reform group  comparing proficiency rates on the battery of tests known as the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) with achievement on state tests, including Virginias Standards of Learning assessments. I was not surprised that this study caught the attention of military parents.

The study described a so-called honesty gap between the percentage of students demonstrating proficiency in reading or mathematics on the national tests and the percentage performing at grade level on state assessments.

For example, 43 percent of the Virginia fourth-graders who took the 2015 national reading test scored at the proficient or advanced level, compared with 77 percent on the state reading test, a gap of 34 points. Similarly, only 38 percent of Virginia eighth-graders met or exceeded the proficiency bar on the national mathematics test in 2015, compared with 74 percent on eighth-grade math SOL.

It is easy to understand how these gaps might raise concerns about the rigor of Virginias tests. But what the gaps actually represent is more complicated. I hope a fuller understanding will reassure military parents unfamiliar with the commonwealths innovative and challenging assessments.

What the gaps actually reflect is the fact that the national tests and the Virginia SOLs were created to serve different purposes, and that the proficiency benchmarks  or cut scores  on these assessments also reflect this difference.

The NAEP proficiency standard denotes mastery of challenging grade-level content. Results from the national tests are used to compare progress from state to state toward an aspirational national standard.

In contrast, the proficiency bar on SOL tests represents what Virginia teachers and the state Board of Education determine to be the minimum level of acceptable proficiency in the subject for student and school accountability. Most of our students perform far above this level.

Independent evaluators rate Virginias English and mathematics standards among the best in the nation. And ask students who have taken a reading or mathematics SOL in the past five years whether they think the SOLs have gotten easier since the state introduced online tests that require students to problem solve and apply what they have learned. SOL pass rates in reading and mathematics are still recovering from the plunge that followed the introduction of these rigorous assessments.

But while the rigor of the SOLs has increased since 2011, the cut scores on the tests still represent the minimum level of achievement acceptable on assessments that carry high stakes for students and schools, such as whether a student should be denied credit toward a diploma, or whether a school should be denied accreditation.

It also should be noted that there is no correlation between the so-called honesty gap and actual performance on NAEP. For example:

In 17 of the 24 states identified by Achieve as having the narrowest gaps, fourth-graders performed at significantly lower levels in reading on the 2015 NAEP than Virginia fourth-graders;

The reading performance of fourth-graders in six of Achieves top truth-teller states [states whose tests produced proficiency rates closer to the NAEPs] was statistically similar to that of Virginia students; and

Grade 4 students in only one truth-teller state  Massachusetts  outperformed Virginia students by a statistically noteworthy margin.

Performance on the 2015 national grade 8 mathematics test also reveals no correlation. Achievement in 11 of the states praised for narrow honesty gaps was significantly below that of Virginia eighth-graders, and students in only three of the truth-teller states  Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont  performed at a higher level.

The 2015 NAEP results show that the public schools of all states have room for improvement. But they also show that Virginia students continue to rank among the nations highest achievers. Other national measures, such as performance on Advanced Placement tests, and on the SAT and ACT college-admissions tests, confirm the success of most of the commonwealths schools in preparing students for success.

Military parents are right to expect that all states will provide public schools and educational programs that are based on high standards for all children. And Virginia, which educates more military-connected students than almost any other state, is committed to meeting this expectation.
By Nelson Reveley

Why do you travel around Metro Richmond? To get to work, school, the doctor, or the grocery store? To shuffle kids to their various activities? Perhaps to catch an afternoon at the river, or gather for worship? Most of us move about for reasons like these. As transit guru Jarrett Walker notes in his book Human Transit: Most of the time, our travel isnt motivated by a sheer desire for movement. ... We want access. Access is the ability to complete some desired personal or economic transaction. While the internet has affected that access significantly, we still like and need to go places and be with others in person.

Our means of doing so in Metro Richmond have been heavily car-reliant since the 1950s, but we face awesome opportunities today to enhance our access via transit. With the first electric streetcar system in the United States beginning here in 1888, Richmond has a deep history. Those streetcars offered access throughout downtown to neighborhoods north, south, east and west  to the kind of walkable communities with good transit in high demand today.

In 1949 our streetcars transitioned to buses, and that network came under public control as the Greater Richmond Transit Company (GRTC) in 1973. GRTC currently circulates roughly 28,500 riders a day throughout its system, employing 550 people in the process. In a 2015 study from the Southeastern Institute of Research, 71 percent of GRTC riders surveyed expressed satisfaction with their service and only 9 percent expressed dissatisfaction. GRTC has also been making it easier to get on the bus with its informative new signs, bus stop amenities, compressed natural gas buses, video tutorials, payment options, and a mobile app.

Two key opportunities lie before us to join GRTC in taking our transit network and the access it affords to the next level. Our first bus rapid transit (BRT) line, the Pulse, will open in fall 2017, running along portions of Broad and Main like light rail on wheels. It will have 14 station stops, dedicated lanes in high-traffic areas, and frequent 10-15 minute service. The next step is leveraging the Pulse into a regional system, extending prosperously west to Short Pump, east to the airport, and north and south along the Rt. 1 corridor. While we need to consider the best avenue for dedicated funding, the Richmond Regional Transit Vision Plan, set for release this fall by the Department of Rail and Public Transportation, lays out where this transit network could generatively grow. Such a regional asset paired with complementary jurisdictional planning would raise property values, redevelopment and job opportunities along its corridors akin to the prosperity spurred around Clevelands successful BRT, the HealthLine.

A second critical opportunity before us is the Richmond Transit Network Plan (RTNP) www.richmondtransitnetwork.com), set for release in January 2017. RTNP is analyzing three alternative ways to renew the citys bus lines in the near-term  at no added operational cost to the city  so that they connect seamlessly with the Pulse and more efficiently overall. The most exciting and game-changing alternative is a high-frequency, high-ridership network that would provide 15-minute service for many parts of the city while maintaining good coverage throughout. Houston offers a valuable example of this kind of transformation. Houston rearranged its bus network in 2015 from hub-and-spoke to more of a grid, with higher frequency on key corridors and expanded weekend service. Despite a brief downtick as people adjusted, Houstons transit ridership has grown 6.8 percent overall so far with a goal of 20 percent by fall 2017.

High-frequency service matters because it lets riders move about more conveniently, intuitively, and handily, generating the kind of communal asset around which people seek to live, shop, work, and play. Such improvements significantly benefit current riders while attracting new ones. Spending $720 a year on monthly GRTC passes certainly beats shelling out the full $6,000-$9,000 a year it costs to get around by car, according to AAA.

Furthermore, from a jurisdictional and regional perspective, embracing this kind of frequent transit as a core piece of civic infrastructure would carry key benefits. It would offer to households without a car (more than 25,500 across Metro Richmond) literal lifelines to jobs, services and opportunities spread throughout the metro area. It would enable the kind of mixed-use, pedestrian and bike-friendly development that millennials and seniors alike find enormously appealing  development that could rise generatively in place of mid-to-late 20th century parking lots that sit upon so much land. And unlike driverless cars, which will be excellent additions to how we move about but not a transportation panacea, including transit would help keep congestion low, crucial for us as we gain an estimated 400,000 neighbors by 2040.

The opportunity for enhanced access via transit awaits us, Metro Richmond. Carpe diem!
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A Place for All Conservatives to Speak Their Mind.
CHARLOTTESVILLE  At least two members of the General Assembly still have doubts about the University of Virginias $2.3 billion Strategic Investment Fund.

Last month, state auditors cleared the university of allegations  first raised by former Rector Helen Dragas in an opinion column for The Washington Post  that the money constituted a slush fund.

But Del. Terry Kilgore, R-Scott, and Sen. Bill DeSteph, R-Virginia Beach, still have questions about the way the money is being used and the level of transparency of the boards business.

DeStephs office Thursday afternoon shared a series of letters exchanged between officials and General Assembly members.

Kilgore said a small group of board members and administrators withheld their plans to create the Strategic Investment Fund until the last minute. He also questioned the use of the fund, which officials say will be used to make improvements that enhance the universitys research capabilities, reputation and the student experience.

No matter what it may be called, we are dumbfounded that the university could have amassed $2.3 billion and not considered  even for a moment  using that money to hold the line on tuition increases, reads a letter from Kilgores office, dated Sept. 8.

In a letter sent to UVa President Teresa Sullivan on Wednesday, DeSteph said the payout from the fund  estimated by university officials to be about $100 million annually  could be used to lower and freeze tuition and increase the number of in-state students.

The university could do this while investing in new initiatives, DeSteph wrote.

The good that can be accomplished with that kind of resource and how it can be best used to advance the interests of all Virginians remain priorities for me, he wrote.

DeSteph also repeated allegations that the board violated open-meetings law when it met in closed session to discuss the Strategic Investment Fund, an allegation that Rector William Goodwin has denied.

In the meantime, the UVa Board of Visitors is trying to move on. On Wednesday, board members met to discuss possible uses for the payout, which is supposed to be distributed to staff and faculty via grants each year.

The board also is looking at ways to use the money for students . Two possibilities were floated at Wednesdays meeting: lowering the yearly maximum loan cap for non-low-income students from $4,500 to $3,500; and starting an initiative to match philanthropic donations to AccessUVa, the financial aid program, dollar for dollar.
Virginia voters are widely split over which Democrat Gov. Terry McAuliffe should appoint to fill Tim Kaines Senate seat should he be elected vice president in November, according to a University of Mary Washington survey.

That scenario is anything but a sure thing less than two months from Election Day.

Should Hillary Clinton win the presidential election, Kaine would step down from the Senate seat. McAuliffe would appoint an interim senator who would run in a November 2017 special election. The seat comes up again in November 2018, its regular six-year interval.

McAuliffe has said repeatedly that he would not name himself to the seat  that he has an executive temperament and is not suited for the Senate.

In the poll, 83 percent said McAuliffe should name someone else to the seat and 10 percent said he should name himself.

The pollsters offered four other possible picks to respondents who said McAuliffe should not pick himself.

Fifteen percent picked Rep. Robert Bobby Scott, D-Newport News, 10 percent picked Rep. Gerald Connolly, D-Fairfax, 10 percent chose Attorney General Mark Herring and 8 percent said Rep. Don Beyer, D-Alexandria.

A full 40 percent said they did not know who McAuliffe should appoint, 11 percent said none of them, 3 percent said another candidate and 3 percent refused to answer.

McAuliffe has said that about 20 people have reached out to his office expressing interest in the potential Senate opening, but that he will not hold discussions about the seat unless Clinton and Kaine win on Nov. 8.

Scott has the support of the Congressional Black Caucus, the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus and former Gov. Doug Wilder.

Princeton Data Source conducted the survey for the University of Mary Washington. It interviewed 1,006 Virginia adults between Sept. 6 and Sept. 12. The margin of error was plus or minus 3.6 percentage points.

McAuliffes approval rating was at 53 percent in the poll, up from 43 percent in UMWs November 2015 survey.
World Diamond Council (WDC) members from across the globe gathered in New York City last Thursday for the organizations 12th Annual General Meeting (AGM). Hosted by the United States Jewelry Council (USJC) and generously supported by Signet Jewelers, ABN Amro Bank, De Beers Group, Brinks, UL and JCK, more than 100 representatives from the diamond industry, government, civil society and media came together to study new proposals for current industry self-regulation procedures, as well as proposals for the Kimberley Process (KP) review process to be engaged in 2017.

Representing every sector of the diamond supply chain, the WDCs AGM focused on its proposed new Strategic Plan, which will guide the organizations work through 2020 as it

continues to serve as the industry voice in the KP. The WDC has been tasked with maintaining stability in the diamond world, building upon the successful eradication of 99% of the worlds conflict diamonds, stated Andrey Polyakov, president of the WDC and vice president of ALROSA. This success is being realized through active participation, transparency and continued dialogue.

The AGMs keynote address was delivered by Mr. Maurice Tempelsman, Chairman of the board of directors of Lazare Kaplan International Inc., who praised the progress the diamond industry continues to make and its ability to collaborate across diverse groups. It is vital to maintain a sense of direction and the WDC is a rarity in that its mandate requires strategic dialogue with governments as well as nongovernmental organizations, said Mr. Tempelsman.

Other speakers included government representatives who complimented the work of the WDC and discussed international efforts to strengthen the KP. Expressing the United Nations perspective, H.E. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin, Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation to the United Nations, noted, The WDC is the strongest lobbyist for the diamond industry within the Kimberley Process and a perfect example of an organization coming together to accomplish goals through compromise during a time of continuous global instability.

Mr. Andrew Keller, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Counter Threat Finance and Sanctions in the Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs at the U.S. Department of State, echoed this theme and further complimented the WDCs success over the past 15 years. Id like to personally recognize the WDCs support of the KP review system, said Mr. Keller. We must keep tackling the issues facing us to ensure the integrity of the worlds diamond supply chain from mine to market.

WDC members also heard from Mr. Robert Owen-Jones, Assistant Secretary of the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, who will become the next KP Chair in 2017. During his speech Mr. Owen-Jones applauded the relationship between the WDC and the KP pointing out, It is something you dont see a lot of in other intergovernmental processes. It is not just an open forum but a true lasting partnership.

Andrew Bone, Executive Director of the Responsible Jewellery Council (RJC), and Fred Waelter, Global Business Lead for ULs Responsible Sourcing division, also made valuable presentations on RJC industry certification and UL supply chain verification, respectively.

The AGM provided a platform for WDC members to discuss industry issues, share educational information and hold the organizations board of directors and business meetings. Since the formation of the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme in 2003, the establishment of best practices and voluntary guidelines like the WDCs System of Warranties have transformed the diamond industry.

The WDC concluded the AGM eager to build upon the progress made at this years meeting, looking ahead to the KP Plenary Session taking place November of this year in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
A delegation from The Gem & Jewellery Export Promotion Council (GJEPC) of India, led by its Chairman Praveenshankar Pandya is currently visiting China to boost interaction and trade between the Indian and Chinese diamond industries, reports gjepc.org.The delegation participated in the 2016 China International Diamond Industry Summit Forum which was held at Shenzhen on September 12. A number of Chinese trade associations participated in the summit, which was also attended by manufacturers and retailers as well as government officials.Praveenshankar Pandya made a presentation at the event, focusing on different aspects of Indo-Chinese co-operation. Later he also participated in a Round Table discussion on synthetic diamonds.The delegation also visited the National Gem Testing Centre, the official laboratory of the Chinese industry.Pandya and GII Chairman Bakul Mehta also discussed possibilities of co-operation between GII and NGTC for joint lab operations, particularly with regard to sharing information and training techniques, with the lab officials.
The study, based on previous researches which targeted over 300,000 women, found that the women who had earlier onset of menopause had 50 percent increased risk of developing coronary heart disease, which can lead to chest pain and heart attack as plaque accumulates on the wall of the arteries. Knowing this, those who reach menopause early should also be screened for other medical conditions such as diabetes, hypertension and hyperlipidemia so these disorders can be treated as early as possible. The reason why early menopause is tied to increased health risks is not clear. One in 10 women reaches natural menopause at 45 years old, this is premature menopause. Menopause can also be considered as a sign of overall aging. Those women who enter menopause early should consider hormone therapy if they are eligible to manage symptoms and protect vascular and bone health. Researchers from Netherlands published the study in JAMA Cardiology on Sept. 14.
Canadian Pacific

Guido De Ciccio, Canadian Pacific (CP) senior vice president, Operations Western Region, announced his retirement from CP after 40 years with the company on Sept. 15.

After 40 excellent years with the company, it is time to embrace the next phase of my life and make way for the next generation of railroaders at CP, De Ciccio said. CP has transformed for the better under the leadership of Hunter Harrison and I am grateful for his mentorship. While I am excited about the future, I will always look back on my time at CP with great fondness and appreciation.

Mark Redd, vice president Operations West Region, will replace De Ciccio in the senior vice president role. Redd joined the CP staff in October of 2013, taking on roles including general manager operations for U.S. West and general manager operations for the companys Central Division. Officials say Redd brings more than 20 years of industry experience from Kansas City Southern Railway prior to joining CP.

De Ciccio joined CP in May of 1976, beginning his career with the company as a laborer in Montreal. De Ciccio also served as general manager East, assistant vice president East and vice president CP before taking the helm as senior vice president, Operations Western Region.

I congratulate Guido on his 40 years of loyal service and thank him for his leadership and extraordinary commitment to CP, said CP CEO E. Hunter Harrison. I also thank Guido for his friendship; it was a unique pleasure to work alongside a railroader with a vintage in the industry close to mine and I wish him well in all his future endeavours.

Keith Creel, CPs president and CEO, emphasized how much he enjoyed his working relationship and friendship with De Ciccio.

His passion and enthusiasm for railroading was infectious, Creel said of De Ciccio. While he will be sorely missed, we are delighted to give Mark an opportunity to step up and continue to deliver superior service for our customers, employees and shareholders.
Doubling down on comments by Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, the real estate tycoon's running mate Mike Pence agreed with the claim that Russian President Vladimir Putin is a stronger leader than U.S. President Barack Obama.

In an interview with CNN's Dana Bash at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library on Thursday, Pence compared Trump's bold comments to those made by the former president.

"I think it's inarguable that Vladimir Putin has been a stronger leader in his country than Barack Obama has been in this country," Pence said. "And that's going to change the day that Donald Trump becomes president."

Putin is frequently labeled as an authoritarian who maintains his dominance over Russia through control of the media and the judiciary.

With Bash highlighting the differences between the two nation's governments, Pence claimed Trump doesn't particularly like the Russian system.

The comments from Pence come after Trump praised Putin's leadership ability at the NBC News "Commander in Chief Forum" on Wednesday.

"It's a very different system, and I don't happen to like the system," Trump said. "But certainly, in that system, [Putin's] been a leader, far more than our president has been a leader."

Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton described Trump's remarks about the Russian President as bizarre and scary.

"That is not just unpatriotic and insulting for the people of our country as well as to our commander in chief, it is scary," Clinton told reporters on Thursday. "Because it suggests he will let Putin do whatever Putin wants to do. And then make excuses for him."

Clinton also bashed Trump for seeming to "trash talk" the nation's top military commanders, although Pence argued that the billionaire-turned-politician was referring to Obama reducing the generals' influence.

(Photo: Gage Skidmore)

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Business News
Shares of Avanti Communications Group plc (AVN.L) were gaining around 12 percent on the morning trading in London after the provider of satellite data communications services announced Friday a new worth contract with the European Space Agency or ESA through its ARTES Partner programme.

The contract will provide affordable satellite broadband connectivity to 1,400 community sites across Sub-Saharan Africa over the next two years using Avanti's new ECO Wi-Fi hotspot initiative, launched today.

ESA will contribute up to 10.7 million euros in funding that Avanti will use to bring rural communities across Africa online. Avanti will partner with Newtec and a group of leading Service Providers, combining satellite, Wi-Fi and solar power, to deliver the programme in the market.

The company noted that Memorandums of Understanding on ECO have been signed with authorities in South Africa, Kenya and Tanzania. Many other governments, Service Providers and other Avanti partners have also expressed support for the ECO initiative.

Solar-powered ECO Wi-Fi hotspots will be hosted at schools that will benefit from subsidised Internet access. Consumers and local businesses, within range of the ECO Wi-Fi hotspot, will use the ECO mobile payment app, which is newly developed by Avanti, to make micropayments for broadband credits which convert to data usage.

In London, Avanti shares were trading at 35.13 pence, up 11.51 percent.

For comments and feedback contact: editorial@rttnews.com

Business News
A majority of likely American voters oppose building a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico, according to the results of a new Quinnipiac University poll released Friday.

The poll found that 53 percent of likely voters oppose building the wall along the border, while 42 percent support building the wall.

While white voters are divided 49 percent in favor of the wall and 47 percent opposed, non-white voters are opposed to the wall 69 percent to 24 percent.

Building a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border has been a central tenet of Donald Trump's presidential campaign, with the Republican nominee insisting that the wall will be built and that Mexico will pay for its construction.

Meanwhile, the poll showed that the vast majority of likely voters are concerned about illegal immigration, including 36 percent that are "very concerned."

Among those that are concerned, 49 percent say "the potential strain on tax-funded services" worries them most about illegal immigration.

Sixty-one percent of likely voters told Quinnipiac illegal immigrants currently in the country should be allowed to stay and apply for citizenship.

Another 11 percent said illegal immigrants should be allowed to stay but not apply for citizenship, while 24 percent said the immigrants should be forced to leave the country.

Among Trump supporters, 39 percent said illegal immigrants should be allowed to stay and seek citizenship, 14 percent said immigrants can stay but not seek citizenship and 45 percent said they should be forced to leave.

The Quinnipiac survey of 960 likely voters was conducted September 8th through 13th and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.2 percentage points.

For comments and feedback contact: editorial@rttnews.com

Business News
All various ways that Muslim men use to enclave their women or that Muslim women use as an act of defiance. Their way of saying: "F*ck you. We're Muslims and we can do what we like. You accept our rules and customs, not vice versa."



Before 9/11, you rarely saw women wearing burkas in Britain. They were a very rare and unusual sight. As soon as 9/11 occurred, there were suddenly loads of Muslim women wearing them and still are. They wear it as a form of intimidation and you can't blame any non-Muslim for suddenly snapping and attacking one of these women.
Bar mitzvah babe acquittedBy Brad Hunter , 24 HoursFirst posted: Thursday, September 15, 2016 05:36 PM EDT | Updated: Thursday, September 15, 2016 05:41 PM EDTOy Vey!The big-boobed bar mitzvah babe who allegedly invited a gaggle of teen boys to fondle her newly-augmented chest and performed oral sex on another has been acquitted.Lindsey Ann Radomski, 33, sobbed after being found not guilty on all 18 misdemeanour counts.The yoga instructor was busted in 2015 on public sexual indecency with contact and contributing to the delinquency of a child.The sordid events unfolded at a bar mitzvah in Scottsdale, Ariz., where Radomski allegedly sent pre-pubescent partiers into a frenzy.But her lawyer said a hair sample proved that she had been given the date rape drug GHB and was actually the victim of a gang sex attack.A woman thats incapacitated cant consent to any sexual contact, any sexual assault ... we dont know if the allegations that are charged against her are even true because theres no proof of it, Jocquese Blackwell told the Arizona Republic last year.Theres no proof that the actions actually happened, (or) if there was a video, theres no video.Lindsey Ann Radomski (police handout)
Took one off a guy in a bar I was running once.

I just grabbed it out of his hand from his blind side, and put it inside my jacket pocket, and walked out of the bar, so customers didn't see it and panic.

I didn't know it was a BB gun till I was out in the lobby, and pulled it out of my pocket, and I tilted it so I could see to make safe and unload, and I heard the bbs rattle around inside. In a quick moment, with loud noise, and bad lighting, they ARE hard to spot.



So while I sympathize with the cop for the above reason, there are other ways to do things sometimes that are much less permanent.

ah fikk...

and sometimes not



Also, while I stood there with the gun in my hand, someone had seen the gun, and called the cops, who's station was about 100 feet from the bar. Four cops walked into the bar, past me two to a side, and didn't even see the gun in my hand, which was at the instant being held open palm up, right in front of me.



Again they are damn hard to spot under certain circumstances
Millennial Moms Review: 2022 Acura MDX is pretty close to the perfect family car

I dont know if perfect is attainable, especially considering weve got the world of options when it comes to modern vehicles. Were spoiled and, as such, we have very specific needs and wants. Driving-wise, the 2022 Acura MDX is one of my favourite ...